Tuesday, November 20, 2012

A visit with Santa

Last year Pookie's visit with Santa went very smooth.  I don't think Pookie even knew what hit him.  I zoomed into the mall, wheeled the carriage to where Santa was at and plunked Pookie on Santa's lap faster than Pookie can say "Mama."  This year has been a very different experience.  At first I thought that things might go well.  Pookie has been doing really well with costume characters, like Donald Duck.  I had a small hope that this would translate to a visit with Santa.  Apparently, no such luck. 

A couple of weeks ago, my Aunt, Cousin, Pookie and I went to a craft fair.  There was a very nice Santa there.  Pookie wanted no part of saying hello to Santa.  In fact, he buried his head in my shoulder and refused to even open his eyes.  No big deal, I told myself.  There are plenty of opportunities to visit Santa.  Last Wednesday, I needed to get my glasses fixed.  We wandered around the mall for awhile to kill some time while my glasses were getting worked on.  I figured it would be a good idea for Pookie to try to see Santa again.  Once again, he had his arm over his head and he wouldn't even look at Santa.  Humm, we seem to have a trend here.  So on Friday I had errands to run, one of which was at the mall.  I figured I would try again.  Once again, no luck.  Although this time, as we are leaving the mall, Pookie announces STOP! followed by a motion to go back inside.  At this point, I have other errands to run and I figured it would be better to just cut our losses and try again another day. 

Monday was the day!  After breakfast I told Pookie that we ARE going to visit Santa and all I need is for him to sit on Santa's lap and get a few pictures.  He looked at me as if I were off my rocker.  At this point, I probably am.  Then, I had a brilliant idea.  I needed to pick up a book at the library, and Pookie loves books.  So I told him that we could get books after we saw Santa.  You would have thought that I had just told him that he had won a life time supply of blueberries.  All the way to see Santa he kept saying "Book!"  After we left Santa, all I heard was "Book! Book! Book!"  I felt so proud.  Pookie isn't quite 2 yet, and I have managed to instill a love affair with books.  Score one for Mama!  On a side note, Santa was very nice, but the photographer completely ROCKED!  He managed to get Pookie laughing and that is a good thing indeed!  I seriously thought that this would be the year of the screaming child pictures. 

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Happy Halloween!

Pookie has started to move into the Terrific Two's.  *cough*cough*  I think he is in the middle of a growth spurt and getting all four of his two year molars in.  My once happy baby is having a few issues.  Yesterday did not start well.  Pookie woke up crying.  That is never a good way to start one's day.  From there we had a bit of an issue with the Cream of Wheat cereal.  I think I added too much rice milk and it ended up very runny.  There was Cream of Wheat everywhere.  Do you have any idea how challenging it is to clean Cream of Wheat off of an almost two year old?  There was little specks of wheat all over the place.  After the Cream of Wheat debacle, things were going fairly smoothly, until we tried to leave the house.  Pookie wanted my keys.  I knew that if I gave him my keys we would never leave the driveway.  So I gave him his play keys instead.  The play keys were flung to the ground, followed by Pookie belly-flopping onto the floor having a hissy fit.  He finally managed to calm down and we made it out of the house and into the truck.  (My car was under the weather and was in for repairs.)  To say that I dislike driving the truck would be an understatement.  I hate it.  I can't see anything and it takes me three tries to get into a parking spot.  Whenever I back up, I'm afraid that I'm going to run someone or something over.  Pookie, of course, loves the truck. 

We finally made it to our destination.  There is a breastfeeding mother's group that we used to belong to.  They have a Halloween party every year, and the big kids are welcomed back for a visit.  Pookie is decked out in his snazzy fish costume and is doing good.  This of course, does not last for long.  There were only a couple of big kids that were there and thank goodness, we knew some of them.  However, I spent the entire time removing Pookie from the snack table and the corner of the room where there was a stack of precariously perched yoga balls.  To top it all of, the room was hot as hades.  We did make it a full hour before heading home.

Once we got home Pookie took his version of a "nap."  Once again, he woke up crying.  At this rate, I was seriously considering calling off trick-or-treating for Pookie.  He doesn't really go trick-or-treating, but the neighbors get a real kick seeing Pookie dressed up.  Plus, Rob has a fun time bringing Pookie out.  According to Rob, Pookie had a great time trick-or-treating.  Pookie let himself in to at least one of our neighbors homes and made himself comfortable on the couch.  From the sounds of it they had a nice visit with the neighbor.  Pookie came home with quite the haul.  Rob said that Pookie helped himself to a couple of handfuls of candy at a couple locations.  It sounds like we have a few things to work on for next year.  From a day that started questionable, it ended quite well.  It was all topped of with a showing of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.  Seeing as Pookie loves pumpkins, he was quite enthralled with it.

Costume, check.  Pumpkin, check.  Treat bag, check.  Let's go!


Pookie practicing knocking on the door.