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Shower the People


Pumpkin’s latest obsession is personal hygiene. I thought children typically hated to leave playtime to tend to those pesky necessities, but this child of mine literally begs to take showers and brush her teeth. Not only that, but one would suspect torture to overhear her being dragged out of the shower to dry off. In fact, a few nights ago after several long minutes of tooth-brushing, I pried the brush from her tiny Vulcan grip only to have her fall to her knees screaming “TEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEETH.” I was just taking her toothbrush, not ripping her teeth out of her gums, but it was a horrifying enough scream to cause Hubby to come and check on us. Similar bellowing cries are evoked every night when I make her get out of the “showw-showw.”

Of course, it’s hard to discipline or discourage a child who WANTS to brush her teeth and who WANTS to take a shower. On the other hand, I can’t have her wrinkle into a prune and as much as I’d love to, I can’t just stand in the bathroom while she brushes her 8 tiny teeth for hours on end (and by brush I mean chews on the bristles and sucks the toothpaste out of them). So we just let her scream.

When she isn’t brushing or washing, Pumpkin is just an absolute angel these days. She’s always been an angel, but lately she has been SO FUN and SO SWEET. Seriously. She spends her evenings entertaining us with dances and singing (constant singing) and every night at about 7 we snuggle bug on the couch and read books until 8, at which time (sometimes without my prompting) she kisses daddy goodnight, leads me to the bedroom, tells Ganny, Nona, and Pop’s pictures goodnight, and then says her prayers and goes to bed. That easy. So easy it is scary in fact.

We’ve also gotten away from complete mama-dependency. I was also able to determine that the source of her angst at school lately wasn’t so much that she wanted ME as that she did not want a bunch of grimy-fingered toddlers in her face first thing in the morning. See, Pumpkin and I are not exactly morning people. Now, don’t get me wrong, we wake up early, but it takes us time to adjust to being awake. For me it also takes mass amounts of caffeine, but for now anyway Pumpkin just needs time. Not only that, but it takes her a bit to warm up to any new environment whether it is morning, noon, or night.

Well, each morning when I drop Pumpkin off at school the other kiddos who are already there (because of our new later arrival time – see previous post) are all-too-happy to see her. When I set her down, these little two-foot-tall-close-talkers flank her on all sides and put their pudgy pointers in her face while repeating her name over and over, “Awy, Awy, Awy.” It’s at that exact moment that she would look at me with tears in her eyes. Once I figured it out (much to my simultaneous dismay and delight), I was able to tell Miss Lana what the problem was and the very next morning, Miss Lana’s open arms were waiting for Pumpkin when we arrived and the first tot to approach her was met with Miss Lana’s “she doesn’t want you in her face.”

Today, she even waved goodbye to me and blew me kisses, safe above the heads of her munchkin admirers and in Miss Lana’s embrace. What can I say, it’s tough being popular.

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