C is for Cookie

And Lula was already in bed, so Lumpyhead didn't even have to share it.

Proof of Shelf Life

The Cookie abides.
For now, at least.

It is certainly not out of danger. It still has to make it through the day. I wouldn't consider it Lumpyhead's yet.

Oh, and it occurred to me yesterday that I didn't buy a cookie for Lula.

So today's question is: Should I go buy another one this afternoon, or should I make Lumpyhead share this cookie?

An Ethical Question

Lumpyhead's teacher once gave him an iced sugar cookie, and now he refers to such baked goods as a "Miss Beth Cookie." I do not mix, roll out, cut, bake, ice, then festively decorate cookies at my house, so Lumpyhead does not get these cookies very often. (Since the initial introduction and subsequent constant mention of Miss Beth Cookies, I think we bought him one once. Poor deprived boy.)

I stopped by the bakery at lunch today, just to "see if anything looked good." As if. I ended up back at my desk with a $4 fudge-covered brownie in addition to my less-than-sensible lunch.

The bakery also had a pretty display of Miss Beth Cookies, so I bought one for Lumpyhead to assuage my guilt.

But here's the thing.

1. I'm not going straight home tonight. I'm going to Happy Hour first.

2. I don't want to cram this beautiful cookie into my briefcase - where it could get broken. And I'm taking the metro to the Happy Hour location, so I can't just carry the cookie carefully to my car and leave it there.

3. After approximately 36 square inches of fudge-covered brownie, I'm starting to eye that damn cookie a bit too lustily.

So. Internet:

Can I eat the cookie?

User Error

Over the course of the long weekend, I took 128 pictures - most of which are fuzzy,
blurry,
or wherein the subjects are clearly being tortured.

Bump took one. It looks like this.

Seriously. Why do I even bother?

Lumpyhead, Where Did You Go?

He's hiding.

Sometimes you just have to play along.

I Was Raised by the Dutch, You Know

Nana bought Lumpyhead this great little contraption. It "reads" specially designed books using magnetic dots near the book's spine. Lumpyhead loves it, but the books are not very durable (they are essentially spiral-bound paper). The boy is careful enough with them, but Lula is not. She rips through them like a gleeful crosscut shredder, much to Lumpyhead's dismay.

I spent about an hour last night reinserting and repairing a torn-out page from one of Lumpyhead's favorite books - using sixteen tiny pieces of tape and two tweezers. This shows:

a) I am an extremely dedicated mother who will do anything - even something sublimely ridiculous - to make her son happy.

or

b) I'm too fucking cheap to spend $8 on a new book.

Next Lesson: We Don't Unplug the Lamp When We're Supposed to be SLEEPING

We decided to wait to transition Lumpyhead to a big kid bed until after the move. We even have a kick-ass race car bed waiting at a friend's house for that fateful day, whenever that might be.

Our plan changed yesterday when during naptime, Bump went in three times to find Lumpyhead out of his crib, handing the baby things or taunting her. Lumpyhead willingly showed Bump his escape technique - which was pretty graceful - and had re-entry not proved so tricky, Lumpyhead might have kept his newfound freedom a secret for a little while longer.

The first thing Lumpyhead told me when I came home last night was "I climb out of my bed, Mama!" Awesome, Little Man. Awesome.

Bump converted Lumpyhead's crib to a toddler bed. Lula immediately climbed into it, stood up, and started jumping. Then she hauled every member of Lumpyhead's Paci Posse - those night time toys she usually can't reach - into the living room. I'm pretty sure that was just to bug her brother, because she didn't seem to want to play with them once they were there. Maybe I shouldn't assign such dark motives; it could be that she wanted to show the Paci Posse there was more to the apartment than her brother's bed.

Lumpyhead seems pretty stoked about the new arrangement. I've heard there are toddlers who treat their big kid beds like islands - even though they can get out of them, they don't.

Lumpyhead isn't one of those kids. I have good reason to suspect he spent the entire night playing with the electrical outlets in his room.

Maybe I'm a Little Oversensitive

Morning diaper changes typically go like this. I ask, "Who wants a new diaper?" and Lumpyhead enthusiastically replies "Baby!" - effectively calling Not It on the first diaper question.

Lula usually comes willingly, but this morning she took Lumpyhead's "Baby" declaration as her cue to shake her head and run squealing in the other direction.

My toddler is faster than me.

I'm really fat and cumbersome right now, but even at my un-pregnant thinnest I wasn't setting any land speed records. It took me nearly an entire lap around the apartment to catch her. If she hadn't started giggling, I might not have caught up at all. I considered throwing something at her legs to slow her down.

It's not enough that she can outwit me, apparently. She has to outrun me, too.

--

Every evening I get an email summarizing my blocked spam messages. Occasionally a real message gets caught, so I read the subject line of every blocked "likely spam" message, just in case.

For example, last week a friend sent an email with "Poker tonight?" in the subject line. Punctuation and the word "poker" (heh heh, poker) was apparently enough to categorize this invitation as "likely spam," meaning I didn't get the message until too late. Bump told me he was interested in playing and I meekly agreed to stay home with the kids, thinking I hadn't been invited. Damn spam filter.

So the emails I would otherwise ignore are starting to get under my skin. I can shrug off the solicitations for discount viagra and advice on how to keep her satisfied, but the offers to hook me up with local horny singles have lately said things like "You're a lonely loser" and "Don't spend another Friday night at home." I gotta say, it's starting to hurt my feelings.

Wail! Gasp. Sob.

The last few times I've gone to get a corn dog they have been out. This afternoon the lady behind the counter told me they weren't selling them any more. "It was fun while it lasted, though, huh?" she said cheerfully.

I couldn't tell if she was making fun of me or not.

I'm crushed.

Help a Mother Out, Again

When I get home on Mondays and Thursdays, I ask Lumpyhead if he had fun at school that day. I ask him what he did.

With prompting from Bump (who very helpfully reads the "What Your Child Did in Class Today" sheet when he's not co-oping), Lumpyhead tells me a thing or two about his preschool day.

Last night Lumpyhead asked me, "Did you have fun at work today, Mama?"

I stammered something like "Well. . . I guess so."

Which was terrible, right? Shouldn't I be modeling the kind of conversation I would like him to have with me on school days? My excuse is that I was sort of stunned by the question, so I didn't have a prepared response.

So, Internet. The next time this question comes up, do I:
1. Lie. Gush about how Yes! I had wonderful fun at work that day. I saw my friends and played with my computer and ate all of my lunch.
2. Actually tell him about my day. Explain that I had a two-hour meeting about the wording of a footnote and that my Senate counterparts are being jackasses. Again.
3. Thank him for asking and move on.

Other suggestions? Should I tell him that work isn't "fun," and I go just to keep him and his sister fed, clothed, sheltered, and insured? Would that just spur him to tell me that school isn't "fun"? Should I stop asking him if he had fun at school, and instead just ask what he did?

Do you debrief your kids about your day?


(Oh, and I kept the dress. But it still pisses me off every time I see it in the closet. Too small in the belly?!? Cripes.)