Archives for 2012

We are white-knuckling it through the last two weeks of school. Every morning it seems more difficult to get everyone out of the bed, dressed, fed and out the door on time. As soon as I crack the door open in the room my 7-year-old and 5-year-old shared, they whine in unison, “I’m so tired! I don’t want to go to school today!”

I really do understand. Their little brains have absorbed all they can hold. They are tired of sitting still, tired of waiting their turn and tired of wearing shoes.

I remember the first few days of summer vacation as a little girl growing up in Alabama. The lazy days of waking up when your body told you it was time, instead of being jerked out of the bed and rushed off to school.

I remember the simple joy of not worrying about my clothes, but throwing on cut-off blue jeans, a t-shirt and flip-flops to walk on the dirt path to my friend’s house next door.  My feet would be covered with dust and mosquito bites by the time I got there and my hair would be a halo of frizz from the humid honeysuckled air.

My little sister, Blair, and I would squirt Palmolive on the trampoline then spray it with the garden hose and slip and slide all over the thing, while my mother watched from the laundry room, having heart palpitations and praying someone would invent a safety net for that thing.

Our joy lasted for about two weeks, just enough time for our eyes to become red from the chlorinated pool water and our first sunburns to begin to fade. Instead of waking up refreshed and excited about a brand new day, it would begin. The summertime blues.

“Momma, I’m bored,” I would whine to my mother.

“Y’all go jump on the trampoline.”

“It’s too hot and we did that yesterday.” My sister said.

Momma put up with that kind of business for approximately 60 seconds. Regardless of what Eddie Cochran sang, my Momma had a cure for “The Summertime Blues.” Her cure for boredom involved a bucket, a washcloth, all the baseboards and staircases in our house. If you started the day whining about how bored you were, you ended it with itchy eyes and a runny nose as your allergies reacted to all the dusting you’d done.

Now the tables have turned. I’m the mother at the laundry room window, thanking God that someone finally did invent a safety net for trampolines and making a list of all the small chores my girls can help me with this summer, should they be overcome with boredom.

I’m trying to spread our visits with out of town friends evenly over the summer, to break up the monotony, and working on organizing some summer play dates with friends to keep us busy.

In an attempt to avoid the depths of summertime despair, I have been signing up my two oldest children for Vacation Bible Schools and week long day camps all over town. They may not know what they are supposed to believe after a summer of theological vegetable soup. But they will be the most talented soccer playing, tutu wearing, singing and dancing, Baptist, Methodist, Pentecostal, Presbyterian kids in the school yard come September. And I’ve got a gut feeling my baseboards are going to be pretty clean, too.

 

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Ketchup is a Vegetable

by Robin O’Bryant

Giveaway ends June 13, 2012.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win

After spending roughly eleventy-hundred hours in pediatrician’s waiting room over the last eight years of my life, I have made several observations that could make the experience more pleasant for everyone involved. Here is a complete list of the problems and my ingenious solutions.

Problem: Toddlers logrolling on the waiting room floor.

Solution: Install carseats with 5-point harnesses instead of chairs. All children not capable of sitting still must be strapped in.

Problem: Other people’s obnoxious children screaming, whining and throwing a fit.

Solution: Instead of a well child and sick child waiting areas at the doctors office I propose a different solution– Well Behaved Kids Waiting Room and Kids That Need an Exorcist Waiting Room. I will be the first to admit that occasionally my own children need to go to the latter room. I’d willingly take the walk of shame to take them there to save everyone else from having to deal with them.

My children have finally graduated from the rolling in the floor stage and thanks, in no small part to Steve Jobs and my iPhone, we are now capable of waiting for hours on end without me losing my mind.

But at this point I’ve discovered something even more annoying than listening to my kids screaming. That’d be listening to somebody else’s kid screaming. The screams of a known toddler are maddening. The screams of unknown toddler are enough to make you beat your head against the waiting room wall until you blissfully lose consciousness making your wait much shorter.

Last week I learned two very effective methods to stop the screaming. The first is simple, but possibly illegal— but desperate times, desperate measures. To stop the screams of an unknown toddler, simply flip the fire alarm, because apparently the antidote to high-pitched screaming and crying is more high pitched squealing. Win, win. Right? The fire alarm went off and suddenly the obnoxious kid who had been screaming for hours was silent.

The second way to stop kids from screaming at the doctor’s office is to threaten to punish them by counting. It’s a little known fact that children are terrified of numbers. Specifically the numbers, “One, two, and three.” Nothing is more terrifying to a toddler than hearing their parent say while never looking up from their cell phone, “Junior if you don’t sit down and stop screaming you are going to be in big trouble! Do you hear me! Stop. One…two…three…”

Cue hysterical laughter from unknown toddler.

Installing a few of these in the waiting room couldn’t hurt anything. 

My oldest has been particularly hilarious lately. Last night while I was cooking dinner, gluten free pizza, Aubrey (7-years-old) said, “How do you fix a broken pizza?”

Me: I don’t know. How?

Aubrey: Tomato paste!

I cracked up and asked where she had heard it but she insisted she made it up on her own.

Later that evening Aubrey and I were sitting outside playing with her kitten, (after much consideration she has renamed Fluffy, Sophie.) So we were sitting outside playing with Sophie and I said, “I liked Fluffy. It sounded like more of a kitten name.”

Aubrey: What do you mean?

Me: I just thought Fluffy was more of a cat name. Don’t you think so?

Aubrey: I guess. Do you think I should change her name to something else?

Me: It’s up to you…

Aubrey: Like… pu$$y?

I. Died. I fell over in the carport and lay on the concrete in the fetal position sobbing with laughter. She has no idea there is another connotation for that word, but we do watch a lot of Looney Tunes. She giggled at my reaction.

Aubrey: Is that funny?!

Me: YES!!! Oh my lord!!!

I gasped for air.

Aubrey: DON’T PUT THAT IN THE NEWSPAPER!

Me: Don’t worry! I couldn’t if I wanted to!

Today I picked Aubrey up from school by herself. My mother is in town and was at the house with the two younger girls so I took the opportunity to spend a little time with my big girl one on one. We skipped her dance class and went to Sonic instead. As we shared an ice cream she talked and talked.

Aubrey: Momma. I’ve got to tell you something and it’s going to totally blow your mind.

Me: What?

Aubrey: <Insert name of girl who has been a jerk to Aubrey repeatedly> looked at me in class today and said, “You’re NOT funny.”

Aubrey cackled with laughter, “Isn’t that the funniest thing you’ve ever heard?”

“Almost,” I said with a grin and dipped my spoon back into our shared treat.