I've been told I talk a lot...
...and apparently, it's genetic.
buck·eye - noun, \ˈbək-ˌī\ 1: any of various shrubs or trees (genus Aesculus) of the horse-chestnut family; also : the large nutlike seed of such a shrub or tree 2: capitalized : a native or resident of Ohio — used as a nickname
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Sucker
There's not much that I feel like sharing today. It's been sort of an oddly emotional evening for me and there's really no good reason for it.
Well, no good reason besides this:
He just melts my stinkin' heart.
And for some reason he's been sad this evening. He's got the pouty lower lip down and everything.
There's actually a lengthy story there, but I'm not going to tell it. The point is, I'm a sucker for that boy.
There aren't even any words that can describe it.
(Trust me, I just spent several minutes trying to come up with some and failed miserably.)
And Peter?
Well, he's just a sucker for his thumb, apparently.
Well, no good reason besides this:
He just melts my stinkin' heart.And for some reason he's been sad this evening. He's got the pouty lower lip down and everything.
There's actually a lengthy story there, but I'm not going to tell it. The point is, I'm a sucker for that boy.
There aren't even any words that can describe it.
(Trust me, I just spent several minutes trying to come up with some and failed miserably.)
And Peter?
Well, he's just a sucker for his thumb, apparently.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Your Sugar Coating is made of Artificial Sweetener
Dear Everyone,
I am tired of having the following conversation, and if I never have it again it will be too soon.
Random Person: How old is your baby?
Me: Oh, he's almost 3 months.
Random Person: Wow! He's Humongous!!!
Me: Well, um, yes, I guess he is.
Random Person: That's just "wonderful."
The random person I refer to here could be any one of several dozen people who, in the last 3 weeks or so, has approached me at the store or church or around our neighborhood and each and every time the interaction has been the same.
:(
For the record, I wouldn't call my son humongous. We haven't been to the doctor lately so I don't have his exact measurements and/or percentiles but he fits just fine in clothes labelled 3 months, so he can't possible be THAT big.
He's just a good eater, with a dairy cow for a mother, helping him to be a good grower.
And, Mister or Misses Random Person, saying that his size is "wonderful," immediately after you've realized you've hurt my feelings doesn't help either. Why don't you just go on and call my son a Lard-Ass while you're at it?
Because up until about 3 weeks ago people commented on how cute, beautiful or handsome he was. Now you all just call him gigantic and look at him like maybe he is a freak of nature.
Suddenly a vision of a GIANT baby Peter stomping through the nursery at church like Godzilla appears in my head. He's ripping apart the toys, shoving the adults aside and devouring all the other babies.
*shudder*
He's not THAT big.
I promise.
For the record, YES, I do realize there are all sorts of mother's out there who struggle with milk production and feeding their baby enough, or with really little babies who don't grow very fast, that might actually think that my situation IS wonderful. But the fact of the matter is that I worry about his size, because I, let's face it, I worry about everything. The LAST thing I need is a bunch of people making me worry even more.
Thank you, and that will be all for now.
I am tired of having the following conversation, and if I never have it again it will be too soon.
Random Person: How old is your baby?
Me: Oh, he's almost 3 months.
Random Person: Wow! He's Humongous!!!
Me: Well, um, yes, I guess he is.
Random Person: That's just "wonderful."
The random person I refer to here could be any one of several dozen people who, in the last 3 weeks or so, has approached me at the store or church or around our neighborhood and each and every time the interaction has been the same.
:(
For the record, I wouldn't call my son humongous. We haven't been to the doctor lately so I don't have his exact measurements and/or percentiles but he fits just fine in clothes labelled 3 months, so he can't possible be THAT big.
He's just a good eater, with a dairy cow for a mother, helping him to be a good grower.
And, Mister or Misses Random Person, saying that his size is "wonderful," immediately after you've realized you've hurt my feelings doesn't help either. Why don't you just go on and call my son a Lard-Ass while you're at it?
Because up until about 3 weeks ago people commented on how cute, beautiful or handsome he was. Now you all just call him gigantic and look at him like maybe he is a freak of nature.
Suddenly a vision of a GIANT baby Peter stomping through the nursery at church like Godzilla appears in my head. He's ripping apart the toys, shoving the adults aside and devouring all the other babies.
*shudder*
He's not THAT big.
I promise.
For the record, YES, I do realize there are all sorts of mother's out there who struggle with milk production and feeding their baby enough, or with really little babies who don't grow very fast, that might actually think that my situation IS wonderful. But the fact of the matter is that I worry about his size, because I, let's face it, I worry about everything. The LAST thing I need is a bunch of people making me worry even more.
Thank you, and that will be all for now.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Working in Mysterious Ways
Where on Earth is this week going?
I can't say that I've been having any real kind of fun, and yet the time is FLYING.
Somehow, Peter has gotten himself onto something which very closely resembles a 3 hour feeding schedule during the day.
:)
Just take a moment to bask in the glory of that statement.
Because let's face it, now that I put it in writing, it will probably all fall apart.
He's still going to sleep right around 8 pm, sleeping through until 2 or 3 am before waking to be fed and then sleeping through again until anywhere from 6-9 am. Then, depending upon when he gets his first breakfast, I set my eye on that 3 hour prize... and most of the time we make it!!
That whole eat-play-nap thing is genius.
And then something else happened.
As I mentioned in a previous post, last week we started attending mass at the military chapel here where I was pleased to run into Nikki, a friend of mine from Japan. She invited me to join her in attending the women's bible study groups (P.W.O.C.) held at the chapel on Tuesday morning. Unfortunately, the class (Boundaries in Marriage) that she is part of was full, so I ended up joining a different class (The 5 Love Languages of Children.)
I was less than thrilled to be separated from my friend, but the ladies in my group were very nice and welcoming despite the fact that I am coming in late and I don't actually have children old enough for a lot of the class topics to apply to yet. I went into the class thinking that the worst thing this class could do for me would be to give me more ideas about working with children that I could use if/when I go back to teaching. But also, I think that examining my parenting skills EARLY ON is a good idea, because although I am experienced with children, I have some family issues and want to do anything I can to try to prevent repeating the mistakes of my parents.
So I joined the class and I'm loving it, but that's sort of beside the point of this story, which is about Peter, his feeding schedule his "fondness" for all the screaming.
Yesterday in class Peter got hungry right on schedule. I had a bottle of pumped milk all ready, but for some reason he wasn't having any of it, which led me to cover up with my sweatshirt and nurse him during class, despite how it makes me entirely uncomfortable to do so.
Forget the fact that ALL the other mothers do it.
Forget the fact that nursing feels sort of like an intimate thing that I don't like doing in public.
Because the real reason I don't like doing it is because of ALL THE SCREAMING!!!
Seriously.
Many of you have heard me complain about nursing. How it is difficult and frustrating and sometimes hurts and is almost NEVER anything remotely close to being the intimate bonding experience I've heard about.
Friends have told me to give it time; to wait for my son's charming personality to emerge. They assure me that eventually we'll settle into a groove and it will be wonderful.
Yeah. Right.
It has also been suggested that my bad attitude going into it, and my frustration about my experience thus far is ruining it for me.
Trust me, it isn't that either.
It's the screaming.
And probably also the spitting, coughing and sometimes choking.
And for sure the spraying.
(Mine, not Peter's. His comes later and is usually contained nicely by a pamper.)
ANYWAY... so yesterday during Bible Study class I tried to feed Peter for a grand total of maybe 10 minutes total, using both sides. I must have succeeded in getting some food into him, since he didn't eat for another 3 hours that day, but nobody in the room would have called that meal a success. In between short bouts of suckling he screamed and spit and coughed and choked. Probably, I was spraying everywhere too, but thankfully it was concealed by my sweatshirt.
I just kept wondering how on Earth all the other Mom's are able to quietly nurse their child and, like, go on about their business. You know, without all the screaming, spitting, etc.
After the 10 minutes, Peter was rapidly approaching super-sonic and I'd started to work on burping him but was having zero success and I was going to take him out of the to try to calm him down outside of class. However, another Mom (who's own 18 month old son was toddling around the room) offered to take him for a bit and, in my frustration, I let her.
She gently placed Peter in her arms, tummy down, across her body, almost as if she was going to "fly him" like Superman. He immediately stopped crying, startled at the new position. Then she gently swung him side to side a few times and he let out 2 HUMONGOUS burps.
WHATTHEHECK???
How did she do that?
Class went on and she held my child, who swung happily in her arms for the remainder of our time. Thankful for the help, I found myself feeling like the most inadequate mother on the planet.
Afterward she gave me back my son and went to get her older daughter out of childcare. I waited outside the building for her and flagged her down when she came out so we could talk more.
First she started with the "It's okay" speech as in, "It's okay if you don't feel bonded with your baby yet." "It's okay if sometimes you sort of hate him a little since being a new parent is hard, etc..."
It sort of made me laugh. I am absolutely bonded with my child. I love him. He's my whole world. I promise.
I just really tend to hate feeding him. (See above, re: screaming, etc.)
Then she explained that the way she'd been holding Peter is a colic hold recommended by Doctors since your hand on the baby's tummy encourages the baby to burp and release all that unwanted air and gas. She told me that she's an advisor for La Leche League and that I shouldn't feel bad about my "mommy-skills" because she has a lot of experience with babies and helping new moms. We talked for awhile and she asked me if I thought maybe I had an over supply of milk since she'd heard Peter coughing and spitting. And if he's coughing and spitting a lot when nursing he'd be swallowing a lot of air, needing to be burped and providing an excellent opportunity to use that colic hold.
Undoubtedly, I told her yes. Me=Dairy Cow. Milk supply abundant
So then she recommended some different reclined positions to try to help me not flood my poor child each time I feed him and sent me on my way.
Her nursing advice, plus the new colic hold.... holy smokes, it's like parenting GOLD.
Don't get me wrong, there is still some of the screaming, etc... but so much less and now I have an almost guaranteed strategy to use to burp him efficiently and then he's all better and ready to continue eating more peacefully.
Which leads me to the following conclusion:
I should just listen to the Lord. If I pay attention it is so obvious that He really is watching over me. He will provide.
Case and point:
1. A few weeks ago Matt and I met with the local Priest to make arrangements on our end for our son's baptism.
2. At that meeting I also mentioned my interest in converting and found out that RCIA was starting the following Sunday, getting me and Matt back to church and working on our faith.
3. That Sunday I ran into Nikki at mass, providing me with a much needed local friend. She invited me to bible study.
4. At bible study I not only get time to work on my faith, and my parenting skills, but I also met a lovely woman from La Leche who gave me some WONDERFUL, much needed advice on burping my baby and feeding him reducing the amount of screaming etc I must deal with during feedings and FINALLY helping me to find some pleasure in nursing my child.
Amen.
I can't say that I've been having any real kind of fun, and yet the time is FLYING.
Somehow, Peter has gotten himself onto something which very closely resembles a 3 hour feeding schedule during the day.
:)
Just take a moment to bask in the glory of that statement.
Because let's face it, now that I put it in writing, it will probably all fall apart.
He's still going to sleep right around 8 pm, sleeping through until 2 or 3 am before waking to be fed and then sleeping through again until anywhere from 6-9 am. Then, depending upon when he gets his first breakfast, I set my eye on that 3 hour prize... and most of the time we make it!!
That whole eat-play-nap thing is genius.
And then something else happened.
As I mentioned in a previous post, last week we started attending mass at the military chapel here where I was pleased to run into Nikki, a friend of mine from Japan. She invited me to join her in attending the women's bible study groups (P.W.O.C.) held at the chapel on Tuesday morning. Unfortunately, the class (Boundaries in Marriage) that she is part of was full, so I ended up joining a different class (The 5 Love Languages of Children.)
I was less than thrilled to be separated from my friend, but the ladies in my group were very nice and welcoming despite the fact that I am coming in late and I don't actually have children old enough for a lot of the class topics to apply to yet. I went into the class thinking that the worst thing this class could do for me would be to give me more ideas about working with children that I could use if/when I go back to teaching. But also, I think that examining my parenting skills EARLY ON is a good idea, because although I am experienced with children, I have some family issues and want to do anything I can to try to prevent repeating the mistakes of my parents.
So I joined the class and I'm loving it, but that's sort of beside the point of this story, which is about Peter, his feeding schedule his "fondness" for all the screaming.
Yesterday in class Peter got hungry right on schedule. I had a bottle of pumped milk all ready, but for some reason he wasn't having any of it, which led me to cover up with my sweatshirt and nurse him during class, despite how it makes me entirely uncomfortable to do so.
Forget the fact that ALL the other mothers do it.
Forget the fact that nursing feels sort of like an intimate thing that I don't like doing in public.
Because the real reason I don't like doing it is because of ALL THE SCREAMING!!!
Seriously.
Many of you have heard me complain about nursing. How it is difficult and frustrating and sometimes hurts and is almost NEVER anything remotely close to being the intimate bonding experience I've heard about.
Friends have told me to give it time; to wait for my son's charming personality to emerge. They assure me that eventually we'll settle into a groove and it will be wonderful.
Yeah. Right.
It has also been suggested that my bad attitude going into it, and my frustration about my experience thus far is ruining it for me.
Trust me, it isn't that either.
It's the screaming.
And probably also the spitting, coughing and sometimes choking.
And for sure the spraying.
(Mine, not Peter's. His comes later and is usually contained nicely by a pamper.)
ANYWAY... so yesterday during Bible Study class I tried to feed Peter for a grand total of maybe 10 minutes total, using both sides. I must have succeeded in getting some food into him, since he didn't eat for another 3 hours that day, but nobody in the room would have called that meal a success. In between short bouts of suckling he screamed and spit and coughed and choked. Probably, I was spraying everywhere too, but thankfully it was concealed by my sweatshirt.
I just kept wondering how on Earth all the other Mom's are able to quietly nurse their child and, like, go on about their business. You know, without all the screaming, spitting, etc.
After the 10 minutes, Peter was rapidly approaching super-sonic and I'd started to work on burping him but was having zero success and I was going to take him out of the to try to calm him down outside of class. However, another Mom (who's own 18 month old son was toddling around the room) offered to take him for a bit and, in my frustration, I let her.
She gently placed Peter in her arms, tummy down, across her body, almost as if she was going to "fly him" like Superman. He immediately stopped crying, startled at the new position. Then she gently swung him side to side a few times and he let out 2 HUMONGOUS burps.
WHATTHEHECK???
How did she do that?
Class went on and she held my child, who swung happily in her arms for the remainder of our time. Thankful for the help, I found myself feeling like the most inadequate mother on the planet.
Afterward she gave me back my son and went to get her older daughter out of childcare. I waited outside the building for her and flagged her down when she came out so we could talk more.
First she started with the "It's okay" speech as in, "It's okay if you don't feel bonded with your baby yet." "It's okay if sometimes you sort of hate him a little since being a new parent is hard, etc..."
It sort of made me laugh. I am absolutely bonded with my child. I love him. He's my whole world. I promise.
I just really tend to hate feeding him. (See above, re: screaming, etc.)
Then she explained that the way she'd been holding Peter is a colic hold recommended by Doctors since your hand on the baby's tummy encourages the baby to burp and release all that unwanted air and gas. She told me that she's an advisor for La Leche League and that I shouldn't feel bad about my "mommy-skills" because she has a lot of experience with babies and helping new moms. We talked for awhile and she asked me if I thought maybe I had an over supply of milk since she'd heard Peter coughing and spitting. And if he's coughing and spitting a lot when nursing he'd be swallowing a lot of air, needing to be burped and providing an excellent opportunity to use that colic hold.
Undoubtedly, I told her yes. Me=Dairy Cow. Milk supply abundant
So then she recommended some different reclined positions to try to help me not flood my poor child each time I feed him and sent me on my way.
Her nursing advice, plus the new colic hold.... holy smokes, it's like parenting GOLD.
Don't get me wrong, there is still some of the screaming, etc... but so much less and now I have an almost guaranteed strategy to use to burp him efficiently and then he's all better and ready to continue eating more peacefully.
Which leads me to the following conclusion:
I should just listen to the Lord. If I pay attention it is so obvious that He really is watching over me. He will provide.
Case and point:
1. A few weeks ago Matt and I met with the local Priest to make arrangements on our end for our son's baptism.
2. At that meeting I also mentioned my interest in converting and found out that RCIA was starting the following Sunday, getting me and Matt back to church and working on our faith.
3. That Sunday I ran into Nikki at mass, providing me with a much needed local friend. She invited me to bible study.
4. At bible study I not only get time to work on my faith, and my parenting skills, but I also met a lovely woman from La Leche who gave me some WONDERFUL, much needed advice on burping my baby and feeding him reducing the amount of screaming etc I must deal with during feedings and FINALLY helping me to find some pleasure in nursing my child.
Amen.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Happy Birthday Matt!
Yesterday was my husband's birthday. His birthdays are always a little frustrating because he always wants NOTHING. And I know that once you're a grown up, and a parent, a birthday is supposed to be no big deal. But it's difficult for me, because, generally speaking, I love that man and I want to make him feel special.
I did search for a new pair of olive green cargo shorts for him, since he has managed to rip a humongous hole in his, but it was too late in the season to find any. I also tried to find him some new grey tshirts to replace his Stomp tshirt (purchased in 1999,) his "Miami!" tshirt (purchased in 2000) and his TAMUCC tech-expo tshirt (which was given to me for him in 2003) which he wears ENTIRELY too often so that the images are really starting to wear off and random holes are beginning to appear in odd places where the fabric is literally disintegrating.
But, no luck there either.
(At least I know what to aim for at Christmas, and if I start looking NOW I might actually find something to make him happy.)
Anyway, since I failed MISERABLY at finding him any presents I decided to make him a cake. I probably should have known better, as my efforts started out ALL WRONG in his opinion and he started giving me a whole lot of unwanted advice on how to do it, never mind the fact that I KNOW perfectly well how to make a cake and never asked for his advice anyway.
What this meant was that by the time I got around to decorating the cake I was THOROUGHLY annoyed at him.
A feeling which I decided would be best expressed through some gentle harassment in butter cream:
Not too shabby of a cake decorating effort, if I do say so myself. Except of course that the M and the N in "Damn" are sort of squashed together but maybe that's what I get for swearing in icing.
Oh, and what's that crack you ask?
Well, that would be the cause of the whole argument to begin with. The cakes didn't rise evenly but instead looked like little mounds so I was a bit concerned about stacking them. I was considering my options when Matt came in and INSISTED that I stack them with the curvy parts facing to the middle and just fill in the extra space with icing.
I did, and in listening to him I used an ENTIRE batch of butter cream balancing the cake.
Not that it mattered anyway, because once the whole thing settled overnight, the cracks appeared.
Anyway, Matt didn't even bother to pretend to be insulted or even amused at my little insult. :(
At least the cake tasted good, with an extra overdose of SUGAR along the way because of all that extra filling icing.
Happy Birthday Honey.
(Oh and you too Gramma Terri.)
I did search for a new pair of olive green cargo shorts for him, since he has managed to rip a humongous hole in his, but it was too late in the season to find any. I also tried to find him some new grey tshirts to replace his Stomp tshirt (purchased in 1999,) his "Miami!" tshirt (purchased in 2000) and his TAMUCC tech-expo tshirt (which was given to me for him in 2003) which he wears ENTIRELY too often so that the images are really starting to wear off and random holes are beginning to appear in odd places where the fabric is literally disintegrating.
But, no luck there either.
(At least I know what to aim for at Christmas, and if I start looking NOW I might actually find something to make him happy.)
Anyway, since I failed MISERABLY at finding him any presents I decided to make him a cake. I probably should have known better, as my efforts started out ALL WRONG in his opinion and he started giving me a whole lot of unwanted advice on how to do it, never mind the fact that I KNOW perfectly well how to make a cake and never asked for his advice anyway.
What this meant was that by the time I got around to decorating the cake I was THOROUGHLY annoyed at him.
A feeling which I decided would be best expressed through some gentle harassment in butter cream:
Not too shabby of a cake decorating effort, if I do say so myself. Except of course that the M and the N in "Damn" are sort of squashed together but maybe that's what I get for swearing in icing.
Oh, and what's that crack you ask?
Well, that would be the cause of the whole argument to begin with. The cakes didn't rise evenly but instead looked like little mounds so I was a bit concerned about stacking them. I was considering my options when Matt came in and INSISTED that I stack them with the curvy parts facing to the middle and just fill in the extra space with icing.
I did, and in listening to him I used an ENTIRE batch of butter cream balancing the cake.
Not that it mattered anyway, because once the whole thing settled overnight, the cracks appeared.
Anyway, Matt didn't even bother to pretend to be insulted or even amused at my little insult. :(
At least the cake tasted good, with an extra overdose of SUGAR along the way because of all that extra filling icing.
Happy Birthday Honey.
(Oh and you too Gramma Terri.)
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Winter Clothes
Last week at one of the local farmers' markets a lady was selling hand made hats including a hilarious style that looks like a fish eating your head. Since we're going to be spending the holidays in Ohio we decided Peter needed one of his very own to protect his cute little head against the COLD Midwestern winter weather.
(Even when totally at his Mommy annoyed, he still manages to be a total cutie-pie.)
I think perhaps he was less than thrilled when we asked him to model his new hat.
(Even when totally at his Mommy annoyed, he still manages to be a total cutie-pie.)Here's a better view of the silly fish design that just cracks me right up:
I'm actually completely surprised Matt allowed me to make this purchase. Usually he gets angry when I buy stuff because it amuses me. Maybe its different when that stuff is for your kid.
Of course this turned out to be a dilemma all of its own. They had pink, ivory, brown and navy blue suits. Obviously I didn't want pink or ivory. I debated for awhile between the brown and the blue, but eventually settled on the blue because I thought it would go better with the silly hat. However, they didn't have a blue one in size 6-12 months and I hemmed and hawed forever before eventually deciding just to go up to the 12-18 month size figuring that Pete is big for his age already and that maybe he'd even be able to wear it for two years.
When I got it home, I put it on the boy and was happy to see that with a good 3 months left til December, the suit is really that big on him and, in my opinion, it looked really cute.
He kind of looks like a really silly navy blue sea lion, which makes me think that, probably, it's a very good thing that I opted against the brown.
I wonder how long til somebody asks me why my son's hat has olives on it...
I'm actually completely surprised Matt allowed me to make this purchase. Usually he gets angry when I buy stuff because it amuses me. Maybe its different when that stuff is for your kid.
So then the next day I decided to visit Old Navy to see if they had any affordable winter coats. As it turned out, they were having a huge baby sale and I spent a lot more money then I meant too stocking up on 6-12 month size clothes, but I also was happy to find an even better alternative to the winter coat I was originally looking for since they had fleece "teddy bear" snow suits on sale for just $15. ("Teddy bear" suits because the hoods have ears on them.)
Of course this turned out to be a dilemma all of its own. They had pink, ivory, brown and navy blue suits. Obviously I didn't want pink or ivory. I debated for awhile between the brown and the blue, but eventually settled on the blue because I thought it would go better with the silly hat. However, they didn't have a blue one in size 6-12 months and I hemmed and hawed forever before eventually deciding just to go up to the 12-18 month size figuring that Pete is big for his age already and that maybe he'd even be able to wear it for two years.
When I got it home, I put it on the boy and was happy to see that with a good 3 months left til December, the suit is really that big on him and, in my opinion, it looked really cute.
He kind of looks like a really silly navy blue sea lion, which makes me think that, probably, it's a very good thing that I opted against the brown. Thursday, September 17, 2009
Peter's Laugh
At long last, as promised, here is a short video featuring my son and his ridiculous sounding little laugh:
If you are wondering, yes, his Daddy did actually pick out those ridiculous socks, although to be fair, some of the lettering on the shirt is yellow as you can see here:
Not that I am one to judge. Ladies and gentleman, in a STELLAR moment of parenting, here is my 2 month old watching Dora the "Explora."
Yes I know that this is awful, but to be fair, Dora seemed to make him happy and this was that day last week when the screaming reached an all time high leading in my blog begging for help.
Oh and if by any chance you find yourself wondering WHY on earth my little boy even owns a pair of ridiculous yellow socks, just be patient and all will be revealed come Halloween.
If you are wondering, yes, his Daddy did actually pick out those ridiculous socks, although to be fair, some of the lettering on the shirt is yellow as you can see here:
It says "Handsome just like Daddy."
Which may be very true, but regardless those socks look ridiculous as you can clearly see in this last picture.Not that I am one to judge. Ladies and gentleman, in a STELLAR moment of parenting, here is my 2 month old watching Dora the "Explora."
Yes I know that this is awful, but to be fair, Dora seemed to make him happy and this was that day last week when the screaming reached an all time high leading in my blog begging for help.
Oh and if by any chance you find yourself wondering WHY on earth my little boy even owns a pair of ridiculous yellow socks, just be patient and all will be revealed come Halloween.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
The Icing on the Cake
I have a confession to make and its a little bit embarrassing, so please try not to judge.
I am addicted to cake decorating shows.
I also spent many long moments at the Ohio State Fair studying the entries from the cake decorating contest.
Please don't misunderstand me, I still love Ace of Cakes best, but if there is a cake decorating show on television, competition or otherwise, there is a VERY good chance I'll watch it.
And then since we had the recipes we started making them.
Which by the way is AWESOME, because I really like cake.
Here is a photo of Matt trying a new recipe for Chocolate Butter cream icing while Peter looks on. Mmmmmmm.
(If you're wondering, yes, my son does appear to find baking amusing. He smiles and giggles at Matt while he counts out the measurements. There's probably a silly voice involved in there somewhere too.)
Please keep in mind that in our house, the kitchen is Matt's domain.
It's not that I can't cook. I really can. But, I don't generally enjoy it, especially since pretty much any time I've ever tried to cook my husband something special for dinner he inevitably HATED it. Eventually I stopped trying and he took over which means that the only time I willingly go in the kitchen these days is to bake.
Now I know what you're all thinking... and YES, since we were baking I was helping. The cake thing, and trying out the recipes was originally my thing, but Matt, in his own subtle way likes to take over and tell me I'm doing everything wrong. It has something to do with the fact that one of his jobs in the Navy is running the Galley (aka, a Navy Kitchen) and how he somehow possesses this uncanny knowledge of all things culinary.
So during this particular baking adventure he'd taken over and instead of helping I ended up amusing myself and my child with the powdered sugar by doing stuff like this:
Why decorate a cake when you can decorate your baby?
And then of course I had to go get the camera and before I was done taking pictures, Matt was finished with the baking.
At some point, maybe we'll actually attempt to decorate one of our cakes. Maybe at that point I'll actually get to do my thing and Matt won't take over because that boy doesn't have an artistic bone in his body.
Maybe.
Otherwise I'll just have to keep taking pictures.
I am addicted to cake decorating shows.
You see, when I was a child my mother had an OLD copy of a Wilton cake decorating magazine. Just one random issue. I think it was a summer one because it definitely featured some 4th of July type patriotic cakes. I probably first dug it off the shelf when I was still too young to read but I pulled it out often and I remember loving the pictures of those awesomely decorated cakes.
I also spent many long moments at the Ohio State Fair studying the entries from the cake decorating contest.
When I was younger my fascination with cakes probably had a lot to do with my extreme love of sugar and all things buttercream. As I matured, I'm hoping I was also interested by the decorations from an artistic perspective.
I did try to decorate cakes myself from time to time, usually for my mother's birthday. The cakes I made tasted good and looked nice enough, but there were hardly beautiful like the ones in the magazine and at the fair.
Then last spring I stumbled upon Food Network's show Ace of Cakes during a random late night bought of insomnia induced channel surfing. I quickly became engrossed with all the random adventures of Duff and his gang over at Charm City Cakes and fascinated by the enormous variety of cakes they make.
My addiction to Ace of Cakes eventually grew to a borderline obsession once I introduced my hubby to the show and he enjoyed it as well and it earned a spot in my DVR programming. These days I secretly dream of running away to Baltimore with the hopes of securing a position working in their fabulous bakery.
Apparently, since Duff's show has become such a cult hit, several more cake decorating shows have been created to ride its on cake tails. (Okay, I swear to heaven I didn't mean to type that, I meant to type "coat tails," but that is what came out and now I sort of find it funny so I'm leaving it.)
Please don't misunderstand me, I still love Ace of Cakes best, but if there is a cake decorating show on television, competition or otherwise, there is a VERY good chance I'll watch it.
It's a guilty pleasure really.
Which was all well and good until Matt started wondering about some of the materials they use. Obviously we know all about the cakes per say, and your standard whipped or butter cream frosting. After that though, our knowledge of fondant and gum paste and royal icing was severely lacking. Lacking until I started looking up recipes for them on the Internet. Wilton's website by the way is an AWESOME baking site, featuring everything from recipes to decorating patterns for all sorts of sweets.
And then since we had the recipes we started making them.
Which by the way is AWESOME, because I really like cake.
But is not so awesome for my figure. Hopefully, I can blame the flab on leftover baby weight. Right? Right.
Here is a photo of Matt trying a new recipe for Chocolate Butter cream icing while Peter looks on. Mmmmmmm.
(If you're wondering, yes, my son does appear to find baking amusing. He smiles and giggles at Matt while he counts out the measurements. There's probably a silly voice involved in there somewhere too.)Please keep in mind that in our house, the kitchen is Matt's domain.
It's not that I can't cook. I really can. But, I don't generally enjoy it, especially since pretty much any time I've ever tried to cook my husband something special for dinner he inevitably HATED it. Eventually I stopped trying and he took over which means that the only time I willingly go in the kitchen these days is to bake.
Now I know what you're all thinking... and YES, since we were baking I was helping. The cake thing, and trying out the recipes was originally my thing, but Matt, in his own subtle way likes to take over and tell me I'm doing everything wrong. It has something to do with the fact that one of his jobs in the Navy is running the Galley (aka, a Navy Kitchen) and how he somehow possesses this uncanny knowledge of all things culinary.
So during this particular baking adventure he'd taken over and instead of helping I ended up amusing myself and my child with the powdered sugar by doing stuff like this:
Why decorate a cake when you can decorate your baby?And then of course I had to go get the camera and before I was done taking pictures, Matt was finished with the baking.
At some point, maybe we'll actually attempt to decorate one of our cakes. Maybe at that point I'll actually get to do my thing and Matt won't take over because that boy doesn't have an artistic bone in his body.
Maybe.
Otherwise I'll just have to keep taking pictures.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Too Tired to Give this Post a Clever Title
I'm not really sure if its the whole, revisiting of our "feeding the baby on demand" schedule or just a random fluke, but the last 2 nights, Peter decided he needed to wake up and be fed twice (as opposed to the once he's been going with for right around a month now.)
In all fairness, Saturday night was the big OSU vs USC game so his bedtime routine was completely thrown out for the night as we let him fall asleep downstairs with us while we were holding him, and then, after USC fought back to break the hearts of Buckeyes fans everywhere for yet another year, and the game was over, I moved him up to his crib. He still ATE at the same time he would have, but I guess his schedule was thrown off because he was up at 1:00 am and 4:00 am HUNGRY.
This was really unfortunate because I had to be by 7:30 to give myself time to pump enough to last through the morning so that we could (finally) start going to church again.
If you're wondering what happened on the church front, (and I doubt you, are but I'm going tell you anyway) well, a lot of things happened. Last year we'd been attending a non-denominational contemporary worship service at a church my neighbor had taken me to. And for a few months I really liked it. Matt, who was raised very Catholic, and now, um, "struggles" with his faith and/or religious devotion was really not. He kept going, for me, but I knew he was unhappy.
Then the Pastor there got into this whole serious of sermons about seeking out the Lord and spending time in the Word, which on the surface sounds really great, but in all actuality was really not. It felt like he was berating us for not being devoted enough. And the whole time I kept thinking, "Um, well gee, I'm here because I am seeking God and I want to be devoted and spend time reading the Bible, but the Bible happens to be really tough to understand at times and I need help so why can't you stop "yelling" at me and help me figure out what it all means."
And then I got pregnant. Which was also around the time I found out that that church, like MANY others, doesn't believe in infant baptism. And that's fine. It's just that infant baptism IS something I was, in my limited religious upbringing, taught to believe in. And I started to worry about my baby and whether or not he would be baptised.
And then the hormones and the exhaustion and the nausea set in for real, and I couldn't pry myself out of bed in the morning, so, we just stopped going.
It was easier to just postpone dealing with it all for another, good long while. That is SO terrible, but its what happend.
When Peter was born it was time to get our act together.
I knew I wanted to get him baptised, which seemed like a difficult thing to do without being affiliated with any church, besides maybe the one where we had our marriage blessed in Ohio so I was working with Matt's mother to try to arrange to have the Baptism done there over the holidays. Then Matt said that it seemed like the only way to get this thing done properly was for us to start attending mass regularly.
Now, I was raised loosely protestant, but when we had our marriage blessed by the church we agreed to raise our children in the Catholic faith. This was something I was absolutely fine with doing, but also not something I'd be able to take care of for our family by myself if Matt wasn't interested since it was HIS religion, and, technically, not mine. (Which is why we ended up where we did last year.) After our marriage blessing, I'd always intended to convert, but had never been able to make the time commitment to take all the classes and wasn't really sure if converting to my husband's faith made any sense if my husband didn't care either way.
For the record, the whole idea that a Protestant becoming a Catholic is a "conversion' is ludicrous to me. God is still God. Jesus still died to save us. I still have to accept him as my Lord and Savior and put my trust in Him. Period. At the heart of the matter, the core beliefs are still the same and honestly I believe that the whole Free Will thing created a lot of people who really thought they knew better and started all the arguing and the reform, which is kind of a shame, that all of God's children can't get along.... but my point here is that while the practices may be different, the CORE beliefs are still the same.
Anyway.
Last week I called the local Chaplin's office to schedule a meeting with the local military Priest about taking care of classes/arrangements for my son's baptism on this end. During the meeting I also brought up to Father Peter (I find it amusing that he shares my son's name) the idea of my converting, and as it turns out the classes started the following Sunday (or, as I am writing this now, yesterday.)
At that point in the meeting, Father and I giggled about how that timing might be Divine Provenance.
And Matt rolled his eyes at us.
Meanwhile, Peter looked out at us from his car seat and blew spit bubbles.
Now who am I to argue with God and his timing? For the first time in years I have time to attend and the classes are right before mass, so I signed up. Conversion... here I come.
Which brings me back to how getting up twice to feed Peter the night before left me exhausted.
But I powered through. Coffee is a BEAUTIFUL thing. And, coincidentally, my old friend Nikki, who used to work with me in Japan happened to be there at mass. A happy blessing, discovered right around the time I was beginning to feel resigned to the fact that I would never have any friends at this duty station.
After church, Matt took the baby and together they napped on the coach for TWO hours while I did laundry. (I still don't know how Matt can hold our son and still relax enough to fall sleep.) I loved the free time to get stuff done but I really could have used a nap myself.
Because of course last night Peter was up twice again. At 4:00 when Peter started to carry on for the second time and Matt kept right on sleeping peacefully, I seriously contemplated, for about 10 seconds, murdering my beloved spouse because at least maybe I'd be able to sleep in prison. Then I remembered I love my spouse and my baby, and I dragged myself to the crib to take care of business.
The "great" part was that by the time the baby had been fed and changed and rocked back to sleep, Matt's alarm had woken him anyway.
Thankfully, when Matt left for school at 7:00 am Peter was still sleeping in his crib giving me a little time to get myself together. And by together, I mean be asleep.
Around 8:00 am little, happy, "Hey Mommy! I'm awake and entertaining myself for now but I'm also in a very dirty diaper and could really go for some breakfast soon." type baby noises started to come at me through the monitor. I forced myself to get up.
I changed Peter and then fed him.
Then I went to make some much needed coffee, because even though I've asked Matt about seven hundred times to put some on in the mornings before he leaves, he NEVER does.
Peter sat in his bouncy chair and I poured in the water and dumped 3 scoops of grounds into the top of the machine and then stared at everything for a minute as it seemed so very wrong.
Then I realized I'd forgotten the filter.
Yuck.
It's definitely Monday.
Mondays and I don't get along.
**Edit: I'm not kidding here. When I hit "Post" and the confirm window popped up it, had an ad for sleep therapy. :) Oh, if it could only be that simple!**
In all fairness, Saturday night was the big OSU vs USC game so his bedtime routine was completely thrown out for the night as we let him fall asleep downstairs with us while we were holding him, and then, after USC fought back to break the hearts of Buckeyes fans everywhere for yet another year, and the game was over, I moved him up to his crib. He still ATE at the same time he would have, but I guess his schedule was thrown off because he was up at 1:00 am and 4:00 am HUNGRY.
This was really unfortunate because I had to be by 7:30 to give myself time to pump enough to last through the morning so that we could (finally) start going to church again.
If you're wondering what happened on the church front, (and I doubt you, are but I'm going tell you anyway) well, a lot of things happened. Last year we'd been attending a non-denominational contemporary worship service at a church my neighbor had taken me to. And for a few months I really liked it. Matt, who was raised very Catholic, and now, um, "struggles" with his faith and/or religious devotion was really not. He kept going, for me, but I knew he was unhappy.
Then the Pastor there got into this whole serious of sermons about seeking out the Lord and spending time in the Word, which on the surface sounds really great, but in all actuality was really not. It felt like he was berating us for not being devoted enough. And the whole time I kept thinking, "Um, well gee, I'm here because I am seeking God and I want to be devoted and spend time reading the Bible, but the Bible happens to be really tough to understand at times and I need help so why can't you stop "yelling" at me and help me figure out what it all means."
And then I got pregnant. Which was also around the time I found out that that church, like MANY others, doesn't believe in infant baptism. And that's fine. It's just that infant baptism IS something I was, in my limited religious upbringing, taught to believe in. And I started to worry about my baby and whether or not he would be baptised.
And then the hormones and the exhaustion and the nausea set in for real, and I couldn't pry myself out of bed in the morning, so, we just stopped going.
It was easier to just postpone dealing with it all for another, good long while. That is SO terrible, but its what happend.
When Peter was born it was time to get our act together.
I knew I wanted to get him baptised, which seemed like a difficult thing to do without being affiliated with any church, besides maybe the one where we had our marriage blessed in Ohio so I was working with Matt's mother to try to arrange to have the Baptism done there over the holidays. Then Matt said that it seemed like the only way to get this thing done properly was for us to start attending mass regularly.
Now, I was raised loosely protestant, but when we had our marriage blessed by the church we agreed to raise our children in the Catholic faith. This was something I was absolutely fine with doing, but also not something I'd be able to take care of for our family by myself if Matt wasn't interested since it was HIS religion, and, technically, not mine. (Which is why we ended up where we did last year.) After our marriage blessing, I'd always intended to convert, but had never been able to make the time commitment to take all the classes and wasn't really sure if converting to my husband's faith made any sense if my husband didn't care either way.
For the record, the whole idea that a Protestant becoming a Catholic is a "conversion' is ludicrous to me. God is still God. Jesus still died to save us. I still have to accept him as my Lord and Savior and put my trust in Him. Period. At the heart of the matter, the core beliefs are still the same and honestly I believe that the whole Free Will thing created a lot of people who really thought they knew better and started all the arguing and the reform, which is kind of a shame, that all of God's children can't get along.... but my point here is that while the practices may be different, the CORE beliefs are still the same.
Anyway.
Last week I called the local Chaplin's office to schedule a meeting with the local military Priest about taking care of classes/arrangements for my son's baptism on this end. During the meeting I also brought up to Father Peter (I find it amusing that he shares my son's name) the idea of my converting, and as it turns out the classes started the following Sunday (or, as I am writing this now, yesterday.)
At that point in the meeting, Father and I giggled about how that timing might be Divine Provenance.
And Matt rolled his eyes at us.
Meanwhile, Peter looked out at us from his car seat and blew spit bubbles.
Now who am I to argue with God and his timing? For the first time in years I have time to attend and the classes are right before mass, so I signed up. Conversion... here I come.
Which brings me back to how getting up twice to feed Peter the night before left me exhausted.
But I powered through. Coffee is a BEAUTIFUL thing. And, coincidentally, my old friend Nikki, who used to work with me in Japan happened to be there at mass. A happy blessing, discovered right around the time I was beginning to feel resigned to the fact that I would never have any friends at this duty station.
After church, Matt took the baby and together they napped on the coach for TWO hours while I did laundry. (I still don't know how Matt can hold our son and still relax enough to fall sleep.) I loved the free time to get stuff done but I really could have used a nap myself.
Because of course last night Peter was up twice again. At 4:00 when Peter started to carry on for the second time and Matt kept right on sleeping peacefully, I seriously contemplated, for about 10 seconds, murdering my beloved spouse because at least maybe I'd be able to sleep in prison. Then I remembered I love my spouse and my baby, and I dragged myself to the crib to take care of business.
The "great" part was that by the time the baby had been fed and changed and rocked back to sleep, Matt's alarm had woken him anyway.
Thankfully, when Matt left for school at 7:00 am Peter was still sleeping in his crib giving me a little time to get myself together. And by together, I mean be asleep.
Around 8:00 am little, happy, "Hey Mommy! I'm awake and entertaining myself for now but I'm also in a very dirty diaper and could really go for some breakfast soon." type baby noises started to come at me through the monitor. I forced myself to get up.
I changed Peter and then fed him.
Then I went to make some much needed coffee, because even though I've asked Matt about seven hundred times to put some on in the mornings before he leaves, he NEVER does.
Peter sat in his bouncy chair and I poured in the water and dumped 3 scoops of grounds into the top of the machine and then stared at everything for a minute as it seemed so very wrong.
Then I realized I'd forgotten the filter.
Yuck.
It's definitely Monday.
Mondays and I don't get along.
**Edit: I'm not kidding here. When I hit "Post" and the confirm window popped up it, had an ad for sleep therapy. :) Oh, if it could only be that simple!**
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Fleas, Baths and more on not getting any Sleep
The other day, I noticed that the KC, the fat cat, was quite literally the definition of a "Flea Bag."
While unfortunate and gross, this wasn't too surprising since some where in the midst of moving and having a baby within 2 weeks of each other, the pets' flea medicine went missing and nobody got flea treatments in July or August.
Also, as you may recall, Chase got out at the beginning of last month and had his little adventure jumping fences and traipsing through the yards of 4 or 5 of our neighbor's dogs.
And yes, before you ask, all of our neighbors have dogs. All of them. In both directions.
So, since nobody had ad flea treatments and Chase had gone exploring the territories of several other probably flea-ridden animals, and they live in the same house together, now KC had fleas.
And also since Chase and KC had fleas, this undoubtedly meant that Brutus too had fleas. Something I'd actually been suspecting for a few weeks at least as he's been spending an extraordinary amount of any given day chewing on himself. But it was hard to tell for sure, because that dog not only has very thick fur (which makes looking for fleas difficult) but he also happens to be just neurotic enough that you can never really be sure if he's chewing on himself because of fleas or because of his neurosis.
Anyway, I made a mental note to pick up some flea shampoo and carpet shampoo and make a good healthy effort to erratic the fleas ASAP, lest they start eating my husband, myself or, worse yet, my baby.
That night, the dog woke me up at something like 2:30 in the morning with his scratching because the entire bed was shaking. Then he started chewing on himself so hard that he actually made himself yelp. He's such a dumb dog.
Meanwhile, Chase was asleep on the floor next to my side of the bed and he was snoring.
No I'm not kidding, that cat snores. I think he has a deviated septum or something because he's always done it and its annoying. Especially at 2:30 in the morning when the dog has just woken you up because he's apparently itchy. But what the heck do you do about a cake with a deviated septum who snores?
Yea, I don't know either.
So I'm laying there, annoyed to be awake, cursing the dog and the skinny cat and thinking that gosh my breasts are about to explode so why the hasn't the baby, who I can hear cooing softly through the monitor, woken up for his feeding yet and what's the point in even going back to sleep because, probably, the minute I started to dream again there will be crying and I'll need to get up all over again.
I decided to go check on Peter and see if maybe he could be convinced to eat a little early.
He couldn't.
I returned back to bed to wait him out, only to find that my (evil) husband, in the 4 minutes I had been gone from our bed, had decided to sprawl out and take over my side as well as his own.
I squeeze myself into the approximately 3 inches of leftover space and tried to doze while I waited for my child to be hungry. The dog kept right on scratching. Chase kept right on snoring.
Matt kept right on hogging the bed. And I kept right on not sleeping.
Then along came KC.
KC, as I might have mentioned before, is huge and furry and fat and dumb. And also, on this particular night, a flea bag. So I was less than thrilled when he arrived and plopped his fat ass down on the pillow right next to my head and started purring loud enough to wake the dead. (The dead mind you, but NOT my husband.) Because KC was literally crawling with fleas that night and I didn't want them on me.
And also because in the dark when his humongous face is right next to yours KC literally looks like he might eat just try to eat you.
He really is that fat.
I rolled over. Then I notice that that the baby monitor's "on" light, which fills our bedroom with a soft neon-green glow, was throwing a gigantic shadow of my enormously-fat-and-often-a-little-scary-because-you-never-know-if-he-might-just-eat-you cat's head on the wall.
A gigantic, scary cat shadow.
*shudder*
Say what you will about how stupid that is to be scared by, but it was the middle of the night and I was tired and irrational.
It's a wonder I ever get any sleep at all. Ever.
Anyway, the next day Matt and I picked up some flea shampoo and flea collars. My husband, who I like a lot more during the day then I tend to at night, took Peter while I wrangled three furry, flea ridden animals in and out of the tub amidst puddles and evil smelling soapy suds and hissing and growling and meowing and barking and clawing and a lot of gnashing teeth and, after about 2 hours, I finally had three clean, flea-free animals and one disaster area of bathroom.
That night, after shampooing the carpets and dinner and Peter's bath and eating entirely too much popcorn, I found myself awake once again at 2:30 in the morning with an upset tummy and the overwhelming feeling that my engorged breasts really might explode. The baby was again cooing softly in his sleep through the monitor, Chase was again snoring on the floor.. The dog, however, was cuddled up between Matt and I, flea less and no longer itchy. Matt was again hogging the bed and sleeping like the dead. KC was, thankfully, no where to be found and the filthy bathroom, which I hadn't gotten around to cleaning up, was mocking me by the soft green light of the baby monitor.
Then it occurred to me.
That day, the cats had a bath. The dog had a bath. The baby had a bath. Heck, even the carpet had a bath. As it turned out though, amongst all the fun, the only one who did NOT get to take a bath... was me.
While unfortunate and gross, this wasn't too surprising since some where in the midst of moving and having a baby within 2 weeks of each other, the pets' flea medicine went missing and nobody got flea treatments in July or August.
Also, as you may recall, Chase got out at the beginning of last month and had his little adventure jumping fences and traipsing through the yards of 4 or 5 of our neighbor's dogs.
And yes, before you ask, all of our neighbors have dogs. All of them. In both directions.
So, since nobody had ad flea treatments and Chase had gone exploring the territories of several other probably flea-ridden animals, and they live in the same house together, now KC had fleas.
And also since Chase and KC had fleas, this undoubtedly meant that Brutus too had fleas. Something I'd actually been suspecting for a few weeks at least as he's been spending an extraordinary amount of any given day chewing on himself. But it was hard to tell for sure, because that dog not only has very thick fur (which makes looking for fleas difficult) but he also happens to be just neurotic enough that you can never really be sure if he's chewing on himself because of fleas or because of his neurosis.
Anyway, I made a mental note to pick up some flea shampoo and carpet shampoo and make a good healthy effort to erratic the fleas ASAP, lest they start eating my husband, myself or, worse yet, my baby.
That night, the dog woke me up at something like 2:30 in the morning with his scratching because the entire bed was shaking. Then he started chewing on himself so hard that he actually made himself yelp. He's such a dumb dog.
Meanwhile, Chase was asleep on the floor next to my side of the bed and he was snoring.
No I'm not kidding, that cat snores. I think he has a deviated septum or something because he's always done it and its annoying. Especially at 2:30 in the morning when the dog has just woken you up because he's apparently itchy. But what the heck do you do about a cake with a deviated septum who snores?
Yea, I don't know either.
So I'm laying there, annoyed to be awake, cursing the dog and the skinny cat and thinking that gosh my breasts are about to explode so why the hasn't the baby, who I can hear cooing softly through the monitor, woken up for his feeding yet and what's the point in even going back to sleep because, probably, the minute I started to dream again there will be crying and I'll need to get up all over again.
I decided to go check on Peter and see if maybe he could be convinced to eat a little early.
He couldn't.
I returned back to bed to wait him out, only to find that my (evil) husband, in the 4 minutes I had been gone from our bed, had decided to sprawl out and take over my side as well as his own.
I squeeze myself into the approximately 3 inches of leftover space and tried to doze while I waited for my child to be hungry. The dog kept right on scratching. Chase kept right on snoring.
Matt kept right on hogging the bed. And I kept right on not sleeping.
Then along came KC.
KC, as I might have mentioned before, is huge and furry and fat and dumb. And also, on this particular night, a flea bag. So I was less than thrilled when he arrived and plopped his fat ass down on the pillow right next to my head and started purring loud enough to wake the dead. (The dead mind you, but NOT my husband.) Because KC was literally crawling with fleas that night and I didn't want them on me.
And also because in the dark when his humongous face is right next to yours KC literally looks like he might eat just try to eat you.
He really is that fat.
I rolled over. Then I notice that that the baby monitor's "on" light, which fills our bedroom with a soft neon-green glow, was throwing a gigantic shadow of my enormously-fat-and-often-a-little-scary-because-you-never-know-if-he-might-just-eat-you cat's head on the wall.
A gigantic, scary cat shadow.
*shudder*
Say what you will about how stupid that is to be scared by, but it was the middle of the night and I was tired and irrational.
It's a wonder I ever get any sleep at all. Ever.
Anyway, the next day Matt and I picked up some flea shampoo and flea collars. My husband, who I like a lot more during the day then I tend to at night, took Peter while I wrangled three furry, flea ridden animals in and out of the tub amidst puddles and evil smelling soapy suds and hissing and growling and meowing and barking and clawing and a lot of gnashing teeth and, after about 2 hours, I finally had three clean, flea-free animals and one disaster area of bathroom.
That night, after shampooing the carpets and dinner and Peter's bath and eating entirely too much popcorn, I found myself awake once again at 2:30 in the morning with an upset tummy and the overwhelming feeling that my engorged breasts really might explode. The baby was again cooing softly in his sleep through the monitor, Chase was again snoring on the floor.. The dog, however, was cuddled up between Matt and I, flea less and no longer itchy. Matt was again hogging the bed and sleeping like the dead. KC was, thankfully, no where to be found and the filthy bathroom, which I hadn't gotten around to cleaning up, was mocking me by the soft green light of the baby monitor.
Then it occurred to me.
That day, the cats had a bath. The dog had a bath. The baby had a bath. Heck, even the carpet had a bath. As it turned out though, amongst all the fun, the only one who did NOT get to take a bath... was me.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Mood Swings
First of all, THANK YOU ALL very, very, very much for all of your helpful input and advice yesterday. I welcome ALL of your opinions and advice. Because let's face it, worrying and doubting myself are two things I excel at.
Forget the fact fact that this child had been wholly unhappy for approximately two full hours immediately prior to this moment, because, we were going to see Daddy!!! See how happy that made him!! Not that there is really any way that my son understood what I was talking about, but it sure seamed to make him happy!!!
That being said, what I really want to know is how on Earth it is possible that I've never heard of this Babywise book? What makes me a little sad is that I think there's a VERY good chance that it was mentioned to me in advice given to me at any of several million times during my pregnancy which I ignored. Not that the advice given to me then wouldn't have been helpful (as I am learning now,) but I was too busy being really, really crabby the entire time I was pregnant and basically refused to listen.
So anyway, at the urging of most of you I am going to throw the strict 3-4 hour plan right out the window and see what happens. But I am also going to try to get my boy onto a more regular feeding schedule based on his own 2 hour 15 minute trend, hopefully, by using the Babywise Eat-Play-Sleep plan. We actually started to try this yesterday afternoon and I already noticed a difference in the amount of crying. I'm thinking that once I get him more regulated then it might be able to try to move the feedings further apart, little by little.
Peter, up until this point, has had no napping schedule what so ever. He slept when he wanted or not, despite my attempts at getting him on a feeding schedule. Thinking about it now, that plan doesn't make very much sense at all. A lesson I probably should have learned when it became clear how easily "programmed" to fall asleep he was by a our creation of a bedtime routine.
Finally, I am definitely going to consider eliminating dairy from my own diet as well depending upon how things continue. I'm lactose intolerant myself, which I mostly manage by limiting my intake of milk products, so it occurs to me now that my son might be having similar tummy issues to mine.
So again, thank you all for you input. I'm sure I'll be posting about how things develop.
Now, onto something more entertaining:
The other day, as had become our latest trend, I spent my morning with a very fussy, whining and occasionally screaming little boy.
For my own sanity, I decided, once the boy had settled down a bit, to get him dressed and take him to see Daddy during the lunch hour. If nothing else, this would require me to strap Peter into his car seat and then drive him in the car, which up until this point in his little life has had nearly a 100% success rate at calming my baby down and lulling him to sleep.
So I got him dressed in one of his cutest little outfits all the while telling him, in my best soothing-sing-song voice, that we were going to see Daddy!!!!
This seemed to please Peter like nothing else could.
Forget the fact fact that this child had been wholly unhappy for approximately two full hours immediately prior to this moment, because, we were going to see Daddy!!! See how happy that made him!! Not that there is really any way that my son understood what I was talking about, but it sure seamed to make him happy!!!(For the record, Mommy has spent enough days dealing with an insanely fussy baby, only to see that same baby completely transform into the happiest kid on the planet the minute his father walks in the door... giving her a bit of a complex about her skills as a parent.)
So anyway, I loaded up the kid and we went to meet Daddy.
Afterward, since we were out anyway, I decided to run a few errands to the grocery store and Target and stuff.
Peter, did his part to be pleasant and agreeable for most of the afternoon. (Praise the Lord!) However, towards the end of our last stop he started to get a little fussy again, even though he was freshly fed and changed. It made sense, as he'd spent the better part of about 3 hours strapped into his seat and I'm sure by that point he was more than ready to be able to stretch out and wiggle again, so I quickly finished my shopping and hurried home.
By the time we'd reached our own garage Peter had dozed off again. In his own little way, however, he found a way to let me know how he was feeling.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
Mommy-ing Advice Needed
Let me start off by saying that I've been considering writing this post, this plea for help, for several days now.
Next, let me provide a little background information so that everyone has all the facts:
My son Peter is 10 weeks old (as of yesterday.) And he's already getting "tubby" (that's my husband's word, not mine) as he has quite the little gut on him and about 3 chins. Yes I know babies are supposed to be chubby I'm just a bit concerned about how rapidly he's getting there.
When he was born he was 8 lb 2 oz. and as of this time last week he was 13 lb 6 oz. so obviously growing is not something we're having a problem with. While I realize growing is good and great, I also know that growing too fast, or growing "out" as opposed to "up," can lead to problems later on.
I want to ensure that I am not setting my child up for a life of over eating and obesity.
(Unless of course Coach Tressel is willing to guarantee him a spot as a Defensive Lineman in the recruiting class of 2027, like, right now, in which case, raising a little beefcake might pay off.)
For the record, our pediatrician is not concerned. "Yet." She's not concerned, "yet," but was "eager" to see where he falls at our next appointment, which will be in 4 more weeks at which point we "may have to talk." Then she said that since he is growing so well, I should be striving to feed him ONLY every 3 or 4 hours and that should reduce the chances of any weight problems.
So, um, ok.
Peter gets a bath every night at 7:00 pm after which I feed him and he is out like a light by 8:00 sharp. I'm not kidding. He's out. Down for the count and all that. He then sleeps well until something between 2 and 3:30am, depending upon how much he ate before conking out for the night.
After his middle of the night feeding, he'll sleep until 6:30 or 7:00 in the morning when my lovely "morning person" husband gets him and gives him a small bottle of usually 3 oz of pumped milk. This is supposed to hold him until I get up, shower and find my brain located at the bottom of a large cup of coffee, somewhere before 9:30 am.
This is also where things start to fall apart with the whole 3-4 hour feeding schedule.
During the day, Peter doesn't WANT to wait 3-4 hours between eating. As soon as he sees me in the morning he wants to eat. Period. It wouldn't matter if he was still suckling on the bottle with Daddy, if he sees me, he wants to nurse. So fine, inevitably, he wins that first morning argument, I feed him a little bit, usually until he falls back to sleep, make note of the time and set my determination that we will wait at least THREE hours until we eat again.
Unfortunately, Peter refuses to agree to my plans. Somewhere around the 2 hour and 15 minute mark he inevitable melts down. If you're one of my friends on facebook you've probably noted my updates in relation to all the screaming, because when he decides he wants to eat, he's SERIOUS and me with my pediatrician-prescribed schedule can just be damned.
He screams.
He whines.
He turns purple.
He flails his arms.
He kicks like crazy.
I try to make him wait. I rock him. I sing to him. I make faces at him. I stick a pacifier in his mouth. I dance for him. I even turn the tv on and let him look at it. Nothing works.
What all this means is that by the time the 3 hour mark arrives, if we make it that long, he is literally inconsolable. Far too inconsolable, even, to settle down and finally eat. I try to feed him at last and he sucks for about 4 seconds at a time between turning purple, screaming, whining, flailing his arms and kicking some more. He spits milk ALL over me and in the process swallows massive amounts of air which upsets him even further.
So then I spend many more minutes trying to burp him.... minutes filled with even more turning purple and screaming and whining and flailing arms and kicking... before he finally belches and then, maybe, if I'm really lucky, he realizes that Mommy is actually NOT trying to starve him to death and settles down to eat.
Then he's happy for about 2 hours and 15 minutes and the whole thing starts over.
Needless to say every 2 hours and 15 minutes these days, I come close to losing my mind completely.
So, what I want to know, everyone, in your opinions, is this all worth it?
He does sleep for 6-7 hours straight at night, so maybe he's just playing catch up during the day?
Should I work so hard to stretch out the times between feedings or should I just listen to my tubby little boy's demands and feed him when he decides to be hungry?
Opinions and advice please!
My sanity will thank you. :)
Next, let me provide a little background information so that everyone has all the facts:
My son Peter is 10 weeks old (as of yesterday.) And he's already getting "tubby" (that's my husband's word, not mine) as he has quite the little gut on him and about 3 chins. Yes I know babies are supposed to be chubby I'm just a bit concerned about how rapidly he's getting there.
When he was born he was 8 lb 2 oz. and as of this time last week he was 13 lb 6 oz. so obviously growing is not something we're having a problem with. While I realize growing is good and great, I also know that growing too fast, or growing "out" as opposed to "up," can lead to problems later on.
I want to ensure that I am not setting my child up for a life of over eating and obesity.
(Unless of course Coach Tressel is willing to guarantee him a spot as a Defensive Lineman in the recruiting class of 2027, like, right now, in which case, raising a little beefcake might pay off.)
For the record, our pediatrician is not concerned. "Yet." She's not concerned, "yet," but was "eager" to see where he falls at our next appointment, which will be in 4 more weeks at which point we "may have to talk." Then she said that since he is growing so well, I should be striving to feed him ONLY every 3 or 4 hours and that should reduce the chances of any weight problems.
So, um, ok.
Peter gets a bath every night at 7:00 pm after which I feed him and he is out like a light by 8:00 sharp. I'm not kidding. He's out. Down for the count and all that. He then sleeps well until something between 2 and 3:30am, depending upon how much he ate before conking out for the night.
After his middle of the night feeding, he'll sleep until 6:30 or 7:00 in the morning when my lovely "morning person" husband gets him and gives him a small bottle of usually 3 oz of pumped milk. This is supposed to hold him until I get up, shower and find my brain located at the bottom of a large cup of coffee, somewhere before 9:30 am.
This is also where things start to fall apart with the whole 3-4 hour feeding schedule.
During the day, Peter doesn't WANT to wait 3-4 hours between eating. As soon as he sees me in the morning he wants to eat. Period. It wouldn't matter if he was still suckling on the bottle with Daddy, if he sees me, he wants to nurse. So fine, inevitably, he wins that first morning argument, I feed him a little bit, usually until he falls back to sleep, make note of the time and set my determination that we will wait at least THREE hours until we eat again.
Unfortunately, Peter refuses to agree to my plans. Somewhere around the 2 hour and 15 minute mark he inevitable melts down. If you're one of my friends on facebook you've probably noted my updates in relation to all the screaming, because when he decides he wants to eat, he's SERIOUS and me with my pediatrician-prescribed schedule can just be damned.
He screams.
He whines.
He turns purple.
He flails his arms.
He kicks like crazy.
I try to make him wait. I rock him. I sing to him. I make faces at him. I stick a pacifier in his mouth. I dance for him. I even turn the tv on and let him look at it. Nothing works.
What all this means is that by the time the 3 hour mark arrives, if we make it that long, he is literally inconsolable. Far too inconsolable, even, to settle down and finally eat. I try to feed him at last and he sucks for about 4 seconds at a time between turning purple, screaming, whining, flailing his arms and kicking some more. He spits milk ALL over me and in the process swallows massive amounts of air which upsets him even further.
So then I spend many more minutes trying to burp him.... minutes filled with even more turning purple and screaming and whining and flailing arms and kicking... before he finally belches and then, maybe, if I'm really lucky, he realizes that Mommy is actually NOT trying to starve him to death and settles down to eat.
Then he's happy for about 2 hours and 15 minutes and the whole thing starts over.
Needless to say every 2 hours and 15 minutes these days, I come close to losing my mind completely.
So, what I want to know, everyone, in your opinions, is this all worth it?
He does sleep for 6-7 hours straight at night, so maybe he's just playing catch up during the day?
Should I work so hard to stretch out the times between feedings or should I just listen to my tubby little boy's demands and feed him when he decides to be hungry?
Opinions and advice please!
My sanity will thank you. :)
Labor Day at Big Sur
This past Monday, since it was the Labor Day holiday and Matt's regular 3-day weekend was extended to a 4-day (boy do I ever love his graduate school schedule!) we decided that we really needed to do something fun and outdoorsy.
One of the nice things about life here in Monterey (aside from Matt's graduate school schedule) is that there is an abundance of fun and outdoorsy stuff to do. Also, that fun and outdoorsy stuff tends to be either free or rather cheap to enjoy and what with loss of Mommy's income and the cost of diapers these days, free/cheap is right up our alley.
So, we decided to drive south on Highway 1 towards Big Sur and check out the amazing coastal views.
And MAN were they ever amazing!
This photo is taken from the top of a cliff labeled by a small weather-worn sign as "Hurricane Point," where it was so windy I had trouble opening and closing the car doors. I'm looking down over the ocean and back towards the famous Bixby Creek bridge, which I call famous because I've seen a lot of pictures of it since moving to California's central coast, not that I'd ever heard of it prior to, say, this past June.
After we drove most of the length of the famous the cliff-side highway, we eventually descended into the hills and forest of Pfeiffer Big Sur State park. There we parked the car, put Peter in the Baby Bjorn and did a little light hiking around the park.
Peter seemed to enjoy getting out of his car seat and riding around in the carrier, which until that point he'd only been in when we walk the dog. I was just pleased that Matt carried him. When I was still pregnant, I was always trudging behind my husband trying desperately to keep up and cursing his ability to walk quickly, without the shooting pains in his pelvis and back whenever we went anywhere. (It seemed like a bit of sweet redemption later when Matt complained of soreness in his own back.)
One of the nice things about life here in Monterey (aside from Matt's graduate school schedule) is that there is an abundance of fun and outdoorsy stuff to do. Also, that fun and outdoorsy stuff tends to be either free or rather cheap to enjoy and what with loss of Mommy's income and the cost of diapers these days, free/cheap is right up our alley.
So, we decided to drive south on Highway 1 towards Big Sur and check out the amazing coastal views.
And MAN were they ever amazing!
This photo is taken from the top of a cliff labeled by a small weather-worn sign as "Hurricane Point," where it was so windy I had trouble opening and closing the car doors. I'm looking down over the ocean and back towards the famous Bixby Creek bridge, which I call famous because I've seen a lot of pictures of it since moving to California's central coast, not that I'd ever heard of it prior to, say, this past June.After we drove most of the length of the famous the cliff-side highway, we eventually descended into the hills and forest of Pfeiffer Big Sur State park. There we parked the car, put Peter in the Baby Bjorn and did a little light hiking around the park.
Peter seemed to enjoy getting out of his car seat and riding around in the carrier, which until that point he'd only been in when we walk the dog. I was just pleased that Matt carried him. When I was still pregnant, I was always trudging behind my husband trying desperately to keep up and cursing his ability to walk quickly, without the shooting pains in his pelvis and back whenever we went anywhere. (It seemed like a bit of sweet redemption later when Matt complained of soreness in his own back.)Meanwhile, the baby happily bobbed along, twisting and turning his head in all directions and staring out with those big blue eyes up at the enormous Redwood trees, the patches of blue sky, the beams of sunlight breaking through the trees and toward the sound of running water in the river.
Our short hike was nice, but we're going to need to obtain some better hiking shoes (or say, ANY kind of hiking shoes, as opposed to flip flops,) if we're going to explore any of the really good trails in the future. We could also maybe rent a site and camp out for a night, but Matt long ago declared that I am "too girly" to take camping. I'm not sure this is entirely fair, since the only trouble I'd have would be with skittering creatures owning more than four legs or or, say, those that slither and own no legs. Other than that I'd be fine. (I have been to BAND CAMP after all!)
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Mommy is "dum"
You know it's going to be a long day when, after breakfast, you have strapped the baby into his swing (one of his favorite places to be) and he looks at you like you're crazy for awhile before eventually starting to cry.
After probably about 5 minutes you figure out that the reason the baby is (still) so unhappy is that you forgot to actually turn the swing on.
After probably about 5 minutes you figure out that the reason the baby is (still) so unhappy is that you forgot to actually turn the swing on.
Monday, September 7, 2009
"Bleeeeeeh!"
I mentioned awhile ago that one of my son's favorite things in the whole wide world is his tongue and sticking it out at his parents. I read somewhere that playing a game such as this shows a baby has good problem solving skills. I don't know about any of that, but its fun to see his goofy personality emerging.
Awhile ago I added a "Bleh" sound to the game and was quite amused when the baby tried to imitate the noise back at me. More recently raspberry sounds have been added as well, but Peter is less successful at making those so far.
Anyway, today I finally managed to capture some of the fun on video.
I'm still working on trying to capture some of his bizarre-o little laugh, but hopefully stay tuned and I'll get some soon.
More importantly, for the first time in nearly 10 weeks, I actually appear in one of his videos as something more than a disembodied weirdo voice from behind the camera. :)
Awhile ago I added a "Bleh" sound to the game and was quite amused when the baby tried to imitate the noise back at me. More recently raspberry sounds have been added as well, but Peter is less successful at making those so far.
Anyway, today I finally managed to capture some of the fun on video.
I'm still working on trying to capture some of his bizarre-o little laugh, but hopefully stay tuned and I'll get some soon.
More importantly, for the first time in nearly 10 weeks, I actually appear in one of his videos as something more than a disembodied weirdo voice from behind the camera. :)
Saturday, September 5, 2009
At long last....
...College Football season is upon us!
about which there is only one thing to say:
Go Bucks!
about which there is only one thing to say:
Go Bucks!
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Life in the Land of all things Nasty
I used to live such a nice, mature, dignified life.
I got every morning, put on fashionable clothes, cute high heels, styled my hair, put on make up, grabbed a designer handbag and headed off to work. I spent my days in the land of Academics, striving to inspire our nation's young people to love learning and the arts. My spouse and I frequented nice restaurants, saw all the latest movies and theater productions when they came to town. We took scuba diving and snow boarding trips and we enjoyed seeing different parts of the world.
I was intellectual. Worldly even.
Not. Anymore.
These days, I get up and either stay in my pajamas all day or in the rare instance that I do manage a morning shower and a change of clothes I put on sweats or jeans and a t-shirt. Shoes? Who needs them? I almost never leave the house and when I do, a pair of flip flops does me just fine. My hair lives in a pony tail (although that is more the fault of a bad hair cut then anything else,) and my make up case has gathered about an inch of dust. My expensive purses have been replaced by a diaper bag and the closest thing to academics in my world are the songs I sing to my son and the time we spend playing on the floor together. The only person I hope to inspire these days is my son and it is rather doubtful I am having much of affect. I no longer eat out, ever, and only catch movies on TV or via Netflix. Theater? What's the theater? My diving equipment and snowboard are buried under boxes in the corner of my garage.
I'm not complaining, honest, just observing how my life, and priorities have all changed.
And also, there's this other thing.... the amount of time I spend dealing with pee and poop.
So, yes of course there are all the dirty baby diapers. But that's fine. That was to be expected.
Less expected were the exploding poop stains on onsies and blankets and the furniture and well, everything. And then there's the random pee that somehow occasionally completely misses the absorbent part of a diaper and soaks through the back of my son's pajamas.
Even that is okay, though. It's part of being a Mommy I guess.
As is the difficulty I have finding time to visit the restroom myself.
(Nobody needs to hear about that, but admit it fellow Mommies... you've all been there. I know you have.)
Then there are the pets.
People warned me about getting pets before I had children and I always figured they were referring to issues with my pets getting jealous of the baby, or possible baby allergies or something like that.
Well, luckily, we haven't had any problems with that stuff (yet.)
But, their pee and poop, when added to that of the baby, is starting to drive me a little crazy.
For some reason, my moronic cats can poo in their GIGANTIC litter box just fine (as long as we scoop it out every 2-3 days) but they FLAT OUT REFUSE to pee in there. Instead they pee on the little ramp that leads into the box. Or on the mat outside. Or on the floor. So there's almost always pee all over the downstairs bathroom floor. Pee that I never have enough time or free hands to properly clean up. Pee that smells rancid.
Which brings me to the dog. He's potty trained just fine, as long as he gets a walk and all the attention he thinks he deserves. But, if he feels even the slightest bit neglected for, say, 57 seconds or more, he goes upstairs and pees. And, no matter how much you soak up with the Shamwow or douse it with carpet cleaner, that too smells rancid.
It's gross.
Investing the substantial amount of money needed for a carpet steamer is starting to seem like a very good idea.
Which brings me to this past Monday night.
The doggie randomly starts barking and carrying on to be let out of our bedroom at one o'clock in the morning. Matt sleeps through it, because let's face it, he sleeps through everything and then complains in the morning that he doesn't feel well rested. I tell Brutus to shut up and go back to sleep before burying my head under the covers to ignore him because I'm exhausted and I know that in another hour I'll have to get up and feed the baby. The dog, in all of his furry doggie splendor continues to carry on for awhile before going into our bathroom and doing something horrible. A few minutes later I hear the dog sitting on the floor next to my side of the bed licking himself inappropriately. Then I notice that THE WORST SMELL IN HISTORY is wafting out of the bathroom towards me, even though I am still hiding deep underneath the covers.
I crawl out of bed and find doggie-explodo-"poop" all over the place which I guess I sort of expected and deserved for ignoring the him despite the way he was carrying on. (Please notice the quotation marks. They are intentional, because what my dear furry friend left on the floor only very loosely resembled normal animal waste. Pun intended.)
I woke my husband (who jumped 400 feet in the air and I swear to God if he'd had a gun he would have probably shot me... which makes me wonder what exactly they do to those guys at boot camp to program a response like that into their sub consciouses,) and made him clean up the bathroom while I took the dog outside to carry on with his butt-explosions.
The best part is that in the morning, Matt didn't remember any of it.
Which left me to worry about the doggie and his case of the runs.
As if I don't spend enough time worrying about him peeing upstairs...
...and worrying about whether or not the cats have peed on the floor again...
...and about whether or not my son is peeing and pooing enough...
...and whether or not said pee and poo is spraying/exploding out of his diapers and getting all over everything within a 25 foot radius of his little squirmy body.
This isn't even addressing all the burping, farting and spitting up/puking going on around here, from the animals and the baby alike.
So you see, I am certainly no longer intellectual or worldly. No, in my short tenure as a Mommy
I have been reduced to something else: perhaps, a 4th grade boy?
The male 4th graders I used to teach certainly concerned themselves with all things nasty about as much as I do now.
Awesome.
I got every morning, put on fashionable clothes, cute high heels, styled my hair, put on make up, grabbed a designer handbag and headed off to work. I spent my days in the land of Academics, striving to inspire our nation's young people to love learning and the arts. My spouse and I frequented nice restaurants, saw all the latest movies and theater productions when they came to town. We took scuba diving and snow boarding trips and we enjoyed seeing different parts of the world.
I was intellectual. Worldly even.
Not. Anymore.
These days, I get up and either stay in my pajamas all day or in the rare instance that I do manage a morning shower and a change of clothes I put on sweats or jeans and a t-shirt. Shoes? Who needs them? I almost never leave the house and when I do, a pair of flip flops does me just fine. My hair lives in a pony tail (although that is more the fault of a bad hair cut then anything else,) and my make up case has gathered about an inch of dust. My expensive purses have been replaced by a diaper bag and the closest thing to academics in my world are the songs I sing to my son and the time we spend playing on the floor together. The only person I hope to inspire these days is my son and it is rather doubtful I am having much of affect. I no longer eat out, ever, and only catch movies on TV or via Netflix. Theater? What's the theater? My diving equipment and snowboard are buried under boxes in the corner of my garage.
I'm not complaining, honest, just observing how my life, and priorities have all changed.
And also, there's this other thing.... the amount of time I spend dealing with pee and poop.
So, yes of course there are all the dirty baby diapers. But that's fine. That was to be expected.
Less expected were the exploding poop stains on onsies and blankets and the furniture and well, everything. And then there's the random pee that somehow occasionally completely misses the absorbent part of a diaper and soaks through the back of my son's pajamas.
Even that is okay, though. It's part of being a Mommy I guess.
As is the difficulty I have finding time to visit the restroom myself.
(Nobody needs to hear about that, but admit it fellow Mommies... you've all been there. I know you have.)
Then there are the pets.
People warned me about getting pets before I had children and I always figured they were referring to issues with my pets getting jealous of the baby, or possible baby allergies or something like that.
Well, luckily, we haven't had any problems with that stuff (yet.)
But, their pee and poop, when added to that of the baby, is starting to drive me a little crazy.
For some reason, my moronic cats can poo in their GIGANTIC litter box just fine (as long as we scoop it out every 2-3 days) but they FLAT OUT REFUSE to pee in there. Instead they pee on the little ramp that leads into the box. Or on the mat outside. Or on the floor. So there's almost always pee all over the downstairs bathroom floor. Pee that I never have enough time or free hands to properly clean up. Pee that smells rancid.
Which brings me to the dog. He's potty trained just fine, as long as he gets a walk and all the attention he thinks he deserves. But, if he feels even the slightest bit neglected for, say, 57 seconds or more, he goes upstairs and pees. And, no matter how much you soak up with the Shamwow or douse it with carpet cleaner, that too smells rancid.
It's gross.
Investing the substantial amount of money needed for a carpet steamer is starting to seem like a very good idea.
Which brings me to this past Monday night.
The doggie randomly starts barking and carrying on to be let out of our bedroom at one o'clock in the morning. Matt sleeps through it, because let's face it, he sleeps through everything and then complains in the morning that he doesn't feel well rested. I tell Brutus to shut up and go back to sleep before burying my head under the covers to ignore him because I'm exhausted and I know that in another hour I'll have to get up and feed the baby. The dog, in all of his furry doggie splendor continues to carry on for awhile before going into our bathroom and doing something horrible. A few minutes later I hear the dog sitting on the floor next to my side of the bed licking himself inappropriately. Then I notice that THE WORST SMELL IN HISTORY is wafting out of the bathroom towards me, even though I am still hiding deep underneath the covers.
I crawl out of bed and find doggie-explodo-"poop" all over the place which I guess I sort of expected and deserved for ignoring the him despite the way he was carrying on. (Please notice the quotation marks. They are intentional, because what my dear furry friend left on the floor only very loosely resembled normal animal waste. Pun intended.)
I woke my husband (who jumped 400 feet in the air and I swear to God if he'd had a gun he would have probably shot me... which makes me wonder what exactly they do to those guys at boot camp to program a response like that into their sub consciouses,) and made him clean up the bathroom while I took the dog outside to carry on with his butt-explosions.
The best part is that in the morning, Matt didn't remember any of it.
Which left me to worry about the doggie and his case of the runs.
As if I don't spend enough time worrying about him peeing upstairs...
...and worrying about whether or not the cats have peed on the floor again...
...and about whether or not my son is peeing and pooing enough...
...and whether or not said pee and poo is spraying/exploding out of his diapers and getting all over everything within a 25 foot radius of his little squirmy body.
This isn't even addressing all the burping, farting and spitting up/puking going on around here, from the animals and the baby alike.
So you see, I am certainly no longer intellectual or worldly. No, in my short tenure as a Mommy
I have been reduced to something else: perhaps, a 4th grade boy?
The male 4th graders I used to teach certainly concerned themselves with all things nasty about as much as I do now.
Awesome.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
This didn't start as a letter....
.... but it ended up as one anyway*.
Peter,
My dear little handsome Prince Charming and squirmy monster all rolled into one, you amaze me!
Today you are 2 months old!!
When my Grandma (your Great Grandma) came at the beginning of this month she insisted that you acted a lot more like a 3 month old rather than your own age. As I've never really done this whole Mommy thing before, and I was never really a baby person before (unless one was throwing up on me,) I didn't really understand what that meant. But in this, the 2nd month of your little life, you have had so many firsts and SO many of them happened well ahead of schedule! I wish you weren't in such a hurry to grow up, but it is a fun journey to be taking with you.
This month you've gone from sleeping in tiny bassinet next to me, to a sleeping in your own "Big Baby Bed" (also known as your crib,) in your very own Ohio State clad room. With the move to your own room you went from waking up every 3-4 hours to nurse, to sleeping as many as 6 and 7 hours in a stretch!! (By the way, Mommy, is very appreciative for the extra rest but misses you terribly when she has to go that long without seeing you.)
This month you learned to stick out your tongue on purpose, to smile and to laugh. Your smile is absolutely the best sight my eyes have ever looked upon and it melts my heart every time. This works out well at 4 o'clock in the morning when you are refusing to go back to sleep and my patience/energy level is waining or when you have just finished blowing a round of diaper-bursting exploding poo all over yourself. It was at one of those insanely middle of the night anti-sleeping sessions that I first heard you laugh. Honestly I don't know what prompted you, unless it was the ridiculously tired and disheveled way your mother looked that made you do it, but all at once you suddenly made the sweetest little sound of laughter. Your laugh at this point, is very dry sounding and comes from deep in the back of your throat, which is a little weird maybe, but its yours so I love it anyway.
This month you also quickly started to master holding up the enormous weight of your own head. At your six week check-up the pediatrician said your head was actually a little small for your body since it is measuring in the 50th percentile while your weight and length are in the 75 and 90th, but regardless it looks heavy and I was very impressed when you started holding it up steadily at just 6 weeks old. Once you mastered this amazing skill in my arms I started to spend lots of time with you down on the floor so that you could practice pushing yourself up into a "push up position" in preparation for rolling over. I never dreamed, though, not in a million years, that you would ACTUALLY roll over on your own already, but you did. YOU DO!! Over and over and over... you're just amazing that way.
Peter, the thing that you don't even realize is how you have changed not only my life, but my entire soul in the short time I've been lucky enough to know you. Your existence has turned me into a bit of a hypocrite, actually, for I constantly finding myself acting as I thought I never would.
I always maintained that I didn't NEED to have children to have a complete life and that if I never had any that would be okay. I know now, having met you, that I was a total idiot. I could never be complete or okay without you.
I also always maintained that I wouldn't breast feed and you turned my words on me with that too. While its certainly NOT easy... you are VERY particular about when/how you want to eat, you apparently have a shorter attention span than your Mommy even and will kick and squirm and yell and spit enough to nearly drive me mad sometimes... I am sticking with it, since doing it is what's best for you.
Your Daddy and I always thought maybe one child would be plenty. But Peter, again your prove me wrong. You are such an adorable joy and blessing that we absolutely can barely wait to give you brothers or sisters!! Son, that's really saying something, because being pregnant with you made me a real grump!
I used to be very career driven and never thought I'd be able to stand staying at home all day. It's only actually because the navy moved us right before your arrival that I am not employed right now, yet, while I miss teaching (and the paycheck) the idea of leaving you all day simply isn't even an option. You're too perfect to entrust with strangers all day and you're growing too fast! I don't want to miss any of it.
Peter, my little son, my firstborn, I would give up everything for you. Thank you for coming into my life. Thank you for making me eat my words. I was so stupid before I met you. I only pray that I can be the type of Mother you deserve. I am sorry that I am not perfect at it all yet and that, probably, I never will be because all I will ever want for you is the very, very best.
I love you!
*Sorry Lori, for stealing your format, it was not my intention, but my emotions took over as I was writing and this is what I ended up with.
Peter,
My dear little handsome Prince Charming and squirmy monster all rolled into one, you amaze me!
Today you are 2 months old!!
When my Grandma (your Great Grandma) came at the beginning of this month she insisted that you acted a lot more like a 3 month old rather than your own age. As I've never really done this whole Mommy thing before, and I was never really a baby person before (unless one was throwing up on me,) I didn't really understand what that meant. But in this, the 2nd month of your little life, you have had so many firsts and SO many of them happened well ahead of schedule! I wish you weren't in such a hurry to grow up, but it is a fun journey to be taking with you.
This month you've gone from sleeping in tiny bassinet next to me, to a sleeping in your own "Big Baby Bed" (also known as your crib,) in your very own Ohio State clad room. With the move to your own room you went from waking up every 3-4 hours to nurse, to sleeping as many as 6 and 7 hours in a stretch!! (By the way, Mommy, is very appreciative for the extra rest but misses you terribly when she has to go that long without seeing you.)
This month you learned to stick out your tongue on purpose, to smile and to laugh. Your smile is absolutely the best sight my eyes have ever looked upon and it melts my heart every time. This works out well at 4 o'clock in the morning when you are refusing to go back to sleep and my patience/energy level is waining or when you have just finished blowing a round of diaper-bursting exploding poo all over yourself. It was at one of those insanely middle of the night anti-sleeping sessions that I first heard you laugh. Honestly I don't know what prompted you, unless it was the ridiculously tired and disheveled way your mother looked that made you do it, but all at once you suddenly made the sweetest little sound of laughter. Your laugh at this point, is very dry sounding and comes from deep in the back of your throat, which is a little weird maybe, but its yours so I love it anyway.
This month you also quickly started to master holding up the enormous weight of your own head. At your six week check-up the pediatrician said your head was actually a little small for your body since it is measuring in the 50th percentile while your weight and length are in the 75 and 90th, but regardless it looks heavy and I was very impressed when you started holding it up steadily at just 6 weeks old. Once you mastered this amazing skill in my arms I started to spend lots of time with you down on the floor so that you could practice pushing yourself up into a "push up position" in preparation for rolling over. I never dreamed, though, not in a million years, that you would ACTUALLY roll over on your own already, but you did. YOU DO!! Over and over and over... you're just amazing that way.
Peter, the thing that you don't even realize is how you have changed not only my life, but my entire soul in the short time I've been lucky enough to know you. Your existence has turned me into a bit of a hypocrite, actually, for I constantly finding myself acting as I thought I never would.
I always maintained that I didn't NEED to have children to have a complete life and that if I never had any that would be okay. I know now, having met you, that I was a total idiot. I could never be complete or okay without you.
I also always maintained that I wouldn't breast feed and you turned my words on me with that too. While its certainly NOT easy... you are VERY particular about when/how you want to eat, you apparently have a shorter attention span than your Mommy even and will kick and squirm and yell and spit enough to nearly drive me mad sometimes... I am sticking with it, since doing it is what's best for you.
Your Daddy and I always thought maybe one child would be plenty. But Peter, again your prove me wrong. You are such an adorable joy and blessing that we absolutely can barely wait to give you brothers or sisters!! Son, that's really saying something, because being pregnant with you made me a real grump!
I used to be very career driven and never thought I'd be able to stand staying at home all day. It's only actually because the navy moved us right before your arrival that I am not employed right now, yet, while I miss teaching (and the paycheck) the idea of leaving you all day simply isn't even an option. You're too perfect to entrust with strangers all day and you're growing too fast! I don't want to miss any of it.
Peter, my little son, my firstborn, I would give up everything for you. Thank you for coming into my life. Thank you for making me eat my words. I was so stupid before I met you. I only pray that I can be the type of Mother you deserve. I am sorry that I am not perfect at it all yet and that, probably, I never will be because all I will ever want for you is the very, very best.
I love you!
*Sorry Lori, for stealing your format, it was not my intention, but my emotions took over as I was writing and this is what I ended up with.
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