A/N: Just wanted to express how happy I am at seeing all these pretty reviews, they really make me enjoy writing this. I am also pleased to add that my word count is growing with every chapter in case anyone is still irked at the shortness.
Chapter 3: Toddler Era
By now you should be having a reasonable night's sleep, however you may find you wake up early in the morning to find your half-human banging on pots, pans, or various other things they have senselessly thrown out of your cupboards. A good locking charm on them would do the trick to keep them out, or if you don't want to be repeatedly saying or thinking alohomora every time you need a spork, a simple spell preventing it from entering the kitchen will also work.
Your child shall now be able to actually spew out words that have meaning, and if you've noticed, they may do this very frequently. If you find that your thing will just not shut up, I suggest the spell langlock to give you some peace and quiet. This may also work and is very useful during temper tantrums, though these are very good in developing their personality and ensuring that their mindsets are on their own needs and not wasted away on tending to someone else's.
They are also beginning, if you notice, to walk and run all over your house, probably knocking over various things along the way. If you feel the need to restrain that, a simple leg-locker curse will work wonderfully, though this may cause a tantrum as listed above, and though you may wish this, your child is not your prisoner so you should try not to curse it as much. This will not only stunt their growth and make their brains deteriorate, but will also stir up rebellion from within themselves and also resentment towards you, and may cause them to defect to the other side at a later age. We certainly do not want that to happen, as it causes great shame not only to you but also to your whole family, as in the case of my late aunt and my family as a result of my half-witted cousin changing sides.
Since your child is starting to grow pretty quickly now, they will need some 'friends' around the same age, so that you will not have to occupy the little nothing every moment of the day and also so they may become influences for each other during their lifetime. Be careful as you are picking though, since they might also affect your total waste of galleons in a negative way. I use for example, again, my cousin, who fell in with the wrong crowd and went down very idiotic paths and later got his very just desserts if I do say so myself. Therefore, I suggest finding playmates within your Death Eater circle, as this will most likely yield the most positive influence. However, this does not indicate that you will never have to watch out to see what kinds of people this moron keeps around themself. You should continue to point out the good and bad people and show them the differences between the two throughout their lifetime, and especially while they are at school.
Another thing to do with your horrible offspring if you have the time, the memories, and a pensieve, is to take your child into a memory of a Death Eater meeting, preferably when the Dark Lord is there and giving orders or perhaps punishing a less-than-loyal or clumsy comrade of yours, to introduce your child to him and teach them the proper ways of respect and obedience towards him which will be very useful later on. This also will give you yet another cheat towards the competition since The Dark Lord does not tolerate scum such as mere children near him, so they obviously will not be able to attend real meetings with you for quite some time. It would also do well to point out various others of your Death Eater friends that you are well acquainted with, so that your child will be comfortable with the familiar face if they so choose to drop by your house for whatever reason.
While your child is growing mentally, it wouldn't help to teach them basics at this stage, either, such as learning how to read or write. Though this is a long, drawn out process and you may wish that you could just pay someone to teach them for you, you may realize that most tutor's career selection of choice was because they actually cared about these little piles of dungbombs and wanted to teach them. This is no good, and they are probably working for the other side, besides. Although it may be natural for most of you to take the easy way out, I'm afraid that until I find a reasonable alternative you will have to add this to the list of burdens you must put on yourself.
Some Do's and Do Not's during this stage include:
DO: Continue to perform spells and use magic around your child. If they are able to talk now, give them a stick and teach them a few good curses for practice.
DO NOT: Try and find friends for them around your own neighborhood. Unless you know their parents well, neighborhood friendships are the hardest to break if they get difficult, and neighborhood friends are also hard to decipher as a good influence or a bad influence.
DO: Start getting them to eat regular foods on their own now, as the less you have to do for them the better.
DO NOT: insist on bringing the little rat with you every time you leave the house, as this will teach it to cling to you and you should hopefully want it away from you and out of your life as soon as it can survive.
DO: try and get them to stop using diapers and start using the facilities like any normal human being would, though I hope this would be a given to anyone reading this wonderful novel.