Going to Town with Poppa

Yesterday, Carter out-guilt tripped me into staying home with me all day. I had taken her to my Gramma Pat's the day before with Blake, thinking she would have a ball with Blake there. Not as much as I had hoped. Apparently all she wanted to do was come home, and when she got home she was in full rebellion mode. We had a horrible afternoon with her crying, temper tantrums, the works. Even after a nap, she woke up on the fight. Blake had come home with us to spend the night...a huge honor, since Blake normally would rather stay at home. I'm sure by the end of the night she was wishing maybe she had stayed home. The next morning when I woke her up to get ready to go to Landa's, she jumped out of bed like a shot and instantly started a new temper tantrum about wanting to stay home. I spent almost 10 minutes chasing her around the house trying to catch her so I could get her dressed. The dressing part was not pretty. We were both worn out and upset by the time I finally got her in the car. Blake, wisely, just went and sat in the car and waited for us. Carter cried all the way to Wynne's house to drop off Blake. At that point, I realized I had forgot to put gas in the car and might not have enough to get Carter down to Landa's and back. I knew if I went back home to get gas, World War III was going to break out when we turned right back around to go to Landa's. I chickened out and just went home to stay.



Carter's went in phases in the past where she only wanted to stay home, but never this bad. I'd heard several reports from the following week where Carter really had to be convinced to stay with whoever was watching her and that she really wanted to go home. Christy had also mentioned that Cade had a bit of a fever the last day or so, so maybe she was trying to come down with something and just needed some extra TLC. (I'm not convinced this was Carter's problem, but I'm willing to add it to the list to lessen my guilt) So, the heck with it, she stayed home with me yesterday and we had fun!. I still had to do some over the phone training first thing in the morning and warned Carter that if I heard one peep out of her while I was on the phone, I was putting her right back in the car and she was going right down to Landa's. (ooh even better parenting, make it a punishment to leave...sigh.) Would you believe she was dead quiet for over 2 hours? She cut up newspapers, played with play dough, colored, watched a movie, and never bothered me once. Granted I lined up all the activities, but still, she's only 2! The two ladies on the phone that I was training were amazed. We had back up plans in place for when Carter got tired of being quiet, but they couldn't believe (well me neither!) that we got as long as we did. The silence was finally broken by a rather legit potty emergency. And then she was ready to play with mom. The sun came out for the first time in a week, so we went outside and played as much as we could, played with the bunnies, jumped on the trampoline, dug up worms, chased the dog, looked over all of the newly planted trees, and just had a good time. By the time we came back in, she was tired and took a big nap, so I went back to work. Got all my hours in, and just made it work. When she woke up though, she was ready to dad to be home! He didn't get home until after I had put her to bed, with the promise that I would wake her up when he got home. Boy was she ever happy to see him!



Carter was glued to Robert's side this morning from the minute she woke up, watching me very suspiciously, sure that I was going to pack her off to Landa's if she let me get too close. Since he had a slow day, Robert offered to take her to town with him today. Did that ever perk her right up! She was instantly stripped of her pj's (a process that can take anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour) running through the house naked trying to get her clothes gathered up and dressed, terrified Robert would change his mind before she was ready to go. She even let me fix her hair! The only thing she likes more than staying home with mom, is going to town with dad. Naturally she also needed her sticker earrings on, her pink sunglasses (just like dad who always wears sunglasses although they aren't pink) and gathered up her jam crammed purse full of everything she would need in town--chap stick, her latest favorite rock, a book, some gum, skittles, tic-taks, an extra crayon, some paper, etc. It weighed almost as much as she did. Oh, and I wasn't taking a picture of Carter, I was taking a picture of the purse. That was the only way she would agree to stand there once I got the camera out!



So, now I'm not sure if she will go to my mom's on Friday or not, but we'll see--having a tea party at Gramma's is a pretty big draw right now. I'm really not sure what to do, but I can tell you that dragging her kicking and screaming to Landa's or Gramma's every weekday is almost more than I can stand (and yes, I realize she knows this even better than I do). Peeling her off me while she is crying and begging to just go home with me once we get there is even less fun. Not to mention having her coming home mad and on the fight for the rest of the afternoon isn't exactly my idea of a good time either. It just kills me that now whenever we go anywhere, she always looks at me and asks "Please don't leave me, momma!". I have at least 3 more months until maternity leave, and I'm hoping to work another 4 or 5 months after that before I quit my job. That's my optimistic goal, but in toddler time, that's eternity plus infinity and 3 more weeks added in for good measure. I'm not sure if keeping her home more helps or makes the situation worse. Guess I'll find out soon enough. One more reason I need to make me staying home work for awhile. I genuinely think she would rather just stay home (just like her momma!) most the time. So she comes by it naturally and has been like this from the pretty much from beginning.