Murphy's Laws for Moms

A soft, plush rocking horse that sings, talks to you, and neighs.  The mouth even moves.  It has two modes: it can rock gently back and forth for younger children or it can spring up and down as if galloping through the forest.  It even has a safety harness for younger children who may not yet know how to sit upright on it.  It is amazing!  At least that's what I thought when I purchased it for my daughter's first birthday present.  The entire time I was trying to determine an appropriate gift, I knew I wanted it to be spectacular.  After all, how many first birthdays does a person have? Infants and toddlers are imaginative creatures.  They build stories and worlds inside their tiny heads.  They look at the world around them and see nothing but possibilities where we might see something boring, bland, or meek.  They see a toy and don't understand price tags.  No, they understand possibilities...just not the same way as us parents....

"Mommy, you've made me very disappointed!" she screamed from the top of her lungs.  Repeating the same phrase over and over and over again.  The emotions continued to rise.  Tears drenched her pillow as she lay kicking in her bed.  I gently tried to calm her down, but to no avail.  Nothing could calm the monster, after all, she was very disappointed.  But, I tried again, "Sweet Pea, you need to take a deep breath and calm down."  We breathed in together and out together.  The fire from her face was beginning to settle.  We breathed again.  The tears gentled.  We counted down: 10...9...8...Breathe...7...6...5...Smile...4...3...2...Relax...1...  Ah.  The moment was calm.  I stared into the eyes of my toddler and said, "Let's talk...Sweet Pea, you cannot eat grapes in bed during naptime."  And, the screaming began again, "Mommy, you've made me very disappointed!" I like to believe that people are rational creature...

She looked at the mountain in front of her and said, "I think I can.  I think I can,"  after all, that's the book Mommy read to her last night before bedtime.  She had become the Little Engine Who Could.  Slowly, she began climbing.  Building strength and speed.  Gaining more and more ground.  Oh, the views from this height; they were spectacular.  She could see the bathroom sink - even reach out and turn the faucets on.  She could grab the toothpaste - untwisting the cap to paint the sink glittery blue.  The excitement!  She had to share it with someone.  As she looked around at the miraculous scenery, she saw someone off in the distance.  "Mommy!  Mommy!"  Then she crashed to the ground. A strong rule for mothers - or parents, in general - to know is that accidents will happen.  We cannot completely protect our kids from them.  Yes, we can try to implement safety precautions to delay the inevitable....

My beautiful daughter can often be found trying to mimic me.  I've always enjoyed the fact that she wants to do what I'm doing and wants to act like me.  This has served me well.  She will repeat phrases I say to her; such as, "My mommy is beautiful" or "Supercallafragalisticexpialladocious" (which often comes out simply as superdocious).  She mimics my behaviors, so I can easily get her to walk like an Egyptian or do the Hokey Pokey.   As I've grown older, I like to think that I have also grown wiser.  I have learned what things I need to purchase in quantity and what things I need to for quality.  I take pride in the things I purchase for their quality, trying to be sure that they have a full life of use. I was getting ready one morning when she was still my only child.  Still learning all of the Mama's Laws, I wasn't paying complete attention to her and was letting her play in one of my bathroom drawers.  After all, how much h...

My morning started off fairly normal.  I was woken up 30 minutes before my alarm went off by a newly potty-trained child telling me her bed was wet.   As I was changing the sheets, the same child had helped herself to a breakfast of Oreos.  My baby boy decided to then wake up as I was cleaning up the trail of double-stuffed cookie crumbs.  Always a happy child, he immediately smiled and brought me back to my happy mama zone.  So, with one child's hunger temporarily satisfied, I opted to take a gamble on getting a shower before noon.  My children were happily playing in my bedroom with PBS Kids playing in the background.  I got everything ready for my shower and started brushing my teeth.  Halfway through my first task, my toddler daughter  told me that my still-infant son was "a piggy bank."  Unsure of what she was talking about, I glanced at my son and noticed that he had something in his mouth.  Well-versed in Heimlich procedure...