Sometimes I'm a lazy dad.
There! I finally said it. I don't feel particularly better about this problem, but I hope to start my road to recovery with this first step.
Let me explain. Daphne does a great job of providing Charlotte with enrichment activities when Char has free time at home. Got 15 minutes to kill before bath time? Mom and Char play with Brain Quest cards.
Want to play with crayons? Why not sit with mom and work on your eye-hand coordination and color recognition at the same time?
Please don't get the idea that my wife is a taskmaster. Charlotte relishes these activities, and she requests to do them. In fact, the only time Char gets mad about reading books is when it's time to put them away. Her free time with mom is fun and educational.
Free time with dad is a little different. When it's just Char and I we... watch TV. [hangs head]
We don't watch television all the time, please, that would be ridiculous. Sometimes we... watch the computer. [hangs ahead again, but with a smirk]
As an English teacher, you think I'd recognize the importance of reading as much as possible as soon as possible. But there I am on the couch, lying on my side with my daughter tucked behind my knees, watching Bubble Guppies. Or Mike the Knight. Or Team Umizoomi. Or our newest addiction, Peppa Pig:
I'm such a parental bum. Check out how many Peppa Pig episodes I have stored on our DVR:
Sometimes when I get bored after reading the same book to her for the fifth time in a row, I'll whistle a handful of notes from the Peppa Pig theme song to see if Char will take the bait. She usually does, "Hey, Dad? Can we go watch Peppa Pig?"
"Well," I'll slowly say while tossing the book to the floor, "We've been watching that a lot lately, but I suppose so."
Sad. Truly sad. But we're behind closed doors, so who's to know how I parent? We could watch 500 episodes of Peppa, and no one would be the wiser. Would they?
Well, Peppa Pig is a British television show, and the characters speak with an accent. It didn't occur to me that Charlotte is still deep in her speech acquisition mode until she casually told us while we were in the car, "Dad, my bear is such a cheeky rascal!" And her British accent was spot on.
Not my proudest moment as a dad.
No, Charlotte doesn't sound like she's a cast member of Downton Abbey, but she does randomly sprinkle her sentences with the sounds from across the pond: "Da dee? Can I come ta-ooo?" That's when I wince, Daphne shoots me a look, and Char and I go to her pink room to read ten books as penance.
So, have I learned my lesson? Will I grab math flash cards instead of the cable box remote when Daphne leaves us at home alone? Not blooming likely. Paw Patrol just started their new season, and those dogs are all American!
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