Allisun's Diary Entries Diary Navigation: Choose A Diary Entry -------------------- Latest Entry: 1/4/03 -------------------- 12/23/02 11/6/02 10/29/02 10/18/02 10/7/02 9/25/02 8/30/02 8/27/02 8/20/02 8/4/02 3/12/02 -------------------- Allisun's Introduction

October 7, 2002

15 months and a week

I say this with every ounce of sarcasm I can muster up. This last week of my life was an absolutely lovely one.

Fifteen loads of laundry a week and guess who's machine started running out of steam? It's actually been a summer of strange noises and burning smells. Without even sticking a nose in it, Remo diagnosed it as a belt in need of replacement. But don't think he ran out and replaced anything. He ran out alright, he ran out and bought me a foosball table for my anniversary. What I always wanted, foosball.

My biggest pressure came from work. My boss was leaving on mission and needed me to prepare some data and one of the projects had to be something I had never done before. I was starting at 7:30 and working straight through the day. My eyes were crossed, my brain was begging me to stop racking it and I felt like the minutes were blinking by. It's those moments when you know you can't possibly complete something in time, and as if it's not bad enough already, the freaking calculations kept being wrong.

Everyday I was picking up the kids late, which is awful because it's already a long day for the kids and I hate doing it to Annabelle and Andree. They have a life too. On one of the days I called Remo in a panic. What I thought I was saying was that I'd have to stay late and there was no way I could make it home till 7 or 8. What Remo heard was that he should run and pick up the kids and drop them off at home, I'd be there in time for him to keep his appointments. I showed up at 7:45 with a head that weighed four hundred pounds and he said he thought I would be there at six. At six? How? I reminded him that it's the first time I've ever done that and he doesn't come home before then, ever. Then I started in about gawd knows what else just because I was frustrated. Remo said not to come home and kick the cat. Ding dong at the door and wouldn't you know his parents had just arrived. His parents are not on our list of favoured guests and so what that I have a rule where you have to call first and not show up at 8:30 at night during the week. That they couldn't summon up a single nice thing to say was only fuelling me.

When they left I brought up the washing machine problem and asked Remo where he was going to get clean clothes from. His response was the real clincher and in fairness, he didn't mean for it to be taken wrong... "don't worry about mine, I'll take care of it"? Ha! You take care of you and I take care of us.

I think the part that makes me craziest is I can never turn off. Do you think he for a minute wonders what we're having for supper? Does he know what day I change the beds or what groceries I buy? We have 42 people on our Christmas and birthday shopping list. With a gun to his head, he could probably think of ten. Who actually buys all those gifts? Who keeps up with the social responsibilities? Who worries whether the kids are regular, whether their shoes cause blisters?

The problem with Remo is he doesn't get upset, he's incredibly calm and easy going. I have a fuse that'll set off now and then, but I don't harbour anger. I say my piece and then it's over and I'll move on. When I'm really worked up though, I want a reaction, if I'm frustrated out of my mind, I want Remo to be frustrated out of his mind so he can understand where I'm coming from. So I think I told you about my solution. I don't have to raise my voice or fight. If I reach a point where my knickers are royally twisted, I simply take his cell phone and pitch it out the door (or misplace it somewhere in the house) and I feel fabulous. On this particular night, Remo hid his phone first. Now keep in mind, I am purebred Irish.

I hid his keys.

Remo really thought I'd get up in the morning my usual cheerful self and I did get up cheerful but there was no way I was helping him find the keys. It may not have been my most mature moment in my life but my ONLY regret was that Brandan was around. He couldn't figure out why we weren't rushing out of the house in a panic. Remo told him it was because I hid his keys and I wanted to throttle him. I said I was playing a trick on silly Papa. When I could see him finally getting a little upset I gave in and by the time we were both at work we were all ok again. I brought my laundry to the laundromat on the weekend and I have to say I like the part where you do all those loads in forty-five minutes. I was folding and ironing everything when I came across two of Remo's shirts coming apart at the seams, he had attempted to sew them himself. I was touched. He has a hundred new shirts so I went to toss them out and then I decided to keep one of them. It says a lot about who Remo is. Sonny came over and they opened up my washing machine and said it's fine. But since they closed the thing up again it's as if they shut a wild beast in there. I'm lying low till the thing crashes and then I'm going for the one with 35 hand wash cycles. Or at least a window on it.

One of the husband's of another diary writer, Dawn I think, wrote about her husband making a duck cake for her baby's duck theme party and I was a little envious. Remo would wonder party, what party. I think I'm going to challenge him and Brandan to making a desert. Yup, that's exactly what I'm going to do and I'll take a picture of whatever they concoct. Once Remo made me a cake without measuring any ingredients, probably without even knowing what ingredients go into a cake (his mother doesn't have one cookbook), and it evolved into a freak of nature. The only thing I can liken it to is a hockey helmet. It was hard, huge and hollow and he iced it, but as he walked, it seemed to bounce and knock around on the plate. I think I froze it just to be able to show it to people.

Brandan started two classes last week, swimming lessons and skating. The first time (he was almost three years old) he started swimming, he spent the entire session on the side of the pool. This last spring, he started again and everything was going well till he got water up his nose. We had to practically pay him off every week and nearly threaten him to get him to feign participation. We took a bit of a break from it and then last Monday, Dee Dee started taking him. The two of them came back completely pumped up because he did really well. He's excited and he's going at it full force.

Last fall, Remo and Brandan took a parent and tot skating class and the only good that came out of it was I met Annabelle. He was shy or just really stubborn but he wasn't really into it, so we dropped that too. Nothing like teaching your child skills in sticking it out. Last Saturday was the first skating day and we were bursting with pride. It's not because he belongs to us, he really was the best out there. He's walking on his skates, not really skating yet, but he can run across the ice and kick balls around. He did so well. We had to each take turns with Kaillan, she was on a rampage, and when it was my turn to watch Brandan, one of the other mothers asked if he'd done this before. She said he has great balance, then we talked about how she's about to have her third child. When we left, Remo was pumping me for what the woman had said, he was so convinced we'd spent the entire time talking about his Olympian. Brandan is really coordinated and strong for his age; he rode a two wheeler three, he'll leap off something five feet in the air, land on his feet and keep running and I'm sure I mentioned he can standing long jump farther than Remo. I know he'll be great in sports and it looks like Kaillan inherited the same athletic genes. Everyone who meets my kids says the same thing: they're strong and they're tough. They get bumps and bruises and scrape the crap out their knees and never even flinch.

But man, does Kaillan have a temper.

When Brandan was her age, he ran an aggressive streak and I was really nervous. I figured we were handling it all wrong, if we didn't deal with him appropriately, for sure he was going to grow into a kid with real problems. For me, the kicker came when he was a year and a half and we were at my girlfriend's house. Her son was two and they were playing with a bunch of balls. Brandan had to have every single ball in that playroom and he flipped out when we tried to share even one. He couldn't even play because he might let go of one of them. Here and there he'd have temper tantrums and he'd bite us when he was royally frustrated and was deviating him effective? I made an appointment with a child psychologist. I didn't really think Brandan was a danger to society, so if the most I got out of this doctor was a few good pointers, or if she could refer me to a couple of good books, it would be money well spent. I can't tell you how relieved I was to be told he was completely normal and just lacking the sort of effective communication skills age provides you with.

So when Kaillan's whole world crashes and she's thrashing on the floor and screaming louder than a fire alarm, I don't even bat an eye. Experience dictates calm in the crisis. Brandan mastered temper tantrums but I can't remember the last time he had one. In the last six months, I can only remember one time he got good and mad at one of us. We give the kids their bath together and Brandan had been making potions with the shampoo. I didn't have a problem with it till twice he emptied the bottles, so I said no more. I hauled Kaillan out and went to put on her jammies and came back to bath water that was thick with 906ml of shampoo. I told Brandan that because he didn't listen to me, I was going to have to take a toy away forever. At that point I was making it up. He asked which one. I said one of his cars. He asked which one. The white one. No, not the white one! He was nearly devastated and I could sense this being a monumental moment so I said it was the white one with a number on it. At that point he completely fell apart. Brandan stormed behind me buck naked, in and out of every room in our house, threatening, pleading with me not to put that car in the garbage. I stayed firm, he was not getting it back, ever, and he'd have to learn to listen to the rules. Since I didn't actually have the car it was easy not to give in. All I have to do now is mention is car going into the garbage and he immediately tows the line.

So back to my toddler. When we're together, Kaillan desperately needs me to hold her. If she's in the room with anybody else she's fine but the moment she sees me she needs up NOW and three people can't pry her off. Yesterday, I started organizing my life but I got sidetracked just when everything I owned was on the counter or the floor. I was trying to sort things out when Kaillan started to freak out. I couldn't put her down, so I went in the family room to play with the kids and Dee Dee. I distracted her for two seconds and tried to slither away and she came at me like a magnet. She wanted me to stand and hold her, end of story. If I attempted to sit and hold her, she cried hysterically. If I tried to feed her or give her any distraction, she cried. Half an hour later I was still trying to shake her off. So I sat with her on her picnic table because she loves her table. She furiously tried to push me off that thing and I'm telling you, she was pushing me at a 45 degree angle. She wanted up and she wanted me up. Something tells me that whole spectacle was because I had found one of her soothers under the armoire and though I tried to hide it, I think she saw it. If I give one piece advice to any of you, let it be this: drop the soother earlier rather than later.

Kaillan's added a few more words to her repertoire although I'm mind blocked... belly button, all done, more, boy, girl, what else was there...She doesn't say hi yet although she has no problem kissing everyone who says hello to her. Kaillan loves blueberries and eats ten pounds of cheese a week. She's been eating so well lately, I'm actually scared to jinx myself by mentioning it. She's big time into babies now, she carries her doll around everywhere till she wants whatever Brandan has. She mauls the crap out of him if she doesn't get her way and I have to say he's incredible with her.

Did I mention last entry? Kaillan can play the harmonica. And she does it in style. If there's one thing I must say, these kids have amazing wardrobes. Their outfits are impressibly fashionable and excellent quality and it's such a waste that it's only for a little time. I know it seems materialistic to even consider clothes when thinking about having another baby and worse, to consider whether it would be clothes-wise better to have a girl or a boy, but I can't help but think it's a shame that I'll never again use one of their wardrobes. For the record, I'm not pregnant, but I do see myself with another one day and I have to say I feel certain another would be a boy. Even my string thing said so.

Advice number two for anyone interested? Way back earlier in the summer we were wamboozled by earwigs and ants. They were outside but the prospect of them moving in completely freaked me out. On the internet, I found a cure for ants and I've been meaning to share it with you. Cream of wheat, but not the instant one. They eat it and drag it back to their colony so the rest of them can knock it back and a few days later it swells their stomach and it's adios amigos. It's cheap, effective, and most important, safe. I had the really tiny ants, I'm not sure how it would work on the big mothers.

I'm completely into Survivor, The Amazing Race and though I hate to admit it, the Bachelor. Last Thursday on Survivor, the older team ruled and I was so proud. Is anyone out there still into getting organized? I had huge plans and before I'd even actually got on the wagon, I fell off. So many distractions, so little time. I needed the book club like I needed a hole in my head but I finished Drowning Ruth so now I'm going to start on Julie Morgenstern's book. To anyone just joining, Oprah Winfrey swore by it. My other plan was to discuss food at length with you guys, but just as soon as I made THAT pledge I hated every single meal we ate. So how about if scrap the daily menu diary and just toss some ideas over?

Last week I made a incredible chicken soup, so three days later I was making another batch of broth. Every once in a while, I make a big huge batch. I drain out the chicken and bones and vegetables and pour the broth into large ziploc bags and I toss them in the freezer. Once a week I pull out the broth, throw in cubed chicken and vegetables, sometimes chick peas too and voila. I also bought a whole whack of ground beef and made what felt like a million meatballs. I freeze them all on a tray then when they're frozen I sort them into serving sizes and put them back in the freezer. One day I'll pull them out, boil them (gets rid of more fat) and put them either in a gravy or a tomato sauce. The kids really love meatballs. My personal favourite meal this week was marinated chicken breasts and grilled vegetables on the barbeque. I threw on fancy salad greens and it was a grownup meal that was easy and even better for lunches the next day.

Monday morning Dee Dee came to spend the day with Brandan and as the whistles of my train echoed, I could not find my car keys. I ripped the house apart and vowed there must be a clap-on key chain somewhere out there so I could eliminate this panic from my life forever. The keys might have been in my purse but my purse was sitting on the seat in the locked van. Uuuggghh. In Plan B, I tore back into the house like a raving lunatic, found extra makeup, grabbed some money and Dee Dee and Brandan took me to the train. At work, I didn't have my security pass, no ID even to get a temporary one. When Remo got home he got my purse out of the car but the keys weren't in it. I didn't actually remember having them all weekend. Then I had a thought. "Brandan, do you know where my keys are?" He went straight into the family room and dug under the cushion. These?

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree, he can play a silly trick too. I swear Remo's eyes glistened.

Gotta make like a bandit and run,

Allisun