favorite foto friday

Here is my favorite foto of the week. I love the way the light falls across her face. Why the serious look? She is watching Elmo's World.

More Favorite Foto Friday

question of the day

Your friendly neighborhood girl scout brings over the six boxes of Samoa and Thin Mint cookies you ordered. Do you:

a) have your husband take them to work to share with his coworkers because you are trying to loose weight

b) stash them in the pantry where they will taunt you every night

c) scarf them down as quickly as possible, because surely you get some type of calorie discount if you eat the whole box

I am leaning towards c.

getting out of the house

How going to the supermarket 5 miles from my house takes all morning:

9:00 bring kids upstairs; turn on Curious George

9:03 ask Abby to brush her hair; she screams and ducks under a blanket

9:05 attempt escape to bathroom to brush teeth and put in contact lenses; despite interesting TV show Claire follows me in and walks out with a handful of tampons

9:10 vaguely register that a tampon parade is now underway; take opportunity to put on some make-up and get dressed

9:15 tell Abby she really needs to brush her hair; I have become invisible

9:25 find Claire under bed and wrangle her into clothes

9:30 attempt to brush Abby's hair; get a one brush in before she runs off screaming

9:35 get out clothes for Abby

9:45 convince Abby that it is too cold out to wear a bathing suit; settle on bathing suit under clothes; give up on brushing hair and tie the whole mess back in a ponytail

9:50 head downstairs to get coats and shoes; Abby wants to bring her giraffe in the car; Claire wants to bring a piece of her long lost crib mobile; I say yes to both

9:55 Claire finds her boots and brings them over; Abby finds her clogs and in an increasingly agitated voice, repeatedly asks 'Is this the right foot' until I say yes; she then calmly puts them on

10:00 get out coats, Claire runs away

10:05 get in car; negotiate truce regarding how to hang crib mobile piece in the car

10:10 get kids strapped in car; Abby: "Mommy, I'm hungry" Claire: "Me too! Me too!"

10:15 back in the car with bags of crackers

10:20 arrive at market

Why bother at all? Because the alternative is driving each other bat shit at home as I count the minutes until nap time.

Spring time, please come soon.

when I grow up

Abby asked me today what I want to be when I grow up. Clearly somehow it has escaped her notice that I am already OLD. A new wrinkle appeared out of nowhere on my forehead just this morning. I have a husband and kids and a mortgage. I cook and clean and make the rules. So despite the fact that I still sometimes do stupid, irresponsible things I believe I am, in fact, grown up.

I love the spirit of this question though. With all the talk of work vs stay at home moms, it is easy to forget that I should have quite a few good years left after these kids are off to school and not clinging to me quite so much. What then? What do I want to be then? Writer? Photographer? Woman of leisure? Supreme Court Justice (Sandra Day O'Connor was a stay at home mom when her kids were young too)? I do not think I can go back to my old career focused self, working 12 hours a day in the real world. So what do I want to be when my kids grow up?

And in case you are wondering, Abby wants to be a Mommy when she grows up. I am both flattered and horrified.

my girls

I realized I have not been taking as many photos as usual lately. The main reason? We have not been doing anything photo worthy. Like get dressed. Or brush our hair. Or leave the house. Both kids view any attempt to change them out of their cozy pjs with great suspicion. Why they ask? Where are we going? Abby also likes to change back into her pajamas and take any clips out of her hair as soon as we get home, which means she pretty much always looks like she just rolled out of bed.

So this is what my kids really looked like for most of January and February. I did discover that getting a picture of them together is amazingly easy if I do not try to dress, groom and pose them though. For reference below was one of many Christmas card attempts.

these kids are good

Both kids were happily playing (and by happily playing I mean not killing each other) in their toy room while I was cleaning up the kitchen. Quietly, I took out a spray can of whipped cream from the fridge, squirted some on my finger and quickly ate it. I look down and two little faces are looking up at me with fingers outstretched. How in the world do they do that? If I call them to come eat it takes at least ten minutes for them to tear themselves away from whatever they are playing with. It's like they can smell something is up.

Worse yet, the baby outed me to my husband by pointing at the can of whipped cream and saying "Finger? Want some finger?"

thanks for sharing

I open one groggy eye to see that it is 6am and Abby is guzzling from the glass of water I leave next to my bed. Then she crawls into bed with me and sneezes on my pillow.

Why do I keep getting colds?

wordless wednesday

The closet of a princess.

She did this all herself. Don't ask where her real clothes are.

More Worldless Wednesday

the pressures of being 4 years old

Before Halloween was even over this year, Abby started thinking about what she wanted to be next year. The thoughts come as randomly as everything else she does. At breakfast "Mommy, for Halloween next year I want to be the little guy with one eye in Monsters Inc. Can you make that costume?" Then "Mommy I want to be Wendy from Peter Pan." Then days later while on the potty "Mommy, does Wendy wear an elastic in her hair? I think I need to get one."

Then it was Dash from the Incredibles. Then Snow White. Then every year I am going to be a different princess until I have been all of the princesses, then I will be Sleeping Beauty. And the latest "Mommy, can I be a cat for Halloween? With mittens for paws so I can still get the candy?" Clearly, my answer is always yes since we have a long way to go until October.

Today she tells me "Mommy, picking what you want to be for Halloween is REALLY hard" Clearly, I could not possibly understand. The year long pressure of it all. The possibility of picking the wrong costume and getting no candy. Or ruining the preschool Halloween parade maybe? I love that this is the hardest thing in her life right now because that means her life is really pretty good.

we made it to the backyard!!

a day with no rain, freezing cold or vomit. woohooo!

baby is finally paying off

I was folding laundry today and realized that my girls were playing happily in the next room. Just the two of them. Talking to each other. Entertaining each other. Like two real people.

Having that second baby is finally paying off. In fact, I think this means I no longer have a baby. I am not sure if I am happy or sad about this. Both I guess.

car buying

My husband's car is eleven years old. He has a long commute to work everyday. It is time to buy him a new car. Actually about three years ago it was time to buy him a new car, but we had another baby instead.

After much research he decided on the Volvo S40. Safe, good gas mileage, should last us another eleven years. After looking at hundreds online he found a year old one that seemed like a good deal. Yesterday, we went to the dealer to check it out. We took it for a drive. I had important concerns like where I could plug in my iPod. After addressing that, all was well until he discovered that the owners manual was missing. Not in the glove compartment. Or the truck. Or the backseat. No owners manual.

We sat down with the salesman. We agreed on the price. We agreed on our trade in. But wait. There was no owners manual. Do you have it? Err, we can look around for one, sure (clearly not grasping the importance of the owners manual). Despite this, we went ahead with the deal.

In the car on the way home and again at dinner my husband brought up the importance of the owners manual. Its absence was clearly stressing him out much more than the large amount of money we had just spent.

Later, in our usual positions on the couch, both on our laptops:

Him: Hey, I can get an owners manual on eBay for $40.
Me: Interesting.

Note to self: find owners manual for car and sell on eBay

competition, whining, and lots of boogers

That pretty much sums up our week.

Earlier in the week Abby was sick so now, predictably, Claire is sick. Feverish, boggers pouring out everywhere type sick. All things considered, Claire is being a very good sport, but she is fussier than usual and needs bit more attention. She gets to watch her favorite TV shows and pick her favorite foods to eat, just like Abby did all of 3 days ago. Abby CANNOT handle this. She is yelling and screaming and throwing herself on the floor over the littlest of problems. She insists she is sick again. So sick. Much sicker than anyone has ever been. So sick that she should get all the attention, ever. Just what I need after being up most of the night with a sick baby. Not to mention the fact that I am not feeling so hot myself.

To buy us all a few hours of peace I called in Grandma to take Abby out for some special big girl time. So we will get through today, but I can not help but wonder if I have created a monster or just a typical four year old in Abby. How is it that she has so little ability to focus on the needs of anyone other than herself? To delay what she wants for even the smallest amount of time. Is it her personality? Her age? Is she given too much attention? Not enough attention? This parenting business is hard.

just another morning

6:15 am

Me: zzz...zzz...zzz

Andy: zzz...zzz...zzz

Abby: zzz...zzz...zzz

Claire: I farted!!! I pooped!! I farted and pooped!!! Mommy, I pooped! Mommy! Hello! Mommy? I farted and pooped!!!!!

Happy Valentines Day!!

win pretty stuff

Nissa over at Nissa's Niceties is running a great contest. Enter to win one of these beautiful ballerinas from her new etsy store Luscious Little Treasures. Perfect for a little princess!

And Nissa, in anwser to your question this is my vision of a stunning ballerina:

wordless wednesday

shhhh... baby dreaming

found my calling

I am an awesome mother of sick kids. I have seemingly limitless patience. I will cook whatever food you want. I will let you watch what ever movie you want. I will let you wear whatever you want. I will play whatever game you want. If you have trouble sleeping, I will feel bad for you and stay up with you. I am even fun- Let’s put up a tent! Let’s fill it with blankets and pillows! If my kids were sick all the time I would be the best mother ever.

Maybe it is the temporariness of the whole situation. The opportunity to lower expectations for all of us. To put off our everyday responsibilities and commitments. Perhaps we should try this more often, but without the vomit.

sick days

Me: How are you feeling today?

Abby: What day is it?

Me: Tuesday.

Abby: Do I have school?

Me: Yes.

Abby: Is today the Valentines party?

Me: No.

Abby: I am really really sick - cough, cough, gag, sniff. Can you make waffles and put on a movie? And bring down my pillows?

musings on motherhood

On Saturday night I had a few too many martinis, so on Sunday my foggy brain was thrilled to find an all day marathon of one of my favorite TV shows, Jon & Kate plus 8. If you are not familiar with this show, it features a couple, their three year old sextuplets and their seven year old twins. As you can imagine kids are constantly whining or fighting about something. Jon and Kate themselves are also often bickering about something. My husband does not see why anyone in their right mind would want to watch this show. After all we have our own whiny kids and our own shit to bicker about. He makes an excellent point.

Yet I continue to watch. Yesterday I watched for hours. The show is in its fourth season so someone else must be watching too. What is it about motherhood that compels us to spend what precious little kid free time we have writing about our kids or reading about other peoples kids or watching other peoples kids on TV? At times I want desperately to escape my mommy self but I am not sure I know how. I guess I just need constant reinforcement that other people are dealing with the same shit, or more in the case of dear Jon and Kate. If they can do it, surely I can too.

negotiation

I used to negotiate rather large contacts rather well. This in no way prepared me for the daily negotiations of motherhood.

One of Claire's favorite books is a tale of Elmo and his missing blanket. Under one flap is a picture of Bert's pigeon. I innocently opened it and said pigeon. Claire said DUCK. I tried explaining why it was a pigeon. How pigeons are gray. How ducks are yellow. How the beaks are different. How Bert is into pigeons. Claire continued to say DUCK. Apparently, negotiating with a one year old all comes down to volume and who can draw out the word the longest. Eventually DDDDDUUUUUCCCCKKKK!!!!!!! won out.

Now when we read this book Claire goes straight to the pigeon page, opens up the flap and triumphantly says duck. Just to remind me. Because clearly I do not know what I duck is. Good thing I have her around.

things I am grateful for

10) The laughter that fills my house as the girls chase each other.

11) The opportunity to cuddle together on the couch in our pajamas on a cold, rainy day.

weaning, day 6

It has been a rough week around here, filled with sore boobs and lots of tears. It seems that when I told Claire that Mommy's milk was all gone she thought it would be like when we run out of orange juice. Things seem bad and maybe you have a meltdown or two, but eventually someone goes to the store and gets more. A few days in, she got real angry about this whole no milk thing. She reached her little fists to the heavens and cried for milk, milk, milk. No luck. She threw her little body on the floor and cried for milk, milk, milk. Still no luck. I sense her will may be breaking though as she did allow me to cuddle her at nap time today.

Meanwhile, Abby who has been hoping to get some milk in her boobs wondered if maybe she would finally get some now that mine is gone. Maybe now my boobs would get small like hers and she will get milk in hers? My husband generally deals well with girl crap, but this he just could not handle. I think he actually threw up a little.

The only bright spot in this week is that on Saturday the girls are going to Grandma and Grandpas for a sleepover. For a blissful 30 or so hours we will be child free adults. We are going out in the city, to an adult restaurant, with two other childless adult couples. We will drink wine and talk about adult things, come home whenever we want, sleep as late as we want and spend whatever remains of Sunday doing other adult things. Just the anticipation of it makes dealing with today easier.

cow kisses

I am not what you would call a farm person, but we buy our milk from a local dairy which means weekly visits with the cows. The girls were delighted to discover two new baby cows in the barn this week. How in the world did I go from disinfecting everything in sight to this?

things I am grateful for

9) My husband, who cleaned the entire house this weekend.

bye bye baby

The time to wean Claire has finally come. I have been tossing the idea around for months now, but the time never seemed quite right. She had trouble gaining weight, then she was sick, then she was having trouble sleeping, then finally she was sleeping well who wants to mess with that? Not to mention the fact that I am kind of lazy and find changes to our routine stressful.

The funny thing is nursing was not that important to me in the beginning. When Abby was born I figured I would try it and maybe do it for a few weeks, certainly not longer than 6 weeks, since I was going back to work after 12 weeks and the thought of pumping milk- yuck. Yet somehow, here I am finally reclaiming my boobs from a toddler with 16 teeth.

Nursing a toddler is nothing like nursing a baby. With babies there are boobs and milk everywhere, all the time. They need milk. They can not be without you. You can not be without them. Your day revolves around it. A toddler is a fully functional person by day with a secret little addiction. Kind of like a hidden pack of cigarettes or a stash of chocolate bars. They can get by without it if you happen to want to go out and you are just fine too. But it remains a small connection to babyhood as well as a quick, easy way to comfort at 6 am when you just want more sleep. Everyone wins.

But I have decided that this peaceful rainy day is the day. Weaning a toddler presents challenges not covered in the typical wean your baby article. They talk. And understand. Sort of. So I told Claire that the milk is all gone. She is big like Abby now so it is gone. She whined a bit, peered down my shirt a couple of times then agreed to read her favorite Elmo book and go to bed. End of story. Bye Bye baby.