Serenity Now!
Remember when I wrote this?
A lovely little post about adjusting to life as a family of four, about regaining serenity, and about all my motherly goodness?
Yeah.
Tonight, serenity hid in the closet and had the nerve to laugh at me when I went looking for her.
Party Girl on albuterol is kind of like a bag of marbles. You know, like if you dropped them? And they went in every direction? Like under the computer desk and on top of the end table with the glasses of water sitting on it and most definitely into the corner where M. keeps his 1000+ collection of cds in alphabetical order (and of course while the marbles were there they would have to pull at least 20 of those cds down). Those marbles might even make a point to roll right into whatever Sass was working on, kind of on purpose but maybe not, just to make her screech. Except PG's not a bag of marbles -- just a baby -- so why can't I keep up with her today?
Sass, on the other hand, had herself one long, slow, but certain meltdown. It all started at 4:00 when I refused to take off her shirt so she could go potty. (Pick your battles, I hear you saying with a knowing nod. When you have a 3 year old who must strip off every shred of clothing to use the bathroom several times a day, and who also must also put each piece of clothing back on usually in a certain order that changes each time you do it, you will learn that this is a battle to be picked.) She cried and she moaned and then she went potty (With the shirt on! Apparently it's possible!) and then she lay in the beanbag and bemoaned her great misfortune at having such an insensitive mother.
Later, at dinner, she actually tried to get mouthy. Sass getting mouthy is actually pretty cute, because she is a people pleaser -- as is her mother -- and people pleasers don't really get mouthy. Ask my mom. I don't think I've talked back to her once in my life.
(Sidebar: I still had a curfew at her house at 21 years old. I think it was 1 AM or something. When I mentioned to her that my older brother hadn't had a curfew since he'd gone off to college at 18, she said, "Ok. No more curfew." When I asked her why I still had one and he didn't, she said simply, "Because you never asked.")
But Sass getting mouthy at my hip while I'm trying to take a break and eat dinner, and then still at it while I do dishes, then still at it while I start preparing their bath? I finally put her in her bed for a 2 minute time-out.
Which leads us to the story of The Haunted Vaporizer. Or possibly the story of The Mommy Who Was Losing Her Mind.
The girls have both had vaporizers running in their rooms this last week -- poor things. I warned Sass not to touch it because it's hot, and since she's all about not getting hurt, I knew she would stay away from it.
The other morning, I took the girls upstairs so I could shower. I put PG in her saucer in the bathroom and Sass went to play in her room. Since she was the first one up that morning I had not been in her room yet. When I went in after my shower to get her, her vaporizer was unplugged.
Me: Sass? Did you unplug your vaporizer?
Sass: No Mommy.
Sass has never once in her life lied to me (or anyone else for that matter). I don't really think that developmentally she knows how. If she did lie, I think I would know because it would be such a new technique for her. She was telling me the truth.
Me: Are you sure? How did it get unplugged?
Sass: It just did it by itself Mommy.
Hmmm..
The cord from the vaporizer went right through the area she was playing in. So my theories are:
1) I never plugged it in the night before. I swear I remember seeing it on when I checked on her in the night though.
2) She tripped over it and it came unplugged (great parenting on my part).
3) We have a friendly ghost who saw that the cord could be dangerous and he/she plucked it out of the wall.
I'm going with 1 or 2, but it was still really weird.
So tonight, I went to get her from her timeout and her vaporizer was plugged in. I had just finished filling them and was (I thought) waiting to plug them in until the girls went to bed.
Me: Sass. I told you not to play with your vaporizer.
Sass: What?
Me: Did you plug that in?
Sass: No Mommy, you did.
I don't know. Everything else around here gets blamed on the cats, so I'll say it's their fault and leave it at that.
So I got them in the tub, and out of the tub, and back downstairs. Sass trotted off with her bedtime snack to parts unknown -- which at this point was fine with me, we all needed a little break! -- while I gave Party Girl her breathing treatment. Ten minutes later I found her sacked out in a bean bag watching some crazy MTV show (which I didn't even realize was on.) Lovely. Upstairs we go.
The albuterol has Party Girl on high speed and and she can't settle down after her bottle. She thrashes in my arms and beats on my chest and pulls at her hair and screeches and snuffles and says things like "Uh-oh!" and "Gog!" and then after 5 minutes of this, throws herself down on my chest and collapses, weepy and exhausted. Then she cuddles in, sticks her fingers in my mouth and sings me a lullaby as she drifts off to sleep. When I get back to Sass in her bed, she says:
"I don't want Party Girl to be sick anymore."
"Me either, honey," I say as I kiss her and we snuggle up. "I love you Sass," I say.
"I sure love you too, Mama," she says, and soon she's snoring.
One good thing about a night like this is that you can look upon their peaceful sleeping faces and remember that tomorrow is a fresh, new day.
Maybe serenity did sneak out of the closet for a little while there at the end. I'm glad, but I sure hope she doesn't unplug the vaporizer.
A lovely little post about adjusting to life as a family of four, about regaining serenity, and about all my motherly goodness?
Yeah.
Tonight, serenity hid in the closet and had the nerve to laugh at me when I went looking for her.
Party Girl on albuterol is kind of like a bag of marbles. You know, like if you dropped them? And they went in every direction? Like under the computer desk and on top of the end table with the glasses of water sitting on it and most definitely into the corner where M. keeps his 1000+ collection of cds in alphabetical order (and of course while the marbles were there they would have to pull at least 20 of those cds down). Those marbles might even make a point to roll right into whatever Sass was working on, kind of on purpose but maybe not, just to make her screech. Except PG's not a bag of marbles -- just a baby -- so why can't I keep up with her today?
Sass, on the other hand, had herself one long, slow, but certain meltdown. It all started at 4:00 when I refused to take off her shirt so she could go potty. (Pick your battles, I hear you saying with a knowing nod. When you have a 3 year old who must strip off every shred of clothing to use the bathroom several times a day, and who also must also put each piece of clothing back on usually in a certain order that changes each time you do it, you will learn that this is a battle to be picked.) She cried and she moaned and then she went potty (With the shirt on! Apparently it's possible!) and then she lay in the beanbag and bemoaned her great misfortune at having such an insensitive mother.
Later, at dinner, she actually tried to get mouthy. Sass getting mouthy is actually pretty cute, because she is a people pleaser -- as is her mother -- and people pleasers don't really get mouthy. Ask my mom. I don't think I've talked back to her once in my life.
(Sidebar: I still had a curfew at her house at 21 years old. I think it was 1 AM or something. When I mentioned to her that my older brother hadn't had a curfew since he'd gone off to college at 18, she said, "Ok. No more curfew." When I asked her why I still had one and he didn't, she said simply, "Because you never asked.")
But Sass getting mouthy at my hip while I'm trying to take a break and eat dinner, and then still at it while I do dishes, then still at it while I start preparing their bath? I finally put her in her bed for a 2 minute time-out.
Which leads us to the story of The Haunted Vaporizer. Or possibly the story of The Mommy Who Was Losing Her Mind.
The girls have both had vaporizers running in their rooms this last week -- poor things. I warned Sass not to touch it because it's hot, and since she's all about not getting hurt, I knew she would stay away from it.
The other morning, I took the girls upstairs so I could shower. I put PG in her saucer in the bathroom and Sass went to play in her room. Since she was the first one up that morning I had not been in her room yet. When I went in after my shower to get her, her vaporizer was unplugged.
Me: Sass? Did you unplug your vaporizer?
Sass: No Mommy.
Sass has never once in her life lied to me (or anyone else for that matter). I don't really think that developmentally she knows how. If she did lie, I think I would know because it would be such a new technique for her. She was telling me the truth.
Me: Are you sure? How did it get unplugged?
Sass: It just did it by itself Mommy.
Hmmm..
The cord from the vaporizer went right through the area she was playing in. So my theories are:
1) I never plugged it in the night before. I swear I remember seeing it on when I checked on her in the night though.
2) She tripped over it and it came unplugged (great parenting on my part).
3) We have a friendly ghost who saw that the cord could be dangerous and he/she plucked it out of the wall.
I'm going with 1 or 2, but it was still really weird.
So tonight, I went to get her from her timeout and her vaporizer was plugged in. I had just finished filling them and was (I thought) waiting to plug them in until the girls went to bed.
Me: Sass. I told you not to play with your vaporizer.
Sass: What?
Me: Did you plug that in?
Sass: No Mommy, you did.
I don't know. Everything else around here gets blamed on the cats, so I'll say it's their fault and leave it at that.
So I got them in the tub, and out of the tub, and back downstairs. Sass trotted off with her bedtime snack to parts unknown -- which at this point was fine with me, we all needed a little break! -- while I gave Party Girl her breathing treatment. Ten minutes later I found her sacked out in a bean bag watching some crazy MTV show (which I didn't even realize was on.) Lovely. Upstairs we go.
The albuterol has Party Girl on high speed and and she can't settle down after her bottle. She thrashes in my arms and beats on my chest and pulls at her hair and screeches and snuffles and says things like "Uh-oh!" and "Gog!" and then after 5 minutes of this, throws herself down on my chest and collapses, weepy and exhausted. Then she cuddles in, sticks her fingers in my mouth and sings me a lullaby as she drifts off to sleep. When I get back to Sass in her bed, she says:
"I don't want Party Girl to be sick anymore."
"Me either, honey," I say as I kiss her and we snuggle up. "I love you Sass," I say.
"I sure love you too, Mama," she says, and soon she's snoring.
One good thing about a night like this is that you can look upon their peaceful sleeping faces and remember that tomorrow is a fresh, new day.
Maybe serenity did sneak out of the closet for a little while there at the end. I'm glad, but I sure hope she doesn't unplug the vaporizer.
posted by Her Grace at
7:01 PM
2 Comments:
Great post! The vaporizer ghost is as good as my cat food ghost. Inexplicable... but too stupid to be even remotely ghostly.
I absolutely love your site!. You have so many stories that I can relate to. We have two little ones ourselves and they are 2 and 5. And boy have we done many of the albuterol treatments..OH MY!!. I loved your side note about the losing weight part. Please, oh please tell me how you are doing it. I gained ungodly amounts with my two pregnancies and I want "my groove back"!!!! I can't wait to finish reading more of your posts. I am new to all of this. Thanks for letting me post here!
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