Phew!

This past holiday season I did more baking than in any three previous years combined.  More importantly, I've done more eating of said baked goods than normal.  (But, dude, chocolate chip macaroons?  Easy, fast and delicious before and after baking.)

So it was no surprise when I gained five pounds.

After enjoying myself through New Year's, I put the brakes on and began making some healthier choices.  Lost a couple pounds right away.

A week ago I weighed myself for the first time in maybe 10 days.  I was stunned, shocked and concerned to see that I had gained about 13 pounds.

Thirteen pounds.  In 10 days.

I'll just admit that the idea of a tumor popped right up.  But let's be honest, that's kind of my first response to everything.  Missed my period right after Tom and I agreed we weren't having kids together?  Gotta be a tumor!

If the brakes had been put on before, the keys were now removed.

And I gained two more pounds by yesterday.

I mentioned the situation to Tom and Nance, but lightly, like, "Haha, no reason to be frightened, I know what I'd been eating.  I guess it just took a minute to catch up to me."

I started an exercise routine last night that kicked my butt.

Today?  Gained another pound.

Concerned?  Shocked?  Stressed?  Oh yeah.

Then this fantastic little kid of mine who can't seem to get passed the 23 pound mark stepped on the scale.  She weighed 40 pounds.  And her sister, who was very recently right on the cusp of 40 pounds?  Try 56.

Fucking stupid digital scale.  I'll get new batteries this weekend.

I weighed myself at my dad's house this morning.  In full clothes, including jeans.  After breakfast.  On the first day of my period.  And I needed to use the restroom (every ounce counts, people!).  And I was still 15 pounds less than I had been only 90 minutes earlier at my home, naked.

I haven't gained weight.  In fact, in three days I can pretty much guarantee that I'll lose three to five pounds, which will put me right back to my pre-holiday number.

Came home tonight and stuck with my exercise plan, because it is still needed.  No longer secretly wondering if I'm going to die.  Openly feeling kind of stupid because now that the moment has passed, I am forced to recognize that my clothes still fit the same and that the scale had been kind of wonky lately.

Whatever.

The Old Homestead

I recently purchased a card reader so I'll be able to upload photos to this computer from my old camera.  We have only come across one disk so far.  October 28, 2007.  This is my old Mexican sage plant that I grew from a clipping a friend gave me.  Mexican sage is among the lengthy list of plants that are not ideal for the high desert climate, so we left it in the yard of our old apartment.  Nance and I went past the other day.    Either the apartment manager or the tenant who moved in after us removed it and everything else we grew.

Bummer.

Enough

I have just given up a friendship.  I am sad and mad and upset, but mostly I am fine.  It was both sudden and not.

This friendship was an important one to me.  We met while expecting our babies, who ended up being born on the same day, just a few hours and rooms apart.  I had dreams of our kids being lifelong friends.

It's one thing to be friends with other parents of newborns, but trickier once the kids get a little older.  Maybe a year ago after I listened to yet another story about the screaming match she got into with her not quite two year old and the nit-picking of her husband's faults*, Tom and I agreed that maybe they are not "our people" after all.

*Not that we haven't all complained about our spouses now and again.  These stories often took venting to new levels.

Then there were the two years in a row when they were invited to our house, confirmed, and then ended up at a different friend's home instead.  And that other friend?  Lived about the same distance from them that we do, only in another direction.

More importantly, there was that call I made to her last year around this time.  Struggling and feeling like I was drowning, I turned to her.  Told her what I was going through and didn't quite buy it when she said she couldn't hear me well and ended the call.  A month later she wrote to apologize and I just let it go without comment.

This friend had a second baby two months ago, a daughter.  Some of the stories I heard several weeks back... the last time I called, because I am always the one who calls... reminded me of our own Mad-A-Girl.  The independence, the determination.  I laughed and said, "Sounds like you've got your own Madelyn!"

Are those bad words?

Because when we spoke today she said her husband was upset that I would say something negative, you know, about his baby.

"But I told him you didn't mean it that way, in a bad way."

"And then there's the fact that there is absolutely nothing wrong with my daughter."

Sometimes in life I have overreacted and/or been too quick to react.  It's not a mistake I like to keep making, so I let the conversation end itself naturally (not before listening to how she can't relate to other moms who have a second baby because she's just so darn sure it's worse for her than it is for anyone else.  Really?!?).

I spoke with Tom and I spoke with Nancy.

If it were just the stupid comment about my girl, I'd probably attribute it to sleep deprivation and extra hormones.  But all in all, I've had enough.

I contemplated writing a lengthy email detailing my exact feelings (this is the Reader's Digest version, in case you were wondering), but instead decided to call her back.  I got their answering machine and left a message.  I wanted to say that I loved her kids, but I didn't.  I just said I couldn't be friends with someone who thought comparing their child to my own was hurtful, upsetting or offensive (all words that were used, can you believe it?) and that I would just enjoy the memories of when I thought we were friends.  And that is it.

And it is.

Or it will be once I get over it.

The Best Things

Feeling the giggling belly up against your own.

Seeing the soft baby shrugs of sleep.

Looking at her and thinking she's so grown up for her age, and then stumbling across a photo of this day last year, remembering you felt the exact same way then, only now you can see she was just a baby.  She still is.

Half Cookery

Every once in a while for the past several months, I have thought about making some foodie type posts.  So I have pulled out my camera, set up some shots of questionable greatness and began to document some of the things I've made.

And then, as in so many aspects of my life, I get caught up in the actual doing and dealing with children who have *gasp* needs, and I never take a shot of the completed dish.

Oh, there was one exception.  These oven-dried tomatoes?  They were just a fantastic snack that came from the dozens of late blooming tomatoes I grew.

Um, yes, there are quite a few less in the "done" picture.  Odd.  (My mouth is watering right now just thinking about them.)

This is about half the blueberries I scored at the farmer's market last month.  They have become a fabulous jam.

But where the heck is the finished product?  Well, I still have seven unlabeled jars in the cupboard.

This?  This is the start of a fabulous apple pear cranberry sauce that I made at Thanksgiving.

And this is the garlic I roasted for the Thanksgiving mashed potatoes.

I swear that I did finish making everything.  And more!  I am apparently not cut out to be a foodie blogger, though.

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.

Can You Keep It Straight?

Today my girls and I went to a cookie exchange.  We took cranberry pumpkin bread that I learned how to make because of Bossy Betty.  So yummy.  Especially if you realize you didn't add sugar before popping that last batch of mini loaves into the oven.  *In our oven, the cranberry pumpkin bread (second recipe in that link) took about 34 minutes for four mini loaves.  We're just under the 3000 feet above sea leave mark, so I'm not sure if that's the difference.

To avoid minimize potential problems, I didn't tell Madelyn that it was a cookie exchange or even that cookies would be involved.  I said we were going to see friends.

These friends?  They're from an online mommy group that I just couldn't bust into last year to save my life.  This year?  Not to brag (seriously, I'm just grateful and kind of in awe), but the cookie exchange was changed from yesterday to today so I could go.  I'd only met one of the women in real life before, but it wasn't at her house.  The rest were friends waiting to be made.

As far as Mad was concerned, she was already friends with everybody.

As I pulled her from the car seat, a woman came out to greet us and see if I needed help bringing everything in.  Mad went up to her and said, "Hi, can you call me Rocket?" and then ran into this house we've never been to before.  Went straight in and found the kids in a back room of the house.

Eventually she came back to the front, where another little girl was playing.  Mad walked over and said, "Hi.  I want to be called Rocket.  Can you call me Rocket and keep it straight, please?"

And then I was forced to reveal that Mad's real nickname is The Director.

Inappropriate Baby Babble

In case you find yourself deep in conversation with one Fynnie Fynnie Coco Pop, here is a handy translation guide:

Day-iss = Dog
"Sheesh!" = What a day-iss says

Mmm-poop (also known as Mmm-poopf) = Winnie the Pooh

Guck = Duck (and most other birdlike animals)
"Gack!" = What a guck says, of course

Fynnie doesn't mention Santa by name, but over the past few days she has been telling us what he says.

A week ago, Santa gave a breathy, "Oh!"

This afternoon she told us Santa says, "Oh ha!"

And tonight?  Tonight she insisted that Santa shouts, "Ho!"

Tired. Sad. Happy. Eh.

It's been a few days.  No, I didn't skip a word there.  It's been all of them.

Friday marked one year since I removed Corey from our home.  He has lived with my mom this whole time, because the one alternative he's placing his energies in is a bureaucratic mess.

There is not an activity that I do with Tom and the girls that I am not fully aware that my son is missing.

While shopping with my mother-in-law recently we came across some adorable hand-painted ornaments.

"Why don't you pick one out for each of the girls?"

I did.  I did not blame her for not saying, "Why don't you pick one out for each of the kids?"  She does not ignore or disregard Corey.  He does not live at our house.  What sense does it make to get him an ornament for our tree?

It doesn't.  I know it.  Do I always have to make sense?

And again, the fact that he does not live here was a decision I made.  I stand by it as much as I hate it.  He is still, and will always be, my son.  I love him.  I want him to be part of our lives as much possible, and as much as he's able.

He and my mom spend holidays and birthdays with us, with the occasional "just because" day thrown in here and there.  Sometimes she offers to bring him up to see his sisters, but he declines.

It was a little surprising to me how he jumped at the chance to be in a family portrait.  If he weren't there, I'm not sure I could have done it.  A week ago when things were falling apart (pre-vomiting) as we tried to prepare for the photo shoot, I called to tell him I was thinking about scrapping the whole idea.  It was the disappointment in his voice that made me reconsider.

We had our do-over on Saturday morning.  Corey looked fabulous.  The girls were adorable.  For some reason I looked like Marie Osmond, pre-Weight Watchers.  (Ask me if I care.  G'ahead, ask.  No, I don't care.)

Tom, who had obsessed about what I wanted him to wear for the better part of 10 days, showed up wearing the burgundy shirt that was my first choice?

No.

Well then, he definitely wore the black shirt, right?  I mean, everyone else was wearing shades of burgundy or pink and black or khaki, so he did, too.  Right?

Hell no.

Blue.  A blue T-shirt with a gray sweater vest... with a (small) stain on it.  What the hell?!

Since Fynnie and I had gone to get Corey while Tom and Mad went to get new tires, we met up at the photographer's locale about four miles out on unmarked dirt roads.  There wasn't really a chance of him going back to change.  And we're cutting it really close if we're going to use anything from this session for our Christmas cards, so rescheduling was out.

Did I mention that I got my period as we arrived at the photo shoot?  That helped explain the entirely new levels of unreasonable irritation I was inflicting... sharing experiencing that morning.

Our photographer, Gina, is such a relaxed, happy person.  It rubbed off.  We had a lovely time.  A happy time.  The photos look like it, too.  Even though I just knew I'd be annoyed when I saw that blue shirt, it wasn't the first thing I saw.  Not even close.

I saw a family.  My family.  With my husband and my son and my daughters.  Smiling.  At the camera.  We look good.  We look okay.

Could we submit a pose to AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com?  Yeah, probably.  One of my favorites does have both guys laying in the dirt.*

We drove away from the photo shoot with a slight change.  Fynn went with Daddy while Madelyn Baby Rocket rode in Mama's car with Brother.

Driving almost four miles on deeply rutted roads eventually caused Mad to stop talking.  Corey asked, "Are you okay, Madelyn?"

"I'm Baby Rocket."

"Are you okay, Baby Rocket?"

"Yes.  I'm just a little shaken."

Not to worry, she likes being a little shaken.

A few minutes later she asked him, "Are you coming home?"

"No."

"Are you going to my house, Brother?"

"No."

Corey did his best to continue the conversation as he wiped tears from his eyes.

He did end up coming home with us after lunch, where it was almost like old times.  Including the fact that we locked up doors to certain rooms.  Corey went into his old room and brought out the last two boxes of his belongings and took them with him.  There are a few books, his light up tambourine, a baby blanket and a shirt.  Little pieces of him here and there, but he takes more each time he leaves.

Yesterday was uneventful, emotionally.

Today... today was all over the map.

One of my fellow MomShare mamas had her second child, a beautiful little girl.

One of my blogging buddies stood by and waited for her beautiful four month old Elimy to come through open heart surgery.  Everything is going great!


And this evening, I learned that one of my colleagues got the results of a biopsy that was done Friday, after a year of battling two cancers and two days after making it through seven hard weeks of radiation.  One of the cancers is back.  In a bad place for some treatments.

I am spent.

I read most of today's news while nursing Fynnie to sleep tonight.  Crying in the dark for the good and the bad.  Feeling how grateful I am for what I have.

Apparently my emotions were too much for Fynn.  She became restless in that very rare way that means, Please put me down and leave me alone!

I didn't want to, but a mama's got to do what a mama's got to do.  So I put her in the crib and covered her up.  I rested my hands on her belly and told her, "I love you so much and so much."

And my girl, who would rather sleep in someone's arms than all alone any day or night... my girl, who has only slept through the night maybe a dozen times in her life... grabbed my hands and flung them away.  And went to sleep.

I took it as a little "Get over yourself!"  So that's what I'm going to do.  Tomorrow.

Good night, all.  Sleep sweet when you get there.

*If you have my personal email address and you'd like to see the photos, let me know and I'll send you a link.

Hope We'll Be Ready for Our Do-Over

Family photo shoot scheduled for last Friday morning got derailed by two of us projectile vomiting.

And do you know why I am sort of grateful for all of that yuck and goo?  (Well, not for Mad's.  That's just sad.)  Because my eyebrows started growing long.

Not just long.  Curly and long.

And I, style maven that I am (not), decided to trim them myself.

Pawing my way through the beauty supply drawer in my lair bedroom that is pretty much all hair bands of varying sizes, a face file, the crappy nail clippers (what happened to the good ones?!) and a few brushes and combs.

Eyebrow brush?  Not on your life.

Special clippers or scissors or whatever the hell people use to accomplish this task?  Bah.  Ha.  Ha.

Just me, the scissors that Tom recently used for some nefarious purpose that apparently dulled the blades (a fact I didn't realize until trying to trim Mad's bangs last night), my eyebrows-gone-wild and a lot of tension.

What could go wrong?

Yeah, no.  I'm not including any photos.  I suck.  Whatever.

I will say that there are no unruly or long hairs on my face at this moment.

Okay, yes, there might be a shocking lack of hair in the middle of my right brow.  I'm telling myself that people will think I have a cool scar.

It's hard to maintain the delusion, though, when my Nancy saw it and laughed out loud this morning.  She tried to hold it in.  Couldn't.  Kind of loud.  May have created a different type of scar.

Ode To the 10X Mirror

How do I love thee?

Let me count the blackheads,

The white heads,

The stray eyebrows that keep finding their way to my chin.

What kind of a fool leaves for five days and doesn’t take you with?

A hairy she-beast who, three days in, fondles her chin hairs in the manner of old time professors.

Upon returning home, She-Beast will silently call out for you while tending to other important duties.  Like taking a three year old (and herself) to the potty and then through the rest of the world’s fastest bedtime routine, unloading the car and notifying concerned friends and family members that we are all home again, home again, jiggity jig.

But then, oh then, she will steal up the stairs and into her lair, where she’ll search frantically for Grandma’s old tweezers. Finding them, she will push her face into you, beloved 10X mirror and gasp, “What the hell did you do to yourself?!”

Soon all will be well (plucked and squeezed) in her world and she will move onto other important tasks, like paying the mortgage and showering.

The end.

Dear Daughter,

You are adorable.  People smile at you and talk to you and about you as you pass by.  This happens whether we're in the store or you're on the soccer field, where you run with your hands by your face, looking only to the audience to make sure they’re watching you instead of watching the ball, your teammates or opponents. And when you speak, people listen.

So please do not tell the lovely restaurant hostess, “Mommy has to go the potty.  We’re going to the potty.  Me and Mama are gonna use the potty.  Fynnie doesn't use the potty.  I have my potty seat because I don't want to sit on the big one.”

Thank you.

Your onliest mother,

Mama 

Conversations and Notes From Vacationland

From the road

*Mad calling Fynnie "Baby" incessantly*

*Fynnie fussing every single freaking time*

Tom: Maybe Fynnie doesn’t want to be called Baby anymore, Big Jet.

Mad: *blowing raspberries* Pshht!  She’s still in the Baby Fynnie seat.

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

Mad: I have to go potty!

Daddy: We’ll stop at the next off-ramp and find a potty.

Mad: *grunting* I pushed myself and got the poop out.

Mama: *silently laughing in the front passenger seat*

Daddy: Don’t push the poop out.  Hold it in.

Mad, proudly and coolly: I’m holding it in my pants.

I'm happy to report it was not a true statement.

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

Tom: Do you know what she’s doing now when she helps with laundry?

Me: ?

Tom: She’s turning them inside right.

Me: I taught her that.

*high five*

Tom: Mad, when you’re uh…

Mad: I’m not Madelyn.

Tom: Mad… er… Big Jet… I’m sorry.  Big Jet, when you’re six you’re going to take over doing all the laundry for the family.  How does that sound?

Mad: That sounds fine.

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

Tom, as we passed a slow, beat up motorhome: Can you be an outlaw and drive an RV? I mean, really, c’mon!

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

On location

How to stand out in a hip downtown restaurant, the kind that serves cauliflower soup and potato and leek pizzas?  Walk in carrying a potty seat adapter.  Nothing says suave and sophisticated like bright white plastic and a foam cushion with Sesame Street characters.

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

Chris to Matt, pointing at the device that has just done something unexpected less than two feet from me:  Are you printing something?
Matt, looking slightly confused:  Uh, no.  I guess sometimes it just does that.  Like a test page or something.
Me: Um, actually, I just photocopied my butt.  It'll be printing a while.
Judy, laughing (thank god!):  Just like your father.  I assume she was talking to her sons about me being just like my father-in-law, but she could have been talking to me, too.

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


Note to self
Stray eyebrows, no tweezers = bad.

In Case You Didn't Know

Per Mad... Big Jeff... Blue Plane... Big Jet Rocket:

"Twice is two times.  Thrice is three times.  Rice is just for eating."

Itchy, Scratchy, Lumpy, Bumpy

In the beginning of allergy shot therapy, there are weekly shots. Four weeks at each level, with increasing amounts of a person's particular allergens. Have a reaction and you are either "held" at that level for an extended time or dropped back to a previous level.

Five weeks into my shots and I am already back where I started.

Last week's Pets and Grass shot caused a reaction. It was pretty much instant. Nothing dangerous.  I never had problems breathing unless I thought about how I should make sure my airway wasn't closing up.

The doctor and nurses had told me that any welt larger than some coin (quarter? silver dollar?) was cause for concern. Yet when I called to say that half my arm was red, itchy, hot and swollen to the point of being painful and that the swelling was causing my hand and elbow joints to ache?

"It's a localized reaction.  Ice it."

"What about the fact that it's still growing more than 24 hours later? Or that it's raised about half an inch?"

*in a tone that clearly indicated I'm overreacting* "It's a localized reaction. Ice it. Can you take Benadryl?"

"I'm nursing."

"Okay, suck it up and deal ice it."

Do you know what kinds of looks people give you if you're walking around with an ice pack under your shirt sleeve at work? Especially when you are in the midst of an important conversation right when you can no longer take the cold, so you wiggle and pop it out the bottom of your shirt?

I Have Always Said...

Madelyn is smart.  Advanced.  Brilliant.

Now I'm being forced to take that back.

Madelyn... er... Mad-A-Girl... em... Mad... *sigh*... none of those work any more.

Oh no, not for my girl.  Try it and her initial response is a giggling, "Madelyn isn't Madelyn.  Madelyn is Bob Dole Rocket."

Did you know I call my daughter by her wrong name at least 15 times an hour?  Who knew?

Rocket is fairly tolerant about the whole thing.  I mean, it took her four whole days to go from laughingly reminding us to telling us through clenched teeth EACH AND EVERY SINGLE FREAKING TIME we slip up.

It's been a week and a day.  And now?

Now she hangs her head in forlorn dejection, clearly wondering if she was adopted or switched at birth.

She is pitiful and we are pathetic.

MomShare

What have you done with 2011?

I have wasted spent a lot of hours online this year.  Mostly I've chalked it up to being a good way of multitasking while Fynn nurses.  Sometimes I've been able to step away from the computer knowing that I have just done something that will make a difference.

Late last year I became friends with someone who is more driven than I will ever be.  Her name is Bridget and she's from the same birth board I've mentioned before.  She read a post on the board by a young mama who was receiving assistance, but still couldn't keep her child diapered and fed.  The woman's own relative was taking her daughter's diapers and formula.  In desperation, she had resorted to using maxi pads to diaper her daughter.

Can you imagine?

Bridget looked around and saw the diapers her daughter no longer fit, and the formula that didn't work out as expected.  It's not like Bridget was rolling in dough.  Her husband's work in construction was spotty because of the economy, but she could still help.

She gathered a few of us together and we have worked toward a common dream.  It's called MomShare and it's pretty amazing.

Do you have things your baby or child has outgrown that are just taking up space in your home?

Are you in need of clothes, baby gear or just an amazing group of women who understand what it's like to struggle to meet the needs of your family?

Maybe you fit into both of those categories.  Most of us can help and yet still occasionally need help, too.

MomShare was set up to connect moms in need with moms who have.  We come from all over the country and from all levels of education, life experience and income.

Members have shared coupons, clothes, breast pumps, bottles, cloth diapers, books and our lives.  We started out on BabyCenter, but have been steadily making the switch to our own site, MomShare.

That and many hours of Thousand Island Solitaire, online tabloid reading and sarcastic commenting on other people's blogs is what I've done with 2011.  What about you?

Hide and Seek Isn't Scary

Today Mad and I played hide and seek for the first time.  She asked.  I never would have brought it up.  It was fun!  We laughed and hid and sought and laughed some more.

Sounds normal, right?

Did I mention that I was secretly tense the entire time?  Seriously.

No, I'm not afraid of a three and a half year old jumping out at me.  (Not that she did.  She stalks the hider and can barely contain her laughter when it's her turn to be found.)

Let's go back 15 years, shall we?

Corey was the same age as Mad and we played our first ever game of hide and seek.  He was terrorized by the hiding.  By the seeking.   Thought I had left and wasn't coming back.  Freaked out.  It ended with tears and hugs and confusion.

Looking back, it was the very first sign that things were not as wonderful as I thought they'd been.  We never played again.

I know that the game didn't cause Corey's problems.  I get it.  But I guess I was traumatized by that afternoon, too.

Today Mad and Mama played hide and seek.  Then she played with Daddy.  Then with Mama again.  The only thing that upset her was that it had to end.  That little girl is balm for my soul.

Learning Something (Or Two!) Every Day

In case you were wondering...

The way to ensure that guy from Craigslist will show up on time even though he didn't confirm that he was coming?  Take off your bra.

Living in the desert is so dry!  (You know you wanna ask.)  It's so dry that folding toilet paper in a dark restroom in the dark at say, 2:45 in the morning, will allow you to see the toilet paper light up from static sparking.  And then you get to contemplate wiping.

But wait, there's more!

After asking if you can put someone on hold for a minute so you can dash into the restroom and pee, make sure you only hit the mute button on your cell phone once.  Once.  Or, I guess, three times would work.  Twice will just... well, let's just say that I'm glad it was family and not some employer or teacher I work with.

My work here is done.  Carry on.

What It Takes

Know what it takes to get the fridge sold for $150 on Craigslist?

Girl power.  (And maybe invoking the "I transferred everything from the old one to the new one, so maybe you can clean it so I can take pictures" clause.)

Ahem, yes, I was completely willing to just let the delivery guys pick up the old one.  Or sell it to Edison for a $50 rebate.

Know what it takes to get the guys who are coming to buy said fridge to actually show up?

Bra removal.

Women who work outside the home know what I'm talking about.  Taking off one's bra at the end of a long day is a mini rite of passage.  It says, "I'm done.  Clocked out.  Shuffling around until bedtime is my latest pastime."

It's magic, I tell ya!