Real Men Change Diapers

Last weekend was a busy one. Hurricane Hanna drenched our area in ridiculous amounts of rain. Truman was groomed (and even though he goes every 8 weeks...and has for the 6 1/2 years I've had him...he still shakes like a leaf and heaps tons of guilt on me for leaving him there). We hosted some 60 people -- including more than 20 tykes -- at Lily's farewell party. And I took the first step towards reclaiming my body from the ugly wrath of pregnancy...I started pilates.

My cousin Susana swore to me that the class starts off easy and only gradually becomes more difficult. She promised me that I'd be able to do it, even when I told her that I was scared...very, very scared.

Well I survived the rain, the party and even the pilates. I made it through the hour class in one piece. And it only hurt to breathe for 3 days. OK, maybe 4.

While Susana and I were out contorting our bodies and doing the hundreds, Noah and Chad took all four girls to the Original Pancake House for breakfast. Apparently not even a hurricane can keep them away from those flapjacks.

Susana arrived home afterwards to find the boys and the babes "kicking it" on the couch. The bigger girls were probably off getting in to something they shouldn't have been in to. Note to all -- real men change diapers AND feed babies!

As for me, after barely surviving last week's "introductory" pilates class, I'm very, very, VERY scared for tomorrow's.

Motessori-gate, Day 3

As I suspected would be the case, Lily's enthusiasm for her new school has dwindled a bit with each passing day. Noah and I still think that this is absolutely the right place for her to be, but I think that we're all in for a rough September.

Daily Reports:

Day 1 -- LOVED the kids and super nice teachers. Lily adjusted well to the new classroom, rules and schedule. She got a glowing report from Ms. Jane and had lots of positive things to say about school upon pick-up. [2 thumbs up!]

Day 2 -- Lily woke up and suggested that we do a girl's day instead of school. When I told her that I had to go to work, she immediately turned to Noah and lobbied for a "daddy daughter day." I could see that she was struggling, so I suggested that we all go to drop her off again; Anna and me included. She went along for the ride and reluctantly said good-bye, but only after spotting her new friend, Carley. Noah discovered a happy kid at the end of the day, and he got to meet Coach Mike, whom Lily now raves about. At bed time, though, Lily confided that she'd cried for us during the day...but just a little bit. [1 thumb up]

Day 3 -- Total meltdown, almost from the time she woke up this morning. Lots of tears. Lots of pleading. (Lots 'o mommy guilt.) A wonderfully kind teacher's aid took Lily off Noah's hands upon arrival (more likely she peeled Lily off Noah's leg...literally); hopefully the crying didn't last long after he left. I'm on pick-up duty this evening. My fingers are crossed that she was able to pull it together and have a good day. [no thumbs up]

If her disheveled hair and filthy clothes at the end of the day are any indication of how much/hard she's played at school, she's actually having a wonderful time...in spite of the tears. She certainly hasn't lost her spunk, and she can still make us all laugh. Especially the baby.



Hopefully tomorrow -- with it's proximity to the weekend -- will see an improvement.

Then again, Lily definitely does march to the beat of her own drum. She's a remarkable kid, but she's determined to do things when she wants to do them, on her own schedule.

Her transitions from one classroom to another at the Huck were always fraught with some drama or another. She's just trying to show us who's boss (as if there were any doubts!). For our sake and, really, for hers, though, I hope the painful part of this transition passes quickly.

Blah Blah Black Sheep

Operation "Montessori Transition" has been deemed a great success, at least until the novelty wears off. Thank goodness! I definitely think that I was more nervous than anyone else; I had knots in my stomach all day long. I tried to get her to talk about the day at our Baskin & Robbins dessert stop, but after being followed by the camera at dinner Lily had had enough of my antics. (my apologies, but you'll have to turn up your speakers to hear above the ice cream shop chatter)



Since she won't give you the scoop herself, here are the stats from the day --

Day's rating: Great!!

Teachers: Ms. Jane and Ms. Hannah

New BFFs: Carley and Elisabeth

New "Not Sure I'm Going to Like Her" person: Olympia

Favorite part of the day: SNACK! (overwhelmingly)

As a post-first-day treat, Lily got to pick where we ate dinner. She chose Joe's Pizza & Pasta, an interesting (to say the least) neighborhood spot. Since we arrived a few minutes after 6, we caught the tail end of the blue-haired crowd (Did I forget to mention that Monday nights happen to be all you can eat buffet nights? What a bizarre scene...part elderly crowd...part college crowd...and part family night...weird!).

Lily was in her element and, between bites, sang us the new song she learned today. Still can't believe that between us and the Huck she hadn't learned it before. Perhaps we need to spend a few extra minutes re-learning the words.



Then again, I sort of think her version is better. "Blah, blah black sheep have you any more..."

So Long, Farewell

Huckleberry Cheesecake friends -- highlights

Friday, August 29, 2008 was Lily's last day at Huckleberry Cheesecake. While I still think that we're moving her to a preschool for all the right reasons, it was hard to see her walk through the school, one last time, hugging and kissing friends and teachers good-bye.

I'll never forget going over to tour the Huck when I was 9 weeks pregnant, still very much hiding my pregnancy from the entire world, yet due to ridiculously long waiting lists at any center worthy of our tiny bambino forced to shell out "registration fees" and apply to several places downtown. I actually made calls to these centers from conference room phones at work, nervous that if my calls were ever monitored someone would put things together and figure out that I was pregnant (they already knew that I was a paranoid and neurotic loon!).

We've had some incredible moments along the way; tons of "firsts" that we got to share with Lily's amazingly loving caregivers and teachers since she started there March 1, 2005. All three of us -- Lily, Noah and me -- have made some tremendous friends from within the Huckleberry community.

To give our Huck "peeps" a proper farewell, we hosted a party for Lily and her entire class at Jonah's Treehouse yesterday. I had originally considered doing pony rides in the park across from our house. Not wanting to worry about the weather, we moved it to an indoor play spot. THANK GOODNESS. Just as our party was heating up, so were the winds and rain from Hurricane Hanna. We stayed nice and drying inside, though, and it was the perfect way for Lily to say good-bye. We're enjoying yesterday's memories today, and getting her ready for her first day at Children's House Montessori, tomorrow.

Lily's farewell party

Wish us luck! I'm sure that Lily will be fine. Me...well, I'm not so sure about me.

Party Lines

With the momentum coming off of the Democratic convention in Denver...and all the buzz surrounding McCain's veep pick of Sarah Palin...I couldn't help but turn to my younger and less jaded daughter for her opinions.

"So Anna, what do you think about the news coming out of Minneapolis right now?"

"As a girl, what do you think about McCain's selection of this 'experienced' woman to be his running mate?"

(notice the middle finger...)

"So you're not a big fan of the moose eating, gun toting, hockey mom from Alaska?"

(she spit up about 2 seconds after this picture was taken)

"What's that you say, Anna? They need a real maverick to shake up Washington? Who could that be??"

"SUPER CUTE TO THE RESCUE!!"

BTW, can you believe that this is the same baby?  Anna was only 3 weeks old when she announced her party affiliation to the world!

Seriously though, if you were remotely fooled by last night's speech...a speech that was written a week ago with a few [fill in candidate's name here] blanks...by one of George Bush's speechwriters...please read this article by Gloria Steinem.  And for those who need a little reminder of the facts, well, let's let the Associated Press do the talking (so that my blood pressure remains remotely close to normal...don't even get me started!).

And I don't just dislike Sarah Palin because we're both almost 5 months post partum and she looks wwwaaaayyyyyy better than I do.  Shame, though, that she and her husband have it in for their sons.  I mean, what's up with the names??

Call me a quitter

It's official. I've stopped pumping. And oh has the guilt permeated my being.

Yes I did a great job of stock-piling our extra freezer at home with hundreds of ounces of milk before returning to work. Yes I had every intention of pumping my milk for Anna for months and months to come. Yes I do plan to continue nursing for as long as we're both willing and able.

But I just can't stand the pump any more. Between client deadlines, meetings and conference calls, my work day pumping session were getting less and less frequent...and were happening later and later in the day. It got to the point where I was pumping just before leaving in the evenings. As a result, my "supplies" were too low to actually nurse my baby at night. Umm...that's so not the point of this endeavor!

Enter, stage right, TONS 'O GUILT!

It's so obvious that Anna prefers milk to formula...and with each missed pumping session I think of her at school, choking down Similac with a "are you kidding me?" look on her face. While I still have a nice supply of milk in the freezer, this stockpile will only last for so long. Maybe another few weeks.

I managed to pump, during the Lily years, for 2 months after returning from leave before quitting. One more reason to feel guilty. I "tried harder" with my first daughter. Poor Anna -- definitely #2.

For those of you who have pumped for babies in the past, you so know what I'm talking about. You feel my pain...figuratively and literally. For those of you who made it longer -- Lisa, you are my hero! -- my hat is off to you. But I'm done. And, secretly, I'm thrilled to be done.

For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about...well, I'll let Stephen Colbert do the talking!

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

Having had the benefit of a few days of much needed R&R (I so love long weekends!), I've had some time to reflect on all my rantings about Steve Jobs, Mac products, and the guys who staff the Genius Bars.

Perhaps I was a bit harsh...too quick to judge....and just supremely frustrated by it all. Perhaps my last few postings were better suited for a "Dear Diary..." entry than a blog posting. So, to all of you out in the blogosphere reading today, please bear witness to my apologies.

I am sorry. (Mostly.)

And since, after apologizing, we make Lily say two nice things about whomever she's been mean to, here's my attempt...

1. Mac products...any and all...are WAY cool looking.

2. Steve Jobs pushed the envelope beyond where people thought it could be pushed and, as a result, helped revolutionize the electronics industry around the world. Even if Bloomberg did erroneously publish your obit, Mr. Jobs, and even though I'm still FUMING over my hard drive melt-down, I definitely don't wish you dead. YOU are the genius.

I wonder, though, if my criticism has come full circle.

While my thick, curly pregnancy locks did start falling out before I'd checked out of the hospital after Lily was born, I thought that I'd escaped that this time around. While I'll never have to worry about female baldness, I thought that I'd get lucky enough to keep the extra thick/quick growing hair that had taken over my head during my Anna pregnancy.

Until last week. Around the same time as my public musing about how much I hated Mac. My hair started falling out. In giant clumps.

Karma kickback sure is a bear!

BACK UP!

While we were hoping...desperately hoping...that Drivecrash.com would be the answer to our iMac nightmares, our hard drive's mechanical failure is more complicated than we had ever imagined.

And more expensive.

The $350 -- $1800 that we were originally quoted (a safe range for probably 95% of the hard drive failures that they see) has been blown out the window. After quickly looking at our drive, the estimate was upwardly revised to between $1200 and $2900. They won't know for sure until they get it in to the lab. There is, of course, a $500 lab fee. And there is no guarantee they'll be able to recover our data. (excuse me while I get sick)

I'm not sure what Noah has decided, although I suspect we'll be taking the "second opinion" path before making a real decision.

Of course, Mac won't give us a new hard drive until we relinquish the old one. Which I won't, of course, until we recover our precious photos, music and documents.

I will never, EVER, buy another Mac again. No new iPod. No iPhone is in my future. No more iTunes gift cards will be given by me.

While I'm sure that many have been using Macs for years, without problems, ours has been a source of headaches. Nothing with this computer has been simple, and if I ever have to deal with another "genius," well, I'll ask for Mensa documentation first.

Sorry, Mr. Jobs, but there are many reasons why I hate your machines. Here are but a few.

1. While you advertise one click operations, blogging from a Mac nearly requires a computer science degree. I've actually had to use the HTML coding that I learned while taking a website class back in 2001. Blogging from a PC is sssoooooo much easier. Even my Mac-enthusiast friends will agree.
2. Corporate America doesn't exactly support Macs. Because we've had a Mac at home, I've not been able to log on to my office's network. This has meant more than a handful of late-night Sunday "office dash" trips to enter my time before the midnight Sunday deadlines. If I had a PC at home, I could have done it while getting my weekly fix of In Plain Sight (awesome show, btw).
3. After some 20 years of PC ownership (I can even remember back to my Atari computer!), I HAVE NEVER HAD A HARD DRIVE FAIL BEFORE. Enough said.
4. Mac employees are, for the most part, snobs. Do they really think that they're so much better, and more cool, that the rest of us? They have the worst return policies in the galaxy, awful warranty policies, and the folks behind the genius bar are anything but.
5. Don't even get me started on Apple Care. You cannot make appointments over the phone; they only accept them online. Which would probably be OK if your computer actually worked....and, of course, if your computer worked YOU WOULDN'T NEED AN APPOINTMENT!

Perhaps I can somehow convince Barack Obama -- who, by the way, is so going to be elected in November....or I'm moving my entire family to Canada -- to include a "Consumers Who Have Been Wronged by Mac Bill of Rights" on to his official platform.

Until then, please use my hardship for your own gain. PLEASE go home and back up your computer hard drive(s). Back up early. Back up often!

Off the Charts

Anna had her 4 month appointment yesterday, which was much less feared (by me) than her 2 month appointment; this time Noah was the one who had the "pleasure" of taking her.

As I expected -- based on the fact that at 4 1/2 months she's nearly outgrown her 3-6 month clothing -- Anna is nearly off the charts for both height (97th percentile) and weight (also 97th percentile). Our beloved pediatrician couldn't have been more pleased and said that Anna looked awesome (full disclosure, she's also the mama of big, juicy babies!).

4.10.08 -- Anna was born weighing in at a smallish but respectable 6 pounds 15 ounces

4.26.08 -- Our buddha baby now weighs (in a diaper, to be fair) a WHOPPING 17 pounds 1 ounce!

It's 5:00 somewhere, right?

Perhaps there's a full moon on the horizon. Perhaps my exhaustion is just catching up with me. But when I realized, half way to the Huck last night that I'd forgotten THE CUPCAKES at my office, I should have known that I was in for a spell of bad luck.

So for all you moms out there who have periods when you feel like nothing can go right and you just want to hide under the covers....well, you're not alone.

Perhaps you'll feel better about your own situations when you read about the last 16 hours of my life.

Yes, I did forget the cupcakes in my mini-fridge at work. I realized about half way to the Huck when my hands felt strangely empty. For a nano-second I debated just leaving them, but the thought quickly passed and I ran (yes, ran...in heels) back to the office.

Upon arriving at the Huck, I handed over Lily's snack of pretzel goldfish (which, if you're 3 3/4, you think that these are far superior to their orange cousins). While trying to take the top off of the tupperware container, she dropped them, they all went flying and ended up on the floor. Major crying ensued. I almost let her eat them off the floor. Almost, but not quite.

We made it home, in one piece, only to discover the world's largest moving van in our cul-de-sac. Even though we knew this was on the horizon, it took us all by surprise that our favorite neighbors were leaving today. Jamie -- you'd better take care of them up in NJ!!

As soon as we got in to the house, and I had a second to thumb through the mail, Anna started making a weird noise. No sooner did I look at her, held in my arms, than she started throwing up. Regurgitated milk started coming out of her mouth and nose. And she started turning purple. Milk was coming from everywhere and going everywhere...there was a trail of it from the pile of mail in the dining room to the kitchen sink. And, of course, our housekeeper had been there that day so the floors had been sparkling clean.

Then, when taking Lily's dress off to get her ready for her shower, we discovered no less than 2 dozen red dots on her back and legs. While rationally I knew that they had to be mosquito bites, I panicked for a second and thought they were chicken pox. I raced to the computer to Google something....anything....only to discover an empty desk. Right, we have no computer right now; how could I forget. Upon booting my work laptop up, I discovered that there's some new firewall that's been installed and I can't get it to connect with our wireless internet. Uugh!

I got Anna to sleep and immediately had to race out to Babies R Us to buy a new bulb aspirator. Poor baby. She's probably going to start having nightmares about things being jammed up her nose and junk sucked out. But with her not sleeping well because of congestion, I needed to have a few extra on hand. I got to Babies R Us approximately 3 minutes before the store closed. After cooking a delicious salmon dinner, Noah had to cancel his Monday night workout so that he could handle Lily (shower, book, bed, etc...never as simple as it sounds) while I ran my errand; how do single parents do it?

Thanks to the above mentioned congestion, Anna woke up at 4:45 a.m. today because she couldn't breathe. Somehow in the midst of pre-dawn nose sucking and subsequent early morning snack (for her), we both fell asleep in my bed and didn't wake up until NOAH'S alarm clock when off at 7 a.m. Damn! I must have turned the alarm off in my sleep. Maybe Anna did. But I was off to the races the second my eyes opened; the day had just begun and already I was 30 minutes behind schedule. What an awful way to start the day. And it's only Tuesday!

Thanks to a handy protein bar, Lily's favorite breakfast selection (one that we probably shouldn't allow her to eat, but when you need your child to eat on the go.....well, today she was allowed one), we were actually in the car on time.

I backed out of the driveway, for the first time, and realized that I'd forgotten my pony tail holder. Considering my hair is 4 weeks overdue for a cut and color (a whole other story), said pony tail holder is critical. Raced back in to the house, grabbed the holder, and got back in the car.

As I was backing out of the driveway, for the second time, I realized that I had forgotten the bulb aspirator....the one that I had bought last night...the whole reason why I made the late night Babies R Us run. Damn, damn! I raced back in to the house, grabbed it and got back in the car.

OK, so now I was breathing a small sigh of relief. We were in the car. No one was crying. There was no traffic in sight. Bad luck turning around? Ha, not mine!

When I pulled in to the garage at 20th and M streets, I looked over at the passenger seat in my car to discover it empty. ANNA'S BOTTLES. Shit! Where were they? On the kitchen counter, of course. OK, go ahead and laugh...

So, yes, I had finally forgotten the bottles; I knew it would happen at some point. Noah (to the rescue once again) hadn't left the house and agreed to bring them to school...after I promised to stop swearing in front of the kids.

Of course, the icing on the cake is that Anna's 4 month check up is today. Her first appointment with our beloved Dr. Emily Palmer...who just returned from maternity leave herself (and I'm so dying to see her and catch up!). Emily's third child, Ann, is 2 days older than Anna. This appointment has been on the calendar for 2 months. And, at 6 p.m. last night, I got an email telling me that I have to be in an important meeting. A meeting that I cannot miss. It is, of course, at the exact same time as Anna's appointment.

I spent 45 minutes last night typing a note to Dr. Palmer...listing all of Anna's brilliant developmental milestones....and itemizing all of the 12 zillion questions that I have. Noah, as he has taken to do, will likely just hand the note over (they're used to my system of communicating). Emily will likely write all the answers on my note and hand it back.

At least I didn't spill my latte on myself while walking to work.

Here's hoping that the next 16 hours are better than the last. At least I got to eat those cupcakes last night! They're SO good. CRAZY good. If you're local, I'd highly recommend indulging yourself. Just one piece of advice -- get there when they open (10 a.m.) for the best selection...and don't ever walk out the door without your baby's bottles!