The Morning After

I was standing at my bathroom sink putting my contacts in while Jeremiah showered, when Kate slinked with cat-like silence into our bathroom this morning. All tussled blonde and purple princess nightgown, she was groggy but smiling. "Daddy" she said, as Jeremiah shaved "I'm sorry I was so bad last night." I didn't even hear her, she managed to truly only say it to him; he told me about it tonight.

When Jeremiah told me I thought of my post from last night, and of the conversation we had Saturday night, after I'd spent the entire day cleaning, only to have the kids trash the place before they went to bed so it seemed as though I'd done nothing, causing me to become somewhat unpleasant, about how great our lives would be if we'd never had children. I then felt like a total asshole. This, I suppose, is the how it goes.

I went out with my girlfriends this evening for drinks and a mani/pedi. Yes you heard me right. A mani/pedi. I haven't had a pedicure since before the 3-Day last year so don't look at me like that. We drank a few beers before and a bottle of wine during the pampering and reflected on how this is what we'd do every week if we'd married rich husbands. We didn't, though, so instead we ended up talking about work a lot and no one was quite willing to put her Blackberry out of sight. Never-the-less we had a delightful time and I am still feeling relaxed and lucky. This afternoon made possible by an awesome husband who picked the girls up from daycare, fed them and got them changed and ready for bed.

When I got home Kate & Sarah were just about to get into bed. Kate ran to me and gave me a big hug. Sarah was next. "Were you girls good for Daddy tonight?" I asked, smooching each of them. "Yes!" Kate said, "I didn't throw nothing in the toilet!" Sarah nodded in agreement. "Anything." I said, "you didn't throw anything in the toilet".

Need Reinforcements

My dad had a look he could give me that would cause me to flee in terror. I think in all my years of childhood and absolutely obnoxious behavior he spanked me once, still, I had that fear. I thought of it as a healthy fear. Today I wonder how he managed to instill that fear because my children lack it. Both of them. They like to look straight at me and continue to do exactly what they've just been told not to do. It's not just me, either. They do it to Jeremiah.

Tonight while getting ready for bed Sarah discovered some hair clip that, for whatever reason, made her excited and happy. She picked it up, exclaiming over it and Kate snatched it from her and threw it into the toilet as the toilet was flushing. Sarah was, of course, reduced to a torrent of tears. "NO STORY" was Jeremiah's apoplectic response to the event. I missed it. I was sauteing some kale. Steve and Joy were here and we all heard the screaming but it's pretty par for the course at bedtime so we thought nothing of it.

So Kate did not get the bedtime story and she was furious with her Dad about that. By the time I went up to kiss them goodnight she seemed to be over it. Sarah was not. She told me all about how Kate had something something down the toilet something something that's BAD. Kate appeared not the least bit contrite. At 4, she is a million times worse than she ever was at 2 or 3. Everyone talks about the Terrible Twos and warns that at 3 they're even worse, but neither was all that true of Kate. No, she's really hit her stride at 4. Petulant, I'd say. What was Dad's secret? I knew better than to even strike "a tone" with my mom, too. I need to know how to get my kids to that point because right now I'm reasonably certain they are killing me.

Next

We've been trying to convince Sarah to give up the pacifier. She's on the fence about it, but has made some progress. We only let her have it during the sleeping hours, we make her give it up otherwise. She never has it at daycare or, indeed, anywhere she's not with her parents. We're know we're being played. The other night right before bed she'd been walking around with a pacifier in her mouth. She walked up to me, took it out and handed it to me and said "I'm a big girl. I don't need this" and then went to bed without it.

The moment caused me to reflect because we've been watching the first season of Mad Men. We're not quite through it yet, 3 or 4 more episodes to go, I think. We started it after entire series of The Wire. I loved The Wire, even though we sometimes had to watch a cartoon before bed after viewing an episode of it. You know a show is good when you're fooled into thinking you're actually reading a book. I loved those characters and when it ended I was sad; I miss them.

We took a short 30 Rock, season 2 break and began Mad Men. I'm enjoying it but I find it roundly more depressing than The Wire. The characters in The Wire caused you to feel righteously ambivalent because, which ever side they were on, they had a code. Sorry, a Code. And they lived by it. Omar Little, for example, robbed drugged dealers and killed will impunity. But he never killed a citizen and he never worked on Sunday. Also, he didn't cuss and as best I can remember, he didn't lie. In Mad Men, the characters seem to be lacking any sort of code. They all seem miserable, forced to live under the auspices of some fake code no one can really get behind. What's really so amazing to watch is how very different the mores were regarding relationships, child-rearing and health. Pregnant women smoking and drinking. Drunk driving as a normal daily routine. And of course the rampant sexism. The show begins in 1960 and it's pretty clear 1968 is eagerly gestating.

When Sarah handed me her pacifier and repeated the very words we'd been saying over and over to her I wondered if the scene would be something horrific 50 years from now. Some young mother might have watched it thinking "why on EARTH would they make that poor kid think she was being somehow bad by sucking on a pacifier at age 2?!?" What things seem so normal right now that will be completely nuts when I'm a grandmother? I think of all the people one or two generations ahead of us who just couldn't believe we weren't feeding Kate solid food by the time she was one month old...and for some reason, seeing Sarah hand over her security bobble made me feel potentially mistaken.

Block Party

We've just returned from the Third Avenue block party over at Steve & Joy's (and Brendan & Kore's...it's a big block.) We don't live on their block but I think of us as ambassadors from Atlanta. Plus, we brought food and we know that if we just show up with food we're always welcome.

I'm tired of lugging the camera with me everywhere. Why does it always have to be about potential blog fodder, I asked myself and left without the camera. That left my hands free to pick up a latte en route. When I arrived all the kids were in full-on cute mode and I instantly regretted my decision. Let's face it, sometimes they're not that cute. There are 4,000,000 small children now residing on and immediately around Third Avenue. They're all cute. I have no idea how that happened. Something in the water, I assume.

What I wish I had on camera, well, on video really, was all of them playing with the rat. (A rat?!? Adorable!) No, it's not real. It's furry and has glowing red eyes and is remote control. Joy picked it up at Target in the Halloween goodies and I've just spent a solid 15 minutes scouring the web in search of a photo of the thing and can't find it. There are other remote controlled rats out there (obviously) but not as good as this one. The other ones aren't covered in varying shades of wiry, gray hair. The rubbery black tail is the antenna. They were sweetly taking turns controlling the thing while the rest of the kids would scream and scream and run from it. All of them liked to run the rat directly under the cast iron fireplace, which was filled with bright orange flame.

At first all the adults would lunge toward the fire as the rat approached it and try to explain the inherent danger in sending the rat under there. But then it became clear we were all sort of looking forward to seeing the thing emerge on the other side, red eyes still glowing, fully engulfed in flame. If only for a moment. Once it became clear the rat wasn't going to ignite, we left that scene. Fun party, though. Sorry we don't have any pictures. That's on me.

Addled?

I already posted once today, over at Worst. Mama. Ever. (right where I belong). But what the heck, let's clutter this page a bit. My Kitchen Assistant Sarah has become expert at climbing. It's impressive to watch her go. When I really think about the kind of upper body strength she must be using to get on top of things that are at perfect adult butt-height for simply sitting, it's impressive.

There's a problem, though. Sarah keeps climbing up on the small kitchen stools, and she does it so well she can even sort of dance around on them and perform other feats of strength while up there. Because of her stool-standing acumen, we keep forgetting she's a tiny thing atop what is for her a great height. And she keeps falling off them. I think this morning was her 4th tumble, but it might have been her 5th (I should probably still be posting at WME...) I don't know, the new cork floors were installed in part for this purpose, but I worry she's knocking loose future potential.

She cries and cries but then gets right back up there so you can see why I think she might already be making herself a little on the dull side. So far she's never landed on anything scary like a table corner or the dog, but it's somewhat worrisome. And it's not as though we're not in there with her (usually). I keep thinking all the falling will teach how to, you know, not fall. But she seems to just be getting better at falling. I hate to ban her from her monkey antics but I can't afford to be caring for her beyond age 18 so she's going to need every ounce of IQ God gave her. Maybe we'll just get her a helmet.

Here's some photos of us making election night chocolate chip cookies. Why chocolate chip, you ask? Well, they're mostly sort of beige in color, and the beige parts are great, but they're so much better with plenty of brown mixed in. Sorry about the really offensive t-shirt. My big brother made me wear it.