Jill and Derwood 62: Law School Rumors and Boring Sam

[singsingsing]

I was watching an old home video of my first birthday party not that long ago, and my reaction to the cake was to very tentatively poke at it. Seems like a lot of kids have that reaction. It makes me wonder how the parents react when they go to all the trouble and expense of getting a beautiful backdrop, a professionally made and decorated cake, and a professional photographer, just to have the baby react in a way that 'ruins' the plan...

[Greendoor]

My son was a tidy eater as a little kid too.  No smashing or smearing.  Now of course his room is a train wreck, but...

[Pecansforeveryone]

I know my sister decorated an individual sized angel food cake (def small) with a little whipped cream for my niece to smash. My niece poked her finger in it and was not enjoying the feel or the taste of the whipped cream. My niece also became overwhelmed and started crying in her high chair when she realized everyone was looking at her. My sister immediately stopped filming and comforted her daughter. The smash cake was taken away. Cause you know that's what caring, engaged parents do. It's one of my biggest pet peeves when parents force their children into certain situations ignoring obvious signs of distress just for a photo opportunity. 

[onekidanddone]

Jill could have put a candle in a Cheerio and for all Sam would care

[TheOneAndOnly]

I really don't understand giving the kid a cake or even a slice of cake, then no fork or spoon. Twelve months is about the age kids are learning about eating properly at the table and suddenly they're expected to just grab squishy sticky cake? How weird. Give the kid a fork and don't complain if it isn't used since it's a special occasion. Yaaay. 

[Shadoewolf]

Harps and Walmart make small little $3-5 cakes if that's what she wanted for a photo opportunity. Or even a cupcake. That orange disaster was just that. I bake all my kids' cakes and I'm no professional.  They still look better than that. And if Sam wasn't digging it then why force it? I try not to snark on the trivial stuff Jill does but these tone deaf posts and parenting fails are hard to leave be.

[Edhelfin]

Are loose potatoes not cheaper than canned ones? How hard is it to peel/scrub and dice potatoes? How lazy and clueless are these people?! Years of training in 'homemaking' and they cannot even dice and cook a bloody potato? Is Jill trolling people at this point?!

[Melissa1977]

I don't get the smash cake concept. I don't care babies making messes with food (it is their way to learn), but deliberately helping them is beyond me. 

I prefer giving them a little piece of cake to eat, or even feed them with a spoon, than give them a whole cake just to destroy. What's the lesson there? In fact 1 year old start to learn that food must not be thrown out.

But it is just me. 

[Bad Wolf]

Sam was happy poking the cake and licking his fingers. They had Israel take his hand to smash in the cake. Later, Jill forced his hands into the cake and smeared them over his face. I don't get it. Sam seems to respond well to his big brother

[Seahorse Wrangler]

8 hours ago, CoveredInBees said:

Canned potatoes take me back to my childhood.........

Or more specifically that day in January just before payday when you're eating the last contents of the Christmas hamper (paid for over the year via the milkman or the Rington's tea man). Normally canned potatoes/veg and the Fray Bentos pie or if I'm really unlucky, spam fritters 

Oh goodness, The Rington's Rea Man in all his finery. My grand-mother's man always had fruit salad chews in his pocket for the children on his round.

 

re tinned potatoes. I was so jealous that my friend's family had canned new potatoes while we had the fresh ones from the local greengrocer.

[Melissa1977]

3 minutes ago, Bad Wolf said:

. Sam seems to respond well to his big brother

They only had each other

[Ilovebrownies]

wtf is wrong with her?  She pushed his hand into the cake with her thumb, then pushed his hands down repeatedly, then forced his hands into his mouth, and smeared his face with his own hands.  I am disgusted.  The cake looked gross too.  

[jqlgoblue]

4 hours ago, Melissa1977 said:

I don't get the smash cake concept. I don't care babies making messes with food (it is their way to learn), but deliberately helping them is beyond me. 

I think it's the picture mom's want for social media. I'm not sure why other photos of your kid on their first birthday won't do. 

[Lisafer]

She smeared the poor kid's hands on his face? WTF, really? 

I'm not really into smash cakes because I don't like having to clean up the mess, but I understand people who want their kids to enjoy crushing a bunch of sugary dessert with their hands. But I have NEVER seen anybody force their kid into the cake and then force them to smear themselves with it. 

[artdecades]

I didn't realize smash cakes were a thing until now. Like pre ripped jeans or wreck the dress photo shoots, it seems wasteful for the sake of it.

I finally got around to watching the videos (why did they feel the need to break it into three different videos?) and wow does it make me sad. They can't just enjoy their children for who they are. The dillards is so intent on making the perfect pinterest moment that they once again put their baby into distress to create it. Sam was so cute with his prodding and they ruined it and made him upset. I certainly also didn't miss Jessa's comments in the background of how "spurgie" did with his cake. I am sure it makes Jill seethe when Jessa gets these perfect moments.

And speaking of Spurgie, where is he. Him and Israel are the same age but Israel just seemed to be alone. No Henry either. Austin (and I am assuming Joy) were there, but we saw none of Gideon. No cousins, no little babies running around. Not even preshus miracle Josie. For a mega family like the Duggars, it felt awkward and small. IDK, maybe they were there and in the background and not filmed but why wouldn't they be.

[fluffernutter]

The idea of giving a one year old his or her own cake for the first birthday must be pretty normal- We did it with our kids who are now adults and a teen. I always gave them something separate from what the guests were eating, and afterwards, straight into the bath they went. 

[justmissedquiver]

I agree with the others who think Jill needs to take a breath and enjoy her children the way they are. They are beautiful and sweet and need to be appreciated just as they are.  It's too bad jill and Der can't see that showing the kids just as they are, without pushing them into contrived situations, would be so much better for their brand; AND it would relieve them of so much self-inflicted pressure. Poor little babes are growing up with such a twisted reality.

[scoutsadie]

12 hours ago, AprilQuilt said:

I've noticed quite a lot of little kids are squeamish about having claggy muck on their hands.

I love this - have never heard anything called "claggy" before, but the phrase is so onomatopoedic! (Though I'm not a fan of sticky stuff on my hands or feet myself, ha ha.)

[artdecades]

Once again, the ads on my phone seem directed towards the dullards (Jill and dwreck being the pests). 

[Dandruff]

I wonder if Sam was afraid to make a mess because bad things happen when he makes a mess.

[nvmbr02]

59 minutes ago, fluffernutter said:

The idea of giving a one year old his or her own cake for the first birthday must be pretty normal- We did it with our kids who are now adults and a teen. I always gave them something separate from what the guests were eating, and afterwards, straight into the bath they went. 

Yeah, I have pictures of me with a smash cake (1981) and my husband in 1978. I am pretty sure I have seen pictures of my cousins with them also and they would have been in the late 60s, early to mid 70s.  For my own kids, my first had her own cake the was a miniature of her full cake, which was shaped like a flower. My sister baked both of them and put an insane amount of work into both. Took her hours. With my son, I just baked a cupcake and frosted it with the same frosting I made for his full sized cake. My youngest... got a slice of cake from the grocery store next to the Dairy Queen where we picked up her birthday cake. Ah, third child. Haha! Anyway, no social media then, just a birthday tradition that both Dh and I grew up with. Oh, and we didn't used forks or spoons with the cake either. But none of my kids really started using a fork or a spoon until closer to 15 months. Before that they would just use it to throw on the floor or bang on the table while the ate with their hands. 

I do agree that there is no need for Jill to be pushy with it though. We always just let the kids play with it. I don't think my son did more than put his finger in and lick it once or twice, he just wasn't interested. 

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

There is a photo of me sitting in my birthday cake. My dad says I crawled over to it grabbed it and was  shoving my hands and face in it and as they watched me (on the dinning room table) I somehow manged sit my little butt down ON the cake. My mom & dad and my dad's father and dad step mother and Aunt were all at the feast in 1971, I was apparently a hit .

[Kittikatz]

15 hours ago, BabyFactoryClosing said:

@Kittikatz I'm so sorry for your experience. I hope this isn't inappropriate to ask but you said your brother couldn't absorb nutrients... Did he by chance have biliary atresia?

Among many other things. The poor kid was a medical disaster. He had four or five surgeries just on his liver - they tried to put shunts in, and the shunts kept blocking, so they'd go in again and the whole process would repeat itself. He also had encephalitis (and required multiple surgeries to try to drain the excess fluid and relieve the pressure on his brain - they wound up putting in shunts there too - which also kept blocking) and Cat's Eye Syndrome in a pretty severe way - I was in awe of his cat shaped pupils, but in reality the severity of his affliction resulted in limited vision, hearing impairment and a number of other abnormalities in his internal organs.

Had he lived, my brother would have had severe mental disabilities  coupled with a physically very difficult and painful life with some major limitations on how he could sense and interact with the world. It irritated me then and infuriates me still that the doctors knew that his best case scenario was not going to be a good one, but they kept taking extraordinary measures to prolong his life. At this time too they didn't believe that babies felt pain like adults, as a result there was very little pain management. This was IMO utter bullshit. My brother never cried - I don't know if he physically could, but the sound of that baby's endless whimpering haunts my nightmares. I am certain that he was in constant pain.

On a lighter note, Cat's Eye Syndrome isn't supposed to be genetic, but weirdly, I found out when I went to get laser surgery on my eyes that I have a slight case of bilateral coloboma (oval pupils - one of the most visible symptoms of my brother's Cats Eye Syndrome) - this explained my life long issues with poor eyesight and hyper sensitivity to light. I had the surgery and got results that were extraordinary - I now have vision that could put a sniper to shame, and it is just so freaking cool to be able to really see everything around me. The doctor said that he had heard that people with coloboma tend to respond better to laser eye correction than people with normal pupils. The surgery did nothing for the light sensitivity, but I have a ridiculous collection of sunglasses that more than makes up for that, and it's a strange and kind of neat link to a deceased sibling - especially since it never occurred to me that he and I would have had anything in common.

[Shadoewolf]

2 hours ago, artdecades said:

SNIP

I finally got around to watching the videos (why did they feel the need to break it into three different videos?) and wow does it make me sad. They can't just enjoy their children for who they are. The dillards is so intent on making the perfect pinterest moment that they once again put their baby into distress to create it. Sam was so cute with his prodding and they ruined it and made him upset.

SNIP

I think this has to do with Jill being raised on TV. Most of her life has been staged, adjusted and unnatural so it's not only natural to her because in the TTH that's how it was done, but also no wonder she feels like she needs 'the' moment. Add in the need to establish their own brand outside of TLC...

Problem is Jill's not savvy enough to stage it right or to edit it. TLC would've shown Sam poking at the cake and if he wouldn't dig in then cut away to someone else then cut back and showed him covered in it. Jill just posts with no thought to the potential outcome where a TLC producer knows way better than to show footage of Sam being forced. Surprised with some of the backlash that she hasn't pulled the video down. 

[nastyhobbitses]

Re smash cakes: the picture my mom always threatens to show my sister's potential significant others is of her first birthday, where she fell asleep facedown in her birthday cake. In fact, my sister had a history of falling asleep facedown in food. We also have a picture of the aftermath of her taking a nap in a plate of spaghetti. As the Gen-Z kids say, #Mood