Kids are people too

Both Husband and I try to give zaiki autonomy: they get to choose between two outfits (only two!), they get to pick shoes to wear and they don't have to clean their plates at every meal. I understand that, when you need help to wipe your own hiney or put on clothes, having control over some decisions in your life is important, even empowering. This article is exactly how I feel. You know when you meet a distant and somewhat creepy relative and just don't want to touch them? As an adult, we have an option of a handshake or a wave, but we generally think it's acceptable to make our children give hugs to all the relatives. "Oh, how cute!" we say as our child is gripped in the clutches of a distant uncle they don't know or a great-aunt with halitosis. But I 100% agree with the author: kids should own their bodies, and if they don't feel like hugging, they don't have to. They are people too, and they should have a choice in how they express themselves. Having a choice lets them know that they are respected and their feelings are taken into account. So kudos to the article author for eloquently expressing thoughts that lazily hung in my own head. 

Zaiki turn 3, or how did we get here?

I was going to write a post about life, changes, children growing up and other sappy stuff, but I am too tired and don't feel nostalgic/romantic/sensitive enough. Instead, I present you with a photo gallery that can only be titled
 "How did we get from this":

 To this:

 To this:

 To finally, this:

Out of mouths of babes

So Papa was working this past weekend, and I was left to entertain zaiki on my very lonesome both Saturday and Sunday. Not an easy task, I have to say, but some amusing moments make up for the back-breaking labor that is zaiki-care.

For instance, this past weekend we decided to change things up and feed goats/deer/geese at a local park's zoo. Basically, it's a bunch of cages in a park with very sad-looking animals. I actually feel bad for poor creatures, but zaiki find it facinating. After scaring baby goats with delightful squealing, shooing off an overly enthusiastic rooster and washing deer slobber off zaiki's hands, we went over to the playground. There was a very cute Russian boy, maybe about a year younger then my girls, with long blonde hair down to his shoulders. Sonya inspected him up and down, turned to me and asked: "Mama, is it a girl?" I said no, that is a boy. "No Mama, it's a girl". I reassured that no, it is, in fact, a little boy. "Mama, but he has girl hair". Solid logic, can't argue with that. Some time later, a very obese girl about their age appeared, Sonya inquired: "Mama, is that a baby?"...I just sighed, scooped her up and moved her over to another slide.

Later, on the drive home, the following exchange took place in the back seat (backstory to it is that zaiki's Papa is a policeman, or "peaceman" in zaiki-speak and that last week Maya broke sunglasses he takes to work with him):
Sonya: "Maya, I'm really MAD at you"
Maya: "Why sissy?"
Sonya: "YOU BROKE MY POLICE GLASSES AND NOW I CAN'T DO MY POLICE WORK ANYMORE!!!!" 
Maya: "Humf, I AM MEAN ON YOU TOO!!!!"
Both: "MAMA-SHE-IS-TEASING-ME-WAWAWA"

Yep, terrible threes are looking stormy...

Happy 12th anniversary to me

Wow, time flies! It's been over a month since I've written anything in here. I guess I'd make a shitty Carrie Bradshaw. :) Anyway, I have a good reason to revive my blog today. Besides being a wonderful cool Friday night in June and the fact that my zaiki are in bed, and I'm sitting in the living room enjoying a nice cold Blue Moon, it is also a 12th anniversary of my coming to the United States. Epic!

 It's a date that usually falls off my radar, especially since we've had kids and most days I'm lucky if I remember to set my alarm clock, but tonight it hit me: June 8th, 2000 is the day I landed in New York City.

I came to the US to work in a summer camp and was scheduled to go back in August same year. I never did. The funny thing is that, a week before I left Russia, my girlfriend and I were joking about me falling for a square-jaw-baseball-playing-gum-chewing-American, getting married and staying there. In the end, my American husband does not play baseball or chew gum (thank you Jesus!) but he is square-jawed and handsome non the less. :)

I was very naive, young (like not able to buy liquor young) and full of hopes. Watching soapy American touchey-feeley movies where all the right doors open and everything is wonderful also played into my delusions that life will be easy for me once I get to the States. And things did work out, but it was pretty rough for the first few years. Like am I going to make it or am I going to disappear in the underbelly of Russian/Ukranian Massachusetts underworld rough. The craziest part of it all was deciding to stay in the States and leaving behind all the life I knew. I still can't talk about things that I lived through. I just can't. Words just don't string together. The first year in the US was truly the darkest, the most difficult time in my life.

I believe that there are many paths in life to choose from and our choices make us who we are (yes, it is a cliche, thank you!). One day I will tell my zaiki about the choices I had to make, and the happiness and heartbreak that came with them. How those choices made me tougher, but also made me almost lose hope, and taught me patience and humility (not really, still working on it!). How there are good people willing to help you, but there are also those who are looking to take advantage of your helplessness, and how to tell the difference. How difficult it is to live as an undocumented immigrant, to put your dreams on hold and to see precious time and opportunities slip by. How it is so hard not to see your mom for years, or miss your younger brother grow up. How without me making these choices they would not exist.

But tonight, I simply raise my beer to the day when my life changed irrevocably and forever and enjoy my quiet Friday night. Cheers!

Musing of an imperfect mama

To breasfeed or not, to co-sleep or not, to potty-train at 2 or not. Guilt and uncertainty are the two heaviest parenting burdens. "Am I doing it right? I cannot possibly screw this up, I have to be PERFECT!!!!" These thoughts constantly went through my head the first year of being a mama. It felt like a tremendous weight on my shoulders - the constant guilt and second guessing, beating myself up for a smallest misstep. I did not breastfeed for very long - I just couldn't. Between postpartum depression, full-time work, selling our house, and shock of caring for two babies at once I just wasn't able to focus and do it. We "formula-ed" the girls, and it took a lot of stress off.

I do wish I breastfed them more. I think breastfeeding is such an awesome, wonderful bonding time and it's really amazing that a human body can do that. All new moms are superheroes: able to give life and nourish it. It needs to be celebrated!

This cover and articles about it have been all over the news, generating buzz and criticism of the "crazy" attachment parenting. Who cares? It's that mom's choice, and it's fine. The boy will be just fine. Honestly, how breastfeeding your child for a long (ok, really long-long-long time) is worse than feeding him McDonald's for dinner? Or leaving him in front of television for hours? Or taking him to a tanning salon?

Americans are uptight, really uptight, if this picture is able to generate negative/critical response. It is a challenge to social norms, and I'm sure TIME chose it for the shock value: picking a young, blonde, very attractive mother, airbrushing and somewhat sexualizing her (gee, I wonder why they didn't go with a 200 lb older woman!) and slapping the photo on the interwebs.

I don't care what the parenting approach is. Attachment parenting is great, if you are a stay-at-home mama of one baby. It didn't work for me. I vacillated somewhere in the middle: sleep trained a little bit, cuddled a little bit, co-slept a little bit and breastfed a little bit. I am not perfect (slightly damaged too): I yell at the girls sometimes, I micromanage them sometimes, I won't let them drink water out of the hose in the yard (uhm, Husband!), but I do let them pee outside in the grass if pressed to find a bathroom. My imperfections are good for them, pushing them to grow and develop independently from me. Imperfect is fine, as long as our kids know they are loved and allowed to be imperfect in their own way in return.

April is a sllooowwww month

Slow month for me - some strange lethargy overcame my brain and it actually hurts to think. I believe that is due to high pollen count this month. But there have been some interesting revelations however:

- I am capable of running 8-10 miles at a time and my knee caps don't burst and shatter to pieces as expected
- Big dogs suck: after being scared by a big undisciplined Rottweiler, Maya keeps having nightmares about wolves in her room
- As mentioned elsewhere previously, my graduate studies have begun to interfere with my wine-drinking time and I don't like it
- Judging by the intensity of recent tantrums, terrible threes promise to be far more terrible than terrible twos
- I have to get up even earlier on Saturday mornings to have some resemblance of sanity and inner peace for the weekend (it gives me alone time)
- I love doing nails with my girls on rainy Sunday afternoon
- Maya thinks that Sonya came out of her belly, to which Sonya laughed and said that it's silly since Maya's belly is small
- I get dizzy and nauseous spinning at zaiki-speed on the tire swing (Husband thinks it's funny)
- Sonya likes playing "bird soccer" at the park
- April showers, apparently, bring not only May flowers but a ridiculous allergy attacks

I believe that is all for now :) Mulling a post about Romney vs Rosen but it's old news by now. LAZY!!!!

More on dogs and dog owners

I'm a pretty chill (albeit sarcastic) person with almost no violent tendencies (unless someone cuts me off in traffic), but this weekend I found myself fantasizing about using a hammer to bash in the head of a living, breathing thing:

The weather was gorgeous. Friday afternoon Husband and I decided to walk over to pick up zaiki from the babysitter, since it's only 5 minutes away. Zaiki love walking home instead of driving, (a rarity among American children, I'm beginning to realize), so I try to foster that love for bypedal-izm by walking with them as much as I can. It's a nice little walk except that the most direct route takes us by the house with a huge and mean Rottweiler that barks and snarls at you when you walk by, not even close to the fence. Just being in the line of sight of that thing is all it takes to send it into a drool-filled snarl fit. Barking and snarling is all well and good, that's what dogs do, but the problem is the the fence in the yard is pretty flimsy, short, with gaps under it and the dog is usually left unattended. Zaiki are afraid of it (justifiably) and so am I. It was a matter of time when it got out.

So this Friday the dog wasn't there on the way to pick the kids up and we thought it was safe to walk back the same way. Unfortunately, it was there. Sonya and I were meandering a few feet behind and saw the dog duck under the fence and lunge at Kevin and the little Maya. I picked Sonya up and ran. Kevin was fighting off the creature with his knife, Maya was screaming when the owner came out and grabbed the snarling, growling beast.

It was horrible. The only weapon I had were my bare hands and they were holding Sonya. What could I do? I comforted Maya and carried her all the way home. Now for the past three days she's been saying she is afraid of "big wolves", won't leave my side and fell asleep curled up on my chest, shaking and crying.

I had contemplated taking my .38, going over and blasting that dog to hell. Only:
1. I may miss
2. I'll go to jail and, as a consequence,
3. My children will be left motherless
So we did the next best thing and called animal control. Twice as of today, but I'll keep at it.

The best (worst, really) part was the dog owner's reaction. If my dog attacked a small child on the street, I would not limit my involvement by shrugging shoulders, saying "sorry, it got out" and walking away. I would at least check to see how that child was doing and my apologies would be more sincere. What an asshole.
My suspicions from before that only uncouth ugly filth would own such a vicious and mean creature (and would let it run loose) were confirmed.

I am very angry at the injustice. We teach our children that all actions have consequences, that bad deeds always go punished, but in this case, there are no repercussions for the owners. I know life is full of disappointments, that zaiki will have their share of tears and fears, but I still feel that, as their mother, I have an obligation to protect them as much as I can, because they still can't fight their battles. They are so little...It's my job to make sure that justice is restored. In this case, I can't. And it makes me feel sad, helpless and angry. Have I mentioned I'm angry? And next time I'm walking past that house I'm carrying a hammer.