[Gushing Parents] Tell me your cute kid stories

[GreenGoo]

You can tell he's a second kid. I'm pretty sure with the girl the wife and I both went, said goodbye a dozen times, and I even stopped by for lunch.

By the third, I was like "go make me a grilled cheese sandwich". Now it's "please stop making me grilled cheese sandwiches, for the love of all that is holy"

Which is weird, because I can't get the other two (older, boys) to do anything without heavy supervision.

[coopasonic]

Which is weird, because I can't get the other two (older, boys) to do anything without heavy supervision.

Children are, in fact, individuals. I only have two, both boys, and they are completely different. Basically the only thing they have in common is their love of reading... and Terraria.

My youngest had his birthday party this weekend. Father-in-law couldn't make it and asks if we had any pictures. I said, "No, he's the second kid."

Is that a cute kid story? I wouldn't call my kids cute, they kind of look like me minus the ginger.

[GreenGoo]

Lies.

[Jag]

Older son turns 18 next week and just started his senior year in HS. Dealing with the college applications now. Just crazy how fast it goes. Glad he takes after his very smart mom and not his not so smart dad

Edit: His school's Twitter just posted this today, he got National Merit along with 5 other seniors in his grade. He's the tall one.

Texted him to ask why he's covering his nuts. He said "U don't get to the top without sacrifice."

[Jeff V]

My kids are attempting to level up in the extra-curricular stage. Son is competing in a Taekwondo tournament Saturday, and my daughter just signed up to be in a stage production of 101 Dalmatians, with performances in November and December.

[Isgrimnur]

Older son turns 18 next week and just started his senior year in HS. Dealing with the college applications now. Just crazy how fast it goes. Glad he takes after his very smart mom and not his not so smart dad

Edit: His school's Twitter just posted this today, he got National Merit along with 5 other seniors in his grade. He's the tall one.

Texted him to ask why he's covering his nuts. He said "U don't get to the top without sacrifice."

Guy on the right looks like the pain meds didn't kick in.

[YellowKing]

I overheard my son (10) talking to one of this friends on Xbox the other night: "My dad is my best gaming buddy, and he's crack at Fortnite."

Spoiler alert: I'm not *actually* "crack" at Fortnite.

[Lassr]

My son (23) got hired on by EPB (Chattanooga Public Utilities) this month. He's going through training on the internet side of the utilities and has already gotten high praise from some of his superiors on his work ethic. Of course, he says, not sure why, I'm not doing anything special. Of course I tell him, sure that's how you feel because you are doing everything right and the way it's supposed to be done, you'd be surprised how man people don't do that.

He always hoped to move back to Huntsville once his girlfriend graduated cosmetology school, but I told him, she is building up her clientele now in Chattanooga and this job could be a career for you. It's not like Huntsville is that far. It's a 90 minute drive.

Everyone was posting their kids 1st day of school pictures on Facebook, so we posted his first day of work picture.

[Isgrimnur]

[Jeff V]

So today the Winter/spring season of our local arts organization began. My daughter is in a theater class -- they are doing Disney's The Descendants. She is in the "Musical Theater - Kids" group, she did not try out for any lead role (not ready for that), so she will be part of a group. Now, she did this in the fall for 101 Dalmations -- it went well when they did the regular performances and they had an encore number as part of the art's group's Winterfest. Because there was a conflict with my son's taekwondo belt test, wife took the two daughters of a friend (including my daughter's best friend), and I took their son to see my son. All was going well until the performance -- apparently they took my daughter to a room with kids not part of her group, so when they were called, my daughter wasn't, and did not appear. She was devasted, my wife was enraged (and still is). I hoped she would quickly get over it, but she refused to go to a pajama party showing of The Nutcracker (which she was also in) and when winter session resumed this week was reluctant to go to her dance classes on Wednesday (ballet, jazz and tap). I encouraged her to go though, and she said she liked it well enough. Today was the first theater practice -- when we went in, we first saw the theater director. My daughter told him, "you better not leave me behind again!" I hope that afforded her some closure.

My son had a trial piano lesson today (same organization, different location). My daughter wants to take singing lessons (which they also offer) and suggested that if her brother takes piano lessons, they can play songs together -- him on the piano and her singing.

My son, who resisted the free piano lesson for 2 years, loved it today and show his sister what he learned when he got home.

[Jeff V]

Son had his second Taekwondo tournament last weekend -- won 3 medals, all gold. He beat a higher-ranked opponent in forms, beat 3 other kids in an obstacle course, and broke all of the boards offered in that event. I love that he's taking it much more seriously now. He's on the blackbelt team, prepaid for 2 years now. He can attend class every day if he wishes, first he said he wanted to add a 3rd day. Last week in prep for the tournament, I asked him if he wanted to go 4 days and he immediately said yes. I didn't realize he thought this to be a permanent arrangement, and when I did not come home from work in the afternoon yesterday, he sent me panicked messages on Discord on how he was going to be late (I did not see these until much too late). So now I have to be home every day that my wife isn't (currently, Monday and Thursday).

Today he brought home a letter from school, informing us that due to his superb performance in math, he can take a test that will allow him to skip 4th grade math and go straight to 5th grade math. He will, I think, take the test tomorrow.

I was almost a great week for him...until my daughter told me he would not let her bring a game to school for game day (he was in the room yesterday when we put Sorry! into her backpack). I'm not sure why he decided to assert himself in this situation, and my daughter was sad she couldn't show her game to the class.

[Jeff V]

Daughter had kindergarten graduation yesterday. Teacher had previously asked them what their favorite part of kindergarten was, and what they wanted to be when they grew up. Most kids said the zoo for the first question. Most of the boys want to be police officers, the girls were more varied, including teacher, hairstylist, and mommy.

My daughter said art was her favorite thing, and she wants to be famous.

She's been saying of late that she wants to give up dancing -- she is currently taking ballet, jazz and tap. She wants to replace it with singing lessons, and remain in music theater. She also wants to get back into taekwondo -- we know from our son that the schedules often overlap, so that could be tough. Also, she had her tonsils and adenoids removed in April -- but she still sounds like a chipmunk. Anyone know if her voice will return to what it used to be?

Son had his first piano recital last Friday. He was the youngest person to perform in the show, and played "Old McDonald" from memory. It's only 30 seconds long -- I encouraged him to play it super-fast after playing it straight, but in practice he tangled his fingers sometimes and so he didn't want to do it (I'm sure the audience would have loved it). My daughter watched the 5 singers closely and really liked two of them.

[stessier]

And 14 years after the OP... She just got into Clemson, her first choice, and with her preferred major!!!! Gushing parent indeed!!

[Unagi]

And 14 years after the OP... She just got into Clemson, her first choice, and with her preferred major!!!! Gushing parent indeed!!

That's crazy cool.

[coopasonic]

I can't wait until my little one is old enough to talk. Or wait, maybe I can!

MY son is closing in on four now and oneof the most commonly heard things in our house is: "Remember when he couldn't talk? Good times."

Mine was just accepted at Texas Tech. They do seems to get older over time.

[Isgrimnur]

Mine was just accepted at Texas Tech. They do seems to get older over time.

I'm so sorry for his (and your) loss.

[coopasonic]

Mine was just accepted at Texas Tech. They do seems to get older over time.

I'm so sorry for his (and your) loss.

We still have hope for UTD.

[LordMortis]

We still have hope for UTD.

Is that a cross between an STD and a UTI?

[Isgrimnur]

Knowing Texas, probably.

[Jeff V]

I don't know about "cute", but my son achieved black belt in Taekwondo this past weekend. He started out ambivalent towards it, seemed to be mostly going through the motions but got really serious after Covid and his work paid off! He's also on the Demo team, a performance group that does choreographed performances incorporating Taekwondo moves, dance, and manipulating various items (such as hand fans, nunchucks, etc.) He is one of only 2 new members invited after the last Demo camp held in January.

[Eel Snave]

Emma is 8, and I've been trying to get my daughter to play music for years, and she's always fought me tooth and nail. Last weekend, I finally mandated that she had to go in the basement for 20 minutes and play drums, just bang around on them. She cried and cried in the kitchen because she didn't want to, and finally she went down and hit the drums a bit. She actually started keeping a beat, and then my son went down there with his trombone, and the two of them were having a great time and she didn't want to stop!

So yesterday, I was going to practice the drums, and she wanted to go down there too, so I showed her some stuff and jokingly suggested that I bring my guitar down, and she was like, "YES DO THAT PLEASE." I hauled my huge-ass amp down and I jammed with my daughter. Kind of all I ever wanted.

[Jaymann]

My granddaughter (almost 10) is now playing the violin. I got her mom to play for a while but it didn't stick.

[YellowKing]

My daughter has been taking drum lessons for about a year and loves it. We got her a "real" drum kit for Christmas after we saw she was going to stick with it. She also dabbles on guitar (self-taught). She tried violin for a few weeks but it didn't click with her so she dropped that in favor of focusing on drums. Definitely has some musical talent. I hope she sticks with it.

[disarm]

My almost-10yo son has been taking weekly guitar lessons since the beginning of November...almost five months in and he's still excited to go every week. Getting him to practice is sometimes a struggle, but I'm increasingly confident that he'll be sticking with it long term.

Upside to him taking electric guitar lessons? He's developing a strong liking for rock music, so I can introduce him to all the bands I love, and we've started going to a few concerts together. It's been a lot of fun watching him learn and develop a common interest with me...very rewarding as a parent!

[ImLawBoy]

9 year old twins have been taking music lessons since kindergarten. Girl has played the violin the whole time - and she's quite good! She has one lesson a week and also goes to "orchestra" once a week (the group she plays with is two other violinists her age, but they occasionally do concerts with a larger group that meets at a different time).

The boy started on drums, but switched at the beginning of last summer to guitar. He's . . . not as good. The drums were OK, but I don't think he has an easy time with a consistent rhythm. Guitar is hard because his hands are still pretty small, so stretching for chords can be a challenge. Plus, while he really likes his teacher, I'm not convinced he's great at teaching my son. It's kind of ADHD teaching ADHD, and I don't know that they stay on track very well together. (Not being glib here - teacher has mentioned his ADHD before, and the boy has a diagnosis and everything.)

[hepcat]

At the next Octocon, I'll help you set up the drums in front of Plaster of Jesus and he can entertain us with some musical interludes!

Sincerely,

A Milk Dribbin' F....well, you know the rest.

[Octavious]

Maybe not cute but so far my daughter has got into
Lehigh
William and Mary
The College of NJ

Wait Listed
Laffeyette (For serious? Lehigh is better anyway)

Left
Vassar
Princeton (Might as well try.)

We're stoked.

[Jeff V]

End of school year update.

We got the results of the year-end MAP tests, which show progression in math and reading. They compare with peers and prior results, to show current state and relative improvement.

My son (straight-A's in everything), was high achievement in both math and reading (95%), but low improvement, suggesting he's coasting and not going above and beyond what is necessary. Still, results to be proud of. The fall test, designed to measure what was forgotten over the summer, he was a star -- the teach said he did the improbable -- his scores increased over the summer!

Then I saw my daughter's. Very high achievement in both math and reading (99%) and very high improvement (98-99%). The difference? My daughter had a modicum of homework -- a 10-word list of spelling words to practice and a math sheet most days. My son had no assigned homework at all, and made no effort to do extra work on the Chromebook apps. Both kids read 30 minutes at least every night as a matter of habit.

On to the extra-curriculars. My son got his blackbelt in Taekwondo in March, and got his first tip last week (a partial segment building to the next Dan, or level, at which he can become an instructor). The tips are spaced out so he'll level up every 2 years for the first few Dans. I suspect it's just a mechanism for the studio to harvest more cash by having him test every 3 months -- officially, he can test for the next Dan after 2 years. He is also in their Demo team, a performance group doing choreographed routines using Taekwondo moves. These performances are quite impressive, and he would not have been allowed to perform on Demo team without also testing for the tip.

He also had his piano recital 2 weeks ago. He played two short pieces from memory, and performed them flawlessly. His teacher is getting a free ride for a masters degree in music, so he now has a new teacher, who teaches on a different day and this week I dropped the ball and forgot about it. Next school year he will start playing trombone, he bought an instrument from his cousin and is primed to become the next Trombone Shorty (he is Filipino, after all).

My daughter had her year-end dance recitals last Saturday. She was in 2 of the 3 shows (so it cost us $200 for 4 of us to see her in both). In the first show, they did a song from Legally Blonde -- The Musical. The full shows were about a month ago. In the second show, she did her ballet group performance (first and only time that was ever performed for an audience). She was front and center for most of that routine. Then later in the show was a jazz performance we've seen several times before at competitions, done to the song "I Feel Good". With so many performances under their belt, it was a show-stopper.

Last night I went to the wine bar owned by studio owners (it's adjacent to a theater they own and where they have the music recitals). I chatted with the dance studio owner, and she could not say enough about how my daughter has grown and is taking on leadership roles already. Then today I got an email from the music theater director -- I thought my daughter was signed up for next year but apparently not. She went on and on about how much energy and enthusiasm my daughter brings to practice every week My daughter actually also wants to start taking singing lessons so she might compete for lead roles. She's not registered yet, but if we do put her in voice, she wants to do a duet with her brother on piano. The Xmas show, doing an Xmas carol, would work well for this.

Somehow we made good kids because aside from providing opportunity, I can't claim credit for any of this.

[Default]

9 year old twins have been taking music lessons since kindergarten. Girl has played the violin the whole time - and she's quite good! She has one lesson a week and also goes to "orchestra" once a week (the group she plays with is two other violinists her age, but they occasionally do concerts with a larger group that meets at a different time).

The boy started on drums, but switched at the beginning of last summer to guitar. He's . . . not as good. The drums were OK, but I don't think he has an easy time with a consistent rhythm. Guitar is hard because his hands are still pretty small, so stretching for chords can be a challenge. Plus, while he really likes his teacher, I'm not convinced he's great at teaching my son. It's kind of ADHD teaching ADHD, and I don't know that they stay on track very well together. (Not being glib here - teacher has mentioned his ADHD before, and the boy has a diagnosis and everything.)

Ask his teacher to show him chord inversions. There's about four or five ways to make the same chord, musically. An F chord on the first fret is pretty difficult at first, but an F chord on the eighth fret is more compact.

[YellowKing]

Guitar is hard because his hands are still pretty small, so stretching for chords can be a challenge.

My daughter and I just started taking guitar lessons together, as our local music charges the same for parent/child duos as they do for a single one-one-one lesson. As I mentioned before she already takes drums, but wanted to learn guitar since I've been playing self-taught guitar since high school.

She also has a difficult time with my full-sized acoustic, so we ordered her a 1/2 size travel guitar and that has really made a big difference.

P.S. It's extremely humbling to walk into a guitar lesson and learn from a 20-year old that you've essentially been holding it wrong for the last 30 years. That's why I wanted to take lessons though - I want to learn the right way from a professional, and I'm not too proud to admit that I really don't know WTF I'm doing.

[LawBeefaroni]

Guitar is hard because his hands are still pretty small, so stretching for chords can be a challenge.

My daughter and I just started taking guitar lessons together, as our local music charges the same for parent/child duos as they do for a single one-one-one lesson. As I mentioned before she already takes drums, but wanted to learn guitar since I've been playing self-taught guitar since high school.

She also has a difficult time with my full-sized acoustic, so we ordered her a 1/2 size travel guitar and that has really made a big difference.

My oldest started uke when she was 6 or so and guitar at 9 on a cheap 1/2 size. She stuck with it so we got her a full size last year when she turned 13. It's a Taylor Academy so I think it's a "compact" but still technically full size. I don't know anything about guitars. All I know is that it sounds a lot better.

[ImLawBoy]

So girl twin decided she wanted to do vocal lessons instead of violin. We've still got her doing orchestra (which she enjoys) so she stays in practice, but we've canceled her regular solo lessons and switched her to voice. This had the added benefit of needing to move boy twin's guitar lesson (keeping them at the same time is important, and the vocal lessons were only available on a different day at a different location). The new teacher is focusing a bit more on technical stuff, individual notes, etc., while still making time for rock stuff. I think it's a better approach for my son. The new teacher was impressed by the boy's grasp of things, though, so it's apparent that he was making progress with the other teacher, even if we weren't always seeing it.

[hepcat]

My oldest started uke when she was 6 or so and guitar at 9 on a cheap 1/2 size. She stuck with it so we got her a full size last year when she turned 13. It's a Taylor Academy so I think it's a "compact" but still technically full size. I don't know anything about guitars. All I know is that it sounds a lot better.

Soon you'll be coming home to this....

[Unagi]

I gave them life.
I pored over data to choose the best preschool.
I have helicoptered.
I have snowplowed.
I've saved every penny for their college accounts...
BUT IF I LOSE ONE MORE PIECE OF CHARGING APPARATUS IN THIS HOUSE
that "no one" took, so help me I'm putting them on the street and changing the locks.

[Isgrimnur]

[Jeff V]

My 7 year old daughter playing my son's VR:

"Laws of physics, what happened to you? Where are you laws of physics! This isn't right!"

[Zarathud]

My youngest kid was showing off the board game tonight that was created during a summer program in Chicago. Did their own art to create a 4-area board consisting of the forest, the village, the sea, and the ruins. Each area had an asymmetrical boss and minion who could appear based on how many movement points you've spent in the area. Movement could result in drawing a chit providing healing, money, boosts or spawning a foe (a "press your luck" mechanic). The money could be spent on two cards available in the "market" that gave a fixed boost. Once a character killed a foe in any zone, they qualified to progress to the next respawn "safe" hex between the zones. That allowed progression to kill one foe in each area, and potentially some tactical choice on how to progress.

I'm pretty proud of the concept and hard work that went into the game. It was clearly more advanced than the linear adventure game showcased on one side, or the messy circular "dungeon crawl" system on the other. Not a bad treat before heading out to GenCon.

[Jeff V]

Several years ago, my son and I made a PacMan board game, using popsicle sticks, fuzzballs, and various other crafty things. He was very proud of it, although it was played just a couple of times as we tried to define the rules.

He said a few weeks ago that he wants to make another.

[dbt1949]

You're being replaced.

[Jeff V]

You're being replaced.

My kids each got packets from Social Security this week telling them about the benefits they are receiving, as well as things such as survivor benefits were I to be dead. My wife was uncomfortably interested in this...