Who Cares if There's Water in the Basement?

I debated whether I should post about my fourth stomach bug in three years. I feel I should write down some of the unhappy details of our parenthood or otherwise we'll only remember the good stuff. To which Bridges says "So what? Why do you want to remember the bad things?" Which just about sums up his wonderfully positive attitude about life.

Actually, even if I didn't write things down, I would still probably remember 10x more negative stuff than he would. It's just the way we're wired. But it's not all bad, because after some time these memories can be awfully damn funny. Just read Operating Instructions if you want a fine example. Now that I think about it, Bridges couldn't finish that book because it was too hard to read, whereas I thought it was hilarious. As I said, we're wired differently.

So I will just shortly summarize. Friday Clara is diagnosed with her sixth ear infection (a double) in ten months. She's on antibiotics. She's not sleeping well. Lee's having nightmares and is not sleeping well. Saturday I come down with terrible stomach cramps, which last for 36 hours (mercifully no vomiting this time around), and am now on my third day of diarrhea. The kind where you don't leave the house.

Let me just say that this has not been as bad as the rotovirus (or possible Norwalk virus) we got last year. Which hit us just one month after a 3-day stomach bug which involved Lee throwing up on Bridges' head while riding his shoulders through the mall (see, that's funny!). This nasty bug lasted six days and we were lucky Lee didn't end up in the hospital. One night her fever climbed over 104, at which point we yanked out the thermometer and dumped her in the bathtub at 3 am. She lost an unbelievable amount of liquids and was so sick she wouldn't even watch TV. I was nursing Clara at the time, somehow, between cleaning up bedsheets, Lees clothes, my clothes, etc... it was really awful.

But not to digress, let's get back to stomach bug #4, which for some reason has selected only me out of the family. Which I know is a good thing but somehow still seems horribly unfair. Sunday night I'm lying on the couch with pretty sharp stomach cramps, and Bridges tells me we've got water in the basement, which is coming up from the floor and flooding the west end of the house... as opposed to the east end in which we installed a brand new sump pump last summer. Poor Bridges, who has had very little sleep the past week because of the kids' not sleeping, spends the next three nights dealing with this (first just bailing by hand, then installing a second sump pump himself which turns out to be a learning experience), while I just lie on the couch.

I knew I was feeling better yesterday because I could spend some energy actually worrying about it.

The Power of Suggestion (or The Dreamcatcher)

Well, Lee's been having a tough time sleeping again. She's actually scared of sleeping because she's afraid bad dreams will come. She dreads the approaching nighttime, and says in the middle of the night "I wish it were morning." The other night we were up five times with her (and three times with Clara, but the details of those unhappy few days is another story).

We've tried a fair number of things. The light nights (yes, that's plural) weren't bright enough, so we have a lamp on in the room. The closet doors are shut tight. The door to the room is left ajar. She's got her blankie, and stuffed animals to protect her. We've talked with her about how we need our sleep, how she needs her sleep, etc....

So I mentioned this to my helpful friend Karen, who suggested trying a dream catcher to catch the bad dreams. For me the next step was going to be moving her onto the floor of our bedroom, and that's a hard thing to undo again, so I figured what the heck, we'll try one more night in her room with this crazy dream catcher idea.

I put her in her sleeping bag on the floor (this has been helpful previously because I take it bedcovers can be scary), and she sets up her stuffed animals as little sentinels and I hold, I kid you not, a fine-mesh kitchen strainer with a handle (because who has a dream catcher in the house?), and I dance around the room catching the bad dreams. Lee is fascinated with this process and has a huge smile on her face. I make sure I get even the tiny ones hiding in the corners of the ceiling. Then I leave the room, she goes to sleep, and sleeps soundly through the night. Two nights in a row.

As Lilly says, "Wow." That's about all I can say. "Wow."

Here she is, sound asleep under the sleeping bag with her animals at the ready.


I like that she put the United plane there. Just in case she needs to be transported away quickly.

Violet Beauregarde

I've mentioned that Lee likes to sit on the heating vents in our house. She's kind of like a cat that way, except that a cat would stay there for hours on end, whereas Lee doesn't stay put anywhere for very long.

This morning, in the dress she was wearing, Lee ended up looking like the blueberry girl from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Remember her? Violet Beauregarde. Gosh I couldn't stand her. I should really get a copy of that movie to show Lee. Although, both kids, without knowing anything about the movie, thought it was pretty funny anyway.

Room for Kids

We finally received the living room furniture that we ordered back in October. I hardly knew what it would look like since it had been so long since we'd picked it out, and was surprised at how big the storage ottoman is. Lots of room for feet on top, and kids inside.

Oh, Tiger

I would be remiss to not have a post about Tiger. Clara is very attached to Tiger. Lee has her blankie, but Clara's relationship with Tiger started much much earlier and seems much stronger. She loves Tiger and will not go to sleep without him. When she gets herself to sleep, she lies down , buries her face into him, and kind of moans until she's out. If she's rolling around the floor of the playroom with her face buried in Tiger, we know she's tired.

If she hasn't seen Tiger for a while (we half-heartedly attempt to keep Tiger in the crib during the day so that we don't have to execute the house-wide Search For Tiger before bedtime), she will grab him and just sniff and sniff. Then she starts to chew on his tail, and then she buries her face into him. Of course after a trip through the laundry, there is a bit of consternation at his new fresh scent, but he is soon accepted just like a two-week-old seasoned Tiger.


Tiger has a rattle in his head, so he softly jingles when shaken. This is often how we awaken during the night or in the morning - to the sound of Tiger jingling. We can also track her movements through the house if she's carrying him around.

Clara went through a period where she would throw Tiger out of the crib whenever we put her down. She would stand in the crib and cry, staring at Tiger far below on the floor. Of course this presents a dilemma - do we go back in the room and give her Tiger, thus teaching her that if she throws him out we will come back in the room? We always broke down rather early and went in and put Tiger back into the crib (imagining all the while that we'd be repeating this many times over the next hour or so), but nearly every time, she would immediately lie down, bury her face into Tiger, and go to sleep.

Candyland

Lee loves playing Candyland. She especially loves picking the "special cards," e.g the candy cane that sends you to the Peppermint Forest or the gumdrop that puts you in the Gumdrop Mountains. These cards can skyrocket you forwards, but can also send you back near the beginning when you are agonizingly close to reaching the Candy Castle.

The last six or so games we have played, I have picked nearly all of the special cards. I think Lee has had just two over all the games, and I have gotten the rest of them. I know that this is how Lady Luck works, but I really don't want to be on a special card streak when my daughter is heartbroken every time I pick one. She knows that she is expected to be a good sport and she does really well for a three-year-old, even saying "congratulations" when I pick yet another one. I feel for her because it is just so unfair, and eventually she does break down in tears.

Of course the irony of this is that out of those six games, Lee has reached the Candy Castle first (and thus won the game) five times. But to her winning is just not as thrilling as turning over her card and seeing a pretty picture of candy. I explain to her several times that you don't really want to pick a special card that's going to send you backwards, but she's not buying it. And towards the end of the last game I find myself saying, "Lee, what's really important is who wins. It's not about the special cards along the way."

No wait, isn't that backwards? Maybe she has the right idea after all.

A Thought on Happiness

I've been reading a blog written by two friends who have quit their jobs and are taking a series of trips over the course of a year. They are currently in Patagonia. As I read their blog, I find it interesting, and the pictures beautiful, and yet not once have I heard a voice in my head saying "I wish I were there."

Now this is amazing to me. I have been known in the past to be what some might call, oh, a bit restless. From the time I went to college, I moved often (every two years on average), and traveled a good deal both for work and play. One move took me to the UK where I was able to travel all over the world for work. It was wonderful. But when I look back now I am struck by how little I was able to enjoy being where I was because I always wanted to be somewhere else. Or maybe it's that I wanted to be somewhere else because I just wasn't happy where I was.

It has occurred to me that this is one reason I was meant to have children at 40. I know that ten years ago, if I were home changing diapers with friends hiking across glaciers, I would be itching to be in their shoes, or hiking boots as the case may be. Maybe I just got the travel bug out of my system, but I think it's more that I am just happy to put it all on hold for the moment.

Hmm...wanting to be exactly where I am. That sounds strangely like some form of happiness.