I am mommy

I am not a babysitter, a childcare worker, or a nanny
I carry a diaper bag not a purse
I live in a home filled with toys and stain guarded carpet, not an Ikea catalogue
I use a train table for a coffee table
and drink from plastic cups, not glasses
I answer to no one, not Barney, not Thomas, not Dora
I follow no rules and adhere to no schedule (except nap time)
I go to the park not the mall
and eat Cheerios and highchair left overs for lunch
I don't know where the potty is
...but we'll just pee right here in the parking lot
I own a mini-van not a Honda civic
and it comes fully loaded with diapers, wipes and snacks
Its called a sucky not a binky or a pacifier
And that smell, its Penaten
My shirts are stained, my hair is dirty
and I own 12 pairs of black yoga pants
I cook macaroni and cheese because that's what my kids like
I push strollers
I hold hands
I sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star
and that is his indoor voice
I breastfeed, wipe bums and check my email
all at the same time
I kiss boo boos, I check for monsters
and yes we will have a time out in the grocery store
We say penis and vagina, not wiener or bun
I have read Good Night Moon 11,329 times
now its 11,330
I will proudly feed my baby where ever I want
and it won't be in a public washroom
No I won't cover up and yes you can see my stretch marks
My kids are not angels but
I reserve the right to tell you all the cute things they say
in a baby voice
I will count to 3
and I will use my grumpy words
I finish sentences with, "because I said so"
and "I'll wait for manners"
I can stop a whine with a look
I recognize the dangers in silence
and will discipline your child if the situation arises
I go to bed at 9:00 but don't go to sleep until 9:30
and I always remember to turn the baby monitor back on after sex
I appreciate the appeal of a nice pair of cotton panties
and will never go bra-less again
I was not born into motherhood but I'm really starting to like it
to one little girl and one little boy I am everything
to them
I am Mommy.

all I really need to know I learned while potty training

He's potty trained.

I've come through the other side.

Everyone is alive and accounted for. There may or may not be a red wine shortage in Southern Ontario that I may or may not be responsible for. And it is a good possibility that my son has learned how to use the word 'shit'. Not in the context of poop but 'shit' as in, 'shit I just dropped the potty bowl full of pee all over the kitchen floor.' I always thought I would encourage my children to expand their vocabularies whenever possible and am happy to see that some of my parenting goals have come to fruition.

Now that the dust has cleared and I don't hate my life anymore, I'm reflecting on this little milestone in the hopes of helping others who find themselves in the potty predicament. Because potty training almost kicked my ass, until I looked it in the eye, cussed it out, distracted it with my boobs and then punched it in the ear and ran away. After being roughed up a bit, potty training started to see it my way and we pretty much got along after that. That's when things really started to improve.

And during the whole experience did I swear and stomp and take out my frustrations on my husband? Yes, I did. But after I was done compensating my husband for my bad behaviour (which is a win win situation because I love kissing and kissing while smelling like your own child's urine is not as appalling as you would think) I re-evaluated my potty training experience and have come to the realization that I am wiser for it and that there are some real life lessons to be learned here.

Whenever possible let someone else do the dirty work. If you can swing it let your child's Childcare do it. I am not being funny or sarcastic, I am being so serious, I have a very serious face on. I am looking at you seriously. These people are trained professionals and are probably incarnated saints or Buddhist monks with the patience they have. Patience that I do not have after throwing away the sixth pair of poop filled size 3 briefs because I just could not deal with it. One pair was so bad I burst into tears and had to lie and say I stubbed my toe. It was that bad. And again with the corn. It would appear that I feed my son inordinate amounts of corn. I do not. But there it is none the less. Oh and if you decide to go this route you better be slipping that Childcare professional an envelope filled with like $50,000 and even then you probably are being cheap.

The best quality time is spent in small confined spaces. Possibly while one of you is on the toilet. I've known this a long time as I can read a mean story while sitting on the toilet, captivating audiences for minutes at a time. My toilet rendition of Sandra Boynton's Barnyard Dance, is brilliant and has garnered international rave reviews. I think there was even a write up in the Village Voice. So while potty training, Monkeybone and I really had some deep conversations. For example I've learned that I am in fact his best girl, that he really likes the 'spicy crackers' (cracked pepper and olive oil Triscuits) we had for snack a couple of days ago, he aspires to see a snake and ride a train, sometimes his penis tickles when he pees and that he enjoys pooping. Thank you potty training for strengthening that mommy-son bond.

Know when to let go. I'm talking about underwear here. When first potty training your child, their underwear may resemble an accident scene, skid marks everywhere. Consider yourself warned. Sometimes you just have to cut your losses and throw them away. I would advise you to buy like 378 pairs of little underwear and budget to throw about 300 of them out. Its just easier that way. I did have to take a part time job to finance this decision but I think it was really worth it in the end.

Always be prepared and plan for setbacks. When you decide to potty train your child if you are not stocked with at least 50 cases of paper towels you are fucking delusional. I am just trying to be real here. And that is a conservative estimate. Mother Earth and I have made our peace and she is understanding, after all she is a mother herself but to not be a total ass you better compensate for your mass paper towel consumption by being extra vigilant with recycling and composting, walk instead of drive or at the very least kiss your lawn or hug a tree (lawns and trees need love too). You'll feel better for it. Also a word on expecting setbacks, you might be getting somewhere with the potty training thing and then explosive diarrhea will hit and you are fucked. You're fucked. Just keep your chin up, literally a toddler with explosive diarrhea is well, explosive. Be on guard. This setback however could just be me, obviously I was someone horrible in a past life and karma is coming back to get her revenge.

You pay for what you get. Don't cheap out on toilet paper. Just don't. Take out a second mortgage, sell your least favourite kid, do what you need to do. Cheap toilet paper has no place in the home of a potty training toddler. Because if you think skid marky underwear is the worst of it wait to you experience your first poke through because you tried to cut corners with the cheap toilet paper. I use three-ply, but I'm sensitive and not much of a risk taker.

Shit happens. Its a hazard of the job. And when it does happen, it is usually on the carpeted stairs.

the difference between bears and balls

Alternate post title: Motherhood fucks with your head.

That could be the title of pretty much anything I've ever written on the subject of motherhood, hell that could be the name of my blog! But it does, fuck with your head.

Just when you think you might have figured out your way, indoctrinated a particular set of values, come to terms with your new role and position, you're thrown for a philosophical loop and end up ass over tea kettle. Philosophically speaking of course.

Its hard figuring it all out, who you are as a mother, how you want to mother, where you fit in. Maintaining your youishness. And it all changes with each new stage, each passed developmental milestone. And you change too and how you see yourself, how you see the world, how you see yourself in the world.

So I sit, fancying myself a great philosopher, which is rather ridiculous because in that long list of great philosophers, of great thinkers of the past, vaginas are hard to come by. Which does add to the ridiculousness of it all because everyone knows vaginas are smart as hell.

And that most recent philosophical loop thrown at me and my vagina? That loop was not getting a coveted job. A job that involved working with kids who are at risk of becoming non-readers. A job at which I would have excelled. Because those are my kids, the kids who get into grade 1 and aren't reading, who don't recognize letters and sounds, who can't identify basic sight words. Those are the kids I live for, I am all over those kids. I can make those kids readers. I know this.

So when reading the job posting, I figured I had it in the bag, being awesome and all. And it fell nicely in sequence with my career goals, the path I want to move towards professionally. But then I started filling out the application, and on this application my awesomeness? Not so apparent. Because it would appear that my awesomeness checked out in and around 2007. My awesomeness had taken a leave. It on paper had taken a leave three years back and had not made an appearance since.

Oh I knew where my awesomeness had gone. It was creating and nourishing life, my awesomeness was delivering babies, changing diapers, breastfeeding, cuddling, singing, playing peekaboo, reading Goodnight Moon, holding little moist hands, kissing chubby nibbly toes. My awesomeness had escaped the classroom and had descended on the world at large.

I looked for the spot where I could record all this awesomeness down on this particular job application, to fill in the blanks, but had difficulty finding it, probably because it doesn't exist. Probably because I had fallen into the maternity leave black hole, that may or may not be an actual HR term but don't quote me on it.

With a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach, I sent that application in, holes and all. The inevitable occurred. I didn't get the job. I didn't even get an interview. I expected it, but it was still a shot to the ego, and my used to being at the topishness was replaced by wishing I was still the bestishness.

And with all that mixed up ishness rolling around in my head, I sulked. I sulked shamelessly about the choices women have to make, and how do we choose and the sacrifices mothers make and the guilt we feel about those sacrifices and is there ever a right answer, the right road to take. Will mothers always be a step behind, is it always necessary to choose between our children and our careers? Do penises feel this way? Do I really feel that staying at home with my kids has affected my career? And where the hell are all the women philosophers, was it there vaginas that kept them off the list, prevented them from getting the job?

There I sat with my vagina, all sulky and moody and mad feministy and feeling all mixed uppity, like I wasn't on the listy, that I had been past by and for what? What did I have to show for it besides holes on a job application?

At this particular moment of dark complicated vagina feelings, over crawls Little Miss, a downy ball of strawberry curls and baby chub. And what does she have the nerve to say to me? In all her baby wisdom, the depth and complexity of which is beyond me (she is sure to make the list of great philosophers some day), she looks me straight in the eye and exclaims, "Ba-ah."

And that is all it took, to shake me from my black, selfish, stupid mood, "Ba-ah". Because you see, 'ba-ah' is Little Miss' word for bear, most specifically a favoured brown bear wearing a red shirt, the bear of which I had been stonily sitting on. But what shook me from my revelry was that even though her word for ball is also 'ba-ah', I knew she meant bear when she said,'ba-ah', I understood. I knew this because I know Little Miss. Of her 423 days on this earth, I have spent 420 of them with her.

Suddenly there were no holes, or difficult decisions for my vagina to make, there was no feeling left behind or not being on the list. There was only the difference between bears and balls, which turns out to be everything.

sometimes

Sometimes there is no father because mothers have to make decisions that are right and do it themselves.

Sometimes mothers are better than fathers.

Sometimes in the absence of a father little girls look for a surrogate and call these surrogates, uncle or grandfather. And sometimes from these fathers, is learned the strength and softness of men.

Sometimes fathers hold little hands and walk slow for little feet, never leaving them behind. Telling them all that they know of the land and animals and things.

Sometimes there are men who love women and love their children too, because they come together. With some ceremony and little preamble, some men become fathers to forever remain so. And to little girls this is everything.

Sometimes fathers sigh. Over their daughter's math grades. Over the honks of a saxophone coming from the basement. Over car loads of giggling girls. Over missed curfews and first boyfriends.

Sometimes fathers let their daughters. Let their daughters, get liberal arts degrees, rent apartments in seedy (eclectic) neighborhoods, dye their hair black, pierce their tongues and their noses. Sometimes fathers let their daughters be.

Sometimes fathers call David Susiki an asshole to bait their idealistic daughters.

Sometimes fathers let their daughters go. To find their ways. To follow their paths. To fall in love.

Sometimes fathers smile at daughters in black gowns and caps. And hold their hands in white dresses and veils.

Sometimes daughters of good fathers, find good men and watch them become good fathers. The birth of a father, being a beautiful thing.

Sometimes daughters become mothers of great big, bouncy, bubbly babies.

Sometimes mothers of great big, bouncy, babies become tired and turn their pleading eyes to fathers who smile and carry these babies off so that mothers can have a minute of peace.

And sometimes in the quiet that is left behind, mothers can hear fathers singing to babies, softly over the monitor. With an energy that throughout the course of the messy, diaper-filled day has escaped her, and she is thankful.

Sometimes fathers are better than mothers.

choosy moms choose this

T.V.

Sometimes its a necessary evil and by sometimes I mean almost everyday so you can sit without being touched or talked to for five glorious minutes. Its necessary I tell you! -reaches out hand imploring for a lifeline-

These are my kids on T.V. (not on as in actors, on as in getting their fix)



This is an old picture, but probably the T.V. is on right now. For no other reason then there are distinct fertility patterns within my husband's family, the result being that there are 50 gazillion June birthdays and I am all over it.

Although I'm only admitting to you that my kids are watching t.v in this picture, to everyone else I will say that we are parodying the Simon and Garfunkel album cover for Bookends.



(shhh it will be our little secret)

Today is also the day you have all (well all four of you) been waiting for. The day I have lost my fucking mind and decided that I will bake a cake with a toddler.

I could make an assault and batter joke here but I just don't have the appetite for it.

Also if you don't head over and wish Bibliomama a happy 40th birthday month (the actual day was yesterday) then you are most definitely an ass munch. Chocolate cakey kisses to you my dear!

well I'll be a monkey's uncle

I was as surprised as anyone. Toddlers are pretty fucking hilarious. Or mine is anyways.

You see Monkeybone (whose humble beginnings can be read here) is a spirited toddler. Spirited being parentese for he can be a complete asshole a lot of the time. And by asshole I mean running around the house screaming "NO", sitting on the cat, throwing catastrophic tantrums in public places, refusing (just refusing everything and everybody), you known textbook assholey stuff. I forgive him a lot because he's not yet 3, he's pretty cute, and anyways he's my asshole, so there.

Also I read somewhere that geniuses were often spirited toddlers, so there's that.

However as he gets older and becomes a bit more civilized (and by bit I mean he doesn't sit on the cat anymore) his assholishness often gives way to comedic gold. The shit that comes out of this kid's mouth is unreal, also I can see the light at the end of the tunnel of Terrible Twos (which started at 14 months so its been a long time coming) so maybe I just have more patience. Whatever it is this kid is hilarious. So here are a few adages from the Tao of Monkeybone:

"Mommy I love pooping. Pooping is so great.", said after pooping on the potty for the sixth time that day. Seriously if there was ever any doubt who this kid's father is there isn't anymore.

"Nana you have big underwear.", said to my Mother on her last visit. He's nothing if not observant. Also I have hidden away all of my underwear, I'm premenstrual and can't handle that kind of criticism right now.

"Mommy look, look I can touch my penis.", said this morning while I snoozed in bed and he lay next to me watching TV (yeah I'm that kind of mother and I will fucking snap your head off if you judge me, as I've just said I'm premenstrual). Not wearing diapers has given him a whole new lease on life.

"Daddy look at your big penis!", said every morning that he sees Daddy get out of the shower, causing my husband's ego to grow exponentially.

"Let's hear Goo-Goo Ga-Ga!", said every time we get into the car after repeated playings of Lady Gaga's Telephone. (there is an adult in this house that really likes this song, I don't want to mention any names but that adult is not me, however I will chime in on Beyonce's part because, duh) And if you try to switch it up with Madonna, he indignantly cries, "This isn't Goo-Goo Ga-Ga!", demanding he is.

And finally this. In my own defense, while trying to watch my language (I'm being serious here) around impressionable ears, when my sister and I get together sometimes things just slip, as was the case here.

My sister being a sneaky bitch has gotten herself out of an upcoming family event, not even considering my own well being during such an affair. She probably doesn't love me anymore and so I was just outlining the obvious for her by shouting, "You are such a dick," forgetting that Monkeybone was quietly eating his lunch in the kitchen. My sister protested, "No I'm not!" To which Monkeybone's prompt reply was, "Yes, you are a dick."

Finally, someone who sees it my way!

special sauce makes all the difference

Because it totally does, and so does Cheryl over at Special Sauce in the House.

There are no words for the fantasticness that is Cheryl, so when she asked me to guest post I abandoned the kids on my mother-in-law's front porch and headed on over.

I can't quite say how we found each other and formed a friendship within the vast expanse of the blogisphere. But now we are like macaroni and cheese, her being the sleek, shiny, curvy macaroni and me being the messy, gooey, stringy yet strangely delectable cheese that just sits in your gut until you vow you won't indulge in it again but you always come back for more. Cheryl is way easier to digest.

Also we both have Sawyer boys.

This is my Sawyer boy, fresh in this world.


Read his story here and also bask in the glory that is Chery but don't get too comfy because she is changing up her site to showcase her fabulous ass, you will love to hate her.

date night should not smell like gravy...

Or should it? Because ours did, what with this and all...



The sex afterwards was hot. You would think stopping halfway through for a Rolaids break would kill the mood, it doesn't. I guess gravy and cheese curds call for good sex.

Also I'm a bit worried that now I have a gravy fetish, which just doesn't work for me. I'm a mother to small children, I have no time for fetishes, least of all those that induce heartburn.

For my non-Canadian brethren, this is what we up here in the Great White North call poutine or what I call fodder for hot sex. It is what it looks like, fries topped with cheese curds then covered in gravy.

I also occasionally call it dinner. As was the case last night, which turned into a quality date night.

Now to decide whether this being our date night was alluringly funny or just sad. I'm going with funny given the hot gravy sex. You just can't look at sex that smells like gravy any other way.

this was so predictable

That one day I would be engaging in a threesome for all the blogisphere to behold. I prefer menage a trois because I eat a lot of poutine and consider myself francophone but threesome does make me sound younger and slims out my thighs, so I'm going to go with it.

Where is this threesome occurring? Over at The Dirty Mommy Club where she features two additional blogs to her own (hence the threesome, clever like a fox she is) on what has now been coined Threesome Thursdays.

So saunter on over there wearing your prettiest panties under your yoga pants and discover some more awesome bloggage (in addition to my own of course but that goes without saying). The other blog she is featuring sounds like it is cool bananas (I watch a lot of Zigby, fucking Australians they're just so endearing) and there may or may not be Cool Whip involved. That is the only hint I'm giving, you are just going to have to go check it out yourselves. How's that for tough love. Was it believable? Did you really think that I meant business? I am trying to practice so that I am ready for the teen years. It might need some work. -sigh-

Also I have been racking up the blog awards as of late, from some lovelies who just brighten the world with their extreme coolness and mad blogging skills. I'm feeling a bit sheepish that it has taken me a while to send out my thank-yous, please forgive me my assholeness. And with out further adieu (I know you are all on the edge of your seats).

The Empressover at Good Day, Regular People nodded her crowned head my way and graced me with this beauty,

Allow me to kiss your bejewelled hand your Highness.

Heligirl as well took it upon herself to send the love my way. She is hellagood like that. She thinks I am trendy, which is true as I am trying to bring back sweatpants and heels worn together as a fashion statement, so I guess you could say I'm a bit of a trendsetter. She gave me this bad boy to seal the deal.


Nodding nonchalantly your way, Heligirl. Exuberance and unabashed joy is so not cool, which is why I am probably not usually considered cool. Alright what the hell, waving wildly and throwing kisses at you Heligirl! Cool be damned.

The third and final award was passed on to me by the ever infallible, always hilarious, chastiser of boob popcorn eaters everywhere the incomparable Mayor of Crazy Town. Once her blog quits acting the fool with all its 404'd malarkey I will post this shiny sparkly award, for all the world to see and envy.

It will be right here:

Finally, I have been recognized for the Uber I am.

So now in the name of good Karma and because I think these blogs will rock your socks off, here are the blogs that make me curl up in the fetal position crying because I will never be as bad ass as they are. Oh alright I don't cry not being a cryer and all but I do drink wine and rock while humming the theme to Twin Peaks in the face of my mediocrity in comparison to their awesomeness. Here they are, ladies feel free to choose the award that best suits your tastes, or that coordinates with your outfit. If you want, be a greedy gus and grab all three because you're cool like that. Or just stick it to the man and not take any at all but secretly thrill to the idea that you are great. Whatevs I'm not judgey.

Little Green One Kermit the Frog was a damn liar when he said 'it ain't easy being green'. Frogs are just so untrustworthy!
Mom vs. The Boys Head on over and assure her I won't be drunk at her son's first birthday party. Hung over is fair game though.
Pregnant with Anticipation She just had a baby and I loves the new mama drama! Show here some love and convince her blogging is where it's at.
Special Sauce in the House Because I love her, that is all. Also because she lives in the OC and looks like that naturally.
Taming Insanity Read her! But don't take her last soda, girlfriend will cut you down for that.
Pretty All True I wear a panty liner when reading her, because she is really funny and I am slightly incontinent.
Mommy of a Monster and Infant Twins She's really pretty and I like pretty people. I also like people who call their kids monsters, it makes me feel not so alone. Hold me.

Off to wear these shoes around the house and pretend that I'm Giselle Bundchen. Although I will draw the line at getting a Brazilian, I've a low tolerance for pain and cannot abide the smell of hot wax.

Bundchen, out!

Holy Shit! Shoes!

Goodness me who would have ever thought that I would have fallen madly in love with shoes so late in the game (doesn't life end after 30? No? Oh. Well then. Who would have thought it none the less).

Not I said the fly, who has been bearing witness to all the gastric-intestinal horrors that have darkened the doors of this house. I have been wiping bums (just the kids, thankfully the adults have been spared thus far)and doing loads upon loads of sheets that look suspiciously like Rorschach inkblots, the diagnosis being that I have laundered way to many shitty sheets and vomit covered pajamas for my own good.

These are the things that just amble around in my mind as I move from room to room with a spray bottle of lavender citrus oil, which really only makes the house smell like a pile of shit in a lavender field, the lavender is nice but the shit smell is still there. Also my inner voice keeps quoting Shakespeare, "A plague on both your houses". I don't know where this other house is but plagued we have been at my house. And channelling my inner Mercutio seems appropriate. Until I find myself stabbed and bleeding in the middle of the street, this flu bug being the culprit, as it makes its hasty getaway to assault some other mother farther on down the street. "Arm yourself woman," I yell.

I am only moderately impressed that while most inner voices demand some sort of intoxicant or persuades one to commit crime, mine seems to favour literary classics. I'm trying not to be too boastful about it given the present circumstances and the smell of puke heavy in the air. But it probably means that I'm smarter than you or at least infinitely better. No not really, but then I remember my new shoes and think that it is true. I am better, but only because of the shoes. Not because I'm smarter or anything. Although, I do have two degrees, but I did forget what 8x6 was last week. Its 54, but it took me a really long time to remember that.

So no I'm not smarter than you but I am better because I have new shoes and they are fantastic (I'm resisting the urge to say 'fan-fucking-tatic' because it sounds a lot like Big's 'abso-fucking-lutely' and I don't want you all to know how much I love Sex in the City, it not being very post-feminist of me, but then I remember that I am gushing over a pair of shoes that may or may not ellicit sexual arousal just by looking at them and I figure my cover is blown anyway).

So shoes and I go a little like this. Birkenstocks and clogs for most of my liberal arts educated twenties with the occasional black ballet flat for when I'm feeling particularly chic. I'm a clothes horse of the horsiest kind, pulling rein at any and all thrift shops that I may stumble across. But shoes, strangely enough have alluded me up until now. Well its not strange really, there is a perfectly good explanation for my relationship with shoes not progressing past the friendly acquaintance stage, that being I am 5'10 and most hot looking shoes make me feel like I'm walking on stilts, really trendy stilts. Now while I love towering over my inferiors, I am not a fan of falling on my ass so sadly all the fun shoes never go beyond brief flirtations in the store.

That is until this past Sunday. My mother having whisked me away from the gloom and doom of home, implored my sister and I to join her on a day of shopping. The thing about shopping with my mom, is she just chooses the store and my sister and I load her up with outfits to try on. Its like playing Barbies only with no Ken and its your mom so you can't name her Tiffany or Brooke or any of those other grandiose Barbie names (again that's probably just me).

Having tired of playing dress up with my mom, I wandered through the aisles of a shoe store we were browsing in, when my eyes fell upon a pair of shoes that left me breathless. Should I try them on? Should I wear them around the store for 30 minutes while my mom shopped? Should I catwalk down the aisles and booty dance for my sister just to experience their effect? Are you fucking kidding me of course I did!

These shoes, while having a heel and easily making me 6 feet tall, felt like a second skin, a blue, snakey textured with a peekaboo toe second skin. My spirits lifted just wearing them. I probably was stunning and the sales guy I think had to hold the pricing binder strategically in front of him whilst I pranced around. But alas I knew, this love affair would be short lived as purchasing shoes of such frivolity couldn't be presently justified.

I slowly took them off and put them back on the shelf and as I bent over to put my flip flops back on, someone brushed by me, reaching for my shoes. I looked up ready to cut the bitch who dared take my pretties away. But I put away my switchblade, because that bitch was my mom who was carrying my shoes with here to the front. Where she proceeded to buy me my shoes and turned deaf ears on my protests. -Sigh- My mom is just so much goodness it hurts my heart.

However I really only reflected on this for but a moment because I had my shoes! I wore them home and into the house and I might have vacuumed with them yesterday

Behold their loveliness.



Feel free to go touch yourself after looking at them. I won't be offended and am certainly in no position to rant about the dangers of shoe porn.