scatterbrained listy post
I was talking to Bethany today about what a crappy blogger I’ve become recently. My biggest excuse is that my peak creative time does not align with Bug’s nap schedule anymore. This is very true. But it doesn’t help that I’ve discovered that I can watch television online when Bug is asleep. (Where have I been? 1993?) My productivity has taken a steep decline since I became hooked on Mad Men. Groan.
So I’m prying myself awake with a cup of java and hammering out a listy post. You guys like those, right? What’s been up around here? I started a meme called 101 Quirky Things My Kid Does but I’ve only gotten to about ten. So much for that idea.
Here they are so far:
- When Bug needs to go potty she will insist I come with her only so she can yell, “PRIVACY!” at me and demand that I shut my eyes while she poops.
- Pacifiers that are old are called “yucky pahs.” Pacifiers that are new are called “yummy pahs.” Only she can tell the difference but according to her it’s a really really big difference.
- She hates potatoes. She always has, even when she was a baby. She wouldn’t eat any baby food if it had potatoes in it.
- She walks up to random strangers and introduces herself. I really need to teach her not to do that.
- She doesn’t like chicken or pork unless it’s the “dark kind” that I make (aka drowned in soy sauce).
- To Bug, people are color-coded. Everyone has a color. If you don’t have one she will assign you one. (Her color is green, duh. Mine is red and Toby is blue, Bethany is yellow and orange, SuperChic is purple and pink…they usually match your favorite color but not always.)
- She has her own Moleskine sketchbook that she draws in when she is bored.
- When bathtime is over if I don’t let her pull the plug and say, “I caught a shark!” as she dangles the plug on its long chain into our hair-rinsing pitcher, she will fall to pieces. Same thing with the vacuum cleaner plug. If I unplug it myself we have water-works so bad that I will just plug the cord back in so she can unplug it.
- If anyone but me takes her out of the carseat without explicit permission, she falls apart.
- When she says she’s hungry it just means she wants a pah, aka pacifier.
Those of you who know Bug will be totally bored by this list because it’s so old news.
In other news we have a pumpkin growing on our porch! A real pumpkin!…I think. It could be a watermelon. It’s growing in a big pot with our struggling palm tree and even-more-struggling orchid. I just looked over one day and there was this giant sprout growing out of the rocks. It didn’t look like a weed, it looked like a squash leaf or something. So I pulled back a couple of rocks and lo and behold there were some big flat pumpkin seed looking things. So I’m almost convinced that somehow last year when we were carving pumpkins some stray seeds crawled over there and planted themselves.
I’m very happy about this development. I never ever remember to plant a pumpkin and every year about October I kick myself because how easy would it be to plant a pumpkin? So this year it planted itself! Bug and I are watching our little (but actually pretty big) sprout very carefully. I can’t wait until it winds itself around our porch and produces a big fat baby pumpkin. If it makes it. If it dies I think I will cry.
And that’s all she wrote.
18 Comments
Angella
Except! She let me take her out of her car seat! Only once, but still.
Emily is the same with the TV; if anyone else shuts it off it is a Disaster of Epic Proportions. I turn it back on, she shuts it off, and all is well.
Sigh.
gingermog
Well I think this is a nice long newsy post. I love Mad Men too, although I haven’t seen it in chronological order as I keep on forgetting when it’s on. I love the design of the times, dresses, furniture etc. TV is kind of dormant in our house. Except I bought Julian some Northern Exposure DVD’s for his birthday the other week so were viewing that when the box is on. Do you remember that series?
I think the “privacy” thing Bug has going on is just precious. Sounds like she has a very individual personality. I met a little girl in the laundrette the other day who reminded me of her. She was so ready to talk about everything and show me her special knickers from the laundry pile lol
Good luck with raising the pumpkin. I have strawberries and tomatoes growing in large pots this year. xxx
Barb
I love the list. When she’s flown the nest, you will be so, so happy that you wrote those things down. Add one thing a day and you’ll eventually get to 101.
I’m hooked on Mad Men, too. Can’t wait for the new season to come out.
beyond
i’m so glad i haven’t discovered online tv yet!
bug has a moleskin sketchbook? that’s so sweet and … fancy. and she is the first person i know (well, i “know’) who doesn’t like potatoes. what will she do for comfort food? mashed pasta? ha!
in my experience pumpkins grow like weeds. that tiny plant might take over your porch in a couple of months…
Katie
I had a rash of pumpkin plants show up in my yard last year. It was the weirdest thing. I have no idea how all the seeds got there. The plants lasted a good long week before my husband mowed them over. I tried to convince him to let me transplant them somewhere else but.. oh well.
I think you can be excused for taking time for yourself.. Every moment to yourself is a huge feat when you have a kid. :)
whoorl
At least she doesn’t walk up to strange men and call them “daddy”.
Sonja
A volunteer pumpkin! How exciting! I’m pretty sure the odds of it ‘making it’ are really good, since it already had enough of a will to live to plant itself!
Tristan
Great blog. Your love for your Bug comes across. So, there’s no need to apologize for not having time to post.
The internet’s not going anywhere. But, she will grow up fast. I turned around and my son grew up while I was at work, cutting the grass, or asleep on the couch. You can’t get these times back.
Thanks for sharing what you can, when you can. Tristan
Sarah @ BecomingSarah.com
I think it’s funny that when she says she’s hungry, it doesn’t mean she’s actually hungry. When my littlest sister was Bug’s age, she did the same thing. My mom would pick the rest of us up from school every day and the other parents always heard my sister saying she was hungry, so they started bringing her snacks in case my mom was starving her lol.
Aunt Jaynette
I’ll bet the old pah’s do taste different. Do they acquire their better flavor when you boil them to clean them?
Her oldest cousins hates potatoes also, but loves rice.
A sketch pad works great to keep all their drawings in one place. It’s so hard to keep all the scraps of paper my kids were handing me. B found hers the other day from first grade.
Is it an official moleskin or the one I made the girls in February?
Kuky
Hee hee! Isabelle did that for a bit. She’d go to the bathroom by herself and close the door. But then of course she’d call one of us back to help her wipe.
And I like your listy post. I didn’t know those things about bug even though I’ve been reading for a while. Is that because they’ve never been mentioned or is that because I have a bad memory? No I think it must be new. Because I remember you mentioning cardiac hill before we visited. Hmmm…selective memory?
Karlie
I’ve been lurking here for a little while, loving your craft ideas and sharing them with the after-school daycare I work at!
The colour-assignment thing is very neat – does Bug assign colours to anything else, like words, numbers, or pieces of music? It sounds like she has synaesthesia, which is TOTALLY cool. If she does, I’m jealous :)
Blue Kaeru
What a coincidence. My youngest went to a school festival where one of the activities was to plant seeds. He planted a sunflower and a pumpkin. With huge tongue depressors they were labels and put on the sill to germinate. Only one made it- the one labeled “sunflower”. So as to ensure said sunflower was not “lonely”, I bought some more seed and germinated them in the house while the “big guy” was left outside to grow big and strong. Last weekend the “little guys” were big enough to plant outside whereby I looked and realized that G’s sunflower was NOT a sunflower. He is thrilled to have a little pumpkin plant and I cross my finger that the guy grows. We tried years past with no success. I hope your sprout thrives and produces a pumpkin. I am betting it is a volunteer- my dad had a HUGE volunteer pumpkin in the mulch patch one year and it produced a single perfect pumpkin.
Jen
My dear Lars is 3 and has never eaten potatoes and will do anything to NOT eat anything made with potatoes. Only recently has he begun to eat crunchy tater tots. This is beyond weird to me! He simply does not like potatoes and will not eat them.
julie
I can’t tell you how funny it was to see your post today. My husband has worked for IP in the Food Service Division for 15 years. We just recently moved to Champion Aerospace after being with IP for so long. I just missed them looking at the box.
Julie IN SC
Jackee
Bug is so darn cute.
I grew the best pumpkin one year by the “waste” from an old Jack-o-Lantern I threw out in the gardent to compost. By garden I mean, little patch of tomato plants and green beans. No fancy garden. Anyway, the gook, apparently rotted away and fed rich nutrients to a lonely pumpkin seed and we got a fabulous pumpkin out of it!
Anonymous
Why should you teach her not to say hi to strangers? I think it’s AWESOME when kids are friendly like that. It means they trust that people are generally good.
Lori
maybe bug planted them :^)
she is getting so big — it’s really scarring! :^)