Florida's Rules

Last weekend we went on a business trip  vacation to Florida.  We were there visiting my husband's grandfather, J's great-grandpa.  He lives in one of those 55-and over developments that exist (in my opinion) only in Florida.  I visited my own grandparents in these kind of places when I was a kid.  And I remember my parents always being 'on edge'.  It never felt totally relaxing and I never knew why...until I went with my own bundle of joy.
Here's a sampling of some of the "rules" that we had to deal with  follow:

1. Do not have fun.
2. No child under 3 is allowed in the pool.
3. All children must be fully potty trained in order to use the pool.
4. No food or beverages near the pool area.
5. Any questions? See rule #1.

I spent the weekend:
1. Lying about my 2 1/2 year old's age - I even had her saying "I'm 3!"
2. Trying to explain to my toddler why she couldn't have a snack by the pool.
3. Although she's mostly potty trained, I had her in swim diapers - I had to lie about this as well - when asked - which I was.
4. Arguing with an 80+ year old woman about these rules.

Before the "No fun" rules!

Some asked me why we didn't just go to the beach - and it was 30+ minutes away and I don't know if you've ever been to Florida in August, but it's ridiculously HOT.  To drive thirty minutes and spend an hour at the beach with all the gear just wasn't worth it.

On a sidenote: I think that the next rule should be: Over 80 must wear a diaper...I'm just sayin'.

Rules

Two of my close friends just had babies and I passed onto them a golden rule of parenting that was given to me when we first had Jenna...

Do not talk to your spouse between the hours of midnight and 5 am when caring for your baby.  Nothing good will come of it.

This may sound silly...but honestly at 2 am when you have a crying baby are you really going to say anything nice? When your kid is teething at 3 in the morning and you're so freaking tired you can't see straight, what productive conversation could you possibly have? I don't know about the rest of you but those middle of the night wakeups make me frustrated, tired and not a happy camper.  Not exactly a good state of mind to start talking about things.

When I first got this advice, I thought it was silly - we were still in the "we take care of our infant together in the middle of the night" phase. Then we realized that's it's dumb for both of us to be up and we should take turns (which we still do now) and inevitably the one who's up is not happy with the one who's still sleeping...hence the no talking rule.

We're usually pretty good about sticking to it and when one of us forgets the other reminds them.  Like last night, Jenna woke up from the crazy rain, I went in and got her back to sleep and when I came back to bed, I tried to have a whole conversation with Mike about the weather and I think I even tried to discuss some current events...his response? "Honey, what are you doing? We don't talk now." Right - those are the rules!