before my second son was born, i was the oh so naïve mom trying to satisfy my firstborn’s ever whim, which much to my dismay included listening to a collection of children’s nursery songs everyday, stuck in traffic, to and from work…did i mention EVERYDAY?!  now the thing about infants and nursery rhymes is – you not only have to SING along to entertain your wee one, but you also need to engage in the quirky gyrations that accompany each song.  and don’t forget, all of this while driving.  now i don’t condone road rage – but after a few rounds of nursery rhymes in the car, i can empathize…

one song in particular that always seemed to hit the cd changer was ‘where is thumpkin?’ personally, i knew exactly where thumpkin was – he was in HELL with me and all the other darn nursery rhyme songs!  anyways, here i am singing along and going through the motions when all of a sudden – someone cuts me off in rush hour traffic right when I am on ‘tall man’!  at that moment, i had an epiphany – i could just drive in rush hour every day and satisfy my hatred for nursery rhymes AND rush hour traffic by innocently displaying tall man at every turn!  …you cut me off?!  tall man this!  who you honkin’ at?!  I’ll tell you – it’s tall man!  say hello to my little friend – tall man! …i was killing two birds with one tall man – and loving it!

okay, by now i am sure you are wondering if i have a point – and yes i do – it’s a tall point, called tall man! …sorry. flashbacks.  seriously, here is my modern mama advice:

there are two crucial tips for any modern mama who has to endure long car rides stuck in traffic day after day with their precious offspring:

1. get them to start listening to and enjoying ‘clean’ versions of your favorite genre of music.  by the time dylan was born, jalen was already two, and after developing arthritis in both middle fingers from too much ‘tall man’, i needed to make a change.  here is what i learned.  kids like repetition.  they also like upbeat songs.  after pre-screening all of my CDs, I made a car ride CD full of clean (or radio) versions of songs from artists i enjoy. and you know what?!  the results were amazing!  jalen loved it!  fast forward two years and now, this mama has her sanity back AND her kids can both spell ‘bananas’ thanks to gwen stefani’s hollaback girl – not to mention they are even learning directions, thanks to beyonce’s irreplaceable!  …there is something endearing about a four-year old signing ‘to the left, to the left – everything you owns in a box to the left”!
2. my second tip is, purchase or download current disney soundtracks for you and your kids to enjoy in the car.  i actually enjoy listening to the Cars soundtrack as well as songs by rob thomas from Meet the Robinsons.  the boys now even visit disney.com and have grown fond of the jonas brothers all on their own - and you know what?!  now days ‘life (and the car ride!) is a highway and i wanna ride it all night long’, thanks to rascal flatts and the Cars soundtrack!

i hope you found this advice helpful…and if you didn’t i would like to invite you to please join me in a round of ‘where is thumpkin’…we’ll skip to the verse right after ‘where is pointer’!

sorry – my real job is taking precedence this week, and although i would much rather rant about all things new and on my mind, i gotta take a break so i can support my diet coke and shoe addictions…so anyways - i only have time for a quick post today, BUT because of this, my NEXT one will be EXTRA good, i promise! ;)  …so you’d better check back soon!  as i mentioned in one of my earlier ramblings, i will try and post at least two times a week so here goes…

my son jalen and i have a new bedtime ritual inspired by the movie wall-e.  each night after his bedtime story and our small chat about his day, we pretend he is a robot and i proceed to ‘power him off’ by pushing a button on his forehead.  this is his clue that he needs to quit talking and go to sleep – because just like his mama, he is a chatter-box and can go on and on and on… ;)  after about a week of this fun new game preparing for sleep, jalen started ‘moving’ the button around to mix it up a bit (gotta love his creativity!).  one night it will be on his hand, the next on his foot, then his belly button, etc, etc… however, last night the funniest thing happened – when i pressed jalen’s ‘power off button’ on his toe (the last place it ended up at) – he told me as he often does – ‘no mommy, that’s not where my button is anymore!!! – then he proceeded to say – ‘my button is now HERE (pointing to his ‘pee-pee’) and i can turn MYSELF off and on by touching it!’

got a funny line or incident that happened with your precious offspring?!  i know you do – please share!

i know i just got a lot of guys’ attention with this header (and maybe some unique, new visitors to my site!), but this post – fortunately or unfortunately is NOT about double d’s… ;)  double d-d is the phrase my two-year old dylan exclaims every time he sees his reflection in the mirror because he thinks there are two dylan’s or d-d’s, since we often call him ‘d’ for short.  it is funny to see how excited he gets at the thought of having a twin or clone of himself, although the thought of having two kids the SAME age at the same time (especially when they are babies and toddlers) is pretty unnerving for this modern mama!  speaking of twins, what is up with all the hollywood mamas having twins?!  off the top of my head i can think of j-lo, brangelina, mia hamm, kim porter, marcia cross, and the list goes on and on… is it something in the water or just the latest ‘in’ thing to do or have?!  read more

the other day i saw an ad for crocs, this time advertising their new ‘fashionable crocs for summer fashionistas’. after seeing what they deemed ‘fashionable’, any modern mama with any fashion sense (and even those without!) would know that ‘fashionable crocs’ is the ultimate oxy-moron because unless your age is still in single digits, there is nothing fashionable or ‘cute’ about crocs. In fact, their own ad slogan ‘what a CROC’ says it best displaying an ugly rubber pump-type shoe that no one would be caught dead in, even it came in leather. now I can hear the complaints already – but their so comfortable, their anti-microbial and odor resistant, blah, blah, blah… i don’t know about you, but i personally have never been comfortable in something that i am truly embarrassed to be wearing altogether (think bridesmaid dresses from hell).

kids and crocs make sense since they are easy to slip on and off, just don’t ‘jibbitize’ them. what are jibbitz? they are those plastic things that go into the holes of your kids crocs to let child molesters far and wide know all about your precious offspring. all of a sudden your kids shoes have a voice (even before some kids do!) and tell the world – “hi, my name is jeff (j-e-f-f not g-e-o-f-f), my favorite color is red, and i like dolphins and soccer – come strike up a conversation with me by pretending like you know me cuz now you do!” read more