Toddlers Do Chores Too

I'm cleaning up the bathroom in a fury today because I really don't want A2 to come in with me since I have a lot to get accomplished and don't want to spend the whole day cleaning. He loves to swirl the scrub brush around in the toilet and it takes me forever to pry him away. I'm also in the middle of finishing up the laundry I started on Thursday and didn't get to complete because we went to see family for the weekend. I know that A2 likes to follow me around and help in his own little way and it's very cute but can sometimes be very time consuming. He loves for me to let him Swiffer the floors and another of his favorite things in the world right now is to put things in the garbage. It's amazing the things he loves to mimic. I think it's so cute how he tries to be just like us. Anyway, I'd rather be playing with him than these mundane chores!

Well undoubtably A2 has been watching his brother while he does chores too and wanted to be a big boy and do what bubba does. Now A2 is really good about telling on himself. Usually whenever he does somehing he's either proud of or that he shouldn't he will come up to me, jabber something and point in the direction of the deed. As I was humped over the toilet in the boy's bathroom he came in and beckoned me in his little way to come see. I just assumed he wanted me to come fix his train that had fallen off the track or something simple like that. Not quite! A2 had decided to take it upon himself to feed the cat. Now you might think that's the cutest thing ever and deep down I know it really is but to my horror A2 had dumped an entire bag of mini marshmallows in the cat's food bowl, in her water bowl, and all over the floor in the laundry room. How did he get them you wonder? We keep his snacks on the bottom shelf in the pantry and he can easily get them and bring them to us if he wants something. We are more than happy to oblige him since he's not that big of an eater these days and it's starting to really frustrate me. So I'm guessing he thought Cat1 (yes, even the cat deserves her privacy) might want a little bit of his favorite snack. ARRRGH!

Note to self: Make sure pantry door is shut from now on or at least make sure the stuff with clips on then that A2 can take off are on the next shelf up.

This has to stay between you and me because if hubby found out he would flip his lid. I think he wanted to make Rice Crispy Treats with those marshmallows! I've learned something from today and it's that I think I know where a toddler gets all their energy. They suck it out of adults.

Wish I was fat like that!

Tyra Banks, who has gained weight since her days strutting the catwalk, says she was upset when unflattering photos showing her in a one-piece bathing suit were mocked on the Internet.

"It was such a strange meanness and rejoicing that people had when thinking that was what my body looked like. It was really hurtful to me," the 33-year-old talk-show host says in an interview in the Feb. 5 issue of People magazine.

The photos show Banks on a beach during a recent trip to Sydney, Australia. They had popped up earlier this month on a celebrity gossip Web site with the not-so-nice headline: "Tyra Banks is Fat."

Banks, who hosts the syndicated The Tyra Banks Show and the CW network's America's Next Top Model, tells the magazine she weighs 161 pounds and has fluctuated from 148 pounds to 162 pounds, depending on how well she's taking care of herself, since retiring from modeling in 2005.

"I don't want to sit in front of you and be soap-boxy and fake and say, 'I love myself, I'm beautiful, it's great,'" says Banks, who is 5 feet 10 inches tall. "I still feel hot, but every day is different. It's when I put on the jeans that used to fit a year ago and don't fit now and give me the muffin top, that's when I say, 'Damn!'"

In other words, yes, she has put on weight, though not nearly as much as recent tabloid stories have suggested.

Banks says "I'm not the healthiest eater" and isn't required to "live up to that model standard anymore."

"I've made millions of dollars with the body I have, so where's the pain in that?" she says. "If I was in pain, I would have dieted. The pain is not there — the pain is someone printing a picture of me and saying those (horrible) things."

I copied that from a website today after seeing this story on television. It's such a shame that someone that is so beautiful and known for her body is being scorned now because she no longer fits the uberthin supermodel standard. She has a few extra curves but carries it extremely well. Hell I wish I carried my weight as well as this girl! Granted she is about six inches taller than I am but I'm guessing my 149lbs (yes, it's up a couple from before) are proportionate to her 161 with the height difference. To me she still looks amazing and I think it's stupid that so much emphasis is being placed on her current weight.

Today's society is so worried about what the scale says that they lose perspective on what kind of message it sends to girls and young women. I was very fortunate to be a skinny little shit for most of my life. I had my first child and gained only about 10 to 12 pounds with that pregnancy. After he was born you would have never guessed I had given birth. It wasn't until about four years ago that I noticed I had went up from about 110 to about 125 and at the time that was a big jump for me. My gracious I had to move up to a size 8, for shame. **rolling my eyes** After I got pregnant with A2 I more than made up for the weight I didn't gain with A1. I ballooned up to about 165 and convinced myself that it would all go away after he was born. He was going to be a big baby. Yeah right! He was smaller than the first one and after he was born I still looked like I was carrying twins!

Hence you keep hearing about my struggle right now to lose weight. I don't want to get back down to 110 or even 120. In fact I went through my closet and gave away all my size 4 and most of my size 6 pants. My goal is to get back into a comfortable 8 and down to about 135. I would love to see 130 but don't want to set myself up for disappointment. I'm doing extremely well as far as working out on a regular basis goes. I'm not eating so well this week. It's the chocolate and cheese week and it's a real struggle but I'm trying, not succeeding very well, but trying. I see the number on the scale rise back up a couple of pounds but I'm not discouraged. I like to think it's muscle that I'm building. I can already see a difference and I went out with a friend yesterday who noticed as well. Major confidence booster!

So anyway, it's just crappy that the top headline on one of those stupid newsmagazine programs today was the fact that Tyra Banks would no longer blow away in a windstorm but might actually sit down and chow on a cheeseburger. I say good for you Tyra for saying that you still feel hot. I'm working on being able to say that myself...right now I'm just a little warm!

Current specs:
149lbs
about three weeks away from comfortably wearing my favorite jeans

To Spank or Not To Spank

I was watching the Today show this morning and there is this lady in California who wants to make it illegal to spank a child that is under the age of three. I got to thinking about it and wondered this: 1. Does this lady even have children of her own? I'm guessing probably not, and 2. Who the hell is she to decide how someone should discipline their own child?

I was brought up in a home where I cringed whenever my mother would walk behind me because she firmly believed in the "spare the rod spoil the child" mentality but this bat-shit-crazy bitch took it way too far. I can remember many many occasions in which I got my ass beat by this bscb and had no idea why I had to endure her wrath and there were times in which I probably needed it. I don't condone beating your children, don't get me wrong. My heart goes out to all the voiceless children who are being abused in homes across the world. These are the extreme cases and in that situation it is wrong. What my mother did to me was wrong but it taught me a valuable lesson in how not to be. I do believe that it doesn't harm a child if they are spanked within the proper context and right after they have committed the infraction. This bullshit of "you're gonna get it when we get home" is just that, bullshit. By that time the child has disconnected the wrong doing with the spanking and now it's just a display of them being spanked by their parent for who knows what they are thinking in their little heads.

The real debate is this, we know that about two-thirds of parents in the U.S. do spank their kids at some point, yet most "experts" caution against it. Passions run high: some liken spanking to child abuse; others call it a practical and effective punishment. Some say it will do no harm if used gently and appropriately, while others claim a child will grow up more aggressive and unhappy if he or she is spanked.

I have a 12 and a half year old and I can only go on my experience with him and the experience I had as a child. On the one hand you have my situation, step out of line and get your ass beat. On the other hand you have me and my son, he misbehaved, I spanked (not beat with a belt or switch but usually open palm). He and I are both very well adjusted fully functioning members of society. I decided that the ordeal I had to go through was something that I was never going to put my children through but I didn't have a problem with spanking him when he needed it. You can draw your own conclusions but A1 is a straight A student. He is very well behaved and always has been. I haven't had to spank him but a handfull of times in his 12+ years and I get compliments from friends, family and even complete strangers on how well behaved he is and that he is a joy to be around. I can't take full credit for that because he was born a great kid with an awesome temperament but he's a kid and has done some pretty stupid shit that he needed to be punished for.

A2 is a very active 18 month old and he's already a well behaved little boy. No, I don't spank him per se, but I have swatted his hands when he has grabbed for something that he shouldn't have and now all it takes, most of the time, is a good "aaaiiinnt" from me and he leaves stuff alone or stops what he isn't suppose to be doing. I'm very lucky that he has his brother as an example to go by but he isn't as mild mannered as his bubba. A2 is a little more mischevious and rowdy. But that can be a fun thing as long as he understands he can't just do whatever he wants to do without consequences.

Of course spanking my children isn't the only means of discipline I have used. I don't want to sound like some harsh disciplinarian because I'm really not (disregard the fact that my nephew calls me the Queen of Mean). I've tried time out and that works for about a minute. I've tried to just talk them out of doing something but seriously do you really think a one and a half year old knows what you are trying to explain to him when you are yammering on and on about why he can't throw your hairbrush in the toilet? Personally, I worry much more about consistent verbal criticism than the occasional swat on the butt. The wayward child who runs out in the street must learn that they shouldn't do so, even if they are too young to understand why they shouldn't do so. Explanations can only get you so far in restraining the desires of the young toddler who is going to constantly be testing your limits.

I have found the reward system to work exceptionally well with both of the boys and plain and simple ignoring some behaviors works like a charm. Now that A1 is older I get him where it hurts now and that is taking away stuff. He loses computer privileges and that kills him and now that he has an iPod he'd rather walk the line than see me jamming out to his tunes while he's grounded from it for a week!

So what should you do? It's nice for parents to present a unified front with regard to discipline -- that way the child gets a consistent message, learns the lessons more efficiently, and can't play one parent against the other. Providing my children with a loving home with proper discipline is my first priority in life. I'm not perfect and there are days I wish I could start all over knowing the things I do know but who doesn't? I just think it's a parent's right to choose how they want to discipline their child and crazy to pass laws regulating those choices. Hell, I think it should be against the law for not disciplining your child. Who wants to be around some bratty ass kid that noone can control and is bound and determined to do everything they shouldn't just to get a rise out of their parents?!

“Discipline doesn't break a child's spirit half as often as the lack of it breaks a parent's heart”.