You know what? Sometimes I can take it. Sometimes it keeps me awake when I should be sleeping.

First of all it starts with money. See, I'm the CFO in our family venture. Lars doesn't do well knowing about profits and losses. There's only so much a nerdy scientist can handle when it comes to losses. Oh, he'll take the profits. He'll take the profits, even if that means being awake from 1:00 a.m. until 5:47 a.m. with a screaming baby who wants nothing but booby snacks and not some BPA-free, latex-free almost-as-good-as-the-breast good-for-nothing contraption because her mama is away at work. He'll take the profits but he could go without the losses.

Mostly, though, you can't make profits out of spending $93.81 at Trader Joes. At some point you're gonna have to write that down in your check book registry as a loss. You gotta write it down even though it is food that is going into your body, like Scandinavian Blend Half Light Half Dark fair trade coffee, so that you can go to work and have energy to make the profits. You just can't spin that $93.81 into a profit. That isn't the kind of math likes to do.

Instead, I stay up late doing clandestine bill-paying, check book reconciling, and down to the penny financial planning for the months to come. It has to be clandestine because Lars feels awfully pukey when he knows I'm hunkering down to manage that money business.

Recently, I took 10-days off of work to manage some family priorites. We learned a good financial lesson from that 10-day Family Management Episode. Primarily what we learned is that I can't take any more time off of work, like ever. I made the mistake of telling Lars that we needed to tighten our belts the next couple of months to make up for that Family Management Episode.

Lars got a bit squeezy in his chest and started blinking his eyes like he was watching a ping-pong match on fast-forward. Of course, everything is fine, it always has been and it always will be. I just can't take time off of work, that's all. That's okay, cause braces and other miscellaneous orthodontia are way better than Disney World.

Then on top of the Family Management Episode putting the near-final wrench in our Disney World and Operation Home Addition plans, Lars' work is going through a little something. Pfarma recently made plans to acquire another major pharmaceutical company. That acquisition is slated to take place in September. Included in the acquisition plans are plans to lay-off 19,000 workers. Lars was kindly notified that lay-off decisions would be announced by December.

Between the two big hits (okay one is only a potential hit) we've made some spending decisions. For example, in honor of the kids first day of school we did . . . nothing. In the past we have taken them clothes shopping where they could each pick out a brand new outfit. This year not even their socks were new. We haven't dined out in a month, not even for a Slurpee or a bagel or a chai tea latte. For the recent round of birthday parties, blessedly all for girls, we made hair bows here at home with supplies we keep on hand. In short, I have every penny accounted for and spoken for. There's little elbow room, and if all goes according to my evil plans then we're going to ride through this without a scratch.

Of course, we're on pins and needles waiting for The Big Announcement from Pfarma. I suppose this is what many other fellow countrymen feel like, all pins and needley. You wonder to your pincushion self, "what can I tell my spouse?' or 'how do I get the kids on board?' or 'do I take on more hours at work, thereby paying the nanny more, thusly decreasing take-home pay only to make a couple hundred extra bucks not to mention more time away from the kids?" I suppose this is what most of us are going through. It makes the line between what is important (kids, health, marriage) and what seems really important (fiscal health) get very blurry. Where do you draw that line? Isn't one more important that the other? Isn't money just a thing? And yet, we have to be on solid ground at all times, we can't risk spillage on the financial end. The first day back at school for the kids Lars and I dropped them off inside their classroom with many kisses and much fanfare. Then, as soon as their classroom doors were closed I rushed off to the clinic in the barrio to fill in for a midwife who had emergency gall bladder surgery. Originally, I had requested the day off but I was feeling ansty to bring home some unbudgeted profits, so I made a couple extra bucks and was able to sock it away as cushion, but in doing so caught some flack from a friend for working on their first day and disappointed the kids.

Working motherhood sucks sometimes. The work-life balance is always just beyond my fingertips. Is there a real cost in not picking up a few extra hours here and there? Sometimes, a lot of times, I just don't know the answer and this is what keeps me up at night.

But not my husband, nothing keeps him up at night. Oh, to be a man.

And then again, maybe tomorrow, we'll come into a modest sum of money. If that happens, I plan on sleeping well and keeping my lady parts. Lord knows, we only need one man in this here family.

It's Not What You Think It Is, At Least I Think . . .

On Thursday, when I was at the barrio clinic, temperatures in that area soared to 109-degrees by noon. Fortunately for me, I live coastal. Typically this means that there is a night and day difference in temperature, with the coast being much cooler and breezier. I guess, compared to 109-degrees you could call the 90-degree temperatures that we've been experiencing over here on the edge of the earth as cooler.

We don't have air-conditioning in our house. From what I gather from most other people in this area, you don't need it but maybe a few times a year. That said, all newer homes have it. Our dated and not-so-spring-chickeny home would probably burst into flames if we added it. We patiently wait for the night to fall, when temperatures drop immensely and the earth cools off. Then we sit around in boxer shorts and tank tops with all the fans pointed at us, eating popsicles and not touching each other while we wait for our house to finally cool off.

Yesterday was prickly warm by 8:00 a.m. It was the school's Walk-t0-School Day which meant I had to get everybody pulled together with teeth brushed by 7:30 to get to school on time. Keeping in mind the weather predictions, I put on one of the two pairs of shorts that I own. Shorts for me are typically reserved for in-home family days, occasionally I wear them around DJ and Courtney who are pretty much family anyhow. The point is, I don't typically wear shorts but yesterday I did because it was damn hot. It made my heart feel a little squeezy with my legs out there in public for everyone to see, but then again, just about everyone else was in shorts and it weren't no thing for my legs to be in shorts either.

Eventually, the end of the day came closer. In the afternoon I brought all the kids with Petra and me to her gymnastics club, which is situated in a little cranny overlooking ocean swaths with cool, salty winds tickling your unshaven and shorted leg. I relaxed back in a hard plastic chair, sleeping Tova situated at my side in her stroller, Annike and Soren safely playing on the generously treed lawn outside the building. I propped my feet up against the parent-viewing window, legs stretched out before me exposed from ankle to mid-thigh.

It was out of the corner of my eye that I spotted it, in between takes of watching Petra looping around the uneven bars, a small discoloration on my leg. Now I know what you're thinking, I'm notoriously fond of baby poop stories and it seems like this is headed that way. Bear with me.

Upon further inspection, this thing on the upper inner thigh of my left leg was about the size of a quarter but more oval than circle. It was flat against, or rather, in my skin. Purple, pink and red little dots at the surface. Not painful and not swollen. With great horror I wondered, "is this a hickey?"

Now before you going thinking things, let me make it quite clear to you that I am a 30-something married woman with four children and a career. I have absolutely no time in my life for "fore"-activities that involve hickey making and the like. That is just ridiculous of you to even go there. I'm ashamed.

And yet, there it is, a hickey on my inner thigh. I suppose that this will just have to be one of life's mysteries, like the Bermuda Triangle, and I will never fully know the answer.

Now You Can Begin to Understand

See, the deal is that I want to blog everyday. I want to tell you all the true, funny stories that happen to my family and me. I have tons of ideas swimming around in my head and mean to have them down on that virtual paper the moment they come to me. That's my plan.

Thing is, this is what typically happens: With my mom here, which makes things easier and less complicated, I theoretically have more time to catch-up on everything. But what really happens is that I sit down to nurse Tovey right before I plan to blog. But then I have to help Soren blow his nose right after that. After that I have to go wash my hands. As soon I wash my hands, I hear Annike calling me from the potty. She needed some help wiping. Washed my hands again, only to find that Tova has pooped out. Onsie off, baby in the shower. Then dry her off, calendula to her tushie, moisturizer all over. We make it back out to the family, Petra has single-handedly turned it upside-down and then vacated the premises. I chase after her, regaling her with the virtues of cleaning up after oneself.

After supervising Petra, I finally sit down to tell you the funny thing that happened on the way to the _________ when I realize that I've forgotten what I was going to say but have some vague sense that it really wasn't that funny anyhow.

Anyway, Annike was starting to look like green haired muppet with all the chlorine in her hair (see her ends in the above photo?). Today, I took her to the nearby children's' salon where they offer a treatment for just this problem. In spite of all our new cost cutting behaviors, part of Operation Finance a Home Addition, I left that little kiddie salon having spent $27-dollars getting the green out and the ends trimmed off. She is now fully restored to blond with hair texture that no longer resembles sticky, moldy hay. Earlier, before all the aforementioned nose-blowing, buns-wiping, daughter scolding hullabaloo, there was a really funny angle to this story. It evades me now.

More tomorrow.

But then again . . .

Yesterday morning Lars woke up around 6:40 a.m., stumbled through the house, crashed into the wall in the family room only to surprise Petra. Petra is never awake at 6:40 a.m., she's not a morning-type. In fact, we have a pulley system hooked up to her loft so that we can heave her out of bed in the morning. Not yesterday morning.

Lars found her sprawled out on a yoga mat doing sit-ups and push-ups.

Sometimes I really don't know about her. If it weren't for her startlingly Lars-tastic features I'd almost wonder if they switched her out at that busy old University of Michigan on the day she was born and now some other couple has a couch potato kid.

I suppose her early morning workout is why she has a six-pack and I do not.

Call It Whatever You Want . . . I'll Call It Rotten

My husband and I don't even agree to disagree, that's too disharmonious for me. I need everyone to think exactly the same way I do.

They should agree with me, too.

Always.

And not just my husband. Really, I like the kids to think their own things, as long as it is what I would think about that very same thing.

You pickin' up what I'm laying down?

Imagine my chagrin when Tova decided to think something else about things. In particular, night related things. Like sleeping.

I'm really tired. Washed out. Lethargic. Inconsolably exhausted.

When that old fart sneezed on me on Sunday I fell ill, remember? Then Tova and Annike got it. Annike is a champ, a true hero of getting-betterness. Tova hasn't figured things out just yet, so instead of focusing, she's been spending her days blowing green snot bubbles out of her nostrils at our nanny -- who is only recently semi-comfortable with body fluids.

That is how Tova has been spending her days, well, that and eating Chinese checkers pieces. As to how Tova has been spending her nights, well let me tell you . . .

I'm so grrrrrrr-frustrated at feeling this pitiful. Makes me more pitiful. Makes my contacts pop out. Damn brand-new contacts.

I . . . just . . . need . . . sleep.

I told Tova. I think.

For sure, I told my husband. I especially told him (can I say that?). I told him 2-sleepless nights ago at 4:00 in the morning. I cried it out at the top of my whisper, hoping and praying it would have an effect on his sleep through anything at any time man-brain.

Wah, wah, wah. Working everyday with this dang virus and a sleepless baby and no sleep.

Probably, Tova feels just as miserable as me. She can't breathe through her nose because there are green and yellow rivers of boogies. She wakes up every couple of short something-or-others to ask for help and a little boobie snack. Lars suckers out her nose in his sleep, then I hook that little fella on my ta-ta that faces the center of the bed (so she won't roll off the side of the bed) and lay there while she nurses with my eyes close, in misery, waiting for her to stop using me as a pacifier. Then I get 35-minutes of sleep until we're at it again. In the mean time, my left boob becomes engorged and 8-times the natural size a boob oughta be.

Don't ask me why I only feed her on the inner boob at night. I don't want to talk about it. It was awful. (She fell off our bed one night as I was nursing her on lefty! Just fell off! My tube sock boob couldn't hold her! Dang it.) I don't want to talk about it. Don't make me tell you.

Tonight is the night things are going to change. My husband is going to have to accept the fact that while this could be a teensy-weensy bit teething, and a teensy-weensy bit growth spurt (his old standbys when the baby shit hits the fan) that this is really a cold and that if we're going to get through this then I am going to have to sleep tonight. As in this night. Red wine, vicodin, ambien, Nyquil -- whatever it takes, thy will be done.

He plans on going surfing tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. I guess he's taking Tovey Marge with him because I, for one, do not intend to be operable.

Potty Talk

Today was a rough day. First of all, I got new contact lenses, but to clean them one must only use the tres chere Opti Free brand. This really irks me because I have 37-bottles of a store brand in my closet but can't use it because when I do it feels like someone is squeezing hand sanitizer into my eyes. Plus, it is allergy season in SoCal so I can only wear my brand new contacts for 7-hours before I need to take them out and soak them in generous amounts of aforementioned, and over-priced, OptiFree.

And then, on top of that, on Sunday some old fart sneezed on me. Now I'm sick. Because I can't stop sucking on my baby's face she is sick now too. And Annike. Annike is sick. And the thing is, it just feels like some one is poking bristly pipe cleaners into my right ear and out my right nostril then looping back through into my left nostril and out my other ear. Somehow my throat and eyeballs are involved too. Today, at my lunch moment (not hour, but moment) when I finally had the chance to duck outside to meet up with Nanny Hope and my two little girls (big kids at camp) I laid my eyes on Baby Tovey. Oh, oh, oh what a sight! Tova's face was puffy and bright red, snot trickling from her nose, tears from her eyes, boogies all over. A very sad sight indeed. She couldn't nurse through it all so she just blobbed there in my arms all juicy and drippy until 3-seconds later it was time for me to get back into the ultrasound room.

Home again. Tova the Puffy One was able to nurse. We said goodbye to Hope and then went to get the big kids, who were waiting in the parking lot of the Y with Karah. Karah took one look at Tova and said "Allium Cepa."

After the pick-up we rushed off to the orthodontist. Petra had her spacers installed in a jiff. I paid the $500-deposit -- oh s$%^, I really hope there is money in the account but no time for worrying about it cause I gotta get some of that Allium Cepa.

Across the parking lot we went. Inside the whole foods grocer (not to be confused with Whole Foods, sadly) we made our way over to the health aisle. All the while, it should be noted, a strange odor was trailing us. The health aisle lady took one look at Tovey and agreed, Allium Cepa. But just in case, a free sample of Camilia was given to us because Tova also is cutting her first two teeth at the same time! Because we invited the neighbors over for dessert, fruit shortcake, we needed to jet! Jet! Okay, we got in the very long line becaus apparently every other check-out specialist was on break. We got down to two parties in line in front of us, Annike patiently waiting with all our provisions in the kiddie grocery cart, Petra valiantly entertaining Baby SickyPoo, me trying to do a quick accounting of our checking account . . . and there it was again, that very strange odor! The 11-parties in line behind us were staring at us. Oh no. The odor. I suppose the odor is coming from someone in my party.

"Mommy," Soren looks up at me with pleading eyes "I have to go potty."

Of course, this is the way it always works. It's almost my turn in a very long slow line and one of my kids invariably has to take a dump.

"Can't you just wait?" I whisper, not wanting to sound impatient.

"No. I have to go now," he whispers back. "Now!"

We get out of line, it's getting serious. I grab Tova's stroller, running for the back of the store. Soren leads the way, grabbing his swim trunks up around his legs. Annike is in hot pursuit with the kiddy cart, snapping at the heels of all the other shoppers in the store. Soren runs into the men's room. I wait. He comes out smiling, whew he made it.

We head back for the line. We are now at the back of a huge line, people in front smile sweetly like they want me to know that they understand what it's like to have worked all day and come home to 2-sick children, take all of them to the orthodontist, need to catch up on groceries and then have to leave the grocery line because your kid almost had a code brown. I typically can't stand that kind of stuff, especially if it won't get me my spot back in the line. Leave it to Soren to make everyone feel really uncomfortable.

"It's a good thing I didn't poop my pants this time cause I don't have any undies on. It would have gone on the floor!" Then, he makes that cute little laugh that little boys make when they are thoroughly impressed with themselves.