Here’s another oh-my-gosh-my-child-can-stand moment.

One of my AMC mommy friends found this video online the other day. It looks like a video for occupational therapists to get an overview of arthrogryposis. That’s awesome! When I was watching it I spotted four pictures that were very familiar. They were familiar because I took them. Two are of my daughter, one has my daughter in it but it’s hard to see her, and the last one is of her AFO (and my husband’s left butt cheek). One of those pictures even shows my friend, Chelsea, doing Laelia’s hip stretches.

Google is credited for all the pictures. I guess my name is Google.

I actually love the video. I was thrilled to see my little girl in it, as well as a few of her friends. I think more videos like this should be made available. I have given permission to a few people to use my daughter’s image for OT or PT presentations. The Child Development staff at Rady Children’s Hospital knows they can take pictures now and get permission later. I can’t help it that my daughter is gorgeous (“Gorgeous” is even the nick name her Grandma calls her), and everyone wants to use her picture.

But now I do want to be clear: You must ask permission to use my daughter’s image. If it’s for OT or PT-related things, you’ll get it. If it’s for AMC awareness, you’ll get it. If it’s for something silly, you’ll get it. If it’s for a listing of beautiful children, you got it. But if it’s for bullying or supporting an agenda that’s political or religious, you won’t get it.

Okay?

Great. And now I feel compelled to balance out the universe by taking a random picture off the Internet and crediting Google for it.

Kitten with arthrogryposis.

Picture by Google. Duh.

All this last week I have been adjusting to my new role of housewife, super PTA mom and work-from-home employee. I’ve been failing miserably! Thus no blogging this week. And before this blog post turns into a whine fest about how much I miss my normal job and boohoo I have to do dishes now, I’ll start talking about Laelia. :) People have been asking about the kid to see if she’s doing okay after surgery. She’s doing so well I forget she had surgery last week. This was what she was like right after surgery.

Last Saturday she was begging to do some weight bearing on her knees. Since physical therapy for the first week is Laelia-directed, I let her do it. I was still a little afraid I’d break her, but she was harder on herself than I would have been. With a little  help from Dora the Explorer, Lali logged over an hour of weight bearing! She’s very independent and nothing will hold her back.

I cringed thinking of her sore hips, but she wanted to hear daddy’s story while holding her toes.

Laelia’s school: Last Monday I had a school meeting to determine if Laelia could go back to school. It was going to be with a nurse or health person of some kind. Anyway when we landed in San Diego and I listened to my messages I had missed two calls from the school saying that the health person was not available for another week! I thought, “Oh no! No school for a week and me with a new job on Monday!” Well thankfully Sunday night our SEEC (Special Education… something something) coordinator, Sue, called and after I explained that the surgery went really well and was even technically “an outpatient procedure” (Laelia didn’t stay at the hospital overnight… and she didn’t really need to stay very long at all) then Sue suggested I email the school to tell them since I couldn’t call on a Sunday night. So I emailed the director and hoped for the best. I worried about it all that night despite trying not to think about it. The next morning I showed up for school and once people saw Laelia and that she wasn’t in pain or in casts, and she didn’t need any medication of any kind, they let her stay at school that day! When the director said, “Okay sign her in,” my brain didn’t register the words and I was all, “Sign her in for what?” :) Before I had been told she would definitely not be allowed to go back to school on Monday, but since she was fine they let her! They are saving our big meeting with the health person for after her bigger surgery this spring.

Laelia’s bus: Tuesday morning after the bus didn’t show up I fought with the bus people over the phone for 40 minutes. A weird thing happened–they put me on hold at one point but without actually putting me on hold. That meant I could hear them dealing with another parent who was very upset. I also could hear them dealing with her in the way they deal with me: with the tough talk, “I’m sorry ma’am, next time call at least two weeks ahead of time… uh huh… well then you should have stood in a more visible spot… uh huh… well it’s our procedure to…” and so forth. When they hung up with that parent I heard them say something like, “Well she’s right. We didn’t do our job and now her job is in jeopardy. I feel for her.” Then they got back on the phone with me!!! And at this point everyone just seemed more human, and I felt more confident in what to say. Long story short, a bus came that morning (very late) for my daughter, and after that her regular bus drivers (whom I adore) have showed up every morning and afternoon since!

Mommy works from home: The great thing about this shift in my job is that I’m able to attend every school meeting. Like Thursday night I went to a Community Advisory Committee meeting for parents and staff who support students with disabilities. It was boring as heck, but I ended up meeting people. In fact I met someone who would be able to assist me when we return back to school after Laelia’s next surgery! My goal is to go to EVERY school meeting in any way related to my daughter’s needs or education from now on. It’s really confusing, but I’m learning stuff! Like there’s something called SELPA and it stands for “Special Education… El… Pa.”

One of the perks of working from home is that I no longer panic when Laelia gets kicked out of school. Like for example we were told Thursday that there was no school on Friday for Veteran’s Day. (We had missed the reminders since we were in Philly.) In my former life that would have meant some mad scrambling and most likely a day of Laelia and Chelsea bonding while Mommy went to work. This time it meant working from home while my daughter was home! That was exciting for all of three minutes. I was looking forward to this new dynamic of working while parenting. I now know this is impossible. Utterly, miserably impossible. I’m never trying it again. It doesn’t work. No good. Nope.

Next time I will parent during the day, and then start work at 3:00 a.m. when work can actually get done.

Laelia’s shots: So Laelia was driving me crazy-go-nuts on Friday since I was trying to work from home at my computer while answering her incessant calls every five seconds followed by the whining and crying of an only child who is being ignored. Laelia had a doctor’s visit that day, the school reminded me, because even though our lives are surrounded with doctors, they don’t count! Without a physical from a local doctor Laelia would not be allowed to return to school. In the waiting room a nice couple holding a newborn picked my brain about pediatricians while they offered my little angel a mini Hershey bar. She ate half before her name was called. After her name was called (Lala or Layla or Layloni, they were close) evil Mommy took. her. candy. *gasp* Mommy mentioned something dastardly about “eating it later.” This led to screaming the likes of which has never before been heard. Her first two attempts at the eardrum-piercing scream were too breathy, but the third attempt nailed it. She had people on the other side of the office poking their heads out from behind their paperwork to stare. Telling her that because she screamed she was now getting no more chocolate did not help matters. Threatening her with a time out got the response of, “You can’t give me a timeout, there’s no timeout place here.” Wow. Let’s just say it takes a lot to make me laugh hysterically in public, but I did. Then I said in a sing-song voice to my precious little daughter who I was not strangling (so, WINNING), I said, ”I hope you get lots and lots of shots today!”

Okay the truth was that I honestly did not know she was getting any shots that day. I never would have said that if I had known she was getting shots that day. I thought she was just in for a physical where they checked her tummy and stuff. But she was also in for four shots. Four. And when the nurse told me this in response to my sing-song statement, well that sobered me up real quick. I immediately said, “Oh honey you are getting shots today, but I didn’t know! It’s not because you didn’t behave correctly. Shots are good for you and they make you healthy. They are not a punishment.”

Nothing I said mattered. For the next half hour everyone within the building heard the loud wales of, “Iiiiiiiiiiiii Doooooooooon’t Liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiike Shots! Nooooooooooooooooooooooo! I doooooooooooon’t waaaaaaaaaaaaaaant!!!!!!!!! Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!” I told her that if I could I would take one for her. She got hopeful and said between sobs, “I wish you could take all my shots!” Stinker.

After the pokes they gave her a treasure box toy for being so… um, loud? She happily strolled out of the office cheerfully playing with her tiny plastic camera. I didn’t strangle her once. Where’s my parenting trophy?

More parenting stuff: In other news, I’m starting to regret telling my daughter about the time I found a horse outside. He had escaped from the fair and was wandering the Carl’s Jr parking lot all done up like a faerie tale. It was probably the most exciting thing that ever happened to little kid me. I ran up to him and held his reins. I had no idea what to do next, but was grinning my head off. My sister had to tell my mom that I had a horse when she showed up. Her facial expression was priceless. It was a great memory. I told Lali about my horse during our bedtime story. (A quick aside about our bedtime stories, in the beginning it was all Bible stories and great works of literature. It didn’t take long to devolve into Disney princesses. Now I’ve started telling her stories about my childhood and how her daddy and I met and married. I lost my mom when I was nineteen and I regret not knowing more about her precious memories. So now I make an effort to share mine.)

But now I’m constantly hearing in my daughter’s overly excited voice, “The next time you see a horse outside get me!” Then her tone drops to a serious one. “I want to ride him. I will ride on him. On the horse.”

Tonight I taught Laelia how to play Uno. We take out the wild cards for now, but leave in all the other ones. She beat me three out of three games! I only helped her the first game! She’s really good at this even though the box says ages 7 and up. Because of the arthrogryposis in her hands we hold something (in this case the Candyland game box) between us so she can lay her cards out without having to hold them. And that way I can’t see her cards. Well not that I’d need to since every time she has a turn she starts out by announcing every card she has. (It makes the game take ten billion years to finish. “Oh that’s a green seven. That means I need a green card or a seven card. This card in my pile is red and it’s a six. This card is blue and it’s a zero. This card…”) The discard pile and deck are to the right of the Candyland lid so we can both see them and get to them. It works really well! Well until she has to reach over to grab a card. Then I catch her starting to poke her little nose over the lid to see my cards. She says, “I’m just counting them!” Or, “I’m just seeing if you have a four!” So, you know, it’s totally justified. Still I don’t know how she’s beating me. I’m not letting her win! Maybe I need to start enforcing the rule where you have to say “Uno” when you have one card left. Instead she does a little dance and sings, “I have one card left! I have one card left! I’m gonna wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin. You’re gonna loooooooooooooooooose.”

I respectfully reply, “You mean ‘Uno’ dear.”

Sleeping Beauty is out of surgery!

(Hip plate removal surgery marks Laelia’s fifth surgery and she just turned four years old.)

Thank you for all your prayers and words of encouragement and well wishes and positive thoughts and everything else! This was our best surgery yet! And I’m sure all our friends and family contributed to that. My cousin, Josh, also put something on his music blog for Laelia. So sweet.

I don’t know where to start. Well I’ll just say I can’t believe we made it to the hospital by 6:30 a.m. after three hours of sleep. (Considering it was 3:30 a.m. in California.) We’ve looked better. Laelia was her usual chipper self so we gave her the stink eye a lot.

It’s a practice at Shriners Hospital for Children for the anesthesiologist to carry your child into the surgical room without her parents. In San Diego I would get into full scrubs and follow her in and help her get through the scary gas mask, etc. Here I just watch as they take off with her. So how do you get a perfect stranger to carry a child into surgery without the child freaking out?

You get them drunk. Really drunk.

There’s a medicine they give them orally that makes the kids so loopy and crazy that it provides a bit of dark comedy right before they leave. Laelia is the funniest drunkard ever. She’s goes from being scared to grinning her head off at everything. And her big head just bobs like her little neck has no power whatsoever over it’s course. Her cheeks get rosy and she starts talking nonsense too. It’s the best. Charley went to get out the video camera to record my daughter making a right fool of herself in my arms when the anesthesiologist came for her. Then it became a little heartbreaking.

Surgery went well. She was under for only about two hours. A bit of bone grew over the right plate so they had to chip it off before removing that plate. But my biggest fear was evaded: none of her bones broke! And that means this is Laelia’s first ever surgery where she did not go into casts afterwards!!!!!!!!!

She came out of her deep sleep a mess. She screamed her head off. I walked into the room with her crying and the apologetic nurse saying she hadn’t been “doing it long.” Who knows what that means. I went to her side and sang to her. She just cried loudly for a while. The nurses were asking where the pain was. Finally Laelia just shook her head. I asked her, “Are you in pain?” Laelia shook her head. “Are you just mad?” Laelia nodded and said between gasps, “Saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad toooooooooooo!” Poor thing hates surgery.

Reassured her pain meds were working (remember our failed epidural last surgery?), I rocked her in a rocking chair and then we transported a calmer version of Laelia to the fifth floor for recovery. She cuddled and fretted and finally fell asleep. So did her daddy.

She woke up and drank a little. A good sign. She hated her IV and would cry out saying she was in pain, but when we asked where the pain was she said her hand. Well her pain should have been in her hips where the surgery was, so I can only assume she was trying this ploy to get us to remove the IV. She would have done anything to get that out and even attempted to do it herself! Good thing they tape it down on kids!

This surgery was just so much easier than others we’ve had. She only needed extra oxygen for about ten minutes. That’s a first. We usually have that thing going by her head for days. By the end of her stays I’m usually pretty light headed from leaning in close. She also had the usual sweaty head and low temp, but that was also minimal. She developed a cough, but it wasn’t bad enough like last time to require the breathing treatments. We even decided to put her in her own clothes and it made her look and feel even better!

I remember after her last surgery clutching the Pain Management brochure they gave us and reading it over and over, searching for ideas that would help. This time we were joking about her stricken look as she told us it wasn’t funny. “It’s not nice! I had surgery!” She pouted. But she was just doing so well we couldn’t help ourselves.

By dinner time Laelia had eaten a ton and wanted her Halloween candy. No nausea this time! She was being polite to the nurses but she was bored. So they let us go home! We were suppose to stay overnight, but we happily fled back to the Ronald McDonald House. Laelia was so happy to see her mound of Halloween candy again until I assured her that she couldn’t have any until it had been a full 24 hours after surgery. It had only been twelve hours!

Now I know surgery, and I’ve experienced it quite a few times, but this was nothing, this was EASY. They even cut into scars she already had so no new scars!

We visited Brysen, an AMCer who is also from California (although a good nine hour drive away from us), while we were there. He had a similar surgery to what Laelia had last year. He had lots of complications though, but seems to be doing better now. Still Laelia tried to say, “There there, it will be alright,” and make him feel better. He put up with her well. I have been loving his mom’s blog since I discovered it: http://www.mylifemydesire.blogspot.com/ (Scroll down to the bottom of the page if you want to turn off the music.)

We got back to the house and had some dinner. We ran into Jen and her family while we were there. Isabel (also an AMCer), Emma and Laelia colored pictures and Laelia even moved around in her wheelchair by herself. That caused some pain issues later, but I think the freedom was good for her. (I’m writing this post the next day and the girls are playing in the playground while I do.)

Laelia didn’t sleep much and she scared us with a low fever and some pain issues, but overall I think this went better than it could have. Her cough seems better this morning too. She just seems happier in her own bed with her own music and pillow.

Does this look like a kid who had surgery this morning???

City Hall!

I took Laelia to downtown today because I am crazy and like to get lost in cities whose roads make no sense and are rarely marked with road signs!

We actually saw guys putting  up a road sign. Great! Now do that TO EVERY ROAD!

I called my husband (who I had warned before hand that we were going exploring and when we’d probably be calling him saying we were lost) and he was in a meeting! He said he’d call back in ten minutes! Ten minutes! I almost ended up in New Jersey in those ten minutes!!! So I called Chelsea and she helped me find City Hall again down one-way roads and back alleys. She saved my life. Did I mention I get lost every time I drive in Philly? And that Philly sucks? Oh I have? Countless times? Okay well then. We did get to see Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell finally.

Laelia stopped to see the birdies.

The birdies were digging little holes in the ground.

Looking up.

“She’s saying hi.” (Um, Lali, that’s a boy.) “But she has a ponytail!”

“Guys I can’t see!”

Me: “Here’s the most important room in American history!” Laelia: “Okay.”

Aren’t we cute?

Here it is!

So Laelia charmed all the guards and park rangers by being so sweet and showing them all her card with a picture of the liberty bell and asking them if they knew what this was and then telling them she was going to see it! She talked about it non-stop. Then we finally see it and she says, “Okay…” (she’s all excited) “Go for it!”

Me: “Go for what?

Lali: “You ding it!”

Me: “Um, no we don’t.”

Lali: “You don’t ding it? Then what do you do with it?”

Me: “You look at it.”

Lali: “…..”

History is boring.

I found this while washing one of my husband’s shirts. The “other woman” uses chocolate instead of lipstick. Oh who could it be?

Here are a bunch of Laelia stories in no particular order. Enjoy!

Laelia has new hip stretches that make her cry. I’m getting flashbacks to when she was a tiny baby and we had to do stretches all the time that made her scream. It’s awful, but it’s necessary. But the difference between now and then is quite huge. Instead of just screaming and not understanding why I’m doing it, she now just cries (or says, “owie owie owieowieowie”) and then when it’s over she instantly stops crying and says something random like, “I’m a finger puppet!” Yep. In that cheerful voice while making what I can only imagine is a finger puppet face. I’ve never been a finger puppet myself so I wouldn’t know.  Regardless it lets me know I’m not damaging her for life. When I tell her how sorry I am that it’s not comfortable she just says, “Stretchies are good for my legs. I’m gonna walk soon!” Love this kid.

I asked if Laelia wanted a sandwich or pasta for lunch. She said she wanted a sandwich, but after her daddy whispered something in her ear she said, “Not peanut butter sandwich, a SUBWAY sandwich!” Being suspicious I asked her what kind of sandwich she would get there. She replied, “ELEPHANT!”

My husband and I were sitting on the couch talking about the “someone who is sometimes very loud and crazy.” Then Laelia gets all excited and yells, “I LIKE TO BE VERY LOUD AND CRAZY TOO!!!” As if she’d found a kindred spirit! We didn’t have the heart to tell her we were talking about her.

Laelia decided before bed one night that the best way to get to stay awake was to ask a bunch of questions. “Hey Mama, why is it dark?” “Hey Mama, why come I don’t move off my bed?” “Hey Mama, can I have some water?” “Hey Mama, why are my fingers doing *this*?” (As she wiggles them around.) “Hey Mama? Hey Mama? Hey Mama?!!!”

And when I started to ignore her and finally walked towards the door she just became more frantic. “HEY MAMA! HEY MAMA?!!! WHY, um, WHY IS MY BED HERE? HEY HEY HEY!!! HEY MAMA, HOW IS MY PILLOW HERE? WHY HOW COME IS WHY HOW?!!” I had no idea what to do at this point, so I had to rely on my intuition and motherly wisdom. I pulled deep into the storehouses of this wisdom…

…and then this worked.

So we thought Laelia had ring worm and took her to the doctor. It turned out to be nummular eczema (I blame her daddy’s genes for this one). So it’s not contagious and she can go back to school. But when I told her it wasn’t ring worm she looked so relieved. Then she said, “I don’t have the worms! Yay!” I realized that she thought ring worm was really little worms in her body. Poor thing. I explained it was just a skin problem that looked like little rings. Then I get home and tell my husband that it’s not ring worm. He looked so relieved… you can guess what he was thinking too.

Laelia had her most successful game of hide and seek this week yet! Since all her games involve telling the seeker exactly where to put her, and then laughing with glee when she’s found (even though the seeker JUST PUT HER THERE), let’s just say it’s an easy game.  So this time she had me hide her and her daddy seek her. Smart kid, she’s learning. She asked me to put her on the kitchen counter. I told her that there was nothing to hide behind there, but she insisted. Then she just buried her face into the cabinet.

Can you spot the hiding child?

How about now?

Well her daddy didn’t spot her right away. He looked in her room and then the hall and then walked through the dinning room and then almost walked right past her! I saw her shaking with excitement–this was the longest she had ever hidden! She refused to quit “hiding” even when he spotted her, called her name and had me take a couple pictures. That’s what I call a real professional.

Last night I told Laelia if she got ready for bed quickly that I would give her a surprise. Well she did well so I hunted around and found an old sticker. She likes stickers, right? Well her disappointment was so obvious but she replied, “Thanks Mama! Um…. it’s a sticker. Thanks. Well, do you want my sticker? Thanks for my surprise.” So sweet and mature! I had to spend the next half hour finding her better presents: a rock from the yard and some old $1 juggling balls from Target. :)

My husband sent our daughter to school in pajamas the other day. And it wasn’t any sort of special pajama day either. Well, it wasn’t for anyone else anyway.

Laelia found a dime on the ground and I let her keep it. She later said, “Mama, I need to give my money to the guys, to the kids, you know, that don’t have a Mommy and Daddy so we adopt ‘em.” ♥ Yeah my kid said that!!! Isn’t she the best?! We put it in a special jar to give to baby Joel. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Laelia begged to do some gardening this week. Well she’s begged me about this very thing since we moved in four months ago, but we always had so many other pressing things to do. But this week I gave in.

Mr. Gnome and Jessi the flower

Before

After

Here’s Laelia helping. She promised she would dig the holes and clear the rocks and water them every day. For the rest of her life!

The helping part lasted, er, ten minutes before she got bored and started throwing rocks, pulling petals off sunflowers and attacking ants with the spade. I asked her at one point while my arms were buried to the elbows in dirt, “Hey Laelia can I see your tiny shovel?” She responded, “Um… I’m busy.” Then I hear, “ANTS GO SQUISH NOW!!!” As she continued pummeling them with her spade.

Here’s the rest of the yard. Laelia wanted to know why I would ever want to pull out these lovely plants. Since I had a pretty big blister forming I decided she can keep her weeds.

Okay I think I’m done being random with Lali stories. Oh wait, here’s a video of Laelia being mauled by a bear. Okay good-night!

So Laelia has to wear her splints EVERY night. Every single night. No exceptions. If she doesn’t then I can tell a difference in the range of motion in her wrists. Stupid aggressive  arthrogryposis…

So we were bummed when the little girl figured out how to take the splints off.

She’s been smart enough to take them off for a while now, but this last time, Jill, the hand specialist, made them extra hard and tricky with double, mountainous straps and everything. Lali was thwarted for quite a while before finally figuring out how to remove them. But thankfully she’s old enough now that we can make a rule to not take them off and she just has to obey us.

But to make this parental command a little more sweet, we told her that for every morning she leaves her splints on she gets some fish crackers or cheese crackers.

The child loves her some novelty crackers.

So every morning Laelia (who wakes up first) yells, “I’m awake now!!!” and her Daddy (since I have been at work for two hours by the time she wakes up) gets her and checks on her splints. Every morning she holds them up and announces, “Look at my splints! I want some crackers now!”

But lately during her daily stretches I noticed her wrists were stiff. Usually this means she’s having a growth spurt so I didn’t give it much thought.

Then one day I was on the phone with my dad and I heard, “I’m awake now!!!” I had put her down for a nap so I could call my dad in peace. I walked in and Laelia held up both her arms with the splints on and said, “My splints are on! I want crackers please!”

I answered automatically, “Okay, just a minute,” as I continued to half talk to Dad and half get her splints off.

Then it hit me. “Wait, I didn’t put your splints on for your nap!”

Laelia said, “Oh. Then no crackers. Let’s read a book!”

Me: “No, wait. Did YOU put them on?”

Laelia: “…”

Me (inspecting them closer): “And you put the stockinette on underneath?!!! And you worked the special straps on?!!??!!!”

Laelia: “…”

Me: “Answer me young lady.”

Laelia: “…yeah.”

Me: “Wait, do you do this EVERY MORNING?!!!!!”

Laelia: “Keeheehee.”

It was hard to think of an appropriate consequence while Lali’s grandparents laughed their heads off on the other end of the phone.

Which brings me to my topic of parenting. I feel like Laelia has made me do it a whole lot more since turning three last October. I was so relieved when it looked like we would be spared the “terrible twos,” but instead we got a more advanced form of acting out in our super intelligent three-year old. Potty training for example has been a battle of the wills. And her fits are so strategic that sometimes I just ask her while she’s screaming, “Laelia is this just so you don’t have to do what I asked?” And she’ll stop screaming (because she never was upset) and will start to bargain with me, “Um, so maybe I can eat a snack instead?”

*sigh*

But one night I had this mountain top experience with parenting. You know the term, when things are going badly then it’s like you’re in a dark valley trying to climb out. Then something goes well and you feel like you’re on the top of the mountain, all the hard work behind you. That’s kinda how it went.

Laelia was screaming because she had to go to bed and she wanted to play. I counted (I’m always counting) to three, because she knows she has to stop by “three” or she gets a time out. I held her in my lap, facing me, and said, “I expect you to obey and not scream. You’re a big girl and you have the ability to obey really well.” But my awesome positivity and encouragement got thrown back in my face as she yelled, “You’re MEAN!”

Me: (taken aback) “I’m mean? Why?”

Laelia: “Because you counted!”

Her Daddy was in the corner of the room, slumped over and completely defeated. It had been one of those days. This imp in my lap had the frump face going pretty good and I was worried this would be a long conversation, and that’s when the genius parenting fairy came. *bling!*

Me: “Do you want to be the Mama?”

Laelia (frump face instantly melted away): “…yeah.”

Me: “Okay you’re now the Mama.”

Laelia: “Can you be the Laelia?” (her tone was so bright all of the sudden)

Me: “Okay. Ready?”

Laelia: “Ready! (then she converts into an overly stern voice) Go to bed!”

Me: “WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

(I just have to stop right here and say this was the most fun I’ve ever had as a parent. )

Laelia: “There there. Don’t fuss. It’s bedtime.” She gave me a hug.

Me: “But you’re meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeean.” I continued.

Laelia: “I’m not mean. I’m Mama!”

Me (phony sniffles): “But you COUNTED.” (Trying to drum up the horror.)

Laelia: “Mama has to count so you obey. That’s not mean. You’re a big girl and you can obey. It makes God happy.”

Me: “So I have to go to bed?”

Laelia: “Yes. It’s past your bed time. (She had my tone of voice down pat for that sentence.)”

(She gave me more hugs and patted my back.)

Me: “Okay Mama. I love you Mama.”

Laelia: “I love you too, Laelia.”

I tucked her in and kissed her good night. She went down without a battle. To think all that parenting had sunk in!

I practically strutted back to my own room.

So Laelia has a giant new friend named Mr. Bear. Or at least that’s what we tell people. What we don’t tell them is that Mr. Bear is for me. Yep, Mama needed a giant bear. No telling! Promise? Good. Now I’ll explain.

It started out with a much needed trip to Costco. We usually get a toy that Laelia can hold while I shop, then we put the toy back before we check out. Well when we saw the giant stuffed bears and Laelia squealed in delight, we figured we’d found our toy. Giant bear in the cart for the trip. Done.

We had some issues fitting anything else in the cart with us. Okay a lot of issues. Mr. Bear (or Bear-y or Joey or Teddy, as Laelia kept naming him over and over in her excitement) filled up the entire basket while his head drooped over Laelia’s shoulder. I almost ran into people because I just couldn’t see past him well. Some people pointed at us and said things like, “Look at that huge bear!” Or “What a lucky little girl!” But one couple just shook their heads with disdain like I had bought one hundred pounds of chocolate for dinner. I heard them mutter, “Better ways to spend your money…” Obviously they didn’t know that I was only getting him for the trip and it cost no money at all just to drag him around the store. I refrained from sticking out my tongue at them.

When we got to the check out, it was time to say good-bye to Mr. Bear. Laelia was so cute about it. She said, “We have to go now Mr. Bear. Oh no. No no. Don’t cry. Be a big girl, Mr. Bear. No crying. Someone will buy you. We have to go…” It was around this time that I saw that Mr. Bear was only $29.95.

I caved.

I think I wanted him just as much as Lali. I put a few things back (stupid budget) and got the BEAR. (I would type “bear” but he’s so huge. From now on he deserves all caps.) He took up the entire back seat of my car, leaving just a bit of space for Laelia and her car seat. He was hot too. It’s summertime and this BEAR was furry and huge and a million degrees! I was thinking how impulsively stupid spending 1/3 of my budget on a BEAR was around the time I was dragging him through my front door.

But Laelia loves him. And so do I. In fact she had to ask me if *she* could have a turn with him after I was done cuddling him. It’s just something about having a giant teddy bear that brings back weird longings from my childhood. I couldn’t stop taking running jumps on top of him with my daughter in my arms. We laughed our heads off!

I curled up with Mr. Bear and took a nap. Laelia also took a nap ON TOP OF HIM! We were having a great time until Daddy got home. Charley just stared at Mr. Bear for a minute and then shook his head like those people at the store did.

Charley says I can’t do the Costco shopping anymore. …  …   …. This thing pays for itself!

Laelia threw up a few days later and Mr. Bear was there for her with snuggles and bedtime stories. It was the cutest thing! He’s just so soft!

So now I tell myself we don’t need the black one just like him back at the store. We don’t. We don’t. No.  :)

UPDATE: It didn’t take Charely long to warm up to Mr. Bear. He now grabs the bear in front of him (completely hiding his frame from view) and says, “I’m gonna eat a little girl!” (in a bear voice I might add) and chases Laelia throughout the house.

Want to see how one little girl earned all these cheese crackers? Just click on the picture above to see what she did!

And click here to see her attempt of that same feat the day before.

And below is a video of Laelia turning on the lights all by herself! (If anyone has a better idea of how to set this up let me know. I’m using a wand for window shades and duct tape. Sometimes the weight of it all turns the light off.)

And lastly, here is my little girl and her new found story telling ability.

Yay videos!

I hate spiders so why am I moving in with so many?

So tomorrow is moving day. Today is packing day. And every day this week has been cleaning day.

Laelia is reacting to the chaos around her in equal parts excitement and meltdowns. Naps help so I starting bringing Laelia’s playpen to the new place and letting her take a nap while I cleaned out the spiders. There are spiders everywhere. I’ve cleaned about 800 so far. I’m getting pretty brave about it too. I can now kill them with my thumb and finger. It’s only freaky when I hear what sounds like bones crunching because the spider was so huge it had some serious mass to it. (Even creepier is when they squeal, “Noooooo!” right before I do it. ) And every time I clean a wall I get bug parts all over it from something I inadvertently killed in the process. Yuck.

But so far our move is still on schedule. I’ve been all over Craigslist finding furniture. I got Laelia’s new bed! So exciting! The owners said it was “lucky.”

Laelia’s new room and bed! (Before cleaning. Mind the mess.)

Speaking of mess, my kitchen was the worst. I painted two of the walls myself (learned the difference between a brush job and a roller job… big difference!), and cleaned all the walls. I only have a few permanent spiders who are painted into the wall, but I’m still very proud of the job I did! But the bugs!!! Ugggggh! I can’t kill one without twenty more showing up. I thought of sweeping them up and then just killing them outside, but they overtook my broom.

I kept the smaller black ones. Apparently they are a different kind than the brown ones and are good for your yard. And since I’m so excited to finally be around grass (first time living with grass and dirt in my whole adult life!) that I’m just thrilled to help out my new backyard however I can.

Speaking of my backyard, Charley was out there the other day with David and they noticed a stone poking out the side lawn. It turned out to be one of those pet cemetery deals. Creepy! I definitely didn’t want “Fluffy” or in this case, “Adam Sinroy” in my yard so I had them dig him up.

Ugly dog bones. 

Well now I’m off to finish cleaning my apartment. I don’t cook so we eat out a lot. The take out trash has been piling up lately.

I hope that our move goes smoothly tomorrow. I’m so excited about our new place. Even the “dog” bones are excited. They started talking one day so I kept them around. Apparently they came with a scary warning about disturbing them and curses. Bah. He’s making friends with all the spiders.

Happy April Fools Day!