In which I lock up my ‘Mother of the Year’ Nomination

We went to Disney on the 15th for a week. And then we came home, and real life resumed, which meant that aprox 48 hours after we got home, the husband got on a plane (”in da sky!”).

The husband is in Colorado this week and because of conflicting schedules I haven’t really spoken to him much. He’s working the ‘late’ shift on his show, and I have the ‘early’ shift with the toddler so we haven’t really been awake during each others free time.

Monday he was able to call before he started work. Three and I had already had a busy morning of errand running and I was in the process of putting away laundry. In to Three’s room I go, laundry in hand, husband on the phone while Three plays contentedly in the living room. I am in his bedroom for 5 minutes, tops. I walk out of the room laundry happily in its place and the door to our apartment is open. As is the outside door. And the toddler is not where I left him.

The next 60 seconds or so feel like an eternity. I tell the husband I don’t know where Three is, and I don’t really think he understands that at that moment, I didn’t know where the child was. I ran outside and he was no where to be found. I hang up on the husband. Shout to our neighbors across the way who were sitting outside and they hadn’t seen him either. And that’s when in my head I see an image of the bathroom door closed. I run back into the apartment open the bathroom door, and there is Three, giggling away.

He is so grounded.

The deadbolt in my new best friend.

Over / Under

Friday is our 6th wedding anniversary.

Crazy.

Normally, I would post a wedding photo. But the husband is turning 30 in less than a month, and he has become a wee bit sensitive to how much he has aged in the last few years. So, its Aruba instead.

We haven’t spent our anniversary together since we were in Aruba for our second. And that last two years we weren’t even the same time zone.

This year, the husband will actually be home. Sadly, he is home for about 36 hours before he hits the road again. I think he planned it this way. With that time frame it wasn’t even worth trying to convince him that a trip to Aruba would be the perfect way to celebrate. It is where we spent the last anniversary we actually were together for. After 3 years without him, I think the refresher course on how to celebrate together would be in order.

But alas.

We will be going out to lunch while Three is still in daycare after I get out of work. Or maybe we’ll just go see Toy Story 3. Its not an anniversary around here if we actually talk to each other!

What I want to know is if hitting the 6 year mark has busted through to the over of the under / over that I am sure was being bet on (either formally or informally) by our relatives. My mom scoffs at this idea, but with the great drama and resulting invitation wording switheroo that happened once we decided that the catholic church wasn’t going to have anything to do with our wedding/marriage, she managed to escape reading the RSVP cards that told us that our marriage was doomed, our kids would essentially be bastards, how dare we invite someone to a wedding where god would not be present, and my personal favorite: ‘you have ruined Mickey Mouse for us’.

Yeah, that was as fun as it sounds. I can laugh about it. NOW. At the time, not so much.

So far, the naysayers are pretty disappointed. I am not going to pretend that our marriage is perfect and that we never fight. Because we do. We are both part Italian. And I have some Irish in me. We are super stubborn people. But at the end of the day (okay, I admit it, sometimes the next morning) we always have way more fun together than apart. Even if I am not very good at admitting when I’m wrong.

Besides, what all the god-fairing catholic folks don’t know is that we have St. Claire watching over us.

I think she is why we never fight over the TiVo remote. Thus saving our marriage.

The Power of No

We are just going to ignore that I haven’t posted since like March, k?

Three’s vocabulary is growing in leaps and bounds. Frankly the breakthrough (somewhat guiltily) came by allowing him to watch too much TV. After watching Finding Nemo during the big storms this February, he became obsessed with it. Which left him begging for “ish” and the other words just followed. He was calling the husband ‘Pop’ within hours. He discovered truck, car, plane, and bus. I never knew a bus could be so freaking exciting until he learned to spot and say BUS!!!! It is always said with a minimum of 3 exclamation points, sometimes as many as 8. It has been absolutely fascinating to see happen. Since the first major breakthrough he has been adding 2 words or more a week.

Three continues to be a pretty easy going and happy kid. He generally goes along with whatever you want to him to do, although sometimes there is a small protest that must happen first. These protests are strongest around nap time. If Three were to ever go down for nap without screaming for 5 minutes before lying down I would think someone had abducted my child. He can be falling asleep in his lunch but once he spots the crib he is suddenly back to being fully awake. But Mama knows better!

About a week and a half ago on one of the weekdays that I don’t work, I put a protesting Three down for a nap. Nothing unusual about that. He woke up close to 3 hours later which was a little odd, he usually naps an hour, maybe 2. When he woke up, he was in a bit of a mood. Which I always have found to be unfair. Children should not be allowed to wake up from a nap in a worse mood then they were in when they went down for the nap.

The husband happened to be home that day. I think we were planning on going out to Starbucks for a snack (sidenote: Starbucks Double Chocolate Chip non fat no whip frappacino = heaven. And yes, I am so one of those people know who orders some obnoxious drink. I am not proud, but I am yuppie). Generally Three is totally into this plan as he LOVES Starbucks, especially their pumpkin bread. The child claps when we pull into the parking lot, and cries when we pass it by (additional sidenote: we may possibly go there WAY too often). So on this particular Thursday afternoon at the beginning of June, we figured a promised trip to ‘bucks’ as Three calls it for ‘bread’ would improve his mood dramatically.

Husband: Three, you want to go to ‘bucks and get some bread?

Three: NO!

And that is when our world as we knew it came to an end. Up to that point, Three had been an avid user of the word yes, adding to our description of him as easy going. But in that moment, the terrible two’s arrived just over 2 months early.

Someone hold me.