So You Think You Can Dance?

Anna thinks she can dance.  I know this because she dances constantly.  The theme song to Mr. Rogers could come on, and she’d jump up and dance.  Although I can’t dance, I still dance with her.  I can get away with my mom moves for now since Anna can’t speak in full sentences, but once she starts making fun of me, I’m on the sidelines watching again.

We basically have music playing in our house all the time, so she has numerous opportunities to shake her groove thing. 

After dressing her up in her best Jersey Housewives garb, Anna put on a show for Joe and his family.  It was quite the spectacle as I saw some key moves in her choreography.

1.  The worm
2.  The robot
3.  The “spank your butt” move

Her grandfather was choreographing all of this behind the camera, so she welcomed the new moves. 

Here we go.

Future footballer.

Anna is already in training to be a future Saint. She’s perfecting her spiral as I type this.

Here she is completely enthralled with the first pre-season Saints game against the Patriots.

Yes, I know she watches TV up close.  I’m going to mommy hell, aren’t I?

I thought these fabulous socks would bring the Saints some good luck.  Nope.

She’s already drooling over football players.  Lucky me.

Dirty chicken.

Since the Saints returned last night for their pre-season opener, what better way to celebrate the beginning of football season than with a plate full of fried chicken.

That’s exactly what we did. 

We ate chicken.  We laughed.  We cried.  It was glorious.

Anna, being the most helpful little child on the planet, offered to take my plate of half eaten chicken into the kitchen.  I politely asked her to throw the chicken into the trash can.  She loves throwing things away.  Thank GOD she takes after me in this respect.

So, I wait patiently for her to return.  30 seconds goes by, no Anna.

I trek into the kitchen and find Anna sitting on the floor.  Her back was turned to me at the time, so I had to walk around to see what she was doing.

What was she doing?

Eating the half-eaten piece of chicken with a spoon.

She has figured out how to open the utensil drawer and grab out whatever utensil she wants to use.  For this feat, she chose a spoon. 

Sometimes you just have to go with it, people.  She’s creative. 

Pee.

Yep, my child had her first pee on the potty.  I am fighting the urge to smack my face while typing this post because I swore I’d never be one of those moms – the moms who share every single detail of their child’s life, even the embarrassing ones that may eventually come back to haunt them.

So, here I am, doing that very thing.  Oh well, hopefully Anna won’t hate me for it one day.

Anyway, we’ve noticed that Anna has been showing some interest in using the bathroom outside of a plastic clump of landfill (aka a diaper).  I know it’s not even worth it to press the issue if she’s not ready, so we’re going to take it slowly.

My mom and I were at Target this past weekend, and she bought Anna’s first toilet.  It looks like this:

Disclaimer:  That’s not Anna.  We also don’t use that kind of toilet paper.

So, it’s a cute toilet.  It has turtles on it.  Who doesn’t love turtles? 

Anna has adapted to the toilet fairly quickly.  She loves sitting on it and putting toilet paper in it.  She didn’t quite grasp the concept of what to actually put into it until tonight (8-11 – this will post on 8-12). 

After sitting on the toilet for at least 5 minutes, she finally did the deed, and we seriously couldn’t be prouder of her. 

Granted, this is just the beginning of a long process, I’m sure, but it’s truly amazing how excited two parents can get over pee.  You would’ve thought Anna walked up to us with the winning Powerball ticket by our reaction.

Maybe it was overkill.  It probably was.  Gee, that’s so unlike us.  

Weaner.

Since becoming a mother, I’ve adopted the “never say never” mentality.  I’m more of a “whatever works at this very moment, go for it” type of mom.  So, that’s why we started giving Anna a pacifier when she was just a few minutes old.  Nah, days.  It kept her from screaming.  It allowed me to hold on to the last ounce of sanity I had.  Win-win, right?

Once the sleep deprivation and hormonal outbursts of early motherhood wore off, I continued giving Anna a pacifier because, hey, she liked it.  Who am I to withhold likeable stuff from my child?

So, now here we are.  I have an almost 2 year old pacifier addict.  We’ve begun the weaning process, and it’s been a very slow and very painful ordeal.  First action, take the paci away from her during the day.  Most days, this works just fine.  Other days, she walks out of her room or another room in the house with a random pacifier that I thought was lost.  How she finds them is beyond me.  She’s like a hound dog with a buried bone.  She can sniff out a pacifier from a 3 mile radius. 

If she doesn’t find one of her own pacifiers, she’ll steal her cousin Jackson’s pacifiers.  It’s always humorous to see my large child sucking on a 0-3 month sized pacifier.  It’s barely big enough to cover her mouth, but she doesn’t care.  She’d suck on a clothes pin at this point because that’s how addicted she is.

If I catch her with a pacifier during the day, she has started doing one of two things:

1) She covers it up with her Dot so as to throw me off.  I mean, no way could she be hiding a pacifier behind her Dot, right?  Smart girl.  Dumb mom.
2) She shoves it down her shirt and sucks it through the fabric.  I walked up to her the other day and noticed she was sucking on her shirt.  When I looked more closely, I noticed the familiar outline of a pacifier nipple.  I give her props for being so inventive, but she clearly didn’t think that would fool me.  Well, OK, it almost did.

I’ve cut off the tips.  She won’t take those, but she begs for another pacifier, so then I’ve ruined a pacifier and can’t find another one.  The screaming ensues.  I go crazy.

So, here’s where we are today:

Anna will sometimes go the entire day without a pacifier, if she finds a random one lying around the house, she will suck it through her shirt. Mom = 0, Anna = 1

She is doing OK with riding in cars without a pacifier.  As long as she has a mouth full of goldfish, she’s golden.  Mom = 1 point, Anna = 0

At night she still requires a pacifier to go to sleep.  If it falls out of her bed in the middle of the night, she can self-sooth and fall back asleep without one .  Mom = 1 point, Anna = 1

So, right now we’re tied 2 to 2.  My goal is to actually win this war.  I need suggestions from the other mothers who have gone through this hell.  I’d really like to have a paci-free child by her 2nd birthday.  So, we have 2 months.

Then on to potty training.  One thing at a time, folks.

 
For the record, Anna actually did all of this AFTER I wrote this blog.  I promise.

Here’s a video of her hiding it in her shirt.

Here’s a video of her covering it up with Dot.

Demonic toys.

Our house is over flowing with toys.  Loud toys, bright toys, spinning toys, flashy toys.  You get it.  Lots of toys.  For an anti-clutter freak, it’s taken some getting used to, but I’ve managed to give in to Hurricane Anna, and now I just walk over the toys or kick them out of my way without thinking a second thought. Perhaps this is how a hoarder starts?

The problem I’ve been having with Anna’s toys is that some of them are activated by simply touching them, some of them are activated when the cat farts on them, some of them are activated when there’s a full moon.  Some of them activate when it’s dark in my house, Joe is at work, Anna is asleep, and everything is silent. 

Picture it, my bed, last night.  I’m lying there typing on my laptop, minding my own business, when all of a sudden, I hear a scratchy, demonic sounding voice in the living room.  “Natalie, I’m coming for you.  You can’t run.  You can’t hide.”

Granted, this isn’t what was said, but when you’re tired and not expecting ANY voices to blare out in your house, you imagine all sorts of awful communication. 

I halfway expect that meowing kid from The Grudge to come into my room and crawl on the ceiling.  MEOWWWWWWWWWWW!

I freeze in panic because this is what I do when faced with fear.  I break out into a cold sweat because this is what brave people do.  I listen a little longer and fully expect to see a vision so terrifying that I would need years of therapy just to be able to speak again.

Then it stops.

I grasp reality for a second and realize, wait, could it possibly be a toy?  Not some demonic force in my house?

Thankfully, it was a toy.   A toy that is 5 steps away from being landfill.  I have to gauge my child’s love for this toy before I make a decision whether to throw it out ‘cause I do put her first, you know?

Good vs. Evil. 

By the way, a little funny side story that has absolutely nothing to do with the topic of this post, but I wanted to write it down incase I ever forget.  My child has started using random items around the house as deodorant.  She must watch Joe get ready, so now everything that takes on the shape of a a bar of deodorant gets rolled on her underarm.  Last night’s choice – a Rice Krispy treat. 

Another side note.  I just turned around and Anna is wearing a pair of my clean underwear around her neck like a necklace.  This child never ceases to entertain me.