Better Blogger in 2011

So I'm thinking about promising to be a better blogger in 2011. I'm not sure if it's really going to work out, but I'm going to give it a shot!

I was doing maybe, C- quality work at the blogging until I got pregnant, then I became a big fat F at it. It didn't help that at the start of my pregnancy my mom passed away after her long battle with illness. After that, I didn't feel much like blogging, or reflecting, or thinking. I just wanted to exist without regurgitating, it was my way of processing everything.

New year though, fresh start, and it's a good time to refocus and rededicate myself to the process of documenting my life or at least just reporting the most humorous, or perhaps embarrassing details of it for your amusement!

I look back on the last year and I'm amazed at what my kids have become!! Lilah just turned 3 the other day, but it seems like she's 13 or 30, depending on the moment. She's full of energy and attitude, intelligence and persistence. Keeping up with her on a daily basis is exhausting, fun, and punishment for what I put my own mother through! Haha! Miles is mellow and easy going. He's got the most amazing attention span, which is a marvel to me considering that Lilah and I have the combined attention span of a gnat. He is the diffuser and always keeps Lilah and me laughing. He also has the profound ability to keep Lilah screaming, because he's definitely got a mind of his own and will not be bossed around by Miss Thang. He likes to take a moment to irritate her by taking her doll house babies, positioning them methodically on the train tracks, and move the train so they get ever so close to running the poor plastic babies over. But then, just before the gruesome end, he decides to be sweet to Lilah (or wants to end the shrieking that I have long ago gone deaf from) and hands her back her babies unharmed.

This year we embarked upon our homeschooling journey and started participating in a preschool co-op that both kids seem to enjoy equally. Miles seems equally interested in the work that I'm doing with Lilah, so we all do it together! I guess that's one of the benefits of them being close in age, it makes my teacher job easier! I'm hoping to not lose momentum with the birth of the next little girl, but I will cut myself some slack too.

So what's to come in the Kerr household in 2011? Well, basing my prediction off of current data, it looks like there will be plenty of noise, a bit of chaos, probably lots of fun and learning too. And yes, for those of you wondering, Miles and Lilah will both receive college credit for attending the birth of the next baby! The class is called "icky things that happen in a birthing tub but then end up with having a cute baby."

Well, that's it. That's my update and my challenge, to be a better blogger. We'll see how well I do, and no friends, you cannot grade my work. Unless you're going to tell me how awesome I am, no feedback please :)

Don't Wake Me

I've been an absentee blogger. I think of things I need to write about on here all the time but the truth is, I'm just too exhausted to write it down.

Miles, formerly known as "the easy one" has taken up the hobby of torturing us. The most significant damage is done in the form of sleep deprivation, since Miles has decided that sleeping is for wusses, and he's no wuss, so he likes to wake up at 5:00. 6:00 at best. Every day. No exceptions. Weekends shmeekends! That boy waits for the first sign of dawn and starts screaming like a banshee until we get him. I have tried telling him that roosters don't scream, they cock-a-doodle-do, and I've also reminded him that he's not a rooster, and it's not his job to wake us up so damn early every day. We're going on at least three weeks of this madness. Jade and I are making pouches with the bags under our eyes. They're so deep we can store a hand full of cheerios in them.

All sleeplessness aside, Miles has also decided he'd take up the personality of a cantankerous 90 year old man. He complains about everything, and when he doesn't get what he wants, he throws toys like they're empty beer bottles. In a last ditch effort to get us to feel sorry for him, he collapses in a pile on the floor, screaming and red faced. Usually sitting, he folds completely in half and rams his head against the floor in protest.

Aside from not sleeping, and constantly complaining, Miles has decided he needs to scale every piece of furniture, every toy, every wall, in our house. I'm pretty sure he'd climb to the roof if we'd let him. The routine is climbing up, getting down, climbing up, getting down, climbing up, falling down, climbing up, getting rescued from another fall, climbing up, being removed from the piece of furniture, throw a screaming fit until he finds something else to climb. He needs a trapeze harness I think, because I'm tired of serving as his bodyguard all day, every day.

In the small chunks of time that Miles decides to take a break from climbing, he's engaging in a love/hate/but mostly love relationship with Lilah. If she's sleeping, he's pretty obviously bored and unhappy until she wakes up. He wants to go "up" to get her, and when he can't, he is insanely unhappy. I try to explain to him that Lilah doesn't get up at 5:00 am, and that she will sleep for another few hours, trying to convince him that sleep is awesome (everybody's doing it!,) but he doesn't care. When I get him from his room in the morning, Miles frantically points to Lilah's door, shouting "that, that, that!!!!!!" and when we pass her room without entering, he reduces to a pile of shrieking tears. For the next few hours I have to work diligently to keep Miles entertained enough that he doesn't pace the stairs, which is usually a fail. Once Lilah wakes up, Miles is immediately happy and vibrant, and gets right to violating her personal space as much as possible, which Lilah usually enjoys reciprocating. The next few hours of my morning is spent refereeing them as they proceed to attempt to sit on each others' laps, steal each other's food and drink, and get in front of each other's TV view. With all of the angry screaming, you'd never know that Miles loves Lilah best of all.

Last but not least, I can't sum up my dear son without explaining the many hickeys, fang marks, and bruises that decorate my arms, legs, neck, shoulders, and various other parts of my body. Miles is a biter. He bites constantly, for every reason. He bites if he's excited, if he's happy, sad, angry, bored, tired.... Not only does he have a nice mouth full of teeth to make a decent sized chomp mark, but he's also got a razor edge on his front tooth to amp up the pain factor. A while back, on a climbing endeavor, Miles managed to chip a tooth, and the result was a pretty uniform razor, jagged edge on his front tooth, that helps him deliver quite the bite. I believe I'm his most frequent victim, but he does enjoy dolling out an occasional bite punishment to Lilah when she gets a little too heavy handed with him. So when you see me, please know, I'm not a junky, I do not have anemia, I don't have a relationship with a vampire, and no, they're not hickeys. They're simply artifacts to demonstrate how much I hold my son these days and serve as his pin cushion. War wounds from the battle I'm losing against the much dreaded toddler bite.

After many discussions of how our easy going Miles managed to turn into a high maintenance hellion over night, Jade and I often wonder if we'll ever get our easy guy back, or if we just don't make easy kids. Of course we love Miles and are enjoying him more than ever. He's walking, talking, and has a really great sense of humor and vibrant personality. But he's keeping us on our toes these days, and keeping us very surprised! At the end of the day, we'll keep all of these new facets of Miles we've recently discovered, except for the sleeping thing of course. Because waking up at dawn at this house, is truly unacceptable.

Do I Love Poop?

Interesting notes from today...

Lilah: "Mommy, do you like my poop?" I was unsure of how to answer this. I wanted to say no, because I'm definitely not a lover of poop, but I was afraid to say that because I don't want her to think there's any part of her I don't love.

_____

Miles has been attacking Lilah at every opportunity, and it's been a slight annoyance because every time I turn my back, my sweet Minels is crawling, pushing, or chewing on his sister. I've been seeing it as an aggressive act that I must correct. Mostly because Lilah shrieks so loud my eardrums burst every time he lays a hand on her. To her credit, that's probably because his touches kind of hurt. Miles is quickly becoming stronger than Lilah, even though she has a good 16 months of growth on him, it's clear that he has the upper hand when it comes to physicality. Today I noticed something that I've not seen before, and I felt ashamed that I've never taken the time or had a clear enough eye to notice this. Right before Miles is about to pounce, he looks at Lilah and gives her the sweetest smile, not the mischievous smile that prefaces something naughty, but a smile that illustrates true happiness. I was shocked to see this, and couldn't believe I've never paid attention to such a detail. It illustrated clearly to me that Miles' attacks had nothing to do with asserting his new physical strength, or even just being a playful baby/toddler, he's just wanting to touch Lilah. He genuinely loves her and sees her as his buddy. He reserves his most special playfulness for her. He wants to interact with her and get her attention, and this is his way. When Miles is being especially sweet with me, he butts me with his head. That's his way of bein' like, "hey, I love you!" The fact that Miles can hardly be around Lilah for five seconds without engaging with her physically, shows that Lilah is his teddy bear. Today I realized for the first time that they had a relationship, one that existed completely without me, outside of the bounds of my refereeing. That this special relationship between Lilah and Miles has already taken on a life of its own, and that it will define our family dynamic is such an amazing way. This doesn't mean that I will allow Miles to chomp Lilah every chance he gets, but it does mean I will approach it differently as a parent.

Bye Bye Baby

One year ago today I was celebrating Mother's Day and had no idea that I was going to have a baby in a matter of a few days...

My baby turns one this week and is soon to be an official "big boy." Most moms would be sad about this, but not me. I love for my kids to grow up! I don't feel like you sacrifice sweet moments with age, you just trade them for different kinds of sweet moments. Instead of rocking and nursing Miles for hours, he's crawling over to me so that he can give me a big hug and cuddle. Miles is still the ultimate sweetness, but has also learned some survival skills too. He is constantly letting Lilah know that he is a "big boy" by pulling her hair, clobbering her, pushing her over as he reaches for a toy, screaming and pulling as she tries to take his toy. His affinity for climbing at the moment is far more important than walking, although he has taken some steps while on break from scaling the furniture. I'm not sad as I take inventory of all the ways Miles is growing and changing, I'm proud that I get to take part in raising such a wonderful boy.

Miles may be turning one, but Lilah is turning 30, I'm pretty sure. I will let these quotes illustrate my point...

"Mommy, you have to share with your friends and your family." (said on a daily basis, usually when I don't want to hand over my drink for both of my kids to backwash in)

"Don't worry mommy, just leave it. We'll get it in a minute. Now turn around and sit in your seat." (said after Miles dropped his toy in the car and I attempted to retrieve it)

"I just need a little water in my hand. Because I'm thirsty. Very thirsty." (just need a little water in her hand?)

"Oh dear!" (after dropping a toy. Oh dear? Who the heck even says that? Has my daughter been hanging out with Miss Manners?)

"I look like a fraggle, except that I have skin."

I wish I could remember more, especially the extra funny ones.

On this Mother's Day, I celebrate my two incredible kids, the sweetness and the sillies, who should take a great deal of the credit for making me the mother I am today!

Up

This is what I hear all day long from the mouth of my babe. Miles is totally obsessed with the stairs in our house and constantly wants to go up. If we're downstairs (which is the majority of the time) he's crawling around the proximity of the stairs like a prowling shark, muttering "up. up. up." As if there's nothing else to do on our whole first floor (besides nearly every toy/activity we own.)

If it's not time to go upstairs, I gently remind Miles "no up" and he will collapse in a pile of sobs like I just murdered his puppy. The amusing thing is that he listens to me most of the time, and if I say "no up" an invisible shield appears at the bottom of the stairs that prohibits him from going further. This is obviously very upsetting to him, because I have honestly never seen a sadder show (even in all of the drama queen Lilah tantrums.) After he comes to from his crying coma, he'll look at me with the plainest face and say "up." And the cycle repeats until eventually I pick him up and put him somewhere else, away from the stairs. Well, try to pick him up anyway, because in his rage over being removed from the beloved staircase, he becomes a very stiff, slippery, flingy thing that I can barely keep a hold of.

After forcing poor Miles to do something other than stalk the staircase, I find a reason to go up just to appease his desires. When it's time to go make our way upstairs, he can barely contain himself, and literally shakes with excitement before clomping over to the stairs, laughing the whole time.

It's quite obvious that the stairs hold a very strong power over Miles, giving him access to the most exuberant joy and his deepest sorrows. His whole world revolves around "up" and "no up." His passion for the stairs has provided me with a lot of entertainment, and enlightened me to his desire to climb, but also probably for his need to have a change of scenery.

Cha Cha Cha Changes

I feel like my kids change so quickly and constantly that I have a hard time nailing down who they are at the moment. I stay home with them, and they still just change so fast, I can't possibly keep up. Every week I find myself thinking "who are you going to be this week?" There's a million versions of Miles and Lilah and I feel like I'm always drawing straws on their personalities. Sometimes I get lucky and both kids are the best possible versions of themselves, other weeks I get the short end of the stick. Usually it's somewhere in the middle, Lilah might be more energetic and hilarious, but more dramatic and whiny too. Miles might become more independent but also more clingy.

I start to feel really drained by such massive amounts of change. Once I finally get something nailed down, ways of dealing with whiny Lilah she quickly becomes aggressive Lilah, and all of the methods and strategies I had become so proud of are useless. I feel like I can't ever get a leg up. I don't know why this seems new to me. In my years of teaching, my classroom was always about as schizophrenic as they come. Every day there was a different life force that I had to become accustomed to in about 0.5 seconds or risk drowning in chaos.

I did learn a thing or two from those teaching years but it feels different with my own kids. I guess maybe it's that I become attached to certain versions of my kids. I'm not one of those people who wants to preserve my children in baby form. For me, the older they are, the better, but there is a certain level of innocence, not dependent on age, but life exposure, that I want to hold on to. Every time Lilah becomes subjected to one of the many downfalls of having a sibling, I feel like she loses a part of her innocence. Every time Miles has to forgo a cuddle so that I can tame his maniacal sister, I see a shard of his youth fall away. I definitely want my kids to get older, but I don't want them to become hardened. I have to realize that change is part of experimentation though, not a reflection of my parenting. As my children learn more, they start playing with who they want to be, testing physical and emotional boundaries.

As I write this, I am feeling like it's really neat that my kids go through a daily metamorphosis. In the moment though, it's draining and annoying. I guess maybe that's because I'm rarely the best possible version of myself either. My kids are probably rolling the dice with me too, the same as I am with them. It's always an adventure to see what random combination of personalities come up each day and what we can make from it.

Beuh

Miles has spoken his first official word. He's said some random stuff, but nothing consistent enough to give it the label of "first word." He may have said mama a few times, but he doesn't look at me and say it, and once I think he said dada, but I can't be sure. What is completely clear coming out of his mouth though, is Beuh, as in Bill, the cat. His favorite cat (we have three.) For the past few days he has done little more than crawl (clomp) around the house at full pace shouting BEUH! BEUH! BEUH! BEEEEEEEUUUUUUUUHHHHHHH! He says it when he's looking for the cat, when he spots the cat, when he touches the cat, when he's thinking of the cat. I am pretty sure he said it 1,304,326,678 times today and he's getting really good at it. Very clearly articulated for a 10 month old.

You can tell I'm not a first time mom because I'm not the least bit hurt that Miles' first redundant utterings are not mama, or less importantly dada (haha!) I'm just pleased that he's saying something, because by the time Lilah was 10 months, I'm pretty sure she was saying nearly 10 words fairly clearly. She's a linguistic marvel though, so I really don't ever compare. I'm also glad that his first word isn't one of the many obscenities Lilah's been shouting lately.

Speaking of Lilah, she's come up with some pretty good ones lately. Our poor cats. Miles chases after Bill all day shouting and Lilah has taken to running around, chasing the cats, screaming "For crying out loud!!!!!" at the top of her lungs. I guess she gets the pun.

My favorite was yesterday though when I was clearly annoyed at her for repeatedly taking Miles' toys, and my voice was showing my irritation. She said "mama I don't like it when you talk to me like that." Well too bad kiddo. I'm not made of wood. After asking her to leave Miles alone for the one millionth time that day, I was doing good to just let my voice to ONLY sound mildly irritated! In my mind I was screaming. Out loud I was clenching my jaw as I spoke in a subtly annoyed tone. So my response? I could have come up with many but I left it at "I don't like it when you take Miles' toys. It's frustrating." She just shrugged and moved on like she was glad we had our little talk.