Things this mommy can make with Play-Doh:
Balls
Small balls
Blueberries
Pancakes
Bowls
Marshmallows
The end.
Playing with Play-Doh makes me feel like an untalented idiot. Especially thanks to my artistically inclined husband, who can make almost anything the baby asks for. So every time the baby and I sit down with Play-Doh, she starts asking for me to make lizards, people, teeter-totters, etc.... and I'm all like "let me make you a blueberry!" I redeem myself with the xylophone and my bedtime rendition of "Rockabye Baby."
By the way, this could very well be my first blog post written while consuming wine. So... sorry if it's obvious. I guess it couldn't be much worse than blogging while post-op and under the influence of narcotics. Although I'm already sensing that my typing skills are worse with wine than they were with the narcotics... #backspaceismybestfriend
Is there an anonymous support group for mothers of two-year-olds? Somewhere I can go and hang my head in shame while admitting the thoughts that run through my head as I'm chasing a screaming toddler through the house and shouting "put down the pool noodle!" and "no Goldfish!" In my mind, the other moms at said support group would all hug me and say "it's ok, girl, we've all been there" and then hand me wine and life gets better. Does that exist? It should.
Because right now, parenting this monster is NOT EASY. Omg, it's downright exhausting.
So crazy baby started daycare at the beginning of September- I found a nice little home daycare not too far out of the way from my new job (woop! Got a sweet new job with the same pay and 25% of the stress. Score.) and we took the plunge and enrolled her. I wasn't freaking out about the transition as much as I thought I would, which is most likely due to the fact that I was so crazy busy at work that I didn't have time to stress over anything else. I also figured she was in good hands, and for some reason knew I didn't need to worry. Day 1 was great. Day 2 was meh. And after that... this kid caught on to the fact that Mommy would leave and not come back until much later. Then started the crying when I would leave, and it broke my heart. So I tried to keep the goodbyes sweet and simple, and reminded her that I would be back. And just over the last week, she has made major progress with the drop-offs. She started to be alright with me leaving if I handed her off to one of the daycare ladies- if I tried to put her down, she'd dig my heels into my stomach and try to crawl up higher on me. And UGH my belly button is still sore from surgery and she reminded me of that. Thanks, kid. Anyways- I was actually able to put her down before leaving twice within the last week and she didn't have a fit. Progress!
Oh, and potty training. OMG GAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH it's awful. Considering the fact that I did the most awesome thing by putting my child in daycare like two months after starting potty training (sarcasm!) I can't really complain too much. Two big transitions at the same time... yikes. She regressed a bit last week and started having multiple accidents per day, to the point that she was being sent home in a diaper and t-shirt because she peed through all of the extra pairs of shorts and underwear I sent in her daycare bag. I did LOTS of laundry last week. She started peeing in her highchair every.damn.time at daycare and at home, even if she had just peed right before sitting down. I think that's finally starting to subside. And of course, at home I wouldn't realize it until I picked her up and felt the lovely warmth and wetness through my shirt, because I don't learn these things very quickly and it takes like 5 pee-pee shirts for me to figure out that I need to check her BEFORE picking her up. Grrr. But she did better this weekend, and better today too. Fingers crossed.
Two weekends ago was just awful. I don't know if it was molars, being two-years-old, the universe being out to get me again, being overtired, or a combination of all of those, but she was hell-on-wheels all weekend long. Here's an example of what I was dealing with:
Emma: "Play with Play-Doh!"
*mommy puts the baby in the high chair and gives her Play-Doh*
Emma: NoooooooooooooOOOOOOOOOO!!!! *screams bloody murder and cries*
I literally could not keep her happy at all. I found myself looking at the clock, counting the hours until it was bedtime. And ugh, I felt guilty about that. I should enjoy every second with my screaming two-year-old, right? I should be hugging and kissing on my sweet little miracle baby every second, even when she's trying to slap me and is laughing in my face to mock me the entire time, right? Right?
I love her, I really do.
Because in between the "NO, I DON'T WANT IT!" and "NO POTTY!" moments, she's stinking adorable. Who am I kidding, sometimes I have to hide my smile when she's in a crappy mood because she's even adorable when she's raging angry. Sometimes. But mostly, I take a deep breath and envision myself hopping on the first flight to the Bahamas, then sitting on a beach while a bartender pours me cold drinks and someone fans me with a palm frond, while yet a third person feeds me junk food and no one judges me at all.
The craziest development is that we can have full conversations with her now, and she tells us about what happened during her day at school. She'll even randomly start telling us something that another child at daycare did... apparently one day, her little bunk-mate tried to lay on Emma's nap mat. What a jerk. Emma can hold her own, though... just today, she was telling me that her friend from school was going to work. I asked where, and she said in the daycare owner's car. I asked if she worked there too, and she said yes. So my guess is that the two of them are running some kind of toddler Chop Shop and are slowly selling the parts to the daycare lady's car. If her car mysteriously stops running, I'm going to have to call the cops on my own child.
Another new development: dolls and dress-up! Girly things, yay! She doesn't really play with her baby dolls, per se, but has this one Pottery Barn doll with long legs that she has lovingly named "Cheese" and totes around sometimes at home. She puts her in the high chair and buckles her in, then "feeds" her and gives her milk from a sippy cup. She'll also put Cheese to bed and give her goodnight kisses and sing her songs (just like I do, which is soooooooooo freaking adorable that I melt into a little puddle of goo), and puts her in her little doll stroller and walks her around the house. She crashes a lot, though... poor Cheese. Cheese. LOL. And dress up! She likes to put on a little dress-up skirt and twirl like a ballerina until she gets dizzy and falls down, at which point I laugh at her and tell her she's beautiful.
I wish I could bottle her energy and take hits of it during the day... I swear she's like a toddler tornado, especially at night, and I can't figure out how it's even possible some days. I spend the better part of every evening trying to prevent her from killing herself/breaking things/killing the dog/killing me.
And I honestly wouldn't change it for the world. The other day, I realized that I was mindlessly stepping over a pool noodle that was lying in the middle of the master bedroom floor (my house isn't messy, but you can tell a very spoiled two-year-old lives here). Like it was no big deal that there was a POOL NOODLE on the floor in my bedroom. I chuckled, and put that thing where it belongs- in the living room. lol. I don't believe that pool noodle has actually been in a pool for even a second of its life... the baby just likes to run around the house waving it around and almost breaking everything. Come to think of it, that sucker is going in the garage tonight.
Oh, and she HATES bedtime now. Score one for jinxing myself on that! Woo! Some nights she cries and refuses to lay down (but always does because I'm mom and I have more willpower than an overtired two-year-old) but mostly she stalls like crazy. She knows I'm a sucker for kisses, so she usually ones one more kiss and one more hug and sing songs in the bed and sing songs in the chair. She thinks she's clever, but I'm on to her. Although, admittedly, I give in to one more kiss every night. Because who wouldn't want one more kiss from that adorable face?
Oh, and I'm feeling pretty fan-freaking-tastic these days. I'm sure it's a combination of things right now, but not having that pesky uterus has been amazing. My pain has decreased tremendously, although I do have some bad days where things just hurt for no apparent reason. But otherwise, I'm feeling wonderful! My bellybutton is still sore when pressed or when I stretch out during yoga but that's the only lingering reminder of my surgery, other than the scars. Which aren't too bad, but are high enough that they stick out from underneath my swimsuit :(
And scene. Time for bed, so that I can prepare myself for another week of chasing around an insane toddler.
