Monday, August 24, 2009

Chicken With Its Head Cut Off

There's this song by The Magnetic Fields that goes "My heart's runnin' 'round like a chicken with its head cut off.  All around the barn yard fallin' in and out of love.  Poor thing's blind as a bat, gettin' up, fallin' down, gettin' uuuuuup.  Who'd fall in love with a chicken with its head cut off?"  It's as great song, and it's fun to listen to, but it gets stuck in my head rather easily.  In fact, I had this song stuck in my head the entire time I was in labor with Chubbs.  All. 27. Hours.

Not so much the whole chorus, as the "gettin' up, fallin' down, gettin' uuuuuup" part.  As annoying as it got (especially after the 18-hour mark), it was how I got myself to keep "getting up" after every contraction, something that got harder and harder the longer I labored.  My midwife was of the mind that in some ways a long labor isn't necessarily a bad thing: it helps you keep things in perspective later on when your child won't, oh, let's say, sleep.

Let me pause here and say that I hate lessons.  They really irk me.  It's like the Universe is saying, "I told you so.  I told you there's a reason for certain life experiences."  I'd like to give the Universe a good, swift kick in the shins.  But sometimes the Universe is right.  Grumble, grumble.  So there you are Universe; you were right.  Let's not make a habit out of it.

Anyway, I often think of my long labor (as well as the week leading up to the long labor when Chubbs was overdue and I wanted to stab forks in my eyes and Chris feared for his life) when I'm having a particularly rough time with Chubbs.  Like today.  I spent, count 'em, 73 minutes - that's an hour and thirteen minutes - trying to get Chubbs back to sleep after he woke up in the middle of a nap.

Ok, lemme clarify.  I had no trouble getting him back to sleep.  What I did have trouble with was getting him back into his crib to continue his nap.  I tried five (yeah, you heard me) times to put him down, and every single time he immediately woke up and got upset.  After the fifth time I just gave up, which came back to haunt me this evening when Chubbs got really crabby and started sounding like a constipated cat when he cried.  One can only take so much.

Anyone with a child knows how freaking annoying it is when said child won't sleep.  Not only are they crabby because they're tired,  but you have no time for yourself because you spend all your time trying to get them to sleep.  This has been going on for a few weeks for Chubbs and me, and I'm really ready for it to be over.  I need sleep.  And as exasperating as it is to continually have to pick him up, get him back to sleep, put him in his crib, and repeat, I know (hope?) that it will eventually come to an end, and in a few years I will wish that my little boy would let me hold him while he sleeps.  But in the meantime, I just keep reminding myself that I have to keep getting up.

Saturday, August 22, 2009

Of Boxes and Bathrooms

So apparently this is my first post for August, which is a little sad.  But things have been a bit of a whirlwind lately, so I think I have a pretty good excuse.  We sold our house (after only 9 days on the market, I might add) and bought a new one, and we move in a week.  We started packing today.  And packing with a little one around the house presents some fairly tricky obstacles.  We found that we can get about 20 minutes of work done before Chubbs wakes up/is hungry/is tired of Noggin, which means you can really only pack about one box per hour.  This is going to be a long week.

In the interest of being optimistic (only because I have just had a large bowl of ice cream to cheer me up), I am super-excited about our new house.  We will have a big, gorgeous kitchen with cabinet space up the wazoo, a full, unfinished basement to do with as we please, and a master bathroom with...wait for it...two sinks and a separate tub and shower!!!!  I am now drooling.  I should mention that Chris's favorite part is having the toilet in its own, separate area with a door.  He's really excited about this.

But in order to get there, we have to pack.  Thank goodness my parents were able to come over today and help us out.  We got a lot done, but now we're sort of at the random-crap phase, where you have all these extra bits that you can't really throw away, but you're not really sure how to pack them so that there is some semblance of order.  I will probably end up just throwing them all in a box, and then avoid opening it until I absolutely have to.

Speaking of throwing stuff in boxes, we tried to get Chubbs to amuse himself with a few toys in a box today.  Most kids love playing in boxes because it's a small, secure area that the have all to themselves.  But Chubbs was not content unless he was standing in the box and rocking it back and forth, or hanging is upper body over the edge.  He got a little taste of freedom when he jumped out of his crib earlier this week, and I think he's looking for another high.  Good thing we didn't buy the house with the all-too-easily-accessible ledge overlooking the living room.  Although the kid will probably just find something else to rappel down.

I hit mental gridlock at about midday, which is why I'm eating ice cream and messing around online instead of packing.  So if anyone wants to come over and help me throw random crap in boxes, I would appreciate it.  I pay in beer.