Becky's Bottom Line: The Boy Chapter of the Terrible Twos

He does still need me, but his defiance is showing me that he wants to do it on his own. His very dangerous, not-so-thought-through, wild and crazy way of doing it on his own.

The Boy Chapter of the Terrible Twos

By Becky Brownstein

I recently went on a trip with my almost-two-year-old son to California. Superman – I mean my husband – took care of all the others. Granted, I did make to-do lists and schedules for him, but he's a natural. Even though he was a little hesitant at first, he pulled it off without a hitch. Or at least I hope so. He's smart enough not to tell me.

The reason for my trip was that my sister had a baby a few weeks ago and my internal family connection was pulling at my soul; it hurt so badly that I couldn't be with her. My husband saw my anguish and we made a joint decision that I should go to be with my family. That's when the superman cape came out and my husband said "Bring it on!"

Becky's Bottom Line: Disaster Zone B

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstien

DISASTER ZONE B

I have a rare condition. Yes, it was self diagnosed. My condition is, if I don’t see it, it doesn’t exist. I’m not talking about faith or religious thoughts or anything like that. I’m talking about messes. Huge, ginormous, larger than life disaster areas that make you stop breathing if you think about the act of cleaning it. Like, the basement/playroom, otherwise known as disaster zone B. (Disaster zone A is another post altogether)

In an act to regain control of the playroom, I did a major makeover in the basement. I painted, bought really cute shelving, made a chalkboard on the wall with a really cute boarder, organized the books and toys. I made it adorable!

The kids were so excited about it.

Becky's Bottom Line: Date Night

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein

"Her emotions are so fragile. But I can’t stop my relationship 

with my husband for a daughter who misunderstands the whole point of a date."

DATE NIGHT

My kids are getting older. With them getting older, life has given me much more space to breathe. But with more breathing space comes many more hardships. For one, date night. You might be thinking, “What the heck is this woman writing about? Date nights making things harder? Seriously?!”

Calm down. Let me explain.

Becky's Bottom Line: I Hate Winter

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein

Somewhere over the rainbow....

...there's something Becky calls, "real summer." 

I HATE WINTER 

Growing up in Southern California had many perks. The number one perk is the weather. It took me having to move to Pennsylvania to appreciate the weather I lived with for 18 years of my life. Now that it’s summer and school is out, the kids are home a lot. Yes, they do have camp but the days are long. The days are even longer when it rains. I never knew it rained in the summer until I moved here. What the heck is spring for then?

On the pesky rainy days, when the kids are locked inside, I find myself humming little tunes here and there.

Becky's Bottom Line: Acculturation and Assimilation

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein 

ACCULTURATION AND ASSIMILATION

While my kids are young and are still trying to listen to and explore their surroundings, it often makes me think about the times long ago when explorers were still discovering the world. These explorers docked their boats on foreign land to discover. They didn’t know what it was they were discovering, but they wanted to discover. Y’know, totally cool with me since I am no historian and doodled my way through history class. I am going to assume that they hopped off their boats and started learning new things to bring back to their own lands. I assume this from the fact that we all have popcorn thanks to the Native Americans and tea from Boston. Also from the phrase “when in Rome do as the Romans.” It had to come from somewhere.

Now that some of my kids have gotten a little older, watching the younger ones grow and adapt to their surroundings is quite entertaining. I’ll explain.

Becky's Bottom Line: Fun or Destruction?

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein

 "Walls are just mass expanses of mural space."

FUN OR DESTRUCTION?

Kids break things. Kids ruin things. Kids touch what they shouldn't. Kids use their imaginations and turn diaper changing table pads into stair sleds. They also create forts out of every single blanket that’s folded neatly in the linen closet. Panty liners are money. Toilet paper  is used for a new age Hansel and Gretel game. Books are for practicing scissor skills. Pencils are meant to be broken and then sharpened over and over again. Walls are just mass expanses of mural space.


As a parent, I get angry. These are the things that I have bought with my own money (that my husband worked so hard to make) and took the time to make nice. All my hard work and planning can get ruined in exactly three seconds. I want to make rule after rule after rule to get the kids to stop touching what they shoudn’t, but it would only make the planning that much greater. They want to discover. I want them to discover, but I also don’t want my things ruined.

It’s a tug of war I have in my head all the time.

Becky's Bottom Line: Stress

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein

STRESS 

Stress. Something That Really Extra Specially Sucks. Stress. I carry my stress in my neck and shoulders. At the end of a stressful day I feel like I'm lugging around packages of super sized heavy weights around my neck and shoulders. I wind up with a massive headache and a bunch of kids all wanting to be be cleaned and fed. Don’t they realize I am stressed?!

Sometimes it feels like I'm the only stressed out person there is (I know I’m not).

Becky's Bottom Line: Mistakes Happen

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein

MISTAKES HAPPEN

After having a C-section with my first daughter I was unable to drive for at least six weeks. The fridge, freezer, and pantry suffered dearly through my recovery. They were running on empty. I needed a restock on all food related things. My first stop would be the Kosher store in Scranton, which had the majority of the things I needed. The drive is about a 25 minutes on the highway.The thrill of finally getting behind the wheel with my baby in the back seat was exhilarating. After putting together a baby bag with a million things I would probably never need, I went out to the car to deal with her car seat. I buckled in the base and snapped in her car seat, like I had seen so many others do. I then checked to make sure everything was secure with the car seat and that the level tool ball was in the right spot. Then I closed the door. I drove very cautiously with my precious cargo. When I finally pulled into the parking lot of the kosher store and got out to get my baby, I saw that I had never strapped her in! Her base was buckled in tight. Her car seat was snapped in, in the upright perfect position. But she was not buckled! I thought the police were for sure going to come screeching in and take me away.

That was only the beginning. Once, on a long trip, I gave my first daughter (yep, her again) a pushka (charity box) to play with in the car. She was crying and fidgeting so much that I had thoughtlessly handed her anything to keep her quiet. Pushkas are actually really dangerous for little baby fingers. She put her teeny tiny, unmarked, perfectly plump and pink finger right into the penny slot. She cut her finger right open. She probably would have needed a stitch (my doctor told me) if I didn't quickly squeeze her finger and apply a butterfly band aid. I had a whole pack of them in my first aid kit that I kept in my diaper bag. So much for useless junk. I still carry one for just that reason.

When we had justtwo little kids, the living room in our apartment was decked out with a couch and a coffee table. Now, the living room in our home is decked out with just a couch. I now see the coffee table as a big object with sharp corners waiting to poke a hole in some unsuspecting child's head. In that same living room I had a cart that stored all the diapers. I didn't want them upstairs because then I had to go up there for all the diaper changes. I had no shelving space or drawers downstairs to stick them in. I didn't want a bag of diapers just floating around the house. I wanted them to look neat and tidy stacked in a three-tiered cart that could roll around for my convenience. The top shelf was for diaper cream and wipes and the bottom two shelves were for the diapers. The diapers never stayed on the shelf. My daughter thought it was the most hysterical thing to dump the entire thing out. When I made a game out of cleaning them all up, the diapers wound up looking like a stack of the used variety. It wasn't neat anymore. And it definitly didn't look nice.

Fast forward a few years with some bumps, bruises, and scrapes. My kids moved on to cabinets and cabinet contents. No more are my feminine hygiene products safe. After giving birth to my fourth daughter, my oldest daughter introduced "store" to her siblings. In an attempt to use money in the "store" they searched the entire house for a currency to meet their standards. They found panty liners. I didn't realize until I noticed half the box was gone. I didn't know where they kept them. That is, until one day a friend came over to visit. I had just finished nursing the baby upstairs and put her to bed. I went to answer the knock at the door. It was then that I saw my three daughters with purses full of panty liners, lining a walkway from the front door to the dining room. They were ripping off the backing and sticking the liners onto the laminate floor with such precision that I almost didn't want to interrupt them because of the workmanship. But someone was at the door, right behind the panty liner pathway. I answered it and hoped that they would smile, wave, and leave. No such luck. She wanted to come in and see the baby. She had to step over panty liners to get into my house. She was so nice about it. She pretended to not even notice.

Now that my kids are out of the infancy stage I have other problems. I am a huge diet Dr. Pepper fan. I open a can and then go about my day. That's not the problem. The problem is by the time I get back to it, the can is almost empty. I have yet to be brave enough to swallow the last few gulps of little kid backwash. Last week, I left my brand new, texting-enabled cell phone on my nightstand. The next thing I knew it was being carried out of the toilet on life support. It did not survive it's waterlogged coma and I had to get a new one. My grocery lists don't survive if I leave them on the table within reach. Especially if there is a pen on the notepad waiting to be used. We have to lock our pantry so we don't have random children grabbing cereal bags and emptying the contents. (I think every single one of the kids had done this before we got the lock.) It took the need to move my bedroom furniture for Pesach cleaning to find my glasses that went missing a half a year before.

Bottom line is: Mistakes happen. Sometimes we get so caught up in the moment that we can't think clearly. Sleep deprivation and loss of brain cells don't really help at all either. But as mothers, we have the stamina to pick ourselves up, brush ourselves off, take note of the incident, and try our darndest to never let it happen again. Okay, so my kids also seem to be huge diet Dr. Pepper fans. They also like to make lists on my designated notepad. I don't have to brush myself off for those minor offenses, but at least I have learned where to keep the candy stash and where I need hide to finish the tub of ice cream.

Becky's Bottom Line: My Balagan

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein

 "My stomach was so ginormous with my fourth that people would 

stop on the street and ask me if my stomach was real."

MY BALAGAN

I have developed a theory. The first child is a change. Having a second child is an adjustment. Having a third child is an addition to the adjustment. Four is a crowd and five is a balagan (modern Hebrew, meaning "chaos" or "fiasco.") Past the balagan part are uncharted waters for me. For those superhero mothers who have passed five, I look up to you very highly.

Having my first child was a most wonderful occasion. I never wanted to let anyone else hold my baby. I wanted her all to myself. She was so perfect with her little nails and chubby arms and legs. Little did I know that I stunk, had blood shot eyes from no sleep, and an exorbitant amount of breast milk that refused to give me any relief. Let me explain a little more. My first daughter was born via an emergency C-section and was then rushed to an out of area hospital with a neonatal ICU. She had to stay there for five days. I was stuck in a hospital 20 miles away from her recovering from my Cesarean. It was pure agony. So I pumped my milk. I pumped every three hours. That's what they told me to do. When I was finally reunited with my baby I was so eager to get her to breastfeed! I was dying from pain. No one thought to tell me that newborns nurse for maybe TWO SECONDS!  I had so much milk! I couldn't leave the house from fear of springing a leak. But you have to stop and notice something here. That was my main concern. I didn't have any other children to take care of. I couldn't even think of leaving her in another room unattended while I bathed.

A little while later we were blessed with our second daughter. I was able to have a natural, peaceful birth with her. It was very magical. Then I went home. The magic disappeared. Laundering became my hobby as did wiping spit up with my socks and corralling a very  mischievous toddler. I had to figure out how to keep my toddler's already set schedule in place, while trying to figure out how to fit in my new baby's schedule. I also had to figure out how to keep everyone happy and rested. It was quite the adjustment and quite the tiring process. When I think back to those years, I don't remember sleeping a lot.

While I was in my ninth month with my third daughter, we bought a home. I realized the best time to move into a home is when the nesting hormone is in full swing. We were unpacked in about three weeks. I had also made a list of all the aesthetic adjustments our new residence would need, and listed them in order of importance. She was born beautiful and healthy. Another natural, peaceful birth. When I got home I wasn't overwhelmed. She was just an addition to the adjustment.  The schedule was set.  I fell right into the schedule and so did the baby. Well, kinda. She did have the cranky hour in the evenings.  But our new home came with an atrocious powder blue carpet all through the front rooms (this was priority one on the aesthetic list) that I would vacuum every night - she would hear the roar of the vacuum from her crib and fall asleep. If that didn't work, I'd rock her in the laundry room where she'd fall asleep from the hum of the hand-held vacuum still hanging on the wall. The older babies were already sleeping by then. I was okay to spend that vacuum time with her.

My fourth daughter was my biggest baby and the longest and hardest pregnancy and birth. She was due right before the summer, so my kids would be home for the majority of the hard newborn part. My stomach was so ginormous with her that people would stop on the street and ask me if my stomach was real. In my seventh month people would be like, “Any day now huh?” My reply would be, “Sorry buddy, three more months.” Nobody believed I would make it till my due date. When I would waddle through the corridor at my doctors office, everyone would rub my back and tell me I was doing great and was almost there. My birth with her started off peaceful and relaxed, until she got stuck coming out. I always envision her entrance into the world like a kid trying to pull on a shirt that's too small. The kid manages to get part of his face through the hole but gets majorly stuck because he prematurely stuck his shoulder in. His face is squished, looking out, his huge shoulder stuck right in there with it.  Needless to say my daughter's face was black and blue and GINORMOUS! The nurse called her a big blueberry. She weighed in at a whopping 10 lbs. 1 oz. Coming home with her has been blacked out from my mind. I assume for my own safety. Our minds are our own safety nets, so I assume it is for good reason. Carrying on.

My fifth child. G-d really made this time worth my while: I had a boy! The excitement of having variety made things so much better. Because my fourth daughter was so ginormous, and no one had a clue that her enormousness was going to happen, they were very strict on how far I could go with this pregnancy. I have a great relationship with my doctor and I was able to keep pushing deadline date. But, I could only push her off so long. I asked her “Why do you want to torture me with an induction?” Her response was, “I am torturing you?” She's great. Needless to say, it wasn't the most natural birth when it comes to how labor came about, but it was not a C-section either. Hey, I did have to keep my relationship with my doctor. Shes my ally when it comes to the whole giving birth thing.

Dealing with all five children is very very hard, especially when I had a newborn. I remember standing in my kitchen when I had only four children and I was on the phone with my sister. I think everyone kept coming over to me to report something. Like they spilled yogurt all over themselves, one sister is coloring on the wall with permanent marker, another sister is flushing too much toilet paper and so on. The point is, it was loud. And my sister said, “How do you handle it?” And I replied “I just laugh.” Some of the complaints are pretty funny. I wouldn't laugh in their face, but I would let out a chuckle here or there. Fast forward to having five children all being loud at the same time. I would call my sister and ask her “How am I going to handle this?” And she would reply, “Just laugh!” And she was right.

Bottom line is: Everything has to do with perception. Yes, I have a bunch of kids close in age. Yes, it is sometimes hard to deal with. Yes, it does feel like a balagan. But, this is the life I chose. These are the children I brought into the world to take care of. Sometimes putting on the rose colored glasses in the morning changes my day. It doesn't necessarily make it easier, but it changes the way I see things. And in changing the way I see things, it changes the way those things are handled. With the rose colored glasses, I envision myself as a construction worker buckling my tool belt before starting a job. I would never go to a job without a tool belt. I have to be prepared for the day ahead of me. That means anything can happen that day. I can't be afraid. And if that means my rose colored glasses make me see things in a comical way, I'll take it.

Becky's Bottom Line: Genetics

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein

 

 

 

GENETICS 

Genetics is a funny thing. Genes are almost a way for G-d to show us his sense of humor. Let me explain. I received my humor gene from my father. Don't get me wrong, my mother has a sense of humor too; just not the telling jokes kind. She knows how to laugh and when to laugh. But my father was a funny guy. I also got his hands and feet. That totally sucks since, y'know, he was a guy. Most of my life I never thought I got anything from my mother (except for her skin which I am grateful for) until I was going through child birth.

I went through the centuries old form of torture called back labor. Anyone who has had back labor knows what I mean when I say that I would rather run into a wall over and over and over again, than to have to endure back labor. I had it with all my kids. EVERY-SINGLE-ONE! Want to know why? Genetics. Hah!

When I was pregnant for the first time I experienced everything the books say you “might” experience. Morning sickness, bloating, sciatica, bursitis of the hips, stretch marks, insane weight gain, constant nose bleeds, the sprouting of varicose veins, and the inability to get comfortable for the ENTIRE ninth month. My mother? Never experienced any of those. After I gave birth and experienced the worst pain EVER, called back labor, I told my mother all about it. I told her that this jack hammer kept ramming into my lower back causing me to want to jump out a window, but knock myself out first so I won't feel the intolerable pain the entire way down. She smiled, let out a little laugh and said “Oh Becky, you got what I have. A posterior cervix.” (Sorry if saying “cervix” is making you uncomfortable, but we do have 'em). “Okay mom, so what you're telling me is that I am going to go through that every single time I have a baby?” “Yep. And so did I.” Talk about payback. “What if I just apologize right now for all my craziness? Doesn't that help? Will my stretch marks disappear?”

I'm not even going to mention the fact – OK, I'll mention the fact – that my blood type is Rh negative, thanks to my loving mom. Since my husband's blood is Rh positive I have to get injections every time I am pregnant. I have to have them just in case the baby I am carrying has positive blood. If the baby I am carrying does in fact have positive blood, my body could attack the baby as a foreign substance. After giving birth, my babies have their Rh factor checked, and if they are positive I have to have yet another injection. But just as a precaution. Guess what? Every single one of my children have been positive. Yipee. Did I mention I hate shots?

Of all the things I could have had, G-d had to pass on the torture gene and the absence of the Rh factor. Of course, since y'know, G-d is way smarter than I am, I won't challenge Him. He does have a plan and I am sure there is a reason. I am hoping there is a reason. But because of my rational thinking, I started to realize the genetics that come into play with my own children. They are all Rh positive and the majority of them are girls. They don't have to worry about that when they have their own babies. But the posterior cervix....

Along the genetic line their personality traits come into play. My kids are all jokesters. They laugh hysterically at anything. I love it. I love that they can be goofy and funny and laugh at their own mistakes. I love how my second daughter has my husbands feet. It's one of the distinct features that connects them. I love how my son has my hands and feet, but looks just like his father. They each have a feature that is a distinct trait that connects them to us, but makes them into their own person. It is these features that we share with them that makes them into the special individuals that we love so much. All their personalities are intertwined because they came from the same parents, but it's their individuality that makes them each special to us and those around them.

Bottom line is: We get what we get and we don't get upset. We are who we are. My children have some of the same traits that I have judged myself so harshly over, like being short or not having elegant hands. These traits are what link us together. My traits don't seam so bad when I see my own children, who I love dearly, with those same traits I despised so much. And I know for myself, it molds them into who they are and makes me appreciate what it is we both share.

Come back to LadyMama every week for Becky's hilarious and candid take on being a mother of five! Read more about Becky on the author page.

Becky's Bottom Line: Superheroes, Soldiers and Mothers

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein

 

Superheroes, Soldiers and Mothers

Someone asked me recently to tell them of an experience that made me believe in my prowess as a mom. My first thought was, “Huh? Prowess? What's a prowess?” Being that I watched the movie “Seven” with a dictionary when I was 15, I decided to rely once again on Webster.

Main Entry: prow·ess

Pronunciation: \ˈprau̇-əs also ˈprō-\

Function: noun

Etymology: Middle English prouesse, from Anglo-French pruesse, prowesse, from prou

Date: 13th century

1 : distinguished bravery; especially : military valor and skill
2 : extraordinary ability

Via: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/prowess

After I read this definition, I realized how prowess describes not only soldiers and super heroes, but mothers as well. Let me break it down.

Distinguished Bravery:

·        I wipe butts. Not just my own bottom, my kids' butts. Not only do I wipe my own kids' butts, but if one of my children has a play date, I wipe someone else's kid's butt as well.

·        I use public germ infested bathrooms. Not for myself of course, but when my kid has to go, they have to go. Of course, I don't just let them park it; I have to somehow sanitize the place so my kid won't come home with some rare disease that I made up in my head.

·        I take car trips. Sometimes these car trips are excruciating, but we will all have a good time, darn-it, even if I have to pull over  untill the fighting stops.

·        I clean up vomit. There is nothing braver than cleaning vomit. It's worse than cleaning up raw egg that slipped off the counter.

·        I cut toenails, wipe noses and everything that goes along with that.

·        I change HORRENDOUS diapers.

·        I wake up every hour to breast feed when I have a newborn. I give up sleep! I give up my own restful hours to take care of my children...and sometimes my husband.

Do you know why? Because I am a mother. It's not even like we take a vow before we have kids. We have a marriage contract of course, but there is no contract binding us to wipe butts, boogers and lose sleep. We do it because we have distinguished bravery. Our children need us. And by golly, we sure need them.

Extraordinary Ability:

I used to think I had extraordinary ability because I can do that weird double jointed finger thing. I also thought I was extraordinary because I could touch my toes without bending my knees. Fast forward to now.

·        Now I have extraordinary ability because I can function as a semi normal member of society with a mere 4 hours of sleep.

·        My house can look not so put together – okay let's be honest, a total disaster zone – all week, but miraculously be all clean and put together for Shabbos. Now that is ability.

·        I make dinner every night. Ability.

·        I pushed out a 10 pound 1 oz. baby (yes, every ounce counts). Extraordinary ability.

·        And on and on and on…

Bottom line is, I am not alone in this. There are so many mothers, who have so much bravery and ability. It’s not one specific experience that makes us acknowledge our prowess as a mom; just the fact that we are mothers and that we took that unsaid vow after carrying, nurturing and then pushing out our babies, gives us the defining term “prowess” as a freebee. It comes with the package. Like one of those toys in the cereal box that everyone sticks their dirty hands in, to fish out. Some mothers have PROWESS and some have prowess, but we all have it. It’s that simple. “Distinguished bravery” and “extraordinary ability” just come with the name “Mommy."

 

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Come back to LadyMama every week for Becky's hilarious and candid take on being a mother of five! Read more about Becky on the author page.

Becky's Bottom Line: We Can Move Mountains

Becky's Bottom Line

By Becky Brownstein 

Come back to LadyMama every week for Becky's hilarious and candid take on being a mother of five! 

Read more about Becky on the author page.

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WE CAN MOVE MOUNTAINS 

After giving birth, I felt like I could do anything. The first time it happened was so thrilling! The adrenaline that pumped through me made me want to jump out of that hospital bed and run through the halls. Move mountains? Sure. It was an all time high. But then the doctor discharged me and the pediatrician discharged my baby. I was standing there holding my beautiful bundle and the free diapers and hemorrhoid cream they let me take. I was told to go home and do everything myself. “But, I never had a baby before. What if I put it somewhere and forget where I put it?” The nurse reassured me that babies are not like car keys or cell phones. They let you know when they need something.

When I got home with her, I had no idea what I was in for. Of course I read all the books. I was already a pregnancy expert after signing up with every single baby site there was. I got weekly updates. I sat in Barnes and Noble and read any book I was able to find. At my doctor appointments I would talk about anything that came to mind - one of those things being an epidural. I openly told my doctor that I did not want an epidural. She looked at me kinda shocked and said “Are you sure about that Rebecca?  Go into labor with an open mind so you don't get disappointed.” I scoffed at her. What did she know? I mean, she kinda was my doctor, but HAH! I knew much better. I read a book about it.  Needless to say, after many hours of laboring and no progression, I was induced and had an epidural. Come on, I'm not a martyr. But the whole thing ended in an emergency c-section. I never read the c-section chapters. They weren't supposed to be for me.

My mother-in-law came to help me, then my mother. Then my mother-in-law sent my sister-in-law to help. Those were good times – except for the c-section part. But then they all left. The way I see myself and my husband back then is like watching two people fumble in the dark. We had no idea what we were doing. I didn't know what the rules were on anything baby related. I didn't know that after you give birth you give half your brain cells to your kid. So here I was constantly forgetting things like dishes, laundry, and showering. Mistakes. There were lots of those.

I used to think the cause of  postpartum depression was trying to fit back into your pre-pregnancy clothes. Can you believe that I actually brought a pre-pregnancy skirt to the hospital to wear home?! I know, so stupid. I met a wise woman at a function I attended after giving birth. She saw me snacking on carrots and she asked how old my baby was. I told her she was just a few weeks old. She said, “I hope you're not making yourself crazy about dieting.” I looked at her and my eyes welled up. I told her that my clothes don't fit. Her response was, “So buy new clothes!” Genius! I bought new clothes.

Having a second daughter shortly after the first was quite the traumatic experience. Mostly because I had to learn all new mommy techniques. Don't get me wrong, I couldn't wait to have another baby because I wanted my dream birth to happen (which thankfully did).  But, how was I supposed to take two kids to the store? In an attempt to figure it out, I went to the store. I put my newborn into the Baby Bjorn and my toddler into the cart. They were both fine. I wasn't. It was winter. I had my coat on, my purse on my shoulder, a baby on the front and a tall kid in the cart.  The baby kept kvetching so I had to walk with a jump and somehow manage to hold her pacifier in while I tried to keep my purse on my shoulder and see over my toddlers head (I'm of the short variety). Stores are heated. The outside isn't. Where was I supposed to put my coat after I got in?

Now that my first born is seven, I have evolved. When I have young babies, I stay home during the day and save the food shopping for evening. Instead of food shopping being one of the many chores on my daytime To-Do list, it is now a time for me to peruse the aisles and zone out. Never in my life did I  think that perusing the aisles at Wal-Mart would be like walking in an oasis. That reminds me of the time I was in the vegetable section deep in thought when the vegetable guy (you know the one who refills the crates?) saw me and said “Smile, it can't be that bad!” I looked at him and said, “Sir, I am making mental menus right now and concentrating on the fact that I have no children with me. Do you know how much concentration that takes?” I don't think he has children because he had no idea what I was talking about.

Evolving from the first kid to subsequent kids, in my opinion, makes for better parenting. With each kid comes learning experiences. I learned to patch up holes in the wall, repaint colored-on surfaces, super glue anything, know which cleaning products remove which stains, know that how long the kids have been quiet is an indicator of how much damage I can expect to find, remove cracked tile from the floor, fix a toilet, change a diaper with one hand while the kid is running away, and somehow manage to serve dinner on time.

Bottom line is, the first kid is thrilling and each kid after is even more thrilling. Watching each personality form from the moment I brought them home to listening to them fight with each other as they grow up, is priceless. But whats more thrilling is watching my own personality change over time. I'm not the same parent  I was in the beginning (even though I refuse to believe that I have aged at all since I got married.) Mothers really can move mountains. We shift them a little more each day.