Appetizers coming right up!

Well if being a new mother isn't enough I thought I would help my friend out with the the food for her baby shower. Before I knew it there were four or five of us hosting this event. Thanks goodness her whole list of 100 didn't attend. My part was doing the food/ appetizers. Let me begin by saying when I confirmed to help her I was figuring 15-25 people, OK, totally doable, 30 um OK, 60 what!

So I got to work. Keep in mind that I've never even made enough food for 10 let alone 60. I did my research online of what to make and how much for that many guests ahead of time. I would need 8-10 appetizers. Thank goodness her Mom was bringing cake and punch. Like a good girl I planned her menu. Chicken salad sandwiches, olive sandwiches, cucumber tea sandwiches, deviled eggs, Salmon dip & crackers, spinach dip & bread bites, tortellini salad, jello fruit salad,veggie & hummus dip, regular fruit salad and watermelon. If that wasn't enough she wanted me to make frozen quiche she had in her freezer. I didn't want to hurt her feelings so I said OK. I've Ok'd myself into a corner with this whole endeavour. I didn't want to have to cook anything on the actual day that I would have to keep hot. She insisted and said they have an oven at the place the shower was being held at. So "OK".

Everything was set. I did my research, menu, shopping a dozen times. I began prepping two days before I had Mr. C watch the baby so I could focus. I was ready and in a zone. You feel me a zone!

I got up at 5am the day before. This was the main cook day. Everything in line ready to roll. I am a one woman catering team working in a closet of a kitchen. I have my college cooler running and my fridge clean and cleared. I began. Deviled eggs done, chicken salad, olive and cucumber sandwich filler cooled and prepped to spread on bread. Spinach dip in tubs ready to go, hummus ready, jello set, watermelon ready to slice. I'm feeling pretty proud of my abilities right now.

My friend decides to drop in last minute with her trays she wants me to use for the food, "thanks" as I clench my teeth. They were small and of various size and not even close to enough for my menu.

Now she is pregnant and has nothing better to do but have time to socialize. #1 wrench in the gear box. She left after about 2-3 hours of gabbing. I keep saying "well I still have a lot to do". Apparently she wasn't taking hints that day. An hour or two later after feeding baby girl here comes Mr. C's brother to drop in and say hi. #2 wrench. As it turns out he wanted to spend the night so he didn't have to drive home so he could drink and party down town. We live in walking distance, so I said "OK".

Then they both decide to leave for the gym. Good! They took baby girl to Grandma's and now back to my task at hand. Well, they were only gone for and hour and a half maybe. In that time I got almost nothing done besides dishes for the next phase, went to my folks house to pick up some big bowls and trays but couldn't because they weren't home #3 wrench and so I came home to begin on the tortellini salad but it was dinner time and the boys were saying they were hungry #4 wrench, "OK tortellini Alfredo for you guys comin' right up"! Smooth, right? Then as I am almost finished, Wham! Spike #5, I get a call from my step mother "your Dad is in the emergency room and not doing good". I said "be there shortly". Dinner is just about to be served and Boom! #6 Mr.C's whole crew of siblings decided to ride their bikes over to our house to visit with the baby with out even calling to let us know (he has 7 younger siblings and we live in a granny unit). So I eat a bite, feed the boys, kiss the baby and off to the hospital but wait Step Ma needs coffee, "OK". Gonna stop at the corner restaurant and get her some pie and coffee. OK now to the hospital. Zoom Zoom Zoom!

My Ma's in the parking lot because Dad's off getting a scan of his abdomen. We meet him in his ER stall and I visit for a bit then head home because he's waiting for the results and as you may know that can take forever. I get home clean up from the crew and dinner. Now to finish my tortellini salad, Oh but that's not gonna happen because I fed it to the boys for dinner. UGH! OK I will do it tomorrow. Fruit salad time. Baby's down, Mr. C is helping me cut fruit and then the call comes in "your Dad is going in for an emergency appendectomy where they're removing his appendix". AHHHHHH! WhAt!!!! "OK, I'll be there shortly".I hit the shower.

As I'm getting ready to go. Mr. C's bro shows up with his friend from the local watering hole. He was afraid for his friend to drive home drunk so he brought him to my place. ERG!!!! Not only am I in a rush with a mile long "to do list", I don't know this dude and now he wakes up the baby not once that can be forgiven but 3 times by being loud, after we warned him to be quiet while he sobers up, so he can eventually leave safely. Oh now I am uberchillin on the sofa. I come out of the bed room and about to leave and brother opens the bathroom door after we hear a loud noise and find that his stupid asshole friend has crawled over my sink and out the 8inch window! Mr. C's brother goes running outside after his friend as does Mr. C and I grab a baseball bat and follow. I'm gonna break his legs right now because he had been warned. We couldn't find him, apparently he went up and over the fence into my neighbors yard scaring his nieces having a sleep over and breaks 2 locks on the gate before running down our street. From what the neighbors were telling us as we were outside. If I see this man again I think I will literally run him over with my car! So...

Back to the house again to grab my purse for trip #2 to the restaurant for coffee and no pie this time and again ZOOM ZOOM ZOOM! back to the hospital. I left Mr. C with knife in hand to finish the fruit salad.

I meet Ma in the surgery waiting room. Its quiet and dark and we catch up and relax as much as possible then in an hour or so the Dr. comes in and says Dad is OK and in recovery. We go in to see him, he tells me of his vision he had while under the needle and then I give him my loves and goodbyes and head back home. Its now 6am game day for the Baby shower! Mr. C was barely asleep when I went in to check on him and then he says "crawl in bed for a bit you need it". "OK, but just for an hour". 3 hours later the baby cries for food and I'm seriously late. The shower is in two and a half hours. OMG!!!!

I give Mr. C a to do list while I hit the store for the tortellini and when I got back from the store, I see he hadn't done what was on the to do list. So we both have a melt down. I feed the baby then its on. Its a race to the finish. He is chopping, I'm spreading and the phone is ringing from the mother of the girl having the baby shower "are you on your way?, you are late?, why aren't you here yet?, We are waiting for you to get here before the guests arrive!" I say "Yep Yep! We're loading the car right now". In actuality we will be in about 15- 20 minutes. Mr. C loads the car and off to the shower I go, but not before he hands me the damn frozen quiche to take with me.

I fly to the shower in the next town over in the same clothes I was in the night before, unload, pop the quiche in the oven, we set the table as the guests were arriving and the mother of the Mom to be tells everyone "don't eat yet!" I'm thinking why the hell not! She has to go into a spiel about this and that and then announces "OK, go ahead and have some food". Everyone lines up, chow time and they all brought there feed bags. At this point I could care less whether we have enough or not.

I told them "Sorry I can't stay my Dad is ill in the hospital" while the all give me looks of death and I head out. I go home to collect Mr. C and baby and then Zoom Zoom Zoom! back to the hospital again. Dad is coherent and happy to see us and we socialize for a bit with him and the family, then finally we leave after I'm positive he's OK, to go home for some much needed sleep. Thank goodness for Mr. C's help because without it I would still be wondering how to finish it all. That will be the last baby shower I ever volunteer for.

What happened to my flexibility!?!

Wow! Let me start by telling you that my ever so loving Mr. C has been doing the workout video program P90X and it is sooo extreme. His brother's come over everyday to do it with him but yesterday they didn't arrive till he or shall I say we were almost done.

I thought to myself "maybe I will try this workout with him, after all it is yoga day"
I love yoga and being as big as I am, "I'm not too bad at it" or so I thought. Poor guy was doing it all by himself so I decided to join in.

We started out with easy deep breathing and light stretches, "this is going well and hey, I feel pretty good" as my confidence increased I increased my stretching abilities. Child's pose, cool.
Downward Dog, "I got this". Cobra, Warrior 1,2,3, exhalted warrior.

Whoot! Oh yeah! Yoga postures you're my B_ _ _ _!".





Then it got not so easy. I thought I would attempt the Triangle poses, "UuuHH there it is!" Pigeon, "Ha ok right". Then comes Crow "how about no"
here we go with Childs Pose instead. Now that is over Bridge Pose, "mmm hmmm Downward Dog here I come again".

Confidence descending and really fast! Crow Pose, "Ouch, What the Hell!".


Confidence completely lost. My spirits semi lifted with a Sun salutation and Tree Pose but not by much.


As I lay there in Corpse Pose
feeling like I got dragged down the street by a semi truck, what muscle tissue I had was completely shredded, confidence obliterated, I realized after giving birth and being hacked in half from the C section my body will never be the same and I will have to start back at square one, again. Then here come the boys fit and

supremely manicured men with perfect skin and chiselled abs. I hate 20 year olds!

I lept to my feet, defeated by my inflexibility I huffed off to get ready for work and to get a lil' sweet lovin' from my baby girl, after all I am her Mama right, wrong! She see's me and cries like I am trying to kill her. Not a great self esteem booster and to top it off she's muddy. Thanks baby girl.

Today as I write this I can feel my mid section, it reminds me of the feeling I had in the recovery room after the C section. Where is the Morphine!

I wonder if my personal trainer can help me with a bruised ego.

The Lil' Swimmer

The other day my lil' family went to my work for Zoey's first swimming adventure. The difficult part was in the locker room. She decided to have her 2nd public explosive diaper which is not a problem, I cleaned her up like a pro. I put on her lil swimmer panties and Pluuuoop Squish!!! Ewwwey! Not again! Not in her new swimmer panties.. and she looked soo cute! So not only did she get it all out this time but I had the pleasure of introducing her to the shower where I got to wash her off and her new panties and me. No one told me how slippery naked babies are in the shower. They really should make a tub to wash off lil babies for circumstances like these. She did great in the shower to my surprise and why wouldn't she...she had emptied her bowels all over the place and she had a quite satisfied look on her face.



So now that baby girl is showered with newly broken in semi new swimmer panties its out to the pool where Daddy/ Mr. C is waiting for us. Thankfully I washed us off because she was the only 3 month old lil baby out there and everyone was staring at us for this new experience. It was so quiet you could've heard a pin drop.

We got in the warm water and I held Zoey afraid and terrified that she would freak out when the water touched her but instead she smiled with a little skepticism to the new sensation as I submerged the lower half of her body. I swayed her from side to side then it was time to go for more. By now the older ladies in the pool were oooing and awwing at her and asking a ton of questions but Mr. C and I were too engrossed by our lil wonder baby to pay too much attention to the onlookers.



I tried to submerge her to her shoulders but its easier said than done. Apparently babies are really very buoyant and she floated right up. It was the strangest thing. Daddy C had to get in and take over the reins being his baby girl was in his eyes about to drown my mama and he held her and tried to submerge her and found out how she naturally floated with no effort at all. It was amazing. She acted like she was right at home. I heard how babies take to the water pretty easily but I didn't think my child would be one that did. She never ceases to amaze me.



Mr. C and I were both afraid to let her go completely in fear that her head may submerge and that it might be too much for her at this time. But tomorrow we will try again. I think I will start looking for Mother and child swimming lessons so I don't drown my Lil' Swan by accident.

I wonder if she will be an Olympic swimmer someday...Hmmm I wonder.

I think I can...I think I can...

I think I can...I feel like the little engine that could. I needed to see if I could parent solo successfully so I ventured out on my own with my new baby girl. Once on Father's Day to give her Daddy, Mr. C some snooze time. Which to a new parent is worth its weight in gold and he was oh so appreciative, when he woke up at almost 3pm.Zoey and I left the house at or around 10am hit the drug store and headed for my parents house. A comfortable territory for me to practice my parental skills with some supervision from Gammy and Grumpy. Gammy took her from me almost immediately, put her to sleep and I didn't really see my baby till I was about to leave. After his late awakening we spent the rest of the afternoon up until 10pm that night at his folks house for a Father's day Celebration. I had her most of the time when the his family wasn't passing her around. I wanted him to be able to enjoy his family and play some of the games they had set up (volleyball, horse shoes, target shooting). All in all a pretty safe and successful journey, but I had lots of help so it didn't satisfy my need for independent parenting.

I needed some more practice. So on Monday, baby girl and I ventured out again on a huge outing to my cousins house for a drop in visit which ended up at the river and not only with my lil' girl but also with her two lil' boys of 2yrs and the other of 4yrs old. I didn't realize what I was in for. My daughter behaved beautifully, to my surprise. My cousin tried to soothe her cries but she wanted Mama and I bounced her and fed her like a pro. I can't hardly believe it myself. Usually when she starts a fit Mr.C is the only one she wants and quiets for him almost instantly. This time I was sufficient for her and she relaxed just the way she does for him. We sat in my cousin's front yard under the trees till her 4yr old came home from school at or around noon. Then off to the River.

I was nervous about going on a spur of the moment trip to the river. New moms usually don't do anything on the fly and I didn't realize I said yes till we were on our way. As we were driving I started to get anxious and started doubting myself but I should have been doubting my cousin.

When we got there. My cuz drops me, baby girl, her 2 boys and all the gear off near the river shore. She leaves me to carry it all and watch her kids while she parks the vehicle back up in the parking lot a long ways off. I felt like a camel with a crooked hump trying to lug it all to a spot on the beach. Did I mention I had a c-section like 7wks ago. She didn't remember obviously. Her boys listened pretty well and followed me to a sunny spot. Of course all the shady spots under the trees were taken already. So we copped a spot directly in the blaring sun. Not exactly ideal for my infant of now 7wks. A nice beach goer offered her kids toys for my lil cuzzez to play with and introduced her boy of 3yrs and her daughter of 6mo. The 3yr old played with my cousins children till she came from the parking lot. My daughter was asleep and stayed that way till we left. She was a dream.

I was very nervous of the heat and fussed over her and shaded her with my two umbrellas. I got in the water about up to my hips but couldn't take my eyes off her on the shore. She never even stirred. She was great for our first trip. After a little while I relaxed some.

As I sat on the shore watching my family play in the river, I notice my cousin playing with her youngest and chatting with the beach lady. Then I notice beach lady's son, who had on a life vest, playing with my cousins eldest the 4yr old who had nothing but shorts on and a smile. I called to my cousin 3x hey!, hey!!! Cousin!!! Get your boy!!! I see his red hair under water. I begin to get up because she was so oblivious to what was going on. The beach lady's boy was not intending to but was holding down my cousins boy as the both of them went sailing down the river about 20-30ft. I get up to rescue my cousins kid and just as I did, he popped up and gasped for air and was able to touch bottom. Thank god!!! I made him get out for a bit.

Needless to say I scolded my cousin's parenting skills, she was sooo oblivious. She is new to parenting thing too, these are foster children she has and intends to adopt them. She has only been a parent a little longer than I have been. Not only that but she was standing in knee high water with the 2yr old wading on his back between her legs so he could practice floating. She didn't even realize how awful that looked as she wiggled above his head in a dance to make him smile. I told her that is completely inappropriate for her to do with her kid whether her intentions were innocent or not. It looked horrendous. I told her that we needed to be getting back and started to pack up my daughter, who was still sound asleep.

These outings deeply satisfied my need for independent parenting practice and now I feel much more confident and not only do I think I can, I know I can. My cousin however needs much more practice. Until next time wish me luck.

Stranger Danger mixer with a Paranoia garnish

Well, Today was a good productive day, saw a cousin and put him to work moving a piece of furniture out of my boudoir, ran several errands and now I will be able to continue on with life as I know it, I'm all paid up. On the way home from these errands my Lil' baby girl decides to have a screaming fit, I know surprise, surprise. The thing is that this time it struck as we were driving. So we sat with that screeching till we were almost home but the sound escalated to that 3 alarm fire siren I am oh so fond of, I had to pull over. Luckily we were near a park and so we pulled in to give her and my nerves a break.

The park was lovely and wierd all at the same time. I've never quite noticed it in this light before. There were children on the playground, a music function under the gazebo's, a study group of some sort measuring the ground (I don't know), people lounging on the cool grass in the shade soaking up the fresh air. Normal right, wrong what I failed to mention is the unusually large group of icky and rowdy bums. I don't mean to be rude. I do realize the park is for everyone and I know what it is like to not have a lot of money, but it was like some sort of bum convention. There were like 15+ bums chilling, smoking, drinking, chummin' it up and taking up the whole side walk with their shopping carts, bikes, bags, and what not. Wierd! Its like the dark warning you see in those generic movies in grade school about "stranger danger" that we all laughed at. But they were really there and it just looked really out of place because the children weren't very far away and the bums frequented the restroom right next to the playground while children went to the bathroom unattended. Where were there parent's I wondered.

Come to think of it may be it wasn't them, gasp! Maybe it was me. I was in fact trying to soothe a lil baby, and it was my first time nursing on the grass in front of the whole world, watching everyone at the park with suspicious eyes. I wonder if this is what Motherhood is... constant paranoia...who's watching me, what are they thinking and constant worry...will I ever be ok with letting Zoey play at the park with this dark presence, will I ever let her go alone when she is 10-12 years old, will I be the dark presence watching her with her friends from behind the bushes in case something happens. Sheesh! I feel like someone turned on the neighbourhood watch in side me. I have a new keen sense of "stranger dangerism" alarms going off at random. No one told me of the head trips I would be having, I wonder how long this lasts? I must say aside from all that it was a nice day at the park.

I live with the banshee and I call her Zoey

This morning started off as usual since the afterbirth. 7am or earlier my baby girl starts to stir and start crying...Mr.C gets her and says "She's hungry, are you gonna feed her?" as if I didn't know she was hungry and like I wouldn't feed my child...30min of feeding till we all pass out again till around 9 or 10am...Screaming from the crib begins again..."She's hungry, are you gonna feed her?" I think I will say "Nope, not gonna do it" tomorrow to see what he does. Some times she goes back to sleep and sometimes she doesn't. Things have been like this for a while now off and on with some regularity. But today for extra fun she doesn't stop crying.

My little sweet child of now 6 weeks is practising her bone chilling screeches and testing her little wind pipes to see exactly how loud she can make noise and she chose today to do it. I pat her, sing, push her knees up to her chest (to crank out a fart), I put her on her tummy and then up over my shoulder and then on the bed on her tummy,I rock and swing her, we bounce in the bouncy/buzzy chair, I rub her back, made silly faces and googly eyes, nothing worked. So it was Mr. C's turn because she isn't calming down for me. She has had it with my shenanigans.

We live in a 1 bedroom house and you could hear a mouse fart with how thin the walls are. So I call sweetly "Michael", "Michael?", "Daddy?"...nothing. No sound of stirring, no bed creaking from him getting up, no sound of footsteps coming to soothe my sweet bellowing little baby. "Can he really not hear me or baby girl for that matter" I thought how unusual is that. Mr. C is normally a very and overly attentive Father, but where is he. Our child is screeching like a banshee. So I go to find out what's going on...or not going on. There is my love lying so peacefully on the bed real calm like, wait...are his eyes fluttering. Are you serious... He is pretending to sleep. So very calm and casually I say "Ahem...do you hear this shrieking child...do you think you come and soothe this baby." Now maybe that may have had a touch of sarcasm and tone but so did our child's cry. He did manage to get up with an evil glare of "how dare I disrupt his false slumber" and as soon as he held her lo and behold she stops her howling. That was all it took. I said thanks and I went to make breakfast while he rocked her. It wasn't long before she was asleep again. So we all passed out. We were up late the previous night.

Now I thought I did everything I could've possibly done to stop her from freaking out. Why did she stop with him. When she did fall asleep, he acted smug,like "was that so hard". Urg! Men sometimes,I swear.

Mr.C and I were finally up and at em and baby girl starts it up again. I have been able to decipher some of her cries, there is the sweet "wahh".... that says "I want attention", then the "ahhhh"...she is uncomfortable, usually a diaper change so better step on it quick...then there is the 3 alarm fire siren "Wahhh Ahhhh Ruuuuhhhh!!!!!...repeated over and over and over!!!!" meaning get it together and do something NOW I am pissed off cry!!!! We got to listen to this last cry for what seemed like and eternity today with baby girl taking short 5 to 10 minute naps in between so she could recharge her batteries for the next sound off.

I love this child with every fiber of my being, but wow, can she make you lose your sanity in aninstant! I wonder what is wrong with her, is she sick, does she need a diaper change, is she hungry, nope the culprit is the infamous gas mixed with constipation (I think because she hasn't do do'd in two days). The thing is there was nothing that we could do that would help her get it out. Mr. C rocked her and bounced her till he was about to fall over and I sang, nursed, played and cuddled her. We bathed her thinking the warm water will help her get it out. Nothing...so what do you do when you are at the end of your rope?, besides tie a noose in it and slip it over your head. Mr.C and I decided it was time to play the blame game. Dun Dun Duhh!!! He started with "do this" so I retort with a "do that" and that was all it took for us to squash our what seemed to be strong foundation of patience and gratitude. Yep! we threw it out the window just like that.

Finally after our little bickering match and short bout of the silent treatment, did we calm down and resumed being gracious to each other again; all about the time my little girl gave the screeching a rest and decided to sleep for a while to let us regroup and compose ourselves.

Gas and constipation are common for infants I was told, but never was I told how to stop it and how to maintain sanity while in the trenches.

Now she is out for the night I hope...for our sake. She let out some enormous farts accompanied by some belches and spit up. I think she is good for now. Its funny that when you are a tiny little infant is the only time when people are actually proud and excited by your bodily functions.

I hope tomorrow goes better than today. I don't like it when the banshee takes hold of my little girl ( I seriously think she was possessed) Ha ha!

After birth

Hmmm...Birth. Birth is not quite what I expected it to be like. Pain...yes, drugs...definitely yes!..., privacy...none..., Modest...no..., seriously thought you would die...yesssoouchhhh!!! What was about to happen after the birth when we came home I must say I didn't expect. That is when things became...different. This is the ending of an era and the beginning of the rabbit hole and I took the red pill! Wow! was that an eye opener!

People often warn you about their adventures in pregnancy and lightly drop hints on how you adjust to life after you come home. Books keep your head in a great fantasy world full of super women where if you do this then all will be good in your world. What if you are not a super woman? What if you are just a regular person, ya know, someone like me.

The thing your friends and their suggested motherhood manuals don't tell you is HOW to maintain sanity when you are in the heat of the moment and sleep deprived and there is a tiny human testing her wind pipes at 3 am while trying to remember all their great tips and tricks of the trade for child rearing.

Someone ought to make school for people with kids. They need dressing a baby101 class. To learn how to not break their delicate, little limbs off when you are putting on a Onsie. Onsie. A Onsie is a tee shirt for babies that has snaps in the crotch. That's another class in its self...Baby item vocabulary 102, or how to speak conversation baby language with other parents 103! I swear the names for things like a binky (pacifier/to me that "sucky thing"), a boppy, which is a basically pillow the baby lays on while you breast feed. Not even going to touch on breast feeding yet. Dressing isn't even the beginning. A How to stop a crying child class would be great and how do you do it when you've had no sleep class would be better. I now understand why there are some really messed up people in the world. Their parents got lost in the after birth and are forever in wonderland.

I wonder all the time how my new little baby girl is going to turn out in a month, a year, ten years from now from the choices I make for us. I wonder what she is thinking, I wonder if she loves me, I wonder if I will be able to endure the hard times that are in our future, I wonder what she will remember of me after I die...Hmmm I wonder.

The life of sleeping in past noon are gone, gone are the days of bar hopping (regularly), gone are the days of reckless love...but still are the days of firsts. First step, first word, first birthday, first Halloween and Christmas. Still are the days of making my own family traditions and instilling value and morals too.I hope I have the strength, wisdom and nerve to form my child into a decent,fun,kind and loving human being. I wonder.

Until the answers come to me I will be lost in wonderland. Wondering and learning how to decipher what cry means what and how to breast feed while walking and how to be somewhere on time when you have an infant and how to accept that I am enough and know that I am just what my daughter needs. I think I am going to enjoy the ride.