mother daughter day

when we started trying for a baby, we made sure to talk to bry about it. we didn't have to actually, because it was all she ever talked about when the wolf and i met. 'can i have a baby brother or sister?' 'when are you guys going to give me a brother or sister?' it was like that all the time. but still; we wanted to make sure she understood what it would be like to have a baby in the house. one of the biggest worries i had was that she would feel left out. i know that i would never let that happen, but i can't avoid how she would feel anyway.

one of the ways we had planned to avoid the 'left out' feeling was to dedicate a day each week to only her. whether it was going out for froyo, taking a little day trip to the park, or whatever; we wanted to make sure she knew we still loved her too. when we brought baby home and i was recovering from a cesarean, the wolf stepped in and did all extra curricular activities with bry, volunteered at school, took over some of my PTA roles, and more. what was huge to bry was how much time he spent with her and only her since i was all wrapped up in baby newborn bliss [and not to mention, the cesarean]. but when i could, i gave bry all of me.

there was a particular moment i cherish a lot: i was lying in bed [finally! the cesarean made it difficult for me to be in any position other than upright for two whole weeks!] reading, baby out in the living room with the wolf, and it's mid day. i call for bry to come in and lie next to me. we're lying on the bed and i flip on netflix and put a movie on for us to watch. usually when we are together we get crazy, like farting noises, british accents, farting literally, making fun of the asian nail salons [im so sorry!!] 'ohhhh you pick color. ohhh that color look good on you', and laughing our butts off. so of course, this moment was no different. i cherish this moment the most in those first several months because it was the first time i had with her since baby. and i loved it. i snapped a few photos of our time together [comparing tattoos on one another; hers totally fake of course]:

we know how to party.

thankfully i have been able to spend some quality time with bry like we had planned. once i recovered from the cesarean and i could actually leave the house with out baby, bry and i took our mother daughter time to the outdoors. but honestly my life has been sort of hectic and we don't always get to spend one on one time together as much as i'd hoped. so along with scheduling as much as possible in life, i'm planning on doing the same with my time with bry. 

the beginning of this month we had a big mother daughter day. we left in the early afternoon and didn't get back until evening. it was great being with her and equally great being away from home for so long with out baby. [don't get me wrong; i'm pretty attached to him, but mama need her break too!] it was so amazing to dedicate my time to only her and go out and do girly things. 

how we spent our mother daughter day:

-listening to music that bry chose cause god forbid her mother's taste in music is worth listening to. 

-target dollar section raid; spent under $4.00

-forever21 where we tried on outfits, did a mini fashion runway show in the fitting rooms [while getting weird looks], and got some forever21 accessories; spent under $4.00

-quick stop at a friends guitar shop in the village

-hopped on over to old village grill across from said friend's guitar shop where we ate lunch; spent $0.00 cause my friend bought us lunch.

-headed to the vans store in the outlets and bought two pairs of shoes, one for each of us; spent $15.00 [i had a $40 gift card there from christmas so the total was $55, but only actually spent $15.00]

-window shopped the outlets

-bought bry some neon green fishnet hand gloves at claire's; spent $1.00

we had so much fun! we laughed and talked and she even shared a secret with me about a boy! it was awesome. and... i only spent $25.00! score! since we had so much fun, i thought this would be perfect to schedule in to my month; a mother daughter day. the next one will be the first weekend in april and we plan on going [OMG i can't believe this!] bra shopping. victoria's secret here we come...

should tweens have a cell phone

i never wanted my tween to have a cell phone. her dad got her one all on his own. at first she had a super simple phone that did text and made calls only. then she got upgraded a little bit. then she got upgraded a lot. to a droid. to a fragile {better than mine at the time} phone with internet and facebook and twitter and youtube and apps. to a phone that requires a data plan and needs a screen protector and phone case that is military grade. because lets face it - tweens are irresponsible and should not have a cell phone.

why?

because her phone was dropped.

yup a cracked screen. oh, don't get me wrong; it happens to the best of us. i dropped my phone once and well, the entire screen shattered. the result of carelessly leaving my cell phone in my lap while driving to pick up the wolf and getting out forgetting it was there only to watch it fall {as if it were in slow motion} screen first onto the gravel. but wait, we're not talking about how careless i am with my phone. we're talking about my daughter here.

so hers is the result of letting a friend enter in her number and it being dropped in the process. shes been told time and time again to not let other people handle her phone. she can't even handle it well enough; there's no way i want other people touching it. she dropped it just a few nights before at films with families and it scratched up the case pretty badly. now its completely unusable! which is really fine with me, but her dad has to pay a big ol' deductible to get it fixed so thats a bummer.

but if she didn't have the thing in the first place we wouldn't have this problem!

i have to admit; it is sort of handy to get a hold of her at times. and she doesn't have to use up my phone to talk to her bff at the moment. but aside from the irresponsible handling, the limitless access to the internet and apps are ridiculous! why pay for all that stuff if they can't even use it?! or they shouldn't anyway {she isn't allowed to}. but even so, it's there. for them to take advantage of! that's pretty scary! so many weirdos out there and kids are so impressionable and naive... they'd believe just about anything!  even with parental controls theres only so much you can limit on those darn things anyway.

but, she does have a phone and it does have all of that stuff so what do we do? we monitor it ourselves as much as we can and leave the rest to her to make the decisions. we've explained to her the rules and boundaries and trust she will make the right decisions. so far she hasn't let us down. except for breaking it...

well, there was that one time that one of her friends prank called - oh wait, that was on my phone! hahaha, oh my gosh. ok, story time! one of her friends had prank called my phone. i answered and these kids on the other end were talking funny asking for bry. i asked who it was and they hung up. i shrugged it off. then they called again, and kept calling! so i called them back, told them i was bry's mom. they were like 'oh you must have the wrong number' and hung up on me. so i called back again and tried asking who they were and they were giving me the run around. so then i decided to play a little trick on them, just to scare them a bit. i then proceeded to tell them that if they don't tell me who it was i was going to call the police and file a report. i told them i had their number and the cops could trace it to their exact location and they could get in a lot of trouble for harassment. i also told them that the cops would be talking to their parents. you guys... it was the funniest thing! i was dying holding back laughter and you could totally hear bry and the wolf laughing their asses off in the background. so they quickly gave up who they were and were suuuuuper apologetic. i was dying! so funny. i told them dont ever call my phone again and if they want to talk to bry to just call her and they were like 'im so sorry miss saunders, im so sorry! we wont do it again we promise!' hahaha. punks. {totally prank called my fair share of people back in the day myself so i wasn't even mad}. then when they hung up i felt terrible and had the wolf talk to them at school that monday to apologize to them for me {i would have done it myself but i was pregnant with morning sickness so i was no good to anyone before 10am.}. every thing was cool after that and i felt better, but every now and then when im picking her up from school and i see the kids in the hallway i feel a pang of guilt and also can't help but laugh a little.

ok, anyway, enough about that! so, tell me... do you think tweens should have a cell phone? at what age do you think it is appropriate to let your child have one?

also, did you ever prank call someone? what was your favorite time? what happened?

mama problems

hello there! i am trying to enjoy the last few moments of 'relaxation' before the wolf comes back with the baby. though bry is here and she is driving me up the damn wall. bry is super sensitive and i can never tell if she is being emotional and pissy because she has raging hormones or if something happened to her that day that is setting her off. i am not sure if i can survive much longer with a tween and an infant. i might die of stress. i have been a ticking time bomb for about a week now and have cried at the drop of a hat. yes, i know; i am emotional too. maybe a little over emotional, but usually when something entirely passionate or sad happens. not so much when i have an irritating child or children. for the most part i can tune that stuff out. i seriously feel as though i am going to explode. i NEED A BREAK! last night, when baby was just digging in to my every nerve and emotion and i had said out loud that i was 'done nursing', i almost woke bry up, bundled the kids up, and walked to the grocery store so i could buy some damn formula. then today as we were making our rounds through the baby department in target i stopped in the food isle and just stared at all the wonderful, helpful, amazing, ready formula. oh sure, my boobs already make ready, precious milk; but when I have a damn baby attached to them all of the time making a bottle at 3am doesn't sound so bad. i even texted one of my friends {who tried to nurse, but couldn't and ended up using formula} to ask for advice at 1 in the morning! i felt terrible and she didn't reply because, well; its 1 am and no one in their right mind would be up replying to someone who is searching for answers on how to stop breastfeeding at that time! they'd be sleeping! see, i'm a mess. i think monday i am going to call a lactation consultant and try to figure this all out. i really don't want to quit nursing, but every mama has been here, right? teething, needy baby who is on your boob all the damn time... it's enough to consider quitting before the one year mark {or even before the 8 month mark}and just give the baby formula.

oh and the dr. says he is under weight {3rd percentile for weight for his age} and needs to eat more solid foods. i felt like handing her the baby, giving her some food and saying 'here; you have a crack at it'. i'm sure she would not be amused. but seriously! if she only knew... 

except wouldn't yah know? the day AFTER i cowardly declare i am done nursing and am so entirely stressed out because the kid just does not want to eat anything else... he ends up eating a breakfast, snack, lunch, snack and only nursed ONCE today so far.

JUST SHOOT ME!

please tell me i am not alone.

being 'present'

as a mother of a tween and a baby it is necessary to multi-task. juggling doing the dishes while checking sisters homework and nursing the baby has become the routine in this house. i’ve been multi-tasking since i was a teen; basically when i had my daughter. there were a lot of nights where nursing and doing homework were imperative or i wouldn’t have finished school and my daughter wouldn’t have gotten fed. as my responsibilities grew with work and other activities, it was only natural to take on more tasks while accomplishing other tasks. i’d like to consider myself excellent at multi-tasking…

but recently i have taken a step back and analyzed what i’m missing out when i’m multi-tasking. sadly, it is a lot. though many things are being accomplished {dishes, homework, blogging, tweeting, nursing, etc} i’m not actually ‘present’. it seems as though the attention my children and husband should get from me through out the day has dwindled down to just physically being here. but mentally they need me too! it saddens me deeply to know that i am not fulfilling the needs of my family!

so with this new year i am going to make it a point to approach each task singly. when i do the dishes, i do the dishes and thats it. when i’m helping bry with her homework, i am going to just help her with her homework {not blog, text, IG, etc at the same time}, when i am nursing baby i am going to make it a point to just nurse him, in his nursery, with out distractions. that is one of the things i am most excited about because i miss the mommy and baby connection of just being ‘present’ with him. same with bry! when we hang out and watch a movie, i am putting down the phone and lap top and we are going to snuggle gosh darn it! the multi-tasking will be cut way down and i am going to enjoy my kids, my family, and life! i am going to be more present.

hey, that's your opinion

i’m just going to go right out there and say it. my kids are my kids and i’ll raise them how i see fit. ok? ok! 

i am so sick and tired of other moms telling me how to raise my kids. look, you labored your precious little bean and popped them out all of your own and i labored mine and popped mine out on my own. therefore we each have our own right to raise our own kids. its not like i labored yours and then you popped yours out and visa versa. {but hey, that would be neat, huh?}

we cloth diaper. used to be full time, but now its not at all cause the house is a disaster and i don’t want to add another load of laundry on top of all that i already have to do anyway. but usually its full time. except at night. but some of my mommy friends feel that they need to tell me that cloth diapering is best for baby and do i know how many chemicals there are in disposables and blah blah blah. yes, i know. but look – what may work for you doesn’t work for me. i appreciate your input, but please don’t put me and my parenting choices down. 

we give our baby organic puree pouches. oh my god, call the presses! she doesn’t use table foods. actually, we do that too, thank you. i’m sorry, but i don’t eat super plain, safe for baby’s tummy foods all the time so we give him purees. which, by the way, he doesn’t want real food half the time. oh no! do you think he is going to be too small? >gasp!< you don’t know how much flack i get for feeding my baby organic puree food from a pouch. look, if i can pronounce the ingredients and there are less than 5, i’m good. and if it’s organic, i’m even better. besides; my baby will let me know when he is ready for food – table or from a pouch. 

we co-sleep. oh no, im going to have an insecure mama’s boy. puhhlease! i co-slept with my daughter for almost 4 years! she’s 11 now and half the time she can’t get rid of me enough. and just to let you know, we do put him in his crib the first part of the night anyway now. well how horrible of you to not want to sleep with your baby! goodness gracious mama’s make up your damn minds! my baby is not going to be insecure and have separation problems because he slept in bed with me for a couple years. and he isn’t going to feel abandoned and lonely if i put him to bed in his own crib each night, either. do what you do and i’ll do what i do. 

we practice attachment parenting, but you let your baby cry himself to sleep? uhhhh, yes. if i didn’t he would sleep in my arms all day long and i wouldn’t be able to sit here and bitch about your opinions and how they dont really mean much to me. seriously though; i run an etsy business and until i can figure out how to cut, sew, finish, and package with no arms then i’ll let him sleep in my arms all damn day long. but don’t get me wrong – we get a lot of snuggle time, play time, baby-wearing time in. i just don’t have all the time in the day to not let him cry himself to sleep {which is only in like 3 minutes most times anyway}. 

yes, these are all things i have heard from friends who have told me that what i am doing is wrong, not right, ruining my childs life. look; i would understand if i popped online and was like ‘hey mamas; i need some suggestions or advice about this or that’ and you offered what works for you or whatever. but most of the time i’m not. i post our life and what we do as a family and i am not asking for your opinion. i don’t sit and troll your facebook for posts that i can correct you on and give you my opinion and beat you down, don’t do it to me. 

parenting is about giving your children the best life that you can with what you have and know and loving them with your whole being. it’s not about that organic cotton swaddle blanket or all natural organic fruit snack or the amount of time you ‘wear’ him through out the day. and i know that just because i didn’t give him the hyland’s brand whatever doesn’t mean he is going to grow up screwed up.