Red Light!

When I got to day care to pick him up, Alex came running up with a huge grin.  Said he had a great day!  Were you a good boy?  Nope!  And that is when his teacher said, "That's right...you didn't have a very good day did you?  Where is your name?"  As I wasn't aware there was a specific place for the names of crazy little boys that didn't have a good day, I too asked where his name was.

On the red light.

I look down and on the wall is a brand new giant paper traffic light and next to it a list of the class rules.  Obviously, if you function within the rules throughout the day, your name stays on the green light.  All the kids' names were on the green light...except my kid.  I'm the lucky mom with the only red light kid in class!  Yay.

Working Mom

Ok, so seriously, Alex completely ignores me 99% of the time, but as soon as my phone rings he NEEDS my attention.  This proves to be super handy when I am talking to Dave from Mitchel's Heating in Minnesota.  So while he is asking me questions about the different products we work with, there is a non-stop symphony of, "Mom?  Mom?  Hey Mom!  Mom?" in the background.

I want to be a mom or an HVAC rep.  But not both at the same time thankyouverymuch.

Yay! Puke!

Wanna guess where I am?  If you said at home with the tv on constantly with a puky kid laying on the couch in his underwear and about a zillion blankets, you are correct!!

He threw up twice at day care yesterday AND had a fever, so he gets to stay home today.  Usually he wakes up just fine and I spend the day trying to corral a maniac while trying to accomplish something close to work.  Today he seems to still be a bit down and out this morning, which is a bummer for him...but makes it way easier for me to get work done.  And yes, I am aware of how horrible a parent I am.  Good talk.

Picture Day!

A couple weeks ago, a photographer came to the day care and took "school" pictures.  There are three poses.  One standard school picture complete with blue background, one standing next to a tree and tire swing prop, and THIS:

Here's a good spot

Like most children, Alex really likes stickers.  So far, he hasn't stuck any on anything other than paper, but he asks if he can...a lot.  One of his most frequently desired locations for stickers is the window next to his car seat.  He got a hold of a green crayon in Travis's car once and created a masterpiece on the window.  Ever since, he has consistently requested art supplies for window decoration.

I was looking for window cling thingys and end up with "peel&stick" wall decorations.  They are easily removable!  They use water-based adhesive!  Who needs static cling?!  I do.  These are not easily removable from glass, much the opposite of the packaging claims.  I'm not too concerned since hopefully the water-based adhesive will be easy enough to get off.

The whole way home yesterday, all I heard from the back seat was, "This goes riiiiight abbboooouuuuutttt.....here."

Given the rapid pace the peel&stick ones were used up, I have an order awaiting processing on Amazon for reusable CLING stickers.

Out to get me

My dog child and my human child conspired against me once again.

Yesterday morning, Alex was on the precipice of a "Dont waaaaaanna leave" meltdown, and he was insistent on giving the dog a treat before we left.  In the interest of the sanity of all parties involved, I agreed to said treat.  And since he had been gearing up for a meltdown, we were slightly running late.  So I ripped the lid off the chicken jerky canister, handed Alex a piece and spun around to put the lid back on.

In my rush, I didn't properly calculate the height of my hand relative to the height of the bottom corner of the cabinet.  The very hard, very right angled, very not rounded corner of the cabinet.  This poor spacial judgement resulted in my middle finger smashing into the corner, the cabinet hitting just above the middle knuckle.  I hit it hard enough that it was one of those injuries that just turns white for about five minutes and then the spot of impact gets brutally dark purple.  As I sit here now, 29 hours later, it's still swollen and is slowly, but constantly changing colors.  Fun! Kaleidoscope finger!

Any way, back to how this is not my fault.  Obviously, there is no way those two little assholes didn't realize my clumsy ass would hurt myself whilst rushing for a dog treat.  They are obviously trying to take the matriarch down.  I'm on to them.

Nutty

My stomach does not do well with milk.  I can get behind some serious cheese consumption, but the more liquid dairy products I have an issue with.  I power through ice cream because, well, it's ice cream.  But yogurt can only be in small doses and one bowl of cereal with milk is a no go.  Seeing as though the fat content outweighs the calcium content when it comes to cheese, I realize that is not a solid option to make sure my bones don't fall apart.

I have tried calcium supplements, but those do a number on my stomach as well...which in turn produces excessive use of air freshener, and we have to think about the ozone people.  I try to eat spinach and broccoli, but if I'm being honest with myself, I'm not getting enough calcium from that either.  So I've decided to give alternative milk a whirl.  First up:  almond milk.

It's the same thickness as skim milk, so it's not like your drinking cream.  I don't know why, but I was taken by surprise by how much it tastes like almonds.  You'd think I would've expected that flavor since it's a product made with almonds and it has almond right in the name.  First part of the name as a matter of fact.  But, I didn't.  I was down right blown away by how much it tastes like liquefied almonds.  I mean, dairy milk doesn't taste like burgers...maybe that's why I didn't expect the almond flavor.

Any way, it's not bad, but I'm not sure I could just sit down with a glass of it.  I found out it's delicious in coffee this morning.  I'm thinkin' it would also be good blended with strawberries and ice...Strawberry  almond milk shake!  Oooo!  Or maybe coffee and almond milk shake....the possibilities are endless.

My thoughts exactly

This is a spot on representation of how I feel today:

Lil' Crazy

Alex's demeanor last night, summed up in one question from Travis:

Did day care pour a Red Bull in him and shake him up before they handed him over?

Charged Up.

The last song on the radio as we pulled into day care this morning was "Call Me Maybe."  Throw shade if you'd like, but I cannot help but like that song.  I turned off the car as it ended and went around to get Alex.  I unbuckled him and then started sing/dancing my best Carly Rae to him.  All I got was a Stop Mom.  So, I sang louder and danced with more pointing at him.  And this conversation commenced:

Alex:  Mom, that song isn't on anymore.
Me:  I wanna sing it again.
Alex:  But that's the song we just heard.
Me:  But I want to sing it again.
Alex:  No.  You can't.  'Cause we're out of batteries.

Forgetful Jones

I'm supposed to get to my desk by 8am.  This is not a strict start time by any means, but it is definitely what I shoot for.  I am 5 minutes late almost every single day.  And I blame that damn mouse, because clearly it couldn't be my fault.  Mickey and his band of merry problem solvers don't solve their problem until 7:24 every morning.  And then, after they solve whatever wacky thing happened that day, they have to do a "Hot Dog Dance" because they are just so darn excited about their impressive feat.  And Alex cannot leave without witnessing this glorious celebration.  Which then puts us out the door at 7:26.  Figure in the ridiculous amount of time it takes to get a 3 year old in a car seat and we are rarely leaving the driveway before 7:30.  Now this departure time would be fine if I was able to launch him from the moving car accurately enough to get him through the door of day care safely.  Alas, I am not that talented, so I am late.  Every morning.

And then there are mornings like today.  Mornings where all the problem solving and hot dog dancing in the world doesn't make this child ready to leave.  Usually there is a lot of crying and whining and why'ing.  This morning, he just straight up told me he wasn't coming with.  So, I said Ok and headed for the door.  And he collapsed on the floor.  Let Operation Whining Army Crawl commence!  This one took an extra long time because it started in the living room.  But, he finally made it outside with me.

We got to the garage when he announced he forgot something and had to go back in the house.  That's his new thing..."forgetting" things.

Alex, why are you standing in front of the open refrigerator door?  I forgot something in here.
Alex, why aren't you laying down for a nap?  I forgot something in my playroom.
Alex, why aren't you coming home with me from the neighbor's yard?  I forgot something there.

It's a good thing I haven't forgotten that it isn't acceptable to leave your child unattended for 8 hours.

In an effort to move things along this morning, I played along and back to the house we went.  And then my patience quickly vanished.  Had he just had something in mind to grab, I would have been fine.  But no.  He just stood there, looking around and saying Ummmmm.  So I picked him up, grabbed a couple cars and headed to the garage with a screaming angry bundle of Alex on my hip.  Normally I let him climb in the truck from the driver's door and make his way back to his seat, which I realize is part of why it takes so long for him to get in his seat.  Shut it.  I promptly informed him he had lost that privilege this morning.  Which lead to more tears and a straight steel bar child that refused to bend at the waist and sit in his seat.  And that caused said child to slide down the front of his seat and scrape his back.  Which turned into an injured child that needed soothing.  But the one that needs soothing is willing to sit in his seat after a couple hugs, so we were good to go.

I was still flustered and expressed my sarcastic shock at the fact that I was going to be late to work.  About half way to day care, Alex says in a sweet little voice, "Why are you late for work Mama?"

Someone is really excited about his Badger pajamas...

Another item for the List of Things I Shouldn't Admit:

It took three texts worth of being super frustrated and confused because my phone wasn't auto-filling the correct words to figure out that my text function had been switched to Spanish by my darling son.  You would think I would have recognize some of the words it was auto-correcting into Spanish since, you know, I took Spanish classes for 5 years.

Using up her cute points

Fun fact:  When you are an incredibly clumsy person, you will hurt yourself accomplishing every day tasks, including replacing 6 mini blinds your asshat of a dog ruined.

I would cut myself some slack if I was actually installing said blinds.  But no, the install is done and all I was doing was taking the shredded ones out of the little hanger thingys and putting the new ones in.  When I took the old ones out I saved the little tabs that hold the blinds in the holder thingys and set them on each window sill and proceeded to unwrap/de-box the new blinds.

The Injuries  
1.  After putting a new blind in the hanger thingys, I bent over to retrieve the little tabs from the window sill.  At which point I apparently forgot there was a freaking window in front of my head and smacked my forehead on the window.  Stung for a bit, but the pain quickly subsided.  The blow to my ego is still smoldering.

2.  The last blind was hung.  The anger was quelling.  And then I hit my elbow so hard on the top of the bottom window pane, it made my middle finger go numb.  It instantly swelled up.  Some ice and ibuprofen seemed to take care of it.  Until today.  Now every time I put my elbow on my desk, I yelp and wince.

This dog is so freaking lucky she is cute.

The Adventures of Miss Aiden

I'm pretty sure that when I do finally lose it and have to be committed, it is going to be because of my dog.  She goes from normal loving sweet dog to Captain Insane Puppy in like .2 seconds.  She is the only reason I look forward to nights being cold enough that we have to shut the windows.  Because with the windows shut she doesn't absolutely freak out about a caterpillar crunching too loudly on a leaf at 12:37AM.

Saturday evening ranked right up there in the top ten times I wanted to find a pack of wild hyenas and send her back to live with her brethren.  Alex and I ventured out Saturday a little before 7 in hopes of finding a fire truck at a thrift store.  This child has a zillion toys, but he really loves a good fire truck.  Due to the zillion toys, I am not about to drop $30-50 on another noise producing, insanity solidifying machine.  Off to Goodwill and Savers!

Side note about the Goodwill store closest to us.  Scary.  Nothing was organized, there was a baby screaming the entire 20 minutes we were there, there were more toys on the floor than on the shelves, don't even get me started on the book section.  I witnessed two little girls break two different toys and just walk away from the mess.  And they didn't have any fire trucks.  Moving on.

As we were leaving Goodwill, it was sprinkling.  Then while we were in Savers playing with the toys, going pee, playing some more, going poop, and playing yet again, I heard two small claps of thunder.  And when we came out it was pouring.  Who cares about a little unexpected storm, right?  Aiden, that's who.

I could tell she had done something horrible the second we walked in the house.  But I remembered putting up the two baby gates blocking the upstairs, and closing both doors to the spare room, and closing the door to Alex's room.  What I didn't remember was the door to the playroom.  There are 7 blinds in the playroom.  She shredded 6.  And apparently caused such a ruckus, my next door neighbor was about to come over and see if the key was under the mat because he was concerned.  Two thunderclaps.  Two.

And I was standing in the middle of the demolition, blind shrapnel everywhere, just absolutely steaming, I apologized to Alex for yelling, and explained that I was really mad the dog had ruined all the blinds in his playroom.  He just looks up at me while pointing to the single blind that remained in tact and says, "She didn't ruin this one Mama."  Thanks Señor Silver Lining.

Hands are NOT for Hitting!

So, the hitting thing.  Yeah, not so much done with this little fun time circus.  He still gets very sad when the Brown Elephant Blanket is taken away and very happy upon its return, but that deal is turning out to be not quite motivation enough for this child to keep his hands to himself.

Wednesday was horrendous.

When I picked him for his doctor appointment, his teacher told me he was kind of emotional throughout the morning.  Everything was great on the way to the doctor's office, while we were there, and on the way back.  He laid down right away for nap when we got back and I thought we were on our way to a good afternoon. I am so easily fooled.  Or gullible.

I was a bit late picking him up so I had to go to a different room because his teacher was gone for the day and they had combined two of the rooms.  The teacher in that room is new and I had yet to meet her.  So I walked in and introduced myself as Alex was happily screaming MOOOOOOMMMM and running over to me.  All good signs.  After introducing herself, the new teacher got a funny look on her face.  And as she started telling me about Alex's afternoon, I began to understand the face.  She was the lucky one that got to tell me that Alex's afternoon was all out terrible.  He would not stop hitting his friends and then topped that off when his teacher had to physically put him in a time out and while that was happening, he hit her.  Let's review.  Blah, blah, blah, HE HIT HIS TEACHER.  And not only did he hit his teacher, but I got to hear about from a different teacher that I have never met before.  Awesomesauce for everyone.

When I asked him why he hit his teacher, he responded:  "Uh, she put me in a time out Mom."  I'm not really sure how to adequately type the "duh I thought this was obvious" tone with which that statement was delivered.  He may as well have just worded it, "Ummm, seriously...do I have to answer this?  Ok, yeah, she put me in a time out.  What else was I supposed to do?"

So I did what any stellar mom would do.  I sternly told him that is not a reason to hit someone and he is not allowed to hit people, especially his teacher.  Then, I calmly told the new teacher to never have a three year old and cheerily said it was so nice to meet her.  And we left.

Check Up!

Did you know they document BMI on three year olds?  Me neither!

I finally got Alex in for his 3 year check up.  He is 3'3" tall and 39lbs.  This puts him in the 76th percentile for height and 94th for weight.  This also puts him at an 18 for BMI.  Which is totally fine.  That BMI is fine...but the giant jump in BMI from last year to this year apparently is a something to "keep an eye on."  He has grown out faster than up this past year.  Although he does not appear heavy, so I think a better description would be that he has grown more physically dense.  He is one solid kid.

He also is a solid kid with 20/30 vision and an ok understanding of what the hell the nurse needed him to do during a hearing test.  After his doctor said it's hard to do an adequate hearing test on 3 year olds, he asked me if I have any concerns about his hearing.  I burst out laughing.  His hearing?  Oh no...he can hear me just fine.  His listening?  Now, that is something of concern.

Truck babies

So I know I was/am supposed to make sure I didn't only have traditional gender specific toys so says some article or something.  Yeah, I didn't do that.  I didn't intentionally not do that...I just didn't make it a priority.  Alex definitely has some gender neutral toys, but he definitely doesn't have anything "girly."  This little fact was brought to light when a friend was looking at a different child's "baby" and asked Alex if he had any babies at home.  His response:  Ummm...I have trucks?

Fast forward a couple weeks to last night.  The stroller is upstairs for the first time in forever.  We lent it to some friends and I just haven't managed to get it back downstairs.  And now I am not sure Alex is going to be too cool with me putting it away.  He brought it in the kitchen, asked me unfold it, and squealed as he pushed it into his play room.  He came back with this thing stuffed with toys.  A wooden train, Mack, and about 7 monster trucks.  And he proudly instructed me to look at, and give kisses to, his babies.

Might be time for a doll of some sort.

And Forever Begins

While pondering the fact that my child is 3 years old the other day, I came to a frightening realization...Alex is old enough now that he will most likely remember the things that happen on a day to day basis.  Like he will remember them forever.  We are forming life memories here people.

This is insane.  I have been operating the past 3 years with the fantastic safety net of no long term memory.  You can't screw a kid up too bad when he can't remember what the hell happened, right?  I mean, so far, he hasn't been able to tell me what he had for lunch much less remember something from the more distant past.  But now?  Now he will most likely have at least a faint recollection of the things that happen each and every day, when he is like 27.

Suddenly, this extreme pressure to ensure the shit we do every day will make good memories has moved in and it was definitely not invited.  I have a hard enough time coming up with things to do that will mildly entertain him IN THE MOMENT.  But now I have to figure out how to make sure he has good memories of his childhood?  You know, memories other than his mother being in a constant state of crazed pissed off and yelling NO!

I am not expecting his childhood memory piggy bank to be filled with rainbows and kitten farts.  I realize it is ok and the right thing to discipline him.  But is there a way to only have him remember the times when I am Fun Mom?

Safety Third.

This weekend marked the first time my child wore a helmet while riding a motorized three wheeled motorcycle thingy at my parents' house.  This weekend also marked the first time my child drove said motorcycle thingy into the trampoline.  Good thing he was wearing a helmet, right?  Wrong.  The crossbar on the trampoline is exactly eye height and he was wearing a bike helmet so there was no face protector part.  Based on what his little eye socket looked like shortly after the incident, I thought he was gonna have a nice shiner.  But, it really doesn't look that bad.

And before you question why I only had a bike helmet on him while he was on a motorcycle, I will tell you this thing goes about 4 miles an hour.  Definitely slow enough to steer around a GIANT FREAKING TRAMPOLINE.  But to steer around an obstacle, you would have to be looking in the direction in which you were going.  And that is not his forte.