making friends wherever i go
{ Monthly Archives }
My dad was babysitting this morning and the Fiendling sneaked into the bathroom, climbed up onto the toilet to reach the counter, and unscrewed (push down and turn) the “childproof” lid of his super-delicious gummy vitamins. He’d eaten at least 3 or 4 by the time my dad caught him, though I fear it was actually more like a handful. When I got home he was still crying for “more vimins, more vimins.” This is the second day in a row he’s gotten the lid off. It’s my own damn fault for not moving them out of sight.
I walked my dad out and when I got back upstairs less than a minute later he’d opened the bathroom door again and was up on the toilet trying to get the cap off of my prenatals. “Mama’s vimins.” Today we install a lock on the bathroom door. A medicine cabinet wouldn’t be a bad idea either.
I looked out the window and saw my next door neighbor’s 17 year old son and his delinquent friend obviously up to no good. I couldn’t hear the heated whispers, but I could tell by their body language that something was up. My instincts were correct. The delinquent friend handed the neighbor’s kid a 40 which he hid in a storage bench in their driveway. I called Boyfiend who was in the back yard and said, “Yo, X and his delinquent friend just hid a 40 in the bench in the driveway. You should take it just to fuck with them.” Boyfiend laughed, but wasn’t interested. I said that I should go next door and take it myself. He told me just to leave it alone. So I did.
But what I really want to do is tell his parents. The idea of him drinking and driving the family van, which he’s already smashed up enough in the month he’s had his license, is too much. It was bad when he and his delinquent friends were arguing on the front porch late at night about who owed who money for weed, but in my opinion alcohol is much worse than a little pot. Alcohol leads to blackouts and hit and runs. Weed generally leads to driving 15 in a 35. Maybe I’ll take the 40 anyway.
The Fiendling loves to read to himself. His memory is excellent and he often “reads” pages of books we haven’t read together in a while without making a mistake.
Unfortunately his love for television is still growing. He’s learned how to turn on the tv and the dvd player, open a dvd case, put it in the player and press play. We get new ones from the library each week so I don’t lose my mind watching the same ones repeatedly.
He now identifies shapes without prompting. Except for octagon and pentagon. He needs prompting for those. But triangle, rectangle, circle, oval, diamond and square he’s got down. He also knows ten colors- ROYGBV (well, purple), black, white and brown.
His toddler thoughts astound me. The other day in the car he randomly said, “helicopters fly up high.”
Earlier he opened the refrigerator, opened the drawer, took out a handful of cheese sticks, closed the drawer, closed the drawer, ripped on off one of the sticks, put them all on the counter, opened the fridge, opened the drawer, put back the two sticks he wasn’t going to eat, closed the drawer, closed the door, then started to try to open the plastic on the cheese stick himself before he needed help.
When he asks for chocolate milk he opens the fridge and takes out the milk and chocolate syrup. I hate that he learned how to open the fridge.
He’s in a mommy stage where he demands that I do things like make the chocolate milk and feed him dinner when he’s too hungry/lazy/cranky to feed himself.
He likes to sit in a chair without his tray most of the time now. The other night he climbed up in the chair beside me and ate his butternut squash and caramelized onion galette with a fork. He didn’t even hesitate or test the temperature before digging right in. I was so proud.
He’s in a huge “Fiendling do it” stage where he wants to do everything himself whether he can or not. We have to compromise. He can peel oranges by himself. He can’t change his own diaper. He can pick out what color diaper he wants to wear.
Cuddling with Isaac the cat is a new favorite activity. A quote: “Uh-uh, playground! Cuddle with Isaac!”
Playing with trains is another favorite activity, especially playing with Boyfiend’s old (they were his dad’s) electric trains. The Fiendling can turn them on and off, make them go forward and backward, have them switch tracks (though he often screws this up) and he loves to blow the whistle. His 12 piece wooden train set from Ikea is a reasonable substitute when Boyfiend’s not home to supervise. He makes the trains “go through tunnel,” “crash” and often shoves one in my hand and says, “mama have one too.” Then he throws a fit when I push the train in the wrong direction.
I didn’t want to say “no” to him when he was little because I was afraid he’d grow up to be a toddler who said “no” all of the time. Instead of no I ended up saying “uh-uh,” because now he’s a toddler who says “uh-uh” all of the time. “Uh-uh bath!” “Uh-uh bed!” “Uh-uh playground, watch Thomas!” I suppose “uh-uh” is slightly better than “no,” but I much prefer when he says “uh-huh” with a smile.
Bedtime is less of a battle. Now we read a few stories, kiss him good night and leave the room. We have to stand in the hall until he falls asleep because he will get out of bed repeatedly some nights, but when we tell him to get back into bed he does.
Naps still only happen in the car, but I’ll take what I can get. I’d rather have him sleep in the car than not sleep at all.
I think we’re officially weaned. He hasn’t nursed in more than four weeks. I never dreamed I’d nurse this long, but I’m glad I did. I’m also glad we’re done.
His most charming new habit is that he directs kisses. If I kiss him on the head he’ll sometimes cry, “uh-uh!’ and wipe it off. Then he’ll say nose and present his nose for me to kiss. Then cheek. Then other cheek. Then chin. Then other chin which is his neck. Then eye and other eye. Ear and other ear. Hand and other hand. Head and other head which is just a different place on his head. I love him so much.
I know, I know, no one cares about your dreams, but this one I had to share.
Last night I dreamed I was at a party at Lawmummy’s house and I cracked open an icy cold can of Bud lite. And I drank the whole thing.
In real life Bud Lite is one of those beers that I just don’t drink. If it’s the only beer at a party I may have a cup from the keg, but chances are I’ll take a few sips, make a face and switch to water for the rest of the night. In real life Bud Lite is one of those beers I can’t imagine actually seeing at Lawmummy’s house.
Back to the dream. I’m sitting on the sofa and Lawmummy looks over and notices the empty can in my hand. She gives me a look and says something to the effect of, “If you’re going to drink when you’re pregnant, couldn’t you pick something less offensive. People are going to talk.” I realized that she didn’t know the can was empty, so I took it to the sink, turned the water on and pretended to dump the rest out. Then I passed out on her bed.
Of course I’ve been back on the messageboards since I got pregnant. I’ve stayed away from the baby names boards thus far, stuck with the mainstream board, and found a couple of crunchier boards. The crunchier boards aren’t nearly as insane/white trash as the mainstream board which means there’s a lot less to make fun of. But don’t worry. I still check in on the crazy ladies from my old board every so often.
Because so many of the women on the old March ‘06 board are batshit crazy there have been several shakeups and breakups in the past few years since we were all pregnant together. The board’s now down to just a few dozen of the original women and a few new people after a few splits where women went off to form their own boards. There’s still a ton of infighting and rage with the few members left which means lots of entertainment for me. One of the latest fight threads was because a few Christians on the board felt like their opinions were discounted. Yes, that’s right. The Christians felt persecuted.
Anyway, I just wanted to update you on a few names I will not be selecting for baby #2
The first name wouldn’t be so bad if she’d just picked Audrey or Anna, but combining the two is just silly. I don’t even know what Abiah is about and I don’t want to ask. And Gabryl? What ever happened to spelling things properly?
Montana, as state names go, isn’t the worst. I mean at least the kid’s not named Jersey. But Anthonie? Again, just spell it properly. The “ie” doesn’t make it unique, it just makes the parent look stupid.
Dylan is another name that doesn’t bother me. It’s a fine name, a classic name. It’s not one of my favorites, but it certainly doesn’t offend. But again with the stupid spelling of the middle name. It looks like a typo, not a choice. It’s Michael people, not Mike-eel.
Mix keeps telling me I’m neglecting this blog in favor of my food blog and my boob blog, and it’s true. I was thinking about another year end retrospective and while browsing through the archives I saw that the last few months have been especially pathetic post-wise. I really just haven’t felt like posting.
Since September I’ve been depressed, the most depressed I’ve been since Boyfiend and I broke up in 2003. After the best summer I’ve ever had, a summer with beach vacations, fewer fights with my mom, tons of fresh fruits and vegetables from my CSA, farmers markets and my own garden, happy hours with friends, and many margaritas I peed on a stick and learned I was pregnant just a few weeks after Boyfiend went back to work.
The first week or two wasn’t too terrible. I worked part-time at the bagel place to help out my old boss and my mom came in to babysit. But then I didn’t have anymore babysitters and had to stop working, morning sickness struck with a vengeance, and the Fiendling stopped sleeping through the night again. The wisdom of a second pregnancy eluded me. I didn’t know what the fuck I was thinking getting pregnant when my toddler was such a shitty sleeper and didn’t really want to talk about how depressed I was because of a planned pregnancy. I felt selfish. So many women try so hard to have babies and can’t, and here I was pregnant after two months of unprotected sex and miserable about it.
We didn’t tell anyone about it for another two months. Many of our friends figured it out since I wasn’t drinking (no one seemed to buy my alcoholism excuse for refusing drinks) but we didn’t confirm their suspicions until right around Thanksgiving when I hit the second trimester, my belly exploded, most of the morning sickness ceased, and the Fiendling finally started sleeping a little better. Since then I’ve been feeling better. My depression about being pregnant has faded into acceptance and while I fear for my sanity I’m not quite as terrified as I was a few months ago.
We’re going to have another baby in May. I’m 20 weeks pregnant right now. We’re not finding out the gender and we have no idea what we’re going to do about where the new baby will sleep. Our house is big enough, but it may require some renovation. I really miss margaritas and I really miss happy hour.
But aside from these last few depressing months 2007 was a pretty good year. Boyfiend and I are lucky to have such a smart, sweet boy and another on the way. Let’s hope 2008 is just as good. Stay tuned for posts about swollen ankles, a big belly, and a fat ass.
Happy New Year!