4 months today.

No, that's not P'Bean's age it's how long B's been gone.

I am so ready for him to come home.

I'm having such a hard time with the holidays this year. Mel had a great post the other day about the emotional minefield of Christmas during IF. Or rather, the emotional minefield of IF during Christmas... so true. It's a tough time of year whenever your family isn't complete... or is complete (enough) but isn't together.

Tonight, G was marveling at the neighborhood lights. He thought the lights meant that it was Christmas.

No, not yet. People put their lights out early because they're excited that Christmas will be here in a few weeks.



.. and then he asked why we didn't have any lights outside our house.

Because, sweet boy, that's your dad's thing*.


And maybe because your mom is not all that excited.



It's a huge reminder of everything that B's missing.



For the first few months, I just didn't think about what B was missing. I couldn't think about it.



.. and he couldn't think about anything else.



He has missed PB's first smile, laugh, and her first tears. G's first day of pre-k, that sweet and indefinable moment where he pulled out his independence and stood on his own as just one of the big kids, and the everyday moments of two little ones learning how siblings interact.



G started pre-k the day before T'giving. I emailed B lots of pictures, and happily reported that no one had cried.



He emailed me back with just two words "except me".



Ouch.



That's what I think of every time someone tells me that it must be hard having him gone... yeah, it's hard - but it's nothing compared to what he's going through.

_ _ _

ok, I wrote all that last week, with the intention of actually finishing it. I had sorta even planned on working in the point I actually sat down to write - which was that B & I had that always-fun 'state of the union' discussion re: family planning... and I've been trying to write about it ever since. Twice I've sat down to work through it in my mind and my keyboard.. and twice I managed to write an entire post without once mentioning the actual subject I'd intended to discuss.

Obviously it's not an easy thing for me to think through (else I'd have written the #$^&! post and published it and been done already) .. so .. maybe next time?

* Usually we have enough lights strung around the front yard to qualify us for the Hall of Shame.

'D' is for drummer

Every flippin' time I think I'm going to blog more, life happens... and then all the great anecdotes and topics I think of just fall outta my head before I've even had a chance to type 'em.

So G started pre-k last week (better late than never, right?) word of advice - if you attempt to enroll your child in pre-k, and said child marches to his own drummer, and the pre-k even breathes the words "wait list", just find a new school.

It is exceedingly difficult to teach a nonconformist to conform... and once you're three months into the school year and all the other kids already know the rules and ropes, the honeymoon period is over and conformity is expected.

It's been a fun week... G's starting to get the hang of some things, but he does still like to do it his own way. His homework* yesterday was to write the letter "d" .. he was ok with that, but he didn't want to write it on the line.. and when he asked why he had to write it on the line and the best answer I could come up with was "because that's what they said to do", I figured screw 'em, he's four. And if he wants to write his d's sideways and under the line, so be it. This week, we're working on why a nap mat isn't a wrestling mat - surely where he writes his 'd' is small stuff in comparison. Besides, I like that he has his own opinions and questions the status quo. Tonight, while picking the d's out in the book we were reading, he pointed to a 'p'. I dutifully pointed out that it was a 'p' and not a 'd'.. and G flipped the book over to show me that it was, indeed, a 'd', I just had to look at it a little differently.

.. and after all, isn't that one of the reasons I wanted to be a parent? To learn to see the world in a different way, through my child's eyes?


Rock on, my free-thinking little man..




*yes, homework! in pre-k! wtf??

Merry Flippin' Holidays

For weeks, B has been bugging me to send him my measurements because he's trying to order my C'mas present and needs this information. Why yes, I am pretty sure that said present is going to be tiny, see-through, and more for him than me, but that's practically a tradition in the Grail household. Some day I'll tell you the story of how he wanted to get me a bikini wax for C'mas. A Brazilian wax.

.. and he cannot imagine why I haven't been jumping up and down with eager excitement, breathlessly emailing him those numbers.

So tonight, I decide to bite the bullet, and shut his arse up cheerfully send him my information.

Do you know they make tape measures that only go up to 36"??

Yeah. And I own one of them.

It's going to take some serious retail therapy to get over this. Or maybe cupcakes... which, I admit, may be part of the problem.

I can't believe that when I finally gathered up the courage to confront my jiggly curvaceous body, I couldn't stretch the tape measure around it.

I am simply too much woman for that f'ing thing tiny little tape measure, I suppose.



Oh hell, it's not that I expected to be under 36" anywhere. It's just the idea.

I've outgrown a tape measure (!!)

So...

I found this nifty link in a friend's myspace blog the other day:

Look-alike Meter

Upload kid-pics and parent-pics and it will tell you which parent the kid resembles more*.

So, it was fun to play with, but it got me thinking... the physical stuff is pretty easy: G inherited my grandfather's eye color and B's everything else, P'Bean got the sweet little double chin I had as a babe,** her father's blue eyes and long toes... it's fun looking at parts and picking out who got what from whom...

.. but that always leads me to wonder which child inherited what bad genes from us, too.

Some of it I know already, some of it I just worry about. G inherited my quirky mindset, my tendency to worry too much and his Dad's ADHD. I worry that he's inherited the double whopper of B's dyslexia, but that's one that will have to wait unless/until he's old enough to sit still and learn his letters. They tell me that his speech delays will cause him problems with reading anyway, so it could be a moot point.. my bright child will likely struggle in school.

Because of the things he's inherited from us.

P'Bean is still largely unknown. She's just too little for me to know yet. I worry that she'll struggle with PCOS, or high blood pressure, or some other problem that will creep up when she's an adult. Something I gave her.

.. if I hadn't spent so much time worrying about my genetics, and wondering if our IF was a cosmic hint not to have children, I probably wouldn't even be having these thoughts.

.. and ya know, whatever their struggles, difficuties or genetic quirks, I wouldn't change either of them. I adore them just the way they are.






~edited to remove photo~






*I make absolutely no claims on its accuracy, as it said my stepson looks more like me than his dad.



**truth: I had a triple chin. P'Bean only has a double chin, but it's chunky enough that I have to floss her neck at bath-time.