Being a mom is like being an engineer but without any schooling or training. The first time I tried to put our Baby Einstein bouncer together, I thought, "How hard could this be?" Apparently, due to complaints about difficult to understand instructions and the inconvenience of writing instructions in various languages for a global society, many companies have begun just doing picture instructions. But these picture instructions are NOT detailed or well-drawn. It's like the pictures that your weird third-cousin draws while playing Pictionary at the family reunion. Is that a bat? A dog? Oh, it's George Clooney. I see it now. One of these days I'm going to write to these toy manufacturers using just stick figure drawings to complain about their complex instructions.
After assembling various toys, bikes, trikes, beds, furniture, etc. I think I'm ready to go help with the overpass they're building on the freeway nearby. It really can't be much more complicated than putting a day bed together, right?
Just inserting batteries can be a complicated procedure--the most complicated part being not losing those itty bitty screws that they use. Every time, the minute I do the last twist to remove the tiny screw, it's going to somehow go flying across the room. We then spend the next forty minutes on our hands and knees searching for it, only to find it as it's about to go in the baby's mouth. Every time.
The other thing that makes me feel like an engineer is all the building that I do with my boys. They love blocks and train tracks. And they don't want just your standard run-of-the mill buildings. They want state-of-the-art sky scrapers and complex European train track systems. I'm still working on making a good oval with my train tracks; anything more complicated, we usually need to call in the big guns, Daddy. Somehow daddy knows how to build arches and bridges, balconies and balustrades. But I'm learning and the boys make sure that I get plenty of practice.
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