The New Party Circuit

I felt her hand on my shoulder as she saddled up to me. She leaned in and said -  I feel like I'm trolling you but I'm not. It's just that you seem normal and if you ever want to hang out and have a play date here's my card. I took it, laughed. I think I'm normal, I said. She smiled - gotta go.

This is what children's birthday parties are like. 

In our twenties we awkwardly bummed cigarettes and went out for a smoke and now we trail after our kids hoping there will be one or two other normal parents it won't be too awkward to strike up a conversation with.

Knowing each others names is not as important as knowing each others kids. Or at least matching kids to the appropriate parent so as not to seem self-involved, oblivious or worse - racist.

You find yourself thinking things like - I've go to get the name of their face painter. And you hardly blink when the party reaches the inevitable moment where kids start to strip down to their underwear and run around in the sprinklers like drunken 80's rock stars hopped up on lollipops and cake.

You think it's hilarious when the birthday girl's mom slits the throat of the My Little Pony cake decapitating it and you know you've found a kindred spirit when another mom pulls out her phone to snap a picture of it too. The kids gather 'round the pony like ravenous vultures attempting to take a bite - plates be damned.

I eat all the pizza and don't even try to pretend I'm going to feed my daughter broccoli or baby carrots. She's going to subsist on a a lunch of skittles and cake pops and it's too much energy to pretend I'm a better mom than that. I'm not, but that's okay cause most of the other moms aren't either. We're all just getting through it and that's okay.

Eventually you pull it together enough to get your kid to put her clothes back on and manage a gracious exit hopefully sans tears and meltdowns, waving goodbye or slipping business cards until next time.

Adventures in Potty Training

One of the true joys of parenting is getting to watch a person experience things in life for the first time. When those things are ice cream or jumping in puddles, it’s an amazing feeling. But with this great power comes great responsibility - like, you have to actually teach your child to do things that, as an adult, it’s very easy to take for granted – such as eating with a fork or using a toilet.

As with many things in life, I postponed dealing with potty training until I started to feel the societal shame. As her younger cousin declared bowel control victory and the mother of a one-year old asked me what method I was using, I thought maybe it was time I gave this more of an effort than just buying a small potty and hoping she’d figure it out eventually.

Many moms I know sing the praises of the 3-day method. But the idea of letting my kid go commando and locking myself in the house for three days while following her around with a roll of paper towels just didn’t sound all that appealing. I haven’t had to clean up messes like that since my now 11 year-old dog was a puppy and I didn’t really want to start again. Plus, what do you do about your furniture? But even her daycare teacher seemed to think it was worth a shot, so we did a modified version.

FRIDAY NIGHT

I bought new underwear. The smallest Target had were two sizes too big. But I figured the toddler version of granny panties is better than nothing. They were pink, so she was interested. I also cut up a bunch of garbage bags and covered the couch. So basically the same method of furniture protection I used with my dog way back when.  

SATURDAY

My husband was working all weekend so the plan was for me to stay home with our toddler and tackle this seemingly impossible task. Of course, that went out the window immediately as one thing after another kept me out of the house and our daughter in pull-ups.

SUNDAY

With an afternoon birthday party cutting into training time, I decided to try and make the most of the morning. Out came the underwear – a whole stack piled on the coffee table like napkins. I wasn’t wrong in thinking we’d go through them as quickly as napkins at a BBQ serving ribs. Before noon we’d gone through at least 4 pairs, including the moment my daughter came hobbling out of her bedroom carrying a load of poop in saggy granny panties. There was no way I was attempting this outside of the house, especially not at a trampoline themed birthday party, so we switched to pull-ups for the rest of the day.

MONDAY

It’s a three-day weekend and the last day of my self-imposed three-day challenge. I was fully prepared to lie to her teacher if I needed to tomorrow and tell her we were successful so I could cowardly pass her the baton.   But then the most amazing thing happened. An hour had passed since I’d put her in underwear and I realized that unless I wanted to continue the puddle mopping from yesterday I needed to get her on a potty ASAP. So I did the only thing I could think of and bribed her with cookies. She immediately pulled her underwear down, sat on the potty and took a Tom Hanks in A League of Their Own level pee – then asked for her cookie. Half an hour later we repeated this scenario (half a cookie this time).

While she switched back to pull-ups after that, I will take this small victory. And if I am being really honest, I’m surprised to find the joy of watching this tiny person pee in her tiny plastic toilet is kind of right up there with puddle jumping.

Happy New Year!

The holidays are over and I couldn't be happier. This year my family gave the group gift of flu and stomach bugs. No one was spared, but we each went down separately. Nothing better than traveling across the country just to lay in bed for three days wishing you could just be unconscious and fast forward through it all. 

Christmas was a sad sight. It was as if my siblings and I had broken into my parents' house to throw the saddest dinner party ever. My sister, a vegetarian up until a year ago, and myself, who doesn't cook - were in charge of cooking the turkey. While it was eventually edible, half of it was thrown away immediately - still raw after seven hours in the oven. My parents spent the entire day on the couch sleep behind us.

It wasn't all bad though. There were a few moments of brightness. Took my nephew to a farm where he met his first cow and was chased by geese. Had brunch with some friends I hadn't seen in a while. And went to a housewarming holiday party at my best friend from high school's little sister's house. This was a girl we would torture when we were younger - now grown up herself and a home owner. To make it even weirder she bought the childhood home of a high school classmate of mine - one that my group of friends had idolized from afar. He was the mysterious cool kid we always hoped would acknowledge our coolness. He once gave me a copy of a Hole album, that I believe I still own. Apparently, when my friend explored the attic with her little sister they found a box of his old stuff. Issues of Rolling Stone and People from the week Kurt Cobain died, like a time capsule of our youth left behind. Which seems sort of the perfect way to spend the holidays. Going home is always a little bit like that.

But here's to looking forward. Happy New Year and may 2015 be an awesome year.