It's not always easy, okay it's never easy, when you have little ones running around to grab a few minutes for yourself. I find it particularly hard now that my daughter, Liddy, refuses to nap anymore in the afternoon. She's only two, I was sure I still had a couple more years of napping left. That's my time to have a quick Chai and catch up on my e-mail (which is something I find relaxing).
I was looking for a way to steal a few quiet moments when Liddy decided to dig into the trunk in our living room where we keep our old videos and DVDs. I had stashed her Baby Einstein
DVDs in there thinking that they were too young for her now. Before certain people get all in an uproar, no, I don't believe in plunking your baby in front of the television for hours at a time. However I don't see any harm in snuggling on the couch and watching and talking about beautiful pictures of animals and other things while enjoying the classical music that goes along with them. Liddy and I passed many an enjoyable half hour (sometimes an hour) together with me pointing out objects and naming them, sometimes after surviving a difficult night (my daugher never slept more than an hour at a time) we would just lie on the couch and let the music and images soothe and relax us. I did hear all of the controversy awhile ago about them and thought it was absolutely ridiculous to condemn a whole line of products, including the Mom who invented them, because some parents are irresponsible. My heart went out to Julie Aigner-Clark when I heard how she was being harassed, people can be so immature and thoughtless.Anyway I am a fan of both the books and the videos, I actually attribute my daughter's love of books to the Baby Einstein bath books
she had as a small baby. Even at two months old she would sit on my husband's knee and stare at the pictures getting all excited, her favourites were Water, Water Everywhere 
and What Floats 
they are vinyl bath books so you don't have to worry about drool, spit-up or the baby grabbing a page and tearing it.Well my point in all this is that I needed a few minutes to unwind and she wanted to watch one of these Baby Einstein DVDs
. I was sure she would lose interest quickly but I started the Neighborhood Animals
one anyway. She was able to enjoy it in a whole new way than when she was younger, she danced around to Old MacDonald and made the animals sounds along with it. She even laughed out loud at the antics of the puppets, especially the horse and the cow scene. She thoroughly enjoyed herself in a totally harmless fashion and I had 30 minutes to myself although I spent most of them watching her enjoy herself....I hope you find at least 30 minutes a day to yourself...I'm sure you've earned it.
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