Sunday, April 28, 2013

Sunday, sunday, sunday!

This post is dedicated to play-doh. Thank you for being you and for allowing me the time to blog. It is only because of you that I have had the ability to do 2/3 of the blogging I have done recently. Always in my heart.

Happy Sunday, blogosphere. I am currently sitting at my table drinking a mug of (decaf (ha!)) tea and wishing it was (caffeinated) coffee. My son is using cardboard to cut up purple play-doh next to me, the baby is napping in her swing and Ryan is simultaneously waging a war against the pipes under our kitchen sink while also cooking us lunch. Life is good, lol.

Our sink has chosen today to start leaking (and to especially start leaking while the garbage disposal runs so now I'm not allowed to turn that on for several days until Ryan fixes it...that will be great). The batteries in Cassie's swing have also decided to start to die and the song that plays while she swings has gone from an upbeat children's lullaby to something that sounds like deranged circus music.

Truly, non-parents beware and make sure that once you have a kid you always have batteries on hand - there is nothing more frightening than a child's toy whose batteries are dying. Especially if, lord save you, you have a talking toy. Once, Henry's stuffed animal Scout started to run out of batteries and I literally had nightmares of it's terrifying little voice all slow and deep saying "Hi Henry" like it was possessed by Satan.

Weekends are different now that we have two kids. Instead of a chance to relax and watch a movie, Ryan and I find ourselves competing in a dual juggling act - trying to make sure both kids are happy, fed and taken care of all while simultaneously keeping the house from falling in on itself or exploding in a cloud of laundry and home projects. It's been an interesting adjustment.

During the week not much of my routine has changed - I just juggle my household tasks with two kids instead of one. I nurse a baby while playing blocks with Henry or I strap her into the moby wrap while we run our errands. It's been a fairly seamless transition. The weekends though are really where I see the difference.

I think weekends used to be a place where we could hand off responsibility to the other person for a while and each get a chance to get something done. I could run errands solo, for example. Or I could shower by myself. Ryan got to actually do whatever he wanted to do for a few hours. Now it's different though, now we're handing off one kid in exchange for another and usually one of them is crying at the time. There is little to be found in the way of us doing whatever it is we had planned to do. And I think that's the root of parenting, isn't it? Either suspending your own plans or figuring out a way to incorporate your kids into those plans.

I think I'm making more headway with this than Ryan at the moment because, frankly, it's harder to come from a world of working in an office to basically living in a preschool on the weekends. For me, I'm used to it now and I've just come to the realization that we are living in a different universe now than the one we lived in when we just had one kid. And LOL to think about how many universes away we are from life before any kids.

But truthfully, those are Universes that I don't miss and I don't want to be in anymore. I'm grateful for the one I'm in at the moment thankyouverymuch. Although I will say this, if there's another one exactly like that only I'm excessively wealthy - I'd love to transport ourselves there immediately. Just putting it out there!

Rich as Lannisters.

Friday, April 26, 2013

some letters

Here's a post full of letters that I'd like to write right now:

Dear Zoey,

I understand that it is in the feline nature to enjoy sitting on soft materials but please stop sitting on every freshly laundered baby blanket, baby towel, boppy cover and baby outfit that I fold and leave on the couch. I have enough on my mind right now trying to keep paint-covered toddler hands off of everything that I really would love to stop pulling white cat hair out of Cassandra's mouth before nursing her. Thanks.

Love,
Mommy

---------

Dear Henry,

You are a wonderful joy and I love having you in my life. You are transitioning remarkably well to your role of Big Brother and I am truly so very proud of you. I love you so much my sweetheart.

Love,
Mommy aka your bubby bear

PS Zoey wrote me a letter and asked that you please stop chasing her around the house

-------

Dear Ryan's Car,

Get your shit together and stop being broken. I don't want to spend all of our extra money on you right now and quite honestly, I hate giving Ryan my car and being stranded home all day with two kids when I need to go to Starbucks in order to survive  run errands. Since you're already broken at least have the decency to be cheap to fix.

No love,
Your owner's wife

-----

Dear Ryan,

You have been so amazing since the baby has been born. You're doing an absolutely incredible job as a daddy of two and are helping me keep my sanity (no small feat, trust me I know). I love you more and more each day. Seriously.

So much love,
Rhian

------

Dear Ryan,

This is a totally unrelated letter. I have made a list of suggestions for gifts for mother's day. They're on my twitter feed if you'd like to see them. Please email me if you have questions ;)

Love,
The mother of your offspring

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Dear Sink,

Thank you for providing Henry with hours of entertainment. I have no idea why he loves washing things in you so much, especially considering how much I really dislike all of the time I've spent with you personally but that's neither here nor there. I am totally grateful that you are in my life. It is because of you that I am able to even be writing this post at all.

Love,
The lady who complains whenever she's at you

-----

Dear PBS,

Thank you for having shows that actually teach my kid stuff and don't flood him with trashy commercials for a bunch of junk. We have enough junk as it is.

Love,
An inadvertent viewer

-----

Dear Coffee,

Thank you. I love you.

Love,
Your biggest fan

----

Dear Cassie,

Thank you for sleeping in your swing long enough for me to sit down and write this post along with getting a few other tasks done. I feel somewhat human again. You are the best.

And now you're awake so I'm gonna go get you :)

Love,
Mommy


Monday, April 22, 2013

mommy of two

Hi there blog, how's it going?

Me? Nothing much happening here. You know, just settling in to being a mom of two and all.

I don't want to jinx it but I think that I might be getting the hang of this whole kids (you know, instead of just one kid - no 's') thing. I've managed to wean myself off of my twice-weekly visits from my postpartum doula. I don't have people lined up to come over every day of the week. I even managed to cook dinner a few times AND clean the house. And we are even having a fairly good time. The days of manic screaming and crying (both on my part and Henry's) seem to be slowly (and thankfully) trotting off into the sunset. We're doing pretty good.

I mean, I don't want to lead you astray and have you think that this is all singalongs and fun times. I have been awake since 3:00AM, I haven't brushed my hair in a few days and I only can take showers with one person screaming and the other standing in the tub next to me with a watering can and a tupperware container full of rocks he collected from outside that he "washes" in the shower every (other) day when I get up the energy to get us all up there.

But I consider even that scenario a success.

Currently I'm writing this in my kitchen with the baby bundled in a blanket on the boppy on my lap. Henry is sitting in his high chair playing with play-doh for the first time ever (I had previously said to myself, "why would I even give in and ever let him play with play-doh - it's so messy?" (and as with all things that I declared I wouldn't do - here we are. I need to declare that I'll never wear a size two or be a multi-trillionaire))

and holy crap, there the Universe goes again - kicking me when I start to get cocky - I kid you not - while I was writing that paragraph Henry managed to get a piece of orange play doh shoved up his nose. Not just a little up there - like UP there. I had to get the snot sucker which I've been using to systematically torture his sister every morning and night and even THAT didn't work. Thank God somehow Ryan has taught him how to blow his nose and I managed to plug one nostril and get him to blow that thing out of there otherwise I was putting in a frantic call to my mother.

So I guess what I'm saying is, that's my cue to go. I might not be ready for regular blogging yet but at least I can drop in sometimes and say that I'm surviving which is more than I thought would happen if you had asked me how I predicted this was gonna go a few months ago.

One day at a time.

and at least my kids are cute:


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