Differences That Don't Belong or The Truth Behind Our Differences

Makiya was racing around the play area, trying to find someone to play with, deciding which piece of equipment to tackle next, pleasantly occupied, so I wandered back over to my mom and her husband, who was intently watching a group of kids playing on the spinner. He quickly filled me in on what he had just witnessed; a little boy, only six or seven years old, nastily, physically, and roughly pushed two girls to the side as he forced his way onto the spinner, proclaiming that “the man goes first!”

I sputtered, coughed, choked as he relayed the story, and my attention returned to the boy. What I continued to see stunned me; I felt sickened.

He seemed to zero in on one little girl in particular, who was only around the age of three. He would literally charge towards her, like a bull having spotted a red flag; the cartoon image of smoke streaming from his ears and flared nostrils flitted through my mind. He pulled her back towards the spinner, yelling something at her as he shoved her forward, and then tossed her aside as he again hopped onto the spinner. There was another, older girl, who tried to intervene, telling him to stop and reminding him of how little this other child was, but he had no qualms about showering aggression back upon her. I stood there, doing a little tippy-toe dance as I felt drawn in, needing to intervene, but then more parents would slide in front, blocking me, only to move again, giving me access to the situation once again; back and forth, back and forth, should I say something, should I not… He paced back and forth, between the two identical spinners, huffing and puffing, “Grrr… the girls get this one too?!” Finally, there was a threat to tell, and an interest in the location of his mom, and the boy raced off.

It took a few moments to locate the mother, sitting, hidden behind the climbing bars and slide, chatting away with another mother. It didn’t take long to realize she wasn’t paying attention to the actions of her son, and even less time to consider that, even at the young age of six or seven, it was very possible this little boy left his mother feeling intimidated, perhaps even scared.

This little boy carried himself with a look upon his face unlike anything I have seen in a child, or maybe I have, in a horror movie. Evil came to mind afterwards, harsh, but true. He looked more like an adult male, a man who had been tortured and tormented, left in a state of rage.

Glad that he hadn’t attempted to unleash any of his hostility on my own daughter, I tried to distract myself from it, and we soon left the play area. As we left, we came upon the boy again. He had removed his shoes and had his feet in the fish ponds; we were in an indoor natural area. He quickly pulled out of the water as he shouted threats at another, older boy and went running after him.

The whole situation left me feeling very agitated and angry, and a little judgemental. I spewed off a few things, including that he would likely spend a lot of time in jail, at an early age.

What it was in truth, was, and is a very sad situation; that a child so young could have been shown, taught and lived through enough horror to leave him in such a state.

(While there are some details that I have purposely left out, in an attempt not to offend anyone, the roots of this little boys actions and words are buried in his family, their lifestyle and beliefs... While I respect all of our insights, beliefs, ways of life, and the right to them, there are differences that are sometimes shown to be just plain offensive and inappropriate.)

Life Lessons in Our "Less Than Perfect-Mom" Moments"

I was having one of “those” nights last night. Again.

There are just so many things not going smoothly in my life, and aside from feeling worn out from the stress and worry, I am tired of battling with Ms. Magoo, which in turn makes me question myself, worrying that I am not doing it all “right” with her.

By the time we got to her bedroom at bedtime I felt ready to crack. Tears spilled over, and I couldn’t seem to get myself under control for over half an hour.

Then, as these things happen, I sat down to check out Facebook and some blogs that I follow. Great timing.

First up was a great read, shared by Pamela Price, and Marnie Craycroft, called “Yeah. I’m THAT mom.” by Amanda Morgan of Not Just Cute. I almost continued to cry as I read, but realized I was feeling comforted by Amanda’s words. She reminded me that we are not alone. While we can try to tell ourselves over again that we are not the only one who makes mistakes, sometimes we need to actually hear it from another mother to really get it: we can’t be perfect, do it all and get it right every time.

Next, I popped over to a blog I recently discovered, Winds of Lindy, man this girl has a way with words! I read through some of her posts from the week that I had missed, and again, found myself feeling soothed by Lindy’s words as she too spoke of this illusion of perfection that we, as mothers, seem to strive for.

We can only do the best that we can, and each and every one of us makes mistakes. That is part of learning and growing.

Which is one of the most important things that we can teach our children: to get up, try again and learn from their mistakes.

So instead of beating ourselves up when we have a rough day, perhaps we should be patting ourselves on the back for a job well done.

Keeping our chin up, doing the best we can and making the most of it all; those are not really bad things to be teaching our kids are they?

Be the Monkey

My thoughts are often dominated by my daughter, pondering what I want her to know, feel, experience and what I don’t. In my mind, for some of the most important things to stick, to become part of her thoughts and beliefs, they need to be instilled early on.

It is important to me that she never feels embarrassed or afraid to be herself, and that she feels free to express her thoughts and feelings, no matter what. I don’t want her to worry about being judged by anyone for any reason.

In order for her to learn that, I believe that she has to see it.

In the most sacred of moments, perfectly timed chances, my daughter catch me by surprise, as we walk down a busy street, stand on a crowded train platform or in line at the store, and she invites me into her magical fantasy world.

 In these situations, I could become trapped by thoughts of what people will think, but instead, my concern is only with what will go through her mind, what she will take away from the moment.

I joyfully dive in, full of pride and a sense of freedom; I become the monkey swinging from trees, the wolf howling at the moon, the performer belting out some wacky song, with moves to go along with it, whatever creature or character I am directed to be, I become. I join her in that wondrous place between imagination and reality, where anything and everything is possible.

When the moment calls for monster that chases and captures children for dinner, or a hungry, roaring lion to feed its hissing snake baby, or a twinkly, spinning dance across the sidewalk, count me in.

When I see her face light up with delight and admiration, I am satisfied on so many levels, knowing that in that one moment, she received a lifetime of positive lessons and memories.

And so did I.

Lesson of the Week

The past few months (perhaps if I were to be completely honest, I would admit that it’s actually been closer to a year) have held vast amounts of uncertainty and worry in my life, and I realize how that has impacted the job I have been doing as a Mommy.

Days where my inability to concentrate or fully BE with my daughter have added up, run together and become more of a consistency at times than the days where she was my world, fully. I “have” to do this or that, it’s time to make lunch/dinner, we have to go to the store, it’s “time” for this and that, “in a minute honey!”, “not now”, “later”, all becoming more and more frequent.

I have observed changes in her that I, out of feelings of guilt, attribute to the change in our patterns.

It makes me feel horrible. I have moments where these realizations cause me to panic.

After allowing stress to be the ruler of our days for so long, and tired of the walls closing in around us, I hit a point in the past week where I decided that it was time to let her have some fun. I found a couple of new, free activities for us to attend; I wanted to get out and do some things that were new and different, in addition to the regular Storytime at the library and her Music Class.

What started out as a plan with the best of intentions, I now realize, was not the required prescription.

Instead, I feel totally wiped out; not to mention the gazillion things that didn’t get done this week.

My girl? She is exhausted and cranky.

She hit the nail on the head when we got home this afternoon, just in time for me to start dinner, “I just want you to sit down and read with me!”

Lesson of the week: She doesn’t want to do more, get out more, see more. She wants me. Fully present, happy, fun and engaging, ME. 

Baby Girl Turns Four

Today, my baby girl, my lil’ ladybug girl, Ms. Magoo, turns 4!

I cannot believe how fast the time has gone by. I can’t believe that she isn’t a baby anymore! Sob…

While I wipe my tears away, I can’t help but smile.

I smile at the amazing little girl that I see before me. This little girl who has such a strong mind, definite likes and dislikes, preferences, plenty enough that we can only laugh as we shake our heads, interests that surprise and delight me, and a heart so tender and loving.

Every day I realize that I am the one learning. My little girl is, and has been since the day she arrived in my arms, teaching ME. She is the teacher that opens my eyes and so often she is the spark that re-ignites the fires of my own interests, beliefs, dreams… Simply by being herself, she inspires me in so many ways.

Happy Birthday my sweet girl! Live, love, learn and grow, be all that you can be… I love you baby!!

I Found the Moss!

It was a beautiful and sunny day here, and FINALLY warm enough to get out and have some fun!

Of course, with moss on the brain, between snow angels, snow shovelling, sliding and checking out all that was covered in snow, I went searching for materials for the terrarium I have been excited to make.

I wandered through the garden area, and was surprised to find two clumps of moss covered dirt! Well of course that ignited the drive to find more. And there it was, still growing on the tree!  A little brushing away of the snow, a little screwdriver that was just close enough to grab and I was able to peel away some nice batches of moss. A few rocks, pinecones and a little stump (I think it looks like the foot of an elephant!) that had been cut away from our Christmas Tree, and inside we went to create our little terrarium.

I quietly held onto the cover from Makiya’s birthday cake (thank you Grandma for the DQ Ice Cream Cake!), dreaming of ideas, things we had around the house, what we could use to turn it into a beautiful little terrarium. Along with our outside treasures, we added some cat grass seeds that I hope will get sprouted in the next couple of days. (I have some plants almost ready to take cuttings from, and as soon as they are ready, we will add them too.)

And here it now is!

We both had a blast putting it together, and are excited to watch it grow!

Happy Birthday Sweet Girl

Makiya.

My little angel.

My baby girl.

I never imagined I would ever hold you in my arms, and even when they finally placed you on my chest and I finally got to look into your amazing little face, I couldn’t seem to breathe, relax and accept that you had made your way to me.

In just these short three years that I have had you before my eyes, in my arms, on my mind and in my heart, I have been transformed, before your eyes and because of your life, love and innocence. You’ve made me see through the eyes of a child again, and brought me to a place that could never have one face anything less than that; to grow, live and laugh as a child. You have a joy and determination, a love for all that amazes me daily; you make me feel as naïve and hungry for learning and life as you must be.

I wonder about what you think about, the things you aren’t able, ready or perhaps willing to yet share. I wonder how you feel, what your thoughts are to this point about this world, your family… I long to know what truly makes you happiest, what interests you the most and what you would love to try, aside from EVERYTHING at this early age of three! I think about the parts of you that are forming, the things that are beyond, hidden behind, inside, the things that aren’t shouted, giggled and whispered about. I wonder about the person you are becoming.

I try my best every day, even on the roughest of them. I try to show you only the joys that a child should experience. I try to give you a childhood that will be woven into memories, happy and warm thoughts of a loving, learning and laughing time in your life.

I want only for you to breathe gently and inhale all of the world that surrounds you. I want for you to dance freely, as you do, releasing yourself to all that will surely come to you. I want for you to continue to sing as exuberantly, happily and straight from the heart and soul as I witness constantly throughout our days.I want for you to be all that you can, which is anything and everything.

You are the most amazing little girl; so smart, funny, strong and, of course, beautiful.

You are my world, my everything, my all. I would do anything I ever could for you, and I will always do my best to make sure that you are surrounded by nothing less than a true, peaceful and love filled home.

Happy 3rd Birthday my sweet girl!

Love, Mommy

This Girl of Ours

Well, it seems others take much more pleasure from the current antics of my daughter than I, so I thought I would update you on her “attitude” and such!

The main point I must include being that her strengths are certainly growing stronger!

While the little voice inside begs to be heard and is constantly trying to remind me, I often find myself in battles with baby girl. I allow myself to engage, which only leads to her screaming at the top of her lungs into my face. There is nothing that I can say in those moments (nor that I should say!), and not regularly enough, she finds herself in her beloved “time-out”. (I have realized that her putting herself into time out is her reminder to me that I am lacking in consistency; I am not sticking with our choice of discipline and she is letting me know I need to get to it!)

During the difficult times we have endured in these past months, and additional people that have been an influence on her, Makiya has also picked up, and quickly learned the correct usage of certain, umm, undesirable words. Luckily for me, at the time they sound more like “sit” and “pssd”, but nonetheless, she is saying them and at the right time. As hard as I try to ignore her, she comes right up to my face, a smile on hers and repeats it; in those cases I FINALLY resort to a calm, nonchalant “That’s enough.” While truly not funny, I cannot remove the image from my mind of her and her older cousin a couple of weeks ago caught in a tug o’war battle over his skateboard. When I finally intervened and removed the board, she stood there, crossed her arms and said “SIT!” Yes I know honey, life is frustrating!

Last weekend, playing with her new friend quite happily for hours, she suddenly turns wicked. Only mere moments after giving her friend a big hug, she stops. She slowly unzipped her sweater, pulled herself out of it, (typically something that requires “help mommy” at home) and proceeded to swing around and “whip” this poor girl with her it!

Her sweetness comes out in silent moments when she’ll suddenly turn to me and ask “Evthing ok mommy?” Siiighh.

Rambling to myself as I went through recipes yesterday, she turns around to look at me, palms up in the air and asks “What’d you say mommy?”

Today, I let out a noise as I burned myself removing muffins from the oven. She comes back up the stairs and says “What’s up?” I shook my head, did I really hear that? I ask her if she really just said “What’s up?” and she says “Yes, what happened?” Oh this girl just amuses me to no end!

Her favorite character is Curious George (recently being joined by Dora the Explorer) and her whole world is about George. No matter what she does or says, she will tell us that “George do this too”! Everything is likened to George and that Man in the Yellow Hat!

She is reciting her ABC’s perfectly now. Not only does she count 1 to 10, she goes back and does 10 to 1! Add to that, she is able to tell us what Cat, Dog, Zoo, Mom, Dad, No, Go and Makiya are when we spell it aloud for her, as she sees it on paper and spells it out, she is also getting these and a few more!

Oh this girl is too smart for her parents own good!

My Sweet Bully

She put herself in time out, for her in her words "being sassy"!

This sweet little girl clutches the dark corner of her blanket as she cuddles into my body as she sips her milk in the early hours of the morning. Her tiny little form warm against my own and that heavenly sweet smell that is all hers, filling me with love. She turns to me, holds my face in her hands, looks me in the eyes deeply and says "Mommy, I love you so much."

A few hours later, we make our way to the park. Her soft hand melting into mine as we walk and chatter back and forth as she notices everything, points out all she can name and wonders at all that she sees around her. As we near the entrance, I stop and kneel down to her level, “Makiya, there are other kids at the park. The park is for everyone to play together. Are you going to be nice to the kids?” She roughly crosses her arms and slams them against her body, uttering the typical “hmmph” and loud “NO!” I stand and start to turn, “That’s fine, we’ll just go home then.” “No mommy, I sorry. Go to pawk!” We spend a few moments talking about how she needs to be nice and finally reached a calm point where I felt we may be okay to proceed to the park. We walk into the park and as she waves she says “Hi kids! Habing fun?! Hi kids! Habing fun?!” It only takes a moment, she is yelling “Nooo!!” and throwing rocks at the other children and succeeds in hitting me in the teeth with them. I firmly reprimand her, offer her a final chance and am not even fully standing back up before she throws more rocks and throws herself on the ground kicking and screaming. I stand her up, take her by the hand and lead her off to try to calm down with the lunch that I brought. We walked across the greenspace with her screaming, crying, falling down, and begging “No mommy! I sorry, I sorry! Go back to pawk! NO! No lunch! PAWK!!!!” After failing at lunch the playground had quieted a little and I again hoped it may be okay. We spent a few minutes laughing and playing; she made me go for a ride in the “car” and she amazed me with her agility and speed in climbing the ladders up to the slide. Then, we headed back to the “car” where we approached a group of kids, and again, she picked up two fistfuls of rocks that I quickly kept from being thrown.

We left that park and headed home.

In what I must admit would be giving yet another, hmmm, un-earned chance, before we made it home, we stopped at another little playground that was pretty quiet. As soon as she began to climb up, two kids appeared and she waved! “Hi kids! Habing fun!” Whew! Down the slide, laughter and giggles and a race back around to do it all over again. She climbed up and encountered the kids again, this time she wasn’t so friendly. I grabbed her by the arm and began to tell her we were leaving when she punched me in the face. I was stunned. I quickly picked her up and carried her back down and began to walk home. We struggled a moment as she proceeded to hit me in the face a few more times. I managed to strap her into her stroller for the first time in our entire outing. She thrashed and screamed the entire two blocks home, where she found herself in a time out immediately.

It was, thankfully naptime.

Stage or attitude that is purely her own? We shall see!

In the meantime, I can hear us being labeled as the ones with the bully child! The one who beats up her mommy!

Book Lover and Reader in Training

We have been in a state of wonder as we watch and listen to our daughter these days; she is speaking so many new words, putting sentences together and surprising us with the clarity of her communications, memory and the list goes on!

Today, I stood at the sink, mindlessly, washing dishes when Makiya came around the corner. She had her hands out, palms up and was shaking her head as she walked up and looked at me. “Mommy, I can not read books.” She was obviously feeling a little frustrated, and needed to express her concerns. That beautiful, sweet and innocent voice; my heart melted in that moment.

We spent a few minutes talking about it, as I pointed out that she IS learning words, and is amazing with her letters, so it would only be a matter of time before she caught on.

She appeared satisfied, and went on her way, back to her books. I went back to finishing the dishes and beginning dinner preparations.

About 20 minutes later she calls out to me. “Mommy, Mommy!! I CAN read!” Smiling to myself, heart thumping, mind turning back to the stories of my own early reading capabilities, I raced out into the living room. I found her sitting there in a pile of books, holding up one of the books that I know would be a FAR stretch in regards to her actually reading it. She was beaming as I came to her, she placed the book atop one of the several stacks surrounding her, proceeded to grab another and went about her reading.

I ruffled her hair, beaming myself, placed a kiss on her head and thought, “Maybe not today, but in the near future, she WILL be reading to me.”

What a special moment to have shared; the pride that comes with it, inevitable. I AM teaching my girl. She IS learning. She is AMAZING.

Those Things Our Kids Say

A few days ago, my 26 month old daughter spoke words to me that I thought would be, at the least, a few years away.

We sat at the table with her lunch sitting in front of her. A typical meal, she twisted and turned in her chair as she ate sparingly. Also normal, was my continual utterance of “Makiya, please turn around and eat…”

Today was different though. This little girl turned around, sat on her bum and put her head down. Then she said “I merry mad Mommy.”

Stunned a little, I shook my head, perhaps something was blocking my ears from hearing my girls words correctly? I asked her if she said she was mad at me.

“Yes. I merry mad Mommy. Merry angwee.”

I tried very hard not to laugh, a little smirk creeping across my face, “I am very sorry to hear that, but you still need to eat your lunch.”

She’s very mad at me, angry even?!

Takes me back a few months, to the morning I asked her to please clear her toys off of the table so we could get up and eat breakfast. She said no, her then favorite word. I repeated my request, asking where she would eat if she didn’t move these things. She turned back to the table and proceeded to take the tablecloth by the corner and pull. In one movement, the table was cleared and she was looking back at me quite pointedly. No words required there!

Oh this little girl is growing up so quickly; a little too smart for her own good we often remark. Or is it too smart for OUR own good?!

She certainly does take it all in.

Nap and bedtime battles have gotten the best of me recently, and she is now showing, or more accurately telling, me the message that she has gotten and chosen to ignore; EVERYTIME we prepare for the sleep routine. This is what I hear:

“No toys, no stowee, bed. Okay? Okay.” That’s right Makiya, “If you don’t clean up your toys, we won’t read a story, it will be bedtime.”

“Bedtime bedtime.” She says. Yes Makiya, “Bedtime is bedtime.”

“Dettin ohd.” Yes, “This is getting old.”

“No moah.” That’s right, “I am not doing this anymore.”

Oh yes, this daughter of mine is keeping me on my toes!