~~~~May 2004 Mamas ~~~~ Feelin' Thankful it's November ~~~~ - Page 8

[Miss Juice]

Hi all,
I'm still hanging around mostly lurking because this one-handed typing is a PIA.

Originally Posted by jstar

threadkilla forgot to answer the crafty question. i wish i had more time to be crafty!!! i knit. i wish the yarns i covet weren't so pricey. i have yet to make myself a sweater because i think it would be $90+ and what if i don't LOVE how it fits? i'm freshly back into sewing although i haven't sewn in years because i sewed my finger. last weekend i made isaac a new blanket for napping at school. flannel on one side/cotton on the back/batting in the middle and ribbon edging. i just did a grid pattern for the quilting. i have a bazillion quilt triangles cut out to make him a quilt but i have yet to stitch one. i like scrapbooking. or crapping as my mom calls it. i have scrapbooked exactly 2 pages since isaac turned 1. yeah. i better get on it. but i went to a little scrapping party and now i have realized i *need* these oval/circle cutter things. and rounded corner cutters. i can't possibly scrap another item without them.

i need to go pay my bills : joyous occasion.

You make me smile! I also like to knit, also like the spendy yarns and also don't want to commit to a *real* project like a sweater. I don't sew because i am pretty sure I would sew my finger in short order. I love scrapbooking but my perfectionism gets in the way. Also I can't get any of my stuff out because I'll instantly have "helpers" and a 2yo with a corner rounder is a recipe for disaster. I avoid crapping parties because I don't want to know what lovely tools I'm missing. I love my corner rounder, though :

Also I'm glad you're feeling more resolved about the MW/OB situation. It's so vital to feel supported.

Originally Posted by KKmama

[COLOR=navy]L is almost sitting. Amazing the difference a *week* makes at this age.

I was just thinking that! Ethan is just starting to reach for things. He's not rolling over at all, which hih sisters did at this age, but I'm calling that a blessing.

Originally Posted by elsanne

a) I purchased Sol a castle/loft bed with a slide! I am so psyched. She played with it in the store tons, and it was a great price! Early Christmas 'round here.

b) And it's from Denmark, with cotton tent drapings! (I didn't dare peek until I got home, so the madeinchina wouldn't deter me.) Vegan nuns tsk tsk at my cowardice.

c) Sol and Amara and I and a friend and her two children all went to Queretaro (an hour away) to the MALL. This is a couple times a year event. It was packed, and I had no way to control Sol, and she was a champ--stayed with the pack! First time I have attempted anything like this and WE DID IT!! And MY KID IS AWESOME!!! I was so happy with how she "minded" me. It was extremely stressful overall anyway, but no crises or tantrums or grabbythings or breakythings, even tearing herself away from REALLY interesting things to mind me.

Bed sounds fun! And yay for toddlers pulling it together when it's important. Of course, when it's NOT important...

On that note, do your maybabies completely ignore you when you're talking to them? Mine does, and it's really testing the limits of my GD patience. And if I start to get edgy, she laughs at me, and it goes downhill quickly from there. Anybody got any good tricks?

Dh and I have our consultation with the urologist to discuss the big V today. Not really related to the toddler conversation, but there it is.

[elsanne]

Oooh there are a few women here who have experience with the big V! Well, one that I know of anyway!

juice something to say about that not listening but gotta run.

[KKmama]

Yeah, I sacrifice virgins on my altar all the time. Oh wait--that's not the V you're talking about, is it?

Miss Juice, it's actually my 5 yr old who does more of the ignoring when I'm talking. I have a phrase which I use which helps getting their attention: "I'm asking you nicely." (What it translates to is "Mommy is going to get grumpy and louder if you don't start interacting." We got to this point because T doesn't like me to yell--I don't like to either, it's my ongoing self-improvement project--and when I do, he asks me to talk nicely... so it's basically a reminder that I'm trying to keep up my end of the bargain, so he has to keep his.)

I was talking to an older friend who's an OT/PT (and she happens to work with Z's old OT peripherally) about child development, and we agreed that it just seems like such a *miracle* (and you notice the miracle more after you've been dealing with a child whose development is slower/different).

Jstar... It sounds like you're in a better place wrt caregivers for this pg. You need someone you both like and trust (though your opinion counts for more than your dh's), and if that person happens to be an ob, it's okay.

Yeah, PV = solar cells (I must've been tired). CO passed a law couple of yrs ago which puts a tax on the electrical utilities to fund more renewable energy, and our utility uses it to provide a 50% rebate on solar cells. (And then there's the federal tax rebate, too.) So the time seems right (and ripe!) for us. It would be grid-tied.

On the tongue mvmt... Z's tongue (and really his lips, too) never moved at all. And what it meant for eating was that he couldn't move food (even tiny dabs of purees) around in his mouth, and he couldn't swallow it.

[nuggetsmom]

Once again I have paying work and once again I am ignoring it.
Well, crafty stuff
I like to knit, paint -watercolor only
I sketch and garden and sketch the garden
I also scrapbook though I haven't been into it lately. I spend too muchmoney on tools altogether and I don't even go to parties. My friend ia a creative memories consultant though and she ahs all the stuff so if I am over at her house I drool over her scrapbooks and want her stuff. Really, I want her to do my scrapbook for me.

My grandmother has a huge floor loom and a spinning wheel and I want them but I don't see how I will get them here from The Netherlands and more iportantly, fit them in my tiny expensive house with no heat...

I admit it, I am cold today. My "office" has no heat.
I also want PV's and a foam roof and I want double paned glass. This is really ironic since I have a whole wall of glass...

DH went out and got a huge flatscreen TV this weekend and I am super pissed off. I could rant about this but I really don't want the big TV to dominate the living room (which is small). I admit that the penguins in high def were really cool, but so what. Then he wanted my opinion and I kept pointing to the little TV but he really wanted the 37 inch monster TV. He actually said that we would be sacrificing status if we got only the 37 inch off brand TV. I pointed out that I am sacrificing status b y simply having a TV at all. Then there were all the furniture and accoutrments for said TV and the whole living room got rearranged.

I DON"T WANT TO HAVE THIS TV! I DON"T WANT TO WATCH TV ALL THE TIME and what else are you going to do with such a huge presence in your living room (which is tiny) :

: and then I turned it on this mornign so I could get J dressed wothout a fuss in something besides the tinkerbell costume. :
I better make some money now

I need a new computer if I am going to make my latest and greatest idea work with a ton of expensive software...

So here I go

[orangecanoe]

Ick on the HUGE tv. We have a giganto one leftover from DH's law school days and I can't wait to get rid of it!

crafty: I taught myself to knit when C was a babe and learned to crochet last year. Have been on hiatus though and mostly spend my free time reading hs'ing books these days. I sew well enough to make the girls some diapers and blankets.

LONG day. We had to be at E's ENT appt at 8am and it took us over an hour to get there during rush hour and we were late. egads. all is good which is good. another copay down the drain. Seriously...I think we could have funded a week's vacation in PDX on all the medical expenses this year. blah!


Question:: where oh where has saartje gone?? and I do still miss maggie

[jstar]

Originally Posted by heatherfeather

Question:: where oh where has saartje gone?? and I do still miss maggie

I think about them too.

tinkerbell costume

my kiddo was not-so-nice this morning. i had to tell his teacher 'good luck.' his latest thing is SHRIEKING. when he gets mad : restaurants, school, home. *sigh*

[orangecanoe]

jstar---eek! C has started protesting vociferously in public. It's usually a shouted "that's not my favorite thing to do!" or "I don't like that so very much!" :

um, where is everyone? the weekend is OVER. come out and play! Sherri is probably out on her porch rearranging her mums or something. :

[nuggetsmom]

I have also been thinking about them.

I am here. I have got to clean my house though.

[Miss Juice]

Waaaaahhh major mommy crisis here!
DD's preschool class is having a parent/grandparent morning tomorrow AM. For 1 hour, one parent or GP for each child can come to class and participate. They try for 100% participation. I can't go because I work Tuesday mornings. DH was supposed to go, and put it on his schedule weeks ago. Well today he got saddled with a court appearance at the same time in a city 45 minutes away
Grandmas arent available, and FIL's wife has to stay home because they have a furnace inspection scheduled :
I am so worried that DD will be the only one without a parent there

What do I do??? I could take her to work with me... oy, that would be beyond awful. I could cancel a bunch of patients at 8am...

Waaaaaaahhhhh.

[elsanne]

Jess, bless your mama heart. I put in my .02 on yonder thread, I think I would just send her off to school, and go to work, and hope for the very best. Maybe carve a special moment to take her to a meal at her favorite place. : I am sad for you because I know how very hard you try to balance it all. Which speaks to that place in me, very much. This is such a hard job, and you are doing your very best, woman! Deep breath, big hug, try to get some rest. It will be okay.

[TurboClaudia]

just typing to say hi and that i'm thinking of you all. i put my info in the gifty database on the yg.

you all...

MMF!

~claudia

[Miss Juice]

Thanks, elsanne. Crisis managed - I called up FIL's wife (grandma 3 for those counting) and begged her to change her furnace appointment, which she agreed to do. If that falls through I will cancel a bunch of patients and go myself. I really want someone to be there for DD. And the furnace people should just be able to come later in the day. *sigh, that was way too much work*

[Mama Faery]

Netflix sent us The Big Lebowski yesterday. : I so know what we're doing this evening!
Can you believe DH has NEVER seen it??
Elsanne's DDDDC got me thinking about it again. As usual.

Miss Juicy Juice! Good luck with everything, mama. I agree with Els, do what you have to do but you know, I bet your DD won't be the ONLY child there whose parents/grandparents couldn't come. Life happens, you know? I know you do everything you can to balance your work and parenting, and you do an AWESOME job I'm sure! Good luck. Let us know how it goes!
(and omg, you just managed it. Rock on with your bad self! )

So I am in the "what am I doing with this TV thing???" camp right now too. I have it on right now so I can catch up on some work here (applying for craft fairs, checking out etsy.com to sell jewelry...*sigh* I am glad I quit my sketchy whippersnapper job, but I NEED to find some other income, mamas! Wish me luck...) and we turn it off after Curious George...but then later he'll ask for a movie and I cave SO OFTEN.

We're having some shrieking issues here too...and the WHINING. Everything that comes out of his mouth, whether it's asking for something to drink or for me to read a book: "Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaammmmaaaaaaaaa! I waaaaaannnntttttt NuuuuuunnnnnnnnN!!!!!" : Ugh. I feel like all I repeat nowadays is "how do you ask?" and then he mumbles "please"

Anyway. Not much else to talk about...it's still yucky out here, I added my gifty stuff, and I realized something; with the shopping trip in PA and the renewed jewelry making, I can pretty much get my gift stuff out of the way totally early! Woot!
This NEVER happens. Hee.

I'm just babbling now. I hope you all have a wonderful day. I'm watching too much YouTube. Ask a Gay Man makes me

I think of Saartje and Maggie too. And QofC! I got a birthday reminder in my email this morning. I hope you all are well.

[elsanne]

Renae, check out your new siggie! You rocker! I can't believe dh has not seen the big lebowski. Enjoy!!! It is way fun.

Hi TC!

Jess so glad someone can be there for her. I think this was a bigger issue for you than it would be for her, kwim? Glad crisis was averted.

Must run. Amara is sitting up, almost!! OMGOMG!

[jstar]

oh yeah whining too. dh claims isaac was an angel while i was gone with NO whining and no screaming. wellllllllllllll clearly i am his comfort zone and all that pent up behavior has been pouring out since i got back. now dh is gone for the week so i am dealing. bedtimes have been a pita ever since halloween. i was so enjoying the easy thing while it lasted. shoulda known it would change :

juice - is this your 04 dd? she may not have been too bothered. but i hope it works out!

i slept in today. feeling guilty but actually rested. and omg the sky is BLUE. it has been raining insanely forever. have you locals seen the pics of highway 35 at white river? i'm freaked because we are big snowboarders and usually go to meadows all the time (or i should say it was all the time before isaac). i won't be this year, obviously. so i guess if the highway was going to wash out the timing is good. i feel *terrible* for people with season passes. there is no access to the resort right now but i have a feeling they will get the hood river side open and no one will get a refund. we always drive that way anyway because the govy side is a traffic nightmare. but now hood river will be a traffic nightmare. (we had insane amounts of rain - and the glacier got so overloaded with water a glacial dam broke.)

i can't wait until isaac is big enough to ski!!!

4 days til vacation : which won't really be a vacation. my mom invited 43 people to thanksgiving. that is insane.

[Miss Juice]

43 people. Ummm, wow! Is she renting a banquet hall? You could barely fit 43 people in my house at the same time, and you definitely couldn't give them all a place to sit.

Everything went fine at school. Grandma said Allison (yes, my 04 babe) was really happy to see her. I've given some thought to why I was so upset about this, and why it was so important to me, and I think it's that she's my middle child, and she's very easygoing in general so it's kind of easy to overlook her. She's getting the short end of the stick attention-wise since the baby was born, and I'm trying not to let that be a trend. I was the oldest of 5 kids, and I have never before felt much sympathy for the plight of the middle child - but I can see how it's hard for her. She isn't big enough to do everything her sister does, and isn't little enough to demand attention the way the baby does. And while it might not have been a big deal for her if nobody was there this morning, it WAS a big deal that someone was, if you know what I mean.

This parenting stuff is hard sometimes!!

She's not doing much in the whining or yelling department, but she's very big on ignoring me until I start to lose my cool, at which time she laughs maniacally.

[Mama Faery]

Originally Posted by Miss Juice

She's not doing much in the whining or yelling department, but she's very big on ignoring me until I start to lose my cool, at which time she laughs maniacally.

Just had to respond to say, um, YEP! : Mine does that too. : Dude. Parenting is hard indeed.
And sleeping being a pita lately? *nod* I mean, this is ROWAN we're talking about here, so it's not like it was EVER sunshine and bunnies but man, for a while there it wasn't torturous! Take today's naptime for example: He complained about it; "NO NAP!" then when I gave him the option of sitting upstairs alone in his crib for an hour if he wouldn't let me pat his back,. he let me...but it took 40 minutes. : THEN, he slept for 45 minutes before waking up and grumping, so back upstairs I went to pat, pat, pat his back for another 20 min. and then I got another 15 or so before he woke up AGAIN. I patted him for another while, and now...well, he's making grumping noises again. ANd I am done patting him so let him wake up. : : :

And bedtime has been an utter joy lately, too. I am definitely the comfort zone here too; while away this weekend DH had a great time with the little poop. Now that MAMA'S back, it's all back to the testing. ARG!

Though, the night I got home from PA, I nursed him down at 8:30 and HE SLEPT UNTIL 6:40 in the am!! That will never happen again, I'm sure.

So, he's up. Gotta go. It's dreary here today but we saw our chiro this morning and my neck feels so much better. Yay.
And I do indeed ROCK.

[jstar]

sunshine and bunnies tee hee isaac keeps telling me he is scared of his room (aka i'm going to work my mom now). so my new approach is to tell isaac that he's a pony and his room is a barn and he gets to go to sleep in the sweet warm hay. it worked 2 nights ago. last night he goes 'i'm not a pony! i'm isaac br***!!!' oh, ok!

my parents' house is huge but 43 people is still a boatload. i think maybe 7 or 8 of those are kids. my mom thought one of my aunt/uncle/cousins grouping wasn't coming so she invited her friends and then my aunt etc really are coming. so it got a little out of hand. but i am sooooooo excited about the food.

[Jacqueline]

Renae-G does the same thing about everything, although he doesn't really yell it, he says very loudly "I Want ______" And he always wants it NOW. Please is getting harder and harder to come by; we always have to remind him. I guess he says "want" because since he was a little baby, we've said "what do you want" (in a nice way) before he was verbal. Now I wish he didn't "WANT" everything.

Crafty: I'm so NOT crafty. I play playdough with G and love working with glitter from time to time, but that's about it. I know how to cross stitch, but have completed ONE actual project in my whole life. I took beginner sewing while I was pg, and I think I could enjoy that, but we still don't have our own machine, so it makes it hard to sew! I have tried scrapbooking, but it just takes so long. I'd rather just slap the pics in a photo album and be done with it. I admire other's books, though. I used to be in journalism/PR and did loads of magazine layouts for various publications. So, I have an "eye" for design but just don't know how to bring it out in any tangible ways (besides a very well-designed Christmas letter, thank you very much.) I do bake, though, and really get into the holidays for that reason.

Miss Juice, I'm glad you found a solution to your situation. I hear what you're saying about wanting to make sure the middle child feels included. That's so important, and it sounds like you're working hard to make sure it happens!

It's been snowing here for the past couple days and today we've had some of the big, fat white pretty flakes. G went outside yesterday and tried to make a snowman with dh, but there wasn't that much snow and it didn't pack well. He's really into the snow now, which is fun to watch.

Here's a new sentence G spoke to me at the LLL meeting this morning: "I want milk from mama's boobie." He's really stringing the words together. It's fun to hear.

And here's a newsflash for me: I bought some new bras on Sunday....non-nursing bras! They aren't sexy, lacy numbers or anything, because I do have to whip it out on occasion and I need something capable of stretching. But, I feel so much better. My nursing bras were getting so stretched out and made me feel so icky. I had to measure myself because my pre-baby size was really too small. So, I had to go up to a harder-to-find size, but I found 'em.

Well, I need to balance the checkbook and get the laundry out before G wakes up from his nap.

[KKmama]

Jacquie, how much did you get total? All we got was BIG gusts of wind and ~25 flakes. (And G is *very* articulate... knows what he wants )

Z's doing much better napwise lately. I got a pointer or 2 from the AP friendly sleep book I looked at (sheesh... which one *was* it???). But I think his teeth are finally done, too.

Miss Juice, I worry about Z being the middle child, but honestly... I think they wind up being the most sensible and balanced as adults. (the oldest are neurotic, the youngest are spoiled ) I think they don't have a chance to fall into their siblings' pitfalls.

Dh got Donnie Darko (or should I say Donnie Dork@$$) from Netflix. He started it before I got home from a concert with a mom friend. He fell asleep before it finished. So I haven't seen the beginning, he hasn't seen the end. (I wanted to return it today, he wants to finish it.) We're both kind of amused seeing young Jake G., since the last movie we saw with him was Brokeback (roles are slightly different, no?). Frank the bunny scares the bejeezus out of me.

Ack, I was thinking about Saartje and Maggie, too. Are there email addresses for them over yonder?

Jess, shrieking is a big boy thing. You should see all the K boys SHRIEK when they play after school...

My dh totally wants the huge TV. He lately admitted he wants one BIGGER than Nugget's. It seems like a ridiculous expense to me. We don't *watch* TV (but I will admit, we love us some Netflix). But I am holding it out to him like a so we can finally get our @#$!! painting project done, house finally sort of decorated, stuff on the walls, etc. (And TV for husby)

Also, Nugget, my spinning wheel is a Louet (Dutch!).

One last thing... I am *so* stalking Jess' baby... if you decide to find out gender, the second that you find out, you must report back (because I know you want a girl).