That’s what I am today. Super grumpy, in fact. Lucas realized it was a good day to make himself scarce and actually asked if he could go to the babysitters’. Yes, wise son, you may. The midget and I are lying in bed. He’s pissed at me because I’m no fun today.
Nothing in the world makes me long to be childless more than being sick. So hard to give a damn about my kids’ needs when I feel like hell. I want my mommy.
A few days ago I didn’t have much work except for a long-term project and my regular magazine gig. I started beating the bushes. Now I have offers coming out my ears. The rest of this month looks to be very busy. I’m hoping I can manage it all with Asher by my side. Darn baby thinks he should get all of my attention!
So sorry I didn’t get in touch yesterday! Happy belated birthday.
What? You’re like 29 now right? Not sure, Flonk, but I think I am now the age you were when we first met. My mistake. Please forgive me. You aren’t old after all!
Hope you guys are doing well and making progress on Project Return to Good Places.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxo
Yep, baby Asher has pinkeye. Lucas managed to infect both his grandmother and his brother. Asher’s medicine is an ointment that has to be squirted into his eyes four times a day. The tip of the ointment tube is totally long and pointy and Ian and I are terrified that we’re going to stab the baby in the eye trying to deliver the medicine. I wish the doctor had prescribed eye drops like Lucas had! Asher is rubbing his eyes a lot and they’re goopy.
He also seems to have picked up his first cold. But if so, it’s fairly mild. He has a slightly snotty nose and a hoarse little cough, but otherwise seems unperturbed. He’s still got a mellow demeanor, which is a big blessing.
Today I’m out in the world, working at my client’s office. Ian is home with Asher. It’s only the second day I’ve been apart from Asher to go to work (yesterday was the first). This is possible thanks to Ian having two days off this week at just the perfect time.
Today I’m able to work with gusto, to concentrate for more than 10 minutes at a time! It’s refreshing and enjoyable, but I admit to missing Asher and worrying a little—Not that Ian can’t handle it. He can. But because Asher is so young, he doesn’t know that I’ll be gone only a few hours. When he wants me and I’m not there, he becomes very, very sad.
I work away from home only three to five days per month. When I do, I take the baby with me. It’s ideal! Getting out of my home office once in a while c’est tres bon!
Today is especially nice. It’s quiet; I can hear myself think. I talk to grown-ups. I am wearing jewelery, which I usually can’t do with the baby. I can chat by the water cooler and participate in office birthday celebrations.
But at the end of the day, like now at 4:30 p.m., I’m missing my boys and looking forward to going home to see their smiling faces. T.G.I.F.
The boys and I drove up to Apple Hill to Patrick’s Berry Farm yesterday. We picked berries for about an hour or so on a sunny hillside surrounded by conifers. Finally, I understand why specialty seed and flower catalogues offer blackberry plants for sale! When berries are grown deliberately and orderly rows, trained on four-foot high fences, and trimmed so that the fruit can actually be harvested, they’re freakin’ wonderful! The plants weren’t dense and overgrown as they are growing wild along the American river (or as a nuisance to be erradicated in your backyard)–you know, so you can see the lovely black berries dangling on their stems but can’t possibly reach them without lacerating the hell out of your hands and arms. Until yesterday, that was my only experience of picking berries! We picked marionberries (a variety of blackberries) and boysenberries. We sampled New Zealand thornless blackberries, which were beautiful and truly thornless, but not as sweet as the marionberries we found up the hill.
We picked 4.5 pounds of berries, and bought pectin and citric acid powder, too, when we paid for them. Then we had lunch at a local tavern and headed back down the hill, wondering if we were actually clever enough to make jam. Ian and Lucas bought 16-oz. jelly jars.
The berry farm gives away a jam recipe for free. So we bravely tried it. I had always thought that jam making was one of those totally-not-worth-the-hassle endeavors. Something too complicated that would take several days, make the kitchen unusable, etc. Not so! Within two hours, we had four jars of jam (about 54 ounces, I guess; the fourth jar wasn’t full) in the water bath bubbling away. Lucas helped with mashing the berries and stiring the sugar in. Ian headed up the project and it was marvelous.
The jam cooled overnight. We opened the not-full jar this morning. The seal was good. The jam’s color is beautiful–deepest red-black. It’s full of merry berry pips. It smells delightful, spreads just as it should, and tastes divine. It was a low-sugar recipe, so the jam is very fruity and not too sweet.
I’m torn between the idea of giving away two jars and hording it all for ourselves. What a great experience! We got to do something totally new and had such fun in the process. I feel like we earned beaucoup Waldorf points yesterday. Makes me want to go back and do it all again before summer’s over.
Lucas completed this summer’s first session of swimming lessons. (See here http://sarabellae.livejournal.com/49861.html and here http://sarabellae.livejournal.com/50010.html for last summer’s Learning-To-Swim saga, including breakthrough moments.)
This time he was in the Sea Turtle II class, but it looks like he’s been working on Sea Horse skills (unassisted glides, backstroke, diving for objects with eyes open, jumping into deep water, etc.). It was a nice class composed of Lucas and only one other child, Annika, with the same swimming instructor as last year, Miss Natalie. She says that Lucas and Annika are her favorite students, and says that it’s largely because they are so well-behaved in the pool and listen to her instructions. That’s a nice thing to hear!
Annika’s mom took some photos of the kids that she’s promised to share with me. I’ll post one after she does. (Here they are: http://sarabellae.livejournal.com/110974.html)
I think Lucas will do at least one more session of lessons this summer to build on these skills. Next time he’ll be in the Sea Horses class and Daddy will be able to take him after work. Yay! Asher and I can stay home and make dinner, or maybe Asher can go to the gym day care and I can–gasp!–work out! Oh, the possibilities!
When he’s not in class, Lucas swims with great joy and confidence in the 3-foot-deep play pool. He dives for rings, attempts handstands, swims underwater, and practices other skills. Ripley from school, and her brother Rocco, are often at the pool when we are, so it’s cool that they play together and I can talk with Val. It’s a joy to see Lucas so free and happy in the water. Some of my very best memories from childhood involve swimming and playing in my grandmother’s pool. I’ve been grateful that he can swim as well as he can, for I cannot hold Asher outside the pool and assist Lucas in the water at the same time.
As for Asher, he went in the water with me once last week. The pool is heated, so he didn’t protest (unlike at my parents’ pool when I put his feet in the cold water!). I bought a floating baby boat for him, which will work well, I think, when he can sit up a little better. Right now, it seems best to hold him in my arms so that he feels secure and safe.
Later today I get to have a confrontation with a friend who’s pissed off at me for something that happened a long time ago–almost a year. I’m very very sad that this is going down and also very pissed off that this friend let it fester within for 10 months before giving us the opportunity to talk it out. It feels like I will have to bite my tongue and apologize profusely in order to make it better, if that is at all possible. But I also feel unfairly judged and that has my hackles up. It’s hard to make new friends for a freak like me. Apparently, it’s hard to keep them because I’m a freak.
Damn. I have a sick feeling in my tummy because of all this.
EDIT: My friend called today, an hour before our appointed meeting time, and canceled. My friend had reasons for canceling, which may or may not have been true. Now I get to wait at least another two weeks before we have another opportunity to work through this issue. I’m kind of tired of having this hanging over my head.
