Tippy Toes and Tantrums

Negotiating with the Tooth Fairy

My daughter is seven, which puts her square at the age where skepticism has seeped into her brain. Or maybe it's all of the mystery books she likes to read. Either way, she took an agnostic approach to Santa this year, announcing at one moment that she knows parents put the toys into the stockings, but a moment later, sincerely asking if it's possible to see Rudolph's nose in the sky as Santa flew around. I prepared my answers for when she asked me about Santa - possible options were: only those who believe, receive or that Santa and the spirit of Christmas lives in our hearts...blah blah blah - but if asked directly, I would answer truthfully. I'd always imagined we were alone for this conversation, so when she did ask me, it was in the car with her three year old brother present. I panicked, said it was late and asked that we continue the conversation in the morning. When she never brought it up again, I thought we were okay for a little while longer. By next Christmas she will have found her truth, for sure, but what I didn't expect was for her to lose a tooth on Christmas Day, reigniting her issues of faith and belief.

"Listen," my daughter said while holding her tooth. "I want this tooth. It's my fravorite. I know you are the tooth fairy, so can I just get my dollar now and keep the tooth?" Luckily the pitch was made to me, someone who is most definitely not the tooth fairy, and not to my husband, who places an extremely high value on getting to sleep early. Also, my daughter is a hoarder, so even if I was the tooth fairy, the thought of her keeping anything else in her room - even a tiny tooth - bothered me. Soon after I said no, my husband jumped in to say that with the tooth fairy, there needs to be an exchange. It's not only about leaving money. The tooth fairy wants the tooth in exchange. She sulked off to her room to work on Plan B, which turned out to be simple - and timeless. Her plan was to stay awake all night, watching her tooth.

After a long Christmas day, my husband and I wanted to go to sleep early, but now we were forced to stay awake too. My husband proposed waking up during the middle of the night, but because we were both exhausted, that plan could too easily fail. We waited and waited until finally at midnight, when the coast was clear. Glitter dust in hand, my husband went into her room to access the situation, only to come back a minute later saying the tooth was gone. He was ready to give up, but I forced him back out with his little headlamp to find the tooth. I was worried that if my daughter woke up, not only would she never believe in the tooth fairy, but she was likely to have nightmares from the headlamp. After a few minutes, he came back to say it was really gone.

My daughter came out of her room the next morning annoyed at the tooth fairy. There was no tooth and no money, but a note explaining the exchange could not happen. The tooth is still missing, but a note left that night from my daughter may explain the situation more: "Dear tooth fariy, Can you please leave me a dollor and let me keep my tooth? It is just that this tooth is my faiveorite tooth. If you need to do the exechange, can you please leave me two or three dollors? And sense it is x-mas, can you please leave me extra presents? If you will please, Gogo's, Pokemon are awsome!"

Two shrewd negotiators went head to head, but a deal could not be struck. I don't know if I will ever know who ended up with the tooth.

Negotiating with the Tooth Fairy

My daughter is seven, which puts her square at the age where skepticism has seeped into her brain. Or maybe it's all of the mystery books she likes to read. Either way, she took an agnostic approach to Santa this year, announcing at one moment that she knows parents put the toys into the stockings, but a moment later, sincerely asking if it's possible to see Rudolph's nose in the sky as Santa flew around. I prepared my answers for when she asked me about Santa - possible options were: only those who believe, receive or that Santa and the spirit of Christmas lives in our hearts...blah blah blah - but if asked directly, I would answer truthfully. I'd always imagined we were alone for this conversation, so when she did ask me, it was in the car with her three year old brother present. I panicked, said it was late and asked that we continue the conversation in the morning. When she never brought it up again, I thought we were okay for a little while longer. By next Christmas she will have found her truth, for sure, but what I didn't expect was for her to lose a tooth on Christmas Day, reigniting her issues of faith and belief.

"Listen," my daughter said while holding her tooth. "I want this tooth. It's my fravorite. I know you are the tooth fairy, so can I just get my dollar now and keep the tooth?" Luckily the pitch was made to me, someone who is most definitely not the tooth fairy, and not to my husband, who places an extremely high value on getting to sleep early. Also, my daughter is a hoarder, so even if I was the tooth fairy, the thought of her keeping anything else in her room - even a tiny tooth - bothered me. Soon after I said no, my husband jumped in to say that with the tooth fairy, there needs to be an exchange. It's not only about leaving money. The tooth fairy wants the tooth in exchange. She sulked off to her room to work on Plan B, which turned out to be simple - and timeless. Her plan was to stay awake all night, watching her tooth.
After a long Christmas day, my husband and I wanted to go to sleep early, but now we were forced to stay awake too. My husband proposed waking up during the middle of the night, but because we were both exhausted, that plan could too easily fail. We waited and waited until finally at midnight, when the coast was clear. Glitter dust in hand, my husband went into her room to access the situation, only to come back a minute later saying the tooth was gone. He was ready to give up, but I forced him back out with his little headlamp to find the tooth. I was worried that if my daughter woke up, not only would she never believe in the tooth fairy, but she was likely to have nightmares from the headlamp. After a few minutes, he came back to say it was really gone.

My daughter came out of her room the next morning annoyed at the tooth fairy. There was no tooth and no money, but a note explaining the exchange could not happen. The tooth is still missing, but a note left that night from my daughter may explain the situation more: "Dear tooth fariy, Can you please leave me a dollor and let me keep my tooth? It is just that this tooth is my faiveorite tooth. If you need to do the exechange, can you please leave me two or three dollors? And sense it is x-mas, can you please leave me extra presents? If you will please, Gogo's, Pokemon are awsome!"

Two shrewd negotiators went head to head, but a deal could not be struck. I don't know if I will ever know who ended up with the tooth.

Original Silicon Valley Moms Blog post.

Wrapping Up Christmas

This is why we're not Jewish: he cannot handle chocolate coins.

Christmas brought in a tsunami of electronics and we're all trying to stay afloat. Clover got a fancy new keyboard and I demonstrated the definition of buzz kill when I said, "And now you can take piano lessons!" I clapped my hands too, which didn't help, as all of the joy drained out of her face. It only lasted a few minutes until she went back to the keyboard, after deciding piano lessons wouldn't be so bad. (SUCKER!)

We tried to stretch the holiday a day by heading south to a kiddie amusement park on Saturday, except suddenly a "slight chance of showers" turned into a relentless downpour. It's bad when the kids say they'd rather go home then go on a few more partially covered rides. We left, changing all of our plans on the fly and due to a major failure of a iPhone app, we ended up at Bennigan's for dinner. Prior to last night, all I knew about Bennigan's is that Beavis and Butthead thought it was the place rich people went to dinner. The restaurant was really cold and sparely populated, but there was a little excitement when a police officer walked in. He was coming in for dinner, but the kids bubbled with the thought that he was there to arrest some bad guys. Sharing a space - and possibly a meal - with potential criminals is a good thing, according to my kids. We may get to see a shooting! What fun!

Soon after the officer sat down, Clover breathlessly whispered to me that even better than a police officer was a football play and THERE WAS A REAL FOOTBALL PLAYER BEHIND US! I looked around and didn't see anything other than a few sad looking other diners. When I said there weren't any football players, Clover said, "He's wearing a jersey...and the pants!" Behind us was a squat, pimply faced white guy in his early 20s wearing a Warren Sapp Raiders jersey and unmatching track pants, sucking down a giant Coke while sitting with his parents. She disputed my denial until I pulled out my iPhone to show her a photo of Warren Sapp. "There is NO RESEMBLANCE!" I said, when really I should have sent her over for an autograph.

And to All a Good Night

Ice rink near the Ferry Building, San Francisco

We've watched Elf, the Charlie Brown Christmas special, decorated cookies and all snuggled in the light of the tree. The big things the kids will remember have been done. The next day and a half will be about family and surviving enjoying that. Merry Christmas to all and to those who don't celebrate, enjoy the peace of the movies and Chinese food or whatever else you do on Dec. 25.

One final pro tip: when making chocolate ganache at 8 a.m., don't taste it, especially don't taste it by dipping in a tiny piece of sugar cookie. You may justify this by saying some people eat chocolate croissants for breakfast and this surely isn't as bad. If you do this, you may come to a few minutes later with a spoon in your hand, chocolate on your face and two kids staring at you with their mouths agape.

The End of Kindness (Week-ish)

Finally, after unanticipated delay, the dramatic conclusion to kindness week:

The weather and the last day of school before holiday got the best of my kindness plans. I was busy doing the standard, preholiday kindness, handing out gifts to the teachers, the mailman, the newspaper delivery woman (oh yeah, we're old school, still getting the newspaper...once a week) and our adopt-a-family gift. Then this weekend came with a major gift of kindness for me: my parents took the kids for three days, two nights. It was a gift better than whatever they will give me on Christmas. The only downside was that the freedom took us out of the house, when I really needed to knit, wrap and knit and wrap some more.

I ended the week with two Starbucks gift cards to drop, two to give away to readers and about $10 left of my Yahoo! money. I ended the weekend with nothing.

I dropped my second-to-last Starbucks card in San Francisco near the Ferry Building, where the area was full of families and people ice skating and enjoying the lights. I wanted to leave the card in a tiny neighborhood park, but because it looked like rain was coming, I wanted to leave it somewhere it would be quickly found.

The last card to drop was mailed to a person I've met only once. She's in my local mother's club and while things may be quite tight for her, she's dedicated herself to working for those with even less. I wanted to let her know that her work was noticed and appreciated.

While I was wondering what to do with my last few dollars, I was listening to the This American Life podcast and it began with a periodic request for money to help support the program and the bandwidth. I always mean to give, but then I forget before I act. While listening, Ira Glass explained that while yes, he was only asking for a donation as small as a dollar, if one gave more, they were essentially covering other listeners with their donation. With that, I gave my last $10 from Yahoo! and matched it with $10 of my own. My gift to fellow TAL listeners.

The gift from Yahoo! to help spread kindness was great. It was a lot of fun and it made me feel good too. My mom has always said, "It pays to be nice," and while she's right, there is nothing more annoying than hearing that from her throughout my life, always with the implication that I wasn't nice. While paying attention this past week, I felt that a lot of people were really nice to me and I know it was because I was being just as kind back. There are still jackass drivers - of cars and shopping carts - that will annoy me, but it's reassuring to be reminded that most people aren't like that.

Finally, the two cards awarded to commenters: Congrats Kathryn and Justice Fergie! You both won and I'll be contacting you just after I hit post.

Kindness Around the Bay

Things are hectic as school comes to a pre-holiday close and my plans for kindness drops got a little tripped up - once I set out to leave a Starbucks card, only to realize I left my phone in the car and couldn't document the event, and another time the kids and I were heading to a planned drop location when I discovered I forgot the kindness items at home. Small setbacks in what feels like a successful effort.

Here's what the last two days included:

I left a Starbucks gift card for the office manager/scheduler for our swim school, which is the first item this week I've left for a specific person. She deals with a lot of people, some cranky, but she always manages to make necessary changes happen. Like some other families, we get a gift for our swim instructor, but I wanted to make sure the office manager knew she was appreciated too. I had hoped she's walk away from her station during Rocket's swim lesson, but she didn't, so I had to leave this while she was sitting a few feet away from me. As I took the photo, I could see she was giving me a look that said she thought I was crazy, so I explained what it was and why I was doing it, and while she was thankful, she still looked a little suspicious.

I left a Sudoku book and pen on a bench at the Redwood City train station. I don't know if it was noticed that I'd left something behind, but I'm sure I was watched as I waddled over to the spot in flip-flops, just having come from a pedicure appointment. Timing isn't always my thing. Hopefully the book helped pass the time on the train and brightened one passenger's day.

The kindness drops spread to the East Bay today as I head to Oakland for a meeting. I left a pack of notecards on a bench on Telegraph. The frozen lemonade from Bakesale Betty was all mine, sorry people of Oakland hoping for a free drink.

Finally, I left a little notebook and a pen in Berkeley. Maybe it will become a to-do list or a dream journal, I only hope it made someone smile.

You can follow the progress of - or participate in - Yahoo's You In program here and on Flickr. To help spread kindness, tomorrow I'll select two commenters to each receive a $5 Starbucks gift card. Just leave a comment on any post this week with a way to contact you.

Kindness in a Cup

Day two of kindness week was fun, especially because it included ice cream.

First I quickly dropped off a new coffee grinder and a pound of Starbucks Christmas blend at the teacher lounge at Clover's school. At the beginning of the month, the subject of coffee came up with a office staffer and she mentioned that the grinder in the lounge was practically dead. I started looking into grinders and while burr grinders appear to be superior, it would have blown my $100 Yahoo! money in one shot, so I decided to get them a regular blade grinder. It may not produce baby fine coffee grinds, but it's better than what they had. What the lounge really needs is an Oprah-sponsored visit from Nate Birkus.

Trying to be stealthy about getting into the lounge, dropping off the package and taking a picture was difficult, especially since I had my tiny sidekick with me. It's nearly impossible to convince a three year old boy to walk quickly and quietly. I told him we were on a top secret spy mission, but he kept putting his finger over his mouth and saying "shoosh!" to anyone we encountered. That doesn't exactly help one to go unnoticed.

We were stopped near one of the office exits by another mom who needed to talk to me. I'm certain she must have thought I was weird because the whole time I felt like I needed to get out of there, like a criminal on the lam, glancing around, acting fidgety. As I talked to her, I realized I hadn't dropped off a package of flavored Coffee-Mate packs that I received at the Silicon Valley Moms Blog holiday party. I thought about sending Rocket back into the lounge with the Coffee-Mate pack, but sending a three year old alone on the stealth mission is asking for failure, so we took off with the Coffee-Mate. I hope the teachers weren't dreaming about artificially flavored vanilla coffee.

After getting all of the carpool kids into the car, we made a totally unprecedented surprise stop at Baskin-Robbins. The other carpool mom is nicer and has been known to stop for milkshakes, but I never stop because I generally want to get carpool over as quickly as possible. The kids first thought I'd lost my mind, but they ripped out of their booster seats and out of the car in record time, trying to get into the store before I changed my mind. I explained the concept of Yahoo's kindness project, but I don't think it stuck. They had a million questions, like "Who is Yahoo?" or "Why are you taking a picture?" which was answered with "I know! She's going to open a shop and she wants to use this picture." I should note that the picture comments did come from my kids, who have grown immune to me photographing everything. With kids, work usually has to happen before the reward, so while they all promised to do something kind without prompting, but I haven't seen any follow through in my house.

Throughout the day I dropped pennies because I know how much excitement a found coin brings to my kids. Dropping coins, especially around Rocket's school felt so odd, like I was trying to lure kids away with a path of pennies. Not the Rocket even noticed the little "clink, clinks" around him as the money fell out of my hands.

The funniest kindness act I've done was mitt removal. My friend lives in a tony neighborhood on a sometimes busy street and one day a few months ago, a furry glove, the kind for washing cars, showed up in one of their trees. We guessed that it landed on the street, but someone put it on the tree in the hopes that the owner would return. My friend was creeped out by the mitt and hoped the situation would resolve itself. Weeks went by, then months. Finally on Monday I picked the mitt out of the tree, threw it away and watched their property value soar. It's all about curb appeal, yo.

You can follow the progress of - or participate in - Yahoo's You In program here and on Flickr. To help spread kindness, at the end of the week, I'll select two commenters to each receive a $5 Starbucks gift card. Just leave a comment on any post this week with a way to contact you.

Spreading Kind on a Rainy Day

The weather has altered some of my plans of leaving little surprises outside for people, forcing me to be a little more creative. Sunday afternoon, as it began to get dark, Clover and I set out on a stealthy mission. Our first stop was a public school where we wrote some inspirational messages and drawings in chalk on the sidewalk near where the school buses let out. The surprise for me was how excited Clover was to take part in this. She drew happy faces that looked like faces, unlike the face she drew on a birthday card that made my sister ask if "those" were boobs. The things in question were eyes that were particularly large with a tiny pupil, making them look kind of boob-ish. Okay, they looked very boob-ish, but thankfully her chalk drawings all looked like human faces.

As we drove away from the school, it started to sprinkle a little, causing us to worry, but I drove by the school today and the chalk drawings were still there.

Next we drove to a local library branch where I'd planned to leave a Starbucks card outside on top of the book return box. Our main library building is closed this month for renovations, forcing a large number of people into the branches. When I was at the branch last week, each of the computer stations were filled with adults who all appeared to be looking for work, making the branch busier than I'd ever seen it. Unfortunately the book return was not beneath an overhang, as I'd remembered, and I didn't want to leave the card in the rain, so I dropped it in the book return slot, and hopefully it made the day of a librarian this morning. Clover drew a happy face - again, without boobs - on the sidewalk in front of the library.

Our last stop was a community center. The center was closed, but there were a lot of families around back near the soccer fields. I placed a Starbucks card on a bench in front of the building, somewhat shielded from any rain, while Clover did her thing with the chalk.

Day one: success!

You can follow the progress of - or participate in - Yahoo's You In program here and on Flickr. To help spread kindness, at the end of the week, I'll select two commenters to each receive a $5 Starbucks gift card. Just leave a comment with a way to contact you.

Can You Spare Some Kind?

A friend wrote something about kindness a few weeks ago, saying that once you set out to be kind to others, you become aware of the thousands of decisions you make each day and the number of opportunities you have to impact other people - in a positive or negative way. Her words came back to me the next day when I got cut off by a driver. In that split second before responding, I thought that this was a decision I get to make. A simple fact that I should have realized sooner, but in that instant, I could have honked or flipped them off, but I let it go. Sure, the driver did something negative, but that didn't mean I needed to go there too. 

Around the same time of my friend's words, I started following the inspiring Secret Agent L and her "acts of kindness and day brightening." Reading her blog is day-brightening.

Both my friend's words and Secret Agent L were in my mind when I was invited to take part in You In? Or what I keep calling Yahoo! for Good! I was especially lucky when Yahoo! offered me $100 to do some good. People suggested I donate the money to different charitable organizations, but we already give to charity, we give to food banks and we participate in an Adopt-a-Family program. I didn't want the Yahoo! money to go to anything we already do anyway. Not to mention a friend let me off the hook by saying charity isn't kindness. They often intersect like two circles overlapping, but they don't always mean the same thing.

What appeals to me about Secret Agent L is that she's boosting the spirits of potentially anyone. There are many days when I'm exhausted and I've really had enough of my kids squabbling, making dinner, chauffeuring, laundry...the list goes on, and I feel completely unappreciated. I don't need charity, but something small, like a phone call from a friend, makes the difference in a day. A teacher-friend told me that I was a rock star mom recently. I didn't think about it until after, but it really made my day. I told Kevin about it and he shrugged it off for whatever reason, but it still made me feel appreciated. In the mom job, there aren't annual reviews with the chance for praise or god forbid a bonus. "Let's see Kim, you've moved one kid closer to getting out of diapers and the other kid doesn't always gag at the sight of a vegetable. Good work this quarter!" There's no clear finish line in parenting where success can be judged and gold watches handed out for merit.

With that, this week I will set out to do tiny acts of mostly anonymous kindness that I hope will brighten days for those unsuspecting. It started with a penny left near a wishing well in the hopes that another person's wish will come true. When I left the penny and explained to Clover what I was doing, she said "Ohhhkay," in a way that conveyed she'd rather flip that last penny into the little well (she'd tossed two already), but she went along with it. About an hour later, as we crossed a busy street, she gasped and picked up a penny that appeared to have been on that road for a long time. "We got it back!" she exclaimed. "We left that penny and now we got a new one," she explained when it was clear I didn't know what she meant. Yes, this is what happens, I told her. When you do something good, it comes back to you. Not always so quick, and rarely as precise as a penny for a penny, but it does come back. If only all lessons were as clearly demonstrative. 

I want to share the kindness with you. At the end of the week, I'll pick two commenters and send them each a $5 Starbucks card. You can comment once a day and I'll pick the winners at 5 p.m. pst Friday. To enter, you only need to leave a comment with a way to reach you (as long as it is visible to me, such as in your sign in), but on your honor, I'd like to ask that you do something kind for someone else. Hold open a door, say thank you, tell someone you appreciate them. (For inspiration, you can visit You In? or the companion Flickr group.)

It doesn't have to be big. Sometimes the smallest gesture means the most.

What to Buy for Teacher Gifts

"What do teachers like to get?" one mom asked during the talk given by teacher Phil Done recently when the subject of holiday gifts came up. Every mom in the room leaned in closer to get the inside scoop. Some grabbed a pen to make sure this moment wasn't missed. Here's what he said:

*Gift certificates, especially to teacher supply stores or art stores because sadly, many teachers buy classroom supplies out of pocket and the gift certificates help.

*Movie passes.

*A card from the parent, even just one line saying the teacher's work is appreciated means a lot.

He said one of the most memorable and greatest gifts was the year his class mom organized a week's worth of lunches for him during the week prior to the holiday break. That last week before the holiday tends to be hectic, making it an especially great week to have someone else take care of lunch. Each day that week a different family brought him lunch and it wasn't boring PB&J, making Done the envy of his fellow teachers.

I am a big fan of the class gift when it comes to buying something for teachers. Going in as a group results in a bigger and better gift for the teacher, but I mostly love group gifts because they are easy. For Rocket's preschool, I wrote one check to the mom taking care of the gift for his three teachers, letting me cross off three gifts in well under a minute. For Clover's class, I'm the person collecting for the gift.

Done's list made me feel particularly good because we've always done gift cards and I write a note to the teachers at the end of each year. Last year our class gave Clover's teachers Amex gift cards, which seem to be a popular teacher gift around here. However, afterward I polled a few teachers and they unanimously agreed on the best gift: cash money.

Cash feels tacky and kind of weird. I should note that Clover's school does not issue grades, so there's no feeling of payola or preferential treatment when it comes to giving gifts. Amex or similar cards have fees and are frequently difficult to use in their entirety, making them more of a headache than cash, the teachers told me. So following their suggestion, we're giving cash. Plus a laundry basket because boy, that room really needs one.