Tag Archives: Parenthood

Maybe I’m Doing it Wrong?

I don’t know whether or not being a stay-at-home parent is the hardest job in the world. I haven’t had every other job in the world. I have had my fair share of jobs. Jobs that I was fairly successful in. Jobs that I was pretty confident in. I know that, in comparison to those jobs, this one is definitely the hardest. Definitely.

Staying at home with my kids is undoubtedly the most rewarding thing I have ever done. It is also the most thankless, frustrating, lonely, isolating, and lowest paying thing I have ever done. And I know that I just made being a SAHM sound like the worst thing that anyone could ever do. And it isn’t. But it is, to me, definitely all of those things. But, obviously, that’s just the stuff that makes me want to stick my head in the oven.

Having a toddler is like trying to ride across country on a stationary bike.

I wake up, change her, feed her, play with her, clean up after her, try and deal with 17 tantrums before lunch, feed her again…you know…lather, rinse, repeat. But no matter how much I clean up, she is one step ahead. Destroying some other part of the house. And all that food I just swept up from under the high chair? I think someone just retrieved it from the garbage and placed it right back where it just was. And there is screaming about nap time. And the Today Show. And tooth brushing. And rain. And a closed door. (Like, if there is a closed door ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD, my daughter knows about it and she HATES it. Which reminds me of this giant, orange cat I used to have.) I, now, fully understand these “Terrible Twos” I have been hearing so much about. And I hate them. (And then people tell me that THREE is worse. Which is SO AWESOME, because by the time I have a three-year-old, I will also have another two-year-old. I really screwed myself here, didn’t I?)

But this whole merry-go-round of crazy is sort of what I expected to happen with her. I mean, I have met toddlers before. I know they can be pint-size jerk-faces with wicked tempers and strong little wills. I knew that. What I wasn’t expecting, and what I couldn’t have expected not knowing exactly everything about everything, was how hard it was going to be to do all of this toddler stuff, while somehow also managing to keep a very large infant alive. You know, and sometimes even HAPPY.

What I’m saying is that I do all of that toddler stuff. And sometimes I do it while carrying a 25 lb infant. And sometimes there are two VERY unhappy kids in my house, both screaming for me at the same time. One is screaming because “OH MY GOD, THE TODAY SHOW!” and the other is screaming because “OH MY GOD, THAT OTHER SHORT PERSON IS HARSHING MY MELLOW*!” And then I want to cry. I try to hide in the bathroom for sixteen seconds but as soon as the door closes, almost to the point of the click of the knob, there is more screaming. Then more screaming from the other one. I have been discovered trying to sneak away. A door has almost completely closed. GASP!

There are still infinite bottles to wash and fill and feed to the baby. And there are infinite Cheerios and there are infinite tantrums and faces full of spaghetti sauce and diaper changes and nap-time battles and night wakings and sometimes, Mommy just straight LOSES HER SHIT. And sometimes I just wish that I could have A WHOLE DAY wherein no one spoke to me. No one asked me for anything. No one bothered me at all. I would sit by a pool with a book and a cocktail. And I would remember what those days were like when I didn’t have someone attached to me every second of every day.

And then I know I would miss all of this stuff. Because the babies laughing, you guys? The best sound in the world. And I’ve never had a job that paid in baby laughs. (I am not sure I would have accepted that job, though? I mean…that’s a confusing thing to think about. Because I really also like to get paid with money.) And okay, maybe I wouldn’t miss diaper changing. And temper tantrums. But I would TOTALLY miss playing and giggling and hugs and kisses and all the twirling I get to do with my little lady.

But seriously, you guys…hardest job I’ve ever had. And the noisiest. Holy shitballs. The noise.

*Seriously, if you know which movie this is from, you’re as sad as I am for quoting it. Yep. I said it.

**I just read this post by AM and this is absolutely not a rebuttal. I laughed my face off when I read her post because I was halfway through this one and thinking, “Dammit. What am I doing WRONG?! And I wonder if she would come over and show me how to work it! Ooooh! And maybe she’d bring booze!”

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An Open Letter to Baby O: Ten Months

Oh, Oliver. My dear, sweet, adorable little man. You are getting so ridiculously big. You are almost not a baby anymore. It is so amazing to me how quickly this year has flown by. Just a year ago last week, we had your baby shower. I called it a “sprinkle” because I felt like it was a little insane of me to have had two full-on baby showers in 13 months. But, that doesn’t matter. It was a big party. And it was a whole year ago. And you are here and you are already turning into your own little person.

The last ten months has flown by, for sure. It is such a gift to have been able to stay home with you and watch you grow and explore this new world. It has been INSANELY difficult to be a stay-at-home-mom. But it has been well worth it (most days). I can’t help but feel that your infancy is going by too fast for me though. I mean, there have been plenty of times when I have wished you were walking and talking and capable of entertaining yourself (and/or your sister) so that I could step out of the room for 35 seconds without someone starting to wail like a hyena. But mostly, I feel like, when your sister was your age, she had me all to herself. And your dad was not working 16-hour days. And I wish that I could give you all of my attention. At least sometimes. But you seem to be happy. You are cuddly and completely smoochable. ALL THE TIME. (Well, except when you are screaming, which is rare and usually occurs when you REALLY don’t want to go to bed. But, unlike your sister, you usually settle down on your own and sleep like a little angel. You know…usually.) I promise that your dad is doing all that he can do right now to find a job that will allow him more time with all of us. And I promise that when that happens, you and I are gonna have some really good one-on-one time. Because you, sir, are the cutest, best boy I know. And I want ALL OF THE SNUGGLES.

You still look like a tiny version of your dad. Your eyes are big , like mine (but they are the color of Daddy’s), and your hair is blonde, like mine. But there is no denying that you’re his. (Not that there was ever any doubt! Don’t worry!)

You aren’t crawling yet. This, I must say, doesn’t surprise me. Your sister never really crawled either. You are lead to believe, when you have a baby, that all of you little nuggets do the same stuff. You know, generally. Not so, little dude. You and your sister are very different little people. But you have this, never wanting to crawl thing in common. You do, however, have a GREAT interest in squirming away from people when they are trying to hold you. Which poses a problem because you can’t GO ANYWHERE YET and you are more likely to end up on your head than anything else. We are working on getting you walking as soon as possible. Because your little noggin…your poor little noggin. The good news is that you stand REALLY well (assisted) and today actually cruised a little bit. And you turned all the way around to reach for me. It was a pretty exciting time. You looked very proud of yourself. And I took 87 pictures with my phone. Because…well…I’m your biggest fan.

You are lying down on the couch next to me right now, furiously kicking me while I type and throwing toys onto the floor. You seem very pleased with all of the noise you are making. You are very fond of making noise. A LOT OF NOISE. But I forgive you, because you are really cute. And I plan to pay you back for all of this noise when you are older. One word: AIRHORN. Be warned.

You have seven teeth and you feed yourself like you have been doing it all of your little life. You needed no instruction with a sippy cup at all. You’re just all grown up already. I have your college applications ready.

As always, I am so in love with you. More and more every day and I just thank all the gods and goddesses that had a part in bringing you to me. You are beautiful and amazing and I couldn’t be happier to get to be your mom.

To the moon and back,
Mom

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A Cruel Joke

Okay, you guys. Seriously. I am writing this from the edge of insanity.

L has decided that sleep is no longer necessary for her. She has, since right after her first birthday, been good about going to sleep on her own, in her bed, for naps and at bedtime. We lay her down awake, she goes to sleep, ba-da-bing. But for the last three days, she has been standing up in her crib and IMMEDIATELY starting to scream like she is being murdered. And today, it happened at naptime too. BA-DA-BOOM.

I took her to the doctor on Thursday last week because she was acting a little funny. Like, she was extra sleepy and extra clingy and the pediatrician told me that she has a virus (she has a few spots on her throat) but they did a rapid strep test and she was negative (THANK CHEESUS, because we just went through that…) and she hadn’t had a fever. But she had been sleeping fine at that point. Now, this starts. What IS this? Night terrors? The Terrible Twos? WHAT? Last night, after 40 minutes of trying to let her CIO, which I almost never do, I called the after-hours doctor on call and she told me to just let her keep screaming and that she would eventually go to sleep. Which I did. And she did. But I felt terrible. Worn down. Stressed out. Angry. I mean, first of all, who wants to hear their child scream for over an hour? Secondly, SERIOUSLY?! Isn’t that kind of MEAN? But I did it. And I did it again today when she was refusing to nap. And I made it exactly 61 minutes before I gave in so that I could FINALLY put Baby O down for his nap, and I went in and got her. And I told her to lie on the couch and stay there. And she did. She didn’t sleep. But she laid there quietly until I came and sat next to her. And now she is imitating me as I type this.

Have you guys ever experienced anything like this? What did you do? How do I make the shit stop? Because, I mean, I obviously can’t put drugs in her apple juice. Duh.

MB said to me today, “Just be strong. If you get her up now, she will never learn.” But I think he is an idiot. And I think his proximity to the blood curdling screaming may be making this a little easier for him to say.

Why I Need to Baby-Proof My Husband

Childproofing is a bitch.

We were pretty lax about it when we started because L didn’t seem to have much interest in things that weren’t HER things. Or, you know, my hair. So, we covered the outlets, and she figured out how to pull the little things out of the plugs and bring them to me. She unplugged all of the night lights. She seemed, not so much to want to play with the outlets themselves, but that anything that was in them should be brought straight to me. So, obviously, those little white plug things didn’t really help with anything. Really, the only thing that did any good was watching her round the clock so that she didn’t electrocute herself. We didn’t pad the corners of the tables and we didn’t put those SUPER ANNOYING plastic cabinet locks on everything because I found that she really only gets into the tupperware and, lets be honest, I doubt that a plastic bowl will be the cause of her first major injury. (We have them on SOME cabinets, but only the ones that contain any sort of cleaning chemicals and things of the like but I think that I actually have a harder time getting past them than she would. Parent-proof.) Then she started climbing on everything. Nothing is safe. How do you childproof for that? They don’t make a baby spray that repels babies away from dangerous things. You know, like that spray they make for pets that makes them not want to climb on/pee on things? (They really should develop this for babies. Because, aside from smearing peas on everything she could climb on, I can’t think of anything that would deter her.)

I can tell that I am going to have to, very soon, start re-evaluating this whole “baby-proofing” thing because Baby O is getting there. And by “getting there” I mean he is mobile enough to GET to things that are small enough to put in his mouth, however, not yet mobile enough to climb onto the dining room table and take a flying leap from it. And I have this feeling that it won’t be long before he will discover plugs. And cabinets. And…all sorts of potentially dangerous things…

Which brings me to my point: I can handle baby-proofing the house. Because I am home with the kids all day and I have developed a pretty good sense of what they can and WILL get into. I can see the little twinkle in their eyes when they see something intriguing. Like…anything that they can swallow and/or choke themselves with. I am getting SO good at spotting these things before they become an issue, you guys. SO GOOD. But I think I need to figure out how to childproof my husband.

MB seems completely oblivious to the fact that we have one kid who would love nothing more than for our entire house to be a climbing wall and another who would love for it to be made of tiny, brightly colored things that he can “taste”. So, he comes home from work, empties the day’s worth of tiny metal screws, nuts, and other weird stuff, pieces of wire, you name it, out of his pockets and onto a placemat on the kitchen table. We have a high table. No problem, right? Wrong, MB. You could not be more wrong. L can reach the place mat. She can reach it and she can pull it down, spilling tiny pieces of metal all over the kitchen floor. And even on my best day, I cannot guarantee that I got every speck of everything that has landed on the kitchen floor. So those little pieces travel into the living room. And become little potential killers of our baby. I tell him and I tell him and I tell him. And he cannot seem to wrap his head around the idea that he could just leave it in his work truck and then there would be no such issue.

I don’t know if this is a daddy thing or a parent who works outside the home thing or what…It just seems like none of this ever occurs to him. How can that be? After all the crazy he went about those stupid little plug things…

I googled “How to baby-proof your husband” but all I got was a bunch of relationship advice for new parents. Hell…maybe I should read that too? I am pretty sure killing your husband because he leaves tiny metal things all over the place isn’t the way to go…

Ten and a Half Things

There are so many things that I want to teach my kids. I want them to appreciate people. And life. And art. And love. And I want them to embrace their individuality. I want them to recognize that they are unlike any other people on earth. That they have skills and talents and strengths that no one else can match. And I want to empower them to find out what those things are. I am especially concerned about being a good role model for my daughter because I feel that I, as a woman, have to pave the way for her to become a proud, self-sufficient, confident woman too. And that is so scary to me. Because what if I fail? I think about this often. So often, in fact, that I map out conversations we will have when she is thirteen, sixteen, eighteen, twenty-two…I try and imagine how I will handle the hard questions. The ones that I wasn’t brave enough to ask or that no one was brave enough to answer for me. It all makes my head spin.

But then, what about my son? He has an amazing role model in MB. He really does. MB is kind and generous and thoughtful and loves his own mother (which is a really great way to tell if a man is worth your time, by the way he treats his mama) and would do anything for his family. And that is all great. But I started thinking about my contributions, or what they will be, to my son’s life and how they will differ from what MB brings to the table. I want so much for him. I want him to be the kind of man that his father is. But, and I think every parent can identify with this, I want him to be better than us. Better than the best.

I keep trying to figure out what I want to say to him in these moments in his life when he dares to ask me the hard questions. I keep thinking about what my responses will be. And I don’t know any of the answers right now. I know that being a girl is hard business. I, obviously, can’t speak about being a boy and growing up. So, I guess I will play it all by ear. Because, aside from directing him to MB every time he has any concerns or questions about anything, what else can I do?

I do, however, have a few things I want him to know. You know, from me. The one who carried him in her uterus for a really long effing time.

1. No one will EVER love you as much as I do. Ever. Like, there is no possible way that this could happen. You just remember that.

2. Don’t be a dick. Listen. There are going to be times that you will feel like you aren’t good enough. And everyone has those moments. And kids are mean. And they will make you feel that way ON PURPOSE. Don’t buy into that stuff. Don’t let people make you feel that way and DON’T DO IT TO ANYONE ELSE. (Do you hear me, son? Don’t be a dick.)

3. Don’t let anyone push you around. Don’t go around punching people in the throat. But don’t take any shit either. You are better than that. And if they are pushing you around, you are also better than THEM. Know that.

4. Be kind to the ladies. And not just because you hope they will make out with you under the bleachers. Be kind to the ones that you have no interest in making out with too. Because she is someone’s sister. She also possibly has a brother who will kick your ass. And, I have to tell you, son, I am not sure I would blame him. I have threatened many, many people for my own sister. So…

5. Don’t listen to the radio too much. This doesn’t sound like a big deal. But I have NO idea what kind of crap will be happening on the airwaves when you are older. I know what kind of crap is happening now. And pop culture is a trap. I am not saying that you aren’t allowed to listen to popular music. I am just saying that you shouldn’t let it suck all of the intelligence out of your head. (If you need an example of what I am talking about, please Google “2 Chainz”. The end.)

6. Laugh at yourself. PLEASE do not take yourself too seriously. PLEASE. You are amazing. But you are flawed. And sometimes, you are going to do things that are SO STUPID. And the only way to get through that stuff without sticking your head in the oven is to laugh like a madman at yourself. And it is OKAY.

7. Please, also know that your parents are flawed. We are going to do our damndest to make you proud. Seriously. But we are going to mess up. Probably a lot. But it is just because parenting is like driving while blindfolded.

8. Find something that you love and DO IT. I don’t care if it is cooking, writing, music, Civil War reenactment, ballet or football. Just do it. (I am not a fan of football, so I would prefer ANY of the others over this. But…whatever.) Don’t let me or anyone else tell you what you want to do or what you SHOULD do. You just follow your bliss. And I will be right there. (With a painted face and some kind of jersey on if absolutely necessary. Again. I would prefer…cooking maybe?)

9. When you love, love with your whole heart. And yes. It could get broken. And yes. That shit is scary as hell. But I promise, you will appreciate this advice someday. I PROMISE.

10. Be honest. Just don’t lie, man. No one likes that. NO ONE LIKES THAT.

10.5. Just remember that your father and I love you. Just because you are you. That’s all we need from you.

An Open Letter to My Kids: On Motherhood

Dearest Kiddos,

I wanted to talk to you both about motherhood. And yes, O, I know that you won’t ever be a mother but I think that you need to understand this as much as your sister so that you can appreciate, not only what a beautiful gift motherhood is, but how you can be appreciative to mothers. You know, in general.

No one, thankfully, has ever asked me to explain how motherhood feels. And that is a good thing. Because there is no way to really describe it. But I’m about to try.

I think there are moments for every mother, when they feel like the world is crumbling. I think that we all, sometimes, feel like there is no possible way that we, as mere women, can make it through one more sleepless night. One more day of constant hysterics (on your parts and/or ours). One more day. Because motherhood, my babies, is hard work. It is the hardest, most beautiful work that can be done. And I don’t take it for granted. You work and you work. And you forget to eat and you can’t sleep because your babies are so small and defenseless and hungry or wet or…you know…whatever. But mommies: We are THERE. We are there at 4 AM, when we have just gone to bed at 3, thinking that if we just fell asleep RIGHT NOW, we would, at least, get to MAYBE sleep until dawn. We are there at 4PM when you should be napping but you are teething and you can’t seem to get comfortable enough to do so. We are just there. And it is HARD. But we love you. We love you because we grew you in our bodies.  And no one else can feel that for you. You just remember that. Because at the risk of being generic and weird, I felt your hearts beat first from INSIDE my body. And THAT, is a miracle. YOU are my miracles.

Tonight, neither of you wanted to go to sleep. You wanted to be held and cuddled and just loved. And sometimes, and I can’t lie here, I find myself irritated at the fact that I have been working to keep you both happy all day and I feel that, once you are both in bed, it is MY time. And sometimes, when you wake up and insist on being held or rocked or fed, it irritates me. Tonight, when you cried, I came to you and I held you, like I do every night. I felt a rush of something come over me. Maybe a rush of everything. Happiness that y0u are my babies. Sadness that someday you won’t be babies and I will not feel the softness of your forehead on my lips as you drift to sleep. You will not grasp my hair with your tiny fingers. I won’t hold you in my lap. You won’t need me to comfort you. You won’t NEED me at all. Because I will raise you to trust in yourselves. Because you should. You should believe in yourselves enough that I am not your everything. But then…I think about how lost I will be when I am no longer just that.

Motherhood is a joyous, heartbreaking thing.

I love you both until my heart overflows. And I struggle, every day, with a mixture of making you the happiest you can be, and dealing with the fact that some day, I will not be the source of that happiness at all.

I hope that you both know how much I love you. I hope that you know that every, single thing that I do is for you. I hope that you know that it will be so for the rest of my days. And I hope that you respect Motherhood. Because it is truly the best gift anyone can be given.

That is all.

To the moon and back,

Mommy

 

Not Twins

When I tell people that I have two kids under two and give them their specific ages, one of two things happens: 1. They grimace and say something along the lines of, “YIKES. You must be tired.” or “You must really have your hands full!” or 2. They compare my situation to that of parents of twins.

 

Let me just say RIGHT NOW, that I have never been a parent of twins and I, under no circumstances, think that that shit is easy, ya’ll. But I can’t speak to that. Because MY kids, though just about the same size, are not twins. They are on VERY different pages developmentally and are in VERY different stages of personality development. And, in some ways, I think my life might be a little easier if I had had twins instead of accidentally getting pregnant TWICE in a little over a year. I understand that I would have been twice the size I was during my pregnancies. And I understand that I would have had the same newborn issues TIMES TWO. I know. I know! But when I was pregnant with Baby O, L wasn’t walking yet. So, with my bad back and my giant pregnant belly, I was carrying this squirmy ball of energy around with me everywhere. She was frustrated because she did not yet have the autonomy that she wanted so badly, and I was losing my sanity because…PREGNANCY. (Ouch.)

Then I had Baby O. And L started walking thirteen days later. And I had a newborn and a new walker (read: drunk zombie, because that, in my opinion, is what babies look like when they start walking) who was running into crap and banging her head on things and falling down every 30 seconds or so. (I’m still trying to get her to SIT DOWN.) And, while I realize that having TWO doing all of that at the same time would have been really challenging, I think I might have preferred two drunk zombies over one drunk zombie and a meatloaf. Because chasing L around the house and trying to pick her up off the floor after a fall while trying to nurse a newborn was a little ridiculous.

Now, we’re in a pretty crazy place. We are, with Baby O, right where we were a year ago with L. He wants to be mobile. He wants to be held and not be held at the same time. Because being held means he can’t move around but not being held means he can’t move around. So…you can understand his dilemma. But also, I now have L who is independent but entering the Terrible Twos and throwing tantrums and climbing things and locking herself in rooms that she shouldn’t be in in the first place and eating everything or refusing to eat at all. (And unraveling the toilet paper, and trying to flush shoes down the toilet and jumping off of the couch and…I could go on…) So, I’m still chasing. And holding a baby (who now weighs approximately as much as my car…) and trying to keep everyone happy at each of their developmental levels, all while cleaning and cooking and trying to remember to eat a sandwich every once in a while.

I keep thinking about how much time I wish away just wishing that Baby O would hurry up and learn to walk. Because, even though I know it is going to be a whole new drunk zombie experience, at least I will just be chasing and not so much carrying and picking up and all that stuff. I don’t want to wish it away. But my back is pretty much broken at this point, you guys. BROKEN.

So, yeah, sometimes, I think it may have been easier if they were at least in the same place so there wasn’t so much chaos. But I keep holding onto the hope that after the Terrible Twos are over for everyone, things will calm a bit and the kids will entertain each other.

I mean, that’s gonna happen. Right?

Open Letter to Baby O: 9 Months

Dear Oliver,

You are nine months old now and let me tell you, this month has been insane. You are finally getting your four top teeth AT THE SAME TIME. Or you have been, your front two popped out yesterday and I was so relieved because I thought that all of this sleep business (you know, the business of you not wanting to do any of it) was over. Or at least CLOSE to being over. But you showed me, son. You showed me. You have been worse about sleeping since you got the teeth than you were before. It has only been 48 hours at most, but you are definitely giving me a bit of a hard time.

You also just had strep throat. A month after your sister had it. Which made me so sad for you because I had it once and it was hell. Granted, I was 25 then and maybe a little bit of a wuss. Because you didn’t act like you were nearly in as bad of shape as I remember feeling. But whatever. It is gone now and hopefully that little experience will help to strengthen your little immune system.

You are huge. You are 28.5 inches long and a whopping 23.9 lbs. Which is, just so you know, in the 95th percentile for weight and your doctor, I’m sure, thinks I am feeding you whole steaks and straight butter. (I am not. FYI.) You aren’t yet crawling. And I blame myself for that because I am still petrified with fear that your sister will try and stand on you while you are attempting to do so. I try and practice with you while she is sleeping so that there is less danger of anyone’s demise or serious injury. You stand up like a pro, though. You can stand, holding onto things, for quite a long time.

You are still, generally, a happy baby. Although, even when you are happy, you are the loudest baby EVAR. You screech like a pterodactyl when you are happy and when you are pissed, you are a tiny air horn. If you weren’t so cute, I might get a little pissed about this because it is really hard to deal with it when your sister is, in an attempt to get my attention, trying to match your hollering. We’ve had to replace all of the windows in the house. (This is not true. But I am surprised.)

You look so much more like a little boy than a baby now. (Which might have something to do with the fact that you are gigantic and rival your sister in the size department. People often ask if you are twins, with puzzled looks on their faces.) I can’t believe that in a few months we will be throwing your first birthday party. There is a whole lot of emotion involved in this for me. I am so happy you are growing up to be such a perfect little guy but I am super sad that you won’t be a baby anymore. This, by no means, implies that I would have any other babies. Because, oh my god, you kids are enough.

I would really appreciate if you would go ahead and push those teeth out and maybe remedy whatever is going on with your sleep schedule, though. Mommy is tired and cranky and scarcely has time to write letters to you. And that, my little guy, is unacceptable. Let’s get this show on the road, shall we?

As always, you are a joy. You are getting to an age where you are taking everything in and are actually able to PLAY with your sister which is really fun to watch. The two of you laugh and squeal and you hit her a lot and she hates that. And it is hard to explain to her that you don’t mean to hit her and that you just flail around like a crazy person when you get excited. I am sure she won’t remember this and pretty soon you will be hitting each other on purpose. Oh, so much to look forward to!

I never knew I wanted kids until I had the two of you. And now I cannot imagine my life without you. Your smiles are the things that keep me going. You make me want to be better. You give me faith that I can be. And that the world can be better. And that you two will play a part in making it better. And I daydream about all the things you will accomplish. You are my hope, my heart, my everything. And I thank the Universe for every day with you. Every smile. Even when you are screaming your bloody heads off.

 

To the moon and back,

Mom

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Hey, Hey, Hey!

Hi, guys! I know! You had almost forgotten about me. Its okay. I totally understand. I am a slacker. But I haven’t forgotten YOU…

My kids are currently quiet and watching some ridiculousness on BabyFirst TV (which makes me want to shoot myself in the face, but I have discovered that, if I allow this, I am able to drink coffee and possibly pay some bills online so…I’m running with it) so I have a few minutes and I thought I would try and pound out an update.

Before we get started, I want to go ahead and dedicate this post to themathmaster because I am a woman of my word and I do it all for the people. (My apologies, because I am basically still asleep and I am not sure I have anything interesting to say at all…so…there’s that…)

I don’t really know the format in which to write this post because SO many things are going on. Every day is different. I can’t even explain to you how much of a roller coaster this last couple of months has been. But here goes…let’s start with L.

  • L is 22 months old today. She is absolutely hilarious. And also ABSOLUTELY a part of this gang called “The Terrible Twosies”. It is notorious. You may have heard of them. If you haven’t, BE WARNED.
  • She likes to wear my Reeboks around the house and then attempt to jump over things.
  • I put her on a gluten-free diet a little over three weeks ago because Celiac Disease runs in my family. I was hoping that this would improve her ability to sleep through the night without any blood-curdling screaming for me. This did not happen. She is still sleeping on face for half of the night. BUT, the tantrums, which started at about 18 months, have lessened. I don’t know if there is a connection there, but I’ll take it.
  • We decided that, instead of a birthday party for her, we are going to take a family trip to visit my sister and stay on the beach on the gulf. I am super excited because 1. L has never been to the beach because the whole time she has been alive it has either been cold or I have been pregnant, neither of which will be the case in May this year and 2. I have to throw Baby O’s FIRST birthday party three weeks later and am NOT A FAN of trying to plan two parties at the same time. And he gets a first birthday party. Next year, they can share the party.
  • She’s doing things like, throwing everything in the garbage can (and when I say EVERYTHING, that’s exactly what I mean), unraveling rolls of toilet paper and then shredding said paper all over the house, “reorganizing” shelves full of things like DVDs or cabinets full of tupperware, (I don’t think I need to tell you that reorganizing actually means, THROWING EVERYTHING ONTO THE GODDAMNED FLOOR), trying to jump on Baby O (I think that she THINKS that she is playing…but…), screeching like a pterodactyl, climbing any and all furniture (or anything else that is stationary enough for her to get onto, this includes people and pets), repeating EVERYTHING I say. EVER. (Again, dangerous. I have mentioned before that I am really bad about censoring my expletives because for 33 years, I didn’t have to. Now I find myself making up words on the fly to avoid screaming “FUUUUUUUCK” when a can of frozen apple juice hurls itself out of the freezer and onto my toe. (Note: I was not successful. I totally screamed, “FUUUUUUUCK!” She did not repeat this. But I think it was more because I think it sounded more like, “FUUUUUUUUUHHHHHH” and the “CK!!!!” part I said under my breath. Because, that’s effective, right?
  • She is still obsessed with “Yo Gabba Gabba”. I don’t have much else to say about this except that she can, at least, now sing the words to songs that they sing. And sings them all day when she is not watching the show too. Which, while sometimes annoying, is REALLY EFFING CUTE.
  • I still can’t believ e that this little PERSON came out of my body.

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Okay, now Baby O:

  • He turned 9 months last week (hopefully an Open Letter to follow this afternoon…) and has started to do some dumb shit where he gets up twice per night wanting to be held or a bottle or whatever and it is very reminiscent of having a newborn. And I don’t want to remember all of that not sleeping and forgetting my name and stuff. I am really not sure if this is because he is about to have some major milestone or he is getting teeth (he is TOTALLY getting teeth. I can see those little bastards…) or a combo of both. But with this kind of shenanigans, the milestone had better be that he has learned to speak German, graduated from college and written some sort of book. I will keep you updated.
  • He currently has four teeth. The top two front ones just came through within the last two days after nearly a month and a half of sitting there, RIGHT BELOW THE SURFACE and making everyone’s life a living hell. I will be glad when this kid doesn’t need to grow anymore of these bitches.
  • He is blonde. Like me. And that gives me a lot of pleasure. Because, if he weren’t blonde, I wouldn’t see any of myself in him at ALL. Because he looks JUST LIKE MB.
  • I almost punched his pediatrician in the throat last week at his nine-month checkup because she was really condescending about the fact that he isn’t crawling. I don’t think that people understand that with an almost two-year-old, crazy hard floors and a pretty hefty anxiety issue, putting him down on the floor for any length of time, unless I am sitting RIGHT THERE, is not really an option. I am not worried. Hell, L went from not crawling to RUNNING around like a little insane tornado with barely any transition time at all.
  • He is a massive kid. 28.5 inches long and 23 lbs 9 oz as of last week. GIANT.

That’s about all. I mean, aside from that I need a nanny, a cook and mimosas with breakfast.

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