Happy Birthday/Mother's Day/No-Bottle Day

What another fabulous weekend!!!

The boys had a wonderful birthday, in spite of the fact that I barely planned anything!

They had fun blowing out their candles in their ice cream and I even gave them seconds when they asked for it.

Dean ate his so fast, I barely had time to get the camera out before he was finished. He even ate the candle too. Can wax poison small children? I guess we'll find out.

Cary also ate his candle. My children either have PICA or they're just weird.

 Later on that night, Lester gave me a pre-Mother's Day gift to die for: He BAKED for me! My friend Angel, seeing my love for Morton's LEGENDARY HOT CHOCOLATE CAKE!, sent me a recipe for molten chocolate lava cake (or something like that). Lester tried his hand at it, and it was delicious!!! I ate two of them, hot out the oven, with ice cream on the side, and swooned from happiness. Thanks, Angel! Thanks, Lester!!!

On Sunday, Mother's Day, all three of my boys fixed me breakfast (pancakes, fried cinnamon apples, sausage and coffee) and then gave me beautiful cards and gifts.

They also sent a Mother's Day message to all the Moms in their lives. (Well, Dean did most of the messaging. Cary was too busy "READING!")

Later, my mom, Dad, my Aunt Fern (Mom's sister) and my Uncle Buddy and Aunt Pam (Mom's brother and sis-in-law) came to Baltimore to have brunch at the Rusty Scupper, overlooking the Inner Harbor. So they stopped by our house afterward. I loved having them over, and so did the boys. And Clair didn't get put down the entire time they were there, so she was in Heaven.

Aunt Pam, Auntie Fern, me and Mom. Happy Mother's Day to us!

It was a wonderful, wonderful, family-filled weekend. I was really very much at peace and feeling loved and blessed, and not stressed, all weekend long. That is a beautiful thing. Happy Mother's Day to me!


AND!!!

As planned, we sent the boys to bed last night without a bottle for the first time in their lives! Following my weekly weaning plan, they had already gotten down to only 2 oz. each, so I figured they might not miss it. Boy was I wrong! There was considerable crying from both boys -- but the hysterics came mostly from Cary. Deanie seemed to understand much more when we explained that only babies have bottles and they were big boys now. But Cary (as usual) didn't really care what we said. He flipped around in his crib and screamed bloody murder. He wailed and moaned like someone had died. He refused to sleep, refused his lovey, refused his blanket, refused comforting. He was really putting on the performance of a lifetime.

I was feeling very determined as a mother to cross this bridge, but I was also feeling quite sad for him. It's Mother's Day! And I'm torturing my child. Also, I had to bathe Clair and put her to sleep. And also Mad Men was coming on in an hour or so! I needed this child to sleep!!

So after 45 minutes and several times of me going in to comfort him and reason with him, finally Lester went in and firmly told him enough was enough and it was time to go. to. sleep!

And you know what? He did. Just like that. Not a whimper out of him for the rest of the night.


Yes, it was Mother's Day, and yes I am a darn good Mom, 95-percent of the time. But I've said it before and I'll say it again: Thank the good LORD for fathers. :-)

(Note: One night bottle-free down. The rest of their lives to go. Pray for us!)

(P.S. This is my LAST WEEK of maternity leave. Waaaaaaaah! :-( )

In celebration of moms who say "Yes."

Mother's Day is coming up. Since it is the same weekend as my boys' birthday, it's likely to get short shrift.
So I thought I'd post a little something now about my Mom.

There are a lot of things I could say about her: she's an amazing homemaker, a fabulous teacher, an accomplished career woman, a fantastic cook, beautiful, (see photo above) smart, fashionable, handy, crafty, loyal, kind and hard-working. She sets a wonderful example for me, my two sisters (and two brothers, for that matter) and her grandchildren. I'm proud of her every day.


But the thing that impresses me the most about her is her strength. My mother is the strongest woman I know.

Let me tell you a little story about her:

When she discovered she was pregnant with me at 18, her stepfather, not condoning her unmarried state, kicked her out of the house. It was the early 1970s and he was old-school.

She was a student on a full scholarship at Tufts University in Boston, with no money, no place to live and a baby on the way. She had very few options. Some people suggested she "get rid" of her "situation." And if she did, who would've blamed her? I'm pro-choice myself, so I can understand her dilemma.

But my mother decided to do the harder thing. She decided to say "Yes" to this gift that had been handed to her unexpectedly. She decided to be a mother.

She dropped out of school, moved in with a family friend. She applied for a job that required she have a car. She lied and said she had one. Somehow she pulled together enough money to buy something barely drivable, but good enough to get her to work and back. It was a 5-speed, which she didn't know how to drive. Over the weekend, she taught herself, with the help of friends, to drive it. That's how determined she was to be able to support herself and me.

She worked hard, and finally got an apartment of her own. She took care of me by herself until she and my Dad -- who had reunited six years later -- got married and moved to Washington, D.C. Just the two of us, me and my Mom, we had a wonderful life. We were dirt poor, but I never knew it. Our house was warm and clean and full of things a little girl wants -- Barbies and doll houses and Lite Brite, spaghetti and chocolate pudding and endless games of "I Declare War."

I can't imagine how hard those years must have been for her, first as a homeless, pregnant teen, and then a single mother whose dreams of a college education had just been obliterated.

But all I remember growing up is love. I remember making Jell-o pudding on the stove in the little kitchen in the apartment on East Concord Street with her. And her letting me wash the dishes, with a plastic trash bag tied around my body to keep me from soaking my clothes. I remember my little bedroom, with the pink canopy bed and little wooden table and chair set. I remember her coating my face in Calamine lotion when I had the chicken pox, and us pretending to be Indians, all painted for war. I remember watching "Happy Days" with her, and begging to stay up past my bedtime to watch "Laverne and Shirley." I remember her saying, "Yes."

How strong my mother must have been to have made the decisions she made. The decisions that brought me into this world and helped make me the person I am. What inner resolve and tenacity. What courage. I don't know that, given similar circumstances, I would have been so able.

When I was a cub reporter in my early 20s, working at The Kansas City Star, a co-worker gave me the best compliment I've ever received. She told me that a friend she'd introduced me to told her later, "Tanika is the kind of person who you can tell never doubted for one minute that she was loved."

That stuck with me in such a profound way. I'd never thought about it that way, but it was so true. No matter her circumstances -- even when it was a detriment to her own personal success or desires -- my mother put her love for me first. And she continues to do that for me and my siblings today.

I am so lucky that I have a mother who, when the world was telling her "No," she chose to say "Yes."

 

I love you, Mom! And I strive to be like you: the kind of mother whose children will one day project to the world that they never for one minute doubted that they were loved.

P.S. Happy Birthday, Tahira! Happy Birthday, Aminah!!!

Happy Day After Mother's Day!

I will never forget Mother's Day last year. My Aunt and cousins were in town, and my mother planned a huge seafood feast, complete with my favorite food of all time: lobster. Lester and I couldn't get to Mom's fast enough.

But I was heavy with two babies and downright miserable. I couldn't sit for long periods of time or stand without tiring. Climbing stairs was out of the question. And that day, I realized that eating was also a chore. I barely touched my bowl of sweet lobster meat, sprinkled with fresh lemon juice and soaked in melted butter. Mostly, I just laid on the loveseat in the family room, grumpy and uncomfortable. I couldn't wait for that coming Thursday, when I was going back to the doctor for my 35-week checkup, so the perinatologist could tell me if one of the babies was lodged under a rib and the other one stuck in my pelvis. 'Cause that is sure what it felt like.

My cousin -- who has three children -- watched me toss and turn on the loveseat, and said to me, "Honey, I hate to tell you, but you're not making it to Thursday."

I ignored her. I HAD to make it Thursday and to the following Thursday, too. I was determined to make it to 38 weeks, but if not, then 36 weeks was the absolute floor for gestation. Anything else would be a failure! I wanted that lobster, but if I had to suffer without it (and without sleep) for two more weeks for my babies' sakes, then I would do it!

Two days later, in the middle of the night, I woke with a start, feeling like I had wet myself in the bed. So I got up to go to the bathroom and water GUSHED down my legs and onto the floor. I screamed out to Lester, "Babe, wake up, my water just broke!"

As he rushed around getting the hospital bag (which was packed and ready for days) and calling the doctor, I stood in the shower, with my head against the wall and cried.

I was 34 weeks, 5 days. I hadn't made it to 38 weeks. I hadn't made it to 36 weeks. I hadn't even made it to 35 weeks!!! My babies weren't ready; they were too small, too young! I had failed as a mother -- and they weren't even here yet!

Later that afternoon, Cary was born at 4 lbs., 4 oz. Dean followed 90 minutes later at 4 lbs. 10 oz.
They stayed in the NICU -- mainly to eat and grow -- for two weeks and one week, respectively.
I worried about them fiercely! What would happen to them, having been born so early? Would they struggle? Suffer? I prayed that God would protect them and grow them, and help them develop normally -- despite my inability to keep them protected, growing and developing inside me.

Yesterday, my first Mother's Day, I looked at my two big, healthy, active, smart, hysterical babies and my heart smiled.

God had done it.

And I had not failed. These two precious nearly-1-year-old boys are proof positive of that.