10 months

My sweet, sweet boy,

Today, you are 10 months old. Double digits!! It's bittersweet to know you'll never be a single-digit month-age ever again in your entire life. Yes, I think about things like that. Yes, I'm a sap. And ten months? Do you even realize how close that is to a year?

This month has been amazing in a way that's totally different than the last couple of months. Those months were marked with a flurry of new skills and abilities and experiences, new teeth and new charms. This month, though? None of that. You had no new teeth (hallelujah for a teething break!!). You had no new big skills. You had no illnesses. You were just steady and sweet and happy. It was a calm month, a welcome month of tranquility after the flurries of the months before.

You ate great this month! We are finally, finally not having to worry about your weight. You are nursing well and eating solids with gusto. I can't wait to get you back to the doctor to see how much you've gained, but each night when I rock you and sing to you, I can feel your weight in my arms. I look down at you and you suddenly seem like such a big boy, no longer the little baby you used to be. You have just about outgrown your infant car seat, but for some reason, I'm dragging my feet on moving your into your big boy chair. Maybe it's one of those last little vestiges of infancy that some deep part of me is sad to cut loose.

Your communication abilities are really developing and it's so amazing to see. You surprise me daily with how much you really understand. In fact, the other day you were playing with a water bottle and were going to leave it behind as we left the room. I turned and told you to go get the water bottle . . . and you know what? You crawled right over to it and picked it up. You do the same thing when I tell you to go play with a ball, or go get a book. And you seem to have an insatiable desire to learn more. You are constantly pointing at different things and saying "da!" (which I interpret as "that!" as in, "what's the name of that thing?!") and you and I walk around naming all the different things in our house. I had forgotten how mind blowing it really is to watch someone figure out the world.

You are an incorrigible flirt. You love girls of all ages and have learned to smile and babble and give kissies, much to the delight of girls young and old. We are going to have our hands full with you for sure.

You are still waking once a night to eat. I have loved our quiet nighttime moments together, and loved knowing that I've been able to feed you as much as you want to help you gain weight. But as soon as I can get confirmation that your weight is back on track, we're going to work on getting you to sleep all the way through the night. I don't know how yet, but I know that it's important for you to learn, one way or another. I'm still waiting on you just dropping that night feeding on your own when you're ready. So . . . you know . . . whenever you're ready. . . .

You are standing on your own for longer and longer stretches now. It still works best when you're distracted. You pull up on something and then let go, and if we can keep you distracted, you'll stand there for a good 10 seconds before slowly dropping down to sit. You're a cruising machine and as much as I know how much more complicated our lives will get when you take that big first step, I know how much you want to be able to move and play and keep up with your sister, and I know how happy you'll be when you're finally able to do that. So, for your sake, baby boy, I hope you're walking soon. (For my sake, though, I'm happy happy happy that you're not quite there yet!)

I know next month will bring big things. I assume our teething break will come to an end. You'll learn more words (right now you're saying "ball," "book," "dada," "Ah-ya" (Ali), "ow," "hi," and "all done"). You might learn to walk. You might learn to sleep all the way through the night. I kind of feel like this last month was our last smooth month of things as we know it before you suddenly become a big boy.

This month has been easy and smooth and relaxed. You've been your wonderful, sweet, happy, laughing, smiling, babbling, snuggling self.

This was a good month.

Thanks for letting me be here to share it with you.

Love forever and ever and a day,
Mom

A Cinderella Story

It's hard raising a girl. To be sure, it's hard raising any child, regardless of sex. But with a girl, there's a lot of extra "stuff" you have to navigate through--things like body issues, safety issues, sexual discrimination, wanting her to know it's okay to be smarter than boys, etc.

I've already written about making sure that my daughter knows that she's smart and funny and beautiful and nice. I make sure to reinforce this message with her daily. But sometimes it's still hard to know if all the messages that she's getting from society are overriding my daily efforts. If the "Princess phenomenon" will prove too strong for us to defeat.

Every time I tell her a story, I am careful to emphasize that it's often the girl doing the saving, not the boy. My stories have strong heroines, women who feature the personality traits I'd like to see developed in baby girl. But when she requests certain stories, like Cinderella, it's sometimes hard to work those angles in. Unfortunately, Disney stories are a wealth of females who are judged by their looks and need rescuing by men. So when I am asked to tell these stories, I try to mold the story a bit to avoid those less-than-desirable messages.

The other day, I was telling her Cinderella. I got to the part where Cinderella goes to the ball, saying, "And when Cinderella walked in, the Prince saw her and though, 'Wow! She's beautiful! I definitely want to get to know her better.' So he started talking to Cinderella, and do you know what he discovered? He discovered that not only was she beautiful, she was also really smart!"

"Just like me!" my daughter interrupted.

I could not possibly have smiled any bigger. "That's right!" I said. "She's smart just like you!"

"Yeah, I'm the smartest of all!" she said proudly.

"Yes, you are," I told her.

"Is Cinderella funny like me, too?" she asked.

"Yes, of course! She's smart and funny and nice, just like you!"

"Yeah. I'm the nicest, mommy!"

"Yes, you are!"

And I finished telling the story with my feet about ten feet off the ground.

Parenting is hard. Parenting a girl is harder. It's so great when you have these little flashes that let you know you're doing something right.

So this what burning out feels like.

I'm in a bad place.

I want to quit my job. And not even necessarily pull the kids out of school. Really, what I want is the freedom to stay home, pursue my little passion project that has started to gain momentum, keep our house in order, and go to the gym. From looking at my list of short demands, it's pretty clear that I'm craving something that I have absolutely zero of right now: time to myself.

If you're a stay-at-home mom, you might be thinking, "pshhh. You work. That IS time to yourself." But it's not. No really. For the last five years, our company has had lay-off after lay-off. That has amounted to fewer and fewer people left to do the same--no, more--work. Often with smaller budgets and shorter project timelines. From the second I get here, I am stressed and grumpy. I sit through meeting after meeting and listen to decisions being made that are the WRONG decision, but all our hands are tied because of time constraints or budget constraints or staffing constraints. Then my lunch break rolls around and I go nurse baby boy because he won't take a bottle anymore. Then I come back and eat my lunch at my desk while I work. Then I rush out at 4 to go nurse baby boy again. Then I get home with both kids and feed baby boy immediately, then cook dinner for everyone, then we eat together and play until bath time. Then I nurse him again and do baths and books and bedtimes, and then when they're both sleeping, I have a choice: laundry? kitchen? bag/freeze milk? wash pump parts? put away dishes? pick up the house? spend time with my husband? watch TV? get on my computer and veg out for 30 minutes? One of those options--ONE--is time just spent on myself, and I have to rotate nightly which one I pick so that our house and my marriage doesn't fall into disarray. Then I pump once before bed and try to be in bed by 9:30 or so so that, despite the fact that I'm still getting up at night with little man, I can function at a somewhat human level the next day.

The only downtime I get is on weekends, during the afternoon nap window when both kids are sleeping. And baby boy sleeps anywhere from 30-90 minutes, so it's kind of a crap shoot.

Don't misinterpret things. I LOVE my lunch dates with baby boy. His smiles and coos and giggles are the total bright spot between 8 and 4. And our evenings are not just on me--TH helps out with everything listed as soon as he walks in the door.

But still,y'all. I feel like I'm drowning in life. Losing myself. I can keep everything above water but my own head.

And I know it's temporary. Really I do. I know in three months or less I'll have my lunch breaks back. That will help. I know at some point I'll stop getting up in the middle of the night. That will help. But I don't see how there will ever be more hours in the day, more hours for me to take care of all the chores around the house so that the limited time that I DO get with my kids is spent enjoying each other and relaxing and playing rather than trying to pick up and keep up. So that I can start doing things like working out again without having to sacrifice something else in order to do it, like time with my family.

I just feel stuck.

I'm even considering quitting and pulling the kids out of school (the only way we'd be able to afford me not working) so that at LEAST I'd get nap times, once a day, where there was just quiet, where nobody needed me for anything, where I could just sit.and.be.still. All by myself. A once-a-day break seems like such an incredible luxury to me.

Like, actually considering it.

First world problems, eh? Not enough time for me.

I'll go ahead and give myself the ol' violin.