Snow.

Same girls, same flail, but I swear they just keep getting cuter.

God, I love my neighbors.  I love their babies.  I love how much they have made this first year of parenthood sane (parents), fun (parents & babies) and adorable (just the babies).  I think I had the best snowed in Saturday ever.  There will be more pictures, don't you worry. 

How can I focus on work...

When I know I have this waiting for me at home? The weekend can't come fast enough.

Sometimes I just need perspective.

Tonight I found myself trying to hand MJ's sippy cup to Vito.  I stared at him for a couple seconds before realizing why he wasn't taking it.  Lack of opposable thumbs, mostly, because he'll happily lick milk off of MJ's face.

That has nothing to do with this post.  But it is evidence of how scattered my brain is.

I just wrote a post about how stressed MJ makes me.  And how I love her like flies love.... fruit.  But sometimes I find it hard to focus on that love.

Then I caught up on google reader, and in so doing read about the Sartins. If it's not a blog you already follow, you might cry.  Her little boy, only 12 months old, has been battling cancer.  And if she can maintain her positive outlook, I certainly don't have any damn excuse.  I'll probably post some version of my stressed out post when I once again lose perspective, which I'm bound to do.  I'm convinced my 14.5 month old is the most rambunctious child alive, and while it may not be true, it would take a lot for you to convince me otherwise.   But for the moment, I'll remember that every day she walks the earth I love her more than the day before.  And every day it seems impossible that I'll love her more than I do today, and every new morning proves that's not true.

Tunnel vision

MJ has one of these fun Ikea play tunnels, a gift from her grandmother:

though by fun I mean that I enjoy it far more than she does.  For example, it served as my halloween costume.

I crawled inside and waddled around while holding a mirror.

I was a?  You-tube!

Haha.

But what MJ does enjoy are tunnels that remind her of the blue tube.  Turns out there are these little cat tunnels strangely reminiscent of her play tunnel:

An important question arises:  what came first, the kid tunnel or the cat tunnel?

MJ seems to like the cat tunnel better than the kid tunnel.

As evidenced by her Thanksgiving performance, in which she put the hole over her head and walked around with a tunnel on her head.

God I love this child.  She never ceases to make me laugh.

In addition to giving birth to me, I have to thank my mom for taking this picture.

MJ has learned about the playground. There will be a lot less of that now, since our morning was met with boatloads of snow. But she doesn't get that yet, and when the word "park" is spoken will run to the door, banging furiously, as though she's swearing at me in baby sign language. I tell you, you haven't even heard cursing until you've seen baby sign language cursing. That sh!znat is scary.

But I digress. She loves crawling through the tunnel, but, unfortunately, some poorly paid playground architect decided to put no rails on the far side of the playground tunnel. So that poor (30-year-old) moms would have to climb through them to keep their evil knievel offspring from jumping to their death.  We look happy about it, but our knees are sadly bruised.  Playground architects should really be paid better.

Baby mama becomes old lady mama

30.  Sounds.  Old.  My mom put it in perspective by pointing out that having a 30-year-old makes you feel older than being a 30-year-old.  I distinctly remember when I was 8 and my drama teacher turned 30.  She was traumatized, and therefore I have always thought of it as a traumatic milestone.  I dreaded it.  I'm kind of a birthday primadonna.  I still want the whole classroom to sing me happy birthday, and it turns out no one really does that when you turn 30.

But, in spite of the fact that adults don't get as gleeful about birthdays as little kids, I still had a great 30th.  I am so blessed.  I frequently become fixated on unimportant crap, but when I stop to ponder it all, I remember how blessed I am.  I have a beautiful daughter.  A supportive husband that always makes me laugh.  A job I look forward to 90% of the time.  We are healthy.  We can pay our bills and have enough left to not feel stressed about money.  We get to travel.  And buy good beer and fancy cheese.  I have friends that will drop everything to come celebrate with me.  Our family supports us in every way.  And I get to write all of my sentences as "we" sentences.  And I get to, don't have to.

I'm not sure what I thought 30 would look like, I never really got that far in my imaginings.  I thought I'd be classy by now, but being as I marked the event with a pub-crawl, that is clearly not true.  I hoped I'd have met my soulmate by now, and I have.  I hadn't really imagined the kid part, or family part, or happy part.  But I have that, too.   And did I mention I get to buy fancy cheese? 

Belated halloween wishes

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It's shocking how behind my pictures get when I misplace the camera for a few days (or weeks?) Even more shocking? It turns out there is no greater joy on earth than dressing up babies in costumes. Better, even, than dressing up dogs in costumes.

Indecision.

Clearly I don't know what I want.  All week I fantasized about being a stay at home mom, sparked, in part, by a conversation with my advisor about my lack of PhD progress.  This is not new, I knew this, but I like to forget it.  DH called me out when he saw my internet history, in which I had googled "how do you decide to become a stay at home mom."

But then, a weekend of hubs working and solo parenting makes me long to go back to work.  I love this little girl, but she is just so exhausting.  Within her first hour of being awake she had:
- Torn all the clean clothes from the laundry basket and scattered them around the house.
- Dumped a jar of oats on the floor.
- Dumped a bag of dry beans on the floor.
- Had a (oh-so-heart-wrenching) temper tantrum when I insisted her oatmeal cool down before she could eat it.
- Climbed on top of the end table.
- Fallen off the couch.

This in addition to the run-of-the-mill tear-her-books-off-the-shelf, throw-half-her-food-on-the-floor and take-everything-out-of-the-cupboards daily routine.

By noon I was ready for her to go to sleep for the night.

How do stay at home mom's do it?  I know they say to set one goal a day, and that's what I do.  But if I don't get her out of the house we both go nuts.  Though getting her out of the house is just as exhausting since she won't sit in grocery carts or high chairs. I supposed I need to become a more patient person.  And stop trying to accomplish anything, because the moment I sat down and played with her my stress (mostly) went away.

Fancy pants

It is a lamentable fact that adults wearing patterned pants almost always look foolish. There are exceptions, clearly, but it is almost certain that you don't fall into that category. However, babies wearing patterned pants is another thing entirely. We are letting MJ get her fill of fancy pants while it is still socially acceptable. Maybe this way she won't feel compelled to wear this:

Teach them young.

For those of you who aren't up on your rock identification skillz, this is pumice. MJ played with this pumice for about 30 minutes, which is longer than she played with my cell phone (a tough act to follow).  

So, although her interpration of the principle of faunal succession may be a bit off, as evidenced above, her geological understanding is still deeper than many of my students.

Before the clean

Though they couldn't do anything about the yellow-that-is-our-bathroom, at least MJ now gets to sit in a clean sink.

Sanity, oh how I've missed you

I was in kind of a bad place a few weeks back. There was one morning where I said to DH "I feel like I'm going crazy and nobody cares." I did not mean this in a haha sort of way. Not to demean those who are actually going crazy; I've had a front row seat for that performance before, and I knew I was in a different place.  But at the same time, I was going crazy inside.  DH was working all the time.  MJ was adjusting her napping routine (no thanks to daycare, who has mandated one nap a day) and was cranky every time I saw her.  I felt like everything was falling on my shoulders.  I didn't just feel this way, I knew that it was true.

But then my mom came to visit.  We had an initial rough patch.  Then I came down with some sort of 6 day stomach flu, complete with the worst pain I've had since labor, and it was such a relief to have her here.  To be the one being mothered rather than doing the mothering.  We worked through our differences and really had a wonderful visit.  She stayed for 3 weeks, a long time to have any house guest, but I was still sad to see her go.

We have started to get back into our old routine.  The first day after my mom's departure we both came thudding back to reality, remembering what it's like to come home and never be able to relax.  But some things have changed.  DH is picking up fewer shifts, meaning I am not doing as much solo parenting.  We have started to pay someone to come clean for us, and they are absolutely superb.  It's expensive, but the amount of sanity and peace it brings me has so far been worth every penny.  And I signed up for an art class, the first thing I've done just-for-me since MJ was born.  Yes, I've had beers with friends and had some me-time afternoons.  But this feels different, and I'm psyched about it.  I'll post pics when I have something to show.

I've talked to a few women whose blogs petered out after their little one's first birthday.  I will try my darnedest not to let that happen here.  But feel free to call me out if you haven't heard from me in a while....

But she is awfully cute.

Just a reminder to myself that, tantrums and all, she is the cutest human ever to see the inside of my uterus.  Or the outside of it, for that matter.

Early onset terrible twos

Our first verifiable temper tantrum. We've had two others, while at home, with no witnesses. But yesterday, while searching for a toybox at Ikea, I dared take MJ's baby kong away. While I thank the Cheerio gods for inventing such a portable snack, and the baby kong gods for inventing a way to let her snack whilst at Ikea, she was still managing to get Cheerios in every particle board crack possible. So I took it away, and she started flailing on the ground. This elicited snickers from passersby at first, and it was funny to see such a determined little human. But it just escalated. Oy.

I am not ready for this. I know that temper tantrums come hand in hand with toddlerhood, but I thought that was the 2-year-old variety of toddlerhood. This time grandma was present to verify that the flailing, inconsolable child I call mine was indeed having a temper tantrum. I spent some time googling last night. The danger-age is 1-4, so we're officially in tantrum territory.

So yep, the Moms is in town. I'm lucky she puts up with me, even though she kind of drives me nuts. I can tell I kind of drive her nuts, too. This is my own future. Right now, when MJ drives me nuts, I can blame it on the age, the maturity level, etc. But in the end, even when we're both full grown adults, we will still drive each other nuts. Kind of nuts, if we're lucky, and full-blown-never-speak-except-for-holidays if we're not so lucky. Like my daughter, I am something of a drama queen, imagining the worst just because my child has a temper tantrum. Are we in for a prolonged toddlerhood, or are we just getting it out of the way early?

Get this girl a runway.

Combined with her Queen's wave, MJ is definitely practicing for a red carpet event.  I think she's going to skip the princess phase altogether.  She's currently trying to establish the one-shoe-look as the trend of the season.  

The working mom blog that never talks about work

I advertise this as a working mom blog.  Because I work.  And I'm a mom.  But really, I rarely talk about W*RK.  Largely because I don't want to Dooce myself.  And I'm not very good at being honest whilst being funny whilst not saying things I shouldn't.  Perhaps you remmeber this post?  Yep, got in trouble from the hubs for that one.  I tend to reveal more than I should.

Anyway, I recently flirted with the idea of stopping the PhD and teaching community college.  I met a great lady and blogger who happened to be looking for someone to teach as well, it all seemed so perfect.  But it turns out teaching is hard.  I knew that, to be fair.  But I realized it's just not for me.  Every day I got to come back to the lab and not teach was glorious.

What really happened is that an awesome job opportunity came about right as I was starting back to work after maternity leave.  And going back to work was REALLY hard.  The first couple months in particular.  But going to a job I didn't like was even harder, even if I knew it was a stellar opportunity.  It reminded me why I chose the path I did.  Why I started back to graduate school.  Why I chose to study geology and climate.  Why I love the freedom that graduate school and academia allows, even if the pay isn't all that great.

It gets easier.  The first few months back, all I did was miss MJ.  But at some point, I realized I had my self back.  I didn't even realize I had missed her, I had been so focused on my child. So to anyone in the midst of going back, the best thing I can tell you is that it gets easier.  If you like your job, in particular.  I realize I am lucky in this, to have a job I love and not need to find a better paying job.

But I have this great thing right now.  I have work/life balance.  It seems almost impossible to find, and I'm told it's even harder with a second child, but I have it.  And I don't think I could have found it without work, because, much as I love my child and love spending time with her, my life would not have been balanced.  It would have been happy, but it would have been unbalanced.  So maybe, more than seeking what makes you happy, it's important to seek balance.  And balance will give you happiness.

Presents? I don't need no stinking presents.

MJ had a bit of difficulty with the concept of opening presents. Sitting on them was about as far as she got.  Her birthday was a blast, particularly by the time we go to the opening presents phase.  Everyone had eaten, everyone was satiated, I could finally relax and enjoy some MJ time.

On a side note, this is the face that DH and I have started to make when we're provoking each other, doing something we know we're not supposed to do.  Someday she'll be embarrassed by this, but we'll continue to explain that she started it.

MILFdom and gender bending friendships

I'm fairly certain I got hit on at Starbucks today.

On Sunday, whilst preparing for MJ's party (the details of which I still owe you), I put my hand directly on a yellowjacket.  I haven't done great at not cursing in front of MJ, but that was a whole new territory of "not great".  Before my ring finger swelled up, I decided I should take my wedding ring off. 

So I'm going ringless for a few days.  Mr. Guy at Starbucks appeared old enough to have done the ring-finger-check.  It's nice to know I still got it.  Though Mr. Guy doesn't know that there used to be a lot more of "it", and his lack of suave suggests he was just going after the weakest gazelle on the savanna, it's still nice.  Before getting married I told DH that one of my goals in life was to be a MILF.  I never specified whose definition of MILF that would be.   

On an only-slightly-related note, I've lately been pondering the subject of friendship between men and women.  I remember (or, possibly, misremember) a conversation between my stepmom and I when I was a teenager and swore that some boy was "just a friend".  She told me that it's impossible for men and women to be just friends.  At the time I thought she was totally wrong, but after many (like, 5) dates-that-I-didn't-realize-were-dates-until-some-guy-tried-to-kiss-me in college, I started to wonder if she's right.  Not in the they-can-never-be-friends sense, but in the they-can-never-be-CLOSE-friends sense.  The kind of friend you have deep conversations with, tell secrets to, etc. 

Furthermore, the desire to have guys as "just friends" is seemingly far stronger from women than men.  Nearly every woman I know claims that "most of her friends are guys", which is mathematically impossible.  Granted, most the women I know are somehow related to Geology, so for this group it may be true.  But it extends beyond that.  In contrast, I have never met a straight man who claims that "most of his friends are women".  Men seem to understand the "impossibility".

So what do you think?  Is it impossible?  Do you even care to have close friends of the opposite sex?

One year

On the eve of the anniversary of your birth, you are asleep. Even after two 2-hour naps, you were ready to fall asleep by 6. We stretched it to 7. This means it could be a rough night, so I better write this before I get too grumpy with you.

Little girl, I love you whole hog. I'm sorry that I sometimes get grumpy with you. I try to remind myself ::over:: and ::over:: and ::over:: again how short each little moment is. We are currently with dad at a conference. The most family friendly conference I've ever seen, which is pretty great. Today you got to splash in the waterpark and play at the arcade and run through a huge field. But I see all these moms-of-tweens jealously eyeing you, missing their own babies baby-days. This year has flown by, and I know it will only continue to go faster.

Last year at this time I didn't quite know when you'd arrive, but I knew it'd be soon. Each day seemed like an eternity. Now each day is an instant.

What are you doing at 1 year?

You walk like a wild woman. Everyone quizzically looks at you and says "Wow, she's awfully young to be walking" and I say "No, she's almost a year, she's just a peanut". And you are a peanut. You've been consistently at the 15th percentile, and I wouldn't be surprised if you've even dropped a little. I think that the massive quantities of food we feed you go into fueling your constant motion, and that you never sit still enough for body fat to accumulate.

You started in the older infant room this past week. They said you walked right in like you'd been there for a year, and apparently are no longer enamoured with Baby-Boy-S now that there are older boys to flirt with. They say you're very good and very smart. Of course I love to hear these things, and as every mom is convinced of their own, I'm sure you're the cutest-and-the-smartest-and-the-best ad nauseam. I am far more traumatized by you already moving to the next grade than you are.

You are actually more cuddly than you used to be. Now that you've found some measure of independence and can get where you want to go, you have decided it's okay to come back and snuggle with Mom. This is one of my favorite developments. You will sometimes nap with your head on my shoulder, as you did today, and it is the most heart warming moment of my week.

You are not much for being read to, though I endeavour to change this. You are far too interested in turning the pages yourself or walking off with the book to sit still enough for me to read to you.

You torment Vito, though not too badly. You love to dance. You have recently discovered the TV. You like to feed Vito his dog food. You like to wear my purse around your neck like a St. Bernard brandy barrel. You love all fruit, particularly melon and blueberries. You hate hummus. You love to flirt with strangers, and will make little, insistent sounds until they pay attention to you. You say "mama" and "dada" and "hi", and you sign "milk", "food" and "more". You are a pretty good though highly erratic sleeper. You love to climb up everything, including your dresser.

You may be the mosttraumatic but are certainly thebest thing that has ever happened to your dad and I. Happy birthday munchkin.

A photo that captures how I feel.

I love taking photos. I'm not a photographer, I just like to capture a moment to help my poor memory hold on to it. But the downside is that I rarely end up in the photos. It's a small price to pay to have my own vision the one of record. But sometimes, DH picks up the camera. And sometimes the results are beautiful.  And I don't even recognize myself.  Or my daughter, sitting calmly, staring off into the distance.  And yet it captures a brief instant in time that I desperately try to hold on to, because they're rare moments.  This was a gift that I don't even think you knew you were giving me.

I love upstate New York.  I love my daughter.  I can't believe she's almost 1. 

We went to the fair yesterday, and I constantly thought about last year at this time.  On the dawn of giving birth.  Not even being able to conceptualize what my life would be like afterward.  How painful walking even a block was.  The impatience.  The fear.  Life is good right now.  It's nice to have my body back.  And my mind, even if my life is permanently altered.   Life 1 year later is glorious.  I never thought of myself as a motherly person, but, if you're lucky, your own child will make you motherly.  And that's all you really need.