New Mama Musings

Eleven Weeks Today -- Again

2010-05-06T17:59:00.002-05:00

Things are about to change -- a lot -- around here. I'm eleven weeks pregnant; the baby is due on Thanksgiving Day.

I realized the other day that I started this blog the day I was eleven weeks pregnant with Henry. Since then, my life has changed more than I ever could have imagined, in ways I never could have dreamed.

I adore being Henry's mother. He is so smart, so funny, and so sweet. I love seeing him grow up and learn new things and develop into his own person. But I want him to have a sibling, one raised in the same household with the same parents, sharing the same memories. I want that for him now, growing up, but also for when he's an adult and his dad and I are elderly or deceased.

And I want another child for me, I'll admit. There's nothing wrong with having only one child, I know, yet I can't help looking forward to the day when I can refer to "my kids."

At the same time, I'm nervous about once again going through the exhaustion and stress and dirty diapers that accompany the first year or so of a new baby's life. I'm thirty-nine years old (the other day Henry greeted me with, "Hello, you old pregnant woman!"). Part of me wishes I had done all this child-rearing stuff about twenty or even ten years ago, but I know I'm a more aware and patient mother now than I would have been then.

Facebook

2010-05-05T14:39:00.006-05:00

March 2010:

[New Mama]: This morning in bed Henry said (in his sleep), "No! Put it back!" Then 30 seconds later he mumbled, "Never mind. I was just dreamin'."

[New Mama] is both amused and annoyed by the new game Henry invented. He calls it "Sound Search." It's like a word search, but out loud -- he spews nonsense words with a few real words mixed in for about two minutes, and then we have to tell him what real words we heard.

[New Mama] likes it when Henry calls me "Mama-ka."

[New Mama] hates it when Henry tries to get my attention when I'm on the computer by silently pushing the lever to lower my chair.

[New Mama] was coloring robots with Henry when he stopped to watch me work. I said, "Honey, are you going to finish yours?" and he replied, "No, I'm just mostly making sure you stay in the lines."

[New Mama] likes to use reverse psychology on Henry. So I shouldn't have been surprised last night when I was laying with him waiting for him to fall asleep, and he kept begging me to hand him his water bottle for "one more drink", and he finally said quietly, "Mom? You better not get that water before *I* do."

[New Mama]'s son is now pretending that he's a dirigible called "The Hindenburger."

[New Mama] just explained to Henry about earning the cat's trust so she would stop running from him even when he's trying to be kind. He replied, "I'll earn Venus's trust and then surprise her by being mean to her."

April 2010:

[New Mama] is getting a little weary of answering questions like, "What happens if your bladder explodes?" and "Why do they call it a 'penis' if pee AND sperm come out of it?"

[New Mama]'s son just found out that he's been drawing Jewish stars. Henry said, "Mom, I think we should become Jewish since I've been drawing Jewish stars." And then he got mad when I told him I didn't think that would be happening.

[New Mama]'s son just said to the cat, "Venus, I love you. Let's kiss."

[New Mama] recently explained to Henry what a GPS is and he's started pretending to be one in the car. Let's just say that if this is what GPS is really like, there's no way in hell I'm ever buying one.

[New Mama]'s son woke up this morning and asked, "Who's getting up with me?" I told him that I was and he said, "That's good news. I love you more than Daddy." Poor Daddy.

[New Mama]'s son just said, "Venus [our cat] is mostly made of purrs and meows."

[New Mama]'s son is constantly asking me to look up projects on the computer ("Mom, I want a project of a blimp! Mom, look up a project of a volcano!"). Just now he said, "I want a project of a project."

[New Mama]'s son has been SO sweet to me when I've been feeling yucky. I told him, "Henry, I really appreciate what good care you take of me when I'm not feeling well." He replied, "That's because...I love you!" Awwww...

[New Mama] just heard Henry say sternly to the cat, "I want more purring and less meowing."

[New Mama]'s son was just asked to clean up the living room. As he pushed everything against the walls, I said, "Why don't you put things where they belong instead?" He replied, "This is my way. If you don't like my way, don't ask."

[New Mama] adores that Henry says "Mom? I love you" constantly throughout the day and night.

[New Mama]'s son just had an accident and when I asked him why he didn't just poop when he was peeing on the toilet two minutes earlier, he said, "It's too hard to explain."

[New Mama] was singing "Skip to My Lou" (it's on a children's CD we have) and Henry said, "Are those the words? I thought it was 'hit the loop of hot garlic'."

May 2010:

[New Mama]: This morning Henry said, "My pajamas don't make any sense. They have astronauts floating in space, but they're not tethered to anything."

The Vast and Endless Sea

2010-04-20T19:49:00.007-05:00

If you want to build a ship, don’t divide the work and give orders; teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

When I think back on all the crap I learned in high school, it's a wonder I can think at all.
-- Paul Simon, "Kodachrome"

Several weeks ago my husband ran into a co-worker and his wife. They're the parents of a two-year old boy, and they asked how old Henry was now and if he were in kindergarten. My husband told them that no, in fact, we're homeschooling. And not only that, but we're unschooling. (I'm not sure I would have added that part, as I’m learning that it’s often better to say as little about our unusual parenting choices as possible. But anyway...)

The couple were very interested in this and started peppering my husband with questions. Fair enough. It's probably a new concept for them, as it was for me not that long ago.

But the following Monday the co-worker met my husband as he came into work and followed him to his cubicle, where he had written on my husband's white board subject headings like "History," "Science" and "Math."

He proceeded to hammer my husband with questions like, "What happens when Henry turns 18 and doesn't know who Benjamin Franklin is?" and "What happens when Henry gets out into the real world and realizes that he didn't learn all the stuff that other people learned?"

I know the concept of unschooling (which some people prefer to call "child-led education" or "life learning") is difficult to grasp. On the surface it sounds like you just let your kids sit around all day doing nothing. Henry is only four-and-a-half, but so far this has not been our experience. It seems to take just one little observation on my part, or a page in a book, or something Henry sees outside our window for him to want.to.learn.more.about.it.NOW! He is constantly asking me to look things up on the internet, we are doing crafts related to topics of interest almost daily, and we are at the library once a week at a minimum (where we are, according to Henry, "fishing for knowledge").

Henry's latest passion is zeppelins and blimps. I'm 39 years old and I did not know the difference between them -- or that there even was a difference between them. But thanks to Henry's interest (and internet research and library books), we both now know that zeppelins (invented by Count Zeppelin of Germany) have a rigid structure and are filled with gas bags. They used to be powered by hydrogen, which proved too flammable (think Hindenberg), so they switched to helium. Blimps are inflated entirely with helium.

We watched a video on YouTube of a Goodyear blimp and Henry became so enamored of Kristin Davis, the pilot, that we sent her a letter (along with a drawing Henry made of a blimp). She wrote back and included some Goodyear pins, stickers and erasers. How cool is that?

So back to my husband's co-worker's questions.

First of all, I have no doubt that when Henry reaches adulthood he will know as much or possibly more about Ben Franklin than the average 18-year old. And if he doesn't? He’ll come across the name and look him up, if he’s interested. One common criticism of unschooling is that if children aren't made to study something, they'll never learn it. I would respond that if certain information is important to that child's life, he'll learn it, and if it's not important, why learn it at all?

In any case, it's amazing to me that people think that school curriculum somehow contains everything one needs to know. Do they not realize that what kids study in school is determined by groups such as the U.S. Department of Education and the local school district, who furthermore rely on textbook companies? Really, who is to say which bits of knowledge are the most important for kids to learn? By the very definition of the process of choosing, things are left out. Going to school does not ensure that you know everything you need to know to live a productive, happy life.

In my opinion, the purpose of education should not be to make people learn a list of facts, but to teach them how to learn. When Henry expresses an interest in a subject, we go to the computer to look up more information, we take books out of the library to read about it in depth, we contact people who might have experience with it (i.e., the blimp pilot), he makes art about it and he incorporates it into his play. Right now my job is to show him what resources are available and help him utilize them, but eventually he'll be able to do so on his own.

Second of all, Henry is in the real world right now. He's probably more squarely in the real world than kids his age who spend all day in school, an artificial environment in which kids are thrown together with twenty or more children all exactly the same age. Now we get together with a loose group of unschoolers consisting of kids much younger and much older than Henry, and we hope to become even more involved with the larger citywide group of homeschoolers in the future.

In addition, Henry has no problem talking to adults out in the "real world" (unlike me when I was a child). He's friends with the butcher at our food co-op, the children's librarians, the elderly neighbor two doors down and the clerks at Starbucks.

The more time that passes the more I'm convinced that this style of learning works. Henry is all the proof I need.

Venus

2010-03-27T15:28:00.003-05:00

I promised in a previous post that I would introduce our cat, Venus. We adopted her from the humane society last summer. I had been on the lookout for a tiger-striped tabby, since I had one as a child and they're my favorite kind of cat.

Venus is probably the perfect cat for our family, which consists of someone who doesn't care for animals (my husband), someone who loves cats (me) and a four-year old boy. She's sweet-natured and likes to be around us, but she does not sit in our laps. Seriously. You know how with some cats, as soon as you sit down, they're in your lap, putting their butts in your face, and when you push them off they're back a minute later? Not Venus. She has never sat in my lap.

On the other hand, she is very affectionate. She rubs up against our legs, hangs out near me and Henry, flops down next to us and lets us pet her, and even sleeps under the blankets pressed against me at night.

Venus is actually the second cat we adopted in 2009. Very early in the year we brought home another tabby named Jasper but ended up returning him to the humane society a week later. I still feel guilty about this and blame myself for the poor timing.

It was in January, when I was attempting to leave Henry in the childcare at the health club. If you'll remember, it didn't go so well, and Henry became particularly clingy and needy. Jasper was shy and very young, and while Henry was intrigued by him he also started to yell at Jasper and chase him. In addition, Jasper had a few accidents and started to chew on some of Henry's toys.

I think if I had given it some time Jasper might have worked out, but it just didn't feel right. So I returned Jasper with a very heavy heart, certain that I had scarred my child for life.

Yet I still really wanted a cat. For some reason I think a pet makes a home feel warmer and I was hoping that Henry would grow to like animals as much as I do -- which is to say, not become a crazy animal person, but to appreciate and enjoy them.

And I think for the most part Henry does enjoy Venus. It's true that he vascillates between, "Go away Venus!" and "Oh, sweetie girl, I love you!" but I think that's normal for his age. At any rate, it's pretty much the way he talks to the humans in his family.

More Henry Highlights

2010-02-28T16:17:00.010-06:00

More Facebook postings. Deal with it.

From October:

[New Mama's] son had a good question at bedtime: "Why do they call him 'Sam-I-Am' if his name is Sam?"

[New Mama's] son asked for a second helping of oatmeal, saying, "It's so delicious, I just can't help myself!"

[New Mama's] son was waiting for her to finish eating lunch so she would play with him. After watching her take a second bowl of noodles, he said, "GOD, you're eating a lot."

[New Mama] loves it when Henry talks straight out of the Charlie & Lola books: "I absolutely and completely do not like this."

From November:

[New Mama's] son was mad at her today when he noticed she hadn't put the "right" pants on him, so he yelled, "You don't even know ANYTHING. You don't even know how to cook!" Ouch.

[New Mama] swears her four-year old is trying to drive her insane. He just said, "Mom" and when she said, "What, sweetie?" he screamed, "I'm not talking to you!"

[New Mama] just apologized to Henry for yelling at him earlier. He said, "It made me sad and made me feel like you weren't my friend anymore." I'm so proud of him for being to express himself so well, but I feel about *thisbig*.

[New Mama's] son just said, "Here comes a bear!" I said, "Oh no, please don't eat me," and he responded, "I won't eat you; I'm a chiropractor."

[New Mama] was trying to explain "stranger danger" to her son by role playing (what would you do if a stranger offered you candy or toy trains to come with them?). He listened quietly and then said, "Mom, you're playing outside when an alligator walks down the sidewalk and says, 'I have some gardening stuff for you if you come with me...'"

From December:

[New Mama] overheard her son playing just now, and he referred to something as "a pain in the buttcrack."

[New Mama] says you know your kid has old parents when he's playing trains on the floor and you hear him say things like, "I can't lean over like this too long because it hurts my back."

[New Mama] just had the following exchange with her four-year old:

Henry: Mommy, clean up the Lincoln Logs I'm not using so Venus (our cat) won't get them.
Me (starting to clean up): Wait, why am *I* cleaning them up?
Henry: Because I don't want to.

[New Mama] overheard the following exchange this morning:

Henry: There are different kinds of buffers for trains, Daddy.
Daddy: How do you know so much about trains?
Henry: I was born that way.
Daddy: I was there when you were born, and you didn't say ANYTHING about trains.
Henry: I didn't feel like sharing.

[New Mama's] husband was telling her about a scene from Inglourious Basterds in which a Nazi was interrogating a homeowner hiding Jews. When he finished, Henry said, "Now why would someone hide juice?"

From January:

[New Mama] just had to tell her four-year old, "No tongue." I thought those days were behind me.

[New Mama's] son wants to know what number comes before infinity. My head hurts.

[New Mama] was changing into a gown at the doctor's office when Henry said, "You look more pretty with your clothes on."

[New Mama] made a new cookie recipe today (oatmeal, coconut & chocolate chips) and as she and Henry were munching them she said, "These are pretty good!" Henry's response? "They're even better than poop!" Ah, four.

[New Mama] was listening to a Ralph's World song about monkeys with Henry when he said, "I would hate to be a monkey." When asked why, he replied, "Because I don't like to eat bananas."

From February:

[New Mama] was in the upstairs bathroom when she heard shrieking from the family room. She called down, "Henry, I'm upstairs!" and he replied, "I wasn't calling for you. I was pretending to be a washing machine that was overflowing."

[New Mama] asked her son this morning if he wanted her to cuff his too-long pants, or maybe for her to put his slippers on, and he said no thanks to both. Then he said, "I don't need any of those things. All I need is you."

[New Mama] recently read that Neil Young is a huge model train fan and that he set up a layout that his disabled adult son could control by himself. I shared this with Henry and now he has us playing "the singer and the kid in the wheelchair."

[New Mama's] son just said (prompted by an earlier conversation), "VENUS [our cat] is a carnivore!" Pause. "So why doesn't she eat US?"

[New Mama] heard her husband yawn loudly from the bedroom this morning and said to Henry, "I think I heard a bear! Or a monster!" Henry said, "That's just Daddy. Stop your nonsense."

[New Mama] took a break from playing with Henry to check Facebook just now. He crawled into my lap and said, "What happened? You were playing so nicely, and then you just stopped."

[New Mama] reports that this morning Henry is pretending to be a tiger. He says he lives in the zoo, but he's at my house because he's visiting all the people who don't get to the zoo very often.

What say?

2010-02-14T09:58:00.003-06:00

Recently it occurred to me that a verbal tic Henry had when he was three and for a while when he was four had disappeared. And then I realized that I had never blogged about it. I meant to, because Henry's dad and I found it both maddening and endearing and I don't want to forget it.

For some reason, instead of asking, "What did you say?" Henry merely said, "What say?" And not only that, he had a habit of either not hearing or not understanding what we were telling him, so he would repeat "What say?" every time we said something. (His dad and I called it "getting 'what say-ed'".) For example:

Me: Henry, we're going to Grandma's today.
Henry: What say?
Me: I said we're going to Grandma's house.
Henry: WHAT say?
Me: We're going to Grandma's today.
Henry: What SAY?"
Me: Are you listening to me?
Henry: No.

Buzz Cut

2010-02-09T18:39:00.003-06:00

For months and months Henry resisted our attempts to give him a haircut, saying he wanted his hair "as long as Mommy's." Honestly, I don't mind long hair on boys in general, but his was always in his face and it was becoming a collector of both food and snot. Lovely. This past weekend he finally consented to a haircut, and I cannot stop looking at him.

A Little Push

2010-02-04T18:14:00.002-06:00

I grew up in a very authoritarian household. There was absolutely no question that my parents were in charge and that the opinions of the children were neither desired nor valued. We were "good" kids not because we were all naturally easygoing but because we lived in fear of our mom and dad.

When Henry was born I could not imagine parenting that way. I read Unconditional Parenting when he was a baby and much of what Alfie Kohn wrote resonated with me. I had known that my childhood had adversely affected me, but suddenly I realized where my intense desire for approval and acceptance, my insecurity about my own abilities despite praise, and my inability to make even the smallest decision without agonizing had come from.

Parenting Henry unconditionally was fairly easy at first. My husband and I cut "Good job!" out of our vocabulary; instead, we strove to let Henry validate his own accomplishments or to make neutral comments like, "Wow, that's a really tall tower. Can you show me how you did it?" Shaming him by giving him time-outs away from us just didn't feel right so instead we did "time-ins," holding him close and talking to him.

We also discovered that playing to Henry's interest in pretending often quickly worked to turn a bad situation around. When we sat down to dinner and Henry complained that he wanted a spoon, not a fork, and wanted us to get it for him, suggesting that we'd like to see how fast the “spoon train” could zoom to the kitchen worked like magic.

But now he's four and the gap between philosophy and reality seems, at times, to be a giant yawning chasm. He’s stuck between baby and big kid, and sometimes it seems as though he acts badly just to see what he’s capable of.

Last fall Henry decided he was no longer going to take baths. He’d never been in love with the water, like some kids, but he had started to have fun playing in the tub. And then one day, he refused. It felt wrong to force him to bathe, so we let it go for a while. I really, truly thought that eventually he would decide that he was ready to take a bath. I tried talking to him to get to the root of the issue – was there some fear we needed to overcome? – but he said he just didn’t want to.

I found myself sponge-bathing a four-year old. For MONTHS. And then one day I snapped. I didn’t know if this would be Alfie Kohn-approved, but one morning I told Henry that he would be taking a bath that afternoon. I was calm and matter-of-fact about it. He cried and said he wouldn’t take the bath, and I just told him that I knew he was upset but it was important, and it would be happening later that day.

When the time came, my husband got the bath ready and Henry – still crying – followed us willingly into the bathroom and allowed us to get him in the tub. And when it was over he wanted to take another bath immediately.

A similar thing happened with potty-learning. At almost four-and-a-half, Henry is still in diapers. He’s been dry all night for years now, so I know that he has the control. He has just been refusing to go in the toilet. But flush (no pun intended) with the success of the bath ultimatum, I told Henry one night that he would be using the toilet the next morning. I wasn’t expecting him to start using the toilet all the time, but I thought that if we could get him using it first thing in the morning we would be off to a good start.

Again, he cried and insisted he would not be doing it, and again I calmly said he would but that Mommy and Daddy would be right there with him.

When morning came he sat on the toilet, we read books to him, and he peed, and he’s been doing that ever since. Now he tells us when he has to pee and goes in the toilet most of the time. He’s only had one BM but I’m hopeful that this will come in time.

I’m still a fan of Unconditional Parenting, but I’m learning that Henry might need a push here and there and that being firm about things that are important is not the same as my parents’ “us against them” style of parenting. I never felt as though my mom and dad were on my side and I never wanted Henry to feel that way. But maybe being firm when Henry’s unsure -- as long as it’s done with compassion and understanding – is actually another way of showing him my support.

Maybe. This parenting stuff is getting harder.

That Santa Guy

2009-12-07T13:48:00.002-06:00

We took Henry to see Santa on Saturday at his request. He believes in Santa but knows that the Santas you see around town are just guys dressed up like him.

After very animatedly telling Santa that he wanted some Lego trains, Henry walked away and said, "That guy was nice, whoever he was."

Letting It All Hang Out

2009-09-15T18:33:00.014-05:00

Henry turned four on August third and I'm a bad Mommy blogger for not writing about this earlier. I'm not sure why my blogging has slowed to a virtual crawl, but it might have something to do with Facebook. Or with Henry being four.

He's changed a lot in the last six months or so. Remember the little boy who wouldn't talk to strangers? Somehow, this past summer, he morphed into a little boy who WILL NOT STOP TALKING TO STRANGERS. Seriously. I can't tell you how many times I've caught him stopping people on the sidewalk, asking who they are and where they're going. When we go to stores he wants to tell the cashiers all about his trains. He walks up to other parents at the park to tell them God-knows-what. He babbles. He prattles. HE WON'T STOP TALKING.

And this is good, mostly. It's nice to see him reaching out to others. I worry that he's bothering people, but for the most part people seem amused by Henry's exuberance. Or possibly they're just being polite.

Henry has also become more independent when he's playing outside. He likes to run around the perimeter of our house and our neighbors' houses, either with or without the neighbor kids. I'll often go in the house to get dinner started and come out a few minutes later to find Henry two doors down talking to our neighbor Don.

And speaking of my going in the house and leaving Henry outside -- last year I could not have conceived of letting him out of my sight. And I still wouldn't, say, go take a nap and leave him alone. But now if he's outside with the neighbor kids I'll sometimes stay inside and keep an ear and an eye out for him every few minutes. It scares me a little, to be honest. But his appetite for being outside is insatiable and sometimes I've got to get a few things done.

Another change this year has brought...aggression. Hoo boy. I read recently that boys have a surge of testosterone in utero that drops way down when they're a few months old. Then boys and girls are at about the same level until boys turn four, when they have a huge surge of testosterone again. I guess it drops again when they turn five and it stays low until they're about eleven.

And right on cue, a few days or a week before his fourth birthday, Henry started hitting. HITTING. My sweet baby boy, the one I always shielded from other children, was hitting. It was (and continues to be) mostly directed at me and his father, though he does have a tendency to grab things out of other kids' hands and do things like push other kids with his feet. But my husband and I have borne the brunt of Henry's aggressive behavior. One day it was so bad that I locked myself in the bathroom and cried because I didn't want to have a little boy who behaved like this.

Henry is still aggressive, but things aren't as bad as they were around his birthday. Now he's more apt to say, "If you don't get me the paints, I'll HIT you!" I hate hearing this from my baby boy. But I'm trying (though not always succeeding) to be aware of a few things. First of all, he could be dealing with a surge of testosterone. I do think that's real, judging from my conversations with other mothers of four-year old boys.

But also, I think this is such an age of changes. He sees his friends going off to kindergarten and he's more aware that the neighbor kids are at school all day, too. He's started riding a two-wheeler with training wheels (though he still mostly rides his tricycle). He's not potty-trained (yeah, I know) but he's aware that this is unusual and he's done some talking about it. He's separating from me but probably scared to be separating, at the same time. His brain is processing an incredible amount of information...he's constantly questioning and putting things together and just amazing me with his complex thinking skills.

So I'm guessing that he 1) has a lot of pent-up fears and frustrations that he's not sure how to handle and 2) wants to make sure we're still going to be there for him, no matter what changes he may undergo.

This is not to say I haven't done my share of screaming at him. I'm not proud of the way I've responded to some of his aggression. It's hard when someone is demanding your immediate attention and physically assaulting you and you're so tired that all you want to do is sit and flip though a catalog for FIVE MINUTES to be empathetic and react calmly. But I'm working on it.

In more positive news, Henry's personality is really shining through lately. He's taken to wearing one red Croc and one orange Croc, sometimes on the wrong feet, just because he can. He won't let us cut his hair because he wants to grow it long. He raids my jewelry box for necklaces to wear. He comes up with random scenarios to act out ("I'm a yellow-jacket and I'm nice but sometimes I accidentally sting. So when I sting you can go to the snake and he'll spit medicine in your mouth.") that must somehow help him process some information, though I can't always figure out what that might be. He used to say that he wanted to work for Walsh Piano Movers when he grew up, but now he says he'd like to be a train engineer -- "But don't worry, Mom, I'll come home again in time for dinner."

And although he almost always wipes off our kisses he lets me hug him many, many times a day. And the occasional kiss he allows is that much sweeter.

Facebook Status Updates

2009-08-25T20:23:00.003-05:00

I've been reporting the cute and/or funny things Henry says on my Facebook account lately instead of here, so I thought I'd copy some of my posts over for posterity:

From May:

[New Mama]'s son's breadth of love for his mommy has expanded from "to the moon and back" to "to the moon and back and EVERYWHERE and back."

From June:

[New Mama]'s son told her at bedtime, "I don't want you to ever die, because I love you. So see what you can do."

[New Mama]'s son was watching the workers pouring a neighbor's new driveway when he suddenly said, "I've noticed that almost all the workers have tattoos."

[New Mama] had terrible insomnia last night, but she's still smiling because as Henry was falling asleep last night he buried his face in her hair, breathed deeply, and said, "Your hair smells pretty, Mommy."

[New Mama] inexplicably provoked this outburst from Henry in Target today: "You're making my life DIFFICULT!" (Update: I was telling the neighbors this anecdote in front of Henry and when I said, "I don't know what I said to provoke that outburst," Henry said, "You were kissin' me!")

From July:

[New Mama] is still amused. Yesterday I tried reading "The Monster at the End of this Book" for the first time to Henry. One page in and he silently grabbed the book out of my hands, closed it and threw it on the couch.

[New Mama] to her son: "How did you get so cute?" Henry: "I'm coot because you're coot." Awww...but wait... "No, I'm coot because Daddy's coot."

[New Mama] hears this constantly throughout the day (and sometimes in the night): Mom! (Yes, Henry?) I love you.

[New Mama] was trying to play along with Henry's pretending, like always, when Henry said, "NO! You're interruptin' my PLAYTIME!"

From August:

[New Mama] was with her family having dinner at Rio West Cantina when her son (loudly) asked, "Is this Mexican food made by real Mexicans?"

[New Mama]'s son just said, "I love you. SO much. More than anything else in the world."

[New Mama] just had the following conversation with her four-year old:

Henry: Where's the cat?
Me: I don't know. I haven't seen her since we got home.
Henry: Maybe she chewed on a cord and died or somethin'?"

(Yes, we got a cat recently. More on that later.)

Style Quest Update

2009-07-07T20:35:00.007-05:00

Last year I wrote a blog entry about my plan to tackle the problems I had with my personal style (or lack thereof). It felt as though I were missing some sort of basic style knowledge that was obvious to other people. So I started to read fashion blogs, checked a few books on style out of the library and went through every item in my wardrobe.

And then I discovered Peak Oil and started freaking out about TEOTWAWKI (The End Of The World As We Know It). Dressing stylishly didn't seem that important anymore, at least not while I was busy planning for zombie attacks.

I've calmed down a bit, though, and decided that while I'm waiting for TEOTWAWKI I might as well be dressed decently.

This does not mean that I've become super stylish. In fact, I'm not sure if anyone who knows me IRL has noticed a difference in the way I dress, since I still mostly wear jeans and t-shirts. But I feel better about the way the jeans and t-shirts I wear now fit and look.

The biggest thing I learned was that most of my clothes fit me wrong. Once I noticed it I was kind of appalled that I'd been wearing them that way for so long.

For example, the problem with most of my shirts was that the armholes were too far from my torso. You would think that if I had the right size shirt that wouldn't be a problem, but I've found this to be true even with some extra-smalls.

I used to buy small shirts and if they fit loosely in the wrong places I'd think, Well, it's a small, which is my size, so the problem must be with me. (Yes, I have some lingering self-esteem issues.)

However, I began to realize that clothing is cut in all different ways, regardless of the size on the label. Now when I buy shirts I check to make sure the sleeves start just under my arm, and even if I love the item in every other way, if there's a big gap under the arm, I don't buy it.

Another issue I had was the length of my pants. I found a fashion blog written by a style consultant who says that the bottom of your pants need to skim the surface of the floor when you're standing up straight. Once I learned this I started noticing incorrect pants lengths everywhere, and saw that when pants almost touched the ground it just looked better.

Doesn't this:

look better than this?

The same stylist says that when you're wearing an untucked shirt with pants it should be 1 to 3 inches above the crotch.

So this:

and not this:

When you wear an untucked shirt with a skirt, however, the hemline should be on or just above the hipbone. And again, I started noticing this in my own wardrobe and others' and it makes a difference.

Oddly, I even found that many of my sandals were a size too large. I'm not sure how this happened, but once I replaced them with some that fit properly (with the ends of my toes almost to the tips of the shoes) they just looked better.

Learning how clothes should fit was huge (no pun intended). But I also found it helpful to learn what colors work for me and what colors don't. Remember the 1980's fad of having your colors "done"? I read the book that started that fad, Color Me Beautiful, and found it to be surprisingly helpful even twenty years later.

I'm a Summer, by the way:

I don't wear only the colors from my palette, but it's one more objective tool for me to use when I'm trying to decide whether or not an article of clothing is flattering on me.

Oh, and I did give my hair some highlights, and I did get bangs. I did not, however, get my nose pierced, though I came pretty close to it a few times. I started wearing jewelry more often, even buying a few funky pieces from Etsy, but I forget more often than I remember. And I continue to resist wearing the pretty sundresses I have in my closet because, let's face it, a t-shirt and shorts are more comfortable.

I still have some work to do.

Peak Oil

2009-05-26T19:41:00.009-05:00

I first read about Peak Oil a year ago and I've been meaning to write about it here ever since. But it's such a difficult concept to understand -- not so much intellectually as emotionally -- that I was unable to really deal with it for a long time.

Peak Oil is defined as the point at which we are extracting the most petroleum we'll ever be able to extract from the earth, with the rate of production declining dramatically thereafter. There will still be oil in the ground, but it will be the harder-to-get, less viable oil. Eventually it will be too costly to try to extract it. Some experts say that we've already passed Peak Oil, while others say it's in the very near future.

Natural gas is following a similar trajectory.

So oil is a finite resource. James Howard Kunstler, the author of several books on the topic of Peak Oil (including The Long Emergency, the book that first scared the hell out of me) calls the suburbs "the greatest misallocation of resources in the history of the world." I agree with this, but I don't think any of us, urban-dwellers or otherwise, are innocent. We've been throwing one hell of a party for the last 150 years, but the party is almost over.

A common reaction to this news is, "Fine, we'll just replace all of our energy needs with alternative energy." The problem with this is that oil is required to make solar panels, to build electric cars, and to construct windmills. By the time we as a society realize that our way of life is about to change dramatically, it will be too late to build a brand-new infrastructure. Even if we were to begin now we wouldn't be able to replace all of our energy needs ("needs" being a questionable label) with alternative sources.

And oil isn't just needed for fuel -- almost everything in our lives is made from oil. Computers, medical supplies, clothing, glasses, roofing, bike helmets, crayons, house paint. It's an astounding list.

So what now? This is what I've been grappling with. The blogs, articles and books I've been reading suggest that things won't suddenly stop.

What will happen is that the economy will crash, maybe slowly, with seeming improvements and then repeated declines. Sharon Astyk, a Peak Oil author, wrote this in her book Depletion and Abundance: Life on the New Home Front:

Peak Energy will appear as an economic problem; that is, the way we are likely to experience Peak Oil is not in the sudden disappearance of oil from our lives, but in the steady rise of gas prices, food and goods prices, and job losses, along with shortages and disruptions.

Anyone reading this in 2009 doesn't need me to explain that this is happening right now. Someday I'll tell Henry how beloved Milwaukee institutions like Atomic Records, Schwartz Bookstores and Brady Street Pharmacy all succumbed to the economic "downturn." My mom says she doesn't remember the economy ever being this bad, and she's seventy-three years old.

The price of gas will become volatile. Remember $4.50/gallon here in the United States last year? Everyone freaked out about it then, but it seems to have been dismissed as an anomaly. It's just over $2.50/gallon now, but how long will that last?

Global conflict will escalate as countries jockey for the most advantageous position as far as petroleum is concerned. Last August, when Russia attacked Georgia, I did some research and discovered that valuable oil and natural gas pipelines run through Georgia, and many people think that's ultimately what Russia was after. It makes me wonder how many of the conflicts in the world have to do with oil, even while taking place under the guise of religion or territory. I'm guessing a lot of it.

Power outages will become more common, as well, like what happened during the Northeast Blackout of 2003. Fifty million people lost power for up to two days -- in unseasonably hot August weather -- in the biggest blackout in North American history. At least eleven people died, and the overall financial cost was estimated to be $6 billion.

Food shortages are also possible, brought on by a combination of the death of the small-scale local farms and the rising cost of oil. What happens when it becomes too costly to ship food from across the country, or halfway across the world? What if gas prices spike again, higher this time, and for a longer period of time?

Violence could become common, as people struggle for survival. I think this is the part that scares me the most. I don't want to live in fear.

In fact, fear has pretty much paralyzed me since I first learned about this concept. It all makes sense to me, which scares me even more: I feel pretty confident that life as we know it is going to change a LOT. I think this past year was almost a time of grieving for me, when I thought about Peak Oil. Most of my sadness and fear is for Henry. What kind of world is he growing up in? What kind of world is he going to inherit? We've all fucked things up for our children and grandchildren, haven't we?

I had to stop reading about Peak Oil, because whenever I did I felt helpless and hopeless. But a funny thing happened a month or so ago. I started to think about what I could do, now, to prepare.

I've started gardening even more this year, though I have yet to turn our whole backyard into raised beds like I hope to do. But I'm learning a lot about seed starting and companion planting and organic growing practices.

I've begun a stockpile of food and hygiene items. It's all things that we eat and use anyway. But if something should happen and we'd need to live off what we have in our house for an extended period of time (interrupted service to grocery stores, unemployment, etc.), we'll be set. The recent "swine flu" outbreak, while not worrying me in and of itself, has made me think of another use for our stockpile: self- or government-imposed quarantine in the event of some kind of outbreak.

This summer I'm hoping to learn to preserve the food we're growing, too. I'm currently taking an online course on food preservation taught by Sharon Astyk. I've always wanted to learn to can, and now seems like the time to do so. Same with foraging for herbs and food.

I'm beginning to consider what we would do in any given situation: No heat. No food. No transportation. I don't have the answers yet, but I think it's promising that the questions are on the table.

I've also started to think about community more than ever. We love our immediate neighbors, and we have several friends in other parts of our village and surrounding area. But I'm starting to develop networks of people who are also familiar with the concept of Peak Oil and feel the same way about it that I do. The daughter of a friend of mine in the neighboring village had their board of trustees considering allowing backyard chickens (unfortunately, it was shot down). I think my village would be an even tougher sell, but now might be the time to start working on it.

I'm also hooking up with The Victory Garden Initiative, which has the tagline: "This is a grassroots movement. Move grass. Grow food." Last Saturday I participated in the VGI's blitz, where groups of people installed raised beds all across the city.

I've never been an activist, never one to get involved, but I am beginning to feel that it is necessary. The days of not knowing your neighbors, not participating in the growing and preserving of your own food, and throwing away and buying new things instead of fixing them are almost over. And while I still fear for the safety of my family and friends, and still feel unprepared for the future, I'm excited to be a part of the Transition Movement, which aims to build community in response to the challenges of peak oil, climate change and the economic crisis.

As one blogger put it, "People are starting to see peak oil as the Great Opportunity, the chance to build the world they always dreamt of."

Solving the Puzzle

2009-04-28T18:43:00.015-05:00

As followers of this blog and/or followers of my life know, Henry has slept like shit since the day he was born. Never sleeping more than a few hours at a stretch, crying out, talking in his sleep, thrashing, clawing at his stomach, climbing on top of me, asking multiple times for drinks of water. Awful.

I had hoped that two years ago after I discovered he was gluten-intolerant and removed gluten from his diet his sleep would improve, but it never did. I even took dairy out at the same time, but after nothing changed I added it back in.

I wasn't sure what else to do, and in the back of my mind I wondered if this was just how Henry was wired. Maybe he simply needed more reassurance at night than other kids. If I would just hang in there, maybe eventually he'd sleep through the night.

But at the beginning of this year, when Henry was almost three-and-a-half, I decided to have him tested for food intolerances again. He'd had the IgG test done about two years prior but I'd read that the test wasn't very reliable until the subject was older than two years old.

The IgG test looks for food sensitivities or intolerances -- reactions that show up more slowly and in less obvious ways than an IgE reaction like a peanut allergy that can be immediately life-threatening.

This time dairy showed up again, practically off the charts -- as did eggs. (I had the same test done on myself with the same results.) I'd been eating a LOT of eggs, and although Henry had stopped eating them scrambled when I made them for breakfast I was putting them raw into our morning smoothie. They were also in the gluten-free rolls and cookies we got from a local bakery. And I had been making rolls out of egg whites and cream cheese.

So on February first I cut eggs and dairy out of our diet. I hit a few stumbling blocks as I discovered dairy in things I hadn't thought to check at first -- like the probiotic powder I put in Henry's daily water bottle.

Within the first week I noticed a positive difference in Henry's sleep. He started to sleep through the night for the first time in his three-and-a-half years. No more yelling, "No no no!" and getting agitated in his sleep. No more clawing at himself. It was amazing.

Henry's skin had also been a problem since he was a baby. He'd had patches of eczema that went away some time after we went gluten-free, and he continued to have what looked like goosebumps all over his body. And in the past year or so he started to get really dry patches on his torso.

I took him to a mainstream allergist shortly after we had the IgG test done (but before we got the results) and his advice was to lube Henry up with lots of cream before bed every night, and if that didn't help, to come back and get some steroid cream.

Henry would never have let me put lotion of any kind on him, and I was not about to slather him with steroids.

The allergist, not surprisingly, scoffed when I mentioned the IgG test. (It's controversial in mainstream medicine...but then so are most of the things I've come to believe about health.) He said it looked for raised levels of antibodies against certain foods, but since the body sees all food as an invader and creates antibodies against everything we eat, the test was worthless. I acknowledged that it wasn't perfect -- there were often false negatives, for instance -- but I thought it was a good starting point.

And now Henry's skin was clearing up within a matter of days, with no lotion and (thank God) no steroid cream. What makes me sad is that the nurse in the allergist's office said her daughter's skin looked exactly like Henry's, and because of where she works she'd probably never look into food sensitivities as a cause.

It's been almost three months since I took Henry off eggs and dairy, and while things aren't perfect, they are MUCH improved. He still has some interrupted sleep, and although his skin is a lot better he continues to have some goosebump-like patches. I'm looking into a pattern of possible reactions with other foods and also giving Henry some supplements to make up for years of nutrition compromised by a messed-up gut.

Our journey isn't over, but it's incredible to me that I've solved one piece of the puzzle after we all suffered at night for so long.

Always With the Questions

2009-04-14T15:40:00.013-05:00

Henry has an insatiable thirst for knowledge, as I suppose nearly all young children do. He's moved past the "Why?" stage for the most part, thank God. At times I felt like I was being "why"-ed to death:

Why do we have to take the books back to the library?

Because we only get to borrow them for a little while and then we have to return them.

Why?

So other kids get a chance to check them out.

Why?

Because the library is for everyone who lives around here and not just us.

Why?

Because...you're killin' me here, kid.

I thought that was the most challenging stage, that when he moved on to actual questions of substance I'd be home free. Definitive questions call for definitive answers, right?

So now Henry asks things like:

Why don't people call the belly button "The Tube to Nowhere"?

What happens when we die?

Can a man marry another man?

How does the baby get in the mommy's tummy?

What is Down syndrome?

Where does the sky start?

The most frustrating part is that he rarely accepts "I don't know" as an answer. He seems to think I know, or should know, everything. And when I try to explain that no one can know everything he falls back on that old standby, "Why?"

(At other times, though, he says to me, "How did you know that?" like he can't comprehend someone having such a vast scope of knowledge.)

What's interesting to me, beyond the intelligence of Henry's questions, is how he immediately applies the knowledge he acquires. For instance, he recently asked what the word "firm" meant and when I explained it, he said, "My trains are firm." (Okay, that particular definition may need some tweaking.)

He also play-acts new concepts, as when he learned about the way the American Indians were pushed out by white settlers and the role rail transportation played in this. Now he tells me, "Mommy, you're an American Indian hunting buffalo and I'm building a track." And I'm supposed to say, "I'm sad that you're bringing trains through the land I live and hunt on."

Of course he doesn't quite get it; he says that he'll move me to another area and I can hunt there (I'm not about to explain that level of cruelty to him yet). But I can practically see the gears turning in his little brain as new concepts are learned and assimilated.

Watching this progression in Henry is making me even more confident in my desire to unschool him. For those unfamiliar with this term, it means letting children decide their own education. Kids learn about whatever interests them.

I'm simply astounded by what Henry knows already at the age of three. A lot of it is fed by his love of trains, as evidenced by the previous anecdote. He can tell you how steam engines work (coal fuels the fire that heats the water in the boiler that makes steam that drives the pistons that push the rods that turn the wheels), what a lighthouse is for, what the different kinds of bridges are, what kinds of engines are in use today, how the first transcontinental tracks were laid in America and on and on.

I'm learning right along with him and facilitating his education by helping him find library books, following train tracks on Google maps and looking up information online when necessary (because no one can know everything). I'm also hoping to take him to a train museum and maybe on a real train ride this summer.

It's exciting to be around someone who is excited to learn, who doesn't see education as something you get at school (nine months out of the year, on weekdays, between the hours of eight-thirty and three). Education is just part of life.

Isn't that the way it should be?

'Scuse Me While I Kiss This Guy

2009-04-02T19:43:00.004-05:00

Lately Henry and I have been listening to Paul Simon's Graceland nonstop. Yesterday while "I Know What I Know" was playing Henry asked, "Is he saying 'money' or 'Mommy'?"

"There's something about you that really reminds me of Mommy."

Love it.

Commentary

2009-03-03T07:01:00.001-06:00

Henry has started saying "UCK-oh!" when he notices something wrong. I'm not sure how that word evolved, so the other day when he said it, I asked my husband, "Why does he say 'uck-oh'?"

Henry answered instead: "I say 'uck-oh' because it's a bummer!"

Summing It All Up

2009-02-28T20:54:00.004-06:00

Today after returning home from a long afternoon of errands, we pulled the car into the garage and shut off the engine, and Henry said, "The end."

Mother & Son

2009-02-25T06:48:00.004-06:00

My friend Allie is a professional photographer and took some fabulous photos of me and Henry recently:

Henry wasn't being overly cooperative and Allie was still able to get some amazing shots. Thanks again, Allie!

My Birthday

2009-02-20T08:13:00.007-06:00

I turned thirty-eight two days ago and while I didn't do anything flashy, it was a wonderful birthday. My husband took the day off work and after we took Henry to storytime together I got to go out shopping. By myself. Then I came home and took a bath. It was heavenly.

Friends wished me a happy birthday with cards, Facebook greetings and even flowers. Another friend is taking me out for drinks on Saturday. My mom, sister and in-laws gave me gifts earlier in the week.

My husband, though, deserves special mention. He's a great husband and is always appreciative of me, even when I'm not sure it's merited. I don't really need material things to prove how much he loves me. But his birthday gifts were so thoughtful that I wanted to share:

A few assorted small kitchen utensils that I'd been wanting.

A book on teaching yourself to play piano. (We got a "new" antique piano recently and I'd like to learn to play.)

A CD version, mastered and cleaned up, of a tape of songs I'd written and recorded fourteen years ago. This was something I've been wanting him to do for a while, but the time and care he took with it just blew me away.

And a poem telling me how much I rock.

The last gift was in response to one I'd given him when he turned thirty-eight. Here's what he wrote:

To My Best Friend
On Her Thirty-Eighth Birthday

Six years ago
A friend of mine
Professed her love
Inside a rhyme

No memories stray
As I repay
My sentiments
On her birthday

So whether I express my love
On paper or on coffee mug
The following things
Are not said enough

***

best mother best researcher best wife best caregiver best daughter best doctor best sister best therapist best daughter-in-law best teacher best step-mother best writer best neighbor best partner best listener best financier best lover best organizer best homemaker best cleaner best cook best writer best blogger best friend

***

I love you

He made me cry, in the best possible way. It was a wonderful way to start thirty-eight.

If You Walk Away, Walk Away

2009-01-17T10:20:00.002-06:00

Generally I feel pretty confident about the parenting path I've chosen, but every so often something comes up that makes me question myself. Recently my parenting skills were put to the test.

A friend of mine puts her daughter in the childcare room of a nearby health center and exercises there nearly every weekday. I loved the thought of being able to leave Henry in a fun place for an hour a few times a week while I exercised, so I thought I'd give it a try.

I got a free three-week pass to the place and introduced Henry to the childcare room. The first few times I stayed with him so he could get used the room and the teachers. He absolutely loved it -- all new stuff to play with!

The next time I left him for five minutes and returned to find him crying and hiding under the indoor slide, a space so small he could barely squeeze into it. The second time I left for about ten minutes and when I came back he was in the same spot, again teary-eyed. I left for longer periods of time (twenty and thirty minutes) other days and each time he sobbed and begged me not to leave. While I was gone he wouldn't let anyone talk to him, touch him or comfort him in any way.

People kept telling me that it would take time, but if I stuck with it he would eventually grow to love the place. I really, really wanted it to work.

And I wondered if maybe it was my job to give him a push into something he didn't want to do, if I thought he'd have fun eventually. Did I coddle him too much? Was I doing him a disservice by allowing him to cling to me? Should I make him stay against his will for his own good?

But he looked so stricken when I left and so defeated when I returned. It stirred up memories of how my mother reacted whenever any of us showed emotion that wasn't convenient for her: "Knock it off! You're fine!" But we weren't fine. We wanted her to be on our side, and she never was.

Eventually I decided not to push Henry into this. We may still join the health center, though -- Henry loves going to their indoor jungle gym and I'm hoping to start taking him to the pool. Maybe in time he'll want to go to the childcare center.

I still don't know, objectively, if I made the right decision. But a little voice was telling me not to leave Henry, and ultimately I could not ignore it.

The Great Pretender

2009-01-03T20:29:00.004-06:00

Henry is pretty much pretending one thing or another every minute of the day lately. Around here exhanges like this are very common:

Henry: I tried Ramen noodles once at my school.

Me: Did you like them?

Henry: Not so much. They were too salty.

Me: Yes, they are very salty.

Henry: And my teacher added more salt.

Henry does not go to school and has never seen, much less tried, Ramen noodles.

And another day, after we explained to him what cigarettes are:

Henry: Do you want to hear about my first day of school?

Me: Sure, tell me about it.

Henry: My teacher was smokin' semaphores.

Me: Do you mean cigarettes? That's not good.

Henry: Why?

Me: Cigarette smoke is not good for people to breathe, kids especially.

Henry: It's okay. She was smokin' semaphores in the bathroom.

Being Realistic

2009-01-03T20:18:00.003-06:00

The other day, on the way to Outpost, Henry said, "Let's talk about something."

"Okay, what do you want to talk about?" I asked.

Henry said, "Let's talk about everything." Then he paused. "But we won't be able to finish before we get to Outpost."

President-Elect Obama

2008-11-05T07:23:00.005-06:00

I haven't written anything about this election, although my political leanings are probably obvious to even the most casual observer. But I'm feeling so good, so hopeful, so inspired this morning, that I wanted to post Barack Obama's speech here so that someday Henry might know about this historical event in his life.

The following is the prepared text of Barack Obama's election night address:

If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

It’s the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the very first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different; that their voice could be that difference.

It’s the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled – Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of Red States and Blue States: we are, and always will be, the United States of America.

It’s the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful of what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.

It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America.

I just received a very gracious call from Senator McCain. He fought long and hard in this campaign, and he’s fought even longer and harder for the country he loves. He has endured sacrifices for America that most of us cannot begin to imagine, and we are better off for the service rendered by this brave and selfless leader. I congratulate him and Governor Palin for all they have achieved, and I look forward to working with them to renew this nation’s promise in the months ahead.

I want to thank my partner in this journey, a man who campaigned from his heart and spoke for the men and women he grew up with on the streets of Scranton and rode with on that train home to Delaware, the Vice President-elect of the United States, Joe Biden.

I would not be standing here tonight without the unyielding support of my best friend for the last sixteen years, the rock of our family and the love of my life, our nation’s next First Lady, Michelle Obama. Sasha and Malia, I love you both so much, and you have earned the new puppy that’s coming with us to the White House. And while she’s no longer with us, I know my grandmother is watching, along with the family that made me who I am. I miss them tonight, and know that my debt to them is beyond measure.

To my campaign manager David Plouffe, my chief strategist David Axelrod, and the best campaign team ever assembled in the history of politics – you made this happen, and I am forever grateful for what you’ve sacrificed to get it done.

But above all, I will never forget who this victory truly belongs to – it belongs to you.

I was never the likeliest candidate for this office. We didn’t start with much money or many endorsements. Our campaign was not hatched in the halls of Washington – it began in the backyards of Des Moines and the living rooms of Concord and the front porches of Charleston.

It was built by working men and women who dug into what little savings they had to give five dollars and ten dollars and twenty dollars to this cause. It grew strength from the young people who rejected the myth of their generation’s apathy; who left their homes and their families for jobs that offered little pay and less sleep; from the not-so-young people who braved the bitter cold and scorching heat to knock on the doors of perfect strangers; from the millions of Americans who volunteered, and organized, and proved that more than two centuries later, a government of the people, by the people and for the people has not perished from this Earth. This is your victory.

I know you didn’t do this just to win an election and I know you didn’t do it for me. You did it because you understand the enormity of the task that lies ahead. For even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime – two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century. Even as we stand here tonight, we know there are brave Americans waking up in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan to risk their lives for us. There are mothers and fathers who will lie awake after their children fall asleep and wonder how they’ll make the mortgage, or pay their doctor’s bills, or save enough for college. There is new energy to harness and new jobs to be created; new schools to build and threats to meet and alliances to repair.

The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America – I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you – we as a people will get there.

There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who won’t agree with every decision or policy I make as President, and we know that government can’t solve every problem. But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And above all, I will ask you join in the work of remaking this nation the only way it’s been done in America for two-hundred and twenty-one years – block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand.

What began twenty-one months ago in the depths of winter must not end on this autumn night. This victory alone is not the change we seek – it is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. It cannot happen without you.

So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other. Let us remember that if this financial crisis taught us anything, it’s that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers – in this country, we rise or fall as one nation; as one people.

Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long. Let us remember that it was a man from this state who first carried the banner of the Republican Party to the White House – a party founded on the values of self-reliance, individual liberty, and national unity. Those are values we all share, and while the Democratic Party has won a great victory tonight, we do so with a measure of humility and determination to heal the divides that have held back our progress. As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, “We are not enemies, but friends…though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection.” And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn – I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President too.

And to all those watching tonight from beyond our shores, from parliaments and palaces to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of our world – our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand. To those who would tear this world down – we will defeat you. To those who seek peace and security – we support you. And to all those who have wondered if America’s beacon still burns as bright – tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope.

For that is the true genius of America – that America can change. Our union can be perfected. And what we have already achieved gives us hope for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.

This election had many firsts and many stories that will be told for generations. But one that’s on my mind tonight is about a woman who cast her ballot in Atlanta. She’s a lot like the millions of others who stood in line to make their voice heard in this election except for one thing – Ann Nixon Cooper is 106 years old.

She was born just a generation past slavery; a time when there were no cars on the road or planes in the sky; when someone like her couldn’t vote for two reasons – because she was a woman and because of the color of her skin.

And tonight, I think about all that she’s seen throughout her century in America – the heartache and the hope; the struggle and the progress; the times we were told that we can’t, and the people who pressed on with that American creed: Yes we can.

At a time when women’s voices were silenced and their hopes dismissed, she lived to see them stand up and speak out and reach for the ballot. Yes we can.

When there was despair in the dust bowl and depression across the land, she saw a nation conquer fear itself with a New Deal, new jobs and a new sense of common purpose. Yes we can.

When the bombs fell on our harbor and tyranny threatened the world, she was there to witness a generation rise to greatness and a democracy was saved. Yes we can.

She was there for the buses in Montgomery, the hoses in Birmingham, a bridge in Selma, and a preacher from Atlanta who told a people that “We Shall Overcome.” Yes we can.

A man touched down on the moon, a wall came down in Berlin, a world was connected by our own science and imagination. And this year, in this election, she touched her finger to a screen, and cast her vote, because after 106 years in America, through the best of times and the darkest of hours, she knows how America can change. Yes we can.

America, we have come so far. We have seen so much. But there is so much more to do. So tonight, let us ask ourselves – if our children should live to see the next century; if my daughters should be so lucky to live as long as Ann Nixon Cooper, what change will they see? What progress will we have made?

This is our chance to answer that call. This is our moment. This is our time – to put our people back to work and open doors of opportunity for our kids; to restore prosperity and promote the cause of peace; to reclaim the American Dream and reaffirm that fundamental truth – that out of many, we are one; that while we breathe, we hope, and where we are met with cynicism, and doubt, and those who tell us that we can’t, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of a people:

Yes We Can. Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.

Halloween 2008

2008-11-03T20:21:00.004-06:00

A long time ago Henry told me he wanted to be a train for Halloween. I don't generally think of myself as a "crafty" person, but with the help of some examples on the internet and boxes we had in the basement, I think I did okay.

It took me so long, though, that I joked that I was going to build a glass box to display it in after Halloween. My husband said I should take the box my wedding dress came in, throw out the dress and store the train costume in it instead.

Henry ended up only wearing it for an hour, since the day was really cold and windy, but he seemed pretty happy, and I got tons of compliments.

He was all about the candy afterward, and we let him have a few pieces, but we implemented the Candy Witch tradition this year. The night after trick-or-treat the Candy Witch takes the candy and replaces it with small gifts. Henry got some train cars, some art supplies, and a plastic molded giraffe family (all things I got free or super cheap).

I'm still not sure how I feel about this -- I don't like that we essentially lied to him (something I said I'd never do about Santa) or that we took away the candy at all. But then again I don't really want him eating so much crap.

Sigh. This parenting thing is really tough sometimes.

A few more amusing Henry anecdotes, since I don't seem to find the energy for a more comprehensive post lately:

Henry and I were looking at a new book about tools I had just bought for him. It had an area to write on and Henry said that first he had to draw up a plan. I was impressed and asked him where he learned that and he said, "Daddy." I replied, "Yeah, Daddy is pretty smart. He knows about a lot of things," and Henry said, "But not about plumbing."

My husband was cleaning Henry up after a meal recently, and he was so messy that he told him, "I'm going to call you Taco Pants." Immediately Henry replied, "And I'm going to call you Clean Up Pants."

I think we're going to have to keep an eye on this one.

Still My Baby

2008-10-25T19:55:00.009-05:00

A few Henry anecdotes, along with photos from our outing to the pumpkin farm last weekend:

Henry has been even more needy at night than usual lately, and yesterday, while trying to get to sleep, he said, "I want to lay on top of you because I love you." I replied, "I love you, too," and he said, "I love you too." This went on for a bit, and then, as he was nuzzling into me, he said, "I love you, and you love me." And he fell asleep laying on my chest.

We have a book called Five Little Ducks about a mama duck whose ducklings go off to play, and every time she calls them home, one less duckling returns. Finally, one day she calls them back and none of them come. The book shows her searching for her babies in the fall and then in winter, and the next page says, "Sad mother duck went out one day, over the hills and far away. Mother duck said, 'Quack quack quack quack...'" and then, when you turn the page, all of the ducklings come back, all grown up with families of their own.

I noticed a year or so ago that when I read this book to Henry he would get very emotional -- lip quivering, eyes filling up with tears -- but it sort of got lost in our bookcase. He pulled it out again today and he's had the same reaction each time we've read it.

My poor, sweet little boy. He's so wild and demanding sometimes, but also still a baby in many ways.

Boy

2008-09-24T09:45:00.003-05:00

Is it just me, or does Henry's drawing of a boy look shockingly like something else?

Random Photos

2008-08-29T21:26:00.004-05:00

I just bought a new lens on the advice of my friend Allie (thanks, Allie!) and wanted to show off some photos I took today. Check out those eyes!

Some Kind of Comedian

2008-08-26T09:02:00.009-05:00

This morning in bed, as Henry was head-butting me and elbowing me and thrashing around, I finally got fed up, shoved his leg away, and said, "Don't knee me in the chest!"

He giggled and said, "Did you just hand me in the leg?"

(Also, Eeyore is pronounced "He-whore," a cicada is a cicad-o, and the song, apparently, is actually titled "The Itsy-Spitsy Spider.")

Count Ability

2008-08-13T19:34:00.003-05:00

Last night, as I was nursing Henry to sleep, he asked to switch to the other side. As usual, I suggested we sing the alphabet song or count to ten first. He chose counting to ten, and as usual, he couldn't just simply count to ten.

Me: One.
Henry: Six.
Me: Two.
Henry: Nine.
Me: Three.
Henry: Five.
Me: Four.
Henry: Soove.
Me: "Soove"?
Henry: *giggle*
Me: Five.
Henry: Ten.
Me: Six.
Henry: One.
Me: Seven.
Henry: Six.
Me: Eight.
Henry: Four.
Me: Nine.
Henry: Three.
Me: Ten.
Henry: Two.
*pause*
Henry: I was just teasin'.

A Pox Upon the House of Henry

2008-08-09T14:59:00.007-05:00

After a summer filled with one intentional, one incidental and one more intentional exposure, Henry has finally come down with chickenpox.

On Wednesday, the thirteenth day after the latest exposure, he developed three red spots under the front of his diaper. By the next morning they were blisters. The day after that more spots started appearing, mostly on his back. When we woke up this morning, they were on his face and scalp.

So far he seems pretty unaffected, other than an increased restlessness at night. I'm not sure when the intense itching sets in, though. Hopefully this will prove to be a mild case.

It felt strange to expose Henry to sick kids, hoping he'd get sick, too. But I want him to get full immunity and have this out of the way now, while he's little. I'm thinking this is one of those "some day you'll thank me" parenting moments.

Heard in the Night

2008-08-07T20:17:00.007-05:00

Henry has long talked in his sleep, but now that he's three years old the things he says have become more clear and even more entertaining. A few nights ago he said, "I'll huff...and I'll puff...."

On a related note, Henry sometimes asks to nurse in the night, even though we night-weaned months ago and he knows I won't nurse him until morning. Lately, if it's after 5am I give in.

I think that's pretty generous, so you can imagine that the other day when he wanted to nurse at 4:30am I was not about to go for it.

He asked, in many different ways, with many different inflections: "MOMMY, I want to nahs! I want to NAHS, Mommy. Please nahs!" I've learned to firmly say no after the first request and then ignore him, so I was completely silent while he begged in a million different ways.

He stopped; it was quiet for about fifteen seconds, and then he said, "What? [pause] What did you say?"

Three on the Third

2008-08-04T17:34:00.001-05:00

*sniff*

Looking Out the Window

2008-07-26T21:02:00.001-05:00

The city pulled up some sections of our sidewalk yesterday, which is pretty interesting if you're almost three (or even if you're much, much older).

It wasn't enough for Henry to watch at the window.

He had to be in the window.

Henry Says the Darndest Things

2008-07-24T21:31:00.009-05:00

Here are some random funny things that Henry has been saying lately. I can't think of a way to tie them together into one coherent blog entry, so you're getting a bullet list. And you'll like it.

And yes, the photos are of my son's feet. I painted Henry's toenails today at his request, like any good mother would.

The other day Henry told Jack, the very sweet eight-year old next door, that he loved him, that he was his best friend, and that he did not want him to die.

Henry and I were discussing last names. We went over everyone in our family with our last name, and then moved on to the next-door neighbors. The mom and kids have one last name and the dad has a different one, Johnson. We went through each person and each name, and then Henry said them again: Zoe S., Jack S., Paige S. and C. Johnsonville. I guess we've been grilling brats a little too often this summer.

The same neighbors gave us a plant when my dad died. Henry has started talking about his grandpa dying a bit lately, and he said, "Grandpa died, and now we have a plant."

Henry told me that his stuffed tiger works at the courthouse. I asked, "Oh, does he work with Paige (a public defender)?" Henry paused and said, "Not recently."

Sometimes when Henry does not want us to do something, like change his diaper or put on his sandals, he'll say, "I'm busy!"

The other day Henry wanted my husband to help him build a lighthouse out of cardboard "bricks." My husband told him he would, but asked that Henry get out the bricks. Henry said, "But you know how to do that."

One morning Henry told my husband, "I want to make a mobe." My husband said, "Okay, make a mobe," and Henry said, "You're supposed to say, 'What's a mobe?'" So my husband said, "What's a mobe?" and Henry replied, "It's a sidewalk."

Some mispronunciations that I may have already mentioned: apple trips (apple crisp), hop-sis (hospice) and hot air gaboon (hot air balloon).

When asking a question Henry always says the negative of what he wants to know. For instance, if I put my shoes on, he'll say, "Why don't you put your shoes on?" or if a neighbor rides by on her bike, he asks, "Why isn't Patti riding her bike?"

On a recent rainy day, Henry looked out the window and said, "Rain rain go away. Come again another time."

I've been trying to explain the concept of saying you're sorry when you hurt someone. Henry gets it, but he's also begun intentionally injuring me so that he can say, "I sorry. Tiss! (kiss)" Not really what I was going for.

I was reading him a book from the library called Hats Off for the Fourth of July. After I read the title Henry pointed to the cover and said, "Their hats are on." Not thinking, I said, "That's right," and he replied, "But you said, 'hats off.'"

The other morning he told me, "I'm WET!" I said, "Okay, let's change your diaper," and he replied, "Not yet. I'm still peein'."

Henry has long had trouble with the difference between the words "beard" and "beer." My husband recently tried to explain it to him: "I drink beer. I grow a beard." Henry responded, "You drink beer, and it comes out a beard."

Sometimes Henry cracks himself up: "I coughed so hard I tooted!"

Yesterday Henry was looking out the front door and saw some people stopped on the sidewalk. He commented, "There's someone talking to no one."

And today, walking home from CVS pharmacy, we passed a couch leaning vertically against a garage in an alley. Henry said, "THAT doesn't look safe."

Sleeping Like a Baby

2008-07-04T20:48:00.004-05:00

I'm not sure what it is, but seeing babies or small children sleeping in this position always makes my heart melt. The white socks just puts it over the top, don't you think?

Stuff and Nonsense

2008-07-03T20:42:00.014-05:00

Henry has apparently inherited his parents' propensity to play around with language, because he is constantly making up words. If you ask him what he's doing he'll often tell you, "I'm sivvin'!" And maybe, "I'm sivvin' and divvin' and pivvin'!"

A tree that's been knocked down (we had a big storm a few weeks back, and trees were uprooted all around us) has been "ned." Henry actually told me that "ned" means "knocked down," as in, "That tree got ned."

He also likes to make up names for contractors. A few months ago we hired a company to put a cap on our chimney. The woman on the phone told me that Dan would be stopping by, so I was able to answer Henry when he asked me who would be coming over. But when two men showed up Henry decided the other one was named "Fuv." For a week or two he played "Fuv and Dan" with his Duplo people. I won't go into details, but there was something about Fuv not stopping the truck for a train and getting chastised by Dan.

And finally, there's the Piz Store. One day Henry didn't like any of the choices I was offering him for a snack, so I asked him what he would like. "Piz," he said. I told him we were all out of piz at the moment. Where would we get more? "The Piz Store," he said. Of course. And not only that, but the Piz Store is on 43-North (a stretch of freeway near our house).

After the storms I mentioned earlier our village cleaned the trees up within a day or so, which really upset Henry. At the Piz Store, he informed me, those ned trees have not yet been cleaned up.

I'm guessing property taxes must be a lot lower near the Piz Store. Not surprising, I guess, considering it's right on the freeway.

Friendships, An Addendum

2008-06-12T16:02:00.004-05:00

(Or is that Friendendum?)

I've been thinking about my previous post and I've come to a few realizations.

I am a bit nostalgic for the days when my friends and I all worked crappy jobs and really lived to socialize. But in many, many ways my life is more meaningful now and I wouldn't trade that for the world.

I do have someone I can call for absolutely no reason: my sister. No matter what time of day it is, or how recently we last spoke, she always sounds pleased to hear from me. I'm truly lucky to have her in my life.

A few days ago, when Henry and I had nothing scheduled, I called up a friend and within forty-five minutes he came over with his two younger kids to hang out for a few hours. So there's that...

The internet has changed the way people socialize. In the past ten or so years I've met a lot of wonderful, supportive people online through discussion forums. Two of them even sent me cards when my dad died. I consider them friends even though I've never met most of them.

And finally -- I think that if I'm not satisfied with the level of intimacy in some of my friendships, it's pretty much my own fault. I tend to be reserved and socially awkward (or at least I feel that way some of the time -- thanks, Mom and Dad!). It can be an effort to put myself out there. But even if the woman I mentioned in my previous post isn't interested in pursuing a friendship with me, I am surrounded by friends already. It's up to me to make of those relationships what I want.

Friendships Past and Present

2008-06-09T20:12:00.028-05:00

"It is the friends you can call up at 4 a.m. that matter."
-- Marlene Dietrich

I need friends.

Okay, I have friends. Good ones.

But back in the day I had peeps, homies, or whatever kids are calling them these days. Friends I could call up and ask, "What are you doing?" Friends who would come over just because I was bored. Friends I could share a carton of Ben & Jerry's with.

In a lot of ways my husband fills that role for me now. I read an essay in a recent issue of O, The Oprah Magazine (I know, I know) by a woman who finds it pathetic when a woman calls her husband her best friend.

I don't think it is. In fact, I think it's kind of sad when someone conveys that status on anyone other than their spouse.

I mean, c'mon, the man saw me give birth.

That being said, I do miss having girlfriends (though I had just as many male friends, back in the day).

Yes, I do have some. But as much as I love these women, I never feel like I can call them up just to talk about nothing. Because I'm bored. Or having a bad day. Or saw something in the paper that ticked me off.

And when we get together we e-mail and set something up a week or two in advance. While possibly necessary, making plans this way seems so...formal. So detached. So planned.

Is this just how things evolve once lives become complicated by marriages, mortgages and children?

Or is it me? My former friendships fell away after my husband and I got together under seemingly inappropriate circumstances. People in our circle were quick to jump to (false) conclusions.

I had one close friend literally turn her back on me -- which, by the way, sucks as much as you might think.

After that I was loathe to trust anyone with my friendship again, and it took me a while to cultivate the relationships I have now. Combine that with my reserved nature and I guess I just explained my own predicament. But how do I rectify this?

I've been thinking more about this topic lately because I recently reconnected with someone from way back when. She moved away soon after my now-husband and I started seeing one another, so I was never sure whether she was the judge-y sort or if we merely lost track of one another.

When we moved to this community over a year ago I found out that she was living here too, was a stay-at-home mom like me, and that one of her children was also born in 2005 and named Henry.

I e-mailed her but never heard back, so I figured she was thinking, "Oh crap, leave me alone." Or something like that. (Yes, I have issues.)

Last week it finally happened: I ran into her at the local library. I swear she turned to the woman she was with and said something about me, and that when she finally came over to talk she had a deer-stuck-in-headlights look, but she made polite conversation and even said something about getting together.

Which I promptly dismissed as something she felt she had to say.

But then she actually e-mailed me along with a mutual friend who also lives here, and the three of us and our six kids got together this morning at Starbucks. It was all normal-feeling and nice, and we went our separate ways saying we'd do it again, but here's the thing: I want more. I want to be friends again, not just acquaintances.

Is that wrong? Am I just nostalgic for a more carefree period in my life? Are things simply different now?

And how do I know when to pursue a friendship and when I'm veering dangerously close to a version of He's Just Not That Into You?

Self-Awareness

2008-06-03T17:35:00.004-05:00

Henry still mispronounces many words, which is not surprising considering he's not even three. What is surprising, to me at least, is the degree to which he's aware of this.

When I ask him to come into the living room, he'll giggle and say, "I call it 'zoom-zoom.'" He asks me to say the name of the dessert we're making -- an apple crisp -- and then concedes that he says "apple trips." A hospital is a "hopsital," which certainly makes the place sound more fun than it actually is.

What's most interesting is that "nurse" comes out "nahhs" even though he's able to say it correctly. The other day I think he actually mocked me:

Henry: Nahhs! Nahhs!
Me: You want to nurse? Can you say "nurse"?
Henry: (giggling) I say "nahhs."

And then...

Henry: Can you say "nurse"?

What's even funnier is the way he said "nurse," the way you'd say it if you were making fun of someone with an accent.

Which, in his mind, maybe he was.

Sawyer the Saw, or, Making My Son Happy While Killing the Earth

2008-06-03T14:33:00.017-05:00

Today Henry and I went to Kohl's Department Store so I could use a $10 coupon that expires tomorrow. I tried on numerous pairs of shorts without finding anything that fit (why do all pants gap in the back on me?).

Henry was getting a bit cranky, and I couldn't think of anything else to spend the coupon on, so we headed over to their very small toy section.

I figured I'd pick up something creative and open-ended like chalk or sand toys, but Henry latched on to this:

And yes, it is even more horrible in person. It's a big hunk of plastic that requires batteries and makes noise. Not only does the blade whir around and make the requisite saw noise, the thing talks.

Why does it have to be a talking saw?

I repeatedly told Henry I was not buying it. It was too noisy, too obnoxious, just too much. I picked out a Thomas the Tank Engine book and a shovel for the sandbox and he fairly readily accepted the exchange.

As I wheeled him up to the checkout, though, I started feeling guilty.

Just because I thought the saw toy was obnoxious didn't mean I had to undermine his choice. He didn't really need another train book or another shovel; I just picked them out because they fit within the $10 limit and they seemed fairly innocuous.

And the way he so readily put the saw back on the shelf when I told him it was time to go -- he was just so good about following my request, even though he was fascinated by the toy.

When we got up to the front of the store I leaned over and asked him if he'd rather have the saw than the things I picked out. He said yes, and I explained that although I wasn't crazy about it, I recognized that it was important to him.

We turned around, went back to the toy department, put the book and shovel back and found the saw.

And now I have yet another noisy, plastic, battery-operated hunk of junk expanding my home's carbon footprint.

Honestly, I can't figure out if this episode demonstrates growth as a parent or a slip-up on my part.

On the one hand I'm proud to have acknowledged that Henry's desires can have equal or even more weight than mine, especially when it concerns what he does and what he owns.

On the other hand, I just gave in to buying my kid Sawyer the Saw.

Maybe I'm just over-thinking things.

RIP: December 13, 1928 - May 25, 2008

2008-05-26T08:08:00.009-05:00

My dad passed away last night.

At around the time my dad was dying I had gone to bed and laid there, watching Henry sleep, and thinking about my dad. When he was about Henry's age his beloved older sister Frances died of influenza, and not understanding, he sat on the front steps of their house waiting for her to come home.

I imagined that little boy being Henry, and then I thought of my dad the way he was yesterday -- waxy-looking, with his mouth open, and the death rattle in his breathing -- and got all freaked out about mortality.

We had a thunderstorm last night -- the first one in a long time -- and I also thought of my dad lying in his room in the hospice with its one wall of windows, and of the lightening flashing and my dad being there by himself. I wondered if he would pass away like that. (My mom, exhausted, had gone home to sleep, but some nurses were with him when he died.)

For so long I had been thinking that since my dad was such a terrible father, this wasn't really affecting me...but I think I was wrong. He was still my dad, even if he wasn't the dad I would have wanted.

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

--T.S. Eliot

Don't Say Any Words

2008-05-21T20:02:00.012-05:00

I've been struggling for some time with how to explain my dad's move to a nursing home, inevitable decline and eventual death to Henry. What words could I use to make things clear without scaring him? How could Henry even comprehend the idea of someone dying and never coming back?

My dad moved to the nursing home a little over a month ago and two weeks later, before I got the chance to take Henry to visit him, my dad was rushed to the hospital with what was thought to be a gallbladder infection. He developed a few other problems and after an extended stay there he was released to a hospice. They are giving him massive doses of morphine to make him comfortable, but not doing much beyond that. A few days ago my dad stopped eating and drinking.

We took Henry to the hospital once and to the hospice twice. He heard my dad moaning in pain, saw him sleeping with his mouth open, and the last time, saw my dad almost comatose. And after all those visits Henry has asked no questions at all about his grandpa.

This is a kid who drives me batty with questions all day long: "Why doesn't Paige (our neighbor) want dandelions in her yard?" "Why does the road have those lines on it?" "Why do some clocks have all the numbers and some clocks don't?"

And no matter how thoroughly or definitively we think we've answered his question, our response is almost always followed by another "Why?"

My dad has been on the decline since just before Henry was born, so he was never a robust or playful grandpa to him.

Still, though, my dad was present during our weekly visits to my parents' house. He and Henry both liked baked beans for lunch. He would comment on the toys Henry was playing with. And Henry would talk about Grandpa as much as he would talk about anyone he knew.

Before my dad was moved to the nursing home he would fall asleep in his chair quite a bit, and during our last visit to my parents' house before my dad moved out I remember Henry running into the living room, putting his hands on the chair next to my dad, and saying, "I came in to see you, Grandpa!" My dad smiled and said, "Was I sleeping?"

My guess is that Henry just can't or doesn't want to process this change in his grandpa. I haven't tried to explain it because I'm afraid of scaring him. Whenever we mention something that Henry doesn't want to hear, he says, "Don't say anything! Don't say any words!" and I think if I broached the subject with him, this would be his response.

My mom thinks my dad will be gone by the end of this coming weekend, and I still don't know exactly what I'll say to Henry. I guess I'll simply tell him that Grandpa died, that he was very old and that his body stopped working.

And then I'll stop talking and let Henry process it in whatever way he can.

For the Love of God -- Do NOT Talk to Him!

2008-05-11T16:39:00.010-05:00

Everywhere we go, people try to talk to Henry. Invariably he says, "No" to every question (even things like "What's your name?") and generally comes off as anti-social.

I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I'm a little embarrassed that my kid can't even say "hello" when greeted by a cashier.

But on the other hand, I'm reserved and a bit shy by nature too, so I understand the desire to avoid unwanted attention. He doesn't know these people. They're big; he's little. Maybe he doesn't feel like talking. Maybe he's intimidated.

Maybe he thinks they're morons and undeserving of his attention.

Whatever it is, I don't think I would appreciate the sort of attention he gets merely because he's a kid -- people asking my name, my age, if I'm being a good helper to the person I'm out with, etc.

The other day a friend's mother actually tried to pick Henry up from behind, saying, "Let's see how heavy you are." Henry crumpled to the floor. It was such a violation; I was shocked.

I've been a little unsure about what to do in these situations (except when he was physically handled -- I firmly said, "Don't pick him up!" and comforted him). I want to acknowledge and respect Henry's feelings. But I also don't want to be rude to people who really only have the best of intentions. And I would like to model socially appropriate behavior for my son.

When the clerk at Starbucks says "hi" to Henry and he tells her, "No, don't say that!" I don't want to minimize his feelings by saying, "He's cranky."

I remember being upset about something as an adolescent and my parents rolling their eyes, saying to one another, "Here we go, another teenager." I never want Henry to feel that I'm trivializing his emotions. Even saying "he's shy" is labeling him and may not accurately reflect his current state of mind anyway.

For now I've decided to smile and say, "He'd rather not talk right now." This way I am acknowledging the other person in a socially appropriate way while validating my son's feelings at the same time.

Hopefully, someday, Henry will figure out how to honor everyone's feelings himself.

The Words I've Been Waiting to Hear

2008-05-01T20:50:00.006-05:00

"I love reading books."

That's my boy.

Gone Daddy Gone

2008-04-18T12:42:00.004-05:00

This morning my dad went into a nursing home.

Lately I've been going back, in my mind, to the child I was, terrorized and belittled by her father, and I think: someday he's going to have dementia. He's going to forget who I am, who my sisters are, and everything that he's raging about right now. He won't be able to put slippers on his own feet without assistance. He won't remember how to go to the bathroom. He will fade slowly away.

And I'm not sure whether this knowledge would have made my childhood better or worse.

Counting Sheeps

2008-04-16T12:11:00.010-05:00

A few nights ago Henry was talking in his sleep, as he often does.

"Why Maddy take my sheeps?"

He was pretty upset, but I consoled him a bit and he settled back down.

This morning, out of the blue, he said it again: "Why Maddy take my sheeps? Why she take my sheeps to her mom's house?"

I tried to explain to him that in fact Maddy did not take his stuffed animals to her mom's, that it was only a dream. I told him that sometimes, when we sleep, we tell ourselves stories or pretend things, but they're not real.

I thought I expressed the concept pretty plainly, but Henry appeared not to get it.

"Why Maddy take my sheeps?" he asked again.

And then: "Did Maddy take my sheeps while we was dreaming in bed?"

Missing the Big Picture, in the Best Possible Way

2008-04-11T20:02:00.005-05:00

Earlier this week my sister Karen was watching Henry for me. For fun she asked him the names of his (half-) brothers and sister, which he gave her, and then he added, "Maddy is different."

Maddy has Down syndrome. Karen, surprised by my two-year old's apparent insightfulness, asked Henry how his sister was different.

"She has painted fingernails," he said, looking at his hands. "I do not."

One Week Later...

2008-03-23T08:45:00.004-05:00

Last night my husband gave Henry a bath. I was putting laundry away in our bedroom when my husband brought him in, wrapped in a towel, and laid him on the bed.

I asked Henry how his bath was and he said, "Good. (pause) Fine. (pause) I didn't throw up."

The Best of Times and the Worst of Times

2008-03-19T20:18:00.009-05:00

Henry came down with a stomach bug last weekend. He had been out of sorts, not eating much, and on Saturday night he refused to sit at the dinner table and was crying when he suddenly threw up.

I went to comfort him but my husband wisely said, "I think there's more coming," and sure enough, there was. He threw up again in bed that night and many times on Sunday -- including twice in my lap.

Henry has never thrown up before Saturday, so I suppose I should be thankful that he and we made it this far, but it's tough to feel gratitude when you're covered in vomit.

He didn't eat any solid foods on Sunday or Monday and very little on Tuesday, but he nursed often. I watched him for signs of dehydration, but I was never really worried. He seemed to know what his body needed.

Henry's back to eating normally and we had the most wonderful day today. I pushed him on his bike up to the park, where he dug in the soggy sand and climbed through tunnels and went down slides and pretended to fly a plane for almost an hour.

At home we made apple muffins and played with Play-Doh and read books and built a new track configuration for his trains.

It was a regular day for us, but it seemed so much sweeter knowing Henry felt normal again -- not to mention the lack of vomit. "No vomit" has moved high on my list of what constitutes a good day.

It's the little things.

Style Quest

2008-02-29T15:02:00.013-06:00

I've always been extremely insecure about the way I look. (But then, what woman isn't at one point or another?) I've talked about my crappy childhood before, so I won't go into details. Suffice it to say I blame it for my lack of self-confidence in many areas of my life, including how I present my physical self to the world.

Growing up, I spent summers poring over Seventeen magazine plotting how I would re-invent myself for the start of the new school year. Different hair? More make-up? New clothes?

Inevitably though, come September I was the same old me, lacking the cojones to put myself out there. For some reason, even though I thought most of my classmates were morons, I wanted to impress them.

Go figure.

In my late teens I discovered new wave, punk and otherwise "alternative" music and I began to relish being different. (Being different by being part of a group of people being different...follow?)

I also discovered the thrill of thrift store shopping and started to dress more "alternatively."

Back then, I was not all that picky. If it was cool, or had the potential to be cool, I snapped it up, regardless of the fit or how it might work in my wardrobe (such as it was). I dressed a little funky, and on special occasions I could put it together, but I'm not sure I ever really developed a true, personal sense of style.

At the same time I was very shy and afraid of looking foolish. I know that sounds like a contradiction, but I think any funkiness I indulged in was within certain parameters of established funkiness. I gravitated toward solid-colored tops. Nothing form-fitting. Nothing button-down. Few accessories. Kind of a boring, take-no-chances funky.

(Man, I'm loving this hair. The eighties were awesome.)

In my early twenties I started nannying and my daily wardrobe went a bit downhill. I got lazy. There was no point in dressing up, since no one really saw me but the kids and their parents. I saved skirts, dresses, tights and cool shoes for the nights I went out to see bands. Clothing I was hesitant to wear for fear it would make me stand out or look silly went even deeper underground, becoming something "special" I rarely wore.

Then I had Henry. For the first six months, during his infant spitting-up phase, I wore fleece pullovers from L.L.Bean (helpful new mama hint: liquid wipes right off fleece, saving multiple changes of clothes a day). Not pretty, but warm and practical. My hair was in a funky (in a bad way) growing-out stage and make-up became even more non-existent than before.

Lately, I've been trying a little harder. Now that Henry's older and I have more time and space for myself, I realize that I want to be stylish. I want to be more daring. I want to know that everything in my closet is flattering and nicely constructed and goes with other things I own. I want to look put-together. I want to be a bit funky and cool, even though I'm thirty-seven and I have no idea if the kids are using those words these days.

So. I have a plan. Beginning in March, I will go through every item of clothing I own. I'm starting with sweaters and pants, since it's still damn cold here in Wisconsin and skirts may be more do-able in April. Maybe.

I plan on evaluating each piece to make sure it really fits and is in decent condition, de-pilling and sending off for alterations when necessary. I'll be a bit more daring, putting pieces together even if I'm not totally sure they work, taking photos of each outfit for more objective judgment. When I'm done I hope to feel good about my clothes and to have come up with actual outfits and not just disparate pieces I throw together at the last minute.

My hair is a more difficult case. I've been cursed with baby-fine, thin hair, and although it's finally at a length I'm happy with, I'm not sure what to do with it. It's too cold for me to wear up, though I like how it looks that way. I'm thinking of getting highlights and side-swept bangs so it at least looks like I'm trying.

And then, I'm a bit embarrassed to admit this, but I want to get my nose pierced.

I've been thinking about getting a tiny diamond stud for a long, long time. Yeah, sure, I'm in my late thirties. But when I'm fifty, won't thirty-seven seem a perfectly reasonable age for getting one's nose pierced?

In the scheme of things, figuring out my wardrobe and how I look in general may seem shallow. Petty. Superficial. Irrelevant.

But even at my age I feel the labels and judgments placed upon me in childhood pulling me back, keeping me from being who I really want to be and doing what I truly want to do. Deciding to deal with this one area of my life, no matter how small it may be, seems like a step in the right direction.

Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Updated Version

2008-02-18T12:37:00.010-06:00

Henry has been asking us to "talk wid you" lately, and today he specifically requested that we discuss Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

I told him the story, stopping every now and then to ask him what happens next. We got to the part about the bears going upstairs, and I said, "Papa Bear saw that his bed was all messed up. And what did he say?"

I expected Henry to reply, "'Someone's been sleeping in my bed.'"

Instead, he said, "'What the...?'"

I'm 37. I'm Not Old.*

2008-02-18T12:28:00.003-06:00

Happy Birthday to me!

*I've been waiting a long time to use that quote!

The Little Engine that Would

2008-02-12T20:08:00.001-06:00

I've been giving Henry a teaspoon of cod liver oil every night for the past month or so. He's never been thrilled about it, but lately it seems as though he's starting to catch on that hey, this is not very fun.

The other night I told him it was time for the "squirty stuff" (I put it in a syringe and squirt it into his mouth). He said, "No. Don't want to."

I tried my usual tactic of putting it aside and telling him to let me know when he was ready, but after about twenty minutes and a few more attempts on my part I realized I would have to change my approach.

"Open up," I said. "The engine needs some grease or it might get stuck!"

And just like that, Henry smiled and opened his mouth for me.

This is a strategy my husband and I have been using with great success lately.

Henry doesn't want to get his boots on? "Hey engine, you need your wheel covers so you don't get wet in the snow!"

He doesn't want to change clothes? "Let's paint the engine a different color!"

This feels a bit like subterfuge, but obviously Henry knows he's not an engine, and I love that we're making things into a game instead of a battle of wills.

The old me would have thought I was giving in or abdicating my authority, but I know now that it's not about that. Just one more thing Henry has taught me.

An Overdue Update

2008-02-10T20:46:00.000-06:00

I haven't been very good at updating this blog lately, but it isn't because I have nothing to say. On the contrary: Henry amazes me constantly.

His speech has improved considerably in the past few months, to the point that he's telling me, when he doesn't want to do something, "I too tired, so Mommy do it." He does have one verbal quirk, though, which is that he mixes up "me" and "you." I suppose it's understandable since we say, "Give the book to me" and "Here's a sandwich for you" that he would think he is "you" and the other person is "me."

The other day, for the first time, he expressed love for me. "I love Mommy," he said, repeating the sentence two more times. And then: "I love me."

His curiosity has expanded along with his vocabulary. He is constantly asking, "What this is?" or "What that mean?" When we read to him he wants to know what the words on the page say. He notices every little detail about everything, and sometimes, honestly, I have no idea what something is called. We've made many trips to the computer recently to consult Google.

Did you know that the device mounted on the front of a locomotive to deflect obstacles from the track is called a cow catcher or a pilot? Yeah, I didn't either, up until a few weeks ago. Now I don't know how I ever got along without that particular piece of knowledge.

Speaking of trains, Henry is crazy about them. I've been doing my best to facilitate his interest by checking out every storybook involving trains from our library. It's amazing to watch him absorbing the information in the books, and I'll admit to having fun learning along with him. When it warms up around here I hope to find an old-time steam engine to take him on.

Henry likes lighthouses, too, and after checking out a book on them from the library we took him to a lighthouse museum not far from our house. Daddy carried him nearly to the top (the last stretch involved a metal ladder, which will have to wait until he's older) and after we came back down, he tried to follow another group back into the lighthouse.

He also likes to draw, going through way too much paper, making train tracks and who-knows-what-else and then dropping the paper to the floor. He also "writes" his name, making a perfectly legible "H" and then several lines after it. I've written his name out for him many times in an attempt to get him to copy it, but he just tells me, "Already wrote 'Henry.'" That's good enough for me. It will come when he's ready.

He has one more obsession, which when he's much older he will not appreciate me discussing, and that is what we call "Baby Discovery Time." When he gets too quiet I can almost guarantee he's got his diaper and pants down, checking things out. It is his body, so we try to let him do his thing when we can. But Lord I'll be happy when he learns a little modesty.

Memory and Forgetting

2008-01-19T20:47:00.000-06:00

I've written about my dad before. His dementia was diagnosed the year Henry was born and has progressed to the point that he doesn't know who my sisters and I are. He has no memories of our childhoods, or his childhood, or my parents' wedding day. He assumes my mom is his wife because they live together and because he's been told so.

He was an abusive father, a bitter and angry man, but in his forgetfulness he's become more sensitive and appreciative. Ironically my mother thought he was wonderful before, if a "little gruff" at times, and has no use for him now.

My sister who lives next door to my parents has been working for my mom taking care of him so my mom can escape -- I mean, get out of the house -- for a few hours almost every day. Every once in a while my dad will say something interesting to my sister (who he thinks is just the neighbor lady), but the other day they had a conversation that made my sister sit straight up and start writing down everything he said.

* * *

My dad walked into the room and said, "You know what I've been doing? Thinking about Donald E. [his name] and what a bastard he was."

He said, in reply to my sister asking how he knew this, "I saw a copy on the visit stand when they were working on him. He was cussing and swearing in anger. I think there were some pieces left behind someplace. And I wonder sometimes, was he really that bad?"

When my sister asked how he knew he was bad he said, "I heard it from Geri [our mom], I think."

My sister asked if he was just remembering this now and he said, "No, I've known this for quite awhile. I wonder how bad he was? That was quite a trick there -- instead of leaving the guy there you just change him. They probably had him tied down...wait a minute, that was me. I know that the doctor used medical materials to do it.

"And I wonder what the real guy was like? Was he really as bad as Geri said he was? I've seen some pictures but I don't know why or where they were doing the surgery. Maybe some things did slip through. You wonder how many times they've done this to [other people].

"It's my understanding that that Donald was a bastard, a real meanie, so that's why they got me instead [pointing to himself], the mild Donald. When they had him he swore like hell, cussed, tried to fight his way out of the hospital."

My sister asked if he'd like to know everything and he said, "I'd like to know but I also don't want to take it too far."

* * *

Almost a year ago my dad had surgery to remove an eye after an infection developed following an operation to remove a cataract. My sister thinks he believes that during that procedure the doctors changed his personality from the Donald who was a bastard to the mild Donald. And in reality, he didn't cuss or try to fight his way out of the hospital.

My dad's comments may have been precipitated by the events of the previous day, when my mom had a nurse from an adult day care center come by the house to evaluate my dad. He doesn't want to go and he said to my mom, "What did I ever do to you?"

I know that my mom would never have told my dad he was a bastard, since her M.O. is to converse with him as little as possible, and also because she doesn't think he was a bastard. But I wonder if maybe, in his own way, he's examining his life and it's easier to attribute his characterization of his former self to my mom rather than confront it directly.

Is it possible that in forgetting almost everything he knew, my dad is able to realize the truth about who he was? I had thought that it was too late for any revelations, but my sister said our dad's tone conveyed regret.

And somehow, in the smallest, saddest way, that offers us both a measure of closure.

More Christmas Song Lyrics

2007-12-23T09:09:00.000-06:00

Have you ever noticed that "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" starts out all friendly-like, then takes a a decidedly un-Christian turn?

We wish you a Merry Christmas
We wish you a Merry Christmas
We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year
Good tidings we bring to you and your kin
Good tidings for Christmas and a Happy New Year.

All good, right?

Oh, bring us a figgy pudding
Oh, bring us a figgy pudding
Oh, bring us a figgy pudding and a cup of good cheer
We won't go until we get some
We won't go until we get some
We won't go until we get some, so bring some out here.

I want an Oompa-Loompa, Daddy. I want an Oompa-Loompa now!

Fun in the Snow

2007-12-18T20:55:00.001-06:00

Here We Come a What Now?

2007-12-12T21:27:00.010-06:00

The other day I was playing our Time-Life Treasury of Christmas CD, as I do every December, all month long, when The Wassail Song came on. My husband sang along:

"Love and joy come to you, and to you, you asshole, too..."

We like to leave the "Christ" out of Christmas at our house.

Personal Hygiene

2007-12-03T21:01:00.001-06:00

Continuing my series on living frugally and naturally while saving the Earth...

This entry may reveal more about me than you really want to know, so if you're happy with our current level of intimacy please stop reading here.

I thought so.

I used to be a long-hot-shower-every-morning kind of girl. I felt gross if I didn't get my shower in that day.

And then Henry was born, and my husband eventually had to go back to work, and like other things I had previously taken for granted showers became a luxury.

I tried putting Henry in his bouncy seat and peeking around the shower curtain at him every few minutes, but he was not buying it. And by the time my husband got home from work and we ate dinner and I ran around doing all the things I wasn't able to do during the day, it was bedtime for Henry -- which for a long time meant bedtime for me.

I started taking showers once or twice during the week and twice on weekends. And then it became once on the weekends and once during the week. And now I only shower once a week.

Surprisingly I do not feel gross and my husband tells me I don't smell, and that's good enough for me.

So this qualifies as natural, in a hippie kind of way. But what does it mean for the environment and our budget? A quick Google search says that a bathtub holds about 30 to 50 gallons of water; I easily fill a tub while showering.

I used to waste up to 300 gallons of water a week! According to my local water works website, four gallons of water cost one cent. So although 75 cents a week isn't a huge amount of money, every little bit adds up. The cost to our environment, though, was much more dear.

I still wash my hair in between, but I've gone from every day to every other day. I have to say that I do notice a difference here, mainly because I am cursed with very fine, straight hair. But I like not having to wait until my hair is dry before Henry and I can go somewhere, so I live with it.

And now for an even more radical move on my part: using cloth for toilet paper.

Yeah. You heard me.

I'd read about other people using cloth and it seemed too extreme to me. But I never liked using dry paper to begin with. It just didn't seem very clean, and even the cheapest paper left "lint" (for lack of a better word).

I used flushable wipes for a while but when I started looking into the chemicals in personal care products the thought of rubbing who-knows-what down there was pretty horrifying.

It was when I realized that, hey, we wipe Henry's butt with cloth and assume it's clean once it goes through the washer. How would using cloth instead of toilet paper for myself be any different?

I cut up some old t-shirts and put them in baskets on the back of both the toilets in our house. Each bathroom has a small metal step-can in it, and this is where I keep the used cloth. When it's time to wash diapers we dump the contents of the can in the diaper pail liner and then dump that in the washer.

If it makes you feel any better, all diapers and cloth wipes (which I also use to blow my nose) get washed first in cold (using reverse osmosis wastewater) and then in hot. Of course, if you're not down with the whole idea, no amount of washing will appease you.

Don't worry, we still have regular (100% recycled toilet paper) in our bathrooms for my husband, my stepkids and guests.

Like with cloth diapers, one could debate the greenness of this endeavor. I guess what it comes down to for me is that while this process requires the use of water, it's not requiring the manufacturing, packaging and transport of a product. (In fact it's re-using something that would otherwise be thrown away.)

And I always wonder, when this topic comes up, why aren't people ever asking this about rags? Why isn't there a great "paper towel vs. cloth rag" debate? Could it possibly have something to do with how squeamish we are as a society?

Another wacky natural, frugal and green thing we do: use soap instead of toothpaste.

It's not as crazy as it sounds. There are people out there who believe that teeth can remineralize, and that conventional toothpaste leaves a coating of glycerin on your teeth that interferes with this process. And since we try to avoid flouride and only use something abrasive (baking soda or Eco-Dent) occasionally so as not to wear down the enamel on our teeth, it really makes sense.

We're currently using Tooth Soap, but after I realized that it's pretty much diluted liquid soap I've decided that once we run out we'll switch to Dr. Bronner's Peppermint Soap. For the same price of 2 ounces of the Toothsoap I can buy a gallon of Dr. Bronner's and then water it down.

By my calculations, one gallon of Dr. Bronners (diluted with water in a 1:3 ratio) yields 256 bottles of Tooth Soap. And if we re-use the Tooth Soap bottle we already have we're being green and frugal. Also, since two ounces lasts us almost two months, I figure once we buy the gallon of Dr. Bronner's we won't have to buy anything else to clean our teeth with (beyond brushes and floss) for over 42 years.

Other products I use instead of the conventional, expensive, store-bought items:

Raw honey as face wash.
Baking soda (diluted with honey or liquid soap) as an exfoliator.
Baking soda as deodorant. (This seriously works. Just dab a little under your damp underarm.)
Coconut oil infused with essential oil as body lotion after a shower.
Aloe vera gel as hair gel. (It adds a little body and hold.)
Olive oil as make-up remover.

We still buy (natural/organic) lotion, shampoo and conditioner, and we use Dr. Bronner's soap in foaming dispensers for washing hands and in the shower. I'm also in the process of switching us over to Preserve toothbrushes and razors, which are made from recycled plastic and can be recycled when we're done with them.

This is where frugality and natural-/green-living depart once again. But I'm fine with paying a little more for products that I believe in.

And that's pretty much it. When peak oil hits and no one can afford to drive to work, and global warming gets to the point that we have chronic crop shortages, I can proudly say, "Hey, I was using cloth toilet paper back in '07. Don't look at me!"

Fall Fun

2007-10-29T19:52:00.000-05:00

I'm interrupting my series on living frugally/naturally/green-ly to share some photos. It's been a fabulous fall.

We took Henry to a pumpkin farm and he really, really wanted to ride a pony. We thought he was too little and were on our way back to the car when he asked again. We decided to let him try it and it turned out to be the best part of our day!

Last weekend we carved pumpkins (okay, I drew the faces and my husband did all the actual work, with a little help from Henry).

This is the result -- the Daddy, Henry and Mommy pumpkins:

On Sunday morning Henry and the neighbor kids played with trains outside on our driveway:

And in the afternoon it was time for trick-or-treat. Henry was a brown bear:

It didn't take him long to figure out what was up with the whole candy thing. Here he is eyeing the neighbor's candy bowl:

Walking ahead of Mommy:

And back home, enjoying his first ever piece of candy, a Tootsie Roll Pop:

Laundry

2007-10-21T21:55:00.001-05:00

One of the most important things we do to save energy and costs in regards to laundry is to re-wear our clothes. I actually do the sniff test on my shirts; if they pass they get hung back up in the closet. Jeans get worn until they start getting baggy, typically after the third or fourth day of wear.

Socks and underwear are an exception to this, as are Henry's clothes. At two, Henry still spills a lot of food on himself when he eats and gets dirty playing outside.

Bath towels are also used more than once, typically for a week. (We only use them when we're clean, after all.)

Additionally, we have enough rags, dishclothes and washcloths on hand to ensure we're always washing a full load. Rags, of course, are from ripped-up old clothes and the other cloths were purchased on the cheap at the dollar store.

Finally I should add that although my husband has a few dry-clean only clothes for work (which occasionally get taken to the Natural Cleaners) we try not to own any clothing that can't be washed at home.

Now on to technique.

When we moved to our house in February I was pleased to discover that a reverse osmosis filter was part of the deal. I was less thrilled to find out how much water gets wasted in the filtration process. The system is mounted on a basement wall and water seemed to be continually coming out of the hose into the utility tub below.

And then I got a bright idea: the water might not be good to drink, but couldn't we wash our clothes in it?

We took a rain barrel we'd purchased years ago from our local water company, set it on concrete blocks to maximize gravity, fed the wastewater hose from the RO filter into the top of the barrel, connected a piece of old garden hose to the overflow spout and set it in the utility tub and connected another hose long enough to reach the washing machine to the main faucet of the barrel.

Now when we do a load of laundry we stick the second hose into the washing machine, turn the faucet on the rain barrel and let the washer fill up.

This typically takes about ten minutes, so we either putz around in the basement or come upstairs and set a timer. We only do this for the first fill; the washer does its thing for rinse water.

Since we wash almost all our clothes in cold water anyway (diapers get one cycle of cold and one of hot) I figure this is quite a savings in the long run. Of course, this method wouldn't work if you have a front-loader, something I hope to purchase whenever our current washer gives out. But then we'll be trading saving filtered wastewater for using a machine that uses a lot less water to begin with.

Sometimes, though, I just want to wash one or two things, usually a sweater or a wool diaper cover. And although we have both "delicate" and "hand wash" cycles on our washing machine, even using the smallest fill setting still seems like too much water to waste (not to mention the electricity used). I used to occasionally use a bucket, but I could never seem to rinse the soap out well enough.

And then I read about using a five-gallon bucket and a plunger.

Cut a hole in the lid of the bucket and stick the handle of the (new, of course) plunger into the hole. Fill the bucket with enough water to cover whatever you're washing, add a tiny bit of detergent, close the lid and plunge away.

After a few plunges, dump out the soapy water and repeat the process with clean water to rinse. Then lay the item out or hang to dry.

I imagine you could do all your laundry this way, if you had to, or even fairly easily if you were just one person. But I'll be keeping our washing machine.

For detergent we use Dr. Bronner's Sal Suds or Seventh Generation liquid laundry detergent -- and only 1/8 of a cup per load. (This is one area where green and natural does not equal frugal, but the extra money is worth it to me.) Occasionally I throw some vinegar (which softens clothes, kills odors and helps remove stains) in either the main cycle or in the rinse compartment. And that's it.

Now that we've been using minimal, natural products we've noticed how strongly perfumy many people's clothes smell. And I find the scent coming from other people's dryer vents to be totally overpowering.

Which brings me to how we dry our laundry. (Smooth, New Mama, smooth.)

The latest focus of my frugal/natural living/green efforts is line drying. I've dabbled in it in the past, but I've become more determined to have it become a regular part of my routine. In the past month I hung two retractable clotheslines in our backyard and have been using them when the weather allows.

(Note: Despite a striking resemblance, that is not my hand.)

I also hung one in our basement for the winter months -- half the year around here -- when it's too cold to hang things outside and dry enough inside that the added moisture isn't a problem. I bought the clotheslines at Ace Hardware for under $20 each. They're great if you have a small backyard, like we do.

I don't plan on hanging all our laundry, though. Since our neighbors are *thisclose* to us I don't feel comfortable hanging our underwear up outside (it's very respectable underwear, but still). And I don't like how shirts come off the line; they tend to get a bit stretched out and linty. I also still use our dryer (and clean the lint trap after every use!) when I don't have the time to hang things up or the weather isn't cooperating in summer. But I figure every bit I do counts, particularly since we have an electric dryer.

And that's how we do laundry at New Mama's house.

Where Frugality, Natural Living and Environmentalism Meet

2007-10-19T21:48:00.001-05:00

When I was growing up one of my first chores was emptying all the wastebaskets in the house. I'm not sure why there was a trash can in every room, but I never minded emptying them because I often found treasures: Broken necklaces. Empty Tic-Tac containers. Pieces of wrapping paper. Treasures.

Well, I was four or five.

It probably won't surprise you to hear, then, that as an adult I have a serious aversion to waste. At one point a lot of our furnishings, and some of our clothes, were picked out of trash piles I found by the side of the road. (We've since upgraded to hand-me-downs or thrift store finds with a few new purchases thrown in.) I try to get the last little bit out of every product I buy, even going so far as to cut bottles open. We recycle everything we can, including scrap paper, which requires a drive to a paper recycling facility a few miles away.

I'm always trying to figure out how I can waste less of something.

This started out as a way to cut expenses. Slowly but surely, though, the health and environmental benefits started to become just as important. For me, frugality, natural living and being green (mostly) intersect nicely and define how I try to live my life. It's how I run our household and what I hope to pass on to Henry.

For instance, I wash my face with raw honey, which I can buy a pound of for $6.28. I'm not buying a product by Neutrogena which costs more than twice that and contains ingredients I can't pronounce. Honey is cheap, natural and kind to the environment. (And amazingly, it works great.)

I've been thinking a lot about this recently, since moving to the new house in February has strained our finances and forced me back into guerrilla frugal mode. Often just thinking about how I can waste less -- less electricity, less water, less food -- or how I can use natural products instead of things companies try to brainwash me into thinking I need (disposable dusting cloths?) leads me down the frugal path.

In the next few blog entries I'm going to discuss some of the areas where living frugally, naturally and green intersect. Feel free to move along if all of this bores you. I'll be back to posting amusing anecdotes about Henry soon.

My Dad

2007-10-14T12:36:00.000-05:00

My father has Alzheimer's. He was diagnosed in the spring of 2005 and my mother told us about a month after Henry was born.

I've wanted to post an entry about this for a long time, but it's not an easy thing to write about. My dad was not a good father, and watching him slowly slipping away has made me look at him with a critical eye.

When I think of him several words come to mind, none of them flattering: Controlling. Reclusive. Belittling. Bitter. Insecure. Angry. Petty. Unhappy.

I lived in fear of him growing up as I never knew when he would fly into a rage. He was often verbally abusive and sometimes physically so. To him, my sisters and I were nothing and had no say, no voice, no opinions. We were lucky to live in his house and eat his food and wear the clothes he paid for.

I look at Henry now and think how we scrimped to buy an organic mattress for his bed, how I researched to find out the cause of his skin rashes, how I have to restrain myself from buying him more toys, and I wonder how a parent could begrudge their children having more than they had as a child.

Because I know my dad had a difficult childhood, lacking in both financial security and nurturing. His own father died when he was young. The only memory he had of my grandfather was of him getting into a physical altercation with a neighbor and drawing blood. And his mother used to beat him with a broomstick when he wet the bed, something he did until he was quite old.

I know all about the cycle of violence and abuse, but I've broken it and it's difficult for me to understand how my dad could not.

My dad had a few interests, including gardening -- such as it was. Every year he grew tomato and pepper plants in garden beds against the back of the house. But he staked the beds off and wrapped a string around them, a reminder that we were not to touch them.

I think of this when Henry and I water our garden and pick green beans for him to eat. I want him to be a part of the things I enjoy. How could my dad not have wanted that, too?

Mostly, though, my dad watched a lot of TV, and I watched with him: Star Trek. Hill Street Blues. M*A*S*H. Cheers. The A-Team. Remington Steele. Night Court.

I wasted my childhood in television and fear, because of my father.

And now he's wasting away, unable to find the bathroom in his own house. Not remembering the day he married my mother. Not knowing how to put on a shirt. Unable to even watch TV -- the damn thing he paid more attention to than his own children.

And he doesn't know who I am anymore.

Ironically in his forgetfulness he's become the kind of person I would have wished him to be: kind, appreciative, thoughtful. So now I want to say to him, "I am your daughter and you were a horrible father. You terrified and belittled me. How could you treat your own child that way?"

But he's old and frail and what would be the point? He doesn't have the answers anymore, if he ever did.

Two is the Nuttiest Age

2007-10-10T21:20:00.000-05:00

Henry and I hung out at home all day today and for some reason he was even funnier than normal. Well, I thought he was pretty amusing anyway. I can't really decide that for you. Make up your own mind:

He found a long blondish hair (mine) while we were playing in the living room, held it stretched between the thumbs and forefingers of both hands, walked over to me and solemnly placed it on my head.

Later we were in the bedroom where I was sorting out his cold-weather clothes. He was bouncing on the bed a little too close to the edge for my comfort, so I told him to please back up a little bit. He said, "BEEP BEEP BEEP" and moved backwards.

His sister Madeleine brought over a Barbie cell phone (I know, I was thrilled) and he held it up to my back, saying, "Call Mommy's back." Okay, cute. Then he moved it down and said, "Call Mommy's 'gina."

See what I mean?

Finally!

2007-09-18T19:27:00.001-05:00

An "H" Henry can be proud of!

"H" is for Holy Crap! Part Two

2007-09-17T20:43:00.001-05:00

Tonight after dinner Henry picked up the Magna Doodle and started shrieking, "Make H!" He was getting really frustrated so I sat on the floor and drew an "H" for him, telling him to make two lines next to each other and one crossing between them.

I guess he just needed a refresher (we haven't drawn any letters all day), because he immediately proceeded to draw this:

I'm afraid my son has inherited my perfectionist tendencies, though, because he said, "NO! Doan yike dis. 'Rase it!" I had to take this picture under protest.

Because, you know, it would be really embarrassing for him if I trot the photo out during his Nobel Prize acceptance speech in thirty years. My God, those lines aren't even perfectly straight!

"H" is for Holy Crap!

2007-09-17T08:06:00.000-05:00

Yesterday Henry drew the letter H.

I don't have a photo of it because he did it on his Magna Doodle and he erased it right away.

But I was writing out the names of family members for him and then he took the drawing pad and started to draw a line. I said, "What are you making, Henry?" and he said, "H."

Sure enough, he drew a second line parallel to the first and then another line intersecting them.

He's just over twenty-five months old. Is this normal?

Now We Know

2007-09-13T18:31:00.000-05:00

Last year my husband and I started talking about using our last remaining frozen embryo. When we did the IVF cycle almost three years ago, we had three viable embryos after genetic testing screened out those that were incompatible with life.

Two of them were transferred to my uterus (one became Henry, though we don't know which one)

and the third one was frozen.

It bothered me that something that could turn into a person the way Henry did was sitting frozen in a lab across town. But more than that, we were enjoying Henry so much that we decided we wanted to add to our family.

So on September 4th, after a few weeks of prepping my body with estrogen pills and shots of progesterone, our reproductive endocrinologist transferred the thawed embryo into my uterus. The blood test to determine whether or not I was pregnant was yesterday.

It didn't work.

We're pretty disappointed, naturally. But I was grateful that the embryo thawed out fine (this is not always the case) and, as a friend put it, we were able to bring it home.

And How Was Your Day?

2007-09-07T20:20:00.000-05:00

I knew that when I became a mother any sense of modesty I had enjoyed up until then would disappear. I just had no idea how far the other way the pendulum would swing.

Today I went number two with a small human draped across my lap, pressing down on my legs to "help get the poopies out." This was followed by a discussion of how no, the poop does not come out of the vagina; it comes out of the anus.

Followed by a listing of every family member and how they all poop out of their anuses too.

Declaring the Eternal "Es"

2007-08-25T18:48:00.000-05:00

I realized recently that Henry's word for "nurse" and the way he pronounces "yes" are one and the same.

Es, es...the eternal es.

Smart Art

2007-08-19T09:36:00.000-05:00

Henry has enjoyed scribbling for a long time now, but suddenly, the other day, he was actually drawing.

We were playing outside and when the neighbor girl drew a star with a piece of chalk, he picked up some chalk and said he was going to make a star, too. He drew an oval with a line through it, and then started to draw spikes extending from the perimeter. He said it was a sun. But when he finished making the spikes, he stood up, looked at it, and said, "Beetle!"

Next he made this:

and said it was a castle.

This is a boat:

and this is a construction crane:

I commented on the drawings, saying things like I noticed that the beetle had a stripe down his back, or that the boat looked just like the ones we see on Lake Michigan. I don't want Henry to look to me for praise for everything he does, but I do want to show him I'm paying attention. I admit, though, that it took everything in me not to tell him how incredibly smart and wonderful and amazing and gifted he is.

But he is, isn't he?

"What do you sayyyyy?"

2007-08-18T20:24:00.000-05:00

A few months ago Henry started adding "NOW" to the end of his requests, i.e., "Fruit bar NOW."

While it amused me a little to see such a small person demanding what he wanted, it also made me think about the best way to teach Henry civility.

I really, really hate it when parents prompt their kids with "What do you sayyyyy?" or "What's the magic word?" I don't want Henry saying please or thank you merely because it's been drilled into his head to do so. I want him to be polite because he knows it makes other people feel good. Because it makes him feel good about himself. And because it makes the world a nicer place.

I think it's important as a parent to lead by example. So instead of telling Henry he needed to say "please," I started repeating his requests and adding "please" to it. ("You'd like a fruit bar, please? Okay, let's get you one!") And I always make sure to thank him for anything he does to help (or anything he does that he thinks is helping).

Suddenly in the past few weeks my boy is a please-and-thank-you machine. He'll grab something he shouldn't, and when I say, "Henry, please don't play with that," he'll immediately give it to me and say, "Danes you Mommy." (He's a bit mixed up on when to say it, and a lot of the time it comes out "Danes you Henny," but that's okay.)

Now when he wants a treat, he says "Fruit bar pease." When he wants to get up in the morning, it's "All done pease."

The one that gets me right here, though, is "Es (nurse) Mommy pease."

I realize that Henry is saying these things without really knowing what they mean and that this comes dangerously close to him saying it only because it's been drilled into his head to do so. But there's a difference: I'm not hounding him about it; he's picking it up on his own. And that's how kids learn language.

Henry still doesn't say these things at all the appropriate times. And for now other adults don't expect him to. However, even in a year or two, when I might be expected to prompt him, I don't plan on doing it.

I do plan on commenting, "Wow, that was really nice of Isabella's mommy to share their treats with you. Thank you, Jennifer!" or "Grandma drove to a special store to buy that book just for you. Wasn't that thoughtful?"

The idea is to get Henry thinking about other people's feelings. I want him to grow up to say and do things for the right reasons, to be guided by his own moral compass.

Learning politeness on his own -- not with me demanding it from him -- is one step in that direction.

Blue Hands Group (Fun with Chalk)

2007-08-12T21:17:00.000-05:00

"No! Brush Off!"

2007-08-09T20:26:00.000-05:00

Lately if Henry is the object of any unwanted attention -- a kiss, a hug, a touch on the arm, a wave -- he takes one hand and "wipes" it off, saying, "NO! Brush off!"

He also doesn't like it when my husband kisses me and insists on wiping my mouth off afterward, frequently smearing Carmex all over my face in the process.

I guess it's a good thing that he can assert himself this way, righting what he perceives to be a wrong.

If only every injustice were so easily corrected.

Happy Tooey! Cha Cha Cha

2007-08-03T08:50:00.001-05:00

My baby turns two today. *sniff*

Who knew this tiny little thing...

would become this crazy kid?

Happy Tooey (translation: Happy Birthday To You!) my little one.

Cha cha cha.

Ding!

2007-07-30T21:15:00.000-05:00

Henry has been showing more of an interest in toileting issues lately. He likes to look in the toilet and see the water; he usually tells us when he has a dirty diaper; and he wants to inspect his poop after we change him.

The other day Henry was in the family room with my husband, a room that's gated because he's normally not allowed in it. He went to the closed gate and said, "Poopy." My husband checked his diaper, but it was clean.

Henry really seemed to be hanging on the gate, however, so my husband opened it and Henry ran into the other room. A few minutes later he came back and said, "Poopy ready."

And now, for your diaper-changing enjoyment...

The Henry-to-English Dictionary

2007-07-19T18:46:00.000-05:00

Henry's been talking up a storm. Here are a few gems:

Home DEEM-poh: Home Depot
Booey, stah-bee, ras-bee: Blueberries, strawberries, raspberries
Ahp-so: Outpost, our natural foods co-op
Henny Hoe-nie: his name, Henry Holden...it's particularly funny when he mimics my inflection: HEN-ny HOE-nie!
Bock PAH-tee: block party
Doan wan to: don't want to
Top-pee: coffee
Wa-wa mo-mo: watermelon
Yi-yay: library
P'AHgo (soft "g" sound): parking garage -- or translated literally, "parking garage door"
Ohnee: open
Poptorn: popcorn
Bean BEE-tull: green beetle
Bimpler: sprinkler
Ace Hah-doe: Ace Hardware
Fuht bah: fruit bar
Wa-wa bah-wull: water bottle
Tuit: carrot
Suzie: scissors
Bain-bint: bacon
Boonie: building
Happy Tooey!: Happy Birthday (to you)

The World's Longest Eyelashes

2007-07-18T16:23:00.000-05:00

Nature Center

2007-07-18T16:06:00.001-05:00

On Sunday we went with our neighbors to a nature center about a forty-five minute drive from our house.

Their seven-year old, Jack, had recently gone to day camp there and was eager to show us around.

There were lots of paths for running on.

Jack was especially excited about the island, which he called "the most beautiful place in the world."

Henry wasn't too sure about everything he saw, but I think overall he had a good time.

Eight Things About Me

2007-07-17T20:39:00.000-05:00

I've been tagged by Caitlin to post "Eight Things About Me." Here they are.

My favorite movie is It's a Wonderful Life.
I was carjacked at gunpoint when I was twenty-one.
My second toe is longer than my big toe on both feet.
I have been to Germany (twice), Amsterdam, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Italy.
In 1993 I attended in the National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights.
I used to play guitar and sing and have written several songs.
If I were a boy I would have been named David.
I dropped out of Girl Scouts after the first meeting.

I tag Gearhead Mama, bfmomma and Mere Mortal Mama.

My Beautiful Boy

2007-07-08T21:51:00.004-05:00

I honestly get overwhelmed sometimes when I think about Henry. I remember when I first found out we were having a boy and I expressed my minor disppointment on one of the message boards I frequent. The response was what I knew intellectually: that after I had my son I wouldn't want things any other way. One woman said that her son was her little buddy, following her everywhere.

I now know this in my heart as well as in my head. And Henry is my buddy. The bond we have is something I've never experienced before, and it's so precious to me. I'm pretty much Henry's world, and I take that responsibility very seriously. But then, he's my world too.

Is the Skin the Window to the Gut?

2007-07-01T09:14:00.000-05:00

As I mentioned in a previous post, Henry has some skin issues that continue to stump me.

This is what his face looks like sometimes:

These marks usually come and go within a day, and I think they may be caused by fruit. Yesterday they showed up after Henry ate some dried strawberries, then faded a bit, and then flared up again after we shared a blended raspberry drink at Summerfest. I'm going to cut fruit out of his diet for a week to see if I notice a difference. (Oh, the cries of "Smooey! Smooey!" -- smoothie -- this morning!)

He also gets raised rough patches, mostly on the backs and insides of his thighs. The redness comes and goes, but the patches stay for weeks. Here's a photo I took last night (it's not a great picture, but you get the idea):

These marks are also the same kind that covered his back before we took him (and me) off dairy. I'm pretty careful about our diets, so I'm puzzled as to why he's still getting them. Another food intolerance, maybe?

Summerfest, Part Deux

2007-06-30T17:09:00.000-05:00

My husband, Henry and I just got back from Summerfest, where we pretty much did everything but listen to music -- a total turnaround from our lives PH (Pre-Henry) when we'd go several times, but only to see specific bands. We did try to take Henry to see a friend's band, but even with his sound-dampening headphones on he seemed kind of freaked out by how loud it was.

So we got some lunch, played in the children's area, petted a lizard,

explored the newly opened Lakeshore State Park

-- which included walking down a ramp to a floating deck --

played in the splash pad,

and overall had a wonderful, family-friendly day.

"...and Let Medicine Be Thy Food" -- Hippocrates

2007-06-28T21:41:00.002-05:00

So, where was I?

In part one of this post I discussed my growing interest in celiac disease. I should probably stop and explain just what celiac disease is, or at least how it's medically defined.

Celiac disease is an autoimmune disorder in which one's immune system views gluten -- a protein found in wheat, barley and rye -- as an invader. The body responds by creating an inflammation in the small intestine, which damages the villi (fingerlike projections lining the small intestine) and prevents absorption of nutrients from other foods. The medical gold standard for diagnosis is blood testing to identify antibodies against gliadin (a simple protein derived from gluten) and then, if the tests are positive, a biopsy of the small intestine to check for flattened villi.

There are many problems associated with this "gold standard," however -- false negatives are very common in both the blood tests and the biopsies. In biopsies part of the problem is that the small intestine is roughly 21 feet long (yes, you read that correctly), and if damage has occurred in only certain spots it's quite possible the biopsy will miss the damaged area and be taken from a "healthy" section instead.

So I started thinking that testing wasn't all it was cracked up to be -- you could have blood drawn and even have a tube stuck down your throat and your intestine scraped, and still have unreliable and inaccurate test results. And since Henry wasn't exhibiting any of the "classic" symptoms associated with the disease (malnutrition, distended abdomen, diarrhea) I wasn't sure his villi were actually damaged anyway. Also, false negatives are even more common in young children.

The more I read the more I started to think that mainstream medicine views this issue with too narrow of a focus. Again and again I read reports of people suffering terrible health problems who tested negative for celiac disease. Often their doctors told them they couldn't possibly have a problem with gluten, and sometimes they were even told that it was all in their head. These same people, after going gluten-free on their own initiative, noticed incredible improvement in their health.

It occurred to me that if doctors are waiting until they can see completely damaged villi before diagnosing someone as having celiac disease...how do they think that damage occurred? Did it just magically appear? Or more likely, did it start out as an intolerance to gluten that created problems little by little for years until the patient was desperately ill?

I now think gluten intolerance is the real issue and celiac disease merely one possible symptom of it. It seems like gluten, in someone who is intolerant to it, harms health in many different ways.

If you have celiac disease, you are gluten intolerant. If you are gluten intolerant, you may or may not have celiac disease. You also may or may not have:

Fatigue
Depression
Addison's disease
Gastrointestinal problems, like gas, bloating, diarrhea, constipation or reflux
Headaches
Infertility/Amenorrhea
Mouth sores
Weight loss/gain
Fuzzy thinking
Bone/joint/muscle pain
Poor formation of dental enamel
Anemia
Eczema
Seizures
Sinus problems
Tingling or numbness in the extremities
Hair loss

If you visit your doctor with any of these complaints -- hell, all of these complaints -- he or she is unlikely to suggest that you may be intolerant to gluten. Possibly, if you have severe diarrhea and exhibit signs of malnutrition, he/she might test you for celiac disease, but if your blood tests or biopsy come back negative, you will probably be told you don't have a problem with gluten.

I believe this is a situation where we need to listen to our bodies and do our own research. (Okay, that's every situation.) And since Henry is counting on me to do what's right for him, I scoured message boards and PubMed and finally found EnteroLab. EnteroLab tests stool samples for food sensitivities and specializes in gluten intolerance. Their tests are supposed to be much more sensitive and accurate than the blood tests traditionally used, since the immune response takes place in the intestine and not in the blood. You don't need a doctor's order to have any testing done by them. And although most mainstream physicians do not accept EnteroLab's test results, Dr. Fine, who perfected this mode of testing, has an impressive resume, which includes Staff Gastroenterologist at Baylor University Medical Center.

So I placed an order for the "Gluten Sensitivity Stool and Gene Panel Complete" which includes a gluten sensitivity stool test, tissue transglutaminase stool test (test for the autoimmune reaction caused by gluten sensitivity), intestinal malabsorption test, gluten sensitivity gene test and a free milk sensitivity stool test.

The testing package came, I swabbed the inside of Henry's cheeks (for the gene test), collected and froze his poop and dropped the whole thing off at UPS. And then I waited.

On May 23rd Henry's test results were e-mailed to me, and they indicated a very high immune response to gluten. Luckily, he did not seem to have any issues with malabsorption; my guess is that if he'd continued ingesting gluten it would only be a matter of time before he did. He also tested positive for a sensitivity to casein (the protein in milk), something we already knew from the testing done by the naturopath.

I had taken both of us off gluten (and dairy) about four weeks prior to receiving the test results -- even before sending in the test -- and I had already noticed a few changes.

The bumps on Henry's cheeks seemed to be disappearing, though the ones on his upper arms weren't changing much. (Photo is from August of last year.)

For my part, I noticed that my light-headedness was gone almost immediately. I thought I was feeling more energetic, and possibly less achy too.

It's now been nine weeks since we started eating gluten-free. The bumps on Henry's arms are finally starting to go away and his cheeks are completely smooth. I often stroke his cheeks while he's nursing and I have to admit, I feel vindicated: I knew those bumps were an indication that something was wrong. I knew it, I knew it, I knew it.

His stool is looking better, too, though I didn't realize it was abnormal before. Light-colored and slightly loose poops, as Henry had previously, are one sign of gluten intolerance. His dirty diapers now look much more normal. (Aren't you glad you know?)

He does still get some red patches on his skin, along with random bumps. I suspect we might be dealing with other food intolerances, or yeast issues, and I'm continuing to investigate.

And me? I'm feeling...not so great. I'm beginning to believe that the reason I felt so good in the beginning was that I was eating very little grains, simple carbs or sugar. But then I discovered a great big world of gluten- and dairy-free processed treats: cake, brownies, cookies and biscotti. (Just because it's gluten-free does not mean it's healthy.)

I think I'm currently dealing with candida overgrowth -- something common in those with gluten intolerance, by the way -- and I'm on day one of a anti-candida, healing regimen.

Ironically, it's a low-carb eating plan. Back in the day, when I was a vegan eating granola for breakfast, pasta for lunch, muffins for snacks and dinner rolls with, well, dinner, I mocked people on low-carb diets.

See how things have come full circle?

Seriously, though, in one year I went from eating lots of processed soy, low fat, lots of carbs/grains, and no meat or dairy. A year later, I'm eating no soy, lots of "good" fats (coconut oil and eggs), very little carbs and no grains, and lots of (organic, grass-fed) meat.

I also learned that I may have a problem with gluten; Henry's gene test showed two genes for gluten intolerance, and I gave him one of them. And from my research it seems like a heck of a lot of people have an auto-immune response to gluten.

And it's all because of Henry. His health is the primary reason I've been reading and researching and trying really hard to do what's right. Isn't that the amazing thing about having children?

The Passing

2007-06-08T17:21:00.000-05:00

I promise I'm working on part two of my post about diet and health, but I wanted to write about something that's on my mind today.

My Uncle Richard -- my mom's brother -- passed away last night. It was expected; he'd had lung cancer and it was obvious to everyone that the end was near. My mom called this morning to tell me and said that the visitation and funeral would likely be next Monday or Tuesday.

I was sad, of course, but mainly in the way that it's sobering when anyone you know dies. I wasn't particularly close to him, even though he was my godfather and possibly the relative I saw the most growing up. Our family just isn't connected like that.

An hour or so later my sister called. She'd spent some time with my parents this morning and heard more details about my uncle's passing. Apparently my aunt was helping my uncle back from the bathroom in the middle of the night when he suddenly slumped over the bed. Blood began pouring out of his mouth, and then he was gone.

The last words he spoke were to call out for his mother.

I don't know if in some place between life and death Uncle Richard actually saw my grandmother, who died thirty-six years ago. Maybe it's just that it's a primal instinct to call for your mother, at your most vulnerable moment, no matter how old you are.

Then I thought of Henry. He will, most likely and hopefully, live long after I am gone. But I thought of him calling for his mother in his darkest, most difficult moment. I am that person to him.

The tears came, then.

Doesn't Miss A Thing

2007-06-06T20:56:00.001-05:00

When nursing Henry I often stroke his hair and say "my sweet baby" or "my sweet guy."

The other night while I was nursing Henry to sleep we had this exchange:

Me: Are you my sweet baby?

~ silence ~

Me: Yes, you are. You're my sweet baby.
Henry: Guy. Too.

"Let Food Be Thy Medicine..."

2007-05-30T21:53:00.001-05:00

When I started this blog I fully intended to someday write an entry about why I was raising my child vegan. I had been a vegetarian for over ten years and a vegan (with occasional lapses) for about three and I was convinced that it was the best way to eat. My prime motivation was health, though the "no-animals-were-harmed-during-the-making-of-this-meal" aspect was a nice bonus.

I won't go into the details of why I felt this way. Suffice it to say that I had done a lot of reading on the subject and felt fairly confident in my choice: nothing but whole grains, vegetables, legumes and fruit for my baby. And then...

For the first few months of Henry's life he was very fussy. He was up most of the night, every night, crying and pumping his little legs. Clearly he was in pain. We tried the "I Love You" massage, The Miracle Blanket, The Five S's System and the Hotsling. We took him to his pediatrician, a chiropractor, a homeopath and a cranio-sacral therapist. We tried Hyland's Colic Tablets, Cocyntal (for colic) by Boiron and Gripe Water.

And since Henry was exclusively breastfed, I went on an elimination diet, thinking he might be sensitive to something I was eating. At one point I had cut out wheat, soy, dairy (falling off the vegan wagon really did a number on him) and tomatoes. Since I was already not eating meat or eggs this severely limited my diet. I was stressed out, hungry all the time and the skinniest I've ever been in my life.

But still Henry cried. He also started spitting up.

Henry's doctor assured us that some babies just cry a lot, that spitting up was normal and that Henry would grow out of it. Not to worry. (He was a little more concerned with Henry's occasional violent, strangling cough, but since it happened only every so often he didn't think we needed to take any action.)

But I didn't accept that any of this was normal or healthy. I'm a big believer that there's a reason for everything, and Henry's discomfort was an indication that something was not agreeing with him: his body was unable to completely handle something he was eating, breathing or absorbing through his skin. The fact that I couldn't figure out what it was meant that I was failing him.

At six months or so the spitting up stopped. He stopped crying in the nighttime, too, for the most part, but he still nursed all night long and slept fitfully.

At around nine months -- about the same time he started eating his first solid food -- Henry developed bumps on his cheeks and upper arms. The bumps on his arms were mostly flesh-colored, so not really noticeable, but the ones on his cheeks frequently became red and inflamed for no obvious reason.

Again I sought the pediatrician's advice and again he told me there was nothing to worry about. The bumps were keratosis pilaris, he said, and very common. The ones on Henry's arms would probably be there for life, but the ones on his cheeks would eventually go away by themselves.

I was not satisfied with this prognosis, but my internet research failed to turn up a cause or a cure.

It was about this time that I started lurking at the "Healing the Gut" thread on MotheringDotCommune. The mamas there were all trying to solve their children's health problems, and they bandied about terms like leaky gut, probiotics, digestive enzymes, lectins and peptides. I still don't understand a lot of what they're talking about. But reading their posts made me think that I was on to something when I suspected Henry's initial discomfort, and now skin issues, were not nothing to worry about but a mystery to be solved.

It was "Healing the Gut" that made me re-think my vegan diet. A big part of the discussion was food as medicine, and bone broths, organ meats, cod liver oil and egg yolks were said to be healing. I was seriously grossed out. And confused. So on another mama's recommendation I started reading up on Weston A. Price and the book he wrote, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration.

Price was a dentist in Ohio in the early 1900's who began noticing poor dentition and chronic disease in his patients. He traveled all over the world in search of native peoples in robust health (and with straight, well-formed teeth) in order to figure out what it was they ate that made them so healthy. One of the common denominators in the healthy tribes' diets was fat from animals -- from insects, eggs, fish, game animals or domesticated herds.

Price's discoveries made a lot of sense to me. I began to wonder: Does eating meat and dairy products seem so detrimental merely because of how atrociously most animals are raised and most food is processed? What if the animals were treated right -- allowed to graze freely and live healthy lives?

I found a farm about an hour's drive away that is committed to Price's ideals. I signed up for a "raw" (unpasteurized) milk subscription and started using the milk in smoothies. I was feeling pretty good, mentally at least, about getting back to a more natural way of eating. And I was excited to make trips to the farm with Henry to show him exactly where our food was coming from.

After a few months, as we were getting ready to sell our old house and move to the new one, I got lazy. Although I had read that drinking pasteurized milk was not advised, I just didn't have time to drive out to the farm, nor did I want to move gallons of frozen milk to the new house. So I started buying whole but pasteurized milk from our health food store as a temporary measure.

And then Henry, who had had small, red raised patches of skin here and there on his body for several months, began to get the patches all over his back.

I didn't at first consider milk, which now seems like the obvious culprit. Instead I made an appointment with a naturopath who I'd heard did food sensitivity testing. Henry's lab work came back indicating a problem with wheat and cow's milk and the naturopath suggested we cut both things out of his diet for six months and then have him re-tested.

I had stopped using milk in our morning smoothie right after the blood draw and Henry's skin had cleared up, so I already knew that dairy was a problem. The naturopath said that the milk sensitivity would show up on his skin, but that the wheat intolerance would do unseen damage to his body. Gluten, she said, did not appear to be a problem.

For some reason, though, I couldn't stop thinking about the possibility that gluten was a problem. My husband's half-sister had been diagnosed with celiac disease about four years ago and even before that I had researched gluten intolerance, though I can't now remember why.

I started to read up on it again and found out that while most doctors in the U.S. think celiac disease is only marked by gastrointestinal distress, the disorder can actually cause all kinds of seemingly unrelated symptoms. Things like migraine headaches. Canker sores. Allergies. Skin rashes.

Also, interestingly, amenorrhea. Remember how I didn't get a period from adolescence on? And how no doctor could tell me why?

I could relate to other symptoms of celiac disease, too: fatigue, light-headedness, post-nasal drip, achy joints and sore muscles. I've always had low blood pressure with bouts of dizziness, particularly so since Henry was born. And lately my joints had been getting sore and stiff. In fact, I had recently insisted my doctor test me for thyroid dysfunction, but the tests had come out normal.

If you're rolling your eyes at this point, thinking I'm reaching, look at it this way: People with celiac disease who continue to eat gluten are not absorbing the nutrients their bodies need to function. So it makes sense that the result would be any number of conditions according to what their bodies are not getting enough of.

I also found out that celiac disease runs in families and that autoimmune disorders are more prevalent in celiacs . My family is lousy with auto-immune disorders -- rheumatoid arthritis, hypothyroidism, gout, phlebitis, food allergies, seasonal allergies. (Honestly? I kind of thought that was normal.)

Finally, although most doctors in the U.S. still don't consider celiac disease when confronted with any of the above symptoms and conditions, it is estimated that 1 in 133 Americans have it -- and the majority don't even know it.

I started thinking I was on to something...not just for Henry but for me, too.

*To Be Continued*

Family Resemblance

2007-05-24T21:01:00.001-05:00

This is a photograph of my husband when he was two-and-a-half years old:

This is my K4 school photo (who cut those bangs?):

Here's a recent one of Henry:

Here's my husband as a three-and-a-half year old (inexplicably sporting the same shirt and 'do):

And me as a toddler:

Here's another recent one of Henry:

Now with Henry's photos between ours for comparison:

If there was ever any suspicion of a mix-up at the infertility clinic, those fears can now be safely put to rest.

*I apologize if the photos are all off-kilter...it looks fine on Mozilla but I've been informed that on other browsers it's all messed up. I will try to fix it later when I'm off duty!

Love Me, Love My Peanut Butter Face

2007-05-24T20:22:00.000-05:00

Out of the Mouths of Babes

2007-05-23T10:00:00.000-05:00

This morning while snuggling with me, Henry said, "Fart."

Me: Did you fart?
Henry: Henny. ~pause~ Mommy. Fart.
Me: Yes, I've been known to let one rip.
Henry: Daddy. Fart.
Me: Yes, Daddy farts too. Mommy, Henry and Daddy.
Henry: Daddy burp. Too.

You Can All Rest Easy Now

2007-05-18T18:32:00.000-05:00

The spice racks survived the move and have finally been put up in our new kitchen:

Only a minimum amount of cursing was involved during the installation.

"He's really going to sleep tonight!"

2007-05-17T08:59:00.000-05:00

Often said by well-meaning strangers and casual acquaintances while watching Henry run around outside in the fresh air.

Forgive them, Lord. They know not why I am ROTFLMAO.

Jabberwocky

2007-05-14T21:24:00.000-05:00

I haven't given the Henry highlights in a while. Here's the latest on my twenty-one month old wunderkind.

My husband and I are now Daddy and Mommy, as of a few weeks ago. We went from Dada and Mama, to Dad and Mom, to Daddy and Mommy. I'm relieved, frankly. I was so not ready to be "Mom."

Henry has started saying "maybe," I guess because I qualify statements a lot. For example, we go to my parents' house for a visit once a week. Since my sister Karen lives next door, she often, but not always, stops in to see us as well. So when I tell Henry we're going to Grandma and Grandpa's house, he says, "Duh-duh." (Grandma.) "Pa." (Grandpa.) "Toon." (Karen.) "...may-mee."

Apparently I also say "neat" a lot. And "pretty." Because now anything that interests my boy is "neat!" Pause. "Pih-tee." And really, I have never seen a more beautiful screwdriver.

Also, after Daddy leaves us at bedtime so Henry can nurse to sleep, Henry sometimes talks about what he might be doing. "Daddy. Book." ~pause~ "May-mee." "Daddy. Pew-pew." (Computer.) ~pause~ "May-mee." It's so damn cute.

He now refers to himself in the third person. He started out with "Hen" but has progressed to "Henny," and the word is accompanied by him jabbing a finger into his torso. Just so there's no confusion.

The other day I sneezed and he said, "Bless you." I had no idea he even knew to say "bless you" after someone sneezed.

Another two-word combo is "far away." When we hear a siren we talk about whether we can see the fire truck or just hear it. I'll say, "We can hear it with our ears, but we can't see it with our eyes because it's too far away." So now when we hear a siren and he says, "See, see," I'll ask him, "Can we see it?" and he'll say, "Far 'way."

He is on the verge of spelling words, too. His favorite by far is "stop" since we pass so many stop signs on our walks. He can also identify "Daddy," "Mommy," and "Henry." Also "poop." (Thanks, cousin Shelly!) In fact, if you ask him what some letters spell and he doesn't know, he will triumphantly announce, "POOP!"

When we read a book in which a character gets hurt (for instance, in "Hop On Pop" those crazy characters playing ball up on the wall eventually all fall, fall off the wall) Henry says, "Mommy." The inference is that they need their mommy to come make it better.

I mean, don't we all?

Tomorrow We Drop Him Off at the Mall

2007-04-12T21:19:00.000-05:00

Today, upon awakening, Henry said, "Dad. Dad. Dad."

At first I wasn't sure what he was saying, but then I noticed he was referring to me as "Mom."

He just woke up and starting calling us "Mom" and "Dad" instead of "Mama" and "Dada." And that continued right up until I got him off to sleep an hour ago.

What's next? Calling us by our first names?

Twenty Months on Tuesday

2007-03-31T22:04:00.001-05:00

Henry's language has exploded in the past month and he's constantly surprising me with words I had no idea he knew. I guess he really does listen to me.

He's also started telling me "stories" about experiences he's had, which I then translate into the long version for him. For example:

Henry: "Stow! Daw! Stih! Mau! Puhpah!"

Translation: One day, while Mama was pushing Henry in the stroller and Henry was holding a stick in his hand, a dog came along and grabbed the stick with its mouth. The girl walking the dog said, "Copper! You silly dog!"

Henry: "Puh-poe! Boom! Pop! Moh!"

Translation: The purple balloon Henry had been enjoying for weeks popped. He was upset and asked for another one, but Mama said there weren't any more balloons in the house.

These are the stories that make up the fabric of a toddler's life.

He loves being outside ("side!") now, dragging things out of the garage and hunting for sticks. I showed him a worm the other day, suppressing my urge to tell him it was icky and instead letting him carry it around until it was lost.

We washed hands especially well after coming inside that day.

The park is a popular outdoor destination, too, what with the swings and slides and pretend car and sandbox and other fun stuff. It's only a few blocks from our new house and it's pretty hoppin' when the weather is nice.

Henry has also been very into drawing lately, as evidenced by the ink on his clothes and occasionally, his body.

I hear a desperately shouted "DAW!" multiple times a day. His preferred writing implements are pens (he's too mature for crayons) and while he will scribble on his own, he'd rather I sit with him and draw instead. He loves to recognize my squiggles -- bikes, hammers, garages, stop signs, etc. Essentially anything in his world that I can draw he finds fascinating.

And while my artistic ability is lacking, I try very hard not to say anything negative about it. I've noticed other people making self-deprecating remarks when they sit down to draw with Henry and I find it sort of sad. Yeah, even my stop signs are all out of proportion, but it's art, and anyway, Henry doesn't care.

I mean, have they seen how he draws?

Finally, my smart little boy is learning his colors, letters and shapes. I don't know if this is unusually early or right on track, but I find it amazing. I've been spelling out "stop," "dada" and "mama" and he seems to recognize the words. He sees the letters he knows everywhere we go. He also knows a square and a triangle when he sees them, though he calls a circle (and the letter "o") a moon. And I think he's gotten most of the basic colors down, too, though he likes to say "boo" first before settling on the correct color.

Just to keep Mama guessing.

Just Because

2007-03-16T22:19:00.000-05:00

I have many, many things to say about what Henry's been up to, but because it's getting late I'll just post a photo for now. It's not the best -- a little out of focus -- but his smile is just the cutest.

Back on Track

2007-03-16T20:58:00.000-05:00

I have been a bad, bad blogger lately. I would blame the move and subsequent settling in except that we essentially reached a level of functionality soon after getting here and have not progressed much since. Mainly I think I've just gotten out of the groove of blogging. But that doesn't mean I don't have things to say.

First, I must tell you that our new neighborhood rocks even harder than I thought it would. My quality of life has already improved about ten thousand percent. (Yes, ten thousand. It's on the internet, so it must be true.)

In our old neighborhood we had sidewalks but taking walks was not very appealing. Here I put Henry in the stroller and we walk for miles and miles. Everyone is so friendly; the houses are so gorgeous (old half-million dollar mansions abound, though not on our block!); and there are things worth walking to: the library, the lakefront, the grocery store, the coffee shop.

Ah, the coffee shop. I've been spending a lot of time (and too much money) there lately. Since Henry has become resistant to napping in bed I've started letting him nap in the stroller, and he's usually asleep by the time I reach Starbucks. I throw a blanket over him and sink into an armchair with a mocha and a book. It's completely, utterly decadent.

And then there are the neighbors. We've met about half the people on our block, both sides of the street, and have learned the names of many more. And it's only been a month. In winter.

Also, we had people bring us pound cake and brownies to welcome us to the neighborhood. (Yes, this apparently actually happens outside of movies.)

And now a titch of defensiveness about our new community: When we told people we were moving here, a common (and unoriginal) response was a wordplay on the name of the village indicating that only white people live there.

I ranted about this to a friend who also lives here and she pointed out that there is actually a fair amount of diversity -- Asians, Russians and Poles, for starters. There is also a large Jewish population, and although I can't say this with authority, I'm betting a fair amount of gay people.

This week at the library I saw a man and his (apparent) granddaughter speaking Russian and a mother and daughter who looked Indian, speaking with accents. I also heard a family at the park speaking Spanish and two women with British accents at Starbucks. And we learned that one of our new neighbors is an older German woman.

So, okay, maybe there isn't a big African-American population. But does diversity have to mean black people? Is our new community not diverse just because none of the people I just mentioned are African-American?

Maybe I'm rationalizing. All I know is that I love where we live. It's interesting. It's neighborly. And best of all, it's home.

We're In

2007-02-24T21:08:00.000-06:00

We moved to the new house (that's "moo-moo" if you're Henry) last Monday and we're still trying to get rooms set up. I thought we lived pretty simply, and in fact we gave away lots of items prior to moving (including large items like a treadmill and a kitchen table) but we still have crap everywhere. I'm really feeling the urge to purge (naturally after we paid to have everything moved). For now, though, we're in survival mode, just trying to get things put away in the right general area.

We've discovered lots of fun things about the new place, too, like the fact that both toilets leak and need to be replaced. It's probably just as well since they're both really old and most likely use lots of water. But it's one more expense on top of others that we can barely afford after moving to a much pricier end of town.

The good news is that I am loving our new neighborhood. Although I'm currently listening to the wind howl in the chimney and waiting for the blizzard that's supposed to hit tonight, on Wednesday Henry and I took a huge walk in near-springtime weather. It was so great to see all the nice, normal, friendly people out, and walking down streets filled with gorgeous old half-million dollar homes wasn't bad, either. (For the record, our home is on the modest end of town.)

On Thursday Henry and I went to the library and there were lots of parents there with their kids for storytime. Henry had a blast flirting with another little girl, sitting at the kid-sized tables and trying to carry around a crate filled with board books.

There's no way to say this without sounding like a snob, but this area is filled with nice people. Educated people. Well-dressed people. People who enjoy their children. People who care about the environment. People who don't see Iraq as being linked to 9-11. People who introduce themselves to the new neighbors.

And really, that's all I ever wanted.