Friday, October 28, 2011

Tonight's a Twofer, What!

Since the last post was kind of whiny, I am going to change the tone.  Baby M is cutting two front teeth and a couple molars.  He can say the word booze.  Development is going swimmingly!  He can order alcohol and chew real food, kinda.  I am depriving myself of sleep so I can play on the interwebz, even though I have to cook and clean tomorrow, and dress myself for the family invasion.  Why am I depriving myself?  Because I neglected to describe my fitness assessment.

I joined a health center affiliated with a local hospital.  I chose this gym because 1) it's cheap and 2) it has child care.  So I go ahead and make the appointment to have an assessment.  After I have the assessment, which will definitely suck, the trainer will give me a workout, which theoretically will help me shrink.  Yes, this is the carrot and stick.  On the morning of my assessment (notice the first syllable is ass, which draws attention to the fact that mine has spread,) a very buff and possibly, well maybe, straight male nurse/trainer comes to lead me through the gym to the room where they humiliate you.  As we were walking I discovered the best part of the gym.  Everyone in there is older than me!  Every. Single. One of Them.  How freaking awesome is that!  My gym is inhabited by the elderly cardiac, and pulmonary rehab patients, with the odd joint replacement thrown in.  I look GOOD in this gym!

Elation fills me as we step into the humiliation cell, or assessment room.  Guess how your BMI is measured these days?  Your trainer, who should wear a black pillow case with eyeholes cut out, uses the little caliper things to pinch the fat on seven places on your body. Not two.  He measured my belly fat, my hip fat, my back fat, my thigh fat, the little weird fat pocket between my arm pit and bra strap.  He even measured the fat under my arm pit after he measure the fat on the back of my arm.  Thank heavens I shaved the day before (I think).  I don't think my OBGYN has ever examined me this closely.  Crikey!

Then the trainer tells me my number.  Apparently I am 39% fat.  I am going to say that 5% of that is in the boob, so I am 34% fat.  WTH?  How did this happen?  Oh yeah!  I ate a lot!  So now I am going to stop eating and start sweating.  My goal is to lose 70 pounds in a year.  Lord help me, I am going to be working out for the first time in my life.  On the bright side, I look good in my gym!

And...I'm Back

Had to take a brief hiatus to work some things out.  In short, I am going crazy being a SAH mom.  I think I actually do need to work and be around people.  So, I have been depressed, and somewhat coping, but not really.  I keep sticking food in my mouth because I am so stressed out with being home with the kids all the time, and trying to teach G. while M. competes for whiniest baby of the year award.  Then I gain more weight and get more depressed, because I am overweight and disgust myself.  So I have been a fat ball of depressed stress.  EW.

I also tend to just spaz out on A about not every having any time to not be a mom or wife, and to remember what the hell I like to do.  This hasn't been good.  The hubs and I sat down and did some talking.  I am now a member of a gym and love it!  I got back on Weight Watchers, and have lost 4 pounds, so that is pretty stinking awesome as well.  And I think I will be returning to the work force after G tests in January to get into the magnet program.  Hopefully it will go better than the G/T testing where he decided to come back later.  (failed!)  There will be a lot of prayer going into the decision to no longer stay home, but I am pretty certain that is my direction.  I am going to stop being a middle school life group leader at church and join the ladies group instead.  I need grownups so badly!

Tomorrow is the last soccer game of this season, for which I am extraordinarily grateful.  No more snotty private school mommies to deal with next season, please God.  They are all, "ohhh...I don't have any kids at home, but I don't work, so I can polish myself all day.  I will toss my carefully colored blonde locks and ignore "the outsider"". I am more, "oh, I took a shower about an hour ago and when I was done the baby was crying again (as usual) so my hair isn't dry.  I apparently don't wear fancy enough clothes to sit on bleachers and watch a 4-year old soccer practice.  Yeah, it's been a dream to deal with these awesome ladies.  I am sure they have redeeming qualities under their shallow attitudes.  Or not.  I am just going to beg, plead, and tantrum if necessary to get G on a team with real people.  Oh, and other boys, that would be nice too!

Tonight, A. watched the boys so I could go have dinner with another stressed out, never a moment to herself, almost sick to death of her family, mommy.  We both really enjoyed hanging out with another woman and talking about how we love our kids and how hard it is when they won't stop crying or whining.  No one tells you how much motherhood can isolate you, and how you need time away from your kids to talk to peers.  I went waaayyyy too long without this, and as a result I was almost batshit insane.  I feel better now.

Tomorrow will be fun.  I am getting up early to bake a cake for G.'s end of season shindig.  I also have to make some chili, and vacuum the den and hide the laundry that is decorating every surface of that room.  And dry the soccer uniform, and wet jet the floor so I can pretend I mopped.  It should be a pretty busy morning and a pretty good day.  Can't wait to see my parents.

Saturday, October 15, 2011

Bedtime for Babies


I guess I am not the most feminine of women, because I do not enjoy putting my children to bed.  With my oldest child, circumstances forced me to rock him to sleep every single freaking night as a baby.  I hated it!  Let it be said that my oldest child did not cuddle, and did not coo.  He would scream bloody murder for an hour and a half before finally just tiring himself out.  No matter what time of night you tried to put him down, you were in for the scream fest.  Some mommies will probably want to crucify me for this, but I did not like my baby during this time every day.  I dreaded it, and I resented it.  I came to understand why people shake babies.  I don’t condone it at all (I sucked it up and dealt with the little turd lovingly, everyone else can too.)  I really just wanted him to conk out and let me have a few minutes of peace.  Peace was defined as time to do my homework, or plan for my 5 different classes.  And the irony is that he really threw tantrums when I finally stopped rocking him.  In short, the kid fought sleep like it was a pack of ninja bunnies out to eat his face.

My circumstances are vastly different with our second baby, and I do not ever rock him to sleep.  He goes to sleep faster in his bed, and sleeps more soundly.  While M. is a totally different kettle of kid from G. (can we say mellow?)  I also think his awesome sleep habits have to do with our unswerving devotion to not rocking.  The only time he gets rocked to sleep is at his grandparents, if we don’t catch them first.  And then we have a week of hell when we get home because we have to go on holding detox.  All in all, it’s okay.  Will our next baby get rocked to sleep?  Probably not.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

We Survived Snot and Vomit Week!

Yes, each and every one of my little family was blessed with a stomach virus, and a cold virus all in the same week. It was not so glorious, and I am not going to describe why baby M. and I took a bath at midnight last week. We also got carpet in our den, making it the only room in the entire house that does not have hard floors. NO one was allowed in the den until vomit free for 24 hours. We spent a lot of time in the small living room last week. Thank God it is all over! So what else has been going on? Well, G has not forgotten the word vagina. However, he has forgotten the meaning.

Today while we were homeschooling it up, G and I played a game where every time he got an answer right, he got to pin a leaf on his "Halloween tree". I do realize now that I was doing this backwards and he should have been taking the leaves off, but I didn't get certified to teach pre-K now did I? Anyway, he was also naming the types of leaves as he pinned them on the tree. There were: willow, pin oak, live oak, red oak, and vagina berry. Yes folks, according to my son, it does grow on trees.

Thankfully I was able to gently correct him and say, "sorry dude, I think you mean china berry leaves, not vagina berry leaves." For the first time in his entire life he didn't argue, or ask any questions, and I was able to send him outside for "recess". Then I laughed hysterically at the mental image he gifted me. Days like today make up for every miserable night I spent rocking that screaming little turd to sleep. That kid is more entertaining than a pet racoon.