Teasing your kids is fun fun fun!

In the mornings, I like to tease Sabrina about the number of outfits she goes through when she gets dressed.

"Wait!" I'll say, eyeballing the rejects lying all over the floor of her room. "You haven't yet tried on every single piece of clothing you own!" She'll giggle.

Teasing the kids is ever so much more sanity saving than getting perturbed by their habits and ways. It was only a matter of time before I started teasing Max about his tendency to tell me, approximately every 6.5 minutes, "I want to be a fireman when I grow up."

There's a song he likes me to sing to him that goes:

Fireman Max
Fireman Max
He wants to be a fireman
When he grows up

The stanzas include: He's going to ride Ladder 31/He's going to sleep in the firehouse/He's going to eat in the firehouse. The song comes in handy for calming him down when he's upset and generally making him happy.

Last night, he was a little grumpy at bedtime. So I sang:

Fireman Max
Fireman Max
He wants to be a policeman
When he grows up

"No!" said Max, smiling.

Fireman Max
Fireman Max
He wants to be a hair stylist
When he grows up

"Noooooooo!" said Max, laughing.

"He wants to be a zookeeper when he grows up!"

"No!"

"He wants to be a baseball player when he grows up!"

"He wants to be an ice-cream chef when he grows up!"

"He wants to be Mickey Mouse when he grows up!"

"He wants to be an astronaut when he grows up!"

"He wants to be a clown when he grows up!"

By this point, Max was laughing so hard no sound was coming out of his mouth and I was cracking up. I let him calm down. And then:

"Fireman Max, you don't want to be a hair stylist when you grow up?"

"Nooooooo! Ire-anne!" he said, laughing again.

"OK, Hairs Stylist Max," I said, mercilessly.

The possibilities are endless.

Image: Flickr/Nina Matthews Photography