Joy

We watched Inside Out finally because one of our children was shown part of the sequel during childcare and I figured I should know what my kids are watching even if we're not with them. I borrowed both from the library and we watched the first one. If you haven't watched the movie and you don't want descriptions of it spoiled for you, you probably shouldn't read this blog. 

It's a good movie. I really enjoyed it, but it definitely hits differently as an adult. While the children are gravitated toward colorful glass orbs of different colors and laughing at the goofiness of the characters (and the one who gets dragged around by her leg,) I was processing how Disney so perfectly displayed the essence of how memory works in a make-believe land. 

It was sobering to see how Riley's initial islands were all destroyed due to changes happening in her life. I think if we're all honest with ourselves, our main core childhood islands in our lives get destroyed too. There's definitely moments in my life, some which are core memories and I still recall, which destroyed my islands of family, friendship, and pillars of my childhood. At the same time, I have new islands with new "themes" from my life today which are holding strong and thriving. 

Seeing the cleaners vacuum old memory orbs for the pit was sobering. I have countless memories which have faded away over time and been forgotten. When you think about all the forgotten events and happenings, some of it is sad because at one point, they were seemingly very important and significant. I had written about this in a previous blog about my journals. Without rereading, I would have forgotten many details of that semester of my life. 

I believe the biggest theme in the movie, one purposely emphasized, was the importance of joy. This would be pretty easy for most children to pick up. The hidden theme beyond that was the importance of sadness behind the joy. My guess is you'd have to be age 14-15+ in order to begin to understand this one. If anyone had kids who understood this theme after watching the movie, I'd love to know what age they were!

Sadness is necessary in order for joy to truly shine through. I didn't get a lot of things I wanted as a child because they were deemed "unnecessary" or "not useful enough." To be honest, if it's necessary or useful, there would almost never be a discussion on whether or not to buy it because you always would. As an adult, I've been adding new memories of joy to rectify all the sad ones. I've blogged about a number of them here. Two which stand out in my memory include Cinderella's slipper ornament and a pair of flats. 

This year for my birthday, my husband gifted me an entire set of miniatures. I'd seen these (in Taiwan?) somewhere and thought it would be so cute to own the entire set. I contemplated it for a while and then tossed away my thoughts. Miniatures were just little figurines to be displayed and looked at, right? I didn't need them. They would just take up space. These fell under the "unnecessary" and "not useful" category. 

Well, I opened them for my birthday, and it was a fun surprise. But the real surprise came after we were able to display them.  

I love walking by this display in our bedroom and taking a closer look at it each time I pass. I get a sense of joy and warmth from looking at these miniatures. The detail put into these is incredible. The tiny glasses of lemonade have removable lids and straws. The hand on the scale actually spins around. 

I secured everything into the case with museum gel so nothing would tip over or fall if someone sneezed wrong. Seeing my own miniature display brings me back to when I saw miniatures in museums. The Art Institute of Chicago has one downstairs, and we went to the Miniatures Museum of Taiwan this summer. I feel like I have a small piece of the museum with me.  

You can arguably measure the usefulness of an item, and you can arguably measure the necessity of an item. But it's hard to gauge the joy of an item. These are subjective and will differ from person to person. Sometimes, joy is a longer lasting factor than the usefulness or necessity of something ever will be. I find lots of things useful and necessary, but very few of those things bring me joy the way these miniatures do. 

Achievement Unlocked

I've been a mom for almost 7 years, and only recently did I unlock a new achievement. I'm not sure every mom unlocks this achievement, but I'm sure a good number do at one point or another.

We washed a good number of stuffies in the washing machine recently. I don't tend to wash them in the machine because it rips up the fur, the stuffing gets displaced, and they don't look or feel the same after they come out of the machine. Yes, they're cleaner, and yes, they smell (so much!) better, but it comes with different costs. 

When my daughter's penguin came out of the wash, I noticed her beak had a piece of the fabric going threadbare, slowly forming a hole. A few weeks passed and then she showed me her poor penguin with a tuft of fluff coming out of the beak. She asked me to sew it up, and I said I would. I forgot for the entire day until we were getting ready for bedtime. I pulled out my sewing box, found the closest yellow thread I owned, asked if it was okay (it was), and sewed up the hole after stuffing the fluff back in.

My sewing skills aren't great. I sew for functionality, not aesthetics. So now, her penguin has a double beak. It's not horrible, and my daughter doesn't mind. So I won't complain. This wasn't the first stuffed animal I sewed for her, but it's the first time I've sewed a precious stuffed animal. 

I was reminded of a stuffed animal my mother sewed for me. I've posted about this teddy bear before. She is now 24 years old! I can hardly believe it sometimes. She's been stitched behind the ear, but the one I remember most is the stitching on her leg. It was the last stuffie my mother stitched for me. 

My mother did a nicer job than I did. In my defense, I didn't have a seam to stitch from. I just had to pull two sides of the torn fabric together and mend it the best I knew how. Teddy's leg looks a lot neater and cleaner. And the stitches have lasted over two decades. 

I don't think about my mother often anymore. I don't think it's anything negative. There's still thoughts to that regard which I need to process and may one day end up on the blog. For now, I was just thinking about a mini rite-of-passage I've experienced. And in some ways, it's like I got to walk in my mother's footsteps for a bit. 

 Here's to the last stuffie she mended and the (almost) first stuffie I've mended. They're friends. 😊

Time-Saving Changes

We recently made a change in the house which has had a huge impact on my day. Years ago, we turned our dining room into a playroom for the kids. They've happily maximized this space and played to their hearts content. However, as time passed, their toys would gradually leave the playmate and infiltrate the rooms around. Any fellow parents out there understand how this works. 

Dealing with this tornado every day I taught was really annoying.

Last weekend, we moved all the toys into a bedroom. The dining room still isn't back to being a regular dining room, but I'm okay with it. We still have a table for the kids to do homework. There's a lamp in the corner with an armchair. And the rest is empty space. You know what? I want to leave it empty.

The styrofoam wanted the spotlight.

We moved all the toys into a bedroom, and I no longer have to corral toys before my afternoon teaching. I really love it. Cleaning up after my kids really stressed me out and made me unhappy. The irony is, the mess looks the same. It's just moved into a different location in the house, one which can be closed off and hidden from view.

This is so much more bearable for me to look at.

See, I'm not kidding. It looks the same, just in a different location. But looking at their toys in my dining room made me resent them. I didn't enjoy the creations my children made. It stressed me out to see everything not put away neatly in the storage containers and clear boxes I purchased specifically to house them. 

But now, when I see their toys in the bedroom, I get excited to see what toys they pull off the shelves to play with. It's fun for my eyes to dart from one area of fun to another. I don't need to destroy their Hot wheels garages constructed out of Magnatiles because they can simply just stay put.

So I'm excited for this year because it means I don't have to do a mad dash of cleaning around my house in the half hour before my students begin arriving for the day. It means I don't have to force my children to disassemble their precious creations. It means I don't have to resent their mess of creativity and entertainment. 

That's Valuable. 

Beads

My daughter requested a bead kit for Christmas. I was slightly hesitant at first because these bead kits get pricey! Not only the cost, but I was not mentally ready to deal with having loose beads all over the house if she spilled it. We'd already dealt with Legos, scraps of cut paper, paper stars, play money coins, puzzle pieces, foam letter stickers, colored pencils, crayons, magnatiles, mini figures, toy cars, play gemstones, Cheerios, and probably more categories of tiny toys and food I've failed to mention. I did not want to add beads to that list.

Well, I ended up taking her to the store and she looked at a bunch and told me which ones she didn't want and which ones she wanted. I took some pictures, went home, and looked online again to find one to closely match her pre-approved selections from the store. In the end, the one I purchased was not "pre-approved" but I think she was going to enjoy it. 

The package arrived, and it was much smaller than I anticipated. I was very tempted to open it up and look, but I had to save it for Christmas. So I wrapped it up, put it under the tree, and was glad I had an extra long return window with the holiday season. 

She opened it early because we let the kids open some presents before Christmas. She loved it! I know my daughter after all. And she's aligned her heart with the things the child inside of me loves (not intentionally!), so it's pretty easy to shop for her. 😝

She wanted to make bracelets immediately, but I told her to wait a few days. She didn't even try to object and waited patiently for the day she could make bracelets, another cue that I've been blessed with very special children. 

When we sat down to make bracelets together, she had so much fun. She wanted to make one for all her friends at school, family members, and even one for her piano teacher! As I watched her make these bracelets, the little girl inside of me really wanted to make one myself.

So I did!

M💗MMY

It was so much fun making bracelets with my daughter. I was even able to repair a bracelet I bought in high school which had broken in the last five years because the elastic was too old. 

These loose beads were hanging out on the bathroom
counter at my dad's house for the last few years.

Slowly restringing them.

Good as new!

I spent $3.50 on this bracelet in high school and it's not worth much at all, but being able to fix it instead of throw it away was very satisfying. What started out as a one bead kit actually turned into three, but I have been able to partake in the joy and enjoyment of her gift as well. Perhaps I should oblige her wishes more often. 😁 and I've only dealt with a "couple" beads on the floor. 

The Power of Play

We’ve had many things lost under our refrigerator at one point or another. There was a trapped marker for the longest time which I fetched out a while after it was originally lost. There have been blueberries hiding underneath from being dropped on the floor. Once I spilled a bag of frozen shrimp and one was barely tucked underneath the fridge. It’s a good thing I saw that one in time and fished it out before it mysteriously stunk up the kitchen.

One item which had been lost underneath the refrigerator and never rescued was a lone chopstick. I no longer remember when and how it was dropped, but this one single chopstick was trapped underneath for the longest time. Multiple occasions, we said we’d fish it out, and we never did, because let’s be honest. Life gets busy. There are other things more important than fishing out a single chopstick. And quite frankly, if our children hadn’t noticed it one day while playing on the floor, we would never have noticed we were missing one because we’ve always had plenty of extra.

Yesterday, something amazing happened. My five-year-old found a way to get the chopstick out from underneath the refrigerator. She grabbed a flashlight which they already played with and built a long stick out of some Lego pieces. Then, while shining the light underneath the refrigerator, used the Legos to swipe the chopstick out from underneath. Genius, right? 

Creative genius at its finest. 

To our credit, she’s seen me innovatively fix things or solve problems for her using everyday objects. She had seen her daddy just earlier take a stick with some fabric wrapped around it and clean dust from underneath the sofa. Perhaps this inspired her to do the same underneath the refrigerator to get the chopstick out. (Now, the real question is, why did my husband not swipe underneath the fridge to retrieve this chopstick instead of swiping under the sofa? Ha….)

When I see my daughter display these moments of brilliance, it makes me so proud. At the same time, I wonder if my mother noticed these things when I was younger. Did she ever watch us do something profound or special? If she did, it’s a shame there is no record or written evidence of it. And it’s a pity she will never be able to tell me about them.

I’ve never been one of those mothers to keep the house absolutely sparkling and to discourage my children from playing with non-toys. Yes, there are things she should not be playing with. But if it’s not a dangerous or precious item, chances are, I’ll let her play with it. And as a result, I get to see her be creative, be innovative, and think in ways much beyond her years. Do I encourage this because I want her to be top of her class earning the highest grades possible? Nah. I truly don’t because I wasn’t that student myself. What do I care about? I need to know that she is going to be okay without me whenever that day comes, whether through natural, healthy reasons, or due to heartbreaking circumstances.

She’s slowly showing me she will.

Consumables

I've never been a fan of consumables. Specifically for this post, I would be referring to stickers. Are stickers fun? Yes! Are stickers cute? Yes! Would I buy stickers for my children to play with? Nope. The reason is logical but narrow-minded. I specifically don't like buying things like stickers because they end up stuck on pieces of paper or items, and the pieces of paper will eventually get thrown away. 

So why are there so many stickers at my house? I've bought stickers to teach. As early as 11 years ago, I purchased reward stickers for my classroom when I was a student teacher. I used a handful here and there and had leftover which I saved and carried over to my future teaching positions. I still buy stickers to teach. I go through multiple stickers a day and about every 2-3 weeks I need a new sheet. For teaching, I buy bulk ones so they last me at least a year if not multiple years. 

A few years ago, my Christmas gift to my students included a few sheets of stickers each. I had tons leftover because when I bought the set, even though it was advertised as 232 pieces, almost half of the bundle was sticker sheets. 

Only two shiny sheets left...

My children recently discovered stickers. I know, they're very late to the game. I've held off for a long time. It started after a friend babysat for us. They took the kids out on errands and bought them stickers from one of the stores. After that, we noticed how entertained they were by stickers. I remembered my extra stash from Christmas stored away and pulled them out again for the kids to play with. They loved it! I could even teach a 30 minute lesson while they busily pulled off stickers and pressed them onto a blank piece of paper without being bothered. I’ve been able to take a shower without fear of my child tearing down the house. We can make it through a meal at a restaurant without fussy children.

My son's stickers on stickers. 

Specifically, my children love the stickers that are shiny and holographic. They're very keen on this - they prefer the "fancier" stickers and always ask for those first. It's not a taught skill. I didn't teach them to preference the shiny stickers. They just naturally figured it out. Sadly, we are down to the last two sheets of the shiny stickers. My daughter asked me a few days ago if I would buy her more stickers. I went online to look for sheets of shiny stickers and I couldn't find anything like what I wanted.

My daughter, on the other hand, is very organized.
I did not teach her to do this...but she probably inherited my type A 😅

All I want is a sheet of the shiny holographic-type stickers in bulk. And I couldn't find it. I'm actually pretty close to just buying the Christmas stationery set again which included stickers and just save the rest of the pieces for other purposes. 

My daughter also uses the outsides of her stickers now. She learned it from us because we would peel the outside off first so our son could peel his own stickers without the border pieces. 

So my perspective on consumables has broadened. Although they will all eventually end up in the trash, what they afford me along the way is more valuable to me as a parent: time to shower in peace, eating at a restaurant calmly, being able to not have my children say "mommy" 10x in a row and leave me alone for 10 minutes, fostering my children's creativity. I'm sure a child therapist or psychologist could go on and on about why consumables, although not financially efficient, are a wonderful "toy" for children. 

Do you buy your kids consumables? How has it saved your sanity?

Lilly

My mother is not remembered as being someone who would openly buy and spoil us with gifts. Most of what we asked for was rejected, but that is not to say she never bought us anything. I've written about the dollhouse furniture she bought me, and that memory brings a lot of grief. But this one brings joy. 

One year on a book order, my mother let me buy a set - the book, a cassette tape, and a character doll. I think it must have cost her somewhere between $10-$15 for the set. It wasn't like her to buy the entire set considering the book and cassette tape together probably only would have cost around $7. But she did. I vaguely remember the book orders being handed out in class when they arrived and some of my classmates envied the fact that my mother bought it for me.

Pristine condition if I do say so myself...the tag is still attached to her arm.

It's a cute storybook. I still remember swapping out the cassette tape holder to a "cooler" one my grandfather had. Instead of a plastic hinge lid, there's a little button you can press and the cassette tape slides out from the compartment. My grandfather wrote the title on the side for me. It's one of the last remaining pieces of his handwriting I have in English. 

I did a random search online to see what Lilly would go for on the market today. The doll itself is being sold for almost $40! Not to say someone is going to pay that much for a plush doll...but you never know. 

My mother didn't buy random things for us because she didn't see the value in them. If we could convince her an item had a purpose other than "because I want it," there was more of a chance she would buy it for us. I don't remember the reasoning I gave her to justify buying the entire book set including the doll, but she bought it for me. I enjoyed Lilly as a child, but she wasn't played with. However, I never got rid of her. 

Recently, my children wanted to play with the box of stuffed animals in the closet so I pulled the boxes out and let them go nuts. When they cleaned up, my daughter saved Lilly and didn't put her back into the box. She asked me if Lilly could stand, if Lilly could sit. She took off Lilly's purple purse and put it on the flipper of her penguin. A little tight, but cute. She took Lilly in the stroller with her penguin when we went on walks around the neighborhood.

I can't really explain why I've kept Lilly all these years. I think the closest explanation would simply be because my mother bought her for me. And it's nice to keep the doll, the book, and the cassette tape all together as a set. Watching my daughter play with Lilly is special. Although sad, Lilly will probably not stay as pristine as I'd like if she keeps playing with her, maybe it's time Lilly fulfilled her destiny as a plush toy. 

Had my mother known that 25 years later, her granddaughter would be playing with something she bought for her daughter, she might have been more willing to buy things. If only she were here to see it...

The Art of Retail

Since Covid hit nearly two years ago, our leisure shopping has decreased significantly. Only this fall did we start actually going out to "browse" with the kids, and even then, the trips were no more than 20-30 minutes inside the store tops. Thinking about the way germs spread and being in an enclosed space indoors has really affected some of the things we used to do. Right before the pandemic hit, my husband took some super cute pictures of our daughter sitting in chairs and playing with toys at Walmart and Target during my last semester of pregnancy. I would teach in the evenings and he would take her out during my lessons so I could teach in peace and she wasn't asked to be quiet.

In the winter of 2021, my daughter and I finally ventured out shopping again. I had taken her with me to run an errand and deliver some things. After our delivery, I took her to Home Goods. This was one of our favorite stores to peruse before we had kids and even before the pandemic. Almost exactly three years ago, we had taken her to the same store. She wasn't walking at the time and we pushed her around the store in her stroller. There was a giant stuffed penguin at the store for sale that day and we took a picture with it. 

Three years ago. One of us looks very different. Two of us look the same 😉.

She and I went into the store and briefly passed their Christmas aisle. I took her to browse the wall of kitchen tools, and then we made it to the toy section. She and I looked at toys for a while. Then I told her I wanted to look at my stuff and we browsed the beauty aisle. She told me she wanted to go back and look at toys. I obliged and we walked back to the toy section. She wandered around some more and we made it to one corner.

I found a Baby Shark mini tablet and pressed the music button. It started playing Baby Shark. Just days before, I had played around with the piano app on my iPad while she was next to me and came across the tune for Baby Shark. I played through it once and moved onto other things. For days after I'd hear her humming the melody or making up her own words to the tune. This girl has an ear! She hears something once and I'll hear it from her days later with her own rendition. I can't wait to start teaching her piano, but boy am I not looking forward to the sass she might give me when she realizes it's more than just fun and games. 

She and I stood there for a very long time listening to the Baby Shark song. She'd press the button, look at some other toy, and press it again after it stopped despite looking at other toys. Then, she asked me if I was going to buy it and take it home. I didn't give her a direct answer first, but after messaging Daddy and doing some googling online, we came to the conclusion that I was not going to buy it. I told her she could keep playing with it in the store but we couldn't take it home with us. So she kept pressing the buttons and listening to the music. 

The Baby Shark toy she played with for a long time.

Then, I told her to put it back because Mommy wanted to look at one more thing before leaving. Well, we ended up looking at like 10 more things. I wandered a puzzle section. We made it back to the kitchen housewares section and looked at sheet pans and kitchen shears. Finally, we were ready to checkout with our two items (and no toys!). She looked at a few more things while we waited to checkout but put everything back when I asked her to.

Normally I don't give a play by play of my shopping trip, but this is monumental. I haven't shopped like this in almost two years. When Covid first hit and I went inside a grocery store to shop in-person after a month of going nowhere, I started to make my grocery lists twice: once to list the items and a second time to reorder them in order of how the store was arranged. Leisurely shopping? What is it?!

We spent an hour and a half inside the store browsing and walking around. I had my daughter with me, I didn't buy any toys, and nobody had a meltdown. It was amazing. 

For the Love of Penguins

Friends celebrated its 25th anniversary last summer and there was huge hype over a reunion. They made a special Central Perk Lego set to commemorate this milestone and had an orange couch tour across the world. No, I didn't go visit the orange couch, but yes, I did buy the Lego set.

It really wasn't a bad price for genuine Legos with that many pieces.

The Friends anniversary didn't mean much to me because I'm not the biggest fan out there, but all the hype and video clips being circulated online made me curious to look up some facts about each of the six main actors in real life. A couple facts I learned:

1. Lisa Kudrow is the only actor to be married and stay married to the same person.
2. Lisa Kudrow was actually pregnant when her character was pregnant.
3. Courteney Cox was pregnant in the end of the last season but it was not written into the script.
4. They served really good food on set.

Coincidentally, I've proved an aspect of Friends to be accurate to real life, which most of the show is not in all honesty. 

In season 9, Joey's beloved penguin, Hugsy, makes his appearance again when Emma finds him and enjoys playing with him. Joey becomes jealous and wants his penguin back. He buys a second Hugsy in an attempt to give the newer penguin to Emma and take his original one back. Emma doesn't want the new Hugsy and Joey is left disappointedly taking the new Hugsy.

Hugsy

If you've watched the show or just simply read the quick synopsis, you might have wondered, can children really tell the difference between two identical stuffed animals?

The answer is yes. I've proved it. 

After my brother got married, he returned from his honeymoon and gifted me a stuffed penguin. It was a very cute stuffed penguin and he has received lots of love from me over the last 6 years. 

Meet Chilly Willy!

After my daughter was born, and even when we were preparing for kids and her arrival, I knew there were special stuffed animals I didn't want my children to mess with because they were special to me and I wanted them to last as long as they possibly could. If you know children and stuffed animals, there's a lot of abuse to be had: drool, food residue, puke, dirt, and overall abusive love. It's just simply how they play with them. I did not want Chilly Willy to experience any of this, so he stayed out of reach on our bed or hidden under the blankets.

Well...babies grow up and become mobile and get smart, and before you knew it she could climb onto our bed and locate Chilly Willy. So I did the best thing I could. I went online, located an identical version of my penguin, and bought it.

She was pretty excited when we got Chilly Billy...but I think I was more excited.

She definitely likes her penguin and holds onto him tightly. But you know what? If she ever catches a glimpse of Chilly Willy, she wants him. Put the two side by side? Chilly Billy is left behind every time.

I'm not sure why this is, but they know. Oh, they know.

DIY Play Dough

Often times, the only two classifications given are “working mother” and “stay-at-home mom” but what about those of us who watch our own kids for part of the time (or a whole 8-hour day) and then proceed to work in the afternoons or evenings or whenever we get a chance to for a few hours to another 4-8 hours? What if you do both?

As a working mother I feel pressure to do my job well and prepare. This involves knowing my lesson schedule, having books on hand for when students need new ones, and knowing what piece they’re working on so I know what to teach or have an idea of what to teach for the day. As a stay-at-home mom, I feel pressure to take my daughter out on play dates to socialize her as well as let her see the world and explore.

Because of this conundrum, I often find myself at a catch-22. If I choose to practice piano for 1-2 hours during her nap, I don’t get much else done during the day before I switch gears and teach for a few hours.  If I don’t practice during her nap, I can prep dinner, clean the house, do laundry, or even take a nap myself, but sometimes I’m left winging it and thinking fast during my lessons. If I take her out on a play date, which I both should and want to, she won’t get a good nap in unless our play date, including the drive, is not more than 2.5 hours and she can return home to nap at the proper time. 

So instead, much of my life looks like fast thinking, crying toddler fighting naps, being overtired and stressed out, and eating frozen corn dogs (or frozen something) for dinner more than occasionally. 

But sometimes, I feel like I actually have my life together and can do a multitude of things. Hence why we made play dough today. 

While cleaning out her toy bin, I found an unopened package of model magic from our trip to Crayola a few months ago. I hadn’t opened it yet because I wasn’t sure if she was ready to play with something moldable and not put it in her mouth. The model magic reminded me of play dough, so during her breakfast, I looked up a quick recipe for homemade play dough. It involved some ingredients I didn’t have on hand at home, but nothing a quick trip to the neighborhood store wouldn’t solve. 

So after breakfast, I loaded her up, and we went to the store to pick up the remaining ingredients I didn’t have. Being that I was only going to pick up two things, I decided to simply use my stroller instead of putting her in a shopping cart and just hold what I needed. Well, I ended up with seven items in my arms totaling just over 13 pounds. Actually, I take that back. I ended up with five of the items in my arms, and I gave my daughter two to be entertained. Don’t worry, I still held over 13 pounds with five items. Ask me if you’re curious. 

We left the store and returned home where I commenced to make play dough while she played in the living room. She was doing fine and I was at the final steps when she started crawling away. I wasn’t in the mood to shut the door and have her start a tantrum on me so I picked her up and put her in her high chair to watch me finish making play dough. (yes, she does that now. If you hinder her idea even before she gets to proceed with the idea, ie: shutting a door she wants to go through even though, she’s three feet away, she will start to cry and it does get annoying). 

I finished making the play dough and it actually turned out pretty well. I gave her a little ball to play with and practiced my dough kneading skills on the remaining ball. She wasn’t very interested to be honest. She touched it a few times and tried eating a small piece stuck to her finger, but that was about it. After a short lived time with the play dough that clearly wasn’t entertaining her like it was entertaining me, I put it away.

Compared to store bought play dough, I like the homemade version because:

• It’s soft and has the texture of real play dough
• I know what’s in it so if my daughter does try eating it or gets it in her mouth, I know she’s not eating chemicals. 

But, at the same time, I also don’t like the homemade version because:

• It’s greasier than the store bought ones. Not in a gross, runny way, but we played on a glass table and I had to wipe it after. To be fair I haven’t played with real play dough in many many years so maybe it has the same issue. 
• It’s got a starch/dough smell. I realize that the kind you buy also has a strong smell and I remember disliking it as a child, but I think having played with it for many years, I got used to it. 

When I get some more time or feel like it again, I’ll probably make another batch and maybe add some tweaks to experiment myself. If you’re interested, this is the recipe I used. It makes about 2 cups worth of play dough.

Airtight storage for my play dough. Next challenge: see how long it stays soft.

In short, it’s simply flour, water, salt, oil, cream of tartar, and food coloring.

Maybe my husband will be just as entertained with this as I was, even for a little bit. And now my daughter is awake, and I practiced piano for an hour before writing this blog, so I will now get ready to feed her, feed myself some leftovers or something frozen, and then teach for 2.5 hours nonstop this evening.

That's a normal day for us. :) 

The Dollhouse Furniture

There's a doctor somewhere out there who has brought me much grief. No, I was not her patient. No, nobody I know has been or is her patient. Why then? Because she never returned what she borrowed from me nearly 15 years ago.

We weren't even friends really. We went to school together. She was a few years older than me and I had "little sister syndrome." I wanted to hang with the older kids and do everything they were doing. No, don't worry, I never got myself in trouble....for the most part.

10th grade science was chemistry. They had a mole project assigned, and she was making a little "mole" house I think. She asked if I had dollhouse furniture and wanted to borrow them for her project. Me, having "little sister syndrome," immediately let her borrow the pieces she wanted. They were some of my favorites - the shower, the toilet (with a lid that actually lifted up and down), a sofa, etc.

Years after she had finished 10th grade chemistry and was about to graduate, I remember asking people to ask her about returning my dollhouse furniture. Because we weren't actually friends and the introvert and ever developing passive aggressive side of me thought it inappropriate to directly ask her for them back myself. I remember asking a friend to ask her, and he told me when he asked her about returning the pieces, she became angry. Who does that?

I never got the dollhouse furniture back. Years and years later when I was cleaning out my dad's house, I looked again at my incomplete set of dollhouse furniture which was missing some of my favorite pieces. It'd been so many years, I had long given up on ever seeing them again. I boxed away the remaining pieces and gave them away. I had convinced myself it wasn't worth keeping an incomplete set.

It was just a simple $10 40-pc set of girly dollhouse furniture from Toys 'R Us. Everything was constructed of plastic in shades of white, pink, and light blue. I loved that set of dollhouse furniture. The drawers and cabinets actually opened and closed. The tiny television had a sticker of New York City with the Statue of Liberty framed between the Twin Towers. The set came with a mommy, daddy, and baby doll. The baby even had a cradle that rocked back and forth.

As a child I asked for a lot of things. I wanted a lot of things as children do. And for the most part, I did not get them. This is not to say I did not receive things I wanted or that my mother never bought me things. She bought me a lot of things - clothes, books, snacks - but when it came to toys, she was always the first to say no. With all the toys I had growing up - and I had a lot, most of them meticulously taken care of and saved to this day - I remember my dad buying them.

I remember looking in the Toys 'R Us ad and flipping through the colorful pages. I saw this set of dollhouse furniture and remember it costing $9.99. Surely that price for the value would convince my mother to buy it for me. 40 pieces for $10? That's $0.25 a piece - what a steal! I showed it to my mother, and she actually agreed to buy it for me. I still remember going to the store with her, and she asked the salesman to get a package from the top shelf because she wanted to make sure the box we bought was in good condition.

Thinking about this memory always makes me cry. There's anger. There's sadness. I've told myself over and over again I just need to get over it and move on. In some ways I have. Over the years I've always just thought the dollhouse furniture was sentimental to me because my mother bought it, and having lost her, it made the things she gave me more meaningful. This time, when this memory resurfaced, I realized why this set of colorful, cheap plastic was truly sentimental: my mother said yes.

Teddy

This is Teddy.



Today is Teddy's 17th birthday. She's been through a lot with me these last nearly two decades, and she wasn't supposed to be mine to begin with.

Our Sunday school teacher at church motivated us with a point system. We would earn points for memorizing Bible verses, completing worksheets, and participating in class. The points could be used to trade for prizes at the end of the semester. I didn't particularly care about earning points so I didn't make an effort to do anything extra aside from going to class on Sundays because I had to go to church.

On the Sunday when we were trading in our points for prizes, the teacher pulled out an array of toys, games, and trinkets, and displayed them on the table. He called up the students first with the highest points earned that year to choose their prizes. After everyone with points had chosen their prizes, he was still left with a lot of toys and gifts on the table. He piled them all back into his bag but then changed his mind and pulled them back out again and set them on the table. He started calling us up one at a time to go pick something, not because we had earned the points to get a prize, but because he deemed us worthy of choosing one. He called me up to pick a prize and said I paid attention in class and didn't disrupt the class during lessons.

I timidly walked up and picked one of the few remaining teddy bears from the table and brought it back to my seat. From the very beginning, there was something so charming and so cute about this little bear.

Over the years, this bear has seen it all - the good days and the bad. Her wounds and scars are just a sampling of the experiences we've endured together. Her nose is no longer perfectly smooth and shiny, but chipped in small places from years of play and some abuse. There's a furless line running down the front from every time she's been through the washing machine, each time growing a little longer until it reached from her neck seam to the leg. She's missing toes on her left leg because the threads have pulled out. Her stuffing and beads are all mashed up and in the wrong places now. Both of her legs have been torn through years of ransom tug of war with my mother, and of course, I'd always have to let go through tears when I heard the seam rip. And my mother always sewed it up because she knew how I loved the bear.

I actually ran into my old Sunday school teacher at our church about a year ago. I mustered up the courage to walk up to him and say hi. He vaguely remembered that class and some of the other students. I told him about the bear he'd given to me and how I still had it. He met my husband and was a bit surprised at how early we'd gotten married.

Even now, 17 years later, weathered and worn, she possesses this same charm and cuteness. Happy birthday little bear. I've not forgotten that you were given to me through grace.