May Long Weekend...aka Too Much Pressure in 3 days off

Last night we were sitting at the playground in Prince's Island watching Charlie walking around, pondering life one year ago, when little brownbear was just over 2 months old. Every May long weekend, the pressure becomes insurmountable to go out and do something adventurous on May Long. Especially in Canada, where the first signs of summer have come, and are usually gone by this weekend. Yes, the week preceding May Long is inevitably hot and crazy, and by Friday night, it is pouring,  snowing, hailing, windy, cold or overcast. Especially in Calgary, where we seem to get our "rainy season" from Mid-May to Mid-June.

What did we do last year??? We seriously wracked our brains and came up with nada. I think we tried to sleep. I'm sure that is what we did. Sleep, sleep, sleep.

This year, even though we now get 11-12 hours a night uninterrupted sleep if we want as talked about here(really though, we go to bed late and brownbear is up by 6am), the world is our oyster. But the pressure to get out and DO is simply gone, poof! Vamoose! It's so refreshing. But I'm not gonna lie, I'm still going to use this weekend to get as much sleep as I can, so maybe things aren't that free, but let's just pretend;)

PS: We also talked about hooking a high-end GPS up to little brownbear and tracking his path around the playground since we think it would be the most chaotic path you could imagine. As a mapper, I am up for the challenge, but until he can roam further than a 15 foot radius, I'm afraid I don't have the moola to spend a lot for a high end surveying GPS unit. Still, the idea...

Boobs are okay, I just don't want them

Seth Meyers saved my day on Sunday, which was in fact Mother's Day when I got around to watching SNL. We always tape it and watch it the next day, so it's really called "Sunday Night Recorded for Lame Parents" in our house. When I saw the news segment with Seth tearing down the Times Magazine cover, was practically doing little dancing cheers. Seth put it perfectly with comments like "When I first glanced at the cover ... I thought: Did the kid from Modern Family sexually assault his yoga instructor?"


And this makes me seriously consider packing up and moving to NYC.

Sometimes I forget that I live in Calgary, land of the Conservatives. Doing my job at the library, it should be blatant when I see that our main demographic in Cowtown is literally called "Pets &PC's"  (PC=Conservatives or Republicans if you're a Yank). So why do I spend most of my days feeling guilty for being liberal in my approach to parenting, when it's obvious I'm a minority?? Coming here 11 years ago, I was at the most naive point in my life, but at least I had the objectivity to remember that I was different. That my best friends were gay, that I hated paying for a library card, that you were respecting at walk-in clinics, that  people spoke easily to one another, waving on the sidewalk, making eye contact, using that famous Saskie self-deprecating humour...I know I have changed in 11 years, became more Conservative as product of my city's influence but also with age. But when I feel like I'm the ONLY one who isn't jubilant about breastfeeding and attachment parenting, watching a little SNL reminds me that other people DO live in small apartments (like we have for 10 years), not own cars, joke around at their own expense...enjoy life on different levels than most Pets &PCers. Thanks Seth.

On another note. About boobs. Hopefully I can get a large chunk of this out of my system.

1. I never had boobs. Back in early college, I wore all sorts of boobalicious bras to pretend. Then, at a later stage in college, I slowly transitioned away from any artificial boobalage and just went free. No bras. This continued until after baby was born. I couldn't and didn't want to relate to boobs. It was like the myth of penis envy. I don't have one, don't care about them. Why spend a minute more on the subject?

2. When brownbear came along, I had no idea how to handle boobs. None. I had one ratty sports bra. No button down shirts (they have never been flattering on my "silhouette"). I literally had to pull my bra up while jogging when I saw someone coming my way because they literally came out the top! I had no clue how to reign them in, and while it's a funny image, it wasn't fun for me. It was like waking up in someone else's body, a body that you were completely unprepared for and didn't want.

3. When breastfeeding wasn't working, I wanted SO bad to stop. Not because of the other problems (the thrush, the anxiety, the fatigue, the sense of impending doom), but because it wasn't right for me. I can wrestle with brownbear unlike other moms. I can be a goof, I can show him how to pitch a baseball. In short, I can do a lot of tomboy things. The fact that I struggled with my identity as Nurting Earth Goddess shouldn't be surprising to those who really know the "f-bombing, braless, Never-crosses-her-legs, Chews-with-her-mouth-open, Trys-to-Outrun/OutSwim/Outdo-Men" ME. Sure, I have some girl skills too, but boobs weren't in my repertoire. They weren't anything for me.

4. Last, the thing I want to say the most to people when I talk about that dark breastfeeding time in my life is this, but I can never say it since it is horribly taboo. I want to say "I had a bit of trouble breastfeeding, but mainly I didn't like it. It wasn't for me so I stopped." But instead it comes out all blubbery like "We both had thrush so it became painful, I needed to recover from surgery, so I pumped his milk for 10 months and took 16 pills a day to keep up the milk supply". Like I wished I could have nursed. I didn't want to! And when I tell people this, I get pity and "you were amazing to pump for that long". Gar! I want to say "I hated it! I hated that I was doing something "amazing" that I hated just for your sake, for the sake of people I don't know who make nasty comments on internet blogs!"

5. There are some people who will say it's all  part of motherhood. But I disagree. Juts like saying this or that is critical to being a girl, we now live in a society where gender lines are blurred. Not everyone accepts these blurred boundaries so I should have been prepared for the backlash of not buying into one ideal image of being a mother. But I wasn't. I had no idea how accepting my mom friends were on gender issues and identity. I didn't poll them on their beliefs and understanding of bisexuality, or feelings on 2 men adopting a baby.  So I became a "closet mother"? Then a woman like me bails on that duty of breastfeeding, it seems very telling how those friends would react to gender differences. They would hate it. They would hate me. So I feign Earth Momma..knowing that it is not me. That I never want to wear a bra, never want to use my boobs as nourishment, and yes, I'm still a girl.

6. Sigh.

7. One last thing. Like all 30something women in my generation, I am still (STILL!) struggling to find who I am. It's lame, but a fact. Our prolonged adolescence and post-adolescence has made it this way. And like most women, I did fantasize about wearing dangly feather earrings (I don't even have holes anymore), long skirts, and baby wraps, walking in the park all summer on Mat Leave breastfeeding my little baby. And when I think of another baby, that image comes to mind. Which is perfectly normal. Maybe when I'm 50 I will be that woman. But I am not her now. I'm more likely to have my baby in an outwards-facing (gasp) jogging stroller, doing pushups at the park while baby lays there entertaining himself.
In running shoes.

And a top without a bra underneath.

Updating old posts to bring closure

You may have noticed that I'm updating old posts today. This has been a long time coming. Not just updating, but reading them. I swore that I would write down every nasty thing I hated about being pregnant, then force myself to read it when I started to consider having another baby was a good idea. That time has come. I want another one, and I need to close off everything that happened during that pregnancy, birth and postpartum period. I need to move on. I wish, as my therapist suggested, that I could "rewrite" my story in a way that was positive and affirming. I cannot do this. I just can't. I'm not ready, but someday I hope I can, so I can stop being the victim. Maybe this is the other motivation to have a baby. It seems to be the only way to rewrite my experiences. I know this is a huge challenge, no one can say it will be easy or easier than before. But I missed out so much on that newborn stage, either from the trauma, depression, anxiety, meds, or physical problems. When I meet other people's babies, I feel like I never had my own. Or maybe it's just the clock ticking away... Just like a woman starts nesting when the time is right, I'm cleaning up and straightening out the emotions, photos, posts and issues in preparation for another baby. I don't even know if it will happen, but something has stirred in me to motivate me to do this. There will be a lot emotions involved, a LOT of anger, a LOT of sadness. The latest TIME magazine, breastfeeding cover has caused a lot of those same emotions. I hate to hear about breastfeeding, it literally accelerates my blood pressure! But I'm trying to deal. Trying.

STTN Training eeek!!!

After talking to our $400 sleep consultant via phone (she doesn't live anywhere near us, how helpful), we learned some tips to get sweet brownbear down to sleep.

I was advised, due to my anxiety, and reluctance to follow through with this method, to find another place to bed the night of the dreaded sleep-training. After much crying, last minute backing out, then being almost pushed out the door. I drove to my nearby friend's house, loaded up on comfort candy such as Fun Dip, Skittles and a banana slurpie to watch a girly comedy with her and another gal. At one point we had to stop the movie so I could have "a moment" and then we carried on, my stomach starting to twist with the combination of anxiety and candy.

Alone with my friend, I broke down around 11pm, knowing my little guy would have already woken up for his first "starvation" breakdown, when he would cry, and Justin would not feed him, but only go into his room and stroke his face.

I went to bed late for me, around midnight. I awoke from a bad dream at 3:30am, sure that brownbear was awake and crying across the river from me. So after waking my friend and being assured no one had called, I made the call home. I woke up J, and he informed me that all was well. Brownbear had cried for no more than 10 minutes, and there was no 'scary scream' to be had.

When I couldn't sleep around 4:30am, I packed up and headed back home. I got in around 5am, J telling me that brownbear had woken in total for an hour, but not all at once. He seemed to be fussing more than anything, and when J would go in the room, it seemed to make him more upset.

J was and still is a horrible sleeper. When I asked his mom "when will brownbear STTN" she pretty much referred me to the fact that he DOESN'T STTN! No, I don't have to breastfeed him or make him a cheese sandwich to get him back down. No, instead my poor J lays awake for sometimes hours in the night. What happened? At what point do poor baby sleepers just stop getting mom and dad back in the room with them, and accept that they'll never sleep? Did his parents try sleep-training? No, heaven forbid! His mom not only co-slept with him for a couple months (while pa slept on the sofa, a great reason why I can't co-sleep, I like to cuddle my husband, not my baby!) but she breastfed him for about 6 months and they continued feeding him until about 2 yrs in the night. I think it was when baby 2 came along when J was 6 that they stopped going to him in the night. Did we want to wait 6 years for brownbear to stop waking in the night?! NO!!

Anyways, it took a couple more nights, but you should have seen J. He was the proudest papa...knowing he was teaching his son a skill he never learned, how to soothe himself back to sleep all on his own. It was an amazing, epiphany-filled journey. Just like we will have to do things he doesn't like in the future (holding our hands to cross the street, refusing him donuts and candy), I feel we spent a good effort in doing this. For our family, it was one of the best things we have ever done together. ZZZ.....

Color Bug by Kevin Murphy

Source: Uploaded by user via Shari on Pinterest

I just bought this today at Swizzlesticks Salon & Spa in Kensington. Obviously I can't make my hair like this, but my stylist did put orange and purple on one side of my hair, the hair underneath, and it looked awesome. I bought the pink colour for 20 bones (after an expensive hair salon visit I have this horrible tendency of then spending more money on makeup as I make my way out the door!). I found the colour faded super bad during an afternoon at the zoo, but maybe I need some hairspray to keep it from fading on a regular hair day. ?
You can't see the colour, but this is a photo of us at the zoo yesterday.

And this was 7 months ago, when Chuck was just 7 months old. Haha, still a baldy, but at least his legs now hang OVER the edge of the stroller seat!

Escape from Calgary

I had a few dreams growing up.

1. Be in the Olympics for Softball.

2. Go to college in the States on a softball scholarship.

3. Live in Waskesiu one day.

4. Live in the mountains (I think I meant literally in a mountain, like a cave...but what can you expect from a prairie girl).

So 1 and 2 both faded away a long time ago. I am happy to say that a few girls we played against did end up achieving those dreams, and for some reason, that was totally sufficient for me, especially when team sports and softball had lost a big thrill for me in my late teens.

So number 3. I went there every summer, my husband went there, and now we all go there for a few days when we can each summer. There is something so attractive about Waskesiu. My first memories are always the town itself. Quaint wooden shops that allow a lazy day of shopping, without having too many to really call it shopping, yet enough that you are guaranteed to blend in if you want. Secondly, the weather. Yes, it's Northern Saskatchewan. So there are mosquitoes, but like the weather in Sask, there are definite seasons, and the mosquitoes have a peak then fade off around August. Of course, then comes the hornets, but again, a short time then gone. The marvellous thing about the weather is this. You have very little wind at all. Every morning is the most peaceful lake you have ever seen.

Every afternoon brings a wind, then more, then a huge thunderstorm that you can watch from a deck somewhere in town, or maybe from the beach house if you tempted fate. After the thunderstorm comes huge rays of sunlight and again, the peaceful lake, even the sounds of loons on most evenings. Because it is so far North, you get the Northern Lights in late summer.

The forest itself is mainly deciduous, but like most Canadian Shield forests, there are some beautiful mixed forests, and plenty of underbrush. Best of all, the forest still has wolves and bears. You can even go out on a wolf howl with Parks staff, trying to howl to the wolves and hear them howl back, in the middle of the night on a long road where you are never sure where you are. It's so thrilling.

We once went there for Amber's wedding and arrived at midnight exactly. Being seasoned Albertans now, we were getting ready to put on the jackets to get out of the car, but lo and behold, it was so warm and humid that none were needed. I miss that living in Calgary. And the air was so fragrant, yet also full of families up and down the cabin street still up visiting in the late summer night.

There is one laundromat, and one gas station. One fancy hotel, and one newer, fancier hotel, that luckily is just out of town not to ruin the town's flavour. There are definite locals, who seem a little spoiled, and a little snobby, and there are always the summer tourists, but after spending many summers in Banff on the weekend, they are nothing like those tourists. They are Saskies, drinking, partying, and gone by Monday.

I am never sure about living there though. The cabins aren't winterized, so no one can live there besides a few hotel and Parks staff. So you have to really be there all summer to get your "money's worth". The alternative is to have a cabin outside the town, but so much of my love lays with the town, with the people. Oh, I forgot to mention that there's even a theatre there. Just one theatre, literally, one screen. With newish movies. It's also quaint and perfect for some reason. There is one main ice cream place with people always sitting around it. All ages, teens, babies, the elderly.

Then there is the lake. the lake has water that seems to heal, at least for me. On the very rare days (about one in seven) that there is a wind, people gather to watch the exciting white caps on the lake. For Saskies, this is a rare event with water. But swimming in those waves is the most exhilirating experience in my life. It always seems as though the turbidity from the waves makes the water warmer, and I'm not the only one to claim that. We ponder whether it is more a result of the smaller difference between the air temperature and the water (since windy days are always cooler), or the actual waves. But nothing beats going in that lake on a typical hot prairie summer day, with the sand burning your feet as you run in to frigid water.

I think I will live there one day. Live might mean just the summer, but I love it so much. I'm a little scared that doing it will break the spell I've been under with Waskesiu my whole life, but I also feel I can't die having not tried.

Learningtryin

I get so restless when I am not in the process of learning something. It isn't even so much as "doing" as actually "learning". Of course, all that research I did into happiness correlates well with this sentiment, that for true happiness, we must always be growing, which to me, has always meant "learning" but that is a rather bookish way to say it I guess.

Just as Photoshop became a wild obsession for me until late in the night during university for a short stint, when I was supposed to be sleeping my brain into passing Stats exams, I've lately had a few similar obsessions. The problem is what happens in between these things. Will explain in a sec.

Lately I became slightly addicted to the online software floorplanner.com. It's a European designed software that allows you to create floorplans, then design everything to fit your furniture, or a kitchen of your dreams. When I see a house listing I like, I must (MUST!), sit down no matter how long it takes, and "draw" the floorplan in this program until I'm satisfied that I can feel the house before I have walked in the door. Anyways, I'm telling you all this because in fact I LOVE being that obsessive about something. Mastering a tiny piece of the universe. The downside is that we find a house, or we don't move, and I have no reason to keep using it, or I simply have mastered the skill. SO! Lately, feeling like house hunting is a purposeless pursuit, I am so restless for my next new skill. What will it be! I feel I came and went with yoga for many years in this way, having to teach it, learn it, master it until I ruined every single yoga class afterwards, inwardly scoffing at teachers who were not to the level I wanted. Sigh...if *this* is happiness....you get the point....it's not working.
Meanwhile, I'll indulge you. Here is a house I absolutely love.

After mapping it out on floorplanner, I realize I can't have this house! It has way too many windows that I won't have, and a floorplan that I also won't have. But mapping it out helped me to avoid a huge pitfall. It's like saying you want Cameron Diaz' haircut, when you really want her cheekbones. You gots to know these things!