Why the rush?

So I am just going to start with my rant.  I just don’t get it….retailers trying to rush us through the seasons!  I got an email the other day from Carter’s (a children’s clothing store) showing the new fall line.  WTF!!!  It is not even July yet!  I understand you need the clothes before the season gets here, but it is so frustrating that somewhere along the line, they have backed it up so much that you can hardly find the things you are looking for in the season you need them.  You want an example?  Last summer I needed to find a life jacket in the middle of July….NONE!!  They were already on clearance and were gone!  Did I mention it was July?  They had replaced the summer items in the seasonal section to back to school items (i.e. backpacks, notebooks, pens).  As I have said previously, I am a planner, I love getting things together early, but this is just ridiculous.  I want to find what I need in the season that I need it, that’s all that I ask.  Who are these people that are out buying back to school clothes at the end of June?  It can’t possibly be the parents that just had their kids get out of school 2 weeks ago.  I think I might start showing them who’s boss….you know what Carter’s?  I am not ready for fall, so I am refusing to buy my daughters back to school wear now, so there! 

Baby Scare

So I had a baby scare the other day, and not the kind you’re thinking of.  This was the “my almost 3 year old asks me how babies get here” kind of scare.  It didn’t happen when I was pregnant, and it didn’t happen when I had her little sister.  No, it popped up 2 months after her sister was born, out of nowhere, driving in the car to her eye doctor appointment.  It went a little something like this:

Her: Are you & Daddy married?

Me: Yes we are.

Her: Did you kiss him?

Me: Yes I did.

Her: Why???

Me: Because I love him, just like I kiss you because I love you too.

Her: Oh, that was very nice of you, Mom.

….more conversation about weddings (no idea where she got this information from)….

Her: So how do babies get here?

Me: (oh shit oh shit)  Umm…*

*All I was thinking of at this point was how to explain this without much detail, or how to table the question for later.  My husband and I hadn’t discussed how we would handle this issue..we thought we had time.  When I remembered this book that I had read “So Sexy, So Soon” By: Levin & Kilbourne…I highly recommend this book by the way, especially if you have girls!  It basically says that kids ask questions and that you can give the minimal answers for their age, because most of the time that satisfies the curiosity for the information, without giving them info they won’t understand yet.  So basically, save the birds and bees talk until they are older and can really understand.

Me: Well, when a Mommy & Daddy love each other then they have a baby.

(Silence..and more panic for me)

Her: Oh ok.  Can I bring my purse into the doctor?

SUCCESS!!  Hopefully it is a while before it comes up again and we have to go into more detail!!

What? Me??

Organized.  That would probably be the word that most people would use to describe me.  Which everyone knows really means that I am a very detail oriented person who is anal retentive, and maybe a little bit of a control freak.  I like things a certain way, I like things clean and sleek.  I hate clutter.  I like to have a plan in place for everything I do.  One of my favorite things to do is get a new planner and rewrite my calendar.  I don’t like surprises; I like to know what is coming ahead of time so that I can contemplate my plan of attack.  I know I am this way, and I am okay with it.  Both my husband and I like to plan and organize most things in our lives. Do I secretly hope my daughters get this trait as well??  Why, yes, yes I do.  Detail oriented people know how to get things done, how to make a clear decision and make it happen.  It means my daughters will hopefully be strong women that know what they want in life and how to get it.  At the same time, it also means they will have to be hard workers (also not a bad trait) because detail oriented people end up doing more work themselves rather than delegating…that would be that darn control freak issue popping up!  Essentially, I think the pros outweigh the cons in this situation.  The real trouble is how do I instill this trait in my girls without pushing them in the other direction?  Will they just pick up on it from the way my husband and I live our lives?  Or will they see the way we have chosen to live our lives and run in the other direction?  I know that I am rubbing off on my oldest already.  How do I know this you ask?  Well, why most young kids just color with their crayons, probably leave them all over the floor, my girl likes to take all her crayons out and lay them in a line by color.  She then proceeds to put them all back into the container in order nice and straight.  When I ask what she is doing, she tells me she is playing “organizing”.  J  That’s my girl!  I wish there was a sure fire way to encourage the hard working, decisive, organized traits into the girls without the anal retentive, and control freak issues creeping in there as well.  Oh well, I guess I will just take what I can get and hopefully I don’t screw them up too badly, but that’s something I won’t know until they are 18 and can tell me how I did as a parent J