18 months

Dear KP,
At this point in our relationship, I have totally fallen head over heals in love with you.

You with your green eyes and funny dance and sassy words with fingers waging and arms always ready for hugging and little hands always reaching up to something you shouldn’t be reaching. You my dear are something else. I find myself taking in every ounce of you. Never wanting to look away for fear I might miss something.

You have stolen my heart. I love you so.

Mom

I guess I’m not getting my Christmas bonus this year

On the days we go to the gym, we ALWAYS have the following conversation, “Now, when mommy comes in to get you, what do I expect you to do?” Kids in angelic tandem, “Come right out and put on our shoes and coats.”

And today was no different. I asked the question. They responded. We went into the gym. I worked out. I came into the daycare to get them and PJ refused to get her shoes on. It’s not that she just doesn’t want to do it; she simply wants to watch the rest of the Dora the Explorer that she was so rudely ripped away from. None the less, we still need to leave.

After several failed attempts to redirect her to her shoes and away from the TV, I told her that the rest of us were ready and that we were going to start walking out the door. She turned to me and loudly proclaimed, “Mama, you goin in a time-out cause yous a snotty giyal. AND, (brow furrowed and finger waging back and forth at me) I don’t want you to be my mama anymore, I want someone else to be my mama!”

I told her that if that was indeed the case, she could go find that woman and have her make her lunch.

Heeeerrrrre Rufus, Rufus, Rufus

PJ has an unreasonable, ridiculous, violent and down right insane aversion to dogs. If she sees one from across the street she’ll go plumb crazy. She’ll start jumping up and down flailing her arms like she’s standing on a bed of hot coals and can’t get off and then will start in with begging and quickly move onto screaming some unintelligible voodoo spell at the dog. It’s a real sight to behold.

But over the past few weeks, PJ has mentioned that she now likes dogs. OK, small dogs. But it is progress non-the-less. And just two days ago she actually asked for a dog. Albeit, a small dog. And just yesterday she played with a dog, her very own dog. Her very own small dog that she made up in her mind, and she named her Rufus. Yes, her Rufus. She spent a couple hours throwing a bone (CT’s balled up socks) to Rufus, taking Rufus for a walk, feeding Rufus and putting Rufus’ collar on and off. Rufus even slept in her bed and kept her warm last night.

This evening we are invited over to The Bickerons for a campfire with the kids and their dogs. I can’t wait to see if Rufus will be joining us or if we will be dragging our hysterical, head spinning, fire spitting, dog hating little girl back home early.

Anyone want to place a bet?

Can you hear it?

Yeah, that’s it. The beating drums of the holidays fast approaching.

I wouldn’t call what I feel panic, but I definitely feel the jitters of the big race bell about to sound.

Between creating the lists and fulfilling the lists and the menus and the cookies and the wrappings and the photos for cards and the cards themselves and the giving of thanks and the giving of yourself and the wonderfulness of everything. My pledge is to take a step back, NOT panic, enjoy my family and hold onto every precious moment.

Starting right now!

Catholic guilt

Phone rings.

Hello.

This is The Father.

Hi Dad.

I was just wondering if you thought I was dead. Since you and your brother don’t call anymore.

You see…it really doesn’t matter to him that we spoke four days ago. If he doesn’t reign supreme in your thoughts on a daily basis he gets feisty or maybe crotchety would be a more fitting word.

Green tiles red walls

Saturday night I was lucky enough to be invited to a dinner party. This gathering consisted of six women, two of whom I knew and three of whom I did not.

As I walked into the house and met Meredith, I immediately knew I had met her before. So we went through the litany of ways we could have bumped into each other; college, high school, parks, gym, neighborhoods, neighbors, new houses, church (since we don’t go, that was never going to fly), friends, work, husbands. We kept trying but kept coming up empty handed and all that even before I had downed my first drink.

The wine kept coming and I almost felt like a stalker in the room. I sat there and stared and stared at her. I couldn’t figure it out and now it was driving me crazy. The way she talked, her mannerisms, her daughter, it all seemed so familiar I knew I had spoken with her before.

At the dinner table the conversation turned to pregnancies. All the women present had children, fifteen amongst the six of us in fact and another due in less than a month. The pregnancy discussion went full circle and ended on bed rest stories. I was telling my tale of 10 weeks of bed rest with CT and how we had to move in with my in-laws because or cute little English Tudor house had only one bathroom and it was on the upper level with the bedrooms and I couldn’t take the stairs up and down to watch TV, make food, or go to the bathroom.

At that point in the story, Meredith says, “I know this is so random, but what color was the tile in your bathroom?”

“Green.”

“With red walls?”

“Yes.”

“AAAAhhhhhaaaaaaa, you were selling your house and I walked through it.”

Three years ago, when we put our house on the market, she and her husband and her daughter came to look at the house. My kids were sleeping, so I told the realtor that I would not wake my sleeping babies but they could come look and I would hang out in the back yard. And in the back yard Meredith and I had a lengthy conversation about the house and the neighborhood and kids.

How “random” is right. How small of a world we live in. How lucky that I got another chance to meet Meredith, she’s way cool…even though she didn’t buy my house.

Strategies for Dealing with Challenging Behaviors

Last week I attended a parenting class, see title above. As I tried to leave the house, I was attacked by three little people pulling on me, tears in their eyes, telling me not to leave and saying things like: why do you have to go, stay with us, you always leave, it’s not fair, I’m mad.

I looked at all of them, pulled the smallest one off of me, sat him on the floor and calmly told them that I was going to a class and that the class was going to make me a better mommy.

The next morning, as we were awaiting our “fun buddies” or playdates to arrive, CT said, “that class did teach you to be a better mom?” “How so?” I said. “You’re not doing anything mean.”

I told him not to worry and that the beatings would commence shortly.

A week of doo with sprinkles on top

This week has sucked out loud, OUT LOUD! Maybe it’s me. Maybe it’s the kids. I usually blame the moon but it was full last week, so I guess I can’t use that one.

This week, we have hammered through one kid with strep throat, one kid with an ear infection and one kid with severe diarrhea and a bout of diaper rash the likes I have never before seen in my life. So, we have made it to the doctors office on three separate occasions this week alone and one of those visits was for a simple flu shot that turned into a scream fest wherein mom had to run down the hall to catch the hysterical 5 year old and then take him down for a five count so the nurse could needle him.

Today I am trying to play the “catch-up clean-up” game. You know, all those cleaning tasks that I was hoping to get done on the previous days of the week, but didn’t.

On my way down to the basement to get the bucket and mop, I decided I would help out our friendly felines by cleaning their cat litter. After scooping all the cat crap into a bag I headed up the stairs and straight out to the garbage can with it. As I headed back into the house I realized that there was a hole in the bag. This hole left a lovely trail of kitty poop crumbles down the hall, through the kitchen and up and down two flights of stairs.

Thank god my new replacement is coming at 4:00, so only two more hours to go until happy hour! Yeeeeehaw!

Daddy dun dat bully in

There’s a bully on the bus who seems to pick on all the Kindergarteners. I found this out through another mother, who asked if CT had said anything to me. That would be NO, and obviously the next thing I will be teaching him…TELL MOMMY EVERTHING! Anyway, that’s for another time.

I have done some interrogating of my son and also made a few calls to the school to rectify this situation. You see, the school has a policy of no “below the line” behavior and we defiantly have some of that going on.

Last night, while trick-or-treating, CT spotted the bully dressed in Power Ranger regalia. Then, he ran into him again at our neighborhood Halloween bon fire. He pointed him out to Adam. Adam determined that it was an inopportune time to discuss matters with this kid, seeing everyone was having so much fun that night.

As Adam was talking with the neighbors, he spotted the bully up in the tree house repeatedly punching Darth Vader in the chest. Adam flew up the tree house ladder, grabbed the kid by the arm, and read him the riot act. He made it abundantly clear that he’s not allowed to bully our kid or anyone else’s kid on the bus, in the neighborhood or anywhere else for that matter. And if he heard that he had, well…we now know who his mother is.