Does That Make Me a Grandma?

Okay, off the bat, no. This has nothing to do with Corey. This is all about one Fynnie Fynn.

Do you remember her traumatic poop incident? Happened in early July, took 'til September to recover. And many dietary changes. And put potty training, which I was so sure was going to be a breeze, on hold.

By mid-October things were really looking up.

Two weeks ago the signs were clearly present, she was ready to potty train again, right before my week off at Thanksgiving. Only we weren't staying home for Thanksgiving. 

A seven hour drive just really doesn't mesh well with potty training.

Fynnie is such a sensitive child. I don't think this is such a bad thing, generally. It has caused me to stretch and grow (okay, yes, and groan).

Unlike her traumatic poop incident, this time I do not know what happened.

I think maybe she connects using the potty with the stress, pain and strain of this summer. But she was the one asking to use the potty recently.

Whatever it was, she quit pooping again. For four to five days at a time.

She went on Monday and then nothing all week during our little vacation up in the Bay Area.

The vacation? 

Unfortunately, the girls didn't often get the two things they need when they needed them. You know, food and sleep.

On the up side, it was better than this summer's trip to Boston in that I only spent about half the time in a darkened room with the girls. Plus, this room's curtains still let a little light in. Said room had a very nice seating area reasonably separate from where the girls were sleeping, too.  And my new phone kept me connected to the rest of the world longer than five minutes at a time.

But unlike Boston, where I attended a wedding and had a brief walking tour of downtown, this time my excursions included a girls' night out with my friend who lives nearby (thank you!), two walks in a shopping center, one of which was during normal business hours. One happy trip to the park (that ended with Madelyn having a meltdown). One very tense trip to the same park (that ended with Madelyn having a major meltdown) after I declined taking the girls to a different park about 35 miles away when no one else could get themselves ready to go for the day until it was the girls' lunchtime.

Did you know lunchtime comes right before nap time? No? Then, like the rest of Tom's family you are either the parents of adults, the parents of your first infant or childless. For the record, I do not expect any of them to automatically understand our girls' needs. However, both of their parents should know this. And the one who is actually related should grow a pair feel comfortable speaking up. It's not even remotely like Tom's family is a pack of wolves. They would understand if they knew. *ohm*

Oh, and we also had a lovely meal on Thanksgiving at Matt and Sarah's, after which everyone but Fynnie and I went for a three hour walk. Why stay back? Because the girls hadn't napped yet, since the meal was scheduled to start at 2:00. True to form for Tom's family, it actually started about 90 minutes later, which means they could have slept.

That tense trip to the park? That was yesterday. It was awesome. Between Mad's meltdown, Fynnie's obvious discomfort and Tom and I searching different parts of the sky for the answers to life's persistent questions... well, I'm glad it was yesterday. After the park, we went back and put the girls down for their nap. Tom and I worked on a little 160 piece puzzle together, solving it almost silently in record time.

Last night we joined the family at this fabulous vegetarian/vegan restaurant. They were very nice and didn't seem at all put off about our party having two littles and a wee bebe. The servers engaged Madelyn and talked with Baby Zoe. They would have included Fynnie but she was only up for being held by Mama.

Dinner was amazing. Seriously, if I could get vegan food like this regularly, I would give up meat in a heartbeat.

The restaurant? Tiny, but very hip.

Since they have do have one highchair, there's a sense that the occasional kidlet does come into the joint.

You know what they probably don't usually get?

A toddler, no longer able to delay the inevitable, using vocalizations... LOUD grunts and gasps while clawing at my shoulders and crying... as she pushed out something unholy that made the back side of her heinie seem to grow by three or four inches.

The upside? Fynnie usually declares, "I'm pooping!" This time? No. But in case people had any doubts about what had just transpired, she did announce, "I want you cwean ma diapah!"

Oh, and me? Yeah, I was the one cheering her on the whole time. Rubbing her back, kissing her sweaty head, giving a big thumbs up and goofy grin to the rest of my table mates. And in case that wasn't clear enough for them? I added, "Successs!"

The single restroom in the joint was occupied (I have my doubts we'd find a changing table anyway), so I carried Fynnie out to my car and changed her in the cargo area.

Right in front of the little Prius that was parked just a few feet behind us.

With a couple that, only moments before, could not keep their hands off one another.

I'm pretty sure they were parked close enough that they couldn't see around me. But I know they quit hanging around and left right after I double-bagged that diaper.

This morning all of Tom's family gathered in the hotel lobby where we stayed and hung out before heading off in separate directions.

Fynnie ate more than she had the entire trip.

About 90 minutes into our drive home she started fussing about having "booboo for you booboo," which is our rather long pet name for nursing. It was almost lunchtime, so Tom pulled off at the next stop. I brought Fynnie into the front seat with me while Tom took Mad in to get lunch.

Not long into it, I realized that Fynnie was acting very similar to last night. I sat her up and held her with her bottom hanging between my legs.

Again I cheered and rubbed and smooched while she sweated and grunted and pushed. Again, her diaper grew by several inches. When I went to change her, however, I found that things had stopped coming out simply because there was no more room. Using the diaper, I pulled while she finished pushing. Seriously, it was like performing a poopectomy.

As I was about to close up her new diaper, I realized that we hadn't gotten everything. So, with her half-naked body not quite fitting across the front passenger seat of my car, I again cheered her onto victory.

It was like delivering twins.

In other news, I am looking forward to having a vacation that feels like a vacation. Some day.

Why I Love Her

It's because of little notes like this:

Dearest Shannon, 

Dad and I just watched the girls and they are so beautiful, Dad actually had tears in his eyes. I can't believe how grown they are.  Nana needs an updated pic for my quilt on my bedroom wall.  Shannon, you and your family have a very Merry Christmas and know that I have loved you since the day I met you and now I love your children as I have loved you.  Sending you sugar with tears as I remember how little you were and now see your face in your children.  Love ya bunches,

The wicked step mom who loves you like a mom.

Dad and Margaret decided to gather all of the kids and grandkids together yesterday for a barbecue before the grandkids start school (some of them next week!).


Mad spent quite a bit of time watering things (the grass, herself, the bird feeder, plants).

Then she decided to spend some time "dirting" things (see previous list).

Once she formed her mud pies, it was time to get down to some serious cooking!

Someone chose other activities rather than sampling his daughter's delights.

Chi-CAH-Go, Chi-CAH-Go, (I Don't Know The Words To This Song)

Historically, Tom and I do not do well on our trips into the great city of Chicago.  With the exception of our first trip, we have always ended up arguing or having some sort of drama.


Once it was because one too many people asked us about when we'd be getting married (we'd been together four years... it's not like they were rushing us).  I broached the subject later that night and we ended up having a painful argument that almost ended the relationship.


Another time we left our hotel in a northern suburb around 6:00 A.M. local time (4:00 to us) to meet up with his family for a shopping and art museum excursion.  We returned after midnight.  In between we'd stopped at Starbucks (in the wee hours of the morning) and had dinner after a four hour long discussion about where we should go for dinner (not joking here).  Tom's brother, Chris... the one who lives IN Chicago even asked me where I thought we should go (points to me for not stating the answer I had in mind).  This was about half an hour after my son was sitting in a department store, rhythmically banging his head on a shelf of books while everyone tried to think of a place that was still open.  I took him to the cafeteria and got him a burger and fries.  It was apparently not the experience anybody else wanted.  We ended up at a little place in "Greek Town" an hour later that makes pretty much every kind of fast food.  Several in our party had burgers and fries.


Last time my whole family got hit by salmonella poisoning two days before driving home.  We're pretty sure we got it from two places (one with peanut butter, the other with spinach), and we were pretty messed up through the whole drive back to California.  The worst thing was worrying about whether we'd have to take Mad to a hospital somewhere in New Mexico.  The second worst thing was Tom's... *deep cleansing breath*... demeanor... during the drive.  I believe that I called it cruel and unusual punishment at the time.  Sixteen months have passed and I stand by my statement.


So it was with some trepidation that I approached last weekend's trip.  To give ourselves a fighting chance of not fighting, I attempted to establish some boundaries and guidelines with Tom.


1.  We all need to eat... especially Mad (I strategically threw her name in since getting meals for the rest of us wasn't something Tom managed so well in the past).  However, unlike last year's trip to Vegas with your friends, we do not need to obsess over eating and mention it 30 times until everyone else is wondering if you... or I... have a tapeworm.  We just need to have at least two meals less than 16 hours apart  (Mad will need three).  A granola bar is not a meal.  Neither is juice.


2.  Mad will need to sleep.  She loves her nip-nappy-snip-snappy and we're not going to keep her from it.  Lucky for us she's flexible if she has to be, but if a meltdown is imminent, she's outta there!  Same goes for nigh-night.


3.  It's your family, and you should be at everything.  If Mad's acting up during Chris and Carol's wedding, I'll take her to a quieter place away from the action.  If her needs (or my own) aren't jibing with the festivities, just point me in the direction of the nearest El stop and tell me which train to get on.  We'll see you when you're done or when we can come back and have fun, too.


And guess what... it worked!  It helped that Mad magically and instantly adapted to Chicago time (okay, it didn't help us that first morning when she was up and grooving at what was 4:15 to us). 


Dinner that first night was at Quartino's, which I heard was excellent.  We all walked the mile or so to dinner only to find that Mad was about ready for bed.  So she and I chugged our way back to the hotel.  She ate the rest of my lunch for dinner and conked out almost immediately.  Since we were in the same room (and I'd been up since 2:00 AM my time), I conked out, too.  Tom and Corey came in a couple hours later with a salad and steak for me.  They spent a long time talking about all the dishes they'd had.


Just before we went down and hailed a cab to get to the wedding the next day, I put on a pair of heels.  Heels that I'd worn only two weeks before.  Heels that were now more snug than I would have liked.  I figured we'd be seated most of the day, so I didn't sweat it.


During the wedding, which was on a boat*, Mad and I ended up hanging out inside with the captain.  It was too cold to forego her big coat and having the life vest on over it did not make her happy. 

Bubbles, however, did.  (No, we're not Amish.  Tom just likes to shave like he is.)

After the cruise ended, we hopped into cabs and headed for this amazing restaurant, The Publican.  Corey went with Tom's parents.  Tom mentioned that he hadn't remembered to get the monetary gift we'd been planning to put in a card for his brother and Carol, so we stopped at the first bank the cabbie saw.  Tom's card was declined.  He called the bank and was told there was no hold on our account.  Tom mentioned that we were out of town and that he was trying to make a more sizable withdrawal than we usually do, but that didn't phase the service rep.  Tom figured it must be the ATM.  He hopped back in and we headed to the restaurant.  Since the bride and groom hadn't arrived, we decided to walk to find a working ATM.

Second ATM... four or five blocks away, his card was declined.  Mine wasn't even recognized.

Third ATM... two more blocks away... is inside an enclosed lobby (thank you for small blessings... Mad could run around safely).  Both of our cards were declined.  Tom reached for his phone, but I said I'd call instead.  He laughed and says they should have just worked it out with him when they had the chance.

After being told that A) there is no hold or other problem B) I've input my pin number incorrectly and C) there is no problem on their end, I explained that A) we are 2200 miles from home B) I've had my husband verify that I did it correctly and C) I am not getting off the phone until I have cash in hand.

Somewhere along the line the guy decided to send me to the fraud department.  Lo and behold we were flagged because of being out of town and attempting to make a rather sizable withdrawal compared to the paltry sums we usually request.  He reset my card.  I made the withdrawal and then had him fix Tom's card, too.

So we had money for the gift, but no card.  We schlepped up one more block to a grocery store, bought a card and a coloring book with crayons for Mad, and hobbled back to the restaurant.  Our excursion since the boat probably took an hour, but we arrived at the same time as the bride and groom, so it worked out.

Dinner was excellent.  Some six courses before the main dish.  A few things I've only heard about through Top Chef.  Each item was presented with it's name and place of origin, from local farms to faraway lands.

Mad's meltdown began just after the main course arrived.  I packed her up and said our goodbyes.  Corey decided to come with us.  It turns out he felt he had better leave because he was eating too much.  Dude missed out on dessert, a "white chocolate cremeaux with rhubarb and candied walnuts."  Tom enjoyed it for him.

In the cab on the way back to the hotel, Mad leaned back and stared at the lights.  As soon as she walked in she wanted her "nap."  I managed to get her dress, pants and one sock off, change the diaper and get some bottoms on her.  She slept in the shirt she wore under the dress.

... until 8:30 local time the next morning.

That's probably more than enough for one post, so I continue the story next time.


*I'm sorry, but if your "boat" has four levels, three bedrooms and two living areas and holds 100 people... that's a yacht to me.  But what do I know?

*muttering* Hmm... Whattodo, whattodo...

I'm gonna lay some things out here.  It could be too long for many people, but I'm mainly doing this one for me.  There may be a point and a question at the end.  We'll see.


I was 19 when I married Stephen.  He turned 20 the next day.  So, ya know, we were, like, mature and all (is that me popping my gum?).  Prior to meeting him I had spent about 18 months being more of a party girl than I care to admit.  I've always had a very low tolerance for alcohol.  So when the weekly 2-3 nights of partying led to my being able to consume two drinks a night, I was a little concerned about the direction of my life.  (For context, I can start feeling the effects of alcohol within 1-2 sips.)


Enter my high school buddy, Deb.  She had gotten pregnant and then married within a year of graduation.  Her husband immediately went in the Navy.  I don't recall ever seeing him again, and it didn't take long for her to stop talking about him.  After the baby was a few months old, Deb and I headed down to the Naval Training Center (NTC) to check out the clubs where, rumor had it, we wouldn't be carded.


Not only weren't we carded, the ratio of guys to girls was something like 10/1.  We were as happy to see them as they were to see us.  Somewhere in that night, Stephen and I met.  Deb met a guy, too.  The four of us went to the peninsula at Point Loma and watched the sun rise.  It was a nice time, fun and kind of free, but nobody was making out or anything like that.


Stephen took my number.  The first time he called, he left a message for "Sharon."  There was never any amazing, wonderful love between us, but we got on well.  He was willing to talk about all the same stuff I liked to talk about, plus we both loved dancing.  That was the basis of our relationship.  The conversation when we said we loved one another started off like this (in the bed of a pick-up truck as we headed back to his base one night):


Him:  "I think I might be falling in love with you."
Me:  "Get back to me when you're sure."


I don't even remember how it ended.  Ahh, romance.   Clearly I needed a change in my life and he was willing to be that change.  I'm not sure what he got out of the deal.


Stephen and I suffered many miscarriages.  By the time I got pregnant with Corey, it was more by sheer determination than even affection.  Halfway through my pregnancy, I knew the marriage was over, but it was too soon to leave.  Things got progressively worse between us, but four days after Corey was born, I agreed to move the family to Oklahoma, where Stephen's family lived.  It was either that, which would allow me to stay home with the baby, or stay in San Diego but return to work and let Stephen stay home with him.  By that time, he'd been kicked out of disinvited to re-enlist with the Navy and was all but refusing to get a job unless we moved.


Making that move was the first time I truly sacrificed anything in my life, and it was for my son.  We moved from our perfect little apartment half a block from the beach and 90 minutes from my family to Enid, Oklahoma.  To say I was devastated doesn't really express how hard I took it.  We arrived when Corey was seven weeks old; Corey and I left eight and a half months later, when my dad and two brothers came to get us. 


During the Oklahoma sentence, Corey and I spent a month visiting my baby sister in Alabama.  It was supposed to be a two week visit, but Stephen spent the money for our return trip partying with his friends.  His parents sent me the ticket and offered to have us go straight back to California, but I guess everything wasn't finished between us yet, so we returned to Enid.


Going back did one thing for me, which was let me know that I was not making a rash decision in leaving.  We were being evicted from our apartment for non-payment and for the wild parties that required police to break up.  Stephen and I started off agreeing to divorce.  I was just about giddy with relief that he was letting me take Corey back to California without a fight.


Me + giddy often = stupid jokes.  We got into a fight and ended the night in separate parts of town: Stephen at the apartment; Corey and I at a shelter.  In the one thing I will ever say to defend Stephen, he was not worse than me that night, only stronger.  The good thing about that fight is that my dad moved up the date he could come get us by six weeks.


Stephen came out to California about a week or so before Corey's first birthday.  He couldn't stay with us at my mom's place, but also didn't bring enough money to stay anywhere for long.  He chose the vacant lot down at the end of our block.  We tried to be cordial to one another, but it mostly didn't go well.  I don't recall much of our actual conversations, but I'm willing to concede that I was more of a smart ass than I needed to be.  He became a bit of a stalker.  After I got a restraining order and my dad and sister's boyfriend had a little chat with him, Stephen decided to really and truly return to Oklahoma.


Things settled down between us after that.  It took me two years to finalize the divorce because I'd handled most of it on my own.


Over the years we have had very little contact with Stephen or his family.  I used to call his dad and stepmom.  Christmas cards went to all of his family members for several years even though I never heard back from them.  Stephen's mom, Janice, came out to California a couple of times and we made sure to spend time with her, but again, we rarely heard from her.  When Corey's great-grandfather passed away in 2003, we flew back for the funeral.  By then Corey hadn't heard from Stephen in four years.


I spent some time with Janice, who defended her son by saying she'd done something similar to him when he was young and she knew how these things could happen.  I guess there's just some information I refuse to learn because I will never understand that.  Even though I never heard from her again, we still sent a Christmas card to her every year except last year (the year I quit sending cards to a lot of people who aren't really a part of our lives anymore... not just her).


And here's my point in writing all this down:  Today I received a Facebook request from Janice.  No message, no anything in over six years, just a friend request.  I asked Corey what he would prefer I do.  She's his Mimi.  He shrugged his shoulders and made a sour face and said he didn't care what I did, but that he didn't want to be involved.


His feelings are clear, rational and understandable to me.  If I were in his shoes I would likely do and say the same.  In fact, I do believe in the ability to choose your family, or at least the ones to associate with.  The part that's muddying this up for me is that, odd as it sounds, I like Janice.  That last conversation was the only time we disagreed.  She is the one who told Stephen in front of me, "Yes, you did have a rotten childhood.  I'm sorry.  If I could change that I would.  But I can't, and the fact is that you're an adult now.  No one cares what happened when you were a child."  I don't know if that helped him, but it put my own childhood into perspective.  The other problem is I don't feel I'm making the choice strictly for me, I am the door between Corey and the other half of his family.  He doesn't have Facebook or MySpace or even use an email address.  They will only find him through me.


Is it completely lame that I'm wondering what to do here?

My New Favorite Sound

... is the silence after a houseful of people have left.


It's been a lovely weekend.  Yesterday's class was preceded by an hourlong trip to the bookstore by myself.  Yes, I might have spent my time reading an entire People magazine for free because it annoys me that the website has pop-ups despite my blocker, but guilt be damned, I'm glad I did it (or as glad as I can be for reading that crap).  I also looked through some of David Sedaris' books that I haven't yet read.  I liked "When You Are Engulfed In Flames" and loved "Me Talk Pretty One Day," but the new (to me) stuff didn't hold my interest.


After the class we drove back up here and took the kids and ourselves out to dinner.  I have vague recollections of the last time that happened.  The weather was consistently warm then; that's as close as I'll come to narrowing it down.  We had a lovely time, and Mad wasn't any more difficult out than she is at home (which is saying a lot... she's an easygoing kid).  However, she did try to get the server to bring more milk many times.  She got to use that same cup this morning and it was fun to watch her remember where it had come from.  As she's losing her baby words, her facial expressions are also becoming so much clearer.


Last night we stayed up late.  Tom did the grocery shopping after dinner.  My first big hint that something was up was that he'd bought six bags of tortilla chips.  Now I did request that he purchase enough food to last the entire week, and we do live with a teen boy, but that wasn't quite what I'd had in mind.


I went to bed around 11:00 and awoke at 2:00 AM to the overwhelming scent of something lemony.  Turns out he was downstairs shampooing the carpet.  We've lived here 11 months and have cleaned the carpets four or five times.  I don't think it's an unreasonable amount in either direction, but the fact is the carpets get cleaned right before something is going to happen (except for when Maisy went through that phase in November).  I didn't figure out what the aroma was until this morning when I took Mad downstairs and saw all the furniture was sitting in the kitchen.


Tom came down and we put the furniture back.  He started doing some deep cleaning, but declined my help.  Normally I'd honor his response and "dutifully" go upstairs and take a nap.  This time I cleaned the bathroom downstairs and washed some windows and the slider screen.  By the time I finished, most of the rest of the work was done, too.  It was still only mid-morning, but Mad wanted her nap.  Once she went down, so did I.  Tom had some mysterious errands to run and Corey had a friend over to play video games.  Kind of a nice way to pass the time on a Sunday, I have to say.


When he returned home, Tom said I had to get showered and dressed and be ready to leave by 2:00.  In the meantime, he had another errand to run. 


I sent a text to Nance to say I was thinking about her.  We had been in the midst of a meeting at Starbucks the other day when an elderly woman walked by and Nance broke down.  Checking in on one another is normal for us.  She lied said she was at her mom's signing more papers (the home is in escrow for the second time this month... keep your fingers crossed).


In keeping with his family traditions, Tom wasn't home even by 2:10.  A few minutes later my mom walked in.  She could tell I wasn't expecting her (maybe it was the way I said, "Something is up, but don't tell me"... I'm subtle like that) and made up some cockamamie story about just coming up for a visit.  On a Sunday, when she's got church in the morning and in the evening.  On a spring break weekend, when the pass is filled with hundreds of thousands of cars returning from Vegas and the river.  And with her recent knee problems that are exascerbated by driving.


The doorbell rang and it was Nance and a small crowd of people, including Tom.  Apparently they'd all met up where Tom had ordered the cake and had come over together.  I almost cried when I saw them.  If they had been the only people to show up today, I would have been a very happy girl.  But the doorbell kept ringing and people kept arriving.  The last few times I suspected it might be one of our smokers or the kids just playing around with me, but it never was.


There were gifts, but none were as special as what Tom had done.  However, my second favorite has to be the one from my dad and Margaret.  We have talked about the cravings I've had with this pregnancy and about what a hard time we have finding decent cranberry juice.  Neither of the places we shop carry Ocean Spray's straight 100% cranberry juice.  Dad's gift?  Cranberry juice, lemons, tomatoes and salt.  Between that and the cake, I could be set for the next week!  I might not have any teeth left, but I'll still be smiling.


Once everybody left and Mad was in bed, Corey invited his friend back over.  I felt bad he'd had to leave earlier, but I thought we were going somewhere.  Tom and I played gin rummy and had a picnic dinner on the front room floor.  It was perfect.

History of the Madelyn Girl

I was reading some of the responses on The One Minute Writer today and it took me back to last year, when Madelyn was born. I had written most of it down... or typed it up... on the computer, but when we had that crash in January, everything was lost. So I'm going to put some of what I remember about my pregnancy and delivery and Mad's early days here. This first bit is from an article I submitted to DivineCaroline in November of 2007.

My husband and I have been together for nearly eight years and married for two. We’ve discussed having children together. Sometimes I felt the pull of the daughter who is “out there” waiting for me. Other times I knew for sure I didn’t want to go through that again. For my husband, I think he has worried about how good of a father he’d be “from the get-go.” I have been married once before and have a fourteen-year old son. Tom has been wonderful with my son, who is now our son.

For the better part of a year we had been discussing whether or not we wanted to have a child together. If we weren’t having a baby, then I wanted to get my tubes tied so I could go off the pill and live a less chemical life.

Sometime early this summer we both decided that not having a baby was the better decision for us. We’ve been working on some financial goals and enjoying the freedom that comes with having a teenager. I was in agreement with the decision, but I wasn’t ecstatic about it. I told Tom that I would take a little time to absorb the finality and then I’d make the appointment. However, our summer schedule was insane. Our son started an independent study program that meant I was essentially his teacher. When we weren’t working eight hours a day on schoolwork, we were off camping. We had so many trips scheduled, and not all with definite dates. So there wasn’t really time to have surgery. I planned to make the appointment for early October, when life would be back to normal and taking a few days off work wouldn’t be such a big deal.

I remember the time that I think the baby was conceived. In a small part of my mind, I thought about our decision ... but I had thought about it other times as well. This particular time, though, was so incredible and magical. It felt like making a baby.

A few weeks later when my period didn’t come on Sunday, as it had been for a few months, I wasn’t too worried. The original reason I got on the pill was to regulate my period, and even with that help, the only thing I could guarantee was the week that my period would start and stop ... not which day. When my period didn’t come on Wednesday ... typically the latest day ... I started to wonder. When nothing had happened by Sunday night and I was starting to feel “different,” I was concerned.

One night while Corey was away and Tom was playing tennis, I did a little online research to see if maybe I had cancer or something else that caused my missed period. It sounds crazy, and it probably is, to say that a major ailment could be better than being pregnant. But this is where I was at: Life was so good. Tom, Corey and I were settling well into married life. We had been incredibly happy. Getting pregnant without both sides consenting seems to me a lot like betrayal. I know I didn’t do it on purpose, but I think that the part of me that wanted to have a child with him feels guilty anyway. The thing I kept thinking was that this pregnancy could be the key to unlock the happiness of our marriage and send it away for good.

I stopped sleeping well. I couldn’t fall asleep and I couldn’t stay asleep. For the next couple of nights, I probably averaged two to three hours over the course of the night. Even though I’m off during summers, I couldn’t sleep late because I was now home schooling our son.

Relief came in the form of a camping trip with my brother and his family. Tom couldn’t join us, so Corey and I headed out to the Eastern Sierras without him. By the time Corey finished setting up the tent, I was so exhausted that I went to take a nap. This is not something I normally do on vacation, and especially not on camping trips. I slept for an hour and then when we all headed to bed later, I crashed right away. Part of me knew this was probably a bit of being pregnant and a lot of not having to face Tom with this news.

We stayed away for three nights. I slept so well for the first two, but the night before we went home, I could feel the tension welling up again. I couldn’t sleep to save my life. When I did sleep, I dreamt that his best friend tried to kiss me and that I was sort of letting him when Tom walked up. I don’t remember it as clearly now, but one of us said to the other, “We have a lot of things to talk about.”

When we got home that night, it was too beautiful outside and too stuffy inside, so I spent most of the evening on the grass in the yard. When Tom got home and joined me, I listened to the events of his past few days without us and told him a little about our time in the mountains. I told him about the dream and then, without my meaning to, but also without my being able to stop, I told him that I thought I was pregnant. Well, I told him that I was either pregnant or very sick and that I’d done research that pretty much negated the possibility of very sick.

I thought I saw him smile (or grimace) a little and I saw tears welling in his eyes. I didn’t have a clue as to what he was going through. I was as ready as I could be for, “You know I said no, so you can deal with it on your own.” (This really wouldn’t be like him.) To my complete relief, what he said was, “Well this is just another adventure for us, isn’t it?”

The next morning we went together to buy a pregnancy test. He waited for me to take it and made me promise not to look without him. Once it was confirmed, we went to the bookstore, where each of us got a pregnancy book. He has attended every appointment with me, and insisted after the first one that we change doctors because of the demeanor of that doctor and his staff. He gets to decide if we find out or not about the baby’s gender, and we both have to love the names we choose.

When it came to telling our families, he made me wait until his was out here in late September (we found out in August). In reality, this made perfect sense because I have a history of miscarriages prior to having Corey, and I was only a few weeks along. And telling all of our parents at the same time would be fairer. I’m glad we waited, but it was one of the most difficult things I’ve had to do in a few years.

Our son is thrilled to finally be getting the brother or sister he’s always wanted. My father almost knocked me down when he came to hug me after getting a copy of the first ultrasound photo. My mother, who is almost blind, just sat there perplexed as to why she was given a photo of an owl until she heard my mother-in-law gasp and saw her come running up to hug me. My father-in-law, who’s never been one to think women can’t do anything they want to, has suddenly become very concerned that I not go out of my way to do things for others, or otherwise over-exert myself.

And somehow, this news, this pregnancy, did unlock a key to the happiness in our marriage, but instead of letting it fly away, it has deepened and become more intense and exciting and fun. Life is good.

Comin' Together

***Although this post was started on April 11, it wasn't finished/posted until April 22. Until I remember how to change this, it'll read as if from a time warp.

Hard to believe we've lived here a month already. Now I know why shows like House Hunters revisit the new owners after they've been settled in for three or four months. Only crazy people have housewarming/first birthday parties three weeks after moving in.

Of course, only crazy people move in five days before escrow is really closed.

The party went well, though, and I'm glad it's over. And for my coworker who is almost done with her own home buying experience, we have set the bar comfortably low for her party. Most of the stuff we really can live without is still packed up and making a wall in the garage. Our cabinets are still only painted on the ends. Some people loved the color. Some thought it was black. Some didn't care for it. One of the things that I love about them is that they are not for everybody.


Our dining table is still in the box. Staining the chairs has gone very badly. I'm not sure if the problem is that it's a cherry stain or if it's water-based. I'm leaning toward the former, because Corey stained Mad's dresser with a rosewood water-based stain and it came out beautifully. In a couple of weeks I'll deal with that. At the party we just used our old dining table which was, as usual, way too small for the occasion.

The walls are still bare. We still only own three lamps. Thank goodness for battery operated camping lanterns or I'm not sure what Mad would use for lighting in her room. We still have no dishes. Probably Mother's Day weekend we'll deal with that.


We haven't brought our computer desk over from my mom's place yet. I hope we do soon, though. I've used this table of Tom's for the past three and a half years and it isn't that comfortable.

The day of the party was pretty cool. We had just over 50 people in and out. Most of them stayed a lot longer than I'd anticipated. I'm not sure why I thought people might come in, have a tour, snack a little and leave, but mostly they didn't. The only ones who did were Tom's coffee drinking relatives. When my mom arrived without her promised coffee maker (yeah, I have one... I decided to clean it with vinegar... who knew it wasn't supposed to be an entire pot of vinegar? OK, you knew that, but I didn't), I headed off to Starbucks to get some of their travelers. Took a bit longer than I'd figured. If I were a thinking girl, I'd have sent someone. Like my mom. But it would have felt like punishment to her. By the time I returned, the coffee drinkers were gone. They live in Santa Monica and L.A., and felt like our old place was "out there." C'est la vie.


Mad handled the party like she handles anything new and overwhelming. She was confused and upset for a little while, then she was fine. When she saw Grandma Margaret, however, she was free and happy to roam around and check people out. And so was I. Margaret was Mad's familiar face and arms in the crowd. She made sure that Mad got something to eat, gave her the afternoon bottle. And when it was naptime, Margaret climbed our staircase so she could rock our baby in the same chair that Margaret used to rock her own babies.


I point out climbed our staircase because it impresses me that she did it. That she can do it. A few years back she and her two daughters and their five kids were in a van that rolled three times. Margaret was the second most badly injured. The "relatively simple surgery" to repair some broken vertebrae took triple the time we were told to expect. Afterward Dad and I met with the neurosurgeon, standing over Margaret's unconscious body. Dad asked her, "When will we know if she's paralyzed?"


"Mr. S., she is paralyzed. In a year we will know how much she can recover." Ugh! It still pains me to think about it, even though I know what she's done since then.


So having Margaret get up those stairs is amazing. It's not easy for her. She has to use both hands on the handrail (it's not a super wide staircase, so there's only one rail) and pull herself up each step. She'd already been up once to see the place, but for Madelyn she did it again. Margaret doesn't say I love you, but she does.

One of the activities we'd planned for the party was Easter egg coloring. We had 10 dozen perfectly boiled eggs (thanks again, Margaret!) for people to color and take home. Apparently nobody got the and take home part of the message.

Madelyn's part of the party was nice. Naturally my camera wouldn't even turn on when it was time to do the cake (yes, I'd charged the battery the night before... this is just not supposed to be my camera). Meija saved the day by snapping photos for us. The other activity was designing our backyard. Out of all the people there, we probably had a dozen entries. Two were from a six year old boy. His dad also did one, which included grass growing up the sides and dirt overhead. Imagine what the boy's looked like!


We had two prizes: For the winner, a prize of questionable greatness ($50 gift card for Red Lobster/Olive Garden); and for the loser, tools and gloves to come work in our yard.


There were two contenders for the loser prize. One from my friend Jesse. It had four stick people, a rat dog and a tiny house (roughly the same size as the adult sticks) with a chimney. She came in second. The winning loser was Tom's friend Ray. His had a pond with a "No fishing" sign, a horse in a cage (yeah, the yard's decent, but not horse-sized) and an outhouse with yellow stuff leaking out the bottom. Have another beer, Ray!


There were four top choices for winner; two were really pretty and two were very technical. One of the technical ones won. It has a garden on the side (yay!), trees and a place for Mad and Corey to play. Sure, Corey's nearly 16, but he's a very young nearly 16. We can't imagine Steve and Meija eating at Red Lobster, so we're getting them something more appropriate... a gift card for an organic nursery.

We're pretty good about making sure Mad gets organic baby cereal and I make all of her fruits and vegetables and meats. But if we can't find something organic, we move on. When Meija couldn't find organic barley baby cereal for her daughter, she found organic barley and ground it herself. As Tom said, "Whoa. They're hardcore." Props to them.


After the party was over, some of Tom's guys stuck around for a poker game. They're fun guys who really enjoy giving one another a hard time. I had a lot of laughs hanging out with them.

Oh, we did have a neighbor come by to welcome us the day after the party. We thought he was pretty cool right up to the point when he said, "You know, there are a lot of blacks in the area." Oh well, better to know up front than to find out later, I guess (uh... I mean about him... we'd already seen the neighbors before moving here... they looked nice).
Dad and Margaret brought my sister's family up to check out our new home this past Saturday. That evening Mad attended her first birthday party for a friend. She was quite a hit in her party dress.
Since our party day, nothing has been done besides laundry and a bit of straightening. We have only had one evening as a family (tonight). It was spent pulling Mad around the neighborhood in her wagon. We didn't meet anybody, but one woman waved. She's one of "the lot" but saw fit to be friendly with those of us who are pigmentally challenged (do I sound jealous? I might be) anyway. Go figure.

Vacation Stories

I'll admit that I'd forgotten I was going to blog about the trip. Life has just been so busy lately that our limited down time has been spent sleeping. Lucky for you (yeah, I know that's questionable at best), I got a nap this afternoon, so I'm wide awake tonight. I already did a couple loads of laundry and responded to a few emails, so now I'm all yours.
Wait... where are you going?
I was going to have a step-by-step guide to our vacation, but I figured it'd be better to just give you some distilled nuggets of knowledge gained along the way.
1. Driving until you're exhausted... which happens to coincide with 15 minutes after the baby has fallen asleep in her carseat... is never a good idea. If you choose this option anyway, when you do get everyone unloaded and into your third floor outside walk-up "hotel" room in six degree weather, do not be surprised if your teen and your toddler have crawling contests to help them unwind. Hope there is no one in the room below you. Further, do not expect said toddler to fall asleep for at least 90 minutes after everyone's in bed, because she could not be more awake right now.2. Giving a baby a teething biscuit while going through the hillier areas of Missouri is only good as long as someone is in the back seat with her to know that she's choking on it. Thank you, Corey... you saved your sister's life, even if you felt helpless at the time.
3. Watching your husband introduce your daughter to snow is beautiful.
4. Those puffy kids jackets that you hate because they get staticky and also because they make it hard to fit your daughter into her carseat? They are great as something to hide behind in a photo.5. No matter how grateful you are that your son helped keep your daughter from choking to death, you will be extremely upset and embarrassed when you walk in a room to find him rifling through your in-laws belongs. Quadruple those feelings when you discover what he's pocketed. Feeling lost and unsure of where to go from here comes when, a few days later, you realize that he just ripped a bunch of nude photos out of an art book at Borders, where you've all gone to spend some Christmas gift cards. Relief and frustration, on the other hand, come when the store manager accepts payment for the book, but you know she would have just let you leave without anything worse than, "Thank you for letting us know."
***Note: I don't have a problem, per se, with the nude photos. He might have been able to purchase the book whole if he'd asked.
6. You're never too young to learn about cards.
7. There's nothing like a full belly and Daddy's lap to relax a girl. There's also nothing like putting your daughter to sleep to make Daddy proud.8. Sometimes it's hard to remember the difference between knitted and crocheted... but with enough time in Wisconsin, you'll figure it out.9. Traveling is not fun when you're sick. It's worse when your baby is so sick, you're in frequent contact with your pediatric nurse mother-in-law to make sure you're doing everything you can. It's cruel and unusual punishment if your husband is also ill.
10. Changing pads are required for diaper changes, especially when traveling. If you choose not to use one, know that you will:

• realize that she just peed all over the bedding in yet another motel;
• watch, fascinated, as your daughter craps all over the bed, the diaper you were about to put under her and... yes, your hand because you were too shocked to move; and
• know that you are cursed as she pees all over you during an in-car diaper change somewhere in Denver on your way home... and thanks to the stomach bug she has, these are your last clothes that have not been peed, pooped or vomited on, so expect to spend the next 1300 miles or so in your pajamas.

Well that about sums up our trip. We had an excellent time mostly. In two years when we're ready to go again, I'll probably be ready.

Christmas Letter

This year, for the first time ever, I am writing a Christmas letter. Yes, I realize I am either a couple of weeks late or several months ahead. All the same. So many of these letters that people write focus on health concerns, scares and other bad things. They tend to end with something like, "we're looking forward to things being even better next year." I'm putting my own spin on the concept this year, and will instead focus on one aspect of life: The Family Photo Christmas Card:

Dear Family and Friends,

With the birth of our Madelyn, and perhaps more so, with the creation of the world's cutest "announcement photo"

(yes, she was almost three months old and, as my dad liked to point out, everybody already knew she was here), the idea of a family photo Christmas card was something I looked forward to creating. I even had an idea, carefully crafted in my (apparently pea-sized) brain, that would allow me to get everybody in the photo without fighting Corey to smile, damnit! or stress out about the fact that no one is looking in the same direction as the baby: A "stack" of our upturned hands... first Tom's, then mine, then Corey's... each hand at a different angle, so most of our fingers would show. On top would rest Madelyn's chubby little starfish of a hand. I even had the perfect sentiment to accompany such a photo.

We had a pretty awesome camera and a fairly puny budget, so DIY was definitely the way to go. After several missed opportunities, I decided to force the issue. This method has always worked well for me in the past, right?

Yeah, no. But time was running out for us to get the photo cards made and mailed. So Corey and I worked together to choose the room with the best lighting (of course it had to be the world's smallest kitchen) and then to figure out the camera settings. We put a red blanket on the floor for our background and took a few practice shots.Then we added Tom to the mix. You can see Mad's nearby, ready for her close-up.Madelyn was a little tired that evening, but she was doing alright.Once we were all set up and ready to go, the next step (and perhaps, the most crucial, yet least well thought out) was to deal with logistics. How do you get a kind of tired, sort of hungry eight month old little girl with a mind of her own to stretch out her hand and leave it there long enough for the shutter to click? We tried everything.That's not it.Mad tried to help, too. (Yes, Corey's hand is bleeding because in the fracas he re-opened a wound from earlier in the day.)At times, we got close to the elusive shot.

Eventually it became clear that the shoot was over.

This really was the last night that we could get it done, so I sadly put down the camera (okay, I was sort of giggling about that last shot) and walked away. Maybe next year I'll be able to make it work. I mean, really, how hard could it be? Mad'll be 20 months old by then. She'll cooperate, right?
Quit laughing, would ya?
Anyway, about a week later, I was looking through what we'd done and chuckling to myself about how it had gone. There was a small feeling of regret that we weren't able to make this happen. And then I saw it...

May the spirit of the season bring your family together.