...because the Fates had other plans for us. Or maybe I should say Northwest Airlines had other plans. Alternate post title: air travel sucks, especially when there's no travel involved.
Today finds me at home with two wide-open days to fill, so I thought I'd use my new-found wealth of free time to blog about how I got all this extra time. Any of you who follow me on Twitter or Facebook may have read my disgruntled updates yesterday, so now you can get the full story. I'll try to keep it brief, but no promises, because I might get ranty. Read the whole saga below the fold:
Friday, Dec. 19
3:30am: Alarm clock jolts us out of sleep
3:55am: Taxi arrives to take us to the airport
4:05am: Standing in line at Northwest check-in counter
4:20am: NW employees begin to arrive
4:30am: Check-in counter opens and we proceed to check in and check 3 large suitcases
5:00am: Checked in and through security, waiting at the gate
5:30am: Boarding begins for 6am flight to Detroit
6:00am: Airplane backs out of the gate to prepare for flight
Around this time, our pilot makes an announcement: the weather in Detroit isn't looking so good, and we may have to reroute to either Pittsburgh or Minneapolis. We cross our fingers for Minneapolis, since that's our layover between Detroit and Seattle. They are adding extra fuel to the plane in case we are rerouted.
5-10 minutes later, our pilot makes another announcement: the extra fuel has pushed our airplane over the weight limit and they are looking for nine volunteers to get off the plane. No one moves. Plane returns to the gate.
5 or so minutes later, flight crew makes an announcement: NW has another plane headed directly to Minneapolis, and anyone who gets off our plane can be rebooked on the Minneapolis flight. Greg goes to the front of the plane to speak to the NW representative.
Greg returns to me and the kids and says we can get off and go straight to Minneapolis on another flight instead of going through Detroit. We exit the plane with 5 other passengers who have the same plan.
7:00am: We are told at the ticket counter that the NW flight to Minneapolis that was used to lure us off the plane has no extra seats. We are issued travel vouchers and meal vouchers and rebooked on a 12:15pm flight to Detroit.
7:30am: Muffins, bagels and coffee at Dunkin' Donuts, courtesy of NW meal vouchers.
8:30am - 11am: We set up camp next to the children's play area. Kids run and jump and play while Greg and I amuse ourselves with the laptop and the Nintendo DS.
11am-ish: Head back to gate to check status of our new flight. Flight is delayed. Snow has started falling in earnest.
12pm-ish: Find a quiet, unoccupied gate to settle in and wait for flight status updates.
1pm-ish: Lunch at Subway courtesy of NW meal vouchers.
2pm - 5pm: Waiting. Waiting. Waiting. Repeated flight delays. We are told that a flight headed to Rochester was rerouted to Syracuse, and our flight is dependent on that plane getting to Rochester from Syracuse. We also learn during this time period that our luggage has arrived in Seattle. Thankfully our toothbrushes are in our carry-on bags.
5:00pm: Another Detroit flight begins boarding. There are extra seats on this flight but the line of standby passengers is too long for us to get on board. At this point our 12:15pm flight is expected to leave at 7pm.
5:30pm: Detroit flight that has just boarded is now deboarding. I mention this because for the second time in one day, a NW flight is over the weight limit and passengers are asked to leave. This time, however, all passengers must exit the plane because one of the random passengers who was asked to get off refused and argued, and caused this flight to miss its window of opportunity to take off.
6:00pm: The same flight to Detroit begins reboarding.
6:30pm: The flight to Detroit is boarded, but by this time, so many passengers have missed their connecting flights and rebooked new flights for other days that there are 8 available seats.
Around this time, the flight crew is trying to determine how many more people they can take while staying within the weight limits. A pilot approaches us and asks if we are headed to Detroit; when we say yes he tells us he'd like to get us on the plane because our children would help keep the plane under the weight limit.
Then this pilot disappears and is never seen again.
The NW agent at the check-in counter begins letting standby passengers onto the flight. Greg inquires at the counter and we are told we can't get on this flight. The woman tells us that there is some feature of their computer system that won't allow her to change us to this flight, despite the fact that it's going to our destination and there are seats available, because we are still booked on the 12:15pm flight.
7:00pm: Flight to Detroit that we were not allowed to change to takes off. We are told that the plane we are waiting for from Syracuse is on its way and is expected to arrive at 7:30pm. We buy snacks to wait, still using vouchers. At least they were generous about that.
7:30pm: NW agent tells us that the plane from Syracuse is no longer listed as in the air, and our flight time has been moved back to 8:30pm. The kids are starting to get stir-crazy and continually ask when we're getting on the plane to go see Grandma and Papa.
8:00pm: At this point there are eight people left waiting: the four of us, a college student, and a couple with a 17-month old baby. We are all trying to get to Detroit to transfer on to other locations. I send NW a complaint through their website, detailing our saga.
8:30pm: We are informed that the plane we've been waiting for for over 8 hours has had a mechanical issue and our flight is canceled. We are all in tears of exhaustion, frustration and disappointment by this point.
9:00pm: We are rebooked for a Monday morning flight, 6am. We are told that there are no flights available on Saturday, and there is only one flight on Sunday, but it is already overbooked by 15 people, and there is another winter storm due on Sunday anyway. We are given additional travel vouchers. Evan asks if we're getting on the airplane now and I laugh and cry at the same time.
9:30pm: A friend picks us up at the airport to take us home.
10:00pm: We watch A Muppet Family Christmas while I make pasta for my starving children, who are too tired to eat more than a few bites despite how hungry they have been for the last couple of hours.
10:45pm: My children fall asleep, one on the couch and the other on the floor, and I carry them to bed.
11:00pm: Greg phones NW's Baggage Services to find out what is going to happen to our luggage. The employee he speaks with at first argues that our luggage can't be in Seattle, because it should have been taken off the flight when we got off the plane, despite the fact that more than one NW agent told us over the course of the day that our luggage was in Seattle. Then the customer service rep tells Greg that he will have to return to our airport to file a claim with the NW baggage office there. Greg, bless his little heart, argues with the woman for 5 minutes before she relents and checks the damn computer to find that yes, our bags are in Seattle and we can pick them up when we arrive there. Which will hopefully be on Monday.
Today we woke up late to a beautiful day, sunny, with fluffy white snow everywhere. We were dismayed to remember that our kids' boots and snow clothes are in our luggage, but luckily I found some slightly outgrown and some slightly too big items in the basement that will suffice for going sledding today. We have enough canned and frozen food to save us from having to go grocery shopping. We are planning to enjoy our extra two days of vacation even if we're not where we wish we were. We're just hoping that the snow that's expected on Sunday both here and in Seattle will be over by Monday morning so we can just get to our family for Christmas, damn it.
If you've made it to the end of this, thanks for indulging my self-pitying rant. I would advise you to steer clear of Northwest Airlines, but honestly, I don't trust that the others are that much better. The quality of our experiences with air travel has been steadily worsening over the last few years, regardless of which airline we're on. And they don't have to care, because we don't really have any choice.
Sigh. Hope everyone out there is having a better time than we are. And hopefully I won't have anything to blog about any time soon.
20 December 2008
hahaha, did i say hiatus?
10 July 2008
i knew i would jinx it somehow
We've started potty training Evan, and I've been holding off on writing about it here, because I knew that as soon as I proclaimed to the Internet that Evan was really doing well at potty training, he would stop doing well, because that's the way things go in my life.
It turns out I was wrong. He hit a speed bump in the potty training today, after all I did was think about writing about it. I don't know what I did in my last life to end up with such ridiculously bad luck in this one, but if we're at the point where my thoughts are jinxing things, I'm in trouble.
Anyway, he had been doing well. Really, really well. Greg and I had a big argument a week or two ago in which I firmly insisted that Evan was not ready for potty training, and then about five minutes after yelling at Greg and bursting into tears I realized that it was really me who was not ready. So I decided to suck it up and move forward with the potty training. It couldn't possibly increase the amount of bodily fluids in my life, and might actually reduce them a little bit, so what did I have to lose?
And he was good at it! And so very different from James. James didn't care what it felt like, what it smelled like, he was not going to interrupt his precious playtime to pee on the potty. Thankfully, with James, poo was a different story -- I'm pretty sure he never had a poopy accident after we started potty training. After the last three years, I shouldn't have been surprised that Evan would be the exact opposite.
He's good with the peeing. We let him run naked a lot, now that it's so hot, and he has no hesitations about running upstairs to pee in the potty. A few days ago we even attempted an outing in underpants -- I didn't even bring any diapers with us -- and we returned home from the library clean and dry. We've had a couple of minor accidents, but mostly he's been willing and even enthusiastic about peeing in the potty.
But. There is a but. We are having poo issues. One issue, really, and that is issue is this: my kid would rather poo in his pants -- underwear or diaper, doesn't matter -- than go on the potty. Today he was playing naked and started asking for a diaper. We both knew why. So I had him sit on the potty, and he peed, and then said he was done.
"Don't you need to poop?" I asked.
"No."
"Don't you want to try?"
More emphatically: "No."
"Please, can you try? Just try for a minute?"
"I don't want toooooo!"
"What's the matter? Why don't you want to try?"
"I don't want you to see it."
"Do you want me to leave? So you can do it by yourself?"
"Yes."
I start to walk out of the bathroom and notice I have an extra shadow. Before I can stop him he streaks into my bedroom and hops up on my bed.
"No! Don't poop on my bed!"
"Mom, I think I'm ready for a nap."
The little sneak. Since he naps in my bed, I don't let him nap diaperless.
I tried to push it a little longer. I said it wasn't time for a nap, so we went and played for a while, me hoping the whole time that he would give in and use the potty, and Evan determinedly holding it in.
Eventually it was nap time, and I diapered him and we snuggled together and he quickly fell asleep. And an hour and a half later from downstairs I heard little footsteps running out of my bedroom, and heard a door slam. Oh, but it's not what you think; he was not going to use the potty. My little sneak likes to fill his diaper in the privacy of his bedroom, which is exactly what he did.
So I brought him downstairs and changed him and tried to stay positive! And encouraging! And enthusiastic! About how next time he can use the potty! Then, as I do after most diaper changes, I asked him to throw the diaper away. All of a sudden we had a tantrum on our hands.
As an aside, Evan appears to have been taking tantrum lessons from a 12-year-old girl lately. More than once, after putting him in time out, we have heard him sob melodramatically, "No one wants me around!" and today's time out had him wailing about how he never gets to go anywhere. "Why exactly do you think you're in time out?" I asked him. He knew, but I guess he likes to throw dramatic non-sequiturs into his tantrums these days.
Anyway, back to the problem at hand, this poop thing. Anyone with some potty experience have any advice about this? He's so stubborn, I don't want to push it and make a huge issue out of it, but I would just like him to, you know, go in the potty. I'm ready to be done with the diapers already, and he's not helping! What's worse is that he has pooped in the potty, several times. He just seemed to suddenly develop this aversion and I don't have any ideas on what to do. Suggestions?
10 June 2008
a tiny misunderstanding
James came to the back door to complain about Evan splashing mud on him. I looked at James, already spattered with plenty of mud.
I said: "Ask him to stop, but if he does get more mud on you, it doesn't really matter, because you're already muddy."
James heard: "It doesn't matter how muddy you get! In fact, why don't you go ahead and cover yourself in mud, because I don't think you're muddy enough already. You can never be too muddy! ... And don't forget about your brother; make sure you coat him in mud too!"Evan Batman was very sad about having to come inside and get into the bathtub:
By the way, I know he doesn't look terribly muddy in that photo, but bear in mind that most of the mud on his body had by that time dried to a much lighter color.
James had literally painted his legs with mud. This photo was taken after he'd already started washing off:
The bathtub was filled with muddy water:
I was too busy at the time to think about taking a similar photo of the laundry sink while I was rinsing out the boys' clothes. Let's not even talk about James' sandals, which were about five pounds heavier with all the caked-on mud.
You know, after six and a half years of mess, dirt, sand, mud, muck, and bodily fluids, you start to think you've seen it all, that they've exhausted their capacity to disgust you, but kids always find a way to surprise you.
02 April 2008
housebound
We have been more or less housebound since Friday afternoon, when we inadvertently killed our car's transmission and had it towed to a repair shop that wasn't open all weekend, and which took one day to diagnose the problem, and is taking another three days to fix it. Oh, the joys of being a one-car family! But on the bright side, by not driving, we are saving a lot of gas money, and we are sparing the atmosphere a miniscule amount of pollution. I'm patting myself on the back as I'm typing this.
It's okay, really it's okay that we're stranded at home, because we now own Rock Band and we are putting it to constant use, annoying our neighbors and giving ourselves sore muscles from the intensity of our rock and roll. Our neighbors retaliate by blasting bad '80s music and Celine Dion at unpardonable volume levels (really, any volume is too much for Celine), but I suppose that makes us even.
Being carless has really not been so bad. Greg has been working from home, and the kids and I have been finding more to do around the house. It's been nice enough to play outside the last couple of days (though windy and muddy -- James and our neighbor were playing a game yesterday called "Scooby Doo and the Tornado Swamp"). This afternoon I played Candy Land for the first time in ages, albeit with Lego people instead of the plastic characters that come with the game. Okay, I know that really has nothing to do with not having the car this week, but I'm on a roll, here, and this is my first post in a while, so let's pretend it's relevant.
The biggest problem we're having actually, is that we're beginning to run out of food. This is partly because we're too lazy to walk the mile and a half to the grocery store for whatever food could fit into a backpack, but partly because I am viewing this situation as a challenge to see how well I can feed our family on the odds and ends now in the cupboards and refrigerator. I've been managing the dinners pretty well -- thank goodness for canned and frozen foods! -- and we have plenty of breakfast stuff around (even stuff that doesn't require millk, which we're almost out of), but I'm starting to run out of ideas on lunches. Today's fruit-and-vegetable-group offerings for my children's lunches were banana yogurt and pickles. They love those, sure, but it's a good thing we're getting the car back tomorrow.
Of course, when we get the car back we have a bunch of errands to run, so it'll probably negate all of the good anti-global warming karma we've been accumulating over the last week. But I feel like I've learned some kind of lesson this week, something about simplicity and not taking things for granted and being resourceful and adapting to unfortunate circumstances, and maybe some other things that I can't quite grasp in my current tired state. It's been a pretty good week so far.
29 January 2008
updates
Things have been busy around here, and I haven't been interested in blogging lately, for no particular reason, but I thought I should post a brief update to let you all know we're still alive. Because I'm not feeling up to writing real paragraphs and stuff (mentally, that is), I will do this list-style, because I'm fond of lists.
1. I'll start with the bad news. Our car was hit, in the parking lot right in front of our house, a few nights ago. Our bumper is smashed and mysteriously, none of the neighbors seems to know anything. So later this week we have to take it in to get fixed and get a rental car for a day or so. The boys were excited because we had to report it as a hit-and-run, and a police officer came to our house!! Thrilling.
2. Other bad parking lot news: in the last couple of weeks, we know of one car that was broken into and another which had its windows smashed by a group of unruly fellows. The window smashing actually bothered me less, because from all appearances that was a personal attack, not random, but still, we're becoming less enchanted with the neighborhood. To put it mildly.
3. In good news, we took the kids bowling for the first time this weekend. We went with some friends of our who had some coupons, and of course I didn't take any pictures, why would I do that, but believe me, it was adorable. Evan and our friends' daughter got to use a ramp that's normally reserved for people in wheelchairs -- you just set your ball on top and push it down. This, along with bumpers on the kids' lane, meant that the two littler kids beat the two older kids who actually had to roll the ball down the lane themselves. We heard just a little complaining about the injustice of one being expected to actually bowl at a bowling alley. (And by "a little" I mean "constant".) But I think they all had fun anyway.
4. Big lifestyle changes are afoot: we are transitioning to a mostly vegetarian diet. We've been heading that way slowly for some time, but I really accelerated it last week. Maybe I'll write a whole post on this sometime, but I'm feeling more and more strongly, for environmental reasons, that we need to stop supporting the corporate farm industry. This also means more local and organic foods, too. Everyone so far is dealing with the change pretty well -- we were never big meat eaters to begin with -- so hopefully this will be a good change for us in the long run. Maybe when Greg gets a real job and we have more money, we'll buy organic, local meats too. But for now, lentils and beans and tofu are cheaper than most meats anyway.
5. I think that's all. Nothing terribly exciting, but I felt like I was being neglectful of the blog, so there we are.
15 January 2008
i can't write a post today
We were beginning to think that Evan was starting to outgrow the terrible twos. The tantrums were becoming fewer, or at least they were getting easier to handle. He was learning to share, and play nicely with his brother. He was growing up a little, in subtle ways. Or so we thought.
It turns out that the terrible twos are like a resilient virus or bacteria. We thought we were eradicating the problem, but instead, it simply mutated into another form, and we now have to deal with it all over again. The tantrums are disappearing, yes, but in their place are the stubborn, obstinant protestations of a toddler who wants everything to be his way.
His newest thing is, "I can't." "I can't say please," whenever he is told to ask nicely. "I can't go to bed," whenever we catch him running around upstairs after bedtime. "I can't eat," when faced with food he doesn't like, though sometimes this is said as he eats whatever it is anyway. "I can't talk" is pretty self-explanatory. "I can't wear pants." That's the one I hear the most. And I am channelling Inigo Montoya as I tell him, "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
In fact, a perfect example of this phenomenon happened just now, while I was trying to write. Evan threw a video game of James' on the floor. Twenty minutes later, after two time-outs, lots of tears, and plenty of motherly coaxing, Evan blurted out, in a pained voice, "I'm sorry for throwing your video game!" And in a burst of tears, ran to me, crying, "I can't say it anymore! I can't say it!"
So you see, I can't write a post today -- I have too much to do with managing a stubborn toddler; I'm afraid it will be utterly impossible.
31 August 2007
maybe not too soon after all
There are days like yesterday, when I lament the passage of time and mourn the fact that my baby boy is heading off to kindergarten, and then there are days like today, when I try to give my children a bath and am bombarded with screaming: one shouting in his angry voice that he does not want toys in the bathtub, along with throwing said toys and hitting me because evidently the shouting is not enough to make me understand his fury at the idea that I would try to give him something to play with, while at the same time the other is howling in exaggerated pain from the merest drops of water coming in contact with the places on his elbow and knee where he fell and scraped himself yesterday.
Today is the sort of day where I find myself wishing that life had a remote control, because this morning I would have fast-forwarded to the year 2023 in the hopes that maybe by then my children would have learned to chill out once in a while. Or even if they hadn't figured it out by then, they'd both be out of the house and screaming and whining at their friends or employers or strangers on the street, just so long as it wasn't me anymore.
18 June 2007
in which i use Too Many Capital Letters
So have I mentioned how much I hate apartment hunting? Because I do. I really, really hate it. I don't think I can possibly stress enough how tired I am of this. Would you like to hear all about it? I thought you might.
You may have noticed my lack of blogging lately. I'm spending a lot of time on Craigslist these days, and on pretty much any other local rental website I can find. I also scour the rental ads in the papers, and pick up the free real estate booklets from teh grocery store. I am getting to be a pro at scanning the ads; however, there's not much out there that meets our criteria. Here are our criteria:
- 2-3 bedrooms
- storage space
- within our budget (i.e., pretty frickin' cheap)
- in a semi-decent neighborhood
- near a semi-decent school
- willing to give a short-term lease
Does that sound impossible to you? It didn't sound impossible to me when we started looking, but apparently I'm pretty naive. The one thing we really can't compromise at all is the price we can afford to pay, so we're being forced to revise all of the rest of our standards. Like, it goes without saying that we won't be living in the Beautiful Amazing Pricey Suburb, which means that James will not be going to kindergarten in one of the best school districts in the country, but instead will be going to whichever underfunded city school still has room. We won't even be living in one of the Cool Urban-by-Choice Artsy Neighborhoods. No, we'll probably end up in the Pretty Decent Neighborhood, But Don't Go Too Far North (Or East, Or West) Or It Gets Sketchy Neighborhood.
I'm pretty sure that last sentence didn't make sense, but I think you get my drift. We will be settling.
We've looked at a few places so far, and they have universally been either Too Expensive, or Too Small. Sometimes both. Correction: there was one place that's neither Too Expensive nor Too Small, but Very Far Away, which kind of equates to Too Expensive in time and transportation costs. Given all of that, we will probably end up with Too Small. That should be fun. You know, with the two growing, energetic, rambunctious boys and all.
I just keep telling myself that this will only be for six months. No matter where we end up living, no matter which school James ends up in, no matter whether I have to drive Greg to school every day, no matter what kind of freaky neighbors we end up with, no matter how small the apartment, it's only for six months. Six months. We can live with anything for just six months, right?
And then we start the apartment hunting all over again.
16 April 2007
a few minutes of fame in the blogosphere
There's a good handful of people who've been reading my blog for a while. If you're one of those regular readers, you must know all about the ways in which I'm psychologically damaging my sons. You must be aware that I really want daughters. Certainly you'd agree that I'm sort of "loco", possibly "delusional", and probably a little "off". It must be obvious, because some of these guys managed to draw those conclusions from reading only one of my posts!
I'm fairly amused. This is the first time, to my knowledge, that I've been linked anywhere, and it's by someone who thinks I'm crazy because once, I painted my son's nails when he asked me to; because I did not forbid him from trying on a pair of my heels when he expressed curiosity; because I entertained the idea of buying him a skirt when he asked me to.
I'm actually quite pleased at the number of people on that forum who can recognize that I love my sons, and that I'm not willing to limit their self-expression based on some arbitrarily gendered cultural guildelines for appearance. One of them also pointed out that Jesus & Co. had "a certain propensity for long skirts", to which I say, right on! If it was good enough for the savior of mankind, it's good enough for my kids!
As to the allegation that I want or need a daughter: I have been known to say that the main reason I'm sad about not having any daughters is because of the adorable, ridiculously froufrou clothes. I guess it says something incredible about my self-restraint that I do not, in fact, force my sons to wear that sort of clothing. It helps that I have a niece for whom I can buy such things if I really can't resist. Or, you know, what with me being a woman and all, I could wear them myself. But other than clothes, I don't have any reason to desire a hypothetical daughter over the wonderful sons I actually have.
So it wasn't my influence (my example, perhaps, but not my suggestion) that led to James' nails being painted. Believe it or not, my son did ask, entirely un-coerced, to wear nail polish and a skirt. He tried on my heels because they were lying out on the floor, not because I bribed him with a Gameboy. In fact, a couple of months ago, he saw a grandfather and granddaughter at the library and said, "I want my hair to look like that." I thought he meant the grandfather ("What? Why do you want gray hair?") but he actually meant the little girl's long golden braid. So we started growing his hair. And I will admit that James' ponytail was my idea -- it was my suggestion for keeping the hair out of his face all the time, and he liked my bubble-gum hair ties. But the inconvenience of growing his hair long eventually made him decide to cut his hair a few weeks ago. I was glad, though, that his decision was practical rather than gendered.
By the way, James does not own a skirt. I looked briefly last summer for something kilt-ish, but couldn't find anything I liked, and it hasn't really come up since then. Although, this morning when I went in to pick him up from preschool, he was wearing a flowered dress out of the dress-up room. So I guess it's too late for James -- the psychological damage has been done. We'll have to count on Evan to be the manly man -- but wait! Evan likes to play with dolls!! God, what have I done to these children?!
Greg looked around on the forum for a little while last night, trying to figure out who these guys were and how they'd found my site. (Believe it or not, my gender-bending post is the most frequently visited page on my blog. A lot of people reach it by Googling things like "paint his nails" or "under his skirt". I don't understand it, but I hope I can be of service.) He pointed out to me that a lot of the guys on that site are into comics. I'm a fan of certain comics, and movies made from them, but I was not above pointing out the irony of guys who like to read about guys who wear tights finding fault with a little boy's experimentation with his wardrobe and appearance.
12 April 2007
uh-oh
Yesterday afternoon, I put Evan down for a nap and sent James outside to play. Ahhh, I thought, some peace and quiet. Time to relax.
But suddenly, I heard the pitter-patter of little feet running around upstairs. Was it the neighbors' kid? (Sometimes, with the way these apartments were built, something happening next door can sound as if it's happening in your own apartment.) No, this definitely sounded like our apartment. Did we have a ghost? If so, it would be the first time I'd seen evidence of a ghost.
So I went upstairs to check it out and found Evan in my bedroom. "Wait a minute," I said, "I just put you in your crib." Didn't I? Yes, I was pretty sure I had. Had James helped him get out? No, James was outside. That left one explanation:
(Sorry the video is sideways; I don't know how to fix that. And please ignore the fact that he's not wearing pants.)
He's not even two! James slept in that crib for three years and never made it out on his own. (He tried twice: once, he got stuck on top of the railing and got scared; the other time, I freaked out and scared him saying things like, "You're going to fall and break your neck!!!" No, I'm not proud of that lack of composure, but it was effective.)
But Evan, Evan climbs out of that crib like he's been doing it every day of his life. So last night we took the mattress out of his crib, and he's now temporarily sleeping on a tiny mattress on the floor. Only, to say he's sleeping is an exaggeration. Last night he played and ran around until he collapsed. I'm dreading trying to put him down for a nap today. With Evan, I don't think this will be an easy transition.
I almost wish it had been a ghost instead. I suspect that would have been easier to deal with.
05 April 2007
an open letter to the month of april
Dear April,
I wanted to say thanks for the great time we had earlier this week. You took over right where March left off, and you were mild, sunny, and beautiful. The boys and I spent hours and hours playing outside on the playground and in the sandbox. It was so nice to feel like we were finally leaving winter behind. I made fruit smoothies for James' preschool class and we could sense summer in the air, on its way. I thought we were showing suitable appreciation for your kindness.
But then. Something happened. What happened, April? My frisbee league started last night and I should have been running around in shorts and short sleeves, but instead I was squinting against the raging wind, huddling in three layers against the snowflakes beginning to fall. I have to admit, it's nice to be able to run around playing frisbee for an hour without feeling like you're sweating... but that feeling was much nicer in October, when I was expecting it. I wore my winter hat last night!
How does that rhyme about you go, April? "April showers bring May flowers"? Right. Well, then, what do April blizzards bring? Lizards? Gizzards? Obviously, nothing pleasant. I prefer the flowers.
My neighborhood is having an Easter Egg hunt on Saturday, April, and we aren't really keen on the idea of hiding those eggs in snowbanks. My sources tell me you're not yet ready to change your mind and lighten up, but I do hope you'll consider the feelings of all of us who depend on you for relief after the long winter.
Hugs and kisses,
Heidi
02 April 2007
what have i done?!
Apparently I wanted to start the week off in the most depressing way possible. What did I do this morning? I cut my baby's hair. His angelic golden curls, while torture to drag a comb through, were so beautiful. And now they have been chopped off. By me. He used to look like this:
But now he looks like this:
I. CUT. My little boy's curls. I miss them so much! It's going to take me a while to get used to this.
28 March 2007
what does it take to get fired from this job?
The events of this morning have made it clear to me that, if this were a paying job, I'd have either quit or been fired by now, because I am really not that good at this stay-at-home parenting thing.
This morning, I'm babysitting for a friend's son while James is at school. Currently my baby is on the floor screaming for orange juice, because he's not interested in the water I'm offering him. The only reason that the boy I'm sitting for is no longer crying is because I turned on the TV to shut the kids up. I make children cry! I make children cry because I will not give them orange juice when they turn up their noses at the drink I've already gotten them, and because I will not return them to their mothers an hour before the scheduled time. I have never heard so much crying! The kid I'm sitting for has a pair of lungs to rival Evan's, and that's saying something.
Who let me be a stay-at-home parent, anyway? I'm not qualified. My house is constantly a mess; my five-year-old is still not registered for kindergarten (I got the paperwork in December); I cannot for the life of me convince my toddler to eat a single vegetable, even those he once loved; I bribe children with video games and television; and now, this morning, I had two children, one of whom is not even mine, screaming at me for different reasons, while the other mothers on the playground looked on with pitying smiles.
It has been a rough morning.
07 March 2007
my children are driving me insane
Okay, I really don't want this to turn into the "My Children Are Driving Me Insane" blog, but it's hard to avoid it on the days when you would sell your children on the black market for enough cash to get a full body massage and a meal cooked by someone else. Someday, I will return to writing Posts With Substance, but today is not that day. Today, my children are driving me insane.
To be fair, I should specify that it is Evan driving me insane. I do get annoyed with James crying that Evan is hitting him or biting him, but Evan is ultimately the source of those problems. And Evan... what can I really say that will fully impress upon my readers the horrors of living with a toddler deep in the throes of the terrible twos, one who is prone to screaming, hitting and biting, one who wakes at ungoldy hours of the morning, piercing the darkness with banshee-like wails?
Most mornings we have the first screaming fit before 8am. What makes him scream? Well, your guess is as good as mine. It changes day to day. For example, today he asked me for a banana. Okay, I said, and got him a banana. Then: "NOOO!!! I want baby banana!" Okay, I said, and found the smallest banana I could find. "This baby banana?" "NOOO!!! I want baby banana!!!" Okay, I said, and asked him to show me which was the baby banana. At this he threw his head back and started crying. "NOOO!!! I want magic baby!"
Whatever that means.
Then there are the times he starts screaming and crying for no reason, at least no reason you can determine. At least three times a day we have the following conversation:
Evan: WAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!
Me: Evan, what's wrong?
Evan: I cryin'.
Me: Why are you crying?
Evan: I sad.
Me: Why are you sad?
Evan: I cryin'.
Me: Why are you crying?
Evan: I sad.
Etcetera, etcetera.
Today I'm far more tired than usual, due to being jolted into consciousness before 7am by lots of shrieking. Evan is clearly overtired as well, and when the two of us are both overtired it does not make for a pleasant day for anyone. James was so easy in this regard -- always so good-natured -- that I'm still figuring out how to deal with a child who is so much more like myself (ie, moody and cranky). So please indulge my self-pitying complaining post -- if you've read this far I congratulate you -- and one day we will return to our regularly scheduled blogging, when I will write about interesting things.
19 February 2007
the master of positivity
It has not been the best of days. Fortunately, I've had lots of opportunities to practice looking on the bright side. Examples:
1. Evan smeared yogurt in his hair at lunch.
The bright side? He smells like strawberries.
2. The toilet overflowed this afternoon, and it was messy. And smelly.
The bright side? The bathroom is cleaner than it's been in a long, long time.
3. It took me close to an hour to clean the bathroom, right when I should have been making dinner.
The bright side? Greg is making dinner because he feels sorry for me. (Actually I demanded that he either cook or take me out to dinner, because I felt sorry for myself, but that's beside the point.)
4. When the floor in the bathroom gets wet, the ceiling in the dining room leaks. I forgot about this until I came downstairs after cleaning the bathroom, and had to clean all over again.
The bright side? ... Okay, there isn't really a bright side to that.
And, okay, it actually wasn't such a terrible day, apart from the toilet issues. I only threw in the bit about Evan with yogurt in his hair because I actually really loved it that he smelled like strawberries. Anyway, it's times like this I feel thankful that I'm an optimist and am able to laugh at myself.
18 February 2007
anatomy is inappropriate for children
The New York Times has an article about a children's book that was just awarded the Newbery Medal, "the most prestigious award in children's literature." It's rated at 4.5 stars on amazon.com; reviews are positive, saying things like "[the main character is] a multi-dimensional character whose predicament is compelling", "Readers will gladly give themselves over to [author Susan] Patron, a master of light but sure characterization and closely observed detail", and "Patron's plotting is as tight as her characters are endearing." As far as I've been able to tell, it contains no sex scenes, no promotion of Satanism, and no graphic violence, yet school libraries all over the country are refusing to purchase it. What could be so terrible about this book that should deem it worthy of widespread censorship?
Well, it contains the word "scrotum."
Yes, you read that right. Scrotum. Scrotum scrotum scrotum. And it's not that a scrotum is seen by a character or described by the author, no, but the word is overheard by the main character, a 10-year-old girl, who is puzzled and intrigues by the word. And why don't librarians want to purchase this book for their libraries, despite its obvious merits? According to a librarian in Brighton, NY (literally minutes from where we live), "I don’t think our teachers, or myself, want to do that vocabulary lesson."
That's what it really comes down to, isn't it? A "poignant Newbery-winning story [that] sails along with believable childlike rhythms and kid's-eye-view observations" is being censored from schools because the word "scrotum" appears on page one, and adults do not want to be faced with describing an anatomical term to middle-schoolers. One would think that these squeamish librarians, being librarians and all, might also have access to books featuring anatomical diagrams, thus relieving them of the problem of even saying the word "scrotum", much less having to explain it! No, it's far easier just to ban the book.
This makes me a little angry, but mostly sad. Is it really so terrible to ackowledge the sexual parts of the human body? It reminds me of a recent conversation in which some friends of ours expressed surprise that James is familiar with the words "penis" and "vagina", and has in fact occasionally seen his parents in various states of undress. It kind of baffles me. The only reason, I think, that anatomical words carry such mystery and secrecy about them is because we make it so. If our culture were less afraid to admit that every male person possesses a penis (and a scrotum) and every female person possesses a vagina, perhaps we'd allow our children to read a book which is not about sex or even naked people, but instead is a touching story about a young girl growing up that happens to contain the word "scrotum".
I think the next time James has a bath, I'll make sure he knows what his scrotum is and where, because it is his body, and since he's five years old, not really any more important than his knee or his kidney at this point.
26 January 2007
the n-word
No, not that N-word. This is a family blog! But Evan has a new favorite word, one that begins with N, and at first, it was cute and adorable. Now it's making me want to rip my hair out. The word?
Naked.
Every day, multiple times a day, we have battles over the N-word. Every diaper change comes with a plea to be naked. Every change of clothing comes with cries to be naked. And every time he does get naked, for a bath or a combined diaper and clothing change? Chaos. Trying to put that kid into a diaper and clothes when he is naked is like wrestling a tiger.
Letting him play naked makes him very happy. Of course, letting him play naked means he usually pees on something. One time that "something" was our bed, which resulted in us limitiing the nudity. But let me tell you, once you've gone naked, it's hard to go back.
On top of this, every time Evan asks to be naked, James asks to be naked. James is now at an age where we're trying to discourage the public nudity. We're trying to teach him about privacy and modesty and respecting other people's desires not to see a naked five-year-old running around. This is especially important when we are visiting relatives, where certain males who are not directly related to us tend to get very uncomfortable seeing James naked. We're also trying to explain that there is a difference between being naked for a few minutes during a diaper or clothing change, and just tearing your clothes off and running wild.
So in addition to Evan screeching "I WANT NAKED! I WANT NAKED!" we have James whining, "Why can't I be naked? Evan gets to be naked. I want to be naked tooooooo!" And it seems kind of silly, because in our house we don't really have any issues with nudity. We're all pretty comfortable with it. But I don't like to encourage running around naked just for the heck of it.
What to do? On the one hand we want them to be comfortable with their bodies, but on the other hand, we want them to be considerate of other people. On the one hand, I'm getting so tired of listening to the whining and crying to be naked all the time, but on the other hand I don't want to give in to whining and crying.
Sigh. Nudity. Who knew that this would be a complicated parenting issue one day?
24 January 2007
snowy day
We are finally in the midst of a real live winter here in western New York. Today was not intolerably cold, or windy, or snowing, so I actually felt ambitious enough to take the boys outside to play. Of course, even something as simple as going outside to play in the snow ended up as a source of drama in this family.
First let me post some cute photos, taken before things went awry:
Evan, toddling through the snow
James, after sledding down a wee hill
Evan is at that weird in-between age when it comes to the snow. He's too big to be carried around, but too small to really play. At his size, every step in the snow is a gigantic undertaking of simply lifting his foot high enough so as not to trip and fall. Evan has the additional problem of refusing to wear mittens. Actually, it's not so much a refusal as it is screaming every time he sees his gloves.
So for the first ten minutes or so that we were outside, Evan did his best to simply walk through the snow. He seemed to be enjoying himself, until he got to the slight hill at the back of our yard and instantly fell. Of course, he caught himself with his hands, which were, of course, bare. Screaming, of course, ensued.
It was all downhill from there. Evan's hands were freezing, which made him cry, but the suggestion of mittens made him cry even more. Eventually I forced his little mittens onto his red little fingers. Then he spent the next ten minutes or so demanding to be carried, and crying, "My hands! My hands!" So the mittens came off again, and a thumb was immediately crammed into the mouth, and we watched James sled for a few minutes while Evan repeatedly refused every suggestion I made to him. ("Want to sled?" "No." "Want to play in the snow?" "No." "Want to go inside?" "No." "Want to go take a nap?"* "No.")
Despite Evan's lack of enthusiasm for the idea, I brought him inside and put him in bed, because I didn't dress him and myself in three layers of winter clothing to go stand around and watch James sled (though it is pretty amusing to watch, what with James being unable to steer, and half the time unable to even stay upright).
And Greg wonders why I don't take the kids out to play more often.
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*I know you think this is a silly question to ask a toddler, but Evan will actually answer yes to this question if he's really feeling tired.
23 January 2007
the fifth birthday party: a cautionary tale
I've been meaning to write about James' birthday party for days now, but I wanted to be sure I waited until I had sufficient time to relay the horrors of a five-year-old's birthday party. Sit back and listen to my tale, but make sure the lights are on, because there is some mildly frightening material ahead.
Let me begin by saying that I can't blame the boys for everything -- some of it was due to my lack of experience in the birthday party-planning field. However, I can blame the boys for most of what happened.
We had three party guests: B. (a friend of James' from school); P. (a friend who went to school with James last year but is no longer there); and E. (a friend from the neighborhood). None of the guests knew each other, though over time they bonded through their shared interests and hobbies (namely, screaming, running, jumping, and wrestling). Everyone managed to leave the party alive, though I can't say the same for some of the poor balloons, many of which were the victims of excessive rough-housing.
The first lesson of the day was that simply allowing 4 young boys to be a room together is a recipe for trouble. The noise level, the energy -- I had a headache within the first five minutes. I thought quickly and devised a plan to trick them into settling down a bit, by proposing a game. Lesson #2: Telling the boys that it's time to play a game is smarter than asking them. Obviously the little banshees, who are perfectly happy shrieking and bounding around on the furniture, will not willingly choose to slow down. To their credit, two of them told me "No, thank you" when I asked, but still, I was looking for cooperation, not politeness.
I did eventually manage to convince them to participate in the game, though, by revealing that the game was a treasure hunt, and that there would be treasure for them to keep at the end. These were the thing I had to keep stressing to hold their interest. See, because I had thought it would be a clever idea to start the treasure hunt with a puzzle telling them how to find the treasure. But the puzzle was so much work and they really wanted to just play. I reminded them of the treasure that they could keep, so they did the puzzle. And then -- lesson #3: Do not assume that other people's children are as smart as your own child. That sounds mean, but I did assume that because James can read, his peers should be able to read at least a little bit. I know that they can't does not mean they're stupid. (But I did feel a little surge of parental pride at James' ability.)
But. James read the puzzle message and a mad-cap race through the house ensued. I had planned for the treasure hunt to take 15 minutes or so (it took me twice that long to create it!) but I underestimated these clever children, who found their treasure in 5 minutes or less. Their delight in the treasure taught me lesson #4: Do not distribute the goody bags until the end of the party, unless you are trying to increase the mess and confusion of the party. Doing the treasure hunt first meant that sticky frogs and flying discs immediately filled the air. This left me with the challenge of recollecting and redistributing everything at the end of the party.
Okay, I can't remember whether we did the cake of the craft next, but I'll post the cake photos here, partly because I'm proud of my little Yoda cake, partly to remember to thank Karen for the cake recipe (thanks, Karen! It was delicious!), and partly to provide photographic evidence of the carnage created by four little boys:
Feeding them cake and popsicles did keep their mouths busy enough to bring us a little quiet (and I do only mean a little, because they still managed to keep talking and talking and talking). We were also given a little quiet while they concentrated on the craft I had prepared. Which brings me to lesson #5: Do not give paint to little boys, ever. Yes, little boys love superheroes, and yes, they love to dress like them, and yes, they love to paint, but NO, it is NOT a good idea to decorate superhero capes with fabric paint at a birthday party, especially when that paint requires 24 hours to dry. That's one lesson I wish I hadn't learned the hard way. And I'm pretty sure the other boys' parents hate me for the laundry troubles I caused them, because each of those little boys went home with paint on their clothes, and some with paint in their hair as well.
We opened birthday presents before the boys left, because I knew James was getting a couple of games that could entertain the boys until it was time to go home. Lesson #6: Do not attempt to teach young boys new games at a birthday party, because none of them will hear, much less remember the rules, and they will spend most of the game arguing over whose turn it is. We gave up on the games pretty quickly, which was a good move to stop the arguing, but it was a pretty bad move overall because I didn't have anything else planned for the party. Which leads to lesson #7: Do NOT, under any circumstances, leave young boys to their own devices! Someone will get hurt.
But the boys made it home in one piece, and I survived to write this harrowing tale of lessons learned, so that you may not repeat my mistakes. As I said to my mom after the party, thank goodness birthdays only come once a year -- that's not an experience I could stand to repeat anytime soon.
11 January 2007
i might be crazy
I decided to have a birthday party for James. He's five years old, he's been to enough birthday parties to know what he's been missing before now, and gosh darn it, I do like to make the kid happy.
But. I forgot that Greg was going to be out of town for a few days this week (yesterday morning through tomorrow night), so the job of cleaning the house and getting it ready for a party falls squarely on my shoulders, on top of single momming. If you have any idea of what kind of effort I put into housekeeping on a daily basis (i.e., virtually none), you will understand what a challenge it is going to be for me to make the house presentable.
I started last night, but for some reason I began my cleaning efforts with the toys. Actually, I know the reason: I can't vacuum the living room until the millions of cars and action figures and Go Fish cards and random Mr Potatohead parts and teeny-tiny Lego pieces are picked up. The smartest thing would have been to vacuum immediately after picking up, but by then it was midnight and I figured I'd tackle it in the morning. Of course, my efforts were immediately reversed this morning, since the first thing Evan does when confronted with the wide-open space of a living room floor is to dump toys all over it.
In addition to the cleaning, I decided to make a vegan cake so that one of the party guests won't be left out. This will require finding a suitable recipe and shopping for ingredients (neither of which I've done yet) as well as actually baking and decorating the thing. James still hasn't told me what he wants his cake to look like, either.
And on top of the cleaning and the cake, I have yet to figure out what I'm going to do with four 4-6-year-olds for two hours. I know, it's only 4 boys, and it's only 2 hours, but seriously, two of those boys are the most high-energy kids I've ever met, as well as being a little aggressive. And James is the type of kid who just feeds off of the energy of other children and tends to get a little out of control in social situations. And I'm going to be giving these kids sugar?!
I'm kind of wishing I had not let James talk me into this. I really should learn not to take advice from five-year-olds.
