Tag: Toddlers

Balance.

I think I blame my blood pressure medicine (?), but I just have, like, zero will to write at the moment. I have no motherly wisdoms. I have no funny, relatable story to share. I’m just here, trying to soak up every minute of every day while also being productive. And every day I wind up disappointed because, once again, I couldn’t find the balance. For the last couple of weeks, this means that I’ve gotten so many hours in for work, but my kid is constantly in a mood from lack of enough attention (at least she thinks so, anyway), and my dishes and laundry are piled high. As I’m writing this out, I should be in the kitchen putting away the clean dishes and filling the dishwasher back up, but, I finally just clocked out of work like 20 minutes ago (it’s TEN THIRTY PM) and I really just wanted to lay down. I’m tired. And I feel like I say that a lot, but it’s the truth. I was getting so good about taking a walk every morning… I had even added some running into those walks and was just getting to the point where I didn’t feel like I was absolutely dying when I came inside. But, now, I’m pretty sure it’s been about a week since I did any sort of physical activity, and I’m feeling it. Starting all over again sounds awful. Being out of shape is awful. Ah, the conundrum of life.

Baby girl is going to be two NEXT MONTH, and this mama is having a hard time dealing. When I worked at the daycare, the one year olds were always my favorite – they could interact with you and do activities, but they didn’t sass back much yet. I hated when the kids in my class had to move up, but there were always more kids coming right behind them. A whole new set of kiddos that were the perfect age. The fact that reality is not that way… that my baby will be two, and there’s nothing I can do about it and there’s not another little baby waiting patiently behind her and I have to keep moving and growing with her and she WON’T STOP GETTING OLDER. I’m a mess. I can (just a little bit) understand why some people just keep having babies… mostly, I just want her to be a baby again. Like I said, I’m a mess.

Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love this stage she’s in… except for when I don’t, haha. She’s so smart and understands so much. We haven’t actually seen Santa yet this year. She’s seen him portrayed on TV, and we’ve read The Night Before Christmas about a thousand times, and we’ve talked about who he is and what he does. This afternoon, I went to get her out of bed after her nap. She usually lays there and talks until I go in, so I didn’t think much of it when I went in there today and she was talking. She jerked around and smiled at me and said, “I was talking to Santa!” I laughed and asked her if she told Santa what she wanted for Christmas. She got so excited and said, “Santa’s awesome! He bringing me books!” So, I guess “Santa” needs to find some books to bring. This makes my heart happy. I love the fact that books make her so happy.

This same sweet kid also yells, “no” at me or, “I ‘note’ want to!” about fifty times a day now… so there’s that. I’m not feeling that part of this lovely stage at all. Asking her to turn her “listening ears” on, complete with pretending to turn knobs on our ears, before I ask her to do something is working wonders for getting her to listen at the moment, but I’m sure that won’t last too long. She’s so emotional about everything, but she can’t convey those emotions properly yet… it just comes out in flops and tears, sometimes the dramatic throwing of her body onto the nearest piece of furniture like she’s a Disney princess, or, my favorite one so far – she put her hand up to her head, fell back into my arms, and said, “I tan’t go on!” Good grief.

Baby girl sitting in her great grandmother’s rocking chair on one of our Thanksgiving stops.

Thanksgiving was good, but busy. We had three places to go and baby girl stayed up way past bedtime two nights in a row… yeah, not pretty. We are so very blessed that we both have so much family close by, but man does it make for busy holidays. When I was pregnant, hubby and I agreed that we would tell people that they could come to our house to see us on holidays, that we weren’t going to drag our kid all over creation. For one, our mid-renovation-for-two-years house just isn’t equipped to handle a bunch of people. For two, it’s just really not fair or feasible to ask everyone else to work around our one small family. So, we trudge from one house to the next, trying not to eat too much and save room for the next stop but failing miserably, and worrying that we’re not giving each stop enough time. As I said, all our family is local, so it’s just a drive across town from one stop to the next, but there’s only so much food and fun you can squeeze in before you have to move on. If we ever get our house together and we have Thanksgiving here, I might change my tune. I might prefer the trudging to having a house full of people. But, I don’t know… I’ll let you know if it ever happens. As far as traditions go, I feel like on both sides of our family, they have changed immensely over the last few years, mostly as grandparents have passed away. The only steady thing is the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade, I have to watch it every year. I was so excited to share it with baby girl this year… she was not really having it. She kept begging us to go to her room with her and play. It was like we were torturing her making her watch TV. Poor baby. As I’ve said before, the house we live in was the only house I knew for my granny. This was her house. And this was where we came for holidays, family dinners, birthday parties, everything. It feels so weird for it to be empty on special occasions. That’s why I’m hoping someday, it can be that house again. As introverted as my husband and I both are, we’re also both family people, and having a house full of family just seems right. Now, if someone could win the lottery and share a little with us so we could finish our renovations, that would be great! All kidding aside, I love how life has come full circle and we call this house home.

Guilt.

I’m still having trouble writing. I think I’m a little worried about my health, and I’m feeling SO MUCH guilt over balancing work and spending time with baby girl. She’s to the point where she asks me not to work, to stay with her, to play with her. And yes, I get that I’m at least home with her. And yes, I know she will be fine entertaining herself for a while. She doesn’t understand those things, though. All she knows is that she’s trying to talk to me and I’m not responding. All she knows is that she wants me in her room with her while she plays. All she knows is that she’d rather be running around the house than stuck in a pack and play. And honestly, I’d rather be playing with her. I’d rather spend my time planning neat activities to do with her. I’d rather be reading her even more books. But then when I do that, when I spend the extra time with her and do minimal just-enough-to-squeak-by work, I feel awful as well. Then, I’m barely getting any hours, which means hardly any extra money for my family, and I feel like a sub-par employee. Someone please tell me where the balance is. Any activities for an almost two year old that can be done mostly unsupervised would be great too. Most days I’m at a loss anymore.

I’m trying so incredibly hard to hold onto each precious moment of this life we all have together, no matter how small. The other day, we spent a few minutes outside together in the November snow. Baby girl loved it so much, and it made my heart so, so happy. She loved walking in it, she tried to catch it as it fell from the sky, she brushed some off of her swing set and wanted to play on it. We had to almost drag her back inside. Before we went out, she and I had prepared dinner, and she helped me make a piecrust from scratch. I hope cooking together is something that she enjoys in the years to come. As much as her daddy and I love food, she’s probably kind of destined to be in the kitchen. At least, I hope anyway, haha. As much as I enjoyed the special moments we had, I literally worked an hour that day. AN HOUR. Great, now I can buy a fast food lunch out somewhere. Ugh.

My literal snow bunny.

The next day, I managed to get in a whole two hours of work, and only made a small dent in my to-do list. But, I read about a million books, rearranged baby girl’s stuff because we got her a bigger bookshelf, and cuddled a little girl who doesn’t usually like to cuddle. Did the laundry get done? Nope. Well, sort of. It was washed and dried… it just chilled in the dryer for the next few days. Did I get much of anything else done? Nope. I know I need to learn to be okay with these kinds of things, but man, do I get bent out of shape. Like I said, I need to figure out this balance thing. I also need to remember to give myself some grace.

Speaking of that… I wrote the above last week, and just let it sit in my phone. For the life of me I don’t know why I’m struggling with this whole blogging thing all the sudden. But, the other night I was reading through some notes in my phone, trying to remember my inspiration, and came across something I had written for myself and had already decided when I wrote it that I wasn’t going to share it. It was raw, it showed my flaws, and it honestly just made me look like a bad mother (I felt like, anyway.) But today, I was working and baby girl was in the pack and play and we had a moment. She was stubborn and defiant, and I lost my temper. It wasn’t great. I was doing my daily bible and prayer time after she laid down for a nap, and I was overwhelmed with the feeling that other people needed to see what we go through. Other people need to see that my child is far from perfect, but more importantly, so am I. So… here’s an account from July that, up until now, I haven’t shared out of fear of judgement.

I stayed home from church with baby girl today because I’m not feeling well and didn’t want to spread my germs. I kid you not, I just spent OVER AN HOUR trying to get my tired, cranky toddler to clean up the blocks she got out.

After a lot of me asking nicely and active avoidance on her part, it got ugly. I used my firm mom voice, then raised my firm mom voice, then just plain raised my voice because I really didn’t feel good and my patience was wearing thin. All of that was met with her attempts to distract me by going to get other toys and trying to give me cuddles. After telling her I wouldn’t ask her again, and her responding by giving me a coy smile and toddling away, I swatted her bottom – not hard, but hard enough to get her attention. She cried for about 5 seconds, and then went back to trying to “distract” me. Whew.

At this point, I’m mentally exhausted and we’re only about 20 minutes into this. I went and stood her in the corner and told her she had to stay there until she was ready to clean up her blocks. She didn’t mind, and started inspecting the tiny bumps on the wall. Only when she tried to move out of the corner did she get upset. I stood in her way and reminded her she couldn’t get out until she was ready to clean up her blocks. She started fussing and I asked her if she was ready to clean up. She said, “yes,” so I took her by the hand over to where her blocks were and told her to clean up. She did a couple, I praised her for good listening, she looked at me, got up and ran across the room to her bookshelf. She’s been obsessed with reading this box set of Disney books lately, so I tried to use that to my advantage. “Do you want to read books?” “Yeah, read!” “Okay, you have to clean up your blocks and then mama will read to you, okay?” She just stares blankly at me. (And before anyone says she didn’t understand, she did. We do this bargaining thing all the time. Ex. If she wants a bite of something we have, we tell her to eat a bite of meat or whatever we’re trying to get her to eat first, and she does it. I frequently give her two step instructions, and she carries them out perfectly. SHE UNDERSTANDS.) So, at this point, I’m quickly losing my cool, and I literally have to leave the room. I look her in the eye and tell her that mama is going across the hall, and that I will come back when she’s picked up her blocks. I leave and shut the door. In hindsight, it probably wasn’t the best decision to just walk out on an already emotionally unstable toddler and leave her alone with her big feelings, but this mama was about to be emotionally unstable as well if I didn’t take a step back from the situation for a second. She stood at the door and hysterically screamed her head off until I went back in there a few minutes later. Realizing that that probably wasn’t the best way to handle that, I scooped her up, wiped her face, and told her I was sorry. I sat in the chair in her room and just held her for a few minutes. I couldn’t see her face because it was buried in my shoulder, but I noticed her breathing had changed. I kind of shift her to see her face, and she’s sound asleep. Then I feel really bad. She’s just tired. I get grumpy when I’m tired too. So, I just hold her for a few minutes and let her nap in my arms. I shift again and she doesn’t wake up, so I’m thinking she’s super sleepy. I get up, close the curtains, turn on her sound and go to lay her down. I get her halfway into the bed and she starts whining, “mama.” I’m mentally and physically exhausted (she probably was too) so I’m like, okay, but I’ve got to lay down. So I carry her into my bedroom and lay down with her in my bed (which we never do.) She immediately pops up and says, “eat!” [Now, before anyone decides to judge me for what I did next, please keep in mind that she had already eaten a good breakfast, and then, just like an hour and a half before all this started, ate an ENTIRE pumpkin muffie from Panera. She wasn’t starving.]

It was lunchtime, but I told her she had to go pick up her blocks so we could go get lunch. We go back in her room, I sit her on the floor next to the blocks… here comes the screaming banshee again. I literally just sit there and stare at her while she screams. It was just an angry, frustrated cry that I had tried to soothe repeatedly. I wasn’t sure what to do. After several minutes of that, I figured she really might be getting hungry, because it was like thirty minutes past normal lunchtime at that point. I tried one more time getting down on her level, asking her nicely to please pick up her blocks. I got nothing but blood curdling screams. So, I put her hand in my hand and we picked up every single block together. I even had to use my hand to close her fingers around each block, because if I didn’t, she would let it fall back to the floor.

After that was finally over, I picked her up and let her lay on my shoulder and just hugged her. I explained that she had to listen to her mama. Whew. She usually always sits in the high chair to eat, but that almost led to another meltdown, so I chose not to fight that battle. She sat in my lap and ate a baby food squeeze pouch and part of a slice of cheese. A gourmet meal it was not, but it satisfied her enough.

We both were so ready for nap time. I’m hoping this does a world of good. Otherwise, it might be daddy’s turn to deal with the attitude for a while.

So, there’s that. We’ve only had one other huge blowup like this since then, because I’ve tried to not let it get to the point that I did that day. My girl is usually good. She’s usually pretty agreeable, or can be persuaded to do something pretty easily by offering something else. There was A LOT going on in our lives in July to begin with, and I ended up being sick for two weeks after I wrote this, so I really have tried to cut myself some slack. But, I felt awful about it. I literally agonized over how I handled it for days. At the time I wrote it, I was just trying to process it because every time I thought about it my thoughts got jumbled from all the guilt (I know, I’m so very weird). I couldn’t even put it into words enough to really explain it to my husband out loud, so I ended up letting him read what I wrote above. Motherhood is hard, guys. I’m just going to come right out and say it. The sweet moments are worth every second of worry and agony, but it’s still hard.

Me.

I haven’t written anything (besides my bible journal) in a while. I guess my recent anxiety is trying to hold on, because I just haven’t really felt like writing. I started typing out something similar to this the other night and got distracted. I just looked for it, and it was nowhere to be found – my phone deleted it. In talking with the husband, he pointed out that someone (ahem, satan) doesn’t want me writing. I’ve had an excuse why I shouldn’t or don’t want to the last several times I have sat down to do it. I was talking to him just now about it, waved my arms around (as I often do while talking… what can I say? I’m animated) and completely tossed my phone across the room as a loud, thunderous echo resounded through the house and down the hall to where I’m sure my sleeping toddler could hear. I literally started crying. A) because that proved right what he had just said… there have been so many distractions and emotional setbacks over the past few weeks that have prevented me from writing, and B) because I was stinking embarrassed. I’m a spaz, and I’ll be the first to admit it, but GOOD GRIEF. So, I guess I’ll just write. Whether I know what I’m going to say or not, whether I think it’s good or not. I’ve got to start again somewhere.

For those of you following my health, some new things have happened. Keep in mind: I am thirty one years old. I finally visited a primary care physician for the first time in my adult life. My blood pressure during my visit was through the roof, and the nurse practitioner I saw didn’t like it at all. We discussed a few options, and landed on a low dose of beta blockers. She said that not only would it help my blood pressure, but also my anxiety and migraines. So, I’ve been taking those for about a week and a half, and I have been checking my own blood pressure at home at least once a day. I’ve been told that I have white coat syndrome before, and I know that is a lot of why my blood pressure is high when I go to the doctor. I get so worked up about it… I even freak out using the machine at the grocery store. I don’t know what my problem is… I told my mom the other day that it hurts my arm, and I think that is part of the reason I get so upset – because I’m anticipating the pain. She said that it doesn’t hurt her, but that my granny used to always say the same thing – that it hurt. So, I’ve been taking it a lot lately, trying to desensitize myself to the cuff. The other day, I took it five times in a row because it was a little higher than it had been at first. I got it down substantially just by doing it over and over again – it literally went down a little every time. So, that’s where I am… constantly being aware of my heart rate and taking a “grandma dose” of blood pressure medication, as my nurse practitioner called it. I’m going to get labs done to recheck my cholesterol (fasting this time) and some other things this week. Then I will go back for a more comprehensive physical at the end of the month. It’s been so long since I have seen a doctor, I have a huge list of concerns… she’ll probably think I’m a hypochondriac. And she’ll probably be right. Everytime I have a random pain in my arms or legs, I pretty much convince myself that it’s a blood clot or that I’m getting ready to have a stroke. Yeah, that definitely helps my anxiety… The other night, I had sharp pains from my rib cage, up into my chest, and down my arm. I was pretty convinced I was having a heart attack. Then the husband pushed on my stomach, I let out a huge belch, everything shifted a little, and I realized it was probably just a gas bubble pressing on a nerve or something. Ugh.

Some other random thoughts:

Baby girl’s favorite word is “no” at the moment and she will disagree with whatever you say, it doesn’t matter what it is. She liked Halloween, but a boy in one of those blow-up dinosaur costumes really made her day. She keeps talking about it whenever anybody asks her about Halloween, and the last two nights, we’ve thanked God for dinosaurs in our prayers. She kills me. She’s also been very clingy the last few days. And as much as l love to hear her say, “cuddle mama,” I do have a job that I sort of have to do some of the time. It killed me this past week when I was working, and she kept coming over to my desk and saying, “mama play with you [me]?” How can I say no to that? How do work at home parents get work done? My job is only part time, and my new normal the last few weeks has been finishing up my work after she goes to bed (which, by the way, annoyingly cuts into husband time). Balance is hard. I feel guilty when I’m actually productive for work, because that usually means that baby girl has been left to entertain herself for hours, or has been dragged all over creation with me in the car. I also feel guilty when I spend the day with her, because I feel like I’m not contributing enough financially to our family. Mom guilt is rough.

A screen shot of a typical time sheet for me. Clocked in 12 hours, only worked less than five. A lot of times, it’s even less.

Baby girl and I have gotten back to taking morning walks. I love getting to spend the time with her, starting our day exploring outside, and getting in a small workout for me. Twice around our neighborhood is about a mile, and I know that’s not much. But, out of shape me works up a sweat and gets a couple thousand steps in. I figure that’s better than nothing.

Love our morning walks, even if we have to bundle up quite a bit now that the weather is chillier.

Well, now that I’ve broken the ice again, maybe I’ll get back to writing more regularly. I don’t know what kind of writing funk I’m in, but it can go away now. I’ll probably post a bible journal entry or two next time. I have several earmarked that I felt were important to share.

Summer? Fall?

I’m having some serious cognitive dissonance over here. It’s September, and in my cold-weather-loving mind, it’s (un)officially fall and I’m ready to break out all the fake leaves and pumpkins, amazing-smelling pumpkin candles, and my sweaters. However, it was 90 degrees here today and we’re going on a beach vacation soon. I can’t quite get my mind straight. [Over] half of me wants to just take off running toward pumpkin spice everything and never look back, but the other part of me is trying on bathing suits and packing a beach bag. I’m so lost and confused. As I’ve said before, I am not a summer girl. I’m so, so ready to say goodbye to it. But then, a beach vacation in the fall is just not seasonal. Ugh. I guess I have to hold off on pretending that fall is here until we get back. And, seriously, pretending is all I’m doing, because as I said, it was 90 here today. The weather I’m dreaming of won’t actually be here for at least another month, more realistically two.

[I’m going to show how incredibly weird I am, but does anyone else have a mental seasonal calendar in their head? Mine’s like a square. Fall (September, October, and November) is at the bottom, then Winter is on the right side (December, January, February), and so on, continuing counterclockwise, three months at a time. HOW STRANGE AM I?? Like, I literally picture this in my head every time I think about months or seasons. Maybe I’ll illustrate it one day so everyone else can have a glimpse of how weird I am.]

Picture from last year’s vacation. This hat was too big last year, now it doesn’t fit her head at all. So many changes.

I am, however, excited to go on vacation with baby girl. The beach is not my ideal vacation spot, but I will love watching her experience everything. We went last year, when she was about 7.5 months old. She loved it, but there was a hurricane and we got evacuated after only being there like a day and a half. Pray that there won’t be any hurricanes this year! Baby girl is so smart and expressive, and loves exploring and learning. I think this will be so much fun. And I’m excited for all the amazing pictures we’ll get (bahaha, probably not.) Also pray for this momma and her husband as we travel with a toddler, stay in strange places with a toddler, and royally mess up our routine-loving toddler’s schedule. Yikes. That part is making me more than a little nervous. But, I’m so very thankful and grateful to be able to get away for a while. This summer has not been very kind to my whole family, and I think we all need a change of pace.

Rollercoaster.

This week. This week has been a week. Last night, I contemplated on this week, trying to look back and see my blessings. Monday started like this:

I’m trying to decompress from this day, and I’m just not sure how to do it. Besides the two loads of dishes I ran in the dishwasher, I got absolutely nothing done. I’m completely exhausted. This kid of mine is going through something, and I pray to God it’s just a phase. I think she’s testing her free will, but I wish she would just stop. Every other thing I ask her to do is answered with, “no,” the last few days, and I’m not handling it well. This morning, me asking her to clean up her blocks turned into a huge fight, and I ended up screaming at my child. The worst part, to me, is that none of it phased her. Speaking sternly did nothing. Physically picking her up and putting her in front of the blocks was apparently hysterical. Me raising my voice was also funny. Me swatting her bottom was a game. I finally just screamed. I was so mean. She jumped and finally started crying. I immediately felt terrible and started sobbing as well. It was awful. I left the room for a minute to compose myself, and left her just standing there crying. When I came back, I was more sad than mad, and just scooped her up and hugged her. I tried to explain to her that it makes mama sad when she says, “no,” to me and doesn’t listen. We cuddled a bit, I was trying to defuse the situation. After I thought we had both calmed down, I tried again to get her to put the blocks away. She started doing everything but that again, and I did not want a repeat of what had just happened. I tried telling her that it was almost lunchtime; that didn’t really matter to her. I finally gave up and just let her roam around her room for a few minutes, stalling. It really was lunchtime now, and I was wondering how stubborn she was really going to be about it all. She finally looked at me and said, “eat?” I asked her if she was hungry and she said yes. So, she picked up all her blocks and put them away… it had to be her idea, not something I was telling her to do. Ugh.

Is it because she is a mini version of me and I know exactly what she’s thinking when she acts like this that I get so very angry? She’s pushing limits, resisting authority. I get it, I do it too, just most of the time it’s in a much more passive (sometimes passive-aggressive) way. I understand the desire to do the exact opposite of what someone tells me to do, simply because they told me to do it. I understand getting defensive when someone tries to tell me they know what’s best for me. But for goodness sakes, she’s ONE AND A HALF. Should she even feel like this yet? Or does she simply just not want to clean up her toys. Maybe I’m projecting.

We tried on this bathing suit for vacation Tuesday night, and she was very adamant about wearing it the rest of the night… I think she was perfecting her Fancy Nancy look with those socks.

Then yesterday, I was just anxious all day. Like heart racing, body trembling, feeling of dread, edge of a full-blown anxiety attack kind of anxious, and I don’t even know why. I told my hubby last night – usually when I get like that, I have an idea (even if it’s somewhat vague) of what is stressing me out; I usually kind of know what exactly has me feeling that way. Not yesterday. I was seemingly having a physiological response to nothing. I still don’t know what had me so upset.

Today was pretty good. We all slept in a few extra minutes, baby girl woke up in a very good mood and stayed that way all day, and I’ve just generally felt better. It’s really been a pretty good day.

We’ll see about Saturday. In baby girl’s babbling earlier, I clearly heard her say, “doughnut ‘morrow,” so we’ll see how thoroughly disappointed she is in the morning that there aren’t any doughnuts… I know I’m already pretty disappointed about it.

Even after this week, I’m so very thankful that the “mundane, everyday” stuff is all we have to worry about. Life could be, and has been before, much more complicated. Work hasn’t been very demanding this week, and I’m so very grateful for that. With that being said, I am still mentally exhausted. I need a vacation.

Toddler lesson.

My kid has a stuffy nose. Like, the kind where I have to catch the snot dripping from her nose every thirty seconds. The kind that when she says “mama,” it comes out “bah bah.” The kind that makes it hard to eat because she can’t breathe through her nose, so she has to take breathing breaks in the middle of her chewing, causing her to gag on her food and refuse to eat any more. She’s so miserable, but she’s still so positive.

She went with me to work for a while – sat on the desk, got a sticker from my planner, watched the cars go by out the window. She fell asleep on the way home, cuddling an elephant toy that’s probably way too young for her, but it’s her car toy and she loves it. She was a trooper as I dragged her around to do more work. She was pleasant and smiling as we had lunch with family, although she didn’t eat much. She took FOREVER to go to sleep at naptime, but she wasn’t fussing, just singing and talking. She took a good, long nap and then woke up singing and talking some more. She then proceeded to play with her (my) bracelets for almost TWO hours. We laid in the bed while she played with them for a while and sang and talked. Then her granny came over and she played with the bracelets with her. She cleaned up when I asked her to. She quickly ate a very good dinner after her small lunch and not having any afternoon snack. She let me brush her teeth. She freaked out about getting saline drops in her nose, but really liked the vapor rub. She took forever to go to sleep again, but slept all night with minimal fussing.

That was yesterday. Today was… still okay, but we had a couple of battles of will. Today, she thought it was funny to tell mama, “no,” and run away after I asked her to clean up her books. Today, she said she didn’t want chips and salsa and rice (some of her favorites, and mine too to be honest!), but wanted to stay home (we went anyway, by the way, and she ate just fine). Today she said she wasn’t going to listen to me tomorrow, but wanted daddy to get her doughnuts. How old is my child?! Sometimes even I forget that she’s only just over 18 months old. Sometimes I forget that she’s not like, at least 3. Good grief. The conversations we have are ridiculous. The things she remembers after months are ridiculous. I’m seriously doomed. I’m pretty sure she’s already smarter than I am.

Despite her difficult-ness today, she was still pretty good. She was still obsessed with playing nicely with her bracelets. She still kept a pretty good humor as I dragged her back to the office for an unexpected work errand, enduring standstill interstate traffic and a car that was still hot even with the air blasting. She did ask me to sing “mermaid” all the way there and all the way back, and got really upset when I would stop to, you know, breathe and stuff. I kept trying to remind myself all day that she still doesn’t feel very good.

Sweet girl with all her “brabets”.

All that being said, I would not be even half as cheerful as she has been if I had a stuffy nose. In fact, I wasn’t. I was sick for two weeks straight last month and I’m pretty sure I was the biggest grump ever. How can I be more positive like my baby girl? How can I so easily look past the fact that I feel miserable and still see things around me to make me happy? I need a lesson from my one year old.

Expectations.

I expect a lot of my kid – I have since she was in the womb. She had to be tough, because there wasn’t much room in there. The last month or so of my pregnancy, her head stayed in my ribcage pretty much the whole time. They tried to make her turn, but there was just no room. Her poor little head kept getting stuck. I have said since she was born that I honestly think that’s why she had so much neck strength from the get go – she was used to constantly fighting for room. Almost immediately, my sweet girl realized she much preferred sitting up to laying back. She would get so very angry if you tried to cradle her, you know, like a baby. She also didn’t care for being rocked or cuddled too much. We gave up trying to use the rocking chair a few months in, it almost seemed to over-stimulate her rather than calm her down. She is just now getting to where she wants to cuddle for short periods of time, but still mostly just when she’s sick (or when she wants something.) She’s been miss independent for her whole almost year and a half of life. Maybe it was partly because of how big she acted from the beginning, but I’ve always had great expectations for my child.

This got me in trouble a little bit when we were in the newborn stages. The hormones and the lack of sleep made me a super unhappy person. I would get so frustrated with my poor baby when she wouldn’t go back to sleep, or seemed to be crying for no reason. I just wanted this tiny thing who needed me for everything to be able to self-regulate and self-soothe. I wanted her to just know how to do things that tiny babies really don’t know how to do.

I worked with kids for about ten years, and several of those years were spent with one year olds specifically. I learned a great deal about children and their development over those years. The biggest thing I think I learned? They are capable of so much more than we think, and expectation is everything. I would have a giant pile of money if I had a dollar for every time a parent asked, “how did you get him/ her to do that?!” Teaching a child to do something, anticipating that they will actually do it, and offering help when needed is all I ever did. Kids learn really quickly what it is you expect of them, and for the most part, they’re people-pleasers; they just want to do a good job.

For this reason, I expect quite a lot from my kid. And, for the most part, this has worked for us so far. Her mind amazes me all the time. She knows exactly what I’m saying to her. She can walk from one end of the house to the other to throw something away or put dirty clothes in the laundry basket. She can push her basket of clean clothes from the laundry room down the hall to her room. She can go get a specific book I ask for off the shelf, or a specific toy out of her bin. She can ask me to do things, like help, open her Easter egg (she’s still obsessed with these, months after Easter), pick her up, or go “that way”. She can tell me what she wants to eat (which currently is some combination of doughnuts, yogurt, bread, crackers, and prunes [yeah, I don’t know].) She knows so so many words that I’ve lost count. And she hears and repeats EVERYTHING.

My child is also my child, however, and we often have a battle of wills. After being sick for a week recently, she has been winning these battles, simply because getting her to eat or drink or do anything was a struggle. Now that she feels better, setting these boundaries again has been so hard. She really likes to test boundaries. I feel like I keep having to pray for patience, just to have enough to show her how to be patient. She really can push my buttons.

I think sometimes people think I’m too hard on my kid, that I’m not letting her be a baby. I’ll admit, it’s harder than I thought it would be with my own. Part of me wants her to stay a tiny squish for as long as possible. Another part of me, however, sees a toddler who, if left unchecked, could easily turn into the poster child for terrible twos. Yes, I want her to stay little, but I also want to set expectations now for how she should act – at some point, it will be too late.

Another thing I learned during my time with all those kiddos? Children thrive in routines. Again, I think it’s an expectation thing – if they know what’s expected and what’s going to happen next, there’s a comfort there. Another thing I’m not great at with my own stinking kid? Routines. I mean, we have a loose schedule, but it usually gets thrown off by something – a work phone call, a tantrum-throwing toddler who refuses to eat anything but yogurt, a lunch out with friends or family, or something. I keep telling myself that even if we keep the schedule a few times a week, it will stay familiar enough to be routine… but the planner and micromanager in me stays pretty anxious about it all the time.

My poor kid. She’ll either be super smart and a thoughtful, caring human being… or be scarred for life.

Change, Part 2.

I found another thought I had typed out on my phone and labeled “change,” so I thought I’d share it. I wrote this in early March:

“Man, I never have understood more the saying about life changing when you have a kid. Not the fact that one day you’re walking around doing your own thing and literally the next you’re responsible not only for yourself but another human being as well (although this is scary true too), but the fact that when you’re an adult, a whole year can go by and you still pretty much look the same, you have the same job, and you cook the same dinner as you did the year before. A year with a kid has brought SO MANY changes in the same amount of time. There’s the new mom, so sleepy, so thirsty, breastfeeding is life, c-section [in my case] recovery stage. Then breastfeeding is still life and you’re literally hungry ALL THE TIME. Sleeping schedules, feeding schedules, runny noses, is that an angry cry or a something’s wrong cry? Tummy time, rolling over, naps. Introducing food, babbles, sippy cups, crawling. Is she eating enough? Is she sleeping enough?

As I sit here pumping, trying to wean myself down to none, I can’t help but be emotional. Before [Baby Girl], a year might have brought a few new outfits, a new piece of furniture, and another anniversary. This past year has brought more emotions than I think I’ve felt in my entire life. Breastfeeding was the center of my world for so many months. I planned my days around it. I tracked it. I worried over it. I prayed over it. And I worked at it. And now I’m actively working to stop it. This season is over and it was entirely too short.

Change comes way too quickly with a child. Every single day she does something new or improves a skill. I’m trying my best to soak up every second of it, but it’s still passing me by so very quickly.”

It’s so weird to me that even a year ago, I had this shiny new baby and was still trying to figure out this motherhood thing. I now have a full-blown toddler who likes to wear my bracelets, asks me for doughnuts, and sometimes screams no at me. What happened to that precious, innocent, tiny squish that needed me for everything? I’m super emotional even writing this right now. This change-hating mama is not okay.

Shopping at Lowe’s like a big girl.

Grateful.

I took this picture in February and just couldn’t bear to put into words what I was feeling when I saw this scene. Everything in it means something to me.

I walked down the hallway one morning and saw this: shoes that hadn’t been put away, a goody bag from a birthday party from several days before, a trim-less wall (a reminder of just how unfinished our house really is), and some dirt that the picture caught that I couldn’t even see in person (a reminder of how I don’t clean as often as I would like.) This scene was not what I wanted to see first thing in the morning. I started to get upset, to put myself down for not picking up after myself and my family. But, suddenly my perspective changed, and I saw our mess differently.

The shoes in the floor didn’t annoy me anymore, but instead, made me feel so incredibly blessed. We had prayed so hard to have a baby; we struggled, we suffered. Those tiny shoes transformed into a symbol of a miracle, an answered prayer. The goody bag became a reminder of the amazing friends we get to share life with, and of how sweet it was that they invited my one year old to their five year old’s birthday party. The crack between the wall and the floor became a reminder of how hard my amazing husband has worked since we moved into this house. No, it’s not done yet, but it looks a lot different than it did when we started. And that dirt and dust – it reminded me that I had more important things to do than to keep my house spotless. I had a life to live and people to love.

The scene that began to cause me anxiety when I first came upon it, was now the best reminder of how amazing my life is, and how blessed I am. I’m grateful for my mess.

Random.

My head is all over the place today. Bear with me. We went to see Avengers: Endgame today. Don’t worry, no spoilers here. But, the best way I can explain it is satisfying.

I didn’t have coffee this afternoon and I am FEELING IT. My sweet momma stayed with baby girl so we could go to the movies. I always feel so guilty when I get her out of her routine, but it inevitably happens very often. She loves playing with her granny, though, and I don’t think she minded at all. She does love her routines, however. Tonight we were putting her to bed, and she kept pointing to the shelf saying, “ball, ball.” Her ball was on her bookshelf, and she did not like it. We’re so organized (not), there are places for everything. The place for her ball is in the living room, in the pack and play. I literally had to take it with me after I laid her down and promise her I was going to put it away. It made me think of another time she was particular like this. I wrote it down then, because I wanted to always remember how difficult my child was. Who am I kidding? This will probably only get worse as she gets older.

I wrote this in February: “We’ve gotten into a bedtime routine with [baby girl]: once it’s time for bed, she goes to her daddy, we walk to the bathroom, and I brush her teeth. Then she turns out the light in the bathroom and we go to her room. She picks out her jammies, then lays down to get a diaper and put on her jammies. Then, where it’s so cold in her room, she has a sleep sack that she puts on. Daddy turns on her sound and gets the book while we settle into the chair. After we read Goodnight Moon, daddy turns off her light and we walk toward the bed. She gives her daddy hugs, and then waves to him and blows a kiss as he leaves. Finally, we do our hugs and kisses, and I lay her down, leave, and shut the door
She’s pretty good about going to bed usually, and most of the time is very ready to go to sleep.
Tonight was bath night, so we did that before her usual routine. As I was going to lay her down, she started to fuss and was reaching toward the hallway. I gave her a kiss, but she was being very fidgety and reaching still. I told her to get some rest and sang her Goodnight Someone, then laid her down. She starting crying and didn’t stop after ten minutes or so. I walked into the bathroom, and it hit me that we had forgotten to brush her teeth… we had ruined her routine, and she had been trying to tell us. After a couple more minutes, we went in to get her. We got her up and took her to the bathroom to brush her teeth. She seemed satisfied like that was exactly what she wanted. We went back and did book, hugs, and kisses again as well. After a couple of minutes of fussing, she finally went to sleep.
Don’t. Mess. With. The. Routine.”

My one year old, guys. She is totally my child – she does not deal well with change. If you don’t know me, you don’t know the dramatic extent to which I detest change, but it’s pretty bad. I’m sure I’ll share with you soon about my aversion to change. I could write a novel.