Homemade Friday: Handknit hand-me-downs

Adele, October 2011

Sebastian, January 2009

Sebastian, October 2009

My own patterns.

I also have a picture of her daughter but thought posting it would be mean

I had a fourth grade teacher who hated my guts.  (Apparently I have an issue with teachers.)

No, really.  Just ask my mom. 

My parents were never one to blindly believe what we said regarding persons of authority, and usually the authority figures won out in the ‘who’s right’ contest. 

But this woman was so nuts even my mom agreed.  She had a personal vendetta against me and I never quite figured out why, unless you count me ‘going’ with the boy her also-9-year-old daughter liked and occasionally ‘went’ with as well.

Evil (also - girl eating a banana.  Her name was Tess)

His name was Steven and he was kind of dreamy, dark hair, dark eyes, perpetually tanned skin.  Also a little bit of a man-whore.  As much as being 9 would allow.

True story – when he broke up with me one time (because I think we broke up and got back together a total of 12 times throughout our doomed courtship) I tragically sat on the steps and sobbed because that’s what heroines who’ve lost the love of their lives do.  And these were for real sobs – loud, wailing, brutal sobs.  My mom found me there heaving and blubbering and told me that all of it wouldn’t matter when I was older.

I told her she just didn’t understand.

I can only imagine how difficult it was for her to contain her laughter.

So my teacher, Mrs. Locke, had some sanity issues and was maybe a little too involved in her daughter’s life.  Luckily this girl wasn’t in the same class as I was, but she was always there spiritually.  Mrs. Locke one time put two strikes next to another girl’s name on the punishment chart for sitting next to Steven.  Three strikes and something bad happened, like a note home to your parents or being forced to write an essay or something.    

Now I’ve mentioned my fear of authority.  But when certain authority figures reveal themselves to be crazy, nutjob, jerks then all bets are off.  I do not recognize their authority; I inwardly roll my eyes and tell them off in my head.  Sometimes I have been known to let inappropriate comments slip out because I’ve been saying them so long and so loudly inside that my mouth cannot contain what my brain is shouting.

But I’m sure I held my tongue with this woman. 

Maybe.

She routinely tried to embarrass me, to call on me in class, or just to find things to chastise me for.

And yet she saw fit to invite me to her daughter’s birthday party.  I’m certain it was just to try to rub it in my face that Steven was no longer my boyfriend.  And as shocked as I was to be invited, I was even more shocked to see my teacher in her own house.

That shit’s weird.  Some boundaries shouldn’t be crossed.

We went on a field trip once to My Old Kentucky Home and my mom was a chaperon.  After hours and hours of drudgery and hatefulness from this woman, finally my mom said “You’re just going to have to try to stay out of her way, Jaime.”

Wise words, Mom.  If only I didn’t have to spend all day every week day in her presence … 

Luckily the batshit insane woman left after only one year so no one else at Flaherty Elementary had to deal with her.

I think she actually did quit for ‘mental reasons.’ 

It’s hard to see the boy your daughter likes going with another girl, I guess.

20 pounds, 8 ounces

She's gained almost a whole pound in the last month.

And I didn't even have to give her buttered apple pie.

What kind of bees make milk?*

I may have baby fever.

(Don’t tell my husband.)

This happened to me last time I weaned a baby.  Four months later I was pregnant with the second.

That will not be happening now.

Life is just starting to become easier.  We’ve hit our stride and schedules are down and I’m not ready for all that to be upended again.

But my baby is no longer my baby.  And that makes me sad.

Nursing a baby has always come easy to me.  I’m not bragging, I’m just in awe of what our bodies can do.  So from the moment I found out I was pregnant with the first I knew that I wanted to breastfeed.  I hoped that circumstances would cooperate and, if they weren’t, was prepared to freak out and consider myself an awful mother, probably the worst in the world. 

Luckily I’m not quite as dramatic as I used to be.  But, so far, that aspect of motherhood has worked out.  I nursed both kids for 13 months, through the terrible, first-stage, let’s get used to this together cry-fests and immense pain, through teething, and thus biting and immense pain, and  finally through disinterest, and immense, emotional pain.   

I dealt with that last one more with Sebastian than Adele.  He just lost interest.  Since he was in daycare he mostly took bottles of pumped milk and nursed at night and on the weekends.  Taking the bottles away was simple, and finally he was only nursing at night before he went to bed.  And then he just didn’t want to anymore.  I think part of it was he couldn't sit still long enough.  I was sad, much more so than I thought I’d be.  But I also wasn’t.  My baby was growing up, but it felt so good to have my body back after almost two years of catering to someone else. 

And then, as I said, four months later I was pregnant again.

With Adele I worried because I am home with her.  I’ve nursed her far more than her brother and I felt like it would be more of an issue, more difficult to wean her.  She seemed to rely on me more, to need me more. 

I’d started months ago making sure she was going to bed awake, that she wasn’t using me to put her to sleep, but she was still nursing at least three times a day when she was a year old.  And so gradually, I started to wean.  I began by taking out the morning nap feeding.  She also was transitioning to one nap a day at this point so I held on to the afternoon feeding a little longer, just to make things easier.  But then it was gone, too.

And so we were down to one nursing session a day, at night before she went to sleep.  I worried and fretted and stressed about ending this one.  But I shouldn’t have. 

One day, last Wednesday, I just decided that that was it.  The last one.  She would be fine.  Thirteen months was good for her brother, and 13 months was good for her, too.

And so we are done.  She’s growing up.  She no longer relies on me, physically, for sustenance. 

And I felt good the first day.  Relieved, almost.  It’s hard to not feel totally like yourself for two years, to constantly have to monitor what you eat and drink, to check medications before you take them to make sure they won’t affect your baby. 

I loved nursing, and will most definitely nurse any other children I have.  But I am happy to be finished.

And then there are those cravings. 

The craving for another tiny little one curled up close.  For the sweet, new-baby smell.  For the tiny clothes and socks and swaddle blankets.

My chest hurts when I think about it. 

I will not be having another baby soon.  At least that’s the plan.  I am not ready to give up this little bit of ease we’ve gained in the last few months, and I know my husband isn’t.

But still.  Babies.  I can’t wait to have another one.

(Don’t tell my husband.)

*Boobies