After I put the kids to bed last Thursday, I called my sister. The conversation went like this:
Me: Wanna buy a four year old? I’ll give you a great deal!
Sister: Hmmm this sounds interesting. But shouldn’t you be telling me you’ll pay me for taking her?
Me: Ok fine. I’ll send her your way with a pocketful of change. Deal?
Sister: Sounds good. Why are you looking to get rid of her?
And so my story went…
Mallory has a bad case of the whineys. She uses it best when we have company or when we are out and about. This makes me look like a fantastic, has her sh*t together, kind of mom. Her whiney voice grates on me like fingernails on a chalkboard. Somewhere along the way she must have whined to get her way, I gave in, and now we hear all too much of it.
Friday came and we went to feed the ducks and run some errands with Kristen. My best friend in the whole world, did exactly has she was supposed to. She gave it to me straight up. I think I looked at her through Mallory’s afternoon of whiney-ness, and she saw defeat. She said to me “This is the worst I have ever seen it.” Dear God. I had to fix it.
I called my dad. Asked if he wanted a four year old. He laughed and laughed and said “Ah, No. It’s just a phase.” Then he laughed some more. See, he can laugh. He can laugh because he sees me going through, what they went through thirty-some years ago. Oh how the laugh grates on me sometimes too…
I pulled out all my research materials. You know the books that talk about “positive discipline” and “understanding your preschooler” and came up with a game plan. Extinction. We are three days into it and it seems to be working. We have yet to have company over to see how well it will work…anybody want to come over for dinner??
Sunday we celebrated my birthday with my family. It came time for me to open presents and when I read the card from my parents, the words couldn’t have said it better.
This is what the card said:
Parents do not realize, when their daughter is a child, how fleeting the moments truly are.
And in the blink of an eye, the little girl who did pirouettes down the hall is dancing her way through her own life.
Instead of buying my daughter from me, he showed me that life is all to short and these hard times go by just as quickly as all of the great ones do. Word to Hallmark.
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