Stop Thinking You're the Only One

I've talked with people recently who admit to feeling overwhelmed by housework, read about moms who feel like they're letting themselves or their family down if they don't keep a neat home. I am definitely in the same boat 99.9% of the time.
I follow a couple of blogs with tips on staying organized, mostly so I can bitch about how type A they are and what a miserable life that must be. And occasionally I'm like "oh I should go alphabetize my socks right now too!" But most of the time I get super jealous and feel bad about myself and what a failure I must be.
I have my moments where I am ambitious and I get shit done. But even on a Saturday when I have extra help at home, it still takes a really long time to do what takes others 10 minutes.

My whole point here is if you feel like you can't stay on top of it, you're not alone.
So here. You can start feeling better now:

Mud room. Absolutely no organization to it. Drives me nuts.  Makes me anxious to share this.

Family room after moving all the random stuff onto the coffee table (instead of just putting it away) to clean the carpets.

At least the carpet is clean.

The things tossed on the stairs "so I can bring them up next time I go upstairs." hahahahahaha

Oh yeah. Don't we have a playroom down here? yup. It's bulimic. 

Maybe If I just move everything to the bottom it won't look as messy.

If you're looking for something, it's likely it's stuck on the fridge.

Ugh. the kitchen table. We eat our meals here. HOW? By moving that pile someplace else, that's how.

And it turns out I'm a mess too. I have spit up all over this shirt. Notice the finger prints on that mirror.
DEAL WITH IT.

Just because I'm sharing these things doesn't mean I don't care about the mess. I do, and I clean it up when I feel like I can. But you know what? My girls are fed. 3, sometimes 4 times a day. There's bowls, plates, bottles and sippy cups laying around to prove it. There are toys strewn about because mommy told you to just go play with your toys already, we spend time playing and reading together. 

With people posting, sharing, pinning, instagramming everything these days, it can be easy to feel like you don't measure up to it all. 

But dude. This is my house on a normal day. Not a tornado day, not the day of cleaning, just a normal day. Sorry if you're disappointed.

No I'm not.

I just hope I made you feel a *teensy* bit better about not always being on top of it all.

Do you think that social media has an impact about how you feel about yourself, your home, or your possessions? 

I do. But then I just read the confessions on Scary Mommy and decide I'm normal. 

Quiet

I've been quiet the last few days. In the wake of the terrible happenings in CT, I feel like anything I would share would be trite and meaningless. I may get around to something, but then again, I may not.

What I will share today is how I feel the need to focus on some positivity. (Wait. is that not a word? why am I getting the red squiggle under that? I googled it like a moron. Is everything in my life a lie?)
I need some warm fuzzies (red squiggle again! fuzzies is a word!! wtf!) and if I need create warm fuzzy situations, so be it. Extra bubbles in the bath, heck yes. A big muffin and cookie at breakfast just to see how much Charlotte enjoys it, no problem. Dance party, followed by stories and singing in bed, my heart explodes. I may not be able to control the bad things that happen in life, but I can do my best to contribute some happy things.
Here are just a couple of things that have made me smile in the last few days.

Popping blood vessels from extreme weight lifting

Tucking in all of her babies (including Minnie Mouse)

hey. my eyes are up here.

Practicing for the luge. 

sparkles spread cheer

This is what she'll look like at 90 when she takes her dentures out

Good leggings gone bad

What are the little things that have made you smile lately?

A Beep

Tonight I was taking video of Charlotte eating because she was totally scarfing down her dinner and I wanted to show my husband, who had to work late. The video doesn't capture how fast she was eating at the moment, but it does capture something else. 

Make sure your volume is turned up.

Yes, she calls farts "a beep." And burps, and sometimes hiccups. While I don't encourage potty humor at the dinner table, I find this hilarious because she has no clue that farts are gross, funny, or whatever else people think of them. To her, it's just "a  beep." and clearly, they are somewhat surprising to her as well. 

Things That Annoy Me

1. World Market. Normally I really like the store. Normally, I don't have two kids that need to be in a cart.
This week I took the girls out, and my plan was to go to World Market to get a few baskets to go in our entertainment center. There wasn't any up-close parking available, so I walked with Charlotte while I carried Lena in her car seat. Charlotte walks like a sloth. (I've never actually seen one walk. Just hang. But I imagine they walk slowly. I wonder if Kristen Bell knows all things sloth.) We make it into the store to discover that Lena will not fit in the shopping cart. So I walk back out with them to load them up in the stroller. Charlotte falls in the parking lot and skins her knee. But she's a lot like the Honey Badger. She don't give a shit.
But once I got out the stroller, she was ticked! I finally restrained the flailing little bugger and head into the store, but the aisles do not accommodate my double stroller. (file this under: why I shop online).
I make it to the back of the store where the baskets are, and this is what I find:

awesome.

2,) Finally getting a restless over-tired baby to sleep only to have them violently fill their diaper. It's sort of like the kid in a snowsuit saying they need to go to the bathroom, but in the middle of the night with a little baby that you just.want.to.go.to.sleep.

3.) When people say "supposably". That is NOT A WORD. Read more. If you pay attention, you'll realize that you've never read that word in your life.
Maybe I should lighten up. After all, it was I who thought these guys:

were actually called "Haulin' Oats" until like 5 years ago. And I never knew how to say Don Quixote so I just didn't. Clearly I have issues with things involving oats. But yeah. Stop saying supposably.


I know I should be blogging more meaningful bits of my life, but I know how much you guys like a rant.

What words or phrases did you have wrong for way too long?
I have a friend who thought a rum & coke was called a Roman Coke until she saw it spelled out at a bar.

A Few Constants

I laughed to myself today while realizing the few constants that present themselves in my life lately.

I can always count on finding miscellaneous items in random places due to a certain Charlotte.

I discovered this the day after I went out and finally bought Charlotte a new toothbrush.

Velcro rollers, baby monitor, rolls of tape, formula dispenser, baby toys - all in Darby's crate.
(Darby doesn't spend as much time in there lately)

Fridge Phonics in the bathroom

I can also count on my dog doing this:

In the family room

On the new couch that is for the basement but since the basement is not ready, it's in the great room.

In my bed.

The other constant is that Charlotte will try to step, stand, or sit in just about everything that isn't intended for it.

Climbs in but is instantly distressed.

She dumps out all of the blocks and climbs right in

In a doll box

So if there are a few things that I can count on, it's those things. And also heartburn.

I'm Melting.

Holy moly it's hot, people.
I know. It's hot other places too, and upper 90s is normal. But we're in Michigan. A heat index of 105 for days at a time is too hot.
So now that Charlotte is finally down to one nap a day, that leaves a big chunk of the day where I need to find something to do, and when it's been so hot, I don't know what to do.
At the recommendation of some friends, I took her to the library on Tuesday, and I am so glad I did. I don't know if I've ever seen Charlotte so excited. She was the youngest kid there by just a couple of months, and she didn't sit for the last story, but she did really great.

There are quilts! Hanging on the walls!

We were the first to arrive, so Charlotte had full run of the place and decided that the chair in the front would have to be hers.
I wish I could have taken pictures the whole time because it was ridiculous. The reader (I don't think she was a librarian...not sure who she was exactly...community service?) came out with a puppet, and I think Charlotte had bite marks in her index fingers from chomping down on them with excitement. I made a mental note to get a puppet for crabby times. There were songs in between each story and even though she didn't dance along much, I'm pretty sure Charlotte was peeing her pants the whole time out of sheer delight.
After the stories and songs were over, the kids lined up and got a stamp of an ice cream cone on their hand. Why? Who cares. If she could talk she would tell us that she would cherish her first stamp forever, and you better not give me a bath tonight!!

She caught a ghost with her bare hands during activity time.

Overall, it was a great way to spend part of the morning, and I think we'll be going each Tuesday for a little while. I also am signing us up for a music & me class in August with one of my friends and her little girl. It's things like these that seem so corny, but make me love being a mom.

Charlotte also had her 18 month well check this week, and she's still in just the 25% for her weight, and still at 75% for height. I can't wait for her to be a model and bring home the bacon. I was convinced she had an ear infection, but since she was having a spaz attack during her entire check up, it was too hard to get a good look at her ears, nose and throat. But she was put on an antibiotic due to a runny nose for 3 weeks, and four doses in, the snot has stopped.

We also stayed home for the first time in like 9 years for the 4th of July. It's just easier these days. I took Charlotte to her first parade (last year she was in one with me, but slept the whole time) and it was frickin broiling hot.

I'm pretending to enjoy this. I'm hot, and where are the horses? 

In other, being a SAHM mom, news: I am saving so much money on hair product and cosmetics! Sure, I look homeless most of the time and Sephora is calling me and asking where I've been, but at least I'm saving literally dollars per month! Tonight, I stopped into the beloved Sephora, and I just browsed. No one convinced me to buy some fancy skin illuminator, eyelid primer, or even a new brush head for my Clarisonic. I left without that cute black bag. I should get paid for this.

And only because this is awesome, I leave you with this:

This is the face she makes when she wakes up to an iPhone in her face.

I Have Very Little To Talk About

Life has been pretty dull around these parts, and that's not so bad.
The weather this summer has been mostly awesome and before I quit my job, I figured I'd be out enjoying every moment of the summer sun, but there's only so much I can take. I've relaxed a little around my in-law's pool, so we've spent some time there splashing and having fun.

Just let me go under already!!

One day I brought her there and she only wanted to play in the water for about 15 minutes. Then she wanted to crawl up and down the stairs and play inside. Well, no one was home at my in-law's, and it just didn't feel right hanging out inside on such a nice day. So I put her down for a nap. The logical thing to do...?

I thought she'd be tired, but after an hour she was shouting, and I was roasting in the beastly hot sun and was hoping that she'd wake up. So our day at the pool was actually 15 minutes of fun, 15 minutes of whining, and 60 minutes of me feeling like a pig roast and 60 minutes of Charlotte shouting. Sounds fun.

We also recently went to a Whitecaps game (our minor league baseball team for those who don't know) for Marcus' work picnic. We didn't watch a lick of baseball because we knew Brobee from Yo Gabba Gabba was there and we needed to find him. Charlotte loves mascots, I think they're creepy as hell. We discovered that we might be the family that puts our kid on a leash. Once her feet hit the pavement, she is gone. How does someone with 15" legs move faster than every person at the ballpark? And she's tricky because it's like she's training for a distance run by doing fartleks. Right when we catch up to her, she slows down so we look like idiots trying to grab her. She keeps her little arms tight to her sides and won't let us grab her. She ran the entire concourse of the ballpark. On top of that, we were about 10 feet away from Brobee, when he decided he needed a break.

I guess he *may* have been getting warm, it was like 85 degrees that day.

So never got to meet him.

So we settled for Frankie. You know...the pig that wears a floatie ring? Because that just shouts "West Michigan Whitecaps!"

You smell like bacon. And I LOVE bacon. 

We're headed back to the ballpark again tonight, so not only do we get another opportunity to hang out with teens dressed in cuckoo costumes, but it's 10 cent hot dog night! Nothing says quality like 10 cent "meat"!

I Sleep A Lot

Some people associate sleeping with laziness. I, however, associate it with awesomeness.
You may think I'm wasting precious getting stuff done hours by napping, but what I'm really doing is becoming so much smarter than you.
Ok. I'll try to keep the snark to a minimum, but really, I do require a lot of sleep. Most people say 8 hours is plenty, others only need 6. I need 9 hours of sleep. I can sometimes sleep 10, but that's only if Charlotte lets me sleep in until 8 and if I made it to bed by 10 pm. I frequently nap during the day. Not frequently in one day, but many times throughout the week. Yeah, I'm pregnant, but I think I would try to sneak in a cat nap even if I weren't.
Here's the issue. Pregnancy, though it makes me sleepy, doesn't allow me to sleep at night. I've had this nagging anxiety the past few months which causes my mind to race, especially at night. Add a crazy post-surgery hound to the mix, I won't sleep at all.
Last night for some reason, we had a smoke detector beep sporadically 3 times. Just one loud beep! over the course of an hour. It didn't really bother me, but for some reason, Darby went apeshit. Dude, it's just a beep. She wanted to hide in the bathroom, so when we put her in the bathroom, she'd want to come in our room. If she's in our room, she can be trusted, but if she's on her own, she'll lick her stitches. So then we'd have to put her cone around her head.
This monkey business continued from 11-1. The last I looked at the clock, it was 1:30 and I was ticked!
The thing is, this is how Darby will be ALL day, and then at night, she's up and at 'em.

I ended up giving her a valium and we slept until 6:30. 

This turned into being about the dog, when really it was supposed to be about my sleep habits. Since both are so extremely interesting it doesn't matter which direction it goes in because I know you're enthralled. 

I may as well throw a little Charlotte in here, too! 

She's not saying a ton of words specifically, but I sort of know what she's saying. She was good at using words for a little while, but now she's resorted to using "d" as her main consonant of choice. 

Me: Say please!

C: Daaaaah!

Me: Ok, now say thank you!

C: Dinkoo!

Me: Where's your blankie?

C: Deedeeee

Diaper=Dyder

Mama=Dada

Dada=Dada

Darby=Goggie

Milk=Meowl

What cat's say= Meow

Bubbles=Bubbahs

Yes=No

No= No, but with fury.

Drinking her meowl

I went on a little shopping trip this week and when I think about what I purchased for the girls, I realize it was almost exclusively pajamas and this:

She better oblige! 

Sorry this kind of went all over the place. You can tell I'm tired.

How much sleep do you require? Am I abnormal when it comes to demanding so much sleep?

Phone Dump

I was swiping through my photos yesterday and realized they pretty much sum up what's been going on lately (besides my ER visit. no photos, please!)  side note: 10 years ago if I would have said "swiping through my photos" it would have made it sound like I was manically spreading them out all over the place, or possibly "making it rain" with my pictures. Sorry. Tangent.

So here's my phone dump, and not in exact chronological order.


I discovered that my house had a mouse. And that made me INSANE.

yeah. that's mouse crap.

So naturally, I assumed mice made a home in my dishtowel basket. I chucked it outside and ran.

No, I'm not trapped under a rug. That's my view above rotund belly at 22 weeks. 

Have you heard of this? Best invention ever. Darby traveled three hours without panting or pacing (a problem she developed since we got the mini van) and was calmer than normal during the thunder storm we had over the weekend.

SO WORTH IT

 She sort of looked like a helper dog.

So chill. So chill I might just pee in your bed this weekend instead of telling you it's time to go out.

Yeah. She peed on our bed in the middle of the night. It was unrelated to the thundershirt. It was the night I was given morphine and I think I slept a little deeper than normal. She also had a chill pill before bed (she also doesn't sleep during the night while we're up north.) I'm sort of relieved it was her and not me.

Dad. Your jokes are lame.

Completely fascinated with the storm sewer grate. 

She looks so smart ever since her auto accident. 

 I picked up a potty to get Charlotte familiar with it.

Just testing the waters

Off to the hives to collect honey

I must get my power seller status back!!

Yes! Another positive rating! 

Eyes on the water, Captain Charlotte

She tells us she knows how to swim, but we don't trust her.

Ruby. Your face is squashed in.

And that?  is hilarious.

                                       

                                                      Watchin Elmo with my baby sister

We came back from my not so great weekend (everyone else had a nice time...) and fortunately caught that bastard mouse, but I'm not sure he was working alone. I need to set out more traps. 

I've also been feeling much better and have moved forward eating regular food. My doctor is hesitant to do much testing while I'm pregnant, so hopefully whatever that flare up was, it doesn't happen again. 

That's all for now, folks.