Putting Tom Cruise to Shame

Seriously. Way cuter!

And for the record, he was totally playing the air guitar.

I’m not sure if the following photo would put anyone famous to shame. More likely, Mattix will hate me one day for posting it. I can’t help myself. He’s so cute! This happened back in December when I was really sick. I had showered and was doing my best to “get ready,” which is a term that is quite subjective these days. He went into my closet, which is normally against the rules b/c of the sheer amount of havoc this kid can wreak in there in five minutes flat. But he was totally quiet and busy and I was really sick. After 20 minutes, I got worried, so I walked in there and lost it! I couldn’t stop laughing. He took off running, so I had to grab the camera and hunt him down. How funny is this?! He was literally draped in my thongs and bras!

 I wish I could have gotten a better photo. He just wouldn’t hold still. It took a bit to untangle the mess and take all of the stuff off of him. And yeah, in case you’re wondering, I’m totally sexy these days, with my black and nude colored cotton thongs and plain bras. Ed’s a lucky, lucky man. I’ve been married for almost eight years, my ass is jiggly, and I look like beached whale these days - give me a break. Although there is a drawer with some (dusty) nicer stuff, Mattix obviously prefers the basics, too.

My poor bug still has a bug. Ed and I have been really lucky and were only mildly sick for a short period of time. Little guy has a hacking cough and the nastiest snot nose ever. I can tell he’s still not feeling well b/c he’s clingy and whiny, and Mattix isn’t a whiny kid…unless he’s sick. Then he’s whiny enough to make up for all the times he’s not whiny. Yesterday, I earned another mom of the year award. I’m going to need a full on room to display all those bad boys by the time I’m done. First, Ed, Matty and I went first thing in the morning to take care of something that absolutely had to be done yesterday. And guess what? We forgot to feed him breakfast. We ate lunch at Sweet Tomatoes after our errands. Poor little guy was so hungry that he totally ate the entire plate of food I gave him. This is significant because I chopped up tons of veggies, mixed them into his Mac and Cheese, gave him a huge side of cottage cheese, and a few crackers. Normally, he wouldn’t touch the mac and cheese if I were so bold as to mix in veggies. He HATES veggies and acts like I’m sneaking in rat poison when I have the audacity to try go put any in his food.  So he must have been really hungry to eat big chunks of broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, zucchini, and some other stuff.

Then Mattix and I went to Mayo Clinic , where we stayed for quite some time b/c my grandfather had (yet another) surgery. Mattix was amazing in the family waiting room. We were there for over three hours, which was only a fraction of the time the rest of my family was there. He truly was an angel…a really, really funny angel. In fact, he made a lot of families who were visibly stressed as they waited for their loved ones smile with his antics. I really needed to run a few errands at a few stores that were in the area. I totally thought I could just get him to hang on for a little longer, but he thought otherwise. He had his first major meltdown in a store. It was actually mild by some children’s standards, but it was a meltdown nonetheless. I was trying to put him in a cart and he wasn’t having it. He let me know – he kicked his legs straight out, arched his back, and WAILED! He kept yelling, “Nooooo! Mama! Noooooo!” like I was trying to kill him.  I tried using my stern voice and telling him he was going to have a time out if he didn’t get it together, but it was just so pathetic that I totally indulged him and carried him around on my hip for half an hour until he was amenable to riding in the cart. I normally wouldn’t let it go and would have taken him to the car for a time out, but I know he acted that way because he didn’t feel well. Which is why I deserve another mother of the year award…because we went to two more stores. At the third one, HE FELL ASLEEP IN MY ARMS.  This child does. not. sleep. anywhere. Ever. Other than his crib, where he only sometimes sleeps. But he totally passed out on my hip, his little sweaty head pressed up against my cheek. Even when I would shift his weight, he wouldn’t really wake up. Until I put him in the car seat. Then he woke up. And cried the whole 45 minutes home.

I fed him a late snack at 5:00. Ed made dinner and it was almost ready at 6:30 when Matty began demanded, “Milk. Baba. Nigh nigh. Peeeezzzeee! I asked him if he wanted to stay up just ten more minutes for dinner, and he cried! He just kept saying, “Nigh nigh…peeezzzeeee…milk…..peeeezzzeee!” She he went to bed at 6:30, fell asleep by 7:30 and didn’t get out of bed until 8:00 this morning. At 6:30, I woke up and asked Ed if Matty was still breathing! I hadn’t hear him cough since 2:00 a.m. and this is not a child to sleep through the night and especially so late. But I guess that’s what happens when your child is sick and you drag him to three more stores.

Anyone want me to babysit?

Kidding. He’s still a little unstable today. It doesn’t take much to set him off. And he’s really clingy. I hope he gets back to himself soon. I hate that he’s feeling under the weather, but I also have to say that compared to some of the bubonic plagues that have swept through our house, this one looks pretty good.

I’m working on a post that requires my brain, so it’s going to take another six months. Okay, not quite, but it’s taking longer to write b/c I seem to have little uninterrupted time lately. It will be up this weekend. It’s another post about things that people say and our reactions to them. I would really like your input because I’ve been giving this a lot of thought.

Makes me Proud!

Another week in review? I’m pretty much on track for that, being that this is my third weekly Sunday post. Really, I’m working on that. It was a busy week.

The low light is that Mattix got sick last week YET AGAIN and has some nasty virus YET AGAIN. And, yet again, Ed and I both have it. Hopefully it won’t last as long. I know this is from taking him to the child care room in the gym and I know I could make it stop by not taking him (and therefore not going to the gym), but that’s so not gonna happen. First of all, whether we get through it now or later (when he goes to preschool) we’re going to deal with the icky bugs while Matty builds up an immune system. Secondly, well, read on….

My kid has apparently had it with my jiggly, fat ass. We’re going to have to deal with the gym’s child care room sickness because I don’t want to offend him further. It’s gotten revolting enough that he is done being polite. On Friday, I walked up the stairs in front of Ed and Mattix. I was about 3/4 of the way up when Matty started yelling, “Mooooo! Mama! Mooooooo!” The hell? Seriously? My two year old is mooing at me? I know it’s not pretty, but honestly, I didn’t expect Mattix to start MOOING at me.  Ed laughed so hard, which only made Mattix do it more. Now he moos at me at least two or three times a day, often when I eat. Kids are smart.

My self esteem was pretty beaten down after that incident, and it almost took another  hit shortly thereafter, when I pulled out a pair of pants, shimmied into them, buttoned them (barely) and felt my muffin top spill over the edges, then nearly split the crotch when I took a few steps. It was hard to walk. I almost cried. I peeled them off and checked the tag. Thank goodness I realized I was trying on the exact same pair of pants that I intended to grab, only a size smaller. You know, the size I’d like to be again, but obviously won’t be for a while, given my moo status. But anyway, crisis sotra averted. I’ve never been so relieved to NOT be able to fit into a size 4. Didn’t thought I’d hear myself say that.

Now that part that makes me proud!

So, me and my jiggly, fat, deserving-of-mooing ass went to the gym on Friday, like always.  Matty walked into the gym. I often carry him, just because I’m usually in  a hurry and he has a nice, easily distracted, toddler saunter, which means it takes five times as long to get anywhere. But on Friday, he had dropped his bottle  as we were walking from the parking lot and my hands were too full to pick it up, so  I set him down to grab it. Then he decided he wanted to walk. Backwards. Really. He turned around, announced, “BACK UP,” and walked backwards all. the. way. into. the. gym. Good thing we were a few minutes early. Anyway, once we were through the front door, he turned around and marched right into the child care room. He plopped his little booty down on the floor, took off his shoes, stuck them in a cubby, ran up to the little gate (where they buzz the kids in), turned around to look at me, and said, “Bye byes!” (Bye bye is plural around here.)

How SWEET!

This was the first day where he didn’t whine – even just a little – when I left. In fact, it’s the first day where he wanted ME to LEAVE. I loved it. He is getting comfortable and I’m so proud of him. When I picked him up, he walked out, gave me a hug, found his shoes (there were like a billion pairs of shoes in the cubbies, but he knew exactly where his were), sat down, and tried to put them on. My baby is growing up so fast.

All of the girls there know his name (there are a LOT of kids) and are always telling me how cute and sweet he is, but on Friday, one of the girls told me that they really, truly love having him every day. She said that he is super polite, sweet with the other kids, “energetic” (we get that one a lot), and funny. I of course know all of these things, but it’s nice to know that when I’m not around, he  is still himself.  He still wants picked up occasionally, and one of the girls always picks him up when he needs it, but she just went on and on about what a pleasure it was to have him daily. She also said that he always wants to kiss the babies if one of them is holding a baby. What a sweetie!

Now if we could just get past the horribly disgusting communicable viruses that cause HUNKS of green, goopy, runny snot to flow from his nose 24 hours a day, we’d be good. He is having so much trouble sleeping because of the cough. Last night, he woke up at 11:00, screaming bloody murder. I’m not sure if he had a bad dream or just didn’t feel well. Ed had to rock him for nearly an hour until he fell back asleep. The one thing I can count on is that no matter how cruddy Matty feels, he won’t stay in bed…or still for that matter. He is so busy.

So far, it seems like maybe this won’t be another death virus for Ed and me. I’m crossing my fingers, because really, we deserve a virus/infection break around here. I just finished up six straight weeks of sick, and as nice as it would be to lose another 10 pounds from laying in bed, I’m not interested.

And that’s this past week in review. PROMISE there will be at least two more posts before next week, inluding one of “substance” (I use the term loosely these days) because there’s something that’s been on my mind lately. Happy Monday (is Monday ever happy?)!

Week In Review!

I’m getting really good at posting only once a week, huh? Well, because it’s been a full week, no time like the present for a week in review.

The highlights:

• Mattix fell down the stairs. The big, steep section. Thank God he was okay, but I totally flipped out, which caused him to flip out, which made the whole thing worse. I’m usually really good at holding it together, but he could have broken his neck and until I knew he was okay, I was NOT okay. He thumped and thudded the whole way down. I’m very lucky Ed was here at the time. I made poor Matty stand on the counter and do all sorts of crazy stuff until I was totally satisfied that his limbs (and brain) were okay.
• Someone in our NEIGHBORHOOD pulled a hit and run on one of our vehicles. Awesome.  It was either someone who LIVES in our freaking neighborhood or someone who was visiting someone who lives here because the gates were closed all weekend. Ed parked his car on the street while he rearranged the garage this weekend. It wasn’t like they accidentally backed into it, then didn’t notice. Oh no, they hit the driver’s side door with the SIDE bumper of their car and then apparently didn’t bother to stop. The ENTIRE door is totally smashed in. Super excited to pay for that one. I’m thinking about having Ed drive it as is, with the door bungee’d closed, to really get back to his carnie (sorry J) roots. Jury’s out. Note the the person who did this: Karma’s a Bitch…and I think this karma is way worse than my carnie (sorry, J) karma.
• Mattix has decided that he LOVES eggs, so long as they have some stuff  (white meat turkey, rice, veggies, etc.)mixed in, and he will only eat his eggs if they’ve been sprinkled with salt and PECKER. I can’t stop laughing. Every morning, I ask Matty what he wants on his egg whites like ten times, just so I can hear him say, “Salt and Pecker! Peeezzzeee!”  Then I offer him salt and pepper at lunch, but not until he says it. I don’t actually give him any, but he’s still satisfied by pretend sprinkle. Note to self: GROW UP.
• I made it back to the trainer twice last week. I could barely walk on Saturday. Mattix ran up to me and threw his arms around my legs and I’m pretty sure my natural instinct was to punch him. Hard. I think I cried a little. I thought my muscles hurt when I first started training again, but as it turns out, training after lying in bed on and off for six weeks, letting your muscles waste away, is much worse. Oh and I had my body fat re-done. Turns out  losing ten pounds while laying in bed isn’t necessarily a good thing when ALL of it is muscle. I lost TEN pounds and my body fat went UP. I pretty much rule. The really awesome thing is that my ass now shakes when I’m standing still. Makes you wonder how that works, huh? Don’t think about it too much. It’s sickening.
• It’s easy to stay on the Precor machine when your favorite re-run is on. I watched a full 45 minutes and If I didn’t have to be somewhere today, I totally would have stayed another hour so I could have watched the second Las Vegas on HD. But then I might have gotten really depressed, because I was having vague memories of what it was like to actually be able to do really crazy stuff, like, you know, go to Vegas every once in a while.

                Memory
                All alone in the moonlight
                I can smile at the old days
                I was beautiful then

Okay, so I wasn’t beautiful then, but whatever. I WAS 20 pounds lighter. Stop judging. I was really singing the song in my head while havin’ me some nasty thoughts about Josh Duhamel. Can’t help it. Sorry. He’s hot. But then I started to think about Fergie, which totally turned my nasty thoughts into the bad kind of nasty, so I refocused, stopped daydreaming about Josh Duhamel, and accepted the fact that I’ll probably be 50 by the time I get to go back to Vegas and party like a rock star (or stay out until midnight, but partying like a rock star is totally subjective). And by then, I’ll totally be all old and busted. I mean, I’m already wearing my brown or black mommy Uggs with everything. I took all of my heels and suits to the resale shop six months ago, and it’s been a downward spiral since then. It’s a slippery slope. So next time Ed and I go to Vegas, we won’t look like this:

Not that we looked good (at ALL), but it’s a lot better than this, which is totally gonna be us:

 

• Mattix says “Bug you” (love you) almost every night now, on his own. I can’t even handle it. On our way out of his room, he yells, “Nigh nigh. Bug you.” That makes not being able to go back to Vegas (ever, or until I’m old and busted) totally worth it.
• Ed and I had our first (and probably last for a long time) solo night. It was great! It involved lost of crazy…sleeping. Really, from like 10:30 p.m. until 9:30 a.m. Straight, uninterrupted, no-baby-monitor, sleep. It was waayyy better than what we could have been doing, which is what I know all you pervs were thinking.  Although the hotel bill suggested otherwise. I may or may not have had WAY too much wine at dinner (which was truly awesome – two hours of an adult-only dinner at a no-kids restaurant with adult food and adult drinks and ohmygosh I want more - and I may or may not have been messing around with the PayPerView channels, thinking I was funny (but really being stupid and drunk), and I may or may not have accidentally ordered PORN. I wish I were kidding. As soon as I did it, I was all, “No, No! Make it stop!” before it even started, and I turned it off, except that the resort doesn’t much care if you watch it or not b/c they still charge you $17.99. Did you read that? $17.99!  For that price, it should include the escort. Or does that cost more? I’ll have to ask the ex governor of New York. All I know is that no dude is gonna watch $17.99 worth of porn if he is so inclined to order it…and who else orders it, besides drunken moms who think it’s funny to read all the porn “synopses” out loud whilst snickering like a (drunken) idiot and I wanted my $17.99 back, but my wus of a husband was too embarrassed to call the front desk and tell them it was a mistake. Assuming any of that actually happened.

And I think that covers it. I REALLY am going to get back to posting three or so times a week. Ed took the past week off, so we spent the time getting lots of stuff done and hanging out together. It was strangely exciting to have one’s spouse HOME, IN TOWN, and available for an entire week. He more or less traveled all of October, November, and December. Good thing I’m the world’s best mom; otherwise, it would be really hard to do it alone for that long. HA! I crack myself up.  It was quite the rude wake up call today when I actually had to get out of bed when Matty woke up. One week of rolling out of bed whenever I was so inclined was NICE!

And just because I was going through old photos a while ago, here’s a cute oldie but goodie of Matty. We had only been home for about a month and it was a rare, super happy moment. I promise to put up our Christmas post this week.

Happy Monday!

Happy New Year and One Year Blog Anniversary!

I totally missed my one year blog anniversary. One year ago on January 2nd, I started the never ending bitch-a-thon about being impossibly overtired. That continued for a long time. I blogged through our hard times – some really, really hard ones, and our great times – many amazing ones. I blogged about my crappy parenting, the few occasions I didn’t suck, our trips, our months in DC, our scary surgery experiences, our never ending illness, our trip to the state fair, my humiliating Spanx experience, and a lot more! (I was totally going to link stuff and started doing it, but I’m tired, so I quit after two. Half assed, as per my usual lately.)

2008 was an incredible year. It was by far the most difficult and amazing of my entire life. That’s saying a lot, because I’ve had both many difficult and many incredible years. Mattix has changed Ed’s and my life in a way we never could have expected. We are so blessed to be his parents; he reminds us of that every day. Tonight, when he ran up to me as I was drying my hair and hugged my leg, then ran back to whatever he was doing, I was once again reminded how amazing it is to be a parent. (Yes, I was drying my hair at 5:00 p.m. That’s because Ed passed me today in the loft, took a look at my hair, and said, “For the love of God, when did you wash that $hit last? It’s getting bad, honey. Your blond hair is BROWN.” Shallow, much? I mean, when did it become all about looks. Or is this a personal grooming issue? Whatever. I took a shower AND washed my hair tonight. Big night. Crazy stuff going on at our house.) Last night, when Matty yelled, “Night Night. Wuv woo” as I was walking out of his room, I was reminded of how lucky I am.

It was a difficult year, for sure. Parenting isn’t for the faint of heart, and adoption sure as hell isn’t, either. Ed and I are practical and knew it wasn’t going to be easy in the beginning, but nothing could have prepared us. Difficult doesn’t begin to cover it. We were lucky to have nearly seven years of a well developed, strong marriage behind us. Interestingly enough, the one thing that wasn’t challenged during the past year was our marriage. We always said that if we made it through three years in a 380 square foot house while I was in law school and he was working full time and in his MBA program, we’d make it through anything. And while this past year was far more difficult than those three years combined, we were in an even better place.

I’m so grateful to my blog friends for being sources of amazing support during the good and the bad times. I procrastinated starting a blog for almost two years. I’m an over-sharer (although I just prefer to call myself honest) and I knew that if I started blogging, it wouldn’t be all happy and fluffy. And I’m a smart ass and as much as I sometimes try, it’s hard to make that part of my brain shut up. So, after one year, I’m glad I haven’t fully offended everyone and I’m so happy to have met the wonderful people that I have through blogging.

The past six or eight weeks have been tough and I haven’t had a ton of time. I’ve considered giving up my blog, but I can’t do it. I would miss everyone too much. For now, I’m reading everyone’s blogs and getting caught up, but not commenting much. Hopefully, during the next month, time will be more readily available. We just have a lot of changes happening, I’ve been dead ass sick and I’m generally behind in life. I finally started feeling half better on Sunday and am working on living a “normal” life again.

I’ve also started working part time from home. It’s going to be a bit of a challenge b/c I’m only willing to work during Mattix’s naps, after he goes to bed, and on the weekends, but we’ll see how it goes. One year of full time, at home parenting has turned my brain into a small, dried out, pea sized, broken, useless “part” and I’m truly amazed at how stupid I’ve become. I find myself talking to everyone – including my friends on the phone and the cashier at the grocery store – in that annoying, sing-songy voice, smiling waaayyy too big, and forgetting really important things, like, you know, why I went to the store in the first place.  But I’m sure smiley about it.

So, I’m going to see how this works out. And really, with the crap economy, this isn’t going to hurt. I’m not ready to work outside the home b/c I genuinely feel like Matty still needs me, but I’m also not totally comfortable with my brainless state of being. And of course what I’m doing is in the field I was SO not going to work in…sort of putting my $130,000 education to use. I have not become licensed in my state, nor do I have any intention of doing so in the near future, because I know that would be slippery slope for me (wherein I would slide right into LONG hours and a lot of time away from my family), but the fact of the matter is I’m familiar with this stuff and not too bad at it. The good news is that not being licensed means no court time and everything is done for a licensed attorney, which means, again, everything at home and not too difficult.

Again, we’ll see how this goes and whether I can keep up with it and not get too overtired and too distracted. I’m hoping this is the small amount of mental stimulation I’ve been craving lately. My ultimate goal is to have a part time career (not in law, because it’s not my passion and the kind of law I’d want to practice would suck the life out of me) when my children are in school, but hopefully this will keep my somewhat less stupid for the time being, even if for a few months.

Can I waffle on the issue any longer? Didn’t think so – I’m done.

On a super crazy, way too exciting note, Ed and I are going to spend our FIRST night together without the Bug. Slightly over one year and it’s going to happen. We’re staying at a local resort for a night this week and my parents are going to watch Matty. Both Ed and I (Ed obviously way more often b/c of work) have been away from Matty, but never at the same time. He’s going to be just fine, because he adores MaMaw and Papa. And want to hear a little role reversal? Ed surprised me with the plans. I asked him why we’re not staying for two nights (we’re using some of his bajillion hotel points and trust me, there’s enough for an eternity. Ed looked at me like I was the dumbest person on earth and said, “Because, HONEY, Mattix is so not ready for that.” Isn’t it the woman who is supposed to be all, “I can’t be away from my baby for more than a night?” Hmmmm…

You might be thinking, “Gross, a night together. Don’t even want to think about that,” but I can assure you that the dirtiest thing happening on our “special” night is probably going to be sleeping withOUT a baby monitor all. night. long in the SAME bed and THEN not getting out of bed until after 10:00 a.m. and only AFTER eating breakfast in bed. And then I’m totally taking a HOT shower ALONE and I’m washing my hair. Holy crazy shit, Batman, we’re ready to party.

Like I said, I’m catching up and reading blogs in Reader, just not commenting much. I’ll get back to that, I promise. I think most everyone takes a comment break here or there.  Oh, and I’ll update my other blog tomorrow.

To end my random post, I’m stealing Nicki’s idea and posting the first sentence from the first post of each month of 2008:

• January: So, finally, nearly two years after beginning our adoption process, we’re home from Vietnam with our son.
• February: First, a little whining because I’m still sick.
• March: On Thursday, my mom and I wanted to see the Holocaust Museum.
• April: Getting to the hole in the hoo ha (vajinga, vajajay, bits and pieces…).
• May: I’ve been quiet on the blog for the past week.
• June: So, somehow, I managed to drag Ed into a children’s shop with me today.
• July: First of all, thank you to everyone who shared their thoughts and experiences on my last post. I truly appreciate it and I value your opinions and personal journeys.
• August: What could have been a very funny story turned into an hour of trauma for the Mattix and me.
• September: Strange title, huh?
• October: If anyone is still out there, we’re still here!
• November: A few things have been on my mind lately.
• December: Ha! Well, I’m not! Everyone will be punished!

What did this year-in-review teach me? That if you only read the first sentence of my posts, you’d never come back because they’re totally lame. My one and only New Year’s Resolution is to start my posts of with something really super exciting. Except for today. ‘Cause I already wrote that.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!