New York City

Well, the bags are packed and the business cards are printed off.  I'm ready for NYC! 

We need to wake up at O'Dark thirty, so I really should be in bed right this second.  But I'm just too darn excited!!! 

I can't wait to see the city.  I've never been, so this will be such an awesome experience just for that alone!  I can't wait to see what they do for Stoofy, and I really can't wait to see what they put me in.  I'm nervous and excited but really I'm just happy to have this opportunity.

I'm worried about messing up Elly's schedule, but I also couldn't care less because who knows when I'll be able to bring her back!  I'll take lots of pictures and post a few here. 

I'm also really excited to meet Nate and his whole crew that have been helping to plan and organize this trip for us.  They're really a great bunch of people and it should be lots of fun meeting them.

Time to hit the sheets.  I'll probably want to kill myself in just a few hours when it's time to wake up.  Just remind me that I'm getting pampered for a couple days in NYC!  That should knock the sleepy right out of me!

Cue the Chipmunk Music

All I want for Christmas is my kid's two front teeth to finish growing in.  Who knew growing teeth is one of the most painful processes as a parent.  Not to mention painful for your kid.  But that last point is obvious because that's what makes it painful for the parent... duh!

Anyway, Elly had one of her front teeth come in just before Thanksgiving time.  And it was a little painful and she was crabby.  But it was manageable.  (Either that, or I've already forgotten how exhausting it was last month.)  But only one of the two of them cut through. 

My first thought was, holy shit! I actually gave birth to a real-life hillbilly.  Great.  I already need to start worrying about braces, baby dentures and if Fixadent is safe for children under the age of one. 

My next thought was, crap! Did she somehow smash her face into something hard enough during the early stages of walking that she already fucked up her grill?  Did she somehow push the tooth back up in her gum?

And you're thinking right now that I'm completely irrational and crazy.  Stoofy says that I'm not crazy, I'm just a psychotic bitch.  He means that in the most funny, loving, tender-hearted way. 

As it turns out, the missing tooth is just a late bloomer.  It decided it wanted to wait a month before it's grand entrance on the scene.  Just in time for Christmas!  Lucky me.

But this tooth is different than all the rest of her three teeth.  This one has come with more than just tears, it's come with blood too.  Twice now I've found her bleeding from the mouth with no tears.  And it's left me wondering is this some sick, elaborate prank? Did some kind of special effects guru break into my room, bloody up my daughter, only to wait for me to find her and start screaming my head off so they can capture the sound for their movie? 

And Stoofy found her bloody during nap time the other day too.  He sent me this little gem of a text:
S- So I just had my first OMG moment as a dad.
B- Oh God, what?
S- I didn't notice it right away when I pulled the bottle out of her mouth.  I looked over and saw blood on her bottle so I looked at her and she had blood on her chin and on her binkie so I tried looking in her mouth and she freaked out.  She was finally falling asleep so I cleaned off her face and looked again and saw nothing.  But kids don't just bleed for no reason and I still don't know what it is.  But I don't see any more blood. 

And for me, this is victory!  Finally, I'm not the only one freaking out (and for Stoofy, that's the closest he gets to a freak out) over something Elly just did!  On the other hand, I'm sad that my poor little baby girl is bleeding from her mouth. 

Then add in the fact that she's in pain and fussy all day and all night long and it makes for a very long, long, LONG process just for one little chomper.  I just want that tooth to finally break through so we can get over this hump.... until the next tooth starts forcing its way out of the gum line. But for now, I'll just keep singing in my chipmunk voice. 

Caught Red Handed

This week (actually the last 2 days) I've made some major rookie mom mistakes!  The first being way worst than the second.  I'll start with the lesser of two evils first.

Tonight I had to run a few errands.  I knew it was close to Elly's bedtime, but I had no choice.  I have to do what I have to do!  So I packed her up and headed on my way.  I barely made it a half mile before she started screaming.  She's screaming because it's nearly bed time and she wants to be rocked to sleep with all her usual night time fanfare.  None of this bundled and tied into a carseat crap.  And what was my rookie mistake?  Not having a freakin' binkie!

Man did I swear up a storm at myself.  I mean, it's not like I don't have the mom purse (you know what I'm talking about!  That jumbo-sized monstrosity you lug around to haul all the shit you can't fit into the diaper bag because your husband packed retarded shit in the diaper bag and you're too exhausted to fight him on it so you just stick it all in your purse instead? Yeah, that thing.) on the front seat.  Yet, there's not one single binkie to be found. 

You want to know where they were?  Four of them were lined up next to each other on the bedside table ready for night time combat ops (or you know, a little thing normal parents like to call bed time). 

So what did I do?  I just endured it.  That's right.  There's nothing I could do but suck it up.  No speeding, no dilly-dallying or chit-chatting.  Just there, pick up stuff, and go.  Because she's in the back seat wailing! 

Can you say MOM OF THE YEAR?

But the big kahuna of the week is way worse.  Yesterday, in all my wonderful glory, I put Elly in her make-shift play area.  It's a good play area for her with lots of space and toys to play with.  We've blocked off the Christmas tree and she can't get out to freedom (aka, the stairs).  And so I put her in her area and turned my back for a minute. 

EP-IC MIS-TA-KE!!!!!

I all of a sudden here a splat and her playing with what sounds to be a solo cup.  Now this is something that's my own fault.  Stoofy and I have gotten in the habit of giving her one to play with.  So to her it's a toy.  For us it's cheap entertainment for 10 minutes. 

Turns out I didn't do a great job inspecting the living room before I turned it into her play area.  There was a wayward half-cup of red Koolaide.  And Elly got her grubby little hands all over it!

When I first saw her I started to freak out because she was splattered head to toe in red.  My first thought was Red= Dead.  So I scoop her up and checked for bleeding.  Nope, nothing. 

And then the realization that I'll be replacing carpet hits me and I look around to see what happened.  I grab Elly's hands and see them clearly stained red.  The white/beige carpet is a nice hue of pink.  And one of the throw pillows is a very festive shade of red to complement the green and white stripes the manufacture meant for it to have. 

Awesome.  Not only do I suck as a mom, I now suck as a friend and roommate too.  Triple wammie!  I think that means I've Pressed my Luck and lost.  FML.

And of course all of this happens minutes before I have to run out the door to be somewhere to meet people.  Clearly this is one of those moments where you realize being a mom is great... just not every single second of every single day.  And why the hell does this shit have to happen when dad's not around? 

Needless to say I'm now a proud promoter of the powers of Oxyclean.  If you catch your kid red handed and need to get the Koolaide up, just think of Billy Mays.  Since he's obviously looking down from heaven for all us rookie moms out there.

I'm One Lucky B!

If you've been reading my blog, you know that I recently got out of the Navy.  And if you've been reading my blog since I started, you also know that I've been crazy (that might not be a strong enough description actually) about looking for a job so, you know, I'm not homeless and the baby has food.  (You know, nothing major or anything.) 

Well, I've been very fortunate in landing a great job in the civilian sector, and it's truly been a major blessing how it's all worked out. 

I'm a firm believe that I'm very lucky.  Not like lucky in that I win the lottery or anything (I wish!), but mostly lucky in timing.  I miss near accidents.  I miss major disasters.  I miss events that I wish I could have been at, only to get an opportunity to have an even better experience (sometimes even behind the scenes) for that missed event!  And just when I think I've hit a bad spot and my luck has run out, I realize (sometimes I have to be reminded and forced to see the positive) that really, it's not that bad and I'm actually very lucky how things work out for me.  (My mom says it’s because when I was very young, like the age Elly is right now, she and my dad took me to Mexico and all these Mexican ladies swarmed me and blessed me.  It freaked my mom out since she didn’t speak Spanish and they kept grabbing at me.  Uh, yeah, I would have flipped out too mom.)

Take for example this whole Navy thing.  I've felt very slighted by the Navy.  I feel like I've been cheated on and just finished divorce proceedings. But now I've just gotten to the next step in the grieving process; I'm not as bitter any more.  (Well, I'm a little bit bitter still.  Just being honest with my friends!) But it's nothing like what it used to be.

Instead, I've taken all my knowledge and experience I gained in the Navy and put it toward getting a new job.  And then as luck would have it (and awesome timing) a series of crazy events lead me to my job today!

First, I was going to move to Washington State.  But I started getting notices that my resume was moving along with jobs in the DC area.  So Stoofy and I decided to try staying put.  I told my supervisor that I was staying in the area and for her to keep her ears open for jobs for me. (And that's called networking folks!  Or nagging depending on your view.) Well, one of my co-workers decided to take it upon himself to cancel an assignment he had no business cancelling without our supervisor's permission.  My supervisor got a call from the canceled event coordinator. 

Well those ladies got to chatting (after a whole lot of yelling at the nimrod who shirked his duty!), and it just so happened that the woman coordinating the event was looking for a journalist for a job position!  Hot damn!  So my supervisor said I've got the perfect girl for you!  And low and behold.... I got my foot in the door.

Now, this isn't exactly success yet.  But it's a start.  You see, there are major budget cuts happening across the board in the federal government.  (And unless you've had your head up your ass for the last few years, you would already know that fact!)  So there was absolutely no guarantee the job they needed to hire someone (like me) into would even exist after a round of budget cuts.  But as it just so happens, my soon-to-be supervisor worked her magic and got approval.  The only hang up was she couldn't hire anyone until the guy still filling the job before me officially left his position, late in November.

Well, that's no problem, since I couldn't take a job until after my final day in the military....LATE IN NOVEMBER!!!  Oh snap!  Another win for the good luck girl! 

We began processing all my hiring paperwork that goes into federal employment after I got a soft job offer.  Processing paperwork to be a government employee is a lot like your paperwork in-process for the military.  The only difference is you don't get a shot in the ass when you become a government employee.  (That should be a selling point when advertising jobs.)

And wouldn't you know it, my paperwork was having issues and it didn't look like I was going to make it by the deadline to start my job on time.  I had until 2:00 pm on a Friday to get everything in so I could start on Monday morning or I’d have to wait two weeks before I could officially start.  I held my breath and sucked it in and just barely got it all in on time!  And thank God I did! 

I started my job just a couple weeks ago and have begun to hit the ground running.  I'm very grateful for my job and the opportunity to get my career going.  And even more so grateful after I found out just last week that had my paperwork been delayed, I wouldn't have a job to start today.  Because they just laid down a hiring freeze.  My job offer would have been frozen and I would have been sitting at home with Elly wondering what the hell am I going to do now!?!?!?!?

So when I say I'm one lucky B, I mean it.  I get things in just the nick of time.  Life seems to work itself out in just the right moments.  And for that, I'm forever grateful!


****Betty's note: My mom set the record straight.  I was actually much closer to Elly's age right now when I was blessed by Mexicans.  She wanted to make sure I got the facts straight.  Side note from Betty's mom: It was Labor Day weekend 1983 in Metamora, Mexico, just across the border from Brownsville, TX.  I guess I need to plan a trip there with Elly ASAP. (Maybe once I actually earn some vacation time!)****