Early Morning Rambling

It's 3:45 in the morning and I've been awake for an hour.

The fan clicks. Not always, not every night, but when it's in a bad mood, it clicks. Tomorrow, I told myself, I'll fix it tomorrow. Just ignore it for now. So I tried. Then, it began clicking to the beat of the song, Hey, Mickey. Have you ever tried to sleep with that song in your head?

The birds are awake and chirping. I know, I know. The early bird gets the worm. But dude. It's 3:45. The sun isn't going to be up for another 2 hours. There's no way these birds can even see a worm right now. Furthermore? Worms are gross and the early bird might get the worm, but the sensible, late bird gets to sleep in. I know which one I'd pick.

Every morning, at 3:30 am, McMoose's phone buzzes and speaks in a demonic voice. Apparently, some automated service sends him email updates at this ludicrous time of day and the phone feels the need to inform us of that fact.

Hopper is awake and rolling around, probably because he hears Hey, Mickey playing and he wants to join the party.

My rash is back. Of course it is. From what I remember, it started at 35 weeks last time and when I realized it probably wouldn't go away until the baby was born, I spent about an hour crying. Because the thought of living with it for the next 5-7 weeks was that horrifying. This time? 33 weeks and 4 days. That means that potentially, I could have to put up with up to eight-and-a-half more weeks of this torture.

Since this is the third night I've woken up at this ungodly hour, it would seem that I've entered that ridiculous phase of pregnancy during which one is constantly tired, but can't sleep for longer than three hours at a time. And I've entered this phase a good 3 weeks earlier than I did last time. Because...this time, I have a toddler running around, so not only do I need more energy, but I'm also less able to take naps whenever I'm tired. So of course, of course I would enter the insomniac phase earlier. Because that's the kind of thing that makes sense to my body.

Good Mama: Fail

Today was one of those days when we didn't have anything planned. What that usually means is that we take our time getting ready in the morning, enjoy a leisurely breakfast, and spend the morning at the playground. And this was exactly what I was planning to do today.

So I showered and got dressed. Got Luke dressed. Made breakfast. Fed them breakfast. Cleaned remnants of breakfast off the table, wall, and carpet. Took Luke to the potty. Changed Other Baby's ridiculous blowout of a diaper. Found him some new pants. Got both kids dressed again.

And...stepped in cat vomit. Awesome. Cleaned up the vomit, while the toddlers stood around, saying, "Eww, what's that? Mama got yuck on foot? Mama got yuck on hand? What's that yuck?"

Got the diaper bag packed. Got the kids' shoes on, amidst protests of, "No brown socks today, want WHITE socks. No sandals! Want sneakers! No shoes today, just socks! Guk do it! Guk do it! No mama put Guk's socks on--GUK DO IT!!!"

So I figured that after all that, I should take a short break, get some water and maybe eat a handful of peanuts before heading out. And during the two minutes that it took me go fill up my water glass and grab the peanuts from the pantry, Luke came up and proudly informed me that, "Guk go pee-pee on Guk pants! Guk go pee-pee on Guk's socks! Guk go pee-pee on FLOOR!!! Get new pants now? Get new socks? Get new shoes?"

And while I was getting him his new pants, Other Baby brought me a little white screw and just as I asked where it came from, there was an enormous crash from the other room. Turns out he'd pulled it out of the tall fan in Luke's room, which was now in two separate pieces on the floor. So I shoved it into the guest room and put up a gate so they wouldn't go in and play with it and turned around to find that Other Baby had taken off his shoes, socks, and pants and Luke had emptied one of his dresser drawers in an attempt to find himself some green pants.

It was at this point that I came to the realization that it's upwards of 90 degrees outside, I'm 32 weeks pregnant, the kids are out of their ever-loving minds, and I'm too damn tired to get them down two flights of stairs, wrestle them into carseats, drive them to the playground, and then make sure they don't throw sand, push each other down the slides, eat mulch, or run out into the parking lot. So instead, I'm sitting here in my rocking chair and letting them slowly destroy my apartment.

Thank. God. It's. Friday.

Glass Half Full

Other pregnant woman: How's the pregnancy going? Are you having any problems?
Me: Nope, it's going really well so far! How about yours?
Other Pregnant woman: Well...my back hurts...I can't sleep...I have no patience with my toddler...I'm always tired...and hungry...and hot...I'm just ready to be done!

I'm not an optimistic person, not really. But the above conversation gave me pause this morning because my response? Sounds totally positive. I mean, of COURSE my back hurts too and I can't sleep either and my patience levels are sadly low and I'm tired and hungry and hot and have random dizzy spells. That's pretty much a given with the last couple of months of pregnancy, isn't it? But when I said everything was great, what I meant was that considering I'm 32 weeks pregnant, everything is great. Everything is normal. There are no complications, no added risk factors, nothing unusual.

The conversation continued as we talked about our toddlers. Again, when she asked about how Luke was sleeping, I said he sleeps fine. She responded by saying that her daughter still wakes up about once a week and again, I thought, oh. Well, of course. Luke still wakes up at night too, most of the time. But again, isn't that par for the course of having a toddler? They wake up. They refuse to eat green things. They play with the toilet water sometimes. They touch dead bugs. It's just what they do. Right?

I'm trying to figure out when I went from being a grouchy pessimist to being a somewhat positive person. (And I'm thinking it has something to do with the fact that McMoose gets to bear the brunt of my pessimism. He gets to see the freaking-out-about-random-stuff, the complaining-about-the-size-of-my-feet, the grouchiness-about-the-never-ending-pregnancy. He gets to talk me down from this stuff on the daily. And because he does, I get to spend most of my days being positive and feeling like I have a decent handle on this stuff. Thank you, McMoose.)

More Context, Please

You know how sometimes, you're driving and something interesting comes on the radio and you have to turn it off, just so you don't get too distracted? No? That doesn't happen to other people? Oh. Well, anyway...I was wishing pretty hard that Luke had an off button while we were driving back from story time today because HOW ON EARTH is a person supposed to concentrate on driving when this conversation is going on:

Luke: Mama, see turkey today?
Me: Hmm?
Luke: I want see that turkey again.
Me, tuning in: See what?
Luke: That turkey! That turkey! I want see that turkey again!
Me: You want to eat turkey?
Luke, getting more insistent: NO! I want SEE that turkey again!
Me: Dude, WHAT are you talking about? What turkey?
Luke: That BIIIIIIG turkey.
Me: Ok, that helps me not at all. When did you see a turkey?
Luke: Guk see turkey this morning.
Me: You did not see a turkey this morning. You might have seen a turkey some other morning, but you did not see a turkey THIS morning.
Luke: I DID see turkey this morning. It was BIIIIG. I want see that turkey again.
Me: Luke. I have NO IDEA what you're talking about. Where did you see a turkey?
Luke: See turkey by the fire.
Me: By...the...fire?
Luke: Turkey run fast! Guk run. Other Baby run. Other Baby dada run.
Me: The turkey was by a fire...and it ran...and Other Baby and Other Baby's dada were there? Are you talking about the turkey you saw when we went camping BACK IN APRIL?
Luke: Yes. Want see that turkey again today? Yes? Okay?

The Hopper Special

I know that when I was pregnant with Luke, there were a million things I wanted to say about the pregnancy and about Luke and this time, I haven't dedicated nearly as much time to talking about pregnancy. Or at least, not on this blog. Because goodness knows I talk about it constantly in real life.

Part of the reason is that this pregnancy has been so easy. Very little morning sickness, no horrible, constant contractions like I had last time, no gigantic swollen ankles (yet!) It has been--dare I say it?--pleasant. Enjoyable, even. I mean, other than the part where I've gained a million pounds and can't roll over in bed, but I was pretty much expecting that.

But you know what has taken me by surprise? The fact that, while Hopper moves around a lot, he doesn't act like a crazy jumping bean 24-7. Which is to say, he sleeps from time to time. And he doesn't care for it when he's woken up. At my last two midwife appointments, they wiggled his head to make sure that it was, in fact, his head and not his bottom, and boy howdy, was he displeased with that. Have you ever housed an annoyed fetus who holds a grudge? Yeah. It's fun. I'm hoping that some of the calmness will translate to life outside the womb and that he might sleep on the outside, too. Of course, given the fact that his big brother already pokes at him and says, "All done night-night, Hopper," I'm guessing he's not going to get too much opportunity for uninterrupted rest.

So far, I know that Hopper sucks his thumb, likes to sleep (sometimes), gets angry easily, and might be...large. Here's looking forward to getting to know a lot more in a couple of months.

He Said, She Said

Methinks it's time for another round of "Things Luke Said."

Luke: I baby Guk!
Me: Hi, Baby Luke. How's it going?
Luke: Noooo, I not a baby. A baby is a baby.
Me: Well, what are you then?
Luke: I a boy!

Luke, while looking through the bushes for a lizard he'd seen the previous day: Izard! Izard! Where are you, Izard? Come out, I show you a leaf!

Me: Hey, Luke, do you hear that firetruck siren?
Luke: It's not firetruck. It's ambulance, actually.
Me: It is? How do you know?
Luke: Firetruck go wee-wee-wee. Ambulance go we-oh-we-oh-we-oh.
(I had no response to this because...is there actually a difference between firetruck and ambulance sirens? This isn't a question I've ever pondered before.)

Luke: Guk eat peanut butter sandwich?
Me: No, you just ate oatmeal. That would be Mama's peanut butter sandwich.
Luke: That be Guks', actually. (Aside: That wasn't a misplaced apostrophe. That's how he actually pronounces it: Guks'es.)
Me: I'm pretty sure it's Mama's.
Luke: I pretty sure it Guks'.
Me: I don't think so.
Luke: I DO think so. Dada DO think so. Other Baby DO think so. It Guks' now.

Me: Ok, Luke, time to go night-night.
Luke: Yes, night-night. But play first, then go night-night, okay?
(I put this one in here because that's my standard answer when he wants to do something: Yes, of course we can go to the playground...but we're going to take a nap/eat lunch/go potty/whatever first and THEN we can go to the playground. And the two-year-old has figured out how to turn my own words against me.)

The First Day of June

The first day of June and we have a high of 99 degrees. I have 9 weeks to go in this pregnancy and every day that the temperature soars above 90, I wonder how I'm going to make it.

Two toddlers are running around like maniacs because even at 10 am, it's too hot to be outside. So far this morning, we've heard the firetruck sirens pass by the road outside our apartment five times. It seems cruel that anyone should have to deal with a fire on top of the crazy heat.

The belly boy seems to sense my discomfort and is trying to make himself more comfortable by stretching out his limbs. If I had to make a prediction, I'd say he's going to have long limbs.

The toddlers have two identical toys, thoughtfully purchased because Other Baby's mom figured that might decrease some of the fighting and make my days somewhat easier. One of the toys has been abandoned and they are fighting over the other one. Two-year-olds are just unfathomable little beings.

Luke informed me this morning that the firetrucks were going "to get some fire." Other Baby is sitting with a bucket on his head, saying "Boooooo!" The Dog is panting on the back of the couch, as high off the ground and as far from the toddlers as he can get. I imagine that has something to do with the fact that they tried to use their toy drills on his head not too long ago. Soon, they'll lure him back down with sticky hands full of raisins, just to try to use their (toy) circular saw on his back.

The air conditioner shudders and turns off. I hope this isn't one of the days it decides to stop working because I'm sick of seeing the maintenance man, who comes to our apartment, talks to the toddlers, and fixes nothing.

Luke licks a book, then tosses it into the basketball goal, where it gets stuck. Unfazed by the loss, he goes off to lick the wall instead.

The first day of June and the crazy heat seems to be bringing some extra crazy to our home.