When I'm Older

Well this came earlier than I expected. We're in the car, driving somewhere and Haley has been quietly sucking her thumb in the back seat. All of a sudden she chirps, "Dad, can I drive the car?" Somehow I manage to not freak out and swerve us off the road. I wasn't expecting that question until she was at least fifteen. "Uh... no, sweetie. You're too little. Perhaps when your older." She thinks about this for a while before responding, "Yeah. I can't drive from back here. I don't have a steering wheel."

We've been telling her "when you're older" for a number of things. While she doesn't quite comprehend that we're usually talking about MANY years into the future, she does seem to understand that, at some time in the future, we will allow her to do these things. A few examples...

You're not supposed to let toddlers have peanuts or shellfish until they're 3 years old. I couldn't tell you the science behind this, but it has something to do with decreasing the chance that they'll develop an allergy to these foods. So whenever Haley is around food with one of these items in it, we explain that she can't have it until she is older. One of Haley's playmates was eating trail-mix with peanuts in it. When she offered some to Haley, Haley responded with, "No thank you. Not till I'm older." (Seriously. Thats a direct quote.)

Sometimes it backfires on us. One evening, when we were getting her ready for bed, Haley announced, "I'm older, dad." I looked at Nicole. She shrugged. "We don't understand, Haley." She pointed to the dog. "Now Akira can stay in my room with me." We had told her several months earlier that "when she was older", she could have the dog sleep in her room. Apparently she took "older" to mean 3 months older. We had to explain that she needed to be a little bit older for that to happen. So she'll probably ask again another three months from now.