Author: Reedu

Double 3’s

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I turned 33 today. It’s the day I was born in Nigeria. It’s also my first birthday as a mom. And it’s for this very reason that the day I entered the world feels that much more important.

Mylo’s trying to open, make that, EAT, my present!

Ever since I turned 30, birthdays have served as nothing more than a reminder that I am getting older. But now that I have this new role as a mom, each year that I age will also be marked with more wisdom (and hopefully more grace). I am responsible for guiding my son Mylo through this scary, albeit beautiful shifting terrain called life.

On a note-so-deep note, I began my morning as I like to begin most birthdays: with a run. And that’s not always easy being that my birthday is in February, and it doesn’t help that New York City has been getting slammed by fierce weather this winter. Luckily it was almost 40 degrees out with the sun shining when we took a 4-mile run over the Brooklyn Bridge.

Last year, while preggers I ran on my birthday with Jason and our foster dog, Lucy. This year I ran with Jason and Mylo, which is an extra treat AND an extra workout pushing a 20 pound jogging stroller and a 16 pound baby! I made us a late breakfast (J did the dishes), and then Jason is taking me to dinner at Buttermilk Channel tonight. Never ate their before and they are known to have a pretty killer pecan pie sundae. So much for that run this morning!

Mylostone – Times Square

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A New York City Mylostone down the hatch! We celebrated the birthdays at Carmine’s in Times Square Friday night and I think my son Mylo enjoyed himself more in the middle of Times Square than he did at the restaurant. Lights it seem, are more fascinating than eggplant parmasean the size of Texas!

No, seriously, the boy loves just about ANYTHING that lights up. Our Blackberries, his baby mobile, and now the busiest neighborhood in Manhattan. While his dad carried him around, he stared dead ahead with his eyes affixed to the blinking billboard monstrosities and his mouth was agape with wonder. It’s anyone’s guess how I was even able to get his attention long enough to snap this photo!

Times Square is nothing. Wait until he see Vegas!

Times Square: A baby mobile on steroids.

Cool Pad, School Bad

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We went to look at a new-construction apartment last Sunday in Brooklyn. We weren’t initially looking to move until this summer, when our son Mylo is about 1 year-old, but that ever-ticking time bomb that serves as a reminder that we need a bigger apartment, is beginning to tick louder and louder.

We saw a few different units, and the one I liked the most was the one with the biggest open kitchen – which is ironic given the amount of cooking that I do. Another appeal of the apartment is that the bedrooms and living room overlooked a New York City public school yard. Convenient, I thought seeing how we’re looking to get at least five years out of our next apartment. But my Internet search on the school when we got home quickly killed any visions of me baking a casserole in the big kitchen while watching Mylo play in the schoolyard.

The apt. overlooked this NYC public school.

The school rated a 1 out of 10 and was hurting in the test scores and in the quality-of-teachers department. We didn’t take the pad. But even more alarming was that some parents reviewed the school as home to “Brooklyn’s roughest”. These are kids mind you, PK – 5! One parent wrote that her son came home with bumps and bruises. Bumps and bruises?!

It fast-forwarded me to a place of parenting that I haven’t even considered yet. Math homework, mean kids, schoolyard scuffles, bullying… was I prepared for any of this? No, not yet. Which is why we high-tailed it out of there and back to our cozy one-bedroom apartment complete with Manhattan views and our innocent, not-yet-ready-for-school 6-month old baby.

Learning to Say “No”

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I would imagine I’m not alone in thinking there’s not a whole lot of the word “no” being directed at newborn babies. But who knows, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe there are some moms out there who lay down the law about wrong and right behavior from the get-go. I mean, we do that with puppies, don’t we?

My son Mylo is almost 6 months old and he is beginning to do things that require the word “no” become more common place in my vocabulary and yet I am finding that word difficult to say.

How can anyone tell this child "no"?

Case in point. Just now as I sit at my desk typing away on my laptop, Mylo dragged himself off of his playmat and army-crawled his way to the basket full of our dog’s chewed up and dirty dog toys. I watched as he lifted himself into a half push-up and reached with one hand out hoping to dip the corner of the basket toward himself. I called out “NO” and he froze with his hand in the air. He then cocked his head in my direction and shot me one of those infallible smiles that makes my insides melt. He was waiting for me to light up in response. I’ll be honest, I almost failed right there. It took every microscopic muscle in my face to refrain from smiling back.

I can see where it’s going to get more challenging. I can see already where I am going to have to become more comfortable with saying and using the word “no,” and yet I question my abilities to not just say it, but mean it.

Are there any veteran moms out there who have tips on teaching babies about wrong and right behavior? If you found it hard, as I do, do you now say the word “no” with ease and confidence?

NYC Tightens Leash on Dog Laws

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Enrique, as an animal welfare advocate and animal rescuer I do not support breeding, not even the most responsibl­e of responsibl­e breeding. I understand why you called me biased and I don’t disagree, this is after all a blog, which expresses my opinion. Until the homeless rate and euthanasia rates are down in this country, I stand vehemently against breeding of any kind. Thank you for taking the time to leave a comment.
More on Dogs
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Still Sick

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Hack. Wheeze. Cough.

After being fed-up of my almost-week long cold (that I so luckily got from my husband Jason and passed on to our son Mylo) I went to the Brooklyn Heights after-hours clinic on Sunday. The doctor I saw listened to my chest and told me I had an upper-respiratory infection. I told him I was breastfeeding and he prescribed me medication accordingly. An antibiotic and a steroid. I never really questioned him because a) he’s a doctor and knows better than me and b) I was willing to sniff glue if that’s what would make me feel better.

But it’s been 2 1/2 days since I have been on the meds and while my voice has cleared up, my cough certainly hasn’t. But I am so sick of hacking up a lung while I am mid-sentence that I went back to the doc’s office again this morning…

So $60 later (co-pays are a pricey $30 for each visit), the doctor I saw today told me I had nothing more than a common cold and that he never would have put me on an antibiotic. Seriously, WTF?

Blog it and they will come?

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I came across a great post about building community through blogging by Amber Strocel of Strocel.com, I only wish I came across it when it was published last March. I came into the blogosphere in 2008 – I didn’t miss the boat, but I was late.

Strocel writes that she lurked on other blogs but didn’t comment. She didn’t participate in forums or social media either, and was nervous about the prospect of having visitors to her blog. That’s me in a nutshell. She proceeds to share invaluable tips about how she makes blogging work for her.

I wish I stumbled on Strocel’s blog last year as I was just laid-off and pregnant and certainly had a ton of free time on my hands. Not to mention that I didn’t take blogging seriously until May 2010 when I made the leap from Blogger to WordPress.

Now my son Mylo is six months old and I recently wrote something that was featured on BlogHer and they subsequently came. Now I am frantically trying to absorb, absorb and absorb as much as I can about building and keeping a community.

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How did you get and how do you maintain your blog community?

Mederma My A$$

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Update

The goddesses at Groupon must have ESP! The morning after I submitted this post I got my daily Groupon email and it was (hold on to your seats), for three stretch mark removal sessions for $220 with Dr. Morris Westfried right here in Brooklyn!! The same Dr. Westfried that I paid $1,000 to remove one of my three tattoos in 2006. Where were the Gods, forget the Gods, where was Groupon then, HUH?!

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I often refer to the 40 weeks I spent pregnant as the most magical nine months of my life. But those gorgeous nine months left me with stretch marks on the underbelly of my belly, the part you can’t see when you’re carrying around a watermelon in your uterus. I didn’t even know they were there until I dropped a good chunk of the 32-pounds I added while preggers and my tan vanished after the summer. At my six-week post-partum appointment my midwife, Beverly, advised me there was cream out there for it.

Save. Your. Money.

I read the decidedly mixed reviews for Mederma on drugstore.com and took the plunge anyway. I have been using the cream as advised, twice daily, for a few months now and zero, zilch, nada. As in, they are not gone. NOT as in there are no more. My stretch marks, which are slightly darker than my skin color, are still very much with me.

I’m torn about my mama-marks. On the one hand they signify a magical time in my life when I did not yet know the little person budding inside me, and on the other hand they serve as a reminder that even if I can get my body back into a bikini, it won’t ever be perfect.

As far as Mederma goes, I wish I had saved my money.

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Are there any mama’s out there that can recommend a different product for stretch marks? One that actually works?! Do share!

January 2011 Takeaways

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I’ve had this blog for almost three years but always kept it to myself. No more. This year, I made ‘building a blog community’ one of my New Year’s resolutions, and well, to do that I need to blog more for starters. Becoming a more active participant in blogs I like would help, too.

Writing down my monthly takeaways will help me see how therapeutic this blog can be and how much growth and progress I have made in my life (or not). After all, a month left behind means my son is one month older, I am one month older and therefore, hopefully, one month wiser.

My hope is that these takeaways will be fun and interactive and that you will join me by posting about your takeaways from this past month in the comments, below.

So, here goes…

My January Takeaways

1. Breastfeeding a baby who has teeth is not that painful after all.

2. Running with the baby jogger kicks my butt.

3. Collecting unemployment insurance benefits does not mean I am a stay-at-home-mom.

4. I am torn about going back to work as an analyst at a financial company. (Writing more on that depends on whether or not I land the job).

5. Homeless people have a story. My new friends’ story in particular, is a compelling one.

6. The ASPCA has a program called “Operation Pit” in which even the most unfortunate pitbull gets spayed/neutered, vaccinated and microchipped, FOR FREE.

Nirvana doning her free K9 camo gear after her surgery.

6. It’s worth waiting until after the holidays to get your fix of much-needed retail therapy.

My $475 Michael Kors boots that I paid $100 for.

7. I am in awe of how social media has sped up the process of protest in Egypt.

8. I should have opened a consignment shop in Brooklyn when I still had a sizable nest egg.

9. If your pup has blood in her poop, don’t delay. Take her to the vet. ($165 later)

Ella was poopin' blood on and off the whole month.

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So, what are some of your takeaways from this past month? Please share them with me in the comments, I’d love to hear!

 

Snow Storm Numero Ocho

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Not sure if I’m right about this being the eighth snow storm of the season, I pretty much lost track after the first two wallops. Honestly, it feels as if it’s been snowing once a week since the first storm on December 26th!

I ran out to get bagels this morning  and for the first time in almost 11 years that I have lived in this neighborhood, it was closed! Closed because not one employee was able to get their butts in to work! Bococa without bagels on a snow day? Blasphemy!!

I took these two photos on my way there. The first one is a good representation of the main road which is plowed and is the main drag since the sidewalks look like something out of Siberia. The side streets are also another story. On the hunt for some place else to buy breakfast had me trekking down Bergen Street where I saw a couple of kids snowboarding! Yes, snowboarding in Boulder Brooklyn.