Today was a great day. I wasn't sure I was going to get one of them anytime this summer...but it came to us today. The morning was pure bliss, filled with playing and laughter and children occupying themselves without needing me to "camp counselor" them through the first few hours of the day. And then we went to the pool.

I let them fly today. I had to. There is no other way to survive at this point in my life when I have three children, two of whom are ready to go and one of whom is a freak who needs to be tracked and monitored every moment. So I let Erin and Meghan head off to the big pool, where I could watch them, and trusted that they would be okay. They had the most wonderful time, like all the other normal kids who don't have their moms hovering over them every single moment. They met other kids and played for hours, and Meghan even jumped in and let her whole head get wet. What a milestone for a child who doesn't like her ears to get wet in the shower to this day.

The downfall today was when Lizzy methodically made her way through the toddlers in the baby pool area and proceeded to hit them either on the head with her hand or with a hard, plastic toy that she hurled, with perfect aim, at each kid. I was mortified. I put her on a chair to sit, was firm in reprimanded her every time, but how in heaven's name do you discipline an eighteen-month old? I am pulling out my toddler-rearing books tonight to try to figure this one out, because this is a serious hitting problem that's emerging with her. It's not the first time she's hit, but I'm sitting there trying to make friends with these ladies, and here's my sweet, angelic child walking up to their kids and brutalizing them!

My biological clock starting to faintly tick-tock today, and it does this every time I have a great day with my kids. And even through baths and bedtime, all three of them were so delicious I was longing for a litter of them! I'm sure tomorrow will be rough and I'll be wishing for a voluntary hysterectomy simply because two in a row can't possibly happen. But oh how I would love to be pregnant again tonight.

I'm out of my mind. I know this.

Man Flu

It is real and simultaneously bullshit.

I am rarely ill. And if I am, it's usually because I need surgery of some sort (i.e., my gall bladder is kaput or I have a suspicious lump in a tata.) If I have a cold, I keep going. If I am pregnant and throwing my guts up for nine months, I keep going. I don't have a job that let's me phone in sick days. So...I (say it with me now) KEEP GOING.

All day yesterday I felt sick. Very, very tired. Upset stomach. Terrible headache. Felt like the flu. So what did I do? What any mother does with her three kids on a beautiful day...she throws her ailments in the garbage and takes the kids, with lunches, snacks, drinks, sunscreen and towels to the swim club and proceeds to chase them around for four hours in the hot, hot sun. Why? Because I had to in order to save the kids and myself from a day of misery.

Yes, there are many moms who don't have a swim club to go to and I'm not bitching because "Woe is me, I had to spend my day at the swim club." I'm saying here, that a Daddy who wasn't feeling well would probably call out sick from work and then get into bed for the day. He wouldn't take three kids to the swim club if those three kids were my kids' ages. He wouldn't even do it if he was feeling great.

So last night, I made dinner, got everyone to bed (he helped a bit) and crawled into bed at 8:30 pm. Unheard of! The baby was up a couple of times, I went in once and thought I would die, so the next time I asked him to go in and rock with her. He did, God love him.

I woke up at 5:15 am, got sick, went for a run, worked out, got a shower and continued to feel awful. And after I brought him his cup of coffee in bed (as I do every stinking morning) he says, "Did you get sick this morning?"

"Yep," I replied.

"Yeah, I thought so. I feel awful! Dizzy and nauseous...," he says.

Really? Just like that? You hear me puke, therefore, you feel pukey?

And this is why they call it the Man Flu. Because they're not really sick. They are just so petrified at the thought that the mom might need a day to sleep and puke, that they trump mom by playing the Man Flu card. So we both rallied today, and my rally included schlepping through Wegman's with three kids at 1:00 in the afternoon feeling like I could hurl at any given moment. Good times. Nothing like having to mentally meal plan when everything you look at makes you want to barf.

Ugh

I'm not sure what is up with my brain lately, but it's not been in its best place. I'm weepy and crabby and confused, generally, about where I've been and where I'm going from here. I guess it's just one of those crossroads I'm coming to, yet again, and my reaction is usually to get myself swirled up in a tornado of emotion and then eventually let the dust settle and move into whatever lies in front of me.

I have to acknowledge a piece of this distress that I've been denying for a couple of months. My friend is moving far, far away. And while it is silly to be distressed because we are women in our thirties and should not be effected by such things...this one is whooping my ass. I've included her in my blog time and time again, whether it be for her funny commentary, for being a part of most of my weekends, for being a fabulous photographer, or for just being my dear friend, so I know if you read, you know of her. As of this afternoon, her house is "Under Contract" and she is moving to Florida in three weeks.

We've been through this whole thing before. We moved to Maryland and didn't see her and her family often while we were there (the whopping 15 months that that relo lasted), but when we moved back, we moved into a house that literally looks at the back of their house. We can walk to and from, have the same park, can borrow eggs and share meatballs and gravy when we've made a larger-than-usual batch. (This happened countless times this past winter.) I really thought this is how we'd grow old...with us and our best friends a stone's throw away. (P.S. Her hubby and my hubby are best buds since grade school; he was the Best Man at our wedding...so you begin to see how deep the waters run.)

We've gone from being neighbors to not before, and it only strengthened our friendship. Distance doesn't change anything other than your geographic location, and I know I'm going to love having a reason to go to Florida for a visit. But I don't think she knows (until she reads this) how sad I really am to see them go. And it's not about not having the "comfort" of their family so close by...it's because I never had a sister, and always wanted one. And over the past fifteen years or so, she and I have slowly gotten to really know each other. She has become my sister. We are really different people, fundamentally. (A Virgo and a Gemini. Hello?) But we were always in the same point in our lives at roughly the same time, or what one went through, the other would get there at some point. She and her hubby were getting together around the same time as me and Pete. We each moved into apartments and out of apartments at the same time. They got engaged. We got engaged. We got married. They got married. Houses. Babies. Moves. Family implosions. Rotten gall bladders. We've sort of been through it all together. And my God, she was a rock for me when Elizabeth was sick. Despite the fact that my kids have always called her "Aunt," she has truly become an Aunt to her. She and Lizzy have a connection unlike most, and I know that Lizzy will find strength in their relationship for years to come. That means the world to me. After everything that 2007 brought us, it wasn't until we moved back to NJ and I truly understood how much the concept of home meant to me that I also understood how much that concept had her and her family bundled into it.

So I run the risk of making her really mad (because as sister-friends, we've gotten really good at bickering and sparring, too) by putting this out there. But it's how I feel. And I want her to know how much she'll be missed, how much I love her, and how I will be there for everything, even if I'm far, far away. They are going on such an exciting adventure, and I am thrilled for them. I remember how excited we were to start over and carve out a little place in the world that was all ours. I know they'll do the same...and I know they'll do better at it than we did. But good Lord. I will miss my friend so very much.

It's really, really early on Wednesday morning as I finish this post, and I'm off to exercise. I've managed to workout 6 days a week for the past three weeks, have stopped a whole bunch of destructive bad habits and am feeling pretty proud of myself for finally turning this ship around. I have taken stock of my shortcomings and am trying to improve upon them in realistic steps so I can finally be the person I want to be. We have a playdate scheduled today with the moms and kids at a play place since it's going to rain - AGAIN - so I am hopeful that this day will be a vast improvement over yesterday. Yesterday sucked.

But today is new and untouched. Off I go to better it from the git-go.

Helpful Hints for the Care of Toddler Teeth

Having three children teaches you a lot about various facets of human hygiene and care. I've learned that there's a lot of crap merchandise out there, purporting to do all sorts of fabulous things for your kids' health. Few of them live up to any of their hype. Amongst the crap are the various versions of toddler toothbrushes out there, my favorite of which is the bristled-finger-cot looking thing that seems much better suited for a good anal exam than an oral cleansing. With those thingamajigs, you, sticking your rubber-clad finger into the mouth of the beast, get bitten and accomplish absolutely no oral hygiene for your dirty-mouthed toddler anyway.

So I, being the "Good Mommy" (yeah, right) that I am, finally followed the ADA's recommendation and took Liz to the dentist at age 1. The first two didn't go that young. But this one did. The best thing that came out of it was this: they gave me an Oral-B toothbrush suitable for her age with an extra-long handle. Then, the dentist had me hold the baby on my lap, he sat knee to knee with me (frankly, too close for my own personal comfort, but it wasn't about me for once), and leaned the baby backwards so her head was in his lap and he was looking down at her upside down head. He brushed the bejeezus out of those teeth...and so I learned how to properly do it myself.

I now lie her down on her changing table "upside down" so that her head is where her feet would normally be and I can stand at the end of the changing table, rather than at the side. We sing something like "Itsy Bitsy Spider" a few times, and that, in combination with watching my silly face sing to her upside down, makes her laugh and open wide. Great brushing has finally been achieved on these toddler teeth.

It astonishes me that these tips are not readily available to the masses, as they are actually helpful and constructive, and do not require Mommy to be bitten even once. Happy brushing!

I took some pictures at the park the other day...a grey day (big surprise), but a day for swinging and climbing and sliding nonetheless. It wasn't raining, for a change, so off we went. I reveled in the beauty of my children, each accomplishing something huge, and I happened to have my camera to capture each achievement. What a world.


Meghan learned how to pump her legs on the swing for the first time. It's been a long time coming, but it finally just clicked. And away she soared.

Ms. Liz looking for trouble...trying to figure out which way to go on the jungle-gym, and whether or not I'd be there to catch her. She'd prefer that I not be there.


Being able to swing like a monkey on the monkey bars the "normal" way isn't enough for my Erin. She now wants to master skipping every other bar. This child is what you find in the dictionary when you look up "small and mighty."


Elizabeth figured out how to slide without holding my hand. She slid with such freedom...I couldn't help but wonder if she had been wishing for that freedom for weeks and I just had not been willing to let her go.



My girls often ask me, "Which Little Miss character am I?"
I would call this one Little Miss Monkey.

If you have a sensitive gag reflex, don't read this.

I, as any mother can say, am no stranger to poop. We discuss poop freely in our house. I am constantly asking the kids, "When was the last time you pooped?" And they answer me with honesty. I am also very in-tune with the baby's poop, probably because of all her digestive issues. As one doctor did say to me, "You can learn a lot about a person from their poop." All the validation for staring and analysis I need!

But I have to say this, even with all the poop I've seen, I just changed a diaper containing a poop deposit the likes of which I've never seen. It was so puzzling and confusing and I couldn't understand what I was looking at...so I took a picture of it.

I have decided not to post said picture. I think my blog will get tossed if I do.

This poop made me flip. It was Lizzy's. (Obviously, because she's the only one in a diaper.) It was totally normal except there was part that was seedy and bright neon green! I am not exaggerating. Neon green. Eeew. I was flipping out at the sight because I started giving her cow's milk on Monday upon the advice of the allergist we saw at CHOP. He scratch-tested her for a bunch of stuff and everything came up negative! Including milk. So there I am, feeling (again) like a completely insane person receiving another clean bill of health from another specialist about this child who is clearly healthy as a horse, but whom I still treat (at times, getting better) like a fragile doll.

So in an effort to trust the doctor and let go of my fear of making her sick, I came home and let her try some milk. No problem. No spitting up. No gas. No weird poops. All the stuff I had been waiting for didn't happen. But when this seedy, fluorescent nonsense emerged in her diaper this afternoon...well you can just imagine. I instantly thought it was the milk, blah blah blah. But the poop seemed too normal (other than the fluorescence of it, that is)...so I started trying to think about what else she's been eating.

Long story short...High School Musical 3 fruit snacks have neon green treats in them. (Yes, I let my 18-month-old eat fruit snacks. Go ahead and judge me.) And I am thinking that they are the nasty culprits and explanation for the freaky junk coming out of baby girl's trunk.

Ah, the mysteries of bodily function and fluid we mommies must solve. They never cease to entertain and amaze me.

What is the Cardinal Rule when you start sleeping through the night with your kids?

I'll tell you what it is:

DO NOT TALK ABOUT IT. DO NOT ACKNOWLEDGE IT. JUST TAKE IT.

Because what happens when you talk about it?

I'll tell you what happens:

IT STOPS! AND YOUR SLEEP GOES RIGHT OUT THE DOOR.

Liz has been sleeping twelve straight hours at night since we started her on her asthma medication. So a little more than two weeks. This is the first consecutive two weeks of sleep we've had in nearly eighteen months. As a result, I have been energized and able to work out every single day. Some days I've run, other days I've done yoga or a quick circuit training DVD. Regardless of the exercise, I have done something every day. So Pete, my dear, sweet husband says to me last night, "You are transforming! I can see such a difference in you!"

(Pause for, "Awwwww!")

"Yes," I respond, coyly, "it's great that I've been able to get back to exercising."

"The only question is," he proceeds to say, quite unnecessarily, "will you be able to do it when you don't get sleep at night."

I tried desperately to remove his words from the air as they dangled above us, and drifted into the baby's room, taunting her, daring her to sleep through the night. I told him he'd be sorry for saying such audacious words. He thought, silently, "No, YOU'LL be sorry, stupid."

She woke at 11 pm and didn't go back until 3 am. I hadn't gone to sleep when she woke. I didn't go to sleep until after she wore herself out. I don't know why she was up. The only logical explanation is the taunting, jinxing words the slid under the crack of her door and woke her ass up.

So as I'm sitting in her room with her, I begin to calculate what year it will be when she goes to Kindergarten. (Half-day, only, mind you.) And after numerous calculations, and re-calculations because the answer couldn't have possibly been correct, I arrived at the following conclusion:

It will be September (the year nearly over) of...

2013.

Almost 2014.

It's presently 2009. Half-way through 2009.

I have three hours of sleep under my belt.

And I have to go over to CHOP to take Lizzy to her allergist's appointment, with another kid with a bad attitude (i.e., Meghan) in tow.

Venti latte with an extra shot will be my only savior now.

For several years I've toyed with the idea of going back to school for Nursing. I actually had the pieces put into place in 2006, but we soon thereafter decided to move to Maryland, I got pregnant unexpectedly with Liz, yada, yada, yada. So I abandoned the notion at that time.

Then, after living in the NICU for ten weeks and getting a bird's eye view of what real nursing is all about, I started to think about it again. Lizzy came home on a nasogastric feeding tube that I had to put in place before we left the hospital. I checked its placement daily, administered her meds through it, just like I had watched the nurses do for weeks. And while I hated doing it for my baby, I loved it. I felt confident and interested and fed that I was so needed in a way I had never been needed before...and I was good at it. Don't get me wrong...I was ridiculously psyched to pull that tube out a month after she came home and to never have to put it back in. But the learning that went on as I watched and listened and waited, both in the NICU and at home with her, was exhilarating, unlike anything I'd known in college or law school. (Which is probably why I don't teach now and am not a lawyer. They just didn't do it for me.) And obviously, while Lizzy was so little and still pretty sick, me thinking about a career was out of the question.

But here we are, cruising out of baby mode yet again, and we know that's where we are going to stay. In perpetual forward motion. And with that motion come the realities of life with three children, and those realities are beginning to hit us upside the head..just feeding this group of us requires a pretty penny. And then you think about activities, sports, parties, them getting their drivers' licenses and needing wheels (*gulp*), wanting to pursue their higher educations...and then to top it off with three weddings. It's enough to make one sick to her stomach.

Which, by the way, it just has. Again.

So it's time for me to think about where I go from here...and with my husband's encouragement, I am looking at what do I want to do, rather than just do something because it's a quick band-aid style fix. With that thought in mind, I have arrived back on the nursing doorstep. As I have begun to research, I am quickly finding myself entrenched in the world of prerequisites and applications, weighing the options of going for my Associates degree (because it's cheaper) against trying to find scholarship money and get my B.S.N. There are so many components about which I must seriously think because doing this will require a sacrifice of my family time and the peace we enjoy now. But the more I think about it, the more sure I am becoming that this is the right course of action for me.

I have felt a little lost all these years, hoping to find answers in various places. My kids and my husband have been the only medium through which I've learned anything definitive. I've learned that I am patient. (Not always, but more than I used to be.) I have a lot of love to give. I communicate well. I love to take care of people and be needed. I've dealt with NG tubes and have removed intestinal worms from my child's backside without even gaging, much less barfing. I think I could handle this.

If any of you fab readers have any thoughts, insights, resources, etc. about this topic, please share them. I need all the help I can get with this one.

Crazy is...

...starting everyday with the thought that today will be the day that these last 15 pounds actually start to go away.

...trying to explain to a bare-bottomed seventeen-month-old sitting on a toilet that she can't have the toilet paper until after she's peed. An exercise in futility.

...thinking that the "dig for your own fossils" kit from Dollar Tree would be a great reward for your five-year-old, so much so that you encouraged her to pick it because of its coolness potential. Then she brings it home and begins to play with it, only to reveal that it is nothing more than an egg-shaped conglomeration of compressed vacuum dust with some plastic dinosaur-bone-looking-bits hidden inside.

I keep telling myself that I'm getting better at being a mother. Doesn't make it true.

There's no chocolate in my house. None.

Pete's away for three days, and I shouldn't complain because he really isn't away all that much anymore...and especially considering my sister-friend is basically a single mom right now Monday through Friday due to hubby's new job and impending relocation on the horizon, I have NO room to bitch.

But goddamn these kids are a lot to deal with 24/7 on my own.

I remember when Pete would travel for a couple days here or there and we had one or two kids and I'd get all weak in the knees. Not because I was overwhelmed but because I was so bored and lonely without him. Now my days go by so quickly, there seems no time to get anything done...other than surfing the Internet with mindless abandon and managing to post to my blog every so often. Right. Priorities.

Bedtime falls upon us again and I am solo...so I never know how long it will take. But the dishes are done, the coffee is set, baby is watching her Mickey video (yes, VHS...she's like a heroin junky in there), and the older ones are watching iCarly, which is undoubtedly teaching them something inappropriate. But the peace and quiet has given me a minute to blog, so I'm throwing caution, and my standards, to the wind.

I'm in the process of facelifting All That Mama Drama...stay tuned. I'm feeling all rammy and needing a change. So I'm taking it out on my blog instead of joining the circus this week. And that shows just what kind of gal I am...'cause I'll bet they ALWAYS have chocolate when you're in the circus.

It's Thursday morning, and to quote a wise bear: "Tut, tut, it looks like rain."

What to do today? I guess I'll be doing (finally) the old summer clothing switcheroo and pulling things together for the community yard sale on Saturday. Time to say good bye to my spare crib, exersaucer, bassinet, changing table, and bins and bins full of baby clothes. This act of purging scares me, of course, because the last time I did it, I got pregnant four seconds later with Elizabeth. But that can't happen to a person twice in one lifetime, right?

Don't comment with answers to that question.

The new Dave Matthews Band disk, Big Whiskey and the GrooGrux King was released yesterday and I'll say this much: it's ethereal and excellent, and it is transporting me to a place and time, long, long ago and far, far away when I fell (wicked hard) for Pete.

I was 17 years old, a senior in high school and Pete sent me a "tape" (Remember those? Our kids won't!) of Recently and Under the Table and Dreaming...and I listened to that tape over and over again in my smokin' hot VW Jetta. (A car over which I still pine.) Pete went to school in Vermont and I was finishing up high school in Jersey, gearing up for the big leagues of college and we were linked to each other, by both fate and this music. It is amazing how I can still hear any of their music from the past fifteen years and instantly be taken away to whatever was going on when those songs were gifted to us. We all have that...certain songs that just remind us of different places and times, some happy, some sad, some uncertain, friendships and loves. It just makes me happy to look back on the past fifteen years of me and Pete being together and know where we started, the bumps and turns we've taken together and where we are now. I love that my favorite music and my favorite person are all the same now as they were then. This band has truly written the soundtrack of our life together.

And their new disk is ridiculous. It's clear from listening that it has brought them back to center. Their old energy combined with their polished musicianship make for a beautiful finished product, and despite the loss of the late and great LeRoi Moore, they begin and end the record with him, and have paid beautiful homage to him by adding a horn section that is reminiscent of Genesis...without losing a bit of their originality. I cannot wait to see their energy on stage in September, when they have perfectly timed a visit to New Jersey in honor of my birthday.

Those sweet, sweet boys.

So I am energized by a new DMB release, and am looking forward to syncing up my iPod so I can have it on repeat in my smokin' hot minivan. From Jetta to Sienna, fifteen years with the love of my life, eight years of marriage, three kids, four houses...funny how as much as things have changed, there's a whole bunch of stuff that's stayed the same for us. I'm happy to hear in this disk that the same can be said for my favorite, favorite band under the sun.