Cheer Up, Charlie

Today I am grouchy. Perhaps it is because for the first night in a week I didn't take cold medicine before bed, so while I could breath (this is an improvement), I didn't sleep well. Or maybe it's because now Kennady is sick and she is so whiny that I want to pull all of my hair out or lock her in a sound proof closet. Or maybe it's because my house is a mess, despite all of my work yesterday to clean it. Or because today I realized that we've blown our budget out of the water, and that I didn't even think about budgeting in money for Christmas presents. Or because I was passed over for a babysitting job because I don't have a 3 year old. And no one wants to buy any cookies or cheesecakes, most likely because they have no idea that I am even selling them, because I have done pretty much zero advertising, because, well, that would take money and time. Or maybe it's because it's the end of the semester and Ben is locked away in the library. Or because I haven't showered yet. Or because our computer shuts off every time the power cord gets pulled out or because I am super nervous that our dangerously full hard drive is going to crash any minute, losing all my photos, which are backed up nowhere.

Yes, this is my vent blog, I am allowed one every once in a while. So here are some pictures to cheer all of us up. This is Kennady with pigtails. Yes, I know, hard to see, and once you do find them I'm sure you'll notice that they are entirely uneven. And the grouchy look on her face and remnants of tears are hard to miss. My little girl will probably never be the super cute one with pigtails.

This is Ben and Kennady from last night. Luckily my mom was smart enough to send her a chocolate brown coat, which hides the actual chocolate from the grocery store cookies. Local grocery stores- could you please hand out sugar cookies or something without chocolate? Kennady did finally decide that she will wear a hat, as long as it is below 10 degrees. That hat came from The Great Grandmother, for her birthday.


And here are pictures of Kennady "drinking" her smoothie. I thought I would give green smoothies a try, since Kennady won't seem to eat anything (except fruit snacks, which have now been limited to birthdays, holidays, and other rare occasions- like when she actually eats her lunch). She will drink just about anything though- juice, water, milk without strawberry and she's even been begging me all day (by this I mean throwing herself on the floor screaming) to let her drink the candle on the table (which is in a glass jar that looks a lot like a cup, my bad). So I thought maybe I could sneak some veggies, and of course fruits into something that she would drink. What I made probably doesn't even qualify as a green smoothie. It did have 5 large green leaves of spinach (perhaps there should have been more, because it wasn't green in color). And blackberries, raspberries and blueberries (perhaps these overpowered the green?), strawberry yogurt, V8 Splash Diet Berry Blend (full of berries and mostly carrots, which also may have contributed to the none green color), and ice. Well, it did taste a little like spinach, which wasn't too terrible, maybe because I didn't put in enough or maybe because I don't think spinach is all too bad itself. Regardless, Kennady drank it, and seemed to like it.

Now I know what she will have to drink before her next iron check, so maybe she'll fall in the normal category so I don't have to hear the lecture about making sure my child is getting enough iron from the WIC people. It's not like I don't try. But short of cramming food down her throat (which I'll admit I've attempted, unsuccessfully), she eats what she wants, when she wants too. I'm pretty good about not caving in on giving her junk when she won't eat anything else, unless we are at the grocery store or WalMart or some similar place and she is screaming, ripping my list to shreds and throwing food from the cart basket on to the floor. Then I cave and let her eat unpurchased fruit snacks and chocolate chip cookies. All in hopes that I won't entirely forget everything that I've come for and wind up wandering in a zig zag pattern back and forth across the store as I slowly decipher the items on my chewed on list. Which usually happens anyways, but at least she stops screaming.

Besides, it doesn't seem to matter how much spinach, beans and red meat she eats (accompanied with high in vitamin C items like oranges and juice, of course, and under no circumstances paired with milk which according to 50% of the studies slows the absorption of iron) her iron count always comes up low, as did mine and my siblings for most of our childhoods (and still does on occasions). I'm blaming it on genetics- not the inability or lack of effort to feed my child correctly.

Stubborn grouchiness. It just won't go away.