Crabby Apple Seed

Eat Something New Already

2012-02-12T20:56:00.000-06:00

As an infant/toddler, Gracie was seriously the most amazing eater you have ever seen in your life. Child ate 95% of what was put in front of her. The 5% included meat and ravioli/pierogis/any smooth pasta like that. As she approached three, that list got narrower and narrower- she still eats fruits and vegetables, so we're ahead of the game as it typically goes with kids her age, but her acceptable entree list has grown shorter and shorter with each passing day. Katie is a bit pickier than her sister, and of course, her favorites are ravioli and anything involving meat. It's become a challenge to make dinner, to say the least. And? Really? I refuse to fall into a rut where they eat spaghetti and meatballs or mac and cheese every single freaking night of their lives.

So I went looking for recipes and I found this. And although it seemed inocuous enough, I needed to choose a day when Gracie ate a big lunch, in case she fully rejected it (since it would defeat the purpose entirely if I gave her the same old bean and cheese quesadilla if she refused it.) I didn't follow the recipe exactly, because I am allergic to following recipes. Also because i wanted to use what I had in the house.

I used chickpeas instead of black beans, 1/2 tsp chili powder instead of cayenne, 1/4 tsp of cumin because too much bothers me (it totally smells like B.O., and I can't be convinced otherwise), and just kind of shook oregano over it til it looked about right to me. I also just added whatever corn I had in the house, which wasn't very much.

I just kind of scooped some cooked brown basmati rice in until it looked right to me. The pics in the recipe looked rice-y for us, so I think I used less than two cups.

I had cheddar cheese in the house, so that is what I used. I don't really know how much I used, just enough to make a thin layer on top. She says, at one point in the recipe, to mix everything together, but her pictures pretty clearly look like the cheese is just on top, so that is what I did.

I started cooking dinner too late tonight, so I definitely did not leave it in the oven for a full thirty minutes. I just left it there til the cheese was all melted. I prefer my cheese more bubbly, and would cook it longer next time.

I did let it rest for the full ten minutes- anyone reading this probably knows this, but just in case, you have to rest casseroles just like you rest meat, or they'll just be a runny, disgusting mess.

It was extremely easy and fast- I made it while Grace ran in and out of the kitchen and Katie whined and clung to my leg because she woke up from her nap too early. The whole time I was cooking it, I kept showing it to Gracie and stressing that it was full of delicious things that she really likes. She kept talking about it being new cheesy beans- her name for the bean and cheese quesadillas she would eat for every meal if we let her.

And then she ate it!

Well. Mostly, she ate the cheesy topping. But she ate everything that was stuck to it and picked out a lot of the chickpeas, too.

Katie ate hers, too. WITH GUSTO.

And Stephen and I ate ours, too (not pictured.) I added salt and hot sauce to mine, because it was definitely a little bland (the recipe suggests adding meat, which I did not do so I could eat it too, and I probably went easier on the spices than I needed to.) And bonus points: it was something new! With new flavors and textures! And there were actual vegetables involved!

It was a win. We'll make it again.

THIS IS NOT NORMAL.

2012-02-11T13:57:00.000-06:00

So I was sitting at my desk yesterday, minding my own business and generally being an angel of mercy, when suddenly, it washed over me: I. Was. SICK.

I collapsed on the floor for awhile, and when the waves of nausea finally passed enough for me to be ambulatory, I drove home. Once I got here, I perked up a little bit, and thought, oh, okay, I just ate something funny.

BUT NO.

We got the girls to bed and I am not going to go into any details, but let me assure you, it was EPIC. I got back on the couch, teeth chattering, for awhile, before I remembered I still had leftover zofran from when I was pregnant with Katie, choked down a tab, and went to bed.

About an hour later, I heard Katie screaming. I mean, of COURSE she was. She is the worst sleeper ever and she will be waking up and asking her college roommate to call me so she can nurse. A few days ago, I decided I would not be nursing her at ALL overnight anymore, because we are weaning (WE ARE) and she absolutely does not need to nurse and it is time for us to figure out other ways to soothe this kid back to sleep. But you know, I was exhausted and racked with nausea and the thought of listening to her scream on and off for the hour and a half it would take her to get back to sleep just crushed me. So I went and nursed her. And I knew it was a mistake, but I did it.

...So I wasn't remotely surprised when I heard her crying again at 3:15. What did shock me was the nature of her crying. Because it wasn't the "I woke up and I'm lonely and also would like some boob" cry, it was the "I woke up and am ready to start the day so please come fetch me" cry. I ignored her for an hour, during which time she cried and stopped and cried and stopped but cleeearly was not going to be going back to sleep. And so she got her way and I fetched her and brought her downstairs. Stephen followed close behind me and sent me back to bed for a few hours.

What kid wakes up at 3:15 for the day when you haven't reset your clocks? MY KID, that's who.

so then? THEN??? THEN????

She did not nap until 9am. And woke up screaming the minute I put her down. She cried for maybe five minutes and fell asleep. For half an hour. When she woke up. Wide awake.

Of course. I mean, seriously, what baby needs more than nine hours of sleep?

Fast forward to 1pm (yes, ONE PM, she is still going strong), we are taking Gracie up for her nap, and Katie is still wide awake. A few minutes later, she rubs one eye and I decide we are DONE. Diaper change, nurse, she's out cold. Until she wakes up the second I unlatch her. But you know what? NO. She is a year old and there is no reason for me to be nursing this kid through an entire frigging nap. So I put her down.

And forty minutes later, she is still screaming bloody murder.

And look. I get that "sleeping like a baby" is the stupidest, most bullshit statement anyone ever cliched, but SERIOUSLY WHAT THE F*#((???

I guess I'll just need to make sure I'm in her roommate's speed dial.

SHENANIGANS.

2012-02-06T07:44:00.000-06:00

Katie's fevers have broken and a rash has appeared, so she appears to be on the mend (and I am once again fooled by benign ear fluid OH HOW SHOCKING.) Last night's sleep was marginally better than the rest of the weekend, with only two night wakings. The first time she woke up, I must have been really sound asleep, because when I fully woke up, she was screaming bloody murder. I staggered down the hall and walked into her room, where I found her standing in her crib.

With one leg up.

As if to climb out.

OH HELL MOTHERLOVIN' NO.

Among the list of many troubling behaviors that never entered Gracie's mind is climbing out of the crib. Child never attempted it once in the two years she spent in her crib. She would march back and forth, waving her blanket around, drinking water, reading books, occasionally sleeping, but she never, ever tried to climb out.

Of course- OF COURSE- the child who I have woefully slacked on sleep training, is the one who thinks, I shall set myself free from this infant Bastille and go find my mother and also her bewbs.

Viva La Sleep Deprivation. Or something. I'm too tired to think of a clever way to end this.

Siiiick

2012-02-04T20:14:00.000-06:00

Poor K-Mae.

This kid has seriously spent 2/3 of our (totally mild! extremely pleasant!) winter with one virus or another. And again, this week, she is fighting the crud, complete with scorching fevers.

Grace, being the oldest, was never sick at this age. But on the very rare occasions when she was, you would never guess it. I can't tell you how many times I scooped her up and realized, once my hands were firmly in her armpits, that she had a raging fever. She was eating, playing, acting like Grace, never missing a beat. Katie? Well, just as she's been since before she was born, is a complete and total drama queen. We should have named her Camille, the way this kid acts when she's sick. She cries and moans and refuses to eat and hurls herself on the floor and stays up all night and is not sure, but thinks it's entirely possible she needs to be hospitalized. Perhaps in the ICU. This kid, I am TELLING you.

...and of course, as soon as I had all of those thoughts, I decided to take a second look in her ears, since she keeps getting these damn fevers. And, so, yeah- you DO know her left ear looks crappy to me, right? Mind you, there is a junkload of wax in there, and it's possible it's just benign fluid (I never have been good at telling the difference between that and an actual otitis, and I am pretty sure nobody else can tell either, they just like to mess with me and say the opposite of whatever I guess), but if she has an actual ear infection, she trumps Gracie right there, who has never, ever had one. BUT! Still! Katie's been sick plenty of times that did not involve ear infections and she acted just like this so don't think I'm mean because I'm not.

Yes I am. But this is not an example of that.

Countdown

2012-01-26T14:23:00.000-06:00

I have a baby for one more month. After that: Toddler City.

And, you know, time flies blah blah blah...but what really made me realize how fast time has gone by? I was saying I got pregnant with Grace nearly four years ago, and I thought, that can't be right, I was just blogging about that the other day...NOPE. Almost a year ago.

Anyway: KATIE.

She no longer requires the assistance of this friendly lion to walk all over the house. She is juuuust beyond the Frankenstein stage, now she's more at the stage where it looks like the floor is sticky. You know what I mean? When they kind of haltingly pick up their feet? Like that.

She loves getting into things. She's doing a lot more imitative play lately, which is really awesome. She tries to brush her hair, and today, when she saw me dusting her changing table with a diaper wipe (they do an excellent job, in case you're wondering. of course, her changing table is particle board, if you have actual wood with an actual finish, your mileage may vary), shetook one out of the box, and proceeded to do the same. It still shocks me when she does it, because wtf, she thinks she's people!

She does not enjoy the snow. That's my girl. Gracie will win her over to the dark side soon, I think, because of all the things Katie loves, she loves her sister the most of all.

Although probably this is a really close second:

One more month. The countdown starts!

Trouble: A Play in Pictures

2012-01-24T20:49:00.000-06:00

well, well, well. what have we here?

It would appear to be CHOCOLATE.

Lemme just take this now...


Hey! Uh...little help here?

Make it worth my while, and we'll talk. For now? I don't know you. Walk two feet behind me at all times.

Kryptonite

2012-01-22T21:18:00.001-06:00

Lately, G has taken to asking me, "Mama? You wanna color wif me?" and "Mama? You wanna pway stickers wif me?" and last but definitely not least, "Mama? You wanna dance wif me?"

And I could be in the middle of, like, performing coronary bypass surgery, and I would have to drop it all immediately and color, play stickers, or dance.

(right here, there should be a video of Grace singing and dancing along to Cinderella, but of course, tonight she SENSED she was being recorded and instead ran laps around the first floor of the house.)

Anxiety Level...Rising

2012-01-18T21:35:00.001-06:00

In five weeks, Katie will be a year old. Of course, I am shocked- SHOCKED, I tell you- by this development. But I am also planning furiously, because this means I need to figure out The Great Wean.

Here's the thing: Katie is actually working herself in that direction anyway. She has gotten a lot wilder while she's nursing, popping on and off, digging her nails in, pulling, twisting, and acting generally agitated. I've been putting her to bed wide awake with good results on a pretty consistent basis for a little over a week, which is huge. She still STRONGLY needs The Bewb for her afternoon nap, but aside from that, she's become quite independent from it. This is totally, absolutely the right time for me, too. I am really ready to dress myself each day in clothes that are comfortable and look nice, rather than clothes that offer ready access to my sprout (EDITED: ha ha ha, that should say access FOR my sprout. the way I wrote it sounds like a really gross euphemism for my chestal region, and EW. No.) I am sick to DEATH of pumping. I am so ready to be done.

So if all of that is true, why do I get a sick knot in my stomach each time I think of it?

Weaning Grace was a really, really unpleasant experience. I did it way too quickly, and the way my hormones bottomed out was so, so ugly. Again, for the eight millionth time, I had no idea, though I should have guessed, that the hormones would be so brutal. It was like being postpartum all over again. I know now that I cannot expect to wean Katie as quickly as I weaned Gracie- or, I guess, I CAN, but it's a really stupid idea. I ALSO know that, once the whole process was complete, I was so happy and relieved. The first time I went to work sans pump, I practically skipped to the car. I stopped stressing so profoundly about every second that I was away from her. It was like a switch flipped, and I went from "ohhhh nooooes, what shall I DOOOO about Teh Weeeeaning??" to "YES. AWESOME." But nonetheless, anxiety was the main hormonal side effect of my Supah Fast Rapid Wean, so the mini-anxiety I get when I think about the process is probably related.

I also stress quite a bit about how I will handle afternoon naps- as I may or may not have confessed, Katie frequently spends the second half of her afternoon nap, wrapped in my arms, nursing herself in and out of sleep. I know. I KNOW!!! But people, I am so frigging tired. And she sleeps that way, at the same time her sister sleeps. How can I refuse that? I'm not made of steel, I'M A REAL LIVE GIRL. I'ma needa figure this out. I have absolutely no idea what I am going to do. Besides die of exhaustion and/or fatigue-induced stupidity.

Five weeks. I have five weeks to figure this out.

Why I hate going to the optometrist

2012-01-13T16:46:00.000-06:00

Reason the first:

Getting my eyes dilated. UCH. Hate. Especially because at this particular visit, he dilated my eyes, then sent me out to the front room to pick out new glasses. Thanks dude, great timing. I can't see a farking thing, what a fantastic time to choose an accessory that will be ON MY FACE for probably three years. Which is another issue, I always always always get buyer's remorse, because I am, in fact, going to wear them for three years, so what if I hate them???? I remember when I was a junior in high school, I decided to be a little risky, and got these plastic frames that were in kind of a lighter tortoiseshell color/pattern, thinking they would be fun and, maybe? A little funky? Or something? Spoiler alert: I looked horrible. Like the world's BIGGEST DORK. And since I was a junior in high school, I couldn't afford to just go back and get a different pair. Of course, this purchase coincided with the point in my life when my eyes got bad enough that I had to wear my glasses all the time, and since the change had just happened, I did not yet have contacts. Epic fail. Which is part of my next point.

Reason the Second:

The PRESSURE. Because eventually? 1 and 2, or 2 and 3, are going to look so similar, it is not so much that it's hard to tell if there's a difference or not, but that there IS a difference, and somehow it is hard to tell which is better. And it's always a miniscule difference, but it's THERE. And you just know you're going to make the wrong choice. And that is always confirmed when they look at your records and oh-so-casually say, "oh, yeah, just a very minor change in the prescription." And it's usually going from, like, -4.50 to -4.25, and SERIOUSLY? You can't just leave my prescription alone? When I have zero visual complaints and I am only here because you make me come here to get new contacts? This is bothersome because, as I mentioned, I remain convinced that I have made the wrong choice and, in fact, my prior prescription was the right one, and this new one is just completely all wrong, but also because...

Reason the Third:

Getting used to a new prescription SUCKS. It's like that favorite pair of pajamas you have, the nicely worn-in soft ones, that you wear every time they're clean? Like someone taking them away, handing you a brand-new pair of jeans- and not just any jeans, but really cheap, stiff, scratchy jeans- and being all, "What? These are actually BETTER. They will keep you WARMER!" and you're all, fuck that, I felt perfectly FINE in my threadbare flannel, give me back my jammies!!!! But they will not. And you must break in the new jeans, so to speak, and spend the day feeling slightly queasy and unsteady, and blinking forcefully, as if something tiny has floated into your eye and you can make everything better if you just squeeze your eyes shut hard enough. BUT YOU CAN'T.

I also need to get myself to the dentist. And I hope you don't need me to tell you why I hate THAT.

To Sleep, Perchance to Not Be Aphasic

2012-01-09T21:52:00.000-06:00

I have this theory that kids are all either eaters or sleepers.

My girls loooove to eat.

*sigh*

Gracie had some weird and frustrating sleep quirks that I thought we'd managed to avoid with Katie. G used to wake up at 2am and stay awake for hoooours. Katie didn't do that. G started waking up at 4:30 when she was something like five or six months old. Katie didn't do that. So even though her naps were rotten and she woke up a ton overnight, I tried to look at the positive side. Then, of course, Katie started staying awake for hours in the middle of the night and waking up every day before 5am. I mean, of COURSE she did. Except, unlike Gracie, who had the decency to go to bed at 6pm every day, I'm lucky if I have Katie asleep by 7:30. And I can't go back to bed at 9am when she takes her nap.

I thought I had an ace in the hole with this- we took away Gracie's morning nap, et voila, sleeping til 6am. like MAGIC. And just last weekend, Katie was suddenly sleeping til 6:30 or 7 and not requiring a morning nap. Score! Aaaand then she stopped. Started waking at 4am. But ALSO, because she was used to not taking a nap, she also refused to take a morning nap! And so has really been a joy to be around. Right now, her sleep schedule is roughly as follows: wake up before 5am. Refuse to take a morning nap, but get really crabby. Pass out in the car on the way to/from running errands. Going down for afternoon nap around 1:30. Sleep an hour, wake up screaming, demanding bewb. Get bewb. Nap on couch another hour with mom. Stay awake until at least 7:30. Wake at least once. Wake again at 4 or 4:30. And so on.

We have tried putting her down earlier. We have tried waiting until she acts really tired. We have tried CIO. None of it works. Earlier and later bedtimes have no effect on her, one way or another. CIO is no match for her, the kid is STUBBORN. She will scream and scream and scream and screeeeeam, and after an hour, is still standing in her bed, shrieking her brains out.

I got nothin' else. My kids just do not need a lot of sleep, that is an undeniable fact, but I DO know Katie needs more than she is getting. But short of, like, voodoo dolls or soaking her cheerios in benadryl, I am pretty sure there's nothing I can do to enforce that.

On the plus side, I get to remain totally smug about having kids that eat their vegetables.

Now it's MADE OF AWESOME

2012-01-05T22:42:00.000-06:00

I used to totally hate my birthday. It sucks being born two weeks before Christmas. It was seriously my number one reason for wanting Grace to be born early.

but THEN?! Everyone started posting the videos for the number one song from the week they were born on Facebook, and now I know better. Oh yes. I know better.

Just Keep Some Pants on the Kid

2012-01-01T14:46:00.000-06:00

This morning, we were all sitting around/playing in our pajamas, when Gracie slammed her knees together and said, "mama? I pee in my pants..." and hobbled to the bathroom. We took her pajama pants off, and I thought to myself, I should go get her some pants or a tutu* or something...but laziness won out, and I figured, we're gonna take a shower soon anyway, and she's perfectly happy, so whatever.

She and Katie were goofing around when Katie suddenly started laughing hysterically. I looked more closely, and realized that Katie was sitting up on the trampoline, with her face smashed against the mesh, while Gracie was lying underneath it shrieking, "PEEKY-BOO!!!! PEEKY-BOO!!"

omfg. My head exploded a little bit from the cuteness.

I ran and got the camera and dashed back into the room, where I realized that there was no way to capture it without also capturing Grace's dupa.

CURSE YOU, LAZINESS.

*tutus = potty-training MAGIC. don't ask me WHY so many kids are incapable of staying dry if there is a stitch of clothing on their butts, but the tutu lets them be nakey while also decent AND they love them, so they don't want to get pee on them. Gracie is currently the proud owner of five tutus. Yes, five. I GIVE YOU THIS ADVICE FOR FREE.

Amateur Night

2011-12-31T21:14:00.000-06:00

I have not really liked New Year's Eve for awhile now. In fact, I got so sick of scrambling to find a party that I stopped celebrating before I even met Stephen. It was the year I turned thirty, and I was working really hard to be happy just being SINGLE and just ENJOY MY LIFE. As part of that? I was not going to spend $100 to go to a bar and drink watery beer and stand around wishing I had a place to sit or put my jacket. So I stayed in that night, made pizza, ate half a gallon of ice cream, watched a marathon about illegal drugs on the History channel, and went to bed early.

It. Was. AWESOME. You do not even know. (unless you've also done it, in which case, wasn't it AWESOME????)

So, even though I have plenty of things on my list of Stuff I Miss Since I Had Kids, New Year's Eve is soooo not one of them.

Instead, I go out to dinner with another cop's wife and all our kids (and this year, the husbands were able to join us!), come home, put on my pajamas, and sit on the couch with the tv and the internet and an early bedtime. I could joke about my glamorous lifestyle, but I also secretly know that it's a damn good way to spend an evening.

So long, 2011. You were a real asshole to a lot of people, but you were pretty good to me.

Geriatric Baby

2011-12-25T20:57:00.001-06:00

Look at this gorgeous girl.

Guess what? SHE NEVER SLEEPS OMFG. She USED to sleep, she was even sleeping through the night! Routinely! Her naps sucked eggs, and that is annoying, to be sure, but nothing new. I have PRACTICE with this, I know what to do! And then she got the Virus That Ate Cleveland, and as soon as she lost the boogery coating on her nose (sorry, gross, I know, but it was really impressive), she finally, finally, finally started to get her two bottom teeth. And so she wakes up before 5am every day and barely naps at all and anyway, even if she DID take good naps, it's been so dang busy around here I couldn't take advantage of it anyway. Today she woke up from her afternoon nap after just an hour (after waking at 4:45 and taking a twenty minute morning nap). I knew she needed to sleep, but I couldn't nap with her on the couch today because we had Christmas celebrations to attend, so I sat with her in the glider while she napped with her favorite pacifier (moi). I passed out cold sitting upright in the glider with my mouth hanging open. It was really hott. Anyway. No sleep.

But teeth! FINALLY! Way to go, baby.

There was also the matter of Baby's First Christmas, which was as impressive to her as it ever is to any baby. Her sister had fun, though, and I had fun dressing them in matching pajamas and feeding them too much candy.

We only have two months left with a Baby, before she becomes a Toddler. And I could go on and on about "ZOMG WHERE DOES THE TIME GO", but I think that all goes without saying. On the plus side: only two more months of pumping! Because seriously, sooo sick of feeling like a dairy cow. On the minus side: weaning is going to be a seeeerious bitch. I had a hard enough time the last time I weaned a baby (seriously, wtf, , why does nobody talk about weaning hormones? holy suck, they are HORRIBLE and nobody warns you! at all! so you feel like you're probably going crazy but you're totally not it's just the world's biggest SECRET that they let you find out all on your own!), but this baby? I cannot possibly explain to you clearly enough how much she loves the bewbs. And before you even tell me I don't have to wean at a year, I do know that people don't have to wean at a year. However, *I* have to wean at a year. So. It is going to be difficult and sucky and within a five minute span, I rapidly cycle between being TOTALLY THRILLED to have my body entirely to myself a little bit and TOTALLY ANXIOUS about how much the whole process is going to suck eggs.

This had fail written all over it.

2011-12-23T22:21:00.000-06:00

Sometimes, I do things because I think I want to, even though, if I really thought about it, I would know that I actually did not. Some other times, I do things that I KNOW I do not want to do, but I feel obligated to do because I'm worried I'll regret it if I do NOT.

Going to the mall to see Santa less than a week before Christmas with a three year old and a baby? That would be the latter. Especially after last year, which I apparently didn't blog about! When I risked a car nap to drive to the mall, only to find a totally creepy, silent Santa, and a douchebag photographer who was so busy talking to his friend, he never took ANY picture at ALL. (I ended up getting the Gabs an egg roll and apple juice for lunch in the food court, so she was just fine with the way things turned out, but me, not so much).

So yeah, this year I was not so excited. Gracie is old enough to understand Santa, though, and I just felt like I would regret it if I didn't have that picture so FINE, I'll go I'll go I'll go. Maureen told me there was a really great-looking Santa with no wait at this mall, so FINE.

The thing is, that mall has the worst, most obnoxious, stupidly engineered parking lot EVER. So when I pulled in and could barely even make it to a parking spot, I was nervous. When I finally parked and saw the hordes of people walking in to the mall, I started sending out whiny texts about how much it was going to suck. When I had to strap Katie to my chest and push Gracie the length of the mall in a crappy umbrella stroller, I was DONE.

So. I mean. SOMETIMES I'm wrong.

Sisters

2011-12-15T21:34:00.002-06:00

grown-up birthdays

2011-12-12T14:55:00.000-06:00

Inititally I used the word adult in the title here, but that made it sound way too p0rn-y, so I changed it. Anyway.

Stephen and I were talking yesterday, about how birthdays when you're a grown-up don't have that same "special day" feeling they do when you're younger, and how much that stinks. All day yesterday, I kept forgetting it was even my birthday at all.

It was, however, all worth it when Stephen stuck a candle in a cupcake and he and Gracie sang happy birthday to me. Gracie isn't big on singing happy birthday to other people, and kind of tends to lose her mind when it happens, so it was really cool to have her sing to me. Also? She pronounces it birpday. Which, if you're me, means she's singing Happy Burp-day to you, which is pretty freaking awesome.

Three

2011-12-08T22:23:00.000-06:00

I know this is where I'm supposed to weep and gnash my teeth and ask where the last three years have gone.

But...sorry. Three seems totally, totally right.

She looks like a three-year-old, right? And she really acts like one, which is awesome and infuriating and hilarious and have I mentioned potty training lately? Yeah, well, let's just keep not mentioning that business.

Not to beat a dead horse here, but I'm pretty sure she's the world's awesomest big sister.

She loves to match colors (and has to announce it to you- "See? It's a match!") She walks up the stairs one at a time, instead of putting both feet on each step at the same time. She is starting to fight me on napping (we are not even going to discuss this right now. Carry on nothing to see here lalaLALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU.) She is not the eater she used to be, but as three year olds go, she's a freaking gourmand. At the very least, I have no worries about her developing scurvy, which puts her ahead of most of her peers.

And, like I said, I feel like I'm supposed to be shocked that she's old enough to operate a remote control car (and serve as a human tunnel for it to drive through), but, I don't know. It seems exactly right.

*******

This song was on an LL Bean commercial that seemed to be running on continuous loop the whole month of December 2008. I think it must have played a lot in the evenings, when she was screaming a lot and I *swear* I was doing some kind of freaky post-partum sundowning (well, except substitute anxiety/borderline panic for confusion), because after awhile, that commercial would come on and I would instantly taste bile. After awhile though, it started to remind me of the (admittedly rare) good moments in those early days. And after that, it just reminded me of becoming a mom. I listened to it a lot after Katie was born, too, which kind of cemented the association. And I try not to listen to it too often (in spite of being a really awesome sun about the suckitude of winter), because I don't ever want that association to wear off. Because now it makes me happy, in a weird way. I didn't think I would ever want to dwell on those early days, and I didn't think I would ever want to have any kind of detailed memories. But now that I really DON'T? Now that it's all fuzzy and distant? All I remember is that one day I wasn't a mom, and then the next day I was, and I got this awesome little girl as part of the deal.

Katie: A Play in One Act

2011-11-30T09:19:00.000-06:00

Katie: I've decided to give up sleep for Advent.

Her mother: You can't give up something you never really had to begin with, first of all, and secondly, you give stuff up for Lent, not Advent. Third, it's not even Advent yet.

Katie: Well then. Bet you're really regretting not taking me to church more often, every day at 4:30, aren't you?

FIN.

Well, but with less pigs' blood.

2011-11-27T19:52:00.000-06:00

You know, at the end of Carrie*, when she's killing the entire prom with her brain? And in the back of her mind, she notices that some kids are escaping, but she's so busy dropping beams on everyone else and lighting them on fire that she decides she just can't address that, and so she just lets them go?

I think that is kind of what it's like to raise two kids.**

*- I wish I hadn't read that wikipedia article. the part where he talks about the girl finally changing her outfit really, really breaks my heart. Because that girl was TRYING.

**-without the massacre, I mean. In case that isn't obvious. Like, I"m too busy keeping one kid from eating coins to worry about the other one who's unfurled an entire roll of toilet paper into the toilet, just so she can say it's plugged and use the plunger. Because nobody ever died from using a plunger***.

***- maybe they did. if they did, just...don't tell me, okay?

Nine

2011-11-25T19:56:00.001-06:00

Nine months ago today, I was rudely awakened at 4:something by a baby who wanted to get born. I left work early and when I came home, found Stephen had fallen asleep on the couch instead of going up to bed.

Today, I was rudely awakened at 4:something by a baby who wanted to get the day started. I left work early and when I came home, found Stephen had fallen asleep on the couch instead of going up to bed.

Thankfully, that is where the similarities end, because I wasn't really in the mood to spend the day having a black hole open up just beneath my belly button.

Katie: loves eating (hates veggies, loves meat and beans and fruit), doesn't particularly care for sleeping, cruises, crawls, shrieks, squeals, squirms out of her tub ring and stands up in the tub all. tubby. long., screams with rage every time she has her diaper changed (woe be unto you if there are extensive crotch/leg snaps), hates her car seat, loves her sister, never naps, always smiles.

I think we shall keep her.

I am thankful for

2011-11-24T20:58:00.001-06:00

so, so, so many things. But especially:

Running, which keeps me sane and gives me something to obsess about besides my children, keeps me healthy and makes me feel accomplished in a way that I never, ever have.

Having two steady jobs in our household, especially these days.

my December mamas, who also keep me sane, make me laugh, make me feel like part of a huge family, and always, always, always know that I am never alone.

peanut butter-chocolate chip oatmeal.

my oldest friends, who are my other pretend-family, who will always be there and always be them.

my amazing, funny, all-around kickass husband.

my hilarious, kind, brilliant older daughter.

my happy, inquisitive, sweet younger daughter.

my FAMILY, my real actual family, who have all saved our lives a million times since Gabba was born, proving that there are no small families, only small actors. Or, um, something like that.

my stupid smelly dog

dimples!

and sunshine.

Oh no she di-int.

2011-11-23T21:00:00.000-06:00

So Gracie goes to a play group every tuesday morning- just kids, no parents/babysitters. It's only an hour and a half, but gives her time with other kids her age. She really loves it, has become so much more outgoing since it started, and her speech has absolutely exploded since she started going. It's all-around awesome.

The teachers have their work cut out for them- they've got a few criers, and a few spitfires, who seemingly spend half their time in time out. So far, we've been really lucky with Gracie. She's always been fine with me leaving, and the teachers always talk about how sweet she is with the other kids. Apparently, she saves all her turdiness for home.

This week, I went to pick her up and found her playing with legos with another little boy. I mean, kind of- he had his back to her. This is important to the story. Trust me. She did not notice that I had walked in, as her back was to me. She picked up a chunk of stuck-together Duplos, and whacked the little boy in the back of the head.

SHE HIT HIM.

For no reason! wtf?!

I actually jumped and gasped a little bit. Her teacher did the same. She almost spluttered, "I...wha? Gracie!!! We don't hit! What do you say?!?!?" and Gracie cheerfully said, "Sowwy!!" I was still frozen. I could not even react. Where on earth did that even come from!?

Yeah. I still don't know. Honestly, she wasn't mad or having a fit or anything. I really think she just wanted to get his attention, or see what would happen. Something similar happened when Katie was brand-new and we were playing at the park. Suddenly she decided it would be fun to run up behind other kids and push them. It was totally mortifying, but also completely bizarre.

One of my friends joked that she's practicing for when she starts dating. Like, "HELLO, are you LISTENING TO ME?!!"

Yeah. Works for me.

The Return of the Car Nap.

2011-11-20T21:31:00.001-06:00

This is my own fault.

A few weeks ago, Gracie woke up exceptionally early. Katie was still sleeping and I was just flat-out not ready to face the day. I pulled out a trick from my mom's repertoire, asking her "Would you like to come watch tv in my bed?!?!" as if I were offering her the opportunity to color on the walls with Sharpies or eat an entire package of oreos. She, of course, leaped at the chance, and snuggled under the covers with me, quietly watching tv while I half-slept for another twenty minutes. Genius, I told myself. I am a genius. Surely there shall be no repercussions for this behavior because these things never backfire ever especially if you are me.

So of course, in a shocking and amazing development, she is now waking up every day at 5am, asking to watch tv in my bed. (oh, and did I mention I also let her use my strawberry chapstick while we watched tv? And so she also wakes up asking for red lips? Yeah, look, I never said I was smart.) Aside from the fact that there are few things I hate more than waking before 6am (I used to hate waking at 8am. let's all pause a minute and laugh and then weep.), it also means she's exhausted by 10am. And since her sister still needs a morning nap, we never leave the house before 11am. Which means...THE RETURN OF THE CAR NAP OH MY GOD SUUUUCK.

So.

This past week, we took my mom to lunch for her birthday. Both girls fell asleep on the way there, and I thought, "How odd. Of course, Gracie has a cold, surely that is why." And since she was a little bit of a troll the whole morning, I decided to just let her sleep. Of course, that meant she took no afternoon nap and if I thought she was a troll that morning I was sadly underestimating her abilities.

I figured it was an isolated incident, and so we attempted to go to Lincoln Square, about twenty minutes from our house, to pick up our packets for the Turkey Trot (and Gobble Gallop!) on saturday. Traffic was light, we didn't have anything else to do, Lincoln Square is a cute neighborhood, I had high hopes.

sigh.

We got about halfway there when I noticed the steady stream of jabbering had slowed and then disappeared. I peeked in the mirror and saw Grace with her head lolling off to one side. No. No! No no no no NOOOOO!!!!!! So I did what any rational person would do. I aborted our mission, rolled down her window, and started screaming bloody murder. You guys. Oh my god. I was screaming so freakishly, trying to wake this kid up. I mean, the full, throaty kind of screaming you do when your dog chases a squirrel into four lanes of traffic. And did I mention I rolled down the window?! I seriously cannot even imagine what people were thinking as I weaved in and out of traffic on Irving Park Road on a saturday, screaming, "WAKE UP GRACIE NO SLEEPING NO SLEEPING NO SLEEPING WAKE UP!!!"

It....didn't work. She slept all the way home. I whipped the car into the garage, opened the door, and woke her up. She started sobbing, which is pretty much what she does after a car nap, except she kept saying something, over and over.

Oh. Did I mention? I was a little nervous about how she'd act at packet pick up? And I bribed her by telling her we'd go to Starbucks for cake pops if she was good? And all she knew was that we were driving somewhere, and then we were back in the garage, and there was no cake pop? WOOPS.

So, I mean, yeah, ok. We went back out for her cake pop. But the closest Starbucks is on Irving Park Road, the same heavily-trafficked road we'd been on earlier. And it was also the only place where we could find parking, a block from Starbucks. Grace was SHOCKINGLY good, holding my hand, walking nicely up the street. When we got there, she got her cake pop and even sat nicely on a chair while I waited for my latte. And said hi to every. single. person. who walked in (and a LOT of people walked in.) Finally! Win.

By then it was gorgeous and sunny, so we went home and played in the backyard. And everyone took a nap. All's well that ends well. (even if the same damn thing happened on the way home today and now we're gonna be back on house arrest DAMNIT.)

Four Years Ago...and today

2011-11-17T20:38:00.000-06:00

Stephen and I exchanged gifts when he got home this morning. That was pretty much the extent of our celebration today, since we're celebrating over the weekend. We were standing in the dining room, spacing out, kind of leaning into each other, and just as I looked over at the girls and thought, wow, who would've thought? Stephen said, "That's what you wanted, right?" And I thought, wow. That's a little deep for 6 in the morning, and anyway, how did he know what I was thinking??? Then he said, "I mean, that's the link you sent..."

Oh. Right. The totally kick-ass running watch he gave me. THAT was what he meant. Heh.

....but for the record, he was right on both counts.

Daytime TV

2011-11-15T14:43:00.000-06:00

There's some real winner advertising on daytime tv. Mostly ads for personal injury attorneys, OTC yeast treatments, and shady insurance companies, amiright?

And I just want to know one thing: that ad for correspondence school, with Shannen Doherty? I'm wondering who they think they're fooling. Because she talks about studying on the set, and I'm pretty sure nobody actually believes she's still working. Unless she's referring to the actual commercial she's acting in when she talks about being on the set. But that seems a little too meta for Brenda Walsh.

Home Sweet Home

2011-11-14T21:25:00.000-06:00

We moved into our house three years ago yesterday. I know I've covered this before, but it's a funny anniversary.

The move was brutal. Long and grueling for a woman who was nine months pregnant and a man who had just had a huge surgery on his shoulder. Had to wedge a doctor's appointment in there, amidst all the chaos. Had to go to work the next day, bright and early, after being up all night because our bed and clothes had to be unpacked. Exhausted, hungry, frustrated, I thought I was gonna DIE.

....except ho ho ho, I had no idea how EASY that day really was. I mean, isn't it CUTE that I thought it was hard to MOVE STUFF and MISS MEALS and GO WITHOUT SLEEP ZOMG. And every year when this anniversary rolls around, I think about the three weeks we lived in this house as a family of two, and it makes me happy and sad and most mortified for being so very naive about what I was getting into. I think about standing in front of our washing machine and pre-washing all the baby clothes (after removing the eight million plastic tethers from all the carter's stuff- WHY do all their clothes have eight million plastic tethers?! wtf?! it's so annoying!) and friends coming over to help us paint and set up baby furniture and I just kind of can't believe our lives were ever, ever that easy.

And as much as this house drives me crazy, it was our daughters' first home. We became parents in this house. Grace became a big sister in this house. It's where we really became a family. So no matter what, I'll always kind of love this house, too. Even in spite of our uninvited guests.

...which is weird, because I HATE the cold

2011-11-05T21:32:00.000-05:00

I ran a 15k today. I was, um, nervous, to say the least.

This past week completely kicked my ass. Also, I had not run more than six miles since the half, two months ago. Sooo, I was not going into things in particularly good form.

My friends and I decided to drive down, rather than deal with the El, which turned out to be more stressful than I expected, when we couldn't find parking. We FINALLY managed to find parking (in a building with a view of what we called "the dead body field", because seriously, it was so desolate and creepy) and walked over to the start. It. Was. FREEEEZING. They also didn't have enough port-a-potties and they started the race twenty minutes late. Things were not off to a great start.

But then? We started running, and it felt...really, really good. I forgot to take note of what time I started, so I wasn't sure how fast I ran my first mile, but it felt reasonably fast. As the race went on, I thought, hmm, that's odd, I swear I'm running sub-10 minute miles. Surely that can't be right. I bet the clocks are wrong.

Then I missed the 7 mile marker. I just kept looking and looking and never did see it. When I finally saw the clock coming up for the 8 mile marker, all I could think was, if that is the 7-mile marker, I am in big trouble here, heh.

When I crossed the finish line, I felt like a million bucks. I wasn't sore, walking was easy, I chugged three cups of gatorade without feeling like I was going to be sick. I even had a cup of post-race hot chocolate (and I basically NEVER indulge in post-race treats, I usually feel way too rotten for that). I found my official results online and sure enough, I paced 9:35 minute miles. That is pretty slow to most people, but NOT if you're me. If you're me, that's AWESOME. That is kick. ass.

It's the weather. It was cold and crisp and PERFECT for running. I can't run in the heat. It's why I haven't been able to PR a half marathon. It only kind of makes sense, because I really, really, really hate being cold, but I also hate being hot, and when I'm running, I'm never really cold for very long. The annoying thing, though? Is that I thought to myself, I really wish there were a late fall half marathon in Chicago, THEN I could get my PR. ....Of course, there IS, and I just missed it, because sit was the weekend before Halloween.

Next year.

oh god, it's EVERYWHERE

2011-10-31T14:32:00.000-05:00

In an effort to catalog my every achievement of Maternal Awesomeness, I give you this:

The day was saturday. The time was just before 9am. Grace, Katie and I were playing in Gracie's room. Katie started to fuss, so I told Gracie I was putting her down for her nap, and asked if she wanted to keep playing in her room. Yes, she said. I told her I was closing her door so the noise wouldn't bother Katie. I settled into the glider with Katie, and of COURSE, just as her eyes got heavy, heard Gracie calling, "mama? mama! mama!" I stage-whispered, "in a minute, Gracie!!!" and as I got Katie into her crib a few minutes later, thought to myself, yes. I will leave Gracie downstairs tomorrow at naptime like always, this was a tactical error.

I had NO IDEA.

I opened the door to G's room, and....poo. EVERYWHERE. Alllll over the floor. See, because, the thing is, I FORGOT that when we put G in a bed, we put a childproof doorknob cover on the inside door knob, so she couldn't get up in the night and wander around looking for broken glass to eat or anvils to pull on top of her head. So she had to go potty and she couldn't get out of her room.

Just let that sink in for a minute, how awesome I am.

I. Felt. AWFUL. I kept saying, "I'm so sorry Gracie, I'm so sorry!!!" which then led her to mimic me and say, "sowwy, mommy!! Sowwy!" so THEN I had to keep saying, "NO Gracie, don't be sorry!!! it's okay!!!" Then she said, "Mama, ees okay, I cleaned it up!" And my eyes darted furiously around the room, and asked, "...wiiiiith what?" "The diap-air!" (God I love how she says that word.) Sure enough, we'd left an overnight dipe in her room, and she had used it to try to clean up a bit. Which you know made me feel that much worse.

Now the carpet is scrubbed clean and the childproof doorknob is off the door (we sold all our anvils) and seriously? I would prefer to not repeat that little adventure.

And on a totally unrelated note, I need Halloween to be OVER already, because I cannot seem to stop eating candy, and aside from the fact that I am pretty sure I gained back every ounce of baby weight that I FINALLY lost (but don't know for sure because I cannot bring myself to check), I have a constant ice pick headache, upset stomach, and hideous mood swings. So srsly. Why I can't just stop eating the damn candy is also beyond me, but since I CAN'T, I need the sugar out of the house.

What is this, the Ritz???

2011-10-27T22:11:00.002-05:00

"Gracie. You HAVE to put underwear on before you eat lunch."

...

"GRACIE. You don't have to wear pants, but you HAVE to wear underwear."

What? NO. just....no.

2011-10-25T21:34:00.000-05:00

Eight months????? I do not remember signing off on this.


Katie, on the other hand, is fully on board.

You guys, this kid. OMG. She is like a living, breathing ball of sunshine. She is perpetually GIDDY about life in the world.

Especially when it involves cupcakes.

She learned a few new tricks this month. She has always been crazy vocal, and FINALLY, we have consonant babbling. She loves to practice and play around with pitch and volume and she's *pretty* sure she's saying something awfully important. She's started throwing her hands in the air- but never when we ask how big she is. Instead, she raises them above her head and looks at us expectantly, like, "Um, HELLO, waving my hands here, don't you have something to say?!" And of course, the second I get the camera out, she's got her hands back in her lap like nothing ever happened. Just tonight after dinner, I noticed her clasping her hands under her chin, like a little old lady.

Oh yeah, and she did this, too:

and by "this", I mean, survived being dressed this way.

Her sleep seems to finally be getting back on track- the last few nights, she's only been up once, and she's actually learning how to take a nap, which is seriously nothing short of a miracle. I really didn't think she'd EVER learn how to do that. Of course, she'll get shots in a month and that'll all go to hell, but for now, I'll take it.

She looooves to eat, and unlike her sister, this one is an omnivore. Meatloaf, meat balls, sloppy joes, turkey and rice, you name it, she loves it.

Oh yes, also bagels.

Her most favorite thing in the world, though, is still her big sister. Grace walks into the room, and Katie's whole face lights up. When Katie is crying and fussy and mad, Gracie can *instantly* make her laugh, just by sticking out her tongue and saying, "blablablablalbalba!!!" (Um. that's not doing it justice. anyway.) The feeling is moooostly mutual- if Katie's crying, Grace will say, "Ohhh, what happen-a Katie?!" But then Katie will reach for one of her toys and it's all, "noooooo, KATIE." So, I mean, they're normal, too.

"Seriously Katie, if you wear those pants again, I WILL pretend I don't know you."

One of the games that seriously never gets old to me is the "X months ago at this very minute, ABC was happening" game. I'm pretty sure I'm alone in that, heh. ANYWAY, tonight we were all playing upstairs after tubbies, and when the clock ticked to 6:43, I said, "awww, eight months ago right now, I told my nurse I needed to push and she went to get dinner!" Seven minutes later, I tickled Katie under her chin and smiled. And maybe ten minutes after that, it was time for bed, and I was nursing her, all bundled up. And I thought, wow. Eight months ago right now, I was doing the exact same thing.

Oooh, hello, did someone say nursing?!

Happy eight months K-Mae. It just keeps getting better and better:)

Klumsy Kate

2011-10-16T21:41:00.001-05:00

I've been saying for awhile that Grace isn't particularly accurately named. The poor kid can trip on thin air. Her sister appears to be following in her footsteps.

Katie's weekend, in summary:

While scooting around on the bathroom floor, she lunged forward on her knees, headfirst, into the corner of the tile wall in the bathroom, cracking her forehead right on the browbone, leaving a red mark.

While crawling around at my parents' house, she somehow wedged herself under one of their chairs. Said chair is also a recliner, and Gracie chose that moment to open the chair, leaving a big scratch on the back of her head.

While exploring in the pull-out pantry in the kitchen, she lost her balance and slammed down, face first, onto the bottom shelf, leaving a big swollen cut smack in the middle of her philtrum. (Sorry. Her philtrum)

Considering her rapidly increasing mobility, I'm guessing we're going to have to invest in a set of football pads for her. Because just a few days ago, she got herself stuck like this:


Of course I took a picture before I rescued her. Mother of the Year!

I'm Not Above Bribery

2011-10-10T20:25:00.000-05:00

So I'm just gonna cut to the chase here: Grace totally refuses to pee anywhere other than home/Grammy's house/Grandma and Pop-Pop's house. ONE TIME, we went out to dinner and she peed three times on the potty. Then someone came in and went in the next stall and she damn near lost her mind. When the person started making noise, she shrieked, "GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!" And there has been no public bathroom utilization since.

Not for lack of trying. Ohhhh, I have tried. And you know what? She's tried too. Her teacher at the Y said that, at the second class, Grace told her she had to go potty. They got to the bathroom and Grace looked around and said, "There's no frog (frog potty)!!" and refused to go. We've made it to the bathroom at Target multiple times, only to have her completely freak and refuse to go- and I can't blame her, since the last time we were there, someone started using the hand dryer and oh my GOD, it sounded like a 747 was taking off in the bathroom.

So I've changed gears. My new goal is to have her hold it til we can get home. Sometimes, I will offer incentives to achieve this.

Whatever it takes, people. Whatever it takes.

If only I could bribe Katie to sleep, I'd be golden. Particularly since she seems to alternate between waking three times a night and waking for the day at ungodly times. She has been known to sleep until 6 or 7, waking only once, but that only happens when she forgets to wake up. And she's too little for popcorn, so I am stumped here.

Add it to the list

2011-10-01T21:50:00.000-05:00

As if it weren't bad enough when I started flagrantly disregarding allergy rules?

Today I let Katie eat tortilla chips off the floor. At someone else's house. And acknowledged she was doing it. And when my friend offered to clean them up, I rolled my eyes and said, "Nah. She's fine."

Dude. I let her eat off the floor and didn't pretend to be horrified.

(in my defense: I happen to know for a fact that the rug she was eating them off of was probably cleaner than any plate in my house. if I'd wanted chips myself, I would have happily picked up a few and eaten them, too.)

The Saga of the Toenail

2011-09-28T21:03:00.000-05:00

So.

I've had this ongoing....issue. With my toenail. For, um, years now. The fourth toenail on my left foot is...thick. And it looks like there's something underneath it. And while it never looked like any fungus I've ever seen, I couldn't imagine what else it could be. Oddly, it resolved when I was pregnant with Grace, then returned with a vengeance after she was born. Resolved a liiiitle bit when I was pregnant with Katie, again returned with a vengeance after she was born. This makes ZERO immunologic sense, as you are immunosuppressed when pregnant and then have a surge of immunity following childbirth. (This is why pregnant women always have colds.) (This is also documented by people with autoimmune disease, who typically feel fantastic while pregnant and then become extremely ill about a month to six weeks after their babies are born.) So, clearly, this is all very confounding. Also, like I said, it just didn't look like any fungus I'd ever seen. I even suspected warts for awhile (you can actually get warts under your nails), but it didn't look like that either. I was STUMPED...and rather than deal with it, I ignored it. For years, people. YEARS. Because although it bothered me, and although I greatly enjoyed the pedicures I had when I was pregnant with Grace, and sorely missed them when I had to stop, the foot shame was too great to overcome and actually make a podiatrist appointment.

Well, there was pride, and also the fact that if the podiatrist ever wanted to do anything to my feet, I was always either training for something or pregnant, so that wouldn't work. And also because everything I read about toenail fungus said that it wouldn't respond to oral meds anyway, and here, try these home remedies. Vicks vapo rub, soaking in apple cider vinegar- both of which I tried, both of which failed. THEN?! After the half marathon? Oh man. The second and fourth toenails on my right foot started looking...suspicious. CLEARLY something needed to be done.

So, my mom told me to go see her podiatrist, I made an appointment, she babysat, I went. The medical assistant who did the preliminary assessment kept asking all kinds of questions about my running habits. At first I thought she was making conversation, and felt awfully silly about halfway through when I realized she was actually taking a bit of a history. The podiatrist came in the room, took one look at my feet, and told me I have runner's toes.

RUNNER'S TOES. I spent all that time avoiding pedicures and applying various ridiculous home remedies to my toes for RUNNER'S TOES (I already told you about the fungus cures. I have not discussed the wart treatments I attempted, thinking I had one of THOSE).

Runner's toes? WELL. Apparently, toenail fungus in young people is unheard of. Thickened toenails are not the result of any fungal infection, they're the result of trauma. Whether that trauma occurs from infection, running, or something else, the thickening is just hyperkeratosis (piles upon piles of keratin getting churned out by the nailbed.) Only 50% of thick toe nails are caused by fungus, and all that fungus is seen in old people. The rest of us? RUNNER'S TOES. But, but, what about the nasty toenails people sometimes get after pedicures? I started to ask, and realized the answer as I asked the question. Ever had an aggressive pedicure? It really hurts. And it is TRAUMATIC. You do the math.

But! It turns out there's something I can do! He prescribed a keratinolytic that I can apply to the toenails which will cause them to thin out and flake off, and a new, normal nail will grown in. If it keeps happening, he said I can go up half a shoe size and get a special insert to keep my toes from knocking into the front of my shoes, preventing the trauma altogether. Yay!! Pedicures! ....Boo. Not sure if it's safe for breastfeeding. But, you know, I've been dealing with this for, like, ninety years, so I guess I can wait five more months.

And this is all kind of disgusting, I know. But? This entry? Gets like eleventy bajillion Google hits each week, and I think maybe this information would be really helpful to some runners out there, too. I'm trying to think of the right combo of key words to bring people here and let them know they probably DON'T HAVE FUNGUS. Like, runner thick toenails? Runner you don't have fungus? I dunno.

(and in case you are here trying to figure out what's wrong with your toes: I will not be posting pictures. I'm sorry. I do still have some pride, and seriously: NASTY.)

(Un)Lucky Number Seven

2011-09-25T20:06:00.000-05:00

Although you would not guess it from this picture, Katie is SICK.

Ok, maybe not SICK. But she's sick. She has her sister's totally gross cold, which means her head is filled with viscous goo. I know it doesn't sound like the worst thing in the world, but think of it this way: imagine your most favorite activity in the entire world. Is it sitting on a beach? Reading a book? Running? Sleeping? Now imagine that every time you start that activity, someone puts duct tape over your nose and mouth. Not so fun, is it? Yeah. Katie's favorite thing in the whoooole wide world is nursing. When you are suddenly an obligate mouth-breather, that makes it a bit challenging. It makes it go a bit like this "Ahhhh, heaven...nurse nurse nurse...GASP! Scream! WTF?!?!?! Ok....nurse nurse nurse....GASP!!! OH MY GOD WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME?!?!?" etc. ad infinitum.

Poor baby:( Being suffocated by your favorite past time is no way to spend a birthdate.

Current viral invaders aside, it's been a quiet month. Overnight sleep was on the mend recently (though I'm guessing that's set to change until she can breathe thru her nose again), naps are still for the birds. Food is still pretty cool, according to every part of Katie except her gut, which is still on strike in response to increased demands. Oh! But she did start crawling and sitting up pretty well independently. So I guess there's that. But you know, it's still mostly army-crawling (although she gets up on her knees and rocks furiously, trying to figure out how to propel herself on those knees), and she still falls over a lot, so let's pretend I didn't almost forget that.

oh! and after weeks of Gracie crawling into her tubby and crawling all over her, I finally got her a tub seat so they can take baths together. It is insane and hysterical and delicious to watch the two of them splash together, but I have no pictures because we just did it tonight for the first time. Instead you get a picture of Katie after another bath, wrapped in a duckie towel. Equally delicious.

Differences part I STOPPED COUNTING

2011-09-18T21:34:00.000-05:00

When we started giving Gracie solids, I was really careful. New foods, every three days. Because seriously, if you've read any medical journal in the last decade: your child WILL have a food allergy. And that food will sneak into their bed at night and smother them.

Stephen took this picture last night:

That would be soup she's eating.

Meh, whatever. Gracie is a super good eater, and I would love to have two of those. It's a lot less annoying than dealing with a picky eater. Plus, as Gracie will tell you, soup gives you muscles!

Also: although they appear to nearly be twins, they have very different eye colors. In person, you can also see Katie's hair getting lighter, and our Sorta Rican daughter is looking a bit lighter in general. Observe:

Yeah, ok, I really just wanted to post both of those pictures. Got a problem with that? You better not. Gracie will crush you.

K-K-K-Kaaatie, Sleeeepless Kaaatie

2011-09-14T20:37:00.000-05:00

People.

Katie used to sleep. For realz. She was only waking up once a night, at roughly the same time every night. It was so clearly habit, I even thought, ok, if I CARE to break this habit (which I did NOT, because I don't want her to wake up at 4:30 every day like another baby I once knew), I bet I could. Well, maybe. Katie does not, at this stage, appear to be a tension reliever, she appears to be an escalator, and so I am unsure how we will go about breaking this habit, but my POINT is that it was clearly just habit and not hunger or immature sleep. Her naps still sucked rocks, but beggars can't be choosers.

And then?!?!?!

She STOPPED.

This child of mine, with her impeccable timing, chose to stop doing this the night before the half marathon. Awesome, no? Awake every two hours. SUCK. The next night? The night AFTER the half marathon? The same. Again. (Meanwhile, next door, her father was working to get her big sister back to sleep, as she had also chosen this week to stop sleeping entirely.) (What could possibly be going on in our house? I cannot imagine...) And the next night. And the next. She did have one night when I made her fuss it out and she slept until 4:45 the next morning, but the next night she promptly resumed her dastardly ways.

I'm gonna make you wake up alllll night long as punishment for putting me in this laundry basket.

I have a few ideas about what might be up with her. She got shots last thursday, and after a few really solid nights' sleep, I can see it being rebound. I think a tooth might be breaking thru her gums- I have zero experience with difficult teethers, with Grace, it was always a shock when we saw a new white little nugget poking thru her gums, so totally nonplussed was she by the entire process.

Whatever it is, I want her to sleep again. Please. Dear God.

Half Marathon Thoughts

2011-09-11T21:08:00.000-05:00

I went in to today with mixed emotions. On the one hand, I missed a lot of training time this summer, with the hideous weather. I also tore the heck out of my feet yesterday, picking up my race packet. (who the hell thought it was a good idea to make us pick up our packets at Navy Pier on a saturday? That's like making people pick up race packets in Times Square on New Years Eve. Except more annoying.) On the other hand, my long training runs went well. Like, REALLY well. I was probably as well-prepared as I'd never been for a half marathon.

I had butterflies as I walked to the car. My feet really hurt, I was nervous about getting there and finding parking, not getting lost. I followed the traffic and got swept up in the current that was parking at the museum. I thought that was a really sweet score until I got out to walk to the start line and realized they'd entirely remapped the course since the last time I ran this race, and I was close to a mile from the start line. FAIL.

It was foggy and chilly, just like they'd said it would be. The green flag was flying, meaning weather was ideal. I felt a little lonely, being there to run by myself, but mostly I felt really happy about it, because it left me free to run at whatever pace I chose, weaving in and out of the crowds and not worrying about losing a race buddy.

It started out really well, my pace was dead-on, my breathing felt good, and although my hip was sore, it was nothing I couldn't handle. My achilles, which have both been bothering me on and off since Katie was born, felt fine.

Somewhere around mile five, I was suddenly sharing a pace with a man who was attempting to clear his throat/cough/shake out a loogie with every. goddamn. breath. I thought I was going to lose my mind. I couldn't run any faster, I didn't want to slow down, and he would not cut that shit out. Eventually he stopped...and someone on the course started playing the macarena through a loudspeaker. You cannot make this shit up.

Somewhere around mile seven, it went from warm to straight-up hot, with a glaring sun. I wanted shade. I wanted a cool breeze. I wanted to WALK. "I will not walk, I will not walk, I will not walk," I started chanting to myself. I had managed seven miles without walking pleeeenty of times and there was no reason to walk. I chugged along. My hip gradually went from a dull ache to a nagging throb. The sun was beating down with no shady spot to ease into. I passed a gatorade station and it seemed like a good idea- maybe I needed some 'lytes and my hip would feel better. I took one sip and felt my gorge rise. Woops. I dropped the cup on the ground, splattering the person next to me. I feel pretty bad about that.

I made it to mile ten before the beating sun overcame my will power to keep running. Well, that and the announcement on the loudspeaker that they were changing the flag from green to yellow- stay hydrated, it's HOT, in other words. It was all the validation I needed to work my way to the curb and start walking. I was disappointed and sad, but I just didn't have it in me to keep running. The second I started walking, I knew it was a mistake. The nagging throb in my hip escalated to a searing pain that radiated all the way down my leg. I stepped onto the grass and tried to stretch. It didn't help. I was barely able to hobble at that point, and running seemed out of the question. I tried, and it was not pretty. I walked again, and by that time, could barely put any weight on the leg at all. I decided there was just no way around it- I was not going to finish this race. I needed to find an aide station. I started to wonder if I had a stress fracture in my hip, the pain was so bad. I hobbled along, cursing the lack of aide stations in this part of the course, and stepped off again to try to stretch. No help. Started walking again. I started wondering if they'd let me call Stephen, because I knew he would worry if someone else called. Then I started thinking about the girls, waiting at the finish line. I would have to explain to Gracie why I didn't come across with everyone else. And only finishers get medals. I wouldn't have a medal to hang on her neck.

Fuck. That.

And I started running again. At first, hobbling and keeping as much of my weight as I could on my left leg, but eventually, it loosened up again and I actually felt better. I tried to tell myself that I could run a 5k under any circumstances, and I should just keep running, but I knew I was going to be walking a lot, those last three miles. My goal going into it was to make it in 2:15, but I swore I'd be okay as long as I made it under 2:30 (my real goal was to run the entire thing without walk breaks, but that ship had obviously already sailed). I had been on track for a 2:10 finish, but that chance was gone. The 2:20 pace runner came up over my right shoulder, and I thought, okay. I can be totally happy with 2:20. My new strategy was to get ahead of her, give myself a walk break, then start up again after she'd passed me.

It worked. My official finish time was 2:19:02. Although it was not what I'd hoped for, it's still a personal record. I can't decide how I feel about it. I mean, yay and all. My training went as well as it could. I can't control the weather. I couldn't stop my hip from hurting so much. And I finished! But not the way I wanted to. And sometimes I think I'm never going to get my 2:10 PR. I started running too late- if I'd started when I was 14, I could easily pull out a sub-2hour half marathon- I'm totally built to run. But I didn't, I started when I was 28, so I'm never going to be as fast as I want to be. But on the other hand? When I was training for the full marathon, I KNOW I ran 13.1 in 2:10. I know I did. I just need the right weather. I just need to be healthy. I can do it. And both perspectives annoy me, because I haven't done it yet, officially.

At the end of the day, I finished the race, in spite of some wicked pain. I got to hang the medal from Gracie's neck (special thanks to the stranger who let me borrow her cell phone to call Stephen so we could meet up after I finished) (also thanks to Michelob Ultra for their kick-ass refresher towels, washcloths soaked in lemony, cooling water, that were passed out at the end of the race). And I get to say that I have run four half marathons. And I still have a 15k coming up in November, another chance to set a personal record:)

Oh, just pee on the floor. See if I care.

2011-09-03T20:52:00.000-05:00

Sooooo, I decided I needed to stop being so damn lazy/chicken and re-attempt potty training. Grace is 100% reliable when she's nekkid, has started asking to be changed the second she's dirty, and frequently informs me when she pees (this last one is my favorite. The other day we were lying in her bed looking at books and she SO nonchalantly said, without looking away from the page, "I pee in da bed.")

We started today. She peed in the potty exactly twice- both when she was immediately out of the shower/tub. The times when she would've peed there anyway. She went all over the floor, all day long.

Oddly, she managed to drop the Browns off at the Superbowl twice. The first time, I flushed it for her, and OH MY GOD STUPID. This potty training business is just a big fat load of TMI, but omg, I stood there in a compete panic for a second, trying to figure out how to undo what I'd just done.

So anyway. We'll give it another day. If it's as bad as today, we'll have to talk about quitting again, because I really don't know how long we can last at this.

Oh, but guess what she seems to be nearly ready to do? Give up naps. OF COURSE SHE IS.

Woe.

Six Months (...and change)

2011-08-29T21:11:00.001-05:00

Yeah, so I'm almost a week late here (more on that in a minute.)

It's been HALF A YEAR since I was rudely awakened from a blissful slumber by the first signs that Katie would not, in fact, be a March baby.

Six months is, I think, my favorite age. It's when they finally start to DO stuff. They're happier and calmer, but also more interested in and excited about their surroundings.

This is a chatty kid, right here. Or maybe she's not. Grace was very quiet and thoughtful at this stage, watching everything you did, serious as a heart attack. Katie is jabbering constantly, sometimes quietly, sometimes yelling, but always chattering away. It's completely hilarious.

She's getting super strong. She pushes all the way up on her arms, rocks on her hands and knees, and is never, ever in the same spot where you put her down.

She likes to eat well enough, but it reeeally pisses her off if you do the feeding. She's quite vexed by the digestive changes that food hath wrought.

She looooves her tubby. She's really close to being ready for joint tubbies with her sister- though Grace begs to differ on the "really close" point, and has started climbing in with her every night. It's all fun and games til Katie has the gall to reposition, at which point it turns from, "ohhhh, Katie!!!" to "NO KATIE STOP DAT." *sigh*

And look, I don't want to jinx anything, but it's possible she's figuring out how to sleep. She likes to stay up late and wake up early, which is some bullsnitch, but she usually only wakes up once, maybe twice. Her naps stink like yogurt that's been left in the sun, but you know, you can't win 'em all and a six month old who only wakes up once overnight? Yes, I will take that.

And it might just be me, but I think that she might possibly kind of look a little bit like her sister.

HAHAHA, good night, I am so tired I almost forgot my "more on that in a minute" point, and it actually directly relates to the picture right above this one.

I spend a lot of time feeling bad for Katie, because everything Gracie does is being done for the first time. It seems like she gets the shaft. But then I spend a lot of time feeling bad for Gracie, because Katie ha a much more relaxed, laidback mother, who's not constantly freaking out about every little thing. Someone said to me, just today, "First children are lucky because they have their parents' constant attention. Second children are lucky because they don't." Yep. That. Exactly.

Life is sweet. What more is there to say?

It's an ANALOGY.

2011-08-24T14:49:00.000-05:00

Running the marathon is one of my absolute proudest accomplishments. I still kind of can't believe I even did it. I never, ever thought I could do something like that, I thought it was something other, more athletic, dedicated people could do. I wasn't tough enough, I lacked the concentration, I started running too late in life...but then I did it! I actually did it! And it was so amazing.

I felt incredibly proud. That pride didn't mean I looked down on other people who did not run marathons, that I thought less of people who didn't ever want to run a marathon, that there was anything wrong with not running marathons or that I thought anyone could run a marathon if only they tried hard enough. I was proud for me and it wasn't about anyone else.

(....some of you see where this is going, right?)

Katie will be six months old tomorrow. I have been back at work full-time for half of her life. And yet? I have managed to provide her with every drop of breastmilk she has required. (I can't say I've fed her exclusively since we already introduced solids, but I have been able to produce all the milk she needs. We've had a nearly-flawless breastfeeding course so far, she had a great latch right from her first moments in the world, and with the exception of a brief (albeit incredibly stressful) strike and some diva-like behavior requiring that I be standing whilst nursing, it's been uneventful. My body is also more than happy to produce milk, so even though she wasn't much of an eater for those first few weeks, we're keeping up just fine.

And you know, I'm really glad for all that. I'm very lucky in that sense, for all of those things. I know what it's like to have a baby who can't seem to latch (and really, I was even lucky then, since the lactation consultant got Grace right on, she just needed someone who knew what they were doing to show her how, rather than the broke-ass "breastfeeding counselors" we had in the hospital). I do NOT know what it's like to have supply issues, but as a working mom, I know what it's like to go several days on end watching the bottles fall ounces and ounces short of what the baby will need, leading to frantic water-chugging and calorie consumption. So yes, I'm lucky...but I also kind of resent the word lucky here, because it's a helluva lot of work. Pumping sucks ass. I have repetitive motion stress in both hands and wrists from it. I have to schedule my work day down to the nanosecond to be sure I can pump often enough to maintain a supply (not an easy task in a job where planning is nonexistent, as neurosurgical emergencies don't typically follow a schedule). I feel limited in the amount of time I can spend away from Katie, because I don't want her to need too many bottles- in the first few months, that means essentially being attached 24/7, since new babies really like to eat frequently. It means dealing with a public that still thinks of breastfeeding as somehow sexual/offensive/disgusting. (like the woman at Target who sneered at me with disgust while I nursed Katie UNDER A COVER. I glared right back bat her and defiantly raised my eyebrows. Bitch kept walking.)

So, yes. I'm lucky. But I'm also working hard at it. And I'm really, really proud of this accomplishment.

Switching Things Around

2011-08-20T20:01:00.000-05:00

SO.

Our swimming issues.

I was talking to a friend at work, who also has a daughter Grace, a few months older than my Grace. She was gloating about the fact that her daughter was finally old enough to go to classes on her own. I mentioned what was going on in our classes, and that I was thinking we should probably take a break...but also thought she might keep asking when we were going to swimming and I would regret skipping it. My friend commented that it used to be Grace's favorite thing ever, and we talked about it a little more. And then, I was AGAIN reminded that I am not always the sharpest knife in the drawer, when my friend wrinkled her nose and said, "Soooo....do you think maybe she's just bored?"

Bored? After essentially taking the same class for the last year and half of her life? What on EARTH are you talking about? How could she possibly be bored with the same songs and drills that she's been doing since she was 13 months old?

Derrrr.

We are skipping the next session of swimming. We may or may not do one more parent/tot session before starting her in big girl classes. I haven't decided yet. She has to learn how to swim, so eventually she's going to have to go back, but I'm not sure when that will happen.

I'm kind of surprised how sad I am about it. I really hated swimming. I mean, no, not as much as I hated gymnastics, which I inexplicably signed up for when I decided we weren't taking swimming (AGAIN, I did not ever say I was smart), but I really wasn't enjoying it. There were other moms I looked forward to seeing (even when they weren't giving us cute dresses;), we knew all the teachers, and it was just something we did. And now we don't. And that should be fine! But, yeah.

She's really looking forward to gymnastics, and that's what really matters. What matters even more is that she's also taking a tuesday morning playdate class all by herself. As in, no parents. As in, TEH AWESOME.

Yeah. We're gonna be alright;)

A Peek Inside My Head

2011-08-16T21:09:00.000-05:00

(in case you had any doubts about the depths of my insanity)

So, after Grace was born, the postpartum period was reeeeally rough. And honestly, not just because she was fussy and high-maintenance. The hormones were awful. I'm pretty sure I've covered this before. And I'm also pretty sure I've covered the fact that I had the exact opposite experience with Katie- I was positively euphoric. But I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned that although things got a lot better within a week or so of Grace being born, I continued to feel like a bit of a nutcase for a long time after Grace was born. Like, pretty much until Katie was born. And it's like the hormones snapped me back into being myself. Which makes me think of that Sweet Valley High Book, where Elizabeth hits her head and turns from the good girl into the BAD girl, and is TOTALLY about to give it up when she falls and hits her head again and snaps back into being the good girl, and thus her virginity is preserved.

And, see, this worries me, because I only want three kids. And what if having the third kid snaps me back into being off-kilter, and I don't have another baby to snap me back into place????

This Actually Happened.

2011-08-14T19:25:00.000-05:00

So Grace woke up horribly from her nap the other day. Stephen finally got her calmed down, and then we had the following conversation:

S: I know she's calm now, but it's not gonna be pretty when it's time for s-t-o-r-e.
me:....huh??
S: remember, I told you, I'm going to the s-t-o-r-e!
me: what?!?!?! What are you talking about with a story?!
S:...Oh my God. Seriously???

I TOLD YOU, I'M TIRED.

Incoherent and Unrelated

2011-08-12T21:30:00.000-05:00

You know how there's, like, a PERFECT amount of drunkenness for bowling? You go out with friends, play a few frames, and you're doing fine, but nothing remarkable. Then, a few beers later, suddenly everything is a strike, except the 7-10 split that you absolutely OWN. And just as you're making your plans to join the pro circuit, you drink juuuuust one more beer, and suddenly you can barely get the ball out of the gutter.

It's like that with being tired, too, I've found. I go from my usual state, to just plain tired, at which point I become clever, charming, and generally hilarious. Then I have one more bad night of sleep and the next thing I know, I'm hurtling down the expressway and it takes me a solid two minutes to remember where I'm going. Then I think, muuhhhhh.....maybe I should eat lots of food. And next I think, "Sigh. Now I am stupid AND I need new clothes."

Guess which phase I'm in now? Sigh, indeed.

Unrelated: yesterday at the produce market, I had Katie in the carrier and Gracie in the cart. Gracie was helping me put red peppers in a bag when a rather loud woman walked up to us and started blathering about how wonderful it was that I was TALKING to my children instead of being on my CELL PHONE, and on and on. And I felt really uncomfortable and kind of speechless. Because on the one hand, it doesn't matter who they are or what they are saying, when someone compliments your parenting, it's really hard to have any reaction other than bashful, aw-shucks, drink-in-the-validation. And so there was some of that. But also? Gah. PET PEEVE. Mothers are allowed to talk on the phone. I know that before Katie, when I had more of a free hand, so to speak, I actually tried to make my phone calls in the store, because Gracie was mesmerized by the bright lights and people and displays, as opposed to at home, where she needed my constant entertainment. Just because you see someone talking on their phone for the thirty seconds it takes to walk past them doesn't mean you know a thing about the way they spend their days. And although I was chatting and playing with my daughter in the store, I also let her watch too much non-educational tv on many days when we're home, and that little nugget makes it way onto my application for Mother of the Year, too.

Also on my application: Grace has been waking HORRIBLY from her naps lately. Yesterday was no exception. Shortly after she woke up, Stephen went to get her dressed for swimming. She. Lost. Her. Mind. Went insaaaaane. Stephen asked what I wanted to do, and I said we'd go anyway- she does that a lot and then rallies once we're out of the immediate situation. (this is just like the moment in the horror movie where the people go upstairs to check out the funny noise, isn't it?) So we got in the car, and yep, she was fine. Ran around the locker room once we got there, laughing and having fun. We went out to the pool, and she was acting...funny. Normally she sits right on the edge of the pool, next to me, kicks in the water, and demands that I get in the water (she knows she's not allowed in the water until I get in). Yesterday, all she wanted to do was play in the drinking fountain. The teacher bribed her into the pool with a toy, and she started jumping in, standing in the water (she's just now tall enough to "touch bommom!"and thinks it's the coolest thing ever), throwing the toy so she could swim after it, etc. And then it was circle time.

(cue ominous music)

Gracie did not want to do the circle time. She didn't want to sing the songs, she didn't want to do the motions that went along with them, all she wanted to do was scream no and cling to me like a spider monkey. I tried everything and she just kept escalating. She was obnoxious and disruptive and we just could not stay. So, we didn't. I was utterly mortified, turned ten shades of purple, and carried her out of the pool and to the shower. Continued to feel like a gigantic horse's ass the entire time we were getting showered and dressed. She was told multiple times why we were leaving, apologized, and even said to me at one point, "mama, pwease be happy. be happy, mama." Sooo, message received? I hope so, because minutes later, one of the moms we've known from previous classes came into the locker room and told us she had a present for us. I had complimented her daughters on this dress before, and she was giving it to us, since her girls had outgrown it. And that is only the second nicest thing she did, because when she heard what happened, she did my absolute favorite thing in the world: she told me a story about one of her daughter's tantrums. I mean, seriously, is there a nicer thing one mom can do for another?

I feel like this is the point where I should tie everything together, but I'm too tired. (ooh! that kind of ties it all together! Go me.)

PANTS.

2011-08-04T15:19:00.000-05:00

So, we've been battling some seriously bad sleep in our house. To anyone who's shocked: welcome to my blog! I'm glad you've stopped by. My interests include running and making babies that never sleep. To the rest of you: sorry. I know. it's so tiresome. but this one is interesting! Because it's all about how stupid I can be!

Because, see, I do This Thing, where a piece of information enters my brain, and something flickers and tells me it's significant, but I choose to dismiss it. I really think there should be a name for that phenomenon, because although my skillz are exceptional, I know everyone does this. This happens to me allll the time at work, I figure stuff out and don't say anything, and then it turns out the thought I had was right and nobody believes me because I didn't say anything. Another, less flattering example: when Grace was about seven or eight months old, she woke up in the middle of the night, at a time when she'd mostly stopped waking. I got her out of bed and it was like nursing a little chunk of asphalt. Damn, I thought, I really need to turn on the air conditioning, it's hot in here! The next day, I kept thinking, jeeeeez kid, what the heck? Stop WHINING! And then? After I'd dragged her all over kingdom come, running errands, I took one look at her sitting in the shopping cart, with red-rimmed, glassy eyes, saw her let out a big heavy sigh, and thought, "oh my SHIT, she is SICK. Mommy fail. NURSE FAIL!!!! AUGH!" And yes, she had, like, a 432 degree fever. So my point is, I'm sometimes a little slow on the uptake.

...whiiich is important to the story. Because for the last week or so, Katie developed the extremely (un)charming habit of waking upwards of six times a night, waking only a few times a night but staying awake for an hour or more (a true Gracie special), and generally sleeping horribly all-around. Which did not exactly have a positive impact on her personality. About a week ago, I scooped her and was nursing her when I thought, dang, her little legs are COLD. Here, let me just warm them up on my warm belly. And put her back to bed. Lather, rinse, repeat, ad finitum.

And then? A few evenings ago, it occurred to me: PANTS. Who the hell can sleep when they're cold? Yeah. So I put pants on the poor kid before she went to bed. She woke up twice that night. Since she slept well, her naps were also better (although that is another story for another day, right there). Was it a fluke? Nope. Next two nights, same thing.

The secret is pants.

(OK. the secret is not freezing your baby. But for a massively SIDS-paranoid person like me, I prefer to think of the secret as pants rather than warmth.)

Walt Disney Was a Sick, Sick Man.

2011-07-31T14:52:00.000-05:00

This morning on the news, they were talking about sad movies*, which of course necessitated showing some of the most gut-wrenching clips in movie history.

And you know how, when you were little, it was really sad and kind of scary when Bambi's mom died?

Yeah. Try watching it after you have kids, when he's wandering in the snow and calling for his mom, and you know she's not coming. I DEFY you to sit through that without wanting to curl up in the fetal position and vomit for awhile.

*I don't actually know the point of the story, because before they could get to it, they started showing Debra Winger saying good bye to her sons, and I had a psychotic break.

5

2011-07-25T21:41:00.000-05:00

Remember when I was pregnant, and every time I posted an update, I was all, "ZOMG, I know this will shock you, but this pregnancy is SO DIFFERENT from the first one!!" And eventually, you were all like, "yeah, DUH, you've mentioned that before"??

The new theme is "WTF, how has it been X many months already?!?!?" Because, seriously, wtf, this kid's first year is flying by at the speed of light. And I know I keep saying this, but how on EARTH has it been five months? That's almost half a year!

We had another big month around here. Katie started eating peas, along with her cereal (and her secret watermelon), which she seems to like so far. Our girls are eaters, what can I say? She's starting to tripod sit, although she still refuses to roll from her back to her tummy. She's started doing That Thing Gracie used to do with towels, blankets, random you-name-it fabrics, where she pores over them as if they hold the secrets of the universe.

She took her first trip to the beach! She did not like Lake Michigan. Maybe she shares my utter disgust with natural bodies of water? Smart girl.

She does not sleep. Ever. Well, ok, no. She does okay overnight. She wakes up two or three times, and at least once a night pulls a total Gracie and stays awake for an hour, hour and a half, like it's time to party. She will occasionally sleep past 6, which is awfully nice. She does not, however, nap. This weekend she took no naps at all, unless you count sleeping in the car or the twenty minutes on my chest (which I do not). A typical nap is half an hour long. Forty five minutes is great. An hour is unheard of anymore. But eh, we don't make babies that sleep, and once they hit toddlerhood, they generally do okay. It's more frustrating when she's crabby as a result- for the last few days, she's been so overtired, it's like having a colicky newborn all over again, with the constant walking, the screaming every time we sit down, needing to be singing and playing with her and giving her 100% of our attention. But this, too, shall pass. Right? Yeah. it's all good.

The thing is, I don't have that much to say that's terribly interesting. She's adorable and dimply and she likes to eat and play with her feet and doesn't like to sleep or play by herself and her big sister loves her like crazy and she's just awesome and even though it's only been five months, she must have always been here somehow, because I don't know what we ever did without her.

Gratuitious Gracie Shots

2011-07-20T21:21:00.000-05:00


it's the damndest thing, she covers her face and she's GONE.


Ah-PRISE!!!


"NO, Mama. I not want say cheese anymore."

CHEESE!! (just seconds after the previous picture. She's a waffler, that one.)

Rolls

2011-07-19T21:30:00.000-05:00

Check out that chub. I took that picture because, for an entire year, before and after she was born, those rolls were 100% courtesy of moi. It's kind of an amazing, crazy feeling. I just wanted photographic evidence.

Now, though, we've started oatmeal. And, I mean, just a few bites every night, so it's not like that is really packing on the pounds or anything.

She took to the spoon really well. I was so sure she wasn't ready, that we'd try once, shrug and say, okay, maybe next month. But she ate every last morsel with no tongue thrusting and only minimal loss of oaty goodness.

As you can see, she was a big fan. Soooo, we're officially on solids. For the first few weeks, it's just oats at dinnertime, and we'll ramp it up from there.

I, uh, may or may not have cheated on that....

But come on! Watermelon season doesn't last forever! And I am not made of stone. Watermelon was an even bigger hit than oatmeal. I know, you're shocked.

I Made Gwammy!!

2011-07-10T20:52:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, getting ready for naptime, I ran some of Grace's stuffed animals upstairs while she played downstairs. When I got back downstairs, she said, "I made Gwammy!!"

....huh? Gracie's speech is still frequently unintelligible, but I knew what she was saying here, and she was saying she made Grammy (excuse me, Gwammy). Since that made, um, zero sense, I just smiled and said, "Okay!!" (as I frequently do when I have no earthly idea what the kid is talking about.) (Mother of the Year!!)

She persisted in saying it, even after I'd acknowledged her, which is also not unusual, but then she grabbed me and dragged me back to the windows in the dining room. This is what I saw:

I'll be damned. She made Grammy.

Grace approaches the world at her own pace. She rarely does anything ahead of schedule. It doesn't matter, for the most part. I know it doesn't. But seeing her draw a face at 2.5 years old, even though I KNOW she was taught how to do it by her retired-teacher Grammy? I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty cool. While we were still standing there, she picked up the crayon and said, "Oop-ees, pants! onnnnne pants, twoooo pants!" and drew legs. And my head, she exploded.

Now the only issue is getting her to stop drawing on the damn windows.

It MOSTLY works, though

2011-07-02T14:05:00.000-05:00

For the most part, this is going well. It really is.

But there are still days that suck so very, very hard, that there is just flat-out no way I'm going to enjoy them. There's not a chance in hell I"ll look back on them fondly, or wish I'd enjoyed them more.

Today is one of those days. Not even for any terribly interesting or unique reasons, just because my younger child has decided that mom can sleep when she's dead, but of course, that means my youngest child is not sleeping, and let's just say she's not going to win any personality contests right about now (though she could TOTALLY win a screaming contest) and I am exhausted and worn down and I've just had it.

I'm really completely cool with wishing today away. I just wish it, you know, worked.

Ghosts and Gardens

2011-06-28T16:02:00.001-05:00

I've recently decided our house is haunted by the previous owner.

Yeah. I know. But I'm serious!

The couple who sold us this house left voluntarily, but not happily. It was just too much house for them anymore. It's not a big house, but it's over a hundred years old, and the age shows. The neighborhood is not easy for an older couple. Their son lives in the far suburbs. Etc etc. After they'd moved out, I saw the woman drive past our house. She did not park in front of our next-door neighbor and head in for a visit. She just...kept driving. It was creepy and sad. Anyhow, about a year ago, she died at the neighbor's house after a medical procedure. Around the same time, though I didn't make the connection then, I started feel incredibly, unpleasantly uneasy when I need to go in Grace's room in the middle of the night. I always expect to see someone standing in the corner. I never, ever used to feel like that. I kind of chalked it up to my overactive imagination and ridiculousness and left it at that. It's a reasonable enough explanation.

A few nights ago, Grace was crying in the middle of the night. I opened the door to her room and it was pitch black- her nightlight had been turned off. It's not unheard of for her to play with it, but she never leaves it turned off. Weird, but...okay.

Last night, Katie woke up at 2:20 and decided it was play time (my children really enjoy this particular trick. do I even need to tell you that I do not?). I was desperately tired and trying everything to get her back to sleep. I went to look for a paci, which I knew would not work, but again: desperate. I keep one on the nightstand and one in her crib. I could not find either one. Because I am nothing if not eminently rational (especially in the middle of the night), I called the previous owner a nasty name and told her that if she didn't cut that shit out, I would call a priest to expel her from the house. (This is where half of you think I'm kidding, and half of you absolutely know that I'm not.) (to the latter half: thanks for being friends with me anyway.) This morning, I found the paci on the floor in the hall, up against the baby gate, underneath a sweatshirt I'd flung over it. It is possible that Katie had grabbed it and dropped it on the way from her room to my room. But not very likely. (This is where you all roll your eyes and say, "yes, Kathy, and a ghost is soooo likely." I KNOW.) And I keep forgetting to mention this last part: I got so frustrated, I wrapped Katie up, put her in her crib, turned on the aquarium, and told her to go to sleep. I went back to bed and woke up an hour later, totally shocked- she actually fell asleep. She is entirely incapable of falling asleep on her own from a wide-awake state. PREVIOUS OWNER TOTES HELPED HER TO SLEEP.

I shared my suspicions with Stephen this morning, and he gave me the look he saves for special occasions, when I do things like crying over Susan Boyle's "Britain's Got Talent" audition, or suggesting we name our child Adele. (I still like that name, for the record.)

So anyway. I know it's unlikely. But I also know what I believe.

******

Gracie has been REALLY interested in the garden this summer. Mostly because she likes to take the hose and make mud pits in the corners, and as we've covered, she really, really loves mud. She also likes to pick flowers, which shows me what a huge tactical error it was, planting the zinnias right at the front.

Today she started calling the bigger blooms "mama fowrs" and the smaller blooms "baby fowrs", which is cute enough by itself, but when she started pushing the blooms together and making them kiss, it veered into head-exploding territory.

We planted seeds together, too. Beets and mesclun and lots of flowers. She had tons of fun, picking the right spot, covering the seeds with dirt, and "pat pat pat!"ing the dirt on top of them. Probably most of them won't do anything, due to a combination of bad timing, being planted too deep, and having the dirt packed too hard on top, but ask me if I care. She was actually really good at watering them afterwards, even shaking the hose back and forth to keep puddles from forming.

One of these days, I'll actually bring my camera outside so I can stop posting all these janky cell phone pics, but until then, behold: early onion, held by inexplicably grown-up child.

I'd say we're having a pretty good summer so far. Ghosts and all.

Potty Training vFail.0

2011-06-26T22:22:00.000-05:00

The title says it all, doesn't it?

She just wasn't ready. It seemed like she might be, and even though *I* wasn't, I felt like we needed to try. And after a few weeks of constantly reminding her to tell me when she had to go potty, changing underwear and pants, wiping pee off her legs (pee whose presence bothered her not one bit), I finally waved the white flag and dug the dipes out from under Katie's crib.

It's gonna be awhile before we try again, and it's gonna have to come from her. If I had to guess, I'd say it'll happen sometime between three and three and a half (although now that I said that, she'll be in dipes til she's twelve).

On the plus side, as a result of all of this nonsense, we have a really hilarious picture of her sitting on her potty chair, playing on her laptop. I'd post it here, but. You know. Internet sickos and all. You'll have to take my word for it, it's freaking adorable.

1/3 of a Year

2011-06-25T20:21:00.001-05:00

That's how old Katie is today. At this exact time four months ago, we were making phone calls and taking pictures and cuddling our new baby.

FOUR MONTHS AGO, PEOPLE.

Mostly, this makes me stop and ask, wtf??? But then other times, I think, only four months? When I just think, Katie is four months old, it doesn't seem possible. But when I think about her as a part of our family, I can't believe there was ever a time when she wasn't here. In a funny coincidence, we found out a year ago today that Katie was coming, and that definitely does not seem right, because THAT feels like six or seven years ago.

It was a big month for her, I think. She started playing with toys and putting them in her mouth a few weeks ago, which is AWESOME, because it significantly cuts down on the amount of time she spends screaming in the car. Just in the last few days, she's really started grabbing her feet, but they haven't made it into her mouth just yet. She rolled over once from her tummy to her back, but hasnt' repeated that. She gets waaay up on her side and will swivel around on her hips when she's lying on her back, so that she can scoot around and get into totally different positions, but hasn't made it onto her belly yet. She's started talking with her voice, instead of gurgling/cooing in the back of her throat, if that makes sense? Lots of "aaaahhhh!!! ah ah ah aaaah!" which I actually don't think I totally remember with Grace, but you know, I was totally wrecked by fatigue, so maybe I just forgot.

She's really not a big eater. We'll most likely introduce solids in the next month. I think? I am fully aware of the recommendation to wait until six months, but we introduced them for Gracie at about four and a half months and it went really well. On the other hand, Gracie was a much more vigorous eater than Katie all around, so who knows if it'll really take. Gracie was really ready at four and a half months,and if we had to decide today, I'd say Katie's not, but I guess we'll see.

Sleep is straight-up awful. Possibly worse than Grace. YEAH, I SAID IT. Our evenings are much better, she's gotten used to being put down in the crib and sleeping there in the evening. After that, all bets are off- she typically wakes at least a few times a night and is up for the day by 5 or 5:30 at the latest, with rare, beautiful exceptions. Most days, she gets really fussy and antsy at 4:30 and it's all downhill from there. I generally try everything to get her back to sleep, especially when she pulls that business at 4am, but it doesn't often work. Today she was up at 5, wouldn't take a morning nap til 9:30 (it lasted twenty minutes), took a 50 minute afternoon nap in the pack n play, and then napped maybe another hour with me on the couch. It's unpleasant. I'll just leave it at that.

I'm still trying to figure out her little personality. It's so hard to do that without comparing her to Gracie. I don't want to do that, and I also don't want to assign too much to her when she's this little, but I can't help but notice that she's snugglier and quieter, calmer but more easily overwhelmed. Afternoons are not exactly a good time for her, she gets sooo crabby and high-maintenance, and I'm not gonna lie, it's exhausting and often frustrating, but it really feels like...babyness. Not temperament. If that makes any sense.

There's so much I want to remember, and so much I'll be perfectly content to forget. Mostly, I feel like, on some level, she was always part of our family.

Oh, and also: I really, really, really might eat her.

'Tis the Season

2011-06-24T13:12:00.000-05:00

for running!

I mean, not my favorite season for it- HARDLY. But the time of year when I'm training, if I'm going to be training that year.

The marathon felt like way too tall of an order this year, especially with Katie being born later in the year than Gracie was, I had that much more of a deficit to start. So I decided to train for the half marathon, which will be my fourth, and try to get a personal best (aka PR in runner's lingo).

Official training starts this weekend. I'm using an intermediate training program, because I want to improve on previous performance but more importantly, because it makes me feel like a big, ImportantPants runner person. Like, "oh, you novices. I remember when I was like you. now if you'll excuse me, I need to go run 25-minute miles..." It starts out with a five-mile run as the long run, which is fine because I'm already doing six-mile runs. It's a little stressful to think about building distance, though, because I'm not running as consistently as I need to be. The fatigue is definitely hitting me a LOT harder this time around. That, and we're not having another summer of all 50 degree days, so I'm a little more limited on what time of day I can run (and when it's 85 degrees with 90% humidity, there's really no time of day when I'm capable of completing long distances, sadly). ALSO, there's the fact that I now have two children who need watching, so I can't just throw one in the stroller and go. We have the double jogger assembled (and by "we", I mean Stephen) (duh), and Katie is almost big enough for me to run with her, but it's rather...daunting. The stroller itself is huge and much more cumbersome than the single, Grace is really a big kid now, and their combined weight is, um, a lot. Add to that the fact that most of my running for the last year has been solo, and I'm not in any shape for running while pushing kids. Stephen has really been great about making sure I get my running time in, but it just doesn't always work out.

What I really need to do is bottle the way I feel AFTER I run, so when I'm exhausted and sprawled on the couch and want to run about as much as I want to chew on broken glass, I can remember that it always feels better to get up off the couch. And also that I will be sorely disappointed if I get a personal worst come September.

And also the feeling I have in my legs right now, all sore and weak, the kind where you actual stumble on smooth linoleum flooring because your legs are so tired? I feel that way because I haven't been running enough. Need to avoid that. Falling is embarassing.

In Which Katie is Precocious

2011-06-18T22:44:00.000-05:00

It really is impressive that she learned, within just weeks of my return to work, the joys of waking me before 5am every. single. day.

Mostly, I look at Grace and remind myself that, for a two year old, she is really a great sleeper. But when she was up last night, shrieking, from 1-1:30, that was not so easy to remember. And why did she stop taking those awesome two hour naps as soon as Katie started waking at 4:45?

And most importantly, who told my daughters the benefits of keeping me tired and stupid?

Differences

2011-06-14T14:19:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking a lot lately (for the last three and a half months, actually) about the differences between my first and second child. And when I say that, I don't mean the differences between Gracie and Katie (though they are extremely different, it's still too soon for those differences to be terribly interesting to anyone other than us). I mean, the differences between having my first and having my second.

People always say adding a second child is more than twice the work, go on and on about how overwhelming it is to have that extra baby around. I only know one person- another nurse practitioner at work that I rarely even talk to, actually- who rolled her eyes and said, "Going from zero to one was much, much harder than going from one to two." When I was pregnant with Katie and would hopefully repeat that comment, people with more than one child would snicker derisively and tell me to just wait and see.

Ok. I waited and saw. And sorry to disappoint all the smug assholes who tried to scare me, going from zero to one was eighty thousand times harder than going from one to two.

I realize part of that may have been our first child's hatred of the world in her early days. The same people made also told me that crawling and walking were when the REAL FUN began! "Ohhh, just wait! NOW it gets really hard!" And then she started moving, and Stephen and I were like, "Really? Y'all think this shit is hard? We'll show you HARD." So, there's that. But my work friend said something else that I think is really, really true- the culture shock of having your first child, for her, and for me, was so much more difficult than adding another needy little being to the crew. Going from total freedom to almost none, all that sleep to almost none- even if you have the world's easiest baby, those changes still have to hit you pretty hard. I think? I don't know. Those were really hard adjustments for me. And when Katie came along, well, I was already hardly getting any sleep and already had very little freedom, because I already had a two year old. I also knew- I mean, really KNEW- that I needed to get my hair cut and read a book and clean my house and spend an afternoon by myself before she was born, because I KNEW I wouldn't be doing those things for awhile, in a way that I couldn't have known before Grace was born.

There are other differences, too, that I think are easier the second time. Recovering from the whole process was a million times easier the second time. I thought at first there were other reasons for that- I was pregnant with Grace two weeks longer than I was pregnant with Katie, and those are two pretty unpleasant weeks. Katie was over a pound smaller than Gracie. I labored all night with Gracie and was utterly exhausted when she was born, but Katie's labor was mostly during daylight hours (well, 4am is still considered daylight after waking up at that hour for a year). But then my friend Laura went and had her second baby who was much larger than her first in the middle of the night, just as overdue as she was with her first, and still recovered faster. So there's probably something to be said for that.

The hormones didn't hit me nearly as hard the second time. The first time, I was weepy and anxious and just really completely out of my tree. The second time, I was still hormonal, but it was weird- I was completely euphoric. And yeah, I'd just had a healthy baby girl, I had plenty of reasons to be happy, but I am telling you, I was like a walking bundle of sunshine and happiness and isn't life AMAZING?!?! Which, okay, Grace was fussy from minute one, and Katie slept for the first two weeks of her life, but even the physical effects of the hormones (specifically, those disgusting soaking night sweats) were barely an issue at all this time. It was kind of amazing.

I guess it makes sense- the two pregnancies were like night and day, so it makes sense that the differences continued after the babies were born, but it never stops amazing me.

Our first weekend of potty training

2011-06-12T22:34:00.000-05:00

Or, the depths of my laziness: Come, stare into the abyss.

We had a rather inauspicious beginning on saturday, when we went into the bathroom and she tripped over the potty chair and cried for "whiiiite" (her name for bacitracin, which she insists she needs for every owie). Doh. My first misstep occurred only seconds later, when I REALLY talked up her big girl pants as I diapered her for a trip to Target (don't you judge me, this wasn't a recreational trip, it was actually extremely necessary and could not be skipped). She completely refused her dipe and insisted on the big girl pants.

You have never, ever seen me blaze through Target so fast. It's probably a STELLAR budgeting move.

The rest of the morning was a total dream, not a single accident. I did notice she was probably not going all the way, because she'd go, and then ten minutes later, be able to go again- it seemed like she was going for the marshmallow reward and not really caring if she actually stayed dry or not. Then she had like, eleventy bajillion accidents and I just...kind of gave up for the evening. I know, right?! Tooootally the wrong thing. I'm TIRED, sue me. I did use pull-ups at nap time and in the evening while friends were here, even though I don't believe in them (why bother taking them out of dipes if you're gonna put them in absorbent pants?), and told her they were special big girl naptime pants. I don't really think she noticed one way or another, because she's used to going back and forth between sposies and cloth (more on that in a sec). We had similar luck at my parents' house today, although she only had one accident (and one on-purpose because she's gonna have some issues with one particular bodily function and look, I don't mean to be obtuse or anything, I just don't wanna get gross here.) She wore a pull-up home in the car and she did pee in it, so that counts as another accident. She wouldn't go before we left and I wanted to get home and also see above re: lazy. I am just not cut out for potty training.

Her trainers have cupcakes and flowers on them, and her pull-ups have princesses, so I told her she had to be very careful to NOT pee on her cupcakes/flowers/princesses, because they did not like that. She had fun repeating that back to me, but I'm not sure she actually registered what I was saying to her.

There's this whole MYTH out there that kids who wear cloth dipes potty train earlier, and I guess I shouldn't call it a myth, because maybe it's a truth that G just deviates from (which would be typical, we ARE talking about Grace here), but yeah. There was once this bit on The Simpsons (I'm pretty sure it was the Simpsons), where they talk about midnight basketball programs, and how they're supposed to keep kids off the street but really just turned them into super strong ultra athletes who could fight that much harder. That is so totally what happened with cloth diapering and Grace- it made her utterly immune to having wet pants up against her butt. *sigh*. FAIL.

So, we'll see what happens. I've kinda lost steam on the whole thing. Which is pretty ridiculous since it's not like potty training is an overnight event. Meh. It's hard to find the motivation when it's not something I was excited about in the first place.

Two and a Half

2011-06-10T21:44:00.001-05:00

It's funny how time doesn't exactly whiz by at this stage like it does when they're tiny, and at the same time, I've been cheating and saying Grace is two and a half for probably a month now, and just realized last night as I was falling asleep that I'd missed her half birthday.

Of course she's two and a half. She has these ginormous hands and all these teeth and her hair finally seems to be growing.

There are so many things I know I'll never forget- how she prefers to be outside, especially when it involves digging and mud and messes of every kind, her deep and abiding love of junk food, and how she somehow innately knew how to be a big sister. The first few times someone asked us, with a nudge and a wink, how Grace responded to Katie, I was sort of shocked to say, "...you know? Really, really well." She hugs and kisses and plays with her, and gets VERY upset if anyone else takes her away. Once when I was loading them in the car, I broke my routine and got Katie in first- Grace grabbed the Babyhawk and asked, "Where Tatie go?!??" If I only got to choose one thing for her future (I mean, beyond her health and 200 year long lifespan, obviously), it would be that it stays that way between them. I know it will EVENTUALLY get old, but I'm strangely looking forward to the first time they plot against me. I mean, probably it won't be funny at the TIME, but come on! Sisters conspiring together! It's all fun and games til mom gets mad enough to burst a blood vessel in her eye.

Then there are a lot of other things that I'm afraid I'll forget, that I have to write down. Mostly Grace-isms, like keppich (ketchup) and lello keppich (mustard) and scawbees (strawberries) and shammich (sandwich) and nokies (milk) and baby nokies (breastmilk. my personal favorite.) and toysbox and the way she specifically asks for cold ice (as opposed to warm, I guess?) The way she'll tell us everything something is NOT lately- her shoes are pink. NOT purple. NOT brown. The way she'll exclaim, "mama! Three flags!" when we drive past a cluster of three flags, making me realize she can, in fact, count objects. The funny way she cups her hand when she gestures, instead of pointing, and the way she'll use both arms for something far away, with one arm bent and one arm straight, like she's a prize girl on The Price is Right. Her totally inexplicable obsession with Spider Man. Gah, SO many things that I'm sure I'm even forgetting now.

My dad told me a few weeks ago that she'd finally earned her homo sapien certificate, which I think was due more to the fact that she finally stopped shrieking every time he walks into the room, but he's got a point. She's really a PERSON now, instead of a baby or a toddler. I mean, she always had opinions (um. from the moment of her very first breath), but her inner life is so much clearer now than it used to be.

Next up: potty training. *sigh* I guess. Along with the total suckitude of the fall-back time change, it's one of those things you THINK is awesome before you have kids, but then you learn the real truth when you realize that you will never, ever leave the house on time again, unless you want pee all over your car.

It's okay, I'll be back.

2011-06-05T16:35:00.000-05:00

The best time to run errands is right after Katie's nap. Her limit for naps that don't occur on my body seems to be an hour, which is rarely enough. Typically, we head out and she sleeps in the carrier while we shop. Sometimes, that's plenty, and she's happy to look around and be nosy.

Today, though, she had other plans. *sigh*

I had a big long list for Target (duh) and piled the girls in the car. I could tell Katie was antsy while we were waiting at Starbucks- the line was long, and her highness does NOT like when I stand still. I hoped she'd fall asleep quickly, but instead, she just ramped it up and started screeeeaming. SCREAMING. And screamed all the way through Target. I got lots of sympathetic smiles, which was disappointing because my nerves were quite jangled and I was really hoping someone would give me a look so I'd have an excuse to go off on them. Alas, it was not to be.

I gave up on the trip about halfway through and headed to the checkout. The cashier was entirely untroubled by her screams, and took her sweeeet time ringing me up. At this point, Katie was in a full-body sweat, and the most vivid shade of fluorescent pink you can imagine. Finally, the cashier was done, and we bolted for the doors, where she proceeded to put her head down on my chest and fall asleep. Soundly. I was tempted to load what I had in the car and go back and finish my shopping trip, but I'd bought a few frozen things, so that wasn't an option. Instead, I gingerly slid her into the car seat and we came home. She's had two similar screaming episodes since then, so I'm getting a little suspicious that she's dealing with a viral invader, but I sure hope I'm wrong.

Grace, for the record, was a perfect angel through all of this. Gotta give credit where it's due.

Myths, Damn Myths, and Statistics

2011-05-31T14:29:00.000-05:00

"Breastfeeding will make you sooooooooo skinny. You can eat a whole pizza for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and you'll still disappear when you turn sideways. It's like MAGIC."

Reality:

I guess that's true for some people? But for me, it's a preview of menopause. I count every calorie and run like an escaped convict and still, I cannot lose an ounce. The same thing happened after Grace was born, but it was no big deal, because I was only up five pounds or so, and your body is so different after you have babies, I couldn't even REALLY tell. This time, I am somewhere between ten and fifteen pounds up. None of my clothes fit. I look awful. I am completely frustrated and pissed off and I swear to God, if one more person tries to perpetuate that myth about breastfeeding making a person skinny while in my presence, I will stab them in the eye with a string bean and spritz some nice lemon in it for good measure.

(also, memo to my children: I'm sure you think it's hysterical how you timed it so that one of you took an hour to fall asleep at naptime, during which time the other was out cold on my chest, waking just seconds after big sister fell asleep, but it is actually not remotely funny or charming and I would REALLY PREFER YOU NOT REPEAT THIS CRAP THANK YOU AND YOU'RE BOTH GROUNDED.)

Warning: May Be Habit Forming

2011-05-28T21:54:00.000-05:00

So, I briefly alluded to our sleep issues yesterday, but I have more to say about it. I know, you're shocked.

I just don't make easy sleepers. I've accepted that. This is an extra-mean joke from the universe, because oh my GOD, I need my sleep more than the average ten people combined. Some people can go days and days without sleep, and they're all, "Yawn, I'm tired, pass the salt." I go ONE night missing out on just a few hours, and I'm like, "oh my god my eyes are filled with sand and my skin is too small for my body and WHAT are we going to do about the ECONOMY and THE CHEESE TRIANGLES DON'T GO LIKE THAT!!!" And even though I've always known that, I REALLY learned it when Grace was born.

Hence, cosleeping with Katie.

And in the beginning, I was really not happy about it. It made me nervous and was uncomfortable and I just didn't like it. I hoped it would be short-lived. I did it because I had to.

Then I started to get into a little ritual every night. And some of you might already know this, but SRSLY: you have never known a bigger ritual person in your life. For realz. You know how Mr. Rogers walked in the door every day and changed into his sweater and changed his shoes? If you put me in a functional MRI scanner and showed that to me, the happy-calm center of my brain would light up like a frigging Christmas tree. I love me some routines. So when each evening started consisting of sitting in the bed with Katie asleep on a pillow in my lap while I read a book (and may or may not have watched TMZ), it was the beginning of the end. After that came waking in the morning with her sweet face just inches from mine, and after that, the naps with her warm little body sprawled on my chest. The next thing I knew, I was getting ready to go back to work and not only was she in the bed full-time, we also had no routine or bedtime. And really, that last part isn't really appropriate, especially since she has to wake up so early on my work days.

So we're working on it. She has a bedtime, which I suspect will get progressively earlier (and probably, she'll be a 6pm bedtime kid for awhile, which is awfully nice when your kid wakes at 5:30, but totally sucks nuggets when you work til 7.) And last night, she even slept four whole hours in her crib. But then she woke up and I scooped up her warm snuggly body and carried her right back to my bed and snuggled up to her.

So when I said you don't need to worry about forming bad habits? I still think I was right, because all those so-called experts are talking about the babies. They never really warn you about how YOU'RE going to feel. So, uh, consider yourself warned.

Three

2011-05-27T21:19:00.000-05:00

I know it's a stupid, obvious thing to say, but how on earth has it been three months?

Katie decided much earlier than Grace that the world might not be such a bad place after all. It was probably in the last month that Her Royal Highness started allowing me to put her on the play mat or in her bouncie seat. She grabs at the toys on her playmat- half the time she misses, and the other half of the time, she's so shocked to succeed that she just kinda sits there staring at it and trying to figure out how to let go.

She LOVES the Wheels on the Bus, and Patty Cake will sometimes induce such a state of rapture, she will furiously stuff both hands into her mouth, drooling and sucking furiously, like she's so happy, she doesn't even know what to do with herself.

And yay, sleep! That is where she is...totally NOT a Viking. sigh. We are learning to go in our crib for bedtime and the pack n play for naps. The pack n play usually lasts for about 45 minutes. The crib is super hit or miss, sometimes we only get 45 minutes, once we got three hours. So far, I haven't been able to put her back in the crib after her first waking. Initially, it was just because I was so tired, but now that I'm back at work, I have to admit it: I miss her. And I like the snuggling. It has to stop soon, because I'm noticing she's not sleeping as well in my bed as she used to, and being back at work, I just think she needs her own, quiet space. Naps, well....her afternoon nap usually happens on my chest. Partly because she needs the sleep and she does well there, and partly because *I* need the sleep, and she does well there.

Sometimes, too, when we're all snuggled up on the couch, with her perfectly curled up in the crook of my arm, and she starts to fuss and root and gets herself a little snack, I think about how amazing it is that we're doing the same thing moms and babies have done since we climbed out of the primordial ooze.

...Then I laugh at myself because I'm pretty sure the oozy people weren't lying on couches inside climate-controlled houses while something tivo'd off the History Channel played for background noise.

A quarter of the way to her first birthday. *sigh* She's going to be starting kindergarten in, like, a week.

An Example of My Personal Growth

2011-05-23T20:43:00.002-05:00

Today at work (*sob*), I went to the coffee shop with a gift card for my daily decaf. Because our coffee shop is a little archaic, they deduct from the card (which is actually just a square of paper, by the way) by writing the new total on the back.

Today, I had $2.29 left on my card, and my coffee was $1.99.

I handed my card to the coffee lady, who sighed heavily (as is her way) and pulled out a calculator.

And although I desperately wanted to, I did not smirk at her and say, "It's thirty cents." I just waited patiently for her to punch the numbers into the calculator.

See, it's true, having kids CHANGES a person.

Back to Life, Back to Reality

2011-05-22T14:24:00.000-05:00

Screw you, bills that need to be paid. Screw you forever.

There should be a word that describes how something can feel like it was ten million years ago, and just yesterday, all at the same time. I think back to being rudely awakened by painful contractions at 4:something in the morning, three months ago, and it seems like a year ago. And at the same time, Katie MUST be just a few weeks old. I have not been home for three months.

I hoped that, since I had so much practice leaving Grace three days a week, it would be easier this time. I was...really, really wrong. I mean, no. Well. It's not easier, it's less hard. For about a week before I went back to work after Grace was born, I would rock her to sleep and weep into her hair and whisper that I wasn't leaving her forever. There have been no such theatrics this time around, but the stress is different. I don't want to leave Katie, who is still so tiny and helpless, and also just way too small to be away from me that long, in my opinion, just like with Grace, but on top of that, Gracie has gotten used to me being home every day. We have a routine, too. Morning errands and playing, post-nap popcorn, tubby every night (and she grabs my pump from the hallway every night, chucks in the bathroom, and says, "mama make baby nokies!!!") It's all stuff we've done every day, and even though yes, I really loved it, I know she did, too, and it's stressful to think about disrupting that routine.

It'll be fine. We'll all survive.

But I don't have to like it.

But I just HAD her!!!

2011-05-20T14:20:00.003-05:00

I'm going back to work monday.

SIGH.

I've actually already been dealing with a lot of work-related stress that I can't get into here, for obvious reasons (although I always feel kind of douchey saying it that way, like I'm Heather B. Armstrong or something. But really, it doesn't matter that I only have, like, ten readers, I know, the internets are wide open and I need to be careful and blah blah blah, it still makes me feel like I have delusions of grandeur), so in some ways, it will be good to be on site, so to speak, and able to address a few things.

...but that doesn't mean I like it.

I keep saying, if/when we go for the Trifecta/aka our Caboose, I want to move to Canada or Sweden or some other civilized nation that gives a full year of maternity leave, because I just really, really hate leaving them this early. I hate leaving them, period, but I felt like the one year mark was when it stopped ripping my still-beating heart out of my chest. Obviously I'm not ACTUALLY going to do that, any more than anyone else who claims they're going to move to Canada if THAT PERSON becomes the president, but if all of those people can be all hyperbolic about it, then so can I.

Going back to work means working on sleep. We handled Katie's sleep toootally differently than Gracie's, which means that she actually has no real structure at all and I am woefully unprepared for the transition. And, look. I get it. Half the people around me think it's totally asinine that I've had her in my bed for the last three months, that she just sleeps in the carrier or on my chest whenever she sleeps (to my credit, she DOES have a morning nap in the pack n play...), and the other half will be happy to inform me that it's NOT NATURAL for babies to sleep away from their parents and I should continue to have her in my bed. Both groups can go pound sand. Maybe we DID form some awful habit, but? We also really, really enjoyed the last three months. Katie's introduction to our family was so pleasant and I have so many good memories of curling up with her each night. We've been fully functional, and oh hell, I already covered all the reasons why I think co-sleeping was just fine for us. I just don't make babies that sleep independently, and so we did what we had to do. And to the latter group, the ones who would tell me it's not natural, I say that it's also not "natural" for me to be going to work when my baby is three months old, but this is the reality we have, and we need to make it work. So enjoy your sand-pounding, I'll be over here teaching my baby to sleep in her crib.

So far, it is going...not well. I'm just starting to give her a bedtime (for the last three months, she either slept on my chest, or next to me on the Boppy in the evening), and that part is actually fine. Her best stretches in the crib typically come in the early evening. It's around 11pm when all bets are off. One night, we got three hours out of her, but most nights, it's just the jack-in-the-box routine, falling asleep in my arms, waking up as soon as I get back to bed. My cut-off point is midnight, when we get there, I just can't take it anymore, and she comes back in the bed.

We'll get there. And eventually, going to work won't feel like an occlusion of my left anterior descending artery. It'll all happen. In the meantime, UCH.

How Old Is Your Little Guy??

2011-05-17T21:19:00.003-05:00

The man asked, when she was wearing the outfit pictured here.

Three months, I told him, without correcting him.

He called his wife over and they started telling me about their grandchildren. I was cornered, between the pears and the grapefruit,so even though Grace was getting antsy, I listened to him tell me how he got ripped off at the Brookfield Zoo. His wife eventually asked, "what's his name?"

"Katie," I smiled and said.

And the best part wasn't saying it, it was watching the woman smack her husband and say, "She's wearing pink!!!" As if she hadn't been standing there talking to me and staring at Katie's pink outfit the whole time. And he just took it and laughed.

THAT is a strong marriage.

These Are The Good Old Days

2011-05-15T20:40:00.003-05:00

There is absolutely nothing in this world that will make you feel more lame than hearing a cheesy Carly Simon song on the radio and thinking, awww, yes! Totally!

But whatever, because it's true. It is really hard right now- I constantly question my decisions and I'm pulled in ten different directions every day and I cannot remember the last time I went to the bathroom by myself with the door closed, but I also know, as surely as I know Taco Bell bean burritos are sent to us from heaven, that I will look back on these as some of the happiest days of my life.

Oil Change FAIL

2011-05-11T11:58:00.006-05:00

I had big plans for today. Grace is with her Grammy, it's just me and Katie, and I have a few things to take care of before I go back to work in two weeks (SOOOB). Namely, an oil change and a stock-up trip to Costco.

We got a late start, but I figured, eh, no worries, it's just me and Katie! Cheap Oil Change Place (name of business changed to protect not the HORRIBLY GUILTY, but myself because even though everything here is utterly true, I just...yeah.) was remarkably fast, didn't try to sell me a new air filter I didn't need (FORESHADOWING!!), and I was on my way to Costco.

I stopped at Dunkin Donuts for my delicious decaf-skim-2 splenda coffee (seriously, they make the best decaf in the entire universe, and with Katie's extreme reaction to caffeine, it's been an addiction. anyway.) When I left Dunkin Donuts, I was headed towards the expressway rather than the surface road that would take me to Costco, so I figured, eh, probably faster! And I hopped on the Kennedy. I noticed a state trooper right in front of me and was glad I wasn't talking on the phone or anything (MORE FORESHADOWING!!)

Shortly after getting on the expressway, I abruptly lost acceleration. Well SHIT, I thought. Bet they screwed up my car. I stayed in the right lane and hoped to make it to the next exit. As I lost speed, it became increasingly clear I would not. I made it to the shoulder juuuust as I lost steering and all the car's warning lights came on.

I would like to say the nurse in me took over, and I calmly assessed the situation. However, there were mere inches between me and the cars whizzing by on Chicago's busiest expressway, because I wasn't actually on the shoulder, but the little space right before an entrance ramp. It was probably 90 degrees in the car. Katie was screaming. I had NO IDEA what exactly was wrong with my car. I don't have AAA. And did I mention Katie was utterly losing her mind and I could not get to her because cars were whizzing by, mere inches from my door? So the mama in me overtook the nurse in me and I promptly freaked the fuck out. I'm not gonna lie here.

Although the state trooper was several hundred feet behind me, he was busy doing SOMETHING with a truck and I knew he couldn't do anything for me at that moment. So I thought to call 911. The see-you-next-tuesday who answered the phone bitchily asked if I had called my motor club. I had no patience for such dipshitty inquiries and told her that if I HAD a motor club, I would call them. She promptly put me on hold without another word, because apparently being on the expressway in a disabled car with a screaming infant in extreme heat is not a reason to be concerned. She had, in fact, transferred me to 311 (I was going to link to them, but nobody really cares THAT much, so I"ll briefly tell you that it's Chicago's non-emergency service line.) When they finally got to my call (because remember, they're for non-emergency services, there's quite a wait time), the person was at least really helpful and reminded me I needed to call *999. Which, okay, DUH. But the, ahem, woman at 911 couldn't have told me that? I will say a nightly prayer for her that God helps her to not be such an unhelpful, hateful shrew.

So *999 tells me they've called IDOT and they're on the way, and assures me he's told them there's an infant in the car. An infant who is STILL screaming, in a car that is still a billion degrees even though all the windows are down, and I can't get to her without risking life and limb.

And I sit. For approximately fifty years. I honestly have no idea how long we sat there. Eventually, the state trooper finished with the truck and pulled up behind me. It was pretty obvious I wasn't just lounging, since I had my blinkers on and also was just sitting on the side of the expressway. And I will seriously NEVER stop kicking myself for not getting his name, because he was the nicest, most calming and helpful person I encountered in this whole mess. He suggested I try starting the car again, and when it started fine, told me he would escort me off the ramp (which was not far ahead at all) and that I would be okay to make it back to Oil Change Place of Death.

And he was right. I did make it back there alive, jumped out of the car, and furiously told Oil Change of Death employees what had happened. Pulled a screaming, sweat-soaked Katie out of the back seat and went into the waiting area, where I had to towel her off with a burpy dampened by the drinking fountain. Long story short (too late!): they had re-installed the air filter incorrectly, leaving a huge gap that allowed too much air to be pulled in. He reinstalled it correctly and drove it around the block to make sure the car was okay. I pointed out the car was fine on surface roads anyway, but whatfriggingever.

He was the manager. I did not get my money back. I will not be returning to Oil Change of Death. Their corporate headquarters will, however, be receiving a really awesomely bitchy email from me, which they will promptly delete without reading but I will feel better for having written.

We never made it to Costco. Katie is fast asleep on my chest, stripped down to her diaper, and while I doubt she is as traumatized as I am, the memory of sitting in that car with traffic flying past us, with her screaming and me unable to do a damn thing about it, is enough to keep me off the expressway for today. I'll have to get the 64-pack of toilet paper another day. Today I have bigger things to do. Like signing up for AAA and sending nasty emails.

Thwarted at every turn!

2011-05-10T20:34:00.007-05:00

Grace is a massive mudpuppy. Last summer, she basically lived in these cheap little sundresses made out of bathing suit material, because it was totally pointless to dress the kid before we went outside. Today it was unseasonably hot, but I couldn't find her darn water dresses, so we put on a t shirt and a cloth diaper and headed outside.

I had a stroke of genius as I was setting up her water table- if I add Dawn to the water, it'll be bubbly, which will be FUN, and also keep her clean!

Grace, however, had other plans.

Namely, recreating Woodstock. (the original Woodstock, not the bad one in the 90s where all hell broke loose.)

She was SO proud of herself.

You guys. She BATHED in that little mud pit of hers.

I literally hosed her off before we came inside, and she was STILL so caked in mud, I had to strip her down by the back door, bring her upstairs and put her in the tub, and then mop the kitchen floor because there were globs of mud eeeeverywhere. And the best part is, now that she's done it once, it is ALL she's gonna want to do, all summer long.

She does, however, occasionally act like a girl, too. Look, purple flowers!

Smart Girl

2011-05-07T20:30:00.003-05:00

I got double-teamed big time today. Neither girl was really especially difficult, they just managed to time allll their meltdowns simultaneously. Plus it kept threatening to rain, so poor Gabba barely got any outside time today (and the kid NEEDS to have time to roll around in the mud every day in order to be entirely happy.)

Naptime was exceptionally frustrating. Normally, Katie naps while I'm getting Gabba down for her nap, but was wide awake today and refusing to ride in the Babyhawk, so I had to tuck one girl under each arm and truck up the stairs. (If you haven't seen Grace lately: Girlfriend is a TANK. She's gonna play middle linebacker on the ~~powder puff~~ Varsity football team.) We got upstairs, and both girls proceeded to ramp up from vigorous whining to balls-out screaming. Grace wanted sit in the glider for stories instead of the bed, a request I tried to accomodate, but Katie was not exactly down with. I tried to move us all to the bed, at which point everyone melted down and there was just absolutely nothing I could do but walk out of the room and close the door. Katie promptly fell asleep, which was great except that I had too much to do to lie down with her, so I got a bit done with her in my arms, and then tried to put her down so I could finish. Nope. Not havin' that. However, she DID decide the Babyhawk was acceptable, so I got a bit more done like that, gave up on the rest, and sat on the couch. Normally, she will sleep thru G's nap, and then be sleeping so soundly when G wakes up that I can set her on the Boppy and go get Grace.

Not today. Oh no. Today, she woke up ravenously hungry just five minutes before Grace did. I really had no choice but to wrangle Grace out of her bed with Katie hanging off me, gulping furiously, while her sister screamed with rage over the unfairness of having to share mama's attention after naptime. She then screamed because I wouldn't give her the bottle of fake butter-flavored oil we put on post-nap popcorn (nutrition WIN!), and again when I only let her shake half the salt shaker over her popcorn.

SIGH.

So, after about fifty years, it was finally bedtime, and even though she had my full, undivided attention, her mood remained foul and screamy. But after the day we'd had, I just....I couldn't just tuck her in screaming and walk out. Not tonight. So when she started begging for the rocking chair, I knew she was stalling, but I couldn't tell her no. I scooped her up and carried her over to the chair, where she told me that she has brown eyes but I have blue eyes and daddy has green eyes and Tatie has blue eyes and we both have noses and then we rubbed our noses like the bears in her book. Then she wrapped her arms over my shoulders, nuzzled her face into my neck, and whispered--

"No no touch fire. Too hot."

And see, the problem there? Was that I could. not. stop. laughing, and my chest was shaking so hard she woke up, saw me laughing, and kept saying it over and over to make me laugh again. BUT, I did tuck her in with no tears, so the day that was mostly a fail, ended a win.

In honor of Mother's Day, maybe let's not be so hard on ourselves for the days that feel like epic fails.

It never gets old...

2011-05-02T21:21:00.004-05:00

and I seriously wish I could get it on video, but you'll just have to use your imagination.

The scene: my car

Katie: waah! WAAAAAAH!!!!!!!!!!!! I AM DYING BECAUSE I AM IN MY CAR SEAT AND NOBODY IS HOLDING ME SWEET BABY JESUS SAAAAAAVE MEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!

Gracie: BABY!! Stop cwying. STOP STOP STOP STOP!!!

Me: Hee. This is teh awesome.

Random

2011-04-27T19:59:00.003-05:00

Do you ever get words or phrases in your head the way you get songs stuck in your head? Or am I the only one? Because I am constantly getting phrases and names stuck in my head. And lately, I get the names of other people's facebook friends stuck in my head (esp. if I see them crop up frequently). And then that makes me wonder if other people are walking around turning my name over in their brains a thousand times, the way you rub your tongue over a rough spot on your tooth, for a whole day. Kind of the way I wonder how many strangers have pictures with me in the background or accidentally in the frame. Like that.

Trust me, I'm an expert

2011-04-25T20:24:00.003-05:00

I decided today, that after parenting not one, but two very fussy babies (one quite fussy, one UNSPEAKABLY fussy), I am An Expert. At least as much as the Baby Whisperer and the jackhole that wrote Babywise. (Um. Y'all know I already thought I was smarter than them even before Gracie was born. But like, now I KNOW.)

And you know, as a Very Important and Also Smart Expert, my biggest problem with those books, and I'm sure plenty of others, is the whole stupid idea of forming bad habits. They tell you not to do things like co-sleep or hold your baby all the time or feed on demand or anything like that because you will form bad habits and it might be okay now but one day? Oh, you will PAY.

Katie was two months old today. We've handled her reeeally differently from Gracie. With Gracie, we lived in perpetual fear of forming bad habits. We did everything in our power to avoid it, and stressed endlessly over how much we held her, how much attention we gave her to stop her from crying, the amount of time she spent in the swing. Katie? Partly out of necessity and partly from experience, we just hold her all the time. It's what she needs right now. We WOULD put her in the swing except she hates it with a fiery passion, so we don't, but we WOULD. She sleeps in my bed every night. That one, I'm working on fixing, and guess what? Last night, she slept in her cradle until 4am. I mean, no, she woke up twice, but when I put her back in the cradle, there was no vortex that opened up out of her head to suck in the entire room. She didn't kill me with death rays from her eyes. And she also, um, slept. Not every night has gone as smoothly, and tonight probably won't either, if I have to place a bet (she's been EXTRA ticked off today). But how is that different from Gracie? Only in one way: neither Stephen nor I want to jump off the roof and die. We're as rested as we can be with a baby and a toddler (and for Stephen, with a job that requires him to be up all night and attempt to sleep during the day). We can see straight and operate motor vehicles safely and again, I cannot stress this enough: we do not wish we were dead. In terms of Katie's behavior, though? She is in *exactly* the same place Gracie was at this age. So much for bad habits.

But let's just say I'm wrong (which I'm not, trust me, but let's just SAY I'm wrong). Let's say I'm forming all kinds of terrible habits with Katie that I will have to fix one day. You tell me: would you rather work on things like sleeping independently and nap schedules and eating every three hours and not being held all the time when you're ALSO torn and bruised and swollen in one location or another from pushing out a baby and riding the Postpartum Hormone Roller Coaster and your entire life has been flipped upside down by the addition of another human being? Or a few months later when you're physically healed and your hormones have stopped beating you up and you feel like maybe one day your life will feel normal again?

Exactly.

And I'm pointing this out for free on my blog. And you'll never get bedbugs from my blog.

That one was my fault.

2011-04-23T21:45:00.003-05:00

I've come to accept in the last two months, that I just make high-maintenance babies. I don't make babies that sit in bouncie seats or sleep in cradles or nurse without striking or live without hours of screaming. It sucks, but what are ya gonna do? They grow into pretty awesome kids, so whatever.

Today, Katie would not. stop. screaming. I mean, she was a handful even by Katie standards. The kind of screaming where her head gets sweaty. Inconsolable. I was entirely fed up and frustrated.

While Gracie and I were eating dinner, Stephen was watching a show about chocolate on tv. He commented on the caffeine content in chocolate- it's actually pretty low.

But let's say, theoretically, that someone- we'll call her Piggy- ate an entire one pound bag of M&Ms yesterday. A bag intended for her toddler, but hello, that kid doesn't need any more cawkit, so I will eat it for her. THAT? would result in significant caffeine consumption. And if Piggy had a baby daughter, I bet she would be reeeally caffeine-sensitive.

Oops. My bad.

At least it's healthy?

2011-04-21T23:04:00.004-05:00

My little Norma Rae continues her strike today- she did pretty well overnight, but was on and off today, mainly refusing lefty like it was spraying poison, but better than yesterday.

One of the things you're supposed to do with a striking baby is to avoid letting them get too pissed off. Get them nursing before they're screaming with rage, because once that happens, you've missed your chance. Sooo, when Katie started crying while I was making lunch today, I knew I had to drop everything and feed her. Gracie was not necessarily on board with this plan, as she stood at my side screaming, "Wahermelon!! WAHERMELONWAHERMELON!!!!" I sliced a piece off the wedge I was chopping, rinsed off the knife and put it away, handed it to her, and rushed off to feed Katie.

While Katie was grudgingly accepting FOOD I made WITH MY OWN BODY (no, no, don't mind me, dear. just put me in the first nursing home you find...), Gracie was munching away at her wahermelon. AND THEN SOME. Because after I left the room, she pushed a stool up to the counter, scooped up the seriously enormous chunk of watermelon I'd left on the counter, and chowed on it like a cartoon character.

You guys. She ate the whole thing. When she was done, the rind was entirely white. I really should've taken a picture of it, I was really very impressed.

She was pretty impressed with herself too (and in case you're wondering, she also ate a bean and cheese quesadilla and an entire container of strawberries for lunch. I'm thinking maybe she's growing...)

Deja Vu All Over Again

2011-04-20T20:43:00.003-05:00

When Grace was two months old, she went on a hard-core nursing strike. (well. saying it was hard-core is rather unnecessary, since EVERYTHING Gracie has ever done has been hard-core, a pattern which continues to this day, but I digress.) We eventually recovered, but it took a LOT of blood, sweat and tears to do so. (Two out of the three of those cliched terms are entirely literal here, by the way.) I never could figure out the cause, there were so many possible choices. She was getting lots of pumped milk, because she screamed all the time and never slept, and I had to occasionally sleep. Since she happily took bottles during her strike, and part of getting her back on the breast involved using bottle nipples like nipple shields and tricking her, I thought maybe that played a role. I started the mini pill days before she went on strike, and I thought I noticed a drop in my supply, maybe that was why? Also, Gracie was just an intense, pissed-off mess, so maybe THAT was why. In the end, even my kick-ass lactation consultant could only guess what was going on and offer emotional support. There's not much to do with a striking baby besides offer the breast without forcing it and pump to maintain your supply (and, apparently, trick them with bottle nipples.)

*****

A few weeks ago, I was really not feeling breastfeeding. If you've breastfed before, you know this happens a lot. I say all the time, breastfeeding is the most counterevolutionary process on earth. That particular day, I was feeling exhausted and stressed about never being able to be away from Katie, about not having enough pumped milk ready for me to go back to work. I cannot lose weight when I am breastfeeding- with Grace, that meant I fluctuated somewhere around 5-8 pounds above my goal. This time, it means 15 pounds. That's a LOT. Enough to need new clothes. And on this particular day I'm referring to, I discovered that after a week of eating absolutely perfectly, hoping to at least drop five pounds before returning to work so I won't need new work clothes, I'd gained three pounds. I was DONE. Totally fed up. I met a friend for lunch and tried not to think about it. Noticed a pair of women at a table behind us talking about healthcare-related issues. Thought I overheard them refer to the lactation consultant's agency that I'd used with Grace. After lunch, I picked up Katie, nursed her, and popped her on my shoulder to burp her. The women commented on how cute she was, and told me they were lactation consultants. It opened the floodgates, so to speak. I tend to get really serious verbal diarrhea under the best of circumstances, but I was feeling so stressed and frustrated, I just felt the need to tell them all about how a lactation consultant was the reason I'd nursed my first child for a year, how my kids were so different, etc etc blah blah blah. About 2/3 of the way through this explosion, I felt utterly mortified and tried to back my way out gracefully. Like all good lactation consultants, they smiled warmly and let me ramble on. Women who look at other women's boobs for a living need to be maternal and non-judgemental. Anyway, I took it as a sign from the universe. I needed to stop being so vain about my stupid weight, stop stressing so much, and just enjoy nursing my baby.

*****

Last night, Katie slept in the cradle for two hours. When she woke up, I promised myself I would attempt to get her back in the cradle after I'd nursed her. I HAVE to break this habit. I HAVE to get her sleeping on her own.

I woke up an hour later with her jammed in the crook of my arm, with the most smug little smile on her face, and my boob hanging out in the breeze.

Best laid plans and all.

*****

I noticed today that Katie was very, very fussy nursing on the left. She's always been noisier on that side, just like her sister, and also like her sister, strongly prefers to nurse on the right. It was frustrating, but not shocking. I was out at the mall with a friend and her new baby, and by the end of our shopping trip, I noticed she was also fussing a little about nursing on the right. She was fussy overall, so I didn't think much of it.

When we got home, she refused the left side entirely. A few hours later, she was completely refusing to nurse and screaming with rage at the mere suggestion. I pumped while Grace was in the tub and Stephen gave her a bottle, which she chugged in minutes, grateful she didn't have to debase herself by, gross, nursing. GOD, Mom, WTF do you think I am, some kind of dirty HIPPIE?!??!

An hour and a half later, I was able to get her to nurse on the right, with a LOT of support and focus. She kept leaning her head back, but she did it.

*****

Of the many friends I have that live inside my computer, one has mentioned a relative in Chicago who is an IBCLC. Today, while checking out the website for my beloved IBCLC from Gracie's newborn days, I realized her relative works for the same agency as my lactation consultant. Suddenly, things started to come together. I was so sure I had heard the two women at the restaurant allude to the agency I'd used when Grace was born. There were only four IBCLCs with that agency. Neither of those women was my IBCLC, so it was likely that one of those women was my friend's relative.

Yep. It was.

I feel like that is a huge, flashing sign from the universe, that I put all of that together today. Hell if I know what the universe is telling me, though, since, as I learned with Grace, there's just not that much to do with a striking baby. But it's pretty amazing nonetheless.

*****

That story about falling asleep with Katie in the bed doesn't really tie into anything else here. I just thought it was funny.

Wait...

2011-04-19T19:36:00.002-05:00

I was supposed to do tummy time with EACH kid?

....oops.

Gonna get right on that.

Tomorrow.

How is this possible?!

2011-04-16T22:09:00.004-05:00

I blinked, and she went from this

to this

That'll teach me to blink.

And to breathe. When we got home this morning, I was seriously overwhelmed. Gracie was a tornado at breakfast with the bunny, tearing around and getting lost in the crowd, photo-bombing the other kids' easter bunny pics, trying to take all the eggs in the hunt, and I ran after her while wearing Katie on my chest. We got home with Gracie hopped up on sugar and Katie just DONE with being dragged around. I was still overheated from running around with a human strapped to my chest while carrying the diaper bag and trying not to lose my phone or my keys and for a second, I felt totally irritated with myself for even leaving the house, and just wished that the girls were old enough to visit the bunny and wait in line nicely and participate in arts and crafts and not run away from me the whole time. But for once, I stopped myself and remembered not to wish my life away. That the days are long but the years are short and one day, the absolute last thing either one of them will want to do is visit the Easter bunny with their stupid, badly-dressed mother.

It was a really, really good morning.

Random Thoughts

2011-04-15T20:16:00.003-05:00

I met a new friend today from inside my computer. She's a baby center person, from the March 2011 AMA (advanced-maternal age, hello, I'm old) board. She had twins, so she also had February babies. (and we found out later we were even in the hospital, on the same floor, at the same time. Crazy, right?!) It's cold and raw and disgusting in Chicago, so we went here. It was super crowded, the parking situation was terrible (the neighborhood is notoriously crowded), and I had the worst cup of decaf I've ever had in my life, but oh my. Grace was in HEAVEN. I wish I'd found it sooner, because even though she dozed in the car on the way there AND back, she still took a two and a half hour nap after lunch. We'll definitely be going back.

For the most part, the kids all shared space pretty well. Considering the age group and how crowded it was, I was really surprised there wasnt' more of a need for parental intervention. There was one kid, though, who wasn't playing super-well with others. He saw Gracie climbing the stairs to go down the slide, shoved her out of the way and said, "NO! MINE!", and then proceeded to stand at the top of the stairs and block her from even going up at all. I glanced around for his parent/nanny/responsible adult, and nobody came forward. I watched him act like that a few more times, and nothing. My new friend shrugged and said, "I think in places like this, all's fair in love and war. it's just part of the setting." And considering the fact that she has twins, that attitude is probably a very, very good thing. But...I disagree. Grace is one of those kids who MEANS to be good when she's playing with other kids, but she has a really poor sense of her body in space, so I have to really watch her to make sure she doesn't plow anyone over. The other day at the children's museum, she accidentally STOMPED another little girl's fingers before I could stop her. And while I would be totally appalled with any parent who went nuts over that, I also think I need to step in and show her that she hurt someone and needs to say she's sorry. I mean, they're all little, how can they learn to behave if we don't tell them? I also had to watch Grace like a hawk because she's a human garbage disposal and tried to eat like five random bags of goldfish and snacktrap contents that she found scattered throughout. I can't imagine that would have gone over very well.

On the flip side, when I set down an empty coffee cup next to my foot so I could lift her up to dunk a basketball, if someone else's kid comes running over and picks it up, I don't think that deserves the nasty look I got from their nanny. Because, seriously, the play space is a coffee shop. that's the idea. There are no garbage cans in the play space. It's NEXT TO MY FOOT. But then, maybe the other mom felt that way about her bully of a son? I really don't know. Just thinking out loud.

And speaking of twins (we were speaking of twins. Tangentially, anyway), one of my other friends linked me to this blog. (She knows her from her multiples group.) God bless her. Can you imagine? I think there are people in this world who are meant to have twins and people who aren't and I think you can ALL guess under category I FIRMLY fall. It's not just me being high-strung and far too inflexible for twins, there is also the fact that I don't give birth to newborns so much as miniature terrorists. I mean, CAN YOU IMAGINE?! Good night. I work with a woman whose first baby was born in December, second baby was born in March, and then had boy/girl twins in December. When she found out Katie was due in March, knowing that Grace was born in December, she said, "ohhh, and when you have your third, you'll have twins in December!" I threw my pen at her. I am not kidding you guys- if I ever got pregnant with December twins, you would all have to take turns staying in my house and hiding the sharp objects.

Consider yourselves warned.

Look at me! Look at me!

2011-04-11T21:55:00.003-05:00

One day, if all goes according to plan, Katie will be a middle child. And when that day comes, everyone will chuckle and say, awww, look at Katie. Typical middle child. Desperate for attention!

So I just want to say for the record: She has been like that SINCE BEFORE SHE WAS BORN.

"hi, I'm your fetus and I have a cardiac arrhythmia. Look at me!!!"

"hi, I'm your fetus and I'm allll tiny! Go get your growth ultrasound and look at me!!"

"Hi, I'm your baby and I'm gonna come ten days early! Look at me and all my dimples!"

"HI MY NAME IS KATIE AND I'M PRETTY SURE YOU'RE NOT HOLDING ME WTFSCREEEEEAM!!!"

Unless the universe somehow knew she was going to be a middle child and programmed her accordingly, it's just how she is. And I'll have my little drama queen know, she might have decided yesterday that she hates the front carrier, but that is too freaking bad because I occasionally require the use of my hands.

Currency!!!

2011-04-10T16:06:00.003-05:00

You may or may not be aware, girls who hit and kick get their blankies taken away. This causes much weeping and wailing and cries of "peeeeeease bankit BACK!!"

Whether or not it produces actual changes in behavior remains to be seen. Stay tuned.

Stats

2011-04-09T21:02:00.002-05:00

I just read mine for the first time. I dunno, I kind of figured it was just friends reading here and the occasional person who got lost on Google, so it didn't seem that interesting.

And really, yes, that is exactly who's reading here. But then I saw the search keywords that got people here and I found this phrase:

"baby crabby for weeks crying doc says nothing help"

I'm sorry, random person who was googling with frustration, rage, whatever. I know you didn't find anything here that helped you. Probably you are not even reading this anyway, but man, it sure does suck, doesn't it?

It gets better. Promise.

And when she was good, she was very, very good....

2011-04-06T20:55:00.003-05:00

People have been asking how Gracie is doing with Katie. Gracie is doing very well with Katie. It's everything else in the world that's giving her fits.

No. I exaggerate. But SERIOUSLY OH MY GOD, the girl is feeling every second of her two years old.

Defiant is the word that comes to mind most often. Not always- often, in fact, when we ask her to do something (or not do something), she just ignores us. Clearly, we are addressing another child named Gracie who is banging on the wall with plastic bowling pins, or not picking up her toys, or digging thru the kitchen drawers. But when she REALLY doesn't want to do something?! "NOOO! NO NO NO NO NO NO," she will shriek (SHRIEK) with a pitch and timbre that can shatter your eardrums. And the TONE in her voice? There's so much more than no in there. It's "I don't want to and you can't make me because you're stupid and dumb and I don't EVER have to listen to you so just go to hell already OKAY?!?!?" And in those moments, she challenges me more than she ever did as a newborn. Which is saying something.

Aaaand then there's the kicking and the hitting. Kicking is mostly reserved for diaper changes and getting dressed. She doesn't want to, and if she has to bloody my nose to stop it, so be it. It's a loss of control, really. The hitting, though? Ohhh, my, does my blood boil. She stares me dead in the eye and slowly, deliberately, reaches out and smacks me. Or pinches me. Or grabs my fingers and pulls in opposite directions.

If I show anger, either to these actions, or really any form of misbehavior, she finds it utterly hilarious. Time-outs are merely a brief interlude in her day. "Sah mommy," she'll say afterwards, hug me, and skip off on her way, only to repeat the same misbehavior the next time the mood strikes. Taking away things she wants occasionally works temporarily, but she soon forgets it ever happens. I know I have to find her currency, but I have a feeling that won't happen until her memory is a bit longer (and I seriously can't believe there are kids who actually respond to time-outs. for real.)

But she's also so, so, so good. She's getting such a sense of humor, with actual give and take. She gets SO excited about going to play outside in her sandbox. She'll get so excited about something, and say to me, "Mama! Wookit dat!" She spreads her hands out over something and says "taaa!" (because she hasn't quite figured out Ta-Da!). She'll walk into a room with her hands behind her back and say, "ah-prise!" and when we ask her what, she'll whip out some random object and say, "Deese!" She will occasionally do this in front of the mirror, to watch herself say it. (she'll also run past the front hall mirror and check herself out as she goes by.) She pats her sister on the head and says, "nice baby..."

She is funny and sweet and clever and amazing. And when she's bad? Well. I'm really hoping to find her currency soon.

Losing!

2011-03-29T13:24:00.003-05:00

Let's recap today, shall we?

Grace continues with the hideous lower GI bug she's had since sunday. It's....messy. NOT as messy as it would be if she were also puking, so thank god for small favors, but it's gross and she doesn't feel good. She's highly uninterested in liquids, too- hates gatorade, doesn't want water, I even tried bribing her with "bubble juice" (aka Sprite) and got minimal sips. She did eat most of a popsicle for lunch, but that was basically it. She is alternating between lying on the couch with glassy eyes and trying to run around like a crazy person.

In the meantime, Katie has been screaming bloody murder all day long unless she's lying next to a naked boob. Possibly nursing, possibly not, BUT THAT IS NOT THE POINT SHE NEEDS BOOB. The swing is a profound, personal insult. Ditto to the front carrier. Rocking, swaying, patting- do not make me laugh. It makes it a bit of a challenge to take care of the sick child, to say the least. Especially when I am absolutely certain that if the younger child were to get sick with the same bug, we WOULD buy ourselves a hospital stay and have been obsessively washing hands and refraining from cross-contamination of any kind.

Before Grace turned into a human poop fountain, one of my friends was going to come meet Katie tonight, so this morning I quick ran a mop over the floor. Except I did not realize until after I had mopped the entire first floor that the mop head needs to be replaced, so now half of our house smells like a dirty rag.

Oh, and also, I took the girls out this morning to pick up the cat's Prozac and some Sprite for Grace (which she won't drink, of course), and did not realize until I got home that the vet called in a refill for Xanax. A prescription they gave me once that I never actually filled.

Currently, Katie is in her favored position of the day, Grace is taking a nap, and I am breathing through my mouth.

I really don't like the newborn stage.

(and before anyone suggests it: I can't take the Xanax while I'm breastfeeding.)

The Happiest Day

2011-03-27T12:22:00.004-05:00

You know how people always refer to their wedding day, or the day their kids were born, as the happiest day of their lives? I've done it too, and it makes sense, because those are really big, happy occasions.

...But, really? Weddings are stressful. There are always glitches, there's so much PRESSURE. And the days that my girls were born were happy days, but there's, um, a bit of discomfort involved with the whole process, too.

So to be accurate, I think the day when I felt the most overwhelming, unqualified, all-encompassing happiness was three years ago, today.

A Month Later...

2011-03-25T17:43:00.004-05:00

I really want to commit Katie's birth story to memory in one single place. I know all y'all have heard it before, just bear with me;)

I was so determined to go late with her, I should have known she would come early. The wednesday before I went into labor, I was telling everyone who would listen that I could easily go for another month feeling the way I did. Then I went went for the internal exam that changed it all, heh...

I know the doctor expected me to be more dilated than I was at that appointment, but when she told me I was dilated at all, it made me nervous. I have this totally unfounded theory that women either dilate slowly ahead of time, or all at once, and since I was an "all at once" with Gracie, and went into labor within days of being told I'd started dilating, I worried I wouldn't go late after all. When I had all kinds of crazy pressure the rest of the day and night, I worried I wouldn't even make it til March. But denial is a strong thing, and even though my BFF the L&D nurse kept saying, "Um. You might want to consider that you're in labor...", I laughed and said, "oh, PISH. Cervix of steel, remember?!"

4am on February 25th, I was rudely awakened by painful contractions. I told myself it was just false labor from the exam, but I knew better. I don't even really remember if I had any more contractions while I laid in bed, but I was so amped up I couldn't fall asleep again. And all I could think was, dangit, I really wanted a March baby!!

I got showered and dressed and ready for work as if nothing was happening- if it WAS false labor, I was going to feel like a complete jackass if I stayed home and acted like I was maybe in labor. I had contractions the whole time, but tried to write it all off. I carried Grace down the stairs, I was bending over too far and too long, etc...but I also painted my toenails, just to be safe. I told Stephen I didn't think I"d make it til March, but I was NOT in labor, and he should go to sleep. I didn't think he believed me, but I guess I was more convincing than I felt, because he actually did get some sleep that day, thank GOD.

I went to work and the contractions started in earnest. Everyone was watching me like a hawk while I tried to pretend nothing was happening- again, denial is a strong thing, and I just kept thinking, if I'm not really in labor, I'm going to feel so stupid. So I went and hid in my office...and the contractions spread waaay out. The doctor had said not to wait too long before calling, second babies come faster, but I was NOT about to call the office having contractions ten minutes apart. I got up and walked around, and they came back instantly. At one point, I went down to the cafeteria, and literally seconds after a blinding contraction, saw an infectious disease fellow who jokingly said to me, "what, haven't had that baby yet?!" I smirked and walked away.

The pattern repeated the whole time I was at work- try to walk around, have contractions, get annoyed by PEOPLE (I just kept thinking, wtf, why are all these RESIDENTS here????), go back to the office, contractions stop. Finally decided after my coworker showed up that I really needed to go home. I drove home, stopping at McDonald's for lunch (I wanted one last splurge!) (ha. yeah. I continue to splurge.) and came in the house to find Stephen sleeping on the couch. No, Stephen wide awake on the couch, on the verge of a heart attack, wondering who was coming in the house in the middle of the day. I sent him upstairs to keep sleeping and tried to keep contractions going. Bounced on the exercise ball- that made them stop. Swept the kitchen. That made them continue, but damn, cleaning is annoying. Walked on the treadmill, that made them continue, but was boring and irritating. I finally broke down and called the doctor's office.

The nurse was skeptical when I told her my contraction pattern, until I told her it was my second baby, when she became far more serious and told me to come in to be seen.

I woke Stephen up, and was shocked by how calm he was. As I was slammed by a contraction, he said something about "...if this turns out to be go time..." and I grunted, "THIS IS GO TIME." I guess that's what he needed to hear? Because his whole boogey changed, and we were out the door in seconds.

Disgustingly lost my mucous plug in the doctor's office waiting room. You know you wanted to know that.

After the world's shortest NST, the doctor pronounced that I was dilated to 4cm and obviously in labor, and should head to the hospital. She asked if I wanted an epidural. HA. I wanted one TWO HOURS BEFORE SHE ASKED ME.

While we were moving the car from the doctor's office to the hospital, Stephen, in an attempt to distract me, said, "OK. We need to talk girls names." The only reason I did not kill him was because our child needed a father.

We called our parents from the hospital, and I writhed around the couch in OB reg. People stared and I was mortified. It sucked.

We finally got sent to L&D, and rode the elevator with two other couples. One was really friendly and chatty. The other barged ahead of all of us to the registration desk, told the woman behind the desk that she was 41 weeks pregnant and there for induction. They had not registered downstairs, and actually started an argument with the woman about whether or not they would go back down there to register. I have a really clear memory of turning and giving Stephen the world's biggest "ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME???" look ever, and he took my arm and pulled me back. I mean, SERIOUSLY?!

FINALLY, we got into L&D. My nurse started the IV right away, and I expected things to be just like the day Grace was born- instant epidural.

HA.

I waited another hour and a half, writhing and cursing and progressing to tears when I heard my nurse and the anesthesia nurse whispering to each other, convinced I was never going to get the epidural and that I would have to deliver without it. Some dipshit ER resident, doing his OB rotation, came in to do some pointless ultrasound to see if the baby was head down. God I hate residents.

Epidural finally in place, I settled in for the fun part of labor. We could pick a girl's name, get online, update friends, relax, and enjoy the process. Except then the on-call doctor came in, found me at 6cm, broke my water, and told me the baby would be here within the hour. whaaaa??? NO!!

Sure enough, within seconds, my contractions changed, and I knew it was time to push.

Pushing this time was amazing. I could see everything, and as I felt Katie slide out, I looked down and turned to Stephen, who said at the same time, "it's a girl!!!"

*****************

The first month of Grace's life felt like running the marathon. I felt every. single. step. Every second. It was agony. I thought there was no way I would survive, that surely I could not do it.

This month has flown by in the blink of an eye. It's totally unreal to me that Katie is a whole month old. And the fact that it went by so quickly makes me awfully nervous about how quickly the rest of this year will go by. I'm no fan of the newborn period, to be sure, but because I've done it before, I know: the best is yet to come.

Kids Change Your Life.

2011-03-23T20:11:00.004-05:00

You know those big cliches that people constantly cite, to the point that you just roll your eyes and turn off your ears as soon as you hear them? But then you actually experience them, and they don't feel like a cliche, they feel like the SMARTEST THING ANYONE SAID EVER?

Gracie went with her grandma today, leaving just Katie and me at home while Stephen slept after work. I missed her...but I was ready for the rest/break and one on one time with K-Mae.

I had big plans. Groceries, lunch, and a nap. Try not to be jealous.

Thanks to Target's new grocery section, we did our shopping at my favorite store on earth, complete with latte:) From there, I went to Taco Bell for lunch. And you just hush your mouth, because it is delicious and you just don't know, I don't even want to hear about it. I came home with lunch, fed Katie, fed myself, and checked out the TiVo. Sometimes my TiVo is pretty sure I have horrible taste in television and want to watch crap like Two and a Half men or the latest Patricia Heaton vehicle. But sometimes? My TiVo loves me and records kickass shows like Freaks and Geeks. ONLY the awesomest show ever. So while Katie napped on the boppy, I watched some awesome tv. And then I took a long-ass nap.

And all of that combined? Made the best day I've had in a really, insanely long time.

Three years ago, a day of Target, Taco Bell, and TiVo would not be noteworthy. It would probably be totally boring. Now? HEAVEN.

To be covered in our next installment of "understand the cliche": the intense guilt you feel as a mother when you describe your perfect day which involves a prolonged break from your firstborn child.

So it's true. huh.

2011-03-22T14:11:00.002-05:00

One of the things they really drilled into our heads in grad school was that a baby is full-term at 40 weeks. Not a 37, not at 39, but at forty weeks, and even though they won't have any more life-threatening issues at that point than they would at 40 weeks, they are different. They have higher rates of jaundice and feeding issues, among other things.

So, for example, to pull some numbers out of thin air? You can have a baby at 38w5d and they will come into the world happy. Practically meditating!

But as they approach their due date, they will slowly wake up and notice the world around them. And they won't like what they see. At first, they'll just demand to be held 24/7, but that's okay, because you're all into baby-wearing, and your first baby was probably REALLY fussy, and if the baby is happy when they're held, they're happier than your first baby! Maybe they'll insist on sleeping in your bed, but hey, sleep is sleep, so no biggie. Then maybe they'll get really fussy in the evenings, and you'll think, well. That's less than ideal. But it's okay! All babies are fussier in the evening.

Then they'll be a screaming, raw bundle of nerves in the evening, wanting to nurse every single second, but becoming enraged when their mouth fills with MILK as a result (and some dumbass will ask if you've tried a pacifier, like you recently suffered severe brain damage and couldn't come up with such a simple solution on your own). So you'll stop nursing, and they'll arch and writhe and root frantically. Songs, rocking, bouncing, walking- won't help.

Then? This behavior will progress to the whole day. And probably, your two year old isn't on board with every second being devoted to calming the baby. Probably, she'll feel all neglected. And maybe she'll watch lots and LOTS of tv, which is really great for her speech development.

Just, you know, to cite a hypothetical example.

And probably, if that happened, you would feel like it was really an unfair pile of bullshit, because you already went through this and it was your turn to have an easier baby this time. Maybe this baby would want to be held all the time, maybe this baby would be crabby in the evenings, maybe this baby would even cry every evening, but to scream all day? No. You already went through that and feel absolutely no shame whatsoever about thinking that it was someone else's turn. Probably, you'll also be acutely aware that people alternate between thinking you're exaggerating, or that you're doing something to the kid to make them that way, and that just pisses you off more.

And then, finally, an hour and a half after big sister is asleep, fussy baby v2.0 will finally fall into a fitful sleep, and you won't even care about any of that anymore, because you are going to die and be dead if you don't take a nap.

Thoughts on Sleep

2011-03-18T20:14:00.003-05:00

My biggest thought on sleep these days is, it's really shocking how well my body remembers how to function on minimal sleep. Which is not to say I'm functioning WELL, but that I am LIGHT YEARS ahead of where I was at this point with Grace. She was, admittedly, much much fussier, and her sleep was a lot worse, but she was also our only concern, and I could sleep when she slept. (Although, to play Devil's advocate with myself, I also have LOTS more practice at the whole, "ok, she's sleeping, take a nap NOW!!!!" thing.) All I know is, it's just not as overwhelming as it was the first time around.

Katie is not really a better sleeper than Grace at three weeks old. She's not one of those babies who's born knowing how to sleep, even if she acted like she might be, for a little while. The trick, like I said, is that she's far less fussy, so co-sleeping is an option. Co-sleeping was never an option with Grace, because she screamed as much in our bed as she did anywhere else. For the record, I totally hate co-sleeping. I've taken care of too many babies who rolled off the bed and cracked their heads than I can even count, not to mention the worries about pillows and heavy blankets and smothering and overheating and just plain not being able to roll onto my stomach, put the pillow over my head, and pull the blankets up to my neck. So I'd really like to stop this as soon as possible...I'm just not sure that's going to be possible very soon.

And when the time DOES come to get her to sleep in the cradle at the foot of the bed, or in her crib in her own room? Oh man. It's gonna suck. At the same time, I feel like there's this tiny window, where I need to do it before she's firmly convinced she needs to sleep with me for the rest of my life, but after she's old enough to be able to do it (and have it actually be worth the sleep deprivation). My mom thinks she's ready now. I know there's a school of thought that she should be in my bed until she decides to leave, even if that happens when she's, like, eighteen years old. To me, the right answer is somewhere in the middle. I just haven't decided where. To be honest, it's not so much feeling bad about it, as it is wanting to have it all go as smoothly as possible, and I don't think there's any one answer to that.

...Although? I say that now, but we all know I'm a lot softer than I try to make myself out to be. And I thought I'd toughened up about some things, but nope. Just today, my mom stopped by and offered to take one of the girls. Grace promptly LOST HER MIND, and I had two bottles that didn't get used when we went out to dinner last night, so I sent Katie with her. It used to be almost physically painful to leave Gracie, especially when I went back to work. Eventually, it got easier, and I actually enjoyed my time away (like ALL parents should). I thought it would be easy-peasy with Katie, what with all the practice I have. Nope. I almost stopped my mom at least five times between deciding to send Katie with her and having them actually walk out the door. It sucked. I'm SO glad I did it, though, because Grace and I had a great morning and got a lot done.

And I guess that's the rub, no matter what you're talking about when it comes to parenthood. Sigh. You'd think two years after becoming a mom, I'd stop being shocked by how difficult it is.

Segundo

2011-03-13T20:35:00.002-05:00

I've been thinking a lot about what's different between having your first and second baby. Not in the specific sense, like, "I craved cereal with Grace but never wanted it with Katie," but more in the general sense.

I know a lot of people really worry about adding a second child to their family- will they love the baby as much? And worry about how it totally rocks the first child's world. I really didn't worry about that- maybe because I'm the second child and it's impossible for me to believe that I am anything but the sunshine of my family's life? Heh. Probably. I did feel a little bit sad about the one-on-one time with Gabba going away- being home four days a week, we had a little routine, and lots of time together, and it did make me sad to think about losing that.

Pregnancy was much easier the second time around. I mean, objectively it really wasn't, not at all. I was much, much more tired, the nausea was worse, and there obviously wasn't as much lounging time as there was the first time. It was emotionally easier, though. I didn't expect it to all be fun, I knew it would be unpleasant, and I didn't really fight it. I knew to just kind of focus on the fun parts. I really, REALLY liked that I didn't have to build a baby registry, that people weren't so interested in my nursery theme, all of that first-baby pressure that I absolutely HATED, was gone. Good riddance. It also helped that we didn't move when I was 36 weeks pregnant.

Recovery was a LOT easier this time around, too. I am not sure how much of that was the weight difference, with Katie being over a pound smaller than Gracie, and how much of it was just coincidence? Because I can say for sure, the hormone dump was not nearly as brutal this time around as it was last time. I really don't know how much of that was sleep deprivation the first time, in retrospect.

Which leads to my next point- Katie is a much, MUCH easier baby than Gracie was. I know people want to think that Gracie's fussiness was because of our tension, and I get that. People want to think they'll never have a baby that fussy, and they think that surely you can influence your newborn and keep them from being that fussy. I would have been the same way if Katie came before Gracie. But seriously, just trust me on this: Katie is just easier. And if she were our first, we would lie in bed til noon every day, and then I'd spend the rest of the day sitting on the couch and just staring at her. But she's not our first, and I am constantly trying to figure out how much to tell Gracie to just hold on, and how often Katie just needs to fuss awhile so I can dote on Gracie. That part stinks, because no matter what, I end up feeling guilty.

The best part, though, about the second time around? People actually take you seriously. When I called the doctor to say, hey, wtf, I've been having contractions all day, but they keep spacing out and bunching up and spacing out and bunching up, the nurse skeptically asked me which baby this was for me. When I told her my second, her whole tone changed. When I took Katie for her two-week check-up and voiced concerns about her stuffy nose and puking, the response was totally different from any response I ever got about Grace. The first time, people assume you're being a spaz. The second time, people assume you probably have a point. That's a really nice change.

Well. that's the second best part, anyway.

We Should All Have Something

2011-03-11T14:11:00.002-06:00

I really think everyone should have something they're really, really good at.

For most of my life, I didn't really have anything. I'm just...really average. I am horrible at sports (esp. anything involving a ball, it's a depth-perception issue). I am good at school, but not great. Reasonably intelligent, but not super-smart. Took voice lessons for three years in high school and was just above average (and now, can't carry a tune in a bucket, for the record), took piano lessons for four years and oh my god was I horrible...just, yeah. Really average. Which is fine, but kinda sad, right?

But now, in my thirties, I have found my gift.

I can out-lactate EVERYONE. My body makes milk like it's getting paidd. Cows across America hang their heads in shame.

It's my superpower. I am a Dairy Queen.

Before I Forget, Part Two

2011-03-09T09:19:00.004-06:00

Okay, so I know these little nuggets are really not interesting to anyone other than me, but they're the funny things I really want to remember, so, you know, bear with me. (or don't, and come back in a month;)

After Gracie was born, I said that I wanted to labor with my next baby during the day. Partly because I wanted to remember the experience, partly because I didn't want to have to use the answering service for my doctor, and partly because laboring all night long is frigging exhausting and just gets everything off on the WRONG foot. So, when I woke up at 4am with the first painful contractions with Katie, well, that wasn't reeeeally daytime, but I was excited to know I'd probably be laboring during the day.

Of course, the contractions spread out and bunched up and spread out and bunched up, and I didn't know WHAT to think. I finally called the doctor at 2pm, and was super excited to have them tell me to come in, rather than going to OB triage. (bummed that my primary doc wasn't in the office that day, but that's neither here nor there.)

Stephen and I got in the car and headed to the office, in the swanky office just a few doors down from the hospital. I was having awful contractions all the way there, and at that point, was going on eight hours of painful contractions, mostly about 4-6 minutes apart, 10 minutes apart at the most. Which is to say, I was IRRITABLE. Go to get on the elevator in the garage, where, seriously??? I can count on one hand the number of times other people have been on that elevator with me. This time? Three people and a stroller come piling on. Jabbering in some Nordic language. I was shooting daggers at Stephen across the elevator (because it was his fault? I don't know. I guess I wasn't irritable enough yet to shoot daggers at strangers.) Then, they suddenly switched to English and started talking about doing their taxes. THEN?! The elevator stopped again, and this woman piled into the elevator with her roughly ten year old daughter. (and in case you were wondering, NO, there was NOT room for them.) We complete the world's longest three-floor elevator ride, pile off, and Stephen tells me we should really wait for all those people to get on the office elevators before we get on (maybe I WAS shooting daggers at strangers? heh. he was pretty insistent.) I was trying to ignore him, because I was crabby and not interested in being helped. However, my body had other plans and slammed me with a huge contraction. I gripped the corner of the wall and steeled myself, just in time to see ALL of our elevator mates turn and STARE at me. If looks could kill, I would be blogging from prison.

Seriously, EVERY OTHER TIME I took those elevator trips, I MIGHT have seen two other people the whole time. WTF?!

So THEN, I go to the doctor, where the office was shockingly expeditious (first time for everything, I guess), and we get sent to the hospital. Going back thru the garage, we actually walk past another person on the little walkway to the car- for the record, that has NEVER happened. Of course, right as he's approaching, here comes a contraction. Being a concerned human being, he stopped just after he passed us to make sure we were okay. "Keep on walking," I snarled under my breath, FILLED WITH RAGE over his concern. Stephen smiled and said, "We're okay!! THANKS!!!"

"EVERYBODY IS REALLY PISSING ME OFF, PONES."

"I know. Let's just go to the car."

When did my labor become a sitcom? I don't know, but I guess I should be glad we didn't get trapped in the elevator, forcing my new Scandinavian friends to deliver Katie.

Curse You, Day/Night Confusion!!

2011-03-08T15:00:00.002-06:00

So, true story: about three or four nights ago, Katie slept thru the night. Or would have, if I'd let her. I woke her up twice to eat so her brain would not be all hypoglycemic and damaged, as I tend to be picky about that. I knew that wouldn't last, but it was pretty freaking awesome.

Aaaand then, we approached our due date. And she got her sister's bubble nose. More awake baby plus stuffy head equals not such good sleep.

I mean, no. She sleeps like an angel all day long. Has some brief awake periods, but mostly is just comatose. Then, around 10pm, she wakes up. At first, she fools me, because she seems all normal. Then she eats, and while she's eating, she gets super worked up. She starts panting and her stuffy nose goes crazy and she makes so much noise, you can hear her down the hall. Then she gets really restless and uncomfortable. She stretches out and writhes around and cries out occasionally and then she poops, and you THINK she'll be okay then, but she's NOT! Not yet. She still needs to writhe around awhile and feel pissed off. This lasts until about midnght or 1am, when she finally falls into a fitful sleep. She wakes up several hours later, and either repeats the routine, or is just wide awake and looking around, but that also trips off the bubble nose, and so her breathing sounds like a jet trying to take off. She's also not super interested in eating, which is a darn shame, because at that point I have prepared her the equivalent of a Roman feast, and when she won't eat it, well, that's a bit uncomfortable. She finally falls asleep again, only to go thru it all again around 5 or 6. Lather, rinse, repeat.

And SERIOUSLY: I should not complain. Compared to Grace's early days, this is still cake. But darnit, I am TIRED. And then, as a result of all that night waking, I am staying in bed til 8 or later, which is too late. Stephen will be going back to work soon, and that just flat-out won't work. After we get up, I feed her, and then I have to pump, both to maintain a supply that I know she's going to want eventually, and also just for my own comfort, because it HURTS to leave all that sitting there. Plus it really freaks Grace out and just does not start the day off on the right foot. She doesn't understand why I'm not coming downstairs by 7am like I usually do, and although she is THRILLED to have her daddy's undivided attention, it just weirds her out. She also doesn't like it when I come down the stairs carrying two bottles of milk and don't let her have them. The screaming, carrying on, and cries for "nawk, PEEEEASE!! Pease mama, nawk!!!" are totally heartbreaking. (seriously: I have no idea why she wants the milk so badly. it's weird. I would just give it to her so she could get over her curiosity, but probably, it would just make her want it more and also, who the hell just throws away pumped milk? Good Lord.)

Before I Forget

2011-03-05T15:18:00.002-06:00

because I DO keep forgetting, I need to record this little nugget from Katie's delivery for posterity:

When we went to the hospital, and I finally, finally, finally had the epidural, an adorable little pocket-sized medical student came in to see us. Wearing the requisite, ridiculous waist-length coat, looking far too perky for the situation, she came over to introduce herself. I had propped myself forward, the doctor had just broken my water, and I was perfectly comfortable, but it was odd timing. As she approached me, she stopped talking for a second, then laughed and said, "sorry! fumes got to me for a second there...." and proceeded to introduce herself to us. After she left, Stephen was all, wtf dude?!?! Who SAYS that?! And although I'd had the same initial thought, I started cracking up, explaining that she'd just used the alcohol-based hand gel, and those were the fumes she was referring to.

Medical students. They're so cute, couldn't you just PINCH them??

(and for the record, we never did see her again. Too bad. She missed a kickass delivery.)

39 weeks

2011-03-01T19:45:00.002-06:00

You know how you get to that point, in every pregnancy, where you are just DONE? You're sick of peeing all the time, you can't sleep, you wish you could stop smelling your next door neighbor's cologne from your couch, all of that?

Yeah, I never got there with this pregnancy.

After Grace was born, and I was shocked to find myself heartbroken over no longer being pregnant, I swore to myself that I would enjoy my next pregnancy. I prepared myself and talked it up, and remembered all the good stuff to get in the right mindset, and it really worked. It helped that it took us longer to get pregnant this time than it did with Gracie, for sure, but a lot of it was the constant pep talks. I was nauseous longer, more exhausted, and had various other unpleasant symptoms this time around that I didn't have last time, but really, it was also a dreamy pregnancy in so many ways, and my focus was on all the good stuff.

Appointments were fun and exciting- sitting in the waiting room with all the other pregnant women, feeling all special, hearing the heartbeat, scheduling ultrasounds. My baby bump this time was cute and round and perfect, just like last time, but this time, I spent endless amounts of time just staring at it and rubbing it- I was cute, and I knew it. So much of the pressure that goes with a first pregnancy- making a registry, building a nursery, not knowing what to expect from anything- gone. This time, it was just about the anticipation of the baby, and it was so, so awesome.

I am thrilled to be sitting here, snuggling with my squishy newborn. But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't feeling really, really sad about not being pregnant anymore. I miss my bump. I miss out on two whole fun appointments! I miss the anticipation. It's a ridiculous thing to feel sad about, but...there you have it.

....or maybe not.

2011-02-26T07:55:00.004-06:00

February baby, huh? Ohhh, Kaitlyn Mae...you little stinker:)

What's more shocking- that she came a week and a half early, or that we finally settled on a name as soon as the epidural was in?

I...yeah. I'm not sure!

So far, it's a totally different experience, in some good ways and some less than pleasant. With Grace, I got to the hospital and got the epidural immediately. It numbed me completely and removed any and all urge to push, and I labored and labored afterwards. Pushing Grace out took 22 minutes and felt like a breeze. Her little 8-lb self finally came out, looking like she'd been through ten rounds, and ohhhhh, was she PISSED OFF. A feeling that did not change for, um, a few months, we'll say:) with Katie, I labored at home much, much longer, and then when we finally got to the hospital, had to wait for approximately a week and a half for the epidural. (ok, or maybe an hour and a half or something like that.) People. I do NOT do pain. I don't know how anyone does that completely natural, but it is never, ever in the cards for me. But the differences didnt' stop there- when I finally got this epi, it was absolutely *perfect*. Took away all the pain, but none of the pressure from the contractions. I immediately knew when I was ready to push, and was able to use that as a guide. Katie popped out after five minutes of the most intense pushing I can possibly imagine, so tiny she was barely swollen at all, so quiet they took her away for a few minutes to wake her up a bit. She never did scream, though- they decided not to worry about it when she pinked up anyway. Nursed like she'd been doing it for ages, and drifted back to sleep, which ended up being our pattern for the entire night.

Our little peanut, our second daughter.

Grace made us parents, and Katie made Grace a big sister. Each girl changing our family in the most amazing way.

I can't wait for them to meet.

Uno Punto Cinco Por Segundo

2011-02-24T18:15:00.003-06:00

It's really funny how different the whole OB visit is between baby number one and baby number two.

With Grace, I went to every appointment between 36 and 40 weeks praying for some change, ANY change. I never got it until the very, very end. They stressed that I would have to go ten days past my due date for induction (which, on the one hand, I did not want, but on the other hand, I did NOT want to stay pregnant forever and ever). They assured me that I shouldn't be expecting cervical changes, that it meant nothing that I wasn't having them.

This time, I've been going to each appointment hoping to be told, "Ohhh, you have awhile yet! Nothing going on down here!" And until today, I got just that. Today the doctor said I'm dilated to 1.5cm, which shocked me a bit (but only a little, after I woke up in the middle of the night a few days ago with some intensely weird feelings that made me wonder if something was going on). The doctor was also shocked- that I wasn't dilated more. She said a second-time mom at 38 weeks and change is usually dilated further. I explained that I have a cervix of steel so she should not be surprised (left out the part about leaping buildings in a single bound). She asked me what my plan is- am I getting induced, or waiting? I was really taken aback, especially after getting the opposite spiel with Grace. I told her I'm waiting. She stressed that she would not induce me today, as I am not favorable at this point, but that it could be different by next week. I told her no thank you. (Role reversal, much?) We talked a bit more about it, and it turns out I can only go seven days, not ten, past my due date this time. I'm really okay with that, it's only a three-day difference and as much as I don't want to go early, I have my own worries about aging placentas.

Oh, and it wasn't my imagination or the angle of the pictures- Segundo measured 37cm this week, a 3cm growth from last week. Packing on the fat for life in the world:)

Of course, last week, when I was sick as a dog, the weather was slightly warmer (aka downright balmy for February in Chicago) and the snow melted and everything. Now that I am healthy, it's turning cold and snowy and hideous. FIGURES. I would've LOVED to get one last outdoor run in before this baby comes, but I guess it's not in the cards. Though I guess we'll have to see what the cervix of steel is doing next week before I decide that for sure;)