Top Ten Things Not to say to Identical Twins

Here is my list of the top ten things not to say to identical twins.

1.

Oh wait, I don't have a list of the top then things not to say to identical twins because I'm not a big, smug dickhead who thinks she has a right to tell you what and what not to say, think, do, or feel. I fucking HATE those lists SOOOO much. Why is everyone so offended by everything? There are so many of these lists out there right now, that basically the best thing to do is to KEEP LOOKING AT YOUR PHONE AND STOP TALKING TO PEOPLE!

But wait!

Social Media enrages people too!

 If I want to stand in a chicken pose and make duck faces at my baby and my dog while taking an instagram picture of my margarita under a sunset-then I am going to! Why do these things make people so mad? it is just all in good fun!

I LOVE kid pics, and food pics, and house pics! They give me inspiration! I feel happy for people who are succeeding and I like smiling for others successes. Feeling excited and happy for others gives me a big boost of happy as well. It is contagious.

Have you ever had a random stranger smile at you? I have, and it makes me smile at the next person I see!

So, let's all smile at someone today, and feel happy for someone, and agree that the only person that owes us anything is OUR-SELF!   We owe it to ourselves to not allow anyone to owe us anything, because when someone owes us something, we sit around and wait for it, and waiting makes people mad an anxious. So don't wait. Do it yourself.  give yourself a big does of positive self talk because all of the negative I see throughout the day makes me totally bummed.

Last night I was laying down and thinking about my sister Jill, and all of our crazy shenanigans we have gotten into over they years.  I laughed and laughed by myself for 15 minutes. I couldn't stop laughing at some of the memories that were popping into my brain. It was great, and it made me remember that it is important to smile and laugh and I am going to try to do it once a day. Laughing once a day should not be hard, but in our new society where everyone is so openly negative and mean to huge audiences, I think the funny gets lost.

So everyone try to smile today, and think of a memory that make you laugh your ass off, or look at someone's facebook picture and find something nice to say about it.

I hope you all have a nice day.

Chocolat

So, like, who else bribes their kid in the morning with chocolate?

Oh you don't?

You must be a good parent.

There are many things that I do that deserve nominations into the "Mom Hall of Fame" but getting myself and Georgia dressed and out the door by 7:30AM is not one of my most amazing acts of parenting.

So, Georgia has school from 8AM to 3:30PM. Yes, I said school. It is not daycare, as they tell us OVER and OVER again. They do not tolerate lateness, no diapers allowed, and homework is to be completed every other night. I'm sure people think this sounds horrible, but really the homework is like a 5 second worksheet that I actually like to doing with her because I feel like I am involved in her learning.

She is speaking French ( the second half of her day is in all French, no English spoken), she can spell and write her name (in English..well probably in french too LOL), she is doing a little math on her own, and her artwork has improved so much! She is playing the violin.

"Mom, my violin is now in rest position" and she sounds exactly like a teacher when she says "rest position" haha.

She is learning to pay attention and to stay focused, and hey, if somebody else wants to teach my kid to stay focused I am all for it!

So anyway, there I go talking about how great my kid is again!

But wait! She actually sucks sometimes too! like, in the morning when I try to get us ready. I miss the days of old, when she like, did whatever I wanted her to do. Yes, that was a fabulous time.

So anyway, here is basically how every morning is in my house.

Chris, in order to pick her up by 3:30 has to be at work by like 7AM so he leaves around 6ish. He brings me up a cup of coffee every single morning, and tells me it's time to get up! If I were smart, I would get up and take a shower and get ready so that when Georgia got up at 6:45ish I would be ready to deal with her.

But no.

I am stupid and we both get up at the same time, and every morning I'm like 'UM WHY DIDN"T I GET UP FIRST?"

What should only take 10 minutes (getting Georgia dressed and brushing her teeth) takes 45 minutes. There is a lot of planning and trickery involved in getting a toddler out of the house at that early hour.

So first, I need to figure out who to dress first. Myself or G? Yesterday morning I had to make up a song called "I'm just picking out clothes and shakin my hiney" and I shake my butt in her face as I hand her a variety of shirts and pants to choose from. This worked yesterday and today. I try to avoid screaming at all costs. I will make myself look stupid.

I have also taken to telling her about some imaginary girl in order to get her to do shit.

"Oh okay. You don't want to take a bath? I am going to give the "othe girl" a bath."

Georgia toally freaks out and is like, "NOOOOO!!!!! DON"T GIVE THE 'NOTHER GIRL A BATH!! I WANT A BATH!"

And then she gets in the bathtub. Mean? yes. Efficient? yes.

So... rump shaking, chocolate, fake children. this is how I work my morning. If I don't cry and  if I do get a sip of coffee in, I consider it a victory!

You're Out!

I do not want my child to be scared of me. I do not want her to listen to me because she is frightened of me. I am totally against hitting and corporal punishment. It does nothing but cause anxiety and low self esteem, and  there are better ways to communicate to your child that they are wrong and you are disappointed. I'm just trying to figure out what they are.

Georgia for the most part is a very good child. Lately though, she is testing me, and it is deliberate and annoying. She has never drawn on anything, and Saturday she drew on her little potty seat which really I don't care about, but I need to give her the message that we don't draw on things.

"Mom, I drew on my potty seat." She totally told on herself.

She was WAITING for me to react. I could see it in her face. I asked her why she drew on it, and she said it was because she was a baby.

WTF? Um...Humm....I didn't really know what to say. I just told her I was disappointed in her and that she was a big girl and big girls don't draw on their potty.

"Mom! Don't say that! Don't say you "dis-pointed!" she started to cry and I felt TERRIBLE, and then wondered what I could have done differently, but then decided there really wasn't much in the way of options.

THEN she goes and gets one of her wipes and starts to try to clean the crayon off and said, "Mom I clean it! Are you still dis-pointed?" This is through tears and crying and I'm just standing there like I really don't know what the heck to do. One hand, I'm happy she is trying to fix it, but on the other hand, the crime doesn't really fit her devastated reaction. I just picked her up, gave her a hug and told her I loved her but not to draw on things anymore and I guess that was that for now.

I've also never done "time out" up until recently. Mostly because if she does act like an asshole, it is very age appropriate, and I don't think preschoolers should be punished for being developmentally appropriate. Like for instance, getting her ready for school in the morning sucks. We are both in tears most days because I just want to walk out the door and get the fuck to work, and she has gotten into this thing where she does not want to get dressed in the morning and it is like WWIII is happening in her bedroom from 7AM-7:30AM.

I do not want to punish her for this, because in my opinion being 2 years old and having to be up, dressed, breakfast, and out the door by 7:30AM every morning is very hard. It is hard for adults! I don't want getting ready for school to seem like punishment, so I try to be calm and patient and I just go into my room and cry and sometimes scream into my pillow. I know if you don't have kids, you can't imagine what would be hard about getting a 2 year old dressed, but OMG it sucks so bad,a nd I usually bribe her with M&M's. By the time I get to work, I feel like I've already put in a full day, and I only have child, and I have no idea how moms of more than one kid get to work int he morning, but just know that if you are one of these moms ...I worship you.

So, there is that. I don't punish her for not wanting to go to school because damn, I never wanted to go to school. I get it.

Besides drawing on the can, the other thing she did last night that was very out of character, was hit me. When she was like 18 months old she hit me a few times, but she was too young to understand "time out" or why you shouldn't hit people so I just ignored it and she stopped doing it.. At almost 3 years old now, she totally knows hitting sucks and that it hurts feelings, and blah blah blah.

 Last night though, I gave her a few sips of my ginger ale and she thought that was super awesome. When she asked me for more, I said that she had finished it and we could have more later in the week. My answer did not go over well, and she totally smacked me in the face. I was STUNNED. I asked her if she knew hitting was wrong and she said yes, and then I asked her if she was sorry and she said no and hit me again!

Time for "time out"

Of course she started crying she did not want time out. I haven't really done it before, only threatened it but we walked over to a chair and I said "It's time to take a breather. Let's count to ten." We sit on the chair together and I counted to ten, and then asked her if she was sorry, and she's all like, NO!  I WANT MORE GINGER ALE!!"

Um..duh. I should tell her WHY she can't have more ginger als. Stupid me. If she doesn't know why I'm saying no, this time out is really pointless. So we count to ten again and I tell her that soda is only good once in a while and if you drink too much your teeth fall out. She was totally into this answer. "WHAAT!!' she says and then is like hysterically laughing. I asked her if she was sorry and she said yes and gave me a kiss and then I asked her if she knew why she could not have more ginger ale and she's all like " YES! MY TEETH WILL FALLED OUT! HAHAHAHAHAAAA!" So we get out of the chair and return to our show on the couch. Seems successful, right?

"Mom. Mom. I want time out again."

Jesus Christ.

"Mom. Mom. Mom. I want time out again".

Ignore.

SMACK. She hits me and says "Okay now lets do time out. "

Blah. So much to learn. Will I ever figure it out?