Lesson : there will be time when you truly wish that it was legal to send your toddler to to daycare naked. However that is frowned upon.
Here is why you will staunchly wish for that very thing. You will wake one morning and all will be well. Breakfast goes well. Potty goes well. Smiles and hugs all around.
Until your precious little bundle of seething diva attitude decides that she does not want to wear clothes or fix her hair. You will look wide eyed at the pretty princess dress and the Afro of tangled curls and wonder what you should do.
First you will fail at an attempt to wrestle your biting alligator of a toddler into a diaper. After twenty minutes of fighting with a stupid piece of Velcro, you will silently think ” F this” and wrestle her into a pull up while dodging her attempts at being the next Cujo. Pull ups are easier and don’t come with minuscule tabs of Velcro. Even though you hate them, it is a bandaid to this initial problem.
You will eyeball your now demon possessed stomping toddler and her coat and actually debate in your head how much trouble you will get in if you send her to daycare after winning this minor battle just the way she stands. Your car has heat after all. Tempatures are not freezing. All sorts of logic will run through your head as she screams “no dress” over and over again.
You will resign. Open her drawer and say “pick out your clothes”
She will scream “no clothes”
You will want to cry once you realize it is too early to drink and showing up at work with a drunk smile probably violates some company policy somewhere.
The thought of calling your boss for a sick day for the simple fact that life with a toddler can be hell also runs through your mind.
Deciding against all of the above, you will grab whatever you can find that even closely resembles an outfit and put it on her. Avoiding her Hannibal lector antics the whole time. There could be scars from teeth.
You will finally get to daycare, explain to them why she is a hot mess and apologize for failing as a fashion forward parent.
Your evil little monster will have calmed down at this point. You will shoot her a fake smile that resembles a painted on clown face and say “have a good day”
Said toddler, dressed in stripes, fleece, mismatching socks and shirt that saw better days in a ditch on the side of a dirt road, will then run to you with hugs and kisses and “nice day” and you will melt. Literally.
All will be well until the next time she turns into a fire breathing naked dragon. This is why you should be allowed to send your kids to daycare naked at times. Because the battle is never really won. I will say that the hugs and kisses and “nice day” are always worth the war.
Parentingandwine 