We're In Plain View

Thanks to all for the comments and personal emails. I appreciate you trying to talk me off the ledge of last week. She is now being a mostly perfect child again. Of course, she is asleep right now so that isn't a fair statement. We are up in New York and I still prove to suck as a parent:
We left our home (which is 725 miles away) and I didn't check what Noodle packed for toys. She packed all Polly Pockets. Aren't they great? I mean, they are small and have tones of interghangeable outfits and we can have loads of fun dressing up and playing. They are a great role playing toy. Unless you are around someone under the age of 3 who could eat most of the clothes and choke to death. My cousin K8 one time told me she only has one shoe of all her older daughter's Pollys and she thinks it is because the younger shild, who has a well known shoe fetish (at the ripe old age of two) has eaten half of them. All the toys Noodle brought with her have to stay in the hotel when we go over to my friend's house to hang out with the one year old (who is actually cuter than this picture, she really is). Noodle is trying so hard to be a good kid while she hangs outs with us (we are trying to be good adults while we are hanging out listening to Hubby remodel the bathroom). She has a ton of toys to play with but they are all for a one year old and Noodle is 5. We go outside and play a little but then we get hot and go back inside. Noodle actually asked if we could go back to the hotel for quiet time. I figured it was so she could play with her Polly's but she actually went to sleep (boredom induced sleep?). If I had thought at all about packing I would have thrown in games that were age appropriate that the one year old wouldn't choke on. But I didn't because I just wasn't thinking because I suck. Have a mentioned we aren't in NYC, we are on the Island (the only island, just like Manhattan is the ONLY burrough). There isn't a lot to do, or at least I am not aware of there being a lot to do. We can't go too far from the house because there are aesthetic decisions to be made and so I am the best version of a plaything for my daughter except I am really boring. Really.
I also brought some new books to read, books I loved as a child. I brought some poems and some Dr Suess and some fairy tales. They are Stories by the Brothers Grimm with pictures by Maurice Sendak. Beuatiful pictures. The stories...really dark and depressing. No wonder I was a punk teenager. In one story (the Juniper Tree) the step-mother doesn't like the step son so she kills him, blames it on the daughter and then feeds the corpse to the dad in a stew. Then the son reeks revenge on the mother by killing her. And I read this to my child on the car ride up. great.
I sound like I am bitching but I am really just bitching at myself.
I think maybe controlling the amount of time I spend with my daughter is a good thing, I may really do major damage.
It is good to see our friends though. They are great people. The birthday party was fun. Hubby and I tend to deconstruct parties and we noticed three things:
1. People here look different than people in NC. Not good or bad, they just look different. They look different in MA too, everyone there has a ruddier complexion than anywhere else in the country. Here they look different than NC, I couldn't figure out exactly the difference but it was there.
2. A lot of the parents' clothing matched the kids' clothing. Not exactly the same outfits but similar enough that but Hubby and I noticed this at the party and remembered to comment on it after the party. One dad had the same color shirt as his daughter's dress. One family all the boys had polos and madras shorts and they matched their dad. If that has ever happened at a birthday party in Asheville I have never noticed it. I know one mom who always dresses her daughters in matching outfits but she never matched them. Is this a regional trend, a national trend or a lark?
3. New Yorkers are much nicer than anyone gives them credit. I haven't seen most of these people since Jessa's wedding and once they recognized me they came over and said hi and complimented my daughter and my husband and it was really nice. Most people I have met once years ago. That is very welcoming, not what most people think of when they think New Yorkers. I am not that social at parties, I get a little shy and I become nervous that I am going to have a quick onset attack of Tourrette's Syndrome if I talk. I thought it was really nice for everyone to talk to me.
So that is the status report from here. Hopefuly I will be able to blog again soon.