Temporary Solo Parenting: How Am I Going to Be An Optimist About This? Six Ways.

I would not trade my husband for anything - he truly shares parenting with me and now that BabyM is no longer breastfeeding, he is 100% interchangeable with me where kid tasks are concerned.

The one time that's not awesome is when he needs to go out of town. Fortunately it's pretty rare (2 one-week trips in the past year), but during the time he's gone it feels like an *eternity*. 12-14 hours a day of All Mama, All the Time plus random night wakings gets old fast.  

A tropical drink always helps.

I should also say that I know a lot of people are doing this on their own *every day* with no help from a partner. My hat is off to you - that is hard work. I know I'm lucky.

Here are some things that helped me get through this past week. In less than 8 hours, I'll be back to 50% Parent, so yay!

1 - Stick to bedtime.  I cannot stress this one enough.  My girls usually go to bed around 7-ish, which usually means "somewhere between 7 and 7:30". Not this week. This week, both were tucked in, Mama out the door, by 6:30pm SHARP for BabyM (who sleeps remarkably better with this earlier bedtime) and 7:00 ON THE DOT for T. I needed a bit of time to decompress at night, had to stagger bedtimes to get each one's routine done, and REALLY didn't want to deal with more night wakings than necessary. This was also true for BabyM's nap - I made sure *every day* that we were home on time and we didn't have a single day where she refused.  Small victories, yo.

2 - Minimize commitments.  This is another one of those "survival mode" things. I didn't accept play dates, volunteer work, or extra errands that didn't need to be done this week. We managed to get T to preschool, Spanish class and Little Gym on time. I took M to her toddler group, because she loves it and I don't need to entertain her for that 2 hour stretch. We bailed on T's second Little Gym class of the week today in favor of Pajama Day at home. It's been lovely. On the stressful side, I (stupidly) decided to go through with my plan to bake blueberry muffins for T's class when it was her day to bring the snack, since I had promised her I'd do it.  Next time I'll pick something store-bought.

3 - Eat simply. We did a big grocery run on Sunday so we were well-stocked for the week. Meals usually consisted of a protein, some fat, a fruit or vegetable, and a small portion of something whole grain. Super easy options, like a whole wheat English muffin with peanut butter and a tangerine.  Oatmeal, apples and breakfast sausage. Things I can grab from the pantry and require simple heating - no major cooking.  (Blueberry muffins not included!)

4 - Get a babysitter.  T is in preschool for a few hours a day, but BabyM is my shadow ALL.DAY.LONG. And she's in that lovely phase where she's active and into *everything* and totally not interested in logic or reason. Fortunately, we have an awesome babysitter who comes every other week for 3 hours, and this was one of those weeks.  If it wasn't, I'd ask her anyway. It was lovely to get a break just for one afternoon. I got a pedicure, went to Starbucks, had a lovely drink and dinner at a local pub, and went home refreshed just in time to put the girls to bed.

5 - Sleep when they sleep. Some people hate this one, remembering it from the newborn days. BabyM is still an unpredictable sleeper so I try very hard not to stay up too late. One or two nights this week, I put the girls to bed, spent some non-quality time vegging out online, then went to bed myself before 8:30pm. The extra sleep was heavenly. Some afternoons I snoozed on the couch while the girls had nap/Quiet Time. It felt ridiculously slothlike and lazy, but since I didn't have backup on those days, I had to be well rested or I'd be a grouchy mess. 

6 - Plan something FUN. This goes against #2, Minimize Commitments, but I planned it before TJ left, put it on the calendar and talked it up as our "super-secret BIG FUN SURPRISE field trip". This gave T something to look forward to mid-week, helped keep her mind off missing Daddy, and filled up one afternoon of this long, long week. We visited the Seattle Uwajimaya, a huge local Asian grocery and gift store for cream puffs, some Hello Kitty shopping, and dinner. We went after BabyM woke from nap, and got back in time for bed. It wasn't super-elaborate but it was REALLY fun. 

Something unexpected always happens on these weeks.  Last time, when M was 4 months old, our power went out and I freaked out about all the frozen breastmilk in the fridge.  Fortunately, the power returned before any of it defrosted.  This time, our old dog Peanut, took a turn for the worse. He's been having more problems related to his advanced arthritis, but this week has been a LOT worse, possibly due to the fact that he misses TJ. There have been more calls to the vet, but thankfully I haven't had to take him in.

Here's hoping that the next 8 hours or so stay uneventful.  I'd love to hear your tips on coping with occasional solo parenting of little kids!

A Christmas Miracle and Gifts for 1 and 4 Year Olds

Last night I finished our Christmas shopping for the girls. A week before Thanksgiving, no less. I'm on fire!

Thanks to our huge construction project and the fact that we're living temporarily in my parents' condo, this Christmas cannot be about piles of *stuff*. When we were packing up our house to move out, I realized how much we have accumulated that we don't even use - clothes for all of us, toys that no one plays with, random kitchen gadgets. I'm no minimalist, but I love the idea I read somewhere about keeping only what's "useful, beautiful, or loved".

So with that in mind, I finished off my Christmas shopping last night on Amazon.

For four year old T:

Amazon Kindle Fire HD (8GB, no ads)

This is her BIG present. I'm rolling my eyes a bit at the idea of a four year old having her own tablet, but I think it's a sign of our technological times, and she will actually get a lot of educational (and fun!) use out of it. We have two trips coming up, and we'll give it to her early to keep her occupied on the plane and car. I chose the version without "special offers" for an extra $15 to minimize her chance of clicking and purchasing something accidentally.

I'm still working on setting it up (I'll write another post later), but will load up a few kids' books, fun apps, music and videos for her. This also means I'll get my phone back at restaurants and waiting rooms!

Tickets to "The Snowman" at the Symphony

Seattle Symphony has an awesome Discover Music series for older kids (6-12) where real symphony musicians play and the conductor explains the music.  The entire show is about an hour, which is perfect. This year they will show the movie The Snowman while the symphony plays the score live. I think T will love it.

A large magnifying glass

Like most kids, T is a born scientist who likes to study the world around her. Because she wears glasses and hasn't yet mastered the idea of closing one eye, things like kaleidoscopes, telescopes, microscopes and binoculars are tricky. This magnifying glass set will be perfect for inspecting slugs (she loves them!) and the fine print on various boxes that she's always asking me to read.

Las Lechucitas (Owl Babies in Spanish)

Owl Babies is one of my all time favorite kids' books and T loves it too. This summer at one of the excellent Spanish Story Times at our library, we found out the book has been translated into Spanish. It's a pretty simple story so I can probably manage reading it to her. And soon she'll be able to read it to *us*!

BOB Books, Set 1

This set of beginning reader books was recommended by a friend. T is very close to being able to read - she has a lot of sight words memorized, and can sound out other simple words with some help. She really wants to read by herself and studies her books carefully for hours (and has memorized many of them!)  So I'm hoping these simple books will be good practice and encouragement for her.

For 1 year old M:

Nesting stainless steel sauce cups

Yes, this sounds crazy. But these little cups are her favorite toy at our toddler group. They're metal, make fun noises, and she loves to nest and separate them. She also loves to put things in them, hand them back and forth to other people, and pretend like she's giving you something to eat. $5.79 for 12? Awesome.

Egg Shakers/Maracas with handles

This is another find from her toddler group - when the music teacher brings these out, the babies go crazy. M loves them - they have thin handles and are light, perfect for chubby baby hands. We'll need to keep an eye on them to make sure they don't break, but they are quite sturdy.

Hand Kite and Wooden Eggs

More hippie crunchy toys for BabyM. Watching her interact with the simple toys at her toddler group is amazing - she is so focused and interested in them. I found this Etsy shop, CakeInTheMorn, through a search and fell in love with their wood toys.

The "hand kite" is a smooth wooden ring with a large silky scarf tied to it. The eggs are solid heavy wood, good for putting in things and figuring out gravity and balance. I think they might fit in the nesting cups - we'll have to find out!

For both girls:

Christmas PJs from Old Navy

Since T now wears regular girls' sizes, and M is still in baby sizes, I couldn't find any matching pajamas.  I probably could have looked at Hanna Andersson, but we have a LOT of pajamas already and I didn't want to spend a lot. But I love the idea of special December PJs, especially when we cuddle up and do our Book Advent. T got penguin and snowflake PJs, and M got some cute red ones with a Christmas mouse.

I'm happy with our short list of presents and love that many are things that will be enjoyed through the month of December. I've found that both girls get overwhelmed when there are too many boxes to open and new things clamoring for their attention. Having just a few presents on Christmas Day will be much better, I hope!

What about you?  Have you started your shopping yet?

Three bits of parenting advice that changed my life

My friend J and I have known each other for 22 years. We met in college, became roommates, and now live in the same city. I don't see her as much as I'd like, thanks to busy family schedules and a lake that separates us (though let's not be dramatic, it's only about a 20 minute drive.)

Not only is J generous with her hand-me-downs, she has given me a few pieces of parenting advice over the years which are pure gold. These were not unsolicited drive-bys - they were little gifts that came when I asked questions on the parenting e-mail list we're both on. Her younger child is a couple of years older than T, so she's got more experience, but recent enough that she's still got useful details.

Baby Zombie Eye

If she hadn't told me about this, I would *still* be wondering why my kids never nap and wake up 10x a night. It was THAT life-changing for us.  When T was about 12 weeks old, I posted a question to our email list about naps. When did we expect babies to be on some kind of schedule?  How do we accomplish that?

Most of the answers came back as "it's still early", but only J gave me the info that changed our lives significantly.

She told me to keep an eye out for T's "tired signs" and mentioned her baby used to get this glassy-eyed, unfocused look when she got tired (long before she'd get fussy). Once she saw that, she'd try to put her down for a nap. Experienced mamas, this sounds so obvious, right? But as new parents, we assumed that a newborn would just fall asleep wherever she was, and we didn't have to *do* anything about naps.  Hah!

So we made a plan. T's other tired sign was nice and obvious - yawning. We counted yawns. When she got to Zombie Eye or 3 yawns, we'd put her down for a nap - nurse her and put her in the crib in a darkened room with white noise. If we got to the 2 hour mark without seeing these things, we'd try for a nap anyway.  And O. M. G.  This worked wonders within days.

Prior to doing this, T would stay awake for HOURS (because we were too dumb to realize she needed help to get to sleep!). One day at 8 weeks or so, she was up for 9 hours STRAIGHT and then cried for the next 3 (who wouldn't!).

We tried the same tactic with M, except she doesn't typically get Zombie Eye until it's too late, after she gets to the fussy stage.  M's tired sign?  Eye-rubbing!  Again, super obvious, so lucky us.  But with M we had to be even more vigilant because she masks the tiredness and gets her second wind easily when people are around playing with her.

Don't get me wrong - we were blessed with two fairly good sleepers.  But we never would have discovered that had J not given me this magic advice.

No Power Struggles 

J told me there were a few things you couldn't make a kid do: eat, sleep, and use the bathroom.  If you try, you'll get stuck in a horrible power struggle. It's better to avoid getting into that position.

Again, *so* brilliant. It got me out of the mindset of "she *should* be doing xyz", or worse, "she *has* to do xyz". I keep this one top of mind, and trust that my girls will do these things when they need to, with our help and routine, of course.

This helped me get through potty training with T and her current habit of waking up in the middle of the night to play in her room. It makes me less crazy when M gets up at 1am and is ready to PARTY. We just go downstairs and she plays in the gated living room while I nap on the couch.

Don't get me wrong, I'm still annoyed when they don't do what I (think I) need them to do, but I don't get all dictator-y about it. Most of the time, anyway. I'm still a work in progress.

Fair Isn't Equal

J told me this one before I was pregnant with BabyM so it didn't really sink in at the time, though I recognized it for its brilliance. She said her grad school adviser told her that fair didn't mean everyone got the same thing - it's each person getting what they *need*.

*So* true for siblings, especially those with different personalities and big age gaps.  M doesn't have the attention span for more than one or maybe two short board books, while T would love to read together for hours. I don't try to make sure I read the same *number* of books to both girls.

I know M loves it when I just sit in the playroom with her and let her do her own thing. T wants me to participate actively in her games. What fills each of their cups is pretty different, despite them being sisters in the same house with similar temperaments.

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I'm grateful to have a wise friend like J! What about you - what did you learn about parenting that rocked your world?

This too shall pass

On our way to school!

Today I dropped T off for her first day of her second full year of preschool. I'm not very sentimental about it, since she's been in preschool since she was 2.5, and she still has *another* entire year of preschool before she's eligible for kindergarten in our state.  Never mind that she's academically ready for K now.  Sigh.

I'm somewhat amused that she'll have almost as much preschool as I had college, and more time than it took me to get my Master's degree.  But she loves her school, and (mostly) so do I. 

I realized something this morning when she was getting ready for school.  When she was 2 and still sleeping in her crib, I lamented the fact that as soon as she woke up, I had to go get her, change her and get her breakfast. My day started when hers did, and it was often long before I would choose to wake.  If I had my choice, I'd sleep until the kingly hour of 9am at least.

Last year, I brought her a complete outfit into the bathroom, she'd get dressed by herself and come upstairs for breakfast. I was pretty excited about that.  This summer, she's been getting up herself, choosing her own outfit and coming upstairs completely dressed *without my intervention*.  Holy crap!  How did we get here? 

Now, obviously, Baby M runs my schedule, and when she's up, I'm up.  But (and I'm sure I'm jinxing it here), for the last week, more often than not, she's been SLEEPING THROUGH THE ENTIRE NIGHT, y'all. Like 7pm to 6:30am. No milk at 11pm or 2am, or both.  No perplexing screaming for hours at 3am.

When I wrote about being resigned to cosleeping back in March, I couldn't even imagine this. We transitioned BabyM to sleeping in her crib in May, and that was a rough couple of weeks.  She regularly woke up twice a night, which is astronomically harder for me than once a night, for some reason.  And then, she slowly started waking only once, and usually it was *before* our bedtime - how courteous.

So far in such a short time. I forget how all these daily parenting annoyances fade away in weeks. Sure, they are replaced by others, but it's a hard job with ever changing requirements, so I expect that.  It seems like the annoying habit or extra work will last FOREVER, but it doesn't.  

It's only taken me two kids and four years to realize this! 

Like I was poison in your mouth

I live in a crunchy city on the "Left Coast". Mamas routinely breastfeed in public without covering up. (I high-five them in my mind, because I'm not brave enough.)

BabyM flat-out refused to nurse in public around 5 months old. Life was just WAY TOO INTERESTING to worry about milk and definitely not under cover. Trying to wrangle a wiggly baby and not flash my fellow diners in a restaurant was good times.

So I stopped breastfeeding in public. I had a giant stash of milk stored up for my return to work (which didn't happen) so we had plenty when she *finally* deigned to accept a bottle around 6 months. I had nearly given up hope of anyone else feeding her at that point, so hooray for small victories.

But we kept nursing at home and she became super quick and efficient. She outgrew needing to be nursed to fall asleep and in a stunning turn of events, I can put her down in the crib in the mythical state of "drowsy but awake" and she actually, amazingly, puts herself to sleep.  This was unheard of 2 months ago and the cause of much despair around here.

The only constant with a baby is change.  At almost 10 months, BabyM is apparently ready to do everything at once - in the last 3 weeks she's learned to sit up from lying down, rolls around in both directions, *crawls* and is growing 3 new teeth at the same freakin' time.

The one thing I didn't expect to change - our easy, efficient "nursing relationship" - did.  I'll spare you the details, but it started to hurt a lot.  I was dreading her feedings. This was all new, since this amazing baby showed up on Day 1 knowing exactly what to do. 

My best guess is that her new teeth are affecting her latch, *and* she's growing like crazy and really hungry. When we give her a bottle, she drains 5-6oz in just a few minutes. She wants to eat and get on with her day. She also eats unbelievable quantities of solid food - actual person-sized amounts.

For a couple of weeks I've been pumping and feeding her, but I hate it.  One of the awesome benefits of not working anymore is not having to pump several times a day and feeling the stress of "do I have enough?". 

The freezer stash is dwindling - we have 2 weeks' worth of occasional bottles left.  I know I could spend time and $$$ getting a lactation consultant to diagnose what's going on. Lord knows I've used Dr. Google to self-diagnose as well.  I could drink the tea and take the supplements, which I've done in the past for T.

Or, I could supplement with formula for the next 1.5 months until we can introduce regular soy milk and use this as an opportunity to slowly wean her so I don't quit cold turkey and become Hormone-Crazed Angry Mama.  

It's taken me weeks to come to terms with this, thanks to the propaganda machine. I know logically that formula != "poison" (like some would have you believe) and that whole generations were raised successfully on formulas less nutritionally advanced than what's available now.  Big sister T was essentially prescribed formula by her doctor at 9 months since she was so low on iron and it was better than holding her down to force the nasty iron supplement into her mouth.  

BabyM isn't allergic to anything as far as we can tell so our options are wide open, unlike with T.  BabyM eats *everything*, including carpet lint, so the term "exclusively breastfed" means nothing at this point. 

But that little voice inside my head is telling me I'm being lazy and not trying hard enough to fix the nursing issue.  It's telling me I should breastfeed BabyM *exactly* as long as I did for her big sister, which would mean continuing in some form for 4 more months (ouch!).

It shouldn't be this complicated or guilt-inducing, right?  So today I took the first baby step. I wanted to make sure we had a backup option for M when our freezer stash of breastmilk runs out. I can't pump enough to get her through a day.

I found the "just in case" formula I bought before M was born. It expired in February so I threw it out. I wondered if it was a sign.

Then I realized I had a can of the same brand powdered stuff as well, likely a free "gift" from somewhere. This was a new experience for me - we always used the ready-to-feed for T. I got my chemistry on and made up a bottle very carefully as per the instructions. 

And she drank it down like it was sweet candy juice from heaven. Seriously, I think she drank it faster than any bottle of milk she'd had before. Well, then. I feel good that we have options.

I've given myself a couple more weeks to figure out the nursing stuff and see if there's an obvious, easy solution. I'm disappointed at how much internal angst I'm having over this. I know logically everything will be fine, but there's that nagging doubt when I consider taking a different path than I did last time.

But that's the crux of parenting, isn't it?  You have no idea whether or how any one decision is going to affect THE FUTURE. You just take a breath, pick a path that you think is right, and get moving. Kind of terrifying and kind of awesome all at the same time.

I feel like I should end this post with something uplifting, like "Go forth and conquer."  So, um, yeah!

A space that now you hold: Summer Kid Schedule

T's preschool is on Summer Break until Labor Day. Thanks to my new "life of leisure", this wasn't a cause of consternation or a mad scramble to find camps and alternate arrangements to cover the time.

However, I realized about a month ago that I would need to plan *something* for our days.  We don't do well just lolling around in the house. T can play on her own a bit, but quickly gets bored and wants to play *with* me. While I love being home with the kids, I don't want to be drafted into the role of being their playmate and entertaining them all day long either.

We needed a plan. I've always been intrigued by homeschooling, partly just due to the structure and organization it requires to plan educational, interesting activities.

When T was a baby, I made up a schedule to hang on the fridge that outlined our activities for the week including my work days, our Toddler Group, and various meals and naps. It helped a lot by taking some of the "hmm, what's next" processing out of my brain, and also got us on a more regular eating schedule.  (Coordinating 3 meals and 2 baby snacks was driving me bonkers until I picked times and followed them.)

My imaginary Internet friend J (who I've actually met a few times in real life) posted a quick sample summer schedule on Facebook and it was *brilliant*.  The key items I hadn't thought about were having a couple of "activity blocks" like "art project" or "outside fun" or "game" where you could change it up each day, but still have an idea of what to fill that time with.

So I ran with it. Since we have T (age 3.5) and M's (age 8 months) schedules to contend with, ours is a bit tricky.  It was like a fun logic puzzle to fit in all the pieces.

Once everyone is up and has gotten dressed and eaten breakfast, we do a bit of reading time. I noticed that lately we've gotten out of the habit of reading during the day as T is *so busy* with her own playtime.  Consequently M isn't hearing as many books as T did when she was a baby.  Sigh, poor neglected second child.

As much as I can, I try to be hardcore about making sure we're home at the appropriate times for naps and not scheduling over them. M still takes a morning nap, so we're typically home until she wakes from that, which is around 10:30am.  While she sleeps, T and I do either an art project or work on some of her workbooks. (She loves them- I swear I'm not running an academic sweatshop here.)

The *actual* schedule

We then have a morning "Get Out of the House" activity, which on nice days would be a trip to the park to burn off some preschooler beans, or running errands. (Can I say how in love I am with places that have double shopping carts?!)

Next is lunch and both girls napping (or T having Quiet Time) until about 3pm.  (Divine, I know.) After that we have a quick snack, then our Afternoon Activity, which is T's swimming lesson twice a week, a park trip if we didn't go in the morning, or maybe some sidewalk chalk or playing in the rice bin on the deck.  When it's nicer out, we'll get out the Crab Pool and play in there.

Then we get into the home stretch - T watches some Spanish or educational TV while I cook dinner, then we have Cleanup Time (I have J to thank for this!).  By this time TJ is usually home, so we eat then everyone gets ready for bed. On a good day, the girls are in bed, lights out at 7:30pm. We don't always have Good Days, though. Such is life with 2 under 4, I guess.

But just a few days into Summer Break, this schedule is making me a lot less stressed out. I don't have to scramble and plan for each afternoon while the girls are napping - I just need to pick one activity for the days we don't have swimming.  If we get off track due to late naps or sleeping in, no worries - we just pick up where we left off and skip stuff as needed (except for naps. We try not to skip naps because that causes 2am BADNESS).

I printed a copy of the schedule to hang on the fridge (with cute fonts, of course). T likes me to read it to her each day, and has already taken to asking "what's next on the Mama School Schedule?". Definitely my kid.

That's it - very simple, but super effective. I'm looking forward to seeing how it evolves over the next couple of months!

Getting rid of the F word in kids' books

And now you're thinking, "what kind of books is she reading to her kids?!"

One of the common themes in kids' books is words that are opposites. We have at least 3 books that tackle this topic: Boynton's Opposites, the most excellent Hippo Opposites by Janik Coat, and parts of I'll Teach My Dog A Lot of Words by Frith.

In I'll Teach My Dog A Lot of Words, there's a comparison that bugs the crap out of me. Fat and Thin. The illustration is with animals and it's not making a value judgment, but it still bothers me. First, as anyone with a toddler or preschooler knows, they are way into classifying things in their environment.

They also have no filter, especially when in public. Like the time T pointed out "Mama, look at that brown baby eating a banana!" very loudly while we were in Trader Joe's.  Not offensive, of course, just a little uncomfortable when everyone can hear.

So back to the books. I don't really need "fat" in my preschooler's vocabulary. I can't think of one situation where it's ok to apply that word to a person and I sure as heck DO NOT want them using it to describe themselves.

There are plenty of other words to describe *things* that weigh a lot or look big - heavy, fluffy, large, etc.  Boynton and Coat both get it - they use heavy/light and show animals on a see-saw or in a hot air balloon/under water to illustrate this.

And no doubt, preschoolers raised on these books will likely find some other way to comment on people's size, like big or heavy, and they still need to learn that it's not appropriate to comment on strangers' appearances (unless directly giving them a compliment, of course).

But I think getting rid of "fat" would go a long way. Language matters.

There's so much more that you need to work out

I keep composing blog posts in my head during the quiet times while nursing, showering, and driving but haven't been able to sit down and write them.

My daily life has been turned upside down by TJ's return to work.  Not in a bad way, but just in an "I need to get used to the new normal" way.  Before he started work, I literally had not spent more than 4 hours alone with the girls - just the time it took for TJ to get a good motorcycle ride in over the weekend, or have dinner with a friend.

Four hours is very different from an entire week, which is what I had when he had to go to the East Coast for his new job's orientation. It was a trial by fire, serendipitously aided by the arrival of my friend Di who just happened to be visiting that first weekend.  She helped us get in the groove by chatting with T while I was nursing M, or hanging out with M while I helped T get dressed.

Sadly, she had to leave on Sunday night, but we made it through the week.  By the end, I even felt like we had our routine DOWN. I got T to preschool on time every day that week with her lunch, everyone got a couple of baths and we slept ok.  We were in "survival mode", doing only what we needed to get through the day. Sometimes we all went to bed at 7:30pm.

When TJ returned from his trip, we had to figure out our routines again, this time with him. It was great having him around to handle bedtime and tag-team again when he was home, but there were new wrinkles, like the fact that he gets ready for work around 5:30 or 6am, and BabyM is a ridiculously light sleeper, so suddenly my day was starting then too.

But now we're 3 weeks into this new life and finding our way through it.  Once a week or so, I get to that magical state where I got everything done during the day that I was planning to do: basic chores, something fun outside the house with the girls, some exercise, an actual home cooked dinner, and maybe even a blog post or some crafty time.

The rest of the time, I'm still muddling through trying to figure out how to get the girls to nap in parallel rather than in series, how to keep the baby entertained for a few minutes while I shower, and how to convince the 3yo that her mere presence while I'm nursing the baby causes the baby to completely ignore me.

So by the end of the day, I'm worn out and way too tired to use that time to craft or blog. On the bright side I've been getting a reasonable amount of (crappy, baby-bedsharing) sleep, which makes me a better mama overall.

I think I'm going to have to switch my "me-time" activities to the early morning, which is painful for this night owl. We'll see. Every day is like a new (tiring) adventure.

I want it all, and I want it now

BabyM wonders if she has it all

The media is all a-flutter with the same old stories of whether women "can have it all", thanks to  Sheryl Sandberg's new book about leadership and Marissa Mayer's "thou shalt not work from home" decree at Yahoo.
And of course, everyone MUST weigh in, as we always do.  I'm no different.  I've been reading Dinner: A Love Story by Jenny Rosenstrach, which is a combination cookbook, memoir and guidebook on how to pull together family meals. (Something I really, really need help with, before the God of Tater Tots installs himself permanently in our house.) 

Rosenstrach talks about returning to her job after maternity leave, reading articles and attending lectures about working motherhood.  One of my favorite quotes from this book is this: "That was the other thing I realized quickly - working mothers loved nothing more than talking about being working mothers."  I giggled out loud when I read that line - so true, online and in real life.

And of course, like noticing all the other Audi A3s once I got one myself, I see articles about "Having It All" everywhere. I love this opinion piece in the NYT by Erin Callan, a former Lehman Brothers CFO. And of course, I love it because it supports my point of view, which is that Work is Not Everything.  It's so easy to get caught up in the race under the guise of having a great career, and ambition, etc. as we are all exhorted to do, but at some point, it becomes toxic if you let it take over your entire life. 

I also read this great CNN piece where 10 women define "having it all".  I love how varied the answers are. I love how Ana Navarro, a political strategist, thought it was a stupid question. There are a lot of great points, like how men weren't being raised for this change, and thus there are still guys out there who think being with their kids is "babysitting". Or how we never ask men how they manage to "have it all".  Or what exactly "having it all" means.

I think these discussion are best when they involve real people, so with that, I'm going to navel gaze along with the best of them.

Prior to 2006, I had no hobbies outside of work. So I just worked more. And yes, I was rewarded. I hit my salary goal before I expected to. I got 2 promotions in 3 years. I also got fat (again), and wasn't really that *happy*. Then I found jewelry making, and finally had a passion outside of work. It was life changing to have something that occupied my mind that wasn't work, that got me out of bed in the morning eager to try new designs and make things with my hands instead of sitting in front of a computer screen. I finally had the elusive "balance". I finally was happy and able to recharge with breaks of something non-work-related.

I've written before about how I'd be happy to stay home with the girls, to teach them, do art projects, and live a less hectic life that didn't involve shlepping to and from daycare several times a week.  To that end, I've been working part-time, 2 or 3 days a week since 2010. 

We had been living an idyllic existence when TJ quit his job. Two parents at home most days. During my mat leave, we could easily divide and conquer and give everyone the attention they needed during the transition.

Sadly, all good things must come to an end. In our case, TJ got offered a dream job which didn't even require us to move. It was too good not to take it. So he started work 2 weeks ago, and boy do we miss him!

But there was the Looming Question. What happens when my maternity leave ends? We didn't have childcare lined up because that was going to be TJ's role until early next year. We weren't happy with the options available for a 5 month old baby, and T's awesome preschool is only half-day. (But did I mention awesome?!)

So it's my turn to step out of the standard corporate world for a while. I'm currently looking for 15 hours a week of remote work, and am considering contract and freelance opportunities as well. (So if you know anyone who needs a project manager...)

I'm also taking custom orders again in my Etsy shop and looking into Elance and TaskRabbit for work I can do outside the normal 9 to 5.  I'm in the middle of reading Chris Guillebeau's The $100 Startup, and am intrigued by the possibility of starting something myself.  I don't have an entrepreneurial personality but am figuring out how to develop some of those skills.

Yesterday T and I did some "Mama School" - we worked on some "number work" and did some cutting practice with scissors.  I spent an inordinate amount of time getting the Baby Who Will Not Nap to go to sleep.  The three of us went to the mall for an errand and to lunch, a lesson for me in wrangling two tired kids.  So I'm definitely learning new skills!

I'm both nervous and excited about this new life. For me "having it all" means that as a family, we have the flexibility to adjust our working lives as needed to manage our responsibilities at home.   My version of "it all" includes a partner who sees all "jobs" in this house as equal - whether that be working for pay or just the sheer glory of changing diapers, making dinner and pulling weeds. That, and being grateful that we *can* choose this lifestyle, as long as one of us has consistent income (and health insurance!).  It's definitely a team effort here.

What about you?  What does "having it all" look like to you?

Six things they don't tell you about babies

Despite my extensive reading and research, there are still things I didn't know about babies until we had one (and now two) living in our house.  Mysterious creatures, babies.

1. They don't arrive knowing how to eat
I read a lot of articles about breastfeeding, and had honest friends who shared their struggles, but I didn't pick up on one important detail.  It's not just about the mama learning the "womanly art of breastfeeding". The babies don't know how to do it either. They need to figure out how to latch, how to suck, and how to eat and breathe at the same time.  The same is true about drinking from a bottle, which is a different set of skills.  All those Sesame Street videos of people feeding baby animals with bottles made me believe that it was something babies just knew how to *do*. Not so much.

2. A baby is not a function box
When I was learning middle school math, our book had a photo of a "function box" to get us to understand inputs and outputs of algebraic functions.

Function box, courtesy of
One Mathematical Cat

I imagined a new baby would be like this function box and it was my job to figure out the right input to get the desired output.  Baby crying?  Maybe it's a messy diaper.  Deliver clean diaper, then baby should stop crying right?  HAHAHA. Not really.

Sure, sometimes it worked, as I figured out the baby's patterns for hunger and sleep.  But many times, she cried for no reason at all.  Friends of mine have graphed and journaled sleep patterns for weeks, and found no useful correlations.  The function box doesn't cover that.

3. Each one is a special snowflake
This is a twist on the previous lesson. We've had two newborns, and even with our tiny n=2 sample size, I can tell that babies are born with different preferences and personalities.  Again this was something I had simply not considered prior to becoming a parent. I just figured babies were mostly alike until they got older.

BabyT loved the pacifier and drank happily from a bottle.  BabyM says no to both.  BabyM really prefers to be held or at least talked to when she's awake, while BabyT was happy to sit in her bouncy seat and amuse herself for long stretches of time.

Keep that in mind when helpful friends and relatives tell you what to do that "always worked for their babies". Yours may hate it, and it's not because you're doing something wrong.

4. Physical development takes a top down approach
Our awesome pediatrician mentioned this in passing, and I think it's so cool. I never thought about it that way until she brought it up.  First they learn to use their mouths to eat, then get control of their head/neck, then their arms and hands, then they can roll over, sit up, crawl, stand, and finally walk and run.

Obviously not every baby will do it exactly this way (see special snowflake, above) but it's a rough guideline and a neat, logical pattern.  So much is illogical in the world of babies that I latch onto what I can.

5. Photoshop is your friend
Everyone thinks babies are born all cute and cuddly. Not so much. They have weird skin issues like baby acne, cradle cap, and birthmarks that disappear in varying amounts of time. They spent 9+ months squished inside someone's belly.  They are also skinny and take several weeks to plump up.

see how this was taken from really far away?
and artfully blurred?

Photoshop and Instagram filters will save you in these uncertain times.  Around 3-6 months, babies usually deliver the goods and get really cute as promised.

6. Oh god, the laundry
So people do talk about how babies exponentially increase the amount of laundry they do.  Especially those folks who launder their own cloth diapers.  And I do find myself always behind on laundry these days, but it's not the baby's clothes that are piling up - it's mine.

Sure, we have the occasional diaper blowout or spit up incident that requires a full baby outfit change and maybe also the changing station covers. In general, though, babies who don't move don't get dirty so ours tend to wear outfits for more than one day.

The biggest increase in laundry is MY clothes.  I've still got a limited wardrobe because I didn't lose all the baby weight in 3 weeks as advertised.  Breastfeeding means I need to wear easy-access clothing, and I don't have many nursing tops.  Not to mention all the reusable nursing pads that need to be washed and every last thing the baby spits up on.  Most of my shirts meet their demise that way - I put on a clean one, and 15 minutes later, the baby spits up on it. Lather, rinse, repeat.


Maybe there's someone out there who benefits from this list, and remembers it at 3am when they're feeling like a failure because the (fed and diapered) baby just won't stop crying and go to sleep already.  Or maybe that person will cut herself some slack when she has to decide whether to wear the sweatshirt with the milk spot or the spit up on the shoulder, because nothing else is clean.

It definitely gets better.

Project Life: November 2012, Thanksgiving Edition

I'm so close to completing Project Life for 2012 and I'm so excited!  Even more so that it's still FUN to put the pages together each time.

For this layout, I used the Noel Mignon November 2012 kit. I bought a single one to see what a different kit was like.  (I already subscribe to Studio Calico.) This one was a bit too "themed" for my liking - very fall and Thanksgiving-ish, but perfect for this spread in Project Life. I also used a few of the cards from the We R Memory Keepers line at Target - the 4x6 list of T's favorite things, and the little cards with the banners and Meridian's schedule matched nicely with the NM kit.  I've finally figured out that I prefer to use all cream-based papers or all white-based, instead of mixing the two.

Apologies in advance for the photos being a bit wonky.  I got done with this spread very late so had to take them under incandescent light. I'm also learning how to use Adobe Lightroom, and am still getting used to the editing tools.

Nov 12-25, 2012: Thanksgiving, Crossroads Mall, Portage Bay Cafe

Closeup of "baby schedule" card ;)

Nov 12-25: Babies, friends, and food.

Not much craftiness this week - a sequin, a brad and a sticker.

I printed fewer photos than usual this time, because I had put a lot of this month's photos in my 30 Days of Thankful album and didn't want to use duplicates.  So I had to come up with some "filler" cards, and I just wasn't feeling as crafty this week.

I had a few cards in my stash that I added a bit of journaling and kit stickers to, and then I thought it might be nice to capture a little bit about what the girls are like right now.  With BabyM, it's all about the eating and sleeping, so I wrote up her "schedule" (such as it is). I'm sure it'll be amusing when she's a teenager.

For T, I wrote about her current favorite things - book, movie, parent (always Daddy!).  I wrote these up from my own observation, so I'm sure she'd disagree with my choices. She's 3 and tends to disagree with most things. Sigh.

I'm also totally stoked that all the pages for the year will fit into one 2.5" binder.  Other people have had to split their year into 2 albums, which just doesn't seem ok to me. I know, I'm weird.

Only 3 more layouts to go for the year!  Woot!

Linked up with The Mom Creative for Project Life Tuesday.

No one ever said it would be this hard

As you may remember, I didn't think Marissa Meyer (new CEO of Yahoo) was a great role model for working parents or changing our workaholic culture. That's still true.

But I thought this mean-spirited article by Lisa Belkin on HuffPo, was pretty uncalled-for. Apparently, like us, Ms. Mayer has been blessed with an "easy" baby.  Not to mention, she has help - her husband reportedly stays at home, plus I'm sure neither of them shleps to the grocery store or cleans their own bathrooms.  Not unlike our current situation.

But apparently she's not allowed to call it like it is, because "it turns her into one of those mothers we don't like very much."  I'm sure Ms. Mayer doesn't particularly care, of course.  But the article goes further and makes these dire predictions about how her baby could change in an instant, and how she shouldn't be too smug, etc. etc. 

And the comments?  Even worse.  They seem to be wishing her all sorts of ill will, and warning her about all of the rough patches that (may not) come ahead.  

While I do not aspire to her version of work life "balance", I'm not rooting for her to fail, or waiting for her to eat her words, as several commenters seem to be doing.  I hope baby Macallister continues to be easy, because honestly, that makes parenting that much more fun. It's easier to be patient when someone isn't demanding your time and energy 24x7 by yelling.

People, it's not a reflection of your own parenting when other people say they're having an easier time of it.  I'm not sure why it's so hard to get that.

Apparently, while we're allowed to talk on the Internet all we want about how parenting sucks and babies are hard, we're not allowed to breathe one word of how some babies actually do sleep long stretches regularly or are generally "easy".  I've seen this in real life as well as online, and it frustrates me.  

I don't think anyone with an "easy" baby is deluded into thinking it's their excellent parenting that made it so - it's totally the luck of the draw.  In fact, before BabyM was born, I was sure she wouldn't be as chill as her big sister, and that we'd have to "pay" for the relatively easy babyhood we had with T. (We haven't, knock on wood.)

Clearly, it's our excellent parenting at work here.

Why do we think like that?  Is it an American thing? In Seattle people talk about "doing penance" for our gorgeous summers by living through 9 months of gray. I think that's a depressing way to look at things.

What I've found is that if I dread something to come (terrible twos, potty training, etc.) it *feels* worse than if I just accept it as developmentally appropriate for my kid.  And yes, even parents of "easy" babies have things that are "harder" than others.  

But all the "you'll see, it's harder than you think" stuff?  It's condescending and just plain annoying. Wouldn't it be great if we could just accept that all experiences are equally valid and sometimes people just get lucky?

Just walk away, there'll be no more tomorrow

Apparently today is the day to read More Working Mother posts.  Laura Vanderkam has a post about the resignation letter from a lawyer who detailed her hellish schedule trying to juggle her family life and work.  The original blog that posted the letter, and the HuffPo article about it (I'm lazy, Laura's post above has links) are about how the work culture in the US is stuck in the 1950s and doesn't jive well with two working parent families.  This, I can totally get behind.

What irks me is all the posts and comments people are making on the different sites about how this woman isn't doing it right, that she's not outsourcing enough, that her quitting to handle family stuff was really an excuse for her not liking her job, and really how she's not prioritizing her time correctly and should be able to work full time, goshdarnit, because everyone else does it.

This is what sets my teeth on edge.  Yes, *some* people can and do outsource everything, down to the night nanny to handle frequent baby wakings.  Yes, *some* people need to work outside the home and would go batshit crazy if they were home with kids all day.  Yes, *some* people thrive on a constant level of busy.

But not all of us are like that. And again, maybe it's because I haven't found my people in blog land so what I'm reading is biased. 

Everyone's life activities are prioritized differently.  Some people simply need more sleep (or uninterrupted sleep). Some people have a passion for what they do for work. Some people homeschool. Some people can only handle having one or two scheduled activities on a weekend.

Tonight, both kids in my house were finally asleep by 7:45pm.  I wasn't going to blog.  As you can see, some of my previous projects had to be dropped, like NaBloPoMo.

But then I read the comments in this AskMoxie post.  Specifically, the ones by Jan and by Gina.   I had to write this post after reading those. These women have articulated how I feel about working, far more eloquently than I ever could.  They do work outside the home, but regret that it changes the relationship and time they spend with their kids. 

There are those of us who do work, but whose work is quite simply a lower priority. Yes, maybe that means I don't LUUURVE my job so much I can't imagine not having it. (For the record, I do like it.)  I've already detailed why I work.

But for me, and apparently at least a few of us out there, the answer is not always "outsource everything".  And that's how I feel every time I see helpful tips like "hire an au pair/nanny" or "have the nanny give the kid a bath before you get home from work" or "just buy the cupcakes at the grocery store".  This may work for some people, heck, even most working parents, but it doesn't work for me.

I want to do these things myself, even if "they" don't think those tasks are important.  I'm very lucky to have an equal partner in my husband, a great preschool, and parents who live nearby for part of the year.  Even with all that, *I* still want to do the hands on stuff, and not squeeze it into the 1 hour we have between dinner and bed.  I'd like to make cupcakes from scratch and discuss and execute elaborate birthday plans with the 3 year old.  And though it's not pleasant, I want to be the one who wakes up with the baby at night, not some person I hired.

I'm glad to know there are other people like me out there, and want to give a shout out to Jan and Gina for making me feel like I'm not an anomaly.  But now, I must go.  There is pumpkin bread to be baked and Project Life pages to be made.

I'm learning to live

It's been a little over 2 weeks as a family of four and so far it's gone much better than I expected.  Most of this is due to the fact that TJ is home so we're pretty much always dividing and conquering.

Things that are going well:

No meltdowns yet, from anyone.  I'm pretty surprised, to be honest.  I suppose it's too early to get too excited about that, though.

Everyone is fed, clothed, clean and mostly happy.  That's a big deal, right?  BabyM sleeps in pretty good stretches usually - 2.5 hours up to 8 hours once (!).  It's all over the place - sometimes during the day, sometimes at night, but I'll take it.

I'm off the pain meds.  I can drive!  Things (mostly) don't hurt.  I can leave the house on my own! (In theory anyway.  In practice I need to take The Baby since I'm the only one who can feed her.)

I'm pretty well-rested.  I am one of those people who can nap anytime, almost anywhere.  TJ holds down the fort with T since I've got all the night duty with The Baby.  (I know, he is so awesome.)

I'm (mostly) accepting that I don't *have* to do anything right now except take care of my family.  It's hard for my Type-A self, but I keep reminding myself I have about 20 weeks left at home.  That's a long time.

Nursing.  So easy this time.  And efficient.  Loving the snuggly quiet time with BabyM, and also sometimes T keeps us company and "reads" us a book.

Things I'd like to be better:

T is waking multiple times at night and requires soothing.  Not surprising considering the circumstances but very rough on TJ who is NOT a napper.  I can't help much yet since I'm already up a couple of times with The Baby, but I'm hoping it'll iron out soon.  Sort of wondering if cosleeping will fix it - the one night she came to our bed, she slept through *everything*.

I had forgotten how ridiculously hard it is to leave the house with a baby.  T has gotten pretty self sufficient - she can put on her own shoes/jacket, use the bathroom and mostly dress herself.  We're starting over.  It took us 90 minutes to get out the door this morning to go to the Children's Museum.  Thankfully we didn't need to be there by a certain time.

BabyM hates the carseat.  I don't know why.  On the bright side, she almost always falls asleep after a few minutes of driving.  But this is the only time she really cries, and it's awful.

I still don't want to make a lot of plans with people.  First, it's hard to get out of the house and be somewhere at a certain time, not to mention, I may not want to be awake at that time.

Then I have to figure out the nursing-in-public thing, made more complicated by the fact that I can't find my nursing cover up.  The blanket over the shoulder trick is NOT working for me.  Also, it's so much easier with the enormous nursing pillow.  Sigh.

I miss my big girl.  I miss having uninterrupted time with her.  I'm often still asleep when she leaves for preschool in the morning.  She is here and awake for such limited hours that I feel like I'm missing out.  Sniffle.  Nearly every book-reading session or art project is interrupted because The Baby needs to eat and right now I'm the only one who can feed her. 

Which leads me to Introducing the Bottle.  We need to do this, but I'm afraid.  One of the nurses at the hospital gave her a paci (I know, too early!) and she took to it right away, but it screwed up her latch for the *entire next day*.  I was really upset about this, thinking we had broken our perfectly-nursing baby.  Fortunately, the following day she was fine and we haven't tried a paci since.


But it would be nice if TJ could feed her occasionally, *and* she's going to need to take a bottle when I go back to work in March.   Which means I need to start pumping anyway, so that we can stockpile milk.  Blergh.

=============================================

Not bad for the first few weeks, though.  Fingers crossed that the relative peacefulness and Baby Good Sleep will last!

Parental Leave Checklist, Part III: Just Before and After

If you missed, them, here are:
Part I of the Parental Leave Checklist
Part II of the Parental Leave Checklist

Just like the previous set of tasks, these are hard to plan in advance since you don't know *exactly* when your baby will arrive.  I like to do as much as I can beforehand (remember The List?) but there are a few items that can *only* be done once the baby is born.

Just Before or Just After Parental or Maternity Leave Begins:

• Post the note on your office door saying you’re on leave  - If you work from home before your due date, you can post this on your last day in the office.  Or ask a coworker to do this for you once your leave starts.  Some people think it invites theft, so decide if that's an issue for your workplace before doing this.

• Turn on your voicemail extended absence greeting and email OOF message - If you prepared these ahead of time, actually turning them on should be quick and painless.  If you're planning to take some time off before your due date, you can obviously turn these on when you're no longer working.

• Contact HR with the baby’s birthdate to start the official leave process - The information you'll need to provide depends on your company.  You may need to wait until the baby has an official birth certificate or Social Security Number.

• Enroll new baby in health insurance plan - Same as above - you may need specific info before the baby can be added to your plan.  Read over the docs carefully and make sure you've made the appropriate changes for your baby.  You usually have a limited amount of time to add a new baby, so make sure you're within the correct timeframe.

• Sign up for childcare flexible spending account (FSA) - if your company offers this, and you'll need childcare within the year, it's a good idea to set aside money in your dependent care FSA account.  The max in 2012 is $5000 per year per family which doesn't even begin to cover infant care for a year here, but it's tax free so we do take advantage of it.

• Send email to your team announcing the baby’s arrival - this is the fun part!  Send a cute photo, but maybe not one where you're looking all disheveled in your hospital gown (personal preference).  

this was the photo I sent out when BabyM was born

I'll post the next section in a few weeks, which is Things to Do While You're On Leave.  I created a handy downloadable checklist with the whole thing, for the impatient folks out there.  It's my first experiment with Google Drive for shared downloads.  Let me know if you have trouble accessing the files.

Parental Leave Checklist Downloads:
Download the Word version (.doc)
Download the PDF version (.pdf)

If you find this helpful, please contribute to my Starbucks chai fund :)
Thanks in advance!

I'd love to know if I've missed anything.  Let me know and good luck with your leave preparations!

Brown paper packages tied up with string

Our days are fragmented by the schedules of our two little people.  T has to be at preschool exactly at 8:40 and picked up at 12:40.  M eats approximately every 3-5 hours round the clock, which also includes one or more diaper changes and some extra cuddling when she just doesn't want to be put down.  

We have doctor's appointments for M, T, and me, as well as errands like prescription pickup and grocery shopping.  I can't drive until I stop taking pain meds.  I can't stop taking pain meds until it stops hurting.  So we do everything, "all four together", which is kind of nice, but also means neither adult can "tag out".

Not unexpected, and thankfully being on maternity leave frees me up to think about nothing else than what's going on here at home.  Our second time with a newborn has been easier, mainly because my expectations of "getting things done" are low.  And this one sleeps and eats better than I expected (sleep gods, don't strike me down).



gratuitous baby picture.  blanket knit by my mom!

While I was thinking about not much else besides our day-to-day routine, two awesome things happened.

Today I got email from a BlogHer editor telling me they are featuring one of my older posts about contentment on their front page.  Woot!  I still love me some external validation.

 But even bigger and MORE exciting than that was an email I got last night as I was trying to convince myself to spend a little time in the craft room before falling into bed. 

Create magazine, part of the gorgeous Northridge Publishing family, wants to publish a project I submitted!!  I sent in the photos months ago, but since I hadn't heard from them, I figured they didn't want it.  I was a little sad, but honestly, not surprised since this was the first mini scrapbook album I've made on my own. 

But they want to publish it in March!  I need to send it in this month, with some additional info.  This is one of the items on my Mondo Beyondo list.  I honestly was going to give up on this one, partly because of the lack of time I have right now to focus on crafting, but also because of some customer service issues I've been having with Northridge regarding my subscription.

But when I got the email requesting my project, I just couldn't say no.  It's on my dream list!  The album itself is very special to me - it's a list of all the qualities I want to have as a mama, kind of a scrapbook version of a "vision board".  So you can be sure I'll be taking a ton of photos of it just in case it doesn't come back to me.

So to quote John Lennon, "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."

Update:  One more awesome thing I forgot to mention - BabyM weighs 7lbs today, which is 3 oz more than her birthweight.  Which also means we don't need to wake her to eat.  Woohoo!

Now your turn.  Tell me about an unexpected good thing in your life!

Blessed and lucky

So here we are on the Other Side.  I've been meaning to post something since Monday, but have been too tired to sit down and write anything more complex than a Facebook status.

Meridian Rayna made her way into the world on Monday morning, weighing 6 lbs 13 oz and measuring 18.5 inches. Surprisingly, everything was right on schedule.  We showed up at the hospital at 7am, they took us back almost immediately and got me prepped for surgery.  I had less time to freak out this time than last time. But, I still dislike hospitals, and hate having an IV.  Especially when they have to poke me more than once to get a good spot.

The anesthesiologist, Dr. L, was *amazing*.  She got the job done right on the first try and chatted with me the entire time to distract me from what was happening.  We talked about The Checklist Manifesto which I read earlier this year.  I was thrilled to note that as part of the procedure, my doctor ran through a checklist/intros before they got started.  So cool to read about it, then see it in action.

Both TJ and I are very squeamish, so we had them put up a screen, and asked the docs not to tell us what they were doing and that we were perfectly happy to assume that babies come out perfectly clean and wrapped in blankets :)

Just like last time, I cried when I heard BabyM's "voice".  She has a ton of dark brown hair and deep blue eyes, both of which are probably temporary.  The time holding her in the recovery room passed quickly, as did nursing her for the first time.

The nurses who took care of us were FANTASTIC, again.  We were lucky to have them looking out for us and responding to my requests for help getting M in and out of her "crib",  swaddling her tightly, getting me up and walking, and working with me to find a painkiller/schedule that worked.

With that, a short list of things I am grateful for:

1.  Feeding - Baby M is one of those mythical babies "born knowing what to do".  She latched on right away. She's quick. It doesn't hurt and is actually kind of a nice peaceful cuddly time. (Did I really say that?!)  This was definitely *not* the case with T in the early months.

2.  Husband - I count my lucky stars to have TJ (sappy alert).  M would not sleep in the hospital's Baby Tupperware (aka "crib") so he slept with her in his arms every night and for some naps.  We are currently practicing "divide and conquer" to shepherd T through her schedule and keep BabyM fed, clean and happy.  I can't imagine if it had to be all Mama, all the time. 

3.  Sleep - Of course we could be getting more sleep, uninterrupted, but after the last month of pregnancy, what I'm getting now is amazing.  Plus, BabyM sleeps in 2-4 hour stretches, which is more than I expected.  So far, so good.

4.  My mom - She stayed with T at our house while we were in the hospital.  T somehow convinced her to co-sleep, so I'm sure my mom didn't get much rest.  She also left us a huge pot of chili which we are still eating (when we remember to eat).  T is at her house today to play. Hooray.

5.  Narcotics - It's really too bad I don't enjoy them more.  My doctor is very thorough and sent me home with a bunch of different ones to try, since both of the options I used in the hospital made me dizzy and nauseous.  But honestly, all I need right now is the high dose ibuprofen, alternating with Tylenol + codeine.  When I remember to take them on schedule, nothing hurts.  Hooray for modern medicine.

Life is good around here, if a bit hazy from lack of sleep.  I think there might be nothing better than cuddling a sweet, sleepy baby, with nothing else on the agenda.

We may only have tonight

I wanted this weekend to be Big and Special, as it's T's last couple of days with us all to herself.  Instead it started out with the Great Oatmeal Standoff of 2012 which left more than one of us in tears and all of us a little out of sorts for a good portion of the day.

It was the same drama that plays itself out in every household at some point.  Parent serves a meal, kid refuses to eat it.  Kid makes a request (in this case, extra maple syrup), promising to eat it, then doesn't.  Power struggle ensues.  No one wants to "lose".

This hasn't happened before.  T is pretty easygoing about food - we give her a couple of choices and she picks one.  But today she pitched a fit, spit it out, and got everyone all riled up.  We found ourselves in a situation where we couldn't back down, or at least that's how it felt at the time.

After both of us took a long nap, I figured a way to disengage without giving in would be to present the oatmeal again at lunch, with something else to eat chosen by us.  (In our case, a hot dog.) No more choices would be offered today (we typically let her choose most things - what to wear, activities, etc.).  When she turned down our choices, we told her that if she ate the oatmeal like she promised in the morning, then she could make her own choices.  Apparently this wasn't worth it.  (I have to give her credit for her stubbornness, er commitment to her principles.) 

The oatmeal reappeared at dinner, along with shrimp, which she really likes.  She finally agreed to eat the oatmeal in order to get more shrimp so we alternated bites of oatmeal and shrimp.  She proceeded to eat the entire bowl of oatmeal without incident, much to my surprise.  She got her choices back - what to wear to bed, what to watch before bed, etc.  And even earned a star for her potty-training chart.  (She's 2 half-days away from getting a toy she's wanted for a couple of weeks.)

I don't feel very good about how this went down.  In general, it makes me very uneasy to "force" a particular food on someone.  I'm not willing to be a short order cook, for sure - we let her choose one of two or three options, typically, so that she'll eat something, but if she doesn't want it, she can choose to eat it or not eat it. There are no other options until the next meal or snacktime.  But I don't feel the need to "exert my authoritay" on her, certainly not on something this inconsequential.  But age 3 is a bit...difficult.

We got into the power struggle, and couldn't get out.  I was tired having barely slept last night (thank you heartburn and snoring).  She was tired from her messed up sleep schedule for 2 weeks, despite our best efforts to get her back on track.  TJ was annoyed about the spitting, my grouchiness, and the tantrum.  We found ourselves "stuck".

I'm still not sure what the right course of action would have been - maybe not even getting her to *try* the oatmeal would have preempted the spitting and tantrum.  Or perhaps this was an unavoidable train wreck given everyone's lack of sleep.

Sigh.  But like the old adage about never going to bed with unresolved issues in a relationship, I feel like we worked this out as best we could.  And tomorrow is another day.

Circling the wagons

So there's that "nesting" instinct that's supposed to kick in just as a woman gets ready to have a baby.  It's hard for me to tell if that has happened/is happening because I'm pretty project-oriented to begin with, and doing stuff like organizing my pantry is fun for me, pregnant or not.

But I will tell you what I've noticed in the past couple of weeks - I have a HUGE desire to hole up in my house and not go anywhere, not make plans, and not see anyone.  Even social media seems taxing and too busy and interactive.  Someone else mentioned this happening to them while pregnant, so I'm not alone.  I'm already an introvert to begin with, so I suspect something hormonal is enhancing those tendencies even more.

Sadly, September was a bad month to feel this way.  It's been jam-packed with appointments and errands to get ready for Baby X', BabyT's birthday, adjustment to her new preschool (though the schedule seems to definitely agree with her more), the start of her new dance class, wrapping up work before leave, and lots of family in town.  Worst is that I'm exhausted because I can't sleep well at all (thanks pregnancy-induced snoring and being planet-sized!).

But it's coming to a close now, and I have 6 days left.  I'm not working this week.  My last prenatal appointment is tomorrow, and I have to attend "Curriculum Night" at T's preschool so I can meet the other parents.  (Ok, "have to" is a strong word, but it's something I'd like to do.) 

TJ drew the line in the sand about not doing any more things from The List.  We're ready with all the important stuff.  No more stressing about hanging up coat hooks and pictures or other low-priority tasks.  I like it and it's just the "permission" I needed to let those last few things go.

Besides taking T to preschool, our calendar is blissfully empty the rest of the week.  I'm going to do a little crafting, play with my new DSLR camera, and spend a lot of time at home with my girl in our last few days of being a mama-baby duo.  (Just writing that makes me a little teary.) 

I need this quiet time to get myself together for what's going to be a difficult month up ahead.  I'm certain that the pregnancy and nursing hormones have erased the bad memories from 2009, because I remember it being "not that bad" while TJ remembers the first few weeks as "awful" as we figured out how to get by on broken sleep, nursing ickiness, and troubleshooting baby cries. 

This time we get to do it again, 3 years older, and with a little girl who needs us just as much as her new baby sister will.  We are lucky to have people around offering help, but most of my worries are about the things that other people just can't do - helping BabyT feel secure about her place in our family while also bonding and learning about new Baby X'.  I'm not too concerned about what we're going to eat or getting T to the places she needs to be - with two adults at home, that should be a little easier.

So if you email or call or text us and we don't reply, it's because we're in the bunker waiting for the Armageddon.  No wait, that's not right.  But we are focusing inward this week (and of course the next few weeks).   Please leave a message after the beep and we'll get back to you when we are ready.

BEEP.