Fly!

Last Monday I woke up and didn't want to go to work.  It was more than a case of the Mondays.  I was feeling overwhelmed and just wanted a day to knock out all the Christmas-related errand running.  I am also lucky in that I have a fabulous boss and a flexible work schedule, so I even had the possibility of just working a half day from home on Monday and making up the time on Friday.  (I usually do it the other way around.)  Unfortunately, we were already booked for Friday, so I drug myself to work.

Tuesday I woke up and I still didn't want to go to work.  And I was feeling nauseous as an added bonus.  Still, I made myself go to work (I'm saving what little sick and vacation time I have to cover my time off for maternity leave, and I don't want to use them unless I really, really have to), and by 9:00 a.m. I was feeling like a functional human being.

Wednesday morning I woke up really and truly sick with a stomach bug.  I think it was my body's way of forcing me to take some time off.  The morning was rough, but once my stomach settled down, it was actually a decent day.  I hid in the bedroom and did actually work a half day, and I read most of a novel too.

But I didn't learn.  I felt run down the rest of the week, and by Sunday morning I was nice and sick again.  As I was sitting on the bathroom floor thinking I should've at least had a crazy night out that involved tequila shots to be so miserable, it occurred to me that I needed to stop.  Christmas would happen when it happened.  Santa had already confirmed his visit to our house, complete with stocking stuffers, and Ree and I had agreed on an easy coffee cake recipe for Christmas morning.  (Well, actually, we're still debating.  I want a honey bun cake with pecans and she wants a peach thing that looks like a dessert pizza.  We'll see who wins in the end.)  But I realized, do we really need anything more than Santa and breakfast pastries to have a good holiday?

So I took the day to actually enjoy the season with my kids.  Crazy, huh?  We had fun.  I looked at the newspaper ads with Ree and realized we both like shiny and sparkly things.  (Probably no big surprise there.)  Ree and I also made Christmas cards.  We didn't get too many done, but it was a fun process.  I sat with Leon and Michael while they colored pictures of Charlie Brown and Snoopy from a new Christmas coloring book.  Actually, Leon colored, and Michael talked.  All Michael ever does is talk.  I actually had a few minutes to myself, and was in the middle of looking at an ad for World Market, totally amazed that the front page featured a set of Russian Leaders Vodka Shooters, when I realized Michael had stopped with his stream of consciousness babble and was actually addressing me.

Michael: Hep!  Hep!  (That would be "Help! Help!" in regular English.)
Me: Do you need help?
Michael: Hep wall!
Me: You need help with the wall?
Michael: Reach top.
Me: You want to reach the top of the wall?

Michael then starts frantically waving his arms over his head indicating that is EXACTLY what he wants to do.  I check out the wall.  It is divider between the kitchen and dining area.  It runs floor to ceiling.  It's about four feet wide.  There is a framed picture in the middle of it.  Otherwise, it is a pretty boring wall.  There is nothing I could see of interest near the ceiling.

Me: Mikey, we can't reach the top of the wall.  It's too tall.
Michael: Wall too tall?
Me: Yeah, I'm sorry.  We just aren't big enough to reach up there.

Michael stops to think for a second.

Michael: FLY!
Me: No, sweetie.  We can't fly there.  People can't fly.  Just birds.

He spends a few seconds flapping his arms trying to fly anyway.  All the arm swinging makes him think.  Arm swinging is what he does when he tries to jump.  So he starts working on jumping to reach the top of the wall.  Unfortunately, he hasn't quite mastered the leaving the ground thing, so it's mostly a lot of grunting, arm swinging, and standing on tiptoes.  I can't help but just stare at him throughout this process.  Finally, he wanders off.  And it occurs to me that wow, I just had this conversation with a sober person.

Do Good Things and Good Things Happen

I really enjoy volunteering and helping people, I just seem to be short on time and motivation these days.  So I love it when I find ways to feel like I am bettering the world (at least a little) but can be totally lazy about it.

I joined MomsRising a couple of years ago.  It's a fabulous bipartisan organization that is working to build a more family-friendly country.  They focus on topics impacting moms, children, and families, and basic involvement is simple.  They send out emails on hot topics, which are often items in pending legislation.  If, after reading the summary, you want to take action, you click on a link and it sends letters to the appropriate state and federal officials.  If you want to learn more, there are links for that too.  So simple.

Yesterday, I learned about another site that helps you improve the world (at least an itty-bitty bit) in 30 seconds or less.  Xerox is sponsoring a site called Let's Say Thanks.  The website gives you the opportunity to send a free printed postcard to U.S. military personnel stationed overseas.  You pick a design, enter a message, and add your name and hometown.  Xerox prints it and sends it to someone.  No providing your email address or contact information.  Just an easy way to say thanks.

Yesterday must have just been a help people day in general, because one of my favorite blogs also had information on helping others.  Cake Wrecks, a blog featuring professional cakes gone oh-so-wrong, began their second annual Christmas Charity Countdown.  The premise is simple.  Small gifts add up, so they ask readers who want to participate to give a $1 a day to charity for 12 days.  That's it.  A buck.  Yesterday's charity, Give Kids the World, has already received $3,137 just from readers contributing.  Today's charity, Doctors Without Borders, has raised $1,925 from loyal wreckerators so far.  It's nice to know I'm not the only person who wants to make the world a better place.  Or that there are innovative people willing to help us do so easily.

Away in a Manger

Sunday morning Jeff and I headed out to the garage to get the Christmas decorations while the kids ate breakfast.  We keep the decorations in plastic tubs on overhead shelves, and it's just easier to get them down when we don't have an audience of toddlers, preschoolers, and dogs around to "help."

Leon watched, his eyes growing wider and wider, as we brought the tubs into the house.  The kid was squirming with anticipation as he sat in his booster seat.  There were new latches to master and so many potential goodies inside.  It was a Leon dream come true!

I can't remember if I even attempted to flat out tell him "no."  Whatever happened, it wasn't long before I said, "These are Mommy's boxes and THIS is Leon, Michael, and Ree's box," and I handed him the box with our nativity set.

We happen to have a Little People nativity set, and I just love the dang thing.  I am a dork and think it is the cutest thing in the world.  I may actually enjoy playing with it more than the kids do.  I also love that Little People are virtually indestructible (so far) and the dogs understand that they are neither treats nor chew toys (so far). 

While I cleaned up the kitchen after breakfast, I heard Leon busily playing in the sunroom.  Since everything is an ingredient to Leon, I figured he was stirring the poor shepherds and sheep in a bowl and calling it "soup."  Much to my surprise, as I walked out to the living room, I found the people and critters scattered all over the floor.  Baby Jesus was face down on the rug with the manger still stuck to his back.  (Must resist the urge to add a "plight of the Jews" joke here.)  But the stable was missing.

I found the stable sitting on the kids' train table in the sunroom.  It was void of living creatures.  Instead, it was filled with little Tonka trucks.  The stable had become a garage.  I can only imagine the angel on the roof was the parking attendant.

Norman Rockwell, Eat Your Heart Out

 

I love this picture Jeff took of the kids last week.  With a bit of editing, it could be totally Christmas card worthy with a nice "Waiting for Santa" caption.  As it is, it captures the suburban reality of "watching the garbage man."

They Start Young

Not too surprisingly, the Bengals game was not on TV locally last Sunday, so while Jeff went to a neighborhood bar to watch it, I gamecasted it on the computer while Ree and I decorated for Christmas.

For those of you not familiar with gamecasting, it pretty much involves watching arrows representing the teams move back and forth on a drawing of a football field.  Not exactly an HD broadcast.  Still, somehow, when Michael woke up from his nap, he saw the computer and immediately exclaimed, "Football!"  Um, yeah.  At one point he apparently noticed the arrows moving fast or something, because we had the following conversation.

Michael: (Excitedly) Touchdown Bengals?
Me: No, not touchdown Bengals.  The other team scored.  Touchdown Saints.
Michael: (Pausing to think and then sadly) I'm sorry, Daddy.
Me: Yeah, I bet Daddy is sorry too.

The Great Christmas Tree Disaster of 2010

Last night I made perfect peppermint frosting.  Seriously.  It was phenomenal.  I think it was my redemption moment for the evening.  For the boys' birthdays, I made bright yellow and blue cakes shaped like Legos, and I had frozen the leftover frosting for an emergency dessert moment.  (Hey, mock me if you will, but these moments obviously happen to me.)  I thawed the two cans of frosting, and when I combined them, they actually blended into a lovely shade of light green.  (Purists be damned.  Mint things need to be green.)  Then I slowly added peppermint extract and the result was amazing.  Peppermint frosting, made from the canned stuff, that wasn't overwhelming in mint flavor and didn't taste like chemicals.  Tonight it will be added to a pan of brownies that didn't work out quite right.  I tried a sample frosted brownie last night, and the result was heavenly.  Not only great frosting, but totally salvaged brownies.  Some melted chocolate might be drizzled over the top as an added bonus.
 
I call the frosting creation my redemption moment because the afternoon was marked by the Great Christmas Tree Disaster of 2010.  (I'm a realist.  I am a totally klutz.  We have two dogs and 3.34 kids.  I know we are not done with Christmas tree disasters.  I am just hoping this is the only one in 2010.)  In short, yesterday we learned that glass Christmas ornament balls and ceramic floors don't mix.

In the ten years that Jeff and I have been together, we have never had a full-sized Christmas tree.  I briefly contemplated purchasing one this year, then I realized that Leon would just spend the holidays trying to scale the thing.  Next year is probably out since we will have a ten-ish month old, but maybe the next year.  Last year, since the boys were busy pulling up on things, in lieu of having any sort of Christmas tree at child height, we put out what we refer to as the Christmas tree village on our bar.  It is collection of three little artificial Christmas trees that individually each look like Charlie Brown Christmas trees, but when lit and decorated, you can practically hear Linus saying, "I never thought it was such a bad little tree. It's not bad at all, really."  But, as "not bad" as they may be, I really liked the idea of having a tree that the kids could sit around and find presents under, and we have also have a four-foot tall fake tree that I acquired my first Christmas out of college.  I figured it was low enough that Leon wouldn't see it as a new jungle gym and felt sure the kids could handle having it out in our living room.  I didn't know that our floors were plotting against us.

Yesterday while the boys were napping and Jeff was busy watching the Bengals, Ree and I decided to put up the tree.  She did a fabulous job of entertaining herself by emptying out the plastic bins of Christmas stuff and reading all the Christmas books while I put it together.  Then I went to put on the lights and realized that the only Christmas lights we had were a strand of all purple lights leftover from my college days and a monstrously long strand of colored lights we used to outline our entire garage last year.  Neither was quite what I was looking for, but amazingly, Ree and I happened to stop at Target on Friday afternoon and we happened to browse the Christmas section and we happened to pick up a set of retro globe lights.  Perfect.  I put them on, and while the tree was a bit dark, I figured it would look better with ornaments, and I could always add other lights later.

Then it was time to decorate.  Ree was very excited, and she and I started hanging ornaments.  About three ornaments in, Ree accidentally dropped a snow globe ornament.  It only fell about six inches, but it shattered.  She was okay with it, and while warning bells were starting to go off, I just cleaned it up without too much thought.  Although we normally put the tree skirt on last, I went ahead and put it around the tree, with a fleece blanket under it for extra padding, just in case of other ornament disasters.  Thankfully, we got through the tree trimming without any of those, and we even finished before Leon and Michael woke up from naps.

When the boys woke up, they were very excited about seeing all the Christmas stuff.  Since I hadn't cleaned up yet, Leon was especially excited to see all the bins with their lids off, and he busily ran around the living room putting all of the sorted decorations back into the bins and slamming the lids on.  (Ahh, my little "helper".)  The boys and I had a chat that the tree was for looking at, not for touching, and they seemed pretty respectful.  Michael walked around it, naming every ornament, with his hands neatly clasped behind his back in parade rest.  Leon wasn't quite so respectful, but he at least limited himself to poking at ornaments rather than pulling them off the tree.

Then dinner time rolled around.  I'm not sure who or what was the cause, but I suddenly found myself having to abandon my lo mein to clean up a Bengals ornament ball that had shattered in the middle of the living room.  It wasn't too much later that I heard Michael delightfully exclaim, "Ball!  Then I heard the tinkling sound of another ornament crumbling upon impact with the floor.  Michael was remorseful, and I was contemplative.  Had he really learned his lesson?  Could this work?  And I felt bad undoing all of Ree's hard work.  Since we have been married, each year I have made ornaments for everyone in our family.  Ree, a chip off the ol' block and a true math geek, had made it a point to find each year's set and arrange them together on the tree.  She must've read my mind, because that's when she spoke up and said, "Mom, maybe we should just put up the little trees up high."  The kid was so right.


So while the kids ate dinner, I went to the garage, got out the other trees, and started setting them up on the bar in a back corner of our dining room.  I also made the kids stay in their seats a little longer than they needed to so I could transfer most of the ornaments to the tree village.  Shortly after dinner, I once again heard Michael say, "Ball!" and then heard the distinctive sound of another ornament shattering.  And I, again, found a remorseful Michael.  Apparently he either forgot the incident before dinner or figured it couldn't possibly happy again.  But at least I knew we really needed to limit Christmas decorations to those at least four feet in the air.  The kids clearly aren't ready for a tree at their level.

After the kids went to bed, I finished decorating the tree village and put away the additional ornaments from the other tree.  Just as I was finishing, I too dropped an ornament, and it shattered.  Doh!  Apparently I too am not ready for a tree at my level.

So after I got that mess squared away, I made the peppermint frosting.  And when all was said and done, and I was munching on my delightful dessert, the little Christmas tree village looked nice.  And the lessons for the day are, when in doubt, head to the kitchen.  Also, install wrestling mats throughout the living area before putting up a Christmas tree.  Either that, or only use Kevlar ornaments.

From The Baby Blues Archive

Me, Me, Me

So about three weeks ago I was plodding along, minding my own business, when Ka-Blammo!  My body decided to tell me in no uncertain terms that I had reached the third trimester of this pregnancy.  I am lucky and have gotten through many years on few hours of sleep each day, catching up on sleep in the years in which life is a little less insane.  (Yes, I know normal people catch up on weekends, and I'm weird.  Does this really surprise you?)  I've been scraping by on 6.5 hours a night since Leon and Michael have been born, but my body is now scoffing at that.  Nope, I need more sleep, at least on the weekends.  And since the kids prefer to get up earlier than usual on the weekends and sleep "in" during the week, that means I now have to nap (read: I pass out randomly) on more weekend days than not.  (The good news - the kids have actually been sleeping or at least staying in bed until 7:00 a.m. most week day mornings lately.)  And the hormones!  Holy cow, the hormones!  I've had mood swings this whole pregnancy, but the crazy, angry pregnant lady is leaking out more and more.  I am fairly good at repressing her at work (as the breadwinner in the family, remaining employed is kinda important), but then I take it out on my whole family by being mean wife and mean mommy with no patience.

Right after a good workout (have you ever seen a woman who's 30 weeks pregnant workout?  I almost wish I could see myself.  It has to be hilarious!) when the crazy is somewhat at bay, I can put it in perspective.  At any time I can recognize that I have much easier pregnancies than many women, but in those moments of exhaustion and a clear head, I can also be grateful that my body gave me a free pass to enjoy "regular" life for a good seven months even while pregnant again.  But the rest of the time, it's hard not to be at least a little annoyed that my body would just have to finally succumb to pregnant madness during the holidays.  As though there isn't enough crap to do, I now have to stop to take care of me and this hyper little being (and wow is this one a wiggler!) in my belly?  For real?

So this year, more than ever, I am working to find balance during the holidays.  I'll let you know how that all works out.