I Swear My Husband is New

I sometimes can't believe that my husband and I have been married for 11 years. Not because it seems like yesterday that we got married, or because we've had such a blast that time just flew by, it's more like I can't believe he still doesn't know or remember things that he clearly should by now. My loving, highly intelligent, kind and generous husband that graduated from an Ivy League college, still acts surprised that I always have to have a plan for the weekend, or well for anything we do, and that I always have to have a place for things because I hate having stuff out on the counters, and that I hate touching things that are wooden (like popsicle sticks), and that I can't open things with my teeth and have to cut them (like icee pops).

Well now that we have a daughter, the same thing is happening. He never remembers where any of her stuff is, he never remembers that she needs a bath at night, and sometimes I'm surprised he remembers she has to eat. Well today was another perfect example. She stopped taking a bottle a little over a year ago, but since she's on the small side, and is often too busy to stop and eat, we make sure she gets her nutrients by giving her one Pediasure drink a day. We fix it at night before she goes to bed, she usually has a few sips, and then when she wakes up in the morning we give her the rest of it. As I stated, this has been the same thing every day for over a year now. Today we had to go buy a new kitchen faucet (I had no idea how expensive those could be!) and we had to get moving pretty early. I asked my husband to get her dressed, of course I had to tell him what she should wear, and I asked him to get her a drink. Before we walked out the door I asked where her drink was and he said she drank half of it and he put it back in the refrigerator. I was a little concerned because she had only a little more than half of one left from the night before, so if she only drank half of that, it probably wouldn't hold her over very long while we were shopping.

So we bought a new faucet and went to lunch and then came home, which by the way, was a deviation from my initial plan L. Anyway, we came home and I went to put her leftover macaroni and cheese away and saw two of her drinks in the top of the refrigerator. I was really confused for a minute until I realized that he didn't give her the rest of last night's drink this morning, he made her a whole new one. Why? What in the world was he thinking? I mean I know it's not a big deal, or any type of malicious behavior, but really? How hard is that? The man can remember things that he was taught when he was 5 and why he was taught them, and by whom. He can remember all kinds of football scores and plays and statistics. But he can't remember that every night we fix her a drink, put the leftovers in the fridge and then get it out the next morning??? Ugh, sometimes I swear my husband must be new.

She Ruins Everything . . . Perfectly

I have always been amazed at my daughters amazing ability to ruin everything I plan, even before she was born! I should have known when we tried to get 3-D images ten times and she wouldn't let us. Once she was born she would always stay on a schedule long enough for me to depend on it and plan around it and then BAM she'd completely change everything and ruin the plans, whether it was a shopping trip, a play date, a doctor's appointment, etc. When she was really little she would randomly decide she needed to eat every two hours, or she would nap all day instead of fighting sleep like normal. She then started napping at different times, or she would be whiny and fussy from teething. The switch to 1 nap a day was great because it allowed me to plan a lot better, and it put her on a much more regular routine for quite a while. Now that I'm not working, of course, a routine isn't as significant, but she's kept to it rather well. There have been several days where she's decided not to nap until 5 pm, or she's napped for about 45 minutes and then wants to nap at 8 pm, but they hadn't really disrupted anything….yet.
Her second birthday is approaching rapidly, and I've decided to try and make as much as possible to save on costs, plus it seems like fun things we can do together. Tuesday was supposed to be yucky and rainy, so I thought it might be a good time to go shopping for supplies, and if all went well we could stop at an indoor playground. Well she woke up really late, was whiny and clingy (she's working on her 2 year molars, yay) I decided it would be much easier just to keep her home and try for Wednesday. Despite not going shopping, we had a nice day at home and I was able to plan a few more craft activities for Father's Day that I thought she would enjoy. She was super cuddly, and I definitely don't mind that now that she's trying so desperately to become "Miss Independent". All in all, it was a nice, yet rainy day.
Our normal routine is that she wakes up at 9, naps from 2 to 4, and then goes to bed at 10. That gives me a nice 5 hour window to get things done in the morning, and it gives her several hours in the evening with dad after he gets home from work. Well, first she woke up late again, she fought me about eating breakfast and then, she wanted to get in the shower. I figured it wouldn't hurt and let her get in, at which point she decided she did not, in fact, want a shower and she quickly jumped out and ran through the house, naked and dripping. After chasing her down and finally getting her dressed she ran back into the bathroom and slipped and hurt her elbow. I have now learned that the only thing that makes a bruised elbow better is a Dora bandage. Then she opened the powder and 'sprinkled' it all over herself and the floor while I was cleaning up the wet bathroom. Once that was cleaned up all I had to do was her hair and we could walk out the door. Waking up at 10:30 had put me way behind schedule, and now it was after 12, but I figured if we grabbed lunch out I could still squeeze in the shopping. Well she tried to run out of the room and when I called her to come back she turned quickly and ran right into the door frame…..hard. There was an instant bump on the forehead and lots of tears. It required a frozen teething ring, which she was supposed to put on the bump, but ended up chewing on instead, and a grape icee pop (that makes any injury better). Once she was all better, she handed me the teething ring and I was able to get her hair done. I looked down and found that the teething ring had cracked and was leaking all over the table….you know, because I needed something else to clean up before we left. So once we were ready to walk out the door it was a little after 1:30 and I had about a half an hour before the little one turned into a pumpkin. We ended up going out to lunch, having a blast, and postponed our shopping trip for the evening.
I decided that we could just leave when she woke up and start shopping then. I arranged to meet my husband at the store and then we could all grab something for dinner while we were out. Well of course she ended up sleeping until after 5:30, and my husband had already left work. She woke up right before he came home and then we all left together. We had a blast shopping for items for her party, she tried on all kinds of birthday hats and tiaras, she played with maracas all around the store, she danced around on the sidewalk outside while I sneaked away to look for items for Father's Day, and we had a lovely dinner together….none of which would have happened if she hadn't decided to change my plans. Normally I always have to have a plan, and a list, and a timeline before I do things, but slowly I'm learning to let go and just go with the flow of things and everything will work out. My daughter is not quite 2 yet and she's already teaching me things, why am I not surprised?