Mattix, please don’t interact with the drunk man. Thank you.

Tonight, Mattix, Ed and I went out for Vietnamese food. We went to the restaurant where the woman thought I was a filthy whore who had no idea who Mattix’s father is. She’s much more comfortable now that she knows why I don’t know who Mattix’s father is. That one still cracks me up. I had cortisone shots in my knee on Friday afternoon and my blood sugars have been quite high since then. As a result, I have……………………….now wait for this, because you’ll very, very rarely hear such a thing from me………………………no appetite. The only thing that sounded good was a bowl of pho and a glass of iced VNese coffee. Ed was exhausted b/c he was supposed to come in from DC last night but his flight was delayed, which would have caused him to miss his connecting, so he caught the 6 something flight this morning. He’s on east coast time and has gotten little sleep this week, but come on. How do you even think about saying no to the girl with a pathetic limp whose blood sugar is 400? Exactly! He went with a smile.

I digress. We had just gotten settled in, meaning Mattix had on his bib, the table had been cleaned with a Lysol wipe (b/c Mattix sometimes eats directly off the table now, sans hands), he was strapped into his high chair, getting ready to grab for anything within reach, when we first heard it.

“Whaaazzzz goooing onnnn baaaccckkk theeeere?”

I looked at Ed. My back was to whoever was slurring his words. I asked who was saying that. Ed told me it was some guy sitting at a table by himself, two tables behind ours.

“Whaaazzzz goooing onnnn baaaccckkk theeeere?”

I asked Ed if the man looked drunk or mentally ill. I was being serious. Drunk and embarrassingly loud is one thing. Severely mentally disturbed in another. Or was he both?

I did not turn around; the best thing to do is avoid eye contact. I continued to look forward at Ed and to my left at Mattix. That’s when Mattix dropped something and yelled, in that cute little baby voice, “Uuuuuhhhhhh ohhhhhhhhhh!!!”

And so of course the drunk or disturbed man said it back. I immediately tried to distract Mattix, but naturally he was interested in the person talking in a loud, childish voice, and so Mattix said it again. “Uuuuuhhhhhh ohhhhhhhhhh!!!”

Thankfully, the man was distracted by the server who brought his food out.

He ate his dinner and made a loud, slurred comment every once in a while about how good it was, how he was there last night and he told his buddy the food was “sooooo gaaaaooooooddddd” that he was coming back the next night, and how “all the rest ovvv that moneeeeey is for you….your tiiippppp.” It became apparent at some point that the man was good and drunk. There’s a bar in the same parking lot, and Ed and I assumed he probably got really drunk and stumbled in for dinner. Sad, huh? I think it has to be pretty bad to get to the point where you’ll get drunk alone by 6:00 p.m. and stumble into a restaurant, plastered, and make a fool of yourself.

Anyway, tonight’s lesson for Mattix was that even though publically drunken men may talk to you, you’re not supposed to acknowledge them!

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I’m pretty sure I sent my password to everyone who was meant to receive it. If I missed you by mistake, please leave a comment or send me an email. To everyone who has emailed me or left a comment on the first post, thank you so much. The next one will be up soon. I hope you’re having a wonderful three day weekend, enjoying friends and family.

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A very relaxing week (photo heavy)

We spent the last week in the north eastern part of our state in the mountains. Ed, Mattix, and I went with my parents and my little brother. My parents rented great, cozy cabins for each of our families and it was just what I needed. The weather was amazingly beautiful. Not too cold, but not at all warm (what a nice change!). I had an incredible time without a phone. I wasn’t supposed to be on the Internet, but I couldn’t resist on two evenings and so I’m nearly caught up on blogs! Other than that, I relaxed, played endless board and card games with my family (I kicked some ass in Scrabble, thankyouverymuch),  read garbage magazines, and did a lot of thinking. T

he best part for me was that Mattix spent six and a half days surrounded by the people that love him the most, and he soaked up every minute of it. I feel like at this point in time, one of the more important things he needs is a close group of family and friends that loves him unconditionally. Like I said in my last post, Mattix has been forced to struggle immensely as a result of his time in the orphanage and we’re at a point where *I* feel as though it’s important for him to know that in addition to Ed and I, there are family members and a few friends that would do anything in the world for him.  He’s really doing a great job at accepting and receiving others’ affection, as well as returning it.  This may seem like an obvious thing to so many people, but in reality, it’s not always easy.

Mattix bonded quite well with my mom while we were in Washington, DC.  (If you don’t remember or if you weren’t reading back then, we went to DC for about five weeks in February/March for Ed’s job. My mom came to help me out b/c we were still in the middle of a tough transition and it was a really great opportunity for the two of them to bond.) Well, Mattix already adored my dad and brother, but he had six solid days to spend time with them and it was great. He now calls my dad “Papa,” my brother “Mamew” (sounds like Shamu, ha ha ha – his name is Matthew), and my mom “MaMaw” (the first “Ma sounds like the first syllable in ma’am and the “Maw” rhymes with saw). Anyway, it was great! Mattix loves being outdoors, and given our current summer hell weather, there hasn’t been much of that. Well, he spent most of the past week outside and he enjoyed it immensely. He was an angel on the five hour ride to the cabins, but not so much on the way home! He hadn’t been in his car seat in a week and he had been allowed to do nothing but play, and he wasn’t loving the transition.

Here are a few photos from our trip. There were sunflowers everywhere and it was so pretty. A LONG time ago, my mom taught Mattix to “smell” the flowers instead of ripping the hell out of touching the flowers.  My mom has tons of beautiful gardens and flowers at her house, and when I can keep them alive, so do I. In the interest of keeping said flowers intact, my mom showed Matty how to lean over and smell them. It is soooo cute and now every time he sees a flower, fake or real, he has to smell it. He’s not actually smelling it, but he doesn’t know that. In fact, one day in the doctor’s office, I was using one of those pens that has a giant fake flower taped to the top to prevent people from stealing the pen.  Well, Mattix was flipping out trying to get a whiffs I was using it to write. He had everyone in the room cracking up. Anyway, he smelled more sunflowers than I can count and it was precious.

{cheating just a little bit and touching just a little bit…because we told him to!}

{i love how his shirt is stuck in the back of his diaper! if you look really closely, you can see a key attached to his belt loop on his right side. on the first day, my mom hooked her cabin key to his pants. every day thereafter, he INSISTED that he wear a cabin key on his beltloop. after he was dressed every morning, he would point up at the keys and yell until we put one on his pants.}

A few scenery shots:

 

I’ll begin posting my password protected posts this week and I will send the password out to those who left a comment last week before I put the first one up.  I also have to do an eighteen month update for the little guy because he’s changing sooo much. That’ll hopefully happen this week, too. I hope you’re all doing well. For those that are nearing the deadline, still waiting, you’re in my thoughts daily, and for my friends waiting for travel, I know it can’t come soon enough. And for one friend who is just back from quite the adventure, welcome home, girly!!! I’m so happy for you. (I have no idea why the text is suddenly weird and I’m too tired to try to figure it out. Sorry.)

Letting Go – getting started

Where to Start?

I’ve had an overwhelming week, but not for any particular reason. Our friends Karen, Andrew, and Khai left, which bummed me out. Mattix came down with a nasty cold while Ed was out of town and he was up all night, every night, then Ed came home and caught it, and now I’m coming down with it. I’ve been living in TOTAL chaos for the past ten days since Ed gutted our closet. We’ve lived here for just over three years and it’s shameful how much stuff I had accumulated in our master bedroom closet. I’m a minimalist in general and don’t like clutter. I often tear through a closet or room and just clear out stuff I don’t think I need. But obviously I haven’t done enough of that with my clothes and shoes. I can’t even get over how efficiently I used every square inch of that stupid closet.  It was ridiculous.

As you may well guess, I don’t do well with disorder, and that word barely covers the state of our house since the “closet project” began. We’re in the home stretch, but it’s hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel (or the couches under the piles, or the floor under the stacks, or the bed under the mess…you get the idea). We’ve been in the guest room since last Sunday b/c there’s barely a path from the top of the stairs, through the loft, into our room, into our bathroom, and into our closet. I never knew that gutting a 130 square foot room could create such insanity.

HOWEVER, I’m not writing to complain and there is a point to this if you read to the end. I began sorting through everything in my closet and have eliminated about 40% of my clothes and shoes. I have a huge pile for donation, a moderate pile for consignment, and a pile for my friend Kedra’s Little Sister (she has been mentoring the same young lady in the Big Brothers, Big Sisters program for eight years now).  Ed did an amazing, beautiful job. I can’t even begin to convey how impressed by and proud of him I am. When Ed and I met, he truly did not know how to do anything “handy.” He just didn’t grow up in that sort of environment. I came from a family where my dad can do anything and everything, so it was strange to me. However, over the past nine years, Ed has become so talented. Although our home was new when we purchased it, it was a spec home and so therefore we weren’t able to make any selections. We have changed SO much and Ed has done 90% of it because he enjoys projects and learning.   The closet came as a result of him feeling bored because he hadn’t done a big project in a while. I was the one who was dragging my feet because I knew it would be a mess, although I did not know it would be THIS big of a mess.  Anyway, it’s incredible and it is the closet I’ve always wanted! Sounds silly, but I love to be organized and I love me my clothes and shoes and handbags. In our last home (remember, the 380 square foot one – three hundred and eighty, just in case you thought there was a zero at the end of that number), I didn’t even have a closet. Honestly, NO closet for three years. Now I have a custom closet of my dreams.

So, onto the point of my title. This past week, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking while I stand in the middle of the loft and have panic attacks. I’ve been bogged down in a lot of stuff – physical stuff and mental stuff. I’m well on my way to dealing with the physical stuff, but the mental stuff, well, not so much. I’ve mentioned it before, but I’m having a very hard time dealing with the care that Mattix rec’d before he came to us as well as the ridiculous nine month wait between his referral and our travel. I know families are waiting a long time now because of the I600 policy. We were the first group approved under it, but we only had to wait a week. Our wait was for different reasons and in my not so humble opinion, those reasons are very unclear and invalid. I I suppose this is exactly how a lot of people who have had to wait for a long time because of the I600 process feel. It’s upsetting to say the least.

Why do I care at this point, you might wonder. Aren’t you supposed to forget about all that once you have your child? Sure, maybe, if you’re the forgetting type and the fact that your child has struggled immensely because of that extra time in the orphanage doesn’t upset you much. Then maybe you’d forget. But, unfortunately, I’m not the forgetting type and my child has struggled immensely, both because of the crappy, unfair, terrible care (in my opinion)  he received in the orphanage (well beyond what we were prepared for) and because that “extra” time he spent there has only made his transition all the more difficult. It is still very difficult for him.

I spend a lot of time dwelling on that. I look at him and wonder why he had to endure that. I get very upset. I lay in bed at night and think, dwell, obsess. This is not my personality and this is not something I do. Ever. While I will admit to never forgetting anything and often failing to totally let things go, I most certainly do not do this. I feel like I’m not even much fun to be around right now because I can’t get my mind in the right place. I’m allowing it to affect my mood and my feelings and let’s be honest, this is all going to affect my ability to be the best parent I can for Mattix if I don’t get my mind in the right place.

So, that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to spend the next week not doing a damn thing productivity wise. I’m not going to sign onto the Internet ONCE beginning Wednesday, I’m not going to clean anything, Ed is taking the week off, and we’re going to enjoy it as a family and with my family (my parents and my brother). I’m going to spend the next week doing my best to LET GO. As another adoptive parent honestly who gets all of this and truly validated every last one of my feelings recently told me, I won’t over get over it completely. (You know who you are and I hope you know how much I appreciate you.) She’s right. How do you ever get over that?  I won’t every get over it completely. But I think I can let it go. I need to let it go. And that’s what I’m going to do.

I plan to “write” my way through it and so at the end of my week, I will begin posting my thoughts. Writing really, truly helps me work through things. I’ve done that my whole life. I’m debating just how much I’ll share as far as the details of the situation go, but whatever I share, it will be far more than I will post without a password. Therefore, all of my upcoming posts will be PW protected and the PW will be different than the one I’ve used previously. I’m more than willing to share it with just about anyone who asks, so if you’d like it, please leave a comment and let me know. I really have no issues with sharing this with anyone who wants to read, but I do want to know who is reading. I’m a pretty open book, but there are some things that I just don’t want on the open Internet, you know?

To end on a great note, Matty Bug turned 18 months old on Thursday. He went to the pediatrician on his 18 month “birthday” and was the unfortunate recipient of two shots. The upside is that he must be in the middle of a huge growth spurt because in the past three months, he has gained over two pounds and grown over two inches! He’s getting sooo big. I’ll post something about his general progress next week.

Until then, I hope everyone’s week is wonderful. I’m still sadly behind in google reader and it’s only going to get worse this week, but one day, I’ll be all caught up!

I rule the world

 

Okay, maybe I don’t rule the world, but thanks to Kelli, I am in possession of my very first blogger award. AWESOME. Thanks, Kelli!  The following Q&A is everyone’s punishment for reading my blog:

A. Attached or single? Very attached. Poof…and there went my 20’s. Just kidding. Happily attached.

B. Best friend? Laura. Not me. I’m lame, but not that lame. My best friend’s name is also Laura.

C. Cake or pie? Both

D. Day of choice? Friday  

E. Essential item? Diet Coke

F. Favorite color? Black. It makes the ass look less expansive.

G. Gummy bears or worms? Gross, neither. Sourpatch kids, thank you very much.

H. Hometown? I’m too paranoid to share this much info. Someone might steal my identity. I try not to share too much on my blog. Ha ha ha.

I. Indulgence? Massages, pedicures, chocolate, and wine. I have a kid that doesn’t sleep, so I’m entitled to more than one.  

J. January or July? That’s a hard one. It’s cold in January, and I don’t like the cold, but it’s 115 in July, and who likes that? I pick April, because it’s my birthday month and the weather is awesome!  I’m a rule breaker. Look at me. I’m crazy. I’m not even answering the question.

K. Kids? One amazing little guy and hopefully one equally amazing little girl in the not-so-distant future.

L. Life isn’t complete without? Friends, family and faith (answer shamelessly hijacked from Kelli because it’s the truth). 

M. Marriage date? February 10

N. Number of brothers & sisters? One cool little brother

O. Oranges or apples? Apples

P. Phobias? Snakes, definitely snakes. I mean, have you seen me in this picture???

Q. Quotes? “I think the American people – I hope the American – I don’t think, let me – I hope the American people trust me.” -George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Dec. 18, 2002

R. Reasons to smile? My family, my friends, my life, this ROCKIN’ body that I get to stare at in the mirror every damn day.

S. Season of choice? Spring

T. Tag: I’ll do it tomorrow b/c I’m too tired right now to link. Matty Bug isn’t sleeping at night…AGAIN.

U. Unknown fact about me? I’ve had my belly button pierced since I was 19. It looked less offensive back then, when my stomach was flat.

V. Vegetable? Avocados (Shut up. As far as I’m concerned, they’re sold in the produce department, right next ot the tomatoes, so what else would they be???)

W. Worst habits? My foul mouth

X. X-ray or ultrasound? Hmmm, I’d have to say ultrasound because you don’t have to remove your jewelery.

Y. Your favorite food? Mostly anything that I can shove down my gullet. But if I have to be specific, I’d say pho, pizza from Pizza Picazzo, and chocolate.

Z. Zodiac sign? Aries

Thanks, Kelli! I’ll pass it on this weekend! This made my day.

Lots of stuff to learn

First of all, Matty and Baby D went on a date. I think things went a little *too* well.  Lots of kissing, although I have to say that Baby D, in all of her cuteness, makes Glow Worm look pretty lame. Way to go, Matty. Huge upgrade.  They are so stinking adorable in their photos, and Delila’s pigtails make me melt. I haven’t uploaded any pictures yet, but for now, you can go HERE to Kelley’s blog and check them out.

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Despite the fact that I probably sound like a moron most of the time on my blog (and in real life), I really do like to learn. I thought I’d share some of the things I’ve learned over the past month with you, just in case you could learn from them as well.

Today, I learned that if you forget to feed your child lunch, it really IS possible to make a meal out of the Costco samples. I had a doctor’s appointment this afternoon and I wanted to let Mattix sleep as long as possible. If I know anything, it’s that waking him up before he is ready is a very, Very, VERY bad idea.  I had made a PB and J sandwich and cut it into little squares to take with us, then I had put it in the fridge. PB and J is less messy when it’s cold. When Mattix woke up, I literally had five minutes to dress him and get out of the house. Well, guess what I forgot?

Anyway, he made it through my appointment with a Whole Foods breakfast bar from the diaper bag, then we stopped by Costco on the way home to pick up a few things for dinner. I was walking around trying to find something I could grab and open up to feed him when I discovered it was sample day. Awesome. Being a Celiac, I cannot take advantage of sample day, but my kid sure can. He had a fairly well balanced meal in little snack sized cups that consisted of noodles & cheese, some chicken sandwich, yogurt, Barenaked juice, lentil soup, apple juice, and for dessert, a piece of Skinny Cow ice cream sandwich. The only think he declined was a peanut butter cliff bar sample, and he did so by leaning over and spitting it down the front of his shirt and onto the floor. Mmmm, good.  I enjoyed cleaning that up. Overall, I felt pretty positive about the situation and he loved the variety. If anyone knows where I can enter myself into a mom of the year contest, be sure to leave a comment and let me know. I feel like I have a fighting chance.

Last week, I learned that one does not “prepare” an avocado by peeling it like an orange, then using a knife to cut it into little chunks. As it turns out, one cuts the avocado vertically, pulls out the pit, and uses a spoon the remove the avocado from the skin, making neat little slices to put on the salad. I learned this when, apparently for the first time, Ed saw me preparing an avocado for my salad. He looked at me and said, “What in the hell are you doing?” Actually, he didn’t say hell b/c Mattix was napping, but I’m trying to clean it up for the blog.  Then he showed me how one cuts an avocado. The light went off and it all suddenly made sense – so THAT’S why avocados on my salads in restaurants look like that.  Now my hands aren’t a slimy, avocado covered mess when I make my salads. I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned that I know nothing about anything in the kitchen.

The week before last, I learned that when someone asks you something about your child’s ethnicity under the guise of an “innocuous” question, it’s not always a guise. I’ll explain the lesson at the end of the story. This is why I’m never initially rude to anyone who asks about Mattix unless it is VERY clearly inappropriate. This experience was one of the funnier things that has happened to me lately.

Mattix and I stopped in a VNese restaurant to grab an in iced coffee. I’m thoroughly addicted to them and any time I see a VNese restaurant, I pull over. We’ve been to the same one about 20 minutes from my parent’s house a handful of times. In fact, we took Karen, Andrew and Khai there while they were in town. Anyway, whenever Matty and I stop by during the day, there’s a young girl there – about my age, hence the “young” descriptor, because I’m so young. I’m pretty sure she co-owns the place with her grandma. I’m almost certain I read that somewhere. Anyway, her English is perfect. I mention this so that you know there was absolutely NO language barrier impeding our conversation. It would be less amusing if there were. This is how our conversation went:

Her: I’ve seen you guys in here a few times. He is such a doll. What ethnicity is his father?’

Me:  {smiling, and being sincere) Oh, I don’t know.

Her: His father’s ethnicity? You don’t know?

Me: No, unfortunately, I don’t have a clue.

Her: Um, oh, so you really have NO idea?

Me: Nope, I wish I did, but really, I know nothing about his father. Absolutely nothing.

Her: Ummmm, oh, okay. I’m sorry, um, okay, well, um…

{She was clearly starting to feel awkward. I was feeling confused and a little frustrated. So I did what I never do, which was voluntarily offer up additional information about Mattix}

Me: Well, we do know that his mom is Khmer. We just don’t know anything about his father.

Her: {Stares at me for a minute} Ohhhh. OH. OHHHH! So you didn’t have him? Oh! {Starting to laugh.}

Me: {Finally getting why this conversation was going the way it was. Laughing.} He was born in Vietnam and we adopted him in December. We only have information about his mother, but nothing about his father. Now I know why you were so confused!

So, yeah, the woman at the restaurant must have thought I was a hooker who didn’t keep track of my clients. She truly thought he was my biological child and that I had absolutely NO idea who his father was. As in, I must have had so many partners that I couldn’t even remember if one of them was Asian. Suddenly, the look on her face during our conversation made a lot of sense.

So, my lesson that week was that when someone asks me about Mattix’s father’s ethnicity (which I actually get asked often enough), it’s not necessarily just a nice way of asking whether he’s adopted without coming out and asking it directly. Sometimes, people might actually think he’s my bio child! I just never thought anyone would ask that sincerely. It’s usually something people who are very curious ask when they are trying to be respectful and not make assumptions.

So, those are my lessons from the past three weeks. Like I said, always learning…

I am SO far behind in google reader that it’s not even funny. The other day, I had 250 posts to read. I managed to read down to 150, but you guys keep writing stuff. STOP until I catch up, k? I’ll get there one day, but right now, I’m sooo tired that I’m going to bed by 9:00, which for me is the equivalent of a normal person going to bed at 4:00 in the afternoon. Night!

Fun times around our house

I haven’t disappeared. We’ve just been having too much fun and have been far too busy to blog! Andrew, Karen, and Khai made our week awesome! It was so great to have them here, and I swear, Karen made the best choice for someone who wanted to punish herself and her family by visiting us in August. Our weather was really mild last week and it was actually enjoyable. It was back up to 112 yesterday and today should be about the same.

I don’t even know where to start. We just had a really, really great time. I’ll update this and post some photos later today. I have far fewer photos than I would like, but to be honest, we were just having too much fun for me to worry about getting pictures of everything. We do have a few cute ones, though.

So, I guess I’ll post a few highlights so that I can remember our week:

–  Andrew, Karen, and Khai, at the airport baggage claim, with a plastic bag full of puked-all-over clothes, courtesy of Khai. Yup, he hit all of them on their way out here.

–  Mattix, crying and whining on the way home from the airport b/c I drove everyone through In N Out (Karen and Andrew don’t have this novel creation where they live). Mattix wanted him some fries ASAP and he was not interested in waiting until we got home. So we all heard about it for quite some time.

–  Upon arriving at our house, Khai heading straight for one of the huge boxes of toys and digging out, piece by piece, the one and only train that Mattix owns. He then assembled the entire thing and played “woo woo” at the table until Mattix ruined his fun. That kid is amazing with trains. He really had to dig through the box to find all three pieces, and he somehow knew there were only three, ’cause as soon as he had the third, he began assembling. Very impressive.

–  Andrew, Karen, Ed and I having our nanny come over at 4:30, hanging around until 6:00 so that Khai could get to bed, then crapping out and coming home at 9:30. Seriously. We were all excited for our adults night out and we didn’t even make it to 10:00. We suck.

–  Making it a bit longer on Friday night and having a really great time. My parents and my friends Kedra and Heather came over. Ed made his awesome pho and lemon grass chicken, accompanied by some margaritas, and some wine, and some beer, and some Goose and Tonics. It was an early morning on Saturday. I’ll leave it at that. Kids don’t seem to respect the sleep it off rule.

– Me, drying my hair in the bathroom, then running out into the loft to find out what all the laughter was about, only to discover my son wearing my THONG around his neck. I guess he’d wandered into the bathroom, picked it up, and decided to model it for everyone. Good times, good times.

–  We’re such dorks that we decided to watch the slide show of all 750 photos that Ed and I we took while we were in Vietnam (the ones we FINALLy gave to Karen and Andrew while they were here). The low point for me was when a picture of my ASS came up on our 47″ television screen for everyone’s viewing pleasure.  Apparently, Ed thought he was being funny while we were in VN and snapped a photo of said ASS while I was walking in front of him. I vaguely remember this; he said he’d erased it. He apparently forgot. Until everyone saw it blown up on the television. Nice. (Just so as not to create any confusion, I was wearing pants. But still. Who wants to see that? Not me.)

–  Andrew informing me that my new, handy, pink computer actually has a built in SD card reader. WHAT??? How could I not know this??? That pretty much made my month. And yes, my life is so frickin’ awesome now that learning something like this thrills me that much. I’m being serious. I’m still a little giddy about it.

– Andrew and I arguing with Karen and Ed about what movie we were going to see. We voted for Pineapple Express and they wanted Batman. Actually, Ed was on the fence, so he was the swing vote. Karen and I spent all day trying to convince him to vote our respective ways. After an entire day of offering him things we all know would never happen, we didn’t even make it to the movie. 

–  Reliving our Vietnam trip memories, including all the ones involving Ed being treated like a Rock Star. I’m not sure I’ve ever posted about that, so I’ll do it soon. Let’s just say that Ed was quite popular with the ladies there. Like, really popular.  He had women giggling and fawning all over him. At a few restaurants, none of us could even get anyone to help us because three or four women were all over Ed. It was hilarious. At least he got to experience it for a few weeks, right? Then we came home.

–  Mattix jacking Khai’s sippy cup full of juice and……laxatives. Oh yeah, that was a good one. We were at the children’s museum when the action happened. Let’s just say that we’re lucky they have a family bathroom because that $hit (pun totally intended) required a group effort.  So. Not. Okay. Mattix has a habit of “sharing” sippy cups. It wasn’t a problem, until he got a hold of the “spiked” one.

– A conversation that went something like this:

Me: Is THIS where you took that photo of Mattix? HERE? On this Ledge? What? Are you kidding? You set my baby up there and then let go of him? Are you nuts? (You can click HERE to see the photo I’m talking about.)

Ed: Yup, that’s where. Come on, relax. There’s plenty of room. He wasn’t going to fall.

Me: What the hell?  That’s insane. I’m so mad at you. He could have fallen off and died.

Ed: Oh come on. It’s fine. He wouldn’t fall off. There’s plenty of room, even if he fell backwards. Plus, I was standing right there.

Andrew: I think we need to put both the boys up there and get a group photo.

Me: Okay. Great idea.

Karen: WHAT????

And so we have awesome photos of the boys on the ledge. Unfortunately, they’re on Ed’s camera. He’s out of town and he took the camera with him. So, I’ll post those this weekend. The boys are so cute together. They play incredibly well and get along wonderfully. My favorite moments are when Khai rubs Mattix on the head and Mattix tries to kiss Khai. I think Khai is attempting to teach the Matty Bug that boys don’t kiss each other, but rather do manly things like head rubs, but Matty is undeterred. Oh, and Khai was awesome for Mattix’s sleeping. The little guy slept eleven to twelve hours every night, which is unheard of around here. I offered to let them all move into our guest room and live rent free for the next 16.5 years. I’m not feeling too confident that they will accept this wonderful offer.  I feel like that might have something to do with the fact that Khai never switched over to our time zone and therefore graced his mommy and daddy with his presence at 4:00 am-ish every day except for one, when he threw them a bone and slept until 5:30. Lucky for Karen, he did that one the day that Ed and Andrew went golfing early in the morning. I *almost* felt guilty that they got up so early every day and I kept my lazy butt in bed until nearly 7:00. Almost.

And then they left and Ed got the brilliant idea to GUT our master bedroom closet. It’s something I’ve wanted since we moved in, but the timing wasn’t the best. I mean gut. He took everything out, ripped up the flooring, ripped off the baseboards, tore down every last builder-installed shelf, and started over. Ed is amazingly talented when it comes to this kind of stuff, but if you recall, I don’t handle messes that well. I apparently have a LOT of stuff in that closet, because our bedroom, bathroom, and entire loft are FILLED with piles and stacks of I don’t even know what. It’s a freaking disaster around here, and he won’t be able to finish it until this weekend. I often have to take a moment to curl up into the fetal position and rock a bit when I pass through these areas. On Sunday, and then Monday after work, he managed to gut everything, paint, install real hardwood floors, and begin assembling and installing the closet system of my fantasies. Yes, that’s right, my fantasies. Normal women dream of, um, well, other stuff. I dream of a perfect closet. It will be done by the weekend and I can begin putting everything I own away. I keep my closet very organized, but I realize that I have a LOT of stuff that I don’t need. Like four inch wedges and four inch stilletos that I will NEVER be able to wear again.  I’m so excited because I’ve always wanted a “real” closet. When we lived in Coronado, we didnt’ even have a pretend closet! In fact, our bedroom there was smaller than my closet here. So I’m super stoked, but I’m also a little overwhelmed right now.

These photos are from the new children’s museum, which, IMO, left quite a bit to be desired. I’m not sure how the term “museum” works. It reminded me of a not-so-stellar children’s play facility. I guess if the boys were older, they could have enjoyed more of it. However, I’m still unsure of the whole “museum” aspect. Anyhoo…

 

 

 

 

 

Matty and Khai passed things back and forth in the car. It was super cute. I’m far too old and decrepit to fully twist around in my seat, so unfortunately, I cut off most of Khai! But you get the idea. They were really sweet.

 

Mattix and Khai on the way home from Sedona. They were D-O-N-E. The great Sedona pictures are on Ed’s camera, so I’ll post those this weekend.

 

 

Karen put Mattix’s Bobo from DC on his back (the hands and feet have Velcro). He looked at her like, “Finally! Someone who knows what to do with this thing!” He loved it. Now my kid has a monkey on his back.

Finally, when Ed, Matty and I were in Home Depot, buying stuff for our “little” project, I took these. I thought they were so cute. He’s fascinated with balloons and they had a bunch of them on a display to indicate a giant crap sale. Seriously, there was way too much junk on those tables. Anyway, Mattix wanted the balloons. They were tied to the table, but I handed him the strings. He was a riot, playing peek-a-boo by hiding behind the balloons, then pulling them aside and laughing his little head off.  I looked like a total idiot taking photos of my kid in Home Depot, but what do I care?! Then a few of the balloons came detahed and floated away. So we moved on.

 

Locked out

What could have been a very funny story turned into an hour of trauma for the Mattix and me. This might get a little long…

On Friday I finally decided to pull out the giant suit case full of Mattix’s winter clothes and deal with them. After we came home from our month in DC, I put 90% of his winter things in one of our huge suitcases, put it in the hall closet, and pretended it didn’t exist. I mean, it was March, and there’s no need for winter clothes in March where we live. I’m not entirely sure there’s really a need for winter clothes at all. I’ve been on a rampage the last few days and have sorted through just about every drawer and closet in our house (I know, you already think I’m a freak and here I go, doing more freakish things). So, I pulled out that bad boy and after lots of sorting and stacking and whatnot, I had my piles of donate, keep b/c I love them so much I can’t let them go, and put aside for this winter b/c I’m pretty sure he’ll still fit into the 6-12 month sweaters. Little peanut.

I started taking the “donate” clothes out to the garage, as I already had a big pile of various donations from the past few days of said rampage. A little boring background so that this makes sense: we bought our house new three years ago. The door between the garage and the house has never shut tightly on its own, meaning we cannot use the handle lock (you know, the small lock that you twist on the handle, but that is really useless as far as security goes) because the door will not shut tight, anyway. ONE month each year – ONE MONTH - when it’s humid here, the door swells and it actually shuts. The other eleven months, the damn door has to be kept shut with the dead bolt, which I always keep locked so that Mattix cannot escape into the garage (and because I’m one of the weirdos who is obsessive about locking doors). All of this is to say that when I’m going in and out of the garage, he will follow me out, come in, etc., on his own. The door is semi-heavy and spring loaded (I don’t know how else to describe it – it shuts on its own), but that kid is strong and he can open it up and get out (and in) just fine. So basically, the door shuts, but not tightly, so you just have to push (or pull) and it opens, without needing to turn the handle. Make sense?

So Friday, I walked out with an armful of clothes and began to put them into my donation boxes. Mattix came out with me, poked around the garage for a bit, then got hot. He actually said “hot” once and looked at me like, “Hey crazy woman, let’s get back into the house where it’s 75.” I told him I was almost done and we’d go right in. I guess he’d had enough, because he marched over to the door and let himself in. It’s funny, because usually I have to drag him back into the house, kicking and screaming. But not Friday. He walked into the house, the door slammed, and not two seconds later, I heard it. That little, tiny, almost silent click. I knew right away what happened.

I walked over and tried the handle, and sure enough, he’d locked the door. Mattix has never, ever, not once, even tried to lock any door, and yesterday, he was so inspired. And he got it on his first try. There wasn’t even any jiggling or anything first. Just one. single. click.

I started jiggling the handle and told Mattix to touch the door, unlock the door, you name it. Within fifteen seconds of this happening, he freaked the eff out. I mean flipped out. Screaming, crying, horrifying sobs. I couldn’t figure it out. I knew he couldn’t have realized that he’d locked me out that quickly. I tried to talk to him, I tried to say his name over and over, I used all of his favorite words, and nothing. I pulled pieces of paper out of the recycle and pushed them under the door, tyring to get his attention so that he could calm down. I did this for a few minutes, but the screaming got louder and louder and the terror in his voice just eslcalated. When I first realized the door was locked, I thought I would remain pretty calm, but I started to panic a little bit. 

The true bit of humor in all of this is that I was locked out in brightly colored lounge pants and a freaking white tshirt, no bra (as if I need one), because I had laid down for an hour during his nap. Oh, and I was wearing my “house slippers” – Karen, you know what I’m talking about! Those nasty orange things that you laughed at when I came to visit. So I’m wearing these old, thin, multi colored lounge pants that are two sizes too big, an old, ratty, half see through white tshirt, the nastiest slippers you’ve ever seen, my hair is piled on the top of my head in a knot, and I’m sweating like a pig because it was 115 degrees outside. Yes, 115 degrees. It was at least that hot in the garage.

I realized that I was not going to be able to help him calm down through the door and that I needed to figure something out. I hit the garage door opener and headed down the driveway. When I got to the end, I realized why he was such a mess and I thought I might throw up.

A UPS truck was parked on the street.

Our houses are situated in such a way that the garage is on one side of the house and the front door is on the complete opposite. We have a long driveway on the garage side, and a long walkway on the other. It’s impossible to see anyone at the front door from the garage side. It’s also impossible to see someone parked on the street if the vehicle is not directly in front of the driveway,  unless you actually walk down the entire driveway. I had taken off, running in my nasty slippers, to get to my neighbor’s house, and I saw the UPS truck.

What the hell, you might be thinking. I can’t remember if I’ve written about this, but Mattix has a pretty severe sensory integration issue with loud, sudden noises. In our house, the two things that always set him off are the dryer buzzer and the door bell. If you could see him react to either of these things, you’d understand why I almost threw up when I saw the UPS truck. When the door bell rings or the dryer buzzer goes off, the most horrifying look of terror covers his little face, his eyes get huge and wild, he SCREAMS, lunges at me, literally climbs my body, clings to me, and cries in a tone that I am unable to put into words. It only takes one minute of me comforting Mattix for him to return to normal, but until he receives that comfort, he is NOT. OKAY. He is terrified.

I knew, at that moment, that the UPS man had rang the door bell. Twice. Because he always rings it twice if I don’t answer after the first time. And Mattix was sitting on the other side of the door, scared to death, needing me, and I couldn’t get to him. I literally ran to my neighbor’s front door, rang her door bell and pounded on the door, and flew into her house when she opened the door (I scared the crap out of her, by the way). Kedra is a very good friend of mine  and why I had never thought to give her a key is beyond me. But she didn’t have a key and I needed a phone. She was on the cell phone with her manager (she works from home) and here I was, yelling like a mad woman. I grabbed her cordless, calling my mom as I ran back home.

When I got back to the door, I could still hear him, sort of half screeching, half crying. I’ve never heard him so upset. I got a hold of my mom and told her I needed her to bring our key immediately. She was at the grocery store and headed straight to the parking lot. I hung up with her and was trying to talk to Mattix, but nothing I said helped. Five minutes later, my dad called me. My mom had given him the key ring with our house key on it the day before and had remembered as she was getting into her car. He was at the service department of the car dealership, waiting for them to bring his truck up (on an unrelated note, someone had tried to break into his truck in the craziest way ever. I’ll write about that b/c I’ve never heard of it). He left as soon as they had his vehicle out, but that added another five or so minutes. Oh, and it was rush hour traffic on a Friday.

My mom then called me back and told me I needed to get somewhere so that Mattix could see me. The only place is in the backyard. Did I mention I’m a security freak? We have an industrial sized Master Lock on the gate. So heaved my FAT ASS over the eight foot block wall – actually, the gate – to get into the back yard. I ran to the back door and started pounding on it and calling for Mattix. He was so damn upset he couldn’t even focus.

At some point, he wandered into my view, but I couldn’t get his attention. I called the house, waited for the answering machine to pick up, and started saying, “Mattix, where is the dog? The dog is outside. Go find the dog? Where’s the dog.” I watched his poor little body shaking and shivering, stumble to the back door. He finally saw me, and for a moment, that made it worse. He tried his best to open the glass door (he knows how to slide it if it’s not locked) and when he realized it wouldn’t open, he got even more upset. He kept yelling, “Mama, Mama, MAMA.” It was horrible. He was drenched in sweat, covered in snot, his eyes were swollen and red, and he couldn’t stop crying. I was thisclose to breaking a window and climbing through, but it was late on a Friday afternoon and I knew we probably wouldn’t be able to get anyone out to the house to fix it over the weekend, so I tried to remain rational.

I sat cross legged in the sun against the door for what seemed like an eternity, but was probably more like 30 minutes, talking to Mattix in my happy mommy voice, doing everything I could to calm him. We went through all of the body parts he knows (which is a lot), all of his favorite words, his favorite people, everything I could think of at that moment. Finally, I heard the door open and my dad walked in. He immediately unlocked the back door and I grabbed Matty. He cried harder. His little body was soaking wet, his hair literally felt like he’d just gotten out of the bath, and he had poo’d. Poor little guy. 

It didn’t take him long to calm down. I gave him a bottle (we only use those at bedtime and nap time now), changed his diaper, took off his sweaty clothes, and rubbed his back. He was back to himself within a few hours. My dad and Kedra (neighbor) were there, which was a great distraction b/c he really likes both of them, and then my mom came over later in the evening until Ed got back into town.

And so, for anyone who is wondering, the maternal instinct does not require biology. I didn’t realize what a sweaty mess *I* was until Kedra said something. I had been sitting outside in the sun and it was 115 degrees and I never even noticed. I was literally soaking wet.  My blood sugar was so low for the rest of the day that I cannot tell you how much juice I drank, and I was low another four times during the night.  I didn’t even realize the kind of stress a mom can experience when she cannot comfort her child. The physical reaction is real. And this wasn’t some huge incident. But to see his scared, confused face, hear his cries, and not be able to do anything about it was gut wrenching.  If the doorbell had not rang, I know it wouldn’t have been that bad. I actually believe I could have gotten him to unlock the door. When he wants to, Mattix can follow a list of instructions like nobody’s business.

I’ve learned my lesson about locks.

On a positive note, Karen, Andrew and Khai are flying in tomorrow. We are sooo excited to have them here, and I’m sure they will enjoy our lovely weather as much as we do.