Tales from the Locker Room

Every week, it's the same thing. I DREAD swimming. I don't wanna get into a stupid bathing suit. I don't wanna drive all the way out there. I don't wanna get in the water. I don't wanna chase her all over the locker room while I'm trying to dry off and get dressed and then do the same for her. She's getting HEAVY and the class is getting to be a serious work-out. I swear that this is our last session and I'm not signing up next time. Then we go and she has so much fun that I think, ohhh, but she loves it! This week, she started clapping when we were a block away, and saying, "wawa! wawa!"

Today when we were getting dressed (or I was getting dressed and she was running around in a swimming diaper, closing herself in various lockers), a woman came to the locker on the end of the section and started changing. And kept smiling at me. Staring right at people and smiling is creepy when you're naked, people. But Grace got revenge, because she found a candy wrapper on the floor, carried it over to the woman's purse, dropped it in, and walked away. The woman did not notice. I did not say anything.

After we were both dressed and I had everything packed up, I realized I left her diaper on the floor. I handed it to her and asked her to please throw it away. She immediately trotted over to the garbage can and threw it away. I seriously don't know what's up with this kid and throwing things in the garbage, but I'll take it.

They have canvases all over the locker room, painted in solid colors. I have no idea why she loves them so much, but she does. It's how I figured out she knew her colors, she kept pointing at only the blue ones and saying, "boooo!!!!" and eventually worked up to "ghee" and "lala". On the way out of the room, there's one green and one yellow canvas. Every week, she wants to be picked up so she can touch them on the way out. This week, she kept touching and patting and rubbing them, so I told her, "Okay Gracie, say bye bye to green and yellow!" And my mute little girl said, "Bye Ghee! Bye Lala!"

so FINE. We'll keep going to stupid swimming. I mean, damn, I'm not made of STONE. Plus, I'm all tired and pregnant and not really very much fun for her, already, and I can only imagine it's going to get worse over the next few months. She needs the activity, the fun, the structure, and the time with kids her own age. But I'm still going to whine about it. At least, until she starts doing things like speaking in sentences because of swimming.

dang, this kid is consistent!

So, I'm sitting on the couch, feeling miserable and sorry for myself (Segundo is making my pledge to enjoy this pregnancy entirely impossible), and I decided to distract myself by reading my own archives. Eventually, I came across this.

It is so funny to me how she has the exact same personality now that she did then.

The list of dislikes? IDENTICAL, to this day. Well, now she sleeps until 5:30 instead of 4:30, and will even occasionally give me a 6am, but aside from that minor difference, she hates all the same things! Por ejemplo: now that it's cooler, we're putting her in shoes and socks instead of sandals or crocs. The MINUTE we walk in the door, she plops down and holds her feet up for us to take her shoes off. She then strips off her socks and runs around barefoot. I mean it, she does not make it two feet from the door before she does this. It's pretty darn cute. Otro ejemplo: she still gets pissed off and cries with every diaper change. I am not at all sure what is so objectionable about such service, but she is not a fan.

Oh, and if fingernails were bad, they're NOTHING compared to toe nails. *shudder*

She also still looooves swimming, and she loves to eat. We went to lunch today and she had scrambled eggs and sauteed veggies. She picked up a long piece of spinach, right out of the middle of the plate, tipped her head back, and ate it like a cartoon character. Ate her eggs with a fork. Took a teeny sip of my chai, licked her lips, and said, "Mmmmmm!"

Of course, none of that compares with her new tricks. Just this week, she started running after us with both index fingers pointed, saying "tickatickaticka!", trying to tickle us.

Even when it's hard, it just keeps getting better.

ZOMG! I'm psychic!!

For real!

Not so much the actual entry, but the last line of my comment in response.

How did I KNOW?!??!

Hail Mary...

We have had a busy weekend and my poor little overtired monkey is feelin' it. OH, the tantrums. The crazed running in circles because she's so amped up, she doesn't know what else to do with herself. Did I mention the tantrums?

It used to be easier. She used to melt down at 6pm, and we had no choice but to leave. If she rallied, she rallied, and she'd still be okay the next day. Now she totally does the second-wind thing, where she gets this crazy burst of energy and I lose track of time and fail to get her in bed at a reasonable hour. I watch her toss and turn for an hour on the spy-cam, but know that she will still be up the next day at 5am. God help us if we have errands to run, because she'll fall asleep in the car, pushing back her nap, which pushes back her bedtime, which perpetuates the cycle. GAH.

Today we stuck close to home. She woke up in such a foul mood, we didn't really have a choice. It was totally obvious I'd stretched her way too far and the entire focus today needs to be on SLEEEEP.

Minus her power nap in the car? She fell asleep eating lunch at 11:45. Here begins the novena that she sleeps until at least 2:30.

Looking On The Bright Side...

Grace isn't exactly known for her awesome sleeping habits. Her naps are either short, or start at 2pm and last through dinner time, leaving her amped up well past bedtime. She still has a seriously frustrating habit of waking up at 5am every day (unless, of course, I'm getting up for work, on which days she will often sleep past 6, and sometimes even until I wake her up). I, on the other hand? Ohhhh. I know the joys of sleep. Burrowing down under the covers and staying there all day. Getting up only to laze around on the couch. I once slept for seventeen hours. I was working nights at the time, so my sleep was really messed up, but I still did it. (In my defense, I was appropriately horrified when I woke up and saw the clock said 3pm.)

Anyway.

This morning, I realized there IS a bright side to this. On the rare occasions when I need to wake her up (get her dressed, send her to MIL's before I go to work. I've never, EVER had to wake her on my day off. But then, I bet you knew that)? You have never seen anyone wake up so easily and happily. Or maybe you have, I don't know. This is generally how it goes when someone tries to wake me up:

you: (gently touching my shoulder and whispering)Kathy?
me: GRUNT
you:...hey, Kath? we gotta go.
me:GRUUUUNT
you: ...um. Kathy?
me: RAWR
you: (screaming in pain because I just clawed your face off)

When I go in to wake up Grace? Usually she's barely still asleep, and the light from the bathroom is enough to wake her up. She squints for a millisecond, pops her eyes open, breaks out in the biggest smile you have EVER seen. Jumps to her feet, starts waving her blanket around and saying, "BEEEEEEEE!" Hears Sam in the hallway, leans over the side of her crib, waving and saying, "DOGDOGDOGDOGDOG!!"

It's a pretty awesome way to start the day.

well, now that it's out there...

(I mean, not that anyone who actually reads here was surprised to hear about Segundo;)

I remember learning in nursing school that women forget how much labor hurts. That later, they say, "Ohhh, it wasn't so bad!" That is NOT MY EXPERIENCE. I mean, I can't tell you exactly how it felt, but I can tell you I was in agony. Admittedly, I am a big, giant wuss, but my POINT is, I haven't forgotten how awful it was. The strange thing, that I knew was strange, even when it was happening, was how quickly I forgot the suckitude of pregnancy.

I, um, did not like being pregnant. And within seconds of G's birth, I forgot all of it. The nausea, insomnia, back pain, restless legs, fatigue, constant sinus headaches...poof. Gone.

Part of that was our newborn experience. Look, I know nobody's newborn is easy. I also know I am really vocal and dramatic and so there's no way anybody really believes it was that bad. People just giggle and think, ohhh, KATHY. There you go again! Or roll their eyes. I get it. I really do. But just trust me on this: HELL. It was hell. It was beyond anything I could have imagined. Dante was like, "Whoa, dude. That's some messed-up shit." So really, even though I did not enjoy being pregnant, ohhh, it was SO much easier than attempting to console the inconsolable.

But more than that? I really, genuinely forgot. Months went by before I thought, oh crap, that's right, I had that weird thing with my legs where it felt like I had little electric shocks running through them anytime I sat still for more than a millisecond. Huh. Weird that I would forget that.

And then I got pregnant again. Ho-lee cow. I forgot! I forgot the mind-bending nausea, the gagging over the taste of tap water, the heavy-lidded exhaustion. The bloat. But? It's really weird. It's harder this time- I don't get to spend all my non-work time curled up in a ball, watching tv. I never, ever get to sleep until my body decides to wake up. Y'know, I have responsibilities beyond my own selfish self. But in some weird way, it almost makes it easier. Like, ok, yeah, I feel like crap. But I have bigger things to worry about now. NOT that it's stopped me from whining incessantly, as anyone reading this already knows. I do have to say though, objectively, there's something about already being a mom that makes this more tolerable.

Also, now that we've passed the twelve week mark, I'm actually starting to believe we might get an actual baby out of this deal. Yippee!!!

If I Ever

start talking about moving into another 100 year old house when we are finally able to move from this house?

Please remind me about the time Stephen went to work out, and not five minutes later, a horrible, plasticky rattling sound came from behind the sideboard. Where we have a mousetrap. And how that rattling continued until Stephen came home and rescued me from the rattling trap. (and how UTTERLY WORTHLESS our stupid dog was, staring at me blankly while a trapped, probably half-dead mouse, tried to escape from the trap, climb my leg, eat my face and give me hanta virus.)

I am hoping that is all the reminder I'll need to rethink such a totally stupid idea.