Cheating at life

I'm all for giving life your 110% unless of course you don't have 110% to give because you're exhausted or lazy.  I would say I'm a little of both at the moment but I'm sure it's a winter lull, I'm definitely in love with the Spring and Summer.  Also, it did not stop raining today.  The. Whole. Day.  Bring on the sunshine and picnics in the park already. 

I don't say I have any particular life hacks, I'm very much list orientated so my husband finds my lists everywhere.  I have to do lists, things I need to pay/buy lists, budgets, shopping lists, I could go on.  I find them effective and also encouraging as I love to see all of the ticks.  So sad I know, but to me lists are satisfying.  They mean I get stuff done especially now I'm still suffering with baby brain.  I'm much less forgetful than when my son was a young baby but I still struggle week to week to remember things if I haven't written them down.  In fact, if I haven't written it down - forget about me remembering whatever it was.  I'm sure you can read very clearly that I'm writing before thinking and as I explained to someone at work, if I read things back immediately they seem absolutely fine but if I read it back a week later, I sound like English is my second language and for that I apologise.  It must make for a hard read but my intention was for this to be an overspill of my thoughts as I have so very many! 

Anyway, back to the point.  I spend a lot of time on Buzzfeed looking at their DIYs and hacks for everything and I think, I should do that or I really should make that because they would be helpful.  Have I recreated anything I have seen on there that would change my life? No.  My day to day thought is now - get through the day successfully and by that I mean without burning the house down and/or anything bad happening to my son or I.  It can be summed up in a quote I recently saw on a mug, 

"Yes, I am still in my pajamas.  What did I accomplish today? 

The kids are still alive.  Say thank you.

Now say I'm pretty."

Amazing, right? I wish I would have had this mug when my son was first born as a response to both mothers asking why I was still in pyjamas more than once.   

Today though, something amazing happened.  I had a cleaner.  I'm going to keep this a secret from my mother obviously (she has no idea I blog) but I feel so much better about our house and I feel like effort was actually put into making sure the surfaces are no longer gross.  Yes we have anti-bacterial spray and wipes and yes they get used constantly, but it's not the same as someone deep cleaning your house.  My bathroom is actually gleaming and she did a much better job than my husband or I at getting rid of most of the limescale on our shower doors - using the exact same product.  Now I know what you might be thinking - how lazy am I that I can't clean the house myself?  There are two answers to this - (1) I hate cleaning but I do it out of necessity - when I have the time which is barely ever (2) my son is so active and desperate to help us do anything I would spend the entire time trying to stop him eating window cleaner/hoovering up his toys.  

When I received an email on Friday asking if I would like 2 hours free I practically cried.  I could not have signed up any quicker and I even paid extra for the windows to be cleaned as it's something I still haven't got round to since my son has been born.  I went through this company: https://housekeep.com/how-it-works/ and although my original booking had to be rescheduled to today (in their defence it was less than 24 hours notice but they did seemingly have availability) it was well worth the wait.  From the moment Viorica stepped into the house, I felt relieved.  She was great with my son as well and knew he would be a little bit cautious as she was someone new.  I had asked her to prioritise the bathroom and the nursery as well as the windows which was allocated extra time.  As I have mentioned above, she did an amazing job and I'm so happy I went for it, I'm just sad it will be a little while before we have her round again.  

No part of me feels guilty for paying someone to clean my house while I spend time with my son.  I would love to have more social time with him instead of planning what I'm going to do the moment he goes down for a nap which is generally housework instead of napping myself.  Our pile of ironing is shocking but if we're out when my son has his nap, that's my housework window gone.  I know millions of women have dealt with this situation much better than me but I'm not a natural housewife and never will be.  I love to bake and craft sure, but my cooking leaves a lot to be desired and as you already know my cleaning is the same.  I wish we would come into money so I could have her back weekly but this was an experience I'm definitely happy to admit to and share.  

~AB~

Dairy Free Me

Today I watched my office devour an apple tart and dark chocolate torte from Paul.  Inside I'm weeping and I'm hoping the green eyed monster didn't peek through my longing gaze as people went back for seconds.  Yes, I could have had some but would it really have been worth it?  For most it's a moment on the lips, a lifetime on the hips... for me however it's that plus untold levels of wind followed by so much bloating I look 6 months pregnant for at least three days after (there are other issues but I'm a lady and I won't discuss them in public, I've gone far enough saying I get windy!).  

Since being told I'm dairy intolerant it has been a tough slog.  I loved ice cream and cake and strangely since pregnancy I have also loved cheese but now that is a distant memory.  To be clear, I am not lactose intolerant, I am dairy intolerant.  The difference is that I react to the proteins in milk and not the sugars so lactose free products still cause the same issues. 

As I am new to this, I was unaware of the other factors I would have to take into consideration.  Eating out, the ignorance of others and packet reading now feature heavily in my daily life.  Whilst I accept that I am intolerant and not allergic, I feel I should be clear that this is not a lifestyle choice for me like with socialites and gluten.  I also know others have got it much much worse and I'm not looking for sympathy, only to share a few observations.  

Before, I could grab literally anything I wanted off of the shelf in a shop for lunch, now I have to check the ingredients of everything.  Why you ask? It should be obvious shouldn't it, like a cheese and pickle sandwich clearly has dairy? Whilst I would love for that to be the case, certain retailers and also brands who I will not mention have a penchant for adding skimmed milk powder into practically everything.  I was disgusted to find I couldn't have a packet of dry roasted peanuts or certain salt and vinegar crisps for this reason alone.  

Before, I could go out for a meal and eat anything on the menu... now I have discovered people cook with butter and add cheese to everything.  Dessert at any restaurant is totally out of the question.  An example of this was my work Christmas party where my colleagues sampled such delights as a sweet chestnut charlotte, Christmas pudding with white chocolate ice cream and a chocolate tart, I was offered... fruit salad.  More recently, at a hen do the bridesmaid had booked a sharing menu for the dinner at a restaurant and despite telling the restaurant the dietary requirements, they made no provision for anyone but simply told us which dishes we couldn't eat on the menu.   No alternative was offered for dessert as they didn't have any fresh fruit so another girl and I watched the rest of the table eating theirs.   As you can imagine, this makes meeting up with friends difficult especially if they have chosen an Italian restaurant.  I'm not asking for special treatment but a dairy intolerance is hardly a new development.  I find it hard to believe that putting one less ingredient in recipes would be that difficult that can't be balanced out with extra seasoning, unless everything you have is pre-prepared and frozen, please correct me if I'm wrong. 

Finally the judgement.  Everyone has a view on intolerances and allergies, most are misguided ("I have the low cholesterol margarine that's fine right?"), others are downright ignorant ("well it's only an intolerance so you can still have it can't you?").  There's also the looks implying I'm intentionally being difficult because of course I have manifested an intolerance to be an irritation to people.  

All of that aside however, I have managed to lose and maintain my weight for the first time and because I have to make a concerted effort picking things out for lunch, I find I always try and look for a healthy option.  I have also discovered dairy free baking as you may have seen in previous posts which all come out pretty well albeit a little more dense than I would like.  Last weekend I made this for a friend and her boyfriend, visiting us from abroad: 

http://purefreefrom.co.uk/recipes/lemon-drizzle-slices

And have spent the rest of this week gorging on leftovers of these from the weekend as well:

Their tiffin cake is also good but I definitely prefer these. 

And today, I tried these for the first time and although they taste a little bit too healthy, I still feel like I'm being naughty that there is "salted caramel" in the name and "bakewell tarts" are bad for you. 

 

Although shopping "free from" is super expensive at the moment I am assured the market place for free from products was much worse as recent as 5 years ago.  At least there is now some variety and it tastes pretty good.  It's not easy to eat dairy free but I'm not resentful, I had a good innings with dairy while I didn't know I was intolerant, I've tried and enjoyed many cakes and ice creams and I definitely ate a ton of dairy pregnant.   I just wish people and companies were a little more understanding. 

 

~AB~

What a whirlwind!

Again I apologise for my radio silence.  The last two weeks seem to have been an endless blur of cleaning up half digested food/nappy contents and I cannot tell you how much Dettol has been used to prevent this from spreading further.  

Living in London, you're forever warned about the hygiene of fellow commuters who all seem to sneeze without covering their mouths and noses, yawn loudly and incessantly sniff like they were never told that it's rude and to blow your nose (I was constantly).  The same is said of the cleanliness of surfaces on a tube train due to some people's lack of hand washing.  It is no wonder that norovirus (a milder form of gastroenteritis) and viral infections are rife during the winter months here.  Antibacterial gel is a must have in any handbag.  It is more a wonder if you don't catch anything so it is with pride that I can say that I have never (touch wood) caught anything other than a cold while commuting.  I appreciate how damning this sounds and also how gross I'm making commuters sound but it is not all commuters and given the swathes of people who use transport in London, one person not washing their hands or using gel after sneezing for example and touching a railing spreads a cold/flu like wildfire.  Commuting aside, the other breeding ground would be a nursery... 

We are now 5 days in and my son is still off food.   We have offered him literally everything we have in our house but still no dice.  What I can be grateful for is that he will drink milk and water so he isn't dehydrated.  Obviously for a 14month old this isn't the best diet but at least he's getting some nutrition and not losing any more weight - a huge relief for an anxious mum.  The worst of mine lasted for 24 hours but whilst I'm still feeling niggles when I eat and I'm not back to eating the amount I usually would, I'm still managing 3 meals a day plus some snacks.  Thankfully, we have some reprieve in that today my son was looked after by my mum.  My son absolutely adores her and is generally well behaved for her so this could be the breakthrough we need to kickstart his eating again.  I'm keeping my fingers firmly crossed as it's heartbreaking to see my baby boy this way. 

One thing that seems to have helped albeit only a little is camomile tea.  For some it may seem odd and extremely English that I would choose to brew a cuppa for my son but it's natural soothing qualities were appealing and frankly, I'm not a fan of giving my son medicine for no reason.  As far as I know, there is no medicine to cure an upset stomach for a toddler and I refuse to use something general like Calpol.  Strangely, my son loved it except for when I tried to sneakily add sugar to give him some energy!  Whilst I won't fully advocate camomile tea, it seemed to work for us.  One concern I had though was that I had read a lot of teas naturally contain tannin which affects the absorption of iron.  Being anaemic myself I would usually try and avoid things like this but the plus side of settling my son's stomach outweighed my concerns when using the following logic.  I assume firstly that my son would have to be consuming more than the occasional 4oz I gave him for this to make an extreme difference to his iron levels, I secondly could find no definitive answer as to whether camomile tea does contain tannin and if it does, that it's on the lower end of the scale.  

I'm not a bohemian mother by any means, I'm certainly not chilled out like one but I do prefer to solve upsets as naturally as possible when it comes to health.  That being said, I refuse to subscribe to health fads like buying a smoothie maker... it's a blender people and you already have one!  Hopefully my son is on the path to recovery so I can start relaxing again.  Having an unwell son is such an emotional rollercoaster! 

~AB~

Meal Plan Wins

I know, I am mega late again and whilst I hate to make excuses this was written last week and not posted due to my family being struck down with gastroenteritis but that's another story.  Please ignore the fact it refers to "this week" as that was now in fact last week.  Sorry :(

Anyway, as I mentioned a couple of posts ago, I have been meal planning and my husband even remarked at how much less stressed I was about dinner times.  I know it sounds a little menial to get stressed over something like that but again as I have mentioned before, my husband and my diet wasn't the best pre-baby and when my son finally came of age to be weaned I took this as my chance to transform things.  We barely have takeaways now and I feel like we're all (well my husband and I as my son wouldn't be allowed our takeaways) much better for it.  Also, I am trying to keep to the daily requirements of everything which I had also been finding hard so 5 fruit and or veg a day and then two portions of fish a week. 

Whilst I have always been keen on experimentation - I barely follow recipes and always chuck things in based on the smell of what's currently cooking (which makes cooking with a cold really hard), I tend to gravitate to the same food and they were lazy "typically British" staples like bangers and mash and spaghetti bolognaise.  My main aims with the meal plan were obviously to have a plan rather than going from day to day guessing what I would make that night, to save money, for us to achieve the 5 a day and to have some variety to my meals but not take hours slaving to make them. 

Week one as you saw was a little basic but I had never made cottage pie before and it was a winner.  Last week left a lot to be desired.  I found it difficult to plan and we ended up having leftovers a couple of the nights as it was getting late by the time I was home from work and we had so much left.  This week however, was different.  I had planned the meals out by midweek last week so I didn't have to think about it on Sunday and then rush to the shops before they closed.  I managed to get all of the shopping done in one day and I was a little more ambitious this time.   So far I have managed to get everything done on time and catering to dietary requirements.  This week's menu is as follows: 

The fish pie is entirely dairy free and I think was a winner (my husband didn't hate it so that's a massive win) but I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the rest of the week.  I'm definitely looking forward to Friday!  

Here are a couple of the recipes as I think they are way too good not to be shared: 

• Vegan Kofte - http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/vegetables-recipes/my-special-vegan-kofte/
• Sweet orange salmon - http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/sweet-orange-salmon 

Sunday this week will be meatball bolognaise as it's a Valentines' Day tradition for my husband and I as an ode to Lady and the Tramp (because that scene is so sweet), I usually alternate each year between pork and beef so I will see how I feel on the day as I bought both sausagemeat and mince in just in case.  Maybe I will get crazy and make both, who knows! 

Happy Valentines' Day! 

~AB~

Parent Shaming

I know I have mentioned many times that I feel a little inadequate as a parent and I have been anxious from day one.  Obviously, as I imagine any parent feels, I want to do the best by my son and I have been known to give myself a hard time about it. 

Not long after I had my son, I was awakened to the world of "parent shaming".   This might be a phrase that has been around for a long time and I didn't know about it but I certainly know the concept of it has been around forever.  To be clear, the kind of shaming I'm talking about is the kind where people outwardly judge other people's forms of parenting because they don't agree with it or don't think it's effective enough.  You've done it I'm sure, where you've seen a child being bratty, the mother is either ignoring them or disciplining them but either way you're thinking, "I wouldn't do that".   Yes, you might be saying it in your head but your eyes and stares speak volumes.  Another example of this is the concept of attachment parenting.  I used to be very judgy about it until I became a parent.  Whilst I vowed never to do it myself, I have learnt that judging people for doing it is not right and it is entirely their prerogative.  Also, my sister-in-law has unintentionally ended up attachment parenting our nephew.  She has been trying to get out of it because people have stuck their two pennies worth in and told her she's wrong for letting her son share their bed but has come to the conclusion that as long as her son is happy, she's happy and he will grow out of it eventually anyway. 

One thing that does get me, is the opinions of those close to us.  I say opinions because that is what they are entirely.   Noone is forcing their methods of parenting onto me but it certainly feels like they are.  From my understanding, a lot has changed in the parenting world and Government advice/family circumstances are different now from 5 years ago let alone 30 years ago, but does that give people that have had children before and raised them to adulthood, the right to criticise my parenting? It's one thing being judged by an outsider but something else entirely when it's within your own circle.   Nodding and smiling to unwarranted advice and comments don't come easily to me and when I do do it, I still feel myself replaying their words over and over as if it were a personal attack.   I get that I sound overly sensitive but sometimes it does get a bit much to deal with and I find myself needing to walk away from it. 

What I have learnt in 13 months of motherhood is that there is no specific path of parenthood.  Everyone does things in a way that suit them.  This may sound like common sense but it's something I need to remind myself of every day instead of criticising my own actions as a parent and constantly comparing myself to others.  When I first became a parent, I spent the first couple of months in a dressing gown and pyjamas because to be quite frank, none of my clothes fit me properly, I hated my body shape and I needed the looseness of pyjamas for comfort while I recovered and to hide myself.  Also though, I mainly just wanted to make sure my son was fed and clean and happy so who cares what I wore doing it.   It turns out people who have done it before do but this little meme helped me ignore the comments... hilarious right?  The fact that this even exists suggests other people felt the same as me when their baby was just born.

Noone should be parent shamed for trying their hardest and making it work as best as they can.  If you do find it getting a bit much, I'm here.  Us anxious parents need to stick together for the reassurance that you're doing a great job and you are amazing.  

~AB~

A whole new world... of organisation

Being that this is a new year and as most people see it, a fresh start I am taking this as my opportunity to be more organised again.  Just to be clear, this is not a resolution as I used to be very organised before my son and this will not get broken like resolutions do so there.  I vowed at the end of last year that I would never lose track of everything again like I did 2015.  It flew so out of control that I didn't manage to organise anything, except for my son's birthday.  It still irks me that I almost missed Christmas card giving.  I have also literally just given our last Christmas present (which I had to make in the new year) as I wasn't organised enough to arrange it before December.  Grrrr.

That behind me, I am armed with a list of things I need to do and achieve this year.  I will make sure nothing slips behind like it did last year and if it starts happening I will be asking for help! Especially as my husband has proved he is quite handy with the finishing touches of cake and biscuit decorating! 

This year so far, I have firstly started compiling a list of presents for people.  Whenever I see something in a newsletter or whatever that I think they will love, it gets added to the list.  I used to pride myself on always being able to give people a unique present they have loved but as of late I have been off my game and I need to find said game again.  I'm pretty excited about some of the things I have added to the list and I can't wait for their birthdays/Christmas to finally be able to get them.  This whole present list idea also helps me to budget so as not to overload myself come December payday. 

Secondly, I have already prepared the backdrop to this year's Christmas card... early I know but the card I had to send out last year was less than perfect (not my son's fault although he's not the most patient model in the world) and this year I need time to plan and edit the final image.  No I will not be photoshopping my son per se, but it does require photoshop and yet another costume.  That is another story for another time... like December.  2015 has taught me to be less ambitious but not less creative.  Again, so excited in advance that this is already sorted and I can't wait for October to get it started!

Third and finally, I have started meal planning.  It was something I had suggested to my husband as our shopping bill seems to have increased all of a sudden and our son isn't a big eater so it can't be him.  I have seen many example recipes and plans so I thought I would get in on it.  Our shop for this week has cost us £20, we had some of the ingredients already like herbs and garlic etc but this is a major breakthrough and hopefully will save us some serious money in the long run.  This also helps to make sure that not only are we eating properly but also that I'm not spending hours on the dinner and I have intentionally only put quick food on the list.  A lot of the money saving plans suggest a roast dinner on the Sunday and then using the leftovers to create another meal in the week which I have done with Monday (to coincide with me being out for the evening and my husband liking Mexican food).  All of the meals have hidden or added veg to make sure we're getting our fill and I have to say sweet potato wedges are amazing! I try to save myself some time where I can and also to reduce wastage by buying mostly frozen fish and frozen pre-prepared vegetables.  This week a lot of the vegetables have been fresh but I feel better knowing I have frozen chopped stuff just in case.  Dinner so far has taken me less than an hour each day but my working days will be the true test as I'm usually too tired to want to cook anything. 

My aim is to eventually start incorporating slow cooker meals and I have already been trawling the internet for new but quick recipes so I'm not cooking the same old things.  I have never made cottage pie before so that is my test for this week and the stuffed aubergines comes from here: http://goodfood.uktv.co.uk/recipe/stuffed-aubergines/
I am also trying to incorporate a meat free day for our health and two fish days as per our government's suggestion.  These in turn will make the shop cheaper as frozen fish and vegetables cost so much less than meat (obviously I have failed on the fish part this week - unless we have fish and chips on Saturday). 

Here is this week's board:

Some other things I have managed to do:

• Sort and file photos - also copy and compress a batch to send to our relatives of my son's first birthday (we took 250 photos)! I have also backed them up on a hard drive I asked for for Christmas so they're now in three places... just in case.
• Cut down half of a tree in the garden and pick up the things strewn across our lawn from the many storms we seem to be having at the moment 
• Ironing - three weeks or possibly more old 
• Buy this and next month's birthday and Valentines' Day cards
• Finish and get printed my son's first year album
• Calendars for all of the grandparents and my sister 
• Sort out my personal email inbox which has so many emails I didn't need anymore

And it is only January.  Bring on the rest of the year, I will win 2016!  

~AB~

Expectation

Last week my husband and I attended our son's very first parents evening at his nursery.  I'm not sure if it's just me and I know I shouldn't put so much pressure on myself but I want my son to do well at nursery.  To take out of it as much as he can and to develop as much as he can.  The results had been evident as he seems to have skyrocketed and is doing so many new things in such a short space of time.  His walking confidence has been admirable and he has such a gung ho attitude to learning (obviously there is a downside to a toddler wanting to literally throw himself into everything he does as I'm sure you can only imagine). 

I wanted my son's development to be the most important factor when choosing a nursery but obviously through encouragement with care and affection.  It's not that I didn't also look at the food they prepare or the way they care for the babies but I needed to know when it came down to it that they wouldn't molly coddle my son in my absence.  Every opportunity is a chance to show or teach my son something new and I want him to be worldly, culturally aware and open minded.  

We were informed that our nursery follow the Early Years Foundation Stages (EYFS) and that everything they do they assess along the guidelines set out in these stages.  At my son's tender age, the development is encouraged through play but certain aspects of play i.e. learning to share with other children, learning to stack cups/duplo/rings when they are starting to approach one year old.  I won't pretend to know or understand what these guidelines are or even that I have had the time to look and read them, what I do know is that clearly my son is doing well under these guidelines and that his nursery are obviously implementing them very well.  Either that, or my son is a genius.  Unfortunately, judging by his insistence on walking backwards or forwards covering his face for fun I doubt it is the latter.  

We were greeted by our son's main key worker who seems a little too young to be looking after babies but who am I to judge as she seems to be doing a pretty good job at it.  However, being that she is so young, she is super enthusiastic about EVERYTHING and talks at a million miles an hour and keeps on talking and talking and talking and talking and I could barely ask questions let alone read the books she was holding in front of me for all of the talking and talking and talking.  You catch my drift.  The enthusiasm fills me with confidence that she's fun for my son and has patience for him, something which I'm sure I have mentioned more than once is now occasionally what I lack.  Then I actually read some of the content she is putting in front of me and my heart sinks.   A little background - the nursery keep a scrapbook of everything they do week on week with photos and little diary excerpts and dates of little milestones etc.  This is shown to parents every parents evening and then when the babies leave the nursery, the scrapbook is part of their leaving present.  We also have a progress diary where they write in a little book every day he attends what he ate and drank that day, how many naps he's had/length of naps, the nappy changes and how his behaviour was and we had always noticed he seemed to be eating double at nursery but thought it was exaggeration...

So anyway, my son has been attending nursery since September and so much has changed in that short space of time.  To put it into perspective, a couple of days after my son's first official day, he started crawling and pulling himself up, he had barely any hair and was a little waif.  My son is still a little waif but has a full head of thick curly hair and is now running and mischievous.  I would be in denial if I thought the majority of his development was down to me as I have barely known what to do at every stage.  If it wasn't for my BabyCentre newsletter I would have no idea what my son would need for encouragement.  Motherhood has not come naturally to me at all.  

You can imagine my surprise though, when I start flicking through the scrapbook zoning out his key worker and seeing all of these photos of my son that I haven't taken and he's doing things I haven't seen him directly doing.  He's smiling and playing and pulling himself up and developing right in front of my eyes through film.  Then, I read some of the captions and excerpts... my son did this and my son did that and I think, hang on a second... he only started doing that at home last week but... he's been doing it at nursery for two months... Then I see more and more of these little excerpts where he has been doing things long before we got the opportunity to see him do them and my heart ached.  Now I know that had my son not have gone to nursery, he would in no way be this advanced and I'm under no illusion that I would have been able to do the same/a better job alone.  I am also aware of the fact that my husband and I had no choice but to send him to nursery as we couldn't afford for me to stay off of work for much longer if we wanted to continue to pay bills and own our house.  Still, it hurt to see that my son was being a different person to the person we see at home.   As my husband put it into perspective that we're not the same people at work as we are at home, it still struck me hard that my son would knowingly be a toddler at nursery but a baby at home.  We don't treat our son like he is a baby, we definitely don't baby talk him or run to his aid every time he thinks he has hurt himself so I couldn't understand why he was so different.  Then I realised, he is in a room full of his peers.  He has no siblings here to copy and all he has are my husband and I.  One part I do remember his key worker saying was that he prefers to play with the older kids, my son is trying to be older than he is to fit in and as a result is developing much faster than he would at home.  

Part of me now is still cut up about it and I even shed a couple of tears writing about it but this is what I wanted.  I wanted my son to learn, to advance and to developmentally thrive at nursery.   This is exactly what's happening and the only person I have to blame is myself if I don't like it.  I'm so pleased that he is doing well and maybe were it not for the fact he was developing so well outside of our home I would be ecstatic.  It's just another self-inflicted mummy struggle I will have to come to terms with.  I wouldn't be human if I didn't feel upset that it wasn't me that had done all of this and I shouldn't feel guilty and berate myself for being a bad mum because I had to send my son to nursery.   Sometimes, I should just give myself a break and maybe even pat myself on the back that my son wants to learn and quickly but hey, that's another breakthrough for another day. 

~AB~