Mr. Sty and I homeschool our daughter. During this past semester we had someone who could babysit her during the days, but our sitter recently decided to start working in a dental office again. Thankfully, I can take the kiddo to work with me. Yesterday I taught a knitting class for kids, which she joined in on, so that led to some entertainment for the day.
Why do kids love to sit in stupid places? I feel like I can't keep her off of the counter.
Here she is with Crayola's Dry Erase Crayons. They are actually pretty cool. She colored flowers and yarn balls all over the big front window. The crayon wipes off really easily. Coloring on a window somehow is just waaay more fun than coloring on paper.
She is very well behaved, but trying to think of things to keep her busy all day while I'm also working makes me exhausted by the end of the day. Remember that story that I was going to tell you the other day in my post about voting? I'll share now.
Ridiculous Parenting Moment:
The other day was just one of those days when everything the girl-child did was not necessarily naughty, but it was annoying enough to have to tell her to stop. Over and over and over. For example, everything that she fricking ate that day was shoved into her mouth whole. Seriously. Every time I turned around, she had her cheeks stuffed like a binging chipmunk and could barely breathe, let alone talk. Driving. Me. Nuts. (Yaaaaarggghhh! Hahaha...) Anyways, later in the day we were sitting at home. She was eating a soft pretzel for a snack while sitting on the loveseat in our living room. The front door was open to let in some breeze and the loveseat faces the door. I was standing at the kitchen table about 10 feet away, but not in view of the door. I was talking to a friend who was over (the one with the pig-gum) when child began making muffled sounds with her voicebox. She was trying to communicate, but had so much fucking soft-pretzel crammed in her face that she couldn't even move her lips. I freaked. The following conversation ensued.
Me: (yelling, naturally, because I was at the end of my fricking rope) For Christ's sake! You seriously have soooo much food stuffed into your mouth that you can't even talk!!! What the hell! Don't try to talk when your mouth is that full! Don't put that much food into your mouth! You're seven years old, not two! I've been telling you ALL DAY that you are GOING TO CHOKE! You know what? You're going to choke, and I'm really not in the mood to do the Heimlich maneuver right now, so I'm not going to. (At this point she is laughing, as she usually is when I start getting hysterical and/or threatening her with death. She thinks it's completely amusing.) (Also, probably not the best idea to do anything to make your child-with-a-mouth-full-of-pretzel laugh, especially while you are lecturing her about choking. Hindsight.) Do you even know what the Heimlich is? (She nods, muffled laughter coming from her doughy maw, while making a Heimlich motion on her own midsection.) Good, I'm glad you know, because you'll be doing it to YOURSELF!!!!!
Voice Outside: Uh...hello?
(I freeze for a second like a deer in headlight, then walk to the door to find a middle-aged man standing on my porch with a clipboard.)
Man: Um, hi, I'm with the democratic (words I couldn't understand...perhaps his mouth was full of pretzel) and I wanted to remind you to...
Me: Yep, voting tomorrow. Yay democrats! I'm on board. (Seriously, that was the third person I'd had at my door that day.)
Man: Uh...okay, good. So, I was listening to you talking to your daughter just now. She was trying to tell you that there was someone at the door...
Me: (nervously) Oh, haha...maybe if her mouth wasn't so full, I could have understood that. She's been doing that all day. Kids, you know? (More nervous laughter...)
Man: Okay, well, have a good night. (Walks away.)
My Friend: (laughing hysterically) Huh, well, I guess you can expect a visit from child services.
Me: (also laughing hysterically) Seriously! Who does that happen to? He would stand there for a full 2 minutes while I tell my 7-year-old that I'm going to let her choke to death. Don't people knock anymore? Or ring doorbells? I should be writing a book! You can't make that crap up.
So, ladies and gentlemen, the lesson of the day is that if you threaten your child with death, you should do it behind closed doors.
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