Today Evy came into bed with us at 6am, burning up with a fever. She was a sweetheart, all cuddly and sleepy, but we could tell she wasn’t feeling herself. Of course I couldn’t take her to school and head to work, so we lounged around in bed watching cartoons until 9.
We finally made our way downstairs to share a poptart picnic in the living room floor. Evy saw a commercial for a kids’ music cd, and told me, “I want some of that.” So we put on our raincoats and headed to Wal-Mart. I had been wanting to buy her a boom box for her room, since she loves music and dancing so much, anyway.
Of course, 5 minutes into our car ride she passed out, exhausted. I persevered, and woke her up with a loud “We’re here!” as we parked at the store. She woke up SO HAPPY to go shopping, and this attitude lasted ALMOST the entire time we were inside. We picked up a little boombox, and a cd of 150 toddler songs, the movie Bolt, and some other random items that jumped into our cart as we walked around. (i.e. tiny yellow velcro baseball glove and ball…you know, necessities.) I was still looking for a little step stool when the meltdown began. I decided to leave immediately.
The incident began with her request to get down and walk, followed by my denial of her request, and then things spiraled. She stood up in the seat and leaned toward me and certainly would have jumped had I not grabbed her and put her on my hip, still pushing the cart with one hand. You can imagine how 3-Stooges-like it must have looked. So, I convinced her to get back in the cart so I could pay, and we left without incident. Other than trying to get out of the cart in the rainy parking lot.
So we came home with visions of assembling the boombox and playing some toddler tunes and having fun fun fun. Instead, we had meltdown after meltdown about everything from her jacket zipper to her shoes to her juicebox. She wanted nothing, she didn’t want to be held nor left alone. She didn’t want to eat or nap or play or sit together or color or dance or practice letters or A N Y T H I N G. She just cried and cried and threw herself on the floor.
Finally I made myself some cheese nachos and ate them in front of her, trying to tempt her without actually asking her if she wanted any, which would have certainly insulted her and initiated a huge tantrum. She cried about it for about 20 minutes while I ate, then she grabbed a chip, dipped it in the queso, sat back, took a bite, and said, “I like it.” WHEW. We had a nice time after that, with only a few touchy moments for the rest of the evening.
Her fever never came back, and we shared some quality time, which really was awesome. I will blame the rest on the “TWO’s.”