One of these bulges is not like the other...

Pregnancy takes some explanation.  Especially when you're two and are wondering which mound on your mama's mid-section houses what, and for what purpose.

My mom, Jude and I had stopped at a Red Burrito joint in Iowa on the way back from a visit to the town where I grew up.  Mom had gone to the bathroom and I was cleaning up the remnants of dinner and corralling Jude so that he wouldn't get tripped on by a crew of about 12 men who had arrived after what I'm guessing was a football game.

After feeling the usual twinge of guilt at tossing the packaging from a rare fast-food meal on the road, I bent down to talk to Jude, who was pointing at my stomach and trying to ask me something.

"Is your baby in here?" he asked, addressing the firm bulge of my belly with his short, pudgy finger.

"Yes, he is," I answered.  "He's your baby brother."

"My baby brudder?" he said.

"Yep," I replied, noting how irresistible he is when he replaces "th" with "d". 

His bright eyes moved further up my torso and he pointed again, this time at my chest area, his fingertip burrowing into my flesh.

"Is your baby in here?", he asked.  (I swear he had a twinkle in his eye.)

"Nooooo..." I replied, redirecting his curiosity from my chest back to my belly.  "He's in here, remember?"

"Oh," he said.  "Huh."

Having been in our own world together for a few moments, I looked up to see a 20-something guy with shaved black hair, sagging jeans, and a huge smirk on his face.  He wasn't making eye contact, but it was obvious he had overheard Jude's questions.  My mom had returned from the bathroom just in time to witness the tail end of Jude and my conversation, and the look on the guy's face.  We laughed all the way to the car.

Since then he asks me daily if I have a baby in each of my boobs.

"Is your baby in here?" (pokes one boob).  "No."

"Is your baby in here?" (pokes the other boob).  "No."

"Is your baby in here?" (pokes my stomach).  "Yes!"

I tried to help him make sense of mama's changing landscape by introducing him to the concept of nursing.  Babies are in tummies, whereas these other two things have a different purpose once the baby is born.  When the routine guessing game is over, he reminds himself of the facts by saying, "There's no baby in there.  There's milk in there for the baby to drink."

It's a good thing their brains are so malleable at this age, because otherwise these concepts would seem ridiculous.  In some ways, they're still strange to me.

Some Bragging and a Few Confessions

So to balance out last week's Naughty Post, I'll warn you - I'm totally going to brag in this one. And I am 100% biased so pay no mind. My boy falls well within the range of normal, but to me, he's awesome. (THIS HAS NEVER HAPPENED BEFORE TO ANY MOTHER.) Plus I never did post a two-years update on his recent achievements, so here it is:

Flat-out Brags (and A Few Confessions):

• Brag: He said "Mississippi" perfectly as we crossed that river on the way home from Iowa for Thanksgiving.

Jude in Iowa with my cousins' kids, Asher and Devin

• Brag: He can pull off a purple shirt with green overalls better than anyone I know.

• Brag: He pronounces the Danish words for Grandpa and Grandma perfectly during our stay at my grandparents' house. My grandma is Danish and that's who they are to Jude (Bedstemor and Bedstefor)

Jude with his Bedstemor

• Brag: He is very tidy. When he was a baby, if a microscopic drop of rice cereal landed on his tray rather than in his mouth, he would meticulously dab at it with his finger until it disappeared. Once I watched him throw a ball behind one of our stereo speakers, slide the speaker to the side to get it, then carefully slide it back into place (why thank you son). The other day he and Jono were playing "Daddy Get You", where Jono chases Jude around the house and tackles him. Jude suddenly halted mid-flight near the dining room table, alarmed by the sight of a chair that wasn't pushed all the way in after we had eaten. He carefully slid it back into place, then continued his rampage around the house.
  

• Brag: He counted to ten for the first time three days before his birthday. Technically this lets me tell him, far off in the future, that he could count when he was one. Sorta.

I got this off the internet

• Confession: He's obsessed with boobies. He walks up to me and honks them whenever he wants, then proudly says "Boobie". He also pats them appreciatively and says, "Pillow". Cute now, but will need to curb it in the future.
  

• Brag: He likes to compare body parts. When I'm getting him ready for bed, he points out my freckles, then points to the freckle he has on his foot. (He says "fweckle" while he does this. For heavens' sake Jude.) He likes to show me his Boopus and then make me show him mine. He points out my chest and then asks Daddy why he doesn't have those. He looks for them on himself as well and is disappointed.

• Brag: When he's mildly bored he likes to name all of the animals and people he knows. He'll rattle off ten to twenty names, including the uncles he rarely sees (Tyler, Bett, Gant, Joel, Jessie, Ella, Mona, Giraffe, El-phant, Doggy, Kitty, Gamma, Bapa...)

Probably dismantling a parental conspiracy...

• Brag: Nothing gets by him. NOTHING. We will need to learn a second language soon.

• Confession: One time I asked him for a kiss and he said sweetly, "Okay Mommy." Then when I leaned in he smacked me on the cheek. I'm telling myself he was not being cruel, it's just that he has a warped sense of humor and was feeling spontaneous. Right?

• Brag: He sings now, kind of, though not in tune.

• Brag: His memory is scarily accurate and long-lived. We walked by an ice cream shop one evening that we had gone to months before in the summer, only in the daylight. He attempted to climb the stairs under cover of darkness saying, "ice keam, ice keam, ice keam" frantically. We saw five minutes of G-Rap's Santa Claus parade over a week ago and he was still talking about it as we decorated the tree. "Santa Kaus? Reindea'? Machin' Band? Too loud. I waved."

• Confession: He is extremely contrary right now. He's like one of those independent voters who hate whichever political party is in power at any given time, or a hipster that only thought Indian headbands were cool when he was the sole person wearing one.

"Eyes"

• Brag: He's beginning to know some of his colors. He can point out blue, green, yellow, and sometimes red. He likes to color, but only if I sit by him and continually draw "eyes". He likes to tell me exactly where to put my two little dots, and he doesn't have time for me to draw the rest of the face before he wants another pair of just eyes somewhere else on the page. Our artwork lately looks like a 50's housewife's apron.

• Brag: Alongside the naughty, he can be heart-breakingly sweet. He gives kisses and asks for hugs voluntarily, says, "Bye Daddy. I love you." when Jono leaves, asks if you're okay if it looks like you fell down or are fake-crying about something, and asks his toy dinosaurs the same question if he drops them. He always reaches for me, then lays his head on my shoulder whenever I sing to him before bed.

• Just weird: His favorite book right now is "Go Dog, Go!" When we get to the page where three dogs are having a party in a boat, he always points to the dog playing checkers and says, "No doggy! No! Don't do dat." I tell him the doggy isn't doing anything wrong. He looks at me incredulously and doesn't believe it.

So there's the two-year update, heavy on the trumping up of Jude. The grandparents won't mind.

Boys and Girls are Different.

Jude asked where my _________ (fill in the blank: boy part) was this morning as I was getting into the shower. I'm not in the best of moods at 6:30 am on a Tuesday. This snapped me right out of it.

He also asked me what another part of my anatomy was. I told him. He then pointed out that I have more than one of them. Again, bad mood gone completely. Thank you Jude.

How does he do that?

If you have any other good stories along these lines, please share. It's Tuesday and I need a good laugh.

(Image from pastryngifts.com)

Working Girl

It's official. As of September 1, I was back to being a working girl.

This is nothing new. I've been working since I was 13. But I've had a golden nine months "off" now (all stay-at-home and work-at-home moms are laughing with me now), and it's time I started getting paid.

The first couple of mornings were the hardest. I didn't know when it would hit me, but suddenly it did as I gave Jude to Jono and turned around to grab my bag of work stuff. Hot tears. When Jono saw my face, he got them too. As I went out the door I waved. Jude stared at me with his mouth in typical Cheerio mode. His chubby arm stayed by his side.

By the time I sat down at my desk things were okay. How I felt about things this week changed by the hour.

When I got up those first couple of mornings to bacon and eggs on the table, I thought "Hmm. This is above and beyond." When I was making good progress on something at work I would think, "Hmm. I can see how some women can't do the stay-at-home thing." When I would get home and Jono would be making some exotic Indian dish for me, I would think, "Hmm. Not bad." When he cleaned up afterward, baked some blueberry muffins, made a batch of cookies, and packed me a mid-morning snack for the next day I thought, "Hmm. This is crazy. My husband is Susie Homemaker. And I LOVE it."

Then night would come, darkness would fall and I would start to get a little anxious. I worried Jude wouldn't reach for me any more. I worried my relationship with him will change; that I'd start feeling differently about him somehow, and that it wouldn't be as good. I worried about becoming the "secondary parent". I worried I'd lose confidence in parenting him because I don't see him all day.

This morning I woke up and it was low-drama Friday. I smooched Jude's cheek goodbye and left the house cool as a cucumber. After work I pulled into the driveway and he was in the front yard playing with my mom. I turned off the ignition as fast as I could, hopped out and peeked at him over the roof rack. He gave me the Cheerio mouth again and the bright little eyes starting to recognize and anticipate. We smiled big smiles at each other.

I scuttled around the back of the car, threw my bag and travel mug onto the sidewalk and ran for him -- he was doing the quick, excited breathing he does now when he sees me -- I scooped him up and it was like that moment in the movies when two people are embracing after running across a golden wheat field in slow motion. Except that one of us is a full-sized adult female and the other one is a short, chunky infant who can't walk.

Within seconds of our reunion, he started whining. To nurse of course. I am his personal milk-cow. But it's a sound I like to hear. Bubba still loves his mama.

So that's that. I'll be back to laughing hard when I watch The Office. As everyone knows, that show was made for people who work in one.

Things Have Changed...

...everyone else is on vacation in warm places and you're excited that your husband offered to take the baby for most of a Saturday so you could organize the basement.

...nothing fills you with more glee than when your kiddo goes down for a morning nap so you can run around like a chicken with its head cut off "getting things done" for an average of 30 savory minutes.

...your hubs gets home from work and your heart literally jumps out of your chest with excitement that you'll get to hand the babe off to him when he walks in the door -- then falls somewhere below your knees when you realize he's decided to split wood for 30 minutes in the backyard instead of coming in.

...said hubs becomes unsettled when he notices wife and babe are plastered against the sliding glass door boring four holes into the back of his head as he splits said wood, and he feels a wee bit of pressure to make his way into the house sooner rather than later.

...you still can't believe how big your boobs are, and have to keep reminding yourself that they will eventually go away.

... you forget to wear a tank top under some of your favorite pre-baby shirts, and notice later that the buttons around your bust-line are about to pop open. The gaps between each one are so big pretty much everyone can see your son's lunch buffet area.

...what you consider quality "alone time" becomes the ten minutes you spend in the shower with the babe in an infant seat outside the shower curtain. Whom you must soothe every 30 seconds by keeping the curtain partially open so he can see what you're doing.

..."reading a book" becomes the 20 seconds in bed before you pass out like a drunken sailor.

...you must now use the bathroom in the company of another tiny person who is lying on the bathroom rug staring at you.

...you use morning nap time to write a blog post instead of working and feel extremely guilty about it.

...your husband's asthmatic night-time breathing sounds exactly like the beginnings of a baby fussing in the next room and you can't stop yourself from tensing up every 3 seconds because of it.

... even though the bod isn't what is used to be, you figure you can still get away with wearing your two-piece swimsuit this summer. People will lend you a little grace when they see you on the beach with the baby you recently pushed out of it.

...your prayer life has gone significantly downhill as it now revolves around asking God to put your baby into an 8-hour stupor for the night.

...it seems whenever you sit down to nurse, the phone rings, the dog whines to be let out and someone knocks on the door, and you're completely paralyzed by the indecision of which need to address first.

...you are blinded by a huge wave of jealousy when another new mom "can't believe how long my baby's naps are".

...you can't believe this chubby, bald, two-foot tall creature is part of you and always will be, and the love you have for him is sometimes terrifying because of all the things that could happen to him.

...you don't know how it's possible that this is the most work, time, and love you've ever lavished on anything, you've never been more exhausted in your life, and yet there are moments where you feel deliriously happy about it.

... your shower looks like a sasquatch was in there last. There's a lot of post-partum hair coming out of your head, and you figure it's only a matter of time until you look like Demi Moore in G.I. Jane.

... an hour after the babe goes to bed for the night, you miss him already, and must go in to stare at his fat little sleeping face.