This Moment

A Friday ritual that I am copying from Finding Chaos, who got it from SouleMama.

A single photo– no words – capturing a moment from the week.
A simple, special, extraordinary moment.
A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Happy New Year everyone! Have a safe and fun evening. See you all in 2011...

It's Official...

My daughter is...a girly-girl (GASP!!) I knew this would happen. As soon as that ultrasound showed I was having a girl, I knew that I would be given one that was as "girly" as they come. It's just the law of nature. Although I have to say...it isn't quite as scary as I thought. Sure I still have a mild panic attack when she comes to me in the morning and says, "Wanna fix da hair..." because, let's face it, there aren't a lot of tricks in my arsenal regarding hair styles. But I am learning. I still marvel at the people at her daycare that make her hair look SO cute (little braids and whatnot) and it isn't that I can't do a braid; I can. It's just that I cannot even BEGIN to braid her hair when she's twisting and turning and grabbing the brush and trying to do it herself...etc... So really, she ends up with a little side pony most days.

But there really is no denying her love of all things baby. And this is seriously some in-born stuff we are dealing with here. I bought The Boy a bunch of babies when he was little and he never once picked them up. So when The Girl started getting baby dolls for gifts and stuff I assumed she would act the same. In a word: No. Not the case. She started carrying them around and patting their backs and covering them with her blankets and singing to them. It's amazing how different it is between the two of them. And as you saw previously, one of her gifts from Santa was a cradle and, although she wasn't that into it when she first saw it, she now sits in her room with like three different dolls and puts them in, and covers them and sings to them and then comes out and tells me to be quiet please because her babies are sleeping. And then she finally opened one of her last gifts (she couldn't be bothered on Christmas to actually finish opening her gifts so I just left them under the tree for a "bored moment" assuming she would find them and open them) it turned out to be a little high chair for her babies. She wanted it out right away and put together (god help me...). And now? Now this is her favorite past time...

She takes the feeding of her babies very seriously. My little girly-girl with her side pony...love that little girl!

A Great Holiday

Those of you who know me in real life know that there was a bit of drama this holiday season regarding my family and when we were going to celebrate each occasion and with whom. Since I don't really talk about my family on my blog, I will spare you the details but let you in on the important part. I had to fight hard to have one day this holiday where my kids and I were not obligated to go anywhere or do anything. That day turned out to be Christmas Day. And what a wonderful day it was. I am SO glad I went through what I did to be able to have a day at home with my kids.

Of course it really started the moment we got home from the Christmas Eve festivities. The Boy got all ready for bed and then had to leave the cookies and milk for Santa and the carrots for Rudolph... Look at the anticipation on his little face. I swear if I could bottle that magical feeling...

(Note to the future: Perhaps if one's child is going to leave cookies for said "Santa," then perhaps said Mommy should buy some cookies she actually likes. I hate those damn chocolate things...but it was all we had in the house...)

And once the children were all snug in their heads with their visions of sugar plums... Then it was time for me to get to work. Fortunately The Ex and I had a good agreement this year. I paid for all the Santa stuff, but I sent it all home with her in the boxes and made her put it all together. Therefore once the kids were in bed, I went underneath the quilt in my room and found everything ready to be wheeled out. Here is the loot: Stockings for both of course, a Skuut Balance Bike for The Boy, his Bat Cave (the only thing he actually asked Santa for besides flash cards...), a new cradle and new dolly for Peanut, a new shopping cart for her as well, and then a Crayola drawing thing that they will both share...
Note the movie that is on the TV--mandatory for Christmas Eve in my house! And then I had a glass of wine and went to bed. The Boy got up about 7:15am and we texted The Ex (who was coming over for Santa time in the morning--how nice am I?) and while we waited for her The Girl got up and enjoyed her morning milk and then they tore out into the living room at about 7:45am. Not too bad. Of course The Boy LOVED, loved, loved his batcave...
The Girl was a fan of her shopping cart and didn't so much care about her dolly or her cradle, although she has really used and enjoyed both of them since then. I think her favorite gifts would be the shopping cart and this other dolly with a bottle...because apparently it's ALL about the bottle. Who knew?
And as you see in the above picture, The Girl stayed in her jammies all day long. It was fabulous. We had The Ex here until about 10:00 in the morning and then she left and it was just me and the kids until about 2:30 when my mom, step dad and grandmother came over. We had a mellow afternoon and had some good food, but it was SO relaxing and so lovely. I really had a great day. I am so unbelievably lucky to have the kids that I do and the family that I do. I really realized that this holiday season. Perhaps because my 94 year old grandmother is getting up there, or perhaps because I don't have a partner...but for whatever reason, I was eternally grateful to have the life that I do.

And then the next day, instead of being anal-retentive girl and ripping down all of Christmas I had a leisurely morning and took the kids on a walk. It was a great weekend. Exactly what the holidays SHOULD be.
Hope you all had a wonderful weekend as well, however you celebrate. And here's to a great 2011!

Happy Holidays to You!

I am wishing all of my internet friends a wonderful and happy holiday. If you know me in real life and got my Christmas card, just move along. :) But for the friends I know through my blog and the internet, here was the holiday cards that were sent out of my house.

The stockings are all stuffed by the chimney with care and Santa has visited and left all the gifts for the morning. I am enjoying a glass of milk left out by a certain red-headed little boy, finishing up watching A Christmas Story and then heading to bed. I can't wait to wake up with my little ones to watch them enjoy the morning. I hope you are all enjoying a relaxing and wonderful holiday. Merry Christmas to all!

Holy Crap, the 400th Post!

First of all, this is my 400th post! And don't I wish this was going to be some spectacular post worthy of that great number...alas, it's not. I feel so sad for my poor, neglected blog. Not because I kid myself enough to think that my readers (all 10 of you) are sitting at home staring at your computer screen thinking, "I enjoy her posts SO much...I just wish she would post more..." No, I don't think that at all. But the main reason I do this blog at all is for myself and for my kids. And to keep record of this crazy life that seems to be flying by me at a rate faster than I can possibly absorb. So I write it for me, and for my children when they are old enough to read it. And because of that, I am a little sad that I haven't been more diligent in updating during this holiday season. Because this is one of the special ones. It really is. My children will only be young for so long and this is truly the "magical" time. My son is SO taken by the entire season and my daughter is at the most hysterical and sweet age that I could literally eat her up and not get enough. Alas, I have work and I have to prepare for said holiday so that the children CAN enjoy the hell out of it and, as always, there simply aren't enough hours in the day for me to get it all done. And so my record keeping (aka the blog) suffers.

We are a mere 3 days away from THE BIG DAY, as it is known in my house. And everyone is all a flurry of excitement. Unfortunately my clients don't seem to care about that and still want their damn bookkeeping done. It is quite rude actually. And to further that notion, they don't seem to understand that my daughter is out of daycare for 2 entire weeks, thus leaving me with nary of a moment of time to work on said bookkeeping. So I spend the entire day doing a balancing act. As I type away and try and figure out the numbers my daughter follows me around the house telling me it's time to read a book. Add to that the pressure of having all the gifts and stockings (the damn stockings!! Whose idea WAS that anyway?!?! What a waste of time and money...) and food and everything ready for the big day and you have one tired Mommy.

BUT. There are moments. There are moments during each and every single day that I stop for just a millisecond and I smile in my heart. Because these are THE moments. You know? The ones that make it all worthwhile? There are so many of them lately. From my son singing all the Christmas carols he knows while falling asleep at night to my daughter just recently mastering singing Jingle Bell Rock that make me smile. A moment like the other night when I walked down the hall about an hour before bed time and noticed that my son's door was closed. This usually means he has had quite enough of his sister thankyouverymuch and has taken a break. So I walked the house looking for his sister and when I couldn't find her I knocked on his door and entered. What I found was enough to bring tears to my eyes. They were both sitting on his bed leaning against his pillow and he had turned out all the lights but turned on the lights from his little Christmas tree in his room. It was dark except for the light of the tree and they were laying together singing songs. And not only that, but he had gone into her room and gotten her pillow (if I'm being honest it is one of those damn pillow pets that they advertise for all the time--I can't help it! They love the freaking things!) and her lovey for her and they were laying together actually holding hands. I seriously cried. He told me to please shut the door because this was a brother and sister special moment. Of course I shut it immediately and smiled while doing so. THIS is why I had two of them. THIS RIGHT HERE. This bond that they have. These holidays that they are sharing together. The fact that on Christmas morning they will run down the hall TOGETHER to see what Santa brought for them. My son isn't doing it alone. He has a sibling to share it with. And all the drama of getting pregnant and being the single mom who CHOSE (gasp!!) to have another child on my own is all culminated in that very moment. My heart literally bursts with joy.

Of course then I had to continue down the hall because I was in the middle of 15 things and needed to continue. But the point is, I stopped and I DID notice. And even as I try and type this blog entry my son just came barreling down the hall into my office because my time of typing has come to an end. He wants to tell me a story about a ladybug who has small claws on their legs so they can poke holes in the leaves...

Of course the monotony of life is still here and it also exists in my son's everlasting stories about his bugs and his friends...and I can honestly no longer hear myself think because we have now moved on to listening to how his ants in his ant farms dug tunnels so they too could have holes to live in...and dear god I just can't shoo him away. I will go and listen to the end of his story and then I will brush his teeth and put him to bed and then I will go and sit at my computer and work for the next two hours until it is almost 11:00 at night at which time I will stumble to my room, turn on an old rerun of Golden Girls from my DVR and fall asleep before the credits are even done rolling. Thus is my life lately. But as I pointed out earlier, amongst the craziness and work and preparations for the holiday season, there are some super special times. I just wish I had more time to stop and enjoy them and document them here for me to look back on later. Because for some reason this year I am acutely aware of the fact that my kids will not be small forever. They will be sullen teenagers who just await their gifts and skip past the singing of songs and the magic of the season and just sit with their iPods playing in their ears and only stop long enough to rip the paper off their gifts and then go back to their room to enjoy them. I know this is coming. And that is why NOW is so special. And that is why I feel like I need to "bottle" now and be able to look back and remember it.

But for tonight I will just put a little red-headed boy to bed and listen to his stories about bugs and hug him and we will read Twas the Night Before Christmas and I will kiss his little head and then listen to him sing softly on his monitor while I work.

And since you have stuck with me for this long, babbling post...here are some pics. Because of course we all know that's why you really come here anyway, right? The Boy decorating a gingerbread man:

And The Girl when we were picking out our Christmas tree. I don't know how I snapped this picture but it is SO her. The little face, that little expression...just totally my daughter. Love her so much...
Happy Holidays everyone. May you all be enjoying it as much as I am!

I Swear I'll Post Something of Substance at Some Point...

We interrupt this blogging haitus for these words:

Thank you, Spout PBS, for airing the Calliou Holiday Movie on this rainy Sunday morning in December and giving me an hour and a half with which to get things done. I do not, however, thank you for airing commercials during said movie because my son is now following me around going, "You know what else I want for Christmas...I saw it on a commercial during Calliou..."

Ugh. Is this why everybody bashes the TV watching by young kids? :)

Neglect

I've been neglecting my blog lately; it's true. But I have also been neglecting my health which is why my throat is so raw that I can't even begin to swallow and I have no voice to speak of, or to speak with for that matter. I have also been neglecting my sleep, my laundry, my house work and probably some of my good friends.

But here is what I have NOT been neglecting. First of all my kids. On Friday I sent my daughter to daycare even though she doesn't usually go on Fridays (okay so maybe I neglected HER a little bit...) so that I could have an entire one-on-one day with my son. We went to Petroglyph to make Christmas presents, had a little lunch, went and saw Tangled at the movies and then ended the day back at his school for his performance of the Holiday Program where he sang 5 songs like a champ. It was an amazing day and I am SO glad I carved out some time just for him.

I have not been missing these holiday moments with either of my kids. As you saw in my Friday "this moment" post, my daughter is unbelievably cute in her little Santa hat as she runs around the house singing Jingle Bells. She stops by our Christmas tree every single time she passes it and tells me, "Oooohhh! So pretty!" which is quickly followed by, "Don't TOUCH! We don't touch the ornaments..." as she gives me a sideways grin and proceeds to touch every single ornament that she can reach. BUT! She isn't pulling them off so that's something. I have said before and I'll say it again, I think this might be the greatest year ever for my son and the holidays. It is just so...magical for him. I want to bottle this time and save it for when he's a sullen teenager telling me, "just give me my gifts!" When we went driving the other night and looked at lights he said to me, "Mommy these lights are a special rainbow made just for my eyes!" I know, right? Kills me...

I have not been neglecting my so-unbelievably-busy work schedule and I can't get over how much work there really is to be done. I am not sure I will ever get back on top of it all but I am doing my damnest to try and get myself out from under the pile. And so far nothing tragic has happened... (knock on wood...knock on wood...)

AND! I am almost done Christmas shopping. I still have the damn stockings to deal with but all the big gifts have been done and ordered and most have arrived. PLUS! Super bonus. I actually got my Christmas cards (photo picture cards plus a letter) written, addressed, stamped and mailed out this morning. And believe me, that was no easy task as I send out over 60 cards and hand addressed them all.

So as you see...tis the season for lots of things. It just doesn't appear to be the season for updating my blog. Which is unfortunate really because there are some pretty damn cute and priceless moments going on in my world right now and I would love it if I had the super human strength needed to document it all here so I can look back later and swoon. But...like I said, the Christmas cards got mailed. So that's something.

This Moment

A Friday ritual that I am copying from Finding Chaos, who got it from SouleMama.

A single photo– no words – capturing a moment from the week.
A simple, special, extraordinary moment.
A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

'Tis the Season

In my family we celebrate Christmas. And it is such a different time as an adult than it is as a child. And thank God right? It is such a magical time for kids. And I think part of our jobs as parents is to attempt to give that type of a feeling to our children. But I think for a lot of adults in general, Christmas and the holidays in general isn’t anywhere near as amazing as it was when you were a child. And part of that is because you are trying to give your children that magical experience and the magic doesn’t just come out of nowhere does it?

We work hard as parents to create the perfect holiday moments. But the moments with our children when they are young and impressionable and sweet during the holidays are amongst the best. Seeing their little faces when they walk down the hall and see a full stocking that Santa filled for them? And then the look of pure amazement on their faces when they see the almost-completely-gone cookies and milk they left out the night before for Santa and you can practically hear them thinking, “He was actually HERE last night.” It really is a magical time for them. And, I think, for us as parents. This is what we work for all year long. Not necessarily the gifts, because although seeing the kids open and enjoy those gifts is fabulous, it’s the whole “Santa coming to visit” thing that makes it all spectacular. I remember feeling like that as a kid too. I remember going outside of my grandmother’s house at like 8:00 at night and looking up in the sky and seeing (what was probably the lights of an airplane) Santa and the reindeer flying and just knowing that it was Santa. And that feeling of joy that comes with it. Not only gifts, but gifts from Santa!!, which of course was different than gifts from my parents. They were the special ones. Parents gave stuff like underwear and clothes and stuff, but the stuff that came from Santa was always awesome. Somehow he knew exactly which present would be your favorite and it always came from him. Funny how that happens.

All of this to say that this time when the kids are young and they feel this way goes so fast. My son will be 5 in January and he is still firmly in the magical kingdom. But when talking to my Mom about plans for the early morning she said, “You know it won’t always be like this.” In a few years he will know and it will be different. And then it will be that way for The Girl for as long as her brother keeps his mouth shut…and then it is just different.” And she’s right. I hadn’t thought of that. I guess I just thought it would always be like this. But I don’t know how many more years I have of this innocence and love and pure joy. I want to live it while it’s here.

The other day in the car we were listening to Christmas music. And for the first time this season my son heard the song “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” and he thought it was great. We talked about how it was a silly song and we laughed and listened to it again. One the second listen through my son was trying to sing along with the chorus and suddenly he stopped singing and said, “What do they mean ‘there’s no such thing as Santa…” ? Why would they say that?” Cause you know that’s part of the chorus. Sing it for a minute in your head…I’ll wait…

Right? So of course my little OCD son picks up on that. I proceeded to tell him that it was just part of the silly song. Of course Grandma wouldn’t get run over by a reindeer! And of course there’ such a thing as Santa!” Silly song!!

But how much longer do we get to believe that?

This Moment

A Friday ritual that I am copying from Finding Chaos, who got it from SouleMama.

A single photo– no words – capturing a moment from the week.
A simple, special, extraordinary moment.
A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

Poop Update

Because I know you are all dying to hear about this. In fact the only reason I am posting this is because 'tis the season for all things flu and yuck and I thought I might be able to help someone else out who might be going through something similar. If you don't have kids at home who might or might not come down with the flu this season feel free to just skip past this entire post.

To recap: The Girl as had horrific diarrhea for the past...um...today is day 6. And when I say horrific, trust me, I mean it. Explosive, water type yuckiness that happens three to four times a day. No fever and for the most part she is acting mostly normal. She is a little more clingy and whiny than usual and for sure she has less of an appetite than normal, but other than that, when she isn't physically pooping, she seems to be okay. In terms of the poop (so sorry...) what has been happening for The Girl is that she starts to cry and asks to have her diaper changed. Generally at that point there is nothing there to change. But about 10 minutes after that happens she bursts into tears and starts screaming, squats down and has "a blast." It literally puddles at the bottom of her jammies if she's wearing them, and if not, then physically goes to the floor. Good times...

So that has been going on for 6 days now and after the fourth time yesterday I decided that I was going to bring her into the doctor to test for allergies or something. This happened at the end of September/early October so this was the second time this type of thing had happened with her and I wanted to make sure that I wasn't giving her some food to set it off, or doing something else that was causing it. Plus I was getting worried about dehydration given that she absolutely refuses to drink pedia.lite, or Gator.ade or any of those other things they recommend and I was sure she was losing weight. So I called the doctor this morning and they said since it was the second time it has happened and we were on day 6 to bring her in.

Bottom line: Stomach flu. As someone who really hates barfing I can thank my daughter that she doesn't seem to have that type of flu. But that appears to be what this is. The doctor said the things to look for and/or worry about are blood or mucus in the stool and dehydration. I asked him the signs of that and he laughed and said, "She's fine. I heard her screaming all the way down the hall. She wouldn't be doing that if she were dehydrated." Point taken. But apparently the signs to watch for are obviously no urine output, lack of saliva in her mouth, chapped lips, no tears...that kind of thing. I asked about the B.R.A.T. diet and he said it doesn't make it go away it just sometimes helps the symptoms. So give her mild stuff to eat but I don't have to be totally anal about that diet (thank God, she HATES it). He said to basically leave her alone in terms of eating and let her do her own thing. Her body will send her cues. Put out a bowl of toasted "O's" and let her snack on them. But don't bug her to eat. Think about how we feel when we have the stomach flu and realize we don't want to eat at all; she probably doesn't either. If she is freaking out about wanting her milk and it doesn't seem to make things worse then let her have milk. But basically it just needs to run it's course. And sometimes this can take up to two weeks.

I asked about having to keep her home from daycare (!!!) and he said she was probably only contagious for the first few days and since we are on day 6 there is little chance that she is giving it to the other kids at this point. So anyway, he won't start worrying unless there's blood or mucus and/or it lasts more than 2 weeks. So continue on, business as usual. Anyway, like I said, since this is cold and flu season I just thought I should post this so that if someone else is dealing with their kids yuck-fest maybe this can help them know what's going on. Hopefully she will be on the mend soon.

PS--To my regular commenter who asked how her daycare would simply change her outfit four times full of poop and not call me...well I had warned them about what was going on and told them to call if she was upset or cranky or causing them too much work, or lethargic etc... And since she was acting perfectly fine in between bouts of poop, they went with it. And I'm fine with that. They know her very well and love her and I trust they would call me if she was in trouble. I am grateful that they are still willing to take her everyday given that she is a walking poop machine. And of course I knew getting into single motherhood that there would be days/weeks like this and I would NEVER change anything for the world. I adore my kids and don't ever question the bad with the good. But I also don't want to sugar coat things either and there are times when it really IS tough to be the only one in a house with two kids when one of them is sick. And I try to keep it real on my blog so I was simply expressing that it had been a LONG weekend home alone with both of them.

Here's hoping all of your kids are flu and poop free all winter long! :)