Only Six Days

I’ve been waiting to write this. Waiting until my t-shirt wasn’t covered in puke, waiting until there wasn’t a huge pile of towels in the bedroom, waiting until I had more than three hours of sleep, but I can’t wait any more. If I do, I may never write again.

The night after Christmas our darling five month old, Coral Anna, turned into a human geyser. The gurgling of her first-ever projectile vomit awoke us. In the continuing chaos, we haven’t managed to get a picture for the baby book.

Tonight Old Faithful has slowed down. She’s been gagging down Pedialyte administered through a syringe and sleeping in her bouncy chair upright. Our pediatrician has assured us that it will only last about six days. Only six days.

Big sister Cedar doesn’t quite get it. After the first sleepless night, as I prepared for an emergency run to Fred Meyer, I told her, “Coral’s puking. We have to go get her a special drink.” Cedar replied, “I want to puke too,” and then ran around the room sticking her tongue out and barking like a seal.

We’ve been wondering which one of us will be stricken next. So far, so good, but odds are with the vomit to human ratio in our household, Coral passed this on. What will we do if both mom and dad taken out at the same time? Like so many transplanted Alaskans we don’t have any family nearby, so we’re on our own. No Grandma and Grandpa to call. No Auntie to stop by with soup and DVDs for the kids.

It happened once before Coral was born. Cedar was nineteen months old when TJ and I were both stricken with food poisoning in the middle of the night. It was an ugly evening in a one-bathroom house. We negotiated a triage system for toilet priority. I lay on the couch while TJ curled in a nest of comforters right outside the bathroom door.

When Cedar woke up we got breakfast on the table. We called in sick to work, but neither of us could venture far enough from the toilet to drive her to daycare. She managed without us. She fed the dog, returned to her leftover breakfast later in the morning calling it her “snack,” and dragged out every toy in the house. We both stirred into consciousness when she shouted, “Look I have a knife,” and relaxed when we saw it was a butter knife. At one point I opened my eyes and saw her standing over TJ, demanding, “Daddy, play a song on the green guitar.” He was unresponsive. By lunchtime, I was functional enough to parent, but I’ll admit I fed her cereal.

It’s a good thing Cedar isn’t one of those heroic child prodigies who learned to dial 911 at a young age. While we were explaining to the paramedics why an ambulance wasn’t necessary, she would have been meeting her new foster parents.

If this happens now, I don’t know what we’ll do. We can’t let the two of them go feral for a day. It was scary enough with one. Being outnumbered parents so far from family is like being the cop who decides to go in without backup. Moms out there please comment with advice if this has happened to you. I think I might start training Cedar to dial 911 just in case.

tags technorati : fairbanks alaska motherhood vomit

Review: Gulliver’s Books

Gulliver’s Books, 3525 College Road, Fairbanks, Alaska

With two in diapers, no errand is easy. The potential “I need to use the potty,” from Cedar coupled with the threat of a diaper buster from Coral leaves me dreading going out outnumbered. Gulliver’s Books is my carrot. I tell Cedar, “We’ll stop at Gulliver’s” and she will endure any trial of difficult errands around town. The bank, the post office, the gas station—Gulliver’s makes them all bearable.

It’s the Shangri La of errand spots for parents with little ones. The lay out of the used book floor makes it easy to corral a rambunctious toddler while you browse. Trap them in the spirituality corner while you look for books on Buddhism or corner them in the parenting section while you find advice on how to get them to listen. They can’t get too far.

The same feature in the Cafe makes it an ideal setting for a couple of moms (or dads) wanting to get together during the day. Choose a table in one of the little semi-private roomlets. The kids are contained and you don’t feel like you’re ruining everyone else’s coffee break. Cedar is fond of Second Story Café cinnamon rolls. She folds her hands prayer-like, cues up her most polite voice, and says, “Mama, may I please get something from the café.”

The bathroom with the changing table is in the literature section wedged somewhere between Hardy and Kundera. Far from the maddening crowd, it’s always clean, has a handy coat hook for the diaper bag, and is well lit. I wonder about the folks browsing the Brontes overhearing my diapering dialogue with Coral. “Let’s change your diaper. Let’s use a wiper,” I sing. My MFA in poetry comes in handy. I rock the rhymes in the diaper changing songs. I’m hopeful that some mournful English major will overhear me and be inspired.

The mustard colored chairs in mass-market paperback fiction are a nursing mom’s sanctuary. If Coral’s getting ornery, I take Cedar over to the kid’s section, let her choose a few books, and park the three of us on the chairs. Cedar takes one and Coral and I take the other. I can read while Coral fills up. Mesmerized by the books, Cedar doesn’t try to run off even though she knows I can’t easily get up. Any Gulliver’s visit ends in a big stack of used books for Cedar at a price I can handle, so we all go home happy.

The staff is friendly to little ones. Before Christmas they were patient enough to allow Cedar to use my credit card (with my assistance) to pay for her sister’s present. “This is for my sister,” she said, her chest puffed out with pride. “What a great big sister you are,” said the bookseller. A little positive reinforcement from a stranger goes a long way for a two year old. Cedar has been saying, “Remember when I got a compliment at the bookstore. I have good manners!” I’m happy to both shop and change diapers locally at Gulliver’s.

tags technorati : fairbanks alaska bookstore motherhood

Review: Ichiban Noodle Restaurant

Ichiban Noodle Restaurant, 400 College Road, Fairbanks, Alaska.

Leave the crayons and the bag of busy toys at home. At Ichiban there’s no time to throw a tantrum. For parents, wait time in a restaurant is inversely proportionate to total satisfaction. Unlike other slow-motion restaurants in town (I’m looking at you Cookie Jar), Ichiban understands that bringing a two-year-old into a restaurant is like pulling the pin on a grenade and holding on just to see what happens.

On our most recent visit I brought a stopwatch. Our egg rolls were delivered one minute and twenty seconds after our order. Our entrees arrived seven minutes later. I thought the Flash might be working in the kitchen.

Ichiban’s staff is kid friendly. The waitresses make them feel welcome. They compliment you on how cute your baby is and they sound sincere. They don’t blink if a member of your party is wearing a fairy dress because she refused to leave the house without it. The cook not only came out to smile at our baby, but also gave my husband a thumbs-up sign. We’re not sure what he meant, but we appreciated it.

For parents sharing with tots, I recommend the Ichiban Fried Rice. It’s a mix of beef, shrimp, chicken, and pork, providing a variety of finger foods perfect for anyone capable of a pincer grasp. For younger babies, the peas, carrots and rice are great. The older finger food aficionado will probably like at least one of the meats. Cedar changes her mind with each meal. On one visit, she will eat all the chicken, the next all the beef. The meat is fresh and tender and the rice is lightly seasoned.

If you have a small infant, Ichiban is a great place to nurse. The chairs pivot and recline slightly, making eating while juggling a squirmy infant almost a pleasure. Instead of walking and bouncing, the turning of the chair can comfort a fussy baby long enough for you to scarf down delicious pork bulgogi.

Unfortunately, Ichiban lacks a changing table. It doesn’t matter though. Both the men and women’s bathrooms were so immaculate that changing a baby on the floor could be an option. Besides, the food will be ready so fast no one will have time to dirty a diaper.

tags technorati : fairbanks alaska motherhood

Gingerbread Crack Houses

One recipe said a gingerbread house would “take all weekend.” Another said, “Banish all small children from the kitchen,” but Laura and I didn’t believe the hype. We decided to have a stay-at-home mom Stepford-style holiday baking spree.

Being outnumbered by children two-to-one wouldn’t be a problem. The babies would cooperate by sleeping and the toddlers would follow directions. Gingerbread would become a shared Christmas tradition. The websites didn’t tell me that gingerbread, like heroin, alcohol, or crack, would lead me to violate my principles as a parent.

During Cedar’s first two years I was an anti-TV, anti-sugar zealot. Maybe baby number two softened me. Maybe Christmas with kids made me delusional. Maybe when there are only three hours and thirty minutes of daylight, sugar and TV become necessities. Whatever the reason, the two-day gingerbread house ordeal broke me.

Day one, the baking was difficult. We thought the girls would calmly cut out stars and people with the cookie cutters. Instead they decided that flour tasted great on its own. Despite our attempts to explain, “flour is an ingredient, not a food,” they each downed about a third of a cup. Cedar licked the countertop like a junkie after I confiscated hers.

The babies, alternately fussing in slings or crying in the bouncy chair, complicated the baking. Squirming babies in slings made it hard to operate a mixer or rolling pin. Taking pans out of the oven became impossible.

At the end of day one, surveying our warped and crooked house parts, Laura said, “Decorating will be a lot more fun than this.”

Decorating was much worse. The frosting attracted the girls like lemonade attracts yellowjackets. They poked and licked, poked and licked. The ramshackle houses teetered.

Laura had read about having kids make graham cracker houses with milk cartons for support. We broke out the graham crackers. Of course, they would work quietly on their own projects.

As Laura handed them little cups full of frosting and bowls of candy she said, “These are not for eating.” We both burst out laughing. All we could do was sit there and watch them dig in. They scooped frosting into their mouths with their fingers. Only a few pieces of candy made it onto the houses. Cedar pulled the frosted graham crackers off her milk carton and licked them too.

We confiscated the little houses, and the girls rushed to the kitchen and stuck their fingers into the puddles of frosting that were holding our houses upright. I wanted to shout, “Damnit, We’re trying to make a nice Christmas memory and you’re both ruining it.”

Instead I said, “Come on girls, let’s watch a video!” Ellie asked, “What video?” Zoolander? The Sopranos Season One? What was upstairs in our previously almost TV-free house? I found a Schoolhouse Rocks DVD I bought years ago (in an attempt to relive my own childhood). The girls, starting to come down off their sugar buzzes, lay on the floor under blankets and stared, zombielike.

Later, when Cedar woke up after her nap she requested a snack. “May I have a bowl of frosting, please?” she asked. Goodbye carrots and broccoli. Hello Cheetos and TiVo.

tags technorati : motherhood baking

Trick or Treaters in December

Halloween ended at our house last weekend. When we went out in the yard to cut our Christmas tree down, three moose were hanging out behind the garden fence. After we went back inside, they climbed the deck to eat our frozen pumpkins. Perhaps the holiday decoration zoning board sent them.

A cow with twins. Another mama of two just trying to get by. I was glad to be able to help. When they finished with the pumpkins, they ate all the dead plants out of the raised beds around the deck. I hadn’t cleaned the garden out because in August I had been too busy with newborn Coral.

This moose visit had an impact on Cedar. She’s not afraid, but she is worried that they will be bad houseguests. The other day she woke up from her nap and told me about a dream. “Mama, a moose came into my bedroom and knocked over my toys,” she said. “It ate my food.” Maybe we’ve read “If You Give a Moose a Muffin” too many times.

tags technorati : alaska motherhood

Review: Ivory Jack’s

Ivory Jack’s, 2581 Goldstream Road, Fairbanks, Alaska

There’s something appealing about returning to the scene of one’s misspent youth with children in tow. Maybe you want to prove you’ve turned responsible. Maybe you’re hoping that your kid will misspend his youth in the same place. For many of us in Fairbanks, especially the cabin dwelling variety, Ivory Jack’s is the place.

They do a great job welcoming the younger patrons. High chairs are plentiful. There’s space between tables to park the car seat and enough elbow room to nurse comfortably. Our server promptly brought a silver bowl brimming with crayons and a bright paper menu for Cedar to color. Her special water, a to-go coffee cup and lid with a red straw, was a hit as well. She was thrilled to ditch her old sippy cup.

The kids’ menu features chicken fingers, grilled cheese, a smaller sized version of the adult burger, and a kids’ dessert among other things. Fries can be added to any kids’ item for one dollar. If you have fries coming with your burger, save your dollar. There will be plenty to share with your toddler. Cedar chose a burger and told the server repeatedly, “French fries please. Ketchup please.” She used the ketchup as pickle dip and didn’t actually eat any fries.

Coral cooperated by playing angel baby for a little while. She nursed and then sat in her car seat staring at the people next to us like a tiny stalker. I took advantage of her bad manners and ate my dinner in peace.

When bringing the little ones, keep in mind it is a bar, and a particularly Alaskan one. There are bearded Goldstream Valley gentlemen drinking, smoking, and occasionally yelling, “motherfucker!” over at the bar. Mounted on the wall, right next to my head, was an oosik (a walrus penis bone—for my readers outside Alaska). The placemats feature a long poem about said oosik.

If any of this offends you, you probably didn’t misspend your youth, so you’re probably not looking to return, but if you’re thinking of taking the kids, come early, just before five o’clock or so, and the secondhand smoke and cussing will both be at a manageable level. Whenever we’ve gone at this time, there’s a tiny contingent at the bar, and several other families with small children in the dining area. It’s the under three happy hour.

Around five o’ clock, it’s pretty quiet, so the service is quick. With so much on the walls–from the giant Elvis, to News-Miner articles, to every piece of elementary school artwork the owner’s kid ever made–there’s plenty to distract an escalating two-year-old during a pre-dinner stroll.

The changing situation is a challenge. I took Coral in after our meal for a pre-departure change and confronted the harsh reality of changing a baby in a bar. No changing table. In fact no surface was really large enough for a baby. I improvised by rolling out eight feet of paper towels, stuffing them in the small space between the lip of the sink and the wall of the handicapped stall. Coral lay there wedged and smiling. Changing complete, as I walked back to our table, Cedar smiled and said, “I need a diaper change too.” The table next to us laughed. When she entered the bathroom, she said, “Hey! There’s no changing table.”

Honestly, it wouldn’t be fair to ask Ivory Jack’s to put in a changing table. The owners have done enough. They rebuilt from ashes a number of years ago, a resplendent log cabin with huge beams and a high ceiling. Besides, no one will mind when next time I spread a dirty Carhartt on the floor, strip the baby down, and duct-tape a new diaper on right in the dining room. It’s family-friendly, Fairbanks style.

tags technorati : fairbanks alaska

Into the Big Clichés Full On

Before Cedar was born, when I was lumbering around pregnant, people would tell me, “It goes by so fast.” It didn’t matter if it was a cashier at the grocery store, a co-worker, or a friend, their eyes misted over with thoughts of their grown babies as they said it.

I promised myself I wouldn’t say it. I planned to observe my daughter closely, come to know her as a person, and come up with an elegant way to sum up the grandeur of her babyhood. Then Cedar came into the world, pink and shouting, holding her fist up in a “fight the power” salute.

I broke my promise. Suddenly, she was incorporated into our lives. Suddenly she crawled, walked, and ran. Suddenly, she had learned to say, “Don’t stress out mama,” when I couldn’t find the keys. I now realize the reason people sigh and say, “It all goes by so fast” is that there is nothing else to say. Really. That’s it. I’ve been in rooms full of parents with graduate degrees—Education, Counseling, Library Science, Biology, Physics, even Creative Writing—and no one can do anything but sigh and utter, “It goes by so fast.” Impermanence. It’s so beautiful and sad. Babies and death are the universe’s way of saying hello.

After Coral was born our pediatrician put it another way, “Take lots of pictures. They get big fast. Then, someday you find yourself looking at the ‘Police Blotter’ to find out what they’ve been up to.” He didn’t mist over; he’s a trained professional.

With Coral, it’s all going by even faster. My husband says it’s like driving somewhere for the second time. The trip seems much shorter. She’s only four months old and her helpless newbornhood has been erased from my memory. I needed room in my brain for the new her, the one that beats her arms on her chest like a baby King Kong and laughs. Something had to go. It couldn’t be remembering my phone number or knowing how to drive, so Coral Anna made way for a new Coral Anna, and then another, and another.

Even the cliché has changed into something else. Since Coral was born “It goes by so fast” has changed into, “They’re sisters, but they’ll be so different.” I smile and wonder what cliché I’ll find myself finding true next.

tags technorati : motherhood

Review: Fred Meyer East

Fred Meyer, 930 Old Steese Highway, Fairbanks, Alaska

In Dante’s “Inferno,” the flatterers lie in pits of human excrement, the diviners have their heads turned the wrong way, and the sowers of discord are perpetually cleaved in two. Dante doesn’t specify a place for perpetrators of bad bathroom design. I propose they be sent to Fred Meyer East in Fairbanks with an infant sporting a poopy diaper.

The problem isn’t the lack of a changing table, and to Fred Meyer’s credit, the table in the women’s room is fairly consistently clean. Instead, the bathroom’s layout makes changing a diaper a problem for everyone. The changing table blocks the main traffic flow from the stalls to the sink. If you use the changing table, you become an obstacle.

Anyone unlucky enough to be using the sink when a mama unfolds the table is trapped. Anyone desiring to wash her hands after coming out of the stall has to wait. Adding to the problem, the mama’s butt becomes a target for the swinging door. If you have more than one kid with you, you have a dilemma: do you let one stand near you and get brained by the door while you change the other or do you lock the loose child in a nearby stall and hope they don’t put their hands in the toilet.

Rather than push a full cart of groceries down the narrow hallway to the bathroom only to be smacked by the door, I’ve resorted to changing the girls in the cart. I recommend the oft-deserted bedding aisle for on the go diaper changes. I just take something flat from the cart, set it up on top. Boxes of diapers or packs of paper towels make great improv changing tables.

For the daddies out there, all I know about the men’s bathroom is that my husband walked back out and took our daughter to the car after seeing the state of the changing table in the there. He hasn’t spoken of it since.

If you’re looking for diaper change utopia, try elsewhere. If you’re looking for potential hepatitis and a bruised ass, “You’ll Find It At Fred Meyer.”

tags technorati : fairbanks alaska

From One to Outnumbered

When we drove home from the hospital with our second child, Coral Anna, life seemed like it would bump along as usual. My husband even stopped in the parking lot to help someone change a tire. Our 23 month old, securely buckled into her car seat, kicked her legs. She said, “I want to take Coral home and read her a book.”

It was a sharp contrast to driving home with Cedar two years before. The light was different that day. The world felt fragile. Blades of grass and stop signs had turned menacing overnight. I rode in the backseat next to our newborn firstborn worried that she would be afraid to be alone back there. I felt like I was under water. Like all first timers, we eventually adjusted. Cedar changed us from a couple into parents.

Driving Coral home, we were already parents. That shift was done. She was just another baby in the car. The sun was just the sun. We marveled, “It’s so much easier starting out with the second one.” I even felt sad, as if the second time around would be old hat.

Then we got out of the car. Two girls with different needs at different times washed away my naïve sadness. It got hard for a while. Really hard. Naps and bedtimes became impossible. I got mastitis and never slept. The dog died, breaking my heart and confusing the two-year-old. My husband went back to work. I paced circles in the living room with the baby in the sling singing “Little Maggie” over and over again while my toddler chugged along with me shouting, “We’re running a race!” I actually purchased and read “Star” magazine for a few weeks.

Then it got better. After four months of playing two-on-one all day, I realize that Coral has changed us. We’re all different now. Cedar explained it best. Coral’s first week at home Cedar would run to us, grab our legs, jump up and down and shout, “We are in a family! We are in a family!” She had never said that before. I had never thought that before. Now, when I offhandedly refer to “the girls,” I know Coral has done her part.

tags technorati : motherhood

The Kindness of Strangers with Coats Full of Wiener Dogs

Today my friend Laura, also a new mom to two, Ellie, 3 1/2, and Josie, 6 weeks, met at Fred Meyer and decided to visit the built-in Starbucks after we finished shopping. Before children, grown women planning to meet at a grocery store as a social event would have seemed pathetic to me. Maybe it’s the waning daylight or the fact that all day my two-year-old calls me “Auntie Katie” and pretends that she’s her cousin Jacob, but it seemed like a good idea.

There we were, two moms nursing tiny babies, sitting across from two toddlers who were teetering back and forth on the precarious 4-foot café chairs. We both knew this was a bad idea, but we were hopeful. We had managed to get everyone cocoa and caffeine and to make it through Josie’s poopy diaper. We sighed, nursed the babies and relaxed a little.

Laura said, looking at the girls, “Oh my god, Nicole, do you realize that all three of them could be yours.” I didn’t know what she meant at first. Then watching Cedar and Ellie wave their arms in a toddler interpretive dance, I realized. It would be possible for me to have a 3 and 1/2 year old, a two year old, and a four month old. There are women who have that exact combination right now. The thought took my breath away.

Before I could inhale, Cedar’s hot chocolate tipped off the table, into her lap, all over the chair, and into a lake sized puddle on the floor. It spilled halfway into Laura’s full grocery cart and coated Ellie’s boots. We began mopping with napkins and the Starbucks folks brought out a giant squeegee to clean the floor. Ellie tried to dance in to puddle and both babies started crying.

All clean and settled again, Laura said, “It was hubris.”

Cedar promptly fell out of her chair, hit her hip on a sharp corner of a Starbucks Christmas display housing snow globes and holiday mugs. She screamed. I set Coral down and she started to scream. Ellie tried to climb out of her chair and Josie began to cry.

A man with a long beard, a cane, dark sunglasses and a Carhartt coat approached. He asked, “What’s wrong? Why are you crying?” The girls fell silent. I thought, “This is just what we need.”

Then, a little wiener dog poked its head out from underneath his beard. I entered the flow. Everything became manageable. I said, “Cedar, look at the man’s doggie” and I thought, “Thank god this man has wiener dogs in his coat,” unsurprised, as if he had been sent to help us. As in, “Thank god this paramedic is here to check my child’s broken hip.” Paramedics check injuries; grizzly Alaska men hide wiener dogs under their beards. It made sense to me. He was just what we needed.

He let the girls pet the dog and another popped out. With the toddlers occupied, we packed up the babies, rearranged the groceries, and got ourselves together. Everyone was glad to see us go.

The next time we meet for coffee it will be in a rubber padded coffeehouse and I’ll be sure to put Cedar’s cocoa in a sippy. I hope the man with the wiener dogs will be there too

tags technorati : alaska motherhood