where's a band of gypsies when you really need them?

we have been in the throes of the terrible twos around here ever since our trip to florida. it started with a trip to a mall in ocala florida and evie's discovery of what i'll call "satan's rides". you know those coin operated little rides in malls. they look so innocent, but now i know.



once the child has had a taste of the rides, there is no stopping her jones. in this particular case she got to ride on three different rides, and easily agreed before the third that this was the "last ride".

hmm, she did seem to agree a little too easily.

the removal from the ride and the walking away resulted in her first mall tantrum. she was on the floor kicking and screaming yelling "evie ride choo choo train".

now i know what you're thinking. where's the video? well don't think i didn't want to get some for you. i had my camera in my purse and would have put my foot on her back and taken a video for you all if i didn't think that someone would call the cops on me, so my memories will have to suffice.

i finally carried her out of the mall screaming and pleading. people were staring at me, but mostly with the looks of people who understood.

since that time the tantrums have not really subsided. the trip home from florida could have been titled "tantrum at 37,000 feet". we were not loved on that plane, even though grandma gave us plenty of stickers to entertain ourselves with.



once we were home things seemed calm, for a while. the tantrums now seem to be over two primary issues:

1) evie be naked - she no longer wants to wear a diaper or any clothes, no matter the occasion

2) evie ride here - she no longer wants to ride in her carseat when there's a perfectly good console she could sit on in the car instead

mind you, these are not the only events that can trigger a tantrum, but there are pretty much sure things.

so, i ask again, where is that roving band of gypsies my parents always threatened to sell me too?

abc's, sort of

evie would sing her abc's for you, but there are just too many distractions.

happy family

happy family
Originally uploaded by jcampioni

i need to get around to writing more about our trip to florida, but here's a nice picture from the last day that sums it up. the smiles on all our faces say it all.

er, um, not quite...

so this morning i'm getting out of the shower and evie walks in. she points at me and says "mommy's penis!".

let's go over that anatomy thing again...

we're off to florida to see grandma & grandpa tomorrow!

i did it!

so i survived my first trip away from evie. i left sunday night on the red-eye for boston, with plans to return on tuesday evening. mike and evie drove me to the airport. evie and i held hands and she sang to me. she knew that i was going away on an airplane. kisses and i love yous and i was off to the plane. i was sad as i walked away from the car, but no crying.

i missed her.

she woke up on monday morning and told mike "mommy ride the airplane", then that's pretty much the last time she mentioned me. too busy having fun with dad.

i got home late last night, and peeked in to watch her sleep for a bit. she appeared to still be in one piece. in the morning i went in her room to see her when she woke up. first words out of her mouth? "daddy's turn."

yeah, she did fine.

25 more things about me - the motherhood/family edition

so i didn't want to make the original list all about evie & mike, so i decided to give them their own list.

1. i have a daughter named evelyn, we call her evie. she's named after my mom's stepmother, the only grandmother that i really knew. she was born on march 23, 2007

2. i gave her my last name as her middle name.

3. i always wanted to be a mother, ever since i was a kid.

4. when i turned 30, i realized that it might never happen for me, and i got ok with it.

5. in 2003, i walked into a room to watch a raiders' play-off game and met mike. i didn't know i was going to marry him, but i knew he was going to be something very special and important to me. our first date was six months later. we got married almost exactly one year after our first date. i was a few weeks shy of 37.

6. our wedding was planned in 10 days, and an amazing array of friends came together to help create the most amazing day i could ever imagine. it still makes me smile to think about any part of it. i felt beautiful and special.

7. i decided to wing my wedding vows, mike went first and completely blew me away.

8. it took us a year to decide we wanted to have a baby, then it took another year before i got pregnant. i'm pretty sure i got pregnant the night that we decided to give up.

9. i knew that evie was going to be a girl, even though the doctor's never told me. i figured it was because i was terrified of the idea of having a girlie-girl.

10. i did not really love being pregnant. months of cankles get old. pre-natal yoga helped.

11. i grew really attached to the name "guido" during the pregnancy - mike, not so much.

12. i took a couple of birthing classes, but they were unnecessary since she was breech and i had a scheduled c-section. piece of cake. i heal fast.

13. i felt exactly how i thought i would the first time i saw her. what i didn't expect was how much more i would love her every single day. there was no way i could have understood until it happened.

14. i used to put her to bed listening to tom waits "closing time". now i sing "time after time" and "country roads" to her. last week, she sang "time after time" to me. it was the best thing i'd ever heard.

15. i despise thomas the tank engine and anyone involved in its production. this is a repeat from my other list, but i thought it beared mentioning again.

16. i spend fridays with evie and a group of other moms and kids. it is a true luxury.

17. i love having dinner together every night as a family.

18. i wonder what the right thing to do is about religion. i was happy to have been raised catholic and to have decided that it wasn't for me. i'm not interested in a formal religion for myself, but i enjoyed the moral framework that it provided me growing up. i hope i will do the right thing, and that she will feel like she is part of something bigger than just herself.

19. i have a wedding ring, but i don't wear it because it is made of white gold, which it turns out contains nickel, which it turns out i'm allergic to. it's a beautiful carved ring with 5 small blue sapphires. someday i will get around to having it remade in a metal that i'm not allergic to.

20. i will be forever grateful to all of the people who encouraged me to become a mother.

21. i am much more vulnerable in the world now. there is so much more to lose.

22. i love how much mike loves evie.

23. i love how much evie loves mike.

24. i would rather hang out with mike and evie than do anything else.

25. i feel blessed.

25 random things about me

ok, this is a repeat of something from facebook. i received a note to put together 25 random things about myself. i enjoyed reading the lists put together by other people, and i enjoyed putting together mine (there are two, so this will be a two part post). i decided to add the lists here too, since this blog is sort of evie's baby book, so i want her to be able to read this someday, and i wanted to share it with folks who aren't my friends on facebook.

1. i can't believe that i'm 41 and i still rent an apartment.

2. my mom drives me crazy, and the longer i live, the more i realize i am like her - and the longer i am a mom, the more i appreciate her.

3. i love to eat pretty much everything, except lima beans. and i tolerate raspberries, but i don't see what the big deal is.

4. bjork scares me.

5. i'm proud that i grew up in a small town in upper michigan.

6. i'm proud that i got a degree in mechanical engineering, even if i haven't done anything with it in well over a decade.

7. i love living in san francisco, where anyone can be what they want to be and no one really minds. i don't even want to be anything particularly different, but i enjoy that others around me can be free. i wish people everywhere could be so lucky.

8. i wish that i could sing - you know, in a way that people liked.

9. i wonder what kind of person i'd have been if i was born before suffrage. i like to think i'd have fought for women's rights, but i wonder.

10. i love being at home with my family and to have friends come over. bonus points if they just stop by.

11. i wish i had a yard.

12. i feel blessed to have spent the last 18 months of my father-in-law's life close to him. he was a one-of-a-kind crotchety old man who helped me understand that there was room in my life to love more than one person, and that i wouldn't be giving up a thing if i had a baby.

13. i used to be a lot smarter, i swear. i think it mostly has to do with the degradation of my memory.

14. mike shows me he loves me by going to the atm and filling up the gas tank (two things i don't like to do), i show him i love him by cooking and keeping chocolate in the house. it truly is the little things.

15. i worry a little about raising my daughter in such an urban environment.

16. i hate thomas the tank engine.

17. i am surprised by how many friends i have after growing up a little bit of an oddball.

18. my dad is one of my best friends.

19. i wish i could go back and do my college degree all over again - i think i'd get so much more out of it this time around.

20. i still feel like an oddball sometimes.

21. i wish i could win the lottery without buying a ticket, cause it really does seem like money could make life easier.

22. i like to work.

23. i only get my hair cut every 8 months.

24. i would make a good benevolent dictator

25. i feel blessed.