Baby Reunion

Everyone,

I don't talk a lot about our infertility struggles (hardly at all) because I choose not to talk about them here. Needless to say, we've had struggles, and we've had successes. Three of them!

My infertility clinic has a huge party every Saturday before Mother's Day to celebrate these successes. We always love to go see our friends and show off the kids.
Today had all the regular fare (love Marriott ham and muffin sandwiches!) and all the regular fun for the kids. This was the first year that Pirate and Professor participated in the face painting. They got balloons on their arms. Butterfly had 2 butterflies painted...one on her hand which got washed off during a potty trip, and one on her arm.

We left with very tired kids and 3 teddy bears to add to our collection.

We had a great time at this year's reunion!

Safire

What Motherhood has given me.

Everyone,

I was just reading a post over at Arwen/Elizabeth about the things that motherhood have given her. She got me thinking about what motherhood has given me. So here is a list.

1. Tough feet and the ability to step on small sharp toys. When it first started to happen, I would hop up and down and moan a little because ouch! Those things hurt! Now, I just look down to see what I stepped on and move it out of the walk way. Hopefully it didn't break.

2. The ability to watch the same episodes of tv over and over and over without complaining. There are only 2 shows I let Butterfly watch on tv. And I have seen all of them at least 3 times. Is it sad when I am excited when the commercials say that there is going to be a new episode?

3. The ability to read books out loud to Butterfly in the dark. She wakes up at an awful hour of 6am. It's not light out yet. I barely have enough energy to help her climb into bed with us and peer at the book she has thrown on my head. I don't even put on my glasses. I just start and she turns the pages. It's only because I have so many of them memorized. Want to hear "Go, Dogs. Go!" or perhaps "The Alphabet Book"? Because I can recite them at a moments notice.

4. The ability to negotiate. Butterfly has her own opinions. She is very very loud about them. She has been since probably day 3. This is when she would go from content to squalling in .002 seconds. It was especially hard in the middle of the night when she slept right next to my ear. The one nice thing about this is that she is just as easily calmed down. She can go from squalling to content in about .2 seconds. You just have to know just what to say and when to say it.

5. The ability to function on very little sleep. I don't know why we got a early bird and a night owl. Last night Butterfly did not fall asleep until close to 10pm, and was up again at 6am. I can't sleep while she is reciting Nemo in her bedroom. Juice is so not a morning person. He rolls over and does his best to hide under his pillow when she gets up so early. He says it's just because I am so much better at fighting the breakfast battle. I know it's really because he's cranky when he doesn't sleep in in the morning.

6. The ability to listen about other peoples kids and actually be interested. That's because I want my turn to brag about Butterfly. And I want the people I brag to to be a little interested in my amazing child. So I force myself to be interested in their child. And you know what? I actually do get interested in the other children. It makes me a better friend to their mom, and hopefully they are a little interested in my wonderful toddler. When she was a baby I could not wait to skip over their kid stories to inject one of my own. But now, I listen, wait my turn, and ask questions for more clarifications.

I guess what this all boils down to is patience. Juice has this endless fountain of patience. I do not. But motherhood is teaching this to me one hard little step at a time. From trying to get pregnant with Butterfly for 3 years, celebrating her baby-ness (the good and the bad, I was so happy to just have a baby!) and now enjoying the blossoming Independence of a 2 year old. I'm digging my well of patience slowly. Patience isn't bad, right?

Safire

Summer Business

Everyone,

This summer has been jam packed with outings, things to do, things to see, and more. It has been so fun to be a little more mobile than last summer, and to have Butterfly enjoy some more things.

We've been to the splash park, the museums, the pool, the park, scrap booking with JeuJeu and his family, the farmer's market, the post office, the park, the store, the art supply store, the park, the mall, Juice's work, the park. We go to the park a lot.

Although with this hot and steamy weather we've been getting, the park is not an option. This week, the temps rose to over 100 degrees, with at least 90% humidity. They set a new record at Regan National Airport for the hottest day ever. 103! With the heat index (is that the humidity or what?) it felt like around 115 degrees. Needless to say, we've been watching a lot of Finding Nemo in the house.

I'm hoping that the weather will break a little for our county fair that is going on next week. I plan on going to children's day because all kids under 12 get in free. Juice works across the street from the fair grounds and will join us there for dinner and rides. Maybe a better way would be rides then dinner.

My kid concerts are over, which I'm sad for. I don't know what to do with myself on Mondays now! I was going to go to the park with Vinny and his mom but she is pregnant and sick and well, I don't deal with that right now. Not with the whole miscarriage, infertility, you-don't-know-how-lucky-you-are-and-I-don't-want-to-hear-about-it-at-all-so-I-can-focus-on-yet-another-cycle feelings I'm having. I cry just thinking about it. (That could also be the hormones, man I hate these things!) Oh, I have started another blog to go through the infertility stuff but it is invite only. Please email me at safirecat at gmail dot com if you want an invite.

I am gearing up to also do a marathon cook with the lady I used to babysit for. We are going to make about 9 frozen meals that will hopefully be eatable. This is our first time doing this (for both of us!) so I'm not sure how it's supposed to go. But hopefully I will have 9 or eve 18 meals all frozen and put away for busy days.

I am also trying to add a little to our camping gear. I bought a dutch oven about a week ago and have been dying to use it! But Juice doesn't want me to use it on our front porch (we have no yard) so I have to find a table of some kind to set it on. Anyone have any ideas?

Cookbooks are my reading of choice right now. I have a frozen meal one, a dutch oven one, and a food storage one that I'm all trying to learn at once. Never mind that I don't even have one whit of food storage or idea on how this frozen meal thing is supposed to work or really, how to use a dutch oven. All I know is that these are things I want to know how to do eventually and I better do it sooner rather than later.

I feel like I have more to say, but can't figure out what. Oh well. Until next time!

Safire