Slackserdoo

That’s Bruce and Loxley’s word for whenever they don’t know the answer to something or don’t know what to say. And I hate coming up with titles, so slackserdoo.

I went down a bit of a rabbit hole this week and found myself learning about the history behind the fairy tale of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. Uh, super crazy! A brief refresher on the story: the town was suffering from an invasion of rats, they contracted with a pied piper to get rid of the rats, he did, but the town refused to pay him what they had agreed to. He promised retribution, and eventually lured the children out of the town and they disappeared, never to return.

Pretty morbid, in classic fairy tale fashion. Here is the interesting thing, though. There are several historical records/artifacts that indicate that the worst elements of this tale are actually true! In the year 1284 on the 26th of June (and the records are very precise and in agreement about this date) the town lost 130 of its children (again, an exact number in multiple sources) when they were led away by a piper in brightly colored clothing (apparently that is what “pied” meant in the original script, even though children following apple pies down the street always made way more sense to me). Here’s the link to one of the articles I read if you want to read more.

Regardless of the specifics of what really happened (and there are several theories) I thought it was a good time for our kids to have a refresher course on stranger danger. We introduced the issue about a year ago, not because we have ever had a problem with Bruce - it’s a rare day if I can get him to walk to the other side of the house without me - but Loxley is a friendly wanderer and would happily go with anyone who looked like they had better snacks. We spent several days talking about it and acting out scenarios while trying to keep it from becoming too intense. (Turns out Bruce was very excited to learn that if a stranger tries to take him away from his Mom or Dad he is welcome to kick, punch, hit, scratch or bite. Figures.) They took turns yelling for Mom or Dad as loud as they could, watched kid-friendly videos of potential scenarios to be wary of, and we culminated in a role-play where they had to turn down a lollipop to stay safe… needless to say, Loxley failed. I guess I need to keep lollipops in our snack bag now.

On a happier note, the forecast says that we have almost an entire week of sub-110 temps to look forward to! I know that doesn’t sound like anything to celebrate, but it gives my poor plants a bit of respite, and it means my eyeballs don’t feel so singed when we go to Costco, which we do two or three times a week these days, just for the samples and the refrigerator rooms.

Also, if you’re new to the newsletter and here without your consent, you can probably thank/blame Stanton. 😆 I welcome all and hope you enjoy, but I won’t judge anyone who is protective of their inbox space and decides to unsubscribe.

May your day be filled with vegetables, fruit, and mostly nice people! Toddlers don’t always make the grade.

-Kiera