LOST A SOCK

Of Parenting Decisions

So Kevin and I went Christmas shopping today, which is now technically yesterday because it is almost three a.m..  Go me. 

We decided that since we had babysitters held hostage willing to stay the entire day with our three kids, two of whom have snotty sinus and raspy chest colds, one of whom has an ear infection, and yet another who is plagued with a serious case of thrush that has overtaken her mouth, we should get everything done in one single day.  (Thank you, Sant and Leslie.)  We shopped from 7:30am until 10pm and holy crap, that was both awesome fun and terribly exhausting. 

But I have a dilemma. 

During our trip, we searched high and low for one of the toys KJ has been asking for: Lego Mars Mission Recon Dropship, 7692.  (My God I will remember that title forever.) 

Every store, high and low, never finding it or anything like it.  Of course, we bought him other things along the way, and because there seems to be a huge gap between the toy interests (price-wise, I mean) of a six year old versus a five year old, we spent much more on KJ this year than we did in any other year of his life thus far just to give him a handful of gifts (equal to the quantity of gifts received by his brother, is what I aimed for).  Granted, this amount is probably laughably small to some parents, but I don't believe in going overboard in what I spend on the kids, and I realize that everyone's "overboard" means something different. 

That being said, allow me to preface my question to you with just a smidge more information.  What the kid has really been talking about for months and months now, that he did not receive for his birthday and what he will not receive for Christmas, is the Lego Mars Mission Command Base, which retails for $90-100.  There is no way in hell I could, in my right mind, spend such an outrageous amount of money for something I'll be stepping on in all of it's 800-peice glory all over my living room at three o'clock in the morning.  Because I know that once he assembles it and then just as quickly takes it apart, some sort of mystical explosion will take place and parts and peices of all shapes, colors and sizes will systematically disburse themselves into every nook and cranny of my home.  So, no hundred dollar Lego set.  No way.

And so?  Possibly he has become happy to hope for the Recon Dropship.  It has become The Present.

So after we couldn't find the damn thing all day today, I figured I would order it online when I got home.  What could it cost?  Twenty bucks?  It's a box of Legos.

Oh wrong, mama.

Wrong, wrong, mama.  

Try spending what I consider a ton of cash on my kid today, willing to drop another twenty just for his Lego Mars Mission Happiness, only to learn that it costs almost forty bucks far and wide on the internet, even with missing peices on ebay.

So tell me...

poll by twiigs.com

And also just out of curiosity...

poll by twiigs.com

Edited to add:  Please understand that I actually don't believe this to be an Earth-shattering conundrum.  The economy is shit, there are hungry people in the world.  I'm more than aware that my kid's toy situation will be just fine, before you walk away from here wondering exactly what I'm on.  It seemed like blog fodder in the middle of the night, though, and now I'm leaving the entry up because I LOVE POLLS!  POLLS!  OMG!  EEEE!    Love Always, My Own Worst Critic

Weight Loss Wednesday: Gobble, Gobble, and one last Gobble.

Edited to add: Get ready to talk about food, food, food...again.  There is one time in my life that I eat, sleep and breathe food other than during pregnancy, and that is during a diet.  Only difference?  During one I can actually eat it, and the other I plan it out thoroughly to get the maximum bang for my buck.

Never in a million years did I think I would actively diet through the Thanksgiving holiday(s).  Even when I conducted my ginormous weight loss a couple years ago, I took whole weeks off through the holidays, sure that it was just too difficult to stay on at this time of year.

But now?  I sort of feel like I have no choice.  Not an article of my pre-pregnancy clothing fits, and is in fact a very long way off, and I've only purchased an extreme minimum to get me through until it does again. 

The good news is that the one pair of jeans that I'd been pouring my post-baby body into over the last couple months?  They're beginning to loosen!

This week’s loss: 3.0

Total loss: -12

Left to goal: 43.8

 

Even with one Thanksgiving dinner this past week, one full day out Christmas shopping with the girls over the weekend, and what is always somewhat of a stressful day spent at the children's hospital discussing Marin's upcoming surgery, I stuck to my guns and stayed with the diet. 

Okay, I blew it at that first Thanksgiving dinner. 

But I barely ate the entire day leading up to it, and then kept the dinner to one serving only, half of dessert.  Then I ordered something lite at Applebees during the girls' shopping trip, and even though it was late when I was finally picking up the boys after Marin's day of appointments, and I was starving for an entire herd of cattle, special sauce, lettuce, cheese on a sesame seed bun or the next best thing, I bought myself one lousy dry hamburger and a small fry on the way home, scarfed down five or six fries and swooshed all the rest onto the floor for the dog in a moment of over-dramatic I WILL LOSE THIS WEIGHT even though holy crap I would have liked to have eaten every last greasy salty little one of them, double the ketchup, and then run out for more.

There is no doubt in my mind, even when I have setbacks, even when I have stress, even when all kinds of tempting opportunities for chicken fingers, honey mustard and buttery garlic mashed potatoes arise in day-to-day life, that I have to keep my nose to the grindstone and make this happen. 

Now that being said, tomorrow is Thanksgiving.  I'll be taking that day off, or at least just dinner, as well as Sunday dinner for our last Thanksgiving in order to enjoy both my mom's and my mother-in-law's stuffingohmygod, marshmallowy sweet potatoes, broccoli cheesy ritz crackery casserole, green bean casserole, drool drool drool. 

It's really such a shame that I love food so much.  Otherwise I might be a string bean.

Of course, there are some diet-friendly favorites that I have bonded with over the years, and eat practically every day...

• Lean Cuisine Spinach & Mushroom Alfredo Pizza
• Quaker Peaches-n-Cream or Strawberry instant oatmeal
• Chex Mix bars, Turtle or Chocolate, mmmmm
• Chicken breasts marinated in fat-free Italian dressing, over baby spinach
• Breakfast-size pork chops on the grill (even in the cold!)
• Hershey's sticks
• Oscar Meyer lean ham on a sandwich, with crunchy Claussen pickles on the side
• Fat Free popcorn
• Coffee, black, adding happiness to my every day

I hope you all have a wonderful and delicious Thanksgiving!  There is so much to be thankful for this year.

Of Christmas and Indoor Temperatures and Kidney Removal. You know, all things completely related.

Or let's pretend them to be so, m'kay?

So I've come to several conclusions after last week's poll. 

One, I now love polls more than double frosted sugar cookies and should like to poll you more often.  Like every day.

Two, I will be wearing a sweatshirt at the majority of your homes (because I'm so sure you're going to invite me to stop by, across the United States and Canada), with twenty-eight percent of you running a constant temperature of 69-70 degrees.  That's what I kick the furnace down to on those rare winter occasions when we leave the house, just so it doesn't take very long to lose the chill when we arrive home.

Three, sixteen percent of you disturb me with your 66 or below.  Aren't you freezing?  In your living rooms?  Coat, hat and mittens, I tell you.

Four, I was surprised to see that We Warm People with our Cozy 74 only comprised eight percent of those who participated.  I'm all for saving money, but when it comes to the temperature of my house...heat is one thing I cannot cut back on.  Even if I knocked it down just a couple degrees, I'd probably only save a hundred dollars or so while shivering all month long.  And for that I'd rather do without a family dinner and a half at TGI Fridays or something.  Just my personal philosophy.  Wear your bermudas all year long here! 

This, my husband concluded, is why our (possibly always-warm) second child refuses to wear pants in the house.

 

My living room in real-time.  Jack pants-less, using the poor sleeping canine as his personal pillow, watching Polar Express for the nine millionth time while KJ is at school (and cannot veto the nine millionth viewing of Polar Express, see?)  

Also, hey look!  A Christmas tree!

I've apparently fallen into the category of Those People this year, who have Christmas decorations up before Thanksgiving.  To offer a different perspective, may I point out that Thanksgiving falls late this year, and I very much enjoy celebrating the Christmas season in anticipation rather than post-holiday, when all is finished.  My tree generally comes down immediately after we celebrate the New Year. 

 

Also, given our calendar this holiday season and the fact that we decided to put up two trees this year, a wide open Sunday was the best time to do it.  Now we can bake cookies, construct consume gingerbread houses, write letters to Santa, watch our collection of holiday movies and run off to various holiday celebrations all by the (non) twinkling lights of our trees.  Forget ye not the heat blazing from my fireplace, also.  Heh.

One thing we will not be doing this holiday season, thankfully, is going through Marin's kidney surgery.  (You liked that segue, didn't you?) 

I took her in for another renal scan yesterday, and to meet with her surgeon again.  Everything is still the same with her kidney (not that it could change) and he didn't feel too pressed in getting the operation underway.  I did hate the thought of putting her - all of us, through that just before Christmas.  He decided to put it off until January, then realized he'd be off giving a talk in Dubai for the middle part of that month (it's always something, right?), then pushed it into early February.  The tenth of that month, to be exact. 

The surgery will take three to four hours, he said, and reassured me that she won't be able to wake herself from anesthesia this time.  (Always a plus, yes?)  The most amazing part is that he is going to remove half of a kidney and a ureter via laparoscopy!  Three one-centimeter incisions in her back is all he should need to make, unless there is an issue with bleeding, in which he would then have to make a large cut in her side to stop the bleeding and finish the operation.  Thank God for amazing doctors and modern technology, I tell you.

Now all I have to do is make sure my little reflux baby holds down her daily antibiotic for a couple more months.  A task more daunting than kidney removal, I believe.

In the name of all things random

So now that winter is here, I have a question that is begging to be asked. 

I grew up in an older house, fairly typical for the south side of Chicago, with radiators for heat.  I remember coming in from playing in the snow and stripping back down to the last layer of clothing, putting all of our wet coats, hats, and gloves across the living room and dining room radiators to dry.  When it was cold in the house, I remember laying a blanket across the radiator and laying on top of it to warm up.  When I wanted to write on the winter ice that formed on the living room window most mornings?  I sat on the nice toasty radiator.  Both my younger brother and my younger sister split their heads open on those radiators and needed stitches, but that is neither here nor there.

The first house we purchased when we got married (that we very much still own, renters going strong, holla!) had forced air heat.  That was something very new to me, and I found that I was cold all the time that first winter.  Not that it had anything to do with the fact that both our non-existent insulation and our windows went back to, literally, 1904. 

So I ran the heat on 74 that first winter.

The second winter we realized that we should close the storm windows and cover the leaky front door.

The third winter we had KJ and finally put hair dryer plastics over the windows and ran the heat on 75.  Did I mention our furnace was twenty-five years old, too?

I was always so cold in that house.

Fast forward to this winter, 2008.  We live in a house that was built in 2004.  Our furnace and windows are four years old, and our walls have insulation (amazing what the human race has come up with over 100 years of house building).  I would like to tell you that it is because we have a new baby that I have kicked our heat up with the arrival of winter temperatures, but, eh, we carried the same constant temp last year.

74 during the day.

73 at night.

I hate being cold.  I can't stand the thought of a cold nose or toes, living in a sweatshirt and under blankets to keep warm inside the house.  So I keep it what I've been told is fairly-tropical in here. 

My parents, my in-laws and most everyone else I know runs their heat lower than we do, and even our doctor's office suggests we keep the heat at 68 or higher.  Sixty-eight, really?  Often times when we have visitors who have, ahem, visted in the past, they wear short sleeves - sometimes even pointing out that they are intentionally wearing short sleeves because our house is so warm.  (Not that I'm offended.  I'm completely secure in my heating needs, thank you.) 

Recently I wondered if I really should kick it down a bit, with the conversations out of curiosity I've been having with people lately.  So I set our heat on 70 before I went to bed.  And when I got up the next morning, pulling back my double blankets, I went downstairs to find my six-year-old watching television on the couch.  Wearing his winter coat. 

So I just need to know...

poll by twiigs.com

Weight Loss Wednesday: Grumble, Grumble.

Be forewarned:  I had three hours of sleep last night.  And had to run errands this morning with numbers two and three.

I practically counted down the minutes until post-lunch naptime today, dying for it to finally arrive.  You see, I encountered a surge of spastic yesterday, which caused me to clean all three floors of my house, top to bottom, stripping beds, doing regular laundry and washing every blanket in the house just for giggles with a hop skip and a jump, taking down all fall decorations (we have snow! who can have porcelain pumpkins sitting around with snow on the ground, I ask you?) and taking inventory of The Christmas Storage.  Then once the kids were asleep I decided to talk on the phone with my gal-pal until nearly midnight, waiting for Kevin to arrive home from work.  At which time Marin woke for a feeding and refused to go back to sleep.  Twice. 

Sigh.

So I was tired.  And when naptime did finally roll around this afternoon, after settling Marin into her swing, putting Jack down with seven stories, three drinks and two head stands with a twist, and cleaning up KJ's massive bloodspill of a second lost tooth, Jack would have no part of a nap, screaming, growling and writhing, gnashing teeth at his bedroom door because not only does he refuse to wear pants at any moment of day or night, but now that winter has arrived, he doesn't want socks either. (Of course he doesn't.)  And he needed to place them in the bathroom laundry basket BEFORE HE COULD REST, bring on the temper explosion. 

"Leave them on the floor!" I instructed several times, half-conscious, head pounding from my first three minutes of slumber on the couch.

Six minutes later I woke up to intense pounding of a different kind, of a two-year-old on his bedroom door because those socks?  OHHHH THOSE SOCKS.  There would be NO! NAP! until those damn socks were safely in the hamper where there was NO POSSIBILITY of making it back onto his feet.

I dragged my dead self up the stairs, sent him with the God-forsaken socks into the bathroom, retreived him from playing in the sink, changed his third! poop diaper of the day and tucked him tightly back into bed.  Tightly.

Cue Marin. 

Nap no more.

This week’s loss: 2.2

Total loss: 9.2

Left to goal: 46.8

 

Eh.

 

The best thing I can say about this week is that I sacrificed.  And it worked. 

 

While I did treat myself to Gino's East deep dish sausage-mushroom-onion bliss last Friday night, I also sacrificed even a morsel of Key West Lime Pie when we had friends over for dinner on Saturday night, and gnawed on a damn Special K Bar on Sunday at a table where my entire family enjoyed my father's birthday cake, the tallest chocolate chiffon you've ever seen, Moose Tracks ice cream on the side.  My husband discussed its goodness with every single bite.

 

Ded

 

i

 

ca

 

tion.

 

I've been really hungry this week but I've continued pushing forward, staying within WW points because I know that the start of our THREE Thanksgiving dinners is just around the corner.  I have yet to come up with some plan of attack for those three parties, other than It Happens Just Once Thrice A Year, Dig In.  What would you suggest?  (Tell me to bring a Turkey Lean Cuisine to any one of my dinners and I WILL HUNT YOU DOWN.)  (So really I mean to ask, don't you agree that Thanksgiving is NOT THE TIME TO DIET, LET THE STUFFING CONSUMPTION RAMPAGE BEGIN?) 

 

 

I would neither wear clothing nor eat stuffing to save my little soul.  Happy sleeping, happy dieting, mom.

 

Also, don't you love it when she's crabby? 

In which I attempt Christmas Pictures.

Once upon a time in 2006 I decided to take pictures of my, then, two children playing with Christmas ornaments. 

Every now and then I stumble across one of those pictures and sigh, and think about eating delicious baby Jack on the spot, right out of the photograph.

My God they were cute at ages four and ten months old, and so sweet,

so sweet and sweet and sweet MUNCH MUNCH NOM NOM NOM.

So coming across these pictures, as I was saying, gave me a splendid (where splendid equals somewhat foolish, as you can imagine) idea.  Every year in late November Kevin and I and the kids fight the mall crowds and spend hours of, ahem, family fun having our pictures taken at the Picture People.  This year, I thought, having threeee young children, maybe I should orchestrate my own Christmas photo shoot for our cards, and then we can take care of actual family pictures in January when noooo one is having pictures taken. 

Avoid the lines, avoid the crowds, avoid the wait, avoid the hysterical bored tired hungry aggravated husband children.

This sounds brilliant out the gate, yes? 

 

Offffffffffffffffffffffff course it does. 

Actually, it didn't start out too bad.  A little red and green, a large white sheet, toss a few Christmas decorations on the floor and squeak at your two month old and hot diggity, we're off.  She IS so damn cute, isn't she!?

 

And now at six years old, KJ does pretty well too.

  

Bribe him with Skittles and those icy blue eyes are good to go.  What?  Another smile as a trade for two reds and a yellow?  Noooo problem.  He'd look at the camera all afternoon if I'd let him eat the whole one pound bag, one little bribe at a time. 

(A note to my new-ish mom readers: Take no cues from my parenting skills.  Go towards the light.)

 

I wanted one of the two brothers together, except for where one kept his eyes closed and the other attempted second loose tooth removal at that moment.  

Think, think, think...

 

KJ! CANDY!

See?

  

Wait.

Shit.

No tackling.

 

Good enough.  I'll take it.

Now if you'll agree, I would like to propose the theory (as evidenced here, as well as in many, many awful pictures of KJ from years previous) that something happens to a boy when he approaches the age of three, and even four years old.

  

He becomes obstinant, and cranky,

and altogether impossible to photograph...

unless he is taking part in The Somewhat Ridiculous.  

 

Boys of (almost) three are heavily into Their Own Thing, and usually not so much with Mom's Plan To Avoid A Frustrating Mall Photo Session.

Holding baby sisters for Christmas pictures?  Not.  So.  Much.

  

One is bored, one is frightened, one is hamming it up for the camera the Skittles.

  

Oh God just one full set of smiles?  Please?

Hmm Yeah No.

Okay, instead of smiling, everybody just look at your...

 

...sister...

  

Merry Not-Quite Christmas from the Lost A Sock Family.

And I'm spent. 

Ten, or something like it.

Sure sign that I am a parent of multiple children?  I attempt to title a blog entry with the number of weeks old my baby daughter is and have no idea how many weeks old my daughter is.  Score!

Somewhere in our second month, I am sure. 

Hee.

I think it is finally safe to say at nine? ten? eleven? weeks postpardum, that everything around here is back to normal after baby carrying, delivering and recovery. 

I am mildly obsessed with a comfortably clean house again, cooking healthy meals, bathing children regularly, even reading from time to time, grocery shopping and getting out of the house for sport, always with three yahoos in tow, not losing my mind so much anymore.  I've also gotten my first week of WW under my belt, which means I can stand on my own two feet enough to not look to good old Chips Ahoy for comfort, and I've been thinking about painting rooms again.  Hot damn it feels good.

And I hate to admit this, but after three kids, I think I really suck at pregnancy.

Feeling my usual spunk and energy return, it has become abundantly clear that pregnancy makes me so tired, so whiny, ultra moody and mildly depressed.  Now don't get me wrong - I am unbelievably grateful that my body has carried my three beautiful babies, and without that I would neither be who I am nor so damn happy.  It's just that I spent nine months this year trying to not crash and burn, and then two months crashing and burning, and now?  I realize that it wasn't me just being whiny and awful (well, it was...)  It had to have been my hormones going bonkers.

(And this is where the world wide web sighs in utter disbelief of my universe altering discovery: Pregnancy Makes Women Moody! Tired! Emotional! And at times Down Right Miserable!  Holy Shit!  Somebody call Ted Koppel, I think she's on to something!)

I think one of the biggest positive changes has been our reintroduction to routine.  Don't you feel like you function best when your daily life is fairly predictable?  As of the last week Marin is down to taking two feedings during the night and, knock on wood, going back to sleep when she finishes.  Usually she's finishing up her second feeding around 4am, when Kevin gets up for work.  We say hi and head back to bed until six or seven, when the boys get up.  Then I kick it into high gear as I feed and dress the three kids, give the baby her meds, add a bra and crocs to whatever I slept in the night before and load everyone up to drive KJ to school.  If Marin decides to not scream the entire way there, I sometimes drive around town for ten minutes just to BE OUT.  Then we return home in time to plop Marin in her swing for a morning nap, for Jack to veg out with his gal-pal Dora, and for me to handle laundry, dishes, banking, picking up and sometimes blawwwwgs.  In there I get one-on-one time with Jack, breakfast and the occasional shower.  KJ comes home on the bus around noon, wakes the baby if Jack hasn't by now, we do some form of mildly chaotic lunch preparation while feeding the starving baby and prying children off each other depending on exactly how many Lego creations Jack managed to disassemble while KJ was at school.  By two Jack goes down for a nap, I do more house crap and spend one-on-one time with KJ, get Marin back to happy dreamland in her swing, and occasionally sneak in thirty minutes of couch time to read, nap or catch part of a previously recorded Oprah while KJ has some computer or Wii time.  Make dinner, clean up from dinner, homework, baths, pajamas, read stories, tell stories, prayers.  Fifty-three drinks of water with and without ice, both crushed and cubed, back rubs, back scratches, excuses, whining, lights out.  Eventually get the baby to sleep, clean up, dishes, bottles, internet, crash on couch, Kevin home at 10:30, say hi, bed around 11.  Sporadically insert fifteen hundred infant and toddler diaper changes, baby feedings, baby spit-ups, kid snacks, nose wipes, loads of laundry and long periods of high pitched uber-happy speaking, singing, bouncing and rocking.

I'm sorry.  I got on a roll and couldn't stop.

My point?  Predictable.  I like predictable.

 

I love watching him watch Dora, 

and witnessing his excitement when Thomas began talking in all of his computer-animated glory.

I love watching her grow, now stretching to the length of this surface that practically swallowed her whole just a couple months ago.

I love seeing her facial features change, her responses to people and toys change, and her personality begin to surface. 

And in no time flat KJ will be home from school, bringing with him a plethora of fresh energy, ready to tell me bits and pieces from his day at school, ready to know what's on the agenda for the afternoon - today an afternoon playdate if I ever stop typing and get in the shower. 

It's so good to be back to normal.

Weight Loss Wednesday: Running Start

This was my first week of many dieting weeks, I will assume.  And if there is one thing I know about beginning a diet, after having lost almost a hundred pounds once upon a pre-Marin time, it's that when you start a diet, the very first week?  You need to do it in the most ass kicking way possible.  And so I did.

This week’s loss: 7

Left to goal: 49

Yippee!

(Disclaimer: I'm going to write this entry, chock-full of ass-vice like I know what I'm talking about (because I do, if experience means anything) and with lots of My Dieting Style information, because I received quite a few comments and emails after last week's entry, asking what my specific plan is.)

As I did the last time I lost a substantial amount of weight, I am using the Weight Watchers points system.  It is the most long-term useable plan, in my opinion, and it applies to real, everyday, every-situation life.  And just as I did before, I am doing it on my own at home using the Weight Watchers materials I have from the first time I tried the program eight years ago.  No internet tools, no meetings - just me and my honesty and my scale.

I gave myself a higher-than-usual amount of points this week and then tapered myself down as the days passed.  It is way too hard to begin a diet by starving yourself to death, and I refuse to do that.  Diets aren't about punishing oneself for all of the bad things you've eaten or lack of exercise -- they are a way to GIVE yourself something wonderful -- your health, back.  And so it's important to be kind to yourself. 

I also allowed myself one night off this week, on Saturday, when I went out for girls' night out (and ate the hell out of a giant Turkey Pesto Ciabatta with cheese bacon, french fries and a dish of apple cobbler, without an ounce of guilt, if I may say so.)  And I didn't do any type of formal exercise - that will most certainly come in time.  I did take my kids to the zoo one day, and big grocery shopped another. 

And I still lost seven pounds.

Last week I talked about all of the "mental stuff" that went along with my weight loss in 06-07, and I think that is the biggest thing that comes into play for me.  I approached this first dieting week knowing that I was ready to take on the challenge, believing that I deserve to return to my healthy weight, and fully convinced that I have everything it takes to be disciplined enough to lose all fifty-six pounds over the long haul, no matter how long it takes.  And believing in myself and really, truly, deep-down loving myself, is everything.  It is how I diet, it is how I parent, it is how I achieve most anything I set my mind to.  As far as I am concerned, my every success is based upon exactly that.

This week I will get a little closer to hitting in my daily points range, and I will choose one day or a part of a day that I will eat whatever I want, to both keep up my spirits and give my metabolism a swift kick.  I know the toughest part is when I leave the house and cannot cook for myself, but all I can do is try.  Really, will there ever be a time when I don't leave my house for a while and can just diet without the lure of restaurant food and (three!) upcoming Thanksgiving celebrations?  Oh, right.  January, February, March.  Blech.

Until then, I'm taking it one day, one meal, one step at a time, losing what I can, maintaining where I have to.  Shooting for another good week. 

If you happen to be dieting too, at this crazy time of year, please feel free to check in here.  It's always more fun with friends!

Oh Fall

Our weather forecast calls for a high of forty degrees today.  Yesterday we experienced a rainy-sleety combination falling from the clouds.  The colorful leaves have fallen, almost completely, from the trees now.  I think my very most favorite time of the year is coming to a close, thankfully only to be followed by my second favorite time of year (Christmas!) 

Here are some of my favorites from this fall, and one little blast from the past.  Enjoy!

Tall trees & yellow leaves

 

There is seriously nothing like this time of year.

  

  

An oldie from 2006.  I could eat them up!

But, hmm, someone's missing...

Much better, thankyouverymuch!

Dare I say this picture makes me want a few more?  Maybe three?  Four more?

 

Our last warm fall day at the zoo.

Playing with our buddies, Marky and Connor.

Whoosh!

 

There's something so different and so beautiful about fall shadows.

 

Until next year...

Also, I'm attempting to finally update flickr in my sidebar with the two months of pictures I'm behind.  Now that it's almost Thanksgiving and my daughter is two months old, it would be nice to look at something other than swimming pool shots and my big baby belly, eh?

The Return of Weight Loss Wednesday (posted on Thursday, no less)

You love long stories, don't you? 

Heh.

If you've been reading me for a long while - as in, almost three years long while, you'll remember that I began a diet journey way back then.  And I call it a journey not only because it's been going on (and off) for almost three long years now, but because in order for the actual diet, the weight loss, to happen, I had to take a personal journey myself. 

Just like with everything else I have learned, being overweight -- along with judging others, having too much debt, spoiling one's children, talking down to people or flaunting your material possessions is all about something deeper.  Usually it has to do with filling a void, covering for insecurities, and not realizing that your skin, your career, your clothes and your popularity?  Are not what life is all about, and will never make you happy no matter what size you wear or how much money you make.  We all have our demons, of course.  But it isn't until you boldly look them in the face and choose to address them every single day, that you can heal what lies beneath and begin living a richer and happier life than you ever could have imagined.  (And God I know how corny that sounds at the surface, but I swear to you I am living proof.) 

I had no idea about any of this when I began dieting a few years back.  I thought I was overweight because I ate too much and exercised too little, and maybe something with my genetic make-up.  I figured I would drop a pants size and physically feel a little better until I would diet again in a few months.  I was responding to life as it hit me, and had no idea that I could really take control and responsibility.  I didn't even comprehend the baggage I was carrying at that time, much less stare it in the face, but boy was I about to learn. 

Thankfully most things in life are a slow process, given to us in that way so that we can be ready for each new step.  And what an incredible process I have been since I took my initial weight loss step several years ago.  I immediately ran into The Secret and the power of positive thinking, and over months and years really began learning about purpose, spirit and the power of my choices from inspirational teachers such as Tony Robbins, Wayne Dyer, The Dalai Lama, Louise Hay, Martha Beck and every other Change Your Life, Heal Your Life, Control Your Life, Love Your Life book, podcast and video I could get my hands on. 

I'm a Head Stuff guru, though I choose to discuss it so very little.  And who knew that it would result all from my long-ago break up with Ronald McDonald?  Though you're about to see, oooh boy, that we're an on-again off-again couple, my bright red-haired painted-face boyfriend and I.

 

February 2006, Jackson's baptism.  Boy howdy I don't know what I'm in for.

  

April 2006, Breain & Luke's wedding.  I had dropped my twenty pounds and was feeling good.  Honest to God, I actually considered quitting at this point.  I had been fat my entire adult life and this?  Was fine with me.  But I decided to continue as long as the momentum was good.   

 

July 4th, 2006.  Momentum going strong as my sister and I took the world our asses on by storm, together. 

 

November 2006, still going.  Not that there haven't been setbacks and even broken bones from falling off the wagon.  The holiday months are the most difficult time to diet through, which is why I normally just try to maintain my weight.  Except for this year, of course, given that the only thing I've been able to maintain since Marin's birth two months ago is my love affair with cookie dough.

 

February 2007, a little silly, but somehow balanced out the holiday cookie stash for the first time ever.  By this point my momentum was incredible and I was damn-near ready to take on anything that crossed my path.  We were preparing to sell our house and so happy together as a family.  On a roll, for sure.

 

April 2007, my girlfriend Mary's wedding.  I had lost 87 pounds by this point, and was feeling fantastic.  I still had fifteen or so pounds to go, and was more myself, both inside and out, than at any other time in my life. 

 

October 2007, highest lowest point at a 92 pound loss.  This picture is blurry and silly and nonsensical, but one of my favorite weight loss pictures.  I looked good, I was happy and I had both the energy and strength to toss my five-year-old up over my shoulder to spin him in circles.  I was exactly the kind of mom that I wanted to be. 

February 2008, dun dun duuuuunnnnnn.  Surprise!  I had learned of my pregnancy just a month prior, and will save you the retelling of the story of stress and struggle that was 2008 up until recently.

    
But it left me here in September of 2008, carrying a healthy baby as well as 2,101,786 chocolate chip cookies and more than fifty extra pounds.  Without all of the extra weight I was able to have my first healthy pregnancy, and carry a baby closer to term than I had with either of my preemie boys.  My hormones threw me for a loop afterwards, and I had no idea that adjusting to being a mother of three would be, well, an adjustment.

 

But I'm here.  I tried to skimp on my recovery time, blaming myself for hormonal meltdowns and such, but now two months and one day after giving birth to my third child, I feel strong and ready for my next challenge.  I am finally going to finish losing the weight.   

Except when I was fifteen pounds from the finish line at this time one year ago?  I am now fifty six pounds away, post-baby.

I have learned so much in the last three years, and I can't feel anything but excited for what's in front of me - a great challenge, a healthy body, and a new me, all over again.  For that reason, I've decided to document the ups and downs in regular Wednesday installments again, I'm sorry to say, more for me than for you.  Some day I will look back at all of these entries, remembering what it took to get wherever I had gotten, and say...something really inspiring...I hope.

Rock Obama

I've not discussed the election here, up to this point, for a couple reasons.  One, I maintain this website for the sole purpose of documenting our life as a growing, learning, fun-loving family, and to put all of my pictures somewhere beyond C-Drive Land.  Two, I have no interest in debating anything with anyone here.  I get enough of that at home, debating Corn Pops or Cheerios, pants or bare toddler thighs, and the pros and cons of brushing both hair and teeth before school.  Here?  I enjoy peace.  And last but not least, holy shit, I have NO TIME to write anything that requires an actual thought process at this point in my life.

That being said, here I go documenting the election in the way that it applies to a six and two year old, an almost two month old, and a mother sometimes found teetering on the edge of her sanity.

At our house we've been learning all about voting, the election, our country and the president.  Above is Jackson's picture of, as he says, Rock Obama.  

Rock Obama and Jon and Kate Plus Eight.

I don't get the connection either.

 

And here my six-year-old, KJ, has illustrated for us a meeting of the minds:  He and Barack Obama eating cookies together while Air Force One pulls a fly-by.  (Duck, Obama, Duck!)

 

We decorated our kitchen and living room in preparation for both the election and for our Uber-Fun Election Party, which is coming up this evening.  It shall involve CNN, a few of our famous pals, and a fine time of eating every high-calorie, high-fat, high-fun treat from within my fridge and cabinets before I begin my post-baby diet tomorrow morning.   

This and more to make reparations for the stunt my husband pulled at our 2000 wedding, mere days before voters put the current fool into office:

 

How'd you like THAT burned into your Book O' Love forever, eh?

So this afternoon following no less than a ninety minute mildly-chaotic pediatrician visit for three, shots and all, pukey baby, no-nap toddler, we stopped at our local polling place so that I could speak up and say MY GOD I NEED CHAAAAAANGE.  (Nannies for all!)

Ahem.

I had built up so much excitement with the boys about the entire process that I couldn't wait to get them there, three hours of sleep be damned, to receive their "I Voted" stickers (which turned out to be "Vote for So-and-So" breath mints stapled to a bright orange business card.)  We first walked into the wrong precinct room, where I was sternly admonished for wearing a white t-shirt that read "VOTE NOW" in plain black lettering.  The elections facilitator, with eyebrows tightly furled, pointed my children and I towards the nearest bathroom demanding that I immediately turn my t-shirt inside out (you know, lest I convince someone in the POLLING PLACE...to VOTE...sooner than later...for no one in particular.) 

We ran from that room towards the correct room, zipping past the bathroom while hoping to avoid any further elections wardrobe officials, where we joined a line that wasn't terribly long.  And that is the best thing I can say about our wait, since my two-year-old took it upon himself fall on the floor three times, lose a gym shoe, take off to be chased down twice, and finally to slap his gigantic doctor-gifted Snow White sticker onto the ass of the woman in front of us. 

(Seriously, what do you do in that scenario with Doc, Grumpy, Snoozy, Sleepy, Crabby, Cranky and Bashful, and a Flushed Cheeked Snow White, stuck to the ass of some stranger's black dress slacks, courtesy of your kid?  I yanked it off as fast as humanly possible as she spun around, shocked, wondering why the woman in the terribly convincing VOTE NOW t-shirt was grabbing at her butt.  And if she wasn't in that line to VOTE NOW before, she sure as hell was now.  Nannies for all, I bet she thought, so that four years from now I could LEAVE MY DAMN KIDS AT HOME.)

I like hands-on education.  What can I say?  I just don't have my husband convinced as of yet that it really might be great for me to homeschool.  But I digress...

 

You red-eyed nap-boycotting little booger, all I wanted was for you to experience the pressing of the big red button, casting our ballot.  A memorable election indeed.

Happy voting! 

Whoaaaah.

Eventful weekend, in photo review:

 

Halloween! 

(I have no idea why both Kevin and I are stooping down in this picture.  Possibly we believe we are 6'4 and 5'7 and tower over our children.  Oh wait.  Mystery solved.) 

We had Optimus Prime the Transformer, Thomas the Tank Engine, and Marin the sleeping infant in her car seat (though not without adorable Halloween shirt and bib, so as not to appear lost for the day.)

(Hot dog, the parenthesis!)

  

And for as much debating I did this halloween month over whether to allow my boys, for the first time, to don the As Seen On TV costumes they were dying to wear, I was amazed to walk into KJ's school Halloween Party to find almost every other boy in the kindergarten classroom wearing similar costumes, be it another Transformer or a Star Wars Storm Trooper.

Which made me realize that, heh, Halloween is about kids having fun and dressing up as whatever is fun to them for the moment.  Mother guilt for this one?  Gone.

Also, duh.

 

We also celebrated Marin Ann's baptism this weekend.

  

Parents and Godparents,

 

grandparents,

some of our closest friends,

and our little family.

We kept things small and simple, given everything that has been going on with Marin, and it was a nice day.

 

Marin was baptized in the same Christening gown as KJ and Jack, the same as my sister and I, and our brothers and all of our cousins.  It was made from my gramma's wedding gown and is now sixty years old.  I LOVE that we've carried on this tradition, and that my gramma was with us in this small way today.

 

Later in the day Marin recieved her very first princess dress, from her Godmother, and EEEEEE the excitement over that as well!

 

Seriously.  

 

And last but not least, KJ lost his first tooth!  (I so hate when bloggers post pictures of their children's teeth, but alas, I am a proud mother and I conform. Ha!) 

With an upcoming week full of voting (VOTING! EEEEE!), doctor visits, post-baby diet starting line and a planned first trip to the zoo, just the three kids and I, I'll be back, hopefully soon, with another post just like this, swap out the pictures.  Three, more, commas, for, effect.