Today's highlights...
I haven't had any coffee yet today, not to mention a shower. Ari finally is down for his nap, 2 hours late (postnote: which lasted 40 minutes). The dishwasher is still full from last night's wash. Today's dishes are piled by the sink. Our cooking utensils are strewn on the floor and tucked into various corners throughout the kitchen...Ari's hiding spots. A box of colored pencils has exploded, compliments of Ari, all over the office and the contents of the trash can have been "categorized" on the floor next to the desk. The house smells like a deep fryer from last night's Hannakuh latkes and every window is open. I have a Cheerio stuck to my sock, black handprints on my sweatshirt...and something sticky in my hair. I think it's applesauce.
It's 3:14 p.m.
I'm not sure where things went wrong today. Perhaps it was the lack of early a.m. caffeine or perhaps it was the doughnut (oh scurge of the breakfast world) I ate at the Saturn dealership instead of breakfast. Maybe it was due to stopping at the beach on the way home to see the record winter waves...which threw off our schedule and let Ari get a 20 minute snooze in before his official naptime.
Or maybe it's just Wednesday.
Tired momma that I am, I was going to crash myself after the bugger went down. But I decided to brew a pot (for which I will certainly be up until 2 am) and get some words out instead. Sometimes, when you're drained beyond words...words are what you need to regain your energy. Some of you out there will get that. High five to the writers in the crowd.
Which brings me back to my chosen subject today. Parenting. I am such a novice. Sascha and I are finding that we must actually parent now. It's a verb, parenting. Discipline. Leading by example. Being firm. Trying not to actually yell "stop" at the top of your lungs (at which I failed today). For the first year, our primary job was to keep him alive and try to avoid an attachment disorder that could possibly land him in prison one day. Now, it's pro-active stuff. And he knows how to communicate "no" and use his legs to run away. Exhausting.
Sometimes my breath is knocked out of me when I consider the enormity of the commitment we've made here. I mean, this is forever. This is life. This is another human being with a personality and preferences all his own, dependent upon me 24/7 to care for him and lead the way and make sure he eats his vegetables (which he doesn't). I mentioned this "breath-knocked-out-of-me" phenomena to a dear friend the other day. She has two kids and knows all too well what I'm talking about. She replied to my wonder with, "Yeah, I try not to think about it."
Good choice.
I don't know. Frequently I feel that I'm in over my head (to our dear parents: this is not a call for help, I'm not losing it, it's just random musing). And I know almost every other new parent feels the same way. For example, today I learned that we have a biter on our hands. Lately, if I don't pick up the cat bowls first thing in the morning, Ari's sees fit to quickly and surrepticiously eat any leftover kibble. So, when I see this happen, I go swooping in with the old Mommy Index Finger to rid his baby mouth of said kibble. He HATES this. Gets so mad. Today, he bit back. Just clamped right down on my finger, hard. Then, after I pried my finger out of his mouth, he clamped down on my hand. I still have the mark from that one. What the...? From whom did he learn this??
So. How does one handle this? After an incredibly firm-yellish "no bite" from me, he walked about 4 feet away and hung onto the scratching post (notice a cat theme here) while I stared long and hard at him. Silently. We sat like that for about a minute. Me staring with displeasure. Him whimpering, stepping back and forth over the scratching post and glancing at me every once in a while. Then he started walking towards me...then apparently thought better of it and circled back around to his standoff position. After a moment, he plastered a huge grin on his face and walked over to me with his arms out in hug position. Like Jesus, welcoming a wayward lamb to his fold. I don't know if he was asking for forgiveness or giving it. Still not sure.
So this has been our day. Oy. And I didn't even mention the epic tantrums he's been perfecting. Although I hear from friends that that's pretty normal as well. Ah. One year old. And I thought it was "The Terrible Twos".
I guess that's about it for now. Sascha's home. And I'm taking a Moment for Sanity's Sake to finish my coffee and this blog before we head out for dinner. Yes, I've boycotted cooking tonight. Mom needs a burger and a beer. Let's just see Ari throw Red Robin's macaroni and cheese on the floor for a change. Luckily, he's cute.
Sticky-haired mom, out.
Showing posts with label ari antics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ari antics. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Friday, September 14, 2007
giddyup
Ari's newest thing...playing 'horsey'. If I'm playing on the floor with him, he'll walk around to my back, grab onto my shoulders and pull himself up. Then we'll "gallop" around the house. The horsey gets tired pretty quickly (try this...hold an 18 lb sack of flour on your back...one that wiggles....and then do a little halting trot/run...in circles...for 10 minutes). He also likes to look at himself in the mirror while he's on my back (hence the picture taken in the mirror). I woke up with a weird backache yesterday morning but couldn't figure out why. It hit me later today when I was being "horsey" again. Yes, it's tiring. But it's also awfully cute.
Other new things he's up to (to make up for my self-involved rant yesterday): Standing on his own (not standing UP on his own yet). Walking up to three steps alone. Eating with a fork (loves the fork). Eating from my plate appears to be more fun for him, too. I swear he said "mama" twice yesterday. "Draws" with a pencil on paper...did this on his own without any prompting from me. Is communicating a lot more clearly with us - or maybe we're just getting better at understanding - he tells us when he's done with something, when he wants something, when he's happy that we've done the thing he wants, when he wants to go outside to play...can't remember much else and this list is probably getting a little dull for some of you (grin).
I'll write an update at the end of this weekend. It's Ari's first birthday Sunday and we're going to a Padres game. Should make for an interesting weekend.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Food and Boo Boos
Monday, 8/27/07 (I'm a day behind on posting this)
We’ve had a productive morning over here. In an attempt to acclimate Ari to the fun of feeding himself, I decided to throw caution to the wind, strip him down and let him have at it with a plastic spoon (which he quickly chucked to the floor) and a pile of cottage cheese on his tray. You’d have thought I handed him a pile of extension cords, he was so happy. Of course, not much of the cheese made it to his mouth after he swipe-swipe-swiped his arm back and forth over the tray. However, the floor and pretty yellow walls soon boasted a lovely smattering of white fleck. I sat down next to him with my oatmeal, feeding him a bit of that and some fruit to make up for the carnage left on the floor. As I was finishing my oatmeal, I noticed how cheesy his hands were…just as he reached up to scratch the back of his head. Now, my son never touches his head – unless he’s in his high chair sporting the grimiest hands you’ve ever seen. What’s that about? After wiping his hands on his hair, he grinned at me and I noticed that he had, after all, been eating some of the cottage cheese. At which point, he blew me a great big, loving raspberry. Cheesy Mommy.
I must say, it’s amazing to watch these little buggers develop into big buggers. Over the past couple days, Ari’s developed a slightly more gourmet palate…meaning, he digs cottage cheese, egg yolk, “banana nuggets” (house recipe) and little bits of flotsam off the floor along with the ubiquitous Cheerios and fruit puffs (i.e. infant junk food). Just recently he’s been initiating his own sippy cup action, lifting it up to his mouth with one hand (frequently with the sippy part jammed into his chest) to get a slurp. Today, he realized he needed two hands in order for it to really work…but only after repeatedly pushing my hands away when I tried to help. Okaaay, hint taken, backing off.
After the feeding cyclone had passed, I mopped him off and set him down to jam with a little Elvis in the living room while I attempted some kitchen clean-up. He laughed, pointed at me, sucked on the CD case and “danced” while I sponged up the floor, myself and the dozen or so items it takes to feed an almost-toddler breakfast. I remember reading, while Ari was in utero, that “babies don’t take up much space”. Ahem. Now, I’m sure these books were trying to tell you that you don’t need a nursery or a fancy play room to have a kid in your life. In fact, you could just “appoint a corner of your bedroom” for the new baby. Bullshit. Our entire home has become BabyVille. “They don’t take up much space”? That’s crap. They take up all the space.
But they also fill it with a lot of laughs, smiles, sloppy hugs and cheesy raspberries…so I guess the swap is worth it in the end.
On the home front, we finally found an arrangement for our living room that works. Thank God, because I’ve been pushing furniture around since we moved in and, frankly, I’m tired. By 11:30 last night, things were looking pretty damn good and I decided that I was going to move one last speaker. This speaker weighs 30 lbs. Big ass speaker. And I dropped it. Wisely, to break the fall and avoid the expense of a damaged floor and broken speaker, I tried to "catch it" with my shin and foot. Bad idea. The speaker weighs 30 lbs (did I mention that?). Immediately, the impact site swelled to a nice egg-shaped lump, enhanced by gash down the middle. I sat down, trying to avoid shock, and got ice on it right away so today it's just slightly swollen but I’m sure it’ll be a lovely shade of purplish yellow in a few days. Should’ve left “well enough” alone…but that’s not really my style.
But the living room looks great.
We’ve had a productive morning over here. In an attempt to acclimate Ari to the fun of feeding himself, I decided to throw caution to the wind, strip him down and let him have at it with a plastic spoon (which he quickly chucked to the floor) and a pile of cottage cheese on his tray. You’d have thought I handed him a pile of extension cords, he was so happy. Of course, not much of the cheese made it to his mouth after he swipe-swipe-swiped his arm back and forth over the tray. However, the floor and pretty yellow walls soon boasted a lovely smattering of white fleck. I sat down next to him with my oatmeal, feeding him a bit of that and some fruit to make up for the carnage left on the floor. As I was finishing my oatmeal, I noticed how cheesy his hands were…just as he reached up to scratch the back of his head. Now, my son never touches his head – unless he’s in his high chair sporting the grimiest hands you’ve ever seen. What’s that about? After wiping his hands on his hair, he grinned at me and I noticed that he had, after all, been eating some of the cottage cheese. At which point, he blew me a great big, loving raspberry. Cheesy Mommy.
I must say, it’s amazing to watch these little buggers develop into big buggers. Over the past couple days, Ari’s developed a slightly more gourmet palate…meaning, he digs cottage cheese, egg yolk, “banana nuggets” (house recipe) and little bits of flotsam off the floor along with the ubiquitous Cheerios and fruit puffs (i.e. infant junk food). Just recently he’s been initiating his own sippy cup action, lifting it up to his mouth with one hand (frequently with the sippy part jammed into his chest) to get a slurp. Today, he realized he needed two hands in order for it to really work…but only after repeatedly pushing my hands away when I tried to help. Okaaay, hint taken, backing off.
After the feeding cyclone had passed, I mopped him off and set him down to jam with a little Elvis in the living room while I attempted some kitchen clean-up. He laughed, pointed at me, sucked on the CD case and “danced” while I sponged up the floor, myself and the dozen or so items it takes to feed an almost-toddler breakfast. I remember reading, while Ari was in utero, that “babies don’t take up much space”. Ahem. Now, I’m sure these books were trying to tell you that you don’t need a nursery or a fancy play room to have a kid in your life. In fact, you could just “appoint a corner of your bedroom” for the new baby. Bullshit. Our entire home has become BabyVille. “They don’t take up much space”? That’s crap. They take up all the space.
But they also fill it with a lot of laughs, smiles, sloppy hugs and cheesy raspberries…so I guess the swap is worth it in the end.
On the home front, we finally found an arrangement for our living room that works. Thank God, because I’ve been pushing furniture around since we moved in and, frankly, I’m tired. By 11:30 last night, things were looking pretty damn good and I decided that I was going to move one last speaker. This speaker weighs 30 lbs. Big ass speaker. And I dropped it. Wisely, to break the fall and avoid the expense of a damaged floor and broken speaker, I tried to "catch it" with my shin and foot. Bad idea. The speaker weighs 30 lbs (did I mention that?). Immediately, the impact site swelled to a nice egg-shaped lump, enhanced by gash down the middle. I sat down, trying to avoid shock, and got ice on it right away so today it's just slightly swollen but I’m sure it’ll be a lovely shade of purplish yellow in a few days. Should’ve left “well enough” alone…but that’s not really my style.
But the living room looks great.
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