February 2009 - Posts

• That's just how I blog

  To the average reader, my blog posts may appear to be effortless.  It may seem as though they simply spring from my pen…er, my keyboard…with no real work on my part.  That could not be farther from the truth.  In actuality, it takes me a few days to fully flesh out a blog (well, there are a few I did more quickly, but they are not my best work).  I carry a mini-recorder with me everywhere I go so that I can easily record random thoughts before they are lost.  It is either record my thought process or careen into the car in front of me while I juggle pen and paper…so I figure the odd looks I get are well worth our safety.  On most of those recordings, you can clearly hear Dom in the background, saying, “Mommy?  What are you saying?”  Every now and then, you will also hear me say, “Shhh…Mommy’s working.”  Then you will hear a huge giggle from Dom.  Yeah, it is work.  Fun work, but still work. So, on to my point.  Dom ate my mini-recorder.  Okay, he probably didn’t actually eat it, but the end result is the same.  It is gone, and I have been looking for it for a week.  I feel naked, and all of my great blog thoughts have disappeared somewhere into toddler chaos.  Hence, this completely random post about my missing mini-recorder.  Enjoy. Posted Feb 27 2009, 05:38 PM by marylandmom with no comments Filed under: maryland [Edit Tags]

• Two Teenagers

  I have decided that I must be entirely insane at the moments I catch myself wanting another kid.  Silly me – I forgot that they grow up…and I recently discovered that there is no way I could ever handle two teenagers.   My niece, Summer, came for another visit over her winter break.  We looked forward to it for months (ever since her visit over the summer), and we counted down with Dom over the last few weeks of our waiting.  Because my nephew, who lives here in Maryland, had his winter break at the same time, I decided to host both of them.   Two thirteen year olds.  In our two-bedroom apartment.  During the week.  I think I figured that they were old enough that they wouldn’t be too hyper or loud.  I was wrong.    On her own, Summer is silly and funny, but her volume is rather low.  But once Tommy was added to the mix, things got, well...out of control.  It isn’t that they are bad kids, or even that anything they did was over the top.  It is just that, well, they are teenagers.    They stay up all night and sleep all day.  They eat a lot.  They are trapped in that weird place between childhood and adulthood…and they think there is nothing I could possibly know that they don’t already.    So, should I ever again gleefully say that I can’t wait until Dom is able to get himself around, participate in school events, etc., please remind me of this moment.  Because, honestly, I am just so thankful I was able to send them both home.  And when Dom is a teenager, I will be stuck with him.  Posted Feb 24 2009, 11:40 PM by marylandmom with no comments Filed under: maryland, holidays, teenagers [Edit Tags]

• Belly Buttons

  A week or so ago, Dom made an incredible discovery.  Until now, his pudgy belly has prevented the full exploration of his lower body.  He is losing the last of his baby fat (which means I am losing my baby, but never mind…).  In the bathtub last week, he stopped pouring water over his belly and craned his head upside down.  “What that, Mommy?” As I was only half-paying attention, I threw out a few random guesses.  “Cup.  Water.  Bubbles.”  Each guess was met with an aggravated shake of his head.    “No, Mommy.  That!”  He pointed to his lower tummy with a very concerned look on his face.    “That is your belly button.  That is how you ate while you were in Mommy’s tummy.”   “Oh.”  Over the next few days, Dom inspected his navel often.  He has also pulled our shirts far enough up to inspect ours.    Fast forward to a few days ago, when we went to visit my sister and her family.  Dom played the belly button game with everyone there, and he spent the bulk of his time with Lisa (18) and Tommy (13), his cousins, and Tommy’s girlfriend, Kristin.   It was a wonderful afternoon.  But as we drove out of their development, I nearly took out a mailbox.  All because my sweet baby said, “Kristin feed baby with belly button?  Lisa do it?”  Good Lord, I hope not. And that is not a conversation I am willing to have with a two year old, anyway. Posted Feb 21 2009, 11:11 PM by marylandmom with no comments Filed under: maryland [Edit Tags]

• Our evening (Or, why I need a boytoy to whisk me away for a tropical weekend)

  Dom has been sick.  I have been sick.  The hardest part of being a Mommy is taking care of your kidlet when you really, really need your own Mommy to take care of you. Tonight, a cranky Dom was sitting on my lap five minutes before his bedtime.  Daddy came at him with a horrifying instrument of torture - his Spongebob toothbrush.  During his mad attempt to escape, Dom jumped from my lap...and landed throat down over the arm of his potty chair. (You know, that potty chair that he refuses to use?  I'm sure he absolutely hates it now).  He cried, then he quieted down.  Of course, being the wuss I am, I nixed toothbrushing for the evening.  He was left with a huge mark across the front of his neck, and I immediately started having visions of his throat swelling in his sleep.  So I called my Mom, the ER nurse.  She calmly gave me a list of 20-30 things to look out for and a few things I could do for Dom...from this list, all I remembered by the end was "Popsicles."  So Dom ate four.  Not all at once - but back to back.  Shortly after he finished the last one, I looked at him and was horrified to see that his face was covered with a rash.  I have only seen my baby that outwardly miserable once...when he ate artificial food coloring in his first birthday cake.  So I ran to look at the "all-natural" popsicles ingredient label.  Red dye 40.  How is that all-natural?  How is that organic?  I dosed my little allergic reaction with Benadryl and waited. Thankfully, the Benadryl seems to have done the trick.  Dom no longer looks like a science experiment gone wrong, and he is finally asleep.  And, being the paranoid Mommy I am, I will be sleeping next to him tonight.  Yep, that will be me...curled up on the hard, cold floor with one arm uncomfortably tossed up over the mattress so I can be instantly alerted should something go wrong.  Since we're already having one of those nights, anyway, I may as well go all the way. Posted Feb 18 2009, 09:16 PM by marylandmom with no comments Filed under: maryland, doctor [Edit Tags]

• Goodbye, Capital Crescent Trail, Hello Purple Line

  As I said in my last entry, Dom and I took full advantage of the beautiful Spring weather D.C. has had lately by going on a lot of walks.  The majority of those walks took place, at least partially, along the Capital Crescent Trail, a biking/hiking path that connects Rock Creek Park and the Georgetown Branch Trail to the Montgomery County Park system.  We live in an area with no room to run.  The streets aren’t safe – even our dead-end road – because drivers are idiots.  The sidewalks are mostly along very busy Connecticut Avenue, so we have to hold tightly to Dom as we walk.  Parks?  I have ranted about the nonexistence of them in our area before.  The grass in our apartment complex is usually covered with pesticides, and the hills are too steep to run up and down, anyway.  So, in essence, the only time Dom is free to run on his own is when we walk along the Trail.  There, we can let go of his hand and let him do what comes naturally – running, spinning, walking backwards, looking for rocks, stomping in puddles.  The Trail allows him to be a kid.  And soon it will be gone. The State of Maryland, in cahoots with Montgomery County and a greedy developer (you know who you are, Chevy Chase Land Company) next year will begin building the Purple Line along the Trail.  No study has yet shown that the planned train line will actually reduce traffic, and the greedy developer’s part in all of this hasn’t been made public, but why bog ourselves down with details?  The plan calls for a pedestrian walkway just feet away from a high-speed light rail line, despite the fact that in no other place in the world has anyone been stupid enough to put pedestrians at such risk.  The quiet that now envelops users of the Trail will be no more – instead, it will be replaced by the squeaks and rattles of a train (I know the government says that the trains will be silent.  Yeah, right).  The rail line will destroy our community – the tracks themselves will bisect the small-town atmosphere we enjoy now.  A train stop will be built here, which gives the greedy developer (Chevy Chase Land Company) the opportunity to put in high-rises and way too much retail.  Street parking will be nonexistent, even for residents.  Traffic will be worse than it is now (and during rush hour, it is bad already).  The increase in visitors will lead to an increase in crime. The silence that gives me peace of mind when our windows are open?  The babbling creek across the street that soothes my soul when I am stressed?  It will be drowned out by traffic and trains.  The Trail runs 20 feet from Dom’s window, which will disturb his sleep.  And that situation exists all up and down the Trail, where homes were built close to the Trail for maximum residential enjoyment.  Some of those homes will have to be torn down to make way for the trains. Ah, progress…thy name is greed. Posted Feb 13 2009, 07:43 PM by marylandmom with 2 comment(s) Filed under: maryland, politics [Edit Tags]

• Oh, Spring!

  Oh, Spring, you deceptive tease!  For the past week or so, D.C. has been enjoying beautiful weather.  I mean coatless, you-could-wear-shorts-if-it-didn’t-make-you-look-like-a-dork weather (my apologies to those readers still shoveling out from their last polar freeze).  While the weather lasted, Dom and I took a lot of walks.  We ran into neighbors we haven’t seen since the first frost.  We went to eat at our favorite restaurant around the corner, and we made a few trips to the nearby grocery store so Dom could play hopscotch in their freezer section (I even jumped the hopscotch grid a few times). Then came the wind, which made the comfortable temperatures not quite as comfortable and apparently brought Winter back.  And made normally intelligent people not quite as smart.  For instance, the tree trimmers who decided that 40 m.p.h. winds were perfect for climbing into a bucket with a power saw.  I watched out the window as they were slapped by branches from all sides, and I was honestly waiting for someone to yell, “My eye!  My eye!”  But back to the subject at hand.  Spring.  I will miss you.  And, honestly, you need to stop taking orders from that damned rodent, Phil.  He lives in a hole.  Honestly – what can he possibly do to you? Posted Feb 09 2009, 07:04 PM by marylandmom with no comments Filed under: maryland, dc, virginia, weather [Edit Tags]

• Octomom

  I have a confession to make.  I am obsessed with news about Octomom.  You know, that woman who already had six kids, all of whom were living off of her parents, and then decided to have six more embryos implanted?  Which resulted in eight more mouths for her…er, her parents…er, the state of California to feed? I am disgusted with the entire story, to be honest.  If Octomom is given a TV show or book deal, I will boycott whichever media outlet is responsible.  There will soon be 16 people living in a three-bedroom home that can’t hold the eight people already living in it.  It isn’t just the lack of space, though, or even the fact that she had six embryos implanted at once, which probably wasn’t the brightest idea.  It is the fact that, since 2007, she has done nothing to support her first six children.  They live in her parents’ home, her father is reportedly going to Iraq to support the eight additional children, and her mother has stated that she can’t continue caring for the children the way she has been.  The kicker is that Octomom collected a settlement for an on-the-job injury from her last job and never told her parents…nor did she give them any portion of the money to offset their support of her children.  Instead, she spent the money on more in vitro.  This wasn’t an “oops, the needle slipped and I put too many in” type of deal…it was planned.  Poorly planned, but planned.  She needs to live with the consequences of her irresponsible decision.  Ideally, the state will step in to ensure the safety and well-being of all 14 children.  If Octomom’s mother is truly unable to help her anymore, then the state needs to decide whether it is in the children’s best interest to remain with their mother.  Not an easy decision, but one that needs to be made.  This woman couldn’t take care of her first six children, and now eight more are in her care.  That is incredibly scary to me.  And I don’t see how any media outlet or corporation could possibly spin this story to justify any sort of donation or deal for this woman.  And that is why I will boycott anyone stupid enough to even try to spin this tragic tale.  But I will still be watching the news coverage...you know, just to make sure nobody tries. Posted Feb 06 2009, 10:39 PM by marylandmom with no comments Filed under: maryland, weird stuff [Edit Tags]