Because lord knows I’ve got a toddler of my own and I’m well aware of how easy it is to be distracted for a second, but really?  I know this story is a teensy bit old, but I can’t help myself.

When I’m watching the Munchkinette at home, I’m way more relaxed about it than when we are out in public.  I am well aware of danger zones and things she can get into. But when we are somewhere else,  I put hawks to shame.  She doesn’t take a step without me right behind her.

So, I’m thinking that if my toddler is at someone’s place of work, where there are a million things she could get into, not to mention an open TIME-LOCKED SAFE, I would tend to be a little more watchful than normal.

I’m not trying to minimize the obvious distress caused to the toddler and her mom, but for this mother, I’m going to advocate the use of a leash.

And if this family gets money for exclusive story rights or a made-for-television movie, then I will know for sure there is no justice in this world.

Believe it or not, I’m a friendly person.

I like to think that my friends are good friends, and if I don’t consider you a friend, then you are merely an acquaintance whom I have deemed unworthy of pursuing a friendship with.  I’m not someone who enters a friendship lightly.

That changed when I became a parent.

For good or ill, I must cast my lot with unknowns, whether it be for birthday parties or play dates or watching soccer practice.

I consider myself to be a gracious, social person.  But nothing has tested my notion of friendship more than the constant game of  musical chairs with other parents.

For a few years, the Munchkin had a really good friend.  We would take that friend with us to trick-or-treat and to the beach and the movies and all sorts of fun places.  The other family would also invite the Munchkin to do fun things and all were having a good time. I was glad to do it, and I felt that in turn, I was forged a fairly good relationship with the other mom.  Now, Other Mom had two older children, so methinks she knew the course our friendship would run a bit better than I did.  As our children became closer, so did we.  We would chat when picking up and dropping off, as well as at school and on the phone when making arrangements. 

When I say that, I mean that we ventured into deeper conversational territory than what we were cooking for dinner that night, if you know what I mean.

Then last year, the friendship between the two children began to fade.  I will never force my child to play with someone he doesn’t want to play with, so other than suggesting some outings with said friend that were rejected, I didn’t push.

I swore, though, that the fact that our children’s friendship was possibly waning didn’t mean Other Mom and myself also had to cease talking.

So I called, and we talked, and everything was fine.

But then, I noticed that I was waiting longer and longer between calls, and Other Mom wasn’t calling me at all.

And that is when I realized that I hadn’t been Aware. 

Other Mom had probably had this happen to her many times prior to this due to her two older children.  Your kid has a friend, and you obviously get to know the parent of the other child if they are hanging out a lot, but it is more a friendship of convenience and forced proximity than something that would have happened organically.  Then when the kids move on, you move on.  There aren’t any hard feelings or deliberate attempts to be hurtful, but one only has so much time in the day.  And how else can you get to know the parents of your child’s new friends when you are busy hanging on to the old ones?

Sigh.

I guess it’s a game I’d rather not play, but at least now I know the rules.

When my son turned six, I discovered that he had a hearing problem.

It was nothing that needed a doctor’s intervention.  It was just that he discovered the fine art of selective listening.

He is now 8, and it hasn’t really gotten better.  In fact, I’d say it has gotten worse.

Although he never fails to hear any sentence that includes the words “candy” or “dessert.”

What I don’t understand is the thought process behind his almost supernatural ability to not hear what I’m telling him.   Does he think that I will suddenly give up?  That I will get tired of repeating myself and stop ordering him to clean his room because it is just too much trouble?  I suppose it might be worth a shot.

But then I find myself saying the same thing over and over, each time getting louder and louder.

Because we ALL know the thought process on that one, right?

When someone doesn’t understand you, you feel you must talk LOUDER and SLOWER, as if that will suddenly clear everything up.

But for an 8 year old, that still doesn’t work. 

I can’t be the only one out there with this problem, right?

So I’m thinking of investing in a tape recorder, recording my top ten oft-repeated phrases, and then selling it as a CD so that I can help every other mom out there save her vocal cords and her patience.  I’d even have a special one made just for the car.   You would never have to answer the question “Are we there yet?” again.  Let me do it for you! Just keep hitting the repeat button and I’ll be glad to say the response a hundred times if that’s what it takes!

You’re welcome, world.

That will be $13.99.

Plus tax.

We swore we weren’t going to do it with this one.

Little did we know.

When our son was born, he refused to sleep alone.  After many heartbreaking attempts to get him to do so, my husband and I finally gave up.  I’ve always leaned toward attachment parenting, and we just went with it. We had two bedrooms, and one of us at a time co-slept with our son until he was about two and a half years old.

Now, it wasn’t horrible.  The Munchkin was and is still a very sound sleeper and everyone got plenty of sleep during that phase.  Since we “weaned” him off the co-sleeping, he has had absolutely zero sleep issues. He goes to be without a fuss every night and wakes up refreshed in the morning.  No nightmares, no crawling into bed at 2AM, no sleep-walking, nothing.

But, everyone always clucks at you when you let it slip that you co-slept. And yes, usually people don’t own up to the fact simply because it’s easier just not to have to explain to people that no, you are not trying to destroy your kid.  Despite the fact that we were sincerely doing what we thought best for our family, everyone is always out to second-guess you.

When my daughter was born, it all started wonderfully.  She slept alone in her co-sleeper bassinet, (which I highly recommend, by the way) and in her swing. 

She then transitioned pretty well into the crib, although there were some rough nights here and there.  But nothing out of the ordinary.

However, between the sixth and ninth months of her life, she got quite ill from whatever her brother brought home from school, and simply refused to sleep alone.  We tried, we really did.  But she was sick three times in a three-month period, and everyone was absolutely miserable and getting little rest.  Everybody knows that much poor decision making comes from lack of sleep, and we were no different.

So one night we said, let’s just try bringing her in the bed and see what happens.

Worked like a charm.  She’s a bit of a restless sleeper, but if she wakes up she will usually go right back to sleep.  Unless of course it is teething pain, and then all bets are off. She is able to sleep by herself during naps, although she requires someone to fall asleep with her. 

So instead of starting out co-sleeping and then transitioning to the crib, we sort of did it backwards.  Goodness knows, not by design. Would I prefer that she sleep on her own in a crib? Yes.   But sometimes things just work out a certain way, and that’s what happened with us.

And really?  I’ve pretty much stopped caring about what other people think about the co-sleeping situation.  We have made the bed perfectly safe, and she is well past the age of being smothered by blankets or pillows.  She gets her rest, I get my much-needed beauty sleep, and we are all happy.  There is nothing wrong with this picture except for the people who want to get all hot and bothered about things that aren’t really their business. 

We co-slept with our son and he didn’t turn out to be some co-dependent wussy who can’t fall asleep on his own.  Quite the contrary. 

So, if you are thinking about co-sleeping, do what works best for you, and all the rest can shut up and do what’s best for them.

I’m a SAHM with a very part-time job that consists of writing this and that other blog.

This means I spend a lot of time with my children.

Which means at the end of the day, I can definitely see why the evening glass (or on certain days, bottle) of wine begins to look mighty attractive.

The problem is, I don’t really drink.

So, short of having my own rubber-padded room in which to retreat, I rely on getting away from my sometimes annoying darling children to maintain my sanity.

I cannot stress the importance of taking time for yourself to my fellow mothers.

When my son was born, I saw any time I spent away from him as a betrayal of my motherly duties.  That I would choose to not be with him was an insult to him, and just a sign of my deficiency as a mother.  Puh-leeze, former me, you are taking yourself waaay too seriously. 

Now that my daughter is here, I’ve thrown all that nonsense to the wind.   The kids are not going to melt because you left them with your husband.  In fact, it’s probably a good thing that Dad has some alone time, since Mommy tends to dominate their social schedule. Having two children is definitely harder than one, I just never knew how much more mentally draining it could be.  Add the fact that my Energizer-bunny daughter is in a rebellious toddler phase, and most of the time I can’t get out of here fast enough.

So if you can get some time, any time, away from your kids, do it.  Don’t second guess yourself, and don’t feel guilty.  I don’t care if it’s just a quick trip to Target, (which I don’t consider a chore the same way I do a trip to the grocery store), coffee with a friend, or a walk around the neighborhood.

GET THEE OUT!

I don’t care if you have to bribe your husband, or hire a sitter, or whatever.

You will feel happier and refreshed and it’s true that it will make you a better parent. It’s healthier for every relationship to have some time away from each other, and the parent-child one is no exception.

I promise.

I am a loner. An outcast. Someone not to be trusted.

Why?

Because I don’t, and never will, post pictures of my kids on the internet. Not on my personal blog, not on this blog, and definitely not on Facebook.

In an ocean of mommybloggers who document their offspring’s every moment online, I stand out. And not in a good way. I actually feel that in the long run, it has hurt me as a blogger not to post pictures. People want to identify with you, and it is hard to do that if they have no idea what you and your family look like.  I’ve actually noticed that some of the most popular bloggers are the ones who post lots and lots of pictures of themselves and their families.

But the way I see it, once you post a picture on the intertubes, it is always there. There is always a version of it cached somewhere, even if you delete it later. I feel it is unfair for me to put up a bunch of pictures of my kids for people to possibly find one day and use for their own purposes. The thought of that totally skeeves me out. The fact that if they felt like it, a complete stranger could print out a picture of my son and put it in a frame in their own home makes me feel faint. 

Now, is there much likelihood that this will happen?

Not really.

But there is always the possibility, and I am just that paranoid.

And speaking of paranoid? As a public service announcement, I would like to introduce you to a new site called Spokeo. On this site, many of your nightmares may actually come true. If you look up your name, you will find a bunch of aggregated information about yourself culled from public sources, including your age, where you live, your phone number, whether you own a house and how much it is currently worth, and pictures of your property.  If you have a spouse, there will be a link under your name to all of your spouse’s information.  Oh, and be sure to look up your maiden name as well.  On mine, it had links to my mom and dad.  If someone wants to pay three bucks, they can look at financial information as well as pictures you’ve posted on Facebook.

I figure if someone wants really badly to locate me, then they are going to have to hire a freaking private detective.  None of this one-second searching on the internet and finding out everything about me.  You want to know where I live, you are going to have to work for it.

I opted out of Spokeo using a gmail address I made specifically for that purpose. You might want to to the same.

I have to start out by saying we are all about team sports here at Casa Glinda.  I played team sports for many, many years including softball, basketball and volleyball.  Later in my career I focused on volleyball, and loved it so much I wound up eventually coaching at the college level.  My husband also participated in multiple team sports, including football and wrestling.  We practically lived and breathed tenets such as “a team is only as good as its weakest player” and “it’s all about teamwork.”  We go around the house high-fiving each other every time one of us makes an impressive display of parenting skills.  OK, I’m joking on that one.  Sort of.

Which is why I don’t understand why the ”go team” DNA apparently did not get passed down to the Munchkin.

Like the good suburban parents we are, we enrolled him in team sports from the time he was in preschool.  Bitty soccer. Tee ball.  Basketball.

He hated them all, especially practices.  It’s not due to a lack of coordination or ability, he just didn’t understand what the big deal was.

He did not see the point at all in running laps.  Why did he have to run in some arbitrary circle just because someone told him to?

Why should he have to sit in the outfield when someone else got to have all the fun at first base?

This is the same child who screeched at his fellow soccer teammate that he had “messed up”and allowed the other team to score and brought the boy to tears.

I’m still apologizing for that one.

Fitting the definition of insanity, I kept trying to push him into team sports, thinking it would be good for him. 

One has to learn how to be a team player eventually, right? Right? 

Hmmm, I’m wondering if Bill Gates or Steve Jobs ever played team sports.  

What it boiled down to was that he was not  happy and thus we were not  happy since badgering my child to attend practice over his vocal protests is not the manner in which I wish to spend my afternoons.

But I do think that exposure to sports is important, if just from an exercise and discipline point of view.

So, tennis, anyone?

As Jezebel reports, there was an (informal) survey done in Britain in which basically a bunch of moms admitted they lie about their parenting.

This is supposedly news.

Are you kidding me?

Lying about your parenting skills is practically an Olympic sport.

Nobody is going to admit that they let their kids play the Wii for an  hour while they surfed on the internets so they could have some alone time.  Oh no.  In their version, the computer was never even on, and instead she and her precious offspring sat around a table and discussed the finer points of music theory.

Also, nobody will admit to having a house that needs cleaned.  There is always a good reason why they should be somewhere else, like a park!  Because then the kids can run around in the fresh air! Then no one will be the wiser as to the dishes still sitting in the sink from last night and the toilet that your son cannot seem to aim into properly.  No matter how many Cheerios you try to float in there.

Also, everyone’s child is a fantastic reader.  In fact, their child cannot get enough of books, and they are forced to rip them out of their hands and tell them to go outside and bounce a ball or something.  Because saying your kid would rather make his bed than read means you are a bad, bad mother who doesn’t take education seriously. 

Oh, and of course their marriage is heavenly, and the sex is fantastic, and their finances are in perfect order.  Nobody fights about folding the laundry, has unsatisfying sex, or hides a credit card bill. 

Nobody.

And why is this surprising?  Parents are being constantly judged by others, whether it is a fellow PTA parent or someone in Starbucks who sees your child the one day out of the month when she didn’t nap and threw a tantrum in the store and so you will forever be branded in their mind as a parent who is sorely lacking.  In what, they aren’t quite sure, they just know from the ten minutes of your life they viewed that you don’t have it.  So whenever the context of their parenting (or often their life in general) is able to be controlled, it’s hard for people not to leap at the chance to control it.

I, for one, have a couple of acquaintances who would qualify for at least the silver.