it’s been nearly a month since I updated.  And the thing with me and blogs is, the longer I go without updating, the harder it is for me to jump back into the swing of things.  The same goes for working out, flossing, reading, or any other beneficial/productive activity I might aspire to add to my routine.  But I refuse- for now- to let this thing die so, here we go.  What’s been going on since the jump?

Adventures in Babysitting.

I have spent many afternoons in the past weeks experiencing what it might be like to be blessed with twins.  A.’s work schedule combined with her mom’s availability have dictated that I be pulled in as a babysitter.  Which sucks for A&W because while they can guiltlessly pawn Riley off on their mothers without paying them for the favor, they can’t bring themselves to NOT thrust a wad of bills in my hand when they come to pick their daughter up from an afternoon with me.  I’ve tried to tell them it’s not necessary, but to no avail.  Persistence only creates an awkward situation . . . 

It can be trying keeping up with two toddlers for hours on end- especially because I don’t know how to get Riley to nap and the Tink won’t nap with a playmate in the house.  The upside is that with a friend to play with, I don’t have to fick on the Noggin’ channel quite as often to gain a few moments reprieve to work or just breath.  This is good for my guilt about too much TV and add and is also good for my sanity because knowing all the words to those Yo Gabba Gabba songs is just wrong.

In short: babysitting Riley equals MORE work, but also MORE play!  Which is good for the Tink so yay.  (The wad o’ bills don’t hurt none neither, I assure you.)

Thanksfornothing.

The good ol’ Arkansas family blowout is quickly becoming semi-annual tradition amongst our kinfolk.  I have learned that I must NEVER stay past three nights with my maternal grandparents or regrettable things WILL be said.  Case in point:

We went to my grandparent’s house for Thanksgiving a few weeks ago.  As “luck” would have it, my family in that neck of the woods had also scheduled a big family reunion.  This entails sitting around my grandfather’s tool shop with about twenty people (out of whom I can confidently name eight) eating nonstop and, sadly, drinking not at all.  What this meant was Mom and I arrived Wednesday evening, and left Sunday morning.  4 nights.  Not good.

Sunday morning eating breakfast before packing up, I sat at the kitchen table not yet humanized by my very necessary caffeine.  My grandfather overheard me launch a bitchy quip in my mother’s direction, and went off on me.  I got defensive.  Then my grandmother got defensive of her man.  And all hell broke loose.  

My grandfather and I made amends before Mom and I got on the road, but I’m still left with a problem.  Mom is returning for a Christmas visit in a few weeks.  I know my grandparents probably want me to come, or at lease want me to come and bring the Tink.  But I’m not sure if a) I’ve gotten over myself or b) I want to risk another scene.  Tricky.  Very tricky.

HOTlanta

Had a rare phone conversation with K. last night which was very fun.  She was a little wasted and I decided to cut loose and have A beer.  She has very recently shacked up with her long time man, and they are now settled in a new townhouse.  K. wants me and the Tink to come visit early next year, so hopefully some solid plans will materialize in the next month or so.  I’m a little nervous about a semi-cross country plain ride all alone with the Tink right as she’s closing in on Terrible Two, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

Cease and Desist

Recently I’ve been really ready to say goodbye to the whole breastfeeding gig.  I’m ready to have my body no longer considered public property in the house; I’m definitely tired of my nipples being virtual pacifiers when trying to soothe the Tink to sleep at night.  I just can’t muster the strength and resolve to stick to any kind of boob-restricting/denying plan that will ultimately end in tears.  I just wish she would eventually get over it and stop nursing without assistance, but that doesn’t seem to be happening.  So I’m at an impasse: put up with the increasingly overwhelming toddler-nursing, or set limits and bring on the tears.  

Conclusion

And thus concludes this update.  I ripped off the bandaid and updated the blog.  It didn’t hurt so bad.  I’ll leave with some pictures of from the break . . . 

My big girl plays at the park now:

Thanksgiving was cooooooold:

A day in the life with two toddlers:

My cat Phoebe finally moved in with us; she and Isabella are negotiating their relationship carefully:

The Tink got new kicks and as been transformed into the world’s tiniest hipster:

And . . . I’m out! Peace!

I am out in the suburbs today.  I came out for the weekend because I had some portrait sittings scheduled and I stayed until today because my mom had decided our dog Bonnie had passed the point of old age into daily, unending suffering and as responsible pet owners it was time to intervene.

Which is all good and well but it still sucks.

We found a vet who made house calls, so Bonnie didn’t have to make that morbid one way trip to a clinic.  But still.  No matter how you try to rationalize and remind yourself she was very old and uncomfortable and death is a part of life, it’s just sad. And hard.  

And it has turned what would otherwise be a harmless Wednesday into a morose “what are we all here for?” kind of days. 

We’ll miss you, Bonnie.

Sadly, the Tink has a nasty cold for Halloween. She’s lost her appetite for everything but sweet, sweet candy.

She smiled through the stuffy nose long enough to take a picture in her Tinkerbell get-up.

Happy Halloween.

So even though the Tink is still categorically too young to participate in the whole trick-or-treating thing, I was still moved to bop down to one of the 65 Houston area locations of the seasonal store “Spirits”, your one-stop shopping Halloween super-center.

And while I briefly mulled over the tiny pirate costume or the teensy red riding hood get up, there really is only one perfect look for a girl who’s nickname is “the Tink”.

So here she is, in all her glory, Miss Tinkerbell:

DSC_0006.JPG, originally uploaded by kitty sanchez.

Our 60 year old neighbor- resident busybody-  stopped by to make small talk.

He started peering over our shoulders to look at the photo album.  I was flipping the pages backwards, so eventually we got to the oldest pictures of Tink’s newborn days taken at the hospital.

Out of nowhere, the busybody asks, “Do they completely shave a woman to deliver a baby?”

Shocked, I replied, “I don’t think so.  I’m not sure I remember.”

“Huh.” he said, “Cos, I had surgery down there once and they shaved me!”

Awkward . . . 

meandtinksep.jpg, originally uploaded by kitty sanchez.

The Tink just started walking this month . . .

This picture was taken on my 27th birthday which was this past Saturday. The Tink and I are in front of my grandparents house; we were about to leave for my cousin Mitchell’s wedding.

isabella is officially ‘walking’ as in like 6 consecutive steps without falling, so I think she can now be moved up a class and she and Ashley’s baby Riley can be comptetitors in baby cage fighting. or they can be partners and tag team another pair of babies. whichever’s easier.

I know it’s been like a month or something, but I feel like I am still “recovering” from Hurricane Ike. And not so much from the effects of the hurricane, just there hasn’t been a moment’s peace (ok, gramma: “moment’s peace”?) since. My mom didn’t have power until last weekend- so she would come out to spend the day at my apartment but wouldn’t stay the night because “the dogs would miss her”.  (Okay, they probably would miss her, but still!  Sleeping at night in Houston with no AC is no fun…) 

Meanwhile, like three days after power came back on, we had to drag the baby out to West Texas to see my dad’s parents last Wednesday. *Spoiler alert*: it seemed none of the family actually wanted to see any of us, and their reaction to Isabella was fear and trepidation that she was going to break something or injur herself on their property. My crazy aunt actually said at dinner one night, “You know what made me maddest about the hurricane? There was a lifetime movie on about Coco Chanel I was going to tell you to watch, but you didn’t have power.” Without a trace of irony I answered, “that wasn’t the low point for us.”

I’ve been back in town less than a week, and I’m dreading tomorrow because then we have to DRIVE six hours out to ARKANSAS for ANOTHER cousin’s wedding which is A) non-boozing and B) (drumroll please) on my birthday. Yay! Good times. I don’t know what’s worse: being a b-list guest to a teetotaler’s wedding on my birthday OR having my mom threaten to get on the mic and wish me happy birthday while everyone else is toasting the new couple. SHOOT ME. (oooh, I should bring a flask. Then I can be the dark tortured drinking single mom at the teetotalers wedding. Is it teetotaler or teetoler?)

Speaking of birthdays, I feel pretty bad because I totally flaked on Ashley’s 27th birthday last week.  (I mean, I texted that I couldn’t make it out, I wasn’t just a no-show, but still.) I know it was lame and flakey, but my mom was being lukewarm about her abilities to watch Isabella (“But at NIGHT she only wants YOU.”) and my checking account had gotten down to the double digits which is never condusive to a rocking night out. (though I DID consider bringing a flask and being the dark tortured drinking single girl at the birthday party- all for you, ash.) 

Why am I equating flasks with being dark and tortured? I guess I think that’s the only way I could pull off drinking from a flask…I could not make that look classy.

Anyway, this was poorly written and rambly- but I’m tired and feel scattered all over the place.  I should be packing, or at least washing some underwear for the trip.  But instead, I used my free time this evening to upload this video:

Fortunately, having fled to Austin yesterday, I am cooled from the lovely AC and can illuminate myself or my surroundings at any hour of the day.  Modernity has it’s perks, I’ll give it that.  

So I am here in Austin, staying with my older brother Chris, my sister-in-law Stephanie, my niece Bella and nephew Sawyer.  Which is a little like staying at a resort for free.  Today- and I feel very guilty about this- their housekeeper did all my hurricane laundry.  (The guilt was dulled slightly by the joy I felt at putting on my pijama pants a few moments ago.  I MUST find out what she did to make them so soft.  I’m a little afraid to broach the subject, though, as I’m worried she may think it is a trick question.  It is my belief (thanks, Carrie Bradshaw.) that domestic employees aren’t given random, sporadic praise all too often and I don’t want to create any awkwardness, but DAMN, how can fabric be this soft.  It is as though it were washed with Angel Dust.

Mom has been in Dallas the past two days at a Yoga Retreat which is part of her training to become a MASTER TRAINER.  Tomorrow she returns to Houston, and I feel pretty bad she is returning to the trainwreck that is our post-hurricane still-without-electricity house alone.  The dogs, the fridge of spoiled food, the fallen trees.  YIKES.  To be fair, there’s not much I could do to help with all of that as the Tink needs to be looked after, but STILL she will end up being the one to put the house back together by herself and I feel bad. 

In the meantime, I guess I will be staying here in shan-gra-lah wearing soft pants until I receive word that either my parents’ neighborhood or my apartment have been plugged back in.  I have some friends in town that I believe I am meeting up with tomorrow: Noel and Erin.  

Erin, K. and I were the tightest, admittedly intimidating, clique our third year at university.  I also lived with Erin (and practically Noel as well since they were a couple) for about three months after graduation before she moved here to Austin and I moved to New York.  I haven’t seen them since I visited in 2005 and they’ve never met my darling Tink, so I’m very excited to see them.

Before I go, a quick picture of the Tink.  Here she is standing in my brother’s driveway – on top of some sidewalk chalked spelling practice done by my nephew Sawyer.

So, I wrote rather dismissively of Hurricane Ike in my last entry, and I would like to go on the record as saying that was a mistake.

Ike blew. Literally.

Here’s how it all went down: I decided to take my parent’s advice (read: desperate, angry pleas) and blow off babysitting for Ashley and Will so I could evacuate my Houston apartment for the suburbs further north.  As it turned out, Ashley and Will decided to evacuate to my parents house as well.  We were also joined by my (EVIL) cousin C. and her aging golden retriever Kelsie.  

Thursday was full-on “this evacuation is precautionary only, there will be no real damage, it’s just an excuse to party!”.  We hung out, bought food and supplies, and watched the weather channel.  

By Friday, the thing was looking kind of real.  The storm was still headed right for Houston, and now looked like areas to the north could be affected too.  Ashley and Will had also spent enough time around my cousin to become aware of her capability of being a total bitch.  C. was completely frazzled by the babies and all of the flotsom and jetsum that comes with.  At one point, the clutter reduced her to tears.  She was also conveniently absent any time work needed to be done: like when we removed all furniture, plants, etc. from the backyard.

After dinner, Friday night, the weather channel and CNN had us good and freaked.  The news proclaimed that anyone refusing to leave Galveston faced “certain death”, and things weren’t looking great for Houston or the suburbs.  We took sleeping bags and mattresses to make a pallet downstairs where it was safer.  We had just gotten the blankets laid out when we lost power.  C. stormed back upstairs to sleep, though, when my mom accidentally insulted her by asking if C. could confine her dog for a few minutes so she could let our dog out.  (The dogs fought.)

After a pretty miserable start to the night- one baby would start wailing just as the other had fallen asleep- Ash, Will and I were all snuggled into our beds with the babies attempting to go to sleep.  It was pretty early in the Ike experience when I decided No Power Make Kit Go Crazy.  At one point, I tried to stumble to the bathroom sans flashlight only to run into five chairs that had been pulled away from the kitchen table.  Then I reached for a flashlight on the counter only to discover upon trying to turn it on that it was actually a half-full beer bottle and I had just poured it all over the floor.  My next trip to the bathroom (I had to pee, constantly!), I saw that my own geriatric dog had become freaked by the storm and pissed all over the floor.  Ewwwww… ever try mopping up dog pee with a flashlight in the pitch black?  Not fun.  

Finally, it was morning again.  I awoke to my dad’s huge rotund body looming over me touching Isabella to see if she was breathing.  (He has always been convinced that she will suffocate when she sleeps with me.)  Not fully awake, “what the hell?”  He said “Is Isabella okay?”  ”YES.”  ”Are you sure she’s breathing?”  He moved to touch her again and I whisper-screamed, “GET AWAY FROM ME!”  I rolled around a little trying to go back to sleep, but I could hear people talking about trees so  I gave up and crawled out of bed.

Then I saw our yard.  Two HUGE trees had been ripped from the ground -roots and all- and had fallen over.  (Luckily not on our actual house.)  After letting that sink in, I started realizing all the other things that suck about having no power.  No TV, no coffee, no clocks, no hot food,  no internet, NO AIR CONDITIONING.  

My mom became the house hero by producing a battery operated television that we all crowded around.  Apparently the storm had been bad.  Images of destruction filled the four inch screen.  Power was out all over the place, and wasn’t coming back any time soon.  

The day drug by as the gravity of the situation slowly sunk in.  C. ended up leaving to go check on her house.  (She actually left FURIOUS because my car was the only one with gas and I didn’t want my mom to follow Courtney for “moral support” or whatever. I was like “Bitch, those streets be floodin’!” and she told me I was totally selfish and left in tears.)  

On Sunday, after much deliberating and planning, Ashley and Will decided to make a run for it and venture off to Dallas to stay with family until we had power again.  They invited me to go, but I was still hopeful power might be turned on at either my parents house or my apartment within hours.

Not the case,  Monday came and went with no power and no sign of it.  My mom and dad both had work taking them out of town this week, so it was looking like I’d be left home alone in the hot, still, miserable house with the Tink.  But this morning, I decided at the last minute to make a break for it and go to Austin to stay with my brother and his family.  

AC has never felt so good.  I arrived this afternoon, unloaded my bags, and we went out to dinner.  Then we returned to realize my Dad had decided to drop in on my brother too.  And there’s only one guest bedroom. Yikes.