Dogs vs. Kids

Toddlers and puppies are so much alike. You have to watch them constantly so they don't make a mess in the house. Both have to be housebroken. You talk to them the same way - short, to the point commands and sentences. Both are bed hogs. They can both be ridiculously cute and annoying.

Both take away time that could be spent updating your blog, but both are worthy distractions.

A Weighty Issue

This has been turning in my brain since my doctor's appointment on Monday. I started Zoloft about 6 weeks ago and since then I have felt a lot better (my good friend Roblyn the Goblyn convinced me to go on drugs. She said she just needs a little help to get through the winter, which made me think it was okay for me to ask for help), but I haven't been hungry. So I've lost some weight.

My doctor told me that my recent weight loss was concerning. I was getting to the point where I weighed too little for my height. I was shocked. Somehow, despite 13 years of dieting, I have never understood that my weight is relative to my height. Sure, I knew that if a person who was 5 feet weighed 150 pounds they would be over-weight, whereas a person who was 6 feet and weighed the same would be underweight. I just never knew this applied to me.

See, I always thought I needed to weigh this magic number, 115, and then my parents would love me and they would be proud of me. My sister wouldn't be embarrassed of me and I would be worth something. At that weight my BMI would be 17.5 and extremely unhealthy. But I equated that magic number with being accepted in my family.

When she told me I was underweight I laughed. I can't possibly be underweight, have you seen my extra skin? It matches quite nicely with my stretch marks. Then I passed out at the vet's office (by the way, the floor stinks like no other!) and I started wondering what I am doing to myself. I have been on a very restrictive diet since we went dress shopping for my sister's wedding. I am the only one in her wedding that is over 5 feet and weighs over 100 pounds. I am an amazon woman compared to the petite things that make of the rest of her bridal party.

For the first time in 13 years (save for when I was pregnant), I am not on a diet. I feel guilty every time I eat, am still not hungry, but I am not counting every calorie I take in and trying to burn every calorie off. My place of employment bought lunch today. I didn't order something low calorie, I ordered what I thought would taste good (I only ate about half of it, but that is another story).

Fainting scared me. I cannot run a marathon on less than 1700 calories a day. I have decided it is more important to be healthy (this feeling faint all the time has got to stop) than fit into a size 6. We will see how that goes for me.

A Real Conversation

Baba: No bark.

Me: You got it little dude.

Baba: Dude?

Me: Yup, Baba is my little dude.

Baba: Dude! Dude! Dude! (Runs across the room to where Sami has resumed her favorite activity-barking at her reflection in the fire place glass) No barking dude!

I love toddlers! If I didn't have to go through that whole first year, I would probably have about fifteen kids.

So little to do, so much time....

Scratch that. Reverse that. I love Sami. I am ridiculously happy I have a puppy, but since she came home, I haven't had a moment to myself.

I've been walking her in the evenings, which got me thinking. Why can't I run at night? Sure, I prefer running in the mornings, but running with a small child and a small puppy isn't realistic (yet, I have plans in the works for that issue). So tonight I went for run with Sami.

We didn't run as far as I usually did, but she is just a puppy. And I've discovered that a dog makes the best running partner ever. She is perfectly content to trot along side of me wagging her tail. Plus, she every time she stops to do her business, I get a little break.

Since I started seriously running (how serious? Well, I sent in my application and money to run Grandma's Marathon in June), I've made a very interesting discovery. Despite the fact that it is colder than a witches' tit, there truly are very few days, even in Minnesota, in the winter, that I can't run outside. Grandma's Marathon, here I come! But first, wonderfully soft bed, here I come!

Leash of Distrust

As cute as Sami is, I don't trust her. She is not housebroken and likes to take off up the steps to visit Wili, who has been cowering in our bedroom since we brought Sami home. So we have invented the "leash of distrust." Whenever Sami gets out of control, we clip the leash on her color. She has no choice but to follow us where we want to go.

I wonder of the leash of distrust would work for the boy.

(Takng a picture of Sami was not an easy task. Everytime the flash would go off, she would get excited and run around crazily)

We've Expanded

We've adopted a wonderful Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, who we have named Baba's Samantha or Sammie for short. She is wonderful and a cuddle-bug. I'll post some pictures soon. But now, I have to spend some quality time with my displaced kitty who is cowering under the bed.

P.S. I cannot believe I own a CKCS! I have the best husband ever!

Romance

Me: What if I say I want to have another baby now?

Zippy: Then as soon as you finish imitating a stuck hog, we better get busy.

Who says romance is dead?

More Bears!

Baba has never been attached to anything besides his plug. That is, until now. He found one of my old Care Bears in his closet the other day and fell in love. He carries Cheer-Bear around constantly.

Then, he found my other two bears. He was in heaven. His newest sentence: "More bears!" The bears, or berrs as he calls them, have to do everything he does. If he eats breakfast, they eat breakfast. If he watches TV, they watch TV. If he gets dressed, they get dressed.

This morning he was throwing a fit. He would point to his feet, which I had just put socks on and then would point to his bears' feet. I finally figured out what he wanted.

He danced a little jig when I figured it out. :-)

You've Got Mail!

I received the following emails today:

One of my rich relatives died in England and has left me 500 million pounds. All I have to do is give them my bank account number so they can transfer the money. Most excellent. I've always wanted to have 500 million pounds. I am not going to work tomorrow.

I can enlarge my penis size. Had I a penis, I would probably be quite excited about this.

Some girl named Kayla wants to have naughty fun tonight. I am going to bed early, Kayla, and you should, too. Stop emailing random people looking for naughty fun. You could do so much more with yourself.

I can refinance my house for 1.27% interest rate. I wonder if the interest rate increases daily or hourly?

I also got three legitimate job offers. How do I know they are legitimate? The title of the email said so, of course.

I got one email from 1901 - the past is trying to sell me a diet plan. I wonder if it involves tape worms. And one email from 2023. The future is trying to tell me to gamble at some online casino, but since I have inhereted 500 million pounds, I don't really need any more money. Unless, the future emailer knows something I don't know and I somehow lose 500 million pounds. Maybe I shouldn't have deleted that message.

I love Spam! Why is it that Spam is pretty much the only email I get? It is like my cell phone. Once in a great while it rings. Every time it does, I think someone else's phone is ringing so I glare at the people around me wondering why they aren't answering their phone.

Jumping

The small child that lives with me has been jumping with both feet off the ground for at least 4 months. On Sunday, he mastered the skill of jumping off the bottom step and landing on both feet. You can imagine how thrilled I was when he decided to go for the second step landing.

I got an email from one of the parenting newsletters I receive today. Apparently, jumping isn't something a child is supposed to master until they are at least two. When Baba gets up tomorrow morning, I'll tell him that. He'll be thrilled that he isn't allowed to jump for two months.

Body Image

The truth is, I've always thought I was fat whether I weighed 135 pounds or 160 pounds or 200 pounds. No matter what I see when I look in the mirror, I always see fat. Do I engage in eating practices that are probably unsafe? Sure, sometimes. Have I gone without eating in the past? Of course.

I wasn't prepared for how pregnancy would change my body. I knew that I would expand but I thought magically my body would return to its former shape. I weigh less than I did when I got pregnant, but my body is no where close to where it was. My boobs are bigger (38D instead of a 36C) so my prepregnancy shirts are all to short. I have stretch marks. Lots of stretch marks. And extra skin that beautifully hangs over the top of some of my tighter pants.

My measurements are the same as before I was pregnant, but clothes that looked good before look good no longer. I have worked very hard to lose the 32 pounds I gained while pregnant and then some (to date I have lost 54 pounds), but the truth is, I am still not happy with my body.

Usually I do very good watching what I eat and stopping when I am hungry, but when I am around my mother it all falls apart. Too many times while growing up she said to me, "You don't need that. You aren't hungry. You don't need to eat that." How could she know if I was hungry or not? Her comments made me feel bad that because I was the size I was, I was fat. I started not eating much at meals and sneaking food to my room to eat in peace.

When I left home, I started losing weight. I could eat when and what I wanted without having to feel guilty or listen to nagging about it.

It is hard to feel good about a normal post-pregnancy body when you see celebraties that lose the weight as soon as the child is born. I guess, if I could afford a nanny, a personal trainer, and an abdominal plasty, I could look like that, too. But, because I can't, I have to deal. I found a website that I think is amazing.

http://theshapeofamother.com/home.php

I wish I could be that proud of my body.

Slightly more exciting that the actual task of filing?

I am anal. I know that. I like being organized and coordinated. Yesterday at work I got teased for typing up labels for my files and color coding my files (yellow for current year, red for last year, and green for misc. stuff - it looks like a stop light).

One of my co-workers showed us a spreadsheet complete with graphs her husband had created to illustrate their daughter's over usage of the cell phone. I wasn't properly impressed because I would do the same thing. Excel is my friend. You should see my budget spreadsheets (yes, plural). They are quite impressive.

Of course, filing isn't a hobby of mine - there are many things I'd rather do (play Lego Star Wars II, write, etc), but as boring as filing is, the end result makes me happy so it is worth it, I guess.

But, I really don't want to think about how many hours I've spent creating and utilizing filing systems.

Fundraising Rant

I am not a fan of fundraising. I never liked doing it when I was in high school/middle school and I don't like having to buy over-priced crap from your child so they can get .40 on the dollar to go to Timbuktu or pay for the senior class trip.

Our neice (Zippy's brother's child from a previous relationship who will be starting kindergarten in the fall - yes, you read that right, she is not even in school yet) just sent us a fundraising thing today. We are supposed to buy a magazine for some reason - what the money is being used for is not mentioned. I told Zippy if they were raising money to send her to boot camp (she is the definition of a little shit), I would gladly send her $100.

We left Baba's previous day-care because this for-profit day-care wanted us to fundraise to build a $6000 screen to put over the playground.

I have one child. I fully understand that I am to feed, clothe, and provide shelter to said child. Extras are my responsibility. If I want my child to be in the band and go march through the jungles of Africa tooting his horn, then I will pay for it (if you want to send a check for the send Baba to Abu Dhabi Fund, feel free). Please don't ask me to pay for your child to do stuff. Pay for your own kid to go.

I fully support scholarships, however. I will gladly donate money to a good, quality charity that uses the money for good, rather than evil, but please don't ask me to buy junk that I don't need. I don't understand why, if I cared to donate to a school or a particular kid, I can't just write a check to the school/kid. Why do I have to buy a candy bar or a magazine?

Shh! Putt-putts are sleeping!

The following is a conversation that Baba and I had several times today:

Baba: Putt-putts, barn, shh!

Me: Yes, tractors sleep in the barn.

Baba: Moos?

Me: Cows sleep in the barn, too.

Baba: Oink, oink gone?

Me: Yes, Grandpa's pigs are gone.

Lather, rinse, and repeat, and repeat, and repeat, and repeat. I feel it is worth noting that Grandpa's pigs have been "gone" since early October, but the boy feels it is necessary to keep reminding us that the pigs are gone. The tractors are sleeping because that is the only way to get the boy away from the tractors. If you tell him they went night-night you have a chance of getting him to think about something else for thirty seconds.

Ahh, the life of an almost two year old. Obsessed with choo-choos, putt-putts, oinks, moos, barns, and 'no balls (snow balls).