Peaches & Honey: One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

It's been a while since I've done a post bitching and moaning about the woes of living life in a home (a home which resembles a Fisher Price crack den) with two toddlers. And that's simply because life has been manageable for the last couple of months. When life is enjoyable, I don't want to take the time out to blog about it. I want to spend my time in the moment and enjoy the Eskimo kisses, the "mommy, you look like a princess" days, and the good afternoons full of sun and sweat and love.

But to everything there is a season. And this new season of behavioral inconsistencies is apparently here to kick my ass.

Which is why I do not discourage day-boozing.

Vivi, while usually my more agreeable child, has become a typical two-year old and everything that entails. She pitches fits, which is standard fare for a two-year-old, but she's also developed a violent little temper that includes, but is not limited to, throwing things, kicking, screaming, and full-on cage fighting. She's a beast, and I'm hoping that this phase leaves immediately, because I hate seeing my normally pleasant little angel act like a member of the Manson family.

To be fair, most of these outbursts are totally on-par with most two-year-old woes. She talks plenty, but not yet well enough to communicate her desires, so there's a lot of frustration for her when we don't understand the things she wants. Some of her frustration stems from wanting to do more than she is physically or mentally able to do, usually involving toys. And then the other 50% of her frustration comes from her brother. Oh, her brother.

The face of an angel.

Bobby and Vivi. They'll antagonize the shit out of each other until they're blue in the face, and yet it all seems to be a game in the end. It's all forgotten after a while, after kisses and hugs and chocolate.

They are finally at an age where they really play with each other and love each other so much. When Vivi wakes up in the morning, she pops her little head up out of her crib and says, "Where's Bobby?" And then when Bobby gets up, the first thing he says is "Oh, hi, Bibi!"

They actually want to be together most of the time and seem sad any time they are apart.

Moments like that melt my heart.

But they are scattered between shrieks and hollering and time-outs and the occasional spanking.

Yesterday, however, was an experiment in torture.

I woke up in a pleasant enough mood at 7am to the tune of coughs and meows. I got us all downstairs for breakfast, made a smoothie, and began to try to shake the dust from my eyes. We aren't good morning people.

It's really hard to be a good morning person when you have one tiny person whining about God-only-knows-what, and the other tiny person whining that he wants Pop-Tarts, but not too hot, and orange juice. Please. The "please" gets me. You'll get a lot of places in life with good manners, included not being murdered by your mother over breakfast. Had he not said, "please," I would have gone in a different direction for breakfast, but I decided that Pop-Tarts and OJ sounded like a winner. Meanwhile, I was also trying to get Vivi the milk that she was still shrieking over. I wasn't going fast enough for Bob, so he came over to reiterate,"MAY I PLEASE HAVE ORANGE JUICE. PLEASE."

But Vivi's crying was at an all-time high, and Bobby's frustration was growing out of control, and I was going as fast as I could..which really only resulted in my hands shaking and me spilling half of the things I was trying to pour. I just had to take a step outside for a second.

People- breakfast for two tiny humans should not be this stress-inducing.

After everyone had cooled down from breakfast, we had a relatively stress-free morning that consisted of the kids completely undecorating my sofas while I tried to get some work done. It was one of those days where you could swear it's 5pm, but you look at the clock and it's only 9:15 in the morning. I got up to change the laundry, only to find that Bobby had somehow gotten ahold of a can of Play-doh. Now, I don't know if I have mentioned it before, but I. effing. loathe. Play-doh. Whoever invented Play-doh must have been a man who wanted to see the sanities of all mothers die. I don't dislike Play-doh because I'm a fun-hating Satan in ~~a skirt~~ yoga pants; if my kids play with it outside (or ideally at school, far, far away from me), then that's cool. But my home is not a Play-doh friendly home. And this was a good reminder of why I made that rule in the first place. Play-doh was everywhere. Smushed in carpet. Smushed in toys. Smushed in clothes. Smushed in Vivi's mouth. Oh my God at the Play-doh disaster.

I decided to avert the inevitable disaster that would come soon and proposed that we get out of the house, so we quickly got dressed and then ran errands out in town. Bobby was so excited to make another trip into Publix; I figured that this was due to the free cookie, but no, he decided to tell another person that "Mama is going poo poo in her pants!"

Y'all this is the second time in a week that he has done this, and it has occurred in Publix both times. I don't know what in the world is causing this random, embarrassing nonsense to spill out of his little mouth, but it leaves me in an awkward predicament of how to clean up that encounter with the other person. (I usually go with, "haaa..hhhaaaa...no, no I'm not. I promise, I actually am not doing that.")

After the errand run, we came home for lunch. After lunch, Bobby asked for more playdoh, and/or some Apple Jacks, and/or to go outside. I shot down all of his requests with the thing a child never wants to hear: NAP TIME.

Well, Bob didn't take too kindly to that, and despite all the progress we have made with him lately, he reverted back and pitched a big ol' hissy fit. He was mad as fire and crying, which led to a coughing jag, and eventually he started puking all up and down my staircase.

Are you serious right now.

I cleaned him up while giving him the Eye. You know, the mad-as-hell, I'm your mama, and I will kill you Eye. So he did not pass Go or collect $200; that kid went straight to his room for time-out, where I told him he had to stay until I said he could come out..or else. And it turns out that lasted a solid three hours.

Once Viv had awakened, I could see that she had clearly gotten up on the wrong side of the bed. Completely unnecessary tantrums ensued until I finally figured out that she wanted a cup of apple juice, but not in just any cup--in Bobby's cup. Why do kids always want what the other one has?

Finally my parents dropped by to save me from myself, and my daddy took the kiddos outside while my mama and I did some quick cleaning during their little time away. There's no point in even bothering to clean when kids are inside the house. That's rookie mistake #1.

Later on, we had our friends drop by for dinner and play time outside, which was one of the only sanity-savers of my day. Even though it added 2 more kids to the mix, it was worth it to gain one more adult friend. The kids played to the max, although a lot of it entailed me chasing Viv out of the street, but when it came time to get ready for bed, we totally skipped baths and went straight to bed. They were warm and snuggly and compliant during bedtime, which made me feel even more guilty for being frustrated all day.

Once I got into bed, I laid there lamenting to myself -where did the last few weeks of my semi-easy kids and decently-enjoyable life go? I really thought I had something going and that things were falling into place. But it seems like when I take one step forward, we end up taking two steps back sometimes. On some days--good days--I think I've really got a handle on all this, and I will occasionally even entertain the idea of a possible third child down the road one day. And then days like yesterday snap me back into reality and remind me, no, no, I have enough of a shitshow as it is.

But on the bright side, I hit my FitBit step goal, and you can't put a price on that.