Beach Babes

We did make it to the beach (in spite of the dump truck I mentioned). I paid a high price for this little trip. Packing and unpacking the car and sitting in traffic was all I was able to pull off. My back has been in attack mode ever since. Luckily my mom & GodMum were here right away and helped to keep the girls entertained and give me a break. I spent the first two days mostly on my back. I'd go do something and then I'd come back and collapse on the couch.

DaddySpeak surprised the hell out of me by showing up late Wednesday night. He got his work done and brought a few things with him to work on, but managed to get here around 9:30 that night. I'm so glad, it means so much to all of us. I can tell the girls are so thrilled to have him back. And it means so much to me when he pulls though like this, I know we're important to him and I know he's got a lot of pressure at work. I get it, I really do, I just get frustrated sometimes. (The back situation doesn't make it easier for me to deal with these things.)

That all being said, we've been fogged in all week. The beach house is in an area known as the Fog Belt. We're the first to get the fog when it comes in and the last to have it burn off. It's typical and we know it, but we've had such incredible weather all this summer that I'd almost forgotten that this is the weather we're more inclined to in the summer months. Even at it's worst it still usually burns off by noon, but not this week. We haven't seen the sun since Wednesday, so today I finally demanded that we go find a beach with some sun. (The irony is that if you go two blocks from the beach it's totally sunny, but we're picky, we want our sun on the beach.) We had to drive to Santa Cruz, and found that the wharf area & Boardwalk were really the only beaches with sun. The fog was hanging right at the edge of the beach so it wasn't exactly "warm", and it's apparently pushing 100 at home so the place was crowded. The girls didn't mind and they had fun, so that was the point right.

Since it's been foggy we've actually been doing some stuff beside just hanging at the beach, but I'll have to post more later as back is telling me it's time for another vicodin!

Straitening Things Out

Yup I'm working on becoming the queen of the pun, cause down here in Silicon Valley, that's how we roll.

Update from today's dr visit:

I still don't have a reflex in my right ankle bad

I have an epidural scheduled for 8/21 good

If the epdural doesn't give me permanent bad
relief, I will be given another MRI & most
likely referred to a specialist surgeon.

I have to say that I will be surprised if the epidural gets rid of it altogether. They've helped my pain a lot, but they've never been permanent. I'll be pleasantly surprised if it happens, but I'm not holding my breath on that one.

Dr. K also commented that nerve pain typically goes into your lower leg (below the knee) and as of the last two weeks mine has not. All the other tenderpoints and movement (or lack of) I do and don't have imply the nerve is still a big part of the problem. I assured him that I knew it was as I'm getting tingling and numbness this go around still AND after his little exam my pain was defineatly all the way back down into my foot (I'm pretty sure my shoe and the floor were feeling it for a while there). I've been poping half vicodins all day. (You could set a clock by me cause I can tell you exactly when they wear off). They don't eliminate the pain (a full one probably would, but I'm responsible for kids you know) but they do take the edge off.



I could've gotten the shot this week, but I'm really, really trying to get the girls to the beach house for an extended period this summer. We're going Wed. for 5 days, DAMIT!

I'm still here! Back here!

Yeah I got a million of them. I'll be here all zee week, and be sure to tip your bartenders and waitresses folks!

So guess what went out the week DaddySpeak left?

Yup, my disk is back being herniated again. I haven't been posting because I haven't really been doing much of anything to be honest. That's not exactly true. We've actually been doing quite a lot as my preshus baaaabeee starts kindergarten in a few short weeks here and I'm trying to fit it all in still. Where did my summer vacation go I ask you? And when did summer vacation end in August???? The school district at the beach house starts this week!!! I guess we're lucky. But I digress; So I hold myself together as long as I can (or until another adult is present and able to be in charge) and then I generally collapse. It's fun! NOT. Since I'm collapsed not so much on the posting happening here, but I suppose you know that already.

I'm somewhat better this week than last, not popping vicodin every day anymore. I have an appointment with the orthopedic surgeon tomorrow, so I'll let you know what he thinks after tomorrow.

Chomp, Chomp, Chomp!

Can we all just agree now, that the next time DaddySpeak goes on a sailing trip it does NOT coincide with Shark Week?

99% of the shows I let the girls watch on "on demand" so guess what's on the advertising loop this week?

Da, na, da, na....

You got it. Shark Week! So now I'm constantly being bombarded with questions from BigSpeak about where DaddySpeak is sailing and could the sharks jump onto his boat? I totally blame that one on the Air Shark ad. Don't get me wrong, I love the shark week too, I just don't want to love it with my 5 & 2 year olds.

Update from the Fire Lines

Just wanted to let you know how our friends are doing. I feel bad that I haven't updated you, but I wanted to be able to include how the fire started, and that's a very recent development.

The Bad News:

Their house is totaled.

It’s in the process of being taken down to studs (which whips up the fire smell on a regular basis). 99% of everything they owned is gone due to water, fire & smoke damage. Pix is from their daughter’s room and it makes me want to cry every time I see it. (It's a color pix, nothing was altered in the color or anything, that's just what it looks like now.)

The fire was arson & apparently the PD & FD feel they know who did it; some kid who has set other fires in the neighborhood. He’s currently detained for other things, but hasn’t been charged with this one yet. They have quite a bit of evidence so I think it’s probably a matter of time. He’s a foster kid, so I’m not sure it does anything for our friends. I don’t think there’s anyone they can sue or anything.

The Good News:

They have unbelievable insurance; their house and possessions are completely covered and there is also money for living and expenses while their out of their house. (Out for 10-12 months). They were able to rent a house on our street, which is amazingly lucky. The response of friends and family actually overwhelmed them. It finally got to the point where they had to tell people not to bring them anymore stuff. One of the other neighbors volunteered to collect the donations and several other neighbors helped with sorting, so in the end it was fine and quite a bit got donated to some very lucky charities too.

They are able to now remodel their house and update their kitchen, which was original (40 years old). Not the way you want that to happen, but it’ll be so nice when it’s done.

Emotionally they are hanging in there. They have good and bad days. I think it’ll be good once school starts and there’s more distraction to things.

The one bad thing is that now they are much farther down the street from us and I miss them a lot. I didn’t realize how many impromptu play dates we had just because the kids where playing out front.

All is well and everyone is safe and really that's all that matters.

Daddy’s on a Laundry Basket

I called DaddySpeak tonight to tell him of today’s happenings: BigSpeak started truly swimming freestyle in her lesson today; both arms out of the water, side-breathing and flip turns with continuing to swim! I’m sure the instructors thought I was on drugs I was so giddy. DS is a big water guy so I wanted him to know, you know he’s got another little fishy in the family to play with. While talking to him I informed him that LittleSpeak apparently misses him a lot, she’s constantly telling anyone who will listen that her “Daddy on a boat.”

DS: Littlespeak is saying this? Does she even know what a boat is?

Me: I was wondering what she thought she meant too, but now that I’m thinking about it, when I do laundry she’ll climb in the basket and I’ll ask her if it’s a boat and where she’s sailing to.

I think she envisions that he’s floating around in a laundry basket somewhere.

Reality Check

I want you to know I don’t begrudge my husband’s trip this week. I think it’s a cool trip and wish I was on it. I think it’s really neat his dad, brother and him and doing this together.
What I’m upset about is the lack of planning toward our family. You could say it’s not personal, his planning efforts can be lackluster about most things that aren’t work. You could, but it doesn’t make me feel better. And yes, you could say I’m a bit mad at myself for not riding him harder about it earlier. Even though he’s an adult and I “shouldn’t have to” remind (nag) him that’s our reality and I guess if the beach trip was that important I should been more of a pain in the arce about it.

“Mad is way too plain a word for how I feel!”

Yes, I’ve taken to quoting Fancy Nancy. But, truth be told, I am furious. I’ve been on DaddySpeak to make sure he scheduled the time off for a week this August so we could have a family vacation at the beach house. I finally emailed him the dates at work so he’d remember, and tonight he told me he didn’t think he could take it because he’ll only have been home a week from his sailing trip.

Yes, he’s taking a vacation.
He’s going sailing with his dad, brother and some other friends for a week in Vancouver. Sounds nice doesn't it?

Being the dutiful wife I offered for his mother to come see the girls during this time (she doesn’t boat; major motion sickness. HOWEVER, I do enjoy boating, but was not asked). It’s true that spending time with his parents has been known to put me over the edge in mental illness in the past. It’s not so bad these days (or hasn’t been, knock on wood) but this next week is NOT my idea of a break, much less a vacation. My initial reaction was to say that the girls and I will head over without him for the week. Then I started to really think about that & honestly, that’s not a break for me on any level. It’s a huge amount of work for me, so I don’t think that’s what we’ll be doing. I don’t know. Right now, what I do know is that I’d really like to smash my fist into someone’s face right now.

The cherry to my sundae is that BigSpeak decided to pull her usual, “I’m too tired” about picking up the playroom tonight. The room is actually not that big of a deal right now and would've taken like 2 minutes. But we made a deal awhile ago that they were going to start picking up the play room 2x a day without protests.

Yeah right, how’s that working for you?….Not so much.

Tonight when she started in I told her she had till the count of 3 to get in there and start picking up or she could go strait to bed. (I was already starting at pissed from my conversation with DaddySpeak.) She informed me she preferred to go to bed.

Mad is way too plain a word for how I feel right now.

Bonus points for you if you know which Nancy book that quote is from.

Slayed

Today the dragons slayed me.

At 2:00 today I’d hit my wall with the girls. They were tag teaming me; BigSpeak would whine for things and demand that she was “too tired to contribute” or that “it wasn’t fair”. LittleSpeak would just demand; if she asked for milk and you gave her milk, she would throw herself in a fit onto the floor because she wanted water!!!! “My God Woman, what is wrong with you! How could you give me milk!” At nap time she literally screamed her head off and threw herself against her crib so it would bang the wall...For. An. Hour! After an hour she’d started to climb out of her crib, and having hardwood floors I had to put the nix on that one. But even when I took her out of her room, did that make her happy? Noooooo. She wanted to go to swim lessons. NOW! Didn’t matter that we had over an hour yet. An hour during which she was supposed to be sleeping. I finally gave up. I grabbed all of our swim stuff , threw them in the car and drove out of our way to the mall because it has a drive-up Starbucks, and we had the time. They had stopped all their whining and fussing once in the car, so I got them each a “treat” and let them drink them at the pool while we waited for their lessons (we were still really early). After lessons I drove to our cabana pool and was so very grateful to see neighbors there, so they played for an hour and a half. We came home to start dinner and the whining commenced, but DaddySpeak showed up and played interference. Thank God!

I decided that what’s going on is that my daughters expect to be entertained every minute of every day, and when they aren’t happy with the entertainment, well I believe today was an example. I think I need to reset some expectations around here. (Theirs not mine.)

Of course, we’re headed to an amusement park tomorrow, so I guess the resetting will start on Saturday.

Slaying Dragons Still

I know I’ve still been pretty much MIA. The truth is I’m still not all that well yet. I’m still having issues with eating. Actually if I don’t eat I’m fine, which is a great weight loss plan. It just not so good when you're chasing kids.

Eventually, I get lightheaded from not eating (my blood pressure is normally on the low side) so I eat and then I’m nauseated. It’s So. Much. Fun!
Now, just to add to my fun, LittleSpeak seems to have picked this up from me. This weekend she ran about 103° on her own, and 101° w/Tylenol. This morning when I took her to the doctor she was normal. Of course. She alternates between bouncing off the walls and moaning in my arms. tonight she completely lost it. Just completely melted down. Wanted to be held by me, but I was not permitted to sit down. Now I needed to hold her and walk around with her. Poor baby. Poor Mommy. I got her fed early (scrambled eggs for breakfast) and she was in bed, passed out, by 6:15.
So, sadly Internet, I’m not intentionally neglecting you, I’m just exhausted. I seem to be a little better every day, so hopefully by the weekend I’ll be 100%. More later, I’m off to try and get some sleep so I can slay some dragons tomorrow.

Potty Watch 2008: Strike Two

I read Mike’s guest post related to potty training and it reminded me of one of LittleSpeak’s newest tricks in the potty training arena that I wanted to share.

LittleSpeak has shown us that she does know how to use the potty, (Yeah!) how to hold it and obviously how to frustrate her mother to no end. The other morning she showed me a new trick.

I was putting on my make up my room while LittleSpeak was playing in hers. I realized that things had gotten awfully quiet, which is never a good thing when you have a toddler in the house. I went into her room where she was laying on the floor. She had already removed her diaper and put it into the diaper genie (at least she's clean). Then, she had put a cloth diaper on the floor (something we use when we change her so the rug/furniture won’t get dirty) and was laying on it on her back attempting to put a clean diaper on the same way we do. She had her legs in the air as she tried to put the diaper underneath her bum. (Got to get them up to your ears honey!) Quite the scene.

I informed her that once she can diaper herself that’s when it’s time to start using the potty. She agreed, but has yet to completely comply.

If only she would use her powers for good instead of evil.
Yes, I do know it could’ve been much worse.

Milestones….and yes, we’ve melted

I’m better! Yeah! I was better and eating again as of last Friday (July 3). Hopefully it’ll hold. We had an amazing, relaxing, crazy, fun weekend at the beach. I have pix & if the stars all line up you may even get to see a few before Labor Day. ;-) But you know me, so don’t like bet on it or anything.
Big News! LittleSpeak hit TWO milestones today!
1. Used the potty on purpose today!!! Wahooooooo!!! It’s a step in the right direction. Now to get her to stop taking her damn diaper off all the time.
2. LittleSpeak climbed out of her crib today. I know, we’re so screwed. BigSpeak NEVER did anything like that at all. Shoot, I had her mobile up until close to her 2nd b-day. She was just a mellow, follow the rules kind of kid. (That’s over.) Little Speak , we knew was just a matter of time. We’ll see if falling out has curbed her from it, or if I’ll be making an emergency trip to Ikea soon.
Got to go to bed!! More soon. I promise.

Still Sick--not for the faint of heart or stomach.

Yes, I am still sick. It's been awful. I'm better in the AM & able to get the girls to appointments and such, but late afternoon/evenings do me in. I'm so nauseated it's not funny. I can't eat anything without feeling awful. I've been subsisting primarily on sugarless jello, string cheese, water and an occasional Diet Dr. Pepper (not necessarily all in one day). According to the doctor's scale (I went last Friday) I've lost 8 lbs. I'm so bloated you can't tell at all. I got some meds from the doctor to stop the bathroom action (TMI I know, you're welcome) which was good cause it scared me. I was so sick I was having trouble keeping me water up. He wanted me to go in for testing, but since the meds basically worked, I think it's just a really nasty virus.

But that's not the worst part. No the worst part is that now I think LittleSpeak may have caught this from me. She was super clingy/wanting to lay on me this afternoon. Finally she had one of the nastiest diapers ever known to mad.

Let's hope it was a one time thing.

Mama Doesn’t Get A Free Day

I’ve been nauseated since Sunday (it’s Wednesday). I’ve mostly been ok until I eat and then I need to lie down because I’m so very nauseated. Obviously, I’ve been mostly avoiding food. Last night it got really bad and didn’t matter if I’d eaten I was so sick. This morning it was still like that so I called my mom to see if she could take the girls for a couple hours and give me a break. She did, so I slept, and took a shower, but still it’s not good. I have only had a granola bar, some jello and a popsicle in the last 24 hours. That and about 7 gallons of water. I’m trying a couple crackers now, cause my stomach is churning on itself. So we’ll see. No sick days for Mama.

Fun Monday--the Fire Sale Edition

Don’t know if you heard, but Northern California is pretty much aflame. Seriously, I woke up with a sore throat from all the smoke in our air. It’s bad. Really bad. None of the fires are very close to us, but the wind is working against us as far as smoke goes. And, just for the record, the beach house has a fire just a few miles from it too, so going down there isn’t much help. Thus you get the fire sale edition of Fun Monday. cough, cough

After many weeks off I decided to participate in Fun Monday again. Fun Monday this week is hosted by Hula Girl at Heart, (go check her out for more on this topic and a really, really 90's wedding dress). The topic she gave us is:

Show us those pieces of clothing you just can't part with, whether you wear them or not. It might be your grandma's vintage wedding dress, a jacket from high school, a t-shirt from an old boyfriend or those jeans you hope to get back into some day. It could be anything. Most of us have something like that we can't seem to throw away.

I was going to participate in the Fun Monday by talking about my favorite outfit, which is a teal skirt & top. I got the outfit the spring Daddy Speak & I were engaged; so it’s 8-9 years old. I love it for a lot of reasons, mostly cause it’s gorgeous and my eyes turn the same color teal when I wear it. I wore it a lot and even took my engagement photos with DaddySpeak in it, so it’s memory is well preserved to me no matter what. Once I got pregnant with BigSpeak (6 years ago) I no longer fit in it. Or at least, no longer fit in it well. I hold on to it in the hope that I will get thin enough to get back into it, although I’m pretty sure even at a size smaller than it, my hips expanded enough so that it won’t fit “right”. But I still hope, a girl‘s gotta have a dream, right? Today I decided I’m going to give up that dream. Yup, just today I decided I’m going to get rid of it. Our friends who lost their house this weekend, I’m going to pass it on to them. Well to K, I don't think D would look that good in teal, I'm just saying... They have nothing now and it’s just sitting in my closet, waiting to eventually be passed on to Goodwill. Instead it’s going to get a new life. It holds such happy memories for me, it seems fitting that it should help her move forward into new happiness.

This is not the best pix of it, but the only I could find for now. Plus look at DaddySpeak w/his long hair! Being the Rock Star he is!

Welcome to the Freak Show

Today was so weird.

All last night & today our street has been a freak show; cars and people are constantly driving and walking by to see the destruction. The FD was here till well past midnight. The phone and cable companies have been working on lines all day. Our electricity came back around 9:30 last night, but it was well past noon before we had internet or cable. The burned out houses were boarded up by 6 this morning (DaddySpeak managed to slip in and get some photos,) and a cyclone fence with locks went up at some point during the day. People get out of their cars to peek through the fence.

Everything seems so surreal.

We had 5 parties today, we were only trying to make three of them, but I told DaddySpeak as we left, “I so don’t want to go anywhere today. I just want to stay around the neighborhood with people who know how I’m feeling. I want to close ranks with everyone here it just seems how it ought to be.” He said he felt the same way. We still had to go. It was fine. We even made the third party which was for the triplets. The majority of people were gone but it was good to be back by our house and with friends who understood our state of mind. One of the neighbors went out & got gift certificates (Target, Old Navy & Toys R Us) for D&K; the kids only have the bathing suits they were wearing at the pool when it all started. Tonight I walked over to her house to give her a check for my part. Our house was the closest of all our friends to the fire, but the smoke, apparently, drifted the away from us. Once I got past the houses I was overwhelmed w/the smoke smell. My nose started dripping uncontrollability and my eyes were watering. I can only imagine what it was like last night. We’re lucky on this front too; I tend to be very sensitive to things like smoke. If it had drifted our way I might be sleeping at my parents house for the next couple days. Several other neighbors happened to be heading to the same house as myself and we had an informal powwow for a half an hour or so. It was what I needed. To feel connected to these people who are feeling the same sense of survivors’ guilt I am. I’m glad it worked out that way.

I’m feeling so many things right now and it’s like I have no words to articulate the complexity of these feelings. I’m suddenly at such a loss of words.

Loss of Innocence

I’m sitting here drinking a mudslide in the heat, trying to get a buzz so I can forget a bit how much I care about what I’m going to tell you. As I sit here I’m also listening to the hum of six large fire engines in our street because some good friends lost their home today.

Today was a typical Friday for our neighborhood. This afternoon (after nap time) we headed out to the pool to hang out because it was HOT. It had to be very close to 100° today. I had stopped at Costco earlier & picked up a chicken to eat cold for dinner tonight. The neighbors behinds us (triplets) were there and so were A, C & their dad D. Mom would be there later after work w/KFC for the crowd. Kids played, we BS’d and shared snacks & beers. At 5:30 we looked toward our neighborhood and saw a huge black cloud rising quickly from some houses. The guys took off running (DaddySpeak was jumping backyard fences) leaving S (triplets mom) and I with 7 kids. And they didn’t come back. K (A & C’s mom) pulled up just as the guys were jumping fences, she was worried about her house. She was going to pull the KFC out & go check, but I told her I’m sure it’s fine, just go check & come back. She never came back! Now I’m getting a little worried, the guys ran over w/out anything but their swim trunks, no shoes and certainly no cell phones. Realizing this was serious and looking for some distraction, I pulled out our food and started feeding kids. K’s mom suddenly pulls up and we know D & K’s house is involved. Their mom packed up their stuff and took the kids to her house. The guys finally came back; it was D & K’s house (three doors down from us) and their next door neighbors, N (two doors down). The guys had been helping to actually fight the fire; unrolling & hooking up hoses and hosing down the house in-between ours and N’s. The fire had started between the two houses, but as of now do not know how or why. (Part of the reason there are still six large trucks out there is because they are working on finding out the why.) K & D’s bedrooms are a loss, the roof on that side collapsed. I imagine most of the stuff in the house has smoke & water damage, so what didn‘t get destroyed is probably mostly lost too. They do have some clothing and the most important irreplaceable stuff (baby mementos) were salvaged. Their dog, Leo, was in their bedroom and did not make it. I am overwhelmed with my feelings and can not begin to fathom how they are feeling right now. I had to explain to BigSpeak that one of her best friends just lost everything safe she knows. She doesn't really understand yet, and I'm sad that in short order she will. They are such babies still, they shouldn't have to understand how vulnerable we are yet.

I am grateful that they are all physically ok.
I am overwhelmed by the outpouring from the neighborhood already. (I’m sure they are too.)
I am grateful that it was not my home and my family.
I’m saddened that my child (BigSpeak) and one of her best friends (A) lost their sense of security in relation to their homes tonight.
I am hopeful that they will be blessed in the rebuilding of their home.
I pray that Leo didn’t suffer.
Mostly I am glad that all of us (their family and mine) are healthy and able to move forward together.

The picture is not of their house, I found it via an image search on yahoo.

Hot Gift

I know a week or two ago I was complaining about how it’s supposed to almost be summer & we are freezing over here! But this week the temperature has been creeping up and today we were about 95° . Not having AC we’re feeling a bit warm in the Speak household (the kids’ rooms are about 80° at 7:30 this evening). In this case the heat wave does have an upside?; my folks gave us a margarita maker last weekend. It was a late anniversary gift. Coincidently my folks are spending the night here; they’re having their house tented for termites, so we broke out the margarita machine (actually the thing is so freakn’ huge it has it’s own spot permanently on the counter!) No margaritas though, mudslides! Yeah Baby! YUM! Not low carb, but yummy.

Summer Vacation with a Vengeance!

This is our first week true week of summer vacation and we are at it with a vengeance!

On Monday we went to Happy Hollow. This is a park aimed at the under 5 set and is perfect for us. After 30+ years are they are gutting the place & redoing all of it starting in July, which is really very bittersweet. On one hand ,it’ll be really, really, really nice once it’s finished. On the other, this park is a place that anyone who grew up in the South Bay has visited as a child, and to have them change it now after all this time, is just sort of sad. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure, safety wise the place is a nightmare, but still, I have pictures of both DaddySpeak and I as children riding the carousel, running in the maze, climbing the fire engine….so it’s melancholy. We’re trying to get in as many visits as possible before their close date.

Yesterday, we cleaned house and then cousin S came over for a playdate; after which you couldn’t tell I’d done any cleaning. It was fine, they just built a “carnival” in the front room using every toy in the house and utilizing every inch of space in our playroom. After the playdate we headed over to one of the neighbors for slip and slide and then take out Chinese. (I love summer!)

This morning we got up and picked up the playroom (took us 30 minutes, I set the timer in 10 minute increments) then headed off to Gilroy Gardens for the day. The girls slept the entire ride home.

Tomorrow we have gymnastics and swim lessons, and Friday is Gymboree.

Whew! If we keep up this pace I’ll be a size 4 in a month!

Typical Night at Home

DaddySpeak and I are having a typical evening at home.

Girls are asleep upstairs.
TV is on; watching Dirty Jobs.
He’s sitting on the love seat and I’m on the couch, we each like to stretch out and have a blanket (cause we're true romantics). AND...

We each have a laptop going; I’m digi-scrapping, he’s cruising the Internet.

Romantics at heart, that's us!

No, we are not emailing each other!