In which I describe my family

First we have Animal and Mineral. They are twin boys. They have been fighting since they were in utero, when Animal was supposed to be born first. I was told by my doctor that they could not change places. Late in my pregnancy, two weeks before they were born, they did. (Thus began my skepticism of mainstream health care practices.) Mineral was born first. Here is a picture of them at about a month old.

Aren't they precious?-- Note Animal is eating Mineral's head. That picture was taken nearly 7 years ago. Not much has changed.  

Next is The Informant. She will be 5 soon. She has never met a human being with whom she didn't long to share her entire life story. Along with anything else you've ever made the mistake of saying in her presence. She will happily describe my TTT in detail, along with information about Mineral's eczema, Animal's love of tomatoes, and the plot of The Sixth Sense. "Rosebud was his sled!" she gleefully exclaimed to a playmate. "I knew from the beginning that Kevin Spacey was Keyser Soze," she once whispered to me conspiratorially.

Keeping track of the world is often quite useful; she lets me know when the house is about to burn down or when My Materpiece is awake from a nap. On the other hand, another word for informant is tattletale. 

Finally, we have My Masterpiece. It took me four tries to get a child who nursed for a year, loves to cuddle, sucks her thumb charmingly (meaning: when she's tired; not all the time) and has a sunny disposition. She's two-and-a-half and has never climbed out of her crib. She loves laying on her tummy and rolling a matchbox car along the carpet, doesn't complain when her routine changes, and recently started replacing Ts with Ns ("I want to go DOWNSNARES!") 

She giggled when I posted that picture. My Masterpiece.

The other players in my house are my husband, also known as My Chemical Romance; the fish; and Maizey, also known as the Dog Without A Downside. 

Upside only. 

That's my family. 

In which I do not bake cookies for crazy neighbor

I have a neighbor I hate. He's so annoying. I'm trying -- not as part of any project, just in general -- to feel neutral toward him, because it's a waste of emotion to hate, but really I just can't stand him.

He's also a total wackadoo, as the kids are calling it these days. Here's why:

1. The "hidden" cameras. Crazy neighbor has two: one in his front window, the other in his above-garage window. I can only assume it's to track the comings and goings of everyone in our neighborhood.

2. The incident with a former neighbor. He pulled a gun on a former neighbor during an argument. This was before my time on the street, and the former neighbor moved away -- actually lost his home in a foreclosure -- but the police were called and crazy neighbor was arrested.

3. The wife nobody sees. Really. I've lived here for two years and have seen her once, in her car. I waved. She gave me a dirty look. A nice neighbor once saw her in the cafeteria at her (nice neighbor's) work -- she (crazy neighbor's wife) was temping at nice neighbor's office. Nice neighbor waved. Crazy neighbor's wife dumped her food tray and left.

4. The dogs who aren't allowed on the grass. Crazy neighbor takes great pride in his grass. He has two dogs. They are not allowed on the grass. Naturally, whenever my former dogs would escape, they ran straight for his grass.

5. The Animal Control on speed-dial. Yes, my neighbor calls Animal Control every time my dog barks more than twice in a row. Unfortunately for me, my dog is a herding breed who uses her voice to move the (imaginary) sheep all over our backyard.

When Animal Control is called for a "noise nuisance" they sit in front of the house that has been complained about, and listen for 15 minutes. The first... three?... times this happened, I freaked out. However, each time the Animal Control officer has knocked on my door and said that he didn't actually hear anything -- because, I don't leave my dog outside to bark! -- but by law he has to give me a copy of the law -- which states that 15 minutes in a row or more of continuous barking is considered a nuisance. Sigh.

The good news is that crazy neighbor has actually helped me bond with less-than crazy neighbors; he calls Animal Control on his adjacent neighbors practically daily, and once when Maizey escaped during a torrential downpour, they grabbed her and brought her back to me. They are actually suing crazy neighbor for harassment.

What have I learned from this? Well, prior to this move, I've always enjoyed living in a neighborhood. You know, the kind with HOA and lots of neighbors and a pool. I've never longed for some huge piece of land that Dustin would spend all weekend mowing. Until now.

Since we average living someplace for 2-3 years, I sometimes think about our next stop. And I hope it will not be in a confined neighborhood; if it is, I want a lot of distance between houses. I bemoan the lack of a community pool -- that was the best thing about living in Arizona, we had a pool in our backyard! -- but I can deal if we join a Y or a Carowinds-type place or something.

Time flies when you're waiting on a baby

I haven't posted since May 8, which was a client's due date. Today is June 1. I had a ton of stuff going on between then and now, much of which I tried to put off until after the client had her baby. For example, I planned to attend a homeschooling conference but didn't want to make formal plans to go until after my client had her baby. Same with contacting another client who is due in August. Same with planning a party for my birthday, which was May 23.

My client went to 42 weeks 4 days.

What I have learned from this experience is that I need to calm down and not avoid living my life because I'm on-call. They all have babies. I have babysitters set up. Everything works out just fine. (I have never missed a birth except for the sand-road situation with Leigh, which was not my fault.) But not sleeping and stressing out because I'm waiting is not good for me. Or my family. Or my friends, or Leigh, to whom I whined about my dilemma.

However, I did not skip my birthday trip to NY state, where I got a new puppy! Yes, my first puppy. Her name is Maizey and she is a Cardigan Welsh Corgi, with many many champions in her immediate family (in fact, nearly everyone for three generations back). I have always had older dogs from the Humane Society, so I was a little nervous about getting a puppy, but she's doing very well. Along with my AAMI books and literature, I'm reading Dr. Ian Dunbar's book "Before and After You Get a Puppy," and "The Art of Raising a Puppy," by the Monks of New Skete. I'm following all the rules, and in return, she's having very few accidents (none today!) and chewing only appropriate chewtoys, and sleeping in her crate when I can't keep my eye on her and at night. I plan to show her and try to finish her. The breeder, Kate Roberson of Hagaren Cardigans, was very kind and generous, and if I am able to title Maizey, and if she is breedable, I'd like Kate to breed her. If she wants to, of course.

(Aside: my birthday trip was when I was technically off-call, as I'm on-call til 42 weeks, and my birthday was at 42 weeks 1 day. I did set up a back-up doula, just in case.)

Leigh gave me my first bit of constructive criticism, which was a terrifying moment for me. She had said, "I need to talk to you about something," and my first thought was, "Aw fuck, what did I do?" LOL. We have been in the honeymoon phase, as Carla refers to it in "Helping Hands," where it's all sunshine and compliments and she's the best preceptor ever and I'm the best apprentice ever. (I am probably the funniest apprentice ever.) Leigh had some genuine concerns about maintaining my (slow, but steady) progress and not moving too fast in clinical practice before I get there in academic study. Totally valid stuff. The initials "CD" and "CBE" behind my name really mean very little when it comes to midwifery (perhaps I've mentioned this before?) and I am really starting from square one, just like everyone else. She was very kind and I felt like an idiot for being so worried. That's always how I feel when someone says, "I need to talk to you;" I always assume I've done something completely wrong and I rack my brain trying to come up with whatever it is, and then when it turns out that I haven't ruined the world, I think, Oh. Right. Just like stressing about being on-call, I need not to stress when it's time to receive constructive criticism. It's just information really, that can help me to improve. Leigh and I have the same goal, which is to prepare me for being a licensed midwife.

Here is another picture of Maizey. Her AKC registered name is Hagaren's Maizey Rockstar. My kids picked the middle name Rockstar.