Doodle

Okay, so it’s not Fashion Friday, but I’m sitting in the San Antonio airport and it’s 6:31 a.m. I need to do something to keep myself from curling up in one of these chairs and falling asleep.

Last night I was trying to pack and Caroline wanted to help. I laid out a few outfit choices trying to decide which ones I wanted to cram into my carry-on bag. There was one jacket that was questionable, so I decided to try it on to see how it fit.

As I was looking at myself in the bathroom mirror, Caroline walked in and said, “I would not go with that jacket.”

Okay, Anna Wintour. I’ll take that under advisement.

So then I decided to see how it looked with a certain necklace.

“Oh Mama, please not that necklace. I am not a fan.”

According to her, I have no business telling anyone what they should wear. It’s a wonder that I can dress myself.

Caroline was out of school on Monday to celebrate the President’s Day holiday. It’s always a big holiday for us. We decorate our President’s Day tree, hide colored eggs, and have the whole family over for a big turkey dinner where we all wear stove-pipe hats.

Or maybe I just complain about the fact that we don’t get any mail and the banks are closed. I can’t really remember.

Anyway, this year we decided to head out to the Stock Show and Rodeo because the folks at the rodeo like to celebrate President’s Day by charging only $1.00 for every single ride. That is a lot of trips on the ferris wheel. However, someone failed to notify the people selling the turkey legs and corn dogs about the perilous economic times in which we are living because they were charging $8.00 per turkey leg. For just one leg. I remember when you could get a whole turkey for $8.00 even though you had to walk uphill in the snow both ways to get it.

Gulley and her boys went with us and the kids had a great time. Eventually our money ran out and it started to rain, so we headed to the car. I was slightly amazed that Caroline didn’t beg to stay for just a few more minutes, but decided she was probably tired since she didn’t sleep good the night before.

We got home and I turned on the T.V. hoping that she would settle in and rest for a little bit, then I went in the kitchen to unload the dishwasher. At some point I realized she was really quiet and peeked in the living room to see if she was wreaking some sort of havoc in the form of permanent markers or eating her body weight in Valentine’s chocolate.

I was stunned to see that she was fast asleep on the couch. Seriously, Caroline falling asleep mid-day is an event that is so unprecedented I scanned the room to see if I was on Candid Camera.

She slept for about an hour and woke up with flushed cheeks and watery, sad eyes. It didn’t take a genius to figure out she was sick, which was fortunate considering that we don’t have any geniuses living in our house. P may beg to differ, but being able to tell how old a deer is from fifty yards isn’t necessarily on the MENSA test.

I gave her some Tylenol and put her to sleep in my bed. She was feverish and restless all night long, so when she woke up around 8:00, I told her that she wasn’t going to school. Bless her heart, she started crying and told me, “I just know they’re going to do something fun and I’m going to miss it!”

We went to see the pediatrician because deep in my heart I just knew it was the flu. They gave her the flu test where they stick a swab up your nose and, let me tell you, she was not happy. Caroline tends to be very dramatic about things that she doesn’t like. If she falls down, she’s been known to yell, “I DON’T EVER WANT TO WALK ON THAT GROUND AGAIN. I DON’T LIKE THAT GROUND!” And it doesn’t really do any good at that point to explain the laws of gravity and physics, so I usually just go along with whatever she says and within three minutes she usually forgives the ground and decides to give it another chance.

My point is that when that swab went up her nose, she was ready to ban cotton swabs from the face of the earth forever. If she knew any profanities, she would have yelled them right there in that lab. And then ten minutes later they confirmed that she has the flu and I wanted to say some profanities of my own.

Namely, I’d like to have a word with the makers of Flu Mist because what exactly was the point of paying that extra money to give my child the Flu Mist if she’s going to get the flu anyway? And not just any flu, but the strain of flu that was specifically supposed to be avoided by getting the aforementioned Flu Mist?

Dear Flu Mist,

You are a crock and are now dead to me.

Good riddance,
Melanie

So, yeah. She has the flu. And I didn’t get a flu shot (not that it matters apparently), so now I’m just hoping it doesn’t take us all down.

On the bright side, “Horton Hears A Who” was available on pay-per-view and I’ve never been so thankful for that lovable elephant and his wee speck of dust. They made a fever-filled afternoon a little bit brighter.

Not to mention the fact that the Girl Scouts of America showed up on my doorstep like green angels sent from heaven bearing the Thin Mints and Lemon Chalets I’d ordered a month ago. It made me realize that the Girl Scout motto is true. They are always prepared.

Or maybe that’s the Boy Scout motto.

Whatever.

Did you not read the part about me being home with a sick child with the flu in spite of the faulty Flu Mist? I’m doing the best I can.

Here’s hoping that Horton and the Thin Mints will get us through.

The other day my dad stopped by after work to see Caroline. He’d been out of town on business for several days and hadn’t seen her since she’d turned five and a half.

In true grandpa fashion, he began telling her much taller she’d gotten in the last few days and how he could tell she was five and half because of how fast she is now.

Bless her heart, it will be a wonder if she has any kind of self-esteem at all.

I was cooking dinner and called into the living room, “And you won’t believe what a good job she’s doing sounding out her words and letter sounds!”

My dad said, “Wow, Caroline! Just think you’ll be able to read before you know it.”

“Yep! I’m gonna read books!”

“That’s right. Then you can just curl up on the couch with a good book and read.”

“I know! Or I can just go in my room, read a book and have a little ‘me’ time.”

“Me” time?

Did she seriously say she could use a little “me” time?

I guess it’s been selfish of me to make her play all those rounds of Candyland with me every afternoon after school when apparently all she’s been looking for is a little “me” time.

There are times when I kind of wish I had another baby.

And then I remember that the one I have knows how to make her own sandwiches and that they don’t come that way at the beginning.

Jelly Sandwich from Big Mama on Vimeo.

Also, how can you do better than a kid that shares my love for making instructional videos?

By the way, I’ll be forever grateful (or at least grateful until that jar of jelly is finished) that she didn’t stick that knife back in the jar after she licked it.

**Edited to add: Sorry it wasn’t working this morning. I didn’t change my privacy settings because I am a moron.

Yesterday was a big day at our house because Caroline turned five. AND A HALF.

This is a milestone she’s been waiting on since the day she turned five last August and I am so happy that she is now officially five AND A HALF because I no longer have to listen to her angst about just being “plain five”. And really who can blame her for all the excitement? I know I cannot wait until I turn 37 AND A HALF later this month.

Since she is like me and cursed with the summer birthday, she gets to celebrate her half-birthday during the school year. They didn’t offer this half-birthday class party feature back in 1977. I endured a lifetime of pool parties with whichever three friends happened to not be out of town on vacation. It’s a wonder I’m not in therapy.

Fortunately, my child has a brighter future filled with faux birthday celebrations. She’ll never have to suffer through the endless parade of fall and spring class birthday parties knowing she’ll never get her moment in the sun. It’s like always being the runner-up in the Miss America pageant, but with icing instead of a crown.

Her teacher sent home the February calendar with February 3 marked as Caroline’s birthday celebration. I told Caroline that we could go to HEB to pick out birthday cupcakes for the class even though I am still harboring some bitterness towards the HEB bakery after the whole “cake-donut” fiasco. So on Saturday we went to HEB and picked out chocolate cupcakes with hot pink icing and Tinkerbell rings on top.

Bless her heart, she wanted to get blue Spiderman cupcakes for the boys but I had to draw the line at custom cupcakes for a group of Kindergartners who have been known to lick glue off their fingers. We compromised and bought Spiderman napkins for the boys and Tinkerbell napkins for the girls.

And is it just me or is Tinkerbell looking a little racier than she used to? I think Disney is slowly transforming her into a Bratz doll with wings. You can’t fool me, Disney. I’m on to you.

At some point she got a little carried away with the HALF-birthday thing. Everything became an argument of “but it’s my HALF-birthday tomorrow!” In fact, Monday night at dinner I told her she needed to quit playing around and finish her dinner and she said, “You shouldn’t be so hard on a kid whose five AND A HALF birthday is tomorrow”.

It took everything in me to not say, “THAT’S NOT EVEN A REAL THING!” And then maybe adding “And while we’re at it, neither is the Easter Bunny.”

But that would be mean.

After all, who wants to get that kind of news on the eve of their five AND A HALF birthday?

She requested that Mimi and I come and eat lunch with her at school prior to the birthday celebration and, by the way, could I please bring McDonalds? So we walked into the school right before lunchtime bearing a Happy Meal and two dozen of the brightest cupcakes you have ever seen. (I’m not kidding. I can’t get the icing stains off my fingers even eight hours later.)

We sat on the stage in the cafeteria and she ate a few bites of cheeseburger in between waving to all her friends and getting up to throw away every small piece of trash she could find. Each time she got up, she walked slowly across the front of the stage, wearing her 5 AND A HALF birthday crown, while waving to the crowd.

So that’s how they roll in Kindergarten these days. She got to be Miss America complete with icing AND a crown.

I was born three decades too soon.