Blog Archives
20
Sep, 2009
Home for 32 Hours and Nap Drama Ensues!
The last couple weeks have been so interesting and exciting and exhausting and… well, enough ands. I can’t say too much at this point, but I just shot a pilot for a new talk show. In the best of all possible worlds, the show will get picked up and I’ll have a regular national tv gig. Don’t jinx me though. I’m just going to sit back, relax and enjoy the waiting process. HA!
Tags: Amy Anderson • comedian • nap time • stand up comedian • toddlers • working mom
07
Sep, 2009
Oh POOP!
As if I haven’t embarrassed myself enough already, here is a true tale from the trenches of motherhood…
So I have a tendency to post things that many people would never admit to (pinching my child, having to leave a restaurant because my kid wouldn’t stop screaming, crapping my pants on Obama’s inauguration day) so why stop now?
My girl is 27 months old tomorrow. She has been going pee in the toilet for several weeks now and I couldn’t be prouder. She’s still wearing diapers and pull-ups but she recently starting telling me when she has to go! This is a GIANT leap for toddlerkind, yes?! I was excited when this started happening. So after a week or so of her announcing, “I have to potty!” and making it to the toilet successfully, I thought it would be a good time to start a little more poop talk as she was still happy to wallow in her own #2 for hours on end if I’d let her. My nanny told me that she was starting to talk more about pooping in her diaper though, so I decided to continue on.
When I started potty training, I asked for any and all advice and I read tons of websites and parenting boards. Many people and experts suggested letting a child of the same gender as you watch you sit on the toilet and go. I was raised in a super conservative family and like many fine Evangelical Christians, we were fairly ashamed of our bodies. This type of potty training wouldn’t have happened in our house. I’m no hippie, but I do want my daughter to feel comfortable and confident about her body and part of that is showing her my confidence and comfort with my body, teaching her the proper names for body parts and at this point in life, making potty training fun and no big whoop!
The “let your child watch you go to the potty” technique had worked like a charm for peeing. Aubrey loves to come into the bathroom with me and watch me pee. She even squats down in front of me and takes a good look at everything going on: “It’s Mommy’s gina! It’s go pee-pee! I see it!” I’m not trying to brag, but yesterday she even announced, “It’s CLEAN!” So there.
Anyway, this morning I thought she might like to watch the poo-poo in action too. She had pooped in her diaper a little earlier and I thought it would be a good opportunity to show her how Mommy does it and what big girls do with their poo-poo. You know, while it was still fresh in her mind. Well, I guess I was wrong.
Aubrey got into her regular front row seat to watch the action. She made her regular exclamation of, “It’s Mommy’s gina!” and when she saw the kids dropping into the pool…
well, the reaction was not positive. First she made a horrible face. I thought, well, she doesn’t like the smell – who can blame her? But then she ran out of the room and said something like, “I don’t want it! I get out.” I had successfully managed to terrify my child with my poop. Great.
This all happened this morning, about 6 hours ago from now. Since then, she has peed in her diaper throughout the day, not going on the potty once. When I ask her if she’d like to sit on the potty and try for a sticker (the photo is actually her with her sticker “chart” – we let it turn into more of a freestyle expression of sticker placement rather than a chart) she says, “No thanks”.
So a giant leap forward and, hopefully, just a small step back. I know with this, like everything else in motherhood, I need to have patience and just give it some time. Pushing (sorry, no pun intended) is not going to help anything and finding that fine line between pushing and encouraging will always be a delicate balancing act. Oh well. At least I have a clean vagina.
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Tags: 2 year olds • Amy Anderson • diapers • motherhood • parenting • poop • potty training • single parenting • toddlers
29
Jun, 2009
The Beach, Poetry, Perfect
(Disclaimer: I can't figure out why the color of my text is showing up grey. Has something to do with the copy and pasted stuff
at the end, but I can't fix it and I'm sick of trying! I hope you can read it ok!)
Aubrey and I took a beach day on June 27! The weather here in SoCal was stunning and it was perfect for Aubrey's first time
in the ocean. Aubrey has been to "the beach" many times here in SoCal, but usually just to walk or play in the sand or at the
playgrounds. This day was the first time she played in the water and I wasn't sure how she would like it. She has a tendency
to be a little hesitant in new situations, but if I push her, just enough, she almost always loves ANYTHING. I think it's all
just part of being two years old.
After settling on our blanket (this followed a great disaster in the public beach bathroom which I'll share on LAMomsBlog.com,
soon) and a picnic lunch of sandwiches, Pirate's Booty, cookies, raisins and juice, I asked her if she wanted to go in the water
and she said "no". Being the good mother that I am, I responded by picking her up, walking her down to the water's edge and
putting her down. Luckily, she went nuts for it. This video is of her first moments with her toes in the Pacific.
After this video was taken she couldn't get enough and I couldn't stop her from running, full speed, into the waves. It was a day
of new experiences and discovery for Aubrey and a day of much needed peace and escape for me. It was truly one of the most
joyful days of my life.
The afternoon reminded me of one of my favorite poems, by the great e.e. cummings. I hope you enjoy it too:
maggie and milly and molly and may
maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles,andmilly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:andmay came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea
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Tags: Amy Anderson • beach • comedian • e.e. cummings • SoCal • toddlers • Topanga Beach