March « 2009 « American Family

busy busy busy

After all that talking about houses, I don’t know why I am surprised that Mr. A and are almost definitely going to put our house up for sale in the near future. Mr. A has requested a week (from last saturday) to think about it, but I am pretty sure he is going to say we should go for it.

There are a lot of reasons why selling now is a good idea, but there are also a few downsides too. Not the least of which is we will probably end up living in an apartment for a while if we do manage to actually sell this place.

I am sure I will expand on this topic in the near future, but I need to get to bed and try to get some sleep before L continues her effort to force me into the loony bin wakes up crying.

Today, I was kind of a big old cheater on the food challenge. Now we are beginning to run out of things in earnest and I can see that this project is going to stop being fun in the very near future.

Day 13

Breakfast: The girls had eggs and toast. I bought a latte for myself and my mom at starbucks because we were driving to the dumb pottery barn outlet and I don’t have a travel mug since my old one broke.

Lunch: My mom bought L and me lunch at Wendy’s. She offered and paid, so I think that is technically allowed.

Snacks: L had a graham cracker, goldfish and raisins. My mom also bought her a cookie. And my mom brought a small bunch of grapes for her own snack, but I confiscated them and reallocated them to L because we are mostly out of fresh fruit. I did give my mom back her tupperware container though. Also we mooched pretzels off Patti at the park. Snack pickings are slim around these parts, we gotta take what we can get.

Dinner: Macaroni with beef tomato sauce and peas.

hanging on by my fingernails.

For the last month (or maybe it is two months now), L has developed a really annoying habit. She wakes up in the middle of the night screaming. And screaming. And screaming. She screams anywhere from 10 minutes to a record breaking 2.5 hours (last night from 2:00 to 4:25 lucky me).

The weirdest part about it is that she screams hysterically until she passes gas. Then, she will immediately stop screaming and become very agreeable. Then she lays down and goes back to sleep. While she is a little stubborn and sometimes demanding during the day, this kind of tantruming is completely out of character for her.

At the beginning of this phase, it seemed like she might be having night terrors. She didn’t seem totally conscious when she started screaming, though she would eventually seem to wake up and kept yelling until she passed gas. Now, though, she seems fully awake.

It seems like the obvious answer would be to treat the gas issue. I started giving her mylicon drops earlier this week. And tums, just in case she has reflux. That worked for one blissful night and one night only.

Now, I am moving on to restricting her diet. As of today, girlfriend is banned from all dairy. She ate ice cream and birthday cake (made with butter and cream cheese frosting) before her marathon tantrum last night, so it seems like lactose intolerance it may be partly to blame.

I am putting all options on the table. I am going to start a food diary tomorrow, but I am also looking at all other possibilities too. She passes some gas during the day, but not an unusual amount and it doesn’t seem to cause any discomfort. She is sometimes constipated, but poop (or not having pooped for a couple days) doesn’t seem to be correlated with this issue. I have even considered an attachment or trauma issue, but I think it really seems to be more a matter of discomfort.

I am going to make her 3 year doctor’s appointment tomorrow, but in the meantime, I am trying to be diligent about helping this kid (and ME!) get her much needed sleep.

Oh wise internet, what is wrong with my kid?

(I will come back to those food questions, but seriously, I am way to exhausted tonight.)

Food Challenge: Day 10

Breakfast: ???

Lunch: L ate rice noodles. I ate a burrito. Mr. A took leftovers and I think M took a bologna sandwich & yoghurt.

Snacks: Cake batter.

Dinner: Pigs in a blanket. Tater tots. Broccoli.

Day 11

Breakfast: Coffee. I don’t know about the rest of them.

Snacks: Guiness Chocolate cake and ice cream for L’s family birthday party.

Lunch: We all went out for lunch for L’s birthday (our one eating out exception for the challenge) and had dim sum.

Dinner: The girls went out with my mom and had restaurant food and ice cream. I had a burrito. Mr. A ate various leftovers.

Day 12

Breakfast: I slept through breakfast to recover from the no-sleeping fiasco.

Snacks: Everyone except L ate cake. L at half an apple.

Lunch: M and I ate tuna helper. L ate a graham cracker and rice noodles with peanut butter. I don’t know what Mr. A ate.

Dinner: Pressed tofu, rice, egg.

Food Challenge: Days 7, 8 and 9

Hmm, if I don’t do these right away, it seems that I forget what we ate. I will try to do better, but we had a death in my extended family, so I was a little distracted last night and this morning.

Day 7

Breakfast: I had coffee and leftover tuna helper and I really, really enjoyed it. Judge me if you must. I don’t know what the others ate.

Lunch: ???

Dinner: Spaghetti w/ meat sauce. Spinach w/ balsamic vinegar. Applesauce.

Day 8

Breakfast: Coffee and a steamed bun and I am guessing everyone else ate cereal. I also drank a caffeinated soda because I was exhausted.

Lunch: I ate veggie soup. L had single serving Annie’s Mac and cheese. Mr. A took leftovers to work.

Snacks: L ate graham crackers and apples. Both M and L had a granola bar.

Dinner: Tofu & Chinese sausage with rice noodles. Soy ginger carrots.

Day 9

Breakfast: I don’t know what everyone else ate, but from here on out you can assume I am drinking coffee. When I run out, you will know by my shrieks of agony.

Lunch: L had a few bites of hotdog and plain rice noodles. I ate shanghai dumplings. M had school lunch. Mr. A had a fancypants lawyer lunch.

Snacks: Dry cheerios. Fruit and cheese samples from the grocery store (we were there to get ingredients to make L’s birthday cake). I had a hot chocolate.

Dinner: Homemade carnitas burritos. (Gotta use more of that huge pork loin!) Applesauce.

M’s Hard Day

I knew when I saw the email from M’s teacher that it probably wasn’t good news.

Today, when M was in her other classroom for reading, her kindergarten teacher forgot she wasn’t there and took the class out of the room for scheduled library time. When M returned to her classroom, everyone was gone. She knew they had library next, so she went and looked in the library, but they weren’t there either. Apparently, the teacher took the class to the cafeteria to drop off their coats first before they moved on to the library.

When the class wasn’t in the library or her classroom, M got very scared. She went back to her classroom and hid between a table and the class mailboxes and started crying. By that time, her kindergarten teacher noticed M was missing and went to look for her in the classroom. When she found M, M was a sobbing mess. She was crying so hard, tears and snot were dripping onto the floor.

Seriously, my heart broke a little hearing that story.

When I asked M later why she hid and what she was thinking, she said “I just kept thinking ‘Why would such a nice teacher leave me here all alone? Why would she do that to me?’ ”

The teacher felt terrible. She apologized, gave M some hugs and talked to M about what to do if that ever happened again. We talked about it some more at home too.

When I talked to the teacher about it after school, she mentioned how surprised she was by M’s reaction, even though she knew it was the same reaction that any kindergartner would probably have had. I knew exactly what she meant. M is so verbal and composed so much of the time, it is hard to remember that she is still just a kindergartner and barely six years old.

Luckily, M is pretty resilient. By the time I got there after school, she had moved on from her scary moment. She talked and joked about it (and the crying) like it was no big deal. She is one tough cookie, my baby girl.

Food Challenge: Day 6

Breakfast: Coffee for me. I don’t know what the other hooligans ate.

Lunch: L and I ate my very favorite lunch: tuna helper with rice vinegar and sriracha. Mr. A took leftovers to work and I don’t know what he packed for M’s lunch.

Snacks: Apples. Diet soda.

Dinner: Fried rice & applesauce. Mr. A is still at work, but I am assuming he either had take out or won’t eat until he gets home.

Note: I also used some of my potatoes to make dinner for my sister’s family because they have a new baby in the house.

Food Challenge: Day 5

I spent the day doing various long-delayed home repairs. I painted the Living Room ceiling and started painting our little fence, among other things.

Breakfast: M spent the night at my parents and ate there. L and Mr. A ate oatmeal. Shockingly enough, I had coffee. Again.

Lunch: Mr. A made us all macaroni with beef tomato sauce and cooked spinach. M was not a fan.

Snacks: L ate goldfish crackers. Both girls ate tootsie roll pops that M’s chinese school teacher gave her. I don’t know if the girls had snacks when they visited Mr. A’s sister’s house. I drank diet soda, as did Mr. A.

Dinner: Mr. A, L and I ate homemade Pockmarked Mrs. Chen’s tofu (mapo tofu, picture below in serving bowl w/o rice), bean sprouts and rice. It was too spicy for M, so she ate rice and egg with peas.

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