Holiday Horror Show

I’m not really sure when I started hating the holidays with a vengeance. I know it got worse after I became a parent. There are so many things we do to make the magic of the season come alive for our children. We kill ourselves trying to make them believe that there really is magic in the world. This year I’ve somehow either got the hang of things or decided I can only do what I can do and that will have to be enough.

Thing 1 is 10 and still believes in Santa. I know that this phase is going to be over soon so I have tried extra hard to give him one more year of magic. First there is the elf. His name is Mark and he is a little jerk. I have to move that thing EVERY NIGHT. And I’m not going to lie so far I’ve forgotten twice. The thing is, he’s really high up on a plant shelf and after the kids go to bed I have to wait for at least an hour to make sure they don’t come creeping out of their rooms for more water, or a scary dream, or they just don’t want to go to bed mom. Because if they come out and I’m standing on a stool to move the damn elf I’m going to be SO busted. The problem is I’m freaking exhausted. I love my children and I’d do anything for them but my chair is really comfy and as I have waited the requisite hour I have fallen asleep too many times. Most of the time I wake up at 3, hide the damn elf, and shuffle off to my comfy bed. Twice I’ve just forgotten. The first time I had to tell Thing 1 that the elf just really liked that spot. He gave me a questioning look so I knew I had to be more vigilant. So the elf stayed on that shelf doing other things for a few days. Just to drive home the point that he really liked it there. This morning I was woken up by Thing 1 as I was still asleep in my chair in the living room. The elf had not moved again and I saw the magic glow in his eyes dim. Now I think I have concocted a story about why Mark didn’t move. I’m going to feed my child an outright lie, because that is what we do as parents trying to keep the magic alive, and say Santa called me because Mark didn’t come home last night. I’m going to explain that Mark’s last report said that Thing 1 was being naughty by staying up past bedtime watching YouTube videos on his tablet he snuck out of the living room unbeknownst to his mother. Then I’m going to tell him that Santa and I think Mark fell asleep before he could leave because he was watching to make sure Tommy didn’t sneak the tablet again. This should work. I think it’s believable but what do I know? I just want to see the magic light shine brightly in his eyes again.

Then there is Santa. He’s a good guy but he screws me out of the cool gift every year. I started a tradition of him only wrapping his gifts in Santa themed wrapping paper. Was that a stupid move? Yes. Have I continued to make that move? Yes. So now I have special wrapping paper stashed at my office so my snoopy children don’t go looking for proof Santa isn’t real. It’s exhausting. Thing 2 no longer believes and his mother confirmed for him that Santa wasn’t real. This happened last year and I WAS PISSED. First, there are tactful ways of saying they might be right, but second he was not following the cardinal rule of keeping it to himself. When Thing 1 asked if Santa was real my response was “sometimes it’s not about how real something is, it’s about the magic it lets you see” then I asked his thoughts. Shockingly he told me he thought Santa, The Easter Bunny, and Tooth fairy were real. All the other characters were made up. In other words, he believes in the ones that bring him cool stuff. I say, fair enough. I created these monsters so I shall continue to make them kick ass in his mind. Thing 2 doesn’t believe but I made it very clear to him that if you don’t believe in Santa he doesn’t bring you presents. After that I got a lot of very enthusiastic belief out of Thing 2. I am not above threats and if he ruins his brother’s belief’s I’m going to follow through on the no gift policy. He’ll still get gifts from us but nothing in his stocking. It will be really sad for him but he has to learn that part of knowing the truth about Santa is keeping it to himself and letting others still feel the magic.

I am also the Gift Buyer in Chief. Meaning my husband and I discuss the gifts but most often I have the task of actually making the gifts appear, wrapped under the tree. This can be exhausting especially when all my children ask for are video games, which I’ve vowed never to purchase again, and other electronic stuff that I’m not going to get them. Then we have to go “off book” and find things they will like without crushing their Christmas dreams. I will say that we are very honest with our children about the “no video game” policy. They know we aren’t going to buy them the games but they also have grandparents and other parents that might be willing. That’s fine with me as long as they don’t have the expectation. This year they wanted the Spy Gear LCD Walkie Talkies. My mother tried to find them for under $98 and was unsuccessful. She got them something else so I casually put them on my Amazon Wish list. I knew I wasn’t willing to pay $98 for walkie talkies but I thought I’d keep it on the back burner. Eventually the Amazon gods were with me and the price dropped to a still outrageous but within our budget price of $65 and I snagged them. So now I’m down to Legos for the stockings and Christmas Eve Pajamas and we are good to go.

Normally I’m a ball of nerves this time of year that presents in the form of fits of tears over something minuscule but this year I feel oddly calm. I’m smiling at people at the grocery stores and trying not to get overly stressed about things I cannot change. I’m happy that we are still part of the magic that is Christmas. I’m happy that my husband will be home for an astonishing 11 days. I’m happy my children are going to have their Christmas wishes come true and I’m happy to be alive. We are in the final countdown, just 8 days until the culmination of excitement. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night. 

Why I freed my nipple

I loved breast feeding my children. I know that a lot of women love it but what I don’t understand is the arguments for and against certain types of breastfeeding. “Free the nipple” or “cover that sexualized part of the body while letting a squirming child clamp on to a very sensitive area” are just strange arguments to me. Personally, do what you gotta do mama. I just tried to make it through each feeding with a happy full baby belly at the end. Isn’t that the only real point to feeding babies?

I personally tried to use a nursing cover with my second child. It made my husband more comfortable and until we got really good at nursing it made me more comfortable too. I was just like every other mom trying to feed their child. I have a story of my struggle and I think it might help some understand why each woman’s choice is hers alone and passing judgement only makes you part of the problem.

When my youngest son was about 6 weeks old he started having some trouble. It appeared to be colic but turned out to be acid reflux. He cried pretty much any time he was awake for about 2 weeks. I was so tired and my nerves were shot. Not only was I healing from a Cesarean section but I was figuring out how to mother a baby again, my older children were 8 and 9 at this point so it was like riding a bike with a bent wheel because this crying gig was something I’d never had to deal with before. After several doctor’s visits and switching to a new doctor we started acid reflux medication hoping to god that it worked (which it did! Yay us!). A few days into the medication my husband and I thought it was a great time to take our children to the hot air “night glow” event.

It was probably about 80 degrees as we set off on a journey to see the glowing balloons. We had to walk about 1.5 miles and because the baby was dealing with tummy issues he was having none of that stroller crap. He wanted to be held, by me, like right NOW! I was sweating like a pig and trying to keep up when the baby decided he was hungry. I was prepared for this because at 6 weeks he was only hungry about every 5 seconds. I had my cute nursing cover in place with a baby latched on as I walked with my family to the event. As we got closer to the crowd my son’s anxiety began to ramp up. He wasn’t used to crowds of thousands of people (gee I wonder why) so all he wanted to do was nurse, for 2 hours straight. I was a living breathing pacifier.

I hate being hot. I keep my house at a balmy 68 degrees in the summer to make sure I don’t kill my family out of crazy heat induced rage. I was not only wearing pants and a t-shirt, but I also had basically a jacket over me to cover the baby and my boob so as not to make those around me uncomfortable. But the hotter I got the less of a fuck I gave. I was becoming a crazy heat induced ball of rage and I was losing my shit. So I looked at my husband and mustered every ounce of calm as I explained that the cover was coming off and he was going to have to be ok with that. He could see that I was hot and bitchy and it wasn’t helping the baby attached to my boob so he was smart enough to hold the cover for me before I tore it to shreds. There I was in a crowd of thousands with my boob, complete with baby nipple cover, exposed for the world to see and I didn’t care one bit. In fact, if someone had told me to put my boob away I probably would have decked them because I was finally feeling air movement and the ball of rage was evaporating.

I was free. I was not trying to stage a nurse in and make other people uncomfortable I was just trying not to die of heat stroke. My husband watched for pervs which was his one and only reason he preferred me to use a cover but like I said, all I was worried about was fresh air. By this time the glowing balloons were out for the evening and we were headed home. I walked down a main street in town with a baby latched on to my nipple for dear life and no one said a word. I’m sure some people were uncomfortable but I didn’t care. We were doing the best we could and that was all that mattered. After that day I decided I wasn’t going to subject myself to that experience again. I hung up my covers and never used them again because that was what worked for me.

The moral of the story is this: each mother has her own limits and no one should judge her for those. I tried using a cover until I just couldn’t take it anymore. Some women are fine without a cover from day one and others prefer the cover at all times. Why not come together as humans and try to support mothers and their choices without passing judgement. We are all just trying to raise small humans to be good big humans someday.  If you want to judge, please do it silently, because nursing mothers are riding a wave of hormones that make them unpredictable and I could see a jury acquitting a nursing mother of homicide.. just saying.

The last time he said I love you

As I sit in my office brooding about a mistake I made my thoughts suddenly drifted to Thing 1. He is the oldest and we've had a lot to work through over the years. School is hard for him, be it because he has to focus or because there are no video games, so he struggles everyday with going to school. We have the same fight every morning where he begs and pleads and tells me how dumb school is. Then I eventually get him and The Baby into the car to take him to school. I drop him off at school since the bus is no longer cool. And for the last 5 years when I take him, I tell him I love him before he gets out of the car. This used to be met with an "I love you too" before he walked away into the land of future adults. I knew with every passing day it might be the last time I heard him utter those words on school property.

Monday was a rush to get to school on time and look like a real responsible adult. On Monday, when I said I loved him and he just got out of the car and went into the school. The slightly pathetic person in me reasoned that he must not have heard me.  On Tuesday, the same thing happened and the voice in my head that gave me so much comfort the day before was not as loud. Today I realized the day had come and gone for "I love you's" in public. I am so happy watching Thing 1 turn into a very strong and wonderful young man, but now that the "I love you's" are no longer free flowing I begin to miss that little boy.

When I used to pick him up from daycare he would launch himself into my arms and hug me so tightly. Some of the staff would just watch in utter amazement that a mother and son could be so happy to see each other after a very short 8 hour day. Someone even commented on us being their favorite child/parent duo because it never got old to see him launch his tiny body with all his might into my arms. It was the very best part of my day to see how happy he was to see me. And just as those days came and went (mostly without me stopping to realize they were gone) here I am struggling with the reality of him growing up even more.

He still loves me, this is something I know and even the pathetic side of me knows, but he has reached a point in his life that he doesn't display that love to the world. He doesn't count the minutes until he sees me again. He doesn't think of his mom as the same hero I must have been in his younger years. Maybe it's part of becoming a big brother. He has to let go so I can have open arms for The Baby to fling himself into. Or maybe he's just old enough that public opinions are too highly regarded (I thought I had until middle school, not 4th grade). Maybe, maybe, maybe... I am so happy I have the memories of the independent boy who didn't care if his friends heard him tell me he loved me, but I'm also happy for his steps into the land of true independence. He grows everyday and though I got my last public declaration of love from him, I know deep down he still feels the same. So I will continue to tell him I love him and when those words aren't returned I will be ok. Because he does love me, he just doesn't love me out loud anymore. He loves me from the inside where his friends can't see and tease him.

Back to School Boot Camp

Last night Thing 1 had "Meet the Teacher Night" at school. We go, meet his new teacher, and get ready for school to start tomorrow... Part of our back to school routine is something I like to call Back to School Boot Camp. It's not something that makes the kids happy but I've found from my many years of transitioning them from fun summer routines back into boring school routines, we all get through it much smoother if I start getting them ready a few weeks before school starts.

1. School bed time is back.
One of the first items in back to school boot camp is bed time adjustments. Not only are the children required to be in bed no later than 9 p.m. but they are also required to sleep in their beds. No couches or floors for my boys. The lazy days of summer are at an end and they start to realize this when I require a real bedtime, instead of the sometimes bedtime we use during the summer, and a real bed for said bedtime. I start a few weeks before school starts so there is no whining about it later.

2. Getting up like we're leaving for school.
Though I don't make the boys put on school clothes I do make them get up at their normal wake up time for school. In the summer they get to sleep in a lot when Nana comes over and even when I have to take them to the spoiler herself, they don't have to be up before 8. During school the bus leaves by 8 so if they want to squeeze in video games and breakfast first they have to get their butts out of bed early. Life is so hard.

3. Respectable school hair.
During the summer the boys are allowed to do whatever they want to their hair. This year Thing 1 bleached his, his first foray into the world of different. He loved his "golden hair" and was very sad when I announced that his golden locks would soon be on the barber's floor. When the whining began I was forced to remind him that our summer hair is not something that is appropriate for school. Discussion was over. Thing 2 had a green Mohawk. Yep, I even dyed it for him. Did he look like a punk? Maybe a little sometimes, but he only acted like a punk to me so I don't care if you judge. He loved it and was very sad to see it go, but since he heard the discussion I JUST HAD with his brother he decided there was no way out and took it without much protest.

4.  Supplies, backpacks, shoes, clothes
I was so happily surprised this year. Both of my children still fit into their school pants from last year. They may look frumpy one year because I get a size they can grow into but since my children aren't that hard on their clothes it saves me some serious money to let them look a little disheveled sometimes. Anyway I offered to take them shopping for back packs, shirts, pants or shoes and they declined.... The heavens opened and there was signing. So this year I didn't have to buy anything. Thing 1 has a dress code he has to follow so shopping for him is no fun anyway, and Thing 2 just wasn't in the mood. Might still have time to add to their wardrobes but if not, they will be ready regardless.

5. Actually start school.
Because Thing 2 primarily lives with his mom, he goes to a different school, in a different district than Thing 1. He has another week to hold on to the last glows of summer. But tomorrow Thing 1 will officially be a 4th grader. This is very hard for me because I still see him as he was when he was The Baby's age. His teacher seems to be wonderful and I am hoping and praying for a teacher who is willing to put in just a little bit of extra effort to help him succeed!

6. Prepare myself for the feelings..
Thing 1 thinks he's going to get to ride the bus tomorrow but I am that mom. I will drive him to school and then cry as I drive away because tomorrow he will be a little older and need me a little less and I hate having to watch him walk away. I get a little sentimental when school starts because I know that he is growing all too fast. During the summer I can forget that he is getting older and wiser and just be with him. But when school starts so do school sports and with that, school activities and with that, more maturity. I will hold on as long as I can to my picture of the golden haired boy laughing as he jumps in the pool and soaks up the suns rays. I will be happy when he learns a new skill but I will never again get to see the almost 4th grader. Because now he is a 4th grader and each year he grows I will remember who he was and try to help him to become who he wants to be.

The Vacation from Hell

I've been back from vacation for almost a week and I've really had time to think about all we did. We got to see some cool things, sweated our butts off, and spent a lot of time in the car. Let me lay out our vacation on a day to day basis.

Day 1: get up at the crack of dawn. Take children and Meemaw to the airport. Surprise the kids and tell them we are, in fact, going with Meemaw to Hawaii. Record their shocked reactions, which were much less exciting then I was expecting, and get all of us and our bags into the actual airport while Meemaw parked the car. I paid a skycap from a different airline $20 to get my bags inside while I tried to wrangle the Things and The Baby. It was like watching a train wreck. I have the Things peppering me with hundreds of questions about what I did and did not pack for them, I am trying to separate the luggage and hand my ID to the lady at the counter and hold The Baby because I was not thinking about putting him in his backpack carrier when Meemaw left us. Finally get everything aside from our carry ons ready, Meemaw comes back, we get boarding passes, head to security. Things were going well, we packed little bags of candy with cute poems to  bribe nearby passengers for when The Baby inevitably screamed. We were there in plenty of time and even though it looked like a disaster I thought I was doing well. Security was less impressed. Meemaw had the bottle and the candy. I had all three children. I forgot to put my phone on the belt in the chaos, which was pointed out to me before I went through the metal detector by a less than happy security Nazi. We go through the metal detector, get my hands swabbed for bomb making materials, happy to say that test came out as an all clear, and then Meemaw gets pulled aside for her suspicious items. She pointed to The Baby to explain away the bottle. The candy only took the security Nazi a minute once he read the note and we were good to go. Met up with Grandma and Brother in Laws Girlfriend, Shaniqua and we were ready for the first of 2 flights.

First flight was only 1.5 hours so baby did well. He snoozed and I thanked God. Get off first plane, eat lunch, let the baby crawl on the horribly dirty floor which I was far too exhausted to care about and then board the plane that mattered. The 5 hour flight plane... It was a darn good thing we bribed the people around us. The Baby got REALLY tired and screamed for a good 20 minutes because he no longer wanted to be touched, he just wanted to sleep, but on a teeny tiny airplane the whole sleep on his own thing was not going to fly. Eventually he fell asleep and I held him and dozed for one blissful hour. The rest of the flight involved a lot of movement, a lot of singing, and a lot of crying, mostly it was The Baby crying but I was close to tears once or twice. Finally touch down I go to get the rental car, Lineman meets everyone and loads enough into Shaniqua's car that only we fit and everyone else has to go in the rental van. It was a nice 2 hour ride in which I was not allowed to sleep due to constant chatting. Eat dinner, explore house, drink wine and fall exhausted into bed.

Day 2: Wake up at 4 AM because the baby is not aware of the time change, go to make coffee, find only decaf, contemplate killing both my brother in law and everyone else around me, eat breakfast and go to the store to buy REAL coffee and other necessary items. Then drive back to the same town that we landed in yesterday, 2 hours away, enjoy a BBQ and fun day at the beach. Introduce The Baby to the ocean, snorkel, watch the Things body board and then dinner and another 2 hour drive back to the house. At this point we are all triple exhausted from the travel and sun and beach. Lineman, Meemaw, Grandma and I vow to never go back to that town until we have to fly back home.

Day 3: Laze around and make breakfast, eat, let the baby nap and then head to a rocky beach in town. Watch the kids play, enjoy our day and be thankful it was only a 20 minute drive. Go home eat dinner, drink wine, and fall exhausted into bed.

Day 4: Special outing to a black sand beach is planned. Get up, make breakfast, play with children, put The Baby down for a nap get ready to go, wait for baby to wake up. Brother in law gets antsy I tell him I will cut him the baby gets a real nap and he isn't going to stop me from providing that. Then I hear where the beach is.... 2 hour drive the other way with a VERY sketchy road that can only be driven by 4 wheel drive vehicles. Baby wakes up, we make the very long drive with the Baby in Brother in law's pickup because we didn't have 4 wheel drive. I was secretly hoping the baby screamed the entire drive but unfortunately he was pretty good. I got an attitude at the beach only enjoyed an hour of our time there, of which we only spent like 3 hours, then drive back home. Yep 2 more hours in a vehicle.

This was my breaking point. Let me first say my Brother in Law and his girlfriend obviously don't have children. They should not have planned the vacation since they live there and there were other things some of us wanted to do besides what they had on the agenda, and I have OCD and need to be in control to enjoy myself. I hated the amount of driving and the poor planning that caused The Baby not to get naps and to hate his life, which in turn make me hate my life.

Drink wine, eat something probably, go to bed really really pissed off.

Day 5: Baby and Meemaw stayed home and everyone else went to visit the volcano, only .5 hours away and had a nice time until my leg floated out of the socket and I was barely able to walk back to the car. Go home, watch a movie about the island, drink wine, eat dinner, go to bed.

Day 6: Go to find awesome waterfalls in the jungle, get sadly disappointed that we could not get closer and they were all right off the road, go to the rocky beach, play, have fun, and enjoy the day without Brother in Law or Shaniqua. Go home, eat dinner, drink wine and go to bed.

Day 7: We had planned to go swim with dolphins this morning but due to Brother in Law and Shaniqua needed us to help them ship their cars we wasted this day. It was a cluster you know what, of stupidity and I was irritated. No one asked the right questions, they assumed it was our problem, yadda yadda yadda. Finally get everyone back to the house, eat dinner, do laundry, drink very little wine because we ran out, and pack to go home. Fight with Lineman before bed and then end fight so we can sleep for 4 hours before getting up to go home.

Day 8: Get up ungodly early with slight headache, drive 2 HOURS to get to airport, go through security without Lineman then barely make it to our flight on time in another chaotic crazy airport experience. Flight has extra seats allowing for The Baby to get his own which was heaven on earth. He napped well until another baby was screaming, with my frayed nerves I wanted to strangle the parents though I know they were doing the best they could. He did really well on the long flight. We got to our connection early had a slight mishap of The Baby smacking his tooth in an attempt to stand, there was blood it was sad. Board last plane, fight with baby for most of flight. Get home and thank god the vacation from hell is over. Vow to never ever do that again with a baby.

The End!

The bible is not back up

I am a very nosy person. I am on social media to boast about my children and see what other people I know are up doing with their lives. If you don't like what I have to say you don't have to see it. It's a choice. I hate when arguments erupt on social media. It's gory and out there for the world to see. When opinions are being expressed tensions run high and inevitably there will be a show stopping comment. BOOM. Bible verse. What now?

I am not a hugely religious person. I have questions that I need to try to answer for myself. I am not against religion in any way. It is normal and natural to want to believe there is someone watching over and protecting you. I have seen religion as something personal for each individual, which is exactly what it is. Some follow certain religions because of their family or friends and others choose what religion works for them. Whatever your reason, good for you. I do, however, have a problem with you shoving your choice down my throat.

Religion is a tricky business and no one religion is ever acceptable universally. I have a problem with those that back their opinions by bible versus because there are so very many versus and versions and not a single one is completely current. There are versus saying that working on Sunday is punishable by death. The people using the bible as a back up for their arguments never touch the versus they don't believe in or think don't apply to them. I get it, you want ammunition to show others your way. Well for me, it's all or nothing. You don't get to choose what pieces work for your argument and leave out some pretty big flaws.

Everyone should have an opinion. Wars have been waged to make sure we are able to express our opinion. It is human nature, especially when we are happy, to want others to be happy as well. When I love a restaurant I tell all my friends so they can enjoy the same experience I had. When I have an amazing hair stylist or babysitter or anything I want to tell me friends and let them experience my joy. I love my hair stylist, my friend hates how she did her highlights. Ok no big deal, we have a difference but we can still be friends. For now. Because I love my highlights and you should too. I understand wanting to convince someone your way is better, and I'm a control freak so my way really is better. I do not, ever, use bible versus. Sometimes I will mention articles I've read, but I'm quick to show that they agree with me so they are articles I enjoy. My husband does not always love my back up but he understands. I want to try to back up my reasoning. It's okay to want others to join you in your views but please choose your versus carefully.

Lazy Sundays are so nice.

I had a semi busy weekend. I played with my boys and even my nephew. I got my hair done and errands run. I have kept my house picked up and laundry caught up so I didn't have much to do yesterday except veg out. Which I did. ALL. DAY. LONG. It was amazing. I finally caught up on my sleep because every time The Baby napped I napped. I felt a little disgusted with myself for not cleaning bathrooms but oh well. I know next weekend will be crazy getting ready for our vacation so I decided to do absolutely nothing. Plus it was in the 90s on Sunday and I am not a fan of heat.

Last night Thing 1 wanted the big screen TV in the living room. Let me break my house down for you we have 3 TVs. 1 large TV in the living room which holds the much coveted DVR. 1 medium sized one in the bonus room, which is where we make the Things watch TV and play on their Wii. And 1 in Lineman and my bedroom. As you see from the breakdown Thing 1 has a TV he can watch. It's in the bonus room. He can keep The Baby out because there is a baby gate so there is no reason to use the living room TV unless you want to play on the PlayStation that Lineman will not let me move to the bonus room. Of course Thing 1 wants to build things in Minecraft, a game I loath with all my heart. So I said, sure you can put The Baby to bed and I'll go to sleep. He actually took me seriously. He stuck with me through bath time, which is really just The Baby playing in the water while we watch and adore him. He stuck with me through getting The Baby diapered and dressed, and he stuck with me through making a bottle and singing a lullaby. I was pretty reasonably impressed that he did not ditch me throughout the process. It was kind of nice. In the end he got 30 minutes on Minecraft while I talked to Lineman on the phone.

These moments pass so quickly that it sometimes escapes me how grown my older boys are becoming. They want to help and play with their baby brother. They want to be part of the conversation. They want to hang out with me. It's nice and I know I will blink and it will be gone so I try, even on my bad days, to show them love and kindness. To show them that I am not the wicked witch of the west no matter what Nana tells them. I try, especially on the days I'm tired, to give them all my patience. In the end we are better off together. In the end it is all worth it, but I don't want it to end. I want to be the mom they still think is cool. Which will be cemented in place when we take them to Hawaii in just over a week! YAY!