Nobody told me there’d be days like these….
Last night I was tired. Jo went out to play hockey and I looked forward to getting the girls to bed and enjoying a little couch time. Grace complained a little that her tummy was aching – I chalked it up to her delaying bedtime. I rubbed her tummy until she was asleep (8:30). I then busied myself with making everyone’s lunches for the next day and tidying up the kitchen. (9:00). I longingly looked at the couch, but also thought of the laundry piling up. I threw in a quick wash and grabbed the items from the dryer, items now permanently wrinkled from sitting there for days. (9:30). Again, I gazed wistfully at the couch, but as I walked towards it, I impaled my foot on a piece of princess lego. With a quick scan, I realized there were toys everywhere, so I did a quick tidy up. (10:00) Finally couch, you are mine, I thought to myself. I poured myself a glass of wine, doled out some Doritos Cool Ranch chips in a bowl (well, I wish I was that civilized – I actually grabbed the whole bag) and plunked myself on the couch and readied myself for a PVR’d episode of Trailer Park Boys. That’s when the retching began. From Grace’s room came the most god awful, “exorcize this demon from my body “ sound. It was my darling girl throwing up everything she has eaten in her entire life. Now, for you seasoned parents, you may think this is no big deal, for me, it was freak out time. For Grace, it was freak out time. You see, in all of Grace’s almost 5 years, she has never, not once, thrown up. She was terrified about what was going on with her body (and I don’t blame her, it didn’t look or smell pretty!) She must have puked on every single item on her bed - this includes a family of stuffed animals, each equally important roles. This includes my bean bag that I heat up in the microwave for my achey muscles (grrrr). This includes her sheets, her duvet, her pillow, her mattress, her pyjamas, her hair, her slippers, the clothes I laid out for her to wear today and a library book. My god, have you ever been so overwhelmed you just don’t know where to begin? In the end, every thing was okay and Grace got over the trauma. Our family now has an “official” barf bowl (did your family have one of these when you were growing up?) and Grace is sort of proud of being in the Barf Club. I could hear her telling her friends about it at school this morning.

All I can say is thank God for Febreeze. Would it be wrong to snort it? I can’t seem to get the smell out of my nose.

This is the story of the Barbapappas…..

Do you remember this show? I didn’t have cable as a kid and I had two significantly older siblings who monopolized the T.V. with “boring” fare. Therefore any T.V. time I did have I absolutely cherished. Shows that stand out in my memory are: G-Force, Simon and the Land of Chalk Drawings, Read-Along, Sesame Street (duh), Smurfs, Barbapappas and The Wondeful World of Disney on Sunday nights (“Mom, can I please be excused to go watch Disney!?). I watched these shows on a tiny little television that you had to (gasp) stand up to change the channel. Okay. I sound like an old fuddy duddy, right? (Back in my day….)

I know history repeats itself, and it makes me laugh to think about what Grace and Edie are going to tell their children one day. Are they going impress their youngsters with stories of their hardships during their youth? I can just imagine Grace saying “You have it so good. When I was growing up, we only five channels dedicated to kids shows, and we had to watch it on a 50” plasma!” Or Edie complaining “Huh, back in my day, the potty training seats only played one song when we tinkled….”

Visions of greatness…

Grace got a stripe last week at karate. Grace got ANOTHER strip this past Friday at karate. This is unheard of. This is exceptional. Children just do not get stripes two classes back to back. Grace is above average, she will be a champion black belt and break records. Okay, okay, I am prone to exaggeration, but I am very proud of her, she is doing so well in her classes. Even Edie has joined in the fun, demanding to wear Grace’s old belt wrapped around her tummy a zillion times and raising her arms in a karate pose. Love it.

This weekend found us dong the following:

Saturday Jo and I roped in the ‘rentals to babysit in the afternoon so we could go shopping….fun!

Saturday night we had dinner with two super-fun couples….lots of belly laughs (who knew trading post-partum depression stories could be so funny!) Edie quickly put a halt on all fun being had – the babysitter called all panicky because Edie was beside herself crying Mommy Mommy over and over again. When we got home, Edie, indignantly planted herself in our bed (how dare we go out, tsk tsk).

Sunday was mellow. Jo took Grace swimming, I napped with Edie (30lb hot water bottle). Jo had some football friends over (something about an important game – this decides who goes to the SuperBowl bleah bleah bleah). I snuck out with a friend to go see Children of Men. I don’t have the words or time to describe this film right now. I did like it though, a lot.

Gotta love swimming. The house was quiet at exactly 8:15. It got loud again at 1:30 a.m. with Edie crying (screaming?) I’ll save that story for another time.

I’ve been slacking big time, sorry to those of you who check in regularly. What happened to me? I think Christmas and New Years just exhausted me – we had fun, lots of fun, but I burned out. I think I’m back in the game now.

Edie was supposed to have her operation today, but lo and behold, she woke up with the snottiest nose EVER on Friday, and the cold has been working its way down to her chest ever since. She spent the night (quite righteously) between Jonas and me. How can a 23 month old make a king sized bed feel like a twin? She managed to send Jo and me both to our respective corners while she ensured comfort for herself. Anyhoooo, the docs won’t touch her with any kind of illness, so the operation is called of for now. I’m a little relieved, I’m not in a hurry to get it done, I know it has to be done, but the delay buys me a little more time to deal with it.

I took Grace and her friend to feed the ducks on Saturday. We all had a little lesson in compassion and how Mother Nature can be a bitch. There was a duck the girls quickly named “Broken Beak” as half of his top beak was broken off. This duck was in rough shape, every time he managed to get some bread we were feeding the ducks, another duck would come along and grab in out of his mouth before he could swallow in (meanies!) The girls proclaimed this as being “NOT FAIR!” and managed to scare away the other ducks and focus on just feeding Broken Beak. I was proud of them. They also want to go back next week and feed Broken Beak again…..I’ll bring them, but Mother Nature might take care of Broken Beak in her own way….try explaining that to a couple of almost 5 year olds in love with a duck.

If anyone knows what “VEEE! VEEEEE!” means, please let me know. Edie is trying to communicate something of obvious importance to us, and we just aren’t getting it. It’s like she has the answer to the meaning of life, but a cruel joke is stopping her from telling us about it.

I was very social last week. Check it out:

-Wednesday, went out with a girlfriend for coffee and a movie (we saw Rocky Balboa…so fricking good)

-Friday night, went out with two girl friends for a movie and drinks (saw Pursuit of Happyness, it was okay. Willl Smith is cheesy though).

-Saturday night, my folks came over to look after the girls while Jo and I went our for dinner with good friends of ours. This was super-fun. One thing I don’t get though. My dinner sucked, I only ate an eighth of it, I told the waitress it sucked, she looked concerned and said she would see what she could do. When the bill came, she said she didn’t charge me for dessert. Huh? I liked the dessert. It was the main course I had issues with. Weird.

Okay. I feel unloaded now.

To sleep, perchance to dream…..

Poor Grace is suddenly terrified of her own shadow (literally). She cannot go anywhere in our house alone (even if it to her own room to get a toy); going to bed is quite stressful for her, and she has consistently been up between 1:30 and 2:30 in the morning all freaked out about something. At this point, I try to coax her back to sleep, but more often than not I shake a sleepy Jonas and send him in to lie down with her. It’s a tough phase, and I can totally sympathize. I’m not the best sleeper myself, often waking in the middle of the night with racing thoughts, but it is so frustrating when I have settled in zzzzzzzzzzzzzz land and am then jolted awake by Grace’s little cries for help. I know it is just a phase, but I am so freaking tired.
While I’m at it, I might as well continue complaining. I am now sick for what I think is the fourth time in 2 months – sore throat, achey muscles, tired/tired/tired and sniffles. What is going on? When God was handing out immune systems, did he forget to give me one? I forget how it feels to be rested and healthy.
Okay, okay. Something positive. Today I am wearing my new skirt from the Gap (scored for $12.99) and my rocking Bad Luck cardigan that Jonas bought me for Xmas . At least I look like a bad ass in my pitiful state (maybe it will distract from the bags under my eyes).

One step forward, three steps back…We had been having a really good streak, a solid week of good behaviour, with an occasion 4 year old moment, but nothing notable. Then it hit the fan.

Grace had a very naughty night last night. I’m growing pretty immune to her declarations that she wants a new Mommy, that prefers friend x’s Mommy over me. But she is now getting more creative with her barbs. She expressed to Jonas that she was going to throw a toy at him so hard that he would go hospital and then he wouldn’t be able to be the boss of her anymore. She lost her t.v. privileges first, then her book at bedtime, and she then lost her favourite thing, which is when Jo or I tell her a story about when we were little. For the first time in her almost five years, she went to bed with nothing, not even a cuddle. I did throw out a “love you” just so she didn’t feel totally stripped. Some days are just so damn hard.

Smackdown!

So, Edie has started hitting. It’s not quite as hard as Grace used to hit, and I guess now that I’m a little bit more seasoned in the parenting department, it’s not as shocking as I used to find it. I remember losing sleep over Gracie’s hitting habits, thinking that hitting was the blueprint for a life of crime; that surely no good could come from a child who dared raise their hand in an act of violence. Now I have a little bit more perspective on the issue. Two months shy of being 2 years old, Edie has a very limited vocabulary (no, shoe, yeah, baba, doh-doh and bum being her favourites). Rather than being able to express herself in a civilized manner (“Actually, mother, father, I would rather not dine in my high chair tonight, I am feeling a little under the weather and would just like to relax on the couch with a bottle and Baby Einstein”), Edie raises her little hand and gives us an oh so gentle smack to let us know she is not happy.

What amazes me the most is Grace’s reaction to be on the receiving end of the smack. Being a physical person and reformed hitter, I thought for sure Grace would just hit back, but she takes it, doesn’t even flinch. She’s not happy about it and certainly thinks Edie should be timed out, but that is the extent of her outrage. I’m pretty proud of her for her restraint.

Help me Mall Santa!

So, Grace is very calm about Christmas this year. Grace knows that Santa is going to get her what she wants, and it is very big. Grace doesn’t need to tell Mommy or Daddy what it is she wants, because she already told Santa. Grace doesn’t need to write a letter to Santa because, well, she already told him when she was at the mall with her Grandmother, so why would she need to tell him again? Best part? Santa PROMISED that the big gift would be under the tree. Also, there’s a new rule, you can’t tell anybody what you ask Santa for, because then you might not get it (“it’s just like making a wish Mommy!) So. Do I go back to the mall, describe my little girl to him (“you MUST remember, she sat on your lap, she 4 years old, light brown hair, cut into a bob, pink Barbie boot, you must remember! How many girls look like that? What did she ask for dammit!!!)
I have a feeling there may be some s’plaining to do on Christmas day……

Ahhhh-choo!…

Our house should be quarantined. There is no guarantee that if you enter our home, that you will leave without being afflicted by some medical atrocity (well, okay, it’s the common cold, but it really sucks!) Edie and I are in this mother-daughter dance of pass the ickiest germs to each other. She had it four weeks ago, then I caught it, then I caught it again, and yesterday, Edie succumbed once again, this time with special effects (snot spray anyone?) Well played, Edie, well played. Not sure how Grace and Jonas are being spared, Grace probably makes sport of dodging airborne germs matrix-style.

*There one nice thing about Edie being sick: when she needs some comfort at night, she curls right up into a fetal position in your arms like a little hot water bottle - feels like she's a teeny little baby once again, and not a (gasp) almost two year old.

Playing with Fire, I Mean Water

Items upstairs:

-musical Winnie the Pooh wagon with blocks
-shopping cart filled with fake food
-LittleTykes pic-nic table with a box of colouring books and crayons at your disposal
-a kajillion puzzles
-a bazillion books
-umpteen toys that flash, ring bells and whistle
-T.V., with a Mommy and Daddy who are usually willing to put it on TreeHouse
-art easle with chalk board

......the list goes on, you get the idea.

What do Grace and Edie want to do the most? Well, it’s a toss up between playing in the kitchen sink and playing in fridge, RIGHT WHEN I WANT TO MAKE DINNER! Grace I can easily reason with and coax into another activity. Edie on the other hand, with her new discovery of her MiniGo supplier and our water source, is much more difficult to navigate out of the way without a blood curdling scream. I don’t know what frustrates me more, a screaming toddler or perpetually wet socks from her playing in the sink.

Is it okay to win?
Last night Grace and I played Snakes and Ladders before bedtime. We have been doing this quite a bit lately, and trying to teach her the virtues of playing by the rules and not cheating. As luck would have it, she has been winning every time. Last night, her lucky winning streak came to an end, and I won. I really didn’t want to, but I figured it was a life lesson, and I should go ahead and take the win. I really wasn’t prepared for how upset she became. She wasn’t angry and she didn’t throw a temper tantrum, she just sobbed. She was crushed. It gave me real insight into our little girl, her competitiveness and her desire to be the very best. I’m glad she wants to be the best, I think this will bode well for her later on in life, we just need to teach her that it is perfectly fine to be the best that she can be and to be okay with that.
That little life lesson made my heart ache.

Wow, it’s getting harder and harder to find the time to write in this thing. I feel like I’m filled with enough clever little stories to write here everyday, but alas, i never get around to it.
Okay, enough about me, more about the family. A check list of this weekends activities:

1) Friends drove Grace to karate in the a.m., yippee! Jo and I were able to drink coffee and read the paper in relaxo-time (Edie was trucking around somewhere, but she’s pretty happy doing just that without much interference on our part).
2) I did my kick boxing class for the first time in two weeks! Felt great! It’s really starting to irk me how the instructor flirts with all the cute girls though. It’s just so…..obvious.
3) During Edie’s nap (went down on the attempt #2) Jonas put up the xmas lights (only a small amount of blood shed). Grace karate kicked down our scarecrow…good-bye Fall, hello Winter!)
4) Paid $15 to go the Museum of Nature, where we only explored the first floor dinosaur exhibit. Spent another $15 in the gift shop on a bouncy ball (lost) and magnet (confiscated).
5) Watched a disturbing movie “The Shape of Things”….good, but icky.
6) Went to Mom and Dad’s for Jo’s birthday breakfast. Jo and Grace then went swimming, Edie and I napped at their house. Cosy.
7) Little hang time with Edie the Bikini, who kills me with her funny ways (I wish I had a video of her dancing, the only way to describe it is….earnest).
8) Grey Cup/football on the new plasma for Jo, girls take refuge in our bedroom and watch Shrek (well, sort of watched it…I think there was five minutes of calm, the rest of the time was spent tickling, breaking up fights, me trying to control the crumb crisis occurring in our bed).
9) Spontaneous walk where Grace kept squishing my shadow. Hmmm, pent up resentment towards Mommy?
10) Ridiculously chaotic dinner (“Grace, ON YOUR BUM! Why isn’t Edie eating anything! Grace, I’m counting, 1-2- that’s your last warning! Edie, keep the chicken IN your mouth! Grace, sit back down…Jonas, pour me a glass of wine……”
11) 8:30, peace and quiet. Good night.

and on the 50th day she posted pictures...

This is my 50th post! Who knew I had so much to ramble on about! Total cop-out today, too lazy to write, so enjoy our Hallowe'en pictures and revel in the girls' cuteness (Jonas wouldn't let me snap him in his costume!)

She was a dancing queen...I was starting to worry about myself and my inability to have fun. It seems that even on nights when we have a babysitter, I can’t completely relax because I’m constantly thinking about functioning the next day. One more glass of wine could equal a hangover, and it’s not much fun parenting with a head ache. One more hour out means I’m not getting enough rest, and I suck at life when I’m not rested. Well, I proved to myself this weekend that I can still have fun and relax – I just need to remove myself from home and my children in order to do so.
On Saturday morning, Jonas drove Terrie, Maureen and me to the train station so we could catch our ride to Montreal. We arrived at noon, scarfed down smoked meat sandwiches and promptly started spending money. We shopped like pro’s, and we shopped well together. Nobody shadowed anybody, we were all happy to split up and meet later.
Four hours later we hit the hotel and Maureen had the foresight to pack some wine. Getting hungry, we got ourselves all gussied up (I dusted off the knee-high leapord skin boots for this night) and head on out for a night out on the town. Gotta love Montreal for it’s bring your own bottle restaurants. Once again, Maureen was smart enough to suggest that two bottles would be better than one. Dinner was okay, conversation was great. And, lo and behold, it was 11 o’clock and I wasn’t even tired. We were ready for some dancing (we had done some research and located some 80’s music clubs). We went here: http://www.worldsbestbars.com/city/montreal/a-gogo-lounge-montreal.htm
and here http://www.clubsmontreal.com/en/electricavenue/home.html
There is something about hearing New Order and old Billy Idol that makes me positively giddy!
We danced up a storm and didn't put our heads to pillow until about 4:30 a.m. Not bad for a couple of old girls.
We were a little slow moving the next morning, and we all crashed hard on the train ride home, but my faith in myself has been renewed, I’m not dead yet and I can get still get a groove on. (And my leopard skin

Random musings on birthday parties

I just had a weird little childhood memory. I was thinking about Grace’s birthday and what we might do for her (she wants Cosmic Adventure for the 3rd year in a row with everyone in the world invited, literally). I then started thinking about my own birthday parties and the effort my parents made to make them special. Three really stand out in my mind, and I can’t remember how old I was for them.

1) My birthday is December 21st, so my birthdays were usually winter themed. One party that I remember so clearly involved a sleigh ride late afternoon. I get so warm and fuzzy thinking about that day: I remember being bundled up, my favourite peeps around me, big fat snowflakes falling and hot chocolate warming my hands. What I also remember not so fondly is one little girl who always like to be the centre attention who whined and complained so much about the cold that the ride was cut short and we all schlepped home. (Whenever I see or hear about that girl, this is all I can think about).

2) Another party I remember involved making gingerbread houses. My Mom, (better referred to as The Saint in this story) hand made a dozen or so individual molds for gingerbread houses so me and my friends could build our own little candy shacks. I remember everyone was thrilled and the project occupied the entire party time. Best thing was, my Mom didn’t have to deal with the nuclear-sugar-effects-on-young-girls syndrome as she encouraged everyone to bring home and show off their houses to their parents. What a great idea, and sadly, I can honestly say, I don’t think I could or would go through this effort for my own girls. Why bake when you can buy, I say.

3) The next party I remember took place when I was a bit older, old enough to watch a PG-13 movie (these rules were strictly enforced in my house - my brother and sister will laugh when they read this). Our family was one of the first to own a VCR (Betamax, thank you very much) and my folks tracked down Raiders of the Last Ark for our viewing pleasure. Well, Harrison Ford (dreamy back then) and a decapitation were the bees knees for the pre-pubescent audience in our family room that winter afternoon, and I’ll never forget the cool factor I was feeling that day.*

I have other odd little memories, like birthday parties in the caboose at McDonald’s, playing Atari and Donkey Kong and having séances and playing ouiji board in friends’ basements.

*Addendum: the cool factor was quickly stripped from me when my parents picked me up early from a friends’ birthday party. My folks had found out that the party girl had rented Porky’s for us to watch, and this was not PG-13 material. I was allowed to stay for gift opening and cake eating and then dragged home. It was stripped from me once again when at another birthday party, the rented movie was Purple Rain. I was allowed to stay this time, but with strict orders from my parents that Jen’s mom fast forward through the naughty bits. Jen’s mom, who was the “cool mom” even sold me out to the party girls so she wouldn’t look bad. Ouch.

It was super-cute up until the moment we tried to take the beer away.....

This PVR you speak of…..
Thank god winter is coming, because I’m going to be spending a lot of time inside. Jonas came home yesterday with the world’s best invention. The PVR. If I win the lottery, I’m going to buy everyone I love, a PVR. Last night I saw my future spread out before me: America’s Top Model, Trailer Park Boys, Miami Ink, Grey’s Anatomy, the Office, Ugly Betty. I even see Grace’s future mapped out: Caillou, SpongeBob, Arthur and Little Bear. Even little Edie, for when she is ready, Boobah (or whatever they are called) are all cued and ready to be viewed.
Unfortunately, Jonas has a different vision. He also ordered some super-sport package that lets him view football games in Croatia, and during the commercial breaks, he exclaimed that he can watch his PVR’d Prison Break (naw, no un-diagnosed ADD in our family!)
We are all pretty excited, but be prepared for some battle lines to be drawn as we all battle for position in front of the idiot box……

Here’s our little Patchie. She is so cute when it is time to put on her patch. She is very stoic about the whole process. She lies down where we ask her too, sometimes she even points to her eye, as if to let us know which eye it is to be covered (in case we have forgotten) and then lies perfectly still while we patch her. Sometimes she even takes the wrapper of the patch and puts in the garbage for us.
I still don’t know much more information about the operation, but it is slated for January, she goes under general anaesthetic for it, and the doc said she will be running around that afternoon. Sometimes I wish the Internet didn’t exist. I was researching strabismus on the web and of course found the one page that includes case studies of infants being left blind after such operations which promptly put my stomach in knots….(there were also hundreds of pages assuring worry-warts that it is a very common procedure with very little to no risk at all).

Missing summer already!
I think reality just set in today that summer is really really really over. I’m doing crazy things like having Jo install a play structure inside the house in anticipation of lots of indoor play. As long as I can remember, I get antsy this time of year. Lack of sunshine, shorter days and the c-c-c-c-cold kind of freak me out. I also think it was this time of year when my post-partum with Grace really took hold of me. I think it will be okay this year though, simply because we are too busy to think about the long stretch of winter ahead of us.
Okay, Grace is in Jr. Kindergarten, and I swear, everyday she comes home with some kind of “homework” for parents from her teacher, is this normal? I feel like ½ an hour of my precious evening is spent filling out forms. What’s going to happen when she and Edie are both in school?
Grace wrote me her first note yesterday. It said “Karen”, then there was a picture of an eyeball, a heart and a letter U. Get it? She wrote “Karen I love You” and then she wrote her name with x’s and o’s. (Not sure why she called me Karen instead of Mommy). That little note makes up for all her comments and her not wanting me to be her Mommy as of late!

The Idiot's Guide to Being a Meanie

Guess what the miserable previous owners of our house did this time! To take the chill out of the house yesterday we decided it was high time to turn on the furnace. With much fiddling and cursing, we couldn’t get it to work. Frank, the fellow who was cleaning out our ducts checked things out for us and announced that the motherf*&?s left us with an empty oil tank AND IT WAS IN OUR CONTRACT THAT THEY WOULD LEAVE A FULL ONE. Can you believe these people? I hope karma comes and kicks them in the ass. They screwed us on our pool, they left the house in a disgusting state, and now they are probably giggling over our lack of heat. Evil. And you should have seen what came out the duct work – I could have built a new dog with all the fur that got sucked out. The scary part is, these dirty evil people are in the medical profession. Scarier yet, they have procreated and are teaching their evil ways to their two little spawns. I think we will dress up as them for Hallowe'en.
Well, at least Grace is getting a good lesson in life with regards to how Jo and I feel about and liars and cheats.
I wish I had happy news, I wish I could say I slept through the night last night….I wish I could say the snot in Edie’s nose has disappeared (instead it has multiplied and taken over Grace’s nose too).
Oh, I know. I bought a pair of kick-ass stacked brown suede mary-jane’s on the weekend – I look like the vamp-y archivist who lives within me. I need to bring her out more often.