Allison Unfiltered

Cat's out of the bag...

...and when I left her last night, kid was alternating between brainmelt and jumping over the moon.

I'm taking this experience as proof that keeping secrets from offspring IS a good thing.

Kid gets her birthday present from Queen Alpo on Vimeo.

Because the President has to answer too many questions, that's why.

Upon seeing the White House in person for the first time in either our lives, this is what my beloved child had to say:

- Why do they need such a big house?  There's only the President, the mommy, the daughter, and the sister.

- Why are there so many windows?  (Because it's a big house.) Well, WHY DO THEY NEED A BIG HOUSE?!  We only have an apartment!

- Why can't we go inside? (Because we need an appointment, we can't just walk in and surprise the First Family at dinner or whatever.) Well, why don't they just go into a room while we go in and look around and when we're done they can come out?

- Why can't we see the daughter's bedroom?  (Would you like thousands of people coming into our apartment and seeing your bedroom?) Yes! (Even your underwear?) Mom, that's stupid.  I'd put it in a DRAWER.

- Why can't we go in?

- Why are there so many police? (Because people have tried to hurt the president before.) Why don't we tell them to stop?  We can reinforce positive behavior and give them something like power bucks.  If they behave they can get a prize.  What? You mean shoot him? But that's NOT NICE!

- Why can't we go in?

- Is the President home?  Can I meet his daughters?

- Are they eating dinner now?

- Why can't we go in?

- How big is the mommy's closet, do you think?

- How many bathrooms does it have?

- They really don't need that many rooms.  Let's see, they need three bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room, a room to watch TV... No, that place is TOO BIG FOR THEM.

- Why can't we go in?

- Like, whoah.  They have a huge backyard, don't they? No fair.

After a gazillion questions like this, it was such a huge relief to find my standby answer translates quite well when concerning matters of national governance:

- I wish I were the President's daughter.  Yeah!  I want to be the President's daughter.  Can I?

- I don't know, honey.  You'd have to ask your father about that, 'cause I don't want to be President.

 

A pause -- during which I could finally catch my breath.  And then:

- But why not?

- *splutter*

 

How to tell if your kid has had a good summer day

Freckles multiplying.  Hair smelling like chlorine.  New friendship bracelets on her wrists.  And when it was my turn to go to bed, I opened the door and found this.

 

My birthday's in a few months, people.

If you've been paying attention to my twitter feed you know I'm in Denver, the beautiful state of Colorado.

(And if you're thinking of referring me to that old site pleaserobme.com, don't forget I've got this nasty, mean dog holding down the fort at home.) 

Saw this box of tea at my hotel gift shop this morning.  Thought it was perfect.  Turns out it's sold by this company, blueq, which happens to have a whole bunch of other stuff that might come in handy should I ever need it...

Sometimes I'm not sure who's the Mom here.

Kid: Mom, is B-I-T-C-H a bad word?

Me: Wha-- huh?

Kid: B-I-T-C-H.  Is that a bad word?

Me: Bitch?  Yeah.

Kid: What about F-U-C-K?  Is it bad too?

Me: Supposed to be, yes.

Kid: Oh... [Friend] told me about them, said not to use them, shhh.

Me: Okay.  Good for her, then.

Kid: But I saw in [other friend's] dad's car, he wrote B-I-T-C-H and taped it to the seat.

Me: Okay.  [shrug]

Kid: That wasn't nice.

Me: Maybe not.  Maybe he was just joking, I don't know.

Kid: But it's a bad word.

Me: It's also a word adults use when they're talking with each other.

Kid: NO!  It's a bad word!  NO! He wasn't being nice!

Me:  Sometimes it is, yeah. Sometimes it's not.

Kid: NO! IT'S BAD!

Me: OKAY!  FINE!  BITCH IS BAD!

Kid: ... Sheesh, Mom.  Calm down.  I'm just asking questions.

My Mother's Day gift to myself

is the kid knocked out from sheer exhaustion.  Hello, me time!

After an hour-long fight over dining options, the kid bitch-slaps me. Metaphorically.

This is how I fool myself into eating broccoli, spinach, and carrots. 

The kid, on the other hand, wants to know why I put cheese and pasta in there.

To which I say: Shut up and eat.  This ain't no fancy schmancy restaurant, but I WILL go Gordon Ramsay on you.

P.S. I also said that metaphorically.

I swear I'm still a good driver. Also: I'm a natural brunette and I'm not a Buddhist.

Kid in the backseat: Mommy! Mommy! MOMMY!

Me: What?!

Kid: I'm part Irish, right?

Me: Yeah.

Kid: Oh. She's Italian.

Me: Are you?

Kid's friend, also in the backseat: I'm dirty blonde and I have blue eyes.

Me: Doesn't have anything to do with being Italian.  Are you?

Kid's friend: I'm not Catholic!

Me: Doesn't matter.

[Kid's friend pounds on my seat to get my attention. Kid admonishes her]: She can hear!  She has her hearing aid on.  Don't do that.

Kid: Mommy! Mommy! MOMMY!

Me: What?!

Kid's friend: [whisper whisper]

Kid: Can we please have ice cream?

Kidlogic dictates a playlist...

According to L'il Red, number four -- and ONLY number four -- on any given CD in my car is the best.  We are only allowed to listen to number four on loop, which means I'm constantly shuffling through my CDs after I. Just. Can't. Listen. To. This. One. Anymore.

But I'm actually not hating her number four preference that bad.  One of these days I might try her system and see what a number six playlist looks like. 

And, yes, YES!!! I'll do it before CDs go extinct.  Shut up.  Stop picking on our taste in music or access thereof. You're talking about two deaf girls rocking on the road (and yes, I know these are all old and cheesy). We don't care.

So, here ya go: the number fours.

 

Music Playlist at MixPod.com

Link: Raising a bilingual non-serial killer

Well, I happen to think the best line from this post by familydocwonk over at Rice Daddies (a blog by a handful of Asian fathers) is this:

Your parents faked their way through it. You fake your way through it. And you just hope you didn’t raise a serial killer.

But the rest of it is actually a good post on bilingual (or, actually, multilingual) parenting and one dad's meditation on resisting a mono-lingual parent's apparently well-meaning interference. 

I wish I'd been able to read more of this type of thing when L'il Red was younger and I kept meeting people who wanted to tell me how best to teach her language ("I can refer you to our speech therapist," "You should stop that cueing stuff, immerse her in ASL," etc.). 

But yeah, I've gotten pretty good at finding passive-agressive ways to tell people to bleep off when it comes to Raising My Child.  Now I just gotta make sure to keep the axes out of her reach.