The Nana Block
At one time our son and his family lived next door. Having four grandchildren right next door was great fun.
The children would slip next door any time they wanted. Especially the oldest grandson and often his brother. Their momma was a late sleeper, and he knew his Nana was an early bird.
Just about every morning, he’d come across the driveway over to where the Captain Crunch cereal and Pop Tarts were and spend the day.
I’d ask, “Does your mother know you’re here?”His answer was always yes.
This was long before cell phone texting, back when phones with long stretchy chords hung on the kitchen wall. My wee hour calls to verify they had permission always woke their whole household.
Because that didn’t work so well, we devised what we called the Nana block, a wooden block from their bucket of blocks with Nana written on it. If they had that, then I was to let them in for Nana time.
No Nana block. No entrance.
This worked nicely until I discovered our clever little grandson who was tall and resourceful was snitching the block.
He’d climb from a chair to the counter to get the block from the refrigerator or stand on an upside-down pot on the counter to reach it from the top of the kitchen cabinets. Totally bypassing the ask mommy part.
We went back to confirmation calls.
Fast forward to now. I get up at 4:30 a.m. most mornings to go swim at the gym. Before I leave I take the dog out. Sometimes when I walk Finnegan that early, he takes care of business. Other times he doesn’t.
We needed a way for hubby-dear to know if he should walk our Finnegan. One that didn’t involve sticky notes, which never seem to stick.
He made a new sorta of Nana Block from a keychain disk. I set it beside his coffee station.
Works like a charm. No wake-up texts or phone calls are needed.
