Rant

Last night Jo suggested we go out for dinner – yippee! I’m all for not having to cook. We loaded the mini-van with protesting kids (they wanted to stay home, maybe for some more of my hallucination-causing cooking?) and headed off to Licks, a family friendly restaurant (it’s kind of a goofy place, but the burgers are good and the kids can run around without causing a lawsuit against us). Anyhoooo, the only other family there happened to be Grace’s former “care”giver (dum dum dummmmmm!) Now, this “care”giver looked after Ms. Grace for under a year. It was during this time that Grace was going through her hitting phase and general two-year old mini-terrorist phase. Being a first time parent and not having any experience with kids whatsoever, I didn’t know that this was perfectly normal behaviour in two year olds. This “care”giver told Jo and I that Grace was abnormally aggressive, not capable of socialization and a general terror. She placed Grace on probation more than once. She had me convinced that Grace would become a danger to society. I also later learned that she used less than desirable time-out techniques on Gracie (my heart bleeds when I think about this). Jo had it after a particularly unpleasant exchange with the “care”giver and we found a new daycare for Grace that day in which she thrived. We also learned that, hey, two year olds hit and say no a lot, and that’s okay! I also developed a stomach burning hatred for this former “care”giver who I really feel caused a lot of stress between Grace and I for those few months.
Back to the restaurant. I’ve been into karma lately and thought I would be civil to this woman and her family, and besides, we were the only ones in the restaurant so it would have been weird if we didn’t acknowledge each other. I said hi, made pleasantries, cooed over her kids (who are not endearing at all) and went back to our table. Her husband never looked up from his meal to acknowledge me, and they slunked out of the restaurant without saying bye. This kind of cowardly behaviour really crawls up my ass. Get over yourself bitch and grab a pair. You screwed us, remember? You made me question my daughter, myself as a mother, my choice to return to work, you even made me question whether or not I should have another child, because I couldn’t bear the thought of having another “bad seed”. Fuck you. If I can put it all aside and say hello, hug your child and smile at you, you can at least not sneak out of the restaurant without acknowledging my family.
When Jo and I asked Grace if she remembered who that lady was, she said no. Thank you Jesus. At least she can close that chapter of her life. Wish I could do the same.

What does it all mean?

• Last night I dreamt that Edie was the size of a PollyPocket doll and I carried her around in the cuff of my jeans. She had very fluffy hair and had jeans and a hot pink vest on. I was participating in frosh week activities and panicked when she fell out my jeans, I couldn’t find her anywhere and started to freak out. Eventually I saw her tiny little self running around in a field and I scooped her up and put her back in the cuff of my jeans.
• Edie had a little nightmare about ice cream. Not sure what was going on in her noggin, but she kept moaning “ice cream ice cream ice cream” in her sleep. A little back rub put her back into la-la land, but she made me want ice cream too!
• Grace had a bigger nightmare – she couldn’t tell me what it was about because it was “too scary to tell”. Poor girl. I remember having nightmares that were too scary to talk about when I was little.

I’ll have to check with Jo to see if he had a weird dream or not. I wonder if it’s my cooking that’s causing all this?

We’ve been having way too many threesomes lately!
Got your attention? Good! Now get your mind out of the gutter because I’m taking about our 2 year old.
Miss Edie has been inviting herself into our bed almost every night now since the operation. The doctor has assured us that she is fine and perfectly healthy in every way. Judging from the way my back feels, I think she has gotten quite used to being attached to one of us constantly (god forbid her Robbie’s should touch the ground!) Well, I think we’ve had it. I don’t mind so much (I get her sweet smelling head on my shoulder) but Jo is getting a little fed up with having her foot up his nostril. Last night we made a decision to put an end to her invading our precious alone time together. We resolved to let her cry (I’m not gonna say for how long – I don’t web-nasties to harass me). Once she finally settled, we didn’t hear another peep from her and I had to wake her at 7:30 this morning. Good, right? Well, just because the stars can never completely be aligned, guess who hollered out at 4:30 this morning? You got it, Miss. Grace did. She first hollered for me, and upon stumbling bleary eyed into her room, she requested that I fetch Jo to comfort her from her night- mare. Uhhh, sure. Why the hell didn’t she call out for him in the first place? Perhaps she was worried that she might hurt my feelings.
We’ll see what tonight brings!

The Soul of a Tortured Artist

So the other day I’m making dinner and Grace is planted in front of me at the bar busy doing her art. Being the supportive, encouraging mother I am, my enthusiasm bubbles over for anything my children produce. This time being no exception, I threw out an “Oh Grace, what a wonderful rocket ship!” After a very stony silence, Grace informed me that it was a Christmas tree, not a rocket ship and said, I quote, “You just don’t understand my art, Mommy”. She then silently descended from her perch, took her drawing, and retired to her room. Wow. I wonder what adolescence will bring.

what strep throat will do to a five year old on a beautiful saturday afternoon
poor gracie, we had no idea. what a trooper.

Edie Before and After
It doesn't look too dramatic here, but there is a difference. Plus, once the blood goes away, I'm sure the difference will be even more obvious.
They almost didn't do the operation due to Edie's cold (number kajillion of the winter). I think they could sense our despair of having fasted this poor two year old all night and morning, getting her all prepped and ready for action. Also, the amount of psychological prepping Jo and I had to due was pretty intense as well. In the end, they felt the gain out weighed the risk, so they went ahead. I had been so strong up until that moment they took her away. Seeing her in the nurses arms, with her own arms outstretched to me, crying, screaming Mommy! Mommy! made me pretty much lose my bones and melt into a puddle on the floor. Luckily, big strong Jo was there to pick up my sorry self and get me out of ear shot. Thank god one of us is strong in these situations.
Edie did remarkably well, and what I will remember forever from that day is when she was brought out crying from the operation. As soon as she was in my arms, she immediately grew quiet and went back to sleep. It was a very profound moment for me, that I could comfort her that way. Sniff.

EDIE'S OPERATION WAS A SUCCESS! THANKS FOR THE CALLS AND EMAILS....YIPPEE!
Details to follow later....

Husband Seeks to Divorce Wife Due to her Ridiculous Library Fines

Well, he’s not going to leave me but he’s not happy with me. I got all excited last summer with the whole concept of going to the library, taking out a kajillion books and DVD’s, for absolutely FREE! I sort of forgot along the way that you have to return these items, and what I really didn’t know is that you have to pay $1.00 for every day a DVD is late being returned. The outcome? A $130.00 fine from the Ottawa Public Library, who have turned my case over to a collection agency. Sheesh, I think that’s a little hardcore considering I was late returning a few Baby Einstein videos and Dr. Seuss books. I guess baby’s not buyin’ any new boots any time soon.

I had Edie in for her pre-op appointment yesterday and it’s all a go for her operation tomorrow. I’m a little concerned about how she will deal with it. Last night she looked at a little cut on her finger (a week-old wound) and burst into tears crying “waaa!!! Bo-Bo!” How is she going to deal with her eyeballs being operated on???

Grace is showing signs of jealousy, I guess by all the concern people are showing over Edie’s operation. Yesterday at the Dr.’s office she insisted on also being weighed and having her chest listened to, eyes and ears looked at. She claimed that she was “sicker” than Edie and even wanted to get a needle. Weird. (And no, the doctor didn’t give her the luxury of an unnecessary needle).

If you want to send donations to my library fine fund, you know where to contact me :)

Giant baby head….

I have pretty much the coolest job ever. I was encouraged (told to) go see the Ron Mueck exhibit at the National Gallery
If you are in Ottawa, you should go check this out. His models are so real it is unsettling. The one thing that made me sort of laugh inside though is that, like I mentioned, everything is very real looking, from the wrinkles to the pubic hair to the toe nails of the subjects. Then you get to the woman who has just given birth and her new baby is lying on her stomach, umbilical cord still attached. Even this artist who focuses so intently on making the subjects realistic feels the need to sanitize the whole notion of childbirth. It’s not clean and pristine, it can be downright messy and kind of gross. While the birth of my two girls was a beautiful thing, I would never consider the birth of other people’s babies to be.

Okay, enough with the soap box. Here are the things I hope to accomplish this weekend, stay tuned next week to see if it gets done:

1) Clean out the medicine cupboard (when Grace required cough suppressant at 3:00 a.m. last week, I was less than thrilled with myself when I discovered I had put an empty bottle back in the cupboard – WHY do I these things!)
2) Get Edie to nap (please God, please let her nap!)
3) Round up some new slow cooker recipes (everything is starting to tase like tomatoes and oregano).
4) Go for a run. I only got out once this week and I feel pasty, pudgy and low on energy.
5) Clean out my closet (gotta make room for the all the spring stuff I’m itching to buy!)
6) Build a snow-fort (hopefully the girls will help!)
7) Make some time and call my best girlfriends who are unfairly scattered around North America.


We’ll see, we’ll see.

Other odds and ends:

My father-in-law has parked his Mercedes in our driveway. I’m acting very aloof about it and letting the neighbours speculate. Hee hee.

Grace has two birthday parties this weekend, Edie has one. My God, even Edie has more social action than I do and she’s only 2!

Jonas has his second last hockey game of the season tomorrow….yippee! I get my husband back!

Edie was scheduled to have her operation back in January, but because of a nasty cold, it had to be delayed (for the record, Edie has been on and off sick since October 21st). I have to admit I was a little bit relieved when it was cancelled as I’m no fan of my baby being put under and operated on. The date was moved to March 7, and that’s next week! I brought her to the doctor yesterday to get her checked out due to yet another nasty cold, and the good doctor wants to see her again next Monday to give her a pre-operation go-over.
I’m nervous. I have a feeling the operation is going to happen. I feel nervous because I like user manuals, instruction booklets and step-by-step guidelines for things, and after Edie’s operation she’ll just get sent home with us, same day, with whatever instructions from the doctor we have retained in our grey matter (I’m not so good at retaining information – especially important information. Now ask me any celebrity related question and for some reason I can retain this and can spew out facts and figures).
I have a few other blogs I’m faithful to, and take great comfort in knowing that there are other moms who know what’s it’s like to have to bring their child to the hospital; Chantal over at http://www.breadcrumbsinthebutter.typepad.com went through hell with her son and a rare illness and http://www.mamatulip.com/will be visiting the hospital soon with her little one soon. I don’t know these people, but reading about their experiences helps me a lot.

Enough about that.

Grandad came over last night and babysat while Jo and I wined and dined. We needed that. Did you know at the Keg you can have your glass of wine “Keg-sized”? I guess this is the classy version of “super-sizing” something. Yum! Both kids slept through the night (hollah!) but it was still painful to get up at 6 a.m. We have our alarm set to a radio station, like many others do I’m sure. So, I’m wondering what the song programmers are thinking when they play songs like Avalon by Roxy Music http://www.mp3.com/albums/13741/summary.html?from=88575 Is this going to make me jump out bed and get going in the morning??? No, it’s going to make me feel all warm and fuzzy and fall right back to sleep, like I did this morning.

I catch my bus to get to work for 7:00. I have a few reasons for doing this. The bus is crowd-free at this hour in the morning and the bus driver is friendly (he stops for me when he sees me running down the street. I get downtown in 15 minutes because there is no traffic and the bus just zooms along. Getting to work this early means I get to leave work at 3:00, giving me extra time at home to work out, get dinner ready and pick the kids up early so I have some quality time with them before shipping them off to bed.
This morning, Edie and Grace were early birds and were both awake before I had to leave the house. They both seemed happy and surprised to see me. They were both so fluffy and sweet. When I walked out the door there were tears (Edie) and quiet sadness (please don’t go Mommy) from Grace. It was then I realized that there is another reason I get up so goddamned early every morning….it’s so I don’t have deal with the guilt of leaving my family every morning.
Sigh.

I have a two year old.

Edie the Bikini is two years old today. She came into the world easily and adapted to her surroundings easily. She rarely woke her daddy or me in the middle of night – in fact we had to wake her for her evening feedings. She is so different from her sister – quick to smile, but also quick to cry. When in the safety of our arms, she greets strangers with a great big HI! and looks a little perplexed when the greeting is not returned. Most of the time though, her sunny disposition is hard to resist, and for the most part she gets an enthusiastic Hi! back.
And now she is two, and now she tests us, and she sometimes annoys us and she sometimes tortures her big sister. This is her right as a two year old. Why would anyone expect anything else from her?
All I know, is at the end of the day, when I get that big (sometimes snotty) kiss goodnight, it still melts my heart.

I have a five year old.

Ms. Grace is five. She's half a decade old. I'm glad she woke up early this morning so I could see her before I headed off to work. I'm glad her daddy emailed me to report that she was tickled when everyone rushed to wish her a happy birthday at her daycare - apparently she was absolutely bursting with pride. I'm glad this very non-domestic mommy took time to make and frost cupcakes last night to share with her kindergarten class. I'm glad I have a husband who saw the importance of driving the cupcakes over to her school to ensure that they got there safely. I'm glad that I'm just as excited as she is to open her gifts tonight. I'm glad that after struggling with post partum depression I can finally feel the joy, pride, optimism that a mommy should feel on her child's birthday.

I'm glad I get to do it all over again tomorrow when Edie turns 2.

High’s and Low’s

High: Went to a movie Saturday night, it was Music and Lyrics. The opening credits are worth the price of admission alone. Lots of laughing out loud.

Low: Upon getting ready to go to the movie, I sprinkled baby powder in my hair to absorb the grease – couldn’t remember last time I washed my hair.

High: Brought both girls to Cosmic Adventures on Sunday for a birthday party and they both had tons of fun.

Low: Edie screamed all the way home. The really bad part is she was screaming bo-bo, which means she was hurting somewhere and nothing I did made it better.

High: Had all the grandparents and Auntie over for a birthday dinner for the girls last night and fun was had by all.

Low(s): 1 new noisy toy; Grace crumbling in tears at bedtime because she wanted to her new puzzle one more time and we said no; Edie’s little tantrums at the dinner table because she didn’t want to sit in her high chair; the fact that we are doing all this all over again when we have Grace’s birthday party with her friends next weekend (actually, this isn’t a low, I kind of get excited too).

High: New, high thread count sheets, pillow cases and duvet cover.

Low: Edie waking up every night at 2 a.m.

High: Putting in couch time to catch up on PVR’d Gray’s Anatomy, the Office and Lost

Low, very low: Gray’s Anatomy didn’t record properly so I couldn’t watch part II!! GACK!

Hope everyone else had a good weekend!

So why do you do it then?

Have you ever noticed that kids can be so smart, but also a little thick at the same time? Case in point, we have these chairs at home that are high up and have bars on the back of them. I lifted Edie up on to me last night so she could see what was going on in the kitchen. Edie then turned herself around in one; promptly got her leg wedged in the bars and couldn’t get it out. Crying ensued, said leg was rescued, tears were dried, the world was once more a happy place. Until she put the same leg, through the same bar, and got stuck again, and again, and again. Look, I know that kids learn via repetition, but come on, how many times do you have to hurt yourself before you get it? After rescue kajillion, my patience was wearing thin and I was no longer a sympathetic Mommy with tissues to dry up the tears. That’s when my wise almost five year old very calmly suggested I take Edie down from the high up chair so she doesn’t keep getting her leg stuck.

Oh. Right. The lovely thing about Grace is that she didn’t say it with even a note of condescension.

Oh my god, this is hilarious. If you have a blog, use this translator
http://www.gizoogle.com/, if you don’t check out my blog translated….

http://sites.gizoogle.com/index2.php?url=http%3A%2F%2Fmeanoldmommy.blogspot.com%2F

Super-DUPER funny!

Thanks to Christopher for passing it on!

Am I middle aged????

Gasp, I just found out now, a minute ago, that the Grammy's were on last night. I used to be on top of this stuff, watch it, talk about it the next day. I had no idea they were on last night ! Oh man, I feel so out of it.

Same make, different model

When we had Edie, I just assumed that raising her be the exact same as raising Grace. I quickly learned that this wasn’t case. Edie never fell asleep in the car (Grace’s chin was always touching her belly in the car); Gracie was a somewhat difficult baby, Edie was easy-peasy. Grace bounced back after a fall. Edie needs several day to recover; Grace would laugh in the face of a stern voice, Edie crumbles to her knees, begging forgiveness for any wrong doing. Grace potty trained at 2 years and 3 months old with 1 accident. Edie has other plans. Edie is just shy of turning two and she wants it bad. She wants others around her to rush her to the potty the minute she says “pee!” She wants a high five every time she gets it right. Sounds great, right? Problem is I’m not ready for this. Diapers are easy, let them get filled up, change them now and then, and you’re good. Toddlers with no diapers is not easy. You are running to the bathroom constantly and doling out stickers for jobs well done (I’ll add here that Edie also sees to it that I get a sticker for a “job well done”). What I’m saying here folks is that I’m lazy and I want to wait until it is pretty and warm outside so we can have our first trial and errors under Mother Nature’s watchful eye and not on our family room carpet. I have a feeling I won’t be asked to write any parenting books in the near future!

wow. i just looked at my calendar and it is FULL. for a brief moment, i felt proud of myself, happy that we are so popular and socially engaged. then i took a closer look. this weekend holds family fun day at the school and a birthday party at Midway (Hollah!) next weekend holds, wait for it, not one, but three birthday parties (all for the five and under crowd). how to pick, how to pick. and the following weekend we celebrate both of our girls' birthdays at Cosmic Adventure/grandma's house, our house, etc. Not one flippin' thing on the calendar is something for me and Jo to do jointly, and not one thing is on the calendar for me to do solo (no, I'm not going to count my appointment with my gynie as an outing!) Somebody, invite me out!

Wait, Feb. 16, i do have an inivitation to meet other women who bitch about their life in their blog! i think i invited myself, does that count?

thank god for t.v.....












i don't know how single parents do it. i got hit HARD this past weekend with the flu, or a really bad cold. swollen glands, stiff neck, painful joints. i literally couldn't get out of bed on both sunday and this morning. jo had to do it all. what do people do who don't have a partner to share in "sickness and in health?" there is no way i could have cared for the girls on my own this weekend. scary eh? this illness has definitely made me think about my sisters who are doin' it on there own.

other than that little cheery note, our family has been kicking butt in the fun department...ummm, can you say tobogganing at mooney's bay? this is so much fun! and free! try it, but just look out for the family with snotty noses cruising out control down the hill....i guess we will tackle winterlude this weekend, assuming all antibiotics have kicked in done their job. it's wierd, i feel like it's a personal failure when i or my kids need antibiotics. i like to think we are above all that, super-hero healthy. oh well, i guess we will have to excel in other areas (i wish i could be proud of the number of times a day i wipe snot from my kids' noses - but it's just not the same)

i watched a great movie on my sick bed today - american dreamz http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0465142/. clever and funny. it must have flown under the radar as i didn't hear about it when it was out.

*this rambling blog entry is courtesy of extra strengh tylenol and lack of nourishment as it hurts to swallow)