Dirty job.

The other morning, while I was nursing Baby N in her room, T - still in his crib - called across the hall to me:

T: Maaaaaammaa, I wna wr my rhynocrs shrt!

Me: No honey, you can't. It's not clean.

T: I wnt mine futball shrt.

Me: No, it's still in the wash too.

T: Mine airpln shrt.

Me: No, honey. I'm sorry. I think that's dirty too.

Finally, after flipping through his Rolodex of shirts that he used to like to wear, T offered up one more option. This time, T's query was not quick and casual. Nor did it escalate in demand, like his other requests. The question lacked any hope that the shirt would soon be slapped onto his body. No. This time, T's hesitant,"Tgr one?" puffed out like a brand new medical resident offering up a diagnosis.

Poor kid. "Tgr one" has been at the bottom of the hamper for weeks, even months. I'm surprised T even remembered that he once possessed a shirt with a big tiger head on the front.

I racked my own Rolodex. Dragon shirt? No way. That was deep-sixed weeks before the tiger. Other football shirt? Maybe. Lame baseball shirt with tiny fake cardinal and three-quarter sleeves? Probably.

You know you're a terrible laundress when a two year old can't even find anything to wear.

Afterthoughts.

I'm thankful for a dark kitchen and a Tupperware full of real whip cream that isn't flat and watery yet.

I'm thankful for loads of salt. Especially finishing salt, introduced to me and supplied to me in addictive volumes by a dear friend.

I'm thankful for light, sweet wine. Both white and red.

I'm thankful for holidays with cousins. All the fun, no baggage.

I'm thankful for a gaming system. It makes everyone happy, especially my husband.

I'm thankful for chocolate turkeys on a stick. They were gone in a flash. I think Dee inhaled hers.

I'm thankful for the Duplo hitch and wagon set for T to drive around the coffee table about 60 bajillion times.

I'm thankful for cranberries with cardamom spice. It makes everyone feel a little more Swedish-American.

I'm thankful for remembering the rice this time. Ten years and my husband finally feels at home.

I'm thankful for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Wow. Three hours of babysitting.

I'm thankful for a day of blissful cooking while dear hub cleaned up after me.

I'm thankful for my hazelnut and persimmon salad. Validation for a year of just about vegetarianism. Also, there was finishing salt.

Of course, I'm thankful for my three little babies, sleeping now after a day full of lots of attention from loving people, sweets and not-so-age-appropriate 4 wheeler video games riddled with headers and crayons. Especially when it was Mama's turn.

Also, did I mention the finishing salt?

Happy Thanksgiving Day, dearhearts.

Rock and rumble.

Those first morning cries are not urgent or sad. Steady, measured bursts of sound come from my baby daughter's mouth to wake me up. I retrieve Baby N from her crib and am greeted with a smile and the sounds of gulping. She starts moving her arms and legs like a challenged octopus and gives me the look of pure glee that is reserved just for me. We settle in with the Boppy and the blanket and she curls her body toward me.

Every morning, my Baby N and I nurse and rock in the same place. It's the bright red rocker that has harbored the spills and snuggles of two newborns before her. The rocker stands out as the "eclectic" piece in my gender neutral, jungle themed nursery, which adeptly reappeared for each kid in three different houses.

Baby N stretches her legs straight as planks and pulls her arms high above her head, fists tight and eyes closed. Her chin is tilted up and her lips pucker out and downward, reveling in the stretch. It's the newborn stretch that stands out for me in the blur of newborn hood. Baby N is now full and satisfied, and its as if she's telling me that the day can now begin. She's received the jump start required for a relatively seamless transition to the car seat (not to mention the spit up that inevitably appears when I squeeze her stuffing out with the five point harness).

From here, Baby N will take extra long naps while I scurry to her siblings' engagements or succumb to the siren song of the grocery store. She's ready to bump along, without complaint, over three flights of stairs to her brother's toddler school. She'll readily accept lunch in the snug fit of a non swiveling chair secured to a table at the local bowling alley. Later, Baby N will endure the "narrows" between the van and the garage wall as I make a a muddled attempt to get from car to house while carrying her, the diaper bag, T-Bone's plastic dinosaurs and various food and drink vessels. Once we reach the threshold, she'll patiently wait - inside or out - while I escort her sister to the bathroom to avoid a potty accident. From there, her next meal is any one's guess. Baby N may get top billing in the living room because my latte is still hot and I need a reason to sit down. Or she may have to wait, fretting at a low rumble in the bouncy chair while I tear up cold cuts for lunch or read T-Bone a story and get him down for his nap.

Throughout it all, the one constant my baby doll can rely on is a good rock in the red chair. One might expect a bang and rumble, quickly escalating to thunder in this unjust existence. Strangely, up to this point, Baby N has elected to take the high road. She sleeps soundly through the night swaddled as tight as flannel stretches and coos and giggles with her daddy and I after her sibs go to bed. It's a treasured time, like easy summer evenings or the bright days of September. Yet even now, as we delve into Baby N's third month of life, her personality is unraveling a calm and patient nature, not the Japanese "thunder" that the name Nari (Baby N), is supposed to embody. Perhaps she'll save the storms for teenage-dom, or even tomorrow. But for now, I'm happy to rock along in her quiet existence.

That jiggly bit.

So, I'm back at the YMCA. This time, I'm not bobbing around in the zero approach pool with swim diapered kids or suffocating in the sauna-like atmosphere of the indoor pool in late July watching swim lessons while 15 months pregnant. No, this time, I'm putting myself first, trying to run off the baby weight while learning the intricacies of locker room etiquette from the retirees who seem to have established - and rigorously enforce - those rules. At this point, I'm mostly failing on all levels. Mainly because I don't have time to wait my turn for the curtained showers (the preschool clock is ticking), and because of all the cookie variations that are available to me.

I imagine the exercise helps, but I believe I expend more energy getting to the gym than any cardio that actually happens on the proverbial treadmill. I'm also finding that while the 2 hour per Diem/who cares how many kids you have/in-house daycare is worth the gym membership alone, I'd rather sit at the Y Cafe with my friends - kid free - than don Lycra and "feel the burn."

The other day I learned, while naked in the open showers and scrubbing away with my new travel size carrot-flavored shampoo (for avid gymrats), that 38 is actually the old 12. A superfit thirty-something mom (who - in a fair world - would have kids no younger than 10), didn't have her shower essentials. I, per subtle instruction from the gym grannies, offered up my gymrat shampoo. This exchange alone required me to talk to another person while naked. And when Superfit Mom accepted my offer, I was then required to traverse across the shower area for the hand off. All the while aware that someone other than my husband could now fully observe the muffin top that has become an impressive layer cake.

Ugg. I'm back. Lamenting a flat chest, butt zits, or whatever other body image issue that was causing me to pine for the curtained showers in the mid '80s. Ugg again. At this point, aren't I significantly closer to that red hat and purple clothing that serve as signs of self acceptance? Haven't the years of ladder climbing, successes, tears, love and labor moved my little pink car closer to a win in the "Game of Life?" The answer appears to be a quiet, but persistent voice in my head mouthing, "no."

Damn. I thought maybe the carrot shampoo would do the trick this time.

A late introduction.

Hey there, dearheart.

I say that to all of my friends. The ones I really love, and the ones I know that I’m going to love. Once you’re in, I become a bit of a stalker.

So, I’m trying my hand at this blog business. I get it that most people don’t care, but I guess it’s the three or so people who birthed me, married me, or held my hand through serious relationship pain that I’m targeting. So...let's meet the family that you've already met!

Today I’m thinking about the fact that I have to force myself to exercise or really do anything to better my well-being. You would think that this sort of objective wouldn’t require much cajoling, but it does. In my lazy, real self world, I would sit with bags and bags of Mint Milanos watching House Hunters (or Two & 1/2 Men, of all shows!) until I learned that I missed the bag of Cheetos behind all the aging Asian food in my pantry that my half Chinese, half Japanese (third-gen American) husband collects (referred hereinafter as "Hub"). Seriously, we have some apparently "perfectly preserved" dried sausages that were purchased in Chinatown in Chicago in 2001. The stuff has made the cut through two cross country moves!

To escape this perpetual food search, and to kid myself that I do have a purpose here, I resort to tricks. I force myself to schedule activities, do errands (a life long endeavor), and – oh – watch my children. It’s a lot easier to do so long as the bathtub isn’t running and I don't feel the need to clean the kitchen....

Anyhoo, wow. I just ran two ½ marathons this summer and fall. Regretfully, my body doesn’t look much better than it did after my little son, T-Bone (or "T"), arrived 18 months ago. Isn’t he tough? He’s not actually. Barely hanging on to the first percentile weight wise, but it’s the nickname my Hub dreams about, all 5 feet, 7inches of him.

We also have my darling daughter, almost-three Dee, who describes herself as the "sis," and manages to finagle the word "purple" into every conversation. Like, when I ask, "Are you a spank?," she'll say, "No, I'm a purple spank."

What else? I often make jokes like I spank my kids, but I don't. I'm not sure why I do it, maybe it's because I was spanked as a kid - and much more often - threatened to be spanked. My parents were and are loving and wonderful, and obviously, I survived. There may even be some colors flying around somewhere....

I guess it is a nervous humor, like toddler potty humor. Like the kind my kids and I freely engage in every time we find ourselves in a drive through coffee line, with plenty of time to make fake toot and fart sounds.

At the moment, I have some fabulous things surrounding my little aura. First among them is the fact that we are expecting our third child, due in August. We had a name for T when he was in utero - Tiny Bun. This one hasn't yet picked up a name. Dee likes to call him/her the "Baby on the Mantle," referring to the rolled up ultrasound pics that reside above the fireplace. Poor third kid. But very much anticipated. Maybe "Dog-Eared Spank" is appropriate.

What would Lincoln do?

On the third of three weekends spent by myself with the kids while Hub worked, I sloshed around this past Sunday with the kids in the Y pool. After a solid hour of making the pool circuit, wherein I held T up front and Dee hung from my shoulders while we scooted around the big mushroom that rains chlorine and avoided the perpetually dumping buckets a few feet over, I finally called it good and we made efforts to get out.

While drying off T, the 18 month old, I had the bright idea to remove his swim shirt and shorts before putting on his baby beach robe, in hopes of warding off hypothermia. Dee took this action as a cue to strip, and promptly had her suit off and was back in the water - naked as a jay bird - before I had opportunity to maneuver the terry cloth over T's little bird arms.

In that same moment, the teenage lifeguard swept over to advise me that disrobing was not allowed "on deck," and that (slimy, open toilet) family changing rooms were available for that purpose. While gripping Dee's arm, my first reaction was not the professional, accommodating, "thank you, it won't happen again," that I aspire to fall upon with Obama-like regularity. Instead, I was instantly defensive, and exclaimed (at least three times), "BUT, he's still wearing his swim diaper...."

Of course T's fig leaf did nothing to assuage Dee's nakedness and our obvious violation of what must be Rule No. 427 of the Y's pool rules. The disappointed lifeguard seized on this weakness in logic, causing me to end the conversation with more defensiveness. Something like, "well, that wasn't intended," and then, finally, "okay."

Wow, I'm smooth. For once in my life, I'd like to avoid turning conversations that do not involve praise for me into something negative, even argumentative. I get that the lawyerly thing courses through my veins, but must I always explain myself? I figured by my mid thirties, humility and the "Serenity Now" principles could help me to keep my mouth shut.

You know, to take the high road, like Abraham Lincoln. While listening to an interview with a Lincoln historian during the "Lincoln's 200!" birthday festivities, I learned that in his day, President Lincoln was often the butt of jokes. Lincoln shook these off with aplomb, however, because he had such a strong sense of self worth. Perhaps that's my problem, then. Self-esteem issues and aggressiveness. No wonder I'm grinding. (:

The nightly grind.

Every other day or so, I play "chase" with my kids. I pretend to be a bear, coming up on all fours from the basement. I "grrrrrrr" at them, and crawl around the corner. They wait for me, get face to face, and then scamper and squeal away. Sometimes they growl back, presumably because they think I'm only half nuts, and will soon return to the comforting tasks of blanket fetching and snack conjuring.

The bear I face at night growls and grinds away at my permanent teeth. It comes from that half nuts part of me that has apparently been driven to the brink by motherhood.

I wasn't always a grinder. I was fitted for a plastic night guard about four years ago, after I'd already made a good dusting of my enamel. Things, and by things, I mean those little white cubes in my mouth that allow me to lead a full and happy life, have only deteriorated since my daughter's birth. At the current moment, as I pamper and avoid paddling the two kids I have, and await the arrival of their sibling, that dang bear attempts to dislodge a tooth on the lower right side from its very roots. My dentist tells me that the cost to repair my own unraveling will range around $30K. My dad tells me that for that price, I could buy a new head.

Today, on the cusp of my second trimester, I learned from my OB that I have actually lost weight since the last appointment. This fact is not a result of morning sickness or loss of appetite, but because of the bear. The grinding has recently caused enough discomfort to keep me from eating. Eating, and all that munching and crunching that it requires, causes my right jaw to ache and radiate pain by dinner time. If I don't head things off with Tylenol well in advance, I might as well settle for a can of Ensure.

I'm not sure what this means. Maybe I'm coming full circle, and will soon be reduced to a baby-esque liquid diet myself. I understand through my anecdotal (and very scientific) research, that the stress of parenting small children can increase teeth grinding. Is my grinding a slow, ugli-fying, and costly form of suicide? Would the treadmill help (please say it isn't so)? Hypnosis?

Does anyone have any other ideas for grrrrring back at the bear?