Things moms say...

As a mom, do you ever stop and listen to the rule you are implementing to only think...did I really just say that? And mean it?? I have caught myself saying..."Please don't shoot babies", "Please don't hit in the face, body only", "Please don't shoot yourself in the eye", "Of course it's ok to hit daddy, just not girls", etc. When did these type of ludicrous things start coming out of my mouth?!? When I had a toddler that became obsessed with Toy Story! He basically runs around pretending to shoot from the pretend laser gun on his arm or makes something into a sword. The worst part is it is virtually impossible to not laugh, to the point of tears, when something goes down! Yesterday we were at Gymboree (where somehow he became the oldest child at the play gyms) when he was yelling about zurg and buzz and trying to shoot all the babies...hence "Please don't shoot babies" came into play. This is such a fantastic age and I'm loving the little caveman behaviour although it may be mortifying others around us!

Countdown to Disney!

Too young? I don't think so....but many people feel the need to tell me that a 2 year old is too young to go to Disneyland...at which time, I generally tell them we also went when he was 18 months and it was amazing. Generally that shuts them up! Everyone has an opinion and I (try to be) open to it but the "Happiest Place in the World" is open to all ages!! I guess it really depends on what you are expecting from the trip. Will he remember it? Most likely no. Do I care? No. When we went to Disneyland when Connor was 18 months I wasn't sure what to expect but since we were in California visiting my sister we figured we'd detour for a few days and check it out. Chris had never been and the last time I had been was when I was about 6 so we went. It was amazing. I think Connor screamed in excitement for 3 days and was thoroughly worn out on the drive back to San Francisco. There were actually a lot of rides open to little toddlers...and we went on most of them!The only thing I want to get from the trip is to watch my baby be amazed and excited. Is there anything that could make a family vacation any better? (Corny but true!) This time what I am looking forward to the most is the look on his face when he sees all the characters he's grown to love! So the countdown continues...16 days till Connor and I fly down to California (Chris will already be there)!!

To shoot or not to shoot?!?

In today's society everyone seems overly sensitive to violence. I am not saying that I am an advocate of violence by any means but I also think that this is something that has become too sensitive due to all the horrible things we hear on the news. The problem is those horrible events tend to have deeper rooted issues than a child that played cowboys and Indians (I'm not sure if you can call it that anymore?!?). I played cowboys and Indians and I always wanted to be the Indian (Native American?) and shoot people with my pretend bow and arrow. My brother and I also stole a crossbow that we found in the basement and shot pencils up into the trees. Smart? NO! Normal childhood stupidity? ABSOLUTELY! That is not to say that I wouldn't absolutely forbid my child to grab the crossbow and go running out into the bushes (I'm sure my mom is really happy to know that we did it!!LOL!!) but I also think that if he did that there wouldn't be anything abnormal about it (assuming no one got hurt there would just be a horrified momma!!). I am a fairly average girl and because I'd fit in the "girly" category most people don't know that I love shooting ranges, have my gun licence, and have always loved martial arts and yet there is nothing violent or abnormal about me. Generally Connor watches Handy Manny, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Toopy and Binoo on TV. Recently he's become obsessed with Toy Story. None of these are violent by any means BUT he has picked out Zurg as a favorite in Toy Story and takes the little guy and runs around shooting all his other characters and then, a lot of the time, kisses them better and keeps playing. I think this is the normal development of a little boy (perhaps less the kissing better!) and I'm not in a rush to stop it. Some people completely disagree but my mother never made it a big deal of my odd games or strange movie choices and I plan on taking the same approach. He is the gentlest child at his Gymboree class and likes to give all the other "babies" (i.e. anyone younger than him) toys for them to play with so I have zero concerns over him being violent in any way. I just find it interesting that everyone is so anxious to stop little boys from playing games that they've played for years. There was an article in the paper this week that discussed sharing and gentler TV shows resulted in calmer less violent children...I have always been a gentle, caring person, and yet at 4 years old I was obsessed with Conan the Barbarian. I'm sure many of you disagree with me but I just don't see the correlation and think that violence stems from the surrounding environment as opposed to TV choices or games. Every child needs to experiment and play and I worry that by stopping our boys / girls from having their games we're making them more curious about it rather than preventing violence outside of playing. I don't want this taken the wrong way...if Connor was to exhibit violent behaviour towards another child I would be mortified and the behavior would be addressed but Zurg shooting buzz doesn't fall in this category in my opinion.

Happy Valentines Day!

It is that day of the year again that you either love or hate...all the pink, hearts, cards, flowers...I personally LOVE it! So this year I decided that this art challenged mother would hand make all of the valentines cards for the kids at the day home. Connor loves arts and crafts so I figured I should be making more of an effort. As with everything I do lately, I ran out of time, and was up at 4:30 am this morning to finish everything. They are cute but I have decided that I will have store bought ones for back up if I endeavor to do this again next year. Below is a picture of what ended up being mommy arts and crafts as opposed to mom and tot craft time...

We started Valentines celebrations this past weekend with a Gymboree Sweetheart Party. Two year olds are so precious...I have yet to understand the "terrible twos" proverb. I am absolutely loving this age. The Sweetheart party was a bunch of children whose parents dress them up in ridiculous Valentines clothing (Connor had a shirt with a raccoon with an eye patch that said "Love Bandit"!!) running around in a love/heart themed party room. Fantastic! I love other OCD parents...most of the time!!

Hope everyone has an amazing day whether or not you are a Valentines day fan!

xoxo

Pictures

I decided to post a couple of pictures for those lovely ladies that read my blog and don't know me so that they can see my wonderful little man and know who is writing these odd blogs...

Exciting Restaurant Endeavors!

So you think that once your wonderful little baby stops having those massive explosive milk poops that you have a bit of a grace period before toilet training commences without major incidences occurring in restaurants or wherever else you may be that is inconvenient and embarrassing...think again...we were going out for dinner and then on to do a big Costco shop when we had a nice little adventure. I received a call from the day home one afternoon..."Sorry Laura, I forgot to tell you we're out of diapers for Connor. I have some back ups but could you please bring more tomorrow"...no problem, I didn't think anything of it. I go pick him up that night, run home to get Chris and off we go for dinner. Now, my day home always changes his diaper before pick up and I felt his diaper when we got to the restaurant and it was empty so nothing to consider, right?!? Think again. Connor is amazing in restaurants and is talking and playing on his leappad. We're in the middle of eating when he gets incredibly upset and starts trying to climb out of his seat. Thinking that he is cranky and just doesn't want to eat I try and talk him into staying seated to which he gets more upset. I pick him up confused only to get soaked. The diaper has completely leaked, his track pants are dripping and the booster seat is a full puddle. This is always fun and I always wonder how other people approach these situations. I grab my change pad, diapers and wipes and take off to a burger joint bathroom...not always the most child diaper friendly places...and am rewarded with a decently clean change table. I strip off the soaking pants and still mostly empty Huggies diaper and proceed to wipe him off. Now, what do other moms do with soaking track pants??? I looked around and improvised. Grabbed a bunch of toilet paper, rolled up the track pants and squeezed...at least now they aren't dripping, right? So after he's all dry and in a new diaper I take my toddler, pantless, back into the restaurant. Now, we are outside of Calgary at the Okotoks Costco because I like it better, but the problem is I don't know the town or where to get pants without going home. So as we sit there and clean the booster seat and attempt to finish our burgers we are contemplating what the next step is when we realize that we have the skating bag in the car with snow pants! Woohoo! Connor finished the night running around Costco in his snow pants...I'm sure some people wondered why our child was in snow pants and a t-shirt...but I'm also sure other parents out there would look and think...wonder what they went through tonight! LOL

On a side note...the reason the diaper leaked is because it was huggies and ever since Connor was born he has only been able to wear pampers. Perhaps it's his shape?!?! I would love for him to be able to wear huggies since that is what Costco sells but every time he wears them we have a nice little adventure! When I first brought him home I thought I was having these problems because I didn't know how to put a diaper on properly...after 28 months I am now secure in saying that it isn't me!!!

Merry Belated Christmas?!?

So this is my delayed Christmas post! Christmas was amazing this year. Although Connor doesn't fully get the concept, he definitely got the hang of opening presents! From the neighbourhood Christmas party I brought him to at the beginning of December it was evident that he was not a fan of Santa...no matter how positive we tried to portray Santa...he was just a scary fat man in a red suit that Connor would prefer to avoid at all costs. On the way down the stairs on Christmas morning we thought we would tell him that Santa had come with presents for him...the response was "No Santa, no presents" followed by extreme agitation and pointing back up the stairs. For a child that does not like "night, night" this was extreme! We told him it was ok and Santa wasn't there which did seem to provide him with a bit of relief. When we got to the bottom of the stairs and his tent with his new blanket and robot were there all set up he went flying to it without any of the previous hesitation. After spending a bit of time in there incredibly happy with the new find and reminding us on occasion "no Santa" we proceeded to the stocking. He thought that was pretty amazing as well and would pull one toy at a time out and squeal before moving to the next. After that we spent from 8:30am till about 3:30pm opening presents...each present had to be unwrapped, taken out of the box, fully assembled, looked over, and all buttons pushed before moving on to the next one. We did try and take breakfast and snack breaks, although they weren't tolerated for long! Here is the issue...take the two annoying Christmas kids from each house that took charge of wake up duty, put them in a house together and give them a toddler to spoil...it was bound to be a long haul of present openings! It was fantastic, but my husband was covered in paper cuts and gauges from all the toys he was made to assemble during the day! Those boxes are beyond child proof they're almost parent proof! You need scissors and knives to get at them...we are still recycling the boxes since we can only flatten and get so much in our bin every week! Hmmm...how do you know you went overboard??? Is it the excessive recycling or not being able to walk through the house without stepping on something for weeks (Don't worry, with working I enlisted the help of a cleaner that comes every two weeks so we don't live in a pig sty!)?!? So to sum up, Christmas with a two year old was amazing and rewarding and everything I had hoped it would be...and it was nice that my husband decided to do away with the budget and get me a Gucci watch!  ;-)