Because I said I would!

While I sit on pins and needles waiting for Will to call me, who is waiting for the Doc to call HIM, let's turn our attention to something happier:

O's Halloweeny First Birthday Extravaganza!!!

I was panicked and stressed up until everyone arrived: The weather was awful, nixing our outside plans, Owen fell asleep right as people were supposed to arrive and tons of people canceled last minute-I thought we were DOOMED...

But you know what?

It turned out to be just what it should have been:

Small

Warm

Comfortable

Sincere

Lovely

Here's a Looky:

 

Big hugs to everyone who helped make his day (and Daddy and Mommy's too) SPECIAL.

We love you all! Thanks for giving us yours!

365 Days of Sunshine.

My little O is one today! He has been on this earth for an ENTIRE year.

How did this happen?! I was warned about the speed at which his babyhood would pass me by, and even so- It takes my breath away...



My Darling Bubu,

Happy Birthday, Love! You don't know what birthdays are yet, but you will!
And you're gonna loooove them!
A birthday is the day that your family and friends celebrate the day that you were born-showering you with joy because of the happiness your birth has brought them. Plus? There's always cake and ice cream....

The day you were born was the most amazing day of my life. It was what I had been waiting for-for a very long time. MORE than worth the wait!! You are the most beautiful little boy I have ever seen, but more than that, you have a beautiful heart. I know that you will grow up to be a good man. You always make me proud. You've given me a peace and a joy that I never thought was possible. You make me laugh every single day, and I am sooooooo lucky to be your Mommy.

I promise to do my best to be worthy of this honor. We may not always agree or see eye-to-eye. There are times where we will be angry at each other, or make one another sad, even though we didn't mean to...whatever happens, know that I love you. I will always do everything in my power to make you feel safe, secure, happy and loved. My love is, and always will be, unconditional. Nothing you can ever do will make me love you less. I promise to listen, to share, to hear you. I will make mistakes, (but you'll learn that we all do) and I will strive to learn from those mistakes so I can be an even better Mommy.

You are never a burden or obligation, you are a gift. You are my 365 days of Sunshine. I can't ever thank you enough.

Happy First Birthday, Sweetpea! You have so many to come, and I'm so excited to see the fantastic person you will be with each passing one. I love you with all the love in the WORLD.

Kisses,

Mommy

One Day...

One YEAR!

Oh, right. The baaaaaabbbbbby.

I'm gonna quit my bitchin' for a sec, and update you, my darling readers on what started this whole enterprise:

My son.



(Who as you can obviously tell, is AWESOME)

My little monkey is 10 months old, which kinda hurts my heart.

Yes, I want him to grow up and have a great life, but that means he's going to become a man...a hairy, stinky, sex-on-the-brain, MAN.

I have a hard time reconciling that. I mean, look at him! He's too cute for puberty!

Moving on...

He's crawling faster than I can walk (yes, I know that's not that HARD, harhar.), and he DESPERATELY wants to become bipedal.

[He's so close, I can taste the ER visits.]

Annnd? He's already climbing.
Homeboy can't walk yet, but he can climb? Lucky Me!


He's fiercely independent and stubborn. I have no idea where he gets it...ahem.

My Mommy-feelings often get hurt b/c he is perfectly happy playing by himself. Sure, he wants to know I'm near him, but when i try to horn in on his games, he looks at me as if to say: "Mommy, I'm having some ME time, right now."

[Uhhh, Sigh. I'll be over here, you know, if you want some company later, or somethin'....]

He's funny. He knows when he's doing something hysterical, and will give you a look like: "Eh? Eh? Funny, right?!"

He has the most expressive little face. He'll never be able to play poker...much like his mother. We can be read like books! BOOKS, I SAY!

He LOOOOOOOVES Sesame Street. He does a little jig as it's coming on. Mr. Noodle is his comic genius.

He's not quite talking yet (He says Mama, much to Dada's chagrin), but he babbles a ton, and gesticulates with his hands as he does it. It's all very Italian, really...

He studies everything. Turning it over and examining it from all angles.

He knows that remote makes the TV work, and that the Xbox controller makes figures move on the screen. He adores anything electronic.

Also? He loves him some ladies. He's a hardcore flirt.

[In short, he's a total dude.]

He's a music baby FO SHO. We listen to classical every morning, and classic punk in the afternoon.

He will wake up in the morning, stand up in his playard and hit all the buttons on the sound machine til music starts playing, and then sit back down and play.

Little man has these little drums that play music when you hit the tops, so he'll sit there w/them next to him while he's playing with another toy-using them as background music. When the music stops, He'll put down his toy, hit the drums, the music will start and he'll go back to what he was doing. Hilarious.

He's got 6 teethies and more on the way. He also has his Daddy's gapped front teeth....Orthodontia is in our future! WOO.

He hates eating solids, because he wants to feed himself. He hates sippy cups because he knows that they are not the same kind of cups Mommy and Daddy drink out of, so he's not having any of it. He'll only drink from MY cup. Period.

He hates bananas, applesauce, and juice of all kinds. What? Weird, right?

When he cries (which isn't a lot), his tone sounds like someone is killing his puppy (if he knew what a puppy was). Hubs and I joke that it's the hurting of his soul...seriously, though. It'll break your heart.

When he's mad (which is more frequent now that he's teething and trying to walk), he has an ADORABLE angry face.

[I don't think he appreciates it being called adorable, but whatever. He can bring that up in therapy a couple decades from now.]

In summation, he's kinda the coolest baby ever. I love him so much it sorta hurts.

Now, I have to start planning his 1st birthday party...


Now, that does hurt.

Oh, I forgot. I'm not allowed to...

Have a life.
Set boundaries.
Say no.
Stand up for myself.
Get respect.
Expect common courtesy.
Receive love unless I've earned it.


What brought on this tirade you ask?


Mother's Day.

I was very excited about this coming M-Day, it being my first official one and all...a day I have waited pretty much my whole freaking life for.

BUT, it was also the first M-day for my mom and my MIL as grandmothers. Exciting right?

I thought so.
So over a month ago, I set to planning.

I thought it would be awesome for us all to celebrate together.

My mother wanted to celebrate separately.
She gave me grief about the fact that she (or my siblings) never sees us and never sees the baby.

(forget the fact that we have tried and tried to go see her, but she's always "busy", and oh, what was that other thing? Oh yeah. I DON'T DRIVE.)

But despite logic, I felt the gnawing of guilt beginning.

So I tell her that we'll come up and spend the day with her, just tell me what day.

She hems and haws for weeks--she's busy, you know.

Finally, she decides on the Saturday of M-Day weekend. Great! Okay! All systems go!

Until I realize that my best friend/college roommate is graduating with her MA, and her celebration is on Saturday. The SAME Saturday. My brain had not previously put that together.

My bad.

So I call my Mom, apologize, explain and say that we can still come up but we won't be able to make it until the (she lives an hour away) evening. She says that's just fine!

Whew! Crisis averted!

Until I get a profanity-laden call from my sister in which she questions my humanity because I waited until the last minute to plan M-Day (apparently that's my sole responsibility even though my mother has 2 other children), AND I'm not spending the DAY of M-day with mom, but the completely unloving day before (never mind that it's also M-day for my MIL too, but that's crazy talk) which is just UNACCEPTABLE.

I explain to her that I had been trying to plan M-Day for over a month, and that our mother CHOSE Saturday.

This shut her up for a couple seconds, but amazingly, I was still the uber-bitch, because I didn't call and tell her that. When I tried to explain the phenomenon known as a two-way telephone, I was immediately shut down. Didn't I know that she was busy? Didn't I know that I had to make time for her?

What an abhorrent person I am, being busy with my husband and son.

But as we all know,as she so helpfully informed me--it’s not that hard to take care of a baby, anyway.

So after she hangs up on me, I call my mom.

I ask her why she didn't tell me she was upset. She denies it until I tell her that my sister called.

Then guess what happened? You'll NEVER guess...

Hey! That's right! It was all my fault again.

I've abandoned my family. It's my attitude that has degraded our relationship.

I do nothing but judge them and think I'm better than them.

My husband is mean to them.

I don't put forth enough effort to compromise with them.

I don't make enough of an effort to call or visit.

I shouldn't speak up when I feel like I'm being disrespected, because I just take things too personally.

I shouldn't say that I disapprove of the drug and/or alcohol use around me, or mention my worry over the legal issues that have resulted as a consequence of it, because who wants to be around someone who is always judging?

I shouldn't expect people to respect my choices or acknowledge my successes, because that's just me throwing things in people's faces.

And the key to it all:

I just need to accept people for who they are and let them say what they want to say, and do what they want to do because that is my duty as their family member and the only way I will ever have a relationship with them.

Suck it up, and put aside my own feelings, because they are all I will ever have. Even my husband won't always be there, because as I should fucking know, it won't last.

Silly me, what WAS I thinking?

I went off and forgot my place again.

I'm going to keep on forgetting, so brace yourselves.

I'm tired of being the bad guy, the asshole, the one who doesn't care about anybody, the one who is selfish and judgmental, simply because:

I no longer make them the center of my universe, dropping everything to do whatever they want me to, whenever they want me to.

I will not tolerate being insulted and disrespected any time I say no or disagree or choose to go a different path.

I won't stand for my husband being treated poorly because he sticks up for me or is protective of me. Guess what? It IS his business. As his wife and father of our son, what goes on with, or is said to us, is in fact, his business.

[And yes, there was a time we broke up. He didn't cheat on me or abuse me, he just got commitment cold feet for a short time. It happens. Get over it. We did. Stop using that as an excuse to treat him like dirt. It's a lame one.]

I will not bring my son around people who are under the influence of drugs and alcohol. That is my RIGHT as his mother. If that makes me judgy and superior, then so it shall be. I don't like being around it, so why the hell would I want my baby to be?

I will not apologize for making my own life and building a family with my husband. I have worked my ass off to get where I am today, and my husband and son are my priority. That is how it should be.

I have spent YEARS making an effort to be closer, to live up to expectations, to make everyone happy, to win over love and approval, to be what I was "supposed" to be, and I'm done. D-O-N-E.

There's no reciprocity, no respect, no compassion. Nothing EVER comes honestly-without motive or agenda.

Don't worry though, I'll probably still continue to second-guess myself

{Am I mean, uncaring, selfish, and judgmental? Do I expect too much? Am I not giving enough? What more could I have done to make it better?}

as life-long habits are hard to break, but I will slowly fade it out because I REFUSE to be manipulated any longer.

I have people in my life who love and support me unconditionally. That is enough.

I agree, that at the end of the day all you really have is your family but--

Blood is not the end-all of what makes a family.


Maybe someday, things can be different, but for now, I need to be different.



This will probably never be read by those it's directed at, and even if it WAS, it would fall of deaf-ly livid  ears.

But I had to get it out, you know?

A lot of hours, therapy and soul-searching have been spent on what to do with my relationships with certain members of my family--how to have one, frankly.

The conclusion that I have come to is that I can have one, but it won't be a healthy one. It won't be reciprocal or unconditional.

It'll have its good times, but ultimately it will just be another round in generational vicious cycle.

Years ago, I would have dove right in. I wanted to be loved and recognized so badly by my family, that I would gut myself on command. Occasionally, I would rebel against that, in an attempt to stand my ground, but after being hyper-villianized, I would feel so guilty and ashamed that I would do ANYTHING to make it better.

Through therapy and education, I started to see the abuse in those relationships, but was still willing to take it because, after all, they're family, right?

Then I met my husband. It dawned of me that if I ever wanted to have a family of my own, I had to get the HELL out of my family's whirling fuck-upedness.

When I got pregnant with our son that idea really crystallized, but yet there was this renewed sense of "maybe we can work it out," because a child brings out the hope in people-mostly though, it was me, as per the usual, second-guessing myself: "What kind of person wouldn't want her family around her son?"

So I tried. And tried. Made phone calls, visited, let them in to my life, my new family, my new self.

Ever hear the phrase, "same shit, different day?"
That's basically how it is.

It's how it's always been, now featuring an extra helping of passive-aggressiveness.

Yay!

And I am OVEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRR it.

I deserve better.

Even if I DIDN'T, my husband and son do.

They deserve better from me.


I know I can't cut them out completely (at least not until we flee the state), but we desperately need the emotional distance. After this, all my efforts cease.


We'll see how it goes.

It's important to clarify that I love my family very much, more than I think most people understand, but just because you love someone, doesn't always mean that you should surround yourself with them. Heredity is not a get-out-of-jail-free card for bad behavior. I don't care what anybody says.


Happy Mother's Day to all my fellow Mamas out there. Have a love-filled day.

He's going to be shaving tomorrow morning, I'm convinced.

O is soooooo big already. He sat up on his own last night, and I burst into tears!

I can't handle this growing up business. OBVIOUSLY, I want him to have a long and healthy life, but can't he just be my baby forever?

No....? Crap.

It's outta control.

I can't believe that he's going to be 6 months next week....

In related news, I turned 29 recently. I was not a fan of turning 29.

Wasn't I supposed to accomplish a lot more? Aren't I supposed to be thinner and more successful?

30 is looming, and things are not the way I'd hoped for them to be.

Last year, we were here and oh yeah, here.

And while some things have changed, it's still a very familiar story except now we're throwing in a baby for extra character development.

It's scary and it's frustrating b/c I want my son to have a good life. I want my husband and I to have a good marriage. Which we do, but the last 2 years has been very hard for us. I don't think we've really had a moment yet to breathe-- to really relax and enjoy being a couple, and now, a family.

We're always trying to figure out how to get to the next step-holding our breath, b/c it feels like at any moment, the other shoe could drop.

I know that's a horrible way to live. I know we need to be grateful (we are) for what we do have.

There's just so much pressure to be "successful." To want more.

This got me thinking: What IS that, exactly?

According to the ever-pervasive "they," success is:
a well-paying salaried job, a nice home, a nice car, a Roth IRA and a 401K.

My husband works hard, gets paid by the hour.
We live in his parent's nice home.
He drives a Jetta that has over a 102 thousand miles on it and a constant check engine light blinking.
I think I may have a great-great grandfather named Ira.
I have friends who've run 5-10ks.

You can see why we feel a little second-class these days....

Butt on the flip side, I constantly try to remind myself of the progress we've made since moving in with the ILs, that perhaps won't recieve any kudos from "the them," but has been huge for us.

After both losing our jobs, my hubs has been at his for 3 years.
We were able to climb out of the red and move into black.
We're able to pay our bills in full every month.
We've drastically improved our credit that took a hit after being unemployed.
We're finally paying down our debt (slowly, but) successfully.
We actually have some money in savings. (!!!)
Most importantly, we've continued to grow in our marriage and we've welcomed a healthy, gorgeous son who we keep fed and cared for.

Why isn't that successful? Where's the respect for those triumphs?



We would LOVE to move out on our own. We dream of owning a home, of being debt-free of having a 401K, but for now, but we can only do so much.

I know that my 29th year is probably not going to be what I had envisioned, and the same will probably be said for my 30th year, but every day I will try to keep moving forward and be successful in my perseverance.

Even so, I know there will be days where I curse everything, cry, and rage against the wreckage that I feel my life has become, but who doesn't have those days?

Things WILL turn around.
(RIGHT?)

We will finally make enough money to get our own place.
We will be able to buy a new car.
We will be debt free.
We will get to the next step.

It might just not be as soon as we hoped. And that has to be okay.

Because:

We are better off than we were.
We are moving forward.
We are in this together.
We are good parents.
We are a FAMILY.


Being an adult is hard. Being okay with not being a "perfect adult" is even harder.

I'm thankful for all that I have. I think it's okay to want to achieve more.

BUT

I have a tendency to criticize my accomplishments that aren't all-encompassing, that don't fit squarely in to society's check list for a happy life.

I have to stop that, for the sake of myself and my family.


It's the little victories that usually add up to mean the most. I need to stop and celebrate them.

I hope your celebrate your own.

Baby's First Thankgiving!!

In lieu of pictures (which I don't have time to post right now), here's a video...Thanks Auntie N!





Pictures are coming though, promise!

A Cornucopia of Cleavage

This holiday weekend marked O's first Thanksgiving, his turning 1 month, and his first trip to Disneyland (Squeal!!!)...

I was sooooo excited!

I freely admit that I am a ginormous cornball, so I love holidays, and "firsts", and sentimental "moments."

He slept through the majority of all of these monumental events.

Sigh.

ANNNNNND, my husband made fun of me for crying because he turned a month.

IT'S A WHOLE MONTH! Already!

(While warned, I was NOT prepared for the rate of growth that goes on...)

Also, I know this will be a shock, but I am officially a mother. Who knew, right?

So, we're at D-land and it's time for the baby to take a bottle. I pull out the water to fill his bottle and it's super cold.

I don't want to give it to him this way, because it'll hurt his little belly, but how can I warm his bottle?

Where's a warm spot to stash it for a few minutes?

Wait....Cleavage!



That's right kids, I warmed my son's bottle by sticking it in between my cleavage.


(I'm a total shoo-in for Mother of the Year for SURE.)

Oh, theose heartwarming holiday memories are already being made....

I finally remembered where my camera was!

I can finally post the pictures of Owen's first real bath...

(It was in the diaper bag, btw. The camera, not the bath.)

READY TO BEGIN

and not too sure about it...



THIS IS KINDA NICE...





YEAH! I'M DIGGIN' IT!




SEE? HE'LL SLEEP ANYWHERE.

The kitchen sink included



WAIT, WHAT THE HECK HAPPENED TO THE WARM WATER?

Not cool, guys.




WARM IS GOOD!




ALL CLEAN!
Time for Snuggles!

Yay! We haven't screwed it up yet!

Owen is 2 weeks old today!

He's been a dream baby so far, and we're all just mesmerized by him in our household.

As with any new baby, the "firsts" have already begun:

FIRST FAMILY PHOTO



FIRST TRIP TO THE PEDIATRICIAN

On our way!



No one likes waiting for the doctor half-naked and cold!






FIRST TRUE LOVE AFFAIR

No one comes between a boy and his Bink... Owen makes sure of that by always holding on to it for dear life. He's committed.