I traveled with my toddler and lived to tell the tail

So until very recently, I hadn't gone anywhere with Finn.

Really.  No trips at all.  And he was 16 months old.

Which was...weird?  Maybe? 

In my defense.  He really really hated the car the first year of his life.  And we had slept over at my mom's, but she's only 45 minutes away.  That was pretty much are farthest outing.

But for Easter this year I sucked it up and we headed up to the in-laws in Nashville.  Four hours each way in the car, away for two nights.

And it was...okay.  The car ride up actually went all right.  We left right after the baby got up and although someone had to sit in the back and work hard to entertain him he stayed pretty happy.  We only stopped once at a McDonald's and let him wander around and eat massive amounts of ketchup.

Being there was fine, although he had trouble with the mere hour of time difference (which really just highlighted that he/we does better when we stick to his schedule).  Being in a non baby proofed house also was without incident.

Admittedly, the drive back was a disaster.  This time we tried to time it with his one nap and he just could not fall asleep.  He screamed for an hour and a half.  Finally the combination of exhaustion and me jiggling and jiggling his chair back and forth put him to sleep, but he still roused himself screaming every ten minutes.

So that was less than fun, but we did it.  And we survived.

And now I have three more trips on the horizon.  I've gone trip crazy.  Boston, Destin, and Seattle.  Flying, driving, flying.  How they go remains to be seen.

Seriously, enough with the porn.

I keep gearing myself up to get back to blogging. And then I see I have a comment on my blog. Yay! I think.

And then I see that it's porn spam.

Why? What about my blog says "great site for porn fishing?" It's very disheartening.

And yet, I'm back. In hopes that a new entry will throw them off the scent.

I could, of course, just make it harder to leave comments.

But what if that makes it so an actual person doesn't write one? I'm comment needy.

Anyway. The porn was the tip of the "why I haven't been writing" iceberg.

Other reasons: great times, awful times, extreme fatigue, not feeling like I had anything clever to say, a fixation on buying and selling cloth diapers.

Any of these good reasons? No, but there we are.

Finn is going through an amazingly cute and fun phase. He's talking a lot more and is a lot more company. Kevin has also been traveling a huge amount and so I've just been taking care of Finn, which means by the end of the day I'm tired and would rather read, watch TV or read other people's blogs than be creative myself.

Plus, the longer I go the better I think the entry needs to be when I return. Which is a lot of pressure.

But I decided to just dive back in.

So here we are.

My day

The baby wakes up at 6:30.  Happy and cute baby, yes, but way too early.

I try to nurse him back to sleep for a while to no avail.  I lay in bed with my eyes closed.  I am already exhausted and haven't even gotten up yet.

It is day two of Kevin's three days of being out of town.  The first day there is a little bit of fun being alone.  Watching what I want, stretching out in bed.  But by day two I am tired and know that there are still two full days with just me and the baby.

I get up and the baby is off and fussing.  He cries on and off for seemingly no reason and I can feel myself get annoyed, but carry him around and try to make him happy.  We eventually go to a story time which he enjoys even though another little boy keeps taking all the toys Finn is playing with and then throwing them at him.  The boys mother does nothing, I glare at him ineffectually.

We go home.  It is the day my house gets cleaned which is my very favorite day of every two weeks.  But today when she leaves the house...just isn't clean.  She's been coming later and leaving earlier and doing a worse and worse job.  Every time she leaves I think I should a) talk to her and explain my upset/concerns or b) fire her and find someone new.  But I do neither of these things because I am a) horrible at confrontation and b) the thought of trying to find someone knew fills me with exhaustion.

I get the baby down for his nap.  I know that later in the day I have to coordinate a pick up from our house of one of Kevin's work instruments.  He was very careful to tell the people not to come before 2:00, after naptime is over.  They come at 1:06.  The baby wakes up.  The baby cries.  I help them find the intrument while thinking that I hate them.

The baby continues to cry.  I manage to get him back to sleep for a while but he wakes up fussy.

My mom is supposed to come over and help me tonight.  Bring dinner, watch the baby while I shower, spend the night.  She calls to tell me she can't come because she has the stomach flu.  I am especially glad to hear that since she was over the day before yesterday playing with me and Finn.

I am also not feeling well.  I want to lay motionless on the couch under a blanket.  Instead I chase a fussy baby.

It is late and the day is almost over.  One of the dogs gets out of the yard.  I put Finn in the car and we drive around in the freezing cold night looking for her.  I have mixed feeling about wanting to find her, but we eventually do.

I try to shower.  Finn wants to get in the shower but then screams until I pick him up (at this point it is well past his bed time).  I wash one handed while holding a slippery baby.

We get out and I go to put on my pajamas.  Finn is mercifully quiet for a minute and I relax, forgetting the cardinal mom rule that quiet is almost always a bad thing.  I go back into the bath room and Finn smiles at me.  At his feet are two golfball sized pieces of poo.

We are finally ready for bed.  Hopefully Finn will sleep.  I will most likely lay next to him in the dark and eat cupcakes.  And then tomorrow I will do it all again.

My little parrot

I am so enjoying Finn's age.  You can just see him learning and understanding things.  Every day he seems to pick up something new.

The (somewhat) downside of that is you have to be VERY careful what you say or do in front of him since he likes to imitate you.  Today I got a rag and was cleaning up doggie paw prints.  When I was done I dropped the rag into a laundry pile.

When I turned around Finn had taken the rag out of the pile and was on his hands and knees rubbing the carpet with it!

So cute!

Less cute was later in the day when I dropped something and said "crap!" really loud and heard a little "cap!" from right next to me.

In a larger sense I feel like I really have to think about what personality traits of mine I want to pass on.

There are definitely things I would love for him to get (my kindness, my love of books) and things I would just as soon he skip (my shyness, my temper).  I feel like there is a ticking clock for me to get my act together to be a good role model.

We shall see how it goes...

Look at me go - making friends!

I feel like I am making headway in the whole wanting friends thing.

I blogged earlier about the very nice mom I hung out with.  She and her daughter are coming over again for another playdate on Monday.

I also reached out to a mom I had seen a couple of times and went over to her house this week.  We really had a great time.  I felt like we could talk and had good friend chemistry.

And my every Friday playgroup, which I was having mixed feeling about, I am really starting to enjoy.  I think it just takes me a while to feel comfortable with people and I get impatient for the feeling uncomfortable time to pass.  But I think it has, which is nice.

These are all good things.  Maybe they are in response to the lovely Emily's visit, which had made me happy, but then sad when she left and there was an Emily shaped hole.  But maybe these new friends are being sucked in by the friend void.

And today I was struck with a bubbly feeling I couldn't name until I realized I was feeling happy.  So that's a good thing for sure.

Today was brought to us by the letter "B"....if B stands for Benadryl

So I finally caved and got on the Benadryl bandwagon today.

I know...I'm drugging my baby.  Bad mommy.

But there was no sleeping last night, and that's just not a good thing for either of us.  Plus Dr. Sears says it's okay as long as they're over one, so I was convinced.

We tried it for his nap, since if he was going to be one of those kids who got all amped up I figured it was better to know earlier in the day.  And he slept!  Yay!  He woke up after about an hour (he's only been taking one forty minute nap a day) but then was still tired and napped for another hour or so in my arms on the couch as Emily and I enjoyed Keeping Up With the Kardashians.

And he was a much happier baby for the rest of the day, including a long mall shopping trip and car ride.

I have hesitated in part ever giving him any because I don't want to be tempted to give it to him unless it's really, really necessary.  I know it will be tempting given his bad sleeper-ness.  But I'm only giving myself permission to use it for a few days until we get through the zillion teeth he currently has coming in.

Now I will go and hopefully sleep.  (Cue angels singing).

I'm a bad hostess...and possibly friend...and mom...join me in a pity party

I am having a hard day.

Well..some of the day was nice...but the evening is not going so great and when I get in the dark cloud it seems to color everything around it, including the immediate past and future, and so a bad day is born.

Finn is not sleeping.  And I know that's the actual problem.  I am on four nights with very little sleep with a very fussy and teething baby.  I know my emotions are really caused by fatigue, but it's hard to seperate out the tiredness from the "my life is out of control...I can't handle this..." even if the root of the problem is really the not sleeping and not my actual life.

But right now I have a tired and fussy baby.  And we're out of pain killers for him.  And he just pooped everywhere.  And I am covered in baby poop and baby food.  And I just want to feel like a person, and not just a mom.  And get some sleep, and have a clean house.

And I feel especially bad that Emily is here in the midst of molar-gate, because I feel like it's making me a much more tired and cranky hostess.  Hopefully she is still having some fun.

And we did go see the movie "Valentine's Day" with my totally age-inappropriate boyfriend, Taylor Lautner.

Mmmm...he's pretty.

So, really, the day wasn't all bad.  And maybe we'll sleep tonight.

Yay! Company!

My college roommate, Emily, is visiting.  It is so nice to see her.  So nice to spend time with someone who knows me well and I am so comfortable with.

She is one of the easiest people to talk to I know and although she doesn't have kids yet I feel very able to discuss Finn issues/concern/life with her.

I always have such fun when we're together, although I know when she goes home I get in a funk wishing she lived here, or that I had a similar friend in the area.

But for now I am enjoying the quality time and getting to show off the baby, although I feel like I have to keep saying "he really isn't always this fussy...he's just teething..."

Hopefully she won't hold it against us.

And...it was Valentine's Day, for which we did absolutely nothing.  But I did take a cute photo of my beautiful boy:

So cute...and so much bigger and more person-like than last Valentine's Day:

I blame the snow...and molars

These are my reasons for not posting yesterday.

Not great ones, but what are you going to do?

We got an actual amount of snow here, which for Atlanta is pretty...exciting?  odd?  end-of-the-world-esque?

And Finn is getting his molars.

These two things did not combine for an easy evening.

My husband got stuck in North Carolina and I was up a good portion of the night with a fussy, fussy (fussy...fussy...you get the point) baby.

So I blogged mentally, but never quite made it to the computer.

I kept thinking I would do it after Finn was good and asleep, but at the point that actually happened it was very very very late.

All right, enough with the excuses.  I am sure we can all move on.

His Fussiness has continued throughout the day, so I am guessing his mouth is all kinds of painful.  My husband finally got here late this afternoon so at least he is another pair of hands.

We had our early Valentine's Day celebration, which involved some take out and somewhat half hearted gift exchanging.  Although I have no energy to make Valentine's Day into a big deal I sometimes worry that I am setting a bad, no romance precendent and we will eventually be one of those couples who can't be bothered to do anything.  Sigh...

All right.  I am in a tired and funky mood from spending night and day with a tired and funky baby.  I promise more stories/wit/sparkle tomorrow.

A confession and a half: I wish he'd watch TV

I know, I know...TV is evil...if I were a better person I wouldn't even OWN a TV...shouldn't I be playing with my child...and so on.  Bring on the judgement.

But I do play with my child.  Constantly.  He's down to only a 45 minute nap a day.  That mean's it's me and him for about 11 hours every day.  I've given up on the gym after day three of constant screaming.  I just need a little time to myself.

Just a bit.  A half hour show a day?  That's not asking too much, right?  It (probably) won't turn him into a future couch potato.

But, unlike his mother, he's not yet into the tube.  He'll watch a few minutes of The Wiggles or Signing Time, but then there is much more interesting things to do - pull books off shelves, chase the dogs, scream.

Give in, Finn, TV is magical.  Pull up a chair!  I'll even show you Barney (yes...I'm that desperate).

I am not good at being happy for others. AKA I am small and petty

I have some mom bloggers that I really like.  But when I read about their various successes...being published places, making a living through advertising doing their blog, I am not quite as happy for them as I probably should be.

I am a small and petty person.

I want to be happy for them.  And I sort of am.  But another part of my just thinks - "why can't that be me?" 

I would LOVE to find a way to make a living blogging.  Not only would I love to be bringing in some money, but it would be amazing to feel like that many people were interested in what I have to say.

Me, me, me!  Why aren't I adored like I should be?

In all seriousness - is that even possible?  I would probably have to commit a lot more time (more time than 20 minutes when I am putting Finn to bed, for example).  Basically I just want it to happen.  An act of God?  Freak popularity?

Perhaps that's what I will wake up to tomorrow.  Fingers crossed.

At this point I'm just doing a nod to "posting every day"

Okay...so consider this an update to a couple of recent posts, and me white knuckleing the whole "posting every day" thing.

But it still counts!

Day two at the gym.  15 more minutes of sobbing, followed by those sad baby post cry hiccups in the car.  I felt awful and am waffling about continuing this experiment.  We shall see how I feel tomorrow.

In brighter news, I think I may have made a friend!

I met (re-met?) a very nice mom at a play date last week (we realized that we were in another mom's group together and had met before).  She had us over today and Finn and I had a lovely time!

The babies played very nicely together and I had such a good time with her.  I am practically giddy.

So that's me today.  All the excitement has left very little time for blogging, hence the half assedness of this post.

In which we go to the gym and my child becomes a banshee

I have a dream.

In it, I can once again belong to the Y.  I loved the Y, once upon a time (also known as before I had a child).  I used to go all the time.  Yoga, pilates, aerobics..I loved the classes.  And I knew they had a nursery that you could start taking the baby to when he/she was 6 weeks old. 

"Great!" pregnant (and stupid) me thought, "once the baby is six weeks, I will head back to the gym and he can go to the nursery...he'll be happy and I'll get to work out."

Oh poor, stupid, pregnant me. 

Of course, then the baby was born and I barely left my house for three months.  And the thought of leaving my baby with strangers?  Not so much.  So I bid a sad farwell to the gym.

But now the little one is over a year and I thought it was time to try again.  So today I went back with a seven day guest pass and tried dropping Finn in the nursery.  From the second I handed him off he started to scream.  I can't entirely blame him.  He and I have been apart for probably under 20 hours his entire life.  And then he was with his father or grandmother.  But here I just had to hand him to someone and walk away.

I gave it 15 minutes, but when he was still crying I went and got him.  I'm going to try everyday this week and see if he gets to like it anymore.  If not, the dream of gym time will have to wait until he's a little older.

This will not be me anytime soon, it appears....

Five things I love about my son

So a bunch of bloggers are doing this "13 (14?) days of love" leading up to Valentine's Day and blogging about things they love and whatnot.  But I missed that blogger memo and so am just doing one nod towards love today.

So, here are five things I love about my baby boy:

1.  His little starfish hands - so cute and tiny - but they're still people hands!  I love it when he pats my face, even if it is all too often the "clawing your eyes out" gateway

2.  His laugh - is there anything cuter than baby laughter?  I think not.  Finn has a dorky indrawn laugh that I completely adore.

3.  His new love of twirling - Finn learned to do this in music class - he now loves twirling until he is dizzy and falls over - then he laughs and laughs

4.  Nursing - yes I am still breastfeeding and while it's sometimes frustrating to not be able to have my husband put him to sleep, I love the feeling of closeness that I get from it and feeling like I am able to meet his needs

5.  How he's imitating everything now - although this is a lot of pressure - Finn is imitating everything we're saying/doing/all the sounds we make.  It's so funny and cute to watch him learn, although I definitely need to watch what I am saying!

Party time!

We went to our first of three weekends in a row with baby birthday parties.  I am glad Finn is slightly older than his little friends so I had nothing to compare his party to.

I like to be able to keep my standards low.  Especially when it comes to entertaining.

My mother is an uber-hostess.  And while her parties/dinners always come off great, they also seem super stressful.  So at some point I decided to adopt the "you can come over for dinner, but we're ordering pizza" attitude.  Less stress, so I can in theory enjoy the company a little more.

Anyway.  So Finn's party was fairly low maintance, and I got a lot of help from my mother and sister.  Sandwhich platter, store bought cake, no real theme (unless you count "I managed to keep him alive for the first year, good for me!") a theme.

Still, it was nice.  People came, there was cake, Finn was cute.

But I can already tell I am most likely on the low end of first birthday parties.  The one we went to today had a theme.  And lots of decorations.  And a very impressive home made cake.

I think the next two weeks may only highlight my non-party-mavenness.

But Finn was a cute birthday boy.  And he won't remember.  And he's still alive and kicking.  Good for me.

Making friends...an uphill battle

I had a group of very close girl friends in high school.

I just didn't know I was peaking, friendwise.

I made a few good friends in college, one of whom is still my closest friend.  And then...not so much...

I've been out of college for about eight years and have really struggled with the finding friends thing.  We've moved around some, but I've been here five years now, so I can't really use that as an excuse.

It's just hard to find someone you have great friend chemistry with.  I feel like I'm still dating.  I have met a lot of nice moms, but I want that best friend closeness, or even really good friend closeness.  It's hard to be patient.

And one of my current favorite mom's is about to move.  As did the last good friend I made here.

Is it something I am doing?  Am I somehow driving people from the state?

Do I sound needy?  That's always a turnoff, I am sure.

Nothing to do but keep trying I guess.  Hopefully I will be at a playgroup and lock eyes with someone across a crowded room of babies and we'll both just know we're meant to be the best of friends.

Cross your fingers.

The sun is shining!

Only metaphorically.  In actuality it is gross and rainy.  But we are doing better today.

No ripped contacts and no dentists, so right there this day is pretty much a winner.

Finn slept from 7 to 8:30.  I mean, yes, he got up in between to nurse and fuss a little, but he was still pretty much out.

And I have decided to accept that he is ready for just one nap a day, although I will admit that it is hard to give up two naps.  It's not that it's a ton less time asleep (although it is some) but it is hard to give up two breaks in the day where I can put my feet up (often literally) and catch my breath and regroup.

But non napping babies wait for no one so I guess I need to get over it.  Soon he will get better at entertaining himself, right?  At the moment he just wants me me me.  I try to remember that is ten years or so he will want nothing to do with me so I should savor this.

Onward, onward.  It seems to be the only choice available as a mother.

Silver lining? Meet cloud.

Want to play a fun new game with me?

Silver lining: The baby lay down and took a very nice nap this morning from 9:45 to 10:30.
Cloud: That was the only nap he was willing to take.  Allowing for a whole lot of cranky baby time.

Silver lining:  My eye is hurting slightly less than it was earlier today.

Cloud:  It was hurting because the contact I had in ripped in half in my eye.  Then the baby and I had to shlep to the eye doctor so he could remove the remaining half a lens.

Silver lining:  I have three fewer cavities than I had before.

Cloud:  Yes, that's because I got them filled today.  A process that took so much numbing that now, four hours later half my face is still numb.

Silver lining: Yes, my husband is away, but that does mean I can cook what I want for dinner and kick back and relax.

Cloud:  I can't eat, lest I chew my tongue.  Plus, see earlier re: fussy, sleep deprived baby.

Silver lining:  I have a mainly sweet baby who I get to stay home with, a husband I love and am pretty damn lucky.

Cloud:  Fine, I guess, you win.  It was close, though.  And I'm only giving in because the baby in finally asleep and you are starting to get feeling back in your lips.

Winner:  Silver lining.  But just barely.

This is why I don't blog every day...and yet, I am

Since I have committed, I shall continue, although today is not a day I would normally blog.

I have no funniness or pithiness.

My husband is out of town at least three days a week.  He hasn't been a ton of help when he is in town.  The baby isn't sleeping.  He is, however, doing an inordinate amount or fussing and crying.

I am so exhausted I feel like there should be another word for it.

But it doesn't matter.  I can't sleep or relax or put my feet up.   I just have to trudge on and on and on.  Which right now seems completely impossible, but I am fairly sure I will manage it all the same.

Defintely one of those "being a stay at home mom is hard!" days.

And you thought I was cranky before.  Who knew I was shielding you from my dark side.

More of me in February?

All right.  I am commiting to National Blog Posting Month which means I am going to post every day this month.

Um...in theory.

No, really, I am.  I'm committed.

I keep wanting to post more than I have been so I figure this is a good way to get into the habit.

Of course, that mean mean that this blog is now more "the minutea" than "the good" and "the bad."  Plus I have another blog I have to attempt not to abandon.  But perhaps I'll try to post on it every day next month.

So here I go.  Color me omnipresent.

Happiness is...a little boring

So you may have noticed, I have a tendency to bitch and moan.


It’s not just a blog thing. I admit I do it in real life too. It is my husband’s (and his family’s) number one complaint about me (although it’s possible that’s a long list).

But I can’t help it. I am not a “la la la I love rainbows every day is heaped with blessings" kind of girl. Which is not to say I’m unhappy. Or that I don’t appreciate my life.

I just like to kvetch. And I think it’s kind of funny.

And, come on. If every day my blog read “Finn is SO cute. I love his chubby cheeks and his little elbows” it would be dull. True (he has phenonenal elbows) but dull.

So, yes, motherhood and staying home with my son is often fun, but I think it’s more entertaining to blog about the recent lesson I learned about not giving a one year old part of a chocolate chip cookie ten minutes before bed. Or the ensueing two hours it took him to go to sleep. And the fact that I didn’t realize that was going to happen means I’m so bizarre combination of a masochist and an idiot.

So laugh at my pain. I do. Or find a cheerier blog. Just don’t complain about mine. No one likes that.

Are you the adult you’d thought you’d be?

Sometimes I have this vision in my head of adult me.

She’s delightful, I have to tell you. Her house is clean, she’s well put together – groomed and dressed, she cooks delicious meals, her time management is amazing, and she is always sweet and happy with her husband and child.

I keep waiting to grow up and be her.

But then I realize that I am grown up and I am nothing like that. And when I start to compare us, I don’t look so good.

My house is a mess. It was never that neat, but the addition of a toddler means it always looks like you’ve walked in in the middle of a robbery. And I’m being robbed by people who rolled in mud and dog hair before they came into your house.

There are (many) days when my version of dressed is most people’s version of pajamas. Make-up and done hair? Not so often.

I hate cooking dinner. I do it, but it’s not pretty. And I really struggle to come up with something healthy and well balanced.

I feel like I can’t get anything done. I run around all day, but have I finished my Christmas thank you cards? Managed to get the enormous laundry pile under control? Not so much.

And, finally, I am often snappish and a little mean to Kevin and frustrated with the little one.

I don’t know how to become the woman I want to be. Sometimes I feel like everyone has it down but me. Or is everyone faking it?

This is not me.

A very Etsy Christmas

I was a little Etsy obsessed this Christmas.

Pretty much everyone I bought for got something from there. But in my defense? Etsy is awesome.

And so easy to personalize, which I like. Plus buying stuff from there is more involved, which my husband hates but I love (a girl who spends much of her time stuck in her house with a toddler needs an outlet).

Some of my favorite Etsy bought gifts:

My very favorite two presents for my husband, a collage of pictures of him and Finn and pictures of Finn from every month of his first year.

I also got him an art piece made from a picture of Finn, which he says makes Finn look like a Vegas dancer, but I love.

I even got some non Finn related gifts as well, like a UK throw for Kevin’s sister who is a student there and a necklace for my sister with the names of her husband and kids.

All in all, quite successful. Or at least I had fun shopping, which is really the only thing within my control.