As My Child Grows

As my child grows, as they both grow, the things that they do and say becomes more and more entertaining to me.

I finally obtained Leap[Pads for the girls. Well, reobtained. I had bought Marilyn one for her birthday back in August. (I purchased it like August 31 so I feel obligated to say that I bought it in August although her birthday is in early September).

Anyhow. Long story short, the backlight broke on it and I sent it back to Toys R Us because I had actually spent the money on one of those warranty plans. Except they didn't fix or replace it, they just sent me a replacement gift card for the exact amount of the product. Which was totally awesome....EXCEPT

I got the card days before black Friday. DAYS. And the toy was one of the top toys for 2011 and of course, was always sold out.

So during my vacationing week, the girls and I trekked out to TRU to see if they actually had it in stock. Which of course they didn't. WalMart had a green computer and I was at the register, ready to purchase it, except, except, Marilyn did NOT want a green computer. She definitely wanted a pink computer.

Anyone with children already knows, this was going to be a dilemma. And of course it was. So we did not get the pink computer and for the next few days Marilyn strongly expressed her negative feelings on those children who had received all of the pink computers for Christmas when she did not have one. I did try to redirect her angry feelings towards the big box corporation that is TRU and how they cannot keep in stock either in store or online one of their self proclaimed hottest toys of the season.

So anyhow, I lucked out and meandered into TRU this past week and indeed, they were in stock. So I got one for each of the girls.

But the joke was on them though, because I didn't have any time Thursday to program their computers or set them up or anything. And no time on Friday. But I did make time over the weekend. And so when I collected my children on Sunday, the first thing that they both eagerly demanded was their computers. And for good reason, those computers are freaking awesome.

Well, one thing that LeapFrog does, which in turn probably boosts their sales, is put advertisements and 'Sneak Peaks' already programmed onto the computer. Mallory spends a lot of time just watching these because she hasn't figured out the games yet. Marilyn scoped them out right away and I may have promised a Cinderella enhanced ebook to my children. And they will definitely hold me to it.

So, even though we just got home, and I am exhausted because today was a 3 shift day with a business meeting and a lot of running around included, I am battling with my shoddy Internet connection (Yeah, thanks again AT&T, I still don't have my Internet back because your customer service SUCKS and it takes even the store reps 40 minutes to wait on hold just to get things straightened out, that is, if they are even transferred to the right department, which they usually are not, so on my rare days off of work I have to waste my time getting the mess that you f$&#$& up fixed up just so I can have functional modern capabilities) to try to download the Cinderella game.

I just gave up and having to explain this to Marilyn has not been easy. But she is whispering to me that I am the best, so perhaps I am forgiven. But now it is finally working again. *Sigh* Technology is nothing but a headache.

Anyhow. As we wait for this, ridiculously late, so she probably won't even get to play it tonight anyhow, I am going to write about the funny things that she has been saying to me.

Today we made this awesome deal, instigated by her, that if I listen to everything that she tells me to do, she will clean for me. I think that sounds like a win win situation. We high fived over it.

She did start pestering me though this evening, the second I walked into the door, about the stupid Cinderella game. Like when was I going to put it on her computer? Where was my credit card? Didn't I find my credit card yet? I told her I was going to put it on her computer! Nevermind that I was lugging a very heavy sleeping Mallory upstairs, heavy bags still on my arms, still walking around in my high heels. Yep, I was totally about to get right to that.

So now they are slowly slowly downloading to my computer and it is way past any reasonable time for a child to be awake, but she will get her sleep, this new schedule is working out where we all get to sleep in a bit longer, which is definitely better, and we are more ready when we leave the house.

Mallory is doing quite well. Her vocabulary and speaking are improving and increasing at this rapid fire pace. She is a little mimic of everything Marilyn does except she still likes to do her own things and she is independent in her own way. Definitely more stubborn, which I know I write about all of the time, almost every post, but that is just because she is. Very persistent. Like she will even push me away and tell me not to help her but when she wants help from me she will seek me out.

The singing too. Oh the singing. Marilyn sang this really nice song about me yesterday in which I was a princess. I catch them both singing this one 3Oh3! Song. I will admit, I like it a lot and it is really catchy....

I have decided I am going to downsize into an apartment. If it is big enough, I will even go down to a 2 bedroom. Now I am just looking. I will upgrade to a house when I get a husband or a really good job and I can afford the full upkeep. Not that I don't like having a house, but I have a lot of things to keep into consideration with this whole hunt. Mostly school district, crime, location, ease of access and oh yeah, affordability. I also want to try somewhere new and in my adventures I have been exploring the various places of Cleveland and I will say, there are vast differences.

So that is that is that is that. And then some.