Meanwhile, elsewhere in BlogLand...

I was recently interviewed by Elizabeth Flora Ross for The Mom Pledge Blog.  She is doing a series on women, the different birthing experiences they can have and the perceptions surrounding them.

I was honoured to be chosen to talk about my experience having a homebirth.  I hope you stop by and read the story.

Here is the apple pie story she references in the interview.  Elizabeth was quite tickled by it.

Happy Mother's Day Part 2

I hope everyone in blogland had a happy Mother's Day. My Mother's Day spread out over two days, lucky me. On Saturday my friend Poppins was ordered out of her home for top-secret Mom's Day crafting so we went shopping (I am always ready to help a friend in need--especially if it is a shopping emergency). I bought some yummy scrummy hand dyed Nova Scotian yarn destined to be a lovely lace scarf as well as a new book-not knitting or mommy related (The Time Traveler's Wife). The next day hubby baked me lemon pie and let me knit for hours. My wrists gave me hell for that one, but I don't regret it.

I also got to surf the web and found a new blog that all mommas who love gossip should read (Rebecca, I am looking in your general direction.) Mamarazzi is the place to go for celebrity snark put together by several blogging mamas.

Oh, check out my food blog for Crock-Pot Sloppy Joes. They feed a crowd and freeze well--great for emergency rations!!

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day! Have some flowers.

New Questions

We had our first session with the Speech Pathologist today. As of this moment we now have many, many questions and no answers. Why are Emmett's orofacial muscles weak? How do we strengthen them? Why can he sit with a pen and fill a sheet of paper with tiny squiggles but cannot undress for a bath without a lot of help? Why does he focus intently on a toy, but won't make eye contact with his playmate? The speech pathologist seems to think his reactions to certain stressful situations are inappropriately intense. She also doesn't think he interacts with people in an age-appropriate way. This means more referrals and more waiting. One referral is with the occupational therapist in her department, and one is with a pediatrician who specializes in child development. We are in for a loooooong wait for the doc appointment. The OT will probably be in a week or two.
I am so happy we are starting to get the wheels in motion to get Emmett better, but I am so scared of these newly uncovered issues. I didn't realize how complex his situation was. I always saw the other problems but I was very quick to dismiss them--Moms are so good at looking at their children with rose-tinted glasses, we don't like having them removed.

I need help!!!

Why can I not stay on top of housework? Fellow bloggers, I need your tips, tricks and techniques to help me stay ahead of the avalanche.

Here is what I already do:
I keep a bottle of cleaner and rags in my bathroom so I can do a spot-clean as I get ready in the morning. I generally use my damp towel to wipe the floor and then drop it in the laundry chute.

I do laundry Every. Frickin'. Day. I fold the clothes right out of the dryer and each family member has a basket everything gets sorted into so I can carry one basket into one room and put everything away. In a perfect world everything gets put away everyday, but my world is far from perfect and it is a major thing that the laundry even gets folded regularly now.

I vacuum twice a week. I have a shedding dog so I should vacuum daily, but I don't.

The kitchen gets cleaned daily after dinner while hubby is bathing the kids. I try to unload the dishwasher as I am making breakfast so I can load it during the day, but if there are rugrats tugging at my coattails, it sometimes doesn't get done until I am doing the big evening clean. I like seeing clean counters first thing in the morning. I need to wash out my fridge more regularly--leftovers and spoiled condiments get thrown out once a week, I just don't wash the shelves often enough.

I plan our dinners a week in advance so I can do one big shopping trip and I never have to wonder what is for dinner. (This helps with my weight loss--I never have an excuse to eat junk because the ingredients for a healthy meal are always in the kitchen)

Generally my house is clean, it is just never, ever tidy and hardly ever dusted. I try to purge our belongings regularly, but as soon as I turn around, any given surface in my house is covered in junk. If you speak the language of Flylady you would say I have multiple hot spots in my house. How do I keep on top of them??? How do I deal with a husband who leaves piles of stuff everywhere and denies that he is messy? (Hey, I am messy too--At least I admit it!). What can I do? Leave me a comment! Maybe we can help each other.

In other news--my favourite belt is on the last hole and is getting too loose to do its job!!!
Check out my food blog for a couple of new recipes.

Have you ever had one of those days...

...Where you just feel like you are pretending to be whomever you are? That was me on Wednesday. I put on my little nurse outfit, threw my hospital ID and stethoscope around my neck, and I was playing dress-up at the hospital. I forgot how many kinds of tired there are and how many you can have at the same time until yesterday. Being a stay-at-home mom is hard, don't' get me wrong, but I never feel the crushing sense of defeat and failure at the end of the day that I do when I work at the hospital. Kids are pretty straightforward: first and foremost you just love them. Next comes food and warmth, then you can stimulate their little brains by playing with them or putting on a Dora video while you throw a load of laundry in the washing machine. Yep, I am bone tired by the end of a day with my kids, but I answer to no one. If I want to load up the v-v-v-van and go on little day trip, I can. If I want to sit in my PJs and serve ice cream for lunch, I can do that too. I forgot what a bureaucratic hell the hospital is (my Sunday shift was just a warm-up--there were no bosses or even doctors around on Sunday) Yesterday I was responsible for five patients and two student nurses while answering to my floor supervisor, charge nurse, the student's instructor and a bunch of doctors and surgeons (one or two for each patient). Truly dizzying after a year off and one shift to learn where things are. I don't wanna go back.

On a happier note, Emm and Char had a blast at the babysitter. The next morning Emmett grabbed my backpack and got ready to follow Richard out the door, just like the day before. He was really mad when he found out he had to stay home with me. I am glad things will work out with her.

We are going into the Big City to visit the Father-in-law and his family tomorrow. How bad would we look if we just dropped the kids off and checked into a hotel? Richard and I are wayyyy overdue for some alone time. Between the kids and our various other responsibilities, there has not been enough time to be a couple. I am tired of being too tired for him. I am tired of being in a rush and always keeping one ear open for a cry or the pitter patter of little feet that should be in bed. I want to run around naked and not care about how much noise we make. I have a two-hour drive to convince Richard we should do it. I don't think it will be too difficult. I know he feels the same way I do.

The trouble with two-year-olds.

My boy is very smart. My boy is very stubborn. My boy has a one-track mind. My boy loves DVDs and video tapes. He likes to carry them around, take them out and put them back in their cases, and watch them over and over. He screams when you mess with his plans and does not stop. This boy can throw a tantrum that will drive a sledgehammer between your eyes. He has no words, but he has volume and pitch.

I have relocated our movie collection once and now need to do it again and I am running out of patience and space. I put them out of his reach and he is now strong enough to carry a diningroom chair over to the high shelf and help himself. I cleaned out my china cabinet drawer to put things in because it is blocked by a playpen. I have no idea what to do with the stuff that was in the drawer.

I think I will be taking a big box out to the dumpster today. It is the sort of day to throw out useless crap. (and about half of the video collection--not hubby's half. Tossing out the Star Trek movie boxed set and the Star Wars movies is grounds for divorce, I think)

I need help! I am losing my mind. Did I mention I also have a baby to look after while I am doing all of this reorganizing? There is only so long she will sit in her exersaucer. Is 11:00 too early for Irish Coffee? Come on, it's cocktail hour somewhere in the world, right?

I am really, really, really looking forward to my night away tomorrow. Really, really really.

Stupid things people say.

So, my friend Cheryl and I took our kiddies to the mall this afternoon. Between the two of us there are: a three-year old, two year old, 8 month old, and a 4 month old. Yes, you can give us our medals (or drugs/alcohol) now.

The three year old needed new shoes. We went to the store were you always Pay Less. The person helping us had to have been raised under a rock or in some sort of cave, away from polite society. At the very least this woman should not be in a retail sales situation where the goal is to butter up people so they will spend gobs of money in your establishment. Yes, I know that people who work at the store where you Pay Less probably don't work on commission, but all salespeople have their sales tracked--you can get prizes and stuff. (I know this from experience)

Anyway, the little boy who needed shoes likes Dora the Explorer. There are no "little boy" shoes with Dora on them (or Diego, for that matter--wassup, Nickelodeon??) This little boy wanted to try on the pink shoes because Dora was on them. His Mom knew that one of the other three children in tow could blow like a volcano at any moment, so she found some shoes with Dora on them in his size. Enter the saleswoman. "Those are girl shoes." Uhh, do we look like we care??? Those of you with toddlers know all about choosing your battles. When the goal is to have shoes on feet, who cares which cartoon character is on them? For that matter--whose to say the small person in blue wasn't a girl in her big brother's hand me downs?? We both kind of rolled our eyes at the saleswoman, before continuing our search for shoes for the little boy. She tried to save face by making small talk about our children. She asked which of the children belonged to which of the mommies. She then turned to me and said: "Wow! You must have your hands full with two." She then glanced at me and added "And I see you are expecting again?" WTF????? Doesn't she know the cardinal rule? You don't ask if a woman is gestating unless she is telling you the time between her contractions, or talking about visits to the OB/Midwife/doula. I was gobsmacked--I mumbled something about not being pregnant (I was being polite because there were impressionable children around...and I was so stunned the appropriate snarky comment just didn't come to me) She then tried to backpedal by telling me all about her troubles losing weight post-partum as well.

Uh, Yeah. You lost me at "expecting again?".