For Christmas, my daughter fell in love with an adorable
play kitchen she received from her Ninas (Godmothers). She even loved the
presentation of the gift on Christmas Eve as it was the last gift to open and
the largest box in the room! This little kitchenette has a fantastic tale to
tell, from its original purchase to its resting place among Neel Royalty for
the next several years…
On Thanksgiving Day 2012, Wal-Mart’s Black Friday bargains
began at 800P. My daughter’s In-Love-With-Shopping-Nina, Carlene, was the one
just crazy enough to brave the masses for the greatest deals of the season. There
were 8 adults babysitting the giant shrink-wrapped boxes until the store gave the
signal that Black Friday had officially started. However, only 7 kitchens were
available. Her Nina sat near those boxes like Horton Hatches the Egg. When the
time came, she pounced on the box she had been eyeballing for the last hour. A man
placed a hand on the box in his feeble attempt to claim it, and she nearly bit
it off with a growl. Her 4 ft 9 in self hobbled the 2x3 ft box and the rest of
her purchase to checkout all by herself. When she got to the parking lot, the
box wouldn’t hobble so great. Luckily, a Wal-Mart employee offered his services
of which she reluctantly accepted, but not until she told him how she didn’t
trust anyone on this day with her hard earned purchase. Carlene knew what she
wanted and she knew how much my daughter would love it. Just like Horton, “I
meant what I said and I said what I meant, and an elephant's faithful, one
hundred percent!" it’s nice for my daughter to have someone in her corner
that looks out for her royal interests.
You all know when Christmas is, and here we are in the last
week of January. If you have children, you understand the importance of making
room, purging, if you will, your children’s toy room and closets. These were
all necessary steps before I crammed this unit in her bedroom somewhere. For
the last week or so, I have been diligently making way for their Christmas
loot. Wednesday was when I was able to assemble the Little Tikes Gourmet Prep ‘n
Serve Kitchen.
Not sure how long this would take, and knowing full well I
will get more done with my children happily occupied, I loaded up the DVD
player, filled a giant bowl of Goldfish for them and handed her a 24 oz water bottle
to minimize my disturbances. I just bought myself 80 minutes! I empty the box
of all its contents, look for the instructions and head to the garage for all
the necessary tools.
Following the step by step instructions, I think to myself
that this is relatively easy and I’ll be done before the kids’ movie is up! As
I assemble the big components, they need to be screwed together. There are indentations
where the screws belong, but no holes. That is why the instructions tell me I
may need a hammer to maybe puncture a hole where I need to screw the pieces
together. The tiny plastic bag has a hundred screws in it. How many holes am I
maybe gonna have to make?? Grrr. So I’m hammering away which draws the
attention of my little fan club. As patiently as an impatient mother can be, I
tell them to get back to their movie. Hammering continues and my son, aka Curious
George, comes back and is so eager to use the hammer, I think he’s gonna burst.
He won’t leave me be completely, so he starts to play with all the kitchenette
accessories. He threw the fake orange over the banister. We could hear it
bouncing off the hardwood below. I send him down there to retrieve it, with strict orders NOT to
come back until it’s found. That bought me like, I dunno, 45 seconds? He comes
back upstairs and says it’s got to be in his room (even though we both saw him
throw it).
The hammering resumes. The boy returns yet again. This time
he’s playing with the Philips. The very thought of those possibilities strikes
fear into my deepest darkest thoughts. I swipe it from him and now he’s the one
upset. I’ve got one eye on his shenanigans and the other on my hammer.
Naturally, I lost focus on the task at hand and smash my thumb. I let out a
yelp and the two of them come to see what happened. When I explained to them the
dangers of working with tools because this exact thing is what can happen, the
boy points a finger at me and laughs the laugh of Nelson from The Simpsons, “Heh-HEH!”
and walks away. I did my best Yosemite Sam impression, shaking my head, mumbling
inaudible profanities under my breath.
Back to the hammer. This time around piques my daughter’s
curiosity. She is quite observant and stands next to me quietly sucking her
thumb. “Mom, your boobies wiggle when you hammer.” She walks back to the toy
room. *sigh*
I finally manage to get all the big pieces together and screwed
in place. The next step is sticker placement. I grab the hammer, screwdriver
and extra screws and put them under my legs so he can’t get to them. The
stickers go all over the kitchen so I’m up and down and sideways trying to get
them placed just right. During that process, the boy sneaks away my hammer. I
yell at him to give it back because he’s gonna hurt himself. He does not like
being told what to do, but he knows how serious I am. That’s when he decided to
chuck it at me. The hammer. Thankfully he’s not a good arm, so it falls short
and lands on my big toe. My initial reaction was to scoop it up and throw it
back at him. He immediately fell asleep and I was able to finish my project
without incident.
But that last part really didn’t happen. I couldn’t hurt my
kid like that and admit it in a public forum, silly! After I responsibly
parented that situation with love and a hug, I finally completed the kitchen
assembly! WooHoo!
I placed it in my Princess’ room, right next to her Disney
Princess vanity. We put all the utensils, pots, pans and food in their
respective spots and the kids went to town with the thing! It was a great
sight.
She sat down at her vanity and asked if she could put make-up on before
she prepares dinner. She had asked
Santa for her very own makeup and he complied. This was the first time I was
allowing my 4 yr old to apply the makeup all by herself. I left the room to
clean up the tools and leftover parts & wrappers. When I came back to her
room, this is what I found.
My sparkling beauty was so proud of herself, but she couldn’t
see very well as she had mistakenly applied pixie dust into her eyeball. I
whisked her off to the bathroom to wash her face. In our absence, the boy took
her place at the vanity. I was so consumed with her, that I didn’t take notice of
the impending doom. We returned to find that he had demolished her eye shadow
compact. My daughter doesn’t know what he did, not yet anyway, and I dread the
moment when she realizes what transpired while we were at the sink. While I was
cleaning up all the dust and powder from the vanity, I looked at the boy. I
saw his hands, then his shirt. Holding my breath, my eyes slowly made their way
up to his face, only to find a forehead of sparkly mess. I refrained from
laughter and asked him what he did. That’s when my 2 yr old son shouted, “I’m a
Princess, too!”
I went way past my 80 minute movie time frame. After
cleaning everyone and everything up, it was nearly 800P and we hadn’t eaten
dinner yet! Where did the time go?! There was no way I was cooking in my real kitchen.
I threw them in their carseats and made our way to In N Out because we all deserved
to be rewarded for the evening we just had. The boy fell asleep in the drive
thru line and he didn’t wake up ‘til the morning. WooHoo! But don’t worry…I
didn’t leave him in the car overnight.
I wouldn’t trade a swollen thumb and a limp for anything as
long as my kids are happy and keep making me laugh uncontrollably. I may suffer
from a bruised ego because my wiggly boobies entertain my daughter and my son
never listens to me, but I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… it’s all
worth it. The sleepless nights, adult-less days, barking orders, cleaning up
messes, days without a shower… I would do it all again in a heartbeat because
my pint-size family makes me the happiest I’ve ever been.
Disclaimer: If you happened upon this blog and don’t know me
from Adam, it’s important to mention that I would never harm my children with
hardware. I’m a great Mom with a sarcastic tone who loves a little witty
banter. No need to get Children & Family Services involved here. Okay?
Thanks.
