Yay, I can fail at this too!

I was so excited to make my own baby food. Really, I felt so jazzed about the whole thing.  I was reading up on recipes before Thing 2 could sit up and was already figuring out what I'd make loooong before I was actually making it.  I was having one big hippie, rainbow-shittin', successful-mama-moment dreaming about how I was going to do something wholesome and right for my little boy.  He would grow up all strong and noble, knowing how to write in cursive, match his own socks, and win the Nobel Prize -- despite my failure at cloth diapering -- all because his mommy made him his first foods.

And it has been one big massive failure.  He hates it. Anything. Everything.

I tried rice and oatmeal first, even though I was biting at the food-processing-bit, and he had super fun allergic reactions.

Oatmeal Art ... unfortunately,
 consuming it made him violently ill

So I researched, and decided to start with orange/yellow veggies first and move to the greens, then fruits.  This is supposed to lay down pathways in the brain that lead to healthy eating habits later.  Supposedly by eating things in this order he would be less likely to develop a sweet tooth -- which led me to believe my mother was giving me chocolate by IV at 4 months of age, but this is beside the point.

I talked with my awesome pediatrician, found websites, read books, then went to websites with simple how-to-recipes that a monkey could follow.  A brain dead, blind monkey ... with a peg leg.

I tried sweet potatoes first.  I grinned like a fool and my husband took pictures.  Baby shivered like a naked man lost int he arctic and gagged like I had asked him to lick a live 9V battery, but he got used to them and eventually he would eat them with only a minimal shudder. But he would eat them.

Yams? Um, two bites then he mutinies.

Squash? Oh hell-to-the-no. You'd swear its torture.

Carrots? Ha!

Avocado? If he could run he would have.

So I figured maybe I just really suck as a baby chef.  Really, who would be surprised by this particular development?  Bought carrots.  Jarred carrots.  He tried those and while it made me feel like less of a failure as a cook (he ate even less of those than he did mine) he still wouldn't eat them.

Giving up I bought pears today.  Pears are yummy. They are fruit, the thing I had intended to not give him until after we'd successfully navigated the less sweet and tasty stuff.  I bought Gerber in a plastic bin, didn't even attempt to make them as it is a lot of freaking work for him to gag on and refuse.

Sigh. Nope.

Now he is sick of the sweet potatoes and won't eat them anymore either.

"Oh Lawd, that airplane is back!"

I let him play with it, play with a spoon, eat in a high chair, on my lap, eat it warm, eat it cold ... in a house, with a mouse ... and a partridge in a pear tree … he wants nothing to do with anything I give him that is "food" ... but he is quite into breast milk still. He also loves to watch people eat and grabs at our food.

I know nutritionally he is fine, I know he can continue this way more or less for a bit. He is about 32 inches long and weighs 23 lbs or so ... not like he is wasting away or anything. I am just baffled. My oldest was inhaling baby food by this age.


I just can't help but laugh that I walked into parenthood this time around thinking I was sooo open minded and was going to do so much better than the stumbling act I did a decade ago with Thing 1.  Well in the immortal words of Lennon, life is what happens while your making other plans.

the genius that is Dobby

(just sharing because it cracks me up)

I will admit to not only being a Harry Potter fan, but also to being mini-obsessed with J.K. Rowling.  She's my hero, plan and simple.  Every time I read anything about her I find myself comparing me to her, which puts me at a ridiculous disadvantage to be sure, but I too was a single mother, want to write a book, have red hair ... but I could read an article discussing that she is female, likes to breathe air, and eat food and would spend the length of that article stupidly exclaiming "me too!" like I was having some kind of major epiphany.

But this morning, while standing outside shivering waiting for the dogs to go numbers one and two before the sun was up, I realized the real brilliance of her writing.

Its not well developed characters with emotional range and problems far superseding the seriousness of those previously seen in books of this genre or for this age group.  Its not the ridiculously complex horcrux/hallows thing that makes me scrunch up my nose and think every time I read it like I am a 12 year old giving it my first go.  Its not any Nazi allegory or the sheer length of the tomes that nevertheless people willingly devoured in under 24 hours either.  No, no, the real literary brilliance of the whole thing lies in Dobby.

Yes, Dobby.

The silly little house elf, and all of his kind, they are the true brilliant spark of Harry Potter.  Creatures that for the first few books Harry isn't even aware of because the mark of a good house elf is that they really aren't noticed.  They move, unseen, in the wee hours of the morning completing tasks that everyone simply assumes will be done.  Unpaid, unappreciated, silent creatures that single-handedly make a household run.  The only time that the existence of such menial tasks is even really noticed is when a house elf is not present to complete it, thereby making it the annoying responsibility of a disgruntled wizard or witch who inevitably will suck at the task because they've always had a damn house elf.

Why, you ask, is this the ingenious gem in the midst of seven huge volumes?  Well isn't it obvious?  We all have our own Dobby, and only a woman, a mom, could write about it so subtly that not everyone would instantly notice?  Harry Potter's mom was killed by He Who Lacks a Nose, sure ... but he had Dobby and Kreature for a time in addition to the harried but lovable Molly Weasley.

Standing there wishing the dogs didn't have to smell every, single blade of grass before they poop on it that epiphany hit me.  We do have a house elf in the mommadeaux abode.

I am Dobby.

So this begs the real question: Where is Hermione and her S.P.E.W. badges when I really need her?

homework assignments & fear

For all my numerous faults as a mom, I am at least one impassioned supporter of my children's education.  I can give my children many things ... fodder for the therapists couch, genetic predisposition toward various chronic ailments, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches heavy on the jelly for lunch ... but the one thing that will remain with them, always, in spite of the weather, who is in the White House, or any other variable out there, is their education.  For this reason (and the fact that my mother was just as maniacal and I come from a long line of teachers) I am a tad hard core when it comes to school related things.

Its how I roll.

So I diligently check emails and communicate with Thing 1's teachers all the time.  Like his mother before him, my child never comes home following a bad day without my already knowing the ins and outs of what happened.  Fortunately for me and my child, there aren't many bad days.  Thing 1 is a good kid, I'd like to take credit, but I am pretty sure he is raising himself.

As I was checking my emails the other day though I came across this message from his fabulous teacher:

As part of our Reading-At-Home assignment your child should be asking you about some “funny” stories about you as a kid. Help keep them motivated by giving them some time at dinner to ask you some questions.

Thanks for all you do.

And my blood ran cold.

I know that the teacher wasn't asking me to share funny stores from my teen-years youth.  I have a few more years before high school aged shenanigans come back to haunt me, and I am praying to never need to explain my college years to my kids, or parents for that matter.  I mean really, I narrowly escaped a terrorist bombing and was too drunk to know it and that was just another Thursday night as far as I was concerned at the time.  True story.  Maybe for another day.

But really, "funny" stories from my youth.  I couldn't think of any immediately that would not make my nun-of-a-child get all judgey-pants on me.  Shall I share about the time I dumped my new born sister into a flower pot?  How about when we got cold at the bus stop and lit notebooks on fire?

So I asked my mom.

Yeah that was a mistake.  {Sigh}

After the fourth story where she told me that she explained to the traumatized witnesses that I was in fact her identical twin sister's daughter (we look quite a bit alike) so as to not have them judging her for birthing the demon child with freckles and pigtails, I decided that I needed to make up some stories. This way, I reasoned, I would have something good to tell Thing 1, were he to ask.

Still trying to make something up, I checked my email and I had a gem of an email from my mother reminding me that I could also tell the story the note I gave to a girl on my bus that would have warranted a greater than PG13 rating due to the volume of "eff off"s included ... then signed my name.  First and last.  Hey, I felt strongly about what I had to say, I guess.

But at any rate I have decided that in this one instance, I am going to just hope that Thing 1 doesn't do his homework.

I suck at Christmas

Lets go ahead and clear the air now: If you are wanting a warm fuzzy I am in the spirit of the holidays BS caked post filled with cute crafts and ideas, go elsewhere.

I groan as Thanksgiving approaches, because this time of year does not happen to awaken a cozy, warm, happy feeling in me.  You could easily confuse me for Ebeneezer were it not for the fact I happen to not be a wildly rich, old, English dude.  Bah.

Since becoming a mom I have really, truly tried.  I can fool my kids.  Most of the time.  I think.  If not its just more therapist-couch-fodder, and I can live that with that.  But between the turtle trying to jump off of her house, the man cold's insistence on re-invading repeatedly, and all this Christmasy cheer I'd consider skipping milk and just make my breakfast cereal with tequila if I thought it wouldn't taste so exceptionally bad with Coco Krispies.

So when it comes to Christmas decor in the mommadeaux house we aren't exactly a regurgitated glitter and garland factory like so many of the blogs I see out there.  Elf on the Shelf?  St. Paul is already developing rules for what I am allowed to do with it because I plan to have one next year and he is scared that we will personally pay for the retirement of the previously mentioned therapist if he gives me free reign.  He's probably right on the money there though.

So there are really only three Christmas-ish things in my house right now, items that suggest the warfare I feel Christmas invokes and items that are manufacturally flawed.  I said I suck at Christmas, but at least I have a sense of humor about the whole thing.

A camouflage Christmas Tree Skirt.
Nuff said.

The applique should, of course, read "Ho Ho Ho"
but when sewn on upside down it says what we all are really thinking:
"Oh Oh Oh"
And yes, we bought the "bad" one on purpose.  So did my mom.

Merry Christmas and a Bah Humbug to boot.  Lets get to New Years, the holiday we all openly admit we have to drink to get through it!

turtles & S.A.D.

the scene of the crime, later that day

Since we have had fairly typical-for-other-parts-of-the-country winter weather here lately we've all been a tad in the downy dumps.  Not being used to cold, grey, dreary weather has made for a miserable mommadeaux clan, and you know my feelings on my menfolk getting sick.  Thing 2 is genuinely sick, Thing 1 had to be picked up early from school this week due to illness, I can't get St Paul out of bed in the mornings without a lot of threats and the promise of coffee brewing and this morning he actually said he was "dying," and I have personally polished off more Christmas cookies than is reasonable for a gal who says she's watching her figure.  So I decided we all had the desert-region-version of Seasonal Affective Disorder, commonly called S.A.D.

But I misjudged the level of seasonal depression in our house apparently.  Why you ask?  Because yesterday morning I had the strangest wake-up-yelling I have had in all ten years of motherhood thus far.

"Mom come quick, the turtle climbed on her log house and jumped off!"

Yes, turtle.  The docile, slow animal typically associated with laziness.  She climbed up on her log tunnel, don't ask how, I can't quite visualize it myself.  This had to require a good amount of effort on her part.  Ultimately I guess she just couldn't take it anymore.  In her misery, she decided to jump off the highest area she could manage in an effort to end it all.  However, the highest area in her aquarium is like 3 inches tall.

As it turns out, she merely got herself stuck and scared the crap out of Thing 1 who awoke to the loud thud that resulted when her shell hit the side of the aquarium.

While this incident may leave you scratching your head don't be alarmed.  If anyone was going to own a turtle that was both acrobatic and klutzy, it would be me.

lies I tell my children

just like candy

Given that a decade passed by between kids I often feel a bit like a first time mom all over again with child numero dos.  I don't remember all of it from ten years ago, and if we're being honest its not like I knew what I was doing well enough to make actual decisions then.  Its a miracle Thing 1 isn't already in rehab.

So when I was nearing the end of the prison term that is pregnancy I joined Baby Center and added myself to a bunch of clubs so I could read and get advice as needed.  I have found on this one website, more than anywhere else, the most concrete of evidence that women are singularly the most cruel beings on the planet at times.  The moms on this site rip each other to shreds at times over things like formula feeding and onsies with stupid phrases on them.  I am not much of a Judgey McJudgerson myself, because I am pretty sure I am doing it all wrong by someone's standard anyway, so I don't dive into these blood baths or partake in assuming I know a dayum thing about how someone else parents (unless you let your kid sleep with knives, then I think you're nucking futs, you sicko).

But a while back the concept of lying to your kids came up on a post and it got me thinking about the lies I tell my children.  As I am not the type of mom featured in parenting magazines I will admit I have had some fun at the expense of the minds I mold ... no, you really are the only person with a butt crack and its because I dropped you ... but one of my best ones came to light fairly recently.

When Thing 1 was younger I, like all good mothers do, warned him of the dangers of accepting candy from strangers.  It was probably a Halloween related bit of wisdom but I never do anything halfsies, so I went fully monty and told him about the crazy Tylenol poisoner.  I believe that whole thing happened the year I was born or so, so I have been raised with the pain-in-the-ass-bottles but none of the fear and stuff people who really lived through it experienced.  But I sure milked it.  And after I was done telling this innocent little three year old about it (see, I told you I was a bad mom) I proceeded to tell him that the crazy Tylenol poisoner considered spiking candy at one point too.  In my infinitely selfless willingness to show motherly love I told Thing 1 that it was best that I act as his royal taster and insure that none of his food was poisoned.

I know, you think I am sick.  But think about the possibilities.  I got the first taste of anything good for years!  That trusting little goober would allow me to take a sip of his chocolate shake, a bite of his cookie, a taste of anything that was appealing to me because I had the foresight to know what kinds of things crazy Tylenol poisoners would poison. Interestingly enough it was all the things *I* like.

But the funniest part about this story isn't that I was evil enough to say it, do it, and milk it for years, but rather that at about 9 Thing 1 finally realized that his mother was devious enough to hatch such a plot.  I got nearly six years of it!

But really, the best news of all: I convinced him to not tell his little brother.  Here we go again! =)

sleeping with swords

I am a bad mom.  The worst in fact.  According to Milwaukee anyway.

As if all the other horrible things I do weren't enough, it seems that there is yet another travesty to add to the list of crimes I have committed against my children.  But this one takes the cake really ... and slices it into nice dangerous pieces ...

These ads recently came out, to much controversy I might add, claiming that sleeping with your child is just as dangerous as letting them sleep in a nice big fluffy bed, on their stomachs, with a butcher knife.

Say what?!

Yes, parents who sleep with their children are clearly all letting them sleep in beds like the one in the images and they may has well stick cleavers in bed beside them.

I will admit to this much, my bed is no where near that poofy/soft looking and I sure as hell would never own white sheets.  Oh, and yes, my kid sleeps with me.

There are plenty of resources that can outline how bullshaty this ad campaign is and how safe co-sleeping is when done properly (like this one, or this one, or even this one) so I won't bore you with that.  

But I will give you this....

Take that Milwaukee!

We are such rebels.

evidence that my child is a horrendous dictator in the making

Following a title like that I am sure you are either thinking "oh my gawd, she's horrible" or "Ha! Preach on sistah, I have one of those kids too!"  Your response of course entirely depends on your being a parent or not being a parent.  Or maybe you are a parent without a sense of humor ... good lord, how do you survive?!

Anyway, my child is only 7 months old and I am pretty sure he has all the makings of a horrendous, terrifying dictator in the making.  I already shudder to think about how the history books will portray his sheer mad brilliance, and I hope history doesn't look down upon me too harshly because, as you are about to see, his path was set long before I started to pretend I had control over this.

{Editors Note: I still pretended I had control of him as a human being from the moment the little line on the pee-stick formed right up until about a few weeks before my due date, when I realized I had truly zero control over anything having to do with this kid beyond incubating him.}

With no further adieu, the Top 5 Reasons My Kid Will Someday Be a Terrifying Dictator:

1. His nickname in the womb was Voldabean.  As in a morph of Jellybean and Voldemort.  Yeah.  At 13 weeks I had my first ultrasound, and it looked like a jellybean with a heartbeat.  I thought it was cute -- this kid hadn't given me any morning sickness or unpleasant preggo symptoms as of yet so I started calling the little gender-less blob my Jellybean.  Fast forward to the Jellybean turning into a Sasquatch sized member of Cirque de Soleil in my tummy who left me with horrendous heartburn, back pain, early onset of contractions, and thought his "due date" was merely a laughable suggestion of date he should avoid arriving on at all costs... I started saying I was going to give birth to Voldemort.  Voldabean was the compromise.

2. His little baby hands can out-do any Chinese Water Torture trial.  Oh. My. Gawd.  I don't care how short I trim those nails, they are daggers.  Maybe he is like Wolverine and can retract them, I don't know.  To add to this he has this adorable habit of squeezing his hands open and closed right as he falls asleep.  So right as he drifts off he starts slowly, delicately, gouging four small trenches in your arm and all you can do is put up with it, or wake him up.  Yes, I have scars.

3. He has a sick sense of humor.  Not all dictators have this, in fact many don't thus why they are so uptight and horrible.  But my kid?  He has already learned to apply his gasp of the ironic in order to manipulate me. Example: I am with this child nearly 24/7.  I am the focal point of his world, and nearly always there trying to teach him and help him.  Who did he roll over for first?  My mom.  When he learned to do the much harder back to belly roll over, who did he do that for first?  St. Paul of Bunyan.  After days of working with his slowly emerging and adorable ability to clap I was gone from his side maybe a couple hours only to return and find him perched on St Paul's knee clapping furiously.  When I excitedly said "he's clapping!" St. Paul replied, "oh he's been doing that for like an hour now."  Don't even get me started on how the little traitor babbles "Dadadada" constantly.

4. His sense of timing is flawless.  Timing is everything, everyone knows this.  And so does my baby.  Case in point: child holds off on a blow-out until just the right moment.  Like the I am running late wearing my favorite shirt and only clean jeans in the house, go to pick him up and put him on my hip and ... I'll spare you the visual.

5. He is so stinkin' cute and perfect he could convince you to do anything.  It has been said that the greatest, most horrible dictators of our time were, for all their tyrannical cruelty, still very good leaders.  This is how they were able to convince so many to follow them, no matter what.  I assure you, Thing 2 could make you do anything.  Anything.  Between his perfect little round-bald-baby-head, big blue eyes framed with perfect dark, curly eyelashes, and adorably chubby cheeks ... my kid could kick the Gerber kid's ass.  He sneezed yams into my eye the other day, and I am the world's biggest sissy with eye stuff.  The word "contacts" makes me shiver just at the thought of touching an eyeball, but there I was with globs of grainy yam in my eye sockets and he laughed, and I was okay with it.  That gummy little smile could melt Satan's heart.  This child can already convince you to do anything, so I can only assume that this skill will be honed and of greater threat once he practices some more.

So let the record show, someday when my child is trying to overtake a small country or is working at the Motor Vehicle Division, that I saw the signs and tried to intervene.  But then he gave me that cute little gummy smile and used sign language to either sign "mama" or "bitch" (they look really similar) and I know whichever it is, it refers to me, and I just melted.  Sorry world.

attacked by the bird in Dumbo

Oh look at that Corolla speeding along down there ...

You know in the opening scenes of the movie Dumbo where the patient Mrs. Jumbo finally and with much relief hears the stork calling out her name and is given her baby elephant with the massive yet adorable ears?  Okay I saw him.  Not the elephant, the bird.  It was huge, it was grey and was not wearing that smart little hat but it was a stork or a crane or something like it.  It was huge, it had a long neck with a floppy skin-pouchy looking area under its beak and it was apparently not at all afraid of my Corolla speeding down the street.  Scared the crud right out of me and between the startle factor and the fact that I have a nasty and otherwise unexplained phobia of birds, it aided in the unleashing of an impressive litany of swear words.

Problem with this story?  Both kids were in the back seat.

Now Thing 2 wouldn't have noticed anything given he is seven months old and mommy's forgivable time is still at hand.  The ten year old Thing 1 ... um, yeah. He's part nun and has been sniffing out swear words from a rather young age.  One of my friends just hands him a five dollar bill whenever she sees us so that she is "pre-paid" and doesn't have to worry about it for a while.

But rather than tell me that I didn't make good choices with my words like he once would have, he laughed.  He said that my word choice was funny.  I honestly don't remember how I combined words, but it is my art, so I am sure it was well done of me.

But it got me thinking about how I have some bad-mom tendencies of "do as I say not as I do."  Anyone who says they don't do this is either lying or not actually raising their kids, and I accept that I am not a fully conventional-mother-of-the-year-award-winning-Martha-freaking-Stewart-esk mom with as much grace as I can muster.  I read blogs.  I see the homeschooling moms who change their mantle decor every 15 seconds so that it can reflect the current season while sewing clothes for their children and making lots of cakes.  Not her, and won't be.  But I am open minded and think of me as a student of life.

So that big nasty bird that swooped over the street whilst I sped toward it and made me slam on the breaks and craft word chains that could have made a sailor blush made me also realize that I have not paid any attention to my list.  So I will be adding to it, and I will hopefully be marking some stuffs off of it soon.  And I am sure I will have plenty of sad, yet amusing, stories to share because failure is a part of learning.  And lord knows, when it comes to domestic skills I am bound to do both.

socks ... in the dishwasher

People say stupid stuff.  Some people, however, are overachievers.

I slept like a baby.

Who in the hell says something that dumb, unless of course its following an all-night-drink-til-you-wet-yourself-bender because that's what my baby does.  I actually put laundry in the dishwasher yesterday.  I blame lack of sleep.  I woke up with my left eye swollen and oozing green toothpaste, but I am not sick.  I think my left eye, rebel that it is, was just pissed it didn't get to stay closed that long.  The right eye was more understanding and merely was bloodshot and felt like it was holding a sandbox.

Apparently at about 6.5 to 7 months of age babies go through a separation anxiety phase.  Haven't looked that up on any milestone charts because I am living it and hardly need some PhD's confirmation that hell exists.  Thing 2 is learning that we are not one person, that I can actually be separate from him.  I think this is further evidence my child is a freaking genius because he can grasp abstract concepts because I don't think we have actually been physically apart since his birth, twenty-nine weeks ago.  At any rate, he sleeps for about an hour then freaks out and needs held.  He also should be about 6 feet long by the end of the week because he wants  to eat about every 20 seconds.  

But back to my point, "sleeping like a baby" is a phrase either first uttered by one sarcastic SOB or someone who has never even seen an effing baby.  Go ahead, embroider that shat on a pillow, I know you want to.

Now on to my day where I try not to appear narcoleptic.

MommyShorts made me do it

As a child, I admit, I was a bit of a girly-girl.  I loved dress up and anything pink.  I have moved far away from this as an adult but I will admit to a bit of pink-envy when I see little girl's clothes as a mom now.  I walk by the frilly-pink-sixteen-racks of dresses and hair bands that is the girl's section of most stores and glare a bit in envy of the moms who get to dress up their daughters while I retreat to the four racks of boys clothes and am busy calculating how many rocks my boys can fit into those cute little pockets and when a reptile will be brought home to me.

But an opportunity to play dress-up with my youngest (and least opinionated as a result) presented itself yesterday and I dove on it.  Not exactly the frills and flowery headbands I have dreamed about, but I am a flexible person after all.

If you don't follow MommyShorts, do.  Like start now.  Go ahead, just make sure you come back.  Cracks. Me. Up.  Love it.  Since discovering this blog I have wiled away my miserable prison sentence in Parent Pick-up reading entries from the past so I can catch up.  So when yesterday a request went out for anyone with a baby and a camera you knew I was down for it.

The end result can be seen here!  I can proudly claim both Popeye and Captain Morgan as my offspring.

And I learned a valuable lesson ... the threat I have made for a while now to my husband -- that I either get a frou-frou dog I can dress up, a daughter, OR I turn one of the boys into a cross dresser so I can buy me some pink shat -- I can make good on.  While the point was that neither outfit was very involved he was a pro with impressions   He owned the Cap'n pose so well I locked the alcohol up.  And the pipe?  Took him a second to get the hang of which end worked better in the mouth, but once he did he got pretty peeved at me when I tried to trade it out with a rattle.

Make sure you go to the MommyShorts entry to see the final images, but here are some out-takes that I will be submitting to the Mom of the Year contest.

me n' Gumby

Lets go ahead and have a disclaimer right from the get go here.  Ready? Set. Go!

If you are one of those people who get freaked out at the thought of breast feeding in general (WTF are you doing reading my blog anyway) or don't like to depart from the happy, comfy, granola crunchy BS version of breast feeding where it never hurts or is awkward at all, read no further.  If you are, like, my dad, or someone who doesn't want to read something that is specifically about my boobs, you should also stop here.

That should cover us.  Its a little TMI, but I don't know of any honest breast feeding sources that don't crap hearts and rainbows and focus on anything other than the bondy happiness breast feeding is to vent my spleen here.  As stated in my last post or two about breast feeding I think it is all those happy unicorn things, but it is more.  So much more.

I have given up any hope or false belief I own my boobs.  He took them.  The ones I have now are not mine for all intents and purposes, nor are they the ones I had before.  I fear that in giving my child all the valuable wonderful (crapping hearts and rainbows) goodness that breast milk undeniably gives him I have also forfeited any hope of having human boobs again.

I have Gumby boobs.  At least Thing 2 thinks so.  He seems to think he can simultaneously eat and do some kind of Linda-Blair-head-turning sort of thing.

At least they aren't green.

Oh, and the baby is learning that my shirt is some sort of barrier between him and that which he loves most dearly.  Not me, just his food source.

So we can definitely add "my boobs" to the list of things my kids stole from me.  File it right after "my dignity" and just before "my peace of mind."

they call me *fart*

If beating myself up counted as I hobby, I could finally say I have a damn hobby.

I don't mean literally physically damaging myself, though with my innate sense of grace I most certainly do that as well, but I mean I can mentally tear myself to shreds in a mater of seconds.  I don't need help, I am quite skilled at neglecting myself, putting me on the back burner, taking care of everyone else ... then feeling like I am some sort of failure for the one, two, or ten things I failed to do or didn't do well enough by my abnormally and unfairly high standards I hold only me to.  Don't even ask me to address body issues, post- or pre-kids.  You'd be here for days hearing words like hideous, flabby, and Mr. Sunffelupagus and I would ruin the mascara I actually managed to apply this morning.

This said, I clearly have a low enough sense of my personal value.  But I still know, somewhere in the back of my mind, that my family needs me and couldn't run with out me.  Oh they'd survive, but they'd smell (worse) and be hungry(er).

This said, note the following conversation which just occurred and has happened in some form now twice.

Me: Can you say mama?

Thing 2: dadadadadadada

Me: Yes, yes, that's very nice, now say mmmmmma-ma!

Thing 2: Looks at me very seriously and says "DAdadadaDA!"

Me: *sigh* Ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma (all while making his toys dance in time with each syllable)

Thing 2: Leans to his right so that his left butt cheek is off the seat and farts. Then lets out a nice sigh.

So after he cracks one off by way of saying "mama" I think to myself, "Self, I am giving up!" only to see him lean in very seriously, probably having some kind of internal dialog that sounds a bit like this

Seriously, she wants me to say mama but she never lets me play with her phone once I figure out how to turn the stupid thing on ... wait ... holy crap, is she wearing mascara???

And he proceeds to yell at me, in his loudest most projected voice he can:

DAAA!!!

I sincerely hope that since this has now happened twice it is purely coincidence and the child eventually decides to call me something else.  Otherwise, those whiny toddler years which are so often punctuated with "mama? Mama? MAMA!!!" are going to be really gross at our house.

Someone pass me some Mommy Juice please.

personal standards and life after children

With motherhood comes some strange gifts, many of which are useful but not exactly easy to brag about.

Particularly to your non-parent friends.

People without children -- also known as people who still have lives and some sense of a personal self -- don't get that your chin may seem like just a chin, until you become a parent.  Suddenly, you have a slightly less maneuverable, but still vital, third limb.

Eyes in the back of your head?  Not exactly, its sorta like Spidey Sense.  My Mommy Sense starts tingling every time a child holds a permanent marker, climbs anything taller than 2 feet off the ground, or speaks the words "this will be soo cool!"  We call it Momdar, as in mom radar.

I have one of the droid smartass phones.  They won't be asking me to do any plugs for them because "smartass phone" is totally the clean name.  I have more creative names, but out of respect for your possiblly delicate sensibilities I will spare you.  I think it has a personal vendetta out for me.  Works fine for everyone ... but me.  But even still, while it will turn off at random, change preferences, and (my personal fave) will have a touch screen that spontaneously takes a cigarette break and goes black, it is my only hope at maintaining my facebook life.

And yes, I hate the new facebook.  But I digress.

The point here (I am rambling, but you would aimlessly ramble your thoughts in a nonsensical-stream-of-consciousness way if you were a parent too) is that I accept all of this and live with it, and I would have never stood for that pre-children.  I would have had the time and energy simultaneously to go to the store.  I would have had to just get myself out of the car and walk into the store.  I would have had a reasonable, logical conversation with the salesperson in which I would appear to be a perfectly clearheaded individual who not once has to wonder if I am leaking on myself or if I only remembered to put mascara on one eye, and the person at the store would fix my issues or I would demand a replacement phone.  Ah, the good ol' days.

But in this reality, I chose to not pack up a diaper bag with stuff that I rarely use but will desperately need if I don't carry all 50 lbs of it, haul a infant carrier/sumo wrestler holder to the nearest cart which will always have a tendency to turn left, only to finally get into the store and have my smartasshole phone work perfectly fine for the guy in the blue polo who will look at me like I am some inept bafoon soccer mom who shouldn't be allowed anything more complex than the flip and just dial phones that were high end tech 4 years ago.  That stupid little hunk of glass and plastic always betrays me, and I usually lose Thing 1 for a while in those stores ("OMG Mom, they have the game/game system/movie/expensive thing I need to have now here on this aisle, can I show you please?!").

So in essence, parenthood has drastically lowered my expectations and personal demands because I prioritize a phone that works 100% of the time lower than my sanity and the little remaining energy I cling to.

It also falls way behind going to the bathroom with out having to yell "I will be there in a sec, just hold on," or showering, or sleeping for 2 hours consecutively, or wearing earrings without fear of having them torn out, or actually having a hair style, or ... you get the idea.

But the sick part isn't that you feel all of those things and more.  So much more.

The slightly sick part is just how worth it you think it all is.

moments: I collect them

I once saw some cutesy crafty sign that said something really profound.  In its adorable fake-cross-stitchiness it stated:

Life is a collection of moments.

Wow.  That's deep.  Like pass the Doritos I am having a Dazed and Confused kind of moment deep.  Not the real "deep" where you have actually said something actually profound.

But I do agree, none the less.  Life is a collection of moments.  And they can be categorized thus:

Moments which are just funny.  Period.

and

Moments you have to find the humor in in order to keep the sane facade up.

For example, when Thing 1 was newly minted and only a couple weeks old I took him and Cindy Lou Who to a store which will remain nameless.  So while we were at the "bulls eye" store and I was still a new enough mom that I was bringing multiple pacifiers with me because I believed they needed boiled after contamination, Thing 1 in all his precious baby-ness had a melt down and started screaming.  Cindy Lou had a very autistic reaction to the shrill baby screams, so she had a meltdown of her own.  There I stood right in front of greeting cards with one baby screaming and one sister shrieking in response with everyone staring at us, mouths agape, and of course blocking the aisle so I can't drag the two out and make my escape.  So I had to find humor and said loudly, over the screams of the two little darlings,

Hi, we are a roaming PSA promoting the use of birth control!  Could you get the helloutta my way now please?

When a friend posted a facebook update recently stating that clearly her two year old had seen her opening a beer because she had pulled her shirt over the lid of her apple juice in order to twist it open I see that as a naturally funny moment, and damn practical.  Parenting fail?  I think not!

Thing 1 seeing me holding his brother while doing dishes one handed, child perched on  my upraised knee  stating that I am doing a, and I quote, "Captain Morgan?"  Um, fail?  Thing 1 played with an old  Copenhagen container that held three beer bottle tops and was sealed with glue as a baby.  At least it wasn't mine, that would have been really redneck.  As it is, it was classy.

Thing 1 also used to say "Whaaaazzzzzuuuupp?" just like the Budweiser commercials cuz we thought it was funny.  I'd like to say that all of this was because I was a really young mom, which is true.  But I am not that young anymore.  Kinda normal mom-aged I guess.  And Thing 2 is fascinated by beer bottles.  Clearly, its not the age but the person.  The me factor.

So life is a collection of moments.

Hopefully my kids won't need to spend too many of theirs re-living their childhoods on a therapists couch.

the Battle of the Toilet

There are things one must accept when horribly outnumbered by boybarians.

Fart is a second language.

Showering can be seen as optional to some.

Chocolate, and Mommy's compulsive need for it, is not treated with the sacred respect it requires.

But the toilet seat?  Ah this is a battle I have had within myself because you see I am a fair person all things considered.  Being that there is only one of me, and two of them (two out of the three males in my house use the toilet, third one is too young yet) I kinda debated briefly whether or not it was reasonable for me to expect the toilet seat to be put down after use. 

When I say I "debated" it that means I thought about it for about forty five tenths of a second.  I asked myself is this a fair request when there is only one pee-sitter in the house and was instantly barraged with mental images too gruesome to share -- though I am sure some of you can relate.

I really have two toilet related issues:
1.) The seat is rarely down
2.) The pee rarely goes where it aught


When I bring up either of the two to the others who live in this house I get one of three responses.

St. Paul of Bunyan: That is sooo Thing 1's doing.

Thing 1: It wasn't ME!!!  I don't know how that happens!

Thing 2: Dadadada <-- he is only 5 months old but if you pay close attention note that he is blaming someone who goes by "dada" ... hmmmmm ...

In the front bathroom, which we all use, there seems to be a pee fairy that hits everything but the toilet, and no one claims to have been this person or had anything to do with it.  Since the baby can't walk yet and I generally know where I have put him we can assume he is not the pee fairy.  Since I would have to do some impressive acrobatics that would leave me severely injured I think we can rule me out as not being the pee fairy.  So that leaves two others.  The two who say they have nothing to do with it.  Strange.  In the other bathroom, the one St. Bunyan and I use, the seat is never down, but the aim does seem to be a bit better.

Odd, donchya think?

Ultimately, I have reached the conclusion that Mars vs Venus may be a way of life for us here, but its all about compromise.  Basically I accept that I will hear things like "no really, pull my finger, I won't do it this time" and will not interfere because really some lessons in trust and gullibility are necessary.  But I also accept that while I expect the seat to be down and there to be some attempt at aiming this this will not happen 100% of the time.  I will be lucky if I see it work out 30% of the time. But that's okay.

What's the phrase?  Revenge is a dish best served cold with a single red sock in a hot wash with all your white clothes?  Something like that anyway.

how serial killers get their names

People in glasshouses are idiots when they start throwing rocks.

The saying goes something like that anyway, but ultimately the point is the same. I am not perfect, so its rare I throw judgement around. Especially about parenting. We are all blindly fumbling through this role that carries more responsibility than anything else in life and trying to act like we know what we're doing while not giving our children therapist couch fodder.

But sometimes, sometimes, you see something that you just can't help yourself but think maybe, just maybe, that person is even worse at this parenting gig than I am.

Case in point, Thing 1's swim practice.

Every week I dutifully take him to practice, and every week there is one particular family that provides the rest of us plenty of mouth dropping moments and times where we all pretend to be coughing rather than laughing. But this past week was a doozy.

Now Brian* and his mom are usually entertainment in that she is desperately trying to keep Brian as a baby even though he is about four now. Usually Brian is pretty obliging with this baby thing, even the week when she announced quite loudly that she had to come to the bathroom so she could "wipey your heiney" and help him. Brian's older brother has swim lessons while Thing 1 is at practice, so for 30 minutes I am a prisoner of circumstance. Brian often provides entertainment, but sometimes its entertainment in the same way nails on a chalkboard make pleasant music.

There was an older kid there (like 8ish) this week and I have no idea who he belonged to. He was just there, and he was actually a pretty well behaved kid. Its not his fault that he is apparently Brian-crack. Seriously, dunno what it was about this child, but the normally just obnoxious babyish Brian was in warp speed. He was running around, screaming, climbing stuff, trying to watch videos on other people's iPads (I am seriously the only person there without one) all while screaming "Look at me David!!!"**

Now while Brian is bouncing off the walls and annoying the crap outta the rest of us his mom is chanting in a sickeningly sing song voice "Gentle, Brian. Gentle." I remember thinking something along the lines of wanting to gently slam into her a few times like her little barbarian had me twice already. But I reminded myself, I am not a judgmental parent. I am not. I don't look down my nose at other parents. Hell, I am a mom of two boybarians, it would be pretty hypocritical to judge someone else I am sure.

About half way through swim I am grinding my teeth to the mental tune of "I am not a judgmental parent, I don't judge other people for how they chose to parent" mixed with shades of "Gentle, Brian. Gentle" in sing song tones with sweet little Brian screaming at the top of his sweet little lungs.

Brian tries to climb a shelving unit and mom comes over and plucks the now screaming Brian off of the shelves saying "Can you please not do that Brian?" When he scales the Everest shelves immediately after being set down she again asks him to behave and could he please lower his voice? Are we really asking him to not climb a dangerous shelf? Are we really asking him to lower his voice so the rest of us stop bleeding from our ears?

The tops of my teeth are nearly as smooth as glass from the grinding I am doing all while reminding myself that "I am not a judgmental parent, I don't judge other people for how they chose to parent" and Cindy-Lou Who (who just happened to be with me that day) and Thing 2 are both looking ready to duct tape sweet little Brian's mouth shut.

Brian also was bored with this routine though, because it was at this point the fan hitting ensued.

After running away from mom again Brain stopped and took a wide stance with his hands at chest level. He positioned his hands so that the strangely looked a bit like he was holding an uzi.

He then proceeded to blast David away with one big boom. David even paused here, and when you make an 8 year old stop and say "hmmmm" ya know you have accomplished something.

He then moved to mom, he blasted her with his invisible uzi. Twice.

"Gentle, Brian. Gentle."

Gentle? Gentle?! Your kid is pretending to bring the heat and you are telling him to be gentle?! Okay, deep breath, I remind myself that "I am not a judgmental parent, I don't judge other people for how they chose to parent." I know that not every family has the same gun stance we do -- namely that they aren't toys but rather a first amendment protecting my family right. But never toys. Never something to pretend with or play with. My children never have, and never will have "toy" guns, even of the spray variety.

But that is my choice as a parent. Mine.

But Brian interrupts my self admonishing thoughts when he steps in front of the little cluster of chairs that sit before the glass wall leading to the pool. Me and about five other families are sitting here, all of us trying to ignore Brian.

Brian proceeds to, quite authentically looking I might add, re-load his imaginary weapon all while glaring at all of us.

"Chick-chick" he says by way of preparing to fire.

Machine gun style, he swings his imaginary gun back and forth, peppering all of the parents and siblings with imaginary bullets. And sweet little Brian proceeds to make sound affects to match the volley of repeated fire he is imagining unleashing on me and about 15 others. After about 5 swings he stops, pretends to hold his gun up in the air in a victory pose while throwing his head back and letting out a massively creepy, maniacal laugh.

"Oh gentle, Brian. Gentle, please."

Seriously? You kid just imagined butchering all of us and all you've got is "gentle" while sounding like Snow White?! Screw this I am not a judgmental parent stuff, your child is practicing murdering people and you are asking him to be gentle? This would be an appropriate thing to say if Brian were, say, carrying a glass of water or wanting to pet a puppy. It is not the thing to say when your kid imagines blasting innocent victims away.

So Brain does the only logical thing he can do. He screams "NO!" and pretends to shoot his mom. In fact, he empties an imaginary clip into her.

And what did she have to say to that?

Can you please be gentle Brain?

Its not easy to render me speechless. But she did. I realized my mouth was hanging open and I was staring at her in shock when I noticed other parents doing the same out of the corner of my eye. Too floored to say anything, and seeing that Thing 1 was heading for the locker room and I would be leaving soon, I started packing my brood up and getting ready to leave. All the while sweet little Brian was standing on chairs and moving around the room still pretending to shoot at things and people. All the while, his mom chanted "Gentle, Brian. Gentle." in the same sing song voice, never once stepping in to actually parent him.

On the drive home I actually had "Gentle Brian, Gentle." stuck in my head. And my thoughts got carried away, as they often do, about the type of person Brian would grow up to be. Chances are he will be a perfectly normal, law abiding, well rounded citizen. A stand-up guy, great man, the type of dude who donates to charities, serves food at the shelter on Christmas, and always picks up litter. But ... if that dark side we saw at swim comes out ...

Well if you ever hear about a serial killer going by the name of Gentle Brain, you'll know who it is.

*Changed his name so the crazy little twerp can't come find me when he is a psycho adult.

**Changed his name because its not his fault that he is Brian-crack, he didn't mean for it to happen.

One effed up "Giving Tree"

I think I was the only child who did not read the Giving Tree as a kid.

When I asked my mom, many years later once I had been given a copy as a gift for my baby shower, why I had not read the book as a kid she said that since Bambi and Dumbo had launched me into a deeply depressive state where I rocked in the fetal position in the corner of my dark room while sobbing that she decided it just wasn't a good read for me.

As an adult I read the book. All of it. Right through the part where the SOB kid chops the tree down. Right up to the part where the tree --er, I mean the stump, kindly lets that jackhole sit on his pathetic stumpiness because he is now an old, withered, useless man who can't stand up for long.

WTF lesson does this teach?! I mean really, what is the freaking moral here???

We wonder why there are people with doormat tendencies? Perhaps its because this book never vilifies that the looser kid who clearly and repeatedly uses and abuses the tree. Perhaps because the main character, the hero if you will, is systematically murdered by his own free will to make an ungrateful little shit of a kid happy. And like some sad little abused dog the tree is thrilled and fulfilled to be kicked -- or chopped -- time and again. The tree gives his shade, apples, branches, trunk, everything to a kid who never thanks him or is grateful even in the slightest. Seriously? WTF?!

I know, I know, the sappy-pants-softies out there are saying "Chrissy, really. Its about selfless love. Giving unconditionally, loving completely. The tree loves the boy and is happy by making the boy happy."

Riiiight. And now lets ask the tree how that selfless giving thing is working out for him, shall we?

Oh yeah, he's not a tree, he's a stump. A stump with old man ass prints.

"But Chrissy, its a classic. Shell Silverstein!"

This part puzzles me more than the tree committing treeicide. Shell Silverstein. Shell-freaking-Silverstein? Where the Sidewalk Ends? A Light in the Attic? Classics, priceless, wonderful and on my kids' shelves.

I don't get it. I don't get why it is a much beloved book, or why parents want to read it to their kids. What message are they hoping their innocent child draws from this? If you love someone its okay for them to treat you like crap? But only if you really, unconditionally and completely love them? Then its okay.

Please, keep your kids away from mine. Not because I don't want their sappy-kick-me-again-please nature rubbing off on my kids, because I know better. My cupcakes will kick your sissy kid's butt in because they asked for it, then I have to deal with the principal or parole officer, whichever the case may be.

And you know I will cry for your weenie child just as hard as I did for the stupid tree.

sky pee and regional knowledge

I remember as a kid overhearing someone talk about needing to put chains on their tires once. In my infinitely Arizonan wisdom I asked if it was because someone was trying to steal them.

We don't do that in AZ.

I use the words coat and jacket interchangeably more or less. Didn't know that there was apparently a difference between the two until I met Paul Bunyan (that would be my husband).

We don't need "coats" in AZ. Sweatshirts usually do the trick.

But I do know what to do if you get bit by a rattlesnake. And I know the symptoms of heat stroke and what to do if someone has it. And I know that walking an extra fifty feet just so you can park your car under that itty bitty tree in the parking lot so you have some shade is worth it.

Chains on tires? Coats? You mean basements aren't just for extra storage space? Huh?

Now when Thing 1 was a toddler we went out of town. And it rained. Not like torrential down pour pull out the rowboat cuz we are going to float away rain. Just a sprinkle. But being raised in Arizona this was a new thing to him, he couldn't remember ever seeing rain before. We were in a big open area when it started sitting at a patio table surrounded by other tables with other non-kid-toting people at them. It was cool and felt nice, so I took a nice deep breath (love the rain smell and never get it here because we only get dirty rain when it happens) and tipped my face back.

Thing 1 was in my lap and I could feel him tense so I looked down at him. He was holding one chubby little arm out in front of him staring at a drop of rain on it. After contemplating the drop for a moment, he suddenly slapped both hands on top of his head. He suddenly turned an accusing glare on me, but as he was presumably about to ask if I had spit on him -- which no, I had never done before and was a total "boy" thing to think about -- he felt a couple more drops but could see I wasn't the one doing it.

Gasping he pointed up at the overcast sky and said "sky leaking?" in the usual soft tones of any toddler.

A few people hearing he subtle little shriek about the sky glance our way and smile. I smile back and say "Yes, the sky is leaking. Its called rain."

Not to be calmed by my sugary sweet tone Thing 1 looks up at the sky blinking rapidly as a few more sprinkles fall on his face and again yells, "sky leaking, Mommy?"

Its rain, I say. Doesn't it feel nice?

"Its wet."

Ah yes, my child the genius. I have always said he is brilliant.

He tries wiping the offending drops off of his arms but more replace them and I can see he is starting to get agitated. So I move to pack up my stuff and take cover even though I am enjoying the minor sprinkling of cool water that my native-Arizonan self rarely gets.

"Why sky leaking, Mommy?"

Because the clouds are full of rain and can't hold any more.

"Why?"

I love that question. At this phase he only asked it about 12,000 times a day. Little did I know then that this was nothing compared to how often he would ask by three.

I put him on the ground so I can gather up his toy and sippy cup. He is standing there acting like he is just drenched still yelling "Sky leaking!" and trying to wipe himself dry much to the amusement of the people at the table next to us.

Yes, its his first time in the rain. We are from Arizona, not much rain there. A couple jokes about the "dry heat" etc ... but I am trying to get moving because Thing 1's voice is now so high and loud bats and dogs in the neighboring areas are registering that the sky is, in fact, leaking.

I finally get everything packed up and go to pick the spastic Thing 1 up when he suddenly stiffens and stares up at the sky. I could see a revelation just happened and I silently prayed to the PleaseDon'tLetMyKidHumilateMe Gods that he wouldn't say anything too horrible. Keep in mind that Thing 1 is at the age where he loves trucks but can't quite say the word right, so everywhere we go he has to yell (he only comes with one volume, even still) "Mommy look at that big truck" only he isn't saying truck. It sounds a bit more like a word for a part of the male anatomy. And just as my luck would have it, everywhere I go there is a big truck that he has to point out. "Look at the big blue truck Mommy, do you see it?" And boy is he observant, can't hide anything from him. So usually whatever comes out of his mouth is comical fodder, but I didn't always have the ability to laugh at the time back then.

His face contorts in pure disgust and he screams in the shrillest voice yet:

EW, it sky pee!!!

Then he began running in circles screaming that the sky was peeing on him while still trying to wipe the "sky pee" off his arms much to the delight of everyone in a 50 foot radius.

We kept spreading the joy though, because he was still yelling that it was gross for the sky to pee on him all the way to the doors, then chattering about how he wondered if I had seen that the sky peed on him, "did you see Mommy, did you? Did you?" the whole way to the elevator.

I was reminded of this story last night when Paul Bunyan came inside and asked to hold Thing 2 and promptly took him outside. When I walked out there I could see that we were getting one of our 10 annual rains for Arizona.

I looked over at Thing 2 to see his reaction and he was alternating between looking at us and looking at the rain. And the "sky pee" story came flooding back to me.

Um, guys? It looks like the sky is peeing on the house.

Why aren't you bothered by this? I pee on you and you flip!

Can't wait to hear if Thing 2 interprets the world the comical way Thing 1 often did.

Does.

Still does and I suspect always will.

Happy 10th birthday to my Thing 1. I love you, even if the sky wants to pee on your head.

Things That Are Different Once You Have More Than One Kid

After being a mom of one for nearly a decade I really didn't expect two to be that much of an astronomical difference when Thing 2 came along. I mean really, there is two of everything now. Right? I can handle that, I so innocently thought to myself.

I'd laugh at my nieve, innocent self if I didn't think I'd wet my pants. Here they are, the

Things That Are Different Once You Have More Than One Kid

Two kids now, that means two of everything ... right? Oh wrong. Wronger than wrong. Somehow that math doesn't work. I know math, I was good at it Before. That's before with a capital B because it was Before this. Before two kids. Because Before there were two kids I was good at math. I even taught it. But now that Before is gone I realize that either some magic happened or I now don't know how to multiply by two. Why you ask? Well because I am pretty damn sure that I have more than "two." Not more than two kids. I can count them easy enough. But there is definitely more than twice the work. More than twice the cleaning. Way more than twice the laundry. More than twice the kid crap. And sleep, I totally get less than an eighth of what I used to do on a bad day. Don't ask how the math works, remember I can't do it anymore because its post-Before.

Have I even looked in a mirror today? The answer is yes. I make a point of it. In fact, I panic if I haven't looked in the mirror and am leaving the house because its the fastest way to do a quick systems check. You know when NASA is preparing for a shuttle launch and the Flight Director checks that everyone is a "go" at Misson Control (think Apollo 13) prior to launch? Same thing.

Just a quick check that all systems are go for Operation Leaving the House. Shoes?

Check and check.

Pants?

We're "go."

Shirt?

Check.

Nothing weird on the face?

We are "go" Flight.

Seriously, I do have to check. Even with checking real quick I still have the occasional panic attack that I forgot something important, like my shoes don't match or I forgot to put a shirt on. Don't judge, it may be you someday. Mirrors used to be for vanity. I wanted to look a certain way when I left the house. Now, mirrors are just my double check that I won't be arrested or make someone need therapy when I leave. Clothing is all I need to be ready. I think being able to brush my teeth and shower is for special occasions, and make up is just so I can hide the bags under my eyes.

What was I talking about? Oh yeah, I forget everything. I haven't left either kid anywhere yet. I haven't lost them at least. But anything and everything else? Well lets just say you would need to be a bit worried if your livelihood depended on my purse remaining safe. Who am I kidding, I don't carry a purse anymore, its a backpack-diaper-bag-emergency-supplies-case-that-also-contains-my-wallet. Last night my husband innocently asked me at about 6:30 what was for dinner. My response? "Oh, wow, I totally forgot about food today." We had bean burros.

Bladder control? Wait ... what's that? I remember back in the day ... oh about fourteen months and six days ago ... when I would have this signal travel all the way from my bladder to my brain alerting me that it had reached the critical fullness mark and needed to be emptied soon for the sake of comfort. I remember thinking "oh I hope I don't need to sneeze" because I would have to concentrate and flex really hard after Thing 1, but its not like anyone else would notice. Now? Now?! Well that sensor in my bladder, it seems that it waits a bit longer to go off because its not longer a matter of "hey you need to go when you have a sec or this could get uncomfy." No, now its more like,

Hoooooooly crap why didn't you go to the bathroom an hour ago?!? WTH made you think you should drink fluids?! You had better hope no one notices you running like someone tied your knees together to the nearest bathroom while holding your breath and praying you don't sneeze, cough, or have to speak.

It might not be the sensor, it might be that I now have about an equal ability to "hold it" as a potty training three year old -- but I have to go NOW! -- but whatever it is, its way worse after Thing 2.

Unicorns and Me Time. They are both fictitious as far as I can tell. Actually, that's not true or fair. Somewhere there is a much maligned unicorn just wishing people would see him/her for who they really are. Me time? Yeah, pure fantasy. But in reality, it was ever since Thing 1 came along so that's not new.

Don't get me wrong, I love my kids. I love being a mom too. I am really happy. Genuinely. I even am beginning to feel like I am getting the hang of being a mom to two.

But some days I wonder if that last bit is actually me being delusional based on the lack of sleep.