3 year olds are the worst.

Seriously. I feel a little guilty typing that, but I think it might be true. 2 was hard, but it was equally balanced (even outweighed) by some amazing times. 3 so far, has few redeeming qualities. I'm resigning myself to just putting my head down and surviving the next 9 months.

This morning, Edie woke up earlier than usual but we had a nice, sleepy morning of cereal, puzzles and a little princess cartoon. But when it came time to get dressed for daycare, which happens 3 days per week EVERY SINGLE WEEK and therefore should not be a surprise, Edie refused. I could see her refusal amping up for a meltdown so I tried to nip it in the bud with an offer of her gummy vitamin if she got dressed (she loves her vitamins). No dice, it immediately ramped into a full scale meltdown with weeping and thrashing and declarations of "hating vitamins". I tried to comfort her and cajole her pajamas off. She doesn't want me to touch her. We offered up her brand new unicorn shirt so she could show it off at daycare. But all of a sudden she HATES daycare and doesn't want to go. Oh, and that's "NOT A UNICORN SHIRT!!" Which is categorically untrue. She always loves going to daycare and it totally is a fucking unicorn. GAAAAHHHHH!!!!

After about 15 minutes of weeping and wailing, I got fed up. No form of "positive discipline" is working at this point. Jeff told her she could go to her room and to let us know when she was ready to get ready. Except she then went to her room and screamed bloody murder for 30 more minutes. By now, we are 30 minutes late for daycare and Edie seems to be enjoying the power she clearly has. She eventually gets naked and then insists that she wants to go to daycare wearing nothing but her green blanket like a cape. She will accept no other options. And obviously, we can't accept taking her to daycare NUDE. Another power struggle ensues, the weeping returns.  She throws a wrench in the whole thing but adding a NEW request to the mix - now she says she'll go potty if we give her a sucker. Which, WHAT? She hasn't ever received rewards for going potty and hasn't had a sucker since the week after Halloween so why in the hell would she thinks she'd get a sucker right now? I don't think I'm attributing too much intelligence to her when I say that she was clearly asking for something she KNEW we would refuse just so she could flip her shit again.

Also, totally out of the blue, mid-wail she tells me that, "I don't WANT Santa to come!" She is referring to the "Santa Clause is Coming to Town" lyric in which you "better not cry, you better not pout". My Mom sang it to her recently to promote good behavior and I think Edie was explaining that it was worth it to her to pout and cry and she didn't care of Santa didn't come as a result.

Oh, and to add to the stew of discontent is the fact that she needed to take her ear infection meds this morning. She's midway through her 10-day course and has to take it twice per day. She usually loves her bubble gum medicine, but not this morning. This morning she clamps her teeth shut and pins her chin to her chest and won't look up at me. And before you excuse her behavior as being related to the ear infection, think again. Her infection is long gone, we just need to finish the course so it won't return.

Finally, after an hour of struggle, I give in. If she takes the medicine, she can put her pajamas back on and go to daycare in her pjs. I feel defeated and angry, but help her put her pajamas back on. I tell her to get her shoes on and what does she do? She goes to her shoe drawer and instead of picking out one of the 2 pairs she wears every day for school, she reaches for her summer sandals that she hasn't shown interest in since July. It's freezing cold and after torrential rain all day yesterday, the entire city is one big mud puddle.  Jeff gives me the stink eye and asks why the sandals are even IN the shoe drawer when it's late November.

Just kill me now.

Halloween

We had our neighbors over for dinner on Halloween and then took Penny and Edie out trick or treating in the neighborhood. The rain kept some at home, so it wasn't quite as bustling as last year, but we still ran into lots of neighbors and groups of little ones in the hood. Halloween is one of the most nostalgic holidays for me as a parent. Ironic considering I think I spent a lot of halloweens as a child complaining about my costume or being cold. Like when my Mom made me a cherry costume and my brother a pumpkin costume and then every house we went to exclaimed, "Oh! 2 little pumpkins! How cute!" and I was OUTRAGED at having been mistaken for a pumpkin when I was so clearly a CHERRY. Sheesh. I'm mostly confused when I remember the time I decided to be an old lady when I was only like 9, but I remain fully committed to my multiple years as a gypsy. Boy did I love wearing all those scarves and big earrings. 

Anyways, watching Edie and Penny love trick or treating together so much was super fun. Most of these photos could be featured in a gallery called "photographing moving item", so apologies for the blurry ones - they really illustrate how excited the girls were - they literally couldn't hold still.

I made pizza dough into mini pumpkins for the girls to make their own.

 Funny:

 With Penny's much overlooked (by this blog - not her parents!) baby sister Daphne:

Pumpkin Patch

Since we missed the one weekend in October that wasn't soggy, we made a haphazard visit to Carleton Farms during a semi-dry morning. We had planned to go with a big group, but plans got confused at the last minute because Edie had a cold, we didn't want to infect the other little ones coming, and the weather was looking like it could go either way with epic rain scheduled for "midday". We had a fun time, but were unimpressed with the farm that I remember enjoying 5 years ago with my girlfriends. Next year it might be worth braving the crowds to hit up The Farm at Swans Trial again.

After putting Edie on the "cow train" it dawned on me that I had no idea how far away it was going and that there were no seatbelts to guarantee that she didn't try to 'dismount' mid-ride. So I climbed in. And regretted it immediately. The ride was LONG and the cow we are riding in was SMALL. As in, I am 5'3" and barely fit my legs into the cow cross legged. Jeff thought it was really funny and took like 200 pictures. I am choosing to only feature this one.

 Then we enjoyed homemade pumpkin donuts. This photo of Edie all down-home AND fancy at the same time, while totally chowing down is a personal fave.

I was also forced to watch horses canter around a ramshackle barn but refused to photograph this. Horses make me nervous. And barns are stinky.
I belong in the city.

Orcas - early October

We made a last minute trip to Orcas in early October. The weather report was suddenly glorious and it was indeed one last burst of Indian Summer. We spent the entire weekend remarking on our shock that it was October and we were in shirtsleeves. The rain and gloom arrived promptly the next week and with the exception of a few days last week, has mostly stuck around. Looking back at these photos, it's hard to believe it was just a month ago.

Look at it big and you might be able to see the 2 GIANT sea lions we visited.
They are on the far right side of the rocks. 

Painting rocks.

Crafting.

I learned my Mickey pancake skills from my Dad. He was the master at
making specialty pancakes when I was a kid.

I have no idea how this started, but Edie spent a great deal of time "pulling Gramma" around the cabin without realizing that Grandma was in fact pushing herself around with her feet while Edie dramatically pulled her using a dish towel.

Until next summer!