it's not too late... yet

The Little Guy isn't speaking yet and his pediatrician had some concerns so we're getting him evaluated to see if he needs some speech therapy.  The lady who came to do our intake visit said we really should be signing with him.   Parenting FAIL right there, since Baby Girl rocked out the signs at a very early age.  I guess that's the difference between paying the equivalent of a second mortgage to awesome daycare providers and trying to do it yourself!  

Anyway,  we remember what the signs are for "food" "eat" "milk" and "all done" are, so that's what we're working on.   I'm repeating the words and doing the signs over and over again in front of the Little Guy and he is giving me the strangest looks.   He isn't even laughing at it, doesn't think it's a game,  he just seems to think I am the biggest fool to walk the earth.   He may have a point there,  I do look like an idiot signing "milk" over and over again - play the video to see why:

Oh, the things we do for our children.   

He has his assessment on the 29th to see if he qualifies for EI.   He needs to have about a 30% delay to qualify,  but at his intake they seemed to think he would definitely qualify.   What a ride to get this kid to talk, I'm sure in a few years he won't shut up!!

Dr. Jeckyll and Baby Girl

OMG

OH EM GEE

My kid is crazy.  This summer has been action packed.  My kids never stop moving from the time they wake up until the time we all admit defeat and throw them in bed (literally in my Little Guy's case,  I'm too short to put him all the way down into the pack and play),  and it takes a toll on them.... well,  on my Baby Girl.   Girlfriend gets tired and cranky.   Tonight my mother and I had to drive about 45 minutes away (in traffic) to pick up my father's power washer.   You know, the one that's been broken for 2 years but suddenly it HAD TO BE PICKED UP TODAY.    We put the kids in the car around 4:20 and headed out.  

Baby Girl was dead asleep in about 10 minutes and she slept for a solid hour before we woke her up to get dinner at Panera.

In retrospect,  that may have been one of the worst ideas in the history of the world.   Eve eating the apple,  letting rats run rampant during the Plague,  Baby Girl being woken up from a nap.  It's clearly in the top three.  She whined and cried for TWO SOLID HOURS.   That's right,  more than double her naptime. 
She wanted chocolate milk.   She has never had chocolate milk and I knew she'd dislike it so I told her as much.  She threw a fit and I let her get it.   Guess who threw a fit because she doesn't like chocolate milk? 

She wanted grilled cheese.  I told her she was splitting it with her brother.   She threw a fit because I gave half her sandwhich to the Little Guy.   Guess who didn't eat a SINGLE BITE OF GRILLED CHEESE?  

She wanted to be carried.  She didn't want to be carried.   She couldn't walk because her legs hurt.  She didn't want to move.  She didn't want to sit.  

She wanted a cookie.   She refused to pick out a cookie.   I picked out a cookie and she didn't want it.  She didn't want to share the cookie.   She wanted to eat the whole cookie and then she didn't want any of the cookie.   She didn't want her brother to eat it.   She wanted me to eat even less than her brother ate.

I wanted to leave her at Panera. 

life as we know it

I am so tired.

My 4 month old has never slept through the night.   Not once.  Not even close.

Do I have your pity yet?  Because I can get more dramatic about it if you don't feel bad for me.

I have calluses on my right hand from carrying my boy in his bucket seat up and down three flights of stairs multiple times a day.   Also,  my back is in constantly in pain. 

Okay,  I'll stop.

Now that I no longer pay people to do it for me,  I need to come up with crafty ideas to do with my Baby Girl so she doesn't grow up and feel a need to pay a therapist to figure out why she never made a handprint turkey.   I search Pintrest on the daily, but a lot of what I see is more suited for older kids,  or requires supplies that I don't have (a list of supplies of things I don't have would include:  construction paper,  googly eyes,  felt,  pipe cleaners,  feathers, and glitter).   The best I can come up with is Thanksgiving Garland
-but only if Andrew can print of a whole bunch of leaves... and if I buy some string.  

Sometimes I even impress myself with my stellar crafty mama skills.  

Okay, so I may not be winning any Martha Stewart awards,  but I allow both play-do AND finger paint and we use both multiple times a week.   I ROCK.

I had to pick up Baby Girl from school yesterday - a task which is normally Andrew's responsibility.   Because this is not Baby Girl's normal schedule, and girlfriend hates deviating from her normal schedule I was harassed the entire way out of the building.

"Mama, how you pick me up from school?"  (she meant 'why'  instead of 'how'.  For reasons unbeknownst to us, she has confused the two words)
"Where's Daddy?"
"How he has to work late?"
"Can Daddy meet us at home after he goes shopping?"  (she refused to accept the fact that he was working late and insisted that he was shopping)

By the time I got her into the car and buckled up,  I was already sick of the questions.  She didn't like any of the answers I was giving her anyway,  so I told her we would listen to some music.   She would have none of it and kept up the interrogation.   Except after she stopped questioning me on Andrew's whereabouts,  she moved on to some things I had no idea how to answer.  Well, I know the answer, but no clue how to explain it to a two year old. 

"Mama, it's almost dark out."
"well, we still have a few hours of daytime"
this answer earns me a gigantic sigh, as though I clearly do not understand when the sun sets
"Mama, where does the dark go?"
"Um.... well.... it goes to the other side of the world"
"The other side of the world?"
"Yes, when we have sun, they have dark"
insert massive eye roll here,  since I'm obviously the dumbest person in the world. She's not buying the other side of the world answer.
"Mama, what happens to the trees when it's dark time?"
"Nothing sweetie, the trees stay where they are at night"
she glared at me for this one.  Apparently the trees move around at night and I'm supposed to know this? 
"Oh.  Mama,  what happens to the trees when it rains?"
"They drink the rain"
"But Mama, how do they drink their milk?"
"trees don't drink milk, only little girls drink milk"
"Mama, that's SO SILLY!"
again with the massive eye roll

Yes,  it's quite silly that trees don't drink milk.  Also,  I don't think I'm sad that I don't pick up from school every day.  I think I would go insane if I was reminded how stupid I am every day on the ride home.   Andrew claims that they don't have those types of conversations on the way home.  I guess I'm just lucky!

I'm not sad that the Little Guy won't be able to talk for a few years....

Alphabet soup

We have starting teaching Baby Girl her letters.  She knows S, M, and B.    As for A...  well,  the following conversation happens about 6 times a day

Mama (after drawing an A):  What's this letter?
Baby Girl:  Yes.
Mama:  Yes.... what?  What letter is this?
Baby Girl.   It's a .....   
Mama:  it's an A!
Baby Girl:  it's an A!

2 seconds later:
Mama:  What's this letter?
Baby Girl:  A 'A'!
Mama:  cringing at the improper use of 'a' vs. 'an' - Yes!

2 seconds later:
Mama:  What's this letter?
Baby Girl:   I don't know!

Seriously,  she forgets it in 2 seconds.   I know she's still young for her letters,  and I understand this is not going to happen quickly,  but seriously?   We probably point out the letter "A" 10 times a day.    She cannot remember it,  yet she saw an "O" on our Welcome mat and recognized it instantly -  they don't do letters as school yet.   So she randomly taught herself what an "O" is,  but cannot get the "A" which is pointed out to her eleventy billion times a day?   Only my kid.   I swear she is doing it on purpose.

In other news, she's potty training.   We're all kind of scarred by it.   Her favorite trick is to sit on the potty for about 10 minutes and not go and then have an accident 30 seconds after she gets up.   My favorite trick is drinking copious amounts of wine to get through it.

HA HA HA JUST KIDDING,  DON'T CALL THE AUTHORITIES ON ME!  I know I'm pregnant.  There is no wine drinking.   There is a lot of complaining about the lack of wine though,  don't get me wrong.

Also on the Lil Sibling front,  I heard the heartbeat today.   4 more weeks until we know if we're welcoming Lil Brother or Lil Sister!

Tis the Season!

This past weekend did not turn out quite how I was expecting it to be.   So when Sunday night rolled around,  all I wanted to do was sit on the couch, watch The Christmas Story and zone out (and curse the person who decided pregnant women can't have a glass of wine).   That isn't quite what I got.

Baby Girl was not herself yesterday and at 7:00 when I asked her if she wanted to go to bed she said yes.   So I put her in the crib and 10 minutes later she was crying.  Not her normal "I'm a toddler and I feel like I have to complain when I'm in bed" cry,  but an actual "there is something wrong cry".   In I go,  try to get her to lay down and go to sleep.   Fail.   So I pick her up, go sit on the couch and ignore the blatant warning signs that are repeatedly thrown in my face.

10 minutes later she's doing her best Regan MacNeil impression.   Seriously, I was waiting for her head to start spinning around.

As  she was projectile vomiting on me,  all I could do was look at Andrew.   He looked back at me.   I started to gag because I cannot deal with the smell of someone throwing up.   Finally he moved and got a towel to mop it all up.    When she was doing puking we moved into the bathroom (right, we waited until AFTER she was done throwing up to do that) and cleaned up.    I managed to not throw up myself, a feat for which I'm pretty sure I deserve a cash prize.

And then Baby Girl went back to bed and I passed out on the couch.

Happy Sunday night to me!

10 on Tuesday

1.  I'm 2 hours into Room.   I think it's a pretty good choice for an audiobook,  the main character is 5 and it's being read as a child.   It's actually the first audiobook I've heard that has different people voicing the different people.   It really works for this book,  and I actually wish my commute was longer so I could listen longer!

2.   Thanksgiving is coming and I don't really like the dress I have for Baby Girl.  I want to buy this,  because OMG ADORABLE...   but I already have a (boring) dress that will be fine.   What to do,  what to do....

3.  I will probably wear a work outfit on Thanksgiving.  Because that's how cool I am.  I can make any even business casual.  It helps that I only own business casual clothing.   A lot of it is grey and black, and kind of screams INSURANCE PROFESSIONAL.    I only wish I could have a turkey made out of bows on my Thanksgiving jumper. 

4.  How many more weeks until ABC pulls the plug on Pan-Am?  I'm starting to actually like it,  so I'm thinking one more week until it's pulled.

5.  I'm still bitter that Off the Map was canceled at the end of last season.  I really liked it,  even if I was the only one!

6.  Baby Girl has been calling her teachers "Silly Goose".    I'm still waiting for my parenting award.

7.  I really like my iPhone 4s,  but I still don't really understand how to use Siri.  I don't have bluetooth in my car so I can't use it to its full potential anyway.  I like to ask it questions until it gets mad at me.

8.  I'm obsessed  with watching Disney reveal videos.   I want someone to take me to Disney World.  NOT Chattanooga


9.  I don't actually want to go to Disney right now,  because the thought of chasing after a 2 year old in Disney World gives me hives

10.  I've had a sore throat for over 2 weeks.   When do you think I should do something about that?

Opine

Andrew showed me this article today.   Take a minute and read it.

Okay,  got that?

Did anyone else become extremely confused by it?    Let's start at the beginning: 

But the Framingham mother of two boys, ages 2 and 5, also works full time. She sends her youngest to a local day-care center that serves breakfast, lunch, and two snacks and, like many programs, prohibits outside food.

What?  Our daycare doesn't provide any food for infants (I'm not sure what they would have provided since she was breastfed),  will provide breakfast (though Baby Girl eats breakfast at home) and snacks to toddlers.   I assume it's the same idea in the pre-school rooms.   But we send in her own lunch - and I'd be horrified if someone told me I couldn't decide what my child was eating.  What kind of daycare are these people using?

In Massachusetts, licensed child-care providers - including private and nonprofit centers, in-home day cares and preschools - must follow two regulations aimed at obesity prevention: Provide one hour of physical activity every six hours, and follow US Department of Agriculture guidelines.

ONE HOUR of physical activity every 6 hours?  One hour?  They are toddlers!  They should be running around all day!  That's what toddlers do!  That and paint really unrecognizable blobs that come home at the end of the day and I squint, stare, rotate, and even ask baby Girl what it is before I throw it away (I'm the best parent ever,  obvi)

“Eating a diet that is high in sugar and refined starch can train the palate from a very young age to accept only these tastes,’’ Rostler said. “In these cases, vegetables become bitter and very unacceptable for children, and as they get older it’s harder and harder for them to eat healthy.’’

Now I just have to brag.   My kid loves vegetables.   I don't know why, I think it's a little weird.   But she does.  She will eat broccoli or green beans over mashed potatoes. 


Mildred Kelley, who runs a day-care program out of her Quincy home, said if she serves carrot sticks or celery, she ends up tossing them out.
“What toddler you know wants carrots and celery sticks for their snack?’’ she said. 

Mildred Kelley,  you are the worst daycare provider ever.  You know what toddler eats carrots and celery sticks for their snack?  My kid does.   And do you know why?  Because she's a toddler and she eats what I put in front of her.  Oh, I've learned not to bother with rice.. or peach flavored yogurt... or summer squash (yet she devours zucchini.... strange),  but she eats what I give her.   I give her healthy snacks.  Ergo,  she eats healthy snacks.   Mildred,  I certainly hope you don't charge for your service.

I don't know a parent would put up with not being in charge of what their child eats.   The toddler room at our daycare serves whole milk (because toddlers are supposed to be on whole milk until at least 2 years old),  but after she turned 2,  we switched her down to 1% because of some other.... digestive issues that she has.   We told them we would provide her milk for her since we don't want her on whole anymore.  I never ASKED if it was okay - they don't get to decide what kind of milk my child drinks,  I do.   And (because Baby Girl goes to the best daycare ever) they told us that we did not have to provide it,  they give the pre-schoolers 1% milk and they are more than happy to fill my girl's cup from the pre-schooler's milk.  They rock.  


OF COURSE - this is separate from the allergy issue.   Our daycare is a peanut free facility and no matter what we tell them,  there will be no peanut or peanut product allowed in.   That's an entirely different (and understandable) issue.  

And on that note,  we've found Sunbutter to be an extremely good substitute for peanut butter. 

WOOOO

I am blogging from the laptop! The power cord has been obtained! The laptop is fully operational! (okay, admit it, who pictures Admiral Ackbar when you see or hear the phrase 'fully operational'? no? just me? righty-o)

For awhile I have been contemplating giving Baby Girl a haircut. As you may remember, girlfriend was born with a full head of hair. Long hair. Oddly long hair for a newborn. She was actually born in a little bit of distress and she was whisked away the second she was born. I didn't get to hold her right away because she was being poked and prodded by the doctors, but I did see her as she was quickly taken away and literally the first thing I noticed about her was her oddly full head of hair.

See what I mean? This is her on the day she was born. When have you see that much hair on a newborn? (and no, i was not choking her, that's actually how you burp a newborn, it just looks really really weird in this picture)

To make a long story short, she has had long hair since the day she was born. Around 7 months I had to give her a quick trim because it had grown out oddly, and that's all the hair that has been cut off her head in 25.5 months. Imagine if you hadn't had a haircut in over 2 years. It was getting bad.

Neither Andrew nor my parents wanted me to cut her hair. They all acted like I was going to physically harm her if I dared cut off her baby curls. No one wanted to admit her hair (in addition to being ridiculously long) was uneven and scraggly. All anyone sees are her gorgeous baby curls.

I love the curls too, but I can't let her become Repunsel. Something had to be done. So I picked up some cutting shears at Wallyworld today and after bathtime, when he hair was combed out, I attacked.

okay, "attacked" may not be the right word. "Barely trimmed" may be a better way to describe it. Because the hair was uneven, I had to cut more in some places than others, and I had to cut about an inch off in some places. But she looks like a normal kid now.

A normal 2 year old with hair halfway down her back...

chugga chugga choo choo!

yeah. There's a "choo choo" episode of Dora on right now.

Come on, Vamanos!

I gave in and let Baby Girl watch ONE episode of Dora. (Don't tell my mother that the TV is on during daylight hours. She may disown me). I told myself it was because BG hasn't been feeling great lately and this is a nice thing to do for her. But in reality I'm letting her do it because the opportunity of sitting on the couch directly in front of the AC sounded way too good to pass up.

I'm a good mother though. Really.

It's really hot. as in REALLY HOT. Hotter than the northern most edges of the arctic circle in which I reside normally gets. And tomorrow it's going to be even more hot. Fun. My little AC can barely handle these temperatures.

BUT I LOVE THEM!!! HEAT!!! SUN!!!!!

Yes, I sit in a cube 9 hours a day, but it's an air conditioned cube!

Let's go B's!

It's do or die night, Broonz. Let's see some hustle!

Well my "weekend" away (ahem... 24 hours) has come and gone. The hotel was everything I wanted it to be. King sized bed, lots of pillows, a TV you could watch from the aforementioned bed, free mini shampoo bottles, NO TODDLERS... basically heaven. The Duck tour was good - it's something I have wanted to do for many many years and I'm glad I did it. I learned nothing about the city I didn't already know, but it was fun. The weather wasn't great, but we only had to deal with pouring rain when we were walking home from the restaurant. We had a super lazy Sunday morning... we watched TV from bed which is something we never get to do, as we only have 1 TV. We didn't bother getting up and no little footsteps could be heard running into our room to get us. To be honest, I didn't want to leave and go collect my child. And to be even more honest, my kid was none too thrilled to see me. She wanted Nana and Grandpa and more of getting everything she wanted.

All in all, everyone had a super weekend. And it cost us less than $50, thanks to some generous donations to the "weekend away" fund and Marriott rewards points!

And in other news, I ran 3.7 miles today. That's half the mileage I need for Falmouth and the longest run to date. I'm still a little afraid that I won't officially finish since you need to do it in 2 hours and I did 3.7 miles in 50 minutes (I know, it's really slow. It's my slowest time yet - I added more hills in today and I was not doing well on the hills). But in the very wise of Dory, just keep swimming... I'll get there.

yuck

I ran out of K-cups today and had to dip into Andrew's supply. We don't exactly have the same taste in coffee. His Donut Shop Extra Bold makes me want to gag. But it's either that, or no coffee today, so I'm forcing it down.

It's gross.

My daughter says everything is gross now. I can't imagine where she learned that.

I'm doing w6d2 today of c25k. I thought it would be easy, since it's back to intervals after running 20 minutes straight on w5d3. From everything I've read, that doesn't seem to be the case. For reasons I don't understand, this is a hard interval workout, even though it seems easy. Run 3 minutes, walk 3 minutes, run 8 minutes, walk 3 minutes, run 5 minutes. It's less running than my 20 minute straight run, so it doesn't make sense that it would be so hard... but what do I know, I just run when the nice woman inside my app tells me to.

Speaking of apps, I was thinking about doing the Bridge to 10K app (because as we remember, Falmouth is longer than a 10k!) after I'm done with c25k, but I downloaded Nike + last night (it's free right now!) and I may just go with that. It has a mapping feature which my c25k app does not have (Andrew has a different c25k app and his does have the mapping feature and I am super jealous), and it has features that you can run against a specific time which will help me because I'm a pretty slow runner. This way I can still keep track of my mileage and my distance all in one app. That's the plan anyway, I need to get through week 9 of c25k!

One... Two.... Oornie!

Baby Girl has found a new book to read 5 trillion times a day. It's only 6 pages long - so that's good. But it's only 6 pages long, so I want to shoot myself when I'm reading it for the 4,999,999,999th time.

It's a Sesame (Tepame in BG's language) Street counting book. Elmo counts the animals and Ernie helps along the way. We were on page two where we count 2 Striped Tigers and 3 Proud Peacocks. Of course, being the Super Mom that I am, we have to actually count all these animals.

Mama: 2 striped tigers. One, Two.
Baby Girl: One, Two!

Mama: 3 proud peacocks. One. Two. Three.
Baby Girl: One... Two.. OORNEE!! (Ernie).

She then laughs hysterically and we flip the page to 4 Waddling Penguins

Mama: 4 Waddling Penguins. One. Two. Three. Four.
Baby Girl: One... Two... OORNEE!!! More laughter.

Who knew Ernie could be so funny?

sicky sue

Baby Girl has been pretty healthy in her first 19 months of life. When all is said and done, she has had 2 double ear infections, one regular ear infection, and three colds. Considering she has been in daycare since she has 13 weeks old, I think that's a pretty good track record. Or, at least it WAS a good track record, until last night.

Last night the dreaded 24 hour stomach bug entered our house. I woke up at 12:30 hearing some strange sounds from Baby Girls room. I stumbled blindly in without glasses or contacts and the second I passed through her door, I knew. You can't mistake that smell.

Oh. My. God.

That's what was running through my head. I don't know how to clean up vomit. I've never cleaned it up. I've only been on the puking side of this, never the cleaning up the puke side of this. I wanted to call my mother and crawl into a hole. But somehow I didn't think she'd appreciate that call, so I plunged forward.

I honestly had NO idea where to begin. I picked up my poor sick little baby (er, toddler) and called Andrew, who then stumbled in and had pretty much the same reaction I did. WTF do we do?

I'll spare you the details of what we did. Suffice to say, we made some mistakes along the way.

She puked in our bed. She puked in her bed. She projectile vomited onto me. We went through 3 sheets, we all had at least two costume changes, and random towels and face cloths were all over the place. The three of us were a collective hot mess.

I slept with Baby Girl on the couch (read: BG snored, I was afraid of dropping her off the side so I didn't sleep a wink) until 3:30. Andrew took over and put her back down in her crib around 4.

We all showered and/or bathed this morning, and I ended up doing 5 loads of laundry at my parents' house. 2 loads were from last night. First time parents, what??

I would like to say that the next time BG gets a bug I'll know what to do. But in reality, I'm still a little shell shocked from last night and I still think calling my mother in the middle of the night is the best answer. It always worked for me when I was a kid...

Friday! FRIDAY FRIDAY FRIDAY!

I have come to the conclusion that Charlie Sheen is a lunatic who exists solely to test the boundaries of cocaine consumption. The fact that he is still alive amazes me, but then again I'm also amazed that Lindsay Lohan is alive.

Anyway.

Toddlers and their repetitiveness are so much fun.

BG: What's Grover doing?
Me: He's riding a horse

BG: What's Grover doing?
Me: He's riding a horse

BG: What's Grover doing?
Me: He's riding a horse

BG: What's Grover doing?
Me: He's riding a horse

BG: What's Grover doing?
Me: Flying to the moon

When I go off script, Baby Girl gets infuriated. "MAMA!!!! GROVER DDDOOOOIIIIINNNNGGGGG!!! GROOOOOVER DOOOOOOOING!". This goes on until I beg forgiveness from her Royal and Supreme Highness and correctly answer the question. I'm surprised she hasn't thrown me in solitary confinement for daring to not play along with her 10 minute question and answer session for the same question.

le sigh

I wish I was pregnant, only because when I was pregnant my headaches went away. I have had annoying headaches at least once a week for as long as I can remember. Plus the occasional caffeine headache... my poor head. For some reason, pregnancy was the cure for them.

Oh well. Maybe someday.

By the way, my child is sneaky. We had pork chops, spinach, and mashed potatoes for dinner. Baby Girl LOVES mashed potatoes (who doesn't?). Unfortunately, that was all she would eat tonight. So I even tried to show her how to put the potatoes on her pork and spinach so she could get those last few bites of potato. The little sneak put the piece of pork in her mouth, sucked off all the potato, and then spit the pork back out.


She is my daughter after all.

grumble grumble

Dooce was all "hey, Stay-At-Home-Moms rock and we have the hardest jobs ever!" in her last post.

While I'm in no way denying that staying home with kids can be very hard - how come no one ever says "Hey, all you mothers who have to go to work every day and then come home and still be a hands on parent, plus everything else that you have to do - you rock too!"

I've said it before, but it drives me crazy when people say that being a stay at home mom is the most demanding job ever, its thankless, and unpaid, and blah blah blah. No. that's just not true. Being a PARENT is the most demanding job ever, is thankless, and goes unpaid, and blah blah blah. It makes no difference if you work or not. In fact, I guess I have TWO jobs, and I still don't get any time off from being a parent.

I'm not knocking stay at home mothers. If our finances ever allowed it, I would stay at home with my Baby Girl too (though apparently people close to me think I go to work each day for the enjoyment of it... that never ceases to amaze me. Have I not been clear in the past 19 months that I would stay home if I could?). However, I AM going to dispute the fact that it's only stay at home parents who have such a hard, thankless, and break free job.

It's called being a parent. And we all do it, whether or not we go to work each day.

So, rock on working moms! Deal with all the crap you have to deal with at the office and then come home and keep a clean house, keep up with all your laundry, always know what is going on at daycare (or whatever child care you have), never be late with anything, always give 100% to your kid... But don't be anything less than your best at work - you still need to bring home that paycheck - and never let down your Super Mom guard. Because that is what people expect from you, since you are so lucky to have a job that gives you "days off".

If I ever am able to stay home and anyone ever catches me complaining about how I never get a day off, I am giving permission for you to smack me across the face.

stir crazy

Fear not, dear readers. I did not trek into work today! Though I totally could have gone in this afternoon if daycare had been open. The roads are fine. We only got a foot of snow, so the storm wasn't as bad as predicted in terms of actual snowfall. But the wind was really bad and there are crazy snowdrifts.

Baby girl is DONE with being stuck at home, and it's only been a day and a half. She literally had a 20 minute temper tantrum where she stood in the corner, put her hands on the wall and hysterically cried. If I tried to go near her she would get so upset that she'd start to shake and scream " NO MAMA NO MAMA NO MAMA".

Did I get that on tape? Obviously. I did feel badly for her though, she's sick and teething, and is sick to death of her 881 SF of living space. We did take her outside yesterday to give her a few minutes of running around, but it's really cold and windy today and she's still too little to really enjoy it. So inside we stay...

meh

I just need it to be Friday. I somehow need to make it through the next 5 days. Right now it seems like an eternity. 5 days.... just 5 days...

I went to Target today to do as much food shopping as the limited food selection at my local Target allows. I almost went crazy. I have a hard time dealing with crowds at stores, to the point where I have become so overwhelmed that I've had to walk out and leave a half full cart behind me. Going to Target at the beginning of the Christmas shopping season may have not been my smartest idea. I almost lost it on a few different occasions, but we really needed our food so I kept going with my mind half gone. Baby girl left a trail of pretzel goldfish throughout the whole store. I couldn't have cared less since she was behaving, but I do feel bad for the employee who has to sweep up tonight. Sorry dude, but I needed to keep my kid quiet.

Yes, I bribe my child with food.

No, I don't care that you think that makes me a bad parent.

5 more days...

Well that sucked

I had my consult this morning for my wisdom teeth. All 4 have to come out, though they will probably only be able to do 2 at a time. Oh joy of joys. And to make it that much better, I had to schedule this for a Monday, which means I have to take at least 2 sick days. If I could have done it on a Friday, I could have had the whole weekend to convalesce. Why can things never work out for me? And the last time I got an IV was when I was in labor and the IDIOT nurse (the one bad one I had in the entire process) couldn't find a vein and "blew up" 2 of them (her words, not mine) and my entire right hand was green and bruised for 2 weeks. I still can see the marks where she tried, 8 months later. I need a stupid IV for the stupid drugs that they are going to give me. Oh no, I can't be completely knocked out, they only partially knock you out.

I'm not looking forward to this process.

Totally different topic: It's pretty obvious that Andrew and I are the best parents in the world. Last night, BG woke up twice. She never ever ever wakes up at night (I think she might be getting her 3rd tooth) so this was a rarity. I got up first and rocked her back to sleep. A few hours later she woke up again and I kicked Andrew until he got up with her. Then she woke up for the day around 7ish. This is the conversation that followed:

BG: whiiiiiine! whiiiiiiine!!! WHIIIIIIINE!
Andrew: I think someone wants her Mama!
Me: Really? I'm hearing "Daddy"
Andrew: No, that's definitely "I want my Mama"
Me: hmm.... nope. Daddy
BG: STILL WHINING HERE!!!!
Me: Maybe she will stop
BG: whiiiine! Whiiiiiiiiine!


That went on for about 10 minutes when Andrew finally got up to get her (I knew she was saying "Daddy! Come get me!"). I rolled over to get some more sleep, but then Andrew put the baby on top of me and left the room. How rude!