Vacation

Ginny is almost a year old now so, needless to say, I need a vacation.  Gone are the days of young married life when my husband and I could throw a few sets of clothes in a bag and dash off for the weekend.  However, we did finally get the chance to go on a real first family vacation to our favorite mountain lake last week.

It's a good thing you get to rest while you're on vacation, because after packing for three people for a week--I was close to losing my mind.  How on earth could one tiny person need so much stuff for one week??  Now I know why, when I was a child, our '89 light blue dodge caravan was always stuffed completely full with six people and their entire lives in bags.  The back end of the van, nearly touching the ground, proved to be just the right tool for removing stumps in the driveway at our mountain cabin.  While my brothers liked to "rough-it" with their sleeping bags and probably one set of "camo" for the week, the rest of us packed up our rooms and brought them to the lake.  I recall one year when I literally sat with my knees around my head.  But with my knees so close to my ears I was able to easily block out the sound of my older sister singing along with R. Kelly's "I Believe I Can Fly" on repeat for 4 solid hours.  That was a long trip.

Facing packing only three people for a week still seemed a little daunting.  So I created a spreadsheet with each family member and all the hundreds of things we needed to bring. Yes I created the spreadsheet in excel and then uploaded it to google docs for ease in sharing.  Yes I am a dork.  We spent a day and a half packing up everything we owned and loaded it all into our moderately sized sedan.  We even noticed how much cleaner our apartment looked with all the crap out of it. (Thoughts of leaving all our belongings on the interstate crossed my mind.)   So after eating a lunch of whatever the heck was still in the fridge, we were off on our first family vacation.

The car trip was supposed to be about 4 and 1/2 hours. (So said our brand-new Garmin who we named James because he sounds exactly like James May from "Top Gear")  We were not looking forward to that length of time in a car with a less than 1 year old, but we had high hopes.  (We're new parents after all...)  Ginny ended up only sleeping for an hour of the trip and began shrieking after about 3 hours.  What a great way to begin a vacation!  So relaxing!  I moved into the back seat with Ginny in order to keep her entertained for the last hour and half to two hours.  She kept herself amused by playing with my cell phone and reading the brochure that came with my motion-sickness wrist bands. 

Finally.  As the sun was sinking below the mountains, we arrived at the lake.  A sense of peace and relaxation immediately came over us.  The sun danced and glittered on the lake.  A flock of birds flitted over the water.  Ah...vacation.  We opened the windows and sniffed deeply that clean, crisp mountain air.  And then, from beside me: "HERRK!!!"  Oh no.  I looked over to see Ginny spewing forth like a geyser.  This was no cute baby spit-up.  This was "I'm-a-big-girl-now" honest to goodness barf.  We pulled over at the side of the lake and I got Ginny out of her carseat and dangled her over the guardrail to finish her expelling.  (I will never look at peaches the same way.)  Cars passed, no doubt trying to see the beautiful scenery, but saw two newbie parents holding out their now naked baby herking at the side of the road.  We gave Ginny a baby wipe bath there on the side of the highway as the sun slid further behind the mountains.  Vacation had begun.

Princess Ginny

Have you seen those baby clothes with bedazzled lettering and some word or phrase denoting royalty?  Well, I'm not a huge fan.  It seems like we're encouraging kids to be vain and bratty. (Don't get me started on the shorts with lettering on the rear that teenage girls wear...) Anyway, regardless of my haughty opinions, Ginny was wearing a pretty simple pink onesie the other day with the word "princess" in smallish silver lettering.  I felt awkward about it.  It didn't really seem to go with her personality all that well, and someone actually commented on it.  It made me stop and think.

Ginny is a baby. She hasn't really developed royal airs yet.  She likes to get messy.  She sits quietly and reads books.  Nothing really regal.  But then I remembered my walk into work today...

I work in an old mansion turned office building a couple miles from my house.   It's quite an impressive building with beautiful carved furniture, large windows, lovely oriental rugs, and a spiral stone staircase.  Rather castle-like.  However, it's quite the to-do getting inside the darn building with a baby in a carseat, a monster diaper bag, any stray toys, and lastly myself.  You have to go through several doors (that are far too narrow) no matter which way you choose to get in.  It's a pain.  Often some kind co-worker will take pity on me and open one or two of the six doors I have to go through to get to my office.  But while I'm sweating and puffing around trying to get in, Ginny is all smiles in her carseat.  And that's when I realized.  She does act rather regal at times.  She rides around in her carseat-turned-sedan chair with me as her lowly lackey.  I scuttle around opening doors for her--and does she thank me? No! She just smiles, or looks off in the distance.  We enter the building and she may smile meekly at co-workers, or occasionally she will deign to wave at someone from behind the sun shade in her sedan chair.  We enter the hall with the large stone staircase.  This entrance of peasants opening doors and smiling and waving wasn't triumphant enough for Princess Ginny.  As we ascend the stairs, Ginny yanks down on her toy bug that "sings" and it's music booms throughout the echoey hall and up the stairs.  A royal fanfare is added to Ginny's procession as if to proclaim to the whole office building: "Hear ye! Hear ye! Stop your work and bow to me, Princess Ginny!  Everyone gather 'round and wave and smile as I bounce towards my luxurious office in my sedan chair with this mere peasant, my mother."

Maybe the onesie speaks the truth.

Squirrely Behavior

If you know me, or have met me even once, you'll know I detest squirrels. Loathe them in fact.  Nevertheless people always give me all sorts of squirrel paraphernalia: squirrel mugs, ornaments, stuffed animals, tins, books, statues, cast iron figures, etc.  Blech.  I don't hate these items, or the people that gave them to me (I do question their sanity though), but I keep them to serve as a constant reminder of how much I hate the nasty little buggers.  People always say, "But they're so cute!". Exactly fools. That's what they want you to think.  They are just rats with fuzzy hind-ends.  But rats have the decency not to pretend they are cute.  I have been barked at more by squirrels than by dogs in my neighborhood.  I have had acorns forcefully propelled towards my head in a cold, calculated manner.  I have had my wedding flowers gnawed to bits the night before my wedding by the varmints. All the while you keep mindlessly chanting, "But they're so cute!".

Hmm? What? This is a parenting blog? Oh. Well that reminds me.  I think I might be raising a squirrel.

I came to the painful realization this morning.  My daughter was playing with some foam floor puzzles that she absolutely adores.  She will not let anyone complete these puzzles.  The air must change and send out special "I'm almost done this puzzle" waves that Ginny immediately picks up on.  She darts over and tears the puzzle apart and stuffs the pieces in her mouth.  This behavior isn't directly squirrely.  But this morning I noticed she was skittering.  Yes, skittering.  I glanced around to see what she was doing.  My skittering daughter was darting around the livingroom (Skittering and darting? This is bad...) collecting the puzzle pieces and stuffing them into her secret hiding places.  Her two main stashes are between the arm chairs an underneath the exer-saucer.  If she can't hold as much as she wants in her hands, she'll stuff the others in her mouth and continue skittering. (The puzzle pieces now have perfect Ginny Teeth impressions that makes me think dentists should invest in a supply of baby floor puzzles to get the tooth info they need.)  I came close to her when she was stashing her pieces and she got frantic!  She immediately leaped up from the floor and skittered to another part of the room.   And now that I think of it, she does wiggle her backside akin to the flick of a bushy tail...

I can just hear the squirrel enthusiasts nodding and patting each other on the back, "Good. She's getting what she deserves.  It serves her right for hating the precious squirrels. They're so cute!"

How to Spy on Your Children

I know this isn't a new idea.  I'm sure if the CIA put some veteran parents in the field they'd have a fleet of the most resourceful, cunning spies.  Spies that don't need to dress in black and dart from dark alley to dark alley.  Rather, they would be spies that can waltz around in broad daylight, coo an embarrassing baby babble--and get the job done.   And all this without their targets thinking they have the mental capacity to function in society.

So our child is only ten months, what on earth would we need to spy on her for? She's not dating boys, staying out late, or going to drinking parties.  She's a baby for goodness sake.  Don't be fooled you naive being.  Babies are cunning.  They can tell once you have put them down for a nap how close you are to the bedroom door.  They can sense your presence and your ear smushed up against the wall.  They know.  They lay there until the winds change from your movement in the rest of the house.  Then they make their move.  It's playtime!  Ginny begins jumping in the crib, playing with the curtains, throwing her stuffed animal out of the crib, walking the perimeter of her mattress.  Say good-bye to nap time.

We had to put an end to this.  This girl needed to nap.  We got tired of walking into the room and lying  her back down every few seconds.  We needed some one-way glass--but we have no budget for such expenditures.  We are no James Bond spies with shmancy gadgets galore.  We are parents.  We have to get crafty.  So we have to go old-school. Old, old, old-school.  We have a keyhole.  My husband first discovered it.  The keyhole is rather large and points directly at the crib.  We have a perfect view.  Now we can sit outside the door and say an ominous "Ginny....." and she will whimper and lay back down.

Jordan: Parental Spy Extraordinaire

Well, she didn't listen to our ominous voices for very long.  Soon she started to ignore us.  Now we just have to let her play herself to sleep, but we still peep in to see if she has indeed fallen asleep.

View from the keyhole: Ginny surveys the perimeter of her crib.

Ginny contemplates throwing Lamby-baa overboard.

Ginny starts to surrender to sleep. Muah ha ha!

And she's down!

 Night-night!

The key to being a parental spy is to get rid of your stuffy pride.  Be resourceful.  Scoff at dignity.  Keep a camera handy.

Warp Speed

Parenting Lesson of the Day: Prepare for Warp Speed.

Ginny turned ten months old this week. She eats pretty much everything that's in front of her, she babbles in a cute squeaky/screechy voice with the occasional "Mamama" and "Daddy-dy"and she's days away from taking her first steps.  I'm pretty sure this can't be happening.

Last I checked I had baby, not a pre-toddler.  Things will surely slow down now. (I hear a roar of veteran parents snickering... This can't be good.)  Anyway, I thought it would be fun to share a heap of cute pictures of Ginny so you can all share the Warp Speed journey that I have been on.  Let us begin at the beginning. A very good place to start! (Great now I'm going to have Julie Andrews and the von Trapp kids running through my head all day...)Anyway!

Ginny. Day 1:

That's a little cold. Here's something cozier:

Ah yes. How well I remember the eye gunk...

"Hello baby! I'm your Mama! I'm the one whose ribs you've been kicking for the last five months!"

Ginny. 1 month:

Ginny's Native American chieftain look.

 Gas or Ginny's first genuine smile? We're not sure, but it sure is cute!

Ginny. 2 months(ish):

I know, I know. Horrible red-eye. But you try saying "no" to this cuteness!

Ginny. 3 months:

Sometimes we wish the girl would just cheer up!

Ginny. 4 months:

Jealous yet?

She is the world's biggest ham. (A Christmas ham!)

Ginny. 5 months:

Ginny. 6 months: (Is your head hurting from all this Warp Speed traveling yet? Join the club.)

 She's such a calm, serene baby...

Ginny. 7 months:

First solo sitting-up.

Ginny. 7.5 months:

Cheer up, girl!

Ginny. 8 months:

Ginny. 9 months:

Ginny. 10 months: (Faint)

Sigh. What happened to this baby?

 Oh well. Can't complain too much!

Well, there's the first leg of our warp speed trip.  I hope your head stops spinning so you can get on with the rest of your day.  I think I might need to lie down and take a nap...

Parlez-vous Mommy?

As I looked around at the city of Paris from the top of the Eiffel tower, I saw a hot air balloon wafting around the city, I heard the lovely melodic chatter of french spoken all around me--the view was incredible.  It was a little foggy that day, but still beautiful. (N.B. The view is better from L'Arc de Triomphe.)  After I descended the tower, the next stop would be the Louvre.  Can't complain!  After taking the required touristy photos, it was time to hop on the elevator and go back down.  There are two elevators at the Eiffel Tower: one that takes people up and one that takes people down.  But where was the elevator?  Sometime after a friend and I made it to the top of the tower, several bus loads of people also made it to the top and we were getting pushed and shoved by large numbers of loud french tourists.  No one else in our party was visible.  We couldn't find the queue to the elevator.  We had actually managed to get lost on the top of the Eiffel Tower. 

We managed to squeeze our way into a queue that we just prayed was the queue to go down because no sign was visible among the hordes of people.  Ten minutes later--we discovered it wasn't the right queue.  The yelling of the french tourists back and forth to each other was increasing as our fear and anxiety was increasing.  We couldn't understand them or any of the guides telling us where to go.  Finally, we found the right queue.  After a long, loud wait, we made it onto the quiet elevator with only a middle-aged couple on it.  We breathed a sigh of relief and overheard the couple quietly chatting to each other.  They were AMERICAN!! English speakers!  Never had the horrible twang of an american sounded so delightful, so musical, so comforting.  We clung to their every word.  We understood them.  It felt safe.

I never knew that with parenthood came a new language.  Not just the baby babble that becomes most of your speaking voice, but the language of different experiences.  Unfortunately, as I become fluent in this new language, I forget the language I used to speak.  Just like my four years of high school french--over years of not using the language, you lose some vocabulary.

As I talk with friends, I am often transported back to that frightening time on top of the Eiffel Tower when I understood nothing and was lost.  They talk about dating, traveling, evenings out, spontaneity.  These are words that are no longer in my vocabulary.  I haven't used them in years so I forget how to talk about them.  All I can muster in my conversations in this old language is a meek: Cava? (How's it going?)  And just like when I was trying out my high school french, I can ask the questions, but I can't understand the responses.

When something in my language comes up in conversations, I cling to it like I clung to the words of the Americans in the descending elevator at the Eiffel Tower: "Child birth?! I know all about that!" "Your baby doesn't sleep through the night?! Mine either!" "Teething? We have a great remedy!" "Carrot poop? Don't get me started--we had to ventilate our car!"  When someone speaks to me in parent language, it's music. It's easy.  I understand.

It's difficult being a young parent because not many people speak your language. The language of going to bed early, of a social life revolving around someone else's nap schedule, or a babysitter's availability.  It's foreign language to most of my peers.  And I can't seem to communicate in their world.

It's not that I don't love the language that my friends speak. But it's a struggle to keep up.  I run through vocab that I once knew in my head.  Baby brain slows down my responses. I'm dreaming of that quiet elevator where I can relax and be understood.

The Adult Onesie

I was absolutely inspired by an article by Jay Mohr I recently read in "Parents" magazine about a couple trying to potty train their toddler. Baffled by why their techniques weren't working, the two wondered whether their toddler actually *liked* peeing and pooping in his diaper. Then they got to thinking that perhaps *they* would like it too. Here is one of my favorite excerpts:

"We've all been stuck in traffic on the way to work after eating a bran muffin and having that extra cup of coffee....Forget car-pool lanes. There should be an 'I'm about to poop my pants!' lane....About 15 percent of the time I get stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic in the desert and think, in all sincerity, that I should have worn a diaper. With adult diapers we'd all drive to work carefree. Like little kids, we'd just let loose when it was time. Hopefully our parents would be at work waiting to change and powder us. Either them or a very understanding colleague."
Full article at http://www.parents.com/parenting/celebrity-parents/moms-dads/jay-mohr-diaper-duty/
(I recommend reading the entire article...)

That got us thinking...

Whenever my husband dresses our daughter, he immediately seeks out a onesie. They are easy to put on and make diaper changing much faster. When the baby wears just an ordinary shirt and pants, the shirt is constantly riding up and we have to chase her around all day pulling the shirt back down. The onesie is your one stop outfit. They are comfy, cool, and they often have a peachy quip like "I'm adorable" or "Princess" or "Free Gas, Inquire in Rear". Gems.

See how easy it is to play a block like a harmonica when you're wearing a onesie?! Poetry.

So why can't adults share in the ease and comfort that is the onesie? My husband pondered the other night: "How old do you think is too old to wear footy pajamas?" That's a good question. We decided that you are never to old. (N.B. We did decide that one may want to avoid wearing them during pivotal high school years)

Afterall, how great would it be, ladies, to not have to worry about your "I'm not in high school anymore" belly hanging out between your pants and shirt? I don't know about you but I think someone between high school and now must have kidnapped me in the middle of the night, drugged me, and put me in one of those torture devices that stretches your limbs into spaghetti--only all it did was stretch my torso, so now all my shirts rest somewhere between my belly button and my neck. Either that or I a shrunk all my shirts. Another somewhat less amusing possibility. Just imagine! With three snaps in your crotch, no more belly hanging out!

When I was in high school, before the dawn of the current "Britney Spears Catholic Girl" uniform, we had a dress code and daily checks for violations. We were required to raise our arms above our heads to see if any skin showed above our pants. And if there was--back home you go to change your shirt! Or you would be given an ENORMOUS traffic-cone-orange shirt to wear, akin to the Hester Prynne's Scarlet Letter, to broadcast how shameful you were to be wearing something culturally normal. Most girls ended up wearing extra long shirts tucked into their pants underneath their "normal" shirts. All day we would fiddle with the shirts, causing much more attention than probably a fraction of an inch of skin would have brought. Man! What a breeze a onesie would have been! We could have done freaking jumping jacks and no skin would have shown! Don't you ever just wish you could re-do high school with the knowledge you know now? That would have been my first change--an adult onesie.

As my husband and I were chuckling at the prospect of an adult onesie, I suddenly remembered, I actually have one! It's in my closet now! When I lived in a college dorm, a mysterious box of peculiar clothing showed up, and all the girls had a blast sifting through and creating the most hideous catwalk show. We laughed and laughed as we mocked whoever must have worn all these hideous articles of clothing, especially what we referred to as "THE SHIRT-ITARD". It was a blouse up top, onesie on the bottom. Genius. People would think you were dressed to the nines with your chic button up blouse--but they would never guess your secret...

I recommend sporting snake skin tights underneath your adult onesie.  And yes. Those are shoulder pads...(This is an ancient picture by the way...)

Even Super-Model gone showbiz tycoon Tyra Banks sports a onesie:

Ms. Banks may call it a "Jumpsuit", I call it an adult onesie. Bravo. Fashion and practicality do mesh!

I think adults, as well as babies, should be able to enjoy the ease and comfort of a onesie.  Now all that's left is to think of adult appropriate peachy quips to go on the front of our onesies.  How about: "I have a mortgage and snaps in my crotch" or...instead of something cutsie like "I'm adorable" we go for something a little more realistic like: "I'm aging...horribly". Or my husband's suggestion: "My shirt is giving me a wedgie".
How could one go wrong with an adult onesie? I see no bad sides.  Have I convinced you?  Please see the newly added poll at the very bottom of my blog page.  Voting will last for a week and your vote counts! (That's more than can be said about the current Electoral College system! But that's fuel for another rant...)