Lawn signs: ugly or public displays of political allegiance?

There is a saying that you should never talk about three subjects when you are in polite company: religion, sex and politics. I usually try to abide by this policy, but sometimes I just can't bite my tongue.

Before darling daughter, I was a newspaper reporter. The job was low paying, but overall, I loved it. One thing I loved was covering elections. I've always found politics fascinating, especially municipal politics. On October 25, Ontario residents everywhere will be casting ballots in municipal elections. With summer coming quietly to an end this week, candidates will be hitting the gas pedals on their election campaigns.

Earlier this evening as I was trying to get laundry done, I heard the door bell ring. It was a canvasser, trying to sell me on the traits of the candidate he was campaigning for. I tried to look mildly interested before I politely accepted the campaign brochure he presented me. I know that sentence may sound like an oxymoron as I've stated I love elections, but I just didn't feel like it was right for me to spout off to this dedicated volunteer as to why I wouldn't be voting his candidate. However, if this candidate had rang my doorbell instead, I would be peppering him with various questions, one being his stance on property taxes and if it is a realistic policy.

Since it isn't in good taste to talk politics while in polite company, I won't name the name of candidate in question. I've met the candidate before. He is a very nice man, but he won't be getting my vote. And that's okay because that's what democracy is about.

I forgot about the canvasser until I returned home this evening. While stopped trying to find my house key, I suddenly spotted a lawn sign with the name of the candidate in question blazoned on a lawn sign posted on my neighbour's front lawn. Great, I thought. Yay, an ugly lawn sign for me to look at for the next two months. Perhaps I don't care for the sign because I don't agree with the candidate's platform or the fact that lawn signs are ugly. I don't know. But I need to remind myself that it is in my neighbour's right to publicly display his political allegiance with that lawn sign, despite the fact they seem kind of useless and old fashioned.

And I also need to remind myself that it is election time and lawn signs come with the territory. At least I know my neighbour will be voting. That is definitely a good thing. In order for democracy to work, we --meaning us voters -- need to get out to the polls. So between now and October 25, I urge you to get to know your candidates and post a lawn sign or two, if you must.

Decluttering one little task at a time

Lately, I've been busying myself with small decluttering tasks. After last fall's massive decluttering of the basement, most of my clutter is in check. But you have to keep on top of clutter before it gets too out of hand.

For the last week, I've been taking about 15 minutes out of my day to do some quick decluttering. Despite some kinks, the method has been working swimmingly. First on the list was the junk and personal mail that needs to be shredded. This is always a work in progress. Things were going well until I clogged the shredder. Unfortunately, it no longer works because of a massive paper jam. Either I buy a new shredder or find someone who is qualified to take it apart and clean it. I haven't decided what I'll do so the paper pile grows.

Another thing that desperately needed to be decluttered was the front of the refrigerator. Cluttered with magnets and pieces of paper, I did a quick clean and voila! Now I can see my entire refrigerator. It has been awhile since the front has been paper and magnet free.

The cupboard under the sink got a quick cleaning as well as I was trying to kill time while waiting for dear husband to get home. It has been a task that I was putting off too long. The space under the sink is like no-man's land. You know it is there, but you really don't want to deal with it. Now it has been dealt with.

Feeling like I should do more decluttering, I cleaned up the mud room this afternoon. With Dyson in hand, I sucked up all the sand and vacuumed the rugs. Now I'm not so self conscious when people come over.

I hope to continue with this decluttering trend through the fall as the clutter never seems to end.

Poopie talk

Dear readers,

I'm sure you are very tired of all this poop and potty training talk. I assure you, so am I. However, all things about poop and related to poop has become my life. Today, I ruined a batch of muffins because I forgot to add the sugar to the batter. It wasn't due to lack of sleep. It was because I was distracted by darling daughter's insistent poopie dance. So I thought I'd wrap up the week with some poopie talk.

I'm still waging a quiet war with darling daughter in over her reluctance to poop on the potty. There is a phrase my mom would often quote to me when I was older: poop or get off the pot. Basically I've used this as my mantra all week. Since last Sunday, we haven't had a successful poop-meet-potty encounter. I have been able to resist the urge in not buying disposable training pants, but it has been hard. No one wants to clean up poop. And toddler poop is quite disgusting.

With the new poop or get off the pot mindset, I've decided to use another arsenal in my toolbox in getting darling daughter to poop: positive peer pressure. I suddenly got the idea after attending a playdate earlier in the week. Darling daughter is enamoured with one particular girl. Loves her. Loves to play with her. So afterwards when darling daughter was singing her praises on the car ride home, I suddenly said, "Did you know that A knows how to poop in the potty?" (A true fact). This piqued darling daughter's interest. I didn't stop there. I continued. "Did you know that C knows how to poop in the potty? Did you know that M knows how to poop in the potty? Did you know that K knows how to poop in the potty?" I mentally went down the list of all the big kids darling daughter has encountered in the last two months and told her that they poop in the potty. Basically my message was, if all the kids are doing it, you can too!

The peer pressure tactic could be working. Several times a day, I take time to engage in some poopie talk with darling daughter. We talk about where it comes from and the fact it is yucky and it needs to go in the potty. We also discuss how big girls wear underwear and big girls use the potty. We talk about how A uses the potty, as well as C, K and M. Daddy uses the potty. Mommy uses the potty. Everyone uses the potty. For good measure, I even told her that Calliou uses the potty, too.

So today when she was doing the insistent potty dance, I brought down the potty into the living room and urged her to use the potty. "No want to. No want to. No want to," was the response I got. I quietly reminded her that A poops in the potty and her mommy gets her a special treat. And if she could do it, she could too. Plus, she'd get a special treat, just like A. It could have been the fact that she couldn't hold it in any longer or that peer pressure is working, but we finally had a successful poop-meets-potty encounter. Thank God! A happy poop-free toddler makes me happy.

Embracing the grey

This is me. This is me and my grey hair.

I'm not even close to 40 and I've already got grey hair. The first grey hairs started to show up soon after my twentieth birthday. I'd like to tell you this photo was taken after darling daughter and I started our potty training journey, but sadly, this self portrait was taken the week before we got rid of the diapers. This is my au naturel hair colour.

I stopped getting my hair coloured since before the new year. There were two reasons behind my decision: cost and time.

It costs money to get your hair coloured. It would cost me a good $100 or more to get rid of the grey. (Once I spent $200 on a horrible highlight job at a high end salon, but I strictly blame that on pregnancy hormones as I was less than a month away from my due date). In my experience, colour doesn't really stick to grey. About two to three weeks after my dye job, the grey roots slowly return. Since it costs $100 or more for a dye job, I couldn't afford to run back to my stylist's salon every three weeks to hide the grey.

Where do I find the time? Regardless of cost, I just don't have the time to get my hair dyed every three weeks. I'm soon in need of a hair cut and I'm trying to find the time to fit in that task in my schedule.

After looking at my options and seeing more grey hairs popping up, I decided to embrace the grey, so to speak, and stop dyeing my hair. I'm not really thrilled that I have a streak of grey running down my part, but every time I visit my nurse practitioner, she tells me people pay good money to add streaks of grey to their hair. I don't get it. Just like I don't get why people want curls.

Until a money tree decides to take root in my back yard, I'll be embracing the grey. If Stacy London can get away with a streak of grey in her hair, I guess I can, too.

What happened to summer?

Looking out the kitchen while doing dishes tonight, I suddenly wondered, what happened to summer?

Good question. The leaves of one of the maple trees are changing colours. It seems like yesterday when I spotted the little boy who lives across the street bring home artwork on his last day of school. In a couple of weeks, him and the rest of the kids who live in the neighbourhood will be returning to school. The days are getting shorter. If I was to run at 8:30 p.m., I'd be running in the dark. The evenings are getting cooler and a tad bit crisper. You can smell fall on the horizon. Yes, the warm weather will likely stick around for another month, but the start of another school year usually marks the end of summertime fun.

Summer always seems to be over in the blink of an eye. With great anticipation and fanfare, it arrives and weeks later it is over for another year. I wish summer lasted a little bit longer than it does.

Oh, poop!

Must. Resist. The. Urge.

Must. Resist. The. Urge.

Must. Resist. The. Urge.

I've been repeating these four words for the last three days. Must resist the urge is my new mantra. The four words suddenly popped into my tired, weary head when I found myself staring at disposable training pants at Shoppers Drug Mart on Saturday afternoon. At that point, we had no pooping success in our potty training journey. In fact, I had a crabby two year old who needed to poop but refused to do it in the potty.

I had went to Shoppers for solace. About two hours before, darling daughter had a huge poop explosion at nap time. Right before the poop hit the fan, dear husband disappeared to run an errand. Let's just say it took two baths and a Calliou book to calm darling daughter down. All the while, I was quietly cursing dear husband, who has yet to clean up one poopie accident. I know sh!t happens, but why does it always fall at my feet (literally) to clean up?

Lots has happened since contemplating buying disposable training pants. (Should I get Life brand? Or should I get Pullups? Damn, these things are expensive!) To make a long story short, darling daughter has pooped twice in the potty, but it has been a big production. She has been cranky, asking to go potty, but refusing to do her business. This process has last for hours until the urge is too big for her to contain and she does her business. After Saturday's big poop celebration, I thought we'd be on easy street. She'd see how easy it is to poop in the potty and continue to do so. Nope. Things have remained the same: she does poopie avoidance dance for hours until it gets too much.

I am of two minds here: Screw it and get the Pullups and use them at nap time. Or remain the course and hope that the poopie avoidance dance starts to dissipate. The three day potty training method I used specifically says that Pullups or training pants of any kind are a big no, no. Another issue we've been force to deal with through this whole potty training journey is sleep. I don't mind cleaning up pee or poop. But what I do mind is that my child seems to be cranky and it could be due to interrupted sleep. Nap time and bedtime cleanups are a sleep disruptor.

We've been diaper-less for a week now. It is quite the accomplishment. But we still aren't fully potty trained and the poop department is still a work in progress. Maybe it is time to screw the three-day potty training method and get disposable training pants. Maybe darling daughter isn't psychologically ready for pooping in the potty. I don't know. All I know that we may be teetering on the edge of a power struggle that may be detrimental to potty training. I may give into the urge any time soon.

The mysterious allure of Calliou

Darling daughter loves Calliou. Absolutely loves him. Loves him to the point where she'll stare at the television in a trance, watching his adventures. The trance is only broken when the show is over. You can't capture her attention when Calliou is on. She has the attitude of don't bother me at the moment. Can't you clearly see my show is on? Talk to me later. I'm busy.

Darling daughter got hooked on Calliou during the World Cup. Since CBC was airing games in the morning, her usual morning television fare was interrupted. No Bo on the Go or Busytown Mysteries. For whatever reason, we found Calliou and since that day there has been no turning back.

But every mother I have spoken to haven't been big Calliou fans. In fact, many have said he is whiny. I can see that. There are some episodes I want to tell Calliou to suck it up. But one shouldn't say such things to her daughter's hero as her love runs deep.

She talks about Calliou and his rubber boots. As well as Gilbert the cat. So we caved and got her some Calliou books which we have read a million times (well, more like a hundred, but it sure feels like a million). Calliou? Calliou? Calliou? is a common question at story time.

I must say that Calliou did come in handy during our trip to PEI. On our return home, we were about an hour away from Edmundston and darling daughter clearly had enough of the long car ride. So I quickly came up with some exciting Calliou stories, stories I had watched on television and read to her. I even came up with some Calliou stories that we a bit elaborate. I talked about Calliou for a good half hour, trying to take her mind off the long car ride.

I'm still unsure of the mysterious allure of Calliou. It seems kids love him. For me, the allure is mysterious.