Down Time

It’s been a couple weeks again.  This is becoming my thing.  And since it seems that there is a trend going on here, I guess it is about time I make it official: I’m taking a break.
 
There has been a lot of upheaval at Chez Knittymuggins over the last month.  I have a beautiful son entering the “Terrific Twos” and every day is a roller coaster of emotions, personalities, and power struggles.  Not only is he the biggest love of my life (besides R. Darling, of course), but he is also the most monumental challenge I will ever face.  Being a parent is HARD.  I am a huge ball of stress.  Normally I consider myself an incredibly patient person, and stable enough to weather the ups and downs that life throws at me.  But between mothering, trying to be a good wife, and trying to keep the household chaos down to a dull roar, I’m kind of losing it here.  And I have absolutely no support network to lean on when things get tough.  I’m holding it all inside and going it alone, and I can’t take it anymore.
 
Don’t worry, nothing drastic is going to happen :)  And I’m not telling you so you’ll feel sorry for me.   I just had to tell someone to relieve some of the anxiety.
 
So I’m going to take some time off.  I need to focus more on my own inner peace, getting things done around the house and re-grouping.  I hope to be back when I’m feeling better, I’m just not sure when that will be.  Until then, thanks so much to all of you for all the friendship & support you’ve given me throughout the years.  It has meant so much more to me than you’ll ever know!  And if you are still here to read when I get back I will welcome you with a heart full of gladness.
 
But just so you know, I DO sometimes still have fun!  Check out my first hand-dyed yarn:
 

 
Best wishes & hope to see you soon,

M
 
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P.S. – Want to do something nice AND get free yarn? Ravelry members check out this thread. I’m already on my second pair of kids’ mittens!

 

The Straight Poop

With a title like that, oh boy am I ever gonna get a bunch of weird ass spam, dirty links, and raunchy searches leading to my blog post.  But hey, it’s the truth.  This post is about…. well…. poop.
 
One of the top two best jobs I ever had in my life (so far) came a few years, and one miserable job later, after grad school.  We were studying E.coli and Salmonella etiology on dairy farms and I was required, among other things, to travel to various dairy farms in eastern Washington and basically scoop poop.  Entirely unglamorous, but really not as bad as you might think.  My family however, thought it was distinctly hilarious that I went to college, and later grad school, just so I could pick up cow poop.  I’m not really one to take myself too seriously (despite outward appearances to the contrary) and it was kind of funny.  At first.  But then I got tired of everyone saying, “Oh have you met my niece/cousin/daughter?  You’ll never guess what she does for a living!  She picks up poop, ha ha!  And she went to college for it too!”  There was really so much more to it than that.
 

Little Mister is 8 months old today!

 
But then this morning, as I changed my third poopy diaper before 10 AM, I got to thinking.  Things really haven’t changed that much I guess.  I’m still dealing with poop and there’s still so much more to it than that :)
 
Things have been good here.  We had our 6th wedding anniversary on Sunday the 26th (love you Honey!) and took a little day trip for ourselves with some shopping and a nice dinner out at Red Lobster.  I know, kinda ghetto to some of you maybe, but hey, we like it and it’s been a while!  Also got to see my good knitty pal Troy for several hours of coffee & knitting last Saturday.  We haven’t done that since before Knittymunchkin was born!  I really needed that time to just be myself and not be a “mom” for a while.  Amazing how restorative a few hours can be!  And I’m knitting.  A bunch of stuff.  But that post will have to wait until later.  I hear my little 8 month old awake and calling for me!

 

Learning Curve

We’ve been having a time of it here at Chez Funkytown.  Knittymunchkin has been going through an extremely exhausting fussy stage, complete with wailing, waking up several times a night (from dead sleep to frantic crying in 1.5 seconds flat), not napping, and crying & pulling while nursing.  The only thing that keeps him mildly content is for me to carry him around all day long.  Needless to say, my back hurts.  Though he’s taken quite nicely to the Baby Bjorn that he used to hate.  Bonus!
 

When he was born, we found out he had acid reflux, which can be really common for preemies.  We have been giving him medicine for it for a few months and he’s been doing so well (not spitting up & not grunting with discomfort while laying down) that we thought we’d try discontinuing the medicine.  He seemed to be doing really well for a day or two, other than the increase in fussing & the waking up at night. Silly me, I didn’t put two and two together until he started spitting up again the past couple days.  D’oh!  Maybe it’s because he still needs his medicine, dummy!  So we’ve started that again and I’m keeping my fingers crossed it will bring him, and us, some relief.  Because this waking up every two hours all night long has got to stop.  I feel like spawn of the dead, all groggy and stuff all day long.  And knitting?  There’s been zip.zero.nada.
 

Sometimes this works too.....

 

I started doing some more extensive reading when he began having so much additional trouble sleeping recently.  It could also be a growth spurt or teething, but I don’t see any evidence of new tooth sprouts, so I don’t know about that.  I really think it’s the reflux coming back.  But I also found out that, apparently, I am a prime candidate for the SMITU award (Shittiest Mother In The Universe – smite you! – I just made that up), for even considering the notion of letting my child “cry it out” like I mentioned the other day.  Dr. Sears says so, so I guess it must be true.  I was just going by the books I’ve read up to this point which tell you you need to “train” your child to fall asleep on their own, otherwise they’ll never learn how.  But surprise surprise, Dr. Sears says you’ll just cause your child to cry more because you aren’t meeting their needs and when you do this you are cheaping out on creating a wonderful relationship with your baby.  Wow.  I really have a lot to learn.  Now don’t get me wrong, I’ll probably never be a militant full-on attachment parenting advocate (people should do what’s right for them, without judgment), but I do think we’ve  benefited from a kinder, gentler, approach towards bedtime. Yes, he does still need to be rocked to sleep for the most part, but he falls asleep faster than he used to and cries less.  Plus, I think we’re bonding more.  I guess it really is a win-win.
 

Meats & Veg In One Big Pot!

 

Despite all this crazy mama drama, I have still managed to find time to try one new recipe (part of my Day Zero Project goals).  I apologize to all you vegetarians out there who will be offended by my pot roast photo up there.  I’m sorry, but I still do eat meat.  I’ve never been very good at cooking it because, frankly, when I lived alone I mostly ate chicken, veg, & pasta.  But I now live with a bona fide carnivore and meat is what’s for dinner.  It’s been dang hot here so I was looking for something to cook in the crock pot that wouldn’t heat up the house.  A friend of ours came over to meet Knittymunchkin for the first time and was talking about going home to cook a pot roast.  He made it sound so easy I thought, why not?  I hopped on the inrawebz and found a likely recipe here.  Following some of the advice of the reviewers I changed it up a little and settled in for a 10 hour wait.  It smelled great and looked good when we dished up.  The flavor however, was missing something.  It’s not like it was bad, it just wasn’t amazing.  R. Darling gave it an 8 and I gave it a 7 for the meat and an 8 for the veg.  As in, I would cook it again, but it sorely needs something.  Any of you lovely readers have a secrety squirrel ingredient you’d be willing to share for fantastic pot roast?  I thought the balsamic vinegar I added would do the trick but sadly, no.  Maybe I didn’t add enough.
 

Well, it’s all part of my learning curve. I’m still on the upward climb, but I will get there someday. I have to!