Sink or Swim

Sully has turned into Lassie in the past few days. It would be incredibly cute if it weren't followed by something incredibly (insert dangerous, expensive, or grotesque here).

On Sunday, for instance, while I was drawing a bath for the boys, trying to encourage William not to splash all of the water onto the floor and grabbing two pairs of pajamas, Sully tugged on my sleeve, looked at me with big brown eyes and said, "Mama."

I know the drill now, so I followed his little footsteps into the bathroom and crossed my fingers he was about to show me something he'd put in the bathtub (for instance, last week's "Mama" led me to a bathtub full of our pots and pans). But that's okay. In instances like this, I've lucked out, because all it takes is a little cleaning time and we're back to normal.

This wasn't one of those times.

I sighed, looked down at Sully's little finger pointing straight at the toilet and groaned. He opened the lid slowly, as if to say, "You won't believe this, Mama. This is something amazing."

"Ooooh," he said as he opened the lid, eyes on me. Look Mom. Magic.

And he revealed his Sleep Sheep sound machine. Sitting at the bottom of the toilet. The only toy that has helped me gain sanity in moments of craziness was sitting like a stone in toilet water. The only sign of life, little bubbles that floated to the top until -

My son reached in and grabbed it and held it out for me like a prize. "Mama," he said again and I groaned ... again. I put the machine on a towel because I couldn't bear with the thought of throwing it in the trash just yet -- the only toy that made a sound that didn't make me crazy.

In case you're wondering about what items sink and what items swim, thus far we have discovered that bottles swim, sound machines sink, Neosporin swims, and toilet paper, well, toilet paper clogs.

Stay tuned for future episodes of Lassie. Until tomorrow ...

Beauty, the Beast, and the Terrible Twos

Our children have turned into Beauty and the Beast. We have one child who is well behaved, and one child who ... well, you see, ahem. People warned me about the Terrible Twos. The thing is, that being completely inexperienced in the realm of Motherhood, I thought it would happen when the boys, well, turned two.

This is not true.

As of late, my little Sully has turned into what John and I lovingly call, "Our little demon." (Sully, if you by chance run across this blog one day, just let me know and I will buy you a present).

Sully spends nearly 80% of his days completely red in the face, furious with me for trying to put his shirt on, or take his shoes off, or put him in the bathtub, or take him out of the bathtub. He's angry at us when we try to feed him dinner, but more angry when we take his tray away.

The one thing I'm thankful for right now is that thus far, he seems not to have heard too many of Mommy's curse words, because I'm fairly certain I would have heard a whole slew of them last night when I was trying to put him to bed.

His brother Will, however, seems to be just fine right now (this will inevitably change as twins seem to have this superhero power way of saying, "I'm done. Your turn." when it comes to things like this).


Sully, we love you still, our little tomato, but if these bouts of demon last until you're 3, Mommy might take a little vacation to Mexico for just a teensy bit of time.

Until tomorrow ... (really this time. I started working on a book so I've been throwing some time to that, but I'll be back this time, barring any unexpected mental health breaks needed from Terrible Two parenting).

I'd rather ride a unicycle.

One night, when I was six years old, my mom served fish sticks for dinner. I took them into the living room, plopped down on my belly and started to eat dinner in front of the television.

The thing was, I wasn't hungry. The other thing was, it was the night my mom promised we would go pick up my brand new bicycle. No more training wheels, but two wheels - with sparkles and spokes.


"Mom," I said after a few bites, "I'm finished." 

And she said what many of us have said once or twice or five thousand times, "Just three more bites, Sweetie."

I remember it took me a whole lot of willpower to get those bites down, but get them down I did, and then I yelled at my sister to hurry up and we jumped in the car to go to the bike shop.

A half-an-hour later, we pulled into the parking lot at the bike shop and I walked inside, my mind scrambling with all of the shiny possibilities. I was just minutes away from my brand new bike.

"This one," I said, pointing at a pink Schwinn. It was beautiful. My eyes went wide when the owner said, "Would you like to give it a try?" and I swung one leg over the seat and imagined how cool I was going to be riding around town.

And then I puked.

All over the bike.

And (weak stomachs stop here), it dripped off the handlebars and crossbar down to the carpet.

I remember the owner's face, and I remember my mom's, and I remember the feel of my sister's arm as she led me away from that super cool bike, out of the store, across the parking lot and into the car, where we watched my mom help the owner clean up my fish sticks.

"That smelled awful," my sister said, watching with gruesome interest, sitting backward in the passenger seat to get a better view of the action.

I curled up in the fetal position in the backseat and groaned.

When my sister was younger, she spent nearly all of her time on her bike, riding all around town with her neighborhood friends.

I walked. A lot. 

I think it's because my bike and I got off on the wrong foot. When I looked at that shiny pink bike, I knew it was a lie. It wasn't going to make me cool. It was going to make me puke in public. Looking back, I guess it was a really good lesson in vanity. Speaking of which, have I told you about the time I chopped my hair off and decided to get a perm?

Until tomorrow ...

Officially a Mrs. Well, except for Facebook.

So it’s official. I’m married. 

And though I promised myself not to cry while we stood under the arbor and my brother-in-law recited the vows we would exchange, I did cry. So much so in fact, I had to ask if I could “skip” a line in the vows.

Just in case anyone else plans on asking if you could skip a line in vows while getting married, it apparently isn’t allowed. 

It was exactly as I thought it would be. 

My walk down the aisle with my parents ended up including William, who upon making eye contact with me was hell bent on ensuring he had 100 percent of my attention, so I tripped my way down the aisle. John ended up holding Sully throughout the ceremony as he became super jealous about Will’s special treatment, and all was as it should have been – John and I holding the loves our lives while we married the love of our life. 

It sounds nice, but I was sweating like a pig because Will weighs close to 30 pounds now, my heels were digging into the mud and to avoid tripping I was constantly shifting – shifting weight in heels in mud by the way, is also not something I recommend for a wedding day. Outdoor wedding = flats. 

John hasn’t accepted my married status on Facebook yet, so I don’t know if we’re legal in all 52 states, but he says he doesn’t want to ruin his image.  Love you too, Sweetie. 

All right, so the blogs on wedding planning will end, and tomorrow, I will begin telling you about my married life. It will start with me hitting a deer while wearing a dress on my way to our celebration dinner. What, you’re surprised?

Changing my name to Mayonnaise

One week from tomorrow, John and I are getting married. It's a bit strange, since we feel like the rings are a bit of an accessory to this life it feels like we've been leading a while, but maybe now when I say, "I'd really like ice cream," at 10:30 at night, he'll feel a little more obligated to deliver, and maybe when he says, "I really want to watch the game," I won't roll my eyes.

Okay, maybe not, but that three second thought was nice.

I'm a bit excited to have my name changed, and a bit sad. It's been with me a while. Sivadge. It has changed over the years, too.

In sports, I started out Sivadge.
In sports, because you're constantly yelling and have two seconds to react, I became, "SIV!"
In awkward telemarketer calls, I'm Ms. Savage. (Sometimes I pretend Fred Savage and I go way back, but other than that, it's not so cool), and Ms. Si-vadge-ee.


In college, when I first started having to make more adult phone calls and pay some bills, I also learned that my name is long.

"S as is Sam. I, V as in Victor. A. D as in Dog. G as in George. E."

It will be weird that I won't have to say that any more. A few months ago, when I got off the phone with someone who said, "B as in Boy? C as in Cat?" and I finally gave up and am pretty sure I agreed to the name, Sibacge, I told John:

"I can't wait to have your name."

"Don't get too excited," he said. "People mess my name up all the time."

"What? How? Maynes?"

"Yup. They say, "Mr. Mayonnaise" a lot.

Sigh. Well, at least I like mayonnaise.

Iddy-at

One of our little guys, Will, started speaking last week. Then, everything was a "Bae-bee." Every photo, young or old, the person was identified as a "Bae-bee." Even inantimate objects were "Bae-Bees."

This weekend, we visited my parents and the boys' Great Grandma (G.G.) who was here for a visit and Will honored her by speaking his second word - "Iddy-at."

About 57 times.

He followed my parents' cats around all day, "Iddy-at Iddy-at," with his little finger pointing at them and his feet, still new to walking, pounding the floor.

Even a concrete bunny my grandma purchased for my parents' yard was an "Iddy-at" and Will took a moment to rest his head on the cold bunny, petting his back.

No animal is safe from his love.

My mom was able to steal a picture of this so I'll post it later in the week. Or month. Let's be honest.

Happy Valentine's Day. I know. I'm late for everything.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Valentine's Day! Good food, good company, good drinks. And if you couldn't have all of them, than I hope you had good company.

Last night, while feeding the boys dinner, John mentioned he wanted to do a favor for one of my friends. This friend is famous for saying "thank you" with a pan of delicious brownies. I said, "Oh, you should do that and then we'll get brownies. I love those brownies."

John looked at the boys and said, "See boys. Here's our problem. When your mom says love that way, she's talking about brownies. When I say love that way, I'm talking about your mom."

Well, Sweetie. It isn't true. I love you more than brownies. More than ice cream. More even than cheesecake (Cheesecake, I will make you feel better about this by eating two slices this week).

Yep. I love you more than all of those things. More than I knew I could. Happy Valentine's Day.

Yeesh. Weddings.

The other night, John and I were talking about wedding planning. It went something like this:
John: It's going to be small though, right? We agreed to very small.
Me: Yes. It's just family and very, very close friends.
John: Thank God. I don't want to spend the whole time telling people where to put the streamers.

Streamers.

At our wedding.

This is the moment I learned John believes our wedding is comparable to a birthday party. It looks like I may be doing the planning here.

Hmmm. Maybe he had this planned all along ...

Who does she think she is anyway?

So I guess I should introduce myself first. I'm the mother of twins who were born on time despite their determination to enter the world extremely early. They're 13 months old now, and we still don't sleep through the nights, but we relish the days they sleep in until 7:30, also known as the days I'm able to get ready for work without telling a child to stop eating lipstick. John is the love of my life (which I've learned does not mean we always get along) and he keeps me in line. It's a full time job.

I think the quickest way to get to know someone is to find out their loves and their, well, not-so-loves.

• Loves: Cooking, writing, discovering something new, listening to my boys laugh, the smell of pumpkin pie, eating pumpkin pie, eating all pie (okay, I digress)
• Not-so-loves: Judgement, car repairs (this is top of mind because it was necessary this week), broccoli without cheese, well, any vegetables without cheese

And my new love, my hope-to-be love, is to connect with other moms - moms who cook, who laugh, who tell their children not to eat lipstick. Moms who wish there were 27 hours a day so they could just get one more hour, okay fine - even 15 minutes - of sleep.

I can't wait to meet you.