Do You Hear What I Hear?

I have officially LOST MY MIND.

My child is currently obsessed with Raffi. Oh help me. Is it my fault? I so wanted to foster a love of music in my child. We listen to a variety of music, but we do have some "kid's" music that is in fairly heavy rotation on the CD player. But I typically insist that the kid's music have some sort of parental appeal - so we have a number of the Putumayo CDs (High Heeled Mama loves the New Orleans one and the Animals one best of all) and Baby Loves Jazz, which gives kiddie songs a jazz twist). And we listen to lots of the hubby's jazz collection and peanut loves the Dixie Chicks. The only exceptions to the parent test are our Music Class CDs and Raffi. Both were okay with me because their songs are cute and didn't really irritate me in the listen to them once a day rotation we were in.

Until now.

Sorry, Raffi. But I'm about to "shake my sillies out" in a way that probably won't be socially acceptable if I hear "Apples and Bananas" one more time...I have already changed the verse from "epples and banenes" to epples and bellinis cause I think I need five (like the number of ducks that run away from mama duck "over the hill and far away") in order to make it through one more repetition of the CD.

My kid doesn't even remember what the color red looks like from one second to the next, but he knows that "Five Little Ducks" comes on after "Rise and Shine."

I can hear you all now - just play something else. Why are you listening to Raffi over and over and over and over? Oh, because peanut has figured out how to ask for it. Breakfast now goes something like this (translations of toddlerease in parentheses):

"Yummmm. Faffle (waffle)."

"You like your waffle?"

"Dip? Dip?"

"Sure, you can dip your waffle in your yogurt."

"Yummmm."

Peanut points to CD player.

"Faffi? Faffi...Mommy? Faffi."

And so it goes. Yesterday, I tried to sneak in a different CD after he asked for Raffi. He was okay for a song or two based on my silly dances, but then, like a light bulb over his head, he turned to me and...

"Faffi?"

I think my ears might be bleeding. The last time I felt that way it was because I had been sitting in the front (oh yeah, the VERY first) row on the floor at a Prince concert (and you bet your "Raspberry Beret" that he looked at me right in the eye during a portion of "Little Red Corvette") and I walked around half deaf for two days with a smile on my face. Now, the ringing in my ears haunts my sleep and I want to find Mother Brown and tell her to put her knees down, for goodness sake.

Guess I'll just have to count down the days until this is released. Although you know what they say, be careful what you wish for...