Helping Hands

30 Jun 2011 Leave a comment

by Natalie in Failed Housewife, What's a mom to do? Tags: ,

Whoever said that many hands make light work has never tried to complete simple household chores with a 2 and 4 year old.

A while ago I asked my kids if they felt “strong” enough to help me rip the sheets off of my bed. Oh they felt strong enough all right. I left my room for less than 30 seconds to grab a new set of sheets from my bathroom only to return to two ghost-like shapes poking from under my mattress cover.

They had crawled under the bottom-most sheet and were using it as a tent.

I read somewhere when I was a brand new mom that you should rest when your child rests, eat when they eat, sleep when they sleep, etc. Well, I have tried to take that advice but it’s too hard for me. If I do that, not only do I leave out any extra time for myself, but I leave out any cleaning time. So, I took another approach and decided to enlist their help while cleaning.

I don’t know if that was a good decision. Sometimes my boys are too “helpful.”

You should see me try to clean our fish tank with their help. One of them helps scrape algae off the glass while the other holds the siphoning hose’s end in to the water bucket. Not only do we end up nearly killing Nemo, but inevitably the hose gets dropped and we splash water all over the wall, ceiling, floor and ourselves as we try to suck the tanks rocks clean.

How many of you have tried to clean your bathroom with your young kids’ help? No matter how many times I tell my 2-year-old to stand back while I’m using bleach cleaner on the bathtub, he still ends up with a bleached out streak across his clothes near his tummy. The curiosity is too much for him and he has to lean over the ceramic edge.

Dusting is also pretty fun for us. My boys fight about who gets to be the “sprayer.” Then whoever wins that battle usually wastes half the bottle of furniture polish because he likes the way it foams. My shelves definitely get shiny. Just don’t hop quickly onto our piano bench on any day we’ve dusted. You’ll launch yourself across the room.

Vacuuming has got to be one of the hardest chores to get done with their “help.” They both love it so they fight, scream and yell for their “turn.” That’s one chore I wish I could do while they were sleeping.

I don’t know what the answer is. I could clean after they went to bed but then they wouldn’t learn how to help. They really would think a fairy came in the night to clean things up.

I think it’s good to have their help. It’s good to teach them how to do chores. I just have to make sure to clean on days that I have a lot of patience saved up. For many times their helpful cleaning leads to more messes. Maybe they have the saying wrong, it’s not that many hands make light work but its many helpful hands make light work.

Everything He Needs To Know He’ll Learn In Kindergarten

23 Jun 2011 8 Comments

by Natalie in What's a mom to do? Tags: , ,

I do not want to send my son to all-day kindergarten. Some of you may call me crazy, but I’m definitely not looking forward to it. With each passing day I feel more dread for the fall, when I no longer will have him here all day to play with.

I know it’s only from about 8:30 a.m. until 3 p.m. but that’s six and a half hours without my baby! Wow. What am I going to do? What is my 2-year-old going to do?

I know I am not thinking rationally and there are plenty of things that I can do with my 2-year-old to stay busy while his brother is gone. It’s just that he and his brother are best friends. Sometimes I think they should have been twins. The three of us have a blast together and now it’s going to be very different.

Don’t worry, I plan on taking my youngest to the local children’s museum for toddler time, and I’m sure we’ll spend most of our Wednesdays at our public library’s discover day. We’ll do all the things I did with my oldest when he was an only child.

My 2-year-old will probably be just fine acting as king of the house while he’s the only child at home. Until he has another sibling someday… whenever that may be. It would have been nice for him to have a little brother to play with, but things don’t always happen they way we plan them to.

Anyway, there are a number of reasons why it’s hard for me to let go of my son and send him to school. For one, I love his company. I have spent 99.9 percent of his 4-and-a-half years with him. He has literally been at my side from day one. When he was a newborn he would sit on the couch next to me in his Boppy pillow while I typed up freelance articles for the Deseret News. I was so happy to have him that I wanted him with me all the time.

It’s also hard for me to see him go because I gave up a lot when I had him. It changed my whole world. Don’t get me wrong, I chose to have him and become a stay-at-home mom. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t hard for me to turn my back on my college education and dream career. Now that he’s going to school I feel abandoned. I gave up so much for him and now he’s leaving me!

Again, I know I am being dramatic. He’ll come home to me every afternoon and we’ll live it up in the evenings. I loved school and so I am so excited for him to get to learn and grow like I did. I am actually a little jealous that he gets to go do all the things I loved doing.

I am just going to miss him so badly while he’s gone. I also don’t want to have any regrets. I keep asking myself if we have read enough stories, watched enough Disney movies, fought enough “wars” or found enough dinosaur bones in the backyard together. Have I done all that I could with him? Will the memories be enough to carry me over while he’s gone?

I sure hope so. Because whether I like it or not, he’s going to turn 5 this summer and I’m going to have to turn him over to his teacher for most of his waking moments. That’s when I’ll live for early-out day, the weekends and summer vacation.

Tainted Food

16 Jun 2011 4 Comments

by Natalie in Uncategorized Tags: ,

NO! I seriously found a black hair in my wrap at my favorite restaurant! Now where am I going to eat? Because anyone who knows me well, knows that I won’t be able to swallow a trip back there for a while.

No matter how much a restaurant manager reassures me that his kitchen staff uses every precaution to prevent straying hair contaminations, I still can’t shake the fact that I nearly ingested a human hair that was trapped inside my meal.

Yuck! I don’t care that you rushed to make me a new wrap and gave it to me “gratis,” I still won’t be able to come back to dine for a while. My gag reflex is just too sensitive.

It’s been more than 5 years since I had a similar experience at a popular Salt Lake City restaurant. My girlfriend and I spotted a black hair in my pasta bowl at lunch. Seriously? Come on people. I still haven’t gone back there since.

When my husband and I were dating, I finally convinced him to try a fast-food Italian joint. I reassured him that they had awesome food, only to find a fly melted into the Swiss cheese of my sandwich. The manager didn’t even offer to give me my money back just another sandwich. Yeah right! Who can eat after that?

I don’t know what restaurants could do to win back customer loyalty after experiences like this. But I do have a suggestion for restaurant managers and waitresses out there. Don’t reassure customers that the black hair hanging from their food looked like an “eyelash” when it was sticking out at least an inch. I know that was no eyelash. Don’t tell me about your staff’s hairnet use and cautious cooking. Obviously they weren’t too cautious this time.

I think the best thing a manager could do is kindly apologize and be on their way. Accidents happen and I realize that, just leave me to swallow the acid in my throat and regain composure of my stomach.  Don’t make any excuses. I’ll come back to your restaurant when I’m ready to come back.

To go, or not to go?

09 Jun 2011 11 Comments

by Natalie in Dealing with Death, My Angel Baby, Uncategorized

My oldest son leaving dinosaurs for his baby brother to play with Memorial Day weekend.

I stopped by the cemetery last Sunday to visit my son’s grave. But I honestly don’t know if I should have gone.

I’ve decided I don’t like going to the place where I buried the child I never got to meet. Every time I go there I leave with a very heavy, sad heart. It’s like the weight of his death comes back crashing down on me.

I have a number of friends who find peace and solace at their child’s resting place. Not me. I feel awkward going there. I don’t know how to act.

Am I supposed to talk to the air and hope he’s nearby listening? Because even if he’s able to visit different places on earth, I don’t know that he’s there all the time waiting for me to come.

Am I supposed to lay a blanket out and sit near his headstone while I reflect on his short life? Because I know I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing that. I thought about taking a cake with me on his first birthday but I am pretty sure our cemetery has rules against picnicking on burial grounds.

Am I supposed to sob at the site, overwhelmed at his loss? Because I am at times overwhelmed, but I am not the kind to openly express my heartache by crying. Write about it? Yes. Break down in the middle of daylight at my son’s grave? Not my style.

So what should I do? I feel helpless when I go there. What can I possibly do for my angel son? I finally threw a plastic bucket and a couple of toothbrushes in the back of my van so we could scrub his headstone each time we visit. My boys love that and it makes me feel like I am at least performing one simple act of service for my lost baby.

I honestly feel bad that we don’t visit the cemetery more often. I feel bad that I don’t like going there. I’m hoping my feelings will change but right now it’s really hard for me. I feel like I gave that earth a piece of my soul the day we covered his tiny casket and it’s a very painful place.

I find myself asking the question, should I go or should I not go? I want to pay tribute to his memory and find a place where I can feel close to him, but I don’t know how or where. And then there’s another question that eats at me making me feel guilty for not visiting his gravesite more often: If I don’t go, does that mean I am letting him go?

Fighting Back

02 Jun 2011 4 Comments

by Natalie in Parenting Battles Tags: , , , ,

Author’s note: I wrote this post about a month ago. Normally my oldest is really well behaved, but every once in a while we get to see his crazy, wild, freaking out side.

I failed big time as a mother today. I spanked my oldest son and put him in time out. I lost my temper and yelled at him harder and louder than I have in a long, long time – All because I refused to let him wear a hideously mismatched outfit to preschool.

If he wants to look like a fool within the comfort of our home that’s fine, but I won’t let him look like a maniac in public.

I know what a lot of you are thinking, “What harm is there in him wearing crazy clothes?” The truth? There isn’t any. His wardrobe selection was not the problem. The underlying issue was his reaction to me telling him “NO.” When he acts like a raging bull because he doesn’t get his way … that’s when I have a problem.

If he would have asked in a kind, calm tone with a cheesy, toothy grin, I probably would have let him wear his ugly bear camouflage shirt with his bright green pants. But his rotten resistance and poisonous attitude set me off.

He grunts and whines and screams if he doesn’t get his way. He pouts and growls and charges. Recently he has resorted to hitting, kicking and even biting me in an effort to get what he wants.

That behavior is unacceptable in my opinion and I’m not going to take it anymore. I’ve got to find a successful way to show him that he can’t act like that.

It’s going to be a battle — not only with him but with myself.  Normally I feel guilty for punishing him. I hear him crying from his bedroom and want to console him. I want to cuddle to him and tell him everything is going to be all right. Everything will be all right, but he isn’t going to get everything he wants — especially if he tries to hurt me. I can’t feel guilty for establishing some boundaries.

I am going to have to buck up and show him some tough love. As I told him today, “He is not the boss around here, I am.” I said that coupled with the disclaimer that I am never going to ask him to do something that will harm him, scare him or make him nervous.

I plan to set him on his bed in time-out as many times as it takes in order for him to realize that he can’t flip out like a crazy man. No matter how much he cries from his bedroom, I can’t cave in anymore to his tantrums. Wish me luck and let’s hope I can keep my temper in check.

Caring for worms

26 May 2011 2 Comments

by Natalie in Crazy Things I'll Do Only For My Kids, What's a mom to do? Tags: , , ,

I have officially become grateful for something that I absolutely detest: worms.

I have pretty much hated worms my entire life. I don’t like that they slither out of the soil when it rains and sneak up onto my sidewalk. I don’t like that mischievous little boys toss them at undeserving little girls on the elementary school playground. I don’t like how I can’t figure them out. They don’t even have eyes!

I even hate the way it smells after it rains as the slimy things dry out in the sun. And no matter how much my boys beg, I refuse to take them fishing as bait.

Yet this spring my heart has been softened and I have started to change my mind about worms.  Without them, I wouldn’t be able to work in my garden. See, the juicy, wiggly guys keep my two crazy boys occupied while I weed, water and plant.

My children have become completely obsessed with digging for worms and I couldn’t be happier, as long as I don’t have to touch them. Normally if I spot one I’ll dangle it over the side of my shovel or rake, and then holler at one of the boys to come and get it.

They fight over who can grab it and then pick it up with their bare hands and rush it back to their bucket, bug cage or worm home they’ve created.

A couple of weeks ago my husband and I planted a bunch of tomatoes in our garden while the boys made worm soup. Disgusting? Yes. Creative? Maybe. Occupying? Definitely.

Is it horrible that I let worms babysit my boys while I work in the yard? I absolutely love gardening. I love raking, weeding and harvesting. Nothing calms me down or helps relieve my stress like pulling out some nasty weeds.

That is why I have become grateful for something I hate. Thank you, worms.

I’ll let my boys play with worms all they want if it gives them something fun to do while I work in the yard. I only have three rules: worms do not enter our home, they do not enter our mouths, and we wash our hands as soon as we are done playing with the slimy, nasty guys.

Laundry Day

19 May 2011 6 Comments

by Natalie in Failed Housewife Tags: , ,

About a year ago I had a “brilliant” plan to start doing all of my laundry in one day. I absolutely hate doing laundry and I absolutely hate Mondays. Why not put them together?

What the heck was I thinking?

I spend Monday mornings racing up and down the stairs changing batches. By evening I’m tired and I’m stressed out trying to get the mountain of clothes sitting on my bed sorted and folded. By bedtime I’m normally in way over my head and my husband has to help finish.

But I bring it on myself. I purposely fold the clean clothes on my bed so I am forced to finish before nightfall. Unless I want to sleep on the couch, I HAVE to get it done. I hate laundry. This is one of the only ways I can motivate myself to get it done.

Why do I loathe laundry? Because it is never-ending. Even if I wash all of the clothes in all of our baskets, unless I do the laundry naked, I still have dirty clothes.

Lately I have become completely obsessed with washing all of our clothes, except the ones we are wearing, in one day. I find serous satisfaction in seeing all of our hanging laundry baskets empty – even if it only lasts until bedtime when we change into our pajamas.

I’ve always been bad at doing the laundry. My mom taught me how to clean, she taught me how to cook, but somehow I managed to skip out on the laundry lessons.

My husband tried to help me our first year of marriage — especially when it came to sorting the batches — but I still was horrible at washing our clothes.  Sometimes I’d forget about a batch at our apartment complex’s laundry center, and we’d have to break into the center in order to have clean underwear for the next day.

I still stink at doing the wash, mostly because I refuse to invest time and energy into something I hate. But I have found some tricks that help me get through my dreaded Monday chore. Here’s what helps me.

First, we have four separate hanging laundry baskets, one for each of our major batches. I spend a couple of minutes each night sorting the clothes we have dirtied that day into each of the hanging baskets. That way I don’t have to sort clothes on Mondays. The baskets also keep them in nice out-of-the-way piles.

Second, when I am really crammed for time, I play what I call laundry “hide and go seek.” While my boys are hiding I “count” in my room. I count slowly, giving myself extra time to fold some clothes while they find the perfect hiding place. Then, while I am “finding” them, I bring a stack of clothes with me to put away. It’s an easy way for me to play with my kids, while doing one of my least favorite chores.

Finally, I try extra hard to get the clothes out of the dryer and folded as soon as they are done drying. Because as much as I hate doing the laundry, I hate ironing the laundry more. I still find myself ironing pants or skirts occasionally for Sunday, but no more.

In retrospect, my laundry-all-in-one-day plan has some major pros and some major cons. But I am such a creature of habit that I will probably keep up the Monday-laundry madness. At least I get it all done in one day. That way, unless we have an emergency, I can go on a six-day laundry strike.

Surviving Mother’s Day

12 May 2011 2 Comments

by Natalie in Dealing with Death, My Angel Baby Tags: , ,

I can’t tell you how many times I had to silently tell myself to smile and be grateful this past Mother’s Day. It has been a long month and a hard season of smiling through my tears.

I should naturally smile and be grateful for the two beautiful, charming boys I get the privilege of raising here on earth. They really are my whole world and I dedicate my entire life to them.

But Mother’s Day is hard now that I’m a mother to an angel. It’s painful to me that I completely failed at my most recent attempt at motherhood. It’s even more painful that since my child was stillborn, I can’t see him, hear him or hold him on a day that celebrates my relationship with him.

Instead I get to wear a pearl bracelet that has his name engraved on a silver heart at the end. I hang a heart-shaped locket filled with a tiny set of footprints and his birthstone around my neck. Then before it gets too dark I get to stop by the cemetery in the cold rain to leave a handful of tulips from my flowerbed on his headstone.

It’s just so hard to smile when I can’t be a mother to all of my children right now. I’ll admit it. I’m having a hard time with his death. Especially on days that celebrate motherhood.

Days where we have a Sunday school lesson on the shepherd who leaves his flock of 99 to tend for the one sheep who is lost. I feel like that shepherd. I love my flock — I wouldn’t trade my two- and four-year-olds for anything — but I still yearn to bring that one lost lamb back to my fold. Only no matter how much I search, my lamb isn’t coming back. Not right now.

I hate feeling down and gloomy. I hate feeling like I am ungrateful. I’ve got to figure out a way to focus on the positive impact Luca’s short life had. I’ve got to remember the tender mercies I’ve received since his death. The times I’ve felt him near. I have to stay focused on the future — the big day I get to hug him in heaven.

Nearly Killing Nemo

05 May 2011 3 Comments

by Natalie in What's a mom to do? Tags: , , , ,

We nearly lost Nemo yesterday. Our oversized goldfish was flopping around struggling for air in his gills at the bottom of his tank.

My four-year-old said he was flopping like the dead fish we catch at the pond. He was twitching while floating sideways – not a good sign. Although it sounds like I am being dramatic, it was an intense situation for a while.

Especially because I was sure I had killed him.

I cleaned out his tank on Tuesday and I probably didn’t do it as carefully as I should have. It had a bunch of algae on the sides so I scrubbed the glass extra hard then siphoned as much of it out as I could. Since it was really dirty, I measured an extra amount of algae-thwarting medicine and dumped it inside. You’re supposed to wait 24 hours before putting a filter cartridge back in so the chemicals can disperse through the water.

Well, not only did I wait to put the cartridge in, I waited to turn the filter back on altogether. Nemo’s tough so I didn’t think anything of it until I saw him swimming sideways in the corner.

I raced downstairs in a panic to find a filter cartridge so I could turn it back on. I thought Nemo was a goner but despite his body arching backwards, his gills were still slightly moving so I had to take a chance.

We’ve had Nemo for 2 years now. We got him and his 10-gallon tank for free on KSL.com after my son begged for a fish for months. Although I hate cleaning his tank and it’s hard for me to remember to feed him each night, I’ve gotten attached to the orange-gilled guy.

He’s getting really old for a goldfish – he’s going on 4-years now- and so I suspect he’ll die soon anyway, but I wasn’t ready for it happen today.

Maybe it’s the guilt of nearly killing him or the emotions of my son’s one-year-memorial carrying over, but I seemed a lot more stressed about Nemo’s near-death than my sons.

The oldest kept screaming, “Yes! We get to get a crab now!” The youngest didn’t really know what to do. He kind of sulked in the corner.

I know I have complained about our family pet, and I have probably secretly wanted him to die, but I wasn’t serious. I was terrified that he was going to go belly-up while the three of us stood there and watched.

Luckily for us, turning the filter on and dumping some extra food in the top of the tank seemed to miraculously heal Nemo. I am happy to say that he is once again swimming around happily.

What has this experience taught me? To never again be flippant when caring for another living thing – even if it is as small as a goldfish. Heaven help me if we ever get a dog.

My Version of “Lost”

28 Apr 2011 Leave a comment

by Natalie in Failed Housewife Tags: , , ,

I blame a lot of things on my children. The dark, puffy circles under my eyes. The pudgy bulge of skin surrounding my waistline. My inability to remember anything for longer than 5 minutes. But there is one thing that I blame on them that I honestly believe they contribute to – missing objects in the Clemens home.

I HATE losing stuff. When something is lost — and I am aware that it’s missing — I turn into a human hurricane blowing through the house leaving a trail of destruction as I scramble until the object is found. For some reason I become completely obsessed, lapsing into an I-can’t-do-anything-else-until-I-find-that-stupid-thing panic mode.

You should have seen me last spring when I lost my 2-year-old’s baby book. I stayed up looking for it until midnight to no avail. I felt so bad that I bought a new book and tried to re-record every baby milestone that I could remember. A couple months later I found the stupid thing in the bottom of my dresser. Now he has two baby books.

Then there was the time last week when I was stressed out of my mind because “we” had misplaced my oldest son’s giant shark-tooth fossil. Don’t worry it was in his closet.

I worry about losing stuff, and stuff that I can’t find, 24 hours a day. You’d think that while my children were sleeping I could put my mind at ease. But half of the time they lose stuff in the dark of the night. They insist on sleeping with certain toys and I agree only with the hope that letting them lay by their toy will help them go to sleep faster and stay asleep longer. But somehow toys get lost in their sea of covers or stuck down the impossible-to-get-to crack between their beds and wall. For the past several weeks I have found my 2-year-old’s metal toy gun in the gap between his bedrail and mattress. I’ve trained myself to check that spot each morning before breakfast.

I think part of my losing-stuff paranoia stems from my concern of what others might think of me. Laugh if you must, but deep down I think that if I lose anything that means I am a sloppy, unorganized maniac. I worry that if I tell a friend something is lost, they’ll imagine my home as a hoarder’s paradise where objects frequently go missing in my mountainous junk piles.

I promise you that I keep a tidy home, but if I was organized and my house was clean I wouldn’t lose anything, right?

Well, maybe if I didn’t have sons with sticky fingers. A lot of my “lost” objects wouldn’t be “lost” without their help. The 2-year-old is the worst. He thinks it’s hilarious to toss random objects in random places. I can’t do any laundry these days without first checking to see if he’s thrown anything into my basket.

Take my planner for example. I lost it a couple of months ago, and therefore lost my calendar, contact information and lists of everything I might possibly need to do for the next year or so. I kid you not, on the day that I was heading to the store to buy another one I found the little blue notebook in the back of my boys’ closet. It was shoved behind the swords and guns. Ironically I was looking for a “lost” toy at the time. I am sure that the little man threw it back there.

I wish our lost objects only got lost at home. But my children have an annoying habit of taking toys with them wherever we go. I don’t know how many times I have had to run back into my mom’s house to search for something after I have already buckled them into the car. And who knows how many things we’ve left at Wal-Mart.

I think I am losing my mind. Maybe I need to get on some losing-stuff stress-reducing medicine. Maybe I just need to realize I’m not going to be able to hang on to everything and even if it kills me, let some of the less important objects remain lost.

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