Michelin Sophie

I didn’t have my camera with me at the swimming pool today, but that’s ok. Because the Michelin Man in the photo perfectly captures Sophie in the pool.

In order for Sophie to enjoy fun time with the rest of her family in the deep end, she needs to wear paraphernalia to help her keep afloat. Until today, she wore a floatie vest. But she wasn’t confident enough in it to let go of us for more than a millisecond.

Today, however, my dear husband had a brilliant idea. In addition to the vest, he outfitted her with a floatie for each arm – just like Mr. Michelin Man. She was so buoyed, in fact, that she was practically walking on water. Watch out, Moses. Actually, she was well on her way to floating halfway to the moon.

Sophie loved her newfound independence. She was happy to float and float and float. All by herself. She didn’t even get a strand of her curly hair wet. Except for the drops caused by other kids’ splashing. She truly is a girl after my own heart. And who cares that once we remove the floaties she won’t know what hit her – except for all of the water she’ll be swallowing as she gets an involuntary close-up of the pool’s concrete floor?

Vacation!

My first real vacation since starting the new job in January. Am I excited? You bet! Overall, it’s been an interesting, but long, seven months. Lots of challenges – lots of good people – lots of stories.

I’m looking forward to spending some quality time with the girls – if the weather cooperates, we should have an excellent time. The vacation will be capped off next weekend by a visit with my long-lost, but just recently found, friend from 30 years ago, with whom I reconnected after seeing her profile on LinkedIn. Pretty cool, actually.

Other than the Great Wolf Lodge adventure early next week, the other big event is the delivery of Sophie’s big girl bed and new mattress on Thursday. She’s still pretty ambivalent about the whole idea, and she’s going to have a lot of crib separation anxiety. But the time has come. The end of an era and the beginning of a new one…her young life will hereafter be divided into the BB (“before bed”) days and the AB (“after bed”) days.

Multi-Vitamin Madness

Seeing as though I discussed Sophie’s fruit issues yesterday, I figured I’d continue along the same theme tonight and discuss her major issues with multi-vitamins.

I have a pharmacy of kids multi-vitamins in the house, none of which Sophie will eat. Dora, Disney princess, traditional circular prescription vitamins, etc. I also purchased vitamins at Whole Foods – “organic” vitamins. I should have known better. I was afraid they’d be inedible, and indeed, they were absolutely horrendous. I mean, really – kids’ vitamins that taste like fish oil? Needless to say, the bottle of solidified fish oil went immediately into the garbage.

The other bottles, however, reside on the window sill in the kitchen – and I look at them longingly everyday – “Maybe she’ll eat one today,” I hope against hope. And Sophie inevitably teases me. “I’ll have a princess vitmin (sic), Mom.” I obligingly behead one of the princesses (because of her age, she can only eat 1/2 of a vitamin per day) and present it to her on a platter (ok, not literally on a platter, but with a lot of love). She looks at it – she sometimes licks it – makes a funny face and announces, “No vitmin (sic), Mom.”

The only vitamins she’ll eat are what she calls the “baby vitmins (sic).” They are miniature fluoride tablets, and she likes them because they’re cute. I need to find out if multi-vitamins come in miniature versions, too. I will stop at nothing for my children, even if it means making the goddamn vitamins myself…

No Fruit!

Sophie is starting to drive me crazy. She has not been eating much fruit of late – stubbornly refusing, in fact, to have more than a few bites here and there.

What’s so frustrating is that she has historically been a fan of all kinds of fruit- until about 2-3 weeks ago. And she’s smart. Because the more I insist and talk about it, the more she resists – with a smirk. Intellectually, I know I just need to stop talking about it. But I can’t help myself. She needs to listen to her mother, for crying out loud.

I have a confession to make. I resorted to bribery with her for the first time this evening. I allowed her a sip of lemonade for every piece of canteloupe she ate. And it worked – in that she ate more melon than she imbibed juice. But hell, I’m not going to resort to that every time she needs to get some nutritious fruit into her belly. I simply refuse to become that person!

The Dentist


Chloe needed to have a cavity filled today (despite our best efforts to limit her sugar intake, she seems to have teeth prone to problems). We went to her new dentist (who happens to be our dentist), and he got to work.

I hadn’t told Chloe that there’d be a needle – I didn’t want to freak her out. But our dentist is a smart one – after giving her the “sleeping juice,” he got the needle ready. Chloe, distracted by the TV – “Drake & Josh” to be precise – was oblivious to the dentist’s quick-handedness. She had no idea what had hit her. And having only been at the receiving end of that needle until now, I hadn’t realized how big that thing is. So it was that much more impressive that he managed to hide it from her.

We’re now home, and Chloe is in dreamland. She still has no idea that a needle was involved. And I don’t plan to tell her anytime soon, either. Maybe when she’s 30.

I’m a Giant?

Sophie is fairly funny – and she doesn’t mean to be – at least not always. Today’s funniness stemmed from her use of an ever-increasing vocabulary.

While in the bath a little earlier, Chloe was having a conversation with a green action figure – a Transformer-type monstrosity that she likes to play with from time to time. She was diligently trying to get the green thing comfortably relaxing in one of her toy boats, and repeatedly said, “That’s stupendous!” The problem is that she has no idea what ‘stupendous’ means. When I explained to her that it was a nice word that meant ‘great’ or ‘fantastic,” Sophie protested mightily. “No it doesn’t. It’s mean.” “Sophie, ‘stupendous’ isn’t a mean word, it’s a nice word. It doesn’t mean ‘stupid.” “Yes, it does, Mommy.” There’s really no arguing with an almost-3 year old.

A little later, Sophie wanted me to put on her long-sleeved winter long johns. Of course, she wants to wear these on the warmest evening of the summer. It was my turn to protest mightily, but my little one is an insistent little bugger. We actually compromised – I told her she could wear the top, but not the bottoms. That it would be sufficient for her to sleep in underwear. She actually liked that somewhat subversive idea. But when I put on the top, she started to complain that it was too small. Indeed, it was a little tight in the arms. I asked if she wanted to change into something else, but she was reluctant. I told her she was growing, and getting bigger by the day. “Like a giant!” she exclaimed.

At which point, I explained that no, she wasn’t a giant, but a growing girl who was a lot taller than she was when I first bought those pyjamas a few months ago. “No, like a giant!” she repeated excitedly, pointing at her ceiling for effect. When she saw that I was not agreeing with her, she moderated her stance and said, “big like you, Mommy?” “Yes, big like me,” I replied. Giant=Mommy. I don’t know whether I should be insulted or proud.

Food Shopping with the Girls…

…Is a nightmare. The four of us went to the supermarket this morning – for a marathon session to buy as much as food as possible before going to the movies to see “Space Chimps” (which was very cute, by the way).

First, Sophie wanted balloons made out of plastic produce bags. That kept her happy for all of two minutes. Chloe, to her credit, helped bag the fruit. Then she went to the bakery for a couple of free cookies. She ended up eating two of them because Sophie wasn’t interested in hers. Chloe was actually fairly well-behaved, although she was almost always an aisle or two behind us – driven to distraction by treats she asked for us to buy (“No!” was a repeated refrain out of my mouth) and by $0.99 lip gloss (“No!” again).

Sophie became obsessed with a box of Non-Pareils that we were buying for the movies, and when we told her she had to wait until after lunch to eat them, she started moaning and groaning. As if the world were crashing down around her. Interspersed among the moans and groans were occasional screams, which were embarrassing, to say the least. She had a one-track mind during our excursion – that little box was pulling her in – turning her into a little monster.

Sophie did manage to charm the cashier, however. With her curls and her gleeful giggles as she played with the credit card machine. She wasn’t very happy when I had to take it over from her, though. She still hasn’t mastered the art of sharing.

I’m going to end this blog entry here – my computer continues to restart on me without warning, and I don’t want to lose any of my musings.

Another TGIF

I am really glad it’s Friday. I am really glad that Chloe’s eye is better and that Sophie, so far, seems to have escaped contamination.

Sophie is starting to get used to the idea of getting a bed – when we first told her we had ordered a big girl bed for her room, she protested mightily: “I don’t want a bed, I want my crib!” Over the last couple of days, however, she’s started talking about the “pretty bed” she’s going to soon receive. It helps that her Grammy bought her a new nightstand and lamp – everything in her room is now “pretty.” According to Sophie, Grammy is also going to be bringing her a pretty new chair next week. I don’t think Grammy is aware of the deadline, however.

In one week, we will be on vacation. I can’t wait. My first real vacation since starting the new job – almost seven months ago! Great Wolf Lodge crazy water park resort, here we come! Chloe will be in heaven there. Sophie will likely be completely overwhelmed and my husband and I will probably be in need of a bottle of Extra-Strength Tylenol. Anything for the kids, right?

It’s a New Day, a New Dawn

OK – so the drama of last night subsided a bit this morning. Chloe does have pink eye, and my husband took her to the doctor and got her a prescription. If you look at the photo with a magnifying glass, you’ll see that the eye on the right side is visibly irritated.

After a day of eye drops, she’s doing a lot better. Back to camp tomorrow. That is, if they don’t throw her out because she has pink eye. I just know she’s going to announce it to everyone who asks why she wasn’t at camp today. And if I tell her to simply say she was sick, she’ll accuse me of wanting her to lie and still announce to the world that she has pink eye. And even though our pediatrican said it would be ok for her to return, pink eye is SCAAARRY – one of those super-contagious kid things – and they might try to kick her out.

Speaking of which, my eye has been bothering me all day. My mom thinks it’s sympathy psychosomatic irritation. I think I may have pink eye. It is super-contagious, after all.

The freezer is working again – although I haven’t yet called to cancel the appointment. I’m afraid if I call it will stop running. So I am waiting until tomorrow to pick up the phone. My computer is still ornery.

In contrast to yesterday evening, Sophie and I had a chance to bond over her farm animals – we played hide and seek with them. And I started to read a Babar book to her – she wasn’t particularly interested in it, except to point out the Mommy, Papa, Sophie and Chloe elephants. At least I was Queen Celeste.

Whatever Can Go Wrong…

…Will most certainly go wrong. I’ll just list all of the fun things going on in our household this evening:

(1) I arrived home after a long day at work and Chloe still hadn’t taken her bath. And was filthy from camp. Why? Because the kids went frog hunting today. Luckily she didn’t catch any of the little critters, because my brother once got salmonella poisoning from a turtle – granted, not the same animal, but close enough to make me cringe at the thought of frog-borne disease.

(2) Chloe was wearing a paper eye patch. When she took it off, her left eye was all red and irritated. “Chloe, what’s wrong with your eye?” I asked. “I don’t know, Mom. It’s bothering me.” Pink eye? I hope not, but it’s looking like it it might be the dreaded bacterial conjunctivitis – with the gook that accompanies it. Murphy’s law, right? And to top it all off, her Papa didn’t even notice it.

(3) A child in Chloe’s camp “village” has lice. Chloe was examined by the camp nurse, along with the other kids, and she’s ok. For now.

(4) I noticed that the freezer door doesn’t seem to be shutting properly. It’s global warming in the freezer, and if it continues, all of the contents will end up in the garbage. We have an appointment with the repair service, but not until Friday.
(5) Sophie was cranky. I hardly saw her tonight, what with all of the other drama. She ended up spending more time with our babysitter than with us.

(6) My stupid Lenovo laptop keeps crashing on me – I’ve been seeing at least five blue screens a day for the past 10 days. That’s not a good thing, to put it mildly. And if it continues, I’ll be visiting the Apple store for a new computer much sooner than planned.

It’s just one of those nights – and I’m very glad it’s almost over.

A Mom's Ramblings About the Marvels & Mishaps of Parenting, the Joys of Family Travel & the Writing Life