Marshmallows

Amanda gets in the car after school today with a bag of "Reindeer Food." I mistakenly thought it was food we were supposed to feed the deer on Christmas night and was about to panic: Do I throw the "food" out on the lawn? How is that going to work since there are chocolate chips, cornflakes, raisins, and marshmallows in it? It will still be sitting on the lawn in the morning and then Amanda will go look and see it and figure out that the reindeer really didn't come because there really are no reindeer.

All of that passed through my mind in about 10 seconds. I'm already thinking we'll have to go to the grocery store and buy cornflakes (we're HoneyNut Cheerio people) and chocolate chips, then we'll have to make a big deal out of it while we're making it....

Amanda, oblivious to the panic in my mind, proceeds to tell me that the Reindeer Food is NOT for reindeer, it is for her to eat. "But," she says as she settles herself into her carseat, "I didn't put marshmallows in mine. I'm not into marshmallows, you know."

And that was that. She ate the Reindeer Food, sans marshmallows, and I laughed. Because, to her, it was all about NOT having the marshmallows. So there!

I love this kid!

One of those days with the kids

I don't get why my kids whine. Oh sure, all kids do at some point, and I know there are kids who whine much more than mine do. But I don't get it. I've read waaaaaaay too many parenting books and I know the "expert's" reasons for why kids whine. My kids don't seem to fall into the grouings that the "experts" throw out. They weren't tired, hungry, or blah blah blah. They were misunderstood. Why in the world does that mean they need to whine? It escalated to crying and screaming, because, of course, I was on the phone. First time I had been on the phone in 3 hours. I'm so tired of listening to the whining. They don't get what they want when they whine. They get to go to their rooms. When I hear whining, it feels as though pieces of me are being ripped out of me, slowly and painfully. A brief time out for us all, then we can rejoin each other and try to be better people.
Did I whine that much as a kid? I don't think I've ever asked my mom. I'll do that. Think she remembers?