My little girl was the first to the nets.

Little Girl has been asking to play soccer for about a year now, as unbelievable as that sounds. We’d drive past the field and she’s squeal and ask me to stop the car. Now that she’s three, I decided to sign her up for a local program. We recently had our first session.

She was so excited on the way there. So much so that when we got to the field she didn’t even look back, running right over to join the other kids — four boys and three other girls. Once the coach explained the rules (for example, you don’t move unless you hear the whistle), she got right into it, running, kicking, and scoring goals.

I was impressed but not surprised to witness her athleticism. The kid is FAST and nimble and precise. She was the first one down the field with her ball, and the only one I saw getting behind the ball when it get away from her. Everything was going great until it was time to do an obstacle course: jumping from hoop to hoop, climbing through two upturned goals, and then kicking the ball into the goal.

“Okay, let’s let our princesses go first,” said the coach in his thick English accent. I sat there incredulous that he would engage in such blatant sexism when his program stresses that it “creates a supportive and positive environment.” How is it supportive or positive to belittle girls by calling them princesses, which are generally soft, sweet, and quiet. After all, you don’t see too many princesses running down a field wearing cleats.

Now, before you call me an annoying feminist harpy let me say that I wouldn’t have such a problem with the word “princess” if the coach called the boys “princes.” But he didn’t. They were “fellas” and “guys,” a fact I mentioned when I emailed the program director to point this out, along with the following note:

“You might think this is nit-picky or that I am being annoying bringing this up. However, by calling the girls “princesses” you set them apart from the boys. You make them different. On the soccer field they are not princesses. They are athletes, albeit small ones. Calling them princesses sends a very negative message, and one that separates them from the boys. I’m sure the coach means no harm, but there is harm since my girl and all of the girls on the team will fight against those stereotypes all their lives. My “princess” ran circles around a good majority of the boys. She should have the courtesy of being called something that denotes equality. Maybe you could bring this up to the coach in a positive, non-threatening, non-judgmental way? (Overall, I thought the coach was wonderful with the kids aside from this one issue.)”

I should have added that I don’t mind my daughter being treated like a princess at Disney World or when she’s playing dress-up, but on the soccer field, she should be treated like what she is and what she will become if given the right lessons and confidence-building verbal instructions:  a kick-ass running, jumping, and scoring machine.

We did a bunch of stuff to keep busy and have fun. I had Big Girl put on a piano recital for us. We ate breakfast. We played on the computer. We played a board game (my new favorite, Discovery Garden Game by The Wonder Forge. We connected via Ooovoo.com with my sister and her son, who is good friends with my kids. That killed a few hours, but Big Girl got bored. She thought we should go outside. Okay, I thought. Let’s do it. We got all dressed up in our snow pants, hats, gloves, snow boots, and warm socks and headed out.

There are no kids on our block so we decided to walk around the corner to see if anyone was out. (TONS of kids around the corner.) Nope, no one was out. Then the husband of my former Daisy troop co-leader drove by. He stopped and said hi. I asked if his kids were out. Yes, he told me, his wife had his kids outside building a fort. So, despite the fact that I didn’t call ahead of time and wasn’t invited, I made an executive decision. I walked over to say hello.

When we rounded the corner I saw my former co-leader out there with her two girls — both really sweet kids. Big Girl, who takes the bus with them, was thrilled. She jumped right in and started playing. Me? I grabbed a shovel and started shoveling and chatting. Then the nice woman who lives next door to my former co-leader came out, too bringing her little girl outside to join in the festivities. Nothing exciting happened, but it was comfortable and relaxing. I really enjoyed chatting with everyone and watching the kids play.

Around 2:30 I realized that the baby needed to go down for a nap so I tried rounding up Big Girl. My former co-leader said that the kids were having fun so I should leave her. That she would walk Big Girl home when they decided to go in. And like that Big Girl got an extended playdate. (And I got to carry a screaming and crying two-year-old for three blocks in the snow. “I WANT MY SISTER! MY SISTER HAS TO COME HOME!!! Sheesh.)

Anyway, I realized once I de-stressed from the walk home that I really don’t do that enough — put myself into uncontrolled social situations. But I should. If I would have hesitated, I would have made all of us miss out on a nice afternoon. So what that I wasn’t showered, didn’t have any make-up on, and didn’t call ahead? There should be no rules on a snow day. Hope we get another one really soon!

Okay, so whatever. But now, as I sit here planning the menu for my own playdate, I am nervously wondering if they will all hate me because I refuse to put out kid food. Or at least dread having to figure out what to feed their kids at my house. Usually, I’ll just order the one “kid” food I can stomach, which is pizza. (Little Girl likes pizza, but would rather spoon hummus out of the container.) Still, there are no nuggets anywhere. There’s a reason for that. Research keeps proving that kids will eat whatever you put out for them.

A December 2010 study — Mothers’ Diets Have Biggest Influence on Children Eating Healthy — out of Michigan State University’s College of Nursing found that “toddlers were less likely to consume fruits and vegetables four or more times a week if their mothers did not consume that amount or if their mothers viewed their children as picky eaters.”

So by putting out what I view as unhealthy stuff just because kids are picky eaters, I’m sending Little Girl a message: Kids should eat kid food. Not something that I believe. Still, I stress over it. I like to be the hostess with the mostess. I like my guest to be happy. I guess I’ll just have to hope they can be happy without fried food.

I won’t lie: This is a nerve wracking process. The first segment east is pretty tame. We stop for all the stop signs. When we go north, I start sweating. It’s a very busy road, and people drive too quickly. I spend most of the time reminding her to stay all the way to the right, and make sure my bike is to her left so I’ll be the first one smooshed. The last leg is terrifying. It’s a bunch of big roads, and even though we ride on the sidewalk it makes me nuts. Still, once we coast into that blocked off bike path I start to relax and enjoy myself.

Yesterday, we made it to the park and had just started doing the loop when I realized that it doesn’t matter where we are, the kid has the ability to twist my heart so hard that it hurts. Literally. We’re riding. Big Girl is practicing standing up on the bike. And then I see it: a tiny dip in the road. I start to call out, but it’s too late. She’s airborne going over the handlebars. I watch in slow motion as her tiny little body slams into the ground, her hands, chest, and knees making contact first.

I don’t remember how I got off my bike. I am on the ground picking her up, searching for blood, looking for bumps. Miraculously, there’s no blood. I am shocked. I thought she took a face plant, too, but we got lucky. Then I start taking stock. Huge, HUGE egg on her knee. Scraped hands. She’s in my arms and I’m rocking her and shushing her and asking her where she hurts. A car drives by on the outside. “Do you need an ambulance?” The woman, who watched my daughter sail off that bike, saw what I saw and assumed the worst. I thanked her and waved her off.

After drying off her tears and making Big Girl stand up I asked if she could ride the rest of the way home. At this point, every cell in my body is screaming. NO! I never, EVER want her to go on a bicycle again. I want to carry her home, wrap her in a bubble, and protect her forever. But I resist the urge to call my husband and demand a car ride home. I do what I know is best: I make her get right back on the horse. And she does. And when we get to the end of the first loop I ask he to do a second loop. Just to make sure she knows she can handle an entire loop without falling. And she’s willing.

After, we bike back to our house. I’m losing my mind inside. It’s getting dark, and I am picturing all the terrible things that can happen. She could swerve into the path of a car. She could hit a pothole. She could ride into a parked car. We make it almost all the way home — we can see our house — when she skids on wet leaves and goes down again. She was barely moving, so it wasn’t like the last one. It was more of a slow-motion side fall. But she’s crying again, and my heart is back in my throat. This time, we start walking back. I’m pushing both bikes, and she’s walking beside me. She finally stops crying, and I coax her back on the bike. I want her to ride into our driveway so we finish the trip on a positive note. She does, and we do, and we go inside.

Later, as she sits on the floor with an old-fashioned ice pack on her knee (WAY better than using a plastic bag, BTW) I start thinking truly crazy thoughts like, what if she has an internal injury? What if she broke something? I know it’s my crazy, but it feels horrible. Later, I tuck her into bed, kiss her goodnight, and wonder why no one ever told me how hard this parenting thing is on your soul.

While we were there we made a pit stop to the doll hospital. Sally-O, our well-loved, much played with Bitty Baby was in dire need of servicing. As I mentioned in a February post (complete with a photo), Bitty Baby’s right eye often stayed closed. Her hair was a wreck. Her right cheek had a pen stain. She looked like a doll that had been hugged a lot.

The woman behind the counter was very nice. She did a checkup. Everything was fixable, she told us. She checked her price list and gave me the damage for the damage. It would cost x price for a new eye and a quick cleanup, which would do nothing for the ink stain or the cut hair. (Although the hair would be brushed and made pretty again.) For an extra $5 they would give Sally-O a brand new head. It would be like getting a new doll.

I went back and forth about it until I decided that yes, I’d go for it. I’d change out the head. Little Girl helped me take off all Sally-O’s clothing and put her into a hospital gown. Then we handed her over to the “doctor” who told us Sally-O would come home in about two to four weeks via U.S. Postal Service complete with a new head, a hospital gown, and a cap. Little Girl was understandably upset when we told her the doll would be staying behind. At first she told us no, but we finally convinced her, although she did ask to give her sister’s doll another hug. (We had to pry it out of her arms after the hug…) She stopped crying when the nice woman at the counter assured us that she would take good care of the doll.

The bargain hunter inside of me loved what we did. A brand new doll for half the price of a new one? Plus, we were recycling? How awesome is that? Except…the mom in me was dying inside. Sally-O has been such an integral part of our life. Big Girl has taken her everywhere since she we got her almost four years ago. Sally-O has been to playdates and parties and to Disney World. She’s been to Woodloch Pines at New Year’s. She’s been on long car trips, and to both of her “great” grandmas’ homes. She’s sat with us at dinner, and slept with Big Girl at night. She’s been a part of the family. And now she’s gone forever. As much as it’s true that the Sally-O that’s coming back to us in the mail will look the same, she will be a new doll. All the reminders — yes, even the cut hair and the stain left by the drive-by magic marker attack — will be gone. I wonder if I did the right thing.

I have a Free Moving Barbie doll. She looks a lot like Sally-O did. Her hair is trashed — knotted and gross, to be honest. She’s got some marker on her feet. One of her arms is a little loose. And yet I am so happy I have her, a reminder of the marathon Barbie sessions I had with my sister. We’d set up my brother’s train table as our Barbie world. A shoebox was a TV stand. We had a plastic pool, the Barbie van, an outdoor camping set. We spent hours and hours in that basement, and looking at that Barbie brings it all back for me. Have I, by freshening up Sally-O, taken away a piece of Big Girl’s childhood? Will she regret the loss of her constant companion? Was I simply too cheap to buy the little one her own Bitty Baby Doll? I’m not 100 percent sure, but I think I’m going to make a phone call this morning. Who needs a new head when a new eye that opens and closes might suffice?

What was your favorite childhood toy? Do you still have it? Would love to hear about it.

She was the narrator. She was supposed to run onto the stage and start the play. Instead of running, though she tripped, or so my mother and husband told me. She went down hard, they said, hitting her side and her face. Amazingly, she got right back up again and started saying her lines. She didn’t cry. She didn’t fuss. She took the old stage adage — the show must go on — to heart, I guess. She is six. That’s pretty incredible in my book.

I wonder how she would have reacted if I was there. I get so nervous when stuff like that happens. My heart would have twisted just like it did when I heard about the mishap. It would have shown it on my face, too. I may have gotten a bit misty, my heart hurting for her. Maybe she would have cried if she saw me cry? Probably.

I got to go to the 7 p.m. show. I got there super-early so I could grab a front row center seat. I sat and watched her read her lines and was in awe of that little girl. When did she become so articulate? When did she get so BIG? And even later, when a huge crash of thunder and lightening caused the lights to flicker and I saw fear cross my baby’s face, I was still impressed. She is not a fan of the dark. (I wasn’t, either, well into my 20s, actually.) Her hands went up to her mouth. Her eyes got big. She fidgeted. I could tell all she wanted to do was run into my arms. But she continued. She finished the play. With the thunder booming all around us and the threat of a black out very real, and yet she did it.

At the end of the show she came to stand in front of me and I grabbed her and pulled her onto my lap, squeezing her extra tight and telling her how proud I was of her. She beamed. We left that school two very happy people. On the way home she got quiet, though. She sighed and said how sorry she was that the play was over. She loved doing it, she said. And then she asked if we could get ices. I was sorry it was over, too, I told her. And yes, we could get ices. I didn’t tell her that I was tearing up realizing that another year was over and there was no way to stop time to keep her a little girl for a little while longer.

Are you looking forward to the summer? Have any teary moments with your kids lately? Would love to hear about them.

Second, my big girl inherited my “love” of the water. I did not do this to her. My husband, a water loving guy who spends his life on boats and in pools, encouraged her to swim as a baby. But she never liked it until last year when she joined a local swim team. Third: My big girl attended swim lessons for four years. The combination of intense fear and a rudimentary knowledge of what to do if she fell in meant my big girl was relatively safe around water. She would never go in alone, and if she fell in she knew, after hours and hours of lessons, what to do to save herself.

My little girl is the complete opposite of her sister. She has absolutely no fear of the water. My big girl would scream if she got even a sprinkle of water on her face. The little one screams to go into the shower and, once there, looks up into the falling water laughing and smiling. In the bathtub the big one always asked to have a washcloth close by to dry her eyes should they get wet. The little one ages me every time she throws herself under the water trying to swim. It’s so bad I have to sit on the edge of the tub with my feet in the water while I am bathing her. With my feet in I can move more swiftly to pull her out. She wants to swim and doesn’t care if, when she submerges her entire head, she drinks a little water. (Which she does several times during every bath.) This is why I was especially interested in the updated guidance from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) related to swimming. (It’s also why she takes a lot of showers.)

The AAP’s stance used to be that toddlers — kids between the ages of 1 and 3 — shouldn’t take organized swim lessons, a fact that haunted me every time my big girl stepped into the swim class. Today, however, it reversed its stance saying that everyone over a year should take a swim class. From the press release: “New evidence shows that children ages 1 to 4 may be less likely to drown if they have had formal swimming instruction. The studies are small, and they don’t define what type of lessons work best, so the AAP is not recommending mandatory swim lessons for all children ages 1 to 4 at this time. Instead, the new guidance recommends that parents should decide whether to enroll an individual child in swim lessons based on the child’s frequency of exposure to water, emotional development, physical abilities, and certain health concerns related to pool water infections and pool chemicals.”

So someone like my little girl, who lives in a beach community, rides on a boat every weekend and is so strong that she can do a basket hang on the uneven bars BY HERSELF should absolutely be learning to swim. And she will be. I had enrolled her a while back, but work got in the way. I had a credit that I needed to use so I recently signed her up for classes. One-on-one once a week for six weeks. I’m sure we’ll have to continue them, too, since she’s intent on spending the entire summer splashing around in a pool.

Of course, even with the lessons I intend on following the AAP’s other guidance: never leaving her alone for a second and keeping her in a life preserver while we’re on the boat — stuff that’s even more important for my little fearless swimming wanna be.

Do you swim? Do your kids? How am I going to spend the summer in the pool when I hate it…sigh…

My personal playground.

Take a look at the photo above. Ignore the fact that it is an obvious attempt to give my kids all the stuff I never had as a child. Also, that it looks like a daycare or a school. Then take another look. Know how much I paid for everything? About $300 total including the swingset. Amazing, right?

The swingset came from a garage sale. The woman just wanted it out of her backyard. I paid about $250 including the cost of having her “man” disassemble it there, drive it to my house and re-assemble it. I had Wood Kingdom, the place she bought it from, come and give it a good tune up, which included tightening all the screws, staining it and checking it all to make sure it was in good working condition. While I was there paying for the appointment I found the nice rock climbing wall. It was on clearance. My mom (and maybe my in-laws) picked it up for Big Girl’s birthday a few years ago.

The Little Tikes 8-in-one tube and slide combo was free. A neighbor was throwing it away. I got the first half of the pieces on Monday night. I brought it home and my husband was mad since there were so many pieces missing. He wanted to know why I brought home a bunch of junk. Don’t worry, I told him, I’ll be stalking the house on Thursday night. That’s when they will put the rest of the pieces out, and I’ll be there to grab them. They did, and we got a cool, much-sought-after item. That big playhouse in the back? $40 at a garage sale. The guy even dropped it off in my driveway. The triangle climber was $8. Another garage sale. I picked up the merry-go-round off Freecycle for free, of course. The sit and spin thingy was a Craigslist find. $20. I got the castle on Craigslist, too. I can’t remember what I paid, but it wasn’t too much. The two rollercoasters? I got one in the garbage and paid $5 for the other. Everything else was free from the trash.

The see-saw from last night's trash collection.

Last night I added another piece to my playground. I was driving home when I spotted a Kettler see-saw out with someone’s trash. It was beautiful except for a bent center piece. Knowing how wonderful that company is I grabbed it. This morning we called Kettler. Once I pay for a replacement piece I will have a beautiful quality piece of equipment that Little Girl has already pronounced, “Mine!”

Okay, so who cares that I am feeding my childhood issues with garbage? Everyone should. More than half of the items in my backyard were earmarked for the trash, including the steel seesaw. It makes me sick at heart to see how much stuff is just tossed out without a thought as to where it’s going to end up. You know where it goes, right? It all ends up in a landfill somewhere in Pennsylvania or Ohio. Lots of plastic that will never degrade. Metal, too. The sad part is that most of the items could have been put out on recycling day where they would have found new life as decking or building supports or whatever they would have been made into.

Anyway, I write this post to remind people to think before tossing. Can that item be put out to recycle? If it’s metal, does your town have a scrap recycling program? Mine does, and I’m calling it to pick up my old metal glider that rusted and broke in the big hurricane-that-wasn’t. Again, I’m not trying to make anyone crazy. I’d just love to see more of us think about our waste stream with a little more care. Recycle, reduce, reuse, right?

How’s your week going? Do you ever garbage pick? If so, what was your best find?

BookSwim. Last week I bought The Red Tent. It was our book club selection. I wanted to take it out of the library or nab it on BookMooch, but after waiting patiently I finally gave up. Wish I would have known about BookSwim before I made my purchase. The service, which charges you between $9.95 and $59.95 per month depending on how many books you want to borrow per month, will mail books directly to you and take them back when you’re done.

Safety Assessments for playgrounds. How safe is your school’s playground? How about the one at your park? The University of Alabama at Birmingham has created playground safety checklists that can be downloaded here. (Click on Supporting Documents at the bottom of the page.) A wonderful free resource for any parent or grandparent.

Child Online Safety Guide. With accounts of cyberbullying and cyberstalking making the news all the time I decided I would pass along this resource, which a PR person passed along to me. Good list of dos and don’ts related to online safety for kids. (I plan on using it next year as the basis for a a Girl Scout Brownie Try-it patch.)

Open Center Online Learning. The New York Open Center is a holistic learning center located in — where else?– New York. So if you want to attend one of the more than 500 programs it runs you need to come this way. Until now. This month the Center launched an online repository of downloadable podcasts that include subjects like Reiki, meditation, reflexology, Feng Shui and Chinese Medicine, among other topics. Some are free; others require payment. (I’m planning on downloading some to my iPod the next time I have to go into the city.)

That’s it for now. Hope everyone has a good weekend. I plan on blogging over the weekend since I am starting WordCount’s Blogathon 2010, which requires daily blogging from May 1 to May 31. Not sure how coherent my weekend posts will be — my weekends are crazy with more events and chores than time to do them — but we’ll see! Hope you’ll stop by to check it out.

She got on the bike tentatively. She was nervous. She was upset. It was like she was starting over. She kept stopping and dropping her bike. Once so hard that the reflector popped off. She often let the bike fall on her, scratching up her legs. Another time she got a huge scrape on her knee because she just stopped riding and jumped off instead of making the turn. I didn’t handle any of that very well. I was aggravated to begin with since the weekend was piled up with events and appointments. I just wanted Big Girl to get it then and there so we could ride off into the sunset together. My expectations were a little flawed. I can see that now, but at the time it was so frustrating.

So terrible mommy that I am, what did I do? I sighed. I rolled my eyes. I acted impatient. Big Girl finally let me know what she thought of my teaching and parenting skills. She stopped, dropped the bike again, and wailed. “You don’t love me because I can’t do this. You are all, ‘Sigh. Sigh.’” she said, acting out my infantile behavior. She was right. I was acting like a baby. I stopped and apologized. I told her she could do it. And that she was doing a great job. I was the one who was doing the wrong thing. I was not being a good teacher. And I was sorry. (As usual.) Once we ironed out the fact that I thought she was doing a good job and I reinforced that fact with a hug and kiss, her confidence seemed to reappear. She started doing her turns. Then doing circles. Then working on starting up without help. We still need to work on the last part, but she got the idea of making turns and circles really quickly. She was beaming from ear to ear. Another mini milestone. And for me? Another failed parenting moment.

We are who we are. Big Girl was born, I am convinced, with my perfectionist leanings and super-high standards for herself. (I say that because I look at my two girls and they are completely different. Little Girl could care less about pleasing people. For Big Girl, it’s one of her main goals.) And because I was born with the same I expect at all times that I will be a great teacher and my kids will get things automatically. Expectations are often wrong, though, and the pressure that those expectations put on both kids and everyone around me is wrong, too. I am sure this won’t be the last time I confess to being a sucky parent, but at least I’m trying to be a better one, right? That, like Big Girl’s efforts to start her bike on her own, should could for something.

What’s your parenting style? How do you teach your kids without getting frustrated? Was your parent like I am? If so, how many years did you spend in therapy? I’d like to know.