jparks: “Do you want me to take you to Circle A with the egg?”
me: “Uh, Circle A? With the egg?” (I’m thinking it’s maybe a new restaurant for brunch)
“Yay, you know the egg. The Circle A.”
“uh…”
“The. Circle. A.”
“Cirque du Soleil? Ovo?”
“Yes!”

Folks, this is why I had to marry him, because no one else would ever be able to figure out what in the hell he’s talking about.

Greetings from the other side of 30! Things here are, um, older? Actually, having only been in the land of 30 year olds for ten days now I can say life here isn’t as scary as I was expecting, although a few things do suck.

Sucky Thing Number 1: Truman’s reaction when I told him how old I am now

He used to be my favorite child, but has now lost that title to Lily. She will never judge me for getting older.

Sucky Thing Number 2: Mustache

I swear the day before my birthday my upper lip decided “What the hell, let’s grow a mustache!” I’m no stranger to facial waxing as I can’t handle plucking my own eyebrows so I have them beaten into submission via wax frequently. And I’ve even given in to waxing that upper lip area in the past, but I’ve never felt like it was necessary. Before it was a preventative attack but now it needs to be done. I wonder if it feels like jparks is just kissing himself lately.

I’m sure there are other sucky things that I’m too tired to remember them right now. (perhaps I’m not too tired, it’s just my memory going since I’m old. That can be Sucky Thing Number 3!) So onto the good things about being 30! Wheee!

We went to dinner at LB Steak, just the two of us, and I got a very tasty adult beverage:

It’s okay to admit that you’re a bit disappointed that my tasty beverage is covering my mustache. That wasn’t done on purpose and is just a happy mistake

Besides a spiced pear lemon drop I also had a filet mignon and some truffled mac and cheese. Oh! And pork belly with a fried egg! It was a meal full of win.

After dinner jparks and I walked over to Nordstrom where I got these beauties:

Apparently once you’re 30 you’re finally responsible enough to own a pair of very expensive shoes. Or maybe you need very expensive shoes to distract from your mustache. Either way, I have very expensive shoes that make me feel very good. I know you’re thinking those are pretty tame as far as shoes go, and I would have loved something more along these lines, but really, a black pump? I’ll wear the hell out of that.

All things considered 30 isn’t too bad. I mean, sure as Mary-Lynn pointed out lusting after Chuck Bass is now probably extra creepy and I bet that same thing applies to Puck from Glee, but hey I have nice shoes! And jparks still loves me despite the mustache. Now if I could just convince Truman that me being 30 isn’t the end of the world and that if he wants to make fun of someone for being old, perhaps his father is better suited for being the butt of those jokes. After all, he’s older then me and bald, that’s comedy gold right there.

Do you know there is such a thing as too long of a vacation? We’ve been away from home since December 18th and dear god I am so ready to get back to my own bed. Also, the kid has refused to sleep in a crib or pack and play through this whole trip and has been sleeping right between jparks and I, which might work for other couples, but sucks for us. Truman is getting the boot as soon as we get home. In fact, he’s lucky jparks and I aren’t hiring a nanny to stay with him that first night so we can go shack up in a hotel. Not that we would have the energy to do anything to make paying for a hotel worthwhile, unless you count me passing out as soon as we walked into the room as jparks serenades me with a chorus of “blowjob? blowjob? blowjob?” all night long worthwhile.

The first part of this trip was spent in New Orleans where we got to see lots of family and friends. We are still on the second part of the trip in Austin where our friends have been really trying to sell me on the idea of buying a house. The biggest selling point is that for what we paid for our tiny townhouse in CA, we could have a huge house with a yard (A YARD!) here. I’ve got to admit, it is very tempting. Also, jparks dreams of living behind his friend Jeff so they can live out some King Of The Hill fantasy where they stand in an alley and drink beer and say “Yup.” So I don’t know, we’ll have to see what happens.

In unrelated news, my Christmas gift to myself from jparks was a Canon G11, which is rocking my world like you would not believe. Another gift was a photography session in New Orleans and so far I’ve only seen three of the pictures, but I’m so excited about them. I love how good my hair and skin can look under the careful hand of someone that knows photoshop.

We also did a session of Truman only pictures with jparks’ mom and thanks to those pictures I’ve learned that my child is beyond albino. Come summer I’m not even sure SPF 100 will be enough to protect him.

The only other thing going on lately is that my birthday is quickly approaching and this year it’s a big one, 30. I waver back and forth between being okay with 30 and having mild freak outs over it. Of course, it helps to remember that I might be turning 30, but that means my mom is 55 and that’s way worse. I’m currently on the hunt for the perfect gift to celebrate this birthday milestone, but have been coming up empty handed. I’m open to suggestions if you know of an awesome gift that says “Hey, you’re 30 and it doesn’t suck as much as everyone says!” Maybe a snuggie?

Happy holidays everyone! It’s been quite the year and I’m so glad you’ve all stuck around during my whining through my pregnancy and my lack of posting while I navigate motherhood.

Here’s hoping 2010 is just as amazing as 2009 was. Cheers!

Guys, I am sick. Like for real sick, not just “I’m so tired I feel sick” sick. I even went to the doctor and got medicine. Liquid medicine that I’m actually taking, which is huge for me. Normally if a doctor prescribes liquid medicine I skip taking it because oh god, barf barf barf. I honestly would rather cough until I puke than take cough syrup, which is kind of dumb since either way puking is the outcome. I am smart like that.

Anyway, since I’m sick how about a random update for a post.

And now I’m off to pass out. Oh codeine, you are so helpful.

It’s a well known fact that I’m stubborn. This means that sometimes I refuse to ask for help and get myself so overwhelmed that I can’t do anything but sit and cry. For hours. You can imagine how much fun that is for jparks.

Since Truman’s birth I’ve been struggling over how to balance taking care of him, taking care of the house, taking care of my marriage, and taking care of myself. I wish I could say I’ve figured out the balance, but I haven’t and things like my sanity and marriage have been suffering for it. Jparks is fond of saying that it takes a village to raise a child and while I don’t disagree, I’m wondering what do you do when you don’t have a village to help you?

I often think about my grandmothers, who raised children while maintaining their homes and I can not wrap my mind around how they did it. All I can focus on is that I must be doing something wrong to feel this lost in motherhood. Jparks likes to point out that Truman is healthy and generally happy and that’s what matters most, but it somehow feels like not enough. I want him healthy and happy in a clean house with a mother who is not exhausted and a set of parents that lovingly sit down to dinner every night. Unobtainable goals? Perhaps, but for some reason it’s how I’ve decided life should be. I have friends that seem able to achieve this so why couldn’t I? What part of the equation was I missing that kept leading me to feel like such a failure?

I spent a few days really thinking about how I was feeling towards being a mother and decided that something had to give because the road I was headed down was not healthy. I decided that while I admire my grandmothers and friends that could do it all, I’m not one of them. The first step was to get the cleaners to tackle the pile of clean laundry and the second was to hire a babysitter. While I always knew I would use babysitters to watch Truman for date nights, the one I found will also be paying me visits during the week. It took awhile for me to admit that I need someone to come once a week or so, for a few hours so I can do what I feel needs to be done; wash some dishes, take a nap, write a blog post, get a pedicure, whatever. I figured that if it takes a village to raise a child and I have no village around me, then I would buy myself one.

So there you have it, I’ve been missing partially out of a lack of time for posting, partially because I’ve been so embarrassed by what I viewed as a failure at motherhood that I couldn’t bring myself to say anything, and partially because the lack of sleep has sucked the creativity right out of me. But I’m slowly coming back and from here out I refuse to see what I’m doing a failed attempt at raising my son. I’m doing the best I can and I won’t feel bad about needing help. I may not be super mom but I am being the best mom I can be and that’s good enough.

Oh internet, I am delusional. You see, today I was at the mall and I saw a sequined dress that I instantly fell deeply in love with. I’m very crow-like in that shiny or sparkly things draw me in and the ultimate in my mind is a black sequined dress. Nothing gaudy or too over the top, just a simple dress with sequins. Twinkling, light catching sequins. I’ve been obsessed with the idea of this dress for a couple of years now and almost bought one last year, but jparks’ holiday party was much too casual for it.

Anyway, back to the delusional aspect of this story.

I was walking through White House Black Market when I stumbled upon the perfect little black sequined dress. And then I tried the dress on and saw that the word that needs the most stress in that last sentence is little. It is hella short. I tried it on, looked in the mirror, thought “holy crap, that’s a lot of leg” and then bought it anyway because I am stupid delusional. This is the kind of dress that you either have to be 21 or Tina Turner to wear and unfortunately I am neither of those. But I’m keeping it and wearing it to jparks’ work holiday party.

If I had one of those ever popular Life Lists “wear a sequined dress” would be on it. I know right now I’m not in the best shape to rock a dress with a “high hemline” but chances are, in the future I’ll be in worse shape. I’m also well aware that this dress doesn’t have to be the one that fulfills my desire, in fact Target has a really cute sequined dress right now, but I figure go big or go home. Or in this case, go teeny tiny hemline or go home.

So there you have it, I have lost my mind and bought a short sequined dress that is not meant to be worn by an adult of my size. And I have bought it to wear around jparks’ coworkers. I’m considering it payback for last year’s holiday party where jparks got drunk and yelled in the middle of the dance floor “I have poo issues! I can’t poo if people can hear me! So what!” Honestly, I think what he did was worse. It’s one thing to have an inappropriately dressed wife, it’s another to loudly share the requirements of your bowel movements while people are trying to dance to YMCA.

Can anyone make a shoe suggestion to complete the look? Also, the model is wearing fishnets with open toe shoes, are we rocking that look now? I was going to maybe wear opaque tights so I don’t blind people with my white legs, are open toe shoes okay with them? Is it acceptable with tights so long as they aren’t reinforced toe? I’m so confused because open toe shoes with tights have been such a fashion no for me for so long that even the idea of wearing them together feels wrong. And can someone talk me out of buying this tank? So shiny!

Well, this was a fun weekend here at Parks Place. Assuming the new definition of fun is “exceptionally bad or displeasing.” Or “having undesirable or negative qualities” would work as fun’s new definition as well. Either way this weekend was sucky. And crappy. And did I mention not fun at all?

Thursday night Tru started with a fever, which we managed through the night with tylenol and cool rags. Friday I took him to the pediatrician expecting to be told we were all clear and it was just a fluke spike in his temperature. Expect it turns out it wasn’t just a fluke and the kid had swine flu H1N1. And because the flu wasn’t enough, the pediatrician called a few hours later to tell me that Tru’s urine sample came back positive for a urinary tract infection. I do want to give Tru props for being a trooper, as sick as he was, he was still smiling and generally in a good mood.

We’re past the worst of the flu and now are left to deal with the UTI. Apparently UTIs are not very common in baby boys so when he’s done with his antibiotics, Tru gets an ultrasound. Depending on the results of that we’ll move on to a voiding cystourethrogram which involves a catheter and dye inserted into his bladder. I’m trying not to worry too much about this because what good will it do? We can’t get the ultrasound for at least a week, and I refuse to obsess about it until then. I will not be referring to Dr. Google because that just leads to sleepless nights spent staring at the ceiling while I chew my bottom lip off.

While I was at the pediatrician and the bad news was washing over me, I kept reminding myself that at least Saturday would be a good day because it was New! Car! Day! A couple of weeks ago jparks and I decided to get an Audi Q5 and Saturday was the day it would be ready for pick up at the dealership. I spent a lot of time while we were considering a new car walking around dealerships, talking to salesguys, researching on edmunds.com, and test driving various models and the Q5 came out on top time and time again. For a bigger car it’s sexy, it handles beautifully, and it comes with enough gadgets inside to make jparks happy. I felt like if I were going to be buying a Mom car, the Q5 was a pretty damn cool Mom car.

Saturday morning came and I called the dealership to make sure the car was ready for pickup when the salesguy dropped this bomb on me “My sales manager says I can’t sell you the Q5 at the price we talked about.” Basically he claims that the Q5 is in such demand that they can sell it at sticker and we had agreed on a price that was not sticker. We hadn’t filled out any paperwork yet because they wanted us to take care of all of that once the car arrived and while I probably could have gone to the dealership and made a scene, I just wasn’t feeling it. The disappointment of not getting the car I wanted and expected should have lit a fire under me, but instead I was feeling rather worn down and just told the dealer “Thanks, but no thanks.”

It’s safe to say that my plan to eat better did not work out so well this weekend. When life gets tough, pie and cookies are very comforting. I guess my new plan is that if I can’t have a new car, I should eat until my ass is as big as one. Good plan!

For the past few Novembers I’ve participated in National Blog Posting Month, and for a couple of days at the end of October I was stupid enough to think I would be able to participate again this year. And then the second day came and I stared at my laptop screen for a few minutes and promptly passed out. I never realized before just how hard it is to string together words into a post when you’ve had all the creative energy sucked out of you by an infant that enjoys made-up-as-you-go songs. Excuses, excuses.

Since I failed at NaBloPoMo before I even really got started, I’ve decided to take up another task, Slynnro’s NoImYoSeMo. Instead of making a blog post a day I’ll make a list of things I want to improve in my life, which oh my god there are so many, and then try my best to get the list done by the end of the month. Sounds easy enough, let’s go!

None of these are huge changes to my life but each one will help me in some way. And besides, I’m not certain right now is the best time to try and take on a huge change. I feel crappy enough that I failed at NaBloPoMo, I can only imagine how crappy I would feel if I weren’t able to make an improvement in my life that I had told everyone about and that I wanted to accomplish. So drinking more water and cleaning drawers it is!

Usually I’m up for celebrating Halloween but someone apparently peed in my Halloween corn flakes this year, because I was really not feeling it. I tried to get into it, I really did, but between the super crowded Google Halloween party and the disappointing Fall Fest I attended, my Halloween spirit died quickly. I did manage to dress Truman up once in his caterpillar costume which made me happy:

ohhhh it’s the elusive Regan smile. No one make any sudden movements so we don’t scare it away

On Halloween night I thought about hitting a local mall with a friend to see the kids all dressed up for a costume parade, or visiting a neighbor’s house because they had set up their porch for a Halloween photo backdrop, or even just going to another friend’s house to hang out but in the end I was lazy and stayed home. Since last year we had one kid come to our house I hadn’t bought any candy and now that we were going to be home, and I would hate to get egged, a quick trip to the store yielded one bag of Mr. Goodbars, which are one of my favorites. Turns out we got more kids than I was expecting and when I lowered the bowl of Mr. Goodbars down for them to grab some, there were quite a few disappointed sighs. Who knew kids aren’t into chocolate and peanut goodness. Sorry kids, I’m happy to share my candy with you but I can’t promise our palates will like the same things. You should be glad I didn’t hand out dark chocolate covered salted caramels since that’s what I really like.

Maybe next year will be better. Tru will be old enough to stand up and act cute in his costume and I’ll know not to buy Mr. Goodbars for the trick-or-treaters. Or I’ll buy Mr. Goodbars but then get something else that kids actually like. Maybe I’ll even go crazy and buy a pumpkin. Whoa, slow down self, you don’t want to get too wild.