New Blog

Okay, so I've started a new blog. One that isn't quite as personal, doesn't share as many pictures and videos as this one. It will be hard to keep up with 2, but I know that there are family members who want to see the pictures and video clips that the rest of the world may not care so much about. So, I've put a link to the new one on the right, as well as the other blogs I follow - some from friends, and some from elsewhere in the blogosphere, from folks who actually are able to make some money from their blogs...
Anyhow, there are some repeat posts from here to the new blog, but there are some new ones there as well. So, if you really want to keep up with us, you'll have to start checking out 2 sites. Just wanted to keep everyone on their toes. :)
Cheers.

Mommy Pill

I am early for a meeting, sitting in a conference room in Vancouver, alone at table #7. I'm surrounded by peers, from all parts of our region, who are here to talk about our company's performance over the last quarter. Given the current economic situation of our nation in general, and since my work is in the wood products industry, this meeting will outline an inevitable message of doom and gloom. However, it will take one of two shapes. It it will either emphasize the horrific situation we are in and we'll all cry in our beers, or it will manifest itself as some sort of pep rally, to try and fire us all up to make positive change. Either route, the fact is that our business is in the toilet, and we are accumulating enormous amounts of debt, and that each and every one of us in this room should thank our lucky stars that we have a job. At least for now.

I need to get fired up. I need some motivation. Because I believe that my work performance has suffered since I had Jordan, and this is not a good time to feel like you aren't doing your very best at your job. I don't like to admit this, but if I am honest with myself, I know that it is true.
This causes a turmoil inside of me. I justify it to myself by saying that my child must be my first priority. Anyone would agree with this. BUT, I also think that I focus on her more than is necesarry. Honestly, the fact of the matter is that I would rather be with her than working. I have to believe that this is a fact of life for most career women who have children.

I have found something that is more interesting to me than sawmilling (lo and behold) - child rearing. The problem is that one can not make money raising their own child. Raising someone elses child, maybe... But that is not the issue here. This must not be an unusual phenomenon, considering all of the "work from home" pop-ups and forums that are frequently found on parenting websites. I always thought that I would be different, that my career would always be just as important as it was pre-baby, that I would continue to want to excel and climb the corporate ladder . But apparently mommyhood has changed that for me - as people told me that it would, and despite my intentions.

Somehow I think that being a mother puts the majority of us into the same boat - onto common ground, no matter our previous circumstances. We all seem to have the same questions, our babies go through the same stages, and have the the same afflictions. We mommy's have the same fears, the same joys, the same emotions in general... And we can relate to one another in ways we could never have before. Maybe this doesn't last long, and surely it changes as the children grow up. But I think if there were a way to replicate it for every non- mommy in the world, perhaps there would be less turmoil.

That's what the planet needs - a "mommy" pill.

Scary World

I managed to find a moment this morning to look at the local news. I'm almost always sorry that I do. The media is merely a showcase for horror stories that have already come to pass, and a crystal ball from which we can hypothesize the inconcievable things that may be to come. It is all about death, and fighting, and abuse, and war, and financial decay... The few positive highlights are about inconsequential trivialities - new movies, and celebrity babies, usually. A few of the headlines from Oregon that made an impression on me today were about a mother who stole thousands of dollars from her child's school booster club - and a gunmen shooting 9 people outside of a club last night. These stories are both true tragedies, but they will be twisted and contorted with blame placed on anything other than the individuals. The mother won't be to blame, it will be the fault of the economy. From what I can tell of our nation today, people will blame capitalism, it was the evil corporations who probably discriminate against this poor woman, thus leaving her jobless and desperate, and forcing her to turn to theft to live the life that she deserves. BULLSHIT. The gunmen will not be the root cause of the shooting - it will be the evil gun itself. If the guy wasn't able to own a gun, those people would still be alive. BULLSHIT. The mother was a coward who didn't have the gumption or the drive to figure out legal means to improve her standard of living. The gunmen could have pulled off the same feat with a slingshot. Truth be told, if someone else in the parking lot had been carrying a firearm, they could have taken this creepo out before he was able to hurt so many people. HE was accountable - HE was responsible. Nothing else. I think there is too much emphasis on people deserving better. I think that our president is going to foster this idea of our "rights" as opposed to our "priviliges". No one is held accountable anymore, popular belief seems to be that controlling everyone's environment will save us all. Scary. I hope that there are enough reasonable people left in this nation to teach their children to be responsible for their own actions, to remember the American Dream, and to work towards earning every benefit that this nation has to offer. If I can do nothing else about the state of our world today, I can do that. And I pray that other parents will do the same.

The meaning of TERROR

Wikipedia defines terror as "a state of fear; an overwhelming sense of imminent danger". If you Google "terror", you will find a Myspace page, a few computer games, but mostly definitions or examples of terrorism. Myself? I think that terror is different for all of us, depending on our circumstance at a given moment. Jordan knows terror. There is a being of which she is truly afraid - that poses IMMINENT danger to her. Here it is, her worst nightmare...


This bloodthirsty beast began stalking Jordan a little after Christmas - and after surviving it's heinous attacks for over a month, she still crumbles at the sight of it. She begins to shake, and cowers for mommy, every time she sees it. Poor baby. I'm not sure what it is about this little critter that petrifies her so. And I must be a sick mommy, because it cracks me up to no end... I find myself pulling it out, to see her reaction, and then laugh hysterically at her!! That's so cruel, I know, I have a twisted sense of humor. I try to justify it by telling myself that she has to overcome her fear of the penguin - and what better way than to keep exposing her again and again - much to my warped delight.

So, Jordan is terrified of a penguin. Mommy is terrified by so many things! This picture terrified me this morning... How could this sweet picture terrify me? Well, if you look closely, at the top left edge of her head, there is a blue goose egg... My poor sweet darling was playing innocently with the vacuum cleaner cord (imagine, afraid of a penguin, but not the vacuum) on the ONE step from our living room to the kitchen. Well, she managed to fall off of the one step, head first, landing on her forehead on the wooden kitchen floor. I saw this happening as if it was in slow motion. I was sliding towards her like a baseball player diving for an out on third base - my hand outstretched to try and buffer the blow - but I didn't make it in time. My heart skipped 2 beats. She was fine, only cried for a few minutes - but seeing her falling; for me, was pure terror. I can only imagine how the rest of my life is going to go....... I'm really in for it.

So, here are just a few more pictures of Miss Jordan - for your viewing pleasure. Pretty girl... :)

Friday

Today is Friday. Today is a Friday that I managed to escape work early. My husband and I went to Applebees, and had hot wings and a beer. It was UNBELIEVABLY nice. We had a real live uninterrupted adult conversation, or two or even three - and I was able to nibble my chicken without tearing off slivers for Jordan, and was able to drink my beer and watch the other people in the establisment in a way that only a person without a child can. No picking up toys that are thrown on the floor, and frantically using a baby wipe to disinfect reasonably enough to feel okay about giving it back to the baby, only to have her instantly throw it on the floor again (fetch is a current favorite game). No worries about every smile when there is a mouthful of food, no conditioned flinching response in preparation for a shower of finely 'gummed' brocolli as it flies out of a laughing babies mouth and ends up all over mommy's face, hair, and personal plate of food... What I'm getting at here people, is that it was a very nice evening at Applebees - one in which I relished being 'baby-less', and remembered all of the good times that BJ and I had pre-Jordan. I became a little nostalgic, and missed those days... As we all do every now an again.
UNTIL
I walked in the door of daycare, and saw the biggest smile light up the face of my daughter, and heard her squeal of delight and saw her anxious crawl towards me... In that moment I instantly forgot about Applebees, and all of the times prior. The only thing that mattered was this perfect baby, and the overwhelming love that gushed from my being as soon as I laid eyes on her!
Even now, as I sit in my kitchen, I no longer long for the 'old days'. Even though before I could sit in this chair I had to move out of the way the Twighlight Turtle and the Toolbench that need new batteries, the 3 sweaters and one hat, the rag we use to wipe up snot bubbles, the book with the torn off 'lift the flap' that needs to be glued back on, and the bajillion twisty ties from the last toy that we bought and opened up to be enjoyed. Even when I look at the kitchen and see a sack of yogurt melts, a package of ritz crakers, 3 sippy cups, each partly full, a bag of dirty bottles and baby food cubes from day care, and a snot rag on the table; not to mention the pea coat and hat (size 18 mo) hanging on the corner of one chair, and the lovey that needs washed draped over the back of another, a bag of new diapers on the floor nearby that were lately used as a drum, and about 4 rolly toys scattered across the floor..... Am I getting the mess across? Because it IS a mess, and a big one... And it is generally every night. But even the mess makes me sentimental when I consider that it is all due to my perfect baby. (Meanwhile I try to block the realization that I am drinking a glass of wine and blogging rather than cleaning up this mess).
Amazingly, I'm glad to have given up all of the "free" days. I'm willing to deal with the disaster in our house. I'm so excited to watch my baby girl grow and learn. She is my new life. :)
'SIGH'
And now that I've spilled a bit of that which overfloweth my cup, I suppose I should get started on cleaning up this mess.
Thanks for listening. :)

GAME ON!!!

My little motorboat - her frustrated sound... :)

Jordan lauging - LOVES this toy!

Happy Thoughts

So lets have some happy thoughts - there is too much GOOD in my life to focus on sad things! I turned 31 yesterday - and it was a pretty crummy birthday... :( BJ had a stomach bug, and he slept pretty much all day - so we didn't get to go get my present, or go to dinner... Oh well - we'll make up for it next weekend, I keep reminding him! Seriously, a birthday should be at least a little bit better than your average day... ?

Jordan is still not crawling quite yet, but she gets around just fine when she is really motivated, by dragging herself along on her tummy. I try to make sure that she doesn't wear white, so that I don't have to be disghusted by the probable reality of my dirty floors... The things that motivate her to move most especially are the refrigerator door being open, the garbage can basket being pulled out of the cabinet, and Cobey's food (or any bone that Cobey may be enjoying). I snapped this picture moments before relocating Cobey's food and water bowl to the laundry room, which will be an effective deterrant for Jordan only until she figures out how to pull herself up over the one step to get into the laundry room...

Poor Cobey attracts more attention from Jordan than he wants to these days. He will be lying on the living room floor, enjoying a bone, until Jordan grabs the bone from his grasp (with authority, I might add), and proceeds to try and stick this ooey gooey slimy dog slobbery rawhide into her own mouth... (mommy becomes motivated to move before this happens when at all possible). She simply can not resist playing this game - she will give poor Cobey NO peace - she steals it over and over and over again. But that's okay, he retaliates when I give her a biter biscuit - he hovers and has stolen these from her on numerous occasions. They are almost like siblings. Jordan squeals with delight every time she sees Cobey, I think that he is her favorite family member. :) When she finally does really get on the move, we are going to be in for it. She is very curious, very persistent, and very FOCUSED on what she wants when she wants it. Distraction isn't always possible... I like to think that she is very much like DADDY in these regards, since mommy doesn't ever display any of those traits, never has, and never will. She is like daddy in lots of ways, and this picture of her "plugged in to" the keyboard reminds me of him as well.

And the last new picture I have of her - with her daddy, doing what they do best together, SLEEPING. And what mommy can resist snapping a shot of the two people she loves most, snuggled up in a blissful slumber. :)

FOG

I have recently gotten news of a horrible tragedy that happened to someone from my past. The kind of tragedy that brought me to my knees, wondering how there could be a God. The kind of thing that happens in movies, that isn't really real becuase we are so desensitized by reading the awful stories in the paper. The kind of thing that haunts your dreams and your quiet thoughts as your conscious mind tries to wrap itself around how such an awful thing could possibly be.
I haven't known how to feel, or what to think, but so many things cross my mind. It is so easy to forget things about people. It is so remarkably easy to forget true reasons for life changing decisions that you made. Time has a way of erasing some bad memories, and saving the good ones - a blessing and a curse. People do so much changing over the course of a lifetime - hell, over the course of a few years. People are capable of keeping so much cooped up inside, and can be so unsure of their identity. That's life - people have quirks. Some of us are defensive, some of us are emotional, some of us get depressed, some of us are impatient or selfish... We all have our demons, our skeletons in the closet. But what is it that snaps in a person to cause the earth to shatter? How come it isn't easier for folks to see someone they love about to lose it? Why don't people find a way to share things that hurt - to really communicate when it matters? And how can life be so short? It can be gone in an instant. We all take so many things forgranted. We need to smell the roses, to spend the extra time with the people we love, to tell eachother how much we care for one another. I cried silently until no more tears would come. Not a shaking tremulous cry, but a deep quiet cry from my soul - I think that it still cries. The tears just kept sliding out, and my heart is all bunched up. For me, the perpetrator was a victim, and I just ACHE for him... How he must have hurt... How angry and sad and penned up he must have felt... How awful it must have been to release it all and then realize what had happened.... It must have been agony. He was a good man - this thing that happened doesn't define him. The news stories make me angry, as they point fingers at him and blame him and make him evil - when I just feel so awful for him... And I get a tight feeling in my throat when I think of the family - and what they are going through. That I didn't even say goodbye to them all these years ago. I didn't tell them that I loved them, and I did. At least he knew that I cared - we were friends after all of the past. Whatever has happened, however awful, no matter the circumstances, right or wrong, Richie will forever hold a place in my heart.