Doom

I was starting to feel like normal was a little closer. I had a couple okay days in a row. Today's another low, grey day. I feel like I'm suffering in silence even though I know there's people who care. I cried most of the morning for no apparent reason. Thinking of talking to someone about how I was feeling made me cry. I don't want to accept that there's something wrong. And it feels like my fault. I can't handle life with 3 kids even though I wanted 3. I did this to myself.

Hello? Hello?? Are you there? Hello??

Craig clipped our phone line. By mistake. The main line coming into the house. Dammit.

Hello?

Unscrewed

Shaun, we're going to be late. Stop worrying about the lego and go get your snow stuff on for school.
I'm going, I'm going!

I rumaged through my coat pockets for the third time searching for my keys. I always put them in the left pocket of my coat or in my purse. The last time I drove the van I didn't have my purse so why aren't they in my coat? Oh well, I haven't time to search any longer.

I grabbed Craig's set and Shaun and I flew out the door. Only once I tried to jam Craig's key into the ignition did I find my set of keys. Still in the ignition from yesterday. Good thing we live in a great neighbourhood.

How much further can my head come unscrewed before it falls off completely?

'Tis the Season

I moaned and complained through Shaun's and Ian's pregnancies because I was pregnant for the whole summer. I particularly remember the summer Shaun was born as having the hottest June on record. I even blogged about it. I was so excited to finally be pregnant in a different season and have all the cozy little outfits to stick Kyle in. Cold and flu season was briefly considered but I brushed off the thought because I obsessively wash my hands since they're either in dish water all day or rinsing washcloths to wipe sticky hands and faces.

Seems all my handwashing and sanitizing wasn't enough. Kyle's been fighting wicked congestion for weeks and Ian hasn't been himself since, oh, January. Seriously. The screaming he's been doing lately is downright awful and very nearly sent me over the edge this afternoon. All because of a stuffy nose. He looks like death though because he refuses to sleep and once he finally does fall asleep he's awake within an hour, screaming again. No amount of drugs are keeping him even satiated. I'm ready to sell him. Or better yet, stick him on the side of the road and have someone pick him up. I'd even put him out there without shoes. Yeah, someone would be sure to pick him up even quicker if he didn't have shoes on.

Seven Years

Because Craig and I are anything but unique, we were married Valentines Day weekend seven years ago. Hard to believe it's been 7 years! Every aniversary we celebrate with dinner somewhere way too fancy and way too expensive for our plain-jane selves. This anniversary was no exception.

We ate at Verses which is an old church that has been converted to a restaurant but the owners kept a lot of the original details like the wood floors, the chandeliers and stained-glass. Some of the old pews are even harvest tables in the middle of the main dining room.

We ate on the balcony and had a stunning view of the dining room below. The service was beyond anything we've experienced and it was so nice to be completely pampered. We chuckled the most at the special little comb our server used to brush the crumbs off the table after our main course and before dessert was brought to us. I wonder what a comb like that goes for?

Craig had:

Course One: Soup Minestrone served with pesto creme fraiche and parmesan tuille.

Course Two: Seafood Crispy filo cup filled with chardonnay poached shrimp, scallops and Alaskan king crab gently simmered in a lemon cream sauce.

Course Three: Veal Grilled Delft Blue milk fed veal striploin steak served with east coast lobster rissotto, buttered rapini, blistered vine ripe cherry tomatoes and tarragon compound butter.

Course Four: Chocolate Pistachio Semi Freddo Semi frozen, layered Grand Marnier soaked Genoisse, chocolate pistachio ganache and vanilla ice cream glazed dark chocolate. Served with berry coulis.

I enjoyed:

Course One: Blackened Brie Salad Baby greens topped with apples, celery and candied black walnuts in a creamy cider dressing.

Course Two: Smoked Duck Crepe Strips of smoked duck breast and shredded duck confit glazed with Hoisin sauce rolled into a crepe cornet with julienne vegetables. Served with an ume plum vinegar dressed nappa, snap pea, and pea tendril slaw.

Course Three: Fish Icy Waters' Arctic char fillet pan seared and served with multigrainpancakes, oven roasted salsify, chive butter sauce with reducedbirch syrup and an argula, tatsoi and citrus supreme salad.

Course Four: Passion Fruit Lemon Tart Velvety white chocolate and passion fruit mousse layered over tart lemon curd in a crispy stoneground cornmeal sweet pastry.

Forward Line

We have formed our forward line for the hockey team.

Mum and Dad are still working on the defense.

One Month Old

Here he is. One month old. I can't believe Kyle's already a month old and in the same breath I feel like it's been ages since I was pregnant. My past life seems like an eternity ago.

The saddest part for me at seeing his first smile is the reality that this is the very last time I'm going to see a first smile from one of my children. Now everytime he does something for the first time it's going to be the last time I'm able to witness that in my kids. Makes me tear up just thinking about it.

A Brave Face

This post is really difficult and I'm not entirely convinced I should be doing it but it's a first step of many to make life for me and my family better.

I accessed a counsellor yesterday through Craig's Employee Assistance Program. I'm just feeling completely overwhelmed. I'm anxious and agitated over everything and can't seem to find any stable ground to get my bearings on. I don't know if it's still because I'm in the post partum period or if it's because I'm genuinely stretched to my max. I feel like everyone is waiting for me to drop all these balls I'm juggling and balancing and that's why this is so difficult to come out and post.

I don't fail. At anything.

Dropping even one ball would be a catastrophic failure in my eyes. I'm still coming to terms with the fact that I even reached out to someone beyond myself for help.

I don't do that. Ever.

But I know in order to get past this place where I feel like I'm stuck, I have to accept that not everything is in my control. And a ball drops.

Glow Worm

Do you remember those Fischer Price Glow Worms from back in the day? My friend had one and I was oh, so jealous that I didn't. Well, now I do. It seems that Kyle sleeps best when he's wrapped up extra tightly in a blanket but not so tight that his feet are wrapped too. More like a buritto. We've started calling him a Glow Worm. Partly because of how much he was glowing orange only a couple of weeks ago and also because he really does resemble a Glow Worm from the 80s.

Adjustments

We're doing well. I think if I said that life was hectic it would be the biggest understatement of 2010. I'm lucky to be able to grab 15 minutes a day at the computer and have the use of both my hands at the same time. I feel like I've fallen behind on everything: laundry, dishes, playing with Shaun and Ian, regular baths for the kids (and myself for that matter!), keeping up with friends via email, even the cats are lucky to get fed by me. At least they still get their morning and late night meals from Craig. Otherwise they would have whithered away by now and I probably would be wondering what the terrible smell was and thinking it had been a while since I'd seen them.

But this is wonderful. I love how busy this house is. Not that it wasn't before, it's just moreso now. I find so much joy in watching Shaun and Ian interacting with Kyle. They give him little tiny kisses on the top of his head or rock him ever so gently in the swing. Shaun gets so excited when he's holding Kyle and Kyle's looking right at him. Ian peeks over the side of the playpen to catch a peek at Kyle in the bassinet when he comes down from his nap or if Kyle is starting to cry. For the mostpart things have stabilized here. I'm getting to know Kyle's routine better and I can recognize his type of cry most of the time. That's been making it a lot easier to help him out and comfort him.

Unfortunately, Shaun's been acting out at school quite a bit over the past couple of weeks. It wasn't an issue until last Monday when his teacher mentioned to me when I picked him up that Shaun had been quite snippy with his classmates that day and it had sort of been an ongoing thing. She acknowledged that there's been quite the transition at home but to me that doesn't excuse him being snippy and snarky with his friends and especially his teacher. Plus, it's not like Shaun hasn't done this whole new baby thing before. He was great after Ian arrived so I can't quite figure out where this new attitude is coming from. Actually, no, that's not true.

I think it's come from me. I'm naturally quite sharp with people and basically tell it like it is. These days I don't have time to sit and mess around with Shaun when it's time to do something or go somewhere. I have 2 other children who are far more needy than him who need my help so I've been, well, snippy with him. I can't even think of any specific examples but I know the attitude has come from me. He's been a little snarky with us here too and as soon as I've seen that side of him come out, I recognize myself immediately. So what sort of a solution have we come to as far as his behaviour?

Friday night Craig and I sat with Shaun and had a very long discussion with him about his behaviour, asking him how he thought it made his friends feel and his teacher feel (Oh! I forgot to add that last Friday is when the shit his the fan. He called his teacher a dufus. She told Craig and was quite upset. Craig made Shaun apologize on the spot and then Craig and I pow-wowd and spoke with Shaun Friday night.). For the most part he seemed to 'get it' but he was still being snippy with us so he got grounded from all his nighttime buddies for the whole weekend. Three sleeps. That's a very long time for a kid who makes it sound like he's DYING in the middle of the night if he wakes up and his favourite bear, Ted, has fallen out of bed.

For the most part he did okay, only waking up once the first night and coming into our room for some hugs. The second night he was a lot more dramatic at bedtime and then again in the middle of the night when he woke up without Ted. We didn't budge on the grounding so when the third night arrived, he was a little weepy at bedtime but went to sleep without as much as a fuss and slept the whole night through.

Today when I picked Shaun up from school I asked his teacher how his day went. The deal was that Shaun would get Ted back for bed tonight only if he had a better day today. She hesitated when I asked her how it went today. I didn't get too much out of her because she wasn't wearing a coat and it was bloody freezing outside so we couldn't chat long but basically she said he went from one extreme to the other. From being so snarky with his classmates last week, today he was so polite with everyone it was almost annoying. She said he was exaggerating all of his Thank You's and Please's and saying them very loudly. I figure he was making sure she heard him being kind and polite with everyone because he knew I was going to ask her at pick-up. Hopefully he can come to some sort of comfortable place within himself where he can be back to being the polite little man he's always been.

Maybe it's just because I'm Shaun's mum but it actually kind of bothers me that Mrs. McNaughton said that Shaun's exaggerated politeness was annoying. What does she want?!

So anyway, I've made it my mission to practice what I preach and made every effort to be patient and kind to Shaun today. It certainly made a difference in how his morning went so hopefully we're on the right track. I don't know what else we can do if his behaviour keeps up!