39 posts tagged “abbey”

Abbey: Mom, I want to paint in the kitchen.

Me: Not right now, honey. Mumma just cleaned up the kitchen and I want it to stay nice at least a little while.

Abbey: But you can clean it again after I'm done painting, ok?

::headdesk::

In other news, I haven't been blogging (or even tweeting) much lately because the kids and I have all been varying degrees of sick over the past week, with Abbey having gotten it the worst. We ended up having to miss my nephew's first birthday party last weekend (and it sounds like they're all sick over there as well). I spent the rest of the week coordinating our joint-exhibit promotion with Imagekind, rolling out the new member list for EBSQ Juried Artists, and then the weekend doing a manual database audit. Fun fun fun!  So right now, I just want to revel in my fabulously clean (and paint-free) kitchen table, read my feeds, and drink a cup of cocoa. At least for a little while before I succumb to Abbey's superior powers of persuation.

Abbey and I were watching Mister Rogers' Neighbourhood this morning (a delightful episode where Purple Panda dresses up in a dinosaur costume, and then Fred takes a trip to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History--right here in Pittsburgh--to show off the Hall of Dinosaurs) and by the end of the episode, Abbey was confused.

Abbey: Why is he taking off his shoes?

Me: He's leaving his play shoes there and putting his fancy shoes back on.

Abbey: Why is he taking off his sweater?

Me: Because he keeps his sweaters there for play. He wears a sports jacket back to his house, see? (pointing to the "lovely" powder-blue blazer that men of Fred's generation seemed to favour)

Abbey: Maybe it's a vacation house.

Me: Why do you think so?

Abbey: Because it doesn't have a freezer* and I didn't see a door for the basement. Maybe I missed that part of the show? Or maybe the basement is underground somwhere?

Me: Maybe!

Did any of you ever wonder where the "rest" of Mister Rogers' house was? I assumed he slept on the sofa, but I did wonder where his bathroom was!

*she commented earlier when Fred opened his old-skool fridge that it didn't seem to have a freezer like ours does

Not having a terribly good day thus far, so to cheer myself up (and perhaps amuse you as well) I'd like to share Abbey's "greatest" made-up joke thus far:

Q. Why did the hippopotamus wake up the grasshopper?

A. To get to the grass!

(apparently, this joke is hilarious if you're 3.5)

I had CNN on when Abbey came downstairs this morning and she wanted to know why mommy was crying and why the people on tv were crying. So wasn't ready to explain 9/11 to a three year old. I told her some bad men got mad and flew some airplanes into some tall buildings and knocked them down. While I was explaining this, a picture of Bin Laden appeared on the screen because of that audio tape that "surfaced" today. She asked me who that was, and I told her that it was a bad man. She asked if he was the one who "drove" the airplanes into the building, and I said, no, but he told his friends to do it. She asked if his friends were good or bad, and I said they were bad. And she said, yeah, flying airplanes into buildings isn't very nice.

Between my two adorable children, I was rudely awoken 7 times in the 6.5 hours they deigned to let me pretend to sleep. And now I am so achy I can barely move (thanks, fibromyalgia.) And I am so mentally sluggish that roughly an hour ago, I couldn't figure out how to make my microwave "go." I've also been very snappish with the children. This does not bode well for the day.

Abbers has pre-school orientation tomorrow. Earlier in the summer, she was really looking forward to this. But as she's seen the day visibly draw near on the calendar, there's been a shift.  She's been having accidents again, including a full-blown pee in the foyer and wet footprints running away from the puddle yesterday evening, which she tried to write off as her spilling her glass of water.  She's been tempermental and having crying jags. Last night around midnight she woke up screaming, which woke her brother (grrrr), and it took Bill close to an hour to calm her back down. 

After she "watered" the foyer and we got her cleaned up, I took her for a walk over to the pre-school, which is literally across the street from our house. We peeked in the windows and I showed her the small  private playground that's nestled beside the building. She seemed relieved to see swingsets and toys. She even noticed cups and napkins for snack time. Still, she confided in me that she was scared to go. "Of the kids?" I asked. "No. I like to play with kids." "Of storytime?" "No." "Of craft time?" "No, I love to make crafts!" "Then what is it, kitten?" 

She thought for a moment, then whispered, "I'm scared of the activities." 

"But Abbers, " I reasoned, "storytime and snack time and craft time are all activities and you love those!"

"I'm scared of activities that I don't even know what they are yet."

Aha. We get to the heart of it. Fear of the unknown. I'm hoping orientation tomorrow morning will ease her fears, particularly since I'll be able to be with her that first day. But a week later, she'll get the real deal and they won't let me past the front door to drop her off. I have to say I have some fear myself. Will being across from the pre-school be a blessing or a curse? I can picture her sad little face staring out that window that faces our house, wanting to be home with mama, dad, and Liam.  I know she'll get over it, particularly since she's an extremely social child who is so lonely for friends. Any child that walks past our front door is fair game, as she screams, "Hi! Hi!" over and over again until she elicits a response (or the child is out of visual range.) I just hope she takes after me (who loved school) and not her dad, who wants to homeschool her because while he values education, he was very unhappy in school, doesn't want her to turn into a little sheep, and of course, he has his own social anxiety issues as well which are no doubt playing into wanting to keep her home. 

Bedtime tonight should be interesting.

[scene: Liam's morning diaper change]

Abbey: What's that skin thing on Liam? (points to his penis)

Me: That's what Liam uses to pee. It's called a penis.

Abbey: I don't have one of those on my dupa (Polish for heine, and what she calls everything below her waist)

Me: No, neither do I because we're girls. Only boys have penises.

Abbey: (thinking for a minute) I think daddy must have one of those, too.

The thing that is amazing to me is that it's taken over a year of her watching me change Liam's diaper to notice his bits are different than hers!

We were driving home from Abbey's post-op visit with Dr. Pav and lunch when we smelled a skunk. Abbey kept sniffing for it until we couldn't smell it any more. Kept asking if she'd smell another skunk soon. I told her to keep sniffing and let me know. She was quiet for a while after that, and I thought she'd dozed off. But apparently, she was deep in thought. A few minutes later, she chimed, "When I was a baby I had 2 more kitties and they were alive." "Yup," I confirmed. "And now they're dead," she informed me, then added as an afterthought,  "Just like that skunk we smelled." Now, we hadn't mentioned that the skunk we smelled was probably dead, nor have we talked about death much, although she does know our one cat was hit by a car when she was a little over a year old. "How did you know the skunk was dead?" Bill asked her. "Because I love animals, daddy!"

Am I overly biased or is my child really precocious in her observations? She never fails to surprise me with her insights, that's for sure!

In other news, after I trimmed Liam's hair, which was getting a tiddly bit mullet-y, Abbey found a pair of scissors and hacked five inches off of her hair. She's lucky I was able to salvage it, although it's now chin-length. Sigh.

Note to Mena: see what you have to look forward to? Congrats! ;)

I was in the kitchen sort of staring off into the space of the backyard when Austin,  an overly-hyper, seven-year-old boy who lives next door, started yelling from his back porch for Abbey, whom he always calls, "Abigail."

"Abigail! Abigail, come out here! Hey, Abigail!"

Of course, since the backdoor is open, Abbey can hear him perfectly well and came running into the kitchen.

"Mama, Aidan and Austin are calling me! I have to go outside!"

"In a little while, kitten; you didn't finish your breakfast."

"Oh, but we can have a pic-i-nic with Aidan and Austin," she stated confidently, much to my inner groan. I like the middle child in their family, Aidan, who is about 5 months older than Abbey and very quiet (and nice) when not egged on by the older brother. The sister is about 6 months older than Liam. But something about Austin rubs me a bit the wrong way, ever since he started making very misogynistic comments to Abbey when they first moved in about why Abbey didn't have a pink bike, or why Abbey played with Thomas Trains because they're for boys, or how she shouldn't have a wooden snake toy because it's a boy toy and she should give it to him so she can go play with dolls.

ANYhoo. Austin kept yelling for Abbey, so I stepped out with her on the porch.

"Hey, Abigail's mom! Can we come over to play today?"

I explained to him that Abbey just had eye surgery yesterday and she might not feel up to it. Then, of course, Abbey chimed in, "Today is a good day to ride bikes, don't you think?" ::headdesk:: So then I counter with, "Maybe later after Abbey finishes her breakfast."

At this point, I am about to shuffle Abbey back in the house because Liam is playing unattended two rooms away, when Austin starts shouting (as he's being shuffled back in):

"I love you Abigail, and I'm going to marry you somday! I want to kiss you, Abigail!"

Dear lord in heaven, I knew there was a reason I didn't like that boy! I am so not ready for this, lol.

It's taken a few days to be able to talk about what happened with Abbey's CT scan on Tuesday. It started off well enough. We got into town with plenty of time. And despite some confusion with parking at Children's Hospital (don't get me started on their valet people) we easily found where we needed to be. 4th Floor Radiology Department via the purple elevators marked by an oversided purple crayon statue. The waiting area was colourful and bright, with wonderful toys to distract even the most nervous child. There were even two volunteers doing craft time with kids. A nice guy named Sunil spent a lot of time with Abbey helping her glue and colour a bunch of projects while we waited. I felt at ease and well prepared. After all, I was told that the CT room was going to be beautiful with oceanic lights to make it look underwater, a movie screen with Finding Nemo, and everything painted to look like an undersea fairyland. I was also told that even though Abbey's opthamologist had recommended sedation for her, they didn't feel it was needed; they prided themselves on a 90% sedation-free rate for this procedure. What could I posibly be worried about? This wasn't any hospital; this was CHILDREN'S Hospital, and surely they know how to make children feel at ease. I told Abbey as we were called away from craft time by what looked like an 80's holdout with spiky hair and earring contrasting with his green scrubs, that she was going to have her picture taken now.

Instead of the magical undersea room, we were first taken to what looked exactly like a doctor's exam room. My daughter and doctor's exam rooms are unmixy things. I was trying to figure out how they were going to do the CT in this room when spiky-hair guy told me to put her up on the table. I tried to figure out how to get up there with her to calm down my now anxious, crying child, but he said that I would need to hold her down. "For what??" I asked as some of Abbey's panic crept into my voice. Let's just say they neglected to tell me that Abbey needed to have an IV of contrast dye for the procedure. Nobody at any point in all of the preparatory conversations leading up to this procedure mentioned this step, so I had no way to prepare her, or myself, for this happening. I was in tears as Abbey screamed that she wanted up, she wanted to go home, mommy this man is huritng me, mommy help me-- and I was holding her down (and singing Frere Jacques through my own tears) helping him do it. I was now wishing we'd had the sedation after all, and not just for her.

We then had to walk down the hall into the actual CT room, which was just as beautiful as they had promised, but it was well beyond too late for it to work its magic. Abbey didn't want to lie down on the scanner board, and I couldn't really blame her at this point. She was near primal, all pure fear and instinct, shrieking her anxiety as only a hysterical three-year-old girl can. They kept forcing her down and "mummified" her in a blanket, strapping her down as she kicked and screamed and cried. They then started stuffing towels next to her head to keep it from moving. She had some stray blonde strands near her eyes and she looked a cornered animal, just howling, "Get me out of heeeeere, let me up, I want up! Mumma, help me, I can't hear, I can't hear, let me UPPPPPPP!!!" They had me lie down on top of her to somehow calm her as she went through the machine. Only my extreme love of my child enabled me to do this since I have serious claustrophobia issues. They then turned on a Barbie movie above her head (and mine at this point) to calm her, and me, near hysterial myself, told them, "You told me you had Nemo. Can't you put that on instead? She doesn't know who the hell Barbie is and that won't calm her down." and they told me they would change films (they didn't). Abbey kept shrieking and crying hysterically. I feel I am overusing this word, but really, there isn't any other word that comes close to describing this experience. I tried to calm her by singing or getting her to talk about what she wanted for lunch, all without letting her know how upset I was myself. She wouldn't have any of it and kept howling more, her little face now beet red from the exertion. I wanted to smooth her hair out of her left eye (ironically, the same eye that was the whole reason for this bloody exercise in the first place) but I wasn't allowed to touch her face during the scan. It stood out as pale, almost white gold against her flushed skin. Her eyes were wild and unfocused now, and when it was finally over (was it really only ten minutes?) she just clung to me like her whole world had come crashing down. 

I have never felt so helpless in my entire life. More to the point, I felt complicit in betraying my daughter's trust. I felt like I helped them torture my child and I couldn't do anything to calm her. In many ways, this was worse than the helplessness I felt when I was rushed into the operating room just over 3 years earlier and she was cut out of me, pulled from her safe space inside me and out into this all-too-often cruel world. All of this was happening to my tiny person and I couldn't protect her or whisk her away. I couldn't keep her safe.  

My daughter just woke up and walked down the steps. She came over to my desk, crawled up on my lap, and said, "Happy Valentine's Day!" I told her, "It's not Valentine's Day, silly; it's Mother's Day!" but she insisted, "I like Valentine's Day better because I get to tell you I love you all day!"