Happy Monday before Thanksgiving!

It’s four days before Family, Food & Football with my family and I’m (as usual) feeling out of sync with all the other mothers in Suburbia.

Which means I cooked and baked like a mad woman last week (I even tried to copy someone else’s fabulous Pinterest worthy Elsa fondant cake) and had Thanksgiving with my husband’s family this weekend.

Not that I brought anything homemade for his family…as I always imagined I would (when I was single and dreaming). . . just some lackluster store bought and hopefully not too road-weary goodness.

I only have the energy to be awesome in spurts. And those are not perfectly timed.

After a caffeine/sugar high, too little sleep and the entitlement that comes with traveling for even just a day (when’s the next adventure?) I’m back home and resisting a gnawing feeling that I’m missing out on the Black Friday 2014 that hasn’t even happened.

And while I could/should be cooking, baking, or decorating, I’m not. Because with the Thanksgiving feast and Advent upon us, it is good time to start on other things.

And wash the bath toys.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As long as I remember to run the dishwasher before the next bath. Or the New Year. Or something like that.

I’m so busy keeping the important things important that I haven’t researched to see whether our yellow surfer duck is on the toxic toy list or recall lists like some of my other stuff was.

Or maybe I just don’t want to hear the inevitable.

I’d been in bath toy withdrawal after our big plastic-switchover when I met Surfette Duck at a yard sale.

She quacked to me from the 25 cent table and I gave her a lift home before discovering she’s vintage 2006.

It was a moment of unprepared weakness and compulsion.

I’m having a lot of those lately.

 

Moment of Weakness, Exhibit “A”

Last night, on a rain-drenched Interstate with a cranky toddler, I told my husband, “Quick! There’s a McDonald’s! Get over!”

And he says, “Really?

“YES! REALLY!” I bounce, hoping we haven’t missed our split second window to exit.

Then, over our daughter’s crescendo we commence a conversational charade as he navigates the exit and drive-thru.

ME: “Oh look! It’s the yum yum store! Quick Da Da, take us to get some yum yums for our baby muffin from the yum yum store!”

HIM: “OH…this yum yum store? Yes, I’ll take you there. I like get yum yums for my baby yum yum.”

ME: “Hurry, Da Da! Our baby is hungry for yum yums!”

And then we observe several mile markers of silent bliss from the rear view mirror as she devours a chicken sandwich and half a burger before asking for “Moo-or!”

End Exhibit “A”

 

Our quick dash beneath the Golden Arches last night (and missing a regularly scheduled poop today) causes me to vacillate today between feeling like a terrible mom… and happily more like a normal American mother than I’ve felt like in awhile.

But I do manage indisputably important other things that are very healthy for my daughter and do not cause me to waver.

For instance, I keep her very warm with lots of winter tights.

More tights that can be crammed in a single drawer.

42 pairs to be exact.

 

 

In case you think I’m “guesstimating” this is an exact count (not including additional pairs in the “gift pile”).

Being one of the last couples on both sides of a large family to have a baby meant we got  a.  lot.  of.  stuff. so I have to satisfy to the urge to baby shop somehow.

My sales resistance when it comes to, well, anything, is usually pretty good but when there’s a 90 percent off end-of-season clearance sale on tights, I’m helpless. They’re cheap, small, semi-disposable, and have a lot of uses when they’re retired.

Besides, I get to walk around the mall with at least one shopping bag.

One of the pairs of tights hung out in the crib while I counted (and we’re still using because at 50th percentile for height, and 200th percentile for escaping, we don’t have to get bumped up to the toddler bed just yet, thankfully).

And that particular pair of tights is back in the crib, not napping, and dashing all my hopes and dreams of running errands before the descent of yet another Daylight Savings Times early afternoon blackout.

But I have more than just too many tights. I have too much of everything baby.

And a sister-in-law (whose has provided an endless and generous supply of clothes and toys for us and multiple cousins on my side of the family over the past couple of years) asked if I could put pay it forward by putting together some clothes for another 2T baby in the community.

So I said, “Uh…, YES!” (And how ’bout some tights? … which makes it completely reasonable for me to buy more.)

And I found another perfect excuse to avoid being in sync with the rest of the celebrators (who will do Spring cleaning in the Spring) and spent much of the morning paring down, scaling back, and de-whelming my daughter’s tights and closet, guilt free.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But now I have to wake up my finally sleeping pair of tights and get to the grocery store.

The toys should be ready to come out of the dishwasher before long…and maybe something on sale will inspire the cooking and baking like a mad woman again.

I’m ready to sync.

-RM