Screen time confessions
Alright, alright, lets be honest here. A woman can only play Barbies while riding the couch like a boat for so long before she snaps. Especially when her three year old could literally do this ALL DAY LONG. That same woman can only sit and be bossed around by that same three year old about which color to use on which part of the paper and draw exactly what that three year old wants for so long before her eye twitches a little. Don't get me wrong; I really do love imaginary play time with my girl. Watching your kid get into pretend adventures and develop a beautiful little imagination is such a fulfilling part of being a parent. But mama can only play these games so many hours of the day.... Scarlett is not yet in preschool (Just a little mommy school once a week for an hour and a half) so we have a lot of down time. That leaves a lot of time for endless imaginary games. A three year old can only take so much "let's practice your letters, numbers and shapes" before she snaps as well. So this game goes both ways. We live in a state that gets pretty cold in the winter, even though it's been a mild year with little snow, I'm a California girl. If it's under 60, good luck getting me out with bundled up kids and snotty noses to enjoy a ten minute stint on the swings before the "I'm cold" melt downs start. I love the outdoors, hate the cold. I'm a much better parent in the summer. ;)
What I'm getting at-- we've spent a lot of the winter with our TV going... I mean we've watched "Annie" at least six times this week. Scarlett actually told me that I'm just like Ms. Hannigan this morning... Yeah, not the new, sexy Cameron Diaz Ms. Hannigan. We've got the old, scarier and much less attractive Ms. Hannigan playing in our house. That was a good self-esteem boost. And excuse me for making you eat your breakfast, kid. Mean mom alert.
But let's be honest, it's hard with two small ones to find constant entertainment and new ideas to keep them busy! Watching back-to-back episodes of "Sofia the First" keeps everyone from burning the house down. And it's often times the only way for the bathrooms to get cleaned. Welles has little interest in the TV unless it's "Baby Signing Time" and usually just rolls around with toys when sister watches. That kid makes everything a little simpler for me. But yes, I'm having some mommy guilt about the amount of Screen time we get around here.
This week, I decided to do a fun and different activity every day. Not nessicarily something we've never done, just something we don't do enough. It's brought a really fun energy to our day and makes me feel like we're kind of accomplishing something. It's not like we're doing anything extravagant or time consuming, just something to switch it up. It's also adds more mess and clean up time, which we can never get enough of (sarcasm), but definately worth it. Yesterday's activity was painting and naturally I documented. That way, in years to come when we look back at pictures of these times, It will look like I was a really good and creative mom!
Welp, gotta run! Scarlett needs my to play on my computer (joking, joking)!
