Aching

In the past year, I've had 5 good friends lose a parent. That's 5 too many. How can we be at the age when this is happening? It is such a sad, sad reality of growing up.

On Christmas day, one of my favorite people on the planet lost her mother. I'm telling you, no matter how old she is or whether or not it is "expected," I will never, ever be ready for that. My heart is aching for my friend as I wonder what I can do or say or pray for to help her or comfort her in any tiny way. The usual fare just doesn't seem adequate, we live very far away, and I know it's just too easy to say the wrong things without knowing it.

For her, I know a comfort right now is knowing that she has spent the last several months and years spending time with her mom and telling her how loved she is. What a blessing to know that your mom had no doubt that you appreciated all she did for you.

Folks, stop what you're doing and call your mom. Tell her how wonderful she is. Tell her you love her.

And for my friend, know that so many people are sending love your way right now. Anything you need, just say the word.

Whale story, part 3

Like the one in the bible, our whale story had a bummer middle, but a happy ending.
And he absolutely adores it (note the monkey looking on with jealousy).

Thanks, LW. What a sweet, wonderful thing you did. It got here just in time.

Merry Christmas to all!

Mommy gets her craft on

Dude. I totally MADE this! Using my hands! This is by far the most crafty thing I've ever done in my life.Feel free to click on it to see the level of detail involved. Really. Go ahead.

Yes. All for the love of this little man.(Feel free to click on that to see the level of cuteness involved.)

P.S. No, I didn't have a pattern. I found a clip art whale and just tried to mimic it a bit.

A White Christmas? Yeah, I think so.

The view from our living room on Sunday afternoon:

Here's a hanging planter on the balcony:

A stroll down ornament lane

This post has taken no less than five attempts to finish. Enough already!

In no particular order, here are a few memories hanging on our Christmas tree.

One of my first friends in Boston was an MIT smarty pants who also blew glass on the side. It's every bit as cool as it sounds. Now he and his wife both do, and these were the favors at their wedding. Definitely the coolest favors ever.

One place I love to visit is my sister's house outside of Memphis. I've never actually seen Memphis. Instead, I spend my time eating Lenny's sandwiches & Baskin Robbins ice cream, going to the Pottery Barn outlet, marveling at her home decor and the fact that she now has high speed internet, and perusing the quaint little shops in her neighborhood. That's where these came from.

There's a lovely German woman in our congregation who does...everything, really. And at Christmastime, she carries around a bag every week filled with canisters of the most delicious Chex Mix known to man, and these little beauties. Some of you readers might have some of these on your tree.

I believe it was our second married Christmas that Mike and I were uh, really struggling financially. We spent Christmas here in Boston but couldn't afford ornaments for our $15 tree. So we made them. My favorite is the wire + ribbon tree topper Mike made, that we still put on our tree every year.

These ornaments are some that we made with the teenagers in our congregation when Mike and I were both working with them a few years back. I think they turned out pretty cool.

I love this ornament, but I try not to remember where I got it. Ever read The Nanny Diaries? Yeah. That lady. This was my Christmas bonus.You remember this post from last Christmas? This is one of those gifts.
In a related story, one year that sister wasn't able to find anything Grinch-y for me, so my mom said she'd find something and send it to me. (Clearly her eyesight is not what it once was. These are frogs, my dear mother.)

The post I hoped I wouldn't have to write

Remember this beauty?
That's right, a hand-crafted gorgeous, sizable, corduroy, lovable whale?

The one I ordered as probably Jonah's only Christmas present from us (cause come on, he's a baby)?

That my friend made with her own hands?

The one that arrived yesterday?

In the box that I saw as I left to pick up Flurg from the babysitter's?

And thought, Oh, I'll grab it on my way back in?

And the one that, 30 minutes later was GONE??!!

That's right, folks. S-T-O-L-E-N. Along with my neighbor's box that was also sitting inside our locked building. Gone.

I am heartbroken. First, that I never even got to see the whale. Second, that my baby's special first Christmas gift was taken. And third, that apparently we have a thief among us. It sickens me.

I'm trying to think about it this way: I hope that adorable whale ends up with a child whose loser parents are too stupid and lazy to earn their own damn Christmas and loves it as much as we would have.

That's almost having the Christmas spirit, right? Big, big sad face. Do you think this warrants (ha) a call to the police? I'm not sure how mail thievery works, but we were robbed, after all. Insights?

A story problem from a math test in Mike's 4th grade class

Santa Claus brings presents to good little boys and girls. For bad boys and girls, he brings one piece of coal for every day they were bad that year. This Christmas Mike Benson got 321 pieces of coal. How many days was he good this year?


Yep. That really happened. His mom saved it and I saw it with my own eyes.

Mike gets his craft on

A few weeks ago we had a Christmas party at church. Parents were encouraged to dress their children in Bethlehem theme for a reenactment they did during the party.

So no one was asking us to dress up our baby, but did that stop us? Are you kidding me?

This was actually wholly and 100% Mikes' doing. He went to the fabric store and bought the supplies. He hand-stitched the little robe (please note the cut outs for belt loops) and assembled the headpiece. The moccasins were really my only contribution. As in, I put them on him.

So here you have it: our little shepherd boy.

And this one's my favorite. Sooo proud of himself.

Typical negotiations at the TurleyBenson home

Mike: We need to set a budget for Christmas presents.

Me: Okay, fifty dollars.

Mike: A hundred.

Me: Grrr. Seventy-five.

Mike: Ninety-five.

Me: Um, no, we're done negotiating.

Mike: Fine. Maybe.

pause

NOT including stockings.

Me: FINE! Ten dollars for stockings, OK?!

Mike: Agreed. Almost.

pause

Not including shipping.

No choice in the matter

Seriously though. How could I NOT order him?

Dear Baby J,
Your whale is on the way. Surprisingly, it's the first one I've ever bought you, and I gotta say, probably the coolest one you'll ever get. You can thank Darcie. She's pretty friggin amazing. The only thing that would get me to move to Utah is to be able to get one of these. I mean, come on!

Be cool. Shop Etsy, folks. I promise you, they have it.

Stats from the doc

Weight: 15 lbs 5 oz --75th percentile

Length: 25.5 in --75th percentile

Head: 17 in--75th percentile


Eyelashes: 1 mile--99.9th percentile
(Seriously kid. You're making me look bad!)

In this week's baby news

This weekend I was at my friend RPFreely's house. For those not in the know, she had a gorgeous little baby girl 2 days after I had a gorgeous little baby boy. They are betrothed.

Anyway, back to the point. Just before leaving, I looked in her freezer. Can you guess why? That's right! Because I'm a masochist! I wanted to see how much pumped milk she had stored up so that ... um, I could feel bad about myself, I guess.

And there was a lot. And it didn't look ANYthing like my stored milk. The bags were like, full, and the milk had color.

And what did my nice friend do? She GAVE ME SOME. Quite a bit, actually. And I am oh so grateful. And I feed it to my baby.

And I swear, now when I give him formula he's like, "Wait a second...WHERE'S THAT GOOD STUFF??!!"

So there you have it. My own personal wet nurse. What a luxury. I feel like an aristocrat.

Some may think this is weird (my husband). I hate to break it to ya, but women have been doing this for years, people.

And on a sadder note, little Flurgie got some shots today. It made neither of us happy. In fact, after his post-shot nap, he was almost inconsolable until that baby Tylenol kicked in. It was a harrowing 53 minutes.

Speaking of vaccines, some of you may have concerns, as I did, about vaccinating, and may have even considered not doing it. In the end, I decided to find a pediatrician who was open to talking about it, and did a little research to find a happy medium.

So I am vaccinating the Flurg, but on a schedule different than the usual one. If you are interested, I'd be happy to direct you to it, but it's basically based on Dr. Bob Sears' research. The theory behind the alternative schedule is to spread out and delay shots as much as possible. I'm a lot more comfortable with that approach, and I found a pedi who was willing to go along with it; I'm not sure all of them would.

Thanks for tuning in. We hope to see you right back here tomorrow.

That dog guy I was telling you about

Sorry, but this is one of those stories I know I'll forget if I don't write it down. And sorry #2 to all you dog lovers out there. You just might hate me after this post.

So. Traveling with an infant is a bit... different than traveling without one, shall we say. First of all, you wouldn't believe how long it takes to get all your stuff (including the car seat and the stroller) through that conveyor belt. And all that other stuff? Just go ahead and grab a baker's dozen of those bins, 'cause trust me. You'll use them.

But also, you suddenly know what it's like to be THOSE people. The ones that everyone else is hoping they don't sit next to on the flight. So on the first leg of our journey home, we sat on a full plane, window and middle seat, and waited to see what poor shmuck would be stuck with us. Well, as luck would have it, we got the one guy on the plane traveling with--you guessed it--a dog in a cage. Could our row have BEEN any fuller? I don't think so!

So I guess we were on an even playing field. He was probably as much a baby person as we are dog people, if you know what I mean. The feeling was mutual.

Soon after takeoff, this guy--get this--takes the dog OUT OF ITS CAGE! Are you as shocked as I was? Are you like shaking your head right now? After a few minutes of Mike and I exchanging What the--! looks with each other, and me reminding Mike repeatedly, "He likes this baby as much as we like that dog," a flight attendant glides over and tells him to put the dog away.

His reply: "I'll put her away as soon as we are at cruising altitude." Um, guess what dog guy. You don't make the rules. She repeated "It needs to go back in the cage. Now."

So guess what he doesn't do. Yeah. At this point, however, he notices Mike's discomfort and how he's sort of leaning very close to me to avoid contact with the dog. "She doesn't bite," he says. And Mike replies, "I'm VERY ALLERGIC to dogs, so I just want to make sure I don't come in contact with her." He gave Mike the same "cruising altitude" response. Or, basically "Yeah, buddy, I don't care."

--pause for soap box speech--
Here's the thing. I know some people hate being near babies for fear of having their silence disturbed, but the thing about babies is that A) they won't bite you and B) no matter how much you dislike them, they will not cause you to break out in hives and have an asthma attack. Pet dander allergies, however, are a real and quite prominent thing. I'll never understand why people don't get that.
--aaand unpause--

Back to the plane. Along comes Flight Attendant #2. Unlike her coworker, she IS a dog person (or more accurately, a dog GUY person), and rules be damned! She kneels down and admires the thing. And its owner. And every chance she has from that point on in the 2.5 hour flight, she continues to admire him/them. She shows her admiration when the drinks come and she hands dog guy a whole can of soda while the rest of us get only cups. She shows it when she hands him 2 packs of pretzels and the rest of us one. And a half hour later gives him 2 more. At one point she almost handed a can of soda to Mike and when she realized it, promptly ripped it from his hand. It was so ridiculous we were biting our hands to keep from screaming out "ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!"

And on one of her [many] trips past our row, young and flirty FA#2 asked the handsome dog guy how old his dog was.

This is good.
Are you ready?

He answered,

in ALL seriousness.

"Fifteen months."



I had to pretend I was choking on my drink.

Are you ready for some football?

You may remember my first nickname for Baby J: little football. Well, when my mom came to visit she asked if I wanted her to make him a Halloween costume. Way ahead of her, I had an idea in mind already.
That's right. A little football. Or actually, kind of a big one, as it turns out.
Mike and I dressed as Superfans (hence the strange face markings), but oddly I have no pics of Mike. The costume was big enough to stuff a large pillow in, and Baby J found it to be a nice, cozy place to nap. I literally had to carry him around with my arms outstretched, the thing was so big.
I scoured the internet and pattern books--this costume does not exist anywhere in the world. My mom, after mulling it over for a few days, whipped it out in 20 minutes. She's that good.

He won funniest costume. Thanks mama!

Anyone lookin' for a Christmas tradition?

I was just thinking about the few little traditions we have this time of year, and how one of them is attending the Longfellow Park Christmas concert. It is almost always fantastic. Just kidding, it's really great. All the time. Anyway, it just wouldn't be the holidays without enjoying some really great festive and reverent music about Christ's birth. We love it.

So then I was thinking, maybe some people don't know about it, or like, aren't Mormon so really don't know about it. Well, it's free and open to anyone, and there's free pie afterward. But you have to request a seat ahead of time. So let me know if you would like to attend a really nice Christmas concert--you will not be disappointed. I'm putting a request in for seats on Monday. Even my friend Timp liked it when he went several years ago, and he's no easy music critic.

Seriously, let me know. It's next weekend, Friday or Sunday evening.

Also, in the works:
An ornament post. As in, a post (with pictures) explaining the memories associated with some ornaments we hang on the tree. I highly recommend doing this, it's a delightful exercise in nostalgia.

Talk about your all time backfires

In the spirit of "economic crisis," I scoured the ads to see where groceries are cheapest this week.

Then I drove a few miles out of my way to go there.

Only to discover that Huh, I must have been looking at LAST WEEK'S FLYER when I was scouring, 'cause nothing I need is on sale.

And that groceries at this out-of-the-way place are actually quite a bit MORE than my usual store.

But I have a baby with me and don't want to load back up and go there.

So I end up spending $75 on groceries I could have gotten for $60 and I'm pretty sure my coupon-clipping little sister would have gotten for $20.

Yeah. I'd say I'm frustrated.

When the river runs dry

Warning: heavy duty mommy business discussed here. Fellas? You might want to tune out.

And so, somewhere between the cold that made it difficult to feed and the traveling that threw off his schedule entirely, my baby made a decision last week.

He hates my boobs.

A few weeks ago he was refusing the bottle, then he decided to do a total 180 and refuse me. So my milk production went down, I had to pump every few hours, and by the end of the week it was taking me 20 minutes to eke out 2 ounces.

And then yesterday, I pumped nothing at all.

So I guess breastfeeding is officially over for us. Yes, I am a bit sad, but I'm not going to dwell on it. In retrospect, I'm not sure there's much I would have done differently. I wouldn't go back and not give him bottles, because giving him bottles gave me a little sanity and sleep that I really needed. I never had great production for unknown reasons (and yes, that includes my hindmilk, trust me!) and it was clear he needed more than I could give him from pretty early on. I'm grateful that he got 3 1/2 months' worth of momma's milk that will hopefully help him be healthy (although, side note: Mike's mom has one child that has no allergies and no asthma--the one she never breastfed. So...you know, potato, potahto).

And here's my little ode to breastfeeding. Until you've done it yourself, you really have no idea how much dedication and sacrifice it takes to do it. I used to think it just sort of worked for you if you wanted it to, and it lasted as long as you chose, but that is really not the case. I definitely could have been more dedicated at it, but I had to attend to my needs too. For any woman who even attempts to breastfeed, I say Good for you! It's really tough! And any amount of time you did it is a great accomplishment.

And for anyone who chose not to, or were unable to, Good for you too. It's a hard hard thing, and I never even had to deal with any of the really painful stuff like mastitis or blocked ducts. Goodness gracious, there is nothing simple about this whole thing.

And if I may make a humble request, I don't want any advice regarding getting my baby to breastfeed again or getting milk back. I've decided to just move forward. Though I thank you for your concern. :)

So much to say

I indeed have much to write about, from the wonderful trip to AZ, to how lucky I am to have my in-laws, from the plane ride home with that dog guy, to the flight attendant who was hitting on him, from being reminded once again how ridiculously far we live from relatives, to the fact that this week I'm officially back at my job.

But for now, I'll just post this:

Reading back on this post, I can see how it was construed that I was implying digestive problems. In fact, I can't see really any other way it could be construed. But that wasn't what I meant. All I meant was, So much for getting back in shape after the baby; my new goal is getting back in shape after a trip to the in-laws. More food was consumed than you might think humanly possible. They had to roll us all onto the plane. Even the baby seems fatter (though that's not from my milk--yet another post!).

So when I asked for a dietary cleanse it was more like a detox, or a quick injection of nutrients I was looking for, to counteract all the crap we just ate. I figure I'll start getting back in shape just in time for another gorge fest at Christmastime.