I'm doing something right...but I feel like shit

Well, we survived! Mac went back to work Friday night and we all lived to tell the tale of his leave time off with us. I love him, goddess knows I do, but I can not take him home all the time with Nixon. He wants Nixon to do exactly as he says. Nixon wants to do exactly what he's used to doing with me which is (unless he's really doing something wrong) pretty much whatever. I'm far more comfortable letting Nixon do his own thing than Mac is. It's a battle of the wills with them and I just get tired of picking sides. And it boils down to picking sides...all the damned time. Sometimes I have to back Mac up because, well he made a parental call and I have to respect that. Sometimes he's just being a dick and I have to call him on that too! Honestly, by the time the weekend hit I was ready for a day off!


But we all made it through. We even had a "fun" family date. Fun is in quotes because I didn't pay attention to the directions very well and we spent 30 more minutes in the car than we needed too and we ran into the rudest group of locals ever and almost puked at one of the exhibits from the rank stench of stagnant water. The plus side to the date was: Nixon had a ball making his very first video/documentary of our day. He had fun feeding birds with me and getting visited by butterflies. We let him lead where we went and he just ate up the experience!


And like any other child his age, tantrums are more elaborate now! We get the whole body thrown to the ground, the blood curdling screams of "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!", and he's started (only once so far) scratching at my face. **Now I don't know the exact proper way to handle this and it caught me totally off guard. I was wearing my wrist brace at the time, so I'm pretty limited on options and really shouldn't have been carrying him in the first place, but since he dropped on his belly in the middle of the parking lot, I had no real option. I picked him up and continued to the car...which led to the attempted face scratching. I grabbed his wrists with my good hand and tucked them into my armpit and kind of hugged them there, while talking into his ear telling him scratching mommy hurts me and makes me sad. I don't know if it helped or not, but I really had tears welling up in my eyes as I told him this.....which was just as we got to the car. Nixon gave me a kiss and said "I sorry mommy, don cry".** 


We've also been spending more time in Time Out. He still knows that when I get up and ask for his hand, he gives me his hand and we walk to T.O together. He sits on the newly painted T.O mat and will read the letters off of the mat. Sometimes he cries sometimes he just sits there.
Tonight before dinner he was being a real punk. Kept screaming at the cat! Like chasing her, getting right behind her, then yelling at her! I gave him one warning, two warnings, and before the third warning I brought him over to his bedroom for something and I saw him get ready to chase the cat again so I *snap* my finger and point in the direction of the T.O mat.....NOT to put him there but as a reminder that *IF* he does chase the cat a 3rd time he *WILL* got into T.O. Well....he gets hysterical, throws himself onto the T.O mat and sits there crying his little heart out!!! I have to get down on the floor with him, pick him up into my arms and apologize to him because I DID NOT send him to time out but was just reminding him if he chased the cat that was where he was going!! But damned if I wasn't just a little impressed that he got into T.O. without me saying a fucking word to him!! 
He calmed down after a couple minutes (and did not chase the cat again for the rest of the night!) and we enjoyed some more snuggles!


Tomorrow, because the heat's finally breaking here on Okinawa, we're hitting the zoo while Mac sleeps. 


Oh yeah, the wrist brace I mentioned...it's because I have carpal tunnel syndrome in my right wrist. I get to sleep with it on every night for 6 weeks.   

Holy Cow...it's a blog about my crafty ass :)

I've recently joined the ranks of those addicted to pintrest.com. I can't even say how it started. I just requested to join, got approved and have been cruising and pinning ever since! Today I did my first project I found on the site, but like most thing I find on the internet, I adjusted to fit my needs. 

I started with a simple idea to help keep Nixon in Time Out. Lately Time Out involves Nixon singing and dancing his ass right off the T.O. mat or him trying to kiss his way out of the punishment to begin with. It's hard to have a naturally smooth-talking child as a mother, I assure you! One of my friends had pinned this on pintrest and I saw it, thinking "wow what a clever idea". And the need to make it got stronger by the minute!

Mac is on leave this week, just out of a need to take a break more than having a place to go or a burning desire to spend time with Nixon and I. So last night, I showed him a few ideas and this one was the top one I mentioned with the few items I'd need to make it. During the explanation of it, I was suddenly aware that handing a toddler in the middle of a meltdown a glass bottle might not be the best idea....BUT I had a solution! We still had Nixon's empty vitamin bottle with cap, waiting to be recycled, if I super glued the cap on, it'd be practically toddler indestructible! 

And so I was off to make my very own "Toddler Time Out Calming Glitter Jar" (as I've come to call it. Fallow the photos and instructions below to see how it turned out, won't you?? 
(**note: Nixon is napping right now, so he has not seen nor needed this tool yet**)

start with: glitter glue, glitter, clear bottle with secure top, 1 cup hot water, food coloring (and in my case because I know Nixon) super glue to glue the cap onto the bottle.

add approx. 1 tbsp glitter glue into bottle/jar

add the 1 cup hot water into the bottle/jar

cloudy.......

add glitter in the bottle/jar. I just poured a bunch on top of the water. too much?? too little?? It's a first attempt, it's not likely to be perfect, right??

I didn't have (and couldn't find) food coloring drops, so I had to use gel, hence the jizz looking blob! Just add a little to make the glitter POP. 

pretty....the food coloring jizz/gel starting to bleed into the water from the top.

The final product shaken up! It's kind of beautiful!

The glitter is settling at the top, not sure if it's supposed to or not, but that's how mine does it! All in all, it seems a perfect Nixon-friendly Time Out Calming Glitter Jar :)

Before I forget: to remove the label from the vitamin bottle, I filled the bottle with water and then soaked the bottle overnight in large bowl filled with hot soapy water. Mac woke up before me this morning and peeled the label off. It peeled off in one piece! He left it in the bowl and I was so amazed I thought it came off like that by itself overnight. (I have to admit I was more than a little disappointed that it did not happen like that). I used my thumb nail and peeled off the remaining adhesive on the bottle.