41 posts tagged “motherhood”

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day one scratch

So today is my first week with a third day in the office. For the past 10 months since returning to work, I've been working two days in the office, and three at home. With Drew's first birthday came an additional day in the office and for that we needed to hire a nanny. 


So we interviewed and interviewed through SitterCity.com and came up with two great candidates. We chose one and worked with her through September to get both Drew and her situated and comfortable with one another. Last week she called to tell me she was giving two weeks notice. 

Nice that she gave notice but she didn't even start yet. Frustrating. I liked her. She was cute and had all the necessary safety certifications that made me feel safe. But I had this nagging feeling that this was just a job. 

The other candidate didn't have the necessary safety certifications but she seemed to fall in love with Drew. The first candidate did not do the ooh'ing an ah'ing that I normally get when people look at him. This second candidate did. She was excited and affectionate and I loved that. I actually thought that was more important than any safety certificate. So when I got the two weeks notice, I called this second candidate and she was still available. Thankfully. And she was available to start today. 

The day started rough. Andrew was running late and cursing. After taking him to the train, I ran home to get ready for work, Drew was tired but wanted to cuddle to sleep. The nanny showed up and we went over some things and off I went to work, crying all the way. 

I get to work and see two texts with photos of my son fast and sound asleep. I begin crying, again. I get control of myself and not too long after, I get a smiling photo of him in his high chair. 

I took a deep breath feeling like it's all going to be okay. 

Then I got a call from the nanny saying they were playing outside in his little tykes house that my parents got him and he fell. She was in the house with him and he just tripped over something and fell hitting his forehead with a nice size goose-egg bump on his head and scratches on his nose. 

PANIC. 

After telling Andrew and my mother, I was running around between phone calls with her, trying to calm  Andrew down, and trying to call my mother back who was answering the phone in sheer panic. 

I can't tell you how rough it was. I am his mother. I am crying, throwing up at work on breaks and somehow I am the one calm and collected trying to get everyone else to remain calm. He fell. It was a mistake. The girl was near tears and feeling so so so guilty. I mean from her end, what a first day. Here she is trying to make me feel at ease and this happens. She was really guilt-ridden. 

Hearing my mom in a panic makes me feel like I have to push my own emotions down so that I can calm her. My husband like any man, gets angry, then upset. So I push my own emotions down to calm him. Then finally my stepfather gets on the phone and I'm overwhelmed, I start crying uncontrollably. 

I know he's going to be fine. It's a bump and a scrape. But the frenzy over him falling along with my own spiraling fears of leaving him today is getting to me. And I feel like no one (well, Sharon IM'd me to see how I was holding up) was saying, how are you doing today. 

Is that selfish? 

7 comments Tags: drew, motherhood, nanny

happy birthday

Dear Drew, 


I can't believe that it's already been one year. Today, is your very first birthday. The first of many birthday's, many celebrations of your life. A life your father and I tried so very hard to bring to existence. 

I always thought that getting here to your first birthday would mean my journey to have you would be ever more distant. The little girl I could have had would have faded away but the thoughts of my journey and the sadness I felt are still there, pieces of a foundation that is ever present. I'm learning though, that those pieces of the foundation are parts of me. Those snippets of my life make me so very grateful to watch you grow, explore and learn. It deepens and strengthens my love for you in ways I couldn't explain to anyone who isn't part of that horrible sisterhood. 

This year has been both amazing and rough. Learning about you the first few months was unbelievable. I remember bringing you home from the hospital and looking at Daddy thinking, What now? We tried for over a year to get to the moment when we'd have a babe in arms and there we were, at THE moment and we had no idea how to leap off. We were so in love with you. So very in love, in ways neither of us expected. We never realized that our lives would suddenly mean so much because you were now a part of us. And once we did, well, you have become our inspiration to do more, try harder, become better people. 

There are still times I can't believe your mine. In the hospital after having you, I would hold onto you for hours studying your perfect face in complete disbelief that you were mine. For months after bringing you home, I would sneak into your room just to make sure you were there and this all wasn't some elaborate dream I was having.

But it wasn't. You're not. You are my son. My love. My heart. My entire life. You are everything. And I love you with so much more than just my heart my boy. 

Happy Birthday Puppy. Happy Happy Birthday. 
xoxo
Love, Mama


6 comments Tags: drew, motherhood, first birthday

girls girls girls

Do you think it's a sign that my son will smile amid a tantrum when he feels long hair is within his grasp? No? 


How about the fact that long hair coupled with dancing will make him giggle? No? 

Well, then how about the fact that if a woman with long hair dances for him and decides to sing as well then he proceeds to do nice to her breast. 

Yep. I thought that you would be convinced at that. 

I am too. 

My son is going to love Strippers. 

Eh. 

Like mother, Like son. 

:-) 

4 comments Tags: drew, girls, motherhood

Drew, 11 months

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Drew_11months

It's been an exciting month for my boy. He went from unsteadily pulling himself up to sailing along from edge to edge and walking with no problem while holding onto things. I'm positive that he's going to walk soon and I'm hoping it's in my presence rather than anyone else's! 


He also cut 4 teeth. In one week. It was quite painful for both of us. It's funny to see him smile and see these bright white buds shining back at me. I keep thinking he put something in his mouth that shouldn't be there! 

Most important this month was the appearance of mama. My boy said Mama. It was heaven and though i still doubt whether he's looking at ME and saying Mama, hearing that mama babble is just as good for me. 

5 comments Tags: baby, drew, motherhood, 11 months

mamamamama

It really was an ordinary day. My mom came over. I went to work. It was a little slow so I decided to start shopping around virtually for Drew's first birthday. I have to say that most party supply websites really are rather generic looking. In a world of personalization and customization, I was rather shocked to see cookie cutter graphics and cheap looking materials. 


Then, I joined the rest of the world and discovered Etsy. 

Now you you might be thinking, where in the world has this chick been? Well... I don't know. My good friend J has mentioned Etsy a number of times and to be honest, she gets super excited about anything new, a charming trait that I adore, but it kind of leads me to write many things off. Etsy was one of them. 

So far I've ordered a tee shirt for him to get his first birthday photos in and to wear at the party. I emailed someone about a banner for the fence and for inside our house and I emailed someone about creating a crown and a bib. I'm so excited. Everything is so much more, and forgive my term here and don't think less of me for this deep dark secret, Martha. There it's out. I adore Martha Stewart. I can't help it. It's a good thing. 

So excited as I was I came home to my mother and my son. I showed mom all my good finds, she was just as excited and then it happened. 

MA MA. 

He was crawling around the floor looked up and said Ma Ma as if he'd always known how. My first reaction was not what I expected. I looked at my mother and said, he doesn't know it's me. He's just saying it. Then it happened again. And he was looking at me. 

Ma Ma. 

That's me. 

Ma ma. 

Then I laughed, cried and kissed him a ridiculous amount of times. 

I'm Mama. Nice to meet you. 

10 comments Tags: birthday, drew, motherhood, mama, first words

hello midnight

I am a horrible sleeper. 


I don't know if there's a possible way that you can think while asleep but I'm pretty sure I have figured it out. Most of the time, I wake around 2 or 3 am because Drew's covers have come off of him or his pacifier has fallen out and I hear him whine before going back to sleep. 

But that minor interruption in his sleep is a major interruption in mine. I start thinking about bills. Money, or our lack thereof. Freelancing. Full-time Jobs. Creative Writing Projects. First Birthday's. Holiday's. Marriage. Adult time. And well this whole post could wind up being topics that cross my mind and prevent me from sleeping at 2 am. 

There are weeks I'm okay and nothing bother's me. There are weeks when I can't let go enough to get some rest. 

It's one of those weeks. The latter kind. And I'm tired. I'm frustrated. Mostly with myself. And I can't wait for the weeks where nothing bother's me to come again. 

4 comments Tags: drew, motherhood, problems

Drew, 10 months

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I can't believe that he's already 10 months old! He's pulling himself up to walk, he's crawling, he's sitting up and just amazing me every day. And he's my biggest fan. I walk in the room and he smiles and wants nothing more than to be with me, in my arms and just around me. He's my drug. 100%. 

He's just my entire heart. Living and breathing outside of me. The best thing in my life. The most amazing accomplishment I've ever had the privilege of coming to fruition. 
9 comments Tags: drew, motherhood, 10 months

i wear my sunglasses in the rain

This morning was not a good one. 


Drew and I had a rough night. The problem lately is that he's going to bed at 8 p.m. and sleeping till 2 am then waking with energy to spare. Last night we woke him at 10 to try and give him the 8 p.m. bottle he fell asleep on. Well, he takes after his dad in that if he doesn't want to be awake no bomb going off in our house is going to get him bright eyed and bushy tailed. So we reluctantly let him sleep. 

And of course, as predicted, at 2 am, he woke. I laid with him on the couch till 2:30 when I tried to put him in bed. He screamed. We laid on the couch some more. Finally at 2:45, he went in his crib. 

Till 3:30. We did the routine over again. And he stayed in his crib till 4:30. 

I was exhausted by then, so I took him in the bed with Andrew and I and he slept till 5:30. He woke Andrew up by climbing on his head and pulling his hair and kicking him in the mouth (Good Morning Daddy!). Andrew actually got up with him (Thank GOD for small favors) and put him to sleep in his crib. 

Where he slept till 7 am. 

Lucky for me I got up earlier at 6:50 and was prepared with a bottle and my coffee. 

Except that all of a sudden I got this flash of heat. And by flash I mean 20-30 minutes of feeling there was not enough air in the world to cool me down. I was sweating profusely, which is a wonderful way to get dressed for work, and couldn't cool down if I stood naked in an icebox. I'm going around and opening windows and putting the fan on and Andrew is closing them and turning the fan off. 

I wanted to strangle him. Mostly because he was present and I was feeling insanely claustrophobic. 

My mother gets there, late cause off traffic and we leave. We get in the car and I had my eyeglasses in my hand but suddenly in the car, can't find them. Andrew starts to pull out and we hear CRUNCH. 

Andrew looks at me and says "Found your glasses." 

He gets out and sure enough my very expensive designer eyeglasses are now garbage. Now if anyone knows me, then you know I cannot see without my glasses on while driving and it was raining cats and dogs. And true to nature, I don't have a back up pair. 

So I drove to work. In the pouring rain. In my very dark sunglasses. 

Can we please just have a do-over? 


4 comments Tags: eyes, baby, drew, eyeglasses, motherhood, no sleep

and now back to your regularly scheduled programming

You know those emails you get where there are a whole bunch of "you know you're a ______ when..." type lines? Well, today I went to Rite Aid after Weight Watchers (down 2.2 this week but it's really like 1 lb cause I gained last time... bloating, I swear) and found Apple Prune Juice by Gerbers. 


My son has such a hard time going that I have to make sure to get some Prunes in him every day to help along the process. Finding Prune baby food has been no issue, but finding Prune Juice of any kind for babies... what a headache. 

So when I saw it in Rite Aid I was beyond excited. I was as excited as I used to be when I received a new handbag or Sephora shopping spree. 

You know you're a mom when you get excited at finding Prune Juice at Rite Aid. 

Any funny or interesting you know you're a mom when's out there? 

9 comments Tags: baby, drew, motherhood

Lights in the sky

Since Drew could see somewhat clearly, he has been fascinated by two things: Lights and Music. We have numerous toys and rattles that light up, play music and do numerous combinations of the two. But last night, we found Drew's favorite way to see lights.
His first July 4th was pretty mellow, it was just us hanging out, which is fine by me but I think Andrew was bored. At around 8:30, we headed to the beach, which is 10 minutes away to watch the big fireworks show. So we find a spot and pull over to watch and realize that the amount of mosquitoes on the beach is insane and I didn't bring bug spray for the baby, who was sleeping at this point in his car seat.
So I roll up all the windows and sit with the baby inside with the air blasting to kill any bugs that are locked in with me while Andrew takes some photos.
When Andrew has no more blood to give he gets back in and we head home. The baby wakes up on the way. By the time we get home, he's irritated that we haven't gotten him out of the seat sooner.
We get him out of his hoodie and sit with him on our front steps and that's when his face just lit up. He saw the colored lights in the sky and just didn't want to look away. He was fascinated. He sat there on Andrew's lap watching for more and I sat there watching them. Both of my men looking up into the sky.
I had this moment on the steps where I realized, this was everything I had ever wanted. 2 1/2 years ago, my heart was so empty, my soul very sad. And now, a war later, here I am, complete.
Tears actually came into my eyes, and I felt my heart swelling but I kept it together so Andrew didn't make fun of me. But right then and there, I knew I truly did have it all. We don't have a lot of money, a big mansion, a lot of property but I have everything I need in those two men...
And I was so happy.

Happy Independence Day!

2 comments Tags: andrew, drew, motherhood, july 4th