My how she’s grown!
Mar 30, 2005 Parenting
One year ago today…
Very small Quicktime movie is here.
The song playing in the slideshow is my most very favorite lullaby (listen to the words): Child of Mine from the beautiful album “The Sun Upon the Lake is Low” by Mae Robertson and Don Jackson.
Happy 1st Birthday, Madison!
Possibly related posts
Tags: Madison
We’re outside
Mar 29, 2005 Writing
Our deck is a sunny haven. Both children are liquored up on their respective herbal and allopathic medications. (Now Noah has an earache and we’ve determined that Madison’s molars are causing all of her snotty angst.) I have wifi so here I am happily updating, keeping one eye on Madison who is digging in rice. Noah keeps coming by to dump rice down his sleeve (no, I don’t understand this game either) and then running out to swoop around on the swingset.
Yesterday Madison was standing in front of the glider rocking it back and forth (a favorite past-time of hers) and I said, “Hey, Madison, you want to give mommy a hug?” And she patted the arm of the rocker and said to me, quite seriously, “Dis.” As in, “Can’t you see, Mommy? I’m doing this.” I had to get my hug later.
I heard back from the editor last night. Message? Rewrite! Even less reporting and more personal hari-kari. I won’t have time to work on it for a couple of weeks.
I still want to write an antiadoption article that’s not related to my life but that’s not in the cards right now.
I have an interview to do today at 3pm and I have no idea how the kids will be. It was the only time I could schedule it so I’m just going to have to warn the person that I have two under-the-weather children. Oh well.
I did talk to a woman who has a couple of great kids about having her oldest daughter come and play with Madison a couple of times a week for an hour or so. I’m going to pay her five bucks and she won’t have to do diapers or anything — just hang with Maddie. Noah can have a friend over on those days, too, so they’ll both be occupied and I can catch up on work. I’m going to talk to the daughter herself soon and see if she’d want to bring a friend along. Madison has a small fan club of 10/11 year old girls. It’s the perfect age for almost-babysitting, I think. They love to play house with a cute toddler and since I’ll be here, their age is not an issue. I figure I’ll either sit here outside or at the kitchen table depending on where they’re playing.
Possibly related posts
Tags: anti-adoption, Madison, Noah
Madison is still sick
Mar 28, 2005 Parenting
I don’t know if it’s an ear infection or if the teething combined with the cold is bothering her ears. I’m dosing her with echinacea, Oregon grape root and wild cherry bark (she’s got a bad cough, too). I was also happy to see that organic strawberries finally made it to the market and got some for both kids. Cost me an arm and a leg but all of that vitamin C makes it worth it.
I bought a can of powdered goat’s milk. Madison can be off formula as of Wednesday and I’ve decided to go with goat’s milk even though she never had any trouble with her dairy-based formula.
This whole weaning thing is hard for me. She eats more than Noah did but by no means does she get the bulk of her nutrition from solid food. Breastmilk was a great comfort when Noah went through his “nothing but cheerios” or “nothing but bananas” stages as a toddler. I don’t want to eliminate formula entirely because I know she’ll need that stop-gap, too. But on the other hand, we don’t use the organic formula because it doesn’t have DHA/ARA (important for brain growth) and I worry about that. Also, any formula is an awful lot of sugar. So I’m thinking that we’ll go half-and-half for awhile and see how that goes. Goat’s milk is expensive but about half as much as formula.
It’s difficult to find good nutrition information for babies. It’s either extreme info very (appropriately) breastmilk biased, which is no help to me. Or else it’s so mainstream that switching straight to cow’s milk is unquestioned. I’ve decided that probably everybody is right and I’ll just do what keeps me sane, which this week at least, means goat’s milk cut with formula.
I’m very schizophrenic in my dietary/nutritional thinking. I was telling a friend that I stand in the aisle staring at the canned organic beans for what seems like hours. I could buy those organic beans, which are twice as much as conventional. Or I could buy dried beans, which are cheaper than canned beans altogether but at this grocery are only available conventionally grown. So I stand in the aisle with these three choices running around my head, recalculating the budget for the week and reviewing my menu plans. One week I’ll go home with organic canned beans and the next week it’ll be dried conventional but organic canned tomatoes. I only buy organic milk but rarely buy organic cheese. Noah will only eat Yoplait and Madison only gets YoBaby. I buy whatever is on sale for myself except for when I occasionally decide to cut back on dairy.
I figure it’ll all even out somehow. As long as we stay away from the hydrogenated vegetable oils (most of the time — my mom bought hideously colored but delicious cupcakes yesterday that were surely chock full of yummy poisons) and not make ourselves too crazy worrying, we’ll be ok. An obsession with a natural diet, some say, can be a form of eating disorder and I think this is true. I don’t want to make Noah nutsy anytime Daddy brings home Cheez-its instead of TLC crackers. On the other hand, I’d rather Brett just remembered not to buy the Cheez-its junk in the first place but I digress.
Possibly related posts
More on the death of the Easter Bunny
Mar 26, 2005 Parenting
I kinda knew that Noah was going to figure things out this year. He’s eight now and it seems like that’s an age when many kids start putting two and two together. I’ve always felt a little ambivalent about the whole thing. I loved it as a kid but I also remember how sad I was when I found out the truth. Unlike a lot of children, I didn’t feel betrayed — just sad. I guess I assumed that we could manage it as well as my mother did and I think for the most part we have.
So we’ve hung up stockings but I haven’t disguised my handwriting on the “To Noah” tags. And Brett took a bite out of each cookie but we never stood outside with sleigh bells. When Noah asked questions, we’d always answer with, “What do you think?” We never tried to explain away inaccuracies or contradictions because I figured that he would explain them away himself for as long as he needed the stories. I knew that if I spent too much time trying to keep up the myth, I would have to go to greater and greater lengths to gaslight him. I didn’t want to do that, which is why I didn’t change the candy hiding place this year.
After I filled the plastic eggs, (way in advance because it’s easier that way) I put the left-over Easter candy in the same place I always do. Noah climbed up on the counter to get a bowl for his crackers and happened to look on the top shelf and see the jelly beans and foil-covered chocolate eggs.
He came into the family room and asked, “Hey, mommy, do you have any candy I could have?”
“Nope,” I answered.
“Are you sure? You don’t have any candy?”
“You’ll get plenty of candy in a couple of days,” I told him. “But what gave you the idea that I have some?”
(I had my suspicions, you see.)
“No reason,” he shrugged then wandered off.
A little later he came back.
“Mommy, do you fill my eggs?”
“Fill your eggs?”
“Yeah, are you filling eggs for me?”
“Do you mean your Easter eggs?”
“Yeah,” he answered. “But never mind. Forget I asked.”
“Noah, do you want to ask me something?”
He shook his head and started to walk away. Then stopped and looked at me.
“I think you’re filling the eggs,” he stated. “I found the candy and I think you’re filling the eggs.”
I didn’t say anything.
“I think you’re the Easter Bunny,” he said, steeling himself.
“You do?” I was still stalling.
“Yes, I think so. Are you?”
“Do you want me to answer that?” I asked him gently.
He thought for a minute then took a deep breath and nodded.
“Yes, Daddy and I are the Easter Bunny.”
He looked down.
“No Easter Bunny,” he said sadly.
“But Noah, listen here, do you know what’s going to happen when you wake up on Sunday?”
He shook his head.
“What’s going to happen is that you’ll wake up and you’ll have to find your Easter basket and then you’ll have to go on an egg hunt and those eggs will be filled with candy.”
“Really? Still?”
“Yes, just like it’s always been. Only instead of thinking the Easter Bunny brought it, you’ll know that it’s Daddy and me loving you and filling up eggs and making a basket for you.”
“Ok,” he snuffled. “Mommy? Did you think there was an Easter Bunny when you were little?”
“Yes I did.”
“And were you sad when you found out there wasn’t?”
“Yes, and I felt a little lonely because it was more fun to believe.”
He agreed with this. Then I told him that when Madison was bigger, he would help hide the eggs for her and help her eat the candy, too. This cheered him up.
Brett was present for this conversation and kept trying to change the subject like this.
“Hey!” full of forced gaiety. “Anyone see The Office the other night? Now that’s one funny show!”
Poor Brett.
When I put Noah to bed last night, I asked him how he was feeling about it.
“Terrible,” he answered but he said it cheerfully. “Can I help hide Madison’s basket this year?”
I said no because I needed him to help her find it, which he seemed to think was sensible.
Now I’m trying to play up all the love that goes into making Easter for him. Like when Brett went out for coffee, we made a big deal out of giving each other meaningful looks and talking in code because I need him to get a chocolate rabbit. This tickled Noah.
“You’re talking about something for me, aren’t you!” he said jumping around on the couch. “For my basket!”
I think he’s ok. But Brett and I, well, we’re a little sad about it. Although I guess I’m relieved, too.
Possibly related posts
It’s the end of an era
Mar 25, 2005 Parenting
Noah just figured out that there’s no Easter bunny. (sigh)
Possibly related posts
Tags: Noah
