Dear People Without Kids:

7pm is not a good time for dinner, when you're meeting a family who has a one year old (or when you're meeting two families with 3 kids 3 and under between them). That's an hour before bedtime. He should be in the bath.

Dear Mr. Wolfman: instead of agreeing to whatever time people suggest and then informing me after the fact, how about you take a second to remember when our kid's bedtime is, and consider the fact that I do the entire bedtime routine alone.

Le Sigh.

Sincerely,

A disgruntled, queasy and very tired Mummy.

What is it with Boys and Sports?

...or, more accurately, boys' stuff and sports.

Probably about 75% of the monster's clothes and toys are 2nd hand. Which means that it's not always about style when I'm shopping for clothes; it's about what condition something is in, whether or not it will be comfortable, and how long it will fit.

I look everything over before I buy it, but I don't really look at it. I'm looking to see if there are stains, tears, worn patches, etc.

So I bought the monster a pair of fuzzy PJs.  A little pilling, but in otherwise good condition. Plus the nice guy was working at the thrift shop, so them, the other pair of PJs I bought, 9 pairs of socks, 1 pair of mittens, 2 decorative spoons and a book only cost me $4. The PJs are cookie monster - pretty cute.

And then I got them home and noticed... football helmets?

The fabric is seriously: baby cookie monster eating a cookie, baby cookie monster in a diaper eating a cookie, jugs of milk, cookies on their own... and random sports equipment. Helmets, sneakers and whistles.
They're sadly not footie pajamas, so I grab the monster one of his new pairs of socks.  Giant 9s on the side, in the same font you get on the back of football jerseys.

And this isn't even the first time it's happened. Not long ago, he outgrew some great quality PJs that were covered in various sports paraphernalia and had numbers and a baseball applique on them; when he was a newborn, I bought a set of hats on sale, only to get them home and find out that the cute little bulldogs were surrounded by footballs.

I could pay closer attention, if it bothered me that much.  But it's not so much that some of his clothes are sports-related, that gets to me.  It's more the insidious way that sports and construction themes get sneaked onto boys' clothes, and the glaringly obvious way they're omitted from girls'.

It's all the: this is for boys, this is for girls bullshit that's still going on, even though it's nearly 2016. You know what you never see on boys' clothes? Horses. Unless there are cowboys involved. You never just see a horse, on its own, on a boy's sweater.  Or a cat. And you're equally unlikely to see a dump truck on a girl's shirt.

It's like, at some point, there was a secret meeting, and not only did all the various activities, professions and interests get divided by genitals, the fucking animals did as well.

Dinosaurs? Obviously for boys. Dolphins? Girls. Cats and horses are for girls, too.  Lizards and sharks, boys. Dogs can go either way, but need accessories to gender things up.  A bow or a sparkly collar indicates a girl-appropriate dog, while a surfboard or suspenders make it for a boy. Nerdy glasses are a bit too ambiguous, so a second accessory is usually required.

Seriously, people, what the crap are we teaching our kids?

I should be sleeping.

The monster is sleeping.... and I am damn tired.  Instead I keep taking those annoyingly unhelpful early pregnancy quizzes online.

A bunch of symptoms that could be otherwise explained (including fatigue and tender breasts), 2 negative HPTs, nausea, lightheadedness, gas, constipation, lemonade cravings, brain fog, 3 weeks late. And a partridge in a pear tree.  My appointment (with some rando doctor, as Dr. Illegible is on vacation) is on Xmas eve.  It's so far away.

Except nowhere near far enough away, in another sense, because I have yet to finish making DH's present and I'm too queasy to work on it atm.  I also have to finish making my niece's present and make something for my nephew.  At least the monster is taken care of.

I should be sleeping.

Christmas!

You may be thinking from my last post that I'm some sort of Christmas-hating Grinch.  Not so. I love Christmas.  In fact, my tree has been up since the middle of November.

In all that time, the monster has noticed the tree, kinda glanced at it, but not, surprisingly, tried to pull it down from the high dresser it sits on, or been particularly interested in general.

Today, I plugged in the lights, and he looked up, wide-eyed, with this huge smile and said, "Aaahhh!" He was just so amazed.  Then he looked at me, to make sure I was looking and did the open-palm gesture he reserves for pointing out really big or amazing things and said "Aaah" again.

And this is why I love Christmas.  That feeling of total wonder and awe, that pure, unsullied magic.

This year, all our gifts are either homemade or secondhand and we don't have money for much of anything - and I'm so damn excited, because my monster is noticing Christmas for the very first time, because he'll be able to eat Xmas dinner with us, maybe have a taste of pie, play outside in the snow. I'm so happy.

Mall Santas Suck and So Do You

Mall Santas. I effing hate mall Santas.

Perhaps not the individuals, who I suspect by and large are just looking to make some extra money and/or bring joy to children - but the whole concept of mall Santas in general is just... gross.

It's that time of year when my social media gets flooded with pictures of people's small children, crying their eyes out on the lap of a stranger - and every time I see it, it makes me want to puke.

And, of course, there are the captions. Not a fan of Santa, lol.  What? You mean to tell me your toddler didn't enjoy being thrust into the hands of a funny-smelling stranger in a cheap polyester suit while an artificially cheerful elf took pictures? How surprising (and sooooo funny)! Then there's: We were expecting him to cry but... But what? You're an asshole, so you didn't care?  The picture was worth more to you than your kid's comfort and ability to trust you? It may be time to face the fact that you're just not a very nice person.

I came across this gem today: It'll be a good memory.  FOR FUCKING WHOM?  Your one year old won't remember crying on Santa's knee (at least not this year) - and I'm guessing, if they somehow did remember, it wouldn't be something they'd look back on with fondness.  Ooooh, you mean it'll be a good memory for you.  I can just picture you, snuggled up by the fireplace* one Christmas many years from now, looking at old pictures.  "Hey Honey, remember this? This is from that time we gave Billy to a strange man and he didn't know why and thought we were going to leave him so he cried. What a great day that was." "Oh yes, Honey, it was the best."

I want a Santa picture every year.  Why?  What are you going to do with those (let's be realistic) seven or eight Santa pictures? Especially if your kid is crying in the first three?  Hang them on the wall? No, I know: post them on Facebook so everyone can see them.  Of course.  (Hint: no one, except maybe your mom, cares about your shitty Santa picture.  They'd much rather see a picture of your kid that was well-taken by a professional, or a candid shot of your child happy or doing something cute.  The zoomed out photo of your red-eyed, snot-nosed child crying on some dude's knee is not something any of your friends care to see.  Trust me).

I haven't even gotten into the issues surrounding mall Santas and older kids. The teaching-kids-strangers-are-safe, the lying to kids about Santa in general, the issues that arise when the mall Santa is a fucking creep (not saying it happens often, but it happens) - I'll leave that for another day (and possibly another Christmas).  Right now, I just want to mention (in case you missed it) that giving your toddler to a weird stranger and taking pictures of their misery as if it's cute is plain messed up. Please consider starting your own, non-creepy tradition instead.

*You know what? No. You don't get a fireplace. You get an electric baseboard heater. Fuck you.

What I Brought on My Vacation, or: Travelling with a 1 Year Old.

A little over a week after the monster turned one, we went on a trip to visit Mr. Wolfman's parents.

I was majorly freaked out about travelling over five thousand miles for the Monster's first real trip (first flight, first car ride over 5 hours, first stay in a hotel, etc.), and put a lot of thought into planning and packing for him.

Stuff that helped:

We took his car seat.  Of course you need to check that the car seat meets the requirements of your destination and will fit in your rental car, but if you can, it's a great thing to have (bonus: if your car seat is approved for it, and you have the $$ to buy an seat for your baby, you can use it on the plane). I really believe having somewhere familiar to sit in our rental car made a huge difference.

We booked an overnight flight.  Even though he wasn't STTN, it totally worked and he slept most of the way there.

Breastfeeding for takeoff.

Stuff that we brought:

Something to draw with.  We brought a Fisher Price Doodle Pro in travel size(?).  It's still a bit bulky because there's a big frame on it.  I think he'll get a lot of use out of it for future trips, now that he knows how to use it, but it took him a while to work it out. I think an etch-a-sketch may have worked better, although the contrast isn't as good; the monster liked when the picture showed up, but got frustrated with things like holding the pen, the fact that the other end of the pen didn't write and the fact that the pen would only write on the board (which is the idea, after all).



Something to read: specifically, buggy books.  These are mini board books with holes in the corner,, so that they can clip to the stroller.  We had one with us and bought one in the airport after the first 9 hour leg of our journey.  A new book is a fantastic thing, especially when you're stuck in a boring airport for 5 hours.

Which reminds me: a stroller. We would have died without it.  Even though the monster's been walking for a while, holy crap, do you ever not want to try to navigate an airport without a stroller.  We bought the Chicco umbrella stroller, on sale for about half it's asking price.  It worked well, we used it for three weeks and it held up to being tossed around by airport staff (until the last leg of our homeward journey, when the pedal for opening it got broken off), but I wouldn't have been thrilled with it for $198, which is what we found it for before the half-off one popped up.  But I'm very glad we didn't go for the $30, super cheap one.  The monster being able to recline and sit comfortably made up for the difference in price.


New toys.  Doesn't matter what (nothing messy and nothing that made noise), just new stuff that the monster hadn't seen before.  A Taggies blanket was one of the things.  A sweater for his stuffed animal.  Just whatever that he could see and touch and be amazed by for a few minutes.

I think that's it. How the whole trip went will require a post down the line, but for now, this is all the important stuff I can think of.

***Oh, we didn't bring our pack'n'play and, even though I can't for the life of me imagine how we could have, I wish we did***

Sweet Potato & Apple Pancakes

I haven't been around for a bit (holiday to visit Mr. Wolfman's family - fun, but a whole other post), but I'm back.  I've been wanting to add recipes to this blog for a bit, so here goes my first:

Ingredients:

• 1 cup of flour
• 1 sweet potato
• 1 large apple or pear
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 1/2 cups milk (at least)
• Butter (a bit)

1. Dice sweet potato and apple (/pear) and steam or boil until soft (if you boil, drain) and mash with a potato masher.  It doesn't need to be creamy, but there shouldn't be any big chunks.
2. In a mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder and cinnamon. Stir until blended, then add eggs and stir until there's no dry powder left.
3. Stir in mashed stuff.
4. Add milk.  At least 1.5 cups, but I don't measure it, I just keep adding milk until the mixture is liquidy enough to pour.
5. Heat a pan on medium-high and add butter - swish it around until it melts.
6. Pour pancake batter into pan, and cook like normal pancakes*
7. Put onto a piece of paper towel on a plate.

*More or less.  They don't bubble like normal pancakes, so you'll need to slip a flipper under them to see when they're ready to flip.  It doesn't take very long.

Once they're cool enough, you can either serve them right away, or put them in the fridge (for 2-3 days) or the freezer (not sure for how long) and heat them up later.

The little monster loves these things, and I love them because they don't have any added sugar or salt and have fruit and veg.