the ba-ba fairy, or, adventures in wtf just came out of my mouth?

I'm going to blame it all on Daylight Savings Time, all right? I'm...a little tired. Hence, the following.

********************

Yesterday, I was driving Rowan home from a fun afternoon at Grandma's house, where she rolled around in a dirt hole as deep as she is tall:

She was chattering away in the back seat about how much she loves the dirt and Grandma and her bike and...something about a ba-ba. "Your pacifier?" I asked, since ba-ba is what she's always called her pacifier.

"No, ba-ba," she emphasized, clearing things right up. Lately, if I don't understand a word she's trying to tell me, I have about 2.5 guesses to get it right, or she loses her crap. So I tried again.

"Um, ba-ba...ba-ba...[*drawing a blank*] Are you sure you don't mean your pacifier?"

"No! No no no NO NO NOOOOOOOO, BA-BA, BA-BAAA!" Aaand crying.

Shit. What else could "ba-ba" mean?! I wracked my brain. "Oh! BALL? Ball-ball?"

"YEAH! Ba-ba. Yeah, Mama."

I tried to explain myself to her, hoping it would chill her out. "Ball! I gotcha now. I thought you were saying ba-ba, like your paci! Silly Mama!"

She sniffled. "Yeah, silly Mama," she chided, not bothering to mask her accusatory tone.

"Mama's so silly. Not ba-ba, Mama! Ball-ball!" These are not Rowan's words; this is me, over-narrating every second of our day, plus trying to make a joke to lighten the mood. It's a habit. "Speaking of ba-bas...yours has a boo-boo, doesn't it?"

"Yeah," she concurred. "Ba-ba has a boo-boo. Has a biiiig boo-boo." She's down to three pacifiers (from five), and her favorite (Green Ba-Ba) has a tear in it. I know we're supposed to get rid of it immediately - it's a huge hazard when it's torn like that - but Rowan was sick for, like, a month around September and October, and we were in no position to fuck with what little sleep she was managing to get. So periodically we check to see if the tear has gotten any bigger, and we remind her that soon, we'll be all done with ba-bas. She's open to the idea, sure, but it's abstract to her, and I don't want to use it as a threat. That said, the ba-bas need to go, and soon - if for no other reason than wear and tear and my refusal to replace the old ones this late in the pacifier game.

All of this was whirling around in my head yesterday, mixing with a lack of sleep (Daylight Savings Time ending has messed us UP, I'm TELLING you) and my poor brain trying to process the concept of 5:30 p.m. rolling around and having the outside world be both dark and 74 degrees. In Michigan. In November.

And so it was that in the three-minute drive from Grandma's house to ours that all of a sudden, as though I were watching myself in a horrible sitcom, I heard myself say the following:

"You know, soon the Ba-Ba Fairy will come and take all the ba-bas away."

I...wut?

WUT??

Where did THAT come from? J.J. and I haven't discussed a paci-removal strategy, much less the introduction of a fictional fairy that steals beloved comfort objects from our daughter.

But the words were out there, hanging in the air between me and the back seat. A Ba-Ba Fairy. Jesus.

Maybe Rowan didn't hear me. It was awfully silent back there.

And so my mouth spoke again, without my knowledge or consent.

"Yep. The Ba-Ba Fairy. She'll come and get your ba-bas and give you a new, special toy to cuddle with in your crib at ni-ni time."

OMG STOP.

CATHY.

SERIOUSLY.

But with the promise of a new toy, the idea of a Ba-Ba Fairy settled into Rowan's head like European interlopers in the Americas. My girl has a keen memory, which brings me regular pride and amazement, but it's damn inconvenient at moments when my sleep deprivation and pure idiocy intersect. She's now mentioned the Ba-Ba Fairy every time a pacifier is mentioned, spotted, or thought about.

And the bitch of it is - the Ba-Ba Fairy is not a horrible idea. It could work, and it could work well. But J.J. and I have no plan for this, no "special toy" in hand or even in mind to bestow upon our ba-ba-less toddler, and no method to this madness. So now the concept of a magical fairy arriving to steal her ba-bas is just floating around, possibly causing Rowan distress, and definitely causing me distress because -

I'm not ready.

I'm not ready for her to be done with her ba-bas.

I'm not ready for her to be old enough to need to be done with pacis, and for her to move past her comfort object. Isn't she my little baby still? Always?

She's not, and I know this, if only because roughly eighty-four times a day I accidentally refer to her as my "baby" or "babe" and am swiftly and harshly corrected: "I NOT A BABY. I A TODD-LOH." Yes, your majesty. "I NOT A MAJESTY. I A TODD-LOH." Okay. She's not a baby.

But she's my baby.

And, importantly, who the hell wants to deal with continued night wakings as she adjusts to not having a pacifier? Ugh. I'm never going to sleep again.

...Which probably bodes well for Rowan. Who knows what new toddler-habit fairies I'll conjure up during my extended state of pacifier-riddance-induced sleep deprivation? The Diaper Fairy, arriving to remove all Pampers from the premises? The Whining Fairy, who shall not tolerate disrespectful tones and snatches voice boxes, à la Ursula from The Little Mermaid? The 5:30-Wake-Up Fairy, who discovers the root cause behind early awakenings and scatters preventive Sleepy Dust (airborne Benadryl) at four in the morning?

Actually. That last one might not be a bad idea.

********************

Will keep you posted on the Ba-Ba Fairy's inevitable proceedings.

a pre-Pinterest wedding was probably a really good thing.

:: This post contains affiliate links.

Look. Back in MY day (ahem...2010), wedding planning was simpler than it is these days. There was no Netflix bingeing to distract me from a menu brainstorming session, no discussions necessary about the perfect punny-yet-memorable wedding picture hashtag to use, and - the biggie - no Pinterest goals to live up to.

On the one hand, you may recall that Pinterest and I are on good terms with each other. Great, even. Could've been my bridesmaid. But Pinterest was started just a few months before my wedding took place, so when I was planning, I had nothing to go on for inspiration other than random Google image searches. Looking back, that was...probably a good thing. I think I would've gone way overboard trying to DIY the crap out of everything.

As it was, our M.O. for wedding planning was to keep everything as simple and stress-free as possible. We got married at a barn on a Sunday; I wore a dress I bought online; and everyone ate pizza and ice cream. We found great ways to save money, but we managed to strike a happy balance between DIY'ing and outsourcing. 

Here's a breakdown of how we pulled off Cathy + J.J.:


#1. We hired a wedding planner.

This might seem backwards in terms of saving money, but trust me, hiring a wedding coordinator was hands-down the best decision we made (aside from choosing each other, duh). We worked with the amazing folks at A Moment In Time, and we picked their middle-of-the-road planning package. Back in 2010, they had three package "levels" (I think it's changed since then). At the high end, they'd take care of every last detail for you throughout the process, right down to serving you breakfast the day of the wedding. At the other end of the spectrum, you could have coordinators show up just for the day of your wedding to help the day run smoothly (set up, juggle vendors, clean up). With our in-between package, we worked with them from the beginning to hone our vision, choose the right vendors for our price points, and stay on a reasonable planning timeline...but everything else (food choices, decoration ideas, etc.) was pretty much up to us. It was the perfect mix between having someone to guide us while still maintaining agency over the final product.

I've recommended a wedding planner (and, specifically, my planners!) to everyone I know who's gotten engaged since I got married. They saved us tons of money by helping us create a budget, by steering us away from accidentally-expensive ideas (example: our original "Taste of Ann Arbor" menu plan), and by helping me maintain my sanity, thereby saving us untold amounts of cash on a Xanax prescription.


#2. We DIYed when it made sense...

It's true that this was pre-Pinterest, but we still had some DIY ideas that we executed, usually with the help of more-talented friends. We just kept the DIY portions of planning to a manageable minimum. For example:

:: Table markers: For our table number markers, we recycled some wood blocks painted with chalkboard paint and stamped around the edges that our friends had made for their wedding.

:: Kid entertainment: J.J. drew a coloring book for the kids who'd be attending, which we left on the tables with crayons. The book told the story of our relationship through J.J.'s cartoons (aww).

:: DIY linens: Instead of more-expensive colored table linens, we went with crisp white linens (included in the cost of renting our venue) and had J.J.'s mom make us table runners in our wedding colors. The great thing about having our own table runners is that J.J.'s mom was able to make them into a quilt for us after the wedding.

:: Moss letters: J.J.'s mom also added moss to papier-maché letters to hang as the decoration on the barn doors. We still have these letters (just the cardboard...the moss is long gone!).

:: Stationery: For stationery, here's a pro tip: Choose your maid of honor based on her graphic design skills. Kidding, but seriously, my maid of honor helped us out with stationery majorly. We ordered professional invitations, and I made the place cards (using card stock and a cheap circle cutter from Michaels), but Beth did pretty much everything else. She's a graphic designer and knows me inside and out, which meant she knew exactly what we'd want in the paper department. She made our save-the-dates:

...our wedding programs:

...and our I Spy game cards, which we put on tables with disposable cameras (since this was also pretty much pre-camera-phones):

:: Lawn games: We wanted to offer something unique and fun to do during the cocktail hour and reception, so we bought inexpensive ladder golf and bocce ball sets, and our friends made us a beanbag game (which we still have).


#3. ...but we generally aimed for simplicity.

:: Online wedding dress shopping: I bought my wedding dress from JCrew.com, which was soooo much more enjoyable for me than trying on dress after dress on a glittery dais in front of cooing (or booing) onlookers (an introvert's freaking nightmare). Thankfully, the dress was made well and fit like a dream right out of the box, and the only alterations I got were some bra cups added, since the material around the bust was see-through silk. (It's also an introvert's nightmare to have her nipples available for viewing at her own wedding. FYI.)

:: A small wedding party: J.J. and I had a best man and a maid of honor, which kept things simple in a bunch of ways. Our siblings did readings at the ceremony, and to me, that was still a super meaningful way for them to be involved.

:: Rehearsal brunch vs. dinner: We did a simple restaurant brunch instead of a rehearsal dinner. This was partially by necessity, since our venue was booked the day before our wedding for another event, so it was do it in the morning or nothing, if we wanted to rehearse on-site. Plus, we had a small wedding party and very few out-of-town guests, so a big dinner wasn't really called for.

:: A Sunday event - but at the ideal venue: By the time I called to reserve our first-choice venue (more than a year in advance), it was already booked for every single Friday and Saturday from May through October. So, it was either go with a Sunday wedding, or choose another venue, which would be both less desirable to us and more expensive. But!! I readily admit that this is one of the few things I regret about our wedding - having it on a Sunday. It meant most guests left between 10 and 11:00 p.m., and it was less convenient for them to squeeze our event into their busy summer schedules. It may have been worth it, though, for the simplicity of the venue: It was naturally beautiful, which kept necessary decorations to a minimum and provided us with lots of pretty photo ops, and it had air conditioning, easy parking, and an inclement-weather indoor option (which was, thankfully, not necessary...it was 74 and overcast, AKA perfect wedding weather).

:: Candles vs. flowers: Instead of designing dozens of flower arrangements, we went with candles and river rocks. Our wedding coordinators were also our floral designers, which helped a ton, and the results were modern, clean, and attractive (and less expensive).

:: Simple ceremony: We hired our friend's band (a string trio) to play during our ceremony, and they even managed to arrange the song "Kiss the Girl" from The Little Mermaid for us (it has special meaning to us, obviously...it was the song J.J. was humming during one of our first dates, as he rowed me down the river in a little boat). And we followed a generic ceremony outline, but added our own vows (and the sibling readings). It was about twenty minutes long, and my only regret is that we didn't get it on video!

:: Donations vs. favors: Instead of spending precious time assembling favors that half the guests would leave on the tables, we made a donation in our guests' names rather than offer wedding favors. The money we would have spent on candies, candles, or keychains instead went to the "Cool Cap" research program at Mott Children's Hospital, where my nephew was treated when he was born with a brain injury.

:: Easy decorations:  The only decorations we added to the rustic barn setting were white twinkle lights and paper lanterns in blue, green, and white.

:: Simple & delicious main course: It's our favorite food, and pretty much everyone loves it, so we went with pizza as our main course (followed by wedding cake and a sundae bar). This also eliminated the step of asking for and organizing meal choice cards, and it was no problem to add vegetarian and vegan options.

:: Guest book: You can buy high-quality, expensive wedding guest books. And I did, in fact, about a month before the big day. A few days later, though, I had to buy a copy of Dr. Suess's "Oh, The Places You'll Go!" since my siblings were going to do readings from the book during the ceremony. As I was flipping through it, I realized it'd make a perfect, unique guest book. I returned the expensive guest book and had the guests make their mark in a book I now read with my daughter.

#4. We planned for memories.

The wedding's only one day, right? We wanted to make sure we remembered details from our day, so we planned to save as many mementos as possible and display them throughout our home. We've managed to incorporate quite a few:

:: Pictures: Obviously. While we tried to scrimp and save in as many areas as possible, we did not want to skimp on a photographer. We ended up getting beyond lucky when our incredibly generous friends gifted us a quality photography package from Michelle & Chris Gerard Photography. We have so many awesome photos from the day, and we put together a photo album with our faves, along with displaying a few more.

:: Anniversary pictures: In addition to the wedding pics themselves, we started a tradition of taking a picture every year in front of a little red barn that was on our wedding venue property. One of these days, I'll even get around to printing and hanging those anniversary shots...

:: Fabric remnants: Like I mentioned earlier, my mother-in-law made us a beautiful quilt using the fabric from our table runners, and I also framed some remnants for our kitchen's frame wall.

:: Random tchotchkes: I saved one of our wedding water bottles (we added custom labels), and we have some of the candles from the reception tables. Our guest book stands on one of our bookshelves, and we still use the paper lanterns every now and again.

********************
So that was our wedding! Overall, I'd say we achieved our wedding goals, which were (1) get married, and (2) plan the wedding without killing each other. If we had to do it all over again, I still say the only things I'd change would be getting a video of the ceremony and holding the event on a Friday or Saturday instead of Sunday. Otherwise? Thanks to our wedding coordinators, our supportive friends and family, and our literal inability to get sucked down the rabbit hole of inflated Pinterest dreams, we got hitched without a hitch.

And are pretty much living happily ever after.

a very Spidey Halloween.

Happy November, everyone, and a giant WHYYYY to the genius who coordinated the end of Daylight Saving Time with the morning after Halloween!

This was our first Halloween with a kid old enough to really get trick-or-treating - and dressing up in a costume. Turns out that, just like with her birthday party theme, it was a little hard for me to accept the idea of letting it go (ugh with the Frozen puns) and following Rowan's wishes when it came to choosing her Halloween costume. She's barely two years old; I kind of just wanted to slap a costume on her and call it a day, much like her first two Halloweens.

2013...Five-week-old Yoda, she was.

2014...Princess Leia (photo credit goes to my friend Stephanie!).

But J.J. convinced me to get Rowan's input on her costume. Still, that's easier said than done when you're talking about a toddler with no cognitive reference for Halloween costumes. I figured it was best to explain the broad ideas of Halloween, costumes, and trick-or-treating to her and see where she went with it. About six weeks ago, I brought it up to her one day while we were reading stories, telling her that after her birthday, it would be Halloween.

Her eyes lit up. "Yeah! Hallo-leen!"

She already had the concepts of treats and neighbors down pat, so I told her that on Halloween, we dress up in costumes and knock on doors to get treats from the neighbors. "Treats! Treats from neighbors!" she repeated.

"What kind of costume would you wear?" I asked, just to see if she was following.

"A kitty-cat!" she responded immediately. Random idea, but I totally did a silent cheer. Yay, an easy, cute costume that wasn't a princess! Look, if she wanted to dress up as a princess (let's get real: Elsa), I'd have gotten on board. But I'm guessing the next five or so years will be princess Halloweens, so I was hoping for one last non-Disney-princess costume. (And yes, I'm aware that dressing Rowan up as Princess Leia last year does technically mean she was a princess, but that's totally different, right?) Anyway, I was all for the kitty-cat idea. A kitty-cat would be great. 

BUT. Since kids are known for changing their costume preferences right up until and including the last minute, I asked her again a couple days later. This time, she had a new answer: "Thwip! Thwip!"

I laughed - "thwip thwip" was her word for Spider-Man. A Spider-Man costume? Okay! I knew J.J. would be psyched; he's the reason Rowan even knows who Spider-Man is. In her world, he's the dude on Daddy's favorite pajama pants. 

Figuring she was going with a superhero theme, I asked her who Mama and Daddy would be and was met with a resounding, "Thwip! Thwip! Thwip! Thwip!"

Ah. Apparently all three of us were going to be Spidey.

I asked her about our Halloween costumes literally at least once a day during September and October, and her answer remained the same (minus the one kitty-cat request): Spider-Man for Rowan, for Mama, and for Daddy. Meanwhile, she acquired a Spidey action figure...and a bona fide obsession with everything Spider-Man. The two went on walks around the neighborhood every evening...

...practiced their gymnastics together...

...and ate dinner together (thanks, Rachel, for her most beloved water bottle, which she is cradling and kissing here)...

...and eventually, Rowan declared that she was "Spider-Man's mommy."

Shit! It's okay, Rowan. Happens to every mom at some point.

All in all, she was psyched and ready for the big day. We tried on her costume (ahem...$6 pajamas from Target plus a hat from Grandma), and she immediately went into Spidey mode, crouching down and shooting webs from her hands.

Additional web-shooting practice at our mommy group Halloween party last Tuesday.

The day before Halloween, we had a dress rehearsal - we attended Ann Arbor's Main Street Trick-or-Treat event, which was crazy busy and lots of fun. Most of the businesses had huge bowls of candy waiting for the tiny trick-or-treaters. Vault of Midnight, the comic book store (and a frequent haunt of Rowan & Daddy's), was giving out free comic books in addition to the candy. Naturally, Rowan chose the Spider-Man comic, which she happily snagged after perusing the entire store:

"There's Spider-Man, and there's Spider-Man, and there's Spider-Man...and I'm Spider-Man, too!"

When Halloween finally rolled around, we had one excited Spidey on our hands. We killed the time between nap and trick-or-treating by finally carving a pumpkin (hey, better late than never, right?):

I wouldn't let her wear her costume to carve the pumpkin, since I knew she'd flip out if it got
messy right before trick-or-treating, but she insisted on still wearing Spidey gear. This girl.

J.J.'s Spider-Man pumpkin turned out pretty cool, but the other
pumpkins are from our Month of Half-Assed Pumpkin Projects.

And then it was time to go. Honestly, I wasn't sure if Rowan would freak out at the prospect of having neighbors open their doors on her - she wasn't a huge fan of it last year, and she still is pretty wary around strangers. But apparently the costume empowered her, because she ran to every door, pounded with both fists, and shouted, "TRICK OR TREAT!" (Thankfully, she learned to pronounce "trick" correctly a couple days before Halloween, instead of her previous highly inappropriate and highly hilarious mispronunciation: "Cock or treat!") She lasted way longer than I did (ugh, it was cold and rainy, leave me alone), roaming the neighborhood with J.J. until it was pitch black outside.

And even though Halloween used to be a total pain-in-my-ass holiday (WORST freaking holiday of the year when you work in a child care center), it's growing on me now. I mean, the fact that I participated in - encouraged, even - family group costumes for two years in a row says a lot.

2014...Princess Leia with her parents {spoiler alert}, Darth Vader and Padme Amidala.

2015...three Spider-Men, just like Rowan requested. (Boot covers by Grandma!)

I've moved on to prepping her for a visit to Santa already, figuring that our six weeks of trick-or-treating prep worked out nicely. Maybe it'll go smoothly if she gets to wear her Spider-Man costume to see Santa? Haha.

Hope everyone else had a happy Halloween! 

GUEST TBT to 1995: "I Want To Cry, But That Would Probably Hurt, Too."

Sure, sure, laughing at my middle school angst is all fine and good. But you know what's even better? Laughing at someone ELSE'S angst!

Hooray for guest posts!!

This yearbook pic is from before the incident discussed in today's throwback,
but it's hard not to hate her for being so pretty during a time in life that's
supposed to be reserved for looking awkward as hell.

I've known Melissa (the writer behind MichiforniaGirl) since our drama-filled tween days. And they were actually literally drama-filled, since we were both in theater. We even ended up in a SUPER EXCLUSIVE high school play together - super exclusive since there were only eight or so students in the cast, so, EXCLUSIVE!!1!!...even though probably only like a dozen kids auditioned. 

Everyone knows that we theater geeks have a knack for turning up the (melo)drama. See for yourself in this painful diary entry, excerpted from Melissa's awesome journal that was adorned with a picture of a (pensive) cat and meticulously labeled "Diary 15: February, '95 - March, '95." 

Our protagonist was thirteen when the following events took place:

********************
March 7, 1995
PART 1 - Spacers

     Yesterday, I got my spacers on. Immediately after I got them on, they did not hurt at ALL. I was FINE. Afterward, Mom took me out for pizza -- no problem.

     Then I woke up this morning and I was like, "Shit!" I couldn't even close my back teeth together. I still can't! I ate virtually NO breakfast, which totally sucked, since I was soooo hungry. I DID take Tylenol, though. After that wore off, I found out just how limited my mouth options were...I couldn't swallow, talk, or God FORBID -- chew -- without a searing pain shooting through my mouth. At lunch, I took half the lunch I usually take, and was able to EAT half of THAT. It took me 15 minutes (NO EXAGGERATION) to eat one fruit-roll-up! I took tiny bites of my sandwich, and was able only to suck them until they were small enough to swallow. Now my tongue is raw, my teeth KILL, and my poor tummy is basically empty.

     P.S. My teeth STILL hurt so much I can scarcely BREATHE. I cannot put my teeth together or even TOUCH certain teeth. And as for brushing, well, you can just about forget about it. And chewing! Oh, how I long to bite down -- hard -- on a pretzel or chip ladened with gooey cheese.

     P.P.S. It's so contradictory -- the orthodontist said to eat soft foods -- but not to eat GOOEY, chewy foods, either. Aaaaaaa! I want to cry, but that would probably hurt, too.

********************

Doesn't this transport you right back to the day after you got your braces on?! And every time you got them tightened? My teeth totally hurt just thinking about it. (Or should I say, they TOTALLY HURT just thinking about it.) Can I just recap my favorite lines from this entry?

:: "...I found out just how limited my mouth options were..." Your mouth options?!

:: "It took me 15 minutes to eat one fruit-roll-up!" The horror.

:: "...my poor tummy is basically empty." Your poor, poor tummy, Melissa.

:: "Oh, how I long to bite down -- hard -- on a pretzel or chip ladened with gooey cheese." Hashtag teenage longing, hashtag teen sorrows, hashtag first-world problems. 

:: "I want to cry, but that would probably hurt, too." This line could've been lifted straight out of my own purple journal. It just...really encapsulates the overall experience of teen angst, doesn't it? Too funny!

...BUT WAIT! That's not all!! Much like the relentless agony of orthodontia, the hilarity doesn't end there:

********************

March 10, 1995

PART II - Braces

     Some Friday. Yuck. Getting my braces on was the worst thing I've ever had to endure in my LIFE. A couple hours? Um, no. More like 4 hours, no joke.

     Getting my brackets on weren't so bad. The worst part about that was the taste of the adhesive. Yuck!

     Then came the metal bands. They're kind of like spacers, but they're metal (duh) not rubber. I got four of them -- but not before an hour and 45 minutes of grueling pain. They'd shove one band onto a tooth; pinch it, hack at it, press it, pick it, PUSH it, scrape it, and basically kill it. The whole procedure of fitting one band took approximately 7 minutes -- only for the orthodontist to check his work with a mirror, say, "Oh, this one doesn't fit," rip it out, and start ALL OVER again.

     At dinnertime, they didn't hurt just yet, but I felt like I was eating with rocks on each of my teeth. The brackets kept banging together when I chewed -- so I just gave up and had soup.

     Now, I look in the mirror and see an ugly, unattractive girl with swollen lips and silver teeth. Yuck. I hope that technology advances quite a bit by the next generation so my children don't have to go through this.

     Love and Hugs,

     MH

********************

I'm not gonna lie, that spot-on description of getting braces put on made my mouth ache in remembrance. Solidarity, Teenage Melissa. My favorite line in Part II, though, is when she says, "I hope that technology advances quite a bit by the next generation so my children don't have to go through this."

Amen to that, Brace-Face. Thank you, Melissa, for being brave enough to share your pain with us.

via

Happy Thursday! For more ridiculous adventures in angst, check out the previous Throwbacks to Hell:

TBT to 1993: "All I Have To Get Is JEANS."

TBT to 1992: "Maybe I'll Turn Out Okay After All."

TBT to 1992: "What Am I Supposed To Use? Underwear On My Head?"