I am Balance

My boss talked to me about branching out and said he appreciated that my last profile (on the pilot kid) wasn't about babies or families or moms. I said, "I try to do every other ..." and he interuptted me. "The newsman in me says you're overdoing it. That your your personal beliefs need to be kept in check for you to remain professional. But then I stopped and thought ... aren't we all parents? Aren't half of us moms? The newMAN in me, I think needs to shut up some, because moms are definitely an underserved part of our readership. You have brought a voice to our paper that it was sorely missing before. So I hate for you to start to second guess yourself since I've said something. But I decided you'd probably rather have the feedback than not. I really liked your pilot kid profile, I felt like I had a real sense of who he was after reading it. ... (goes on to nitpick a few things in it, and is right about two of three of them) ... I sit there, dumbfounded.

Complemented? You bet. But also confuzzled. Not counted Mama Talk, which is duh, supossed to be about babies, I've done like six profiles in the year that I've been here. Only two were about babies.

first one: LLL leader
second one: musician, guy who won Grays Harbor Idol
third one: Jewish dude who saves oceans and made up stories so he could feel important
fourth one: blind guy with guide dog
fifth one: midwife
sixth one: pilot kid.


Seriously, you think I'm overdoing babies/families/motherhood? huh? there was a profile about a woman who invented a baby safety product (the baby bath gate) that wasn't even BY me, but everyone thought it was, just because it had to do with babies. Is it that hard to read the byline? Apparently, yes.

Brown paink

I have the hardest time not talking like Ben all the freaking time. It's just so darn cute that he says "paink" instead of "paint." Anyway, I chose a nice dark brown color that matched the tree trunks on his dinosaur blanets. I decided brown was a boyish color that would grow up with him. Stephen agreeed until we got to the paint store (Ace, not Home Depot, as they have been mean to us recently) and he wigged out on me and started showing me bright blue samples. Uh, NO!

I can't handle neon blue walls, and there are already blue curtains in there and brown is a nice color that Ben will like just fine. Is it the most kidish color in the world? No, but it can be dressed up. We can get him an orange bean bag and a bright blue rug and some brightly colored dinosaur accessories. But trust me, by the time he's 9, he's going to think that dinosaurs are for babies anyway. This way, when he decides he needs a surfing theme or something, the brown walls will still be OK.

Plus I hear kids have a hard time settling down for bed in a room with brightly colored walls. Ha ha ha. Just what we need. More stuff keeping him awake. :-)

Assuming I get the painting done tonight, he'll be sleeping for the very first time in his very own room on Friday. (Which, interestingly enough, is his favorite day. He likes to shout "Fi-day!!! a lot. Why? No one knows.)

Wish us luck!

Carpet?

Ben was babbling in the backseat the other day, not an uncommon occurrence. It was our anniversary and I wanted coffee, so that's where we were headed. The whole way there, Ben's yammering 'Carpet carpet carpet" We can't figure out what he's saying until we pull into the Starbucks drive-thru and he points definitively at the Starbucks lady on the sign and shouts "CARPET!!!!!"

We listen closely, and yes, he is indeed trying to say Starbucks. It was coming out "ar-beck." My husband said that couldn't be it, because he had been saying that since we left home, long before he could see Starbucks, or even know that was where we were going from our route. But I said, "Yeah, but you said you were taking me out for coffee. So he said, "Starbucks!!!!"

He said, "I can't believe my baby knows what Starbucks is."

I am NOT a mother hen. I'm not I'm not I'm not!

Right now, at this very moment, my almost-13-year-old cousin is watching my not-yet-2-year-old son. Actually, he'll turn 2 a month after she's 13, but those few months make a much larger difference in his life than in hers. Anyway, my husband has a doctors appointment and I was originally planning to come home early, but since she was already here, we figured I could stay and get some work done and she could have a trial run before her big gig tomorrow. (She's baby-sitting while we go out for our fifth anniversary.)

I left my cell phone with her. I showed her how to call me at work. I made her repeat the ext. number back to me like 20 times. Which is silly, because its 123, and anyone can remember that. Except that sometimes people still forget. They remember that it was easy, but was it 111 or 123 or 321?

Deep breath.

It's an hour. She'll be fine. They'll be fine. Our house is almost 100 percent baby-proof. They'll just play with toys. Nothing will burn down. No one will need to call 911. There's no reason to call her and check in. Right? RIGHT?!?!?!?!?