Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Sadie Sad Eyes




When my parents got divorced, my mom and I got a puppy. We got her through a friend who rode horses at the Oglebay stables. She had these big distrustful eyes, always leery of strangers. When she was excited she would run through the house, weaving in and out of rooms, burning off energy. I taught her how to sit, sit up pretty and lay down. She had a hound-dog howl. She kept my mom company while I went off to school and started my own life. Whenever she got off her leash, she would bolt through the neighborhood at full speed. She really thought she was a lap dog. When she was happy it looked like she smiled. And now she's gone.
Sadie Mae
1995-2010



Kicking around memory lane.

So, I was going through a box of pictures and found a few of Little Kara.
I'm pretty sure my mom had a thing for the pigtails.
And in the picture below, it's kind of scary how eerily similar I look compared to how I look now (except for the fact that I'm like...5 and miniature).
And below, something completely different. This is a picture of my parents a month after I was born. My mom will be mad at me for posting this picture... she will probably say she doesn't have any make-up on and looks too pale. I don't care, I think she looks beautiful and carefree.
Anyone who knows me well, knows that I have an extreme disrespect for my father. I pretty much hate him. I'm not saying I hate my dad because he never bought me a new car, or grounded me or didn't let me pursue the career I wanted. I do not have a relationship with my father AT ALL because he took a total disinterest in my life. I have not seen him since I was 13, and have only spoken to him a handful of times since then. I don't know where he is, and the older I get, the more I realize that I don't care. It was his choice to disassociate himself from me. He would probably say it's because of his relationship with my mom. I don't care. That doesn't have anything to do with me. And because of this, I can never forgive him. He will likely never ask for my forgiveness, seeing as how he would actually have to contact me to do so. Part of me questioned whether or not to even make something like this public (to the handful of people that read my blog regularly), with the threat that my half sister could inform my father of my thoughts on the subject.
Still don't care, I have never let my feelings on this matter be a secret to anyone.
Clint and I were discussing him the other night. Clint asked me if I thought my dad would like him, meeting him as my spouse. The question kind of stunned me, I guess because since I have been a child, literally, I never seeked his approval for anything. He does not represent a "parent" to me. I have had some male role models in my life since, and thank God I chose to marry a GOOD man. When I think of the milestones in my life that my father has chosen to miss - high school - high school graduation - college selection - college gradution - meeting boyfriends - meeting THE ONE - my wedding - the birth of my child - it makes me sick to think about missing those things in MY child's life.
It has really got me thinking. What kind of person can you be if you don't have a relationship with your child? All these thoughts running through my head lately, makes me realize how grateful I am to have a good husband. I know that Clint would never walk away from our child, regardless of his relationship with me. Makes me love him all the more.
There is nothing more precious in this life than our children. It's heartbreaking to think that not everyone in this world acts accordingly.
Ok, that's my two cents on the subject.









Monday, January 25, 2010

A touch of love.

I had a perfect parent moment the other day.

Owen and I were sitting in the window seat. He was helping me open the (junk) mail, while I open the real stuff. He is a big fan of paper products and ripping them up and all that.

On this particular day, his hair was in all kinds of disarray. He was taking the mail so seriously, with his crazy curls, I just had to laugh at him. Then, I crouched down in front of him and said, "Owen, I love you." And he looked at me very seriously for a moment, and then leaned toward me and kissed me.

Then I cried. He's such a cool kid and I love him to pieces.

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

One year. Already?

Owen had his one-year doctor's appointment today. He weighs 21lbs and 10oz. He is 31 inches long. His ears are healthy. He's hitting all his milestones. He's getting to be a big boy.
It seems like just yesterday I was getting a first glimpse of what he would look like...


Three days old.Almost a year old.Enjoying cake on his birthday.
This is going to be a hard week. First off, he's getting a ton of new teeth. I can't even say for sure how many he has right now. At least eight... But, he's getting molars on the top and bottom, which the doctor said makes his ears feel like they have to pop. We thought he was swiping at his ears because his hair tickles them!
Also, it's time to stop the bottle. The doctor gave me the option of slowing it down gradually or quitting cold turkey. I chose to quit cold turkey. So the last bottle he will ever had was this morning. Single tear... Apparently, I should have been weaning him off the bottle for the past couple of months. Bad mommy! So now, he's just supposed to eat "meals" and a bedtime snack. He's actually pretty good about eating. Tonight he had a little bit of what we were having. I'm going to continue pushing fruits and veggies, and I have to still push the regular milk. He just does not like it! The doctor said after a couple of months he should get used to it. So... hopefully we don't have a hungry baby waking up in the middle of the night. Cross your fingers.








The Little Things - There's Nothing Bigger.



Favorite things about my son's first year of life:

  • His left thumb is almost always wrinkled up like a raisin, because of how frequently said thumb is inserted in the mouth.

  • His eyes are so very blue.

  • He's a good eater.


  • He likes to swim already.

  • His curls are turning into tiny ringlets. I think of him as always having a lot of hair, but even looking back at his 8 and 9 month pictures, his hair is ridiculously long now. He has little wings on the side.



  • He's such a good sleeper. I know how thankful I should be about this. He has slept about 12 hours every night since he was 3 months old. I attribute this to the thumb and his bedtime routine.



  • He always smells like Neutrogena Rainbath. I bought a ton of that Johnsons Bedtime Bath and all that stuff. They used Rainbath on him in the hospital, and he smelled SO good, that I went and bought an enormous bottle at Sam's Club when he was a month old. It's still 25% full. The Johnsons Bedtime Bath is still in the linen closet.


  • Since he has been born, he's only been really sick one time. When he was seven weeks old. I had to spend the night in the hospital with him. Longest night ever. When I think about all the things that can go wrong for children, I thank God that I have a healthy child.



  • He hits all his milestones. He has teeth. He talks. He plays. He walks. He bangs stuff together. He's perfect.


  • Watching him walk is like seeing a little tiny drunk zombie. It's priceless.


  • When he's sleepy, he likes to curl up on something fuzzy and soft, like his polar bear. Or his back-up polar bear that he got for his birthday in case anything ever happens to the original. (that's the polar bear under him...)


  • He's so ticklish. Making him giggle from tickling, it reminds me how happy I am to have him. His giggle is infectious.

  • It appears as if his favorite food is meatloaf of all things. He also really likes pears, noodles, carrots, broccoli, graham crackers and gnocchi.


  • When we read to him, he follows along and "reads" too.

  • His favorite show, (really the only show he pays much attention to) is Little Einsteins. I know all of the songs. They get stuck in my head at work at 3am. I love how he raises his arms when Rocket blasts off. He loves it.

  • He just learned how to give kisses. It's more of an open-mouth head-butt to the face, but... he's learning. And he gives kisses away on demand, so.
  • He flirts with random women. He still has stranger anxiety, but if he doesn't get too worried, he is all smiles and shy glances. Already a ladie's man. He's going to give the girls some trouble. (Especially that Lily Dilly)...

  • Some days he looks like Clint, some days he looks like me. He's the perfect hybrid.

  • His learning to walk has been a crazy adventure.

It's been an awesome year.

The Whole Year In

The kid turned a year old yesterday. All day long I was thinking about what I was doing at that time a year ago. When we got up yesterday, I was thinking about when they started the Pitocin drip. Lot of good that did. I had the drip all day, and dilated a whole fingertip. So, around 2pm, that day... a whole year ago... they decided to give me the epidural and see if that would help things along. The epidural was craziness. Since, people have asked me what it felt like getting the epidural, and I describe it as a corkscrew on your spine. As the needle goes in, it taps all the nerves along your spinal cord. It was nauseating. Once I had the epidural, I told the anesthesiologist that it felt like I was hanging upside down. After the epidural kicked in, I was feeling pretty good.

Still, the kid was happy as a clam up in the belly. He wasn't moving. So, around 5pm, she said, "well, we can take out your epidural, get you something to eat, and do the pitocin again in the morning, or you can have a c-section." At that point, I had been up since 8am the previous morning, having not been able to sleep at all in the hospital, with all the fetal moniters on my belly and my blood pressure being taken every 15 minutes. Ambien didn't even work. I didn't sleep a wink. I had been having really painful contractions all night, and still no dilation. I was done with it. We had been attempting the induced labor for 24 hours and nothing worked. So I said, "Do the whole thing again tomorrow, no thanks. Let's do the c-section."

So it was a little less than an hour later, that I got this:



He was born at 5:59pm, weighing 8lbs, 9oz, 19.5 inches long. He is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. And now he is a whole year old.