One Perfect Mess

Archive for May, 2009

Being a parent is a series of moments where you think “this is the best day of my life, this moment right here I’ll remember forever.” Unfortunately I’ve already long forgotten hundreds of these moments. Tonight we sat on the kitchen floor in our PJ’s, Andrew the Weebles and me, eating warm Rice Krispie treats I’d just made right out of the mixing bowl. We each had our own spoon and ended up getting marshmallow all over ourselves. Yummy, Weebs said grinning. Waking up this morning with one of my peacefully sleeping children on either side of me is another. It is impossible not to feel overwhelmed by the blessing of your children when you watch them sleeping so innocently. Or after naptime today when the three of us were on the bed, I took turns tickling my son and then my daughter and both were giggling and eating up the attention. My son kicking his chubby little legs and my daughter rolling around hiding under the covers. My mom just watched us and told me I was the best mom. Everytime she says that it doesn’t ring true to me. I just love my kids, that’s all. Just like any mom should.

I remember as clearly as if it was yesterday. A month or so ago my husband was on his way out the door with a dozen or so beach towels.

Me: What are you doing with those?
Andrew: Covering up the plants. They are calling for a frost tonight. Don’t worry, I’ll wash them when I bring them back in.
Me: Um..

This afternoon I was attacking the pile of cardboard that has accumulated in my garage thanks to my little online shopping addiction. What did I find but a giant box full of damp musty beach towels? Hmph.

Most nights have been good around here lately. I haven’t had to watch Oobi or Gullah Gullah Island in a couple of months, so that’s progress. However, some nights are still quite challenging. Lucky for me I went to bed early last night because my evening went something like this:

1 am The Peanut wakes up to eat. I plop him in bed beside me, feed him and doze back off.
2 am The Weebles calls out over the monitor. I tuck the Peanut back into his crib while Andrew goes to fetch her. I snuggle her back to sleep.
3 am The Peanut wakes up again. I think he must’ve been cold because this is unusual. I drag myself out of bed and nurse him while I check out Facebook. Big mistake. Do NOT look at the internet while awake in the middle of the night. It got my brain going around in circles and I laid awake for an hour.
4:30 am The Weebles has moved over so close to me I can’t move. I’ve had one cat sleeping on my pillow all night and another sleeping in the center of the bed on top of the covers so I can’t pull any over to cover up with. The Peanut starts to fuss again. At this point I manuever my foot around the cat and kick Andrew and tell him to go calm him down. I wake up again at 5:45 to the sound of the baby crying in the living room. It seems poor husband has been up the whole time bouncing the little guy and trying to convince him to go back to sleep. I take Peanut and settle him in bed with me (on Andrew’s side since there’s some room over there) and everyone goes back to sleep.. for about 15 minutes until cats start making a ruckus to be fed. Finally at 6:30 Andrew gives up and gets up to start the day. I stay in bed with both peacefully sleeping children for another half hour or so then get up. As my dad likes to say “doesn’t it feel good to be so needed?”

I think the pictures speak for themselves….

I have heard different opinions on this from different parents and my own personal belief is that *if* I did end up finding myself feeling a closer bond with one child over the other I would go to the ends of the earth to not let them find out about it. Some parents swear they love their children equally and others make no secrets that they have favorites. After being the parent of two for a whopping four months I am starting to form an opinion on the subject. If you had asked me six months ago, or even three months ago if I was going to have a favorite I would have said absolutely not. But secretly I felt that I would never love anyone like I love my daughter. Now that my little man is here I can easily see how I will love all my children enormously but in different ways. As for a favorite I don’t think that is a question that will be answered the same all the time. For example, right now the Weebles is at a bit of a difficult stage. The Peanut is just now really coming into his own and showing his little personality. He’s at a super fun stage so parenting him is easier right now. In a matter of weeks or months it might change again. And then there will be those blissful times when the planets align just so and they are both at awesome stages of development. Of course I suppose there might also be times where they are both at difficult points… let’s not go there ‘kay?

I asked my pediatrician today about EMLA cream to help with the pain of vaccines. I’m not crazy about vaccines in the first place but I’ll refrain from crawling up on my organic free range hippie soapnuts box for the time being. But, it seems to me if there are methods that can make it less traumatic for the kids then why not? She said that she was fine with writing a script for it but that I also might want to look into this really neat plastic thing called a shot blocker. Basically she said it goes over the shot site and puts pressure in spots that disrupt the pain signals. She went on and on about how neat it was. Meanwhile I just stared and nodded not knowing how to avoid the obvious question. If it is so great, WTF don’t they use it?

All of a sudden I live with a crazy person (well one besides myself). I’m constantly thinking must remember to blog about this and then I forget. But here are just a couple of examples recently.

* I was eating some toast and Weebles saw me. Toast Toast she insisted. So, I got up and made her a piece of toast. All the while she stood there in front of the toaster yelling and screaming TOAST TOAST TOAST as though her very life depended on getting that piece of toast. Finally it was done and I handed it to her. HOT! She said and dropped it. And that was that.

* This morning I set her ball pit back up. The one with 200 plastic balls. Who on earth had that bright idea? Anyway she was frantic for me to get them all in the tent. Because, you know, she had dumped all 200 of them out on the floor while I was setting the damn tent up instead of waiting and dumping them in the tent. As soon as I got them all in she happily threw herself in with them. Immediately she got agitated and started screaming OUT OUT and throwing all 200 back out of the tent on the floor. Once they were out she looked at me pitifully and said Help ? Help ? To put them back in. Nosiree, I don’t think so.

The tantrums in general. OhmyGOD the tantrums. I took some video the last couple of days. We have a new thing where every day after naptime is a good half hour cry and throw ourselves on the floor-fest. I can’t figure out what is going on there.

It seems like for every action there is an opposite and equally intense reaction. Everything that makes her really happy these days then causes a total fit when it is over. A trip to the park? Pure glee until time to go and then we must endure screaming as though she is being poked by hot needles. Popsicle for snack? Once it is gone and she realizes her demands for mo’ mo’ aren’t going to be met she instantly goes face down on the floor howling. But the most puzzling is the tantrums where she really really wants something and as soon as I give it to her she acts disinterested. She must’ve asked me for yogurt fifty times this morning before I could get to the fridge and hand it to her. Then she set it down and walked off. Wonder how long this phase lasts?

Any plan really. I’d really love a five year plan. Where we’ll live, what school the kids will go to. That sort of fun stuff. However, at this point even a plan for dinner would be something to go on. Special days tend to get tense around here. And here is why: My husband doesn’t plan. Oh sure, he’ll frantically have something express shipped a day (or hey, maybe even two!) in advance. But as far as a plan for the day? Not a chance. I think he is well meaning. I really do. I think he assumes “hey we’ll do whatever she wants!” But this doesn’t work. Moms know what I’m talking about here. Because basically that dumps the meal/activity planning right back in my lap and I get the pleasure of doing that every day thankyouverymuch. I don’t want to plan. Come up with something. And you know what? If you are so convinced I won’t like it, come up with TWO options and I’ll pick. But don’t just let the day lolly gag around with me expecting that you have some sort of surprise going and you just sitting around waiting for me to say “hey honey, today we’re going to the store! Won’t that be fun?” Because at some point I’m going to be hungry and cranky and then we’ll be stuck in a panic trying to squeeze some sort of meal in before the kids fall apart all over the living room floor in exhaustion. If you want my input ask me a couple of weeks in advance. If it is Mother’s Day or my birthday (conveniently located in close proximity to each other) assume the ball is in your court.

I just got a new laptop and haven’t transferred my bookmarks yet. So I’ve been relying on my blog list to keep up with the ones I just can’t live without. For some reason today they aren’t showing up. How annoying. That is all.