The playlist on my ipod has been changed to Christmas music (much to SN’s chagrin).  I’m ready to get the decorations out now…

Every night, usually during our bedtime routine, I ask Mo to describe her sunshine (best part) and cloud (worst part) of the day.  I’ve been following this routine for nearly a year, and I positively cherish this part of our day.  Her answers give me such insight into her world, things that I probably would have never learned otherwise.  Last night’s cloud was about her friends in school, named Gabby and Lauren, and how they can’t seem to make up their minds about whether they like her or not.  She sadly explained that these two girls are her best friends some days, and that they don’t like her, and are mean to her, on other days.  She wanted to know why they don’t like her every day. 

Oh.my.goodness.  That fierce protective motherly instinct in me kicked into overdrive.  I wanted to scoop her up and protect her from every possible sadness she’ll ever encounter.  She’s only 4. There are a lot of sad and disappointing moments ahead of her.  How’s a mother to cope???? 

The interesting thing, though, is that it confirmed the feelings I have about my last post.  We can’t shield our kids from experiencing sadness.  But we should do everything we can, within our power and capability, to ensure the odds are stacked in their favor.  As for little Gabby and Lauren, well… girls will be girls I suppose, even at the young age of 4!  L-girl, I might have to purchase that book you referenced in your comment to my last post!  Does the author delve into the inner workings of a preschooler’s mind?  LOL! 

Nearly every time I see this 9 year old child, she is in clothing that is mismatched, way too big or too small, has holes in it, is stained, etc.  She goes to school in outfits like this. 

School is hard enough as it is… kids can be so darn cruel.  Why would a parent willingly expose their child to the harsh reality of social ridicule from other kids?

For the record:

1. This is NOT a financial issue. 
2. This child has very little ability to pick out appropriate clothing for herself, thus the need for parental intervention, at least until she understands how to match things.  (She did not pick this outfit out for herself). 
3. This child already struggles with self esteem issues… and has mentioned on more than one occasion how lonely she feels because she has so few friends at school.

In a perfect world, one’s attire shouldn’t matter.  School is for learning… it’s not a fashion show.  Unfortunately, that’s just not reality.  I’m not saying kids should go to school looking like supermodels.  But they should, at the very least, be afforded the opportunity to wear clothing that fits, matches and is free of holes and tears.  This is one of those times where I think I could get behind the uniform policy that a lot of schools are pushing for these days…

I hate talking politics. It’s a difficult subject to talk about with people, especially when you disagree.  It’s even more difficult for me because I’m a Republican and, well.... it’s not exactly popular to be a Republican!!  Does that mean I’m a John McCain fan, or even a staunch Republican for that matter?  No.  Absolutely not. There are several things on the Republican platform that I don’t agree with.  On the flip side, there are several issues on the Democratic platform I am in complete agreement with.  In reality, I should be a Republicrat! 

As much as people would hate to admit it, Republicans and Democrats are not that far apart on some key issues.  Let’s face it.  We all want to see our children get a decent education.  We all want to feel safe.  We all want to be treated fairly and equitably.  We all want to be paid a decent wage so that we can support our families.  We all want freedom of religion, freedom of speech.  We all want standards of excellence (AKA ethics) in our government.  For me, the reason I am a Republican comes down to a few very basic reasons, mostly financial in nature, with two key exceptions, which I’ll keep to myself for fear of having things thrown at me!!  The majority of my circle of friends and colleagues, however, happen to be Democrats.  We see eye to eye on most issues, and respectfully disagree on a select few.  What apalls me, however, are the people who are avid supporters for one party or the other, and have zero ability to articulate why.  I had a conversation with one such person today.  She is voting for Obama. When asked why, she shrugged her shoulders and said all of her family members are Democrats.  I asked her a few questions and it became apparent that she knew very little about what it meant to be a Democrat.  I encouraged her to read the different platforms and formulate an opinion of her own.  She didn’t know there were such things as platforms.  I can’t tell you how many people I have talked to over the last few months that are just like this person.  Wouldn’t it be nice to vote on issues and beliefs, instead of people?  Hell, it would be awesome if we could take the popularity contest out of the mix altogether. We could stop the media… the ridiculous advertising. The millions of dollars spent on campaigning could be given back to the American people.  Just make sure every American gets a copy of their platforms and we could vote on that.  Simple, huh?  Ha!  I don’t think government and simple can be used in the same sentence!! 

Tonight when Mo was getting ready to exit the bathroom, I asked her my usual question, “Did you wipe?”.  She said yes.  I then asked if she wiped in both places.  Her answer?  “I’m not gonna lie Mommy. I did not wipe my booty”.  Ninety-nine percent of the time she’s good about wiping, but every now and then she gets lazy and I have to get on her butt about it (no pun intended).  Tonight was classic though.  After I gave her the usual speech and then told her she was going to have a ‘time out’, she became extremely upset… crying, shouting “No, Mommy”, the works.  I’m not particularly fond of Mo’s defiant moments!  When I pointed out the potential for her ‘time out’ to turn into an early bed time, she started rambling something about someone else.  My inquiring mind probed a bit and Mo eventually explained that someone else was making her be a bad girl.  “Who?”, I asked.  “Jesus is making me do bad things”.  WHOA!  I responded appropriately to the situation and when she realized that excuse was no longer viable, she then explained that she was just pretending to be bad.  Ha Ha!  The joke’s on me, right?  If she’s coming up with this imaginative stuff at the age of 4, I can’t wait to hear the excuses she comes up with when she decides not to do her homework for the first time!!

My home is my haven, therefore, I need it to be filled with stuff I like to look at.  Over the years I’ve grown pickier and pickier in my style, and I literally drive myself nuts.  I can’t just walk into a typical department store or furniture store and find a bunch of things I like (with one exception being Pottery Barn.  How do I type the famous “Tim the Tool Man Taylor” grunt?).  Anyway, on top of my pain in the neck picky side, I continually crave changes in scenery.  My latest mission?  Trying to find new curtains for the living room and dining room.  I have literally purchased 4 different sets of curtains, hung them, and took them back down because they weren’t quite right.  Not only did I run around to purchase (and return) these things, SN did some running around for me, and so did Mo’s Dad (because, of course, nothing that I want is in stock around me!!!).  It’s sad to say… the sales woman at JC Penney’s is getting to know SN on a first name basis!  Right now, he has pair #5 in his car… just waiting for me to hang them!  I hope these work… otherwise, you’ll see in the headlines later this week “SN kills OC GF”!

In addition to the curtains, I’m trying to find a solution to cover the huge set of windows in my living room.  Ever since the old landscaping was torn out, I have zero privacy!  I do not like traditional blinds, other than bamboo, as I think they’re mostly ugly.  I’m not fond of keeping my curtains closed all day because I love the natural light.  I checked out the price of interior shutters.  Uh, they’re beautiful, but way too expensive.  So my solution?  A gorgeous stained glass window found on ebay that I’m going to suspend right smack in the middle of the window.  It will give just the right amount of privacy, yet let the sunlight pour in!  Check it out! Ain’t it cool?

So, here’s hoping I’ll be happy with the new curtains (for SN’s sake, as well as mine)!

This was the question of the day… the one that nearly made me spit out my drink:

“Mommy, when I was a baby, did you eat me and swallow me to get me in your belly?”

I was observing Madeline play in her dollhouse and I heard some interesting things being said by Mommy Doll:

“Jokey (yep, that’s what she named the kid doll), don’t leave your shoes in the middle of the floor.  Is the kitchen your closet?”

“Do you need to go potty?  Did you wipe Jokey?  Tell me how you wiped.” (Jokey gave a very good answer by the way!)

“Did you wash your hands?  Eeeew.  Jokey, you HAVE to wash your hands.”

“It’s time to go to bed Jokey.  Clean up your toys.  Put your dirty clothes in the basket” (Jokey argued for a bit).  “Jokey, when you make a mess, you have to clean it up.”

At least I can rest assured that Madeline is hearing me. She may not always listen, but the kid definitely gets it!

I want this:

http://www.amazon.com/Apple-iPod-classic-Silver-Generation/dp/B001F7AHXW/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1224121947&sr=8-4

Holy crap, 120 gb???  No more having to sort out different play lists because my current one can’t hold that many songs.  I want, I want, I want! 

I also want this:

http://www.apple.com/macbook/

They’re not going to be $999 for long.  And I’ve had enough with PC’s.  They’re crap.  Total crap.  (I’m trying to justify the purchase I’m about to make this weekend!!  Please people, help me justify it!)

The source of the lice has been identified, thank God.  Now I don’t have to be paranoid about sending Madeline out in public again!!  It turns out that she did, indeed, pick it up at school.  The Director personally checked every child’s head and found the source within 20 minutes of my report.  I asked the Director how she could be so sure that this particular child was the source, and not just another victim.  The Director promptly explained that when she talked to this child’s parent (who I will now, and forevermore, refer to as Dumbass), the parent disclosed that this child’s two older siblings were sent home from school three weeks ago with major infestations.  Dumbass didn’t think to check the little one’s head, nor did she think to report it to anyone.  The Director was extremely apologetic about having a parent who uses such “poor judgement”...and was genuinely surprised by what happened because “this kind of thing doesn’t happen” at her school.  It’s certainly not the school’s fault, however, I will be chatting with them tomorrow about implementing routine head checks going forward. 

So, I think I know just about everything there is to know about head lice thanks to the bazillion hours SN and I spent researching on the handy dandy internet.  Although it still makes me cringe just thinking about it, and I itch incessantly even though I know I have NOTHING in my head, I recognize that I went a little overboard due to my naturally paranoid self!  However, on the flip side, this is one of those situations where my obsessive, anal-retentive self came in handy!!  Bottom line is, if it happens again, I can handle it.  A tip for all you parents out there… put some creamy leave-in conditioner in your kids hair before sending them to school.  It goes a long way in helping to prevent infestation.  I think I’m going to be buying stock in the stuff!

As for Dumbass, she’s lucky I have no idea who she is.  I understand that her kids were victims too, but for goodness sake, be responsible enough to check everyone in the family and REPORT it.  I can’t believe some parents are really that stupid.

That’s the line my Dad gave me yesterday when I explained the horrific ordeal I experienced this past weekend!  On Saturday evening, just before bedtime, I noticed Madeline scratch her head a few times in the same spot.  Something instinctively told me to check her head, yet I never imagined I’d find lice.  Just typing the words makes the obsessive compulsive neat freak inside of me cringe.  Ugh.  Couple my cleanliness obsessiveness with SN’s safety and infection control obsessiveness, and you’ve got a regular pair of paranoid psychotics on your hands!  Let’s just say if there was a loose piece of fabric in this house, it got washed.  Approximately 20 loads of laundry later, we’re still going… Today I’m off to the laundromat to wash the big bulky comforters and pillows.  A big thank you is owed to SN for his invaluable help this weekend.  Man, he was a trooper!

So where did Madeline get this?  That is the million dollar question!  The only change in her routine over the past month has been a new school.  I am spending a fortune in tuition to have her in this suburbanish pre-k program (thinking I could swing the tuition for one year before she starts elementary school).  I would never imagine that she’d get lice in that kind of setting, yet that seems to be the only logical explanation as to where she would have picked it up.  Thus my Dad’s comment! 

Madeline is free of lice now, thank God, after having spent hours and hours combing through every piece of her hair.  Thank goodness I caught it early, as there were only a few lice and eggs in her hair. I can’t imagine if there was a major infestation.  Ugh times ten.  Today I get to call the school and challenge their policy of not checking the kids.  I guess it’s standard in elementary schools to check for this kind of thing, but not in preschools.  For what I’m paying in tuition, they’re darn well going to make it a policy going forward if I have anything to say about it!

... Play.  Nope, more like work to distract myself!  Mo is spending the week with her Gram and Grandpa at Camp Star Lake in NJ.  It’s become an annual tradition and she LOVES this week away!  Her Dad and I had breakfast with her on Saturday morning before she left and we were telling her how much we were going to miss her.  We then asked if she was going to call us.  Her answer?  No.  I guess she’s going to be too busy playing on the beach, riding her bike, getting massages and pedicures from Gram, etc. etc.  Oh, the life of a 4 year old!

http://www.nbc.com/Knight_Rider/

Knight Rider is returning.  David Hasselhoff is even going to make a guest appearance.  Good Lord.  What ‘s next?  Remake of the A-Team?  Oooh, how about some Wonder Woman?  We can sit around in our Underoos and reminisce about the good ol’ times!  (I guess I’m showing my age with the underoos comment. Here you go teeny-boppers and twenty somethings… look it up!  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underoos).

I love watching the Olympics.  My favorite competition is the women’s gymnastics.  Mo’s loving that competition too.  Every time the footage ends, Mo asks me to play the “movie” again! 

... I enthusiastically point out Santa Clause to her at a baseball game tonight, and she responds by saying (insert DUH tone here):  “Mommy, Santa Clause is just a mascot.  It’s just a person in there.” Yep, according to Mo, Mommy is clueless!