Weekly Winners - Bath time!

Before the flu germs exploded all over our family, picking us off one by one, I managed to get some fun shots of the girls as they played in the tub. I played with my bounce flash and laughed at their antics. Now I'm sharing my favorites with you in honor of this week's Weekly Winners. Don't forget to click through to see other great shots!

"Bellah! Bellah!"

A little bath water never hurt anyone.

Bubbles are a special bonus!

Oh! Silly me, it's a hat! not a cup!

I'm too big for such antics.
Instead I'm practicing my facial expressions.

But not too big to put bath toys in my mouth.

Boy, we do have fun in the bath!

It's more fun than having a fever, that's for sure.

Have a lovely week everyone. Hope you all stay healthy!

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Some days it's all about perspective

I woke up to an email from an editor saying that the publication for which I was writing my first print article was going on an extended hiatus. For a year or so. She said this in reply to an email sent by me the night before, letting her know that I was on track for my Monday deadline. I salvaged the situation as best as possible, but to say that I was disappointed would be the understatement of the year.

I checked the rest of my email and found out that a dear friend's new baby is terribly colicky. She's going insane what with the no sleep and non stop screaming. Right then my disappointment seemed petty.

I checked some more email and learned that somewhere in the blogosphere two parents brought home their 2 year old daughter so they could watch her die. Her cancer has become so aggressive treatment isn't an option. What's a missed writing opportunity in comparison to the death of a child?

I hugged my children close and took them to school and daycare. Then I sat down to salvage my day. I sent emails and worked on some projects. Then I answered a call from my husband. He was delirious, hardly making any sense. He sounded like he was crying and laughing at the same time. He'd thought he was better from his flu and had gone to work. He was on his way back home, freaked out by the incessant chills.

I dropped everything, rushed to pick C up from school so I could take her to daycare early. I hurried home to see what was wrong with M. I found him shaking in bed, burning up, lethargic, completely out of sorts. One frantic phone call later to his sister, our internist, and we were in the car headed to see her. Shortly after that we were headed to a nearby radiology office, script for lung x-rays in hand. We didn't learn until later that he didn't have pneumonia, just a terrible case of the flu.

I took him home and put him to bed, I went out to get his meds, and then I sat on the couch to try to get a tiny bit of work done before going to collect the girls. Unfortunately, I was too riled up from my pharmacy trip to get anything worthwhile done.

It was a long and very frustrating day. It was filled with disappointment, sadness, fear, and frustration. The kids sensed all this and were extra challenging tonight. In fact, it's 11pm and for some reason Little L won't sleep. Instead she just keeps crying and fussing.

But I just learned that that little girl passed away today. So I'm going to take my tear stained face and go cuddle gratefully in bed with my grumpy daughter and sick husband, because even though I had a truly terrible day, I know it could have been so very much worse.

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How to Order Medicine from Canada

1. Finally do the math and realize that one child's asthma control meds cost $300/month, her rescue meds cost $100/month, her sister's asthma control meds cost $150/month, and your husband's cholesterol meds cost $90/month.
2. Have a meltdown.
3. Seriously, who can afford over $600 of essential medicine per month?
4. Curse the health care system and your insanely expensive health insurance that doesn't cover any meds.
5. Suck it up and get ready to shell out a small fortune each month to keeps kids breathing and husband's heart ticking.
6. Hear from a friend that meds in Canada are way cheaper than in the States and that you can 100% legally purchase them online.
7. Seriously, they even ask for a prescription and everything.
8. Pooh pooh the friend and vow that you'll never do something that seems as shady as that. Ever.
9. Hand another $600 to the ridiculously friendly Target pharmacists.
10. Wonder why they know your name.
11. Get home and realize why. Swear up and down that you're done, done, done spending this kind of money on medicine.
12. Stay up all night with a child struggling to breathe despite her expensive meds. Realize that you can't stop buying asthma medication, ever. Without the meds those nights would happen every other day. They're bad enough once every couple weeks.
13. Venture onto the Internet to do a bit of research.
14. Pick jaw up off the floor and holler for husband to come see.
15. No, it has nothing to do with the prices for a weekend at Disney. You've just discovered that in Canada you can buy the asthma meds for less than 2/3rds the price.
16. $50/month instead of $300 for Little L's meds. And that's just a start.
17. For that price I'd do it even if it weren't legal.

All joking aside, we've saved an inordinate amount of money buying our regular prescriptions in Cananda. It does take a little planning because the U.S. forbids the Canadian pharmacies from shipping medicine overnight. Everything ends up going through more or less regular mail and takes almost two weeks to be processed and shipped. Sometimes there's even a snafu which causes certain mothers to do insane, and do possibly illegal things, like buying drugs in deserted parking lots. But all in all it's been a good experience.

Don't believe me when I say it's worth it? Visit http://www.pharmacychecker.com, plug in the name of your drug of choice. If it exists in Canada, I guarantee* it'll be cheaper.

Still have doubts? When I told our pediatrician about our little scam she asked for the website. Now she buys her children's asthma medication there too. No joke.

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Bloggers BandingTogether to Reform CPSIA

Today is CPSIA Blogging Day. Now, I'm just going to assume that you're a little like me, (because I'm a narcissist) and you've heard about the CPSIA (Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act) only because everyone has been talking about it for weeks. You probably know that is has something to do with safety and kids, and you might know that it's threatening the existence of countless small businesses, especially home run businesses, beyond that your knowledge of the situation might be a little sketchy.

The Act was originally created in 2007 to protect our children from all the defective and dangerous toys coming out of China. And in theory it's great. It's in practice that issues come up. The testing that the act requires will be easily carried out by huge corporations and will cripple or destroy small businesses. Labs will be charging $300-$4000 per product to test for compliance with CPSIA regulations. And, because of the way the act is worded, each new batch will have to be retested. (To learn more about the act and the repercussions click here and here.)

Right now small retailers are going nuts trying to sell off their stock before they are forced to start testing. And everyone is doing their best to push back the deadlines and try to get the CPSIA changed. (You can learn more about that here.)

One thing that is not often mentioned is that the CPSIA isn't just affecting toys and apparel. It's also affecting books. All those fun toddler books with flaps and bumps and fuzzy things to touch and tickle. Those books are all affected and libraries might have to shut down their children's sections until they bring their inventory into compliance. That's right, it could mean bye bye Pat the Bunny and Peek-A-Zoo.

I'm just trying to show you that this affects you even if you don't have an Etsy store or make baby onesies out of your basement. Worse, countless people might end up out of work and they won't even have Pat the Bunny to console themselves!

Want to do something to help? Click here to get the Etsy Action Kit. It contains sample letters to send to your representatives. Tweet or blog about the situation to help raise awareness. And maybe hunt around for special CPSIA sales to help shop owners sell off their stock.

There isn't a whole lot of time, the act comes into effect in just a couple days. The time to act is right now. I, for one, would like to keep buying cute wooden handmade toys, little hair clips, and fun t-shirts for my girls, and I would greatly prefer not being forced to buy them from massive multinational corporations. Wouldn't you?

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Wordless Wednesday - The Woman Behind the Camera

(Mom on the Run wrote a great post on getting people to subscribe to your blog. She said we should post pictures of ourselves. Think this is what she meant? Does it make you want to subscribe?)

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Organizing the chaos one corner at a time

On Saturday night I cracked open my trusty journal, the one I use to write the maudlin stuff none of you want to see or the more concerning stuff I feel is safest to keep from you, and I wrote "Slowly, step by step I'm taking control of the house. I am determined to be in charge of the mess and to no longer be ruled by the chaos.

In my heart of hearts (Yes, I use cheesy phrases like that in my journal, because my journal, he does not judge me.) I feel that controlling my surroundings will make me feel more in control of what goes on in my head." Then I turned out the lights and went to sleep.

In the morning M said to me "I finally feel like there's a light at the end of the tunnel. I feel like we're finally back in control of our lives." For the record, M does not read my journal, not because I don't let him, but because he doesn't want to. So it was beyond odd that we'd stumbled on the same thought at the exact same time. Well, not that odd, we do sorta kinda share a brain, but oddish. I looked around our room where I'd been standing finally sorting outgrown baby clothes into bins according to size and age. I glanced at the armchair that until last week had housed our insane pile of laundry. And then I looked back at him and nodded.


Over the last couple of weeks I've been tackling the house corner by corner. I started with the laundry. I assigned a laundry basket to each girl and started putting their clothes in them instead of letting them pile up on the chair. Grown-up clothes get folded as soon as they come out of the dryer. It's amazing how much easier it is to fold a handful of large t-shirts when they're not tangled in a mass of tiny onesies. In one weekend I conquered the laundry beast that had been tormenting us forever.

Having taken care of the hulking pile of laundry, I turned my attention to the next most urgent issue, the laundry supply cupboard. For some reason for the longest time ever it hasn't bothered me that every time I opened the cupboard door I had to shield myself with one hand to protect myself from whatever was going to fly out as I maneuvered the laundry detergent out with the other. Then I had to do some serious shoving and pushing to get the thing back in. Today, that chaos is a thing of the past.


And since I was taking care of one shelf, I kept going and did the whole cupboard.

And the underside of the sink.

Have no fear, there's still a lot that needs to be conquered. Like the underside of the bathroom sink, for instance.
But we're getting there. Corner by corner, room by room. Seriously, I'm even measuring windows to see about getting curtains for some of the more neglected rooms. Curtains, people, that's huge for us. That's a world away from where we were just a few months ago.

As I cleaned and organized this weekend I wondered what it was that had caused such a radical shift in the space/mess continuum of our lives. And then I figured it out.

Can you guess?

That's right. It's sleep. Sweet glorious, life changing sleep. For the last month Little L has been sleeping through the night. All of a sudden we have energy to clean up and organize, and more importantly all of a sudden we actually care enough to actually do it. And all it took was a little sleep and a gajillion boxes from Costco. Go figure!

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Who By Fire - More than just another story?

I love tucking into a good novel. I love not knowing anything about a book and gingerly thumbing through those first almost blank pages to get to the first section of real text. I mentally cross my fingers and hope that the writing is going to live up to my expectations. I hold my breath as I'm introduced to the characters and I let it out slowly as they pull me into their lives.

I don't get a lot of time to read. I have two little kids and a demanding list of writing obligations. So if you see me pick up a book and, two or three pages in, sink back into the couch cushions to get comfy, you know I've been captured by the story. And if you see me smile or gasp a little as I read, then you know that I'm a lost cause. Any missing sock, required glass of water, or sibling squabble is just going to have to wait.

Some topics get my heart racing a bit more than others. As a convert to Judaism I'm fascinated with anything having to do with the Jewish faith or the Jewish people. Bonus points go to stories that touch on the oddities of the Orthodox Jews. My goal here is not to offend anyone, honest, but I honestly just don't get the Orthodox Jews. And I especially don't get how people chose to become Orthodox. It's one thing to have been raised in a very controlling faith, a whole other thing to chose it. But as a Reform Jew, I'm not exactly welcomed into the Orthodox world with open arms. In fact, they don't even consider me to be a Jew. So it's a little hard for me to explore this world that both fascinates and puzzles me.

Enter my insatiable thirst for books that touch on the topic.

Who by Fire by Diana Spechler dives right into the heart of my fascination by taking a regular ol' American boy and sending him to live in an Israeli Yeshiva. I stood by this boy as he studied and worried about his soul and family. I watched as he struggled with his decision to chose this life. And I pondered what really pushes people to make that leap.

A part of me nods right along with the author: of course you'd have to be running from something major like the guilt of letting your sister be kidnapped in order to punish yourself that way. But in my gut I know she's taking the easy road. It's highly unlikely that every boy in a Yeshiva has a terrible dark secret in his past. There has to be more to it than that. Right?

Although it was a fantastic read, this book didn't answer that question for me. I think I'm going to have to keep searching.

Original It's my life... post written for the Silicon Valley Book Club Who By Fire event.

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Remember when weekends meant rest and relaxation?

There was a time in our lives when weekends meant two lazy days spent doing a little shopping, a little napping, a lot of reading and hanging out with friends. There was a time when Friday meant that the works was done for the week and then you got to rest and regroup for the coming week.

There was also a time when coming home at the end of the day meant that the hard work was done and that all that was left between you and a great night's sleep was a little TV time, dinner, and, well, bed.

And then we had kids. All of a sudden 5pm means the day is about to start all over again. And as all parents know, the hardest day at work is always easier than the easiest evening with little kids. You have to convince cranky tired kids that they should eat their healthy(ish) dinner, drink their milk, keep their clothes on, then take their clothes off. There's bath time, its very own form of parental torture, what with the "I don't want to take a bath!", "Noooo don't wash my hair!", "Don't get the water in my eyes!", "Owww the water got in my eyes!", and of course "Nooooo, I don't want to get out!"

Once they're clean you have to dress them again and brush their hair, and then if you're like us, you get to strap a mask to their face and force medication into their lungs to ensure that they breathe easily through the night. (Yay asthma!) Finally at long last you read them a short story and plop them in their beds and turn out the light and after three or ten visits to the potty you just might hear the sweet sounds of soft sleepy sighs. After all that, if you have any energy left you drag yourself into the kitchen to see what you can scrounge up for your own dinner.

Weekends are kinda like that, times a bajillion million more exhausting. Some Saturdays I'll have gone through my entire arsenal of tricks to keep them entertained by 10am. And M usually lets me sleep in until 9*, so that's saying a lot.

Forget T.G.I.F., around here we celebrate T.G.I.M.

*We tag team on the weekends. He gets up and has breakfast with the kids. When I get up, he goes back to sleep.

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Love is in the air on the window

"Daddy! Daddy! Mommy is going to take a picture of my Foofa!"

Oh, come now, don't look as shocked as M. No dirty pictures were planned, promise! C, Little L, and I decorated our (rather dirty) windows in preparation for Valentines Day and in protest of all the holiday decorations coming down. The result was something C was so proud of that she wanted me to capture it on film, so she could show it to her friends, not that it's necessary because apparently all her friends from daycare are going to follow us home to see. They have to follow us, because their parents don't know the way. Oh, and also, we're going to have rice. Hot rice for some and cool rice for others. And one of her friends is going to spend the night. But I digress. Let me get back to the topic at hand - our V-Day/beat the winter blahs decorations.

Little L put up lots of preety preeties.

And C put up Foofa and Brobee*, the love birds.

Happy Love Thursday everyone.
Hope something in your home makes you smile
and feel the love every time you pass it.

*Foofa and Brobee are named after two Yo Gaba Gaba characters, in case those of you who are fortunate enough not to know were wondering.

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Being president isn't a job I would want, but no one made them take it.

I never know what I'm going to get when I open my BlogNosh email. Could be about parenting, travel, life, food... anything. I just know it's pretty much guaranteed to be well written and pertinent. I love BlogNosh; it helps me discover great new bloggers.

That said, today the topic of the featured blog post caught me off guard. I wasn't expecting to read such a glowing tribute to former President Bush's career. I'm not going to go into details (you can go read it for yourself). I'm not going to bash what was clearly a heartfelt post. I said it in the comments, that's no longer a fight I want to fight.

But Janel said something in the comments that made me think. She said: "I would never want to walk a day in any president’s shoes. I doubt very many would." She's right. It's a terrible job. A terrible burden. You spend every waking moment in the public eye. Your every decision and thought is scrutinized and analyzed ad nauseum. There's never any winning because someone, somewhere is always going to think you're wrong and horrible. There's never any reprieve because the country doesn't stop running when you need a break. And the lives of countless human beings rest in your hands. To top it off you never have a moment of privacy and as our new president laments, you can never even drive your own car.

It's not a job I would want. I can barely manage my own life, let alone the governing of my family. I couldn't handle being responsible for any one else. I wouldn't be able to tolerate to constant critique, the eternal eyes over my shoulder. And I frankly wouldn't wish it on my own worst enemy.

But people who go into politics know that those are the rules. They're not dumb. So should we feel pity for them because of this burden? Didn't they call it upon themselves? And when they're done with their term, should we assume that saying it's a hard job can absolve them of their mistakes, of their failings?

Yes, they're human, yes they're fallible, but we don't go around electing Joe the Plumber or Tim the Chef, we hire politicians who are trained for the task at hand. They have legions of people and all the necessary resources to do their job right. And yes, we do and should hold them to a higher standard. Because they wanted it and they can handle it. And also because, maybe, just maybe, if we hold them to those high standards and keep from making excuses for them, then they'll rise to the challenge and be the leaders we expect them to be.

************
New review up at The Lemonade Stand. If you need help organizing a group or a club, you need to check out what I have to say about Qlubb.
************

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President Barak Obama's Inauguration: As seen by a 3-year-old

"Ehhhhmo! Ehhhmo!" Little L says, handing me the remote insistently.
"No, baby, no Elmo this morning. This morning we are watching history being made! It's a very important day!"
"Mommy, this TV show is bad. This is not good for us to watch." Chimes in C, coming to see what Little L and I are talking about.
"No, no, this TV show is good! It's great! One day you'll be able to say that you saw this happen!"
"Why? What is it?"
"Well, today we get a new president!"
"Why do we need a new president?"
"Well, the old one is done with his turn. It's the new president's turn now."


"Mommy? Does the new president have more hair than daddy?"
"Uh, no, actually he doesn't."
"But, are they the same?"
"Not exactly, the new president has dark skin, like your babysitter."


"Oh! Look! There's the old president!"
"Mommy, he's making a lot of deals. Why?"
"Deals? What do you mean?"
"He's doing what we do when we make a deal." She said, holding out her hand as an example.
"Oh! Right!" I said, looking at the exiting president, making the rounds, shaking hands right and left. "He's not making deals, that's how grown-ups say hello to each other."


"Oh! Oh! Oh! There he is! There's the new president!" I bounced up and down on the couch.
"Him? That's the new president? I LOVE THAT GUY!" C yelled jumping up and down next to me. "I like him SO MUCH!"
"Me too baby, me too."


"Mommy? Why are all the people sleeping?"
"They're not sleeping honey, they're praying."


"Mommy? When is the visitor coming?"
"What visitor?" I said, looking frantically around at the mess surrounding us.
"The new visitor."
"What new visitor."
"The one we're watching on the TV!"
"Oh! The new president! He's a president, not a visitor."
"So he's not coming here?"
"No, he's not coming here. He's going to be very busy starting tomorrow. He has a lot of work to do!"
"What does he have to do?"
"He has to fix the country!"
"Who broke it?"
"Well, the old president made some bad decisions and some bad choices. Now things have to be fixed."
"Did he break some trees?"
"Uh, actually, in a way he did, and lots of other things. Now the new president needs to try to fix it."


"Mommy? Why are all the people so happy?"
"Well, they chose that president. They're very excited that he's starting his new job."
"Oh." She said, frowning. "I wanted to choose too. I want to choose someone different."
"Oh? Who would you choose?"
"I want to choose a pretty lady."
"One thing at a time sweetie. Maybe next time we'll choose a pretty lady."


"Mommy?"
"Yes honey?"
"Can we watch Little Einsteins now?"


She won't remember watching President Barak Obama be inaugurated, but I don't think I'll ever forget sitting on the couch holding both of my daughters close to me as the country breathed a dual sigh of hope and relief all while beaming with pride.

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From the mouths of babes: My girls are just too classy

Recently Little L has shown a little interest in what goes on under my shirt. And by that I mean that she pulls my shirt down and says "Wah dah?" Then, when I tell her that those are my boobies she laughs hysterically. She does this often.
Today she stood in the middle of the room, pulled her own shirt down and yelled "BOOOBAHS!"
We reenacted that a lot today. Much laughter ensued.

**********
C is all about using big words. The other day at the pediatrician's office she wowed the nurse practitioner by saying "Oh, it was hilarious, the Sesame Street band-aids just - would - not - stick, but the Dora band-aid works just fine!" I don't think she'd ever heard a 3.5-year-old use the word hilarious before.

Tonight C hopped off the toilet and said "I love going potty! It just makes me feel so good!"
Because, clearly just because three-year-olds use big words doesn't mean they don't have to be, you know, three.

**********
Oh, I know I was supposed to write about the inauguration tonight. But what is there to say? Yay! New president! WHOOT, buh bye W, don't let the door hit you on the way out?

OK, fine, I know there's a ton more to be said, but I feel like I said everything I wanted to say in my open letter to President Obama back in November when he was elected. Which is not to say that I won't be watching the inauguration with bated breath tomorrow. Because, you know, WHOOT! New president! And, oh yeah, W? Don't let the door hit you on the way out. Buh bye now! Take care.

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Weekly Winners - A little PlayDoh and a little hammock

It's taken me almost four weeks to shake the exhaustion that came hand in hand with my little bout of bronchitis. Four weeks when I had almost no energy, definitely not enough to pick up my camera and take pictures!
Today I found enough energy to take pictures and to bust out the PlayDoh. I had a blast watching the kids play and I love the pictures I shot. It was almost worth cleaning up all those teeny tiny little PlayDoh crumbs that covered the kitchen floor after they were done.

And so, for the first time in weeks, I bring you my Weekly Winners! (Don't forget to click here to see all the other amazing entries!)

With a Dora stamper, you're supposed to get a Dora image.

Though sometimes you need to flatten out your PlayDoh a bit.

And sometimes you need to give Dora a talking to.

If all else fails, just eat the PlayDoh.
That'll teach it a lesson.

Working with bugs is sometimes more satisfying.

And way more successful.

Then, everyone needs a nice rest.
In a hammock. In January. Gotta love California.

The grown-ups rest first... while the kids nap.
(And yes, those are my pajama bottoms. Why do you ask?)

Then, when they get up, the kids need to cuddle with daddy.
In the hammock.

Yes. Both of them.
No favorites around here!

Tomorrow we're pursuing our lazy (ridiculously warm and sunny) weekend at the beach. I'm hoping to get even more pictures. You know, despite the fact that we're not taking the PlayDoh or the hammock with us.

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Or maybe it wasn't the honey after all...

You enter our daycare by the side door. A little white door with one of those windows that let you see in before you push it open. It's really more than just a door, its a portal, it's what separates me from the mommy part of my day. I'm a mom, then I drop them off and I can go be everything else I have to be. At the end of the day I cross that threshold again and don the mantle of mommyhood all over again.

I'm not saying that I forget my children when I close that door behind me and skip walk to the car, but I am saying that for those couple hours their basic needs are not my responsibility, and usually I don't have a clue about how their day went until I open the door again.

When you go through the door you enter the hallway that leads to the kitchen and family/play room. A quick glance at the bags stashed on the two massive freezers located instantly to the left tells me lots. If the girls are awake their twin stuffed doggies stick out of the top of our bag, if they're napping the bag sits empty, and if a plastic bag sits on top of the whole thing I know something's up.

"Is she OK? What happened?" I asked as soon as I saw the daycare provider. After last night I assumed the worst, but I was hoping that maybe one child needed a change of clothes for a less icky reason. The look on her face dashed that hope instantly.

"Oh! Oh man! Little L had a massive blowout at lunch. Awful. Just awful." A blowout? A 17-month-old with a blowout? That's unusual to say the least. A kid her age with an explosive diaper is a sign of just one thing -- stomach bug. Especially when it comes on the heels of yesterday's incident.

Now, if we're lucky that was the worst of it. After all she's had the Rotovirus vaccine, it's supposed to protect her from this stuff. If we're not so lucky, her sister gets it and we have a messy weekend. But there is good news here! As soon as everyone is in the clear I can start trying to substitute honey for ketchup again. I'll win this fight yet! Yeah!

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Yeah, so maybe she doesn't like honey. Whatever.

Yesterday I learned that the red stains on Little L's shirt weren't tomato sauce as I'd first assumed, but ketchup. Ketchup. Ewwwww.

I have a bit of an issue with ketchup. As in, I hate the stuff with a passion. Dunking french fries in ketchup? Disgusting (Why would you do that when luscious mayo tastes so much better?). Dousing meatloaf in ketchup? Evil. Seriously, I won't even kiss M after he eats some.

C, who clearly shares her mother's good taste, can't abhor the stuff. She'll howl if anyone brings any even close to her plate. So it wasn't so crazy for me to assume that Little L would follow in our footsteps and also shun the sweet (pretend) tomato sauce. But, nooo, apparently my youngest child takes after her father's palette. Blergh.

It took me a while, (and I might have made Little L cry* when I told her that I now had to disown her, but it was OK, because her daddy would now love her twice as much as before) but I think I have finally come to grips with the fact that the ketchup shunners will not outnumber the ketchup eaters in our family. And I've also accepted the fact that maybe this is a good way to get Little L to eat a little more.

Which is how we come to tonight. Because today I figured that if Little L was amenable to dipping fries in ketchup, maybe she'd be willing to try dipping other foods in other dips, and yes, maybe we could lure her back to our side of the ketchup fence. So I let her dip her chicken nugget in honey (my sauce of choice - don't knock it 'til you try it). She took a tentative bite and at first she seemed to like it. And then she made a face, and another face, and gagged a little, then gagged a lot, and then she started throwing up. A lot. Everywhere. Like a fountain. A never ending fountain of yuck.

Of course we had come in M's brand new car. The one that doesn't have diapers, wipes, changes of clothes, or the massive layer of discarded clothes that litter the bottom of my car. Which left us with exactly nothing. Or rather, a disgusting baby and nothing to clean her with or to change her into.

I picked her up at arms length and went to see if I could find a miracle in the McDonald's bathroom. And I didn't. Want to know what I found instead? McDonald's is now saving money by not stocking paper towels! How nice for them. How impractical for moms of babies coated in ick.

I stripped Little L and resisted the urge to chuck her clothes. I gave her an impromptu bath in the sink and tried to dry her off under the hand blowers. (She was not a fan.) I dressed her in my sweater. Then we went back to our table, where I let her eat fries dipped in ketchup, because I know when I've lost and I'm nothing if not able to admit defeat gracefully.

*note to self: 17 and a half month old babies understand way more than you give them credit for.

Original It's my life... post.

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Foreplay, revised for parents of young children

When you're first dating, hooking up, or whatever young kids are calling it these days, you're very focused on foreplay. Well, at least you're supposed to be if you're serious about getting some action, or at least some repeated action.

Once you have kids the focus on foreplay changes. First of all, time becomes a serious constraint. If you have all of a precious 15 minutes before the baby wakes up (again) you become very goal oriented. Traditional foreplay becomes a waste of precious minutes. Once you have your clothes off you don't really want to waste any time getting comfortable with each other, and really, isn't that what foreplay is all about?

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that foreplay should be abandoned, I'm saying that it needs to evolve to fit the situation. Instead of hurrying it up it needs to be stretched out, thinned out, made to fit the tiny moments between the moments that fill up the day. Instead of spending time getting cozy and warmed up under the sheets, you can spend all day getting there.

Every couple is unique and every partner is going to be turned on by different things. One girl might really appreciate a hot cup of tea or a cold glass of wine. One guy might like a quick back scratch or head rub. Maybe it'll be just taking the time to ask a couple questions and really listening to the answer.

Think for a minute. If you are your significant other aren't spending a ton of time getting connected in the bedroom, could it be because you aren't spending enough time connecting outside of it? Do you assume that you'll know the answer to the question "how was your day?" Do you even ask? Do you listen?

How about your evening routines. Is one partner heading to bed much earlier than the other on a regular basis? Is it because one person does all the chores before turning in? Is it because one person can't put down the computer or turn off the TV?

I'm not saying that you have to change your habits. I doubt that's possible, or even optimal, but I am saying that you should build foreplay into your day so that when the opportune moment rolls around you'll both be primed for action.

- Touch, hug, kiss each other, in passing or as a detour. The more you do it, the easier it gets, and the more you crave it.
- Share the load. Don't nitpick about whose chore is whose. If a basket of laundry is what's keeping one partner from going to bed, share the load and connect over sorted socks.
- Spend time together. So what if she's cooking, she can multitask! Who cares if he's cleaning his bike, you can hand him his tools.
- Do little things to lighten each other's loads. Be aware of when loads need to be lightened.
- Watch each other, notice each other's moods, react appropriately.
- Call, email, text, IM, reach out during the day, say hi, say I miss you, ask questions. Communicate.
- Sing, laugh, tease, play. Remember why you enjoy each other's company.

It is unrealistic to expect someone to go from no contact to full contact in 15 seconds after a long stressful day dealing with life, home, work, or kids, especially if a ticking clock is adding pressure to the situation. You need time to unwind enough to be able to reconnect. But if you've never stopped connecting in the first place, then there's no longer any obstacle.

Original It's my life... post.

I really really want to hate FaceBook, but I just can't

I have an odd Facebook resistance. First I want so badly to hate them and shun them for the whole Facebook Sucks - anti-breastfeeding saga. Then I just want to shun them because... because... well, I really don't know why. It's especially odd since I'm usually always ready to jump onto any passing social media bandwagon.

First there's my whole issue with the extra stuff that goes on there. Are we really saving the earth with cute little "green plants," or are we just wasting each other's time? Do I really need to see if I'm related to the whole world? And why can't I just play games on Yahoo! like I always have?

Second there's the whole email thing. I used to get forwards that I could delete in 0.3 seconds. Now I get Facebook messages that take 5 minutes to open before they can be deleted. Granted, I've been told that I can change those email settings, but until recently if I hadn't gotten those regular emails I would never have checked my Facebook account.

Yes. Yes. You read that correctly. I said until recently. Because, bah, I've gotten sucked in. I couldn't help it! The pull was too strong. Not the pull of the friends I already know and love. Nah, I'm probably already chatting those people up on Twitter or IM. You know the pull I mean. The "eh, I wonder what that person has been up to these last couple years..." pull.

I'm placing the blame squarely on the shoulders of one of the friends who came to visit this summer. We were sitting there talking about people we remembered from high school, and he said that so and so was on Facebook, and so we looked her up and that lead to looking up a host of other people, and, and, and well, there's really no excuse for the extremes I took it to. Seriously, I looked up, and friended(!) my first crush, from when I was 11. Who does that? (Also, while we're at it, when did Friend become an acceptable verb?)

Even so I was still feeling conflicted about the whole thing. I'd still rather spend my time reading blogs or Twittering than bouncing around from Facebook profile to Facebook profile. It's bizarre, but I feel more like a stalker on Facebook than I ever do reading people's most intimate thoughts on their blogs. But, today I'm conceding that Facebook does have it's great upside. Today one of my oldest friends reached out through time, space, and my sister's Facebook account to say hi and I almost cried. (My account is under my married name, my sister still has my maiden name.)

I can still remember seeing her bike away 22 years ago as our station wagon pulled out of our Rye, NY driveway for the last time. Tears streamed down my face as I waved goodbye to her, my bestest friend ever. We were heading to the airport, leaving the country forever. We moved to London, England, then Paris, France. Shortly after our tearful goodbyes her family left the U.S. to move back to Australia and we lost touch. We were 10, there was no email, it was all too easy to forget to write.

I've often looked at her picture in my photo album and wondered what happened to her and now I know. She's hanging out somewhere in Australia looking up old friends on Facebook. And I, for one, am tearfully grateful for this not so little website that's allowing me to find my long lost friends again (Yes, even the ones I should probably leave lost in the sands of time, like say, best forgotten crushes.) and I won't be dissing them any more.

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A reader just like her mama

C called me to come see what her sister was up to this morning.
"She's reading on the toilet! Mama!" She called from the bathroom.
"Huh, this I have to see." I thought to myself. "I read on the toilet all the time, guess she's just copying her mama." Then, catching a quick glimpse I tiptoed back out of the room and went to get my camera.

For sure, she was reading.

And yes, it was on the toilet.

But that's for sure not how I do it.

Original It's my life... post.

The guilt money can buy

My sisters and I do our best to make Christmas as magical as possible for our kids. We strive to recreate the awe we felt coming down early on Christmas morning and seeing that mountain of presents under the shimmering tree. In the process we tend to go a bit overboard on gifts.

In the past I've had no qualms buying my nieces and nephews two, three, even sometimes four presents. I've gotten way more than that for my own kids. And I never stopped there. I also went a bit nuts for the grown-ups of the family, usually ending my Christmas shopping with a spree at Barnes & Nobles. Since my sisters do the same, the result is always a tree with a somewhat obscene amount of presents under it.

That's how my latest Silicon Valley Moms Blog post starts. Click here to read the rest.

Who was that kid? And why don't I remember that time?

I snapped this picture a couple of days ago. The girls were playing with the Graco SweetPeace that we'd brought out for Baby M.J. so she'd have a place to hang while her parents were ringing in the new year with us.
That is obviously not Baby M.J. who is all of 4 weeks old, but our very own Little L, always anxious to explore fun baby things.

I hadn't let her climb in the SweetPeace while the whole thing was assembled, so as soon as I separated the seat from the base she climbed right in and got cozy. As a baby she didn't spend a ton of time in the SweetPeace. Maybe because we got it when she was already almost 5 months old, and I was convinced that she was already too big for it, or maybe because she spent all her time attached to my boob and it was hard for me to fit in the SweetPeace with her. Or maybe she did spend a lot of time in the thing and I was just so sleep deprived that I just don't remember it.
That's probably the case, because she sure looked right at home in it the other day.
I did find proof that she did used to go in the SweetPeace. If that is in fact my baby. I have no recollection of this time in her life. None whatsoever. I wasn't sleeping at night and working all day and probably crying through the parts in between. It's a shame if you ask me; that baby looks pretty cute. I wouldn't mind scooping her out of that thing and cuddling with her for a while.
Oh. Wait. Maybe that's why she never spent much time in there...

From the mouths of babes: Sometimes you have to pat yourself on the back

"OK, Little L, go get yourself a pacifier, it's time for your medicine." Little L toddled off towards the bedroom to grab one of the many pacifiers that litter her bed.
"There's one right on the edge." C said, possibly in response to the fact that I was poised to go help Little L as soon as she called for me. She gets very frustrated when the pacifiers are just out of her reach. "I put it there this morning. I put it close to the edge so she'd be able to reach it easily."
"Oh. That was very nice of you." I said to C. "It was very sweet and considerate* of you to think of that."
"Oh, I know," she answered, leaning back and putting her hands behind her head. "I'm am a great big sister."


*No, seriously, ever since my big LeapFrog event I use big words like that around the kids. No joke. Doesn't phase them in the least.

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Taking candy from strangers never leads to anything good

His light tap on my shoulder shocked me to my core. I jumped in my seat and looked around wildly. After not working for over two weeks I had finally managed to knuckle down and concentrate. I was lost in the blog post I was writing for Silicon Valley Moms Blog, focusing on getting the words and feelings just right.

I looked at the man, smiling slightly, standing way too close to me, holding out two Ricola cough drops. It took me a moment to understand what he was implying. I hadn't even noticed that I was coughing. For a crazy second I thought "Whoah, stranger danger. Why is this strange man offering me candy?" Then I remembered that as a grown-up that's not usually a concern, and that my coughing was probably driving him up the wall.

I took a Ricola and thanked him. And then I tried to get back to work, only now I was acutely aware of the tickle in my throat and the insane urge to cough that I kept having to suppress. I sucked slowly on my cough drop and wrote a few more sentences.

A few more sentences later and I had forgotten my irritable neighbor and I let out a small cough. "Would you like another?" He instantly asked. I mumbled a curt no thank you and kept working, grumbling a bit in my head. When he moaned after I cleared my throat I started to get annoyed. Seriously, winter time in a coffee shop, people are going to be sick, it's a fact of life. Deal with it, dude.

I'm too nice. I didn't play the loud coughing passive aggressive card, instead I kept suppressing my cough and attempting to focus on my work. The tickle didn't go away and my production went way down, but by God that man wasn't disturbed. That said, I can't make any promises about tomorrow. If he's around I'm not suppressing anything.

Too busy reading about vampires and werewolves to blog

I have this great post to write about something* and how we're all getting some. I can't write the word out all the way because if I do I might jinx it and we won't get it any more and after 16 months of not getting any I was getting very very weary and so now that it's finally happening I'd hate for it to stop. You know? But it's been almost a month and I'm finally ready to write about it, or at least I would be if I didn't have to get back to this other thing that's taking up all my time.

It's a little something, a tiny book, you might have heard of it. There's a girl? And she like totally falls in love with this vampire? And he like totally loves her too? And and there's also a werewolf? And he also loves the girl? It's great stuff. People get grounded and go on dates! And there's kissing!

Well, OK fine, it's not great literature, but it is a great read. Though I am a little worried that I'm the only girl rooting for the underdogwolf. I find Edward the Vampire to be unbearably controlling and overbearing. Seriously, I keep wondering when Bella is going to tell him to stuff it so she can go hang out with Jake who doesn't treat her like an incompetent, immature nincompoop. Is that weird? And is it weird that I'm still reading because I'm really, really hoping that she's going to do it soon?

Yeah, I thought so. It's OK though, there's another book and a half for me to read, I'm sure she'll give him what for at some point or another. And if she doesn't, please don't tell me, I don't think I'll be able to take it. Hang in there Jake! You're Bella is coming soon!

*Would you get your mind out of the gutter? Sleep people, I'm talking about sleep. Sheesh.

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Aching to get this year started

The germs that plagued us over Christmas break have not loosened their hold on me yet. The girls are healthy again, but I'm not sure I've gotten any better since we got home. In fact it's very possible that I've gotten worse.

There's nothing serious, nothing I could even take to a doctor, but I'm most definitely not myself yet. My voice keeps crapping out on me, my lungs go from feeling fine to aching and back to fine, my nose runs on and off, and tonight I have a headache. There's really no winning.

I shouldn't complain too much, my nights are stuffy nose and cough free, so at least I'm getting some sleep, but my days are a big haze of longing for my couch and my bed. I'm anxious to kick this thing so I can jump start 2009 and get all my big plans underway.

Big, big plans. This is the year that...

...I finally declutter and organize our home. It's not going to be easy and it's not going to be fast, but by God this place is going to look better before the summer rolls around if it kills me. I will have a bedroom free of boxes, piles, and laundry. I will have a home that makes me feel serene rather than overwhelmed.

...I write my book. I have three book projects underway. Two are definitely on the back burner, but one is itching to get written and has a good chance of actually being good. What's for sure is that no one is going to buy a book that's sitting in my head and I'm the only one who can get it out. So out it needs to come.

...I overcome my self sabotaging tendencies. The only thing that's keeping me from relative success is myself. I don't know if it's fear of success or fear of failure that paralyzes me, but something in me fosters the crippling procrastination that's keeping me from realizing my goals, and frankly, that has to stop.

...I write and sell an article to a magazine. I'm halfway there. The article pitch has been accepted, now I just need to write the thing and see it published.

...I'm nominated for a blog award. I need your help for this one and I'm not ashamed to beg for it. If you have a spare moment I would really appreciate a nomination to the 2009 Weblog Awards. It would mean a lot to me to see an underdog running alongside some of the better known bloggers out there. You know, especially if the underdog is me! I nominated a bunch of lesser known bloggers, let's see how many best kept secrets we can expose this year! Please click on the link and nominate away!

There are other things I want to work on like my attitude and self esteem, but I think that's enough to go on for now. So you see? I need to kick these germs to the curb so I can get going! Because one thing is for sure, sitting on the couch drowning my ick in Fage yogurt mixed with Nesquik isn't getting me any closer to reaching any of those goals. Though it is yum, so that's a plus.

Anyway, send healthy vibes my way, and pretty, pretty please go forth and nominate so that at least something gets done. Pretty please? With Fage and Nesquik on top?

Gangsta car in da house driveway

On Monday (Seriously? Have we only been home one week? This has been the longest week in the history of weeks.) I called a sitter and M ditched work early so we could go car shopping. We are not car people. Well, we both covet fast shiny sports cars, but when it comes to functional family cars we draw blanks. So, basically, we had absolutely zero idea about what car we wanted. We needed something with four doors, big enough to hold two car seats and a stroller in the trunk, that preferably wouldn't guzzle $60 of gas a week. (Oh, dear Jeep Cherokee, how we don't miss your gas guzzling ways.)

You'd think that having just vague needs would make our job easy. You'd be wrong. See, what we ended up doing was going from lot to lot checking out family friendly cars and wishing we were buying Corvettes, Nissan Zs, or Audi TTs. And you'd be surprised how unlike sexy sport cars family friendly sedans tend to be. No, really!

After a painful couple of hours we decided that our best bet was the Honda Civic sedan. Small, fuel efficient, just barely big enough for us, and definitely in our price range. Not sexy, not fast, but good enough. We took it for a test drive and we were pretty much sold. Then, walking around the lot looking for a stick shift model, we happened across the Honda Civic's sexy sporty version, the Civic Si. I think I heard M's heart thump in response to my mild "want to take it for a spin?"

The instant M slipped himself into the bucket seat and put his hands on the wheel I knew there was no longer any other car for him. He squealed like a kid in a candy store and almost giggled as he careened around corners and accelerated on the highway. He spent the next three days hunting down the best possible deal on the Internet.

Only issue? The rest of the world also wanted the best deal on that car too. Every time one would pop up on a listing, by the time we called the dealer the car would be sold. All except for one car that was only listed on Craigslist for a couple of hours. We kept trying to convince ourselves that there was something wrong with it, but we also kept coming back to it. Mainly because it was the only one still available. Oh, and because it had the right mileage, color, and price. Details.

As of yesterday that car is now ours. In all it's black tinted windows glory. That's right. Our family car is a sedan, a sporty, sexy, gangster sedan. And I bet the gangster who tinted the windows black would not be amused to see two cow print car seats in the back seat of his sports car, but it works for us and that's all that matters.

Original It's my life... post.

I survived. Kinda. I think.

The kids have been home with me all week because daycare was closed. Not that they wouldn't have been home anyway if it had been open, what with the proliferation of snotty, coughy germs around here and everything. I had originally planned a ton of playdates to keep us busy and entertained, but what with said germs we ended up mainly hanging out with just ourselves.

I slept in lay semi-comatose in the early morning while they played in their rooms. We played games, we read books, we did some shopping, went to the mall, and squabbled, squabbled, squabbles, and, oh yeah, squabbled some more.

My usually well behaved girls who get along like a house on fire got into each other's faces like never before. Hair was pulled, arms were bitten, legs were kicked, and much, much screeching occurred. Mommy's temper was sorely tried and she may, or may not have lost it a few times. Maybe. Not saying.

Luckily there was also lots and lots of cuddling, hugging, and loving, which is why all three of us are still alive, even if only two of us have almost kicked their germs to the curb. This mama seems to still be as sick as she was last week, with a voice that seems to be heading back for the hills for another stay. And, you know, I'm not saying that the fact that I'm losing my voice and the fact that I was with the kids all week are related, but I am going to say that a) it's a good thing that it's the weekend and b) it's a great thing that daycare is going to be open Monday.

It's a good thing they're cute.

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Has anyone seen the last six months? Or my brain?

I have a terribly embarrassing confession to make. I seem to have lost the fall. OK. Wait. If I'm really honest I think I lost the last 6 months.

I know, I know, I've been busy. Doing stuff. And I haven't been sleeping a whole lot. But I truthfully don't have a ton to show for the last couple months and I certainly haven't reached my self appointed goals for the end of last year. But, whatever, it's possible that those goals were a bit lofty anyway.

No, what's worrisome is that I missed a close friend's wedding date. I got a Christmas card from her, signed "from the new Mr. & Mrs." and I swear I thought "Nah, that's not possible. They're getting married in the fall." At which point I realized that I was a total loser and that the fall was like months ago and that I missed one of my oldest friend's wedding. And seriously. Who does that?

It's not like I was going, England is pretty darn far, but still! I could have sent a gift! A couple supportive emails! A request for photos! A darn congratulatory card! Anything! I feel like the worst friend in the world. Did I mention that this friend flew across the world to my wedding? And brought a gift? And slept on the floor in my apartment? That makes it worse doesn't it?

So here's the plan. In 2009, I'm a) getting a better calendar b) putting all important dates on said calendar AND on my Google and Yahoo calendars c) sending a really really nice gift to my friend. Then I'm going to figure out some realistic and attainable goals for the year. I'm not making any other resolutions. It would be a waste of time, it's not like I'd remember them anyway.

Original It's my life... post.