Morningtime…

Filed Under Parenting 

Mornings in our house can get a bit, well, loud. With about 35 minutes from waking her to walking her out the door, Alexis’ morning is always rushed. There is usually a lot of crying and screaming, and Alexis is no picnic either.

This morning was much like other mornings with lots of yelling. Alexis won’t get off the toilet. And she screams bloody murder when I turn on the hall lights. Alexis won’t get dressed quickly – she does this thing where she HAS to get all of her clothes together first, and sits on the floor naked and looking at them forever if you let her. Alexis stands around instead of brushing her teeth. When I finally went in and saw her  standing there after 5 minutes with still no toothpaste even on her brush, I brushed her teeth for her.

Part of the problem with the teeth brushing is that we can’t find a single toothpaste that she likes the taste of. She hates them all, and believe me, we have 15 tubes and bottles of the stuff to prove it. So throughout the entire experience of me tilting her head back and forcing the toothbrush in between her jaws she screamed and cried. I hate doing that stuff to her. But she won’t do it herself, so the “punishment” is that mom does it for her. I’ve used this tactic with picking out clothes, too, and she really really HATES that. I always pick exactly what she doesn’t want to wear.

But as she sat there pouting at her breakfast, I comment that she sure has a lot of peanut butter on her oatmeal (don’t knock it until you try it). Chris must’ve been completely zoned out when he put it on there. There were probably 3 tablespoons of it. It was melting like frosting over the top of the mush underneath. Somehow we started giggling about it and came to the topic of peanut butter and brown sugar sandwiches. You should have seen her eyes widen. I fully expect to come into the kitchen one day and catch her making one.

After she finished her breakfast and put away her dishes,  she came over to me and starts giving me “peanut butter kisses”. Her cold little nose touched mine and I melted just like the peanut butter on her cereal. Then she walks over to her daddy and stands on her tippy-toes and gives him a kiss. I thought she was going to fall over backwards her head was tipped so far back.

As she and Chris left, I watched her bend over and give the dog a kiss, too. I watched my daughter who has grown so much in the last 5 1/2 years walk off to another day at Kindergarten and gratitude just washed over me. These are the moments that make parenting so wonderful.

Comments

One Response to “Morningtime…”

  1. Chris on December 13th, 2007 3:14 pm

    If only we could get her to tip her head that far back when we are washing her hair…

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