Saturday Sept 23^rd

We brought the aspiring organic farmers to a spot where we pay for the right to pick fruit. Seems like a genius idea to me ... load up on cow manure, sprinkle some seeds then let the dumb schmucks pay you to pick your fruit. Makes child labor seem like a waste of money. They even charge for entry to the place ... which begged the obvious question - why the hell am I paying Farmer Bob $2 for a 15 month old child to walk around and torment the farm animals?? While the answer was not immediately obvious it became clear once I saw Brennan eating the raspberries right from the plant ... they charge $2 to cover the cost of the fruit my kid is ingesting. More likely it was the dumbasses beside me who bring their entire herd out to graze for an hour or so, thereby driving up the cost for us quasi honest folk who actually pick and pay. They must be from the States.  

We stuck to raspberries and a few apples this time and tried to avoid the more challenging fruit (cherries give me diarrhea).  Upon our return to the homestead the missus and the youngun baked a raspberry cake with our bounty. I be right grateful for all their hard work!! 

Saturday Oct 7^th,

Halloween costume shopping today. Why so early you ask? Only someone unfamiliar with Jessica would ask that question. She believes in being prepared, to the point that a nuclear holocaust could not take me by surprise.

Sarah decided she wanted to be a Princess. Why do all little girls want to be a princess? Why not a bull fighter, or a cowboy, or Aragorn from the Lord of the Rings?? Hell, I would even take Frodo at this point.

Jess took her to Party Packagers and realized that each purchase of a costume was preceded by an enema for the ass reaming that would happen at the checkout. It was decided that a 3 year old wouldn't really understand costume quality, so we downgraded to Wal Mart et al. Turns out even they can't get a princess costume right but if you want to dress your toddler up as a barnyard animal you are good to go. We eventually found a middle of the road solution at Loblaws ... yes, it is much more than your neighborhood grocery store these days.

Picking a costume for Brennan was a no brainer ... he being the unholy spawn of Satan. We picked up a little devil costume at said grocery store, which was perfect because we wouldn't have to pick up horns seeing as he already has a pair sprouting naturally from the top of his head!!

Turns out dry run was required before the big day, so we dressed them up for Meaghan's 1st birthday party (she being the daughter of my cousin Mike and his wife Rebecca, although truth be told I don't see much of Mike in her but that could just be me). There was really no need to dress the kids up in their Halloween costumes but we decided to throw everyone off and screw with them a little (yes, I am kidding, it was a theme party).

 Sunday Oct 8^th- Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving, or as I like to call it the annual "how much turkey can you eat without puking" day finally rolled around. Last year I ate about 5 pounds of turkey then tried to play hockey a few hours later ... I couldn't decide if I wanted to fall asleep on the ice or puke on the ref. This year I decided to exercise some self control and not eat myself up a pant size.

Bev and Luigi joined us and were promptly issued a feedbag for their use. This year we decided to cover our new chairs with a cloth because The Bev has a nasty habit of spilling red wine on light colored fabric ... I sometimes wonder if she is marking her territory or just trying to create her own Rorschach test, thereby driving me crazy every time I pass by the chair.

Something that bothers me about Canadian Thanksgiving ... where the hell is our football??? The US gets football on Thanksgiving and we get soap operas. And no, the CFL doesn't count.

Friday Oct 13^th,

I took Brennan to the pediatrician and the dumbass decided to screw with us a little. This woman has a receptionist/assistant that would have had a good career torturing prisoners in a Russian gulag. I think she is medically incapable of smiling and that believes that Cruella de Ville was soft. Brennan sees her coming and screams, which is probably due to the fact that she displays all the compassion of a Somalian warlord when giving children needles.

The pediatrician herself seems to have an aversion to buying pads of paper. Whenever she tells us to buy some over the counter medication for our kids she rips off a corner of the paper bed covering and scratches out her illegible babble for us to decipher ... I feel like a cryptographer on acid when I look at her writing.

Brennan has had a chest infection for, ohhhh a freaking year!! She can't seem to get her shit straight and get it cleared up and on this visit she informed me that she was picking up an abnormal heart murmur. Apparently it is common in young children and tends to rectify itself over time but she wanted to run a battery of tests ... ECG, x-rays, another CG of some sort with a different vowel on the front, etc. Jess freaked out but I informed her that this pediatrician is the reason why second opinions were invented.

Brennan got all the tests and the pediatric cardiologist confirmed what I already knew ... our pediatrician is a dumbass. No issues with Brennan's heart. The only question is why the hell do we keep going back to that idiot?

Saturday Oct 14^th,

Halloween decorating time. Jess believes that every holiday requires decorations, including those not normally celebrated in the Fraser household. Chinese New Year, Ramadan, Rosh Hashanah, Mardi Gras, etc. We rent a small 50,000 square foot warehouse to hold all our decorations and probably need to consider hiring a full time decorator.

This year the theme was orange and purple spider webs strung across the entire house. It looked like a giant arachnid with some serious intestinal problems squatted over our house. I don't think any of the neighborhood kids were sufficiently scared because a couple of the little teenage bastards smashed my pumpkin ... not Jess'  but mine. I think they were envious of my artistic talent and could not bear to be in its presence. Next year I am rigging an electric current through the pumpkin and going to watch the little pricks crap in their pants as they get a taste of 25,000 volts!!! Now THAT'S Halloween fun!!!

 Thursday Oct 18^th,

More decorations. This time it is my birthday so Jess and the kids decorated the house as a surprise. I am not particularly uncomfortable with getting older; rather I have come to accept that a birthday is just a reminder of the slow, ceaseless march towards our death. Funny how older men are "distinguished" and older women are just plain "old" ... I keep telling Jess that when she hits 40 I am trading her in for 2 20 year olds. She likes to remind me that when I hit 40 she is just kicking my ass out ... seems like she has been putting too much thought into it. 

Friday Oct 20^th

I officially turned 37. I didn't feel any different but apparently I lost more hair during the preceding year. I think it has to do with the fact that my high testosterone levels are burning the hair off my scalp but my doctor has other theories (I think he might be dipping into the narcotic samples he gets from the pharma companies and have concluded that his diagnosis is flawed).

Jess went hog wild at Banana Republic, which was great for me. Having kids we rarely splurge on anything for ourselves and think that rolling bums for loose change is a perfectly acceptable past time. 

Bev, Luigi, Rosa , Jen and  Jason came over to eat cake and drink Luigi's Red Stripe beer ... I mean really, what is a birthday without crappy Jamaican beer? Luigi decided that one stubby bottle was an appropriate gift and that anything more might set a precedent that he would later regret. What a prince he is.

I especially liked watching Brennan slip into a sugar coma. He packed in more sugar than at any other point in his short existence and proceeded to run around the house as if possessed by Macaulay Culkin on speed. Sarah had her own version of a sugar high, which required Bev to read numerous story books in succession until her tongue felt raw and her right forefinger started bleeding from turning the pages.

Halloween

The previous evening Sarah and I made cupcakes. Apparently the daycare doesn't suck enough blood from us, now we need to supply them with food. Ostensibly it had something to do with a Halloween party but I believe the real reason was they wanted to send all the kids home on a sugar high and torture the parents. Sarah wanted to carry the tray into the daycare to give it to her teacher and almost pulled a Benny Hill a few times but managed the hand-off without incident.

Jess took Brennan downtown for the Oakville Halloween Tots parade. No, there is not parade but what's in a name? He wore his devil costume and got to display his naturally occurring horns proudly. He is a smart kid and after a few minutes realized that all this free candy being dropped into his pumpkin bucket could probably be parlayed into some quick cash ... he was going to sell the candy behind the Hasty Market to some of the local denizens ... the way the kid is always working the angles makes me proud.

Yours truly got suckered into a lame trade show in San Francisco and missed the festivities. Jess left a bucket of crap on the front porch for the kids to steal and set off with Brennan and Sarah. While the haul was good I think Jess almost passed out from chasing 2 kids from house to house, a feat that sufficiently impressed me that I am recommending it as a demonstration sport for the next Olympics.

That's it for now and gets us through September and October. I will get to November and December sometime after Christmas ... I need time to come up with some more meaningless and stupid analogies.

We take it for granted and forget that it is one of life's little pleasures ... taking a dump or going for a piss in a toilet, in relative peace and with some good reading material on hand. Having young children I am quickly reminded of the arduous road we all took, the mountain we had to climb when it came to taking a dump in a toilet and not in our pants.

 

For the better part of a year Jess and I have labored in vain to get Sarah to "go potty on the toilet". It seems like such a straight forward concept - pull down your pants, sit, grunt a little, feel the satisfying splash as poop meets water, then finish with a simple little wipe. We could get as far as step 2 with her but the actual process of pushing the piss and shit out was just not happening. So we did what all parents do at one time or another ... we gave up.

 

Truth be told, Sarah developed a slight bout of constipation. Most parents come to a realization early on that they are delivering psychologically crippling blows to their children on a daily basis, but we all hope that some time wth a therapist and some good drugs will help our children realize that it is really their fault and not ours. But no parent likes to think their actions are causing their children to tighten their sphincter like Andy's wallet and we cringe when we see them doubling over in pain because their bowels are enlarged with a pile of crap. So when Sarah stopped crapping in her diaper on her regular schedule we had to put the potty training on hold (she was so regular even the Germans and Swiss were impressed!).

 

Subsequent attempts to lure her into taking a piss on the toilet failed miserably. We tried bribing her with M&Ms, stickers, toys ... hell, we even bought a book that shows Dora taking a dump and even that had no affect! Each time Sarah rebuffed us we became disheartened, convinced that we were going to have to switch her to man diapers and that she would go through life with crap in her pants.

 

Then she started daycare. It is amazing what happens when a child starts interacting regularly with other children - speech improves, the creative centres of the brain are stimulated, and they want to be part of the crowd rather than stand out in it. Sarah awoke last Wednesday and, after some prodding, went for a piss in the toilet. This was huge, monumental, right up there with walking on the moon or the Leafs making the playoffs.

 

Later in the evening Sarah went on the toilet again. Holy shit we officially had a pattern developing. She probably thought we had completely lost our minds because each bowel movement was met with cheering and a little jig across the family room. Over the coming days Sarah used the toilet regularly and was fond of us taking a good long look at her shit while mavelling at its size ... something I have been known to do myself on ocassion.

 

She officially made the move to Dora panties on Monday. We are still required to make a big deal of her dumps but even she now considers a piss to be pretty common place. It only goes to prove that if you do nothing for long enough that things will work out in the end.

It would seem that birthdays are akin to major holidays when a child is involved. During the months of April, May and June the Fraser house becomes cake central with 3 birthday and an anniversary ... and I think Mothers Day is squeezed in there somewhere too. Gearing up for the birthday marathon requires equal parts patience and stamina, not to mention an extra notch or two in the belt after I eat 15 pounds of cake.

 

Brennan turned 1 on June 25th and in the Fraser homestead all birthdays are celebrated with equal parts exuberation and decoration. Lets face it, kids think birthdays are synonomous with balloons, hats, streamers, cake and the all-important presents.

 

Jess and I, having passed the age of majority and with no milestones worth celebrating yearly because the realization has set in that we are marching ceaselessly towards our death (cheery huh?), have since focused our efforts on the kids and play down our own "one year closer to being ashes" yearly remembrance. That is not to say that presents and a cake are not expected but we want to make sure it is done in an understated way.

The season of birthdays kicked off, in a subdued but dignified manner, with Jess' birthday on April 5th. When we married in 2000 I desperately tried to align both her birthday and our anniversary, figuring this would be the perfect way to avoid a screw up ... it stands to reason that one of the two dates would be seared into my memory (smart ass comments have been edited for fear of having to go to a proctologist to get her foot out of my ass). We decided on April 8th because the 5th was a Wednesday and getting married on Wednesday only happens to people who plan using expired calendars or those who rode the short bus to school and haven't grasped the concept of giving people the day off to recuperate from a bender. I rationalized, and still do, that a birthday on April 5th and an anniversary on April 8th are close enough in proximity to allow for the giving of a single gift to cover 2 days of significance ... unknown to me was a little known clause inserted into the constitution that says 2 events separated by more than 1 minute require gifts of equal value and not less than one month's gross household income.

 

Sarah was very excited to see the birthday cake and quickly formed the opinion that every day is someone's birthday. While I agree with this in principle, because everyday someone somewhere is celebrating a birthday, I don't think she was being quite so profound in her thinking. Jess enjoyed the gifts and cake and I inserted my own clause into the Fraser ammendment to the consitution that says any gift greater than $5 in value requires the receiver of said spousal gift to give up the booty! Jess got a gift and I got a present ... worked out well all around!!!!

 

Sarah's birthday was a much bigger event (depending on your point of view). Turrning 3 is a milestone of significance for the parents moreso than the child ... we anxiously anticipated the day when she would go for a dump in the toilet and not in her pants. A party was held and several little girls stormed the house like the beaches of Normandy, not sure why they were being dragged to Casa Fraser but willing to partake in the festivities all the same. While I slaved over the BBQ the kids pulled the chord on a pinata and the parents passed around the bottle of Tylenol ... good times for everyone. Turns out that 3 year old girls are remarkably similar to 30 year old girls, they just want the bobbles, only difference is that the fake plastic jewellry favored by a 3 year old must manifest itself as gold and diamonds when you add a 0 to their age. My conclusion is that there is some secret society dedicated to training and brainwashing young females.

 

To say Sarah got a shitload of presents would be an understatement. If we stacked them in a pile it would probably look like a section of the Great Wall of China had been erected in our living room. She thoughtfully thanked everyone for their presents (not presence but we know the intent was there), and relished the opportunity to eat birthday cake until it started oozing out of her pores.

 

Brennan was the next birthday to celebrate. It was decided that a slightly subdued celebration was in order since we were still recuperating from the previous birthday only a few weeks previous. Truth be told, the decorations just remained up for the entire month and every day we were required to explain to Sarah that there was no cake, hats or presents to enjoy but that we were in a build up mode for Brennan's birthday. While I drew comparisons to the U.S. moving into a staging area in Kuwait before the Iraq war, others in the house put a more positive spin on the events and anxiously anticipated Brennan turning 1.

 

A child's first birthday is always a significant milestone. Brennan was already walking by 1 and getting into so much trouble that we referred to him as our own little Dennis the Menace. The highlight of the day for him was eating some cake, or should I say wearing some cake. Up till that point Brennan had never tasted sugar, so this was a major event for him. While it was obvious that he enjoyed the cake and associated sugar high, it became obvious to me that cleaning up after him for meals was going to require a pressure washer and a bulk order of detergent.

 

The birthday season is now passed but Sarah still likes to sing Happy Birthday for pretty much any ocassion. We don't have the heart to tell her it isn't a birthday because she is so damned cute when she sings, and besides, Brennan is now trained like Pavolv's dog ... when he hears her sing he starts salivating and thinking of the cake to come. It might be cruel to fool him like that but it makes for some entertaining stories.

 

Coming shortly (as in 10 minutes from now because Jess is bitching me out like a rabid hockey parent), the story of the little girl who went potty.

The mundane nature of our existence does not lend itself well to exciting revelations or inspired authoring, but getting the gaggle of women off my back has provided ample motivation.

 

Upon checking the date of the last blog entry, I was surprised to find that 3 months has elapsed since I bothered to put fingers to keyboard and update the masses on what has transpired inside the walls of the asylum.

 

Sarah is a late comer to the “terrible twos” but seems to relish the role. She has taken to whining, temper tantrums and use of the word “no” with a zeal that is impressive if only for the consistency in which she uses it. There are glimpses of our happy, content little girl, but I think she merely lulling us into a false sense of security before dropping the hammer.

 

Our initial worry that she was not communicating well has been laid to rest. She is now able to speak in full sentences and is adequately, dare I say vehemently, articulating her displeasure with our decisions. I am trying to get her to work on her debating skills because the simple “I don’t like it” hardly qualifies as a moving argument for overriding our choice in meals or TV program choices.

 

I have come to think of Sarah as our own little Jeckyll and Hyde: sweet and innocent one moment and head-spinning spawn of something unholy the next.

 

I don’t want to portray Sarah in only a negative light, so I will throw in some of those “precious little moments” we hold on to for dear life.

è    Sarah’s unwavering admiration and sense of hero worship towards Jess has me perplexed. I have yet to understand the genesis of these feelings and can’t comprehend why I am frequently referred to in the negative … must be all those times I made her pick up her toys, an occurrence she seems to have likened to torturous child labor.

è    She frequently refers to Brennan as “my baby boy” and is assuming the role of protector and guardian. There is no issue with jealousy in this house, but if he lays a hand on Dora she will open a can of whoop ass and feed him his nuts.

è    She still sleeps through the night. Come to think of it, I can’t remember a time when she woke up in the middle of the night. She seems to have inherited her mother’s ability to sleep like the dead.

è    She enjoys helping Jess bake, or more specifically she enjoys eating the ingredients and adheres to the philosophy that the process of baking in the oven is a waste of perfectly good batter.

è    She has a fondness for playing in her sandbox and seems to be headed for a career in construction – she moves a lot of dirt around but doesn’t make any headway on a project; she vastly underestimates the time it will take to move the sand from one meaningless location to another; she breaks frequently and is distracted by passersby; and she is easily annoyed by the mere mention of employing a different method in her sand destruction … er, construction projects. .

è    She continues to grow at a frightening rate. I fully expect to wake up one morning and find a 6-foot 3-year old waiting to kick the crap out of me for rousing her at an the ungodly hour of 9am.

 

Having said all that, she is still our little angel and can do no wrong … well, most of the time. When she is happy and smiling her face will melt your heart, but when she gets herself all wound up like a convict denied parole it is best to find any excuse to get the hell out of the house first.

 

Brennan is the yang to Sarah’s yin.

 

Brennan’s physical growth would probably be classed as average, but he is rapidly approaching his first birthday and transitioning from infant to toddler.

 

His teeth are late coming in, with only the bottom 2 and one of the top teeth currently visible, looking vaguely like a redneck inbreeder from the Deliverance who never met a toothbrush he liked.

 

He has more hair than Sarah did at his age but he too is still a very light shade of blond. Considering the pigmentation of yours truly and his mother, I am still perplexed as to how he ended up with such fair hair. Or to put a finer edge on the point, I am beginning to think I should pay close attention to the UPS driver who drops off the Victorias Secret packages.

 

Brennan can’t quite walk unassisted, but when properly motivated he will walk up to 6 or 7 steps without support. This is truly amazing to us because our baby girl was obstinate and refused to walk until 14 months, something I attribute to Lloyd carrying her everywhere (why walk when someone is willing to carry your ass?!?!).

 

Brennan is very specific in what he wants, usually devolving into a pile of screaming limbs when we pull an object away from him or tell him for the one millionth time to stay out of the freaking kitchen drawers. I know he understands the word “no” but thinks his “I am too cute to punish” smile will get him out of trouble … it used to work, until he reprogrammed the ExpressVu dish to pick up programs from mainland China.

 

Unlike Sarah he has taken to drinking milk without having to be bribed or tied down. In general he is a good eater, when the menu appeals to his palette. Repeated attempts to get him to eat ground chicken or beef have been rebuffed, unless the meat is mixed with a healthy portion of sweet potatoes. The resulting mess seems to please him but makes me queasy.

 

Brennan, like Sarah, is so regular that his dumps can be used to determine the time of day with an accuracy rivaling that of a Swiss watch.

 

Brennan started swimming and as you would expect has taken to the water. The thing I can’t figure is whether Brennan likes the water because it gives him a chance to piss all over us without getting in a heap of trouble, or if he likes listening to the neurotic parents try to convince their drooling offspring that the 2010 Olympics is a reasonable goal … more likely it is just me that enjoys listening to that crap and he relishes every opportunity to empty his bladder in the pool.

 

Brennan’s development continues at a breakneck speed, much to the dismay of Jess and I. The cries of babies and the joy they bring is soon to be a distant memory, to be replaced by other, hopefully enjoyable, sounds.

 

Future blog topics will include our pending trip to the cottage later this summer, the ouster of the Senators from the playoffs (hopeful prognostication) and the forthcoming birthday parties for the kids.   

Mark Twain once wrote that "Adam and Eve had many advantages, but the principal one was, that they escaped teething.". Truer words were never spoken.

 

The similarities in our children seem to end with the fact that they both have blond hair and regular bowel movements. We have recently come to realize that, in addition to his high maintenance 'I want it now" attitude and penchant for waking up at 5am, Brennan is much like me and has a low tolerance for pain. Sarah had a severe case of rosy red cheeks when she teethed but did not make so much as a peep. Brennan has opted to wake up in the middle of the night and remind everyone within a 2 mile radius that he is in pain and that someone in the freaking house should get off their ass and solve this problem!

 

Now some people are opposed to the use of Anbesol because it works something like a local anesthetic you get when you visit the dentist. I think the fact that he probably can't feel his lips and therefore not scream to be a positive side effect ... the easing of the gum pain is just a nice-to-have.

 

Brennan's first tooth finally pushed through and we likely only have to endure another 18 months of this while the remainder of his teeth comes in. I am beginning to wonder if dentures for children are a viable alternative.

 

The apparent mind-numbing pain that causes him to wake at random intervals has not stopped our little Cherry Popper from mastering the commando crawl. Sly Stallone in Rambo could not possibly have been more adept at sneaking up on the enemy. When sitting on the floor one must be careful to avoid any movement without first checking his proximity ... same goes for the spontaneous release of gas (we won't talk about the unfortunate incident recently that almost saw me blow his hair off his head).

 

Speculation in the house is that he is only mere days away from crawling. He rises up on his hands and knees, rocks back and forth and then falls onto his stomach when he actually wants some forward movement. The rocking motion is reminiscent of a particular type of motion a male adult will make when positioned behind a female adult, which has left me feeling this odd sense of pride that he is mastering the art of the dog so young. Unfortunately, Sarah's stuffed animals are bearing the brunt of his hip flexes and Dora the Explorer is looking for a return to the jungle to escape his licentious advances.

 

Sarah seems to take Brennan and his coming of age antics in stride. She behaves like the model big sister and we have thankfully avoided all the feelings of jealousy that normally accompany the birth of the second child. Her own development is marked by a significant increase in her vocabulary and an ability to clearly articulate what she wants, what she likes/dislikes, and what is acceptable to her, which most of the time evolves around Tree House, french fries and not going for a nap.

 

A very unfortunate development is her parroting of her mother ... the little girl echo in the house has me wondering what kind of hell I am in for later in life. While some might consider her mimicking the "Troy come here" yells of her mother quite cute, I think it is God's way of punishing me for my misguided youth. The mommy worship has left me with a chip on my shoulder and I am about to resort to proven methods of winning back favorite status in the house ... bribery ... several Dora dolls and videos dooled out at regular intervals should put me back on top.

 

All these developments and I haven't even scratched the surface. Suffice it to say that the trials and tribulations of raising kids was probably the true motivator for Sun Tzu.

 

Till next time ...

 

I ran across a site recently that posted some of the best one-liners parents had come up with when summarizing the frustrations associated with raising children.

 

A couple that will bring a smile to any parent's face:

-> Children are natural mimics who act like their parents, despite every effort to teach them good manners.

-> Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing is like shoveling the drive before it has stopped snowing.

 

To be sure, the instances where children fill us with joy far outweigh those where we suddenly find ourselves swearing in foreign tongues. Such is the life we lead, filled with peaks and the occasional valley but always an interesting journey when guided by the frenzied screams of children.

 

Our family, led by the two tiny inmates, has seen a lot of change in the last few months. Those peaks and valleys that I speak of have passed at such a frenetic pace that comparing life to a roller coaster might be a fair analogy. Jess began work on December 6th for a company called Heidelberg, a large multi national that does something with printing presses. She endured 20 something interviews with recruiters and various companies to get the right job but seems happy to date.

 

Brennan and Sarah began daycare when Jess went back to work. Separation anxiety set in on both sides, with Jess lamenting the fact that Olon screwed her out of time with Brennan, while Sarah desperately clung to the hope that she could stay home with mommy ... or daddy if absolutely necessary. Every day she gets a little better but I expect the Christmas break, when she will be home for 10 days, to set us back and force us to start all over.

 

Brennan is a trooper and a pooper. The kid regularly takes a crap that spills out of the top of his diaper, and while most people find that disgusting I actually view it as a badge of honor. He is developing quite well and rolls around quite a bit, using his lateral movement capabilities like a drunk on a steep slope. He can get into things faster than a fat kid can bust into a bag of Oreos, so we must remain vigilant. He seems to think the bathtub is his own Olympic size swimming pool and every day is the finals in the 100m backstroke. He is quite the ladies man and apparently has picked up the 17 year old daughter of our daycare provider but hasn't quite figured out how to get to first base ... and NO, definitely not something he picked up from dad!

 

Sarah seems to have gotten the Canadian Idol bug. She will sing all manner of song but thinks that remembering the words is highly overrated ... apparently something she picked up from her mother. She is more affectionate each day and has taken to saying "I wuv oo" quite often. She is still obsessed with Dora, and if not for the fact that she can't drive, talk in full sentences or find her way to the curb let alone another country, I would worry about potential stalker tendencies I am seeing (Note to self: next time she calls Dora a "mala muchacha", for not responding to all the fan letters, we need to get her checked out ... and possibly put on medication). She also talks more Spanish than English some days and I have taken to referring to translation services to understand what she is saying - that Dora is in for a golpeo when I get my manos de mierda on her!!

 

Christmas is here and despite the fact that our credit card melted and had to be put on life support, I am looking forward to the inmates reaction on Christmas morning. To call this the "Year of Dora", insofar as Sarah is concerned, would be an understatement. That fat bastard in the red outfit, and no I am not talking about Ray in his unitard, better remember to bring her all the Dora crap he can carry. Brennan wants something to drool on and put in his mouth ... wait, that sounds like what any male would want.

 

So life trudges on. The kids grow, we stay tired and the beat of life is giving me an irregular heartbeat. Until next time ...

 

 

Just a quick post on the Halloween activities.

 

Planning for Halloween at the Fraser household begins weeks in advance of the actual date. First and foremost on the list of items to accumulate are the costumes, followed closely by the pumpkins and decorations. This year Sarah was dressed as an "adorable witch" (according the costume packaging but would have been accurately described as such by anyone who saw her) and Brennan was a cow. I thought a little Don Juan costume would have been appropriate for him but apparently pint size costumes are limited to farm animals.

 

Jess and I, back in early October, took our 2nd annual trip to Andrew's Scenic Acres to pick some pumpkins and raspberries.  This year Sarah was more mobile and able to pick some fruit on her own. If the owners were smart they would weigh her upon arrival and then when leaving, as I am sure she ingested a pound or two's worth of raspberries. After being given her own container and shown how to pick, she was off to the races. Oddly enough she did not actually try and eat any of the berries and had amassed quite a tidy little pile in relatively short order. 

At some point I decided a treat was in order but was fresh out of Arrowroots, so I decided some unpaid for fruit might do the trick. She tentatively tried one berry and upon discovering it didn't take like toasted horse crap, decided that eating every berry within a 5 mile radius was in order. Unbeknownst to her there were ants and other miscellaneous critters mixed in with the berries ... not a big deal when considering their high protein content but Jess wasn't crazy about the idea of Sarah biting into an ant or worm. While I was able to pry the basket away from her, the raspberry bushes surrounding her proved too much of a temptation and she continued grazing until I popped her into her wagon and hurried along to the pumpkin patch.

 Sarah was initially not much interested in the big orange balls in the middle of the field, but after some cajoling decided to help pick out several suitable pumpkins. Brennan was sleeping peacefully and decided early on that the 3rd annual trip to the fruit farm would be his time to shine.

 

Prep work for Halloween this year included teaching Sarah to say "trick or treat", which came out sounding more like "tik o teet" ... this upped the cute factor and ultimately let to more junk food per house than originally envisioned. Jess also decided that the standard happy face carved into the pumpkins was boring and common, so this year she purchased stencils and power pumpkin carvers. While the pumpkins did turn out quite well I think that the combination of power tools and fruit is a disturbing development ... but that could just be me.

 

Lloyd and Claire made the trip down for Halloween again this year, providing us with the ability to take the kids out while Claire hands out the candy to the beggars. Brayden, Jen's son, decided that going door-to-door with Sarah might yield more candy, so the two kids walked hand-in -hand to the doors while Jess, Jen, Lloyd, Brennan and I tagged along to make sure nobody screwed our kids out of their deserved junk food.

 

The first couple houses were a challenge, mostly because Sarah thought that people opening their doors and offering candy was an invitation for her to enter their home and kick back. After a few lessons from Brayden she got the hang of it and became quite adept and grabbing 2 or 3 treats from people.

 

One stop on the route was the Calabrese home. Pig likes to ham it up a little and play the music to Halloween in an attempt to give kids already on a sugar high another reason to wake up screaming in the middle of the night. Most kids aren't old enough to get the reference and think Pig is probably playing some B side tunes from Barney's Greatest Hits. Sarah didn't flinch and decided that her relationship with Bev and Wee Wee warranted a few extra bags of cheesies.

 

We called it a night after the Calabrese home. Sarah was pooped from her trip earlier in the day to downtown Oakville, where merchants gave out candy to the thousands of pre-school kids roaming the streets at 10am on a Monday morning. While she doesn't actually like chocolate, the abundance of chips made her quite happy, as did the promise of doing it all over in 12 months.

It has been some time since the last update, and the constant reminders of such have produced the desired result.

First off let me say if Dussiaume is reading this then you are a jackass!! You can't ridicule the idea of writing a blog but then continue to read it ... very duplicitous (yes, that is a word jackass!).

 

Brennan is growing faster than Ray's belt size at Christmas. He turned 4 months on October 25th and is over 16 pounds. He is able to roll from his back on to his side; he grabs at everything within reach (including the light reflected off of Lloyd's head); he loves taking baths and kicks up a storm, which has forced us to don Maid of the Mist type rain ponchos; he is beginning the teething process and  drools like Luigi after an all night bender; and he still does not sleep through the freakin'  night.

 

Brennan's baptism was earlier this month in Sudbury. I know what you are thinking, "why in the hell would you go to Sudbury?". Well, it is easier to drag our butts up there than it is to ask the 30 people in Sudbury to come down south, many of which would be expecting free lodging and meals ... well, at least Andy would.

Luigi and Bev are Brennan's godparents, which, when combined with Chris and Sonja being Sarah's godparents, means our kids are in for some troubling years. With Luigi's penchant for inane babble and Chris' facility to heap ceaseless ridicule on innocent bystanders, I can only assume that they will grow up with a healthy dose of self-confidence and an ability to talk to autistic kids, or they will be found cowering in the attic.

 

Getting back to the baptism, we found ourselves deciphering the words of the priest and cringing every time he referred to Brennan as "she". We originally intended on having Chris' father, Randy, complete the trifecta - blessing our marriage, baptising Sarah and baptising Brennan - but the absurd rules put in place by the Catholic Church served as a roadblock. Jess and I weren't all that interested in chasing down letters of approval and participating in a weekend course on how to raise our child as a good catholic (my opinions on the catholic church are best left for another day). Suffice it to say that we did what most people do when faced with such a dilemma ... we found a way around it and took the easy way out.

 

The baptism was nice, Bev kept Luigi in check and we left Sudbury thankful that it might be our last trip for 8 months.

 

Sarah is holding steady in her terrible 2 stage. I am amused by the fact that every time I say the word "no" she tries to win the Academy Award for best dramatic performance by a minor in a supporting role. She flops down on the nearest soft surface (she is very particular about where she lays down), cries for her mommy and screams about the injustices of the world as only a 2 year old can do.

On the flip side, she is becoming quite the cute big sister, playing with Brennan and attempting to shove a bottle in his mouth whenever he so much as emits the tiniest peep. Sarah routinely gives Brennan hugs and kisses but does not fully appreciate her strength, sometimes grabbing Brennan for a hug with such force that his life flashes before his eyes. I can't be certain but I think I saw him mouth the words "please God NO!" the last time she grabbed him for a hug.

 

Sarah has also refined her palette, resulting in a somewhat limited menu around the Fraser house. her life would be nearing nirvana if every meal consisted of breaded chicken, french fries and peas. She still doesn't talk in sentences but to date we aren't sure if that is a good thing or a bad thing. She is back swimming again and has no fear of the pool but does not fully appreciate the fact that trying to free herself from our grasp means she will drown.

 

All in all it is status quo. Everyone is doing fine and Jess is gearing up for Halloween, then Christmas. I figure that with 2 kids out trick or treating I should have enough candy to last until the Christmas baked goods come out, which might just be when the next update is posted.

As most people can probably tell by now, I am not one for general daily updates. The routine of life is hardly worth carrying on about, not to mention the obvious fact that time is a precious commodity. However, it has been some time since the last update so here is a recap of recent developments at casa di Fraser.

 

Brennan has, thankfully, passed the colic phase but shows no apparent desire to sleep thru the night. Anyone who is reading this is likely very familiar with the dedication and zeal that Sarah, Jess and I take in our approach to sleeping, so having an early riser on our hands is a little distressing. I am hopeful that we can break him of this nasty little habit sooner rather than later. Truth be told, most nights he is up around 3 or 4am and then again at 7am, so it isn't terrible but it can be taxing.

 

I have been considering a nicknames for Brennan but Jess is not fond of the one I have chosen - "Cherry Popper". I am trying to ensure that he begins life with a healthy dose of self-confidence, so reciting the mantra "heart breaker and virginity taker" in conjunction with calling him the little 'cherry popper' seems completely reasonable to me. As for Sarah, she is going to be an independant and strong ass kicker, but calling her "pooper" doesn't seem to jive with the vision, so I am diligently working on a PG friendly nickname.

 

Back to the update ... Brennan doesn't crap his pants 7 times a day anymore, which is a relief. But when he does go it is ridiculously huge, one of those spilling-out-the-sides dumps that makes grown men fight back waves of nausea. And the smell ... brings me to my knees and pray to God for forgiveness - I figure I must have done something wrong in a past life to warrant the punishment of changing his crap filled diapers.

 

Sarah is stringing together more words now, which is so unbelievably cute that I feel I should be taping her 10 hours a day. When asked what her name is she will quickly respond with "I Sawah". She sort of counts to 10, often skipping 4, 5 and 6 and going straight to 7,8 and 9 because those are her favorite numbers. She loves to "read", or more aptly look at the books and tell us the details of the story from memory.

 

Brennan sits in his exersaucer now but obviously isn't doing much other than watch Sarah wreak havoc. He smiles quite a bit, often excited by the sound of Jess' voice or the light off of my forehead. Jess brought him to the doctor and he is weighing in at 14 1/2 pounds and right on track in terms of expected growth.

 

Next update will hopefully be coming sooner rather than later.

People are having children later in life, and it makes me wonder about the sanity of the general population.

 

While most couples having children are under 30, the over 30 crowd is gaining ground every year. Births among women 30-34 is up by 6%, 35-39 by 4% and women over 40 by 2%. All of these people are having children later in life because they want to minimize the impact on their careers, get themselves on a more stable financial footing, buy a home, etc.

 

Jess and I fall into the over 30 crowd, and we cited the same reasons as everyone else. What we didn't realize until now, is that having kids later in life means that the physical and psychological demands increase at the same time the energy levels begin to fall off.

 

Having one child is demanding, having 2 is a hell of a lot of work. Sarah is over 2, fully mobile and able to do some things on her own. However, she also wants to play a lot more and the demands of keeping up with her are increasing. Brennan is still an infant and requires constant care, so the balancing act is delicate, to put it mildly.

 

So what does this have to do with potty training? Everything. Potty training requires constant supervision, prompting and child management. It increases the demands significantly, but at the same time it isn't like there is a magic pill out there that provides a boost in energy and calms the nerves ... okay, there ARE those types of pills but only with a prescription.

 

We thought that now might be a good time to potty train Sarah. The "experts" (another rant for another day) all say that there are some obvious signs parents should be attuned to - some measure of bladder control, the child mimics parental bathroom behavior, the child can communicate reasonably well and will be able to tell you when they need to go, etc. Sarah possesses all of these, so we thought it might be a good time to give it a try.

 

The same experts alll say that you have to keep the experience positive, don't make a big deal out of accidents and to realize it may take some time. Getting the initial potty training down might take a few days but getting a child fully potty trained i.e. no pull-ups at night, no accidents, etc, might take months.

 

Jess removed the diaper on Monday and talked to Sarah about going pee pee on the potty. Super Nanny suggests frequently asking the child if they have to go, thereby potentially heading off any accidents. Other experts say don't nag. We went with Super Nanny.

 

We would ask Sarah quite frequently if she had to pee. Occasionally this would elicit a "yes", so off we would run to the potty. She would sit there and look around but never went. To her it was all a game - see mommy run, see mommy wait with me, see mommy clean up my pee.

 

A couple days passed and two things became obvious - she was not ready and neither were we. Asking Sarah if she had to go pee was like asking asking a bank employee to explain the fees - you probably won't get an answer and even if you do it probably isn't germane to the conversation. She often wouldn't answer and when she did the answer was no ... at precisely the same moment she is squatting and creating Lake Sarah Pee Pee on the floor. The only success we had came on Monday evening when Jess noticed Sarah squating on the floor and grunting like a sumo wrestler, a sure sign that Mr. Brown Eye is about to make an appearance. Jess ran over and grabbed Sarah, plopping her on the potty before she was able to turn our creamy carpet and interesting shade of brown. Sarah squeezed out a partial loaf and we figured that might be the beginning of the trend. It was not to be, as was evidenced repeatedly on Tuesday. One concern was that she was beginning to become constipated, sure fire evidence that potty training had to be delayed.

 

Now a lot of people will say we shouldn't have given up but those same people probably missed the point of this article. Raising two kids is tiring and they can, with astonishing regularity, kick our asses. Add the colic cries of a 2 month old to the demands of a 2 year old and you have a recipe for short fuses and exhausted days. Sarah was just not ready and we probably pushed a little too early, as parents of two kids tired of changing two sets of diapers are apt to do. 

 

We will try again in a couple of months and see how it goes. Maybe we can rent a Dora the Explorer costume and show her how Dora goes pee on the potty (don't ask).

Today I saw a woman walking down the road dragging her 4 year old daughter by the arm, screaming at her and telling her she was "no good". So today I vent.

 

Someone needs to explain to me why there are so many "bad" parents in the world.

 

"Bad" parenting, as defined by me, is the abject lack of affection, discipline and communication in a child's life. Providing the basic necessities of life is not enough, we must ensure our children are prepared for a rapidly evolving world by being physically and emotionally secure, educated and possessing of sufficient knowledge and confidence to tackle life's challenges.

Admittedly, not every parent will raise the most well-adjusted honors student, but the effort to do what is right for your child is what matters. Further, it is our actions and not just intent that will ultimately decide what kind of person we send forth into the world.

 

Walk through a mall or down a street and you will encounter someone screaming at their kid, possibly spanking them or, my personal pet peeve, dragging them by the arm because they aren't walking fast enough. Go just about anywhere and you will endure kids screaming and behaving badly, showing a complete lack of respect to those around them.

 

Children learn behavior, they aren't born that way. Similarly, the way we parent will influence the way our children will raise their own children years down the road. It is the reason why children that are physically or sexually abused have a higher likelihood of committing those same acts against their own children or spouses. It is the reason why children raised in racist families continue the cycle of ignorant bigotry.

 

But it isn't like there is a dearth of resources available to guide us on the journey. Books, classes, family/friends and TV all inundate us with parenting tips. Granted, if a parent simply does not care or seemingly desires to warp their child's mind with racist or sexist stereotypes, all the Dr. Phil in the world isn't going to help.

 

We have all heard someone say, at one point or another, that people are required to get a license to drive a car but any ass can become a parent.

 

Leaving aside those people show an absence of common sense or desire to improve the lives of their children, it is the well-intentioned people who raise demonic offspring that confuse me.

 

In the U.S. 66.8% of US households have basic cable. That means there are a lot of people out there with access to television shows that provide information on "how to" parent, ranging from the hokey Dr. Phil to the fix-it-in-a-week Super Nanny and Nanny 911, to the more interesting shows that use real psychologists who actually delve into child behavior. In the case of the latter, the Life Network's  'Life's Real Families" with Michael Weiss is a must see - you won't always agree with him but at least he puts things into perspective.

 

Jess and I approach parenting as a constantly evolving dynamic between us and the kids. We walk in lockstep, ensuring that we agree on how to approach an issue rather than confusing the kids with mixed messages.

 

Last night I asked Sarah to help pick up her toys, which were strewn across the family room like land mines in Afghanistan. After months of work and discipline it was an enjoyable experience to get help from her last night as we cleaned up. She ran back and forth to her bedroom putting her dollies to sleep (aka dumping them in a toy bin); she put her blocks in the bag and picked up miscellaneous toys.  Admittedly, I did have to prompt her a few times but months of parenting work have finally paid off.

 

We did have a minor setback when she pitched a hissy fit and refused to go to bed, but like all things that was dealt with appropriately and instantly.

 

She is a happy, well-adjusted child who listens to us (mostly) and even helps out from time to time by picking up dropped items without much prompting. Is she perfect - hell no. She is 2 and slightly precocious, beginning to exercise her democratic right to say "no" 1000 times a day, but she is beginning to understand that there are things she can decide (yogurt or fruit; book A or book B) and things she can't (don't go near the stove, bedtime, etc).

 

We do not profess to be the perfect parents but Jess and I do pay attention to the nuggets of wisdom gleaned form the TV parenting shows and friends and family. We want our children to be independant, capable of understanding that the decisions they make come with consequences. We let them make small decisions today so they can understand and appreciate the significant ones tomorrow.

 

Raising kids isn't an exact science - you just have to care. Nobody knows how their young children will turn out 10, 15 or 20 years down the road, and possibly despite our best efforts and intentions they still make some bad decisions. But caring today may head off the mistakes in the future.

 

Hopefully that lady I saw today figures it out, for both their sakes.

 

 

All parents with two or more children will inevitably draw comparisons between the older and the younger child.

 

If the older one was the spawn of Satan then the second child will be viewed in a favorable light, often likened to the incarnation of all that is perfect in newborns i.e. sleep well, eat well, no colic, can change his/her own diaper, can communicate using sign language, etc.

 

If the older child was "perfect" then the younger one has some lofty shoes to fill.

 

The problem is that we all forget that the seemingly perfect child is/was anything but. Relatively speaking their habits might have been more aligned to conform with what we think is ideal newborn behavior, but when we stop for a moment we remember that they also had some habits that pushed our patience to the limit. We then realize that each child is unique and we begin to embrace that uniqueness. Really, who wants kids that are carbon copies of each other?

 

However, embracing the unique nature of each individual means we take the ideal with the troublesome. And to be sure, the acceptance of this awareness is definitely called into question during difficult times, when we all long for the challenging behaviors of one child to alter so that they reflect the ideal behaviors of another.

 

On the weekend Jess and I found ourselves in just such a situation. Brennan is an eating machine, wailing for a bottle every 2 to 3 hours. As previously mentioned he is a grazer, meaning he will sometimes eat small amounts to satiate himself and then fall blissfully quiet just long enough to lull is into a false sense of serenity. Then WHAM, he strikes again with that fever pitched scream! You can practically decipher the "get off your lazy asses and give me a bottle" tone coming from the crying.

 

Jess and I fell into the trap of comparing him to Sarah and her relatively efficient way of eating on a regular schedule and for preset amounts. Not this kid ... 2 ounces, 3 ounces, 5 ounces ... there is no telling how much he will want to eat or when. We came to the realization that irrespective of how desperately we wanted him to mimic the eating patterns of his older sister he was not game. We started to look at alternatives.

 

On Saturday we decided it was time to start feeding him Pablum. The rationale was that solid food would tie him over for a longer period of time and help reduce the amount of formula this kid sucks back. Granted, most children don't advance to this point until 4 months of age but he is eating a LOT of formula and most kids aren't 12 1/2 pounds by 6 weeks.

 

He took to the stuff like a fish to water but we were surprised when, 2 hours later, he was crying for his bottle!! My first thought was "holy crap, you have GOT to be kidding me!" My second thought was that we were going to have to take out a second mortgage on the place when he is a teenager to pay for the grocery bill.

 

Jess started with 1 tbsp and then upped it to 2. He ate almost the full 2 tbsps and was STILL asking for more food a couple hours later!! At this point he will have to live with what he is getting because too much too soon can lead to some obvious complications. I briefly wondered if he is old enough to handle steak and eggs, which might be the only thing that would tie him over for a few hours, but Jess vetoed that idea.

 

For all of you out there that think Pablum is the answer ... YOU'RE WRONG!! I am hopeful our pediatrician might yield a nugget of wisdom when he goes in for his 2 month visit on Thursday but I am fairly certain we will be left to our own devices.

 

As we sat in the family room on Sunday and Jess fed him, again, she briefly shuddered, turned to me and said "can you imagine if I was still breast feeding!?!?" I had a vision of what it might look like to have Brennan duct taped to Jess' chest to simplify the ongoing feeding process but then quickly pushed that image from my mind and realized this too will pass.

The development of a child is often measured not in time but in milestones, or those events in the progression of life that are significant not just to the individual himself/herself, but also to those around them.

A child under 5 seems to have watershed moments seemingly once a week. For those uninitiated amongst us, children progress rather quickly and parents obsess unendingly about their development, especially when we make the classic mistake of comparing our children to those around us. We often forget the bullshit factor when listening to other parents espouse how little Johnny or Amber was able to recite the alphabet at 18 months and could calculate the square root of 144 at 24 months. Apparently the fact that little Johnny was still drooling and eating his own snot was not indicative of his genius IQ!!

 

Sarah progressed pretty much according to what all the "experts" say. She was a little late in the walking game but that is probably because Lloyd was inclined to carry her everywhere and she was smart enough to know that being carried was less work than walking.

 

Brennan has a bunch of milestones in sight, some of which we are more excited to see him reach than most people can imagine - sleeping longer during the night, which is supposed to happen around the 6-8 week mark; the passing of the high risk SIDS phase and colic at 3 months; teeth, which starts pretty much any time after 3 months and seemingly never stops; eating solid foods, which can start with pablum at 4 months; crawling, maybe as young as 6 months; walking at 10-15 months; talking in a language that is discernible to the human ear (I think animals can understand what a baby is saying but definitely not any human I know of); etc etc etc

 

Brennan seems to be fighting the first milestone, which is the one we so desperately want and need. All parents, at some point, gaze down upon their screaming child at 4am and ponder that one important question - can I afford a live-in nanny who will get up with this insomniac in the middle of the night? Or more importantly, why can't the pharma companies come up with children's sleep aids??

 

Last night he slept for about 4 hours, which is a long stretch for him. We are hopeful that over the next 2 weeks he will slip into a pattern of sleeping for 5 or 6 hours at night, much the same way Sarah did. We are also looking forward to the end of his colic, which in truth is not so bad. He has his moments, as all babies do, but a little gripe water and some earplugs for us seem to work the trick (my personal preference is to turn up the TV really really loud but Jess said that is bad parenting ... is it still bad parenting if I am watching a show about parenting really really loud?? must discuss this with her).

 

The kid is turning into an eating machine. He eats up to 5 or more ounces every 3 hours. Jess often laments the fact that she spends most of her days sitting on the couch feeding him, but on the flip side she is grateful she is not breastfeeding, otherwise the kid would be permanently attached to her boobs.

 

Sarah has taken to him quite nicely. She tries to play with him, kisses him and wants to help change him. She often refers to Brennan as "my baby". Speaking of Sarah, she is turning into chatty Cathy. The kid can talk for hours on end, the exact topic of her endless dialogue is still a mystery to me. Like other parents I prefer to think she is attempting to explain the theory of relativity to me but in reality I think she is trying to tell me why Dora can walk around the jungle without a gun. 

 

Other important facts about the kids:

Having kids can wreak havoc on a social calendar. We used to revel in the simple pleasure of going to a movie on a whim, going to a mall without first considering the feeding habits and bowel movement schedule of children, and going to a driving range or golf course to whack the hell out of a little white ball minus the requisite 3-month planning for a babysitter.

Not that we would change anything, but having kids definitely requires some adjusting.

 

So it was with great pleasure that I accepted an invitation from Ray to go golfing while in Sudbury, which comes with the added bonus of not having to mortgage the house to pay for the round.

 

The 4some was to include myself, Ray, Darrell and Andy. For those of you that know Andy his attendance was predicated on the assumption that some fat bastard in Sudbury didn't take a monster dump and cause the water treatment plant to pull out the industrial strength Roto Rooter. When it comes to Andy the only thing you can count on is that he NEVER turns down an over-time shift, so we were hopeful that sunny skies and a local diet heavy on blueberries might yield the required result. I will cut to the chase and tell you that Andy found something better to do, probably fishing tampons out of the treatment pool (or whatever the hell they call those big vats of polluted water). Darrell was also a no-show, so Lloyd (aka my dad) was activated off the waiver wire and shoved into the rotation.

 

Driving to the course I found out that we were playing 9 holes at a par 3 course. Since having the kids I have played a grand total of 18 holes of golf in 2 years and picked up the clubs a handful of times, so a par 3 course was a little disappointing, but I thought it might well suit my skill level given the protracted time of my absence from the game.

 

The first hole proved to be interesting with a water hazard on the left. First up was Ray, hacking the ball into the brush 20 feet out. I stifled my sarcastic comments because my own first shot, with no warm up, might prove equally embarrassing. Lloyd hits next and drops it 30 feet out but in the clear. By now my tongue is bleeding but I figure there will be ample opportunity in the coming holes to ridicule and embarrass. My turn, and oh what a shot it is ... barely clears the tee box. Quickly pointing to the fact that I have not golfed or hit a ball in a VERY long while I pull out the often used "mulligan" option, that is to say, I get to retake my shot cause, well, I want to. The next one sails out true and clear and sets me up nicely for a second shot to the hole.

Seizing the opportunity, Lloyd announces that he is going to take a mulligan, as does Ray. What the hell, it gives us all a chance to ease our way into the game. Ray's second shot sucks and Lloyd's doesn't, so off we go.

To make a very long story a smidge shorter I will tell you that I shot par, Ray an 8 or some ungodly score and Lloyd shot a 6.

 

Second hole is more water. It is only the second hole and already I am wondering why some moron put so much damn water on this course. How many balls am I supposed to lose? (no, this is not a reference to my impending vasectomy). Ever wonder where all the driving range balls come from? The guy who owns this course pulls them out of the drink and sells them to every golf course in North America. 

Mine goes in the pond, Lloyd's goes in the pond and I think Ray hit a squirrel. I decide to play "point of entry", meaning I will drop the ball and shoot 3 from the point where the ball entered the water. Of course, this is not strictly legal on a par 3 but absence from the game has ensured my selective recollection of golfing rules is now a bigger issue than before. I chip in for par, Lloyd almost kills a frog with his pitch over the green that looked like an Air France plane trying to hit the runway and Ray tries to figure out how come a putter doesn't work so well in the long rough. Par for me, another ungodly score for Ray and Lloyd shoots a 6.

 

Holes 3 thru 6 - more god damned water, lots of lost balls and greens the size of an Oakville backyard. After the first couple of holes I was counting on a par round, which was quickly shattered by my inability to hit the ball without hooking the damned thing. Now the comments are flying, but more times than not I feel the need to be self-deprecating cause my game is horrendous ... not as bad as Ray's, but it does come close at times. Lots of hideous scores, and not just from Ray.

 

Hole 7 was the capper. Over a pond on to a small green. I step up, whack the ball 10 feet and almost decapitate a duck swimming by. I tried to warn him by making duck sounds with my ass but apparently he thought it was a mating call. Lloyd steps up and puts in square in the drink. Ray takes his turn and smacks the ball but it is a line drive. I figured for sure it would hit the far bank and roll back in, but no, in typical Ray fashion it hits the water, skips on the water and lands on the green.

Ray is so ecstatic that his laugh and shaking belly cause a minor earthquake, sending the remaining animals that have not already sought shelter from the rain of death brought on by the three of us scurrying to the nearest golf ball fall-out shelter. I am dumb-founded. Lloyd decides to hit a provisional.

I had to ask ..."a provisional? what do you mean a provisional?".

He replies, "In case I can't play my first shot." Of course, now I think he is insane, or blind, because he damned well knows that his ball went in the drink.

"What do you mean 'in case I can't play my first shot'? The ball is in the water, about 30 feet from the edge and surrounded by weeds. Did you bring hip waders that I can't see?"

"I think it is playable" he said.

Ray is dying, I mean literally dying from the uncontrollable laughter that threatens to cut off his oxygen supply.

"Hit away" I said "but this is NOT provisional and you are hitting 3 off the tee."

Lloyd smacks it and almost kills another duck that was came landing in the pond, probably in an attempt to find the duck that was in heat (never had the heart to tell him it was just my gas that was warbling at an odd pitch because of all the sweat on my ass!).

2 balls in the water for Lloyd, one for me and divine intervention for Ray. I hit another ball but I state up front that I am hitting 3 off the tee. Thankfully this one lands on land ... not the green, but land all the same (now I know how Columbus felt). Lloyd decides to hit a mulligan.

"What do you mean 'mulligan'? You are only allowed one per round."

He feigns deafness again and hits the ball, which lands on the green. I think I actually heard a collective sigh from all the waterfowl in the area.

He turns around and says he will play that ball.

I am truly and honestly at a loss at this point. Rational explanation on why this ball should be played and why he isn't going to take the penalty shots is probably not forthcoming, so I give him a break and attribute it all to short-term memory loss.

Summary - I shoot a 7, Lloyd shoots a 5 (don't ask) and Ray shot a 5 or something (I am not so good with scores ... apparently it is a genetic trait I inherited from Lloyd).

 

The final 2 holes were excruciating. Balls flying all over the place, smacking trees and causing the Sudbury airport to wave off the one flight they get per week because of "unidentified flying Timbits" (only a person living in the Valley would think a white golf ball looks like a Timbit).

 

I was happy to finish and realized that 9 holes is just the right amount of golf for me. After playing so disastrously I am forsaking the game until at LEAST next year, when I hope to play again with Ray and Lloyd and see how many ducks we can bag using a 9 iron and Pro Staff.

Why won't the kid eat ALL his bottle in one sitting? Why does he force us to wait for an hour before he leisurely finishes off his bottle? These are the questions that have confounded scholars for centuries ... okay, maybe not the scholars but any parent trying to get a decent night sleep obsesses on such matters.

 

The fact is, we have a 'grazer' on our hands folks. Grazers are among us, even though they try and hide their shameful existence. You know the type - the person that eats every freakin' hour, mostly small amounts of food but just enough to drive the rest of the population crazy with their constant opening and closing of the fridge.

 

At first I thought this must be a genetic mutation, handed down by one of us, some recessive gene that precludes our offspring from finishing their meal in one sitting. But over the past few days I have been paying attention to the other three members of our little family and noticed that we are all quite content to satiate ourselves all at once. So this begs the question - what happened to Brennan? I can come up with only one logical answer - alien abduction and scientific experimentation.

 

I am confident that we can overcome this horrible little attribute that was implanted in our baby boy (DAMN ALIENS!!). Until that time, we shall remain sleep deprived and slaves to his eating whims.

 

I know what you are going to say - "have you tried a cold cloth", "have you tried feeding him in his diaper" - you name it we have heard it and tried it. The kid just blows us off and goes back to sleep. At least someone in the house is getting a decent amount of rest...

So I get the question at least once a day - 'how is Sarah dealing with the new baby???' Well, in a word, good.

 

She has always been a kid that can amuse herself and seems to find infinite pleasure in playing outside. Scooping up the gravel in our yard and dropping it under the deck is a recent addition to her playtime antics.

 

She does not really pay the baby much attention; rather, she seems quite content to go about her daily routine and only reacts to Brennan when he starts crying.

 

Her favorite activity is helping to change his diaper, although "helping" might be a bit of an overstatement. As soon as she realizes it is time for a change, she bolts into her room, picks up her stool that she uses to climb in and out of bed, and carries it into Brennan's room so she can stand beside Jess. She pulls out all the necessary diaper change products and gets them ready for use. Quite cute actually.

 

She is 25 months and has entered the "terrible 2's", albeit in a dramatically understated way. Everything is a big drama, which leads me to the conclusion that she is destined for a future in the arts. Every time she hears the word "no" or "put that down" or anything else she deems to be unpleasant, she throws herself down and starts crying, ocassionaly peeking to see if it is having any effect.

 

She shares extremely well, often giving us food out of her mouth!! She has been dancing for some time now and seems to prefer the jingles played during commercials. The issue with her dancing is that she seems to get her rythm from me, which is to say that she looks like she is having an epileptic seizure.

 

She isn't potty trained yet but then again I am not sure why she would ever agree to that! She can go for a crap any old time and never have to worry about it ... something I believe we should all aspire to! Lets face it, incontinence isn't really all that bad. How often did we wish for a pair of depends when we were lying in bed after a good drunk, dreading the long, dizzy trek to the bathroom only to emerge with wet feet because we couldn't aim in our inebriated state? Maybe that was just me.

 

Anyway, Sarah is an angel. Still too friendly and in desparate need of some street-proofing but all things in due course.

Brennan came into the world on Saturday June 25th at 10:44am. He weighed 9 pounds 6 ounces.

 

Everyone wants to know the basics so I will fill in some of the details here i.e. how is he sleeping, how is he eating, etc.

 

First the labor and delivery. Jess went to her OB on Thursday June 23rd for a schedule appointment. She was due on June 20th so we were hoping he would tell us to head over to the hospital right away and have the baby but no such luck. We found out she was 4 cm's dialated and would probably have the baby any day but he schedule an induction for Monday June 27th just in case.

On Friday at about 10:00pm Jess was feeling some discomfort and wanted to go to the hospital to get checked out. She wasn't having any labor pains per se but "lightening bolts" passing through her yoo hoo. So we called Jen Alger and she came to watch Sarah while we made what we assumed would be a quick trip to the hospital. I brought her delivery bag just in case.

We got there and the OB on call finally checked her out at 1:30am. She was already 6cm's dilated and they weren't going to send her home. She was checked in and told the OB would break her water to get the process moving along.

Jess requested an epidural and the bonehead, I mean anesthesiologist, gave her one at 3am. The dumbass used the wrong needle and nearly crippled her.

The OB popped her water at 3:30am. The labor pains were soon to follow but much to Jess' dismay the idiot who administered the epidural had screwed up and only one side of her was frozen. The baby was causing some back labor and she was in a lot of pain. They didn't want to give her another epidural because she was too far along. After a few hours of her writhing in pain the dumbass came back and "topped her up", meaning he gave the epidural a little extra shot to help with the pain, but that didn't really work either.

Finally the time came to push. She started at 8:30 and tried to get the baby to come out. He was facing the up instead of down and wouldn't drop. After 2 hours of pushing I wanted the OB to come in and do something because Jess had no energy left to push. Just as he walked through the door the baby crowned and was born at 10:44.

 

Eating. Brennan started eating 4 ounces of formula or breast milk after just a few days. He eats every three hours (beginning of one feeding to the beginning of the next). He lost some weight in the first 24 hours, as all babies will, but quickly regained it because of his appetite. The issue with him is that he falls asleep after the first 2 hours and nothing, and I mean nothing, will wake this kid up. We tried stripping him down, putting a cold cloth on his face, turning on all the lights, etc and if he doesn't want to eat there is nothing we can do. Usually he will wait a bit and eat the rest but this is not the preferred course of action at 4 in the morning!

 

Sleeping. He is a newborn so all he does is sleep. He sleeps well at night between feedings and is awake in the morning and evening. We hope he will be a good sleeper like Sarah (she sleeps from 9pm to 9am!) but it isn't likely that lightening will strike twice.

 

Jess is doing fine and we are adapting to the new addition. Getting into the swing of things this time around is easier but life is more challenging with a 2 year old and a newborn.  So far Brennan has been to a few restaurants, a drive-in, the mall, a water park and Wal Mart a few times. As long as he is in his car seat he is happy.

 

More entries to follow...