Odds and Ends

Yesterday we hosted a party so that everyone could come and meet Fynnie... or see her again.  Compared to Mad's blowout, this was small.  But in reality, it was well-attended and quite lovely.  The invitation said people should drop in for "snacks and a snuggle"... so why we spent yesterday making a Mediterranean chicken dish, falafel, tahini and tzatziki among other things is unclear to me.  It all worked out well.  The best part was that I sampled a piece of chocolate cake with mocha filling yesterday.  It's one of the two flavors we had at our wedding.  Loved it!  Not that I was surprised.  The surprise was that Fynn didn't get a rash from it.  Corey and Mad were both so sensitive to it.  The only time I tried chocolate while nursing Mad, she got a nasty rash later that day that took three days to heal.  Now, if only there were some way to keep Corey from eating all of the chocolate cake before I get a chance to have more.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


I forgot to mention that the photo shoots went horribly.  Well, not horribly.  Two shots were taken of Mad, but we did not get a shot of Fynn at all; the photographer apparently only had that traditional Sears/Penney's "my baby can hold her head up" shot in mind.  Fynn can hold her head up, she just hated the ridiculous positioning of the rest of her body.  When I mentioned that I was hoping for something more creative (on the second day), the photographer suggested doing a silhouette of me holding Fynn in my arms with our faces close together.  By then Fynn's sweet face was contorted in her efforts to tell me what for!  I requested that my free 8 x 10 be made from one of Mad's shots from earlier in the week.  Photog-girl had reformatted the disk.  Thankfully I'd gotten some pictures of her that day.

  

I got a picture of Fynn after the second day... once she was out of her outfit and much more comfortable.

She was glad all the nonsense was over.


The photographer offered to reschedule again, but I declined.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


Madelyn is becoming quite the big sister.  This weekend she gave Fynn her first kisses.  This evening she wanted to hold her.  Yesterday morning she was all about the "milk in a bag" (whenever I pump she asks if I'm doing milk in a bag).  She wanted to do it, too.

The exact quote was, "I doing milk in a bag.  I make it for Baby Fynn.  I need to switch sides."  Who among us has gone that extra mile for their baby sister?

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


Yesterday one of my friends and her kids did not make it to the party.  She's the same friend who just paid me back for her wedding attire.  I got a call from her oldest daughter saying they were at the ER because L couldn't breathe and was having chest pains.  Now, she's not a hypochondriac or overly dramatic person where health is concerned, but the thought did cross my mind that she might have been having an anxiety attack at the thought of seeing Nance again.  They haven't seen one another since the wedding, and I believe Nance ended up footing the bill entirely for things that were going to be shared.


Turns out she was not having an anxiety attack.  The doctors found a mass in her lung.  It's small and they still have not determined if it's pneumonia, pleurisy or cancer.  Who'd have thought I'd ever be hoping my friend has pneumonia?  She had a fever today and her rationale is that you don't get a fever with cancer.  Having watched Ken die from leukemia, I know that fevers happen, but I'm hoping she's right.

Silver Lining

The silver lining in having the person you trained to take over the administrative tasks of your job so your assistant doesn't end up doing it all (without a raise) *deepcleansingbreath* flake out, act like she's not sure what she agreed to despite months of conversations, training and about a week worth of emails, and decide that she will only handle one small piece and dump everything without notice on your rather overwhelmed partner/assistant?

You "get" to handle a bunch of work-related crap while home on leave.  Okay, that sounds more gray than silver, but wait...

You will use said time in Dawn's manure field to get yourself more time off later. 

My work schedule is probably not like yours.  I have to work 197 days a year (it's in the neighborhood of 10 months).  Per my contract, I have to work at least one day in each month.  Thus, I have scheduled myself for this Thursday and Friday.  That will take care of September and October.  November and December will be handled similarly.  Because of Dawn's (hopefully temporary) case of cranial-sphincter infusion, I have about a foot of paperwork that magically arrived on my doorstep today (along with Biolage from that beauty supply place with the excellent prices... so long flowery new Pantene!).  I will be doing said work over the course of the next few days. Every hour I work from home while Fynn nurses and Madelyn naps will be an hour I don't have to "go" to work next week.

Silver lining... see?

*ohmmmm*

Now I must continue working on my email response to this situation.  I've been mentally hashing it out for four days and it never ends well.

Putting the Pep(per Spray) in Pep Rally

Yet again I am not entirely unhappy that my son doesn't dig large social-ish scenes.  He does not attend most pep rallies at his school.  They had one today.  Instead of going to the gym or wherever it was held, he went to hang out with the sewing teacher.  He made a bag for his pencils.


Meanwhile, the pep rally was rife with "small altercations" that blew up into a riot as kids were leaving.  Security regained control with pepper spray and the school was put on lockdown.  (That was the second time this month... the first was because a student was assaulted off campus just before school started.)


School ended up getting out early and Corey called for a ride.  Took me forever to find my wallet (in a gift bag with assorted things I'd brought upstairs last week) and pick him up.  The bad news is that he was only about 3/4 of a mile from home by the time I got to him.  The good news is that he avoided the fights that continued on some of the buses.


And here's the crazy part... he goes to the good high school.


Tom decided we'll be looking into private high schools in about 11 years.  Then I reminded him about the fight that broke out last spring at a local kindergarten graduation.

Know What This Means?

Last night I tried out for American Idol.  I was pretty relaxed about the whole thing and it went great until it was time to sing.  I couldn't remember the song, but someone had it typed up in color for just such a moment.  So then I had the words, but I couldn't remember the melody.  Oh, and I'd somehow forgotten that I don't know how to sing.  No matter.  I mean, clearly it was a no go, but the people in charge loved me.  Ellen told me that I should be a judge instead, and that I'd get paid three thousand dollars a show.


Tom hugged me and we were gleeful.  It wouldn't take long before all of our non-house and car debt was obliterated.


As were driving away, some woman... a fan?... tried to get into our gold minivan.  I locked it and Tom punched it as we drove up Mountain Avenue in Ontario (California, people... stay with me, sheesh!).  She ran to keep up and was banging on the side of the van.  I was slightly worried about whether she'd get hurt or not.


The banging turned into Corey knocking at my door, letting me know he was getting ready to leave for school.  From across the room I heard Fynn's soft coos and knew she was hungry.  As well she should be... girlfriend slept over four hours in one stretch last night, got up and nursed a little before crashing out again for a couple of hours.


That's right... I had enough time sleeping to dream.  Crazy dreams, sure, and with the terrifying gold minivan... but still.  It's almost 4:00 in the afternoon right now and... well, I could easily stay awake until a reasonable bedtime!

Sucker!

Last week I was called by Our365, the company that took Fynn's hospital photos.  The woman on the other end of the line told me that I was supposed to get "one more photo with your package."  Well I know we didn't buy a package, we bought the CD so we can make our own announcement for the bargain price of not an arm and a leg.  So I was on to her and her wily salesperson tactics lickety-split-like.


And then I accepted her first available appointment.  Tomorrow morning at 9:00.


The front room has been cleared of all extraneous items and is ready for it's close up, Mr. DeMille.*


I have to supply my own props, so I've pulled a couple of cool baskets, a crocheted rabbit from Fynn's newest aunt, and a couple of blankets.


I have two outfits and a hat laid out for Fynn and one in mind for Mad.  I tried to iron the three-dimensional fabric flower on said dress tonight.  On an upholstered chair instead of pulling out the ironing board.  The chair is either A) upholstered in some non-cotton fabric (feels like cotton) or B) also covered in some sort of goo that was not visible until singed with hot metal.  The iron, which is roughly my age (it was my grandmother's... has a fabric-covered cord and is heavy as sin) has probably stopped smoking.  Regardless, it's on the back patio.


More importantly, I did some digging about this offer, found out it's legit (the mind wonders) and got the scoop on what to expect in terms of the sales pitch tomorrow.  Personally, I'm all set to sign on the dotted line.  Tom, not so much.  He's wondering why we need professional photos at all since we have "so many photos" already.  To that I say, Duh! Because none of us here is a professional.  And while we do have a few hundred shots of Fynn lately, they mostly involve her sleeping in some completely normal, dare I say traditional way.

I want something new and exciting.  Don't you?  Exactly.


I'll let you know how it goes.


*Note that clearing it out took all of five minutes. The room is always near empty, with three bookcases, two chairs, an excellent photo of Neil Young that my brother-in-law took while on assignment one night, and a clock that has the first three numbers and "who cares" in place of the rest.  We use this room for playing catch with Maisy from the living room, changing diapers downstairs and letting kids go crazy whenever we have a gathering.  This virtually empty room is entirely visible from the street, so why we had a card on our door from Clean House asking if we have a problem with clutter is beyond me. We do not.  We have a problem with space.  Well, except for our room right now, but that's very temporary. And Corey's room, but... well, he's seventeen. And a boy.

Spam

Mm-hmm. Ya'll know what I'm talkin' about. Gah!


There's nothing like getting your email account hijacked and having people you know from the blogosphere... from childhood... from work find ads for "drugs," "Viagra" or "Ew, Shan... you really ought to get this taken care of."


And how did I become infected? Well, honestly, I think my friend Fran did it. That's right, people. I'm naming names! Her computer has been sending me the same emails periodically (like, once every month or so... not the bazillion in 24 hours my computer likes to shoot out). It has just so happened that I've caught most of those emails on my cell phone. But the one I opened the other day on my computer... without following the link, mind you... must have been the one that brought every thing down.


Sorry people. I'm ridiculously embarrassed, which is silly. I mean, I can talk about penises and vaginas and everything at the drop of a hat. I just don't talk about them with everybody. Like my mom's pastor, for example.


*sigh*


PS I love this song, but there weren't many good choices for videos.  Grr!

Jinxed

I should have gone and looked first, but no!, I had to brazenly assume.


Today my friend and her daughter came out to see me for the first time since we've lived here.  Gave them the grand tour of the yurt and then headed out back.


To see the ants beginning to make their way out from underground.


The only upside is that they didn't seem any larger or... evil-er... than they did before we had ants a la flambe.


Grr!

Saying Goodbye

Okay, that's a bit melodramatic.  Really.


But, Dude!  Seriously!


*sigh*  Here's the deal.  Fynn's five and a half weeks old.  She's been out of newborn clothes for about four weeks.  Last night it became apparent that she is also out of at least one brand of size 0-3 month jammies.


This kind of makes me sad.


She's my last baby, and she's growing so freaking fast!  Thinking about the future makes my head spin.  Mad has almost always been one to whip through the sizes.  When she was 8 months old, she was wearing 18-24 month clothes.  She's not quite two and a half, but wears size 5.  Corey's age always matched up with the sizes.  At 18 months, he was finally ready for size 18 month clothes... but just barely.  I figured that was pretty standard, and must have been how "they" came up with the sizing standards  For now at least, Fynn is growing faster than Mad did!


The growing is exciting.  Thinking about how well she's doing with mama's milk makes me happy and fills me with peace and a sense of being needed.


But the clothes.  I can tell you stories about Mad in most of the clothes.  Yesterday I came across another box of baby clothes. As soon as I opened them, I knew when Mad wore them. The little striped outfit she wore the first time she rode in her big girl car seat (at just under five months old). It happened to be the day I went back to work, so yeah, I could tell you the date.  (Yikes, I just realized I could break it down in terms of how many years and days.  Okay, I can see it's beginning to look less like sentimentality and more like a sickness, haha.)


The jammies Fynn was wearing last night (because yes, I did cram her into them)... the first time she wore them her diaper exploded just as it did when Mad wore them.  And I know who gave us almost everything.


And she's outgrowing them.  Already.


And we're not having any more babies.


And I will be giving them away (most of them... we save one thing from each grandparent and one from us).


But I want to hold onto them and keep those memories right there.

Today I

... managed to get to every appointment on time.
... brought everything I absolutely had to have with us the first time we left the house.
... enjoyed lunch with Nance and Fynn.
... was thrilled to learn Fynn's grown nearly half a pound since Thursday.
... realized that the reason my arms don't get as tired as other breastfeeding mamas' has to do with how *sigh* my daughter can rest on my lap while nursing... without a pillow.
... was disappointed to learn that Fynn did need to be adjusted again, and that her pediatrician also noticed she still favors one side.
... listened in utter delight as Mad "read" Dr. Suess' "One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish"
... got almost completely caught up on my thank you notes... while in the bathroom.
... watched my husband gather up a load of laundry from various spots, and then watched as he acted out a scene from Sesame Street where Bert throws things out of his toy box.  (No, Mama's not the only sleep-deprived person here.)

Burn Baby Burn

I could regale you with the tale of a sleepless night that ended with my husband's alarm, a foul curse and someone bursting into tears (perhaps the same person who uttered the curse).  Instead I will attempt to explain why my backyard is on fire.


Have I told you about our ant hill?  Or the ants that carried away Maisy's massive chunks of kibble?  Or the time Tom couldn't let Mad continue drawing with chalk on the back patio because the massive ants were stalking them?


We had originally heard we had army ants.  However, I looked them up and we don't.  We also don't seem to have the equally obnoxious honey ants that are common to our area. What do we have?  No one has answered that other than to say that the whole High Desert is built on an ant hill.  One thing I can say for sure is that these ants are pretty large.  If you were to stand well inside our kitchen and look out to the back of our yard (maybe 40 feet away), you'd easily be able to track an ant's movement.  Creepy!


We have tried several natural "remedies" to no avail.  Well, a couple attempts seemed to piss off the ants and bring them out in greater numbers, but mostly nothing happened.


Two weeks ago Tom resorted to an "eco-wise" chemical solution.  No change at all.


Today he went with his Dad's preferred remedy.  He poured lighter fluid (four quarts!!) into the ant hill and lit it on fire.  It burned for quite a while, naturally.  Tomorrow we are hoping to see a yard free of these critters.  But we're also a little afraid they'll have mutated and grown even larger and angrier.

Oot and Aboot (a nod to my Canadian friends, eh)

When Mad was newly born, I had her hand and footprints done for Tom for Father's Day.

Disclaimer: I totally snagged this from the prints woman's website, but it's my Mad's parts.

Last Thursday Tom and I intended to go down and get Fynn's hand and footprints done, but the Little Bitty Prints woman didn't go in that day for whatever reason.  Fortunately, we can check her website before heading down to know whether it's worth the drive or not.  This morning I checked and she was going to be there in 45 minutes. 


As if I haven't had every reason to know otherwise, I said to myself, "Hey, I can leave now and get there when she does!"  Then started the mad dash to get the girls' diapers changed and to get all of us into our clothes.  Of course, Mad wanted to "go pee" which really meant sit on the potty, gas a few times, get a "towel" (toilet paper) and hop off.


Then I filled the diaper bag for Fynn and then another gift bag with stuff for Mad.  Lest I come across as a mom who thought to bring toys or snacks for Mad, let me be clear and say I brought diapers and a change of clothes for each girl, wipes, blankets, and my Moby Wrap.


We all came downstairs and I prematurely put Fynn into her carrier, went out and got the new base, took 10 minutes getting the fricken thing out of the box and two minutes installing it while Fynn was screaming her head off and Mad was refusing to rock the carrier or do anything I asked her to do.


I got the girls and bags in the car and we drove away.  A mile out I (and this will seem familiar to anyone who's read my stuff in the past 10 months) realized I'd forgotten something.  In this case it was my phone.  We drove back, I grabbed the phone and we set out again.


We stopped at the bank, Starbucks (I wasn't a complete idiot in the food department) and the gas station.  Then we headed down the hill.  Get there at 9:00?  Not on your life.  Try 10:50.


The whole process of getting Fynn's prints done took about five minutes... including when I had to go back to the car to get my checkbook (that trip to the bank was for a deposit... I figured my urge to pull out cash was just some throwback to the days when I had spare cash to pull out, so I disregarded it).  Once that was done, I nursed Fynn on one side, leaked all over the other side, tried to keep Mad entertained, nursed Fynn on the other side and realized I had left my checkbook and sunglasses with the prints lady (ahem... I "realized" it because the prints lady, after making Mad come back in the room, pointed out very sweetly that I'd left them on her table).


Next, the girls and I went in to get Fynn's weight checked.  Girlfriend has gained nearly two pounds in the past month.  I think that's totally normal, but I was still a little dumbfounded.  My mother-in-law and I estimate it took Mad at least three months to achieve that kind of a gain. 


The odd thing is that Mad fit in newborn clothes and diapers for about three weeks.  Fynn could only wear her newborn things for about a week and a half, and she started size one dipes today.  What makes this odd is that Fynn now weighs approximately what Mad weighed at birth.  I forgot to have her length checked.  That could be part of the difference, I suppose.


In any case, while getting the prints took about five minutes, the entire trip was closer to five hours.  But it was well worth it.  Why?  Because both girls ended up napping almost exactly at the same time for almost the same amount of time (three hours!), and I got to catch a few well earned Z's, too.


Around six weeks from now we should have Fynn's prints back.  We decided to stick with the Chicago sports theme.  Fynn's will be a football (Da Bears!).  I can't wait to see it!

No Cigar

Today is a couple of things.  It's one month since Fynnie's birthday.  It's Mad's first trip down to Grandma's on Tom's way to work since Fynn's was born.  It's back to school night for Corey.  It's that mommy group meeting.  Typically Tom stays late down the hill on Wednesdays for training, but he took Mad so I could go to the group.


Fynnie and I both managed to get bathed and dressed.  I was running too late (thanks to someone's explosive behind) to put on makeup, but I mostly don't wear any these days anyway.


The meeting is 90 minutes long, 20 miles or so away.  We headed out to the car seven minutes before it started.  So I was going to be late at best.  Then I discovered that the carrier base had been removed from my car.  Yes, we do have a second base.  It's still in the box in the garage.  Seeing that I was already running late... and Fynn was shrieking her displeasure at even being in the car seat to begin with... I decided to throw in the towel.  This was my last chance to go since I'll have Mad on the rest of the Wednesdays.  Chances are not great that I would have met a new friend there anyway, right?  I mean, last time I certainly didn't. 


It's not a specific person that I'm missing here... it's that there was a chance I'd meet a kindred spirit.  Earlier this week I found three other mom groups, not just in my area, but in my city.  I was so excited until I learned that each one has disbanded.  I don't have any ideas of where else to turn, but I need to find friends up here. 

My First Day

Although my "day" didn't officially start until Tom left for work this morning, a little background info is in order.


Fynn has been falling asleep between 10:30 and 11:15 most nights, and then sleeping for two to four hours.  Lately she's drifted off progressively earlier.  Last night I put her jammies on right before Mad's bedtime story.  After the story, I brought Fynn here to our room where she pretty much zonked out right away.  I stayed up for about an hour, mainly because I was pumped up on adrenaline in anticipation of today.


Soon after I fell asleep, Fynn woke up.  She and I settled in the recliner.  I promised myself I wouldn't sleep in the chair.  All useless promises aside, I woke up several times with my neck cricked this way or that.  I repeatedly attempted to pop Fynn off my breast and put her back to bed.  I believe this resulted in a cumulative total of about 25 minutes of resting in bed.


Tom's alarm started going off in the wee hours.  He's a big fan of the snooze function and can go almost completely unconscious between alarms.  The last one sounded for at least a full minute before I started calling his name from across the room in the recliner.  I got louder and louder, but... nothing.  I searched around for something to throw at him.  I decided against the water cup and instead selected a cute little denim dress my sister had just brought for the baby on Sunday.  It didn't even hit him, but he jumped up all the same.


Of course he had to brush his teeth with his electronic toothbrush.  It's never been so loud as when I was trying to decide how much longer before I could please put Fynn down and get some real sleep.  Then he needed to shave with his electric razors.  Yes, both of them.  It's probably just as well that I sat there mentally pleading with him to be quiet, turn off the lights and get himself on the freaking road instead of bemoaning the fact that he'd be gone (which I'd already done, trust me).


About the time Tom was finally out the door, Fynn woke up refreshed and hungry.  An hour later, I convinced her to sleep a little longer in her crib(!)... just in time to need to make sure Corey was getting ready for school.  Once he was gone, I stretched out in my bed, closed my eyes and... heard Fynn's hungry sounds.  Like the girl didn't just nurse all night long.  (And no, she shouldn't be going through a growth spurt... we just spent an entire week cluster feeding.)


We nursed for a while before I heard Mad stirring over the monitor.  One thing I was dreading was hearing her call out for Daddy to come get her in the morning.  So I put Fynn down, went in and interrupted Mad's eleventh version of the ABC's.


Fynn spent most of the morning in my Moby wrap. I took the girls for a walk because anything involving my butt on a soft surface would have made staying awake impossible.  I managed to make it through the day, surprisingly only bleary-eyed in the early morning.


Mad went down for her nap a little early, but it was just as Fynn was waking up, so my hopes for sleep weren't looking good.  Maybe 90 minutes after Mad was asleep, so was Fynn.  You've never seen a bed cleared and occupied so quickly in your life!  I think I got at least an hour of uninterrupted sleep.  All at one time!

I had prepped Mad for a couple of things last night.  One, Daddy was going back to work.  (She did ask where he was when we came into my room and didn't look too happy at the answer, but she was fine.)  And two, we were going to be starting potty training today (she and Daddy went out yesterday and bought the rest of the potty seat converters for the restrooms).


She's sat on the potty a few times at Grandma's, but has flipped out quickly each time.  So I told her today we'd be practicing sitting on the potty with her clothes on.  Silly girl!  As soon as I had her up there, she wanted her pants off and diaper removed so she could really sit on the potty.  Over the course of the day, she probably "went to the potty" four or five times.  She never did anything except look really proud and adorable.  She also spent a good part of the day diaper free.  This evening I was surprised to see what looked like a piece of charcoal on the floor.  Just as I realized what it was, Maisy grabbed it and ran off.  Fortunately, Tom was home by then.  He got all the cleanup dooty, buahaha... ahem... I was really glad he was there.  Aside from that, there were no accidents, but there were also no big successes... aside from Mad's willingness to try (which was huge, of course).


All in all, not a bad day.  And now my baby is asleep, so I'm going to see if I can be, too.

Just In Time

... for Daddy to return to work, we all have colds.

Bee-zare

I just spoke with one of my best buddies since my high school days.  Three things came up that, as far as I'm concerned, all fall into the, "Well that's just bizarre" category.


One, apparently Tom and I gave her a cactus three years ago.  We don't remember giving a cactus, but giving a plant is definitely something we would have done.  I know cacti are supposed to be low maintenance, but I've never managed to keep one alive longer than eight or nine months, so when she first mentioned it, I was impressed that she must still have it.  She's been watering and dusting that thing all this time.  In any case, she just discovered it's fake when her boyfriend went to transplant it for her.


Two, her daughter will be calling me to interview me for a childhood development course she needs in order to transfer colleges.  The thing is, she's going to school to become an embalmer.  She'll be the person who preps bodies for funerals.  Why does she need childhood development?


Three, the reason I called her is that she sent me a sizable check... to pay for her gown and shoes that she wore in my wedding.  Almost five years ago.  I had eventually offered to just make the dress and whatnot her gift for being part of our big day.  Since Nance was my matron of honor, it meant giving her a bigger gift than we'd intended, which was a horseback ride and dinner at sunset in Malibu... I have no regrets, especially since I never intend to go riding/racing with my friend, Evel Knievel, again!


I had to make sure that my friend knows there wasn't any reason to do this for me.  She said it's for selfish reasons because she thinks about it every time we talk.  She knows I'm her friend no matter what.


Under other circumstances, I'd probably just send it back or shred it.  But it's helping her and... this the part that's hanging me up... we can really use the money.  It would cover all of Corey's school charges and fees and buy diapers for each of the girls.


I'm generally not good with these sorts of money situations.  How would you handle this?

Helping Daddy

While Tom's home, he's primarily handling everything while I tend to Fynn.  This has been especially helpful as we've worked our way through a nearly weeklong growth spurt.


This morning Tom relayed a new experience he had with Mad.  I could tell by the way his face was becoming more and more red as he struggled to find words that it was something good.


"When I'm downstairs and it's just me and Mad, if I have to use the restroom, I leave the door open.  She doesn't always come in, but that way she knows she can come in if she has to."


I nodded at this, because it's what I do, too.  Otherwise we are very strict bathroom-door-must-remain-shut-at-all-times kind of people.


"So she comes in and goes straight for the toilet paper.  I grab it to stop her so she doesn't take too much.  She hands it to me and says, 'Daddy wipe heinie/*gynie.'  'Uh, thank you.  Daddy has a heinie, but no gynie."


And here I thought all the fun stuff happened in the first year!


*I feel like I need a pronunciation key for this word.  It's just like "genie" but with a long I sound at the beginning.  Heinie/gynie is as close to nonsense names as we get for Mad's parts.  In case you are wondering, no, he apparently did not go into what he has instead of a gynie.