My friend and I have an ongoing joke that adult one piece jumpers do not look good on everyone and in fact, we are one day going to do a photo shoot to prove it. I recently sent her a picture off a one piece shorts jumper and told her I would be unable to wear these because my vagina would eat the shorts immediately. She wrote back, “introducing the new hit game, hungry, hungry meat flaps!” I nearly fell off my chair laughing. Some people just really get me. 

My Mom was over watching the baby and I was upstairs pumping when she yelled out that I needed to come down. Poop emergency! I unhooked my pump wires and ran. When she saw me come bolting down the stairs with two pump cones coming out of my pumping bra she could not stop laughing. I recall that the last time I wore cones like this was at an eighties bar in England and wow, how life has changed. Mother Madonna. 

Update, I still do not have my brain back. It is still on baby vacation. I was trying to tell my partner there was a beautiful quote about children from the book Little Fires Everywhere that involved an apple. I then spent the next 5 minutes trying to remember the quote and then when I resorted to google, my partner says, I bet there isn’t even fruit in the quote at all. It was totally possible he was right. 

I called the clock on the microwave, the microwave’s watch. 

I couldn’t think of the name of the washing machine and I referred to it as the dishwasher for clothes. 

My Mom has a magnet on her fridge that outlines the early signs of dementia. I read over it and announced to the family that I most definitely was suffering from dementia. I had checked all the boxes with a resounding, yessss. 

I actually did read that for 2 years after you have a kid, your brain is in fact missing some grey matter. Obviously I stopped reading the article at about this point because that was all I needed to blame my permanent space cadet-ness. Now every time I say something stupid I folIow it up with a loud, “I have no grey matter in my brain!”.

My Dad was trying to explain a certain product he buys at the grocery store and he said, you know its’ the store’s brand. What is it, constipation? Dad, you think a store has named their private label, constipation? Oh are are you thinking Compliments? Because that is a little different.

There are days that I definitely think parenting in the eighties would have been more fun. There are no google tips right at your fingers and no insta Moms telling you that your baby’s wake windows are short because of a whole host of uncontrollable reasons that you should fix etc. On the one hand it is wonderful to look up poop pictures to ensure your babies excrement is normal but it is also a total curse to constantly see Montessori Moms being over the top perfect at all times while you sit there eating ice cream while your baby jumps around in the controversial exersaucer. Was it controversial in the 80s? Of course not! Eighties parenting feels like there was far more winging it, which I love. Sunscreen? Never thought of it! Beer and breastfeeding? Who cares! Ice cream for infants? Why not!? Smoking while holding a baby? Seems convenient! Breathing in strangers’ air? Sure thing! 

My partner and I obsessively talk about going on hikes and more often than not, just end up walking around the park. But we understand, that as Subaru owners, we must be hitting the open road and going on nature adventures, just like the commercials. I have suggested that we get a Thule roof rack to hold our invisible skis and just use it for snacks instead. Or the 45 baby blankets that seem to accumulate in the car (and hats, and bibs, and shoes). Subaru life! 

My friend sent me an article announcing that there would be a Great British Bake Off America and wondered what I thought about this. I told him without the cute Britishisms from all the English contestants, I would have much less desire to watch. Americans aren’t going to be concerned their bake is too stodgy or claggy. They aren’t going to emphatically add innit to everything they say. I mean, what’s the fucking point of watching if they aren’t going to be making a bloody sticky toffee pudding, that turns out a bit stodgy, but at least it was still edible, innit.

We live next to a large park. My favourite days are when I see this older gentleman that straps an iPad to his body and listens to podcasts from it without headphones. It is literally the largest Apple product available, minus an actual computer, to listen to podcasts off of. He is rejecting any form of convenience and also rejecting the existence of headphones. I just love it. 

Baby words I hate…

Wake windows. Why is it called a wake window? It is just literally when your baby is alive and up. It is just awake life. It should just be called life windows. Or not windows at all. Just life. My baby will live their life for the next 2 hours and then nap again.

Solids. It is just food! You are introducing your baby to food. Solids sounds more like what his poop will become after he eats the real food. 

Blank weeks old. I have no idea how many weeks old he is! And even if I did, I would not tell people he is blank weeks old because no one else knows what the fuck that means in terms of time either. So how old is he? 8 months and a quarter. And you know exactly what I am talking about. 

We recently went to my home town with the baby and wandered around. We ran into someone I have known since I was a kid and when they asked how old the bebe was, I answered 7 months. Wow! He is a big boy, they said. Yup he is a big boy, I agreed. Then they took it a step further and said, well, he’s a Buttrum! (My last name). I laughed and agreed and as we walked away my partner asked, so were you guys like the village fatties? I looked at him with a confused face and replied, yes, apparently so. I never realized that. So now when anyone comments on the size of my big boy, I cringe knowing they are eyeing my double chin and belly rolls and going uh huh, just like his Mama.    

Normal sounds in our house that our now highly upsetting to our newest roommate. 

• Opening a garbage bag
• Vacuuming 
• Using the blender
• Loud coughs
• Aggressive sneezes 
• Clearing of the throat
• Grinding coffee beans

I listen to podcasts all day long. Because of the subject matter, I am fairly certain the baby’s first words will be one of these – cults, Nexium, Mormons, Scientology, Keith Raniere, Teal Swan, Nippy, gaslighting. That’s ok, right? Also why do I keep talking to people that have not watch the Vow on Crave. BEST CULT DOC. Get on it for effs sakes! 

My partner comes down in the morning and joins me and the babe having breakfast and usually sighs and says, what cult are we learning about today and MUST I listen to this over my Bran Flakes? …Yes.

The bebe would NOT go to sleep last night so for 2 hours I paced and/or rocked with him and I sang to him. At one point my partner comes into the room and said, I noticed you went from kids songs to songs you would sing loudly coming home drunk from a party in the nineties…this was accurate. 

I went to my first movie in a theatre in 3 years!! It was Top Gun. I told my friend that my favourite part about the original is that they play Highway to the Danger Zone several times. And I saw there was a soundtrack attached to the movie and I wondered if it was just that song over and over again and Take My Breath Away. Anyways, it felt SO WEIRD sitting with strangers in a very quiet theatre. When the movie isn’t loud you are just listening to people chew and whisper. When Highway to the Danger Zone came on we totally lost it. We could not stop laughing. I had to avoid looking at my friend for fear of continuing to laugh for the entire movie. I had immediate flashbacks of this same friend and I having to be separated in elementary school classes because we did the same thing. Anyways, it was hilarious and I kept having to subtly wipe away tears so my friend would not realize I was still laughing. And I don’t know if it’s because my hips are mega sized or there was something in my jacket pocket, but every time I moved or adjusted myself in the seat, the char would recline in the opposite direction I had been in. I had basically no control. I would reach for the popcorn and it would like fully recline. I would grab my water and it would go back to upright. Did my hips have their own stratosphere? Like what the fuck was happening.