For an update on Laylee, check out [parenting.com].
Family Time
A Couple of New Posts
I’ve written a guest post over at my friend Damomma’s place. She’s the new mother of a 3rd baby and this is my version of taking over a casserole. It’s a puke-casserole, but I hope it helps her out in some way.
I’ve also got a new post up at Parenting about the sweeter side of the motherhood gig. It’s 600 words about how I can’t put into words what I want to say. You won’t want to miss that. [click here to read more]
Tip Tuesday — Date Night Ideas
Dan and I have been dating a lot lately. It’s like being back in high school but I go out with the same guy every time and at the end of the night, he watches me brush my teeth and put on my muumuu. If he’s lucky, I also brush my teeth before the date and don’t put on the muumuu until after.
Dinner and/or a movie has been working well for us for months but we’re read to branch out and I’d love your suggestions. What are some fun date activities you enjoy with your shmoop?
I’ll give a couple.
Go to an arcade and play like you were little kids. Chuck E Cheese would even work for this. Sometimes it’s fun to go to places you normally take your kids but without them. You can actually enjoy yourself instead of following them around taking pictures and watching them have fun. That can be good too but sometimes it’s fun to enjoy yourself without worrying about who that weird creepy adult guy is crawling around in the tunnel maze with your 3-year-old.
Spend some time at a bookstore, browsing new sections and reading together. Dan and I had to stop reading a particular book last time we did this because we were laughing so hard we were worried we’d get kicked out and Dan was embarrassed by his own laughing man-tears.
Go kayaking in the Puget Sound… or other substandard body of water closer to where you live. We’ve done this once and it was a blast. Hopefully when the kids are older we’ll have the time and money to do this more often.
Okay, now you go. Tell me what we should do for our next night (or day) out.
Track Camp is a Better Mom Than Me
Track camp is really the only reason I can hold my head high at the end of a wasted spring break.
[Read the post at Parenting.com]
Cereal Prizes are Making a Comeback
I grew up with prizes in my cereal. There weren’t prizes in EVERY box of cereal but frequently we would rush to open a new box that promised some nugget of disposable plastic fun and goodness. I tend to believe that most boxes of “kid” cereal did contain a prize in each box. I don’t really know because my mom preferred nutrition over the allure of artificial color, flavor and roof-of-mouth-scratching sugar-coated-glee.
Read about our experiences with the comeback of breakfast cereal prizes [at Parenting.com].
It’s Not a Fever if You Don’t Take her Temperature
I’m still pretty sick. Laylee’s been home sick for 3 days. Dan’s home sick. It’s not fun but everything passes, right? At Parenting today I’ve written about how I let my ick and frustration almost take over my parental decision-making skills. Pretty scary.
Calling All Sports Fans
Do your kids participate in competitive sports? How in the world do you cope with it. Recent experience has shown me that I can. not. handle the pressure of watching my loved ones play in sporting events where there’s a chance they might lose. I’ve written about it at Parenting and I’d love for you to come and share your experience, stories or possible advice. Because I need to chill way the heck out.
It’s In the Spin
I’d gotten up the gumption to tidy the kitchen, sweep the floors and even eat some food. These gumptionful actions sent me straight to the couch where I was contemplating a long term stay. I had both phones next to me, my laptop on top of where it’s supposed to go as per its creative name. I was wasting time on Facebook.
Laylee and Magoo walked into the room looking somber.
“Mom,” she began, “I decided it would be better to just tell you the truth.”
“Yeah,” piped in Igor, shaking his head but standing boldly at her right shoulder.
“Just tell me what happened.”
“Well, I was getting out the cheese,” she said, holding up a 2lb babyloaf of Tillamook, “And the salsa fell down.”
“Yeah,” her henchman echoed, trying to look sober but actually looking super-glad he wasn’t to blame. “And broke.” “With glass.”
I looked up at her. I’d just cleaned the kitchen floor for the first time in weeks and now I was recovering, only to be told that the little filth-mongers who are my children have just shattered a bottle of salsa on the floor.
How do you respond to someone who says, “I decided it would be better to tell you the truth”?
Do you freak out and tell them by your actions, “You probably should have lied because I am Ticked OFF!”?
No. You remain calm. You roll off the couch and you clean up the salsa and glass off the floor. You thank them for telling the truth. Maybe you passive-aggressively remind them that you just finished cleaning the floor and ask them to be more careful.
When they spin it like that, you don’t have much choice. I think they know this. It’s all part of the plan.
Laylee’s Take on Work/Family Relations
Sometimes her play mirrors reality and sometimes it more closely resembles reality as she wishes it would be. Other times I have no idea where her playtime dialogue and drama comes from, like when she plays a mom who is a raving lunatic, completely controlling of her children and yelling at them in a crazy German accent. I have never used a German accent so I see this type of play as pure imagination run amok.
[read more]
Daring Young Mom’s Fertility Guide
1. Buy a new belt.
2. Join Weight Watchers.
3. Buy the most expensive theater tickets you’ve ever purchased in your life for a show that’s coming to town in nine months.
Do all these things and you’ll have a positive pregnancy test in less than 2 weeks. I guarantee it.