NS March 22nd, 2007
I was all set to write a long, serious, meaningful post today and apologise to my adoring fans for being so absent as of late. And then I fed my daughter an egg sandwich and Thursday officially ended before it began.
First she puked on my bed, down the side of my bed, and on the rug. This was about two minutes after I’d gotten out of the shower myself so I was clad only in my underwear with a towel perched haphazardly on my head. I rushed her to the bathtub and plopped her in it but she’s already finished hurling so I stripped her and hosed her down. New nappy and outfit, bed stripped and rug placed in washing machine and we were good to go. I strapped her into her high chair, placed her in front of the Mac, and let her bang away on the keyboard with the Alpha Baby program that she so dearly loves while I finished getting ready. She was so happy banging on the keyboard that I figured I’d vacuum quickly while she was off of the floor and occupied. Big mistake. I heard a cough and turned the vacuum off to listen and heard the unmistakable sound of vomit splattering on the floor. This time the vomit was mostly down her front, in her hair and in every nook and crevice on the safety straps of her high chair. Joy! Bath and outfit change number two follow.
In between bouts of puking she seemed pretty happy so she was fine playing on the kitchen floor with her tambourine while I cleaned the high chair and did the dishes. Vomit is really difficult to get out of ridged nylon straps! I started to make lunch for myself when I heard her stomach churn again. I was able to get her to the bathtub in time but the piteous way she looked at me, with tears in her eyes and a retch on her face, made me feel absolutely horrible. There is not much worse than seeing your child feel unwell and there’s nothing you can do for her. I rubbed her back and cuddled her, not caring if puke got on me too, and we cried together.
I realised after outfit change number three that I had only one nappy left and no wipes. Ga-reat. I rang my mother-in-law who just happened to be at the store and she, saintly woman that she is, brought some over a little while later.
So all of my plans to spend the day writing have been dashed. Londonist? Sorry! Meaningful blog entry? Nada. But if I could, I would make it all better for her and I don’t care what I’d have to give up to get it. No more chocolate chip cookies, EVER? Done. No more cute wedges in the summer? No problem. No more large glasses of cabernet sauvign…Now, wait a minute. Some things are just worth throwing up for. Amelia will learn this sad lesson one day as she too chugs her large glass of wine too quickly and spends an entire day examining the contents of her stomach lining. So I think we can safely keep that one. But the others? They can go. I’d even give up pickles for her, and anyone who knows me is gasping right now and trying to pick their jaws up off the floor.
I never did learn another language but I’m becoming fluent in Mother’s Love. There, there baby. Sleep, my angel, sleep. Mama’s here.
NS March 19th, 2007
It was Mother’s Day in the UK yesterday, my first. Here’s how my day went:
4.45am – wake up to feed baby
5.05 – back to bed
6.30 – baby awake again; Paul jumps up to get her and let me sleep
8.38 – wake up from blissful sleep; make coffee and cereal; go back to bed to read
9.15 – Paul and Amelia come into the bedroom and give me a card and gifts (book on wine and some lovely perfume and lip gloss from L’Occitane en Provence)
10-12 – Get showered, tidy up the flat, dress and feed Amelia
12.15 – inlaws arrive to take us for a drive and to do a second viewing on a house
1pm – look at house again; decide we really like it and want to put in an offer (!!!!!)
2.00 – go for coffee; get annoyed at Paul for letting Amelia drink half of his mocha frappuccino
3.15 – back home
3.30 – Amelia down for her nap; get chicken in the oven
5.45 – sit down to eat a roast dinner (chicken, roasted potatoes, squash and peas)
7.30 – Amelia to bed; surf internet
8.00 – curl up in bed with the laptop to watch Prison Break; drool over Wentworth Miller. Again.
9.00 – Oreo break; more PB
11.00 – bed
I could get used to this Mother’s Day stuff! The 8.5 hours of (nearly uninterrupted) sleep was the most precious gift I could’ve gotten. Since I’m American, I think I’ll insist on the same treatment in May for the US holiday. Now if I could just convince Paul…
NS March 17th, 2007
Amelia took her first, teeny tiny step yesterday. We were at a playgroup and I was chatting to a couple other mums, watching Miss Thang out of the corner of my eye, when I saw her pick up a plastic toy, stand up, and then look longingly at the baby’s head just out of her reach. She looked around for something to hold onto but only empty space flanked her. So, determined as ever, she hesitantly put a foot forward, and then the other one. Success! She grinned and just as I exclaimed “Oh my god, she just took a step! Yay!!!” and everyone’s heads swiveled round to see, she took the toy in her hand and began repeatedly bashing another baby’s head with it. When I told Paul about it he said “So we’ve figured out what her incitement to walk is — violence.”
Oh dear. What are we in for?
She also had what can only be described as her first temper tantrum the other day. She kept turning the tv on and off, on and off, and pushing on the screen. Since we are borrowing a friend’s tv right now while ours is being repaired, I had to be quite stern about her not touching it. A series of firm ‘NOs’ followed by picking her up and removing her from the area and distracting her with toys didn’t work and when I caught her going for the tv again I said in my Meanest Mommy voice “Amelia! No!” she looked at me with the widest eyes and stopped dead in her tracks. And then laid her head down upon the floor and began wailing. I couldn’t help but roll my eyes and laugh a bit before I scooped her up to comfort her. Oh, to be inside the head of a baby on the verge on toddlerdom. It must be like a Jackson Pollack painting in there: colorful, a bit crazy and all over the place.
The girl’s not even one yet and I’m thinking that shares in Prozac (for me) might be a good idea.
Another story up over at Londonist — btw, the guy in the picture? He looks eerily like my ex-boyfriend. Gulp.
NS March 14th, 2007
Don’t you love it when you have one of those days where you get so much done without ever feeling stressed and at the end of the evening you just feel perfectly content? I had one of those today and da-ammmmn it feels good! I did the food shopping (where I found many bargains), the cleaning, packaged up some gifts and other things I need to mail and got them ready, made some appointments, began organising a baby shower for my dear friend Lisa, looked for houses online, filled a prescription for Paul, went to a playgroup with Amelia, sent some emails and wrote another story for Londonist.
After that, I got Amelia to bed, cooked dinner, hung up two loads of laundry, cleaned my bedroom, did the dishes and updated my personal website with new pictures and video clips of my baby girl so that family and friends in the States can keep up with her progress.
Right at 10pm, I sat down with a vodka tonic to watch Desperate Housewives. I realized that if I’d been wearing pearls with a sweater set today and baked a cake, you could’ve mistaken me for Bree Van De Kamp/Hodge. Instead, I had one a baggy blue shirt encrusted with a bit of snot on the shoulder (Amelia just loves to bury her head there when she’s got the sniffles), jeans, and not a matching accessory in sight. Ah, well. I’d rather have this life than be worrying all the time if my husband might bash my head in and remove all of my teeth in the middle of the night. I know Paul is way too lazy for that. Who would clean up the mess and get rid of the body?
Speaking of Desperate Housewives, can I just say how much I love Lynette? She is my favorite character. I love that she flashed an old man just to get a liquor license. And what a great comeback when Tom barred her from attending his pizza place’s grand opening and then acted all disappointed when she turned him down for sex — “You barred me from your opening…” Great stuff. If I was a bit like one of the characters it would have to be her. Who are you most like? I know we’ve got some closet Brees and Gabbys up in here!
And this, just because it’s funny. I thoroughly enjoy seeing former 80s pop stars looking ridiculous.
NS March 13th, 2007
So I’ve been brainstorming and researching and figuring out how I can both earn some money by working at home and also keep doing (unpaid) writing to build up a portfolio. While my sister was here she helped me come up with some ideas for making contacts in the writing world and I’ll be going through that list item by item in the coming week or two, ringing around, emailing, and just generally pestering people and places to give me a chance. I’m cheap! Hell, I’m free!
I did manage to get a story in yesterday’s Londonist, my first one for them. I’m so thrilled that I got to throw in an A Team reference and say “pity the fool!” I’ll post the links here when I’ve got stories up over there. It’s a start!
And again, thanks to my sister who told me of a friend’s sister who does the same thing, I may have a great idea for working at home. Seeing as I love all things internet, online and otherwise wired, I think that being a Virtual Assistant would be perfect for me. Anyone who knows me knows I’m highly organised, a lover of lists and good at nagging, er, reminding people of what needs doing. I can imagine nothing more perfect for me if I could do it part time from home. I’ve got the experience and the skills, all I need is a bit of a home office set up and the sanity required to look after a baby/emerging toddler while working from home, and I’m good to go. Though I guess I also need clients, which might be harder to come by. I’ll also be — EEK!! — self-employed and having to do all the blah-blahdy-blah paperwork and tax stuff that goes along with it. I think I will be spending the next few days on the internet and in the library, figuring out how to set myself up for business.
If I get any more virtual I may just disappear altogether and be a mere hologram of my former self, and then I’d feel contagious, outrageous. Truly, truly, truly outrageous. Noble’s my name, no one else is the same. Ooh ooh ooh, N!
