First of the Lasts

Yesterday, for the first time, the realization that she is leaving friends that she has known since infancy behind for new adventure. With reassurances that since their mama’s were friends, they would of course still see each other, her panic was short lived.

For me, it was one long, ongoing battle. There was lots of tears.

Today is the first of the lasts.

I have drove to work with two children in my car for the last time.

*****

I entered with her for the last time.

I unpacked her for the last time.

I signed her in for the last time.

I asked for my push out the door for the last time.

*****

I packed her up for the last time.

I collected her things for the last time.

I signed her out for the last time.

I exited with her for the last time.

*****

I left work with two children in my car for the last time.

Upon her departure there were heartfelt hugs and gifts. A box covered with glitter and filled with love. Drawings, messages, feelings. When we got home, she carefully went through the box picture by picture, giving each a hug and declarations of friendship.

The countdown calendar still says three days until her starts her new school. I think we planned it wrong. I think today should have said zero yesterday. To me, that was the benchmark. The Last.

The last picture of Grace with her class

The Potty Trained Princess

Lately, Grace’s whole world has revolved around princesses.

In her world, princesses are the ultimate super hero. They dance and twirl and fly, always help those in need. Oh, and the best thing about being a princess? The clothes.

A few months ago, I found a cache of princess dresses and they became out potty training prizes. You peed in the potty? Pick a prize! What will it be? A dress, a wand, some sparkly shoes??

I don’t know if the dresses have really had anything to do with it (she had announced to me that she would no longer need diapers when she went to her new school ages ago), but Grace has been potty-trained for 2 full weeks now.

The feat required one more dress, the one dress that is missing from her extensive collection. The Princess and the Frog Tiana costume. And through the wonder that is the internet, we were gifted* a dress for her final reward from Wholesale Halloween Costumes.

It fit the bill perfectly. Twirly, girly and sparkly. It was everything I had hoped for and more than what Grace expected. She celebrated by watching the movie while wearing the costume.

And then, sly as a fox, edged over to ask what else she could to do earn more princess costumes.

Just keep smiling like this kiddo.

* Wholesalehalloweencostumes.com sent us the Princess and The Frog Tiana dress in exchange for the inclusion of the links you see above. Thank you!

Capitol Fourth

When we do something, we do it big time.
(Sometimes I wonder if it is a fundamental fault of ours.)

Day trips turn into overnights with us all the time.

We live close enough to Washington, DC, to take advantage of the city semi-regularly. However, we live just far enough away from it to make it a pain in the ass to get to. When my work put out an all call memo a few weeks ago asking for volunteers to walk with our float in the DC Forth of July parade, I submitted my name. I never expected to be selected.

When I was, it turned into an all out adventure.

This was our day:



9:30 am: Start the trek to Washington, DC

9:45 am: Get a flat tire

9:50 am: Fix flat tire (*totally wanted to take pictures, but I knew that was a bad idea)

9:57 am: Drive to gas station to put air in the spare tire

10:15 am: Leave gas station, but realize that there is no way get there by 11am

10:50 am: Call parade organizer and announce late arrival

  

What says "America" more than an

inflatable Uncle Sam?

11:20 am: Arrive at parade

11:45 am: Walk in parade

12:00 pm: Wave at family as I pass by

 

I love the Where's Waldo quality of the picture.
Can you find my family?



12:30 pm: Find family in crowd 

 

Watching the parade march past.
My favorite? The gay cowboys.

1:15 pm: Load hungry, tired, pissed off children into the car

1:45 pm: Arrive at hotel

2:15 pm: Try to make tired, pissed off children take a nap

2:45 pm: Abandon the nap and go swimming instead

3:30 pm: Give the nap one more try

3:50 pm: Clare falls asleep, Grace goes with Matt to buy much needed wine

4:45 pm: Matt returns with wine and we drink ½ the bottle in 10 minutes

5:15 pm: We head to dinner

6:00 pm: We settle on 4th of July sushi and shumai

6:15 pm: Our children start fighting over chop sticks in a fairly not-child-friendly atmosphere

7:00 pm: We leave the restaurant leaving a wake of dumpling scraps and melting ice cubes

7:05 pm: It starts to drizzle

7:30 pm: We decide we’ve made it this far- if we get wet, we get wet- but we are going to watch the fireworks damn-it

9:00 pm: It never does rain more than a pleasant drizzle and over-tired meltdowns are kept to a minimum with a constant stream of ice cream, angel food cake and strawberries

9:15 pm: The fireworks start and the world comes to a standstill



The spectacular view from our hillside perch

9:35 pm: We load the girls back into the stroller

9:40 pm: They are both sound asleep

10:00 pm: We are all sound asleep

Happy Feet

I have a dent in my forehead.

It's only noticeable when I raise my eyebrows, and if I'm raising my eyebrows at you there is probably too much going on to notice an imperfection in my scull. I received it as a consolidation prize for walking / falling into the corner of the dishwasher when I was 3 years old. Shortly after that incident my mom signed me up for dance classes.

I will admit those classes served me well. I am a klutz to the extreme. I tend to look down when I'm walking to avoid tripping. The 10 years of tap-jazz-ballet-pointe, has spared me from a lot of injury that could have been much, much worse.

******
Case in point:

Clare's new hobby is throwing my cookbooks on the floor.

I will admit they are very colorful, ideally located at toddler height and ripe for tossing, so I can't really blame her. On Sunday night, I didn't immediately clean up her thrown book pile. I let it sit until after dinner. Grace was playing on the floor and I was carrying Clare down the single step to our slightly sunken family room. The books lay in our path just on the other side of that step. I was looking down at them. Grace called my name, and suddenly I was no longer looking down at them.

And I stepped on a banana peel book. One foot in motion on the sunken, wooden floored book and one foot stationary on the tile above. While holding a writhing 20lb child.

Was my thunk loud? Yes.
Am I injured? Yes.
Did I have enough grace not to drop the baby? YES!

******
And that, combined with her incessent begging lately, is the reason why Gracie will also be starting to dance classes on Tuesday.

The class is 20 minutes of tap, followed by 20 minutes of ballet, followed by 15 minutes of creative movement where I assume they just let the kids run around in circles and do the alligator on the floor. Her shoes came yesterday. A full test run was required.

Fully outfitted in tights, leotard and ballet slippers, she jumped into her daddy's arms for an impromptu Swan Lake-esque lift.

She then asked me how she actually does ballet, and I showed my little girl how to put her arms and feet into first and second position, complete with pliés.

Ahhhhh.

OK, maybe her enrollment in these classes are as much for me as they are her.

Daddy-Daughter

Everyone has things from their childhood that they can’t or won’t let go of. (Right?)

One of mine was the Daddy-Daughter Dance. I was in 4th or 5th grade and I desperately wanted to go. I remember begging my dad nonstop to take me.  He wouldn’t even consider it. He didn’t dance and had no interest in going. He had no interest in going with me.

For weeks it was all anyone talked about at school. I withdrew (even further) from the conversations and into myself those weeks to avoid being asked why I wasn’t going. What would I tell them? The day of the dance I cried in my room. He sat in his favorite chair and watched TV.

My mom loves to tell me how much Matt reminds her of my father sometimes. I vehemently disagree with that statement and it drives a wedge even further between us every time she says it.

This past Saturday, Matt took Grace to our local carnival on one of their frequent ‘dates’.

They rode rides, ate snacks and played games. Gracie almost won a ham and a goldfish. (Neither one would have lasted long in our house.) Matt’s superior college dart skills paid off and he won her princess posters. They rode and snuggled and had the kind of love filled experience Grace has come to expect from him.

And I know Matt will always be the first one in line to dance with his little girl.

Mama Knows Best

On Thursday grace found her umbrella that had been missing in action for awhile.

She was thrilled, but was harbored by my warning: Close that umbrella. We do not open umbrellas in the house. Umbrellas are for rain and are not toys. I know, I'm a buzz kill.

Today, I got the best shopping cart at the grocery store. No, not the annoying, impossible to steer ones with the car. There are a bazillion of those. I grabbed one with a full size cart and a little added double bench stuck to the back. (Thus eliminating the undisclosed grabbing of fruit snacks and candy bars that I then feel obligated to purchase since those already have child sized bite marks in them.) ((Whoever realized that putting goods that every child wants, but most moms say no to at the cart-car level is a brilliant bastard.))

Anyway.....

The downside of that cart is there is only one seatbelt. Which I had to use strap in Clare. Which left Grace to her own devices. And her devices preferred to stand and face me.

I warned and bribed her. Standing was not safe. I bought 3 red licorice swirls in the bulk section at 8:30 am to occupy her. It was not enough. I was not focused. Damn. I forgot to grab broccoli slaw in the produce section. I make a sharp about face with the cart. And out went my first born.

People gasped. Gave me the evil eye.

I picked her up, and soothed her. I gave her more candy. She stopped crying and I (loudly) told her that's why I had asked her to stay on her butt.

Tonight Mama knows best once again.

There were ear shattering shrieks from above.

Matt rushed to find out what happened. 'I was playing with the umbrella and pinched my fingers Daddy!'
She came to me shortly after for soothing.

Grace, do you remember when you fell out of the cart this mooring? (nodding) I wasn’t trying to be mean. I just wanted you to be safe. So then do you remember when I told you umbrellas weren't toys? That is because they aren't toys and things like this can happen. Do you understand? I am just trying to protect you Love......

And..........

I told you so.
(I just couldn't resist.)

Pulse Points

I stood there, eyes fixed and willing myself not to let them mist.

She let go of my hand within 5 minutes of stepping into the room, welcomed into the classroom and enticed by the scent of strawberries.

The educational philosophy centers on stimulation and independence. Teaching kids through engagement and creativity.

They handed her a knife.

Grace cooks with me often. I let her stand next to me by the stove and stir bubbling pots. I have never given her a knife though. I guess they knew something that I couldn't see.

I stayed as far back as I could, but watched her closely. She handled it deftly.

She found a container full of tadpoles. She knew what they were without any help. (How does she know what a tadpole looks like?) She explained to the teacher the transformation they would go though. The teacher seemed impressed and told her to feel free to explore anything she was interested in.

She played with puzzles, found fire ants digging tunnels through gel, watched as another teacher transferred the baby chickens into a shaded coop.

She washed hands when instructed to and feasted on her share of the cut strawberries, mint and a sprinkle of sugar she helped prepare.

This change will be hardest on me. Watching my child prove first hand that my baby is no longer a baby. She will thrive in this environment. Without me. Without my vertical 100 yard proximity.

Grace will soon be a Montessori girl and everything I have come to know and depend on will change. This will be good for her. Good for us.

But, ugh, how I hate change.

The Start of Summer

Some people celebrate Memorial Day as the start of summer.

We dace to a slightly different beat, patterned after arm splashes, spinning wheels and pounding feet. Our summer season starts with Matt’s first triathlon. This was Pocomoke weekend.

It was Matt’s 5th year running the race, and while he claims that the field was too slim, his endurance and ambition paid off. He placed 16th overall and 2nd in his age group, resulting in his first real metal.

While I was proud of him, my joy came from watching my girls soak up the sun and sand on the Ocean City beaches.

And our mass consumption of taffy and doughnuts of course.

Away

Tuesday night was the first night I've ever been away from Clare.

393 nights I've spent with my Clare in my arms and pressed to my chest. Give or take a few.

When Matt travles for buisness, Grace says he is going on vacation because there is a hotel stay involved. So while I packed my bag on Monday night, Grace asked why I was going on vacation. I know it is just a word, vacation. Something that helps her understand what is going on, why we are sleeping in beds that are not our own, but it felt like a knife to me.

Mama is not going on vacation.

In fact, I am trying to come up with any feasable reason not to go. If I hadn't promised to split the cost of the hotel room with a colleauge, I don't think I would have gone. 393 nights with my babies. The panic attacks about not being there for the 394th night made my stomach churn right into my throat.

Dropping the girls off at daycare Tuesday morning was gut wrenching. I didn't cry on Clare's 1st day of daycare, but I bawled that monring.

One

Things you MUST know about Clare on her 1st Birthday:

1- The girl loves the wind on her face and in her hair. Promising spring breezes to fridgid winter gusts, it is all the same to her. Her eyes sparkle with smile and her chin always lifts to greet it.

2- She likes to ride in the shopping cart like she’s backing down a driveway. You know that position. Body half twisted, arm up on the seat, head looking backwards. She wants to see where she’s going, not where she’s been.

3- Clare hugs with her whole body. I swear, sometimes think that if I let go, she would stay fastened around my neck. Bumped heads, teething, stolen toys- all can be fixed with a strong hug.

4- She loves her sister fiercely. (As Grace does her) Already they sit close, pressing foreheads together, whisper nonsense words and giggle for the fun of the nonsense. It makes my heart so happy.

Happy Birthday to my little girl- our lives are so much richer with you in them!