A Dada and a Mama

The box fan's on 2, the wind noise is blowing, and the white wood blinds and long chocolate curtains are shuttting out most of the summer evening's stubborn sunshine.

The robin's egg nursery is dimly lit by the mini lamp on the '50s teacher desk I found for 25 bucks at the Maple Valley Goodwill. It's right next to the oversized brown chair once used for nursing, now a place to read bedtime stories.

It's 7:45 p.m. on a Friday night, about 20 minutes behind schedule.

"Who's this?" Mr. T points to his own chest. "T Junior. Who's this?"

Our son is as long as his soft, yellow changing pad. He's laying on it in his diaper waiting for someone to put pajamas on him. "Dada," he whispers without removing his two favorite fingers from his mouth: the index and middle ones on his right hand.

"That's right! And, who's this?" Mr. T taps my collarbone.

"Mama." T Junior smiles with those fingers between his teeth, exposing his gap. A bead of saliva runs down the back of his hand.

"That's right! Mama!" Me and Mr. T clap and smile at each other.

My husband of seven years is beaming. His eyes glisten with joy. "He's so cute when he says mama."

I love my life.

Bit O' Blog Love

Amy and Christina.

Their names together sound like a Nora Ephron movie, but they are my friends in real and bloggy life. We all met when we worked together at a newspaper many years ago.

Today, Amy is the mom of an adorable toddler who adores his prized stuffed Piglet. She has good blog-life balance, and writes occasionally at This Life According to Amy. Christina also has an adorable toddler and a middle-schooler. She first came on the blog scene when her youngest was born at just 25 weeks and 4 days, but she now muses about being a mom and losing her job since her employer, Washington state's oldest newspaper, recently closed. See how she's staying busy over at ChristinaUnemployed.

Ladies, I just wanted to say a big bloggy thanks for being Sanity Department readers and for being great friends in real life! (Go to 5 Minutes for Mom to get your Loyal Commenter badge.)

He's Not Going To Like This

Face washed, I came out of our master bathroom last night ready to relax and watch a little TV with my husband. Mr. T was sitting up on the left side (his side) of our queen-sized bed, four pillows stuffed between his back and the headboard. The mint green comforter was pulled up to his waist underneath his computer, which was open and resting on his lap.

He turned his head and looked up at me. "You can't just keep blogging T Junior's words."

I flicked my arm at him. "Whatever, dude. I didn't feel like writing a big, long post and I hadn't written in a while."

Some days I feel inspired by lots of things. It might be something T Junior did or, ahem, said or it could be something I saw on reality TV (because I don't often get much deeper than that).

However, sometimes nothing seems worth sharing. In fact, I wrote two blog posts recently that I decided not to publish. One was about Father's Day, but I didn't know where I was going with it. I just started writing to see if it took me anywhere. Dead end. The other one was about the differences between girls and boys, and how this shows through the toys they love. Like choo-choos versus Barbies. I was an hour into trying to make it work when I shook my head, wrinkled my nose and thought, not interesting.

And, okay, so maybe a list of T Junior's latest words isn't my best prose, but at least it kind of had a beginning and an end, and was slightly entertaining...even if only for me.

Today, I got a pedicure. A real one. The kind you spend money on. Not the kind where I'm balancing on my left foot with the right one resting up on the soaker tub and I'm painting each entire toe hoping what stays on the nail will look good after I peel the excess off in the shower. It's been two years and, oh man, was it nice.

And, that's what inspired me to write this little gem. *wink, wink*

But Mr. T's not going to be excited about this piece, either, and not just because he'll think my paid-for pedi was frivolous.

I can picture tonight's pre-bedtime scene: He looks up from his laptop, his deep-set eyes scrunched together. "Dude. People are going to think I'm a jerk."

I put my hands on my hips. "No they won't, dude." (We say dude a lot at our house.)

But just in case...Mr. T is not a jerk.

***

What inspires you to blog?

Wa Dis? More Words?

Words have been flying out of T Junior's mouth a lot in the past couple of weeks. He's bursting with surprises. In addition to these, he's got some new ones.

Popular right now:

Down. But he says it like this: "dowwwwwn" and in a very demanding voice. The intonation sounds eerily familiar to the one momma uses during bath time when telling him to, "Sit dowwwwwn, please, T Junior."

New today:

Cracker. Pronounced: curcur.

Yogurt. Pronounced: growgur.

Night-night. Pronounced: nigh-nigh.

Bird. Pronounced: biwrrr.

In the last week:

Truck (chuck), tree (chee), and Spot (Pots), as in the dog from the famous book -- thanks Auntie W!

The Spot

The manicured grass is spongy between my toes, short and soft like a golf green. I can tell it's just damp enough to be comfortable to sit on and dry enough not to make an embarrassing wet mark on my tush.

I breathe the sunlight in through my nose, put my hands on my hips and look at my group.

"Right here, good?"

T Junior looks up at me from his umbrella stroller. "Dis?"

"Yep, this is a good spot," says my younger sister.

Auntie W is four years younger than me. She lives at the opposite end of the coast where they have dog beaches, palm trees and sunshine. (She keeps pointing this out and I keep countering with, "I swear we had sun before you got here.")

Even her lifestyle is the opposite of mine. I'm married with a kid; she's living it up as a single lady. I like the suburbs; she doesn't. The city scares me; she embraces it. I drive a minivan; she pilots a sleek sports car. I'm sticking to my natural icky brown hair color; she's a bright SoCal blonde. I struggle with being overweight; she's always been on the thinner side.

And there's this: I went to Wazzu; she attended our rival school, the U-Dub, for a year, which was just long enough for us to now take jabs at each other. (I'd like to point out, however, that I sucked it up and took her to the University of Washington's campus. I drove her down memory lane in the Odyssey with my huge Washington State University Alumni decal plastered on the back window, slowing down long enough for her to snap pictures out of the passenger side window. What? I wasn't going to stop.)

Despite our differences, though, we make a pretty good team. We packed a lot into the few days she was here and T Junior happily went along for the ride pointing out "dis" and "dat." We threw peanut shells on the floor at Jimmy Mac's, we were tourists in downtown Seattle, and we went to the 3D showing of Up where she patted me on the bicep when I couldn't suppress the tears any longer.

Today, on her last day in town, the gray has finally been swept east and ultraviolet rays are filling our pores with Vitamin D. Earlier, we parked at Bellevue Square mall and bought sandwiches at Specialties, and a mini ham and cheese quiche and a speckled "nana" for T Junior.

Now, we are kicking off our shoes at Bellevue's Downtown Park and I'm thinking maybe she'll stay for good. But I know that is about as unlikely to happen as is sunshine making its way over to Snoqualmie Falls, which is where we are headed after this impromptu picnic.

I finish eating my barbecue chicken sandwich and hand T Junior chunks of banana while Auntie W snaps photos of her nephew with a shiny hi-tech cell phone.

She was definitely right about this spot. It's a good one.

Wa Dis?

Dis is what I have to answer about every 3.2 seconds. Luckily, a tiny pointing index finger is aimed at the object in question.

T Junior: "Wa dis?"

Me: "That's a car."

T Junior: "Oooooo!"

Cracks me up every time.

I guess he's just figured out that everything has a name, and he wants to know what it is, thank you very much.

Here are the ones he knows so far:

Aboo (a boy or a baby)
Aboon (a balloon)
Abeu (a ball)
Bah (bath)
Bah-bah (bye-bye)
Bop (stop)
Buh or boot (book)
Butches (bushes)
Dada
Dah (dog)
Dance
Dat (that)
Daydoo (thank you)
Digga (Tigger)
Dis (this)
Dit (dirt)
Ew
Ha (hi)
Ish (fish)
Momma
Nana (banana)
Ouh (out)
Ouhsigh (outside)
Pew
Poo-poo
Pooh (as in Winnie the)
Soo (shoe)
Tattoo
Two
Up
Wa (what)
Yum

The First Birthday Party: What Not To Do

The past few weeks have been full. We stuffed in birthday celebrations, a garage sale and about a million doctor visits like a one-year-old does with his first piece of cake. And even though it was hectic and busy and tiring and painful, it felt great. I felt like a real mom. A good mom, even. One who has the best husband, son and friends a girl could ask for.

That doesn't mean everything went smoothly. Of course it didn't. This is me we're talking about. Why the heck do you think I named this blog Sanity Department? If everything went according to plan, I'd call it the ... Went According to Plan Department.

So, let me help you before you get tangled up in your baby's first birthday extravaganza. Learn from my mistakes.

First, before I even get started with my list of things Not To Do, let me offer you this: If you can, just have one big celebration. I divided it into two parties because I thought it would be easier. I was so wrong.

Don't schedule important appointments the same week as the party(ies).
A few weeks ago, my back discomfort went from a 5 to a 9 on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being giving birth without drugs. It was, and still is to a lesser degree, causing my brain to function at a much lower level than usual. Blinded by pain, I scheduled several doctor appointments, including poor T Junior's one-year checkup, during the two weeks that contained parties. His big day included a Chicken Pox shot and his first-ever taste of cake and ice cream. When I should have been shopping for My Friends Tigger and Pooh decorations, I was balancing a squirming pre-toddler on my lap in hushed waiting rooms.

Don't let your one-year-old try cake for the first time right before bedtime.
This one may seem obvious, but the traditional order of a party is to have dinner and then cake and ice cream. T Junior chattered for an hour before eventually drifting into sugary dreams.

Don't try to make your own gourmet frosting.
I didn't want to use store-bought icing. I thought it would be a cop-out. I was already using a cake mix. I wanted to make cupcakes with a fancy topping for the first party. How hard could it be to make white chocolate frosting? Well, guess what? It's pretty damn hard if you've never done it before.

For the second party, I just mixed up regular old vanilla icing from a safe Betty Crocker recipe. It was simple, tasted good and it technically wasn't purchased at Safeway.

Success.

Don't let your husband handle the main course.
He was trying to help, he really was. But I couldn't resist when he told me he wanted to cook ribs in the R2D2 smoker.

"For a one-year-old's brithday party?" I was picturing our friends' picky eaters, who range from about age 3 to 7, looking at paper platefuls of messy (but I'm sure very delicious, honey) slabs of meat. "Don't you want to do something easier?"

I was assured they would be simple to make, but that's not really what I meant.
Whatever.

I was letting go. Letting him take care of it for me. He was offering to make the main meal and I was grateful.

But somewhere along the way there was a communication breakdown.

The night before the birthday party, I was wrestling with lumpy chocolate frosting in the kitchen when it dawned on me that no major food had been purchased. "When are you going to smoke ribs?"

Mr. T frowned at me from the living room. "I thought you said you didn't want me to."

What!?

"Um, no. I merely suggested you do something easier."

Great.

The conversation went around and around until he came up with the idea of ordering pizza.

"Brilliant!" I was once again happy to not to have to worry about it. He said he would order it a half-hour before the festivities started so it would arrive at the perfect time, which he did...online. But then an early party attendee unknowingly closed the laptop mid-order and Mr. T had to start over.

An hour into the party and the guests were looking a little Lord of the Flies. Finally, a hot Mr. T stomped upstairs to give the pizza place a call. Turned out, though, in his haste to order the pies for the second time, he forgot to check the box that said: "Delivery."

Fortunately, he handled the emergency food situation swiftly and quietly, coming through the door like Santa with four boxes of doughy, cheesy goodness that everyone ate because who doesn't like pizza?

You cannot purchase balloons the night before the party.
The second party was to be at the park at noon a half-hour away from home. That's right. Immediately after T Junior's nap and 30 minutes down the road. I knew the morning would be hectic, so I opted to buy balloons the evening before. I took my son with me for some pre-party grocery shopping and then I happily ordered five latex balloons -- one for each child that would be at the party.

That night after T Junior was in bed, I dropped thick blocks of pastel-colored sidewalk chalk in cellophane bags and wrote the kid's names on the front. Then, I tied a joyful floating balloon on each one.

Oh, they'll be so excited. Kids love balloons!

By 11 a.m. party day, the two pinks were almost touching the floor along with my spirit. The two blues and one red were also showing signs of distress.

While my birthday boy napped, I packed up the apple and cheese slices, pretzels, pigs in a blankets, juice, water, the plates, cups, napkins, cupcakes and the sad party favors. Then, I gathered my groggy child and completely forgot to grab the camera. We had a very limited time to get fresh balloons.

It wasn't busy at the store, but for some reason (only God knows why), the woman who answered the page to come help me at the florist counter was the assistant store manager. She happened to have a corporate-type woman observing her. She also happened to not do balloons very often. I could tell because I had to show her what drawer they were in.

She was having a very good time blowing up the balloons as T Junior, perched on my hip, shouted and pointed, "A-boon! A-boon!" She made the first one huge.

THAT is going to pop.

The next one was bigger. I tried a friendly hint. "Whoa! She's making those huge, T Junior! Oh my goodness! Wow!"

This had the opposite effect I had been hoping for. As she filled the five balloons with helium, each one was bigger than the next.

Finally, after 15 painful minutes, I was out the door and into the wind. Oh yes, wind.

I muscled an unruly bouquet of bulging orbs in one hand and a 21-pound squirming toddler hollering "Aboon! Aboon! Aboon!" in the other. I tried to hold the giant thin-skinned balloons away from my child's face. They beat me on my head as I made my way across the parking lot to the van.

Luckily, we parked close to the door. As I struggled to get out my keys and unlock the back of the Odyssey, there was a BANG! I yelped and a lady on a cell phone walking by patted her hand over her heart. I glanced over my shoulder and saw a blue carcass on the asphalt.

I also could see that it had scared the older man who was putting a box in the back of his car, which was parked next to us.

"Knew that was going to happen," I smiled helplessly at him while attempting to stuff the remaining wily balloons into the back of the van.

He slammed his trunk. Then, he looked at me with an angry face and said, "Thanks A LOT!" before turning toward the grocery store.

Wait. What? Oh, hell no.

"Sorry, SIR. It was the AIR."

He was still within shouting distance. "I CAN'T CONTROL THE FREAKING WEATHER!"

Which leads me to my last tip:

Don't buy balloons.

***

What about you? Got any good tips for us first-timers?

Priority Panic: Part II in the No More Somedays Series

I haven't been writing lately. Not even in my notebook.

For one, there's too much sunshine right now to stay huddled in the A/C with only a laptop for warmth. Then there's my back. It hurts after sitting for long periods of time and I do enough of that at work.

But remember Nancy Drew? Remember this?

I often think about my book-writing dream when I should be, well, dreaming. I recently outlined a fiction idea that's been occupying my brain space for the past several months. Got it down. Great. Yay, me.

Except...

I haven't been adding anything to it, so I end up going over scenarios in my head at night when I should be shutting down, not ramping up.

I was starting to stress about it because lately I haven't been able to find the time to get things down. Panic buttons were going off all over the place: "When am I going to write? Oh no, I didn't write today. Holy crapy, I forgot to write. Oh man, I was going to write about something and now I can't remember what it was."

I was getting jumpy.

And, I was starting to lose sight of real life. Actual human people. Not ones made up of English characters on a lined and perforated page.

A few weeks ago, I won a book after participating in a blog tour kickoff at WOW. I received the book, Violet Raines Almost Got Struck by Lightning, but like writing, I haven't been able to find time to read either!

I e-mailed the author, Danette Haworth, to thank her for sending me her new book and I asked her how she found time to write when her children were very young.

What she said made a lot of sense to me and she gave me permission to share it here.

"You have to go with your own life, and the main thing with children is that you'll always be a writer, but your children will not always be little. Enjoying this time, right now, is a priority. Fit the writing in where you can, and as your children grow, your schedule will change and so will your writing goals and ability to accomplish them." -- Danette Haworth

She's so right. My schedule has definitely changed in the last year. (Hint: less minutes napping equals fewer written words.)

So, I've been taking her advice. I'm not panicking. I'm enjoying my new one-year-old and all he wants to do and say, and someday I'll get back to writing...

***

Visit Danette's Web site, http://www.danettehaworth.com and her blog, Summer Friend.