Just when I thought all was calm...

It snowed in the WRONG PLACE!!! We wanted snow in the BLACK HILLS of SOUTH DAKOTA, not in DENVER!!! (Yes, I realize that I'm yelling! I mean to yell right now!)

I'm most upset that Denver (hi people, you live at a mile-high altitude-- you should be READY FOR SNOW) has shut down their airport for the last 1 1/2 days. I want to go and be with my family. That currently requires me to go through Denver. About 24 hours after the airport reopens.

DH and I have been on the desktop and laptop, respectively, in a vain attempt to find a way to circumnavigate this mess. No luck, so now we're adding a call to United (which I'm sure will be routed to India) to it all.

Oh-- as we've dug around a bit, we've discovered that we can get to Denver, but can't get from Denver to the Black Hills. And India keeps hanging up on us. Yay.

Happy holidays!

Updated to add: I love my Dad. He offered to drive down to Denver to pick us up. Life is good. Well, pretty good.

And soon... we're off!

Time is passing by more quickly by the minute, it seems. We're getting busier and busier. However, we are trying to savor the little things that make the Christmas season fun. Tonight, it was attending the Christmas program in which my students performed. It was fun and it definitely helped us to get into the holiday spirit!

We're praying for snow in the Black Hills so we can ski when we're back there for Christmas, but it's not looking promising. We're unhappy that we won't be able to use our new skis-- disappointing, because I'd really like to break in my new boots. (We bought skis and boom! I got pregnant! I've been waiting 18 months to use these puppies!)

Anyway, we're soon off to visit the first time grandparents in Wyoming. I'm not sure when I'll be able to post again.

Merry Christmas! Enjoy the holidays with your friends and family! Seasons greetings from AAK!

Social life, smocial life

Mike left a tantalizing comment on my last post. It's something that I've thought about a lot-- in fact, it was something that my husband and I talked about at great length during the time leading up to my pregnancy.

Here's (my interpretation) of the issue: When you choose to have a child, you step up and parent. Yes, you lose your social life, you piss off your co-workers when you MUST leave to pick up the child from daycare, you lose your hobbies, and your relationship with your partner is strained as you both find your new equilibrium. (At least, that's MY experience as a new parent.)

As a teacher, I have clucked in judgement about many a parent and their messed-up priorities. I've experienced the parent that chaperones the field trip only to talk on his cell phone the entire time. I've waited for 90 minutes after school with a child whose parent was not at the bus stop and failed to realize that school is over. I've been on another field trip where a parent took off with his child and another child in a major metropolitan city. I've developed ways to get messages to a parent whose child has seriously violent episodes at school, and the parent in turn avoids me.

I'm not to the point of parenting a school-age child, but I find that I'm softening a bit and becoming a little more understanding. I think our societal expectations of the family and community have really changed, which is what I attempted to address in the 'My Social Life is Nearly Dead' post. I find that some of my friends expect me to carry on with my pre-baby status quo. My husband, who travels extensively for his job, doesn't understand why I compare myself to a single parent. My co-workers demand a reason for why I have to leave right after school.

I can't drop Mark off at my sister's house or my mom's house. I don't feel comfortable dropping Mark off at my friends' homes while I take care of errands, etc., because Mark is my responsibility. I feel like I don't have the family support that my folks had while I was growing up while it feels like my responsibilities are greater than those that my parents faced.

What I'm getting to is that I don't know where MY equilibrium lies quite yet. I feel overwhelmed by the responsibility that I bit off by becoming a parent in our situation. I really enjoy working-- but there are times when I wonder if being a stay-at-home mom would be a better gig. I don't want to shirk the responsibilities that I chose to take on by becoming a parent. However, I don't want to lose my friends, my marriage, and myself in the process.

Am I doing a good job? I really don't know. I'm just trying to do the best I can in my situation.

I'm also hoping that by overpaying the babysitter, that I can carve out a little bit of time for my friends, my husband, and me.

Don't get me wrong-- I love being Mark's mom. He's truly an awesome kid-- the way he crinkles his nose when he's being mischevious, how he giggles and crawls away from me, how he pretends like his toddler car is revving, and how he problem-solves to take things apart. My mistake was that I truly did not imagine, despite what other parents told me, how difficult it would be.

Would I do it all over again? Probably. ;)

We survived...

We went out. We ate. He drank. We laughed. I never took my mind off of the boy. We decided that we'd been gone long enough and decided to come home.

The boy normally goes to bed between 8 and 8:30. When we arrived at home at 9:30, he was still in the babysitter's arms with a tear in his eye.

It was hard to be gone tonight. I think it was good for all of us, though.

My Social Life is Nearly Dead

I live halfway across the U.S. from the bulk of my family. The relative that lives closest to me is roughly a 12-hour drive away. I don't have relatives that I can just swing by and drop Mark off with.

So, I normally take my son with me when I go somewhere. I've never had him with a sitter-- not on purpose, but it just seemed like so much trouble to set up and I didn't have anyone that I trusted to leave the little stinker with. (Especially because my child is a very. active. child.)

Tonight, I'm leaving the bambino with a sitter during my work Christmas party. I'm excited that I'll have a few hours to relax and be an adult without having to constantly be watching and listening for his location and choice of mischief.

Last night, I had an event as well. It was low-key, a small group of my co-workers and spouses at a co-worker's house. She repeatedly assured me that it was okay for me to bring Mark. I was very hesitant, but my husband came back into town and I felt pretty comfortable once I knew I wouldn't be 'on' the whole time.

We arrived at the party (late, of course. Said child got hungry and had a diaper just as we attempted to leave.) and got comfortable. Adult drinks, non-work related conversation-- all was good. Until my son saw a glass of red wine within his reach. Of course it landed on an Oriental rug. I really tried to have a good time after that, but I totally felt preoccupied about what my son was going to throw/dump/bang on next.

So, I'm hoping that I can go and have a good time tonight. I really want to relax and have fun. We'll see how it goes.

Random Holiday Observations

My son does not like his hat and mittens-- but I think that they are really cute.

Making no-bake cookies for my Cookie Exchanges saves me a lot of time and keeps peace with my DH. (I'm making 17 dozen cookies-- I'm a masochist for choosing to join two different exchanges.)

There is no possible way that I can complete all of the tasks that I have laid out for myself. Especially because I'm flying solo next week-- DH is gone tomorrow through Friday night.

Shopping at off-hours keeps me from cussing out the humanity that surrounds me.

While I normally like to make my Christmas cards, I am crying 'uncle' this year. My holiday letter is also very short-- but heavy on baby pictures. (The pictures are what most people like to see, right?)

My classroom looks like a disaster area-- but it's not hurting anybody and I'm okay with that.

Life is interesting right now because my son is now able to escape the ExerSaucer, can climb up our stairs (thank you, DH, for teaching him said task-- can you hear my sarcasm?), and knows how to maneuver the baby-gate free obstacle courses that once worked. Walking is just around the corner, and I'm scared. Really scared.

My son doesn't fuss as I put ornaments and lights on the Christmas tree, but freaks out when I try to wrap presents.

The First Haircut (i.e. Why My Son Has the Haircut I Wanted to Avoid)

I hate the standard baby boy haircut. Seriously. It looks like people put the bowl on their head and cut anything that hangs visible.

Then I took Mark to get his first haircut. It went reasonably well, at first. (I have video of the first 60 seconds or so. Then nothing.) The scissors part went okay, except that he wanted to watch the scissors. So the hair stylist brought out the electric clippers.

I thought it would go well when the stylist let Mark put his hand on the clippers to let him feel the buzzing sensation. Then she started cutting, and my son freaked out. We had screaming, thrashing, tears, louder screaming, and more thrashing. I had to attempt to pin him down by holding him close to my body and holding his head down in my hand. (Yes, I was nearly crying by the end.)

So my son has the bowl haircut. And I don't like it. But I accept it.

Traveling with kids can bite...

Julia at Here Be Hippogriffs has an absolutely awful, yet enthralling account of how traveling with kids can turn into hell when you're at the mercy of the airline industry. I couldn't resist and posted a comment under 'kmr' in the comments section. It's like I say about being a teacher-- I'm not clever enough to make this sh*t up.

Turkey, then sadness

We went back to Minnesota for a week. It was nice to see family, and I really can't complain about the visit. Mark was happy to get a great deal of attention but was less than happy to sleep in a strange house. Overall, it was a good, uneventful trip.

Then we came home.

First, I found out that the mother of my friend, the P.E. teacher had passed away.

When I called my person on the school telephone tree, I found out that the mother of our Media specialist is not doing well.

Then we found out that the good friend of my brother- and sister-in-law, with whom we had just celebrated Thanksgiving, had a heart attack. (Beware, women: pain radiating up the arm into the jaw can mean BAD things.)

Tonight as I was reading my hometown newspaper on the web, I saw that a good family friend had passed away.

Telling my dad that his friend passed away was awful.

Not the way I envisioned kicking off the holidays.

The 3 R's must die

I am a teacher. I teach third grade, and I'm certified as a general classroom teacher in addition to having reading specialist certification.

I am not, however, a fan of the federal No Child Left Behind legislation. I truly think that the sense of developmental appropriateness and creativity has been beaten out of the curriculum. In addition, I believe that teachers are so overwhelmed and harried that they are set up to not do a very good job.

Therefore, I read with great delight this article on cnn.com.

I believe that Americans are innovators. I also think that we need to embrace creativity and foster a culture of lifelong learning. Let's step out of the standardized testing box and really teach-- not to score well on the yearly test, but to help kids discover the world around them.

The relaxing effects of vacation, gone in mere hours

We had a lovely weekend in Maine. We woke up in New Hampshire (crisp morning! fallen leaves! steaming coffee! doesn't get any better!) and made our way up to Maine-- straight to Freeport. For those of you not in the know, it is the home of outlets done right. As in outlets, sans mall. There are just quaint little converted hometown America downtown businesses and homes and three ginormous L.L. Bean stores. It was fun-- we even had lunch at a hometown-y pizza joint.

We then had a great time the next day-- lunch at Big G's (I highly recommend the Avacado Monteban and the peanut butter whoopie pie) and an afternoon at the day spa. Once beautiful and relaxed, it was back for a delicious homemade dinner and the Wizard of Oz on tbs.

Then it was time to go. Off we went, wishing we could stay longer.

What awaited us? The TSA gauntlet from Dante's Inferno, waiting for a late plane with a hyper infant, and being so tired that I forgot to pick up our older car from my school last night. Only to get a call from the sheriff's office this morning that the back window had been smashed out and that we needed to come inspect it to see if anything had been stolen.

We need another vacation. Thank goodness I only have to wait until Saturday.

He's got timing

At the end of September, we took a weekend trip on which Mark got sick. This past weekend was take two.

We went down to Williamsburg to do some outlet shopping and to meet with our financial advisor-- and Mark got sick on the way down. Traffic was bad in West Point, VA (been to West Point? It seems like it's population 200-- but they are constructing a new bridge that stopped traffic for what had to be two miles. The two vehicles in front of us actually got in an accident-- sorry to the Saturn that hit the Beemer...) and Mark started screaming mid-traffic jam.

When we got to the outlet mall, Phil saw a spot open up and zipped in. Unfortunately, there had been two ladies in two different vehicles waiting for the same spot-- who we honestly didn't see. They proceeded to stop and berate us for our rudeness.

Then we started shopping and Mark was not happy with his stroller. The whining in LL Bean turned to crying in Gap (and everything echoes in a Gap outlet) which turned to full screaming and body flailing in Ralph Lauren.

We made our hasty exit to get down to our hotel room-- where Mark power-napped for two hours, screamed for two, restlessly napped for two, screamed for two, and so on. What we needed was Baby Vicks (had it but in the frustration didn't remember it) and a humidifier (I don't believe that humidifiers are amenities offered by the front desk).

We came home yesterday. Since he was at home, the night went better, right? Ha, ha. We actually called our health care's 24 hour nurse hotline at 3:15 A.M.

Thank goodness Mark has an appointment today with the pediatrician. I'm not sure I can take another night tonight.

All brought on by Ben Folds...

As I was growing up, my mom cleaned houses. Even though I was a working class kid, I knew many of the upper middle class kids in my hometown because my mom would bring me along as she cleaned houses on 'snob hill' (aka Ridgeroad). My first paycheck came from when I substituted for my mom and cleaned a dentist office. My first steady job was when I cleaned hotel rooms where my mom was the Assistant Manager of Housekeeping. I cleaned hotel rooms throughout high school and college.

I hated every single minute of cleaning rooms. Perhaps hated is too light a word for what I felt-- despised? Loathed?

Whatever. My goal in life was to be able to afford to pay someone to clean my house. Weird benchmark of success, perhaps. But as I kick back with my glass of wine, I consider myself to be rockin' the suburbs (okay, exurbs) as I sit in my house that is freshly cleaned by someone other than myself.

Life is good.

Cute I am

Mark's Halloween costume arrived. He does the ears when the white robe is on, but doesn't care for the ears by themselves.

Mark seems to be a happy sage, so we thought Yoda was appropriate.

Edited to add: Mark enjoyed all of the attention he received on Halloween night. The costume was quite a hit!

Food photographer vs. Working mom

There are times that I'm jealous of stay-at-home moms. Why? Time. Yes, time, time, time. I went to this blog the other day and turned all green with jealousy. It must be juicily glorious to have the time to take gorgeous pictures of wonderful home-cooked food. Me? I spend my time waking up, rushing around to get the four bags together (school bag, lunch bag, purse, and diaper bag), getting Mark bathed/fed/changed, load it all in the car, get to daycare and unload Mark and the diaper bag, rush to school, run around to get papers copied, teach the 28 kids while they all ask to go to the bathroom/media center/printer to get their Accelerated Reader paper while the instructional resource teacher/special ed paraprofessional/Behavior Center Monitor ask me about the missing writing tests/if student X needs support during the math test/the reading intervention group is one student low, then I get 30 minutes to walk to and from the lunch room/eat/pee, monitor students playing at recess/the car moving slowly alongside the kids standing at the playground fence/the parent without a check-in badge coming onto the playground, teach the kids some more while student X tries to rifle through the backpacks, student Y camps out in the bathroom for 20 minutes, and student Z chucks a crayon across the room but tells me that he didn't do it, then I load all of the papers that I didn't have time to touch during the day into my school bag, load my dirty dish bag/school bag/oops forgot the purse into the car, rush back to daycare, load Mark and the diaper bag, get home and unload the four bags, make dinner, feed Mark, try to eat while he cries because I'm not holding him, and then perhaps I have some time to pop off a quick email/blog post/watch the episode of Ugly Betty I've had tivo-ed for two weeks.

I'd love to be able to take pretty pictures of food.

Dove film

Yesterday, one of my co-workers asked me if I had seen the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty film. I tried to view it on my school computer and the hamsters on their wheels, powering our server, laughed their cheeky heads off at my audacity. Sooo.... didn't see it until tonight. I do think it succinctly sums up what it is like to grow up as a girl. Craziness.

What do you think?

Autism and Television

Last week, I was sent a link to a slate.com article that discussed a statistical connection between rates of television viewing and rates of autism. Being the aunt of an austistic boy (most autistic children are boys-- 4 to 1 boys to girls) and the parent of an infant son, my interest was piqued. I went to the actual Cornell University website to read the research. I was fascinated that: 1) the authors were economists, 2) that the TV-autism connection (and the TV-ADD/ADHD connection) was not drawn before, and 3) that I didn't hear about this on the news. (In fact, I still haven't heard about this on the news which just BLOWS MY MIND. Perhaps because most Media outlets are, ahem, on television?)

I don't get it-- we should be putting our children's needs first, but only when their needs fit with our television viewing habits? Hmm... I think this might be another sign of the apocalypse. (Yes, I'm being tongue-in-cheek!)

Edited to add:
Yesterday morning, I finally heard the report discussed in the Media. It was a 20-30 second radio spot on a major news radio station. They got a sound bite quote from one of the Economist authors of the study and the reporter stated that autism researchers were dismissing the study. Still haven't heard word about it on TV.

Eight months old and already talented!

My boy now has a new talent! My son has learned how to: knock over some sort of toy/bucket/etc. in his playpen, stand on top of his toy/bucket/etc., put his chin over the rail, and spit his pacifier about 4 to 5 feet away. If one decides that the pacifier accidentally made its way onto the middle of the living room floor, washes the pacifier, and returns it to the playpen, my son has the solution. The pacifier offends with its mere presence, so he calmly and patiently repeats the process again. ("Away, damned binky!")

As an educator, I understand that children are egocentric. However, I think my son takes it to a new high. When I go out for any reason, my son gives me the look that says, "Oh yeah, it's time for you to take me out so my fans can adore me." Then what happens? Every other person decides they should stop and admire Mark. I can't even stereotype and say that it is mostly grandmas, because they aren't. It's the huge bodybuilder that stops me to coo at Mark on my way to the gym daycare, the little kid in the grocery line, and the Naval officer behind me at the library. Don't get me wrong-- I'm happy that Mark is interacting with a variety of people in our community. What gives me pause is that in public, he turns on 'the perfect baby' persona. (He doesn't feel the need to use that persona at home. Every night, we get the red-faced, teary baby that immediately calms once we pick him up.)

As my friend says, Mark is rotten. As in spoiled rotten.

Another reason I won't be voting for Republicans this fall...

Commenting on the Foley scandal this morning, Pat Buchanan commented that the Democrats are hypocrites. What was his reasoning? That Rep. Pelosi and Sen. Clinton have marched in Gay Pride parades that 'reportedly' included a floats of the Man-Boy Love group and they failed to denounce that group. Sooo.... because Pelosi and Clinton support gays, they support Man-Boy love? This is what I commented about on another blog-- it really pisses me off that Republicans are spinning the fact that they covered up behavior that would get men arrested on Dateline NBC and swept Foley's behavior under the rug. Republicans are making it sound that gays are pedophiles. The Republican, Foley, was a pedophile, and the party covered it up to save their own butts. I plan to vote for every Democrat on the ticket next month...

Benign!!!

My mom had her appointment at Mayo today-- benign, benign, benign!!! Happy, happy, happy! From what she told me, they were very thorough and looked at many different possibilities of what the lumps could be. (Tumors or dermatological...) Cancer has been ruled out. I'm so happy for her. Yay!