HOSTBODY - Diary of a Mad ex-Pregnant Woman

Dear comment spammer, THANK YOU!

2010-03-22T13:15:00.000-07:00

No, not because I really needed a new source for underground viagra, or to 'make many moneys on the web', but for the laugh. I needed it...
I'd enabled anonymous comments on this blog, mainly because I hate having to log in elsewhere to comment, so I went all 'do unto others'. Until recently I'd not been on the receiving end of comment spam, in fact, I was unaware such a thing existed, but I guess my blog has been around just long enough to get spidered by the spambots, and my has my comment traffic gone up!
I haven't had 2 seconds to rub together, much less the 30+ minutes needed to post, but there's a difference between a lull in posting, and letting your blog totally go to seed. Not pretty wildflower seed, kudzu seed. THAT you FIND time to stop so I finally got in here today to do some clean up.
In the comment purge the vast majority were total wastes of vowels - but this gem stood out from the rest for it's sheer ee cummings artistry. I've been collecting spam emails for a while for the eloquence of their randomness. And for giggles. But this tops them all - If this isn't poetry, I don't know what is....
Ladies and Gentlemen, I present "The Ulysses of His System" - enjoy the poetic artistry:

Send where us
at ground, varies its possible "family set"?

Countrywide financial corporation, the explicit introduction import, that has used to convey agentic of
the systems of
the compulsory setup d a t a b a s e .

Many side motorcycles were an special world
information to adopt the number belts,
deformed - with the slot for both

the gun

and

players,

but were a story, since
biological equipment of the references built a special stage

of the crime

and vast gauge of the projected car
(unless the grass was offset with limits from the flexibility. )

used cars
delray beach.
These remedies, and the hand model points . . . that wireless!

(when they show)
can affect concentration
and single automakers
and measure our car
and sensor of the lake.

Car upholstery
chicagp,
wilson, (usually played as valerie plame),
and the bush dust's barre for 2003 administration of iraq
and the iraq war.
Reingested

of the trench tires
has an hybrid auto of material.

Jasper is running. . .where?
the available bleeding gums, murphy decides, nearly.

As level students pulled
the ulysses of his system,
Monoxide, they found - a applied corresponding drawback.

-SPAMART #3

(All the original artists words and spelling were retained intact - spacing and some punctuation contributed by me)

New Year's Resolutions - Twenty10s in 2010.

2010-01-13T10:30:00.000-08:00

I've been ruminating on my New Year's Resolutions for a while now. Part of it is my usual info junkieism/bigger, better, stronger, faster perfectionist side (And I admit it). But the larger part of the intense thought is wanting to really change things. While I, overall, am quite happy with my life, I know in my heart of hearts that my life could be. . . well, easier, more FUN.

I've been doing a lot of reflecting and research and drafting and redrafting of my life style reboot, and will continue to work on it for the foreseeable future. I gave myself permission for it to be an ongoing process, but I have locked at least a few things down. I decided that I would come up with Twenty10s for 2010. Twenty "10" framed goals for the year. For example: I will lose 10% of my body weight, I will avoid sodas for 10 weeks straight, I will invest at least 10 minutes a day in growing my friendships (a call, an email, a dinner - SOMEthing). You get the idea. The BIG "10" goals will be lined up roughly one per month, since it takes 3-4 weeks for a habit to stick, and I want to be sane about this. The rest of the 10s will come up, well, whenever they occur to me.

While researching ideas my Twenty10s I ran into a NYT article - "Carpe Diem? Maybe Tomorrow" based on this study on "Resource Slack". The upshot is people somehow expect that they will have more time in "The Future", so we put things off, even fun things, until "later" when there will be (magically) more time to do them. However, on average, people will be just as busy in a month as they are now. For some reason, we don't get that. And these fun, or not so fun but important things just don't get done.

This was an eye-opener for me. I realized how often I fell prey to this thinking - that I'd do something next weekend, or later, because I'd have more time then. Except there won't be more time - you can't grow it or create it. It's a constant, so it's really about how you choose to fill it.
Even worse, I'd gotten trapped in the mindset that there 'isn't enough time'.

'Not enough' is a judgment - not enough time, not enough money, not enough space. It all is, what it is. Pushing against the reality with a crabbity attitude isn't going to change the truth of things - it will just make you more crabbity. The amount of time is a constant, and it won't change. The same thing applies to our home, 'not enough' space, and our bank account, 'not enough' money. There is just as much space as there is, and just as much time as there is, and just as much money as there is, and being frustrated that something isn't what it isn't - ain't helping. I simply have to figure out how to work within the real restrictions of what's there, or not there.

In a way, though I am right - there ISN'T enough time for everything I'm trying to do - there are only 24 hours in the day. Period. So whatever I do has to fit within those constraints. In prioritizing what to tackle first, I realized one of the biggest time sucks I have, is the stuff. The more stuff you have, the more stuff you have to clean, sort, stack, maintain, manage, or otherwise just DEAL with. So the shortcut to more time, is, oddly, less stuff. In one fell mind-set swoop I've gone from 'not enough' to 'too much'.

Plus, getting rid of stuff has benefits across the board - there isn't enough space for everything we own, so less stuff means more room. And less stuff means BUYING less stuff, which means spending less money which = working within our budget. Win/win/win/win!

Which leads me to my first big 10 of 2010. Get rid of 10 things a day. Every day. No matter how tired or busy or cranky - at least 10 things need to be gathered up and ushered out of my life. On weekends, the count goes much much higher, but every day, rock bottom minimum - 10 things. I've gotten a solid start on the 'things' part of decluttering by just picking away at it - 10 things a day. It's working, and I'm sticking too it, because it's doable. Once the momentum has started, its a bit easier to keep it going, because it feels so good. Things feel easier already.

Decluttering day to day tasks, commitments, to-dos - all those are up next, and they will free up even more time, but for now, one thing at a time - because there's only so much time to go around...

If anyone wants to join me on my Twenty10s in 2010 - I'd love to have company! I'll be posting on my Twenty10s throughout the next few months (and probably the whole year). Post your own starting "10"s in the comments and keep us updated on progress, via blog links, twitter hashtag #twenty10s, or new comments.

Wordless Wednesday - Love

2009-11-04T06:26:00.000-08:00

GrandPa and The Bean (and Elmo, of course)

Thank goodness for Wordless Wednesdays, it's the only post I have time to make these days...

Stop the madness!

2009-08-06T08:50:00.000-07:00

Life is just hectic - and I'm not sure why. Oh wait, yes, I do know this one. I have a toddler. And a full time job. Both of these are good things - but they are squeezing out pretty much everything else, save occasional errands and my husband. Friends have been relegated to Facebook and Twitter, and face to face contact with anyone I don't a) live with or b) work with had become a rare and exotic occurrence. Which, frankly, sucks. And forget hobbies - the art that I love and can't find time for. The craft projects undone. Blogs unwritten - it's all falling away. And this is SO not cool. Don't get me wrong, I get the life balance CONCEPT, but the practical application part is where it all collapses.
There's also some portion of the fast. cheap, and right theory that ends up applying. Since the Hubble is going back to school full time, we are on a bit of a budget. A lot of the 'tips' designed to help a working women achieve life balance assume a certain amount of disposable income - hiring a mother's helper a few times a week, having meals delivered regularly, outsourcing the day to day basically. Good in theory but not practical to the pocketbook. Daycare pretty much cleans out the disposable income category.
Mercifully, the Hubble is generally a rock star and helps out tremendously with the Bean and around the house. But school is starting back full time in a couple of weeks and even that help is going to be less available. So how to do it? How do you do it all?
The bottom line is, you can't. That's what no one bothers to tell woman - that this bring home the bacon, fry it up in the pan crap is just that crap. There are inviolable limits in the real world - things take time, and time doesn't expand. (Well, unless you want to get all string theory, and I just don't have the brain power to even consider the implications.) Mother's kill themselves chasing the impossible dream of having it all - and then getting confused and frustrated and resentful when they seem to never be able to achieve this 'balanced' state. What they don't realize is that there are simply too many things to balance.
Working full time means that during the week, I get very little time with the most precious knee-high creature in my life since she's zonked by 7:30. That means weekends are all about family time. Which in turn pushes out friends and me-time. And all of these are vital to me being sane. So what to do?
The past year and 1/2 have forced me to come to the conclusion that to achieve this mythical work life balance, you have to give things up. Maybe just for a day or a week or a year, but you can NOT have it all, and you will drive yourself batty trying. Many women give up work for a a couple of years, so they can focus on their child. This has a bunch of pros and cons, but for me, it's moot. With the hubs in school full-time my income is it. It's all good because he's building a future for ALL of us with his new degree. But it does mean I have to be a 'can't lose' employee at work, which means zero slacking allowed. So working ain't going anywhere, but the other pieces and parts that make up a fulfilling life, friends, time with the little one, time with the Hubble, time for ME, those parts can bend and move and twist. And bend and move they must - time to start giving it up, cause I can't have it all - at least not all AT THE SAME TIME. So with that mind set, I've started the horse trading.
This weekend, I'm going to have some over-night friend time (a high school reunion/birthday event), and in 3 weeks, a girl's weekend. A couple of weeks after that, I'm taking 7 days off work, and the Hubble, Stinky Bean and I are going on vacation together. So I'm trading family for friends, then I'm trading work for family. The art - my personal passions, those I'm still working on - what do I swap for those and when, but I know I'll find some time, sometime. Ultimately, it's a shell game - there's never enough time for everything. But, if you are able to say 'not now' there is enough time for SOME things.
So ladies - you can't have it all, all the time, at the same time - but over time, with some juggling and compromise and a serious resetting of expectations - you CAN have an awful lot of it...
screw this bringing home the bacon and frying up in a pan crap - the new marching orders? I'm going to have my bacon and eat it too - so there.

Fake or Real?

2009-07-24T18:31:00.000-07:00

I've been watching the Blogher '09 tweets fly fast and furious for the past few days and feeling a combination of regret and relief that I'm not there. Regret because it sounds like such FUN - and so many people who I've gotten to know and really like through twitter and their blogs are there, all in one place. I could meet them in person! And that's where the relief kicks in... there's a certain safety in the 'anonymity' of tweeting and blogging. But once you meet someone IRL, once you can put a face to the name, things change. It's the Seinfeld "world's colliding" scenario.
Online life is often completely segregated from real world. In some cases its logistics. Some of my favorite twitter friends are in Canada, and Seattle, and Maine. It would be tough for us to get together for lunch. But Blogher, THAT we could coordinate, maybe. But what if we don't like each other in person, what if it just doesn't translate? That would just blow, but odds are, that's the last thing that would happen. People are who they are, regardless of which world they are in... If you like someone on line, you'll like them in person.
The other source of the relief centers on the conference itself. It's a BLOGGING conference - If I went to Blogher, since I'm an attendee and a chick, people would think that *I* was a BLOGGER. I'd be totally misrepresenting. *I*m not a blogger.... I mean, yes, I have a blog - you are reading it, so you know that. But I'm not, like, a BLOGGER. REAL bloggers post every single day, and make money and have sponsors and fans and banner ads and are so WAAAAAY cooler than me. I just blog sometimes, I'm not really a BLOGGER. HerBadMother and Sweetney (really everyone at MamaPop), and basically all the smart clever women I've met on twitter, THOSE are BLOGGERS. Me? I'm a just chick with a Blog...(see: 'Impostor Syndrome')
But maybe, just maybe, not everyone at that conference makes six figures a year off of their adsense accounts. Maybe the conference is full of women just like me - normal people, who blog when they can, as best they can, not because they have a huge adoring audience who demands it, but because they like to - who go to the conference because they want to meet other people, just like them, who just blog for the love of it.
Or maybe they go just for the swag...
Either way, I'm thinking I need to start saving now for 2010...

I have nothing

2009-07-10T09:00:00.000-07:00

Really. I've got nothin'. Which is surprising since I normally have a million ideas, and words and just STUFF bouncing around in my brain, but recently... nada. Just a yearning for sleep and endless to do lists. And this bothers me more than you can imagine. I'm not sure the WHYs of this change, but I wish I did know. My deep and abiding fear is that I used up all of my creativity making a human from scratch and I've got nothing left.
I LOVE being creative, it is a big part of who I am and how I view myself - but these days, I'm suffering from an identity crisis. I sleep I work I hang with the Hubble and I care for the Stinks - and it's all good, but I don't create. I make dinner, I don't make art. I'm suffering from a severe and measurable lack of inspiration.
Is it because I am exhausted? I hope so. Or because I haven't put anything inspiring into my brain? Maybe. I'm really really hoping that its lifestyle or tiredness or not visiting enough art galleries. See these options are fixable - they would mean that I'm still creative - I'm just too tired or busy to DO it. And that can be changed. My fear is that I'm not creative anymore. That I've lost that spark - that I gave birth to it, or that is just died from lack of tending and that I'll never get it back. And that terrifies me. So much so, that it's a self fulfilling prophecy. I'm now afraid to even TRY to create - to force it without the inspiration, because what if it really IS gone? Then what? The who am I? And thus begins the panic.
Something is going to have to change though - I need creativity in my life - it's who I am - or at least who I was. I'm going to have to take a class, or paint something, or sculpt something - I'm going to have to find out if, somewhere under all the powerpoint presentations and spreadsheets and budgets and laundry, there is still a woman who can make beautiful things. Because if not... well... I don't want to even think about that...

Makes me smile EVERY TIME...

2009-06-17T11:58:00.000-07:00

I just LOVE the cuteness! Ah childhood - where did it go?

Bad to the bone

2009-06-09T13:00:00.000-07:00

Her Bad Mother: The Bad Mother Manifesto

First of all - go read this. Right now. (insert Musak version of Purple Rain) you done?
Back now?
OK - let's discuss.
This post was eye-opening to me and apparently to many many other mothers. What was eye-opening to ME is that many other mothers found it eye-opening. And that is sad.
For those of you who lied and said they read that post without actually reading the brilliance, let me summerize - Media definitions of 'good mothering' are ridonkulous, dehibilitiating, demoralizing and full of crap, and we, meaning all mothers, should rise up and call bullsh*t on it all. We need to shrug off the yoke of stupid expectations and just focus on loving our kids and being honest with them, and ourselves, and especially, each other.
I love this, but was a little surprised at how many mothers were shocked, SHOCKED, to discover that other mothers struggle. That other mothers aren't perfect and don't color coordinate their kids socks, or home make baby food, or spend hours developing their tot's brains with classical music and latin flashcards. Good God people you have a child, you should know better than to buy that crap! MOST mothers are excited when everyone, including themselves, simply survives the day.
I started my blog when I was pregnant, and I didn't glow, I bloated. I didn't have magical dreams, I barely slept. I didn't float, I could barely walk without blinding cootchie pain. It sucked, and I was pretty clear about that from day one. I guess that honesty just stayed intact, cause I am more than happy to post about just how much of a butt-head my beloved child is becoming now that toddler-hood has hit. And about the suckitude of every other stage to date, 'cause, well, it's true. I'm also just as happy to blog about the sheer joy of hearing her giggle, and the thrill of her learning how to give a kiss (I will regret teaching her that when the hormones kick in I'm sure). I'm pretty bummed to discover that approach is not the norm.
I think the reason that I was mostly able to avoid falling prey to the 'perfect mom' syndrome is because I have amazing friends, both real and virtual. Mommies who aren't afraid to say, I love my kid, but I don't much LIKE them right at this moment. Friend who said, ignore the hype, just do what feels right. Twitter moms and blogger moms who are huge fans of gnomes, and bubblewrap, and Xanax, and who always offer sympathetic non-judgmental support when you have a 'holy f I'm losing my mind' mommy moment. And there are many of those.
The worst days were the early ones, when you are exhausted and clueless and terrified. That's when the 'authorities' can really get in your head and screw with you. The sheer panic and desperation of the early days of your first child can not be overestimated. It's horrible. And who do you turn to? No one teaches you how to be a mom, all you have are the books and the tv shows and the news articles. I think this is a core failing of life as we know it today - everyone is mobile, no one is anchored and we've lost the community of mom's next door and grandmothers passing on their knowledge (however flawed), and the history of mothers helping mothers.
Or we had, until the mommy blogger phenominon. Women like HerBadMother and every single mother who ever wrote a blog post, commented on a blog post, even read a blog post, tweeted dug or facebooked. We are rebuilding that vital community that we all need to be mothers. We are sharing knowledge, and creating the support network that can guide us and help us as we perform the most difficult job in the world - raising a child. Specifically raising a child to not be a d*ckhead.
And all communities, all relationships are built on trust, and trust comes from honesty. So mommies who blog, mommies who comment, mommies who just talk to other mommies on the playground - don't lie. Tell the truth - if you are struggling, SAY you are struggling, it gives the rest of us the chance to help. If another mother tells you she is struggling, don't be a d*ckhead yourself - HELP! Tell the truth, tell them you were there, tell them you survived, tell them what you wish someone had told YOU when you were in the same place. Don't front to make yourself look good. It's selfish and dishonest and isolating to the parties on both sides. You deny all of us the opportunity to help or to be helped, and you feed the ultimate lie - that there is a RIGHT wat to mommy.
We all deserve better than that.
Love your kid, love yourself, and tell the truth, for it shall set you free...
Preach on HerBadMother!

Vacation?

2009-06-05T13:26:00.000-07:00

Vacation is all about rest and relaxation, right? Well, yes, if you are single, or even a couple (provided the descriptor is 'happy'), but throw a kid in the mix and relaxing isn't really the word anymore. It can be fun, or interesting, but with a kid, regardless of setting, there is no downtime. Especially if your special little kidlet loathes napping. And toting the sheer volume of crap involved with kid care is a passel of work in and of itself. I freely admit to being an overpacker, but not to any level of insanity, just, you know, a few too many outfits for the circumstances. Not 3 suitcases worth or anything. I say this with mild defensiveness considering our car was literally packed to the ceiling with baby crap. In the end, we used nearly all of it, so I felt somewhat vindicated. I also found myself thinking, you know, maybe a minivan isn't such a bad idea...

A little vacation compare and contrast for those of you living the kid free life -

With Baby - The 4-hour drive required a food stop, a diaper stop, a run around in circles stop, and a juice stop along the way.

Before Baby - 4 -hour drive is done in 3 hours and you pee in a cup to get to the beach faster.

With Baby - pack the car with 47 cubic tons of baby crap

Before Baby - put underware, swimsuit, and a credit card in a backpack and call it overpacking.

With Baby - stay at a 2 star motel 'suite' with a fridge for the milk, a microwave for the baby food, and 2 rooms so you have somewhere to hide when the baby goes to bed at 7pm (at least until you go to bed at 8pm).

Before Baby - stay at a 5 star hotel suite with a jacuzzi tub and a king size bed covered in 1000 treadcount linens that you never use cause you are out at the swim up bar until 2am, before swinging over to the all night on grounds club to do jello shots, and end up sleeping on the beach.

With Baby - spend 45 minutes setting up all the beach canopies, blankies, towels and toys, only to bundle them all back up 30 minutes later when you realized how badly you mis-timed the need for napping as indicated by the ear-bleeding screaming so shrill it brought the lifeguard over to your encampment just to 'check in'.

Without Baby - arrive at the beach at 6am with towel and book, lie down, nap, roll over, drink a fruity drink, nap, roll over again, read, nap, and leave at 6pm.

Ah, how times have changed.

In spite of the last night being chockfull of teething misery, overall, for baby's first vacation, I declare the trip a success. Every last bit of it was worth it for this:

Mother's Day Surprise

2009-05-15T08:16:00.000-07:00

The Hubble took me and The Bean out for breakfast on Mother's Day. What I really wanted was to sleep THROUGH breakfast well into mid afternoon or perhaps dinner time, but schedules unfortunately did not allow. Nor will they likely ever allow until roughly 15 years from now, best case. The week before we just had an anniversary, and his gift had finally showed up, so when we started our meal I said, "Hey babe, I have your anniversary present. I've been trying to decided when to give it to you, and now seems as good a time as any." He looked at me and said,

"Are you pregnant?"

[Pregnant?! WTF?!?]

Me: "Um.... no. No, I'm not. Why on EARTH did your mind go there?!"

Him: "Oh I dunno, it just did."

[Are you CRAZY?! I just shed enough baby blubber to get back into my fat pants! Pregnant AGAIN?! *snort*]

Me: "Oh, um, well...I'm not. Pregnant, I mean. Not."

Him: "OK, well, that's just what I thought you were going to say..."

Me: "Um, yeah, no. Not pregnant.

[long pause while curiousity overpowers good sense]

But, well. . . what was your reaction? Before I clarified that I was not in the family way, I mean?"
Him: "Elation - and some serious questions about finances and logistics. But mostly elation."

[Wait - He'd actually WANT another baby?!]

Me: "Seriously?! Wow. Um . . . huh."

Him: "What? It's surprising that I would be excited to make another one of these [gesturing to kidlet vigorously rubbing pancakes into her hair] with my beloved wife?"

Me: "Well, [looking at kidlet now vigorously rubbing bananas into her hair] they do have their downsides. . . plus, we'd not really TALKed about it. So I guess I was just . . . surprised, is all."

Him: "What, do you NOT want to have another one?"

[Damn. That is a good question. DO I want another baby?]

Me: "Oh! Well, No. Not NOT want to have another one. But I wouldn't mind a good night's sleep before we started again. If we WERE going to. Which we aren't, right now, at least. Are we?"

Him: "Well, probably not. I mean, not NOW. With school and finances the timing might not be ideal. "

[Um, have ya SEEN our bank statement recently?]

Me: "Um, no. Not ideal is the understatement of the century."

Him: "But I guess there never is a GOOD time, for something like this...."

[especially since I'm not getting any younger, and we can't wait too long if we really DID want another one cause it might not happen...]

Me: "True, I suppose . . . but still, RIGHT now may be VERY not good vs. kinda not good. Maybe."

Him: "So, yeah. Not now, I guess."

[The physical and emotional toll, the constant what if worries, the blood pressure nightmare, the chance of birth defects, the loss of sleep before AND after, and doing it all with a rambuncious toddler? I can't honestly say I'm ready to sign up for that today.]`

Me: "Yeah, I guess not. Not NOW, like 'this second' now."

Him: "But not 'never', right?"

[looking over at toddler styling her hair into a crazy spike-y mohawky mess and *squee*ing with the pure joy of it all.]

Me: "No. Definitely not 'never'.

[Baby giggles get me every time.]

So, um, anyway. . .

I got you tickets to Cirque du Soleil."

Happy Belated Mother's Day!

Dessert Sushi!

2009-04-29T08:02:00.000-07:00

<-- Dessert Sushi NOM NOM NOM!!!! These were an insanely huge hit at a work event, and when I say insane I mean batsh*t feeding frenzy INSANE. People LOVED these! Plus, much fun to make. I may just quit and start my own sushi making company. I shouldn't reveal all my trade secrets, but since the new business hasn't exactly taken off (i.e. no one has offered me money in exchange for making these - odd.), but while I wait (and wait and wait ;-)) I figured I could at least contribute goodness to the blogosphere. Behold - step by step process to making dessert sushi!

HOW TO MAKE DESSERT SUSHI

Step 1: Go buy a lot of sweet stuff My ingredients list included: Rice Crispie Cereal, Marshmallows, Gummy worms, Fruit leather, Dried fruit (spears and slices mostly), and butter - of course.
Cause nothing goes better with sugar than butter.

Step 2: Sushi Rolls - lay out your rolls BEFORE making the rice crispie treats on a piece of parchment paper or a sushi rolling mat, if you are SUPERHARDCORE. I am not. Thus the parchment paper. The RCTreats are quick and easy in the microwave (just follow the instructions on the package), but accent on the quick. These harden up fast and once they do harden, we're talking concrete, so you have to move FAST. Prep first THEN mix, cause unrolling that freakin' fruit leather without tearing it is a real patience tester, you don't need the Jeopardy theme playing in your head on top of it.

Step 3:
Spread the RCTreats on your fruit leather, then lay the centers in - I used one or two flavors of gummy worms and dried papaya spears. Then roll it up like a regular sushi roll. Don't be afraid to squish the ever livin' crap out of it. Those little crispies are hardier than you'd think.

Step 4:
Slice!

Keep your knife sharp and clean, 'cause these buggers are sticky and the knife will catch if it gets dirty. I had a harder time than I want to admit cutting these flat and the same size (note jaunty angle of the cut). When they are stacked side by side you can really tell. Squishing into more acceptable tolerances is possible, but you can only get an eighth of an inch-ish best case, so try to measure each cut off of the previous one to keep them at least in the same ball park .

Step 5:
Nigiri - mix the CRTreats and wad them into mounds. Smoosh the bottoms on parchment paper so they'll sit flat. By batch 3, I was fast enough to use the RCTreats leftover from the sushi rolls to make Nigiri bases, but first go around I'd recommend saving yourself the stress and doing a totally separate batch.

Step 6:
Measure your strips of fruit leather to wrap twice around each piece. I was using Fruit by the Foot, color by the foot, and it was wicked thin so I doubled up. Other brands might treat you more kindly, so the double-up is optional - your call.

Step 7:
Drape your slice of dried Mango on top of the nigiri RCTreat base then wrap with your 'seaweed' band - and by 'drape' I mean, forcibly make conform to the top of the rice ball. The RCTreats are sticky enough to keep the 'fish' on top especially with the fruit leather strapped around the whole shebang. I did use left over fruit by the foot as an adhesive for my alternative fruit strap made of organic green apple fruit leather (Whole Paycheck, of course).
Pretty but not as effective as the probably chemical laden and I'm sure wholely un-organic Fruit by the Foot.

Step 7:
Admire the glory of your sushi!

So I went totally out of control and got some sushi to go containers. I packaged them in groups with a small pile of shaved dried pineapple and a green gummy candy as wasabi. (I'm thinking next time will be colored marshmallow creme, or icing - depending on which looks better).

So the final result?

Drum roll please....

SWEET! ;-)

First steps!

2009-04-27T13:36:00.000-07:00

As a first time mommy, I pretty much got nuttin'. I have zippy info on what to expect from, well, anything in this process. So I find myself regularly surprised (read: baffled) by some developmental milestone/behavioral change/general new weirdness on the part of my child. The latest WTF appeared this weekend after she took what could arguably be called her first steps.
She's been doing this 'step LUNGE' thing for a week or two now, but this was a step up (heh heh). This was 3 full steps IN A ROW! I know in my heart of hearts that these were her TRUE first steps, mainly because I turned the video camera off approximately .03 seconds before she took said steps. Proof in my mind, cause that's just my gift of timing.
So cheers and huzzahs, mostly, with a slight underlying tinge of 'oh crap, we are REALLY going to have to step up the baby proofing and how in the holy hell am I going to be able to get anything productive done ever again while she is conscious?!'. But mostly cheers and huzzahs. She then proceeded the spend the next 45 minutes practicing - teetering precariously between The Hubble and I. As soon as she got to one of us she U-Turned and started back to the other - back and forth back and forth. Squee-ing the whole time in delight.
I knew that she was due for her first step, and that it's a neato milestone and how wonderful it's supposed to be. And it was exciting and sweet and neat and all those things people said it would be. What no one warned me about was the immediate ripple effect this would have on her behavior, and clearly we are only scratching the surface of this one.
Since The Step, Bean has developed a SEVERE case of the Lemmegos. She is infected by wiggleworms and nothing seems to help. Save, of course, putting her down and watching her pull up on everything she can grab and heartstoppingly pitch face-first from object to object. I know that this is the first step (no pun intended) in a long path leading away from me, and I cheer it (theoretically) but its still a mini little heartbreak, this sign of successful parenting, this independence. (Her still having all her limbs is my own personal parenting high water mark - and at the rate she's going if that is still the case at the end of the learning to walk process, then I am a mommy rockstar!).
This first step is a first step for both of us. For her, it's just the beginning of her standing on her own, taking bold adventurous steps into the world she will conquer. For me, it's my first step toward learning to let her go, in spite of the pain I know is coming, the bonked heads, the skinned knees. She's a brave thing to take those tottering steps, those leaps of faith from thing to thing. But I need to be even braver to let her.
You GO baby girl! Mommy loves you...

Why Maddie Matters

2009-04-08T12:33:00.000-07:00

Mommies need support, even those with healthy children. Parenting is hard (for either gender) and the classic 'it takes a village to raise a child' comment is true. Parents need people to turn to when their child is crying and they have no idea why, when they are tired (oh so very tired), when they are proud (first steps!), pretty much at any stage in the process. We live in such transient times that many of use don't even know our neighbors, much less would be comfortable leaving our children in their care while we ran out for milk. That tight network of help and support that our grandparents had has slowly disintegrated generation over generation. Those of us raising children hours from family, new to areas, far from friends, experience the natural isolation of the early months of infanthood to an excruciating degree. Where can you turn when there is no one near? While we often bemoan the over connectedness of our hyper-wired lives, this very connection can be a parent's salvation.
I have been honored to become a part of the Mommy blogging nation. I'm merely a bit player in a community populated with rock stars - women who share their soul in smart, moving, & interesting ways. Blogher is filled with these women, and men, sharing stories of parenthood and the challenges and rewards it can bring. This blogging community I joined then expanded into twitter giving me the chance to interact real time with other women and men, parents and not, sharing stories of their lives with and without children. Twitter became my virtual community center, only without the bingo, a place to get information, to offer and get support, laugh, learn, and just hang out with like minded, and differently inclined folk - all with something compelling to offer. Intuitively I sensed this was a community, but I didn't know until today what power there was in this connection.
Today has been an amazing day - heartrending and overwhelming, and it's because of a little girl named Maddie. I don't know her. I never had to honor to meet her, and now I never will. She passed away 4 days ago before even reaching the age of two. I can't do Maddie justice but her family can - read their blog: thespohrsaremultiplying.com . It is full of pictures of a beautiful joyful child that reminds me of my own preemie baby enough to make my breath catch at the thought of how close we were to the same situation.
I can't comprehend what this loss is for Heather & Mike, literally, I can NOT comprehend it. But this family is right now deep in this tragic and painful place. Whenever I try to put myself in their shoes, my mind, my HEART, refuses to go there. I can't. I just can't imagine it. It too dark and horrid and terrifying. If ever a parent, a family has needed the support of a community, it is the Spohrs and it is now.
And they got it. This beautiful little girl has triggered an outpouring of love and passion and support from this virtual collective that has shown me what a 'community' really is. #maddie has become a top trend on Twitter, meaning that everyone is talking about this tragedy. Her story has flown from blog to blog, and people from all over the globe have used the internet to pour love and hope and support and even donations towards the Spohrs and Maddie's cause, the March of Dimes.
When people roll their eyes at Twitter or Facebook or blogging, I will point to this story, to this experience. These websites, these technologies aren't the point. They are only tools, and they can be used to superpoke people, or spam market with twitterbots, OR, as today, they can be used for overwhelming good. In spite of the devastating loss of a child far to young to go home, the response of this community makes me believe that meaning can be found even in the unthinkably wrong, and that evil doesn't triumph, not when we all band together to fight it, even if it is virtually.
Maddie, you have touched the world & spread love and joy even in your passing - your parents should be proud of their beautiful baby girl.

My that was SO refreshing!

2009-04-06T14:40:00.000-07:00

I went away this weekend to visit my mom. Generally, 'taking the baby and going to mother's house' is viewed as a little girls getaway, and/or indication of serious marital trouble. In this case it was neither (although, upon arriving home from this somewhat 'challenging' trip and seeing the dishes STILL undone, there was a small bit of, et-hem, relational discord, shall we say - Love you baby! really ;-)).
This trip was not the relaxarama one would think for a few reasons - 1) mom lives 4 hours away. Driving alone for 4 hours with a one year old is not something that ever shows up on a list of relaxing spa services. Cause it's not relaxing. At all. Not even remotely. Even when the baby is quiet, you still can't relax cause it's not a baby - it's a ticking shrieking timebomb and it could GO OFF AT ANY TIME!
Reason number 2 this was not a chillathon - the baby is teething. Yes, a giant chunk of enamel is boring it's way through her gum. I can't blame her for being a crankhead, when you look at it that way, but it doesn't make her any more pleasant to be around. So of course that means she wants to be around you ALL THE TIME. Add that to her being at the clingy age in general and you get a small ill natured barnacle that freaks the everloving F OUT whenever it is pried from your hip and you move outside of the pre-approved one yard radius. Not out of eyesight mind you, just more that 3 feet away, and the infant alarm at 140 dbs starts wailing.
Number 3? Mom's house isn't baby proofed. There is a baby gate to keep her from plummeting down the stairs, but other then that, free for all. This means constant adult supervision is required. And there really aren't many baby restraining devices at my parents house that we can use anymore. The bouncy seat is nothing but chains and handcuffs to a mini Houdini and buys me nothing but a 30 second head start - ergo useless. Considering she wrapped herself around any limb she could get a-hold to, this did have the positive side effect of reducing the chance she'd grab the gallon of bleach and start licking it, or whatever. She was too busy adhering to me to bother... mostly. I won't go into the whole wine bottle battle of wills, but suffice it to say she can't reach the counter top, and I can, so nenner nenner.
And the last reason that it wasn't a cold chillin' weekend, is my mom has MS. Which is why I went down in the first place. My dad had an out of town trip planned, and it seemed like a long time for her to be alone. Mom's at the stage now where her strength is waning, so if she falls, it can be hours before she gets herself back up. Her neighbors who usually look in were busy with cancer surgery (for God sake) so they weren't available. My dad is on duty 24/7 though, and he NEEDED this trip, so enter us.
Mom can't move far or fast, so her vs. a motivated crawling baby is no match - I was on my own with the Critter. And Mom isn't really able to whip together dinner any more - she is on the pointy end of the 'cognitive effects' bell curve for MS, and has trouble staying on track. Things burn, ingredients get left out, and she gets exhausted 1/2 way through. So the weekend was filled with my week-a-day chores of baby care (with a +2 difficulty for teething and location) and cooking and cleaning, so mom could eat something that didn't come from take out or a microwave and so dad wouldn't come home to more work with a leftover mess. Sandwiched between 2 4-hour drives. Um, whee. This was, in fact, the definition of an anti-relaxation weekend on logistics alone, forget about the emotional component of having to parent your own parent while parenting your one child. No. I did not relax.
But for all the stress and baby shrieks and dishes, it was worth every second. Because it was also filled with the baby crawling over to cling to grandmas leg by day 3, and three generations of giggles when the little one decided that peek-a-boo behind a toy cow is THE BEST THING EVAR! This weekend, for all it's challenges, was a great gift for all of us, and I know it and am grateful for it.
That being said, I'd really rather a spa trip next time, so, you know, if you are making plans...

Wow...

2009-03-25T07:27:00.001-07:00

I've been gone. For a while. Not REALLY gone, just not blogging.
The reasons?
Honestly, I don't know.
I think part of it was a change of life (no I'm not talking hotflashes, but God knows those are probably closer than I want to even consider). I mean, change in life FOCUS. The first 6-8 months of mommyhood are all consuming, and that meant I had plenty to say about being a mommy since, basically, it's all I did. Sure I 'worked' but it really took a bit to get back up to speed and my heart was elsewhere.
Round about Sept or Nov of last year, baby-related things got a little more routine, a little less interesting. Everything wasn't new anymore so it all seemed a little less blog worthy. And work started to take over a good chunk of my attention. I think this blog, in my mind, was all mommy all the time, so really, details of work? Who cares? Go start another blog if you want to complain about PowerPoint, this is not the forum. At least, that was my thinking.
And that is stupid. Cause it's MY BLOG damnit! I can write about whatever I want! Now granted, y'all may have zippy interest in READING it, but that's probably the case regardless of subject, so... Might as well entertain myself at least.
I AM still a mommy, in case anyone wondered - I know sometimes I do. I've had a large project at work over the past 2 months (thus the obsessional focus on the evils of PPT) and its required a lot of my time and attention. Since The Hubble is going to school full time, his schedule is much more flexible, and he's taken over a lot of day to day kidlet duties. He's been on night duty for 2 months running now (WHEN will she finally sleep through the night for God sake?!?), and also gets her dressed and ready most mornings. I just drop her off at daycare.
The only time I really get with her during the week these days is feeding her dinner and putting her to bed. I dread days when I have to work til 6 and she refuses her afternoon nap cause it means she will fall asleep on the way home and I won't get any time with her at all. So I get to be a mommy, at least a little. Sometimes. And it's hard when I can't.
Now, do I want night duty back...er... not rly. Or do I want to stay home full time? REALLY not rly. I like my job & I love the people I work with & I adore the industry I'm in. I have several very good friends who are full time SAHMs and I think they are the strongest people I know. I don't think I could do it. Not and be any good at it. It's the toughest job going.
That being said I wouldn't mind a little more balance, and that's been my ongoing struggle, and that of every parent really. How can I be a good wife, a good employee, a good mommy and still have time left to be good to myself? I am a loooong way from having that one figured out. And guess what goes first? Me. And Me-time.
And I am not alone in this. Exhibit A: http://www.sweetney.com/sweetney/2009/03/selfish.html
(This is why I love twitter - you find people like this, who say things like that.) It's NOT easy to strike the balance. I still swing wildly back and forth like some crack addled monkey. I do believe, as in all things, a balance will finally be struck. It will probably be well after the hot flashes have come and gone, but one day... one day....

I'm a mommy...

2008-09-11T14:12:00.000-07:00

I've been a bit lax on updates due to T-total chaos in my general life - short version, sick infant, hubby quit job to go back to school full time, & my boss quit, so I've got the whole 'look smart and competent for the new boss who, incidentally is a morning person (ew!)' thing going on. So yeah....
Anyway, I've been mulling this post for a bit and putting it off since I don't think I can do the subject justice. I finally decided that an inadequate post is better than no post, so here goes.
I am a mommy. Theoretically, we knew this, what with the whole giving birth and getting pooped or thrown up on daily ever since deal. I also am a daughter. Again, not really a shock, except to those who think I sprung full grown from the surf all greek goddess style (it is to laugh). Being a daughter means I have a mommy, and now I AM a mommy, and that's the point where my brain melts.
Here's the why - my mother, whom I love and really is a pretty gosh darn rockin mom over all, can really get on my nerves. Why? Cause she's my mom. Period. Moms can just be annoying. Merely by existing. It's part of the job description. They tell you to take your shoes off in the house, and to make sure you eat lots of fiber, and look enquiringly at your new hairdo while very loudly saying absolutely nothing about it. Moms are just, YOU know, MOMS .
Now back to point number one - I AM A MOM. Now granted, at this stage, The Infant mostly chews on her feet so worst case she'd track spit around, if she could even walk which she can't. She has a diet of exclusively boob juice and formula (does anyone else think of cheesy 50's movie mad scientists every time they hear the word 'formula'? right. only me. check.) so no fiber issues. And she really doesn't have much by way of hair yet, so no conflict there. Yet. I know, no matter how much I swear swear swear it won't happen, I will be as annoying to my daughter as my mom is to me. Cause it's nature's way. Cause I am a MOM . I could sooner stop the rain as I could stop the teenage eye-rolling that is way closer than any of us imagine.
While the parent lore is true, you do gain a much higher appreciation for your parents once you become one yourself, you don't stop being a daughter or a son. When I'm with them both - it's all kinda confusing - I'm still rolling my eyes at my mom, while lovingly caring for a daughter of my own, who will, in due time roll her eyes at me.
The part that really floored me is when I realized that I am ALL parts of mommy, not just the annoying part. I love my mother, and she was the person I turned to when the kids were mean to me at school, or I skinned my knee, or when I had really done something big and wonderful. And to this day, when I am sick, there is always a part of me that just wants my mommy. I have an amazing dad, and I love him to death, but mommies are special. And to this very day, she cheers my victories and helps heal my booboos and sends me fiber bars in the mail, and above all loves me with everything she has.
Cradling my beautiful perfect precious baby girl in my arms last night, rocking her to sleep, it all came together. My mommy did this with me - she held me and rocked me and made it all ok. Now I have been blessed by God with a daughter of my own. And the true blessing I have with the chance to be for her all those things that my mom is to me. The weight of the gift was a little overwhelming, but I am so very grateful for the opportunity. I will do everything I can to earn the right to say honestly 'I am a mommy'.

LINK: baby loves disco

2008-09-08T09:14:00.000-07:00

baby loves disco - washington d.c.
Start 'em young - raise 'em up right...

I watch too much Project Runway

2008-08-29T09:55:00.000-07:00

But is there really any such thing as too MUCH Project Runway?
Every year this time I watch Project Runway, get all hyped up, whip out my sewing machine, and sew SOMEthing. Now mind you, I can't really sew. I took Home Ec in 7th grade and made a 6 panel wrap skirt, which was the height of my sewing career. I've made skirts and costumes and various other things since, but really, I don't have any skillz. This year though, I have a new victim, I mean, subject. The Infant! And even better Infant clothes 1) are small so they take WAY less time to make and 2) since she's going to grow out of any given outfit in less than a fortnight anyway, the crappy construction doesn't matter. Win win!
So behold! The spawn of an old t-shirt, too much Heidi, and some bling...

Sick.... and tired!

2008-08-15T10:24:00.000-07:00

Where've I been? Um, yeah - I've been sick. Now I've been sick before, and I've used that phrase - 'I'm sick' and I meant it when I said it, but this time, I was REALLY sick. Like a miserable f level of sick. Granted, I wasn't Really REALLY sick - that's when you custom design t-shirts and host a fund raiser - nothing like that - just a pile-on of generic nasty bugs having a little party in my body. A party that wouldn't stop. and 14 days later STILL HASN'T, God help me.
The source of this plague? My family, natch. I should say 'plagues' plural. See, that's one of the things that's made this particular party such a t-total blast. Back to back diseases - it was a little virus relay race. Shoot me now.
The first leg of this illness started with the Hubble- whom I nursed back to health JUST in time to get the very same disease, only worse. Perhaps we would have had a closer relationship with the Lysol container during the initial Hubble illness had we realized that he was, in fact, ill. Don't mistake, he was clearly having symptoms. Its just that the symptoms he had mislead us into thinking that what he actually had was food poisoning. FOOD POISONING! Can you guess what symptoms might have lead us to that conclusion?! Hmm?! Gads. But no, NOT food poisoning. Nasty ass stomach bug (no pun intended). Which I promptly caught and lifted to a whole new level of suck. I had managed to delude myself into thinking I had managed to avoid the whole thing until sat the 2nd.
I was feeling a little 'off' on Friday, but I'm always wicked tired on Fridays after a whole week of having to get up and act like a responsible human after nights of no sleep, so I didn't think anything much of it. Then Sat came around. I was up at a semi-reasonable hour, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. I was all a-twitter cause I was going to see one of my bestest and oldest friends brand spanking new condo. This was her very first home purchase and consequently kinda a big whoop. Plus, I was deeply desirous of seeing the horrorshow wall paper that came with said condo. When I said it was new, know that I meant new to HER - it was, as a home, trapped somewhere in the mid-70's, decor and appliances inclusive. So I was excited about the flashback in residence form, on top of the whole 'yay for you!' aspect.
My bestest BiblioDiva, and her family were going to spend the day going mano e mano with the retrofunk spread all over the new joint, so I was going to bring them sustenance as a sympathy offering. Having been through the same procedure with my first home, it seemed karmically appropriate. But the virea had their own karma apparently, and it was totally screwing with mine. I gathered myself and bundled the infant up, ready to head out, and right when I hit the door I felt a little....urghy. Urgently urghy in fact.... Oh dear.... Um, ok, quick restroom trip and we're all good...ish... Take two on exiting the house got us successfully as far as the grocery store.
I debated. Can I do this? Can I make it through the grocery store, and through the 40 minute drive to the new pad without yorking on myself? Or worse, 'othering' on myself. I mommed up. I can DO this.
I spent several important healing moments in the grocery store restroom, and blitzkrieged the grocery aisles. Speed check up and out. I'm happy to report that I was able to make it down to her new place, deliver the food, NOT deliver any viral contaminates with said food, and get back home without embarrassing myself or others. It was a minor miracle. It was also the last time I left the house for the next 4 days.
Wednesday rolls around, and I'm feeling better. Not GREAT, mind you, but better. I'm also feeling like I perhaps ought to get back into the office. This feeling was perhaps partially triggered by my bosses response when I called in sick on Monday. 'Oh. um. ok. You have everything you need to work from home though right?'. Dude, seriously, what part of 'stomach flu' did you not get? I need to be on the crapper AND using wifi simultaneously? WTF?! So with this kinda environment you can imagine why I'm feeling like perhaps I need to hustle back in.
I toddle into the office on wed, zero appetite still, but able to eat bread and rice and other tasteless bland carbs. Luckily I still have all my morning sickness foods lying around, came in handy that. Plus side? lost 7 pounds! Healthy? um no. but still. Anyway, on my way in, I start feeling a little congested. Maybe allergies. Right? Prolly just allergies. No biggie. Wrong. Biggie.
By the end of the day, I was sneezing like a dwarf and had a regular snoterfall coming out of my nose. It totally sucked to be me. Right about 5:30 I got The Call. I was not the only one with a fever and runny nose. The Infant was snotting right along with me. Sigh...
I bundle us both up and head home, chock-a-block full of self-pity. The Hubble, and his unnaturally effective immune system was able to avoid round two of the disease-a-thon, which is a HUGE mercy - cause now it was his turn to take over all household care duties. And he did great. Credit where it is due. He took the lil stinker into her doc appointment the next day, where she was pronounced 'sick with a cold' - shocker. Apparently is went well until the full body exam at which point she became deeply unamused at the whole process. I was curled up at home during all this, whimpering, buried in a perpetually growing heap of used tissues and hating life, but still well pleased that I wasn't the one dealing with a doctor inspired Infant meltdown. During the worst of this, he kept both of us in sandwiches and formula (the first for me, the second for the Infant), and kept me entertained with movies and her entertained with ridiculous faces. She dealt with the whole thing much better than I, overall, and healed up faster as well.
We are now at the end of week 2 of the diseasing, and The Infant is pretty much back to normal, with a slightly higher amount of snot production than usual, but otherwise, no worse for wear. While I am back at work, I am still a disgusting human being. I'm making all those nasty old homeless smoker sounds in the back of my throat and snorking huge lugies every few minutes. My voice is on it's way back - I'm now more of a Kathleen Turner with allergies sort of sound vs the Hulk Hogan with a sinus infection thing I had going before. And before that it was gone altogether for 2 days. So clearly trending better. But still not 100%.
After 14 whole days of this mess. I'm hoping come next week I will be able to breathe without horking - forget dreams of Olympic Gold, I just want to be able to live snot free. Is that asking too much...?

Calm before the storm...?

2008-07-28T11:47:00.000-07:00

Things have been a teetch odd recently, mainly in that they haven't been odd. Qua? Never fear, I will 'splain.
It seems that I have somehow managed to develop something of a routine in my day to day - a routine that includes the existence of the Infant. Having a baby around the house, at some point in the past couple of weeks, became NORMAL. Which in and of itself is abnormal ("Abby? Abby who?"). The occasions when I look over, see The Infant, and go 'oh RIGHT! We have a spawn!' are decreasing down to just about zero.
Now for those without children, this would seem to be normal and good - this settling in. In most circumstances, you figure something out, learn how it works, develop a way to work with it, then set things on cruise control. Here cruise control (or any form of control really) is merely a laughable illusion. I freely admit that I have learned very little in the short time I've been Infant-rearing, but one of the precious few things I've learned is NEVER let your guard down.
Raising a child is like living in Oz (HBO, not Baum, version) only with sharp little baby fingernails instead of shivs. JUUUUUST when you think you've got things figured out there's a riot or the mob tries to take over the lunch room or your child figures out how to roll over, the latter being the scariest by far. I can speak from experience (on 2 of the 3 anyway).
That's right, the Infant has figured out how to flip from belly to back (I'll save the riot story for later). Normally when one's child reaches certain milestones parental units are overcome with joy. Not so much here. Yes, we are well pleased in an abstract sense that our offspring is developing at a semi-normal clip. However, in a practical sense, this latest development is a source of stark terror for us. And it's not ALL developments - I wasn't concerned when, just a week ago The Infant discovered the fascinating appendages known as 'feet' - OOooo! AAaaah! - and begun spending a large portion of her day grabbing at, playing with and/or attempting to jam into her mouth said feet. This was cute, in a fetish-y kinda way. The rolling though - oh God the rolling.... this is terrifying.
But why, sez you? Because rolling is the very first 'step' (pun intended) in mobility. MOBILITY! Gah! See, this lovely routine we've managed to develop, while it sadly involves very little sleep, is one that has added some stability into our little parental lives. We're starting to get the hang of this! Said routine, however, is predicated on the Infant pretty much staying where you put her. Whether she wants to or not. This means we can say, lay The Infant on the middle of the bed while putting a shirt on without worrying about her scuttling off in the 2.3 seconds we take our hands/eyes off of her. This immobility is the lynch pin of our current day-to-day, and it's about to be removed, which will result in our little carefully crafted house of infant care cards crashing down about our ears. And possibly several loosely stacked boxes as well.
Which is the OTHER larger and more terrifying aspect of this looming mobility nightmare. We need to child proof the house. Typing that, my brain just froze. Overwhelming icy panic courses through my veins. Those of you who have been following this adventure since it began will recollect that I was rendered nearly immobile myself for a large chunk of my pregnancy. This had the ripple effect of the house falling totally into the crapper, organizationally-speaking. Add a thick layer of baby accessories and teeny tiny little clothes overtop of the original neglect of household layer and you get QUITE the caca cake. Caca which the Infant is >
And time is running out fast. She's got a pretty decent bead on the belly to back roll, mainly because she despises being on her tummy - hates the view I guess. It's just a matter of days before she figures out the back to belly bit and starts stringing them together in a twirling dervish of here to there-ish-ness. She's a freakishly strong little creature and it's coordination alone that's holding her back, not lack of strength, either in will or body.
Speaking of which, the strong will is starting to express itself as well. Already the Infant has begun expressing 'opinions' about things, in the form of a new vocalization that sounds remarkably like 'NNNYARK!'. While it is nice that her vocabulary is growing beyond impassioned wailing, the corresponding growth of what can only be called 'attitude' is a less promising development in the parent Infant communication timeline. Combine these strong opinions with the looming possibility of willful motion and you begin to get a sense of my dawning horror...
I'm trying to keep myself from asking the teachers at daycare to perhaps offer just a little less 'tummy time'. It would be moot anyway - all it would do is delay the inevitable. The Infant is slowly but surely developing the skills and ability to impress her ever-growing will on the surrounding environs, and we parents are included as viable will-targets. Forget the moving from here to there bits; attempts to take control of the lunch room are merely hours away.... God help us one and all...(where's a sharpened toothbrush when you need one?!)

No, actually, that is NOT funny...

2008-07-18T06:52:00.000-07:00

A few nights ago at bedtime, I was in the bathroom performing my evening ablutions. The household routine developed involves my BabyDaddy taking over Infant control duties for a few minutes before I go to bed, giving me time to, say, extract my contact lenses and/or pee. It's a magical few minutes of peace and quiet.
This evening however, not so much with the 'quiet' part. The Infant was in her Le Terrible mood, one of my least favorites. So handing her over was a mercy. The Hubble was doing a good job managing, working his way through the List of Needs - food? nope, not interested - and was on number 2, which, coincidentally is about Number 2 (& Number 1).
Now all this is going on outside my visual tracking range. I'm able to get a rough lock on location thanks to Infant shrieks and the Doppler effect, but otherwise, blissfully out of the loop. So I'm pretty sure they are in the bedroom and she is unamused. I hear some snippets of Infant/Hubble conversation (he adorably attempts to reason with her - so preciously misguided!), a bit of minor thumping, the tapering of infant hollering, then laughter. She's 4 months so I know it's not coming from her.
Said laughter increases. So of COURSE I have to ask...'what's so funny in there?' Pause, additional laughter. 'Hello? what's the amusement source? Do share - I could use a giggle...'

The Hubble responds, "I don't think you are going to find this nearly as amusing as I do", the Infant is now cooing happily. I, on the other hand am growing increasingly concerned.

'What exactly are you thinking I won't find funny? Be precise please'
I talk and walk simultaneously (no easy feat in my current stage of exhaustion)
On arriving in the bedroom I find a grinning husband and a happy baby, and no obvious reasons for concern - other then the look on his face. 'What happened?'

The Hubble shares, "well, she wasn't hungry, so I went to check her diaper, and sure enough it was wet. So I left her on the bed and ran to get another one from the nursery. Right when I got back she curled her little legs up and peed all over the place! Isn't that funny?!"

I am confused. This must be a guy thing - they seem to find elimination amusing somehow. Even my normally very enlightened spousal unit giggles maniacally at fart jokes.
'Um, I guess its funny. I mean, so she got her diaper wet... I'm not sure I see the humor really.'

The Hubble begins chortling, "Oh no I took her diaper off when I left to get her a new one. I was only going to be gone for a second..."

WHAT?!? You left her sitting on our bed with a naked butt?! That's like leaving a loaded gun lying around!! That's just MADNESS!!
I don't say this though, because realization is beginning to dawn...
'So wait...if there wasn't a diaper.... do you mean she peed on the BED?!'

Much mirth from the Hubble, "Yeah!! And even funnier - it's on your side!! Ha ha ha ha ha a haaa! Woo! Isn't that Funny?!?"

No.

No that is not the LEAST bit funny, in fact. Again, I did not say this, mainly because I'd lost the power of speech. My EXPRESSION however, said a great deal...
"What? It's FUNNY! All those cute stories about babies peeing places and whatnot - we finally have one! it's cute!"

'Its on my side of the bed.'

"Well yeah, but that's no big deal."

'No big deal to YOU! It's not on YOUR side!!!'

At this point the Hubble was beginning to sense danger. He's sharp like that. What he never really calculated into the Har-dee-har-har equation, is that right now, this wet spot is between me and sleep. And I need sleep. I mean, I REALLY REALLY NEED sleep. Like a junkie needs heroin kinda need. And this piddle pool is in the way of a nice juicy pile of zzzzzzs.

"Well it's not THAT wet, we can just put a towel over it or something"

A 'man solution' if I've EVER heard one.

OK, no. 1) we have no clean towels anywhere in the house since I haven't done laundry since it seems like the Reagan administration. The only cleanish towel in the house is the one I'm using in my bathroom, so if we put THAT over it, I get to dry off with pee tomorrow morning, OR not shower after having slept in pee. Both = Suboptimal. 2) I'm one of those 'can't stand to have rumpled sheets' folks - call me the Princess and the Pee-pee, but no way I could sleep with a big lumpy urine soaked towel under me all night. I sum this up in a coherent a way as possible.

Hubble offers solution 2 - "Let's switch sides!" Considering the number of plugs, books, & sleep accessories that he must have at arms length, plus all the various nighttime Infant care caca on MY side, swapping all this would be at *least* a 30 minute process. 30 minutes in which I could be SLEEPING. Did I mention that I need sleep?

At this point, the Hubble begins to sulk.
"well, I think you are being difficult - I've suggested a couple of perfectly good suggestions and you have rejected them both - I'm just out of ideas."

I grit my teeth to keep the expletives from spewing out.
'Just..... help..... me...... change..... the...... sheet......'

Lest you be confused, no - I hadn't washed a load of sheets or anything like that. No, mercifully and miraculously, I had just *bought* a set of sheets at Target, cause, well, it's Target. While I am sure they are covered with sweatshop manufacturing filth, they are, at least, dry. The mattress cover is, of course, soaked as well, and in my exhausted haze I manage to find a kitchen towel in the 'donate' box to sop up the remaining Infant excretions.
Net this fix took 20 minutes. TWENTY perfectly good minutes of sleep WASTED. But still, 10 less than if we'd switched sides, so yay for that!

A few days later, the Hubble told this very story to his dad, albeit with a slightly different spin. *He* of course found it HI-larious. Ho ho ho, hee hee hee, they tittered together. So amused by the Infants shenanigans. How very droll. She peed! How ADORABLE! I did note, however, that The Hubble did NOT tell said story to his MOM. Which to me proves that deep in his testosterone laden heart, he knows....

SummmmmerTIIME and the Infant is screaming...

2008-06-27T12:40:00.001-07:00

We, being first time parents, are relatively ignorant of what we should and shouldn't do. As a result, we tend to try things many other parents would not. Not because we are brave or bold, but because we are stone cold ignorant of the possible repercussions. One of these boldly go things we heedlessly traipsed into was taking the Infant swimming. The Infant, mind you, can't even roll over, so it wasn't so much that she was going swimming, more that we intended to dip her in the water and see what happened. I suppose one shouldn't treat ones child as a science experiment but how else would one learn, I ask you? Now I did do due diligence, i.e. I did a google search on 'infant swimming'. And by all accounts, this would not kill her, so onward!
My BabyDaddy is the king of blissful ignorance when it comes to the Infant. It is a blessing and a curse. I, having consumed more preggers lit than any human should while on bedrest (cause really, after the 6th day of Real World marathons, what else was left to do?), am marginally more informed about what one 'should' do with a baby. He on the other hand knows no fear. Again with the blessing/curse deal. This blind bravery is what led to the pool adventure.
The BabyDaddy wanted, more than anything else for fathers day, to take the Infant to the pool. I, being a sucker for the 'but it's FAAAAATHER'S day' argument, agreed. With some trepidation. We waited til the last hour of pool time, to minimize both exposure to the blinding sun and trauma for other innocent pool goers. I battened down the hatches with 2 hoody towels, 3 diapers, a bottle, a binkie, a bottle, 2 towels for US, 2 changes of clothes for the Infant, a book for me (ha), etc. etc. etc (hey, I'm a first time mom, I have no CLUE what is going to be needed at any given time so I just take it ALL). As I gathered enough crap to fill the actual pool, I handed the Infant over to BabyDaddy to clothe, with a choice of bathing suits. Yes! Exactly - see you experienced womenfolk have successfully IDed this as 'error in judgment #1'. I gave him a CHOICE. After mounding enough crap to last us for a summer in residence at the pool, I turned back to the man and his child, who was, at this point, now wearing pieces of 3 swimsuits. the outfit read like this : regular diaper, one-piece swim suit, bikini swimsuit top, swim diaper on TOP of all that, and knit hat. I tried. I really really TRIED not to say anything but I had to ask at least the most baffling of the choices.... "so why the swim diaper on the OUTside of the swimsuit?" Apparently, he wanted to assure all the pool patrons that our child was indeed wearing a swim diaper designed to reduce spills, by making said diaper as obvious as possible. The fact that the diaper was rendered completely useless by it's location mattered not at all to him, it simply needed to APPEAR useful. Ah. Ok then. Sigh.
We managed to sherp everything to the local pool, which was mercifully emptying. In the gathering frenzy, I had not been allotted time to put on my swimsuit, but at the nanosecond of arrival, BabyDaddy had to leap into the pool immediately. Waiting for me to change would have been an unbearable delay. So I gingerly hand the Infant to mah man in the pool, and brace myself for the storm.... and..... nothing. A short pleased coo, and a mostly curious expression were all we got. BabyDaddy was delighted, I videoed, then trotted off to change, pleased and thrilled at what an easy charming adventurous little baby we had created.
By the time I got into the pool she was babbling happy, splishing about and her extremities were slowing turning a delicate shade of blue. So approximately 39 seconds after getting IN the pool, I get OUT of the pool, with the Infant. U-turn back to the changing room, to change her out of her swimsuit(s) in order to raise her core temperature to at least medium rare.
This part did not go as well as the swimming part. In fact, the second I touched layer one of her swim apparel, she let out a shriek that would shatter glass. And that was just the warm up. During the entire unclothing and reclothing experience, she made noises you would have expected if I had been, say, peeling her actual skin off, instead of just a soggy diaper. And I remind you of the 6 layer dip that was her outfit. There were a LOT of clothes there. Add the lovely echo chamber acoustics of the changing area, and I guarantee this child's displeasure was heard 4 counties away. Of course, the second the displeasure inducing changing was complete, she ceases hollering and turns back into 'pleasant baby'. I, on the other had am still shaking from the side effects of the shock and awe shrieking.
I emerge from the changing room damp, cranky and with significant hearing damage. EVERY eye in the pool area turns to look at me, and really no one wants that much attention while wearing a swimsuit a mere 3 months after giving birth. NO ONE. In truth, though, they weren't looking at me as much as they were inspecting my child for damage and/or blood.
Exhausted, I tuck her into her little carrycot, and flomp down on a pool chair, ready to finally, FINALLY get a little summer pool relaxing in for me. My hubby calls from the pool (where he has been frolicking this entire time), 'do you need me to come out and watch her so you can hop in?'. Just as the words, 'for the love of all that is holy YES!' are about to leave my lips, the lifeguard whistle blows... "POOOLS CLOOOOOSED!"
Ah... summer...

Debunking Parental Myths or Why people are full of poop

2008-06-18T12:43:00.000-07:00

When you are pregnant people who are currently parents become very HELPFUL with their information sharing. They do have the nasty habit of restricting the information they share to the 'scary as all crap' category. You know the type: "I was in labor for 7 days straight and they had to finally pull my child out of my right nostril" or the "Oh just wait 'til he/she/it is born, THEN the nightmare REALLY starts" or the ever popular "My child just graduated high school and it STILL hurts when I poop".
And these stories of horror are not limited to women. My babydaddy got them too, only he got the ones designed to strike terror in the hearts of the y-chromo owners. For example, "You will never play a video game again in your life" or the nightmarish "that sports car you own? Say goodbye now, 'cause you'll have to swing by the car dealership on the way home from the hospital to trade it in for a 1987 AstroVan".
Initially, I thought people were genuinely trying to be helpful - sharing their learnings, so to speak. But as time went on, I noticed that NONE of the stories were positive, pleasant or even remotely helpful. They were all just scary. And they were all relayed with a certain cruel smugness. One of my best friends, a mother of 2 even got in on the act. And, because I was hormonal and because we are those kinda friends, I started shrieking at her, 'ARE YOU TRYING TO FREAK ME THE F OUT?!?!'. This actually startled both of us. Me, because I was unaware I could hit such high notes and her because she honestly hadn't really realized what she was doing.
After I stopped frothing at the mouth and she took that time to consider the valid, albeit high pitched question, we discussed. At length. Eventually we came to the conclusion that humans are spiteful crappy little creatures and the joy of "I know something you don't know" goes back to elementary school days. Parents 'in the know' just loooooooooove to wave their knowingness over the heads of the newly knocked up Bambis wandering in the woods of What The Hell is Happening to My Body and My Life.
But the largest part of it is simply carrying on a tradition. It's just want you DO. People did it to me before I joined the club of parenthood, so now I'm doing it to others. You are a pledge asking for membership in the Frat o' Parent, and you gotta EARN it - *I* sure had to, is the mindset. In short, it's Hazing.
Well, the tradition dies here. Even though I've earned the right to scare the bejeebers out of anyone with a fetus, I'm going to pass. I REALLY did not enjoy being on the receiving end of this hazing process, so now that I've crossed over, I am going to officially turn in my pledge paddle and tell the truth about what happens on the Other Side. Or at least whats happening to me. YMMV. I may get drummed out of mommy's club, but what the hell. I have the stretch marks to prove membership so Nyah. So on the the debunking!

TALE OF TERROR #1 - "You will never sleep again!" - This is sooooo totally untrue! I sleep all the TIME! I sleep in my bed at night, I sleep sitting on the sofa with the TV on, I sleep sitting bolt upright in a nursing chair with a child on my boob, I even sleep in the front row of a meeting while the president of my company presents not 3 feet from me! I am a sleeping MACHINE! Now if what they meant was, you'll not get a good nights sleep for anywhere from 3 - 30 months, then that is, in fact in my experience, extremely accurate.

TALE OF TERROR #2 - "Putting your child in daycare will the the single most emotionally traumatizing experience of your life" - OK this one I'm just calling Bullsh*t on. I'm sure that, societally speaking, it's SUPPOSED to be, but seriously, F that. I love my child. I even love her with that creepy not-quite-sane, throw-yourself-in-front-of-a-truck-to-save-her, hormonal, atavistic brain-stem-level kinda love. But after having cared for this child 24/7 for 3 months straight, handing her over to licensed, regulated, highly competent, professional childcare experts for a few hours was a tiny little slice of heaven. You know that classic labor joke? "nothing's fun for 15 hours straight!". If that's true, sure as hell nothing is fun for 2.160 hours straight. I don't think breathing a sigh of relief when someone comes in to help you out makes you a cold hearted Mommy Dearest. It just makes you human. Now granted, I was really happy to see her again at the end of those few hours, but I will not need years of therapy to get over having handed her over to caring and competent carefully screened professionals in the first place. Pfft on that.

TALE OF TERROR #3 - "You won't go out in public until your child is in kindergarten, if then - and forget about eating out again EVER" - This is doo. We've eaten out at least once a week ever since the Infant was cleared for public exposure (2 month shots). Now before I go any further, let me just cut the flaming off at the pass, I *know* that this is highly Infant disposition dependent. At least I know that *now* - back when I was sitting at the feet of the parental sages, as far as I knew, we would NEVER EAT OUT AGAIN. The BS here is that no one tells you that, actually, some babies don't give a flying monkey where you take them, and they are perfectly content to snooze away in a car seat in a back seat as they are in a car seat in ringside and the Loud and Boisterous Circus of Light and Sound. But since we're told it's IMPOSSIBLE everyone is afraid to even try.
We, being parental daredevils with a high tolerance for risk, tried. And since we happen to have a child who's not a recreational screamer (she's more of a needs based screamer. If she needs something, she screams, otherwise she's cool.),we go out to eat. Sometimes she's awake, mostly she's asleep, and once we had to get our food to go, but we knew we were rolling the dice by going out near bedtime for her. I'm here to tell you it's possible people. Her willingness varies wildly from day to day, hour to hour, and I expect, age by age, but you gotta give it a shot. There's no reason to write off sitting down at a table not covered in unpaid bills, and allowing others to bring you food they cooked for you.
The sleep though? That you can just kiss goodbye.

"But I don't WANNA!" as guest blogged by my inner 2-year old...

2008-06-13T08:29:00.000-07:00

I am in a MOOD today. Partially sleep deprivation fueled, I'll admit. The more tired I am, the more years I shave off of my age, behavior-wise. For example, when I'm a little tired, I'm very likely to find jokes a 12 year old would make funny. When I'm very tired I start to act like a 2 year old, stomping around and saying I don't wanna and being generally self-centered, contrarian and illogical. If I'm completely exhausted beyond reason, I revert to being a 3 month old and just cry til someone feeds me and/or puts me to bed. Since I got 2 chunks of 3 hours of sleep last night, I'm merely 2 today. This means pretty much nearly anything you can name, I don't wanna.
For example, I've joined a weight loss challenge. Another of my Don't Wannas is that I don't wanna have to wear only my pregnancy clothes for the next 4 years of my life. While they fit, in so far as I can squeeze my a$$ into them, they are designed to show off your lovely life-filled belly. Except that my belly is filled exclusively with ice cream sandwiches and ding dongs, so really, not something I want to call attention to. Don't REALLY have a choice however, since I can't fit into and/or find any of my other clothes. Clearly losing weight is the best thing to do, and to do that, one must exercise and cut calories - except... I don't wanna! So I stomp about and sulk every morning when I have to squeeze into my preggers pants, or my non-knocked-up shirt is tight enough to accent my backfat, bitter that I'm not losing weight while eating fried cheese sticks. Logic is not the stronghold of the toddler, clearly.
And as if this self-induced drama doesn't start my morning with a song, my next step is a visit to Chez Bebe aka the baby kennel. Frankly, handing my child over to daycare everyday in order to walk across the street to spend 8 hours doing totally uninteresting stuff, sucks. I'm sort of between projects since I'm transitioning back on, and between projects translates into 'doing wicked boring stuff '. In short, work isn't challenging or interesting or inspiring or really anything other than an annoying timesuck at the moment. And since I am running on roughly a 14 hour time deficit per day, anything that sucks my time bugs the everliving crap out of me. (Although, to be fair, in my current mood, anything, regardless of its time suckness is likely to bug the everliving crap out of me. Remember, I'm 2 and cranky.) If things were marginally more entertaining here in the office there is the outside chance of an attitude shift. But likely the only real source of a better mood lies in sleep, and lots of it.
Even writing about it makes me want to just walk out of here go across the street, snatch my child up and go home, except ... really, I don't wanna do that either!
If I go home, I need to wade through the drift of dirty socks and newspapers that has accumulated around the corners of my house, and try to avoid knocking over the giant pile of unsorted unopened mail, chockablock with unpaid bills in pink envelopes. This could all be taken care of if I just spent a little time cleaning/sorting/billpaying except, well, nobody wants to do that, regardless of how well rested they are or how much time they have on their hands. Anyone who tells you they like cleaning is off their meds. Period.
Plus, when it comes to snatching up the child, honestly? I'm a little tired of being a mommy. At least for this week. I mean, I love my child and all, and with that blind hormonal nearly deranged kinda mommylove, but I've had to be a mommy a LOT recently. Like 24 hours a day. For 3 months straight. That's a lot of non-stop mommying. While leaving the Infant at daycare is a minor heartbreak every single time, it also is a brief break from hands-on child rearing, which is kinda nice occasionally. Using that break to schedule meeting rooms for analytic tool training, however, is not improving my mood. Using it to sit beside the pool, drink something girl-y, preferably with an umbrella, and read an entertaining yet non-taxing book, however, THAT I wanna! But no such luck.
So until such time as I am able to lose weight without dieting or working out, and am able to be a mommy whenever I want and take a break whenever I need, and am able to be inspired by work every day but able to walk away to play with my infant at will, and elves come in the night to clean my house, I will likely remain in a state of toddler tantruminess. Or until I get some sleep - whichever comes first. My money is on the elves.

Exactly how much 'suck' can you cram into one day, anyway?

2008-06-09T12:37:00.000-07:00

Today is the Infants first day of 'school' aka the baby kennel. As the days passed with the family caring for the little one, I became less and less concerned about Official Corporate Daycare. Pros and Cons - Cons, no real family snugglely time & your child is guaranteed to be disease-ridden for the first 9 months of her little life. Pros - Official Corporate Daycare doesn't show up late to your house, or, occasionally forget they are caring for you child altogether forcing you to scramble around to find some one to watch the Infant at 9am on a weekday. So Yay daycare!
Also, this daycare center is insane. If it wasn't corporately subsidized there is no WAY our child would be attending this joint - They pipe classical music into the rooms. They have a separate baby gym. The 2 year olds have computers. They have a WATERPARK for God sake. Clearly, if one is going daycare, this is the kinda daycare to go.
But still, taking a little critter that can't even roll over yet and releasing her into the wild, sort of, is a little distressing. It would be one thing if she'd had a little jujitsu training or something, but no. She isn't totally helpless though - she can pop someones' eardrum if it comes to that, and her little fingernails are SHARP. Overall, my mommyheart is handling the concept fairly well, but still feeling a little twingy at the whole deal.
So I spent last night assembling everything she needs for her first day of school, and it's quite a list - extra diapers, formula galore, diaper cream, extra outfits for blowouts, blankies, forms and paperwork up the yinyang. I was fussing, as one does, before things one is nervous about, but I had the bulk of it all ready to go. All I needed to do was grab the checklist out of the car in the morning & give everything a last once over to make sure I had everything. I went to bed content.
I also woke up content, mainly cause I was waking up, which meant I got sleep. That is a good night. With most of the pre-daycare prep completed the night before, I felt comfortable spending a little extra snuggle time with the Infant. It was a big day, for me, more so than her, but it still - it called for cuddles. Happy warm family time with birds singing and chipmunks outside doing my lawn work. Quite lovely... I finally rousted myself, got the Infant ready for her big day with minimal hearing damage, and headed toward the door with a big smile on my face to get my checklist from the car....the...car.....WHERE THE F IS THE CAR??!?!
The smile went byebye. Our car had been towed. From our reserved parking spot. TOWED! Today of ALLLLL days, my car gets towed. Um, SUCK! No checklist for me... so now instead of wisking the Infant off to her first day of daycare with a song in my heart, we're running around like maniacs trying to locate my automobile.
The series of phone calls that finally led us to the cars location read like a transcript of Who's On First. I kid not, the woman at the association actually said "well, why don't you go check and see if your car has been stolen, and if it HASN'T then you can call us back." Seriously? Did you just say that? What, I'm supposed to call my local car theft ring? Not really sure where to find them in the yellow pages - under 'J' for 'Jackin''? 'Excuse me, did you steal my car? Yes? Ok cool - no need for me to call the tow-happy association then!' I mean really people.
Finally they 'fessed up to having us towed, cause my registration was expired. Which is wasn't. I had renewed it. However, my stickers hadn't come from the DMV yet so my tags showed a May 08 date. I thought that this would be counterbalanced by the large white paper saying "TEMPORARY REGISTRATION" stuck in the windshield, but, gee, it sure is dark at night and SOMEHOW the tow company 'missed' it. Uh huh. Don't GET me started.
Finally auto located, so now all three of us have to shoe horn ourselves and all the Infants extensive daycare accessories into the husband's convertible studmobile to go reenact an episode of Parking Wars. Props to the dude at the car impound lot - he didn't suck. At least he appeared not to suck. Mainly by blaming the other division of the company and saying that yes they DID suck a great deal, very sorry about that here's their number and the receipt for the $175 bones you just had to had over to get back your car that probably shouldn't have been towed in the first place. Car reclaimed we transfer ALLLLL the baby crap, and the baby into the car, then promptly transfer the baby back OUT of the car since it was approximately 7000 degrees in there. After 10 minutes of AC on full blast, the car was no longer a baby slow cooker. She got retransfered, and we were finally on our way to start our day. At 12:30 pm.
The sole upside to this entire debacle is that I was so discombobulated about the whole towing disaster that I didn't have the emotional wherewithal to get too bent about dropping her off. Happy Monday!

My boobs can tell time! Bet yours can't....

2008-06-05T10:59:00.000-07:00

Since I have become a food source, (which, frankly, is just totally wack) there have been several ripple effect changes in my life, none of which was even remotely expected. The expected change e.g gigantic knockers did NOT occur, mainly because life is cruel. What DID happen is, well, weird. Since the Infant has developed something of a 'feed me' routine, I as food source, have had to fall in line with said routine. The negative reenforcement should I not is really pretty dreadful and is measured in decibels. So I got with the program. After 2 1/2 months of training, we developed this was a lovely symbiotic cover-of-a-mommy-book loving kind of relationship. She'd cry, I'd whip 'em out, everyone was happy.
Then, just when my boobs for fully trained to perform on command, we ran into a little scheduling hiccup, called "working full time". Regardless, every 3 1/2 hours or so the kitchen opens at the brestaurant as scheduled. Not so useful since the Infant is all of 20 miles away. There IS a way around this, but man is it inelegant.
Generally, whipping 'em out in a workplace is frowned upon, unless, of course, your boss is called 'Guido'. My boss is called 'Scott' so, really, not so much. However, when one is a food source, in enlightened aren't-we-so-understanding companies it is considered acceptable to slink off to the 'mother's room' aka the milking barn to have a little rastlin' session with the archaic torture device known as a 'breast pump'.
I have a long and difficult history with said mechanical boob sucker. We had a really rocky start since I was using it to convince my body that I needed to make milk. I wasn't actually MAKING milk when the pumping started so I'd have the thing on full mega suction and, after 30 minutes of high powered mechanical titty-twisters, would extract all of .025 of an oz. of milk. Epic Fail! And emotionally draining, especially considering all this was happening in the first 2 weeks after the major surgery that produced the Infant. I'd come to view the Sucking In Style boobulator with a great deal of trepidation, for obvious reasons.
However, there came a healing in our relationship. See, when one is all boobjuiced up, you begin to develop a somewhat...er... FULL feeling. And not a good full feeling, more of a 'ok don't TOUCH those, OW' full feeling. And if the fullness continues unrelieved, the tatas develop an every rack for themselves mentality and open the pressure release valve, at which point you end up with large damp circles right over your knockers, bulls eye style. I remind you again, that I am back at work. Large damp knocker circles are not technically considered 'business casual'. This is when the Sucking In Style became my new brestest friend.
So now right on schedule at 11:30am everyday the milk train comes, and I have to grab my newly adored breastpump and head out. For those of you who have mercifully not ever had to deal with one of these things, it is roughly the size shape and weight of a cellular phone from 1983 so tromping around the halls with this chiropractor's dream of a bag is hardly subtle. It is however more subtle than a soaked shirt, so yay for that?
This routine continues at roughly 3 1/2 hour intervals, schedule providing. Let me clarify - the NEED arises every 3 1/2 hours regardless - my ability to do anything about it is what gets messed with. And past 4 1/2 hours the pressure valves start to kick in. So there IS a window but it's a small one, and one that is fairly non-negotiable. If I could negotiate with my rack, believe me, it would be a different world.
This compressed time frame has resulted in several of the more unexpected ripple effects, among them, me leaving meetings early, cause the boobs were done WELL before the agenda was. Higher on the things I thought I'd never do list, during all day off site team training events, I've slunk out to my car, plugged the MilkMaster into the cigarette lighter and took my top off in the backseat. And really, you know your life has changed radically when its a boob appliance that's getting to second base in the backseat of your car.

Goooooood MORNING! Or it was anyway....

2008-06-02T13:58:00.000-07:00

See, I got Sleep, with a capitol 'S'. Any night that includes a chunk of sleep greater than 3 and 1/2 hours is considered a good night. If a good night includes *2* chunks of sleep greater than 3 and 1/2 hours, it will be followed by a good morning. Which was what I was having. Note use of past tense...
Many things were contributing to the good morning-ness, beyond even the sleep. I'd had the presence of mind/time/energy to switch my wallet and phone from my weekend diaper bag to my weekday working drone purse (how terribly symbolic), so I wasn't going to get 1/2 way to work and realize I would be foraging for leftover conference room food for lunch and/or getting arrested for driving without a license.
I'd also prewashed a bottle so I'd have SOMEthing to leave with the sitter to feed the Infant from - so she'd get to eat too. I'd managed to get showered, find underwear AND a bra I can wear, as well as an outfit I don't feel totally schumpy in. Mommy tummy is restricting my fashion options rather severely at the moment. That and being 4 years behind in laundry.
Speaking of laundry, I managed to get a load in without dripping detergent on myself or having to rewash a load from 4 days ago that had gone all stank. And, while in the basement, cleaned the kitty boxes *before* the inevitable editorial poop appeared on a landing or hall corner. All this and I was only running 30 minutes late. Truly a great morning.
And then......
The Sitter-In-Law had the Infant in arms feeding her a bottle - I was in full sherpa mode: boob pump, purse and computer bag all dangling off of me. I was just reaching for my lunch, the last step on the 'exit stage right' routine when..... YOOOOOOORK! The Infant represented apparently the entire 3 oz of formula she had just schlorped down. And, drama queen that she was, it went everywhere, including out of her nose. She was righteously offended. The expression while pitiful, was somewhat amusing - a mixture of 'oh, seriously, ew!' and 'what the f did I do to deserve THAT?!'. I would be lying if I didn't admit to freezing, with my hand on my lean cuisine lunch, and seriously debate just bolting. But one look at that confused and indignant little babyface and mommy guilt won. Plus I *like* my Sitter-In-Law. So I backed away from the the frozen pizza, de-sherp-ed and dove into decontamination. Since it was morning and the happy Infant side was in place vs. the later hours Sybil who shows up, she took it all with relatively good humor. Meaning her screams didn't actually shatter glass, and it only took 7 minutes to peal her off the ceiling after her onesie was removed.
Once the Infant was stripped and the worst of her hurl was hosed off of her, the Sitter-In-Law was kind enough to take over for the last of the dry down and redressing and I made a bolt for the door, now at least 45 minutes late. As I piled all my electronically laden saddlebags back on, I heard the MOST adorable coos and giggles from upstairs. Those sweet little sounds kept me smiling nearly 1/2 way to work. Which is when I realized I'd left my lunch at home. Le sigh.
Happy Monday to one and all!

Things no one warns you about: Infants spawn paperwork

2008-05-29T14:53:00.001-07:00

I am still wading through an insane backlog of mail and various other bits of paper built up from The Dark Days (so named because, for the first 2 months of the infants live, day became night and visa versa). But wait! There is still more! The pile of paper I need to fill out to get the infant into daycare makes my extended tax returns look like cake. PLUS, I need to get the pediatricians office to fill out part of it. So there is the added level of difficulty of dealing with medical personnel. PLLUUUSS, I need to fill out even MORE paperwork for the flexspending account that will help me pay for the arm, leg and kidney that daycare costs. They tell you about late night feedings and they tell you about stinky diapers, but they never warn you about THIS stuff...
Pray for me to emerge sans papercuts and still sane-ish...

Overheard from the nusery....BWAHhahaaha!

2008-05-29T07:21:00.000-07:00

Infant: WAAAAAHHH!!!!

hubby/studmuffin: Welcome to So You Think You Can Poop! I'll be your judge today... show me what you've got...

Infant: WAAAAAHHH!!!!

hubby/studmuffin: That's it?! That's all you've got?! I've seen better poop from hamsters! Where's the PASSION?!

Infant: WAAAAAHHH!!!!

hubby/studmuffin: Please leave the auditorium

Infant: WAAAAAHHH!!!! WAAAAAHHH!!!!

hubby/studmuffin: You know we're going to have to bleep all that out... bleeping bleepity bleep judges wouldn't know good poop if it bit them on the bleep!

Infant: Waah... Waa.... Aahgoo!

hubby/studmuffin: Come back next year.

"Working Mother" = redundant OR, phrased another way, shoot me now

2008-05-28T12:02:00.000-07:00

Mommyhood is HARD. Seriously. There is a Darwinian reason that nature makes infants so gosh darn cute. It's so they will survive the day - cause they can't do Jack for themselves, and, frankly, in the early days, they really aren't all that entertaining. In fact, they are downright annoying at times. They are kinda like tiny little asexual Paris Hiltons. Good thing they have their looks. They are, all in all, just a f-load of WORK.
The cruelty of 'life today' means that riiiiight about the time they start to suck a little less - adding cooing and gurgling to their to-date limited vocabulary of shrieks - that's exactly the time your maternity leave is up. Which is like, now. That's right folks - I'm back at work. My OTHER work I mean... the corporate stuff that you can get paid for.
I'm only sort of back, in that my brain is still firmly attached to the infant. Not literally, cause, ew. But figuratively, the hormonally-driven two-way baby clinginess is far far more powerful than I gave it credit for being. I miss the creature - the same creature who keeps me up at all hours, who poops on me, and who chews on my nipples for fun - I MISS her. Clearly this is not a feeling driven by logic.
The 'work' part is a little shaky. In part because, compared to what it takes to keep an infant alive during the first few months of its life, my job can hardly be called work. It's bordering on being a vacation, comparatively speaking. A wicked boring one, but still. I am still expected to produce things, for my pay, and that has been a bit of a challenge.
In part because the small segment of my brain that is not attached to the infant and has managed to make itself present in meetings and whatnot, is TIRED. Bone weary tired. Drooling on oneself tired. Consequently, some of my contributions are tending toward the, 'I don't know whatever you think' category. Others are just, well, lame. See, some people work fine on low sleep. Me? I start walking into walls and giggling to myself. Not really employee of the month type behavior.
One of the other little barriers to peak employee performance are my boobs. I'm not Dolly Parton so they've never really had a large impact on, well, anything before, much less work. But now? Since I've managed to get them up to speed on the babyjuice production, they require a lot more maintenance. Specifically, just like the cows in the fields, if I don't get milked regularly, I start to hurt. And/or leak. Both suck (no pun intended). So every few hours I have to take a midevil style boob sucking torture device roughly the size shape and weight of a cellular phone from 1981 down to the officially designated tata room and have at it. Which is just (and there is no better phrase to describe it) flat-out weird. Some things should not be brought into the work place. Rack Milking is one of those things. But here we are.
So between the exhaustion, the hormonal baby yearnings, and the Bessie the Cow deal, I can't honestly say that I feel like I am running at peak performance. In spite of all these however, I AM able to add a few sniblets of value - enough that I am not a TOTAL waste of space here. Some hours it's touch and go though.
The infant meanwhile is currently hangin with relatives, and apparently being incredibly easy to deal with. "She's SUCH a good baby!!!" This is because she saves allllll her cranky up til mommy's home. Now, granted, my arrival home tends to coincide with when she starts to get tired ( 6 or 7pm which my mommy friend refers to as the 'arsenic hour' ). But still. Its hard not to wonder if there is something deliberate there....or if the relatives are drugging her somehow. And if they are, can I get some of what they are dishing out?
In the next week or two she will be starting 'school' aka day care at work. We struggled with the decision on where to put her/keep her. With relatives is nice AND free, which is no small benefit. But they have lives to lead, lives that don't always mesh with the schedules of the infant. On the flip, daycare = no scheduling conflicts ever, but wicked expensive. Ultimately, family could only help for the the summer anyway, and we got a slot in the work daycare which is like, the Harvard of baby care. So we went for it. They seriously have a 'gym' just for babies. A baby gym. seriously. And, I feel pretty sure that the bean will do great there. Like mommy and daddy, she has the attention span of a hamster, and anything bright and shiny and new is considered good to her. They have a LOT of bright shiny and new at this place - more than we could ever provide even at home. We'll know for sure her review of the facilities next week, and I'll report back in. For now, I'm going back to 'work'....

Knocked up no more!

2008-05-09T15:14:00.000-07:00

Clearly, quite a bit has happened since my last post... I spent the week after penning that puppy in and out of the hospital. BP would go up, doc would send me to the hospital, they'd drug me more, BP would drop, they'd send me home, then BP would go up again. lather rinse repeat. It was an ever escalating battle - drugs vs. skyrocketing BP. 'I dare you!' 'I double dare you!!' By the time we'd reached the triple dog-dare of blood pressure treatment aka 750mg of TWO different BP drugs 3 times a day with full left side only hospital bed rest, it became pretty clear that we were out of options. It was babytime.
Because she was only 34 weeks, I was all for riding it out as long as possible. A couple of docs in my ob's practice were down with that, to a point. And there was a lot of 'discussion' about exactly where that point was. This was a bit confusing from the patient side of the conversation since opinions varied. When you are hospitalized, you get the doc du jour, which means you get the opinion du jour. 'You are good, just hang on your left side indefinitely and when your BP spikes again, we'll have a baby!' Next day, next doc? 'Get her out!! NOW NOW NOW!!!' Um, what? Many confused calls and intense spousal conversations later - we went with doc 2s opinion, who, come to find out, was dead serious about the 'NOW' part of her opinion. The hubby barely had time to get to the hospital before they were wheeling me into the operating room. He was literally met at the door with the little paper booties and hat. Exceptional timing!
I'll spare you the details of the delivery, but it could have been worse. We went c-section. Considering that rolling onto my right side spiked my BP by 20 points, we were pretty sure that a 24 hour bout with intense induced pain would probably have had a negative impact on my readings, to the tune of 'not enough drugs in the world'. So a quick slice n' dice and boom! Baby.
She was born at 3 something on march 7th (hey, I was drugged - cut me some slack!) and weighed 5lbs 9ozs. And after 10 days in the NICU, she was allowed to go home. I had to stay in the hospital myself another 4 days. The first of those 4 days, I was drugged to the gills on magnesium, to prevent seizures triggered by my ridiculously intransigent blood pressure. I refer to that period as my Keith Richards days. I was borderline incoherent and feeling zippy pain. This was especially welcome since shortly post birth the epidural wore off/broke (trust me you don't want the details) and I had been feeling EVERY bit-o-pain that comes along with being gutted like a codfish. Yay for magnesium, I say! And percocet and tylenol 3...
Next few posts I'll get y'all up to speed on the transition from human podcreature to mommyhood - its been quite a ride. But details will need to wait - the infant is paging me (read: there is an air raid siren going off in my home).... Happy Early Mother's Day!

You want the good news first?

2008-02-29T13:13:00.001-08:00

VERY good news! The kicked in the crotch sensation has subsided substantially! Now, it's subsided because I've been put on full time bed rest and am not allowed to leave the bed/sofa for more than 5 minutes at a stretch, but hey - I'm all about looking at the sunny side of the street. Another little bit of solar radiance is that I don't have to do said bed rest at the hospital. This was a strong possibility, and in fact, got a little trial run. Here's the fun summary of the past week in short. Monday, standard doc appointment. Been going in once a week for a while, so no biggie right? Um no, BIGGIE. My BP was not exactly what you'd call low... 160/100. This displeased the docs so much they sent me straight to the hospital. Um what? You want me to go where?! 'Labor and Delivery'. Uh-huh. And When do you want me there? 'Now.' Did you say now? 'Now!' Crap. Didn't really expect that one.... to say the least. So I freak, my husband rides in on his green stallion and rescues me from displaced hysteria, and shuttles me over to the hospital, which turns out, not to have been as bad as I expected. Mind you, I expected a cross between a Spanish Inquisition Torture Chamber and the movie Saw, cause I'm what you'd call 'anti-hospital' in spite never having been admitted to one before. I was wrong. It actually wasn't all that bad. It was less fun on the second day. In part cause they sent me home Monday evening, then went and sent me back the very next day. I expect that impacted my overall attitude on day two. Day 3 I was definitely not feeling it. All that said - they really were pretty nice, the food didn't suck as much as I thought, and in spite of all the poking and prodding at all hours, I did actually get SOME sleep. The upshot is that the baby is still doing well, I'm still doing pretty well, but the timing on all this birthing stuff is likely going to be, um, moved up a bit. Like she's going to be showing up any where from one month to 6 weeks early which would be anywhere from 3 weeks away to like, tonight. This is causing some minor scheduling difficulties, in so far as we kinda thought we'd have another, say, month or 6 weeks to do things like get the nursery together and buy diapers. Not so much. But really, of all the things we could be dealing with at this stage of the game, being stuck is bed is minor. She's healthy, I'm all good, and she'll be here soon. So yay!

Ahead of Schedule and Overdelivering - how overacheiving is BAD during pregnancy...

2008-01-25T12:43:00.000-08:00

Normally, the American Way is to do things bigger better and faster, and that is Good. When dealing with baby-growing, average really is optimal. Trust me. I know this for several reasons.
The first reason is that being ahead of the curve when it comes to labor readiness, actually translates into a cootch that hurts like a mother (no pun intended). Here's the medical 411 on this little joy. When you are pregnant, your body is flooded with a chemical that relaxes your ligaments and muscles and whatnot. The technical, medical name for this chemical is, and I am NOT kidding here, 'relaxin'. 'Relaxin' for goodness sake. It's not inherently bad. I mean, loosey goosey ligaments and muscles are a major plus when passing a child out of your nethers. They aren't however so useful when it means your esophagus ends up relaxed enough to allow dinner to wander up in your craw every time you lay down for bed. This is a relatively minor inconvenience, however, when compared to the irritation I'm currently experiencing.
I either have extra relaxin, it started really pumping early, or I'm relaxin sensitive - regardless, I have a REALLY relaxed pelvis. Super chill, is my groin. I am, in short, a loose woman. Now again, when passing a child like a bowling bowl from twixt your legs, this is good. Prior to the actual moments/hours of birthing, this is not so good. Cause it HURTS.
Having the four major bone-parts of your pelvis free to wander about at will, independent of each other and with no ligamentarian supervision means that all the surrounding muscles and joints and tendons and whatnot get wicked ticked. These bones gone wild are wreaking havoc in their bodily neighborhood, and the complaints from the nearby residents are coming in loud and clear.
The overall sensations vary from person to person, depending on how you walk or carry your weight or the weight of your mini-me-2-b. In my case, my pelvic area, for example, feels exactly like I was assaulted in a Law & Order SVU kinda way by an elephant or 12. Or, alternatively, like I just finished a 48 hour bike ride, had my legs removed at the hip, swapped, then screwed back in improperly. So, you know, um, OW! As you can imagine from these scenarios, spreading my legs, or really separating them at all, hurts like heckola. (I'm not exactly sure how that's going to work with the whole birthing process, but I figured I'll worry about that when forced too. Hopefully the drugs will have kicked in before it ever matters.)
Plus, since most of that groinal area seems to be running amuck most of the time, when I need to actually USE those joints, they need a lot of advance notice to get back into marching formation. When I get up after sitting for a while, or lying down, I have about 5 yards of shuffling like a stoned zombie, followed by some rather disturbingly loud popping noises coming from my lower regions, before I can walk even remotely normal. This makes the semi-conscious 3am bathroom trips especially exciting/entertaining for any viewers in the area.
The official medical word on this little adventure is that it is quote, normal, end quote. That's doctor speak for 'I know it hurts like a bieotch but there isn't jack doodly we can do about it so suck it up, and also, drink a lot of water'. Any doctor given advice while pregnant always ends with 'drink a lot of water'. Apparently hyper-hydration cures everything pregnancy related. Who knew?
On top of this day to day groin-centered painfest, last weekend, courtesy of my overrelaxed muscles, I managed to twist my ankle. Doing nothing. I sat on the sofa and pointed my toes. Seriously. That was it. For this impertinent toe-pointing I was rewarded with near total loss of mobility. If you thought the idea of me shuffle stepping around while I waited for my pelvis to get it's act together was amusing, imagine me HOPPING around like a stoned zombie. It WAS really impressive, I have to admit. Jaw dropping even. So being overrelaxed extra early, really? Not recommended...
The other ahead of schedule bit would be, oh something minor, like OUR CHILD. We just went in for an ultrasound (number 3) and were informed that the baby-2-b is approximately 2-3 weeks bigger than is average at this stage. She seems to think I'm in week 31 of my pregnancy vs the actual week 28-29 that I'm in. AND she's started to grow hair. With as much as she kicks and the size and the fur thing, if I wasn't actually there at the time of conception, I would be concerned that I have the love child of Jean-Claude Van Damme and a Yeti in there.
My official advice to any and all pregnant women, now and into the indeterminate future, is Average is Good. Watch Maury, eat McDonalds, Get 'C's. Just let go of any overachieving bone you have anywhere in your body, cause if you don't, I promise you, it will sure enough dislocate itself and start to wreak havoc on every body part you own.

This just in...

2008-01-02T14:31:00.000-08:00

At my appointment this morning the doc decided she wants to 'monitor me more closely', mainly because of the high blood pressure. She wants to make sure that I don't end up with preeclampsia - or more specifically, so they can catch it as soon as possible should I get preeclampsic, since apparently there is Jack Doodle you can do to avoid it, if'n it's a-comin'. Now, I appreciate the vigilance - it's a bad-to-dreadful thing if it kicks in - but the monitoring... oy! I now am on every 2 week doc visits, and they are making me do that pee in a jug thing AGAIN. (Mercifully, they're letting me wait til after I get back from my LA trip so I can collect my urine in a giant gas can in the privacy of my own home, instead of having to skulk around in the work place with it like last time. Whee.) I appreciate the on-top-i-tiveness, I just have a hard time reconciling it with the totally normal BP reading I got this morning.
I was also given the heads up that if I should go all preeclampsic and whatnot, the only 'cure' is to deliver the baby, which clearly, ain't an option for quite a few months yet. Barring the cure, the 'treatment' is to chain me to my bed - the dreaded bed rest! Ugh! Now, the doc said, everything is good now, but she just wanted to let me know so I'd be mentally prepared if this did happen, and that I could, and I quote, 'turn at any time'. I did consider turning on her at that point.... Lemme get this straight, the only thing I can do to possibly avoid this is drink more water? And the treatment is to just go to bed? Greeeeeaaat... sounds like my last stomach virus, and it would be about as welcome.
And on top of this adventure, I'm also due for the standard glucose screening (aka 'the drink some nasty-a** sugar laden goop and then get blood sucked' test), they want to up my ultrasounds to every 3 weeks and I need to go to the hospital for some Ghb, Gbh, Gamma boogen sompin' shot so my blood doesn't end up in a head to head face off with the baby's blood. Basically, I'm going to be spending a CRAPload of time with medical professionals over the next few months.
Talk about starting the new year with a bang! ;-)

I'm BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!

2008-01-01T15:13:00.000-08:00

Between 2 funerals (grandmothers ::sigh::), 2 rounds of work layoffs (still employed), and the general holiday chaos, blogging went bye-bye. But now that I've got a nanosecond to breathe I'll get everyone up to date cause a lots gone down - all good.

- We got our 20 week ultrasound which is the 'measure ever bone in the baby's body' ultrasound. We learned that all bones in the babies body are intact and accounted for, heart's there and beating, so allll good. We also discovered the babies gender. Before we got all excited we asked the doctor, how sure ARE you? Since we've heard stories of all blue nurseries that suddenly get populated with baby girls and visa versa - a boy named Sue and all that. So the doc whipped out the scanner, flipped the switch, and the screen was filled with our lovely child's splayed legs. Nowhere to hide a thing, no pun intended - 'Oh yeah' he said, 'I'm sure - that is DEFINITELY a girl'. So yay!

- We've also discovered that the first ultrasound did not lie - this is one active baby. Now that I can feel her, I'm pretty sure we've bred a kick-boxer. She's now kicking hard enough that I'm not the only one feeling her. The kick like a mule skill is concerning considering I've still got a whole trimester to go. She's going to get WAY bigger and WAY stronger over the next 3 months. THIS is where the stretch marks come from, I'm sure of it. God help me...

- I've also retired nearly all clothes that are non-maternity. I am unmistakably knocked-up from nearly any angle, including the rear (waddle-a-rama!). Now like the kicking skillz, this is concerning. I am short, petite, vertically-challenged, stumpy, un-tall, whatever you want to call it, but the upshot is there really isn't a lot of torso here for baby-hosting. Unless I get a liver removal, I calculate I've got about another 3 or so weeks 'til the only way to grow is out. And with 3 MONTHS left to go, it looks like I'm going to end up approximately as wide as I am tall. Now it's not like I'm giving up a skateboarding career here, but with these proportions I'm not sure how WALKING is going to go. It's going to be entertaining I'm sure.

Next up is a trip next week to LA so we'll be flying cross county and playing tourist, at least as much as I am able in my early-waddling state. This will be one globe-trotting fetus - she'll have been to NYC, West Palm Beach and LA all before she's born! We're clearly enjoying the travel thing while we can. ;-) I'll be updating on the fun upon return...

Wow - that is REALLY ugly - on you, I mean...

2007-10-19T08:25:00.000-07:00

It's been kinda a busy couple of weeks - and by 'busy' I mean 'craptacular'. A funeral to attend (sigh), and layoffs to dodge (ugh). Mercifully, both are over. The plus side is I'm still employed (rock ON) so I can finally stop being the undercover mother at work. I'm not sure which I'm more excited about. Yes, successfully job hunting while obviously knocked up would be difficult, if not impossible, but wearing tight pants and having to suck it in all day REALLY bites, so... tough call...
In preparation for my coming out at work, I went maternity clothes shopping. And wow, was that an experience. Made all the more experiential by having my coolest/oldest (in duration) friend in the area, R, with me. [I'd use her name but she does this nickname/initials thing in HER blog so I'm rolling with that - if she's got a better nickname I should use, she should report in, hint hint. And 'Queen of all I survey' is too long and I can't spell ululating maenaid...or whatever, so guess again.] Because we've been friends for as long as we have, she's honest with me - if not brutally honest when called for. And on this trip? Called for.
So for those of you who haven't gone shopping for maternity clothes, let me paint the picture. If you are a man, this won't be applicable - not because you can't get knocked up, but because clothes always fit you. Or your gender is impervious to pain due to waist binding or has amazing belt skills or less bizarre variety of styles or whatever - but regardless - you do not suffer quite the way we womenfolk do when it comes to clothing. So, back to picture painting.
Imagine the last time you went clothes shopping. Think about how many items you sorted through to get to one you thought was 'cute' or 'pretty' or 'was a color that didn't make me look like cow poop on a platter'. Maybe what, 1 in 20 or 30 things? In a store with stuff that you generally LIKE I mean. Outlets tend to run 1 in like 80 million. Let us, here in imaginationland, take these items into the dressing room. I know I know - this will be hard for all of us, but we are in it together...
Of the small handful of items how many of them didn't 'bind' or 'pinch' or 'make your butt look like a billboard'? Maybe 1 in 10ish? Now, take jeans and bras out of the mix entirely - they are an entirely different breed. Those run 1 in 100 on a good day, and we all know it. We've all been there, and the pain is still fresh.
So now that we've built this imaginary clothing shopping experience - let's apply this to the real world of maternity shopping! First the additional 'factors'. One, you are cranky - maybe it's hormones maybe it's that your underwear has been too tight for at least a month, but for whatever reason, crankicity. Two, your body is no longer your own - it's changing pretty much hourly so everything you ever knew about what styles generally look good on you or whatever, out the window. And whatever you learn about what works, could very well look like ass on you in a month. Talk about a moving target.
Three, the selection of maternity clothes blows CHUNKS. Both in volume and style. AND they are a bitch to find. Quick, where's the nearest maternity clothing store? What about the nearest store that carries maternity clothes? SEE?! Unless you are wearing a nursing bra RIGHT NOW, you have no clue (and if you said Target, that doesn't count since they carry EVERYTHING)
Knowing alllll this, let's go maternity clothes shopping. Whee!
My first excursion was to a store that carried exclusively maternity clothes, which I found solely due to a mall map. My friend to-be-nicknamed-later and I had just had dinner at Tyson's and I figured, what the heck, bound to have SOMETHING in here - it's consumerist heaven. And Lo, a maternity store.
Let's harken back to our earlier 'cute' to 'ew' ratio 1-20 to 30 right? Ok here? 1 in, um, 100. Not that the clothes were, like, hideous, but I'm not what you call a floral and ruffles kinda gal. At all. In fact, I am nearly phobic about lace. Sliiiiiim pickins. THEN you put them on. Remember, I have basically no clue what my current body shape is - since it changes every couple of hours I have trouble keeping up. But these guys are pros, and have foreseen this very problem! They nicely provide a strap-on for you in the fitting room - strap-on belly I mean. Just so you can get an idea of what shape you will be in the next 4 months.
Now, I've not done this before, but I certainly have seen my fair share of knocked up chick and NONE of them had a belly that looked even remotely like this Velcro-able abomination. I seriously looked like an alien ovapositor had been involved in conception. I mean, it was POINTY for God sake! SO not helpful.
Pretty much I am flying blind on this, fitting-wise. I'll spare you the worse of the multiple size swaps, the contortions and dressing room angst. I don't want to trigger flashbacks for any of you. But I will tell you that one outfit made me look like a bloated roe-filled mermaid, one made me look like a 'who's the babydaddy' jerry springer guest, and one just made my friend-to-be-nicknamed-later AND the *sales clerk for the store* laugh hysterically. I managed to cull 2 skirts and some underwear out of the pile of discards and damaged self-esteem, which put my numbers at 1 in 30 for fitting. (And anyone who tells you you don't need maternity underwear can come kiss my comfortably cotton clad bootie, cause they are wrong wrong wrong! Happy sigh!)
I repeated this entire process yesterday at Target, only without the peanut gallery/'support'. And instead of starting with an entire store I started with 5, count 'em, 5 racks of maternity clothes. We've already established that I suck at math, but if you want to apply the 1 in 100 "isn't ass-ugly" ratio to that starting number, then overlay the 1 in 30 "doesn't make you look like you should be at Fleet Week, either as a 'service provider' or an aircraft carrier" ratio, that should give you a good idea of what I walked out of there with.
Yup, you got it - cat food and toilet paper...

I'm off to a work conference next week which should give me even more fodder for my next post - 'the joys of being knocked up in an office environment and the weird things that happen when you come out of the preggers closet'

OK, math isn't really my strong suit, but c'mon!

2007-10-10T07:16:00.000-07:00

Yay! Results are finally in but I should give you the full context... actually, I should give you the full, FULL context... The deep background on this is the following - my babydaddy's grandmother just passed away, the same day we got that news, I found out that MY grandmother was hospitalized, and there is a chance that I will be losing my job next week as part of a massive 'reorganization' at my company. While not directly tied to my being knocked up, these details do help paint the picture of, um, mild stress the man and I were under. I also learned that stress can trigger a relapse of morning sickness - great little educational tidbit there...
So considering the run of crapluck we seem to have been in the middle of we were a bit anxious about the results of the testing. Which you would be anyway, really, but when rendered borderline paranoid by circumstances, the edginess gets a little booster shot.
For those unfamiliar with this testing deal (which is probably most folks, parental or not, since they just came up with this routine a few years ago), it's a 2 parter. First they do an ultrasound and measure.... well, something in the neck area. I was fuzzy about exactly what, but what I'm sure about, through the process, is that it can only be measured when the baby-to-be is in a certain position. A position, I might add, that OUR baby-to-be determinedly refused to take up. And I'm not talking like, down dog or eagle pose here - the kidlet just needed to lay on its back. But would it? OOooooh no. Of course not. Thus the 10 minute ultrasound turned into a hour and 15 minutes worth of comedy fodder.
The tech, God love her, was a sweet and patient woman, and at no point did she begin thumping my belly like a bongo, though I'm sure the desire was strongly there... What she did do was, at first, grease me up and scan a little this way, and a little that way. No luck. Baby gave back - clearly presenting the rear from every angle - which I guess is the fetus equivalent of giving someone the hand. Kidlet was having none of it.
So sweettech goes to Plan B - a sort of gentle jiggling of the ultrasound wand (mercifully an external) to try to encourage relocation. Yeah - no. Nothing. So she goes to slightly more vigorous jiggling. This triggered arm or antennae waving, it's hard to tell what anything is on those screens. But nothing else. The angle was still a no go. After 15 minutes of poke and jiggle the tech yields. OK Plan C - lie on your side for a few minutes, that will usually make the kidlet relocate. So I obediently flop over and lie. And lie. And lie.
10 minutes of lying and the tech comes back. "Let's see if that worked!" Well, yes and no. The kidlet DID move, so yay! The angle still sucks, so boo. So she goes to Plan D, try new directions. So she comes at the belly from the left, from the right, from the top, from the bottom, from the top left, the bottom right - you get the idea. and every angle is close, oh so close, and yet...no. I offer to do a little down dog myself. The tech seems to consider it briefly but passes. She's convinced that the mid bottom rightish angle can work....the kidlet is soooooo close. So she reverts to a more vigorous application of poke and jiggle technique. Poke...JIIIIIIIGGGGGGLLLLE! Poke.... JIIIIIIGGGGGGLLLE!!!! And finally! Success! The kidlet moves to its back, and she begins snapping ultrasound shots like she's the paparazzi with an angle on Britney's bare yaya.
Now the purpose of the poke and jiggle is the bug the baby-to-be enough that he/she relocates. Which worked, but the side effect is that you are left with a seriously bugged baby-to-be. And apparently when our baby-to-be is seriously bugged, it turns into a total spaz. This little thing was FREAKING OUT in there. Limblets a-flailing. Noggin a-turnin. And mid-photo shoot, he/she began what I can only refer to as 'Sproinging'. It wasn't so much a bounce or a hop, as a full body jump. In fact, there was brief discussion about whether fetuses could get hiccups at this stage of development. But after 'Sproing!!!' #15 it was clear that this was very purposeful protest spazzing, not involuntary twitches. This was one P.O.ed kidlet. And, God help me, while I'm sure my soon-to-be-maternal heart should have swelled with sympathy for the agitated little guy/gal, but all I could do was point and laugh. In my defense - it was *hilarious* - seriously. "Sproing!!! SPROING!! sproingsproingsproing!!!" And of course every time I laughed, it wound the critter up more, and the tech kept losing the picture, cause the kidlet was bouncing around so much. The tech finally just gave up - she got enough from the first few photos and it was pretty clear we weren't going to get much more today from the mexican jumping bean. As she packed up she said, well, we know your child has strong legs, that's for sure...
We had an appointment scheduled to review the official results of the testing with our OB for Tuesday. Remember that 'same day' grandmother bad news confluence I mentioned earlier? Yeah - THAT would be the same Tuesday. So by the time we get in there, my brain is a little baked. Because this is a multi-doc practice and my regular OB was on vacation this week, we has started the 'meet all the people who could possibly end up birthing your baby' rotations early. Whee. Major stressful test results from a stranger.
When new doc trots in, she seems quite personable, albeit without a clear sense of humor, and she begins chitchatting, 'so how are you feeling...?' um...good....
'great! And how are you with the symptoms?' um... good...
'Great! And do you have any questions for me today?' um... yeah... What were the test results?! 'oh! hmm.... is that why you are in today? I don't seem to have those....'
I think.
'Let me see what we can find out!' um.... please....
She siccs a nurse on the testing office, then comes back in. 'While she's getting those results, do you have any questions about the tests?' Yes, actually...
The deal is that they give you a ratio for odds of having a down's syndrome baby, based on the combination of the ultrasound measurements of the...well whatever they measure... and various blood chemicals. So I ask what the ratio means. The doctor and my husband look at me like I'm nuts. My husband kindly explains using that tone one uses with a 6 year old. "well, if the ratio is 1 in 100 you have a 1 percent chance of having a down's syndrome baby, so 1 in 1000 is a .1% chance. Do you understand?". Um.... yeah...
OK, yes, I was out sick in elementary school when we did fractions, but I've played the lottery and blackjack so I GET the odds thing. Please. Although the fact that I've played the lottery could be an argument AGAINST me getting the odds thing....At any rate, what I DON'T get is what is considered 'good' relative to say, the planet. What I need is a CONTEXT. While I didn't use those words exactly to clarify - I think there was more frothing pregnant hormonal attitude in my response - but I did get my point across. After backing slowly away from me, the doc pulled out "The Wheel" - which I thought was just for calculating due dates, but is apparently the Rosetta Stone for all things preggers, and told me that based solely on my age my odds are 1 in 167ish. Great! Exactly what I needed - anything better than that, is good. THANK you. You may all stop looking at me like I'm insane now...
This is about the point where the nurse pokes her head in the room to inform us that, while the ultrasound 1/2 of the results are in and look good, the official all things included results are not yet available and they'll have to call us with those. Well, nuts. THAT was worth the office visit...
So we wait. And wait. And wait.... Finally Friday - the call - and the results? "Normal" says the nurse. YAY! Ok, no, WAIT. I spent WAY too much time figuring out this whole odds/ratio thing - I want NUMBERS! Quantify normal for me! The nurse, while probably mildly taken aback at my obsession with math, obliged. According to the official results, my ratio went from 1 in 167 to 1 in 2,741. How they came up with that number exactly is beyond me, but I gotta say... I like those odds... :-)
Tune in next week for my first maternity clothing shopping experience...imagine your last bra or jeans shopping experience - now velcro a pod to your gut....yeah, it was like that...

ok this is a token post and I totally admit it...

2007-09-30T20:29:00.000-07:00

we had our genetic testing on Thursday but won't get the results back til Tuesday so i figured I'd do a full wrote up then but i also don't want to break my weekly update streak so this is a lame one but tune in Tuesday to see why the sweet ultrasound tech probably hates my guts...

um... suuuure I see it...

2007-09-21T16:47:00.000-07:00

So unlike the first doctor visit, I was slightly more prepared/hormone stable for visit number 2. This, I'm sure, was good for all parties involved... This early on, I wanted my BabyDaddy to come to any appointments that might include any milestones of note, and early on, there are quite a few milestones. Later on, the poor man doesn't really need to show up every two weeks to hear the detailed report of my bloating and piddling, now does he? The medical professional gets some form of renumeration for listening, but really, what's in it for him?
This next appointment was a bit of a toss up. Since I'd been more than slightly spacey first go around, I had no idea what to expect for this one, having not had enough sense to ASK. Several of my 'reference' manuals ('what to expect' - for the clinically inclined, and 'girlfriends guide' - for those who need REAL advice), had mentioned that there was the chance of hearing a heart beat at this stage of babybaking - which would be wicked cool and I didn't want him to miss that, but then, I really had no clue what was actually going to go down. My BabyDaddy, being the best BabyDaddy ever, was willing to take time off from work and tearass across town just on the off-chance that we might hear a little thump-a-thump. This general sweetum-ness is one of the many reasons I let him knock me up in the first place.
Like I said, I didn't know what to expect, but I was reallly realllly hoping the doc would do the heartbeat with the professional baby heartbeat listener thinggie (<- technical medical term). I mean how cool would that be! Plus, I did want the BabyDaddy's commute to be worth it - if we didn't do anything but talk about unpleasant bodily functions, I'd feel a little bad for him.
Imagine my joy and delight when the doc decided to pull out the big guns and do not a listener thinggie but a lookie thinggie (aka an ultrasound) - woo hoo! Way better than hearing the heartbeat, we'd get to SEE the spawn.
My joy was damped slightly when I saw the ultrasound, wheeled out with an extended apology. 'Now remember this is out satellite office so this is one of our older machines. Actually, I think this is our oldest machine, so the resolution won't be so great...' We're talking soviet bloc surplus here, really, but hey - any baby picture is a good baby picture at this stage.
The upside of this circa 1972 machinery is that this was an 'outtie' ultrasound. For those of you who haven't had the pleasure of yet learning such ugly details about the underbelly of pregnancy, let me enlighten you. In order to get a better view of the growing human implant, ultrasound machines will try to get closer to the baby-to-be. And how would one get closer? This about it... the only way to get closer is to go...um... inside. Things you neither knew, nor wanted to know, huh?
So I was pleased to know my initiation into the world of ultrasounds was a gentle exterior one, mercifully. The doc flopped me onto my back and greased me up like an old Chevy at a jiffy lube. My hope is that when I get upgraded to the 'detailed' view version, they use at least as much gunk as they did this time cause, man, did I need a bath when they were done.
After a bit of poking around a grey and black lumpy peanut appeared on the screen. The doc jabs and turns a bit and says 'there it is - there's the baby and there's the heart beat! See it?' Um... no actually... I look over at the hubby 'Honey? Do you see it?' He jabs vaguely with his finger, 'Of course! it's right there! See that little fluttering? Mid-peanut lump?' Um...again with the no... It was like one of those annoying as all heck Magic Eye things 'Can't you see the ship?! It's right THERE?! Just relax your eyes... I mean it's right THERE!' Man was that annoying...
The doc is swiping the price scanner about willy nilly at this point 'yep everything looks really good... looks good in here.... would you like me to print out a picture for you?' Hope ignites in my little heart... 'Yes please!' Figuring I could get the hubby to point to the exact where of the magic eye ship of the heartbeat is after the fact. Maybe I saw it and just didn't KNOW that I saw it... maybe.... you know... it could happen!
'I told you it was old, but you can get kinda negative version' As soon as she handed over the printout, I knew I wasn't getting aaaaanything else out of this...This thing looked like it was printed on a dot matrix printer I swear. I'd seen all I was going to see for this go around.
So no, I didn't see my baby-to-be's heart beating, but my babydaddy did, and that's good enough for me.

Oh well THAT is subtle....

2007-09-12T14:42:00.000-07:00

My doctor experience to date has been somewhat mixed. Now I don't lay this on the doorstop of the doctor per se. My doc is actually fairly cool. It was more a minor communications issue, I'd say... So here's what happened on my first visit... .
My doc had told me last time I was in (when she gave the the 'get knocked up pronto or else' speech) that as soon as I got pregnant I should come in and see her. Since I have high blood pressure and am over the age of 22, I am apparently considered 'high-risk', aka 'needs a lot of adult supervision with this babymaking deal'. Shortly post dipstick results, I was a good little patient and called for the first available appointment.
Now the downside of being squeeze into a busy schedule is that there isn't a lot of time for liiiiingering conversations. That wasn't a huge issue, mainly because I wasn't quick capable of conversations at that point. Remember, I had JUST found out a beebee was on the way, so I was still fairly deer in the headlights about the whole thing. I also I still hadn't gotten my hormonal sea-legs, so to speak, so I spent most of my first appointment either incoherently attempting to answer yes/no questions, crying for no discernible reason, or looking as stunned at if I gotten whacked in the head with a trout. My husband was kind generous and caring enough to go to this first appointment with me, which meant the world. About 2 minutes into the visit, he too got the trout to the head look, although in his case, it was in response to me tearing up when the doctor gave me a free vitamin sample. What can I say, the baby on the box was just so precious looking!
After this 10 minute drama, the doctor, who is saint like in her patience with patients, sent us on our way with list of desired tests as long as my arm. Including one testing to see how much protein my kidneys throw off. Now, anyone able to do basic proof would come to the conclusions that if you are looking at kidney products, you would be looking at, well, pee. I was barely able to tie my shoes from all the excitement, so I didn't really GET that this wasn't so much a blood test she was talking about. Oh there were plenty of those though. Vial after vial worth. I 1/2 expected Wesley Snipes to come crashing through the window, Blade a-blazen. But no such luck. I was merely sucked dry and sent out.
As I stagger toward sunlight, the nice lady behind the counter called after me...."Wait! Don't forget your kidney function test!". I'm mildly concerned simply because I don't think I have any liquid anywhere in my body... I toddle woozily over to the counter and the woman hands me a flyer with a list of instructions. I am confused, since I was expecting something more along the lines of a small clear cup, and really, I know what to do with that. As I'm squinting at the sheet, she whomps onto the counter in front of me the largest piddlebucket I have ever seen in my life. This thing is the size of a GAS CAN. a LARGE gas can. With LITER marks on the side. in BRIGHT ORANGE. On the plus side it would be safe for hunting season. The downside is it's not exactly what you would call discrete.
And my little sheet o instructions is quite clear on what has to happen next. For the next 24 hours, I must capture every little dribblet of widdle, and can it. Did I mention this appointment was in the morning and I was now rather late for work? WORK. I have to pee in a giant orange jug AT WORK. Now I'm not sure on the exact workplace etiquette that applies here, but no matter how you slice it, wandering the podfarm with a jug of my own urine is decidedly not cool. People REALLY don't need a part of that. And clearly following the recommended procedure and refrigerating the giant can is totally beyond the pale. People's lean freakin cuisines are in there for heck's sake! This would be less of an issue if I was out of the closet with this whole 'growing a little creature' thing, but work has no idea. And I'd liek to keep it that way for at least another few weeks. You ever try to explain why you need to pee in a jug to your boss? Really, I hope you never do.
I will spare you the gory details of exactly how "operation GoJow" (Giant Orange Jug 'O Widdle) was accomplished. Like many black bag ops, it involved a great deal of skulking, disguises (mainly for the jug), and the details would make you downright queasy if you knew. But i am happy to report it was indeed accomplished - granted, I avoided beverages for straight 24 hours and they didn't get anywhere NEAR their 7 liter maximum, but hey, they got plenty! I can hardly wait for the next 3 times I get to do it... nope... not kidding....
I'm happy to report doc visit 2 involved no jugs and minimal urine - yay for everyone! I'll update you on that and on spreading the news, and reactions thereto - up next!!

Are you SERIOUS?!

2007-09-04T08:36:00.000-07:00

Since we've created the detailed Almanac, I had a pretty good idea of the when and where's of making the mini - which also meant I had a decent idea when it was worth while to try a RUPreggers dipstick. Now, I've known enough women who were really quick out of the gate and knew within, like, hours of blastocysts forming. I decided to pace it a little, just cause you want to make sure it TOOK before you go to the trouble of peeing on your own hand. Gave it a about a week or so then finally whipped out the way-too-costly box o' tests. The adventure proceeded roughly as follows:
Testing Day 1 - I woke up having to go to the bathroom so badly there was no WAY I could get the wrapper on that thing open in enough time to avoid bladder explosion. I did try but it was NOT pretty. Scratch Day 1.
Testing Day 2 - I wisely did NOT drink a gallon of liquid before bed and successfully both unwrapped and target-widdled, with minimal hand splashing. Yay! Success! 5 minutes later, I realize that perhaps I should have had MORE water, since the test stick has decided it doesn't much feel like giving me a result - just a random error message. Boo! Failure! Oh yeah the newfangled ones with the LCD screens are SOOOOO much better. Stupid Technology.
Testing Day 3 - My impatience is starting to build 'slightly' at this point. Remember, I waited like a week before I even STARTED with the dipsticks, so at this point, I want an ANSWER already! In hindsight, the frothing irritation at the busted test stick as well as the total inability to wait more than a minute and 1/2 for ANYTHING were actually better indicators of having a bun in the oven than anything the test could tell me. But that's hindsight. So on day 3 when the pregnancy test stars an planets finally aligned, it was little shock that the dipstick said, and I quote, 'pregnant'. But I lie - it actually WAS a little shock. Even though I had a really darn good idea, what with being as regular as a metronome and having keep good enough records that I could predict hail, it was still very different to have an 'official' medical test confirm what you thought you sort of knew.
So I cried. Happy cry, and just for a minute, but actual tears of joy. Honesty forces me to admit, in part cause, yay! I'm having a baby with the man I adore! in part cause, thank God, I can actually get pregnant without having to give a medical practice $15,000 of our money. The thing about getting pregnant is there is only one way to find out if you can do it, and that's by doing it. And having never been pregnant, we just didn't know if it could even BE done. It can - and we did it - woo hoo!
Of course, I want to tell the hubby immediately. This is not possible since he's at work and I really don't want to reenact the cell phone commercial ('way to step up brad') so I bounce about the house all impatient again (shocker) for him to get home so I can share. After debating a bazillion elaborate ways to tell him, involving life size teddy bears and weather balloons, sanity (briefly) reins and I decide to go relatively prop-free and low-key, and was lying in wait when he got h0me.
We had tickets that night to see Bugs Bunny on Broadway at wolf trap, so I, all low key and all say, "hey baby, I know it's kinda last minute, but would you mind if we brought someone to the concert tonight?" My hubby, being a total sweetums responded with, "um no, I guess that would be ok..."
I said, "It's a child friendly show, right?" The Hubby is deeply puzzled...
"Well, yeah, but who do you want to bring?"
I say "Well, it not really someone YET but....", and with all appropriate drama, whip out the dipstick o' joy and say, '" thought we could could bring our new baby-to-be..."
And the look on his face was priceless...best summed up with the phrase 'shock and awe'. He grabs the test stick "Really?! Are you serious?! really?! oh baby!!!" SO happy! Hug and snuggles and general jubilation all around.
Well worth battling 3 test sticks and waiting 2 weeks for...And we still went to see Bugs Bunny too... :-)

Preggers - It's in there!

2007-08-26T17:50:00.000-07:00

It's official - I've got a bun in the oven. Since we're not sharing early, we're going to document this little adventure here so you can drop in anytime and not have missed a (heart)beat. The hubby and I have been 'trying' for a for, I dunno, a year-ish. If you define trying as not trying to NOT, if you know what I mean. About 6 months ago, after a panic inducing OB/GYN visit, (you know, the one that includes the 'your eggs are aging rapidly and if you aren't knocked up in the next few months we're going to ask your husband to do unmentionable things to a plastic cup and start pumping you full of litter-producing chemicals' speech) we buckled down a little more. By buckle down I mean, I started making note of lots of little numbers in a calendar - temperatures, start dates, end dates, phases of the moon. Ben Franklin had nothing on this personal almanac - I could predict *rainfall* amounts. Now we didn't DO much with them but still - impressive. Of course, after all that math, wouldn't you know it, the ONE time we went purely recreational, wham! OK maybe not the ONE time, maybe more like the 47th time - I told you we weren't hardcore about the trying thing. Regardless, it worked, and how. And here we are. The plan is to spend the next few posts getting everyone up to speed on preggers progress to date including: dipstick turns pink& the hubby is informed, the first doc visit, & staying undercover - then we'll go realtime... So, whenever you come into the story, enjoy... ;-)