This post is from Tiffany from “Braymen, Party of Three”.
My 11-month-old is cute. Actually, beyond cute, she’s beautiful. She’s got enormous dark eyes rimmed with lashes that go on for days. She’s petite, dainty, and incredibly photogenic. She’s also a filthy rotten liar.
Cara started smiling when she was about a month old and, according to most people who know her, she hasn’t stopped since. We call it the All Eyes on Cara Campaign.When we go out, she spends every second of every trip grinning at anybody who happens to look her way. Now that she’s got the waving action down, too, she’s a double threat. Grandmothers and older gentlemen – those are easy targets. She doesn’t even have to work on them. I’ve seen businessmen on their Blackberries stop conversations to flirt with her over my shoulder. I was much more impressed the day I looked back at her in the grocery store and she had what I’d call a “thug”, complete with prison tattoos across his face and neck, giggling and playing peek-a-boo with her.
She seems to take particular pleasure in breaking out the smiles and lashes when she sees a mother trying to contend with a screaming child. It’s almost like she wants to make their situation a little worse.
Even among those who know her well, her powers of flirt and grin are legendary. We’ve been attending a playgroup every week since she was about 4 weeks old. Even after seeing her every week for nearly her entire life, several of them have commented that they’ve never seen her cry. She’s always known as the smiling one, the happy one, the laughing one. I’ve gotten innumerable comments from people about how the happy baby will grow up to be the easy teenager and the happy adult. I’m so lucky! I am that mother in public that other mothers envy!
But I’m here to let you in on the big secret:
It’s all an act.
Not on my part – no. On hers. She started the All Eyes on Cara Campaign quite early and realized that her lashes and smile were the keys to making sure she was always the center of attention. When she meets strangers, it’s like a switch gets flipped inside her evil little head. Some days she will refuse to nap, violently kicking, screaming, arching, scratching, beating me, and generally being a terror. I will give up and put her in her car seat hoping for the best. She will scream so loud that I’m afraid other people in traffic are preparing to report me to CPS. But the second we show up at Target and I put her in the cart, she’s ON. A little director in her head has yelled “Action!” and she’s ready to play the game. We will cruise through the aisles, me playing the part of the exhausted mother who is searching for a band of gypsies interested in adding one to their flock, Cara playing the part of the homecoming queen in training, complete with beauty pageant wave. She will gather all the attention she possibly can, beaming and giggling. Then the second she’s back in the car, the little terror comes back.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying this is a bad thing. Because of her flirting powers we are always able to eat peacefully at restaurants. She’s too busy flirting with the waitstaff and other diners to pitch a fit. And we’ve certainly gotten our share of cute baby discounts, her crowning achievement being the night we got bumped up to first class on a flight because she batted her eyes at the right people. The girl has mad skills, and if she keeps it up, her daddy is going to need to invest in a shotgun about 13 years from now.
I’m not complaining, I’m just looking to reassure those parents who didn’t draw the Little Actress card. My baby isn’t always like this. She doesn’t wake up singing to the forest creatures, smile as she cleans up her own toys and scrubs my sinks, and she most certainly doesn’t fall asleep as gently as that baby bunny in her board book. My baby is an evil, manipulative little witch who takes pleasure in making you feel that much worse when your little one loses it in public.
And that’s not pity in the look I give you when your child is throwing a fit in the store; it’s commiseration. Whatever you’re getting in the check out line is only one tenth of what I will get as soon as Cara realizes her adoring public has moved on.
All I can hope is that one day she makes it up to me by thanking me in her Oscar speech.
Tiffany Braymen is the mother of one living in Austin, Texas. When she’s not failing to keep her kitchen clean or carpets vacuumed, she’s chronicling her daughter’s life on the little known blog “Braymen, Party of Three”.
About Guest Writer
Make the most of it. She has learnt an important lesson, it’s not the reality it’s the presentation. (She sounds a cutie.)
Twitter Name: penbleth
Your first drink drink (or first thirteen) are on me!
Twitter Name: Anissa Mayhew
Dude. My child is like this, too. She LOVES “talking” to anyone who catches her line of vision. Cute yet deadly.
Twitter Name: robinplemmons
OMG L does the same thing….although not so much with the acting. She is actually (usually) a pretty good kid….but MAN…that girl has charm. She was hanging out with the babysitters one afternoon and they were at a doctor’s appointment or something when she saw an older man coming by. She {at the age of 4 or 4} turned and told her babysitter that that man was going to tell her she was so cute.
And you know what…she was right…He walked by, came back, looked at my babysitter and looked at L and then said, “Wow, she is just the cutest little girl I have seen in such a long time!!”
Twitter Name: missycj03