School Daze

Tomorrow is Kamryn's first day of "real" school.  I call it "real" school because I don't have to pay for it anymore.  We have been anticipating the first day of school for months.  Kamryn is technically old enough to go to kindergarten this year since the cutoff in CA right now is in December.  However, instead of sending a 17 year old off to college in 13 years (yes, this was ultimately the deciding factor), we are opting to enroll her in a pre-K program specifically designed for kids born between the dates of June 1 and December 1.  It's basically 1/2 day kindergarten.

The purpose of this post, however, is not to tell you how great this program is, but to share how amazingly unprepared I am for tomorrow despite our eagerness for this day to come.

Yesterday, we spent the entire day with friends at a splash park.  The weather was great, the kids were having a blast and I thought playing on our final days of summer was more important than gathering our school supplies.

Last night I got a recorded message from Kamryn's teacher, Mrs. Moffat.  This is the first communication we have had with her teacher and also how we found out who her teacher actually is.  I don't know how knowing this information any sooner would have benefited me or Kamryn, but it just seemed odd not knowing until 2 days before I was expected to leave my child with her.  Regardless, I absolutely love her name.  Kamryn heard the message and she thinks she sounds "nice".  I agree and then I thought how funny it would be to be a teacher and leave a message in a really gruff voice.  I guess it's good I didn't get into the College of Education when I applied.

I have also been a bit negligent in getting my 12 hour a night sleeper to accept the fact that she needs to get up early.  We did go out and buy a brand new Hello Kitty alarm clock but it's the old school kind that actually rings and guess who got the sh*t scared out of her when it went off the following morning?  I'm not surprised, I heard it go off, clear as a bell (pun intended) in the kitchen with Kamryn's door closed.  Kamryn proceeded to tell me that she didn't think she was going to turn the alarm on anymore.  Kamryn needs to be in line to go in the school at 7:55.  Right now, it's 9:08 and this is what she looks like:

Clothes on?  No
Hair brushed?  No
Teeth brushed?  No
Nevermind the fact that she was still sleeping soundly when we probably should be walking out the door for school.  Mrs. Moffat said we should plan on walking to school because the parking lot will be full.  WHAT?!  It's only about 1/2 mile away, but this would imply that I will have my ducks in a row and be able to wake my child, feed, dress, and brush her in a reasonable amount of time.  Not to mention Rory - I think Kamryn's classmates will get a good look at Rory's pajama wardrobe over the next few months.  This is where being a stay at home mom is going to bite me in the ass.  If I worked and had to take the kids to a daycare, getting my child to school on time wouldn't evoke such anxiety.

Tomorrow will come soon enough and I'm just hoping that I have enough time to take a couple of pictures of my little school girl because I have a super cool craft in mind!!

Seriously?

Last night Kamryn got into a bit of trouble right before bed.  She pushed her brother off the ottoman and while I don't think she was trying to hurt him, but was a little overly excited, I told her she needed to apologize to him.  After some screaming, shouting and a fairly valid attempt at locking me out of her room, things settled down and all seemed back to normal.

However, this morning, I think Kamryn was seeking revenge on her disciplinarian.  She appeared to be the sweet little girl that she usually is, but then she pulled out the big guns.  Passive aggressive insults.  Now, I'm not a moron, I know that my nearly 5 year old wasn't plotting out ways to crush my self esteem, but if she realizes how close she could have come to actually doing it, I am in for a world of hurt for when those teenage years hit.

Her first jab started off by asking me if I would like some water.  I told her I was going to have another cup of coffee instead and she put one hand on her hip and said "Well, aren't you going to work out today?"  For the record, I work out every other day and I ran yesterday.  I told her I wasn't going to work out and she replied with a hugely judgmental "Oh."

I brushed it off and went on with my morning duties.  It was a bit chilly this morning so I put on some leggings and a longer shirt instead of my typical shorts and tank top combo.  The minute I stepped in the living room, Kamryn got this really excited look on her face and said "Oh, Mommy, you look pregnant!"  Seriously?  Pregnant?  Kamryn is really into babies lately.  She loves that her friends have infant siblings that she gets to hold.  I also know she would love it if Rory was still a baby or if I had another baby, but neither of those things are going to happen.

I just paused to take a couple of pictures of what I have on today to prove that I do not appear to be "with child" and as it turns out, Kamryn was right.  This is a hugely unflattering outfit I have on.  Normally, I wouldn't care, but this is so bad that I think I may get asked by strangers when the baby is due.

The last straw was while I was sweeping off the deck.  The kids wanted to play with a slide that has been in the storage closet since we moved and I finally cleaned off enough space for them to play with it.  The detergent bottle had dripped down the front so I was cleaning it off when Kamryn said "You do such a good job cleaning.  I wish you could clean everyday!" 

So to summarize, I'm lazy, look like I'm eating for two, and don't keep a clean household. 

Didn't ask for a dime. Two dollars.

I got the crafting bug and I got it bad!  It all started with those Hershey Kiss Roses.  I am so damn proud of them that I keep upping my ante.  Consequently, I have been spending a lot of time on crafting websites.  First off, there are a lot of really talented and creative people out there.  I am not one of them, but I can steal an idea like nobody’s business.  I don’t really steal it, though.  I’ll give credit where credit is due.  Another reason I’m not actually stealing ideas is because I could never replicate the original so I have to improvise in accordance with my skill level.

Here is the latest in my creations:

There isn’t anything difficult about this.  If you have Excel and know how to copy and paste, you can do it.  And actually, the whole issue of crafting has nothing to do with this post other than finding printable money on Tip Junkie today and it giving me the idea to do it.

Yesterday Ryan and I were discussing buying Kamryn a new bike.  I don’t like to just go out and buy toys for the kids.  I think every kid should have a bike, but I feel that it’s too big of an item to go out and buy on a whim so I’m making Kamryn buy it herself with the above chart.

I printed out the money and made up some things that I would like Kamryn to work on.  Those are listed in the “Rewards” column.  The “Consequences” column contains all the things that annoy me on a daily basis. 

I sat her down and we reviewed both columns and how much she could earn or lose if she did them.  Before I was even half way through the Rewards column, I could see the gears starting to turn.  Kamryn, my darling daughter, has been a manipulator since she was about 18 months.  She would stand at the top of the stairs and yell “Me, hug!”  She used to call me, “Me” as in Mommy.  Anyway, that meant she wanted me to go back up to the top of the stairs and give her a hug so she could latch on to my neck like a spider monkey and I would inevitably carry her down the steps so she wouldn’t have to walk.  Of course I wasn’t going to deny my only child a hug and she knew that. 

Kamryn thought that cleaning her room was going to be “really hard”, that “being sassy was in her brain” and she “really was tired a lot”.  I told her that is why we were doing the chart so we could work on them together.  She more or less agreed to my plan and actually earned $2.00 by picking up her puzzle.  Within the hour, she not only lost her $2.00, but now owes me an additional $2.00 for excessive whining about the turkey burgers I made for dinner.

The challenge is on to see who will break first.  Will it be Kamryn who gets so far in the red that she doesn’t see the point of even trying to dig herself out?  Or will it be me who gets sick of trying to keep track of what she actually owes me?  The actual cost of the bike is about $70, but I was going to make her earn $100 to make it a little more challenging.  I thought if she worked for something for a month, it would give her enough appreciation.  However, at this rate, she'll be asking for a car instead of a bike.

Do Want to Step Outside Little Girl?

There is something that happens when you have children, at least for me.  You want to protect every little fiber of their being from absolutely everything and anything that could harm or hurt them.  I swore I would not be one of those helicopter moms that wouldn't let their child out of arm's reach and I think I have held true to that - at least since my kids have gotten older.  Kamryn does pretty well when it comes to other kids acting out or playing rough.  If she really doesn't like a situation, she just walks away and does something else.  However, if another kid hurts her feelings, she loses it.  And not just a little, but really loses it; hysterical crying with continuing sobs that last far longer than the actual incident.

Today we went to the park and Kamryn took one of her stuffed dogs that she named Snow White.  This little dog isn't particularly special and she doesn't really play with it all that much, but today, Snow White was going to the park.  Once we got there, Kamryn and Rory took turns throwing Snow White down the slide and off the side of the play structure.  All was good.  I was quietly watching How To Mod Podge videos on my phone because I am now a crazy-ass crafter.  About half way through the instruction of how to avoid bubbles on your Mod Podge projects, I hear a little girl, not my own, scream, "THAT'S NOT HIS NAME!"

I immediately hit pause and walked towards the ruckus.  Then I saw Kamryn standing next to the slide with a glare on her face that gave even me a slight chill.  A split second later that glare gave way to a quivering lower lip and tears welling up in her eyes.  Trying to maintain my mantra of "Thou shall not overbear", I stood and let her come to me.  By the time she got to me she was in full blown freak out mode.  I knew she hadn't been hurt, at least physically, because then Kamryn would have been the one screaming "WE DON'T HIT!"  She doesn't put up with that shit, but she was clearly very upset.

I asked her what happened and she wailed "That girl said my puppy isn't named Snow White!"  I know that it wasn't what the little girl said to Kamryn that got her so upset, it was how she said it.  I now understood what the previous yelling was all about and I was pissed.  First of all, the little girl's mom was sitting right next to the play structure.  She had to have heard her little demon seed yelling because I heard it and I was a good 50 feet further away and engrossed in Mod Podge videos!  But yet, she did nothing to find out why her daughter was yelling at the top of her lungs at another little girl.  Second, when Kamryn walked over to me in hysterics, she walked right past the mother of Tiny Terror and that still didn't get Mom to get off her ass and see what was up.

This is when I turn my bitch dial to 10.  All it would have taken is for the mother to ask if Kamryn was OK to which I would have replied, "Yes, she's fine." and given a nice smile for the consideration.  She didn't even look my way.  So now I have to be the bad one.  I told Kamryn that it didn't matter what that little girl said and that she was probably only 3 so she didn't know anything.  Kamryn was undeterred in her fit and screamed "She hurt my feelings!"  And my heart broke.  I knew her feelings were hurt before, but when she said it, I wanted to go over and punch that little girl in the face!  Not really - I mean, I would never actually punch a kid, but I'm trying to make a point.  I stooped one more level and said, loud enough to ensure I was in Oblivious Mommy's earshot, "I know she hurt your feelings, but she isn't your friend and she'll never be your friend because you only have nice, caring, cute friends."  Ugh...what is wrong with me????

What made this a little bit worse was that I thought I would get a little smile out of Kamryn when I said it.  Instead, she just sniffed and nodded her head in agreement.  FAIL!  I am really trying to work on this, but truth be known, I don't think I'll ever be able to sit idly by when I see one of my children so visibly upset.  This is where I wish Kamryn was more like me.  For those that know me well, you know I really don't care what other people think of me.  I don't aim to be disliked, but if you don't like me, c'est la vie.  I took Spanish in high school and I'm pretty sure c'est la vie means "F*ck You!"

Snow White