Tales of one woman stumbling her way through motherhood.
Maybe I was the last one out there to have heard of Pingu? Apparently this little claymation penguin was taking the preschool world by storm on PBS Sprout while I was watching Noggin.
But when Parent Bloggers asked me to review the first DVD, Pingu: On Thin Ice, I jumped at the chance without even knowing the story. It was about penguins, and Cordy likes penguins, so that was enough motivation for me.
With Halloween only days away, there is a rush on costumes. Here are some of the hot selections of costumes for pre-teens this year (yes, these all come in pre-teen sizes – some as small as 6-8):
Maybe your girl wants to be a storybook character, like Miss Muffet:
Or maybe she’d like to be a fairy, like when she was younger:
Does a pre-teen have the breasts to fill that costume out?There’s always the classic vampire:
More Anne Rice, less Bram StokerBut if those are too sexy, you can fall back on the traditional pirate:
More like the galley girl, I think.Yeah, it’s a sexy Halloween, and from the costumes being sold, it looks like the goal is to make everyone look sexy, from adult down to pre-adolescent girls. Do 8 year olds really need costumes like that? Are we so out of imagination and creativity that we have to fall back on sex, even for costumes designed for middle-school girls?
Superhero underwear, now available in size 4-6X!Yes, Linda Carter wore something very similar, but there are modified versions that are more appropriate for a 4 year old.
I’m not against mini-skirts, and I’m not a prude. I’m even OK with these types of costumes for older teenagers. They’re trying out adulthood, and experimenting with looking sexual can be part of finding an identity. But can’t little girls look like little girls, and not prostitots?
So, Miss On-Her-High-Horse, what are your kids dressing as for Halloween? you may ask. Here are this year’s selections. Mira had no choice in hers, but Cordy picked her costume herself.
Mira’s costume:
Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope. And change my diaper, will you?Cordy’s costume:
Real pirates don’t wear fishnets.
Ever since Mira was a few weeks old, she’s been obsessed with watching everyone else eat. We laugh at mealtimes, watching her stare longingly at our plates and making chewing motions right with us. My mom took the girls out to eat on Friday, and told me Mira fixed her gaze on the plates of food like she was going to swipe a piece of chicken when no one was looking.
I knew she was ready for food. The chewing motions, the constant hunger, the fact that she lunged for my sandwich. So we tried some oatmeal on Friday evening. Somewhere in that first meal, she gazed at me with a certain look, as if to say, “Thank you, it’s about damn time.”
Is that bowl for me? If so, put down the camera and feed me, Seymour!
Can you shovel that gruel in a little faster, please?
Oatmeal…check. Now when can we move on to pizza and chicken fries?
After I took that last picture, she cried when she realized it was all gone. This kid takes food seriously. There was no struggle learning to swallow solids properly, no trouble with tongue thrust, no confusion about opening her mouth when the spoon came near. Perfect form, with nary a drop wasted.
This kid is going to be a foodie.
And speaking of food, want to see how I’m sneaking veggies into our meals and how you can too? Check out my review of Deceptively Delicious at Mommy’s Must Haves – there’s a link to some of the recipes, too!
Busy day here, so I’ll leave you with some cute kitten pictures. Three of them may have homes soon, and the others will all be going to a vet’s office, when they’re old enough, to be adopted out from there. For now, they’re hanging out in my guest bedroom. Anyone else want a cute kitten?
And finally, I have a new review up at Mommy’s Must Haves, and it’s a good one. You may remember my laundry crisis? Parent Bloggers had me try out OxiClean, and I discovered it’s a miracle worker on baby poop stains! Click for the full story.
A second language is always helpful, right? OK, maybe Latin is a little outdated, but there are many other languages that can be handy. In our area, we have a large Spanish-speaking population, so Spanish is a commonly taught second language in the schools.
But by the time kids get to school, much of their capacity to easily learn a new language is gone. Starting when a child is a toddler or preschooler is optimal, which leaves more of the responsibility on us as parents.
Cordy has learned some Spanish thanks to her two best friends: Dora and Diego. Not a lot of Spanish – just enough to get me in trouble. Yet somehow, I keep encouraging her to know more Spanish, because I know it will be good for her in the future.
The Parent Bloggers Network sent me the entire DVD set of Kids Love Spanish and asked for my thoughts on it.
Tech geek, wife, mom of two, Disney fanatic, woman with ADD, and a complete domestic zero. I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up, but that's not so bad when you get to keep trying new things, right?
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