Falling off the Earth.

I have received many emails about why I am not writing anymore.

Having a second child has rocked my world. I keep meaning to write, keep mentally filing away snippets of my day to write about yet I struggle with finding the time to do it.

I am busier then I have ever been in my life running after these two children.

The Deuce is almost 10 months old (can you believe it?) and The Dictator is 3.25 years old.

My little Dictator is the biggest ray of sunshine ever.  He is a painfully nice kid, minds his manners and is as funny as his Dad. People just do things for him. Random people give him things. He has this aura around him that makes everyone happy. If it is a cloudy day, the one lone ray of sun will find him and shine on him.

The Deuce is busy, BIG (only 4 pounds separate her and the 3 year old), a bit of a bully, noisy, and always freaking happy. She giggles like a schoolgirl and bounces on you like a damn trampoline. She is so darn fat and cuddly and delicious.

They are so much alike, yet so very different.

The other thing I have been working on for the last few months is my own business. An old friend of mine and I have started an event rental company that specializes in linens, chair covers and the like. If it is a fabric, we can do it.

So thats all for now, but now that I have broken the seal on the not blogging I am sure I will be back here soon. In the meantime, there is some painful cuteness for all to see below.

Never Seen a Blue Dog Before

Scene 1: Wednesday night around 5:30pm after dropping Deuce off at Grandma Claire’s house. The weather is miserable and it is dark out. Mommy (me) is driving the MazdaCar while Dictator is jabbering to me from the backseat. We are on our way to a special Mommy/Dictator only dinner and then off to pre-school registration.

Dictator: Can I see a big yellow dog?

Mommy: If I see a big yellow dog I will point it out to you.

Dictator: Can I see a big black dog?

Mommy: If I see a big black dog Mommy can point it out to you.

Dictator: I never seen a blue dog before.

Mommy: No peanut, Mommy has never seen a blue dog before either.

Dictator: Dictator wants to see a blue dog.

Mommy: If I ever see a blue dog I will let you know OK?

Scene 2: Thursday 8:30am Mommy is in the shower, Deuce is dozing peacefully in the swing after her morning feeding and Dictator is busy playing trucks on the main floor. We are getting ready to meet a friend and do some shopping for the morning.

Dictator enters Mommy’s master bathroom.

Dictator: Dictator has never seen a blue dog before.

Mommy: Neither have I buddy (continue scrubbing shampoo in to head)

Dictator: Dictator has seen a purple dog.

Mommy thinks anything is possible with TV now at days and thinks nothing of it.

Mommy: Really? Where have you seen a purple dog?

Dictator: Dictator seen a red one too.

Mommy: That’s nice dear, are they on TV right now?

Dictator: No they are on Paprika!  LOOK IT HERE!!!!! WHATS GOING ON HERE???!!! (because he says ‘whats going on here’ all the time this week)

Artistic rendition of painted dog.

Obviously:

• My son didn’t care if he ever saw a blue dog, purple and red would do.

• He obviously thought Mommy’s red toenails are pretty since he drew some on the dog.

• Crayola washable markers may not come out of your dogs hair with just water – BUT a phone call to the lovely people at Crayola will tell you that copious amounts dish-soap will do wonders in this situation.

• Given the speed of response from the Crayola staff they OBVIOUSLY had this question a number of times before.

• The dude at Crayola laughed when he heard the dog was white (originally;  before the art experiment) and thought that it was an inviting blank canvas for a child to work on.

• Paprika is obviously a patient (and NICE) dog to sit through the amount of coloring that was done in the 5 minutes I had been in the shower.

• My son may have a future as a hairdresser given the nicely spaced out hi-lights that the dog was given. And because he loves shoes and purses…

• I am an idiot for not taking a real photo before washing the dog.

• My dog now smells like Palmolive soap – original formulation.

Conclusion:

I have not taken the markers out of reach because they are so totally washable, and I just can’t make material like this up so I need to let my 2 year old be the funny one.

Potty Claus, Shit Ninjas and Fat Asses.

Potty training The Dictator has taken up all of my past week. I had no idea that getting one little boy to whizz in a toilet could be so time consuming. BUT we still have one small problem. He will not poop in the potty.

Getting The Dictator to pee in the potty full time (even in underwear overnight) was easy, almost too easy. Stewart and I used simple bribery in the form of Potty Claus (you know Santa’s brother who really likes toilets but not in a creepy way?) and getting him to unwrap a present every time he initiated using the potty himself (my previous method of potty training was based on The Relentless Nagging Technique).  On February 10th we unwrapped the first (and so far LAST) big present for pooping in the potty. Yet he will not poop again.

We are in underwear full time because I thought he would hate the feeling of poop in his underwear. Pffftttt…

Tonight I gave him some prune/apple juice to hopefully loosen things up so tomorrow will not hurt and maybe he will want to go in the toilet. If not then I will need to hire a real life Shit Ninja to poop train this little man.

Thankfully, even as a baby he would never poop anywhere but at home and it seems like he is still hanging onto that habit. Because what do you even do with a shit filled pair of TowMater underwear in public? Ick.

The Deuce is shaping up to be The Most Awesome Baby. She is a big girl now, HUGE actually and sleeps through the night (and not the 6 hours through the night the parenting books talk about, I am talking 10 hours straight, getting up to eat and sleeping 2 more hours) which is nice because I am much more rested and productive right now.

The last couple days after The Deuce gets up to eat (~6:30m-ish) I have been going to the basement and putting about 45 minutes in on my Tony Little Gazelle machine before The Dictator gets up. This is great because I am not using naptime to exercise, and lets face it at 7am I have a hard time going back to bed for less then 1 hour of sleep. Also I have an hour alone with The Dictator before The Deuce gets up to eat again, which means once The Dictator is fed I have some time to get the morning chores out of the way and have a shower myself.

Sadly when I got on my Gazelle (which has been hiding in the storage room for 2 years – yeek!) I realized that my ass is on The Big Side. How big?

BEHOLD:

Not good for the ego ‘yo.

Could be worse though I could have Tony Little’s Hair or Creepy Smile.

How old am I? Like 12?

Goodness it was hard to get a pic of the hair. These kinda suck since they were taken with Photo Booth (Mac users thing)  and the resolution is poor. Also, every face-on photo I took made me look like I was 12 years old; which I know most people wouldn’t complain about at the ripe age of 32 but come on! 

Once Stewart is feeling up to it I will post better photos taken with a real camera. 

I have to say this hair takes about 2-3 minutes with the hairdryer and I am out the door. After a full day of chasing kids and running around it still looks the same (as opposed to the drowned rat look I was sporting). Needless to say, I am quite happy with it and it looks a quite a bit better in person. 

Yes, my bedroom is a SUPER dark grey (Behr 790F-4 Creek Bend). Looks hot after over 4 years of use. Highly recommend dark colors. 

Ok the next one is a bit better face shape wise after a full day of wear and some sleeping on the couch with the Worlds Sweetest Baby Girl. And chasing The Dictator. And some cuddling with Stewart. Ooohhh the coloring sucks – I look like there are massive bags under my eyes. Although at 11pm there just may be…. 

Anything that makes my triangle shaped face (the official diagnosis from the ‘Master stylist’ who was impressively good) look oval is fine by me. Sadly if I was a man I would be considered ‘chiseled’. Not hot on a chick.

State of The Hair Address

I know that some of my readers are waiting to see what I am doing with my hair (and one chicken shit is waiting for me to cut it off so she can see how it looks on her)  and the decision has been made.

Monday at 10:15am here in HickVille City there will be a apprehensive Mom at a Salon/Spa waiting to CUT HER HAIR OFF. Also? Having a fancy hot stone pedicure because a girl needs to soften the blow of cutting off 7 inches of hair. 

The results were as follows:

Option 2 (bob it with short bangs) 10 votes

Option 1 (leave it longer) 8 votes

Option 4 (cut it all off) 8 votes

Option 3 (bob it with long bangs) 7 votes

Option 2 was the Clear Winner of this contest. Now looking at the results you would think it was a close race between Options #2, #1, #4 BUT on further examination Stewart admitted to voting for Option#1 (typical man liking long hair) and ………ummmmm….. so did I. I am such a pussy. I know! Bad me trying to skew the results. So really longer hair only got 6 valid votes. That brings it down to Options #2 and #4, cutting it all off seems like a little too much maintenence for me right now and bangs scare me since I finally grew the damn things out AND I hate having anything on my forehead when I sleep (and hairbands fall off my shrunken head so they don’t work at nighttime). 

So clearly the winner is option #3 – bob it off with long bangs (that I can pull back on lazy days) which was actually the losing option. 

What I really am going to do I go into the salon where I have booked a Master Stylist for an hour and have them help me decide if taking the plunge to bangs is worth it. In my mind I think keeping the bangs long is better – since if I don’t like them long I can easily cut them off. Whereas growing the buggers back out will just cause 5 months of bitching and misery by yours truly. And then you got to read about it. Lucky you.

The funny thing is I am looking forward to the haircut. Usually when I chop it off it is impulsive – but this time since I had to wait for an appointment and get the votes from you guys I feel well prepared and excited. 

Stay tuned for pictures (which will be taken AFTER I dye the grey out of my hair).

What you think is not always what you do

I visited a really old friend of mine last week (my best friend from grades 6-7 until she moved away) who just had her first baby, a sweet little boy named Ben. When she was hugely pregnant she had many fears and expectations of being a parent and was not afraid to talk about them. Being her one friend with a child we talked at length (over pedicures at an awesome spa/salon) about her fears and expectations. It was nice to realize that I wasn’t the only person who believed many things, and expected many more. Having my second child on the way at the time, I must admit my views on raising children were radically changed from my first time around.

I remember these all too well for myself, and I remember how long it took me to feel like I had my legs under me again after the birth of The Dictator. Thankfully, my friend seems to be coping well and has already abandoned some of the bullshit ideas we all have in our head before that first child is born.

Before you have that first child you have all these ideas (or ideals) in your mind. My expectations and the ensuing reality went something like this:

I will breastfeed exclusively. My kid needs formula since I hacked my boobs off in 2001. Yes it sucks in a way, but it is also quite nice to have a partner that can feed a child while you do other things for the family.

My child will be an excellent sleeper and on a schedule. The Deuce is an awesome sleeper already, The Dictator didn’t sleep through the night until 18 months of age. 

He/She will never cry in public. They cry in public, sometimes for the dumbest reasons (today it was because The Dictator wanted a Ninja Sticker, WTF???). 

He/She will never have a temper tantrum in public. Thankfully full-on tantrums in public are rare. Bad behavior and not listening is much more common.

I will never take him/her out in public wearing pajamas. I have left the house with The Deuce in jammies once. Only once. The Dictator has never gone out in jammies, not even as a baby. I really am not cool with my kids wearing pajamas all day. But that is just me.

My child will not be addicted to any one TV show. I know almost every episode of The Backyardigans by heart. The Dictator loves The Backyardigans (so do Stewart and I) and also Finding Nemo. He also loves TowMater from Cars but will not watch the movie – go figure. Having a go-to show for a kid is a necessity and a sanity saver for a busy parent who likes to shower somewhat regularly.

There will be a minimal amount of toys in the house. There are A TON OF TOYS in my house. Hence the new playroom in the basement and the copious amount of toy storage on the main floor. I am in desperate need of a garage sale but since there is one more kid to use these toys I don’t see that happening any time soon.

No soothers. It took forever for me to get the courage to take away The Dictators soother. The Deuce – sadly – is not so keen on having a soother and much prefers my somewhat non-functioning boobs for soothing.

No McDonalds or fast food lunches. The Dictator will only eat potatoes if they come in the form of McDonalds fries. Needless to say he doesn’t eat potatoes very often…

I will cook everything from scratch – free range or organic if possible. I do make many many many many meals from scratch, including breakfast and lunches. Not free range and organic at all though – groceries are expensive enough as it is.

They will eat what we eat at meal times. The Dictator seems to think I am a short order cook and doesn’t always eat what we do. it is getting better though and now he eats modified versions of our meals most nights.

I will involve them in classes to help them learn. I did some classes with The Dictator – they were too expensive. Like Gymboree. 140$ to run around 45 minutes a week? GAH! I learned playing with my kids teaches them much more then any class could.

I will shower each and everyday. I will shower every second day at this point. And be thankful that I did.

I will not be that Mom in yoga pants and a ponytail at the grocery store. Dude, I need a Lululemon closer to me – since that is all I wear now. Ponytail? Yes! I still have long hair and not enough balls to cut it yet.

What I want to know is what expectations did you have before having children, and what is your reality?

Ass Fattage

Why is it when I am bored I decide I want to eat?

Why is it that I want to eat pure crap food?

Why can’t I just crave celery and carrot sticks?

and

WHY oh WHY must it go straight to my flabdomen? 

Of course this happens when the only thing on my mind other then junk food is how badly I would like to get a pair of James Jeans or some Paige Premium Denim. Sadly they don’t make those in super lard ass size. 

Also, I need at least 20 votes to consider the hair poll valid. So far you either want me to leave it long or chop it all off. SO ummmm… yeah, thanks a ton I am still where I started NOT KNOWING WHAT TO DO WITH MY HAIR.

Now for some cute and funny: 

The Dictator has been perfecting his ‘Rock and Roll Scream’. Although this is a vital skill for all RockStars Mommy would prefer he didn’t practice this all day and night; and certainly not when The Deuce is sleeping.

Actually lets call it a RockAndRollScream all one word since that is how The Dictator prefers to say it.

Next he will be trashing Hotel Rooms and charging up room service bills ordering OJ, Sausage and Cucumbers (the favorite foods this week).