What do the H's in 4H stand for?

I've been trying to keep the kids as busy as possible, which is not easy for me since I am not a huge fan of organized classes for kids.  I am of the "Go outside and play" school of child rearing, but that instruction usually results in three boys sitting on the deck waiting until I tell them they can come in again.

It was really pissing me off this summer when they would not ventrue outside unless I told them exactly what to do and play out there.  Don't these kids have any freaking imagination?  I finally realized that they have never gone outside on their own in their entire lives.  In the city they were basically drones waiting for instruction.  They couldn't say, "Hey Mom, I am going to the park." Since we lived in Midtown Manhattan, that would have meant crossing 9th Avenue and some of the worst traffic in the city.

I cannot tell you the number of times we almost got run over by some asshole with Jersey plates while trying to cross 9th Ave. My poor children have been marched over to many a driver's side window to witness their mother scream at the jerk behind the wheel to, "Pay attention to the light idiot or better yet, stay in New Jersey." 

That probably pales in comparison to watching Dad jump out of the car to pour soda all over someone's windshield while calling him all sorts of colorful names for trying to beat us out for the spot in front of our apt building.

Basically the boys are newbies at the whole just go out side and play theory so I had to succumb and become that mom who drives everyone hither and thither to lessons and soccer practice.  I don't mind the classes that they are all involved in.  Tennis:  I get to hit the ball against the wall myself while occasionally yelling, "Good shot Scrappy!"  Swimming:  I get to chat with friends or read while occasionally yelling, "Yes I saw you go underwater James Dean!"

The classes I hate are the ones that only one of them participates in.  James Dean decided to play soccer.  Scrappy is too little and Prince would rather put a hot poker in his eye than play soccer. He is more the tennis, swimming, boating, horseback riding kind of kid.  You know, the things that cost a shit load of money to do.  Maybe he really is royalty?

Every soccer practice involves Scrappy Doo trying to play soccer on the sidelines while Prince continuously steals the ball from him.  Scrappy screeches at the top of his lungs.  I tell Prince to leave him alone.  They stop for two minutes and then the entire scenario is replayed.  Talk about Dante's Inferno. Now I want to put a hot poker in my eye.

With swimming lessons coming to an end I needed to find another activity for all of them.  Scouting is out.  We tried that a few years ago with Prince.  I thought it would be all about hiking and nature and how to avoid the pedophile troop leaders at scout camp, but it was really pretty boring.  One meeting that I attended was an hourlong session on how to fold the flag.  Man, there really are a lot of hot poker in the eye moments while trying to be a good parent.

After much deliberation I decided on 4H.  It was all the cool stuff of scouting without the freaky patriotism aspect, plus there were animals.  The kids were all into it. Prince was especially excited when he discovered you could win cash prizes if your animal wins the county fair.

I wasn't sure how it worked.  Did you need to pick the animal you wanted to 4H with or did you join 4H and the leader would guide you through raising and caring for your animal?  I found out there was a 4H informational meeting and we all went.

There are many different 4H groups out there.  I don't know who started this organization, but they rock.   There is gardening, horse showing, gun shooting, sewing, dairy cows, bunnies, chickens, dairy goats, sheep.  Name your farm animal and there is a 4H club out there for you.   What I didn't realize was there are also geeky science kid clubs.  When we walked into the information session, these two pimply faced, dorky hairdoed, glasses wearing teens were doing a demo of what they do in 4H Robotics.  I saw Prince's eyes light up.  Unfortunately, he was too young so we continued looking.  We did discover that there is a group in our town but Scrappy Doo is too young for this particular group and my one criteria for this adventure is that they all participate.

The other problem is that the group here doesn't really have a theme.  The leader lets the kids decide what they want to do which is great unless there are a bunch of kids who want to do sewing and you want to shoot guns.  I was starting to worry that  I was either going to be driving them 30 miles every week to the 4H group of their choice or they were not going to do 4H.  I had already decided that every city kid who moves to the country must do 4H.  Plus, maybe they will be able to teach me a thing or two.  I was determined to get them all signed up.

I spoke to the woman in charge and she had a great idea.  I could just start a group of my own!   WHOA WHOA WHOA!  Me become a 4H leader?  I don't even know what the H's stand for in 4H.  What the hell could I  teach them?  How not to grow a tomato?  I am sure most of these kids know way more about farm animals than I do given the fact that I failed both the "Name the Parts of the Chicken and the "Name the Parts of the Cow" quizzes some 7 year old was handing out.

Organic cooking?  I could do that, but my boys wouldn't come to the class.

There must be something I could do that would both make my kids happy and attract other cool kids.  I will be damned if I can think of it though.  Maybe I'd better just put lifts in Scrappy Doo's shoes and hope the group in town chooses anything but sewing as their project.  Lord save me from the quagmire I may be about to step into.