Rock On

Posted on 01/28/2013 by lheidimitchell

I can remember being pregnant and asking Mike what we would do if our child couldn’t carry a tune or wasn’t into music for some reason. For us, music is a part of every day life. We grew up playing instruments & singing in church, so it’s a regular occurrence for Mike to have his guitar out playing or for me to be messing around on my keyboard. And singing? Well there’s a lot of that around here. There are also frequent discussions on the merit of certain famous musicians, who’s the best drummer, who’s the best singer, who’s overrated, etc. Mike & I have completely different taste in music, so the discussions can get interesting.

We’ve always said we wouldn’t force our kids to take lessons if they didn’t enjoy them, but hopefully our love would rub off on them naturally. So far, this seems to be the case for Lincoln. He’s really into singing. In fact, last week he told my mom that he wrote a song (Where in the world did he learn the concept of writing songs???) and then he proceeded to sing it for her. He can hear a song in the car once or twice and remember the tune and parts of the lyrics. This can be adorable or scary. I try to introduce him to my idea of good music (Mumford, Dave, Bon Iver), but much to our dismay, he seems to be into pop music currently. He will bust out some Call Me Maybe when the mood strikes.

Yesterday he saw Mike playing his guitar and went to get his own “guitar”. (It’s actually a cheap ukelele we picked up for him last Christmas) When Mike put his guitar into his gig bag, Lincoln went and found his bag and asked for help putting it inside. As Mike walked to the car to load his guitar for church, guess who followed with ukelele in hand? When the musicians were setting up at church, he proudly grabbed his guitar and pulled it from the bag. As soon as his Uncle Mike started playing drums, this is what happened. I’ve never seen him dance like that before. He had us rolling. Thank God for iPhone video cameras. The boy knows how to rock a ukelele. My favorite part is the big smile on his face at the end. He was thoroughly enjoying himself.

Chatty

Posted on 01/14/2013 by lheidimitchell

(Happy New Year. 14 days late. My 2013 blogging is off to a stellar start. I do what I can.)

Sometimes I just want to go back in time & slap my old self. I hope I’m not the only one. If Doc Brown could take me in his fancy car back to May 2011 when I had a one year old uttering only a few words & phrases & I often wondered if he would ever learn to talk, well let’s just say 2013 Heidi would smack 2011 Heidi across the face and say, “GET A GRIP, WOMAN.” Let me tell you, this kid can talk. I should not have wasted a moment worrying about his verbal skills, because at this stage of his life, he exercises them constantly.

Oh sure, it’s cute. And really, how exciting is it when your baby first looks at you and speaks intelligible words? It’s great. And their tiny, toddler voices? The definition of adorable. The problem is that once they learn, they never ever stop talking. People told me boys are rowdy and girls are chatty. People lied. They didn’t tell me that you can have a rowdy and chatty child. Official warning to all new boy moms: Sometimes they talk as much or more than girls. This is a sample of any given 10 minutes of my day:

Mom, is that your hair?

Hey mom, watch this.

Are these your sleeves? I like your sleeves.

Daddy’s at work.

I look like Tyler.

I’m big, you’re small, mommy.

Hey mom.

Watch this.

Where’s daddy?

I want play dough.

I need a drink.

I want a banana.

Hey, I’m chasing Peanut.

Momma, you are cray cray.

It never freaking stops. All day. Every day. I sometimes find myself near tears while answering the 1,456th question of the day. I’ve contemplated writing a letter to President Obama to offer Lincoln’s services during interrogations with terrorists. Who needs water-boarding to get info out of those guys when you could just lock them in a room with my son & his incessant talking and question-asking for 24 hours? They would be begging for mercy. We’ll tell you whatever you want to know, just make that kid stop talking.

There are some days when I have to implement mommy timeouts after Mike gets home. I have actually uttered these words: “Mommy is taking a break from talking. Please direct all questions to daddy until further notice.”

Thankfully in the midst of the 300 questions and completely random statements, there are also these phrases:

I love you, mommy.

Mommy, you’re pretty.

Hey, give me kisses.

Mommy, you’re a princess.

(My friends will know that this is the only time I allow the word “princess” to be spoken near me)

I love my little chatty talking machine. Oh, how I love him. I still think we could win the War on Terror with his help though. To all the mommas waiting on those little ones to learn to talk, enjoy the silence and the babbling that doesn’t require you to provide answers. It will soon be replaced with, “Is that your foot, momma?” and other nonsense.

Psycho

Posted on 10/08/2012 by lheidimitchell

As I’m trying to put away clean clothes this morning, Lincoln decides to dig through the basket and put tank tops and underwear around his neck.

Lincoln: “Mommy! I’m a flower!”

Me: “Cool.”

Lincoln: “I’m a psycho.”

Well, there you have it. You never know what you’re going to get while having a conversation with a 2-year-old.

Once the basket was empty, he wanted me to push him & Peanut around the house in their make-believe car. One of the parties involved wasn’t so thrilled with this game. I’ll let you figure out which one.

Lincoln saying, “Smile, Peanut!”

Peanut saying, “Get adopted, they said. It’ll be fun, they said.”

Lincoln Says

Posted on 08/01/2012 by lheidimitchell

I might be biased, but I think my kid is pretty funny. He got more than his fair share of personality, and now that he has lots of words to express his thoughts, he keeps me laughing & also shaking my head. Here are a few of his funnies from the past few months. I’m trying to make a note to write them down and/or blog them so I can ~~embarrass him~~ show him in the future.

1. He calls dinosaurs, “dineys”. While singing Twinkle, Twinkle:

“Up above da world so high, like a diney in the sky!”

I’m not sure if he just can’t pronounce the word “diamond” or if he actually thinks the song is about a star that looks like a dinosaur.

2. One morning I hear this coming through the baby monitor:

“Moooommmmmy. Mooooommmmy. Get me out!!! Get me out, Mommy!”

Obviously, he was ready to get out of his crib.

3. (His L’s sound like W’s, and also, he refers to himself by one of his nicknames, Linky. I don’t know if Lincoln is too tough to say or maybe he has chosen his favorite nickname already.) I walk into his room to get him out of bed:

“Hiiiiii!!! I’m Winky!”

Yes, I believe we have met before. No need for the formal introductions.

4. While watching a video of himself on Mike’s iPhone:

“It’s Winky! Awwww, it’s cute!”

Not lacking in self confidence.

5. After hugging & kissing his cousin:

“Awwwww, I’m sweet!”

That one if one of my personal favorites. I need to capture it on video for the full effect.

6. He knows all of his colors, but one day, a friend pointed to something that was brown & asked him what color it was:

“Cake!”

That’s my boy.

7. He climbed up on something he’s not supposed to be on, so I asked him, “Lincoln, are you supposed to be up there?”:

“Uhhhh, I think so?”

No, no you’re not.

8. And finally, he was sitting on his buddy Dana’s lap when she realized he had soaked through a diaper & was now getting her pants wet. As he noticed her getting grossed out:

“I didn’t mean to.”

Said very matter-of-factly and with a little disgust directed at her, like he didn’t know why she was blaming him.

And a few Instagrams from my phone last month.

Unbelievable

Posted on 05/21/2012 by lheidimitchell

What a crazy past few weeks we’ve had. I got to experience the joy of Lincoln’s first stomach bug….. and then he was kind enough to share it with me. (Yay) Then last week we took a few days and went to the beach (more on that later). As soon as we got back we had Lincoln’s 2nd birthday party. This Thursday is his official birthday, but we did the party the weekend before because of Memorial Day.

I’ll have photos to share from his party soon. I actually hired a photographer to cover the party this year, so I’m getting to know what it’s like to be a client waiting not-so-patiently to see my photos :)

Until then, here’s a little video of the birthday boy. As you can see, I think he liked all the singing birthday cards as much as the toys he got!

Shhhhh!

Posted on 04/28/2012 by lheidimitchell

If there’s one thing I really value in life, it’s sleep. Okay, and my family. But I really love sleep. I guess Lincoln has learned that about his momma already.

Conversation from this morning when Mike went into Lincoln’s room to get him out of bed:

Mike: Hi, Baby! Good morning! *starts to sing a song about Elmo*

Lincoln: Dada, shhhhh! Momma seeping!

That’s my baby boy. Looking out for his mom already. It is Saturday morning after all.

Passing on the Blame

Posted on 04/10/2012 by lheidimitchell

I’ve longed for the days when Lincoln starts to say funny, witty things. I guess you could say that I’m fluent in sarcasm, and all my favorite people are pretty funny, so I’m definitely hoping Lincoln has a little of that in him. If you’re going to do this parenting gig, it should at least be entertaining, right?

Well since Lincoln’s sentences are just a few words long right now, there hasn’t really been anything funny to report. He does things that are funny, but he doesn’t really use his words to get laughs yet, so I was really surprised when he said a pretty funny thing the other day.

(It will help you to know that Lincoln calls my brother Tyler, Ty-ya)

I was changing his dirty diaper when this conversation took place.

Lincoln: “Momma”

Me: “What?”

Lincoln: “Ty-ya pooped. Ewwwwww”

Me: “Uh, No. Uncle Tyler didn’t poop in your diaper, you did.”

Lincoln: “No, Momma. Ty-ya pooped. Ewwwww”

Totally blamed his dirty diaper on Tyler and was laughing about it. Of course once he realized it made me laugh, he decided it must be a funny sentence, so now he will just randomly repeat that Tyler pooped. Sorry Uncle Tyler, this kid was ready to sell you out. The joys of being a boy mom continue.

The little stinker at a play date last week.

Apologies

Posted on 01/23/2012 by lheidimitchell

I can honestly say that I wasn’t the kind of woman who had a lot of “I will nevers” before becoming a mom. I am a realist through and through, so I mostly understood that there was no way to predict what life would be like after having children. But even with all of my level-headedness, there are still a few things that have happened since Lincoln was born that required me to eat my words.

I remember going to the homes of people with children and thinking, “Why the heck is their car such a mess? Why is everything broken? And why are there crayon marks on the walls? Can’t they control these kids?” Little did I know, there would come a day I would be sitting in the pharmacy drive-thru trying to have an important conversation with the pharmacist with a screaming baby in the back. I had no idea that in that moment, I would happily hand him an entire container of Puffs in the hopes of getting just one minute of quiet. And as we would pull away from the drive-thru, I would hear the sound; The distinct sound that occurs when hundreds of puffy rice cereal pieces are dumped out. Dirty mom car.

I had no idea that window blinds were so fragile that they would easily snap when a toddler decided to peek out to see what was going on outside…..and another set would snap when he thought it would be fun to pull them out far enough so that he could toss cars and sippy cups behind them and watch it all land on the window sill. Broken things around the house.

I didn’t know the speed with which a little boy can find an ink pen, open it, and draw a masterpiece on a leather chaise lounge. Thankfully, I would also learn that hair spray works like a magic eraser on leather. And right as I was about to post this, I caught him driving his cars on the wall, which resulted in some skid marks. Drawings/markings in inappropriate locations around the house.

So now I get it. It makes total sense that sometimes things get broken, and there’s not time/money/energy to immediately replace them. I know why people with children do not have perfect, spotless homes. I saw something on Pinterest that said, “Cleaning house while the kids are home is like shoveling snow while it’s still snowing”. Ummm, yes.

I understand that not everyone’s lives will be like this, but mine is, and I’m slowly learning to be okay with that. If you have a calm, relaxed child, you may never experience the craziness I mentioned above. I hear that some kids don’t spend every waking moment climbing, running, throwing, yelling. I wouldn’t know. Some parents just have Type A personalities and keeping a perfect house is a top priority, so they learn to achieve that. I have neither of those things working in my favor, so I find myself in the so-not-Supermom category, and that’s okay.

To all the moms I silently judged in the past, please accept my apologies. You can stop by my house unexpectedly and judge me as my punishment. Or you can look in my car’s floorboard on any given day and give me a disapproving look when you see a few Annie’s Cheddar Bunnies lying there. I’ve learned my lesson. There is a good reason why we have marks on the walls, food on the floor and overall total chaos at certain points. It’s called children, and more specifically for me, rowdy toddler.

I’m sure it’s hard to believe this innocent looking child caused all the problems I wrote about, but believe it. Here’s a snapshot of the only time he is still and calm. Bed time.

Blockhead

Posted on 11/14/2011 by lheidimitchell

If I’m being totally honest, Lincoln is exhausting to me right now. He never, ever stops all day long. Why do kids have so much energy? Lately he has started what Mike & I call “terror mode”. This is when he gets this mischievous look in his eye, and you just better watch out. He goes to his toy box and just starts randomly throwing things out of it. He runs to the kitchen and finds that one cabinet where the safety lock quit working and starts removing dishes. He reaches into a kitchen drawer he knows he’s not allowed to be in and starts throwing butter knives or birthday candles or pens or whatever thing he can reach at that moment. All of the above would have taken place in under 5 minutes, and then the cycle would just start over again. He is truly like a tornado blowing through this place when he gets into terror mode. I think these are the beginnings of the terrible twos. Too bad nobody told my kid that he’s not two years old yet.

When he’s not in terror mode, he can actually be quite hilarious and charming. His new fun thing to do is to wear this block on his head around the house. I think it’s a safe bet that Lincoln will be a class clown one day. The moment he realizes someone is laughing at what he’s doing, he just lays it on even thicker. Sounds familiar. I’m told that Mike got into lots of trouble in school, not for talking, because he’s actually kind of quiet, but for making other kids laugh. I guess it’s not the worst quality in the world.

My little Blockhead.

I don’t remember why he didn’t have a shirt on at the time, but I’m sure it had something to do with food, drink or dirt.

Just Dance

Posted on 09/28/2011 by lheidimitchell

For all of the oh-my-gosh-i’m-going-to-pull-my-hair-out moments, there are many more hilarious and fun moments in my journey through mommyhood. Lincoln has a new passion for “dancing”. I use that term loosely since his version of dancing resembles those moves that sumo wrestlers do where they shift their weight between each foot with their legs spread. You know what I’m talking about. Lincoln’s dancing is very sumo wrestler-like. Or maybe it’s more of an Irish Jig. Either way, it’s pretty adorable.

When music comes on, he just can’t seem to resist the urge to do his little moves. Even the restraints of his car seat can’t stop him from gettin’ jiggy with it. When he hears music in the car, he moves his feet and slaps his hand on his leg. Isn’t it funny that we are born with a love for music and a desire to dance? Kind of makes you wonder why we have to grow up and become so dignified that we don’t dance much anymore.

Earlier this week I found myself having a rough day. It’s what I like to call the post-nephrologist appointment blues. Mike had just dropped us off after going with him to see the doctor. Even though I try to prepare myself mentally for these regular appointments, I still tend to shed a few tears when they’re over. I decided I should turn on some music to try to cheer me up. Well, when I turned on the radio, the first song that came blaring out was Beyonce’s Crazy in Love. I wasn’t in a Beyonce mood (sorry B), so I was about to change it when I noticed Lincoln trying to catch my eye. He had immediately stopped playing with his toy, turned around towards me, and was grinning at me as he began his dancing. My crying quickly turned into laughing out loud. Being the clown he is, my laughter just encouraged him to keep going. So all around the living room my little baby did his Sumo/Irish dance moves. I grabbed my camera and tried to document another moment when I felt so incredibly thankful to have him in my life. Nothing in the world can make me happier than his chubby little face. Our home has always been a place where there’s a lot of laughing and acting goofy, but Lincoln just takes things to a whole new level.

Check out the moves.

Mommyhood 101

Category Archives: Funny Stuff