Binkytown

Mack is here!

All he wanted for Christmas was Mack.

The camera batteries were charged. The Christmas music was playing. The hot cocoa was brewed. We stacked present after present on top of one another, little ones on top of Mack so as to save the big hurrah for the end. I got all three seconds of it before my camera ran out of memory. Oy.

You can't tell, of course, because I have no record of it, but Christmas with an almost three year old was truly magical and one I'll never forget.

Even if there is no proof.

You deserve a gift right about now don't you?

Head over to the Full Mommy to see what I think about Procter and Gamble's Pure Essentials and comment to WIN a great-big-yummy-smelling-soft-laundry-prize.

(Just in time to welcome you back from over the river and through the woods or wherever you are spending the holidays). 

The Ghost of Christmas Expectations

I cried, broken hearted that not one of the many photos my sister attempted to take of us at Breakfast with Santa turned out. I washed my hair and everything, that doesn't happen every Saturday you know. Really, it wasn't her fault, she tried, but we were working against the lighting and the angles and badly decorated Christmas trees. I try and tell myself it's just another photo, but I really wanted one of the three of us, because right now we are still three.

Last year my little man shrieked like a banshee when he came within five feet of Santa, even after letting him warm up to the idea and watch dozens of others do it before him. He marched right up to Santa this year and with the most serious of faces, told him exactly what he wanted for Christmas (he wants this play set, but armed with the faith that Santa would understand his language, he said very plainly: Mack.) 

In that respect, I guess This photo is not so bad. The look on his face, his hands enveloped by Santa. I am a stark realist; Don't get me wrong, I enjoy seeing photos in Christmas Cards but I know no one else on this planet thinks your kids are as cute as you do, so my theory is that the whole point of sending pictures of your kids in Christmas cards every year must be to demonstrate that there has been growth. Progress made. Another successful trip around the sun. Otherwise we would send the same old cute photo year after year. Speaking for myself, I am proud that we made it through another year and the photo is a celebration. It wasn't easy getting here but we made it AND oh my god he's so cute too isn't he?

Here's what we ended up with. It wasn't what I pictured in my mind, but Christmas in general usually isn't either.

That doesn't mean it's not really good.

Lost in Binkytown

As I tossed and turned in my son's twin sized bed last night, he grated his pacifier against the wall over and over and over again and I physically had to restrain myself from grabbing it and flushing it down the toilet at two thirty in the morning (which really, is not a good idea for anyone involved who wants to sleep before actually getting up and going to work, which is kind of required around here.) Hissing STOP IT and snatching it from his little hands I had a realization.

Not a good realization either- you know how your mind wanders in the middle of the night when it should be resting and it starts to connect all the dots that you have sort of been avoiding in the light of day?

I have made a wrong turn somewhere. I have gotten off track. I see the big green exit sign and the arrow pointing towards PROGRESS but I must be fiddling with the radio and not paying attention.

My son is about to turn three.

He is not potty trained.

He has two binkys that are never more than six inches away from him at all times, except when he is at school and then they are packed in the front zipper pocket of his Diego backpack, providing transferable comfort from the knowledge that they are there.

Not only does he not eat more than six foods, but that number used to be more like ten and has reverted backwards, despite my best efforts in reintroducing new things again and again and again and AGAIN with no success.

He is not sleeping. I have tried no naps and I have tried greatly reduced mini naps, both to no avail. Last night he was awake between 1:30AM and 5AM and no amount of coaxing could lull him back to sleep. He does not make a fuss, he tosses and turns and talks and calls for me and I can not sleep when I know he is awake.

I am very well aware of all of these things and think about them in various combinations every single day but the cold, long, dark night strung them together for me like a constellation of stars, only not at all beautiful.

I don't want to do a-woe-is-me-I-feel-like-shit rant here even though, wow, do I ever. I don't have anything new to say about the fact that there is nothing that compares to feeling like you are not doing the right thing for your child and how that primal emotion is a serious motivator but holy shit, I still want to throw my hands up and say hold the show! I feel like this caught me off guard. I didn't do this on purpose. Doesn't that count for something? I don't have a map that says its time to move from basic needs to developmental leaps and the time is NOW.

Obviously I need a plan and the plan I do have has made me realize I have planned badly.

For the past few weeks I have been telling the little man that after Christmas he is moving up a room in day care. Salamanders don't have binkys! I keep reminding him The binkys will have to go away! (To which he answers NO).

I have also been toying with the idea of potty training but there is not a single weekend in December that we don't have plans either as a family or apart. Since that is not conducive to PT we decided to start right after the holidays. Which coincides with the timing of making him give up the binkys. Something tells me this is a bad idea.

His three year wellness check will be in late January. The Ped we see right now has blown off my concerns about his eating habits more than once so I'm thinking of switching to another doctor in the practice. I believe he has some mild sensory issues and is impacted by food (because I know I do and see the same things in him) and there has to be some help for strong flavor/texture aversion having kids besides the letting them go hungry and when they get hungry enough they will eat it mindset. If Doc number two is no help, I'll find another.

This is the map but I know there are bound to be blown back tires and radiator leaks and at least several detours. I could really use some directions if anyone has any to spare.

(And with the combination of a new day care room, potty training and binky cold turkey-ing I think sleep is a moot fucking point, so no strategy on how to tackle that one as of yet).      

Famous Last Words on a Snow Day

I am not taking a nap

Thats what you think. (The big black blob is my dog)

Meme Christmas

Melinda got me. She tagged me with the 7 Facts About Me challenge. Yes, I am supposed to tag seven people, but people, I am just too tired to do that. Please talk amongst yourselves and if you want to do it, knock yourself out. If you don't, well, Santa's elves will be watching, that's all I'm saying. 

Here are 7 Christmas Facts about me:

1) I have very vivid memories of playing and listening to Christmas Albums (LPs) as a child. My parents had one of those gigantic record playing counsels. It was six feet long and had a sliding cover on top. One half was the record player, the other half was where you stored your records. The Chipmunks Christmas was a big hit in my house.

2) Every Christmas my mom made chocolate chip cookies, chocolate fudge, spritz cookies (with appropriate green food coloring for the Christmas trees) and Mexican wedding cakes. She stored them in holiday tins, separated by pieces of wax paper.    

3) We always spent Christmas Eve at my grandparents house. Down the street from them was a big neighborhood organization called Candy Cane Lane and we would drive by each year on our way home. People in that neighborhood would go bananas decorating their houses and it was free to visit, but some kind soul was always standing outside in the cold taking donations which went to a Children's Cancer Charity. It's still going strong.

4) One year not too long ago Santa Claus (or a very close replica) walked into my mom's house during Christmas Eve Festivities and shouted MERRY CHRISTMAS to everyone. We all assumed he was a friend or a neighbor of my parents. Turns out no one knew who he was.

5) Midnight Mass became a family tradition as we got older. I have such fond memories of it. First of all, it was so cool to be staying up so late. Also, I'm not much of a believer but it was really magical to be there in the middle of the night with the soft candles and beautiful music. SO MUCH better than going to church any old Sunday.

6) Last year my husband's very kindly agreed to celebrate Christmas on the weekend prior, so instead of being on the road Christmas morning, it was the first year since my husband and I have been together (9 years) that we were able to stay home on Christmas morning and celebrate Christmas with our own new and little family. It was the best one yet.   

7) I love Christmas. Everything about it.

Ho Ho Ho

Global Warming-Shwarming

I don't know about the rest of the country but it is slowly dawning on me that winter has pulled up a chair and made itself very comfortable in my driveway and it's only the 5th of December. Do you know what this means?

Weekends Indoors. This past weekend it was sleeting something awful, the kind of freezing rain that pelts you in the eye when you walk out the door. Trips to the park were out of the question. Shopping malls? At this time of year? Hell no. In the span of forty eight hours we went for exactly one three minute walk around the block. I thought I was going to lose it for good. Did I mention the walk was in the snow, which means there were....

Boots. Do I need to remind you what a creature of habit I gave birth to? Last time we went outside we did not wear boots which means we will not wear boots EVAH! ABSOLUTELY NOT. The putting on of boots was and continues to be vehemently protested against, which means I am...

So Very Late. Every morning. It just continues to snow and as if it wasn't hard enough to leave the house in my fifteen minute window before, now with the boots struggle taking up fourteen and half minutes of it I'm completely screwed. Why not let him go out with out the boots you ask? I tried. But there was....

SNOW! Mom! There is SNOW! On my BOOTS! Yes dear, thats what boots are for. NO! I DON'T WANT SNOW ON MY BOOTS! I'm sorry, there is going to be snow and we just have to learn to walk in it. I CAN'T MOM I'LL FALL! I'LL FALL IN THE SNOW! No, you won't, hold my hand. MOM MY HAND IS COLD! Yes, it's very cold outside, let's hurry along. I CAN'T HURRY BECAUSE THERE IS SNOW! MOM THE SNOW IS ON MY BOOTS!

Are you feeling me?

December 5th. A foot of snow. The first week of December is not even come and gone and I am a shut in.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. (Holds head in hands contemplating the many months until Spring.)

* I do believe in Global Warming, by the way and have fluorescent light bulbs and the all the like, but a FOOT of snow? Already? Come on...

A good bad position to be in

Why did I blow off classes when I was in college? Especially when I was paying for it myself? Yes,I was working full time, but I know that's not why. It was just because I could. Not a great answer, but it's the truth. Because no one makes you go to class, if I didn't want to go, I didn't. It was a small (and now I know rather futile) assertion of my independence. It felt good. If I was engaged in a class I went. If I was bored, I dropped in and out, smart enough to know how much work I had to do to get by; not smart enough to know that the people who showed up every day were probably going to get into Grad school and I wasn't. I never had a plan. My grand plan: Get my English degree and stop waitressing. I'd figure out the rest when I got there. Brilliant.

I wanted to be a professor. I wanted to study and write about books, not actually write them myself. I liked poetry. I had a poetry workshop my senior year in which the teacher asked us at the onset why we wrote poems. My answer: I have a short attention span and I like writing big things in little spaces. I swear she rolled her eyes and discounted me immediately. She was a Writer practicing a Craft and I was not worthy of her class. (I'm sure I skipped out a lot. I really showed her!) I had a couple poems that I was really proud of and I sent those babies off to every anthology and press I could find.

Only one submission ever came back. I called people excitedly. They want to publish my poem! Only later did I read the fine print which said I would have to pay them to get it in the book, not the other way other around. I think I may have given up after that. I still sent out submissions but the dream of writing something that would appear in a book became smaller and smaller until I simply didn't notice it anymore.

I did not get into Graduate school with my first attempt and consistent with my behavior up to that point, I didn't persist. I didn't retake some classes to bring my GPA up, I didn't even apply to multiple schools. I got a job and I'm still here. I'm not unhappy about that, I have been fortunate to work with wonderful women who helped to create opportunities for me to find a job that I really like in an industry that I never thought would be mine. I still write, just not in the way I imagined when that dream felt real. I have always wondered in the back of mind, what if I had done things differently, but the truth is, I'm very content with where I am.

From the BlogHer Ads newletter:

Rita Arens of Surrender, Dorothy has landed a book deal for her mommyblogging anthology featuring BlogHers Amy from Binkytown, Stefania from Citymama, Susan from Friday Playdate, Eden from Fussy, Izzy from IzzyMom, Liz from Mom-101, Jenn from Mommy Needs Coffee and Mommybloggers.com, Kristen from Motherhood Uncensored, Jenifer from Not Calm (dot com), Grace from State of Grace, Lisa Stone from Surfette, Jenny from Three Kid Circus, Mir from Would Coulda Shoulda, Amy and Tracey from MamaPop
- the book is tentatively titled Sleep is for the Weak: True Tales to Get You Through Parenthood and is due out from Chicago Review Press in Fall 2008.

Congratulations!

Congratulations Indeed! This is a huge undertaking and I know she worked really hard pulling this together so Yea for Rita. I submitted two posts for consideration for the anthology, I'm not sure which one made it in,but I think based on the title,it's probably Sleeping On the Floor. I am extremely honored to be included with the blogging company listed above. I absolutely swoon when I read that list of authors and see myself included.

A couple of blog friends in the computer have sent congrats after reading this and I really appreciate them because really, it's probably all I am gonna get. No one in my real life knows about my blog except my husband (Who doesn't read it, because he's you know, living it) and my two best girlfriends and only one of them visits. That's by design. The same spirit that made me want to skip classes for no other reason than I wanted to is at work here. This blog is just for me, independent of anyone's expectations or opinions other than mine. I love sharing it with bloggers, lovely friends I have made on line, because you are bloggers too. You get it that I can capture big feelings here in a post, instead of a novel and I can be anyone I want to on any given day. I just don't want to give that up.

Dreams are mysterious creatures. Often when I'm driving or drifting off to sleep I sometimes wonder, How about that? I carried that forgotten dream all these years and suddenly it just happened. It wasn't any poetry workshop, it was having a baby and losing my mind and finding an outlet and writing down what I was thinking about and a dream was realized. A dream I had put aside to make room for other things.

I'm not one hundred percent sure I'm actually in this book, I don't know if the publisher is still going at it with a big black magic marker, crossing out names and lines. If I should find my way in, I would be proud to present a copy to my parents or share this with my sister when the book arrives on shelves. Maybe I will but I don't think so. As much happiness as that would give me, I'd be giving too much away. It's certainly not my book and for some of these authors this is another line on a distinguished list of publications, but for me, it's a big deal. I hope you don't mind if I celebrate here. Everyone is invited and there will most definitely be party hats.