Carmenisms

I love the funny little things Carmen does.

For example, we have this smoke detector in our bedroom right by the bathroom door.  If someone takes a hot shower and doesn't close the door, the steam sets off the alarm.  My sister, Marissa, is notorious for setting off the fire alarms once every time she visits and spends the night.  Often times, it's about 30 minutes after Carmen goes down for a nap, and we feel SO BAD we've woken her up.  Sometimes, Mark sets off the alarm in the morning when he gets back from the gym.  The cats might push the door open or he might forget to turn the fan on, so when he opens the door to leave the bathroom, all of the steam escapes and our house starts beeping loudly at 7:15. O_o;

You'd think all of these rude awakenings would cause Carmen to have a fear of smoke detectors and the sound of the fire alarm.  Strangely enough, she doesn't seem to mind it (even though it drives me crazy!)  Lately, when Mark's putting Carmen through her bedtime routine, she'll look up at the ceiling and point to one of the alarms and go, "Beep!"  Mark says, "Oh, are you looking at the alarm up there?" and she goes, "Uh-huh.  Beep!"

It's a beep!  So cute!  Not a, "ZOMG THAT THING IS SO NOISY IT WAKES ME UP IN THE MIDDLE OF NAPS AND SCARES THE CRAP OUT OF ME!"  Phew.  One potential psychological bullet dodged!!

Carmen developed a rash on her stomach a few weeks ago.  The doctors couldn't figure out what it was, but they prescribed me this antibiotic ointment that seemed to help clear it up.  Carmen was terrified at the doctor's office because she KNEW she only goes to the doctor's to get shots (why else go to the doctor when your kid is perfectly healthy all the time?) ... and it was hard to convince her that we WEREN'T going to hurt her that time.  Poor girl.  But one thing she loves about the pediatrician's office is their aquarium.  She loves to watch the fishies, and the SADDEST part about going to the doctor is not getting the shots - it's the having to say goodbye to the fishies.  ("FEESHIES! FEEEEEESSSHHIIIESSSS!!!")

Back to the rash.  Carmen's been really good about letting me put the medicine on her.  She calls it "Memmin."  I put it on her in the morning when I change her diaper and in the evening when I put her pajamas on.  It goes a little bit onto her back, too, so when I need her to stand up, she stands up and turns around for me.  It's so sweet how helpful and obedient she is! <3  She then likes to take the little tube and pretend she's putting the medicine on herself.  "Memmine." she says.  "Ouchies."


Remember how she calls fingernail polish "candy"?  Turns out it's definitely her word for fingernail polish, not just the fact that the shiny colors makes your nails look like Jolly Ranchers.  I put clear sparkle polish on my nails the other day for the heck of it, and no less than 2 seconds after I finished, Carmen grabbed my hands, touched the sparkles, and cheered, "Candy!!  Hannals!"  (She's learned the word for "fingernails" and it sounds a lot like "hang nails".)


Some of her favorite things to do these days are to color (either with real crayons on paper or with this free "Doodle Kids" iPod app) and ... well ... play pretend.  It doesn't matter if it's with her play kitchen, a play phone, a real phone, an iPod, a baby, her little doll stroller, her big (umbrella) stroller, or someone's shoes ....... she's really creative!  It's fun hearing her sit and chat away about how excited she is about her kitchen, or taking her baby for a walk, or wrapping her baby in a blanket ... and it doesn't matter whether the baby is a doll or a stuffed animal.  I'm sure I could convince her a crayon was a baby if I wrapped it in a toilet paper blanket for her.  IT'S AWESOME.

Speaking of toilet paper ... she does this funny thing where she rips up toilet paper or tissues into little pieces and wipes her nose with them.  It's winter - kids get runny noses.  The other day, we were at Mark's work and she was stuffing the tissue pieces up her nose.  I heard her inhale through her nose and gasp a little bit.  "Oh!  Stuck!" she gasped.  I laughed and said, "Yup, you've got that stuck up your nose!  You probably don't want to put stuff up there!" and helped her pull the tissues out.  She looked at me and said, "Yes!  Stuck!!"

It will be less funny when they're frozen peas.

Parenting with Love and Logic

Today is one of those days many parents fear - Carmen learned how to pull down the door handle to open doors!  Correction - she's finally tall enough to reach the door handle.  I'm happy because now she won't accidentally shut herself in a room and start crying because she can't get out. ;)

My friend, Tammy Fillerup, once recommended the book Parenting With Love and Logic.  I checked it out from the library last week and have been reading it at the gym.  It's a lot like how I've always figured I wanted to parent - let children figure out how to handle their own problems, only intervene when your kids are in danger, give them choices with options that are acceptable to you ("eat nicely at the table or play on the floor..." "red pants or blue pants" and they know you'll make the decision for them if they won't make one), don't use a lot of emotion when disciplining because kids thrive on getting a rise out of people, etc.

When Carmen gets into things she's not supposed to get into, I don't freak out.  I simply say, "That's not food/a toy" and take it away if she won't hand it back to me.  Sometimes she really wants it, but the resistance only lasts a couple of seconds.  She's learned that if she's not supposed to do something, I'm not going to let her do it no matter how much she fusses.  But if she IS allowed to do something and I just prefer her not to, she only has to complain once and I say, "Oh, fine, you can have my spoon.  I'll get another one."

The trickiest part for me was figuring out what I was and wasn't going to let Carmen do before she did it, or making a split-second decision when she does something so she could learn, "If Mom doesn't give in within 10 seconds, she's not giving in EVER."

Another friend of mine, Julie Johnson, talked about disciplining her 8-year-old.  When he does something he's not supposed to do, she's trying to train him that when she says something like, "Uh-uh-uh!" he knows he's about to get into trouble.  I think Carmen's learned that when I say, "Oh, be careful, Carmen!" she knows she's probably about to fall and get hurt.  So she stops and looks at me for instructions when I tell her to stop or be careful.  Parenting so far has not required much yelling.  :)

I was afraid my kid would be one of those kids who gets into the toilet paper roll and empties the whole thing before you can grab them and say, "Stoooooooppppp!!!!"  But I guess the whole, "Not a toy" thing worked pretty well with Carmen before she was mobile enough to unroll a whole thing of toilet paper.  That doesn't mean she hasn't played with it.

The other day, she pulled off a few pieces of toilet paper.  I followed her curiously and said, "You know, Carmen, I'd rather you not play with that.  It's not a toy.  What are you doing?" and she proceeded to bring the toilet paper to her face and wipe her nose, like I do when I have a cold.  Then she went over to Ravis (our cat) and started scrubbing him down.  "Oh, you're cleaning!" I squealed.  "That's so sweet!"

Pretend play and creativity is worth a few squares of toilet paper.

Today, she asked for a glass of water in the bathroom and spilled a little bit on the floor.  I was going to grab a towel and start cleaning it up, but Carmen went into the bathroom and started unrolling the toilet paper again.  Oy!  And it wasn't just a little bit this time - it was like 3 feet.  "Carmen, do you really need to use so much of the toilet paper?  Can we put some back?" and she went to the little spot where she'd spilled her water and started wiping it up with the toilet paper.  I pulled out a towel and said, "I use a towel like this when I clean up spills!" and helped her clean the rest of it up.

I'm not sure if I should've let her clean up the whole mess herself (2 whole ounces of water!), or if I should've handed her the towel and let her do it on her own, or what ... but it was a really neat experience.  She even put the wet toilet paper into the trash when she was done wiping the water up!  Cleaning up her own spills ... She's the coolest 19-month-old ever!!

Now, if only these molars would come in, then we could sleep again ...