Wine Please

This is what I found on my bed the other morning:

Yeah, I thought the same thing as you…who the heck pooped on my freshly washed sheets??? As I got closer I was starting to realize what it truly was:

and thank the good Lord above, it wasn’t poop.

Instead, it used to be this guy:

I forgot. I’m sorry. And Justin, who usually does this, has been ridiculously busy and hasn’t gotten a chance. So thank goodness Trannyhead is on the ball and posted Sumo’s pics (happy b-day, by the way!), which reminded how neglectful we’ve been.

These pics were done over the span of two different photo sessions because Cooper was just not in the mood to have his portraits done. On the first day I’d set him down and he’d start crying immediately.

I even tried sitting him with Gavin, whom he adores, and he’d still start bawling!

So Portrait Innovations saved that photo shoot for us and we came back two days later to try again. This time I brought Justin. And this time instead of crying (although he was a little crabby), he just kept crawling away.

But we begged, pleaded, bribed with milk and poofs, and managed to get some decent shots of our little tempermental toddler:

Last night, or rather, way early this morning, around midnight, I realized I forgot to make the mini-cupcakes I was planning to bring for Cooper’s class today. I got sucked into Twitter and Plurk for the n’th time this week and totally lost track of time. I figured at midnight that I was actually getting to bed early for the first time all week…but read Burgh Baby Mom’s post about homemade grilled pizza and thought, “OH CRAP!!!!”

I rushed through a few other computer-related things I needed to finish then went nuts.

• Pre-heated the oven, then saw the fine print on the cake mix indicating non-stick pans needed a lower temp.
• Mixed the eggs, water, and oil with the Funfetti cake mix by hand even though the mix called for an electric because I was terrified of waking up the whole house with my very noisy hand mixer. And I’m a rebel. No really, I am…went to TF South High School, home of the Rebels!
• I put the pan of mini-cupcakes in the oven, then realize I have NO idea how long to bake because the mix didn’t have time for mini-cupcakes. So I got to babysit the oven.
• Got Cooper’s cups of formula made for school while suspiciously eyeballing the rising cupcakes in the oven.
• Wiped down most of the horizontal surfaces in the kitchen. At least the ones not covered by dirty dishes or mail/papers.
• Since I got to babysit the oven, the dang timer went off three times and it is louder.than.sin.

I pulled them out and was arranging them in a dish to bring to the daycare when I heard Cooper fuss over the monitor. I froze…it was 12:30am. A minute later when he was done and quiet again, I realized that I had involuntarily hunched down behind the kitchen island and was holding my breath. I wonder what that says about my parenting. I mean, it made sense a few months back when I was putting some folded clothes away in his room and he stirred in his bed, that I dropped to the floor and crawled out of his room on my belly. A little extreme, but not for a mother tired of a baby getting up twice a night (at that point). Now that Cooper has been sleeping through the night since coming home from Chicago, I get a little testy when he rescinds on our agreement. And apparently it triggers some sort of Post Traumatic Stress response, as well.

The fiftieth time I checked on the little buggers…

No, I did not wipe down my stove…thank-you for asking.

YUM! Actually, I didn’t have a single one. And I did not frost them because while I love the teachers at daycare, I know that they stragetically give the kids the sweet treats at the end of the day, right before parents pick them up.

In preparation of friends and family coming into town and filling my house with fun and excitement in honor of Cooper’s 1st birthday on the 12th, we have been cleaning. And cleaning. And cleaning some more. And no, our house is still not all that clean because well, we’ve cleaned it like twice since Cooper was born. I might be exaggerating, but not by much.

Justin did some vacuuming and mopping; I’ve been tackling the bathrooms and the never-ending-piles-o-laundry (and really, WTH…every time I go to Target to pick up some more laundry supplies, they’ve stopped carrying whatever I’ve last bought AND they’ve rearranged the whole dang laundry aisle); we’ve been tag-teaming for dishes, toys, and general clutter (I admit, I am a clutter-monster and a pack-rat). So at least we’re getting somewhere so that come this weekend, we just need to do a few good wipe-downs of things and run the vacuum. Or so we hope. We’ll see how things go with weekend.
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In other housekeeping news, Karen over at The Rocking Pony gave me this and I am tickled pink! I swear, she is one of the sweetest people I know.

I would like to pass it along to

• LaskiGal
• Sue over at As Cape Cod Turns
• Tranny Head
• LagLiv

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I realized that due to Justin’s incredibly heavy work schedule in the past few weeks and my idiocy, we never updated you guys on the final say in Gavin’s Child Find testing, etc. The final decision was that he is about 6 months behind for Receptive Language (what he hears and understands), and about 11 or 12 months behind for Expressive Language (what says, his vocabulary, how easily is he understood by strangers). In other words his auditory processing is on par with that of a 3-1/2 year old boy and he speaks like a 3-year old. This has certainly explained a lot of our frustration in communicating with Gavin, and explains why when we ask him a question he sometimes gives us an answer that just isn’t quite right. Add in his stuttering, and it’s downright aggravating for all of us because he’s annoyed he can’t get his words out or get his point across or can’t understand why we keep asking him the same dang thing over and over. And for us…we just have a hard time seeing our child struggle, or hear his classmates speak so much better (or worse, hear children a year or younger have what seems to be better speaking and comprehension skills).

So thankfully we will have our IEP and will be starting services the first week of September. Three hours of therapy per month…well, technically in 3 weeks. The fourth week of the month is set aside for any additional help if needed or meeting with the teacher for in-depth discussions, etc. The neat thing is that it is going to be at the elementary school that he will be going to in Fall ‘09, so by the time he starts kindergarten he will be King of the Classroom and will know the school well.

This post started as a rant about the fight Justin and I had. But I realized that wasn’t appropriate to air that kind of laundry…at least not while he still reads my blog and has comments emailed to him. Suffice it to say it wasn’t pretty, complete with ugly words, and hurt feelings, and for what I think was the first time in nearly 10 years together, I retreated by myself to cool down. Usually I’m the one chasing Justin around the house, shouting like some crazed harpy.

But not this time. I was mad, I was wounded, and didn’t want it to get uglier than we had already allowed it to get, especially since the kids were right there.

I sat in our room working on laundry, watching something stupid on TV so that I could let my brain wander and sort out what was said, and what I was going to say once the kids were in bed, trying to formulate the best passive-aggressive remark to get my point across.

I finished up the laundry, put it away, and started running the water for the kids’ bath. Justin brought them up and, with very few words exchanged, we went to work scrubbing and rinsing them. I pulled Cooper out and got him dried off and into his jammies. I heard Justin doing the same for Gavin. I sat in the rocking chair to give Cooper his nightly cup of milk and snuggle, heart still hurting from the argument two hours before.

Instead of fidgeting around like usual, Cooper looked at me with those big slate-colored eyes of his, crawled up to put his head on my shoulder and nuzzled in my neck. We rocked for a good ten minutes, then I stood up and swayed to the lullabye music playing with Cooper while he kept cuddling and patting me, and stroking my arms, shoulders, and playing with my hair with his chubby little hands.

And I began crying. This little baby, not quite a year old, seemed to know I was hurting and took care of me the best way he knew how. God only knows how Cooper knew (actually, I think He had a lot to do with Cooper’s response to me). But I cried quietly, feeling the pain melt away, trying to not sob or sniff loudly lest I break the spell of my baby comforting his mother.