Toddler Life

It has been so long since Charlotte was a toddler that I forgot just how absolutely savage a toddler can act. The tantrums, the pure insanity, the lack of logical communication. Here are a few examples of toddler life with Mackenzie:

1. She cut her finger a few days ago. She didn’t cry when she cut her finger. She literally did not make a peep when it was bleeding. But now that there is a scab on her finger she does not like it and keeps holding her hand up, pointing at the scab and screams at me to get rid of it. She tries to wipe it off, shake it off, anything she can do to remove the spot from her hand. She’ll forget about it for a few hours, look down at her hand and notice it again and shout “oh no!” and then try to take it off and gets herself all worked up that the scab will not come off her finger.
2. She has decided she doesn’t want to eat normal meals anymore. This morning as I was getting ready for work I made her a plate of blueberries and crepes. She ate the blueberries, pushed the plate of crepes away and walked over to the freezer. She took out the bag of frozen french fries, literally threw them at me, pointed to the microwave and then sat in her chair to wait for the french fries. You can’t say the girl doesn’t know what she wants.
3. After a few weeks of bath time struggles she has finally acclimated herself to the tub again. But now out of nowhere she doesn’t like the soap going into the bathwater. Last night she kept kicking at the water every time it got cloudy from the soap. It was just a chorus of “no no no no” until her bath was over.
4. Whenever we pick Charlotte up from school she insists on walking, which is fine. Exercise is good for the soul and Lord knows she’s been cooped up in the house. But she WILL. NOT. WALK in the direction she needs to walk. She insists on going the opposite way no matter how much I try and direct her. So now I have to pretend to walk to the wrong way to get her to go the right way. And she doesn’t just walk in a normal straight line, she has to strut like a duck on a catwalk. She acts like some sort of high fashion animal model and she doesn’t pay attention to where she is going and gets distracted by all of the dogs around her and ends up sprawled out on the floor more often than not.
5. She has a Little People farm which is her current favorite toy but she insists the chicken is a duck and if you say chicken she screams NO DUCK and so I’ve just decided the chicken is a duck and she can get corrected by teachers at school whenever she attends because I’m no longer interested in fighting with her.
6. Her most used word is no, or oh no, or no no no no no no no no and that’s pretty much all she says until the end of time.

I forgot how fun and exhausting and enraging this age is.