MOTHER

Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Rebel Without A Cause: My Threenager

The other day I read an article about living with a "Threenager".  Are you living with a threeanger? There were 10 tell tale signs to help you decide.

- Yes, I live in constant fear of cutting up her sandwich the wrong way.  Of giving her the wrong colored cup, the wrong plate or wrong colored utensil.

- Yes, we go through multiple wardrobe changes in one day.   Every morning I dread getting her dressed, will she accept the outfit choice for the day without having a full blown tantrum? I know my desire to dress her warmly in freezing cold weather is baffling to her.  Clearly I make poor outfit choices.   Same goes for shoes, headbands, barrettes, coats, you name it, my pick is WRONG! I do let her have options by the way, the problem is the only acceptable options for her are pjs (the monkey dress pjs to be exact), princess outfits, and her stinky purple shoes.

Who is this tyrant that makes me live in fear? My full of sass, cute as a button three year old who loves nothing more than to cuddle and whom I am completely in love with.  SOME OF THE TIME.  I won´t lie, a lot of the time I want to pull my hair out.  I want to go the bathroom, lock the door and wait until she turns four.

We went thru something similar with my oldest, but not in the same way.  Her rebelliousness was best described as the terrible three´s, as it was a continuation of the terrible two´s.  Tantrums, trying to get her way, wanting to wear the same outfit all day everyday...similar to threenager behavior, but without so much drama and a lot less attitude.  Challenging nonetheless but not as exhausting.  Once she reached four it was smooth sailing (most of the time).  How quickly one forgets, and how quickly you get used to the easiness that comes with them getting older.  For the time being...

Whilst I live through the daily bickering with the little one, my oldest shares knowing looks with me.  Gives in when the threenager targets her, ¨Fiiiiiine, fine, fine....¨ she´ll say in an almost condescending tone and even shakes her head as if she were forty-five instead of five.  It is the comic relief I need, to maintain my sanity, to remember that it WILL get better.  Five, the golden age.

Yes, I have a threenager, a little rebellious person who wants nothing more than to assert her will and negate mine for no reason whatsoever other than to prove that she can.  I remind myself that she needs this phase to test boundaries, to figure out right and wrong, to become a confident independent four year old and angelic five year old.  Mostly I remind myself it is just another phase. Deep breaths, lots of deep breaths, some yelling, some crying (both of us), some guilt for said yelling, for thinking I handled it poorly, for wishing I´d done it better.  And somehow at the end of the day, however it turned out, I always know my threenager is in love with me too, and nothing beats that.  (I know because she follows me to the bathroom and if I lock the door she pounds on it like a 300 lb man til I open it).

Sunday, July 13, 2014

Rainy afternoon...IKEA?

Not sure if this is a european thing, or if it happens in the states too.  Imagine it does, although I wonder because one of my bff´s back home has never been...not once!  I´m a little bit obsessed, I must admit.  IKEA doesn´t just have amazing home furnishings, with simple, beautiful nordic designs.  It also has a play center (Ikea Smaland) where you can drop your kids off while you shop.  There´s also a huge restaurant with a child play area that actually allows you to take a few consecutive bites before having to attend to your kids. 

Having an IKEA 15 minutes away has made us regular visitors on those rainy days when there´s absolutely nothing else to do.  The fact that Emma loves to go and can spend an hour of hard core kid action in the play center, leaving her thoroughly relaxed and ready for bedtime is a bonus.

Although our youngest is not yet old enough to get checked in,  she still enjoys running around the place and stopping at the many play stations they have set up throughout the store.  And because I can never stop decorating (or redecorating) our home, I will never decline a chance to go.  When we woke up one morning recently, and saw the dreadful gloomy day ahead, I immediately thought it would be a perfect day to go, get lunch and spend some time browsing thru their bedding section (I wanted a new duvet cover).  But since I know how much my husband dreads the place (because it´s always beyond crowded, everyone brings their kids and it´s basically a circus) I held back from suggesting it.  However, after 15 minutes of seeing the kids running like tornadoes throughout the house, bored out of their minds,  he asked if maybe it was a good idea.  Casually I responded that I ¨might¨ have some things I needed to get (yes!).  He doesn´t know that I have decided Ikea´s 2014 collection contains items that absolutely belong in our home.

As per usual, once there we immediately realized 90% of our state population had had the same bright idea.  But we went in anyways knowing it would only get worse from there. People with kids, people with screaming babies AND kids, older folks out for a stroll with no intention of buying a single thing being completely oblivious to the flow of traffic, just ¨browsing¨, not moving as you try to maneuver your stroller around them.  But it´s ok, because when I´m here I act as if I don´t have kids and very discretely slip away into their many room areas...leaving the chasing duties to my husband.

In the end, after Emma has played and Kate is covered in ice cream from head to toe, after we´ve waited an obscene amount of time at the checkout line, yes, we come out a little bit stressed... but the kids are exhausted, I´m happy with my new acquisitions and my husband is thrilled we´re finally headed home...to put the kids to bed!  An afternoon well spent.  If you´re like me and visit IKEA regularly you´ll know what I´m talking about, if not...go and have a visit.  Let me know what you think!

x

C

Wednesday, July 6, 2014

Why blog?


Some time ago I heard or read something, somewhere, about blogging.  Nothing that interested me, in the least.  Strangely enough, through my two pregnancies I avidly followed other pregnant women´s journeys on youtube (something I also heard or read somewhere) and yet that had managed to catch my attention.  I think because I saw them live, heard the concern in their voices, the excitement and anticipation of their upcoming motherhood that was so much like my own, I connected to them.  

I admit I never really read a blog, anyone´s blog until very recently and so I really had no basis to write them off entirely.  But just like when you hear a new word or expression, you suddenly see it everywhere....so it was with blogs for me.  A few months ago a friend of mine told me of her new project, she was starting a blog.  Very enthusiastically she told me about her search for finding a personal space, in which to pour her creativity, share her thoughts and perhaps even create something new for herself. She had been following blogs for some time and had seen working moms like herself, dedicating time to blogs that were an outlet for creativity and inspiration.  Some had even created businesses out of them.  Not intentionally,  they had found a niche in which to share ideas, advice, just about anything they wanted and people were paying attention.  

Interestingly enough, I was just starting a ¨project¨ myself,  a children´s clothing store online. I was curious and began to investigate, reading a few here and there, suddenly realizing it was a whole other world I had not been privy to. The more I read the more out of touch I felt.  I suddenly felt like I needed to write as well...(warning, cliche ahead) a need to be heard?  I imagine this comes from raising two kids under the age of 5, you crave creativity - the adult kind!  I realized I needed time to share my thoughts, express ideas, if even just for myself, at the very least it might be therapeutic. So here it is, welcome to my blog...stay tuned, more to come!

x

C