'Tis the Season

It's that time of year filled with joy, cheer, party overload and desperate attempts to bring the magic of the holiday season into sharp focus for toddlers everywhere, so long as they still believe.

After the season got off to a roll with a pre-holiday "just because" pancake party, it was off to the races with the first event: a holiday-concurrent birthday party. Which went something like this:

Hello All,

Just a quick reminder that there is a bit of a schedule. We are very excited to see everyone tomorrow!!

3:30-3:45—Greetings!

3:45-4:00—Dress up! Costumes passed out. (Tutu, wings, wand, halo—so have kids wear clothes that they can put the costume over).

4:00-4:15—Picture Time

4:30-5:00—Craft Time

5:00-5:30—Pizza, Salad, Cake, Cupcakes

I think the important thing to point out here is that the child in question was turning 3. I don't think I need to explain beyond that.

Next, was a holiday party at an indoor playground - complete with crafts, cookie decorating, bouncy house, obstacle course, temporary tattoos, face painting, magic show, parachute, and cupcakes.

Throw in some holiday baking (OK, a LOT of holiday baking), walks to admire the neighborhood lights, nighttime train rides to Santa's house, plans for Disneyland, Nutcracker recitals (too much? too soon?) figuring out Santa's list and endless scouring of Internet holiday event listings (amid self-flagellation for each missed event) and the pressure to make this magical season well, magical can get the best of any elf. Especially an elf who has yet to finish her Christmas shopping.

And then sometimes the favor is returned, a thousandfold. Tonight, as I put my girl to bed, after the obligatory sprinkling of magic dust AND powder, she reached under her covers and found some magic powder to scatter over me. It was the perfect, irreplaceable, unsolicited gift.

Keeping Score

Parenthood is a balance sheet, your victories listed on the blood-strewn, tattered side in an all-too-short list, your defeats stretching from the distant past into the equally distant future. On the better days, you find yourself philosophically assessing the the invaluable lessons you learned on this long and winding road. On the bad days you just fight back tears and blinding rage.

This weekend proved a fertile battleground - an array of skirmishes with no clear victor, and many wounded. And so, on to the scorecard...

1) Otter chooses not to poop. SB has long battled with digestive issues but now it appears that we've shifted gears. And while I am grateful for mankind's ability to control certain bodily functions, this same capacity has left me completely out of my depth. How does one reason with a 2-year-old, who is unhappy with how her past experiences have gone and seems determined to never repeat them? This was SO not in the manual - not even in the fine print. After pleading, cajoling, bribery, guilt-trips and self-deprecation had all failed, we resorted to medicine, and pathetic whimpering.

2) Otter refused to nap. Largely due to point #1, we were robbed of our downtime. Because let's face it - at this point we need her nap more than she does.

3) Otter challenged our plan for walking Foster. Now that Foz is back on the walk circuit, SB naturally expects to be included. Unfortunately, the novelty of walking doggie lasted approximately 5 minutes, until Otter decided that their path in the urban jungle diverged. When I didn't back her plan to follow the one less traveled, she responded by lying down on the sidewalk. Unlike my usual response at home, I could not just leave her there. Though I did consider it.

4) Jumping in puddles. Judging from the above, anyone would surmise that this day of combat belonged to Otter. But wait - before you judge... After the pouring rain, SB insisted on going outside. At first, we - the reasonable parents - resisted, but she wouldn't take no for an answer. Donning some boots we went outside, where I tried to control the mad dashes up and down the rainy street. Of particular fascination was the knee deep puddle near our neighbor's driveway. Initially, I firmly insisted that SB avoid the cold water. But then I said, why do I care? Clothes can be changed, after all. So there she was, wading into cold water, happy as a clam. I even flirted with the water's edge myself.

And for my encore performance, I managed to convince my girl that jumping into pretend puddles on our living room rug was just as fun as the real deal, and participated happily as we bounced and "splashed" in the "water."

Sure I endured tantrums, tears, and mineral oil injections. But watching my girl bound around my living room I still think I won.

Potty Mouth

While Otter may be having a tough time with the potty itself, it should come as no surprise that as far as a potty mouth is concerned, she's got it going on. There was no question that sooner or later (with all signs pointing to 'sooner') SB was going to adopt some of her parents...um, colorful expressions. The only debate was which of us would be responsible for the first utterance.

And the winner is...mommy! Adding to her already rich vocabulary of "Oh my God's," SB took the game up a notch. Don't snicker. I know what you are all thinking, but, for the record, Bree isn't exactly innocent of dropping Otter-inappropriate bombs on quite a regular basis. As my narrative will prove.

This morning, as Bree was putting enough butter on a waffle to deep fry a whole chicken in, I couldn't help but comment on it, in my own distinctive way. "Holy crap, poppa!" Otter gleefully parroted.

Amid looks of surprise and judgement mixed with barely suppressed laughter, Bree and I tried to make sense of this new linguistic frontier we had just so casually embarked upon. There were silent accusations of wrong-doing, expressions of surprise at how long it took for this to happen, an offhanded remark about being convinced it would be the other parent who would open Pandora's box, and finally, a curious confession.

"You know," said Bree, after having thoroughly reprimanded me for having befouled our child's previously virginal vocabulary, "she may have repeated something I said the other day, and dropped an f-bomb." Really? "But I'm not entirely sure," he quickly added. "And this is the first confirmed cursing."

Perpetrated by me. How convenient.

Signs your almost 2-year-old may be getting blase about air travel?

Me: Honey we're gonna go on an airplane! Want to go on an airplane?

SB: Go on helicopter?

Buh-bye Jagoouah

Recently, we completed a rite of passage of nearly ever family with kids. We have become official, card-carrying members of the Los Angeles Zoo.

It all happened on Easter Sunday. Having little first-hand experience with Easter, I imagined it as a day of churching and picnic-ing with the family, looking for eggs, and stuffing yourself with candy until you were sick. Certainly not a day of going to the zoo. And after confirming they were open, we packed up 3/4 of our family and headed off.

I first suspected my miscalculation as we entered the parking lot only to see a serpentine line of cars inching their way past florescent vest-clad parking attendants. Bree, who is not a fan of crowds, and had been very much on the fence about this trip to begin with glared and seethed noticeably in his seat. But, you don't just drive a 19-month-old out for half an hour only to turn around and go home so we were stuck.

Parking didn't end up being nearly as dramatic as it had first appeared and with renewed hope, we loped down to the main entrance. Only to be confronted with a line of approximately 150 people, none of whom had gotten the "go to church and picnic on Easter" memo. Oh, and the register was only taking cash - whether out of deference for the Resurrection, or simply because the credit card swipey thing was down, I'll never know.

But again, being a crafty chick, who was not about to give Bree the satisfaction of going home empty-handed, I looked to and quickly found the beacon of hope - the Membership Signup desk. There was no line there. And a fully operational credit card machine. Any thoughts about giving the zoo a test run before committing to a year of visits went out the window. If Otter was terrified by a face-to-face confrontation with a wild animal, so be it. So, swiping my card, free plush gorilla in hand, Bree, Otter and I entered the zoo.

And...

She loved it! The kangaroos (though possibly dead, by Bree's and my estimation) seemed to fascinate. The tigers and meercats, pretty solid. But the crown went to the jaguar, who, agitated for some reason, was pacing his enclosure with a barely concealed desire to rip anyone close enough limb to limb. This animal, large enough to swallow Otter without really having to chew, instantly stole her heart, and she sat transfixed as he did his paces. In an effort to avoid a melt-down, we engaged Otter with saying goodbye to the jaguar as we turned to go.

Later that night, as I tucked her into bed, a bleary looking girl looked up at me, completely over-stimulated by her day. "Buh-bye jagoouah," she said. "Buh-bye."

You Must Remember This...

I got my first Otter kiss yesterday, a solid third behind her rubber duck (which has been getting action since Thursday) and the dog.

Yeah, it was way cool.

The Bonds That Tie

A relationship between a parent and child is a forever thing. Regardless of age or distance, the bonds that tie exist, both in their ability to connect and restrain.

For a parent, it is the hope that if we do it half right, our children will grow up to be good people, able to face life's challenges with grace and bravery; that they will find passion in their lives, will not repeat our mistakes, and that the mistakes they are bound to make won't scar them too permanently or deeply.

For the child, there is a tether stretching back through time and generations, connecting us those that came before us, stretching to its maximum capacity on occasion, but holding us back from ever revoking our past completely.

This bond can be a thing of beauty, or an instrument of oppression, and as we stumble along, sometimes blindly, all we can do is hope that we are making the right decisions, nurturing this chord which connects the past to the future.

Chris Martin sings,

Lights will guide you home,

And ignite your bones,

And I will try to fix you.

And these words make me cry every time I hear them, because they are beautiful and true, and they remind me that I am a mother, trying to raise my child in the best way I know how; and that I am also a daughter, and there is someone out there that has wished all that I wish for Otter, for me. And that this connection is forever.

Rise and Shine

The problem with toddlers is nobody told them the proper time to wake up. When the memo stating that 5:05 am is too early went out, they weren't on the distribution list. Apparently they missed the "Don't even THINK about getting up before 5!" memo as well. Never one to repeat a performance, SB decided that 5:05 was so Saturday morning, and greeted Sunday at 4:46 am. As did we, her hapless parents.

By 10:30, when we had been up for SIX HOURS, Otter was starting to melt down, big-time. Everything annoyed and upset her, and led to tears. It was clearly time for a nap. I turned to Bree, bleary-eyed and asked, "Why did we decide to have one?" And then we headed off to Travel Town, for a birthday party.

Travel Town, for those who have not been, is a magical world of trains and tracks, cabooses and train rides, and a museum of all things choo-choo (including a horrifying zoo crate marked "Cheetah" that I would barely fit into).

Otter was thrilled. Even though she avoided the other kids, the idea of running full speed down train tracks appealed to her immensely. With nary a look back at mom and dad, she bolted away, scampering over rails that nearly came up to her knees, collecting rocks, and trying to climb under train cars. And the ride on the mini-train had her right-out laughing. All grumpiness and tiredness were forgotten.

She (and we) survived it like a champ. She was happy and fun, and adventurous and independent - all the things I adore about her. How could I begrudge her an early-morning rising when she was so easy during the day? Oh wait - that's still TOTALLY not cool...

If at the end of it all I should end up in hell, which (based on much of this blog alone) I suspect may happen, I predict it will look exactly like the Garden State Plaza during the post-Christmas shopping rush. Whatever rumors are circulating about a recession, they have not reached Paramus where every man, woman and child were out looking for a deal, a steal, a sale of the century.

And much as Bree and I vow every year to not end up in the fray, we are invariably yanked into the vortex that is the post holiday-season mall for some present we forgot, overlooked or simply didn't feel like hauling cross-country. This time SB, guilty by association, was hauled into the vortex with us.

I won't speak of the 45 minutes it took us to find parking or the 3 times we got hopelessly lost in a place where the ground floor is actually considered the 2nd floor.

There was one shining moment in the whole fiasco. There was a fantastic merry-go-round - complete with every animal, real and imagined. After gazing at it longingly each time we passed by, Otter was rewarded with a ride. We chose a horse with a fish tail. A mer-horse? A hor-phin? All went well for the first 10 seconds. Then Otter noticed the panda and her heart, already filled with panda-obsession flowed over. "Deda! Deda! Deda!" continued the chant. Nothing could be done except a second ride - this time on the panda. The carousel spun around and around while hordes of shopper jostled past. Unfazed, SB sat on the panda, smiling happily.

And somehow that made it all ok...