Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Renaming my children for the blogosphere

A few weeks ago, I called them the Handful and the Midget. From now on, they shall be known as BIG and BUSY. And while I'm on the subject, let me tell you about my girls.

BIG:
(formerly known as Handful)
She's 3.5 and cannot wait to turn 4. Sports a mop of curly blond hair, which we hope she'll keep (the blond as well as the curls), and very pale blue eyes. Last weighed in at 38 lb and 39" tall. Chatters constantly. Her latest pet phrase is "sooner or later". Likes to read -- and I don't just mean that she likes books, although she certainly does. She actually keeps mostly quiet during Busy's naptimeShe surprised the hell out me the other day while I was visiting this friend's blog; out of nowhere I hear her say "my life right now." I don't know how she got the word "right", except to assume that she got it from the context. (Any teachers reading this? Is that typical of her age? I kind of think not.)

But I was getting around to explaining the source of the nickname Big. This child is obsessed with being bigger. It seems that every other sentence begins with "When I'm big! big! big! bigger!, I will ..." And all kinds of ideas, from the sensible to the crazy-she-just-said-what!?, will follow. "When I'm bigger ... I will climb that big tree." or "... I will go in the street by myself." or "... I will learn how to jump rope." or "... I will like mashed potatoes." We also hear the Big theme in variations like "When I was a baby, X, ... but now that I am a big girl, Y"; or "When Busy is a big girl like me, she can Z, but now she's just a little baby so she can't do that!" When Big gets really excited and tries to delineate exactly when she'll be "this big", she starts to count "1, 2, 3, 4, ... 100!! When I am 100 old, then I can eat my ice cream for breakfast!" (For the record, she doesn't actually count to 100; she gets to 20, mumbles her way to 29, and then proclaims, 100!)

BUSY:
(formerly known as Midget)
I was about to call her Bitty because 1) it made a nice contrast with Big, and 2) she loves to play with Big's Bitty Baby doll. However, having just spent ~20 minutes carrying her around like deadweight on my arm, I can attest to the fact that there is very little "bitty" about her. So Busy it is. She's 13 months old; a delightful blond child with sparkling eyes (for this I've got a pic here). When Busy first learned to sit by herself, back when she was Bitty ( approx 6 months old), I was happy and relieved. Finally, we'd reached a stage where she could sit and happily play with a few toys, without me having to worry about her. Ha ha, wishful thinking! Two weeks later, Busy learned to crawl. Three months later (yes, at 9 months old) she started to walk. "Just trying to keep up with her Big Sister," everyone said. Thankfully I didn't know then the extent to which that was true, or else I'd have duct-taped her to the floor right then.

As befits a 1-yr-old, Busy spends the majority of her time getting into things. You know the drill: open every kitchen cabinet, take out all the food container lids and drool all over them, whine about the drawers/cabinets that mommy put the latches on, pull all the books out of the bookshelf, pick up every cheerio and cricket that she finds on the floor (the ChemMom's a bad housekeeper, btw), restack all the videos, etc etc etc. In the modern parenting paradigm, I suppose that is called "exploring her environment" and "learning about cause and effect."

Also, Busy climbs. She's a little monkey, that one is. (Big is a good teacher that way.) Started climbing up the slide on the Kangaroo Climber in our playroom about 3 months ago. Finally we got smart and put an old comforter down the inside as padding. Now Busy's latest trick is to stand on the little window and jump off. At least, that's what she's trying to do (just like Big Sister!), but Mommy is anxious and keeps whisking her off. Which Busy finds fun, so she climbs up the slide so we can do it again. I foresee a broken clavicle within a year.

I could go on, but I've stayed up too late as it is. Should probably quit referring to myself as ChemMom and just go with how I really feel, which is BEAT!

Friday, August 19, 2005

OK, so here's an update

I've been pretty lucky in the past couple of months, in that I haven't often been up between the hours of 12-5 am, so I guess an occasional episode like tonight's shouldn't get my goat too much. The Midget has actually subjected me to untimely wakings for the past three nights. Normally these experiences are so infrequent that I'm not sure which flavor of Ferber I ought to practice. Also, I don't go back to sleep nearly as easily as I did in former years.

A summary of recent events seems appropriate. I hope I'll have time to elaborate on one or more of these points as the week goes on ... only if other life doesn't get in the way.

1. We're home from a recent trip to Philadelphia, a visit to my sister which was marked by only a FEW feelings of unspeakable envy. Schwester's got a nice house, an AWESOME fiance, two sweet soon-to-be-stepdaughters (though only the younger child was home, the elder having gone to church camp). She's getting married in November, and we picked out a dress for her (go to s 2 of the Fall 2005 section; it's the 6th one, #25287). Is it wrong that I was a tad gleeful that despite the pads inserted into the bodice, on top of Schwester's padded bra, she was still nowhere close to filling it out? Being stacked ... that's like the ONLY category in which I stack up well against my sister. Trip highlights included: driving the Lexus with the psychotic GPS, going to Philly's Please Touch Museum, enjoying a grown-up coffee hour with this woman, and having a real date with my husband, that SDG I mentioned once upon a time! AND on the date I got to wear a new dress, which Schwester had ordered for herself but (too bad for her) got sent the wrong size -- my size!

2. School started in our little town this week. For my girls, it means preschool for the Handful 3 mornings a week (9:15-11:45). Both Handful and Midget will go for the extended day on Wednesdays (9:15-2:45), and Midget might go Friday mornings as well. It seems a bizarre and uncomfortable switch in my schedule, going from PDO ("full" days) to preschool (just half days). Not sure how I'll accomplish anything while Handful's in school, which makes me feel horrible WRT how that speaks to my attitude toward the Midget. She's such a sweet, sensitive, easy-going child, and utterly devoted to Mommy. How dare I treat her like an obstacle? When I delay responding to her cries from the crib, reasoning that a few minutes of fussing is worth it, since I'm indulging myself in personal Internet time -- what kind of monster does that?

3. Wow ... I didn't know I was going to go *there*! It's 5am and I've been up for over an hour. And I really despise myself for being so cavalier about my baby's cries.

4. New job prospect on the horizon. Two PhD positions at the local oil company. Even as I've gotten excited about the idea of pulling in a FT income, I'm hesitant to apply. The situation presents a three-fold difficulty for me: 1) I haven't been in a real lab in almost 8 years; 2) my sole work experience after grad school was in academia, not industry; 3) I'm an organic chemist, but the potential job is mainly analytical, heavy on IR and Ramen spectroscopy. I can count on one hand the number of organic chemists I know who can identify anything more than a simple carbonyl band. ONTH, despite SDG's protestations to the contrary, I feel that he will be disappointed if I don't go for it. Funny thing is, I'd have to put in so much work/preparation to GET the job, that the job itself could seem easy by comparison.

5. Went to the movies and saw "Wedding Crashers". Was f*ucking hysterical. Highly recommend.