Scanfam

Luca's Birth Journey

2010-04-21T11:19:00.001-07:00

My daughter Maya was a c-section in 2006 because she was breech and they thought I had low amniotic fluid. I never went into labor because they took her at 37 weeks. At that time I was told by my OB that my local hospital has a "once a c-section always a c-section" policy.

When my husband and I began thinking about having another baby, I began to mourn the loss of my birth experience with my daughter. I was scared to go through the surgery, recovery, PPD, difficulty breastfeeding and bonding, etc. that I mostly blamed on the cesarean. Ever since I had helped a friend through her labor in college, I had wanted to experience labor and delivery of my own child. I felt that God had created me capable of birthing babies, and I wanted to feel that power through my body.

Miraculously, right around the time I became pregnant, I connected with strong birth advocates on Facebook through my Aunt Robin. These women pointed me towards International Cesarean Awareness Network (ICAN) and told me that hospital policy didn't have to stop me from having the birth I desired. My husband and I contacted local midwives Laurie and Dzhan and told them our desire to have a VBAC and to do what it took to make it happen. They told us they had just helped another local woman do the same thing in Seattle and they seemed thrilled by our choice and excited to help us. We were so encouraged to encounter so many supportive people.

It was a slightly bumpy journey trying to find a provider due to insurance issues and my location and circumstances. I had decided I wanted a hospital birth with a midwife but I and my midwife here had difficulty getting people to call me back. Finally, my awesome Facebook friends (Megan Miles and Alyson Davis) recommended homebirth midwives in the Seattle area. By that time I had read enough about having a VBAC that I was fully convinced I would have better odds at a good outcome having an out of hospital homebirth. The first midwife I contacted agreed to meet with my husband and I on a Saturday night at 5 pm. She spent almost two hours with us discussing our plans and her philosophies. She would open up her home to us for a homebirth. At 30 weeks we were finally set with a VBAC plan!

Easter Sunday I relocated to my Aunt Robin’s (also my Doula) home in Arlington, about a week and a half before my due date. It was really difficult leaving my family but both my husband and I felt like we were doing the right thing for our family.

Thursday, April 15 at about 2 a.m. I thought my water had broken. I called my husband and he drove over the pass right away. My mom stayed with my kids in Wenatchee and then her and my dad drove them over Thursday morning. We spent all day Thursday trying to kick start labor with no luck. By Friday with no progress I began having visions of having to go to the hospital and have another c-section. I went and saw my midwife and she determined that my water had not broken, I was just having a lot of pre-labor signs. (And no, i didn't just wet my pants!)

Saturday April 17 I began to feel hopeless and thought that I was going to have to say goodbye to my family AGAIN without a baby. I desperately missed my home and my kids and I began to feel guilty about the sacrifices everyone was having to make. I had a really good cry at about 5:30 pm and at 6:10 I had a big contraction. I decided to just sit by myself, watch TV and notice if I had anymore. I was tired of all the fuss about every contraction and I was sick of being a watched pot. After an hour, I had had about 8 contractions and they seemed to be getting closer together. I told my Aunt and my husband and we started walking outside to see if they kept coming. They did and they began getting more intense. My three big labor goals were to stay active, keep my sense of humor and relax my entire body through each contraction (inspired through the birth stories I read in Ina May Gaskin’s Guide to Childbirth). My husband held me through each one and reminded me to relax. Just saying that word helped me remember not to tense my body, but to relax everything. I could actually feel my body opening up as I rode each wave. I kept reminding myself that movement through labor would shorten my labor and I just kept repeating "relax and open" to myself. They were perfect mantras to get me through the pain.

One of my midwives came to my aunt’s house to listen to the baby and watch my contractions. My husband told her that I was anxious about the drive to Seattle and that he thought I would like to leave sooner rather than later. She listened to him and my husband and I got in the car and took off. My midwife told me my contractions would probably slow down on the car ride and I would have to get back in the groove once I got to the house, but she was wrong! I think because I kept accepting every contraction, rather than fighting them or tensing up against the pain, they just kept right on trucking through my body. During the car ride, I actually felt the baby’s head move further down into my pelvis. I was so relieved when we arrived at the midwives house and I still had the baby inside of me! We had made the 50 minute trip in about 40. It was 10 pm, so there was no traffic.

I immediately stripped off my clothes and got in the birth tub. It felt good to hang myself over the side. By this time I was pretty oblivious to time and activity around me, although I could hear everything. At one point I made some joke and someone joked back "she’s still got a sense of humor she must only be at a 4!!" and then I think I started swearing.

My birth team was incredible! They kept telling me I was a Rockstar and telling me how great I was doing. Their encouragement kept me going. My mom came around midnight. I had decided that I really wanted her to be there with me. She had originally thought that she wouldn’t be able to handle it because she gets queasy at the sight of blood and always said she couldn’t even watch her own children be born. But she came and became apart of the birth team! My husband was awesome, he stayed with me almost the whole time and looking back at pictures, he always has a smile on his face. He kept kissing me and followed every direction I gave him!
At one point I said "I can’t" and then remembered that I didn’t want any negative thoughts and immediately began saying "I can do this."

Once I started to feel like I wanted to push, my midwife checked me and said I was complete. I pushed for a little bit in the tub but didn’t like it very much. I pushed on the toilet for a while and liked that a whole lot better. I could feel the baby moving down through me – it was incredible! Then I moved to the bed and laid on my side to push. They told me the tub was ready again because I had thought I wanted to have a waterbirth. But by that time I could feel my baby’s head coming and I didn’t want to move again. I pushed a few more times and out he came straight into my husbands hands at 2:20 am on April 18 after 8 hours of labor! My Aunt/Doula was holding my hand, my mom was holding my leg and my midwives made sure I didn’t tear!
My son was placed right onto my chest. It is the best feeling knowing that my husband and I were the first to touch him and hold him.

Several hours later he weighed in at 9 lbs 12 oz, 14 ½ in head and 21 in long! My mom went back to the hotel and my dad came to visit. We celebrated with champagne at 5 a.m. Then later in the morning they brought our kids to meet their new baby brother!

We are so thrilled to have Luca Thomas Scanlon as the newest member of our family and so grateful for all of the support and encouragement we received from family, friends, and our birth team. We feel that God had his hand on this whole process and orchestrated every detail according to his plan. We have been blessed beyond belief.

the one with lots of capital letters aka a love letter

2009-10-20T21:56:00.000-07:00

i have always been attracted to the bad boys. remember the weird-o kid in parenthood? loved him. edward furlong in terminator 2? nick stahl in man without a face? brent ogee in 6th grade. still makes my heart flutter a little bit. i like the bad boys. probably has something to do with the facts that i was known as "the perfect child", my dad was a cop and i didn't rebel in my teenage years. who wouldn't love the sexy, long greasy haired, introverted loners with a reputation like mine?

spring 2004. i meet ted and alan during church softball. those boys were/are CUTE. cute together. cute by themselves. cute. i could tell ted had been a little bit of a bad boy (i have badboydar) so of course i clued in and started paying attention. NOT TO MENTION, that bad boy could run the bases like nobody's business and he had very attractive arms while he was up to bat. what? i'd never cared about arms before. bad boys don't normally have particularly hot arms. but oh man, i always wished ted was up to bat. OR i wished that i would get hurt somehow, so ted would come show me sympathy. my wish came true frequently, because 1. ted is very sympathetic and 2. i got hurt a lot.

it took this bad boy all season to ask me out. that's the beauty of bad boys. they aren't cocky and forward. they are shy, planful and unassuming. during our first date ted invited me on three more in the next three days and he didn't even think i was a loser for not having any plans. pretty good for a first date.

so the next day when ted called me and said he would meet me at the movie theater, i was pretty bummed. meeting is no fun. getting picked up for a date is fun. so when ted called me back 30 seconds later and told me he would pick me up instead, i was thinking that he was the right kind of bad boy for me.

and that is the beginning of our love story.

this is the other beginning of our love story:

ted is not so much a bad boy anymore. sometimes, i have to convince him to be just a little bad and NOT eat healthy. or i have to make him blow off some responsibility for a little fun. other times he makes me do wild and crazy things like jump on the piles of fertilizer bags outside of safeway or chase an ambulance or two. we balance. his bad boy with my good girl.

tonight i was contemplating this man i LOVE.

he started back to school this year to pursue his love of music. he works hard on homework and studies every night and day. he puts a lot of thought and effort into cooking meals for our family. he spends time playing with the kids. once in a while he blows off his homework "just to hang out" with me. he reads hatchet to alan almost every night. he rubs my shoulders when i have a headache. he makes up stories to tell maya before bed. he makes me sit down with him and come up with a chore chart. he always does his chores and sometimes mine.

last night ted was super stressed about his homework and test today. (he has about a million hours of homework a week.) during study breaks he made cookies with the kids. (did I mention they were GOOD cookies??) then he took his test and got an A.

and today when he had the day off from work, what did he do? not the hours of homework he could have. he decided to take maya and alan to the skate park and then hike saddle rock.

this man is a GOOD dad.

he's a GOOD husband.

he's a GOOD student.

he's a GOOD guy.

i love my bad boy turned good guy. and his arms STILL get me. literally and figuratively.

why i don't share magazines with my dad anymore.

2009-10-19T21:06:00.000-07:00

i seriously love readers digest. but i realized i was old the other day as i was reading it. i have been reading it forever, like since i was old enough to read (and it was safe because without a "sex and dating" column, i didn't have to anticipate my dad's "discussion" about the "sex and dating" topics). i realized i was old because i have started to pay attention to all the health, heart disease, diabetes articles that i used to skip because they were for the old people. i've always been in denial that its written for geezers and i sing its praises to everyone who cares (pretty much nobody) but i have finally decided to accept the truth, embrace the "studies show..." articles and try to learn more about (and not just eat) the benefits of avocados and how to sit and be fit.

i have always been amazed at rd's ability to bring me to tears and then get me gut laughing at some schmuck's stupid antics or some daily newspaper's misprint. oh boy, those things can crack me up. it is truly a great periodical that can bring you full circle in your emotions and brain function and leave you wanting more. (if i read people, i usually end up feeling ugly and disgusted with myself for caring about trash. i need the week between issues to recover.)

but the day readers digest arrives at our house is like Christmas. and for a whole week (i used to be able to finish an issue in a couple hours but kids and family fixed that right up for me) my stomach tingles with excitement. sometimes i forget why i'm excited and then i remember! um, ted, i have to use the bathroom. i'll be right back. and I get two minutes of uninterrupted reading (the perfect amount of time for rd)

then this: (enter maya) maya go find daddy. no this is mommy's. i know it's little and has a ton of cat litter ads, but mommy is trying to read this right now. maya go see if daddy needs help. maya mommy needs some privacy. please. maya. please.

and then my rd disappears with my daughter into the other room. she thinks because it's small it's for her. i might have to start buying the large print edition. (so much of it makes so much more sense now).

oh well, my legs are usually asleep by then anyways.

ps. when seventeen magazine did a "sex and dating" on oral sex, i hid it from my dad. i'm sure you understand.

from the mouths of babes

2009-10-14T21:54:00.000-07:00

my mom emailed me at work today:

"mikey says to maya: maya you should talk to your mother about being a pumpkin for halloween. maya says to mikey: i don't have a mother, i have a mommy."

she's so smart and so right. mother's are smarmy.

my contribution to the cultural education of my children

2009-10-12T20:24:00.000-07:00

ted and i like to plan things in advance. and then we change our minds. and then ted changes his again. and then i get used to the new plan. and then ted changes his mind again. and then i get mad. and then i don't plan things in advance anymore.

ted wanted to go to barter faire and camp this last weekend. i did not. nothing against barter faire and all, but i was not too keen on subjecting my kids to a place so cold you are drawn to the flame....and that is NOT the place to be drawn to the flame, if you get my drift. so i let him stew on it for a day or two and then said things like"it's too cold" and "i have to grow a baby and it's too cold up there to do that" and "pot smoke is not good for growing babies or children." then he changes his mind. and then he changes it back. and then friday night we decide that maybe it would be ok to just go for the day. and i'm kind of ok with that and i get used to the idea.

saturday morning. t minus 3 minutes until we are going to leave and ted changes his mind (you live with him, you learn to expect it.) i find myself actually talking him into going to barter faire.

what?

driving in cars for long periods of time with maya is not. fun. capitol NOT. i, of course, make the mistake of telling her we will be going through a tunnel (her favorite) and then ted reminds me bebe bridge is open and we, in fact, will not be traveling through any tunnels. i think this is ridiculous and someone should build a tunnel somewhere on that drive. we then spend about 20 minutes convincing maya that it is actually more exciting to cross bridges then go through tunnels. this translates into a commitment to raise our hands and feet and yell like banshees as we travel over all 12 bridges between here and tonasket. we always end with clapping to celebrate. anything with water on both sides of the road qualified as a bridge. alan was the official judge and counter. i have never had so much fun with bridges. you should try it sometime. it's better if you do it on the way to tonasket, where all the people are a little cooky anyway and don't think it out of the ordinary to see a car full of people yelling and doing the wave over a bridge.

once we arrive at barter faire (following charming a cop out of a ticket and spending an hour in the driveway inching our way towards the parking lot) i learned several things. maya is not as bohemian as I thought. not brushing my hair or putting on make-up did not help me fit in. drug dealers do not discriminate against people with kids. or people in tennis shoes. my mother in law makes great pumpkin bread that is best if you just gnaw on it. the kids of free spirited parents are bratty just like other kids. free face painting for kids is an awesome perk. it really meant a lot to my mother in law that we came, seeing as it was her birthday and all. i am thankful and glad that i talked ted into going. maya melts down after two hours of living the bohemian lifestyle.
as we were walking around we walked right past one of the staff at alan's old school. i pointed her out (because it made me feel slightly more normal to be there after seeing her). i say "that was mrs. bull." ted says "oh really?" and alan says "that's unfortunate."

what?

I say "why is that unfortunate?" and he says "that a person like her would be at a place like this."

what?

i say "what about us? we are here." and he shrugs his shoulders.

ever since i have been trying to figure out exactly what goes through that kid's head about our family.

oh and excuse me but it is now called okanogan family faire...to make it more family friendly and less drug dealer friendly. i'm not really sure what to make of that. but thanks for the effort.

part of the family friendly aspect, i assume.

gone too long

2009-10-11T21:28:00.000-07:00

i miss my blog and i miss writing in it. i think my new years resolution (what?) should be to start posting again. ok, it's settled. so for those faithful readers who have been biting their nails in anticipation that i would return to the blogging world, you are welcome.

new talent

2008-06-08T07:25:00.000-07:00

"i better taste this to make sure you made it right mommy."

"i want that one right there."

51% of the time

2008-06-07T14:37:00.001-07:00

alan is in rare form today. here is from a random conversation:

alan: i just learned that there are more girls than boys.

me: yeah, i think like 51%. where did you hear that?

alan: i just learned it from myself.

me: did it just pop into your brain or did you hear it somewhere?

alan: i heard it. why do boys want to become girls? then there are just more girls. a boy wants to be a girl and then there goes another girl. and then there goes another girl. they just want to become girls and then there are more girls.

me: um, yeah. why don't you, uh.....

alan: play on the playstation 2?

me. um, yeah.

alan: ok. so now you don't have to take care of me. i'll just take care of myself.

me: i love you.

seriously, i think i should be voted mother of the year. where is ted when i need him?

bathtism

2008-05-27T19:45:00.000-07:00

i thought it was important to share one of our family's best moments. i had a hard time holding the camera steady and you can hear maya in the background protesting being held. but all imperfections aside, we were so proud of alan for making this decision for his life.

alan speak

2008-05-23T06:05:00.001-07:00

i just asked alan if he had cleaned his room. his response? "if you go in there it won't look like I had a war at all."

my favoritist day

2008-05-20T22:03:00.000-07:00

my mom was out of town on monday so i got to take the day off work and stay home with maya and be home when alan got home from school. maya and i had a pretty good time cleaning out the fridge (me cleaning and her taking the cheese and tofu out and throwing it at me over and over again.) and running errands. i finally let her take a nap in the afternoon and then i accidently woke her up and decided to just get her up again so i could play with her some more. I didn't want to miss anytime with her. then alan came home and kept telling me that i was "good" and "cool" because I had bought a wading pool, i had cucumbers and ranch dip for a snack and we were going to make oatmeal raisen cookies.

to top it off, Ted barbecued chicken and we ate corn on the cob outside on our deck. i love this time of year!

this morning when I told Alan I would be at work again and not home when he got home from school he said "dang it. I wanted to see you again." I almost felt as sappy as a kodak commercial and I was definately as happy as the little girl staying in Cinderella's castle. i love that kid.

this is the part where someone reminds me that if I did this everyday, I might not appreciate it so much. then maybe I won't feel so guilty and sad about having to work full time.

chaos, crisis and can somebody help me please!

2008-05-08T06:18:00.000-07:00

ted had worship practice, so i was flying solo on taking alan and maya to alan's baseball game. going to baseball games with maya is not the easiest task in the world. she is at a delightful age where everything is a game and she relies on her cuteness to get her out of trouble. well, cuteness or screaming, usually the latter after the cuteness fails to charm me (a very hard task). so anyway, i'm chasing maya around the ballfield trying to make sure she doesn't spend too much time talking to weird people, trying to watch my stuff so it doesn't get stolen and trying to watch alan play baseball (why are we here again? oh yeah, to watch alan.) I grabbed maya one last time off the field and turned around and my son is standing on 2nd base with the ball in his glove and some sad sack from the other team is walking off the field from 2nd base. wooohooooo alan! apparently he made the game winning play! the coach gave him a "player of the game award" and I almost started crying i was so proud.

once we got home, i remembered that maya had a diaper rash and i thought she might need some naked time to air stuff out. so i stripped her and she proceeded to dance and sing naked around the house. something about being naked makes that girl very happy. i was trying to watch her for signs of going potty while doing other stuff one must do when they have two kids a husband and a house (don't ask me what because I'm not even sure). i had turned on some music for her to dance to and i looked over at her at one point and she was rolling around on the floor and then she was, um....pooping. right on the carpet. she kind of freaked out, and looked at me like "mommy there is nothing to catch my poooooooooop!" in my genius, quick thinking mode, i picked her up and put her on the toilet (hey, why not start right that minute?). she didn't like that very much.

so while, i'm putting her in a diaper, two of my friends show up and alan opens the door for them and says "you can't walk on the carpet." they ask why and he says "because maya pooped on it." oh. my. goodness.

luckily it was easily cleaned up and they didn't mind much.....until they stepped in pee on the way out the door.

also luckily one of my new goals is to go with the flow a little better and not be so anxious and uptight about everything. so i just told myself "no big deal" and moved on.
are you impressed? because i'm impressed with myself. poop on the floor, friends coming over, crazy children....life is good.

baby soft buns

2008-05-05T07:00:00.000-07:00

yeah for fuzzibuns! and my friend beth who is lending me some! my goal right now is to go green. not superpsycho green, but as green as i can while still maintaining sanity. so, my next step after starting to use my recycling tubs is to try some cloth diapers. we'll see how they go and we'll see how my mom does with them during the day. wish maya a happy tushy!

our tuesday

2008-04-24T21:48:00.000-07:00

4:55 p.m. at work on tuesday and i received a less than nice email. well, a nasty email to be exact. unfortunately, i've gotten used to them lately from this specific client and it's forcing me to learn the fine art of not taking things personally. so i read the two choice words that start with f and end in u and were so eloquently attached to my name and i smiled, shut down my computer, grabbed my stuff and walked out the door. i thought to myself that life is just too damn short to let my day be ruined by someone like her or something as nasty as that. so when i got home i told alan and ted that we were going to go out to celebrate. i didn't have an answer for what exactly we would be celebrating, but i didn't care.

ted celebrated that he has great ideas.
alan celebrated that he is doing good in school.
alan told me that i should celebrate being a good mom. we all agreed but then decided that i could decide what i celebrated.
i celebrated that i've been swimming regularly and that it has improved my life.
and we all decided to celebrate that maya was over the "disease" (decided as she shoved food into her mouth)

it was a good time. and a nice change of pace for a tuesday night.

what can you celebrate?

just keep swimming

2008-04-15T21:12:00.000-07:00

so i've been swimming lately. i go with sarah on my lunch hour and i love it. she wrote a cool post about water and swimming on her blog http://onewholaughs.wordpress.com/ (November 20 "and it feels like flying") when she started swimming. i'm not that cool, but i will say that i smell like chlorine constantly, my hair is probably turning green as we speak, i spend half of every day with wet hair and sometimes i can't hear because there is water in my ear, but it's so worth it! woohoo!!

it is hard to get used to doing an excercise regime where I can't breathe for half the time i'm working out. sometimes i have a small panic attack when my face is in the water about not being able to breathe but then it's time to suck some air in again and the feeling goes away until i stick my face back in the water. it motivates me to swim faster so I can breathe more often, but then i breathe harder and freak out more often.

yeah. i'm hoping to get over that soon. i'm also hoping to get over my fear of naked old ladies.

i'm pretty convinced that the some people get off on the whole "locker room" experience. come on! don't you know that eve ate the apple and we are suppossed to be embarrassed and ashamed to be naked???? some people must not read the old testament part of their Bible. i just don't think it's too much to ask to change into your clothes before you brush your hair or wring out your swimsuit. am i wrong, or isn't that a little weird for everyone involved?

i know for sure these other women in the locker room read the new testament because they already know exactly what's going to happen when the world ends. i almost told them that i believe that Christians will NOT be raptured before the tribulation (gasp!) when i remembered that God is about love and not about being a smart ass.

i need to remember that way more often. (big sigh).

attack of the coxsackie virus or how the hand, foot, and mouth disease changed my view of life

2008-04-10T19:43:00.001-07:00

ok, so some of it is chocolate milk...but that was because i made a desperate attempt to get her to drink something.

she's a trooper. a crabby trooper, but a trooper nonetheless.

and my mom is a trooper.

i am not a trooper. i am a victim of this cruel, cruel world; which causes my child to spit out orange disgusting medicine all over me while screaming in pain as i try to force it down her throat because it's good for her

oh the joy.

i can only imagine God. "um, marie. remember the times i knew what was good for you and you screamed in pain and spit it out?"

dang it! why does he always have to be right?

ted gave me the task of trying to see God on everything and seeing God in everything is unavoidable when you start looking. i think our world was designed to bring us closer to God and in doing that we learn more about him, about who he is and who he created us to be.

marriage and parenting have been the two greatest things that have helped me understand God more intimately. i think that's why he designed them and why he designed them the way he did.

once again, i was thinking that somethings were about me.

i thought being a mom would be all fluffy clouds, gushy feelings, cuddles and kisses (well, not completely. but you know, most of the time). but there is way more dirt, grime, blisters, chocolate milk and orange medicine everywhere than I expected. it is one of the hardest things i have ever had to do. the expectations are hugousmongous, the information is exorbitant and the emotions are o-ver-whelm-ing. overwhelming. but it is also the most rewarding experiences.

i'm pretty sure God feels similarly about us. we are difficult but he loves us so much and wants the best for us always. even if we are screaming and crying and trying to spit it out and he has to try and shove it down our throats. (that is not generally the picture i like to have or give of God; but i think he does everything he can to reach us and draw us closer to him).

and when my kids are hurting and they need me to hug them, comfort them and love them (despite the fact that my new shirt now has a huge orange stain and alan is almost too big to fit in my lap), you couldn't pay me to be anywhere else, doing anything else.

we were created to learn how to sacrifice. to learn how to give up ourselves completely and give it to others. selflessness goes against human nature, so God created ways that we would be forced to practice it.

he's good. a little tricky. but good.

so, the coxsackie virus sucks and maybe i'm overspiritualizing, but i guess i can see God in it somewhere.

laughter is the best medicine

2008-04-06T13:53:00.000-07:00

the lament of alan

2008-04-06T13:46:00.001-07:00

i've been a little blogged out lately. don't worry it's not because of anything you've done. and there is never a shortage of inspiration for things to write about, just no time and energy to do it.

maya and alan have been up to their usual tricks lately. alan was drawing one morning and said to me "why would I do anything else, if I can draw?" or something like that. but of course, today, life is going to end because he's "boooooooooored out of his mind with nothing to do." i say "i thought drawing was supremo" and he just says "mom, you make me want to scream-o."

toys

2008-03-02T13:11:00.001-08:00

after church today i took alan and maya to rotary park. we think that park is pretty cool. they have these really crazy, space age-y toys that are unlike any other toys i've seen at a park. there were a bunch of other kids there and alan and maya were having fun romping around on all the toys (maya mostly threw bark at the toys and yelled things like "a-lan" and "yeah"). at one point i took maya over to the slide and this girl who looked about 6 years old said to me "this isn't very safe for babies." i wanted to say "um, thank you. the next time i have a parenting question, i'll know who to call." instead i just said "yes, if they don't have their mommies with them." and...."so, where is your mommy, oh wise one?" geez, i am just a little too sensitive.

our next adventure was with one of the dad's standing around. he seemed to think that while i was chasing an active toddler it was a good time for him to make conversation with me about how brilliant his son is. i'm always suspicious of older (than me) men who like to randomly make conversation (it probably has somethign to do with "perv patrol" when i was a kid...but that is a story for another post.) anyway, he kept telling me about how his son's nervous habits and learning problems are now miraculously gone after switching schools while i kept trying to keep an eye on maya and make sure none of the flying bark ended up in her mouth or up her nose. somehow i don't do a good job of giving off the "i really didn't come to this park to talk about your kid" vibe so I'll have to work on that. he kept talking and talking and then luckily i suddenly had a life or death situation with maya (she was standing around looking bored) and i had a good excuse to walk away. i began to question if his kids really were his because when he tried to talk to them they ignored him.

so about 20 minutes later and from the other side of the playground i turned around and a bunch of the kids had left including alan. i started scanning the park for him but i couldn't find him. and then i heard this girl tell her mom that she wanted to go play in the picnic shelter. i turned and looked and there were all the missing kids, including alan. they had arranged the tables so that she could run in a circle on the tops of them. go figure. brand spanking new toys unlike anything else in wenatchee and they play with the stuff you can find anywhere and that wasn't even designed to be a toy. i had to rip alan away from their fun game when it was time to go home. i told him he can come back to our house and play wtih the broken toys he fishes out of the garbage...instead of the awesome, new, state of the art toys we paid a million dollars for that he got for Christmas.

talking

2008-02-28T17:27:00.000-08:00

we think maya is talking pretty regularly now. we don't understand her most of the time, but i still think there are words forming. i swear she said "what's that?" one day. but it sounded more like "wa-sssss?" and then she definately says grandma, mama, dada, alan, all done, kitty and yeah. whenever we say something at alan...like "alan it's time to get ready to go" she'll walk around yelling"a-lan, a-lan." and then i taught her how to say please in sign language in one day. my mom and i have been using sign language for just a few things since she was about six months old, but we have never been really consistent or thorough. so one day i wouldn't give her anything until she signed please (touching your right hand to your upper chest in a circular motion...as far as i know) and now she does it all the time. actually her process goes something like this. "uh, uh... [clap, clap, point]...uh..[pat her chest once]...[clap]....point]...uuuuuuhhhhhh." it kind of appears that she's saying "mommy, take me outside now. please." she's pretty persistant. she also knows how to throw things in the garbage. she crawls around the kitchen floor until she finds things and then walks over and puts them in the garbage can. she's brilliant.

quotes

2008-02-26T20:48:00.000-08:00

ok, so my best friend misty has a webpage and she puts up quotes from her two daughters when they say something cute and/or hilarious. i told her that it was a brilliant idea and i'm stealing it. i have always wanted to write down the crazy things that alan says, but i never remember to. plus, i just know i'll start a notebook and then forget about it and someday when i need a peice of paper i will find it and use it for something else and wonder what to do with the one quote i've written down.

anyway, today's funny quote comes courtesy of alan:

"mike, you shouldn't lose weight because then you won't be soft and squishy like a pillow."

TORRO!

2008-02-24T10:01:00.000-08:00

apparently maya is also part bull. the girl is silly, we never know what she will do next.

maya loves to eat....

2008-01-29T22:28:00.000-08:00

...everything but peanuts and peanut butter. it's official, our house and grandma and mike's house is peanut and nut free. we did a scratch test and she is certifiably allergic. maya is thrilled she is not allergic to bananas. that would be a sad day around here.

her dad says "it's a sad day we don't get nuts around here."

I say "we get nuts most days."

Alan says "probably we are too nutty. probably our family doesn't need any more nuts. we have mike."

the evil peanut butter episode

2008-01-23T12:16:00.000-08:00

"some babies can eat peanut butter at 10 months and be fine, other babies can eat peanut butter at 18 months and develop an allergy." so said our pediatrician, Dr. Milnes.

after showing up at the emergency room with maya and her puffy eyes, hands and lips the nurse says "oh peanuts, you aren't suppossed to give those to kids until after they are two years old." Um, excuse me...next time I have a parenting question I will have to call you.

so, apparently maya may have a peanut allergy. and that sucks.

the whole ordeal did not do anything for my panic mom disorder. i told my mom that i didn't want to try peanut butter until i was ready to take her to the emergency room if needed. so yesterday on my lunch hour, it seemed as good a time as any. my mom gave her a piece of bread with a light spread of peanut butter. maya promptly held the bread up to her face and tried to lick off the peanut butter. (why eat the bread if you already know what it tastes like...it's much more efficient to lick the new thing). so after a couple minutes of smearing it all over her face and not getting much in her mouth (most of the time what goes in comes right back out to be inspected...she likes to view her food in all stages of digestion) i take a look at her to wipe her off and she has huge welts all around her lips. then they are on her hands. and then she starts rubbing them into her eyes. and then i am internally freaking out and externally saying things like "mom, do you think her mouth looks different?" "what is on her hands?"

you have to remember that i have been diagnosed with panic mom syndrome (or PMS)...where everything seems to be a potential tradgedy...and I mean everything. she can poke her eye out with the pig tail from the animal farm she got for Christmas, or she can choke on the socks she likes to carry around, or she may stop breathing in the middle of the night for no reason, or she may get a concussion by hitting herself in the head with her toy phone. it's neverending and it makes it really hard to tell when something is serious or silly. most of my worries are silly. so i tend to think all of them are. because i am an all or nothing thinker....but that is a whole other post for a whole other day.

so anyway, my panic mom syndrome kicks in and i immediately want to call 911, but i try to be rational (which does not blend with PMS) and i call her pediatrician first. and i am put on hold for about 13 and one half hours because "all the lines are busy." which is, again, not helpful for PMS. then finally someone puts me through to our nurse whose voice mail comes on. COME ON!! so I calmly press "0" because that is more rational than screaming into the phone and throwing it through a window. but then i start thinking things like "why didn't i do this on my cell phone so i could be halfway to the ER by now. what possessed me to use a land line phone when i never use land lines? how am i going to hold this phone to my ear while on hold and corral maya and get her coat and hat on because it is about -13 degrees outside?" so i finally get a nurse on the phone who tells me to take maya to the ER. well, duh! i wasted all my time being rational.

i love going to the ER when you have a true emergency. i've been there before when i thought i broke my toe. i waited four hours and the doctor told me that there was nothing he could do. it was a fantabulous experience. so this time, i say "PEANUT. REACTION" and I sure do get one. i get miss know-it-all-nurse to check maya's "vitals" and another lady to check us in. except everyone seems to be moving in slow motion. I tried saying it a few more times..."PEANUT. REACTION." but they don't move any faster. apparently they think it's important to talk to maya and ask her what happened and get all of her "vitals" before they will let us in the er and give us something that will make the pink, puffy, rashy-thing stop.

what are "vitals" anyways? i could have told them what her vitals were..."temp fine, breathing fine, pulse fine. the only thing NOT fine is that she ate peanut butter for the first time and now she is pink and puffy and itchy and uncomfortable....so do something to help her NOW." not to mention, everytime they come at maya with a stethescope or a pulse reader thingy she screams and squirms out of my grip. the real clincher was the butt thermometer. i felt violated right along with her. by the time we finally saw the doctor she was giving everyone the pink, puffy, evil eye.

they didn't have a room for us so they sat us on a bed in the hallway. we looked right into a room where an old lady was laying. the er is full of old people. old people and a pink puffy naked maya. they did let us keep her in a diaper and her pink booties. needless to say, we were popular with nurses and old ladies alike.

we were finally sent home after some benadryl and monitoring and then as soon as we got home, she breaks out into a huge rash all over her body...so back in the car and back to the ER. I wasn't even messing around with a phone or rational-ness anymore.

this time we waited in the lobby and they treated her out there because she decided that she would rather run around the hospital half naked than sit in a boring room. she got a steriod, and luckily it was a liquid, so we got to try and squirt it into her mouth while she writhed out of the grip of three people. it was lots of fun.

then the doctor tells us that she needs to sleep in the same room with us for the night and that we can't let her out of our sight. we need to make sure she keeps breathing. great. as if i am not already on the verge of tears and in panic mom mode, i now will lay awake all night wondering if my daughter is breathing.

these instructions proved very difficult because apparently Dr. ER hasn't lived with maya. it is really hard to tell if she is struggling to breathe in between moving the furniture, running laps around the kitchen, and making loud announcements at anyone who will listen.

i woke her up several times last night trying to check her breathing. and this morning she's fine, no more pink puffy rashy maya.

i think i will recover eventually, hopefully. maybe. but probably not.

christmas 2007

2008-01-16T21:52:00.000-08:00

I have to say that Christmas at our house was C-R-A-Z-Y this year. However, I did have a gi-normous better time than last year considering that last year I had just given birth through a hole in my stomach to a squirmy, loud, teeny-tiny baby who occupied my space and time 24/7. SO, needless to say, Christmas this year was fantabulous. (I am really enjoying conjuctive adjectives at the moment).

As evidenced by the picture above, our family minus the mom, recieved guitars from the Christmas Clown (aka Santa Claus). After much resistance, I did inherit Ted's old guitar. Apparently it's kind of like giving up a child when you get a gargantuanlly nice, expensive, brand stinking new guitar from your loving, thoughtful, sneaky wife and you are asked to give your old, smelly, well worn, throw around guitar to said wife. So, after a little lesson in "my wife is always right" I was "given" the stinkin guitar and I got my 2nd guitar lesson. I now know two chords...E minor and another one whose name I forgot. You can say you knew me when...

So other than the guitars, there were no other major surprises. I got an i-tunes card to load music on Ted's i-pod...how nice of him. But actually, it has been fun to browse music and discover old and new loves. And now I have a good excuse to steal his I-pod!

Maya didn't enjoy ripping into wrapping paper as much as I had hoped. I think we spent too much time discouraging her from carrying around the presents under the tree so that when we shoved them at her and tried to help her rip into them, she would politely pull her hand away and look at us with a look that said "I would never touch something I wasn't suppossed to." In the next minute we would be chasing her down (that girl can run!) into the next room while she holds the digital camera in her greedy little hands, shrieking and waving it around like it was a prize earned for being so cute. She is pretty darn cute...but we still say things like "Camera's are not for babies Maya. Maya give that to mommy. Maya! Maya do not put the camera in your mouth. Maya! Maya! [clap, clap] Maya! Come to Mama. Maya. Come. To. Mama. Give me the camera. Ted get the camera from her. Ted. Ted. Get the camera. Maya. Don't take a picture of mama. Mama said no. Maya."

Ok, so that was exagerrated exponentially. But still...as you can tell, she knows her own name, I speak in the third person constantly and poor Alan is dying for a little attention thrown his way. In the middle of the whole above conversation would be Alan talking to someone, anyone who might listen "Probably she wants to take a picture. I think she's hungry. Mom, mom what if Maya took a picture and then an alien came down and sat on the camera and then a little spaceship grew out of the camera and then when she pressed the button this guy came out and said 'i am an alien.' and then he jumped off and he decided to climb up the tree and then, mom...mom...and then the alien would be in the tree and he could yell 'merry christmas' and then he would slide down the tree and jump onto all the presents and then we would give him the left over cookies and milk but he got sick and threw up on my shoes and you had to buy me some new ones. mom....wouldn't that be funny mom. Mom. are you listening to me. mom."

poor kid, he is stuck with me and my maniac-like behavior and his dad and his distracted mind and Maya and her freakishly fast little legs. He has the best imagination though and we are so thankful for that.

So, Christmas was a little crazy. But we had fun.

habitat, fat cats and dating with children

2007-12-04T09:11:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite memories was of a time when just after Ted and I started dating. Ted volunteered to help roof a house for Habitat for Humanity and I volunteered to "hang out" with Alan. Ted dropped him off at my parents house and his hair looked like he had just rolled out of bed. My mom and I fussed over him for awhile and we took some pictures of him hugging our fat cat. Then I walked with him to the corner store to buy something cold to drink and then past the house his dad was working on. He was so little and cute. He insisted on holding his water while we walked and I just wanted him to hold my hand. He called me "Mawee" and I was in love.

We have a picture on our fridge of Alan hugging the fat cat because I like to remember how excited I was to get to know Ted and Alan.

snow day!

2007-12-02T23:51:00.000-08:00

what is that and what is it doing in my yard?

work

2007-11-25T19:16:00.000-08:00

i ran into a foster mom at safeway tonight. she had her foster daughter and her two biological daughters with her. her 13 month old foster daughter used to be a client of mine. she looked happy; they all looked happy. but i am wondering. that girl could grow up in that family and be loved and loved well. she would have a nice home, lots of toys, a brother, sisters, a caring and doting mom and options for her life. she could go through life with all of that and then some but always with the thought that her biological mom didn't want her bad enough. is it worth it?

at this point, if she were to grow up with her biological mom, she would more than likely be overexposed to sex, drugs and bad choices, she may have brothers and sisters that she would end up taking care of, she would be treated poorly by many people because of her mom's choices, she would have few options for her life, she would be homeless, she would be poor, she would have her mom.

this would just be the way it has been for her family. you get what you get and you don't throw a fit.

my daughter grew in me and then was born from me. i cannot imagine a time when she will not feel like an extension of my own body. how do mother's who don't have their children with them survive? how do they live with themselves? how can you get your priorities mixed up when it involves something that came from your body and was created from your being?

what if her mom did get her act together? got some parenting classes, proved she was clean and sober and made her daughter a priority? what then?

she would [most likely] still live in poverty, have to put up with her mom's bad choices, still get treated differently, still have to raise her brothers and sisters, still be overexposed to the evils of the world and still have less opportunities. is that worth it? is it worth it for her to have her "mom" as opposed to being loved by someone who didn't give birth to her?

i am not my son's biological mom. but i am still his mom. i'm his only mom right now...but then again i'm not. i'm not the only mom who loves him, thinks about him.

Straight from wikipedia: "A mother is the biological and/or social female parent of an offspring. In the case of a mammal such as a human, the mother gestates her child, which is called first an embryo, and then a fetus. This gestation occurs in the mother's uterus from conception until the fetus is sufficiently developed to be born. The mother then goes into labor and gives birth. Once the child is born, the mother produces milk in a process called lactation to feed the child."

what? are you serious? i did none of those things and i'm still Alan's "mom."

a friend once told me that mom is a weird term that is considered a noun but really should be a verb. and ted always says it's something to be earned.

when Alan has a rough day, i mom it. i hug him, i talk to him, i listen to him, i make him laugh, he smiles, my heart gets warm... his "mom" is no where to be found, but he is officially "mommed."

"foster" moms and "step" moms have it rough. they aren't moms, but they "mom" every day. they get the same amount of appreciation, if not less, than the rest of the "mom's" out there. i'm a "step" [ew, i hate that word...who comes up with this stuff?] and i have to ring in that the "fosters" have it worse. they have to deal with the "system" on top of it all. that's a whole 'nother blog in and of itself.

alan is better off with me. i have no doubt about that. but he will always have a void in his life that i cannot fill. he will always be missing his "biological" mom. and he will always be missing the things that she could have given him.

Isaiah 49:15

The Lord answers, "Can a mother forget the baby who is nursing at her breast? Can she stop showing her tender love to the child who was born to her? She might forget her child. But I will not forget you.

p.s. alan just walked in. i signed his homework, he told me a story about his youth pastor not brushing his teeth and getting thirteen cavities, i told him i love him, i gave him a kiss [and smelled his clean teeth] and then he ran off saying "come on mom." i have to go kiss him goodnight now. i will get to hold his hand while we say the Lord's prayer. he will officially be "mommed" for the day.

a blog

2007-11-24T09:07:00.000-08:00

I'm starting a blog. That may be a "duh" at this point, if you are reading this, but it's my blog and I can say what I want. I don't know why other people start blogs but for me it's because I think other people should be interested in what I have to say and how I'm going to say it and I don't like to be interrupted. AND with two kids and a husband, sometimes I don't get anytime to say what I want, when and how I want to. So, I've tried to do the journal thing but it just doesn't cut it. There is something intimately satisfying to write something that you think/know other people will read.

Alan is saying "mom, come on!" pretty insistently right now. I have to go admire his drawings.