Raising My Girls

Today is Tuesday, and that means that Ironman came out on DVD.  Well, my husband has been looking forward to this release ever since we saw the movie in the theater.  With that in mind, the youngest and I ran out for a bit this morning to pick up the DVD.

When I picked up that DVD you could have sworn that I’d turned on a light and shined it in that child’s face.  She light up and said, “Wow! You got daddy’s moobie? It’s daddy’s moobie!”  Then she clapped and bounced up and down with excitement.  I’ve never seen someone so excited about someone else’s DVD.  LOL!

During her fit of enthusiasm, she declared to me that she was going to surprise her daddy when he comes home from work by hiding the movie behind her back and then pulling it out and shouting, “Surprise!”  She even had a demonstration showing me exactly how she would do it.  Keep in mind that we’re still in the store when this is going on.  LOL

She held onto the DVD all the way home!

Later in the day, Daddy called Mommy from work to ask an insurance related question.  While Mommy was chatting with Daddy, the youngest shouts, “Don’t tell daddy that we got his moobie!”  To which I replied, “Ok, I won’t tell daddy that we got his movie.” 

Daddy thought that was highly hilarious since he was on the other end of the phone line and completely in hearing distance of said demand of not telling him about his “moobie.”  LOL!!

My poor, sweet, little doll still doesn’t realize what she actually did, and probably never will.  She’s just soooo excited to be able to be the one to give her daddy his surprise.

Keep this in mind if you have little girls… little girls and secrets do not go together.  They just aren’t physically capable of keeping one.  LOL!  Of course, I know many grown women who are the exact same way. 

 Anyway, I’ll be sure to not tell my little miss about any Christmas gifts this year.  Who knows who she’ll NOT tell about them.  Hahaha! 

Little girls love tutus; it’s just a given.  My girls are no different.  Well, I should say that two of my three girls are no different.  The oldest has decided that she’s too old for a tutu now that she’s a “pre-teen.”

I’ve started working on Halloween costumes for the girls.  Well, the 3 yr old wants to be Tinkerbell.  Okay.  I ordered her a Tinkerbell costume from eBay for $5.  It was suppose to be a size 3T-4T, bu when it arrived it was far too short for my tall child.  So, I decided to make a tutu for her to wear under the costume.  It turned out perfect!  She looks like a little green angel.  As soon as it was completed, she HAD to have her picture taken.  LOL.  She’s all girl!

Now, the 8yr old has decided that she wants to be a witch.  She’s excited because I’m going to make her a black and orange striped tutu for her costume.  She’ll wear a black turtleneck, witch’s hat, and orange & black striped tights.  So, I ordered the tulle today and will get right to work as soon as it arrives.  I’m sure that she’ll be dancing around in the tutu long before and long after Halloween.

The 11 yr old, on the other hand, doesn’t know what she wants to be, but she does know that she does NOT want a tutu.  Apparently she’s just too old to wear a tutu, not matter how cool or what color her mom makes it.  LOL!  Oh well, at least I still have the younger two who think that mommy is the coolest woman around and everything I make is fabulous!  All I know is that the oldest better get on the ball about deciding what she wants to be, or I WILL make her a tutu and she’ll have to be happy with it or nothing.  LOL!

Girls and tutus, a love that can last a lifetime… or not!

All it takes is the determination of one angry mother to solve a problem.  Yes, my oldest daughter’s problem at school has now been resolved.  She spoke with her school counselor about the issue and made sure to let said counselor know that Mommy would be up there Monday morning if it wasn’t taken care of this week.  Soooooo…..

 It was taken care of today!  And quite satisfactory if I do say so myself.

Seriously though, people out there need to know that raising a girl to be critical of other females is not only wrong, but it is detrimental to their daughter, as well as the ones she teases and bullys.  Most of the girls who pick at other girls are simply unhappy with their own bodies, lives, circumstances and they think that making others miserable will make them feel better.  That doesn’t work.  Those girls will eventually turn into lonely adults because no one will want to be around such negative people.

If you find that your daughter is being harassed in school, then take the necessary steps to point out that you’re there to help and if it doesn’t get resolved then you’re more than happy to step in and take care of it yourself.  This could mean speaking to the teachers, the counselor, the principal, or even to the higher ups in order to get the inappropriate actions stopped.  Usually things will be taken care of as soon as you speak to a teacher about it, but if that doesn’t help then it’s time to move on to the next person of authority. 

Don’t just stand back and take the “kids will be kids” bull that some will spew at you.  Yes, kids may be kids, but your kid doesn’t have to be tormented, belittled, or made to feel less than normal.  Our girls have enough to deal with when it comes to body image just from the media, without having to deal with it at school where they’re there to get an education.

Just remember that an angry mother’s determination can do anything if you know how to use it to your advantage. 

Oh I remember the days of being a girl and fearing that the entire world hated me.  My siblings annoyed me, my parents didn’t understand me, and my best friend was the only person who listened to me.  Years later, when I finally became my own person, I stopped caring about what other people thought, and became a much happier person because of it.  I’ll always wish that I’d learned to do that at a much younger age than I did.

 Now, I’m dealing with my oldest daughter being in that same stage in her own life.  I look at her and see me at that age.  I remember how close my emotions were to the surface everytime she has an outburst of tears, a touch of attitude toward her little sisters, and when she expresses her thoughts that the entire world hates her.

It’s difficult to watch your children go through the same things that you did, ad not be able to help them get to a point where you want them to be.  You can guide and talk to them over and over, but they are still their own person and need to learn these things on their own.

My oldest is an “early bloomer,” as I was at her age.  She has the figure of someone a couple years older (as I did) and she’s starting to get teased at school about the size of her bosom by a couple of snooty girls.  I keep telling her to ignore them–that they are just jealous–and she tries very hard to do that.  But, it’s gone on for about four weeks now and I do believe that it’s time for Mommy to get involved.  And the principal, office staff, and 90% of the teachers in that school know me and know that I’m a hardass when it comes to protecting my children.  They don’t want me up there taking care of this!

So, I’ve gven my daughter today as the last attempt to take care of this problem herself.  She’s gone to her teacher twice, the vice principal twice, and today she’s going to the school counselor to see if that will work.  Yesterday she was so distraught when she came home from school that she ultimately bursted into tears later in the evening.  That just made me even more angr at the situation.

Today’s the day.  If this doesn’t work, then I will be up there first thing next Monday morning. 

Preteen girls and their emotions will never trump a pissed-off Mommy!  But those preteen girls will eventually learn how to be themselves and not care about what other people think about them.  It just takes us mothers to teach them that by leading by example!

This weekend we took the girls up to the mountains to go apple-picking at one of our favorite orchards.  This orchard will allow you to pick your own apples and enjoy tons of activities for only three weekends in September.  So,if you don’t do it then, you’re out of luck.  We didn’t make it the first weekend, but we made sure to go this weekend.

The girls had a blast!  We went through a small museum, they played on the playground, we took a nature walk, they checked out some ponies, and the two younger girls milked a cow.  Turns out the 3yr old is a natural cow-milker.  LOL!

What always intrigues me each year we do this is how the girls don’t seem to “get” the concept of having an entire orchard at their disposal when picking apples.  They tend to hit the first trees they see and stay right there until our bag is full.  I keep trying to point out that there are rows and rows of trees–all covered with large, juicy apples–but they just don’t seem to get it.  Then, of course, after our bag is full they will see trees further back that have ginormous apples on then and they’ll complain that they should have gone back there to pick apples.  LOL!  Ah well, what do I know… I’m just the mom!

In the end, we left the orchard with a bushel of apples, two jars of apple jelly, three candied apples, and one jar of fresh honey.  YUM!  Now I just gotta use up all these apples over the next couple weeks so they don’t go bad.  No worries though.  I have tons of apple recipes that only get used during this time of the year.  Yesterday I made them an apple pizza (which is all gone right now) and something this week I’ll make some apple bread and muffins.  The two big girls took apples to school for snack today as well.  I think we’ll be okay.  LOL!

We have a dog.  We’ve had our dog since October 2007.  Our dog was a stray puppy that someone had dumped.  Our dog took a shying to our girls and we brought our dog home.

Well, our dog is a year old now and we just found out that the dog we thought was a boy, is actually a GIRL!  Yep, we’re idiots.  LOL!  The hubby and I have been around cats and dogs all of our lives.  We both checked this dog out numerous times in the first few weeks, but he/she was still so young that one day we’d think boy and the next girl.  So we finally settled on boy and went callingour dog a HIM for the last year.

 Now our dog has hit puberty and it’s very easy to tell that he is now a SHE.  The girls are getting a huge kick out it.  They keep laughing and saying, “Fudge is a girl now!”

So, it looks like the hubby has yet another girl in the family.  Here he thought that he had a male companion and it turns out to be another girl.  The poor guy!

Go ahead, laugh at our stupidity… we already have!  LOL!

After months of eager anticipation and questions of when this day would arrive, the movie SpeedRacer finally arrived in our mailbox from Netflix today.  Oh, the girls were ecstatic when I told them after school.  They wanted to watch it as soon as we walked in the house, but I held them off until their dad came home from work.

They heard his car coming up the driveway at ten ’til six.  The youngest ran to the door to greet her favorite guy.  The older two were shouting, “Daddy’s home! Daddy’s home!”  Such impatient little demons, they are.

Everyone crowded into the livingroom.  The girls laid in the floor, lined up from oldest to youngest.  The youngest was beside herself with excitement as she repeated over and over, “Go Speed, Go!” until the movie finally started.

It all went downhill from there.  LOL!  The youngest one’s excitement slowly waned with each passing minute.  She soon started whispering to her sisters, wiggling around, climbing up into my lap and then back down again.  Finally, after twenty minutes of movie, she asked to go in my room and watch Dora the Explorer.  That was it for her.

Next up was the middle daughter.  She’s eight years old and laste longer than the three year old… but only by another ten minutes!

I’m happy to say that the eleven year old made it all th way through the 2 hour 15 minute movie without any complaints.  She enjoyed it a lot.

So this is how our family movie nights go.  Loads of excitement and anticipation that quickly dwindles down to boredom, annoyance, and nothingness.  Ah well, maybe next time!  I enjoyed the movie though. 

Sisters.  Sisters have a unique connection.  I have a younger sister of my own, so I know this connection personally.  However, the connection, the sisterly love as it is, between my three daughters is somthing of pure genius.

At this moment, I sit here typing to the sounds of three girls outside in the backyard screaming at each other.  You’d think, “Better outside than inside,” and normally I’d agree.  But, today the cool temperatures have allowed me to open all the windows in the house, leaving me under an audible assault of screams and cryings of displeasure.

But back to sisterly love!  These three girls of mine are at each others’ throats one minute, crying because another hit her the next minute, and then being all lovey dovey and playing nicely five minutes later.  One day the older two will come home from school complaining about things they’d done to each other at school (keep in mind that they are in 3rd & 6th grade and rarely have contact with each other throughout the day) and then the next day the oldest will be fuming that someone was picking on her little sister in school.

I do know that the fighting will eventually diminish and they will slowly learn to respect and (hopefully) stop tormenting each other, but until then, I think I may go completely insane.  I don’t recall my sister and me fighting so much.  There are five years between us, where as my girls are separated by three and a half and four and a half years.

Until those days of future peace come to light, I’ll just have to sit back and tolerate their bickering, screaming, crying, and shouts of, “MOMMY, she’s bothering me” with as much grace as I can muster.  Ahhh, sisterly love… will it ever end?  LOL!

I’ve noticed that preteen girls enjoy pushing to see just how far they distort a parental rule.  My 11yr old is no different. 

One of my main rules is that laundry hampers must be brought into the laundry room if you’d like me to wash your clothes.  I don’t think it’s a difficult rule and it keeps me from going around the house to see if clothes need to be washed.  So basically, if the hamper is not in the laundry room, I will not wash your clothes.

There for a while I would “remind” them to bring the hamper in before school.  But, I got tired of that and stopped.  Now the two older girls are in charge of doing it themselves without being reminded.  They hate it.

Now, my preteen is the worst when it comes to the laundry rule.  She’ll run around the house each morning searching for clothes that she wants to wear, but they’re still dirty because low and behold, the hamper was never taken into the laundry room!  She’ll then get mad and declare that she has absolutely NOTHING to wear.  Of course, I call B.S. on that because I’m the one who buys and washes her clothes, so I know exactly what’s in her closet.

We had this problem over the weekend.  So this morning I was highly amused to find only a half-full clothes hamper parked in the laundry room.  Maybe I’m getting through to her after all!  This mom can only hope!!

Here’s to a clean laundry day and a happy preteen when she comes home from school today. 

Hello.  I am Christie Silvers.  I’m a wife, mother, and writer.  On this blog I will discuss the trials and tribulations of raising three daughters. 

 My girls are currently ages 11, 8, and 3yrs old.  Life with three girls is pretty exciting, frustrating, exhausting, and all around enjoyable.  Of course their father wouldn’t say that.  LOL!  He’s the only man in the house and he’s outnumbered when it comes to femal hormones, thoughts, and attitudes… most of those being my own!

I look forward to sharing my life and times of raising girls with all of you in the future days, weeks, months.  I hope that you will come back regularly and enjoy your time with me.

If you’re interested in my other work, feel free to pop on over to my website at http://www.christiesilvers.com You’ll be able to find out all about my paranormal romance novels, as well as check out my numerous other blogs, MySpace page, and more.