Weekend by numbers: Tag-team parenting, and trains

1: Afternoon spent hanging with my Junebug, while....



1: Afternoon the Man-cub tried out the dadster's prototype bicycle-pedal-powered train.



2: Arms and shoulders that got tired (much needed for still-developing fine motor skills).



1: Birthday party I took the Junebug to while the Man-cub stayed home.

1: Birthday party I took the Man-cub to while the Junebug stayed home.

(1: Time I couldn't bite my tongue and told a party-goer it wasn't nice she stole my parking spot. She turned out to be the birthday boy's grandma. Go me.)

I say blah blah blah

The so-called blogging experts say you shouldn't write "why I haven't blogged" posts, but I figure you deserve an explanation.

If you are coming here in your free time to read my silly drivel and even check in on me (which I didn't realize until 10 minutes ago ... thank you!), then you are true friends.

I could wax poetic about writing and life, but I'll spare your eyes. (Save your good vision for wrapping presents, reading holiday cards that arrive in the mail and watching specials on TV.)

Basically, I just can't keep up the blogging game anymore -- and trying to do so has ruined my health.

I started blogging while expecting my five-year-old, and it was great to find a community of other dedicated moms from all philosophies, locations and walks of life. I depended on their support during my pregnancy and first months as a mother, and later to find out how other moms were walking that motherhood walk. Because I sure didn't know how to do it!

Maybe it's just me, but commercialization has changed that community a bit. There are the haves and have-nots of the blogosphere, and, well, I guess I'm just not as hilarious or poignant as the blog superstars (some of whom I "grew up with" as a new mom blogger), or maybe it's that I didn't have a hook or niche of some kind to catch much interest. I admit I compared myself to other bloggers. And I admit lack of success got me down.

Also, I have two little boys now who don't really nap, and they are just too cute and fun (and OK, needy) to ignore while I devote my attention to a computer screen. (Well, that's what they think I'm doing.)

So I stayed up in the wee hours after everyone was asleep to blog and comment.

And/or I ended up ignoring my children. (I am right now. But they are enjoying a new DVD and are happy for the moment.)

And still got nowhere with my blog.

So, whatever.

A five-year track record of five to six broken hours of sleep every night made me cranky and ill. I finally had to say enough was enough, turn off the computer for the night, get some rest and get well. Some people say they trained themselves to need very little sleep. I say that's awesome for them! But yeah it didn't really work for me.

After so much time away from my blogs, I feel guilty. Almost like How dare I try to post again? Who will even remember me now?!

But I made a deal with myself. If I focus on my health and family first, and I get a chance to post something, great! I'm just not going to care about how many posts I do every week. I'm not going to worry about stats. I'm not going to try to be popular. I know some of my blogging peeps would say it's blog suicide and you have to treat your blog like a business. I say blah blah blah. Tried it, failed, ruined my health and slighted my family, moving on.

Because even though I'm a writer, I don't have to be a great blogger.

Maybe I'll be able to give it another earnest try some time. Just not now.

Now, I need time to rest and time to enjoy my boys.

They are the reason for this blog, after all....

Weekend by numbers: Rain, rain and more rain

1: Flash flood warning.

1: Closed street.

1: Day without Internet access.

1: Neighbor's birthday party that was postponed due to the weather.

1: Friend's birthday party that carried on ... but was flooded.



3: Days of rain. Hard rain.

5: Inches of rain from the former Hurricane Rina on already-soaked land. (Um. Did you see that picture above? How does a 5-inch rainfall create a 7-inch-deep lake in a field?)

6: Halloween cupcakes.



(Yeah, those are Easter and Hanukkah decorations. I thought I had Halloween decorations but turns out I didn't. I don't know how I got a Hanukkah cupcake topper, but the Junebug loved the Star of David. The Man-cub loved his Valentine's Day heart. We love all the holidays.)


(OK, this cupcake I didn't make. It was a surprise from my husband. Which is why I had to make cupcakes the Man-cub could eat.)

13: Apollo mission that inspired my husband to create this costume for Halloween.

Moved in the stillness

After dinner, I looked out the window. The sun had dipped below the horizon until all that was left of it were pink and orange streaks making arcs and bubbles in the sky.

Without saying a word to my family, I passed through the doorway, crossed the patio and collapsed into the hammock to watch the spectacle of dusk. Just a moment of peace after a busy day.

I'd been outside hardly a minute when my husband opened the back door, letting the Junebug out.

"Mommee-ee-ee-ee!" he squealed as he ran to me.

"He wondered where you were," my husband said, who stayed inside and closed the door.

I pulled the Junebug onto the hammock next to me, and soon the Man-cub joined us. I was flanked by little boys.

"That looks like a rainbow!" the Man-cub said, looking at the same marvel of sky.

I smiled and squeezed them close to me, one of my arms around each boy.

Time slowed down. I remember the rising and falling of breathing. I remember the Junebug's baby-fine hair whisping across my cheek like a feather. I remember the individual fronds of the palm trees, looking almost black in silhouette against the sunset in the west, moving together and yet individually in the breeze. Even the rarely-still Man-cub melded next to me in the quiet. We listened to the local high school band practicing -- starting and stopping in such a way it could have been just another cricket.

And we watched the sky, like an Impressionist painting in motion.

It was probably only a few minutes, but it may as well have been an hour.

It's great to do just nothing with my guys.

Yet even while we were doing nothing, I was completely moved.

Reach for the stars -- if you don't make it, at least you might get a lamp painted

Recently, I broke down and told my husband I want to move.

Yes, I mean I literally broke down. I had a weak moment. Probably caused by too little sleep and too much stress. And possibly a little wine.

"I can't live this way," is something I think I remember saying.

That sounds a bit dramatic to me now, but you decide....

For starters, our master bathroom has been "under construction" since I was pregnant with the Man-cub (who is 5). Friends, I have no drywall in this bathroom. There are small holes in the ceiling where the room is open to the attic above. There is a pockmarked concrete floor with no working bath tub or shower. I could show you a picture, but I'm too embarrassed. At least the two sinks work. The toilet works now -- but it didn't for the first year or so. Having a pregnant bladder waking you up at night is no fun, especially when you have to walk to the other side of the house to get to the working toilet! (The boys' bathroom is freshly redone and awesome.) Ah, memories.

Also, our stove/range unit is dying -- one burner won't come on and another one recently caught on fire -- and the handle of the oven (which runs too hot) broke off a long time ago. Because of the Man-cub's food allergies, I do a lot of from-scratch cooking, so I really need a place to cook. A place that actually works.

Then you add a floor redo that is half finished (the front half of our house has a nice laminate wood flooring and the back half still has 25-year-old chipped, stained tile), a hedge that always needs to be trimmed and shaped but never is (we have a huge yard) and a driveway that is crumbling due to tree roots and never having been resurfaced in the 15 years we've lived here ... and my joy is complete.

But actually, no, wait, there's more! Now there is a construction project going on right behind our property line. Here in southern Florida, there are lots of canals that were dug out so houses could be built. We have a canal behind our house too. It's considered an outfall canal -- all the water from other canals in our neighborhood drain into our canal and gets pumped out to a larger canal that runs from the Everglades (1 mile away) to the Atlantic Ocean. The water management folks are building a new pump. I don't know how they are accomplishing this, but I have two bull elephant-sized piles of dirt on the other side of said beat-up hedge, and their equipment shakes our house from 7 am to 4:30 pm six days a week. I mean, glasses in my cupboards are rattling. On the upside, I have a lovely view of a construction crane in my backyard (the Florida state bird).

When I recounted these things to my husband, he pointed out that no one is going to buy our house while the construction project is going on.

I may have literally choked back a sob.

But then he told me he would finish up the master bathroom before the end of the year and that we could get an all-new kitchen (not just a stove and oven, but cabinets too, which I wanted since before we moved in) in the first half of next year. It's not a matter of needing the money (well, OK, just a bit), but needing the time for him to do the projects. He is the kind of man who has to do everything himself.

I didn't know if I could believe he would actually get the ball rolling, but he started working on the bath tub right away.



Because everyone builds their own custom-sized bath tub, right?

My husband also repainted the yellowed used-to-be-white chandelier that hangs over where we eat in the kitchen.


Before




After

So we won't be moving into a beautiful new home. And maybe that bathroom actually won't get finished in 2011. But the stove and oven are on its last legs, so if he wants to eat, my husband knows the kitchen has got to materialize.

And if I'm still staring at exposed electrical wiring in the master bathroom this time next year, I'll console myself knowing at least that lamp got painted.

Different vs. better: When do you give other parents the benefit of the doubt?

I worked as an editor for a while before starting my own (failed) magazine, writing a book and then staying home to take care of the Man-Cub. I learned that when editing, changing something a writer has written doesn't always make the piece better -- sometimes, it's just different. And if editing didn't improve the piece, then I learned to just leave it alone. Because different doesn't equal better.

I have similar thoughts as a parent: Just because other parents do something I wouldn't, it doesn't mean either one of us is better. We're just different. All parents have to make their own choices that are right for their kids and their families.

But in some situations, I still worry about the kids involved. While editing, if someone wrote "lead" when she meant "led," misused a semicolon or needed better organization for her thoughts, that's one thing. Kids are more important.

One night recently, I made a quick dash to the supermarket when my husband was home with my boys. I pulled into the parking lot at the same time as another car. The car had a young man, an elderly woman and a little girl around three or four. The girl wasn't in a car seat or even a seat belt. I could tell because she was bouncing around. Later, I was surprised to see the elderly woman limping through the store with the girl -- while the young man in the driver's seat waited in a handicapped parking spot. I found myself casting judgment against this family. Then I reminded myself there was probably a reason the little girl was out late, there was a reason the young man wasn't the one to go into the store instead of the feeble grandmother (even though the handicapped parking sticker was probably for her). Maybe the grandmother was raising the girl herself and wasn't aware of child restraint laws, and the young man was a neighbor who offered to drive her after dark. Maybe the woman couldn't leave the girl with anyone but had to get something for breakfast the next morning.

So I didn't say or do anything. But I worried about the girl not being in a seat belt. I always buckle my kids in, after all. It's the law.

Then yesterday afternoon when I was taking my boys to an appointment, we parked near a large SUV outside a cafe. As I was getting the Man-Cub and Junebug out of their seats, I could hear kids playing inside the SUV. The engine was running, and the front windows were rolled all the way down -- but I didn't see any adults. I looked around to see if someone was nearby. All I saw were a man and woman sitting at one of the cafe tables. As I led the Man-Cub and Junebug away, the woman got up and opened the SUV to yell at the kids to get back in their seats. I instantly thought the couple was enjoying an early dinner while the kids were left in the vehicle. But then I wondered if the couple was just waiting to pick up a to-go order and didn't want kids running around the cafe tables. The SUV was right in front of them, so the children were in sight. And I'm sure with the engine running, the A/C was still on, so they weren't going to die of heat.

But the situation reminded me of a time when parents went into a local restaurant and left their son and daughter in the car in the parking lot, and a woman in the nearby store I was in called the police. A community resource patrolman -- a volunteer "cop" -- showed up to give the couple an oral warning. That was it, in spite of the trouble we have in steamy southern Florida with children being left in cars (and even school buses) to roast to death.

I didn't say or do anything about the SUV full of kids. I gave the woman the benefit of the doubt, even though I personally wouldn't leave my children in my car while picking up a meal (if that's what was going on).

Most of the time, I do give other parents the benefit of the doubt, because parenting is hard, and we all are trying to raise our children the best way we can. Defend the mother whose toddler was burned by hot coffee at Starbucks? I was the only one who did so on my local newspaper's Facebook page. Stick up for the woman who was ahead of a friend in line at a fast-food place and was apparently taking too much time ordering meals for the kids in her van? Yes, even though my friend complained it was somehow rude of the woman not to usher the children inside to order and leave the drive-through window for people who are trying to get to work.

A few months ago, I blogged that Jaycee Dugard's story taught me to trust my maternal instincts even if it meant calling the police. In these definitely less-dire situations I witnessed, I hope that those instincts were right and that the kids would be OK. Still, it's something I struggle with, knowing when to speak up.

Have you ever confronted a parent or called the police?

Weekend by numbers: Friends and food

1.5: Years since my husband and I had a date. Yeah, really.

2: Friends who came in from out of town we got to hang out with.



5: Attempts the Junebug made to make his peas disappear. (Disney magic.)



42: Homemade donuts I made this morning, half of them wheat- egg- and dairy-free.



50: Times I wished I had something better to do with the kids, but it rained all weekend.