A Day with Rider

My 3 year old is about to turn 4 the end of this month. My youngest child. It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it. But what a neat kid he is.

Yesterday we were running errands together and having a good time. During our fun day we had quite the conversations.

Rider sees the sticker in the truck that said to wear a seat belt at all times.

"Mom, would you click on this picture?"

"Sorry Rider but this isn't the computer, I can't click on that picture."

"Why?"

That was interesting to try and explain. After my super lame explanation:

"Mom, can I play games on your phone?"


This conversation made me think of the little techno children we are raising.

After a lovely time shopping and grabbing a bite to eat, we pass a man trying to hitch a ride by the entry to the freeway.

"Mom, why is that man standing in the road?"

"He is trying to get a ride from someone. But they won't give him a ride because he is a stranger."

I seriously thought that maybe Rider was going to need a powerful therapy session. His eyes got huge and he knew that whatever the word stranger meant it was NOT good.

I explained that stranger was someone that we didn't know that could very well try to do something VERY bad and mean to us. Rider then had to rattle off the list of possible things this stranger could do:
*take Rider's chicken nuggets
*get the truck dirty
*kill us with his sword
*take our groceries
*be mean

His list went on and on. I found it very endearing how naive, but inventive he was about what bad guys could do. I was stuck in the moment with Rider looking at me with his big blues and concerned about a new element in life that he hadn't realized before ~ Strangers.

Of course I thought of how I hoped nothing would ever hurt my soon-to-be-birthday-boy. I know he won't always be so naive about the scary side of the world, but I hope and pray he is able to stand back away from it, like he does now, and see it for what it is dangerous. (Not the whole world, just the potentially harmful part of it.)

I am so grateful for these tender moments we get to have with our kids. The sweet moments we have to look into their eyes and never want it to end....

For now,I can relish in the fact that he is still under my care. Where he can just keep pretending to fight bad guys with his super sweet Ninja Kung-Fu moves.