Saturday, May 14, 2011

Quiet Time Mom Blogging

It is "quiet time'- the fiction we cling to that we'll have two hours of quiet from Pumpkin, since she will no longer nap on the weekend. Actually, she does OK, as long as I keep a show on. Sometimes, we color or do puzzles instead, but since the real purpose of this time is a little sanity break for the grown ups, we usually put on a show. This is her chance to watch her longer, non-educational shows- she has Cinderella (I bought it used for her when I decided that she should get to see at least one of the princess shows all of her friends at day care were talking about. I chose Cinderella as the one least likely to scare her- she typically doesn't do well with the scary bits of shows.) and Madagascar (a birthday gift, after she saw while we were visiting some friends and loved it- despite the scary bits).

But today, she picked out her current favorite video, The Wiggles' "Ukelele Baby", a gift from her New Zealand grandparents. You can't buy that here in the US, but apparently you can buy lots of other Wiggles DVDs. They're good singers, but the lyrics are mostly the typical kids song inanity.

To give you an idea of what I mean, here is one of Pumpkin's favorites:


Speaking of inane lyrics, Hubby showed the Rebecca Black YouTube hit, "Friday" to Pumpkin. She loves that, too. Her day care teachers are very amused with her rendition of the song.

Petunia hasn't shown as much interest in songs, with or without inane lyrics, although she does still love to dance with her Daddy to Amy Winehouse's "Rehab", a song that Pumpkin first heard at a restaurant during our trip to Wichita, and loved. Hubby decided that we'd keep playing it at home, and now both girls like to dance to that song with him. Since I apparently used to like to serenade the other shoppers with my rendition of Arlo Gutherie's "Lightening Bar Blues" while grocery shopping with my Mom, I figure I can let my girls listen to Rehab.

Petunia has been doing some cute things lately, though. Last night at dinner, she threw her cup on the floor because we weren't figuring out what she wanted fast enough. We were going to leave the cup there, since we don't really condone the cup throwing reaction to parental slowness. Pumpkin didn't want her to cry, though, so she went and got the cup. She handed it back to Petunia, who said "ank do" (thank you) and signed "thank you". She repeated this not long after dinner when Pumpkin handed her a toy she wanted, so I know I wasn't mistaken- she says thank you now.

She also likes playing with blocks. Her current favorites are the old wooden blocks that were mine as a kid (similar to these blocks, but mine are from Playskool and in an old canister with a metal lid). She'll stack three up, then stop and clap and say "yaaaaaay!" She repeats that after every block she successfully stacks. When the tower falls over, she throws her arms out wide and says "uh oh!"

My favorite Petunia game right now, though, is the "come to Mommy" game, in which she runs repeatedly into my open arms, giving me a hug each time. Sometimes we vary it, and she goes between me and Hubby, giving us hugs. It is possibly the sweetest thing ever. It is hard to believe that in a few short years, she too will probably want nothing more than to watch DVDs of grown men singing silly songs.

6 comments:

  1. Anonymous2:12 PM

    That "thank-you" sounds soooo cute! We're just now starting to use some signs with Monkey...I need to look for some signing videos for him, too. I'd think just seeing him sign for the first time would be thrilling. Hearing him actually say a word will be the coolest thing ever!

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  2. paola2:28 AM

    We too have been through the Wiggles stage with both kids and for a while there, I thought it would never end. And occasionally I do still get the odd request for 'Big Red Boat', by far the most annoying and (IMHO) embarassing of all the Wiggles DVDs we have in our collection. Still, they do know how to make a buck, I'll give them that much.

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  3. Anonymous6:07 AM

    My son is happily blissfully unaware that the Wiggles exist. Also Barney. Go judicious clicking of the "not interested" button on Netflix. (Don't worry, DC has watched plenty of kids stuff, just not any that would drive me crazy. Yay TMBG.)

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  4. the milliner8:25 AM

    So sweet seeing 'thank you's' between sisters.

    We have thankfully avoided the Wiggles so far. DS is so obsessed with Sesame Street videos (and now games...eek!) on the computer that he rarely watches TV anymore (we have the Wiggles on our toddler station). He thankfully had a very short period of being interested in Yo Gabba Gabba. And he's seen Barney all of once when we weren't fast enough with the remote one Saturday morning. I just can't bare the knocked off songs and the baaad 80's fashion. DH and I actually kind of miss some of the cute shows he used to watch. I hope we can steer fairly clear from our kid TV station when the time comes. It seems to have much more crap (and commercials) than the toddler station does.

    But yes. 30 minutes or so of Sesame Street video games buys some quiet and time to make dinner.

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  5. Where would my sanity be without DVDs?

    @nicoleandmaggie - I agree, TMBG are the shiznat. ;)

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  6. Awww. They are so cute!

    My son finally got into DVDs recently when I introduced the nursery rhymes videos that his sister also loved at this age: http://www.amazon.com/Baby-Genius-Favorite-Nursery-Rhymes/dp/B00009RDGR

    And now? He loves "Dorah Dorah Dorah"! Luckily, I don't mind those shows, and I've successfully avoided Barney and most of Elmo and most of the Wiggles. My daughter is totally into Word Girl, which I also love, so that's a huge win.

    Hubby and I were just talking about what princess movie we could get our girl for basically the same reasons. We have The Little Mermaid, but she gets scared of the shark. She's seen Tangled in the theater, and we'll have to get that. But it's good to know that Cinderella isn't too scary. It's been a long time since I've seen it. I think that will be the next Disney movie!

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