Things we're trying around here (again or for the first time)

I.  Exercise Redux
D has high triglycerides and his good cholesterol is too low so I harangued him into visiting the doctor.  The Rx was for D to exercise.  Being the supportive wife I am, I told him I would exercise with him.  If I'm putting the kids to bed, he walks on the treadmill.  If he's putting the kids to bed, I walk on the treadmill.  Whomever is putting the kids to bed walks on the treadmill after he/she has marched G back to bed for the 11th time.

On the weekends, our goal is to walk for a longer stretch.  Yesterday we took the boys to the park in the morning since N had a sleepover with her Mamaw so when we got home last night after a busy day, I asked D if he was gonna walk on the treadmill.  He said, "Nah.  On the weekends, I have to walk in the morning because being with the kids all day wears me out."

And I replied, "Yeah, I don't know anything about that."

II. Meal-Planning....finally
Desperation has finally forced me to make a monthly meal plan because I am sick to death of trying to figure out what to eat every night at 4:45 p.m.  Oh hell, who am I kidding---it's totally 5:30 p.m. before I think about dinner most nights.  And we eat around 6:10.

I printed out a calendar-like chart and planned meals for 5 days of the week.  I figure the other two days will be leftover days or eating at the grandparents' homes or ordering takeout pizza.  There are four weeks scheduled.  But I'm being very loosey-goosey about it because I don't like to feel committed to making meatloaf on a Thursday if I don't want to.  So what I'm doing is making sure I have ingredients to make 80% of the meals and then picking the ones I want to fix given my mood on that particular day.  Once I've made it, I cross it out.  If I think of another meal I can fix, I add it at the end of the month (moving into week 5).  If I have to purchase any perishables, then those meals that I've tentatively scheduled will definitely be fixed that week.

At the top of the calendar, I've got about 4 side dishes planned that I can pick from for the month---side dishes made from scratch....not like pre-packaged mac & cheese.  The remainder of our meal will include veggies (canned or frozen) or salad.

This is only week two of the "plan," but I feel much less stress about what to fix.  Just having the meals written in front of me takes a lot of the work out of making dinner.  Half the battle is just deciding what the eff to prepare.

III. A New Shopping List
I googled grocery-shopping list templates, found one I liked and reworked it so that my new grocery list is one that categorizes items (dairy, produce, canned goods, etc) and lists the items I tend to purchase the most (like balsamic vinaigrette and steel cut oats).  I printed off some on the backs of old paper and now when I need something I can just check it off on the list.  And since everything is lumped together based on where it is in the grocery, I will hopefully avoid circling back multiple times to get coconut, and then nuts and then dried mint.

I am hoping some of this efficiency will enhance my motivation to clean out and re-order the garage and my craft closet.
But I doubt it.

Goings on around here--a pictorial

And a few words because I simply have a hard time not shutting up.  

He's eating yogurt now which is terribly exciting for momma because I was seriously wondering what would happen when cheddar cheese and raisins got old.  

I took the kids to a local nature preserve on one of those warmer days earlier in the month.  N pet the horse whom she named Pepper and then proceeded to cry big huge tears at the prospect of the land of the preserve being sold and Pepper forgetting N.  Girls and their drama!  Sheesh.

While N was busy bonding with Pepper, G enjoyed climbing the ginormous pile of gravel.  

And M just wandered around drooling.

HEY GUYS!  WAIT UP!!!!!!!

The smile was totally worth keeping my OCD in check while he petted the goat.  

And this week I've been taking random pics of M, who is this close to 18 months.  Sniff, sniff.  

Still loves dem boobs.  

The other two monkeys are pretty cute too.

And today, I may have dressed G in his brother's jeans.  Size 24 months.  And didn't realize it until G was walking through school on our way to his speech therapy session.  

Oooops. 

Messages about being a woman

I really work hard to send my daughter positive messages about being a healthy and satisfied-with-oneself woman.

I eat well with occasional treats allowed (and no saying, "I was bad. I had some cake.")

I exercise as much as I can given that two little boys in the house wake me up through the night on an all too regular basis.  

I don't wear makeup at all (thereby sending the message "I am fine as is").

I don't dress skimpy or provocatively.  (A nursing bra flap hanging out does not count.)

I wear my hair short because it looks good on me (thereby sending a message that women can still be feminine without long hair).  

And I try to tell myself that it is what she sees me do that is most important.

But I sometimes worry what message I am unintentionally sending when I get my subscriptions to Allure and US Weekly magazine, which are chock full of women all gussied up in expensive clothes, Spanxed to death, with at least 2 layers of makeup on.  They look fantastic, but they aren't real.  Because on top of all the primping and sucking in, they are Photoshopped to boot.  

And then there was the time I wanted to purchase new underwear when N and I were at the mall, and so I went to Victoria's Secret.  I just wanted some panties that weren't all stretched out from pregnancy, but since I haven't stepped into a VS in years (since before my first pregnancy in 2003) I forgot how sexy everything is.  How luscious the models are with their pictures lining the store walls.  It made me feel more than a little weird with my 7-year-old standing there taking it all in.

Of course, truth be told, I feel weird in a VS by myself.  I'm pushing 40 but I still don't feel like I'm grown-up enough to be there.

I'm not losing any sleep over this, but I do wonder how N will perceive her body and her femininity as time goes by.

My notes to myself

I finally bought a small notepad to keep in the car so that I can write down all the junk that runs through my head as I'm driving or waiting at stoplights.  I have some of my best blog ideas while driving.  And things I need to do also tend to pop into my brain while I'm on the road.  Of course once I've got a couple of pages filled in my notepad, I tear them out and bring them into the house where they then linger on my desk.

So in bold are the words I jotted down in my notepad and everything else is what I wanted to say about them.

One day after picking N up from school I saw a bumper sticker that read, "You don't have to believe everything you think," which reminded me of how my brain operated during the worst of my nervous breakdown in 2004.  I go for many months most of the time without thinking about my anxiety, my OCD, my mood issues, my breakdown.  But then something will remind me.  My brain used to be far more critical of my mothering than it is now.  Perhaps I'm just too busy taking care of the kids that I don't have the time or energy to give it much notice.  I have learned that my brain sometimes thinks what it wants, but that doesn't mean it is right or true.  Or that I have to go along with it.

My brain was critical if I wasn't spending 99.9% of my time fawning over N.  Now with both the boys and trying to keep up with them and stay on top of the house and N's activities and school work, it is simply an impossible task to spend oodles of time directly in G and M's faces, or in N's on the weekends.  I have finally accepted that there are some things I kinda suck at and dislike about SAH mothering and some things I am really exceptionally good at.  I like to think my enthusiasm for learning, for reading, is something I transmit to the kids.  And that my desire to experience life, to get out and do and see, is something they will take with them.  It is a good thing to get excited by watching animals, squealing maybe a little bit when a bunny runs out from behind the bushes.  And I'm talking about me....my reaction.

I have eaten a tremendous amount of crow since having my children.  All the things I used to see parents do and "poo poo" in my head are things I now do on a regular basis....like pick up a box of crackers, open it in the middle of the aisle, and stuff my kids with them, sometimes paying for an empty package by the time we reach checkout.  But I will not have tvs in bedrooms.  D and I don't have one in our bedroom (because, honestly, like I need something besides the 3-foot tall stack of books on my bedside table to distract me from having sex).  Our kids will not get tvs in their bedrooms.  I have told D that the kids will not have computers in their bedrooms. The chances of them getting cell phones is pretty slim.  I, of course, reserve the right to change my mind, but I just have serious qualms about kids having a vast array of technology at their fingertips to use in private.  Of course, I live in the stone age and have never texted before.  I have been accused of being a Luddite.

And yet, here I am blogging.

I heard a show on NPR and learned that I may or may not be a Gen Xer, as I always thought I was.  Apparently I need to read the book Boom, Bust and Echo.

G has been a good source of material in my notepad.  He about blew my mind when he asked, "Mommy, turn it on "Ih Ovatakes Me."  At first I had no clue what he was talking about, but then I realized he was requesting a Flaming Lips song.  Is my son totally AWESOME or what???

And then a couple days later, on 3-23, he said, "That cloud looks like a dolphin."  And it did.

Ok, I can now commence with throwing these small snippets of paper in the garbage.
My thoughts are saved for posterity.
Huzzah.

She will not make it to teenager-hood

Today I have gotten a glimpse of what my daughter will be like as a teenager:  a complete shithead.

She has been resisting doing her reading journal for school for awhile now.  The reading itself is not the problem.  As best I can tell, she is at a high 3rd grade/low 4th grade reading level.  She just doesn't want to take the time to do it.

To make a long story short, she asked me to buy her a book set at her school's book fair two weeks ago.  I told her I would buy them but that she'd have to earn them by being cooperative and respectful about doing her reading responses.  She was better during the time she was "earning" her books.

(When she does them, she can either read aloud to me or read silently to herself.  Either way, I ask her questions about her reading afterwards to ensure she understood what she read.  And then I ask her questions to help her write her extended responses when she does those.)

Today I told her she could read while I was putting G down for a nap and then we'd talk about what she read afterward.  When I came downstairs and started asking her about her reading, she kept saying, "I don't remember," to which I replied, "Well read right here, then, to refresh your memory."  I tried asking her my question in a different way in case I was phrasing it awkwardly.  Still, "I don't remember," followed by my prompt to re-read.

After about the third time, she started to just be sassy, so I told her she wouldn't be able to play at her Mamaw's house tomorrow.  Now I generally avoid using time with grandparents as a disciplinary measure (just as I generally don't take away bedtime reading time since it serves a good purpose on its own), but I had told her yesterday that she would have to do a reading log on Saturday and Sunday before going to Mamaw's house.  If she was being uncooperative on Saturday, I figured it would be even worse on Sunday.  Perhaps the threat of not going to Mamaw's would snap her into shape.

She immediately said she'd be cooperative, so I told her if she did anything disrespectful to me or her dad the rest of the day she would NOT go to Mamaw's tomorrow.

And dammit if that child didn't do the EXACT same "I don't remember" crap and refuse to reread the part she didn't remember.

The next half hour was her crying, threatening that she would just walk to Mamaw's house tomorrow, begging, pleading, telling me she hated me, blah, blah, blah.  And then when I said I was going to the grocery, she begged to come with me, that she wanted to stay with me.  I unequivocally told her NO WAY, that I didn't want to spend the next two hours listening to her beg me to go to Mamaw's.

I told her that while I really hated for her to lose her fun time with Mamaw, apparently she will only be cooperative about doing her reading logs when she can get something for it....like the books or playing at Mamaw's....and that in our house we are cooperative with each other because it makes life easier for everyone and is the respectful way to be.

This whole episode discombobulated me to the point that I, EGADS, forgot my coupons in the car when I went to the store, requiring me to leave my cart after walking around the store for a good 20 minutes and go back to the car to retrieve them.

D said she slept for 45 minutes while I was at the grocery, evidence that tiredness played a role in her mental collapse.

But I'm still holding firm, tiredness as a cause or not.

I hate having to deprive her of something fun as a disciplinary measure, but I also don't think kids who act like assholes to their parents and fail to take their schoolwork seriously deserve to get whatever the hell they want.  There are consequences to treating people like shit and not doing what needs to be done in the real world.  She needs to understand that.

But it still sucks.
For both of us.

Dear Justin Bieber (and other wonderful writings)

Dear Justin Bieber,
I've got a poster of you, a notebook, a folder, a catalog of you.  One time I wanted to paint a picture of you it didn't workout!  I love the song Never Say Never.  I love you!  I know that your dating Selena Gomez!  Your and Selena Gomezs songs are the best!!!


Love, your fan N
I am seven years old


P.S. Your cute and I never saw your movie.  :(


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A New Monkey Friend

Once there was a monkey named Caroline.  She didn't have any friends.  One day she went to the park.  She went on the monkey bars first then she went on the swings next.  Then another monkey came  His name was Nathan.  Nathan was an African monkey.  Caroline was a zoo monkey.  Nathan looked differinter than Caroline.  Caroline looked pretty to Nathan.  Nathan said "Will you play with me?"  Caroline said "Sure"!  "Great"!  Nathan said.  So they played happily ever after.  The end.  


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I saw that a local magazine was having a contest for young writers, ages 6-10.  The topic was to write about their super hero....someone from their real life.  N wrote the entire thing, and I very gently helped her edit it.  

I admire my friend Maya.  She is funny and huggable.  She play’s games with me like card games in the gym in the morning.  At lunch she shares cheese balls, cheese sticks, brownies, and all kinds of deserts but not cake.  She is my number one friend.  I’m her BFF.  I love her.  She is nice and kind.  She gave me a  pencil when there where no more pencils in the out box.  I had asked all the people at my table for one but they didn’t have any.  She wears pretty clothes.  And she is my super hero.

                                                                 

Nagging

I don't think I'm a particularly naggy wife.  
A nagging mother.....ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY.  With kids, you have to repeat yourself 10 gazillion-trillion times before they finally get it through their thick skulls.
But apparently, I am a naggy wife.

My husband's work does a wellness check every six months as part of our health care....checking glucose levels, cholesterol, waist measurement, blood pressure.  D has had high triglycerides for years, even before his company started this program.  This last go-round, though, his good cholesterol is too low, so I told him he needs to see the doctor so he knows whether he should begin medication.

Now there are two reasons for me saying this to my husband.

The first and least important reason is because his company gives cash incentives to employees for keeping their health steady or improving it from one assessment to another.  And by cash incentive, in the past it has been up to $250 per person twice a year  So together, D and I could basically earn up to $1000 a year just by maintaining our health.  And if your assessment shows a new issue, but you speak to the clinic doctor and deal with it, you may still be able to qualify for the incentive.  As we are going to Disney in June, I sure as shit am not going to sniff at an extra $500.

BUT the second and MOST important reason I want him to see the doctor is because he has had high triglycerides for a number of years, now has a new issue, and his dad who also had high triglycerides died at age 58 of a major heart attack.  His dad died entirely too young.  He didn't get to see N's first birthday.  He never met our two boys.  He hasn't been able to experience all this great stuff that has been our lives for the last six years.

Apparently, asking once a week for the past month is nagging.
Apparently, it takes hours upon hours to make a phone call or walk downstairs to make an appointment at the clinic in person.
Apparently, my children are not the only thick-headed people in this house.