Cracking Up: Baby fat I adore

as published at www.ocregister.com on May 23, 2012:

There are some things sisters just shouldn't share: toothbrushes, boyfriends, mood swings … But my two daughters have found the joy in sharing the one thing sisters should: clothes! The problem is, one sister's 4, and the other 11.


"Mom, why is Gracie wearing my shirt?" our oldest Alex asked on St. Patrick's Day, when little Gracie came down dressed for preschool in a sparkly green top.


"You put that shirt in your 'too small' pile," I said.


"Yeah, but I wore it in fifth grade! What size is she?"


And a double check revealed that indeed, my 4-year-old should most appropriately be shopping at Forever 21.


Meet Gracie: the baby of our family, and our Amazon woman. The sensitive would term her "long torsoed." Her brothers prefer the nicknames "Juicy," "Jelly" and "Bacon." They're still in time-out for that one. But our little marshmallow is the mascot of our family.


Gracie is hands-down the most loving child you'll ever meet. She's all about jumping on your neck and giving you a squeeze. But somewhere in that long torso, she's packing lead. Unsuspecting relatives frequently emit a guttural "Ughhhhh" when she leaps into their lap. But no one gives better hugs, so she's worth the deadlegs...

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Cracking Up: Baby fat I adore - OC Moms - The Orange County Register

Does Life Get Any Better Than This?

The perfect combo: a McDonald's ice cream cone and a nap...
Pardon the blur, but we caught her actually dozing off mid-lick:

And gone.


And if that doesn't do it for "the perfect nap", there's always those holes in the sand...until the tide comes in.

Bigger than I Thought

Well sheez. Another mother of the year moment today fer sure.

Today when I picked up the youngers at St. Andrew's, I was busy noticing Gracie's lovely purple marker "eye shadow" (hey, her shirt was purple so at least she got an "A" for color coordination)! Then a new teacher there came up to me and said, "She's doing so good going potty! She went twice today all by herself!"

Huh?

"I haven't potty trained her yet," I said. But the new assistant teacher (busy shrugging at this point) apparently did. Awesome. I think that constitutes a bonus or something in next month's tuition?

A potty-training preschool. Now there's a lucrative business plan.

I'm a Big Kid Now

Do two-year-olds really need to go to the dentist? My recent read of "Freakonomics" has brought to light the altered marketing "realities" of our capitalist economy that encourage my better sense to answer this question with a big, fat NO.

Which I kept in mind when the hygienist at a new peds dental office today looked at me like I was Kate Gosselin when I told her that just my three oldest kids would be having appointments.

But after watching the big kids do x-rays and teeth counts and cotton candy "vitaboosts" (while mommy filled out 42 pages of paperwork), Gracie was NOT leaving until she got her turn to watch Nemo with the Strawberry Shortcake shades in the magic chair. Watching her open her cute little mouth so proudly made me forget that pull-ups don't really belong in the magic chair. Oh, she was so cute.

Next thing I know, she'll be at the orthodontist...

Has Anyone Seen Gracie?

This question never ends well...

But today it ended pretty funny. Meet Gracie's new obsession: my make up drawer.

What Not to Do at the Movies...

Who'd a thunk a Miley Cyrus movie would be such a tear jerker? I guess I should have caught a hint with that sneaky little title, "The Last Song."

Yesterday, I learned this and other lessons--like don't walk in halfway through a Nicholas Sparks adaptation when one of the main characters is saying sayanora--and sit in front of a sniffling grandma when you have four kids under seven with you.

My friend Sam and I took our combined Spring Break groupies to the Krik for movie thirty since it was a shivering 60 degrees here--brrr. She drew the "older girls tween drama," while I got to enjoy boogers and flarts with the boys and Gracie in "Diary of a Wimpy Kid." (You read the book, you see the movie in our household.) Not really sure which mom won as she left with tear stains, while I left slightly nauseous.

Our movie ended 45 minutes earlier, so we thought we'd catch Miley's grand finale. But I brought the ONLY boys and toddlers into this chick-packed theatre at the very worst moment. Sniff, sniff is the only spoiler you'll get. Suddenly, Gracie wanted to leave. The boys didn't. Gracie needed to run. The boys didn't. Gracie was going to get some popcorn to quiet her silly self down so people could cry in peace. So I left the boys with all those ladies and created another stir with our re-entry and popcorn dispersal. The grandma behind me was ready to kick my chair but I thought it was kind of nice how Gracie provided a much needed release from all that sniffling.

Today, we went to Chuck-E-Cheese.

Breakfast of Champions

Alex used to get Mickey Mouse shaped pancakes. Gavin got pancakes. Blake gets...cake. But when it comes to breakfast, if Gracie gets it at all, it comes in a shiny wrapper and on the go. And later that afternoon, it's available for seconds for anyone willing to burrow through the undercarriage of her car seat.

Poor fourth children. Their morning meal only happens if they can both open and feed it to themselves while their moms simultaneously fix their hair, brush their teeth, and put on their shoes.

Naturally, I take the health of my children very seriously. Luckily, so does Nutrigrain.

What Comes After 6?

Today I went to lunch with a friend, who offered to share her babysitter with my two kids. As a given, I was running late. So when I dropped my kids off at her house, my friend had already left. But her sitter was there--and she didn't speak a lick of English.

At this point, I needed an adult lunch date more than I needed to communicate that my kids had already eaten and had no allergies. So trusting in my friend's trust of the girl, I turned to go. And then I remembered--the diaper. I had none. And Gracie had had her necessary dose of morning Miralax. She just may need a diaper. So I faced the sitter and used my best sign language-Spanglish to infer that if Gracie needed it, maybe she could borrow one of my friend's kids' diapers?

As I drove off, I laughed at the thought. Gracie is, well...lovably large. Like never measured on the charts large. She has actually outgrown size six diapers, but Huggies and Pampers don't offer size 7. And yeah, I would potty train her but she's kind of got that awkward clumsiness you'd expect of an overly large 2 1/2 year old. I just can't see her gracefully making her way onto a toilet. The two little featherweight daughters of my friend could both fit into Gracie's left thigh, so I knew nothing bigger than a size 4 was in their house. Oops!

When I returned two hours later, Gracie was running around in a swim diaper. And the sitter just gave me a universal sign all caretakers of children understand...a helpless shrug.

Gracie's Fun New Game

Besides hiding herself all around town, waiting for us or the "bad duys" to chase and find her, my two-year-old Gracie has discovered a new version of Hide and Seek that is just SUPER. Yep, just about every time we're already late somewhere, she plays "Turn the volume all the way down on Mommy's cell phone and HIDE IT somewhere she will never find it!"

So today when a realtor walked in to show a client our house and I popped out from behind the couch, desperate Seeker sweat pouring down my face and with the house phone to my ear, I don't think it helped the cause. The realtor started to introduce herself, but I broke in,

"Wait. Do you hear anything? Do you hear a phone?"

I shimmied around on the floor, calling myself on the phone and trying to make out any vibration sound from under the couch cushions. Always selling, the realtor helped me, moving to various areas of the house to listen. She didn't sell our house today, but I sold crazy.

I'm learning it's only four-year-old Blake who can help in such times. He's dialed in to the toddler mind, and predicts Gracie's plots from his own past experience. Two days ago, he found my cell in the back of Michael's closet, underneath a pair of his shoes. Today, we finally found it buried in cords in the office. Blake's wallet is expanding, as the rewards pour in.

I wish I could program Gracie to outgrow this fun new game. Is there an app for that?

If Found, Please Dial...

I think it's oddly disturbing that my precious little two-year-old has been lost and found twice in the past 48 hours--once in the church parking lot and once in the dollar store.

But apparently, that wasn't as oddly disturbing to today's Disneyland clientele as the fact that I put these stickers on my toddlers' backs. Because the strange looks and questions I got today from mouse-eared humans gaping at my save-me stickers placed me in the same demographic as moms who leash.

(*Note: No parent of an actual toddler gave me any grief whatsoever.)

If she shows up at your door tomorrow, please, please call me.

Swiper Progresses

We left a friend's house and I did my usual pat-down of the kids to see what souvenirs they intended to bring home. As I took a foreign bracelet off of Gracie, Blake looked at me and proudly beamed,

"Mommy, I didn't steal anything today!"

Little Miss Messy Face

What happens when you give a two-year-old an ice cream sandwich in the car--to keep her awake during a napless afternoon carpool run so she'll actually go to bed that night?

It worked!

Oh, this little one cracks us up. She ALWAYS has a messy face--even during her bath. There are so many things about her that we just love.

Last night, Gracie took a turn saying an evening prayer. As she mumbled her sweet little words, "fanks for bwessings...have nice day...fanks for De-sus...have nice day--" Blake broke in with a heavy sigh and said, "I just can't take it anymore!"

We all turned to him. He met our bewildered eyes with a smile and exclaimed, "She's just so cute!"

How She Gets Away With It

Today at church, after chasing Gracie into the far back of the gym FIVE TIMES during the main meeting, Michael finally took her out into the hall. Once there, he asked, "Gracie, are you being naughty or nice?"

She smiled back and said, "I'm being cute."

Found!

She's back! Our sweet Gracie's back... The snot is gone (literally) and today we found our little love happier and healthier. She's still two-year-old Gracie, and sneak out of the house Gracie, and diva-in-training Gracie, but no major fits today.

Instead, she kissed my toe after dropping a phone on it. She said, "Be careful, Bwakey" as he slid down the stairs. She said, "Mommy, I'm pwoud of you" after she heard me tell Gavin I was proud of him. She may have also drawn on the tile floor and the couch with a marker and climbed into the sink, into the driver's seat of my friend's car, and almost out of her crib, but those things are a lot "cuter" when she does them with a smile.

What do you get...

when you cross a two-year-old with a horrible cold and a high school basketball game?

"But mom, what do you expect after a thrilling day of emptying albuterol tubes all over the couch, escaping from the car, the park, IHOP's "Free Pancake" event, and our house--twice, and me biting, clawing, and hitting you when you tried to carry me up the stairs for my nap?"

Oh, has anyone seen my sweet little precious Gracie? Offering a major reward...

Little White Lies

As parents, we all know there are "kind of okay" times to fudge and blur the truth just a little: "Nope, your school doesn't let you wear shoes with characters on them," and "When you grow up, you can be anything you want to be!"

Well, confession: today, I was less than scrupulous at a preschool field trip to Legoland. I was already frustrated with this shiny little plastic park-- it's bright, Legorific attractions make one think it's family friendly, yet by the day's end, every mother I was with had come to the same conclusion that NO ONE on the Legoland design and engineering team is a parent, because who designs a theme park where every single ride requires the improbable ratio of one adult over 48" yet less than 170 lbs. combined with their one and only ride partner kid? This ain't Noah's ark, people. Families often come with more than two passengers.

Anyways, my odd combo of one mom plus two kids had eliminated us from the probability of riding most of the rides, but our grand finale attraction of "driving the cars" had gotten the kids excited. Only when we got there, the sign said riders must be between 3-5 years. While Gracie is tall enough to pass for a kindergartner, she's barely 2 1/2. So while waiting in the cars line, Gracie suddenly had a third birthday... "Three, Gracie, say 'I'm three'." We practiced Gracie's new age all the way through the line, complete with a "hold up three fingers" rehearsal. A typically rule-abiding citizen, I was feeling pretty guilty, but Gracie put me in my place. When the line guy asked Gracie how old she was, she held up one chubby little finger and exclaimed, "One!"

So, did she get on anyway?

Yep, she did. And the guilt seeped in even more as I watched the poor line guy chase her around the track all hunched over for two full minutes of damage control as she played brutal bumper cars with every other driver who really was old enough to steer and press the gas pedal on their own. I think I owe someone a chiropractor.

Saint Blake

Although adorable little Blake is our kid who has by far thrown the wildest fits, granted us the most sleepless nights, and slugged more family members than Mike Tyson, one of his many endearing qualities is this: he's a Jesus lover.

The revival started last summer when I put him in a Vacation Bible School camp at a local church. It wasn't our church, but hey--it was $35 for 15 hours of crafts, snacks, and summer time praise, so I gladly took advantage of their hospitality.

I expected Blake to display his usual trepidation with new experiences upon initial drop-off, but I didn't expect the conniption fit he threw on the floor when I snuck out during singing time. He was truly speaking in tongues.

But when I picked him up, Blake had seen the light. The next week (and for three months afterwards until we "misplaced" the CD), he insisted on listening to his take-home souvenir of Christian kids' rock constantly at FULL volume. He would dance around the house singing to tunes that still course through my head: "I will nooooot be afraid..."

Since then, our very angelic little boy has been a medium for higher powers as he frequently begins sentences with the words "God gave me a thought..." That "thought" ranges anywhere from "I really should clean my own room" to "I really should have a few more pieces of candy." We're just glad he's our messenger from above.

Today Blake was playing downstairs with Gracie and her little friend when I heard these words angrily spew out of his mouth: "You guys are trying to be like you--BABIES--but I'm trying to be like Jesus!!!"

After I spoke to him about the tone of voice Jesus would most likely use to "motivate" baby girls into proper play date behavior, Blake considered this for a moment, then said, "Mommy, God gave me a thought...you know why I want to be like Jesus? Because when I grow up, I really want to be one of Santa's elves."

Love that boy!

A Long Way Down

How cute are these girls? The cutest ever. They love each other so much and always greet each other with a big hug. They (along with Blake, who was sick today) go to St. Andrew's Mother's Day Out every Tuesday together. They (or I) carry those big red buckets down a long set of stairs and into their cute little classroom. Today I took them, and they were so happy to go. Sooo cute.

See these boots? How cute are they? Michael picked them out for me for Christmas all by himself--with the help of a photo I might have taken of them on my phone while in Steve Madden, then perhaps emailed him with a gentle suggestion: "Buy me these for Christmas." Doesn't he have great taste? What a cute husband.

See these stairs? These long, long stairs? Not so cute. These are the long, long stairs I get to walk those two cute girls with their two cute buckets down on Tuesday mornings. But those two cute girls insist on walking themselves--so we make a very slow trek. I try hard to steer my laid back Gracie along with gentle "Hurry ups," and sometimes we get in a little struggle over who should hold the big red buckets as we hold up the other 24 mothers with their toddlers and red buckets who are waiting behind for our cattle drive to proceed down. But always my biggest concern is that the girls will fall down these long, long cement stairs with the big red buckets and get hurt. That's always worry numero uno. So much so that today as I was turning back to gently "Hurry up" Gracie down, those cute boots Michael picked out for me that were on my feet kind of got ahead of themselves and not cute little Gracie or cute little Sadie, but ME--I went stumbling down six stairs, tangled in buckets and boots, and landed on my knees on the hard cement while cute little Gracie and cute little Sadie and four other mothers and six other toddlers watched in shock. Ta-da!

Two-Year-Olds

Oh, ya gotta love those school parties. The school board/state laws/principal claim only 20 classroom minutes may be allocated to celebrating any version of dead saints, presidents, or poultry throughout the year, but these parties send home enough gift bags of crap to cover my entire kitchen counter in dollar store clutter for a week.

Of course, the one item Gracie wanted out of first grader Gavin's ten pounds of Valentine's colored sugar happened to be the one item he also wanted: the last pixy stick. I ignored his first three protests of, "Mom, Gracie's taking my pixy stick! Mommy, Gracie's opening my pixy stick! MOMMY! Gracie's eating my pixy stick!" But when he escalated into a sugar-high-pitched whine, I looked up from the Twix bar of his I was breaking into.

We both watched as Gracie, two (yet peculiarly large and strong for her age), climbed onto the counter and into the kitchen sink to get away from him. He was blocked by a strategically placed barstool, and he teared up as Gracie giggled and tipped his pixy stick up and emptied the last of the pink sugar into her mouth... bottoms up...gone.

Gavin was speechless, then turned to me and muttered, "It's like she has no conscience."