Camp Creek Press

I knew a guy once who said the best gift he gave to his kids was fire. He also told them to not come running to him if they got hurt. The only other rule was that they had to stay on the concrete.

Another friend let's her 4 year old have a hatchet. I drew the line at power tools, clippers, loppers, etc, mostly because the hatchet would be used to hack down trees, which is a big attraction around here. Maybe I should send him over to your neighbors property -- just kidding.

i won't let the boys have knives, and his talk made me feel guilty, lol. i think i had a pocket knife at that age! and i ran around with three-inch nails in my pocket, too, because they're so handy when you're scrounging around in the woods and the creek.

i admit that i am overprotective; i've just recently decided that they are old enough that they will likely only maim themselves, not kill themselves, so i should be somewhat more lenient. :^P

rofl re: the neighbor's property .. i'd TOTALLY let him do it. (actually, all his new trees are the size of twigs, so maybe safety scissors would suffice ;^)

That was a good link. Made me think.
But I am glad to hear your boys don't have knives. Now I don't feel like such a pansy for shuddering when the speaker said he had some big scars from using a pocket knife as a kid. I like the idea of letting my boys have a pocketknife, but it's hard to imagine it happening in real life. I wish that (childless) guy had thrown out some ages during his talk. I'd be interested to know when he thinks is a good time to distribute the knives. Surely not as babies, despite the cartoon he showed.

On another note, we got Artist to Artist for Christmas! I'll admit, it was probably more for me than for my son. But I hope he'll be interested in it someday. I love it.
Ciao!

Why would they do what they are doing? I'm too lazy to look it up?

Sorry about improper punctuation and grammar and such. Now I'm all self-conscious. ;)

laura, lol re: the babies with knives. i look forward to reading his book when it's published. and yay for "artist to artist"! i'm glad you love it; i do, too. :^)

michelle, i would love to answer your question if i knew what you were talking about. are you looking at the body stocking picture again?

you know i love this.

and for the record--all the boys around the farm here have a leatherman on their belts. i've never seen much blood, maiming or stab wounds. Maybe a leatherman would be a good first pocket knife b/c it is such an multi-tool kind of knife. i don't know. i have three girls, who only want horses and hoof picks.

i love the leatherman; actually the boys do have a cheap target version of the multitool and i even think it has a little knife on it but i don't think they know it's there. lol

lol re: the hoof picks. horses seem a much more wholesome thing to be obsessed with as opposed to, say, video games (SIGH), but then .. i guess they're more expensive, too. ;^)