When I got accepted to the University of Arizona, way back in 1991, I was elated.  Not only was I going off to college out of state, I was (more importantly) getting out from under my dad's thumb.  Spring Semester '92 couldn't get here quick enough, and I couldn't get out of the house quick enough.

My high school years were the epitome of tumultuous.  From a social perspective, they were probably the greatest years of my life.  My high school friends are still very much a part of my adult life.  (It's a bit surreal when we get together now, watching our children play together while we wax poetic about the times when we were more than slightly enebriated in Mexico as teenagers...)  At home, I was at war with my dad.  We couldn't agree on anything.  How I dressed, how I combed (colored, or shaved) my hair, the company I sometimes kept...  you name it, and we were on polar opposite sides of the spectrum.  I spent a lot of time in my room in (a.k.a. The SHU), and my dad and I spent a lot of time not speaking to each other.

I moved out of that house in December 1991.  I returned to the house during school breaks, but never permanently moved back in.  I graduated college in 1996 and moved to Los Angeles to seek my fortune.  My relationship with my dad got much better after I moved out of his house.  I grew up (sort of.)  I made my own way in the world (with a little help from my dad.)  The house was always there, as was my room, and it changed from the place I could barely spend another second in to the familiar four walls that were my home.  As much as I say I hate it, I always feel good returning to the city where I grew up, driving down the familiar streets that seem so much smaller in comparison to the busy boulevards of Los Angeles, and pulling into the driveway of the only place I've ever really known as "home."  At least for the first 17 years of my life.  In all, the fondness I have for this house far outweighs the darker memories of the goings on there.

Just this past summer, my husband and I took our daughter to visit my dad and mom in Texas.  It was the first time we had visited since she was born.  I snapped pictures of her in the backyard, running in the thick green grass where I had run when I was her age.  I took her picture in my room, in the kitchen, near the rock walls that are distinctively part of the city where I grew up.  I took as many pictures of her in that house as I could because I knew I would never have the opportunity again.  I want to be able to show her, when she's older, that she has been to the house where Mommy grew up.

This year, my dad retired from his business.  He recently moved back to his hometown in Arizona.  Back to the city where he built his dream home, and where my mom has been "holding down the fort" for just over a year. This past weekend, my childhood home was listed for sale.  I looked at the listing, and as I browsed the photos that the listing agent posted, the tears welled up in my eyes.  The rooms are empty, and the walls are bare.  The house seemed sad, or maybe it was just me.   The grass in the backyard is yellow.  The flowerbeds that I remember "helping" my dad build when I was maybe 4, that were full of purple and white periwinkles and hot peppers this past May, are empty.

I said goodbye to the house in May.  I was fine then.  Maybe because I knew it was still there.  It was still mine. Ironically, today, after so many years of wanting to be as far away from that house as possible, all I want to do is go back.  I know I can't.  It's going to be someone else's soon, and I hope that the house gives the new owners as many good memories as it has given me.

Goodbye, house.  Thank you. 

 

I just had a 15 minute internal struggle with myself at Target.

Over a t-shirt.

It's strange, because looking back, I'm not quite sure what exactly happened - what stopped me from mindlessly throwing the shirt into the cart like I wanted to when I first saw it?  Why did I instead spend so much time chastizing myslef, and ultimately walking away from the shirt?  Could it be that this is the point at which I officially become a grown up, or better (worse) yet, is today the day that I have become aware that I am no longer a carefree, livin' on the edge, somewhat cool thirty-something...  Is today the day when I become responsible?

Let's recap.

I'm strolling through the CLEARANCE rack at Target (because the already low prices are still too high for my cheap ass) when I see a cute graphic tee.  It's not just on sale, it's on sale and there's an additional 30% that will be taken off at the register when you pay.  In any other circumstance, you pretty much have to buy this item on principle alone, right?  But I don't, and here's where the wheels sorta fall off the wagon for me...  I mentioned it was a graphic tee.  What is the graphic?  It's the O.G. Spaghetti-Os can smiley guy.  THIS ONE

For the next 15 minutes, I have an internal (thankfully, it was internal) dialogue with myself wherein I argue that, as a 37 year old mother, I have no business wearing a Spaghetti-Os t-shirt.  I counter myself by stating that it's a cool shirt, and I'm a cool person, and that it's just the sort of wacky thing that makes me who I am.  At some point during this dialogue, I channel my dad from one of the many arguements we used to have when I was a teenager hellbent on dressing in the complete polar opposite fashion that my dad wanted me to.  During the channeling, I mentally had my hands on my hips when I told myself, "Who the hell do you think you are?  You are a parent now.  You can't dress that way anymore."  I put the shirt back on the rack and walked away.  Did I mention it was only $6.98 before the additional 30% at check-out?!  

I walked away.  

I've been thinking about the whole incident since then, and I think I've made a mistake.  I'm not trying to hang on to my youth.  I'm not trying to be a cool mom, who doesn't dress like a mom.  What are moms supposed to dress like, anyway?  I know I'm not a teenager.  I know I'm not in my twenties.  Hell, I'm at the tail-end of my thirties.  Where is it written that, once you become a parent, you have to abandon whimsy and start dressing like the Miss Beadle from Little House on the Prairie?

I'm going back later to pick it up. 

 

 

I love food.  If you've seen me, you know this is a true statement.  I've often wondered what it's like to be one of those people who eats solely for sustenance.  (The husband has a friend like this.  It's fascinating.  At one point, he had a fixed menu for each day of the week; Monday: tacos, Tuesday: spaghetti, Wednesday: burritos, etc.  Every week.)  I am not that person.  I adore food.  

My adoration of food includes cooking.  I like to think that, at least to a small degree, I am a fairly good cook.  With the exception of bread, I think I can pull off just about any sort of meal.  I love shopping for ingredients for meals. I love the whole process of cooking; from preparation through consumption.  Truth be told, though, I am usually disappointed when my masterpiece doesn't look like the picture in the cookbook (it rarely does.  Why is that?)  I love pretty much all cuisine.  Off the top of my head, and obviously excluding the gross stuff (entrails, organ meats, stuff that you see Andrew Zimmern eat), the only thing I can think of that haven't enjoyed is "squishy thing with black stuff in it" from Chinese dim-sum.  The one thing I can't do is make bread.  If you're in the market for a paperweight or a doorstop, have me bake you a loaf or yeast roll.

I digress.

I am also fascinated by the "Olden Times," especially as it concerns food.  I love learning about what people used to eat - deviled eggs in aspic, anyone?  I get giddy when I find old menus from restaurants (like on the Queen Mary, where they've got displays of menus from 1st class through steerage from voyages in the 1930s).  I don't know what the fascination is.  I do know that, based on recipes I've read in old cookbooks, cooking in the "Olden Times" was no walk in the park.  Women had to work hard (and seemingly all day) to get a meal on the table.  Sarah Fain, via her blog, has shared some amazing excerpts from the Woman's Exchange Cookbook - the tome that her great-grandmother kept at her side as she plucked feathers from reed birds for a proper early 20th Century evening meal. 

Imagine my excitement then, when I found the Woman's Home Companion Cook Book sitting on a display outside an antique store in Seal Beach this afternoon.  I was even more excited when I paid $9.27 for the thing!  I couldn't wait to get home and thumb through it.  Guess what was hidden in the pages just in front of Chapter 22, Cakes? THIS!  It's like a page out of history, right?!  I don't know when the article ran, but it was sometime between 1943 and 1969.  There is an advertisement (?) on the back of the clipping written by Fay Hammond, who was the LA Times Fashion Editor during that period.  Not surprisingly, and in case you're interested, Ms. Hammond passed away on Dec. 9, 1985 at 81 years.

I'm seriously considering making all meals from this point forward exclusively from this book...

 

From about the time I announced that I was pregnant, I have been bombarded with advice about pretty much every single thing that anyone could ever imagine about pregnancy and child-rearing.  At first, before I started showing, the advice would come from family and close friends.  This was welcomed advice, for the most part, as this was my first pregnancy and I was navigating unchartered waters.  I listened to everything. Some stuff I filed for later, and some stuff I forgot as quickly as it was doled out to me.  As my pregnancy matured, and it became more obvious that I was pregnant, the advice started coming fast and hard from all directions.  Any woman who has been in this situation can remember the random stranger at the grocery store making some comment about how "that can of chili in your cart is going to give you heartburn..."  It was a pretty eye-opening experience for me, honestly.  I don't go around giving unsolicited opinions or advice to people I don't know, and it just blew my mind that, despite the good intentions...  I don't remember asking the little old lady at Ralphs if she thought I should be drinking 4 glasses of whole milk per day or not.

Apparently, the onslaught of advice doesn't stop when the kid comes out.  For me, it started during the 5 months where I was back at work, and had to endure the litany of Guatemalan old wives' tales the nanny hurled at me the second she walked in the door.  Here are a couple of favorites:

Don't give the baby cold vegetables, or she'll have gas all day

If you eat pineapple, the acid will get into your breast milk, and will give the baby heartburn

I think I have mentally blocked out the majority of stuff that she told me.  It was pretty Old World.

My job is seasonal, and we're currently on a break, so I'm back at home sans nanny.  I've been knee-deep in all things baby for the last 4 months and have had fairly limited contact with the outside world.  We occasionally go to the park and run errands a couple days a week, but the majority of the day is spent at home, just us girls.

I almost forgot about the advice that usually comes out of left field from the mouths of strangers.  But it still comes.  And it's annoying. Especially this conversation, which I've had on at least three different occasions:

STRANGER: What a cute baby!  Is she your first?

ME: Thank you.  Yes.

STRANGER: When are you going to have another one?

ME: Another one?!  She's not even one year old yet.

STRANGER: Well, she's got to have a sibling.  Othewise she'll be all alone...

I usually either say something like, "Well, we're going to get her a puppy soon," or, "If you'd like to sponsor him/her through college, I'll gladly have another one."  This is where the stranger usually gives me a dirty look and then walks away.

The last unsolicited tidbit of advice came from so far out of left field, I thought it was a joke.  I'm at the park with the baby.  We're doing our thing - swings, picking up sticks and leaves - having a good time.  A man and his son arrive in the play area.  We make small talk, asking each other how old our respective kids are.  The very next thing that comes out of the guy's mouth is, "You should get the 'Your Baby Can Read' program.  It uses flash cards and videos and it really works.  My son has been reading for over a year now, and he's only two years old."

WHAT?!  Where did that come from?!  Did I ask if your son can read?!

Like a dumbass, I respond.  "Well, she's going to have 12+ years of schooling soon enough, so I think I'm just going to focus on letting her play and have fun for right now."

The guy looks at me, shakes his head and says something about it never being too early to get the ball rolling on education, or something like that.  I don't remember what he said exactly.  We were hightailing it to another part of the play area.  To play.

OK, OK, so it doesn't really count.  I mean, if you're gonna blog, you have to have something to say, right?  Just posting something for the sake of posting so that I don't feel guilty for reneging on my Facebook New Year's Resolution Status within 48 hours is pretty sad.  Yet, here I am.

Christmas was awesome.  It was Charlotte Rose's first.  She hit it out of the ballpark, and has so much stuff, we're going to need a bigger place.  I have 3 boxes (count 'em - 3 boxes) coming to me with the loot that she got in Arizona.  She got a bunch of other stuff from Grammy & Grandpa here in California, and from aunts & uncles as well as some friends.  Put it to you this way:  if I could charge rent to all of the Fisher Price Little People (toys, not midgets) that have moved in, I would be a rich woman right now.

We're all getting back into the swing of things.  I'm populating a list of stuff that I really would love to get done (i.e. - cleaning out that closet full of clothes that I don't even remember owning) and I'm curious to see if I'll be able to get it done.  

Oh yeah, and I renewed my gym membership for another year.  Let's see if I can actually get in more than 5 workouts in 2011, and beat my 2010 record.

So I'm officially starting my 2nd week as a Stay at Home Mom (that's SAHM for all you acronym nuts.)  This week is really the litmus test to see whether or not I can actually hack it as a SAHM, since my parents were in town last week, so I had some help.  

It's been 2 days since they left, and I can't hack it.  This is hard.  Trying to keep a very active 8 month old entertained all day is no easy feat.  Add to the mix the fact that I'm also trying (and failing) to be a good wife and have dinner ready, get the apartment clean, and at least get out of my pajamas by the time Husband gets home from work.  So far, I've been able to get out of my pajamas, at least.

I've justified my domestic shortcomings by saying that my priority is the bambina.  As a matter of fact, that was one of the main gripes I had about the nanny.  She would clean my house.  I know, I know, what the hell is wrong with that?  So many people have said that they would love to have someone clean their house.  My whole thing, though, is this:  if you're cleaning my house, who's watching the baby?!  So, pretty much everything else has taken a back seat while I do my best to keep the baby alive and happy until it's time for her to go to sleep.  My bag of tricks (and my success/failure rate) includes:

• Feeding the baby SUCCESS!  Too bad I can't do the same for Husband...
• Taking the baby potty in 15-20 minute intervals 98% SUCCESS - She hates pooping in her diaper, but is OK with peeing in it.
• Reading books in silly voices FAILURE - She's over "Old MacDonald."  And his farm.
• Building block towers for the baby to knock down  SUCCESS!  She actually waits for me to finish before destroying it.
• Attempting to put the baby down for at least 2 naps  FAILURE - Apparently, 8 month olds don't need naps, despite the eye grinding.
• Following the baby around on all fours making sure she doesn't bang her head on something, ingest something, or get mauled by the cat  SUCCESS!  For now...
• Taking the baby out to do errands  50% SUCCESS - As long as I have an errand to do.
• Singing silly songs in silly voices FAILURE - I'm trying not to take her rolling over and crawling away mid-song personally.
• Bathing the baby  SUCCESS!  She loves her bath.

I know that I'm very fortunate to be able to stay at home and take care of our daughter, and every day I try to remind myself that there are so many other moms who don't have this opportunity.  I know that the time I spend with her now is the foundation for the kind of person that she will grow up to be.  That's a little bit frightening when you realize the responsibility that I have.  Who am I kidding?  That's a lot frightening... And still, I'm frustrated because I can't have dinner ready for Husband when he gets home, and I feel like a total asshole because he's got to eat hot dogs, that he made himself, for dinner.

So, in an effort to not be a complete embarrassment to my husband and daughter, I recently went back on Weight Watchers.  I had joined the program once before, back in 2004, after reaching my "bottom," and becoming completely disgusted with my physical appearance.  Have you ever seen that bumper sticker that reads, "I may be fat, but you're ugly, and I can lose weight..."?  Yeah.  I needed to at least try to whittle myself down so that at least I didn't have fat and ugly going for me.

So in October 2004, I walked into Weight Watchers and signed up.  At the time, I was sort of in between careers, having just finished my first gig in the Entertainment Industry.  It was an experience that made me question whether or not I wanted to continue working in television.  The people I worked for were... well, "crazy" would only begin to scratch the surface of what they were.  So, I ended up taking a gig at Starbucks while I sorted out what I was going to do with the rest of my life.  My shifts got me out of work by 2PM, so I turned into a gym rat - 2hrs a day, 5 times a week.  So, WW + gym rat = melted pounds.  By May, I had dropped 30 lbs and was looking buff.  Not like a bodybuilder or anything, but there was definite muscle tone.  It was awesome.  I was a size 5.  I was wearing bathing suits in public, I looked that good.

Then in June of 2005, I got idiopathic viral cardiomyopathy (you can Google that later), had a minor heart attack, was put into a medically-induced coma for ten days, and ended up with two giant gashes on my left leg (also Google "fasciotomy" on an empty stomach) and two months in the hospital.  When I got back home, my left leg was still attached, but not working any longer (enrich your life, read about DROP FOOT), and pretty much all my muscles had atrophied to almost nothing.  Learning how to walk again, with a foot that doesn't function, has been somewhat of a journey and a priority.  I recently ditched the brace because it hurt my foot too much, and it was more cumbersome than helpful.  So now, my goal is to remain upright at all times - I'm at about a 75% success rate right now.

Oh.  And I gained everything I lost, and then a little bit more after I had a baby this past February.  I also broke three bones in my good foot this past June and was in a cast for 8 weeks.  These aren't excuses.  These are facts.  I've also had access to a never-ending buffet of food since I returned to working in TV/Film.  Why eat fruit when there's fresh baked cookies?  Which would I rather do after a 13 hour day - go home to the baby and then sleep or go to the gym?

Yesterday was our last day of shooting.  I'm going to stay at home with the baby for as long as I can.  I have a Wii Fit at home, and I'm gonna start using it regularly.  Not sure how often I'm gonna make it to the gym because I've got to watch the baby, but I'd like to get in at least a couple of days.  I'm determined to get back into shape, and the first step is getting back on Weight Watchers.  It's one of the easiest programs to follow.  You just have to stay within your points range, and you're pretty much guaranteed to lose weight.  I know, because I've done it before. So last week was my first week in.  I stayed within my points range.  It was easy!  

This morning, I weighed in to see how I did.

I gained half a pound.

I know it's not going to melt off.  I know that I didn't exercise for even a second last week.  I know it's a slow-going journey.  It doesn't make me feel any better, though. DAMMIT.

 

It's happened.  I don't believe it, to be quite honest with you.  They told me it would happen, but I thought that I would be different.  I'm not.  We're not.  It's just like they said.

All I talk about now is my baby's poop.

Did she poop today?  How many times?  What color was it?  Was it a lot or just a little?  What shape was it - Tootsie Roll or nugget?  How long after she ate did she poop?

What the hell is wrong with us?  I guess this is the barometer by which we determine the overall good health of our children.  I remember that when she was just born, before we left the hospital even, we were tasked with writing down the number of times the baby pooped and peed each day.  I kept forgetting to write it down.  I got in trouble for it.  "You have to write down every time she poops and pees.  If you don't, you may not be able to leave the hospital."   I know that with a new baby, and all new parts, you have to keep track.  What if something didn't work correctly?  What if something was missing, and the only way to know it was missing was if the baby didn't poop or pee?  But she did.  Which is why I wasn't worried about writing it down.  As a matter of fact, I would cross off the little pictures on the Poo/Pee chart randomly throughout the day, just so that the nurses would leave me alone.  

By the time we got home from the hospital, I was completely obsessed with her pooping and peeing.  Every time she did it, there was an announcement.  "THE BABY JUST POOPED!  YAY!"  If it had been a while since the last diaper change, there was concern.  "HAS THE BABY PEED LATELY?"  When the nanny started, she asked me to make her a chart so that she can write down the number of times that the baby goes to the bathroom during the day, so that I would know what she was doing while I was at work.  Every morning when she arrives, the first things the nanny asks me is whether or not the baby has pooped.  

This has been going on for 7 months now.

It's the most ridiculous thing I think I have ever done.  The crazy thing is that for some God-awful reason, I don't think I'm going to stop any time soon.  It's as though I need to know that she's pooped because then I'll know that she's OK.  I think I may need some professional help...

 

 

 

So, last night, I'm watching "19 Kids and Counting," and about midway through the program, there was a commercial on for birth control pills.

The fact that I'm watching "19 Kids and Counting" is a blog post all on it's own.  

So I am on hiatus this week, and I'm going to spend the entire week at home, chillin' with Charlotte Rose.

It's gonna be awesome.

Here's something else that's awesome:  Charlotte has been napping for 2 hours now.  That's something that she doesn't normally do when the nanny is here.  Why?  Because the nanny is usually banging shit around while the baby sleeps, and guess what?  That wakes her up.  

Bitter... Party of one... Your table's ready.