A Grammy, An Angel and "Todzilla"

Advent: The Coming of Something Momentous.

Advent for me is always what the definition is: waiting, lying in wait for something to happen. Growing up in the Catholic Church, my memories of Advent are of the dark purple vestments the priests wore for the four weeks at Mass, the Advent wreath, the hymns of waiting for the Savior’s birth (“Oh Come, Oh Come, Emmanuel”), and the bare altar that suddenly exploded on Christmas eve into a stage of brilliantly lit Christmas trees and holly lining the altar and a spectacular manger scene complete with the Holy Family, a crèche with lots of blessed hay spread around, shepherds and angels in diaphanous white gowns with wings that looked like Michelangelo himself had created them. Fast forward into my younger Mommy years, and immediately after Thanksgiving my Advent was coupled with that feeling of “lying in wait for something to happen”– and always with the angst of did I get it all done?! right up to midnight of Christmas Eve.

In my Grandparent years I still feel the “lying in wait for something to happen.” But the angst is replaced with anticipation for how I’m going to knock the socks off my grandkids with an experience they might not have had the opportunity to enjoy with their overbooked and exhausted parents. Sometimes it’s an expensive event, but the memories are priceless. This year it cost me less than $25 for my granddaughter Meghan.

Meghan is tiny in a family of non-tiny people. She is also “affectionately” nicknamed “Todzilla,” and lately, “Toddy.” She actually is proud of the moniker. Her small size is a shrewd disguise for her huge temper, the volume of her articulate voice and not the least of all her razor sharp intelligence. Her brain never shuts down. I find it amusing more often than not, but she gives her parents an emotional workout.

An application was sent home  for which role a child would like to be in the Nativity play. My daughter Kate asked Meghan if she’d like to be something different this year, maybe a shepherd or a reader. Meghan’s response was without hesitation, direct and terse: “No! You said I could be an angel.” Okay, we won’t dwell on the double entendre in the statement, but this is life with Todzilla, and angelic is not one of her characteristics .

Meghan’s mom was in that very place of anxiety I remember so well. When she called, I could hear in her voice the restrained panic: “Toddy wants to be an angel in the Nativity play, we don’t have a costume. The play is in two weeks.” We dug out last year’s costume. Because she is so petite the angel dress still fit her. But then we found the homemade wings and the halo. Toddy looked at them and stated, “I thought we threw those away.”

It was a set of fairy wings we purchased at the Dollar Store and covered them with foil. The only thing we could find were pink ones and had no time to find anything else. Meghan had declared she could not have pink wings in a white gown, so we improvised. We thought our resourcefulness of using the shiny foil did the job, but apparently other parents’ angels were adorned with real feathered angel wings trimmed in maribou. There was nothing homemade about their wings. Meghan looked angelic throughout the Nativity play, but she continued throughout that evening about how she was the only one with “silver wings.” That was last year.

This year, Meghan’s had no change of heart about the homemade wings and halo. We tried to convince her that her wings were special because they were different. But Toddy wasn’t having any of that nonsense and walked away, arms folded and chin out. With two weeks until the play, I was confident I could find a set of angel wings that would be suitable to Meghan’s standards.

Naturally, I consulted the internet. The initial search resulted in a lot of “sold out” or “out of stock” findings. It was beginning to look bleak. The feeling of anticipation and confidence that these wings were going to be a slam dunk was ebbing. After taking a break from the search, I went back online, determined we were going to have feathered wings for Todzilla in time for the play. Thanks be to God for persistence, patience and OrientalTrading.com: feathered angel wings, trimmed in white maribou, $8.50. Expedited shipping was more than the cost of the wings, but it did not matter.

They were delivered as promised and when I displayed them for her, Meghan exclaimed “Oh my God! They are HUGE!” Although the wings are almost the same size as Meghan, they are beautiful and look like real feathered angel wings.

The halo never fit well on her head, so we’re going to forgo the halo and go with a trimmed white headband. Toddy is just fine with not wearing a halo. As she so astutely observed, “it’s always slipping off my head.” YEA, No kidding.

Merry Christmas

 

 

Day 4 of #30Shorts: Warnings Signs

My granddaughter Meghan is more frequently call “Todzilla”, although she is 8 years old, she is rather proud of that moniker. When she was born I predicted she was going to be trouble.

I have been present at each of my grandchildren’s birth and Meghan was the only baby I’ve seen literally pop out instead of ease out with each push. She was laid out in the bassinette and immediately started to look around as if she could actually see and was taking inventory of her surroundings. I looked at her and said, “OOOO, you are going to be TROUBLE.” With that the nurses all exclaimed, “ Oh, No. She’s so pretty.” and she was and still is, but I was spot on about the trouble part.

As Meghan learned the force of her voice and the control it had over her parents, I named her Todzilla. To say that her early years were trying is a huge understatement. Bedtime and nights are still a challenge, but somewhat more quiet as she leads her Mom though her nightly routine close to bedtime.

When Meghan is tired, she has hit a wall that makes everyone around her on edge and miserable. She has also come to understand the term, “she’s hit the wall” and true to her Todzilla way yells with clenched fists, “NO, I HAVEN’T! I am NOT tired! Stop SAYING that!”

With that she whines and complains that NOBODY knows when SHE is tired, but we have had 8 years to learn the warning signs.

First her right eye begins to slightly droop, more like a half-lidded droop, a sign that her ever-ready brain is getting ready to shut down. She insists it is time for her night time snack and then deliberates for twenty minutes to make a choice.

Then she asks me for a foot rub, which I give her. The first time I rubbed her feet, she immediately relaxed and claimed it was “the best thing EVER!”

After the foot rub she has stalled for ten more minutes. When done with me she moves on to PopPop for a five minute snuggle.

After that, she summons her mother, “Mommy, it’s time for me to go to beeeddd. Let’s go!” and she does.

Todzilla Meghan has successfully managed the evening and we have successfully navigated the warning signs.

Day 2 of 30 Shorts: Appreciating Small Moments

My entire agenda for today got thrown out the window with a tempting and irresistible offer to go to a morning showing of “Into the Woods”, the movie production based on the stage production of the same name, with music written by the prolific Stephen Sondheim.

The offer came from granddaughter Meghan, whom we still refer to as the Todzilla. Today’s movie was a reward for Meghan NOT being the Todzilla for roughly 24 hours. It’s a just reward and a monumental success for Meghan to not a have any kind of meltdown within a twenty four hour window. Naturally I accepted the offer.

I have heard consistent reviews of Into the Woods being very entertaining, with a wonderful cast, but a bit long. It was all of those things.

Being a fan of the Grimm Brothers and their tales I found the movie enchanting for myself as well as for the not always so charming Miss Meghan. Recently Meghan has been charged with extra reading projects to be done at home as part of her accelerated reading program at school. Like most homework, this often becomes a tedious affair when it is ongoing and can become super boring, especially for a personality such as Meghan’s. We don’t still call an 8 year old 'Todzilla' because we think she’s cute.

I am a voracious reader, as is Meghan, but she wants to read out loud. She loves the attention and relishes the performance of acting out the story. Lately, her selections have been a lot of the Grimm stories, Cinderella, Rapunzel, Jack and the Bean Stalk, Red Riding Hood, and a few others. She likes heroes and princesses. Who doesn’t? She looks for a moral if the story doesn’t seem to have the formula happy ending, which is very intuitive for a third grader.

It was especially rewarding to watch the movie and hear Meghan’s reaction as she recognized some of her favorite characters in a familiar storyline but different from what she’s read. Rapunzel’s hero in her book is a thief named Flynn, but in the movie he is a Prince and although you never hear him referred to by name, at his appearance, she immediately called out, “It’s Flynn!” and after a musical duet by the two charming and handsome princes (Chris Pine and Billy Magnussen) , which several adults in the audience found almost comical, she sighed and said not once but twice, “Bravo.”  She loves her handsome heroes.

Johnny Depp has a very brief appearance, but as usual, his performance was memorable as the Wolf and his interaction with Red Riding Hood in the woods felt very predatory.

Meryl Streep, the evil witch, looked as though she was having as much fun playing the role as it was to watch her.

The storyline turns dark with Tracy Ullman playing Jack’s mother as she valiantly tried to face the Giant’s wife, who was seeking vengeance for Jack’s misdeeds to her husband the giant and their gold.

The length of the movie is a full two hours and 5 minutes. We did not feel there was any time that seemed to lag. Here follows a spoiler if you have not seen the movie.

Just when the movie felt like it was going to end with pink and blue ribbons tied up in a happy ending for all, it segued into the darkness of Grimms’ tales.  But like the Rolling Stones song, “you don’t always get what you want, you get what you need.”

“Bravo”. Well worth the change in my day and the 2hours, plus sitting through 20 minutes of trailers, just to hear that.