Pierce Addition

To Whom it May Concern

2012-01-30T21:56:00.005-05:00

Dear Second Pierce Child Who Refuses to Be Conceived,

I get it. You won't be rushed. Unlike your older sister, you aren't in any huge hurry to meet me and Shawn. So be it. We will (continue to) wait.

But just in case you're wondering about things around here, let me tell you, it's good. It's all good.

We aren't novices anymore, not like we were in 2008 when Violet came along. We get babies now. At least we did. Not trying to pressure you or anything, but we might actually be a bit rusty if you don't come pretty soon. I promise I'll remember enough that I won't fret over some imaginary baby schedule or worry about following advice from an article in Parents magazine, but I'd still like it if you'd try to get here soon. I don't think your Daddy has changed a diaper in over a year, so expect a brief re-acclimation period there.

Did I mention I'm only working part-time? That's a perk Violet didn't get until she turned 1, but you could have it from the get-go. And I think we can get the same awesome babysitter for you that we've had for your sister all these years. You'll call her Grammy and she'll be WILD for you!

We honestly don't have a preference on your gender. Penis? Vagina? Don't let that decision hold you up. Bring it. I think your sister would like you to be a girl, but that's only because all of her baby dolls are girls and she doesn't have a boy name picked out. If you're a girl, she'd like to name you Lucy. Should you decide you'd like a penis, we'll love you just the same. And Daddy would be excited to tip the gender balance of the house back in his direction.

Now, I cannot promise you much in the way of material things. We have a nice, comfortable, cleanish house. You'll get a room in the house when you're ready for it. You'll always have clothes and toys and a bike and I know that because I know your grandparents. You'll get fed regularly; nursed for as long as we both care to and a pretty good mix of healthy and yummy vittles after that. No, you can't drink soda.

Your Dad has really come into his own in the last 3+ years. He is relishing being the daddy and I know he will scoop you up and never look back. We promised to stay together forever and I can tell you neither of us has changed our minds about that nor will we. So that's one thing you won't have to worry about.

Will we embarrass you? For sure. Your Daddy probably won't make you cringe as much as I will, but I'm sure from time to time we'll both have you rolling your eyes. We already love your as-yet unmapped chromosomes so very much that we can cry just from longing for you. So, yeah. Get ready for it.

You have no idea about the host of people who are over here for you when you come. I already mentioned your grandparents--you'll have 3 waiting when you get here. There is also a whole host of aunts and uncles, a slew of cousins (such fun for you!), and more friends than you can count! And I know I keep talking about Violet, but, that's because she is quite possible going to be your biggest fan. Unlike you, she was quite eager to join our family and she's eager to get you here, too. I can't say for sure, but I think she'd even be willing to give up her coveted spot sleeping between me and your Dad for you when you get here. Don't hold me to that, however. I do know that you'll love her to pieces. If you manage to learn from her even a fraction of all the amazing things she has taught me, you'll be the envy of the playground.

Speaking of playgrounds, we go to them quite often. Picnics, too. And we like to swim and bike, camp and cook. We'll take you to the drive-in and dance with you in the kitchen. If you're into art, I'll make sure you always have plenty of paints and a blank canvas. Trips to the library, walks through the neighborhood, feeding the ducks, museum visits galore, classes and snow angels; we'll see to it you get to do all of that.

Daddy and I are doing what we need to be doing to bring you here. If it's the coffee you don't like, just say the word and I'll nix it. But I'll give you a really crappy middle name. Just kidding, of course. If being a twinkle in Daddy's eye is really so hard to give up, maybe it would help you to know that he's going to be taking well over 100,000 photos of you before you turn 3. Not so different from being a twinkle, really. Except unlike being just a twinkle, you'll get to experience real hugs from the 3 other Pierces currently waiting on you. You just can't get that as a twinkle.

So at the risk of going completely Mommy on you:

Get over here right this instant. And I mean it.

Love,

Your Terribly Impatient Future Mommy

Giving Due Credit: Stole the lovely idea to write to a pre-baby from this blog: http://v-double-u.blogspot.com/ It worked for her.

Relief from Worry

2012-01-26T09:12:00.004-05:00

I had an ultrasound on Monday. That's the second one in two months, if you're counting. And it was the second decidedly un-fun ultrasound of my life. During my routine annual exam two weeks ago my doctor felt an abnormality while she was palpating my abdomen. She pressed down twice on my right side under my rib cage. "Hmmm, that's funny. I can feel your liver." She guided my hand to the area, had me breath in and let me feel it too.

To save space, I will just tell you that most people's livers are completely contained by the ribcage and only occasionally can a normal liver be felt under the costal margin (below the ribs). My liver function blood tests came back normal, but to be sure, I was ordered to have an ultrasound to rule out "tumors." Not my phrasing but the doctor's.

I won't rehash the entirety of my thought process from the last two weeks, but I can tell you I have picked out the one of my friends that I'd like Shawn to marry when he's ready to take another wife. She's adorable, likes country music, and most importantly would be a wonderful step-mother to Violet. I know she would love her as if she were her own and never make Violet feel like a step child even if she and Shawn went on to have more children together.

So, yeah. I've been pretty worried.

I love my fucking life.

Just as it is.

Violet's hair is getting so long.

She's never had a school picture taken.

Seeing the mall makes her excited.

Stories about the day she was born are some of her favorites.

She just dropped her first f-bomb. ("Come on fuckers!" as we waited in the car at preschool drop off line at her Catholic school. Eek.)

She likes Indian food. All of the people she draws are smiling. She is delightfully literal but starting to pick up on sarcasm. She calls hummus "thomas." There is a girl in her class who Violet is convinced is named Elf. When someone is sick she brings them a glass of water. She regularly tells me, "I love Daddy."

Having a shadow, a hint, an outside chance that something would come between me and being this kid's Mommy for a long, long, time is unacceptable.

My liver is not going to be that something. The ultrasound tech told me I have the most beautiful anatomy she's seen in a long time and the doctor confirmed her findings. All those parts seem to be in acceptable working order, thank heavens.

This whole thing has really reminded me that nothing is permanent. Even the things that should be givens, should be exempt from life's shitty rules, sometimes are not. Parents lose children. Kids lose parents. We are all working under the assumption that it won't be us, and that's probably for the best. But every now and then, it is worth it take a second and squeeze a bit tighter to that little hand, just because.

If You're Happy and You Know It

2012-01-08T20:11:00.006-05:00

The first week of January has been, much to my surprise, wonderful. Not tolerable, not manageable, not even just okay; it has truly been a great week. Shocker.

In December, I started a new job working for a small non-profit that provides support groups for young people experiencing grief. This was my third week and I am starting to get over my newbie jitters and see how much I am really going to enjoy being involved with this organization. The mission is so important and the kids in the program are receiving a service that just isn't available anywhere else in our area. We serve kids from the age of 3 all the way through young adults and it seems that being with other kids who have lost a loved one is the best therapy for them. I am working part-time as the Volunteer Coordinator and so far I really feel that I made a great decision when I changed jobs.

I am not the only one who has made a change in 2012. On January 4th, Violet had her very first ever day of preschool. We visited several schools in December looking for the right one. In the end, both Violet and Shawn and I decided that we'd send her to the same school where both of her cousins already attend. It's a parochial school and is the parish where Violet was baptized. Though we aren't what you'd call active parishioners, we do feel connected to the community there and I think the grade school is one of the best choices in our area. Nonetheless, I was nervous.

Starting on New Years Day, Violet started abiding by her first real bedtime. Since preschool begins at 8am, we didn't want her to be a little basket case when her first 7am wake up call rolled around. I am amazed at how easily our night owl transitioned to a more reasonable bedtime. The night before her first morning of school, she fell asleep around 8:30. I was the one who tossed and turned. I kept dreaming that I had left her in a crowd by herself. No Freudian interpretation needed on that one.

Though Violet did have some jitters on that first morning as we walked in, she was braver than I ever would have imagined. She complained a few times that her tummy hurt--nerves no doubt--and I did stay with her for about 30 minutes while she warmed up to her new classroom. But by about 8:35, she was reluctantly coloring at a table and I sneaked out unnoticed. When Grammy and I picked her up at 12:30, she was all smiles. Her teacher said she did wonderfully and Day Two was even smoother.

The weather this past week has also been unseasonably warm and sunny. We've gotten to take Violet on several wagon rides and have spent more than our share of time outdoors for any Hoosiers in January. Cold, gray, days are usually all that Indiana has to offer those of us suffering from a holiday hangover but this year she actually managed to cheer us up with some blue skies and 50's. I know it won't last, but I am going to take it for now.

As Crafty as I Wanna Be

2011-12-27T10:30:00.003-05:00

I am not a big crafter, so making gifts for anyone on my Christmas list was a big accomplishment. After several tries, I made this subway art poster for Shawn. It's a favorite Avett Brothers lyric and, obviously, our last name. It's a 12 x 18 print and looks pretty cool.

I also made 12 x 18 prints for my brothers and their wives. For their posters, I used their old addresses. It took a lot of playing with and no fewer than 3 failed attempts, but I think that all the posters turned out pretty well. And it was fun to give a personalized piece of art to people for Christmas. The printing was inexpensive at Meijer and using coupons, I was able to get fairly nice frames from Michaels.

If you want to make your own, I followed this tutorial from I Am Momma. I did use her printing method the first time but had limited success using the engineer's blueprint so I ended up printing a plain old poster and using a frame. It's a different look, but still nice, I think.

I'm Better, Really

2011-12-14T22:43:00.003-05:00

Hormones can really upend your life. I am FINALLY feeling mostly back to normal after the longest miscarriage experience ever.

It wasn't until my acupuncturist told me that, in fact, bleeding for 21 days is NOT normal that I went back to the doctor. I am really trying my hardest to live in a let-things-take-their-course way, especially when it comes to my reproductive health. Sometimes, though, it's good to have someone give you a nudge in the right direction when things are a bit off balance.

After a call to my doc's office to fill them in on what had been going on, they wanted me to come in right away for an ultrasound. The last time I had an ultrasound, there was a gorgeous little girl dancing around on the screen. This one was way less fun.

If I hadn't been crying, I might have thought it was pretty cool to see my lady parts on TV like that. My uterus was empty, which was sad, but also very good. Any remaining tissue would have had to been removed surgically, through a D&C. The tech pointed out my uterine scar from my c-section (grrrr), and the remaining corpus luteum (egg casing) from the miscarriage still on my ovary. The corpus luteum should go away on its own without intervention.

I also had my blood drawn by the sweetest nurse ever, who I cried upon relentlessly. She even showed me out the back door when I told her I didn't want to walk out through the waiting room. Bless her.

The results of the blood test showed that my hcg (the pregnancy hormone) level was still elevated which is probably part of the reason why I still felt pretty far gone. With time, probably more time than I'd like to give it, that will zero out and I'll go back to being a normal (?) woman.

I am glad to have the worst of this shit behind me. There were several days during late November and early December when I thought I might have slipped into the realm of clinical depression. The overwhelming feeling of hopelessness was unlike anything I've experienced and I talked to Shawn twice about the possibility of needing some professional help. Very scary and, I do believe, a clinically real hormone driven phenomenon. Surely the loss of the pregnancy was the catalyst for my blues, but I think the fact that my hormones had been whacked out coupled with dealing with continued bleeding kept me spiraling downward.

I am excited/terrified to try again to conceive. I am finally feeling back to normal and I kind of just want to drink wine and coffee and not worry that it might be hindering my reproductive ability. But I also really, really want to be with a baby again. So, I dunno. I guess I will try to trust my body on this one. After all, it kind of screwed things up last time, so it owes me one.

Carrying On

2011-12-02T16:55:00.005-05:00

Since my public has been hounding me to return to the blog, here I am. Sorry, Jen.

I have not felt like writing much for awhile. I started this space to chronicle Violet's life and my entry into motherhood. Lately, I haven't had much to say about motherhood.

And I haven't had much to say about motherhood because I'm infertile.

I really hate that word. I didn't want to read it anywhere let alone write in on the blog that was created to capture my life as a mother. And it still seems like the wrong word for me, because--hello--Violet.

But, look it up and you will see that, regardless of previous children, a couple is considered infertile after 12 months of unprotected, well-timed intercourse that does not result in a live birth.

We are wrapping up month 15.

The first 6 months were almost fun since I knew at any moment I'd see two lines on a test and we'd get ready to do this awesome parenthood trip again. And two lines did appear. Violet and I made a save the date card and she told her Daddy on June 7th that I "had a baby in my tummy."

Things got markedly less fun when I started bleeding in June shortly after the two lines appeared. I got the gift of my first miscarriage on June 9th, my 33rd birthday. And then I started to worry.

I got really serious about making this happen. I knew the 12 month mark was coming and I since I knew we weren't infertile--hello, Violet--I knew we'd have conceived by then.

But 12 months came and there was no baby. We went on to the next step and had some preliminary tests run because, as the nurse at my ob-gyn's office was nice enough to point out ON my birthday WHILE I was having a miscarriage, I am closer to 35 than I am to 25.

The tests were normal. My hormone levels, my thyroid, anything that could be measured through a blood test was normal. I asked Shawn to be tested, too, and, because he is a sweet man and because he also wants more kids he agreed. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the doctor described his results as "perfect."

With the affordable testing done and no infertility coverage on our insurance, I decided to forgo the more invasive and expensive testing and went the natural route instead. In October, I started seeing an acupuncturist and taking Chinese herbs to help my get pregnant. Three cycles is how long I'd give it, I decided, before going forward with more exhaustive Western medical testing. Along with the herbs and acupuncture, I did fertility yoga, cut out coffee, didn't drink, and generally lived each day as a meditation on getting pregnant.

The good news is, I became pregnant on the first cycle. The bad news is, this pregnancy also ended in miscarriage. With the exception of losing my Dad, this miscarriage has been the most emotionally taxing time of my life.

I thought I lost the pregnancy very early, grieved, then realized I was still pregnant. I prepared for the worst and hoped for the best--an exhausting state in which to live--for several days until it definitively ended. The blood work showed poor progesterone levels, but whether that was the cause of the miscarriage or one of its effects is unknown.

It's been 12 days since the miscarriage began and it still isn't over. I feel like I am supposed to have moved on from this already, but my body hasn't even done that yet.

I'd like to carry on, enjoy the holidays, enjoy being Violet's Mommy again. I am feeling intermittently better but, by and large, still kind of like a basketcase.

***The other sucky thing about secondary infertility is that the pain it causes feels somehow a result of greediness. I AM lucky, blessed, amazingly wowed everyday by the one daughter I have. If anything, Violet makes me hyper-aware of how incredibly precious the gift of motherhood is.

I know there are people out there, some dear friends and family, who have gone through this taxing journey of trying to conceive that are not lucky enough to end a shitty day with a snuggle from their kid. I am not trying to compare my pain with theirs--it all sucks. I do feel like I understand infertility in a whole new way in light of the last year and that can only make me a better, more compassionate person.

Lasterday

2011-09-26T15:50:00.005-04:00

With a vocabulary that is growing by leaps and bounds, and pronunciation skills that are improving daily, Violet's speech is getting very adult. She uses a lot of conversational conventions, like, "Do you want to use my toothpaste, or no?" and "Can I have just a smidge of brownie?"

While time is still fairly abstract, she definitely grasps the difference between now and later. She asked me if she could get a bathrobe of her own, and since I believe that, like dinnertime, robetime is sacrosanct in the Pierce home, I told her yes. She then asked if she'd be getting the robe "now or someday?" Smart kid and patient, too! Don't you worry, Violet, Mommy's gonna get you a cozy robe of your very own!

There are some words and concepts that still evade her. Similar to the way a non-native speaker will find concepts from their native language that cannot be expressed in English, Violet is forced to create her own words where the ones we give her are lacking. One of my favorites is

lasterday: noun, a day longer ago that the immediate day prior. Not to be confused with yesterday, which actually means yesterday. Used to recall any memorable event from the last 14 months. e.g. Remember lasterday when we went to the apple orchard with Jack and Charlie?

I saw a guy at a festival we went to this weekend wearing a shirt that read, 'Carpe Manana.' Lasterday, or wasterday, as it is properly pronounced, is kind of in line with Carpe Manana. It's just a laid back idea of time. Much like the word y'all, I can see a use for lasterday in my vocabulary. But, also like y'all, it just sounds stupid coming out of my mouth.

balleotard: noun; the stretchy pink outfit worn by ballet girls. A blending of the words ballet and leotard. Duh.

Balleotards are a hot topic in my house right now. Violet wants to keep constant tabs on her balleotard; ideally she'd like to be wearing it. If she isn't wearing it, she wants to know the status of the costume. "Is my balleotard dirty or clean? Is it in the hamper or the washer? Is it dry YET?" She's napped in it, grocery shopped in it, lunched in it.

The current balleotard, which is wadded up on a dining room chair right now awaiting a stain stick, will be lucky to make it through the full 6 weeks of dance class. We may have to buy a second--I'm thinking black this time--if we decide to re-enroll for the second session. And enroll we likely will. Violet is in love with her class. She and Ruby are in class together and I can't get over how excited to participate Violet is. Having a friend makes a world of difference.

It seems like only lasterday that I was rescuing her from her scary swim teacher at the pool, and now she and her balleotard would run me over to get into the dance studio.

Say Cheese, Eat Cheese

2011-08-27T16:42:00.003-04:00

The most awesome Mommy-Violet Days involve pretzles and cheese.

Summer Catch-Up

2011-08-14T14:09:00.019-04:00

Just like last summer, I am finding these warmer months are not great for my blog. Unlike last summer, I have a killer excuse for not posting anything. This summer we have been incredibly busy tending our garden. We are practically farmers, I tell you! Seriously, we have been ~~burdened~~ blessed with multiple pounds of zucchini each week.

We have eaten grilled zucchini, zucchini fries, zucchini pancakes (yuck), sauteed zucchini, zucchini casserole (mild yuck), chocolate chip zucchini cookies (yum), and chocolate zucchini bread (big yum, Violet calls this brownies!). We have also given tons away and it just keeps coming. I almost didn't want to leave to go on vacation because I was worried about who would tend the garden.

Almost. But we did, and oh, what a great beach vacation it was! Violet was a big fan of both the beach and the ocean and despite a bit of rain, we mostly great weather.

As if a family vacation at the beach wasn't enough fun, we went down with our dear friends, Jen, Mark, and Avery. Violet had a blast playing with 5-year-old Avery, and Avery displayed extended patience with her tag-a-long toddler shadow!

For me, the week was reminicent of the old days when Jen and I were roommates. Life with spouses and young kids gets so busy, it was wonderful to have a week of co-habitating with my bestie. I am always a big fan of sleepovers, and this one was perfect. Also, it was a great time to get to know Jen's new husband Mark better. I do not for a second take for granted how rad it is to have a family with whom we get along so well!

When we returned, the countdown was on to the first day of school. Shawn and I tried to make the most of his last week before school began. He had a lot of prep work that needed to be done in his classroom, but we still managed to take a day trip to Bloomington. We had a delicious lunch and then walked around campus for a couple of hours. I love Bloomington so much and it was great to be able to share it with Violet.

We are going to try to suck the most possible fun out of the remaining weeks of summer. I don't feel nearly finished with cookouts, swimming pools, or bike rides!

Just Add Water

2011-06-14T23:59:00.006-04:00

Though I am not a very religious person, I do believe that summer is a gift from beyond and to waste it is a sin. So, we've been swimming. A lot.

After a cool and rainy spring, summer roared in with 90 degree temps during the first week of June and our threesome (Daddy's on summer break--YAY!) rose to the challenge of staying cool. We've hit IndyPark spraygrounds, city pools, sprinkler parks, friend's backyard pools, and filled our own inflatable kiddie-pool more than once.

In fact, we have been so diligent about cooling off using whatever means neccessary, Violet can barely see a hose without stripping. Seriously, Shawn and I have turned our backs on her for .2 seconds and found her naked as a jaybird turning the spicket. I am delighted that she isn't afflicted with body consciousness yet, but a bit concerned that our neighbors might be put off by our clear lack of modesty.

The temperatures cooled off this week and we have been enjoying the kind of sun-drenched, humidity-free days that lead people to southern California. What did the Beach Boys say about the Midwest farmer's daughters?

Violet is even taking her first big-kid, i.e. not in a parent's arms, swim lessons. The class runs 8 sessions, M-Th, and is a BIG DEAL for our shy Violet. Since she hasn't been in any kind of daycare setting, this is little V's first experience going with an instructor and class without a primary caregiver. She did swimmingly the first day, cried on the second day (photos below), refused to go in on the third day, and has rocked it every day since. We have two more sessions and I am actually considering enrolling her for another 8. She is such a surprise to me!

THREE!!

2011-05-11T15:13:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow Violet turns 3. Just like her 1st and 2nd birthdays, I have put together a little photo montage of the last year. The photos are set to what is currently Violet's second favorite song (the Darth Vader theme just gave the whole thing a kind of creepy feeling)!

Sprung

2011-04-26T23:45:00.003-04:00

I know that it is finally springtime in Indiana because people have stopped moaning about the snow and started complaining about the rain.

In fairness, it has been pretty soggy, but, April Showers=May Flowers, right? And, I am spoiled now that I am working 12 hours a week. When the sun has popped its head out for intermittent hours here and there, and I've been able to catch it. Violet and I dash out the door when the light starts to stream in the window. We take a rag to wipe off the swing, carry out a bag full of chalk to decorate the sidewalks, and wear Hello Kitty rain boots to stomp the wet off the puddles. You'd be surprised how much spring you can fit into a two hour break in the clouds!

Violet has changed so much since November when we had to head in for the winter. She now can peddle her tricycle on her own fairly well and, more importantly, turn it to avoid oncoming cars and ditches. She is beginning to understand the rules of outdoor games like tag, too. She loves digging for worms, and proudly carries around her "wormy c'llection" whenever we do yard work. Violet has been helping quite a bit in the garden, not just finding worms but also watering the broccoli and pepper seedlings she planted in yogurt cups whenever they need a drink. I hope they produce something edible in a few months, because she is expecting big things from those little guys!

5 Days, 4 Nights

2011-03-23T10:46:00.003-04:00

At 6am Friday morning, I'll be taking off for L.A. and a long weekend with two of my best and oldest friends. I'll be travelling sans the other Pierces. I have very conflicted feelings about this.

On the one hand, I am clearly excited for this trip. It has been 5 years since the three of us took a trip together and I have no doubt I will laugh almost continuously. Also, we are going to Southern California, so it's going to be really nice. An overnight to Santa Barbara County and some wine tastings are also on the calendar. So, yeah, I'm not conflicted about the company I'll be keeping or the itinerary for the trip. It's who won't be there.

Violet will be 3 in two months. She is such a big kid these days in so many ways. But she is still a baby. She is enough of a baby that she doesn't understand when I tell her that this weekend, her Daddy will be the one putting her to bed. She still has no concept of time. A promise of a Popsicle after dinner, even when dinner is about over, can cause a major meltdown.

I really didn't set out to be an "attachment parent." I don't think either Shawn or I knew what that was when Violet was born. But the more we followed our instincts, the longer we nursed, the more we listened to Violet and ignored the experts, the more attached we got. And I wouldn't change anything about the parenting decisions we have made. Ok, maybe I wouldn't give her nutrient void rice cereal as her first food. But, on the whole, I think we're doing well for her and ourselves.

But being securely attached means that we haven't gone anywhere overnight as a couple without Violet. She's never had a night without one of her parents being with her. And our solo excursions have been pretty limited as well. Leading up to this weekend, I've been away from Violet 3 non-consecutive nights. I think Shawn's total is about the same. So four nights away, really far away, is a huge deal in my journey as a mom.

I think I am ready. I hope Violet is.

Farewell to a Friend

2011-02-15T17:13:00.002-05:00

On Friday morning, the mobile vet is coming to our house to put Scout to sleep. Right now, she is resting in my car, parked in the cold garage. The car is the only place where she can escape the anxiety that turns her into a trembling mess more often than not these days.

Violet and I took her for a short walk today. We all enjoyed the cool, fresh, air and Scout's enthusiasm over going for a walk hasn't dampened despite her 15 years. She walked through deep puddles getting her underbelly wet and sniffed the recently revealed grass for signs of other dogs. She was so perky on the walk, in fact, I once again doubted whether or not euthenasia is the right decision right now. But when we got home, the panting and scratching and searching resumed right where it had left off. I know that the kind, responsible, choice is to let her go while there are still good moments. If I wait until she is constanly miserable, I will have waited too long.

So during the next few days, we'll take our walks. Violet will feed Scouty extra treats. We will enjoy the mild February weather outside as much as we can. I may buy Scout a Big Mac. Some extra ear scratches will definitely be in order. And then I'll cry for a long time while I say goodbye to my furry firstborn.

We Have Panties

2011-02-07T11:51:00.005-05:00

On Saturday, the 22nd of January, 2011, Violet pooped on the potty, and received her long awaited Dora underwear and chocolate chips. Like a mantra, during every poopy diaper change for almost a year, we have chanted about the exciting day when Violet pooped on the potty and got the grand prize, Dora underwear and chocolate chips. That glorious underwear and chocolate chip day has come and it was worth the wait.

I am so proud of Violet, I could shout it from the rooftops! 'MY BABY IS WEARING UNDERWEAR--NOT A DIAPER! SHE IS REFINED AND BRILLIANT!'

Of course there have been accidents. That's why it is called potty training. But the accidents are few and usually my fault. Like a pants pooping when I am in the shower--who could blame her? And she's learning quickly. Yesterday when I was finished drying my hair, Violet called me down to show me that she had deuced on the big toilet all by herself! I think she was finally ready. And a little friendly competition from her best friend/arch-rival/closest cousin, Charlie, surely didn't hurt the process. Thanks, Cha!

So, while I loved cloth diapering, I can say I did not shed a tear when I washed those stinkers for the last time. When Violet finishes on the potty--usually after requesting a moment or two of 'quivacy'--she shouts, "Mommy, I knew I can do it!" We rush in to praise and ogle and say goodbye to her work as we flush it away. And I am proud.

The Horse That Launched a Room Renovation

2011-01-21T16:04:00.006-05:00

Meet Trigger. No, he's not one of Sarah Palin's children, though I can see how the name might confuse people. He's the spring-loaded, Radio Flyer, bouncing horse who inspired Shawn and I to turn our rarely used 4th bedroom into a playroom last weekend. When Santa dropped Trigger at our house on Christmas Eve, he knew that the horse would need to find a permanent home somewhere other than on our main floor living area.

Our pie in the sky playroom would be a finished basement room, but since a couple of gallons of paint are way cheaper than drywalling a humid basement, we decided that we'd go upstairs for now. Violet's bedroom--a good sized room, might I add--is already packed full of toys. So we scrapped our office/guest bedroom/catch all crap room and devoted it to Violet. Now she has an office for her very important work. One wall got the chalkboard treatment and the other three walls took on a robin-egg blue. Shawn and I may love the chalkboard more than Violet does, but on the whole, the girl is thrilled with her playroom. She's had a lot of fun showing her "pwaywoom" to her cousins and her friend Avery. Hopefully, having one room devoted to toys will prevent us from having anymore parades like this one:

The parade in the photo was the result of 4 kids left unattended upstairs at our house during a potluck dinner last week. The kiddos took every single toy out of Violet's bedroom and closet, and then packed our hallway--the parade route, I assume--with said toys. We had a good laugh when they finally called us up to see the spectacle, and since we were planning on moving most of those toys into the new playroom after we finished it up over the weekend, so cleaning up the hallway was a cinch.

The thing about having a devoted play space for a two year old is that it is the playmates, not the room, that make it fun. Duh. Violet's imagination is getting so big and pretending is SO much more fun when you have someone else to dream with you. So, for now, Shawn and I will be spending a lot of time playing in our spare bedroom with Vi. But that's cool. I can't overstate how nice it is to NOT have a 35 lb rocking horse next to my fireplace anymore. Oh, and walking out of the playroom and closing the door on 3 dozen stuffed toys scattered all over the floor ain't too bad either!

Technology Native

2010-12-18T17:18:00.005-05:00

I expect to have to negotiate with my husband over who gets to use the laptop. We both have business to take care of, guilty pleasures to feed, and online shopping to complete.

I really didn't think I would have to share screen time with Violet at the tender age of 2 and a half. Her love affair with the Mac started at the hands of my mom who introduced her to YouTube videos of kitties and trains. "Kitty Moobie!" is still one of the most common phrases heard pre-tantrum around here, but Violet's repertoire of computer activities is growing.

After she navigated away from the kitten movies I had pulled up on YouTube and found herself--no kidding--viewing a Dr. Dre video, I asked her if she'd like to look at Sprout Online. Her response: "Spwout Onwine Dot Com?"

It has taken her about 4 tries to learn how to play all of the games on the Sprout website. She is dangerous with a mouse and way more dexterous than I gave her credit for. She will play Barney coloring games for 30 minutes at a time.

I can't decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing. It's like the discussion Shawn and I had in Target as we fretted over whether or not to buy her the claymation Rudolph movie. She saw it on TV and loved it, but we were torn. A big part of what we both remember about the Rudolph movie was that the night it aired became a red-letter day on our calendars. We remember the music, the commercials, the splendor of it all. It was special because it was only available to watch once a year. Would buying the Rudolph movie for Violet cheapen it or lessen her enjoyment of it?

We came to the conclusion that Violet is not going to consume media the way Shawn and I did. Her budding computer literacy is an example of that. She lives in a world of On Demand Calliou and a never-ending stream of kitten movies. We grew up watching television specials once a year (with commercials!) and having posters of kittens (or, in Shawn's case, race cars). There is no way we can make Violet's childhood the same as ours, nor should we.

So we bought the whole damn Christmas Treasury including Rudolph, Frosty, and Santa Claus is Coming to Town.

But I'm not going to let her watch them after New Year's Day or before Thanksgiving.

There have to be some rules, after all.

An Alternative to Water Boarding

2010-11-29T21:12:00.002-05:00

I can't for sure say how well this would work when cracking a terrorist, but it seemed to drive a Lhasa Apso to her breaking point.

Thankfully

2010-11-22T20:56:00.007-05:00

Thankfully, I can truly appreciate my mom now that I am a mom.

Thankfully, a glass of wine cuts my annoyance at picking up crayons for the 12th time today.

Thankfully, I get to work part-time.

Thankfully, I have a daughter with a healthy body and inquisitive mind.

Thankfully, Scout doesn't have to be put to sleep immediately.

Thankfully, I live close to my mother.

Thankfully, Violet is sleeping like an angel.

Thankfully, my siblings are still a big part of my life.

Thankfully, our marriage is the safest place I know.

Thankfully, cleaning up dog whizz is less tedious when said dog is on her last leg.

Thankfully, I threw out the Halloween candy before the pies arrive.

Thankfully, I found volunteer work that feeds my soul.

Thankfully, little boys are a part of my life even if I never have a son.

Thankfully, Shawn doesn't pick on me for being a little soft in the middle.

Thankfully, I have nutritious food to eat and usually have enough sense to choose it over Kit-Kats.

Thankfully, there are still interesting people to meet, books to read, and places to visit.

Thankfully, I was plunked down in the right place, during the right time, and among the right people. I have never known war or hunger or poverty. Amazingly, I am surrounded by people who love me and care for me and who show me how to do the same for others.

I am so fortunate and so, so, thankful.

The Bad Habit

2010-11-08T23:00:00.005-05:00

This post has been a bitch to write. I write it because I believe wholeheartedly in the science behind it and I think parents simply aren't being given all of the choices when it comes to sleep. Humans have shared sleep for tens of thousands of years. We were designed for it. Our babies are expecting it. And, clearly, Violet rocks (in part) because of it!!

I spent the first Saturday of October at The Safe Sleep Symposium put on by Safe Sleep Indiana. I heard three speakers, all of them doctors, speak about how, where, and with whom, infants sleep the best. A lot of people may have been shocked by what these Notre Dame PhD's and MD's were saying. It likely isn't what you've been hearing from your TV or even your pediatrician.

They said that babies sleep the most soundly, the most safely, the most NORMALLY, with their mothers. The closer the better, as a matter of fact.

So why on earth are all of us terrified to take our tiny people to bed with us? Why are there billboards warning us to "Never Ever Sleep with Your Baby!" Why aren't our pediatricians offering us safe options for sharing a bed with our infants but instead suggesting that we let our babies cry alone in a crib?

I suspect the reasons are very complicated. I know that a lot of it is misinformation. No one in an authority role tells us that there are ways to safely bedshare. Because of that, we (I) fell asleep in a rocking chair at 4am while nursing, waking up scared shitless. Rightly so.

We (I) repeatedly put a newborn in a bassinet next to my bed and wonder what is wrong with her(!) when she wakes after 4 minutes.

We (I) lie to the nurse at the doctor's office when she asks the "Where does the baby sleep" question because when I answered truthfully--"With us" --I got the hairy eyeball.

I more than suspect that the Juvenile Products Manufacturers Association, a trade organization representing 95% of the prenatal and preschool industry, has a vested interest in seeing that parents are afraid to place their baby down to sleep in anything other than a JPMA sanctioned crib. The fact that the JPMA has co-sponsored the national campaign warning parents about the dangers of sleeping with their babies is reason enough to question the advice. I didn't notice a warning about the safety of cribs when 6 MILLION of them were recalled this year.

The biggest reason, though, that I think we are all frightened to death to sleep as humans have for, well, forEVER, is because no one admits to doing it. Or if they do admit to sleeping with their babies, the admission seems wacky. It is tainted because it comes from somebody fringy--too fringy to relate to. The parents who eat kefir and have chickens and still smoke pot.***

When more mainstream parents admit to bedsharing it is usually in a "We know we shouldn't but it just happened" kind of way. For instance: "We were so tired we all just collapsed into bed and didn't even realize that Janie was still sleeping between us. I hope it doesn't take a month to break her of her BAD HABIT."

I rarely hear parents who acknowledge the closeness and normalcy that bedsharing brings to their family. Discussions about how to make it work in the context of your life--how does everyone sleep? what time do you go to bed? is it every night? what about sex? will he still be in between us when he's 6?--these are the discussions that we need to be having about bedsharing and cosleeping. I usually don't hear parents whose little folk sleep with them who don't think this is some sort of terrible habit to be broken.

Some of the first candid, down-to-earth discussions I heard about sleep were with friends at my breastfeeding support group. When I heard these women relay their experience, it all started to click for me. No one was recommending I stand outside Vi's door while she cried. Shawn and I weren't bad parents for having Violet sleep with us. We were--dare I say, we are--very NORMAL.

Once I got over the vast majority of America (from Parents magazine--don't get me started on my loathing of that rag-- to my peds office), telling me that I should put Baby V down "drowsy, but awake" to establish healthy sleep habits from the start, I became comfortable with normal infant mother sleep routines. Instead of combing Parents for tips on how to traumatize my babe to sleep, I read tips for safely sharing sleep and was a changed mother.

Babies (and by babies, I mean people who are very small, wear diapers, have dimples, and can't cut meat), like to fall asleep close to the adult who can handle all the shit that they cannot. By close, I mean touching, if possible. The AAP now (finally!) recommends a "proximate sleeping environment" for infants. They go on to say, "The risk of SIDS has been shown to be reduced when the baby sleeps in the same room as the mother." And really, isn't SIDS what this whole scare campaign is about? They haven't recommended, and probably won't for quite awhile, bedsharing, but they are starting to see how key it is for littles to sleep close to bigs. How beneficial shared sleep is. How lifesaving.

Sleeping babies use their mother's bodies to help them regulate their temperature, regulate their breathing, and they rouse more frequently and easily than their solo-sleeping counterparts. (Trouble with arousal is a major SIDS risk.) Breastfeeding mothers who bedshare feed their babies more frequently, make more milk, and--hold on to your hats--report feeling LESS TIRED THAN THOSE WHO DO NOT BEDSHARE!!

More sleep for moms, huge benefits for babies, and listening to nature instead of crappy Parents magazine.

Three outstanding reasons to talk about bedsharing!

***I count quite a few kefir-eating, chicken-tending, perhaps even pot-smoking individuals among my favorite people and mean no disrespect. (Sharing a bed with a baby while under the influence of anything is just plain dumb, however!! I don't know people who do that!) I am just pointing out the fact that a lot of parents don't know what kefir is, think chickens still live in happy red barns, and haven't tried pot since that one night in college. We need to let them know that bedsharing is good for their babies, too!

BIG

2010-10-10T22:14:00.003-04:00

Lights come up on a warm living room scene.

Mother holds a very young girl close to her on the sofa. Father reads a book laying flat at the other end of the sofa. A dog is curled at their feet and there are toys scattered around on the floor.

Mother: (cooing) Are you my little snuggle girl?

Girl: Mm-hm. (She snuggles closer into her mother, they nuzzle. )

(Pause)

I wanna be tall like you and Daddy.

Mother: What?

Girl: I wanna be tall like you and Daddy. (sweetly, genuinely) I wanna be big like you and Daddy. I wanna be bigger like you and Daddy.

(Mother and Father's hearts break audibly.)

Lights dim.

On marriage

2010-09-30T22:10:00.004-04:00

I don't write much about Shawn on my blog because, really, what is there to say? He is so constant, so steady, so ready to rub a foot, or change a diaper, or squash a spider, it would seem like bragging.

Husbandness is Shawn. Shawn was born to be a husband. My husband, such a gift.

He is quiet but thoughtful. He is intelligent and modest. He is expressive but reserved. Shawn loves fatherhood like I love motherhood and we have joined together almost seamlessly as parents.

He lets me plan for Christmas tree placement in September. When I mentally move our family to London for a year, he goes with it and even helps me decide whether we'll store our furniture or sell it. Shawn eats fake meat on pizzas and on tacos with a smiling gulp.

Tonight, Shawn went to Birdy's to see Trampled by Turtles and I wanted to go but sitter money always seems frivolous and it was a late show (9p.m. start--yes, I am OLD), and it just didn't come together. I kinda miss weeknight dates to smokey bars to hear traveling bands with my blue eyed sweetie. I like seeing him navigate the crowd to find us a suitable spot to watch the show only to work his way right back to fetch me a beer. I love the way he'll drum his fingers on my shoulder sort of off beat when he really gets into the music. Shawn introduced me to bluegrass--a music I have come to love--and I like to see new bands with him.

I hope he's having fun. In the meantime, I am going to fall asleep in the shape of an X on the bed. I need some consolation, after all.

Relativity

2010-09-24T22:28:00.010-04:00

Like many conversations I begin, this blog will start with this sentence:

So I was listening to NPR yesterday and I heard the most interesting story.

It was about these physicists in Colorado who did actual tests on Einstein's theory of relativity by using an amazingly sensitive clock to measure time on a quickly moving train. What they found was that Einstein was right (of course) and time is not constant. The clock on the high speed train found time moved just a teeny-tiny bit more slowly than the stationary clock. How much more slowly? About 18 zeros after the decimal point of a second more slowly. Not a lot, but a bit.

This news is promising however. Because regular time is just going too damn fast. I think I'd be willing to become the Boxcar Kids if it meant a little longer at bedtime. More snuggles, more books, more talks about our day together.

I would take 18 zeros after the decimal point worth of more walks through the neighborhood.

Even though I'm growing weary of nursing in public, with my big girl baby, I know that those nursing snuggles are winding down so an extra billionth of a second would probably be welcome.

I wouldn't turn down an extra moment watching her take in a fall parade.

18 zeros after the decimal place wouldn't be close to enough time to drink in Violet's new love for dressing herself.

I'm going to hold out hope that these physicists will be able to translate 18 zeros after the decimal into some meaningful extra time for those of us watching our babies grow up too fast.

Drought

2010-09-19T15:55:00.003-04:00

It has been so dry here for the last two months, I feel like I am living out west again. Everyone's yards are brittle, the leaves are starting to turn brown and drop, and the farmers are calling it a year. So when the skies finally do open up, if only for a moment or two, rather than running inside to hide, we run outside to play! Yay, rain!

Mother's Bias

2010-08-30T23:10:00.003-04:00

There is no diplomatic way to write about how amazingly cute your kid is. No matter how poetically I try to phrase it, the truth is it's just going to sound like the gushing of a smitten mama. So I'll just photo brag, instead.

Love, Mommy

2010-08-25T20:18:00.013-04:00

Dear Violet,

This summer with you has flown by, my dear. I know Daddy would agree. He's been back at school for almost 2 weeks now and I can tell by the way he struggles to leave our snug threesome in the morning that it's been a rough transition for him. Being away from you is so hard for both of us, but, alas, we like raising you under this roof and on these floors. So off to work we go.

And, you know what, I think you're pretty happy with our choice of sitter, anyway. Sometimes Daddy and I think that you might secretly want to live at Grammy's house. Or, not so secretly, even.

But we have had a great summer together, the three of us. Even if your memories of it don't make it to the front of your mind, I'll remember it forever. Thanks to Daddy's pictures, when we reminisce years from now, you'll be able to look back and see what we are talking about, too.

We'll tell you about how you loved underdog pushes in your little red swing and how the three of us looked like mosquito bait after standing under our big elm tree pushing you until the sun sank behind the house. You would always swing longer, if we'd let you.

Your intense love of all animals will certainly be something that will always define your nature as a child. You would have a petting zoo in our back yard if we allowed it. As a matter of fact, our uninvited feline family member, Henrietta, owes a debt of gratitude to you because her residence here was facilitated almost solely by you. Since taking on any more animals at this point is unlikely, we relished our trip with you to the State Fair this summer where you got to see so many great critters. The bunnies were easily your favorite at the time, but the nursing piglets and the jumping horses are what you keep talking about. The cows were so sweet, but a bit too large for you to trust!

And even though I love to brag about your healthy diet (you ate lentils with kale over a bed of brown rice for dinner tonight!) you, Daddy, and I SCARFED down some fair food!! We all shared a spiral cut potato and you had such fun dipping it in the neon orange cheese. You are from Indiana, after all, and who am I to deny you liquid cheese and elephant ears at the State Fair?

Your Daddy and I deliberated and debated and went back and forth more times than I can count when we tried to decide whether or not we should leave you overnight without us for the first time last weekend. We decided not to and I am proud of us for making the right decision. You are still so little, so uniquely OURS, I just don't think you were ready to be in the care of someone else (even the loving, wonderfully fun care of your Aunt and Uncle), for a full day and night. So we packed you up and took you to Michiana with us where you had a BLAST with your Grandma and Grandpa and we got to enjoy a great adult day at the lake with our friends. And you know what, Violet? When Grandma and Grandpa came to pick us up that night from the lake because you needed us, I was so relieved that we were spending the night with you! I thought I might have wished that we were staying to party with all of our friends, but you, little girl, you are better than any party around! We had so much fun the next morning during our picnic and creek-stomp with your cousins and grandparents. I wouldn't have missed it for the world! The giggling and the frogs and the cool creek water were such a perfect way to spend a day.

Here in late August, I am already mourning the end of this great summer we've made together. I know that we have a few weeks until the season officially closes, but if summertime were a weekend, late August is definitely Sunday evening. I rushed home from work this afternoon and deprived you of a nap so we could hit the pool at least one more time before it closes. Your tired and tanned little self is snoozing now, completely exhausted from sun and chlorine. I know there is lots of fun just around the corner, too, with hayrides and cider and campfires and costumes. I know, too, that we have lots more summers to fill up with memories, but for now, on this summer Sunday, I want to hold on to the two-year-old you for as long as I can.

Love,

Mommy

A Family of Three

2010-08-08T22:24:00.003-04:00

Deciding to make a person is a huge deal. Or it should be. Shawn and I think so, anyway.

This little girl, this soul, this Violet, who showed up on our radar screen-- or at least our ultrasound screen--about 3 years ago, has upended the whole world. She reordered the way I look at work, at food, at birth, at money, at love, at music, at culture, at family, at marriage, at BLADES OF GRASS.

The willy-nillyness with which Violet's cells met seems insane to me now.

I don't see how we can have another baby without first commissioning a study or plotting a graph or at least making a budget.

How do we know this is the right time? How will I be sure Violet is ready for a sibling? Is there some sort of litmus test to determine if we can manage a baby AND an older child? Where can I get the guarantee that adding another Pierce won't be the end to the ridiculous wave of contentment Shawn and I have been riding for the last few years? What if #2 adds more stress than bliss? Would we be crazy to roll the dice?

The "It Will Probably Take A Really Long Time To Conceive So We Will Just Eschew Birth Control" method that brought Violet to Indiana now seems like a naive approach to family planning. People have asked me if Violet was a honeymoon baby; if Shawn and I wanted to celebrate our 1st anniversary with a newborn in tow.

The answer is no.

But of course NOW the answer is "Yes." A trip to Europe or a couple more months of newlyweddedness would have been fabulous. But not as fabulous as Violet telling me thank you after I sweep the kitchen floor. Not as magical as our family of 3 hiding in closets and bathtubs as we play hide and seek at 9:30 on a Friday night.

All of the things I worry about-- money, mostly-- but also the spacing between kids, the balance between marriage and parenting, the question of school and childcare, seem like enigmas. I just don't know that there will be a day when all of those ducks are in a row, when all of those concerns can be put to rest. We could bide our time, wait and plan, analyze every facet of each issue, and still decide next year might be better.

It was priority to me that Violet get to be a baby; that we not hustle her through her infancy because there was a fetus waiting in the wings. Violet would be 3 by the time another baby came on the scene. I think we've succeeded on that front.

Attachment is of the utmost important for me and I don't know how I could repeat Violet's 1st year with another baby. After our first 12 weeks together, I returned to work 32 hours a week leaving Violet with my Mom. Compared to most working moms, that deal sounds pretty cushy.

But I want more.

Ideally, I could be with Pierce Baby #2 full-time for the first year or longer. Mothering is a calling I feel more strongly than any other pull in my life and I would like to devote my all to it. Working apart from my baby for 8 or 10 hours a day feels unnatural to me. It depresses me. It makes me feel like a poor employee and a crappy mother. Before we add a person to the family I would really like to figure out a work/home balance that allows me to be the best mother possible to him or her. For me and for the baby.

Maybe the roulette method is the only way babies ever come along. Happy accidents, unanswered prayers, babies who were only sort of planned but were wholly wanted. Or maybe these questions that keep leading me to think "Maybe next month..." are a sign that I'm not ready yet. Maybe next year really would be better, more settled, lower stress. That annoying tick-tock keeps nagging, though, and I want to make sure that the clock doesn't make the decision for us.

I want Shawn and I to be the ones throwing the dice when we roll for 4.

Little Girl, Big World

2010-08-05T15:24:00.005-04:00

At 27 Months, Violet:

Runs more than she walks.

She loves Dora the "Plorer."

Would have books read to her one after another all day long with a willing reader.

Loves her kitties (yes, plural, we've adopted the stray that's been in our yard for months) and generally is quite gentle with them.

Has a nagging fear of the vacuum.

Is a water-a-holic. Whether it is in the tub, the pool, the kitchen sink, or spurting from a hose, this kid is drawn to all things H2O.

Babies are fascinating to Violet (maybe she IS ready for a sibling?). She would really like to hold a baby but she'll settle for having one on her lap. Baby Ava is probably her favorite baby friend because Ava's mom lets her have lots of lap time.

Her favorite foods include popcorn, peppers, ice cream, noodles, corn, grapes, cheese, marshmallows, Aly's cookies, and hummus. She is not picky, however, and warmed my heart the other day when she ate a whole bowl of lentils and brown rice and then asked for more. I am really hoping she won't have to relearn how to eat when she grows up because she'll already be a health nut.

Violet loves her extended family. She sees Grammy and her Schroeder cousins regularly and they are a part of her daily conversation. She also loves her aunts and uncles (Aly for her cookies and singing, Jeff for throwing her around) and loves visiting with them. She doesn't see her Pierce relatives as much, but she still talks about them all the time. Grandma and Logan are two names that she uses alot when I hear her playing and imagining by herself.

She asks permission before she destructs a puzzle.

Outside is her favorite and she loves to go for walks. She likes to gather acorns and look for squirrels to feed them to along our route.

She has real friends. Ruby has been her friend since way back and is still her best girlfriend. Eli recently showed up on Violet's radar and she plays really well with him.

Her words are too numerous to list but a few favorites this summer have been sump-pump and HOME RUN!. She also asks questions that have no answer and I know this is only the beginning.

She loves to wear her jammies and frequently tries to change out of one pair in the morning into another pair for the day.

Shawn has definitely earned major points with Violet this summer. They are closer than ever. Watching their relationship develop has been the highlight of my summer so far.

There are many more things about Violet this summer that I wish to always remember. I knew, though, if I didn't write a few down, they would be gone forever.

The poem was right. Babies don't keep.

Angel of the Morning

2010-07-24T08:56:00.004-04:00

There are not many decisions we've made as parents that have been easy. Some of the things that we fretted over long and hard at the beginning have now become no-brainers. Sleep is one of them.

When Violet was wee, well, wee-er than she is now, Shawn and I talked to death the pros and cons of how she should sleep, where she should sleep, when she should sleep. She got baths in lavender scented soap to calm her when she was up too late. I felt something like guilt when she slept in until 10am since I knew so many babies rouse before the sun.

Now at two and change, Violet sleeps as she always has, like Violet. She stays up late, she sleeps late, she likes to snuggle with her parents in bed, and she naps pretty well but not on any sort of rigid schedule. And it works for us. We are rested, Violet wakes up happy and ready for her day, as do we.

I never imagined we'd have a family bed, but the more I read, the more normal it seems. Baby mammals, from lions to deer to chimps, like to sleep in close proximity to one another for protection, for comfort and for socialization. No other mammal mother would put a baby to sleep in one nest and then go off to a separate nest of her own. It just wouldn't happen.

Our baby human seems to like it, too! She falls asleep most nights in her room, in her big girl bed, and then when she wakes, anywhere between 2 and 6 am, she calls for us and sleeps the rest of the night between me and Shawn. I'll be sad when our mornings don't start with this baby face cuddled next to us.

The Anatomy of a Nap

2010-07-15T22:20:00.003-04:00

There is no afternoon that is more perfect for a nap than another.

Two-thirty on a cold and dreary Tuesday gets top billing as a great time to curl up on the sofa because, really, what am I gonna miss? And that utterly forgettable Tuesday in February is a great time to snuggle in; grab a fleecy blanket, thaw a cold hand on a warm baby tummy, and wake up in the drear of 4:15 with the world outside looking exactly the same as it did when I shut my eyes. The winter hibernation doesn't require any shades to be drawn. The thin winter light isn't enough to keep anyone awake anyway. Actually, the low cloud deck is probably as effective as an OTC sleep aid for the insomniac.

That February nap has nothing on a summer nap, though. Unlike the February nap, when I grab the baby and head to bed because a) it's her arbitrary nap time, or b) I need to get something done without her meddling, or c) I thought it was 8:30pm because the sun never really came out, the summer nap is something we both earn. The summertime nap is earned through an early wake-up and a dip in the baby pool before a cup of coffee. A full-on chalk Monet on the driveway is proof that we've put in enough time to deserve a siesta. Throw in a game of ball, 20 minutes of swinging, an outdoor tuna sandwich picnic, and a lawn that's been saturated in bubbles, and 3:30 comes faster than I thought it could. I wipe the popsicled, sticky grass blades from our hands and legs and faces and head into the cool house for a well deserved rest.

I feel no guilt when I pull the black-out shades to close out the sun so we can dissolve into a snugly heap, undisturbed by the bright. The breeze occasionally whips the blinds open and the clacking of the shades on the window sill is the only nearby noise. The neighbor's mower and the chirping birds swirl like soft serve into the white noise that funds our sleep. Violet's sweaty head cuddles into my chest and I feel her warm shoulders, her moist forehead, smell her earthy, sunscreened babyness and I know that summer naps are my calling.

Whether I doze with her or leave her little, diaper-clad butt to be cooled by the ceiling fan's gentle breeze, it seems like these summertime naps are worth pausing everything for. Unlike the winter nap, where I sleep precisely because there is nothing to miss, the summer nap is an indulgence because of what we miss. The phone calls left unanswered, the dinner left unstarted, our pink skin untouched by the hottest rays of the sun.

Today marked the first day of my week and a half long "stay-cation" and I am looking forward to some summer naps with my two favorite Pierces.

Winter is Better

2010-06-28T23:56:00.004-04:00

For blogging, anyway.

I always swore I wouldn't make excuses if I didn't post on this blog very often. I mean, it's a blog with a readership of 10 people. Most of you know why I've been too busy to blog. And if you don't know, this blog's for you.

An X-Ray of My Heart

2010-05-15T22:43:00.007-04:00

The evening of her second birthday, Violet started limping. Actually, limping isn't quite the right word, because it was more of a shuffle walk than a limp. Hard to describe, really. My sister in law thought she had a load in her diaper because of her walk, but that wasn't quite it.

The limp seemed to come and go. My Mom didn't notice it at all when she babysat during the day on Thursday but it was fairly pronounced when I got home from work that night. We wracked our brains to think of a fall or injury that she may have sustained that could have caused the change in her gait, but could come up with none. Violet didn't seem bothered by it and was moving as much as ever if not as smoothly. She had a long standing appointment with her doctor the next day for her two year check up and I figured I could ask about it then.

When the doctor had her take a runway stroll, she immediately noticed the odd shuffle walk. Doc wanted to be safe instead of sorry, and since she determined that Violet wasn't a complainer, (she hadn't so much as whimpered during her entire exam), she ordered some x-rays to rule out a fracture.

And I was glad the Doc ordered the x-rays. I was worried. It's amazing how quickly my mind went to unfathomable places without even so much as Googling "Toddler Limp." I thought of how blindsided parents must feel when their little person is diagnosed with some horrible, dangerous, maybe life-ending disease. I found myself holding my girl's hand a little tighter when I walked her through the parking lot and not jumping up hurriedly after she fell asleep when I laid down with her for her nap but instead laying next to her and sucking in the smell of her damp head.

So after 2 days of gnawing, churning worry, I was hoping to lay this thing to rest and move on. We headed from the pediatrician's office to the imaging center a couple of miles away. It was 3pm and Violet was exhausted. We'd been at our mothering group meeting early in the morning, had lunch with a friend, had a doctor's appointment, and not even gotten close to a nap. Violet was a plum in the waiting room despite her fatigue and she managed to woo everyone in the place. When her name was finally called, we headed back to a private waiting room with the technician. She had me undress Violet completely (the snaps on her diaper would have interfered with the x-ray) and we waited together alone in the quiet room while she set up the machine down the hall.

During our private wait, I nursed the tired love and she fell asleep in a matter of seconds. I was hopeful that she would sleep through the whole ordeal and never be any the wiser. The radiologist came back and let me know she was ready for us and I took Violet down the hall to the imaging room. I laid her down gently but before her little butt even skimmed the table she whipped back awake and terror ensued.

Two twenty-something men came in to restrain my little crumb-cake. Since her limp was so hard to define, they had to take about a million different shots so that the doctors could make sure things looked copacetic from every angle.

It was, hands down, the worst 10 minutes of my short parenting career. It between hysterical, breath-stealing sobs, Violet managed to get out the few words she thought would get her point across most clearly. "Mommy!" and "No!' were her most frequent cries but she also repeated, "I go back home," like a mantra. At one point, the radiologist told me I could lay on the x-ray table with Violet between my legs for a couple x-rays and she just clung to me, sobbing, "Peese, Mommy, peese!"

By the time we were finished, I really didn't care what was wrong with Violet's leg anymore I just wanted to get my baby the hell away from her tormentors, who, incidentally, were all wonderfully nice people. They just happened to need to lay my naked baby down under a lead vest and hold her immobile in a dozen different poses to do their job. The x-rays showed nothing and Violet's limp mostly cleared up by the end of the weekend so, mercifully, we don't have to take any further medical action. The cause of the limp will remain a mystery but it was likely a virus or a fall that caused it.

The only follow-up required on this one is thanking Jesus, Buddha, Vishnu, Brahma, Mohammad, and every other deity and life force around for the health of my firstborn baby. I didn't know I was capable of generating worry like what I felt when I let my mind imagine the worst. It is no wonder parents have gray hairs and wrinkled faces. We are charged with protecting the most important and fragile things in existence; our kids.

Two Years of Violet

2010-05-11T20:40:00.001-04:00

Tomorrow we celebrate two years of Violet.

They have certainly been two years sweeter than any others I've known.

Because of Mom, I am Mommy

2010-05-08T12:39:00.005-04:00

I am the kind of Mom who recognizes the importance of family dinners. I'll put plates in the oven if you can't make it, but if it's possible, we'll all just wait. The Mom who includes kids in the conversation never mind their age or interest level.

I'm the Mom who tries not to get touched-out, who realizes this is my decade to stroke baby thighs and lay in bed feeling rhythmic, humid, toddler breath on my neck and chest. I'm the mom who can't think of anything better than a king-sized bed with three loved ones side-by-side sleeping late into the morning.

I will be the Mom who will side with her kids at the risk of belligerence on the sides soccer fields and in the bleachers at basketball courts. I'll be the Mom who lets her kids decide what activity and how much cause I don't care if it's dance or football or reading if that's where their heart is I will be thrilled.

Vacations are crucial for weaving the memory quilt of our family and I am the Mom who knows it. I also know that a driving get-away to Toledo can produce as many warm-fuzzies as a trip to the beach can and it is all in how you approach it. I'm the Mom who'll hang banners over the breakfast table if a birthday falls on a school day. And, holidays? Forget it--I am the Mom who will coax the magic out of every last one of them!

I am the Mom who will always answer the phone and have time to talk. I am the Mom who will put things in perspective and always, ALWAYS, leave my grown-up baby feeling a little less afraid after we hang-up. I am the Mom who will still let my grown child sleep in my bed, because sometimes that is the only way to feel safe.

I am the Mom who knows how to laugh and is never embarrassed that my laugh is the loudest in the room. My kids are encouraged by my rolling Mom-laugh and will ham it up just for me. I am the rare Mom that is a friend and a parent without sacrificing any duty of one role for the sake of the other.

I am the Mom who has a life. I realize my kids will also have a life apart from our family and I know that their Mom needs to do the same.

I am the Mom who loves her husband and the father of her kids. I know that everything he does is done with his family in mind and I couldn't have married a better father. I am the Mom who can see her husband through her child's eyes and never forget how important that relationship is.

This is my Mom, and I hope, someday, it will be me.

Love you, Mommy. Happy Mother's Day!

Tough Decisions

2010-04-25T18:35:00.001-04:00

What is more appealing, an afternoon nap or a chocolate chip cookie?

Violet wrestled with this very question last weekend.

What's Up, Doc?

2010-04-16T13:16:00.005-04:00

I got the chance to lead a meeting of my local breastfeeding support group today and it was awesome. We always have a topic and I chose "Breastfeeding Advocacy." The group was super and the conversation flowed really well with moms from all different backgrounds sharing their personal experience with nursing as well as their views. There were 10 or so moms at the group and we were all coming from differing places. A couple of the moms are brand new with babies 3 months old or less (including Ava and Amanda), a few are nursing older infants, and some of us are nursing our toddlers.

Our conversation ranged from birth, to nutrition, to sleep, to weaning, and touched lots of topics in between. What always shocks me is how much bad-- no, APPALLING-- advice is being given to new mothers regarding breastfeeding. Some bits of advice is more excusable than others, like the well-meaning grandmother telling a new mother that she had fed her own babies rice cereal in a bottle at two months to help them sleep. Now, this advice flies in the face of the American Academy of Pediatrics advice on starting solids, but I can give Grandma the benefit of the doubt because she raised her children many years ago and there is no reason why she would have kept up on the latest medical recommendations for infant nutrition.

The APPALLING part comes in when I hear mother after mother talking about the horrific advice she was given by the DOCTOR. I am beginning to think that pediatricians as a group are the saddest lot of professionals out there. Here is an example of some of the advice given to a handful of mothers at our group today: "Do not feed your baby any more frequently than every three hours."

"Your baby is growing fast and you will have to start him on cereal at 4 months to keep up with his growth."

"Your baby has breastmilk jaundice. Give him formula."

Each one of these golden nuggets of advice fly in the face of sound breastfeeding management and have the potential to destroy a mother's breastfeeding relationship with her baby. My own personal EX-doctor advised me at her one month check up to begin giving Violet formula because I was going back to work and needed to "get her used to the taste of it." Thanks Dr. Fortner--great advice, but no thanks to you we were able to exclusively breastfeed for 6 months despite my work schedule. That probably wouldn't have happened if I'd listened to the doctor. She never did have to "get used to" the taste of formula.

I left that meeting more convinced than ever that there IS a need for breastfeeding advocacy in my community. Help with breastfeeding certainly isn't coming from the top down, so I guess it needs to move from the bottom up. I think the part of the situation that makes me the angriest is that moms are bombarded with the message that nursing is the best (like the recent Pediatrics study that was featured in the New York Times and a hundred other media outlets highlighting the $13 billion dollar price tag in the US from our failure to breastfeed) and then we not prepared in any way, shape, or form to actually do it. I have dear friends who wanted to nurse and couldn't, not because of any failure on their part, but because they were not supported by the medical community to get through the difficult first weeks of motherhood and nursing. My sister-in-law, Aly, was a pro-breastfeeder with her second son Charlie, but still laments her less-than-ideal start with her first boy Jack.

And Aly is right when she says, "Guilt Be Gone." I would suggest, however, that the feeling of guilt be replaced with a feeling of anger and a desire for change. Anger at the way our country's medical establishment sabotages breastfeeding and a desire to make ours the LAST generation of American women who "can't breastfeed" their babies. If you want to, you should be able to, plain and simple. But you cannot do it alone. My hope is that when Violet becomes a mom, she won't even understand why women of my generation had such trouble with nursing.

Finally, I want to share one more link from The Huffington Post that I think any mother who wasn't able to meet her personal breastfeeding goals should read. It was written by Dr. Melissa Bartick and is titled Peaceful Revolution: Motherhood and the $13 Billion Guilt. She says it so well, I only hope women out there are listening! We deserve more!

Housekeeping in the Time of a Toddler

2010-04-12T14:35:00.007-04:00

I am tired of sweeping the floor. I'm not trying to sound ungrateful, I love our floor, I am grateful to have it and the roof that goes over it, but Christ on a crutch, the floor is CONSTANTLY dirty.

When we chose new flooring for our house, the rednecky guy at the flooring store warned me that the dark hardwood I wanted was not the best at disguising dirt. But my heart was set. And, I know flooring was the rednecky guy's business, but he didn't look like he'd spent a whole lot of time cleaning floors in his life. "Women's work," you know; so I doubted him. A really, really, dark floor, I surmised, would be like a dark colored shirt, hiding much more than a white one. Turns out, there is a lot more light colored floor dirt in the world than I'd expected.

It might help if I didn't share the house with a ~~pack of wolves~~ toddler. Violet doesn't try to be messy. Actually, sometimes Violet does try to be messy. But generally, she's just learning. Learning and leaving a trail of learning dust wherever she goes. Most of the floor schmaltz is unrecognizable in its current form; it has just become whitish dust collecting at the doorsteps of all of our kitchen appliances. Sometimes I'll spot a shred of cheese or a square of Life cereal that has been stepped on ever so gingerly allowing it to retain its woven pattern but disintegrate as soon as my fingers reach to scoop it up.

And Shawn, God love him, wears his mud caked work boots in the house every other day tracking bits of grass and mud in just about every room in the house. I think he figures it is the duration of his trip into the house that dictates the necessity of removing his shoes. So if he is only going to be in the house for 3 minutes, he'll leave them on. Never mind that during those three minutes he'll stomp garden dirt from the front door, up the stairs, into the bathroom, back downstairs, through the living room for a check of the score, into the kitchen and past the fridge for a glass of lemonade, and then back out the back door. It looks like that little kid from the Family Circus has been running laps through the house by the time Shawn heads back outside.

Scout tracks in all sorts of crap, too. Even the cat manages to leave footprints on the floor. She doesn't ever leave the house, but she has litter dust to add to the mix. Gross.

Luckily, I don't ever do anything dirty to our floors. At least one of us isn't a slob.

Sweeping used to be a once-a-week activity in my life. I am at the point now where I am doing it every other day. And everyday probably wouldn't hurt it. I have no idea what is normal for other people but this seems like excessive cleaning to me. I don't know about you, but I can think of four hundred and thirty-six thousand other activities I would rather do than clean my house EVERYDAY. But the spring sunshine bouncing off of the dust bunnies just doesn't make me feel like mother of the year. So I get out the broom. Or the Swiffer. Or the mostly worthless little vacuum that is supposed to easily tackle small jobs like my kitchen floor but is more like a dust bunny Cuisinart the way it spins the fluff away from the suction instead of into it.

I'm trying to keep up but I am really seeing the value of a live-in maid more and more. Or maybe just poorer vision so the dirt wouldn't bother me. Or lower standards. Or maybe we just need to go shoeless indoors, Tokyo-style. And get rid of the pets. And feed Violet exclusively outdoors.

But my guess is that I should just keep the broom handy.

Who's The Easta Bunny?

2010-04-04T23:11:00.005-04:00

If Christmas traditions are etched in stone for my family, Easter ones are more huffed into the fog your breath makes on a window. Shawn and I discovered last night that we couldn't really remember how Easter went or exactly what the bunny did. I have memories of hunting for eggs indoors and outside and filling a woven basket full as I went. Shawn remembered little about his Easter past so he was of little help as I was calling out to him last night questioning the number of candies that went into each plastic egg. He was several beers deep by the time Vi finally crashed (we had cheered Butler on to the NCAA championship) so we improvised on the Bunny rules.

Despite our lack of planning, today we cobbled together a pretty sweet holiday, if I do say so myself. There were parts that were familiar; a family brunch, some egg hunts, deviled eggs, stuffed rabbits, and parts that were new; salmon instead of ham, a family bike ride, watching The Sound of Music (which Violet LOVES--she is so going to be my best friend someday).

And of course, there were tutus. It was just too nice out not to get some naked tutu time in...

Budding

2010-03-26T21:42:00.005-04:00

Violet has begun practicing the most human of all connections; friendship. I don't know when I thought children started flexing their friendship muscle, but at 22 months, Violet is entering BFF territory with Ruby, her weekly playmate.

Jack and Charlie, Vi's cousins, laid the groundwork for her first friend not within her bloodline. At 4, Jack is more idol than companion, and Charlie's "All Boy All The Time" attitude makes Violet seem a bit boring. The cousin closeness definitely can't be duplicated but the girlfriendiness that Violet and Ruby are developing is too precious.

Maybe it was all the time that Felicia (aka: Violet) spent in utero with Ruby that has led them to be such fast friends. Carrie and I shared an 8x12 office while we were simultaneously pregnant with our daughters. Maybe all those post-nacho lunch kicks and hiccups that had our bellies gyrating were actually Morse Code intended for the other fetus in the office. Or maybe the girls just sense how well their moms get along and figure they might as well learn to love each other, cause they know they'll be seeing a lot of each other in the next 18+ years. Most likely, though, Ruby and Violet are both rockin' 1.5 year old ladies and they know a good time when they see one. And when they lay eyes on each other? You guessed it; good times all around.

Violet has taken to asking for Ruby at all hours. At dinner, she will randomly turn to the empty booster Ruby sits in when she visits and ask, "BooBee? " Car trips are not complete with out a litany of BooBee requests. But when Violet let out a low moan in the middle of the night last week, "Booooo-Beeeeee," I knew it was more than stream of consciousness, toddler babble.

And to see these two in action together is as cute as a clothes hamper full of kittens and puppies. Carrie and I take turns watching the girls for one another and both of us have been almost accosted by onlookers when we attempt to run errands. I mean, one at a time, they are both stunningly cute babies, but together? SHUT UP. STOP IT. PUKE. That's how cute it is.

They laugh at private jokes. They hold hands. They feed each other. They squeal and coo with delight. They nap side by side. Name a charming baby behavior and these girls have it in spades.

I don't pretend to know what the future holds for the Violet/Ruby friendship. I know little kids have lots of playmates at different stages in their lives that morph and change and lose their spark as they grow. But I also have heard all about kids who sat across from each other in diapers and went on to be roommates in college. Of course, either way (or anything in between) would be great with me. Carrie was in my wedding, her family is precious to me and I know our lives will always intersect. But, wouldn't this blog post make a great segue into a maid of honor toast someday?

Even Oxi Has A Threshold

2010-03-07T22:33:00.003-05:00

Pitty. Violet loves pitty things right now.

Her pajama pants are "pitty." They must be worn over every outfit.

Our stained glass lamp is "pitty." It is worth climbing a precarious stack of boxes to fondle.

Scout's bandanna from the groomer is "pitty." Yanking a 14 year old, biting dog around by the neck is never a great idea.

The nail polish I bought at the grocery is "pitty," both in the bottle and on my toes. And now, it is also pitty on Vi's toes. I felt a little Jonbenet doing it, but Violet sat as still as a statue to have her nails polished.

.4 seconds after they were done, she knocked the bottle of hot pink polish onto the living room rug.

Hot pink is not so pitty on the rug unfortunately, but, I think it is there for eternity. Oxiclean was no match for the polish and even acetone couldn't fade it.

Good thing Violet is so damn pitty!!

Show Us Your Tits (or Why Moms SHOULD Nurse in Public)

2010-03-01T16:35:00.010-05:00

When I had Violet 22 months ago, I knew very little about what kind of Mommy I'd be. One of the few things that I did know was that I would stop at nothing to breastfeed her. I was more determined than knowledgeable at the outset but that determination paid off. After a rough start, Violet and I found our nursing rhythm and it has been (mostly) smooth sailing since then.

Nursing has become such an integral part of the kind of parent I am that we are still at it, 10 months after I reached my personal goal of breastfeeding for a year. I did not plan to nurse Violet this long at the outset, but I can't imagine abruptly stopping right now. This one activity fills so many purposes: nursing is a hug and a nuzzle, it's a pacifier and a nap begetter, nursing is a reassuring squeeze in an unfamiliar situation; it is a snuggle and a refreshment, all mixed into one.

Because I am now nursing a full-on toddler, I have gotten pretty sensitive to what the public perception of breastfeeding beyond a year is. And I am more easily ruffled when I read things like this. Because instead of it just being an anecdote about someone far away, it is a story about someone LIKE me, doing what I am doing, and being judged harshly for it.

I wish I could say that my determination to breastfeed at the beginning translated to me feeling comfortable nursing Violet when and where she required but that was not how we started. When Violet was between 1-3 months old, there were dozens of times when I put off her cries or left a situation in a hurry to feed her. There was a family brunch at Le Peep when she was 3 months old where I forgot my nursing cover and so I scooted off to the car to nurse while my pancakes got cold. I remember a dinner at Charleston's where I spent 25 minutes before we left pumping so I could fill a bottle for Violet to have during dinner. She finished that bottle in less than 5 minutes and I still had to nurse her in the restaurant. I almost made Shawn leave an Indian's baseball game in the 4th inning because I was so paranoid about nursing in public. Thank God Shawn noticed another mom nursing and pointed her out to me. The sight of that mom was enough to give me the courage to nurse.

She probably had no idea that by nursing her kid at the baseball game that night, she made another mom feel normal.

I got pretty good at nursing Violet comfortably around the time she turned 5 months or so. I nursed her at the library, at the State Fair, at the mall, at a parade next to my also nursing sister in law, at P.F. Chang's, in the doctor's office, and pretty much everywhere in between. Those were the glory days of public nursing; I had become comfortable enough to do it almost anywhere and still had a baby young enough to "pass." Not so much anymore.

Violet is a big, old, nursling, now. She doesn't walk, she runs, and she's speaking better each day. She is one of the kids people joke about when they say "If they're old enough to ask for it, they're too old to have it." Again, nursing in public has become nerve wracking for me.

Shawn and I flew to Florida a few weeks back and I knew that when it came to keeping Violet content and thus making my fellow passengers' trip more pleasant, nursing was going to be my ace in the hole. And it was. On the way down, Shawn and I sat next to each other and Violet was a peach. She read books, ate pretzels, and nursed to sleep for the remainder of the flight. After we landed, the older man sitting in the row ahead of us turned around and commented on how well behaved Vi had been during the flight. I don't think any passengers were any the wiser about why she'd been so mellow. The flight attendants might have noticed that she was nursing, but they would have had to been looking closely.

On the flight home, Shawn and I were seated in different rows. I had Violet on my lap and a 40 year old man sitting in the seat 7 millimeters away. My palms were sweaty as I adjusted Vi and I into our window seat and tried to get into a position that would be comfortable for all of us. Since airplane seats have shrunk considerably since I gained a lap rider, I knew there was no way I was going to be able to keep the nursing secret from the guy next to me. Violet's return flight was much like the way down; some books, some snacks, and then nursing to sleep. What they guy next to me thought, I'll never know. He was polite enough, and seemed to be genuinely engrossed in his own book, so maybe it was a non-issue for him. I just hope there wasn't something ugly written about me on the Internet later that night. I guess I'll never know.

So, why, despite the fact that it makes me nervous, do I nurse in public?

Because it sucks that I'm nervous.

Because mothers who feels too uncomfortable to nurse in public are far less likely to meet their personal breastfeeding goals than a mom who is willing to give it a whirl. No one can stay at home forever, after all.

Because there is all kinds of lip service telling women "Breast is Best" but very little societal support for that statement. You cannot say you are "all for breastfeeding" and in the next breath be "NOT supportive of moms" who do so in public.

Because I worked really hard to get breastfeeding established and I didn't want the use of bottles to undermine that effort.

Because the decision to breastfeed Violet is one of the cornerstones of my mothering philosophy and I am proud of that.

Because nursing is NORMAL, for heaven's sake!

When I was hiding in cars or restrooms to nurse, I was doing nothing to help other nursing moms feel normal. As a matter of fact, I was buying into the shame that nursing mothers feel that makes them hide from view in the first place. Unless people see babies at the breast, it will never become the norm. As long as bottles remain in plain sight and nursing is hidden, artificial feeding will be accepted as normal and breastfeeding a baby (let alone a huge toddler like mine!) will remain on the fringe.

The Man in My Life

2010-02-22T14:01:00.008-05:00

A house full of chicks, that's what Shawn lives in. A chick wife, a chick dog, a chick baby, and a chick cat. There isn't another Y chromosome in the bunch. His Y is the only Pierce Y for now and it has a lot of man things to do. I need that chromosome to do all the normal man stuff: take out the garbage, shovel the snow, mow the lawn in season. Light bulbs get changed, water softeners get salted, and racing is watched on TV. The Y takes care of all that.

But Shawn is called on to dig deep and use his X chromy from time to time, too. He listens to my "Lesbian Music," a term coined by one of Shawn's less enlightened friends, without complaint. He does diapers without batting an eye and cleans up after dinner most nights. He lets me be indecisive and doesn't roll his eyes. The length of my showers or get-ready ritual has never been called into question. He gossips with me and pumps my gas, watches ice skating and carries my 14 year old mop dog outside for a pee.

Shawn surely wants a son but, if ever there was a man who could survive--thrive, even--in a female filled house, it is this one. If we have another baby, which we plan to do, I know he would welcome a girl as enthusiastically as he would a boy, and for that I am thankful.

As long as it is just us girls, I'm glad we have friends who have sons. Shawn practically choked on his dinner volunteering to dress as Batman for Carrie and Conor's son's 4th birthday party.

That's not Bruce Wayne. That's my husband. In full bat regalia. At McDonald's.

Hands off, Ladies.

Batman was a huge hit with 4 year old Griffin. I know that Shawn would love to share superheroes and slot cars and tackle football--all those activities that are so strongly identified with the male gender--with a son, but I'm sure he'd love to share them with Violet, too, if she was interested. Judging from her reaction to Batman showing up at the party, he may want to wait a couple years for the superheroes.

A Pot to Poop In

2010-02-19T15:22:00.004-05:00

As recently as 2009, I was disgusted by the itty-bitty crappers people use catch their toddler mess. We'd get an invite over to a friend's home for dinner and then, sitting there beside the crudites next to the coffee table would be this teeny-tiny port-o-john. Usually it would go unused, but some nights you'd get lucky and actually get to see the kid in question pinch one off before dessert. Why can't the kid sit on the toilet, I wondered, or at least have his port-o-pot in the bathroom? Why does it have to be in the living room for all to observe?

When she first started showing an interest in the toilet a month ago, I bought Violet one of those kiddie donut seats that sits on top of the full-sized john. I figured she could learn using that and we'd never have to go the port-o-tot route. Then, like many of the other parenting decisions I've made in the last 21 months, reason and laziness trumped disgust and I saw why so many parents have chosen to let their kid wee-wee in bucket on the floor.

They can reach it.

Potty Chair, I believe, is the proper mommy term, but they are really not much more than a molded plastic bowl that the kid sits on to take care of business. Obviously, there's no running water attached, so a parent has to clean out the trough after the baby is through. And actually, for me, wiping down a plastic bowl after dunking umpteen cloth diapers in the toilet will be like being a zookeeper transferred from the elephant exhibit to the gazelle run. Still scooping shit, but a vast improvement.

So, a co-worker gave me two tiny potty chairs and they have taken up residence in our bathrooms. However, if Violet agreed to shit exclusively in a training toilet from now on, never again soiling a diaper for me to change, I would let her go about her business perched like a grunting centerpiece on the dining room table if she so wished. I might move her to the floor if we had guests or a piping hot dish on the table, but otherwise, I wouldn't let it get to me. Again, laziness trumping disgust.

Part of me feels like this is premature. She is only 21 months old, after all, and I've watched lots of bright kids who don't potty train until over age 3. But she showed and interest, so I figured, let the kid have a chance to choose not to wear crappy pants. Seems like a basic human right.

I don't know if it was the novelty of the the potty, the glitz of the toilet paper, or just dumb luck, but the morning after we introduced the new potty chairs, I let her have a sit down and discovered this at the end of her turn:

That, next to the penny (which I added as a point of reference on size), is a teeny-tiny turd. I was overwhelmed with pride and disbelief.

Less than 30 minutes after this photo was taken, I was dunking into my toilet a diaper filled with 70 times the volume of crap as is shown in this photo; but still, my little girl made ca-ca. In a potty. And I took a photo. And posted it on the Internet.

This is why childless people don't read mommy blogs.

Our Budget; One Slice of Pie Away From Turning Us Into Cannibals

2010-02-02T20:34:00.010-05:00

I spent the better part of the afternoon yesterday linking our family finances up to the budgeting tools at Mint.com. A friend had recommended the site to me before the holidays and it became clear last week when I warned Shawn yet again that our joint checking account was on red-alert that I needed to figure our what is becoming of our money. So I signed up. I inputted all of the ugly details about who we owe, where we shop, and what's coming in. The site sends alerts to your email account to keep you abreast of your finances. Within seconds of establishing our account, I got a low-balance alert.

Thanks, Mint.com. That's why I signed up.

I had been fooling myself into thinking that what Shawn and I had was a cash flow problem; that we just needed to redistribute the pay dates for some of our bills and we'd have hundreds left over at the end of each month. The pie chart generated by Mint.com tells a different tale. When I say we spend the entire pie, I do not exaggerate. There is not one crumb to spare. And, the frequent transfers I make from savings to checking--"just this month," to cover this one time thing (a new set of tires, a special birthday gift, Christmas) are because we routinely spend more than we make. This is hard to admit, embarrassing even, but it's true. I gave great lip service to the cuts we would have to make so that I could work part-time, and then we really didn't make any cuts. We'd go out to eat 5 or 6 times a month and then I'd wonder why we we can't save a penny and why we have to limit our gas fill-ups to 1/2 a tank at a time the last couple days before a paycheck.

Here's the good news; a good chunk of our budget is slash-able. The second largest slice of our pie during January was food.

Oink, oink, piggy.

That includes both groceries and restaurants. The dining out is a no-brainer. We aren't rich, eating out once or twice a month is plenty. The hard thing about that for us is we never want to miss anything so it can be difficult to turn down an invite. But I know we can do a better job of focusing on the "can't miss" opportunities to eat out like birthdays or special get-togethers with friends and skipping the "we are bored because it is January in Indiana so let's go get some nachos" nights. Those nights add up with a quickness when both of us have 2 or 3 drinks. We rarely get out of a restaurant for under $50 once we leave a tip. During the month of January, we spent close to $500 eating out. There was New Years, then Jen's birthday, a random pizza night, a girls night, a book club. You get the picture. Going forward, that is going to be unheard of.

Cutting the grocery bill is a different beast. I am a firm believer that spending a little more on organic milk or pastured eggs not only makes good health sense, but it is also the environmentally sound thing to dol. I buy generic stuff when I can, like mouthwash or canned beans or tortillas, but I need to trust that my freshies: veggies, dairy, fruits, fish, etc...

And don't even get me started about cutting out wine. NOT. GOING. TO. HAPPEN. While wine and beer are regularly the culprit for pushing the total on our Meijer receipt from the tens place to the hundreds, I need to have some release. All budget and no play makes Jill a total bitch. So the wine stays.

After all, if I cut out wine, became a total bitch, and Shawn divorced me, then we would have to pay for TWO households instead of just one, and that would be a complete budget-buster. Mint.com would send an alert for sure.

To Do or Not To Do...

2010-01-29T14:12:00.003-05:00

I'm not a big list maker. My sister-in-law makes lists. I've seen them on her chalkboard. She makes the list and then crosses things off when they are finished. Her list might say:

Car wash✓
Pay IPL bill
Get shower gift✓
Iron curtains

Each time I go over to their house, I'll see what she's accomplished on her list. Items rarely fester on that blackboard for more than a week. The task is posted, accomplished, checked off and replaced with a new to-do. What a system.

My To-Do list is mental. It is constantly being revised based on my mood, what time I wake up, how I feel, how Violet feels, what kind of mood she is in, what kind of nap she takes, what I am hungry for, what the weather is like, and how willing I am at each given moment to live with clutter. For instance, a quick glance around my living room right now reveals every DVD we own scattered on the floor around the entertainment center, a dozen or so of Vi's books on the floor near her book basket, one of my cookbooks on an end table, some laundry folded on the coffee table, and 7 other toys laying in random spots. Violet is napping. I could be straightening and making some real headway without the tot-tornado following behind me undoing my work. Cleaning and picking-up, like laundry, is always on the To Do list. But, I'm not into it right now.

There are several things I've done today that haven't been on my To Do list. I've brushed the dog. I made homemade brownies. I cleaned brownie batter off of Violet. I cleaned shampoo off of Violet. I cleaned blueberry juice (which is about as easy to remove as bank robbery ink) off of Violet. I made arrangements to pay two bills once we get our next paychecks. I called to make a reservation for our book club dinner. I'm writing a blog.

The mental To-Do's that I haven't gotten to yet today are also many. Write thank you notes for Christmas. Install printer to the Mac. Workout. Shower. And of course, clean up before Shawn gets home so he doesn't wonder what in Christ I've been doing all day.

The To-Do's I have actually done? I called Allstate and reported the minor accident I was in (2 weeks ago) so we can get my car fixed. Oh, yeah, I've done laundry, too.

Maybe writing the list down would motivate me to do more. Maybe it would help my nieces and nephews to get a birthday gift on time once and a while. Perhaps it would mean that we'd stop getting emails from the chick who bought our house telling us that she has yet another stack of our mail. Maybe a list would help us get those new insurance cards or paint the bathroom ceiling.

But it would probably just make me feel guilty for deviating from a plan. So I'd erase the original list with the thank yous and the workout on it and make a new fake To Do list of things I had already done:

brownies✓
brush dog✓
laundry✓
write blog✓

All those check marks are satisfying to look at. I think this might be a good system for me! And now, since I've accomplished so much, I'm going to take a nap!

Fear of Fuzzball

2010-01-22T16:25:00.002-05:00

Fully understanding another human is an impossibility. We come close with some people, spouses, if we're lucky; best friends, certainly; maybe our same sex parent, as we age. I don't know how much I'll ever understand about Violet. I know her better than anyone but I definitely don't understand her. I assume to understand a lot of her toddler behavior and relate to it in the context of "what kids do" but the motivation behind the behavior is alien to me.

Here are a list of "I wonders" about Violet:

Why does she always take a bite of the dog's treat before she hands it over?
Why doesn't the feeling of a turd in her pants creep her out?
What does she like about Dora?
Why does she love broccoli?
Why must she always pull off her socks even when her feet are freezing?
Why doesn't she understand that bodyslamming the cat will hurt her?

As a person who has overcome her share of fears and still harbors a few others, the one thing I respect thoroughly are Violet's hot button creepouts. That is not to say that I understand them all. My childhood fears--water, men with beards--may have seemed irrational to my parents, too. But at least both of those things--water, men with beards--are actually capable of doing harm to a little girl. Whether or not they ever had or would hurt me was irrelevant. I could drown in water. I could be abducted by a man with a beard. It could happen.

Violet's #1 fear right now...? Fuzzballs. Yup, dustbunnies, lintballs, floorfuzz. I don't think there are any documented cases of fuzzballs actually hurting anyone. It makes so little sense, it is hard to not take advantage of the poor kid for a laugh. I'm fairly sure this is how phobias begin...

Christmas Past

2010-01-07T22:28:00.001-05:00

Christmas was not my Dad's favorite holiday. Come to think of it, I don't know if my Dad would call any holiday his favorite. He was agnostic, so that ruled out giddiness over the traditional Christian holidays. He worked like a slave, so he never took off on secular holidays like President's Day. And he was not impressed by material goods, for the most part, so holidays that centered around buying trinkets did nothing for him. I guess he liked setting off fireworks when we were little, so maybe the 4th of July would have been a favorite. He didn't like the fireworks nearly as much as my brothers liked them, though, and I think by the 5th he was tired of fielding complaints from the neighbors about bottle rockets scaring their dogs.

So why did I feel the absence of my Dad so much more keenly at Christmastime? He told me once, during one of the years I lived at home after he got sick, that Christmas was always depressing for him; that he didn't much care for it. Lots of people get down in the dumps at the holidays, and I do understand why.

When my parent's divorce was still fresh, Christmas wasn't exactly all elves and peanut brittle. All of the shittiness of the rest of the calendar year seemed to come to a head and there was no way to avoid it. All collected in the same room, gathered around a tree, the tension and annoyance that ran the lines between the 5 of us would crackle to the surface in a sarcastic comment or a more blatant ridiculing. Despite their divorce, we all still always had Christmas together and my parents enduring tenderness toward one another made that possible. We did, and still do, like each other, but, like most families, we are not without our baggage and it is always heavier during the last week of the year.

The first couple of holidays after the split were bizarre as we navigated our way through a new normal, one that included two houses and two trees. My parents were hurting after being unable to salvage a 25 year union; their three semi-adult children were angry, and in true family tradition we dealt with those raw emotions by joking and teasing, occasionally taking it too far, but never apologizing. We were pissed at my Mom and felt sorry for my Dad and we'd swap presents and try to be the first to leave. My feelings would be hurt that Jeff had other plans or that Andy was only home for 4 days. I missed the pajamaed Christmases I'd grown up knowing, with myriad gifts, omelets at 11am, and naps in the afternoon. No hurrying, no leaving. So, I'd drink too much and count the days til it was time to go back to school, back to my friends and the anonymity of a huge university.

But Christmas wasn't always this way. For the first 17 years of my life it was generally looked more like a Folger's commercial. My Mom made Christmas the event that it was around our house. She baked and decorated, bought and wrapped gifts, and created the traditions that I see being replicated in my brother's homes as well as my own. We made lists, got toys and clothes when we were younger, clothes and electronics when we reached adolescence. The homemade fudge and stairway garland and big Christmas party that happened at our house during December helped build the excitement for me and I have never forgotten what that felt like. No memories from the divorce years can dampen that. I can still capture that feeling, though it is fleeting, as an adult.

The lazy but speedy week between Christmas and New Year's was maybe the best part of it all. My Dad would take vacation and be at home working puzzles during the day and making soup at night. The living room would still be littered with toys as no parent would dream of making you take your Christmas loot to your room before the tree came down. Shawn and I adopted that same policy last week, sleeping in, cooking, and playing with Violet's new toys late into the afternoon. The thing that struck me was just how normal it felt to have our little family together and complete for the week. It isn't normal, just like it wasn't normal for my Dad to be puttering around the house when I was young, but it just feels so right.

And that's what was missing from Christmas 2009. And 2008 and 2007, for that matter. That complete feeling of having all my loved ones surrounding me. I still miss my Dad and I suppose that I always will.

Top 10 Violet Pics From 2009

2009-12-31T16:33:00.007-05:00

A Year End Wrap-Up of Cuteness

10. A hot day at the park.

9. February's swimsuit shoot...what a little girl!

8. I'm a sucker for swimwear!

7. She's an American Girl!

6. A personal favorite...

5. Autumn.

4. Cowgirl.

3. With her Grammy.

2. Our beauty.

1. My Loves.

Happy New Year!!

Truth in Diapers

2009-12-16T21:55:00.006-05:00

When we switched ten days ago from disposable to cloth diapers for Violet I felt good about making the earth a little less of a (literal) shithole. I felt bad about turning my own home into more of a shithole. It seems there is an unavoidable truth that is this: Babies shit. Someone deals with the shit. If you do not deal with your own baby's shit, someone else (or likely, several someone elses) will have to do it for you.

On the one hand, you have the baby who shits (or pees, but, let's talk about the deuce for comparison's sake) in a disposable diaper. Up until this month, that is where Violet was doing her business. She takes a couple of two-spots a day and probably wets 3-4 other diapers. Those size 4 Pampers or Huggies or Luvs--we've never been brand loyal, whatever was on sale she soiled--mostly got put into our Diaper Genie. Occasionally a wet one would be tossed into the regular trash, but typically, they got gobbled up by the Genie. Changing a baby in a disposable diaper is a cinch. Peel back the tabs, wipe the privates, fold the wipe(s) up in the dirty diaper and mush the whole rancid mess into the blue plastic liner of the Diaper Genie. It's a thirty second procedure from start to finish and after the diaper had been used, I'd toss it and never ever think of it again. Except when it was time to change the Diaper Genie.

The day I, or, more frequently, Shawn, empties the Diaper Genie is a cold, scary, time when you come face to face with the enormous sack o shit you and your tot will be sending to the landfill (or here in Indy, the incinerator). For those who haven't seen what comes out of the Genie here's the gist: it is like a sausage. The casing is made of the Diaper Genie bag and the meat made of poo and pee diapers. It is as thick as your thigh, as tall as your knees, weighs about 5-8 lbs, and smells like the zoo on a humid day. And Violet was making one of those A WEEK. So, sickened, saddened and embarrassed, I began losing sleep. Then, I started researching alternatives to the disposables. That brings us to cloth diapers.

The variety in cloth diaper styles is staggering. As I started asking around, I found out there are many more kinds of cloth diapers than there are kinds of disposable diapers. There are Chinese prefolds, Indian prefolds, pocket diapers, cloth diapers with disposable liners, cloth diapers with washable liners, and about a thousand variations within those categories, i.e. hemp, cotton, unbleached cotton, organic, etc... To say I was overwhelmed as I tried to decide which cloth diaper would work for Violet is an understatement. The thing moms who diaper using cloth kept telling me was that once you get the hang of it, cloth diapering is just as easy as using disposables. This is a lie.

Remember earlier when I mentioned that someone has to deal with your kid's poop? Well, with cloth diapers, that someone is YOU. You deal intimately with said poop. With disposables, the rest of the world deals with the poop. With disposables, it is out of sight, out of mind. The cloth diapers are never really out of sight.

I settled on a cloth diaper called Flip. I bought one of their day packs for forty bucks to see if we liked it before investing the hundred or more dollars it takes to really start using solely cloth. The Flip system has two parts: a pretty pink cloth pair of snap on pants and an absorbent cloth insert made of cotton and microfiber. The pink pants are can be reused without being washed unless there is poop on them; they just require a new insert. The inserts are absorbent enough that Violet hasn't leaked through one yet and they do a good job keeping her dry. If she's wet, I just wipe her, throw the wet insert into the diaper pail, and put a new one in her pink pants. That really is quite easy. It's the poop that presents a challenge.

On the first day of cloth diapering Violet let go a #2 that would have tested a disposable diaper. It was like the universe was asking me if I really wanted to do this by throwing out the gnarliest test immediately. The poop was like a peanut butter clay and it was EVERYWHERE. The instructions that come with the Flip diapers recommend "tossing solids right into your toilet." They did not have a recommendation for how to handle a dump that was neither solid nor liquid nor gas, but was actually a unique fourth stage of matter that has never before been seen on earth. I held it over the toilet and wiggled it gently, trying to get it to slide off of the insert. I knew that eventually this thing was supposed to go in my washing machine but I had no idea how to get enough of the crap off of it to get it to that point. Realizing the poo was not going to budge by the force of gravity alone, I dunked the whole mess into the toilet and let it soak while I called my mom. She cloth diapered 2 of her 3 kids so I thought she might know what I had done wrong.

"I've missed a step," I told her and explained how the poop was all over the insert, the pink pants, and now, all over my toilet bowl as well. "I mean, I don't see how this works without me having to touch the poop." And that's when she told me the secret cloth diaperers do not share: "Honey," she said, "You do have to touch the poop sometimes."

So I stood there, peering into the toilet and contemplating how I had gotten to this point. Any poop touching that has occurred in the last 18 months has been accidental. A wiggly baby, an occasional smear--gross?--hell yes, but nothing a quick hand washing can't solve. But to deliberately touch poop repeatedly...I just don't know about that. I considered throwing the whole thing away and closing the book on cloth right then and there. I mean, Violet will likely be potty trained in a year or so, that's not that many disposable diapers more, is it? But, I flashed back to the Diaper Genie Crap Sausage and I shuddered.

Either I deal with her shit or someone else deals with her shit.

So I reached my hands INTO THE TOILET, and I swished the diaper vigorously enough to remove some of the peanut butter clay. I flushed. I repeated.

I am proud to say, I am getting the hang of using cloth diapers and I feel pretty good about it. The peanut butter clay crap is not Violet's norm and I often can simply "toss solids right into my toilet." I purchased more diapers and we have enough to get through about 1/2 the week without washing with is fine with me. I even bought cloth wipes which I though were just for crazy hippie moms who don't eat buy paper towels or eat sweetened peanut butter or let their kids believe in Santa. Now I understand that using cloth wipes makes sense when you are using cloth diapers because you can throw them all in the same diaper pail rather than putting your diapers one place and finding a separate trash can in which to throw away your wipes. And, really, the thing that skeeved me out about re-usable wipes was the hygiene factor but after I see how clean the diapers are after washing, I realized that wipes will be the same way.

Al Gore is not coming to my house to give me a medal for making the choice to cut our consumption by repeatedly touching poop. Violet won't ever care what kind of diapers she used. But I'm saving money on diapers. And I'm cutting down on our carbon footprint. And I would probably be a stronger contestant on Fear Factor.

The Evolution of a Christmas Card

2009-12-04T09:17:00.005-05:00

I spent an embarrassing amount of time during the last 7 days trying to create the cutest Christmas card ever. It started with an idea, discussion, then, a photo shoot. The photo shoot covered two locations, but our model only wore one outfit. And unlike her counterparts that took to the Victoria's Secret runway this week, Violet had to have her mom there to scrape boogers off of her face and wipe her snot in between takes.

We had lunch after the photo shoot and then the hard work began: photo selection and card layout. I tried to use iphoto, but didn't like it. Then I went to Snapfish, the site we've used for several other photo cards, but I am just over their designs. They all look the same as last year. So I finally settled on a site we used to design an invite last year called Vistaprint. They have cute designs, the website is easily navigated, the uploading is simple and the prices are unbeatable.

Once I started to layout the card according to our original idea, it became clear that it just wasn't going to fly. We didn't have the right pictures, and even though Shawn offered to take more pictures later on in the week, I just knew if I didn't get them ordered over the weekend, they would not make a timely appearance in people's mailboxes. (Proving my point: I'll be putting our "We've Moved" cards in with the Christmas cards. We moved in JULY!) So, instead of waiting for another round of photos, I used some of the cute ones Shawn took and just re-imagined what the card would look like this year.

One thing I knew: Violet would be on the card, Shawn and I would not. I love getting photos from my friends and family at Christmas whether it is just their little ones or their whole family. Seeing how much their kids have grown (especially when you never see them in person) is wonderful. But, what if I've grown since last Christmas? I don't necessarily want anyone commenting on that over a glass of eggnog. I see myself everyday in the mirror so I barely notice those little lines around my eyes or the extra puff in my cheeks. But, if you only see me once a year in a Christmas card photo, you notice. I will leave this open, how ever, and won't say that I'll NEVER put a picture of myself on my greeting. After all, there is still hope I'll become a marathon runner and be one of those 40-year-olds that make everyone want to puke, so, if that happens, expect to see me plastered all over my own card. Wearing a candy-cane striped bikini.

We are not above pet portraiture on the holiday cards. I can't remember if Scout has graced any of our cards since we were married, but I'm pretty sure her image went around the country wishing people peace and joy at least once when I was single. She turns 14 this year so if we want to have her star on a Pierce family card, then we'll have to put it on the list for 2010. But then that brings up the question of the cat. If the dog is on the card, will the cat feel left out? She is sort of a junior family member this year. We are not sure whether or not she gets a stocking yet so I'm on the fence about adding her to a card so soon. Shawn had a good point when he said that Violet got a stocking and made the card on her very first time out; but she is our human child and that must be worth something.

It seems like a lot of work to put into a card that will likely find its way into every one's garbage by the 26th, if not before. But, I figure these are the glory days of Christmas cards for me. In 15 years, when my family is all pimples and bald heads and saddlebags, there will be no picture greeting card going out. Then we'll be on to family newsletters and that will be a whole other story...

Gratitude

2009-11-26T08:58:00.003-05:00

To say I am grateful doesn't even begin to cover it. Happy Thanksgiving!

The Law of Halves

2009-11-12T23:14:00.004-05:00

Today was Violet's half birthday. She's been around the sun 547 (or 548, my math is very loose, mkay?) times. So in honor of reaching the mid-point of her second year on ye old planet Earf, here are some halves in the Pierce family these days...

My showers are approximately 1/2 as long as they used to be. It is hard to take a 12 minute shower when a tiny person occasionally walks in, flings the sliding shower door open, and throws in a whole roll of toilet paper.

On the topic of toilet paper, only 1/2 of the rolls we buy ever actually make it to any one's bum. The other 1/2 of the shit tickets are routinely unravelled and dipped in the toilet or thrown in the bathtub.

1/2 of the days I used to go to work I now stay home with my Violet. That's a happy 1/2!

Each night, Violet spends about 1/2 of her sleeping time in her own bed. The other 1/2? You guessed it, tucked snugly in between Mommy and Daddy. Who wants to sleep alone, after all?

Only 1/2 of what Vi can say today was a part of her vocabulary last week and the new words are coming all the time. Some new favorites include bubble, rainbow, Grammy, Jack, Charlie, Brrrr (in Indiana, it's a word), cheese, truck, ball, backpack, and blueberry. Most of it is still in Violetese so if you're not around her frequently, the words are hard to make out. I guarantee she says all of them, though.

We can make it through 1/2 of the grocery store aisles before she has to have a snack. Usually that is close to the Goldfish aisle so it works out well. She used to get impatient and want a sample when we were still in produce which led to some bites taken out of banana peels and heads of iceberg. Those were harder to explain to the cashiers.

It takes about 1/2 hour for Violet to warm up when meeting new people. Mainly she looks down to avoid eye contact and clings to my leg or neck until the stranger has proven themselves to her. I hope she gets over her fear of people. I was painfully shy as a child and it really was a drag.

My life had 1/2 the significance, 1/2 the purpose, and 1/2 the love before Violet came along. The world was missing a really awesome person 1 and 1/2 years ago. I'm glad we added her when we did. We made a really neat kid.

Mullet Glow

2009-11-08T22:22:00.003-05:00

With no formal cultivation on our part, Violet has grown a tremendous mullet.

What To Eat

2009-11-04T09:22:00.003-05:00

For the majority of my life, I have given little thought to nutrition. I've given a ton of thought to food, but not a lot of thought to feeding my body. I've been a Weight Watcher half a dozen times, I've read diet books, I understand the concept of taking in fewer calories than you burn to lose weight. I've done the calorie counting for so long that I know what foods are "good foods;" nutrient-rich, low calorie, fiber dense, etc. And I know that there are A LOT of foods that are pretty much like crack; addictive but empty and, in time, lethal.

Since my pregnancy, I began to think differently about my diet specifically and our food culture in general. Eating to fit into a pair of jeans or lose a gut is different than eating well, I have learned. The former, dieting as I knew it pre-baby, involved eating lots of substitutes for bad foods. For example, in lieu of eating butter (high fat=bad food), I would spray I Can't Believe It's Not Butter on everything. That choice, while it facilitated weight loss (maybe), isn't what I'd call eating well.

It wasn't just pregnancy that got me thinking about nutrition. As a matter of fact, I clearly remember my first trip to the grocery store after I found out I was expecting. It involved a cart full of Oreos, chicken nuggets, and tater tots. I could suddenly eat anything I wanted without even a twinge of guilt. If I was spotted downing donuts by a fellow Weight Watcher I'd just whip out my grainy ultrasound picture and tell her to shove off, I was growing a human. A human whose cell walls were coated in high fructose corn syrup.

The day my diet began to change happened while I was pregnant, but whether it was pregnancy related is not clear to me. It was January, I was 5 months along and I had just fixed dinner. A pot of chili was simmering on the stove while I waited for Shawn to get home from work. I had been listening to the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric and I walked into the living room in time to see a story about abuse occurring in a California slaughterhouse. Shawn came home at that moment and I was crying. I did not eat the chili that night and haven't eaten beef since.

I thought long and hard, after seeing that story and reading more about the meat industry in the United States, about what I considered good food. I cannot get past the cruelty; a gut wrenching video on the treatment of veal calves just came to my inbox from the Humane Society. Then there are still issues of how safe is it to eat animals raised confined in cramped cages, pumped full of growth hormone to fatten them quickly, and fed a steady diet of antibiotics to counteract the diseases that flourish among livestock kept in such poor conditions.

Shawn prefers to take an "ignorance is bliss" stand on meat consumption. He loves his steak and doesn't want to hear about the conditions that created it. I think a lot of us feel that way. I know I did for a long time. The thought of making a drastic shift in my diet based on something as seemingly far removed from my life as factory farming did not appeal to me. Out of sight, out of mind. Then I realized that if I was too squeamish and bothered by watching a video of how the animals I eat are raised, I shouldn't eat them, plain and simple.

And for Violet, ignorance is bliss is not good enough. I do not want her eating crappy food day in and day out. I want her to be aware of what it takes to bring food to her table not an ignorant consumer of whatever tastes good at McDonald's. I think our generation is so far removed from where our food comes from we started to think some really sinister stuff (trans fats, high fructose corn syrup, MSG) was fine simply because it tastes good.

So I am going to have to start being a better consumer. When I went off beef and pork, I started buying a lot of ground turkey products and using chicken more to fill in the gaps at dinnertime. I have been fooling myself into thinking that poultry production is better than any other kind of factory farming. Beginning now I want to know where all of my meat comes from. In France, consumers can actually trace a cut of meat from their butcher back to the farmer and even the actual animal from where it came. This creates an accountability that is unheard of in the US. I don't know that that level of accountability is possible, but I am going to start exclusively getting any meat we consume from the local farmers that raise their animals safely and ethically. (Our Thanksgiving turkey is coming from the same farmer where we get our pastured eggs, Gunthorp Farms in Northern Indiana). In the past, I've balked at the higher prices for these products until in occurred to me that I am willing to pay more for a better quality of food. And if that means we eat less meat to stay on our budget, so be it (sorry, Shawn!). We'll all be healthier for it!

Maybe eating better quality meat less often will justify the occasional (daily?) slice of apple pie!

Non-Nutritive

2009-10-27T22:38:00.003-04:00

Every time I take Violet to the doctor or even read BabyCenter.com's medical advice I get blog fodder. I am just baffled by how far off Western Medicine is from human nature. Or what freaks we all are at my house. Take your pick.

As I mentioned in my last post, we didn't see Violet's regular pediatrician last visit, but saw another doc in the practice. No biggie, they are all pretty nice. This doctor, a youngish woman, maybe my age plus or minus 10 years (I am a terrible judge of age and she had a really generic haircut that made it difficult to date her), asked all the normal well-visit questions. She wanted to know about Violet's development (words? understanding? fine motor skills?) and she wanted to know about her habits (sleeping? eating? crapping?).

The little gem of advice she handed out regarding night-nursing is what I keep rolling around in my brain. She asked where Violet sleeps and I told her the first half of the night she sleeps in her room and the second half of the night she sleeps in our bed. I don't know if I told her that I nurse her back to sleep when she wakes up, but the doctor (correctly) assumed that to be the case. Then she told me, "I realize it is easier said than done, but you may want to avoid breast feeding at night. At her age she isn't doing it out of hunger; she just is doing it for comfort. I know, though, that is easier said than done. Just, you know, it is a habit that will be harder and harder to break..."

Me: "Ok. Thank you."

Somehow, I don't think the doctor would have understood me when I told her that we dole out comfort to our 1 year old when she needs comforting. Day or night, we are those crazy parents who believe that if our baby is crying, we would like to help her stop crying. We are the fruitcakes who believe that when our daughter wants to nurse, whether it be out of hunger, thirst, or need of human touch, we'll cave in, putting her needs above ours. I just don't understand when it became a bad thing to nurse a baby to sleep and a good thing to let a baby cry herself to sleep. Who is that good for?

Sustenance comes in many forms and I can say with some degree of certainty that Violet needs more from me and Shawn than calories. She can walk now, too, so should we stop carrying her when she wants to be held? I mean, isn't she really just clamoring to be picked up out of her selfish, childish desire to be cuddled? That, too, may be a hard habit to break the longer we keep it up. I have to say, one of my worst fears is nursing her in the car right before I carry her in and drop her off at Prom. That shit happens. I can't say the doctor didn't warn me.

One last point on this and then I'll drop it. Calling nursing a toddler non-nutritive is really a mistake. Worldwide, the average age of weaning is 4.2 years. Studies point to around 6 years of age as being the point when a child's immune system fully matures. The maternal antibodies produced in breastmilk continue to provide protection to the nursling long after s/he begins to eat other foods. Look at it like the green tea of the toddler world. Only way better.

82,64,5

2009-10-20T21:50:00.003-04:00

Violet is destined to be a model. A SUPERmodel. I just know it.

Just like every kid who loves cars will be a race car driver, and every baby who throws a ball is going to be a baseball player, and every toddler who loves dogs is going to be a vet; now mine has an early vocation, too.

See, Violet is tall and underweight with a huge melon which clearly qualifies her for the most prestigious of all chic jobs: SUPERmodel. How do I know that she's model material, you ask? Well, my friendly pediatrician told me so.

Every infant/toddler "Well Visit" begins with the all-important ranking of the babies. It looks a lot like the last 25 minutes of The Biggest Loser; there is a scale, there are fat rolls on legs and wrists, lots of white skin, and usually some crying. The peds nurse who plots your baby on the infant growth chart isn't really supposed to diagnose anything by these numbers, but you can tell when she finds a kid who is more than a standard deviation from the mean, she makes an asterisk by the number in the chart so the doc can grill you about what in god's name you are doing to your baby that has caused her to be so not-normal.

So, at 17 months Violet is a 19-30-20. It's kinda like the bust-waist-hip ratio that defines a woman's beauty except these numbers refer to a baby's head circumference, length, and weight. And instead of just delivering you the numbers, plain and simple, the pediatrician also goes the extra mile and tells you how your wee one stacks up against other babies in the country. Because that is a good thing to know.

"No two children are alike. They all grow at their own pace. Don't compare your child to your neighbor's, they're individuals."

But really, don't you wanna know how your baby compares? Should you be more winded at the playground toting around your baby than another mom or are you just out of shape? If your sister's baby picks a fight with yours, who will come out victorious? Are those leg rolls really just cute baby fat or did you give birth to a lardass?? These burning questions are why I go to the doctor, plain and simple.

And why do growth charts seemingly disappear from doctor's offices once we reach a certain age? Why don't 20 year old women get to hear where their weight falls on the chart? That would be an interesting tidbit of news for the nurse to deliver. "Well, let's see there, Jenny, you are 140 pounds and that is in the 70th percentile for 20 year-olds. That means you weigh more than 70% of your peers. Congratulations. I'll get the doctor."

Violet's percentages are 82-64-5. Like I said, bigger melon than most, taller than a lot, and skinnier than almost all. These percentages prompted the doctor to ask me what kind of milk Violet is drinking (whole and GASP, still breastmilk as well), how much she's eating, (a lot at times, virtually nothing at others), and what her poops look like (to varied to describe in this forum). The doctor (who isn't our normal pediatrician, I should add) told me she isn't concerned yet about Vi's weight, we'll just need to watch it. When I inquired about what we would do if it did become a concern her advise was to add extra butter to Violet's baked potato and give her Baby-Ensure. Sounds genius.

All of this is good information to know, however. For instance, I know to buy hats that are 18-24 months instead of trying to squeeze my giant-headed baby into a 12-18 month chapeau. Now that I realize that Violet is of fairly average height, I will know that other 18 month-olds who tower over her at playgrounds are freaks and probably have that Andre The Giant disease. And, maybe most importantly, I know my tot has a bumping bod that is made for a two-piece and I'll definitely make sure she rocks her bikini all weekend long when we get to the beach tomorrow.

No Stable Required

2009-10-13T08:07:00.007-04:00

Violet is an animal lover. Thinking she'd like to watch the ponies at a recent festival, we walked over to take a look. Violet was done watching in about 30 seconds and wanted to RIDE! She spend the duration of the 3 minute ride making her horse noise and swatting at Shawn trying to get him to let go of her so she could ride her pony solo. And I thought she was too little!

I am sure when she gets older she will show up at the front door with puppies who followed her home and kitties she "found" in the street. I know that to be true because that's the kind of kid I was. Any animal, whether he was truly homeless or just strayed to the edge of his driveway, became my pet for the day. I would work on luring the cat or dog home, usually with a Kraft Single as my bait of choice. I succeeded in getting quite a few of them back to the house, only to be denied entrance by my Mom or Dad at the door. "We already have two cats" they'd say, and reason that bringing in the newcomer in will throw off the tentative balance in the house. So I'd set up a creche in the garage and hold vigil with my new pet until it eventually tired of being a prisoner of love and escaped back to the mean streets of Indianapolis.

Many of Violet's first words are animal noises. Do those count? She can imitate a dog, (ruff, ruff), a chicken (bok, bok), an elephant, (bbbbbvvvvrrrrr), a lion, (roar), a snake, (ssssss), a horse, (pbpbpbpb), and an owl, (who, who). When she began walking this spring, Scout was often her first destination. Violet would muster all of her balance to toddle over to the dog who would snarl a hot-breathed growl in her direction when she arrived. Scout's out and out loathing of her new owner has only grown, and seems inversely proportional to Vi's love for her dog. The low grumble of Scout's growl served as a daily reminder for me and Shawn that this Lhasa we own is not a family friendly pet.

So, we did what any good parents would do. We got Violet a pet of her own. After we got settled in the new house, we spent the better part of the next month looking for a cat. We combed Craig's List and PetFinder, we visited the Humane Society, we even drove to Muncie to meet a potential adoptee. Our cat standards really aren't that high, we just kept hitting road blocks. The Indy Humane Society only had a handful of cats up for adoption because many of their animals were quarantined after being exposed to a virus. We'd find what looked like the perfect pet for Violet, make the call to the owner, and hear that he had just been adopted. All we wanted was an declawed adult that didn't have any history of mauling babies. And finally, we found her.

We adopted Sasha from a rescue group that operates out of a local pet store and we definitely found the perfect animal for us. She is litter trained and friendly and, most importantly, she will let Violet have her way with her. The cat is either extremely grateful for being rescued, really a fan of 1 and a half year old lovin, or stupid as hell. Violet makes sport of chasing her from bedroom to bedroom and still hasn't gotten that Sasha's tail is not a handle to be pulled. There is a certain shriek Violet reserves only for her kitty and, miraculously, the cat takes it and comes back for more. Ears splayed, tail flitting, she lays on the bed next to her toddler and begs for more. I can't help but think of a pledge at a fraternity who wants desperately to fit in. "Thank you, sir! May I have another!" It's Sasha's motto.

So, Sasha is the anti-Scout. Even after a day of Violet's special brand of love, she'll curl up right next to her at night.

Crawling

2009-10-07T21:53:00.003-04:00

Shawn told me tonight that one of his students has Swine Flu. Last week he got an automated phone call from Brownsburg School Corporation that Whooping Cough has been circulating. Recently, signs have been posted all over one of the homeless shelters where I work reminding residents to WASH YOUR HANDS, as there are 22 families living there at any given time and sickness runs rampant. Oh, yeah, and the bedbugs. One of our shelters has an outbreak of bedbugs.

Is it any wonder that I get home from work and refuse to touch my sweet child who is screaming for me until I have stripped down and scalded my hands as I scrub? Should I be surprised that I have dreams about getting lice? Am I a worry-wart when I won't let Shawn have a snack when he gets home from work until I see him wash his hands?

Violet has a routine doctor's visit coming up next week and I am still debating over the right choice for her vaccine-wise. Up until this point, we have had her on a delayed immunization schedule, so she's getting everything that the CDC prescribes, but at a much slower pace than they recommend. Instead of receiving 3,4, or even 5 different inoculations per visit, Violet only gets two. The idea is that she will be fully immunized by the time she begins Kindergarten, but she will not be at risk for any (real or perceived) interactions between vaccines. Also, if she does have a bad reaction after a round of shots, it will be much simpler to identify which vaccine was the culprit.

Besides spreading them out, I have put an out-and-out hold on a couple of the more controversial vaccines; the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) and the flu shot. The MMR is the vaccine that is most frequently sited as having negative effects and often comes up in discussions regarding autism. This shot is usually given (per CDC guidelines) as early as the 12 month visit. We are going to wait until Violet is at least 24 months to give her the MMR. I would like for her to be speaking clearly so that she can articulate any problems to me.

That brings us to influenza. Until this year, I never gave the flu shot much thought. Some years I got one, some years I didn't, and I never noticed any correlation with my illnesses or lack thereof one way or another. When it comes to Violet, I figure why risk an extra vaccine when the severity of the illness didn't seem to warrant it? I know that people can and do die from the flu, but, the risk seems acceptable to me. The Swine Flu (I refuse to call it by any other name), seems a bit more ferocious. From the accounts I've heard, it sounds like a huge bitch. I don't doubt that most people who get it will live to see another day, but the severity and duration of this one sounds brutal. I heard a frightening story on NPR about a nurse working in D.C. who lost a pregnant patient to Swine Flu. The nurse was devastated and you could tell that encounter was enough to scare the bejesus out of her and make her respect the power of this strain of flu.

Am I scared of it? I guess, yeah, I am. I really don't want to be sick like that, I don't know how I'd take care of Violet. I don't want Shawn to get sick like that; I make a really poor nurse. Mostly, though, I don't want Violet to get sick like that. Even her sniffles break my heart and when she has a fever--forget it. I am a nervous wreck.

But, I don't think we're going to get her vaccinated for Swine Flu. The lack of testing on this vaccine does not sit well with me. No one knows how well it will work, either, and that also, seems asinine. Some of these shots have mercury (one of those red-light ingredients) and they all require the patient to receive 2 doses for "complete" coverage. That, in addition to all the other vaccines that Vi is still in line to get this winter, and it just becomes too many for me to feel comfortable with. I've done my homework, I'll hear what our pediatrician has to say, and then Shawn and I will weigh the pros and cons.

So, yes, germs freak me out. I'd like to have a safety bubble around our house so no outside germs could penetrate it (no lice either!) but I know that's not an option. So I'll keep washing every one's hands, try to keep my fingers off my face, and hope to God these decisions are never something I end up regretting.

My Number

2009-09-28T16:45:00.005-04:00

Every female knows their number. Your number isn't necessarily how much you currently weigh, but it is the number you once weighed or the number you've never weighed but always wished you'd weigh, or the number you think your friend who is your height weighs so you figure you should weigh that, too. Maybe your number was your weight in high school or college or at your wedding. Whatever the significance, I think most of us are always on a quest to get to that number.

So my number for a long time was 130. I don't think I've ever weighed 130. I may have briefly weighed 130 on my way from 129 to 131, but I've never actually held my weight at 130. Why did 130 become my number? I'm not exactly sure. It seemed to be a healthy weight; not to fat but not unattainable. 130 was the weight my Mom was (maybe is right now) and she seemed slim and pretty, a good role model as I grew up. 130 is toward the bottom of my range as provided by Weight Watchers. 130 seems like a number you could have on your driver's license without fear that the bouncer carding you might think you're a fattie.

When Shawn and I got engaged, I went back to Weight Watchers, hired a trainer, and set my sights on 130. If I didn't get to 130 for my wedding day, I figured, I would never get to 130. So I worked out, lifted weights, saw vast improvements in my fitness level, ate a very healthy, balanced diet, and never saw 130. I felt great on my wedding day, despite being many pounds heavier than I had planned. My dress fit beautifully, my arms didn't jiggle violently, and I was head-over-heels in love with my fiance. Had it been a different time in my life, had I not lost my Dad 3 months before my wedding, I probably would have obsessed over the number on the scale. But that spring, those awful weeks when we helped my Dad leave the world with all the dignity he could hold onto, really put the number in perspective. I was surrounded with all the people who loved me the most and people who gathered to celebrate a milestone for me and Shawn and 130 seemed irrelevant. So, that's how I gave up on 130. I guess after seeking it so long, there is still a part of me that believes at 40 I will become one of those late-blooming triathlon athletes and maybe then I'll see 130. But that's a pretty small part. Like maybe only a pound of me.

The bigger part of me, like the other 145.8 pounds of me, figures this weight is about where I shake out. (If you are a between the lines reader and also good at math, you may be able to figure out how much I weigh. When my number was 130 I NEVER would have released that info to ANYONE without MD following their name. And even the MD's usually got the -5 estimate.) I'm eating relatively healthily, lots of greens, leaves, and fruits, no red meat, and the breastfeeding allows me more sugar than I'd probably get without it so my sweet tooth is satisfied. I've felt compelled to offer Violet fresh food, including lots of veggies and fruits, and I think it has rubbed off on me. Wine is a regular part of my diet as is pasta, and I put butter on things that need butter. I feel happy after meals, though I still occasionally overeat, I feel more relaxed about it. Truly no guilt.

There are improvements I could make, must make, to be as healthy as I want to be. Mostly, I need to get back to exercising regularly. Around this time last year, when Violet was 5 months old, I found an elliptical trainer on Craig's List for 80 bucks and convinced Shawn we HAD to have it. This piece of equipment, I knew, would be the end of my puffy, jiggly, post-baby body and the only route to shedding the 25 pounds that stood between me and my pre-pregnancy weight. So, we bought it from a chubby lady, jury-rigged it in the CRV, and drove home with it sticking out of the back end.

Our tiny bungalow was filled to the brim with baby paraphernalia and had no space for the machine except for a corner in our leaky, 90-year-old, basement. So it wasn't exactly the most appealing place to spend 20-30 minutes sweating off baby weight. I had worked out on the machine 4 or 5 times the morning I saw a mouse in our kitchen and then never used it again. What is the mouse-elliptical connection? If that mouse ventured to the bright, cheery, kitchen to fuck with me, imagine all his creepy, skittering, mouse friends darting around the basement waiting to drop down from the ceiling onto my head and down my shirt while I was on the elliptical listening to my ipod so I couldn't hear them coming. See? Case closed, workouts over.

A year later, through no herculean efforts on my part, I've gotten back to where I was when Violet was conceived minus and extra 3 pounds (have I sung the praises of nursing frequently enough on this blog? If not consider me belting it out right now)! The oft-neglected elliptical made the move to the new place where it is waiting in the garage to find if and when it will be allowed in the house. I know I need to initiate and stick to a regular workout schedule; the things that are most important to me in life rely on it. I actually love working out once I establish a routine and I know that fitness will be key if I want to have a successful VBAC with our next baby. The lung disease that killed my Dad as well as his siblings is showing disturbing familial ties and I suspect cardio-vascular fitness won't hurt my chances of avoiding or surviving it should (God forbid) Pulmonary Fibrosis be in my genes. And, not as tragic, but definitely worth a mention, I have the beginnings of Mom-Ass and I would like to nip it in the bud before Lee is the only brand of denim that fits me.

So, I'm moving the elliptical in today. It will sit in one of the spare bedrooms and I have my fingers crossed that it will fit in a spare closet when we have guests or parties. If it doesn't fit and has to sit out, I suppose that there are worse things than having people know that Shawn and I own a piece of exercise equipment. Like, for instance, wearing Lee jeans.

Snot Nose

2009-09-24T23:01:00.005-04:00

As if on cue, Violet and I both got our first colds of the season this week right as the official last day of summer cashed out. Shawn has, thus far, remained healthy. It's not the Swine Flu, thank Christ, but a mild runny-nose-itchy-throat-pain-in-the-ass-cold. Mine is only a figurative pain in the ass, but Vi's virus was accompanied by a diaper rash, too. As if having a raw nose isn't annoying enough...Poor Chicky!

Violet has been in beautiful spirits, though, just running a bit more slowly. The most heartbreaking thing is that she's too congested to nurse, so when she wants to snuggle in and just totally relax, she ends up unable to breath. Tonight as I put her to bed, we repeatedly tried to find a position where her nostrils might clear enough so she could get a breath while she nursed, but didn't have any luck. I sat up and cradled her, we tried to nurse side-lying, I laid down and laid her on her side on my belly but nothing worked. She's such a trooper, though, she didn't get mad or cry a bit. In fact, she let me give her face tickles (a Bill Schroeder specialty) while she got cozy on my lap and zoned out.

We even crawled into the rocking chair in her room, the chair we never use, and rocked off to sleep. This rocking chair is not the uber-cush one Grammy bought us before Vi was born. It is the wooden chair that I was rocked in as a stuffy-nosed kid after my Dad gave me a sip of a horrible hot lemon-whiskey concoction that probably would have gotten me to sleep if I could have choked it down. This is the chair that is pretty to look at, but not quite as great to sit in. But, you know what? It did the trick. In about 4 minutes, Little V was sound asleep and easy to lay down. She was sooo ready to sleep, just needed a little help getting there. What a pleasure as a parent to be that helper.

I am listening to her mouth-breathing on the monitor right now, bless her little snot-filled nose. Hopefully, this is our first and last cold of the season and this will be as bad as it gets. That would be fantastic. I know we can't have summer weather all year round in the Hoosier state, but is summer health for my kid too much to ask?

Sing A New Song

2009-09-08T23:33:00.007-04:00

It really is a wonder that there are not more love songs written about babies. The romantic love that everybody is always crooning about is awesome, but it is so overdone. I can only think of a handful of songs written for babies. And, really, that love is just as kick ass as the kind of love between man and woman (or, I assume, man and man or woman and woman).

Maybe it is just because young lovebirds have nothing but time on their hands to sit around and ruminate about their mates finer features. When you're 23, spending 4 hours laying in bed leafing through photos of your crushes seems like a legit way to spend an afternoon. And, if you're the creative type, maybe you jot down a verse or two when you feel inspired and-- Voila--Brown Eyed Girl is born.

Then, you knock up the Brown Eyed Girl and she spawns a Gray Eyed Girl and suddenly your love multiplies. But your time is divided. The four hours you used to spend with the photo album strumming a guitar in your room becomes 1 hour shoving baby snapshots in an drawer before the baby shreds them. You've probably had to hide the guitar in the closet because she keeps dragging it by the neck down the stairs. So, see, it isn't that the emotion for song isn't there, it's just that new parents are robbed of the creative process they need to create something memorable. The creation is the baby, and like a new song, she requires a lot of attention and tweaking in her infancy. So you have to ignore the rest of the catalogue to get this one right.

But, honestly, the emotion is there. It is a fierce love, more constant and certain than anything I've ever felt before. I wish I could do Violet justice in melody and verse, but the best I can do is hum You Are My Sunshine to her when she's falling asleep. I don't think that she's any kind of Baby Bono or anything, but the kid does love music. Unfortunately for her, the songs that usually come to mind for me to sing to her are from my 12 years of Catholic school. She hears a lot of Eagle's Wings and Were You There When They Crucified My Lord. Neither age nor season appropriate but I'll be damned if I can't sing all those diddies start to finish.

We took her to her first concert two weekends back. It was Old Crow Medicine Show and she was tapping her toe and doing her twirls all evening long. She even got to meet Ketch, OCMS's lead singer after the show. You can see, she (or at least her Daddy) was thrilled! Then, at Uncle Jeff and Aunt Steph's wedding last weekend, we had to pull her off the dance floor. And, I swear, she was clapping along in perfect rhythm to Play That Funky Music White Boy. Later Labor Day weekend, Violet took in the 54th Street Jazz Festival with Patrick as well as a televised Metallica concert late that evening and followed each with equal gusto. I'm glad that her musical taste is broad. I'm sure she'll find her own favorites soon enough and never believe she gave the crap we play for her the time of day.

Tomorrow she and Grams are hitting their first Kindermusik class of the new season taught by none other than Auntie Aly. If possible, Vi will probably fall more in love with Aly after she sees her singing all her kiddo friendly tunes tomorrow. Maybe Aly would even throw in a verse of Play That Funky Music White Boy or a tune from Glory and Praise Volume 1. Either would be a big hit with our girl!

Kool-Aid Mustache Required

2009-09-01T21:37:00.006-04:00

Shawn's best friend and roommate for years, Pat, had these words of congratulations for me upon learning Shawn had proposed:

"Well, that's a mighty nice ring he got you. Just remember, you marry him and you are in for a bunch of kids running around wearing nothing but diapers, cowboy boots and Kool-Aid mustaches."

Once I mix up a pitcher of Purplesaurus Rex, the Prophesy will be complete.

Forking Peas

2009-08-28T23:15:00.003-04:00

Violet has had considerably more success of late with using utensils during meals. She's moved on from the shoveling motion of the spoon to the more intricate stabbing of a fork. Not quite chopsticks, but still.

The dulled tines of her toddler fork were no match for the peas, however.

Fool Me Once...

2009-08-25T19:43:00.005-04:00

Almost every woman loves to tell her birth story. Whether her labor began during American Idol and ended before the evening news or lasted for days on end, it is a story worth telling. The end result--a precious, hopefully healthy, baby--makes it instant family lore and a tale that will be repeated as long as women gather and share their experiences. So having a birth that was a bummer, is, well, a bummer.

Before I get reprimanded, let me emphasize that I know the point of pregnancy and birth is a HEALTHY CHILD and god strike me down if I fail to be grateful for the soft, glorious, human that is Violet. I would have squeezed her out of my nostril if that was what was asked of me and would sleep in a box of live mice every night if it would keep her out of harm's way. She is my blood, my life, my sweet child, and she is far more of a blessing than I have ever earned.

That being said...

Violet's birth was, in hindsight, far from my ideal. My labor was induced at 40 weeks even and ended in a cesarean section. If I had had any idea what kind of parent I'd become prior to V's arrival, I might have done a little more planning, a little more reading, really brushed up on what kind of care and medical advice is being doled out in OBs offices and delivery rooms in the US these days. Had I known that my blind trust, my desire to meet my baby NOW, would have left a permanent mark on my body as well as severely limited my available choices for the rest of my childbearing years, perhaps I'd have thought more seriously about my decision.

And maybe that is why I feel cheated. It is not that I had some grand plan for natural childbirth when I went into this and maybe that is where I went wrong. I wanted an epidural if the pain became overwhelming. I got one long before the pain was too much; the nurse anethstitist must have been a GM dealer in a past life because he convinced me if I didn't have the epidural NOWNOWNOW he may be tied up with other patients and THEN WHAT?? It should have tipped me off when I got the feeling that the hospital was trying to sell me something. That's not why they're there, is it??? If I'd had that plan, if I'd researched my options independently, if I had felt that I'd given Violet's impending birth the study it deserved, maybe ending up with a C-section wouldn't have been such a kick in the ass.

The induction--yep--I wanted that, too. I was over 200 pounds, constipated, weepy, scared, eager, had hemorrhoids, couldn't breath, couldn't sleep, and had no realistic concept of time. The possibility of going 3, 7, 10 days beyond my "due" date was inconceivable. So when my OB offered to bring me in on May 12, the day that had been circled in red on the Pierce calendar for 40 weeks, I agreed and thanked her. And when she ducked out of the exam room leaving Shawn and I to schedule the induction for Monday morning, she even implored us, "If anyone tries to tell you anything bad about being induced, call me. It is perfectly safe."

And I trusted. And we induced. And I lay on my back or side for 15 hours, wearing a fetal monitor (external til noon, internal after doc broke my water), hooked to an IV releasing Pitocin into my bloodstream causing my uterus to contract, not that my cervix ever took note. So after a long day of fake labor, and a measly 3 cm of dilation, my Doc called the game on account of darkness, and wheeled me into the surgical delivery room, where I had the most miraculous experience of my life. Or at least Shawn did.

So, that's my story...and if it ended with that story, maybe it wouldn't be such a sore spot. But Violet's birth story is, I have every reason to believe, going to be only the beginning of my Cesarean saga. Since her birth, (I sure wish this sentence began "Before her birth"), I have read oodles more literature about birth in this country and seen how Violet and I were a part of that machine. ( I'll add some links to some of my favorite sites at the end of this post for those of you who are riveted.) I've realized that the medicalization of a wholly natural human process is taking us further away from our parenting instincts instead of empowering mothers to trust their bodies and listen to their babies. Since Violet was born I have realized how often I act on my instincts and her cues as I mother her and how that rhythm was disrupted when she was born. I've seen how far removed from natural human behavior so many of us are when it comes to our babies; whether it is the mother who lets her tiny baby "cry it out" despite her heart that aches at doing so; or the mother who had every intention of breast feeding her child but convinced herself that her body wasn't making enough milk because the babe wanted to nurse more frequently than the every 3 hours her pediatrician told her to expect.

I am so thankful that we do not live during a time when death was a common result of childbirth and I cannot say enough positive things about all the medical advances that have saved lives, both of mother and baby. But I do think that there is truth in getting too much of a good thing and that, while miraculous when necessary, medical intervention in the birthing process is detrimental when overused. And it is being overused.

Long story longer, I have been corresponding with my OBGYN (actually with her office manager), about the potential for a VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) when and if Shawn and I are lucky enough to get pregnant again. My OB is a young, hip, lovely, fashion forward, woman so, despite what I'd heard about most obstetrician's aversion to VBAC, somehow I thought she would be on board. Turns out, not so much. Below is her response to my inquiries:

Dear Jillian,

Office Manager passed your email on to me and I thought it would be easier to communicate directly with you about your desire to VBAC.

VBAC is becoming an increasingly difficult situation in my practice and I think for many Ob/Gyns in general. There is significant risk to the baby and the mother in the event that the uterine incision opens or ruptures during labor. Because of the poor outcomes in cases of uterine rupture, 50% mortality for mother and/or baby, many Ob/Gyn's do not do VBACs in their practice. In fact, of the seven physicians in my current call group, Dr. X and I are the only physicians who will do a VBAC in the right patient. For the other physicians, they are not willing to take on the increase risk of allowing VBACs to labor, or they have seen the dangers of uterine rupture firsthand and are apprehensive about the potential liability with such clearly documented risks. They have even refused to cover any patient that she or I believe are good candidates. While I understand the serious risks associated with VBAC, I do think that some patients are good candidates and I am willing to be available for those few patients 24 hours a day should they go into labor. Ultimately, I want to do what I feel is the best for the patient and her baby regardless of mode of delivery. I don't do C-sections out of convenience. I perform C-sections when I honestly think it is best and to do otherwise would compromise care. Furthermore, while having a C-section is not without risk, neither is a vaginal delivery (esp. VBAC). Patients who have significant pelvic floor dysfunction, injury to their infant secondary to a difficult vaginal delivery, or chronic pain following a vaginal delivery often feel that a C-section is a much better and safer option for subsequent pregnancies. Again, my focus, and I think your focus should be less on mode of delivery but what is the safest for you and your baby.

To answer your questions, induction can increase the risk of C-section in some patients remote from term or inductions done electively without a clear medical indication. I do not believe that your induction was the reason you needed a C-section. Many of my patients are induced, largely for medical reasons or postdates and the vast majority of my patients still deliver vaginally. You were induced at 40 weeks which would not have been considered elective or premature. In addition, despite adequate contractions and a significant amount of waiting for further cervical dilation your cervix stopped dilating. In my opinion, this suggests that Violet was too big for your pelvis or your pelvis was too small for her, depending on how you want to look at it. In general, subsequent babies are larger and the idea is if a patient either fails to progress in labor despite adequate contractions or is unable to push out a baby, odds are that the next baby will be larger and thus even less likely to deliver vaginally. Patients that have a C-section for breech presentation, fetal distress, placenta previa, and/or multiple gestation have not had an opportunity to labor and therefore are better VBAC candidates than a woman who had a trial of labor prior to their C-section.

Going into labor spontaneously does not guarantee a vaginal delivery, although certainly spontaneous labor in a patient without a medical indication for induction is optimal. I generally induce my patients between 40 and 41 weeks because after 41 weeks there is an increased risk of stillbirth, meconium stained fluid, large babies, and low amnionic fluid. In addition, of those patients who have not gone into labor at 41 weeks I do find that my C-section rate is higher because the increased incidence of large babies, fetal distress, and meconium fluid. I also think that if labor has not happened by 41 weeks that may also suggest that there is an underlying reason why labor did not occur spontaneously (i.e. large baby, inadequate pelvis, etc.) thus leading more often to C-section...this is based solely on my personal experience in practice.

I certainly value you as a patient and would hate to have to transfer your care with your next pregnancy. On the other hand, I do want you to have a positive experience and if that means pursuing a VBAC I respect that as well. After reviewing your labor course, I am not comfortable with the significant risk to you and your baby associated with managing you as a VBAC patient. Although I cannot say with 100% certainty that you would not deliver vaginally, as I have said before, I don't feel you are the best VBAC candidate. As such, I am uncomfortable with the associated risk of VBAC in your particular case. I am happy to discuss this further with you or meet with you in the office if you have any other questions.

Warmly,
Dr. NoChanceInHell

I forwarded this email to my mom, a fellow C-section survivor, looking for the wisdom only your mom can give. Her response?

"How does that make you feel?"

Well, Mom, it makes me feel like she is so entrenched in the medical establishment that she is blind to how birth works.

It makes me feel like a subversive for wanting to see if my body can deliver a baby.

It makes me feel scared that she may be right and I may end up with another cesarean, or worse, a death.

I feel grateful that she took the time to answer my questions herself but I feel belittled for asking: see the part where she says: "my focus, and I think your focus should be less on mode of delivery but what is the safest for you and your baby." As if I would be selfishly endangering my baby's life by attempting a normal birth. It makes me feel like a birth is a birth so what's my hang up?

It makes me feel like she believes she is on the cutting edge of medicine for attending any VBACs and there would be no way I would ever find an OB flippant enough to take me on. I worry that she may be right.

I feel that she is selective with her invocation of statistics. 50% mortality rate in the case of uterine rupture is a scary thought but what is the rate of uterine rupture during VBAC? I've read as little as 1%...Isn't that a tiny risk as far as risks go?

It makes me feel that my due date with Violet was miscalculated. Maybe only miscalculated by a week, but enough that it could have made a huge difference.

I feel that there must be a very real risk of a malpractice lawsuit for an OB who has a VBAC go wrong.

Most of all, I feel powerless. And that sucks.

Here are some of the links that I have been digging on this topic:
www.thebusinessofbeingborn.com/
www.ican-online.org/
www.theunnecesarean.com/
http://yourbirthright.info/
http://www.childbirthconnection.org/

Panty Party

2009-08-19T10:19:00.010-04:00

While I was rearranging my dresser drawers, Violet got into my underwear drawer and re-defined the panty raid...

Shawn and I counted 19 pairs of undies and one bra around her neck as we untangled the web!

Sugar Cubes and Cupcake Batter

2009-08-16T22:52:00.011-04:00

A few hours ago we rolled in from Chicago and Violet's first summertime trip to the Windy City. After getting off to a sloooow start, as in a 2.5 hour traffic jam south of Valpo, the rest of the weekend was a whirlwind.

Due to the time we spent parked, literally with the car turned off, on I-65, we arrived much later on Friday than we'd anticipated. Violet and I spent a little time playing with Jack and having a glass of wine with Aly (respectively), while Shawn and Andy hit the town with a friend and former co-worker to celebrate his bachelor party. I have no idea what time the men returned as everyone in our room was sawing logs by the time Shawn rolled in.

Our hotel was right downtown and we convenient to everything. A short cab ride (with babies on laps!!) got us to our first stop. The Shedd Aquarium was the #1 thing on our list for Saturday and we got there early enough to find the crowds only tedious and maddening but not quite at the suffocation level yet. The line forming outside as we left looked like a rowdy bunch, eager to see some fish and willing to body slam or trample any kid in the way. Probably best we left when we did. Two hours of aquarium is plenty for a 31 year old, so I think the three toddlers had probably gotten their fill as well.

After lunch, we schnarffed down hotdogs and cones in the park while we watched the pigeons and gulls fight for our crumbs. Then, we walked to Buckingham Fountain, in hopes of using it as the background for a family photo. The heat and the excitement of the "'Quarium" had overtaken the smaller members of our group by the time we got to the fountain so our family shot shows three crashed out babies and 4 sweaty adults in from of the gorgeous Chicago skyline.

We met a family friend for dinner at an Italian place near the hotel. The food was great and the kids were decent. A two+ hour dinner is hard to sit through and they did pretty well. Violet is such a night owl so she was hitting her stride around 9 p.m., right when Charlie was losing it because he was so tired. They are soo different already. Aly and Andy do a great job of respecting Charlie's need for zzz's and Aly headed back to the room before dessert so he could zonk out.

Before we left the city this morning, we headed to Wrigleyville to the Southport Grocery for brunch. A friend had mentioned their pancakes made out of CUPCAKE BATTER, so, obviously, I had to get some. There was a Cubs game this afternoon, so the area was busy and we had a 40 minute wait to be seated. Again, the kiddos were being asked to draw on their patience reserves as we waited and waited to eat. The wait was manageable (I really couldn't imagine NOT waiting in Chicago) but we definitely pulled out all the stops to keep everyone chillin' til the food came out. At one point, after sucking on a handful of Splenda packets, Violet joined Jack in eating the sugar cubes on the table. Jack kept saying things like, "Aunt Jilly, this sugar cube is actually delicious." Vi agreed and had downed two by the time our food came out.

The drive home was fairly uneventful and we all are bedding down early. Shawn's first day back at school is tomorrow and I think we all have a case of the Sundays. Hopefully the sugar buzz will wear off slowly!

Fair Time

2009-08-12T22:13:00.006-04:00

Say what you want about how hillbilly Indiana is, the one time it is good to live in a hillbilly state is when it is time for your state fair. The Indiana State Fair is probably one of the top 2 state fairs (I hear Iowa's is pretty awesome) in the country and it really is worth a trip. For those of you who live in cool states, (you know if you live in a cool state if your state is worth visiting year round because there is always something to do, be it hike, swim, shop, eat, view art, go to museums, etc.) this is the one time a year you should be jealous of us Hoosiers. Because we are milking goats and eating deep fried oreos. We use hand sanitizer between the two activities.

Shawn and I took Violet over to the Fairgrounds tonight and met my Mom for dinner. We strolled though the crowds on what might have been the nicest evening of the summer and took in all the manurey goodness that the fair offers. We drank lemon shake-ups while we watched horses and ponies riding in the practice arena.

We looked at the beautiful cows that the 4-H kids from all over the state have been caring for so diligently. Violet got to pet a freshly shorn sheep. For a few hours tonight, we felt really proud of our state. It is hard to see all the livestock and the kids who are learning the art of farming and not get a little Charlotte's Web about it. It's hard to overlook the pride on the parent's faces as they watch their kids learning about agriculture and competition and not feel a little pride for them. I dare you to watch the looks on the city kid's faces the first time they see "The World's Largest Sow" and all her little piglets and not be a little bit amused.

Violet had a great time wiggling to the beat of the band and eating ice cream and learning a little about being born a Hoosier.

Baby Gloton: The Breast-Feeding Doll Who Will Scar Your Daughter For Life

2009-08-09T22:48:00.008-04:00

So, last week I'm diddling around on Facebook, reading the updates from every person I've ever shared a zip code with, paying little attention to "Judy McCullen Walsh is ready for the pool!!!" and "Alex Sanchez can't believe it's August already," and checking to see if anyone has a baby that rivals mine in cuteness when I see a post that actually interests me. A girl I went to high school with wrote something about a new breast feeding doll and leaving motherhood to mommies while letting kids be kids. Well, y'all know I am pretty much a shoe-in for Breast Feeder of the Year (very prestigious) and couldn't believe more in this particular cause (is breast feeding even a cause?) so I have to check out the comments, and, naturally, put in my two cents. Well, all the women that have commented up to this point, probably 5 or so, are all in agreement that this doll is "disturbing" and "goes too far."

Since I haven't seen the doll, I Googled it to see why this particular toy is so creepy. This is what all the fuss is about:

Wow--scandalous, huh? I mean, the way that little girl is pretending to nourish that doll, what is the world coming to? A bunch of sickos, I tell you. What I'd really like Violet to have is yet another baby doll that comes with a bottle to shove in her mouth. I mean, that is wholesome pretend fun for a kid. Playing Mommy crosses the line from sweet and innocent to deviant when you bring nursing into it. Breasts are for sex, kiddies, don't you forget it!

Seriously, though, the reaction of the public to this doll makes me realize that breastfeeding is still a cause that needs to be supported because there is such an incredible slew of misinformation out there. Just look at what the DOCTOR (he's an MD for Crissakes!) who acts as managing health editor for Fox News.com says about what trauma could be unleashed on a child who plays with this toy:

Dr. Manny Alvarez, said although he supports the idea of breast-feeding, he sees how his own daughter plays with dolls and wonders if Bebe Gloton might speed up maternal urges in the little girls who play it.

“Pregnancy has to entail maturity and understanding,” Alvarez said. “It’s like introducing sex education in first grade instead of seventh or eighth grade. Or, it could inadvertently lead little girls to become traumatized. You never know the effects this could have until she’s older.”

WTF? WTF? WTF? Pardon my eloquence, but did I mention WTF? Did Dr. Manny really use the word TRAUMATIZED? Oh, yes, this is a direct quote and he really did use the word TRAUMATIZED to describe what might happen to a child who PRETENDS TO NURSE A BABY DOLL. Now, I can't help but wonder if Manny's daughter has a dolly that came with a bottle, or a doll who has a diaper to change or maybe a doll who even has a lifelike cry? I certainly hope not because surely, these dolls, too, would "speed up her maternal urges" and lead to a knocked-up 3rd grader. I bet Manny buys his daughter dolls that serve as role models, like those sweet Bratz girls or, of course, all-American Barbie dolls. You know, the dolls that can show her what tits are really for!

The crying shame in all of this, though, is how far away we have gotten from what is natural human behavior. Teaching young girls that breast feeding is a shameful act, an act that they need neither knowledge of nor exposure to, is, I believe a grave mistake. All the lip service that the medical community gives to breast feeding is for naught if kids grow up believing that the nice way to give a baby milk is through a bottle and that nursing a child is somehow dirty.

Now, where do I go to order me a Baby Gloton? Violet's first Christmas gift is coming early this year!

So what do you think? Is Baby Gloton going to give kids the wrong sort of ideas or is she a good toy to promote breast feeding? This blog really upset Megan, my Facebook friend who started the thread that got me thinking about this, which was absolutely never my intention. (I'm sorry you felt attacked, Megan!!) But, it is obviously a controversial topic and I'd love to hear your comments!

Away I Go

2009-08-03T07:18:00.002-04:00

After luxuriating at home for the last month, I am headed back to work this morning. It's funny how quickly I got used to having all 3 members of our little family unit at home everyday. I think we would have eventually gotten bored, but 30 some days was not enough to do it. Waking up at 9 or 9:30--yes, Violet sleeps that late!--eating breakfast together Leave-It-To-Beaver-style, and then tackling our house chores for the day--it was a pretty nice little bubble we were living in. We made some progress on the house, not as much as I'd hoped, but not totally worthless, either. We took some bike rides, got to the pool a few times, walked around the new 'hood and met some neighbors, visited with family, and generally enjoyed life. The rigorous exercise regimen that I was going to follow EVERYDAY never materialized, but fortunately I was able to stick to my Twice Daily Dessert program which I'm sure will offset any workouts I missed. Yum pie...

Shawn has another 2 weeks off before school begins again for him so my two partners in crime will be ending the summer the same way they began it, with some quality Daddy-Daughter time. Having this extended chunk of time off has done wonders for Violet's relationship with Shawn. She still has her moments when no one but Mommy will do, but she is becoming far less discriminating when it comes to whose leg she'll nuzzle into to hide from strangers. They have developed their own games to play together and Daddy is the only one thus far who has been able to elicit a certain high pitched shriek of pleasure from Violet during rumpus time. I'll miss them today!

Next weekend is going to bring about another Violet and Shawn milestone: their first solo overnight together. I'll be heading to Nashville, TN for my future sister in law Steph's bachelorette party so the other two Pierces will be holding down the fort. I am excited, but a bit apprehensive about leaving Vi overnight. She sleeps like a champ for us, but when she does wake up, she usually nurses for a minute or two to drift back off. The night nursing doesn't bother me a bit; quite the opposite actually. It's such a snugly time and has become so instinctual for both of us, I frequently don't even fully wake up to do it. I know that Daddy's loving arms are just as capable as mine, and I also know that if I never give them a chance, then Shawn won't ever be on call at night. I'm sure they'll be fine, they always are. And, after a few gin and tonics in Nashville, I'll be fine too! Who knows, maybe I'll even enjoy my ME time...

DANGER

2009-07-27T23:32:00.005-04:00

Violet is a baby living on the edge. She literally teeters on the edge of steps, sofas, Rubbermaid boxes, and any other surface that she can climb on top of with her limited upper body strength. Though Shawn and I have both been off work for the last month, I'll admit, we haven't supervised her 100% of that time. There haven't been any cases of egregious neglect--she hasn't been found wandering in the street clad only in a soiled diaper--but she's definitely been out of line of sight from time to time. It was a little bit of a shocker the afternoon I darted outside to ask Shawn a question and found my sweet little girl, crap loaded in her diaper, crouched on the floor eating the remnants of a peanut butter sandwich she'd scooped from the trash. My little baby bum is a toddler now and nothing brings her more joy than toddling away from her Mommy and Daddy.

Because I know that there is no way to make sure she will never get hurt, I have learned how to pick and choose the hazards I'll allow. The first thing to sort out was hazard vs. annoyance. A hazard would be Violet getting into the cabinets under the kitchen sink and sampling the cleaning products we store under there. An annoyance is Violet getting into the cabinet under our bathroom sink and chewing on the ends of every tampon in a Costco-sized box before she scatters them from one end of the bedroom to the other.

There are a lot of real hazards in the world and even these aren't all easy to protect her from. For instance, the stairs are still largely no-no's for Violet. I have seen her crawl up and now (be still my nervous heart!) I've now seen her back her way all the way down our flight of stairs. I know that she knows how to descend on her belly when that is her goal. I've also seen her roll a ball down the hallway and then sway ever so gut-wrenchingly, over the top stair as she watches it bounce down, step by step. The thought of her tumbling down the stairs scares the bejesus out of me so I'm *mostly* always diligent about gating her on one level. This morning, as I was ------ing (making the bed or drying my hair or putting laundry away or doing one of the other zillion things I do that keep me from focusing all of my attention on my 14 month old), she made a beeline for the stairs. I jumped in front of her to put the baby gate up and turned her around hoping she would find something to while away the next 2 (or 5 or 10 or 12 or 20) minutes so I could finish making/drying/putting/doing task. Unless she's wrecked tired, she's usually fairly easy to re-direct.

She did an about-face and rather than f-ing with me by going down the stairs, she went toward the tools that hang next to the fireplace in our bedroom. These are long, metal shovels and pokers--definitely not approved for baby. But they are also heavy and hard to get out of their holder. So I watched Violet slam them against the brick hearth over and over and I went about my business. There was no imminent danger to her from the fireplace tools, but if she pulled the same shit at someone else's house, I wouldn't let her do it. It doesn't look good, safety-wise, and the metal poker slamming on brick sounds even worse. But, she was entertained by them for a while and that is more than I can say Elmo did for me this morning. And, once I finished my hair/laundry/bed making, it is a lot easier to pick up some tampons out of the fireplace than take the child to the ER for falling down the stairs. That's how I play risky behavior roulette.

CoExisting

2009-07-17T21:00:00.004-04:00

Violet is 14 months old. Not a major milestone for most kids, but 14 months is a number that has some significance for me. See, Violet missed my Dad by just 14 months. Had life moved faster for me, or slowed down for Daddy, he might have gotten to meet his first granddaughter. 14 months--just a wrinkle in time, really.

Violet and I spent Friday at my friend Leslie's lakehouse. I hadn't seen her parents for years and it was nice to catch up with them for a bit. Talking to her father, the way he called me "Kiddo," reminded me so much of my own Dad. I suppose Mr. Ryan and my Dad were contemporaries so no surprise they'd use the same lingo. Hearing his voice transported me briefly back in time.

The most fascinating and appealing part of the idea of heaven, at least for me, is the togetherness of everyone. People who missed each other in life, like my Dad and Violet or me and my own Grandfathers, get to overlap in death. Of course, getting to see those who passed on before us is a huge comfort, but it is those initial meetings that really captivate my imagination. The logistics of heaven start to get messy when you think about how many generations of ancestors may be waiting there to say hey, but, I guess with all eternity to play with, I can spend plenty of time with Great-Great-Great Aunt Maude and not worry to much about what else I'm missing. Ahhh, yes, heaven. What a splendid idea!

I feel that heaven is likely an idea created by humans as a salve for the deepest losses we suffer so I can't just rely on Violet meeting up with my Daddy "someday." I have to do what I can during life to make sure Violet and my Dad do overlap. So I've been trying to remember the details of the "Hairy Green Toe" story he told me so I can share it with her. And I've been making sure to call her toenails "sock sabers" and refer to her as "Little V" every now and then. I'll call her Critter and of course Kiddo in case there isn't a light at the end of the tunnel. Because if there isn't a heaven where Bill Schroeder and Violet Pierce get to meet each other, part of my job as a Schroeder and a Pierce is to see that she gets some sense of who her Grandpa was and how much he would have loved her.

The Lost Month

2009-07-09T00:25:00.008-04:00

So June is over and I managed to post only once. Guess I'm not ready for professional blogging yet after all. I swear, I do have a good excuse. Several excuses really.

The first and grandest excuse for my absence from the world wide web is that we Pierces moved to a NEWWW house on June 24th. After a hellava negotiation process to unload our other house, we finally arrived at an acceptable deal with the buyers (thanks in large part to our realtor, Sussan O'Brien, who I'd recommend to anyone in a heartbeat) and we were able to move forward with buying a NEWWW house!!

The new place is palatial by our old standards, dwarfing our previous house. We went from 2 bedrooms to 4; 1 bathroom to 2.5, no garage to a 2-car attached; a postage stamp yard to a respectable romping ground for all of us. Needless to say, we are loving it. I don't know if I have an absolute-hands-down favorite part of the house yet (I love it all, really) but I am pretty enamoured of Violet's room. It was already painted the perfect shade of--you guessed it--Violet--when we moved in and is easily twice a large as her old room. It has plenty of space for her growing toy collection, her little kid library, a smelly diaper pail, and, her newest addition, her big-girl bed!

In our old house, Violet's room was still The Nursery. It was an idea of a baby's room, The Nursery was, an idea hatched in my mind upon finding out I was pregnant. Babies r Us and Pottery Barn Kids showed me photos of how I was supposed to house a baby and I thought, "This is good, this is cute, my baby must have this." I shopped and I researched, I poured over catalogues and safety guidelines, I deliberated--I shit you not--DELIBERATED FOR DAYS--over what the baby's crib bedding would be. The crib bedding was key of course, because, much like Ohio during a national election, the crib bedding is a bellweather for the rest of the nursery. A proper nursery theme begins with the crib bedding and goes on from there. I chose the Penelope bedding from Pottery Barn Kids and I am lead to believe that the price of the bedding must be inversely proportional to the baby's desire to lay on it. It was damn expensive and Violet spent ZERO nights sleeping on it. Not a one. She much preferred the Target sheets on Mommy and Daddy's bed. Or maybe she preferred Mommy and Daddy...

Anyway, we set up Vi's big girl bed, a double mattress and box spring on the floor, on our second night in the house and, wonder of wonders, she has fallen to sleep in it every night since. She is also logging 1-2 naps in her bed every day allowing Shawn and I to get shit done around the house. It was never possible for me to lay down with her while she drifted off when the crib was her bed and she woke up instantly every time we went to lay her in it. Now I can go lay down with her and nurse her to sleep. She hasn't made it all night in her own bed yet, but I'm fine with that. Even though Shawn and I had discussed how much easier it would be to put Violet to bed once we moved, the reality of her being in her own room didn't hit me til the night we made her bed up. I think moving her has been a bigger deal for me than for her. So when I hear her on the monitor at 2 or 3 am, I am always happy to go grab her and bring her back to our bed for the rest of the night.

Other bonuses about our new house: we are .8 miles from my brother Andy and his wife Aly. This means extra playtime with Vi's cousins Jack and Charlie. We also moved into a great little well-established neighborhood with an active homeowners association. We got here just in time to be a part of the 4th of July parade complete with a marching band and a flaming baton twirler. The neighbors we've met seem wonderful--the couple next door has lived in their home for 40 years and brought us over a lemon poppy seed cake to welcome us. My guess is that Charles and Lorraine will not have the same sort of alcohol fueled late night spats and loud make-up sex like our previous neighbors...Seems we've landed squarely in Pleasantville.

Finally, perhaps my most favoritest part of this new house is the thing we just turned on today...our wireless router! No more hunching over a desk in the wee hours to get a blog posted! I am writing this in the comfort of my own bed! Love it!

The Smackdown

2009-06-01T21:17:00.004-04:00

Violet raised her tiny hand in anger at me this morning for the first time. I say "for the first time" because I realize that we have 2+ years of toddlerhood left to live through and I am not naive enough to think it won't happen again.

She had just woken up and I took her right from her bed to the kitchen where I was busy doctoring up my morning coffee. Violet likes to suck on my empty Splenda packets (the child loooves paper of all sorts) and was reaching out for the box when I went to put it away. I had already thrown out the empty packet before retrieving her from bed so I didn't have any packets for her to gum. Adding insult to injury, I then put the lid back on the gallon of milk without even so much as letting her attempt to close it. Naughty Mommy, right? Well, wee sleepy Violet thought so. She howled a terrible whine and reached for my face to smack and pinch it! What a turd!

I put her on the floor so fast I don't think either she or I realized what I was doing. Part of me was laughing because--how ridiculous that this mini-person clad in bubble gum jammies was throwing an A.M. tantrum directed at me--I just wasn't equipped to handle such a bizarre start to the day before I'd had even a sip of coffee. The other more forward-looking Mommy wasn't laughing at all. She was thinking of all the potential bratty shit I could have staring down the next 10-20 years of my life. I don't care how cute her jammies are, how adorable her little dimply rear is, how sweetly her Johnson & Johnson's washed hair smells...I'm not prepared to deal with a brat. I'm just not. I'm too bratty myself...I'm afraid we'll cancel each other out.

Cringing all the way to work, I thought of the kind of bullshit I used to do to my own Mom, never thinking twice about her feelings. I'd roll my eyes at her music, giggle at her clothes, explain with exasperation for the 10th time why the New Kids on the Block were called the Fab Five. It didn't have anything to do with the Beatles. Sheesh. Danny, Donnie, Joe, Jordan, and John were soo beyond my Mom. She would never, could never, get it.

Mom--did you know that someday I'd get it? You must have hoped that day would come.

I'm not ready to have some tiny girl making fun of my Stevie Wonder songs or my Chaco sandals. I'm not ready to surrender my coolness to someone so much younger than me; someone that I made!

I know this morning's smack wasn't the same as an intentional eye roll and I know we're probably several years off from that kind of shit. Violet's tiny temper was tweaked just enough this morning that she needed to release it on someone, and I was the only one within striking distance. It was just a little glimpse of the big personality she's been working so hard at growing. The little dancing, laughing, penguin-walking, sweet-dolly-talking, doggy-patting, Mommy-snuggling, car-vrooming, swing-squealing, cousin-loving, one-year-old Violet also happens to have a short fuse in the mornings. Duly noted. And, if this is a peephole into the future with Violet, I'll keep the naked pictures handy for blackmail. Just in case.

And, yeah, Sweetie, you are naked in the tub with both of your cousins.

Let Them Eat Cake Twice

2009-05-18T14:36:00.009-04:00

I swear, this is my last post in which I will wax nostalgic over Violet turning the big -1-. I make no promises about what I will do when she turns 18 months or 2 years, however, and I fully reserve the right to ooo and awww publicly over each new milestone if I so desire.

Anyway, the last week was full of fun birthday celebrations for Violet. First, on the 12th, we had a family dinner of spaghetti, her current fave, and of course a birthday cake to ring in the actual day. Then, despite the fact that Shawn and I agreed there had already been quite enough fuss made for a person who didn't even realize it was her birthday, we had a party with all of "Violet's Friends" on Saturday. I'm glad we did the friends birthday party, too, because it gave us a chance to see people we don't usually see and Vi got to visit with the Pierce side of the family.

Violet had a great time at her party which we held at a park. She definitely did a better job making a mess of herself on her second go-around with cake. The first time, on her actual birthday, she picked tentatively at the frosting and barely made a mess at all. She seemed way more into it on her second try, smearing frosting everywhere and licking her palms and the table regularly. I'm sure it was just the result of having a little practice, but I'll attribute it to the fact that she prefers Mama's homemade cupcakes (no mix, the real deal!) to the store bought cake we'd had on Tuesday. The paper wrapper surrounding the cupcake probably didn't hurt either. Paper is the base of Violet's food pyramid on many days.

The weather was sorta yucky but we made due. None of the kids seemed to mind the cold temps or intermittent drizzle. When do those things start to bother you? Must be after the age of 6...The park was still better than doing it at our house for a lot of reasons not the least of which being I didn't have to clean up smashed cake when it was all said and done.

I am going to have to remember to put "NO PRESENTS!" on any future party invites we send out, however, because after a certain number of parties in your honor (wedding showers, wedding, baby showers, 30th birthdays, all in the last 2 years!!!), I feel like a lot of our lesser-seen friends only see us on occasions when they feel required to bring a gift. Hopefully, we'll get to reciprocate for all of our friends and their kids if we haven't already.

The other reason we need to adopt a strict NO PRESENTS policy is because we are out of space. Playskool and Fisher-Price have taken over our house and I am starting to think I should have gone with a decorating palette featuring more primary colors so all the molded plastics would fit in. It is pretty hard to disguise the ball poppers and bubble mowers (both toys that she loooooves, by the way) among our current theme of muted earth tones. The good news on that front is, we just accepted an offer on our house so it looks like a move is in the works for us this summer. Priority #1 in the next house: PLAYROOM!!!

A Three Mimosa Mother's Day

2009-05-10T19:02:00.003-04:00

My first Mother's Day on the Mother-end is winding down. We joined my family for a nice brunch and then spent the early afternoon playing on Jack and Charlie's new swingset at my brother and sister-in-law's house. Then we came home and I got a nap--what luxury--and needed after my 3 mimosas!

I can't believe last Mother's Day I hadn't even met Violet yet--she was still churning around in my belly waiting to be c-sectioned out of there. We didn't even know what her name was going to be and now I must say that name out loud 25 times a day! Violet!

Until this year, Mother's Day had always been only about honoring my Mom. Now, Violet has given me a new holiday. I had a gift to open--a pretty nightie--and lots of cards, too. It is appropriate that my new identity gets a holiday, and fitting, I think that Mother's Day will always fall during the week we celebrate Violet's birth. Violet was born on May 12, 2008, and so was her Mommy.

I don't think there is anyway to really be prepared for how motherhood will change your life and I realize that I am only beginning to see those changes. I had so many notions about what being the mother of a baby would look like, of who I would be when I became Jill the Mommy. Some of these have stuck, but a lot of them haven't. And a lot more quirks that I never expected have become part of my Mommyhood. Like, I am way more laid back than I thought I'd be with Violet eating. I thought I'd be a worried mess about her choking, but I have learned to trust her gag reflex and my own response time and now I feel pretty confident that she can handle most table foods. Just writing this probably guarantees I'll be explaining myself to an EMT in the near future after he wrestles a raisin from her windpipe. Just kidding, I haven't given her raisins. I bet Grammy has, though!

One thing I am getting more uptight about, on the flipside, is her daily bath. We were on the every-other-day bath cycle for a good portion of her infancy, now I am pretty grossed out if her wee bod doesn't get a daily scrub. She is so dirty when she eats that alone qualifies her for some tub time. Unfortunately for Violet, she also inherited Shawn's bizarre sleep sweats, so she wakes up from a lot of naps with her head soaked. And, must I mention the pants-pooping? I know all babies do it, but, if I pooped my pants, I'd like a bath within 24 hours.

I think what keeps surprising me is that I am more relaxed about the things that I thought would concern me--napping, schedules, and well-rounded meals--and way more concerned about things that I never gave much thought to before Violet, like chemicals, shots, and parent-child attachment. I empathize like I never did before I was a Mom. News stories, like the babies in China who were killed by tainted formula, and personal stories, like the one being lived by Maddie Spohr's mom, wrench a part of my heart I'd never even considered before. There is this underlying connectivity that knits us together that wasn't palpable before I was Violet's mom.

Things I thought would be easy, like leaving our baby with a sitter for a night out, are much more difficult than I expected. Things that I thought would be hard, like giving up the freedom of coming and going at a moments notice, have actually been easier than I'd imagined. And all this is just stuff I've learned in the first 363 days. I wonder what the next year and the ones after that will hold? I'm afraid I'm going to find out all too soon, if they all flip by as quickly as this one.

Violet's 1st Year in Photos

2009-05-06T20:38:00.004-04:00

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Avoiding Affluenza

2009-05-02T22:26:00.005-04:00

The (stupid) economy. It was only a matter of time until we Pierces felt it directly. I have enough friends who have lost work. My brother was laid off in December. Shawn's dad was one of the first casualties a year and a half ago. Now, we are preparing for a drop in income and I am wracking my brain for ways to save the money we do bring in.

Let me qualify this income cut we're taking by saying that, in many ways, I chose it and am looking forward to it. The non-profit I work for, School on Wheels, is trying to cut a significant chunk of change from our budget for the 2009-10 fiscal year and our Executive Director let us know she wanted to do this while avoiding laying off any staff. So, the whole staff was presented with a slew of money saving propositions for us to consider with the hope that enough of us would step up and do something thereby saving every one's jobs. One option was to go from working full-time to part-time. I have wanted to work part-time since Violet was born but was afraid I wouldn't have a job at School on Wheels as a part-time employee. Now that I am actually going to be working part-time, however, I am getting a little anxious about how we are going to make ends meet.

Shawn and I are not rich, not you thought a school teacher and a non-profit manager would be loaded, but important to clarify, nonetheless. So I am going to try to remember, as we go from "not rich" to "getting by" in the next few months, that the things Violet will remember as she gets older are not going to be labels on clothes or how fancy her birthday parties were. If she is like me, she's going to remember feelings and smells, things far less tangible, and, fortunately, things that are free.

My parents, like Shawn and me, were "not rich" for most of my childhood. My Dad worked in ball bearing sales (the glamour!) and my mom stayed at home. They put 3 kids through parochial school. We went on one driving vacation a year, sometimes to Texas to visit family, sometimes to the beach to stay in a condo. We never ate out--I mean, McDonald's was a luxury. I can probably count on one hand the number of times I remember going to a sit-down restaurant. If my Mom's side of the family was visiting we might hit up a casual dining restaurant and even then, we'd do places like The Ground Round. We shopped at the 80's version of Costco, called Cub Foods, and my mom clipped and filed coupons for each trip. I know we did get new clothes from time to time, but I don't really remember big shopping trips to get them.

The things I do remember from being a kid have little to do with what we didn't have and everything to do with all that we did get. I remember getting a nickel to ride the Atlas grocery mechanical horse. I remember Mom buying a candy that was wax tubes filled with colored sugary water and letting us spit the chewed up globs of wax out the windows of the van. What the F were those things, anyway? I remember knowing there had to be a Santa because my parents wouldn't ever buy me all of those toys. I remember the way Mom made banners for Jeff and Andy when their birthdays fell on school days and hung them in the breakfast room so they'd get to have a party before school. I remember Dad making homemade egg rolls. I remember eating cherry turnovers and watching Dallas with all 5 of us. I remember catching lightening bugs with my Dad in the front yard. Summer memories are full of days at the Rivi swimming pool eating sandwiches and Goldfish while Mom laid out on the deck.

Once I got to about junior high, my Mom had finished school and gone back to work and my Dad must have gotten a few promotions because we started to have more. I would ask for a certain pair of shoes and they'd get them for me. We took a vacation in the winter and the summer. We'd go out for Mexican food or order pizza more often. It was subtle enough of a change I didn't even notice it at the time. By the time I graduated from high school, I had grown accustomed to getting a new dress before every dance and a $20 a week allowance. How lucky was I?

But what I need to remember is that is was not always that way in my family and I was none the wiser. In fact, I am probably better off for not having had whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. So, while Shawn and I are going to have to watch every penny, we needn't worry that Violet will know that we're doing it. She is going to remember how we took her to see the chickens--maybe not this trip, but future trips. She'll remember helping me frost cupcakes or getting to stay up late on summer nights playing and sweating with her cousins while the grown ups talk. Violet will remember eating cereal and watching Sesame Street while Scout begs at her feet. I hope Violet will remember snuggling between her Mommy and Daddy, feeling so safe and comfy, and knowing no other way to be.

The Pact

2009-04-27T21:51:00.003-04:00

They say that there are no qualifiers to become a parent. There are no exams, no Litmus tests, not even any blood tests required to spread a seed. The thing that is asked of us is that we sign a non-binding agreement with our baby, our child.

Our end, the Mommy and Daddy-end of the bargain is pretty involved. We will be awake on command. We will pick noses when they are crisped over with boogers. We will wipes asses, kiss foreheads, cancel dinner plans when fevers spike, and compromise parts of ourselves for the good of our offspring. We will gaze at baby photos, brag to unsuspecting cashiers, and squirt ibuprofen down a throat if it will cool her forehead. She'll stun us when she walks, propelling that body on her own when it was so grounded mere weeks ago. We'll love the wee thing ferociously, becoming the parent we couldn't imagine we could become before she was ours, and wake up eager to be Mommy and Daddy again today.

Her end of the pact is simply this: Outlive us. Outlive us.

The unspoken first rule for every baby is that she is to go on living long after her parents are gone. She is to be the harbinger of the customs, the sayings, the love of her family, well beyond the day that we die. No matter what else she does, what other joys or griefs she brings to her family, her end of the pact will be upheld so long as she goes on living.

When the pact is broken, hearts break. So when I read the story of this little girl, Madeline Alice Spohr, I wept for her parents. I called home to check on Violet.

I think of her parents during Violet's baths and during her dinner, when she is playing and especially when we go to sleep. I think of the incredible emptiness I felt for months after my Dad died and can only imagine that emptiness mutated and multiplied when a parent loses a child and not the other way around. The unspoken pact, the rule of nature, the DNA that was crafted with all intentions being sent on down the line; all gone in an instant. The ache of it all is too much and I only wish there were some way to give this Mommy and Daddy, and all Mommies and Daddies who have lost a baby, a shred of consolation.

All In The Family

2009-04-14T20:21:00.003-04:00

Before I got pregnant, I remember my mother telling me that she would not be waiting around at any given time to have grand kids dumped with her. She had a life. Fast-forward to May 12, 2008. Her tune changed a bit. Grammy couldn't stand to have her only granddaughter in daycare--so she gave up the retired life and volunteered to stay with Violet 4 days a week.

The situation has really been perfect in almost every way. First, who could be better to care for my precious daughter than my own mother. If I had to drop off my tiny 12 week old at a daycare center back in August, I think I would have quit my job after my first day back. Second, the time and work that Grammy has put into Violet over the last 8 months has forged a very special relationship between the two of them. That bond is evident whenever Violet sees her Grammy and I think these formative months Vi has spent in my Mom's arms will keep them linked in a special way forever. Very cool for Violet, especially in this day and age when so many families are spread out across the country and the only time kids see their grandparents is the week between Christmas and New Year's.

It is also pretty cool for my Mom to have such a close tie to her only granddaughter. Our family has had so much loss in the last 2 years with my Granny's death following my Dad's passing by only a year; I think Mom needed a new itty-bitty to remind her of the wonder surrounding the beginning of a person. After holding her husband and mother's hands as they struggled out of this life, I'm sure holding Violet's hand as she huffs and puffs through her first steps as a toddler is a welcome change.

The only problem with relying on only my Mom to watch Violet is that when she's sick, Shawn and I are scrambling to find an alternative baby watcher so we can both make it to work. Barb was down with pneumonia for two weeks this month and Shawn and I were making phone calls to family and friends each evening, trying to patch together a plan for Violet's care for the next day.

Lucky for us, my sister-in-law Aly and my brother Jeff were both in a position to pinch hit and did so frequently during Grammy's illness. Aly has two little guys of her own, Jack age 3, and Charlie, age 9 months, and I suspect she felt some sympathy for Octomom when I repeatedly showed up to add my 11 month old to her already busy household. She grinned and bore it beautifully, however, and actually had me almost believing her when she said 3 babies aren't any more work than 2.

Uncle Jeff, Violet's godfather, also stepped up to the plate to do some babysitting in our time of need. Talk about a crash course in babies, Jeff learned the ins and outs of diapering, the importance of dicing food in chunks smaller than babies' windpipe, and how to socialize with other mommies at Kindermusik all in 2 weeks. Violet learned that ham and bacon together make a delicious meal.

Jen, my BFF, also spent her day off tending Violet. Her 2 and a half year old Avery helped out quite a bit, I understand! Because of the generosity of all these people, Shawn and I were both able to keep our jobs. And it is these people, relation of blood and marriage, people I've chosen to surround myself with and those who were chosen for me, who tie me to Indianapolis and the Midwest. They are the reasons Shawn and I want to bring Violet up here and no where else.

UltraViolet

2009-03-02T22:42:00.006-05:00

I read a blog called Her Bad Mother and the author (years ago, it would seem, I am so behind blogolistically speaking) called for others to write about the physical nature of their love for their children. I read some, was enthralled, and couldn't wait to give it a whirl myself.

Before Violet, I always heard moms and grannies talk about how they wanted to "eat a baby up." What a horrible, Rosie O'Donnell-esque turn of phrase it was: "Eat a baby up." It was in the same vein as 'cutie-patootie' -- makes me want to puke. First off, ingesting a baby makes no sense. After carrying one for nine long months, going to all the trouble of getting it out, who would want to put her back in? I didn't understand why holding her, cuddling her, rocking her might not seem like enough. Who are these crazies who can't get enough baby via the typical routes? Who are the loons that want to devour poor little babies?

Turns out, I am a baby-eater. Or at least, I would be, if I could be. I suppose, figuratively, I am one. A baby-eater. I really only have an appetite for my baby, but, I think eating just one baby is all it takes to fall under the heading.

The delight of her skin under my fingers is the most soothing sensation I have ever felt. Now, in late winter, with temperatures still lingering below freezing most nights, I have a terrible urge to let her frolic in only her diaper, just so I can glimpse those wondrous new skin cells in all of their rosy, dimply, glory. But just seeing her skin isn't enough, I need to stroke it; with my fingers, with my lips, pressing my cheek to her round belly.

I feel thankful that we are still nursing; I don't know how I would ever get my fix of hands-on baby time if she didn't have to collapse in my lap and snuggle close to me 5 or 6 times a day. She is such a baby on the move these days: crawling, cruising, chasing her dog, I would never be able to justify pinning her down to squeeze her meaty thigh if she didn't need to nurse. And as basic as her need is for her sustenance, my milk; so basic- so primal really- is my need to hold the tiny girl in my arms. When I curl her to me, Violet's slender fingers will find their way to my mouth, inspecting my teeth, my tongue, gently nipping at my lips, as if she understands the urge I have to gobble her up. She's willing, if only for the moments we are connected, baby to bosom, to let me have a nibble; to enjoy again what is surely going to be a fleeting consumption.

Tentative Symbiosis

2009-02-21T21:25:00.004-05:00

The Scout-Violet relationship is growing day by day but still uncertain at best. Violet is a dog enthusiast already, but her enthusiasm does little to quell Scout's baby loathing. Now that Violet is mobile (no, not crawling; but scooting, reversing, butt-pivoting, and toddling with help from a friendly finger), Scout has more to fear. When and if Violet does begin actual forward crawling, I have no doubt it will be the dog that motivates that movement. Her smelly fur is irresistible to the baby and Violet would like nothing more than to suck on her long, hairy tail, oblivious to the fact that it probably grazes every dump Scout takes.

The baby-dog attraction I definitely get. Scout is the best toy in the house; unpredictable and unattainable. What I don't get is why Scout doesn't get the hell out of Violet's way. The dog is way faster on the ground and able to jump up on any piece of furniture in the house. Yet, there she sits, a mere 10 inches from the baby, and then growls and bears her teeth when Violet yanks her furry rear end again and again. She yips but hasn't bitten; so far Shawn and I are always close at hand to scold her. I have even gone as far as to pick Scout up off of the floor where Violet is playing and put her on the sofa. She immediately jumps back down and goes back to laying within a foot of the baby. Go figure.

I would like to think Scout's constant proximity to Violet is related to some primal protective instincts, like that dog that suckled the tiger cubs. But knowing Scout, I think it has far more to do with Violet's burgeoning consumption of human food. Human food, any variety, is ambrosia to Scout. She is consumed by the desire to get her mustachioed under bite around even the smallest morsel of human food. Now that Violet is eating, and doing so messily, I might add, Scout is much more interested in her. Scout sits under her high chair during meals and is right there when we pick her up after eating, cleaning every grain of rice that falls from the baby to the floor within seconds. In many ways, this is nice and eases the burden of cleanup for us parents. But in other ways it is annoying, as Scout rears up and whimpers begging for the leftover baby vittles if we don't immediately wipe out the seat of the high chair.

Forget giving Violet a pretzel or some cheerios to nibble while she plays on the floor. Scout is there like a vulture, gently but persistently weaseling the food out of Vi's hand. And it doesn't help that Violet's eating patterns involve a lot of sucking followed by waving the food around for a while. As soon as she goes to wave her gooey pretzel in Scout's general direction, the dog politely removes it from her hand and devours it with minimal chewing.

I realize Cesar Milan would probably be having a heart attack if he read this. This certainly is not how a pack leader would behave, letting a lower order canine steal food from her pup. And I also realize that it is just a matter of time until Scout crosses the line with Violet and that is something I really don't want to deal with. So if anyone has any suggestions on how to deal with dog-baby relations in the Pierce household, I'm all ears...

Life on the Outside, More Violet than Felicia

2009-02-14T14:09:00.005-05:00

Violet passed the 9 month marker this week and celebrated by going shopping at Carter's. Nothing but the finest sweatshop cotton for my little one!

Nine months old means that Vi has passed a milestone of her life and now has spent longer out of utero than in utero. What a host of changes her little life has already seen! For example, on the inside, she did not have to breathe. All that pesky inhaling and exhaling she does now was done for her by me. However, in my belly, she didn't get to eat Snyder's Homestyle Pretzels, her new fave.

But, the more things change, the more they stay the same. In utero, Violet frequently had the hiccups. That didn't change--several times a week she still sounds like an IU student after playing Sink the Bismark at Nick's. While she was in my womb under the pseudonym Felicia, she was covered in vernix, a white cheesy substance that protected her baby skin from the water she was afloat in. This morning she was covered in actual cheese; whipped cream cheese, to be specific, that was on the English muffin she and I shared. During gestation, especially during the last 2 months or so, Felicia did a great job of making me uncomfortable by resting her girth on my bladder. Violet, too, likes to make her mother uncomfortable, but prefers going the route of pinching any of my exposed skin whenever we are nursing testing my conviction never to spank my child.

The biggest thing that I've noticed as Violet turned 9 months this week, is what an unignorable symbol she is of the passage of time. Like marking big red Xs on a calendar, Violet is a human countdown--or, more aptly, a count-up. She changes quickly yet subtly making it hard to tell if she is actually acquiring a new skill or just stumbling along doing baby stuff. Then--POOF--baby stuff was a new skill and she is opening every cupboard door in the house looking through the treasures that lie within. I have always been both fascinated and saddened by the way we perceive time and having Vi around intensifies both of those feelings.

Oooo, That Smell

2009-01-29T17:18:00.003-05:00

Standing over Violet, wiping off her highchair and face after she gummed down some Cheerios, I smelled the smell of baby. Not the sweet, yummy, baby smell that grandmas and other older women always report when they take a whiff of a newborn's head, but the sticky, oaty, scent that accompanies a growing human who has begun to eat real food, take real craps, but not really wash themselves.

Shawn and I bathe Violet every other day, more frequently if needed, so I'm pretty sure the smell isn't a hygiene issue. I don't even know if it comes directly from Violet though I know she causes it. Right after a bath, Violet smells like her soap, a lightly-perfumed lavendery concoction that, when combined with a certain baby giggle, is probably the root cause of all the spoiled little girls in this country. And even when she is covered with sticky biter-biscuit residue, has peas mushed in her neck-creases, and has a full diaper, she doesn't stink, not really. The diapers smell bad, yes, but they are easy enough to change and dispose of and most of the visible food can be wiped away.

I wonder if having a baby living in your house isn't kind of like sharing your home with a cat. When someone walks in who doesn't have a cat, they can tell right away that one lives there. I love cats, grew up with cats, don't have a cat right now, but probably will own a cat in the future. The thing that I never realized until I did not have a cat living in my house is that cats, as clean and fastidious as they are, have a certain feline odor that is impossible to disguise. It probably has something to do with those scent glands near their whiskers they are always rubbing on your legs and sofa. No matter where you put the litter box or how often it is emptied, the cat smell is a part of your house and easily identifiable to those people who do not have a cat.

I assume the infant smell is the same. No amount of Clorox in the Diaper Genie or Dreft in the laundry can hide the baby smell. Even if we were able to find enough closet space to contain the papasan swing, the Cruise n Crawl Jungle, the Sit to Stand Activity table, the Rainforest Jumparoo, and every other large, colorful, molded Playskool monstrosity that sits in our living room screaming "Baby Lives Here!," I am sure that someone without a baby would know that we had Violet. All the baby stuff has a smell and that smell permeates your home. From the artificial, sterile, lemony/powder scent of baby wipes, to the MRE aroma that accompanies anything packaged by Gerber, to the indescribable smell of plastic covered in drool that is all of her toys, Violet has marked her territory at the Pierce house.

The other funny thing about the smell that is Violet: I love it. I remember going to babysit when I was younger and smelling the baby smell at my charge's house and being sooo happy that my house didn't smell like that. In all likelihood, my own house with two teenage boys and a gross pre-pubescent girl probably smelled much worse, but it was our smell. And now, just like that, the baby smell is our smell, too. And I wouldn't trade it for all the cleaning ladies in the world.

OK, a cleaning lady would be pretty awesome. Maybe I would just ask her not to scrub the highchair too hard...

A Blurry Line

2009-01-08T21:40:00.005-05:00

The dangers of drinking alcohol during pregnancy are well documented. Every pregnancy pamphlet, book, and website will warn the expecting mom that alcohol can cause birth defects. The Surgeon General has even spoken up about the danger of drinking alcohol on an unborn fetus and put his warning on the back of my cheap bottle of 2007 California Red. The common wisdom is that there is no way to know how much booze is too much booze for an unborn baby and Mom's best defense against fetal alcohol syndrome is to just avoid the stuff all together. Some mommies (like me), chose to live on the edge during our pregnancies and indulge in the occasional glass of wine during dinner. I suppose knowing when to say when when you are 40 pounds overweight becomes a little easier. The temptation to have just one more drink and stay out late dancing just wasn't as strong when I'd been constipated for 4 days.

The clearly defined line in the sand becomes a bit windblown when you are talking about the rules for alcohol consumption and breastfeeding. Somehow, the"pump and dump" method became the accepted method for a breast feeding mom who wanted to drink. I guess if I wanted to go on an 8 hour bender and get really shitfaced, I might need to express milk at some point in time just so I didn't get too engorged. Breast milk, like blood, does not hold on to alcohol indefinitely when a mom drinks. About an hour after a drink is consumed, the alcohol content in blood and milk is at it's peak. As her blood alcohol level falls, so does the amount of alcohol in her breast milk. So if I have a glass of wine before bed and fall asleep without pumping, my milk will not have alcohol in it the next morning as my body processed my wine while I slept. There is no need for me to rid my body of any alcohol laced milk, my liver will do that job for my whole body.

Since Violet is still nursing on demand, it is rare that I go very long when I'm not at work without nursing her. And I admit, I'll have a couple glasses of wine during the evening and I still nurse Violet that night. I am usually drinking with my meal, over the course of several hours, and would never nurse her if I felt even a little drunk. That's not to say that I haven't worried about the safety of drinking while being a breastfeeding mom. I've read as much about it as I can (curiously, there isn't a lot of research on the topic), and talked to lots of moms. It seems that lots of breastfed kiddos have survived their mom's social drinking and I am pretty confident that my minimal alcohol consumption has no affect on sweet Baby Violet. The first time I drank after Violet was born I was so nervous, I asked Shawn several times if he thought it would be OK for me to feed her. I have gotten over that fear, as you can see by the accompanying photo. No real staging was needed for this; I have a glass of wine 3 or 4 nights a week.

I think, more than any worries I have about Vi's health or development, I worry that people will judge me as a bad or negligent mom. I certainly don't want to give people who are ignorant about nursing any ammunition. That's why I was so disheartened when Shawn told me about the Connecticut mom who was arrested for breastfeeding her infant while intoxicated. You can read the story here. Clearly, this mom was in the wrong, having 7 drinks with a 3 week old baby is just too much, but it sounds like she needs some treatment for post-partum depression, not a trip to county jail. Anyway, I think a good rule of thumb for parents of infants, breast feeding or not, is that if you have had too much to feel safe holding the baby, you've had too much to be an infant's caregiver. But if the police are going to start arresting moms for the crime of drunk nursing, there needs to be some clear rules about how much is too much.

All She Wants For Christmas

2008-12-18T22:12:00.004-05:00

If Violet understood the concepts of Christmas, wanting material things, and getting the most bang for her entertainment buck, she would most certainly put Baby Einstein DVDs at the top of her wish list. I don't know what it is about these videos that she loves so much, but I sure wish I'd thought of them.

The idea is ingenious: set excruciatingly basic footage of children's toys, animals, babies, and puppets to music. I'm sure the production cost is minimal and, at $14.99 a pop, the lady that invented these things must be rolling in the dough. As with all winning products, the marketing is really the key to Baby Einstein's success. Call it Baby Couch Potato and you probably don't move many units. But a baby couch potato is exactly what you get when you turn one of these things on. As you may have inferred from the name, Baby Einstein markets itself as an educational tool for babies. All the DVDs focus on a different instructive principle: Baby Bach is music appreciation, Baby Wordsworth teaches first words, Baby's First Signs employs Marlee Matlin to show various signs from the ASL lexicon. So, you see, they are good for my baby. She'll have a leg up on the other kids on the playground this spring if she diligently watches her Baby Einstein videos this winter. At least, that is what I told myself tonight when I want to eat a baked potato without her putting her tiny hands in it or wailing when I refused to let her tip over my wine glass.

It is true, Violet does like to watch these 20 minute "movies" and I am amazed how well they hold her attention. I never thought babies were much interested in anything on TV which makes me a bit suspicious of Baby Einstein. Not so suspicious that I won't plop her down in front of one so I can grab a shower, but suspicious just the same. It is sort of creepy-cute the way Violet squeals and beats her arms when the DVD begins to play. And she looks at the toddlers who "star" in the movies like they are near, dear, friends. I don't think she looks at any real people with as much tenderness as her little face expresses when the weird puppets come on the screen.

Honest to God, she really doesn't watch them that much. I know my Mom uses the Baby Einstein DVDs as a distraction when she's caring for Violet during the day and she needs a break. Typically, I don't play them unless I need to take a shower and Vi's awake. Couldn't she play quietly with her toys while I shower, I sometimes wonder. The thing that makes the DVDs so handy is that when I pop one in, Violet suddenly doesn't notice when I leave the room. On the other hand, if I spread out her blanket and scattered all of her favorite toys around her, she would be occupied for somewhere between 3 and 12 minutes. Enough time to shower and dress?? Doubtful. If I'm in the same room and she gets frustrated, I can walk over to Vi as she plays on the floor and re-direct her attention to another toy. With Baby E, there is no need for Mommy to redirect, the monkey puppet or Marlee Matlin do it for me.

So I've been trying to quiet the voice of the parent I was before Violet was born. That parent reminds me that the television should never be used as a babysitter and that babies whose first foods are vegetables and fruits will be healthful eaters their whole lives. I really had good intentions of living by the Rules for Raising Perfect People, but this job is often far more difficult than I thought. I still know what the "right" thing to do is, but sometimes I just want to eat my baked potato and wine unmolested. And if Violet can be learning the sign for "Neglect" at the same time, doesn't everyone win?

Be Here Now

2008-12-07T22:00:00.005-05:00

Momming is, as everyone tells you, a full-time job. Besides going to work, I could probably list from memory how many times I have been out without Violet since she was born almost 7 (!) months ago. Shawn and I have had 2 dates and gone to 2 weddings, I've been out with Jen once, I met a friend after work for drinks about a month ago, and there was one time when I met my co-workers for beers. So when I left Vi with Shawn to go to a holiday dinner for work on Friday, I was a bit disappointed when he called me at 9 o'clock to tell me the little lady hadn't stopped crying since I left home.

The dinner was close by so I got home less than 10 minutes after he called. Violet had 3 vaccines on Friday afternoon and I think the residual effects of those were probably to blame for her unusual fussiness. Whatever the reason, she continues to be a Momma's Girl and her tears disappeared when I walked in to the room. Shawn handed her off to me and, as soon as he did, she turned back to him and grinned from ear to ear, just as an extra slap in the face in case he wasn't sure who her favorite is right now.

This is the thing about Violet's babyhood (and every other mother's baby, as well): It's all or nothing. I can't spread her infancy out; it is finite and fleeting. In 10 years, when she is so over being held, there will be no way for me to recapture that. When she is 17 and wants to spend more time without me than with me, I'm sure there will be no convincing her that snuggling on the sofa is a great way to spend a Saturday night. As much as I'll wish for the feeling of her otherworldly soft skin under my fingers when I am an old, wrinkled, woman, I'll have to settle for the memory of these days she and I are spending together now.

Keeping that in mind, it is easy to turn down an invitation for drinks or rush home from a dinner party or put the vacuuming off for days. Baby Violet will not be Baby Violet for much longer. While I sometimes wish I could put her on hold to do my stuff, that is not an option. So I submerge myself in her babyhood, coming up for air only occasionally, and not worrying too much about what else I might be missing.

This is a poem my Mom recited for me when Vi was just a week or two old. I don't know who wrote it, but it is a wonderful sentiment.

Cleaning and scrubbing can wait til tomorrow,

Cause babies grow up, I've learned to my sorrow.

So quiet down cobwebs, dust go to sleep.

I'm rocking my baby, and babies don't keep.

Lactivism

2008-11-23T12:19:00.005-05:00

A 6 month old baby wearing nothing but cowboy boots is adorable. A 6 month old's mother wearing nothing but cowboy boots would get me thrown off Blogger.

My pre-baby jeans fit me again but to look at my body without clothes I'd never know it belonged to the same person. There are still 8 unfamiliar pounds meating my frame but from what I've read, it is normal to hang on to a few extra lbs whilst one is breastfeeding an infant. While nursing initially helps liquefy pregnancy weight, Nature doesn't want all of Ma's blubber to go away just in case of a famine situation where she'd be unable to scarf down enough calories to make milk. So, said blubber just hangs out, protected by lactation hormones, waiting to be called into action. So far, though the economy is bad, we've still managed to avoid famine and keep my blubber intact. Hooray blubber!

If the physical downside of nursing Violet is the lactation-fat, the upside is the absence of menstruation. What a wonderful gift from the Breastfeeding Fairy! I haven't had a period since July of 2007. How rockin' is that? I think the FDA should require the formula industry to put that little tidbit of info on the side of all its cans of Enfamil and Similac in addition to the breast is best warning. "Use of this product will result in the speedy return of your period." If that didn't encourage new moms to give nursing a try, maybe the FDA might want to include the fact that lactation amenorrhea (the technical name for the temporary halt of menstruation) is a drug-free method of birth control about as effective as The Pill.

Shawn, Violet, and I went to two parties this weekend and the topic of breastfeeding came up at both. A natural thing to talk about when there is an infant suckling, I suppose. At Jen's housewarming party, I hung out in the playroom with the other babies and Mommas while Shawn hung out by the TV watching the football games. One girl who was in the playroom is pregnant with her first and due in December. Between me and Violet (born in May), Aly and Charlie (born in July), and Carrie and Ruby (born in August), she had a virtual panel of baby experts whose brains she could pick. And all of our experiences with birth and feeding have been different.

I was joking with Shawn on the way home from the party that I feel like the Johnny Appleseed of breastfeeding in situations like that. Sort of a "Jilly Boobyfeed." Nursing has been such a positive experience for me and Violet, and I believe so strongly in the benefits of breastfeeding, that I want to share it with all new moms. The difficulty in doing so is to remain diplomatic, to try to avoid coming across as a big, bitchy, breastfeeding nazi. This is especially true in the company of Carrie, one of my best friends, and Aly, my sister-in-law and friend, both who have had unique experiences nursing their kids and found different ways to make their families work. I think that they are both phenomenal moms and I look up to them as parents for different reasons.

That said, I am definitely outspoken in my advocacy of nursing. The more I learn about it, the longer I do it myself, the more angry I become that this society does not embrace nursing as the norm. It upsets me that there are so many women who intend to nurse their babies who, for one reason or another, have difficulty and don't have the resources or know-how to get through. It upsets me that formula companies sent canister after canister of their product to my house unsolicited and unwanted, but there were no invitations to free breastfeeding classes or seminars on how to help a newborn latch on. Those things I had to seek out myself.

If you think, for even a minute, that the shift in feeding from breast to bottle in the U.S. is fueled by anything other than capitalism, then you should do some reading. Breast milk, as nutritionally perfect and easily digestible as it is, happens to be free. No money changes hands when a baby nurses from her mother. Cans of formula, however, are far from free. Infant formula is a billion dollar a year industry. When the hospitals and pediatrician's offices become distribution sites for formula, where can families get unbiased information that they can trust?

That's why those of us that have breastfed and done so successfully have to be lactivists. Like so many other tasks in life, if moms don't do it themselves, it won't get done at all!

Square Footage

2008-11-22T14:09:00.007-05:00

I think Violet is 16 pounds and around 26 inches long. I don't know what that is volume wise, she can't take up more than 2 square feet when stretched all the way out, but the addition of her to our family makes me long for a new house.

Shawn and I bought our little 1920's bungalow in 2006, before we were married, before my Dad died, before the housing bubble burst. That day in August when we signed our name a jillion times, making this old place ours, it seemed that there couldn't be a better house for us. We fell for the history of the house.

I like to think about the other babies who came home to this place, the other couples who cooked eggs here, even the geriatrics who holed up in the living room, watching Wheel of Fortune, until their adult kids decided it was time for a rest home. I love that Shawn gets as hot and bothered by virgin hardwoods and crumbly plaster walls as I do. I love that I live less that a mile from the house where I grew up, even though as a teenager I would have crapped had I known I'd end up settling down so close by. But, I love our neighborhood, all cracking sidewalks and giant trees and large front porches and brick public school buildings. I love our fireplace and the dark beams that run the length of my living room ceiling and the build in china cabinet in our dining room.

I do love this little house but, damn, I would love me walk-in closet, too.

My brother Andy and his wife Aly and their two kids just moved back to Indy after living in Evansville for the last several years. They bought a house in a neighborhood not far from us, but their home was built 40 years later than ours. It's amazing how architechture and neighborhood planning changed between 1920 and 1960. Our neighborhood is layed out in neat, geometric blocks, each house with a yard about as big as a postage stamp. Andy and Aly's hood, just two miles away, still very much in Indianapolis, is all winding lanes, quiet cul-de-sacs, and yards that require a riding mower. The square footage of their closets alone, and I am not kidding here, is probably equal to that of our entire house. Like us, they had to do some rehab when they moved in. Unlike us, when they take a break from a project, say, installing a new light fixture, there is actually a place to put their tools, out of sight, until they get back to complete the job.

I think the thing that really got me thinking about moving was the holidays. Not that my 2 year old nephew's walk-in closet hadn't intrigued me, but the upcoming influx of relatives from near and far makes me long for more space to accomodate them. As both Shawn's side and my side of the family have added members this year, it is getting increasingly difficult for us to squeeze everyone into our charming bungalow. With only two bedrooms, ours and a nursery, we don't have much of a place for houseguests. Shawn's parents stayed with us on Thanksgiving night and they were relegated to the pull out couch in the living room. His sister Elisha came down for the day with her husband and four kids but there really is no way we could have comfortably hosted them overnight. All told, once you add in Shawn's other sister Bridget and her husband Shane, there were 8 adults and 5 kids in our tiny house for Thanksgiving yesterday. The pic posted above is of Violet and her 4 cousins; Logan, Aleah, Ashley, and Alana.

It all worked out fine, actually,and no one complained, but I really would have liked it if,at the end of the day, everyone could have crashed here and not had to drive 3 hours to get back home. Don't get me wrong, I don't want a B&B, but a couple additional bedrooms, an extra bath, and some floor space for kid' sleeping bags would've sufficed. We're about to run into the same situation at Christmas as a lot of my aunts, uncles and cousins come in from Texas and Conneticut. Shawn and I won't be hosting any of the houseguests or get-togethers. Our place just isn't big enough.

So I'm wondering if 2009 will bring a new house for our family. We continue to discuss the pros and cons of moving. I am doubtful that we could find an affordable home in our current neighborhood that we wouldn't outgrow immediately. A vinyl wrapped house in an outlying suburb would offer us the most space for the least money, but neither Shawn nor I want a cookie cutter place devoid of character. Given the state of the economy, I am content staying put for the immediate future. After all, packing people in during the holidays is nothing new and, for the 3 humans and one canine who call this house home, we're pretty happily snug here.

Hoo, Hoo, Hoosiers!

2008-11-15T21:58:00.003-05:00

Today has been an Indiana fall Saturday if ever there was one. Shawn, Violet, and I got out of bed around 8am for pancakes and showers before a 10 o'clock meeting at St. Joan of Arc. We decided to go ahead and get Vi baptized in the Catholic church and we had a baptism prep meeting this morning. The church is only a handful of blocks from our house and on a nice day we would have walked but today was anything but nice. Chilly and rainy, it was definitely a day that makes us Midwesterners save our pennies in hopes of retiring somewhere without seasons.

Violet was sleepy before we even left the meeting, although she was a model baby the whole time, and she fell asleep quickly after we got home and nursed her. I had a couple of errands to run and when I got home from those, Vi was still sleeping. Shawn had "done his chores" while I was gone and was ready for a nap himself. So this afternoon all 3 of us enjoyed some daylight REM cycles and missed nothing more than a couple college football games and more rain.

When the sun set, (not that anyone really noticed it leaving as it was dark all day), we made a fire in the fireplace, ate chicken and dumplings, and drank a couple beers. Violet shit on her 1st outfit of the day which was a good reason to change her into her I.U. cheer leading outfit before the Cream and Crimson's 1t game of the season. After comparing her to the real I.U. cheer squad on TV, I've decided all cheerleaders should have fat rolls on their legs. Not only is it ADORABLE, it would make the post-partum alumnus feel better about the state of their own legs and thus more likely to donate to their alma mater.

I.U. won, I put Violet to bed, and now we're watching the news. How can these weekend days flip by so quickly? Ahhh, at least we still have Sunday.

VOTE

2008-11-04T12:54:00.004-05:00

Violet went to the polls today and helped me cast my ballot. My mom "Took the Day Off For Barack" to help with the campaign so I stayed home with Violet. We are going to walk over to the campaign office after lunch to see if they need any help from a lady and a baby. Not sure what we can do, but we'll do anything! One thing we can do is remind you all (does anyone really need reminding?) to get out there and VOTE!!!

This is a selfie taken outside our polling place. What a gorgeous Election Day!!