Saturday, January 05, 2008

And Now For Something Completely New... A List!

1. It is starting to feel like we are never actually going to move; it's just this hypothetical idea swirling around, which we occasionally discuss. I go to the realtor's website sometimes and take the video tour of our house just to "visit" it and remember that it's still out there, waiting for us. (Hopefully waiting for us, and not whoring itself out to other families to be bought out from under us. *Sniff.*) Also, another house in our current neighborhood, just across the street, went up for sale a few weeks ago, and they are asking ten thousand less than we are. Not good for The Desperates. Not good at all. I took their video tour and I think ours is nicer inside, but who knows what other people will think? I am obviously biased. And unfortunately, lowering our price significantly is just not really an option.

2. Kindermusik is over, and I am not re-enrolling Addy. I think I might try tumbling at the Y or something a little more... Unstructured, I guess. I just felt like it was the adults who were more into it than the kids were. The toddlers just wanted to run around and play, and most of the time weren't really participating anyways. Which meant four kids racing around laughing while four adults pranced in a circle to ethnically enriching music, trying to coax the kids to join us. It wasn't BAD or anything; Addy liked the other kids and enjoyed playing with the instruments. I just feel it was maybe a little overrated and not worth the expense. I think she probably enjoys the FREE church nursery just as much if not more.

3. My sister-in-law hooked me up with the website for an orphanage in Guatemala which does basically what I was wanting to do here awhile ago. I am going to try to donate to them on a regular basis, and I encourage you guys to go check them out too! Also in relation to my desire to DO something for underprivileged kids, I am going to take the advise of one of the commenters and look into being a teacher's aid once a week at one of our city schools. Has anyone done this before, and want to weigh in? (Not that everyone attending city schools is underprivileged, necessarily; it just seems more likely, at least in OUR city school.)

4. I have watched Barbie as The Princess and The Pauper roughly fifteen times since Addy received it for Christmas. I have caught myself several times now singing the songs while working around the house. Singing them with feeling.

5. I think I am reaching a healthier place in terms of body image (crossing fingers fervently.) I realize that I am pretty out of shape and could stand to get more active, but I am coming to terms with the fact that no amount of weight loss and/or physical fitness will change the stretch marks all over my hips and abdomen, and that my skin will probably remain weird and almost scar-like on a portion of my lower belly. I have been quietly (and not so quietly) grieving over this ever since Eli was born, though I haven't posted much about it. I guess it seems both shallow and kind of obvious to complain about post-baby body, but it really does bother me a lot.
Anyways, last night as I was putting Eli to bed, I experienced yet another one of those in-love kind of pangs for him as I snuggled in his chubby baby sweetness. Then I went to put my own self to bed, and as I was changing into my pajamas, found myself staring with hatred at my stomach for the zillionth time. And it just seemed so stupid, suddenly. Weren't my babies worth those marks? They are battle scars! If anything, I should be proud of them! Why should I expect that my body come out of such a transformative and HARD experience as childbirth unaffected and unscarred? My body had to stretch to make room for my babies, and now I think it's time my mindset about physical beauty stretched, too, to make room for the beauty of motherhood.

You can all go barf now.

7 comments:

d e v a n said...

I actually thought that was really nice. :)

Anonymous said...

I really liked what you said in #5. I think we get SO MUCH VISUAL PRESSURE that "women look like THIS" (insert photo of celebrity/model female) and then we hear that Britney Spears is "fat," and what are we supposed to think of our own normal bodies? I like those sites where women send in photos of their stomachs. It's such a surprise to see so many like mine, and so few like Cameron Diaz's.

mamashine said...

I like #5 also. I came around to that mindset while reading the Outlander series again- have you read those? whew. I must fan myself.

anyway, at one point she's all upset about how she looks and he has this horrible bayonet scar from some battle and he gives this little speech about "how ye bear the scars from your own battles as well, and how can I fault ye for it" and when it's done by a hot guy with a Scottish accent I want to believe it, even when he's not actually talking to ME. Since it's a book.

But still. I"m with you. :)

Anonymous said...

I am so with you on #5. And now that I'm starting to pop out with baby #3, I'm already dreading what else could possibly get scarred, stretched out or droop any lower toward my knees. Anyway, this site has helped me tremendously: http://theshapeofamother.com/

I feel so much better knowing that we can't all pop back into shape after childbirth like all of those celebrities.

Mommy Daisy said...

Take Jana's advice and visit "Shape of a Mother". It will make you go "wow, I'm not the only one". I like that you've reached a good place with it though.

I'm glad to hear your "review" of Kindermusic. I've thought it would probably be a complete waste of time and money for us, now I know it would be.

I'm glad that you found a good place to donate too. And volunteering for a school would be awesome. It would be great if you knew a teacher in the district and just asked them if they needed anything done. You could come in once a week and put up a bulletin board or something like that. I know a lot of teachers love mothers and other people who can help with the little, time-consuming things. Or maybe come in for a reading/story time to help or work one on one with some students. Oh, just thought of something. HOSTS is a great programs, and I know they take volunteers to work one on one with kids. I don't know if the city schools does it, but my school district does (E....). (HOSTS = Helping One Student To Succeed) I've helped with that before, and it's awesome. Anyway, I hope those ideas help.

Anonymous said...

I love the description of the Kindermusik class! Ha ha ha!

Jess said...

After reading your blog, I am now convinced that I do not want to do anything like Kindermusik with my kids. So thank you for that.

Also, I love what you said about your body, and I think that's totally right. I'm glad you're able to have some positive feelings about all those changes.