One Perfect Mess

Archive for May, 2010

Today the Peanut is five days shy of seventeen months old. I’ve been waiting for this day for months. Today he is exactly the same age that his sister was on the day he was born. Why that is so significant to me I can’t really say. Maybe it is because he was a “surprise” pregnancy and I still occasionally have lingering guilt over the Weebs’ “growing up” a little quicker than I had planned. I have looked forward to remembering what it was like when she was that age. Although I do think that he is more advanced in some of the more obvious developmental areas such as language and gross motor skills so it isn’t really a fair comparison. She has always been more of a fine motor skills kinda gal. She was able to hold an object in each hand from birth and never looked back, requiring one for each hand of everything until she was at least a year and a half old. Two blocks, two Little People, two Chap Sticks… now that I think of it she still likes to have two but now it is more often two Oreos or two popsicles. I just noticed in the picture below she is holding two cups…  : ) Peanut didn’t pay a bit of attention to any toy we handed to him until he discovered Matchbox cars.

Anyway, so here is my own little milestone. It is hard to think about him being a big brother already. There is a lot of good that came from having my first two so close together. If he had been born once she started going through Diva phases we would’ve been up a creek. She was so little that it never occurred to her not to immediately love him. Still I’m glad that baby #3 isn’t on the way just yet. I’m enjoying letting my little boy have his babyhood that perhaps his sister missed out on.

Peanut 5/29/10

Weebles 1/2/09

There is something special about that first beloved teacher. Ms Kim is the first adult that isn’t related to her that my daughter has fallen in love with. I am eternally grateful to her for drawing the Weebs out, helping her learn to trust new people and instilling in her a love for school. I was crushed when I got the email that Ms Kim was leaving our preschool. The other teachers there are great too, but my heart hurt a little for my girl. She is still so young that she probably won’t even really grasp what is going on until Ms Kim has been gone awhile and by then the sting will have subsided anyway since she will be used to mornings without her. Weebles will likely not have any memories of Ms Kim, but I know I will never forget her.

A few weeks ago I took the Peanut to get his first haircut. The Weebles still hasn’t had one. I’m not sure when I’ll work up the nerve for that. But it was time for the little boy, his hair was starting to cover his eyes. I took him to one of those kids’ places figuring they would be better suited for a toddler. From the toy section to the fun waiting room and the little car shaped seat for him to sit in, every detail had been thought of. Of course, my little guy wasn’t going to just sit there. Nosiree, not the Peanut, he isn’t happy if he isn’t on the go so he got his first haircut standing in the little car, occasionally trying to make a break for it. Lord have mercy that was one hell of a run on sentence. The lady was obviously used to this sort of thing and didn’t even bat an eye at having to wield scissors near a chaotic, on the move toddler’s head. I was overall happy with how it turned out. Admittedly I wish they hadn’t cut as much off but I know that it makes sense to do that so that you won’t end up having to come back in a week. That being said I think I’ll let it grow out for awhile before taking him back. I sort of miss the little bit of shagginess he had going on before.

Before

After

A friend of my mom’s started teaching dance classes in her basement when I was just a baby. By the time I was three I was clomping around in tap shoes and perfecting my step-ball-changes and toe taps. I didn’t last too many years in ballet and tap class, as I got older my interests went more toward gymnastics and baton. Long gone were the classes taught in the basement of her house, now there was a full fledged dance studio. I really enjoyed my fifteen years as a dance student and have remained close to the studio owner… so close in fact they are now my across the street neighbors. So it was a foregone conclusion when I became pregnant that this child would be a part of the Faulkner’s Dance family too. Now that the Weebles is nearing three she is old enough to take her first dance classes and yesterday she went for the very first time. She totally loved it, no surprise there as she is very fond of our neighbor and already loved to “dance.” I will never push my children to pursue any interest like dance or music unless it is something they want to do. I am happy to encourage and support them in anything they want to try. I hope that Weebles decides she likes dance and continues to take classes as she gets older, but I won’t be too disappointed if she doesn’t. She makes a darn cute ballerina though.

We’re back from the beach and I think everyone is struggling to get back into the swing of things. The Weebs has been throwing epic fits on a daily basis, Andrew has been swamped at work, neither kid is sleeping well and I am having a damn hard time remembering that 11 AM is not an appropriate time to start drinking. I’m not sure if my problem is vacation related or tantrum/no sleep related now that I think about it… either way I’m missing my late morning cocktail something fierce.

Much fun was had during our quarterly trip to Hilton Head. Now that the Peanut is older and mobile he was ready to go once he hit the sand. Okay that isn’t entirely true. He sat down and ate a pound and a half of sand first, then he was all set to go. Digging, tearing down sand castles, chasing birds and hopping over waves are the favorite beach activities for my little ones these days. Although my daughter has added a new requirement: She must be served a lemonade at the beach side bar. She gets her love of fruity drinks from her mama obviously. They also both loved the pools and hanging around the condo with their grandparents and uncle. If it wasn’t such a monumental hassle to pack up our entire home and drive six hours to get there I would be sorely tempted to go twice as often as we do. Luckily our next scheduled trip is only seven weeks away.*

*Dear burglars, Don’t bother counting weeks and coming to my house to try to steal things while I am out of town. It isn’t worth your time. I have four attack cats that will not only worry the living hell out of you, but will also have peed on everything I own to spite me for leaving them so you won’t want anything I have anyway. Thank you kindly.

What? That doesn’t exist?

Sigh. I have been neglectful of my poor blog. And the worst part is, several noteworthy things have been going on and I just haven’t managed to find time and brain energy to sit down and type it out. I’ll reform. I’ll do better. Promise?

Seems like I was supposed to be doing something….

I’d be lying if I didn’t say how frustrated I am. I just reread my post from the end of Feb and it is pretty disheartening to realize that nothing has changed after giving things two more months. NOTHING. Not the pictures I take every ten days, not the measurements, not my weight. For three straight months now I have worked out nearly every day. In an effort to add in more cardio (read, calorie burning) I started the Couch to 5K program. I am six weeks in, running 25 minutes at a stretch every other day. On my off days I originally was sticking with Jillian, either her Biggest Winner DVD’s, NMTZ or Shredding. But, as my run intervals got longer I found myself wanting something that really worked my upper body and core but gave my legs a break now and then. I went through the various Jillian workouts and pulled out ten core exercises and ten upper body ones that I felt gave me the best “bang for the buck.” I grouped the 20 exercises into four sections of five exercises each. Sounding familiar? Then I do 30 reps of each of the five exercises, then start over. This gives me approximately a 20 minute mini-NMTZ without so many damn lunges. I know the lunges are just terrific but they really seem to make workout drone on for me and I felt like the running was kicking my legs into enough shape as it was. I still have squats and sumos and other leg work mixed in there. This should at least keep my interest up for another month or two as  I finish out the C25K program.

Eating hasn’t been perfect. When I first joined WW back in 2004 I was living alone. My husband was away at law school in another state and I basically lived off baby carrots, grapes, low fat popcorn, sugar free jello and sugar free popsicles for six months. And it did work. I do not have that sort of motivation now. There is just no way I can find it within myself. I have cut out all fast food (does Subway count as fast food? I hope not.) and have pretty much knocked diet sodas from the diet too. I skipped out on last month’s Shredhead challenge of food journaling. I knew I needed to do it, but I just didn’t have it in me. I am going to try to start being accountable here tomorrow. I feel like I am eating respectably but certainly not staying within my 20 points a day. For the most part I have Greek yogurt and cereal for breakfast, pasta and tomato sauce or Subway for lunch and then what I call a “normal” dinner. Probably not considered healthy, but not swimming in bacon grease either.

I have dessert at some point every day and yes I know that isn’t helping but admittedly I have an entitlement issue. I breastfeed two toddlers. Two toddlers I am with very nearly around the clock seven days a week. I have been working out religiously which is something I have never done before. And quite honestly, it comes to the point where I have two screaming clingy children dragging at my legs while I try to clean up the crayons and the stickers and the pee and the play doh all while dinner is dangerously close to burning on the stove that I just want to cry. It feels downright unfair that the steps I have taken haven’t made even the teeniest bit of a difference. That the next step is to give up the remainder of the slack I give myself with that cupcake or bowl of ice cream is unthinkable. Can you say emotional eating? But, as a rational *ahem* adult I know it is all about the math. If I really want to see a change I am clearly going to have to take it even further than I already have. I don’t know how I can possibly find more time or energy to devote to workouts than I already am. The question will be: Do I care enough to go back to the baby carrot diet? And the answer is.. probably not honestly. I want to live a healthy lifestyle for myself and as an example to my kids. But I don’t want it to be that extreme. At this point I’m not ready for eating steamed veggies, brown rice and plain chicken or fish every night. (We do actually have that often.. just not ALL the time. We also have taco night and beef roast and mac and cheese too.)  So for now I’ll just keep on keepin’ on…