Tuesday, May 29, 2012

The Donut



I have Brady with me every single morning. Every single morning we make our way to school together.  We have a routine.  Part of it includes getting my coffee at Starbucks in the drive thru. Then one day, I had to go in because the line was long and I was in a hurry. Brady is 2.5 so he is pretty capable of walking and going in with me. Now our days go something like this even though this was one I am about to tell you about was extraordinary ordinary day…

“Mama we go in?”

At some point in every morning he asks me this. Sometimes before we have even left our own house.

“No buddy not today. Mama is in a hurry and we need to get to school today quick.”

“Mama we see the cows?”

“No buddy. We don’t have time to see the cows today. Mama promises when school is out we will go visit the cows and horses so you can see them, touch them and talk to them”

He loves to go the “long way” to school each day after stopping to get coffee so he can see the cows grazing at Wagner Farms. It is out of the way but it is usually our way.

“Mama we go in please. I want donut. A white one.”

I glance at the clock wondering if I have time and I know that I don’t but I do. I always have time, it’s just a matter of making it.  

“Right there. Park right there mama.”

I pull in and park even though the drive thru lane is empty.  I unbuckle him from his seat and before I can ask he reaches up for my hand.  We walk from our parking spot to the door. I open the door and he runs to the counter.

“Mama drink coffee. I eat donut. You pay mama?”

“Yeah, buddy I will pay.”

My order never changes. A venti, nonfat,e xtra hot, no foam, no water chai for me and one petite vanilla bean scone for him.  The employee hands him the bag and he carries it with pride. He doesn’t open it because it’s not time. 

Tank You”

I am speechless as I watch how polite he is unprompted. He is mine. I swell with pride.

“Your son is gorgeous. How old is he?”

I notice she is sitting with her daughter and they are enjoying a cup of coffee together and I miss my mama.  And then I look at him and grin.

“Thank you. Tell them how old you are.”

“Two.”

“Tell them your name.”
“Bwady Ischer”

“Brady Fischer. That’s right. Go sit down and let them be. Say goodbye buddy.”

“Bye. I eat my donut now. I go to school.”

He climbs up on the chair careful not to drop the bag and opens it slowly, methodically pulling the scone out.  As fast as he gets up he jumps out of the chair each day and walks the bag to the garbage and puts his bag in there.

I throw the bag in the garbage. I throw it away before I eat my donut.  Ew yucky goes in garbage.”

 He told me it goes in the garbage. He walks it over and places it in. Hurriedly, he climbs back in his chair as I wait for my coffee and he begins to eat. Quietly eats as he looks out the window watching the comings and goings on Lake Avenue. 

My coffee comes and I sit. We sit. We sit watching things move outside. He tells me about the trucks, we count the cars in the parking lot.

Two, one, free, four”

I grab my coffee and his small hand and leave the Starbucks. The donuts are starting to add up.  Yet suddenly, it doesn’t matter about the meeting I missed or the papers I can’t grade before class. I have time and I gave it him and he got his donut.

Friday, May 25, 2012

Tidbits of Talk {Volume 18}



Ack…I am late getting this up and missed last week but I have a lot of good excuses  reasons so I will just get on with it since I can't tell you most of them and you probably don't care. 

~ Brady is in an AWFUL phase right now that Glenn and I hope goes away quickly. He is throwing everything. I mean everything, things and tantrums.  And everything is a battle. And if you have read this blog for any amount of time you know he is stubborn like his parents. He fixates on things and refuses to let them go. Right now it is brushing his teeth. God love my husband who engages patiently in this battle each night but it is bad enough, big enough and loud enough to make me want to crawl in a hole until he is past it. Up to this point he has been an easy kid so I guess it is about time for him to test us. 


~Cate on the other hand is just a total snuggle bug lately. She doesn’t realize she is doing it, but if you are lucky enough to be the one that gets to pick her up out of her crib after her nap, she will hug you…full on hugging. She will bury her head in your shoulder, pinch your skin and hang on for dear life. I melt each time. But with that being said, she is stuck to me like glue. If I am in the room, she wants me to hold her. If I leave the room she cries. She is fine with Glenn but I feel sorry for my mama who is watching her today because Cate seems to have some attachment issues... 


~I am jealous all of my teacher friends in Bloomington-Normal who are already out of school for summer vacation. I am in until June 8th and have meetings the next week. Sigh…

~ I am on this Craigslist kick. We have been selling some things on there and I just love how simple and easy it is to post items, collect the cash and declutter our house. We have a lot more to put on there and I am not trying to sell our entire house but what is better than having a virtual garage sale? 

~I wish when I got married someone would have told me not to register for stupid shit. Who really needs 8 margarita glasses? Or the Kitchen Aid Mixer I have never used? Or even the three huge colanders that sit on a shelf?  I am seriously kicking myself for getting all of these things instead of a second set of bedding or a really nice steam mop or just nothing at all. 

~ I am looking forward to soaking up some sunshine this weekend and spending time with friends and family.  It’s Memorial Day weekend right? The weatherman is telling me it is going to be 97 on Sunday. That is a tad hot for even me to be honest.  Maybe we should take the kids to the beach?

What are you looking forward to this weekend?




Monday, May 14, 2012

Present- Mother's Day

I want to remember this weekend. I want to place the stories, the smiles and the small moments somewhere deep inside my long term memory so that when sad, dark times are consuming me I will have this weekend to pull out from my secret hiding place deep in my memory and I will smile. I will remember how good and full I feel and how easy it was.  It was that good of a weekend because I was present.

There is something about a girl and her mama. I am talking about my own mama. Thanks to my husband (with help from his parents) I spent 24 glorious hours with my mama on Michigan Avenue. I have never been away from my kids alone since I had them. I have only spent one night away from Cate and four from Brady.  We shopped ’til we dropped but really when we returned to our hotel room we had very little in the way of purchases. We were cold and wet because that is Chicago in May.  But we conversations that never staled.  I am not sure we ever stopped talking.  We talked about simple things like what to wear to the three wedding Glenn and I have in June to big life things like wills and death, marriage, and life with kids and how much it changes your views. And when the time came for us to part this Sunday morning,  we realized we forgot to talk about things like calendars and wedding dates and vacations.  We ate pizza, drank wine, and fell back in to this easy routine. As I pulled away in a cab, I was lost in my own thoughts about how we became so close and how she is me, my better half and I am her and only hoping to be half the mother she is to me.  And it dawned on me that between the naps and bottles and drool that I have a special little girl and I am her mama, nothing more and nothing less.  And there is not much more you can want. 


And when I did return home, my babies were there with the man I adore.  There is something so raw when you watch the man you love with the children your created together.  He softens when they need him. We did the simple things like eat lunch and change diapers, all the cliché things that you do on Mother’s Day like plant flowers, exchange cards and play outside and some pretty special things.


I wanted to plant in the wagon...that did not go over well.
“I want to hug you.”
“Brady, you want to hug Cate?”
“Yes please. I want to hug Cate.”
“You can hug her anytime you want.”

And as his arms wrapped around her, I was present watching them interact. I watched him kiss her unprompted. Later, as I pushed er stroller, I caught myself imagining the future they have together as brother and sister.  I wonder if they realize that in that one simple moment, I was present and felt so full and yet moments later consumed with hope for what's to come.

He's not a baby or toddler any more. He is a a little boy who just loves all three of us like it is his job. 


And as the day wound down we landed in a familiar place…our bed.  Tonight as Brady was being his silly self and Cate was laughing at him while Glenn and I protected heads from taking shots from flying feet and knees, I caught myself as the breeze came in our windows thinking that today I was present.  I was present with my husband and my kids all day.  I never told my kids to wait a minute, the whining didn’t bother me and when I put both kids to bed I watched both of them for an extra minute to remember what they looked like today on a day when I present. Today, I was just a mama. 

A day where I didn’t worry about the teaching assignments I need to confirm for next year or the closets that have not been changed out for summer or that groceries and laundry were left for a day. 

And even as life got more interesting tonight (a secret for later), I found myself just thinking about today and how lucky I feel my mama and I got some much needed girl time and my sweet girl and I did too. Doesn’t hurt that these two guys were around all day either.

So this Mother’s Day weekend may have come to an end but I took some conversations, some looks, moments and pictures to make sure I remember. Happy Tuesday Friends!

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Instagram Love


What? Two posts in one week already? You don't say... that is what happens when both children nap simultaneously on a rainy Sunday and when they do so for 2+ hours. #naptimeftw  

If you have read prior posts, you know that I was stoked to find out that Instagram was now available for those of us that have Android phones. I don't love my android and will probably be going to an iphone sooner than later but I do love that I have instagram now.   I love instagram so much that actually I am little bit sad to say that  my DSLR is collecting dust right now.  With Instagram at my fingertips on my phone, which is always in my hands or in my diaper bag, I never shoot with my Nikon anymore. That needs to change.  I digress.  But what is even better about instagram?  I got my mama on it so she can follow me and see my pictures.

I knew a little bit about the Instagram craze and I watched as others participated in  #photoaday challenges through Instagram. I wanted an invite to the club. And lucky for me I have one now.  Follow me and see as I try to capture these picture the month of May. May, really? It is May?

And what is better? Mandy, over at Harper’s Happenings, wrote this post  linking to another great blog with ideas for all my new fabulous instagram photos.

And on pinterest, I found this. How cool is this idea?
via pinterest 

Like I said, Instagram is my new best friend. Am I following you? Are you following me? I am hoping that some of you not on it yet, ahem Ang and Jen, that this might be the push you need so I can stalk watch your days as they unfold in pictures. Happy instagraming! 

Sunday, May 6, 2012

Cate {8 Months}



“So I've been tryin' ta slow it down

I've been tryin' ta take it in

In this here today, gone tomorrow world we're livin' in”

~Kenny Chesney Don’t Blink



I watch Cate on the monitor each morning as she plays with her lovey when she first wakes up.  She talks to it, blow raspberries on its nose and wrestles with it.  And then I walk in and say "good morning baby girl" and she responds with a thump of her legs inside her sleep sack and smile showing me that big top tooth and her two small bottom teeth.

In a blink she has gone from newborn to infant. Three teeth with the fourth one just poking through, she is headed to age of one and I don't want to blink.  Eight months later she is still “high maintenance” 
as we like to call it around here but she is content for the most part.
 

She smiles at anyone and people stop us sometimes to tell us that her smile is like a "doll" with those big, button-like blue eyes.  One eye has a streak of brown in it that sparkles in the sun.  

She still rarely laughs, only when that one special guy in her life, her brother, gives her attention. 
Seriously, if he walks by her and says something as simple as “Hi Cate” then it is a belly laugh that we can all hear and yes we have captured on video.


She is in a phase where the bottle just is not her friend. She drinks less than 25 ounces a day.  Glenn and I just don’t get it. Maybe because Brady drank every last drop and she does not.  Or maybe it's because she never seems settled when she eats.  Regardless it is frustrating and she closes her lips and refuses to drink. 

But, she loves table food. No, not baby food and purees. That came and went in a blink. Table food. What we eat she wants. She will try anything. At 8 months, she is on more table food than most. Any fruit, vegetable, crackers, yogurt and breads.  

She wants to touch everything. So polarizing from Brady who was content to observe and still is.  Cate wants to touch it all, put it all in her month and is fearless in doing so. She will dunk her head in the water stream as we fill her bath, will open her mouth to eat when are and will reach for anything that is near her including Brady's toys.   


Cate is a sleeper..finally. She is a rock star sleeper challenging her brother for the title of “best sleeper in the house”.  She is down by 6:45 and we rarely hear from her before 6:15. I would love to push that back a bit but she fights it and it usually backfires with her waking up even earlier.  Like I said, she’s kinda high maintenance. 

Like any mother, I have my concerns. Some validated and some because I am a “glass half empty” kind of girl.  She bears no weight on her legs and she does not roll. She will not go from sitting to her belly or vice versa.  Brady was like this too but he loved to pull up and was always standing. Even in an exersaucser rarely are her legs bearing any weight.  I know she is small  and I am tired of people reminding me of that.  Sometimes I think we are still playing catch up from the the first few months but still I worry as I watch babies her age crawl, pull up and roll.  

With summer coming, I am sure my instagram feed will be full of pictures like the one below. I mean seriously, there is nothing better than a baby in a romper. She has a closet full of cute clothes, specifically rompers, a swimming suit that will make anyone’s ovaries explode and cute little legs to go with both.

And at night as she drinks some of that last bottle I watch her eyelids struggle to stay open, gazing in to mine. And lately, I have not put her down. I have rocked her because I know that soon she won't let me or need that motion to make her soundly sleep and I try not to blink.  

To my 8 month old Cate, I beg you not to grow up to fast and I swear I won't blink. 

"Best start putting first things first.
Cause when your hourglass runs out of sand
You can't flip over and start again
Take every breathe God gives you for what it's worth.”
~Kenny Chesney Don’t Blink


Friday, May 4, 2012

Tidbits of Talk {Volume 16}


Tidbits of Talk
Okay, so another week of me not blogging.  I want to and then I don’t.  I am just trying to be a mama right now and a wife.  Those two things are my priority right now…even if I am not always the best at either.  But, the delicate balance of being something to everyone gets hard.  And at the end of every night I look at my computer and I just don’t even open it because I find myself grading, lesson planning, or trying to get ready for the next day or just not thinking for a few minutes.  Lots of things going on in my head and life but I never get them written for you all to read about. Anyways, I digress…

~Brady officially is 2.5.  I posted about it last week but this weekend we are taking his pictures and I am just so excited because he is at a great age. I got the nicest note from a friend’s mom on facebook about the post I wrote about last week about him 2.5 and I can tell you that this blog is what I want it to be right now. A place for memories, a place to share my thoughts and connect with others who have had an impact on me in my lifetime. 

My first attempt at PicMonkey. Not to bad right? 
~ This little thing above turned 8 months old earlier this week. How did it happen? I don’t honestly know. She tests us daily. I have a huge post coming about her but for now I will tell you that there is nothing cuter than a baby in a romper. God, I love a baby in a romper. You will see her in one every day this summer. And, no I don’t know why her hair is so crazy. I will take any tips on how to do girl hair. 

~ I had a skype date with this lady Sunday night. She humored my unshowered Sunday self and it was so good to chat with her. Whoever says internet friends aren’t real friends are crazy.  No awkwardness, no nerves, just me, her and a cup of tea for both of us.  Just what I needed…

~ The weather is one of two things that continually perplex me about Chicago. It has been as warm as 87 and as cold as 40 this week. Seriously, what the heck?  We have had our heat and A/C on this week.  Even more is that we had these UNBELIEVABLE storms all week.  And again last night. The hail was huge, the wind whipping, and the rain was coming down in sheets. And of course, my car was on the street...so I ran out to move my car in the garage and go soaked. Someone actually told me today that you get less wet if you walk instead of run in the rain. Is that true? 

~ I am thinking that I may attempt to do some planting this weekend. I am itching to get flowers in the ground and to see the pops of color in our yard.

Happy Friday friends! We have pictures, a trip to the zoo, and maybe an art festival and street festival calling us this weekend. Sounds like a perfect May weekend if you ask me.