The Concept of Time

This afternoon, the clock struck 5:00.
Quinn: It's nine o'clock!
Me: No, it's five o'clock.
Quinn: Oh, it's seven o'clock.
Me: No, it's five o'clock.
Quinn: No, it's seven o'clock.
Me: Okay, it's seven o'clock.
Quinn: No, it's five o'clock.

That's just a day in the life of a mother of a 2-year-old. Oh, and don't buy into all that parenting advice that says to give them two choices to make them feel like they have control. When we give him a choice between, say, two pairs of pajamas or two kinds of fruit, he picks one. Then he changes his mind and picks the other, which I then give to him. At that point, he freaks out and wants both of them. Yeah, giving a little bit of control to a toddler is not necessarily a good thing.

Toddlers are also notoriously inconsistent. Most of my mom friends agree that all two-year-olds ought to be qualified as bipolar. They can turn from hysterically happy to spastically miserable in two seconds flat--for absolutely no reason at all. We took Quinn to the playground today. He was so excited to get out of the car and run up to the playground. He freezes at the blue bridge, which he insists on walking over first and last thing there. He then turns so sad and begs Jalal to pick him up. At the stinking playground!! Who does that? We have to manipulate, threaten, tease, and coddle him to get him to cheer up and play. Weirdo.

Speaking of inconsistent, Quinn has been eating lettuce lately like it's going out of style. I mean, one night I gave him a small bowl of lettuce with dinner, and he asked for seconds--and thirds, and fourths! He's eating salads every day, and he ate almost the whole bowl of lettuce last night as we were having tacos. Today at lunch, I made him a turkey sandwich and put some lettuce on it. He picked off the lettuce and ate the rest. I asked him if he was going to eat his lettuce. "No." "Why not?" I asked. "I don't like lettuce." Oh. Well, I should have figured that out I guess. Tried again with a salad at dinner. He picked out all the pieces of shredded carrot but did not eat the lettuce. Not a fluke. Oh, and another funny story. I made him his turkey sandwich and served him some peas and pasta. While I was making lunch for Jalal, I heard him say, "Mmm, turkey is good." "Oh, have you tried your sandwich?" "Nope!" Okay, then. It's really no wonder that I can't wait for bedtime every day. It takes a lot of energy to be Quinn's mama. Well, I have to go be Maddie's mama now. Love, Us.