baffled by the book

dear world,

i will do a proper holiday celebration post here pretty soon. today, i simply have to vent about one of the most ridiculous children’s books to enter our home. i did not buy it. it was received by my oldest daughter as a gift.

allow me to introduce you to hernando fandango, the great dancing dog! by rachel swirles.

at fist glance, it’s really no worse than some of the other randomly published children’s books we have encountered. but then, i read on. here’s my beef:

it’s like reading a book with no basis in reality. what on earth is a pajama-case dog? doesn’t this need some minor explanation in order to feature so prominently in the plot line? seriously, i’m pretty well read and i’ve never head of a pajama-case dog.

the rhymes are really reaching: “chances” rhymes with “dancers” twice. once, i could forgive, but twice? and she also rhymed “paw” with “floor”. again, forgivable on it’s own, but combined with the rest, it’s just terrible.

but, you  know what? i read it with gusto. i read it with excitement and a tone of “this is the way it should be” because ultimately my girls both enjoy the story. at the end of the day, if a story speaks to my girls, i will continue to read it over and over and over again. whether i like it or not.

feeling fairly unimpressed,

cm

feeling like a good mom

dear world,

today i stayed home with V. yesterday when i picked her up from school, she was literally laying on the floor. the after-school care program teacher said she thought V was really tired. we took her temperature when we got home and it was over 101. 

today, she mostly watched tv. and to be fair, while we don’t usually let her watch much on the television, all i want to do when i’m sick is watch tv. i thought to myself, oh! i’ll get so much done, but she could barely hold her head up. i ended up sitting next to her most of the day. she finally started to perk up around 3pm.

at long last, the tv went on break. no more programs for at least an hour. she couldn’t decide what to do. painting? all the paints are on the sunporch and they’re frozen. play dough? frozen. something else? frozen. then she asked, well can’t we just make play dough? 

actually, yes.

fortunately, we had everything we needed to make play dough. specifically, purple play dough. we used the recipe found here and while ours didn’t look quite as awesome as hers, it certainly worked.

credit: thefabulousmomsguide.com

i substituted arrowroot for cream of tartar and i didn’t read all of the directions beforehand so rather than add water a little at a time, i dumped the whole cup in at once. this is not advisable. i had to add flour to thicken it up so it would stop sticking to my hands like glue. once we reached the proper flour ratio, i set her up with some cookie cutters and she went to town.

i feel like i totally nailed being a mom today. i managed to soothe my sick child and create play dough out of thin air (and flour and water and salt, etc). 

and both kids were asleep by 8:05pm. 

living the dream,

cm

french toast, for the win

dear world,

this past weekend, i asked my husband to pick up a load of the really nice bread from the local bakery so i could make french toast for the girls. but, it turns out they wanted pancakes instead. which is fine. to be fair, this is what they were supposed to look like. mine were a little droopier. but they tasted awesome!

photo credit: post punk kitchen

however, i had this load of really nice bread just sitting there getting stale. so, rather than totally waste it, i made french toast last night after they went to bed and popped it in the fridge so they could have it this morning. apparently, it was a hit. every once in a while, i feel like a nail this mom thing.

for the win,

cm

the morning struggle to get out the door

dear world,

i saw this image on facebook the other day and thought, i can relate to that. we have a limited amount of time in the mornings to get up and have breakfast. the girls wake up around 6:45am and we leave the house around 7:45am to make 2 drop offs at 2 different schools and then i barely have enough time to make it to work.

this morning, N just fell to pieces. she normally wakes up super happy and runs into the bathroom to go potty on her pink potty. then we wash hands, get dressed and wake up V. not so this morning.

first, she didn’t want to wear pants. well, pants are not optional. you have to wear pants.

then, she didn’t want to go potty. not a big deal except she just cried and cried and cried. “no pants! no pants, mommy! no pull up, no pull up. different pull up”. finally, i *literally* wrestled her into a pull up and a pair of purple leggings which led to more crying. “no pants, no pants…”

eventually, we found two additional pull ups, tried each of them on until she found one that met her expectations. we went back to her room and she chose a hello kitty skirt. she calmly let me help her put it on no problem and the tears instantly dried up.

amazing,

cm

i know it’s a phase, but that doesn’t make it better

dear world,

with both kids in new schools, our routines have shifted utterly and completely. N cried every morning for a week when we dropped her off at school and now she’s fine. i get a wave and maybe a hug and off she goes playing with her friends.

V is doing so great in kindergarten, but still struggling with choosing to do something she doesn’t want to do. i read somewhere that kids only have so many minutes of good behavior per day and in all honesty, i’m glad she spends them at school, but it can make for some messy home times.

we had a terrible settle down last night. she yelled, she kicked, she screamed at the top of her lungs. mostly because it was time to go potty and brush teeth before reading books and bed. but she just couldn’t. her little body and mind were so overtired that she fell to pieces. finally, after she eventually calmed down, i told her how much i like spending time with her and how much i would prefer to spend time with her when she felt happy and acted nicely  instead of yelling and kicking and screaming. i’m sure some of this is a desire for attention, but the presentation is really awful.

and then, to top it all off, i thought i’d pick her up from school today instead of having her go to the aftercare and spend some one on one time together. and after she fell out, she finally told me that she’d rather go to y-club and play for a while.

it’s a deal.

i know it’s a phase. i know it will pass. i feel utterly resigned to waiting her out each night for the next however many nights until she works through this. i hope it passes quickly. this sounds terribly morose and in fairness to V, i should also mention how amazing it is to watch her play school with N every evening after dinner. they have centers and take field trips and do art. it’s fantastic to see her parrot her teacher like this. and then it shifts out of pretend and real life is a bummer sometimes. i mean really, who wants to quit playing and go to sleep?

waiting it out,

cm

travel strategy

dear world,

i am travelling for work at the moment. i realized i haven’t flown in a while when i had the option to use my phone as my boarding pass. it was amazing. i didn’t have to go to kiosk to print anything. i just scanned my phone. i feel so out of touch for not knowing this is how we do things now.

yesterday, i got up at 4:45am to get ready and make it to the airport for my flight to chicago. since i’m only here for one overnight, i packed light. my strategy involved choosing (comfortable) pants with pockets, one pair of shoes that match both outfits i brought and remembering to bring my inside sweater. total success.

now, i must find a special treat for each person in my family. V expressed quite specifically her excitement about having 1 present for her, 1 for N and 1 for M. you mean we don’t have to share? to be fair, i wanted her to go to sleep so i committed. but, my meeting starts at 10:30am this morning so i’ll be bringing treats from o’hare. no time to stop at the toy store downtown. she’ll never know.

red lentil cake

i took myself out to dinner last night. it felt a little awkward as i was the only person there dining alone, but i had an excellent meal. i went to sable which is all small plates. i started with truffled deviled eggs which it turns out i don’t actually like. then, i had 2 spicy scallops and i thought i would have risotto to finish, but they couldn’t take out the dairy. the server suggested a red lentil cake. i took 2 bites, but it had too much cinnamon in it and the server offered to take it back. i ended up having house-made honeydew-lime sorbet. so good.

i wore a dress. i took a cab. i made my own little night of it. and none of my clothes were any worse for wear after having spent the day in my bag. travel strategy success!

best of all, i woke up early to be able to talk to the girls on facetime this morning. i’m going to get back after bedtime tonight so i won’t get to see them until tomorrow morning.

missing my girls,

cm

my morning commute

dear world,

i realized on my drive in this morning how much i miss splitting my commute. before we moved, before the summer, i would pile the girls in the car, listen to children’s music (their choice) and have random silly conversations on the way to school. i would drop them off and drive the last 5 minutes by myself listening to the news.

now, it’s so quiet.

from the new house, it takes about 14-20 minutes to get to work depending on the traffic. as i sat in my car, surrounded by other cars, with one ear on the news story, i realized what was missing. i miss the chatter. i miss the singing along. i miss the questions about whatever it is that we’re looking at. i miss pointing out the flowers and trucks and trains and airplanes in the sky.

even after school starts again this fall, V’s kindergarten is 2 minutes from the house and N’s daycare is 2 minutes the other way. then, my commute looms ahead of me.

to be clear, there are morning when i will revel in the 20 minutes of alone time, but that didn’t happen today. loving my ladies,

cm

nervous laughter

dear world,

whenever V is being very bad or feeling very nervous or unsure or just sassy, she busts out in this high pitched, uncontrolled nervous laughter.

we are moving tomorrow and tonight is out last night in this house. last night, she fought bedtime for 2 hours including nervous laughter as well as much jumping on the bed among other poor bedtime choices. i can’t decide if she’s actually nervous and unsettled about the changes or if she’s making a choice to be naughty.

either one is perfectly plausible and equally abrasive. i’m unsettled. i didn’t sleep well last night and woke up realizing all the stuff we hadn’t packed to bring with us for our bagel blanket picnic this morning (including toilet paper!). i know it must be hard for a little person to sort through all this chaos, but as a grown up person who’s sorting through the same chaos, nervous laughter as the cherry on the sundae isn’t really helping.

feeling uneasy,

cm

ps- i should say that i love our new house and can’t wait to get to know our new neighborhood. it’s the transition that’s a bitch.

V is 5

dear world,

V is 5. starting this past monday, we did a little birthday surprise for her everyday after school leading up to the big day on friday. nothing big, but a little something to make the week special. monday, i got her a little potted hibiscus, tuesday she got to eat wendy’s for dinner, wednesday i used duct tape to cover a gatorade bottle and make it into a watering can for her flowers, thursday we went and bought summer sandals and friday we did a pre-school something special.

we registered V for kindergarten. and she was articulate and social and smart and sweet. exactly the little girl i imagine her to be when i’m not around. she showed off the best version of her lovely 5 year old self. she felt so proud to be starting kindergarten in the fall. and i am proud of her.

saturday we held a birthday party at the playground and about 15 friends came and celebrated with her. they mostly banged around on the play equipement and then it was time for cake. mind you, we held the party at 10am so cake at 11am may be a little out of the ordinary, but here we are. we gathered up the kids, sat them around the picnic table and that’s when i realized i forgot the birthday candle.

V was such a good sport. we all sang happy birthday and she literally blew out a pretend candle. they had cake and off they went. at least i only forgot the candle and not the actual cake or something obvious.

loving my little (big) girl,

cm

happy birthday mom!

dear world,

today is my birthday. we went out for a lovely brunch, made the obligatory trip to target for diapers, wipes, etc., and then i went out for a massage this afternoon. not too shabby. all day, V kept wishing me happy birthday and then helpfully reminding me that her birthday is next. it was kind of sweet the first 30 times. after that, it got a little old.

my best moment today, though, happened right after dinner. yesterday, V and her friend helped me bake cupcakes and today, we made frosting and i put the icing on the cupcakes and V put on the sprinkles. then, we just as we finished eating, M brought in our cupcakes. he lit the (single) candle and he and V sang happy birthday to me. the candle mesmerized N. M sang with gusto and V belted it out with the biggest smile on her face, looking at me the whole time.

feeling loved,

cm