Exciting news...Richie turned 31 last week! Oh wait. That's not so exciting. The really exciting birthday was yesterday. It was Eve's FIRST Birthday! She is now One Year Old. Yesterday we went out to dinner (she loves Indian food) and then went swimming. Logan has a very poor selection of indoor activities for winter months, espeicially ones that are conducive to a non-walking one year old's needs. So I thought swimming would be fun. The closest and most affordable pool is at USU and they do have a decent facility, only that, sadly, the water was too cold for little Eve. We got in and I could tell right away that she was cold and not having much fun. Nothing we did made her smile, and she could've cared less about any pool toys. When we took her out her feet were blue, her teeth were chattering, and she was shivering. So we returned to the locker room and took a long hot shower. She was fine after that. We also stopped by to say hi to the NICU nurses, but only one that we knew from last year was on duty. But I think she enjoyed the day. Saturday we are having a little party for her with cake and presents and such, so good times still ahead. She also has her one year well baby check on Feb. 1st, so I will post all her stats then.
Blowing out birthday candles with Dad. She looks really excited about his birthday, right?
I wish there was a kiddie pool open during the winter in Logan. There is one at the community pool, only that it is an outdoor pool, so obviously closed right now. I mean, why in the world would Logan want an indoor community pool? It's not like it averages below freezing six months out the year here. Stupid stupid Logan.
Eve on her birthday. She looked cute! Clapping is her favorite new trick.
I don't have television and don't usually know what's going on in the world around me, but I am aware of the screwy NBC prime time line-up and the subsequent hullabaloo it's created. They want to move The Tonight Show after the Jay Leno Show (which I can't believe is still on--it's not funny people!) and Conan thinks it will destroy the show, so he won't do it. I read his full statement, and I just have to say that I appreciate humble, funny celebrities that can get a point across without name calling or swearing or being basically spoiled and classless. I've always been a fan of Conan O'Brien and I think he is handling this disappointment with grace and wit. He'll always have a fan in me.
#2 In Defense of Diapers
Several people have mentioned how crazy I am to use cloth diapers. In all honesty, I love them. I don't think I'd use them with a newborn, because they are pooping all the time, but once the child is a little older and their BMs are more similar to adults', well, what's the big deal? Eve either pees, and I stick it into the pail, or she poops, which I put into the toilet, flush and then wash. She hasn't been using her diapers a long time, but she's definitely made some good messes and so far the diapers come out perfectly clean, smell perfectly fine, and we start over again. I don't use them when we go out or on trips. And I was concerned about the extra amount of water and soap and energy it takes the washing machine to wash them on a double cycle, but actually, it's a small load, I'm only supposed to use a quarter of detergent that I normally would, and one cycle is hot, the other cold. So really it equals out to one large warm load with less soap. The only problem is that I only have six. I need a dozen more!
#3 A Funny Primary Story
I teach the 7-8 year olds in Primary, the children's Sunday school at my church. We switched classes at the beginning of the year. Last year I had twin boys in my class that were difficult to work with. They came from a pretty unstable home and weren't real active and had a lot of attention problems. But by the end of the year they were living with a different parent in a much more active, stable home. I grew to love them despite our initial rocky start. They are very sweet, good boys.
After church on Sunday I was putting chairs away and they came up to me to say hi. I talked with them a few minutes and then Zach said "Jayden's growing a beard!" I said, "What?" And Jayden said "Yeah, I'm growing a mustache!" I refrained from laughing but smiled and said "Really? That's great! I love mustaches! They're cool!" He nodded in agreement and then said "Do you want to feel it?" I rubbed my finger under his nose--smooth and soft. "Wow," I said, " I can already feel it coming in. You'll have a mustache in no time." He was smiling as he walked away, and so was I.
Last September I entered an essay contest themed "When Did You First Realize You Are An Adult?" And guess what...I didn't win! That's okay. I was expecting that, although I will admit that as January 3rd past without a congratulatory email from the editors of Real Simple, I was a teeny bit heartbroken. I mean, I think anyone who submits anything creative and heartfelt to be judged by strangers is a little dissapointed when it doesn't win, even when one is expecting to lose. And the pain is compounded when you know your essay is good. But, it had been a long time since I'd written anything, and at least I tried, and it was fun and a good creative exercise for me, especially over this past summer when Eve was still so little and we didn't much. Ut's an annual contest, so maybe this year will be the winner. Below is my essay. I know it looks long. but it is a short read, honestly. It's up to you!
Eve, the Beginning
By Renée Barkume Peterson
The first time it happened was in Target, as I stood gazing in slack-jawed wonder at the shiny blue housing of a vacuum: my first “adult moment.”
Adulthood, by definition, is a biological or cultural standard shared within an individual’s community signifying maturation—a girl starts menstruating, a boy silently endures corporeal mutilation, a teenager becomes old enough to vote. Ultimately however, the definition of adulthood is as complicated and individual as the person to which it is applied.
It wasn’t until flipping through the pages of Real Simple that various adult moments distilled into clear focus and I realized—I am an adult! The fact that I had to stop and contemplate the possibility sent simultaneous waves of juvenile horror and smug self-satisfaction through my brain. As a child, adulthood was synonymous with freedom, and how I wanted to revel in that freedom! However, I had also simplified an adult into a humorless, worried, wrinkled individual—a vague future I would escape.
I married when I was twenty-one; quite young by contemporary standards. By no means did I take my marriage as a sign of adulthood. I considered my husband an adult—loyal, cautious, clean and three-years-older-than-me Richard. But I was still the wild child of my teenage years, full of idealistic dreams, happy to live on our meager budget and maintain our single life social calendar. Yes, the sudden obsession with getting a decent vacuum cleaner as a wedding gift and the unnatural desire to have a matching set of plates was “adultish,” but I was not worried. My body still looked as young as it felt, and I had every possibility open to me.
After graduating I took a job as a receptionist at a law firm because we needed to make money quickly before heading to Oregon for my husband’s graduate school program. I have long dreamed of graduate school. I wanted to earn my doctorate degree and teach college, travel, write, enjoy a comfortable level of notoriety. But we also wanted a family, and we wanted me, the mother, at home with our children. So I postponed my academic goals in order to support my husband as he accomplished his, working various nondescript jobs. We moved several times before we finally settled down last year and my husband went to work, having graduated with his Master’s degree. I began preparing to apply for graduate school when we discovered that I was pregnant with our first child.
It was raining hard when I looked at that pee-soaked plastic stick and saw the double pink lines. We had been trying for a year to get pregnant, and I was somewhat stunned. I was also excited, terrified, but mostly, I was conflicted: despite my desire for a child, every precious minute of my independence was going to be gone within months. What about my life? A discovery that was precious also enveloped me in distress. Ironically, the moment the pregnancy test transferred from my hand to my husband’s, a bolt of lightening lit up the early morning sky and a roiling boom of thunder immediately shook the ground. An ominous sign, for sure.
Thus began the Summer of Giving Up, despite the immense Gaining I was physically experiencing. We bought our first house—now am I an adult?—but it just felt like a giant game of dollhouse. It wasn’t real. Even the baby inside of me didn’t make me feel especially grown-up, just…old.
Our little girl was due March 17th 2009. At nine pm on January 26th I began hemorrhaging from between my legs. When I was admitted to the ER my legs and feet were so swollen they looked like grotesque sausages in socks. My blood pressure had spiked dangerously high. Contractions started coming every three minutes and my cervix was dilated three centimeters. I started painful back labor. Nurses struggled to find my baby’s heartbeat on the fetal heart monitor. Suddenly, I felt something warm and heavy pushing out of my body. I yelled to the nurses. My OBGYN went down and pulled out a blood clot the size of a pear. She reached inside of me, each time coming out with fistfuls of blood clots.
Once I was stabilized my doctor put me under observation. Up until this point, I thought that somehow, something could be done to stop my labor, fix things up, and we would wait out the rest of my pregnancy—seven weeks—just as I had planned. But as my doctor left the room, she informed me that if my contractions didn’t stop, she would deliver the baby by cesarean. It took me several minutes to process this statement. Panic and fear set in. By 11:30 pm my contractions were stronger than ever and I had lost two liters of blood. My baby was coming, regardless that neither of us was ready. I was whisked into the operating room.
I usually find medical procedures and the intricacies of the body fascinating, but that night I didn’t want to see or hear or know anything. Nurses scurried, doctors shouted orders. I laid on the operating table, focusing only on the reflection of my body on the unlit lamp above me. I was spread out naked, arms outstretched like I was being crucified. I watched the distorted image of a nurse slopping iodine over my belly and thighs. A mask covered my face, and without even knowing if my baby was still alive, I lost conscienousness.
When I awoke an hour later, I was remarkably clear-minded. The nurse by my side asked me my baby’s name.
“Eve. Eve Belén Barkume Peterson.” My husband would not tell anyone her name until I was awake and able to name her first. Richard came in and showed me pictures of Eve on our pediatrician’s iphone. She was breathtakingly beautiful, a truly perfect little human being. She was born seven minutes after midnight, weighing 3 pounds, 14 ounces and measuring 17 ½ inches.
I didn’t meet Eve until that afternoon. After pumping breast milk, vomiting, and listening anxiously to my husband’s heart-swelling descriptions of Eve, Richard finally wheeled me down to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. When that incredibly tiny person—my daughter—settled into my arms, my swollen body shook and I cried. With a tentative finger I stroked her cheek…
There is something about becoming a parent that can instantly vault a person into adulthood. I do not think it is an instant qualification, nor is it a requirement. But for me it was. It took a fragile, four pound human being to escalate me into adulthood. It is not by mere virtue of the fact that Eve was born and that I am her mother, however. I now realize that an adult is someone who not only accepts responsibility, but welcomes it, and as such, chooses to live for someone else.
My husband looked at the announcement for this essay contest and asked me if I was going to write about Eve.
“Of course,” I said. Then I thought about why.
In Eve, I see every possibility for a glorious, happy life. In Eve, I see the indescribable joy of being a family. In Eve, I experience a love so unfathomable I cannot begin to describe its genesis and cannot contemplate an end. She expands the love I feel for other people, for other children yet to be born. Six months ago, I was in a hospital fighting for my life and the life of my child. I suffered blood clots, painful medications and other health issues to give my child life. And yet most days, I forget all that. Even the seven inch scar below my belly is still surprising.
These are the days ahead of me: trips to the zoo, afternoons spent searching for bugs. Countertops splashed with finger-paints, jam stained clothing, cloud gazing, oatmeal-covered kisses, temper tantrums, bedtime stories. For me, enjoying the simple and innocent pursuits of a child is the core of a fulfilling adult life. As a mother I will be able to re-experience childhood and actually appreciate the freedom that comes with youth, that same freedom that seemed so out of reach as a child. And I will enjoy it hand in hand with Eve.
I still have dreams, ambitions, a certain kind of life I want to live. Only now, along with the travel, the education, and the notoriety, I have someone who takes me places I’ve never dreamed of, who teaches me things I’ve never understood, and with whom I will experience not notoriety, but something far more substantial: motherhood, the opportunity to raise, teach and love the better part of myself. I think of the absolute wonder of my own childhood and recall it warmly, thankfully, sentimentally. But if every adult is required to give a secret password to gain entrance into the “Adults Only” clubhouse, there are many I can choose: “Stretch marks.” “Elastic waistbands.” “Hoover Wind Tunnel Technology.”
Here is what is on my mind. My blog. It's too happy. Too cute. Which, since I primarily created it to share Eve with her grandparents and friends, is easy to do because let's face it: Eve is just too cute, too happy, for words. That's why I like pictures. Which is another problem. I don't really like to post unless I have some photos to illustrate my point, usually that Eve is too cute. When I'm moody and cynical and depressed and have argued with Richie for the umpteenth time in the DAY I don't have any pictures to go along. Which is too bad, because then my blog would be The Most Hilarious Thing In The World. And if anyone has ever read Winnie The Pooh, then you'll be able to tell that I am currently reading it to Eve, and thus my Peculiar Writing Style tonight.
I digress...so, I really like blogging. I like the fact that every blog I've gone to eventually blogs about blogging because then I feel somewhat like a Real Writer, writing about their own particular writing method. Writing on writing. Blogging on blogging. It's all so metaphysical. Kind of.
But here is The Problem: I also think most blogs are not real. I mean, they exist, but it's all happiness and "look at me and my perfect life and kids," and such nonsense. There'll be the occasional hint of something rotten, but it's never fully discussed. So Here It Is. And I've followed suit. Because as my friend Chelsea's husband Matt says, "When you try to keep up with the Jones's, you never really knew what went on, but now you check their blog and see exactly what's happening" and then you either feel like crap and are jealous because you can't do what they're doing or you do keep up with them and end up making yourself and everyone around you unhappy.
But if I make this blog Real, then my poor sweet in-laws will probably think that I hate their son and also it's one thing to vent in a private journal and another bring everyone down with you. I don't think it's healthy to dwell on negative things, though I am a big fan of venting. So I'm not really sure where to leave this conflict. Plus, I have no pictures of this inner struggle. Which is fortunate because I'm sure I look pathetic and overweight in the picture if it existed.
Just to keep in the spirit of things, here are some crappy things that have happened to me lately:
My cycle has started up again and returned with a VENGANCE!
For the past three days I've earnestly and happily tried to do my workout video and something always hinders me, things that are beyond my power.
Yesterday I went into the basement to help Richard clean up and we got into a fight and I threw the kitchen timer on the ground and broke it. Then said some swears.
My house it continually falling apart and because Richie's health insurance plan changed, we have even less money each month. . How are we supposed to get a new water heater?
It's cold outside. Like, really really cold.
Okay so that's a pretty dumb list. I couldn't think of anything too cynical. But here are some pictures to cheer you up :)
Eve and her yoga moves...she loves doing the downward dog all the time. It cracks me up!
Eve found my camelbak and started drinking from it! Like mother like daughter.
She's ready for summer hiking!
One Last Story: the other day after dinner we were all hanging out playing and I told Richie that Eve liked to knock over stacks of blocks. He built a tower and Eve, being on the other side of the room smiled a most devilish smile, then crawled at Full Ramming Speed to the tower of blocks and BAM knocked it down with her head. We laughed for a long time and I wish that I had captured it on video. She wouldn't do it again, but it was FUNNY.
Look at this, two posts in one week! As I mentioned earlier our dear friends the Newsomes recently returned to Utah after living in Texas for a while. They have a baby boy that is just about month older than Eve. He is super duper cute and huge! His mom and dad would tell us how big he is, but I just couldn't tell until I saw him in person. I think these pictures help illustrate. Granted, Eve is very small for her age, which just makes the difference that much greater and funnier. He is in the 95th percentile for weight and height I think. He is 13 months and 26 pounds. His brother is 3 1/2 years old and 29 pounds. It's so much fun to see how two siblings can be so different. But they're both darling boys and we're so glad that they're back!
By the way, I finally have some good video of Eve crawling, but now the new blogger won't let me post it. Plus I think that adding photos is even more frustrating than ever! Does anyone else agree?
If you wanted to see some explicit nudity and read racy anecdotes from my night of hedonistic debauchery, then you came to the right place!
Just Kidding! My New Year's Eve was quite pleasant but conservative, with my parents and sister sharing a crab leg and spicy shrimp dinner, opening presents from a fore mentioned family, putting a very tired and cranky 11 month old to bed, a boisterous game of Pit in which I cheat my sister (only a tiny bit) and then settled in by the fire to watch Star Trek the movie and drink Martinelli's at midnight. And I got a midnight kiss to boot! Sound ideal? It was. Jealous? You should be. So come next year and let's see how we can improve upon the night. Ha ha, I know, it will be hard. But let's try any way. I have a good feeling about 2010. It is the future, now!
So I really do have some Naughty New Year's Eve pictures. Feast your eyes on this:
Eve unfolding all the folded laundry. She stood up there on her own!
Eve pulling out all her books from the bottom shelf. She loves to look at her books.
That is about the extent of Eve's naughtiness. Perhaps someday Eve will have a blog of her own, with her own naught New Year anecdotes; I'm assuming she'll go to college after all. But hopefully those are far far down the road. For now, I'll take book pulling and snowshoeing as a grand way to ring in the New Year.
