The catch-up

So much already happening this year. I guess we’re getting closer to the half-way mark. We celebrate three years in Walla Walla in August. Carlos and I have been together 5 years. Diego turn 4. We head to LA for what is going to be our annual summer trip to see grandparents, family and friends.

My big news around here is that Rafael, all of 14-months, is finally walking like a champ. And he’s having more nights of sleeping soundly. He’s also rolling out his beginner vocab.

Rafael’s favorite words so far are:

DADA (screamed in the direction of Carlos)

Ashes, ashes… (in a sing-song voice, from our many rounds of Ring Around the Rosies)

MAMA (but not as loud as DADA)

DEGO (it’s so cute to hear him say his big bro’s name).

I also think he is fumbling around with Algar, and he points and smiles at Itzul so he is probably working on that one as well.

I’ve been teaching Diego to hum the Darth Vader theme from Star Wars, and I swear Rafael is picking it up as well. If I can get that one on YouTube, watch out.

But my biggest delight, the thing that has brought me immeasurable joy, is that we have brand new windows throughout our house. This means that after three years, we finally have windows that open. We can finally let fresh air in!

Our house was built in 1947, and the windows had been in place that long. I think 60 years is a pretty good shelf life for windows. There is also an addition, that added the master bedroom and bathroom, done in the late 70s I believe. Those windows were different, but I didn’t consider them “new” or “efficient” in their 30 years.

We’re slowly adding little touches to our house that is making it more “ours” every day. We got around to painting our living room, and our kitchen, bathrooms, and bedroom are next. We tried our hands at landscaping out front and hope the little flowers and plants we picked survive the summer and winter.

I gave our roses a good grooming during the winter, and it looks like they might be really nice this year.

When I find our camera I am going to post pictures of all these little projects I’m noting.

July can’t come soon enough. Even though I have the freedom to work from home if I must, or if I’m sick, it will be nice to have that leisure time with no responsibilities beyond the immediate family.

We’re also experimenting with contracting a maid. She’s only come out once so far, for three hours, but I think this is a relationship that is only going to blossom. I can’t explain how hard it is to work full-time, be a mom, and try to keep the house in order. She’s really only doing the grunt work of vacuuming, mopping, dusting, and scrubbing the bathrooms and kitchen. The laundry, dishes, and general tidiness of the house is still on us. Anyway, we only budgeted for 6 hours a month.

Our current situation, of both working full time, and having no family to help around the house, has been really tough. The last thing we want to do with our down time, or on our weekends, is mop, sweep, and scrub bathrooms and counters. But that is what would happen, and then we’d miss time with the kids. I think I may love this arrangement. It costs, but it’s cheaper than having me cut back on hours or not work, which we had also considered. Sometimes being a grown-up stinks.

Sweet sleep

Sleep deprivation has kept me from blogging for a long time. Our “newborn” is nearing his first birthday and he still loves to wake up in the middle of the night and torture us.

This kid is a screamer. He is a yeller, a howler, and a nurser. I guess the routine, if it could be considered that, goes like this:

Baby falls asleep anywhere between 7 and 9 p.m. Snoozes peacefully for about two hours. Wakes up and wants to nurse. We would let him cry, but he shares a room with his big brother. And I make the assumption that if he nurses while I’m still awake, then he might get his fill and sleep until morning.

Not quite.

He wakes up again, at any give time. It’s been 12:30 a.m., it’s been 1, or even 2. At this point, we try to just let him wail it out and get himself back to sleep. Last night, though, after 15 minutes, we couldn’t take it anymore and his cries were getting more intense. He belts his unhappiness. We try singing, rubbing his belly, rocking. I refuse to nurse. But I always give in. And within a matter of seconds, he is quiet and off to dreamland.

We tried something this weekend after a particularly bad night that would probably anger our pediatrician. We put him down on his belly. This is a big no-no in the pediatric world, but was the common practice with infants and toddlers for years. Since the baby is practically walking, we thought the risk was minimal. And he slept fine, from about 2:30 a.m. to about 6. Not great, not bad. But since that was the only length of time we got to sleep, it was a rough Sunday.

Same thing happened Sunday night. I caved in around 2 a.m., nursed, put him on the belly. Slept until about 6:30 a.m., just in time to get ready for work.

Our pediatrician had given us some acid-reflux medicine to give him, in case his sleep problems had to do with his belly and digestion. We have no way to know that this is what’s ailing him, and we haven’t used the medicine because the potential side-effects freaked us out. Depression? Hallucinations? How would we even know? Obviously these are the worst-case scenario, one in a million side effects, but still. That’s our baby.

The belly sleeping worked for now, but now that I think about it the baby usually sleeps from 2 until morning anyway.

My biggest, strongest wish at the moment is that he’ll sleep for 6 to 8 continuous hours. He should take a lesson from big brother Diego, who at 3 now sleeps (mostly) peacefully from 8 to 7. And that’s even with a nap.

A dream house

There is a house for sale a few blocks from our own home, and it is listed online. Every once in a while I go online, stare at the pictures and try to imagine what it would  be like to live in there. In many ways it is exactly the kind of house that I want for our family, and also very much what we need right now. We really need a few extra rooms where the kids can stretch out, run around, play games, explore, be free.

Our house is modest, but it feels like home and we’re happy here. It was also one of a few homes in our area in our price range. Even now I grumble about our mortgage payment, so I don’t know what I’m thinking when I start going window shopping for houses that are more than twice as much as what ours cost.

I try and talk myself out of it in many ways. First, cleaning is still a painful issue in our house. We have yet to find a system for sweeping, mopping, scrubbing the bathrooms, dusting, doing the laundry, and so on. We also have good sized front and back yards, with roses along the driveway and wild bushes out back that require landscaping attention we simply don’t know how to give. So then I think: if we can barely manage our 1,300 square foot house, and 6,000 square foot lot, how are we ever going to keep up with a 3,000 square foot house on a 12,000 square foot lot?

And there’s also the matter that we can’t afford it, even if we wanted it, and the other burden of already owning a house.

I tried to think of my obsession with out-of-reach houses kind of like an adolescent crush on a movie star. Like, I could think I’m in love with Brad Pitt, or Johnny Depp, and that nothing would bring me greater happiness than having one of them fall in love with me. But seriously, what are the chances? And better yet, how likely is it that we’ll even be compatible?

Anyway, here is a picture:

I think I love this house.

I should really stop going to that web site. Isn’t $400,000 a steal in Los Angeles? Maybe soon it will be sold and I can just say, “Oh, well.” But isn’t it cute? And it doesn’t cost anything to dream, right?

A leaky Christmas

We had a great Christmas this year. All our children in the house! Rafael and Itzul were with us this year. Last year Rafa was still in my belly, and Itzul was in LA with her mom. The only real problem was the horrible snow and ice situation. Carlos discovered one of our living room windows was leaking, then realized a window in Itzul’s room was doing the same thing. I’m still not positive how the water was getting in, since most of what was outside was frozen and the highs Christmas week never really broke 20, but I guess it had to do with heat from our roof or walls melting that first layer of snow, which then froze, expanding and forcing its way into our siding, or the window’s frame, then getting closer into our house and the heat source, and eventually turning into a drip. So I was a nervous wreck most of Christmas Eve and Christmas Day wondering when the leak would end, how much this was going to cost us, etc.
Besides our house brining on that headache, we tried to make the best of the holiday

On Christmas Day, after way too much TV and a couple of toys already broken or missing, we decided to go sledding. This is the kind of thing we could never do in LA. And truthfully, it’s not really common for Walla Walla either. We drove to the bike and skate park a couple of minutes from our house and found tons of like-minded people. Diego loved going down the sled, and it was a lot more thrilling (and scary!) than I had expected. We even let the baby have a go at it, very slowly and carefully of course.

Dad and Diego coming up the hill

Rafael and I waiting our turn.

Itzul and Diego

The boys with their new piano

New jammies and drum

A gift from big sister

Rafa and his new toys

Itzul’s gift from Diego

Photog Diego

For his third birthday, we got Diego a little digital camera made just for toddlers. We figured it would distract him from wanting to use our camera all the time. It is encased in rubber, has dual view finders and even has a little screen to see the pictures he just took.

Here are some of my favorite pictures he recently took:

And one of the photographer, taken by me.

to spank…or not

A few months ago, at one of the local restaurants, there was a little girl having a royal tantrum. She either didn’t want to eat, or didn’t want to sit down, quite possibly both. The girl must have been right around Diego’s age, maybe 2 or 3. I watched as the mother switfly spanked the girl, once, quickly on the behind. The little girl let out one more loud scream — and then that was that. She sat down, ate her meal, and nothing more came of it.

I’m not really sure if I stared in disgust or awe. I’d seen Diego have fits way worse than that girl, and I had never thought to spank him. Okay, maybe I’d thought it, but thinking and doing are totally different.  Still, something about that encounter softened my views on spankings.

I have to say I was lucky to not have suffered spankings growing up, although I can recall two distinct times my mom yanked a string of my hair to snap me out of my bratty-ness. And the truth is, it worked. I’m not sure, though, how I would have turned out if spankings were the norm. But I do know people who endured the belt, the wooden spoon, or even “la chancla” and turned out relatively well.

Carlos and I agreed early on that we would not spank our children. But we hadn’t prepared ourselves for the terror that is Diego. My high-energy, defiant, rebellious boy has proven more and more stubborn and head-strong than both Carlos and I combined. Even over simple stuff. Like, “Diego, it’s time to brush your teeth.”

“Nooo!!! Never!!!” Which can be followed with toys being thrown, or the occasional swat at us. We try to understand where he’s coming from. Sometimes it’s hunger, or thirst, or being over-tired. But mainly I think it’s the toddlerhood telling him he knows better and he can do what he wants. (He is almost 3, after all).

So I decided to experiment with the butt pat. I reserved it for only the truly criminal offenses. Like when I had just gotten the baby calm, almost to sleep, and Diego started screaming. As the baby startled, and started to wail, Diego screamed more. The baby flipped out. He was terrified. And here was Diego, screaming away, laughing even, despite the baby’s yells and my pleas for him to stop.

The first time I tried the spank I made him laugh. The next time I tried it was when he bit me in the thigh – hard – twice. I think we were fighting over the nap issue. That time I tried it a bit harder, and he said “Owwie!”

That broke my heart. So later that day I told him I was sorry. And that I would never do that again.

I did, though, one final time, over probably a combination of things. And this time, he said “No!” and hit me back.

So I’ve decided to give up on the spanking thing, and do what we did the other night when he flipped out: pillow fight! We got to slug it out, and made the baby laugh this time instead of cry.

good luck, bad luck

So much news, so little time. The last few weeks feel like they can be gaged in good luck, bad luck terms. First there was the rejection from the Mid-Columbia Symphony I auditioned for. Bad luck. Going to the audition was tough enough. I really tried not to get my hopes up. I felt like “Lucy” from the “I Love Lucy” episode where she tries out for the part of dance girl on Ricky’s show, and all the other girls are younger, thinner, and way better dancers. The girls auditioning before me were younger, talented, and had obviously been practicing with a lot more heart (and time) than I could muster. I really knew I hadn’t spent as much time training as I should, but I wanted to go through with the audition anyway. I hope I didn’t come off like those singing wannabes on American Idol who draw the laughs but are completely ignorant of how much they truly suck.

I know I’m a good flute player, and hearing some recent flute performances have reminded me of how talented I am, but mainly of how talented I was. Or could have been. If I’d kept playing the last few years as much as I did in high school, I might be bad-ass. But I haven’t. Flute has been such an after-thought the last 10 years, that it’s a rarity I play it more than once a month.

Which led me to a big decision. I wanted to sell my flute. I really felt that some young person out there could benefit from having a good flute to kick off their flute-playing ambitions. And I sold it two weeks ago to a college student in Idaho. First year flute student, even tried out the flute in my living room.

It was rough. I got a good chunk of change for it, but now when I get that craving to whip out my flute, there’s nothing there for me to reach for. A coworker recently asked me if I was still selling it (he’d seen an ad I ran in our paper). And I said no. He said his wife has been learning, and is at a point where she could upgrade from her student flute to something more professional. And would you believe I felt jealousy? Like, wait, someone else is learning flute? I’m good at flute! Let me show you!

Anyway, I’ve decided that in a few years, when the boys are well into school, I am going to get a fancy new flute and maybe start teaching lessons. Maybe then I’ll have time to play every day again. Right now, it’s not going to happen.

So I guess the good luck with that is I got a bit of money to buy some nice things for myself and the family. We had a nice streak of good luck with money the last month. Good luck all around. Carlos finally got the money from a retirement account from his old job, and we paid off a ton of debt with it. We got paint so we can make our living room pretty. We got a (used) grill (that needs some parts). And then we both got a little bonus from work for winning journalism awards.

Now the bad luck. I hate UPS right now. A box with some nice clothes I ordered has somehow vanished. I think it got taken to the wrong house. Or it’s likely someone took it off the porch, but really really doubtful. For someone as anal as me, this type of mishap is devastating. I think I lost sleep over it. I”m trying to be humble though. I have so much more than other people. But I really, really wanted those clothes. Oh well.

Last week my grandmother died. Bad luck, although she was close to 100 and not the same abuelita. It was so painful to hear of her passing. It was also painful to see her health go these past few months, so she couldn’t walk or even talk. With her death, I am left without grandparents. But I get to fly down to LA on what would have been her 100th birthday, and see my entire family (all 200 of us) and we get to celebrate her life. That’s the way to go. My grandmother was a beautiful person. I’m glad the boys got to see her before she died. She really enjoyed them and it shows. In the end she even asked me who I was, and when I explained, she said, “oh yes, yes.”

la bisabuela, summer 2008

I’m easily impressed

This revelation blew me away just a moment ago.

Go to the New York Times website, and open any article. Then click twice on any word. The Times’ site has a system that will look up the definition of the word for you, instantly. Even on words like “don’t.” It kind of made my day.

Does it work for anyone else? Maybe I’m hallucinating.

space cadet

I started this post with the title “dumb blonde” but then decided that might be offensive to some. Space cadet gets the same message across, right? I’m using the expressions to describe my mental state since returning to work. I don’t know what I was thinking when I thought going back to work after almost six months, and having one new baby in the house, would all go smoothly. The hardest part of all this is I have a limited amount of hours each day to finish my work so that I’m still doing full time reporting, getting the kids fed, bathed, and off to bed, not to mention interacting with them and doing the bonding parent-child thing. Then there is the cooking for all of us, dishes, laundry, and at some point, general cleaning. And then it would probably be healthy for me to have a moment to myself, perhaps in the form of a shower or brushing my teeth or hair.

So as a result of being pulled in so many directions, I have been making “space cadet” (dumb blonde sounds so much better) mistakes at my work. I called something in a story recently “Annual Yearly Progress” (it was Adequate Yearly Progress…my take of it doesn’t even make sense) I called “Pachucos” “Pochacos” (that’s not even a word) and have done my usual day switching, saying it is Wednesday when it’s really Tuesday, that type of thing.

Luckily my errors have been noted and corrected on our Web site… but the thousands of copies that go out to people every day? Ouch for me.

I haven’t made mistakes like these since I was first starting to report, several years ago. I’ve grown so proud of getting my facts straight that it destroys me to make such slips. One of my most memorable mistakes from years past was typing “nymph nodes” instead of “lymph nodes” in a story. Our copy editors and editors missed it too. It wasn’t until some reader wrote a letter to the editor thanking me for the chuckle.

But it wasn’t really funny. It sucked for me. Here’s another good one from the past. I referred to something in a story as a quarter mile, when it was actually a square mile. For some reason square made me think of four, and I translated that to “quarter.” It made a big difference in what I was saying.

It’s really tough to be a reporter. The printed word makes it that much tougher. Once all the “send” buttons have been pushed there’s really no going back. It’s set in ink “for the record,” forever, until someone lines a cage somewhere with it. Or makes paper boats like Diego and I did the other day with our days paper. That’s why I’m starting to love the Internet that much more every day. Although it is a great feeling when a story runs error free, to know that you’ve informed the public the best you can.

i need a nap

Diego and I have been duking it out over his nap time. He thinks he doesn’t need one. I know better. Our routine right now is that we come home from day care at noon, we eat lunch, and Carlos goes back to work. Ideally, the boys would snooze from 1 to 3, or even 2 to 4, so I could rest too or get some work done. There have been times when Diego even sleeps three or four hours, because he really, really needs his afternoon nap.

But the last couple of weeks I have struggled to get him to rest. We did it to ourselves, though. For too long after we had Rafael, Carlos and I relied on a quick drive in the minivan to get Diego asleep. Diego’s over-tired? Let’s go for a quick drive. This technique back-fired on me, though, when I was home with both boys the last several months. It got too hard for me to take both sleeping kids from the car and into the house, and pray they both stayed asleep. What Diego started doing was waking up as soon as I’d put him on the bed. So I’d have wasted time driving around, and carrying them in two trips into the house, just to have to entertain them again.

I’ve tried putting videos in. I tried to reason with him that he will be so much happier, and play so much nicer, if he just rests. A few times (seriously, like maybe three times) he took his blankets and crawled into our bed on his own, and took a nap. Once I think he lay down on the floor of our bedroom and fell asleep right there. But most times I’m fighting with him that “You Need To Sleep!” and I’m taking him on several trips back into bed. When he refuses, I try to ignore him for however long it would take him to nap.

Yesterday it all came to a head. He’d been nice and quiet in our room (because he doesn’t like to nap in his own bed), and came out a while later. I knew he hadn’t slept, though, and walked him back in. And all over my comforter were his trademark swirls and lines, done in black ink. GRRRRRR!!!

So Carlos and I decided that I will encourage him to sleep, but if he doesn’t want to, I’ll just play nice and not guilt-trip him about how mommy is tried too and needs to rest too. And if he doesn’t sleep on his own before 3 p.m., he’s not to have a nap at all. Yesterday, after I rushed to the dry cleaners to see if they could get the ink marks off, Diego started asking for his “blankies.” I had confiscated them and put them on top of the fridge as punishment for doodling on the bed. He said sorry and I felt bad for the kid, so I gave them back. He walked to the couch and started closing his eyes. It was 4:30 p.m.

“Oh, no you don’t,” I said. I handed him a book. “Here, read instead.”

I felt ridiculous forcing him to stay awake when he clearly was falling asleep before our eyes. But the other day he’d napped from 4 to almost 6:30 p.m. and it totally threw off our night routine. We’re pretty good about getting Diego to sleep by 8 p.m. (after stories it’s probably a bit later, but this is our quiet down time). And the late nap days are rough, because then we’re pushing everything else back one hour.

I feel like there’s a no win situation here. If he doesn’t nap early, I have to keep playing and maybe even walk to the park to try and wear him out. If he sleeps in the stroller on the walk back but then wakes when we get home (which has happened often) I have to keep going with the entertainment. If he waits until way too late to nap, we either work to keep him awake, or work to get him to sleep that night.

In my ideal toddler world, Diego takes his blankies and stuffed tiger right after lunch, walks into mommy’s room and crawls into bed, snoozing for the two hours he desperately needs. This kid isn’t even 3 yet. I refuse to believe he doesn’t need a nap anymore. What 2 1/2 year old kid can go 14 hours without resting? Oh, that’s right. Mine.