Phase or schizophrenia?

My daughter is going through a phase right now. At least if you chose to believe a book that I've got. And I'm choosing to believe it. Because if it's not a phase, then it's probably schizophrenia. So a phase feels better.

Just had a bath on the photo above. Pretty obvious I guess.

Eight hours sleep, WITHOUT INTERRUPTION - luxury

People often ask mothers of infants if they get enough sleep. I've also gotten that question - many times. Funny how much people start caring about your sleeping patterns when you become a parent.

Anyway, I've always answered questions like that by saying that yes, I do get enough sleep, yes, Noam have been sleeping long nights since the start, and yes, she only wakes up to feed and then falls straight back to sleep again.

I've been lucky, I guess. But this morning, when I woke up after eight hours sleep without any interruption (as Noam slept all night), I still realized how much I've missed that. God it felt nice! I felt so alert and happy when I woke up. A true luxury that I had totally forgotten about during the last five months.

(Eight hours sleep, without interruption, means not waking up because of my husband watching TV or working until late, or waking up when he gets to bed, neither waking up from Noam lying in the bed farting and moving around like a helicopter, or waking up to feed).

A fun blog and a bad movie

I've started reading a pretty fun blog and want to share it. It's in Swedish. So those of you that understand Swedish, and want to read something better than the pointless posts in this blog, check it out. The address is: http://spankk.wordpress.com/

Also want to push my sisters blog again. Very entertaining! You can find the address to the right on this page. But I'll write it here too: http://geishaq.blogspot.com/

And finally, I wanted to prove my sister wrong today. She claims that I don't like any romantic comedies or chick lit movies. So I decided to watch the movie "Sex and the City". Thought I would actually enjoy it, as I thought the series was pretty fun, even tough I did not follow it fanatically. Well, unfortunately it seems like my sister is right after all. Had to add "Sex and the City" to the pile of chick lit movies that I didn't enjoy.It was all "on the nose", many scenes and lines seemed a bit forced, and it all felt a bit cheesy.

But despite all of that I managed to cry at least five times. This crying business, inherited from my mother, that both my sister and I have got, is almost embarrassing. Can barely watch an ad on TV without shedding a tear. Sad.

A fun Sunday

Me to Noam with a cheery voice:

"While Dad is in the gym we will eat some sticky potato pure. And after we've cleaned that up we will fold yesterday's laundry. Then, when Dad returns, we will do some very late spring cleaning. Doesn't that sound great?!"

Still with a happy voice. I wonder if Noam managed to see through my fake happiness and excitement about those Sunday tasks.

Noam's first taste of solids - the movie

Well, I was planning on solely posting this film on the blog where I write things about Noam, but I thought I could post it here too.

George Clooney and I

Last night I dreamt that George Clooney was giving me a back massage. I am not even going to try to figure out what made me dream that. But it was very nice. He was really working hard on a muscle knot, on the left side of my back, and I was totally digging it.

"Arn" sucks

Just watched the Swedish film "Arn". Probably the biggest budget ever in Sweden. Based on probably the most known books in Sweden.

It totally sucked! Can't believe that they are actually shooting part two. Who's going to watch it? Don't they have anything better to spend money on?

But at least there was some entertainment, caused by the person who ripped the film. He/she seemed to have done the subtitles with the help of Google translation. Hilarious!

Pissed at "Canada's Next Top Mpdel"

Ended up watching "Canada's Next Top Model" while I was stuck in the sofa breast feeding the other day. What I saw pissed me off!

They were doing a shoot for a mobile phone, and somehow they thought that wearing solely sexy lingerie under an open coat, with the mobile phone in one hand and a dog on a leech in the other hand, outdoors of course, was a good advertisement picture.

In Sweden, sexist advertisement, that has nothing to do with the product being advertised, is not allowed. When advertisement like that happens anyway (because it does unfortunately), anyone can report it, and the company behind the advertisement can be forced to take it down, and, as I've written before, it's also being discusses if companies should also be fined for this.

I guess this is not the case in Canada. What the hell does a half naked woman has to do with mobile phones?!!

Can it get much better?

Last night I decided to get serious. I took a couple of hours and compared all the kindergartens in the area where we live. This as Noam needs to be put in the cue.

The problem was, I thought, that I didn't really prefer any of them. I didn't think that any of them stood out. But I was wrong.

When comparing, I found that basically just next door there is a kindergarden that works a lot with gender issues and equality, a kindergarden that actually won the Stockholm Price of Equality in 2005. Can it get much better than that?!

Of course I had no problem deciding what Noam's (my) first choice of kindergarden is.

The second choice also seemed great as that is a kindergarden focusing on children using two languages, as Noam will be doing.

I must say I was happily surprised when I read about the different kindergartens. Many of them seem brilliant and made me feel pretty exited about Noam joining a kindergarden in the future. Can't of course be sure that theory and practice goes hand in hand, but I'm hoping for the best.

It's true, I'm a geek

You go through quite a few transformations when you become a parent. Been writing about a few of them and will now tell you about one more.

It's the one when you go from a normal, sane person, to a geek. Yes, dear Caroline, you wrote it in a comment on a previous post, and it's true.

Was zapping through channels this evening, and ended up watching a bit of a crappy English program, that claimed that the amount of parents embarrassing to their children has escalated.

It made me think about my own behavior this morning, when I was trying to entertain Noam, by singing some stupid, made up song, while making some odd movements with my arms and legs.

Noam didn't even smile. She just looked at me with a facial expression saying: What the hell is wrong with you?!

The IKEA Syndrome

What is it with IKEA? You go there to get one thing. When you leave, you leave without that one thing, as they didn't have it in stock, but with lots of other things that you didn't plan to buy.

What's the definition of a Swede?

A kid to her Mother at IKEA today:

"Mom, if someone is red in the face, are they really Swedish then?"

I've become one of them

You know how you, before you become a parent, hate prams in groups. Well, no matter how much you try not to, you do become a part of groups like that when you become a parent.

And yesterday, I took the ultimate step. It's impossible to be more of a "pram group person" than I was yesterday.

How? I'll tell you how.

There is something called baby power walk in the area where I live. That means a group of mothers with babies in prams meeting up and then walking together, in speed, and stopping once in a while for some push ups and stuff.

I do realise that it must look totally ridiculous. And it's probably also annoying for certain morning cruisers. But I actually enjoyed it a lot and will be joining in every Friday morning from now on.

Privatizing in areas that should never be privatized

The current government in Sweden seems eager to privatize everything. Now the turn has come to my work area. I work at a so called group home for people with Down Syndrome.

Considering that we are over budget basically every year I get a bit scared thinking of how a private company is supposed to make money by running my work place.

The rent will not change, so, will they move us? That is of course not an option. You don't just move peoples homes.

The costs for materials like office supplies and other stuff is already pretty much as low as it can be. So cutting down there is not a possibility either.

Mine and my colleagues salary could of course be cut. But I'm sure you can understand how I feel about that. Considering I do not work in a well paid area it would be a bad idea to cut salaries any further. That only results in high staff turn overs.

So I'm afraid that they will cut in the amount of staff. The only way this could be possible would be by totally changing the way we work. Which would collide with the rights of the people we are working for. Scary.

Do not support the bus strike

I pay 415 SEK every month to Kommunal, a union that is at the moment having a bus strike in Stockholm and other parts of Sweden. I do not support it!

Okay, certain demands I think are justifiable. And if the strike was only about those I would probably support it. But the strike is also about the bus drivers' pay check. And the fact is that bus drivers make more money than nurses. Nurses that have to spend three years in University, while you can become a bus driver in a heart beat.

And they also make more money than me. But Kommunal is not having a strike on my account. Cant help thinking that it's probably because I work in a female dominated work area, while bus drivers most often are men.

What does the Dad look like?

I'm an idiot. Well we all knew that, but I've proven it again.

Met an acquaintance on the flight home from the North of Sweden last week. She and her girlfriend also recently had a kid with the help of IVF. My acquaintance was the one who was pregnant.

While we were waiting for the flight we spoke about babies (surprise, surprise!). She asked me is I could see my own and my husbands resemblance in Noam. I told her that I could and pointed out what I thought was features from my husband and what was features from me.

Then I asked her the same thing. Yep, I totally forgot that it is totally impossible for two women to both have their resemblance in their baby.

Ok, I guess that was a very "blond moment" but at least it wasn't a very bad thing. It just showed that I actually didn't even reflect over that they were two parents of the same sex.

But then I had my second "blond moment". And this time the mistake was the total opposite. I asked if they knew what the dad looked like.

Yes, I did use the word DAD and I could have bitten my tongue off as soon as I said it.

"Sorry, I didn't mean dad, I meant..." I said apologetic.

"You meant donor", she said.

Yes, that's exactly what I meant. Amazing. There I am thinking that I am so enlightened. And I can't even get that one right. Sad.

Men's age matter

A French study has found that the age of men, when it comes to getting pregnant, matter. When men has reached over 40 years of age, the risk of miscarriage increases to 35 percent.

I think it's nice that it's been proven that the age of men also matters, as there is always so much focus and pressure on women.

When things "go wrong" and the woman is a bit older than the norm, it's been assumed that it's because "something is wrong" with the woman. Now that might change.

Both stress and guilt has easily been put on women when it comes to pregnancy and parenthood. Now maybe the burden of those two will be divided between both sexes.

Need ear plugs

The weather sucks. Therefore Noam and I are doing nothing today. Do not feel like getting wet.

As a result my ears are hurting from my daughters non stop talking.

That's what happens when we're at home. She just doesn't stop talking. Outdoors she's pretty quiet. But at home we are in desperate need of ear plugs.

She is wonderful. But I'm really wishing that she will go to sleep for a while soon. Just so my ears can get some rest.

Back on Facebook

Got back on to Facebook yesterday. Don't know why really. Just felt like it all of the sudden.

But as soon as I got back on, I felt like leaving. Don't know why really. Just felt like it all of the sudden.

Maybe it's the stress of being sent loads of emails from Facebook.

Maybe it's the strange feeling of being observed by strangers. The strangers that see me as a target for advertising, but also all the strangers that are on Facebook and for different reasons end up on my profile.

And on top of that I can't remember half of the people I had added as friends before I left Facebook, and I'm now having a strange feeling of guilt for not adding them as friends now when I'm back on.

I know, I sure seem to be able to care about something totally irrelevant. Probably have way too few things to care about in life. Or just way too much time on my hands now when I'm on maternity leave.

Anyway, now I'm there, on Facebook. So I guess I have to hang in there for at least a few days or so. Just to not seem like a total nutcase. Or at least to not seem like a bigger nutcase than I actually am.

The return of the jeans

In previous posts I have forced you guys to take part in me no longer fitting in my jeans, believing that I would never ever get in to them again, and therefore giving them to my sister.

Well a new era is here! I fit in all my old jeans now. I felt a bit selfish when I realised it and demanded my sister to give up my jeans. But the feeling of selfishness was nothing compared to the feeling of joy when I slipped in to my favorite pair of jeans.

An almost religious moment

The book that I mentioned in my previous post has a photo of me as a baby. When I saw it, it was like looking into Noam's eyes. A really strange feeling. And at the same time a sort of "I now know the meaning of life moment".

Planned to marry a pilot

As I wrote in the previous post, I was visiting my family this week.

When I, at my Mom's place, was looking through some stuff, I found a book about myself, that I made when I was 12.

The last page had the heading "My future". As a twelve years old, I obviously had it all planned.

"When I'm 35 I will be the mother of two children, one boy and one girl. My husband will be a few years older than me and he will be working as a pilot. I will be working as a journalist on TV. But before that I will have worked as a tour guide. I will be travelling a lot".

Well, I did get the tour guide part correct. And I do love travelling.

Will probably never end up on TV, as I now have other dreams in life. But I do enjoy writing, and my husband has forced me to work on a few TV/film productions of his, so maybe I was sort of close in my predictions after all.

Seems like I'm going strong for the two kids plan also. But I'm hoping to be able to have more than two, so with a bit of luck I can prove myself wrong there.

Instead of a pilot a few years older than me I married a struggling artist MORE than a few years older than me. Thank God for breaking a bit of that plan I had set up for myself.

Singing like a crow on amfetamin

Noam and I are up North at the moment. Visiting my family.

To get here we had to take a one hour flight. All well and good, except for one little thing.

My daughter has just left her "I love spitting and talking at the same time" period and entered the period called "I know how to sound like a crazy crow VERY LOUD".

I was honestly a bit embarassed when other flight passangers started looking at my daughter in a strange way after she had been "singing" for half an hour.

Thank God for dummies.

The joy of waxing

Went to wax my legs the other day. Most people find waxing a bit painful. I too used to find it a bit uncomfortable. But since Noam arrived I have actually enjoyed it. It sounds crazy, and it might be. But for me it is a time, a short moment, when someone is taking care of me for a change. It's nice!