Through The Looking Glass

OK, I know I just wrote a whole thing about how I feel that I am confident as a parent and know what I am doing for the most part. So I need you to indulge me for a moment.

I am a little nervous about having a second baby. Part of the reason I was such a kickass parent when Sam was an infant was my ability to stay completely in tune with his needs and meet them. I had infinite patience for him (which lasted until, oh, last week). But I did not have another child who also needed my attention. I had a husband, which is not really the same at all, and I know that I was horribly impatient with him at times. I can’t be like that with Sam when Otter is here. And I am afraid that he will be shortchanged if I give Otter as much of myself as he had. But I don’t want to shortchange the baby either.

I know that every parent ever (at least the non-lame ones) has struggled to find balance. I still have trouble balancing being Sam’s mom and being a writer and being a knitter and knitwear designer and being a housewife and being a friend and being a blogger and the eight million other things I am. Something always suffers. And I worry how I’ll handle adding one more thing to the mix–and an entire human at that!

I take comfort in the hope that the solution will be beer. Foamy, delicious beer.

So, the comments on my last post were all pretty awesome. You guys are okay by me. It did make me wonder, though: do I come across as knowing what I am doing most of the time? Because I feel like I do. At the risk of sounding egotistical, I think I’m a great parent. But because I know there are a lot of people reading this, I tend to play up my inadequacy sometimes. Because it is funny. But sometimes I think people are not reading it as humor but as total lack of confidence. So I feel the need to say, “Don’t worry! I am plenty confident.” And of course, the fact that I feel like I have to say that just proves that I AM NOT CONFIDENT.

Welcome to my brain.

So anyway. Did I tell you all that when we were swimming every day at Cassie’s, Sam would get out of the pool and go to the restroom when he needed to pee? I think he is the only child in the history of swimming pools to do that without prompting of any kind. (Frankly, I don’t care if he pees in the pool.) (Oh, that reminds me–we are all set now for diapers but we’re going to need a small swim diaper. Somebody make sure I buy one before next summer.)

Here’s a good story: The other day Will and Sam were having a Jedi fight. Not a light saber fight, but a force fight. Will suddenly extended his Wolverine claws and Sam, not missing a beat, put his hand up to his temple and blasted Will with his Cyclops eye beams. No wonder Sam doesn’t talk a lot–he is way too busy thinking up awesome ways to knock his mom out with his own awesomeness (no, my double use of “awesome” was NOT redundant).

And in other news, Los Angeles is burning. Again. There are four major fires in four different directions basically surrounding the city. We are perfectly safe except for all the ash in the air, but at least one of the fires is like 0% contained so I am pretty worried for the people who live closer than we do.

This morning Sam brought us the Toy Story 2 VHS and asked to watch it. Feeling insecure because of some comments someone made to us recently, we tried to get him to actually say “Toy Story,” or “Buzz and Woody,” or something other than “Uh-huh!” and “Video?” I don’t know why we were so insistent other than the previously-mentioned insecurity. He IS communicating. He told us EXACTLY what he wanted. When we asked him what the movie is called, he pointed to the title (I swear, I will not be at all surprised if it turns out that he is already reading). He has never, ever repeated anything we have asked him to repeat, and I don’t know why we thought he would start now. I don’t think there is anything wrong with him. And yet, this morning I let myself worry.

Just now, Sam went to the pantry (which, fine, is a shelf on the microwave cart) and brought me the box of blueberry bars. I asked if he wanted one and he said yes. He took one out of the box and handed it to me. I asked him to put the box away and he did. When he came back I opened the packaging and asked him to throw it away. He did so, after checking to make absolutely certain I had not accidentally left the blueberry bar in the wrapping. Then he came back, took the bar, and went to sit down and eat it.

I am so mad that I allowed myself to become so full of doubt and wonder if he actually understands anything we are saying. I know he does. If he chooses to refuse to repeat things, who am I to argue? He communicates just fine, no matter what other people may think. I just wish I could convince those other people to keep their opinions to themselves.

Make your Stick Figure Family at FreeFlashToys.com

I know, it’s cheesy as hell. At least it is not a sticker on the rear window of my minivan. (Seriously, guys? Your kids’ names? I don’t even BELIEVE in stranger danger and I think that is a terrible idea.) Also, I like how the prego stick figure is barefoot.

This is how a typical morning might go around here:

7:00 Wake up, drag myself from bed to bathroom, void my bladder. Jeez, you’d think I was drinking beer in my sleep. Mmmm, beer.

7:10 Wow, sleeping is dehydrating! (Or possibly it’s all that beer.) Drink four glasses of water.

7:15 OMG STARVING. Stuff nearest food substance in mouth (usually cereal).

7:20-7:40 Blearily read internets and/or help Will get ready for work.

7:45 Console Sammy about Daddy leaving. Try to convince him that he does not need to watch a movie just yet.

7:46 Most mornings I give in on the movie.

8:15 There is NOTHING ON THE INTERNET. Decide that today will be the day that I get Sam outside before it gets too hot. Check Twitter one more time.

8:40 LIGHT SABER FIGHT.

8:45 go to bathroom to pee. While there, start getting ready to shower.

9:00 OMG STARVING. Fix myself something to eat. Maybe leftovers. The instant they are ready, Sam needs to use the toilet. Go sit with him while he does so.

9:15 Finally eat my cold leftover leftovers.

9:30 Ready to shower.

10:00 Actually in the shower.

10:05 Out! Skipped shaving to save time. May or may not have remembered to wash hair.

10:10 Dressed, chasing naked Sammy around with clothes.

10:15 Sammy, still naked, tries to open the door.

10:19 Finally convince Sam to get dressed. Yay, we can get going!

10:20 OMG STARVING.

I didn’t put this in the last post, even though it is pretty random, because I thought it deserved its own mention.

Last week Sam and I had a playdate with Brenda and Bug! We’d intended to go swimming but it was chilly and overcast so we went to the playground instead, and then watched a movie and ate snacks (I was unprepared to feed them a proper lunch, which I felt terrible about, but I think everyone was OK).

We had so much fun! And of course I did not take a single picture, but I did steal the one above from Brenda. And if you’re friends with her on Flickr you can see a cute one of the kids here.

Of course, it turns out that neither of them is very weird, but I refuse to think of my internet friends as anything but weirdos (and occasionally ax murderers).

Yesterday I suggested that we move the cradle next to my desk in anticipation of having a baby to put in it. Today Will and I have both slammed our hands into it as we walk past, presumably already in the mindset that it has been moved. I don’t know where either of our brains would get the idea that we are so efficient as to actually follow through on an idea the same day as having said idea. I mean, really. Have our brains not met us?

Speaking of babies, last night we got to meet our friends Chris and Elise’s daughter Hazel, who is approximately the most perfect baby ever. Seriously. I was getting all broody just looking at her and I am already pregnant. We brought them dinner and they gave us a bunch of diapers, including some I’d loaned them and some others they don’t need because they’re using a service. Remember last month when I was worried about needing more diapers? Between these and the prefolds Georgia and Stephanie are sending me, I am now likely to have too many. This is a problem I am perfectly willing to bear. Also, when I asked Elise how she likes the Aden + Anais receiving blankets (which I have been admiring but holy cats are they pricey), she just handed me one. TO KEEP. You guys, sometimes I can’t believe how great my friends are.

It’s Monday and Will has gone to work for his long day. Normally I am in a foul mood on Mondays, but today I am so happy to be home that it’s not so bad thusfar. Also, Sam woke me up by laughing in his sleep right next to my head. So how could I possibly be in a bad mood? (I’m sure I will get grumpy later when I notice all the clothes that need to be put away and the piles of stuff that did not sort themselves while I was away. But for now I am feeling good.)

Still no sign of my driver’s license. If it doesn’t turn up this week, I am going to have to come up with $22 to replace it. And of course I can’t order a duplicate license online. I have to go in person. This is like a special kind of torture. Oh, and I also have to renew my domains in the next week or two. And this is all on top of the normal bills, which we are behind on again. GAH.

Uh-oh, I may be talking myself out of this good mood as you watch, Quick, someone tell me a funny story!

Worry: When we got home from Cassie’s, there was a message on the machine from the VA. (I assume the Veteran’s Association; as far as I know, Virginia does not leave a message when it calls.) The man who called was looking for Mr. Koukoulias’s family, asking that they come to see him now as he is in respiratory distress. We both felt terrible, so I found a phone number and called, hoping to find the right person to tell that they’d called the wrong family and to try again. When I finally got through the automated menu to someone at reception, he was grateful for my call and connected me to someone in Administration. His response was, “Oh man, that could have been any department,” but he said he’d see what he could do.

Annoyance: Sometime last Saturday I mislaid my driver’s license. It is my suspicion that it is actually in some crevice in the console of my car, but it could have been lost on my shopping trip that day. I went back to both stores, but neither had it. Will has taken the Maglite down to the car to investigate, but in the meantime it is a tremendous inconvenience. For instance, he has to go pick up dinner (tacos, of course), not because I won’t drive without my license in hand (as far as I know, it is legal as long as you own one) but because he needs a beer to go with it and if I get carded I will not be able to prove my age. (Incidentally, I never got carded for anything, ever, until three days after my eighteenth birthday. When I was trying to buy cigarettes legally for the first time in my life.)

Sam is watching some show on PBS. Some kids are learning about simple machines to get one kid’s toys up into his tree house so they can play with them. (Why his toys are a bucket full of tennis balls is beyond me, but the pulley they’ve rigged up is working nicely.) (And yes, I am mostly just listening, so I may have the plot all wrong. But I am certain about the pulley.)

I had physics for science three years in a row–sixth, seventh, and eighth grade. Three different schools, as if that’s any excuse. And every single year, we studied simple machines. I know NOTHING about physics except for simple machines. I mean, that and whatever I’ve picked up on the street (where for “the street” you should assume I mean “the internet”).

And? I can’t even remember all of them off the top of my head.