Motherhood Uncensored

Pick your battles

The combination of separation anxiety and the sleep regression that will never end has officially put the fear of God, or at least, whomever willed it that I would have a child still in my bed when I am soon to have another child in my bed.

All this from a person doesn't really love having any children in her bed. And from a child who was, by far, my best sleeper.

Sweet, torturous irony.

I opened the section of my favorite sleep book for parents to the section on the 18-22 month sleep regression and I swear it said "Sleep train your 2-year-old? YOU HAVE LOST YOUR FRACKING MIND."

And really, anything you read about this time in a toddler's development can be paraphrased down to: "Stick it out, sucker."

For awhile, I was freaking out - desperately trying to get her to at least sleep on her own mattress on our floor, hoping the now vacant trundle in Quinlan's room that was occupied by her brother up until last week when he moved back into his own room would entice her.

No such luck.

Instead, she would just scream her bloody guts out, keeping everyone else in the house awake.

So I've resigned myself to laying with her in my bed until she falls asleep, then moving her to her own bed, and then bringing her back into mine when she wakes up screaming at 2am because the two feet between us is too damn far. 

I suppose this is all reorienting me back into newborndom, since I'm waking up every few hours to turn her around or cover her up.

The only difference is that my boobs are well rested and I'm not changing diapers in the dark.

Hers or mine.

If there's anything I've learned over the last six years is that there will always be battles. I've just got to choose which ones I'm willing to fight and the ones where I know I'm going to win. 

Direct TV can kiss my pregnant ass

We've been Direct TV for a couple of years now and at a certain point in time, we decided that if our bill crept up over a certain amount, we'd cancel. Or at least threaten to cancel to get a better deal.

And so, every few months they offer us a deal and then suddenly, without notice, our bill jumps $30 and we make the call.

This time, we decided to finally upgrade to an HD dish (or whatever it's called), and the technician was scheduled for Thursday morning between 8am and 12pm, which means he showed up at 11:55am with the wrong ladder and told us we'd be "first thing in the morning on tomorrow."

So my husband called in the morning to confirm (which they did) and then again at noon when no one had showed up. And then at 2:30 and 5pm and 8pm, because he had just wasted an entire day courtesy of Direct TV who apparently doesn't call anyone back. Even when they say so.

You know it's bad when the person on the other end says "Oh, no one showed up?" 

In any case, I had no idea how it resolved because I was off enjoying the spoils of my husband's clogged ear (still people, still!) at a blogger gathering organized by the lovely Anissa Mayhew and Jessica from Oh The Joys, only to return to find Margot in our bed and coughing. 

[If you're counting, it's almost a month with at least 3 people in my house coughing].

So, I got in bed with her, which I've been doing for the last two weeks, and attempted to sleep, which I haven't really been doing for the last two weeks.

Except last night, she decided to twirl my hair for an hour straight and kick me in the head, at which point I decided that this was the night to break her of her her new habit before the baby comes and played "scream in the bathroom or sleep in your bed."

You can imagine how well that went.

I think I got about 2 hours in my bed and then I ended up sleeping on her crib mattress with her until the phone rang at 7:00am on a Saturday.

Surprise! It was Direct TV.

Because they can't call you on a week day when they're supposed to come, but they can wake up your entire family on a Saturday morning of a holiday weekend, no less. 

However, I will be enjoying the company of storm troopers and Klingons today, and will hopefully miss all the installation shenanigans. And they should consider themselves damn lucky. Because if they knew that there was a very pregnant woman in the house, I'm guessing we would have had our dish up very early yesterday morning.

Here's what's going on in my neck of the woods

*Here's some insight into why we chose to homeschool this year

*My husband is still suffering from the man cold, which is sort of what we all have STILL (in various forms), except without the "this runny nose renders me unable to function" component that he has. I strongly suggest you watch the linked up youtube video. It will definitely make you chuckle.

*We're still having Baby Four name issues, so at your prompting I enlisted the help fo Swistle. Here are her suggestions - go add your 2 or 20 cents.

*The better parent series is all done, but if you're looking for extra tidbits of wisdom, you'll want to read Jen Singer's interview at The Happiest Mom. Truly inspiring. Plus, more great thoughts, particularly for those of you with older kids, at Alphamom. (via Cool Mom Picks).

Have a great weekend everyone!

What happens when your husband goes rogue at Trader Joe's

 
 

(Okay, so he did remember eggs, milk, and beef jerky)

(By the time I got home, he had already eaten one of the TWO frozen pizzas)

("Going rogue" borrowed from Sarah Palin, who stole it from Backpacking Dad, who says it means "losing the grocery list accidentally on purpose").

Liar, liar

I'm not a fan of lying to my kids at all, even when it comes to getting them to eat something.

Beef is beef. Chicken is chicken. And fish is chicken of the sea.

Alright, so I might be a little more willing to play with semantics when it comes to food, but not so much that it'll come up in their therapy session.

"She told me it was chicken and it was really pork. Give me some Xanax."

However, my husband is like freakin' Honest Abe with this whole "lying by omission is still lying."

"Here's a pear, son. It's a little damaged and bruised on the side."

Watch out. Pear. Incoming. At your head.

I call it "yummy vegetables" which means they will get eaten. He calls them "broccoli with stems that are kind of tough" and they get left on the plate.

So yesterday he offered my kids frozen yogurt, but they wanted the ice cream. My son adamantly refused the frozen yogurt, which to a 3 year old looks and tastes the same as ice cream but because it sounds like the stuff he gets for a snack which to him is clearly not dessert, he didn't want it.

As my son was flipping out and my husband was about to toss "the frozen yogurt that I will insist on calling frozen yogurt because that's what it is even though it's pretty much ice cream" out into the sink, I pulled him aside and told him to pull it out of the freezer again and call it "ice cream."

He looked like I was asking him to lie on the stand.

But he obliged me, and said something like "Here you go" so as to not actually call it "ice cream," and my son ate the entire thing without coming up for air.

My husband looked at me suspiciously.

"Don't worry, dear. I'd never lie about, um, that."

(Ahem).