The Screeching Can Stop Anytime...

No. Really. It can. I promise I won't miss it.

My not-yet two year old has turned two. The screeching. The screaming of "MINE!" "NO!!" "NO!! ISS MINE!!" And in case you didn't hear her, a "NO!! MOMMY! ISS MIIIINNNNE!!" for good measure. The biting. The pinching. The hitting. All followed up by me saying "No bite(pinch, hit), that hurts Mommy." Her ever popular response: "NO HURT!, NO MOMMY!" Did I mention the screaming? The screaming seems to be never ending. She screams about anything and everything. The other day I did something that really pissed her off (I probably looked at her, what was I thinking??) and she LITERALLY ran screaming from the room. I mean, little arms up in the air, mouth agape, little legs running, screaming from the room. That one made me laugh.

And WHINING. Whine, scream. Scream, whine. And around and 'round we go....

Maybe I have reaaaallly bad selective memory, but I do NOT remember it being like this with my first daughter, and I thought my first daughter was, at times, born of satan.

She just seems so negative. So unhappy. Where's my sweet, chubby cheeked grins and happy little giggles? Sure, they're there, just few and far between. Is this normal? Is this ok? Please tell me I'm not crazy. Having TWO children, you'd think I'd be more on the ball with this sort of thing, but, well, I'm not. I need reassurance, people. This WILL get better, right? She doesn't have some kind of personality disorder, correct?

Meanwhile, we're all going deaf here on the ranch...

I Love Summer

I sat and watched my girls play at the park today. It was a gorgeous sunny day, and as I watched them I got so excited for the summer to begin. I watched my oldest daughter make a new friend and they ran off holding hands and playing "princess in the castle". It made me think of my own childhood and how much I adored summer. Didn't three months sound like a lifetime back then?! Now, three months is gone in a blink of an eye, it seems. Well, not this year! I'm vowing to enjoy EVERY SINGLE MOMENT of summer this year. We'll have popscicles, ice cream cones, run through the sprinkler and swing on the swings. I can hardly wait. In the meantime, here are my thoughts from the park today as I reminisced about summers past... Hopefully some of you will remember the same things. I don't think I'm THAT old. Heh.

*Doing a “penny drop” off the monkey bars.
*Friendship beads on your tennis shoes - tons of them pinned
to the toes of your shoes.
*Double-dutch.
*Four square.
*Ramona the Pest. (LOVED to read, still do.)
*The Boxcar Children.
*Malibu "tan lines" Barbie.
*Giving an "Underdog" on the swings.
*Cat’s cradle.
*Waiting impatiently for an “appropriate” hour to go
outside, then playing outside until the streetlights
came on. Stopping only briefly around the noon hour for
a quick pb&j sandwich and a snack size bag of Cheetos.
Oh, and a *Tupperware plastic cup full of cherry kool-
aid.
*Cherry kool-aid "mustaches".
*Root beer and banana flavored Twin Pops.
*Being barefoot starting the first day of summer to the
last day of summer.
*Counting your mosquito bites.
*Ready or not, here I come…
*Red Light, Green Light
*Red Rover
*Going to the *Dairy Queen after your softball game - even
if you didn't win.
*Sliding down the METAL, REFLECTIVE slides.
*Drinking out of the hose.
*Sparklers.
*Riding your bike without holding on to the handle bars.
(God I thought I was soooo cool.)
*Going to the grocery store and spending all your money on
bottle caps, wax pop bottles, pixie sticks and (gasp!)
candy cigarettes.
*Doing the "Nestee Plunge" into the swimming pool.

God I hope we have HAlf, no a QUARTER as much fun as I used to have this summer. Even that would probably be too much for this old lady to handle. :)

Unplugged

Ok. Here's the deal. I've been thinking about this for a long time. I think I'm going to turn off the TV for the summer. No, it's not because I'm some TV's-horrible-it-rots-your-brains-it's-evil-it's-the-devil-incarnate type of person. On the contrary I do LOVES me some TV. I LOVES it so much that, look at that! The laundry's not done. I LOVES it so much that, hey there! There's no eating utensils left - they're all dirty. And, more disturbingly lately - I LOVES it so much that my children can be seen zoning out in front of it while I - you guessed it - watch a DIFFERENT show, in a DIFFERENT room, on a DIFFERENT tv. Pathetic. Totally, inexcusably, pathetic.

So, on May 30th, (safetly AFTER my beloved American Idol is finished - sheesh.) the TV screen will go black. It will stay that way at least until August 30th. With the exception of: Friday night movie night (we love the whole thing - making pizza, making popcorn and picking out a movie - so much fun.) and times that we are visiting other peoples' houses. I figure I can't really be a hard ass about SOMEONE ELSE's TV, right?

I know I'm in for a revolt. For at least the first few days. I know this. I intend to be prepared. I'll be armed with outings, play doh, paints and games galore. And, of course riveting conversation at the breakfast, lunch and dinner table. My husband is going to HATE me. He'll have to get over it. Or go hide in the bedroom and watch TV. Either one.

I'm a little excited about it. Scared shitless, but excited.

Has it really been that long?

I can't believe it's been so long since my last post. I've been CRAZY busy this past week/weekend. I had family in for my daughter's dance recital. At least my inlaws weren't going to be over - so I only had to get my house "MY family clean", not "inlaw clean". Oh c'mon. You know what I mean.

So how was everybody's Friday the 13th? I was too busy to notice the date, but my poor husband had a horrible day. First his office (in our basement) flooded, then some kind of parts for some kind of thing that he REALLY needed at work didn't come in and then finally, his dog was shot. Yes. That's right. Someone actually SHOT his dog. The whole day was like some really bad country song.

Oh, and did I mention that he had to sit through a three hour dance recital? My husband is SOOOO not the dance recital type. But, he did it. For our daughter. He hated it, but he did it. After this weekend, I think he's entitled to a bit of *fondling*, don't you?! Heh.

Lordy, this entry is boring. It's even boring me. Sorry bout that. They can't all be winners, can they? Obviously not.

Thank God For Endorphins

I woke up in a crappy mood. I started bitching at my husband before we even got out of bed. No. Really. I bitched at him the whole time he was getting ready for work and then bitched at him some more as he walked out the door.

Then I got on the treadmill. By the end of the 30 minutes I was singing and dancing and had made all these plans...it was great. Thank you LORD for endorphins. Amen.

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Update on the (bitched at) husband - he's doing great. It's only been a week and you can hardly tell anything happened. It's truly amazing. All but 2 or 3 of the stitches are out, and those will come out tomorrow. I still can't believe how lucky he was. Amazing.

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I think the reason I'm in such a foul mood is because of mother'sday. I hate it. Not just because my mom isn't around anymore, it's much more complicated and involves my MIL. I really don't have the energy to go into it right now, so you'll just have to take my word for it - it blows monkey balls. I dread it each and every year. I'll be so incredibly glad when Monday gets here.

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Last but not least, I now have officially won the title of WORST MOTHER. No, no, it's true. In my foulness today I completely WENT OFF on my 4 year old. She was being particularly naughty today and I snapped. I mean REALLY snapped. I started screaming at the top of my lungs at her and threatened a spanking. Actually, I told her I would beat her ass. How's that for white trash mama talk? I've never said anything like that to her before. I even had to EXPLAIN what I meant by spanking. She's never been spanked, so I explained (yelled at) to her that if she didn't listen, that's what she'd get. Stupid part is, I had no intention of spanking her. I just wanted her to THINK that that's what I was going to do. So, I broke the #1 parenting law - Following Through. If you tell them what the consequences are, you better be prepared to follow through or else you'll be seen as a chump from then on. In the end, it really didn't matter because my yelling scared her, hurt her feelings and probably imprinted a horrible memory into her beautiful little brain. Later I told her I was sorry for yelling, but you can't really take it back can you? That memory will be there. Those hurt feelings will remain. I am a chump.

Happy MothersDay. Yipee.

Happy Birthday, Mom

Today is my mom's birthday. She would have been 66 years old. That's amazing to me. It's been 7 years since she died.

Today was also the day we finally buried her ashes. My dad had the urn until he sold his house and moved out of state last fall.

It was a nice little memorial. We laughed a lot and put her favorite flowers (lilacs) and notes we all wrote in with her. I'm sure she was there too, laughing along with us.

I miss her, especially now that I have children of my own. They never knew her, and that's the saddest part. She would have loved them to pieces. She DOES love them to pieces. We just don't get to witness it.

Happy Birthday, Mom.