heyMamas

Completely Clueless

Lily had nine girls including Belle sleep over this past Saturday night for her birthday party, and ever since then the following thoughts have filled my mind....

 

What do you do when one of your baby's best friends literally breaks her heart RIGHT THERE while you are watching?

 

I could actually see Lily's heart break when her new best friend kept pulling another friend away from her at her own birthday party.

 

What do you do to improve a situation where your own child has been made to feel out of place at her own birthday party?

 

What do you do when a child is in your house and acting so inappropriately that you want to discipline her? 

 

Do you discipline her?  Are you allowed? 

 

Will the kids think you are totally uncool?

 

Will the kids be scared of you?

 

Will they go home and tell their parents that you are a monster and that you dared to correct bad behavior when obviously behavior like theirs is tolerated in their house?

 

What do you do when kids are shouting orders at you without a please and thank you when your biggest achievement to date has been that your own children would never utter a command without a please or thank you?

 

What do you when you don't want your children influenced by another child but you are great friends with their parents?

 

What do you do when your daughter now wants you to talk to the mother of this child that hurt her so much?

 

How do you protect your child and try to fix their broken heart, while trying to teach them that this is life and children can be really mean and hurtful.  

 

 

Not only do I not know the answer to these questions, but I have no idea how I am ever going to host another giant sleepover or play date for that matter, without wanting to eavesdrop on everything that is happening.  And that's just not me.  So if anyone out there has any advice on how best to deal with any of the above questions, PLEASE do share.

 

 

Learning To Forgive

I have one daughter who would forgive anyone for anything and another one who can not a hold a grudge per say, but talk you to death with why she is mad or upset with you.

Last night we had a really bad night. 

I couldn't do anything right at all which seems to happen quite often these days, at least according to my girls.  I told one daughter {which I think at this point and the potential trouble I may get in, shall remain nameless} to get over something that her sister did because I was trying to teach her not to give her sister so much power over her, by reacting to everything she says.....but that backfired.

Horribly.

So me trying to move on with the night expeditiously, turned into World War Three. 

I apologized profusely for her feelings being hurt and promised that I would examine my words much more thoroughly before I dared to let them slip out of my mouth the next time.

But we still had to talk about it a few more times until it was 9:30pm and I really just thought I was going to lose my shit. 

So learning to forgive and getting over arguments in a timely manner is going to be a theme in our house over the next few weeks. 

So the child that I mentioned in the first paragraph that would forgive anyone for anything, wrote me the note below and the other one didn't say a word, even today when I got home from work and asked her if there was anything she thought we should review about last night....

Kids are really cute.

My Baby is Eight

Yesterday this beautiful little girl turned EIGHT!

 

 

My baby's eight.   

How can this be happening so fast?

 

 

When she was one, she carried two pacifiers around in her mouth and three in each hand.  They were purple.

When she was two, she had a voice deeper than her Father's. 

When she was three, she would scream bloody murder when Mommy or Daddy left her with anyone other than us.

When she was four, she still needed me to fall asleep with her.

When she was five, I told her now that she was a big girl she needed to fall asleep by herself.

When she was six, I felt like she needed me less and her friends more.

When she was seven, I felt like she was leaving for college at any moment. 

And now that she is eight, I just wish for time to slow down.

 

 

My little birthday girl, I love you more than I ever thought I could love someone.

Saturday Night

It was a long day of sporting events yesterday, coupled with overbearing, over-involved parents and copious amounts of politics.  When we got home, this was the first thing on our to do list.  

Even before I unpacked the bags...

And this, plus some good friends enjoying this with us, turned things around.

Funny how alcohol sometimes has a way of doing that.

 

Sisters

In the almost three years that I have been writing here at heyMamas, I don't think I have ever posted a full on frontal shot of my girls. 

I came across these photos the other day when I was scrolling through the two hundred pages of Flickr photos that I have, and asked Drew if I could post them.

He of course, said no, but that exchange got interrupted and we didn't get to finish discussing it, so I went ahead and posted them so I could check blogging off the list of things that I had to do tonight.  I am not sure how long he will let me keep them up, but they are here now. 

These photos are about three years old and my girls look about forty compared to what they looked like here, but this little collage encapsulates their relationship perfectly.