Things I learned from a 3 Year Old

It's been a while since I've taken care of a three year old for more than a few hours at a time. This past weekend was an adventure and I gained some wisdom to pass on to my friends:

Scrapbook glitter, while enhancing the appearance of the sewing machine, screws up its operation considerably.

You must cut up spaghetti O's before you serve them or they instantly become fashion accessories.

The term "time out" must never be used in place of the word "stop" or hysterics will shortly follow.

No matter how awful the three year old is being, if you put her on the naughty chair her two older sisters will look at you like you've just murdered a kitten.

If you put her on the naughty chair, no matter how awful she's behaved, you will feel like you've just murdered a kitten.

The tiny victorian couch in my library that' s too narrow for any adult to sit on comfortably is perfectly sized for a small girl and an old cat to use as a napping spot.

A brass band playing their way through the library will not wake a small girl up. The sound of a lid being removed from a tube of play-doh two rooms away will.


Blogger won't let me post pictures today... so you'll just have to trust me when I tell you I had a really cute one of the above mentioned three year old.

It's A Girl!

It was a girl after all, Brendolyn Jessica Jolene... great big name for a very tiny little lady, just 4 lbs. 12 ozs. But she is lovely, and not even as big as a football! Bren and her Mom are doing fine, despite her diminutive size she has quite lusty lungs and is eating like a mad woman. Off to write my article so I don't get fired from the paper...

Thursday Full of Opportunities

Grandgirls mom called yesterday to put me on notice that the birth of baby #4 was imminent. Supposedly another girl, I hope so, but doctors have been wrong before and no matter how advanced technology gets, I won't believe it until I see it...her. She has asked her sisters, Princess and Bean, to go with her to the delivery room, my job is to take care of Juliette, who is three.

I love her desperately, but I'd have a better chance of surviving by giving birth to #4 myself rather than being left alone with Juliette. She doesn't sleep, she talks non-stop, and if I knew how to trap frenetic energy, I could supply power to my entire neighborhood. Julzy does things like paint the cat with toothpaste. Her middle name is "drama". Lucky for me, Juliette loves being outside mucking in the garden as much as I do. If the rain holds off... I will wear the little darling down jogging between the tired vegetable garden and the mulch pile.

In the event we don't get a baby today, I have just one feature story for the newspaper this week. Computers breaking, cars breaking... this week was too chaotic to get much of anything accomplished.

Later......
This is one of those moments I remember why I never divorce Papa Bear. After a day of hopping like Tigger, endless rounds of "the wheels on the bus", a monster sized temper tantrum over a nap, followed by an equally frantic crying jag because she was not permited to eat the cat's food... Pap arrived to take Juliette (the chatter box) and I out to dinner and then, and this truly makes him my hero, to our house to put her to bed while I stay here in Bean's quiet, tidy apartment. Calgon calls....

A Murder of Crows...A Blizzard of Buzzards

What do you call a flock of buzzards? This picture was taken by my friend Waldo Schmidlpt of an old tree by the cemetery that was just filled with buzzards. An eerie bird at best, but when hanging out in a gang like this, downright spooky!

Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks? Today, I finally learned how to make a link from this blog. A simple thing to most people, but despite instructions, I have the hardest time with html. All those little carrots and slashes and quotation marks drive me crazy. I have new respect for dark daddy, my web designing friend.

Last year, clay guy talked me into taking a pottery making class. It was a logical request, me and Pap love pottery and have a large collection on top of the fact that pottery is our regional product and we actively promote its sale. I'm creative and kind of artsy, I thought I'd love it. I didn't. I hated everything about making pottery from the uncomfortable position you must assume at the wheel to the feel of the clay squooshing between my fingers. I hated having to remove all my rings, I hated that my long fingernails made it almost impossible to smooth things out properly. I quit the class, but, I gained a whole new respect for the potters who make my dishes and art pottery.

While you may be thinking the previous paragraphs were as random a bunch of thoughts as could be, they connect on the level of "things I once took for granted". I used to believe I was pretty smart, then I realized a three year old could stump me in under thirty seconds (smart people should also have answers for the illogical) and I don't know what a flock of buzzards is called. I used to call myself a quick learner, then the internet came along. Things I once presumed were easy, turned out to be hard, hard things turned out to be easy... I have learned that life has very many more dimensions that I had previously believed. That's cool, and it's inspired me to make a list of things I want to do and see before I die. Luckily, I have many, many years to work on this.

Top of the list: I want to tour Scotland, my husband's, families homeland. I want to learn how to use oil paints, train for a marathon, write a play and see it produced, teach my grandgirls how to walk with a book on their head, build a straw wall, raise a chicken, design a new house, learn to ballroom dance, see a financial report for the lottery, watch a concert from the first row, mediate a debate between a minister and a wiccan priestess, visit my girl in Australia... to be continued somewhere else....

Believe in Yourself

Library Lo sent me this picture, it was on one of those funny things people forward to all their friends with cool pictures captioned with something motivational. This one is called, of course, Believe in Yourself.

For years, the Kat that lives in my head has been a svelte size 8, with perfect hair and small feet. The fact that I haven't been a size 8 since Junior High, have seen maybe 4 perfect hair days in 47 years and have average sized feet that are nearly as wide as they are long, makes no difference. I have been known to catch sight of myself in a store window and recognize it as me only because the reflection is wearing the same clothes I am. So I like this picture, because for once the mirror isn't betraying someone, it's reflecting this internal kitty.

I'm not sure when certain of my body parts decided to move south of their assigned places, but evacuate they did. Dressing around the effects of gravity, (pepsi, hohos, ice cream) and five children is an adventure. Especially when your head still thinks you look like the Disco Queen you were in 1979. Most shopping trips include me trotting back to the dressing room with a lovely selection of cropped and spaghetti strapped tops, then slouching back out to fetch the St. John's Bay practical middled aged t-shirts that actually fit me.

Princess and I refuse to believe there is any size larger than extra large. That's the only thing saving me from needing a cattle scale to weigh in, I don't want to disappoint her by moving into the dreaded 1X, so I do apply myself to healthy eating when I'm busting the seams on those XLs.

I've always had bad eating habits. I hate to cook, so whatever is close at hand is what I'll eat. This is complicated by the fact that I have an addictive personality. I eat oatmeal for breakfast every single morning. If Pap fails to replace my oatmeal and I run out, I'll fret for several days and eat nothing. If he goes too long and doesn't replace it, I'll eat whatever is easy: half a jar of chocolate fudge, popcorn, left over cake. We live in a small town with no fast food restraunts, so anytime we went to the city we'd eat at McDonald's. Well now I go to the city two or three times a week and I can't drive past the McD's, I have to stop. I have eaten the same thing there for years (#2 with diet coke). As slovenly and self-indulgent as this all sounds, there is good news regarding my examination of my eating habits. I don't really care if it's healthy food or junk food, to me food is only fuel. I want it fast, I don't want to have to cook it myself, and I lack a goumets palate. I'm happy to eat the same thing every day for months. I just have to figure out three healthy meals and two snacks that I can eat every day until I'm skinny.

Until that skinny day, I don't really bug on my weight. It's just a number. If it weren't for the fact that I feel like lugging around a bunch of extra pounds is the same as playing russion roulette, I wouldn't care at all.