Monday, October 24, 2011

Now With Added Bonus

I posted here a while ago that Peanut was moving into a toddler bed. She was crawling out of her crib and hurting herself and it was just time. The transition was actually easier than I thought it was going to be. It helps that she can't open her door handle yet, so she can't get out of her room unless I open the door for her. But she LOVED her new "big girl bed." She was ALL about it. Check out the face...
The thing of note in this picture is that the crib is still sitting next to the toddler bed. I left that in there for at least a week, and it was actually quite helpful. Every time she wouldn't lay down to go to bed, I would point at the crib and say, "Do you want to go back to your baby crib? No? Well then lay down. If you don't lay down and go to sleep you have to go back to the crib..." And miraculously, this worked pretty well. After almost two weeks, it was time to get the crib out of the room. But before doing that, one has to snap a final picture of the crib sitting in the "nursery."
That crib has been up and in that spot for almost 6 years. It was kind of am emotional thing for me to take it down and put it away. I don't have any desires for more children, so not in that kind of a way, but in the way that the children I DO have are growing up. One is in school already...the other now has her own bed in her "big girl room." It seems like in just a few years they are going to be surly teenagers that only snarl at me as they walk down the hall. No longer my babies.

But once I got the crib down and moved her bed into its spot, I was thrilled with how big her room looked (it's a pretty tiny room). I had bought a little bin to put all of her toys and stuffed animal into and after all of that, there was so much room to play!
And this is what I am referring to in the title when I say "added bonus." I didn't realize that my daughter never played in her room. Neither did her brother for that matter. They always played in either his room, or in the living room with me. Now that her room is set up like this she plays in it ALL the time. She goes in and gets a book and sits on her bed to read it. Or she takes her baby dolls and/or stuffed animals and puts them in her bed, covers them and sings to them. She climbs up on her window seat and sits there with things she has collected around the house. She loves it. And sometimes The Boy joins her too. I have heard him saying to her recently, "Come on...let's go play in your room..." as they run down the hall. The other night, I was doing dishes and I realized it was silent. Since every mom knows that is never a good thing, I turned off the water and went to investigate. The Boy was in his room sitting on the floor playing with his dinosaurs, and The Girl was in her room playing with her dolls. It was the most surreal moment. Both of my children, playing happily in their own rooms. All in a different space. It was pretty glorious. And of course it lasted approximately 30 seconds because The Girl came barreling down the hall not two minutes later to tell me something. But still. It was there.

And the best thing of all? The Boy saying to her after brushing teeth, "Come on...let's go to your room and I will read you a story. We can sit on your bed together."

And then you get moments like these. And you aren't sad that your baby isn't in her crib anymore. You remember why every single stage is so damn awesome.

Friday, October 21, 2011

Lots of "Firsts" In My World Right Now

Today is New Girl's birthday. We are going to have lunch together just the two of us, and then she has asked me to join her for a birthday dinner with all of her friends tonight. I am *officially* being introduced to all of her friends. But that isn't the "first" I was referring to above. This is the first time that I have ever hired a babysitter to come watch my kids that isn't family. Please don't be confused with this being the first time I have left my children because that couldn't be further from the truth. But this is the first time that I have had enough of a life that I felt it necessary to get an actual "babysitter." One that I pay money and that doesn't come to my Christmas celebrations. She comes very highly recommended by my best friend and is a college student. I'm sold. She came over last weekend and met the kids and played with them for a little and she was hired.

So tonight is the first time I am leaving my kids with a babysitter. And I am not at all emotional about it. I am super stoked that I can get out without having to feel guilty about whichever family member I am making give up a Friday night. And tonight should be fun, so I'm excited.

And then tomorrow night I am leaving my children and going away for a night for the first time. I am taking New Girl away to a hotel right on the beach for 24 glorious hours. I am embarrassed to admit that I have not ever once, in the almost 6 years of having kids, had a night where I wasn't with at least one of them. There are only a few times that I have not had both of them since The Girl was born. The first was when I went to the hospital to have her, and The Boy had to sleep at my parents house. That was somewhat traumatic because while I was convinced we had prepared him for every part of my going into the hospital to have a baby, I apparently forgot to mention to him that I would be spending the night in said hospital. He was good with all of it, until he realized he was expected to leave WITHOUT Mommy. That didn't go over well.

The second time was this last June when I took The Boy to the Monterey Bay Aquarium to spend the night for Father's Day. That was the first night I had ever been away from Peanut and she also stayed with my mom. That particular night went fine, but the aftermath with Peanut left a little bit to be desired. There have also been a few night where The Boy has stayed overnight at my moms, or at The Ex's house. But for the past almost 6 years, there has not been ONE morning that I have not had to wake up and tend to a child. There has not been one morning where my only concern was weather or not *I* felt like getting out of bed. The kids are staying with The Ex at my house and I cannot freaking wait. And who knows? I might not feel like getting out of bed the entire time! :)

Thursday, October 13, 2011

Lucky Me

I've been told that I should update my blog telling you all why I have been so absent. After I laughed at the concept that people might actually miss reading my drivel I decided I would do a post.

So yes...the blog isn't as active as it used to be. There's probably lots of reasons for that, but most likely the new girl has something to do with it. I need to come up with some sort of blog name for her...I'll have to think about that.

But in terms of an update, things are still going very well on that front. It's been SUCH a long time since I have had any sort of a love life, I'm not entirely sure what to say about it. But I should tell you that I have honestly never met anyone in my life that treats me the way this woman treats me. It is sort of astounding to me. I keep waiting for her to "figure it out," or "snap out of it," but it doesn't seem as though that is where she's going with things. She seems to very genuinely like me for me. And that is saying a lot. In the past, I have always tried to figure out what a partner needed from me to be happy with me, and then mold myself into that person. I think because A) so much time has passed since I last had a relationship, and B) the ridiculous amount of therapy I have done in that time, that for this relationship I have never even given a thought to who I "should" be. I just am. And I guess because it has come as a nice surprise, but not one that I feel as though I can't live without, I don't have that panicky feeling that it is all going to go away if I don't do something "right." So I am just me. And guess what? She seems to be really happy with that. Such a concept.

Want to know how she treats me like a princess? Here is what she did for me last night. My mom (and all those who have been reading for a while know my mom is my HUGE helper with the kids) is gone for two entire weeks enjoying a (much deserved) vacation to Hawaii. So I am on my own with the kids for two weeks. That isn't a bad thing, and I can certainly handle my kids on my own, but it does mean that I spend WAY more time running around doing kid errands and picking them both up than I do when my mom is in town. And because of that I don't get to bill as many hours during the day. So for the past week since my mom has been gone I have been working after they go to bed more than usual and just generally running myself ragged. So back to last night...

She was waiting at my house for me when I got home with both kids at 5:30. When we got inside she completely took over for both kids (who LOVE her btw, and were both screaming for her attention) while I was able to calmly and nicely cook dinner for everyone. We all sat together at the table and enjoyed a nice dinner. Then after dinner she did jammies and read books with the kids while I cleaned up (again without kids screaming at me that they need this...or can I do that for them...). We all played together for a little while and then got the kids in bed. As I mentioned I have not had nearly enough time to work lately so after the kids were in bed I worked for about 45 minutes while she played on her phone and watched TV. When I was done working I came and sat with her to watch one of my favorite shows on TV. During the show she was rubbing my back and mentioned that it felt like I had a ton of tension in my neck. Duh. I always do. At her instruction I sat on the floor while she sat behind me on the couch and gave me the most amazing massage. I have had lots of professional massages before and this one was right up there. So she massaged me while I got to watch one of my favorite TV shows. She did this for 45 minutes. Insane... And after all of that she helped me close up the house and we retired to a different part of the house for...um...other lovely stuff. And while I obviously won't go into details of that portion of my life I will say that it has been a really long time since I have enjoyed the um...finer points of a relationship...and that I have been more than pleasantly surprised in that area as well.

It all seems to lame when I type it out, probably because it isn't just that I appreciate her for her help or for the fact that she gives great back massages. But the things she says to me, and the things she asks about, and the things she actually does...well it is just different than I have ever been treated before. And I am constantly surprised and taken aback at this behavior. And then she looks at me like I'm a silly little fool for being surprised by her behavior. She seems to think that I should have always been treated like this and is constantly in shock that I have never had this before.

So yeah. It's going really well right now. It's still super early and I am not going to be that lesbian talking U Haul or anything crazy. But it's good. It's all good. So if I have been a little quiet over here...I am just trying to live this life and soak up the good parts of it. I hope you are all doing the same.

Monday, October 3, 2011

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes...

My baby girl is stressing me out. See, she seems to think that she doesn't want to be a baby anymore. Apparently she didn't get the memo that this is Mommy's last baby and she needs to not grow up so damn quick.

About a week ago, when I was *attempting* to have her take her afternoon nap she had other plans. She didn't think napping was going to happen. So I went into her bedroom and took all of her toys out of her crib and told her to lay down and go to sleep. She begged for one toy to hold onto so I gave in and let her have it, but I told her if she wasn't laying down in 10 minutes then I was coming in and taking that one too. Fast forward 10 minutes and I was back in taking that final toy. She was not pleased. She screamed bloody murder for about 5 minutes and then it got silent. I was meeting with a client at the time so I was glad that she had finally gone to sleep. Or so I thought.

About 10 minutes later I turned on the video monitor to discover that she was no longer IN her bed. Not only that, but she had climbed out and was methodically placing every single one of her toys (that I had taken from her) back into her bed. When she finished that, she played in her room for another 40 minutes before she started knocking on her door to be let out please.

All this to say that she is now climbing out of her crib on a regular basis. However, she is not always so stealth as to make it happen in a safe manner. She wrecked her back this weekend on something...she has informed me that "I crawl out of my crib and I yand on my foot and now my foot is broken." (Drama much?) But either way, I went and bought her a toddler bed this weekend. I am having the new girl put it together for her tonight (one of the many benefits of dating!) so we will see how the transition goes...

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Also, I think I may have mentioned once or twice on here that The Boy's new school is super expensive. :) I am so unbelievably happy with his school that there is no question that I will continue to come up with the money to send him there...but it is a stretch. So I have made another change. I have decided to send The Girl to school on Fridays as well so that I can work. I am super sad to have to make this happen. Not because I am lazy and don't want to work. But because in my head I had hoped to be able to have Fridays with my kids until they entered school. The plan was always to go back to a 5 day work week once they were in Kindergarten, but while they were little I wanted to enjoy one day a week with each of them.

Financially this just isn't a smart decision for me right now. So while I am sad that Peanut and I will not get to continue our Mommy/daughter days, I need to do what is right. And as an added aside, Peanut doesn't seem to appreciate our Mommy/daughter days either right now. Now that we drop off The Boy first in the morning (we used to drop her off first but his kindergarten starts earlier), she gets super mad if she isn't going to school next. So for the past few Friday's we have dropped The Boy off and instead of being happy to be going back home with Mommy, she cries the entire way home telling me, "I big girl too. I want to go to school like brother!" So now I guess she will get her wish. And I will pout sitting at my computer working without either of my babies with me.

Why does this all go so fast?