My baby

Sweet'ums is finally home. I missed her so much this week. I think maybe she missed me too--she wasn't upset at all when my parents left, which is kind of unusual. At the very least she missed her other toys and babies.
It felt really good to hold her again. I missed making her laugh and the silly little jokes we share. It's so weird to hear her saying new words after just a week and to hear how much better she is at expressing herself. She's a really wonderful little person.
I coulda swore earlier she asked me, "We gonna eat?" Mind you, she's capable of good, solid sentences, but rarely uses them unless she's repeating something she's heard. Even then, she doesn't say much.
She changes so quickly. It was only a week, but it feels like it could have been months.
I'm not perfect but I want to be the best I can be for her. She deserves it. Anything in the world for more of those hugs and those sweet, dimpled, giggly smiles.

Why now?

So the alternator in my car is basically gone. It will get us to the end of the street and back, but no further. It's the first major problem we've had with this car in three years, so I guess I can't complain, especially since it's got well over 300,000 miles on it. It won't be an enormously expensive fix but it's still not cheap, and it's not money we just have laying around.
So that's the conclusion to the week. I do hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and a great weekend.

Bear with me

Happy Thanksgiving! There's so much to be thankful for--my husband, my daughter, my silly cats (who drive me crazy but are always there to warm my lap for me), hubby's job (even though I complain a lot), my family (without whom we wouldn't have survived this year), and small miracles (like finding out my alternator was just unplugged, and not dead), just to name a few. This Thanksgiving was quiet--just Nice Guy and I are at home today and Sweet'ums is wrapping up a fun week with MeMe. And even though we miss her, we're glad she's had a chance to stretch her legs and enjoy her grandparents.
Things are weird right now. The Metformin is a small miracle in itself--I've only had minor issues with it, and the trade-off is that I feel absolutely incredible. I'm not tired all the time anymore and already my weight is slipping south. My mood has picked up drastically. And this is just on the half-dose! Next week I start the full dose, and I imagine I'll feel even better. I have energy, which is something I haven't had in... Oh, five or six years probably. The result of this energy is me cleaning house a little. The downside to that is that it led me to organize some of Sweet'ums' old baby things, and now I'm a little sad.
The decision to have just one child is one I never thought I'd actually make. And really, I doubt it's one I'll ever be 100% content with. Going through Sweet'ums' things made me so sad, and brought out my pack-rat tendencies. I want to keep everything that has to do with her even though I know I can't. I don't want to give away any of her baby clothes, even though I know I have to eventually. Folding up her little footie pajamas reminded me of when she was just a few months old in her first winter, and the two of us napping in the afternoons in my bedroom, snug and warm. The little orange romper reminds me of when she had the diaper blow-out at the mall and we didn't have a change of clothes with us, so we had to buy her a new outfit so she wouldn't be Little Naked-In-A-Diaper Baby. The dress we bought her for her first Easter, that she wore to NG's sister's wedding, that brought out her pretty blue eyes. I'm overly sentimental and I tend to attach emotional value to objects that I shouldn't. NG and I will keep a few things that really bring up vivid memories--lots of people do that--but no more of her things than I can keep in a little memory box. I have to keep a tight rein on myself or I'll go overboard. But I admit that I miss having a baby around, and I especially miss my Sweet'ums as a baby. It only gets harder as she gets older, but I know we'll survive.
So more than anything today, I'm thankful for my little girl. She lights up my day and gives me a reason to be.

Today

I survived a doctor's appointment and early Thanksgiving with the in-laws today. I'm tired and not feeling so hot but at least we made it.
My testosterone is down even more but my fasting glucose is up. That scares me. So basically my options were start Metformin now, or try my best to diet and exercise and go back in three more months to see if any more progress has been made. I'm already pre-diabetic and if I wait I might end up with full-fledged diabetes, so Metformin it is. I took my first one this evening and so far, so good. Hopefully it won't bother me too much.
Dinner with the in-laws wasn't so bad. Food was good, socializing was good, and even though some people didn't quite seem like their usual selves everyone got along. My pie was dubbed "heaven in a pie crust" and my MIL found, claimed, and ran off with the last piece. Sweet'ums and her cousin played all night and when we took Sweet'ums back to Mom's house she conked out halfway there.
So now I'm home and it's quiet and I'm probably going to work on the quilt some more. Hopefully I can get some progress made now that I'm not due to be anywhere for a few days.
Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Waiting

Last night we went to NG's granny's house to see whether she still needed a ride to see her daughter that lives up the state from us. She said one of her other girls has decided to go with her so transportation isn't an issue anymore. While we were there we started looking at old pictures. After a while NG's mom came in, asked where Sweet'ums was (she's with my mom, who asked us several weeks ago if she could keep her while she's off for Thanksgiving), and started talking about getting a car seat so she could come get Sweet'ums for a couple hours here and there and get to know her better. She said she didn't want to just take her home and have her get upset because she wanted Mommy and Daddy and they weren't there. So it sounds as if she's been on the same page as me for a while, and perhaps my FIL was the one who really had the problem. Makes me wonder how many times he's used her as his scapegoat when he was really the one who had a problem with things.
So we're waiting to see what really happens, but it seems that waiting is resolving things on its own. Meanwhile, I have a week to just be "me" instead of "Mommy" and while I love my daughter and my job as her mom it really is nice to just get some stuff done around the house and relax. I'm working on her quilt and hoping to have it done for Christmas (cross your fingers!). I'm doing it by hand so it's very time-consuming, but luckily for me I'm not too bad at it and it's not as slow as it could be.

So this is what I have so far.


It's going to be seven 4-square blocks wide and seven tall, plus a one-block-thick border all the way around in purple, plus another two-wide block of white flannel to match the backing. Each block is eight inches square--each little color square is 4". Right now I'm washing my soft, pretty white flannel so it can go ahead and do its shrinking and I can get it dried (it has to be line dried) and I'm going to get to work. I'm almost halfway done with the front. If I work hard, it'll only take me a couple days to finish the front.

Beautiful reminders

Some days you wake up tired. Nothing goes right, and things that have been a problem in your life for a little while just really drag you down that much more. You feel powerless, and yet you want to change things your way, in your own time, and fix them according to the way they "should" be. And then, you open up your Facebook account, check your feeds, and find this:

'He gives strength to the weary, And to him who lacks might He increases power. Yet those who wait for the
LORD Will gain new strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not get tired, They will walk and not become weary.' Isaiah 40:29,31

Waiting isn't my strong point, and letting go of things that are beyond my power is an even weaker point still. I like to be in control, capable, strong. But lately, it seems like my desire for capability and control is really just a cover for how out-of-control and helpless I really am. And many times I pray about things only to feel like nobody is listening, and I feel alone and floundering in the circumstances that surround me.

Little things like this remind me that Someone really is listening, and paying attention, and just waiting for me to get out of the way and let Him handle things.

And as a kid I read this verse over and over again, and the end of it, the "mount up with wings like eagles" part always fascinated me. But today, the part that keeps replaying in my head is the "those who wait on the Lord" part. I get impatient and in a hurry, but it's time to just slow down and step aside.

And for anyone on Facebook who would like daily Scripture in their feeds, check this guy out:
http://www.facebook.com/MarkBrown.page

Falling into place

After having a rough week last week this week definitely seems to be shaping up nicely. We were afraid that if we were to buy a house that it would be hard to get the down payment money from where it's been so far, but NG found out from a guy he works with (whose money was stashed in the same place) that they only require a good faith estimate from the loan company before they let you get your down payment money. Hey, that works for me! I also found out that for the housing credit, basically they'll re-file this year's taxes if you close before the end of the tax year, and if you close after the end of this tax year then you just file it on your taxes in the spring. That works for me too. So basically if we close before the end of December (which is possible, being more of a private transaction type thing) we can go ahead with getting the credit. If not, we wait until the end of January when we typically file our taxes, so there would only be a few weeks' wait.
I really want out of the neighborhood we live in now. There's constant crime out here and I'm scared to death to walk outside at night beyond my carport. There's always burglaries and such here in town, especially in my neighborhood.
At least in the neighborhood the new house is in I know the crime rate. I know what to watch out for, who to watch out for, where to watch for them. I lived there growing up... I SHOULD know. Most of the people there now are the same people who were there when I was growing up.
I guess it's a really big perk for me that it's up the street from my parents. Sweet'ums is crazy about them and I'm sure the feeling is mutual. I know that, growing up, I would have loved to have lived closer to my biological grandparents (one was local, one lived two hours away but kept to himself, and the other two were 1200 miles away). At least, the ones who were interested in us--the one who was local really wasn't interested in me or my brother, instead preferring my cousins. Shoot, I would have loved to have just lived close to a grandparent-like figure. Even NG lived close to fairly involved grandparents growing up. That's something I want for Sweet'ums, and if his parents aren't going to make an effort to be involved, then it would be nice to be near the grandparents who do.
Besides, the two towns we'd live between total only about 20,000 people, and they're a whole lot cozier and more personal than this city of almost 100,000. Both value the small-town feel of their communities, and both towns are still occupied by many of the same families who have been there for generations. So much of my childhood was lived in these towns--the majority of it, in fact. I'd love for NG to live in the place where he grew up and share it with Sweet'ums but his family moved so much that there's a whole huge area that he considers home--there's no one place he feels most connected to, except the area his grandparents live and there's really just not anything for sale right around there.
So I'm actually letting myself get excited now. This might actually happen. I just keept waiting for things to fall apart around me, because that's always what happens when I hope for something, but maybe this time we're actually on the right path.

For Fernie: About the house

So there's this house. It's down the street from my mom and dad, and it's HUGE. It's gotta be twice the size of the one we live in now, if not more. Originally it was three bed, two bath, but they've built on a fourth bedroom that is just beautiful. The kitchen is big, and honestly, the whole place is big enough to get the family together for the holidays for dinner and not be too crowded. It's on a quarter acre, so the yard isn't too big but it's plenty for one kid to play in. The shed takes up half the back yard, is two rooms and could easily be converted to another pair of bedrooms or a small apartment. The carport is big--it could easily accommodate two vehicles and reminds me of the little pavilions at the park. The shed and carport are both constructed of railroad ties, so they're good and solid and will probably be there long after the house is gone. It has its own water and septic, which is nice--no paying the city outrageous prices for something every human needs. The house has plenty of closet space--every bedroom, including the built-on one, has a walk-in closet, and the one in the master bedroom is big enough to use as a small nursery. Each bathroom has a linen closet, and the kitchen has a pantry. Really, you don't know how important those little things can be until you've lived someplace that doesn't have them. The kitchen doesn't have a dishwasher, YET... There's enough cabinet space that I can pull one out and put in a dishwasher and still have plenty of storage space. The insulation has been redone, the a/c is newer with fairly new duct work and the windows have all been replaced in the last few months with double windows.
The down sides are few: there's a couple minor holes in the walls, which would require patching. The entire house could use a nice coat of fresh paint, but that's not a big deal. The difficult part would be replacing the carpet and the bathroom cabinets but even that would be doable and probably not too expensive.
My biggest complaint is the price. They're asking either $80k or $85k and even though it's been worked on it really just isn't worth that price. But honestly, I like where it is and what they've done with it... I almost wouldn't mind paying the price.
Our biggest obstacle right now is paying everything off here so we can afford to start fresh there. They extended the tax credit, luckily, but that doesn't help if I can't get my hands on it until spring when we file our taxes. All we can hope is that the house is still on the market come January, when we do our income taxes.

I'm posting a few pictures. One thing to keep in mind as far as space is concerned is that in all of these pictures I'm standing at least partly in the room, so the entire room isn't visible. That means that some of the rooms are significantly larger than they look.

Front

Master Bedroom

Kitchen

Recovery

This week was bad. Real bad. Even in the throes of rage I'm not one to get my blood pressure up but several days this week were exceptions. My in-laws finally screwed up and NG says he's not interested in bending over backwards to accommodate people who aren't genuinely interested in what we're offering. I mean, what a bargain! All they'd have to do is invest a little time in getting to know their granddaughter, and then she's theirs for any afternoon or evening that they want to spend time with her!

In the end, we made an offer: If it's so important to you that you've just GOT to keep her overnight, and time is such a sensitive issue that you can't possibly spare any to come acquaint yourselves with her first, then this weekend come and get her. Keep her overnight and see how it goes. (No, we didn't word it that way, but that's the gist of it--we were trying very hard to be diplomatic)

The response? A phone call from my father in law, using the same tone that he uses on my MIL when she's making a public scene and embarrassing the snot out of him, informing us that MIL has other plans for the weekend that render her incapable of keeping Sweet'ums. In short, those plans involve her running my teenaged SIL all over the planet to watch her boyfriend play tennis, and probably involving my MIL's boyfriend at some point as well. I kept my responses simple--"Yes, sir," "I understand," "Y'all have a good weekend then."

NG is really upset. We weren't trying to be unreasonable--we're simply trying to spare our two year old the potential and unneccesary upset of being dropped off at the home of someone she hardly knows, with Mommy and Daddy nowhere in sight for consolation as the practical stranger bumbles her way through a very awkward evening. Sweet'ums is a good kid but as an only child of parents who don't get out much, she's fairly particular about who she talks to and who she spends time with. She won't even talk around my in-laws. I can't imagine her enjoying an evening with them if she won't even talk to them.

I think I'd be mad no matter how this thing had gone down, because deep down inside I have a very touchy Mama Bear who really doesn't like the idea of her MIL getting too close to her cub. But I think NG would have been far less hurt if his parents hadn't made such a huge deal out of wanting to keep her and acting like it had to happen N-O-W. I kind of suspected that this is how it would play out, just because this is exactly how everything has gone in the four-plus years I've been associated with this family, but NG always wants to think the best and hope that this time, for the first time in his twenty-five years, things might be different.

Not that I can blame him. I just stopped hoping a long time ago that manipulative and self-absorbed people would change. I went through this with my maternal grandmother as a kid. I'm not letting my child go through it.

So in the end, Sweet'ums got tucked into her own bed by her parents (who love her oh-so-much!) and has plans to go see MeMe tomorrow, who has no qualms whatsoever about making time in her day for the grandbaby.

And I'm off to snuggle into my new flannel nightgown for the night!

Ten minutes later: Ok, so maybe I won't snuggle into my new flannel nightgown... Bless my hubby's heart, he tried, but it's a size too small! Me and my fat arms! lol

Letting go... Or not

My baby has been in a big girl bed (well, a toddler day-bed, really, without the rail) for a month or so now. She's done really well in it but I can't say her mommy is doing as well. My heart nearly bursts each night as I tuck her in, kiss her on the forehead, and make sure she's got her babies (Froggie and Sister Monkey) tucked in snugly beside her. I go to bed each night, half in awe and half heartbroken at how quickly she's growing up and how easily she adapts to the changes that go with the process.

Tucking her in each night is so special to me. My parents always did the same for my brother and I. To this day I just love sleeping in a freshly made bed, sheets tucked in just as tightly as I can manage, because that's how my mom always put us to bed. And that's how Sweet'ums goes to sleep each night.

I don't mind her going to my mom's house because I know that even though Mom doesn't tuck her in quite the same way she did us, I still can count on her to put my baby to bed with the same love and tenderness, to treat the ritual with the same reverence that I do. It means just as much to her as it does me to get to see those pretty blue eyes close and drift off to Dreamland.

Which brings me to my in-laws.

Lately they've been fussing about getting to keep Sweet'ums overnight. First I should mention that in the two plus years my daughter has been on this earth, I could probably count on two hands the times my MIL has been to my house to see her, and every one of those was in the first two or three months of the young'un's life. And until a few months ago, we made trips to their house at least twice a month for them to see Sweet'ums. The only reason we stopped was to conserve gas and cut our costs a bit. My FIL stops by once in a blue moon, but usually only if we've asked him to take a look at one of our cars or if we know he's had problems with MIL and we ask him if he wants to come sit. My only problem with them coming over when Sweet'ums was new was that they'd stop by without calling--and everyone who has had a little baby knows just what a problem that can be sometimes. But they make no effort to come over--they don't even call us on the phone when something's going on, unless one of the girls mentions that we might like to know or be involved.

So anyway, back to the point. They've been fussing about wanting to keep Sweet'ums overnight. The problem, for me anyway, lies in the fact that my daughter really doesn't know them. They don't know her. Sure, they've been introduced, and they've spent some time around each other, but they just don't know her. They don't know what she likes to eat, how she likes to be put to bed, what games she likes to play. Some things they can pick up pretty quickly, but some things Sweet'ums is very particular about and those things don't come quite so easily. And they're not the most patient people. They think that they can just make a little one do things their way because they don't want to take the time to figure the kid out. They've already demonstrated an inability to follow basic instructions back when Sweet'ums was about four months old and they wouldn't even put her to bed at her usual bedtime. My FIL is much more willing to learn Sweet'ums' way of doing things, but my MIL has this mindset that if it worked for her kids it'll work for all kids, if she just persists long enough. She thinks that just because she did it with her kids it's safe for all kids (like feeding coconut cream pie to a 6 month old or giving adult Mylanta to a newborn who, believe it or not, wasn't gassy in the first place!).

I'm terrified to leave my child with her. It's not just the fact that she once tried burning her house down with her kids inside. It's not just how I hear her talk to her daughters, or how I see her feed our nephew (she never cooks... and no child should have McDonalds that often in a weekend). It's not just the knock-down, drag-out, dish-throwing fights that her and my FIL get into sometimes.

It's the fact that she hasn't taken the time to get to know my child. She hasn't been to my house to see my child in her own environment, to see the toys she prefers and the snacks she likes. It's that she doesn't see what's wrong with pumping a 2 year old full of sugar and french fries. It's the fact that when Sweet'ums was 4 months old my MIL couldn't even handle her for one night and called the next day begging my mother to hurry up and come get her (not to mention the phone call I got the next afternoon about how bad my baby had been, when in reality my MIL didn't follow any of the instructions that I'd left for her). It's the fact that I don't feel I can trust my MIL to properly install and use a carseat if she decides to take my baby anywhere, and if she DID manage to do so I can't trust her not to take my daughter to visit people that my MIL herself shouldn't be visiting. And it's the fact that, even though my MIL spends all kinds of time in my town, and even though visiting my house would only be a five minute detour off the path she takes to get home, she can't be bothered to swing by my house and see her granddaughter.

And, too, I guess it's the fact that my FIL popped off with a comment to my husband about "why should [they] always have to come to [our] house to see her" when even my FIL hasn't been to my house in months, and at this moment it's probably been two years since my MIL stepped foot through my doorway. The fact that they want to bring my mom into the argument, about how it's not fair my mom always has Sweet'ums, when in actuality my mom goes out of her way every times she comes to see my child and to pick her up and do things with her (not to mention my mom is happy to accommodate the rules we have for Sweet'ums that require more consistency).

My request was this, and I don't see it being unreasonable: If MIL would come see Sweet'ums a few hours a week for several weeks, in my house, where I can keep an eye on things and give myself a chance to feel more at ease, then after that period of time they can take Sweet'ums to their house for a night and see how it goes. They don't even want to do that! They're not willing to do something so simple to put me at ease and to get to know their own granddaughter!

I refuse to be bullied by people who seem to feel they have more of a right to my child than I do. I refuse to let her be let down time and time again by people who are more interested in doing their own thing than fulfilling promises they made to my daughter. I refuse to give them leeway to act the way my own grandparents did--either they get involved, or they don't. No hard feelings. But no empty promises and no half-assing the whole thing.

I don't even care if they break some of my rules. I mean, that's what grandparents do, they're lenient on the grandkids. But they're not even willing to do something little that would make me feel better, to help me not feel like I'm leaving my only baby with people who are practically strangers. I'm willing to let go, but I'm not willing to throw her to the wolves. Not yet. She's still too little to just be turned loose with people I don't really trust.

What do you think? I know it's only one side of the story. I haven't talked to my FIL myself (MIL is too unreasonable so I avoid dealing with her directly when possible) so I'm only hearing what NG relays, but from where I'm sitting I just feel like they're trying to back me into a corner.

My panic

This morning I woke up at 9 AM after having been on the phone rather late with a friend who needed to talk. My husband was not in bed next to me, nor was he in the shower. I checked in the living room, since sometimes when he's on night shift he can't fall asleep right away so he plays video games or washes dishes. He wasn't in the living room. There was no sign of him, his car keys, the car, his work clothes. I check the phone; he hasn't called.

I'm panicking. I call my mom. I'm thinking, maybe he had car trouble, and called my mom to come help. If he thought he'd be home before I woke up he might not have called. So I call, and Mom answers. Frantic, I tell her that he's not home yet and I'm worried.

Right about that moment, just as it's about to come out of her mouth, I realize: he's on day shift this weekend, not night shift.

I then apologized to Mom, hung up the phone, and following her instructions, went back to bed. Sweet'ums wouldn't be up for a while, so I might as well rest some more.

This is what swing shift does to people. Turns them into frantic lunatics when there's really no reason to be worried at all.

He called me later this morning, safe and sound, from work.