Biggest Mistake I Ever Made - Learn From Me, People!

Our school offers this amazing program where you simply write a check for your children's school supplies and then a magic fairy delivers them to the school all organized and wrapped in a pretty bow. Sure it might be a little more expensive but the extra money goes to the PTA for enrichment programs for the school.  It is a win win!

It's possible the magic fairy part isn't true - I can't say for sure as I haven't seen her but after my experience of buying supplies on my own I am almost 100% positive that must be how it happens.

Last year when the order form came out for this school year I thought: "hmmm. I'm no longer working therefore I can totally take the time to purchase school supplies on my own.  The kids will get to feel the excitement of picking out their own colors for folders and such. It will be a great memory for us all and I will save money and it will be blissful and it will probably solve world peace too!"

And it was a lot like that, but exactly the opposite.  I should have known it was going to be a horrifying experience when on the first trip out it took 33 minutes - no lie - for my daughter to pick out her wide ruled notebook.  If I had to tell her one more time when she found the perfect one! "Sorry honey it's college ruled. Keep looking" I was going to unwrap the spiral binding and use it to poke my eyes out. Alas, we did find one she could tolerate.  We walked out of Walgreens feeling somewhat successful (until I realized later we bought blunt tip scissors and not sharp tip.  D'oh!)

After that trip I never again walked out of a store feeling like I had accomplished anything positive. With each passing journey I questioned my parenting skills and sanity more and more.  But 5 separate trips to 5 separate school supply selling hell holes and about $8,366 later we did have everything on the list - well kind of...

Part of my genius plan was to save money. Let me tell you that does NOT happen if you take a 2 year old with you.  Who has time to compare prices of 463 Elmer glue sticks s vs. 463 Target brand glue sticks when you are chasing a toddler who apparently has an allergic reaction to being strapped into a shopping cart?  Somehow having managed to get a box of yogurt from the refrigerated section and sneaking it to the school supply section he was happily pulling every stapler off the shelf so he could stick the yogurt behind them.  Guess what? I don't care if the Elmer's Glue sticks are eleventy million dollars more than the others - just grab them so we can get out of here!

Other things that might or might not have been happened:

Kid: "Mom, is this $20 Trapper Keeper good?"  Me: "Um, sure yeah, looks great. ALEX! Stop eating erasers and put those sunglasses back - wait where did you find sunglasses?  They are nowhere near this section!  Oh God, did you steal someone's sunglasses?"  (Come to find out later, we got the wrong Trapper Keeper.  Oh and I never figured out where those sunglasses came from.  If you were at Target on Ward Parkway and a short little blond fellow stole your sunglasses, they are in the office supply section by the dry erase markers.  Sorry!)

I might have spent $70 at Walmart and not have found 1 single school supply that was left on our list.

I might have had more than 1 discussion on what color folder is more grown up and acceptable in 4th grade but also not too grown up because after all she is still a kid and has lots of years to buy folders in grown up colors.  Huh?

I might have taken a flask with me.

I might have tried to save money on pencils for my son's list by not buying the Ticonderoga brand and realized they were not pre-sharpened when we got home and then paid him $3 to sharpen them and ended up spending way more than I would have if I had just bought the freaking Ticonderoga ones.

I might have gone into the bathroom to "change a diaper" three times in one trip. Note: "change a diaper" = cry.

I might have accidentally purchased 2 boxes of gallon sized zip lock bags instead 1 box of gallon and 1 box of some other stupid size and when I realized my mistake not cared in the slightest.  I'm sorry teachers - you guys do an amazing job and I know I'm a jerk for not caring but at that point I wouldn't have cared if my hair was on fire.

Our last supply run was my favorite. (I still never found the correctly tipped dry erase board pen.  Let me tell you the amount of sleep I'm losing over that one.) As we were walking through Office Max, I turned to my kids and made them promise that next year when I think it is a good idea to shun the school supply fairy they will kick me in the head.

That request elicited giggles from the aisle over as our former PTA president, who is also my friend, walked out from behind an end cap of 717 colors of post it notes and said, "I am so glad I was here to hear that!"  I'm glad she was too.  She is taller than my kids and might actually be able to reach my head.

The super powers of a Superman costume

I have no issue with the high cost of Halloween costumes.  I would venture to say we get more wear out of our Halloween costumes than most people on the planet. Zachary insists on wearing his costumes all day long about once per month come rain or shine.  I usually look at it as one of those "it's not worth the fight"  situations and with a roll of the eye just let him do it. Then we usually spend our day at home and I catch up on the laundry and housework. Yesterday was different. 

Although my daughter has been in school for two weeks, it is just now the end of the summer for Zachy. He has one more week until school starts.  There have been moments where the week after Labor Day can't get here fast enough.
 
Yesterday he wanted to wear his Superman costume complete with cape. Fine, whatever, throw it on, let's get going we are going to be late! We rushed out the door to walk sissy to school and met up with our neighbors along the way.  Our sweet little 5 year old neighbor was very sad that he didn't have such a get up on and so my little superhero loaned him the cape. It was so genuine and thoughtful and I smiled at that amazing gesture that put a smile on his friend's face.

We went along our day of errand running - Target, Hancock Fabric, the Library, etc.  All along the way, countless ladies sweetly exclaimed how much safer they felt with a real live superhero in their midst. That thrilled him each time and he offered to get rid of any monsters or bad guys that they ran into. I saw person after person nudge their friend and point at my little guy with a huge smile on their face.  I think he should be given a medal for the public service of smiles and laughter he spread around the Kansas City area. Me included.  It was really fun and I was proud to have this creative, outgoing and wonderfully angelic boy on my arm.

But on the walk back to school to pick up sissy, I saw the true awesomeness of the super powers of my Superman.  A woman pulled up to us in her car with tears in her eyes and said she spotted us from two blocks away. She just had to turn around to come talk to us. Apparently her son wore the same type costume practically everyday for a year until it was in such shreds it no longer covered his little body. That boy is now a senior in college and 21 years old.  She said that seeing us was a joyous walk down memory lane and it brought her happily to tears. She thanked us for making her day and reminded me to enjoy this precious time because before I know it, my little super hero will be a 21 year old man ready to graduate college and face the world. Now guess who had tears in their eyes?

Life has been crazy this week. I'm conflicted on the job front, my husband has been traveling like a mad man and school started at its usual hectic pace. That was a reminder I really needed. I thanked the woman, picked up my little superhero and laughingly piggy backed him all the way to the school.

I take it all back!

Still glowing from my brave frog rescue, I woke up in the morning to my son trying to get out of his bedroom by shaking his door handle.  Before I could get to him, the inevitable happened, Z man locked himself in.  Trying to squelch my freak out from my daughter I ran around the house grabbing everything small I could stick in the hole of his doorknob.  Scissors = too big, earring = too small, pen  = just right but not long enough, so on and so forth.

E piped in with "Daddy always uses a Q-tip."  Always? This happens often? How was I not aware of that?

After a lot of 5 year old gibberish and stressed mom talk back and forth I figured out she meant a toothpick.  I got a box of toothpicks and ran back to Z's room. Granted I had tried to shove many things into that hole over the past 7 minutes, but really I had no idea what I supposed to do once I actually got something in there.

I stuck the toothpick in and jiggled it all around poking and prodding at things to no avail.  All the while I'm cursing Dan for being in Oslo, Norway because I could not pick up the phone to call him.  If he were on this side of the world he could at least make fun of sympathize with me while I was attempting to free Z man from what had now become (in my mind) a room full of dangerous, sharp, poisonous, menacing, choking hazardous, items.

There is clearly a God out there because he 1) gave us a child with a happy go lucky demeanor.  The entire time Z kept saying "Mom, you are so silly, open this door!" and unlike me he wasn't freaking out  and 2) God heard my inner panic (it is possible the neighbors heard it too, it was loud) and opened that door because I KNOW for a fact that it was not my clumsy fumbling of the toothpick that did it. (Vows to go to church more often)

So yes, I take back everything I said yesterday, I cannot live without the hubs.

The sensitive father

Like most kids, my kids are picky eaters. But because we live in Kansas City and because my husband recently purchased a new Smoker and has not stopped smoking things for more than a 5 minute period since, my children love BBQ. Gates sauce is a favorite in our household and my daughter will eat it on anything. It isn't normal how much our 5 year old likes it. She loves anything and everything BBQ'd and I know this because I think my husband has smoked every kind of meat known to mankind since he got his new toy.

Today we were driving past a graveyard (bet you are wondering how these are related) and my daughter was really fascinated by it and asked where her great grandfather's graveyard is. I looked at the hubs and kind of gave him the look of why don't you take this one. You see my husband's grandfather was cremated and I was just not sure of how to explain that to her in a delicate manner. I can now for certain tell you how NOT to explain it.

D: "Well honey, when they die some people's bodies are buried like the people in this graveyard."

E: Getting impatient. "I know that dad, I'm asking where Grandpa's grave is."

D: "He doesn't have a grave. His body wasn't buried, it was BBQ'd."

It's unfortunate that we live in the BBQ capital of the world. I'm pretty sure my daughter is never going to eat it again.

The things people will do so they don't have to hang out with me

I'm training for a 5K. Yes, I do realize how pathetic it is that I have to train to run 3.2 miles but that is my reality. I exercise quite a bit but I just don't run long distances (not that 3 miles is a long distance) - until now.

My friend Erica and I decided to run it together and we decided to train together - eventually moving toward training for a 1/2 marathon. This is going to be so much fun especially since the 1st 5K we signed up for is at night and there is drinking involved afterward. I will totally run to a summer brew/glass of wine/etc.

5K signed up for, running schedule and plan in place, music list downloaded to ipod, cute new shoes and running clothes, we were ready to go. Yay!

Next day, Erica broke her ankle.

See:


She did have a cute pedi going on there though, didn't she?

Geez, if she didn't want to be my running partner she just had to tell me.

What are you most thankful for?

I have worked so hard talking to my children about the spirit of "thanks" at Thanksgiving. We discussed all the things they are so very lucky to have (loving supportive family, food at every meal, a nice warm home, etc.) and my kids over and over again made me pictures showing me how thankful they are for all of those things. I was feeling pretty good about myself knowing I had done a fabulous job as mom and had gotten the true meaning of Thanksgiving through to them.

On Thanksgiving day we did the traditional cook all day long, spend time as a family, set a fancy table, etc. The meal was ready and we all sat down to eat. My 2 year old son yelled out "Happy Birthday Papa!" - okay clearly he did not pick up on the correct message.

BUT I still had my sweet thankful daughter who would make me proud. Halfway through the meal my daughter asked if we could go around and say what we are all thankful for. Wow! Great idea from a 5 year old - this was my shining moment! This was moment where everyone would see what an amazing mother I am and what a truly special child I was raising.

She had Papa start (whose bday by the way is not until January) and we went around the table taking turns sharing what we were the most thankful for. I smiled with a warm heart knowing E was going to make me proud by saying she was thankful for her family, friends, food, clothing, shelter, etc. All the things we had discussed for the past few weeks.

It was E's turn.

"I'm thankful for rainbows and unicorns!"

I'm not seeing much point in working on the meaning of Christmas.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Monday was my birthday and my husband was awesome. I went to the gym first thing in the morning and when I got home he had dressed, breakfast'd (yes, I use that as a word - and cereal'd too) the kids, and had emptied the dishwasher. How could the day get any better?

Several hours later, to my surprise, the doorbell rang and a man was holding a beautiful arrangement of flowers. I've told my husband repeatedly he does not need to send me expensive flowers (grocery store ones will do just fine) - and I really mean that. But WOW! He had really outdone himself on this most insignificant of birthdays.

I smiled at the delivery man knowingly and reached out my hands.

ME: "What a great birthday it is! My husband is the best!"

The poor delivery man looked very embarrassed.

DM: "Ma'am these flowers are for your across the street neighbor but she isn't home, I was wondering if you could hold them here and give them to her when she gets home?"

Awesome.

On the bright side, I did get to enjoy the smell of the flowers all day because she didn't get home until much later on - or maybe I didn't check if she was home until much later on, well whatever. And the poor girl really is the younger version of me. She even shares my birthday, she really has no chance.

We're Making Memories Here People

A favorite photo from my childhood shows me sitting on my parents retro space ship looking kitchen table wearing a brown/orange plaid dress with my long hair in two pig tails. My brothers are sitting next to me and we are all watching intently as our father carves a jack-o-lantern. Our young faces are bright with fascination and amazement at what my father is doing. I have always loved that photo because it captures such a great family activity and is exactly the kind of moment I hope my children will hold dear from their own childhoods.

Wanting to create that same memory for my children this past weekend, I gathered the biggest pumpkin we had off the front porch and brought it inside. All morning long I teased our children with a fun activity we were going to do later that day. Organizing the knives, black marker, paper trash bags and bowls for gathering the pumpkin guts/seeds for the yummy roasted seeds I would make later, I was ready.

I gathered my excited children around the kitchen table and got my husband ready for carving. He started drawing the face he would cut out and the kids were eager with anticipation - for about 3 minutes.

Here is a photo of my husband carving a pumpkin all by himself. I'm sparing you the picture of my children watching Max and Ruby on tv.

Either my mom just caught my brothers and me at the right time, or my kids are lame.

Great News! My daughter can be bribed with money!

I find bribery a very effective and genius form of parenting. Yes, I know, I hear it all the time, I really should write a parenting book.

Anyway, I've utilized bribery since the day my kids could talk but up to this point it has been very expensive. Bribing two children with a new toy or a trip to get ice cream can really add up when you do it between seven and twelve times a day. We have often tried to go the cheaper route of "hey I'll give you a dollar if you do such and such" - but it has never worked as my four year old always had the same response.

"Why do I need money when you have it?"

On our family vacation this past week we reached a major milestone in our lives! When our daughter got up at an ungodly hour, my husband offered her a dollar to go back to bed and she said "OK!" Let me tell you, that was money well spent and it was the first time that bribe has ever worked. E trotted off to her bed, I passed out back to slumberland and had a dream and everything. It was pure bliss and it only cost us $1. Ahhh, she is really growing up, this is a very exciting day in our big girl's life, definitely something worth writing in her baby book!

The bonus is that I can now make her buy her own toys and teach her the value of a dollar by discussing how much she has and what she can buy - saving me oodles of money and teaching her valuable life lessons. Clearly all those nay sayers out there who don't believe in bribery are so wrong.

Life lessons from a 2 year old

It is possible to have a split personality at 2? Cuz' I think my son has one. He can be the most gentle loving angel on the planet. He will look at me and say "I wuh you mama" and it is so genuine and sweet it brings tears to my eyes. Then with the next breath he slaps me across the face - which also brings tears to my eyes. What a little monster.

Our daughter has always been more independent than him and not nearly as snuggly - but fun and hilarious in her own way. She is sassy and demanding to a fault, but can flatten me with her observations and jokes.

I have logged hours and hours on end snuggling with our little guy for fear that one day he will stop doing it and I'll have no one to snuggle with. Well, I guess there is always the dogs - oh and my husband.

But this hitting thing is really annoying. He is so good about his apologizing that it melts your heart. "So sorry mama" - aaahhhh - all is forgiven. However, his new thing is pulling that grubby little hand back as far as he can reach and in the process of the hit apologizing profusely. "So, So, So sorry mama" SLAP. And then laughter and a darling crooked teeth smile. It really hurts but it always makes me laugh unfortunately (another example of my solid parenting skills). I think I'm really amazed at how clever he is to apologize while doing something he knows is completely wrong.

I'm thinking I should try this is my daily life. I know I'm not as cute as he is, but really this concept might come in handy at work.

Time to Make the Donuts

Our 4 1/2 year old daughter is a great kid and she is unbelievably smart. So smart that she has advanced her attitude to that of a 14 year old. Sass complete with hands on the hips and eye rolls. Really, I think she might be a prodigy. My dad loves to say that the devil came and took me about 13 years old and returned me at 18. There are times I think that damn devil accidentally stopped at our house a few years too early.

Last week we started a Reward Chart for our daughter. There are about 6 things she is expected to do on a daily basis (i.e. make her bed, clean up her toys, get ready for bed easily, etc.) and each time she completes a task she gets a sticker to put on her chart. At the end of the week if she has gotten a certain number of stickers she gets a treat of her choosing. We have been doing this for a total of 1 week now and so far it has gone well. I'm loving our new system because it is really a nice threat to get her to do things without the impressively dramatic arguments we sometimes have. Now one mention of her not getting the sticker and she immediately goes and completes the necessary task.

There is even an added benefit I did not expect!

This morning my husband took our daughter for her treat - a trip to the donut shop. And since he eats the equivalent of 3 times his body weight on a daily basis, our son tagged along - thank God he did! From that outing, at the ripe age of 2, our little man found his true calling:


He can eat for free and work, this is ideal.

Kickin' it Abe Lincoln style

Really I don't know what it is about this blog but it seems that each time I write about an inanimate object, that object then retaliates. I didn't even say anything mean about our Air Conditioner, I just mentioned it in one of my posts. Maybe it is just shy and doesn't like to be talked about in front of a crowd of the like 25 people who read this blog. I don't know what I did to the A/C, but I do know is that it sucked when it stopped working yesterday at 4:38 in the 1,000 degree afternoon.

At 4:39 I called my husband to let him know our house was possessed. These kinds of phone calls are not rare and I'm not sure he believed me because I don't think he believes more than 27% of what I say. I'm sort of the wife who cried wolf on about 300 different things - but this was real!

I was minding my own business being the best mom ever making spaghetti and banana bread and I noticed some really odd things happening around me.

Everything in our house seemed to be only 1/2 working. I noticed I was getting really hot but I heard the A/C running so I assumed I was warm from all the cheffing up of dinner I was doing. When I opened the fridge I thought the light looked to be a bit dim, but I don't cook a lot so I figured I just didn't know the true color. Next I noticed that the TV had sound only but no picture (I'm super observant - that TV had been on for quite awhile) and then I realized that although my stove said it was hot, it had been like 30 minutes since I had started the water to boil for the pasta and nothing was happening. I'm no Julia Childs but I know that the water should be at least warm at that point. A check of the microwave showed that it was only working at like 15% of its regular power. My phone started ringing but when I picked it up it was dead.

Okay this was all so strange - but SWEEEET, mommy didn't have to cook dinner. I'm definitely not good enough to come up with something for my kiddos to eat if we have only part of a microwave, 1/2 an oven, a non working stove and no telephone to order take out.

Hubby came home, confirmed that I was in fact not insane, which was a huge relief. Does this happen to you? You tell your husband that your car is making a weird noise and have begged him to listen to it for like a week because it is driving you crazy - then he drives it and nada - no noise? Those kinds of things happen to me at least 3 times a day. I feel like I'm getting Punk'd on a regular basis.

These occurrences were verified as bizarre and legit by him. However, he decided it was a "brown out" due to the excessive heat and not a ghost like I had hypothesized from some quick internet research using the last minutes of my computer battery and stolen wireless from my neighbor. We gathered the kiddos up and headed out to dinner. The kids were great during dinner and it was really fun family time. They actually both said they were tired and wanted to go right to bed when we got home - these things NEVER happen! What a perfect night!

We got home and realized the electricity issue had gotten even weirder and to make a long story short, we basically had none. We snuggled the kiddos into bed and then stared at each other. What does one do without a computer, TV and light? Obviously there is only one thing to do...

We played Scrabble by candlelight! As my husband says, we kicked it Abe Lincoln style. It was so much fun and a good reminder to us to take time to reconnect like this.

My husband won the first game and I won the second. Now if he reads this blog, I can tell you he will make some lame comment about how my "win" was not legit. But let me just tell you that it was an absolute accident and not in any way intentional when my foot hit the board and knocked all the letters off one moment after I took the lead in the game. I do not care that he next planned to put down a the word "zealot" on a triple word score - that does NOT count since the game was toppled onto the floor before he could do so. And my foot knocking the board over does not constitute a forfeit - that is just crazy talk. He is a sore loser!!!

I clearly have some left over anger issues from his suggestion that my involuntary foot jerk was anything other than an accident. Maybe kicking it Abe Lincoln style isn't as good for us as I thought. Now that our power is back on we should probably continue to veg out in front of the TV. That might be better for our marriage.

Wine is my savior

I've always been one to enjoy a glass of wine or four. On evenings when we have a night together at home, my husband and I love to make dinner and share a bottle of wine. Those are rare occasions and it seems when those nights do come along we never have any wine in our house.

As a working mom I've had many evenings where I wanted to chug some wine but like I said we never have it on hand - and I am also not a person who wants to drink alone. I would never break open a bottle of wine by myself but of course as soon as someone walks in the door to drink it with me I'm game to get that cork out!

But now, being the cost cutting people that we are trying to turn into, my husband recently brought home one of those good box wines that are so popular now. Ours is super cute. It is shaped like a barrel and apparently holds 4.5 bottles of wine and stays tasty for 40 days which is great because that is probably how long it will take us to finish it. Seriously - GENIUS.

The only issue is, that it is always "open" and so I no longer have that "well, I can't open it by myself" voice nagging me. So one night last week after a particularly trying day when my husband was working late and after my children were in bed, I had a glass of wine by myself! I was a bit nervous that this could start a nasty habit but really it was necessary that particular evening.

I grabbed a fancy glass, filled her up, plopped down on the couch, took a sip and sooo SAD, the wine had gone bad. I was not pleased that our dumb little barrel had turned on me. All day long it had been staring at me letting me know that when the time was right, it was there ready to soothe me. But that problem solver in a bottle started laughing at me on my first sip. YUCK. I tried a few more just to make sure - nope - gone bad.

The next morning I told my husband what a jerk the wine barrel was and that our cost cutting wine plan was a bust. So he tried a small taste and said it was fine. I tried it too and he was right, it was fine. So bizarre. Apparently the best ingredient in wine is the company you are with because we had a few glasses last night and it was delicious!

Here is what I'm thinking really happened... That wine barrel knew if it tasted too yummy that might have been a slippery slope into solitary mommy tipsyness and really no one needs that. I love my little barrel, it is so considerate.

Life lessons from a 4 year old

My daughter met a new friend at school this week.

E: "Mom, I met a new boy at school today. His name is Pete, but his real name is Peter and he is really nice. I like him and we played a lot. His favorite color is red and he likes trucks and dinosaurs. He has an older sister and he doesn't like princesses. Oh yeah and he has big ears."

I immediately dove into the mom required speech about how people can come in all shapes and sizes and look different from one another. I went on about how it doesn't matter how someone looks and she should not point out differences, blah, blah, blah. Literally 5 minutes of really good mom lessons there, I was making myself proud thinking I had dodged that bullet on her saying something hurtful to this sweet new friend.

E: "I already told him he had big ears."

Oh geez, poor little guy. His self esteem is ruined at the age of 4, and it was all my fault because I had not driven this point home earlier. He probably ran away from her and went straight to a therapy session that I definitely should foot the bill for.

I braced myself, imagining lots of tears, hurt feelings, and a parent-teacher conference in my future.

ME: "Well, what did he say when you said that?"

E: "He said, 'I know'."

Okay, I already like his parents. They are raising a great kid.

Even though he doesn't seem to have any long lasting issues from my daughter making such an observation on his outwardly appearance, I was still mortified.

I reiterated, "Honey, we don't talk about people's differences, that can hurt their feelings. How would you feel if someone said you have big ears?"

E: "But I don't have big ears so why would they say that?"

Why do these conversations never go like they write them in parenting books?

ME: "Well wouldn't it hurt your feelings if someone pointed out that you look different than them by saying that you have big ears?"

E: "Well, no, it wouldn't if I had big ears. And he isn't different mom, he just has big ears."

How did she end up looking like Gandhi, while I felt like a total moron? I dropped it and asked her to tell me more about her new friend. The more I discussed his alleged big ears the more I was making it seem as if something was wrong with him. The way my life goes, if I kept on with my point, she would probably go to school and tell this little guy that her mommy said he is funny looking.

Seriously, am I ever going to get this parenting thing down?

And the Worst Mom of the Year Award goes to...

Yesterday afternoon my daughter, son and I were sitting on our front porch enjoying a beautiful day and licking ice cream cones. It was one of those idyllic suburban scenes where we waved to the neighborhood folk as they walked by with their dogs or rode past on bicycles.

My daughter was snuggled up to me and we were just enjoying "being". It was a moment where I paid close attention to all the details so I can remember it forever. That is until our conversation took a turn and now I'd like to forget it all.

My daughter turned to me and said "Mom, we can't make the world a better place" surprised at that, I said "Of course we can honey" to which she responded "but it is already so great!" My heart swelled. In this horrible economic climate and unsure time, I loved her sweet and innocent look on life and I loved that she was clearly enjoying this moment as much as I was.

She continued, "Well we can make it a better place by not glittering and by turning off the water when we are brushing our teeth so we can save electricity."

She had gotten a few things mixed up there. Glittering is what she has always called littering and I'm not sure how much electricity you are saving by turning off your water, but I clearly got the idea and was so proud of her for trying to be environmentally conscious.

I thought this was a good time to take it a step further. "You know honey those are great ways to make the world a better place but there are other things we can do as well - like always be nice to other people."

She turned to me with a sincere look in her eyes, took her soft little hand and cupped my chin in a very condescending way as if to say "silly woman" and answered. "Moooom, no that is not right. We are only nice to other people so Santa Claus will bring us presents."

Apparently I've failed as a mother.