the trouble with ideals . . .

is that they can be awfully hard to live by.

When our kid was born, I swore that we wouldn't let her watch tv until at least 2.  That's the recommendation offered by the American Pediatric Society, and it makes sense to me.  But right from the get go, I realized one huge problem with the plan.  G and I love tv.  We watch it a lot.  So suddenly trying to live by a rule that basically had us not turning the tv on while the kid was in the room was total torture.  But still, for the most part, we've done pretty well.  For the first few months of her life, it didn't matter because she didn't register tv anyway.  And then somewhere around four months, when we noticed her fascination with the bright lights, we turned it off in her presence and it stayed off.  Fortunately, she has an early bedtime, so once she's out for the night, we get to watch WHATEVER we want.

Until now.  Despite the no-tv rule, the one thing that we did do was let the little D watch short videos on our phone now and then.  Usually youtube videos of dogs and babies, or random videos that our friends posted on FB.  And when she turned a year, a friend gave us a DVD called "Science is Real" that's pretty awesome.  It's basically a series of music videos about science-related topics for children, created by They Might Be Giants.  It's super cute.  D's a bit young to grasp the concepts, but it's catchy, and I figured, what the hell, it's educational.   Sure, it was cheating a bit, but those few moments here and there got us through hospital procedures and long plane rides. Because, it's not really cheating if it's for a GOOD CAUSE.

And then, D developed her love for monkeys (well, basically all animals, but she especially loves to say "oooh oooh oooh").  So G thought she might like a few minutes of Curious George here and there.  So he found a series of short videos on Netflix and showed her every so often, just a minute or two now and then.  Usually when we were in bed on weekend mornings and didn't want to get up that early.  Whatever app or video we show her, we always sit and watch with her.  Maybe twice, we've handed her our phones when she got a little fussy in the car and let her watch a few minutes of something.  And it's never been more than maybe 10 minutes tops.

But you see where this is going, right?  This, my friends, is how it all starts.  Suddenly, I can't really claim to not let my kid watch TV anymore.  Well, I mean, I can, but it wouldn't be entirely accurate.  Especially after a month or two ago when I was sick and G was working.  I made the huge jump of actually letting her watch a George episode on the big screen, our living room tv.  I was miserable, already laying on the couch, and it seemed like not such a bad idea at the time, you know, to cuddle up with my kid and watch this inane monkey thing that I've seen a good dozen times now?  But somehow, watching tv on an actual TV (as opposed to our phone or laptop) suddenly seemed like I had slipped into terrible-parent mode. It's like the point of no return or something.  For a good week after that, our kid kept trying to turn the tv on and ask for "un-key."  It took all our distraction powers combined to resist.  Fortunately, she seems to have forgotten about it now.

Oh, of course there was that Elmo and that potty incident, too.   We still can't set her on the dang toilet without her asking for Elmo.  A few months ago, we took D to my brother's and were shocked when she pointed to their tv and said proudly "tee-vee".  How did she even what it was?  Or who Elmo was for that matter.  Now, we can no longer plead ignorance.

And finally, this morning happened.  We were laying in bed.  G was leaving for work.  I was kind of half asleep.  D was just jumping on our bed and grabbing things off the night stands like she always does. She pulled over the 3 remotes we have sitting on G's side (because come on, y'all know my husband -- it would be too easy to just have ONE remote).  And suddenly, she pointed one towards the tv in our bedroom and asked for the damn "un-key."!!!  How the f-- does she know??  It's been so long since we've watched tv in there that I don't even know which remote controls it.  And I certainly don't know how to watch Netflix back there.  But I guess it's not a huge jump to go from one tv to another.  Clearly, she's not fooled by the fact that it's in an entirely different part of the house.  Go figure.

I'm sad to say that I caved.  Because while I was playing around with the remote and trying to grab G before we walked out the door, guess what my kid was doing?  Making herself comfortable by dragging a pillow over to the headboard, pulling the covers up, and snugging in with her lovey blankets.  Sigh.  I'm guessing that many ideals are going to be shattered in the face of such goddamn cuteness.   And honestly, those 20 minutes where she snuggled up next to me and pointed out all the things in her video might just have been worth it.

fathers

With Father's Day around the corner, I've been thinking a lot about good dads.  Specifically, I've been thinking that our kid is pretty darn lucky to have an awesome dad.  Those of you that know G even a little bit are probably shocked to hear this.  Believe me, it was a bit of a shock to me, too, and he may have even surprised himself a little.  But when it comes to parenting, my husband's kind of da bomb.

Lately, I feel like I've heard a lot about friends' husbands who don't "help" out as much around the house or with the kids.  To be honest, I think it rubs me the wrong way to hear it phrased quite that way.  I mean, I could care less how other people about it.  But if G were to talk to me about “helping” me to parent OUR child, I’d be pretty livid.  Because doesn’t helping make it sound like it’s my responsibility to begin with and he's doing me a favor by chipping in?  I don’t know, at least that’s the way I’d see it, but that’s probably another rant for a different day.  Maybe you'll be lucky and I'll go off on it at the next party like I've been known to in the past.

Fortunately for all of us, my husband seems to view parenting the way I do.  Sure he might ask me about "babysitting" our child, but only because he knows it annoys me.  He knows how ridiculous it sounds.  I've never had to ask for "help."  He does for our daughter happily what a good parent would do . . . feed her, bathe her, play with her, tell her he loves her, wake up with her in the middle of the night.  I don't think there's a single aspect of parenthood that he hasn't dived into with equal enthusiasm. Well, ok, enthusiasm is a strong word.  Oh, and he probably doesn't spend hours on the internet reading about how to regulate naps or make baby food.  But for the most part, we're a team, and I'm reminded of it daily.  

When I first went back to work after maternity leave, he took a few weeks off to stay home with our then 6-month old.  He'd send me photo updates throughout the day.  During that time, and any time when I've gone to work and he hasn't, he takes night shifts, knowing he might be able to catch a few zzz's during the day.  I don't have to ask, he just does.  When's the little D's been sick (and that's been often), we take turns staying home with her.  When she gets up at night, he's gotten up just as often as I have, if not more.  Sure, when I was breastfeeding, it was a little hard for him to contribute the same way.  But even those nights, as soon as I went back to work, he took his turn changing diapers and putting D to sleep after she nursed.  When it comes to me taking time away from D, he's never been anything but encouraging.  It's hard for me to leave her but never been hard for him to take on the challenge.  I'd hesitantly propose one night, he inevitably says take two.  Sometimes, ok, often, in the mornings on weekends, I roll over and say, "Maybe you could go grab her."  And he mostly always does.  

These days, sometimes, our kid plays favorites.  But she'll just as often cry out for dada as she does for me.  When he's gone, she'll look for him.  She asks for him as soon as she wakes up in the morning.  Whether she's with me or her dad, she is guaranteed the same naps, the same meals, the same basic routine.  I've never worried that he'll forget to change her diaper or feed her on schedule.  I don't leave him to-do lists.  Sure, there were those times she fell off the high chair and opened a bottle of Excedrin on his watch, but she survived.

We do more than our share of fighting.  A few weeks ago, he got the kid hooked on pub mix.  And of course he works too much.  But D will never find him to be anything less than an active parent.  A few weeks ago, a friend watched him playing with both our girls and made a comment about he was a natural at parenting.  While I sometimes get bored putting the same puzzle together a million times, G was telling me lately that he "liked hanging out" with our kid and always had a good time. Whatever.

Anyway, I don't know how you do, but I love that you've always taken on the challenge of parenting as a 2-man job.  And  your kid might just love you more than me.  Happy father's day!\
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evening chaos

The other night, I was chatting my friend YL and she mentioned that they have their daughter, BabyH, sit in her high chair throughout the meal.  They all eat dinner together every night, and BabyH patiently hangs out even after she's done eating.  We've actually talked about this before, and I'm always impressed.  Not so much about sitting in the high chair, which is cool, but more about the fact that they always eat dinner together.  I have other friends that manage this, too, and I don't get it.  How do you guys do it? 

Our evenings are much more chaotic.  G and I take turns with daycare dropoffs and pick ups, but lately, I seem to be doing more of the dropoffs in the morning.  Which means it's usually anywhere from 8-8:30 before I leave D at daycare and often close to 9 by the time I get to work.  Putting me home in the evenings at about 6 at the earliest.  By this point, D is already hungry, as she eats dinner from anywhere between 5:30 and 6.  So G's already feeding or has fed her by the time I get home.  I'm sure we could push out her dinner a bit, but she has her snack at daycare at 3, so not sure how long she could hold out.  Plus, I'm not that fast at cooking.  So home at 6, I'd be lucky to get dinner on the table by 6:45.  D's bedtime is 7-7:15.  It's just not enough time for us to have dinner and get her ready for bed. 

Not to mention that sometime during all this, we have dogs that need to go out and be fed.  And our little princess runs on her own schedule.  So we have to allow for everything to take longer than it might on its own.  Books before bed, for example, are often extended by her inability to pick out the ones she wants to read and god forbid we pick them out for her.  If she's playing outside, her highness decides when it's appropriate for her to finish with the dirt and come on in.  We can pick her up and haul her kicking and screaming to do whatever we want, of course, but we've found that "convincing" her there might be a more fun thing to do is much better for everyone's sanity.  Toddler Time, I've discovered is much slower than Regular People Time.  So it seems easier to just allow extra time for D to pick out which PJs she wants to wear and try to put her socks on by herself.  Rushing it seems to get us nowhere.  So basically, what I'm saying is, there's no way we could have dinner by 6:45 (even if I could by some miracle consistently get dinner on the table by 6:45) and get D to bed by 7. 

And I've tried many ways to streamline it.  If we're not busy, I'll try to cook a bit on weekends to prepare for the week.  And lately, I've been trying to make sure I have a meal plan for the week with groceries ready.  Dishes washed the night before so the kitchen isn't all cluttered.  But beyond this, I'm stumped.  Last night, I got home at 6:45 -- just in time to help with bath time.  Usually G handles most of the bedtime routine but it sucks when I'm already barely home in time to see my kid.   Plus, she was going through a "Mama"-only thing last night, so I read books and hung out for a bit with her in the rocking chair.  She was being extra cute and chatty, so it was 7:30 by the time I left her in her crib. 

And that's when I started cooking our dinner.  Things were extra slow last night, too, we didn't even end up eating until almost 9.  I know we can do better than this, but having something ready for everyone by 6 just seems beyond me.  It's a bit easier when I go into work early and pick D up from daycare.  The dogs will get walked, dinner gets made at a decent hour.  Sometimes it's completely ready by the time D eats, and I'll sit with her and have a bit, too.  Other times, I feed her as I'm cooking.  So while I may not be done with a curry, for example, she'll get the sauteed tofu and veggies as I go along.  But on those days, G is running late because he's gone into work late after dropping D off.   So our shot at a regular family dinner seems impossible at this point and no two evenings are exactly the same. 

Yet, so many people I know manage to do it.  I'm baffled by this. 

And I think it's becoming clear that some sort of consistency is necessary because dinnertimes are pretty chaotic with the kid now.  Sometimes, she'll demand to go outside or sit at her little table instead of her high chair.  Last week, we shared a lovely meal on our bed.  A few times, G has taken her high chair out to the backyard.  He likes it because he can water our plants while she eats.  But I don't know, more and more, I feel like we're giving in too much.  And with this, like all things, I'm sure that our child will do much better with a routine.  It's hard because my family was never one for formal meal time rules or anything, and G and I often eat our meals in front of the TV.  Honestly, we love that we can enjoy our meal in peace after D's asleep.  So we've been lax ourselves for so long that it's probably making it hard for us to make the switch too. 

So . . . any tips out there for a successful and consistent family meal?

spoiled

Last weekend, we went up to visit G's dad and dad's gf.  It was a nice weekend, and although our kid didn't really want a whole lot to do with her grandpa, she loved saying "gampa" and looking for him when he wasn't in the room.  And he got her a monkey puppet that she loved.  A week later, she remembers that he was the one that gave it to her.  She loved his dogs, Bo-Bo and "Tetie" too.  Anyway, throughout the weekend, my father-in-law's girlfriend, B, kept telling us how spoiled the little D is.  Like constantly.  I hate to complain because she's mostly pretty sweet, but OMG already.  Even G got a little fed up, which is actually saying a lot.

It had me thinking -- how spoiled is our kid?  I mean, don't get me wrong.  I don't have a lot of illusions.  I know we shower a heck of a lot of attention on her.  We've rarely let her cry for more than a few minutes.  If she throws a fit, I'll either give in or redirect her.  Sure, we'll ignore sometimes and she'll get over it, but more often than not, we'll at least try to distract her with something funny.  I think it's a combination of self-preservation as well as the desire to not have her be too unhappy.  Just a few weeks ago, I was telling a friend that I kind of let her do whatever she wants.  And this isn't entirely accurate, but I do feel like I weigh each scenario in my head.  Say, for example, she's sitting at the dinner table and playing with the butter knife.  How much do I really care so long as she's happy?  Is it worth a tantrum right now?  Probably not.  I mean, I know she's not going to stab herself with the knife.  If it were a kitchen knife, it might be a different story, but chances are, I'd just let things be.

It's probably why half the time now, we let her take her meals outside, G going so far as to move her high chair out there last night.  The sudden screaming fits coming in for dinner just wasn't worth it to us.  So yah, spend more than a few days at our house, and I think it'd be very clear who  rules the roost.

But here's the thing.  The little D didn't display any crazy behaviors last weekend.  She wasn't throwing tantrums left and right.  She ate nicely at the table and then asked to get down.  She didn't knock over the dog water bowl or play in it.  We left her in her crib at night and she fell asleep.  She didn't start crying and we didn't rush to her side.  And in fact, she'd wake up early, and then hang out in her crib for over an hour until we were ready to get up.  "Mom and Dad are still sleeping," I'd say, and I have no idea what she did after that.  I heard a little humming, some talking to the dogs, but I was mostly out.  Honestly, I thought she was pretty darn well behaved.  So I guess what I'm saying is, how the heck did she seem spoiled last weekend?  And I certainly wasn't the one giving her pretzels and cookies before each meal either.

I was talking about it with a coworker the other day and we were wondering if part of it is generational.  There is something that we do that I'm guessing B maybe didn't.  We pretty much follow the little D around everywhere.  One of us is usually playing with her exclusively if we're both home.  "Sit" our daughter will tell us, patting the floor beside her as she's playing.  And what do we do?  We sit, of course, doing as we're told.  If she wanders to another room, we follow.  Actually she usually asks us to come with her.  "Go!"  She'll point.   I don't know if it's her personality or just what we've accustomed her to, but she likes having us close.  If she's playing with something, she likes to show us.  I guess you could say she's bossy and we take our orders well.  If I'm home alone with her and need to start dinner, I'll usually have her on the floor of the kitchen or on the counter next to me.  The farthest she might be is around the corner on her play mat.  If she's outside, chances are she's perfectly happy digging in the dirt on her own.  And I would probably take advantage to wash a few dishes or start a load of laundry.  But I come out and check often and usually find myself fairly quickly setting down next to her as soon as I've done a few things.

G is mostly the same.  When he's not running around the house with her on his shoulders or tickling her, he's keeping an eye on her outside while he waters the lawn or does yard work. These days, we've even enlisted the little D's help, handing over bean seeds for her to plant or having her point out dog turds for us to pick up in the yard.

Honestly?  I think that's exactly how it ought to be.  She's not really old enough to play on her own for extended periods.  And I kind of like it.  Last weekend, she sat on the front step and pointed next to her as always.  Sit!  I did, and she sidled over next to me, put her arms on my legs, and started "chatting."  Ummmm.  (It's her new thing, I guess I say "um" a lot, and she's started imitating).  "Ummm, Cow!"  Oh yah, I asked, what does a cow say?  "Ooooo!"  And on and on we went, her coming up with different animals and then telling me what sound they made.  Actually I kind of love it.  Sure, our conversations aren't deep.  But there will come a time when she's not this happy to spend time with me, and I know I will miss it.  But maybe it's considered spoiling?  I know my mom has mentioned that when we were growing up in India, she'd set us down and go on about her day -- housework, cooking, whatever else needed doing that day.

And for the record, I'd like to point out that our kid could probably manipulate us far more than she actually does.  At night, she's been pushing it a bit for bedtimes, asking for more milk or another book.  And of course, we give in at least once.   But as soon as she's in her crib, our work is done.  She doesn't cry even though she undoubtedly knows that we come running the moment she does.  We sit with her for a few minutes before bed in the rocking chair, and before long, she points to the crib and tells us, "Bye!"  Remember how we rocked her to sleep til she was one?  Apparently, it didn't make her clingy or give her poor sleep habits or keep her from learning how to sleep on her own.    So I guess what I'm saying is, if this is where spoiling gets us, it all seems to be working out just fine.

Over the weekend, while she was in her travel crib, she saw me finally open my eyes and look at her.  It couldn't have been for longer than a second.  But instantly, I saw her lean forward and throw her lovey blanket to the floor.  And then heard a loud, "Oh oh!!  Get it?!?"  When I dragged myself out of bed to grab it for her, she raised her arms, grinned, and said, "down?"  So even when she manipulates, damn if it isn't cute.