becoming Those Parents

This is a Firefly. It's a real phone and is very simple to operate. It has 5 buttons on the face: a Phone Book button in the center, the green and red buttons for starting and ending calls, and a Call Mom button and Call Dad button. Each number will turn the screen a different color. It flashes cute light shows ('firefly fireworks') occasionally and with the touch of a small button on the side. A firefly flits across the screen. Dennis adores it, and today, when it arrived in the mail, we became the people we used to make fun of, the parents who bought their preschooler HIS OWN PHONE.

There are reasons, of course; the main one being that we are locked into a 2 year contract on 3 phone lines with AT&T. Why shouldn't Dennis have the third one? The phone was around $14 including shipping, and isn't costing us any extra every month. He can only dial pre-programmed numbers, and I have limited those to David and me and Gran and Pop. He has to know how to spell/read a name in order to call anyone besides 'Mom' or 'Dad' (those keys have pictures on them), so we will add in more people when he can recognize the name on his screen to know who he's calling. He knows how to call the 4 of us, though, and he's learning how to hold the phone not smashed against his cheek, so much of the time we can understand what he's saying.

I wondered about our decision to do this, but it'll be handy for the very rare occasion when he's not with us, or when relatives want to call him directly. And he found it especially useful when I put him down for his nap. He left me 3 voicemails and left 5 for his Daddy (all just dead air and the sounds of buttons pushing). I was not with my phone, but when I finally heard it ring, I ran to it and saw it was him. He was calling to tell me he was through talking and playing and had put himself back in bed and was about to go to sleep. I went in to check, and he was all snuggled in and had placed his phone very carefully on his nightstand (just like we do).