Don't Touch Me

I've been thinking about this ever since I found out I was pregnant with Hannah, how do I keep her safe? How do I instill in her the importance of stranger danger without completely freaking her out? How do I teach her about what is right and what is wrong when it comes to peoples' touches and words.

This subject recently came up in my mommy group and so I've been thinking about it non-stop these days. I have been doing some online research in terms of age appropriate books and reviews of those books. For some reason, I always think I need to approach a subject with a book and then go from there. I did the same thing with potty training…did some research, bought a couple books, read them, put them into action. Researching and reading comes natural to me and gives me the tools I need to approach anything with more confidence. I guess I learned something in my 15 year IT career.

When we lived in the duplex, there was a registered sex offender living across the street and down one house. I know this because I frequent the online offender registry. I need to know who is living near me and if they are considered dangerous. The sex offender registry is unfortunately nowhere near an absolute safeguard, it is just a starting point. There are too many people that slip through the system and simply do not register or have yet to be caught. When you talk about sex crimes and sexual abuse with others, it is absolutely frightening and heartbreaking to find out how many lives it has touched. That is why we are starting as early as we are with Hannah. She needs to begin to learn "safe touch" and "stranger danger" now.

Every one parents differently and I respect that. But for us, it isn't an option to let our child grow up not knowing she can't come to us with questions about her body or concerns about people. I've heard too many times that a child was afraid to tell their parent for fear of not being believed, or for fear of getting in trouble. That is just way too much for a little kid to have to hold on to, they need to be able to tell their mommy and daddy what is going on.

Something that I learned in my reading is that we need to teach our children that their bodies are their own. It is and should be up to them who can hug them, and who can kiss them. They need to be taught early that it is okay to say no to a hug. I hear all the time, "go give so and so a hug" "no, I don't want to" "do it anyway". That is sending the wrong message to our children; it is essentially telling them that we, the parents, expect them to allow someone (no matter who) to touch them to make that other person happy. That is where I have started with Hannah, I ask her for hugs and kisses and if she says no; I respect that and follow it up with a simple, if you don't want to, you don't have to. She'll of course, come flying at me not a minute later asking for hugs and kisses. Because she is such a hugger, I'm working at it from the other angle as well; if one of her friends doesn't want a hug, then she needs to respect that and let it go.

It's a tough subject and one that makes some people uncomfortable. But it's a subject that we can't ignore and one we need to get our girls to be okay with talking about from an early age. I can't even bring myself to think about the "what if's" so we'll talk and we'll continue to talk, and we'll arm our girls with knowledge and power.

The Cats Have Run A-Muck

I know everyone grieves differently and I'm sure that is true for animals as well. Even though, I've always said that Eleanor was Lance's dog, I'm taking her passing very hard. She never listened to me, just like Franklin never listened to Lance. But turns out she was more my dog than I realized. I took care of her all day long, we watched our "stories" together during nap time and towards the end, she'd come sit on the couch next to me for some good head snuggles and we'd just talk.

So, I've been a mess. Some days are better than others, but I'm still crying my eyes out because I miss my dog. I'm still jumpy every time I hear a noise because there's no vicious set of teeth to protect me. Lance comes home from work to find all the locks on the door in place, and I've asked for more locks to be secured to the other door as well.

The cats are also a mess. They have lost their authority figure and are now running willy nilly through the house with nobody to reign them in. Mesa (the old one) is everywhere. She's been acting a little playful lately and hanging out ON the couch during the day. Which had been un-heard of before. George (the black one) is howling and caterwauling throughout the house. I think he actually misses Eleanor quite a bit. Eleanor never let George get too close, but she would tolerate his swishy tail every now and then. George used to be best buds with Franklin and they would literally snuggle and nap together. Then when Franklin moved out, George had a rough time of it and considered Eleanor his replacement Franklin. Henry (the gray one) has been more snuggly with me, if that's even possible. He's always been the one to jump in my lap if I'm sitting down but now, he follows me around even more as if he is worried I might disappear as well.

At any given time, any one of them can be heard tear-assing through the house. Eleanor used to keep them in line. Just one look from her or even her standing up to make a move towards them would make them think twice. Now, they have no ruler and don't seem to know what to do with their new-found freedom. I honestly don't remember what it's like to have a house with cats and no dogs, so I'm not sure if this is normal behavior or if this is them acting out because they're grieving Eleanor. Well, I'm pretty sure the caterwauling is a form of grieving…a loud form, but then, everyone grieves differently.

The Different Types of Thanksgivings

Writing about Christmas travels and plans yesterday made me think about Thanksgiving and how over the years my Thanksgiving traditions have changed depending on where I was in life. It seems that Thanksgiving isn't as high status as Christmas and so you have a little more freedom to opt out if you'd like.

When I was a kid, Thanksgiving was hands down one of my favorite holidays. There were no costumes or presents, but there was Uncle Jack's house. And I don't really know what exactly the draw was, but it was there. I just loved going down to Uncle Jack's and Aunt Rita's every year. We may have visited them other times of year, I'm not sure. All I know is that I looked forward to Thanksgiving because it meant we got to go to Sycamore. Everyone was there too, which made for a loud and packed house. That was probably part of the fun for me. For some reason, I equate loud with fun. Must have something to do with growing up in a large family.

As I got older, maybe high school age or so, we stopped going to Sycamore for Thanksgiving. I don't know why, but I know Thanksgiving suddenly lost its excitement for me. It just wasn't the same. So when I moved away for college, I opted out of the Thanksgiving-come-home-from-school break. Instead I found some friends in town to celebrate with. Thanksgiving, once again became fun!

We had a "friends" Thanksgiving then for quite a few years. It was awesome. Larry and Mike opened up their home, we got really messy, cooked up some great food and just kicked it. It was the perfect way to prepare for the inevitable stresses that would be coming just a month later with Christmas. I don't remember how many years we did the friends Thanksgiving for, but it was a great while it lasted.

Now that we've grown up and have our own little family, Thanksgiving is kind of up in the air. These last couple years, we've done one of our Christmas celebrations at Thanksgiving time and so have traveled. I would like to go back and do a friends Thanksgiving again, I just don't think that would work out as well with kids in the mix. So, for now, we're still figuring out this holiday.

**I actually just went back through my iPhoto library looking for some pics to add to this, but don't have any. The Sycamore Thanksgivings were before digital cameras and the Larry and Mike Thanksgivings were full of too much liquor to remember to take pictures!

The Planning That Is Christmas

The planning for Christmas has begun. We should have all pieces of the family on the calendar soon and then we can sit back and enjoy the ride.

When I was just a friend of Lance's, prior to any co-habitating or even co-holiday visiting, I saw him spend what seemed like the entire holiday season on the road. He had one set of grandparents in northern Iowa, another set in the quad cities, a mom in town and a dad in the quad cities. I know it was very important to him that he saw everyone for Christmas and of course, they all wanted to see him, it just meant he spent so much time in the car. To complicate matters a little, Lance's birthday is on the 23rd, the same as Tom's. And it had been a long-standing tradition that Lance and Tom spend their birthdays together.

Once we were married, we had to consider my people in the mix as well. Luckily, my people are all contained in the same area. So while we did have to drive clear back to Wisconsin, once we were there, that was it. There were some years that he and I spent our entire holiday vacation time traveling from relative to relative just to get them all in. That was when we were living in Minnesota and the large visiting circle took a long time to complete. It was great to see everyone, but we always felt like we needed an extra vacation day to recover from it all once we were back home.

A couple years ago, Lance's dad and Tom became snow-birds, so they essentially removed themselves from the Christmas travels and the birthday celebration tradition. With that side of the family, we all celebrate at Thanksgiving time. The location changes from year to year, so it gives everyone a chance at a short commute to celebrate. I love it. I think they have a brilliant idea with Christmas in November. And so far, pretty much everyone has always been able to make it, which makes it one big party. I love that there are so many cousins and kids to mix with. It reminds me a lot of my people. There is always someone with a baby and it's usually pretty loud :)

And Lance's mom has had dibs on Christmas Eve for a while now. Although, there was the one year I asked that we celebrate a couple weeks earlier because I was due to be 40 weeks pregnant at Christmas. With pregnancy comes perks. I think that may have been the same year we worked bacon into the otherwise pretty solid menu of liver sausage and waffles.

When we became our own little family of 3, we set down some ground rules regarding Christmas. No traveling on Christmas Day. It is important to us that Hannah get to wake up in her own home Christmas morning. Christmas is our day to lounge in jammies, play with new toys, and graze on special-only-on-this-day food, all day long. We've only done this for two years now, but it has been fantastic. I love knowing that for this special day, our family is creating memories and traditions for years to come.

Driving is Not a Sport

I know I was just bitching not too long ago about peoples' driving habits but I have to do it again. I am continually amazed by the amount of bad drivers I see on the road, every day. Lately, it seems that the news has been full of fatal traffic accidents and I can't help but wonder how many of them could have been avoided had someone just paid attention to what they were doing. Rarely is an accident ever just an "accident" - there is someone who is at fault, and there is someone who wasn't able to get out of the way in time.

Last night I was talking to Lance about what I am seeing on the roads these days and how it is just crazy. I remember driving the commute in Minneapolis from Uptown to Downtown (what, like maybe 8 miles?) but it was jam-packed with traffic and I never got in an accident and rarely did I see one. I also drove the freeways regularly to get around and used to really enjoy it. I actually thought it was fun to drive with heavy traffic and a lot of lanes. But these days, I find I am on edge and mostly scared to drive. Everywhere I look, people are driving like they are *trying* to kill someone.

I know part of it is that, right now, I am hyper-sensitive because I usually have my kids in the car and I'm always on alert and in momma-bear mode. And considering I was just T-boned not too long ago, I'm even more sensitive and aware of others' actions. Yesterday I was driving Hannah home from gymnastics and we're going down Grand, when I notice a Buick ahead of us in the other lane, going pretty slow. He wasn't doing anything wrong, other than going slower than the speed limit, so I kept my eye on him. As we got up to almost alongside him, on pops his blinker, and over he comes. I had to do a pretty severe swerve to get out of his way and Hannah says, "Mommy, you almost fell over!" I watch my language in the car now, so all I said was "yep, but we're cool now." I look over so I can give that driver the glare he deserves and see he is just staring straight ahead, hunched over the wheel like he is trying so very hard to see in front of him. Completely oblivious to what he'd just done.

Yesterday afternoon, I headed back out west for a little shopping and as I'm sitting in traffic on University Ave., I start looking at the other cars around me. The woman to the right was texting, wasn't even trying to hide it, had her phone right up on the steering wheel and was typing for all she was worth. As our lanes start moving forward, she moves too, but is able to somehow keep typing. Once I got on the interstate, there was this guy behind me who I could hear coming. He had one of those loud, vroom, vroom cars and he obviously was in a hurry to get somewhere fast - I watched him fly from the far right lane to the far left lane and then, like he was playing checkers or something, bounce from lane to lane, as he cut off car after car. I kept waiting for someone to not be paying close enough attention...

So, just because you put your blinker on, doesn't mean you can or even should, change lanes. STOP looking at your phone. Whatever it is, it can wait. If it absolutely cannot wait, then pull over and type. If you come upon a red light, do not run it. If you see the light ahead is yellow, chances are by the time you reach it, it will be red, so just slow down now. Leave your house 5 minutes earlier so you don't have to put others in danger with your daredevil traffic weaving.

Sleeping In

Oh how I love those words. I remember them fondly. When I was a kid, and mom allowed it, I could sleep until noon without any problem. As I got older, I scaled it back to about 10am because I didn't want to *totally* sleep away the day. Now that we have children, I consider myself lucky if I can sleep until 7am.

Pre-kids, Lance and I would sleep in on the weekend. I always got Saturday, and he got Sunday. Because, while we didn't have kids, we still had a dog that really preferred we let her outside to potty in the morning. But on our respective sleep in days, we'd each go until about 9 or 10 and it was so nice.

When Hannah came, our schedules were adjusted. I woke up when she woke up, period. Sometimes I was really lucky and could coax her back to sleep after she'd eaten and we lay in bed snuggling while Lance got dressed and ready for work. A little piece of me would feel bad, but then I would remember how early I was up feeding her and I'd doze right back off again. As she got old enough, we trained her on the whole Saturday/Sunday ritual. She came downstairs with Daddy on Saturdays so mommy could sleep. Then on Sundays, she came downstairs with Mommy so Daddy could sleep.

Now we've got baby Eliza and she is not respectful of the previously established weekend routine. She is like clockwork; she wakes up about 6am, realizes she is hungry and starts cooing until I come rescue her from her crib. These last few mornings I've brought her back to our bed to eat so I can snuggle back under the covers and keep warm. Lance is one of the heaviest sleepers I know, so this doesn't bother him in the least. Sometimes he'll ask us to keep it down, but mostly he is completely unaware there is even a baby in the bed.

Soon enough, Eliza will be old enough to train. And I know that once she is, we'll get back on our weekend routines. But I also know, I'll be sad that she grew up so fast and is no longer this little snuggly baby who needs me first thing in the morning. So, for now, I'm awake at the crack of dawn and am okay with it, because it's for a good cause.

The Black One

When the cats are particularly bad, they are, for some reason referred to by their color rather than their name. I'm not sure when it started, probably when they were fresh kitties are were often bad. But last night, the black one got in *big* trouble.

I had a cat, Kitty and Lance had a cat, Mesa when we were friends and dating way back when. When we combined households, I had always hoped the cats would become friends but that never happened. Mesa tried to reach out to Kitty to be her friend, but Kitty always furry-paw beat her. (nobody had claws) A few years ago, Kitty got really sick and I had to let her go. She was 12, she had a good kitty life, but I took it hard because she was my kitty and I had had her forever. I think maybe a week went by before Lance told me to go to the rescue league and get a new kitty.

So I did. I looked at all their kitties and went in one of their "play rooms" with a dozen or so random ones to see who played and who snuggled and who caught my eye. I ended up deciding that I had to have two kitties, rather than the previously agreed upon one. On the way home, I came up with a ton of reasons why getting two kitties was a better idea; but the main reason was that they would play with one another rather than bothering the old Mesa cat.

When I brought George and Henry into the house, Mesa was very wary. She used to be the only animal, and over the years she had to watch us bring in Kitty, then Eleanor and now these new kitties. A few months after the kitties were added, we brought home puppy Franklin so Mesa was really hating life. She ended up spending most of her time in the basement or in any room that Franklin and the kitties were not because she didn't want to be harassed or bothered.

Now that we no longer have Franklin or Eleanor, the kitties have taken to ruling the roost. Mostly though, it is the black one. He will literally hunt Mesa. You can see him stalking her; tail swishing, body low to the floor and eyes never leaving her. She sits there growling the whole time because she knows as soon as she takes a step to get out of his path, it's on. He will chase her until he corners her. Then you hear these ugly kitty growly noises that sound like someone is being killed. They're not, but it sounds awful. The hunting has gotten worse these last couple weeks…I think it had something to do with Eleanor being unable to get up and separate them and now that she is gone, George is really pushing it. Henry will sometimes join in the hunt if he thinks it is going to be especially fun, but most of the time he just sits and stares at her. Wearing her down with his gaze.

So, the last couple nights we've tried to put George and Henry in the basement so they can't hunt her while we're trying to sleep. It sucks being woken up by all the sounds associated with a hunt. But the crafty black one was able to get out of the basement around midnight. Its hard to say if he was proud of himself or upset with us, but he meowed for all he was worth in the upstairs hallway, just outside all the bedroom doors. He meowed so much and so loudly that he woke up Hannah and she called out "George is meowing now!!" Lance soothed her back to sleep while I had to jimmy-rig something to keep George in the basement the rest of the night.

I'm a little unsure how to proceed with this. I like when George and Henry sleep on my feet at night so I'd rather they not be locked up. But Mesa has decided she'd like to resume sleeping on our feet like she used to, pre-dog. And right now, nobody can get along. At least at night, because there are plenty of times when I'll come upon all three cats sleeping peacefully on our bed during the day and think, wtf? Why can't you do this at night?!