us in pix

some photos of us for my peeps...

1 - m'boyz drinking their o-jay-jay in their p-jay-jays

2 - the three of us

3 - how in love am I with these two gorgeous creatures? 

A word from my struggling ego

You know something's wrong when even a good tube of mac lipstick won't do the trick. Today I thought a little touch of lip color might make me cute, might give my washed out face a lift. mac used to pick my face up on drab days, but today it didn't even make a dent.  'allure' couldn't even pretend to replace any of the juice that's been sucked out of me in the last 11+ months since I sacrificed any last vestiges of The Rachel Show to become a baby buncher: pushing the pedal to the maternal metal with two under two in order to give them to one another. The toll on my physical body has become apparent each time my fading ego stares into the mirror and sees frayed, squiggly grays coming in, brand new sunken-sometimes-swollen circles under my eyes, and a general sense of dullness pervade my once shiny face. This year's altruistic doling out of my life force for the growth of my boys has leaked a tremendous amount of my inner and outer vitality, which is a beautifully hard-to-swallow thing all at once. 

Beautiful because it's what I'm made for: procreation. My body is entirely geared towards propagation of the species and I've now fulfilled the first chapter of that feat. So I do feel a tremendous amount of accomplishment and pride, having successfully performed my evolutionary duties. Beautiful because I get to feel and give such tremendous love to my children. Beautiful because I am Mother -there is no more meaningful, immediate, challenging and rewarding title on the planet.

Hard-to-swallow however because unfortunately my very humanly-faulted ego also houses itself in this humanly-faulting body that is now finally slooooowing down and (((gasp))) aging. I used to happily anticipate waking up in the morning, hopping out of the bed at the crack of stupid to hike or walk for hours. Now I lie with earplugs and pillows barricading my head, blankets pulled up to my nose, praying for just an hour more peace and quiet in the early morning before I must start my daily rigamarole. And I wait at least an hour after waking to glance into the mirror to see what state my face is in, hoping beyond hope my right eyelid isn't drooping any further.

My ego and I have the following conversation something like every other day now:

Ego: "You're not cute anymore."

Me: "I'm not supposed to be 'cute' right now! I'm being a mother of two very young boys!"

Ego: "You're not pretty anymore."

Me: "My prettiness drained out my left boob nursing N. Shut up!"

Ego: "You're not sexy anymore."

Me: "My sexiness spiraled down the sink with the last 5 nights of endless dishes!"

Enough. You get the drift. All I'm saying here is that I either need a new shade of mac or an attitude adjustment. Oh please, you know that's not true. What I really need is a new shade of mac and an attitude adjustment. Thanks for your patience and witnesship as I remedied today's malady. :)

If it were not for snot...

... I'd be unemployed for starters.

In these difficult and trying economic times, I should be sighing in relief instead of rolling my eyes every time I swab down a snotty nose. My job is recession proof. I am an irreplaceable cog in the wheel of mucus' freeride through our family's respiratory system this season.

This photo hardly shows the offensiveness with which I deal most days. Here N's snot is clear, contained and gleaming, held back from overflow by his upper lip. I just wasn't patient enough to wait for a camera shot of the real thing: the abominable runaway nose with yellow and white marbled snot pliantly hanging in abandon off his lip and dangling in thin air. Those ones should be memorialized in a wax museum somewhere, they are so unbelievably ridiculous. 

Not only would I be laid off if colds and teething let go their tenacious grip on my poor innocent family, I'd also be terribly out of shape. The amount of sprinting under play structures and through sand with tissue blowing in the wind I must do to catch G each time he  races by taunting me with an ornery grin and appalling runny nose yelling, "snot!" would give even Rocky a run for his money.  And puh-lease, screw wimpy, faddish kettle bells. I hoist these mucoid monsters all day long wiping down snot, drool, tears and sniffing for malodorous diaper situations. 

Oh snot, piss, shit and drool... where would I be without  you? 

A mother without a cause is a terrible thing to waste. 

Part II (later that same day): It's a lush life

You know it's a lush life when you've completely forgotten about your very favorite body product brand in the whole wide world and amazon.com is right there to remind you of  how many gloriously aromatic butters n' balms n' splashes n' potions you can cram in your virtual shopping cart with your husband's $150 Corporate Rewards gift.

Ladies (and gents if you're actually reading this trash) it took me approximately 21 minutes from the time I pressed "publish" on my last post to the time I pushed "order now" on amazon.com to lasciviously spend every last penny on the most delicious, tasty and tempting products ever. OMG, I had waaaaay too much fun. Shopping really is a girl's best friend. I'd take it over a blow job any day. Speaking of... let's see, some of the more provocative products being shipped my way:  Lush's 'Soft Core' massage bar made of cacao and coco butter (yummmmmm), 'Fever' massage bar replete with juicy red lips emblazoned on it for good measure, and 'Ohh La La' soap, to name a few.  Oh, maybe you're sensing a theme? Perhaps you're on to something? Possibly you've guessed already? Okay fine, if you must know, yes my husband and I have tested out the newly improved and permanently DONE birth control situation and all is good in the hood. 

:)

Part I: Online shopping - a mom's best friend

Every once in a random while my husband receives these generous little electronic $50 Corporate Rewards gift certificates to amazon.com for his institutionalized slavery. After selfishly hoarding them for himself only to have them expire unredeemed in his inbox, I've finally trained him to forward them immediately to his well-deserving Intuit Widow. They make my toes curl in delight. There is no pleasure guiltier for me right now than slumping back in my black pleather chair in front of the computer during afternoon naptime and SHOPPING! Since there is no such thing as enjoying a nice leisurely stroll through Anthropology these days - frantic races through Costco, Target and Trader Joe's don't count! - online dates with amazon make the leftover girl in me grin bigger than amazon's smiling arrow.

Ahhhhhh... what to buy? I'm temporarily savoring the sweet anticipation of all the nonsense I can possibly order. Right now I've got $150 worth of credit racked up with no definite idea of how to spend it. I've got to spend it, of course. No use saving it for a rainy day when there are frivolous and most likely unnecessary purchases to be made. The credit amount on my account is burning a whole through my virtual pocket, waiting impatiently for my next splurge on incidentals. Biggest question being: Do I spend it on myself? Or do I be a good, altruistic, self-sacrificing mama and spend it on my kids and husband, painstakingly picking out board books, pj's, toys and other absurd crap I've thought I should use the credit on? Puh-lease! The last three surprise purchases I made for my husband were scoffed at. I thoughtfully picked out music and books that fit him to a tee. But not according to him. They collect dust now. So fuck that. I already ordered stupid swim diapers and boring outdoor park blankets for us last week after schlepping the kids around looking for them in vain. 

So I'm gonna buzz on over to amazon right now and see what I can find for myself. You'll probably find me in the beauty section, salivating over all of the facial, body and hair products. Pray for me to be foolish and irresponsible. Pray for me to purchase from my heart, not my head. Who knows, maybe I'll cruise through formerly uncharted categories and find something truly odd and fun to purchase. Will keep you posted.

Nice, normal post

Okay, I'm having a normal mommy moment. (Thank god no drama right now - my tubes, gut and throat can't take another moment's turmoil.) It is a run of the mill, garden variety sensation of undying adoration for my lil' N who is now walking. I dorkily giggle with effervescence every time he staggers diagonally across the floor, arms poised in preparatory martial arts stance, face alight in pure delight.

Even more normal and appallingly cringe worthy, I've found myself showing off his new skills. I'm so embarrassed for me. I actually want to impress. OMG. How mortifying. Shame on me, shame. When he won't do it on demand, which is most of the time, I feel compelled to continue prodding him to walk until I've proved my claim. "No, no, really. He really is walking," I say as he teeters a couple of steps, falls on his butt and crawls fastidiously onward, refusing to reprise his stagger all the way across the floor at home.

The only problem here is that my ego doesn't like becoming a normal part of the human race: One of the million bazillion bragging mommies expecting everyone to be terribly interested in every single one of her baby's normal developmental milestones. It's amazing my ego even tries to butt its stupid head into my business anymore. It's been kicked to the curb so hard by motherhood's reworking of my identity, I'd have thought it took up residence somewhere else by now. But it's so fun to be normal and be so proud of my little guys. And I reckon I've got many more normal landmarks to bliss out on as they both grow. Mmmmmm, for today it feels damn good to just be a good ole' normal mom, proud as punch of my kiddies.

Trojan-enz anybody?

Hmmmmm, what to do with the 13 leftover rubbers from our Costco 40 pack that I'll NEVER EVER not EVER NEVER have to use again? (thank you tubal) Auction them off on eBay to some horny underage kid with stodgy, clueless parents? Donate them to the bathroom of our local suburban strip mall Starbucks where the over-privileged, angst-ridden, Sex Pistols look-alike Carmel Valley youth groom their mohawk, sip Double Fudgey Lattes, drag on fags and cruise chicks? Give them away to a frantic mother of 3 screaming children pushing her stuffed cart through the diaper section of our neighborhood Vons? Or perhaps make a postmodernist collage of them randomly thrown  onto our old (ahem) stained bedspread (where they oftentimes were not used in time, hastening my frantic final fixing fer good), glued down for good measure, and hung inside the garage wall (my man's man cave) as a memorial to the good ole' days. (not)

And while we're at it, does anyone want my leftover Vicodin stash? I've got 16 out of the 20 they supposedly generously-but-really-premeditatedly prescribed me after my tubal. Who are they trying to fool? They're so trying to get me hooked. And while I'm spring cleaning, I might as well add in the big fat bottle of 600 mg Motrin they padded the Vicodin with. I've got 58 out of 60 of those fat suckers left.

So if any of you dear readers are jonesin' for some cheap pain relief or a good case of constipation or perhaps wanna remember how much you hate latex in your dry vagina, holla.