The Cost of Toddlers

There's no denying it, kids cost a lot of money. When you find out your pregnant, you start a list of all the baby items you'll need to get. It's amazing how much 'stuff' such a tiny person needs! And it's not a one-shop deal, as they grow they'll need even more 'stuff.' A lot of it is obvious: clothes, toys, books, bedding, etc. But there are a few things that you may not know you'll be needing for your toddler, so I thought I'd give you a heads-up.

Invest in a second set of play makeup. Even if you have a boy. Especially if you have a boy. Because every time you're doing your makeup, little hands will find their way into it. Worse, when you're not doing your makeup, little hands will find their way into it. I've had to throw out countless lipsticks because CamCam has shoved his finger into the tube to get at the color and rub it on his face. He loves to use the make-up brushes to brush his hair. He pushes really hard though, so they end up all smooshed down and unusable. Kinda like when I was in elementary school art class and the art teacher told us to put the brushes in the jar with their bristles up, because if we did it with the bristles down, the brush would be ruined and then he showed us one. All my makeup brushes look like that. All of my eye shadows have deep ridges across them from where he has scrapped them with his fingernails. I cannot buy compact face powder because he opens it and bangs it on the floor to get it to break apart and come out. I cannot buy loose powder because he opens it and shakes it everywhere like this:

You're toddler will be needing a pair of high heels to go with all that pretty makeup:

I am not joking, he is ALWAYS wearing my shoes! He loves all shoes but his own. He'll just randomly be walking around the house in different people's shoes, even company's.

You should be prepared to invest in a set of new keys for your keyboard:

You'll need a second set of accessories for your vacuum because the first set is actually pirate swords.

Every time I go to vacuum, I have to spend at least 15 minutes hunting down all the pieces. Everyday "Mr. Trouble" and CamCam use them to have pirate sword fights. "Mr. Trouble" always gets the big sword and CamCam gets the little one, but he doesn't complain. The funny thing is that I'll ask them where are my vacuum parts and they look at me like I have 2 heads, but if I ask them where's my sword- they bring me right to them. It's also very weird that I cannot find these vacuum pieces without their help, but no matter where I put these or try to hide them, "Mr. Trouble" and CamCam always find them without my help.

Lastly, I can't imagine why my electric bill is so high???

A Day of No's

I've read parenting articles on how we shouldn't say no to our children. That saying no over and over, actually causes them to ignore the word and they no longer obey it. (Of course, that would imply that at one time they actually did obey the word no, and we all know that's not the case) Instead of saying no, according to the experts, we need to find alternate ways to get our point across. Ideally, instead of using a negative word such as no, we should try and speak positively to our child. I'd love to know if the people who write these articles actually have children. And if they do have children, where on earth do they find the time that all this extra wording would take. If I added up how many times total I say no in a day, I'd be willing to bet the number would be close to 200. It takes me 1 second to say "no" and my children immediately get the point that I do not want them doing whatever it is. (Whether or not they follow through is another story.) If I were to follow the advice of these "parenting experts", it would take me at least 1 minute to figure out a "better" way to word things, and probably 45 seconds to convey the thought. So we're talking about a difference of 3 minutes and 20 seconds a day verses 5 hours 50 minutes! Where on earth am I supposed to find this kind of time???

So I decided to take a day, and keep track of every time I said 'no' to CamCam. Granted, some of these times I probably could have handled in a different/better manner, but I'm pretty sure that the majority of these times a quick response was necessary.

#1- 9:20AM: "No, no, no. Uggghhhh.....Ugggghhhh" Found him with a bottle full of milk that he had tipped upside down and shaken all over the room. Milk was all over the floor and all over the dining room carpet.
#2- 9:44AM: "No CamCam, get out of the baby's bed."
#3- 9:45AM: "No CamCam, that's not a toy." Turned around to see he had picked up my bra off the floor and was wrapping it around his neck and putting it over his head. Maybe he was trying to figure out how to put it on?
#4- 9:59AM: "No, you don't use your brother's toothbrush to brush your hair."
#5- 10:01AM: "No CamCam!" As he had a box of cheez-its upside down and was about to dump them out.
#6- 10:05AM: "Oh, no CamCam, you can't put cheez-its in there!" He had shoved cheez-its into the slots on the air conditioner.
#7- 10:10AM: "No, that's "Mr. Trouble's" food." Ate all his cheez-its, so he grabbed "Mr. Trouble's".
#8- 10:40AM: "No, sorry babe but you have to stay in your stroller." At the farmer's market.
#9- 10:45AM- "Awww, CamCam no...." After he pulled a $3 half-pint of cherry tomatoes off a table at the farmer's market and dumped them on the ground. Actually I felt pretty lucky I only had to pay for the 1, could have been the entire table.
#10 & 11- 10:50AM- "You want this toy? No? You want your blankie? No?" In the van as I'm buckling him up to leave the farmers market and he throws a fit.
#12- 10:53AM- "CamCam, no, don't take your shoes off please." Just as I park and am heading to get him out of the van so we can walk into a building.
#13- 10:57AM- "CamCam no! Stop!" At my parents office and he is letting water out of the water dispenser.
#14- 10:57AM- "I said no!" See #13
#15- 10:57AM- "Stop, Stop! No more water!" Ditto
#16- 10:58AM- "CamCam, no." Unraveling a roll of paper towels at office.
#17- 11:26AM- "No CamCam" Grabbed a yucky bottle out of my kitchen sink and was about to drink out of it.
#18- 11:40AM- "Ohhh no! Awww CamCam." Used his sandwich as a tissue and blew his nose on it.
#19- 11:47AM- "CamCam, no, get down." Climbing stool he pushed over to the kitchen sink.
#20- 11:54AM- "No, no, no. Ewwww gross." Shoving tissue he blew his nose on back into the tissue box.
#21- 12:10PM- "No CamCam, you're going to fall honey!" He's standing at the very edge of our stairs with his toes hanging over the top step and is edging himself more and more over the edge.
#22 &23- 12:38PM- At our preschool time: Him: "Ruff, Ruff!" Me: "No CamCam, what does a cow say?" Him: Pants like a dog Me: "No silly, moo moo. You know that!" Him: laughs and laughs
#24- 1:37PM- "No honey, I'm sorry it's ni-night time." Standing at the gate in his room, getting ready to climb over it.
#25- 2:22PM- Whispering: "No way, you're actually sleeping?"
***(Takes a LONG almost 3 hour nap, very unusual! Seriously lowers my amount of no's for the day)***
#26- 5:01PM- "Hey no, don't eat that!" He's with me outside and spots an old cheez-it on the driveway.
#27- 5:13PM- "No CamCam, out of the garbage please."
#28- 5:14PM- "Noooo CamCam!" He's wielding a pen!!!!
#29- 5:19PM- "No, give "Mr. Trouble" back his blankie." He's running around the kitchen island with "Mr. Trouble's" blankie and yelling: mine! mine! mine! "Mr. Trouble" is running behind him trying to catch up and crying.
#30- 5:33PM- "No? You want to stay in?" Said after he threw a fit when I took him out of his highchair. However, I took him out because he was reaching up to me and saying "out, out, out."
#31- 6:28PM- "No! CamCam get down!" On top of our eating bar area with a glass cup that he's just about ready to throw.
#32- 6:31PM- "What do you have now? Uhhh- no no no no no no." He has my digital camera and is having a blast opening up the part that protects the lens and sticking his little fingers in there.
#33- 6:34PM- "Nooooo..." Walking around with a bottle of wine he took off the wine rack.
#34- 6:45PM- "Hey! No phew phew's, no." He's sitting at the dining room table, holding one arm straight out, and the other arm bent over it so it looks like a gun and is making his gun noises as he shoots his dad and me.
#35- 7:07PM- "No, we do not play with mama's phone."
#36- 7:26PM- "No, don't go behind the grill. That's dangerous."
#37- 7:37PM- "No, just please don't touch." I'm trying to turn on his baby music for him and he's getting impatient waiting for the CD to load so he keeps pushing all the buttons making it so the CD won't load.
#38- 7:46PM- "CamCam no, don't touch." He's fighting with me to push the dvd buttons.
#39- 7:46PM- "CamCam no, don't kick the DVD player."
#40- 7:46PM- "No! Do not push your brother!" Why is it when kids get mad because we won't let them do something, they take it out on a sibling by hurting them? Or is it just my kids that do this?
#41- 7:47PM- "CamCam, no stop touching it" I'm now switching out our old DVD player with our new one because the old one wouldn't work, and he's trying to "help" me by plugging in everything he sees into any hole he can find.
#42- 8:34PM- "No, this is not play time, it's ni-night time. Please get into your bed."
#43- 8:51PM- "No, no, no, it's time for bed. Get out." Find him and his brother under his brother's bed playing.

Simple Things

One of the greatest things about spending time with a toddler, is that they teach you to notice the world around you. There are so many things that we pass by everyday, and never even notice. Everytime we walk, we walk with a purpose. We're so focused on "getting there" and "getting it done" that we do not take the time to enjoy the process of doing. However, to a toddler, the walk to a grocery store is an adventure. Running out to get the mail is a chance to discover something new. Why hurry up and run to the playground when there is so much along the way to look at. Take a walk with a two year old and you'll see what I'm talking about. A flower, an interesting rock, ants, a cool leaf, a yucky looking pine cone, a plane flying overhead, a pretty butterfly, birds flying across the sky, all are things CamCam teaches me to notice and appreciate.

Just today, he showed me the joy in yet another thing I've failed to notice in a long time. Shadows. He was up in his room "napping" and I went to check on him. The door was open, and he didn't hear me coming. He was facing the wall, and looking at his shadow on the wall. He moved to the side, and his shadow followed and disapeared on the bend in the wall. He tilted his head to the left, looking for his shadow. He leaned back to the right and saw it reappear. He did this 4 more times, leaning to the left and looking for his shadow, back to the right and here it is again. He put his hand in the middle of it and moved, trying to hold his shadow in place. Then he reached out to the edge of the shadow, up high where the edge of his head was, and started to dig at it with his fingers. He was trying to peel it off the wall. I smiled as I realized that at this very moment, he was learning so much. He was figuring out what this "thing" on his wall was. He was discovering 2 dimentional and how it differs from 3 dimentional. What a wonderful moment to witness. I take for granted these gifts we've been given, assume that there is nothing new around me to discover. It took my 2 year old son to teach me to open my eyes and to start and appreciate the simple things around me.

Ages Three And Up

I haven't taken an official tally, but if I was forced to put a number on it, I'd say about 99% of my house should be labeled "Ages Three And Up." I do have TONS of age-appropriate toys for Cameron to play with. Brightly colored toys. Toys that make noises. Toys with flashing lights. But none of these have the appeal of something that he knows he shouldn't play with. Here are the top five worst offenders:

#1- My Cell Phone- I guess I'm actually quite lucky that there isn't a long-distance phone #444997785728758971852, because I'd owe a massive cell phone bill if there was. And if I ever am on the phone with you, and after we hang up I immediately call you right back and say nothing, it isn't me calling. And if you send me a text, and I don't respond, I'm not being rude, someone just got to it before me.

#2- The Toy Room- You'd think that this would be an ok place for CamCam to play, isn't that the point of a toy room after all? But you would be seriously mistaken. The toy room is actually one of the worst places in the house because it gives the illusion of being a safe play area, therefore I stupidly leave him unattended in it. When I do that things like this happen:

Nolan yells to me that "CamCam's spitting! CamCam's spitting! He's sick!" and I think, oh no, he's throwing up and then I go into the toy room and see him looking like this....

...and for a minute I freak out thinking that he is throwing up mustard yellow vomit and am trying as hard as I can to figure out what on earth he ate for lunch that disagreed with him so. Then I realize it's not vomit, but a tube of finger paint from the top shelf that for some reason he decided to fill his mouth with.

#3- Chairs, Stools, etc- CamCam is now strong enough to move a chair or barstool around the room as he sees fit and use it to climb up to a whole new world that was previously unavailable to him. Desks, kitchen counters, table tops, all are now at his disposal. I actually watched one day as he climbed up into his highchair, sat in it, and then used the momentum of lunging his body forward to inch-by-inch move the highchair across the room, until he got to the large kitchen pantry cabinet, and then he was able to reach the very high kiddie-lock and undo it to get at the food. Just a couple days ago he moved a barstool over to climb up on the kitchen counter because he wanted more animal crackers. But I guess that once he got up there, he noticed something even better and tried to fill his bowl with salt instead.

.
#4 Laundry Baskets- These sure are fun to play in! I had a weak moment once and gave one to him and "Mr. Trouble" to play with, and let them push each other around in it. I guess toddlers do not understand the difference between a full laundry basket and an empty laundry basket. To me a full laundry basket is a sign of accomplishment- I have made a step toward winning the ongoing battle with Mt.Laundry. To a two year old, the neatly folded clothes are just something standing in the way of their fun and should be dispensed with immediately. But we cannot just tip over the basket and let the clothes semi-neatly fall in a pile, no, the clothing should be punished for getting in the way of our fun time. So instead, we will take out the items one by one and toss them down the stairs. That'll show 'em!

#5- Writing Utensils!!!- This is the worst! Nothing is safe from CamCam weilding a marker. There's always the tell-tale sign of him coming to me with his legs or arms covered in marker. Then I have to go on a hunt throughout the house to figure out what he drew on. He's draw on my couch, the hardwood foor in 3 seperate rooms, the majority of the stairs, our dining room table, the exposed side of our kitchen pantry, the kitchen cabinets, carpet, windowsills, countless walls and I'm certain many other places and things I have yet to discover. I have no idea how he is getting at all these markers and pens and pencils. I keep them ALL very well put away. He must have a secret stash I have yet to discover.

My "favorite" thing is how he took the time to outline the white trim all around this room. I think it makes for a nice accent touch that not a lot of people have.

How Does Your Morning Start?

Oh how I wish I started my day out quietly sipping my coffee and catching up online, or reading, or watching the leaves blow in the wind. Just a moment to myself before the day starts. What a luxurious start to my day that would be. Instead, it starts with me being woken up by either the baby, or one of my two toddlers way earlier then I'd like. At this point I ALWAYS get mad at myself for staying up way too late the night before and vow to go to bed earlier tonight. There's a round of diaper changes, a congratulations and mini-celebration for "Mr. Trouble" if he made it through the night with a dry pull-up. Usually someone is crabby because they were woken up by a sibling. Then "Mr. Trouble" starts bringing me various foods one-by-one asking if he can have them for breakfast. Each time I tell him, just a minute, I have to finish whatever it is I'm doing and then I will be down to feed him. So he leaves the food with me, goes downstairs, then comes back up with another. I wonder if anyone else has three boxes of cereal in their bathroom? Sometimes CamCam follows along in this game. He usually wants Parmesan cheese for breakfast.

Whether before breakfast, during, or just after, there is ALWAYS a meltdown. One day it's because "a-pa-ju" meant apple juice, and I gave him milk. Next day it's because "a-pa-ju" meant milk and I gave him apple juice. Sometimes it's because as he was walking over to the table, one cheerio fell out of his bowl, so now we have to throw the entire bowl across the room. It could be because I handed him his drink first, then his food, and he wanted the food first, then his drink. Or maybe I had the audacity to not let him eat Parmesan cheese for breakfast. I've learnt to ignore these little fits, it actually makes me smile at how much rage can be in such a tiny body one minute, and then be full of smiles and laughter the next.

There's ALWAYS an "event". This is the part I'd LOVE to do without. It's always a big mess I have to clean up. An entire box of cereal dumped on the floor. Their dad left his 1/2 filled coffee cup on the table, and CamCam gets to it before me. The old coffee filter full of grounds happens to be on top of the garbage, and CamCam pulls it out.

But today was one of the worst. Breakfast was over, "Mr. Trouble" and CamCam went downstairs to play. I'm sitting up here, having my coffee, and I actually thought to myself how nice it was that they were playing toys for once. I even enjoyed the view outside for a minute! Then "Mr. Trouble" came up to tell me a story about the dark, and monsters, and dad scaring the monsters, and I asked him what CamCam was doing.

"CamCam's cleaning the potty."

NOOOOOO!!!!!!!! Oh please no!!!! I RUN downstairs and see CamCam elbow deep in potty water with a scrubber in one hand and a bottle of 409 in the other. He is soaked in potty water. The bathroom floor is a lake. Ugh, gross, gag! Now I'd LOVE to say that my bathroom is pristine clean, so this isn't that big of a deal. But I have 5 kids, so there isn't much in my house that is pristine clean. And this is "the" bathroom. The one that I never use, just The Dada and occasionally the 2 boys use it. So I never clean it unless we're expecting company. It's the one that I feel The Dada should be cleaning, since he's the one mainly using it and yet he hardly ever does. It's a mini-battle to see who gets the most grossed out by it first and caves and cleans it. Apparently it takes a lot to gross him out. THIS is the toilet that CamCam has been playing in/cleaning for the past few minutes! I grab his sopping wet body, and run him upstairs to the shower trying to not let any of the yuckiness drip along the way. He thinks this is great- he loves playing in water and so he got to play in a mini-bath and now he gets to play in a big-bath. I'm quite sure he's making a mental note to do this again tomorrow.

And now excuse me, as I have to go and clean up a yucky lake of toilet water. Ewwwwwww.

Ok, Now What?

Nap time has become non-existant. But CamCam needs his naps. I need CamCam to nap. Yet it's a constant struggle with me to get him to take one. Just a couple of weeks ago I put the gate up for his room. It's an extra-tall gate, you know, the kind designed so that dogs cannot jump over them. The kind that's made extra-tall to go at the top of stairs so that way a child cannot climb over them and fall down the stairs. I'm quite sure that the gate making people do not want to get sued, so if your going to claim your gate is taller then regular gates and therefore safe to put at the top of stairs, I'm willing to bet they did TONS of tests to make sure this claim is true.

I remember the day I put the gate up. I was redoing our shelving in the entry closet, and CamCam kept opening his door and coming downstairs and getting into the paint, nails, tools, whatever was around. After about the twentieth time of putting him back into his crib, I remembered the gate that was being stored in my closet. I used it with his older brother for just this exact reason, and it worked beautifully. So he opened his door to see me screwing in the hinges on his door jamb.

"Hey," he said to me.

"Ha ha," I said. "Mommy finally got smart!" I walked away smiling to myself. Even if he didn't take the nap he so desperately needed, atleast I had an hour where I didn't have to worry about him getting into stuff.

Fast-forward to today. I'm sitting here, eating lunch, when who do I see coming down the stairs? I thought maybe I didn't hinge it correctly. Nope- this is what I find instead:

The little bugger outsmarted me and used this red bin to climb over. On a side note, is it really necessary to throw all his stuffed animals over the gate first???

So I take the bin out of his room and put him back to bed. Doesn't matter, out again, this time he found a small plastic container that was holding building blocks to climb up on. So I remove ALL containers from his room. There is NOTHING he can climb on to get out, except the toy box but I can barely move that, there's no way he's going to be able to.

I'm back downstairs, eating my lunch, when who do I see sitting at the bottom of the stairs all proud of himself?!?!?! I shouldn't be surprised he found a way out, but I am! His 4 year old brother, who's tall for his age, can't get out with the gate up, how on earth did he do it? I put him back in his room and tell him to come to me, because I've got to see this one for myself.

Cleaning The Kitchen

Oh boy, what a feat it is to clean a kitchen with a two year old in tow!

~Empty the dishwasher with lightening fast speed. It's a race with me putting away the breakable dishes against CamCam who's trying to grab a bowl, cup, dish, anything he can throw across the floor.

~Load the dishwasher and try to explain to CamCam that, no, these dishes are dirty now and we do not put away dirty dishes. Screaming fit as I pry the dirty fork and spoon out of his hand just as he's about to throw them into the drawer. I show him that if you bang two spoons together, it makes a lovely sound and this keeps him entertained for a minute.

~Wash a kitchen counter, turn around to rinse rag and see that CamCam is licking the front of the only appliance I've managed to clean so far.

~Grab a empty milk jug that CamCam has "put away" in a cupboard. Grab an empty juice jar that he's "put away" in a drawer. Wonder if recycling is really worth it.

~Oh boy! CamCam sees me using the windex and thinks this will be fun! Except he aims it at himself and is now drenched in windex.

~Rinse a sponge, and turn around to see that CamCam has now managed to open the oven door, climb on top of the oven door, and is standing up there to play with the gas burners. How does he do this all in 5 seconds with me 2 feet away?!?!?

~CamCam grabs my cell phone off the kitchen counter, and now I'm chasing him around the island as he laughs and yells "mine, mine, mine!" His laughing is so contageous, I can't help but laugh.

~No, we don't play with the disinfecting spray. No, we don't unravel the paper towels. No, we don't eat out of the garbage. No, we don't empty the cupboard under the kitchen sink- we shouldn't even be in there. Oh wonderful, we can remove the child safety latch from the cupboards- haha what age are these made for? My baby who can't sit up?

~I wonder how many times you can hear the LeapFrog ABC song without going insane? "M says mmm, M says mmm, every letter makes a sound and M says mmm." "M says mmm, M says mmm, every...", "M says mmmm, M says....", "M...", "M...", "M..."

~Five minutes of peace and the kitchen finally done! Yay! He's been quiet though, so I better go check it out:

Maybe....

...if I scoot away...

...she won't know it was me!