I get by with a little help from my friends

These days I get a lot of "help."  Claire seems to have a spidey-sense and even if she's all the way at the other end of the apartment (okay...it's not that far) she can hear and comes running if she hears the dishwasher or the laundry machine open.  I used to be able to prepare dinner by myself while Claire played with her dad (she REALLY loves her dad--even more than she loves me) but not anymore.  Now she wants to be right in the middle of the cooking action, helping to crack eggs, stirring and examining every ingredient.

I wish that I could say I was always a good sport about the "help" but I'm not.  I've been known to smack her little hands away and evict her from the kitchen just so that I can get things done. I could turn every moment into a teaching moment, helping to tell her about chores and cleaning up and why we do what we do but I don't.   I am sometimes in a hurry and am frustrated by little hands spilling and creating mess.

Sometimes when I talk about the things that Claire and I do I worry that I sound like I'm presenting my perfect life and mothering skills.  I want to assure you that is not the case.  When we make cards, she crumples them up and I have to chase her around the house trying to steal it from her death grip which makes her cry.

Claire helping me fix the tire of the Bob

This is how we do all of our vacuuming these days.  She hates the vacuum and she screams and screams if I don't hold her.

So my friends, just a reminder that we're always keeping it real around here.  No perfect lives and perfect teaching moments but some perfect moments and just as many evictions from the kitchen while the baby kicks and screams and just want to help.

Good Night and Good Luck

Our favorite babysitter is leaving the gym.  We are going to miss Malorie like you would not believe.  Today Claire cruised into daycare and when she saw that it was someone other than Malorie she pointed at the babysitter and screamed.  (You can imagine how endeared she is to that babysitter.)  She was in such a tizzy that we only got in 30 minutes of working out.

Malorie got a new job that's full time with full benefits so we can't begrudge her leaving but, oh, we will miss her.  She is the kind of girl who cries Claire's name and hugs and kisses her when she arrives.

My friend Alice just started this brilliant new blog. Before Alice became a mom she was a buyer for an online retailer.  Her blog is all about how to pick gifts and she has incredible ideas.  I emailed Alice to ask her advice (It's kind of a tricky situation because I don't even know Malorie's last name but she has provided wonderful care for Claire) and boy did she deliver.  All of her suggestions can be found here.

Claire and I went with candy in a candy jar.  We filled it with Hershey's hugs and kisses.  Claire finger-painted a card and envelope and I wrote that we wished her lots of hugs and kisses and all the chocolate she needed for her new job.

Goodbye Malorie, you will be missed.

**and speaking of professional gifts did you see this darling ring on Cup of Jo? And when I say "you" I mean the hubbs.  Wouldn't that make a great gift for me?

Taking a hint

Last week I had to go to the doctor's office and run a couple of errands.  I dropped Claire off at babysitting co-op and was going about my business.  Before I went to the bank (where there is no bathroom) I stopped off at the gym (which is right next to the bank and does have a  bathroom).

I am the kind of a girl who goes to the gym to go to the gym.  I almost always go first thing in the morning and I hardly even brush my hair back into a ratty pony-tail before I'm out the door.  When I popped in to use the restroom I was actually dressed--jeans, a white button-down shirt, some cute ballet flats and I'd done my hair and make up.

You would have thought that I had grown a third eye.

Three or four people walked out from behind the desk to greet me, all cooing and telling me how great I looked.  The manager said, "Honestly, I would not have even recognized you!"  The response I got was beyond flattering and well into the realm of humiliating.  I wasn't even that dressed up and I didn't look that cute.  I had just been to a doctor's appointment for goodness sake.

So I guess that the ratty Hanes 3-to-a-pack men's t-shirts and ill-fitting shorts from Smiths' Marketplace aren't really cutting it.  Might be time to invest in some appropriate workout gear.

Suggestions?

*** And seriously--this image has to be altered right?....YIKES.  Cute clothes but she looks like a skeleton

If you don't know where you're going, any road will get you there

Claire has these CDs called the Scripture Scouts.  We play them around the house and we sing along in the car. Every time I hear them I cringe a little inside. Our favorite CD talks about family and how important it is.  It talks about getting along, about being kind at home and about how God loves us and wants our families to be happy.  There are also songs that talk about moms and dads and how families are made up of moms and dads and kids.  There is one song in particular that every time I hear it I'm tempted to whisper to Claire, "I want you to get married and have kids but if you choose something different I will still love you and you will still find happiness."

Every time I play the CDs I think about indoctrination.  I imagine that in North Korea* moms are playing CDs that are just like the ones I play at home but instead of talking about how families are so great they talk about how great Kim Jung-il is.

I have very strong religious beliefs but one of my strongest beliefs is that we have to come to those on our own.  I believe that God loves us and will speak to each of us and guide our lives if we seek his help.  That makes it hard to tell my baby that if she is good and does what she should she will be happy and if she isn't good and doesn't do what she should she will be punished--because I don't really believe that.

Last night while talking to some friends whose kids are older I expressed this concern and asked if they had ever felt the same thing. We laughed about how pictures of Jesus and Temples on the walls really aren't that different than pictures of the fearless leader. One of my friends is studying to be a family therapist and she had really great insights.  She talked about how children aren't capable of the "shades of grey" thinking that my version of morality requires.  They see the world in black and white--lying is bad, telling the truth is good and there is nothing in between.

As she was telling us that, I realized that Claire has to take her version of right and wrong from somewhere.  She has to have a jumping off point to start her negotiating of morality and if I don't give her one, someone else will--and it will be the Disney Princesses, or the Barbie Fairy Princesses or any other of the myriad of entities that tell girls that they can be as selfish as they want to be, that they have to love pink, that they aren't smart enough, thin enough, strong enough or good at math and science.

If I have to pick between the Disney Princesses and The Scripture Scouts, I'm gonna pick The Scripture Scouts every time.  So please know that the songs about how Jesus wants us to chose the right, obey our parents, get married, have kids and study hard in school are going to continue but they will be accompanied by my heart's whispering that morality isn't always black and white and no matter what she chooses to do with her life she will be loved, loved, loved.

*if you haven't listened to this podcast about how North Korea makes money you should.  It's AWESOME.

And my head I'd be scratchin' while my thoughts were busy hatchin'

The other day while sitting at the window at McDonalds and digging in the change bin of the hubbs car (my change bin is, of course, totally wiped out) trying to scrounge up 85 cents for an extra large diet coke (I know I shouldn't but at 85 cents I find myself at McDonalds at least 3 times a week) I had a memory of the 4th grade.

I spent every recess from 4-6 grade where there was enough sunshine playing jump rope with the girls in my grade.  I am still sort of a freakishly good jump roper.  Last year I walked into a church activity and there were several teenage girls trying to teach the little girls how to jump rope.  They were trying to figure out how to double dutch.  It was like I had been called by a higher power to be there.

In the 4th grade the people from Jump Rope For Life came to my school.  Their arrival was preceded by a flier that went home with us telling us that plastic neon jump ropes would be on sale for $3.50 the next day.  My heart soared.  I went home that night and spent hours counting the coins from my piggy bank (there was plenty in there. I've always been a penny pincher), making piles of twenty-five-cents; 1 quarter or 2 nickels and a dime (those of you math majors will realize that my calculations were a little off) and then counting the 14 little piles over and over and over again. I've also always been very cautious so I packed an extra dollar just in case (which was a lucky thing as my knowledge of how many nickles and dimes are in a quarter was amiss). The next day I went home with a neon purple jump rope just as pleased as punch.

And, in the McDonalds' parking lot that memory came so clear to me...22 years later and I still remember counting and counting change and just loving that jump rope.

Yet, last night as the hubbs and I were walking into the grocery store we said, "let's not forget to get windshield wiper fluid."  And we still left the store without it.

How is it that I have room in my memory for every jump rope song I've ever heard but windshield wiper fluid just doesn't fit?

In Laws

            My in-laws were here this weekend.  We crammed 5 adults and 3 kids into our little apartment.  Quarters were pretty tight but we had a great time.  Claire is absolutely in love with her 5-year old cousin J.  He loves her too (but not as much as he loves legos).  He spent lots of time jumping on the bed with her and carrying her around in that awkward child-carrying-a-child pose.  She got rough-housed, chased, poked in the face, kissed until she cried and she loved every single second of it.  We spent lots of time in swim suits and I still have at least two loads of towels to wash.  All in all, a totally successful weekend.

One of the best lines of the trip came from our Uncle K.  We were out to dinner after a ferry ride from Coronado and a walk down the embarcadoro.  Claire had fallen down 2 cement stairs (uninjured but mad) just moments before and J bit his cheek while he was eating so hard that he started to cry.  K (who is not married and doesn't have kids) said, "Is this the normal rate of injury with children?  Because really, I go weeks and weeks without any kind of injury or tears."  We assured him that considering the parent to child ratio and the fact that one of the children is a toddler and still regularly trips over her own feet we were actually doing pretty well.


Hurry back dear ones.  Claire is ready for the beach again whenever you are. (this is how she woke up this morning--actually that's not true.  She woke up crying because one of her sand sifters had fallen on the floor.  This is her after I handed it back.)

I just found your new favorite workout song

Yesterday at a new weightlifting class my short, totally ripped, gay instructor who was wearing patterned converse played this song.  Twice.

I can't get it to embed here but here is a link to go and listen.

Dear Beyonce, Thank you for being so awesome.

I have been playing it ever since.

I played it this morning while I was doing the dishes and Claire was eating her breakfast (Cheese and cheerios.  We eat cheese at every meal these days) and right when it came on she started bopping her little head around and laughing. 

It reminded me of an important point in my relationships with the hubbs.  We had been dating for a while and were talking about getting married but neither one of us was sure.  The hubbs and I are really different and I think we worried that neither one of us was what the other had anticipated.

We had gone to visit his family in Oregon. I had been praying about us getting married and trying to make a good decision.  One night we were doing the dishes after dinner (the hubbs didn't grow up with a dishwasher so when I say we were doing the dishes we were really doing the dishes).  The hubbs started singing and dancing around as he was drying the dishes and the thought came to me, "This could be a happy life."

I am so glad that I listed to that voice and let it grow in me. 

It has indeed been a very happy life.