Blue-Light Special: Double Post Friday

{Editor's Note:  Tried to control my sailor mouth today due to a Blog Blast included in this post.  Let's hope Nintendo can handle it. There will be a return to our normally scheduled profanity tomorrow.]

First topic:  The F Cup from yesterday.  After the dentists' news, I came home and threw away all the Nuby soft tops except one (I am a pussy).  Then I worked the rest of the day, trying not to think about it.  After work, I drove to Target and bought a new electric toothbrush (My Little Pony) and some Tools of Bribery.

Sorry, Izzy, Kristen and Fweetieb, you are going to hate me.

Step One:  (cut a hole in the box) INSTANT GRATIFICATION

Little Angel, today you learned what is HARD about being a big girl:  No more bottle cups.  Behold!  There are FUN things about being a big girl, too.

Step Two:  (put your junk in the box) The Reward System.  Look at what you can EARN if you sleep all night and be brave with no howling for a whole week!

Though I normally spend a good deal of time complaining about product packaging and how large and wasteful it is, I'm grateful this $25 toy is HUGE. The box is half as tall as the little angel. Her eyes practically shot out of her head when she saw it.

I know, I'm totally feeding into the consumer mentality. But really, how different is this from "incentive-based bonus"?  I mean, this is how the world works, folks. Better she learn now that nobody rewards inaction.

Bedtime rolled around.  I read her books.  She squawked because there was no F Cup. I told her she could use her Ariel cup (thanks for the suggestions - we totally own one of those and I planned to use it).  She threw her Ariel cup across the room, then picked it up, threw it out in the hall and kicked it, her lip as big as Montana.  "I don't WANT this cup!  This cup is NOT RIGHT!  This cup is STUPID!"  I picked up a book and started to read it to Ski Bear, Foo Foo Bunny and Pink Kitteh.  Eventually she came over and sat down for a listen.  We finally got her into bed after repeating this exercise a few times.  I asked her if she wanted to hold onto the bottom of the F Cup, but alas, it's only the top that she's interested in.

My beloved spent the first hour in there.  She kept mewing pathetically, "I'm tirsty!" but refusing to drink water from an open cup.  There were many trips to the bathroom and a few more items thrown across the room.  He came down, weary, and asked me take over.

I went upstairs and reminded her she naps without the F Cup.  "Just pretend this is a nap," I said.  "I know how much you want to earn that carriage."  She laid down.  I asked her if she wanted me to tell her a story.  She wanted Cinderella, natch.  I told her Cinderella very quietly.  Then we talked for a while about being a big girl, she asked repeatedly for her cup, and I repeated said no.  We put on Tad the Singing Frog a few thousand times while I faked sleep.  She tried laying down with me on the floor, but the pillow wasn't cold enough and her hair was touching her neck and everything in the world was Wrong Without the F Cup.  I know how it is - I've had my addictions.  I was just waiting her out.  It did work - two hours after she started this mess, she fell asleep. There was really not a lot of howling involved, more just sadness. It was hard.  I wanted so much to give her the cup, but I also want her to stop having to wear Pull-Ups to bed, so I figure if we can eliminate that dratted cup, we can solve a lot of problems.

In return, I'm going to try to give up some of my beloved Diet Coke.  I'm limiting myself to *gasp* two a day. I know, this is pathetic, but I'm a Diet Coke Whore.  I figure it's the least I can do, considering solidarity and all.  I'm starting tomorrow.

PART TWO:  I don't normally do Blog Blasts, but I'm doing this one because my beloved really wants a Wii and they can't be found in Kansas City unless you buy the whole package, which costs a million dollars. So maybe I can win! And we could really use to win.

This contest is brought to you by the awesome ladies of the Parent Bloggers Network and some people I don't know at Wii. I want to win that Boogie game, so I can get down with the funky bunch.

Here's the question: 

What are your favorite family activities and how do you find the quality family time?

And if you don't have quality family time, how do you make up for it? What challenges do you face?

Ah, well, how are we defining "quality family time"?  I admit, as a working parent, I don't get that much time with my daughter.  (And I am going to hell.)  We have the morning rush and the evenings and weekends and whatever vacations we can eek out.  This morning I had to take Bella to the vet.  I decided to take the little angel with me, since I was missing what I should be doing either way.  She was delighted to come along.  We played with Bella in the doctor's office, looked at all the brochures, squished a cricket, weighed ourselves on the PetSmart scale (I think it's low, which means Bella weighs even more than 14 pounds, God help her), put on "lipstick" (chapstick that rolls out like lipstick - little divas love it), discussed life and did a few twirls.  All in all, it took about 45 minutes, but I would totally consider that to be family time.

We eat dinner together almost every night.  The little angel sits between my beloved and me and gets annoyed when we talk about non-little-angel topics or school.  She would rather discuss what's in a magic wand, why Bella eats so much and when Grandma and Grandpa are coming to visit.  She also wants to know when we're getting on the airplane to go to Disney World.  (Thanks, Beloved, for telling her about the trip you're trying to win at work - sucker.)  I consider that "family time," as I do the bath, the books, whatever we do when we're all in the same place.  That said, because I don't have as much time with my daughter as I would if I were a SAHM, I try not to accomplish very much when I'm with her.  I try to cram errands and chores in when she's sleeping or outsource as much as we can afford to with our dual-income salaries.  Right now, that's not such a high number, since we just moved and ya'll know the money drain moving can be, but if I can outsource something that can't be done with the little angel around, I will. If I can't outsource it, I try to include her and make it family time.  Which is why my house isn't all that clean and all the laundry in her room is in the wrong drawers. 

We have Friday Night Movie Night, during which the little angel gets to pick the movie. It's the only movie she sees all week to preserve the "big deal." We have Saturday and Sunday morning cartoons.  We go to the pool every weekend all together.  We go to church on a pretty much monthly basis, but I don't really consider that "family time" so much as "thank the good Lord we haven't driven over any collapsing bridges lately" time.  Mostly, though, we just live our normal lives in the most fun way that is possible, which sometimes isn't "super fun," but hopefully will be the sort of stuff she remembers when she thinks how pleasantly boring her childhood was.  If we can sneak a playground break into Saturday errands, we do.  We seldom pass up the opportunity to stop for McDonald's ice cream or slushies.  We usually go out to dinner as a family on Saturday nights.  All this family time and the money it takes to support family time severely cuts in to couple time, and that's not so great, but at this point, we're doing our best.  We are a family of three (plus Bella), and we like to do things together. I'm relieved we're not constantly tossing the little angel back and forth between us and never doing things together.

This morning when the little angel asked why we were taking Bella to the vet before she went to school, I said, "Because it's more fun to do things when you're with me," and I actually meant it.  I love to take the little angel shopping, even to the grocery store, because it's usually in the produce aisle that I hear what she did at school or what she thinks about princesses.  Quality time, family time, is the time you are together, simple as that.  It's knowing that you would rather be together than alone. It's that time you think of blissfully when you want to leave your screaming three-year-old outside for the squirrels.  It is the ying of the temper tantrum yang, and that reason why some people go back to the well two or even three or nineteen times.  All hail family time.

Now give me my Wii!