The Queen's Rambles

We’re here and mostly alive. My dear son might get himself skinned if he keeps being a pill. I know it is not his fault. His world is in upheaval, his grandma left, I can’t be the mommy to him I used to be. Yadda yadda yadda. That doesn’t make it any easier when he refuses to do what I ask him to do. I get so tired of doing a whole big song and dance complete with every available psychological trick in the book just to get him to put his shoes on (or brush his teeth, or put clothes on, or whatever simple task needs to be completed). We had a “moment” yesterday. After I threw a fit in his general direction and he cried and told me I was making him sad, we sat down and cuddled. We talked about how mommy is tired and needs him to do what I ask instead of fighting me. He agreed. We stood up, I asked him to put his shirt on, he ran away screaming.

He will become cooperative one day, won’t he? Ten years from now I doubt he’ll be running around my house, naked.

I hope.

Ewwwwwww.

Three weeks postpartum and my feet are still swollen and sore. It’s getting old. Even better, I woke up this morning with a bright red rash over the tops of my feet. I suppose I should go to the doctor, but which doctor? OB? Primary care? Derm? I don’t even know. If I go, I will have to do a bunch of explaining about our new insurance. We just switched over to an HSA, whatever that is, and don’t yet have our new numbers so we are just supposed to ask the doctors to work with us till our numbers arrive in a couple of weeks. I don’t want to ask for anything. I hate complicated. Bah!

We are missing my mom, of course. It was so nice to have someone take care of Erik and do a lot of the little things that we didn’t want to do. Real life kind of sucks sometimes, you know? At least I still have Mike here for three weeks. It is going to be a major shock to my system when he goes back to work and it will just be me and the kids. I might cry.

My poor mom had a horrible trip back to Oregon thanks to United Airlines. The door on her plane wouldn’t close, so they had to sit on the tarmac for over an hour. The flight crew kept announcing updates for people making connections to New Zealand but were really rude and wouldn’t help anyone else. When they landed they even told one guy they were going to arrest him if he didn’t fasten his seat belt (they were just taxing up to the gate–yes, you are supposed to have your seat belt on, but you know everyone undoes it after the plane lands). It wasn’t like the guy was arguing. Their first threat out of the box was arrest. I’ve never heard my mom so worked up over customer service. It didn’t help that they lost her luggage and didn’t find it until this morning.

Anyway, thanks to the flight delay she missed her flight back to my hometown. They couldn’t rebook her until the next day at 8 pm, which was not acceptable to her. I would have loved to hang out in San Francisco for a day, but that is not my mom’s style. She finally talked them into sending her to Medford, a town about an hour from our hometown. She was planning on renting a car, but a guy in line said he would drive her home.

She is such a funny lady.

She is convinced our neighbors are terrorists and we are going to be murdered by a crazy person. Then she accepts a ride from a total stranger? What the hell?

I’m very glad she wasn’t murdered. In fact, the guy turned out to be really nice and wouldn’t even take gas money. It’s a small town and they knew several of the same people, but she didn’t know that when she accepted the ride.

I guess I’m not one to talk. Most people wouldn’t invite an internet stranger to their house, but I’ve done that several times. I even married one. Not that he was still an internet stranger when I married him, but there was that first meeting when I had to have faith that he wouldn’t inject Windex into my veins and carve out my liver.

The cloth diapering is going better. I know you all wanted to know that. I’ve figured out I need to put the stuffing more toward the back of the diaper instead of the front. Kind of a DUH! moment, but I’m not used to little girls. It also helps that she’s getting bigger, plus I guess absorbency improves with each wash.

So far I like FuzziBunz and Rumparooz. I hate GoodMama Ones and KnickerNappies.

And now I hear someone grunting like a pig, so I better go.