Hugga’s teacher recently had a baby shower at school, and I forgot because I’m a total asshole. I whipped together this card using a whole lot of Amy Tangerine products. I also had some extra gift card pockets left over from my Teacher Appreciation postcards, so I picked up a Target gift card on the way to pick up the kiddo. Problem solved!
Stuff I Used:
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OH NOES
The census just confirmed that minority babies are now the majority in the United States. That the media treats this as such a huge deal in the first place (after all, it isn’t that babies of one minority group in particular have outnumbered whites, but rather all minorities combined) is very interesting, and Shakesville has a good rundown about why that is so. Seats in public office and CEO’s of US corporations are disproportionately white, and the data finally backs up the reality that the people in positions of power in this country do not reflect the actual cultural landscape. It’s refreshing to see that most young white folks don’t see these new statistics as a “problem,” but clearly the older GOP demographic is shitting their pants (and at least part of it has to do with the panic over this).
Straight White Male: The Lowest Difficulty Setting There Is
On that note, a fresh, smart way of explaining white privilege to people who shut down, get defensive, and derail at the mention of “privilege.” This guy totally gets it.
It’s More Than Okay to be Takei!
George Takei is on the cover of this month’s Hyphen! Normally Facbeook makes me hate everyone I know, but his posts honestly brighten my day.
Too Often, A New Baby Brings Big Debt
Interesting and terribly depressing article. I’m awfully glad we decided to have our second child after we moved to California and thus were both entitled to paid parental leave. It took a really long time to bounce back from unpaid maternity leave when I had Hugga in CT, and a lot of women I worked with faced the same financial issues. I wouldn’t have had a problem paying a shitload in taxes if it meant avoiding the financial nightmare I faced when I went on maternity leave the first time.
Does Anyone Else Feel Like They Broke Their Kid?
This recent XOJane.com post goes really well with my post from Wednesday. I know the feeling of noticing when I was the only mom of color in the room, or of noticing when I was the only mom without a ring.
Yo, Should I Dump This Ahole?
From the guy who brought you Yo, Is This Racist? comes a new tumblr with relationship advice. As with his other blog, the answer is usually “Yes, you should definitely dump that ahole,” but he’s somehow found a million funny ways to say it. Also a good read for when you feel like you may be taking your partner for granted.
Junot Diaz, “Miss Lora”
Finally, a little something to take the sting out of the links above. Diaz is my favorite writer of all time, and when he won the Pulitzer, my heart swelled with pride like we grew up together. I caught on Amazon that he has a new book coming out called This Is How You Lose Her
Every Thursday, I’m counting down to my 30th birthday with 30 Lists!
A few weeks ago, a campaign went down on Creature Comforts about being transparent about some of the things you don’t like to talk about on your blog. You all probably know that I have a long history of personal blogging that I’m trying to get away from, so this hardly applies to me. But I guess since I’m not baring my soul on this blog every day anymore, I don’t want to come off as someone who suddenly lacks self-awareness. Part of growing up is being real with my fears, so here goes nothing:
1. I sometimes get jealous of people who blog professionally, and I sometimes think “I’ve been doing it for much longer, I should be making money!” I feel like I’ve completely missed the train on being able to parlay this into a career, and I feel like I can’t keep up, like I’m missing some sort of secret that catapults bloggers to success. But every time my blog has seen bits of success, drama (of the online sort, with complete strangers) was never far behind, and I hate bringing that stuff into my life, especially now that I have kids. I maintain that I keep this up as a labor of love, because it’s the safe space to express myself, but I do wish this blog was paying me more.
2. I have been thinking about my nemesis lately. See, I had a “nemesis” in the early months of motherhood — we were once online friends and we had our first babies at around the same time, and that’s when it all fell apart. Our lives were just very different, but I took it to heart and couldn’t stop comparing myself to her. The friendship turned into resentment and I pushed her away, which I regret. I’m now in a place in my life where I’m much more secure about myself, and wish she and I could be friends again but I’m embarassed about the way I acted, and I keep thinking she’d be horrified and weirded out if I came out with a heartfelt apology out of the blue.
3. I’m afraid to depend on people. I’m an only child and, for some reason, I have lots of memories of my earliest friends doing really mean things and letting me down. So I have always had serious hang-ups about asking people for help. I also never have birthday parties for myself, because I’m afraid of how embarassed I’d be when nobody shows up.
4. I’m super self-conscious about my social and conversational skills, especially when I’m hanging out with Huz’s friends or meeting some of his coworkers for the first time. I can be quiet and stand-offish sometimes at parties, and I’m always afraid I’m inadvertently coming off as a huge bitch, but it’s just that I still live in the middle school version of myself!
5. I can’t be friends with people who don’t hold mostly similar political views as me. My entire family held wildly different political views — ideologically, I was the black sheep, not to mention I was the youngest girl and was teased a lot. The constant bickering and forcing me to engage in conversations I didn’t want to engage in has really strained my relationship with them. I can’t separate those conversations from being personally attacked. I cannot engage in political conversaton with people who disagree with me anymore because I can’t help feeling cornered and attacked so I shut down.
6. I’m bad at managing money. I can at least ensure we pay our bills on time every month, but I’m still in a lot of debt and I am really bad at putting money in savings. And while I’m not addicted to designer bags or a fashionista by any stretch of the imagination, I think I have a shopping problem, especially with art and craft supplies. It’s embarassing.
7. We’ve lived here for two years, but I’m still not in love with LA. I get really stressed out just at the thought of having to drive anywhere around here (I got into my first bad accident when I lived here before having kids, and my driving record has been downhill ever since). I sometimes think I’d be so much happier if we lived somewhere else, but I grew up thinking this way and it’s an awful habit I learned from my dad. I know that where I am doesn’t really matter as long as I have my family and love in my life, but sometimes it’s easier for me to just get caught up in blaming external factors, like where I live, when things don’t feel right in my life.
8. In my early 20′s, it was a serious goal of mine to have a book written by age 30. I’m approaching 30, and there’s no book in sight. I’ve obviously let go of the deadline — real life got in the way these past five years — but I still want to write a book someday and I’m afraid I’m just another one of those people who just says that. That even though I write on a daily basis, it will never be validated because I might never write an actual book.
9. I am a messy person by nature and am often too lazy to do chores. The only reason why anything ever gets done in this house is because either Huz does it or because I fear that Huz is growing embarassed to call me his wife, so I finally get off my ass and do it. Working for a paycheck, even though it’s from home, absolves me of some of the guilt of being a really awful housewife.
Oh gosh, I think that’s all I can stomach fessing up to today.
Over the past couple of weeks, basically since I’d gone back to work, I had been struggling with patience. I’ve been well aware that I’m at my worst on Sundays.
It’s the day I need to recover from our usual Saturday awesomeness, but it’s also the day the kids and I are all by our lonesome for the whole day. I’m still getting the hang of this being a mom to two kids thing, and I still can’t shake the feeling that if I were to attempt to leave the house with both of them by myself, something awful would happen and I just wouldn’t be able to handle it. So without fail, Hugga gets bored at home and, without fail, I get short on patience. And without fail, I end the day feeling exhausted and guilty that I wasn’t more present and didn’t try harder to enjoy myself.
On Sunday nights I always get that nagging, ominous, “You will never get this day back,” feeling. I imagine myself on my deathbed thinking back to this exact Sunday and remembering it as my biggest regret. But it always makes for a strangely pleasant Monday morning. A new day, a new week to start over, even if I do have to work.
What bothered me the most wasn’t necessarily Hugga’s garden variety four-year-old behavior, but my inability to handle it, my inability to manage my own stress, and my inability to step back and take a deep breath and understand the difference between where the discipline matters and where I’m just getting irritable. Sometimes I even remind myself of my dad, someone I haven’t seen or spoken to in over a decade, and the thought of that cuts real deep. I’m not attempting to be a perfect parent here, but I want to be a better parent, and I don’t want to be motivated by guilt.
Talking to other people, even other parents I knew, didn’t help. I’d get useless advice like “You have to be more patient,” (yes, you are obviously restating the exact problem I told you I had) or worse, I’d simply be met with a reply like, “Oh, I don’t have that problem.” Like really? Y’all are perfect parents with just the right amount of sleep who have children who never ask too many questions and always follow the rules? Wow I must really be fucking this up, or I’m consulting with the wrong friends.
I did end up finding a couple of great articles on ZenHabits to help, like How to Become a Patient Parent and 10 Ideas for Connecting with Your Kids, in case I’m not the only one out there. And, of course, I would be remiss to not link to this recent Babble post here. I can relate to it in a lot of ways, but it also reminds me of the things I take for granted. That Huz and I are better able to share parenting duties and household chores more evenly. That we have a preschool where Hugga is well cared for. That I have people in my life who understand the importance of community and of helping each other out, and that there are many moms I know and respect who willfully share child-rearing responsibilities with others, who aren’t afraid to speak when frustrated, and that nobody I know expects any mom to take it all on and still remain sane.
I’ve really been trying to make it a point to take deep breaths and big steps back sometimes. To resort to the “I can’t hear you when you do this” tactic more readily than the yelling. To talk to Huz when I feel like I’m the only one having these parenting troubles. It’s all helped and I continue to get better about it every day. But it’s always been most helpful to just remind myself that motherhood is a learning process, something I continue to get the hang of over time.
A friend posted a link to this post a few weeks ago, about the regrets of the dying and errors of omission. I don’t mean to beat myself up for it, but dude is right; as long as the mistakes happen by default, you have to be reminded not to make them.
For that reason, I want to reprint a post I wrote a few weeks back, to remind myself not to keep making these mistakes every Sunday.
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Squeaky is nearly four months old. Right now she smiles and coos and squeals like crazy, and bats at her toys, stares at herself in the mirror, even rolls onto her side, and it’s only a matter of time before she musters a real, bona fide laugh out of her tiny mouth.
The fun that we’re having with Squeaky and all the things Huz and I have really gotten to enjoy about her development are, on the downside, a glaring reminder of what we didn’t stop to enjoy when Hugga was a baby. I don’t know if we feel this more profoundly because we’re both only children, but I now understand too well that there are certain things, certain sides of Mommy and Daddy that Hugga will never get to experience simply because she came first. I was too frazzled and stressed and inexperienced as a mom. Hugga was just a little higher maintenance. Our home became an echo chamber of anxious crying.
I know that it had to happen the way it did. I was young and neurotic, not fully formed as a woman, and not confident about my ability to care for a child; not really confident about anything at all. I had more to prove back then. And outside of what I missed of Hugga’s babyhood because I was too deep inside my own head, there are other things from that time that I regret. But most of all, I regret not slowing down more when she was a baby. I know Hugga and I had moments just like the ones I have with Squeaky — moments when she’d flash a smile while nursing or fall asleep nuzzled in my neck. I guess I regret not keeping those memories closer and not being able to remember them more vividly.
I know that I tried my best to savor the precious moments with her, and I know that in hindsight, every mom wishes she’d done a little more. It’s not possible to enjoy motherhood 100% of the time. The patience and mama knowledge I have today is hard-earned, and the stuff I will know ten years from now will only make my journey even more valuable.
There are also things that Hugga is experiencing that I will never know: the pride of being a big sister, her need to protect Squeaky, and her compulsion to shower her with kisses first thing in the morning. I can’t automatically assume that I’m depriving her of something just because her life experiences won’t be exactly like mine or exactly like Squeaky’s.
But when I hold Squeaky, a part of me does wish I could go back a few years, if even for five minutes, and hold Hugga the same way. Maybe I’ve only deprived myself.
We are a multi-computer, multi-device family. Huz and I have separate iCloud accounts, photo libraries, and music collections, so things tend to get disjointed and we complain that we don’t have each other’s photos, that we want each other’s playlists, etc. At the very least, we have all Mac products, and OSX and iOS are adding new features to make things much easier to share right out of the box. Here are a couple of dead simple tips we’ve found.
Email appointment invites to each other.
Huz has a calendar where he records his work schedule which I subscribe to over the air, but we still haven’t quite found a graceful way to share a calendar that will stay synced between our iPhones and Macs given our separate iCloud accounts. I’ve just resorted to using a feature that’s probably always been a part of iCal (and is most definitely a feature of Outlook, for you Windows folks out there): I add Huz as an invitee whenever I make an appointment. He gets an email to accept the invitation and the appointment automatically gets added to his calendar. I don’t know why this hadn’t occurred to me earlier, as we use the feature at work all the time. This is probably the easiest way to get appointments on every calendar in the household.
Set up Photostream and share your iPhoto libraries.
Because I’m a work-at-home mom and I’m with the girls when they’re usually at their most interesting (or most meltdown-y, depending on the day), I’m the one who captures the day-to-day stuff. Huz is a million times better at taking pictures and videos when we’re at an event or doing something fun, so between us, there’s a whole mess of photos telling the stories of our kids’ lives. Before, we used to share photos via email or USB flash drives, but the process was too messy and took too much time, and we’d usually be too busy or lazy to do it until the disconnect was out of control. With Photostream, all we do is open up both iPhotos, share libraries (look for Sharing under iPhoto Preferences), and drag and drop from our own machines. Just doing this every other week keeps us overlapped.
Share files on iTunes.
You can import music from any computer shared on the network via iTunes, which is just a tab and a check box on the iTunes Preferences pane. Load up their library, select a few songs, and hit the “Import” button at the bottom. You’ll need to share passwords in order to share DRM-protected music or anything bought from the iTunes store, but it’s a really simple way to share music over the network with visitors that you may have originally missed.
If you’re a Mac power user, you’re probably already well aware these things existed, but it took me a while to figure out how to do this stuff and I’ve been using Macs for three years. These are perfect, two-second solutions for those of you who can’t be arsed to download some third-party app or manually sync with your partners.
