A New Hat

A few days ago I went to KMart, and took the kids, and my mom. Now, anytime both of the kids go anywhere, it's guaranteed to wear me out quickly, and this day was no different. Colin was as good as he could be for as long as he could handle, but my mother is famous for her shopping excursions. She goes in to get one thing, and two hours later, she's still looking around.
So after an hour of sitting in the cart and being good, I could tell my time was running out. Chloe was getting hungry, Colin wanted to run around, I was slowly losing my famous patience...and Mom wanted to look at the hats. My mother NEVER wears hats.
EVER.
So I tell her that's it, after we look at the hats, we're leaving. I already know she just wants an excuse to look around at more stuff, and I was ready to go and feed the kids.
When we get to the hat department, we start trying them on the kids for laughs. Anyone with kids will appreciate how much fun it is to do terrible things to your children and then laugh about it. For example, trying silly hats on them that are much too big, and ridiculous looking without being huge for their little heads.
After a little while I was pushing for us to go, and starting putting all the hats back. Colin was not happy about clean-up time. He was having a good time laughing, and making us laugh with trying the hats on. As I reached for the last hat, a brown plaid fedora with peach stripes and a leather band around the base, he just started screaming. The high pitched scream that never ends, and everyone looks at you like, "My God, do something with your kid!", which I always love. So instead of waging war, and working on lessons like listening, not screaming, blah blah blah...I just said OK, let's take the damn hat with us.
Now I knew when I said it that the hat would end up forgotten as soon as we got in the car, and I hate having junk just laying around. I have enough junk laying around, and I struggle just to keep my house marginally put together without bringing more useless stuff into it. So I was not in a great mood on the way home, having dealt with a tantrum, another hungry baby starting to cry, and the though of something else to pick up at the end of the day.
When we got home I started putting things away, and as soon as I took that silly fedora out of the bag, Colin grabbed it and started laughing, doing his happy dance around the living room.


And of course, once he started playing with it, Chloe had to go investigate. So Colin, in a rare moment of generosity with a new toy that I will forever be proud of, puts his new hat on Chloe.


Which she is immediately blinded by, considering how huge the hat was. Her inability to see did not, however, detract from her laughing. She crawled all over the floor smiling, and every time he'd take the hat to wear himself, she'd sit next to him and grin, like she was just waiting for her turn.
They just went back and forth, both of them laughing like it was the greatest game in the world. And of course, my bad mood was quickly turning into a good mood. Kids are great for that; they can take one moment, and change everything for the better just by smiling.

Since then the hat has become a part of our nightly playing before bath time, with Colin putting it on and strutting around like Sinatra, and Chloe just happy to be in the middle of things, smiling and laughing whenever her brother decides she needs to wear the hat for awhile.All in all a success, I suppose. And if it's one more thing to clean up, who cares? For a face like that I'd buy ten more!

Free Time

It's been awhile since I've written. Sitting here now, looking inward for the reason, I have to admit to a certain...laziness. The act of writing is just so simultaneously theripudic and tiring that I procrastinate. While procrastinating is an art form, and I consider myself a master, I feel a seriously sense of loathing at realizing that I'm once again procrastinating myself into a practical coma. Well, a thought coma at least.
I blame having 2 kids for taking up my spare time, but that's only true to a certain extent. The times when I watch a movie after they're asleep at night, I could put to better use on writing. The naps they take during the day, I could get a little bit in instead of watching a rerun of E.R., since I've already seen them all anyways. It's just so much easier not to. Not to start my crazy brain working, not to get all those crazy intellectual juices boiling around in there. I get tired just thinking about what it does to me.
But when I go back over old writings, I'm amazed at myself. I did that? Little ol' me? And I feel a sense of pride in myself, and accomplishment in my work. Which is a damn good feeling, I'm sure anyone would agree. The fact that I can bring emotion to myself, from my own work, that's how I know it's a piece to save. That that one is one I'll let someone else read.
Wellll......maybe. I'll think about letting someone else read it though. ;)

Anyways, I have actually been busier than usual with the kids. Colin sees his speech therapist one morning a week, and I've actually been trying to keep that scheduled into our day, in the hopes of cutting down on tantrums when she comes. More on that further in. I've been putting some serious effort into my role as "housewife" as well. I know some of you are laughing, and some of you aren't. Those of you who are have never been a housewife/stay-at-home mom. Good for you. The others of you who are not laughing will appreciate the fact that my job is a lot tougher than almost any other job. Period. And that subject will become another blog in the very near future I believe. Back to my time management though. We've been going on longer walks each day, which has pretty much doubled the time it used to take. Which could be because they've turned more in to "exploration" adventures that just "walks". If you want to see the world from a whole new angle, go on a walk outside with a two-year-old. It's fairly amazing all the things I'd pass by without a glance that Colin has to stop and ponder for at least a few minutes. But it's pretty cool to spend an hour doing what would normally take fifteen minutes.
Even aside from the kids, there's the husband. Who is amazing, by the way. If we happen to have the same fifteen minutes of free time, all we want to do is curl up on the couch together and relax until one of the kids attacks us....or each other. Getting time with just the two of us is pretty rare, so we try hard to enjoy it to the fullest.
So in the spare five minutes that leaves me, on occasion, writing is just soooooo tough to do!! Yes, it makes me feel amazing, I'm pleased, blah blah blah. But even as I'm sitting there writing, (like right now), I'm thinking about the other things I could be doing. Or not doing, because just sitting down on the front porch for a moment in solitude is like....awesome. And I mean that in the truest sense of the word, not in the "gnarly brah!" type of way.