First, if there are a lot of typos in this post, I apologize in advance. I am tired. Isaiah gets up for work at 5:45am, and there's no going back to sleep for me after that. Also, we've finally finished night weaning Imogen and as a thank you she's been waking up regularly between 6-6:30 instead of 7:30 like she used to. Her bedtime is still the same so I don't know what gives. It's probably not the weaning thing (because let's be real, she's almost 11 months old, she doesn't need a bottle at 5am); I'm thinking it's more a developmental phase combined with teething. She has been working on four - yes, count them, FOUR - teeth this last week or two, and it's been off and on hellacious for all of us. Three of them have finally broken the surface, thank the Lord above, so we only have one left and please, Jesus, make it come quickly.
She's also been fighting her afternoon nap like it's her hill to die on, and while she usually does eventually fall asleep, it's kind of stressful for me to sit there and listen to her jabber away and play with the zipper on her sleep sack for 45 minutes to an hour. And yes, I've tried putting her down a little bit earlier and a little bit later for the nap, and neither has made a difference. I know she's not ready for one nap yet, and I've read that there's a nap-fighting stage between 10-11 months, so I'm just trying to weather the storm over here.
Anyway, like I said, I'm tired, and I've been letting Imogen watch far more Little Baby Bum on Netflix than I'd like to admit. At least it's educational???
In other news, I'm starting to plan Imogen's first birthday party (who am I kidding, I started thinking about this months ago). The more I think about it, the more I want to cancel it, and we haven't even invited anyone yet. My mom's flying up for her birthday, which will be awesome, but I really just want to have some family time and not have to think about food and decorations and who we're going to invite and blah blah blah. Let's be honest, people don't have 1st birthday parties for the baby, anyway. It's just for the photos and the baby book. And Facebook, if that's your thing.
In reality, there's no way I could get away with NOT having a birthday party for her, not with in-laws who live here and a grandma flying up for the occasion and friends who have parties every chance they get. I would be the scourge of the family. A plague on both my houses. So, I'm researching inexpensive party decorations and trying to decide exactly how much DIYing I'm willing to do.
The other problem is location. It's not like we're inviting an army, but we'll probably have at least 15 people (ughhhhhhhhhhhh) and our house is flat out too small. There's a small building in town that would have been absolutely perfect and they normally rent it out by the day, but it's unavailable in June and July. Of course. Our only other options are to beg someone to let us have it at their house (nahhhh) or to have it at a covered campground or something outside, and I literally do not remember the last time it didn't rain on the 4th of July. Rainforests, man, always raining.
I'm probably putting way more thought into this than I need to be, and I seriously wish we could just invite her aunts and uncle and grandparents and be done with it (even though that would still be 5 too many people) but I already feel like I'm putting my foot down by saying no, we are not inviting half the police department. Like I told Isaiah, the people you invite to your daughter's first birthday party are people YOU want to spend time with, because the baby couldn't care less. She doesn't have "friends" yet.
Enough about the birthday party.
Did you hear that Ireland just made abortions legal? I shed literal tears when I read the news. I happened to have Imogen sitting on my lap playing with her blocks at that very moment, and the thought of someone murdering her before she was even born had me weeping and hugging her. Screw anyone who thinks unborn babies are not alive. To me, she's been alive since the second I saw that second pink line on my pregnancy test and nobody will ever be able to convince me otherwise. The fact that people were sobbing with joy and celebrating in the streets makes me absolutely sick to my stomach. They're literally celebrating infanticide. Crying tears of happiness because they're now legally able to murder babies whenever they want. If that doesn't disgust you too, there's the door.
On a lighter, less depressing note, has anyone here ever tried the keto diet? Normally I'm not a huge fan of fad diets - I figured out what works for me in terms of eating habits a while back and as long as I stuck to that, I was able to maintain my weight pretty easily. Post-baby, though? Nope. What worked before has most definitely not been working. I used to eat semi-low carb and that worked fine, but the same ratio of carbs to fat/protein has not been working anymore. I was talking to my sister-in-law a week or two ago, and she and her husband have been following the keto diet since last September and she's lost almost 40 pounds. And she doesn't work out. Like, not even a little bit.
Now, I'm not really a fan of NEVER working out, because I like to be fit in order to be able to go hiking on tougher trails and not feel like I'm dead before I've started. But I was intrigued, and since my previous eating habits were doing nothing for me and I have nothing to lose (ha ha) I thought I might give it a shot.
Let's just say I've lost 6 pounds in about two weeks. I know a lot of that is probably water weight, but that's fine - at least something is happening, whereas previously the scale wasn't budging no matter what I did. I still have about 20 pounds I want to lose, but my jeans are getting looser and the scale is going down, so I think I might stick with this for a while. It's simpler than I thought, too, even though when I'm tired I crave sugar and that's not an option with this way of eating. It seems counterintuitive to eat a lot of fat in order to lose fat, but I can't really argue with the science behind it. I don't want to talk forever about this because I know it's super annoying when people blab on and on about their diets and weight loss and whatever, but if you're curious about it, let me know and we can chat about it.
Also, the first person that says "Tee hee, I can't relate because I never had to change a thing after I had my baby and I was back in my size 4 skinny jeans only six weeks after having him/her! But good for you for figuring out what works for you! Tee hee!" gets a loaf of bread thrown at their head. I can't eat it right now anyway.
Tuesday, May 29, 2018
Tuesday, May 15, 2018
On Mother's Day
I get tired of feeling like I have to post disclaimers to the things I write lest someone think I'm passive aggressively singling them out, but here it is anyway: This post is not directed at any one specific person, so please take none of this personally.
First of all, a belated Happy Mother's Day to all of you! I hope you all had a wonderful day full of love and joy, whether you have kids or not. This was my first Mother's Day with Imogen on the outside, and it was pretty great. Even though I wasn't thrilled about having to spend the day alone at home with a baby, Isaiah went above and beyond to make sure the day was special for me anyway, and it was very much appreciated.
That said, I've had something weighing on me the last few days that I have to get off my chest. I noticed a weird, somewhat disturbing trend this year on Mother's Day that has been bothering me ever since.
Have you ever noticed that there seem to be trends in the online world relating to attitudes toward certain situations? For instance, on a very basic level, it's very popular in the blog world to be omginlove with the fall season. If you aren't posting daily photos of your boots amongst the crunchy leaves or publicly drooling over your apple cider, you're the odd one out. Me, I like fall, but it's not my favorite season. You'll probably never catch me blogging about how much I love mustard colored cardigans (even though I do) or Instagramming my own hand holding a Starbucks cup in front of an orange and yellow leaved tree.
Snarkiness aside, it's totally fine to enjoy joining in with other people following popular trends like that. Sometimes.
I've also noticed that there are certain attitudes toward kids that seem to be growing in popularity over the last year or two, and it honestly has started to really upset me.
It's somehow become okay (popular, even) to call your toddler an "asshole." There's even a book with that as part of the title. It's somehow become trendy to go on and on about how all you want for your birthday/Mother's Day is an entire day away from your awful, needy children. It's somehow become the popular thing to do to only speak negative things about your kids, and never say a single positive thing about them. I have to be completely honest - there are some things I've seen online that have literally made me wonder why some people chose to have kids if they hate them so much.
Before you tar and feather me, I'm sure everyone actually loves their kids. But how is anyone supposed to know that if people don't act or talk like it?
I saw one Instagram account this week (nobody who reads this blog, calm down) where the mom could not stop talking about how overjoyed she was that her husband was taking her son out of town for the weekend so she could be away from him for two whole days. Ever since she had her baby, she's done nothing but talk about how difficult motherhood is, how it's nothing like she imagined, and how it should be "okay" to talk publicly, as women, about how much we love our kids but also how much we hate being a mom. Hashtag "brave" or something like that.
I make no apologies when I say I do not feel like that's okay. Are there hard days as a mom? OF COURSE. Curated Instagram accounts where a woman with an immaculately cleaned and decorated house has five kids all perfectly dressed in matching frocks who never whine or cry or throw tantrums or spill all their food on the floor are not real life. I don't think anybody who's a parent can take those kinds of accounts seriously and, if someone who's planning on having kids does, they're in for a shock when life really looks nothing like that.
But I also can't get on board with oversharing the negative side of being a parent and having kids. That's what husbands and your best friend are for - to vent about those hard days. It really shouldn't be the new popular thing to complain 24/7 about your kids on social media. It's not funny to call your toddler an asshole, because your toddler ISN'T an asshole. He/she is a toddler. They need a mature adult to parent them and teach them how to handle their emotions properly, how to be nice and sweet and not hit people, and yes, they need to be disciplined so they don't turn into actual assholes when they're 20.
It just makes me sad. Sometimes I think, what if our parents had Instagram and Facebook and wrote blogs and never had a single good thing to say about us when we were kids? I would be devastated if I cracked open my baby book and all my mom wrote in it was that I was a little asshole and the best Mother's Day she had was one she didn't have to spend with me.
Is it okay to want a break from your kids sometimes? YES. It's totally okay, and totally normal, to want to get out alone or with your spouse or friends for a kid-free date. That's why babysitters were invented. But when I log onto Instagram and it seems like everyone this year is rejoicing because they were able to ditch their kids for the day/weekend, it's a little upsetting. Mother's Day is, yes, a day to celebrate moms and all the hard work they do. And if getting out alone for Mother's Day is what makes it a good day for you, that's fine! What's not fine is to imply your kids are the worst part of your life and THANK GOD ALMIGHTY you're getting rid of them for the day.
I just think we all need to start making a more conscious decision to speak good things over our kids. Instead of calling them names, let's start choosing to share the good things about them. Take a look at your Instagram account or Facebook posts or blog entries - is it 90% negative and 10% positive, or the other way around? I believe words have power - it is in the Bible after all - and if you call your kid an asshole or a little terror or a jerk, they're probably going to start acting like one.
I feel like this was a super ramble-y, disjointed post and I'm not sure I even adequately expressed myself. All I wanted for Mother's Day was for my husband to have the day off so we could celebrate my being a mom to the most beautiful little girl, and instead he had to work. But instead of complaining about single parenting and lamenting the fact that I had to spend yet another 13 hour day alone with my daughter, I woke up that morning and chose to thank God for the blessing of being her mom, and what better way to spend Mother's Day than with the little one who made me a mother in the first place?
First of all, a belated Happy Mother's Day to all of you! I hope you all had a wonderful day full of love and joy, whether you have kids or not. This was my first Mother's Day with Imogen on the outside, and it was pretty great. Even though I wasn't thrilled about having to spend the day alone at home with a baby, Isaiah went above and beyond to make sure the day was special for me anyway, and it was very much appreciated.
That said, I've had something weighing on me the last few days that I have to get off my chest. I noticed a weird, somewhat disturbing trend this year on Mother's Day that has been bothering me ever since.
Have you ever noticed that there seem to be trends in the online world relating to attitudes toward certain situations? For instance, on a very basic level, it's very popular in the blog world to be omginlove with the fall season. If you aren't posting daily photos of your boots amongst the crunchy leaves or publicly drooling over your apple cider, you're the odd one out. Me, I like fall, but it's not my favorite season. You'll probably never catch me blogging about how much I love mustard colored cardigans (even though I do) or Instagramming my own hand holding a Starbucks cup in front of an orange and yellow leaved tree.
Snarkiness aside, it's totally fine to enjoy joining in with other people following popular trends like that. Sometimes.
I've also noticed that there are certain attitudes toward kids that seem to be growing in popularity over the last year or two, and it honestly has started to really upset me.
It's somehow become okay (popular, even) to call your toddler an "asshole." There's even a book with that as part of the title. It's somehow become trendy to go on and on about how all you want for your birthday/Mother's Day is an entire day away from your awful, needy children. It's somehow become the popular thing to do to only speak negative things about your kids, and never say a single positive thing about them. I have to be completely honest - there are some things I've seen online that have literally made me wonder why some people chose to have kids if they hate them so much.
Before you tar and feather me, I'm sure everyone actually loves their kids. But how is anyone supposed to know that if people don't act or talk like it?
I saw one Instagram account this week (nobody who reads this blog, calm down) where the mom could not stop talking about how overjoyed she was that her husband was taking her son out of town for the weekend so she could be away from him for two whole days. Ever since she had her baby, she's done nothing but talk about how difficult motherhood is, how it's nothing like she imagined, and how it should be "okay" to talk publicly, as women, about how much we love our kids but also how much we hate being a mom. Hashtag "brave" or something like that.
I make no apologies when I say I do not feel like that's okay. Are there hard days as a mom? OF COURSE. Curated Instagram accounts where a woman with an immaculately cleaned and decorated house has five kids all perfectly dressed in matching frocks who never whine or cry or throw tantrums or spill all their food on the floor are not real life. I don't think anybody who's a parent can take those kinds of accounts seriously and, if someone who's planning on having kids does, they're in for a shock when life really looks nothing like that.
But I also can't get on board with oversharing the negative side of being a parent and having kids. That's what husbands and your best friend are for - to vent about those hard days. It really shouldn't be the new popular thing to complain 24/7 about your kids on social media. It's not funny to call your toddler an asshole, because your toddler ISN'T an asshole. He/she is a toddler. They need a mature adult to parent them and teach them how to handle their emotions properly, how to be nice and sweet and not hit people, and yes, they need to be disciplined so they don't turn into actual assholes when they're 20.
It just makes me sad. Sometimes I think, what if our parents had Instagram and Facebook and wrote blogs and never had a single good thing to say about us when we were kids? I would be devastated if I cracked open my baby book and all my mom wrote in it was that I was a little asshole and the best Mother's Day she had was one she didn't have to spend with me.
Is it okay to want a break from your kids sometimes? YES. It's totally okay, and totally normal, to want to get out alone or with your spouse or friends for a kid-free date. That's why babysitters were invented. But when I log onto Instagram and it seems like everyone this year is rejoicing because they were able to ditch their kids for the day/weekend, it's a little upsetting. Mother's Day is, yes, a day to celebrate moms and all the hard work they do. And if getting out alone for Mother's Day is what makes it a good day for you, that's fine! What's not fine is to imply your kids are the worst part of your life and THANK GOD ALMIGHTY you're getting rid of them for the day.
I just think we all need to start making a more conscious decision to speak good things over our kids. Instead of calling them names, let's start choosing to share the good things about them. Take a look at your Instagram account or Facebook posts or blog entries - is it 90% negative and 10% positive, or the other way around? I believe words have power - it is in the Bible after all - and if you call your kid an asshole or a little terror or a jerk, they're probably going to start acting like one.
I feel like this was a super ramble-y, disjointed post and I'm not sure I even adequately expressed myself. All I wanted for Mother's Day was for my husband to have the day off so we could celebrate my being a mom to the most beautiful little girl, and instead he had to work. But instead of complaining about single parenting and lamenting the fact that I had to spend yet another 13 hour day alone with my daughter, I woke up that morning and chose to thank God for the blessing of being her mom, and what better way to spend Mother's Day than with the little one who made me a mother in the first place?
Children are a heritage from the Lord; offspring a reward from Him.
Psalm 127:3
Labels:
other things,
the kid
Sunday, May 6, 2018
Life Lately #17
Reading: I just recently started Spaceman by Mike Massimino but I haven't gotten very far. Life and all that fun stuff.
Watching: Isaiah and I have started rewatching House lately after Imogen's in bed, and we also completely blew through the new Lost in Space series in about a week. I really like rewatching
Listening to: Imogen rolling around in her crib* and talking to herself instead of falling asleep like she should be doing. It's the most talkative she's been all day, of course.
* she did finally fall asleep!
Smelling: The coffee I just made. Bless it.
Eating: No-bake peanut butter chocolate oatmeal bars I just made. I shouldn't be eating them because I made them for Isaiah to take to work and Lord knows my hips don't need them, but he doesn't know about them yet so...
Loving: The aforementioned cookie bars. Here's the recipe, they were stupid easy (which makes them extra dangerous).
Not Loving: All the issues we've been having with the USPS lately! Isaiah ordered a knife online, and the company accidentally put some other city/state/zip code after our correct address on the shipping label, and the post office delivered it to Kentucky. I'm not sure HOW they delivered it considering it's highly unlikely there's a house in Kentucky with the same house number and street name as ours, but they apparently delivered it somewhere and it wasn't to Sitka.
Then, a week ago, I ordered something online from Vistaprint that was supposed to be delivered yesterday, but around noon the tracking said "Held at post office per customer's request." Huh?? I didn't request for it to be held, but now I have to wait until Monday to figure out what they're doing with my package. My guess is they forgot to put it on the truck and scrambled to make up a reason why it wouldn't be delivered the day it was supposed to be.
Then, over a month ago, Isaiah ordered something from an Etsy seller. The last tracking update was April 10th and said "in transit to next destination." It's May 6th and there are no more tracking updates and the item hasn't arrived. The seller is thankfully sending us a new one, but what is with the USPS and their losing packages, delivering them to wrong addresses, holding things at the post office when I never requested them to be held...??
Annoyed with: Anyone and everyone who is anti-second amendment or thinks I don't have the right to own weapons to defend myself and my family.
The house right down the drive from us is turning into a legitimate drug house. Three well-known drug dealers (and users) in town have ALL been hanging out at the house the last few days, Isaiah has arrested every one of them at some point, and my guess is they've already figured out that we live next door. Another guy whose truck Isaiah confiscated recently as evidence in a drug-related crime has also been showing up at the police department demanding his truck back and just the other day demanded to know Isaiah's home address so he could "come talk to him in person."
Guess which house THAT guy has also been hanging out at? Yep, the one next door with the drug dealers. If he hasn't figured out we live here already, he will soon.
I literally have to either look up Facebook pages, or have Isaiah text me mug shots of these people so I know exactly who they are if they come to our front door.
THIS is reason #2348023 why I am so pro-second amendment. Nobody but nobody can tell me that I have to sit here all day alone with my baby daughter while drug dealers come and go from the house next door, planning who knows what, and if they decide to come up here and threaten me I have to hope to God they don't try anything while I wait 5-6 minutes for the police to show up. If you think that drugs don't make people violent, think again. We had a shooting here a few weeks back over a drug deal gone bad, and another stabbing just last week because some dude was on a meth trip and thought his "friend" had given him bad drugs. This isn't Pleasantville.
So, screw anyone who thinks I shouldn't own a gun.
And yes, I'm a little bit passionate on the topic.
Creating: A new Etsy shop and small business, and that's all I'll say at the moment, and I'm not trying to be purposely mysterious but...oh wait, yes I am. Smirk.
(Side note: Does it annoy the crap out of anyone else when bloggers are super mysterious and act like they don't want to talk about something and then it's like, well why did you even blog about it then?)
Wanting: A bigger house. Don't get me wrong, I am beyond grateful that we were able to afford to buy a house in this town at all, but a 900 square foot two bedroom house with completely inadequate storage and living space is simply not enough for two people and a baby-almost-toddler. I'm getting a huge urge to do a giant purge (I'm a poet and I know it) because I feel like I'm about to be crushed by all our stuff. There isn't really a lot I can get rid of that belongs to Imogen because we only have things she needs and/or plays with, but if we're going by the KonMari book and deciding whether we love things and/or whether they're useful, there's a lot I could do without.
Laughing at: This new book release from the Babylon Bee. I've been previewing some of the pages on Amazon and cackling.
Wishing: It didn't rain more than it's sunny around these parts. I get all excited because we'll have like 2 days of sun and then it's back to solid rain for the rest of the 15 day forecast. I'm bored, Imogen's bored, and then I end up doing things like making no-bake cookie bars for Isaiah's job and eating them myself instead.
Anticipating: July. Isaiah's taking a couple of weeks off work and my mom will be here for the first little bit because she's coming up for Imogen's first birthday, but after she goes home we're debating where we want to go to get out of town. So far we've thrown around the ideas of a road trip to San Diego, a short cruise out of LA, flying to Hawaii, driving to Montana to see Glacier National Park, or a road trip around Europe, ending in Norway, the next country on our bucket list. We scratched off Europe just because we decided it'll be more fun maybe next summer when Imogen isn't on such a strict nap schedule. I'm not really wanting to take a 6 hour plane trip with a one year old so we probably won't do Hawaii. That leaves one of the USA road trips and we need to decide where to go soon so I can start working on an itinerary!
Watching: Isaiah and I have started rewatching House lately after Imogen's in bed, and we also completely blew through the new Lost in Space series in about a week. I really like rewatching
Listening to: Imogen rolling around in her crib* and talking to herself instead of falling asleep like she should be doing. It's the most talkative she's been all day, of course.
* she did finally fall asleep!
Smelling: The coffee I just made. Bless it.
Eating: No-bake peanut butter chocolate oatmeal bars I just made. I shouldn't be eating them because I made them for Isaiah to take to work and Lord knows my hips don't need them, but he doesn't know about them yet so...
Loving: The aforementioned cookie bars. Here's the recipe, they were stupid easy (which makes them extra dangerous).
Not Loving: All the issues we've been having with the USPS lately! Isaiah ordered a knife online, and the company accidentally put some other city/state/zip code after our correct address on the shipping label, and the post office delivered it to Kentucky. I'm not sure HOW they delivered it considering it's highly unlikely there's a house in Kentucky with the same house number and street name as ours, but they apparently delivered it somewhere and it wasn't to Sitka.
Then, a week ago, I ordered something online from Vistaprint that was supposed to be delivered yesterday, but around noon the tracking said "Held at post office per customer's request." Huh?? I didn't request for it to be held, but now I have to wait until Monday to figure out what they're doing with my package. My guess is they forgot to put it on the truck and scrambled to make up a reason why it wouldn't be delivered the day it was supposed to be.
Then, over a month ago, Isaiah ordered something from an Etsy seller. The last tracking update was April 10th and said "in transit to next destination." It's May 6th and there are no more tracking updates and the item hasn't arrived. The seller is thankfully sending us a new one, but what is with the USPS and their losing packages, delivering them to wrong addresses, holding things at the post office when I never requested them to be held...??
Annoyed with: Anyone and everyone who is anti-second amendment or thinks I don't have the right to own weapons to defend myself and my family.
The house right down the drive from us is turning into a legitimate drug house. Three well-known drug dealers (and users) in town have ALL been hanging out at the house the last few days, Isaiah has arrested every one of them at some point, and my guess is they've already figured out that we live next door. Another guy whose truck Isaiah confiscated recently as evidence in a drug-related crime has also been showing up at the police department demanding his truck back and just the other day demanded to know Isaiah's home address so he could "come talk to him in person."
Guess which house THAT guy has also been hanging out at? Yep, the one next door with the drug dealers. If he hasn't figured out we live here already, he will soon.
I literally have to either look up Facebook pages, or have Isaiah text me mug shots of these people so I know exactly who they are if they come to our front door.
THIS is reason #2348023 why I am so pro-second amendment. Nobody but nobody can tell me that I have to sit here all day alone with my baby daughter while drug dealers come and go from the house next door, planning who knows what, and if they decide to come up here and threaten me I have to hope to God they don't try anything while I wait 5-6 minutes for the police to show up. If you think that drugs don't make people violent, think again. We had a shooting here a few weeks back over a drug deal gone bad, and another stabbing just last week because some dude was on a meth trip and thought his "friend" had given him bad drugs. This isn't Pleasantville.
So, screw anyone who thinks I shouldn't own a gun.
And yes, I'm a little bit passionate on the topic.
(Side note: Does it annoy the crap out of anyone else when bloggers are super mysterious and act like they don't want to talk about something and then it's like, well why did you even blog about it then?)
Wanting: A bigger house. Don't get me wrong, I am beyond grateful that we were able to afford to buy a house in this town at all, but a 900 square foot two bedroom house with completely inadequate storage and living space is simply not enough for two people and a baby-almost-toddler. I'm getting a huge urge to do a giant purge (I'm a poet and I know it) because I feel like I'm about to be crushed by all our stuff. There isn't really a lot I can get rid of that belongs to Imogen because we only have things she needs and/or plays with, but if we're going by the KonMari book and deciding whether we love things and/or whether they're useful, there's a lot I could do without.
Laughing at: This new book release from the Babylon Bee. I've been previewing some of the pages on Amazon and cackling.
One of the marks of a healthy church website is the frequent use of heavily filtered stock images that perfectly encapsulate the aesthetic you need to truly worship the Lord. If the church site you're checking out has pictures of people with a realistic level of attractiveness, close your Internet tab right away and try again. Ideally, the church you target will feature several images of young, unrealistically attractive models smiling and raising their hands as if worshipping with reckless abandon or desperately trying to wave down a passing car.I mean...that's funny.
Wishing: It didn't rain more than it's sunny around these parts. I get all excited because we'll have like 2 days of sun and then it's back to solid rain for the rest of the 15 day forecast. I'm bored, Imogen's bored, and then I end up doing things like making no-bake cookie bars for Isaiah's job and eating them myself instead.
Anticipating: July. Isaiah's taking a couple of weeks off work and my mom will be here for the first little bit because she's coming up for Imogen's first birthday, but after she goes home we're debating where we want to go to get out of town. So far we've thrown around the ideas of a road trip to San Diego, a short cruise out of LA, flying to Hawaii, driving to Montana to see Glacier National Park, or a road trip around Europe, ending in Norway, the next country on our bucket list. We scratched off Europe just because we decided it'll be more fun maybe next summer when Imogen isn't on such a strict nap schedule. I'm not really wanting to take a 6 hour plane trip with a one year old so we probably won't do Hawaii. That leaves one of the USA road trips and we need to decide where to go soon so I can start working on an itinerary!
Labels:
life lately
Tuesday, May 1, 2018
These Are My Confessions #3
Well, it's been a hot minute, hasn't it? I don't know why but I've been in a blogging rut lately and haven't even wanted to do my "life lately" posts because of the funk I've been in.
Wait, I feel like I'm doing this wrong...hold on...
OMG YOU GUYSSS. I'm so so SO sorry, I disappeared for a while but I'm back now!!!!! I hope you all didn't miss me too much, I'll do my best not to let my real life get in the way of my blogging from now on!!!!! Again, I'm SO sorry!!!!!
I crack myself up.
ANYwho, what better way to pull myself out of the funk that I've been in for a solid month now (I blame the weather, single parenting while my husband works 2394723410923874 hours of overtime, and just Alaska in general because why not?) than a bunch of pet peeves and gripes that I've been keeping track of in my phone for a post just like this? Onward!
Oh - and before anybody gets their you-know-whats in a wad, none of this is directed at anyone in particular. Nobody is on my mind THAT much. Well, except my baby, but she'd be on your mind 24/7 too if it was your leg she was trying to climb all day, every day.
+ The phrase "two kids under ____." I totally get the "two under two" or "three under three" notion because that's a lot of toddlerhood all smashed together, but the other day I heard someone make the comment that they had "two under three." As far as I'm concerned, that's a pretty normal spacing of kids, is it not? I was just shy of 2 1/2 when my sister was born, and I know a lot of people who have a two-ish year old when they have a new baby. What's next...two under five? Three under seven? It's like the "my baby is ____ months old" thing. After 24 months, just say how old they are in years, for the love of teething biscuits.
+ The term "girl boss." I don't know why this one gets under my skin, but it's just as annoying as "boy mom" or "girl mom." Hooray for breaking glass ceilings and all that, but there's literally nothing a man can do that a woman is not allowed to do these days, and one of those things is being a boss. How's this for a mind trip - starting at age 15, I've only had ONE job where my boss WASN'T a female. WHOAAAA.
+ Instagram gifs. I get it. They have their time and place. But every freaking Instagram story these days has multiple gifs splattered across the screen and I'm so over it. Enough with the dancing people and bouncy hearts!
+ The term "living my best life." I honestly don't know why this phrase annoys me, but it does. I think maybe because it's overused and applied to seriously mundane situations. "I'm eating a donut right now...living my best life!!" Seriously? Talk about low standards. You can hashtag your Instagram photo when you're doing something actually cool, like scuba diving with sharks in Costa Rica or summiting Mount Everest. Drinking wine next to a swimming pool doesn't qualify.
+ The thumbs up emoji. I'm seriously considering blocking the next person who replies to a text message from me with JUST the thumbs up emoji. How lazy are you, that you can't say "great!" or "sounds good!" or even just "OK"?
+ People who poke/touch babies' faces. Unless you're me or my husband, HANDS OFF. Someone (who shall remain nameless but who I'm related to by marriage) was literally flicking Imogen's cheeks the other day, Imogen was clearly not enjoying it, and yet they wouldn't stop. Add to that the average of three people every time we're at the grocery store who want to walk up and poke her in the face and I'm literally about to start doing it back to these people. Let's see how they like their cheeks flicked, poked and pinched.
+ Baby milestone comparisons. I don't really need to elaborate too much on this one because if you're a parent you already get it, but my goodness. Who cares if your kid pulls themselves to standing at 6 months or 9 months? Who cares if your kid walks at 12 months or 18 months? Who cares if your kid claps or dances or feeds themselves before so-and-so's kid? When mothers do this it always feels like it's more about what your kid isn't doing as opposed to what their kid is doing, and I'm so over it.
Okay, I think that's it for now. Time for coffee #3 and a quick edit job before the kiddo wakes up from her morning nap. Did I mention she's starting to cruise around the furniture now and has been dancing to music for the last week!? No, I didn't, because NOBODY CARES.
Really leaving now.
Wait, I feel like I'm doing this wrong...hold on...
OMG YOU GUYSSS. I'm so so SO sorry, I disappeared for a while but I'm back now!!!!! I hope you all didn't miss me too much, I'll do my best not to let my real life get in the way of my blogging from now on!!!!! Again, I'm SO sorry!!!!!
I crack myself up.
ANYwho, what better way to pull myself out of the funk that I've been in for a solid month now (I blame the weather, single parenting while my husband works 2394723410923874 hours of overtime, and just Alaska in general because why not?) than a bunch of pet peeves and gripes that I've been keeping track of in my phone for a post just like this? Onward!
Oh - and before anybody gets their you-know-whats in a wad, none of this is directed at anyone in particular. Nobody is on my mind THAT much. Well, except my baby, but she'd be on your mind 24/7 too if it was your leg she was trying to climb all day, every day.
+ The phrase "two kids under ____." I totally get the "two under two" or "three under three" notion because that's a lot of toddlerhood all smashed together, but the other day I heard someone make the comment that they had "two under three." As far as I'm concerned, that's a pretty normal spacing of kids, is it not? I was just shy of 2 1/2 when my sister was born, and I know a lot of people who have a two-ish year old when they have a new baby. What's next...two under five? Three under seven? It's like the "my baby is ____ months old" thing. After 24 months, just say how old they are in years, for the love of teething biscuits.
+ The term "girl boss." I don't know why this one gets under my skin, but it's just as annoying as "boy mom" or "girl mom." Hooray for breaking glass ceilings and all that, but there's literally nothing a man can do that a woman is not allowed to do these days, and one of those things is being a boss. How's this for a mind trip - starting at age 15, I've only had ONE job where my boss WASN'T a female. WHOAAAA.
+ Instagram gifs. I get it. They have their time and place. But every freaking Instagram story these days has multiple gifs splattered across the screen and I'm so over it. Enough with the dancing people and bouncy hearts!
+ The term "living my best life." I honestly don't know why this phrase annoys me, but it does. I think maybe because it's overused and applied to seriously mundane situations. "I'm eating a donut right now...living my best life!!" Seriously? Talk about low standards. You can hashtag your Instagram photo when you're doing something actually cool, like scuba diving with sharks in Costa Rica or summiting Mount Everest. Drinking wine next to a swimming pool doesn't qualify.
+ The thumbs up emoji. I'm seriously considering blocking the next person who replies to a text message from me with JUST the thumbs up emoji. How lazy are you, that you can't say "great!" or "sounds good!" or even just "OK"?
+ People who poke/touch babies' faces. Unless you're me or my husband, HANDS OFF. Someone (who shall remain nameless but who I'm related to by marriage) was literally flicking Imogen's cheeks the other day, Imogen was clearly not enjoying it, and yet they wouldn't stop. Add to that the average of three people every time we're at the grocery store who want to walk up and poke her in the face and I'm literally about to start doing it back to these people. Let's see how they like their cheeks flicked, poked and pinched.
+ Baby milestone comparisons. I don't really need to elaborate too much on this one because if you're a parent you already get it, but my goodness. Who cares if your kid pulls themselves to standing at 6 months or 9 months? Who cares if your kid walks at 12 months or 18 months? Who cares if your kid claps or dances or feeds themselves before so-and-so's kid? When mothers do this it always feels like it's more about what your kid isn't doing as opposed to what their kid is doing, and I'm so over it.
Okay, I think that's it for now. Time for coffee #3 and a quick edit job before the kiddo wakes up from her morning nap. Did I mention she's starting to cruise around the furniture now and has been dancing to music for the last week!? No, I didn't, because NOBODY CARES.
Really leaving now.
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