Month: December 2016

Ah… those golden moments of peace and quiet… you’re actually getting into your work – enjoying the silence – WAIT. SILENCE? Oh Shit.

If there is silence there must also be something going on. Something you are not yet aware of. Something that is going to make you cringe or cry or go open a new bottle. Do you go look? Do you ignore it and hope it’s nothing more than Baby Girl sweetly reading books to herself? OK I have to look. Take a peek around the corner. Shit oh Dear. She’s not reading. She is coloring. On the windowsill and on herself. With purple marker. She is having a grand time.

Well of course you have to whip out your phone and take a picture of the naughtiness before you cry or laugh or scream. If you’re lucky she won’t even notice you taking the picture and you’ll get a good one you can use for blackmail someday before you rush forward into the madness to remove the purple marker from her purple fingers and listen to the ensuing screaming of injustice. Coloring on the wall is also a favorite. Seems ok since you haven’t gotten around to re-painting that wall yet. Only to discover the paint you have chosen doesn’t quite cover up the crayon marks. And you’ve already painted the entire rest of the room. Shit oh Dear.

A few days ago I was wondering where the precious Angel was since I was cooking dinner and not hearing a peep from her. Assumed she was watching TV. Y’all. Do not assume. It’s bad for your heart. With trepidation I start searching the house. Finally find Baby Girl in Mama and Daddy’s closet quietly and methodically ripping ALL THE BOWS OFF THE CHRISTMAS PRESENTS. That were hidden. From her. Until Santa Claus came tonight. So much for the element of surprise on Christmas morning. Although, since she also ripped most of the name tags off, there could be a bit of surprise since I am not at all sure I put the tags back on the right packages. I seriously almost had a heart attack.

Speaking of heart attacks, the other night my husband practically had one. We were eating dinner at Babe’s (Chicken for those who don’t know) and as we were finishing up Baby Girl wanted to sit on my lap. In order to avoid any whining or bad behavior I let her. So Sissy and my husband’s cop partner were sitting across the table with hubby and I sitting next to each other. The guys were talking, Baby Girl was being quiet and happy and I was simply enjoying drinking my Sweet Iced Tea. All of a sudden Sissy starts snickering and pokes my husband’s partner and he starts laughing too. Then he says “Hey um, Tony, you might want to take a look….” Hubby looks where they are pointing at Baby Girl and does a complete double take and says Oh! OH SHIT! Baby Girl had gotten a panti liner out of my purse and had unwrapped it and was playing with it. Even better – she would not let me take it away from her! If you can’t cry you gotta laugh right?

Sometimes it’s just bad parenting judgement that makes us cringe. Like letting your two year old take a piece of sidewalk chalk in the car seat with her. Next thing you know the car seat straps, the snuggie and the child are covered in pink chalk. Because she was being – you guessed it – QUIET. Or sometimes you fall asleep, um accidentally, on the couch (or your husband does) and things start to happen that are only discovered later. Like writing (again in marker – where does she find them?!) on Mama’s lovely rustic wood desk. Or covering Mama’s computer screen with ink pen scribbles. Or leaving her alone to eat her yogurt only to discover her giving herself a yogurt rub all over her own body. And also the chair. And the table.

What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger right? And Baby Girl is pretty darn adorable even when she’s doing naughty things. We’ll call it character building.

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas! Peace on Earth, Good Will towards Men.

 

 

Five minutes. That’s all I need. No, maybe half an hour. Ok at least an hour. Alright, alright – give me a full day please. A full day without being the favorite. The only person in the whole world who can make this princess happy. The only one who can get up with her (at 5:30 am), get her breakfast, and spend the entire day granting every wish. The only one who can give her dinner, give her a bath or put her to bed.

I am the one person who can’t go to the potty alone, or go outside without her, or take a nap or bathe by my very own self. I can’t walk down the hallway without hearing “noooooooo waitttttt waiittttt.” Putting laundry away? Please. She has to help. Cooking dinner? She wants cookies right now. Put in a Mickey Mouse DVD? “Noooooo Peppa! Peppa!” Try to work in my office? “Mama come PWAY! PWEASE!” Sit down on the couch and cover myself with a blanket? God Forbid. Takes less than a minute for Baby Girl to start pulling at the blanket and demanding something.

Baby Girl don’t you want to play with Sissy? Nope. Daddy? No way Jose. So you’re going to scream and cry and have a ridiculously huge fit and make Mama feel horribly guilty if I try to go outside without you, or take a little rest alone? You Betcha.

You want to go to school today? You do?! YAAAYYYYYY!!! Oh joy, Mama is so excited. Let’s get you dressed so you can go to school. Can Sissy get you dressed? No. Will you let Sissy do your hair? Nope. OK fine, Mama will do it. Let’s Go Baby Girl! Woo hoo. Free four hours for Mama.

What’s this?! Normal teacher isn’t here today? Oh Shit. Here it comes… “WAAAAAAAA NOOOOOOOO MAMAAAAAA!!!” Tears, spitting, crying, screeching, HITTING the other teacher. So mortified. Baby Girl please let go of Mama’s hair. Mama is leaving now. “NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!” OK here you go new teacher – you have fun with this. Mama is going to go shopping and run completely necessary errands feeling horribly, terribly guilty at leaving you screaming with one person you don’t know, even though you know all the other people in your school. She’s gonna have a great time. Biting her fingernails and waiting for the call from the school saying Baby Girl isn’t calming down and you have to come get her (sort of like being kicked out of an airplane for violence.) Glancing at the phone every five seconds praying there’s no message from the school and yet, really wanting to know – did she calm down? Is she ok? Is she playing with her friends? Or is she hiding under the table with tears running down her poor little face? What a fun way for Mama to spend her free four hours. Of course Baby Girl was (and will be in the future) totally fine after about five minutes. Report from school is that she had a great day. Really? Well I’m glad someone did.

Different day – same game. Mama wants to take a much needed, much deserved little time out NAP. Alone. With the door shut. Daddy says he’ll play with Baby Girl and put her down for nap. Miraculously this all seems to go well and two hours blissfully pass in a dark, quiet room. Sound too good to be true? Of course it is. The instant Baby Girl wakes up from her own nap she is hollering for Mama. Daddy will just not do! So I reluctantly drift up and out of my comatose state – because really you cannot ignore the screaming, screeching, completely beside herself Baby Girl. No matter how badly you want to. Guilt washes over and you find yourself getting up, saying OK OK I’m here. Please stop crying. Which of course she does. Immediately. Because I’M HER PERSON.

It’s flattering, yes, and of course knowing this little person wants her beloved Mama rather than anyone else makes you feel all squishy inside. But it’s also torture. You want to make sure the time you spend together is quality, fun and enjoyable. But when you are at your wits’ end because you can’t string two minutes alone together it is hard to be patient. It is difficult to feel loving every minute of the day. In fact, it’s impossible. You also feel very badly that your husband doesn’t get the same treatment. That he isn’t the favorite. Maybe one day this will change and she’ll become Daddy’s Girl. If that happens, maybe I’ll mind. Maybe I won’t. Maybe I’ll just take a longer nap.

I have been taking comfort in my own home lately. Retreating you might call it. (Or hiding). Really enjoying the fact that the heat is on at night and it is getting chillier and more like winter. In years past I have not typically enjoyed winter – long nights, short days and not much to do. Being cold. Freezing your ass off (literally – because full chaps don’t cover your butt cheeks) while riding and teaching, getting mud and dirt and snow and horse hair everywhere, and re-scheduling endless lessons due to same mud and snow and WET STUFF and WHEN will it be spring?!

This year somehow it seems different. I’m not teaching that much, we have fewer horses to take care of right now and if it wants to rain and be muddy – I just hope the horses keep their shoes on. I am not going to worry so much about the weather (well maybe a little) or having to clean the stalls a billion times – something I get to avoid most of the year because we leave our horses out all the time. The horses are well fed, we have a hot water hook up to the barn now and lights and my Dad’s four wheeler. I have a baby girl old enough to entertain herself and not get into too much trouble in the barn. (The 2 year old I mean – the 15 year old gets herself into plenty of trouble in the barn!).

Inside, my Baby Girl is watching A Curious George Christmas and resolutely taking the “toys” off the Christmas tree while I resolutely continue to put them back on. She thinks the lights are magical. She has no idea yet who Santa Claus is or what is coming on Christmas morning. She’s doing crafty little Christmas things at school and learning Christmas songs and having a great time. I get to dress her up in cute little Christmas themed outfits and pajamas. I get to show her about hot chocolate and marshmallows, popcorn and Christmas cookies. She’ll learn what reindeer are. She sat on Santa’s lap and didn’t cry – wouldn’t smile either but hey you take what you can get sometimes. She has her Daddy’s smirk.

She won’t get a Hatchimal this year because she doesn’t know what they are yet. She doesn’t connect things she sees on TV to things she could actually acquire. A Charlie Brown Christmas will only be another cartoon she gets to watch and Mickey’s Christmas Carol will just be another “Mouse” show. She’s not thumbing through the Toys R Us catalog or making a ridiculous list of expensive stuff she doesn’t need. Today I bought her some Welch’s Fruit Snacks and THAT made me the greatest Mommy ever. A week or so ago somebody brought her a used plastic dollhouse with plastic furniture and plastic dolls and she has played with that thing non-stop ever since.

This year I am stepping back. Taking it all in and chilling out. I am not stressed about Christmas. I have done what shopping I felt like doing and now I’m done. I’ve done a few cards. I did not manage to buy lights for the house. But I don’t care. The family pictures we took in Frisco’s central park didn’t turn out very well and Baby Girl was sick the entire week after that. Oh well. Nobody gets pictures of the Tullos family this year. For the next three weeks I will simply be watching Baby Girl enjoy this season that I love so much. Next year she might realize who Santa is and what it means, she might ask for presents. Things might be a little stressed. I might feel like I have to cook (buy) a big Christmas dinner or mail a thousand cards to everyone I’ve ever known. I might not be so relaxed about a broken ornament or two. I might stress over getting the gifts just right. I might have to wade through Hell to find a Hatchimal.

But not this year. It’s warm and cozy in here. I think I’ll open another bottle of wine and watch Mickey’s Christmas Carol with my Baby Girl.