Grudge-holder. I am SO sure.

Other than what shall be forever known as JB’s Grievous Error, it was a fine weekend at our house. The children were thrilled to have their grandparents around and I was thrilled that their grandparents seem to have inexhaustible resources when it comes to reading books and putting puzzles together. Dylan is particularly besotted with those Priddy picture books which are nothing but carefully photo-masked images of objects on various blank backgrounds and I am here to tell you that the millionth “reading” of My Big Animal Book is enough to drive a person right out of their aching skull. Go ahead and call me Princess all you want—as long as you’re on tap for Priddy duty, I can take it.

I did my long run on Saturday, just under 13 miles. When I first committed to this half marathon I couldn’t begin to imagine running that far, and it’s still kind of hard to believe I can run it now. These past few months of training have been amazing in a lot of ways. It’s been hard physically; it’s been much, much harder mentally, and I’ve grown so much stronger as a result. My legs, sure, but more importantly, in my head and heart. My first reaction to considering a half marathon was a loud and clamoring I CAN’T; I feel like I’ve taken aim and blown that shit away. Pow. And now I know, like really know deep down in my bones, that it’s in me to push through, to keep going when things are hard, to not give up.

Goddamn, I like that feeling.

Lastly, and I know this is all over the place today, but can I just tell you what you can do with Google Image, a printer, and an old photo frame?

You can completely blow your kid’s ever-loving mind, that’s what.

Unlike Riley when he was the same age, Dylan couldn’t care less about trucks. He likes spotting motorcycles when we’re out and about—”I see a MOTACYCLE! I see a MOOOOHHHTACYCLE!”—but wheeled things are far less interesting than things with fur and hooves and snouts. His favorite activities are sitting in someone’s lap looking at pictures of animals (”Reada book? Finda cow?”) or surfing Flickr for barnyard-themed photos (SafeSearch ON, thank you very much).

All day long he asks what things are, and repeats the word to himself.

“DOING, Mommy?”

“Well, I’m loading the dishwasher right now.”

“Dish . . . washa.”

These days he loves maple sausages, macaroni and cheese, yogurt tubes, Life cereal, crackers, pineapple chunks, waffles, pancakes, and “buttah JELLY” sandwiches. He can be counted on to sobbingly refuse anything I’ve spent more than seven minutes preparing.

He is still a tantrumy little sniglet, but he’s starting to respond to time outs. That is, he’ll at least go to his room and howl there for a while, then sniffle “yes!” when we ask him if he’s all done.

He loves his brother and refuses to give Riley one inch of personal space, crushing up against him when they’re watching Yo Gabba Gabba and trailing him from room to room, grabbing at his clothes. They play frenzied screaming cackling games for hours on end, crashing around the house like mad things. Sometimes they throw a ball back and forth to each other, while Dylan shrieks “Throw it to ME, Riley! Throw it to ME, Riley!” and dissolves with joy when the ball invariably smashes into his skull.

At night Dylan collapses into my chest, a warm heavy weight in my arms. “Horses comin’ ’round,” he whispers, and I sing to him. She’ll be comin’ ’round the mountain when she comes. She’ll be riding six white horses when she comes. He drools into my left shoulder; I emerge from his bedroom with my shirt clinging wetly to me. I never mind. Soon I won’t be rocking my little boy to sleep any more, my shirts will always be dry, and oh how sad to think of that day, coming all too soon, ’round the mountain.

Oh, ha ha ha. I seem to have scanned a paragraph without fully understanding it. Silly me! I’ll just reread it again and—

Huh. Boy, there sure isn’t much light in here. Maybe I should change the lightbulb. I wonder if we shouldn’t have painted that wall such a dark color, since it seems to—

NEVERMIND. STUDYING. Study study study. Look at me being all studious and shit! I should totally get some of those arty square-framed glasses that make people look smart. I mean, I don’t technically need glasses, but I could get some with just regular glass in the—or I know, how about a Moleskine notebook, people love those things, I could take notes in it or just . . . I’m pretty good at doodling, like I could use it to draw little robots during—

FOCUS.

Reading! Okay. Reading. La la la, reading reading reading . . . okay, I still didn’t get that paragraph, what the hell. Let’s try the old trick of putting a pen under each sentence and just take it kind of slow. All right. All riiiiight. Here we go. Yeah, this is helping. Right on, pen! Way to work! Epistemological . . . positivism . . . macro . . . methodological . . . WHAT? What the fuck is this book talking about?

“CAN YOU STOP THAT NOISE?”

“Um . . . what noise?”

“THAT OBNOXIOUS DISTRACTING NOISE YOU ARE MAKING WITH YOUR NOSE.”

“You mean . . . breathing?’

“YES. STOP IT. I’M TRYING TO STUDY OVER HERE, GOD.”

Okay. Okay okay okayyyyy. Whoooo. Get ahold of yourself, girl, you’ve got this. Just start over and read that paragraph from top to bottom. Epi . . . epistem . . . stemological. Is that like an episiotomy? Goddamn it, I need a dictionary. I can’t believe I need a dictionary. Good thing everything’s on the internet now, right? I’ll just get my laptop and . . .

Hey, I wonder what’s happening on Twitter?

NO. STOP. DICTIONARY DOT COM. GO THERE. TYPE IN THE WORD.

E. P. I. S—you know what I could really go for right now? A sandwich. Mmmmmmm, sandwich. Okay okay. E. P. I. S. T. E—or a cookie. God damn, I could tear into a cookie. Okay. E. P. I—oh man, I’ve got some dough in the—I’ll just—OKAY, fuck, OKAY. Epistemological.

Epistemology is the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion.

Uh . . . huh. Well. Well, of course! It’s the . . . justified . . . the belief about the investigation of the . . . opinions. Totally obvious.

You know what, I’m going to watch The Soup.

Oh, is it grossing you out to hear about my personal yeasty crust? Well too bad, because where were YOU when I decided that making pizza, naan, and oat bread in the same 24-hour period would be a good idea? Where were you when I learned that while Indian food is all fine and good, fresh naan with peanut butter and jelly is something akin to a taste receptor orgasm? Where were you when I shoveled half a loaf of bread in my mouth at 11 PM last night, even though I was stuffed beyond reason, reasoning that it was easier to simply eat the slices rather than put them away?

I’m going to die of gluten poisoning—distended and bloated on the side of the road like a decomposing raccoon—and it’s all your fault.

In other food ridiculousness, I engaged in an epic battle with Riley on Sunday morning over a waffle. The same damn waffle he eats every day, except this time I snuck some butter—not margarine, mind you, but delicious, drool-triggering butter—on top of it and a tiny microscopic bit hadn’t melted enough and he was all WHAT IS THIS WHITE STUFF I DON’T LIKE IT. And then he refused to take one more bite of his 100% inoffensive WAFFLE coated in SYRUP and I pretty much lost my shit, because while I am used to his obnoxious pickiness when it comes to food apparently I draw the line at barely visible butter freakouts, and then his father and I did the thing I swore I would never do as a parent: we forced him to sit at the table and finish his breakfast.

Naturally it was wholly unpleasant for all parties and by the time the last bite reluctantly slid down his gripe-hole the morning was pretty much lying in ruins. Everyone was mad at each other with the exception of Dylan, who was oblivious to the drama since he was so busy eating his own waffle and about fifteen maple sausages to boot, what the hell. (”MO SASSAGE PEEZ. MO SASSAGE PEEZE. TANK YOU.”)

It seems I have to re-learn this lesson every now and then: fighting about food isn’t worth it. Not to me, anyway. JB and I don’t put up with a lot of bullshit when it comes to disciplinary issues, but food is generally off the list of things I’m willing to do battle over.

Except for Wafflegate, apparently, and if nothing else that certainly served to remind me that in the grand scheme of things, who cares if the kid won’t eat his Eggo? God knows it’s not like a bread product will ever go to waste in my house.

Woe.

He was mostly okay during the day, but for two nights his lying-down cough seemed to worsen into croupy territory and as a result no one got any sleep. Most of you are probably all too familiar with the wee-hour croup routine, which involves steamy baths and lots of hours logged sitting bolt upright in the rocking chair, hoping against hope that the next gap between chest-racking coughs will be long enough for both of you to pass out for an entire restful minute or so.

He’s fine now, but all that nighttime intervention seems to have set us into one butt-fucker of a sleep regression, for I have no other explanation as to why he is continuing to wake throughout the night. I mentioned a while ago that Dylan predictably wakes up once, and as it turns out once is exactly my limit. Anything more than that and I’m plunged into a spiraling well of frustration and self-pity, and as JB can attest, when my bedmate snores peacefully through Cryfest #4, 3:27 AM Edition, I don’t just get kicky, I start aiming for the balls.

(”ZzzzzOw. What the hell?”

“IT IS YOUR TURN. THE TIME OF YOUR TURN IS NOW. GET THE FUCK UP AND DEAL WITH THAT BLATTING CHILD BEFORE I LOSE WHAT’S LEFT OF MY SANITY. YOU WILL NOTE MY HEAD HAS SPUN 180 DEGREES AND I AM SPEAKING WITH THE VOICE OF SATAN. THAT INDICATES YOU SHOULD HURRY.”)

I hope to hell Dylan gets back to his usual routine on his own, because I have completely given up on the idea of sleep training. It didn’t really work when he was younger, and I highly doubt it will work now that he’s in possession of a steel will that cannot be broken no matter what lengths his desperate parents go to. In addition to being funny, smart, and downright adorable, my youngest son is—and I’m not saying this lightly—the most obstinate child on the face of the planet. I’ve never known stubbornness like his, and I’m including my own inability to concede when it comes to certain matters about which I am correct and you are not.

I’m sure it’s a trait that will eventually serve him well in life, unless he chooses a career in the military, but what I’m saying is if he refuses to sleep we are pretty much all fucked until 1) he chooses otherwise, or 2) the Benadryl kicks in, and don’t even think I won’t go there.

Anyway, in the midst of the sleep deprivation and resentment and all, I sort of suddenly realized that his 2-year birthday is coming right up. Two years! (OF NOT SLEEPING OH MY GOD.) It’s both hard to believe he’ll be two already—wasn’t he just a tiny redheaded baby?—and impossible to remember a time when he wasn’t part of our lives.

We aren’t having some big party or anything, but I would like to think of something creative to do with his cake. Specifically, I would like it to be horse-themed, and really, that’s the sort of thing they should mention in that otherwise horrifically comprehensive What to Expect series: enjoy your adult interests while you can, sucker, because someday you will spend your spare time surfing photos of horse-shaped cakes and buying novelty cookie cutters. And staring at this photo with both terror and admiration.

Of course, knowing Dylan I will probably drive myself batty to come up with a perfect equine-pastry and he will refuse to eat it or possibly hurl it across the room in disgust. Then he’ll wake up at 12, 2:30, and 4:05 AM chirping “CAKE? CAKE? CAKE? CAKE?”

I was all fretful ahead of time about various stupid things, because that’s just how I roll (in a useless little circle, that is, while bristling with paranoia over unlikely events), and I was particularly worried about not being able to find the classroom. It’s true I am cursed with a comically terrible sense of direction and have been known to get lost in a restaurant while returning from the restroom, but this fear transcended normal levels of concern and took up giant acres of my brain-space yesterday until I was basically just sitting at my office desk, my foot hammering off nervous energy on the floor Riverdance-style, eyes unfocused, while I entertained a rich and terrifying fantasy of wandering the halls for hours in search of the elusive C-164 room, before eventually arriving halfway through the class, creaking open the door and attracting the hostile stare of every student within while the teacher barked at me to find a seat, which I wouldn’t be able to do because they were all taken, and also for some reason I am naked, OH MY GOD.

So ANYWAY, naturally I found the class in about two seconds and took my seat (in the front row! Nerrrrrrrrd) and surreptitiously peeked at my fellow students and tried to determine if I was in fact the oldest person in the room. (Answer: maybe the second oldest, but I had cute shoes on so I win over the slovenly sweatpants-wearing 19-year-olds, right? Why isn’t there a Twibbon for these poor young people, outfitted in what amounts to a droopy Snuggie with random words emblazoned across their poop-holes and their personal body parts threatening to emerge? #PRAYERS4URASSCRACK).

The first hour or so was a little tedious as the teacher felt compelled to go over the syllabus line by line, while I twitched with irritation over people raising their hands to ask things like how do you log into the distance learning portal (apparently I have become the sort of person who cannot understand being unprepared for class, and between that and the front-row seat choice I DON’T EVEN KNOW ME ANYMORE) and what was the bare minimum for participating in the online discussions (it’s like these people don’t even know the joy of arguing on the internet!), but once the actual lecture got underway, I—well, I really enjoyed it.

I mean, it’s sociology, not really a subject I’m personally super excited about, but it was a good lecture and I got a weird kick out of madly taking notes, and I just . . . I don’t know, it just felt good to be there. Doing something so different from what I usually do, taking that first little step. It was awesome, really. And I still got home in plenty of time to play with the kids and put them to bed, how about that?

Here’s to new experiences, new challenges, and new knowledge! Let us not speak of the new tuition bills.

What is my problem, I kept wondering. I mean, sure, home life is chaotic lately, and it sucks that we can’t go outside to blow off energy, but have I just up and lost every single coping skill I was once in possession of? I’ve been exercising, I’ve been eating well, so why do I all of a sudden feel like I’m clinging to the last shreds of my personal sanity? What’s with this unfamiliar black cloud hanging over my head and the pervasive feeling of doom? Why am I so convinced everything would be a thousand times better if only I mixed salt, butter, sugar, and flour in a bowl and ate it until my pants ruptured? What . . . what’s my . . . oh.

Oh, RIGHT.

You know, I never used to have problems like this during my . . . Special Lady Time. There was the requisite puffiness, snackiness, and maybe the occasional surprise weepies attack during a sappy commercial (damn you, Gerber, and your emotionally manipulative “Anything For Baby” campaign), but I don’t remember feeling like there was a weeklong hormonal Whack-a-Mole game where my mental stability used to be.

I’m vaguely wondering if Teh Crazy might be a side effect of the Mirena, although I’ve had it for two years with no ill effects. Well, except for the first few months, and all I’ll say about that is IF you get a Mirena right after birth—or in my case, as part of the surgical hoedown that is a C-section—your uterus will shrink afterwards, which will lead you to the shocking discovery that your Mirena has STRINGS, and I’m not talking about soft strings, I’m talking about something more like fishing wire, and these strings will need to be repeatedly trimmed while they are in your personal body, unless of course you LIKE having fishing wire in your Girl Parts.

Or maybe I’m just getting older and my brain is more susceptible to fluctuating chemical imbalances. Or maybe parenthood is enough to drive anyone out of their freaking skull now and then. Or maybe this is why you can buy those tubs of pre-made cookie dough, so you can apply medicinally as needed.

• Screamed at the tantruming 2-year-old to SHUT UP

• Hauled thrashing toddler to his feet by the neck of his shirt and roughly shoved him towards the hallway, yelling GO TO YOUR ROOM, slammed his door shut behind him at top volume

• Stormed back to his room in order to pound on closed door as loudly as possible, still yelling

• Told the 4-year-old he was being a crybaby for howling when his brother pulled on his shirt

• Fought with husband over something stupid

• Yelled GET OVER IT at toddler for crying about his new shoes

• Yelled at 4-year-old to GROW THE HELL UP after the millionth brotherly wrestlefest ended with him crying

I was ugly, furious, out of control. I imagine my face, transformed by anger, and what it must look like to my children. The unattractive parentheses on either side of my cheeks deepened, brows creased, mouth open. A terrible witch.

At one point, Dylan acted out after being told to stop misbehaving. He threw his cup on the floor with a loud clatter, staring at me, and I started to walk towards him to—I don’t even know. Bark at him not to do that, probably. And Riley saw me coming and clapped his hands over his ears.

I had yelled so much during that day my boy was covering his ears.

At the end of the evening, I made cookies and ate a large amount of the dough. I took three beta blockers. I talked with Riley about how if he needs an adult to intervene when he and Dylan are playing, he should ask for help instead of crying. (Which he immediately put into effect during their next tussle: “Mom! Help! HELLLP!”) I sat Dylan on my lap and indulged his bottomless desire to surf Flickr for pictures of animals. I took slow, deep breaths.

Too late, though. The day had happened, every shameful, shitty, regrettable moment. The moments I hope they forget. Oh please. No need to keep those memories, babies. It’s my job to hold them and learn from them, not yours.

He also gets dressed on his own, which blows my mind. He goes to bed a pajama’d wee boy, his scrawny butt padded with his nighttime Pull-Up, and by the time we greet him in the morning he’s outfitted himself in t-shirt and jeans, Spiderman underwear lurking underneath. Suddenly he’s some kind of hulking kindergartner or something, chattering away at top volume and likely as not sporting his custom-made water pistol holster, fashioned out of a sock and a belt by yours truly.

Oh, he’s getting to be such a big boy. Which leads me to a delicate question about that aforementioned Pull-Up — at what age do kids typically stop using those at night? He’s rock solid on the bathroom thing and has been for a long time, but not peeing all night long (or waking up and using the bathroom) seems like a lot to expect from a 4-year-old. But maybe not? I have no idea, really.

As far as diaper-related issues go in my house that one overnight Pull-Up is pretty far down the give-a-hoot list, but I thought I’d ask those of you in the know. When did your kid start sleeping without a safety net, so to speak?

It seems like I kept thinking about it but not making any actual effort to change our eating habits, and then I saw Food, Inc. Holy god, you guys. All I can say about that documentary is that it gave me the exact kick in the ass I needed to stop thinking and start acting.

I really don’t want to be an Obnoxious Food Douche on top of being a Tiresome Fitness Douche, so I won’t bore you with all the details of our newfound organic craze (although I am of course writing about it here, because if there is one thing I can’t get enough of, it’s obsessively documenting the minutiae of my thrilling day to day existence. Why, you should see my food journal!), but I will say how rewarding it’s been to put some actual effort into creating our meals. Instead of tearing open a bag or opening a can or just rooting in the fridge, I’m flitting between pots and pans and cutting boards and poking my face in the oven and doing millions of loads of dishes and jesus my feet hurt from that hard-ass tiled floor but it’s all making me so happy.

I’ve spent the last few years relying heavily on Amazon’s grocery delivery service. It’s been enormously convenient, and the fact that I can place an order in the morning and have it waiting for me when I get home from work has been awesome. But for all the time it saved me, I lost any feeling of connection with what I was buying and what we were eating. I shopped by clicking heavily branded product links, one after another, the exact same way you buy anything else on Amazon. Hell, they’ve even got user ratings on each food item, because god knows we all need to know if other buyers thought that bread was worth 3.5 or 4 stars. (Too bad they haven’t yet included reviews.)

I was falling into a rut of coming home from work and downing a bowl of cereal, the kids having already eaten PB&Js or macaroni and cheese for the thousandth time. We bought the same things week after week and rarely dirtied a pan. Things were constantly rotting in the vegetable crisper while the shelves contained an overabundance of colorfully-packaged things loaded with corn syrup and processed flour.

Planning, shopping for, and preparing our food is a big change. It requires time and effort, whether that’s actively working in the kitchen or thinking ahead to the next few meals. But you know, it’s funny, I feel so much better—not just because I believe we’re eating healthier food, but because I’m addressing a part of our family life I think was starting to fall apart. It isn’t always possible to have a nice sit-down meal with two working parents and two young kids, but we’re doing it a lot more than we were before, and cooking—really cooking—the food that we eat seems to . . . I don’t know how to describe it, exactly. It’s like some broken loop is being closed. Like something I didn’t even know was so important to me is finally being addressed.

Plus, homemade bread. God damn.

(Click through for recipes.)