Strive for Five

I have always had basically the same method for grocery shopping. I start out going for the 10 or so items that are on my list (well, the 10 or so that I remember, since the list is usually in a "safe place" where no one will ever find it) remembering in the dairy end that I forgot potatoes, remembering at the russets that I forgot cream cheese. Add the 2 kids to the mix, climbing out of the cart and tossing shoes at the elderly, and by the time I get the bare necessities, old mother nature recipes, it's well past time to go. I spend the way to the checkout with a train of thought that goes something like this: "we need eggs- I'll try to lay some later. We need milk- that's why God invented water. Darnit, toilet paper... oh well, we have paper towels." For dinner, I end up making something like "potato surprise" or some freezer to microwave special, and resolve to do better next time. The boys usually end up having some variation of macaroni and cheese or a special souffle prepared just for them by the renowned Chef Boyardee. The only nutritious part of the trip is the sit-down-be-good apple Jonathan picks out the second we stepn into the store (don't worry people, I scan it). Well, this past week, I decided enough was enough. No more pre-packaged crap, no more adding broccoli to Velveeta and calling it homemade. No more frozen vegetables thrown in with egg noodles and tuna and cream of something soup and keep adding cheese until it looks edible. The Gages were turning a new page. I spent forty minutes, and at least as many dollars, in the produce section. "Carrots? I love carrots. Mmm, snow peas. Parsnips? I saw those on Hell's Kitchen once." The boys went through two apples and an orange (I had a $3.87 bag of peels when we were done, it was awesome) and were surprisingly well behaved. Everything went great, until Jonathan bolted into the checkout aisle and bit right through the wrapper of a Snicker's bar. With that kind of determination, I had to let him have it. Ethan baby was perched in the seat making eyes at the nice Australian woman behind us. She was very sweet. She just kept telling me how well-behaved my children were. "You have no idea how loud they can be. It must be because your boys have such a good diet." She smiled approvingly at my little shopping cart. I smiled and nodded. Yes, yes, must be their good diet.

Gotta love it- incredible, but not so edible

James decided to start this morning off with a lighthearted egg toss game, and although this unfortunate egg never did get a chance to ruin my bowl of cereal (I was grateful) it did end up sustaining some serious, life-threatening injuries. Not to worry, an egg is easily expendable; you simply toss it in the garbage and there is relatively no change in day or lifestyle. Throwing away a cracked egg is completely harmless, in fact, until you factor in my 2 year old. Jonathan is a trash-digger by nature, and he is always curious about the contents of his favorite white container with the cool flip-lid. He must have somehow known about this new addition, because about 30 minutes later, I found him with a coated drinking glass. Fortunately, he tends to get a little hung up on how the tall glasses work, and the egg plastered his stomach on the outside rather than the inside. After cleaning that mess, I assumed we were done with the incident. That is, until I opened up the washing machine and found I had to shake the life out of every single thing. Apparently the trash can is not as intersting a place for an egg shell as an agitating wash machine.

big boys don't cry- unless their bottles are taken away

Jonathan was doing fairly well with the bottle-sippy transition up until Ethan was born. For the past 9 months, it's been a real struggle, however, as Jonathan is (as mentioned before) big on Jonathan-equality. About 3 weeks ago, I was trying to decide when would be a good time to make him give them up. Do I wait 3 months until Ethan is old enough, and take them away together? Then I wondered, what if I got pregnant again (just for the record, I am not going to) and there was another baby who got bottles? Would all 3 of them get bottles? Of course not, that would be insanity. People with multiple children can wean their eldest, and so can I. That morning, we decided we were ready to do whatever it took to help Jonathan recover from his bottle addiction. Of course, the first day without baba's, it ended up reaching 86 degrees inside. Having left our 2 bedroom apartment with central air for a three bedroom with windows that don't even accomodate window a/c, I probably should have tried this in the spring. He cried and refused sippy after sippy, big boy cup, straw, even the ones he used to like best, as part of an elaborate thirst strike. Bedtime that night was fun for all in attendance, and for the neighbors who must have wondered what on earth was going on. I think he drank maybe 16 ounces that whole day. As he was curling up, finally going to sleep, I nearly caved. We were trying to teach him to give up babas, but what kind of lesson would I be teaching my son if we had to take him to the emergency room for dehydration? That IV's are better for little boys than bottles? Just as I was about to spring from my seat and get him a bottle, his little eyelids fell closed. We tucked him in, until 3 am when he woke me up crying. At that point, I got the biggest bottle we have (nine ounces, not eight!) and filled it with cold water. He felt warm and I was starting to really worry. The next morning, he woke up with a sopping wet diaper and I couldn't have been happier. I handed him his green sippy and he downed it. There have been times since then when he has looked longingly at Ethan's bottles, when he has even taken them, but he's getting used to it. I should have known it was going to be an ordeal when Jonathan was learning his first words. I wasn't surprised when he said dada first, but I was surprised that baba came before mama. I guess that means that with bottles out of the picture, I must be Jonathan's second favorite thing. Finally.

the mind of Jonathan

A couple of months ago, James and I were playing a "would you rather" game, and he posed the question, "would you rather have Ethan hold his own bottle, Jonathan learn to talk, or Jonathan potty trained?" I replied that I would rather Jonathan learned to talk. He was somewhat surprised by my answer, until I explained how nice it would be if Jonathan could just tell me what he needed, rather than having it be a twenty questions game I played by myself. "Does he need to poop? Might he be hungry? Is he thirsty? Bored? Tired? Maybe his tummy hurts? Do kids get headaches? What happened more often than not is a whole rigamarole of possible solutions to possible problems that ended with a Tylenol and 2 exhausted parents. James has actually been working with him on a lot of words, and Jonathan has expanded his vocabulary very well. What I have discovered, is that the 2 year old mind is a lot simpler than I would have thought. I was standing at my dresser picking out a shirt the other day, and Jonathan burst through the door. Previously, he would have screamed some kind of "ole-oo-ugh-mim" and I would have been left scratching my head. But this time, using his new vocabulary, Jonathan could tell me exactly his frustrations. "Out!" he cried, and then he began putting up his little baby fingers. "One, two..... out!" He was furious with me for not listening the first time. I get it. Jonathan isn't allowed in my room, neither is mommy. None of this silly double standard stuff. My 2 year old is all about equality.

what have I done?

When I was in my early years of public schooling, we had to fill out a cute little assignment that included our life's goals, aspirations, dreams, and plenty of other things that we had spent very little time thinking about. At this age, I must have had no concept of what Josh and I were like, because I picked as a future career that I wanted to be "a mommy." Years later, I met the requirements and got handed my sparkling new title. It's been kind of a crazy 2 1/2 years, but I have learned a lot and so far I am loving it amidst the frustrations.

One of the most challenging things about this career is how difficult it is to track your progress. I've told my son many times, in the midst of punishing him, that I am "not going to raise a brat." Then there are many times that I wonder if I already have. I say "no," he screams it back in my face. Baby Ethan plays with one of Jonathan's toys, he snatches it up. Baby Ethan plays with one of Ethan's toys, and Jonathan snatches it up. I tell him to go to his time out chair, he gets up twenty seconds later and pulls his diaper off just so he can pee in his toy truck. Once in a while, however, there are these glimmering moments where he does something so super sweet, like kissing brother because he is sad, or helping Ethan eat his bottle when Jonathan openly resents that he can't have one anymore. It's times like those when I like to think that his real, sweet little spirit is shining through, and that when he's finished trying to accomplish his toddler agenda, that's what will be left. I don't know. Perhaps it's just that there are little bits of him I haven't managed to ruin. Yet.

shopping in style

The other day, I was heading out on a late evening trip to the grocery store with the little ones. It had been a long day of spills and shirt changes, and the clothes I had on Jonathan weren't exactly a perfect match. He had actually crossed over to red firetruck pajama bottoms, a blue Wall E long sleeve T, and had shoes that matched nothing. I was trying to decide if I should change everything, or just put a jacket on? Not enough time, too hot. I did the next best thing- grabbed an orange Tigger hat for him so it would look like my 2 year old had dressed himself. Boys will be boys, not much a mom can do.

I CAN have my cake, and eat it too. But it's not all it's cracked up to be.

I finished making the cake yesterday, it ended up being 3 layers (after destroying one of my homemeade cake halves transferring it out of the pan, I discovered it was actually still pretty delicious, even with the baking mishaps) and had a really ooey gooey frosting that was reminiscent of fluff. I put on a few finishing touches, and stuck the candles in early. They were trick "sparkler" candles and were long enough to poke all the way down. I figured it would add stability, so I put them all in. ("What do you mean you're not 18, Josh?) After getting everyone in the car, I put the cake on the passenger side and proceeded to back out of the driveway to pick up James. Halfway down our road, I realized just how difficult this cake would be to transport. I had put it on my glass cake pedestal, which probably wasn't the best idea. I gave up early trying to find a box to put it in, and that probably wasn't wise either. I had to hold onto the rim to keep it from tipping when I stopped my car. This was difficult when I was slowing to a stop, even going 25 mph, and haunting visions of coming off the exit ramp from 81 began to fill my mind. I ended up picking the cake up at my next available opportunity, and held where the pedestal meets the cake plate for the rest of the ride. Everything was going alright until the heat caught up with the clouds. White avalanches started to gather up at the edges. I shrieked in terror, and in a flurry grabbed them with my driving hand and let my leg handle the wheel. I didn't have any good option to deposit these snowdrifts, so I shoved a handful in my mouth and went for the wheel again. When I was merging onto 81, a falling chunk of cake made my blood run cold. I turned the wheel back over to my left leg and shoved that piece in too. About this time a group of 30 or so motorcyclists got on the highway, just before I needed to get in their lane to exit. There was no way I could get out of signaling this time, so my frosting-laden steering wheel got a matching accessory. Once I did get over, and motorcyclists started appearing on my left side, a series of people started looking in at me. They must have signaled to each other to come check out the driver of the red car. I can't imagine what I must have looked like, covered in frosting from chin to forehead, with a partial cake balancing precariously above my lap. My white-tinged hand was all but plastered to the wheel. At one point I was actually scooping up a cloud puddle that was on its way to my leg, and halfway to shoving it desperately into my mouth, when a couple on a motorcycle pulled up next to my window and gave me a laughing thumbs up. As I pulled off on the exit ramp, I started bawling. James said it was hard to contain his laughter as I pulled into the driveway at church, crying and frowning with a cake face. I burst out of the car. "Things did not go well. It's a good cake, but I don't think I'll be eating any more." A few moments later I found myself staring at the cake. "Do we have to take it to the party? Can't I just leave it here?"
On the way to Cortland, the long candles started to cause something of a continental divide. The cake was on the verge of splitting down the middle, but fortunately it survived the trip. Thankfully, my nephew is the very easy going type. I don't think his opinion of cake will change anytime soon, and I'm ok with that. I think this experience may have even changed mine.

let them eat boxed mix.

One of my nieces and both of my nephews are extremely disinterested in most junk food. It's like, "Mom, do I have to eat my brownie?" Anyway, I offered to make my nephew his birthday cake for our family party, and had hoped to change his mind; show him how amazing a really good cake can be. I have yet to find a signature cake of my own, so I spent most of an hour (ok, maybe longer) searching in vain for an amazing cake recipe. I found several that would certainly be appealing to an adult, but wasn't sure how far I could delve into nut territory, for example, with a 10 year old. He also wanted a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting, so any amazing chocolate candy bar frosting was out. Sigh. I nearly went with a chocolate hazelnut cake, which looked divine, (honestly, who doesn't like nutella?) but figured if I spent $30 and as many hours making a cake for a birthday party, I was slightly nuts myself. I finally went with a layer cake that had 2 candy bars in it. After all, how can you go wrong with candy bars?
As I was shopping for a couple of the ingredients, I decided I had better throw a box mix in the cart, just in case. I also grabbed a container of frosting, in case my white cloud recipe turned out more stratonimbus than cumulus.
Anyway, this morning as I was making the cake, I realized that there were no eggs in the recipe. I was extremely skeptical, and thought myself very clever as I reserved a little batter to make a test "cupcake." I went to check on the cake, which by all counts should have been done, and realized that in a braindead moment I had turned the oven off 20 minutes prior when retrieving my test cupcake. Excellent. I had hoped my oven retained heat *exceedingly* well, but, alas, this turned out not to be the case, and my fallen cake looked pretty desperate. Oh well. Dunkin Hines to the rescue.

perspective

I had my first experience with online forums/ baby support groups when Jonathan was about 4 months old. He was going through a phase where he wanted to be held constantly, and I was at my wits end. My housework was piling up around me, and I was tired of listening to him cry. Desperate, I did a Google search for "can't put my baby down," hoping to find some good advice, or at least a reassurance that it was normal and would pass. What I found instead were dozens of people who had it far worse than I did. "I have to hold my child all the time, even when I go to the bathroom." "I can't even have to shower, I have to take shallow baths where I can hold him too." "I only have 10 minutes to cook dinner when my husband is home." "I haven't had deep sleep in months because the only way she will sleep is in bed with me." I couldn't believe the responses and "support" these people received. "Don't worry, before you know it she will be crawling and content to be on her own, just get through these next 5 months..." I can't believe how many people just took for granted that 6 months of velcro-baby was the norm. I'm sorry, but the last thing I want to do is have a baby on me knee in the bathroom (well, every time that is. No comment on occasional occurances). I think I would go crazy.
From that moment, yahoo answers has been my go-to place for perspective. When I was pulling my hair out with sleep problems in my 2 year old, I read about little ones that scream the first hour they are awake. When I distraught with temper tantrums, I couldn't wait to read other people's troubles. Any frustration my child has is just a google search away from looking like a blessing.

Round 2, Hooray for Ethan Baby!

Since I didn't have much time off saved up at work, I decided early on that I would work right until I went into labor with Ethan. That way, I could stay off for Christmas and New Years, and have a lovely holiday with my beautiful family. I figured the absolute, perfect time to go on maternity leave would be 1 week after my due date. That plan was going very well until Ethan decided to beat Jonathan's birth-weight by a full pound, if possible. I was at work one day when we had a really low census. It was about 5 days before my circled calendar due- date, and I was feeling huge. Ethan had been consistently measuring a week or 2 "big." I talked to the charge nurse, who agreed I could go home early, then called my doctor to schedule an appointment. The receptionist actually scheduled me for the wrong office, so I thought I would get even more sympathy points for having to travel twice to get there. I played the most miserable, big, "poor me," I could, just to have the doctor tell me to come back in 4 days. They would do an ultrasound then and go from there. I was beyond bummed. Everyone at work knew my little plan, and as I left work that day they had all wished me luck. "Hope we don't see you tomorrow!" (in the nicest way possible, of course). So, there I was the next day (Tuesday) donning my blue scrubs to finish out the rest of the week. Eventually Friday came, and by ultrasound, Ethan baby was measuring 9 pounds. They scheduled an induction for Sunday evening at 5. That weekend was stake conference (everyone at church meets together Saturday evening and Sunday morning) and James told me to make sure I put our hospital bags in the trunk before I went. I thought it was sweet, but silly of him to suggest. I did it anyway, and it was a good thing because I went into labor on the way there. I must have looked like the biggest jerk, looking up at the clock every couple of minutes, but I had left my watch at home and had to time contractions. James had slipped out with the monk, and once I was sure it was labor, I went out to tell him. I kinda wish I had just sent him our predetermined text message. It said, "bombs are flying, the moose has kissed the goose!" (This was James' idea. He picked it because, and I quote "I'll know exactly what that means. If you wrote out something like, 'I'm in labor,' I wouldn't know if you were joking." I called my doctor, and three hours later they were planning to send me home. I wasn't showing any outward signs of true labor, but the midwife took pity on me. She knew I wouldn't be able to sleep if she sent me home contracting, so she admitted me and wrote for morphine and a sleeping pill. Bless her sweet heart. When I woke up the next morning, I was nearing the end of labor. For those who like numbers, I was 7 centimeters dilated. I couldn't believe it.
2 hours later, Ethan was born, a healthy 8lbs, 15 1/2 ounces. James jokes it's because I prayed I wouldn't have a 9-lb baby. "See, God answers prayers!"
I got a little dose of pain medicine not too long before Ethan was born, and he came out kinda sleepy. He was born at 10:16 am, and from 5 o'clock on, he was asleep. Somewhere around 3 am the nurses got worried and woke him up to try to eat. If they could see the size of my little boy now, maybe they would not have been so concerned (he's not quite 7 months, and already 22 pounds!) I gotta say, though, think of me what you will, having a baby born slightly drugged is not such an awful thing. He was happy, he slept, life was good. I felt sooo much better after Ethan was born than I had the first time. I wasn't nearly so tired, and I had an idea of what to expect. Going home, though, was every bit as awful the second time around. James' mom was there to help, which was great, but I still wasn't prepared. With the first baby, the shock is the baby. With the second, it's having this overwhelming puddle of joy, and another little one to keep track of, feed, and play with, not to mention that he misses you like crazy because you were gone for 3 days. Oh, and you can't lift him for 6 weeks. (Well, you aren't supposed to anyway. I wonder how often that actually works out).
We had decided beforehand that James would get up with Jonathan in the middle of the night, and I would get up with Ethan. That first night, however, I was just slipping back into bed after feeding Ethan for the third time when I heard Jonathan start crying. Rather than wake James up, I figured it was better to just take care of him myself. I went in with a bottle, and realized he had actually peed through his diaper. In the midst of changing his bed, and his pajamas, and trying not to pick him up at all, I broke down. I went out to where my mother in law was already awake in the living room, and started bawling. "I have decided, I'm running away." I have decided that those first few nights awake, with any new baby, are nothing short of terrifying. I felt more incompetent and unequal to my challenge than ever before. When I did crawl back into bed, all but defeated, James heard me sobbing and asked what was the matter. I told him over and over that I just couldn't do it. I can't be a mom to two small boys. I just can't.
He told me that of course I could, I just couldn't do it alone. He lightly scolded me for trying to take care of Jonathan without help, and shortly thereafter we all fell into a great sleep. Now I won't say I wasn't pleased when my mother's car wouldn't start a couple days later. The prospect of her being stuck there a little longer was kind of a nice one. I will say, though, that life wasn't ruined 20 minutes later when the car finally did start up again.

thanks goodness for... cheese.

Lately Jonathan has actually found an appetite. I am not sure if it's his brother's love of food that has propelled this, but regardless of the cause, it's delightful. Provided I can give him something to eat within ten minutes of bursting through the door after church, he goes to bed with a full belly and life is good. When we got home today, I started working through my options. There's always the dependable PBJ, except we are out of bread. There are instant mashed potatoes, but that would require too many clean dishes. Perhaps something with Cheerios and raisins? As I was picking my brain, I suddenly remembered a little stash of ready made toddler meals in the cupboard. I was thrilled. I accidentally pressed the 3 minute button, which is cleverly very near the 30 second button, and about a minute later took out a nice steaming mess of mac n cheese. Jonathan recognized it instantly, and went running to his booster seat with expectant eyes. I quickly stirred it, blew on it, and set it aside, figuring it would be done by the time I got Jonathan stripped down and changed his diaper. No such luck. "Hoch, hoch!" he said, as he pushed a spoonful in front of my face. Once he was satisfied that I had blown long enough on his one little cheesy noodle, he shoved it in his mouth and reached for another. "Hoch, hoch!" This continued for about 8 or so rounds before I finally just plopped the whole bowlful in a plate, and quickly de-nuked it in the freezer. At one point I made the mistake of licking my mac'n cheese finger. Ewww. There are few things more disgusting than premade mac n cheese. Let's see-- there's Ethan diapers, cherry flavored medicine, and Chef Boyardee "meatballs."
As I laid the Monkey Man down for his nap, I was feeling quite accomplished. I actually fed my son, the non-eater. Just in this moment of euphoria, I came across the oatmeal from this morning-- sitting in a heap on the floor, right next to the bowl he raked his foot through moments before we left for church. Hooray for a day of eating. Yay for mom and Jonathan.

Childbirth, Round 1

I couldn't wait to go into labor with Jonathan. The thought consumed me from the moment he was term. Well, more from the second I knew he could survive life in the outside world. He didn't show up on his bright, sunny, Easter Sunday due date. I even had it circled on the calendar for him. Silly boy. When I showed up to church and was scolded for doing so, I knew life would be misery until the day he decided to make his grand appearance. I would go to the mall to take my mind off the empty nursery, just to have someone poke my belly and ask when I was due. "uh, last Sunday." I buried my head in shame and walked to Cold Stone.
I was about a week over when I had the office appointment that I had predetermined would be my last one. It was my first day meeting Dr. Brown, but I told him I was done. James swears there were threats and tie grabbing involved, but I don't remember anything like that. Just a very sweet, very big, very miserable Danielle that couldn't see her toes or the bottom half of her shirt. He must have had experiences like that before, because he wasn't phased a bit as he told me to arrive at St. Joe's at 4 o'clock that afternoon. We made a gloriously brief trip home, and had our last meal as a carefree twosome at KFC.
We stayed up that night in the hospital room, too excited to sleep, and played cards and daydreamed about what our son's face would look like. We didn't have any idea, because he buried it on every ultrasound I ever had. Somewhere around midnight I finally drifted off to sleep, only to wake up very wet 2 hours later. I couldn't believe it- my water broke! I sat there for a moment in silence, just enjoying the moment when it finally hit me I was going to be a mom. I pushed my call button, and a very rough sounding voice disturbed the splendor of the moment. James was waiting anxiously at my side, as we heard "What do you need?" "How dare she?!" was all I could think. "If I rang my button, that means I need my nurse!" I didn't want to tell some voice over a speaker that my water broke.
Once I was all settled in, I realized what labor was all about. It is a nice, little word that means you can't get comfortable, can't sleep, and all you are allowed to think about is how exhausted you are and how much work you have ahead of you. Very clever of them to just put that all in one, innocent-sounding word.
Labor was slow, at first, but toward the end everything picked up speed. I remember being miserable, especially when I was all ready to push but had to wait on my doctor. He had just gotten scrubbed up to do someone else's Cesarean. My nurse got me some nubain, which I will forever hold dear to my heart. It doesn't really take away the pain, but gosh it makes you sleepy. And it sure made me strange. 45 minutes later, when my doctor was finally present, I announced to him that I didn't have a shower that day and I wasn't wearing deodorant. He laughed and made some sort of a joke, at which point I started flapping my wings. "Cakaw! I'm a bird!" When my son was born, ten minutes later, I looked at him and beamed. "Look! He's purple!" No one understood why I sounded so excited. That was when the real misery hit. I was suddenly convinced, due to my altered state of mind, that the entire labor had been a dream. "I can't do it again. That was a dream, and I can't do that over again." It took awhile for me to believe everyone who told me it was real. I will never forget clutching that little boy like he would disappear if I didn't.
Somewhere around 7 that night, I was hit by a wave of guilt. "James! We haven't changed his diaper yet today! He's 5 hours old, and he is still wearing his diaper from birth!!" I wanted to cry I was so upset. Of course, he hadn't even peed yet. He was fine. But I felt terrible.
The whole night was kind of a blur. Jonathan was up every 2 hours for a feeding, which meant that I got exactly 90 minutes of sleep, then 30 minutes of wakefulness, the entire night long. I couldn't care less, I was still walking on a cloud. The next night was a lot more difficult. He was hungry, but sleep is a necessary component for milk to come in (sorry if that's TMI guys), so I had nothing to really offer him. We were up the entire night long. I think we maybe got 2 hours of sleep total, and that was only because I broke hospital rules and brought him in bed to sleep with me. I got another 45 minutes that morning, while James had most of his hand gnawed off by a very hungry baby. We went home, exhausted, that morning. In retrospect, I wish I had sent him to the nursery for at least part of the second night. I was so darned scared the nurses would ignore him. Silly new mom.
I think it's somewhat traumatic to come home from the hospital. When you are there, all your meals are made for you, your bed is made for you, all you really have to do is get up to go to the bathroom and make sure you take care of your baby. Once you get home, responsibility just smacks you in the face.
James was in the middle of classes ending, so Jonathan and I spent about 4 hours alone together. He was starving, I was exhausted. Instead of feeling sweet relief when James was 10 minutes from being due home, I started thinking, "Jonathan would be just fine until then if mommy accidentally drowned washing her face in the sink...." Of course, I couldn't think of a way to accidentally drown, and James was home before I knew it. I remember just hugging him, bawling my little eyes out. He held me and reassured me, and told me to go ahead and get some sleep. "But Jonathan is starving!" I protested. "He needs me!" In his very wise way, he explained that Jonathan could not feasibly starve to death in 60 minutes. I believed him and gladly turned over our young son to his daddy. I awoke a little while later feeling like the energizer bunny. And I finally had milk! Jonathan ate like it was his last meal (which is funny, since it was his first), and finally passed out from contentment. Best day ever.

How you know you're a mom

You spend your whole day doing things you just did.
You remember judging other moms for the way they handled their children, but now you wish you could remember their tricks.
An ounce of milk is suddenly a very, very important thing.
You keep thinking about all the things you will get done when the kids go to sleep, but when they finally do, you are too tired to care anymore.
A solid night's sleep is the stuff of dreams, but when you first get it, you wake up in a cold sweat.
You wonder how such teeny, tiny clothes build up into such huge mountains.
You wonder how those teeny, tiny clothes cost so much.
You want to spend any extra money in your budget (or even part of your grocery budget) on little outfits that they will outgrow in a matter of minutes.
You have entire loads of laundry that you do so that you can pack them up in boxes to save for the next baby.
You don't even want to think about the next baby.
You hold someone else's teeny tiny baby and suddenly want another one.
You dream of going out on a date, but can't stop thinking and talking about the little one at home.
You are suddenly grateful that you don't remember a thing from the first few years of life. You know there is a divine reason that you don't remember your own birth, or teething, or diaper rashes, or the frustration of crying when no-one knows what you want.
The hours drag on, but the days fly by.

the world through a Monkey's eyes

Screwdriver- used to screw my belly button on and off
trashcan- used to collect treasures, especially those of importance to mommy and daddy
toilet- used as a swimming pool for favorite toys
bathtub- place where water is created for the purpose of drinking, splashing, and dumping
baby's head- acts as a backboard to throw things off of. especially important as a learning tool to see which objects bounce
socks and shoes- used as entertainment for long (and short) car trips. Can be pulled off and thrown in a number of places
baby bottle- used to mark territory by putting upside down and shaking/ squeezing. Must be kept in stashes in case of famine.
tears- used to protect me from punishment when I have been naughty
diaper- object which hinders elimination and must be removed just before nature calls
couch- perfect substitute when a toilet is not readily available
toilet- place to escape as soon as possible, because the best place to make messes is actually the floor
dishwasher- place where I can turn knobs and press buttons all day long, especially when I need to hear noises
peash- magic word to get what I want
tank-ew- magic word that will make people happy when I take things out of their hands
Etan Bentew!- name for my baby brother. (translation: Ethan Spencer)
pants-what mommy dresses me in when there is a high of 80
shorts-what mommy sends me to daycare in when it rains

I could not eat a bug. (Exept maybe when camping.)

As I planned out my schedule for work, I carefully plotted out a little cluster of days to set aside for a mini-vacation. It was ultra mini, as I am in the red for time off, but 4 days is plenty of time for a family vacation spent sleeping on an air mattress, sharing a tent with 2 small boys. James and I set out to Dick's to find a new canopy (our old, hand-me-down, originally from someone who bought it at a yard-sale, who probably got it from their pioneer ancestors, just didn't cut it anymore). As soon as we crammed the canopy into my little Hyundai Elantra, we saw a major problem brewing. "James, both of our cars are too small. Now we need to get an SUV." James is usually the more rational of the two of us. "No, we don't. One of us will just have to ride on the top, that's all." We rode in silence for a couple of minutes before James pulled into one of the millions of car dealerships in Syracuse. In the next two days, we became much more well-versed in car-shopping than ever before. James googled "dealer tricks" while I googled "how go get a car cheap." To be honest, I probably spent a little too much packing time trying to seal a deal on a Jeep Liberty or Rav 4. (By I, I mean we, by we I mean James, but it was based on my insistence- yeah). Long story short, we ended up taking my little car, packed to the gills with James' Tetris-like precision, and we still had room to breath. It was great.
I forgot when I was packing how cold the mornings can be camping, especially when little feet want to be moving at 5 am. I packed each of us only one pair of jeans and one sweatshirt, and Jonathan had his hoodie covered in gogurt by 5:45. Way to be, little dude. James washed it out and hung it up to dry, and it was ready by set of sun, just in time to be covered in marshmallows. (Yeah, good job mom- "here Jonathan, have a s'more!")
The thing that always gets me the most is how chill I am about bugs when camping. There was a bug in the sink when I went to wash my hands. Ordinarily, that would be a death sentence. But when you're camping, everything is different. As James would say, "you're invading his home"). So, the little bug in the sink got to live. Just like the bug in the shower. And the bug in the toilet. The bug in my soup, well, not so much; but it wasn't for lack of trying.

undone

I stumbled into the living room this morning, still bleary eyed, and plopped down with Ethan on the couch. James paused at the computer (he was preparing something for church) long enough to greet me and introduce to me a young man with a green mustache and matching belly. He bore a striking resemblance to my dear young lad, Jonathan, and held in his hand a green Sharpie. I remember smiling, and thinking to myself, "Wow, I have finally gotten to the point where that is just funny." I wasn't thinking about how he got a Sharpie in the first place, nor how I would keep him from doing it again. I wasn't thinking about how hard it would be to scrub green ink off a squirmy toddler. I was just enjoying the moment.
A little while later, I was getting the diaper bag packed for church. I was feeling very clever as I packed Jonathan a bottle of plain water (he is starting to lose interest in bottles when they have nothing exciting inside) and a sippy cup of chocolate milk. I am still not ready to face a tired monkey without a bottle, but this is a step.
So there we are in church; we are sitting next to some friends and Jonathan is playing happily with his little buddy Kassy. I look over just in time to see a little foot bump into a little sippy cup (dial it back a few hours, I picked the sippy that doesn't screw in, it just clasps together, yeah, good job, mom) and the whole thing goes tumbling to the floor in slow motion. My mind flashes back to a similar moment when Jonathan had thrown the sippy down the stairs (he does that, every time he goes down the stairs, like it's the only way to make sure his things are there when he gets down). I stop breathing. About 14 milliseconds later the missionaries, who happen to be sitting in front of us, are covered in chocolate milk, along with half of the pew itself. I am completely mortified. "Umm, ugh, hold on, I'll get some wipes..." Thanks to the Target incident, I now know never to leave the house without them.
We somehow get through the rest of the meeting, even though my little Jonathan is bent on giving me some kind of psychotic break. At one point, during the closing prayer, he decides to break away while I am feeding Ethan. My one free hand alternately grasps every one of his appendages as I struggle to contain him. As the rest of the congregation was saying, "Amen," my dear Jonathan screamed at the top of his lungs. Some days, my truest joy comes from thinking about future grandchildren. Not for me, but for my son.

cleaning the house

Step 1: Go in Monkey's room, collect 5-10 bottles randomly stashed around the room. Carefully decide which ones to keep and which ones to throw immediately into the garbage.
Step 2: Take random potholder/ oven mitt collection out of Monkey's room and go to the kitchen to put it back in the drawer.
Step 3: Notice that Monkey has put arm covers from the recliner in where the potholders belong.
Step 4: Bring the arm covers back into the living room and find play doh bits all over the rug.
Step 5: Pick up most of the play doh, vacuum the rest.
Step 6: While vacuuming, find an earring (you stepped on it's match earlier today) that was previously kept in the bathroom. Wonder why Monkey got into your earrings??
Step 7: Put the earring back in the bathroom, notice that your toothbrush is missing.
Step 8: Floss and mouthwash will have to do for tonight, until the toothbrush can be located in the laundry tomorrow morning.
Step 9: Fold the laundry in the morning, looking at all the little grass-stains/ lipstick stains/ juice stains, and laugh at how funny your little boys are.

Yeah, some day, when my kids are grown and my house stays clean, I really am gonna miss this.

creative laundry

My 2 year old has a funny habit where he takes sippy cups and shakes them upside down until they drip into puddles. "Spill proof," maybe, but "toddler mess proof," not so much. He also has a few sippy cups he can actually get apart, which speeds up the process. So, this morning, we were getting in the car for church when I realized he had sat in this morning's applejuice and had a very suspicious looking wet mark on his little bottom. I knew what it was, of course, but as for everyone else at church, well, it definitely looked bad. I quickly inventoried in my mind all of the clean outfits he had left upstairs to change into. I thought of several highwaters (the waist fits so well, as they are size 12 months), and a few longer pants where the waist is almost wide enough to fit his baby brother in too. I sighed and did what any self-respecting young mother would do- took his pants off, and held them out the window the entire way to church to air dry. Yes, if you were driving on 81 South today, that crazy woman driver was me. I can't imagine what people must have thought, but i certainly felt cool managing the wheel, directionals, and everything else with my right hand and my knee. I kinda felt like a 10 minute mini Adam Piner. It was awesome.

rub a dub dub, smack my head on the tub

Bath time is one of those things that never gets old. Monkey always keeps it interesting. Usually, it's a great way to wrap up the day before the boys go to bed. Of course, Ethan can't go in every night, his little baby skin would get dry (oh no!), but Monkey goes in every meal if not more frequently. It's fun to watch him splash, and fill his little cup with water, and pour water all over his little belly, and play all manner of squirting games.
When it came time to put him in the tub tonight (spaghetti night, it had to happen), Ethan was in the process of gnawing off his hand, so I opted to feed him in the other room while catching up on the phone with my father-in-law. All of a sudden, I heard a new kind of splashing noise in the bathroom, and wandered in to find Jonathan pouring entire cups of water on the floor. Since I am past the point where I think it's possible for my house to *ever* be in order, I just mildly scolded him and continued feeding Ethan-- this time perched on the toilet to ensure there was no more naughtiness from the Monk. About fourteen seconds into this new arrangement, I heard this loud pounding on our door. My first thought was to get a knife to protect us from whatever crazy person was trying to bang our door down. Then, after a second more of thought, I realized it had to be the lady downstairs. We love her to death, but everything is a crisis to this woman. "Who is it?" I ask, even though I know full-well who it is. As soon as the door is open, she proceeds to gush about how my toilet must be over-flowing and her apartment is drenched and oh-my-gosh I was falling asleep and I thought it was raining, and WHAT ON EARTH-- she repeats the story several times as if trying to process a near death experience.
About this time, Monkey comes running, nakie, out of the tub and over to see who came to visit. I tell him sternly to "go to bed," figuring at least there he can stay out of trouble (of course, I should know better). I finally convince our downstairs neighbor that the only way I can fix the mess is if she lets me go clean up the water. I explain that it was my son pouring water out of the tub.
Now, Jonathan is normally a very obedient little boy. By normally, I mean not usually. More of a somewhat occasionally. This time, he decides that before he goes to bed, he has to run back in the bathroom and throw a toy back in. He slips on the somewhat flooded linoleum, and is bawling his head off, so I pick him up and coddle him and yada ya until he finally calms down. When I set him down, he goes running into his room, and I find him a minute later curled into one corner of his little bed, all covered up, all sobbing and shaking. Poor guy.
I finish getting the monkey calmed down and ready for bed, figuring the crisis is over now that i have all the water cleaned up. About 5 minutes later, our buddy comes pounding on the door again. She still thinks it's the toilet. Maybe she just underestimates my toddler?

Adventures at Wegman's

There are a lot of things that change when you have kids. You are no longer allowed to dine out or sleep in, vacations require four times as much planning, and your wardrobe is limited to articles that can withstand all matter of little people fluids. You have to get used to a lot of staring and/ or funny looks in public as you attempt (and fail) to contain your small young creatures. There are times that you find yourself not knowing whether to yell at them or kiss their little faces, and you may have created something of a combination between the two. There is a piece of you that is overjoyed when someone else's kid shrieks louder than yours, and on those days that you feel all put together, there is nothing that can bring you down. Until you realize, of course, that you spent have the day wandering around with spaghetti in your hair. But even that doesn't really bother you anymore. Yes, it is a strange new world when you have kids.
One of my greatest joys has been in discovering that Wegman's is just as special to me as it ever was. No great things come without work, and Wegmansing surely includes its fair share of work. For starters, we have to get one of those crazy carts that has a little car built into the front. That way there is room for Ethan's carseat, Jonathan, AND groceries! It's a beautiful thing. Now, there is an art to just getting Jonathan strapped into the thing. If you tie the belt to loose, he wiggles right out, but if you tie it too tight he takes it as a challenge. This is all well and good, as it keeps him occupied, until you pause a second in the vegetable aisle and see your little monkey in a dead run for the candy.
There is a special art to just driving the stinkin' cart, as it's super long and weighted very strangely. There is, in addition, a special art to apologizing to people when you accidentally smack into their carts, or when you purposefully smack into their carts but want them to think it's an accident. There is an art to getting through the store with your sanity, which usually involves opening packages of snacks and drinks, which makes it interesting at the checkout. "Um, yeah, could you just scan the wrapper? Thanks." "Careful with that one, the end is only loosely twisted shut.""No, actually, I don't need a new cider-- that one's fine. I only need half a jug anyway." Which reminds me of the last challenge-- choosing just the right cashier. Preferably a grandma. They understand everything.
Well, I guess my blog-time allotment is being drawn to an abrupt close-- Monkey got himself out of the tub and drew a lipstick maze on his belly. Yes, yes, he is very funny. Here comes one of those combinations.

How to lay an Ethan down for a nap

Step 1: Feed the baby boy.
Step 2: Let him play in his little bouncer.
Step 3: Feed the baby boy again.
Step 4: When he stops taking the bottle, put in his bink.
Step 5: Wrap up the Ethan bundle so tight he can't wiggle out.
Step 6: Kiss him on the forehead, and lay him in his little crib. Say, "sleep tight, Ethan bundle!"
Step 7: Go back in when Ethan starts crying-- note that he has wiggled out and pulled out his bink.
Step 8: Put the plug back in, rub his forehead, and note that he is calm again.
Step 9: Re-wrap Ethan bundle, kiss his little forehead, and walk away.
Step 10: Repeat steps 7-9.
Step 11: Repeat steps 7-9.
Step 12: Repeat steps 7-9.
Step 13: Hear Ethan giggle and coo, go in and notice the Monkey has climbed into his crib.
Step 14: Get Monkey out of the crib, repeat steps 8-9.
Step 15: Put the Monkey back to "bed."

How to put a monkey down for a nap

Step 1: Note that monkey is extremely tired and naughty, and neither of you can go another minute until he takes a nap.
Step 2: Tell the monkey to go lay down in his bed.
Step 3: Prepare a bottle of milk while said Monkey supervises.
Step 4: Follow the monkey to his room and watch him throw himself into bed.
Step 5: Hand the bottle to the giggling monkey.
Step 6: Leave the room, shut the door, and listen for monkey to start playing with his toys.
Step 7: Interrupt Lightening McQueen and Tow Mater, and tell the monkey to get his little butt back in bed.
Step 8: Listen to monkey howl in his bed.
Step 9: Put on your meanest look and command monkey to stop driving his cars on the wall.
Step 10: Listen to the monkey laughing at your mean look, and try very, very, hard to not laugh back.
Step 11: Lay him back down, give him back his bottle, go back in the other room and ignore the sound of monkey playing with toys. Get an hour of semi-quiet time, and call it good.

How to change a monkey diaper

Step 1: Lay the monkey down on his back.
Step 2: Remove his pants.
Step 3: Lay the monkey back down on his back.
Step 4: Unfasten the diaper.
Step 5: Lay the monkey back down on his back.
Step 6: Hold the little monkey's legs up while he twists and wiggles and rolls.
Step 7: Lay the monkey back down on his back, pin his little arms down with your legs, tilt your head back to protect your face from little kicking feet, hold the monkey's legs again, begin to wipe the bottom.
Step 8: try desperately to convince yourself: it is not worth it to give him a sit-still treat. It is a bad idea to reward him with a treat. He really does not deserve a treat. Refrain, refrain...
Step 9: Lay the monkey back down on his back.
Step 10: Finish quickly.
Step 11: Admire the sloppy diaper.
Step 12: Watch the monkey wiggle out of the diaper.
Step 13: Lay the monkey back down on his back...

Potty training.

For a couple of months now, we have been thinking about potty training our little Monkey Man. James picked him out a little blue potty chair for his birthday; it has a sensor that plays a song to reward your little tyke for peeing in the appropriate receptacle. Recently, the monk has gone anti-diaper. As soon as there is pee in it, he takes it off. Before he poops, he takes it off. We were elated (well, sort of) at his attempts to show us how ready he is to be done with his diaper-butt stage. So, bright and early this morning, taking a suggestion from a girl I work with, I began pumping my kid up with every type of beverage in the house. We started sitting on the potty at regular intervals, and he has spent the entire morning sans diaper. Nakie from the waist down. It was actually his idea, I just ran with it.
So here we are, all morning long, in the living room with the potty close at hand. Every time he starts to pee on the rug, I move him to the potty. He is ecstatic to have his own symphony every time he tinkles on the little metal dots. Of course, mommy jumping up and down, clapping and congratulating him, seems to help too. He has even practiced saying "potty," even though it almost sounds like "daddy," but he's getting there. I think that chasing him around with carpet cleaner is beginning to pay off. So far, he has had 2 very impressive accomplishments, and he is loving it.
Then, my little Jonathan, kool-aid in hand, begins to pee on the rug, again. I promptly escort him to his little potty chair, and he refuses to sit. He starts screaming, "no-no-no-no-nooo!" Suddenly, every potty-training tip book/ manual/ article that I have ever read (ok, well, maybe it's only been a couple of internet articles and baby magazines, but still) begins rushing into my mind, and I am haunted by hundreds of little warning voices that say to stop as soon as your toddler gives you indication that he has lost interest. So, instead, we walk into his room and put on a little diaper. Which he has already taken off 5 or 6 times. Ugh.

Daycare.

Our last daycare experience was extremely stressful. When it finally came crashing to an end, I was actually kind of relieved. That is, until we began the process of finding a new one. We had the choice between paying $800 a month for our 3-day a week needs (ick) or a really nice woman with a really tiny house. "But James, what if Jonathan gets claustrophobic?" She also likes to go outside a lot. "James, what if Ethan gets a sunburn?" On our way home from meeting her, a ride which I was making much more painful than it should have been, we stopped to buy lemonade from a few girls down the block. Somewhere in the middle of my super-cheap-cause-no-one-thought-to-buy-sugar glass of lemonsour, I had a brilliant idea. "Look, James! That house is huge! They have a huge backyard and playground set and everything! We should ask them if they will babysit for us!" In the end, James convinced me to calm down, we took the boys to the affordable option, and they are loving it. Apparently Jonathan is actually a good boy underneath all his naughty, as Leslie discovered. He actually lays himself down for naps, wipes his nose without protest, and eats his food without throwing any. And so far, no baby sunburn. I guess we made the right choice after all. Even if I did have to spend half an hour and half a bottle of shout on a serious Spaghettio wardrobe malfunction.

clothes.

My clothes seem to share a common theme of "grease spot." Some of them have ventured from this norm, and have variations such as "chocolate spot," "ink spot," or "detergent spot." I try to keep my children's clothes from these fates, however, because I feel like if at least my boys look nice, people are less likely to think me white trash. That is, of course, unless we are at Target. It is extremely distressing, then, when I pick them up from daycare looking homeless. Or at least washing-machine-less. Like when I went to get Jonathan and he had chocolate frosting plastered all over his brand-new white Alaska T-shirt with the glow-in-the-dark picture on the front. I was furious. I don't have the time to go to Alaska and replace it, and I really liked that shirt. Or yesterday, for the boys' first day at their new daycare, Jonathan had on a brand new button down striped shirt with a doggie. It was adorable, until it was covered in Spaghettio's. There is exactly one thing that is adorable even when covered in Spaghettio's, and that is baby belly. Good ol' nakie baby belly.

Monkey's Birthday

We celebrated the Monkey's birthday this past weekend. Now, 2 is an extremely stressful age under any circumstances. Big people are always trying to make you play with your toys, eat your dinner, drink out of a sippy cup, and to make matters worse, you have no concept of the idea that these days are limited, and some day you will be one of the big people. It's like a never-ending cacophony of "eat your pizza," "drink your juice," play with your car." Nightmare.
Anyway, it's even worse when you have to have a birthday party. We thought Green Lakes would be an excellent place for said party, there is plenty of beach area, a nice playground, even little grills to make burgers. But for young Jonathan, whose mean mommy wouldn't let him run in the lake, made him leave the slide to open presents, systematically took away every cool present he got just when he started having fun, the torture became virtually unbearable. "No! No! Noooo!" Even a bottle couldn't fix it; and when a bottle can't fix it, you know it's bad. Oh well. At least we only have one more year. 12 months. 52 weeks. Shoot me.

Brothers.

When Ethan was first born, it was delightful to watch Jonathan interact with him. His mind always seemed to be filled with nice thoughts -- "I will hug him and kiss him and give him squishes!" Time went by, and Ethan's eyes became the best place to jab little curious fingers. Ethan didn't like it. Now that Ethan is a little bigger, he is in love with Jonathan. Jonathan jumps, Ethan laughs. Jonathan talks, Ethan laughs. Jonathan plays with a toy, Ethan laughs. Jonathan farts, Ethan laughs (well, ok, we laugh too). Jonathan, originally enamored with his little brother, cannot stand it! So now, I am seriously torn. When Ethan reaches out for Jonathan, and Jonathan bats his hand away, Ethan laughs. Do I let it continue, because Ethan is oblivious to the fact that their game is not a "nice" one? In then end, I punish Jonathan for hitting brother. Everyone is sad. Way to go, mom.

motivation

Last night I was trying desperately to find the motivation to clean my house. We have these 3 day cycles between "clean" and "pigsty," and it was time to rework my way to the top of the cycle. It was a perfect time because James was at a meeting, the boys were asleep, (well, sort of. Jonathan was in hysterics because I had sent him to bed without a bottle, but he can't get out of his room, so he may as well have been asleep for practical purposes) and I just kept walking from room to room thinking, "wow, yeah. I should clean that." So, I did what I usually do when I am avoiding something, I Googled ways of doing it. It makes me feel that I am putting effort towards the goal (after all, how can you accomplish something if you are not fully educated on how to do it?), but really I am just playing on the computer. Sigh.
Anyway, in Googling "How do I get motivated to clean my house," I found three helpful ideas that I wanted to share with the rest of you, in case you are ever in my same quandry.
1) Always, and I mean always, burn down your house. The insurance company will buy you a new one.
2) If you cut every corner, it’s really not so bad. Everybody does it.
3)Hard work usually pays off in time, but laziness always pays off right now.
These three helped me the most. Then, there was this one girl, who I think totally missed the general direction of this housework motivator. She said the hard thing is getting past the first 5 minutes, so if you commit yourself to just 5 minutes, it will usually get you into a rhythm and you will find satisfaction in what you are accomplishing. My first thought, is "freaking jerk. She thinks I should clean!" But in the end, I did it, and gosh it was nice to have a clean house. At least until JonaWhirlwind wakes up. At least I'm still 2 days away from having to do it again.

little boys are so gross!

So, here I am, in the middle of an Ethan diaper change (they usually take around 5 minutes apiece, even with proper supplies) and the phone rings. I am not interested in listening to it ring off the hook, then listening to the message being recorded, just to hear my cell start up with Edelweiss. Ethan was at the point where he was *mostly* clean, and I still had 2 clean hands, so I picked him up in a very clever fashion, and carried him to the other room, very very carefully. Meanwhile, while I was on the phone (my husband had to pick on me for asking him to get tortilka shells and soup cream in my earlier text-- haha), Jonathan found the diaper I was in the middle of changing and smeared it on Ethan's carpet. I owe my life to the person who invented my steam cleaner, as I am sure I would shoot myself in the face if I did not have it to cling to during these wondrous years of mothering a toddler.

update

So, today I decided to finally put in one of the exercise videos I borrowed from a girl at work. I fully expected to feel extremely awkward, and bump into furniture like a drunk puppy, etc. etc., but what I didn't expect was for my dear young son to start doing it with me. Aside from the fact that I am worried he will lose weight on his path to sculpted abs, it's great to have an exercise buddy.

for the love of food

I have probably bored many of you to tears with my newest weight loss idea. (...and then, when I lose thirty pounds, I get a new purse. And then, when I lose 40 pounds.... blah, blah, blah...) Anyway, suffice it to say, I am finally on track to lose all of my baby pounds (which, in reality are not baby pounds, but it's easier to blame them on the kids). Basically, I do *so* well all day long (probably in part due to the fact that 4 days a week I am at St. Joe's, and a salad is pretty much the most intriguing meal idea I have, but that's beside the point). Then, at dinner time, I eat what I wanna eat. Which, last night, was a Wegman's Sub. There is almost nothing finer in all the world than their glorious subs. James can't finish his (no comment on mine), so I tell him I will wrap it up for Jonathan tomorrow for lunch. Secretly I am thinking "mmm, midnight snack..." oh well. I am still making progress. 40 more salads, give or take, and I will have earned a pedicure...

Target Sequel

James and I decided to take the boys out to Target today. Thanks to Becka and her mad tax skills, we actually had the means to buy stuff. Yeah baby! So, here we are trudging along, and somewhere in between baby formula and Hungry, Hungry Hippos (yeah, it's so exciting to go to the store when you have kids) I start to smell a very distinct, all too familiar, infant sewage brewing. I was somewhere in between the good-mom-go-change-it-now mood and the pretend-I-think-it-might-be-gas-and-investigate-at-home mood. If we had left Target that very moment, I would have gone with the latter, but, alas, there was too much to do and too much to smell.
James and I split, I went to the car to get the diaper bag for a very routine diaper change.
Now dial it back a few hours. In packing for our weekend trip to Oneonta, I removed one of our portable wipes containers from one of our diaper bags. Guess which one I took to Target? Bingo.
Meanwhile, back on the ranch, Ethan has loaded his pants in a very real way. Based soley on his size, you know he is a big eater, and big eaters make big stinkers. So I'm seriously torn. I could go down to the baby aisle and buy a thing of wipes, even though I just bought about a thousand at BJ's, or just make do with wet paper towels. I know I am going to catch some "second kid" flack for this, but I opted for the paper towels. It just made more sense.
Now, there is no very good way to get a shopping cart into the bathroom. Probably mostly due to the fact that you aren't supposed to bring them in. But I wasn't about to leave Ethan's carseat in the middle of customer service, so in we all went.
In the end, I park my cart so that it is blocking off 2 sinks and a dryer, but since there are 7 total, I don't worry too much about it. This is a pivotal moment for me and my young son-- the discovery that there is not a single paper towel in the entire bathroom. Stupid green initiative. At this point I have come too far to turn back and buy wipes, so I make the decision that I know will be a bad one. I grab a fistfull of toilet paper, wet it in the sink, and cross my fingers.
Now, anyone who has changed a really sloppy diaper knows that no good can come from this. I am very soon low on toilet paper, even after using the diaper itself to scrape off as much of his tooshie as I can. I am forced to run into stalls for seconds or thirds, thankfully it wasn't a busy day and it was easy to be discreet. Thank goodness also, for the placement of my shopping cart. Originally thought to be a liability, it helped to deter people from wanting to come see the baby. I could see the old women sneering and shaking their heads in disgust. I was grateful for it; I have found that if there is anything worse than being unprepared, it is being unprepared with an audience.
Over on the changing table, life is getting messier by the minute. Ethan seems to have taken his own green initiative. I won't go into too much detail, as some may have weak stomachs, but suffice it to say that a battle had been faught, and a battered trail of bunched up toilet paper bits graced my young boy's bottom as I fastened on his new Luvs.
As I am washing my hands and scrubbing down the changing table (yes, it was that bad), I am secretly wondering why I didn't swish him around in the toilet instead. Oh well, there is always next time.

Nearly.

This morning I woke up, ready to conquer the world. Or, at least, to conquer my to do list. They sometimes appear as one and the same. I got the boys all dressed and ready, and got out the door before 9:30. That's practically unheard of for a person such as myself. We can't even manage to do it well on Sundays, when we sort of have to. Anyway, our first destination was Rite Aid, to take and develop a picture for the Monk's birthday invitations. Everything was looking great. Jonathan actually took a nice picture on the first try (never mind the fact that it was a "driving" picture, and he was thrilled to sit in the front of the car), the Rite Aid that is only a mile from our house had a picture kiosk, and Jonathan actually was willing to sit in their shopping carts. I remembered the little adapter to make my SD card go in the kiosk, and was on my way to checkout bliss. This is where life started to get sad. I opened up my purse and discovered there was no wallet. Craptastic. I figured it must have fallen out in the closet where I keep my purse, but I was a dreamer. I called work. "Chris? Hey... could you see if I left my wallet in my locker, and if it is put on my combination lock??" Long pause..... and, hooray! Chris found and locked my wallet! I grabbed a spare checkbook figuring I could get through life with that. Alas, my work ID wouldn't cut it, and since my drivers license is in my wallet at work, I had no choice but to come home, an hour later, with nothing accomplished except mailing my rent. Thank goodness I had a quarter and two dimes.

Ethan's 1st haircut

I think it's a common, unspoken tradition for babies to get their first haircuts somewhere around their first birthdays. I am also fairly certain that it is a more common, and more binding tradition for all of the world's good mommies and daddies to save a lock for a remembrance book. Kinda weird, isn't it? Well, it is what it is.
Ethan, my bright-eyed 4 1/2 month old sweetheart, was not blessed with the greatest head of hair. It's always been kind of patchy, with a long strip on top which has alternately been styled into spikes or a unicorn horn for most of his young life. There was also, of course, the occasional spiked Mohawk, which I think is awesome, but the grandparents did not approve. Any way, yesterday was the day we set aside to assimilate our little patchy unicorn into the rest of society by finally doing something about that hair. Having been cut completely from hair styling privileges myself, we decided it was up to James to transform our son. He eventually decided, after a few hesitant near-attempts, that it wasn't worth the risk of lobbing off wiggly Ethan's little baby ears. Conservative. So, we took Ethan to the nearby Super Cuts for a really super cut. Somewhere between the car and the entrance, I realized I had nothing available for storage of said precious lock. At first I was panicked, but that melted away as soon as I realized it could be a golden ticket-- if I didn't have hair saved from my second son's first haircut, I was absolved from having to keep that silly bag of hair we have from my first son's haircut. It's all about fairness, and a motherly duty to keep all things equal. I was feeling very empowered- today was the day that I, Danielle, would throw away hair.
Of course, that dream was never to come to fruition, for as we were checking out, that blasted hairdresser produced a tiny keepsake packet that held Ethan's little baby hair. She apparently took me to be that kind of mom. Ugh.

P.S.

In the few minutes I spent writing my previous entry, the Monk got into an entire carton of eggs and smashed them individually on the floor. This one is much easier. Go straight to jail, do not pass go, do not collect $200. This is exactly why I buy expensive carpet cleaners, and not expensive eggs.

To punish, or not to punish?

My little Jonathan knows he is not supposed to play on the table. He is not welcome to anything that may be lying on the table. He knows.
So, here I am, making dinner (eggplant parm... :) and I turn around to find him with a freshly poured glass of water, sitting at the table. Five minutes ago I set him there with a juice box. Being a so-so housekeeper, I still had the Brita pitcher and an empty water glass sitting on the table from lunch time. My first thought is that I am so stinkin' proud of him for pouring a glass of water and not even spilling....much. My second is that he really shouldn't be playing on the table, and if I let it go, it will just reinforce to him that it's ok.
In the end, I decided not to punish him. After all, in his little 2 year old mind, mommy doesn't even know that he had to get on the table to pour the water. So I sit with him and help him drink it. I've created a monster. I guess if I am going to make one, I had better at least enjoy him.

absence makes...

When I called tonight to say I was on my way home from work, I was greeted with "say goodnight to the Monkey!" On comes my (nearly) 2 year old, speaking his random nonsense language, making me laugh and miss him even more. His little voice is the best thing I have heard in some time. There is nothing in the world I would rather listen to. When I am home alone with him, however, I can only take so much "ah ba da doleum, yaw!" I swear the only sentence he can say is "hole in it." ?.
It's like that with a lot of little things. Like when James recanted stories tonight of the naught-a-monkey-- "He climbed up on the table, took his little pants off, and poured an entire box of frosted miniwheats into them!" This sounds adorable to me right now. The naughty little things always are when you aren't there to be responsible to clean up the mess and teach the guy manners.

Bed.

I often think how nice it would be to go to bed early. By early, I mean anything on the pm side of midnight. Every so often, I even have a night like tonight, where there is nothing to really keep me from bed-- except that nagging list of things that never seem to get done. Today I had the whole day off of work, and I had ideas of wondrous activities-- go to the park with the boys, grocery shop, fold laundry, wash clothes so we don't look like homeless people... I know it doesn't sound like much, but that is an extraordinarily busy day in Danielle world.
I found I spent little more time than usual in the bathroom, today, and not in a gross way-- it is the only room my toddler is incapable of destroying. When I need reassurance, or a minute away from my desperate attempts to manage the chaos, I poke my head in and just revel in the fact that there is one room in my home I am proud of. If only I could use the bathroom for all of my family time and entertaining needs, I suppose there would be little reason to even bother with the rest of the house. Alas, people would talk.
We did manage to make it to Target today. It was time to get Jonamonkey his very first pillow (he wasn't quite sure what to do with it, and ended up falling asleep curled at the foot of his bed. This is an improvement on last night, however, when he fell asleep atop a pile of books he pulled off the shelf). Target is one of my favorite places. It's the one place where I don't try and pretend I am a calm, cool, collected, sane individual. It all started when I was pregnant with Ethan, and went on a shopping excursion with the Monk. It was nearly bedtime, he was exhausted, and I think I had forgotten to feed him dinner (oops). I can't remember if he was in the front part of the cart or piled underneath all of the items I intended to purchase. I do remember that he had kicked off a shoe in one of the aisles, and a kind employee found and returned it. I couldn't help but notice that he gave me that look-- the look of mixed pity and caution, the one you might use with someone who is indigent, that you don't want to offend by making any show of the fact that you noticed. I couldn't figure out why he might be giving me the look, but then I saw myself. My shirt didn't match my pants, I had toddler snot and cookie crumbs all over my shirt, my hair was in a ragged half ponytail, half bun, and my shoes were caked with mud. Add that to the screaming, unkempt toddler, and I instantly knew that I should be embarrassed. I called my sister in law, delighted-- "I am that person Tammi! I am the one who is the pity of every shopper and employee of Target; and I don't even care!" It was the turning of a new leaf for me. From that day forward, I have had an image to maintain. I could get used to this.