When friends read my blog (the particularly funny entries, anyway) or hear me complain yet again about the scene my children made at Walmart, they always say, "You should write a BOOK!"
Now that's flattering. But I truly don't think I would have enough material to fill, or enough patience to complete, a book.
But as far as solutions for Everyday Toddler Problems? I wish someone WOULD write a book about that. Oh, I know, there are tons of parenting books out there. But they never really get to the heart (or the ass?) of typical, everyday issues that come up when one is living with two (or more) toddlers.
For example: What IS the correct Parent Reaction / Form of Discipline when:
1. L pulls G's winky in the bathtub? Some books say to ignore it and redirect their behavior, but how long can I really ignore it when they're in the process of making up a game called "Catch My Winky"?
2. L steals G's neglected half of a Poptart and crams the entire thing in her mouth before I can stop her? Should I dig it out and make her give it back to G?
3. When they throw objects from the backseat, nearly making me wreck the car? Is it okay to just scream and throw it back?
4. When the whining and crying in the confines of the car reaches a decibel that no human can possibly be expected to tolerate? My answer has always just been to turn up the radio as loud as possible to drown out their noise.
5. When you are so tired that you think you may fall asleep while EATING, and you LOVE eating, so you decide to take a little nap while your kids are napping, and then one of them wakes up before you, and since you are absolutely comatose, they totally disassemble the contents of the refrigerator, no, the ENTIRE KITCHEN, while you drool on the pillow? Wait! I do have a solution to that one! I put up two gates in the hall, one on top of the other (so there can be no climbing over), and then pull a sleeping bag into the hall and nap in front of my children's doors. Ahhh, sleep.
My kids sure have a way of keeping me hopping. Because, really? Yo-Go's up the nose? June bugs in the mouth that are still wiggling their legs? Poptarts in the VCR? Licking deodorant, I assume because it loosely resembles an ice cream cone, but who the hell really knows?
Why didn't someone write a book of WARNING to give us while we were still in the hospital in a Newborn Love Haze?
Probably because none of us would have believed that our precious new babies would EVER grow up to be three and lock us out of the house while we get the mail and then laugh at us through the glass while we beat on the door praying that the neighbors can't see us Losing The Battle Against The Children Inside.
But if someone had written that book of Warning? I might not have been standing outside my own house begging my two and three year old to LET ME IN. So somebody start writing!
Now that's flattering. But I truly don't think I would have enough material to fill, or enough patience to complete, a book.
But as far as solutions for Everyday Toddler Problems? I wish someone WOULD write a book about that. Oh, I know, there are tons of parenting books out there. But they never really get to the heart (or the ass?) of typical, everyday issues that come up when one is living with two (or more) toddlers.
For example: What IS the correct Parent Reaction / Form of Discipline when:
1. L pulls G's winky in the bathtub? Some books say to ignore it and redirect their behavior, but how long can I really ignore it when they're in the process of making up a game called "Catch My Winky"?
2. L steals G's neglected half of a Poptart and crams the entire thing in her mouth before I can stop her? Should I dig it out and make her give it back to G?
3. When they throw objects from the backseat, nearly making me wreck the car? Is it okay to just scream and throw it back?
4. When the whining and crying in the confines of the car reaches a decibel that no human can possibly be expected to tolerate? My answer has always just been to turn up the radio as loud as possible to drown out their noise.
5. When you are so tired that you think you may fall asleep while EATING, and you LOVE eating, so you decide to take a little nap while your kids are napping, and then one of them wakes up before you, and since you are absolutely comatose, they totally disassemble the contents of the refrigerator, no, the ENTIRE KITCHEN, while you drool on the pillow? Wait! I do have a solution to that one! I put up two gates in the hall, one on top of the other (so there can be no climbing over), and then pull a sleeping bag into the hall and nap in front of my children's doors. Ahhh, sleep.
My kids sure have a way of keeping me hopping. Because, really? Yo-Go's up the nose? June bugs in the mouth that are still wiggling their legs? Poptarts in the VCR? Licking deodorant, I assume because it loosely resembles an ice cream cone, but who the hell really knows?
Why didn't someone write a book of WARNING to give us while we were still in the hospital in a Newborn Love Haze?
Probably because none of us would have believed that our precious new babies would EVER grow up to be three and lock us out of the house while we get the mail and then laugh at us through the glass while we beat on the door praying that the neighbors can't see us Losing The Battle Against The Children Inside.
But if someone had written that book of Warning? I might not have been standing outside my own house begging my two and three year old to LET ME IN. So somebody start writing!
14 Comments:
I tried to comment earlier, but Blogger would not let me. Being a grandma is much easier than being a mom. You can hug them, kiss them, love them, play with them, and send them home to Mama when they stick things up their nose.
I liked your magnificent solution to stuff up the nose. You might have to change your name to Magnificent Mama.
Oh man, I am SO GUILTY of number four. And three? Perfectly acceptable.
I totally need the book.
Oh MY WORD!!! you have your hands full. You poor thing! What are the ages/sexes of your kids? I have a two and a five year old, girl and boy respectively. Some of your antics sound familiar.. For example, I don't bathe them together and it's with good reason. :) Lots of questions about boy and girl parts all the way around, that and a drawing of boy parts on my son's Pirates of the Carribean notebook and we don't need to encourage it! My daughter is my challenger now, my son's kind of grown out of the rebellious cantankerous toddler stage. For instance yesterday she drank part of a trial size of men's shampoo. "Icky Mommy, Icky" Ya think?? Man, she stunk like my husband for the rest of the day. I half expected to see bubbles pop out when she burped. She's the one I find after her nap naked in her bed - bored I guess. Anyhoo, I feel your pain. But you definitely should check out "Love and Logic Parenting" - it really helps. I'm praying for you - it sounds like you need it!
oh, and I forgot to say I TOTALLY do the radio thing. It distracts them from their own noise, discovered that when they were just babies. Yep, no mommy of the year award for me! :)
I see an entire scrapbook with the entries from your blog, copied 2 times of course, so that you can give it to each child as a gift when they become parents. You do realize that the best revenge is to just sit back and watch, right? I'm hooked and have recommended your blog to friends that have toddlers too. Antho, that has commented several times is a great friend from St.Louis, she is now a daily fan as well. Keep writing, your helping to get us through these LONG stay-at-home mom days!!!!
antho - My daughter, L, is 2 years 5 months, and my son, G, will turn 4 next week. They are 19 months apart, and NO, I don't know what I was thinking!
Also, what is sad is I am TRAINED in Love and Logic...I just quit my teaching job in May. It worked like a charm with my kindergarteners, but not working so well on my own. :(
And I totally should have known from your awesome scrapbook pages that you were friends with mommascrapbooks!
mommascrapbooks - I'm glad I have gotten you addicted! I think your scrapbook gift for my kiddos is a SUPERB idea! Someday, they will understand what they put me through!
Lol at "winky" that's what we call it around here too except the hubs calls his "Mr. Winky" :-) Get to the ass of the issue? That's hillarious! Fortunately I haven't had to deal with anything stuck up anyone's nose around here (knock on wood). I always turn the radio up too so don't feel bad.
Blogger is sucking. It just ate my comment to?
So, is this what I really have to look forward to with mine 22 months apart and the oldest only being 2? Shit. What were we both thinking?
And, in my "How to Raise Toddlers" book, it's TOTALLY okay to throw things back. But not just in the car. It's acceptable anytime, anywhere. So, there you go.
And once again, you crack me up!
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
:) it'll get better hopefully.
maybe they'll let you have a little break between toddler years and teenager years and be really good kids?
:)
i've always wondered why they don't have books with helpful advice for toddlers, too. maybe you can buy one of the ones for teenagers (there are lots of "how to deal with a teen" books) and use some of those techniques?
mjd....I love Grandma's but you people are adults that have gone SOFT!!!!
I once had a doctor tell me that training kids is a lot like training cats, damn near impossible sometimes. Well, I had cats and I trained them very, very well. So...while driving down the road listening to a screaming fit from my then 7 and 3 year olds, I pulled out a spray bottle and squirted them with water in the face from the front seat that I had hidden. I figured they play in tub and in the water hose so why not? Besides, it worked on the cats.
Jennifer - I must tell you this! I have thought more than once about training my children with spray bottles of water, because it worked so well with MY cat! But I was afraid to go there...thank you! Confirmation that maybe i'm not nuts (or we BOTH are?). Hehehe.
Umm... at least you weren't in your bathrobe?
*snicker*
I'm so going to get bit in the butt by Karma when Zoe is old enough for all this stuff, because I giggle way too much at your stories and others like them. Plus... you know... she's MY daughter... and that'll just 'cause all KINDS of problems.
Spray bottles. snort, snort That's hysterical. I love it. Can we all try it? Please, please. Let's try and then post about it.
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