My house looks like a volcano of toys and books erupted in the middle of my living room. I should be clearing out the mess, but instead I am on the internet letting the world know that my one year old son discovered his baby boy boobs yesterday. He cannot get enough of them now!
This morning, after I got up with Schmoopy at 4:30 and again at 5:30, John got up with him for the day at 6:30 so I could catch up on a little sleep. When I got up and fed him breakfast, John told me a little about their morning together.
John: This morning when I took Schmoopy's jammies off he didn't want me to put his shirt on right away. He wanted to go topless for a while.
Me: Oh?
John: Yes. He wanted to play with his boobies for a while.
Me: (long pause) Dude. That's seriously wrong. I feel dirty now. I want to go take a shower now.
John: OK, maybe played with isn't quite right. But he was pointing at them and wanted to look at them for a while.
Me: I see.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Friday, November 13, 2009
5 Things I love about you
Dear Schmoopy,
Today I felt like telling you 5 things I love about you. Not because it's your birthday or any special kind of day, just because I felt like it.
1. I love it when you take my hand, pull it to your face, and rest your face in my hand; and I love the “Mmmm” sound you make when you do it.
2. I love the thick purple smoothie mustache you get when you drink a breakfast smoothie; and I love that you like my breakfast smoothies.
3. I love the way you bounce and jiggle when you run; and I love the "wabba wabba wabba" sound you make while running.
4. I love your intensity of feeling – when you get upset, boy do you get upset, but when something pleases you, everything is amazing and wonderful and fantastic and the whole world lights up with your happiness.
5. I love that some of the most simple things please you – that the dog walking into the room or spotting a favorite toy on the floor induces a torrent of smiles, squeals, and giggles.
And one bonus because I just can’t limit all the things I love about you to 5…
6. I love your excitement for belly buttons. I smile every time you stand in front of the mirror, pull your shirt up, and point out your own belly button. I laugh out loud every time you pull my shirt up, stick your finger in my belly button, and then blow raspberries on it.
I'm sure by next week I'll discover at least 10 new things I love about you. I'll try not to embarrass you too much by posting all the things I love about you too often.
Love,
Mom
Today I felt like telling you 5 things I love about you. Not because it's your birthday or any special kind of day, just because I felt like it.
1. I love it when you take my hand, pull it to your face, and rest your face in my hand; and I love the “Mmmm” sound you make when you do it.
2. I love the thick purple smoothie mustache you get when you drink a breakfast smoothie; and I love that you like my breakfast smoothies.
3. I love the way you bounce and jiggle when you run; and I love the "wabba wabba wabba" sound you make while running.
4. I love your intensity of feeling – when you get upset, boy do you get upset, but when something pleases you, everything is amazing and wonderful and fantastic and the whole world lights up with your happiness.
5. I love that some of the most simple things please you – that the dog walking into the room or spotting a favorite toy on the floor induces a torrent of smiles, squeals, and giggles.
And one bonus because I just can’t limit all the things I love about you to 5…
6. I love your excitement for belly buttons. I smile every time you stand in front of the mirror, pull your shirt up, and point out your own belly button. I laugh out loud every time you pull my shirt up, stick your finger in my belly button, and then blow raspberries on it.
I'm sure by next week I'll discover at least 10 new things I love about you. I'll try not to embarrass you too much by posting all the things I love about you too often.
Love,
Mom
Monday, November 9, 2009
Uh oh, new trick
I am so in for it. Guess who figured out how to turn the round bathtub water faucets on? Hint, the same little person who was up for the day at 5:15 this morning. Let the games begin.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Daylight Savings Dilemna
You may have noticed the circles under SchmoopyBaby’s eyes in the picture in my last post. There is a very good reason for this – the end of daylight savings time. This event has been the cause of much unhappiness and lack of sleep here at chez-Schmoopy. We even started the transition a week early. The idea was to move bedtime 15 minutes later every 3-4 days until November 1, and hopefully he would start to sleep in later in the morning.
That idea was a big fail.
Here’s the problem - SchmoopyBaby is very sensitive to being over-tired. Pretty much every sleep expert, from Weissbluth who advocates a fairly hardcore version of cry-it-out sleep training, to Pantley of no-cry sleep fame, all agree on one thing – if your baby or toddler is having a hard time sleeping through the night, try putting him/her to bed earlier. They aren’t kidding. You might think it is totally counter-intuitive that a baby or toddler that goes to sleep earlier will sleep longer, but it’s totally true, at least it is for SchmoopyBaby. Moving his bedtime ½ hour earlier got him sleeping 10-10½ hours every night for months! And here we are putting him to sleep later and later each day. Ugh. The night wakings started back up on the first night. Combine that with the fact that he was waking up for the day earlier rather than later and we were starting to make plans to move to Arizona or Hawaii, where there is no time change.
Bedtime is 8:00pm. For most of this week he’s been waking up around 4:30am. I can usually get him back to sleep within about 15 minutes, which is good, only to have him wake up again between 5:00 and 5:30 (the old 6:00-6:30, his usual wake up time) which is not so good. A lot of parents I know are big supporters of cry-it-out, and from what I understand, for most (but not all) kids it works. Kiddo may wake up at 6, but Mom and Dad don’t get up until 7, so Kiddo stays in the crib until the parents are good and ready to pick Kiddo up. Within a couple of days, Kiddo is also back to sleeping until 7.
I have not been, and will not be, following this method for transitioning to standard time. I have a couple of reasons for this.
1. Not my style. There are many forms of sleep training that involve some amount of crying, from the very mild to the hardcore, and I don’t have much problem with the mild forms if it means a child learns to sleep better and the whole family is happier and healthier as a result of being more well-rested. But turning off the baby monitor and ignoring my child’s cries for an hour is just not the kind of parent I want to be. For starters, I don’t believe an hour of unchecked crying is challenging my kid to rise to the next level of his sleeping skills, I think it’s neglect. Additionally, one of my goals as a parent is to teach SchmoopyBaby empathy. One the ways I try to teach this is through my own actions, because I believe parental modeling is a huge influence on behavior. By ignoring his cries for over an hour, I believe I would be demonstrating that it’s ok to ignore another person’s distress. Now, obviously this is not the defining action that would turn my son into an axe murderer. I know it’s the cumulative impact of everything he sees and experiences - but I’m trying to be consistent in my messages starting from day 1, ya know what I mean?
2. The morning poop. This may be an even bigger influencer on my getting up with Schmoopy in the morning. Apparently SchmoopyBaby’s digestive system didn’t get the memo that the clocks changed and the morning poop ought to wait an extra hour before making its appearance. I cannot allow, let alone force, my child to sit or lay crying in a pile of feces in order to make a point that I’m the parent and I decide when wake-up time is. I’ve changed his diaper and tried getting him back to sleep after the morning poop. Resistance is futile. The biological clock is stronger than the digital.
I do think SchmoopyBaby is finally starting to adjust. Yesterday, even though he woke up twice early in the morning, he didn’t get up for the day until 7:15, over 11 hours after bedtime! Then this morning, although he only slept until about 5:45, he slept completely through the night! It is still very inconsistent obviously, but hopefully within the next few days he’ll transition back to his normal schedule (if the poop could only wait just another 30 minutes!!!) and then he’ll be back to his bright-eyed happy self. If not, we’ll re-evaluate our strategy over the weekend.
That idea was a big fail.
Here’s the problem - SchmoopyBaby is very sensitive to being over-tired. Pretty much every sleep expert, from Weissbluth who advocates a fairly hardcore version of cry-it-out sleep training, to Pantley of no-cry sleep fame, all agree on one thing – if your baby or toddler is having a hard time sleeping through the night, try putting him/her to bed earlier. They aren’t kidding. You might think it is totally counter-intuitive that a baby or toddler that goes to sleep earlier will sleep longer, but it’s totally true, at least it is for SchmoopyBaby. Moving his bedtime ½ hour earlier got him sleeping 10-10½ hours every night for months! And here we are putting him to sleep later and later each day. Ugh. The night wakings started back up on the first night. Combine that with the fact that he was waking up for the day earlier rather than later and we were starting to make plans to move to Arizona or Hawaii, where there is no time change.
Bedtime is 8:00pm. For most of this week he’s been waking up around 4:30am. I can usually get him back to sleep within about 15 minutes, which is good, only to have him wake up again between 5:00 and 5:30 (the old 6:00-6:30, his usual wake up time) which is not so good. A lot of parents I know are big supporters of cry-it-out, and from what I understand, for most (but not all) kids it works. Kiddo may wake up at 6, but Mom and Dad don’t get up until 7, so Kiddo stays in the crib until the parents are good and ready to pick Kiddo up. Within a couple of days, Kiddo is also back to sleeping until 7.
I have not been, and will not be, following this method for transitioning to standard time. I have a couple of reasons for this.
1. Not my style. There are many forms of sleep training that involve some amount of crying, from the very mild to the hardcore, and I don’t have much problem with the mild forms if it means a child learns to sleep better and the whole family is happier and healthier as a result of being more well-rested. But turning off the baby monitor and ignoring my child’s cries for an hour is just not the kind of parent I want to be. For starters, I don’t believe an hour of unchecked crying is challenging my kid to rise to the next level of his sleeping skills, I think it’s neglect. Additionally, one of my goals as a parent is to teach SchmoopyBaby empathy. One the ways I try to teach this is through my own actions, because I believe parental modeling is a huge influence on behavior. By ignoring his cries for over an hour, I believe I would be demonstrating that it’s ok to ignore another person’s distress. Now, obviously this is not the defining action that would turn my son into an axe murderer. I know it’s the cumulative impact of everything he sees and experiences - but I’m trying to be consistent in my messages starting from day 1, ya know what I mean?
2. The morning poop. This may be an even bigger influencer on my getting up with Schmoopy in the morning. Apparently SchmoopyBaby’s digestive system didn’t get the memo that the clocks changed and the morning poop ought to wait an extra hour before making its appearance. I cannot allow, let alone force, my child to sit or lay crying in a pile of feces in order to make a point that I’m the parent and I decide when wake-up time is. I’ve changed his diaper and tried getting him back to sleep after the morning poop. Resistance is futile. The biological clock is stronger than the digital.
I do think SchmoopyBaby is finally starting to adjust. Yesterday, even though he woke up twice early in the morning, he didn’t get up for the day until 7:15, over 11 hours after bedtime! Then this morning, although he only slept until about 5:45, he slept completely through the night! It is still very inconsistent obviously, but hopefully within the next few days he’ll transition back to his normal schedule (if the poop could only wait just another 30 minutes!!!) and then he’ll be back to his bright-eyed happy self. If not, we’ll re-evaluate our strategy over the weekend.
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Sticker Fun
I found this activity on another blog that I happened to come across. It was a hit! I had a sheet of disney stickers that came in the mail and pulled it out along with a small paper bag. SchmoopyBaby spent 45 minutes putting the stickers on the bag, then in the bag, then on an empty toy bin that was sitting nearby. Then of course he had to climb into the bin and put the stickers on his leg, then on Mommy's leg, etc, etc. He probably would have gone on even longer if Daddy hadn't come home when he did.
Here is the artist at work.
And here is his finished product.
Here is the artist at work.
And here is his finished product.
Monday, November 2, 2009
Pumpkin Potato Crockpot Recipe
This didn't turn out exactly the way I had hoped, but it was a reasonably decent experiment so I thought I would share. At the pumpkin patch last week I bought a couple small pumpkins. I had never cooked fresh pumpkin before so I thought I'd give it a shot. I've also been meaning to use my crockpot more often so I went on an online search for the perfect pumpkin crockpot recipe, which I sadly didn't find. So I kind of merged a couple different recipes and added a twist or two. The result was hearty, filling, and very comforting for a cold day. I don't think I got the spice combination quite right, as the flavor was a little boring to me. Then again, I also tend to prefer lots of garlic or curry or other fairly intense spices. Many people I know don't care for that kind of intense flavor so maybe you'll like it as I made it this time.
Ingredients:
1 small pumpkin
1 sweet potato
1 red potato (probably any kind of potato will do, I just happen to have red potatoes at the moment)
1 yellow onion
1 can kidney beans
2 cups water
1 salt-free vegetable bouillon cube + 1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp brown sugar
2 cloves garlic
1 tbsp mixed italian seasonings (I used basil, oregano, thyme, and marjoram)
Directions:
1. Chop -
Chop the pumpkin and potato into cubes. Peel and chop the sweet potato.
Chop the onion and garlic.
2. Toss -
Put all the ingredients into the crockpot and stir.
3. Cook -
Set the crockpot to cook on low for 8 hours. Stir once more.
4. NOM
I think next time I might try to make it more like a pumpkin chili. I think a little kick would work well with this.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Political Rant of the Week - Hate Crimes
If you are Republican or sincerely religiously Christian you may not want to read this, because I am mad as hell and I’m about to go off. Still here? Well no whining at the end of this post, because I tried to warn you.
There’s been a lot of press regarding the extension of hate crimes by our government to cover gender identity and homosexuality. This is a good thing. It’s about time. I’d now like to talk about another sort of hate crime. A group of crime that is so widespread it isn’t even acknowledged as hate crime most of the time. That would be crimes against women.
You may or may not have heard of Jamie Leigh Jones, the Halliburton/KBR employee that, while in Baghdad by way of government contract, was gang-raped in 2005 by her co-workers. In an attempt to cover up the incident, the company then put her in a shipping container without food or water and threatened to fire her if she reported the incident or attempted to seek medical attention. Jones was unable to sue KBR for sex discrimination in open court because KBR was one of many companies with government contracts that require employees to sign individual contracts barring lawsuits and forcing mandatory binding arbitration, where the company almost always wins.
Fast forward to October 2009. Senator Al Franken (D-Minn) introduces an amendment to the Defense Appropriations bill that would punish contractors if they “restrict their employees from taking workplace sexual assault, battery and discrimination cases to court.”
Now, most people might think this is a no-brainer. In an age where hate crime protection gets extended to include gay and transgender people, one might expect that an amendment that says raped women can seek justice through open court would pass unanimously and be embraced by all normal functioning human beings. But we aren’t dealing with normal functioning human beings. We’re dealing with the Senate. We’re dealing with politicians.
Thirty, that’s right 30, white male Republicans voted against this amendment. Included in this most classy of crowds is almost-president John McCain. Also included in the mix is my own Senator (not that I ever voted for him) John Ensign.
The question is this: WTF!?!?! What are they thinking?!
Republicans point out that the amendment is opposed by a range of business interests, including the U.S. Chamber of Congress. Oh. I see. So what you’re telling me is civil and criminal rights to women only count as long as it doesn’t impact some corporation’s bottom line. We need to protect the right of businesses to cover up rape and other violence against women in order to protect capitalism. It’s the American way, donchaknow?
Is there anything else that might be going on here? Take Ensign, for instance, since he is so near and dear to my heart. Ensign is an uber-conservative born-again Christian with a 100% approval rating by the Christian Coalition. He has participated in rallies by the Promise Keepers, a male evangelical group that promotes marital fidelity. It also happens that he is an adulterer. And not just any old commonplace adulterer, mind you - the kind of adulterer that fucks his own friend’s wife. But I digress. My point is that he is THE quintessential conservative Christian Republican. And by and large, what do most conservative evangelical Christians believe about the role of women in society? Stay at home, bear as many children as the Lord blesses you with, and remain subservient to and dependent on your husband. This, they profess, is God’s design.
So let’s go back to Jones and the issue at hand. If a woman is employed by a government contractor, clearly she is not at home popping out babies and serving her man. She is, essentially, going against God’s design by working outside the home and therefore deserves all the heinous punishments that are the natural consequence of disobeying The Law. If you take this argument to its logical conclusion, then clearly Jones, as well as any woman audacious enough to try to have a life other than popping out babies starting at the legal age of marriage, deserves to get raped and denied any hope of legal justice. This is God’s justice.
If this isn’t hate speech and hate crime, I don’t know what is. You can dress it up and say it’s a legitimate religious philosophy if you want. You can also put lipstick on a pig, so I’m told. At the end of the day a pig is a pig, and a violent crime committed against a woman for no other reason than the fact that she is a woman is a hate crime and deserves to be treated and prosecuted as such.
Is it too much to want protection under the law for all women, not only women who were once men? I don’t believe I’ll see the end of hate crimes against women in my lifetime. After all, hate crimes against women are probably the oldest form of hate crime in existence. I would like to think that the legal definition of hate crime may one day include the group known as women. But as long as this country is run by corporations and religious fundamentalist nutjobs, I won’t be holding my breath.
Rant over.
There’s been a lot of press regarding the extension of hate crimes by our government to cover gender identity and homosexuality. This is a good thing. It’s about time. I’d now like to talk about another sort of hate crime. A group of crime that is so widespread it isn’t even acknowledged as hate crime most of the time. That would be crimes against women.
You may or may not have heard of Jamie Leigh Jones, the Halliburton/KBR employee that, while in Baghdad by way of government contract, was gang-raped in 2005 by her co-workers. In an attempt to cover up the incident, the company then put her in a shipping container without food or water and threatened to fire her if she reported the incident or attempted to seek medical attention. Jones was unable to sue KBR for sex discrimination in open court because KBR was one of many companies with government contracts that require employees to sign individual contracts barring lawsuits and forcing mandatory binding arbitration, where the company almost always wins.
Fast forward to October 2009. Senator Al Franken (D-Minn) introduces an amendment to the Defense Appropriations bill that would punish contractors if they “restrict their employees from taking workplace sexual assault, battery and discrimination cases to court.”
Now, most people might think this is a no-brainer. In an age where hate crime protection gets extended to include gay and transgender people, one might expect that an amendment that says raped women can seek justice through open court would pass unanimously and be embraced by all normal functioning human beings. But we aren’t dealing with normal functioning human beings. We’re dealing with the Senate. We’re dealing with politicians.
Thirty, that’s right 30, white male Republicans voted against this amendment. Included in this most classy of crowds is almost-president John McCain. Also included in the mix is my own Senator (not that I ever voted for him) John Ensign.
The question is this: WTF!?!?! What are they thinking?!
Republicans point out that the amendment is opposed by a range of business interests, including the U.S. Chamber of Congress. Oh. I see. So what you’re telling me is civil and criminal rights to women only count as long as it doesn’t impact some corporation’s bottom line. We need to protect the right of businesses to cover up rape and other violence against women in order to protect capitalism. It’s the American way, donchaknow?
Is there anything else that might be going on here? Take Ensign, for instance, since he is so near and dear to my heart. Ensign is an uber-conservative born-again Christian with a 100% approval rating by the Christian Coalition. He has participated in rallies by the Promise Keepers, a male evangelical group that promotes marital fidelity. It also happens that he is an adulterer. And not just any old commonplace adulterer, mind you - the kind of adulterer that fucks his own friend’s wife. But I digress. My point is that he is THE quintessential conservative Christian Republican. And by and large, what do most conservative evangelical Christians believe about the role of women in society? Stay at home, bear as many children as the Lord blesses you with, and remain subservient to and dependent on your husband. This, they profess, is God’s design.
So let’s go back to Jones and the issue at hand. If a woman is employed by a government contractor, clearly she is not at home popping out babies and serving her man. She is, essentially, going against God’s design by working outside the home and therefore deserves all the heinous punishments that are the natural consequence of disobeying The Law. If you take this argument to its logical conclusion, then clearly Jones, as well as any woman audacious enough to try to have a life other than popping out babies starting at the legal age of marriage, deserves to get raped and denied any hope of legal justice. This is God’s justice.
If this isn’t hate speech and hate crime, I don’t know what is. You can dress it up and say it’s a legitimate religious philosophy if you want. You can also put lipstick on a pig, so I’m told. At the end of the day a pig is a pig, and a violent crime committed against a woman for no other reason than the fact that she is a woman is a hate crime and deserves to be treated and prosecuted as such.
Is it too much to want protection under the law for all women, not only women who were once men? I don’t believe I’ll see the end of hate crimes against women in my lifetime. After all, hate crimes against women are probably the oldest form of hate crime in existence. I would like to think that the legal definition of hate crime may one day include the group known as women. But as long as this country is run by corporations and religious fundamentalist nutjobs, I won’t be holding my breath.
Rant over.
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