The advent calendar

The advent calendar. Each year I look forward to getting them for the girls. For the past few years Grandma Mower - who is no relation to us (she's my brother-in-law's mother) has bought my girls their advent calendar. This year the 5th of December rolled around and I realized that I didn't have my calendars! I thought about Grandma Mower and realized that she had recently been in the hospital and I was probably not getting calendars this year. My crafty little brain started turning and I started searching for ideas to count down the days until Christmas. Luckily, my crafty little brain got side tracked and Rachel (Grandma Mower's actual granddaughter) showed up with our calendars that very night! We were all super excited to get the calendars. Rachel helped get them all caught up.



The next morning I noticed Macie was in the "don't look at me I'm doing something really bad over here" corner. So I went to investigate and found that she had taken her calendar over to the "Don't look at me I'm doing something really bad corner" and eaten the entire thing. She got in huge trouble. So, each night now when her sisters eat theirs, she gets to watch them and I remind her of how naughty she was for eating all of hers.



A few days ago I got out of the shower and opened the bathroom door and found Macie sitting on the floor - with her "Oh crap, I've been caught again" look on her face, surrounded by advent calendars.

"Macie, what's in your mouth?"

"Noshing" (As she's trying to keep her mouth closed over the chocolate).

"Macie, did you eat from Lindsay and Maddie's calendars?"

She finally nodded.

She got yelled at by me and by Lindsay (Maddie's wrath was later unfolded upon her when she got home from school).

"You shouldn't eat someone else's calendar, that's naughty."

Tears.

"Well, you shouldn't leave them where I can reach them, Mom!" (I had to do a double take, she sounded just like Maddie when she said it).

She did have a point, right?



Another morning Maddie popped out of bed and asked right away if she could have her chocolate. I said no, you need to have breakfast first. She said,
"Humph....then I'm not telling you what I want for breakfast."

"Fine" I say and I go downstairs and pour her a bowl of cocoa puffs instead of her usual breakfast sandwich or waffle. I thought I was punishing her. Jeramy looked in her bowl and said, "So, you wouldn't let her have her chocolate candy before breakfast, but you just gave her a large bowl of chocolate cereal?"

Yup.

I did.

That'll teach her to ask for chocolate in the morning.

Curlers, schmurlers.

Yesterday I had an early morning meeting at church. When I got home, I thought, "There is 4 hours before church, I should put curlers in the girls hair."

So I pulled out the dusty curlers. Macie was amazed by them. "Mom, what do you do with those?" That's when I realized she had never had them in her hair.

You'll notice in the 3 pictures above, Maddie was quite familiar with curlers. They were just a part of her every day life for the first few years of her life. (Maybe that's why she now refuses to let me even curl the ends of her hair).

Well, Macie left the curlers in her hair for a total of 20 minutes before she yanked them all out.

Lindsay's hair looked absolutely beautiful curled! (and yet, I forgot to take a picture). As we sat there in sacrament meeting, I noticed the curl slowly going away, and by then time she went to primary it was just wavy.

Maddie actually asked for curlers also. I had to use my hot curlers on her hair because I was all out of the foam kind. I didn't get to leave them in long enough because she had to go be Jeramy's home teaching companion. Hers didn't curl at all.

Later that night, we had tithing settlement. As we sat waiting for our turn, I looked at each of my girls and thought, "When did I stop caring?"

Macie had somehow got in the car and to the church without shoes. Did we drive the 30 seconds home to get them? Nope. She also had a big glob of what I think was glittery chap stick in the back of her hair. Maddie's hair was a wreck. Lindsay was passable, but in no way really appropriate to be out in public.

A friend of mine blogged about this a few months ago, and as I read it, realized how true it was for me, too! When Madddie was little, we never left the house without her hair done, curled and with a bow. Lindsay was pretty much the same. Macie...well, not so much. Some mornings I'll look at her and think, "Eh, still looks good enough." And I just don't do her hair. (Now you all know what a horrible mother I am). In my defense, she's terrible when I try to do her hair and some days, you just have to pick your battles, right?

I guess I'll blame my lack of caring on the mullet post of 2009

Santa

Last night I took the girls to see Santa. We had tried this on the day after Thanksgiving and after waiting about a half hour and not being anywhere near the front of the line, we all agreed to leave. They have been begging me to go back ever since. Jeramy was at the church again last night, so I decided it was time to go back and face the line again. (And hit Bath and Body works, last day of $6 Wallflowers).

As we walked in the mall, I saw a family dressed in their Sunday best. I knew they were on their way to see Santa. I quickly pulled my three girls around their 3 girls and passed them up. We beat them. I heard some whisperings about "She totally went around us to get here first" behind me. Made for an awkward wait, but totally worth it. (We were not anywhere near Santa when I did it).

We waited for 30 minutes. 30 LONG minutes. The entire time Macie kept saying, "I will not sit on Santa." And the whole time I coached her on what she was to ask for...a camera, not a pillow pet.

The moment finally arrived. Macie latched onto my leg. Sweet Santa stood up, lined my 3 girls up and grabbed Macie's hands (before she could bolt). He stroked her cheek, he played with her hair, he whispered in her ear. He laughed with her. The look of utter amazement on her face brought tears to my eyes. Santa wasn't scary. Santa was a kind, old man who wasn't rushing my children through the line just to get to the next kid. (like the Santa on "The Christmas Story"). He did the same with each of my girls, and each one had that same amazed look. And this is when it gets a little sappy - for me - at least...we have a Christmas book that compares Santa to Christ. As my girls stood there with Santa, I couldn't help but think of how totally Christ-like this Santa really was. He loved my girls, and they felt loved. I can only imagine waiting in line to see Christ, then having him hold my child's hand, stroke their cheek and laugh with them. Wow. Kind of a powerful moment standing there in the mall with Santa.

So, thank you Santa, for being so kind! You rock. (If only you weren't charging $22 for a 5x7 and 2 3x5's, we'd be best friends for life).

Side story...after seeing Santa, we went to Bath and Body. I got what I was there for, then my kids saw the little tiny bottles of hand sanitizer. They all begged me to buy them each one, so I did. (It's the least I could do since they won't have a picture with Santa to remember our night by). They each stood and sniffed and switched about a million times until they all found a scent to their liking. On the way home, they each smelled and sanitized, smelled and sanitized, and then I finally had to put my foot down and only let them smell - before the alcohol ate through their hands. We stopped off to see Jer at the church and they ran in and told him all about...their hand sanitizer. He finally said, "What about Santa??" Then they remembered Santa. First thing this morning when they woke up, they each found their little bottle of sanitizer and had a good smell. Who knew how cool sanitizer could be??

Can I get a large heath bar shake, and a good cry?

Yesterday was just one of those days. I couldn't really pinpoint the source of my stress/anxiety/anger/tension. I tried many times throughout my busy day to figure out why I was feeling so... not like myself. I could never find the source. My post is not really for me to whine about my awful day, but about my sweet daughter.
My day was drawing to a close. It was 8:00 and we were driving home from the library. Macie asked if I would read her new books to her when we got home. I sighed and said, "Mommy is too tired to read tonight." Just then we got stopped at the light right by my favorite place to buy really good shakes.
Shakes large enough to feed a small country.
Shakes filled with enough calories to add a few pounds to my ever-growing body.
I wanted one. Bad. I needed one.
BUT
1) if I got one, I'd have to share with the kids.
2) then they'd be up even longer than necessary eating instead of sleeping
3) then I'd eat all those calories that I didn't need.
4) then I'd feel guilty.
Light changed. I went past. That's when I realized that I didn't need ice cream, I just needed a good cry.
Do you ever need a good cry?
Jeramy thinks that is the dumbest thing ever. "Why are you crying? It's not going to help anything?"
Ahh, but a good cry does help, right ladies?
As we pulled into the driveway, Maddie said to me, "Mom, give us our vitamins and then you go have a bath. I will get the girls ready for bed and read to them."
And she did.
And I did.
And I had my good cry. (Jer was at the church for bishopric, so he wasn't even home to tell me how stupid it is to cry for no reason).
Then I felt better.
I got out and went in and thanked Maddie.
She scratched my back.
That's when I had this thought, "This can't possibly be the same girl that stomped her feet at me this morning for not letting her wear her snow pants to school. The girl that said to me, "Fine. I'm just not going to get off the bus and I'm never coming home!" And I yelled back, FINE. Goodbye!"and shut the door."
Yet another taste of all the fun years ahead of me with 3 girls. The best friend/worst enemy moments. I can hardly wait.