Yet Another Recall

I want my kids safe. So I'm happy they are recalling defective products. What I'm not happy about it that they aren't being made safely to begin with and that some are being recalled years after they were made.

Right before I had Jack I happened to see in a magazine that the bassinet we were going to use had been recalled due to a strangulation hazard. The same bassinet that we had bought 5 years earlier and had used with both girls. Thank God they survived!

Then a month ago, all of our kids medication got recalled. Too bad we had already used most of it!

Then yesterday I stumble upon yet another recall...this time for the crib. What's weird about this is the recall was issued over a month ago and I never heard about it. Sure, I had heard about the drop side crib recall, but this was one related to the mattress support. And the problems started in 2008 when a boy died when the support broke and he suffocated. The recall was in April 2010 - that is a full two years after that happened. How can they wait two years? We would have never used that crib for Jack. But yet another unsafe product all my kids have used.

I do have to say after much run around with the stores where we bought these products (except for the medicine - Costco took it back without a problem), we were finally issued full refunds in the form of store credits for them.

It's getting to the point where I feel like I can't let my kids play with anything, eat anything, sleep in anything. I'd wrap them in bubble wrap, but that would probably get recalled too.

Just a Quick Note

This last month of school is going to be a crazy one for us, so I'm likely not going to be around a lot. But don't worry, I'm still alive and I'll be back to entertain you soon.

If you remember, I vented about the school closure in our district and what it might mean for us. Well, I'm happy to report that we got the phone call yesterday that Lexi is in the school of our choice!

And it other news, I was elected PTA Vice-President. I have no idea what I just got myself into.

Do You Know What Sucks?

When all three of your kids end up with a stomach virus.

Do you know what sucks more?

When two of them get sick in the same night, leaving you with very little sleep.

Do you know what sucks more than that?

When you don't realize that the baby has gotten sick sometime in the night until you go get him up for the day and his entire crib is covered in puke. And you realize you are the world's worst mother because your baby slept in his own puke all.night.long! And you are so disappointed in yourself that it doesn't even make you feel better when somebody else justifies it by saying you've raised pretty awesome kids if they don't even cry when they get sick.

Do you know what sucks more than all of this, though?

When Mom catches the stomach virus and has to take care of sick kids while barely able to lift her head. Umm, Universe, I thought we had agreed that moms can't get sick. Especially when their kids are sick. So I finally admitted defeat and asked Nacho call in sick yesterday because I knew I just couldn't do it.

And I have to give him credit - he stepped up. While I slept upstairs, he got Sam off to school and took care of the two younger ones. When the baby went down for a nap, he took Lexi to Costco and got all of our shopping done. And he even brought home flowers. I finally managed to move down to the couch to watch the younger ones while he picked Sam up from school and then he took the two oldest ones to the preschools' parent potluck. I would like to point out however I did manage to stand upright for 10 whole minutes to make a taco salad for them to take.

After a good nights' sleep, I'm feeling much better. Samantha's teacher, who is recovering from this as well, warned me that I need to take it easy or it will creep back up. The thought of taking it easy sounds heavenly, but I think I just used the one sick day I'll get this decade. And our calendar is crazier than ever, so let's just hope I bounce back as easily as the kids have. Besides, I have to clean the downstairs before I go crazy. Because while Nacho rocked it yesterday, cleaning up is not his strong suit. And making a gigantic mess is Jack's.

My last post really got me thinking about priorities for our family and those to families around us. Obviously I can only speak for my family, since saying anything about how other families live would be making assumptions, which is what I just stated drove me batty. So my comments and observations in the rest of this post are about how I would feel in any given situation and not neccessarily of those living it. I hope that makes sense.

We live in a very nice house in a wonderful neighborhood. Our dream house honestly, unless we were suddenly to win the lotto. Some rooms in our house are nicely put together with furniture that looks like it belongs there, while other rooms have a mish-mash of furniture and somedays look like Toys r' Us has thrown up in it. Our walls are white, something that recently has been driving me nuts, but repainting a house this size would cost lots of money - money we don't have. I suppose I could always do one room at a time, but I tend to be an "all or nothing" type of person.

We recently went over to a friends' house which is honestly immaculate. Now I know we all clean up before having company over, but this was different. You could tell they lived this way. And when it's somebody without kids or with older kids it doesn't really bother me because the need for a bunch of little toys isn't there. But these people have kids similar in age to our oldests, so I'll admit it, I was jealous. How could their entire downstairs be void of little kid toys? Our house looked better when the playroom was upstairs (we had to move it downstairs when we had Jack), but it was never like this.

After sleeping on it for a night (and still waking up a bit jealous) I really got to thinking - I don't really want a house like that. Sure, it would be nice for when company came over for them not trip over toys, but for the day to day stuff around here, I want my kids to know it's their home too. That they can pull toys out during the day and play with them. That for us, this house is a home.

But we've seen the flip side of this too - where a house looks like it's been taken over by the kids and you can't find anything adult in the room. Where counters and tables are covered in papers, games, crayons, etc and you can't quite figure out where they actually eat. Or sit. Where there isn't a single room that looks like it actually belongs. And I couldn't live in a house like that either.

So for me it's trying to find the right balance that allows the kids to be still be kids and allows me to not absolutely go nuts with the clutter and chaos. There are simple things we do each day that helps to accomplish that, I think. Rooms are picked up and beds are made every day. For me walking into a room with a made bed makes the entire room look nicer. Toys are played with and messes are made, but the family room is picked up before bed. And my biggest pet peeve - our center island. Sure it gets covered during mealtimes, but keeping it cleared off for the majority of the day helps me to keep my sanity. Being able to look over and see a clean kitchen table and the clean center island allows me to sit down and watch tv with my husband at the end of day without feeling like hurting somebody.

There are still days where I wish all of our furniture was bought for this house, where we had some actual color on the walls, where we actually had that built in for our tv in our family room and where it didn't look like we owned a toy store. But I also know that there will a time in the not so distant future where we'll probably have all that - a clean house, with matching furniture and no toys. And no noise. And we'll be wishing to have it all back.

It's Not Luck

It's no surprise that it annoys me beyond belief when people make assumptions about our parenting decisions or our overall lifestyle choices. The biggest, which I've talked about before is my decision not to nurse. I can't believe the looks of distain I still get, even though the baby is now almost 17 months old and had been off a bottle all together for 5 months. Does he look like a sickly toddler to you? Do my girls look unhealthy, unhappy and like they're suffering? No? Than shut the hell up!

The other one that really gets under my skin is when people tell us how lucky we are that I can stay home with our kids. It's not luck. We planned it and planned it long before we had our first baby. There is a reason we waited almost 5 years into our marriage before having kids. For us, it is a matter of priorities. Now, that's not to say that our list of priorities are or should be the same for somebody else, but like everything else in our parenting style, we do what is right for us. We don't pay for texting or internet connection on our phones, we don't have any premium cable channels, we rarely go out to eat - all sacrafices we are willing to make so that I can stay home. So, please don't ever assume we just got lucky. It is a choice we made, planned for and continue to live for.

Getting THE Picture

I, like every parent, has spent countless hours trying to get the picture of their kids. When we had one child, piece of cake. Two children? Not that hard. But three? That has proved nearly impossible. So much so, that my friend Christy and I have an ongoing joke* about trying to get the picture.

*not so much a joke as we're both completely serious about it - much to the frustration of our children.

In our household we've come close quite a few times, but when inspecting the picture closer realize it just isn't it.

It never fails that one or more (or in the case all) of my children aren't looking at the camera....

Or that one or more of my children decides to give us that ridiculous fake smile.......

Let's not even talk about the phase we had where Lexi refused to even be in any of my pictures, so it seemed as if I only had two children.....


Or when Jack got mobile and every picture either had him crawling or walking away or he had something (cell phone, keys, camera case) in his lap to keep him still.....


Or most of our pictures which are any combination of the above.

But this Easter I swore I got the picture. So much so that I even posted to Christy's Facebook wall to tell her!


So, upon closer inspection I realize it's not the best picture of Samantha. And the background isn't nice at all. And it appears that my baby son is flipping me off. But, they are all looking at me without any obviously fake smiles. Sure Jack isn't smiling at all, but I've actually got a picture with Lexi's real smile.

Around here, we call that success. You know, until the next time I decide I'm going to torture them to get the picture.

Walking a Fine Line

I was going to post about our Easter today, but I've got something on my mind that I need to get out. I'd like to say I'll post about Easter tomorrow, but that most likely means I'll never post about it. We did have a pretty good Easter though.

But now to what's on my mind. Samantha has a "friend" at school who is just plain mean. I don't know much about her except that she is the youngest of 3 kids and her mom just went back to work. But she likes to make of fun of Samantha and I think truly gets enjoyment out of seeing her upset. Her favorite things to do right now are tease Samantha about being in the school musical and about the clothes she wears (even though my girls have nicer clothes than I do!) I guess I should say, Samantha is not the only person she does this to though. Samantha and I have had long talks about what it means to be a friend and that real friends don't hurt your feelings on purpose, nor do they like to see you upset. We've talked about what do when this "friend" starts being mean and we've discussed other friends she might want to play with. We talk about what kind of friend she, herself, should be. And how sometimes hanging out with the bully will make people think she is one too. I've also made it very clear that I will not tolerate her treating anybody else that way. But for some reason, she gravitates back towards the bully. She has walked away from bad situations with her and I have seen seen her ignore the bully when she's being mean in the morning line. But still, almost every day she's told me they've played together, along with "but she was nice today."

Today my best friend was over and we were talking about a mutual friend who's feeling got hurt by another person. Samantha was surprised to learn that it happens even when you're grown up. I didn't want to depress her with the fact that no matter how old you get there are going to be those toxic people who like to see you upset, but I did take the time to talk a little bit about her situation. I once again explained that real friends don't like to see their friends upset. That I'm sure there have been times where I've hurt people's feeling and mine certainly have been hurt, but when it's been on accident and it's not all the time, those friends are ok to have. Samantha told my friend that her feelings get hurt everyday. Cue heartbreak for me. I don't really think that is true (and I will never discount her feelings) because most days she comes home very happy. But I can tell when I pick her up when it hasn't been a good day. I understand that little kids equals little problems, but I also understand that in the limited world Sam lives in, this is earth-shattering.

So, I'm walking a fine line. She is the one who has to go school everyday. She is the one who sees this girl everyday. She gets to choose her own friends. So I listen and we talk and we talk some more and I remind of how true friends should treat each other. But what I want to do is scream "why are you friends with that brat?"

And to think this is just the beginning.....