Yesterday, I asked him to go to time out and HE WENT.  And stayed there.

I told him no bath until he at his green beans, and he ATE THEM.

I think we're making progress. 

On a side note, does he look like Brangelina's older baby girl here to anyone?  I thought so.  (I think it's the swollen Angelina mouth from the sunburn.)

Hot dog, I love that smile. 

Hot dog, hot dog, hot diggety dog...  (He loves that Mickey Mouse Song.)  He also loves the Thomas song and rides his Thomas car around the house humming hm hm hm hm- hmhmhm, hm hm hm hm- hmhmhm...

This morning he picked up a small plastic bag from my jewelry box that had blue buttons in it. 

Those are buttons, I said.

He tried to open them.  Candy, he said.

No, they're for your clothes, see, (I held them to my shirt.)

Oh, maaan, he said.

Okay, I know I said we were leaving the dunes last post, so let's leave already.

We will have to come back once more for Evan, (I'm just warning you now, you're not clear out of the dunes yet.)

Like any other two year old boy, he hated the chair.

Why, oh WHY would I make him sit on a sinking green chair when there is so much wide-open space to run in? 

Oh the injustice!  The inhumanity!

But he doesn't understand that THIS...

is very difficult to keep in focus.

Freedom makes him happy.  So I treat him like any other client and suck it up, I do what makes him happy.

And happy is good.  So what if my quads hurt from running in a bent stoop to catch this.

I do it for other kids all year long, why not do it for him?

THIS frozen moment makes it all worth it; totally worth feeling like I actually went to a gym and did the stair master. 

And I guess can make that sacrifice.  

Labels: baby, beach, boys will be boys, conversation, Jack, national lampoon family vacations, photography, pics, summer

Doo, doo, doo, doodoo, doo, doo, doo-

Today was the first day I haven't worked in I think about, oh, a year and a half.  Yes, that sounds accurate.  And we made the most of it.  We were going to play with all our new bubble contraptions and swim but it rained and poured and looked like 8pm all day outside, so instead we switched gears and had a baking day.  We made Kentucky Butter Cake, Banana Bread, and Pimento Cheese.  I cooked more today than I have in... oh, about a year and a half. 

Yes, that sounds accurate.

I also did laundry.  And cleaned up pee.  And played Barbie Dolls. 

My mom found Madalyn a photographer Barbie, complete with three children, a camera, and backdrops.  So basically, I did work today.  Only I photographed 3 inch plastic babies with a fake 1/2 inch camera and there are no pictures to edit.

Shaun's boss is sick in the hospital and he has taken on a heavy workload which means late nights, so the kids and I had a light dinner followed by Kentucky Butter Cake. Then they performed a complete Cinderella production for me in the living room. Charlie and I sat on a pillow and clapped like it was the most impressive acting we'd ever seen.  (Well I clapped, and he gnawed at my hands thinking it was a game meant for him,) but even with the gnawing, it's nice to have the warmth of a dog in your lap, like sitting by a warm fire.  Makes a house a home.

Then we read books in bed while Charlie barked because he wanted to be ON the bed right there with us.  He couldn't believe we wouldn't include him in the reading of The Best Nest, (it's his favorite.)  And it was such a perfect little evening.  We were the perfect family for a few hours.  But soon it was time for lights out, for Evan to go to his own room to sleep... for all hell to break loose... 

He and Madalyn have been sleeping in her bed together ALL summer.  It's exciting, you know, like Christmas Eve.  Well, I didn't want them to get too used to it (lest they forget how to sleep alone,) so last night I said they needed to have a night in their own beds.  Evan got all genius-manipulative on me, (as you've heard me lament about before.)  He asked me if I wanted him to be happy or mad because my decision would dictate his behavior and I had the power to make him happy... to which I replied: I don't care what you are so long as you obey me. 

But he kept at it and cried himself to sleep.  (That was last night.)

Tonight it was the same song, second verse.  He was "crying himself to sleep" when I took the dog out for his nightly romp in the grass.  It was dark and misty (rainy day here, remember,) and it was kind of an eery night.  About the time this observation registered in my mind, a sharp finger poked me in the back like a knife.  I turned abruptly to see Evan standing there, ready to go at it again.

Come on buddy, les go!  BRING IT!  (My brain has to put on her boxing gloves and jump back and forth, right and left, to get warmed up for the fight ahead or else I lose all cool and resort to "because I said so," which, for the record, I find nothing wrong with, but I feel like I have to get these moments with him mastered now or else high school is going to be something freaky for us all.)  EX-HALE....

"You scared me!  What are you doing out of your bed?  You're in trouble."  (I'm very good at stating the obvious.)

"Do you want me to cry all night?  See, it's going to be like last night.  I told you.  You just need to let me go in Madalyn's room and I will be so good you won't believe it.  I'm scared.  I'm alone."

"No.  Absolutely not.  You are not the parent.  You do not set the rules.  You are trying to parent me and you are out of line."  (I am reminding myself of this just as much as him... a pep talk, an I think I can, I think I can parenting moment.)

"Fine!  That's it.  Fine, because you know what I'm gonna do,"  (stomping to his room in front of me,) "I'm just going to throw a penny in the wishing well and wish you were a kid."  I hate for it to come to this, but you leave me no other choice.

"That's fine, Evan," I said casually, and letting down my guard knowing I was now winning the battle.

"Fine?  Why is that fine?"

"Because wishing wells aren't real."

"They're not?  Are you sure?"

"Yep."

"What about the one at the mall with all the pennies."

"Not real.  Just pretend."

"It is?"

"Yep."

(BIG SIGH OF EXASPERATION.)

"Well, I will not go to bed nicely till you let me sleep in Madalyn's room."

"Well, then you will never sleep in Madalyn's room again."

"I won't?"

"No.  Not until you can go to bed by yourself, nicely."

"I think I am SO ANGRY."

"That's okay.  You can be angry, but you can't be disrespectful.  You can be angry, but you have to obey me."

And then I tucked him into bed, hugged his tear-stained face and body while he sobbed and tried to catch his breath like a defeated solider who had fought long and hard.

It's hard to be angry with him when I hear myself in the whole conversation, a rebellious child refusing to listen to her Father.  It's also hard to be mad when every time I think of the wishing well statement, I suppress a laugh.  I am smiling right now as I type this, and I was laughing at it when I sat down to write this post:  Fine!  That's it.  Fine, I'm just going to throw a penny in the wishing well and wish you were a kid.  Because that WOULD END THIS THING- AND YOU FORGOT ABOUT THE WISHING WELL- I WIN- HOO-AH!

And wouldn't that be nice, indeed?  There are certainly people I've encountered who I would love to wish away on a penny.  One in particular right now.  Where do we humans get SUCH a sense of entitlement?  Could you answer that for me? 

Just that one question... and I will be so good you won't believe it...

Labels: conversation, dumbhead parenting, Evan, parenthood, parenting, phases, siblings

Mommy, what starts with glass slipper?

G.

Then what?

L.

Then what?

A.

Mommy! WHAT- starts with glass slipper?

I'm trying to tell you! G-l-a-s-s-s-l-i-p-p-

Pee pee?

Yes... p-p-e-r.

What does pee-pee start with?

P.

What does pea start with?

P.

No, the letter 'p.'

P!! I roar with fire, desperate to get my mind back to where it was before the conversation commenced...

And then, right after the smoke settles- that is the moment when I start to wonder when I became this person. This person who loses her temper in 3 seconds flat. Over the letter p.

I'm like Cookie Monster. On crack.

Labels: conversation, dumbhead parenting, Madalyn

Madalyn finds a snail on the way out the door this morning as she has a habit of doing. She brings it into the car with her, which is fine, so long as she promises not to leave him IN the car... to rot and die and SMELL:

"Look! Look at my snail... he's eating a worm. No. No, I think that's poop. I think my snail is pooping."

"I think he's eating the poop," says Evan.

"Eeeew," says Madalyn.

"Eeeew," says Jack.

"What does it taste like?" asks Madalyn.

"I tasted pee pee once," Evan says all too proudly.

"What! When?" I ask.

"I pee-pee'ed into a bucket of water in the shower once, and I drank it. I spit it out. It was gross!"

"Well, YEAH!" I said, beginning to question his intelligence level for the first time. "Why on EARTH would you want to drink pee pee, that's SO gross, Evan!"

"Because I wanted to know what it would taste like."

"Look at my snail!" squeals Madalyn.

(Snail is stretching it's neck high and having a look around the car.)

"It's trying to bite you," says Evan.

"No he's not. He's trying to kiss me," says Madalyn, smiling.

(We are arriving at school now- Madalyn announces she wants ME to hold her snail.)

"Mommy doesn't want to hold your snail, I'll get you out and you can go put him in the grass over there by the building... in the flowers... he'll like that."

"But he might get lost!" Evan says.

"Oh, well I think he IS lost. He's a LONG way from home now," I point out.

"Well he might be sad," says Evan.

"Yeah, he might be sad," says Madalyn.

"He'll make new friends," I say, while she runs over to the wet white flowers in her teal Ariel nightgown, barefoot.

She gets back in the car and fusses at Jack about something.

"You're not his mommy," I say.

"Yes I am!"

"You are, are you? Was he in your belly?"

"Yes. I'm meeried."

"You are? Who are you married to?"

"Evan's my husbin."

"Oh, he is?"

"Mommy, before you meeried daddy he was lost from you," she notes.

"Yes. I was a lost soul before I met your daddy... so let me ask you another question... are you ticklish?"

"No! No, m'am! Give me some space, mommy! I'm going to count. One... two..."

"TICKLE!!!" I yell.

Labels: conversation, Madalyn

Labels: conversation, dreams, Evan, Madalyn, siblings