You probably shouldn't stand near us...

Apparently someone somewhere is trying to tell us something.  And to that someone I say, "Ok, Ok.  We get the freaking point!"

Let me tell you a little bit about our day.  Cormac woke up several times last night crying for no apparent reason, so the day started out a little off.  Chris got out of bed early to put the garbage and recycling out for pick-up, only to discover that his scooter had been stolen.  This means that the only form of transportation we have is one car.  And our good friend Richard T. Davis.

So the count stands at no sleep and a stolen scooter.  What else could go wrong, you ask?  Lots.  During breakfast Chris went downstairs to get some paper towels (which we are apparently out of) and found that the basement had flooded.  With sewage.  Again.  We had almost finished refinishing it from the last time it flooded.  And now it will all have to come out again.

And just to add a little insult to injury, the under-the-sink soap holder broke into several pieces.

All of this happened before noon.  I think the day should just be over at this point.

(Richard T. Davis = RTD = the bus)

Snip Snip

I just got my hair cut.  Short.  Really short.  I mean, it hasn't been this short in 12 or 13 years.  Apparently, about four months after you give birth, your hair starts falling out in massive quantities.  It is somewhat miraculous that I am not bald.  Seriously.  So I decided to cut my losses (quite literally) and chop it all off.  And as long as I was getting rid of it, I figured I might as well donate my hair, so hopefully whoever receives it will appreciate it a lot more than I did.

Just so you know, it looks awesome; Dani did a fabulous job.  And the bonus is I don't think I'm going to have to do anything to it for it to look good down.  Which is nice, because I haven't worn my hair down since Chubbs was born.  But it is short.

It made me realize, though, how much being a mother changes one's perspective on oneself.  Before, I think I probably would have worried about what others would think of my new haircut, whether they would like it.  But now, I could care less.  If the baby is diapered, clothed, and fed, if the diaper bag is packed, and if I have clothes and shoes on, we are good to go.  Although as a general rule I try not to leave the house wearing anything that is covered in dog slobber, baby slobber, or peanut butter.

I've never really lacked self-confidence (maybe I've had a little too much of it...), but I think becoming a mother has changed where my confidence is rooted.  Instead of being tied to more appearance-oriented things, I feel much more intrinsically confident.  I think part of that comes from the fact that as a mother, I am doing something much more significant and far-reaching than anything else I could possible do.  Which isn't to say that other things I do are insignificant.  Being a nurse and caring for very ill people is a valuable thing.  It just doesn't quite compare to the huge responsibility of raising a child.

And that, my friends, is why you see so many mothers out and about in ratty, old t-shirts and sweatpants.  Because we are confident.  Or exhausted, have no clean laundry, been peed on several times already that day, and really need some groceries.  Whatever.

Squeaky Clean

I went grocery shopping with Chubbs today.  I didn't bring a list because we needed so many things that I figured I'd just go up and down the aisles and grab whatever looked good.  This is a dangerous strategy, by the way, and we often end up with several kinds of cookies when I employ this shopping method.  Anyway, we walked by the personal care aisle, and I remembered that we needed some hand soap and lotion for the kitchen sink area.

I prefer to buy natural and/or organic products because I feel better about not having random chemicals that may do weird things as they absorb into my skin.  So I read the labels on a few different kinds of soap, looked at the prices, smelled them, and decided on a Hugo Naturals soap.  I looked around for some corresponding lotion, but a couple trips up and down the aisle proved fruitless.  So instead I decided to go with the Burt's Bees hand soap because there was a bottle of lotion right next to it.  Very convenient.

We finished our shopping with much yelling from Chubbs and a bit of shock on my part in regards to how much the bill was.

When we got home, I put all the groceries away, washed my hands with the new soap (grapefruit ginger!), and rubbed some of the new lotion (shea butter and milk) into my hands.  It was a little sticky, but it eventually absorbed and felt pretty nice.

That evening when Chris got home, he noticed my purchase.  "So you went ahead and made an executive decision on the soap?  It had better smell good."  To test it he washed his hands and approved of the grapefruit ginger smell.

"But why'd you get two kinds of soap?"

Oh.  That would explain the stickiness.  And why I thought Burt's Bees was the only one to have lotion right next to the hand soap.

Words Fail Me

Before leaving the dog park today, I changed Chubb's diaper.  We usually use cloth diapers, but I had to go with a disposable because that was all I had in the diaper bag.  Plus, I think they were a size too small; this was my fatal error.  I was starving when we got home, so I stuck Chubbs in his bouncer and scarfed a fake chicken sandwich.

After I ate, I picked him up and was carrying him into the kitchen when I noticed that my arm was feeling a bit damp.  I moved my arm to find a huge poo stain on his back.  Huge.  I took him upstairs and started to change him, but this blowout was so big, I didn't even know where to start.  It was a poonami.  I finally just decided to take his clothes off and stick them in the washer right away and then stick the kid in the bath.  While I was oxy-cleaning the heck out of the clothes, I stuck Chubbs on a blanket in the middle of the room.

I threw the clothes in the washer and went back to the room.  I found him like this:

Notice the poo stains on his back.  And he had peed all over the carpet.  True story.

Momma's Day Part II: The Streak Has Ended

The beautiful string of sleep-filled nights has ended.  With a vengeance.  Poor, little Chubbs had bad gas last night (totally my fault - I had to have chinese food) and was pretty unhappy, which he let me know about every couple hours.  At least I have some sleep saved up.

I would also like to brag about the fabulous Mother's Day gifts that Chris got me.  And it wouldn't be a present from Chris without some sort of twist; he didn't wrap the presents.  Instead, he put these gifts away where the would normally go, and I had to wander around the house until I spotted them.  The first one I found was a set of stainless steel storage containers for grains.  This may seem like a weird gift, but I looove to organize things (thanks mom and dad), and I have been wanting something like this for awhile.  The other present took me a long time to find, because it wasn't where I expected it would be.  Downstairs in our office Chris hung up a bunch of pictures of Chubbs, him, and me - it was a great, personalized gift.  Thank you, darling!

What's more, my wonderful in-laws gave me a rather delicious gift.  I have already eaten almost all of it:

Yummm...

Momma's Day

My first mother's day was both good and bad.  I shouldn't say bad, just less fun than I would have hoped.  I had to work, because some people have the audacity to get sick on holidays.  So we celebrated a day early at my parents' house with a delicious dinner of crab cakes, sweet potatoes, black beans, and salad.  There was also bacon-wrapped filet mignon for the carnivores (everyone but me).  I love it when my father cooks.

I celebrated the occasion by wrapping Cormac in a much too heavy blanket for his nap, and then not hearing him when he cried because he was too hot.  Poor little guy cried for awhile before Gran went to check on him and heard him.  Way to go, Momma.  Luckily he's resilient, and in the end I was the only one who was upset.

I think Cormac forgave me, though, because he gave me the best Mother's Day present ever:  a full night's sleep!  He went to bed at 8:00 pm and didn't wake up until 6:15 the next morning, when I was already up before work.  It was heavenly.  And then he outdid himself.  He slept all night both Sunday and Monday night.  I am flabbergasted.  But I am not holding my breath.  I am just going to be thankful for every extra hour of sleep I get, because odds are it won't last.  Sigh...

In all seriousness, though, I want to say the being a mother is the most wonderful, most difficult, most mind-boggling thing I have ever done and will ever do.  Nothing can prepare you for how much you will love this funny, little person.  Or how much you will worry about whether you are reading him the right books, putting him in the right diapers, feeding him the right food, and other seemingly trivial things.  Because once you become a mother, you put the majority of your self into making sure that this funny, little person grows up to become a happy, big person.  And my guess is that it doesn't even end there; I will continue to worry, just a little, until the day I die.

And one more thing, to my Momma: thanks for not screwing me up too much, and showing me by example how to be an amazing mother.  I love you.

When Babies Attack!

To the casual observer, they appear to be cute, little things, incapable of much else other than cooing and rolling over. But those that have experienced an attack know all too well what happens when one comes too close to those sharp little teeth and fingernails. There is rarely a warning, and injuries can be serious. Follow along and see what happens when babies attack!

On Sunday afternoon at approximately 3:30 pm, I was the victim of a baby attack. Cormac was sitting on my lap, happy as can be, when all of a sudden, Bam! His finger went straight into my eye. There was no warning. I couldn't see, and tears were pouring from my eye just as fast as expletives were pouring from my mouth.

Ok, so maybe I'm being a little dramatic, but this seriously hurt. I mean, I can stand a whole lot of pain; when one of my lumbar discs herniated two years ago, I dealt with the pain for four days before I went into see a doctor (not necessarily a great decision). Heck, I had a baby! But this eye pain was bad enough that I called Chris to come home from work so that I could go to the urgent care clinic.

And then I sat in the urgent care exam room for four hours. Not that they weren't doing their job, it's just that as far as injury triage goes, I was at the low end of the totem poll. So I sat in the exam room with my eyes closed and tried not to think about how long I had been there. After a couple hours I turned off the lights and curled up on the padded bench. Sleep was not an option, however. Imagine a piece of sand paper being held on the center of your eye - it hurts even when your eye isn't moving, but with even slight movement, like your pupil dilating or constricting with changes in the light, there is intense pain.

Finally, after I had been there about three hours, I just started crying. I was hungry, tired, thirsty, and in pain. And then the doctor came in. So that was embarassing. But he put in these numbing drops and within seconds I had no pain. Hallelujah! That lasted for about an hour - enough time for them to do an eye exam, diagnose me with a corneal abrasion, write me a few prescriptions for vicodin and eye drops, and send me out the door. Then the pain came back, but this time I was armed with vicodin. And while that only took some of the pain away, it also made me not care so much. I love narcotics.

I am still on the road to recovery today (Wednesday). My eye is still pretty sensitive to light and my vision is definitely blurred. On the other hand, my eye is not swollen shut, I can actually keep it open for an extended period of time, and the pain is pretty well controlled with periodic doses of ibuprofen.

So the next time you're around a baby, be a bit more weary. Injuries usually occur quickly and without warning. You never know what the outcome will be when babies attack!