The other day we started teaching our kids the Little Bunny Foo Foo song. They really liked it. But I couldn't quite remember all of the words. I knew that the good fairy threatens to turn him into something or other if he doesn't stop bopping the field mice on the head, but I couldn't for the life of me remember what. So finally tonight after I made up half the words again, Big Daddy decided to look them up. He plugged the title into You Tube to see if there were any cute videos to go with the song. And here's the little gem he came up with...
Uh.....I might not be showing this version to my kids.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Monday, February 15, 2010
Can you say, "precocious?"
I am having teenage conflicts with my daughter right now. She is not a teenager. She is not even a tweenager. She is four. She is four years old and causing me such angst that I've been lying awake at night trying to figure out what I'm doing wrong and what I can change to make her behave and if that older couple at church who thinks she's so cute might want to adopt her.
She is what the psychology books like to call "strong-willed." She is what I like to call "a brat." Up to this point in my life I thought that bratty kids were the product of too much indulgence. Wishy washy parenting. Push-overs. Never being said no to. Having ice cream for breakfast and presents whenever you stomped your feet.
I DO NOT DO ANY OF THESE THINGS.
I consider myself a good parent, and by good I mean that I make my kids eat their fruits and vegetables, I limit their TV time, I don't allow them to run through the neighborhood with no coat and shoes in January (and this is a real example from my neighborhood, I kid you not), and I actually enforce discipline. I say no way more than I say yes, and I follow through on consequences.
So what gives? Why does this method work fine on my second child while making my eldest child so horrible that her teachers at school have had to talk to me no less than five times this school year? About PRESCHOOL. She isn't mean. She isn't snotty. She isn't belligerent. She's actually very charming and cheerful. She is just very very sure that her way is the way things should be done and if you don't agree with her, she will explain it to you until you do. Or until you jump off a bridge just to end the discussion.
This tiny, willful, 32 lb package of joie de vivre is making me crazy. She's making me feel like a bad parent. She is making me shake in my boots about the day she turns 13. Because if we can't seem to get along now, what is going to happen once the REAL hormones kick in???!!!!
Normally I feel pretty confident about my parenting. I managed whole classrooms of six, seventh, eighth, and ninth graders for six years without any problem. But this child has thrown me for a loop. So if anyone has any books that they highly recommend that will instantly make my daughter into a saint, please feel free to list them now.
She is what the psychology books like to call "strong-willed." She is what I like to call "a brat." Up to this point in my life I thought that bratty kids were the product of too much indulgence. Wishy washy parenting. Push-overs. Never being said no to. Having ice cream for breakfast and presents whenever you stomped your feet.
I DO NOT DO ANY OF THESE THINGS.
I consider myself a good parent, and by good I mean that I make my kids eat their fruits and vegetables, I limit their TV time, I don't allow them to run through the neighborhood with no coat and shoes in January (and this is a real example from my neighborhood, I kid you not), and I actually enforce discipline. I say no way more than I say yes, and I follow through on consequences.
So what gives? Why does this method work fine on my second child while making my eldest child so horrible that her teachers at school have had to talk to me no less than five times this school year? About PRESCHOOL. She isn't mean. She isn't snotty. She isn't belligerent. She's actually very charming and cheerful. She is just very very sure that her way is the way things should be done and if you don't agree with her, she will explain it to you until you do. Or until you jump off a bridge just to end the discussion.
This tiny, willful, 32 lb package of joie de vivre is making me crazy. She's making me feel like a bad parent. She is making me shake in my boots about the day she turns 13. Because if we can't seem to get along now, what is going to happen once the REAL hormones kick in???!!!!
Normally I feel pretty confident about my parenting. I managed whole classrooms of six, seventh, eighth, and ninth graders for six years without any problem. But this child has thrown me for a loop. So if anyone has any books that they highly recommend that will instantly make my daughter into a saint, please feel free to list them now.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Texas Check-In
I guess that last post was a bit much for most of you to chew on. (Or it could be that I have completely slacked off on reading other blogs since I've been here, so I have been forgotten.....weep, weep.) Anyway, let's try something simpler.
So, I'm in Texas. It is supposed to be 50-70 degrees this time of year. It was 38 today. With sleet. I want my money back.
On the other hand, I've had a whole week of hanging with Jennie, so that pretty much makes up for it.
I've had two canker sores on the inside of my bottom lip for well over a week. They hurt like hell and will NOT go away. And since the area is swollen, I keep accidentally re-biting them. Stupid vampire fangs.
On the other hand, I've been eating some seriously good food since I got here. Barbeque, Mexican, Greek (the best greek chicken salad on the face of earth. Twice), desserts, Blue Bell ice cream (Ok, that is just Big Daddy's indulgence, but it is pretty good ice cream. Even one day where I ate breakfast, then lunch, then I had cookies and brownies for dinner. AWESOME. Tomorrow? Boston Market. Yeah!
I'm staying at a hotel with TWO bedrooms, a kitchen and living room and two bathrooms. Let me just tell you, it is a saweet way to travel with kids. You lock one in one room, one in the living room, and then you get to sleep in peace in your own bedroom. Why did it take us so long to find this hotel???
U.S. Airways SUCKS. I've got a whole other post about this, but it's a doozie, so I thought I'd just sum up here in case anyone misses that post. Once again, U.S. AIRWAYS SUUUUUCKS.
A good pillow can make all the difference to whether or not you get a good night's sleep at a hotel. So can ear plugs.
I'm reading a super good book right now. Three Cups of Tea. I can hardly put it down.
Exactly two weeks until I will be waking up to this view:
So, I'm in Texas. It is supposed to be 50-70 degrees this time of year. It was 38 today. With sleet. I want my money back.
On the other hand, I've had a whole week of hanging with Jennie, so that pretty much makes up for it.
I've had two canker sores on the inside of my bottom lip for well over a week. They hurt like hell and will NOT go away. And since the area is swollen, I keep accidentally re-biting them. Stupid vampire fangs.
On the other hand, I've been eating some seriously good food since I got here. Barbeque, Mexican, Greek (the best greek chicken salad on the face of earth. Twice), desserts, Blue Bell ice cream (Ok, that is just Big Daddy's indulgence, but it is pretty good ice cream. Even one day where I ate breakfast, then lunch, then I had cookies and brownies for dinner. AWESOME. Tomorrow? Boston Market. Yeah!
I'm staying at a hotel with TWO bedrooms, a kitchen and living room and two bathrooms. Let me just tell you, it is a saweet way to travel with kids. You lock one in one room, one in the living room, and then you get to sleep in peace in your own bedroom. Why did it take us so long to find this hotel???
U.S. Airways SUCKS. I've got a whole other post about this, but it's a doozie, so I thought I'd just sum up here in case anyone misses that post. Once again, U.S. AIRWAYS SUUUUUCKS.
A good pillow can make all the difference to whether or not you get a good night's sleep at a hotel. So can ear plugs.
I'm reading a super good book right now. Three Cups of Tea. I can hardly put it down.
Exactly two weeks until I will be waking up to this view:
and not this one:
I've had a cold since the day I arrived here in Texas. I am so incredibly snotty. I hate it when my vacation is dictated by how close I am to a box of tissues. Can I go mini-golfing with my kids? Hmm, that depends. How close is the nearest box of tissues? Can I go to dinner? That depends. Can I carry enough tissues in my purse to make it through the meal? Shopping? Probably out of the question. Too far to go to get to tissues. See? LAME.
OK, I think that does it. I'll be seeing you on your blog again soon, as soon as I return to the REAL LIFE. Wah.
Sunday, February 7, 2010
A Very Belated Thank You
On a cold, foggy night in January, 1994, I arrived in New Delhi, India. I had flown all day and most of the night, and I was exhausted. But it would be several hours before I would be able to sleep. First I had to clear customs and immigration. I tried to rub the sleep from my eyes.
I found my extra-large backpack--the largest Jan Sport made--stuffed until the seams nearly split (for it would need to provide clothing and basic necessities for 4 months) rotating slowly on the baggage carousel. I made my way through the crowds of foreigners and locals-coming-home to the area where my bags would be searched. Customs was thorough. I repacked as best I could.
Time for the crazy part: Getting out of the airport. Despite the hour (3am), the cold (40 degrees) and the thick nightly mist, the exit from the airport was packed with pushing, shouting men offering their services as taxi and rickshaw drivers. I'd been warned by my professor ahead of time about this situation. "Just keep looking straight ahead," he had said. "Don't speak except to say 'no thank you,' and don't make eye contact with anyone. And hold on tight to your bags." So I did just that. I won't say it wasn't intimidating, maybe even frightening to have several dozen men try to steer you to their vehicles while shouting, "This way, Madam!" "Cheap ride from me! This way!" But my imitation of confidence must have been convincing because soon I was through the throng in once piece and heading towards my bus.
There were only half a dozen of us on the bus, including my friend and travel companion Rachelle. The driver was snoozing while he waited for the proper time to leave. Soon we were on our way. It was hard to see anything through the darkness and fog, but I caught glimpses of cement walls along the street plastered with Bollywood posters and scrawled with Hindi graffiti. A few late-night rickshaws dartied in and out of side streets. But most of the world was asleep.
We reached our hostel, the Blue Triangle YMCA, after half an hour. And despite our reconfirmed reservations, the man at the front desk seemed to have no idea that Rachelle and I were coming. He told us we would have to sort it out with the morning manager. In the meantime, he would send us to the two available beds in the hotel--those in two separate dormitory style rooms.
My room was a long rectangle, maybe 50 feet long. A row of perhaps 8 or 10 low beds flanked one wall while lockers flanked the other. At the end were a couple of sinks and a door to the toilet and shower room. The dormitory was cold. Though the curtains were drawn on some of the windows, others were bare. I could see several broken panes of glass letting in the cold, damp air.
All of the beds were filled with sleeping occupants; all but one, at the end closest to the door. It had a cushion-like mattress, no pillow, and no blankets. The porter who showed me to my room threw up his hands when I asked him for bedding. "All full" was all he would say. It was well past 4am at this point and I was just too tired to argue. So I took out a sweater from my backpack to use as a pillow and curled up on the bed to sleep.
I shivered awake for a while, too cold to sleep. I replayed the last few hours in my mind, recalling the details I had been too overwhelmed to notice--how dark all the faces had been, the lack of women at that hour, the thick smell of pollution, the strange trees, the mangy dogs roaming the roads, and men in turbans and lungis warming their hands over make-shift stoves. As I thought, occasional noises from cars or buses would make their way through the broken windows, but mostly I heard only the sounds of sleeping strangers. Eventually fatigue must have overcome me, because the next thing I knew a faint light was coming through the windows. There was movement and soft voices in the room. And I was suddenly very warm. I forced my weary eyes to blink open a few times, and I saw the sweet face of a young Japanese girl leaning over me as she placed a thick blanket on my curled up body. I think I tried to smile. But before I could squeeze out a thank you, I had relaxed into exhausted, contented sleep.
When I awoke a few hours later, it was full daytime. I got up and went to the window. The mist outside was nearly gone. Somewhere in the distance, a muezzin was calling the faithful to prayer. I turned to examine my surroundings, but the room's occupants were all gone for the day. I repacked my sweater pillow and found the day manager downstairs. Soon I was situated in the correct room two floors up with the other students from my group. We got busy exploring Delhi, visiting the temples and gurdwaras, sampling the local food, and basking in the ecstasy of dirt-cheap shopping. I never saw the group who I had shared a room with on the first night. And I never got a chance to thank the girl who took the time to cover the shivering stranger the end of the room. She is out there somewhere. And she has no idea that I still think of her with gratitude, 16 years later.
So wherever you are, Angel, thank you.
.
I found my extra-large backpack--the largest Jan Sport made--stuffed until the seams nearly split (for it would need to provide clothing and basic necessities for 4 months) rotating slowly on the baggage carousel. I made my way through the crowds of foreigners and locals-coming-home to the area where my bags would be searched. Customs was thorough. I repacked as best I could.
Time for the crazy part: Getting out of the airport. Despite the hour (3am), the cold (40 degrees) and the thick nightly mist, the exit from the airport was packed with pushing, shouting men offering their services as taxi and rickshaw drivers. I'd been warned by my professor ahead of time about this situation. "Just keep looking straight ahead," he had said. "Don't speak except to say 'no thank you,' and don't make eye contact with anyone. And hold on tight to your bags." So I did just that. I won't say it wasn't intimidating, maybe even frightening to have several dozen men try to steer you to their vehicles while shouting, "This way, Madam!" "Cheap ride from me! This way!" But my imitation of confidence must have been convincing because soon I was through the throng in once piece and heading towards my bus.
There were only half a dozen of us on the bus, including my friend and travel companion Rachelle. The driver was snoozing while he waited for the proper time to leave. Soon we were on our way. It was hard to see anything through the darkness and fog, but I caught glimpses of cement walls along the street plastered with Bollywood posters and scrawled with Hindi graffiti. A few late-night rickshaws dartied in and out of side streets. But most of the world was asleep.
We reached our hostel, the Blue Triangle YMCA, after half an hour. And despite our reconfirmed reservations, the man at the front desk seemed to have no idea that Rachelle and I were coming. He told us we would have to sort it out with the morning manager. In the meantime, he would send us to the two available beds in the hotel--those in two separate dormitory style rooms.
My room was a long rectangle, maybe 50 feet long. A row of perhaps 8 or 10 low beds flanked one wall while lockers flanked the other. At the end were a couple of sinks and a door to the toilet and shower room. The dormitory was cold. Though the curtains were drawn on some of the windows, others were bare. I could see several broken panes of glass letting in the cold, damp air.
All of the beds were filled with sleeping occupants; all but one, at the end closest to the door. It had a cushion-like mattress, no pillow, and no blankets. The porter who showed me to my room threw up his hands when I asked him for bedding. "All full" was all he would say. It was well past 4am at this point and I was just too tired to argue. So I took out a sweater from my backpack to use as a pillow and curled up on the bed to sleep.
I shivered awake for a while, too cold to sleep. I replayed the last few hours in my mind, recalling the details I had been too overwhelmed to notice--how dark all the faces had been, the lack of women at that hour, the thick smell of pollution, the strange trees, the mangy dogs roaming the roads, and men in turbans and lungis warming their hands over make-shift stoves. As I thought, occasional noises from cars or buses would make their way through the broken windows, but mostly I heard only the sounds of sleeping strangers. Eventually fatigue must have overcome me, because the next thing I knew a faint light was coming through the windows. There was movement and soft voices in the room. And I was suddenly very warm. I forced my weary eyes to blink open a few times, and I saw the sweet face of a young Japanese girl leaning over me as she placed a thick blanket on my curled up body. I think I tried to smile. But before I could squeeze out a thank you, I had relaxed into exhausted, contented sleep.
When I awoke a few hours later, it was full daytime. I got up and went to the window. The mist outside was nearly gone. Somewhere in the distance, a muezzin was calling the faithful to prayer. I turned to examine my surroundings, but the room's occupants were all gone for the day. I repacked my sweater pillow and found the day manager downstairs. Soon I was situated in the correct room two floors up with the other students from my group. We got busy exploring Delhi, visiting the temples and gurdwaras, sampling the local food, and basking in the ecstasy of dirt-cheap shopping. I never saw the group who I had shared a room with on the first night. And I never got a chance to thank the girl who took the time to cover the shivering stranger the end of the room. She is out there somewhere. And she has no idea that I still think of her with gratitude, 16 years later.
So wherever you are, Angel, thank you.
.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Forever Young
Yesterday I bought my first age defying product. AGE defying. I hate that I am of an age that I have to say "age" like it's a dirty word. Maybe I should start using it to replace some of my usual cuss words. "Age it!" "You age face!" That sort of thing.I didn't buy it because I feel old or because I'm worried that I look old. I mean I do feel old, and I am worried that I'm starting to look older too. But I mostly bought it because I wanted a cream blush and evidently they are VERY hard to come by at the old Target. So when I found a cream blush in the right color, I got it. Regenerist serum and all.
And you know what? I like it. It's a good color. Very creamy. And I think I might be looking youmger already...
What about you? Do you buy age related products? Do you find that they help at all?
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head
The other day I was sitting on my bed, messing around on my computer. It was mid-morning . The kids were upstairs playing, the cat was dozing in her usual spot on my comforter. In the corner of my mind, I noticed a sound. Tippity-tap. Tap tap tap. Tap. Tippity-tap. Tap. "What is that sound?" I thought. It kind of sounded like icicles melting and dripping. Only there weren't any icicles outside my window. So I went back to typing. A few seconds later I heard it again. Tippity-tap-tap. TAP. "What IS that?" I wondered more emphatically. I looked around, tilting my head to catch the direction of the sound. Almost on cue, the cat started looking around as well. And then her eyes drifted upward, to the ceiling. That's when I noticed the crack in the ceiling above my bed. That crack that was DRIPPING WATER ONTO MY CEILING FAN!
CRAAAAP! I thought very emphatically this time. OK, I might have actually yelled it out loud. And I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter, only I was pretty sure it wasn't the dancing and prancing of little reindeer hooves.
It wasn't. I was the pouring and gushing of water onto the floor in the upstairs bathroom. And it was an inch deep! One of my lovely children had turned on the sink to play in and had wandered off, leaving it running. And it just happened (I now noticed) to be one of those rare sinks with no hole do-hickey at the back of the sink to let water out when the sink gets too full. So instead of draining out the non-existent hole do-hickey, it had drained out the top of the basin and onto my floor and through the floor onto the ceiling and through the ceiling onto my ceiling fan, and from the ceiling fan down onto my comforter.
I wasn't sure what I should do first...clean up the water or beat my children. I decided that the beatings could wait (although I did a fair amount of shrieking and ranting, just to set the right mood for what was to come) and pulled all the freshly washed and folded towels onto the floor to mop up the mess.
That done, the interrogation began. Daphne, of course, blamed it on Beck. Beck, of course, said it was him because he admits to anything you ask him, even when he wasn't around when it happened. This was one of those cases where I honestly had no idea which one of them it was. So I did the only fair thing I could come up with--I spanked them both. And though I'm not much for physical punishment, when the ruination of the house is the issue at hand, I find it helpful to punctuate your remarks in a more memorable way than the usual screaming and hair pulling (that would be my own in these lesser cases).
After all that, I realized it was nearly 11 and I still hadn't gotten dressed. So I got in the shower. And when I got out and walked into my room, the cat was staring more intently up at the ceiling. And there was a new sound. Tink, spat. Tinkity tink tink, splat splat splat. This would be the sound of a serious amount of liquid RAINING onto my comforter, my laptop, my iPhone, and my house phone, all of which were clustered under the ceiling fan where I'd left them when I ran upstairs.
Luckily, none of them were ruined. I powered them all down and let them air dry, and they all seem fine. My ceiling, however, has seen better days. And my cat has moved her mid-morning nap spot to the floor a few feet away from my bed. Just in case.
CRAAAAP! I thought very emphatically this time. OK, I might have actually yelled it out loud. And I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter, only I was pretty sure it wasn't the dancing and prancing of little reindeer hooves.
It wasn't. I was the pouring and gushing of water onto the floor in the upstairs bathroom. And it was an inch deep! One of my lovely children had turned on the sink to play in and had wandered off, leaving it running. And it just happened (I now noticed) to be one of those rare sinks with no hole do-hickey at the back of the sink to let water out when the sink gets too full. So instead of draining out the non-existent hole do-hickey, it had drained out the top of the basin and onto my floor and through the floor onto the ceiling and through the ceiling onto my ceiling fan, and from the ceiling fan down onto my comforter.
I wasn't sure what I should do first...clean up the water or beat my children. I decided that the beatings could wait (although I did a fair amount of shrieking and ranting, just to set the right mood for what was to come) and pulled all the freshly washed and folded towels onto the floor to mop up the mess.
That done, the interrogation began. Daphne, of course, blamed it on Beck. Beck, of course, said it was him because he admits to anything you ask him, even when he wasn't around when it happened. This was one of those cases where I honestly had no idea which one of them it was. So I did the only fair thing I could come up with--I spanked them both. And though I'm not much for physical punishment, when the ruination of the house is the issue at hand, I find it helpful to punctuate your remarks in a more memorable way than the usual screaming and hair pulling (that would be my own in these lesser cases).
After all that, I realized it was nearly 11 and I still hadn't gotten dressed. So I got in the shower. And when I got out and walked into my room, the cat was staring more intently up at the ceiling. And there was a new sound. Tink, spat. Tinkity tink tink, splat splat splat. This would be the sound of a serious amount of liquid RAINING onto my comforter, my laptop, my iPhone, and my house phone, all of which were clustered under the ceiling fan where I'd left them when I ran upstairs.
Luckily, none of them were ruined. I powered them all down and let them air dry, and they all seem fine. My ceiling, however, has seen better days. And my cat has moved her mid-morning nap spot to the floor a few feet away from my bed. Just in case.
.
Monday, February 1, 2010
Cockoo For Cocoa Puffs
You know that saying that you have to choose your battles? Well, I finally waved the white flag when it came to the Great Battle of the Cereal. Big Daddy wanted to buy the sugary kind, I wanted to give the kids something more nutritious. I actually threw out the Lucky Charms a couple of times because my kids would only eat the marshallows (that's what they call them). But the Corn Pops, Sugar Smacks, and Honeycombs kept coming in, and naturally they liked them better than the Dirt & Bran Twigs and Pecan Pine Cones I kept buying, so I gave in.
Personally, though, I prefer less sugary cereals. For one, those sugar cereals aren't very filling. But also, breakfast candy just isn't the same now as its 1980's counterparts. Sugar cereals used to be delicious treats on the rare occasions that we got them. But now Cookie Crisp and Peanut Butter Captain Crunch are made of a strange space materials that resemble cereal......until it gets wet. Then it blows up in to this nasty, frothy goo. EEEWWW. No thanks. But for some reason my kids still love it. I guess cause they don't know any better.
Well, this week I found a new sugary atrocity in my cabinet, care of Big Daddy: Cocoa Puffs. I couldn't remember actually ever buying these, even as a kid. But somewhere in the furthest recesses of my mind, a dark chocolaty flavor waved around like a cocoa mirage. I wondered if I actually had eaten this cereal and if it might actually be tasty, as my memory seemed to suggest.
IT WAS! Sweet heaven of chocolate breakfast, it was. My first bite almost made me drop my spoon, it was so good. It tasted like super fudgey brownie bites! FOR BREAKFAST! I quickly scarfed up a whole bowl. Then another. Then another. I guess those sugary cereals CAN be filling. All you have to do is eat three bowls.
Hmmmm.....maybe losing a battle once in a while isn't such a bad thing after all.
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