I lost my phone number. Can I have yours?

So you're sitting in your local bookstore, having a lovely, solitary evening of books and hot cocoa. A tall, youngish, good-looking man passes your cozy armchair, and you feel him walk behind you more than see it. You try to look around discreetly, hoping to catch a better glimpse, only to meet his eyes. Just for a second, though, because suddenly your hot cocoa needs a lot of attention. You know, to keep it from getting lonely while you make eyes at the handsome stranger. Which you're no longer doing, by the way. Because the cocoa is lonely.

Right.

Tipped off by the warmth shivering its way up your spine, however, you realize he's come back in your direction. For a second, your heart heads right up into your throat. Will he really...? No, no. False alarm. Just reaching for a book. One that happens to be right. next. to. you.

He fingers the book for a moment, hesitates, glances down at you with those devastating eyes. Clears his throat. Looks back at the book. Come on, come on already! Is he going to speak or not?

He opens his mouth. He really is going to talk. Your mind races, preparing for every conceivable comment he might make and coming up with witty, sparkling answer that will immediately captivate and hold him. What is he going to say...?!

***
...Well, what does he say at that point? My daydreams as a teenager always stuttered for a moment at this juncture. I didn't know any particularly suave men (heck, I didn't know any men, besides teachers and relatives; just lots of boys). My dad and my brothers certainly wouldn't use their best lines on me. So what did that leave me with?

Pick-up lines. You know, the kind people joke about: "Hey, heaven sure must miss you, you're such an angel!" "Sorry, had to stare. The stars are in your eyes." "I'm lost. Can I follow you home?"

...Okay, I was able to provide a few slightly better than these. Honestly, though, not by much.

The result of these endless, pathetically romantic daydreams is quite amusing. I'm 25 years old, married, have two children, and ... I love pick-up lines. And I don't mean just as an amusing diversion (hey, let's see how many bad pick-up lines we can get my younger brother to use!). I actually blush and get all fluttery inside when Dear Boy uses one on me.

Example: The other night Dear Boy and I had an exchange like this--
Dear Boy: "Wow, are you out of your mind?"
Me: ...
Dear Boy: ...? *Uncertain smile*
Me: ...Um... no... I don't think so. Why?
Dear Boy: *Confident grin* Because you've been wandering around my mind all day.
Me: *Blush*
Dear Boy: *Wink*
Leaving me no longer able to make eye contact because I was completely flustered, flattered, and still blushing. Funny thing is, for the longest time, Dear Boy refused to say these things because he thought I was kidding and all pick-up lines are lame.

However, he's finally learned the truth: His wife is a pathetic, sappy, melting-for-a-bad-line homeless romantic. One can only hope that he never uses his awesome power for evil. He's already talked me into eating whole-grain bread and actually changing the oil in the car every 3,000 miles. Next thing you know, he'll use one of his pickup lines and I'll be going to bed at a sensible time.

Wonders will never cease, and neither will this marriage. Thank goodness.

Ah, a new day--a new blog.

Welcome to my new blog. Really, it's not all that different except it looks a little prettier. I decided that while Wordpress is an excellent sitefor those solely interested in words, I wanted to be able to pictures to names a little more easily. So here I am!

I did want to note that, eventually, I'll have my Twitter linked to this page too. For some reason, though, whenever I try and set it up right now it's displaying someone else's tweets. So it's currently disabled, but it'll come up sometime. I also wanted anyone who saw those pretty foul-mouthed tweets to know that's not really how I talk!

Please note that the links at the top of the page don't currently work. They will eventually, I promise.

So I'm off to start moving old posts over, just because I can. Have a lovely evening.

And stay tuned for more!

Milestones or Millstones?

When Ladybug was a baby, I always said smugly, "Oh, I don't pay much attention to the milestones thing. They're just averages, anyway," before I proceeded to explain how far ahead of the curve she was. She was (yes, I'm going to repeat it all now) holding her head up at two weeks, rolling both ways at 3-1/2 months, crawling at 6-1/2 months, took her first steps at 8-1/2 months (for such a perfectionist, she sure has a thing for fractions, huh?), etc etc. I still get weekly updates for "Your Child's Development, Week XXX." I used to marvel at how far ahead of the game Ladybug was in almost all physical ways (...oh, okay. I still do.).

StrawBee, being premature, has been extremely different. When she was about 2 weeks old, I suddenly realized that she was still acting like a newborn. No, scratch that: She wasn't even as far progressed as many newborns. Her little lower jaw was still developing enough muscle to suckle at the breast, and any attempt at head-holding-up was nonexistent. Soon I became quite concerned. Those weekly emails for "Your Child's Development" kept right on coming, and Miss StrawBee was not moving on nearly as quickly as Baby Center's updates were.

I talked to other mothers of premature infants and was assured that she had until she was two years old to catch up. I was relieved to know it, but still a little worried that it would make more sense to intervene sooner than later---I thought it might be nice to help her get with her age group right from the get-go, instead of waiting until it could be categorized as a "problem." Fortunately, I had the blessing of mentioning this concern to someone who could help and StrawBee was soon (and still is) receiving monthly visits from her wonderful occupational therapist.

StawBee still is not as physically advanced as Ladybug was at her age. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. However, I still find myself taking everything StrawBee does in comparison to others in her age group. I stopped visiting the birth forum for May 2009 because I found myself casting too many worried glances at my happy, growing, learning child. I have to remind myself not to think "Oh, but Ladybug was doing that at .... "

Unlike last time, I'm not the mom with the baby that's setting the curve. I'm the one with the baby who--with courage and gusto, I might add--is trying to catch up and only just making it.

Fortunately, I've already learned (the hard way, of course) to have confidence in the differences. StrawBee will find her own creative solutions, and already has. Ladybug crawled early, true; however, she never learned to scoot. StrawBee has the cutest inch-worm method of moving that has ever existed on the earth (in my professional and---ahem---unbiased opinion, of course). Still, the experience makes me rethink the whole "milestones" thing.

These thoughts came into particular focus a few days ago while visiting my parents. I was repeating some marveled accomplishments to my mother, both of StrawBee's and those of another adorable baby of my acquaintance. This baby has managed to do some things much more quickly than even Ladybug did (go baby, go!) and I was sharing some of my daughters' milestones to illustrate the difference. Suddenly, my dad jumped in with, "Which means that Jane Doe Baby is way smarter than your kids, right?"

I looked at him for a moment, utterly nonplussed, before replying, "Of course not, dad!"

He looked right back and me and said, "Well, that's the way you women make it sound."

It's so true.

Any man who has ever said women aren't as competitive as men has yet to open a thread titled "Milestones" on a birth forum. It's like the Superbowl of "My dog's bigger than your dog." The posters are usually terribly polite about it, true. But everyone (and I'll admittedly include myself) gets a little chin-in-the-air lift from posting what their baby did sooner than someone else's---and how far ahead it was of the milestone---and feels a little stomped on when another baby's done it sooner.

Not that I'm accusing anyone of entering those threads with those intentions. We just seem to gravitate toward these comparisons (Johnny Lingo, anyone?).

And not that I'm trying to single out women. I just haven't sat in on any all-men conversations lately. Or ever.

Anyway, back to the milestones. Obviously it's good to have some general information of where your child should be. I do think we saved StrawBee a lot of extra work by having an occupational therapist teach us a few simple exercises (besides, if not for the OT at the hospital, we would have had major feeding problems and probably not been able to take her home as soon as we did). The thing is that parents tend to forget: the milestones aren't hard and fast rules. They're more like ... guidelines.

Crawling (the up-on-all-fours type), for example, is said to appear between 7 and 9 months. My guess is, a doctor (who is very aware of the milestones, I imagine) probably won't get concerned until the child is approaching month 10 or 11 without any sign of crawling. A parent, on the other hand, will start saying things to friends to excuse the delay sometime around 7 months, 1 week. "He's such a cute chunk, it's hard for him to crawl." "She was such a peanut when she was born, she's just waiting to grow a bit." "All kids have their own milestones."

Yes, they do. So why do we have to keep reassuring ourselves (and everyone else we run into) that our child is, in fact, going to crawl any day now, as well as write their first symphony because, of course, little John Doe has such an innate musical talent that he's too busy pounding out a rhythm on the wall to worry about crawling.

I wonder sometimes if this obsession with milestones (or development/education, as it morphs into as the children get older) pushes us to push our kids. Is it really imperative that a toddler know the alphabet, how to count to ten in three languages, and is capable of doing a crab walk? ...Not really. Is it bad for them to be able to do these things? ...Probably not, especially if they were willing to learn it in the first place.

I just remember how surprised I was, in my short stint in the school system as a teacher-in-training, seeing the kids looking burnt out and disinterested a lot younger than I remember. I can't help but wonder that if by pushing them beyond their happy imaginary play and musical sessions with pots and pans, we're actually shortening their interest in an academic career rather than jumpstarting it. That's all.

Another concern is that parents all over are doubting their capabilities as parents when their children pass that five month mark without sitting up propped. I just wonder when our children's accomplishments, rather than their character, became the laurel of an excellent parent.

Maybe the problem is with calling them milestones. It sounds so definitive and deadline-like. Maybe if we called them mileguidelines. Or milegeneralities. Or milemarshmellows.

That last one makes me feel particularly warm and fuzzy inside. My child has a great, big, 3-month-sized milemarshmellow to scootch herself into that wonderful crawling stage. Then I can enjoy that crawling stage for a long, lovely time because the walking milemarshmellow is even bigger than the crawling one.

Children should be challenged and taught. Moreover, we do need a general idea of what is "normal" to help them reach their full potential. But it's a lot easier to enjoy the sunrise when you sit back and watch it, instead of comparing it to every other sunrise in the history of the world.

Bedwarmers

Back in the day, you set hot potatoes or a pan full of hot coals in your bed to keep warm. These days, electric blankets or just flat-out turning up the heater are great options. I personally prefer a third choice, the nudge-your-spouse-till-they-roll-over-and-you-steal-their-warm-spot bedwarmer.

Last night, I had a run-in with the fourth bedwarmer. The damp kind.

StrawBee and I had had a normal 3 a.m. feeding. I read MLIA, she ate, she blew some raspberries at her food source, I decided she was done if she was making fun of mommy's milk bottles, then I put her back in her bed. As per my usual paranoid routine, I decided to take a quick peek at Ladybug to make sure she was still breathing. I carefully opened her door, sneaked across the bedroom (a feat in itself, considering she considers her floor synonymous with her toy chest), and assured myself that all was well.

As I walked back out the door and started to close it, however, I noticed something a little out of the ordinary. A lone diaper, lying just inside the door frame. This wasn't too out of the ordinary because, let's face it, Dear Boy was kind enough to put the kids to bed and he's notorious for leaving diapers in the most awkward places (bathroom floor, book shelf, dinner table, etc). However, Ladybug has long since mastered the art of diaper removal, so I thought I'd better check to make sure she wasn't missing this vital piece of her ensemble.

She was.

Now, this has happened on several occasions. Each time I've stuck my hand in those blankets to put a clean diaper on her bum, I've prayed the blankets would still be dry. Each time, they have been. Until last night.

Ladybug was plenty warm while the storm howled outside, but damp bedwarmers really just aren't the thing.

What ensued was five silently frantic minutes of finding a clean diaper (check), making sure the pillow wasn't wet (check), moving Ladybug so I could check the bed (check), and putting my hand in every single warm, damp spot that my dear child had made (check, check, check, and check!). Soon, and without waking up a soul in the house, I had Ladybug wrapped in a warm, dry blanket (warm because I had been using it, I might add), lying on a dry bed, and all the warm, damp blankets, sheets, and pajamas bundled up for later washing.

Go me.

This morning, when it was time to get up with the kids, Dear Boy and I both pretended not to hear the baby stirring. When her cries reached a level at which we were either deaf or dead not to hear, I rolled over and said, "Ladybug wet the bed last night. I cleaned it up."

Dear Boy thought for a moment, replied "I'm sorry," then got up to get the baby. I promptly rolled over in bedwarmer #3 fashion, and was soon snuggly (smugly?) asleep.

So, bedwarmer #4, damp and disgusting you may be, but thanks for the extra sleep. See you in the wee hours sometime. ~~Carolynn

If a woman shaves her legs in the forest, does anybody care?

I first learned the art of leg-shaving in the sixth grade, after having noticed during P.E. that I was the only girl in the class whose legs caught the light with luster and shine. If only the hair had been on my head, this would not have been a problem. It wasn't, though, and it quickly became routine for me to shave. Mostly because it was routine for the girls around me to shave, really. You would think that living in Phoenix, where you can wear at least capris almost year-round, would have contributed to this wonderful hygienic monotony, but the fact is that I shaved out of herd instinct. This being an era when butt cheeks were considered a tasteful fashion statement by my peers, it was nigh impossible to find shorts that met my modesty standards. So I wore pants, even when it was 120 degrees out. And still shaved.

The habit stuck, and continued to stick even after my family and I moved to the land of Missouri sometime during high school, a land where a change in seasons meant more than "monsoon" or "no monsoon." It was in this place that my peers (aren't they helpful?) first introduced me to the idea that when a girl wears pants, as I always did, there is no reason whatever to shave the legs. No one sees them, no one touches them, and hey! the hair might actually keep you a little warmer if you let it go long enough.

I was appalled, to say the least.

I think I tried it once, but couldn't make it past that hair-is-just-long-enough-to-brush-the-inside-of-my-pants-and-irritate-my-skin stage. So it was about 48 hours before razor hit skin again.

It was about this time that my best friend, amused at my obsession, shook her head bemusedly and sighed, "Carolynn, if we got stranded in the middle of the woods, in peril of our lives, with no civilization for miles and miles, you would STILL find a way to shave your legs, wouldn't you?"

Yes, yes I would.

From there came college, where I was certain that keeping my legs shaved was one key (of many) to catching dates. Apparently not, since I only went out a couple dozen times my entire college career. Nothing daunted, I continued religious in leg-shaving observance.

It seemed to me that I was vindicated, however, when (happy day) I met Dear Boy and married him. What that had to do with shaving my legs I don't know, but I do know that I was happy in the knowledge that my husband would, at least, never need complain about my hairy legs.

Even I wasn't perfect, however, and I found myself one day apologizing for slightly hairy legs. His reply was something of a shock: "Oh, I don't care."

WHAT?!

He really didn't. It took a couple years before I believed him but he was, in fact, being sincere and not just polite. I was a little shaken. After all, didn't girls learn most of their beautifying habits as teenagers in order to please some nebulous, would-be dream boat of the future? Well, my dream boat had arrived---and well-shaven legs were not a requirement to sail out of the harbor.

You would think that this story would end with me realizing I was liberated and declaring my freedom by swearing off razors forever. However, it doesn't. You'll be glad to know that even when I have an infant that keeps me up all night, I still make the effort to have nicely shaven legs. And why?

Because I want to.

So I guess it is a liberation story. No matter how many moms tell me I'm nuts for worrying about it, or how many women's lib movements say it's a sign of bondage, or even how many beauty ads tell me I should... I do it for me. So when I lotion my legs, I don't feel as though I'm petting a cactus. So tiny leg hairs don't get trapped in my pantyhose (and yes, I do insist on wearing those to church). And because, despite it all, it's become part of who I am. Carolynn-the-compulsive-leg-shaver.

And yes, Amy. Even if we were stranded in the forest and about to die I would still find a way to shave. And maybe the sharp rock I used would be just what we needed to build a fire and save our lives--but only after the leg hairs are gone.