Aussie word of the day: Chip off the old block edition

As I've noted many times, J has very little regard for his own personal safety when it comes to sports.  Every time he goes mountain biking, he comes back all scraped or cut up (or worse).  And it started at an early age.  He tells me these hilarious stories about the crazy shenanigans he and his brothers got into as kids, like when they would careen down huge hills on a skateboard dragging a board studded with nails behind them so that they would make sparks in the road.

So I've been bracing myself, waiting for Zeke to show similar levels of craziness.

We started the vacation by heading to my parents' house in DC for a couple of days.  J really wanted to take Zeke to the Natural History Museum, so we flew in on Friday, went to the museum on Saturday, and then drove down to the Outer Banks on Sunday.

In one of my parents' bedrooms, they still have the bunk beds that Josh and Sam slept in as kids.  Zeke was quite taken with these -- oh, the opportunities to climb up and down ladders!  to sit way up high in the room!

J and I were sitting in my parents' bedroom, chatting with them as Josie played on the bed.  Zeke was in the room with the bunk beds.  J decided to go in and check on him.

Thirty seconds later I heard a "Whoa! Wait!" then a *thunk-thunk-thunk*, then Zeke crying.

I went down the hall to see what happened.  Zeke had a scrape and a bump forming on his forehead.  He was a little shaken up, but otherwise fine.  In typical Aussie form, J said, "she'll be right!"

Apparently, Zeke had decided that it would be a good idea to jump off the top bunk into J's arms.  Except that he forgot to tell J he would be doing this.  And he also forgot about the ceiling fan, which was on, and which turned out to be just level with his forehead.

Oops.

The next day we were talking about how hard it is to try to protect your kids from harm, and the balance that has to be struck between keeping them safe and letting them out into the world to make mistakes.  We talked about Emma (who is doing super-great - more on that in another post), and how scary it would be to be hit by a car, or to see your kid be hit by a car.

J piped up, "I've been hit by a car."

"Really?" my parents said.

"Six times, actually.  While riding my bike.  Well, technically, one was a bus, so five times."

It explains a lot, actually.