Never a dull moment

On January 25, 2014January 25, 2014 By JillIn Uncategorized1 Comment

I feel strange. Not myself – I have been wandering around my kitchen and living room for a while, ok, well it only has been five minutes, but in the “Moooomy- where are you?” world it seems downright long. The girls were playing together for five glorious minutes! Five minutes where the little one wasn’t clinging to my leg and Gia wasn’t asking for a snack or water. Seriously, that girl can put it away….

In a day filled with driving to activities, feeding the kids, and breaking up mini girl fights- What is up with that lately? I thought it was boys that were supposed to be rough…what happened to my dream of two little girls, bent over a book, giggling about their mommy (aka Cinderella) scrubbing the floors…

Gia truly believes I am pretty as that golden haired princess, in fact, she actually thinks I am Cinderella. This makes carrying that 8 + pounder around, delivering past my due date, and suffering through 24 hours of labor, among other technical scares all worth it…I will ride this Cinderella train as long as I can…pretty sure I will be the Wicked Witch of the West soon enough.

I may be Cinderella, but my fairy godmother isn’t helping me in the sibling rivalry department! They are constantly fighting with each other and Arianna can get awfully vicious for a two year old. Two days ago she bit Gia really hard and just today, she did some serious damage with her scratchy fingernails – and I just cut them! Do you moms feel like their fingernails always need to be cut? I pick Gia up from school, notice overgrown nails, and that along with her ratty hair (she equates hair brushing with getting shots at the doctor, you should see the fear and tears in her eyes when I bring out the brush) must raise eyebrows at the school.

So back to those five minutes- I find myself just staring at the floor, staring at piles of clothes (well, actually lumps of clothes) that need to be put away, and gazing out the window. I am like a sulky kitten when I am not needed – aimless with no direction. Upon thinking of this, I realized that the girls must feel this way when they are either finished with a snack, a show, or a project/activity.

They simply don’t know what to do with themselves and that’s when these little angels start to drive me bonkers, and I get frustrated saying, “Come on girls- go play- find something to do.” But they just can’t, well, not yet, not until they’ve reached the slamming of the door stage and not wanting to be bothered with their farty old mom. Oh my Goodness- I’m not ready for that! I better enjoy these moments. Look at these faces…

I think I will take their lost kitten moments and just play.

The cleaning and dishes can wait, mommy time can be postponed, who needs to eat anyway, – wine counts as a food anyway, doesn’t it?

I have to admit that while it is easy for me to stop, drop, and play with my children, I am creatively challenged when it comes to I’m bored, what should we do? And what activity works for a 4 and 2 year old combined?

I started to write down activities and things to do- easy ideas, nothing so messy that I have to lay a tarp out, simple activities that don’t require me to buy out the entire arts and crafts section at Michaels, or spend all my allowance on!

That’s right- my husband gives me a weekly allowance based on my dinners. Gourmet equals jackpot, while soup and sandwich, which he deems as a trucker’s dinner, wins me only the change from his pockets 😦

So, when I’m not scouring the internet for a meal that makes me the big bucks, or I’m not hiding in the closet eating cookies, I hope to surf the net and steal ideas from other brilliant moms – why reinvent the wheel?

Soon, my stack o’ fun will be filled, and when the rainy day, dull moments visit our house and the girls are hovering around me like dogs begging for scraps, I will whip out the cards, let Gia pick out three activity cards (choice is important for them!) and stomp the stale minutes away.

I would love to hear ideas or suggestions! Oh and before I forget to tell you, I was joking about the allowance/dinner situation.

But, he still does consider the soup/sandwich night a trucker’s delight. I tell him I’ve never seen an unhappy trucker before- they always smile at me and honk their horn as I pass them by…well that was when I was ten…when I was lifting my arm and fake honking- remember doing that? Anyway, the point is it’s a hot meal and he should not complain because you never know what’s lurking in my soup….Anyone who has seen Orange is the New Black knows what I’m talking about!

Goldilocks comes for a visit

Goldilocks Comes For a Visit

It is Wednesday and an idea did happen to “pop” into my head so I might as well just keep Wonderific Wednesdays. I mean if I quit all of my commitments what kind of lesson am I teaching my children. Granted they know nothing of this blog at this point, but one day they will.

That is unless someone, perhaps one of those super moms, you know the type- organic, homeschooling, making every craft possible on pinterest, takes me down in the Stop n Shop. I can just see it now, me, strolling down the aisle, donuts in the girls’ mouths, spotted by Susy Brown, author of Happy and Organic. She sees me and charges at me with venomous anger – How dare you let your kids eat chicken nuggets and watch Yo Gabba Gabba?

I have to interject here for a minute and tell you that I have come across one or two moms who said they won’t let their kids watch this show. What? Seriously! The show is certainly not teaching them reading and math but it isn’t immoral or inappropriate. It’s a little weird with strange looking monsters dancing around and I guess if you want to go there, it does seem as if the writers were on acid, but hey, what toddler is going to surmise this? Didn’t they say the same thing about Scooby Doo?

Ok so I made up the part about Susy and the book- I never even heard of a book with that title but I’m sure something like it exists. You get my point.

So, if I am still around when my children can read and understand this blog, I need to encourage them to keep most of their commitments- I tend to quit things pretty easily when the going gets tough. I could probably write a book about the plans I had so enthusiastically began and then quit…giving up sugar, wheat, complaining, more than one cup of coffee- promising to exercise, lift weights, do yoga, meditation, to stop worrying, to stop saying yes to everybody, stop over committing myself, to make everything from scratch, make all my own cleaners, and even, gasp, the thought of this makes me laugh, quit drinking wine!

Moving on – todays’s lesson is to try to keep your commitments but scale down if things are compromising your well-being. Like if I am thinking about watching Downton Abbey from the moment I wake up ( not even the most thrilling series I have binged on till two in the morning) till I put the kids in bed, I am clearly not happy, or functioning as a well adjusted parent.

Well adjusted, um, not exactly sure if that description is right for me. I actually don’t think I will ever be well adjusted…I’m kind of a mess at times but that’s just me- how about I go with content.

Therefore, I am holding my head up high, going the extra mile, keeping Wonderific Wednesdays and the rest is a crapshoot!

It does sound a little farfetched to say that these blog ideas are compromising my well-being but we as Moms need to know when to reprioritize our days and weeks or it might be a lot of yelling/losing temper at those precious angels of ours and forming frowny faces at our poor, innocent husbands…well, maybe not that innocent. I did have to spend like thirty extra minutes cleaning remnants of his cooking off the stove and counter tops, pick up dirty socks and other items off the carpet, and struggle with cleaning my sheets three times TODAY because someone left gum in their jean pockets! But hey, who’s complaining…

So for today’s wonderific idea, I decided to reenact a few scenes from Goldilocks.

Last night we read Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

This morning I thought it would be fun to make it look like Goldilocks was here in our house…

The girls came downstairs to three bowls of porridge (aka Mom’s special oatmeal) and there was something unusual about their breakfast… Notice the blond hair…you see the lengths I go for these girls! Now I have chunks of hair missing from my crown of glory.

Next we looked in the dining room and saw…

Then we hurried upstairs ( I had to do this surreptitiously while they were looking at their oatmeal and tried out chairs).

Surprise!

goldi — “Someone has been sleeping in my bed and she’s still here!”

The girls really got a kick out of this!

And I really didn’t cut my hair-for those of you that know me, you know my hair is “volume challenged.” I couldn’t afford to lose any!

I cut it from a poor, unsuspecting doll but I think she’ll get over it.

On January 23, 2014January 23, 2014 By JillIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Blueberry Crumb Muffins

On January 9, 2014 By JillIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

This one I will put under the page No Brainer. When you are bored, frustrated, or just in dire need of a little comfort.

I woke up so relaxed today for some reason- floating in a zen like state through the routine of getting out of bed, coming downstairs to get breakfast ready and cleaning up from last night- yup- that’s something new. I used to not be able to go to sleep unless the kitchen was spotless. That was until the past year, when life at home with a spunky three year old and a wild one year old left me spent up like a broken wheel. The little one has so much energy and zest for getting into creams, cleaners, and yes, even the occasional nail polish bottle (Even thinking about that incident makes me cry and remember my aching arms from four hours of blotting and rubbing, blotting and rubbling until the stain was a mere pink stain- ON MY NEW CREAM CARPET!)

I digress…the thing is the zen/relaxed thing is a bad thing for me. Its like a warm blanket that makes me loopy and not on my game. I am more organized and on point when I am anxious and jittery. It really is unfortunate that I can’t be both.

All of a sudden we had five minutes to leave for preschool, and I had no make up, didn’t brush my teeth, kids were a mess, etc… I’m sure you’ve all been there at one time or another( assuming anyone is reading this).

We got out the door. I was super frazzled. I didn’t bring diapers or anything useful with me. I stopped at Harmons- baby pooped- very smelly, she opened up nailpolishes (she’s really not a baby- she’s a toddler!) She had a meltdown when I said not to the random winter hat with ears on it that was completely heinous- it was just an off morning and I had wanted to get to the library to get some books but with the poop situation, I had to go home.

The only thing to do when things go awry and I feel a loss of control, is to lock the kids in their room and have a major tantrum.

Kidding. I bake. I do have a play date tomorrow so now I’ll have something fresh and home made to put out. Always a nice touch.