Peace On That

Jaimie and I provided a nice Easter Saturday for mini-mom. We turned the Easter basket into a scavenger hunt. I printed four papers with pictures symbolizing a room. The first I taped on my bedroom dresser that directed her to go to the bathroom. She was talking with Jaimie and the conversation went something like this:

Mini-mom: I don’t think the Easter Rabbit came.

Jaimie: What makes you think that?

Mini-mom: Maybe he got busy and the big house across the street because they have six kids.

(They don’t have any kids but that’s the rationale of a four-year-old mind)

Suddenly she spots the picture on the dresser. She pulls it off and runs to the bath room screaming, “Look what the Easter Bunny left!”

I instructed her how to follow the picture and she was able to do it. We went from the bathroom to the chair in the living room. Then we were off to the refrigerator. Finally, it stopped at the rocking chair. She had her basket.

Later that morning we hike over to the El Segundo Easter Egg hunt. There are a lot of kids and start my coaching on how to get the most candy.

Me: See that area with all of the candy and eggs?

Mini-mom: Yeah.

Me: Go there and pick up as much as you can. Don’t run around the field. Go to one spot and grab candy!

Mini-mom: Ok

Me: (rubbing her shoulders) Ok champ. What are we here for?

Mini-mom: Candy!

Me: What are we here for?

Mini-mom: Candy.

The bell sounds and they’re off. Hundreds of kids running around like a chicken with its head cut off grabbing mounds of candy. But there is a glitch in the Matrix. Someone bumped Mini-mom. She turns with tears streaming from her eyes and runs back to me.

But this was no time to console. There was too much candy at stake. So I grab her hand and walk her back out to the field. Eventually she gets her mojo and starts collecting the good. Suddenly, a friend from her pre-school spots and in the midst of pandemonium, they strike up a conversation. After about 30 seconds of this I scream, “Ladies. CANDY!” They got the idea and went back to collecting the goods.

After it was all over a little girl walks over to us with sad eyes. She has no eggs in her basket. I ask mini-mom if she wanted to share some of hers and she did. She’s such a sweet little girl. But it has become evident to me that my hopes of having her be one of the few girls that play pee-wee football is not going to happen. It looks like ballet and piano lessons are here for the foreseeable future