Grandma Day!

As the title of the post implies, Grant is spending the day at Grandma's house. Yippee!!!

Don't get me wrong, I love spending most of my days with the little guy and the last week and a half has been a very happy time for me. But I have always appreciated the occasional time alone, and in the last two years alone time has been a rare thing in my life. So, again, I say yippee!!!

Of course I have a long to-do list just waiting to be started: laundry, dishes, clean the bathroom- you get the idea. Before doing practical stuff like that I'm going to take a few minutes to reflect on what I've learned in my first week and a half or so of being a stay at home mom (don't worry, I already ate my cream of wheat). It might shock some that I didn't learn some of these things long ago, but what can I say? Sometimes I'm a slow learner. So, here it is, my list of a few of the things I learned in the ten days:

• Contrary to my earlier thoughts regarding the furry little monster, Elmo is a precious gift to mothers who are in desperate need of a shower.
• Precious gift or not, "Elmo's Song" is still annoying as hell when you wake up at 2:00 in the morning singing it to yourself. "Lalalala lalalala Elmo's Song!" For the love of all that is good, does anyone know how to get that song out of your head???
• A couple of hours spent at the zoo or park in the morning makes for a much easier afternoon.
• The chances of my house ever being as clean as I would like it to be is roughly zero.
• The chances of my son ever caring about the cleanliness of the house is about the same.
• Toddler boys are very similar to adult men. You can get them to do just about anything if you can just make them think it was their idea.
• A jar of expensive face cream is surprisingly difficult to get out of a toddler's hair.
• In order to be well-rested and productive, a pregnant woman needs approximately 47 more minutes of sleep than a toddler. This may be true for non-pregnant women as well, but since I have no way of knowing at this point I prefer to hope that someday I will be able to keep up with my son.
• Putting a toddler down for a nap he doesn't want, but clearly needs, is extremely difficult. It's worth it!
• As previously mentioned on this blog, teething sucks, but few sights in this world are better than seeing my son's pearly whites when he's smiling and happy. (okay, I may have already known this one, but I thought it worth noting anyway)

I'm sure I'll think of some other things later, but that'll have to do for now. I'm off to catch up on some sleep!

Grant posing at the zoo

It's only my third day on the job, but I've already figured out that an hour or two spent at the zoo in the morning makes for a much easier afternoon. So after Sesame Street we were once again off to the zoo.

Today we decided to walk out to the farm area. Grant wasn't particularly interested in any of the animals, but when he saw a little girl who was maybe seven or eight years old getting her picture taken by a sign he insisted on going and posing just as the little girl had. I've never really gotten Grant to purposely sit still for pictures before, mostly it's just dumb luck if I manage to get a decent shot, so I just had to post this picture. Grant's first "pose"-

Cream of Wheat!

On Sunday mornings when I was a little girl my mother would wake my siblings and me up by yelling each of our names, in birth order, up the stairs until she got a response from each child to indicate that she or he was at least awake enough to grunt at her. But if, instead of grunting, any child was awake enough to immediately yell back "Cream of Wheat!" then Mom would make that for breakfast instead of the usual cold cereal. The memory of my mother, hair and makeup in various states of done for church and still wearing her big furry red robe while cooking the beloved cream of wheat will always be a fond memory for me. It's just the kind of warm and fuzzy memory I hope my children will one day have from their childhoods.

Perhaps it's not surprising then for me to say that to this day I love Cream of Wheat. I'd go so far as to rank it among my top five comfort foods. I could go on for some time about the intricacies of making the perfect bowl of Cream of Wheat, but I do realize at least on some level that such a dissertation would be boring to most people so I'll limit it to this- timing is crucial! It must be monitored continuously while cooking and then eaten promptly or you’ll end up with an inedible pile of goo. (I suspect that improper preparation is one of the main reasons why many people claim not to like Cream of Wheat. That and the fact that apparently most don’t put butter in it. Fools! Don’t you know that everything is better with butter!?!?)

The timing issue is why, even though I craved it all day, I waited until Matt got home and took Grant upstairs for a bath before making myself a bowl. This was, after all, my first day as a stay at home mom- I did not have Grant's schedule down well enough to test it with something as important as Cream of Wheat!

After hours of waiting the time had finally come. I had just sat down with my coveted bowl of enriched farina- tinged ever so slightly yellow from the butter, glistening from the sugaroverthetopanddon’tstir (which, for those of you who were not raised by my mother is exactly what it sounds like- sugar that you sprinkle over the top but don’t stir into the cereal. And, yes, I’m quite sure it’s one word).

That’s when something happened to make me realize that I am no longer the little girl eagerly waiting to yell out “Cream of Wheat!!” when my name is called. No. I am now in the position of the woman who hasn’t had a chance to get dressed for church yet, but has to stop and stand over a hot stove making cereal because a daughter I loved asked for it.

That’s when Matt yelled from the bathroom upstairs “Honey! Help! Grant just pooped in the tub!!”

Yep, I’m a mom.

(And, yes, I am aware of just how much my son will hate stories like this when he's older, but I gave up my bowl of cream of wheat to clean his poop out of the tub- I'll tell any story I like!)

The First Day of the Rest of Our Lives

Okay, maybe "the rest of our lives" isn't entirely accurate, but "the first day of until I either go crazy or Cookie (or some other as-of-yet not conceived child) goes to kindergarten" just doesn't have the same ring to it. What all that babble amounts to is that as of today I am officially a stay at home mom! Yippee!!

The decision to become a stay at home mom was not an easy one. Both Matt and I have been extremely busy at work and something had to give. For a while we tried letting more trivial tasks, like blogging and sleeping, go undone, but, alas, that was not enough. So after months of discussion and budget analysis we finally came to the conclusion that is was time for my day job to go.

I had never pictured myself as the stay at home mom type, at least not until I had Grant. I never expected going back to work after he was born to be as difficult as it was. It's a subject I could go on and on about for many depressing paragraphs. I kept thinking that my desire to stay home would lessen over time, but it didn't. The fact that I haven't exactly enjoyed my job for the last year and half didn't help matters. Then I got pregnant with Cookie and found myself wanting to stay home more than ever. We talked for a while about waiting until Cookie's arrival in November, which certainly would have made more financial sense than quitting now. But, perhaps selfishly, I wanted very much to have Grant all to myself for at least a couple of months before the new arrival. So here we are.

I'm a stay at home mom!!!

So far my first day has been a good one. Grant and I had a leisurely breakfast and then we went to the zoo. The zoo is very close to our house and we have a membership so I foresee many similar trips in the future. It was so fun to watch him play on the play equipment there. They have a slide that is the perfect size for him and he showed his appreciation for said slide by going down it approximately 1, 256 times- giggling and yelling "weee!!!" each and every time. When it was time to leave I loved being able to say to him that we'd come back later this week.

We were there for less than two hours, but that was enough time for Grant to have lots of fun and to get good and worn out. After eating a quick lunch Grant is now napping in his room. I'm tempted to spend this precious free time either watching TV, reading, or continuing to play on the computer, but I'm determined that when Matt gets home tonight the house will be at least as clean as it would be after his mother has been here all day. At this point in time, it is not in that condition, so I'm off to clean.

My own personal guilt trip

I can't believe Grant is 18 months old already. I also just realized that our blog is a year old. In celebration of this milestone, I went back and read a few of our old posts. Did you know that in the original post my husband said we'd be updating once a week? HAHAHAHA Silly man. I am continually telling myself I will post more often- at least once a month (I've always been one to set lofty goals for myself- that how I got stuck with, I mean landed my current job)! But, what do you know, March came and went with no post. You're all shocked I'm sure.

It’s April now and spring is surely on its way- predictions of snow notwithstanding. And with the warmth of spring comes yet another burst of optimism. I will post more often! My baby is getting bigger every day and I’m feeling guilty for not documenting more of it.

Now, I’ve gotten my rambling and that particular guilt out of the way, I can move on to an actual update. There’s a lot to cover, so you’ll have to excuse me if my transitions leave something to be desired.

Grant is growing bigger every day and learning new things all the time. On the few nice days we’ve had recently, he has very much enjoyed running around outside. Or, at least, he very much enjoyed it once he got the hang of walking around on that weird, bumpy ground. He’s steadily saying more words and more words. Unfortunately, I do not know the translation of many of these words (judging by the intonation, I suspect more than one is a curse word), so I cannot add them to his list of words.

Tormenting Sasha is one of his favorite pass times. By “tormenting” I mean throwing hard projectiles at her, pulling her hair and/ or tail, and trying to ride her and giggling with glee while she growls and tries to get away (excellent way to wear out both toddler and dog by the way). When he’s not tormenting her, he’s throwing to her, which is why she generally puts up with his tormenting. Those two have an interesting relationship. I sometimes feel a little guilty for not stopping Grant when he's tormenting Sasha, but I get over that one surprisingly quickly given my general trend towards guilt land these days. Seems a canine child simply does not hold the same sway as a human one.

Speaking of food, Grant is still very attached to his baby food. Don’t get me wrong, he’ll eat the occasional solid food, but he still loves his baby food. I tell myself that this is fine- after all, it’s fruit and vegetables. How could that be bad? But, being an over-protective first time mom and natural born worrier, it does make me nervous sometimes that he doesn’t eat more solid food and I feel I must be doing something wrong. Also, it gets expensive to buy baby food in the quantities an 18 month old eats! We got to the grocery store and fill up half our cart with the little jars. As Matt says, you get so much that you think it’s crazy, and then you pick up a few more.

Grant has been work on getting his eye teeth for, well, forever. First everyone said that the first tooth is the worst, then everyone said the one year molars are the worst, now everyone says that the eye teeth are the worst. I have to say, at this rate, I’m getting very worried about his two-year molars, as no doubt they will be “the worst” when the time comes. As it is, he's back to waking up several times a night. I hear stories of tiny babies sleeping through the night. Something my 18 month old has done all of once. Maybe three to five times if you use that silly "five hours is sleeping through the night" rule. Again, am I doing something wrong? Have I somehow set my son up for a lifetime of sleep issues? Oh well, who really needs sleep anyway?

Sorry, no pictures with this post. I seem to be having trouble getting blogger to download my pictures right now. Not particularly surprising, given my technical abilities and general computer savvy, or lack thereof (and in case you're wondering, of course I feel guilty about that too). I'll pester Matt about it tonight.

February

According to the calendar in my cube February is the shortest month of the year, but I don’t believe it. February is the month when the sun goes on vacation to California, leaving those of us in the Midwest with nothing but endlessly cloudy, dreary, depressing days. So it was that this morning, after trudging in from my car under a sunless sky only to face a pile of work I don’t want to do, I decided to cheer myself up by checking some blogs. I read several blogs with pictures lovingly posted by parents dutifully chronicling their children’s development.

Then I came upon my own blog. Which I haven’t updated since October. A whole holiday season come and gone without a single picture of my beautiful boy. Now, instead of feeling cheered, I feel sad and guilty.

So now here I am, faced with a choice between updating the blog or figuring out what a scope document for a historical database release is (Bleh! I hate my job!). Easy choice- update the blog!

I have decided to post some pictures from last February. Why on earth would I want to post pictures from such a horrid month? Because last February Grant and I followed the sun to California, where Grant got to meet his Aunt Jojo, Uncle Don, and Cousin Jesse. I also introduced him to the happiest place on earth- Disneyland! Grant was a little young to enjoy most of the rides, but that didn’t stop his mama from going on Space Mountain several times. I’m quite sure it’s impossible not to be happy while in the vicinity of Space Mountain. Even now, sitting at my desk piled with work I do not want to do, the memory and the accompanying pictures make me smile. Enjoy!

The view by Joni's house. Look, the sky is actually blue, not white or grey! Very exotic.

You can't go to Disneyland and not see the light parade!

They can call it Tarzan's tree house all they like- I know it's really the Swiss Family Robinson tree house.

You see that weird light on Joni's left shoulder? That's sunlight!

It was so bright we had to wear shades!