When I was young, my mother used to tell everyone she was 21. And she continued to turn 21 every year until her oldest child turned 21. From that point on, she never had another birthday. Instead, I'd call to wish her a "Happy Day".

When I became a parent, I realized how much work, energy, and effort it takes to raise kids. I decided I would never pretend I was younger than I am. Instead, I want credit for all of the extra years that were added to my age thanks to sleepless nights, exhausting days, endless worrying, and sheer force of will needed on some days to keep going.

I am a big fan of sleep! I have spent years of my life practicing this important skill and I'm proud to say that I have mastered the art of sleep. I could easily sleep 10 hours a night and happily take a nap the next afternoon. Waking up in the morning, then rolling over and going back to sleep is truly one of life's simple pleasures.

My infant child did not believe in the wonderous majesty of sleep and if she was not sleeping, then neither was anyone in the house. I remember nights where we'd spend hours trying to rock the baby to sleep only to realize it was time for the next feeding.

I was endlessly astounded by the sheer amount of energy a small child could generated. I often joked that strollers were backwards. Why was the exhausted parent pushing an over-energized child? Instead, we should make parent-sleds. The parent sits comfortably in the sled and a team of small children provide the locomotion and burn some of that crazy energy before nap time!

Mr. Stuffy is my daughter's emotional support toy. He goes everywhere with her! Inevitably, that means he occasionally needs a "spa treatment" as we call it (aka a run through the washing machine and dryer).

I'd timed his "spa treatment" perfectly so he'd be washed and dried just in time for bedtime. I stepped into our garage to pull Mr. Stuffy out of the dryer to find he'd been mangled beyond recognition! With my daughter just steps behind me, I had to think of something fast! I quickly sent her to go pick out some books to read before bedtime and got to work with my sewing needle and thread.

It was not my best suture work, but Mr. Stuffy was reassembled and in one piece just in time! Mr. Stuffy will probably suffer some residual PTSD, but at least my daughter did not catch a glimpse of him in his less-than-unified state.

Shopping for Halloween costumes with a small child is an adventure!!! You need to get to the costume store early enough to still have a good selection BUT you need to time the shopping trip close enough to Halloween so your small child still likes the character depicted in the costume by the time the holiday rolls around.

Last year, I made the mistake of asking my 3 year old what costume she wanted back in September. Within the span of 30 days, she was adamant that she wanted to be a dinosaur, and then a skeleton, and then a princess, and then a puppy police officer, and then a fire fighter, and then a dinosaur again.

The week before Halloween, we lucked out and found a skeleton costume with a tu-tu. She LOVED it! She actually continued to wear it through the rest of the year... Who's kid arrived to daycare dressed as a skeleton in December? My kid ;)

My daughter is a climber. There is no piece of furniture she cannot scale. It all started before she could walk. We had this giant playpen we used to set up whenever we needed her to be stationary. We'd load it with stuffed animals and toys so she would not get bored but I always tried to avoid hard toys in the playpen so she would not accidently fall on them and hurt herself.

One of her favorite hard toys was a cookie tin. I'd been emptied long ago, but she loved the sound it made when she banged on it.

I'd purposely left it out of the playpen and was going about my chores when I looked over to see she'd stacked her stuffed animals into a staircase and was teetering precariously over the edge of the playpen reaching for her cookie tin. She grabbed it, pulled it into the playpen, looked over at me, and stuck out her tongue.

When I was pregnant, I bought every when-you're-expecting parenting book I could find. 📖 I was determined to know everything before the baby arrived.

I had not bought a "how to raise your child during a pandemic" guide though, honestly, had I seen one when I was pregnant in 2018 I probably would have thought it was ridiculous and wouldn't have bought it. 😂🤣

I guess it really didn't matter because nine months later I'd finished reading all of the books but my child refused to follow any of the typical advice given anyway! 🤦‍♀️🤷‍♀️

I took some liberties with this one to make the story fit a one-panel greeting card. The real story has a couple funny moments...

My daughter is a rough-and-tumble kind of kid. She loves to wrestle and tackle her parents. One day, when I was feeling a bit beat up from the day and had the brilliant idea to pretend to be a horse and let her ride on my back. Down on all fours, I let her climb onto my back. I bucked and jostled as she held on and laughed.

"I'm riding a cow," she yelled out. "Actually, you're a cowboy and I'm a horse".

"Oh," she said. Then she yelled, "Ride A Cowboy!"

"It's Ride 'Em Cowboy!" I choked out between laughs.

This just boggles my mind! I am all the way on the other side of the room. I'm obviously busy; most likely doing something for the benefit of my small child.

From across the room, I hear my daughter yell "you get it!" as she points to some object that's literally 2 feet from her...

Don't try to counter that she's closer or that she dropped it so she should pick it up! That's just asking for a melt down!