Mini-Me

The other day I was taking a shower with Zoey and she was VERY interested in watching me shave my legs. Lots of "Mommy, what's THAT?". Lots of "razors are SHARP, and you never play with them!".

She asked for some shaving cream for her own legs, which was pretty cute.

Then I turned around and found her running her plastic yellow garden rake up and down her leg, "just yike Mommy!".

This is why I go to bed at 9:00 every night

This is what my life has come to: I have to get up 15 minutes earlier in the morning (at 5:30) to enjoy a little time to myself.

I remember, as a teenager, talking to my mom and asking her why she got up so very early every morning, instead of just sleeping in and then rushing around to get out the door (like I did). When she told me that early mornings were her quiet time--the only time, in fact, where she could watch the news uninterrupted, sip her coffee, and start her day at a somewhat leisurely pace--I thought she was, well, crazy.

And yet, here I am, at 6:13 a.m., ready for work and relishing the fact that I still have 30 minutes before I have to be out the door AND Zoey is still sleeping.

Not that it didn't take a little extra effort (and probably just plain luck) to be the only one awake right now...I tiptoed down the hall past her bedroom on my way to the bathroom, pulling her door shut in the hopes that quiet would keep her from sniffing me out and coming to join me. (This, sadly, is what normally happens on my work days. Just as I think I'm finishing up my morning routine in the bathroom and on my way to enjoying a little breakfast by myself, the door is thrown open by a somewhat cranky and disheveled little person who is obviously no fan of being up so early, but feels it's necessary to send her mother off to work in the wake of crabby demands for milk and a new diaper.)

I remember my friend Kelly telling me one time that it is as though her children can smell her, and feel they need to be with her at all times. Kelly is a mother of three...God help her.

And, while it is somewhat flattering to be elevated to super star status around here, and to have someone in my life who wants to follow me around at all times, it is STILL nice to have a little quiet time to myself. I think it is the only way I will ever get anything written on this blog.

So now I need to go shush the cat and fix some breakfast, because it's probably poor form to arrive at work at 7 a.m. and, at 7:20, take a break to fix some breakfast. And....damn. I think I hear Zoey.

Weed Hound, where have you been all my life?

So, Bryan got this gizmo for the yard that looks like a stake with a handle and a push thingy at the bottom (you're picturing this perfectly in your mind, aren't you?), and it's used to snare dandelions right by the root and yank them out of the yard. As many of you already know, I am not one to participate in anything that remotely resembles yard work--give me a load of laundry or even a kitchen floor to mop any day, but ask me to weed? I think not.

But last Sunday I was wandering around the yard waiting for Bryan to finish some mundane garden task, and I happened upon the Weed Hound. I picked it up and asked him to show me how to use it--if anything, I could pass the next 10 minutes productively while I waited for him to finish up and take me to lunch.

Or, I would become a Weed Hound addict, spending the majority of the day stabbing, pulling, and dropping hundreds of dandelions in the wheelbarrow by my side.

Who would have thought?

This morning, I happily bounced out to the yard at 9 a.m. to find my buddy, and began poking and pulling yet again. Tragically, half-a-wheelbarrow-load in to the game, IT BROKE. Not sure if I was too aggressive, or what would cause it to poop out on me, but I have to say that I was disappointed. Bryan was more like pissed off, because apparently the Weed Hound has a lifetime guarantee.

I suggested he find out where the Weed Hound was purchased, go replace it quickly, and get back to the house before I lost interest in the first yard task I've tackled in 15 years.

Seriously, Mom? If you would have provided us all with a Weed Hound as adolescents, I can assure you that the weeding would have been accomplished with a LOT less grumbling. And who wouldn't want to use a sharp stabby thing in the yard right next to her annoying sister that just stole her favorite pair of Champion socks despite the fact that her name was written on the bottom of each sock? I'm still confident there would have been no Weed Hound abuse.

Really.

Is there a (licensed) chiropractor in the house?

It's official--Bryan is now a chiropractor, for real!

He (finally, finally, FINALLY) got his license on Friday, after weeks of waiting and calling the state to pester them about pushing his application through. It is entirely possible that they just gave him his license quickly because they were tired of hearing his voice on their voice mail. But whatever.

Because you know what this means? Now he can find a job!

I'm thinking he should be employed in a very short time--as he pointed out last week, it will be a lot easier to explain to potential employers that he can start working any time, as opposed to telling them he can start whenever the state of Washington gets around to giving him a license, whenever that may be.

Let's hear it for Dr. Angove!

Gotcha! (Or, Why I Love My Friend Nancy)

One of the things I love most about my job is the fact that everyone there is a huge fan of the Practical Joke. Here's how I got Nancy yesterday:

I was working in the procedure room and Nancy was out in the Recovery area. For those of you who don't already know, I'm a GI nurse and assist with colonoscopies and upper endoscopies (scopes that go down your throat and look in your stomach) all day long. My day pretty much consists of an endless litany of "Okay, Mr. So-and-so, turn over on your left side...let me lift up your gown back here...now I'm going to spend the next 20 minutes getting up close and personal with your colon...and then I'll repeat the process 17 times...then I'll go home for the day".

So we rolled the latest patient out to the recovery area, I hooked him up to the monitor while Carol Ann, the other nurse in the procedure room, gave a hand-off report to Nancy, and we went back to get started on the next colon or stomach waiting in line. Pretty soon I heard Nancy coming down the hall hollering "Amy! Are you eating chocolate back there?".

No. Great idea, though.

Turns out that, as Nancy was organizing her paperwork, she came across some flecks of brown something smeared on her paperwork. So, in an attempt to decipher the origin of the smear, SHE SNIFFED IT. That's right. Working in an endo center. Surrounded by poop. Sniffing the mystery brown stuff found on the paperwork.

I thought I was going to die laughing as I asked her if the next thing on her detective list would have been to lick it. I mean, seriously, WHO SNIFFS BROWN STUFF WHERE WE WORK? It could be anything! We're talking about doctors and nurses who have pulled intact mushroom slices, peas, and tomato skins from people's colons and snuck them back to the dirty scope room on a tray for the poor scope tech to find, then yelled happily "HEY LISA! NAME THAT FOOD!".

So, not being one to let opportunities like this pass me by, and still slightly giddy from being back in a place where mocking someone for sniffing brown smears garners plenty of fellow snickerers and not a group of surly people who think you should be burned at the stake, I snuck upstairs to the clinic where one of the doctors had pointed out that the office manager keeps a jar of mini Hershey's bars on her desk. (He was totally in on my scheme.) Then I grabbed an extra recovery room form from the receptionist and proceeded to write SMELL ME in bold, chocolate letters, right across the page.

For the record, a Hershey's bar writes JUST like a brown crayon. It was beautiful.

I could hardly contain myself as I waited for the procedure to be over and roll the patient down the hallway toward recovery. My view was excellent--I could see Nancy's face as I hooked the patient up to the monitor and watched her flipping through the pages on the clipboard while Carol Ann gave her another report. She found her recovery room page. She stopped. And for a split second--right before she yelled OH MY GOD AMY, WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN UP TO?--she looked completely grossed out and confused.

And that? Is why I love my job.

(I can hardly wait to see how she'll get me back!)

I give up.

I just woke up from a nap.

A beautiful, slightly-less-than-an-hour, would-have-been-longer-if-Bryan-hadn't-opened-the-decrepid-garage-door-directly-under-my-pillow, middle-of-the-day NAP.

There are, apparently, only so many days in a row in which I can handle waking at 4 a.m. to fetch hot milk, a new diaper, and/or (in a new, tragic turn of events) a new set of bedding NO! NO! NOT MY SNOWMAN SHEETS MOMMY NO, then waking for the day at 6 a.m. to either fetch more hot milk and turn on Olivia...or setting off for my fun-filled, spend-10-hours-on-your-feet job, before I start feeling like I could strangle my husband who not only sleeps peacefully through the negotiations being held across the hall regarding which set of bedding is best to employ before the sun comes up, but SNORES THROUGH IT.

If there is one thing I learned from the initial months after Zoey's birth, those horrid months filled with winter darkness, postpartum depression, lack of sleep, and a child who could have entered the Olympics on a pooping scholarship, it was this: when killing your husband starts to seem like a viable option and one that would only make your life easier, it's time to just wave the white flag and go take a nap, already.

Because I inherited the SuperMom gene from my very own mother, I find it hard to take a break in the action of laundry, cleaning, and general household organization tasks to just rest. But oohhhh....when I do....I feel like a new woman. Is it really possible that pausing to rest like this every once in awhile (or every day) will mean my laundry will snowball out of control, that the dust bunnies under the couch will grow their own brains and personalities and eventually plot to take over the world, or my family will only ever eat spaghetti from a jar for dinner?

Probably not.

But still. Baby steps, I suppose. At least I can recognize with stunning clarity now that curling up in bed at 2 p.m. on a Wednesday is preferable to beating my husband over the head with a baseball bat.

How is it possible that I have not updated the pictures on here in MONTHS?

Oh, now I remember. We moved, and in all the chaos, the blog suffers yet again.

So enjoy the new photos--I'm spending this afternoon's nap session updating the site and uploading about a thousand photos to the Costco website.

Straight in to the arms of Ann Taylor

I am posting an email I recently got from my sister, Abby, because it made me laugh out loud AND proves the point that the need for retail therapy is apparently genetic. Oh, and Abby? Any girl who just completed a thesis deserves a little $36 pair of earrings. Enjoy.


this is what an irresponsible girl does:

1) takes her thesis to staples and gets it printed not because she's COMPLETELY sure about all the revisions, but because she's COMPLETELY done with revising, period.

2) considers taking the bus up into town to go to lenox and celebrate with some retail therapy,

3) screws the bus idea and drives her ass uptown and marches straight into sephora, where she promptly

4) drops $78 dollars because the salesclerk tells her which products carmindy swears by and even tries them out on this irresponsible girl's face,

5) regrets spending so much on make-up, and in order to console herself, she

6) finds solace in the arms of ann taylor. 20% off coupon? plus an extra discount to get a clasp on a dress re-sewn? sure!

7) and those earrings on my way out of this place? if they're LESS than $21, i'll buy them. let's see. $36. sold!

8) remembers she has a tattoo appointment at the end of the week. hmm.

that's what an irresponsible, spoiled brat would do. just so you know. okay.

Full-time working mom

I am telling you, this working full-time bit has put a serious damper on my life, obviously to include the little time I have left to blog.

First, let me say how much I LOVE my job. I am back at work with nurses and doctors I have known and loved for years, in a place where I know I fit in. And, after three and a half years of working with people who are constantly swinging up and down the needing-Bipolar-meds curve, I have come to realize how very important it is to work with people who are sane and normal, whatever sane and normal means to you. (Putting a note on the bathroom door asking people to please leave the door open when not in use, because Char gets confused and waits for long periods of time for the nobody in the bathroom to open the door and come out? Normal. And fun. Having to send a co-worker to the ER because she's threatening to commit suicide and has barricaded herself in the supply closet? Not normal. Or fun.)

So, I never dread going to work, like I did in Vancouver. BUT, instead of working part-time, I am back to working full-time, 40-hours-a-week, four 10-hour shifts per week. Which leaves me exactly one day in the week to do all the laundry, cleaning, and entertaining of my child. After two weeks of this schedule, all I can say is that we're all still adjusting. And I am so unbelievably tired of getting up at 6 a.m. EVERY SINGLE DAY, whether because of my alarm clock OR my child who seems to crave fewer and fewer hours of sleep these days, I could just...pour myself another cup of coffee.

And now, I need to go get the house ready (as in, kitty fur balls vacuumed off the carpet, beds made, toys picked up) because my sister Michelle, whom I haven't seen in ages, is coming down to visit today. Which means I'm headed back to the coffee pot to re-fuel, and Zoey is well on her way to watching her third episode of Olivia. Which should make both of us happy.

Sleeping in

Normally I get up at 6:03 every morning for work.

This morning Zoey let me sleep in until 6:11 a.m.

That's a full eight minutes of sleeping in...very thoughtful of her, don't you think?

Fake flowers, anyone?

Early morning post today!

Because Zoey was up at 5:20 this morning with another litany of requests (hot milk! kitty cat blanky! my teeth hurt--I need medicine!) I decided to skip crawling back in to bed for an extra 20 minutes of shut-eye and just hopped in the shower instead. And I have to say, it's nice to be up before everyone else in the house. It's quiet, I have my cofffee, AND my dishwasher has already been unloaded. Bonus.

I'm sitting here watching the sun come up over our backyard and wondering about whoever it was that lived here before us. I know it was the original owners of this lovely, heavily-draped and carpeted home, and that they built it custom to suit their tastes (am still incredibly thankful that their taste included a laundry chute). Apparently, the Mrs. was a master gardener as well, specializing in growing dahlias. Our house sits on a 0.9 acre lot, and the backyard appears to go on forever. I can see a future of many, many barbeques, parties, maybe weddings even, happening out in that yard.

Which is why I'm so confused about what we found out in the yard yesterday. Being the first nice stretch of weather since we've arrived in Puyallup, we finally had a chance to get outside and de-ugly the OUTSIDE of the house yesterday. (And really? We just scratched the surface.) I attacked the front porch on Saturday, throwing out a pot of fake plastic pink flowers and removing sheets of thin, vinyl plastic from the amber-glass windows flanking the front door. I mean, amber glass kind of went out with the 70's, but were they thinking that covering it with dark Saran Wrap hid it completely, or perhaps enhanced the look? Very confusing.

And then we hit the backyard on Sunday. Wow. I hadn't even noticed before the ugly plastic flowers hanging on the side of the shed. (Interesting, since you have a pretty good view of the shed from the kitchen window.) There were long, black plastic vinyl tubes with fake flowers poking out the sides. There were pots and pots of fake flowers. Wind chimes that had to be circa 1964. Ugly yard decor in the garden--plastic sunflowers, plastic plants, everything but a yard gnome, really.

But the best find came when we cleared off the downstairs back porch--I noticed what looked like a HUGE condom swirling in the breeze right off the laundry room. On closer inspection, I realized it was half a pair of ladies nylons, amputated below the knee, attached to the spout (is that the correct term?) where the clothes dryer vents to the outside. A nylon condom to catch lint! Brilliant, but...a little weird looking. We'll have to figure out a way to cover that up.

So, as our pile of things awaiting a trip to the dump grew higher and higher, I was wondering what had happened to the couple who lived here previously. I think I heard that the Mr. had passed away, and I'm guessing the Master Gardner Mrs. had to give the place up. But was she going senile before she left? Why all the plastic plants, when you're a master gardner?

I am thankful that we have about 25 years to work on fixing this house (inside AND out!) to our tastes before Zoey might be of the age when a backyard wedding seems like a fun idea.

Excuse me, sorry.

Trying to teach a two year old a sense of manners is quite the chore.

She does great most of the time, although she seems to be going through quite the bossy phase already--I thought that didn't hit until at least age seven? Maybe not. The eye rolling and impatient sighs are probably also a sign of premature adolescence.

Anyway, her new favorite line is "Mommy, I be wight back. STAY!" I have pointed out many times that this is rude, and could she at least add a 'please' after the obnoxiously loud STAY? *Eye roll, impatient sigh* "Okay, Mommy. STAY. PWEASE."

And then there are the times, like this afternoon, where she just misses the mark completely. For example, we were outside enjoying the warm weather, washing my car. Zoey came charging at me, wanting to get past me and hopefully gain complete access to the hose, and as she was pushing me aside she was saying "Sorry, Mommy. Sorry. Sorry." (Or, "saw-ee".)

Um, do you maybe mean 'excuse me'?

*Eye roll. Impatient sigh*

"Okay, Mommy. 'Scuse me! 'Scuse me! Mommy! SCOOT!"

Mmmpppfff.

Scene: Our bedroom. 5:45 a.m.

Zoey: Mommy? I need the big bed. My bed is all wet!

Me: Mmmphff.

Zoey: Mommy! My jammies! All wet!

Me: Mmmmm....

Zoey: I need hot milk! And my kitty cat blankie! And new jammies!

Me: Too early to be so bossy, Zoey. Go away.

Zoey: No! Mommy! GET UP!

And so my Sunday morning is off to a smashing great start. I managed to get Zoey changed, and played the role of servant to all her bossy demands, and back in to the "big bed" where we pretended to sleep for another hour. At 6:45 I gave up and dragged my tired butt out of bed to strip down Zoey's sheets, blankets, duvet cover, mattress pad...how does one tiny bladder produce enough urine to soak through so many layers??

And so, at the moment, I am incredibly thankful for the following:

1. Coffee.

2. Hazelnut creamer.

3. Episodes of Olivia and The Berenstein Bears On Demand.

Maybe we'll both get a nap today....

The sun is out!

Hooray!

After weeks (months, really) of cold, windy, SNOWY weather, I am happy to report that Zoey and I woke up this morning (early, naturally) to see the sun shining in our yard. We've had at least two playgrounds scoped out here in Puyallup for weeks, but we've just been waiting for the chance to get out and try them. Looks like today will be the day!