happy happy birthday birth day.

A nice little quote to start us off:

The most important thing she’d learned over the years was that there was no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one. — Jill Churchill

Oh, I've been thinking about this quote, and every time I do it makes me feel better. Because, of course, I am a good mother in a million ways, but somehow I so often forget that and focus on my lack of perfection. 

Being the good mother that I am, I spent all of last saturday--and I mean all--baking a castle cake. Frances was four on sunday and the party was by royal invitation. We had mostly princesses, one knight, one prince, and one determined royal firefighter. I was a little surprised by the lack of kings and queens. Perhaps these little people recognize their true lack of power and go instead for simple prestige. 

And I made princess hats (what is the actual name for them? the cone shaped things with veils out the top...) out of elmo birthday hats from Clark's party last year: I covered them with foil, cut the tip off, and pulled netting and ribbons through. I cut a few crowns for the fellas out of posterboard and covered them with foil also. They got to decorate these with little stick on gems from Michaels. Mitch erected a "castle" in our family room from a tent, a big blanket, and a broom, and inside we spread out the tea set on a footstool. It was the hit of the party. (Frances is third from the left in this picture, in the lighter pink.)

After the party Frances kept telling me, "You're the best mommy in the whole world." Ten hours on a cake will do that to you, it turns out. I'd been thinking about the cake for some time, trying to figure out how to put it together, or perhaps how to decorate the yummy Ultimate White Cake I was going to buy from Wegmans. Somewhere I heard the suggestion to use upside down ice cream cones for castle turrets and that seemed like a good idea except that I couldn't figure out, once you've frosted the thing, how to get it from your hand onto the cake. You see what I mean? In the end I felt brilliant: I thinned out the frosting with milk, used a pastry brush to paint it on the cone, and then rolled the cone in silver and purple sprinkles. They were lovely. I do wish I'd used a different color of gumdrops, maybe yellow, for the tops of the turrets... the purple doesn't really show up, but I'd already been to the store twice and wasn't going back again. 

The party was lovely. I boycotted the tradition--at least around here--of pizza before cake, which made me a little nervous and feel a bit like an outlaw. (When I brought out the cake, Frances said, "Mommy, where's the pizza?") And I boycotted the goodie bag, as I plan to do for the rest of my kids' lives. Good grief, they've just gotten free cake and drinks and maybe pizza, plus bouncing or painting or some other intentionally fun activity, and now they need goodies in pretty bags too? I don't get it. Isn't the party enough? But I digress.

Just before cake I had the kids line up outside the Entry to the Royal Ballroom and I recruited an older sibling as a trumpeter while each child was announced and introduced to the Royal Court. It might have been my favorite part. Really, can it get any cuter than happy agreeable four year olds? 

So four years ago today I had a newborn and no sleep and ice packs between my legs. Four years ago today we brought Frances home from the hospital and put on on the bed in her room where she lay mesmerized by the light through the gauze curtains. Four years ago I was a new mom and the light came down a little differently through the trees. Happy birth day to me. 

sleepy toddler update

A big THANK YOU to everyone who responded with suggestions! (there were also about 25 more suggestions on my fb page...) It was interesting: all of it was helpful, even if I disagreed with it, because it helped me frame what I believe would work for us.

Here's what's happened: I unplugged the lamp in Clark's room (he has no overhead) and told him it was broken, and then I hung up a pretty little string of multi-colored japanese lantern lights. When I brought him in the room to show him the lights he said, "So beautiful!" That night in bed he stared up at them for ages and was so entranced with them that he let me leave before he was asleep.

The next night we had a harder time when Mitch told Clark he was leaving the room. There was screaming. Mitch left anyway and Clark screamed for a while more before he climbed out of the bed and came downstairs. I took him back up and sang him a song and told him I was going to leave. He protested, as expected. I got the bear off his changing table and put it in his crib, and told him the bear was very sleepy and he wanted to be sung a song so he could go to sleep. I asked Clark if he would sing the bear a song, asked what song he thought was the bear's favorite. Clark thought Row Row Row Your Boat might be, so I suggested he sing it to the very sleepy bear, and then I left. From downstairs the monitor told us that he sang and sang to the bear, and then happily talked to himself until he was asleep.

The next night Mitch was the one putting him down again, and when he told Clark he was leaving Clark screamed, but only for a moment. Maybe we've turned a corner. Aaaand in the middle of the night Mitch  dreamed Clark had climbed up into his arms, and then he woke, and Clark indeed was in bed with us, wrapped in Mitch's arms.

Since then we've been up and down... most nights we leave before he's completely asleep. Since we turned out the bright lights he definitely sleeps more consistently until morning, rather than getting up and 2 or 3 or 4 and wanting to get on with the day. Some nights he has a harder time than others, and we adjust; we stay with him a little while, or we make some kind of deal like we'll leave the door open and books in his bed as long as he will stay there, and some nights we just muddle through. But! Overall we're in a better place. Yay!

Frances's 4th birthday is the day after tomorrow and I'm busy now with the making of princess crowns and the creation of a castle cake, plus family is in town for the festivities, so it might be a few days before much more.... Though I do want to say that the birthday ceremony today at her Waldorf school was the sweetest thing I may have ever seen and it was all I could do not to blubber right there in the middle of it. I'll try to post pictures.

looking for suggestions!!

Serious sleep issues, and I need some help. At two this morning Clark was standing beside my bed saying "downstairs! downstairs!" and this did not work for me. In the end I was only up with him for about 40 minutes, but the night before it was an hour and a half. I'm starting to feel like when he was an infant and I was sleep deprived for legitimate reasons.

Here's what we've got:

First, he sleeps with his light on full, which is a problem because when he wakes up he doesn't know if it's morning and insists that he's ready to get up and go downstairs. I've thought about just taking the bulb out, telling him it's broken, and putting in a small night light. That means we'll have to read books at night somewhere other than in the armchair in his room, but that's okay. Another option is to put in a clock and tell him he can't get up until the first number is a six or seven or whatever, but honestly I don't think he's going to go for that at all. He'll just get up anyway. Or we could try both.

The next issue is that he wants us to stay in the room until he falls asleep. He doesn't do this at nap, by the way. He asks sometimes at nap and I tell him "no, at nap we don't do that," and he accepts it. So we're going to have to have a talk about how mom and dad are not going to stay in the room anymore. I could deal with letting him cry it out (and I think it would only take a day of this....) but he won't just cry it out; he'll climb out of the crib. This all started with his climbing out in the first place: we tried the supernanny thing of putting him back, putting him back, not speaking to him and just putting him back, but he just became more and more hysterical and worked himself up into what seemed an unnecessary panic. When that would happen and I would stop and just put my arms around him, he'd quiet immediately. We figured it was just a stage, some kind of anxiety that would pass, so we started to stay in the room. It isn't so bad to sit with him when we put him to bed, especially as we've taken to watching netflix on our iphones with headphones while we wait, but the problem is that he expects it again when he wakes in the night.

AND I CANNOT KEEP DOING THIS AT 2AM.

Okay. So when he wakes at night and screams, I tell him it's the middle of the night and everyone is sleeping and he needs to sleep too. He shrieks. If I say I'm going back to bed he shrieks and then climbs out of his bed. Here are the options as I see them:

1) Get a crib tent. Zip him in. Ignore the possible hazard were there a fire. Make him feel powerless but dominated. Get some sleep.

2) Get a new toddler bed he loves, a fire truck or pirate boat or something, and tell him he can only have it if he stays in it. In order to enforce that, however, I'd also have to get a crib tent so I can move him to the crib if he won't stay in the bed.

3) Leave the crib the way it is but put latches on the door so he can't get out of the room. This will probably mean he will cry until he passes out on the floor. Again with the powerlessness.

4) Is he old enough (2 1/2) for a sticker chart? I don't know... I don't think he'll get the idea of accumulating stickers toward a goal. But maybe there's something I can bribe him with immediately? I don't know what. He doesn't sleep with any stuffed animals, nothing I can take away if he won't comply...

5) Dose him heavily with narcotics every night before bed. Kidding. Sort of.

6) Gear myself up and do the supernanny sleep training for a couple of nights: simply put him back in bed every time he gets out. The problem with this is that I have to stay nearby to put him back in, and that's just what he wants. He doesn't mind being in the bed as long as I'm there too.

7) Take him into the bed with me in the guest room. (you note the absence of the option to put him in bed with us... both of us are light sleepers and it simply would not work.) I fear this would mean I would forever sleep in the guest room, which just creates another problem rather than solving this one.

8) Is there something I can get for his room that would make him more comfortable, less needy? Suggestions????

He used to be a great sleeper. He used to just wave to us from his bed as we said goodnight. He would wake up and sometimes call out in the night, but then go right back to sleep. All by himself. And I don't feel this is any longer about anxiety and separation and fear; now it seems to be about control, the way he is trying to assert control over his world. Maybe one solution, or part of the solution, is to help him feel in control in other ways, give him choices or let him make other decisions. Thoughts about that?

So, please, if you have any suggestions at all, please please offer them. Helpful or unhelpful, tried or absurd, I'll take em.

By the way, I'm writing this while both kids are at preschool! All on my own here in the world, for a little while. Maybe this space will mean I can keep up with the blog better. That would be nice.

brainfizz

I think my brain is deteorating. This is mostly why I haven't been posting... sometimes interesting issues come up, but then I can't think through them or something. This is what too many diapers will do to a person. Or maybe it's the volume of the screaming; maybe it's not just my eardrums it's damaged, but my actual brain cells too. I'll buy that.

Recently I made a new friend, a childless friend who is a PhD and new faculty here. She uses her brain on a regular basis for more than estimating the fullness of a diaper or how many snacks are necessary for a given outing, and while talking with her I felt like I was sprinting to keep up. It was pitiful. I need to take a class or something.

We are in transition. (We are actually all in transition all the time, but some transitions move more earth than others...) For one thing, school just started for Frances. We visited for a bit on Wednesday and then she had regular school days Thursday and Friday, though Thursday afternoon I was rather shocked to realize she was going again the very next day. I felt like it should be once a week or something....

Wednesday morning was going along fine, everyone wearing their own clothes and generally behaving, then Frances started losing her shit. "Is she hungry?" I asked Mitch. She cried about the toy Clark was playing with. She cried because the 6 page paperback book she was reading 'pinched her finger'. "Did she not sleep?" I asked. "Is she nervous about school?" And she was. It took awhile for her to admit it, or discover it, or something. She appears to be blessed with my complete inability to know what it is I'm feeling while I'm feeling it. I'm trying to help her with this, which is hard since I don't know how to do it in the first place.

So I told her about my scary first day of school, embellishing with all kinds of real and possibly real details. I reminded her I was going to be with her at the school--this was just a visit, not the actual first day--and then I realized she might not remember being there before, so told her what the school looked like, about the play kitchen and the dress up clothes and the baskets of rocks and wood and the chickens in the back. She calmed down, and when we were there she had a lovely time.

Thursday morning at the beginning of school they had a ceremony with this rainbow bridge, where the children, holding flowers, stood on one side of the bridge with their parents and the teacher stood on the other. One by one the children kissed their parents and crossed over the bridge where they gave the flower to the teacher who collected them into a bouquet. It symbolized their spirits going from their parents to the care of the teacher while in school, and at the end of the year ceremony they will walk over the bridge in the opposite direction. It was very very sweet. Frances had no issue at all with it and marched right across the bridge. Later in an email, the teacher said Frances had a really good day and was so confident. How funny to me that she is. The school is a Waldorf Kindergarten which is mixed ages, 4-6, and she's the youngest there. I worried a little that this would show and she would feel out of her element somehow, but I guess not. She's already attached to one other girl whose name is Francesca, interestingly.

So there's that. We've been getting along so well the past few days and Mitch suggested it's because she has school, something of her own away from me, something to make her feel independent. Or maybe we're just in the next (and much improved) stage.

But Clark! The stage we're in now is not so fabulous. I know I've said it before but since I think it every third minute of the day, it can bear repeating here: I cannot WAIT until no one in this house is two. Just the noise level alone is enough to put a person over the edge. I've taken to putting tissue in my ears first thing in the morning. (earplugs seem to be a bit too effective.) It does help with my patience.

There's the sitting in his room until he falls asleep thing; I worried we were creating a monster and indeed here it is. Now he's waking up in the night and wanting us to sit with him until he falls back asleep. Actually, that's after all the arguing; last night he was up from 4-5:30, wanting to go downstairs, wanting snacks, wanting different pajamas. Every time I told him no, explained it was the middle of the night, he screamed. A being attacked 5 alarm kind of scream. I think we're going to have to pick a night, a couple of nights, and just let him scream. It's going to suck. But he's old enough now to understand it, old enough that it will probably only take one night of that kind of hell for him to realize what it means.

Oh when there are no more two-year-olds. But he's so charming and sweet when he's not screaming. When he's not out of sorts he is lovely to be around. I remembered this last week when Frances was in school and I had him all to myself. When they're together they kind of rile each other up, but alone with me he was only joy. Except when he was screaming, as I've said before. I swear I think he's louder than most children.

Yet! Tomorrow! Tomorrow is the first day with both of them in school. I drop Frances off at 8:45, then Clark at 9. What will I do with myself? And then! It will happen again on Thursday! Oh blessed day.

toddlerland

Lots I want to post about; no time, no time. Which is mostly because I've been spending all my time helping Clark with his outfit changes. Seriously. We go through probably 8 different outfits by 10 am. It's currently the way he's attempting to assert 2-year-old control over his out of control world. I can't remember how Frances did it, though I do remember trying to come up with ways for her, things like letting her choose which sippy cup she wanted. Clark has come up with this all on his own and it's simply impossible (or at least unadvisable) to fight. His clothes, her clothes, doesn't matter. It even extends to pajamas. Last night Mitch put him down and when I got him up this morning he was wearing three shirts and two pairs of shorts over his onesie. We don't have air conditioning; he had to be hot, silly guy. 

Clark is the same age now as Frances was when she was tantrumming in full. There was a stretch months that were very loud and volatile, plus an enormously long couple of weeks when she tantrummed about once every 30 minutes. All day long. Sometimes the tantrums would last 20 minutes, which meant only 10 minutes or so of reprieve between. It was seriously exhausting. 

It's that age where they are so proud to be big (Clark tells us all the time, "I a BIG boy.") but also want to still be a baby. Being big is exciting and wonderful--to realize you have power and are ultimately separate--but they also are frustrated by how little actual power they have. After all, I make most decisions for him all day long: where we go, what he eats, when he eats, when he watches tv, when he gets his diaper changed, whether we get to go see the train in the grocery store though he begs and begs and begs. He wants to make some decisions. His clothes have taken the focus. 

But being separate can also be scary, all exposed and vulnerable in the big world. He's back in his crib now, wanted to be in it rather than the toddler bed, and he wants me to carry him everywhere, from room to room, up and down the stairs, to the car, through the parking lot, which is a problem since he's a full 30 pounds now. "Uppy! Uppy!" he says, and I try to explain that I will hold his hand but I can't carry him, and he loses his mind. It's not just the wail of not getting his way; it's a lament of deep sorrow, keening, stamping his feet, tears. Sometimes I just give in and pick him up, but my back is suffering for it. I can't do it much longer. 

I'm struggling with my headaches again, a thing that puts me out of commission on the blog completely. Hopefully they'll let up soon. I'm trying to post at least twice a week but clearly have not been meeting that goal lately. Yet! Next week Frances starts school! Four mornings a week! Clark starts the week after that--two mornings. Which means I'll have two whole mornings to myself!! It may be a whole new world. 

boys will be girls

Clark is all boy. Climbing, jumping, running, tumbling, car-zooming, rocket-blasting, tiger-growling, monster-roaring boy. But he also LOVES his big sister and wants to do whatever she does, which these days means wear her clothes.

"Sissy's clothes!" he says, and pulls open her drawer. "Princess dress!" It started with the dress up clothes, pink tutus and velvet leotards, but now it's Frances's actual clothes he demands, usually a skirt and tank top. His favorite tank top is orange with a bejeweled pineapple on the front. It's lovely. 

        

I let him. Everyone thinks he's a girl, of course, what with his long hair and stick on earrings. I don't correct them. (The stick on earrings were a big thing for a while and looked particularly funny with his regular boy clothes, but now that Frances has her ears actually pierced he's not interested in the stick ons anymore, I assume because she's not.) It occurs to me that it's a good thing his hair isn't buzz cut short--I'd really have to deal with comments then. He looks so funny to me dressed in poofy pink while zooming cars all over the family room floor and walls. I try to squint and see him as a girl but I can't--he just looks so boyish, despite the frills. Handsome as he is, he would not make a pretty girl. 

Salon recently did an article on this, from the point of view of the dad who was much more distressed about it than I am. His son was four and in school, and he was worried about whether the other children would tease him. We start school in about 3 weeks and we'll see then if it's still the fad. I might make a we-wear-our-own-clothes-to-school rule. Then again, I might not care.

My mom was here recently and she bought him a spiderman shirt for dress up. I think she hoped having some dress up of his own would mean he would abandon his sister's. He loved it. He accessorized with a wand and fairy wings. Very nice. 

time for bed

Finally, FINALLY we've got a new functional bedtime system. (All parenting is about systems, isn't it?) For ages bedtime around here was pretty easy. Clark was a dream: plop him in his crib and wave goodnight as you close the door behind you. Frances sometimes argued and negotiated but you can't have everything.

Then a couple of months ago everything changed. It's all Clark's doing--we moved him into a toddler bed and he literally could not stay in it. It was like his feet were physically pulled to the floor. There was lots of carrying him back to bed, back to bed, back to bed, discussing with him, possible threatening, then more simple repetition. Finally we moved him back to the crib, which helped for about 2 days. (For a split second I really thought we were onto something there--that maybe he didn't feel safe in the toddler bed or something, and that being in the crib would solve the problem.) Then he just climbed out of the crib over and over.

Finally he impressed upon us that he wants someone to sit in his room until he falls asleep. Some new fear / insecurity that he's developed, also probably related to his insisting that all the lights stay on like it's daylight in there. (For a short time I would sneak in after he'd fallen asleep and turn them off, leaving a closet light with plenty of light to see by, but he'd just wake at 3 am and insist that the lamps be turned on too...) So these days someone sits in the armchair by the crib until he falls asleep. We'll only stay if he doesn't talk or sing or bang on is crib in an effort to keep himself awake. Now that he trusts we'll be there, doesn't have to argue with us and chase after us, he actually falls asleep pretty quickly. I bring reading material--it's certainly bright enough to read, after all. I have Frances read to herself on her bed while I sit in Clark's room; I tell her I'll come back and lie with her for a few minutes after. And sometimes by the time Clark's fallen asleep, Frances has too.

So. Whew. It's funny the way things move in stages with kids. So often it's hard to spot; you think this new thing is some personality flaw or parenting failure, something you need to address and fix, only to discover a month later that it was a phase and just passed on its own. It would be so much more helpful if the phases would announce themselves.

For now, though, bedtime is no longer a 2 hour ordeal. So happy.

brave big girl

Frances got her ears pierced. She's been asking for a couple of months and decided she wanted to do it when my mom was here visiting last week. I told her it would hurt, tried to impress this upon her so she would be prepared--she is a big wimp when it comes to pain, the tiniest scratch can bring hysteria. Some random person told her it would be just a "little pinch" and she kept repeating this to me. I said, "It's going to be more than a little pinch, Frances. It's going to hurt." "Just a little pinch," she said. So we went.

She was beside herself with excitement while they drew the dots where the piercing would go. They use two folks for the actual piercing so that both ears are done at once (thank goodness) and it was only when they told her to look straight at me and hold very still that she realized it was serious business and nervousness crossed her face. Then the guns clicked and she looked stunned for a moment. Her face crumpled and she leaned into my chest and cried very softly. She tried not to cry, tried so hard to be big and brave. I said, "it's okay to cry, honey," and she did only for a minute. Afterward there were lollypops and she was so proud. She's shown them to every single person she's come into contact with, strangers in the grocery included. And she's very into taking care of them, reminds me when we're supposed to clean them. What a big girl she's getting to be. 

it's not a competition

Saw a friend of mine last weekend at a birthday party and she said she had a question for me. She had read my blog post that mentioned Frances' writing the alphabet and wanted to know if it was something we'd worked with her on, if she initiated interest herself, etc. My friend had recently taken her son for his 4-year-old check up and the doc scolded her because her son wasn't writing yet. Later in the visit when they discussed some other developmental strength, the doctor said, "See? You're doing some things right."

Ack! This makes me nuts. It's a wonderful example of the pressure we put our kids under. WHO CARES if he's not writing yet? He's only four! If he were eight and not writing, then perhaps someone should take a closer look at what's going on. But it's not a competition!!!!! It's the very same thing as parents who brag that their kid walked at 7 months. WHO CARES?!

Kids are different. They develop at different rates. I have a friend whose son didn't walk until he was 22 months old. (He's now four and walks just fine.) When I asked her if this had worried her at the time, she said no, that he was very verbal and she just trusted that he would do things in his own time. She's a wise woman, and an exception, I think. There's so much pressure for our children to be successful in the very same ways, and so much assumption that we parents are doing something wrong when they are not. (This doctor, someone who should know better, pointed this out to my friend specifically--"See? You're doing some things right!" Funny that she'd meant it as an encouragement, because it actually was a condemnation. Which, now that I think about it, pisses me off even more--even if this child were delayed somehow, the doctor assumed this was the fault of the parent, and not the result of many many different and complicated factors that make up this particular child.)

I just wanted to put that out there. It made me wish I hadn't mentioned Frances's alphabet writing in the first place. And for the record, her dad has been working with her on it, and she did initially show interest that led him to work with her (mostly she wanted to use the computer, so they started spelling things on it, which led her to writing...) and at her school they do no letters or reading at all, which means she's felt no pressure from that direction. I mention the school because I firmly believe that teaching letters and reading in preschool is a detrimental thing for those many children who are not yet interested. It just makes them feel pressure and many times eventual dislike for reading and writing. Frances will be attending a Waldorf school in the fall and the Waldorf philosophy specifically holds off on any reading until age seven. I'm for it, but maybe it's easy for me to say that since my kid loves to read and write.

At the risk of sounding like a Waldorf advertisement (which I don't intend to be), I'm going to include a response from the website linked above about the question of why Waldorf teaches reading so late (I just happen to agree with them strongly here...):

"There is evidence that normal, healthy children who learn to read relatively late are not disadvantaged by this, but rather are able quickly to catch up with, and may overtake, children who have learned to read early. Additionally, they are much less likely to develop the "tiredness toward reading" that many children taught to read at a very early age experience later on. Instead there is lively interest in reading and learning that continues into adulthood. Some children will, out of themselves, want to learn to read at an early age. This interest can and should be met, as long as it comes in fact from the child. Early imposed formal instruction in reading can be a handicap in later years, when enthusiasm toward reading and learning may begin to falter.


"If reading is not pushed, a healthy child will pick it up quite quickly and easily. Some Waldorf parents become anxious if their child is slow to learn to read. Eventually these same parents are overjoyed at seeing their child pick up a book and not put it down and become from that moment a voracious reader. Each child has his or her own optimal time for "taking off." Feelings of anxiety and inferiority may develop in a child who is not reading as well as her peers. Often this anxiety is picked up from parents concerned about the child's progress. It is important that parents should deal with their own and their child's apprehensions.


"Human growth and development do not occur in a linear fashion, nor can they be measured. What lives, grows, and has its being in human life can only be grasped with that same human faculty that can grasp the invisible metamorphic laws of living nature."


My truest hope is that I am able simply to see my children for who they are, to allow them to be who they are before the pressure of who they are told, by other people and by my own expectations, they must be. One of my jobs, as I see it and hard though it may be, is to protect them from those expectations and to remind myself--and them--that they are more than the sum of their abilities. They are worlds unto themselves. 

perspective from below

My son is in love with a pinata. It's a Dora pinata (rather large) and he drags it everywhere behind him by a string.

And I'm depressed.

Those are the main news items coming over the reel.

I hate that I get depressed. It's just a part of my life, something that comes and goes, and these days as long as it doesn't hang around for too long, I can ride it. I've been so tired, so tired all the time. I thought at first it was because I hadn't been exercising, but then several days of 40 minutes on the elliptical at the gym didn't seem to change much.

I'm having trouble keeping in perspective that I won't have a 2-year-old forever. One day, no one in this house will scream at the absolute top of his lungs anytime he disagrees. Somedays I feel like this, this, is my world forever and ever, packing snacks and cajoling into carseats, wrestling hollering toddlers to the ground simply to change a diaper, pulling dimes out of mouths to screams of protest.

But then there are clear moments when I can see my life in a long flat plane, and I realize that This Time--with babies--is a distinct phase, and one day (and not that long from now) I'll look back on it as some previous lifetime. When I think this way it all feels so sweet, their chubby little cheeks, their tight hugs, the way Clark smashes his entire face into mine. There are people, certainly, who are best cut out for this work, who in previous eras served as wet nurses and nannies for an entire career lifetime. Though I sometimes wish I were, that's not how I'm built. And, frankly, I suspect most women aren't built this way. Isn't that the trouble, though? That we all expect ourselves to be good at all the jobs, or at this one in particular? We think we are somehow less if we can't easily do this mom thing.

But all that is another issue. For now, I just try to see them. (They are both so sweet. Yesterday Clark brought Frances his own cherished blanket when she hurt herself, because we were at a friend's house and it was the only blanket available. He tucked it under her chin and then patted her back.) I focus and feel my smile every single time Clark says "No dis going," the cutest phrase ever, which means several things from "this toy isn't working" to "I can't get the lid off the applesauce." Cute cute cute stage (except when it isn't), even when he's mad. One of my favorite moves of his right now is his hollering: MOMMY! BAD! GIRL! when I lose my cool and holler at him for hollering at me. Nothing like being called flat out on your stuff.