The Im Family

so i'm trying to read with mimi tonight and she insists on reading herself, but every now and then she doesnt read the words exactly right, so of course, the teacher in me butts in and tells her "look again at that word. that says 'splish' it doesnt say 'splishing.' good readers go back and fix it when it doesnt sound right, look right or make sense." mimi ROLLS HER EYES and brazenly tells me, "no." WHAT? WHAT? my students NEVER said that to me when during a reading workshop. NEVER! i began to sputter and was like, "um, but you HAVE to. you can't just go and read it all wrong. good readers go back and fix it" then mimi GROWLS. and says, "i dont want to fix it. i'm not a good reader!" now, i know i should have just left well enough alone. i dont know, call it an imp of perversion, but i glared at her and said, "listen to mommy, and read it the right way." "NO!" she says. then she tried ...

guess i've been hung up on this whole 'leaving' concern lately. maybe it's because mimi starting kindergarten this fall weighs heavily on me. it scares me to think of her riding that big school bus to school. what if kids are mean to her? she's really not someone who readily stands up for herself when someone pushes her around, and she's sort of different from the other kids, so i worry about her finding a kids that can relate to her. i read somewhere that the craft of parenthood is to teach your child to leave you. everything you do is to teach them to be able to live successfully on their own one day. i remember the first day i took mimi to preschool. it was heart rending to leave her in the care of strangers for nearly 3 hours. it was one of the hardest moments i have ever had to endure. i sat upstairs in the school library trying to busy myself with reading and to resist the urge to crouch on the floor outside the classroom door and peer in. of c...

**same entry as "sad", just changed the title...this one felt more accurate, in line with change and growth. i got caught up the other night looking at old videos and pictures of mimi when she was just a wee thing. i was trying to figure out how to save it all on to an external hard drive that kept telling me that it was not writable. it took my genius husband all of 2 minutes to fix the problem for me, after i whined about it not working on a mac for HOW long? weeks! MONTHS, maybe. anyway, i digress, i was starting to move things from my computer to back it up on the firelite, and got caught up looking at mimi's old videos and pictures and i tell you it made my heart hurt. i literally felt a pain of sorts. the kind of pain that comes from loving someone so much and with that much love, the pain that comes from any thoughts of losing anything about that person. i looked at her sweet babyish face in those pictures, the funny squeaky toddler voice on the videos, and...

ozzy's been sleeping in his crib the past few nights, but is still waking frequently to feed, starting around 1 or 2 am and then every two hours after that. i have been slowly getting him to take in a bit more milk during the day. he latches on and takes an additional 1-2 oz from a bottle. and he's eating solid food well. he loves to hold the spoon and gnaw on it. he took an hour long nap at noon after staying awake for almost 5 hours. but then only took a brief 30 min nap at 5pm. the other day, he learned to use the step up from the sunken family room floor to push himself up to a partial stand. by 6 mos mimi was able to pull herself up on the ottoman, but ozzy isnt quite able to do that just yet, but he's definitely mobile and definitely trying to get himself upright. i'm starting to hear a few more sounds from him. this morning i heard some mmms. sometimes we hear some 'i' sounds, but mostly he makes ahhh sounds and some bah bah bahs. he likes to bo...

we finally got some snow...from the looks of the back deck, maybe 2-3 inches. mimi was singing 'snow' songs all morning, excited about getting out there to play. by 'snow' songs, i mean that she was making up songs about playing in the snow, wanting to go outside, etc. i can't remember any of the words to the songs, but it's something like, 'snow, snow, snow. i want to go out and play in the snow. who's gonna take me to play?..." mimi was quite happy with the snow...she's been asking me when we'd get snow for the better part of the past 6 months. after breakfast mimi, rob and kaya went outside to clear our little patch of driveway and the fourteen hundred steps that lead up to our front door, then went off to the 'pit' with the toboggan. ozzy and i stayed inside, but i did open the back door that leads to the deck to show ozzy the snow. i scooped up a small handful of it and held it out to him to examine. at first he slowly ...

since i took the time to write this out on Facebook, i thought i'd just go ahead and publish it here for posterity. it'll be interesting to look back on this one day. i think i should also think about doing a 25 random things about mimi one day too. i'll have to sit with her and interview her. i'm sure her thoughts will be entertaining. ----------------------------------------------------------- Rules: Once you've been tagged, you can choose to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you. (To do this, go to the Notes tab on your profile page, paste these instructions in the body of the note, type your 25 random things, tag 25 people (in the right hand corner of the app), and then click Publish.) 1. my favorite 'getaway' was our brief time in venice, italy (part of our italy honey...

mimi has been learning that Ozzy is her brother , but not my brother . he is my son . but not her son . and that my mom is not mom to her but her grandmother . etc. she is learning that we have different relationships with people in our family and we call them by different names. so, for the past few months, i'll hear her try out these words. when her maternal grandmother calls on the phone and wishes to speak to her, she'll ask me, oh, is it your mom or dad's mom? when she came home from Korean school this morning i told her to come in quietly because Ozzy was napping and she calls out to Rob, "your wife says to be quiet." when i tell mimi to go tell daddy dinner is ready she says, "but i dont know where he is! where is your husband?"

i'm going to try to get Ozzy to sleep in his crib from now on because i think he's waking more b/c he senses the boobs all through the night and keeps waking to be one with them. so tonight, rob put the crib back together for me (it had to come apart to be removed from his room) and set it up again in my room (we took it out of ozzy's room) and he is now comfortably asleep in his crib. as rob was laboring over all the crib parts to reassemble the damn thing (not as easy as one would think, with complicated layers of springs and sproings and do-hickeys), of course, i choose that moment to start to have misgivings about my decision to move the crib into my bedroom. i think, well, maybe i should do this sleep training in his room so he gets used to being in his own room... and i could sleep on the full size bed that is in there. the crib has to eventually go back into his room anyway. maybe i should tell Rob to put the crib back ...but as i watch Rob toiling away, i think...

ozzy's 6 month check up revealed that the sharp hard white bump in the back of his mouth is NOT a little tooth poking through, but a cyst. it should go away on its own and is not a need for concern. his head is measuring in the 75%, his length 50%, and his weight is in the 25%. he's still feeding every 2 hours, and refuses to take more than 3 oz per feed (i pumped and put 3.5 oz in a bottle...he stops at exactly 3 oz and pushes the bottle away, turns his face, arches his back, and cries out if i kept trying to get him to finish the final .5 oz.) the doc thinks he's doing great though, but says she would be concerned if his weight didnt continue up on the curve and instead makes a downward dive, so we've got to go back in a month for a weight check and his second flu shot. he had 4 shots and 1 oral vaccine today. he cried after the injections, i latched him on, he took a nap for 30 min and he was fine afterwards. i,on the other hand, was not feeling so great. tired,...

as i was drying mimi's hair the other day in my bathroom (b/c there's not enough room for ozzy's exersaucer in her bathroom), she accidentally knocked over a container of my mineral makeup and the jar went flying and power dumped out all over the floor. oh, mimi! i moan, rolling my eyes. shaking my head, i keep on drying her hair. when i'm done i tell her to go get dressed while i sweep the makeup off the floor (i dumped most of it back into the jar...i figure it's all some kind of dirt, anyway). she comes back and w/this sick look on her face she says, "mom, i feel terrible !" thinking she was ill i asked her what's wrong. she say, "i feel just terrible for spilling your makeup all over the floor. i should have been more cautious!" --------------------------------------- while playing on the floor with ozzy, he began merrily tooting away, necessitating a diaper change. mimi asked what i was doing and i said ozzy pooped i have to chan...

i swear when ozzy starts to "talk" while eating his purees (yes, he is on solids now), he sounds like an angry drunkard mumbling obscenities at me. add the still wobbly, uncoordinated movements of his and it completes the picture.

these past week has been a wearying and messy venture in baby care. ozzy had contracted a terrible cold and had been so congested that his nose was constantly draining and so backed up that his eyes were swelling, red and tearing. he's had to breathe through his mouth and was flat out miserable. i took him to see the pediatrician because he seemed so bad off, but there was no ear infection and his lungs sounded clear, so we had to ride this out and let him get better on his own. (of course we were doing the usual thing: irrigating nose with saline, suctioning, steam, and doc said i could give 1/4 to 1/2 tsp of benadryl to help dry him up if needed.) besides the restless nights from heavy congestion, the worst is the inability to feed because of congestion. it's so sad to see your baby unable to feed...it just seems like there's not much a baby can do except eat and sleep and when you take those two experiences and make them miserable...how heartbreaking! and MESSY. ...

mimi's ever expanding vocabulary has her using words she doesnt know the meaning of very well or else misusing words. she told me one day when she was feeling nervous that she felt 'invisible', then she goes, 'wait, what does invisible mean !' she has also been trying to use the word 'fucking' and the funny thing about that is she is knows how to use it correctly. of course i dont condone that sort of language, at least not from a four year old, so i have been trying to get her to stop saying that. she still singing christmas carols even though it is weeks past christmas. i've been enjoying it because she occasionally gets the words wrong. like Deck the Halls, she says "Don we now our gray apparel" and Rudolf (not pronounced roo-dolf, but rather, rude-off) ...then one froggy christmas eve. she is also getting better at playing Deck the Halls and Jingle Bells on the piano. she is learning to play the notes with both hands at the same ti...

2008 went by so fast. i guess i've been in some sort of baby mama fog for most of the year because dang if i remember much of it. thank goodness for this blog... i can go back and read what i've written through this year as a refresher, though i'm not sure how i was ever lucid enough to write half of it. this christmas felt a little off to me. not sure why? maybe i'm just tired because ozzy is still waking frequently to feed and my milk supply has been decreasing...could be because he's waking to feed but only snacking, and hence lowering my supply because he's not emptying the breasts. he's also not a very considerate co-sleeper. mimi used to be able to sleep in the middle of my bed and give me my space, but no matter how many times i keep scooting ozzy away, he scoots right back to me forcing me to edge away bit by bit until i'm literally sleeping on the edge of the bed with my butt hanging off the mattress and finger tips desperately gripping t...