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September 30, 2003
Get comfy, grab a java, I pulled off nearly eight pages with this one…
Jamal, the nicest guy in the world I found in the yellow pages, came to fix my washing machine. When he showed me it spinning a cycle ALL BY ITSELF, I rounded out his $122 bill with an $18 tip. I could’ve cart wheeled around the block I was so excited. I wanted to get online and tell you right away. One and a half loads later, it quit spinning just like that. Jamal came back the next morning to spend a couple hours with the machine, three kids and me, the little lady. He had the thing back on track and told me not to worry about it when I asked what I owed him. I gave him a really good bottle of wine. He walked out the door and the machine immediately demanded I manually kick start every spin cycle. I felt sick. Half because doing laundry in my world is aerobic exercise, and half because I couldn’t possibly call Jamal back again. It was a week and a half before I had the guts to do it. He came and fixed. Left and it broke again. That Sunday I told Remo we were going to buy my machine today or else. I had it in my head we were going to get the $569 heavy load machine. Next thing you know we were walking out the store with a front loading set that costs six times that. Though my practical conscience still has me second guessing my signature on the dotted line, I may in fact throw a come-to-my-laundry-room party. Tomorrow, I’ll be able to do three loads of laundry and dry them in one hour. The Whirlpool Duet. Dry cleaners use them. The honest to Gawd’s truth of the matter is I haven’t actually got a clue what else the thing does, all I cared was how much I could stuff in, we spent the rest of our time negotiating the cost of it.
The camera died. Did I share that situation with you way back when? I bought a decent Canon point and shoot camera when Kaillan was born. A year into it, we were celebrating Dee Dee’s birthday at a restaurant and I left it there. Gone forever, I went and bought the same camera again. It was a moody thing with a character all of it’s own. By Halloween it started voodooing things to the pictures before it eventually ruined every single memorable moment we had. I went back to the store with three rolls of ruined pictures. The salesman was pretty sure it was just a dud when he convinced me to replace that camera with the same make again. Half a year later the camera is flipping out. Mostly it doesn’t want to move the film along, sometimes it just decides on it’s own to rewind a brand new film. Like at the wedding, when my children were walking up the aisle looking beautifully adorable, a never again moment and it up and rewound the film. For the heck of it.
Funny how things happen in threes. The first week of September was going to be hectic with Brandan starting school. We had Andree’s daughter’s wedding that week so she was off and with me being the mother of the flower girl and ring bearer and with Remo lost in quite a few projects, I needed reinforcements. I drove two and a half hours to pick up my aunt and two and a half hours back. I spent a decent amount of that time dreaming up three thousand things I would do while she was here and I started and ended with food. Day one I bought everything I needed to make ten batches of muffins, Sheppard’s pies, lasagna and cabbage rolls. Any busy mother of three needs meals you can just toss in the oven. On the eve of the great bake off, I happily put stuffed chicken breasts in the oven. When forty five minutes later everything else was ready, I discovered the oven was still cold. Our stove is from the Frigidaire Gallery stainless steel collection and a wee fifteen months old, young enough that I could still find the manual. The trouble shooting section told me to call the 1-800 number right away. The 1-800 number for Canada was no longer in service. So I called the U.S. number, punched in about eight options and was referred to Electrolux Canada. They told me I needed to call the only authorized service dealer in Montreal. Wouldn’t you know, you only leave a message at that number. When two days later I still hadn’t heard back from them, I called the furniture store I bought the appliances from. Obviously they had stopped selling appliances. I called the service place again and left a firm message. When a day later I heard from a woman who didn’t speak English, I struggled to understand what she was saying. My warranty had expired six months ago (did you know the one year warranty starts ticking away the moment you buy the appliances even if they don’t deliver them for four months?), it would cost $67 for the techician to come over and then $1.30 a minute, my appointment to simply determine the problem, was for a week later. A WEEK!!! The woman apologized with a smirk, I HEARD the smirk. The day the guy was supposed to come also happened to be my six week checkup with Dr. Bray so I made it clear I would only be here after 10:00 am. Fine.
That week put me more behind than ever. Overwhelmingly so. I had thirty organize my life projects going – in every room. I took six hours and drove my aunt home in between Brandan’s bus pick up and drop off. The morning after that I sent Kaillan to Andree’s and got Brandan and Emmie in the car by 7:20. We got to Bray’s office and discovered he was delivering a baby. Great. I loaded everyone back in the van and raced back to Brandan’s school, waiting in an empty lane for the minutes to slowly creep by. I could’ve made it back to our house in time for the bus, but I’d already written the necessary notes to the parties involved to say Brandan wouldn’t be on it. That part of school takes getting used to. When finally I saw one of the soccer mom’s (Diane, bless your heart), I tossed Brandan on her and raced back to Dr. Bray’s. It was 9:00 am, there were nine women in front of me and he had just arrived. The baby started to fuss while I painfully rescheduled my appointment and went back home. I parked on the driveway because my side of the garage happens to be full of fifty million pieces of hockey gear and saw it. The little card on my door. The service guy had been there, I could call and reschedule an appointment for next week. I lost it. Ever have one of those lives? I furiously dialed up that freaking service number’s freaking answering machine and left a freaking message. I basically told them to find that man who had come when he wasn’t supposed to and make him come back right NOW. I hung up the phone and sorta wished I could take back my message, but when all day went by and they weren’t calling me back, I called the 1-800 Electrolux number back and in twenty minutes or more explained why I could not wait one more day.
The very next morning Mr. Attitude showed up and was able to determine in three minutes, the timer on my control panel was defective and it had blown my control panel. It’s true, I had used the timer for the very first time the day the oven died because I was so terrified I’d miss Brandan’s school bus. The guy said it would have been covered by warranty a few months ago just as he presented me with the $400 bill. You’re joking, right? He had just explained it was defective! I said I was going to call someone but he said it wouldn’t change anything, it would take at least ten more days to even get the new panel. He took my $70 cheque for his time and walked out. Over my dead body was I paying $400 to fix the nearly new stove I spent $2000 on. I called half the living world. It was the important person who asked me how I got his number who actually made things happen. He told me my panel would be flown in that day and installed first thing in the morning at no charge. It’s so sad isn’t it, without a crazy fight you will get nowhere.
Don’t think for a minute everything in that department is perfect because all of a sudden the new control panel has a life of it’s own. Just like that it beeps like crazy and runs through messages on the screen before it turns the oven on all by itself. With my eyebrows nearly touching my hair line, I ask you, what is it with us?
Even the vacuum lost it. The day before the wedding, my aunt and I decided to REALLY clean out the van so it would be shiny clean when we were all decked out. The plan was to do it first thing in the morning, it would only take a half hour or so. It was three o’clock before we got to it, I mean she got to it. I was inside trying to mop the floors, maybe even still in my pyjamas. She needed a vacuum, I got her the upright. Two seconds later she came in to ask where the hose was. I thought it was on it. Thought wrong. In my travels through the house to find the hose we just used but happens to be long gone now, I found the hand held shop vac. Perfect. Now she just needed an extension cord. I looked the two places I thought we kept them and didn’t find anything. So I called Remo. He suggested spots I had already checked. In my travels, I noticed the long orange cord connected to the sprinkler system panel but the other end was plugged in behind the deep freeze. I didn’t think using that one was a good idea since the sprinklers are programmed, so I found a bunch of little extension cords. I moved the van and attached four of them together. The shop vac had three prongs, the extension cords were two pronged. I needed that friggan orange cord. The baby started wailing. I moved the deep freeze with every muscle I own and climbed on top of it, sliding my arm along pink insulation to unplug it (obviously this had to be the only wall in the furnace room not finished), I had insulation in my hair even. I threw my aunt the cord and ran down the street for Brandan’s bus.
We came back and my aunt reluctantly told me the vacuum didn’t work because the hole the hose connected to was broken. She thought if only we had tape, we could fix it. Ten minutes later I found what I thought was a strong enough tape. It was one of those frustrating dig searches where things fell on the floor and crashed and smashed and obviously the tape I found wasn’t strong enough anyway. Brandan, who’s always right in the middle of all the action and usually the most efficient, suggested we use the big shop vac in the other cold room. I didn’t even know we had it. I hauled the thing outside, the missing wheel kept tipping it over. My aunt plugged it in and went to vacuum but it didn’t suck. I actually started to laugh. A sick laugh. There were two holes, one with a hose, and one that blew all the air out. We figured if we stuffed a sock in it (the extra hole that is), it would be ok. It worked for five seconds at a time and then POW, the sock would shoot up twelve feet in the air. Brandan loved the explosions. It was as if we were on ZOOM, coming to you live. That night when Daphne was in our zoo, foiling my hair, I mentioned to Remo that I’d unplugged the irrigation control panel, and joked the grass would probably die, but we had a clean car. Brandan, resourceful as always, went into the garage, hauled out the hose with a sprinkler attached to it and set it up on the grass unbeknownst to us. He turned one of the valves on in the garage and came back in. An hour later, Daphne was washing my hair out in the sink and there was no cold water. Remo had been upstairs having a shower, it was impossible he used all the hot water, we have two 60 gallon tanks. I eeked my way through my shampoo and only a while after Remo came down, I mentioned how strange it was that we didn’t have hot water. Remo bolted out of the room when it hit him, there was no reason for that sprinkler to be running in the front. Brandan, helpful as he strives to be, took it upon himself to save the grass I was “worried” about. By turning on the wrong valve, he had just blessed it with 120 gallons of boiling hot water. Just another day in the life of me. I left out the part where I lost the card with the name, address and telephone number for the lady who was altering Brandan’s suit for tomorrow. Didn’t yet share with you our Sears photo attempt with the three least cooperative children in the world. Or how we needed the suit for the Sears pictures. Forgot to mention the part where I had tried on every single thing I owned that was remotely weddingish and had to go buy something or feel hopelessly uncomfortable, left out how I was late picking up Daphne because my keys were nowhere to be found.
I could go on and on. And on. There’s just one thing after another, all my days long. I’m going back to work at the end of January, I have to and that’s all there is to it, but I can honestly say I can’t imagine how I will fit it in. I apologize profusely for dropping out of site, for not being diligent on the boards, for how far behind I am with the other writers and my e-mails. I understand why so many people crack and leave. Even though weeks went by and I didn’t flip on the computer, I still wore the pressure of it. I’m getting very good at accepting my limitations and working on simplifying things.
We found a cleaning lady who can only come every second week but I grabbed it. She’s only been here once and I’m being very honest when I say it’s too soon to say how I feel about it. Just getting ready for her took me two days. I’d gone so far in cleaning up, it would have been nothing for me to just finish it. Then she got here and I heard myself over and over telling her not to bother with this or that because I would do it. If I’m doing it all myself, what is the point in having her? I know what my problem is: me. I am incredibly organized and bleachably clean. But a sloppy mess. A cluttered space makes for a cluttered mind, I’m working hard right now at simplifying things. I started with our closets and packed up bags and bags of things to give away to friends and charity, even some of Brandan’s things I’m bringing to a second hand store. One room at a time, I’m getting rid of the stuff we really don’t need. The kicker came when I bought an agenda with a calendar in it I could very comfortably use. There was a time in my life, when I remembered everything, every phone number, every appointment, every little thing I needed to pick up at the store, every birthday, every plan, but that part of my brain is long gone. To happily raise three children and run a house and lovingly work at it with my husband, I need to be organized. I can see that fine line where you could become a complete organized nut about it. But as for the alternative, letting it go and simply living today? I find it even less appealing. I’d only turn into a frustrated, stressed out of my mind mess.
It’s at this point that I fell asleep last night. I spent the whole day working on this thing in spurts and I having even hit on the kids yet. Do you still have time for us?
Obviously big things went down in Brandan’s “rife” when he started kindergarten. He did an hour and a half with us the first day, two hours by himself the next and climbed on the bus all by himself for a full day after that. I loved the newness of everything, the new school supplies and new clothes, loved all the excitement in store for Brandan. But that first day when we sat in those little itty bitty chairs with our knees up around our ears, and watched him sit with the other kids under the cubbyhole with his name on it, while Madame Poirier told the kids in French what to pull out of their bags, and I saw him looking to the other kids to see what to do next, I started to cry. All the newness seemed terrifying all of a sudden. It was bad enough he had never been in a structured environment like this, he had to go at it in a whole other language?
Brandan did fantastic. He talked a lot about Kevin those first few days. Kevin played with him every recess unless Kevin found Spiro from the other class first. He was so nonchalant about his big long explanation, and I got a lump THIS BIG from how naïve he is. For now. The first morning he took the bus, I followed it to the school to make sure he got off ok. He looked big shot and teenie tiny at the same time. He came home that night and said the big kids had picked on him. Though it seemed to me from his explanation that they were just banging on his seat, maybe not targeting him, I followed the bus a couple more days. My plan was to not interfere unless it was an obvious problem. He’s bussed happily ever after ever since.
I’m absolutely crazy about Mme Poirier. To be entirely honest, when I first met her, I was apprehensive. Maybe because the rest of his soccer team landed in the classroom with the teacher all the parents wanted. Ours seemed so hard, so serious. But when I saw her in action, I was crazy about her. I found myself hoping even Kaillan would get her one day. Brandan needs someone who’s strict and very structured. During those first few days, I found he often came home with attitude. Show-offie or defiant , I worried about him acting like that in school, the teacher would hate his guts. So I wrote a little note. I mentioned how excited we were with how much he was learning with her and said we were dealing with some attitude issues all of a sudden, my concern was that she was too. She called me the next day and only furthered my admiration. She said Brandan is great with the kids, he’s not aggressive, he’s doing his projects, he’s keen but there were occasions where he didn’t do what she instructed the first time so she had to repeat herself till he complied. While she was suggesting it was probably because he doesn’t speak French yet, I was saying it didn’t help that he didn’t do to preschool. She stopped in her tracks with a “Didn’t go to preschool???? THAT explains it”. Mistake #300 I will not make again. I had Brandan in Annabel’s home daycare because it was intimate and they were supposed to be following the curriculum of the day care she worked through. My idea was this kid would be in school for the rest of his life, why rush him now. I liked that he could flop on her sofa and watch cartoons if it happened to be that kind of day. The other two are going to preschool even if it’s just half days. I think it will be fun and stimulating for them and even if all kids eventually reach the same level anyway it can only help with the transition to school.
I look forward to emptying out Brandan’s bag every night. He has a portfolio in there and every day there’s something in it, whether it’s a calendar or a newsletter or an activity he worked on that day. We have a photocopier at home so we can copy all his work and redo it at night. It’s fun, we do it as a family and he’s getting ready for homework next year. I find those activities so clever and I’m seriously impressed with however it is she managed to get him so smart. You had to see our faces the other night when he counted to thirty-nine in French and English. He can sing ten French songs. Our beams were positively manic. Brandan started hockey every Saturday and Sunday morning. Remo goes on with him and though the kids are playing mostly every game but hockey, it’s still new and fun for us. I can see how if he sticks with it, our whole life will revolve around a arena.
Remember way, way, way up there when I talked about the week from Hell? It also happened to be the week I tried potty training Kaillan. I planned for never leaving the house with her for as long as it took. My plan was to pump her up with wearing big girl underwear and bring her to the bathroom every hour on the hour. For five days she’d sit on the loo and sweetly tell me about how I was going to give her chocolate when she went. Nothing. Then five minutes later she’d pee in a corner somewhere. I kept on positive reinforcing her and kept on mopping up the mess. But day five, when she was peeing like a puppy all over the place and walking it across the floor, I picked her up with my mouth clenched, put her in the bathtub and told her to wait there till I hosed her down. Then I went back down to clean up the mess. I could try to justify it by saying I had a lot on my plate and I haven’t slept in months, but the truth of the matter was my patience was shot. I know people take weeks, months even to go at this, but when I went back upstairs and saw this little bit of a thing standing in the middle of the bathtub, I accepted it wasn’t working. Even if we regressed three months, I wasn’t going to make her a nervous wreck over it. When she’s ready she’ll be ready. Four days later she told me she wanted to pee pee in the potty and we never looked back. The poo poo business took a couple weeks longer till she had the guts to do it for the very first time and she’s been great ever since. It was so funny the other morning because Remo and I were in bed talking when we heard her feet thump to the floor in her room, then boom-boom-boom as she ripped past the end of our bed, through our room into our bathroom, to go all by herself, without so much as a glance to see if we were awake yet.
Kaillan talks our ear off and uses big huge words. Like humungous. When way back we were teaching Brandan things, if he wasn’t interested, we had to repeat it fifty thousand times. Kaillan is interested in everything and she catches it fast, sometimes she really freaks me out. I’m teaching her the names of the bones in the body and she’s remembering them. I guess it helps a lot that we’ve been working with Brandan to help him along with school and she competes with him every step of the way. Funny Kaillan story? Last Thursday I had Emmie’s two month checkup at the same time as Kaillan’s first Shake, Spatter and Roll class so I asked Remo to bring her. I assured him there would probably be another Dad there and it was mostly rumble tumbling. I was sitting with Dr. Kugelmass when my phone rang. Remo wanted to know when I would be home. In the next breath he said he was going to kick my A$$ because I didn’t tell him only the first half hour was in the gym. In the second half of the class he had to sit on the floor cross legged with a bunch of mothers and sing Skimpery Inky Dinky Dink among others, complete with actions. He said he wanted to die. Even Dr. Kugelmass laughed.
Now my little sweetheart is awesome. There’s something so tender and precious about your last baby and she’s all that and more. I drop everything when she smiles and coos and I feel honored because I get the most of it. It really does go by fast. Especially those two hour nights. My Emmie, she does her days…At the two-month checkup she was nearly twelve pounds, and she’s in the 95th percentile for height, weight and head circumference. She’s the biggest of all my babies and I love it. Emersan has a little birthmark on the iris of her eye, a brown spot if you will on the still blue iris. I’m the only one that seems to see it and when her eyes turn brown like the rest of it’ll probably disappear. I brought her to the Children’s hospital for her kidney ultrasound and she has hydronephosis (swelling of the kidneys), a little more than the other two and a little worse on one side but it’ll hopefully correct itself like the other ones. I’m not concerned at all. When I think about how scared I was when they first told me Brandan had it, I have to laugh. I knew more about the condition than my own doctor!
I know I probably have forty million more things to share but I promised to get this up yesterday and typing while the baby is asleep only leaves everything else piling up. My washing machine never did show up yesterday. They told me it would be sometime between seven in the morning and nine at night but I waited for nothing because the salesman forgot to fax the invoice over to the warehouse. Figures.
Hey, just when I’ve complained for seven pages about how busy I am, next week I start my Mini-Med programme at McGill University. I actually read about it in a magazine and put my name down on a waiting list. It took two years. Every week, Claudia and I will be attending a lecture series on a different field (neurology, immunology, pharmacology, oncology…). So next time someone says ‘what do you have a degree in it’, I can holler YES!!! Coming up in my agenda for October, we have Emersan’s baptism, we’re going to Disney on Ice, I’m taking a what to do with potatoes cooking class, there’s Thanksgiving and I’m trying to organize some sort of fall get together with friends. Apple or pumpkin picking, maybe horseback riding or a family soccer game. Got any ideas? And speaking of ideas, tell me, what to do you do with chicken breasts? I’m all pumped in a cooking mode and desperate for some new tried and true recipes. One night my girlfriend taught me how to make real Italian tomato sauce with meatballs, spare ribs and sausages in it (thanks again Gina and Antoinette) and I made enough to last me forever. It’s the time of year to make leek and potato soup, it freezes fantastically so it’s perfect for entertaining, I posted the recipe on the board a while back if anyone’s interested. OH, WAIT A MINUTE, have I got a recipe to share with you. I’ll try to get it up by tomorrow. Someone brought me an apple cheesecake with a shortbread crust and apples, cinnamon and almonds on top and its knock out I actually invited her over again the week after to bring the thing again with the recipe. Give me a day or two and I’ll get it on the board.
Till then have fun and forgive me my flub-ups, and Jen H. and Nancy? Have happy birthdays!
Allisun
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