One Minute Writer catchup

Monday, March 08, 2010

I know I signed up for the One Minute Writer writing prompts, but I will tell you what I have been doing with them: I have been watching them pop up on my Google Reader, making sarcastic remarks about them to myself, and then hitting "Mark As Read".

Let me say this is definitely not the fault of the writers of these prompts - they are good prompts! I am just lazy and sarcastic. And also I am not a very good blogger.

I thought I would just write down the prompts that have popped up lately and what kinds of remarks I made in my head when they popped up. Just because, you know, this catches me up AND creates a blog post, as useless as that blog post might be.

• "Acceptance Speech: You've just been given a Best Actor or Best Actress award. You know how short acceptance speeches need to be for these televised shows.... Take one minute to write your speech."
  During the Oscars last night I just kept thinking it would be totally amazing if Sandra Bullock or Gabby Sidibe would actually do what all of us who were rejected as weird/ugly/nerdy in high school always dreamed of doing, and say something really specific like "And I would just like to tell Jessica to kiss my Oscar-winning @ss!". I know that sounds mean and spiteful, but wouldn't that just be awesome!?
• "Dining: Write about a memorable dining experience you've had."
  When I read this prompt I started worrying about what we were going to have for dinner that night, realizing I had no idea, and trying to think of something I could make that would prevent having to buy food at a restaurant.
• "Dance: Write a brief bit of fiction using the prompt "Dance.""
  I'm pretty sure I just laughed at this one because everyone knows I can't dance. However, if I have a glass of wine and I like the music I will sometimes try. There are no good stories that have resulted from this. Well, there is the one about the red candle wax which ended up on the floor in my last apartment when I was single and that is why I lost my deposit.
• "Perfect Fit: In your life, what's a perfect fit?"
  Not my clothes AHAHAHA!!! Cause nothing I own really fits right anymore.
• "Troublesome Goal: Write about a goal you've had trouble achieving."
  Blogging every day, or even every week. I am FAILing. BIG TIME. This just made me feel guilty.
• "Diary: Write a diary entry, dated March 2, 2020."
  I can't even write an entry dated TODAY.
• "March: Fill in the blanks: "I'd like to march right up to ______ and say, '_____.'""
  I don't really have any unresolved conflict that I feel the need to air.
• "Old friend: Write about an old friend you've lost touch with and would like to talk to again."
  The people I have lost touch with, I have lost touch with for a reason. Like we had nothing in common and it was too much work. I hope they are having great lives but I don't feel the need to add some high-maintenance friends to my life right now.

Well that's it for today, now I have a blog post. Hooray!

Here we go again

Thursday, March 04, 2010

Well I figured that if it has been Twittered, then it is fair game to share: Christian is no longer employed.

Yes, we suspected it was coming. No, he does not have another job lined up yet.
And yes, he did have to give back his amazing almost-brand-new MacBook Pro
* sob *
That part has been a crushing blow because it was so awesome. Well, I say that, but I never actually touched it. It looked awesome, though.

We are super thankful that they gave him a severance-type package. We have a little less than 3 months to find other employment.

Since we both work in technology, this isn't the first time for either of us. This is the second time for him since we've been married.

I don't write about this for sympathy (although maybe for a little bit of publicity in spreading his resume!).

But I'm not going to lie to you, it's not the most fun. I know I'm not supposed to worry, God will provide for us. We have seen it happen before, not even 4 full years ago.

Despite what the feminist agenda might claim, I don't relish the position of being the only one working. I know we need to save money, and as the person who does the grocery shopping and the cooking, I should be the one to figure out how to do that. But it is very difficult for me to figure out how to do this while still working full time. I have been trying to get back to my pre-baby menu-planning and coupon-shopping ways and I've done pretty good so far, but we've still had to resort to buying food 2-3 times a week when I just run out of food and/or ideas. Obviously, this needs to stop. I'm thinking of making a list of easy meals and just keeping the ingredients in stock and rotating them. Maybe I'll make a list of them here on the blog.

I'm also on the lookout for more vegetarian crockpot recipes. So if you have any of those, pass them on!
Also, jobs. You know.

BlogHer 2010!!

Wednesday, March 03, 2010

I am so excited to be registered to attend BlogHer 2010 in New York City in August! We've also already got our hotel reservations. Christian is coming with me and bringing Little Sir, and we're staying 2 extra days to sight-see together as a family! I'm so excited!!

If you are going to be at BlogHer, let me know so we can meet up!

Writing prompt: The biggest question

Monday, February 22, 2010

So I signed up for these writing prompts "The One-Minute Writer" in the hopes that getting these every day would make me want to write something more often. And today's did.

Question: "What is the biggest question in your life that you'd like to have answered?"

I can answer that: "WHY DOES MY CHILD WAKE UP EVERY 1-2 HOURS EVERY NIGHT???"

I could write a lot on this one. I realize no one cares, but this my blog so you have to listen to me!!

He is 4 months old. He just had a checkup today and everything is fine. When he wakes up, he cries but he does not want to eat. He does not want attention and he does not want to be held. We pick him up and try to comfort him and he just gets MORE MAD. He does this for 15-45 minutes every time and then just goes back to sleep. At first I was worried but now it is just getting annoying.

We really did try the Cry It Out but he can out-cry our tolerance. We tried co-sleeping so that we would be near him and he wouldn't cry, but he doesn't care if we are there or not. He just cried VERY LOUDLY IN OUR EARS for 30 minutes. Every 1-2 hours.

Everyone always told me that the first 3 months would be the hardest but honestly they were easy. He woke up at night but I didn't have to work 10 hour shifts then, and I was prepared for the waking up. He still napped during the day so I just took naps when he did. We got to cuddle a lot and it was sweet and fun. By the 10th week he was sleeping 5 hours in the first stretch and then 3 hours after that, so I got almost 8 full hours of sleep every night, it was great!

But then about one month ago, when he is old enough that he isn't supposed to be waking up anymore, he has quit napping during the day and starting this waking thing now that I have to work 10 hour shifts again.

Regardless of how you might think I am blogging about my child, this is about me, people. I never get any sleep. I have trouble communicating. I am letting it seep into my blog.

Go ahead, list things I should try.

I will bet you $10 we have tried it already.

7 Quick Takes Friday #6

Friday, February 19, 2010

I know I haven't done  7 Quick Takes Friday in about 100 years but it's back!

--- 1 ---

Part of the reason I am excited to do this is because Jen of Conversion Diary, who hosts this writing prompt, just posted a link to the Oprah episode about the nuns! I was so mad that I missed this episode of Oprah because I was off that day and getting groceries. We don't have cable or DVR so there was no way for me to see the episode I missed. Now I get to see it!! Woo hoo!

--- 2 ---

Nuns are totally fascinating. I think it is actually the not-having-to-think-about-clothing-or-possessions more than the not-having-sex.

--- 3---

I did get my nose pierced for my birthday. I know my mom is reading this. It's very small.

--- 4 ---

I have had a cold since I got my nose pierced. It is very interesting to have a snotty nose with a newly pierced nose. I am fortunate that I work from home and shut myself up in my office alone because there is a lot of what might be construed as nose-picking going on over here.

--- 5 ---

We still haven't sold our 1980 Mercedes that runs on veggie oil. I have put it on Dallas Craigslist 3 times, the Austin Craigslist once, and the local Dallas area eBay. I am reluctant to put it on eBay Motors nationally because it costs $125 just to list it. But we have been trying 3 months and I am about to do it anyway.

--- 6 ---

People keep contacting us about the ad, asking for the pictures, and then never contacting us again. What?? I think it is in pretty good shape for being 30 years old and it runs perfectly. ALSO IT RUNS ON FUEL THAT IS FREE!

--- 7 ---

Someone very close to me is looking for a job as a Front End Developer (HTML, CSS, Javascript). It does not need to be in Dallas or even in Texas but it must not involve travel from the location of the employment. This person has a lot of experience. Please contact me if you know of anyone hiring.

Well that's all for this week, be sure to visit Conversion Diary for links to more 7 Quick Takes Fridays.

An imaginary conversation

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Sometimes when I don't write for a while I feel guilty. I think, my readers have forgotten about me already, I am a boring blogger, but I have good reasons and no one ever gives me the opportunity to explain myself! It's really all about the invisible audience in my head that I don't actually even have. Then I realized that it's my freakin' blog and I can write out the answers to the questions that, truthfully, no one has even bothered to ask.

Why haven't you been blogging much lately?
I am going to blame this on the baby who never lets me sleep. His cuteness can suck me in and takes me away from other things a lot. I will also admit that I do not have my life balance re-adjusted sufficiently since the birth of my child to be able to incorporate as much blogging as I might like.

I thought you said this wasn't going to be a mommy blog!
I know, you are right, I said that. And honestly, don't think that I have turned this blog into a constant stream of pictures of Little Sir and what he is doing, so that should count for something. I have posted reviews of child-related books and I have whined a lot about mom-related things. But I have kept most of updates about the baby on our Family Blog.

OK fine so this is not technically a mommy blog, but what IS it now?
Who knows? All I can say is that when I want to write about my own personal opinions or feelings, the family blog is not the place to do it. So this blog is where they end up. I really do still feel that this fits in with my tagline "Confused about what I should be doing, but inspired to do the right thing, for the right reasons." and the outline of how I've defined what this blog is about.

What are you planning on writing about that would convince me not to just delete you from my reader?!

• I am trying to finish a book that I really like right now and should be writing a review some time in the next few weeks. It is not about kids or babies! It is a real book.
• I bought a Swiffer WetJet and am currently attempting to figure out how to "green it up" because I feel like the cleaning solution that comes with it is so freaking strong that it made me nauseated and gave me a headache, not to mention that those little disposable pads are wasteful. I am hoping to work on sewing a microfiber cloth alternative.
• I have hired a green housecleaning company to do a 3-room cleaning through the wonders of Groupon discounts and will be reviewing what I think of them in the beginning of March.
• What would YOU like me to write about?

Seriously - does anyone have any suggestions? I would love to hear!

Disproving Dr. Weiss@ss

Tuesday, February 09, 2010

I put that @ sign in there just to be nice. I don't really think he deserves it at this point.

You probably know who I mean - Dr. Weissbluth, MD, author of the famous "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child" book that everyone drools over. Even our pediatrician told us to read this book the most recent time that I called her begging her to do something, anything, about how my child refuses to sleep (I call them about once a week asking this).

First of all, Dr. W is a fan of Cry It Out, which neither of us feel good about, no matter how hard we try. I'm not condemning anyone who is OK with it - I wish we could be, but we have tried and we just can't. Also, our child has never heard of it and he does not abide by it.

That is one of the first of the "facts about sleep" presented by Dr. Wiess@ss that Little Sir has completely disproven. I am so sleep deprived right now that I am getting angry at the doctor for even writing them down and giving me these false hopes. So here they are, a list of "sleep facts" that Little Sir has disproven:

• Longer naps in the day time provides longer sleep at night. Yesterday (Monday) Little Sir took one of the longest naps of his life (excluding the first 2 days after he was born), which was 2.2 hours long. He then proceeded to wake up loudly every 1-2 hours all night long last night. He had done it the night before that as well, only that time he had some stretches of 3 hours or so. Oooo.
• When a child learns to self-soothe to sleep, he will sleep through the night. We have never really had an issue with Little Sir falling asleep. From the very first time we put him alone in his crib, he just smiled up at us and fell right asleep. Nowadays he is more likely to talk to himself for 30 minutes or so, but he rarely actually cries when put down to sleep. It's the waking every 2-3-4 hours when the crying happens. According to the logic of the sleep books, if he can put himself to sleep he "should" be able to stay asleep. I wish!
• A nap of less than one hour is not even real sleep. If this is true, Little Sir has probably only napped for real about 16 times since his birth (excluding the first 2 days after he was born).
• Being sleep deprived creates a grumpy baby.  Considering that, according to Dr. W, Little Sir has almost never had a real nap in his life and has never slept through the night, it seems odd that he is very cheerful and people tell us all the time what a happy baby he is. After a long night of not sleeping or a nap of 10 minutes (not a "real" nap, apparently), Little Sir always looks up at me and smiles like, "Well that was fun". I'm not saying he isn't twitchy and overly excitable from being overtired. I am just saying he's not grumpy about it.

Another thing that sucks is how all these sleep books I have read spend more than 50% of their pages going on and on about how horrible sleep deprivation is, how your child is going to grow up not being able to learn or reach milestones, and what a terrible parent you are if you don't let your child get enough sleep. This just makes me feel crappy. Like I am sitting around making my child stay awake. For the love of God, if I wanted him to stay awake like this all the time, why would I read all these completely unhelpful sleep books?? And who wants to get up constantly all night, every night anyway? Not me.

That is all for now on the sleep books. I have decided they are just making me paranoid.