Archive for the 'Family' Category
August 30th, 2010 by coreyjf
Yesterday I had just stepped outside for a moment of fresh air and sun when one of the neighborhood kids screeched, “can Joshua come out and play”. He was walking up the towards our house, with his mother behind him who was pushing a stroller and his little brother. He asked if he could come to the door and see if if Joshua could come outside. I explained that I would check, as Elijah was still sleeping. The door opens and much screaming occurs between this boy and Joshua. In general Josh is a pretty mellow kid, but if another kid is screaming or misbehaving, expect him to join right in. So Melissa, Joshua and I stepped outside, no worries I took the video monitor with me. The kids played OK together, neither quite mastering cooperative play, but no major meltdowns occurred.
At some point this child’s mother, who is normally pretty nice, offered to let Joshua come down to her house. Melissa and I were both tired, Elijah was still asleep and neither of us really wanted to walk down the street or have play date. So typically nice neighbor (hence more referred to as TNN) proceeds to offer to let Joshua come down without us. We politely declined, and explained we aren’t “there” yet when it comes to play dates without us. So TNN starts pushing the point and offers several more times. I’m starting to get annoyed, because I have now said no multiple times and she has repeatedly made this offer in front of Joshua. I tell her again we aren’t ready, and she explains to me how I need to get ready, because it is coming. And how last year when her son was Joshua’s age it started. She had a play date and the mother just dropped the kid off, and that was the start for them… In my head, I’m like “well isn’t that nice for you”, what I verbalized was, “I’m just not comfortable with that right now”.
Her response. “Well, YOU don’t have to be” with a quick look to Melissa. As I said, I was already annoyed, so I snapped back with – yeah I do, Melissa and I are equal partners and make parenting decisions together. To be fair unlike last week’s post I’m not entirely sure that it had to do with gender. It could simply be that TNN knows Melissa is the one home with the boys. But even still it is pretty ridiculous to disregard a parent like that. It is also possible that she didn’t mean it like that. Melissa, who admits she wasn’t paying attention at that point, thought, she was just saying, you don’t have to be right now…when you are ready… But she didn’t catch the emphasis on YOU, nor did she notice the glance to her as she was emphasizing the word.
But I call bullshit, here is why. She didn’t stop there. She tells her kid it is time to go home (the little one in the stroller is done) and that she will make him a smoothy. She then tells Joshua that he can have a smoothy if he comes over to her house. Melissa turns to her and says that she is too lazy and tired to walk down the street right now. TNN’s response – Thats OK, Joshua can come over by himself. I’m fuming; I have said no, I have explained I’m not comfortable with it, and she repeatedly offers, not just to us, but to Joshua. So now not only do I have to tell her no for the umpteenth time, I have to tell Joshua as well. Melissa politely decline.
Again, maybe this isn’t about gender. Maybe she was just assuming it was entirely Melissa’s decision since she is the one home with the kids, so my comfort isn’t relevant. Maybe she was just disregarding me because she thinks I’m being overprotective. I probably am. I am sure due in no small part to the fact as a child there were times in my life I felt unprotected, my default is to error on the side of overprotection. Bottom line, if you feel I am being an overprotective parent, OK, raise your kids the way you want, don’t tell me how to raise mine. If I say I don’t want my kid doing something, multiple times, don’t turn to my wife and ask if it is OK, and certainly don’t make the offer to my 3 year old.
August 22nd, 2010 by coreyjf
When I was about 5, I was “helping” my Father build a rock-wall for the garden. I honestly don’t remember the entire incident well enough to tell you exactly what happen; but it ended with a rather large rock crushing part of my pinky, blood splattered all over the side of my parent’s house, and me in the ER. Fortunately I did not end up loosing my finger, but the worst of the damage can still be seen today. It’s not horribly disfiguring or anything, but it is noticeable on close inspection. This weekend I had the opportunity to see just how frightening and how much guilt laden anxiety there is when your child is hurt on your watch. Thankfully, Elijah’s pinky faired better than mine, it doesn’t look like there will be lasting damage. No, I did not accidentally place a small boulder on my child’s hand. I did however take my eyes off of him at the wrong moment and did not pay close enough attention to our surroundings.
Melissa and I took the boys to Petsmart to pick up some litter and cat food. We were planning to run a few more errands, so Melissa decided to run to the bathroom while I checked out with the boys. She handed me her Petsmart card and I headed to the register, Elijah was in the shopping cart/child seat and Joshua was walking next to me. We buy in bulk so the girl at the register came around to scan the large items in my cart. She also neglected to turn off the conveyor belt. Midway down the belt there was a triangular-ish metal doohickey that is meant to keep things flowing down the center of the belt. Apparently there is enough of a gap for an 18 month old’s pinky to get wedged between said doohickey and the belt. As I was handing her the Petsmart card to be scanned, I hear Elijah screaming. I saw his finger was stuck, tried to pull it out and realized I couldn’t without doing more damage. I then forcefully told (OK maybe I yelled *slightly*) at this girl to shut of the belt. As she was trying to do so, she moved the shopping cart. OK this time I definitely yelled…SHUT OFF THE BELT… DON’T TOUCH THE CART. So she shuts of the belt and I still can’t manage to get his finger out. After what seemed like an eternity, but was really a couple of seconds, I thought to slip my car keys under the doohickey and pry it up enough to safely pull Elijah’s finger out. There was some skin missing and it was a bit swollen, and he was crying so hard he was shaking the entire ride home, but it doesn’t appear to have caused any lasting damage. We gave him some Ibuprofen and let him take an early nap. It is still a bit raw and a little swollen, but he isn’t complaining and it doesn’t look crushed or broken.
OK for the Gender Bullshit part. We drew a bit of a crowd but things were handled. I kept my cool (I did not tear up until we were in the car on our way home). I got his finger out (mostly intact) and I was doing a pretty darn good job of trying to soothe him and Joshua under the circumstances. And, that is when some random lady comes up and asks – “Where is their mother”. I turned and stared at her, expecting her head to explode; that never happened and after a few moments of me staring at her, she walked away. I’m sure she was just trying to be helpful and she probably didn’t entirely mean it the way it sounded. But on some level I’m pretty sure she did. If this happened under Melissa’s watch, no one would have turned to her and said, Where’s their father. Bottom line, just because I don’t have a vagina doesn’t mean I can’t comfort my children. And of course feel horribly guilty when I ef up.
And yes I know you shouldn’t start a sentence with a conjunction.
July 6th, 2010 by coreyjf
Happy birthday Mom. We miss you.
June 23rd, 2010 by coreyjf
Tomorrow morning I’ll be standing in line for my new iPhone. Apparently if I had pre ordered versus reserved there is a good chance I would be making this post on my new iPhone 4. Oh well, what’s another day in the grand scheme of things. And yes, I know it is just a phone – there are far more important things in life, such as family and good health. But the iPhone has changed the way I live my life on a day to day basis, and I look forward to the changes iPhone 4 will bring.
June 3rd, 2010 by coreyjf
Joshua is doing much better. The first week was rough but he is sleeping through the night, no more snoring, and his hearing has improved. We really hadn’t thought his hearing had been impacted in a substantial way. His speech was great and we hadn’t noticed any other telltale hearing issues. But since the surgery he has started pointing out subtle sounds like an owl hooting in the distance. Clearly his hearing had been affected more than we realized.
His two week postoperative went great. Tubes are firmly in place and his throat is almost healed!
April 14th, 2010 by coreyjf
My mother passed away suddenly about 14 months ago, and there hasn’t been a day since that I haven’t thought of her. She left a huge hole in our lives that will never be filled. But as with everything else in life, you adjust. We made it through the first set of birthdays and holidays. She is missed terribly, but we have focused on making these events enjoyable for the kids. Melissa and I have had far less alone time but we started using babysitters for an occasional night out. We miss Mom’s brisket, but we can throw together a pretty decent approximation, not to mention Dad has dusted off his chef hat and come up with his own creations and future holiday favorites. There are countless other ways my mom impacted our lives. Some big, some small, but you find new ways to get things done. You have new routines that become, well, routine. You don’t stop missing the person you lost, but you are also not constantly thinking – OK Mom used to do XYZ, what do we do now. Then every so often life throws up a reminder.
Our beautiful little germ factories have kept us all under the weather for the better part of 6 months. At least 1 ER visit and a whole lot of stress would have been avoided if my Mom was still alive. She was a brilliant Pediatric ICU Nurse. The kind of nurse that doctors call on for advice and counsel. She was an amazing resource for us and for friends, family, and neighbors. But of course it also meant as kids we could not fake sick. In fact, even if we were sick, we weren’t. The old joke in our house was, if you weren’t on a ventilator you weren’t really sick – so do your homework, go to school, swim practice, whatever… It’s not that we don’t have wonderful resources. The boy’s Pediatrician lives down the street, and we have a friend who lives a couple houses away who is also a Pediatrician. But a friend is not your mom, and my mom only lived 2 miles away.
As for our latest medical reminder, Joshua has a double ear infection and once again refuses to take his antibiotics. We have literally had to force it down his throat. The first time he got so upset, he threw it up about 30 seconds later. This is absolutely emotionally scaring. Probably not for him, I think he’ll get over it. Melissa and me, that is a different story. I have no doubt my mom would have not only gotten him to take the antibiotic without the crying, screaming and projectile vomiting, but she would have also been at our house twice a day until we could do it ourselves or until he finished his course of antibiotics. It would never have occurred to her to do anything less.
April 7th, 2010 by coreyjf
No, I haven’t given up my resolution to stay fit, only blog* about it. We are also not joining the insanely awesome but expensive gym walking distance from our house.
With work and the kids, there just isn’t enough time to fully utilize the gym. Typically during the week, I only have time for a run on the treadmill and in nice weather I prefer to run outside and tack on the the drive time to my run. I rarely go to the gym Spring through Fall. Melissa has had a hard time utilizing it as well. The only time she is able to get a good workout in is on the weekends when I can watch the kids. They do have a day care center, and Joshua does OK there, but Elijah just isn’t ready for it. Typically after 10-15 minutes the staff gives up on calming Elijah down and gets her off the treadmill.
We realized we were spending nearly $800 a year just to use a treadmill, so why not buy one. One that we could use anytime without leaving the house, shlepping the kids, or carving out an extra 20 minutes for drive-time & parking. We found a good quality, sturdy treadmill on sale, tried it a the store, thought it was quiet and comfortable. So we bought it and hopefully it will be delivered and installed this week! The cost of the treadmill is covered in 14 months of gym dues, less when you factor in the gym daycare fees. So if we revisit the gym membership when Elijah gets a little older, it hasn’t cost us anything extra, and we will still have a treadmill in our house.
*No one wants to hear if I got off my tush or not…
**If however Melissa ever decides to teach a yoga class there and they cut us a deal, we might reconsider that option.
October 30th, 2009 by coreyjf
I did not have a good night sleep. Lots of tossing, turning and coughing(stupid chest cold). I finally gave up at 5:30. I flicked through email and facebook on my iPhone but decided if I was up I’d might as well get in a workout. With the chest cold I wasn’t up for a run but figured I would do some strength training in the basement. As I mentioned, I had my iPhone which apparently in an otherwise dark room reflects nicely off the bedroom door, providing the illusion that it is open. Yes, I walked into the door, which was actually partially open, slamming it closed and knocking me on my backside. The slamming door woke up Melissa and Joshua. I tried to convince Joshua that it wasn’t morning yet. He was not convinced and was loud enough in his disagreement to wake up Elijah. Both kids are up and clearly still tired. Of course I have to go to work, so I won’t be the one dealing with the results of my klutziness. Sorry Honey!
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October 21st, 2009 by coreyjf
I finally did it, I joined Netflix. We had been using Blockbuster’s netflix copycat service but dropped it a couple years ago after we did the math. We figured it was coming out to about $20 per rental; we just weren’t watching enough to justify it. We signed up for the service BK (before kids) and choose it over Netflix because of the in store option. If there was a movie we wanted to see, we didn’t have to wait for delivery, just bring one of the old DVDs back to a local blockbuster and take home what we wanted. Eventually we realized considering how few movies we watch it was cheaper to just rent from Apple/ITunes or Comcast On Demand and there was no need to leave the house to watch what we wanted, when we wanted.
Not that anything in our lives has changed. With 2 little ones we don’t have much in the way of popcorn time, and when we do there is enough TV the wife and I actually have in common that we are far more likely to fire up the DVR. There are no time limits on the DVR like there is with Comcast and Apple rentals. We often don’t have the time for a 1.5/2 hour movie but might be able to squeeze in an hour of Grey’s or Glee or even a 1/2 of HIMYM.
So why join Netflix? Impulse I suppose but he selling point was the unlimited streaming. You can stream as much as you want for no additional cost. You don’t like what you are watching stop it and stream something else. No extra cost and this is above and beyond the DVD rental. The video quality was only OK, but I am not sure if that was an impact by yesterday’s integration of Netflix into Microsoft’s Media Center; i’m sure Netflix’s bandwith was being put to the test last night.
I choose the $9 dollar a month – 1 DVD and unlimited streaming plan. I basically need to watch 2 movies a month to justify the cost. I think that is pretty doable.