I am not the only one that going through some major changes.  People all over the place are going through changes.  Heck, even Maks is going through some changes too.  So when I saw that Sprites Keeper made this weeks Spin all about change I had to weigh in.  But I don’t want this post to be about the lay offs, suspensions, unsurity and worries that change is causing me.  I’ll let you in on some of the changes that Maks is going through. 

First, there’s the bed issue.  I am not talking about a sleep number bed or anything, I am talking about his transition from crib to bed.  Maks sleeps in a cot at daycare and he does really well in it.  So that being said I think that he’s ready to be put into a toddler bed at home.  He has a convertible crib so all we (by we I mean Millhouse) has to do is convert it from a crib to a bed.  No new furniture needs to be purchased or anything.  I might get him some Mater sheets or something but other than that his ‘new’ bed would be his old crib.  Millhouse isn’t too keen on this idea.  He thinks that if Maks isn’t in a crib he will never go to sleep.  Because Maks is awake when we put him down he usually plays in his crib for a bit before going to bed.  Millhouse thinks that because of this that Maks will not stay in bed when we put him down.  He thinks that 10 seconds after we put Maks down he will come sauntering out of his room to watch CSI.  I don’t think so.  I think that once he knows that its bedtime and that he has to stay in his room at bedtime (which he knows already) and he will be fine.  So I am thinking that this weekend we are going to have a test run on bedtime.  We will just take one side off the crib (making it into a day bed) and see how Maks does.

Another big change coming for Maks is his daycare.  He is moving from one toddler room into another, due to space issues his toddler class is being converted into a preschool room and the toddlers in his class now are being divided into new classes.  He has about 6 of classmates going with him so I am not worried about the friend factor.  But I am concerned because he is going into a smaller room with different teachers.  This means that the potty training has to start all over again in a new room, plus he has to get used to new teaching methods with very different teachers.  This is what worries me.  Maks loves his teachers now and he is going to some serious issues with leaving them.  I know that kids are adaptable and in about a week he will be fine, but having his new teacher tell me stories about how Maks tries to escape to his old room whenever he gets a chance makes me feel for the kid.

And the last change is a girl!!  Maks is being reunited with Miranda.  For those of you that don’t know who Miranda is, she was Maks first love.  They connected when they were both in the infant room.  I had many a parent / teacher meetings concerning their relationship.  They liked to wander off together holding hands and hugging in the corner.  They were both 14 months at the time!!  Unfortunately they ended their relationship when Maks moved onto the toddler room and Miranda had to stay behind in the infant room.  But now that they are in the same room again, I am not sure if they are going to rekindle their romance but given that they have both matured in their time apart, it will be interesting to see how they interact with one another. 

In short, my kid is growing up and sometimes it hits me really hard that the baby I brought home 21 months ago now answers back and has his own opinions about things.  I don’t know when that happened but I wish I had the power to stop time because whoever controls time just sped things up on me.

The last week at work has been crazy.  I don’t deny that I tend to slack off at work but today even I had to stop my system memory browsing because we had some huge drama.  At around 4pm today my entire department was called into the boardroom for very important meeting.  I was certain that we were all being laid off.  I was shaking and freaking out.  Turns out that the people in the meeting were not being let go but people had been let go.  8 people were suspended because they had been misusing company funds.  Between the lay offs last week and the suspensions today we have let go over 45 people. 

That’s shocking and I’m scared.  I used to think that I had the safest job in the world but I don’t feel that way anymore. 

I know that I can’t control change but I really wish that things would go back to how they were.

OK I know that I have been babbling on and on about babies for the last little bit.  I know that I have been flip flopping about whether or not I am ready or even want another baby right now and to be perfectly honest it is driving me insane.  Right now it feels like I am completely surrounded by pregnant women.  Wherever I go they are there, waving their bellies in my face (figuratively not literally.  Literally would be weird.).  There’s only one at the office right now but I swear she’s following me.  Whenever I get up from my desk to go anywhere she’s right there rubbing her tummy.  My cousin is expecting, my former BFF is expecting, people whose blogs I love to read are expecting.  They’re all over Facebook.  And it seems like even strangers are knocked up, Nicole Ritchie is expecting her second child for goodness sake.  They’re everywhere!  Now I am extremely happy for these people.  Babies are great.  I love my son completely and totally but there is something missing.

Because I am so damn controlling organized.  I made a list of the pros and cons of having another child (and yes you have probably seen this before on this blog somewhere but it is because it is forever on my mind) but even with the good and the bad laid out right in front of me I can’t make a decision.  Here’s my list.

Cost – one baby in daycare uses up half my paycheck.  (Yes, I know I work for peanuts and my daycare is robbing me.)  But if we are stretched with one baby in daycare having two in daycare may force me to start delivering newspapers or pizzas.

My Love – I love my baby with every fiber of my being even when he flushes my toothbrush down the toilet or draws a mural on the closet wall.  I love him so much that I have been known to break down in tears when I am late picking him up from the daycare because I know I am missing out on time spent with him.  He is my everything (as sappy as that sounds) and I don’t know if I can love another child as much as I love him.

Maks’ Love – Maks is a mama’s boy.  He loves everyone else in his life but his number one (for now) is mommy.  I would be lying if I said that this bothered me.  I love the love that I get from him.  But there are times when all that affection causes problems.  There are times that he will flatly refuse to have anything to do with Millhouse.  Sometimes crying until he throws up because he is that angry/upset/cranky and he doesn’t want his daddy.  I am not sure if he is ready for a sibling to share his mommy yet.

Millhouse – Millhouse wants to have another baby.  Actually Millhouse wants to have another 2 babies before he turns 30.  Since he turns 30 next year (yes, I am older) that would mean two babies in two years and that’s not going to happen so he is going to have to settle for one…maybe.  He says that he is ready and that he will be able to help me with two kids.  But I am not sure if he is.  Two babies are a lot of work and there are times when he gets defeated with just one.

Sleep (or lack thereof) – we sleep in batches.  Sometimes we are lucky to get 6 hours in a row and sometimes we have to make do with 3 in a row.  With a newborn we will have to forfeit the 6 hours for about another year.  I don’t know if my body can handle that.

Me – I want another baby.  I have always wanted my kids to be close in age.  Beanz and I are 18 months apart and I want my children to have the kind of relationship that we have.  Millhouse and my BIL are 10 years apart and the relationship that they have more closely resembles that of an older uncle and a nephew than brothers.  The gap between the ages makes a huge difference.  Ideally I wanted my kids to be 2 years apart but with Maks’ second birthday about three months away, that is not going to happen but to me three years apart seems like such a big number.

Can you see my dilemma??  So I am throwing it out there internets help me make my way through this muddle.  How do you know when you a ready for baby #2??   

Oh dear internets how I’ve missed thee.  Let’s never fight again.  I promise to stop neglecting you like a do.  To commemorate my return to the world of blogging lets have some hormone fueled randomness shall we.  This is all thanks to Keely over at the un-mom.

©       The ‘Slumdog’ kids were cute.  They looked really excited to be there and I am glad that they won.

©       The inventor of Midol should have been given a really big prize, like a lifetime supply of cookies or a house made out of chocolate covered marshmallows or something.  Midol is the greatest thing known to man.  Yes I said man because without it there would be a lot of women (me front and centre) curled under their desk in the fetal position, rocking back and forth singing show tunes.  And as amusing as that would be fellas it would eventually translate into men everywhere having to pick up the slack.  So every month for 5 to 7 days you should be grateful to the inventor of Midol because things could be a lot worse.

©       I survived childbirth pretty much unscathed.  My threshold for pain is pretty good.  I have a couple tattoos (that I didn’t cry as they were being done) and I pierced my own belly button (twice) so I would say that I am one tough cookie.  But if I get an eyelash in my eye it’s all over.  I am completely useless until I get it out.  For some reason those suckers hurt way more than childbirth.

©       Today’s pancake Tuesday.  I don’t know who nominated today to be the day of the pancake.  But I love them.  Dedicating a day to those flat fried dough things that you can cover in any kind of syrup and eat them with lots and lots of bacon and / or sausages is my kind of holiday.  Now if only we can make it a stat holiday so we can stay home and eat them in our pajamas that would be even better because eating them in pajamas at work violates the dress code.

©       I think make up in the store is so pretty.  The fancy packaging, the pretty models all dolled up, and the promise that you can look like them gets me every time.  I always end up getting sucked into buying all kinds of stuff; bronzers, glosses, mascara with vibrating brushes.  But when I bring it home the excitement is gone and I don’t bother wearing it.  I don’t think that I’ve worn make up sine my wedding day, unless you count Chap Stick.  Does that make me the anti – girl?

Dear Aunt Flo

Oh, how I despise thee! Let me count the ways. Before you showed up my life was so much simpler. But thanks to you every month for 4 to 7 days I experience pure agony.

1. You remind me that once again, my uterus is empty. Thanks for the reminder that I am still baby – less and that Maks will continue to be without a younger sibling for another month. Thanks ever so much for that.
2. You bring with you debilitating cramps that could cripple a wooly mammoth. I ache not only in my mid section but down my legs to my ankles. For five days I live solely on Midol while wrapped in hot water bottles. Thanks ever so much for that.
3. You turn my face into surface of Mars. I am covered in craters and bumps. Some so red and painful that it hurts to lay my face on the pillow. My face reverts to what it was during the height of puberty when no over the counter medication could help me and I wished that I could crawl into a cave. Thanks ever so much for that.
4. You screw around with my body temperature so I live in a confused state not knowing what to wear. One minute I am freezing with chattering teeth and losing feeling in my toes. To being so hot that I am sweating in the shower. Thanks ever so much for that.
5. You bring on cravings that I didn’t even experience during pregnancy. Because of you I want to eat anything and everything I can get my hands on. I have no self control during my ice cream binges but I do have plenty of guilt afterwards. Thanks ever so much for that.

I really can’t stand you but from what I have read in biology textbooks you are going to be around for the next 30 years or so. So I propose a truce. I stop cussing you and you take it easy on me.

Nah, that’s not going to work. I can see that you are going to keep being a bitch and I am going to have to put up with it. So bring it on, I got my Midol.

So may the best chick win. And in case you didn’t know that would be me.

Kind Regards,
Cranky

I know that this was supposed to be done on Tuesday but Valentines and Family Day threw me off.  I have been running a day behind all week, so technically this is random thought Wednesday.

I had a chocolate fondue party without a fondue pot, fancy forks or special chocolate with the kids for Valentines.  I let them dunk whatever they wanted into bowls of melted chocolate and they thoroughly enjoyed themselves.  Mind you their choice dipping tool was their fingers and by the end of it I wished I had had the party in the bathtub for easy clean up but it was still fun. 

Spent family day at an indoor water park.  It wasn’t Great Wolf Lodge but it came close.  The place was jammed and Stinky and I had to circle the perimeter of the wave pool three times before we found a spot to put our stuff but it was worth it.  The kids had a blast and it beat away the winter blahs…….at least until we had to walk outside to the car.  (Mini rant within a random thought:  Thank you provincial government for deciding that we need a long weekend in the middle of winter NOT in June.  Because lord knows that there are countless FREE outdoor activities that one can partake in during the summer but in February we are limited to tourist attractions and the museum.  And if you have ever seen a rambunctious toddler in a room filled with priceless artifacts you would know why I don’t go to the museum.  End rant.) 

It’s snowing AGAIN!!  When will this winter end?  It feels like it has been dragging on since the age of the dinosaurs.  I’m sick of winter boots, parkas, toques and shoveling.  OK I don’t shovel but Millhouse is tired of shoveling and I am tired of watching him.

I refuse to eat any kind of nuts.  Doesn’t matter what kind they are, even if they are covered in chocolate or buried in ice cream, I refuse to eat it.  But I just had some hickory smoked almonds and they were pretty good.  Almonds covered in salt and flavourings aren’t really nuts right??

I was randomly going through baby names (Wha?  I told you I am suffering from baby envy) and I haven’t found any I like.  So hypothetically if I have a child tomorrow his or her name would be Baby X or some annoyingly sweet rhyme like Zaks

Ever since I started paying attention to the things that I actually say to my son, I am amazed at the level of strangeness that I have been spewing.  And yes I did say “Vaseline does not go on the banana” this morning.  Maks was on the couch eating a banana as I ran around frantically searching for matching socks and pants that weren’t stained got ready for work, his dad was in the kitchen packing up my lunch and Maks’ sippy cup for daycare.  Neither of us was too worried, Imagination Movers was on; he would be hypnotized for exactly 21 minutes.*

Or so we thought.

At some point between me accusing Millhouse of hiding my hairbrush and Millhouse searching for tupper ware all the getting ready Maks got bored and decided to play with the Vaseline.  Now for those of you that don’t know, Maks LOVES Vaseline.  He has some weird fixation on Vaseline and if he is left to his own devises he would have no toys but a lot of jars of Vaseline.  I think he likes the smushiness because I am forever finding him squishing it between his fingers and certain times his toes.  OK tangent over back to the story.  So Maks wondered over to the Vaseline jar that his dad left within reach and decided to see what would happen if he combined banana and the worlds best selling petroleum jelly.  Yep, he smashed them together into a jellified banana mess.

Then. . . .

He smushed his concoction into his hair and all over his daycare clothes.  When Millhouse finished in the kitchen and went to put on Maks’ shoes he got a big surprise.  Maks was a slippery, sticky mess and his dad was not pleased.  We had to strip him down, clean him up and get him dressed all over again.  Good thing we didn’t sleep in this morning or else we would have been royally screwed.

That was my morning, how was yours?

*Just a disclaimer – no my child does not sit unsupervised on the couch for 21 minutes.  The longest we leave him to his own devises is about 5 minutes.  But the bugger is quick and he can get into a boat load of trouble in about 3 seconds.

I’ve never considered myself an adult; in fact I think that I am pretty far from being an adult. But today reality slapped me in the face and made me realize that at some point in my life, I grew up and I got a whole lot riding on my shoulders.

The company that I’ve worked at for the past five years has announced lay offs today. I wasn’t one of the people let go but there were people in my department let go and the scary part is they are not sure if this will be the end of it. They let go of people that had more seniority than me but unfortunately had lost their clients for whatever reasons. People who have given their all to this company were let go. They worked long hours and weekends. They pretty much dedicated their life to this organization and as of the 27th they have to leave for good.

It’s scary to think that I don’t have any guarantees with this company even after all that I’ve put in. This time next month (when the next wave of cuts sweep through) I could be let go. If that happened what would happen to my family. Millhouse is in charge of the majority of the bills but I know that my contribution does help. Me not having a job could mean that we lose our house, that we lose our savings and that we lose our security. I never thought about these things until today. I never thought that this ‘economic crisis’ would effect me. I thought we were safe. I thought that the recession was just something that the news reported on and economists preached about. I never thought that it would hit me.

It did. And I am scared.

It is a harsh way to find out that you are an adult.

Yesterday I was giving Maks a bath and when he was good and soapy he decided that he was going to blow this pop stand and hop out of the bathtub.  Now normally this isn’t a problem.  He is quite good at jumping in and out of the tub.  He is tall and the tub is short.  It is not a problem.  But if you throw in me trying to rinse him off, him trying to squirm out of my grasp and a lot of soap and water you have a very slippery situation.  So the inevitable happened and he slipped.  I dove towards him like a short stop as he was falling head first towards the tile.  And I managed to swoop in and save him.

OK it didn’t really happen like that.  What happened was – I dreamt that the above was happening and the part where I swooped in to save him, I didn’t really save him, I just assaulted Millhouse instead.  In my sleep I dove halfway over my husband, smacked him in the head because his head felt like a towel that was in my way and stuck my knee into my stomach as I braced myself to catch my slippery child.

Yeah, Millhouse not impressed and now he’s bruised.  I bet my husband wishes that I would just have normal dreams. 

In my head I have compartmentalized my family.  I am the COO – the one responsible for the actual smooth running of the family and home.  I work the vacuum and know where the toilet paper is.  Millhouse is the CFO – he’s in charge of the bucks.  I am quite capable of being in charge of the money, just like Millhouse is capable of running the house but there are little things that I am sure that we would miss if we did each others jobs.  Millhouse wouldn’t clean the lint trap in the dryer and I would buy way more shoes.  So this division of responsibility works for us.  Now Maks, he is the CEO.  No matter how much we like to think that we are in charge, he is the one that runs the show.  He determines what we do, when we do it and how much we spend.  I have come to recognize this.  But as of late there has been some struggles for control.

Maks and Millhouse are struggling for control and it looks like Millhouse is losing his grip.  Millhouse has slight OCD.  Before Maks he would forever be rearranging the mugs so that their handles faced a certain direction, fixing the toilet paper so it fell under not over, that kind of stuff.  But with the birth of Maks all that stuff tapered off.  But now that Maks is almost 2, Millhouse is started to revert back to his old ways.  Maks doesn’t like this.  So he is rebelling and this isn’t sitting well with Millhouse.

Personally my money is on Maks because I don’t think that Millhouse will get him to play “neatly” anytime soon.  But they are fun to watch as I research treadmills.