>Baby Blues
>People think my toddler is the major part of my workload, but the truth is, she’s the easy one.
It’s my stepdaughters who keep me busy, what with their soccer practices and their carpools and their play rehearsals and their mercurial appetites and mood swings and their homework questions and their immediate needs to go to the drugstore/bookstore/mall for a new lip gloss/teen novel/ pair of ballet flats. By comparison, Baby is a piece of cake. Play with her for a few minutes at a time, keep her clean and fed and in a dry diaper and she’s good to go.
So I’ve always envied my stay-at-home mom friends who have only one small child. I imagined I’d be living the life of luxury, soap operas and bon bons if I were in their shoes. And I scoffed at their complaints about how much more difficult their lives were now that a baby was in the picture. Ha! I thought. Ha! You don’t even know what work is.
This past weekend, though, I got my comeuppance. The rest of the family left for a three-day soccer tournament and Baby and I were on our own. Oh at first we had fun reading books and playing with the dollhouse and watching Boohbah on the computer and building castles out of wooden blocks.
Two hours later, though, I was ready to move on to something else. Anything else. Was there someone who needed to be picked up? Was it time to start dinner? Did I need to make an emergency grocery run? No, no and no. Shit.
“Play with me!” Baby shouted. “Play Baby games!”
Without my usual excuses I had to comply. I had to comply until I began to itch with irritation during the Kick-the-purple-ball-back-and-forth game and the Pretend-the-refrigerator-magnets-can-talk game and the Read-the-same-book-over-and-over-again game and the Let’s-sing-Old-McDonald-but-Baby-has-to-choose-the-animal-and-will-scream- when-Mommy-tries-to-help game. Oh and a few hundred rounds of the Pull-every-toy-off-the-shelf-and-bring-each-one-into-the-den-in-the-stroller-
so-that-Mommy-can-spend-one-hour-cleaning-it-all-up-later game. That one is my favorite.
For the very first time, I seriously contemplated returning to work.
In desperation, I did the unthinkable. I vacuumed to escape the More-cereal-more-cereal game. And afterward when I got sick of the Bounce-like-a-horsey game, I scrubbed down the sink and countertops. And a little later I put an end to the Tickle-tickle game by Windexing every window in the house. Hell, I even cleaned the toilets after running one too many laps during the Cha-Cha-Monkey-chases-Baby-around-and-around-the-house game.
Today, my home is cleaner than it’s been in months. And for the first time, I’ve realized that having a toddler is a lot of work. I guess I was just too busy to notice it.
>See, I wish I were you, because I don’t clean when Jack gets to be too much, I just go to my computer and virtually plug my ears and say “la la la”.If I cleaned this house would be spotless.
>Wow, I remember all those games. But now they are all but a distant memory of some previous life. Lucky for me I can relive these good times through you!
>damn. Nut is already a handful! I am totally afraid of the twos now!!!
>What you might have been taking for granted is that those demanding teenagers can babysit and entertain baby. THAT helps make her easier. The twos are hard and amazing at the same time, aren’t they. With my second one, I appreciate even more how much fun the twos are. Hard but amazing.
>I have felt your pain.
>Just until baby is old enough to “help” you clean. My 4-year-old absolutely loves to wipe everything down in the house with those Clorox cleaning wipes. She’s also great at dusting and running the Swiffer. 😉
>I’m exhausted reading this b/c I.feel.your.pain!! All those games and noone around to distract Baby with. Well, at least your house is nice and clean.
>Now I keep my kids busy by making them do the chores while I sit on the couch and eat bon bons. OK, so I don’t eat bon bons. I don’t even like bon bons. What’s so special about them anyway. It was nice to wake up Sunday and Zed had already taken out the garbage and the recycling and done the dishes. 🙂 He’s a dear.
>Ohhhhh…. Ireeeemmmmmmbbbberrrthhooosssse gaaaames….I say in a trance…Oh you poor poor woman…I feeeeeeeelll your pain…and a tingle of I survived that…
>Ha – exhausting, aren’t they? I live for naps. Sadly, for two sundays running, she hasn’t taken them! WTF? How am I supposed to survive if she keeps this up? More to the point, how will I survive when she is old enough that she doesn’t take them at all?
>all of those *FUN* games you mentioned…do they have virtual versions? because i am SO wanting to try the “more cereal-more cereal” game.snarf.;)
>I live for the weekends when everyone else is home – or at least home in between sports/jobs/etc – so I can foist the Toddler off onto them for 20 minutes of peace and quiet. If that doesn’t work I grab my neighbour, whose kids are teens and just adores my little girl. That’s good for an hour of free time on a Sunday!
>I have a toddler who will NOT play games. She will NOT play with toys. She just will not. What does she do all day, you query? Drives me insane. Plays with cleaning products. Gets into my purse and calls my church on my cell phone.Eats whatever she can get to, which is normally a bagfull of mini marshmallows.Insists that I put her on Teletubbies and Boobah on the computer, just to play the “click the black X” game. I feel for ya. I really do. And I had already lived through it two times before. But they did things like stick Polly Pocket shoes up their nose, or empty their room of every wordly possession through the open window, or paint their walls with fabric paint, or paint each with fabric paint, or dump the entire container of OxyClean on the floor, just for sh**s and giggles.Wow. Maybe I should go back to work.
>I have from time to time preferred cleaning my house to playing endless toddler games…and I despise cleaning. How sad is that!
>The bun in the oven will help with this. My two keep each other entertained amazingly well.
>Now. You. Feel. My. Pain.So, all I need is stepchildren! Easy peasy.
>this is why I used to go out alot when I was a SAHM. The outdoor elements always entertain.Like Kittenpie said, I’m dreading the no-nap days. SHudder
>The personal fav. game du jour around these parts is turning-everything-into-a-drum & then-scream-like-a-member-of-a-bad-80s-hair-band.It is just delightful.
>Heh. I’m not so sure – I find the one-baby life pretty cruisey.It’s the toddler PLUS baby set that worry me .. trying to bind one child into the car while stomping the other down on the nature strip with a well placed foot so they don’t run onto the road and die.That kind of thing. Hard.
>as the mother of a 21, 15 and 11 year old, i can tell you, my oldest is still the most work. enjoy those toddler years, it may seem like forever, but it will be over in the blink of an eye.and my house is still never clean.
>I was *this close* to seeing if you wanted to meet at the park and let the girls run around. My husband was working this weekend and I was getting tired of the I’ll-hide-in-plain-view-and-ask-you-to-find-me game.Now I know that I would have interrupted your house cleaning.
>You are playin’ my tune, mama. I’m 4 days away from being full-time mommy to two year old “pelo loco” but with Baby B soon to arrive in2-3 weeks. Pretty soon we’ll be in the same playpen, with a newborn and a 2. Aaaarrrggghhhh!!!!!!Can a two year old play safely with a newborn? ha!
>That is the very reason why when people ask if I’m looking forward to my son going to school in two days, I tell them, no I am looking forward to my daughter going to Mother’s Day Out the following week. He’s been my toddler entertainment all summer and this next week is going to be soooo long! HA!By the way, holy crap do you get a lot of comments now or what? LOL
>Your experiencing what alot of parents don’t find out till their children grow up. They don’t get easier as they grow older, they are actually more work, and truly “need” you more, and in a different ways. It gets more complicated, parenting does.All your runs for the teens, is entertaining baby too. Bonding them all together. She’ll feel apart of the ebb and flow. I’ve never regretted having a late in life baby, though her 4 sibs kept me so busy I think I missed alot of one on one time. She toddled at softball games, cheerleading practice,soccer games, slept in the car to and from. Someday this weekend alone with baby will be one of your finest memories.
>Wow, craziness! One toddler is plenty for me to manage, especially this evening while I was trying to prepare his dinner and he was chanting “Mien (noodles), mien, mien, mien, mien, mien . . .”
>It is hard to believe it is so much dang work but it is. Also, even if they are annoying conversations, I suspect your stepdaughters can actually HAVE conversations. That make sense. In a way. That helps too.
>Isn’t it funny the times when we’re ‘alone’ enough in our heads to make us consider major changes?Still, baby sounds awfully cute. 😉
>I don’t necessarily “miss” my kids being toddlers, although when they were toddlers, I have long said that they were ten times easier to deal with than they are now. I miss the older ones playing together and getting along so well, I know that.
>xAh the joys of motherhood!I still can’t wait, though!
>Yup. Sometimes it seems like they can suck the brains right out of you. But this too shall pass, and I will miss it (revisionist historian that I am).
>Trick to that? Letting my 2yo son do the window scrubbing. It’s my You-Scrub-the-Windows-You-Slimed-Up-While-Teasing-The-Dogs-With-Sticky-Fingers game. Just kidding. He’d probably try to drink the Windex. Because blue is such an appetizing color to ingest.Actually now, I’m fighting to avoid tantrums with him when I do clean, because he’s really trying to help me. I’m hoping to word it right now when I say, “no no, hand Mama the super toxic scrubbing bubbles and you can help me carry in groceries later” or something, I do it nicely enough so that when he gets older, maybe I won’t have turned him off to the cleaning.Hey, my 6yo nephew likes to dust. It could happen. They have the shiniest finish on the middle of all their doors (the only place he wipes with the dust cloth).
>OMG. It is so not easy. I was just telling my hubby tonight about how much easier it would be for me to get a job then it is to be a SAHM. Its not really the ohysical work at all its the mental stuff. You have no interaction with adults and just basically feel like your brain is mush after a long day with a 2 year old. I couldnt do it alone for sure cause I would go crazy so I give mad props to single women.
>LOL! I do miss the girls when they’re not here, because I guess I don’t notice how much they do entertain the little ones. Gah…school is starting in 3 weeks. Guess I better get all of my “relaxing” done!