This and That

A few things for Friday:

* Somebody, somewhere, has taught my child that gummy candies belong in her ice cream. I'd like to lodge a formal parenting complaint against this development, because...no.

* Brigid and I are heading to the beach tomorrow to crash my parents'/sister's spring break trip for a few days. There will be three of us in the Bug going down to Florida, as my sister has agreed to help me entertain the two-year old beast for the southbound portion of the trip, but I am on my own for the return leg. So if you have any happy thoughts to spare on Tuesday...send them my way.

* On a related note, I totally plan to take Mary (my lovely sister) and Brigid cruising along the Panama City Beach strip in my convertible. Because every high school senior wants to spend spring break cruising with a two-year old, right? At the very least, it would have to be better than the spring break we took my mom's mini van (and my mom and dad and other sister) out and about...

* Gummy bears. In ice cream. I just don't know about that kid...

* Steve is on his own this weekend, with Brigid and I off frolicking on the beach, so if you happen to drive by my house and notice a raging party taking place, could you call me and let me know? You never know with him...

* I'm really having a problem getting over this gummy bear thing. I mean, seriously. Ew.

Scenes From Bedtime

Steve (leaving the room): Night night, Brigid.

Brigid (to me): Daddy go potty.

Me: No, kiddo, I think daddy's going to bed.

Brigid: No. Daddy go potty. Be right back.

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Brigid (standing up in her crib about halfway through the Winnie the Pooh book I'm reading to her, while lying on the floor next to her crib, per her request): Daddy go potty. Be right back.

Me: No, I told you...daddy went to bed.

Brigid: Dramatic sigh, drops her head down into her hands.

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Brigid (about two hours after she should have been asleep): Daddy, help me. Daddy!

Steve: What's wrong?

Brigid: My tummy hurts.

Me (a few minutes later, when Steve comes out of Brigid's room): Did her tummy really hurt?

Steve: No.

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Brigid (ten minutes after Steve just left her room): Blow! Blow!
 
Me: You need to blow your nose?
 
Brigid: Yes.
 
Me: Is there anything else wrong, kiddo?
 
Brigid: Thumb in my mouth*. Night night.

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And three hours later, the kid finally went to sleep.

The end.


* This whole 'thumb in my mouth' thing is a new Brigid technique for not answering any of our questions. I have no idea where she came up with it, but it started when we'd go through the pictures of the Winnie the Pooh characters in the front of the books we've been reading recently. Roo, Kanga, Piglet, Tigger, Owl, Rabbit, Pooh, Eeyore...she knows them all. She even corrected me when I said it was Roo in Kanga's pouch in one picture, because it was actually Piglet. Eagle eyes, that kid.

But when we get to Christopher Robin, she sticks her thumb in her mouth and refuses to answer, telling us (around that thumb, mind you) that she can't say his name because she has her thumb in her mouth.

It's nice to see she's applying it to other situations where she just doesn't want to talk to me, now...

Perspective

I know my poor dog is not the most favorite animal around these parts, mostly because she's the most obnoxiously annoying dog in the HISTORY of dogs, but you know what?

Brigid kind of likes her...


And that's good enough for me.

Rain, Rain

I see raindrops and think, "The yard is going to get muddy, and the dogs are going to track it in, and I need to get a towel to clean them off, and the tv is going to go out, and I hope this doesn't turn into a big storm, and I hope it clears up by tomorrow..."

Brigid sees raindrops and thinks, "I should totally go dance on the back porch right now, while my mom plays music for me from her phone..."

I like her thought process more.

The Blowing of the Stink

When I was growing up, my dad was full of great one liners, including (but not limited to):

My grandma was slow, but she was 90...
Mess with the bull, you get the horns (not original, but useful nonetheless...)
Paybacks are hell (usually used after I tried to be funny by digging my elbow into his ribs for no reason...which I did A LOT.)

And my personal favorite:

Why don't you get outside and blow the stink off of you?

That's what spring is all about, right? Getting outside and blowing that inside-air-of-winter stink off of you?

(Oh, and getting super excited about a pretty rock that you accidentally found...in the pile of pretty rocks surrounding the air conditioning unit that your mother has told you A MILLION times to stay out of, of course.)

Give them an inch...

Me: No, Brigid, you can't stand on the balcony. You have to stay in the house.

Brigid: Well, that just doesn't seem fair, right there. Maybe, if I just stand here, looking cute, she'll change her mind?

Brigid: No? Really? That's not working? Maybe if I ask Daddy, instead...?

Steve: Sure you can come on the balcony. Oh, wait...mom said no? Then you can only come on the balcony if you're sitting down instead of standing up. Compromise is allowed, right?

Brigid: I WIN!!!

 

 THE END. 

(Do I even need to tell you that all day on Sunday, when I'd tell Brigid no about something, she'd run to Steve in tears, telling him 'mommy said no!', fully expecting to get a different answer out of him? No? I don't need to tell you that? You saw that one coming from a mile away?

 

Yeah...you and me, both, friend...)

Stylin'

Sometimes, you're cool.

And sometimes, you're really-big-sunglasses cool.




Since the dog ate Brigid's sunglasses from last summer, I'm just glad she found a new pair to get her through this year...

Remember that whole vacation thing?

So...

Yeah...

Remember how Steve and I were going away for a week, and I was so concerned because I'd never been away from Brigid for that length of time, and I was going to be in an entirely different country, and OH MY POOR BABY!!!!, and other such nonsense?

Right.

Well, it turns out that I might as well have saved myself the worry (which, yes, of course, I knew before I even left that it was stupid to worry about leaving her because she'd be fine, but still...see 'MY POOR BABY!!' above...), because I'm not entirely sure Brigid even realized we were gone. We talked to her every day over Facetime (hooray for wonderful hotels with free wi-fi), and on every call, after the initial excitement of seeing us on the screen, and shouting 'HI MOMMY!! HI DADDY!!' in our general direction, she'd be off on some other mission much more important than talking to her parents, who obviously missed her much more than she missed them.

And then...

AND THEN!!!

When we did get home, was she excited to see us? NO!!*

In fact, when my sister-in-law heard the garage door open, and she turned to Brigid with a 'guess who's home!!' excitement about her, my dear, sweet daughter (so I've been told) guessed grandma.

Not mommy. Not daddy.

Grandma.

So, while I could take this to mean that a week here or there in a kid-free manner is not ever out of the question now that I know Brigid is perfectly able to get along without us around, I'm choosing, instead, to take the route of never leaving the house again, because if I'm not getting a dramatic 'don't ever leave me again' kind of homecoming out of that kid, then I'm just not going to give her the satisfaction of leaving at all.**

I win. So there.***


*Lies. All lies. Well, most of it, anyway. She was excited to see us, once she realized that it really was us coming home. And, if I'm going to be completely honest, I guess it is understandable that she'd think it was the person she'd just spent the last five days with coming to see her, and not the parents that abandoned her for a week to frolic on tropical beaches.

(Please, take a minute to imagine Steve and I frolicking, tropical beach or not...

Ha! Ok. Sorry about that...

As you were...)

**Also a complete, bald faced lie. If I get the excuse to tropical beach again? I AM TOTALLY TAKING IT!!!!

***I'm guessing Steve is experiencing a moment of pure joy at the realization that I can, in fact, out-immature a toddler.

I. Am. Awesome.


PS: The trip was wonderful. The wedding was lovely. My sister was beautiful. My family members are my favorite people to vacation with. And my in-laws were great for taking Brigid on for a week while we were gone. I'm a pretty lucky gal, you know?

Welcome Home

Me (to Brigid, while playing with her sand table in the backyard): If you keep dumping your sand out on the ground like that, you won't be able to play with your table anymore because there won't be any left.

Her: Dumps another two shovels full of sand onto the ground, while looking me directly in the eyes but saying nothing.

Me: Yeah, I've got nothing for that. You win.



(I'm losing my touch, aren't I? I'm going to have to work on that...)

Pitiful

Steve and Brigid had a few last minute, pre-vacation errands to run, and as my teenaged-sleep-habits-trapped-in-a-toddler-body child has not been sleeping so well lately due to the all-consuming congestion she's been dealing with these last few nights, Brigid obviously thought this was as good a time as any to catch a little snooze.

Poor, sweet baby.



(Also, please note that my child is wearing shorts and a t-shirt in MARCH, because it has been 80 here this week.

That's right, 80.

Why wasn't my tropical vacation scheduled last year when we got hit with the fifteen year snow storm, again?)

She's totally messing with me, isn't she?

Toddler timing strikes again, as Brigid seems to have come down with something that sounds suspiciously like croup only three short days before Steve and I are scheduled to leave the country for a week. So, in addition to trying to get the two of us all ready to go on the trip, and preparing my in-laws for their week with the kid, Steve and I are now debating the merits of taking Brigid to the doctor today versus waiting it out another night to see if anything worsens (Because most likely this is all viral, meaning we're just going to have to tough it out until it runs its course. Or, you know, tough it out until we get the hell out of dodge, and leave someone else to watch it run its course...) while also operating on NO SLEEP!!! because a coughing Brigid is not a sleeping Brigid, which is awesome.

So now, I'm torn between being all, 'Hey, Bug? This? Right here? THIS IS WHY YOU WEREN'T INVITED ON THE TRIP!!!' (because when we were trying to decide whether or not to take her to the wedding with us, all I could see was sick baby in the Dominican Republic, especially after the Christmas-in-Indiana ER disaster, and I just didn't think that was something we wanted to try...), and crying 'I CAN'T LEAVE MY BABY IF SHE'S SICK!!!!' to myself over and over again.

This parenting stuff, man. It's just a nonstop parade of butterflies and rainbows, isn't it?