Mommy confession …

Posted on November 26, 2010 by

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The other day, I started letting my five-and-a-half-month-old watch Treehouse.

Just like 15 or 20 minutes a day, when I desperately need to send a freelance invoice or respond to an e-mail. He has always LOVED TV, and he is especially fixated by these annoying kids’ shows.

For some reason, all the characters — birds, cats, etc. — all seem to have British accents. Anyway.

I felt fine about the decision …

Then I see a Facebook friend’s comment on an article about children and televsion … and she says it’s horrible for TODDLERS to watch TV.

Um …

I think Treehouse has to remain a dirty little secret.

Finding the time to blog …

Posted on November 23, 2010 by

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I haven’t blogged in a week!?!? What the hell happened?

Oh right …

  • I had a miserable fever/chills/body ache (two days before getting my flu shot!)
  • I got my flu shot (and then felt iffy afterwards)
  • I baked some ambitious red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese icing
  • I entertained a crowd of 20 for Darling Husband’s birthday
  • I went out Christmas/birthday shopping for like, two solid days
  • I have been working like mad to finish a homemade Christmas gift for Baby Boy (and have a long list of crafty stuff still left to do!)
  • I have been cleaning/purging our condo, getting it ready to hit the market
… and, most importantly, I have a baby. If you don’t already have one, trust me — when you spend all your time with one, you wonder where the hell the time goes! Even on the days you don’t seem to accomplish much, just meeting their (MANY) needs is a lot of work.
I really do want to blog more often. I swear, I lie in bed at night (um, 8:30 p.m., sadly) and entire blog posts run through my mind. I need one of those computers that reads your thoughts and transcribes them. Are they invented yet?
I have always felt the pressure to blog daily, even in the pre-baby days. But now I feel EXTRA pressure because I want to be able to look back someday and read about what life was like when Baby Boy was three months, four months, five months, etc. 
I want to read about how he’s obsessed with the TV remote control, and how all he wants to do is stand up (holding onto the couch or his Exersaucer). I want to read about how he’s still learning to hold his sippy-cup of water — he hasn’t mastered the art of tipping it, so he gets super frustrated and throws it down (he is my son!). 
I want to read these posts and remember that his favourite activity is when you lie him on his back and pump his legs while singing The Ants Go Marching. I want to remember how we’re getting up so often at night (back to every two hours, zzzz) that I keep falling asleep with him in the rocking chair, and when I wake up, I almost don’t want to put him back down in his crib.
I am going to try really hard to blog more often, to capture more of these special moments here in cyberspace. Naptimes are really the only time I blog now, but there are so many OTHER things I need to do while he naps. Do any moms out there have advice on blogging regularly when you have a baby?

Rice? Not so nice …

Posted on November 16, 2010 by

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Two weeks ago, I was considering making my own baby cereal from brown rice. You know, ’cause the Duggars do it, and I heart them.

But when I did the research (gotta love the internet), I learned that regular brown rice (a.k.a. the stuff I have sitting in my cupboard) may contain traces of arsenic. Yikes and whoa and EW!

Apparently you are supposed to refrigerate the box of brown rice after opening, and I never knew that, so I immediately threw out my two open, who-knows-how-old boxes. I never really liked it anyway, and always opt for my delicious not-that-good-for-me white rice.

The rice you are supposed to use for baby cereal is the organically-grown stuff. Which I don’t have. So I may try this at some point, but things are a bit chaotic right now, so we’re sticking with Nestle for the moment.

Baby Boy seems to be over his cereal strike — well, not so much a strike as he seemed to stop liking it so I decided to stop making it. Darling Husband has gotten home just before bedtime in the last couple of nights, so he fed him cereal every night.

Cereal is just … I don’t know … it’s just such a boring food! I’m excited for the six-month mark so I can break out the blender and introduce some REAL food.

5 things that are NO FUN

Posted on November 15, 2010 by

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  1. Feeling like you may possibly have the flu when you are at home alone with your baby (for 12 straight hours).
  2. Worrying what you will do if you do indeed start puking — drag the Exersaucer into the bathroom with you, so he isn’t alone? — and wondering if watching you puke would scar him for life.
  3. Trying to wrestle your glass of Ginger Ale/package of saltines away from your baby before they take a sip/bite.
  4. Trying to entertain your five-month-old when you are too weak to move. Lying on the carpet and letting your baby use you as a jungle gym is not exactly “resting,” but it beats sitting up and stuff.
  5. The brief flash of “OMG the last time I had crackers and Ginger Ale I was … Holy shit, am I pregnant again?” that races through your mind, before you breathe a sigh of relief and remember you are back on the pill.

Just wondering …

Posted on November 14, 2010 by

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Do they put teeny tiny alarm clocks inside those crib aquarium toys???
Because, seriously, this baby pretty much only ever wakes up ON THE HOUR. It’s weird.

Not 12:17 a.m., not 2:41 a.m.
Nope, it’s all 12:00 a.m., 2:01 a.m., 4:00 a.m.

I’m not complaining, because I’m very bad at math (and, uh, time-telling on “stick clocks,” if I’m being entirely truthful), and this makes it much easier for me to calculate how long it’s been since his last feeding.

But it has me wondering about the internal clocks of little babies! Perhaps Timex has a secret soother sponsorship or something?

P.S. Sleep update: Baby Boy went to bed at 8 p.m. last night, and only nursed at midnight anf 4 a.m., just like I’d hoped! I had to go in and give him his soother a few times, but it was a pretty good night! Success!

P.P.S. Yes, I realize I have just jinxed myself for tonight. Damnit.

I’m Heather Laura Clarke. I’m a writer living in beautiful Nova Scotia, I have a 15-year-old son and a 13-year-old daughter, I married my high school sweetheart, and this is the story of my handmade life.

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