When you become "that" parent.....

I outsmarted myself yet again, yesterday. I offered to take the girls out of the house so that John could clean, reasoning that since he had let the house get into that state, he could get it out.

So, I put Anneliese up front in the van with me, where she couldn't pull out Rori's pacifier, and off we went. Thus far, the plan worked well. Rori napped, Anneliese watched her DVD player, all was well. We arrived at the mall, and I unpacked all the baby gear necessary for an outing, then the baby, then Anneliese. As we walked into the mall, I thought to myself that I ought to have packed a spare outfit for Rori - the last two trips I'd taken with her in the stroller had gotten.... messy.

Sure enough, about 20 minutes later a massive baby blow out necessitated a complete change. *sigh* I changed her diaper, removed her adorable little leg warmers, and rolled up the soiled portion of her romper. Then upstairs we went to Gymboree, where a clearance sale was underway (lukcy for me). $4.79 later I was changing her into a clean, cute onesie. Soiled outfit went into the shopping back for biological containment.

Then to the bookstore, where I sent an elderly clerk in search of the Liffey Rivers series of books, to no avail. I wanted to shoulder her away from the screen and do the search myself - as search results are closely related to what you put into each field. *sigh*. I found them on line when I got home, here.

Still killing time, we wandered down to the Dairy Queen. I got a cone for Anneliese (who wants the cone, but not so much the ice cream). And a Blizzard for Rori and I. I frog-marched them over to a table, set down the ice cream, and went to sit the baby upright for easier feeding. Anneliese, not knowing the meaning of the word "patience," grabbed her cone, pulled it to her, and let go again - knocking it on the floor. I sighed, and picked it up to put in the trash. Cue Anneliese sobbing, as she only knew Momma had thrown away her treat - not understanding really that I was going to go get her another. So I picked up the other cup of ice cream - which I had set down in front of Rori - and she started sobbing - also deprived of ice cream. So the Parade of Woe hiked back to the DQ for another ice cream cone amid much weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth. Rori launched her pacifer, which was retrieved and returned, with significant trepidation, by a kind gentleman. By the time the interlude was over and everyone was again content, I had spent a slid 5 minutes - that felt like an eternity - being "that" mother with the weeping children that everyone looks askance at in silent horror and pity.

I shoulda stayed and cleaned the house!

The ID shopping list....

So the Irish Dance place will take Anneliese AND an aide, without us paying 2x the tuition, which I think is very nice of them. So I have until classes start in Sept to get her gear together.

The list:
Tote bag
T-shirt
Shorts
Poodle socks
ghillies

She won't need a school dress for a while, if ever. Same with the curlers. But I'll bookmark some stuff, just in case. Heck, she may never even get into hard shoes. But as long as she enjoys herself, good enough.

I suspect, if she does like it enough to continue, by the time Rori is old enough she'll want in on this. ;-) Here we see the real disadvantage to the fact that they look nothing alike. I can't hand down Anneliese's things. Especially things like a dance wig and probably the shoes. She has SUCH skinny feet. Though Rori MIGHT, I may be better off to sell them and just get new ones for Rori should I need to.