Children are uniquely suited to be excellent DIY’ers.  That’s all they want to do.  You will often hear, “Do it myself!” screeched in an ear splitting wail if you dare try to help them do something.  Unless of course, it is something they would just rather not do themselves.  You know, those little things that require such effort that, you, as their parental servants, must do for them.  Such tasks as brushing their teeth, wiping their bum or spoon feeding them.  Those would be the things we would happily defer to them.  Thankfully we are making progress on that here.  I don’t think I’ve had to wipe a bum in months.

In order to aid our little DIYers in helping themselves, we try to employ such tactics as, “If you can’t do it yourself you must not be ready for Kindergarten!”  This usually leads to a half-hearted effort, before their little wills groan under the weight of their to-do lists and they throw up their hands in surrender.

Take for instance, them wanting a particular toy.  “Where is my such-and-such?!” they will ponder and pointedly ask us, the parental figures who are both omniscient and all-powerful, able to instantly surmise the position of all toys using our internal GPS tracking systems.  Or so they think. 

We will in turn say, “I don’t know, I wasn’t playing with it.  Perhaps if you actually put your toys away when you are done you will know where they are when you go to look for them.  How about you try to find it yourself?”

They will sigh in consternation and disappointment, as they walk into the Library, look casually at the toy boxes from 5 feet away, and declare, “I can’t find it!  Can you help me?!”  This is a demand, not a request.

Sometimes we help them, sometimes we leave them with the monumental task of finding their toys themselves.  It all depends on the whine barometer of the day.  Lots of whining = no help from parental units.  Generally, what will happen is we will walk over to the toyboxes, open them, look inside and find the toy sitting on top. 

Whether we tell them we found it, is another thing. 😉