Truth and Consequences

The truth is, I am raising a biter and a fighter.

I am outmatched from 7am to 6pm every day and can't stop every fight before it happens.  At least I am well versed in behavior management thanks to my teaching career.  Still, it's different when they are your kids.  Raising one strong-willed child is tough, but raising 2 seems impossible some days.  True there are the rare days like this past Sunday at the Safari Park where everything goes smoothly and you wonder why you don't take the kids on outings more often.  Then there are days like yesterday.

I woke up during the wee hours of what would eventually become Monday to screams of "mommy" and "oh no" from Laney, for which I correctly surmised as I navigated the playroom in the dark, that her diaper had leaked in her bed.  She was soaked in pee, as were her sheets that I had just washed a few days before for the same problem. Laney sleeps so deeply that she doesn't wake up to go to the bathroom and has a tendency to flood her bed at times.  She was crying and upset, so I stripped her nude (still in the dark) and changed her into a new diaper and jammies after giving her a wipee bath.  I brought her back to my bed and popped her in beside me to finish out the night.  Turns out that I would be getting up a few hours later with Liam at 5:15am, who also had pee jammies (see my post from 11/20/2011...I am soooo tired of pee).  I bathed both kids at 7am and then attempted to get them dressed simultaneously so I could head to the gym on time.  Liam was diapered but not clothed and Laney was wrapped in a towel as I helped her to get her undies and pants on.  I guess I wasn't giving the Dude enough attention, because he walked over and bit Laney's shoulder, hard.  Thankfully her towel was still draped over her, so it wasn't as bad as the last time when the teeth marks on her arm eventually bruised.  After Liam served a brief time out in his crib, the kids made up and the rest of the morning went pretty well (other than Liam redecorating my car with Cheerios, which definitely needs to be vacuumed today).

We hit the grocery store after Liam's nap and then headed home to make Martha Stewart's Perfect Macaroni and Cheese (we cut the sauce part in half and add in diced ham!  Yum!!!!  Click here for the recipe )  I turned on an Octonauts episode after we got home and attempted to make dinner despite Liam's frantic whining and leg hugging as he tried to get me to carry him around.  I eventually gave him a snack cup of Cheerios (apparently not learning my lesson from the car) and sent him back to the family room to play.  A few minutes later it was pouring rain outside and raining Cheerios inside...all over the couch and carpet I had JUST vacuumed while he was napping.  So in the midst of making the perfect roux for the cheese sauce and boiling pasta, I whipped out the vacuum again.

Vacuuming at Shesh's house, where he
picked up his mad cleaning skills!

Liam loves to vacuum so I showed him how to vacuum up his mess (they are never too young to do chores!) and went back to food prep.  Then Laney began whining because she wanted to vacuum.  I know what you are thinking:  my kids were arguing over who was lucky enough to vacuum and I am complaining?  Well, here's why.  I told Laney it could be her turn in a minute, which translated in her mind to "get the vacuum out of Liam's hands at any cost-- immediately!"  She began to pry the vacuum wand out of his hands making him so mad that he started hitting/scratching/squealing and she returned the favor.  Mom intervention!  I jump between the two of them and wrestle the wand away from both of them, sending Laney to the front room for a time out for fighting with her brother, and giving Liam a time out in the corner of the kitchen for hitting and scratching.  Both were crying and carrying on as I finished sucking up the Cheerios.  About a minute into her 3 minute time out, Laney came flying back into the family room to watch tv, even though she was supposed to stay on the couch until I came to get her.  I told her that she was not done with her time out, and then she started screaming, telling me that she was going to keep screaming until she got to watch her show.  I noticed then that Liam had completely stopped crying and was sitting up, taking notice of how mommy was going to deal with her.  I calmly turned off the tv, carried Laney back to the time out couch in our front room, and told her that along with her 2 more minutes of time out, she now could not watch tv for the rest of the evening.  She cried for the duration of her timeout, sending the annoyed dog running into the kitchen to hide from the tantrum.

This was the first time that there had been a serious consequence other than a time out for her.  Rarely has she been this defiant, and I was quick to recognize that taking away her tv priveleges would instantly give clout to the time outs that she wasn't taking too seriously until yesterday.  When she was done crying, I gathered her up on my lap and talked to her about why I had taken the tv away, and made sure to tell her that even though I was punishing her for not following directions, I still loved her (something she has questioned in the past when in trouble.)

By the time Patrick got home 45 minutes later, the kids were quietly playing together, the kitchen was clean, and dinner had just come out of the oven.  As far as he was concerned, our day seemed perfect until I mentioned to him during dinner that Laney would need to talk to him after the meal was over about her behavior and consequent punishment.  Surprisingly, she took it in stride and told him very clearly what she had done wrong and accepted her punishment with grace.

The evening turned out nice after all.  Liam went to bed on time and happily, and Patrick and I got to spend some family reading time on the couch with Laney.  I survived my first taste of the years ahead of my and the consequences of breaking mom's rules.  Hopefully Laney learned something from this and will think twice about fighting with Liam.  Either that or I am going to dig out my playground whistle and start wearing it around the house.  The truth is, I am not just a mom anymore:  I am a full-time referee.

Watch out world, Laney is dressing herself

Laney woke up one morning recently and announced to Patrick and I that she was going into her room to get dressed.  She told us not to come in, because she was going to pick out her own outfit and get herself dressed "like a big girl."  Curious yet delighted, we closed her door and began getting ourselves ready in the master bathroom.  About 10 minutes later, she wandered in wearing this outfit:

Yes, those are tights OVER her shorts, which are bright green and are meant to go under skirts.  Clearly she needs bigger tights, and thinks it is very bright in our house.  I gently tried suggesting it would be more comfy to have the shorts on the outside, but she resisted and I ended up letting her spend the day in her first self selected outfit.  Priceless!  I need to give her some lessons on how to pull together a fashionable ensemble, but she looks so cute when she gets herself dressed, I can't bring myself to critique!

A few nights later I let her cover herself in stamps since she was using washable ink.  Hopefully she doesn't end up tattooing herself for real one day!  

Now we can't leave the house unless she has sunglasses on, and yesterday informed Patrick and I during a play session that she needed to go get  her "rockstars."  We were confused until she came back in wearing these:

She woke up yesterday morning and decided that she wanted matching pajamas with her brother.  She picked out these space jammies at Carters and they looked ADORABLE last night as we got them ready for bed.  

After Liam went upstairs, Laney begged me to take pictures of her jumping around the living room so her hair would look silly, like in an episode of her favorite new show on the Disney Channel, Octonauts.  I would shoot a few photos and then she would view them on my camera, laughing hysterically telling me that her tummy couldn't stop laughing.  

Laney's favorite picture from the photo shoot!

Yeah right

During my recent outing to Target, I stumbled upon 2 women in the children's clothing section discussing their respective toddler's diets.  I heard one exclaim to the other, "my son's favorite snack is hearts of palm!"

I know 2 things for sure:
1.  That bitch is lying.
2.  Liam and Laney's favorite snacks, respectively, are candy and butter.

And now I have to go check my mailbox to see if my Mother of the Year award arrived yet.

Excuse me, do you have a rock I could crawl under?

My children are amazing most of the time, but there are always those few moments when you just want to crawl under your chair and become invisible.  Ever had one of those moments?  Unfortunately, I feel like I have them all too often these days.

We spent this past weekend at my sister's house in San Francisco, and I swear I spent the entire time chasing after my kids in an effort to stymie their attempts at embarassing me.  They ran amok in her house, causing messes everywhere, leading my sister to comment, "I just can't keep ahead of all this mess!"  They threw food on the floor in her house, in her new car, and even on the airplane to and from the city.  Still, that isn't the worst of the behavior that made my cheeks flame and beads of sweat pop out on my forehead.

We experienced a particularly uncomfortable 4 minute gaff at the coffee stand in Golden Gate Park.  I ordered a cup of Blue Bottle Coffee (a San Francisco treat) and had to wait as they individually brew it directly into your cup.  While I waited at the coffee stand, a man and his 2 children rode up on bikes.  The kids were probably right around Laney's age, with long flowing locks streaming out from under their helmets.  My mom and Laney both commented on how "that little girl has the same Skuut bike as you Laney!"  The father turned around and glared at us as the older of the 2 children proclaimed that they weren't girls, but were in fact, boys.  I then had to stand next to that father for the next 4 minutes as my coffee percolated trying to make uncomfortable conversation until the coffee maven rescued me with the delivery of my steaming cup.  A bit embarrassing, but not as embarrassing as the haircuts those little boys had.  Really, that dad was just asking for it by allowing his boys to masquerade as Fabio, but in San Francisco you see all kinds I guess.

One would think that that would be the most embarrassing thing that could possibly happen in one weekend.  Not true.  We hit up Babies R Us (or as those of us with small children refer to it:  Mecca) to help Jessica register.  If you haven't been into the big purple wonder emporium lately, you have to check in at a registration desk to give them all pertinent information before they hand you the magic scanning gun and send you off in a cloud of overwhelmed anxiety.  As a side note, never register without someone who has been through it all before!  I headed off to the nursing room to change Liam's diaper, while Laney hung back with Jessica and Shesh.  When I returned to the desk, the large woman behind the counter eyeballed me and I could only wonder what kind of things Laney had told her in my absence.  I could hear her shrill little toddler voice all the way back in the crib section, and I knew she was on a roll.  Predictably, she led off with her go-to story:  Sean and Buster vs. the tent.  My mom reported that after that story she got on a roll and had been going nonstop for nearly 5 minutes.  The desk clerk helping us typed with fury in an attempt to get us to go away, and looked at me with a sidelong smirk that clearly meant, "rein in your kid lady!"

No more embarrassment ensued until I attempted the flight home with the kids.  Going through the security with the kids is quite an exercise in packing and contortion as I struggled to contain Liam with one arm and fold the stroller and insert it into the xray machine with the other.  I also had to remove my shoes, pull all liquids out of the diaper bag, and get it all into the machine before any of us were allowed to go through the metal detector.  Making sure not to let Liam touch the sides of the detector, we made it through without setting off the machine.  The TSA does not require children to remove their shoes anymore, but Laney insists on taking them off just like me.  I had to tell her that they were checking to see if our shoes were stinky, because I was certain that if I explained the real reason she would tell someone I had a bomb in my shoes and we would never make it home.

After we came through security, she grabbed her shoes from the security belt and sat down next to it to put them back on.  Now no one behind us could get their stuff and the whole process came to a grinding halt.  I couldn't reach the stroller because of her position, and was forced to repack our stuff holding Liam under one arm. (I can't put him down because he is a runner.)  We FINALLY headed down the ramp to gate 30 to board our plane.  I cleverly stopped at Peet's Coffee to get some milk for their sippy cups.  I wanted to get a coffee for myself, but couldn't figure out how to hold it and get all 3 of us onto the plane without burning one of the kids with scalding goodness.  Oh well, a Diet Coke from the flight attendant would suffice, but I digress.  I paid for the very overpriced milk and as we were stepping back from the counter, Laney pointed at the 3 Japanese workers behind the counter and yelled, "They don't have eyes!"  Cheeks flushed?  Check.  Beads of sweat popping out on my forehead?  Check.  Desperately attempting a dash to the gate before anyone hears her?  Miserable fail.  As I made her walk faster, she kept saying in the loudest voice possible, "They have no eyes!"  I notice many passengers staring at us and the coffee cart, and I proclaimed loudly in an attempt to save face, "Those people over there (pointing to some sleeping passengers on a bench) are sleeping and that's why it looks like they don't have eyes."  I thought that would satisfy everyone's curiosity, but Laney one-upped me and turned to point at the Peet's Coffee workers and say, "No, those guys.  Those guys don't have eyes."  Let me just tell you that there was no part of me that didn't want to crawl under the nearest bench and hide.

So now everyone on flight 2117 knew who we were.  At least if they didn't, they were about to find out for the next 70 minutes as Liam screamed for nearly the whole flight.  He was teething, tired, and wanted to roam about the plane.  Being corralled into his row made him mad and his only retaliation was biting.  He bit both Laney and I multiple times, threw things on the floor, and even tried to snatch the iPad from a man behind us after sticking his arm between the seats when I wasn't looking.  I'm pretty sure the 9 people sitting directly around us called their loved ones from the San Diego airport to tell them they had just survived the most miserable flight of their lives.  I survived too, but just barely, and have never been so thankful to see Patrick waiting for us at the Baggage Claim.

I naively thought the embarrassment was over, but Patrick deftly pointed out to me as we headed to the car, that there was chocolate smeared all across the seat of my pants.  I guess Laney must have spilled some of the chocolate I was using to coax Liam into good behavior  and didn't tell me about it.  The smear seriously covered my entire rear end, extending down the back of my thighs as my body heat melted it and accelerated the expansion.  I then realized that I had been walking around the airport looking like I had totally crapped myself, and simultaneously felt like laughing and crying.  The perfect end to the most horrific airplane flight of my life.

Putting the kids to bed that night was literally the highlight of my day. All I can say is, watch out kids.  Payback is coming, right around the time that you guys hit your teenage years. Just when you least expect it, mom is going to embarrass the hell out of you, and it's going to feel good.

Diaper disaster

In an unfortunate diaper changing incident a few days ago, Liam got hold of a small nugget of poop and popped it into his mouth.  I had turned my head to grab the wipees and when I turned back to him I thought he was eating chocolate at first.  For a split second I wondered where he got said chocolate, and then I realized what it was as he started screaming and trying to spit out his mouthful of yuck.  I tried some finger swipes with the wipee but he was pissed for a good 5 minutes after eating his own poop.  I'm just thankful that he didn't get sick from his diaper delight!

The Dudey and the Beast

Liam, AKA the Dudey Dude, is giving me a run for my money.  My sweet little boy has turned out to have quite a temper and a bit of a Jekyll and Hyde personality at times.  Take loading the kids into the Beast for instance.  To put him in his car seat, you better have the cup holder in his seat filled with snacks, or have a snack cup in his hand or his little body will become stiff as a board and he will scream as though you are removing one of his limbs (which is an amazing sound when you are trying to load him into the car in public...)  You then have to force him down into the seat and hold him in with your elbow as you attempt to buckle the strap across his chest before he twists onto the floor in a puddle of anger.  If you don't get it buckled then you are treated to the inevitable slap or head bash as he flails like a trout out of water, defiantly trying to remain clear of the car seat.  However, if you attempt to put him in the seat and he spies snacks, he happily grabs one and allows you to strap him in as though this was his idea in the first place and being strapped in is his favorite playtime activity.  It doesn't matter if he just ate the biggest meal of his life, there better be snacks...or else!

When he is happy, he is hilarious to be around, but when he is mad, watch out. In the long list of nicknames this kid has, we can now add the following:  hair puller, scratcher, biter, hitter, and head basher.

How he became known as a hair puller:
I woke up a few days before Christmas with the kids at 6am.  I took them downstairs and plopped them on the carpet in front of the tv with twin sippy cups of milk, turned on "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse", and headed to the coffee maker.  As I went about my business, Laney got a candy cane off the counter and began to eat it unbeknownst to me.  My peaceful morning went from zero to screaming in 3 seconds and I turned around to see that Liam had a handful of Laney's hair and was trying to wrench it from her scalp.  Naturally, she wasn't sharing with him and this was making him a little bit more Hyde this morning.  I separated them, made him apologize/hug Laney and got them settled back down in front on the tv.  I watched Liam as he never took his eyes from the television screen, but managed to reach out laterally and grab a finally hank of Laney's hair and pull it for good measure.  Unbelievable! I thought I had at least another year before that kind of sneaky manuevering.  Too bad for me I have an advanced son.
How he became known as a scratcher:
Liam's nails grow ridiculously fast and when he gets mad he lashes out (like in the car seat).  Several times my face has been too close to the danger zone and he has grabbed at my mouth and scratched furiously, leaving me twice with scrapes that start at my nostril and extend to my lip.  He has scratched Laney too, leaving a red welted mark on her skin several times.  If I trim his nails every 3 days, I have a fighting chance against his fists of fury.
How he became known as a biter:
Liam has 8 front teeth and 4 molars, and is now working on his eye teeth.  He doesn't like to have his gums looked at, and really hates having them prodded.  If you dare to try and feel his gums, he will bite you with all his might.  He recently bit me so hard on my finger nail, that I have a bruise under the nail itself.  His gums respond really well to Orajel, but putting it on my finger and attempting to rub it on his gums is an act of self-loathing for me.  I know I am going to get bit, but I have to do it anyway to stop the fussing.  Then he is happy and I am in pain!  I got wise to the biting and now apply the Orajel to a teething stick so that my fingers remain a good 3 inches from his chompers at all times.
How he became known as a hitter:
Liam doesn't really talk yet, but he babbles a lot.  He can follow a decent amount of directions, but has no real way to tell us when he wants something.  This creates a lot of frustration for him and his favorite way to vent that frustration is hitting.  He often gets very frustrated with Laney (especially because she takes toys away from him all the time) and then whacks her.  She whacks him back and then they are both screaming.  I intervene and then he starts hitting me because he is so mad (enter in the preventative nail clipping!)
How he became known as a head basher:
Due to the previously mentioned anger and frustration, Liam's ultimate breakdown ends in head bashing.  He will bash his head on anything, and if you don't catch him, he will even lay down and smack his head on the tile floor.  I have done some research and I am supposed to be ignoring the behavior, but I usually move him to the carpet if he tries to bash the tile.  I have seen him bash walls, the refrigerator, his high chair, toys, and even the dog. I think it is a response to his frustration over lack of communication skills, but it is still annoying and not to mention painful when the intended target is the bridge of your nose.  3 times in the last few weeks (that I can remember) he has smashed me in the face/head and left me seeing stars.  I seriously hope he finds a new anger outlet soon.  Either that or I will be getting a nose job for Mother's Day.

What makes up for all of this is the fact that he loves to kiss.   He kisses all of us, and has FINALLY started doing it closed-mouth.  Up until now he would move in for a kiss with a big open mouth and would  slobber on your face in his version of a kiss.  2 weeks ago he just started closing his mouth one day and making an "mmmm" sound as he presses his lips to yours.  He loves to kiss all three of us, and even loves kissing the dog (which is a little gross.)  We used to play a game where he would stick out his tongue and touch it to mine and I would yell in horror.  Now when he kisses me he tries to shove his tongue into my mouth every so often for a reaction.   Watch out Patrick!  You're next on his list of people to make out with.

Happy New Year (a little late...)

Where has the time gone?  I swear I just blogged the other day, but I checked and it has been 19 days!  Not really that long in the grand scheme of life, but amazing how much can happen in that amount of time.  What follows is a condensed version of life since 12/22/11:

• Christmas went off without a hitch.  We spent Christmas Eve celebrating with Patrick's family at his sister's house.  Due to the high volume of children under the age of 6, we had a buffet style dinner consisting of heavy appetizers on paper plates.  Genuis!  So much better than trying to have a sit down dinner for 14 ( like we did at Thanksgiving).  There were relatively few tears during the night, and lots of joyful smiles as the cousins exchanged gifts and sang Christmas carols at top volume.  After we snuggled our kids into their beds, I stuffed the stockings and Patrick set about nailing the train tracks to the train table for the kids.  We were (shockingly) in bed by 11pm and ready for the morning.  Laney was ecstatic upon discovering her gifts in the morning and unwrapped all 4 of our stockings for us.  Liam was only interested in playing with toys once they were unwrapped, holding no interest in ripping paper off of gifts.  Oma and Opa arrived at 730am and we enjoyed muffins and coffee as the kids finished opening their presents.  We headed to the Perry's after Liam's morning nap and snacked on Jessica's cinnamon rolls and Shesh's Christmas strata as we exchanged gifts with my family.  I was overwhelmed by the generosity of my family, and our car was quickly laden down in amazing gifts (including a new Cuisinart and an iPad).  We had the Olsons and the Shepners over for dinner that night and Shesh served a delicious standing rib roast with Yorkshire pudding made by the Birminghams.  Gavin whipped up some English trifles which were fantastic and an interesting change to our holiday meal.  At the end of the 2 wonderful days, we were exhausted by overwhelmed by such an amazing holiday spent with our 2 families.
• I planned to go to see a movie at Cineopolis, the new luxury theater in Del Mar, with my family on the 26th.  We arrived at Shesh's house to gather everyone up mid morning.  While the kids were playing, Laney tried to coax Liam away from the powder room and managed to smash his pinky finger between the doorjam and the door, repeatedly trying to pull it shut unaware of his small obstruction.  Patrick and I were standing in the kitchen when we heard a blood-curdling scream and he raced around the corner.  The next thing I heard was , "oh my God, his finger!  Oh my God!"  As Patrick turned around with Liam in his arms, his pinky came into view and I was horrified.  It was purple at the end and twisted out to the side, the middle squished to half its normal size.  I grabbed our diaper bag, my mom took over watching Laney, and Patrick put Liam in the car.  We called Dr. Schmottlach's office while en route and let them know we were coming in.  Liam screamed and cried the entire way, as I sat unbelted on the console hugging him around his seat belt.  Luckily his finger started returning to normal and the doctor pronounced it not broken.  He was encouraged by the fact that Liam was bending it on his own and advised us to watch it for 24 hours for swelling or stiffness.  By the next morning he was grasping everything on his own and not too upset about the minor cuts and bruising on the joint.  We got so lucky!  We didn't punish Laney seeing as how she felt genuinely bad about hurting her brother.  I did ask her to come get me the next time he tried to go into the bathroom by himself instead of trying to shut the door.  We made it through our first true emergency, and didn't even have to spend the day in the emergency room!  I even made it to the movie with my family that afternoon (thanks to Sean and Patrick babysitting).
• Patrick found out right before Christmas that he would be offered a job at Cricket between Christmas and New Years.  It was truly an answer to our prayers after his early October notification that he would be laid off January 31st.  The job description was just what he was looking for, and best of all, it meant that I would be able to stay home this year with the kids.  It was my favorite Christmas gift of all.  
• We were enjoying our time together as a family since Patrick had the week off from work.  We took a misguided trip to Sea World (unbelievably busy!) on the 27th and that night Liam woke up at 4am crying and never went back to sleep.  In fact he spent the entire morning on my lap crying, refusing to play at all.  Now I knew something was wrong!  I ran him into see Dr. Schmottlach that morning and he had an ear infection.  It was a first for me, and I feel lucky to have been a mom for 3.5 years before an ear infection in our home.  A few doses of antibiotics later, and he was a new kid.  Thank goodness for modern medicine
• We spent New Year's Eve at a friend's house participating in a "round the world" party with wine and appetizers from different countries, followed by cheese fondue and a chocolate fountain.  It was a relatively new group of friends for Patrick and I, and it felt nice to break out of our comfort zone for awhile.  The evening was so enjoyable, and it was fun to have some wine with people who could say a prayer before a meal and still party afterwards.  We capped off our evening by stopping by the Goodales' for a nightcap on our way home from the New Year's party.  The kids spent the night with Shesh and Pop Pop, and we all met up the next morning at church.
• New Year's Day is reserved for the Miller family tradition of eating fried Dutch treats with the whole family.  Appelflappen (fried apple fritters) and Oliebollen (fried pastry with raisins in it) were served along with champagne and quiche.  The morning was so fun (as usual) but the afternoon took a turn for the worse for me.  I ended up vomiting for a few hours, not sure if I had the flu or if my body just couldn't handle all that fried food after a decent amount of drinks the night before.  I felt better by the 2nd, but 2012 got off to a rocky start for me
• I got good news from my sister a few days ago after her 20 week ultrasound and anatomy screening.  Not only is her baby super healthy, but IT'S A BOY!  She sent us a 4D image of his face, and I am already in love with my new nephew.  I can't wait to meet him in May, and am even more excited to plan her shower for March 31st now :)
• We are now back into the full swing of our normal routine:  dance class Monday, school Tuesday, Wednesdays free, school and gymnastic Thursday, and mops every other Friday.  I started working out with my mom and her trainer, Brian, MWF mornings while Sonia watches the kids.  It's funny how quickly I forgot how tough mornings are when there is a schedule involved.  I definitely have to do more pre-planning/packing the night before to pull it all off.