From Maintenance to MainteNOTce

  A few years ago I was single with a good income-most of it disposable.  I was high maintenance:  I always got my hair, nails and eyebrows done by professionals.  My wardrobe was always fresh, I mean I couldn't go to the club in the same outfit as last weekend could I?  A lot has changed since then, in fact when I walk down the street people aren't looking at my awesome new 'do or great brows, they're looking for a can to put their spare change in.  I had sort of let myself go.  I can't even blame my sad state of affairs on motherhood.  I see a lot of well dressed moms out there who have managed to keep it together.  Part of my problem is that I'm technically now a bum.  I mean, yes I can say I'm a homemaker, but in reality I don't do that much housework to claim that title, my house isn't THAT clean-I take my example from Peggy Bundy.  Some people are supermoms, I'm apparently a Lex Luther.  That isn't the main reason however-I have discovered I am totally incompetent at these sort of things. But more on that later...
   Why did I stop going to professionals?  See I was in a mission to save money.  Because money was tight and I wasn't really adding to our household income I didn't want to spend money on extras and this looked like an easy way to trim money off our expenses.  I decided I was going to do it myself. I mean so many people do these sort of things every day how hard could it be?  There wouldn't be a multimillon dollar hair-color-in-a-box industry if it DIDN'T work.  Plus nobody dies from a bad plucking job.  Apparently there is a reason why there are professionals..and why I have been relying on them all these years.  It is very hard, well at least for me to do these types of upkeep and still look normal.

•  My hair:  I would still go to my awesome hair dresser to get my hair trimmed up and fixed up.  However in order to make the time between haircuts stretch sometimes I would trim it myself.  Big mistake.  I once ended up cutting my bangs too short and they stuck out like a unicorn's horn.  If I didn't touch it I would just let it grow out until it looked like a greasy, shapeless, limp mess.  Right now I'm in that phase:  the only thing keeping me from shaving my head ala Brittney Spears is by pulling it back in a pony tail and headband-not the most flattering look.  The color?  For the last year and a half it has been done courtesy of a $9.99 color in a box special.  Keeping my hair a solid brown color wasn't too difficult of a task, however in the summer I decided to go blonde.  Not only did I fry my hair but it went copper.  So I had to re-bleach it a few times to try to get a uniform, non kool-aide, semi-it-exists-in-nature shade.  I was in too deep to stop now.  I recently re-dyed it to get rid of my brown roots, however I messed up the application so instead of dying my roots blonde it just lightened them enough to make it look like I'm a lighter shade of brunette who needs to redo her roots.  Just the other day my mom pointed out that my hair was starting to look a little greenish in natural sunlight and when we eventually get natural sunlight I'm in big trouble.  I am so lucky my hair dresser is a patient person... I'm going there Thursday and she has her work cut out for her.  
• My Eyebrows:  I am completely hopeless when it comes to plucking my own eyebrows.  In all fairness to myself my eyebrows don't grow in evenly.  Even in the days when I never let my own hands take tweezers to them, my beautician would accuse me of plucking.  My other issue is I have thick eyebrow hairs but very few of them so if I pluck the wrong hair BAM! I have a bald space.  It's sorta like my brows got tired and needed to take a break. Anyways my eyebrows got so bad it was at the point where they were almost nonexistent.  I mean I had to draw them in which is annoying because you have to plan your facial expression for that day in advance.  You had to either choose to be shocked all day or hope that nothing shocking happened.  I guess I could bring some wet wipes and a pencil in my purse so I could change it throughout the day but I'm way too lazy for that sort of commitment.

    My mission to save money ended a few days ago when I opened up my husband's visa bill.  You see I've been put on mail duty (which sucks BTW: do you know that the mail comes everyday?).  I noticed that while I was stuck to greenish hair and one facial expression Dave was eating at McDonalds 4 times a week and spending money at the pub during his pool tournaments.  I mean it wasn't like he was blowing hundreds of dollars but still, a nice pluck and rinse done by a professional once a month was starting to look reasonable.  I just got my brows redone and on Thursday I'm going to my hairdresser to get my mess cleaned up so I'm starting to feel a little more human.
  I think I saved myself in the nick of time... things are starting to look pretty desperate!

Eyebrows fixed, can't wait to kiss the greenish multi-shade hair goodbye!

Man Cold-Oh the horror, oh the drama!

   
     I briefly touched on the subject of my whole family being sick with the stomach flu the last two days.  Lily was a trooper, sure she was a bit more whiny and cuddly (in fact she never even tried to bitch slap me once yesterday) but other than that she only threw up once and then seemed to be over it.  Today she bounced back to her adorable, albeit exhausting self.  My husband, well that's another story.
But he didn't have what Lily had.
Oh no.
What he had was way, way worse.
He had THE MAN COLD.
     Married, Relationship friends, you're probably nodding and rolling your eyes along with me.  You know exactly what I'm talking about.  I honestly don't understand what happens to the men in our lives when they get sick.  It's like the colds we get mutate and becomes the deadly man-cold, it's like male kryptonite.  Yes, men can run the world but even the littlest sniffles can reduce the toughest man to a whiny man-child calling out to his mommy.  Think about if super heroes got sick during those crucial moments in the movies.  If Superman had gotten the man-cold, Lois Lane would have been a splat on the sidewalk because he wouldn't be able to get out of bed to catch her, and reversing time by rotating the world backwards? forget about it!  Gotham city would fall into the hands of the Joker because Batman would be too busy trying to read the directions on how to make chicken soup (until he eventually put the can in the microwave).  We would be bowing down to our vacuum cleaners because the terminator and what's-his-face wouldn't have stopped Skynet because they were helplessly trying to figure out the difference between dayquil and nightquil.  You get where I'm going with this right?
    I don't mean to totally down play Dave being sick-he was and he vomited a few times-in Lily's toy box I might add.  This makes him exactly like the cat-puking wherever he chooses.  I might add that we have a designated puking/mopping bucket.  It's usually reserved for cleaning the floor or after consuming a few too many rum and cokes, but it is still good for the common stomach bug.  What? I give it a good rinse between the two duties....That didn't bug me as much about him being sick, at least Lily had emptied the toy box out for him beforehand.  What got me was the groaning which got louder and more pronounced the longer I ignored him.  The pleads for me to fetch him water (did I mention I'm overly pregnant) and the helplessness of not being able to read a bottle of Tylenol to determine how much he should take.  Oh yeah, and the best: in the middle of the night he needed his blanket adjusted to cover his feet.  Dave spent all of today on the couch, only sitting up from his deathbed long enough to tell me Lily was crying  (after she had awoken from her nap).  I actually took the garbage down before it was full to get away for a few minutes.
  The scary thing about the last few days is that it made me realize what it's going to be like in a few weeks.  I'll be dealing with Lily AND a defenseless, whiny newborn and I'm not as ready as I thought I might be.  In fact, I'm sorta scared.  I'm going to make sure Dave takes vitamin C and Cold FX every day after the baby is born to guard against the mancold.  I'm not ready for 3 babies anytime soon.
  I think the more important question really should be:  Is the man cold actually tougher than the colds us women get or have we just spoiled men?  I mean I don't really understand how Dave can burn his arm welding stuff and shrug it off but a tiny microorganism can incapacitate him completely for two days.
Oh yeah, when you google "mancold humor" for images for say a blog, nothing comes up.  Because there is no humor in a man cold.

I caved...

Pathetic! I lasted one day off Facebook.  I reactivated my account, however I'm going to try to not have it on my phone and see if that works better.

So how was my day without Facebook?  Lily projectile vomited on me, Dave has been puking with the stomach flu all day and I ended up in the hospital thinking my water broke-apparently I peed myself (most embarrassing reason to go to the hospital yet).  Given all that, honestly I think I'm safer on Facebook!

For your photo/Lily Fix

I have a photo blog  for anyone who needs a daily photo of the MC family.  Just in case my facebook people miss their daily Lily fix.

Plus I can follow my sister's blog about her cats.

Check me out here:
The Daily MC Family

Farewell Facebook-well for now

    
      So I did it, I went off Facebook cold turkey.  I honestly feel like I'm trying to quit smoking.  I've been trying to find ways of cutting back my usage for a few months now.  I tried the Facebook cleanse-but like all diets, I was as good as gold for the morning but by afternoon found myself tired of celery and back in the fridge shoveling cake into my face (or in this case, I wouldn't be on Facebook all day and then killed 3 hours on it at night).  I had a brilliant plan of slowly cutting back my friends list, only keeping the people I interact with online (or they lived far away making offline communication difficult) until eventually I wouldn't feel the need to check my phone every 2 minutes, you know, in case someone mentioned me in a post.  In my hormone soaked brain this seemed like a completely logical idea-until I started deleting people from my list.  I put out a Facebook "warning" but started trimming my list immediately with the same tack as lopping off limbs and then was shocked at the backlash.  I forgot how seriously we all take Facebook-I got a bunch of angry messages, it wasn't like I was un-friending them in REAL life.  If they still wanted to they could phone me and vice versa, however I guess I wasn't sensitive enough, next time I'll mail out a Facebook spring cleaning notification 2weeks in advance.  To be honest even on Facebook where you're not anonymous as say a forum, people can be still be downright nasty online saying things that they would never say to your face, I won't repeat what people said to me to tell me off-maybe we're all a little discontent on the evolution of friendship social media is driving us towards.  However I'm not one for deep thought, so if you are, feel free to take that thought and run with it.  To make a long story short I had a huge cyber temper tantrum and deactivated my account.  I sort of regret it, but I'm too embarrassed to cave after ONE (not even that) day.  Plus I would still be in the same boat as yesterday-overly addicted to Facebook and still having to clean up my friends list.  The draw back to not having Facebook is that I have no idea what day it is or what the weather is like now.  I also don't know if the end of the world happened.  Honestly when I went to bed last night I had no idea if I would still exist when I woke up in the morning. It's weird I woke up today at my usual time and first thing I did was reach for my phone to check what happened last night in my beloved virtual world.  I was saddened when I realized the app was no longer there-now what am I suppose to use this device for?? Oh yeah, maybe dialing someone's number....

Reasons to quit

• I am addicted.  I realized this last year when I clued in that I was checking Facebook on my mobile phone while surfing Facebook on my computer.
• It was making me socially lazy.  Instead of meeting up with people or phoning I was liking statuses and counting that as social maintenance.  
• Too easy to be too personal.  Sure you start off just saying vague thing but next thing you know you've slowly gotten to the point where you're posting your BM schedule.  

Things I miss

• The convenience of knowing everything about everyone.
• Stalking Exes (friends and boyfriends) to make sure they have gotten more fatter, miserable and uglier than me.
• saturating people's newsfeed with pictures of Lily and myself.
• The shamelessness of posting stuff all about me without looking as vapid as if I was telling people the same thing over coffee.
• Pretending I'm the guardian guy on the Matrix.  
• Feeling popular, hey! i got 250 friends!

Excuses to rejoin-I'm jonesing for a status update, I'm a proud person and don't want to go crawling back.  However I'm getting the shakes.

• Pregnancy hormones.  When in doubt, these wonderful hormones can be used to justify every social "oops" or dumb thing I do.  
• Hand slipped-I was trying to like a status but my hand slipped and I deactivated instead.

I'm not completely off the grid-I haven't gone hippy.  I still have a bit of an virtual presence.  I still have my twitter account-yes I know that's like trading heroin for crack but baby steps people!  I'm also going to keep up on this blog so people can still have get an idea what I'm up to without being force feed it via a newsfeed.

So let's hope I make it more than a week.  I've got $2 on making it through the week.

UPDATE:  I briefly logged in this morning, I wanted to see if I could amend my account or get pictures without having an active session-turns out you can't.  I guess I owe Dave $2.00

Preg-NANCY

So I'm in my last trimester of pregnancy.  I'm 36 weeks and if I'm like how I was with Lily, I could be expecting the arrival of baby #3 in as little as 3 weeks.  It's the final crunch and I'm starting to feel, well pregnant...not that glowing feeling of the second trimester but the gross bloated, "I am so done" pregnant feeling. Part of me wants the pregnancy to be done and over with but the other part of me is not quite ready for baby #3 to come just yet-the only thing we have done to prepare was to buy the big ass stroller and even with that we haven't bought the double seat yet.  Do I sense being at Superstore with new baby, Lily and myself crying in the diaper aisle with new baby wearing just a towel around its butt?  I'm also a bit nervous about having a newborn in the house.  You'd think the second time around I would have a clue on what to do but to be honest I have a very short memory.  What I do remember from Lily was that I wasn't fond of the newborn stage.  I mean half the time you didn't know if they even LIKED you, they'd either scream at you or crap their pants.  Once they started smiling it got a bit better, any sort of positive feedback that I was doing something right was welcome.  I also don't like that whole weak neck situation.  I'm also worried about Lily beating it up.  I mean she already wacks my belly with the remote control or jabs it with her finger.  We've been working on the word gentle, incorporating the phrase "hug not thug" given her taste for bitch slapping.  I'd love to say she's getting better but last night she almost broke my mom's nose when she stomped on it (my mom sorta had it coming for holding Lily over her head while lying down..).  At my last prenatal appointment the doctor made a comment that the baby moves around a lot and when they tried to get its heart rate it would move away.  I wasn't surprised-with Lily as your big sister, you would learn to move fast as well.
  Anyways so far everything is looking good-head is down, heart rate good, growth ahead of schedule- Surprise, surprise, they are expecting another big MAC baby. 

So how am I doing so far?:

• I stepped on the scale to inspect my weight gain progress.  Gaining weight during pregnancy is important, sort of like getting off the couch every once in a while and not having cookies for dinner important.  However it is hard for any woman to deal with the concept that weigh gain is okay.  Yes there are some women who claim they love their pregnancy curves but I'm pretty sure they're lying through their teeth while crying into their chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream.  We spend our whole adulthood looking at the numbers on a scale and begging for them to go down or at least stay put.  For some reason as soon as we get a positive pregnancy test, people expect us to get over this fact and do a happy dance as our digits go up.  Did I mention we are also hit in the face with magazine articles about celebrities giving birth then climbing into a size 0 bikini?  No pressure, gain that weight but it better be off before the photoshoot.  I'll gain the weight because it's all about a healthy baby, but it doesn't mean I'm going to celebrate my pregnancy curves.  Anyways I weighed myself and wasn't too worried with the number that showed up until I realized that it was in KGs and not LBS.  Ouch.  The good point is that within the next week I won't be able to see my feet and the numbers on the scale.
• I've had a real terrible pregnancy brain this time around.  As you may have read from other posts I have done stupid things like introducing my cousin to his sister and asking if they have met before at Lily's birthday and shredding a government check.  I have also missed 3 prenatal appointments so far.  With my other two pregnancies I never missed a single one.  Two days ago I had messed up my prenatal appointment. Right time wrong day (last time it was right day wrong time). Luckily they  squeezed me in.  Unlike my clothes the doctors office is more accommodating in that sense.  I have also been hopeless at trying to learn how to work our cable.  For the first week Dave got tired of me calling him at work asking him how to turn the TV on.  I eventually got too embarrassed to phone to ask how to change the channel so I endured a few hours of Jerry Springer the first week.  BTW why is everyone on that show surprised that they are on Jerry Springer,  it's like cows before entering the slaughterhouse, they have that blank "I don't know whats going on and nothing bad can happen from being on this show" glare on their face.  I can safely report that I can now change channels.
• I have entered the "whale" stage of pregnancy, meaning that I feel huge AND take up a lot of space as well.  Not to mention people now go "oh you look huge!","you must be due REAL soon" etc etc.  I feel sorry for every slow moving semi-truck I've passed on the highway in frustration.  I mean when you're this big and heavy, there is no way you're moving fast.  I have noticed that like the semi-trucks, people have the same tolerance for me and my slow moving ways.  I have people getting inpatient with me when I'm on a crosswalk-pregnant and pushing a stroller- for walking too slow (I've even yelled at a idiot in a BAT that it's called a STROLLER for a reason),try to squeeze past me in the mall or walk directly behind me sighing on the sidewalk.  I'm not asking for any special treatment, just a little more space.  If you've been pregnant you know it's not like having stomach fat.  Fat you can manipulate and suck in and adjust your space usuage.  A baby bump isn't going anywhere.  At least nature has given us a natural defense in this circumstance: Pregnancy gas.  Seriously, if someone gets too close I'm crop dusting.
• Every pregnancy, right before the baby is born Dave ruins my maternity clothes.  This is probably correlated with the fact that my nagging increases with each passing week about how he has to help a bit more around the house because I'm to pregnant to do stuff like bend.  In return he gets this urge to all of a sudden do laundry.  Some people say it's because he truly wants to help, but really, I think he's establishing incompetence.  He knows that if he screws up once he'll be off the hook.  When I was pregnant with Lily, he washed all my maternity clothes in hot water, and then threw my maternity pants that were under a no dryer order....IN THE DRYER.  So not only did I have to lube myself into my clothes but my nicely hemmed pants were all of the sudden sporty capris...which would have been fine if it was not FEBRUARY.  With only 3 weeks to go there was no point buying new ones so I had to walk around in flood pants.  What did Dave do this time?  Well I knew there was a problem when he lost his chap stick.  Anyways last night I opened up the dryer and was greeted with the smell of peppermint.  As I pulled out my grease stained clothes I found Dave's chapstick.  It was in his sweater pocket and had go through the washer and dryer and now was consequently all over my maternity clothes.  Dear Dave:  As discussed please don't do laundry, that is my job. I don't go to your place of business and weld stuff.

However as pregnant as I'm feeling right now I just got to remind myself:  At least I'm not Jessica Simpson.  Seriously, we're due around the same time and I do not look half as pregnant as she does.  In fact, one of her boobs is the size of my baby bump.

UPDATE: Check out my belly bump progress here

My Electronic Hostage

        I have been given a new duty -I have been entrusted with the mail key.  Now I usually don't brag when I do a good job, but this is a promotion of some sort-it's kinda a big deal.  I'm slowly climbing up the housewife corporate ladder at the MAC residence:  maybe I'll get a raise in my allowance.  With great power comes great responsibility.  I haven't messed up yet, well aside from accidentally shredding a government check, but it was only $20, lets focus on the positive-I'm keeping up with our shredding pile.
      I checked the mail a few days ago and found postal receipt telling me Dave got a package.  When I picked up said package my keen eye quickly noticed its contents (Read: I ripped open the box with careless disregard for laws preventing people from opening other people's mail).  It was Dave's Xbox-the free one we got for signing away 3 years of our life and half our paycheck to Telus in order to watch the same 4 episodes of Big Bang Theory and 2 1/2 men.  Dave has big plans for the Xbox, he's going to buy the video game Call of Duty so that he can stay up all night playing online with his friends on the days he needs to reset his sleep schedule for nights-a pretty convincing story isn't it?  Please agree since in a moment of pregnancy brain this seemed like a good idea.
     Now I'm no fool.  I know a lot of Call of Duty Widows-girlfriends and wives who have lost their men to that popular online shooting game.  Once they get dispatched into their fantasy war game, it's like they were actually deployed-one moment they're helping you take up the groceries then BAM! they can't leave the house because a mission is at stake and really? they can't let down their team.  It's like cat nip for men, turning even the most mature male into a drooling, adolescence acting, beer drinking, Doritos munching, non-wife-paying-attention-to boy.  I knew that once Dave got his hands on his Xbox that would be the last time he would do anything around the house, or put on pants (a daily struggle as it is already).  It would also be the last time I'd get to enjoy my couch without Dave's buttcheeks permanently indented into it.  So I did what any normal, logical person would do with a ticking time bomb in her hands....I hid it....under Lily's bed (location has since been changed).  At first the trick was to hide it somewhere that Dave would never look.  Sounds like a daunting task but in reality is pretty simple.  The first day I had it sitting on the dining room chair and he walked past it a few times while complaining that he just wanted to look at it.  You see men are not good at finding things, they're hunters, they just look for something moving and try to shoot it, I guess also like the TRex on Jurassic Park-If it stands still it will go unnoticed. I came up with some good ideas for hiding spots:

• I could hide it in the fridge by the leftovers-he can never find any food in the house-but I'm not sure if the Xbox can withstand cold. 
• I could hide it in the dishwasher-he hasn't opened that door since we've been married-but I'm not sure if the Xbox can withstand water. 
• I could hide it in the laundry hamper-he only does laundry once a year- but I'm not sure if the Xbox can withstand stench.
• I could hide it in the dryer-he's never folded clothes-but I'm not sure if the Xbox can withstand heat
• I could hide it in the oven-he hasn't cooked in a long time-but I'm not sure if the Xbox can withstand smoke.
• Or I could hide it in the recycling bags-he hasn't taken the recycling down in a year-but that's a guarantee that I'd accidentally turf it making it the most expensive hobo pillow out there.  

You get my idea, if not let me know, I have many more I can e-mail you.  Anyways the Xbox has been in safe hiding for a few days now-my lips are sealed.
    So what is the solution?  As fun as it is to taunt Dave, I can't hide it forever. However, I'm not just going to surrender it without a fight.  I know my final hours are upon me so I need to make a honey-do list to end all honey-do lists.  It's got to be long and preferably involves lifting heavy objects, opening cans and moving around furniture.  I've already threatened Dave with "the list" but I haven't written it yet.  I have to choose my demands carefully-I have great leverage with my electronic hostage and I don't want to waste it on a few household chores.  It would be like facing life in jail and demanding a pizza in return for your last hostage.  Here are just some of the ideas I've come up with:

•  Take my box of stuff to donate to the Salvation Army:  As you know from my previous blog I am in the process of decluttering.  It shouldn't be too much of a task: don't think I haven't noticed the box is actually getting lighter each day.  Don't believe me? I found that Dave had removed some objects from the box and hide them because "they are cool"
•  Get rid of some of his crap:  If I left for the week I would come home to a video crew taping an episode of Hoarders.  Honestly the man can't get rid of things and just lets everything pile up.  I got an idea! How about we go ahead and throw out that "sentimental" calendar from 2002 that's sitting in a crumpled mess beside your bedstand? Wouldn't that be novel?
• Clean up his nightstand:  Lily goes into our bedroom every day and knocks over all of Dave's crap that he piles on his nightstand.  It's not even kid safe stuff- pointy tools and spare change.  She knocked over his spare change basket the other day and in frustration I rolled all his coins ($45 worth in pennies and nickels) and put the remaining change in a piggy bank which Lily smashed in two today.  The most frustrating thing is that instead of trying to be tidy, Dave gets frustrated and expects a one year old to show restraint and respect for boundaries.
•  Move the furniture:  Really? I always thought the living room would look better if we rotated the couches 5 degrees.  But I really think we should try some different scenarios just to make sure.
• Wash the windows:  I'm tired of buying window decals to hide the dirt.
• Wash the shower:  Needs some powerful cleaners that are not compatible for pregnancy (the joys of being with a tradesman with a dirty job).  There's some pink mold along with some other darker mold that needs to be scrapped off and maybe the lining needs to be re caulked.  He's got HAZMAT training, it should be good.

Anyways those are just a few ideas.  I'm going to have fun with this list.  It's going to be EPIC winning me the admiration of housewives everywhere.
   Worse comes to worse if the Xbox is too much of a distraction I can smash it.  I mean accidents are most likely to occur in the home aren't they?  I could be dusting and trip or Lily could accidentally shove crayons into the disk tray. 

Think I'm blowing this out of proportion?  If it wasn't true, someecards wouldn't have a funny card in regards to it

Much to-do about clutter

  As usual I'm engaged in the never ending task of de-cluttering our apartment.  It's basically a ritual now in our house.  When I buy a box of diapers (which happens often because Lily is a pooping machine), I empty the cardboard box and put it on our kitchen table.  This signals right away to Dave, the cat and Lily that stuff will go missing-it's time for a Salvation Army/Dump run. Sometimes they fight it and I will make my own choices on what stays or goes but if they humor me and sacrifice a few items on the altar of cleanliness I generally will leave their stuff alone.
      It is all about the input/output.  A house is like an  person: you can eat all you want but if you don't *ehem* evacuate your bowels once in a while you're going to get pretty backed up and things are going to get messy.  So I guess I'm giving our house a cleanse because there is a clog in the pipe.  Okay, I'm going to stop it right here before this blog entry goes any more downhill and turns into a bunch of poop jokes (to the delight of my husband).  Like a person, a house has problem areas-certain areas that seem to attract junk and remain messy no matter how many dust bunnies you attempt to slay.  They are just attractors of bulk.  Clutter is like fat cells and I'm like "Trimspa baby!".  Yes it's hard work now but our dwelling will be thanking me at swimsuit season when its not bulging at the seams.
I've identified my house's problem areas that tend to attract the extra "junk".  Sort of like its hips and thighs area:

1. Dave:  Between him and Lily, he is the main source of our clutter issue.  Lily didn't make this list-yes she has a lot of toys and trashes the house daily but at least she doesn't bring anything new into the house and when it's time to get rid of some of her toys she doesn't complain (read: realize).  Dave on the other hand will bring junk into the house and sometimes remove things from the Salvation army box.  While I'm trying to trim down the house, Dave is force feeding it doughnuts!  Dave thinks every piece of garbage is sentimental or worth something and hence won't give it up.  He'll be that 70 year old who has a can collection insisting they are antiques and worth money (yes I've been watching Canadian Pickers on TV).  I've made a little bit of progress with him lately:  I got him to put two baseball hats in our Salvation Army pile without having to nag him within an inch of his life.  This is the most he's gotten rid of in a while!  So what does a girl do?  Obviously I can't throw him out or kick him to the curb-I'd need a bigger box at the very least if I were to attempt to take him to the Salvation Army.  On the plus side he keeps my need to throw out everything in check.  Without him and left to my own devices we'd be sitting on the floor or eating over the sink because I've decided that furniture is a waste of space and dishes take up precious cabinet space.
2. Mount. Recycling:  All our recycling gets put into the laundry room and is quickly forgotten-well until I need to do laundry or get something out of our deep freeze.  Half the problem is that you have to take it down to the parkcade and I don't pass that area often since I don't have a car and don't break into cars looking for loose change (a favorite pastime for residents in this building).  Don't look at Dave to take it down, he hasn't (not without me force feeding it to him first) since we've been married.  Usually I let the recycling pile up until I can barely open the laundry room door.  Quite often I will have to carry 6 or more bags down at once and it often involves having to use the stroller as a garbage barge.  I also have become slightly immune to neighbors' snide comments or dirty looks.  No I am not moving, doing spring cleaning or featured on hoarders! It was funny the first 5 times you asked me that....and BTW I'm not over my bag limit, I have 6 bags of junk yes, but it's six weeks worth thankyouverymuch!
3. Tupperware Drawer:  No matter how many times I organize or throw out random pieces, this cupboard never seems to remain clean.  I'm always finding random lids or pieces that don't fit together.  I'll empty out the cupboard and the next day I'll find that all the Tupperware has multiplied! I have no idea what's going on when I close THAT door.  It doesn't help that children are naturally attracted to Tupperware.  Usually I'll hear crashing and Lily will be destroying the nice piles I have grouped everything in and our kitchen floor will be littered with Tupperware.
4. Shredding Pile:  Until two days ago we had a huge garbage bag of bills and documents that needed to be shredded.  In the last 2.5 years, we've only tackled the pile three times.  Usually we won't bother until the bag starts overflowing.  Even then we shred enough to get rid of the overfill and then promptly deny its existence.  6months ago I took an honest stab at trying to shred our pile and after the second garbage bag of paper our shredder promptly committed suicide.  It tried to take me down with it by trying to set me on fire by overheating.  I felt bad for the poor little thing, it was only a mini.  I started dividing the pile into smaller bags and shredding it at my parent's house.  I ended up shredding 7 bags worth of paper but I finally did it! Our pile is gone.  Let me say Dave and I will be having a discussion about what counts as shredable-the guy is way to paranoid about identify theft, half the stuff I shredded can be found on my Facebook page.  Also I was shredding phone bills from 2001.  I have promised never to let things get that bad but I have just started a new shredding bag...oh dear....
5. Friends list on Facebook:  Everything is going cyber.  Even clutter.  Clutter has a cyber footprint.  I mean my hotmail inbox is jamed full with emails and I have to clean that up daily otherwise I have 600 notifications and trust me I'm not that popular.  The other day I started going through my friends list on Facebook.  I had 250 friends which is weird because I spent Saturday night watching the original Batman in my PJs and went to bed at 9-you'd think with 250 friends I'd out and socializing.  Anyways when I actually looked at my list I had people I haven't talked to in over a year, people I met just once or people who never commented or contributed any juicy gossip to my newsfeed.  I finally got rid of "Mrs. It's mmmooonnndddaay"..trust me I have Rebecca Black if I need help remembering the days of the week.  I'm always worried about the backlash thought.  99% of people won't notice but there is always one person who acts like defriending is a form of is a huge insult.  It's like you peed in their coffee, but then again if you remove someone from Facebook they no longer exist in real life....
6. Dave's Desk:  Here there be dragons.  Seriously, I can't even go there.  I think the only way to clean that mess up is to dump lighter fluid and take a match to it.  Even then I'd have to vacuum the mess it left behind.  Come to think about it, I do have lighter fluid, it's in the bathroom under the sink cabinet right next to the 2 10 gallon jugs of u-brew wine (mental note: baby proof that cabinet..)
7. Hall Closet:  What's even worse is the closet door doesn't close so all our shame is out in the open for everyone to see. Both Dave and I wear the same DC shoes everyday (well different pairs each) but for some reason our closet is full of shoes.  They're not even *nice* shoes.  I mean they were at some point but a lot of them are worn out or half broken.  It's more of a shoe graveyard.

So there you have it.  I'm almost done cleaning out those problem areas but still have a lot of work to do.  Plus now I got to get Dave and the BAT to haul our junk away...before December...

Oh Marge, you get it don't you?

Tome Raider

     So I haven't posted on my blog for almost a week.  You can blame that on two things: Cable and Lily.  First of all I keep running into marathons of brain junk food.  Stark Trek TNG, Four Weddings, Storage Wars, Parking War-I'm beating my brain into a nice gooey submission so I can drown out any individual thought (sometimes a plus when your life revolves around toddler's bowel movements and dishwasher cycles).  Right now as we speak I am watching a Police Academy movie marathon.  I'm ODing on cable because it's such a novelty at the moment.  It reminds me of that time I discovered the Fillet-o-Fish at McDonalds and loved it so much I ate 6 of them and then proceeded to puke all over the restaurant floor...true story. I'm not at the point of puking up cheesy reality TV shows but I'm getting close, well until Duck Hunters premiers-seriously how can you not resist millionaire red necks?  BTW is anyone else disturbed that A&E which stands for Arts and Entertainment and TLC-The Learning Channel only play reality shows now?  I guess I'm entertained but I certainly haven't learned anything.  The second reason for my lack of cyber participation? Lily.  She's teething again which means she's no longer sleeping through the night, which means I'm not sleeping.  Seriously have you ever wanted to know what my apartment looks like at 1AM?  Spoiler:  It looks the exact same as 2AM, 4AM, 6AM and 8AM...
     I'm a house wife, that's my job right now, and like every other job you got to sneak in a nap once in a while, especially when the nights are a write off.  Instead of most people sleeping on the job, it isn't because I was partying and possibly hungover, the reason is a screaming toddler who can't handle two teeth.  So how do you sneak in a nap when your boss is a little tyrant who will hit you with a remote control or eat cat litter or destroy your stuff as soon as you close your eyes?  Seriously, Lily will trash the house (even thought our living room has been taken over by her toys) and right now I'm at the point where I'm sacrificing my stuff to get a few minutes of sleep.  So what is the latest causality this time around?  My books.  Yes I own books.  Before my breeder days I was somewhat educated.  Yes I was a university student who knew everything-but back in our day the only occupy movement we had was occupy the pub.  My books are my last evidence of my degree.  I have since forgotten every single thing I learned.  I majored in Archaeology but at the moment I don't think I can even spell Archeology without the help of spell check.  Seriously if it wasn't for spell check I wouldn't know that learnt isn't grammatically correct.  When I first moved in my books were a source of pride and resistance.  Our place was already set up and filled with Dave's stuff (read: crap) and there was nothing that spoke of my personality in sight.  I decided I wanted the bookcase with my books as a way to make my mark without, you know, peeing all over the place.   
  Lily has a fascination for books.  Please note that I said fascination not respect-she mostly likes turning the pages and teething on them.  In Lily's world books are good for eating and throwing at the cat.  She also has a fascination with the book shelf and will often pull my books down and inspect them ignoring all her baby friendly cardboard page books of her own.  I don't blame her, have you read those Baby Einstein books?  They're not so much as story books as adjectives describing nouns.  I doubt they really make your kids smarter, they just make them more annoying because it takes them 10mins to describe the color orange.  Besides, why do we want our kids to be like Einstein? He was a bit of a weirdo who just happened to work at a patent office.  If we want our kids to be successful this day and age we just need to make sure they can sing to autotune and we can afford them a nose and boob job.  I'm holding up for a "Baby Kardashin" book series..but that's a rant for another day....
  Anyways I was so desperate for 5minutes of sleep, I just wanted to lay down and close my eyes.  Lily, who soon become tired of pelting me with "Little People" figurines decided to inspect the bookcase.  Grateful for some peace, I let Lily gleefully rip the pages out of my academic books.  Just like her viking forefathers who burned down the Roman Libraries setting civilization back 300years, Lily was destroying my own personal library of knowledge.  She pulled book after book out in a state of carnage that would make any book burning/destroying movement proud.  As I slept Archaeology Methods because Anarchy Methods,  Jane Eyre became Jane Error,  Primates in Nature became Primarily in Slobber and Human Pathology became.....well scrap paper.  When I finally decided to scope out the damage, our bedroom was scattered with books, they never had a chance against hurricane Lily.
  I ended up taking half of my books to the Salvation Army or recycling because at this point in my life I can't really see myself needed Archaeology Methods, of course it maybe good at examining the fossilized food I dig up under Lily's highchair.  Plus Lily has given them such a beating that even if I wanted to read them, I would have to madd libb them since so many pages are missing.  So not only are my books at the mercy of a toddler with no respect for the written word but some hobo is probably using my Charlotte Bronte collection as toilet paper.
  I need to find another way of dealing with my Tome Raider before all my archaeology books become lost arks... Some people say put them a shelf higher but I think child services would frown if my kid was flattened like a pancake by a text book.

Lily's Temple of Doom: We just shove everything she pulls out back onto the shelves, it's becoming quite a hazard...

Our own little paper shredder.

Fall of the Iphone

   This is the last entry in my "we had no internet for a week" saga.  I'd link the other two blog posts if I was, you know, a computer programmer and knew how to, so you'll just have to read my previous few entries and do a manual link or as I call it putting two and two together instead.  Just to make sure we're on the same page, the chorus goes:  We canceled our business internet and had to wait a week to get home internet and CABLE.  Yes cable.  So far I'm gorging myself on the best reality TV TLC has to offer.  After watching 4weddings Canada, I have concluded that Canadians are not more polite than Americans. We are just more passive aggressive. Americans will flat out tell you your cake sucks. Canadians will tell you they love your dress then on the private camera say it looks as flattering as a snowsuit on a walrus.  Don't get me started on the differences between Dragon's Den UK and US and kitchen nightmare.... However this post is not a review of all the shows I've been watching, this post is a critic of the Iphone, the device that I relied on to keep me connected through my darkest non-internet having hours.
  I normally love my Iphone, in fact even now if I had to choose between indoor plumbing and my Iphone I would choose the phone.  The world is my toilet, however without my Iphone how would I talk to people? Risk ear herpes using the payphones?  However I have learned a simple fact:  an Iphone cannot replace a computer.  I mean a lot of you computer people are probably rolling your eyes and saying duuuhh that's like saying you can replace a car with a bicycle with a lawnmower motor.  But lets get this straight, I do not use computers to do complex things.  I basically use it as a portal to share all my wisdom and snarky social commentary as well as look up Internet memes and funny cat pictures (so basically Facebook, twitter and LOLcats).  I'm not trying to broker peace deals or launch missiles or use the tremendous technology we have available to better my life.  Heck, I'm not even gaming, hardcore gaming for me is Angry Birds.  The Iphone however has some fatal flaws that I only recently discovered.  First of all the touch screen is horrendous if you need to type anything longer than a sentence.  As I said in earlier posts, it turns my delicate fingers into sausages.  Sorta like how UGGS makes me look like I have cankles.  I've also liked a bunch of things on Facebook I wasn't prepared to like while I was trying to discreetly stalk people.  Don't get me started on the autocorrect-who ever designed that function had a serious sense of humor or a hatred for mankind.  Even today I tried texting my mom "It's hard to get around without a vehicle" and autocorrect changed it to "It's hard to get around without a b-hole".  The apps, while great for checking social networks sites while blogging or absorbed in LOLcats is limited.  Take Facebook, I couldn't figure out how to share Utube videos or status updates on it.  I guess maybe Iphone users are known not to share so they didn't bother adding this function?  By the end of the night my phone was overheating and slowing down.  I was getting a bit worried because when I first got my Iphone I burned out the screen playing spider solitaire.
     Dave had a great idea, the Iphone could be tethered to the computer, so I could basically piggy back on my data plan and have a keyboard that didn't compel me to headbutt walls.  Apparently, if you read the instructions or blogs or forums all you do is plug the phone into the port and BAM you have internet.  Yeah, that did not happen. I plugged it in and nothing happened, except for the fact that it kept trying to sync with Dave's phone, which would have been a disaster since I do not need his heavy metal MP3 clogging my memory and he probably wouldn't appreciate all my cat pictures clogging up his.  For those of you who ask why didn't I use my computer to try to tether that would be because it needed the new version of Itunes installed in order to tether and without internet connection, well you get the vicious cycle.  In the process of attempting to tether my IPhone to my computer I managed to mess up every single setting to ensure that my computer will never be able to connect to the Internet again.  By some miracle we were able to restore the original settings and get rid the maze of networks I created. 
   Let's also not forget the issues of reception.  For some reason my apartment is a huge dead zone when it comes to reception.  On my sofa there is only one bar but on my love seat there is two.  In order to get enough reception to have a fast enough connection, I pretty much have to stand on my head on the dinning room table.  So I guess even if I did figure out how to tether the phone I wouldn't have reception by the computer good enough to make the connection fast enough to spare the monitor from a chair smashing accident.
  Dave suggested a few other ideas to make life without internet easier.  For example downloading Linux, yeah right, like I have the mental capacity to do that. By the time I figure out what is a Linux our Internet would be re-instated.  He also suggested I use the Iphone as like, a phone and call someone and hang out like people did in the 1950s.  If I miss twitter that much, why not go to a crowded place and just shout out catch phrases.  Smartass.
  Anyways with our cable package we got the choice of 3 gifts.  A laptop, Galaxy Tablet or an Xbox.  We were conflicted between the tablet or the Xbox.  I wasn't too partial to the Xbox, we have a PlayStation and all it is to me is another thing to dust.  However Dave wanted it so he could play Call of Duty with his buddies when he's transitioning between nights and days.  After relying on the Iphone for a week I'm glad we didn't go with the tablet because isn't that just a big Iphone?  So I let Dave get his stupid Xbox.
Now that we have internet again, I'm slowly forgiving and forgetting my gripe with the Iphone.  We are on the path of healing however another week without access to my computer and more importantly my keyboard and we would need intensive couple's counseling.

Not my comic

Parenting is a battlefield

  I have to admit that last night was one of those brutal nights, and no not because of the time change, I'm pretty sure that will be tonight's fun adventure.  Lily kept waking up every other hour for no apparent reason, so I'm going to assume it was just to annoy me because really at this age they are still like Tamagotchis and I did the feed, change, hug routine.  At 5am Dave went to deal with her, as I had already been up multiple times and decided that the best plan at the moment was to play dead.  After 10 minutes I realized that it was quiet and Dave hadn't returned.  I got up to check on him to make sure Lily hadn't, you know, killed him and was discreetly disposing of the body.  I now know why I'm not the family favorite.  Dave was sitting there cuddling Lily in his lap looking half dead while Lily laid there looking smug and victorious.  He told me "She doesn't want to be alone".  Now usually I'm not totally immune to cuteness, but I'm fighting off a cold and Dave has to be somewhere at 8am and by looking at her there is nothing the matter.  I walk into the room like a raging battle axe shoved her a bottle and some gripe water and then tucked her in and turned off the baby monitor.  It dawns on me that I would make a wonderful war-time president.
  You see, parenting is a war with many battles, it truly is the 100 years war (I'm pretty sure if you live to see your child to be 100 you'd still be fighting them over something-probably the last pudding cup).  With this in mind I choose to run my household with an iron fist dictatorship and when the masses rebel it's time for action.  Dave is busy peacefully protesting the war like a hippie sitting around the campfire singing kumbaya and waving a "give peace a chance" sign.  Poor guy is going to get crushed, especially in an all female  household when hormone season hits.  I mean do you want to risk the chance of getting schooled by your kids or even worse turning them into HIPPIES?  Yeah you can give toddlers choices and try to use their creative spirits to nurture them but you might as well tie dye them a shirt, hand them a beanie and give them a recipe for hemp seed cookies.  I know for a fact that it is possible for some parents to be lovely-dovey and still raise kids who are not thugs or tree-huggers but given the genetic makeup of our children, I'm not going to risk it.  My sister is a vegan hipster who just started a blog about her cats, oh mom, mom mom mom-I'm glad you waited 2 years before having me, you were able to perfect your parenting game (BTW check it out http://milo-panda.tumblr.com).

Your kid deserves better than to be a hippy

  See kids are like pets, they need to know their place in the pack.  Parents need to remain the alpha dogs.  I've seen what Dave has done to the cat.  The cat tries to dominate us now because Dave has shown weakness and love.  I've tried reading parenting books and they are perfectly acceptable-that is if you don't mind a two year old making all of your major life decisions.  I'm sure once they are done telling you that they want juice in a red cup they can help you re-mortgage your house and hey if that doesn't work I'm sure there's a hippy commune you can go live at.  I agree-the first 5 years are critical in a kid's life.  They are going to test every single boundary you attempt to put up.  Don't get me wrong I believe in free choice-my rules or you can choose to move out.
They say that kids need freedom and room in order to turn into functioning adults.  However I know given the choice Lily would just as easily eat cat food or stick her tongue in an electric socket over healthy food or playing with her baby Einstein toys.  The same goes for society, yes it sucks that "the man" gives us laws but could you imagine if we left people to their own devices?  We'd have a shortage of cat food and a lot of burnt tongues.  So go ahead, call me a dictator, a war lord but when my daughter is at the Harvard graduation ceremony-supporting her soon to be rich Harvard graduate lawyer husband and your kid is shelling seashells by the seashore we'll just see who gets the last laugh.

My special little POW

Cable Fable

   So the magical day has finally arrived-we now have cable.  We also got internet re-installed but that is as much of a luxury as indoor plumbing-nobody boasts about having it, even fewer admit they don't have it and nobody confesses that they go down to the McDonalds across the street to use it for free.  Before we had cable, in a period I'd like to call the stoneage, we were using an "over the air antenna".  It's basically the rabbit ears of the 21st century.  They worked decent enough, provided you didn't want to watch cable while it was raining, windy, slightly overcast or wanted to run the dishwasher.  Also most of the 5 channels we got were chopped and messed so half the time you were playing charades trying to guess what was going on.  The only channel we got reliably was KVOS (METV) which is fine and dandy providing you're 80 and like Andy Griffith and the best the 50s,60s and 70s could offer.  There were days were I'd wish for a good cave art painting instead.   
      Right now we are transitioning.  Trying to ease into being "cable people"-it's almost like jumping a tax bracket.  We are also trying to figure out where and how to arrange all the extra equipment that having cable comes with.  We are trying to arrange the PVR box so it is out of reach of little hands and that the newly assembled wire nest is unavailable to craft a make-shift toddler noose.  On a side note: What's with toddlers and trying to hang themselves?  Lily's newest thing is playing with the window blind cord.  Can't she see the strangulation warning?  I'm not sure what comes next after cable.  I think we have reached the red neck pinnacle.  It's sort of like when city people buy an electric car.  The installer asked us if we had more than one TV to hook up, I told him no. If we want to watch TV from our bedroom we tilt the hallway closet door (which is a full length mirror) so it reflects to the bed.  We may be moving up in the world but we're not living 2 TV large just yet. 
  The Telus installer gave us a crash course on how to work everything and handed us a remote but I'm pretty sure they gave us the wrong one-our remote looks more like something that would launch the US missile defense system.  Seriously, when I hit power I don't know if I'm turning on the TV or waging war on England.  I don't really have to worry about the remote just yet, Dave has it in a death like grip and he shows no signs of relenting that power.  We have a PVR which I think is a VCR without needing the tape.  However, to record series, shows or movies you have to memorize a Morse code-like pattern for each one.  I told Dave to make sure that before he leaves for work he leaves the TV on KVOS because there is no way I will be able to figure this out.
    I'm very interested in what cable in the 2010's is like.  We are so use to the TV of the 1950-70's.  My week night line up is usually the Mary Tyler Moore show, Dick Van Dyke show, Bob Newhart and That Girl.  I have a vague memory of TV of the 90s but that is as far as my pop culture knowledge goes.  I wonder if Marlon Brando is still big these days...  We opted out of the high definition package because having color TV shows AND high definition might be a little too over stimulating.  I've also learned that cable packages are like our BAS-they sell you the frame and then charge you for all the add-ons and high definition is double the price.  I'm not really sure what package we got (read: Dave did the ordering), however if it's 300 channels of sports I wouldn't be surprised and if that is true don't be surprised if you see Dave in the paper-obituaries that is.  I know that we swapped all our kids stations with other ones such as HGTV, TLC and DIY.  Sure Lily won't know how to count and spell but she'll be able to drywall and spackle like no other.  Besides, who needs the cookie monster when she could be learning from cake bosses.  Pawn Stars?  way more life skills than learning shapes and colors.  19 Kids and Counting? Teaches her that getting one baby brother (or sister) is not the worse that could happen.  We are still trying to figure out what cableland has to offer us showwise:  I couldn't find the the housewife version of DIY which is DIN (do it while nagging) so at least I can watch DIY and know what to nag Dave about. Actually being a housewife is a lot of DIY, especially when it comes to laundry, dishes and cooking.
     So far we have learned two things about cable.  First is that sometimes even with 100 channels there is just as much on as with 5 channels.  The second is cable is a great way to eliminate communication between spouses (except for the phrase "really? we're going to watch THIS?").  The only thing we have watched so far is hockey and UFC and Dave has mastered the act of drinking beer, eating pizza and ignoring me so not only have I become a cable widow but apparently the place has become a sports bar as well.  I'm just glad I have 4-6weeks before the X-box arrives (free gift for signing up) because I know as soon as he gets Call of Duty, the last words I'll hear from him is "I'm only going to play for 5minutes honey"..... 

Not reality, our cable guy wasn't like this at all

Inter-vent

We have no home Internet until Saturday. No, this isn't one of those "we didn't pay our bill" situations although it wouldn't be a first-Dave has gone to turn on the lights and nothing has happened only to realize that those envelopes sent by BC Hydro weren't greeting cards. We cancelled his business phone and Internet. Apparently the receptionist he hired (read: me) couldn't be bothered to answer the phone-not during MY TV stories. Since not having Internet is not an option, we crunched some numbers and realized that if we got home Internet we could get cable as well and still be paying less a month. Since we didn't want to pay for two packages we opted to get our Business package canceled first, so for the last few days we have been living like cavemen. I have been hunting and gathering via my expensive cell phone data package (I didn't even know who KONY was until my sister explained it, I thought it was a presidential campaign...so cancel my "vote for KONY 2012" buttons). Until we get our Internet back I've been using an old fashion IPad commonly known as a pen and paper (for those of you born after the 90's).
I have posted a few entries but I have typed them out (including this one) on my IPhone doing the two thumb shuffle.
Blogging is hard enough without your IPhone trying to change every second word into something dirty. The autocorrect is so sneaky. It just changes your words and before you know it what you said isn't what you meant. it's like when I ask Dave if my jeans are too baggy and he replies "they're not painted on like your other ones" and it turns into a 30minute argument over how he called me fat.... Plus trying to type something without mashing all the buttons and phoning someone in the process is near impossible. I have small fingers, in fact they are quite dainty. I've been told they are piano fingers (too bad I have the musical talent of a Spice girl). However dainty my fingers may be, as soon as they hit the IPhone touch keyboard, they become thundering elephants, hitting every button but the one I meant to hit. Seriously, I'm getting a "sausage finger" complex. Also jumping between text is almost impossible so to add something in-between words... Forget about it! This means I actually have to finish my train of thought, I just can't frame it and come back to it later. If I do try I have to delete words to get to the part I want to amend and often forget to re-add them, making sentences that make as much sense as grade 10 algebra. Did I also mention I have sweaty hands? Blogging is such a work out that my fingertips sweat and my touch screen becomes more of a mash and swear screen.
Anyways enough about the IPhone, I have a whole pending blog about it once I figure out how to convert my paper copy into a virtual copy-maybe I'll try shoving it in the CD-rom...or as I call it the cup holder, seriously do we still even make cd's anymore?
Can't wait until I have Internet on my computer again, Dave might be a bit annoyed when he looks at our data usage package on our cell phone-I'm putting someone's kids through college.

Sweet Elijah

I usually don't write anything serious on my blog. In fact I usually keep it light and entertaining. However today is a different kind of post. Today is a special day for me. It may be just another Thursday for you but March 08 2010 is when my fairy tale turned into a horror story. Today is my son's second birthday. I don't mention my son a lot in this blog, in fact I use this blog as an escape from the everyday horror and stark reality I face being a bereaved parent. My logic is that you're doing okay as long as you can keep laughing and finding humor in the small everyday things. Grief is a long journey with its ups and downs, its when you can't cope with life anymore that it becomes depression. That is the difference, not time it takes to "heal".
Most of you know the story of Elijah so I'm not going to tell you it. But in case you just came across my blog and name for the first time today (lucky you), I had a son in 2010, he was full-term and born after 41wks of gestation. He was injured during labor and never recovered. His life was very brief totaling 14hours.
To be honest I don't want to do this, I don't want to be this, I don't want to have to sit here and acknowledge that another year has passed since I last saw-last kissed my son. I know that today will pass-silently-and I also know I'll get through it, I always do. In fact this is just the passing of the storm, the build up started weeks ago. Sometimes the dread of the event is worse than the actual day. Because what really can I do? My son is dead, it happened, he's not going to come walking through those doors anytime soon. I gave up on counseling, until they can cure death, it won't make things right. Everyday starts with a deep breathe, a prayer and then one foot in front of the other. You learn to live and rebuild-you learn to survive. It doesn't mean I only think of him once a year. No, I think about him every.single.day. The events that span March 07-March 08 affect every event and my perspective. Sometimes it jades things, other times it makes things better. Regardless of what my future has for me, Elijah has taught me to survive and persist. It has taught me a lot about being humble and grateful. I'm not saying I'm a better parent than someone who hasn't lost a child, but I'm definitely a better parent to my own than I would have been if I hadn't experienced loss.

So how was the second year of grief? Once again being brutally honest it was pure hell. The first year was in fact easier for me. Your mind puts you in a fog to protect itself. You sort of walk around in a daze. Your child died, and that's as far as it goes. The second year, at first little memories sink in, and as you get better at coping with that the details come pouring in. It is time to process the event, to come to terms. The safety of your cocoon is ripped off and you are exposed. Let me tell you something-the mind is great at capturing every little detail, every little sound. The hardest part of it however is you want to talk, but people around you have already put the event behind them. You're dwelling on it. Get over it. The second year is by far the most isolating. Sometimes you isolate yourself, I know I struggled with a lot of shame-why can't I just move on? Luckily I have a lot of supportive friends and a family that doesn't stop amazing me. There are so many acts of kindness I've experienced from Christmas tree ornaments, to grave ornaments to simple texts when I'm down. I hold comfort in knowing that as I enter year three it's going to be gentler. I've heard on many accounts from bereaved parents is the first 2 years are the hardest and then of course milestone years but by the third year time is already putting up that buffer between you and the pain.
I'm not asking for pity, I just want to feel like a normal human being again. A part of you dies when you bury a child and what's left behind is seriously messed up. For the last year I've lived the same day every single night. I can tell you the exact beeping and clicking sound of the life support machines, when I close my eyes I can see Elijah's chest moving up and down. I remember the first time seeing all the tubes in his body. Elijah didn't die on his own, he was on life support. He died by my hands, I made the call to end life support. I remember holding him, and listening as the machines shut off. I remember begging him to breathe-it can't be that hard I've been doing it for 26yrs without a second thought. I remember him trying to -and failing, I remember the sound his chest made as I held him. I remember staring at him and watching him grow cold and still and blue. I don't regret taking him off life support, for us a miracle is going to happen off the machines-the machines would have kept him in status-quo. It was the last act a mother could do for her child, relieve him of the pain and suffering-to have mercy. Keeping him here would be for my benefit not his. Part of me regrets doing it so soon, I wish I took the time to look at him, cuddle him and read to him. I didn't even count his toes until a week later at the funeral home. I don't believe in ghosts, but I believe that places can be haunted. If you walk down the halls of Children's Hospital and you feel like it's haunted, I'm pretty sure it's not the souls of the children that passed away but the souls of the parents that had to say goodbye. I know in my mind I tread that hallway over and over again. Most bereaved parents will tell you the most aweful experience is walking down the hospital halls empty handed. I see other things, I see my son's tiny blue casket sitting in the cold March ground, I see flowers being thrown in the grave.
How do I feel today? The last few months I've been choking back silent rage and frustration. People say that life isn't fair-and it isn't. It wasn't fair that I got to hold my beautiful son for a few hours only to have him ripped away. It was like I was a few steps away from the finish line only to trip and stumble and break my leg. It isn't fair that they messed up my episomety and I'm in constant pain and discomfort even today. I will eventually have to get it re-cut and re-constructed. It isn't fair the 10s of thousands of dollars of debt we nearly drowned under or the fact that in our first year of marriage is soaked in grief. When I look at my wedding pictures my heart sinks- I was 3months pregnant. I look and see all the promise, hope and true happiness in our eyes. I'd love to see it again in my husband or myself. It isn't fair that Lily not only lost a brother but in a way she lost part of her mom. There are firsts she's had that are drenched in sadness, seen through tears. I'm just happy that mentally I'll be better equipped when she starts building memories.
What about the silence? The silence that takes up every single spare space. The silence between me and friends. The silence between husband and wife. The silence of the cemetery. There is a joke on "Family Guy" that rings true, after Joe loses his teenage kid Peter says "bereaved parents are so awkward. If you don't mention their kid, they get upset, if you do they get upset". It's true, to be honest there are many times I am face to face with a bereaved parent and I have no idea what to say.
So what is it like being a bereaved parent? It's like the story of "the little mermaid". Not the PC Disney version but the old version where after getting her legs, every step Ariel takes is pure agony, it's like walking on broken glass. Broken glass that is the shattered remains of your formal life.

People ask me if I've lost faith, if I'm angry at god. The simple answer is no. Thing is, in the whole bible, no where does it say life is going to be great and easy. It just doesn't happen. God's most devoted followers suffered the most-look at poor Job, and he never once got mad at god for losing his keys. I need to know that this isn't the end of Elijah's story. That one day I will see him again and that his life was part of something bigger. I don't want to be at the cemetary saying to myself, yes that is it. That was his life.
There is so much more I can write about. About that day, about the last two years. However I am typing this out on my IPhone and I think I'll stop there.


*Love you Elijah, my baby boy forever you'll be.*

~In loving memory of Elijah Lachlan McRoberts. Born March 08 2010 12:01AM-2:45PM~

Photo a no go

     For the longest time our house lacked a personalized touch.  It was a mish-mash collection of random stuff, mostly a throw-back to Dave's bachelor days.  See I've never been good at decorating, for me most of the time decorations translate into junk or clutter.  Sure a nice vase is a good conversation piece but it's also taking up space on my coffee table.  Flowers and plants are just something for Dave to kill or the cat to eat and puke up and table clothes are just something for Lily to pull down.  I'd love to have a new picture above the fireplace however artwork is expensive unless you want a piece that is most featured on the wall of Red Robin's.  If you step into Red Robin's and you recognize a painting from your house on its walls, you know it's time to chuck it, that is usually the threshold for passe.
     The wall pictures we do have consists of:  a badly self framed Justin Bua picture above the mantel (doesn't really suit us but better than what Dave had originally which was the Boulevard of Broken Dreams, a favorite among Red Robin walls), store bought photos (some hung upside down or the wrong way to fit the frame), a tiger picture (which I liked until I recognized that it looked familiar to an Ed Hardy design), Dave's school certificates and a fertility fish painting (which is promptly coming down and being stuffed in the closet away from my ovaries).  We had no photos of us hung anywhere. 
     A lot has happened since I moved into Fort McRoberts 2 years ago.  We got married, had 2 kids and have another on the way.  However no where was this reflected in our house, unless you count the toys that I always seem to be stepping on.  It's not that we don't have pictures.  We have over 1000 wedding photos, 2 professional photoshoots of Lily, Gigabytes of vacation photos and enough personally taken photos of Lily to even bore my parents.  Usually I just look through them, take the ones I like, post them on Facebook then promptly forget about them.  Photo Albums? Yes I have tons of them.  They are all empty. 
    The lack of photos has bugged me for a while now, but I'm afflicted by the lazy gene-not having photos on the wall doesn't really effect my quality of life, and I can pretend I don't actually live in this dump, I'm just doing community service for this poor family with bad taste.  However enough is enough, I decided in 2012 I would remedy this situation (I was kinda planning on the world ending before I had to actually do the grunt work, but its now March, so here I am).  For Christmas this year I wanted one thing:  a photo collage of my family.  I got one from my mom and it came with four different frames, each frame had six photo slots.  The frames could either be used alone or interlocked.  It was beautifully done-the family in it looked so happy and put together.  As lovely as it was, I decided that maybe I should have pictures of my own family in it instead of the sample shots of "random perfect family whom probably drive a smart car and not a BAT".  Sensing that putting this together would be work and me being me-unless I'm tripping over it I tend not to deal with it-the frames sat in my parent's office until February.  I kept coming up with excuses like: I was waiting for Lily's 1year photoshoot, I'm still in the planning phase and "the sample family sorta resembles us" (minus the white trash part).  Anyways my mom finally put her foot down and made me order the photos of Lily and Elijah I wanted and then physically put them in the frame for me.  We were down 2/4 frames.  New baby of course was getting the third frame and the fourth one was going to our wedding photos or as Dave wanted:  the cat (I know we "adopted" him but do I really have to pretend to be his mom?).
        So now, bring in the husband.  So far I had left Dave out of this process because I knew what I could do in an afternoon, team McRoberts could do in a month.  For some reason Dave tends to complicate things, I think it's because he wants everything perfect-as it is he has already detected my shoddy craftsmanship cropping and cutting of the frames already done.  However, I do not know how to hang a photo and anything involving me taking a hammer to our cheap apartment's wall doesn't sound like a good idea.  I'd either crack the drywall or put a large hole in the wall and if either happen I'd just keep going until our 2 bedroom place was a one bedroom.  Dave wanted to put all four up at once because then we could interlock it and only do the job once.  He spent 5 hours-one and a half of them included going to Canadian Tire for brackets to connect the frames (and probably to get away from me and our late night arts and crafts project).  Our four frames is now one big heavy one and a potential earthquake hazard.
        Now since I cannot look at our half completed job I then made Dave look through all 1000 of our wedding shots.  Culling 1000 photos to only 6 is hard enough, getting 6 that you actually agree on is near impossible.  We survived but if it took another hour we would be putting up crime scene photos instead. All I needed was his input so I could order them and get the frame done as much as possible before the end of the next week, otherwise knowing us it would never be completed.
  The wedding photos finally came today, so I decided to add them to the frame while Dave was at work.  It was probably a better idea waiting, but as I mentioned above, adding Dave sometimes complicates the matter.  Plus I didn't want to be debating with him how I cut crooked or how I should have zoomed in the photo and edited it before ordering it.  Seriously he is such a perfectionist and I really don't want to be up until 3am with a slide ruler to make sure everything's even.
  So when I got home I lifted the massive frame down, careful not to drop it.  The whole thing is held together with a few brackets so one wrong move and it would snap making us have to repeat the whole process again.   I threw our wedding photos, ignoring every good rule of scrapbooking.  Really? It's on the wall, you wouldn't notice any issues unless you put your nose right up to the frame.  One of Dave's brackets was covering the insert to get the backing off one of the frames.  Since Lily is asleep and all of Dave's tools were in her bedroom closet, the logical thing would ahve been to wait until morning.  However I was in it too deep.  I pulled and tried to get the backing out with a knife.  You can probaly guess what happened. Yup, I put an inch crack in one of the glass tiles.  I'm not going to say which one because I'm hopping that Dave won't notice and I don't really want to rat myself out if he ever reads the blog.  These frames are from costco, so I could technically back over them with the BAT and they wouldn't even blink an eye and replace it, however that would take so much time to disassemble, take back, get a new one, start over and con Dave into putting it back together again.  I may go pick up a cheap 4x6 frame and steal the glass from that.  I also decided to add baby #3's ultrasound photos since now it was a side by side comparison of the sample photo family and us, and the samples were winning both on functionality, cuteness and perfection.  Anyways I will have to get a screw driver and remove that bracket so I can add the last two photos, but I think I'll have to wait until Dave is at work again before I'll attempt it.... 
    So now my collage is done-well so close to being done.  I just have to repeat the hellish task of taking it down and putting baby #3's pictures in once it is born.  The only thing it needs is a clock or some inscription like Family,  or a clock to fill the space in the middle.  It's the gift that keeps on giving.  So I really hope I hung it back on the hanger correctly and it doesn't impale the cat during the night tonight.
  Did I mention that progress encourages more progress?  We also hung up some photos to replace the upside down store stock ones.  We put up three couple pictures of us while I was pregnant with each child.  I call it balloon art because you can compare how big my ass ballooned up with each pregnancy.

The finished product of hours of frustrated and attempted creativity

Stupid stuff my husband has done after nights

  
    So Dave is half way through his 80hour work week.  Just 4 more nights to go and frankly I'm not sure if he's going to make it.
         My husband gets home around 8:30am and then tries to stay up until noon, then he'll try to sleep until 7:30PM.  This means the time we get to see him is at the end of his day and he is exhausted both mentally and physically (he works in a trade, I'm not sure exactly what he does but it involves lifting heavy objects).  Combine that with the fact that I usually end up dragging him on boring domestic errands or try to engage him in conversations of what I did the day before (nothing!), what the cat did (throw up on the carpet!) and what I found on-top of the bookcase (cat puke-I know right?).  Basically any mental function the guy had when he walked in that door walked back out when I attack him with verbal diarrhea and request him to drive me around town to pick up coffee.
        They say night shifts can be hard on the body.  Also sleep deprivation can have the same effect on the brain as alcohol can.  According to an article by the American Pyscological Association that I just skimmed over for a quote that proved my point, they say:

"That resulting crankiness and warped perspective can interfere with one’s ability to make sound decisions and manage people effectively, and can increase the frequency of negative encounters."

What they don't say is that it also makes for some funny stuff as well as a possible blog entry.  As the week progresses I watch my husband go from bright, to functional, to just plain dumb.  You combine the sleep deprived shift worked with the attention deprived, highly pregnant housewife and yup, you can say you might get some "negative encounters" and not in the *wink wink nudge nudge* way.  So without further ado, I bring to you the below list.  Please enjoy because when my husband finally gets around to reading my blog he'll probably make me take it down.

Dumb Stuff My husband has done after a night shift:

• I was gone for literally 5mins, I walk into the living room and Dave is on the computer and Lily is no where in sight. I assumed that Dave put her down for a nap. Wrong. She was in the kitchen eating cat food. Dave said he thought it was the cat rattling the dish. I pointed out the cat is asleep in his lap.  Now if you ask Dave he will tell you it didn't go exactly like this.  So fine, I asked him where Lily was and he bolted up and ran about the apartment and finally to the cat dish where she was gorging herself on the finest cat food $10 can buy.  He than told me he thought that the rattling noise was from the cat which was in his lap and he was holding while running around.  Yes Dave, that sounds so much better...
• If you are my Facebook friend or have read previous blogs, I am obsessed with winning on "Roll up the Rim to Win".  As of last night I was still 0/11.  I finally broke that losing streak today.  I won a doughnut on my 12th drink.  I was so overcome with joy that I showed Dave and did my little happy dance.  I stored the cup on the stroller handle for safe keeping.  Now before you applaud, Dave and I walked by a garbage can and Dave (thinking it was his cup) threw out my cup before I had a chance to protest.  This? Of all times he decides to clean up a mess?  In all fairness to Dave he did offer to reach in the trash can to retrieve the cup but we were at Wal-Mart and I didn't think a nasty case of hand herpes (or whatever else lurks in their garbage can) was worth a free doughnut.  Even that's a gamble I wouldn't take.
• Speaking of Wal-Mart, we were there today and stopped by the Tim Hortons so I could get a coffee (so pretty much related to above).  I was standing by Lily eating, okay fine-cramming a doughnut into my mouth.  Dave looks at me and says "hey I should take a picture of you for the people of Wal-Mart!" har-har.  I wasn't the one concerned about wearing what shirt to wear to the store- apparently looking good in Wal-Mart is now a concern of his.
• I was putting Lily in her crib for her nap.  We have her crib mattress lowered so she doesn't try to do an impersonation of a lemming.  I was bent over (always a flattering pose for someone in my state) and I hear laughing in the other room.  Dave comes over with the video baby monitor in tow chuckling "you should see this!"  He tells me to do what I was doing again and flashes me the screen as I bend over.  Wouldn't you know it, on the screen my enormous butt takes up the whole screen(I guess I was standing directly in front of the camera).  Now ladies...men...if you have ever known a pregnant woman, lived with a pregnant woman especially during the fat stages of pregnancy you know that this is just plain dumb.  It is dumber to point out a pregnant lady's ass size then to jump in the lion's pen wearing a meat thong.   
• Dave was watching T.V.  Lily crawled right up beside him and going unnoticed grabbed his lukewarm tea that was on the coffee table beside him.  She then proceeded to dump the entire cup onto our white carpet-and stared at Dave-with the cup still flipped upside down in her hand-and stared-and coughed.  After a few minutes Dave realized the situation.

The article I skimmed over also discussed concern about decreased safety on the job and commuting to and from the job.  However I'd be more worried about Dave's safety at home.  If he shows me one more panoramic butt shot on the baby monitor he will have to retrieve the device out of his own butt.