Cha cha change...

Bring it on. Im ready for it. Im ready for my routine to get shaken up a bit. Im a very routine person. To much so. I get stuck in it, hide in it possibly. Im ready for my husband to be a part of my routine again. Im tired of this already. He has missed so much. He left a 9 month old baby behind, and he is coming home to a toddler...tantrums and all. Leaving San Diego will be hard....very very hard. The hardest thing will be leaving my mom. I actually, cant even think about it.....its TOO hard.

I try to shake up my routine, shake myself out of a zombie slumber, that i have a tendincy to go into when i get too down. Me and Charlie go on adventures, to the park, or a museum. When im feeling really down we will take a shower or bath together. Hard to be a zombie with a giggling toddler around. Its so much fun, yet bitter sweet, because Pete isnt here. I hate being a Zombie mom. Dont get me wrong, im a damn good Zombie mom...and i love zombies, but Charlie deserves more then that. Its not every day, and seems to coincide with her teething. Her cranky = me cranky and visa versa.

Never the less, we carry on. We shake it up. We dance. We laugh. We sing. We cuddle. We kiss. We discover. I cant wait for our "We" to be three once again. This sucks, and im tired.

Adventures of (sometimes) Zombie mom, and super baby!

Mother may I?

Being a mom. By far the biggest thing you can be. It has outdone everything I thought it could be. While pregnant with your first, you have 10 months to day dream. Dream of what kind of a mom you will be and all of the "perfect" things you will do, then.....here comes baby. A slap in the face. 10 times more then anything you could have ever imagined. Ever. The love is bigger, the fear is bigger, the anxiety is bigger, the patience is smaller (its actually bigger, but feels smaller), the love is bigger ( I know, i had to say it twice). They talked of "mommy club", they were right. Until youve lived it...you cant join..your heart cant imagine. Once in "mommy club" there is mutual understanding of this new existence of self...or selflessness. Moms flock to each other. Fact is, that if you talk of your day to a "non-mom", chances are they will look at you funny.....feel sorry for you possibly. Not the "mommy club"! Oh no. They know exactly what it means to all of a sudden be, not one heart, but two...and the fear that forever encompasses you once you have duplicated.

The first 4 weeks or so are a blur, and i wish i could have it back. I defiantly had the baby blues. I was so scarred, and so overwhelmed. I gave birth and they laid her on my chest, and it was like I was having an out of body experience. I was numb...literally. I knew how i should be feeling, but it all happened so fast. I remember feeling so disconnected. It wasnt until they brought her back from her first bath.....the lights were out in our room, Pete was asleep, and they asked me if i wanted her on my chest to warm her up. Of coarse I said yes, I gently put her in my night gown. The nurse left, and .......i finally felt it. What i thought i would feel right away....."hello, my love...im your mommy". Im not sure if it was the epidural, and not being able to even push myself up to hold her correctly, or just the shear magnitude of what had happened. Once everything was calm..and it was just me an her in the dark, skin on skin. She curled up on me the way she was in me. " Hello". I guess I thought i would know her right away, I had been feeling her for months, but once she was out....she was a new person i had never met.

The only thing predictable for first time moms...is that it is unpredictable. I can remember breast feeding Charlie the first week, I probably hadnt slept longer then 2 hours in 2 or 3 days, and I remeber thinking " never again, never ever again". Its hard, and you do ,at times, resent this ity bity baby, for not letting you sleep, or do anything for that matter. Then, the guilt for resenting this itty bitty baby.....an emotional bootcamp of insecurity and fear to say the least.

I wanted to talk of the hard stuff. We hear of all of the wonderful things that comes from being a mommy, but talking about the hard things is just as important. You are not alone! Having other mommies to talk to when I have "those days" gets me through. ...im not alone. What im feeling is normal...im doing OK.

I AM doing OK. I have eased up on myself a bit. I dont want to be super mom anymore...i was driving myself crazy at first.... but now I just want to be Charlies mom. I dont care that my house is a mess.....well i do if you come over, but other wise, no. I would rather destroy my couch and make a fort for Charlie, and spend her sacred nap time on the computer, talking to other mommies about our day, then cleaning. I have come to terms. My house isnt a disaster, but it isnt perfect....."oh look there is my coffee cup from this moring"..its 10pm..... and thats ok.

I guess my point to all of this is that, the texture of life is deep...and rich...and complicated...and simple. Even when i want to run away as fast as i can, and i feel like i might be going crazy (without my husband none the less), every second is worth it. All of joy, laughter, and love makes even the most difficult moments completely....and totally worth it. If you arent a parent, i dont think you can really comprehend that....hence "mommy club".

And now a picture of the person who has changed me forever. Thank you my love.....I know more about myself now then I ever have.

Hello Goodbye

Pete was intown this weekend, a little more then 48 hours of us being a family. It feel so good....a little foreign at this point, but good. Its like "oh ya, this is us". We stuffed as much in to the 2 days he was here as we could.

On Saturday we woke up and had a big breakfest. Once Charlie went down for her morning nap, we put on "Zombie Land". I love watching Zombie movies with my sweetie. We then went shopping for some new clothes for mom and dads date night. It was gorgeous out, so we decided to head to the beach. Charlie is so amazing. She loved it...just like her dad. She kept picking up seashells and handing them to us. Next thing ya know, me and Pete are carrying around hand fulls of shells. Every shell she found was the most exciting thing to her. Its these moments that my souls shines....and even more that her daddy could be there to see her discovering the beach.

Saturday night we had reservations at Donavan's..... finally I won a 100 dollar gift certificate to it 2 years ago. The day I got into my accident we were suppose to go..but obviously that didnt happen. It was wonderful. The food was amazing, and how wonderful to have an adult dinner every once in a while. I felt gorgeous in my new outfit, and Peter looked so handsome. After dinner we went to Imperial house. My favorite bar in town. It was where Pete took me on our first date, and where we had our first kiss. I knew it was probably our last time there for a while so it was bitter sweet. We headed home after a couple drinks, to be greeted with an angry Charlie. When i walked in the door, she looked at me like "uhhhh...put me to bed!".

I had to work Sunday, but it was wonderful for Pete to have some alone time with Charlie. She does love her daddy. He took her to the Zoo, and I was so glad he got to see her delight at the Animals. I made us dinner, and put the baby to bed. When I returned to spend some good time with Pete before I drove him to the airport, I found him dead asleep...snoring. Even though I really wanted to wake him, to savor the last couple hours we had...I let him sleep. Sound sleep in your own home is a precious thing. I hated having to wake him, to tell him it was time to go. The drive to the airport was serenaded by the first mix CD pete ever made for me. I must have listened to this CD a million times when we first started dating. Its always to short of a drive to the airport, long drive home by myself. These trips are such teases, dont get me wrong I wouldnt trade them for the world, but its just a tast of what it feel like to have a husband and father around....i miss him. We kissed goodbye, and i could tast his chapstick the whole way home. Month and half and we will be a family together again...

Moments and time

Im not sure why I havent written a new entry in a while. I think sometimes I put a bubble around myself hoping that it will make time go by a little bit faster. Waiting to be with my husband again. At the same time, Charlie is growing so fast and changing everyday, that I want time to slow down too.

Ill start with Charlie. She is the most amazing person I have ever met.....and she is only one. She makes me laugh all day long. We have these moments. Like today, we were taking a shower

together...just for fun. Well, I needed to take a shower, but I knew it would be fun for her. She stands with her face in the stream of the water shrieking with joy. I look down at her, she looks up at me, and we are in love. I try to freeze these moments in my soul, because time does go by so fast. Im having to come up with more creative ways to entertain her through out the day. We have been with out a car for the past week, because its getting fixed, so I cant just take her to the park to run around. We make cookies, listen to music and dance dance dance. Build forts and chase the kitties around. Its amazingly simple, and perfectly wonderful. Im so lucky.

This past month I had my first experience as a Doula. It has been wonderful. Not the scenario I pictured my first birth at all. The mama im a doula for was pregnant with triplets. She ended up having a Cesarean, and I was able to be with her during the surgery and in recovery. I have been helping her post partum as well. Its all being filmed for a TV show on TLC, which is exciting being able to advocate Doulas, but im more excited about the experience with the the mom and babies. Birth is such a sacred thing. To be able to be a part of it is truly a wonderful thing. I love it. I cant wait until I can focus all of my extra time on helping mamas.

We found out where we will be moving to in April. Its not 100% but its looking like we are moving to Alaska. At first I was taken a back to say the least, but now im starting to get really excited. Alaska is gorgeous, and to say that ive lived there is so cool! What an awesome place for Charlie too. Im most looking forward to having my husband with me every night again. So we can have our moments. So he can see Charlie everyday, and they can have their moments. Pete is coming home this weekend. Last visit home before he graduates AIT, then off to the great white north. What an adventure!

My next big purchase will be a digital SLR camera. My digital sucks, and im tired of not being able to capture our moments proper...