Still alive...

Sooo.... I've been drifting from the blog a bit lately. My twice-weekly ramblings have dwindled to once a month or so and even that feels like a challenge at times. I feel the need to explain.

First of all, to borrow an excuse from my multi-tasking, Blackberry-addicted generation: I'm ridiculous busy. It's nuts.

Before I had Maddie I thought I lived life at a respectable pace, but looking back I see that my days involved an admirable amount of couch-lounging and leisurely strolls with the dog. Then the girl arrived and our lives got kicked onto another plane of activity, where our days are full and even our nights are sometimes interrupted by sad wails coming from behind her closed bedroom door. (These are getting more creative all the time - last night she woke up two hours after bedtime crying because she suddenly realized that I hadn't cut the washing instructions tag off of her T-shirt; last week it was that her pyjama sleeve was "all pushed up." She lives a tragic life, that girl.)

Those of you with two, three, five, eight kids ('fess up, Octomom - I know you're out there) are probably laughing at me right now, or angrily screaming, You think you're busy?! Try my life you pathetic one-kid cow. And you have a point, I know. But along with the work of being a mom I have taken on a couple of extra jobs over the years and while I love it, it's just... busy. That's all.

The other thing, and I aways knew at some point this time would come, is that it's getting harder for me to tell stories about Mads these days. She's no longer a blob of a human being who falls flat on her face if not propped up by strategically-placed pillows. She this little person now, with little person thoughts and feelings and fears and ideas and experiences all her own. She tells her own stories, which makes it harder for me to tell them for her. I've thought about telling my own stories for a while, but honestly there's not much to tell. I work, I eat too many chips, I attend daily pretend tea parties hosted by Mads' alter-egos "Judy" and "Cindabelya", I change diapers (YES, STILL!), I have a glass of wine. I read a few pages of a book, I see a friend, I buy a new pair of shoes. That's me, in a nutshell.

So that's where things stand. For so long, since I first found myself adrift in a stormy sea of spit-up and pureed peaches with only a screaming baby for company, this little blog has been my lifeline. It's like a living, breathing thing to me, and I'm not ready to leave it behind entirely just yet. Eventually I'll print all of these entries of neuroses and frustration and joy and bind them for the day when Mads is old enough to read and understand them, and hopefully to see that while I may be far, far, far from perfect (like, football field distances from perfect), I love her.

Until then, I'm still around.

July 4, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Misadventures In Potty Training

I'm sitting in the early morning sun as I write this, basking in the warmth and relaxation that only a very lazy week-long vacation can bring. Meanwhile, poor F is probably toiling away at home on The Great Renovation Project, phase 1,465. You may be noticing that this is sort of a running theme in our marriage: When there's work to be done, Mads and I hightail it out of town. I'm not exactly sure how - or if - we actually settled on this arrangement, but it works for me.

If there was one low point of this little break of ours, it's that way, way too much of it has been pre-occupied by poop. Because unfortunately, the Great Potty Training Project continues as well.

I'm a worrier. It's just what I do. I fret and stew and pace and plan and scrap the plan and pace some more and plan again. But in my short career as a mom I've come to see that with just about every new challenge, the anticipation is far worse than the reality. Ditching the bottle? No problem! Moving to a big girl bed? Easy as pie. Then just as I'm starting to think I kick ass at this Mommy thing, along comes potty training. And even though I knew it would likely be a struggle, it turns out to be so so much worse than I'd ever imagined.

I've lost track, but I'd guess we're on day 100 or so of potty training. The girl is a total champ when it comes to peeing, but good god the other bit is testing my sanity. Bribes, charts, stickers, rewards: You name it, we've tried it. Without going into too much detail - because she does deserve a bit of potty privacy, and you might be eating breakfast - I now know far more than I or anyone should ever know about bowel movements.

And I'll leave it at that.

June 6, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Vegas, baby!

Wow, it’s been ages! I’m sorry for neglecting you, blog. Don’t leave me.

We’re still here, alive and mostly, basically well.

F and I spent a weekend in Vegas with friends recently – it was my first trip there. And my first trip anywhere in far too long. We left Mads with the grandparents for 4 whole days – which, apparently we didn’t need to do. Vegas, it turns out, is jam packed with babies. Babies strolling through the casinos in the wee hours, babies sweating in the 100 degree heat, babies hanging out poolside knocking over their moms’ margaritas. But not Mads, she stayed home. That was half the point of going, really.

But wow, I missed her. I had a picture of her grubby, adorable little face propped on the hotel room table and far too many of our conversations were variations of either, “What would Mads think of ___?” or “Remember that time when Mads ___?” Then we’d drink our wine and gossip about how awesome she is (ie – way more awesome than the kid at the pool that morning, or the one napping by the slot machines the evening before). We’re very mature that way.

As happy as she was to see us when we got back, I have a sneaking suspicion she’s now making us pay for our absence. Through conversations like this:

Mads: “I’m just going to jump on the bed, okay?”
Me: “No jumping on the bed, Maddie.”
Mads (climbing on the bed): “But I NEED to jump on it! I’m just going to jump on it. How about 5 jumps?”
Me: “No jumping on the bed, hon. You know that.”
Mads (standing on the bed): “How about 11 jumps? I’m just going to do 13 jumps.”
Me: “How about NO jumps? Off the bed please, Maddie.”
Mads: “How about 39 jumps? 39 jumps, okay? Okay, good! 1, 2, 3… (jumping now).”

She thinks that if she says, “Okay? Okay!” then that means we’re in agreement. I pulled her off by the time she got to four. By the time she got to 13 the counting would have gone a little haywire: “14, 11-teen, 30, 7, 20, 105, 11-teen, 14…” God knows how long it would’ve taken before 39 actually popped up in there somewhere.

But back to Vegas: How crazy is that town? Holy moly, as Mads would say. I left feeling boozy and sleep-deprived and entirely overdressed. It was a warm weekend, but wow - these girls were half naked! And I just firmly believe that it is never so hot that a guy has to walk down the street wearing anything mesh – or worse yet, carrying his T-shirt. Meanwhile there I was in my knee-length skirts and tank tops looking like somebody’s mom.... Oh. Never mind.

May 29, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Happy Mother's Day!

Big news: I'm getting married!!

Okay, technically I'm already married (hey, F). But Mads asked me to marry her last night and hell, I could do a lot worse.

Our 10 billion or so (I'm guess-timating) viewings of Mama Mia have left her a little bit in love with weddings: The big party, the pretty dress, the twinkly lights, the drunk dancing on tabletops. She also knows more than she probably needs to about paternity disputes. "Who's the Daddy?" is sort of an odd theme for a musical, no? But I digress.

Much like the night F proposed, when we were sitting on a moonlit rocky beach and he popped the big question and I laughed and said, "You're not serious?", my heart broke a little bit in a happy way when Mads asked if we could get married. Everything out of her mouth these days is so insanely adorable that it makes me want to squeeze her and never let go.

(Well, almost everything. For some reason she's starting to sound like a Valley Girl, peppering her little sentences with "like" and "totally." She was telling me a story, something about a trip to the playground and a very twisty slide, and it ended with, "I was, like, totally fweaking out. I was, like, fweaking, Mommy." Actually, even that is pretty cute.

Anyways.)

The other night I found myself doing something I haven't done in ages. Before I went to bed I for some reason snuck quietly into her room and sat for few minutes while she slept. It was like something right out of I Love You Forever - only I didn't drag her out of bed to rock her because I'm pretty sure she would've knocked me one - and given my dislike of that book I'm not entirely comfortable with the comparison. But to see her so peaceful and small, the blankets kicked off and her thumb hanging out of her mouth, it was a nice reminder that she's not growing up as quickly as it often seems.

Wishing you a blissfully relaxing Mother's Day - I'm sure you've earned it!

May 9, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Knock knock...

I'm discovering that toddlers, like their sometimes neurotic yet always lovable mothers, seem to be obsessive by nature. Mads will pick something, fixate on it for a couple of months, and then up and decide she wants nothing more to do with it. The obsessions-of-the-day seem to be Abba music and knock-knock jokes.

Her Abba love affair started with the first (of 2,128 and counting) screening of grandma's Mama Mia dvd last month. She was immediately hooked. She's still half asleep each morning when she staggers out of her bedroom and mumbles, "Is it Mama Mia time now?" When the movie isn't on we've got Abba Gold blasting from the iPod or car stereo. When we're at the park we're treated to her own versions of Super Trouper and Does Your Mama Know.

If you have to listen to the same 10 songs ad nauseum for months on end, I guess you could do worse than Abba. That is, until you're waiting in line at Safeway one afternoon and your 3-year-old belts out, "You're so hot, teasing me!" Then things get awkward pretty quick.

If we're in the car and she's not singing Abba songs, chances are she's telling knock-knock jokes. Again, this isn't quite as awesomely entertaining as it may sound since the "jokes" usually involve her just naming whatever random things are in her line of vision at the moment. "Tree who?" "Tree-stop-sign." Ha... ha. It keeps going, back and forth, until she finally loses interest or I finally jump from the moving vehicle.

This weekend while the three of us were en route to get some ice cream she came up with this gem:

Mads: Knock knock
Me: Who's there?
Mads: Car
Me: Car who?
Mads: Car-juice-box. Now your turn!
Me: Knock knock...
Mads: Noo!!! Not you, the guy in the black shirt.
Me: Huh? What guy?
Mads: The guy right there in the black shirt (pointing).
Me: You mean... Daddy?
Mads: Yeah, Daddy. It's his turn.

Heh. I'm not sure when Daddy got downgraded to "the guy in the black shirt" but I admit, I laughed. A lot.

April 27, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (11) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Wherever you go, there you are

Mads is at the in-laws, F is working and I am home all by myself. I repeat: All. By. Myself. Moms, when is the last time you had the house to yourself? It's such a rare occurrence I don't even know what I should do to fill the time.

Actually, that's not entirely true...

Here's what I should be doing: Cracking open my 1200-page book club novel, showering, catching up on work, menu planning this week's suppers, going to the gym, clearing Maddie's drawers of too-short pants and too-tight tops, vacuuming (note to self: Next time, get a NON-SHEDDING dog!!), laundry, laundry and more laundry.

And here's what I am doing: Sitting in my pyjamas, eating some leftover Easter jelly beans, watching last night's SNL (Best of Amy Poehler - awesome), ordering Non-Slippy Hair Clippies (look how cute) and investing every ounce of spare energy into willing someone - anyone! - to show up at my front door with a double tall non-fat no foam latte.

In my defence, I did spend about 15 minutes attempting to read The Power of Now, my latest (Oprah-approved, eek) foray into self-help and spiritual enlightenment. But I guess I'm not in the mood to be enlightened, because while I truly do appreciate the underlying message of living in the Now (capitalization is apparently essential), all that talk about my "pain-body" has me in a perpetual state of eye-rolling. It's dawning on me that I'm too innately sarcastic to be a candidate for enlightenment. I'm kind of sad about it.

So until the need for coffee so overwhelms me that I am forced to drag myself from the couch, I'll be here, in the Now, in my PJs.

Happy weekend!

April 19, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Happy belated birthday... love, Mommy

Amidst my Advil-induced eyepatch ramblings it seems I forgot to mention one important bit of information: Maddie is 3. It's official.

We marked the occasion with a small family dinner, but her party's been postponed until May. I figure this is the last year I can really get away with parental irresponsibility of that magnitude, so better take advantage of it while I can! Honestly, this last month and a bit has been awful beyond measure and I wanted her birthday to be separate from all of that. So May it is!

Mads and I were on on our own tonight so we had a GNO (that's Girls' Night Out, for you non-Twitter folk) at a pizza joint up the street. I had wine, she had milk. She knocked over a pitcher of water, I mopped it up. We coloured a picture of Elmo playing baseball and survived a mild tantrum that came when she suddenly - and might I add, bizarrely - thought it was essential to pull my shirt down and flash my bra to our fellow diners. We chatted about the Easter Bunny and made up a song about sunglasses. I kissed her cheek and she dramatically wiped it away.

F and I have had some memorable dates over the past 15 years but I have to say that tonight ranked up among the best of my life. Sorry, hon.

I know that one day we'll fight. We'll probably say things we regret. She'll probably slam doors and I'll probably tell her that if she slams one more door... We'll probably make each other crazy. But right now - and I know this isn't all that cool or even particularly healthy from a parenting standpoint - we're just crazy about each other.

Every lovely and sweet-sounding cliche that's ever been said about being a mom - that's how I feel about my Mads. I'm a big believer in the power of words but sometimes it feels like even they're not enough - or maybe I just don't know the right ones. I love her. That's the biggest word I know, and the only one that comes even a tiny bit close.

Happy birthday, Mads.

April 9, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (6) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Fashion feeble

I was walking through the mall today after a particularly rage-filled jaunt through the grocery store when I crossed paths with a girl who looked like she was from the future.

She had on white knee-high boots and a long sparkly purple sweater, a silver belt and really abnormally high hair. She looked cute, in an alien invasion kind of way. I gave her the old Star Trek Vulcan salute (in my head, of course) and carried on.

Ugh, I am so out of touch. As I type this I'm wearing a sweater I bought for $8. And when I bought it, I was super pumped about the whole thing. $8! Woo hoo! I rock! But I'm starting to think that I all I'm rocking is this thin, itchy, horizontal striped sweater that looks exactly like what an $8 sweater should look like. What's happened to me?

I'm not saying I was ever a trendsetter, because I wasn't. I tend to pick up on a trend about 21 months after it passes. But at least I was in the same general decade as a trend. This sweater has not been trend-worthy since, oh, never. Never ever.

Mads, on the other hand, has a pretty kick-ass wardrobe. She's got the tunics and the tights and the cardigans; The skinny jeans and (fake) Uggs and the party dresses. It seems I've invested every last inch of my fashion instinct into her, and let's just say there wasn't enough to go around.

Ah well. I suppose she can be the adorable one, I was getting sick of it anyways. Besides, it's a lot easier to dress adorable when you're a size 3T than a size... um, never mind.

April 4, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Does This Eye Patch Make My Butt Look Big?

Today started, as most days do, with a blinding headache. It starts behind my right eye and radiates up to the top of my skull. It’s a clear sign that you spend too much time in front of a computer screen when your eyeballs feel – literally (that’s not just me mis-using the word “literally,” which I am guilty of doing. I mean it this time – literally) – like they are about to explode right out of your head. As I type this I am on hold with the doctor’s office for an optometrist referral and also Googling “computer eye strain” and “cute eye patches.”

And yes, I do realize that the fact that I continue to Google while suffering from “computer eye strain” means that I have serious internet issues.

On the upside, I put on an old pair of jeans today and not only did they still fit, despite the fact that I’ve been eating my way through a box of Rocky Mountain chocolates for dessert all week, but I found $5 in the back pocket. Nice. That’s going straight into the eye patch fund.

The doctor’s assistant just told me that she doesn’t know who I should go see. So that was helpful. I’m so happy I waited through 12 minutes of elevator music for that insight.

The day has barely begun and already I am dreaming of lying on the couch tonight with a cold pack covering my entire head, but civic duty calls. Turns out that our provincial government has been making secret plans to slot a maximum security prison in about 5 minutes from our house. Across the street from a high school, down the hill from an elementary school, surrounded by daycares and churches and seniors’ homes. Nothing says “community” like a barb wire fence.

So tonight we’re having a neighbourhood meeting of protest and general angst, and I will be there with bells – and in all likelihood an eye patch – on.

March 24, 2009 | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0) | ↑ Back to Top

Family Ties

I had planned to add my .02 today on the news that Dora is the latest victim of a Tween Makeover – seriously, is there a worse word in the urban dictionary than “Tween?” Just the sound of it is nauseating – but I have other things on my mind today so that one will have to wait.

Remember when you were a kid and you did something obnoxious or selfish or just plain mean and your mom would say, “Just wait until you have kids of your own...” I don’t specifically recall my parents telling me that, but I’m sure they did, sometime after I slammed the bedroom door and before I sunk to the floor a sobbing, hormonal, over-dramatic mess. Just as I’m sure I’ll be saying it to Mads one day.

But the thing is, like most things your parents tell you, it’s true. I can admit that now because I am a parent so it basically means that I’m awesome and all-knowing. I knew it!

When I was younger, it was all about me: My parents were my parents and nothing else. They drew breath to cook dinner and read stories and coach soccer teams and offer daily reassurance that freckles = beauty marks. Ditto my grandparents. My brothers existed for the sole purpose of hogging my bathroom and reading my diary. End of story.

But now that I have Mads the blinders are off. I get it. I see now that my parents were once kids who brought home report cards and drank too much at friends’ parties and got married and had kids of their own and maybe even wondered, like me, if they might be screwing it all up. And when my grandparents posted my crappy finger painting on their fridge door they were thinking as much about the fact that the kids they raised were now raising kids of their own as they were about my brilliant artistic future.

Kids become parents, parents become grandparents, grandparents become great grandparents, siblings become aunts and uncles, and on it goes forever. Along the way we may make our own path: Grow up, learn, travel, love, laugh, achieve, fall apart, rebuild. But woven through and around the story I write for myself will always be the story of my family.

I was thinking about this the other day as Mads and I were collaborating on a spectacularly messy finger painting for my grandma, and thinking about how when my mom once told me that through it all and in the end nothing matters more than family, it seems she may have been right after all.