Barbie House Party

Ava got a Barbie house for Christmas. It's more like a set of Barbie rooms that you set up all together. My rule for the Grandmas: it has to be able to fit into her closet. Emily gets hungry for small pieces of plastic and I need to be able to put it away. I know it's bad that I just finally got around to setting up Barbie's house last Monday. Ava had a friend over and I promised them that I'd set up the house so they could "play Barbies" with it. I had no idea what an enormous task this would be. There are a million tiny pieces bound to cardboard with twisty wires and clear rubber bands. Some of the furniture required assembly. To Mattel's credit, every little piece is very life-like and most of them work...even the tiny up and down toilet seat. An hour later I was still wrestling Barbie's coat rack out of the packaging. An hour and a half later, I called it "good enough". I still need to put stickers on parts of the house and there are no less than 150 tiny pieces (silverware, cell phone, remote control, picture frames, etc.) still in a baggie that can be added later. Still, it was done. And I was was happy for the girls. They were beside themselves with excitement. "Wow! Look at that!" "Let's make our Barbies have breakfast!" "Yeah! That's awesome." Ava's little friend even told me that she loved me and thanked me for setting up the house. I took a couple of pictures of the house all set up. It felt like a big accomplishment.





I smiled with satisfaction and went downstairs to fold laundry. Another half an hour went by. The girls came down and I gave them a snack and carried the laundry up. This is what I found in Ava's room:


It must've been some party. The house was trashed and both Barbies were passed out. I'll have to look in that little baggie and see if they have tiny Barbie aspirin. These girls look like they could use a few.

Across the Breakfast Table...

I love that I get to sit down (between jumping up for more juice or napkins, etc.) with the girls 3 times a day at breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Here are a couple of scenes from the last week.

Ava: Hey mom, guess what?

Me: What?

Ava: I kissed Michael at school yesterday.

Me: You did? Ava, I don't think that's a good idea, you don't want to share your germs.

Ava: But I loooove him.

Me: Well, it's nice to love your friends, but that doesn't mean that you should kiss them.

Ava: No mommy, he's my BOYFRIEND.

Me: You're too young to have a boyfriend and it's not appropriate for a nice young lady like you to kiss boys.

Ava:(dreamily) I wonder where we should go on a date?

Me: Well, you have 12 years to decide, so I guess you'll know by then.

Then she got quiet for a few minutes.

Ava: I wonder where the kids go?

Me: When?

Ava: Who watches the kids when their mommies are on Oprah?

And just like that we had moved on.....

As a side note, we haven't watched Oprah since I was pregnant with Emily, so I am curious about what brought this up.
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Yesterday morning, I was sipping my coffee while watching Emily cram bananas by the fistful into her mouth. She scooped out the last bit and then proudly held her bowl in the air with one hand and declared, "Ahh duh. Ahh duh" Translation: All done! Then she put the bowl over her face for a second, then yanked it away, laughing hysterically. This little game of hide and seek went on for a few minutes until I wiped off the banana and let her down to run around the house.

She's just so darn cute. I can hardly stand it!

Monday at the Mall

I am not a shopper. That may surprise some of you. But it's true. I really don't like to shop. I always enter a store with a clear agenda of what I need. You'll never find me aimlessly roaming Target on a Tuesday afternoon. I briskly walk the store and if I happen to glimpse what I need, I stop and assess. I do not meander the aisles or peruse the racks. I don't often stop and look just 'cause "it's pretty". And I don't like to stand and debate about my purchases. Frankly, I get bored and end up thinking of the other "important" things that I should be doing. Also, I hate to part with money. I am not the girlfriend that you want to take to the mall. Granted, I've done my share of shopping with the best of them. As a child, I endured shopping trips with my mom and grandma that lasted for hours and hours. Sitting on the floor in Eddie Bauer listening to the longest conversation ever about whether Uncle Tim would look better in this plaid flannel shirt or this one. Standing in a fitting room and hearing, "Now how do those fit in the (whispered) crotch?" While glimpsing myself in teal Healthtex denim. That's right Grandma, I know you're reading and I'm calling you out. Hey- 10 year olds tend to blush at the word "crotch". Anyway, I think that you get the point. Shopping is not my favorite past time. I never go to the mall just to go to the mall...unless I'm meeting my girlfriends and that's the agreed upon rendezvous.

After a busy birthday party weekend, I had big plans for Monday. Drop Ava at preschool and head on over to the license branch for my new plates. And then I pulled into the empty school parking lot...and it registered...MLK Day. Oh yeah. Duh. Well now what? Go back home to the laundry and dishes? I think not. I had successfully gotten three of us clean and dressed (I even put on make up). So we headed to the mall. We did all of the things that we never have time for or I never let the kids do. I got the girls a pretzel dog. Ava's favorite. We rode up and down in the glass elevator. We window shopped. We smelled perfume and Ava tested lip glosses (one of her favorite activities). I finally let Ava ride the train. She's been asking since before Christmas and I never had the time. Since she was the only kid there, the guy let her go round and round for 15 minutes. She laughed and rang that obnoxious bell the whole time. Good for her. It was pure joy. When she asked to get our picture taken in the photo booth I said, "Why not?"