Somehow I think she'll survive

Bandaid So my mom called me at work yesterday to say that poor Mads had taken a tumble off of her stepstool and split her lip on the bathroom counter. I could hear her in the background, sadly begging grandma for cookies.

Betrayed by her beloved hot pink stepstool. It doesn’t get much worse than that.

Those are the times when it really sucks to be a working mom. Don’t get me wrong, normally I love it. But when you know that your baby is hurt or sad but have to wait until 5pm to comfort her you can’t help but feel pretty bad about it.

So I rushed right home after work, knowing that sometimes only mommy can make things better. Poor girl, she had a cut on her lip where she hit the counter, and one on the inside of her mouth where her teeth went through.

Sure enough, as soon as I got there, Mads pulled me into the bathroom and gave me a blow-by-blow description of what had happened. For someone who can only say two words at a time, she is quite the captivating storyteller.

Mads: “Brush teeth. Stepstool. Fall down. Cry.” (See what I mean? Pretty gripping stuff!)
Me: “Oh no, you fell down? Are you okay?”
Mads: “No.”
Me: “Do you want a big hug?”
Mads: “No. Bye Mommy.”

And off she went. Ah, it's always nice to know I'm needed.

An hour later I was working on dinner and she came running at full tilt into the kitchen.

Mads: “Cookie! Cookie!”
Me: “No cookies, Mads. It’s dinner time.”
Mads: “Cookie! Cookie? Peeees cookie?”
Me: “No, cookies are for dessert. We’re going to eat dinner first.”
Mads: “Mommy?” (voice wavering)

Then she pointed to her cut up lip and the corners of her little mouth turned down.

Dammit! Don't you just hate it when they fight dirty?

So we had cookies. Then dinner.

(Image from Photobucket)

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May 14, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

A camping we will go

So F and I have been tossing around the idea of taking an overnight camping trip with Mads this summer. Just one night, and close enough to home that we can pack up and leave at 3am if things go bad.

F is of course near giddy at the warm and fuzzy prospect of campfire bedtime stories and lakeside fishing lessons (though I’d like to point out that he returns from his boys’ fishing trip each year with not much more than a really bad hangover). While I can't wait for the days of family camping trips, right now all I can think about are the logistics of changing a poopy diaper knee deep in dirt and mosquitoes. And then there is the whole sharing-a-tent-with-a-two-year-old thing. I can’t begin to wrap my head around how that works.

Tent_city_6Anyways, I’m slaving away over a hot meal of Kraft Dinner, peas and ketchup last night when in comes F from the shed with the tent in tow. Brushing away my repeated question of, “You’re not actually setting that up, are you?” he proceeds to do just that. Smack dab in the middle of the living room. Thankfully he stopped short of hammering the pegs into the hardwood, instead it’s secured to the floor with masses of green painter’s tape. As you can see. (And yes, the balloons in the corner are from her birthday party 6 weeks ago.)

Of course Mads was out of her mind with happiness. In the tent, out of the tent, in, out, in, out, in, out. She corralled the dog in there, hosted a tea party for all of her many stuffed and plastic Doras, read teddy bear a bedtime story. I kid you not, from her plastic Easter egg collection to all of the letters from her magnetic alphabet on the fridge, just about everything she owns ended up in that tent by the end of the night. She sprinted around the house gathering her “stuff” and yelling, “Mommy? Daddy? TENT!” I’m surprised she didn’t fall down unconscious from the sheer panicked joy of it all.

Cut to this morning when she is up too early – yes, again – and demanding some tent time. I went into her room to try to convince her it was actually still sleep time but she wasn’t buying it. “Knock knock door! Knock knock door!” she wailed, pointing towards the living room. That’s her way of asking us to open the door so she can get the hell out of Dodge. Or is this case, her crib. Although, from the looks of things it won’t be too much longer until she’s able to do that herself! When I went in to her room I caught her with a leg on the railing trying to launch herself overboard. Help me, Rhonda. My worst nightmare. But that is a battle for another day. Back to the tent.

When I wished F luck in trying to take the now beloved tent down tonight he predictably said, “Well, we can leave it up for a few more days.” So we'll just have to wait and see if that means a few more days, or a few more years.

Funny how having a tent pitched in your living room makes you yearn for the days of tripping over Hot Wheels and Little People.

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May 12, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Happy Mother's Day!

I loved everyone's posts on the the news of Mads' first sentence, thanks for the congrats and words of warning (mama's diaper?!). Kelsy, honest to god, if wine has a cork in it we save it for guests and special occasions. Welcome to the world of the 3L box o' wine!

Mother_duckie_2 So... this is it, ladies! Our big weekend. Have you been showered with diamonds? Whisked away for a romantic dinner a deux in Paris? Spent hours lounging with cucumber slices on your freshly botoxed eyes?

Sorry, I'm getting carried away.

I have my Mother's Day all mapped out. Wake up, drink coffee. Brush my hair - crazy, I know. But what the hell, I've earned it. Don't do dishes. Don't do laundry. Go for a walk. Eat chocolate, calories be damned. I can't wait!

Happy Mother's Day to all of us - may it be tantrum free and full of gratitude and positive attitudes. We can always hope! The ups, the downs, and every space of no man's land in between - I'm thankful to have you all to go through it with in some small way. And to Mads, who spent much of the morning in tears over... oh, let's face it, I have no idea; I couldn't imagine a day without her.

I may have posted this in the past, I can't remember. But it's worth sharing again. It's worth sharing a hundred times.

Have a wonderful weekend!

May 9, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

And we have our first sentence...

Mads_bday_2 That’s right, we have a sentence!

It’s only 3 words, but I think has all the necessary components: Noun, verb… what else is there? The specific details of grammar have always eluded me.

In any case, I’m counting it. So, are you ready? Are you sitting down? Here it is…

“Go away, Mommy!”

Go. Away. Mommy. It’s heartwarming, right?

She first said it on the weekend and since then I guess she’s been working on perfecting her diction because I hear it all the time.

To her credit, she says it very sweetly, staring up at me from under her endless lashes and even pointing me in the right direction – namely, towards the nearest door.

Just last night she was pleading for dessert after making a thorough mess of her grilled cheese, so I plopped a cupcake in front of her (no, not homemade). Cupcakes are her very favourite. Next thing I know she’s shooing me into the living room with her little fingers. “Go away, Mommy! Bye bye!” As though she didn’t think I could be trusted around baked goods. She may have had a point, but still.

Don’t get me wrong, I am very happy about the developing vocabulary, but I guess I had envisioned a slightly different first sentence… “I’m so thankful for all that you do, Mommy” or ”That shade of green really brings out your eyes, Mommy.” But I guess “Go away” has its own certain charm.

Now I’m a bit apprehensive to hear what the first question will be. I’d guess that “Can I borrow the car, Mommy?” and “Why are you the only Mommy that buys wine by the box?” are vying for top spot.

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May 7, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

I love you forever... but go home already!

Busy, busy weekend. I was at my friend's baby shower on Sunday – and if it seems like I am saying that a lot these days, that’s because I am. So many babies!

MunschAnyways, the mom-to-be got tons of great necessities: Bouncy chairs, bottles (glass, clearly, not the poisonous plastic deathtraps I used for poor Mads), Bumbos, bibs. Endless. It is amazing the amount of stuff that someone under 10lbs requires.

And of course books. Who doesn’t love kids’ books? At one point a copy of Love You Forever was being passed around the room and I kid you not, women were sobbing. Tears and everything. That book really does tug on the heartstrings. We have it on our bookshelf, and I admit that even I have had a quivering lip and a lump in my throat after reading it.

But in all honesty, am I the only one who finds it just a tad bit creepy? When the mom is rocking and singing to the baby, it’s sweet. The toddler, adorable. The kid, sure, that’s cute, too. The teenager, it starts to get kind of weird, but I can go with it. But when she’s sneaking into her grown son’s house and dragging him out of bed to rock him? That’s plain creepy. She’s got to be the worst nightmare of every wife with an overbearing mother-in-law. Imagine the marital strife caused by that one? “Honey, for god’s sake, you’re an adult! Tell her you’ll call her tomorrow and come back to bed!”

Mads was at the shower too, and did great despite the fact that she was operating on no nap. I tried to put her down, but one of the other kids snuck in and tossed his toys in with her when he heard her crying. Which of course made her go crazy. I went in to see why she’d suddenly started screaming and there she was, standing in her pack n play losing her mind while the boy sat flipping through the channels on the TV. He told me he was trying to find The Wiggles on TV because he knew they made Mads happy. Sweet, eh? Not so sweet when she hit the wall at 5pm and was a monster till bedtime. But still, kids can just be so damn cute.

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May 5, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Today's time-out...

Nothing to do with my baby or yours, but what is up with all the odd celebrity pairings these days?

Mariah Carey and the drumline kid married? (With a second hand ring, no less!) Jennifer Aniston and John Mayer? Really? Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes?? Yeah, still not over that one. Apparently she is holed up in some Scientology hideout, probably receiving electroshock therapy or something. Normally I wouldn’t believe that, but Tom really does seem a bit out there.

Speaking of which, remember to tune in to his couch-abusing return to Oprah today… who am I kidding, I know you all TIVO Oprah anyways. :)

For old times' sake...

Have a happy weekend.

(ps – another not-too-early rising today!)

May 2, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Sweet dreams & playground screams

Countsheep I probably shouldn’t be typing this, because it is inevitable that as soon as I say that something is going right it goes to hell in a handbasket the very next day. But I’m so happy I have to share: Mads has been sleeping in! It’s only been a few days, but I am ecstatic. I don’t know if it was the evil sound machine, luck, or her deciding she missed her late mornings, but she is back to her wonderful sleeping ways. For now!

This is entirely typical of how things seem to go, at least according to my vast (ha!) experience. Here is the pattern in 10 easy steps:

Step 1: Problem arises
Step 2: I try to fix it
Step 3: Problem persists
Step 4: I read parenting books and start incessant Googling (“Toddler early wake-up HELP")
Step 5: Problem persists
Step 6: I panic
Step 7: Problem persists
Step 8: I give up
Step 9: Problem suddenly resolves itself
Step 10: Mads delights in how easy it is to get Mommy to run the wheel like a caged hamster

You’d think that recognizing this pattern would help me to break it. But no, sadly not.

So anyways, now that we’ve got that glorious news out of the way...

The other day Mads and I stopped at the playground on our way home from running errands. We weren’t in our usual 'hood, so I just pulled over at the first park I saw because my backseat driver was getting antsy.

She ran around, collecting rocks and cigarette butts (okay, she didn’t actually gather the butts, but she wanted to) and I exchanged pleasantries with a fellow mom. Mads climbed to the slide, this woman and I looking on, and before I know it my poor monkey is down the slide, flying through the air, and lying stunned flat on her back on the ground. It was like the thing had been waxed for some extreme toddler sliding competition.

I ran over and picked her sobbing self up off the dirt and then my co-mom comes over and says, “Oh, that slide is always very fast, she's too little for that."

Awesome, thanks. But for future reference, I think that might fall under the category of “Things you could have told me 2 minutes ago.”

Mads is okay, though. As usual, her pride took the brunt of it.

Fingers crossed for another good sleep…

May 1, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Bambi vs Bratz

Tammy, if you're out there, after you said that your daughter loves Toy Story I went out and rented it for Mads. One more Fantasia viewing and I was going to lose my mind. Anyways, it was a hit, so thank you! Well, the popcorn was the big draw, as usual. But she’s been talking about dinosaurs, sharks and cowboys ever since, so I think she liked it. Oh, and Mr. Potato Head, which took a while to figure out because it sounds kind of like “Mido-Papo-Ted” when she says it.

Admittedly, there aren’t really any female characters, with the exception of Little Bo Peep who is kind of trampy, throwing herself at every toy with a plastic bulge between his legs. Thankfully she restrains herself from shoving her cleavage at the Etch-a-Sketch. It’s kind of sad when you can’t even trust your kid to a Disney movie. I don’t want poor Mads ending up on a therapist’s couch 20 years from now tracing all of her troubles back to the obvious self-esteem issues of poor, enslaved, dependent Cinderella.

Bratz

But I have to say, pseudo-misogyny and all, I’ll take Bambi over the Bratz dolls any day. I realize that Barbie has some questionable attributes, but at least she has the good sense to mask them under the guise of an all-American image. She may have spent too much time in the backseat of Ken’s hot rod when I was growing up, but she did have a career (sometimes) and clothes that covered her (for the most part). The Bratz wear more make-up than they do clothes, and come accessorized with boom boxes and thigh high boots. And then there are the Bratz Babyz: Newborns with weaves and barely there onesies and bottles of formula (or is that expressed breast milk?) on giant chains around their necks. Don’t even get me started on them.

As a mom, I try to never say never because so many of the things I used to say never to I now do (like feed my 2-year-old Goldfish and turkey dogs while she watches her third episode of The Wiggles that day). But I will go on record as saying that there will never be Bratz in our house. That’s one I’ll go to battle over.

Dora is looking better and better. She’s bilingual, she can read a map, she heaves around a backpack full of all sorts of crap all day long so you know she’s got decent upper body strength. As far as role models go, I guess we could do worse.

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April 28, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Disney's dark side

FantasiaI’m going to take a day off from complaining about Maddie’s early risings. Not because they’ve stopped - they haven’t. But I’m now trying to pretend it’s not happening. When all else fails – curtains, sound machines, bedtime manipulation, begging, bribery - you can always count on good old denial.

So we’ve started a fun new family tradition: Movie night!

Every Saturday after Maddie’s dinner (which these days consists of three pieces of pasta, a bite of chicken, five peas and a whole lot of ketchup), we make a bowl of popcorn, turn off the lights, and get comfy on the couch to watch a movie. The popcorn is key to this activity. Without the popcorn, she would probably be turning the light on and off a hundred times and yelling at us to get “Up!” But give the kid a bowl of popcorn and she is content.

We’ve been having movie night for the past few weeks, but we’re still on the same flick – Fantasia – because she’s obsessed. It really is a great movie, I remember watching it endlessly with my grandma when I was a kid. But somehow seeing it as an adult is a slightly more disturbing experience.

If you’ve seen it, you’ll remember the part where Mickey Mouse and his friend the animated broom are carting buckets of water from the well down into the basement. I’m assuming it is the basement of some castle since Mickey seems to be a magician’s apprentice. I’m not entirely sure, Walt was a little sketchy on the details.

Anyways, Mads is loving Mickey and we’re telling her, “Oh look, there’s Mickey’s friend Mr. Broom! What a good friend he is, see him helping Mickey? What a nice broom. Mickey loves Mr. Broom, see Mads?”

Here’s where things take a surprising and pretty brutal turn. “And now look, Mickey is…. Wait... Mickey! What are you doing, Mickey! For the love of god, stop!” As Mickey picks up an axe and retreats to the shadows to viciously hack poor Mr. Broom into splinters as the music reaches a crescendo. WTF, Mickey? It's like Hitchcock meets Disney. Try explaining that to a 2-year-old.

Thankfully Mads doesn’t ask for an explanation, the fact that Mickey is a savage axe murderer doesn't seem to phase her. But F and I have been left traumatized. I’m afraid Disneyland will never be quite the same.

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April 24, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Just an update...

Today she woke up 2.5 hours early. Awesome.

I might seriously consider running away if only I had the energy to pack. Or to run.

I've heard from a few of you going through similarly painful sleep problems these days. It's nice to know that I'm not the only one up at the crack of dawn with a wailing kid, mounting frustration, and a strong pot of coffee. I'll be thinking of you all tomorrow! Good luck, comrades.

April 22, 2008 | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

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