Grandma's advice

My mom tells a story about coming home from school when she was a teenager and seeing her mom (a mother of 12--yeah, you read it right) lying on the couch reading a book, with a pile of laundry next to her on the floor.

"Never do anything while your kids are asleep that you can do while they are awake," is my grandmother's advice.

Just so no one gets all "I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep" on me, I would like to clarify that I am 100% all for rocking babies and playing with babies for hours on end. But at this point in my life, disorder in my house results in disorder in my brain, and there are plenty of windows of time in my day for doing household chores with the baby underfoot, nearby, or participating. Most days--unless the place is a complete disaster by naptime--I prefer this method of housekeeping over sustaining my energy all day long without a single break.

Granted pretty much every household chore takes about 5 times longer with a small child involved.

So every time my son goes down for a nap and the place is quiet, I get the urge to do something like unload the dishwasher or sweep the patio or organize the linen closet.

However, I try to remind myself of Grandma's advice and proceed to read a book or blog instead...usually with some sort of chocolatey treat within arm's reach. Better yet, lie down and take a nap myself. Ahhhhhh. The dishes can definitely wait.

Redemption song

I have always thought of myself as a Costco type of person. Whenever Costco comes up in conversation I am one to interject, "I love Costco!" and proceed to discuss all manner of Costco goods, even the ones I don't buy. I'll talk about pleated-front khakis, garden statues, and gold necklaces as well as toddler pajamas, gigantic boxes of Cheerios, and caramel apple pie.

Today, however, we went to Costco as a family and the old thrill was gone. It wasn't crowded or anything, and it was a 2:1 ratio adults:babies (always good) but I just wanted to be somewhere else--anywhere, really. All I could think about was how the baby kept screeching and they're trying to sell me "Vitamin Water" and the new box of Tide is twice as high as it used to be so how am I supposed to reach in there every time I do a load?

That said, I not only recommend the caramel apple pie, but you also must try the organic ravioli--in the refrigerated section, not frozen. It is amazing. The chicken kind, not so good, but definitely try the spinach kind. Today I noticed there are two new varieties: eggplant parmesan and tomato-basil-mozzarella. I bought them all. I think the brand name is Monterey something-or-other. Give it a try and you won't look back. At any rate the three containers of ravioli sitting in my fridge are my redemption from the less-than-stellar shopping trip this morning.

Third post

My 1-year-old is exceedingly afraid of the vacuum cleaner. The only way he will tolerate it is if I carry him while I vacuum, and the whole time he stares down at the thing, probably willing with all the telepathy in his tiny toddler brain for it to stop. Fortunately, since we have 4 carpeted rooms, this does in fact fulfill my exercise quota for the day.

I may or may not be able to trace this fear to the fact that once when he was about 6 months old and I really wanted to vacuum his room, I put him in his crib and vacuumed. He was super-traumatized. You should know that he sleeps in a Pack'n'Play so he was face-to-face with the lighted-up, roaring base of the machine going back and forth, back and forth inches from his nose. No wonder he's frightened. I don't know what I was thinking.

Seriously though, if I leave the hall closet open and he sees the vacuum hiding there, unplugged, he starts wailing. He knows. I have tried playing "Hello, Mr. Vacuum Cleaner" (a game I made up which you can probably envision), which so far has not worked. I will let you know.

Or maybe you can let me know if you have any advice. I mean I'm kind of a clean freak and I vacuum often.