I'm Lily!

 

Lily has recently become very sensitive to her sense of self. She's Lily. Anything else you might suggest is contradicted in the most scornful tones! 'I'm not ____, I'm Lily!' 'Not cute' 'Not a girl', 'not a baby' (which makes mom kind of sad), 'not a doctor', not a bunch of other funny things I can't remember, and today 'not normal'. Ha ha.

 

Lily has been quite a bit crankier than usual the past few days which I am hoping is due to the fact that she's been sick, and not to the fact that she's 2 years old. If it's the latter - we have a long year ahead of us. So you know I'm not being too harsh with any of the following statements I will preface them with the fact that my daughter is one of the number 1 loves in my life, and I genuinely like being her mom - most of the time... Sometimes she can be pretty aggravating and I have the desire to just get as far away from the sound of her whining as I possibly can. Of course, I can't just leave her alone to possibly hurt herself, and if I did just completely ignore her I'd feel guilty and sorry for the poor darling within a few minutes and be back in the room trying to make her happy again. OK - so that wasn't so harsh. Sometimes when she's clinging to me while I'm washing dishes I am just longing for the day when that phase will pass. Seriously I will have no sentimental longing for that outgrown habit to return, because she pushes her way in-between my body and the cabinet determined to squeeze into a space that is not there - so that I am forced uncomfortably away from the sink and she is forced uncomfortably into the cabinet drawer handles pointy ends - whining and crying louder the entire time. She really can't stop it soon enough! Just so you know Lily, if you read this in the future: every kid gives their mom some kind of grief, and that doesn't mean you love them any less! A habit I do miss that has been repeated over the last couple of days is rocking her in the glider chair! My sweet baby! She is getting too big for it to really be comfortable, but I love to cuddle her so!

I just feel at a loss sometimes about how to deal with a wall of No's! And that shift from asking me for something specific to freaking out when the very thing she asked for is being presented to her! There is no reasonable approach to take with a person who is acting completely unreasonable! Most of the time when she freaks out - I just ignore it, figuring no response can't be very encouraging for her to continue acting that way.... She's a pretty persistent kid, however. And she's so smart! She's already got down the trick of asking another adult if one says no. Well now that her temperature is back to normal I must be feeling less sorry for her, because I found myself giving her a little attitude crackdown. When the whiny crying voice comes out I am meeting it with counting and timeouts. Let's just hope she gets the connection and I don't waste the effectiveness of the timeout.

She's a good kid - don't get me wrong! I know she's just trying to assert her independence and find out where we'll draw the line. We'll find out together.

On a lighter note: We've been taking Lily's temperature so often over the last couple of days she's added it to her vocabulary. She says it 'temper-picture.' Last night her dad's 'temper-picture' was '40 dollars.' 

Another thing I know I'll miss is how Lily always seems like my baby again when I pull her onto my shoulder and wrap her up in towels after a bath. She always hugs me and usually says 'I love you mama!' I just bought her some new towels - we've been using the same hooded baby ones since she was born and they've gotten far too small...but she looked so like my little baby again wrapped up in them I've been having a hard time letting them go. Oh well, new memories to make coming up!