Grace and James before skating this morning. It was the dads and me today: Robert, Abner, and myself. I spent at least half of the class holding Whit onto the potty waiting for him to produce. Excellent morning.

One of my favorite lines in Loving Frank is between Mamah and her oldest, dearest friend, Mattie. Reunited after a long separation, Mattie comments on how much Mamah’s daughter, Martha (named after Mattie) looks like her. Mamah replies:

“Nature has settled a score,” Mamah said. “I’m raising myself.”

Oh how this is true with Gracie. She has been oscillating wildly between horrifying and wonderful lately, in a way that’s chillingly familiar to me! This morning we had a really lovely time, though, just walking and doing errands. She was whiny and tantrummy and frantic about absolutely nothing and so Matt informed her she was not welcome on the playground trip with Whit. She sat on the steps and sniffled and cried and I decided we’d just walk it out. We walked down to the drycleaner at Porter Square, which was not open yet (does 9am strike anyone else as incredibly late to open on a Saturday morning?) then walked several more blocks to Starbucks, then back to Zoots, and then home. We walked and chatted for about a full hour. She began whining about her legs being tired early on but I shut that down with a promise of a lollipop from the drycleaner if she didn’t say a word again about that. Amazing how bribery works. She was frankly fantastic company and we have vowed to have more walks. Maybe there’s some truth to that notion of firmly changing contexts when children are misbehaving.

I’ve had the notion of capacity for love on my mind lately. I know I’m a verbally effusive person: I share my feelings easily and without reservation. I remember as a child always wanting my parents’ last words to me (and vice versa) whenever we said goodbye to be “I love you.” This was “in case I never see you again.” How desperately macabre that seems now, coming from a 7 year old. Nevertheless, that was what I wanted. Someone recently told me that I have a lot of love in me, which I think is indisputably true. But the person’s tone there wasn’t entirely positive, and I’ve been thinking about that. Does having a lot of love somehow lessen the love one feels for a single person? Does the fact that the well is deep mean that the water offered is less meaningful? I don’t think so, personally, but I’m grappling with the faint assertion that that may be so by a friend. I’m emotionally open and quite warm but I also know I deeply love only a few people. It is easy to become my friend but hard to get very close. And one thing that surprises people is that I am not that interested in being touched; I’m not wildly physically affectionate.
I re-read Peggy Noonan’s achingly wonderful op-ed on the final messages people left for their loved ones on 9/11. I was looking for affirmation that having a lot of love – and expressing it openly – is a good thing. The key line in her piece is an articulate description of how I choose to go through life:

We’re all lucky to be here today and able to say what deserves saying, and if you say it a lot, it won’t make it common and so unheard, but known and absorbed.

The Beginners were making Stone Soup today. We got exactly one day of notice that we had to have our child bring in a vegetable today. Grace had her heart set on a green pepper. This morning I scavenged in the fridge and found only this wrinkled, pathetic specimen. She would not take no for an answer, though, so I tried to ameliorate the sadness of the offering by also making her take this yellow pepper. Don’t know how the combination was received. I did see at least two of my fellow mothers this morning, though, rushing off to find a vegetable somewhere.

Ah. The little devil above is now growing a tail to match the horns he sprouted a few months ago. Seriously. He is simultaneously easier and more difficult than Gracie was at that age. I hate to succumb to and embrace cliches but the old adages about boys do seem true, at least in my house. Whit is physical, full of energy, and unmoved by authority. He is more interested in jumping and hitting and climbing than was Gracie at his age, and less interested in playing by the rules. Don’t get me wrong: Grace can be very naughty. But discipline is almost too effective with her, sending her into spasms of self loathing and noisy bawling. Whit simply doesn’t care. To him a timeout is an opportunity to torture us by screaming at the top of his lungs for 3 minutes.

His latest trick has been to take his diaper off in the middle of the night, pee his bed, and wake me up hollering about it. Now, the little man has been potty trained for about 2 months, but if he follows in his sister’s footsteps (and one has to assume their bladders are made from similar genetic material) he won’t be dry at night for another 2 years. I believe this just his latest ploy for attention and “wocking” (rocking in the rocking chair, mostly a joy because it’s a way to get Out Of The Crib in the middle of the night).
Oh ye of too much faith. No, he is not trying to demonstrate that he’s ready to be dry at night. Do the soaking wet sheets and stuffed animals not bear this out? He’s trying to get some attention in the middle of the night when, as far as I can tell, he wakes up and is bored. The same routine went on for several nights. I thought of just leaving him, but he is soaking wet, the only (small, flimsy) blanket he’ll accept in his crib with him is soaking wet, and our house is heated to a yankee 65 degrees. I worry he will freeze to death. Or, worse, keep me up all night yelling about being cold.
So my attention turned to how to keep him in his diaper. First I tried threats: if you take this off again, no TV tomorrow before bed. Did not work. No TV? Fine. I can play with my trucks. Then I tried a sleepsack, zipped up backwards as I learned long ago from Christina. Somehow he houdinied his way out of that. I considered duct tape but thought that unless I actually adhered the diaper TO his body he would probably find a way to slip it off. And the duct-tape-on-skin idea, while perhaps a last resort, did seem a little hard core.
I finally decided to explore some online solutions, hoping to find a product that could help solve this persistent problem. I stumbled upon a variety of innovative options that promised to be more effective than my current strategies. Among them, I discovered a range of high-quality diapers designed for active toddlers, which seemed like a promising solution. Additionally, I came across Womens Incontinence Pads, which, while primarily designed for adults, offered some interesting features like enhanced adhesive strips and extra secure fits that made me wonder if a similar concept could be adapted for toddlers. In the end, my best bet appeared to be investing in these specialized diapers, which boasted superior durability and locking mechanisms.
Aha! A brain wave. I took an old pair of fleece footie pajamas, size 2T. They are skin tight. I cut the feet off of them. I then put them on backwards and zipped them snugly up the back. Not the most flattering look, but it seems to be working. And he’s slept in them for 6 consecutive nights now. They could probably walk downstairs on their own and wake me up if they wanted to.
Anyway. The latest adventure in trying to sleep with two small children.