Our Family Beginnings

It’s funny how Melissa is talking about fictional homes today, since I’m missing my hometown a bit this week.

Last week, my folks were thinking of coming down for a visit for the weekend, until my brother invited them and his wife’s folks over for dinner.  This is not unheard of for them.  From time to time they have the four parents over, or host a seder, or some other meal.  My brother jokingly said I was welcome to come up, but we both knew that I wouldn’t make a last minute trip up to NYC.  Pre-V, we did it all the time, but now, obviously not.

My dad then asked me if I thought that there was another reason for the dinner…perhaps any announcement?  Instead of letting it eat away at me, I straight up asked my brother, who assured me that there were no ulterior motives of the meal.  It got to me a bit though, the idea that one day they will have a dinner…with an announcement.

At first, the infertile PTSD kicked in and I thought I was jealous of the potential pregnancy down the line.  On further examination, however, it was that my whole family is up in New York, and I’m down here.  Weather this year aside, it is generally warmer here than there, and I hate winter, so that works for me.  If my folks and brother and my sister-in-law (his wife) moved down here, it’d be heaven to me.  I miss being able to see them for no reason at all, or to be with them for small things.

We make up for it by skyping almost daily. If I needed anyone here, I need only say the word and my family would be here in a few hours, thanks to the many options of rail, car, and air in the northeast corridor.  It isn’t the same as how my dad works mere blocks from where my brother lives.

I talked with Mr. Badger about it, and he says he gets why it gets to me, but noted that he didn’t grow up near his aunts, uncles or grandparents.  He didn’t even live in the same time zone for a lot of his childhood, so he doesn’t notice the absence like I do.  Within 25 minutes were my Uncle, Aunt & cousins and both sets of grandparents.  It drove me batty as a teen, and man were some of my grandmother’s dinners boring as hell.  But as an adult, I can look at them fondly, remembering how my brother and I would put on shows on her fireplace and play cards when the adults were still at the table.

E’s Mama and I also talked about it.  She and I don’t have family here, for the most part, and so we really are family to one another.  We watch each other’s kids so we can get errands done.  (It’s amazing how quickly getting your teeth cleaned becomes a luxury.) We bring one another meals when the other can’t get around to cooking.  A lot of my friends down here are like that.  Few of us have our families down here, so we are family – even if that family doesn’t know one another.

And we make special efforts to see our families when we can, like this weekend when we go up north to Mr. Badger’s family.  They too have been wonderful, both my and Mr. Badger’s parents.  V’s a pretty great kid, and they’ve all made great efforts to share this year with us.

There are times, though, when the distance seems farther than the 300 miles to New York.

*As an aside, this is not a constant worry of mine, I just was wistful and it felt good to write it down

To whomever wrote the Secret Ode about me, it was so nice to read it after a long two weeks.  You made my day, you anonymous yet gorgeous person.

Also thanks to Mel and E’s Mama who make it possible for me to be…well…me.  You two are two of the best friends a girl could ask for, aside from Mr. Badger, of course.  You prop me up when I’m blue and help me shine when I’m sunny.

V is growing so fast, as fast as they say it goes, if not faster. We knew it would happen, but wow, a whole year almost? I have all these things to say as we approach official toddlerhood, but the man keeps me so busy that I haven’t made time to stop and record all of my thoughts. What I really need to do is just have some posts in progress and add to them as I think of them, or put titles of things I want to write down, knowing I can go back later and fill them in.

It’s been an amazing year, and we have so much to be thankful for. JJ’s on her way over with O-man, Callie & W will be here too, along with Mel & the twins, so all these thoughts will have to wait for another day…

I have said before that I am tough to shop for, and believe me, I am.  If I want something bad enough, I usually go get it – within reason.  Tonight, though, I went over to Mel’s house for dinner with V and the kids and she surprised me with a birthday gift.  It’s  a fair trade bracelet made out of recycled paper and then lacquered.  It’s gorgeous, and totally me.  All the colors I love to wear.  She rocks.

I watched three babes today.  V, his girlfriend, and her dad who has had a fever since Monday.

To my friends who are single mothers, by choice or otherwise, I bow to you.  You are queens and built of stuff so strong it could stand up in war zones.  That being said, it was actually really fun, and everyone got along fantastically, but I am wiped out after not having Mr. Badger at home all week.

Oh, and I will never again get the flumist.  I got that for my H1N1 vac, and since I always have seasonal allergies, my already inflamed nostrils have been virtually sealed shut since last Saturday night.  Now, as a result, my lips are chapped beyond belief from mouth breathing at night.
I figure, after my post about poop, chapped lips are nada.

But it’s for a good cause.
It’s days like today that make me so grateful to have surrounded myself with such fabulous women.  I spent the day with one today, who is having quite a rough go of it.  So if you have warm thoughts, I know she’d appreciate them.  However, since she can’t tweet it due to her own blog being more of a public family one, I’ll make the joke for her.  “You can get a D&C for 40 bucks?  That’s a bargain! Not a lot of things you can get for 40 bucks…” (she was worried she’d be paying in the hundreds for it…)

Last week, after my awesome day with Serenity, Somewhat Ordinary, and Mel, it rained.  It rained and rained and rained. Today, Sunday is the first sunny day we’ve had in almost a week.  Let’s just say I could never hack it in Anchorage.  To add to the drabness, our faucet wasn’t working in our sink. Luckily it was covered under warranty, but it meant that we had a week without a working kitchen sink.

The first day was fine. It was tough being in all day, but V is so active, that he didn’t seem to mind.

The second day, I think he was starting to get a little cranky being inside all day, so I decided to take him to the indoor playground at the mall.  It’s got a little slide and some things on the padded walls that spin, so while it’s geared at toddlers, he was still entertained. I, on the other hand, had not prepared well.  I was wearing a raincoat, the ergo, had his diaperbag and him.  Unfortunately, there are no lockers, so that meant that I had to follow him everywhere with all of our gear.  All of the other parents sat on the cushy seats, but since V was the only baby, I was stuck running around on my knees, so as not to tempt thieves. It was still a success, though, since the little man loved watching all of the big kids run around.

Then on Friday we went to Stroller Strides, our local workout with other moms and babies.  It was three times the size of the usual class because a professional photographer came to take a picture of each kid.  Not much of a workout for me, and V was beyond ready for a nap by the time that it was picture time.  It was still getting out of the house and I had big plans for the afternoon.  We went to one of the local open gyms for an event that the local SAHM club had organized.

The first time I went to one of these things, I hadn’t really had a great time.  It was very organized and clean and I was comparing it to TOOTPU where we all let loose and laugh a lot.  I am sure a lot had to do with the preponderance of older kids or kids V’s age who were second (or third) children.  I didn’t look around the room and see me, you know?  There was one woman who had a baby about a week younger than V, but I didn’t really keep in touch.  Lo and behold, she and her son were one of the first families there!  We chatted about what our boys are up to, and how I feel like I need to get V out of the house more.

It turns out that she’s a part of the playgroup for babies V’s age, and is hosting this week’s group.  So, I’m gonna give it a go this Thursday.  The downside is that it starts at the end of V’s naptime.  On M/W/F we go to workout at 9:30, so that means his nap is delayed until 10:45, and thus I am a tad concerned about getting him to nap early on days we don’t workout. I say only a tad though, because he’s a pretty roll with it kinda kid.

Either way, I’m just glad to get the kid out and around new environments where I can let him loose.

I have more to say on this subject, but I think I’ll make it a PWP post tomorrow, unless I have something else to talk about.

Wish us luck this week, as Mr. Badger hightails it out of town!

I may have ranted about an unfortunate experience last week, but this week I am awash in love for my fellow moms.  Mel, Serenity, and Somewhat Ordinary and I all started blogging within about a year or less of one another.  Serenity was down for a family wedding, and so Somewhat Ordinary and Smooch came up and we all went to the zoo with our boys.  It’s amazing, each time I met one of these ladies it was as if we’ve known each other for ages.  While infertility was a bitch and a half, it’s made me a happier person in the end, because I have women like this that I can just be me with.

What a provocative little header I put up there, no?

Let me put out there that a) No, I do not actually think all other mothers suck b) that the story I am going to tell is unique to moms.  However, I do think that men waging wars all over the globe over the size of their dicks have nothing on catty mothers.  Mothers can be the atomic freaking bomb of interpersonal relations.

I do this workout outside and in bad/cold weather at the local mall before it opens. Moms bring their strollers and resistance bands and little ones, and we do a 1-hour cardio and resistance class.  It’s fun, and a decent workout. We sing songs to the kids as we do bicep curls, and get out of it what we put into it. Trust me, it’s a good workout.

Because V’s had this thing of napping about 10 minutes before we would leave for class, I hadn’t gone in a few weeks. I decided to capitalize on the time change and get back to class. It was a good class, and in the middle, I felt this sudden burst of energy and took off on one of our running laps. It was a total sprint.  I heard one woman snarkily mumble to another “geez, no need to show off!” and I knew it was directed at me.  I didn’t turn around because I honestly didn’t want to know who had said it. What was going through my head was, “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that the instructor said that judging other mothers for working out at their workout was the holding pattern.”

My dear friend, E’s Mama, has said that motherhood is not a competitive sport.  I wish it were so.  I wish I could say that I never did similar things to others, but I am sure I do.  Anyone who thinks they don’t judge others really is in denial.

Another adoptive momma blogger wrote a few weeks ago about how she doesn’t fit in with her pre-baby friends, and she doesn’t really connect well with other moms.  I remarked that it’d be great if ALI parents could just have our own little island sometimes. I can’t tell you how much I treasure my DC blogger friends, and the extended bloggers who I’ve been lucky enough to either meet in person or talk to on the phone. I just find that as a group, there is less (though clearly not an absence of) judging and more openness to life experiences.

Thanks to all of you who, over the last three years, have held us up, hugged us in person or virtually, or even just read silently and said, “me too”.