Take it like a mom

So, today. OMFG, this day. After I fed Nico this morning, I put him back in his crib to sleep and then I went to sleep. He learned to roll over this week, but can only go back to front, at which point he gets stuck and pissed off. He woke up on his tummy shouting indignantly, and when I rescued him I found that he'd peed out of his diaper. No biggie, for I follow a friend's advice and always have two sheets on his bed with a waterproof pad in between. I stripped off the top sheet and pad, changed him into a cloth diaper and a T-shirt, and brought him back to our room. I nursed him again and then he pooped. It sounded like a small poo, so I stuck my finger in the leg elastic to peek in and check, and lo...it was not a small poo. It was a giant poo, and my finger was in it. But still, I was cheerful!

I took him into the nursery and changed him into another cloth diaper, then took him back and let him finish his second breakfast. He fell asleep and I let him nap on my lap for about twenty minutes, because even though I have tons of stuff to do around the house right now, I don't want to do my work at the expense of enjoying these little moments with him. Finally I decided I had to get some chores done, so I put him back in his crib and went down to start boxing up my stuff in the side porch / office so that we can clean it up and turn it into a playroom. I got two shelves on one bookcase cleared before Nico woke up crying again. I went up and found that he'd peed out a second diaper. Poor guy! Two in one day! Still cheery! Changed, nursed, and once he fell asleep, I put him on the big bed so I could change his crib sheet since he had now peed on the backup sheet.

I like Nico's crib well enough and I try not to complain because it was an incredibly generous gift. But every time I change the sheets, the metal support frame for the crib sags. It has brackets on each corner where you can raise and lower the mattress height, but if I lift the corner of the mattress to mess with the sheets, the opposite corner bracket collapses. I discovered last time the easiest way to do it is to take the mattress out of the crib entirely, put the sheets and pads on, and then carefully put it back in, trying to get the weight to hit the frame exactly evenly, which is nearly impossible with a tight-fitting, double-sheeted mattress. Nico had started to fuss again, having a sixth sense for inconvenient times to refuse to nap, so I put him in his mini-swing on the floor several feet away from the crib and went back to finish. When I got the mattress out, I lifted it too high and I hit the ceiling fan, which was on (of course). One of the blades came loose, bounced off the bed, and nearly beaned the dog, who then bolted from the room. Little clumps of super gross thick dust that were built up on the fan went spiff!, all over the bed and the floor. I realized a few minutes later that the blade could easily have landed on Nico, as he was completely unprotected in his swing. (I still am not entirely okay about this, even though he is.)

I finished re-sheeting his mattress and sure enough, as soon as I put it in the crib, the frame collapsed. I readjusted the frame, put the mattress back in, it collapsed. I got it balanced just right, put the mattress in, and when I tested it by pushing on each end, the fucking thing collapsed. I finally just gave up, moved the frame to the lowered position, and put the mattress in. It's harder to get Nico in and out, but at least I know the frame isn't going to fall while he's in there. If I could have picked up the crib and chucked the whole thing across the room, I would have. And that wasn't even the end of it. When I picked up the fan blade to reattach it, I realized it hadn't simply slipped out of its position. It had snapped completely off. There's no way to fix it and the fan spins all wonky without it. So it's not even noon, I've stuck my finger in poo and changed two peed-out diapers and outfits. The fan is off so it's hot in our room, there are still clumps of dust everywhere, Nico's peed-on sheets are piled on the bed, our sheets now need to be changed, the dog is freaked out, none of my housework has been completed, I'm pissed off at the crib and at myself, and the fucking fan is broken. And I get to email MB and tell him, guess what! I broke the fan in an incredibly stupid fashion! Let's go spend money we need for other things on a new one because your wife is a moron who almost hit your baby in the face with a flying fan blade!

To his credit, MB was very gracious about the whole thing and only teased me a little bit. By the time he got home I was seeing the absurd humor in the morning, especially after working out my rage with a broom on all the errant clumps of dog hair populating our wood floors. I treated him to a litany of complaints when he walked through the door, and when I finally finished, he said, "Suck it up! Take it like a mom!" And I guess I did, poo finger and all.

"Harness your chi, Mama."