You Don’t Have a Penis!

J-man is absolutely obsessed with his penis. That’s right, ladies, and it started basically as soon
as he could figure it out.

I spent the entire summer cleaning sheets because J-man would pull his penis out of his shorts
and fiddle with it while he was falling asleep. I would diligently go into his room before I went to
bed and tuck it back in — hoping I could manage before he’d wet the bed. But inevitably he’d
find it in the middle of the night. “Mommy, I’m all wet.” One night it happened three times —
seriously! “What happened?” I'd ask. The answer, either, “I pulled out my penis,” or “I played
with my penis and I pee.”

He loves to say the word. We never react, and speak very openly about his penis in the hopes
that he’d get bored and stop talking about it. But that hasn’t worked at all.

Potty training has been particularly fun. “J-man, you have to tuck your penis into the potty.
You can’t pee when you are playing with your penis.” I’m convinced the fun of the potty is free
access to the penis!

I was thrilled when fall came. By this time J-man knew he could play and then tuck and then
pee…and then play some more. Yes, we do a lot of hand-washing. But more importantly, I was
happy for the cool weather and the onesie pj’s. “I can’t get my penis,” he says every time I pull
a pair out. Then he laughs hysterically and shows me how he can’t find it. He’s so long his toes
are about to poke out, and no one — I mean no one — makes them in size 4. I may have to just
cut off the feet.

I still have to remind him to keep his hand out of his pants and to point his penis down when
we are out and about, but because we are potty training we are working on going to the potty
enough that there are fewer accidents.

We are also working on who else has a penis. He goes through the list often. “I have a penis,
Mommy doesn’t have a penis, Daddy has a penis, Nana doesn’t have a penis, Grandpa
has a penis.” You get the idea. We go through all of his friends; his daycare teachers; his
cousins, aunts, uncles, and brothers. Sometimes multiple times a day. He’s developed a
joke: “Uncle ‘John’ doesn’t have a penis; he’s a little girrrl!” He can laugh at this joke for a
remarkably long time.

I have explained that girls have vaginas, but that appears to be of no interest to him — they
merely lack a penis. An interesting development for a mom with a women’s studies degree:
how do I change this thinking? I have not yet explained to him that actually I do have a cousin
who is a boy but is trans-gendered and therefore actually does not have a penis. Probably too
confusing at this age, and it might raise more questions than it is worth. We’ll hope it doesn’t
come up at Christmas dinner.

Anyway, for someone who has never had a penis, and quite frankly never thought too much
about them, my life is entirely about penises. Welcome to Motherhood, at least if you have my
son!

-Sleepwalking Mama

Papa

As I am getting older, obviously so are my parents. My father’s health is declining rapidly
these days and it has made me think about how long Lo will have his Papa.

Since the first time Lo was in his Papa’s arms, there has been a connection. The two not
only look alike, Lo loves his Papa. He asks about his Papa when he is not around, he
hugs and kisses him when he is, and when he leaves him Lo calls out, “I love you Papa.”

This past week, my father was in the hospital. He had a major surgery, and as a result
there have been some consequences to the procedure, and he has become increasingly
confused. During his stay at the hospital, Lo wanted to pray for his Papa — on his own
suggestion. He prayed that “Papa’s tummy was better” and that he would “see Papa
soon.” It broke my heart. I struggled with how much information to tell Lo about what was
happening to my father, and also struggled with not telling him anything at all. So I kept it
simple and so did Lo.

An unbelievable thing happened when my father returned home. As we drove up to
my parents’ house, Lo was so excited to see his Papa. We got to the door and Lo ran
straight over to Papa and hugged him, planted a big kiss on him, and told him he loved
him. Everyone was close to tears.

It is inevitable; there will be a day when I will have to sit down to have a discussion
about death with Lo. I will have to struggle with the sadness, anger, and grief of not only
myself but my little Lo. I know a few people who have done some creative things when
explaining death to their children. I have heard of having a family pet — such as a fish,
since they aren’t likely to live long — and using it as a chance to unpack the impending
loss.

I have come to realize that kids are very aware and know that things are happening even
when we think they don’t know anything. Lo knew his Papa was not feeling well because
I was honest. We spoke about Papa, we prayed for Papa, and when we saw Papa we
hugged him. When death happens to our family, I hope I can be just as honest and open
with Lo. Because he will know the reality, because his Papa will not be there anymore.

-Gray Mama

[image: cate james illustration]

Daylight Savings

If you’ve read any of my previous posts, you’ll know that I am totally preoccupied with sleep.

Last night was a typical Sunday night. At 11 I gave up, put myself to bed, with J-man crying in
his room. I pleaded with him to let me sleep and threatened to sleep downstairs in the spare
room, abandoning him to be alone on the second floor. Eventually he quieted down. At 4:30 it
was time for a quick pit-stop, then straight back to bed for fear of waking the monster. (Post-
baby, the bladder, for some reason, refuses to let me sleep through the night.) Surprisingly, I
think I fell back to sleep relatively easily.

At 5:30 a.m., I heard the dreaded screech, “MOMMA!” I waited to see if he was just talking in
his sleep. Then came another, some crying, and then even through the pink foam earplugs, I
heard him get up. He’s still in a crib, like a prison cell, because his parents fear they may never
sleep again once he’s freed. I tip toe into his room for a quick hug, I calm him, tuck him back in,
and he drifts back off to sleep. I crawl back to bed, change the alarm from 6:20 to 6:40 a.m. I am
exhausted and know there is no way for me to get back to sleep with any real effectiveness for
less than an hour.

I wake at 6:20 a.m., anyway but as is the normal course on a Monday morning after a disrupted
sleep, I’m still tired. I’m still lying on my back, knees slung over a pillow, when the alarm clicks
on. I leap out of bed and quiet it quickly for fear I will wake the monster. I slip into the shower,
dress in the dark, and creep out of the house in the dark and without breakfast because the
other monster fell asleep on the couch (I suspect he does this sometimes on purpose to avoid
waking the monster upstairs).

Today when I open the front door, however, there is something that brightens my day. As tired
as I am, I can’t help but be lifted. There is daylight. I have not seen daylight when I’ve opened
my door since before September, when I started my new job. Maybe that’s not quite true, but it
certainly seems that way.

Thank you, daylight savings, for a little ray of sunshine to start my day. It really is the small
things in life, isn’t it?

-Sleepwalking Mama

Dear iPhone

Canadian Thanksgiving has passed, Christmas is coming. This is a time for reflection on the
things we’re thankful for. It’s a stretch, because I spend one-third of the year thankful for sun
and warmth, so the gray, dreary days of November leave me downright crusty. But at least I
have my iPhone.

Oh iPhone, you came into my life a mere two months after my precious daughter. The gap was
probably a good thing — any sooner and that whole attachment parenting thing might not have
happened. I attached to you like a newborn kitten desperate for that first suckle, clambering
over the baby to get to you when I needed my fix of Facebook and Sudoku. Your Daniel Craig
wallpaper reminded me that I was still a silly girl; your iBook app reminded me that I was still
literate. When I was trapped for hours under a feeding baby, you allowed me to avoid watching
The View and instead listen to NPR podcasts or stay in touch with friends who were out in the
world doing things and going places and drinking lots of wine. You caught my tears when I read
their wine-related status updates. You recommended a wine to go with my post-partum rice
cake binges.

During long sleepless nights spent bouncing and rocking and pacing, you kept me awake with
mah-jongg and Twilight books; you told me what I’d missed on The Soup; you provided the
lyrics to “Hallelujah” — all twenty-seven-or-whatever verses (FYI, not the most appropriate
lullaby, but I was running out of ideas, and most of the ones your Safari provided were pretty
lame). For these things I will be eternally grateful.

Now you hold thousands of pictures and videos of Cookie. And she knows this only too
well. “Video of Cookie!” she pleads, grabbing you in her grubby hands and punching uselessly
at the passcode keypad until she dials emergency services. I’ve added a few apps she might
like, but I’d rather have you all to myself. You send me countless tweets that distract me from
my work and lead me down the Internet rabbit hole to dangerous and exciting places. You play
all my favourite songs when I need a lift. You let me know when (if) the sun will shine again.

But now you’re not well. I can no longer clean your screen. Your button is not responsive to my
touch. Our time together isn’t over; according to our contract, I have to wait three more months
to update you. I won’t wait so long next time. Next time I’m getting a two-year contract. I want
you to stay young forever, since neither I nor Cookie can.

-East End Mama

Thankful

Ages ago, like a month ago, in honour of Canadian thanksgiving, East End Mama
challenged us to write about what we are currently thankful for. (I’m pretty sure she’s
going to write about her iPhone.) As odd as this it sounds, I thought of one person — my
financial planner. Let’s call him Brad.

I have been dreaming of a guy like Brad for a long time. Don’t get me wrong, I love my
husband and would not trade him for anything. No, this is a different dream, one where
my money is organized and I don’t live paycheque to paycheque. One where I have
savings (SAVINGS!) and where it all seems to happen effortlessly. Are there families
where this happens? (Please say no.)

Brad is my knight armed with a calculator and a portfolio!

I believe that finding someone like Brad was on my long list of “to dos” during my first
mat leave, but we all know how those dreams are quickly traded in for fitting back in to
your jeans and showering. So, this time, I really am taking charge and crossing things off
the to-do list. Watch out, life: you are about to get purged and organized!

So, in comes Brad to our living room one evening at 8 p.m. (seriously, so convenient).
He never shamed me or my husband (though he should have) for having neither life
insurance nor a will. (I know, the guilt is ridiculous.) He just nodded and said, “I can help
you do that,” and, “Let’s make that a priority.” Seriously, I love him. I was like someone
in one of those hokey banking commercials where the middle-aged couple is nodding
vigorously at the person across the desk, and their life goes from black and white to
vibrant colour when they realize that they CAN retire at 85. He made us feel like saving
was attainable and helped us prioritize what we needed to do. A house with a pool:
probably not soon. New furniture and a vacation not on credit: yes! Life insurance for
$50 a month: yes!

On our second meeting, he also came up with a few simple ways to make our savings
stretch a little further and also told me that we weren’t in bad shape at all (still not sure
what qualifies as bad shape, really, but I am happy to be in the mediocre pile for the time
being).

So, that is what I am thankful for. I guess I am thankful that I finally sent the email to get
this ball rolling, that it is working out pretty well, and also that people like Brad exist to
comfort people like me.

Okay, I have to go, I still don’t have a will…

-Tightrope Mama


[image: vintage coin bank]

Home Care

I finally took the leap and put my daughter in a “homecare” situation. Though it’s
unregulated (those were all full), my friend has a grand-kid in and recommended.

Today I walked in to pick up the Guppins and beheld my friend’s grandson, a three-year-
old, standing facing a wall with his hands in the air, crying.

My dreams of liberal childcare in a small town were shattered.

Let alone my state of being.

I adore this kid. First time I saw him I grabbed him and put him on my lap and kissed him
and hugged him. I have always, always been stand offish with “toddlers.” Maybe having
the Guppins warmed me up. But really I think it was him. B is my guy.

As Sir Dick pointed out (after I told him what I saw), B can be a bit of a little shit:

“I’ve seen him poke at the dog when no one’s looking, use his hands to whack at
things. Maybe this is the new age alternative to punishment: i.e., taking off the strap and
saying ‘All right, you—’”

“So they were taking it easy on him?”

Back at the homecare B is crying. He looks like he’s been crying for a while. He looks
like his arms are sore (I have no idea if this had been two minutes or ten); he keeps
asking to bring them down. But Childcare Lady’s husband is standing in close range, his
voice all-powerful:

“Keep ’em up or we start the clock all over.”

I say, “Hey B, how you doing?” then to the babysitter “What’s going on with B? A little
time out?”

I am balancing a number of emotions. I am trying to act normal, but with just enough
prescience to ask what the fuck is going on. And the husband, well he’s standing there in
the background making dern sure this little boy keeps those paws in the air.

Child-minder woman, a very sweet woman, a very calm woman, says,

“Oh well yes, he’s having a time out, he does things with his”… she stumbles
here… “well, he just has to put his hands up.”

This is a mess. This is unbelievable. Suddenly I’m back in grade one with Mrs. Shaw as
she terrorizes a small boy in the class, hauls him across her lap, pulls down his pants in
front of us, Bobby’s screaming and crying, his bare bum is showing …who she spanked
in front of us…

This is wrong.

I bundle up the Guppins. It’s a Friday so I say, “Okay, so Monday I’m not sure about, I
have a friend visiting with her daughter [true — East End Mama and Cookie]; I’ll call you”

From the wall:

“I need to sleeeeep!”

I say, “You get your nap in, okay? You get some sleep,” and I wish I could say I nail her
with a look but I don’t. I just…look. Pointedly.

And I’m out the door.

The Guppins is happy enough; she happily waves goodbye and says, “Ta ta.” They are
teaching her manners. I take it they are good at that.

I question her in the car:

“Do you like [Childminder Lady]? Do you like [her husband]?”

“Ya!”

“Do they make you stand in the corner with your hands in the air?”

This question comes up several times during the remainder of the day in the following
forms:

1. Guppins wakes up from her nap, stands on the bed next to the wall, and leans on it.
She’s crying, in a bad mood. I say, “Did she make you do that today?”

2. Later watching TV there’s some little animated character who, remarkably,
coincidentally, is dancing up against a kitchen wall with his hands in the air. I ask, “Is that
what B did today?”

I try to calm down. I try to get perspective. I google:

Is making a three-year-old stand facing the wall with his hands in the air child abuse?

Two things come up. One is the Dr. Sears’ treatise on time-outs; the
other is a porny site.

I recommend the Sears. But NOWHERE in it is there mentioned a time out facing the
wall WITH YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR.

I call my friend. First I bake (just to calm me down because the emotions are coming fast
and furious), but I call. I try not to be judgmental. She responds perfectly. She says “His
hands in the air?”

“Facing the wall. But he wasn’t on a seat [I reference Dr. Sears], he wasn’t alone, at
least; that’s a good thing.” (reminiscent of Blair Witch final moments)

“It’s good you called. We’ll talk later.”

The bread is baked (it’s a total flop), the baby wakes up, and my incredibly happy week
of having three hours a day, not including the afternoon nap, all to myself…

ARE OVER.

Sir Dick: “You shoulda known five bucks an hour for a babysitter was too good to be
true.”

Too true.

-Drama Mama

Fertilizing Once Again?

When we decided to try and conceive, we first stopped using protection for about six
months. I tracked my cycle and, of course, read almost everything about trying to get
pregnant. After six months, I spent hundreds of dollars on tracking devices and cycle
counters. Nothing worked. We were not pregnant.

So a year in, we decided to try fertility testing. I had to attend a very sterile and sad place
every day for four months straight. I had to endure a full internal examination with a very
large probe…yes, a probe. It was violating; it was like a large dildo with a condom —
hitting it hard. Then blood was taken…I fear needles, and it never became any easier.
As a result, I left the clinic every day at 7 a.m. — I had to get there before 7 so I could
get to work on time — feeling mismanaged and drained. Horrible.

Everyone who sat on my side of the clinic was there for the same reason, trying to figure
out what was wrong. On the other side of the clinic were couples who came in for IVF.
It was so sad to see the couples on the “other” side. They looked tired, and most looked
angry and were not speaking with each other. They appeared to be embarrassed,
defeated, and, for sure, broke. It was very hard to sit on my side of the clinic and worry
about the reality of maybe having to visit the other side one day if this fertility testing did
not find an easy fix.

After the four months of testing, I was becoming very resentful of the whole process and
of my partner, since he was all snuggled up in bed while I snuck out of the house every
morning at 6 a.m. I was the one who had to publicize my infertility every day to nurses
who did not care and very rich doctors who made millions off my “old eggs.” It ended up
that the issue was I had stale eggs: they were old, as I was also becoming, being 35 and
all.

There was a light at the end of this probe. After months of testing, it was clear I needed
to move up my cycle with medication and take a hormone to increase the stickiness
of my wall. And it worked…after two months (I screwed up the medication for the first
month). The hormone worked so well that the egg was so stuck I could not move from
pain for a week.

But Lo was there; he was nestled on my wall and I was pregnant.

Now that the discussions about another child are arising, I wonder if I want to go down
this road again. It won’t be as bad or as long…but is it worth it?

Hmm. I will let you know.

-Gray Mama

You’ve Got Ten Minutes — What (Else) Should You Read?

After learning about what East End Mama is reading, I thought I would share what I have been reading, or trying to read, lately.

The Light Between Oceans

By M.L. Stedman

I kept seeing this book pop up on “new and hot”-type lists, so I thought I would give it a try. It is about a post-war Australia that still relies on lighthouses to guide ships. Lonely ex-soldier meets free-spirit town girl and they decide to live together on a romantic island where they, and the lighthouse, are the only inhabitants. After they make love on every inch of said island (not gratuitously, I might add), she suffers much heartbreak and is unable to carry a baby to term. Then one day a boat washes ashore with a dead man and a living baby; what to do? Keep the baby, obviously. Her husband is very torn about this, mainly because he lives and dies by the lighthouse code, which is to write everything down in the log. But, of course, the wife NEEDS this baby and believes it is divine intervention. So here the moral dilemma begins. What to do? What to do?

I can’t say I really fully agreed with anything that either character does, but it was thought-provoking and did more than accurately capture the intense and powerful connection between parent and child. I won’t ruin the ending for you, but there is some heartbreak, to be sure. It also made me ask my husband a lot of questions about what he would have done if WE lived on the lighthouse island (cue his eye rolling).

The Paris Wife

By Paula McLain

This is loosely based on Hemingway’s relationship with his first wife and their years spent in Paris. As a wife of an intensely creative man, I felt for her as she patiently sat by his side and urged him to keep writing and keep trying. I also really felt for her when she lost his prized manuscript (in the days before email and USB keys) on a train. I have done things like this, and you are never REALLY forgiven in the eyes of the spouse. (But I digress…)

This was a quick read that gives you extra smart points because I think it is technically historical fiction, so you can whip out some Hemingway knowledge at an upcoming dinner party.

The Night Circus

By Erin Morgenstern

(Disclaimer: I listened to this on audio — but it was unabridged, so that counts.)

This was a book unlike too many others I have come across, not only in subject matter (the full history of a truly magical circus) but also in complexity. There are many characters, and they are all fleshed out in lots of detail. No one disappears from the story and you feel really satisfied by the end of it all. There is a mysterious romance plot, but it never gets too “sexy” (maybe the one minor flaw…), and there are elaborate descriptions of the sumptuous black and white circus, with lots of attention to detail and food, in particular. This is a book to fall in with (maybe on vacation or a sick day) and let your imagination go. I am sure there must be a movie of this book in the works somewhere.

A Fine Balance

by Rohinton Mistry

This isn’t on my most-recently-read list, but whenever I talk about books people should read, this book has to be on it! HAS TO. It is a long, sprawling tale about India in the mid-70s, with a strong focus on the actual people living there, mostly in extreme poverty. If you are able to read this book without crying, you are a weird person to be sure. This is one of those books that stick in your head for years after reading it. They don’t get much better than this.

-Tightrope Mama


[image: books]

My Shopping Compulsion

Do you ever find yourself buying things that your baby or child doesn’t really need and you can’t really afford? 

I do.

I was never much of a shopper before I had J-man, but now I find it hard to resist shopping for things for him. This impulsion covers all kinds of things: toys, outfits, art supplies, hair products, videos, books, and food. I am not certain what the draw is, but I see things and I find myself talking myself into buying things. Last week I bought him Spiderman shoes. They are way too big and probably don’t have good arch support, but they were just so cute!

When I returned home, my husband looked at me sideways. “What does he need those for? It’s going to be a while before they fit — no?”

I was caught and didn’t have much to say — they will fit eventually. They were just so cute!

It got me thinking about all of the things I’d previously bought — a pair of rain boots that never did fit, crafts that he can’t use until he’s a little older, noise toys that drive us crazy, a dinosaur set that is so spiky he could poke an eye out. They were all just so cute.

Do you remember your baby shower? How many things did you get or put on your registry that you thought you needed but never used? I had a few, but wasn’t everything just so cute?

I don’t have an answer for why the advertisers or product developers get me, but they do. Just thought I’d toss it out there. I have a house full of things that I’m not sure we need and certainly couldn’t afford. Do I just want him to have everything and to try everything?

Sleepwalking Mama

[image: shopping carts]

Childcare

In the last 48 hours I have encountered two one-armed persons.

The first was a crabby YMCA counterperson.

I’m trying to find ways to have some time from my kid. In Toronto I had the West End Y with the merry band of ex-fighter-pilot childminders. Only four bucks an hour, two or three women, crisp uniforms, gorgeous open space, coupla babies, coupla two-year–olds; Shirley running things like a sergeant major (I mean, running the other childminders, who clearly fear her). The Guppins would melt at her “Whatsa matter — you gotta problem?” attitude and dissolve with ecstasy into her wise womanly arms. I’d get a sauna, whirlpool, bit of stretching, say hello to several other unemployed actors…what a dream.

I’m missing Shirley and the gang.

Here in Smalltown I’m greeted by a very nice woman who escorts us to an airless cubby in which sits a baseball-hatted babysitter watching her own snot-encrusted three-year-old, her five-year-old, and her five-year-old’s friend, an obnoxious brick shithouse of a child. I tremble. I can’t turn around and leave — the room is too small, it would be noticed. The three-year-old is all over us like a dirty shirt. The beleaguered babysitter (who shares my real name, which makes it pleasurably easy to remember) barks at the five-year-olds while shooting me strained smiles that say:

Please stay I am desperate for company and hate children.

Only five bucks from 9 ’til 12! My dreams of Smalltown childcare realized.

I did not leave the Guppins alone in the room. Though, truth be told, she had a pretty good time chasing around the bigger girls.

I return a few days later. I’m greeted by a different customer service rep (one-armed) who tells me no, it’s SEVEN dollars, even if I leave my kid for the one remaining hour, because I am a visiting member.

I decide to not argue with the one arm.

Door swings open, babysitter running out the door, no intention of turning back.

One Arm stops her in her tracks.

“If there’s no one here by 11 I leave,” she whimpers with determination, kids tugging at her clothes, pale face, monster pick-up running outside.

One Arm gives her a murderous look, says to me (also with a murderous look), “She’ll stay if you want her to.”

Tense silence.

All I’m thinking is get me outta here.

(I mean, the change room looks like a dated dirty high school locker room, they have a co-ed sauna — who wears a bathing suit in a sauna? — the price just went up, I’m clearly an outsider, there’s a whole lot of desperate aggression going on. I mean, what would I possibly have to gain by staying?)

Freedom.

I pretend to be generous.

“No, go ahead, it’s totally okay.”

“If you come earlier tomorrow my daughter’s friend will be back.” (…to stomp out innocence.)

“Okay, great!” I lie.

One Arm’s eyes dart from me to her.

I shift the Guppins to my left hip.

Nobody’s moving and I’m thinking, JUST TURN AROUND, WALK CALMLY TO THE EXIT, DO NOT ENGAGE FURTHER, AND START THE CAR.

The second one-armed person I met was a guarded, intense, edgy little girl named Ariadne, at the community centre drop-in. I think she is my first new friend. (Besides, potentially, Graham Greene. If the name doesn’t ring any bells, your mother might have the Dances with Wolves VHS box set.)

Ariadne let me photograph her artwork.

P.S. The paint is real chocolate.

-Drama Mama

Your Words Are Music to My Ears

Today I am thankful for my daughter’s ability to speak well. How quickly I’ve forgotten those
months of frustration when Cookie desperately wanted something but couldn’t get me to
understand, and collapsed into screaming fits from frustration. Now the screaming fits come
because I say no to her perfectly articulated requests. Success.

Speech has been a preoccupation of mine. My sister is a speech language pathologist who
works with school-aged children, so her tales of children who have limited words or sounds, or who just can’t speak at all, fill me with terror. I decided against baby signing for fear of delaying speech. There’s a theory that children who know how to sign resist speaking because it’s easier to ask for something in a language they already know. Studies have proven this theory unfounded, but anecdotally, before I had Cookie, every child I knew who had learned signing was delayed in speech. Perhaps they were still in the “normal” range, but their parents panicked and struggled to get them to speak.

No such problems with us. Cookie was right on schedule, and at under two-and-a-half she
recently shocked her grandmother by telling her, “Actually, I’d like to go to the park now.” So I’m proud and relieved and satisfied. Until…

My sister-in-law tells us about a child she knows who is just about Cookie’s age and “fluent”
in three languages. And about two others slightly older who are fluent in Mandarin (they are
most definitely not Chinese). My reaction is physical — I feel phantom hackles rise on my back; my body flushes with an angry heat. The competitive aspect of raising a child infuriates me so much that even the slightest allusion to what someone else’s kid is doing brilliantly immediately brings about this reaction. These comparisons are pointless, and they depend on factors almost entirely outside our control, like culture and economic status and geography. And I’m sure in many cases they make little difference on the end result. How many Mandarin-speaking toddlers will go on to be diplomats or CEOs of multinational companies? Just look at children’s pageants: kids are rewarded for being the prettiest and most precocious, but how many of them end up having high-paying jobs for all their effort and pain as three-year-old beauty queens? Give me a study on that. Perhaps most of them — hey, who knows? — but somehow I doubt it.

When I was little, one of my aunts was convinced that her nieces and nephews needed to learn Japanese if we had any hope of being productive members of the society of the future. My parents laughed, and that was that. (Particularly since I grew up in northern Ontario, which has a rather slim Japanese population.) And look how that turned out — Japan is pretty far from being our evil overlords. Now Cookie’s aunt insists that she needs to learn Mandarin. Maybe she’s right, and maybe one day we’ll regret not giving Cookie lessons when she was young, but first off, we have more pressing things to spend our money on, and second, isn’t being half fluent in English at two-and-a-half good enough? Besides, most Chinese people I know aren’t anywhere close to fluent in Mandarin. Let’s give the Anglo toddler a break on this one, shall we?

One of Cookie’s daycare friends is almost incomprehensible. He’s a couple months younger,
and he’s a boy, so there’s that, but every time I talk to him, that old worry comes back. I want
him to have everything a little boy deserves (after all, this is not a competition!), but now he’s a big brother, so I’m afraid his speech development will take a back seat to myriad other demands on his parents’ time and attention. The most I can do is ensure that Cookie is a good role model for him. And that is one thing I am confident about, at least.

-East End Mama

[image: hello in 42 languages]

The Toy Box

On Monday morning, in the staff kitchen, a colleague asked me how my weekend was. Although I had been up with J-man at 1 a.m., 3 a.m., and 6 a.m. and could hardly stand, I politely said it was wonderful. Interested, I guess, he asked what I did. So I explained that I had spent Sunday shopping at IKEA, which of course meant I spent Sunday evening building furniture. It was well after 10 p.m. when I first sat down for the day — a load of laundry still in the dryer.

“What a nightmare,” he replied. “What’s wonderful about that?”

It was the reaction I would have expected of my dad, who always said IKEA was a four-letter swear word. “Well,” I explained, “I bought a toy box for my living room.” I then explained how tired I was of tripping over J-man’s toys, which seem to have taken over my house. I also bought a contraption to organize his teddy bears in his room because there are nights I can’t find his crib through the bears. Being a dad, he was quick to respond that he remembered the days of toys taking over his life to the point of being a safety hazard. He agreed that organizing children’s toys, which seem to quickly take over our lives and our spaces, was well worth a day at IKEA.

On Monday night I returned home to a house that was unusually serene. My husband, ever the tidier, in the morning had tucked the toys back into the box. I put my feet up and thought about a glass of wine. It was peaceful for a full ten minutes. At that point I jumped to attention and started to organize supper. J-man started a new game, taking everything out of the box one by one onto the living room floor. I hope I can teach him that it’s equally fun to put it all back.

Ten minutes of peace, of feeling organized and on top of my life, was well worth the long drive to IKEA, the ridiculous tour through the entire store (like somehow I have nothing else to do but browse) with a cranky husband, the rude and unhelpful warehouse guy, the check-out line that took forever, and the icing on the cake — delivering the boxes home only to have to build the toy box. Oh, the things in life that make us happy — even the small things!

-Sleepwalking Mama

The Santa Experience

Note: I wrote this last year, when W was one and I wasn’t pregnant with #2. But I’m still questioning my sanity, as well as the whole “Santa Experience” sign-up process, so I thought it was worth sharing.

I’m starting to wonder about the kind of parent I am.

I mean, I know I am a good, kind, and funny parent. But lately I have been wondering if I am slowly crossing into insanity. Here are two pieces of evidence that may prove the theory.

First: My best friend is getting married, and as co-MoH I am organizing her bachelorette and shower...on the same weekend...at my house. I have planned a fancy dinner out and a trip to a vodka bar, and this will be amazing fun, but I am not what I used to be. I can’t walk in heels and “club.” I don’t wear Spanx (but might have to start), I don’t order bottle service, and while I have NO problem getting drunk, I physically just cannot be hungover. It is actually painful and lasts a minimum of one day for each bottle of wine I drink. I am also hosting the bridal shower the next morning — post “club” and mid-hangover. Insane. Don’t worry, I’m an organized person; I printed make-ahead recipes and ordered cupcakes. The other MoH is bringing mimosas; it will be all right. Just keep telling yourself that, right?

All this is fine, however LAST weekend I invited over fifty people to our house for a Halloween party. It was good times and the kids (I think I have to stop saying “babies”) were just too cute for words. (Amazing costumes included a ladybug, Princess Leia, a turtle, a lion, a fireman, a cat, a pumpkin, and a puppy!)

What I wasn’t thinking when I thought, “Oh, let’s have some friends over and look at costumes” was, “OMG, I have to be the world’s best friend and hostess in six short days.” Now as I look around, I see I have to take down plastic bats from my ceiling, peel weird plastic blood drippings off my window, and pick up over 250 balls from the playroom floor (husband bought the balls, as if that needed to be clarified), and then transform my place into Martha Stewart’s chic city pad complete with eggs Florentine and bacon biscuits! Fuck. Oh, yeah, and while I do have the perfect gift for my perfect best friend, I forgot to drop it off weeks ago (I’ve had it since May) to get framed and am now paying a rush charge of $40. Fuck. (Side note: I am cheap, and things like “rush” charges at quaint framing stores bug me to no end.) I called the cleaning lady; she’s coming over. One spark of sanity.

Second: I thought I would wear a cute, pre-baby black dress to the bachelorette weekend of amazing-ness. False. That dress looks like someone who just had a baby is squeezing into something too small. So I rushed out last night to the local “nice” mall (i.e., not my usual mall, which actually has an eyeglass store called “Spexx” and a hat store called “Lidz”). I had one hour and fifteen minutes, and I tried on three dresses in store #1, and two were decent. I had one hour left to peruse. Then, I saw it, a big line in the middle of the mall. I thought, what are all these people lined up for? A blood donor clinic? A book signing? NO! Santa!! WTF? (Remember how I said it was just Halloween?) So, I read the big poster: Sign up for Santa, in person only. OMG — what to do? Shop for myself or stand in line to secure a Santa Experience? You guessed it, I stood in line. Fuck. Insane. I know. I texted my husband thinking he would say, “Silly, go shop, buy yourself something pretty.” What he actually wrote was, “Sign. Him. Up.” So, at least if I am insane, he is too.

This was the first day of Santa sign-up, and the woman behind me told me that people were there right when the mall opened that day and waited four hours to sign up. Take a second and soak that in, people. They spent four hours of their lives waiting to sign their kids up to see Santa. At a mall. We all know he isn’t real, right? Twenty-four hours later I am still unsure whether I did the right thing. W has no idea who Santa is, or what the difference is between a “Santa Experience” and watching Elmo on YouTube.

In case you actually remembered that this was about a dress, don’t worry, I ran back to the store and bought a tight leopard-print number. I think that is my third and final example of insanity. Leopard print? Yep, yep I did.

I rest my case. I am an insane mother who hosts back-to-back events in my own home, signs my kid up for things called “The Santa Experience” one and a half months in advance, and buys cougar dresses. What shocking personality disorders will next week reveal?

-Tightrope Mama