Nicole W. Barnes Author

Let me tell you about the time my eight-year-old thought I’d lost my mind. I’m sure this will happen MANY times over the next few years, but this one is my all-time favorite moment in my parenting history so far.

Let me start with a little bit of backstory. My daughter, whom I will refer to as Boogie, has been on a rollercoaster of a ride in her few short years. She lost her biological father at three and was diagnosed with ADHD at four. That diagnosis threw us for a constant loop with the revolving door of medicines until we found what worked for her. (That didn’t happen until just recently.) I was her teacher last school year and noticed some things that didn’t quite add up with a simple ADHD diagnosis. That bit of speculation led my husband and I to find a behavioral specialist to investigate this further. Long story short, Boogie is now diagnosed ADHD with a co-morbid mood disorder. Now, I know not all parents are for medication, but it’s what my daughter needs to simply function on a daily basis. Not giving it to her would do more harm than good. BUT that’s a story for another day.

Back to the day where it rained baby powder. My husband was on shift, so it was just me and the girls. It had been a tough week for Boogie with lots of sneaking and blaming things on the dog when she would get caught. I asked her to keep an eye on her sister while I took the garbage to the garage and, of course, all was well at this point. Or so i thought…

I walked back into the living room to a one-year-old covered in powder. I mean head-to-toe covered. And she had the bottle in her hand just staring at me. I gave that small giggle that (as a mom) signals my dread of having to clean it all up. As I dust off the baby I begin to question Boogie on how the powder got everywhere. She simply stated that the baby did it. I took that answer with a grain of salt and went to bathe the snow baby. After getting the now powder paste off of her head, I pull up the baby cam that views the living room to see if I could either get a good laugh at the baby shooting powder all over herself, or discover the truth that I knew would be shown. (Cue the “dun DuN DUNNN!”)

On the video I see Boogie open the powder, sprinkle a little on the floor, and then look at the baby. She then walks over to her and sprinkles just a little on her head. Then she sprinkles a little more…and then a little more…and then half of the bottle. Keep in mind that all of this happened in a matter of one to two minutes. I calmly dress the baby and walk to the living room where Boogie is sitting on the couch. I pull up the video for her to see and she still denies the powder incident. Even with clear evidence, still denies it. This is where it gets good.

Without saying a word, I take the bottle of baby powder and walk to her bedroom. She quickly jumps up and asks with full alarm what I am doing. I ask her again why she put powder on the baby and on the floor. Here’s her response: “I was just trying to be helpful!”… Helpful! So, I open the powder and let it rain all over her bedroom without any hint of emotion. All the while she is screaming at me to stop and begging me not to spray it on her bed. (I drew the line there. No beds were painted white with powder.) After I finished, I turned to look at her and said, “I was just trying to be helpful,” and walked out.

I sat on the couch and just knew she was going to have a meltdown. I was prepared for another full-blown screaming fit. Instead, she runs to the laundry room to grab the broom and vacuum cleaner. She quickly cleans her room completely and then moves on to clean the living room. The bottle of baby powder was put back into the nursery and then she joined me on the couch. We sat for a minute just watching the baby play and she said to me, “I don’t like what you did, but I know why you did it. You wanted to teach me a lesson. I’m sorry I put powder on the baby and lied about it.” I thanked her for cleaning the messes and we pinky promised not to powder anything other than the baby’s bottom ever again.

<p value="<amp-fit-text layout="fixed-height" min-font-size="6" max-font-size="72" height="80">See? Even when you lose your mind and throw powder everywhere, it can still end up being a mom win. Also, I feel like I need a disclaimer of some sort here. This is not a normal occurrence in our house. Even if it hadn't turned out quite so well, I would've cleaned the messes up myself. Sometimes you just need to let your frustrations out. (Even if it's in the form of a powder dusting.)See? Even when you lose your mind and throw powder everywhere, it can still end up being a mom win. Also, I feel like I need a disclaimer of some sort here. This is not a normal occurrence in our house. Even if it hadn’t turned out quite so well, I would’ve cleaned the messes up myself. Sometimes you just need to let your frustrations out. (Even if it’s in the form of a powder dusting.)

Til next time! 🙂