A Night Away

Dear Amelia,

Tonight I am away at a counseling conference. You are spending the night with your daddy. You and I have had a difficult couple of weeks with your canine teeth coming in and a cough that you have. It has left me a little frazzled. But, as your daddy predicted, I cried when I left this morning, and when I called this evening and you were crying on the phone from being tired, I cried too.

On a positive note, I spoke to you on the phone twice today and realized that this is the first time I've talked to you on the phone! This morning you told me "Hi, Mommy! Puppy! Puppy!!! Bye, Mommy!" and then this evening, once you calmed down, you said "I wuv you!" Twice. And it melted my heart.

Remember this- no matter how frustrated I become, or how thin our relationship ever would be due to anger, arguments, or anything else-- I am grateful that you are my daughter every single day and I love you with all my heart.

Hugs and kisses,
Mommy

One Ticket for Common Sense, Please

Last Tuesday, my friend and I headed out for dinner and a movie. We have been BFF's since third grade and recently have developed the ritual of a Tuesday night get together about once a month. We find a restaurant that has great deals (like the $2 off wine and 1/2 off sushi we enjoyed last night-- well, I did, she hates fish) and then head to our local movie theater which shows flicks for $5 on Tuesdays. It's a great mommy night out, we get to catch up on each other's lives, and we also get to see a cheap movie. You can't beat it.

So, after our meal , we headed to the theater to see Mirror, Mirror. We arrived right as the movie was beginning and took our seats. There were about four other groups of people already seated. We plopped down in front, put our feet up and were ready to enjoy the acting of Julia Roberts.

About five minutes into the movie, I heard a very familiar whining sound. It was for sure a toddler whine. My mommy ears perked up a little bit, since I can't seem to turn the darn things off, and listened for an emergency. Oh, wait, I thought, this is my night off. MY NIGHT OFF FROM TODDLER WHINING. Alas, there was no escape, because what appeared to be a mom and a grandmother had brought two very young children to the theater. If I had to guess, I would say one was ten to eleven months and the other was around 2 years old. Grandma walked to the entryway of the theater with the toddler (not OUT of the theater, just away from the seats), attempting to calm him. Then the baby started and mom took him down to the exit as well. Then all four of them went back to their seats. Repeat this about four or five times and you have the routine of the evening.

Perhaps the highlight of this child wrangling within the theater was when the grandma sat in our row, whispering into the toddler's ears threats, pleas, and promises, in an attempt to get him to sit still and watch the movie. When verbal attempts were ineffective, she placed her open hand across his forehead and forced him backwards against her chest in an attempt to lessen his movements.

Yes, lady. That's a good idea. Actually, what you should have brought was a toddler straight jacket because there is no way in hell a two year old is going to sit through an hour and 45 minutes movie. In a theater. Without cartoons in it.

While my initial feeling was annoyance that my attempt to escape little ones for the evening had been foiled, it quickly faded into feeling empathetic towards the tykes that I was trying to avoid. I am all about reasonable expectations for children. Boundaries, rules, and consequences are essential, but when you fold in something that your child is literally incapable of achieving, you are setting your kid up for failure. Can a two year old really sit quietly in a movie theater for almost two hours without disturbing others? No. Frankly, I know very few adults that can even accomplish that.

I am pretty opposed to age restrictions in businesses. Last year when one of the biggest controversies in the parenting world was restaurants that forbid children younger than six years old, it made me a tad livid. At the time, Amelia was about six months old and reaching a golden age where she was no longer fussy and would sit happily in her car seat while we dined. So for a business to say "Hey, you brought a baby, your money's no good here" really ticked me off.

Of course, one bad apple spoils it for us all. I'm sure that businesses consider permanently kicking out little ones when some parent lets their child squall even though the best bet would be to leave. Again, where is the common sense here? Amelia is 18 months old now and her tolerance for sitting is lower than it was last year. So what do we do? Stick to restaurants that are louder and have quicker service. That leaves us limited to mostly Mexican food and bar & grills. When we did attempt a nicer place a few weeks ago (a sushi place), Amelia picked that evening to throw a fit, who knows about what. So as my husband spoke to the waitress about getting our food to go, I walked around with Amelia outside. See? Common sense.

As a final thought, I have to wonder, was this night out even fun for mom and grandma? It made me sweat a little just watching them go in and out and begging the kids to be quiet. Personally, I would have spent the money on a rented movie and a cheap bottle of wine and stayed in for the evening.

I imagine in about a year (this would put Amelia at 2.5) Amelia might be ready for a mommy/daughter date to see a 75 minute cartoon based movie. As a lover of all things childish, I can't wait. But until then, Amelia will be at home with Daddy when I need to escape to see a movie.

What are your thoughts? What is the youngest age you would take a child to a movie theater?

Coffee Break

Despite Amelia's snot, it hasn't been a bad week. As stubborn and determined as she can be, Amelia usually stays in good spirits when she's sick. She also seems to have chilled out in the 'whine until Mommy walks me around the house' department. Generally she can talk Daddy into it when he gets home from work, which is nice for Mommy's back.

Although it has not been so bad, I still hit a wall Thursday. I'm not quite sure what happened, but my overall theory is this: you can only spend so much time with someone, whether they are your own flesh and blood or not. Jon thinks this is amplified by the fact that I still co-sleep with Amelia. I think that's complete crap, as somehow I sleep better at this point with her by my side than when she's upstairs. Either way, by Thursday afternoon, I was texting Jon frantically, begging him to watch Amelia for a bit so I could escape.

Jon replied with a 'What in the hell's your problem, calm down, I'll watch her, you don't have to beg!' response. Which is true-- as Amelia gets older, she does better and better with her daddy and he has no problems watching her. I actually think I have some guilt about asking him to care for her. You are saying "WTF is your problem, Amanda? He's her daddy, there's no reason he can't care for her in the evenings." I think of it this way, though: Jon heads off to work everyday while I'm at home, and he still has several property maintenance things that he has to do on our two acres in the evenings. So, when he comes home and I practically throw the baby at him, I feel like I'm shoving one more thing onto his plate. As a result, I rush back home quickly when it's 'mommy time' and probably don't ask for that time as much as I should.

A second issue is, I always realize that many things that I do during mommy time, I could do when I have the baby in tow, so I often back out of time that I could be spending in solitude. Pondering going to a local coffee shop always makes me wonder, what will I do there that's so different from what I do at home? I can both read and browse the internet while watching Amelia, even if I do feel a tad guilty (you see the running theme here-- mommy guilt) about plopping her in front of the TV so I can partake in some kind of activity that doesn't involve diaper changing or episodes of Sesame Street.


I pushed all those thoughts aside when Jon arrived home that evening, dumped many baby belongings out of my bag, packed up my laptop and books, and left the house, radio blaring. That right there was worth the time out of the house. I've had to change very few of my listening habits since most of the music I like is not vulgar in nature, but I do miss the outrageous volume I indulged in at times while driving my car. Parking my car behind Panera and not having to double check my bag for diapers, wipes, toys, cheerios, and sippy cup, nor having to either carry a car seat which is ever increasing in weight or lugging out the huge stroller was freeing too. Not to mention, it is absolutely delightful to get on facebook without having to bounce a baby on my knee or respond to some kind of insistent fussing.

It would seem that God was trying to show me that more frequent mommy time is a good thing, because starting at that time, a string of unrelated positives started happening. Or, maybe I just noticed the good things because I wasn't frazzled any longer. I found a twenty dollar bill in the bottom of my bag. I got a positive e-mail about a job opening that I REALLY want. We had a terrific afternoon yesterday getting ice cream and going shopping. I got an interview for aforementioned job. We had an awesome time as a family at a high school football last night, and I got to catch up with one of my friends at the game.

Spectacular.

It's with this in mind that I'm starting to pencil in mommy time. MOPS group, coffee at Panera, movie with a friend, whatever. My new goal is to start doing this for myself at least once a week. Pushing aside my time because I want to be a good wife and mother was clearly working against me. Giving myself the time to hit the virtual 'refresh' button is not only a gift to myself, but a gift to my family. I came home that Thursday evening with not just coffee breath, but a smile on my face, hugs to give, and patience to pass around. Definitely a lesson learned while on the path of parenthood.