Category: Truth in Parenting
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Some moments with toddlers are unforgettable, some are unbelievable, and some are one hundred percent the legacy of Pat Mikkelsen’s child rearing. Me: “Oh Charlie, you are so fucking beautiful!” Charlie: “Mama, you’re fucking beautiful every day!”
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I’m standing in a contraption that stretches my calf and foot to relieve the pain of my plantar fasciitis, stretching my arms up along the wall, wishing for help to pull the ache out. Me: ”Remember when they used to put people on the rack? Wouldn’t that feel good now?” Paulie: “And throw a little…
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Just when I feel overwhelmed by risk and debt and responsibilities, a little voice reminds me of how good we’ve got it. Me, scooping up apple cores, baby wipes and Culver's bags: “Man, this car is a mess”. Viv: ”At least it doesn't smell like old cheese anymore”.
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In an effort to make a temporary, rather bleak one bedroom apartment more tolerable for the family, especially over the holiday, I’ve been thinking we will have some fun and try to make it a little adventure. Mama: ”Honey, let’s make the little apartment fun, we can decorate it anyway we want. How about…
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I have a sheet of stickers. Charlie comes over, asks for a sticker, gets a sticker and waddles in to the next room. In that room, he folds the sticker. A minute later, he is back, waving his hand around with the half folded sticker stuck to it and proclaiming that the sticker is broken.…
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Viv: “Are you going to do my scary face?” Mama: “Yes, I’ll do it.” “Are you sure you can?” “Yes, I’m pretty sure I can make you look like Frankenstein.” “Hmm, well, I recommend watching some youtube videos first.” I’ve literally created a monster.
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Tonight is Charliepant’s first night in his big kid bed. While I was doing laundry or Facebooking or reading or something, Paulie made him his very own cardboard version of Bert & Ernie’s headboards. Because, as Charlie says: ERNIEBERT! ERNIEBERT! ERNIEBERT! (Also, as I write this, Viv is sitting next to his new bed reading…
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It’s been an exhausting few weeks. My community is in an uproar over the highschool production of To Kill A Mockingbird, which exposed the school’s ugly power dynamic, ineffective school board governance, and of course, very loud obnoxious white lady style racism. We spent a week vacationing with family up north, with all the emotional weight,…
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You are six years old today, and right now you are a humid little lump sleeping next to me in Mama’s bed. “Mama Time” you call it. It’s been six years, but I still don’t know exactly what I’m doing. Each time I get confident, each time I get the routine down, you go and…
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“I want a baby but I don’t want to make one so I will go out and buy one because I’ll be be rich because I’ll work at night too. I don’t want to make a baby because I don’t want to feel the pain when it comes out or when the baby kicks me.…
girl at large 