Photos Will Have To Do.

What, You Didn't See Me?

Because I was so totally here.  I just, uh, wasn't posting.

Yes, it is November again and this marks the first time in 3 years that I have decided NOT to participate in the insanity that is NaBloPoMo.  (National Blog Posting Month for the uninitiated).  And I thought I would feel a lot more guilty about it, but mostly I feel relieved - like a kid on a snow day who didn't study for a test.

I have not been feeling my blog mojo lately.  I think this is likely due to sleep deprivation and perhaps a touch of the blues.  Oh, and also due to pathological home improvement, but I'm not posting photos of my finished living room floor yet... Oh No, I am not.

You see, my darling husband, Mister Big Daddy, got called away at the last minute to the Czech Republic and I'm tormenting him by making him wait until his return to get the full effect of my efforts.  So all y'all will just have to wait until after tomorrow to see what my crazy hath wrought.  (Trust me, though, it's pretty spectacular. I am officially In Love with the TrafficMaster vinyl flooring planks.  Like laminate - but cheaper! Also can be installed by a crazy person, such as myself, wielding only a box cutter and a pair of flat-nosed pliers.)

Dear TrafficMaster, I just gave you the most awesome recommendation EVER.. on my website.  Because I installed your stuff in a fit of post-partum nesting frenzy and I still managed not to screw it up too badly and it looks quite nice.  How's about you send me a few gajillion dollars because, really, who doesn't want a positive review that includes words like "Crazy" and "Box Cutter"?!  

Sincerely, 

Crazy Mother of 3 Boys (and yes, I realize the "crazy" is redundant there.)

So.

Um. Wait, what were we talking about again?  I seem to have lost that train of thought somewhere between removing a soaked pull-up from Toby and sipping at my cold coffee while eyeing his Cheerios.  Is it wrong to steal breakfast cereal from your toddler when he's not looking? I figure he'll never miss those 3 pieces, unless he smells them on my breath.  He's sneaky that way. I think he's going to be a detective some day.  Or maybe a train conductor, what with the Thomas & Friends obsession.  But hopefully not the creepy guy who asks all the neighborhood kids to come over and play with the trains in his basement.

I'm suddenly realizing it's probably not a great idea to post in my current condition.  And by "condition" I mean when one's husband is across an ocean and very likely enjoying himself some Viagra gingerbread.  No, really.  Here's the photo:

Apparently Czech gingerbread is famous.

I'm hoping it's not for the reason this would indicate.

Thankfully, Big Daddy is now on his way to Prague to catch a flight that will eventually bring him home again.  I'm pretty sure he packed half my brain in his suitcase when he left.  I'm hoping he remembers to bring it back again, and that it hasn't been displaced by souvenirs for the boys and suspicious gingerbread wrappers.

The Balance Myth.

This is why you love me: Because I will rear my head in your airspace to drop a rant on a random Friday morning.

Today's myth to be busted: "Mothering Balance"

It's dangled out there in front of us as the epitome of "doing it right".  Find that balance! The elusive "work-life-mothering" balance.

Allow me to pose to you a radical and revolutionary idea for our time: There Is NO Such Thing As Balance.

Life is not balanced, and whenever I attempt to ponder this mythical "balance" I find that the hours in my day are spent in the planning and pondering instead of the actual living.

Instead of running ourselves ragged attempting to live up to some sort of balance, let's just admit that - most of us? - we muddle through as best we can.  Some days we do too much work, some days too much playing with legos and too few dishes.  The only balance I expect to achieve is to get to the end of the day and not feel like I've screwed anything up too badly.

So, please, Oprah? Regis and Kelly? GMA Ladies? STOP with the deluge of "experts" telling me how to find Balance.  It doesn't exist.  Like unicorns or decent laundry stain remover, I believe it's a pretty legend that exists only in the minds of the believers.  

I hereby declare that I will no longer concern myself with finding the Balance.  I'm going to concentrate on completing the essential tasks of the day and using whatever time is left in whatever way I see fit.  

And what do you know, so far it's working out pretty well.  Apparently when you stop trying to figure out how to find something and just start Living your life On Purpose... the balance will take care of itself.

*Disclaimer: The above was written by a mother of 3 while holding her six-week-old infant. She got 4 hours of sleep last night.  She hasn't finished the laundry but she vacuumed her whole house yesterday, fed her family, packed a school lunch, cleaned the toy room, nursed the baby a dozen or so times, and she may or may not be typing this at her kitchen table while pantless.  Which is to say she's doing pretty well in her assessment, and has not wasted a moment of her precious time wondering if she is "balancing" all of her responsibilities and goals well.  Later today she plans to go to the playground with her toddler and perhaps lay a new floor in her living room.  This is Life: Lived On Purpose, but not necessarily As Planned.

Still Standing. (or Laying Down, as the case may be)

I know you thought I had abandoned you.  I keep doing these periodic check-ins and then disappearing again.  And I know you forgive me, what with life being totally taken over by the Infant Overlord and his co-Dictators, the Demanders of Snacks.

I'm still here.  WE'RE still here.  I'm still getting over this cold/virus/what-have-you, which includes coughing up things I have only ever seen in my nightmares until now.

Today marks 6 weeks since Milo joined our little posse.  I can't imagine life without him... all glorious, 12 pounds of him.  No, that's not a typo.  He came into the world at 9 pounds 14 ounces, left the hospital 10 ounces lighter, and by his two week check-up had gone up to 10 pounds 7 ounces.  At his one month he was up to 12 pounds 5 ounces.  His pediatrician chuckled and said "So the breast feeding is going well, then..."  Um, yes.  Also, I am thinking of attaching a storefront to my chest and selling it off as soft serve ice cream.  (You're welcome, PETA.)

Also at his one month check-up, the doctor noticed a heart murmur.  

So today is going to be spent having my lady parts inspected by my cheerfully silly OB (whose jokes remind me of my Uncle George) and a visit to a cardiologist who will inspect my tiny wonder and declare him perfect.  We're not discussing any other possible outcome, because my head might explode all over the clean kitchen and then someone would have to scrape brain matter off of the light fixtures.

Which is my offhand way of saying I am doing my very best not to Freak. Out.  Because murmurs are incredibly common in babies and children, and most of the time they are entirely benign.  And still, knowing this, if I think too much about it I start to break out in a cold sweat and my own heart skips a few beats, as though it is trying to send them straight to Milo's heart - just in case it's not as strong as it should be.

The thing is, though, you see... MY heart is not as strong as it should be when it comes to my boys.  Add in the lack of sleep, the lack of clothes that will fit this tired, stretched out body, and the uncertainty of everything right now and... well... there just has not been a lot of me left over to pour out into this chronicle we call "blog".

So forgive me if I continue to be a little sporadic in the posting.  Rest assured I am coping quite well with the post-partum part of all of this.  In fact, I'm getting ready to lay down a new vinyl plank floor in our living room, and the carpet installers will be here this week to replace the old carpets with lovely new carpets.  New carpets which have never been used as a litter box by cats, dog, or small humans. (Seriously. Toby's idea of potty training this week was to give the playroom carpet a fecal frosting.  It was lovely.  I'm taking the cost of the therapy, which I'll need in order to recover from the horrors, out of his college fund.)

But just so you know that we're still here... and perhaps so you can understand when I spend the few minutes I find in the day that could probably be used for writing to instead gaze at his wonder... I present, once again, Milo.