Wordless Wednesday: Hey Look, a Post!

Please stop touching the Christmas Tree....

Dry Nights

Despite being potty trained for about a year and a half, Calder is still having issues at night. Even though we try to make sure he doesn't drink too much late in the evening and make sure he uses the bathroom before he gets in bed, Calder is still sometimes waking up wet. And by sometimes I mean, at least half the week. I think he is sneaking drinks of water from the bathroom sink or something. Or maybe it's bad dreams. Or maybe it's because I am a terrible mother and abandon him all day to go to work. Perhaps he just sleeps so friggin' soundly that he doesn't realize his need to get up. Regardless, I am sick of washing his sheets three or four times a week. I am sick of the electricity bill from running the washer and dryer constantly and am really jealous of how often he gets clean bedclothes. I can't even remember the last time someone washed my sheets.

As loathe as I was to do it, I just had to start putting Calder in nighttime training pants. If we can't get him to stop the peeing at night, at least we can minimize the damage and inconvenience. I felt so bad about doing this too him, it's been going on for over a week and this is the first time I have mentioned it to anyone other than Bruce. I know the kid is sensitive about wearing the training pants, we call them his "special nighttime underpants". When I first introduced them I sat Calder down to talk about why he was going to wear them, showed him the pictures of big kids on the box and made it absolutely clear that we weren't trying to punish him. Bruce slipped once and called them diapers which resulted in Calder crying and sniffling about not being a baby. Who knows if they will help. I am somewhat afraid that wearing the training pants will just encourage him to not bother getting up at night for the bathroom at all. Maybe he'll just wear them forever. At least until he moves out and has to do his own laundry.

Wordless Wednesday: Get Down, Baby! Part II

Sorry, Mom. This is Hilarious

A short play.

Calder (messing around with some old metal bobbins): Here you go, use dese.
Me: I can't. Those go to my old sewing machine.
Calder: Where did dat one go?
Me: I gave it back to Grandma when she gave me this one.
Calder: Oh. Gramma just loooooves old fings. Cause she's old.

Shot to the Legs

On Wednesday Bruce took Wren in for her six month check up. Apparently she is doing just swell. She has grown a half inch to make it to 27 even, and gained almost a pound and a half to get up to 16 lb, 10 oz. Her head size is even an average to large 43 cm so I guess my fears of a teensy headed child have been assuaged.

The doctor told Bruce that we should get her to start using sippy cups and try night weaning if we are at all interested in sleeping through the night. Or as Bruce relayed it to me, "Stop feeding her." Apparently Wren's recent ass-kicking cold did NOT lead to an ear infection but she probably is teething again. Yay? I'll take the split.

All was not perfect though, Wren had a sorta bad reaction to her shots and ended up with a pretty high fever, over 102, that just broke TODAY. She has been miserable and she has brought the whole house down with her. No sleep was to be had by anyone. She's fine now, thankfully and is back to her jolly lil' self in time for the weekend. 

Oh, and how last week I was all she can sort of get around but not really? Yeah, that was total crap.The day after I wrote that she started getting into an upright sitting position by herself and then  on Tuesday I came home from work just as she had PULLED HERSELF UP on a box of toys. Of course she faceplanted into said box immediately and needed to be rescued. But hey, I like that she still needs me. Sorta. Oh and she can for reals crawl too. Not very fast. Yet. But she can do it. At this rate, I expect she'll be walking before Christmas.

Wordless Wednesday: How Do I play Angry Birds on This?

Shoparama

This past weekend was our annual I Have Some Extra Money, Let's Go Buy Shit shopping trip. I use a portion my work bonus to purchase the stuff that isn't really necessary but makes life easier. Stuff that I would like to get all the time but I'm too busy spending all my free cash on children and doctor bills. This time of year I get to shop for all those wonderful amenities that make living in the First World so wonderful. Things like razor cartridges and Magic Erasers. I try to be organized about this. We use coupons and scan fliers but inevitably it ends up that Leah goes into Target and BUYS ALL THE THINGS. Still, even with my Target-induced impulse shopping tendencies we managed to save quite a bit of money by combining sales, coupons and price matching. Our receipt from the grocery store was near as tall as I am and the whole time she was checking us out, the cashier was looking around as if she expected to see TV cameras.

Calder is Smarter Than Me: An Interlude

One of the rando things I got a Target was a dinosaur LED nightlight for Calder. A long, long time ago I bought an LED bird nightlight for Wren's room. If I ever get around to decorating it, Wren's room will be bird and woodland themed, so, bird light. For whatever reason Calder found his nightlight situation lacking and adopted it as his own. So on Sunday, I found a dino one for him. As I put him to bed that night, I apologized for not being able to use his new nightlight because it wasn't plugged in or charged. Calder looked at me with such disdain, pulled out the plug from the bird light and plugged it into the dinosaur. Which immediately lit up. Yeah. I was appropriately shamed.

So anyways. After saving over $200 in one day and accidentally starting my Christmas shopping* I thought maybe I would want to be combining the two. I have never participated in a Black Friday store massacree and I don't ever intend to start however I have become aware that the same sales are pretty much available online at the same ridiculous times of day as the store sales. Hey, I thought to myself, your baby hates you and you are up at 3 a.m. anyways. Why don't you try to get some BF deal. Put that not sleeping to work for you. Seriously. A revelation. But the thing is, I have no idea how this all works. I did some web surfing and found a site that allows you see the BF ads before they are release and you can make yourself a nice little shopping list to save, print and share. Uh-mazing. The thing is, I am still not sure how the whole online process works. Do the online BF sales start at midnight? At  the same time the corresponding stores open? If it's the same time as the store, is that EST? Or Local time? I am dumb, ok? So, have you ever braved the online world of BF sales. Were you successful? Am I wasting my time? I'd be really interested in hearing what others have to say. You can also tell me to just give it up. That's alright too.

Oh, also also. Is it necessary to be in skinny jeans if you want to wear really awesome boots? I want awesome this certain pair boots but I don't want the exact contours of my lower half on display. I mean these are really awesome boots. I would just dump them on the floor and roll in them like I was a dog and they were a fermented squirrel carcass.

In summary: Online Black Friday, is it worth it and can chubby girls wear awesome boots too. HALP.

Zombie Mom

I am still sick. Wren is still sick. Calder is still three going on impossible. Last night ended up with Wren waking up every two hours at which point I resigned myself to just sleeping upright with her attached to my boobs and snoozing. This was a great plan until Calder also woke up. Which woke Wren back up, regardless of her proximity to boobage. Calder was being difficult and wouldn't settle himself without his own snuggles so first we all tried cuddling in his bed. Except, since her brother was up, Wren was ready to party. After about three minutes of that even Calder was all, "I fink this is not a great idea actually" and we relocated back to the couch.

Eventually both kids ended up falling asleep and I was able to nap somewhat from 4 to 7 whereupon I foisted the baby onto Bruce and got one real hour of sleep in my own dear bed. I could have tried to put them back in their own beds much sooner but that would probably have woken everyone up again and Chief had taken over my bed spot, pillow and all, anyways.

This kind of nocturnal nonsense has led to me spending my days shuffling through work and home life, a barely coherent shell of my former self, saying things like "Never, ever vomit on a police officer's daughter" at fancy work lunches. I have forgotten/broken pieces of my pump at least three times in the last two weeks which resulted in me having an extremely painful, if well endowed, few days at work. I could go on and on about my dumbassery but pretty much nothing I could do or say would illustrate the depths to which my mind has fallen better than this conversation I recently had with Bruce:

Bruce: Do you want me to get (Babysitter) to come over on Tuesday so we can go out?

Me: What?

Bruce: Or she could just come over and keep the kids busy in the basement which we have a nice dinner up here.

Me: Huh? For what, why do we need a babysitter on Tuesday?

Bruce: For your birthday.

Me. Oh.

Six Months

Holy crap. It's my baby's half birthday. She's humongous. And has a personality. And moves. She MOVES, people.

Baby yoga

It's crazy how fast time passes when you are really enjoying yourself/not getting any sleep. And for real, I just read the five month post and 30 days ago this girl could not get herself up onto her hands and knees and now she is thisclose to crawling. If I had written this post two weeks ago I would have been like, "Yeah, she can get up on her hands and knees but she just rocks back and forth." and if I had written it on Sunday I would have been all "Yeah, She can get up and shuffle a bit but she can only really slide forward on her belly when she falls. " As of today? Wren gets up on her hands and knees and she can either move her hands or move her knees but she hasn't coordinated the two yet. Does that stop her from getting at whatever it is that she wants with a laser-like focus? No, it does not. Like Calder did his army crawl, Wren has developed a method to cope. She pushed herself up, shuffles her knees in close and then slides down onto her belly and then, with both arms together, pulls herself forward She also uses the arms to steer while sliding on her tum. So it's kind of like a walrusy. swimmy crawly thing. But with less grace and fluidity. It's like... like a legless zombie. My infant daughter gets around almost exactly like a legless zombie. Wren is also developing some mad yoga skills and has quite possibly passed her father in that regard. She can dog, both down and up, table, child's pose (duh) and a something something triangle. It's been a while since I have acquainted myself with my yoga DVDs. So sue me. 

OH HAI, Daddy dressed me.

Oh and the sitting! Wren sits. By herself. When she starts to tip over, she can correct herself. I still wouldn't wander off and leave her alone on a hard surface but if she is on her mats with a blanket for some extra padding, I am in no way concerned about the possibility of her plopping over. If Wren does, in fact, want back down to the floor, she can do that. Without falling over being one of the major steps. She is current working on getting from her back or belly to the sitting position but she hasn't quite gotten their yet. She may even overshoot her goals and pull herself to standing before she ever gets up on her butt. I think Wren may be a toe walker though so that will be something to look out for.

FEED MEH!

Wren may also be teething again. It's hard to tell since she's been so snuffly and ill lately. This whole germ/tooth issue needs to get resolved quickly because it has led to her developing an entirely new and unwelcome sleep pattern. Or non-sleep pattern as the case may be. Waking up every three hours at six months is NOT ACCEPTABLE. I'd be angrier but I am frankly too goddamn tired. THIS NEEDS TO END.

Things she loves: Calder, her pets, chewing paper, pinching my boobs while eating, eating, really big poops, zombie crawl slow-speed cat chases, Bruce's glasses, all her toys. 

Things she hates: Us leaving, Calder being all up in her grill, not getting a boob when she wakes up a night, the dog or cat ignoring her, having her boogers sucked out, wearing bibs for more than five seconds and not having that big satisfying pop changed right now.

Milestones!

Mastered Skills (most kids can do):

Turns toward sounds and voices - Yup
Imitates sounds - Eh? She babbles a lot and I try to get her to say Mama and she sort of does sometimes? But she doesn't repeat if after me or anything? It's more like two hours later when she's screaming her face off and wants something.
Rolls over in both directions - Yessir

Emerging Skills (half of kids can do):

Is ready for solid foods - Are YOU ready for her to be ready for solid foods? Just remember tpo pull your hand away quick lest it get sucked into her chompy vortex.
Sits without support - For sure
Mouths objects - Do shoes count? How 'bout zippers? The bookcase? And the dog?
Passes objects from hand to hand - Definitely, I feel like Wren is incredible good at some of the finer motor skills at her age. She can locate her paci on the floor, get to it and convey it to her mouth before I even have a chance to pretend to clean it off with my mouth.

Advanced Skills (a few kids can do):

Lunges forward or starts crawling - See above re: legless zombie, also bonus video below.
Jabbers or combines syllables - I think she does this. Sometimes it's all "blah blah blah waa ma wa" but she has started experimenting with sound in othe ways too like making one continous noise and flibberting her lips or shaking her head back and forth really fast to change the sounds coming out.
Drags objects toward himself - Or, you know, goes over and gets them and picks them up. Whatever.

Bruce takes her to the doctor next week. I can't wait to see how much she has grown. I bet it's going to be a lot. Like, what have you been giving this child a lot. She's my chubby little chunker and I love her to bits. Though I would like her a whole hell of a lot more if she'd just sleep at night.

Wordless Wednesday: Hmmmm

Baby Boogers

Today, across the momoshpere, was a day widely decried as the day Daylight Savings Time turned their kids into total assholes. This happened to everyone but me. Thanks to the magic of germs, my kids turned into double assholes.

This is surprisingly enough Wren's first illness. I guess not being in the disease vector that is day car had spared her for almost six months but it had to happen eventually. Sad little baby has an awful runny nose, a slight fever and a horrible freaking attitude. She's been tugging her ears and shaking her head all day so I fear for her ears. The teeth may also be in play. Wren used the extra hour last night as an opportunity to wake up an extra time or two to nurse and rub her boogies on me chest. Four times. She got up FOUR TIMES. And then we were all up by 6:15. You can extrapolate how much sleep I got. I think this morning was the longest morning I have ever had. I was ready to give up at about 9:30. Wren spent the day unable to cope with her snots and was alternately refusing to nurse, freaking out at having her nose hoovered and smiling like a goober at her daddy. Who was also sick. And useless.

Calder is only slightly snuffly but managed to twice as crabby as his sister. DST did a number on him, so looking to avoid additional conflict, I let him watch a bunch of Disney DVDs on the portable player all day. Except for when I had him help me clean the bathroom. Mother of the year, I am not but we all made it through the day with a minimum of time outs and wine. Hey, he only told me he didn't love me any more a couple of times today. And my bathroom is clean to boot. I can live with my decisions. I did what I had to do to survive but god help me, if either of these children develop an ear infection I am going to cry.

Present Planning

So the toy commercials have certainly ticked up now that Christmas is less than nine weeks away. This has not escaped Calder's attention. While he has started asking for stuff, I am pretty sure I already know what his big gift is going to be. Now that we live in a house with a yard and space I want to get him a bike. Or a tricycle. Or a bike. I don't know which exactly. He's only going to be four so maybe the tricycle is more appropriate but I feel like Calder is a big little dude and he might outgrow a trike before the snow has even melted. Then again I couldn't ride a bicycle without training wheels until I was nine (true story). What if he inherits my balance along with my nose?

What IS the right age for bike vs. trike anyways? Wren will probably also get some sort of riding implement/yard toy since she is too small to ask for stuff and we already have a crapload of baby and toddler toys. Unless they have come out with something amazing in the last three years. Have they? I don't want to rush out and get a bunch of gurrrrly toys because A. That goes against everything I believe in and B. I just brought home a bunch of my old dolls from my parents' so I've got those covered.

So, things I need advice on: bike or trike and has there been any new developments on the baby toy front? Or, alternately, suggestions for toddler appropriate outdoor playthings.

The Baby that Ate Chicago

Well technically she hasn't eaten Chicago. Yet. She probably would given the chance however. Wren loves to eat. So far, she hasn't refused a single thing we have given her. That includes fruit pieces in a net, regular jarred stuff, primo organic goo from bags and even my feeble attempts at home made. Just because she doesn't particularly care for the flavor of something doesn't mean she won't eat it. Oh, she'll eat it all right, all the while giving you a whole lotta "What the hell, lady?" face. But she keeps trucking along. What she does like, she FLOVES. The ferocity with which she will rip into an apple slice is slightly frightening. Even with the peel still on, she will leave the net reduced to a slimy, empty bag of apple detritus in under ten minutes. Girlfriend only has two teeth so this is quite the accomplishment.

Despite being fond of food in general, Wren still appears to have express favorites like the aforementioned apple slices. She is also quite keen on foods in the orange family like sweet potato, squash and carrots as well as pears and "That thing there. That one. On your plate, Yes, that one. I want that, GIVEIEETOMEHNAOW!"

At the moment we are feeding her solids one a day in the evenings but Bruce will sometimes give her a mid day snack as well. This does not seem to have reduced her need to nurse whatsoever however. Perhaps she is having fewer bottles during the day but it's hard to tell because I am not here. All I know is that our feeding schedule has not changed one bit. I get home from work and feed her before making dinner. I feed her whatever purees and cereal she is getting while we eat dinner. I eat my (now cold) dinner and then feed her again after she has been bathed wiped down (who am I kidding?) and be-jammied. Then I feed her off and on until she goes to sleep. Sometimes she she wakes up for a snack around 11 and sometimes she wakes up at 11 and then again at 3. Other, better, times she doesn't wake up to eat at all until 5 and I cry sweet, salty tears of relief.

All this nighttime snacking has certainly kept my supply going. I was a bit worried when it took a hit after the irregular schedule of our trip to Massachusetts (Now with Less Power!) and then again when Bruce's parents were here. Sure I could have done our regular feedings while they were at our house but on the list of people that don't need to see my boobs, father-in-law is pretty far up. Of course I am still pumping three times a day at work when my schedule allows. Still hate it but at least it permits me to write poorly thought out blog posts (like this one!) on my iPod and check the goings on of Facebook and Twitter without feeling like a degenerate work avoider.

So why does Wren need all this food anyways? Well, for growing at an alarming rate for one thing. She is already comfortable wearing her 6-9 months clothes and I am beginning to fear that the Christmas outfits I bought for her will no longer fit once Christmas finally rolls around. She also needs the extra nourishment to fuel her new found mobility. Yeah, that's right mobility. More on that later.

A(n) (admittedly terrible) Poem

A Happy Birthday to my dad

I admit, he's pretty rad

He builds things from wood and fixes cars

And for that I am sincerely glad

I could have tried to make this longer but it would have only gotten worse so I'll spare you. It's not like he will read it anyways. My father is the veritable definition of a technology-phobe. He may actually be afraid of computers and the Internet in particular. He used to pay us, like, five cents a name to type out the rosters for his softballs teams. When my sisters and I found out he had been given a cell phone by his employer, we wondered how long it would take for him to even use it. When my dad is not busy actively avoiding being thrust into the 21st century, he is many wonderful amazing things: a jumping bag for toddlers, a steadfast coach, a shockingly good dirty joke teller and a neverending font of useless information. OK, sometimes the information is useful, like the whole building shit and repairing cars stuff.

Of course the real reason my father may not read this is because they got their assess handed to them again  by Mother Nature (tornado: check, Hurricaine Irene: check, Snowtober: check) and haven't had power for days. So, Dad, for your birrthday, I hope you get the best gift of all. Electricity.

I love you.

Wordless Wednesday: Lil' Punkin' Head

Halloween!

Did you know yesterday was Halloween? I'll forgive you if you got confused by all the Christmas decorations that are already out and forgot about it. Once again me and my poor time management skills tried to make Calder's costume. I'd say this one was mostly a success. Unfortunately I finished it well after he had gone to bed on the 30th so I couldn't fit him for it and ended up not being able to put on the fasteners so the boot covers and hood are pinned/stapled closed.

Only picture with the mask. He is wearing it upsidedown

He almost dropped her 2 seconds after this.

I also had to staple the bat ears in place because as they were sewn, they made the poor boy look sad and demented. I suppose I could have left them as is and gotten him some pity candy. Not that he needed it. Bruce took him out trick or treating for about two and a half hours. Calder filled his entire plastic pumpkin. Along with some candy, Calder and Bruce managed to pick up some new friends, a family from down the street who also have a superhero-obsessed three-almost four-year-old. Weirdly, the couple also has the same names as Bruce's parents. At least I won't be super rude and immediately forget their names (not on purpose!) like I do almost every other person I meet.

Halloween flashlight or magic baby mesmerizing wand?

Wren and I chillaxed at home in our dinosaur outfits and handed out candy to the dozen or so kids that stopped by. I was super disappointed in our turnout. I was so hoping that moving from an apartment building to a house would mean that we'd have hoards of trick or treaters. Yes, 12 is better than zero, but I wanted more, MOAR! I even decorated! Not well, but I did it. We had spider webs on the bushes, carved pumpkins on the steps and and yard ghosts by the path. Bruce even did this weird Cabbage Patch/My Friend dolls trapped in web cocoon display thing. He even back lit it with the sole black light holdover from my misspent youth. Despite our hopes and bests efforts, hardly any kids showed up. I would have even been happy with barely costumed teenagers. I just want to give candy to other people's children. OK, those last two sentences came out waaay creepier than I intended.

Fat baby dino cannot get enough flashy flashy

Somehow I magically (bribed with pizza) convinced Calder that he only needed to eat three pieces of candy when he got home. Granted he probably snuck one or two extras while I wasn't looking but it was hardly close to being any kind of sugar orgy. I mean, he was asleep by ten. That's pretty good for him under the circumstances.

Look! You can hardly see the staples!

Posing with other people's better deocrations

So yeah, I wore a dinosaur costume yesterday to hand out candy. Hell, I wore a dinosaur costume to work. I wore a full-body dinosaur costume to my work, which does not, as a habit encourage Halloween costumes. I wore a full-body, lime-green dinosaur costume to my work, which does not, as a habit encourage Halloween costumes and to which I commute 2 hours every day via two different forms of public transportation. I got issues.

Working hard for the prehistoric money

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be busy forgetting about Thanksgiving because they are putting up Christmas lights outside my office.