Conversations with a Toddler

Scene: Toddler looks forlornely at his plate of spaghetti as if it is Mount Everest and we just told him to climb without oxygen.

Him: All done! (Insert: Big, sweet smile.)

Us: Okay, but no snacks, no cupcake and no jelly beans.

Him: No cupcake? No snacks? No beans?

Us: No. If you don't eat your dinner, there are no treats. And we might eat a cupcake in front of you. (Don't judge us, we hate the "eat your dinner fight" and have learned to have some fun with it.)

Him: I hold a cupcake?

Well played, little stinker. But, no. We're onto your game....

Motivation

I did a photo shoot a few days ago and I was not happy with the status of my arm jiggle. The photographer sweetly told me, "If you put your hand on your hip, it will pop your tricep out and it will look better."

My hand is on my hip in every picture.

I decided it was time to get myself back into a regular workout routine. My workout routine always seems to falter during wedding season. In addition to that, my husband's schedule hasn't been sane since he entered a political career. So, I'm back to doing yoga once a week and calling it good.

That was, until I saw my arm jiggle.

I marched into my room, got $50 out of my unmentionables drawer and gave it to my husband. "If I don't work out 4 days a week for a month, go spend this."

It worked. I want my $50 back and I don't want him to spend it on something annoying like an Aggies jersey. I got a week reprive due to sickness, but I'm hitting it hard again tomorrow. Me and my personal trainer, of course:

Mooched Mommy Idea #12

This concept comes from the Mother of all wisdom....my very own mother. Ever since I became a Mommy, I have the urge to call her everyday and apologize for taking her for granted, being a drama queen and my phase of thinking I was smarter.

If you have ever spent time with me and my sister, you've probably heard my Mom's discipline stories; she was famous for her creativity. Her philosophy, which is the subject of my mooching today, was "make it harder on them than it is on you." Essentially, make discipline swift and strong; making the consequences harder on the child than on the parent.

Allow me some examples:

-In 6th grade, she made me mad at the busstop. In a show of great indepenence, I slammed the door on her and stomped on the bus. Little did I know she got out of the car, (not at maximum cuteness, I might add), and followed me on the bus. The bus went silent. "You go shut the door correctly young lady." I did as she requested, and never slammed another door on her again. I still have nightmares about the silent bus.

-When my sis was in 5th grade, she kept "forgetting" to do her portion of the dishes. Mom's solution? Amy had to carry clean dishes in a sack all evening...even when she went to the neighbor's house to play. Mom even called the neighbor to ensure that my sis was carrying her dishes. Amy never forgot her dishes again.

-She told us that if we ever cut class in high school, she would escort us to all of our classes the next day. We were smart enough never to test her.

-If we were disrespectful or rudely disobedient, she would wake us up 30 minutes early to write sentences. Mom's sentences were a paragraph each. If we were really bad, she would throw in a loooooong scripture.

-If all else failed, we had to pull weeds. In the hot, Oklahoma heat. During morning cartoons. That fixed our attitude faster than anything.

She became so much cooler once we were adults...

Scenes from a Marriage III

Setting: Cheesecake Factory

Me: I want to look at the cheesecake menu and decide what I want.

Him: Aren't we sharing?

Me: Why can't I have my own?

Him: You can, but they're really big.

Me: Why won't you buy me a cheesecake? Do I not deserve my own?

Him: Whaaa??

Me: You think I'm fat, don't you?

Him: I'm done talking.

Preschool and My Poor, Broken Heart

My baby started preschool today.

When did this guy become ready for freaking preschool:



I spent the morning carefully packing his school lunch, nap mat, blankie and bag. I spent more time obsessing about how he would handle it. Would he cry for me? Would he adjust well? Would he make friends? Is he ready for this? What if someone tries to sell him drugs? Why am I a freak?

You know, the usual questions.

Like so many mommies before me, I cried when I left him in his class. I went straight to Wal-Mart and bought him a fancy lunch sack with a football on it. Cause apparently that's important and he didn't have one.

I spent my 5 hours alone catching up on housework, working on weddings, obsessively checking my phone and calling my Mom to obsess a little more. Then it hit me, I have no idea what to do with myself.

Perhaps I should work on that.

5 hours later, I was the first Mom there to pick up their kid. I wasn't even embarrassed. With much apprehension, I walked to his room and held out my arms. He ran to me, jumped in my arms and declared, "PWEEschool is fun!"

And then we went for icecream to celebrate that we both survived.

Mooched Mommy Idea #11

This one comes from my parenting guru: Aunt Molly. Seriously, go hang with any of her 4 kids and you will know how awesome she is. I'm currently trying to steal one of them, hire the other, and have to wait for the other 2 to graduate before I have all 4 in Tulsa. (insert: evil laugh)

Anywhoo, one of the things that she told me that stuck was: say "yes" as much as you can, and they will include you in their plans. If you say "no" all of the time, they do it anyway behind your back.

I catch myself saying "NO!" all day. It is becoming an act of will to say "yes" more than I say "no." If I'm being totally honest, I usually tell him "no" because it's more convenient for me. Saying "yes" means that there will probably be a bigger mess, more noise and a big chance for embarrassment.

So, here's to saying and enthusiastic "YES!" to big freaking messes and not wincing when he eventually pulls my couch cushions and mattresses out on the lawn to jump off the roof.



*I need to ask Aunt Molly if she had a secret margarita machine to get through parenthood.

Permanent

Why didn't someone tell me that tattoos are really permanent? (Besides my mother, who fell to her knees and wept when she realized that I did, in fact, go with my boyfriend to the tattoo parlor and get inked.)

I still feel really bad about that.

A 20-year-old has no concept of "never coming off." At that age, I knew everything and nothing at all; a dangerous thing. I thought the lily, and later the butterfly, were awesome and indicative of where I was in life. So deep and meaningful, I'm sure.

And now the darn things won't come off.

My wedding day, a formal dinner, a trip to the beach....anytime I show my feet or shoulders, there they are. Mocking me.

I've been too chicken to have them removed, I hear it is more painful than childbirth; I barely made it out of that.

I changed my mind after the precious girls in my Sunday School class all insisted I give them "butterfly tattoos like Miss Sara!" All 6 of them went home from Sunday School that day with a Moses color sheet and a purple butterfly and a stern warning from Miss Sara that only silly girls get real tattoos.

This silly girl knows from personal experience.

Mooched Mommy Idea #10

This mooched mommy idea comes from my good friend, Brad Pitt.

One evening, while we were all hanging out at my house, we started swapping parenting advice. Also, Angelina had an action movie coming up and she wanted some of my personal training tips.

Or, I was reading People magazine. Whatever. Anyway, he said that his best parenting advice is to give his kids a 5 minute warning when it's time to clean-up, switch activities or go somewhere. It struck me as good advice at the time, so I filed it away.

Recently, I've had to pull it out of the file as my little pumpkin poo doesn't like to switch gears as fast as I need him to. It usually looks like this:

Me: Let's go!

Him: NOOOOOOOOOO! NO GO MOMMY!

Me: Let's go, now!

Him: (Closes his eyes so that he can't see me or throws himself on the floor in a great protest.)

Now, thanks to my friend Brad, I know to give him a 5 minute warning so that he can start winding down. It works. He knows his activity is coming to an end, and he'll be moving on soon.

I need to have Brad and Angelina over more often.