Psychotomy

So, I was always going to e one of those parents that’s patient and loving and didn’t yell. When my kids did something, I’d sit down and have a reasoned explanation with them and they’d understand what I was saying and there wouldn’t be yelling

I dislike the yelling see

But it turns out? That’s a pipe dream for delusional people without kids. Omfg. DK starts reading a book with me, gets half a sentence in, decries that he just can’t read and storms off. What just happened? No don’t even know how to have a reasoned discourse, bc WHAT JUST HAPPENED???

I get home from work with a gallon of milk. In the time it takes to put it in the refrigerator, Pi has told me no less than six times that she’s thirsty she needs juice. I heard you, knock it off!

Bear moves next to me at dinner and keeps ramming me with his plate. You’re done? You want more? What???

And yelling? Happens way more than I’d like to admit. Because they never listen to any direction. Pick up the dishes, no seriously I’m asking you to pick up the dishes, not mine for diamond for twenty years bony run away! Wtf? GET BACK HERE DON’T PUSH YOUR SISTER!!!

Sigh. I was seriously deluded. I miss that ;)

Posted in: DK, Kitty, PI by attriel /
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Today in te car we had another wonderful discussion about god and dieing.

I absolutely love hate these conversations. Because timespans are not her strong suit yet, at four.

Will I be with god when I die? Yes, of course (I’m not really going into reincarnation just now). But that’s not going to be for a long time

My next birthdays not for a long time!

Uh, yes, but you’re not going to die on your next birthday. There’s a lot of birthdays left to come.

Why do people die? (They know that three of mommys grandparents are dead, and three of mine too). (Oh and the whole “DK could have died” undertone the last year although I don’t think it was ever clearly stated as such to the other two).

Well, when people get really old or really sick, their body can’t support them anymore, so they die to go be with god then. But there’s a long time before you get that old.

When can I be with god?

Well, gods always there. Everywhere, remember. God, and his fuzzy cat. So you’re always with him, but he’s invisible isn’t he?

I like god. His cat is named Patchey and is very fuzzy. I want a fuzzy cat.

Aaaand thankfully that details our train of thought sufficiently!

Posted in: PI by attriel / Tags: Car conversations

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so, I’ve been exhausted the last few days, and this morning kiir passed me kitty at 6:30 to deal with b/c he wouldn’t go back to sleep for her. That meant that by 7 we were downstairs playing Peggle (b/c I couldn’t risk Arkham City when DK might be coming down; NTS, gotta buy ME3 or ACR soon)

He napped on and off until DK came down at 8? 8:30? then Pi came at about 9:30, and I made breakfast …

About 11 I decided to take a nap b/c, still exhausted. Kiir suggested taking Kitty with me b/c he was ready for his naptime. He doesn’t fall asleep laying in the bed yet with me.

DK followed us up b/c he wanted to take a nap too, so I turned on the light in his room so he could “take a nap” while we went to the other room.

K followed us in to nap with us.

Pi followed up the stairs in a minute to come play too!! Eventually DK let her into the room Kitty and I were in, so she could come in. And since he let her in, he brought his sleeping bag for a sleepover.

Then Kitty, DK and Pi bounced around the bed a bit playing.  And by 11:15 we just all came back down, b/c so far this nap had simply provided me with a bonus headache.

Posted in: DK, Kitty, PI by attriel /
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So, apropos of nothing, this afternoon on the train I started thinking about the kids.

Well, technically, it’s apropos of the fact that I’d watched an emotional episode on my iPod and putting away my ticket I saw kitty’s footprint card from the hospital still in my bag.

When DK was born, Kiir’s aunt made a “milestones” book, and it had a slot for his.

Pi’s sat by the table waiting for Kiir to make a scrapbook for her stuff.

Kitty’s has never even made it out of my bag, because there’s just no time to do anything like that, and frankly if it’s in my bag I know where to find it.  Pi’s I’m not sure which box we put it in to keep it from getting lost.  It’s here, I know we didn’t throw it out, I just don’t know where it is.

Anyway, I got to thinking about how I’ve often said I work my job to provide for my family, but my family is the important thing.  And the last month I’ve been working long hours, putting in time at home, etc, for a big deploy.  Yeah, it’s only really the second time I’ve done that since I started this job five years ago, but it rankles.  Because I put my kids on the back burner instead of the other way round.

That got me to reflecting on the fact that I get angry so often and rage for no reason.  I’ll yell, loudly, and it scares DK.  Some of that is his personality, and I think loud noises bother him in general.  But some of that is he’s afraid of daddy.  I am not a fan of that part.

And I get mad about the dumbest things.  He’ll want to quit playing a video game because it got hard, but I’m trying to finish the level so I’ll “yell” at him.  Or he’ll insist he’s done playing, so I’ll turn off the TV and declare it bedtime.  Because he didn’t want to play the videogame anymore?  WTF!

We’ll go up to put Pi to bed (he’ll help me put her to bed, and fall asleep in the process a lot of times, but he won’t go up for his bedtime, just hers).  And we’ll be reading books, he’ll suddenly remember we need to brush teeth (valid).  Then we’ll get snuggled back down, and he’ll want a drink.  And I’ll just lose it.  Of course it’s a stalling tactic, but it gets me irrationally angry.  And I’ll yell at him to lay down, be quiet, and let Pi go to sleep!!!

I don’t even remember the stupid shit that has me raging, but I do know it’s stupid shit.  I know it even when I’m screaming, I just can’t help myself.

And I don’t like that about me.  About me with them.  I don’t want them to fear me.  That’s not the kind of person I am, seriously.  But I don’t know how to control it.  And if I talk to my psych about it, I’m afraid he’ll change my antidepressants, and honestly it took me long enough to get back on this one that actually works.

All that got me to remembering when he was a newborn at the hospital.  How small he was, how dependent.  And I think part of the issue is he’s NOT dependent anymore.  He’s very much independent.  He’ll need help with things, but he wants to do it by himself.

And Pi, now, too.  And she’s so tiny, she can’t always turn the doorknobs, but she wants to be doing it by herself.  She can’t reach the sink, the lights.  But I want my teeny tiny baby back, that I could hold in the crook of my arm, who would lay down on my chest and sleep.

And even Kitty.  He’s crawling around, standing sometimes in the middle of a room, trying to walk.  He wants to be up and doing whatever his siblings are doing, instead of sitting on me being my baby.

Maybe I do need new antidepressants, but I refuse to go back on the one with the super-side-effects-and-withdrawal-like-morphine issues.

Actually, what I really wanted to do by the time I got off the train was go sit at the hospital maternity ward and just watch the babies in the nursery for an hour or so while I recentered.

Of course, assuming I could get into the hospital, I couldn’t get into the maternity ward.  And if I somehow got in, I’d just get arrested, because you can’t watch the nursery, you might be planning on snatching a baby or something.  *sigh*

But it would be nice to just sit there and watch for a bit, and pretend that my babies were still my babies.

Posted in: DK, general, Kitty, PI by attriel /
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So, Kiir went to the airport and left with Kitty.  Leaving just me in charge of DK and Pi.

So, first things first, we should eat dinner!  I took them to Red Robin, since it’s basically their favorite.  Dinner was good and fine.

She brought the check, and I said no to the boxes since they were still eating.  A minute later, she’s just at the next table  taking their drink orders, they both declare that they’re done.  When she finishes, she carefully turns in a direction away from me, and it’s loud so she didn’t hear me calling for her.

Fine, I’ll catch her when she comes back, she’ll be back for the check anyway.  They start being antsy, duh, but it’s just another minute.

I’m not sure how long it was, I’m sure it wasn’t the ten minutes it felt like, but it was definitely a while before she came back.  I think she waited at the bar for 6 drinks.  Whenever I order, I have to wait forever for my bar drinks while sodas come out instantly.  I guess they weren’t QUITE that busy.

Anyway, she comes back, I give her the card and ask for some boxes.  Pi has been asking to go potty for a while, and DK now wants to go too.  So, we run over to the bathroom.

TWO MINUTES LATER!   TWO MINUTES!!!   Come back out and see the waitress talking to the busser.  Who has already tossed the milkshake and the kids drinks into her bin.  Along with both pastas.  And one of the three things of fries.  She started with the full one apparently.

Seriously!??

I understand, it was the rush time (quarter past 7 on a friday).  I understand that I didn’t have anything at the table to clearly state I was coming back (note:  what, I was going to leave a child?)

But I did have a lot of fries, a full milkshake glass, a kids shake, pasta, and a balloon tied to the lamp.  I’m not sure leaving anything would have helped, honestly.

The waitress apologized and offered to have the kitchen make fresh for me take.  Except, you know, the kids were already done with waiting.  And since they swapped out the motorcycle arcade game, they’re not even really all that interested in the couple games out front (well, one racing game where you sit in a chair now, and then a couple carnival claw games; really, they’re not actually interesting, I agree).  She did say “next time you’re in I’ll remember to take more off”, which I guess means like she wouldn’t charge us for one of the kids meals or something?  But, seriously, even the waitresses we get often don’t recognize us.  We really try not to go too often!

On the way out, the manager on duty apologized, and offered to have the kitchen make up new orders to go.  Still, kids?

So, I ended up losing a pair of school lunch pastas and a weekend lunch of fries.  Because they’re busy enough to need to bus tables quickly.  And apparently have no system to define if a table is done or not.

Actually, the lady doing the bussing, tossed the last two sets of fries as I got back to the table.  While the waitress was waving the togo box and telling her that we had just asked for boxes, we were trying to take it with us.  And watching as I came back with two kids.  Honestly, she looked almost malicious at it.  And when we were leaving the table, she mumbled sorry.  I don’t know if she didn’t mean it, or if she didn’t speak much english and didn’t understand what it was supposed to sound like.  Either way, it certainly wasn’t an apology.

*sigh*

Posted in: DK, general, PI by attriel /
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So, Pi appears to be Milk Protein Intolerant.  It’s totally different from Lactose Intolerant.  Seriously.  We were going to make her a carrot cake for her first birthday, like we did for DK.  Specifically, we made two.  One for the guests, and one that he got to eat with his hands and totally mangle the whole thing.

Then we realized that, while I can substitute hemp milk for the milk in the recipe ( i think there’s milk, I never ended up looking) … The cream cheese frosting was going to be a serious bitch to do.  If we’d thought of it last weekend we could have gone looking at some of the other stores for creamed tofu alternatives. But we didn’t, soooo …

So we went back to our other plan, which was to make Pi birthday pies.  (we might alternate with cakes shaped like ?)!  Kiir suggested that for her first real sugary food, and her first birthday, Pi wanted a chocolate pie.

We decided we liked Alton Brown’s Moo-Less Chocolate Pie, because it’s obviously dairy free!  Well, we both HATE coffee, so we spent some time looking through that, and decided we have some banana liquer in the the fridge for the dirty banana martinis we’ve never made, we could substitute.

So after the aquarium, that evening we went out to get the tofu and the chocolate chips and the pie crusts.  Because our chips are all milk chocolate, and that seemed like it would be counterproductive.

It turns out that the store we considered most likely to have a good selection of things … well, to be fair, it did.  Except the only dairy free chocolate we could find was 100% cocoa at 1$/oz, and we needed 2C per pie … It occurs to me as I’m typing that that was unsweetened pure cocoa, so we probably needed to cut it with sugar/etc, so we didn’t need QUItE as much as we thought (from the nestle’s bags, 12oz is 2C, so… wow)

Apparently all chocolate is made with milk fat.  Which, frankly, is pretty much the opposite of milk protein free.  They were probably lactose free, but that didn’t matter so much.

Also, looking it up online, sounds like our closest store’s chain carries a dairy-free chocolate chips brand.  I don’t remember ever seeing it at ours, though, or that would be a REAL BOTHER!

Here’s hpoing it turns out OK, and she doesn’t get too upset by the dairy in the chocolate …

Posted in: PI by attriel /
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Today it was raining.  Tomorrow it’s supposed to rain.  It rained yesterday.  We decided that taking Pi to the zoo on Pi day was going to be cold, damp, and muddy.  And the animals would probably show more smarts and stay inside.

So we went out to the aquarium in Baltimore today, instead.  Nani & Pom’s gift this year for the two of them was the family membership.  The both fell asleep in the car, so we let them sleep a while.  Woke them up at 3, ~90 minutes of naptime.  DK kept running ahead, I think he was looking for something, but it turned out to not be the puffins or the sharks.  Might have been the arboretum, might have just been hyper.

Kiir kept running after him and trying to get him to stop an look at the fishes, with limited cooperation from the boy.  I had Pi on my back, and we kept stopping to look at the fish.  She liked the pretty colored ones :o

OMG are people annoying.  They kept standing like 5 in a row completely blocking paths and views.  And with Pi on my back, I couldn’t really slip through anything.  And the folks who had to surrender their strollers (it’s crowded enough as it is; we take ours to contain the boy to/from the parking deck, and to store our coats when we check it) and got the aquarium issued carriers … External frame hiking bags.  Except instead of high, they went far back.  And these people weren’t used to them.  I kept having to dodge out of the way :!

Pi enjoyed the fishes, and when DK calmed down (after going up on Kiir’s back) we went through a second time so he could actually see fishes.  And Pi could get a second round with less rushing to keep up.

They were both happy with their fishes viewing, yay!

Happy birthday, Pi girl.

Posted in: DK, PI by attriel /
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So, I am apparently an evil dad.  Today I decided we really needed to take down the xmas tree, so I started pulling down ornaments.  And DK started grabbing them and trying to put them back up :o

By the time I was taking down the lights, Pi had a piece of wrapping paper in her hand and just kept turning it over and looking at it, like ‘wait, what’s happening?  I liked the presents thing :(‘

Apparently after Xmas comes Evil.  And I am the embodiment of all that is evil :/

Posted in: DK, general, PI by attriel /
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Pi went to bed a couple hours ago, but woke up a little bit ago.  While I had K out for his evening walk.

I just saw her on Kiir’s lap and said “Hi baby girl” and she opened her eyes and glared.  Then there was a brief discussion about “when did she get back up?” and “you can go back to sleep”

Then she looked up and just GLARED, with the obvious thought of “I’m TRYING to go back to sleep, daddy, if people would just SHUT UP!!!”

… awkward :o

Posted in: PI by attriel /
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So, last week Pi was doing a bit of pushing with her legs and she can turn herself around pretty well for a few weeks now. and rolling over.

Over the weekend we were at my parents, and I caught her pushing herself forward a couple times! It was so neat! (I know, I have a two year old, I’ve done this, it shouldn’t be cool? but it IS! because she’s moving!!!)

Then yesterday while dinner was cooking, she was laying on the floor and DK and I were in the armchair playing ToonTown. I got up to go finish up with dinner, and I’m talking to DK and looking through the breakfast window at the living room to keep an eye on Pi (not that Kiir wasn’t out there too, but) and I notice that she seems to be in a different place.

So I jokingly say to DK, “Is your sister crawling? Why is she crawling around? Is she looking for something? Go give her a hug so she knows you still love her!” (and he’s looking at me like I’m an idiot)

Then I realized something. She hadn’t just turned around or rolled over. She had physically moved … wait uh … So I looked out again, in time to see her propel herself three more “moves” … “Uh, seriously, DK, why is your sister crawling? She’s only just past four months!!!”

It’s still amazing and incredible and neat. But it’s also terrifying and worrisome. Because now we have to start watching for her getting in things from crawling. Eeek!!!

Posted in: PI by attriel /
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