Increasing BOY's fine motor skills

So, it has been suggested by BOY's teacher that we work with him on his fine motor skills. She emphasized that these activities should be fun for him and non stressful. Some of the things she suggested are: working with modeling clay that he can pound, squish, and stretch - which strengthens his fingers and hands, using tongs in the bathtub to pick up bath toys and put them in a bucket, and tearing newspaper. All of this sounds great, and I am actually quite happy that BOY has a teacher who is taking such care and interest in him as an individual. However, I must point out that BOY appears to have quite a finesse when it comes to having fine motor skills at home. After all, there is the way he can jab his finger in your eye at 4am, the way he can push a chair into the kitchen, slide it up to the counter and open up a box of crackers right before dinner, and of course the way he can curl his fingers around our cat's tail and drag him several paces (happens rarely now, but still when done is artfully, executed.) All of these require high levels of fine motor skills. Oh, and lest I forget... the fine art of jabbering in my ear & simultaneously using his elbow to jab me between the ribs. These skills use an infinite number of small muscles and certainly do an amazing job of disabling my muscles - what I have left. Of course, these skills will probably not help him to hold a pencil and write his name by the time he enters Kindergarten in 2 years, but ... you never know. And I'm all for the non stress. But, I wish she had some suggestions to lessen parental stress when subjected to the aforementioned early AM jabbing and strategic kicks to the crotch area. I guess it will be a learning curve for all of us...

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