This Lunch Is Making Me Lalaloopsy

Wednesday, 9/12/12 - Z and I needed lunches, since this was the first day at the co-op preschool for E's baby class. Followed by school for Z. I knew Z's class was reviewing the letter "L," so when I asked what she was learning, and she said "L," I foolishly mentioned that "Lalaloopsy" started with an "L." And maybe I could make her a Lalaloopsy lunch someday. Dummy.

I was originally going to make Tippy Tumbelina, since that was her first Lalaloopsy doll, and I had some ballet-themed cupcake toppers I could incorporate. But then we got home and I couldn't find her Tippy doll, only the Sugar Cookie Crumbs (or whatever the name is. I can't be bothered to memorize them all...) that she got for Christmas. Plus Cookie's mouse would be easy to do with a boiled egg, versus Tippy's swan thing. And it got Z to stop moping around asking about her Tippy doll when I told her we'd make a Crumbs doll lunch.

L is for Lalaloopsy Lunch

Hard-boiled egg with carrot and olive details, strawberries and blackberries,
ham sandwich, noodles in cheese sauce, chocolate details, edamame, salt

The Mouse Thing: Each Lalaloopsy character has a little minion pet, but I couldn't find the mouse's name, if it even has one.
I hard-boiled one of the free-range eggs I got as a bonus in my CSA share and used a knife to slice slits in the top sides. Two thinly cut carrot coins from a largish organic carrot made the ears, and some bits of uncooked spaghetti noodle and two olive slices made the eyes.

I used some natural food color gel and a toothpick to draw on the facial features, and I tried to draw a tail coming from the back. Meh.
At first the colors bled really badly, so if you choose to color on eggs, here's a tip: blot the liquid off the egg first! Luckily the colors faded into the egg overnight, so it actually doesn't look as bad as it did when I made it!
I used a little DIY funnel out of a scrap of paper to put some pink salt into a little apple-topped sauce bottle for her to add to the egg later.

Lalal-Oopsie: My original plan had been to use my homemade beet dye to color the noodles pink for hair. Easy as pie, right? Bzzzzt! Wrong! I used whole wheat noodles, and they refused to change color! I tried reducing the water and added the whole jar of color, and still nothing!
I was lamenting to my bento buddies on Facebook about my epic fail, and Candy Girl from BentOnBetterLunches suggested I make a cream sauce and just color it. Fine. I was desperate!

Saving Face: For the face I used a biscuit cutter on some bread and ham. I used a mini circle cutter to cut some ham scraps into cheeks.

Lotta Chocolate: My sister loves to melt chocolate to make chocolate-covered strawberries, so whenever I find dark chocolate Dove Promises or bars on super sale, I stock up. Sadly, these all have Vanillin, a fake vanilla flavoring that Z reacts to if she gets too much. I can let the occasional dye-free cupcake slide in an "emergency" (ie: I forgot to bring a safe alternative to her cousin's party,) but not if she also had some recently from, say, Nutella. So we've cut it out of the regular rotation of foods and I'm slowly clearing it out of the house. *sigh* My sister is gonna be sooooo excited to get a grocery-bag full of dark chocolates to make treats with. That she doesn't have to share with us. Since if my babies can't eat it, I try and avoid it as well. (When they're watching, anyways!) She's also going to get my huge stash of Lindt truffles, since they're no good for us either, and I just can't polish them off all on my own!

I did find some dark chocolate Ghirardelli and Lindt bars with no fake flavor though, so we were in business! (Tip: Rite-Aid often has awesome sales on these, like 2/$4 or 2/$5, and often with a +UP reward off your next purchase, making them a fantastic deal to stock up on fancy chocolate bars cheaper than those crappy-tasting chocolate melts!)

I dug around and finally found the Wilton chocolate molding squeeze bottles I had bought to eventually do something with and broke up roughly half a bar to go inside. I like these, since I can just cap them off and keep any leftovers inside to use again next time! If I were really lazy (which I am,) I would just get multiple sets and leave one for each color, once I get some natural chocolate-safe food colors (you don't want to use water-based additives in chocolates. Messes them up somehow!)
I microwaved a mug of water to get it hot, then pushed the bottle into it to get the chocolates to melt. I massaged the sides and put it back in a few times until we were good. Then I made eyes using a mini button chocolate mold. After filling the button molds, I had the chocolate mound up a bit at the back to make them thicker, then trailed off some lines to make eyelashes off the sides. I used a mini bow chocolate mold to make the hair bow. And finally I just squeezed a smile directly onto the sandwich from the bottle. I let my molds sit out on the counter for a while to cool, then popped them in the fridge a few minutes before I was ready to put them on the sandwich.

Hair We Go!: For the pesky noodle hair, I combined some cream cheese, canned parmesan cheese, and milk in the microwave for 30-60 seconds (I forget) until it was all melty, then added a few drops of natural red food color gel and mixed together with the noodles. I don't have exact measurements since I wasn't making a full batch, so I just winged it. Not exactly what I'd had in mind, but good enough!

That'll do, Pig. That'll do.

Well. She LOVED it. L-O-V-E-D it! She made me feel like the bestest Mama in the whole wide world! I really wish I'd gotten a photo of her with it.
She was initially a little thrown by the pink "Mac-n-cheese," but quickly recovered. Tasted okay to me, but it ended up being the only bit of the lunch left over at the end of the day.

Mama Ate A Rainbow!

Tomatoes, blackberries; red lettuce w/purple cabbage, carrots, zucchini, blueberries,
and raspberry vinaigrette. Almonds, dried soy beans, raisins, and chia seeds.

My lunch was fairly quick to toss together. I had pre-made my salad base for the week, so all I had to do was add the fruit topping and sides.
The pointy tomatoes came from Unka Seesee's garden, and the smaller roundier ones came from my organic CSA. The blackberries were all u-pick... from my back yard!

Red tomatoes and lettuce, Orange/Yellow carrots and tomatoes, Green lettuce, Blue/Purple blueberries, blackberries, and cabbage.

In my Easylunchboxes Mini Dippers container with the other dried salad toppings, I added in a Tbsp of MILA Miracle Seed (chia seeds) from my September Savorfull allergy-friendly box. (Savorfull offers a monthly assortment of full- and sample-sized peanut-free and/or dairy-free (your choice) and wheat/gluten-free food items, delivered right to your door. Plus no artificial dyes or flavors!) I had worried that they would be too seedy or weird-crunchy in my salad, but they were fine. Will definitely add again! Extra Omega-3s and fiber? Without adding a funky taste or texture? Sign me up!

Who has TIME for all that?!

Including boiling the noodles and eggs (I went ahead and boiled a few more to put in egg molds, so choosing the molds and peeling the extra eggs and putting them in was also part of this whole time-frame;) freaking out on Facebook that my noodles weren't changing color, getting suggestions and then researching easy cheese sauces; settling the baby back down to sleep; and finding my chocolate stash and chocolate squeezy bottle, searching through my stash for something without artificial vanilla flavoring in it, and then melting, molding, and cooling the chocolates; both lunches took me less than an hour to put together. I've spent a lot longer on a lot less before!
If you had leftover noodles from something else, and enough counter space that you could be boiling eggs WHILE prepping the rest of the lunch (currently I'm using the stovetop as my work surface, which means I have to wait for it to cool down first too...) this would go MUCH faster for you! (And if your stuff was organized so you could find it easily...)

        

Tea For Two... or Three...

ALEX Toys' blog has a contest each month, for a winning birthday boy or girl. So in June, I entered Little Z. And WON! Part of the entry process is to link to an ALEX Toys product your child would like. I assumed the winner got a pre-chosen prize pack, or else I would have been a little greedier more thorough in looking at all the options for my entry selection! There are TONS of Alex Toys I... err, I mean SHE wants. But the one that I came across first was a tin tea set.

My nieces each have different tin tea sets, and they love playing tea party together. And ALEX sent it! They even put her name on the shipping label!

She was BEYOND thrilled! We had an evening gym class and came home late-ish (a make-up class. Our normal class is Friday mornings, but we missed a bunch babysitting my nieces the past few months, and have a ton of make-ups left.) But we came home to find that box on the porch, with "ALEX" on the side, and I told her to look at the label to see who it was for.

Well. Even though it was bath time, she insisted upon getting it all opened and having a tea party first. It comes with a tea pot and lid, 4 cups, 4 saucers, 4 plates, a serving tray and a cardboard suitcase to hold it all.

For "cookies," she used some glass decorator stones that we found in the garage (cleaning. It's a long story. And yes. I did say "cleaning." Take a moment for the disbelief to fade. I'll wait.)

Rock Candy Cookies and Tea for "Dah-duh."
Mommy wasn't invited until later.

So after a short (30-minute-feels-like-eternity/it's-been-a-long-day-Mommy-needs-a-nap/"Mmm! I LOVE pretend tea!") tea party, off to bath, story, bed, etc.
First thing the next morning... does she want to watch a show while I sleep some more take my shower? No. Play games on my phone? No. Tea party with some random small toy "guests" (Little Mermaid figurine, squeezy bath turtle, stretchy spider, plus some others.) Super cute!

"That plate is for Daddy, when he gets home from work."
Awwww!

On a side note, for those of you with an iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad, ALEX Toys has an awesome app, and right now, at least it's free! Moody Monster Manor is one of Z's current favorites. ALEX's monsters are friendly monsters that help identify different emotions. We have a hooded bath towel, some bath puppets, build-a-monster face bath stickers, and a set of Moody Monsters games from them, so she's already a bit familiar with the characters. She likes doing the "Meet the Monsters" where she gets a description of each monster. There is also a monster maker, plus some other games. But I'm ALWAYS hearing the "That's Worried Wanda... blah blah blah" bits!

Disclaimer: I was not solicited to write a review on this product, or any of their products. But since we happened to win this toy, and she loves it SO much, I'm telling you about it, as a kind of thank-you to them for randomly choosing my entry. And for having this contest each month! (Look on the side bar under "Recent Posts" for each month's giveaway. July's is still open! And if you enter, be sure to check back on the post to see if you won! It was a total fluke that I even checked, since I was sure I HADN'T won!)

Muffin Tin Monday - Byoo-duh-fuh Nunch For Baby!

The other night, as I was loading her baby dolls and accessories into the new (used) Cinderella toy chest Unka Kee-ile and Auntie Nizzie gave her for Kimmens, she decided she had to play with one of her babies right now. She chose "brown baby" (her name for it, not mine. I just call them all "baby." The others are "pacifier baby" who came with a pacifier tied on; "bottle baby" who came with a bottle tied to the wrist, although now I think she calls it "feeding baby" since it makes sucking sounds when you use the bottle it came with. There's a "pink baby" too, with a pink body/outfit (they ALL came with pink clothes!) but that may be Tually's. Oh, no wait. They each have a "pink baby." Slightly different ones though.)

Brown Baby is the second baby doll I ever got for her, and it was on super clearance at Target for $3! (First baby doll was Pink Baby. Then Brown Baby, Pacifier Baby and Feeding Baby.) She came with a hat, cloth diaper, and footie pajamas. When you press her tummy, she cycles through "Mama," "Papa," giggling and crying. When we first got her, Little Z would burst into tears whenever the baby made the crying sound, after I told her that the baby was crying because she was sad. Oops. I was just trying to teach vocabulary and emotion identification! I told her that feeding the baby made her happy again, but it didn't work. So we had to turn Brown Baby off for a while.

The reason behind the name, I'm ashamed to say, is because of the doll's skin color. This doll was intended to be Hispanic (hence the "Papa" instead of the more standard "Dada.") I don't care about what race/color her toys are, and it was super cheap, so I bought it. I have *never* called the doll 'brown.' I *have* shown her that her skin is a different color from that doll's (and any other toy with different coloring,) in an attempt to teach diversity acceptance in a safe setting where I won't offend anyone by pointing out their differences! But I also point out that *my* coloring is different from hers (I have brown hair and eyes, she has blond hair and blue eyes) and I talk about how everyone is different and looks different and can do different things, and everyone is special. I've started playing "I Spy" games with her when we eat out, as a way to get her to see differences without saying "look at the kid in the wheelchair." I'll say something like "I spy someone with brown hair" or "I spy someone with a hat." "I spy something that rolls." "I spy someone wearing purple" etc.

Anyway...

She finds the feeding spoon I got for her with a set of baby doll crap accessories and decides she must feed Brown Baby. Since I refuse to open the dolly sippy cup of old stale Goldfish crackers that was in with her baby stuff, she gets out the muffin tin from the Melissa and Doug Cupcake Decorating set and starts putting cupcake liners in each cup.
When I ask her what she's doing, she says she's making a "byoo-duh-fuh nunch" for her baby. Awwwwwwww! Too cute! A Muffin Tin Meal just like Mommy makes!
She puts a wooden cupcake in one liner, the cuppie with stale goldfish in another, and starts spooning out imaginary food to feed the baby from an empty cup.

Her very first Muffin Tin Meal!

FYI: Preemie clothes fit great on the littler baby dolls, and you can often find them super cheap on clearance racks, thrift stores or consignment stores! Cheaper than buying doll clothes! I like to shop Carter's outlet store's clearance racks, but sometime Fred Meyers has some too. Many other brands, like Osh Kosh B'Gosh, Children's Place and Gymboree don't make Preemie sizes. Gerber probably does. Babies R Us might carry some, but I've never seen any on the clearance racks. Newborn size (not 0-3 months. NB specifically) fits medium to larger baby dolls okay too. Brown Baby is wearing a NB-sized outfit I got for $.50 at a garage sale. Many moms clubs have community garage sales, so search Craigslist for club, group or multi-family garage sales! The moms club ones tend to have a great selection of baby stuff!
I usually have a 20% off $40+ purchase coupon for Carter's, so if I'm buying other stuff, I tack on some clearance Preemie clothes for her dolls. Off a 70% off rack I found a set of 2 onesies and a pants for $3, 3 pairs of Preemie booties for $2, and a 2-pack of PJs for $3. Plus the 20% off! So $6.40 plus tax for it all! Most toy store doll outfits you only get one shirt and pants, or one dress, plus maybe shoes or socks or a hat for that price or more!

**Shameless plug alert!**
If you know a kid totally into her doll, like an American Girl doll, for example, my sister makes awesome custom jewelry for the doll and/or child. She can do bracelets for both, necklaces for both, bracelet/necklace set for either/both, whatever! Personalized, if desired. Check her stuff out! You can contact her directly too!

The Cheese Stands Alone

Yesterday was one of those days where doing nothing feels like a fun and fulfilling day! I mean that in a good way. I decided not to do any of the activities on offer with my moms clubs, and we just lounged around the house. Normally on my 'rest' days, I sit at the computer Facebooking and doing emails and such, and Little Z stares like a zombie at her 'shows' on Daddy's computer. Well, in all honesty, we did some of that too. But we also had quality play time together.

We opened the day with me showing her the Dora The Explorer application I put on my 'new' iPhone (my husband's old one - see previous post.) That ate up a bunch of time, until she got too frustrated with it. It's really meant for slightly older kids, and we just did the touch-to-color portion of the app. So then I showed her the Itsy Bitsy Spider app, by Duck Duck Moose, who did the Wheels On The Bus app she loves so much on my husband's phone. It just plays the song in the background while you sift through pages where touching/sliding certain objects makes them move. It's a great tool for teaching her how the touch-screen works. She tends to hold the phone with her thumb over the Menu button, so I frequently hear a wail of "I NEEDA ITTABITTA PIE-DAH GAYM!" from the bedroom, where she's still playing with the phone!
So I show her ONE TIME how to turn the phone on, slide the touch-button to unlock, and slide the app icon pages until she sees her 'spider square.' Not long after, when I went in to change her diaper amidst protests, she snaked the turned-off phone from me, and had it turned on and unlocked before I had grabbed a diaper out of the basket at the foot of the bed! She has mastered the on and unlock features! She still gets stumped if she doesn't see the icon, but I moved her apps to the front page for easy access. She has little sausage fingers, and lack of fine motor skills, so she often jabs at the wrong icon and is typing up text messages before she realizes her game isn't on, but I taught her to press the menu button ONE TIME ONLY until she saw the page with the spider game. She could do it all by herself by lunchtime.

When it was time for my shower, I set her up in front of Dora, with a bowl of Cheerios mixed with organic fruity-O's of some kind (Cascade Farms, I believe.) I confiscated the iPhone due to a lack of desire to get milk on it. Then we played for a while in the living room before I realized we had hit nap time and hadn't had any lunch! Since I was in a hurry, she had a hot dog (she doesn't like them cooked, since she hates waiting, but I read that even though they are pre-cooked, there's still a chance they have listeria, so I nuked it for 30 seconds first.) I cut it up into little chunks, even though she doesn't need me to. I know hot dogs are a choking hazard, but she's been very good about taking small bites and chewing thoroughly. From 13-months-old she's had no problems eating dogs, and I never leave her with one unsupervised. But in this case, I didn't have any cheese except for string cheese and the last little bit of 'cheese of 1000 hands' which is what I call the cheese we used in my cooking class where the kids got to grate it for their quesadillas. It's kinda grubby. I saved it for cooked-food purposes only. So I thought it might be cute to slice up the string cheese and hot dog into little bits. Add a blob of ketchup (she loves 'dip,' and it cools down the food enough she's not screaming that it's too hot when it's really only luke-warm.) She ate it all and asked for seconds! And she ate at least 2/3rds of that too! I had some leftover tuna/mayo mix on Saltines (and her discards.)

After nap, we played in the living room with a new toy I had ordered over a month ago from Totsy.com (a discounted daily-deal site.) It was an Alex Toys' Moody Monsters 3-game-set. We played with the Memory game and the Mix N Match game. I tried to get her to find the matching faces, but she would pair them up using toddler logic. "Dis wun sad, needs his mommy! Happy wun! There! He wit his mommy nao!" And she just liked building long snaking many-armed-and-feeted monsters with the mix n match parts! And then started adding on shapes-shaped play foods (like a rectangle 'chocolate bar.')

Then we touched-up her pedicure by adding new colors and painting them on the parts of the nail that the previous color had washed off of. She loved her 'rainbow nails' and I loved that the polish was non-toxic!

 

On a trip outside to get the mail, Z decided she wanted to play in the little pebble patch next to our driveway. We found a ginormous ant - big enough she could pick it up in her pincer grasp! She loved it. It was dropped and retrieved several times, and, quite frankly, I'm amazed it survived intact! When I finally made her set it free (it needed to go home to it's mommy) she cried and said she missed it.

As some roving missionaries took advantage of my inability to escape inside with my kid fast enough, Z decided to bring out her tub of chalk, which we keep in an old kitty litter bucket on the porch (to prevent having to go inside and look for her outdoor stuff each time she wants to do something. We just keep her chalk and bubble stuff in there.) While drawing her 'fire breath' masterpiece (from DragonTales - they all breathe fire,) she saw a teeeeny tiny ant walking across the poor attempt at a Cassie face that she had me draw. (A Dragon Tales character.) She picked it up (and by 'picked,' I mean 'squished) and proceeded to show it around and talk about how much she loved it and would take good care of it.When I suggested that she may have squished it, I was informed that she had not. When she decided to set him free to go home to his mommy, she decided he was, in fact, squished. "Dis wun too skishy. I needa FESH WUN!"

For dinner we had toasted cheese sandwiches. Since she kept reaching for where the sharp knife was cutting the cheese, I set her up with her child-safe knife (really it's just a pumpkin carving knife, but works for sawing and hacking away at softer foods) and the 'cheese of 1000 hands' to cut on 'her' cutting board. She had great fun. She even helped to slice her sandwich, and enjoyed her crookedy bits.

  

Mary, Mary Quite Contrary

I was expecting an early version of the 'Terrible Twos' at around 18 months, as the books and magazine articles warned, so I was unprepared at 16 months when someone turned on her b!tch switch. Realistically, her 'terrible' mode is probably closer to most kids' 'normal' mode, but I wasn't used to it, so it was probably still as frustrating. Since I got used to it, we've been in a nice groove, with me using my 'Fast Food Rule' and 'Caveman talk' as advised by Dr. Karp in "Happiest Toddler On the Block." My sister may argue that its a waste of time, but it works on HER kid too, whenever I'm there. Based on developmental books and articles I've read, I was under the impression that the last 6 months out of each age-year are the worst parts. So I was looking forward to a nice 6 months, now that she's 2. But apparently she hasn't read these books. She's jumped right into her 2 1/2 'NO' phase.

"Are you hungry? Would you like some popcorn?"
"No.
...
...
I need some poptorn."

With her talking toys, she's super polite about it. She has a Leapfrog plush toy named My Pal Violet that we call Purple Puppy.
"My favorite animal is a zebra! Is that YOUR favorite too?"
"No, purple puppy. Dassnot my favrit"
"I like chicken nuggets! Do YOU?"
"No, purple puppy. I no nyk dem."
"Would you like to play a game?"
"No. Sorry purple puppy."
"Can you show me a happy face?"
"No sorry, I tan't."

All week long I've had a plethora of fun activities to choose between from my myriad moms groups. (More than I've listed, even. These are just the ones that most interested me.)

Monday Fun Plans: Kelsey Creek Farm or a park in Maple Valley 
ACTUAL Monday: Parks cancelled due to rain and my inability to get us both ready in time. I needed supplies for my cooking class the next day, so I decided we'd go shopping.
"Do you want to go to the store with me?"
"No. I no wantoo."
"Do you want to stay here with Unka See-see while I go to the store?"
"No. You no wantoo go to store."
"I need to go to the store. You can come with me or stay here."
"I come with you."

[At store] "Okay, do you want to ride in the cart or walk near me?"
"No. Holdjoo."
"I can't carry you and push the cart. You need to sit here in the cart or here in the basket or walk."
"You want to carry me please."
(Ugh. Fine.) [Carry to produce section.]
"I need to ride inna tart!"

Tuesday Fun Plans: My Toddler/Preschooler Cooking class.
ACTUAL Tuesday:
"Okay! Kids are coming over today! Let's get dressed to cook guacamole and play with the other kids!"
"I no WANNA took kakamoley! No kids! I dohn wanna play!"
"Okay. You don't have to cook or play. But I need to be in the kitchen with the kids to help them. You can play in your room or in the living room. Do you want to put any toys away that you don't want to share?"
"No."
"Do you want me to put your babies in my bedroom so the other kids can't play with them?"
"No. Mine."
"Right. They are YOUR babies. Do you want to share them with the other kids?"
"No kids. Share."
"... Okay. How nice that you want to share your babies. Let's get dressed."
[Diaper wrassling, outfit-choosing samba and Cocoa Puffs with Cheerios for breakfast. Kids arrive. Someone touches one of her babies.]
"Yeeeeee-AAAAAAAUGH! MINE! I NEED IT! THASSMYBAYBEEEDOHRAAAA!"
"Little D is playing with that right now. You can ask him for a turn, or you can wait until he is done to have a turn."
"NO! (weeping, whining, sniveling, sniffling) I need it my baby Dora... [2-3 minutes later]
Maybe I ask... Peash can I have it my baby Dora?" [Little D hands it over without a fuss.]
[Wash, rinse, repeat with each baby-doll-related item. You can read my previous post for more details on not wanting to 'took' the 'kakamoley' or 'kiss-ideass.']

As it was our 14th first date/5th wedding anniversary, we may have gone out to dinner somewhere, but I honestly can't recall. We did our big dinner-and-a-movie on Sunday.

Wednesday Fun Plans: Several park options, a secret shop, meet Daddy at work at 3:30 so he could take her while I got paid $75 to be in a focus group. Little Gym at 6. MOMS board meeting at 7.
ACTUAL Wednesday: Parks cancelled due to rain and lack of gumption on my part. Devastating phone call ate up the rest of my pre-nap time. Secret shop postponed to Thursday. Packed leftover butterfly and flower turkey and cheese plus berry medley as a snack and headed to Daddy's work for a nap-in-the-car ride.
"Let's go meet Daddy at work!"
"No."
"Do you want to go see Daddy?"
"No Daddy."
"...Do you want to stay here with Unka Sees.... nuts. He's off playing Dungeons and Dragons today. Time to get in the car! Do you want to walk or do you want me to carry you?"
"Carry me."
Dumped her off, went to focus group. It was interesting. Paid in cash! Ka-CHINGGG! Made it just in time for the last 10-15 minutes of her Little Gym's end-of-year 'Big Show.' MOMS board meeting for dinner (medium decaf white chocolate mocha. Forgot to order a pastry.)

Thursday Fun Plans: Bouncy Place or Pizza Playdate (we did pizza.) Then afternoon play with Unka See-see while I went out to do a secret shop. My cousin's High School graduation at 6:30.
ACTUAL Thursday: Read previous post
"Okay. I'm going to the sample store! Do you want to come with me?"
"No."
"Okay. You stay here with Unka See-see. Here's some water. Here's a snack. Here's the *Horse and Dinosaur flashlight movie! [Toy Story 2] See you soon! Have fun!"
[Do secret shop. Nosh on many samples. Buy olive oil. Return home. COMPLETELY forget cousin's graduation until about 15 minutes after it started. Doh!]

* Recently I was at Toys R Us and decided to find a kid-friendly flashlight, since she loves Daddy's Mag-light, but for her its basically a head trauma waiting to happen! We found a dollar store flashlight, which she loves, but if you shake it it turns off. Sometimes you have to unscrew it all and re-assemble it to get it to work again. And it has a glass faceplate, so not really kid-safe. The ones I found at first looked like smaller, more expensive, Disney-Princess-covered versions of the same, so I asked for help and they showed me some Toy Story 3 flashlights in the shapes of the Pig, Slinky dog, Dinosaur [Rex] and the Horse [Bullseye] characters. When you push the button under the tail, the mouth opens, light goes on, and fun character sound effects. Since I wasn't going to drag all 4 over to where she was zooming around on a scooter, I picked the dino and horse as the most likely to be favored. It took her about 15 minutes to decide on the Horsey one. About a week later, she started begging and crying for the dinosaur flashlight, only we didn't understand her words, or her context for ages. And I'm not shelling out for another one!

Friday Fun Plans: Father's Day craft or Park Play, but probably just slob around all day since Daddy will be out of town for the weekend. 
ACTUAL Friday: Forgot *I* had to take Daddy to airport. Got up early. Nyah. Skipped both mommy club options after and went to Rite Aid to pick up my prescriptions and a free mouse pad with her picture on it from the photo department. (One of the blogs I get emails from told me about a code to get it free, and free shipping if you pick up in-store!)
"Let's go to the prescription store!"
"No. I don wantoo."
"Well, I can't leave you in the car, and we didn't bring shoes, so I can carry you, or you can ride in the cart."
"No cart. Carry you." [She reverts back to saying 'you' when she means 'me' frequently when she's upset or tired.]
[At photo department to pick up mouse pad.]
Lady: "Here, let me open this so you can make sure it's right before you take it."
"No, it was free, so you don't have too... [too late. It's opened.]"
"IT'S ZJHEE! ITSA PITCHUR ZJHEE! That's for me. I need it for my dolls. Friend for Abby." (Abby Cadabby doll she brought inside with her.)
Cooing/singing: "Heeeeere Abby. Mat for yooooou. Take to bed witjooooo"
.... Okay. Daddy's out of town for Father's Day, so what do I care.

Saturday Fun Plans: Maple Valley Fire Department open house.

ACTUAL Saturday: 

"Okay! Time to get dressed! Do you want to go to the fire house today and see firemen?" [Brace for fight]

"YESH! I want fire house!"

"... 

...

...Okaaay. Let's change your diaper and get an outfit on to wear to see the fire trucks!"

"No diaper! Wear THIS OUTFIT! Gee-go Mah-nuhs!" (Giggle Monsters - a Carter's PJ set.)

[Oh phew. It's still my kid. Compromised with pajama top and regular pants. Relatively little fight over getting in the car, other than wanting to play with sidewalk chalk first.]

It was a pretty cool event. They gave her a goodie bag with a coloring book and crayons, and an activity checklist you could turn in for a prize after completed.

"Do you want to meet a fireman?"

"No."

"... Can you give him a high five?"

"No. I tan't."

"... Can you wave hello?"

"No. I TAN'T"

Fireman: "Here, let me initial your sheet..."

[Roaring] "NO! WAAAAH! IT'S MINE!"

Fireman: "Would you like a sticker?"

"N-..." [Nods head.]

"Oooh do you want to go sit in the fire truck?"

"No." 

"Okay. You can stay in the stroller and we can look around. Ooh they're going to cut open a car. Let's watch them. Do you want a donut?" 

"No donut."

[Describing of tools, situation, explaining actions, all interesting to her until they finally get the doors off.]

"Are you hungry? Would you like a hot dog? A hamburger?"

"Hot. Dock."

[She ate two, and rejected offer of a cookie. We went into a little fire alarm house all scaled to little kids where they showed fire hazards and talked about good and bad fires, then had smoke, and alarm and a hot door so we had to climb down the ladder.]

"Okay! We need to climb down the ladder. That fireman withe the mustache is going to help you and I'll climb down too."

[She's good until she's low enough I won't be able to help her anymore and the fireman starts to grab her.]

"NO! MOMMY! WAAAAH! NO CLIMB!"

[We go back inside and down the stairs and out the side door. Meet police, get card stamped, stand in line FOREVER to get use the fire hose. Stave off whining and nagging pleas for an ICEE (sno-cone.) Start fireman obstacle course. Get kicked off so Medevac Helicopter can land (a fun treat for the event, not an emergency.) Get sand-blasted in the face when it flies past us to land. Finally give in to ICEE requests. Get it in time to still watch helicopter land from within the firetruck garage through the windows on the closed doors. Make one last attempt to finish off our activity card.] 

"Do you want to sit in the fire truck?"

(Nom nom nom slurp.) "No."

"Are you sure? See? That girl is driving it! How fun!"

"No wantoo."

"Fine. Hi! Can we get our thing stamped? She's done." [Nice fireman stamps remaining 2 activities. We go to prize booth.]
"Do you want to turn this in for a prize?"

(Slurp. Nom nom.) "No. Mine."

"Tough. Do you want to spin the wheel? Like this?" [Spin wheel to show her.]

Lady at booth: "Yellow! You get a bracelet!"

(In my head: "Are you shitting me serious? You're not gonna let her do it? Whatever. Don't care. Outta here.")

"Ooo! A bracelet! You are so lucky!"

"Open it!"

"Do you want to wear it?"

(Nom nom slurp) "No."

"Hey. Are you cold? ["No." Shivering] I'm going to put this blanket on you. ["NO!" Blue lips] I won't cover your hands. You can still eat your ICEE."

[Back at car] "Your hands are freezing. Can I rub them or warm them up for you?"

"No."

"Are you done with your ICEE? You want to throw it out?"

"NO! Waaah!"

"Okay, okay! I'm not taking it, I'm just asking. Can I put it in a cup for you? Here. Let me dump out your water and put it in your Dora cup. Now you can drink it." 

"Waaah! Need STRAW!"

"But you won't be able to suck the ice through... fine. Are you hungry? Would you like to get some fries to warm you up?"

"No. No fries."

[Head home.]

"WAAAAAAH! IT'S NOT WORKING! MY ICEE ALL DAWN! OH NO! WAAAAH!"

"You want me to put some of my soda in it?"

"NO! WAAAH!"

"I can put in a little soda to help melt the ice so you can drink it."

"SODA! SODA! WAAAH! [Slurp slurp slorp] WAAAH! ALL DAWN AGAIN!"

(In my head: "It's okay. Breathe. She's tired. It's naptime. We're almost home.")

"Look! Llamas! Do you see them?"

"Dere dey are! HI LLAMAS! HI-YEE! BYE-EE LLAMAS!"

[Repeat with cow, only she insists its an elephant, since she can only see its butt. "BYE-EE EH-NEH-FAN!"]

OhPraiseBabyJesusSheFellAsleep.

The only other 'Yes' today was when I asked if she wanted to watch Unka See-see cook dinner. She LOVES to watch him cook, and he's good about letting her 'help.'

I just hooked up my blog so I can link to Amazon, so you can see some of the stuff I talk about. If you like it, and happen to buy it through my link, I get a teeny tiny commission, which is a nice bonus for me, but don't let that be a factor! Once I figure out how to add pictures and links that aren't big long addresses, I'll be able to use visuals to help you see what I'm talking about! So far, this was the best I could do.
[6/29/10 - I've learned how to add pictures, so I've gone back through and added some!]

  

Whack-A-'Munk, Paint-aminophen

For her 2nd birthday recently, I registered at Amazon for a Whack-A-Mole board game by Mattel. She saw it at Target one time and I had to hold her up to the shelf to use their demo version until my arms fell off. I promised her we would put it on her birthday list. Now, I know she's 2 and wouldn't remember 5 minutes later, and would never know if I had actually put it on her list, but why start deceiving her on the little stuff, when there's loads of bigger issues that will come up where my lies would be better served. I even saw it later at Toys R Us on clearance for around $5! I was about to snap it up when I realized - I don't want this stupid thing in my home. Why would I do this to myself?

Well, Gramma Barp to the rescue! She won't let my baby down! She knows SHE won't be on the receiving end of Z's newly-created 'Whack-A-Mommy' game. SHE won't be the one kissing scratches after an aborted attempt at 'Whack-A-Kitty.' And SHE won't be the one without any working AA batteries in the house the day Z wants to open it, and can only find some questionably used ones that turn out not to work and make the game go 'Heh-heh-heh-heh-heh' endlessly in an annoying, loud, high-pitched mole-y voice. (Supposed to say 'Heeeere Moley moley moley!') The day after her party she demanded that the box be opened (I'm SO glad she was too overwhelmed with dollies at her party, since toddlers with bats is not my idea of a good time!) Much 'Its BROKEN! Lights broken mommy! Waaah!' ensues. I bust into my 'emergency' battery stash (removed from my neglected, dust-covered 'personal massager' in a drawer so unused that my pile of worldly goods cluttering the floor had to be cleared to even get it open.) That's right. I put skeevy batteries in my baby's toy! I'm THAT kind of mom!

So, now that it works, she takes out some toddler aggression on it. Periodically she rediscovers it and obnoxiousness ensues! Well, today, she gathers all of her Alvin and the Chipmunks 2 Happy Meal toys from her room and dumps them in my lap. They have annoying little chipmunk voices, and when you press their 'hair' they chirp some little saying from the movie. My little smart-ass stands them on her Whack-A-Mole board and uses her Whack-A-Mole bat to whack them. I'm ashamed to say this was a proud, proud Mommy moment for me. Until she remembered her old stand-by, Whack-A-Mommy.

When hitting me no longer paid off (I took her bat,) she climbed in my lap and grabbed the Infant Tylenol I had by my monitor from the recall when I went online to get a refund. Now we have a firm rule that medicine is NOT a toy, and don't let her handle the bottles in a casual manner, whether or not they are child-resistant. But as I opened my mouth, I realized that I was going to dump it down the sink anyway, she could have the empty bottle to give medicine to her dollies. Now, my husband and I disagree on this point, but I win, since he's not here. He argues that giving her a bottle to play with will reinforce her belief that medicine IS a toy. I argue that I emphasize that her empty BOTTLES are toys and NOT medicine anymore, but that she can pretend they have medicine for her dollies. We also decorate them, and I tell her we do this so we will know that they AREN'T medicine. She hasn't seemed any more confused than she is about the dolly's bottles and pacifiers.

So I invite her to help me wash out the bottle, which she enjoys. She paints and splatters the bathroom sink with lavender sludge. She uses the squirt dropper and shakes the bottle around (it has a drip-resist thing in the bottle neck, which makes pouring it out harder, but if you shake it sideways, its slings it out in a nice little arc across the sink.) She was very good about not reaching in to the sink to get any on her fingers. I didn't even have to tell her not to. I told her that this medicine had gone bad and was not good anymore so we were throwing it away. After her little APAP Pollock project, we got out her sticker collection and she chose Abby Cadabby stickers to decorate the bottle for her dollies. Big Pooh got a dose of his 'tummy meh-nen' then off to watch some Disney Sing-Along Pooh before crashing asleep in her chair 5 seconds after rejecting my suggestion that we go lie down for her nap. Nuts. I forgot to feed her lunch.