My nemesis: Queen Frostine of Candy Land

If you're a mom with little kids, you may be familiar with Queen Frostine, the warm-hearted wife of the Candy Land King. This Queen is featured on one of the "jump ahead" (or behind, depending on where you are on the game board) cards. Her royal domain sits as close to the end of the Candy Land trail as you can get on a "jump ahead card." She is far superior to Plumpy the plumpa troll or Gloppy the kindly molasses monster. If you are in it to win it, pulling the Queen Frostine card usually leads to a slightly obnoxious (and premature) victory dance.

This morning, I just about fell on my face after stepping on the blue gingerbread man. When I asked my son to put the game away, he set it up on the table instead and asked me to play. I cannot turn down those big brown eyes so, even though I had two loads of laundry to fold and another three loads begging to be washed, I pulled up a mini chair.

As I watched him carefully shuffle the cards and perfectly align the yellow and green gingerbread men at the starting line, I found myself hoping that somehow, Queen Frostine would appear at the top of the stack. Not because I wanted to win. There was no guarantee I would go first. I was hoping for Queen Frostine because her prompt appearance would mean a speedy game.

At that point, the internal conversation began: "Why do I want this game to go fast? I have laundry waiting for me. I'm not about to leave for a fabulous vacation. I don't have an appointment. I have a fresh cup of coffee, I'm still in my robe and my adorable son is sitting across from me. Even better, he wants to be sitting across from me! Why can't I just enjoy this moment?"

And, with that, I relaxed and forgot about Queen Frostine. "You can go first, mommy, because I gave you two gray hairs yesterday," he says. I make a mental note that he heard me mutter under my breath that I can actually feel my hair turn gray when my kids scream, and then reached for a card.

Queen Frostine smiled back and at me. My son's eyes lit up. He was so excited that I pulled the best possible card and said, "Yeah mommy!" My heart sank a bit as I moved my yellow gingerbread man to the last leg of the Candy Land trail. Six rounds later and the game was over.
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Technically, I won...but did I really? I tried to get him to play again, but other toys called and his interested dissipated. There I sat, in my mini chair, staring at Queen Frostine and feeling utterly pathetic about my mothering skills. Another moment with my son, gone. Damn Queen Frostine!

I am tempted to pull her card from the deck and destroy it so no other Candy Land games will be cut short by her grand entrance. I'm still in my robe this morning, but I've already learned a valuable lesson: Queen Frostine isn't doing me any favors.