Carter for President!

Even though he’s only three, I think that Carter has the makings of a fabulous politician. 

To be honest though, politician was my second thought.  At first I came to the conclusion that he’d make a really good con artist.  But I’ve since realized that his talents could be useful in the pursuit of a more respectable…and more legal…line of work

I think that he’s a natural born leader.  He’s not afraid to lay down the law.

For example, in the third week of preschool his teachers told me that he was very “hands on” in class that day.  First of all, what does that even mean?  Like, he used his hands to play a lot that day?  Oh no, come to find out they said he was “hands on” because he literally put his HANDS ON the other kids. (Carter!  Jesus, dude!  It’s the third damn week…couldn’t you at least wait a little longer before showing them your true colors…I wanted to keep them snowed till at least Christmas!  Your cover is blown, man.)

Well, we talked to him about it and told him to cut the crap!  Finally we asked him WHY he was pushing the other kids in class.  His answer?  “They weren’t standing in line, the teacher said to stand in line.”  Very matter of fact.  He apparently feels the need to put himself in charge of everyone’s behavior.  I don’t know WHERE he gets that from!  And if you step out of line...he'll just push you.  It would be great for crime prevention.  I, for one, know that I would walk the straight and narrow if I thought our national leader could pop up at any moment and shove me.

Another reason I want him to run for office is that he is a stellar negotiator.

We were getting ready for nap time so I told Carter we were done reading books.  This was an unpopular decision which led to him kicking over a basket of blocks. I very calmly said "I would like you to pick up those blocks." And he looked right at me and said "Yes...and I would like YOU to read a book to me!"

Oh ok, sooo…we both had scenarios that we’d like to see play out.  And he was really trying work out a deal with me. I like that he wanted to go the diplomatic route.  I also like that he’s three and I’m still bigger than him so I didn’t have to talk it out.  Pick up the damn blocks.

But these little interactions are very good practice for his future.

“President Jefferson, we would like you to get your troops out of our country.”

”Uh huh.  And WE would like YOU to stop bombing your neighbors….so do that and I won’t have to dump a pile of MegaBlocks  on your ass.  OK?”

In order to be successful in office you have to be able to represent you constituents.  Carter has some experience in this area.

Today he walked up to me while I was vacuuming and said:

"Excuse me, Mom. Me and my brother can't hear the TV when you're doing that."

What are you, the representative from the Children’s Union?  Did you get elected to come discuss your list of grievances with me?

Next I’ll be finding notes around the house that say “Dear Mom and Dad, Grant and I are sick of you guys buying the generic cereal.  What the hell are “Tastee O’s?  We want the real thing.  Please meet us in the playroom after dinner to discuss the situation or we’ll be going on a sleep strike effective at midnight tonight.”

I think I’m really onto something here.  He’d be a good candidate.  I mean, I wouldn’t vote for him cause I think he’s a little bastard…but everyone else is more than welcome to! 

Things Mike Says

This week is me and my husband’s 5^th anniversary.  So I found it fitting to write a blog paying tribute to the man who’s genes make of half of Carter’s DNA (I like to throw that fact around whenever I get a chance…makes me feel less responsible for how that kid is turning out.)

He has so many great qualities that it’s hard to name just a few.  But I'll try:

He’s really caring.  He’s always looking out for my well-being.  Like the time that I came home early from work because I was deathly ill and I just knew that when I walked in the door he would immediately take care of me, tuck me in and make me a cup of tea.  And naturally when he saw me he said “What the hell are you doing home?  I’m still watching my motorcycle show, ya know.”  Soooo…is that a no on the tea then?

He always puts me first.  My safety is his number one concern.  One day I fell while carrying our vacuum up the stairs.  Upon hearing the extremely loud bang my loving husband frantically ran over and yelled up “Is the vacuum ok?”  But I didn’t mind cause he explained “We have insurance for you…I don’t want to have to buy a new vacuum.” See?  What a Sweetheart!

Whenever I need an ego boost he’s there to tell me how beautiful I am.  I told him that on my walk with the boys one day I got beeped at by three different cars.  His response?  “Well I would stop walking in the middle of the street then.”  Hands off ladies, he’s all mine!

He really gets into the holidays, too! Last year he came home from Christmas shopping, ignored me and kids and walked straight to the liquor cabinet. After pouring himself a large scotch, he took a sip and said "I hate this fucking holiday!" I truly have the merriest husband in all the land!

He’s a great father, the kids learn so much from him. One morning while I was changing Carter’s diaper he suddenly pointed down and said, "Don't touch your balls!"  He looked very proud of himself, as if he had been saving up this pearl of wisdom for some time and was glad that he finally got to share it with me.  Dads teach the best life lessons, huh?

He also has a very unique fashion sense. The first time I left him alone with Carter I came home to find my precious baby boy wearing a red and brown striped shirt, baby blue sweatpants and green socks.  I wanted to cry...in fact I think I may have actually cried.  But Mike pointed out the fact that “Hey, at least he’s WEARING clothes!  Can’t we just celebrate the little victories?”

He’s super good at home improvement projects.  And he’s always patient while working on them.  Last year when we had all the rain and flooding I woke up one morning to my two beautiful children, a nice hot cup of coffee and the soothing sounds of my husband screaming “FUCK YOU RAIN!!!” at the top of lungs from the basement.  Ahhh…bliss!  

He’s a really hard worker.  One night I happened to comment that it was impossible to set up Carter’s new train tracks so that they looped around twice and met back together.  And wouldn’t you know it; Mike then spent the next THREE HOURS trying to prove me wrong.  Now that’s dedication.  I hope our children inherit his work ethic.

So there you have it, folks, just a short list of some of the reasons why life with Mike is so fun!  Happy Anniversary, honey! 

Fun With Anxiety

We recently took Carter to the doctor because we noticed him having strange reactions to new or unknown things.  Our pediatrician said that he has anxiety.  He needs to feel safe and supported and we need to be patient and understanding with him.

OH MY GOD! 

Seriously?  Do you even know who you’re talking to?  My mind immediately starts flashing back to all the times I’ve used the fact that he’s afraid of something against him.  Um, yeah, I wrote a whole blog about it (see “Using Fear”). 

You mean all this time he’s really had something up with him and I’ve been exploiting it for my own gain?  The therapy bill just keeps getting bigger and bigger…

But, in my defense, I've only tried to scare him in an effort to keep him safe. 

Like, we may or may not have told him that tigers live in the basement.  It’s dangerous down there!  There are tools and crap lying around everywhere!  Do you expect me to tell him the truth?

“Oh, hey, buddy don’t go down in the basement.  All of Daddy’s tools are down there, power tools and saws and hammers and screwdrivers.  Also all of your outside toys are down there.  You know, the ones that you loooooove playing with that are away for the season.  Oh, and I think Daddy even has some old cool car parts lying around.  So, stay outta there, ok?”

 I’m sure that would work just as well.

Now, I think I need a little clarity on the rules here.  I’m not supposed to scare him into compliance anymore, but if he already has a mistaken belief about something am I obligated to correct it? 

I don’t like him reaching into the sink for obvious reasons so I told him so:

“Carter, don’t reach into the sink.  There are things in there that could hurt you.”                          
“Like whales?”

I mean, I was gonna say knives.  But if you thinking there are whales in there keeps you from playing in the sink then...yeah...whales.  He came up with that on his own so technically I can't be held responsible for that one.  Right?  Right?

I don’t only use outrageous threats to keep him from doing things.  I also use them to GET him to do things.

One time I told him that if he didn’t let me cut his nails he would turn into a werewolf.  I guess this whole anxiety thing is the reason why the next day he frantically told Grant, “You better let Mama cut your nails....I think you're in danger." 

I briefly wondered why he was trying to save his brother.  But then I figured Carter realized if Grant turned into a werewolf then Carter would be stuck living with him.  He probably figured having a warewolf as a brother would suck.  So they would both be screwed…hence the warning.

Sometimes, however, things I thought would scare him don’t really seem to bother him that much.

Once I told him that if he didn’t behave I would send him to live with the Wild Things.  This statement put him deep in thought, and then he looked at me and asked:  “What kind of Wild Things?  What color are they?  What kind of house to they live in?  Are there toys there?”

Wait.  I’m sorry, are you asking these questions because you are considering going and you need to collect more information so you can weigh your options?  Gotta get all the facts before you make a final decision?  Do you need to get back to me on this one?

This is going to take some getting used to.  My signature parenting tools are threats and bribery.  I don’t know how to function as a normal, caring, loving mother.  Stay tuned.

Potty Training: The Sequel

In order to potty train a child you have to be patient.

Now, unless I was sitting in a doctor’s office at the time, no one has ever used that word to describe me.  Ever.

Regardless, around 2 ½  I figured I would give it a go.  I started reading all the literature about this horrific process. The experts say you should wait “until he’s ready”.  He’s supposed to give me signs. 

Ok, is stripping down naked, peeing in the middle of the kitchen and then slipping and falling into the pee puddle a sign of potty training readiness?  No?  Well, guess we’ll wait a little longer then…

Cut to a few months later and I’m SO ANNOYED that he’s still not ready.  Especially since all of his friends seemed to be getting the hang of it.  What the hell!  Screw when HE’S ready, I’M frigging ready!  He’s getting his ass on that potty and he’s not getting off until he does something on it!  THAT’S IT!

Raise your hand if you can figure out how that scenario worked itself out?  After a few epic battles the only results were a lot of crying on my part and a lot of not peeing on his part.

 Then I reread my “how to” book of potty training.  The number one rule?  Don’t force them to sit there until they go.  At this point I’m just wondering if these people have cameras in my house.

So I resigned myself to waiting.  Who wants to clean up accidents anyway?  I’m over it.  I have myself all set to just wait it out; I’ve gone over every logical reason for why this is the best possible solution.  

Number one is that having a diaper on restricts his access to his boy parts.  Seriously, when he’s wearing underwear it’s like he’s afraid to let go of his “ween” (yeah that’s the lovely new word that Daddy taught him.) He has to guard it at all times.  Like someone might steal it or something. 

So yeah, we’re waiting.

Except for the next day at nap time Carter informed me:

“Mama, I don’t want to wear a diaper.”

“Well, you are.  Let’s put it on!”

“NO!  I don’t wanna wear one!  BIG BOY UNDERWEAR!”

As I’m sitting there fighting with him to put on a diaper I’m thinking: “Gee, could this be one of those signs the stupid books keep talking about?”  Probably.  But did I keep trying to sell him on wearing the diaper?  You know it! 

‘Cause, I mean, what if the sign comes at a really inconvenient time?  Nap time?  Come on, Carter!  You WOULD pick a time where if you have an accident it will lead to the most work on my part.   Way to stay true to your mission of making my life as difficult as possible. 

I relented, and, much to my surprise, he stayed dry!  And he did it again the next day…and the next…

OK…WOW!  Yippee!  He’s potty trained right?  I can check that off my list of things to do before he hits puberty? 

Yeah, no.  That’s apparently not how that works.  At least not in my life.  If things work that way in your life then I say, in the most loving way possible, screw you!

Pee we have down.  With the exception of the occasional accidents that happen in totally discreet places…like the middle of the library for example.  Now we just have the other thing to contend with.  For the past few months that has been the struggle of the century.  We’ve bribed him with every conceivable thing.  And a few inconceivable things as well. 

Recently, however, he’s been doing his business on the potty as long as he is alone in there.  His new favorite thing is to run out of the bathroom screaming “POOP SURPRISE!”  He gets so excited about it that he doesn’t even pull up his pants.

And then we all have to jump up and down and scream and shout cause there’s one lone little poop in the toilet.

It should be a fun day at preschool when he runs naked from the bathroom, holding his ween and yelling “POOP SURPRISE!”

And the next day will be just as fun when I open my front door to a few people holding a clip board and yelling “DSS HOME VISIT SURPRISE!”

Fragile

When we bought the furnishings for our house I wish someone had said: “Oh hey, by the way?  Don’t buy nice stuff.  Your future kids will just break it all.”

When you’re newlyweds you don’t think about these things. 

So, you go ahead and register for the Tiffany’s picture frames and the Kate Spade vases.  Take it from me, those vases will get dusty waiting for the flowers that you never have the time or money to buy…but don’t fret…you’ll use the frames.  They can hold the pictures of what your house used to look like before your demon children came along and ruined everything they touched.

All kids break things.  Usually just out of curiosity though. 

I think it goes without saying, however, that breaking things in interesting ways is a specialty of Carter’s.  It’s just Murphy’s Law in action.  How does that go again?  Anything that can go wrong…will be because of Carter?  Something like that.

Did you know that a very inventive way to use egg beaters is to bang them against the woodwork in your parent’s house?  Not only does it make lovely music, but it also leaves THE BEST ding marks.  And YOU thought they were just for beating eggs and hitting your brother over the head with!  No, no, my friend.  You were mistaken!

Carter uses his toys as weapons of mass destruction as well. We were playing with his bowling set one day and he said "Auntie Jen got me this! It was a present and it's so cool!"

It was really cute....until he threw the bowling ball at a window and cracked it. Then it was less cute.

I really hated looking at that crack.  But don’t you worry; I really didn’t have to deal with it for long.  A couple months after the bowling ball incident he threw my video camera through that same window and just shattered it completely.  What a doll, huh? (Oh, and if anyone is looking for something to get me for my birthday…I need a new video camera, too.)

I would have to say by far the most expensive thing he’s broken is the dog.  Ok, all you animal lovers out there, no animals were injured during the making of this blog!  Well, I mean...actually, one was.  ‘Cause that’s the point of the story. 

This is what happened: Carter threw his sippy cup off his tray when he was done with it and it hit our dog smack in the eye.  After $900 worth of vet bills they told us…”Eh…he’ll be blind.  There’s nothing you can do about it.”  Oh, super!

Well, turns out they were wrong.  That dog is just fine, nothing is wrong with his sight.  So Carter didn’t blind his dog after all.  But we still had to pay the damn vet bill so I fully intend to use that story against him some time in the future. 

“Remember the time you blinded your dog because you were misbehaving?  Do you want that to happen again?  CLEAN YOUR ROOM OR THE DOG WILL GO BLIND AGAIN!”

I’ll have to work on how those two things are related, but I’m confident that I can come up with something that will scare him into compliance.

The one positive thing about having kids that break things is that if YOU break something you can blame it on them. 

“No honey, it was Carter who spilled scented oil air freshener all over the woodwork and left a huge stain…that you now have to fix.  Kids, right?”

I’m still trying to find a way to blame Carter for the time I sideswiped a huge truck while attempting to sneak by it and smashed in my side mirror.

Mike, you don’t read my blog right?

Smooth Talker

Know how toddlers say the funniest things because they have no filter yet?  Yeah, that’s only enjoyable up to a certain point. 

Carter needs some help learning how to flatter women.  He needs to know that girls like to be complimented, told they look beautiful, etc. etc.  Eventually someone should tell Carter that saying things like, “Oh Mama!  You’re a hot mess!”  is not gonna be socially acceptable for that much longer. 

Seriously, hanging around this kid is not all that good for my ego. 

One morning the boys and I were sitting around playing with cars.  Carter was handing them out to us, dictating which cars we were allowed to play with.  Clearly. 

First he said “Grant can be the Mini cause he’s little”.  Well that makes sense. 

Then he told me that he would be the Porsche.  He did not offer up an explanation, but based on his rationale for Grant I’m thinking he had a reason for this choice.  In which case, I’m also thinking that I’ll never have to worry about my child having a self-esteem problem.

So following along I said "Can I be the Hot Rod cause I'm hot?"

To which he replied: "No, Mama. You're the Dump Truck."

Wow.  Ok then.  The Dump Truck, huh? Diiiiiidn’t see that coming.  You sure know how to make a girl feel special, Cart. 

I guess that’s how he views me.  But hey, dump trucks are awesome in his world.  So maybe THAT’S why he picked it for me.  And that’s what I tell myself so I can sleep at night.

My new role as Dump Truck could be responsible for this next story. 

Grant hit the page button on the phone and it was going "Beep, beep, beep..".  So Carter looked at me and said "Mama, are you backing up?"

No, really, Carter.  Keep ‘em coming.  I so enjoy these interactions where you compare me to some type of heavy machinery. 

Just yesterday I was sitting on the floor, which apparently was not where Carter wanted me.  My bad.  He alerted me to the fact that I needed to move by saying:

“Mama, can you get up?  Here, I’ll help you”.  He grabbed onto my arm, yanked upwards and then said, “Uh Oh!  I can’t even pick you up at all!”

Did he honestly need to add “at all” to the end of that sentence?

I suppose I have to exercise more.  Carter must suppose this as well because we were sitting eating lunch and he came out with "Mama, you have to do booty exercises."

He then proceeded to get on the floor and demonstrate..."You have to do this, Mama. Like this..."

I hate him.

Step Aside Dr. Spock!

When people think of mothers they think of compassionate, caring women who bake cookies and make you feel all better when you’re sick.  But I didn’t have that mother…so I didn’t become that mother.

I had the mother whose idea of compassion was telling me: “Beauty is painful” as she burned my ears with hot rollers.  And whose idea of caring for our injuries was giving us ice and Advil.  No, seriously.  Your whole leg could have just fallen off your body and she’d try to fix it with ice and Advil.

So I guess I’ve inherited her unique parenting style. 

A large part of my parenting philosophy centers on the age old pearl of wisdom “I told you so”. 

You snuck in the cabinet and ate six cookies and now you don’t feel well?  I told you so.  You ran through that puddle and now you’re bitching cause your pants are all wet?  I told you so. 

It’s especially hard not to gloat when he falls after doing something that I’ve told him five times in a row to stop doing. 

Liiiiike…jumping on the couch for example. 

Jump…”Stop it”…jump…”Stop it”…jump…BANG!  In this particular scenario my first instinct was to yell out: “Good!  I hope it hurt!”  I don’t imagine this is a normal motherly reaction. 

The other thing I like to let Carter do is say inappropriate things because they’re funny. 

It was the week of the big Pats/Jets playoff game and when I came home from work one night my husband said "Um, so, your sister taught Carter how to say 'The Jets are poop' when she was babysitting today.  He’s been saying it on and off for the better part of an hour."

I looked at him in surprise and said "OH MY GOD....That's awesome!!"

My husband occasionally works from home.  One day he had called into a meeting.  He had his very serious business voice on and was using important industry terms and such. The whole time Carter was in the background chanting "Pooping on the potty...yeah, yeah ,yeah!" And I didn't stop him.  Cause it was funny.  I’m actually laughing about it right now…

He’ll say these things at preschool one day.  Then it will be significantly less funny.

I really, really hope he doesn’t ever repeat anything that I say to his friends, teachers, social workers…

I mean, we’ll probably be ok.  We all know how I always watch my mouth around my children, how I never yell and always treat others with respect and…No, really, I can’t even finish that sentence.  It’s too ridiculous.

I don’t know WHERE he picked up the phrase “Oh fuck!” but don’t be surprised if you drop something and he yells that out.  Cause, yeah, it’s happened.  Nice, Danielle.  Real nice. 

But sometimes the things he says that he’s gotten from me are funny in a sort of appropriate way (No, really!)

Whenever we see rude behavior I try to use it to teach him a lesson. “Now see Carter, that lady bumped right into us and didn’t even say excuse me!  Oh, what’s that, Mam?  You can hear me?  Weird.”

We were leaving the doctor’s office one day and the man in front of us didn’t hold open the door.  So Carter screamed right behind him “HEY!  He didn’t hold the door for us!  That was mean!” 

See, he speaks the truth!

But then there are always the other things he’s heard me say…like when he pointed to my margarita and said "Can I have that too?" And I told him, "Sorry hunny! This isn't for you...it's because of you."

Unfortunately, I also speak the truth.