Perhaps she should have taken the term "stay at home" literally.

I admit. I am a germaphobe. I have problems with handles on public restroom sinks and doors. I sanitize my hands after touching pens that have been used by a crowd. I get so tense in dirty houses (dirty - not cluttered. There is a difference) that I sometimes take a shower after returning home from such abodes. However, I try to keep my phobias from other people.

Today there was a crack in the facade of sanity. Let me preface this story with the caveat that I very seldom have any sort of altercation with people whom I do not know. There was a boy at the mall play area that was coughing so hard he could barely breathe. I told Emily to stay away from him. But when he grabbed Jane's stroller, I firmly told him "no" and his mom flipped out. Since I don't know her name and she had a nose ring, we will call her Ms. Nose Ring. Here is an abridged version of a very long conversation between her and me:

Ms. Nose Ring: He's touched all the toys here so your kid is going to get sick anyway. You may as well just accept it.

Me: That is incredibly rude of you to bring your child out when he is contagious.

Ms. Nose Ring: I'm a stay at home mom and I needed to get out of the house.

Me: I'm a stay at home mom too and I would like to be able to get my kids out without them getting sick.

Ms. Nose Ring: I've been a stay-at-home mom longer than you have, Sweetie.

Me: confused silence.

So, it pretty much went on like this until I was pretty sure Ms. Nose Ring was going to punch me. That's when Emily got scared and ran over to me and Ms. Nose Ring left. No doubt to go get a tramp stamp. During the altercation, she insulted my mothering skills again and again, but never gave any sort of justification as to why it was okay for her to have a sick kid in the play area.

Germaphobe or not, I know how the flu is spread and I would prefer, if at all possible, that my children not get it. Is that unreasonable? Maybe it is. But at least if I get sick, I won't have snot oozing out my nose ring hole. Because I don't have one. So take that.

Nightmare on My Street

I recall a horror story from my childhood that involved an axe murderer and two little girls. In order to escape the axe murderer, the girls hid in a closet that locked from the inside. Even as a kid, I thought that was lame. I knew that wicked stepmothers liked to lock princesses in closets, but why on earth would anyone have a closet that locks from the inside?

Well, recently I discovered a very good reason. Here is a picture taken from the inside of Emily's closet:

Notice the button lock.

It's there because Emily has discovered the secrets behind every kind of childproof doorknob cover on the market and because the second we walk out of her room for nap or bedtime, she immediately runs to her closet and begins the fashion show. 14 ensembles later, she will fall asleep and we will return at the end of nap to find her in an outfit of her own choosing and her room a disaster worthy of being declared a Superfund site.

We tried everything. Punishment, bribing and putting blackout blinds in her room so she couldn't find her way to her closet. Nothing worked. So today, for the sake of saving what little sanity I have left, I switched out her closet doorknob with one that locks from the inside. It worked like a charm. I do, however, question the effectiveness of this lock against axe murderers.

One for the Jane Fans

Two posts in two days! I am on a roll!

Trip and Fall

Finally! We got a nice, appropriately Fall day. So what did we do with it? We went to Harvest Farms in Wellington and Autmned until we were almost ready to Fall. (I ought to be arrested for that).

First, the girls got to pet goats, sheep and various other assorted farm animals. Jane was a bit unsure of the goats, who seemed especially interested in her shoes.

Then, we went through a toddler-sized corn maze. Maybe next year we'll tackle the biggie one. The girls played in corn, which is way more fun than sand... until we realized that small pieces of dried corn = irresistible choking hazard for babies. Don't worry. We got it out of her mouth just in time.

Chris then got so angry that he snapped and started shooting produce at innocent bystanders.
(It's a pumpkin cannon - sorry I lost track of his ammunition)

And then we topped off the trip with some kettle corn and a couple of farm fresh pumpkins.

In other news: baby Jane is army crawling now. Great news for her. Bad news for Emily's toys.

First Snow

Today we got our first snow (I'll try not to complain that it's only October 8th). Here's how the first snow (and pretty much every snow) affects our household.

Upon waking, Emily declares, "Mom! It snowed. I'm going to play and make snow angels and build a snowman!". She is too excited to eat more than a few bites of her breakfast before she demands I find her snowsuit and boots. Jane insists upon being held while I do all this. Finally, realizing that would be impossible, I set her down on a blanket with some toys and turn my attention to Emily.

Twenty minutes later, Emily is dressed for the snow. I'm still not wearing shoes. I race to my room to put my shoes on before Emily ventures out alone in the snow, then race downstairs to find that Jane has thieved a peppermint patty.
I wipe up Jane and put Emily's mittens on. Finally, after nearly half an hour of preparation, Emily is ready to go out.

She's not out for a full minute before she takes off the mittens.

Then she takes a few laps around the backyard.

And sits down in the snow.

And then starts crying because her hands are cold. Five minutes after she ventures out, she comes in for hot chocolate. And then she realizes that she's hungry because she hardly ate any breakfast.

Needless to say, I'm not too crazy about the snow.

Yet Another Broken Resolution of Motherhood

I always swore I would tell my children the truth. As a matter of fact (don't judge me) Emily already knows that Santa is pretend and that the Easter bunny (who could honestly think that was possible anyway) is faker than fake. But I have realized that sometimes you have to tell your children lies to prevent them from doing things that will be physically or emotionally damaging to themselves. I have already divulged the lie that I told Emily to keep her from cutting her hair, but a couple weeks ago I did it again. I lied to my trusting child.

First of all, you have to understand the desperation that comes with having a 3 year old that has had no success with potty training. For nine months, I have had two children in diapers. I have come to feel that my life exists only in tiny snippets between diaper changes. I knew Emily could understand the concepts. She would dig in her heels and argue with me about why she shouldn't use the toilet. She didn't just yell "no" and cry, she actually used well formed arguments in complete sentences. I was ready to try anything. I took all the advice I could get. We tried every type of reward under the sun. I tried setting her on the toilet every half hour. I even tried punishment. Nothing worked.

And that's when we made our preschool visit to get her on the waiting list. I didn't know a kid could get so excited about school, but after the visit, Emily was ready to sell her soul to go to preschool. Enter the big lie. I told her that they wouldn't accept her unless she was potty trained. I know that is true with some schools, but not this one. I needed a carrot to dangle and I was desperate. That was on a Thursday. The following Sunday, Emily discovered the will to succeed. No effort on my part. Now I am in trouble. Emily is quickly making her way towards being completely potty trained and yet the preschool waiting list refuses to budge. I am beginning to sense a relapse. Oh what a tangled web we weave!

Everybody Poops

I recently recalled a conversation I had with Chris years ago. It was in the golden age before children. We were spending time with some friends who possessed several small children. The wife (let's call her Jan) had just been shouting at the top of her lungs, "Who pooped? I can smell poop". And then, after finding the culprit, she became angry and announced to the pooper, "I don't have any diapers for you. You'll just have to wear some of your brother's".

Not having spent much time around small children, I was horrified. I told Chris I never wanted to have children because it would make me lose my dignity. Chris reassured me, saying, "Jan and you are very different people. You would never be like her in a million years. I'm sure she wasn't dignified before she had children. You, on the other hand, ooze dignity. She is one kind of mom and you will be another kind of mom. You can still keep your identity and be a mother".

Well, Chris, several years later I can tell you that you were unqualifiedly WRONG! I have not a shred of dignity to my name. I lost most of it during Emily's infant months - dealing with public blowouts, trying to nurse in a crowd and going everywhere with a baby that screamed at the top of her lungs all the time. I can actually mark the moment when the last bit of dignity left me. As I puked into a jar in front of a roomful of people during my labor with Jane, I realized it was gone for good. All my dreams of being a sophisticated woman who is known for her grace and clever remarks in intelligent company went into that jar on that cold December morning.

So what triggered that distant memory of my dignified days? While engaged in a conversation with my hairstylist (whom I knew before either she or I were mothers) I realized we had been talking for at least fifteen minutes about our children's poop. Neither of us were embarrassed and the conversation was interesting to both of us. What had happened to those days in college when she would cut my hair and we would discuss world events and concerts and rumors of which new restaurants were coming to town? I'll tell you what happened. This happened:



And then this happened:

At least I got something in return for my dignity.