toddlers – Angel Wheeler

Eleanor’s 2nd bday letter

Dear Eleanor,

Happy 2nd birthday my precious one! You and me, we stayed up past our bedtime last night, you snuggled on my shoulder, and watched videos of your little life. There you were blowing out your candles, and there you were showing me how high you could jump, squatting low and raising up but your toes never left the ground. There you were reading a book and announcing “God loves me” at the end because you had been read it so often you knew that’s what it said. As we watched these videos, I couldn’t help but get a little sad. It just seems like yesterday and so long ago at the same time and I fear I didn’t pay enough attention yo all those little moments that have passed us by. It’s a mom thing. One day, you’ll understand what I’m trying to say.

You are growing up and being shaped by the world around you and I can only pray that I am being the mom you need.

You live life to the fullest. You are smart, determined, headstrong, and dare I say bossy? These sound like bad traits but they are not! You are a force to be reckoned with and steered in the right direction, you can do and will do amazing things with those traits.

You are also friendly, compassionate, empathetic, and so very playful. You love to laugh and make others laugh. You are a bit of a TV junkie and you go through obsessions where we watch the same thing over and over until you are ready to move on. So far, it’s been The Wiggles, CoCoMeLoN, Winnie the Pooh, Monsters Inc., Luca and now you are into The Good Dinosaur.

You are one of those kids who loves to carry around a teddy or a baby doll all the time and sleep with one too. You are a big talker…lots of vocabulary and can communicate all you need, you are a potty training school drop out but we’ll try again later, it’s ok. Sometimes I think I rush you to grow up and you just aren’t ready yet.

You love to read books, color, play with your babies and push them in a stroller. You love to eat food that’s not good for you and play with our new dog Puddin and our old cat Rocky. You give them hugs lay with them when they let you.

You are mischievous and a boundary pusher. You hide to poop and hate getting dressed, your hair brushed, or your diaper changed. We fight a lot. And I usually win but sometimes let you. You throw yourself on the floor on your belly and cry when you throw a fit, which happens daily over the silliest things. You still get hurt a lot but it seems to be getting less frequent. You have had a lot of boo boos in your little life.

You do love your family, although I’m your favorite. Not to brag or anything. But you don’t think anyone can do anything for you except me. You say “mom, hold your baby.” With your little arms outstretched. You’ve started practicing manners and you say “oh thank you” on the sweetest high pitched voice and you beg “peeeas” when you’ve been told no.

I just love you so much little El. You bring so much joy to all those around you. You make people smile and laugh. You are a treasure and you are teaching me so much about faith, love, grace, fun, and patience. Lots and lots of patience!!

I hope you know how much I love you and that I am always here for you no matter what!!!

Xoxo,

Mama

All About EK

I’ve got two reasons for this post.

1) my kid is darling

2) I occasionally run into ‘online’ friends face to face who say they miss seeing my kid on Facebook.

Okay three reasons

3) I need to document the cute, funny, wise, serious things she says and does, and the baby book isn’t cutting it.

So for starters, here’s a pic or two.

She wants to be Snow White for Halloween. Her costume came in and of course I let her try it on.

The problem is, I’m not sure if I snapped a picture of Snow White or Elvis.

I love this picture of her. Even though her eyes are closed. Even though she’s itching her cheek and her dress is dirty. Even though my thumb is in the picture and I didn’t have enough sense to crop it before I posted it. I still love this picture. This is beside our house in a “field” of wildflowers. But we call it the Bear Forest.

She has so many funny things that she says. People tell me I won’t remember and heck, I know that’s true.

This week, I took a piece of paper and pen and decided to write down some of the stuff she says. Some of these, I’ll have to set the scene, and it may be they turn out to be a “you had to be there” moment. But I was, so trust me, it was cute when it happened. Or I wouldn’t have written it down.

Scene 1:

She loves to play with my phone and I’m one of those moms that let her. She calls people, texts people, and I’m sure annoys the crap out of people. She will blow up your phone with emojis. String after string of them.

After sending a text, she said, “I sent daddy a text. He got it in his pocket.”

Scene 2:

She’s a thinker. Always trying to put things in their proper category.

“Why did an old lady live in a shoe? She’s supposed to live in a house!”

Scene 3:

We had some friends come and visit for a couple of days and they happened to have some movies with them. One of them was Beauty and the Beast. EK had never seen it, but she knows all about the princesses, I can assure you. We watched that movie and of course when they left, they took it with them. The other day (months later) she was sitting on the potty….

Her: I wish I had the Belle movie.
Me: Maybe you can get it for Christmas. Maybe you could ask Santa Claus for it?
Her: Maybe Santa will go grab that movie from Suzanne.

Scene 4:

Don’t forget we have a teenager in the house, and with that comes that horrid teenage music. Actually, there’s one song I kind of like. It’s catchy, even though not really appropriate. EK has heard it enough to be caught singing……

“I’m on the bass, on the bass. No trouble” (google it if you don’t know)

Scene 5:

Speaking of singing,

“What are little girls made of?
Spice and onions and sugar”

I’d say that’s right.

Pack up all my care and woe

Right now I am drowning in this parenthood thing. Drowning, I tell ya. The most frequent thought that runs through my head is packing a little knapsack and running away. Far, far, away. Seriously, I’m considering getting a job just to get a break. Is that crazy? Really I should have a handle on this by now, but I don’t.

EK is 2.5 and I think this is the hardest season we’ve gone through so far. For starters, only mom can do anything. Only mom can dress her, wipe her, hold her, pour her milk, put on her shoes, fix her noodles, etc. etc. etc. And second, she is wanting to be independent, bossy, and rule the roost. Then on top of the “push the limits” behavior, the binky fairy visited and took her binkies to all the babies of the world. Biggest Mistake Ever. This has totally rocked her world. And mine. And I’d just like to say right here for the record, the INTERNET IS A BIG, FAT LIAR!

I always go to the Internet because I don’t have an old, wrinkled, medicine woman from an indigenous culture living with me, but oh how I wish I did. First off, I timed the fairy’s visit with the farmer’s almanac for weaning animals and children. Stupid farmers.

Second, I was told by the so called “experts” it would be a couple of rough nights, maybe up to a week. Well, let me tell you folks, we are on day 11 and rough doesn’t scratch the surface. She still asks for it 2-3 times a day and all night. She’s not napping, she’s not sleeping, which translates into I’m not napping. I’m not sleeping. Which translates into one huge, grouchy mother.

Do you want to know what we’re doing? We’re crying. We’re fighting. And I’m drowning. I almost caved last night. I almost, after 11 nights, gave it back to her. It was pushing midnight and she hadn’t napped in days and everything was and is a crisis. But instead of caving, I got the Tylenol. A swig for her. A swig for me. Actually, a couple swigs for me and a carefully measured, accurate dose for her because she truly is a little sick which is like the cherry on top of everything else. We made it until 4:30 a.m. before the next crisis.

Right now the reason I’m able to even blog, is because my husband dragged her out of the house to go build a princess castle in the woods, whatever that may mean. I’m just thankful.

It means I’m alone. It means the house is quiet. It means I can refuel my soul from every ounce that has been drained from it, to prepare for the next siphoning session to begin.

I truly don’t know how parents do this? How do you people do this? So say a prayer for us, would you? I know this isn’t the biggest issue in the world, but it’s the biggest issue in my world, and I’m selfish. And tired.

Adventures in Parenting a.k.a Grody Things

It’s the day after Mother’s Day. The chocolates have been eaten, the flowers are wilting, and all the mothers around the world are back to cooking suppers and cleaning up messes, don’t forget the never-ending messes. Yes, throw me into that lot as well as it has been a doozy of a day with the mess o’ meter going full throttle here. It’s needle is all the way to the right, the red light is blinking rapidly and horns are blaring. This is the house of a toddler.

Through the messes and the accidents that have occurred just today, I have come to the very profound conclusion tonight, that my sweet girl will not make it in the medical profession. I’m writing it down in case I forget to tell her when she’s taking anatomy and filling out admission papers to some high falutin’ medical school 9,000 miles away. Not that I care whether she is a doctor or a nurse or a street-walker, I’d love her all the same.

I don’t know, I could be wrong, I’ve been known to be. So let me lay it out for you and you can understand where I’m coming from. For starters, this morning she had a bit of a mucous problem, putting it nicely. At one point, she smeared her shirt sleeve along her nose, as all kids do, and well, “stuff” ended up on her sleeve. I was rushing for the kleenex and she sat in the chair, looking at it, rubbing it on the chair, and gagging.

What? 2 year-olds gag at grody things? Two year olds ARE grody things, how can they differentiate?

Later in the day I got a splinter. We’d been outside playing and who knows what I did, but I somehow got one of those tiny, annoying, yet painful splinters in my thumb. We came inside and she followed me to the bathroom. The instant I pulled out the tweezers and went to work, she began to cry and protest and tell me she doesn’t like that. Then she ran off crying.

Then somehow later in the day, I scratched my arm pretty good. By what or how, I do not know. I’m as bad as a kid myself. It’s the kind of scratch like the end of a pipe cleaner would leave. A wire scratch. Once again EK started crying and protesting how she doesn’t like my scratch and exited the room.

Then tonight, when it’s supposed to be winding down time, and a mom should be able to put up her feet and drink a glass of wine, a really big mess happened. To save my daughter’s dignity in case she reads this when she’s twelve, I won’t go into details. Let me just say in order to get the point across, it involves the bathroom, bleach, a mop, and a mother’s love to clean it up. It was a case of bad timing on Ek’s part that left her in tears and the bathroom with a lot of sights and smells.

I’d just returned from taking out the trash and returned to a wailing toddler in the bathroom. I go into mother-drive and begin the cleaning process which involves cleaning the toddler as well. The whole time I’m cleaning, she is sitting on the potty and gagging. I thought she was going to vomit, her gagging got so bad. I had to hand her a trashcan so I wouldn’t have that to deal with as well, but fortunately she got it under control after about a minute. And I got every thing else under control about 30 minutes later.

This is definitely not a learned behavior. No one gags here. No one cries and runs off at the sight of a boo-boo. Unless there’s a lot of blood, and in that case, I have a tendency to almost pass out, but that was a long time ago and a whole different blog post.

So she cries and runs off at the sight of a scratch and tweezers, and gags violently at the sight and smell of bodily functions, I seriously think performing open heart surgery or a colonoscopy is out of the question for her. At age two anyway. Perhaps she’ll outgrow it and go on to deal with lots of grody things in stride. But for now, it’s a little bit comical watching her react this way. Well it would be comical if it wasn’t so grody and I wasn’t the one having to clean it up. But after it’s all over, it’s a little bit comical.

Tonight when everyone winds down, I’m going to put my feet up and thank my lucky stars that tomorrow is a new day and that I don’t have carpet in the bathroom.