For once, a great article about toddlers!

I found this article on babble.com, a great website to which Meredith introduced me when I was having guilt over not knowing what to name my child.  Lots of the articles are interesting, but this one really struck a note with me.  Annie is, shall we say, a strong-willed child.  She must have gotten that trait from Toby.  Regardless, it will serve her well as an adult if only we don't all come apart before then. :)  This article is helping to give me a little perspective and may help me be more intentional about how I interact with Annie.

Why Being a Toddler is Hard : The real reason for those tantrums and meltdowns

By Melissa Sher (her website is Mammalingo.com)
May 5, 2011

One morning, my then one-and-a-half-year-old son unlocked the child-safety latch of our bottom bathroom drawer. Upon finding my makeup, he began breathing heavily with excitement and staggering around. What a haul! What loot! Imagine his disappointment when, just as he was about to pry the shiny cap off a red lipstick, I picked him up and carried him out of the bathroom. I didn’t congratulate him on his discovery. I didn’t point him in the direction of the hallway’s white walls and say, “My home is your canvas. Go forth and create.” Instead, I ruined everything.

Before I had children, when I’d go to the grocery store and see a little kid in the cereal aisle screaming and crying, I’d shake my head. Why was it that every time I saw a toddler, he or she was throwing some kind of fit? What could be so difficult about spending the day playing, napping, and eating? Now, after living among their kind, I should apologize. Not to you, but to them. Here’s the sad truth: for toddlers, the world is a rough place full of squelched mysteries, restrained freedoms, and nonsensical commands. I think I’d rather be fourteen again than be a toddler.

What does an old, forgotten Goldfish cracker from the bottom of a car seat taste like? What kind of pattern does yogurt make when it splatters onto the floor? What sound do cookbook pages make as they are torn in half? These and many other great discoveries are often stopped by us, the big people in our toddlers’ lives.

What if you sat down to read the newspaper when suddenly — out of nowhere — some giant swooped down and plopped you in front of a pile of plastic blocks? You’d holler your tush off.

How frustrating! What must it be like to get stopped by a security guard time and time again? To be constantly redirected and rerouted as you tried to go about your day, without an understanding of what you had done wrong?

So what’s the reward for a toddler’s natural curiosity? A little freedom and encouragement? No, just the opposite. Oppression! We pin them to furniture all day long: the stroller, the car seat, the high chair. All of the straps! All of the restraints! How maddening it must be to sit, captive, in front of a tray covered with food you can’t identify or don’t remember liking. No wonder it’s so often tossed to the floor.

And does anyone like being forced to perform for strangers? “Blow a kiss. Clap your hands. Wave ‘bye bye.’ Give Aunt Lisa a high five. Touch your nose. No, not your toes … your nose. Okay, now touch your toes. Blow another kiss. Let’s turn on some music. Dance. Dance!”

Do I need to even mention the language barrier? How much can these chubby-cheeked kids actually understand? Twenty percent? Thirty percent? Two percent? They don’t really understand us. We don’t really understand them. Every day must feel like an endless, torturous game of The $100,000 Pyramid. Anyone can see how badly toddlers want to communicate with the outside world. Does a day go by without a toddler picking up some object and holding it to his or her ear like a telephone? “Lo! Lo! Lo!” my son used to yell into a toy truck. Who was he calling? Was he trying to get help?

Of course, in the end, we parents still have to be the bad cop again and again — and again. Toddlers have to eat. They have to sleep. They can’t run into the street every time they notice an open door or scribble with indelible green marker all over the sofa. But I just want the record to reflect that I feel for them. And, in about fifty or so years, I want the toddlers of today to remember my solidarity with their cause and please treat me with care.

Toby is famous!

Below is a link to the youtube video of the zoo photography class the Toby recently attended.  He has two photos featured (including the first lemur, even though they forgot to give him credit).  You can also hear him speaking later. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dA1lVbotLL0

Franklin Theatre!

I am SO excited to report that the Franklin Theatre will be reopening in just over a month!  The theater has been undergoing renovations since long before we moved to Franklin.  Being able to walk to a movie will be so cool.  They're showing "current run" movies - those are the ones that have been in theaters for about 2 months already, and are also having childrens' matinees on Saturday. 

They are (obviously) showing Gone with the Wind as the first movie upon reopening.  We won't be seeing that.  Ever since I read the book in high school, I have a particular aversion to anything related to GWTW.  Regardless, I can't wait to attend the other events on opening night!  They're showing outdoor movies (King Kong, Wizard of Oz), having swing bands, etc etc. I don't think I can convince Toby to dress as his favorite movie character, but it should be a very fun time.  Annie and I attended the lighting of the marquee recently, and it was packed, lots of fun.  So excited!

Website for the theater - http://www.franklintheatre.com/

Happy Easter!

What a difference a year makes!  Our little bunny has grown so much since last year!

Last year the photo took about twenty seconds to get.  This year we had to spend twenty minutes chasing down the bunny, then wrestle the ears onto her head.  Our first attempt resulted in her sprinting behind the kitchen door and smushing her nose up against it in what must be the baby verison of the finger. :)  She's fiesty, that is for sure!

One year photos

We had family photos taken on the morning of Annie's birthday. Here are a few of our favs!

This is what happens when you don't really think the child's feet are going to be in the shot.  Oh well, at least she isn't too matchy-matchy.

I love, love, love this one!  Annie was losing interest in playing the role of the trained monkey for the camera and looking for a little comfort.

We rallied with the discovery of some nearby daffodils!

And we finally got a good picture of mama and baby.  I've been waiting about a year. :)

We happen to think that Annie gets cuter by the day. Don't you?

Annie's First Birthday!

We had a truly wonderful day yesterday, celebrating Annie's birthday.  Toby and I truly indulged by taking the day off work and spending the whole day with Annie.  We went to the park THREE times, Skyped with our English family, tried twice to get Annie to eat cake, had family photos taken by a photographer, had lunch with my parents, took a nap, and finally crashed on the couch with pizza and tv.  It was a really great day.  I only cried once about Annie's transition to toddlerhood.

Below are a few photographic highlights.  I'll post the professional photos when we have them back.  My expectations are low, since Annie didn't really want to perform on her birthday.

Speaking of non-performance, Annie completely refused to touch her cake, much less eat it.  She really only touched it when trying to push it off her tray.  Hence, you will note a lack of cute-baby-with-cake-rubbed-all-over-her-face photos. 

Here we are, setting out for the first trip to the park - with Annie on her brand new SmartTrike.  She loved it!  She laughed and laughed the whole way.  It was such a trip!

This is the cake.  I promise it was really tasty and took quite a while to make. Don't look to close, I am far from a professional. I hear that each year you are a mom, your decorating skills improve.  

This is our second attempt to get Annie to try her cake.  Ain't happenin'.

We don't have any photos of Annie is the cute dresses she wore most of the day, but hopefully the professional photographs will come through.  These last photos are from our last trip to the park of the day.  Annie doesn't particularly care for walking in shoes, or on grass, or on the grass while wearing shoes.  She stood there under that tree for a rather long time until I rescued her. :)

   

 And now, giving her very stern face and pointing toward her intended destination - the playground.

Annie is really into slides these days.  She loved going down big slide with her daddy -

And the smaller slide - nearly all by herself.  Look at that face!!!

I hope she had as great a day as did Toby and I.  It was an awesome bookend to an awesome year.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow Annie turns 1, which is just unbelievable.  It's also unbelievable that exactly one year ago I was timing contractions and calling Toby to tell him I thought I might be in labor.  I still remember the sound of his voice, though not exactly what he said.  It had a very distinct "holy heck this is really happening and I suddenly have a lot of adrenaline in my veins but I must stay calm" sound.

Then I billed six hours of work.  I should have gotten extra credit and/or automatic partnership for that.

Anyway, I also remember realizing that I had already had the last good night sleep I was going to get for a long time.  That was kind of a bummer.  I would have savored it a bit more or slept in a lot later if I had known.  It was good that I didn't realize how long it would be before she slept through the night reliably.  

Sometimes it feels like yesterday, and sometimes it feels like a lifetime since Annie joined our little family.  It makes me a little sad that she won't really be my little baby anymore after tomorrow.  Then I realize that she's walking, communicating, playing on playgrounds, dancing to music, catching balls thrown by daddy and lots of things that signify that she hasn't been a little baby in a while, she's a toddler.  A very independent, funny little girl, really.  And the cutest little girl I know. :)