I really should be baking a cake...

or at least knitting, but instead I'm here posting.

Alex's Christening is tomorrow and I have to make marinated mushrooms (the Cooks' Illustrated recipe - it's to die for and not the slimy, salad dressing drenched ones you usually see) and a carrot cake (also Cooks' Illustrated - the whole thing gets done in the food processor). Maybe it's the whole second kid thing, maybe it's because my husband worked today and then went straight from work to go out for dinner and a movie with his friend not fully realizing that this is the day before a major event (in his defense he did ask me several times if it was all right, I just didn't feel like explaining to him why it might not be the best of ideas to do this on this specific day so I can't be too mad at him), or maybe it just that I am bone tired, on my own all day and the last thing I want to do is get dressed up to go to Jersey tomorrow and all the hullabaloo that that trip entails.

I've been feeling very slacker-ish recently - actually it would be more precise to say that I've been feeling a lot more introverted. Michael's class had a Mother's Day thing on Friday that I bailed on at the last minute. A few things in my defense - it was pouring rain, Alex was *very* spitty that day and not a little bit colicky, and it wasn't one of Michael's regular school days so I would be bringing both of them over (two buses or a bus and a 5 block walk). The last classroom party we went to back at Halloween put both Michael and me into sensory overload - I don't want to even imagine what it would do to Alex. The other thing that had me more than a bit gun shy was having to nurse Alex there (a very real possibility given his mood that day). I think I've been doing very well on the whole NIP front - I've been working very hard on just concentrating on the fact that I'm feeding my child and nothing more. This had been going well for me until I started to nurse Alex in a waiting room at CHOP and had a nurse run out to tell me that they had a room where I could nurse if I wanted. Firstly, it was phrased as a question - something to which I could have just smiled and said, "No thanks, we're fine here." We had just finished his GI appointment and he was cranky from the exam so we had to go through the whole suck-suck-suck, pop off and cry for a minute, suck-suck-suck thing which always puts me on edge. When this practically out of breath nurse spurted this not-really-a-question question to me all in one breath I was so taken aback that I just humbly unlatched Alex, gathered my stuff and followed her back to an empty exam room where I had to spend not a few minutes calming both me and Alex down so he could eat. Needless to say, my NIP confidence has been a bit shattered by this. Not, and I do repeat, not that this is a valid reason to ask anyone to not nurse - but it is downright impossible for me to be a discrete nurser. I will most likely never be one of those women that you walk up to and never realize that she is breastfeeding. I have huge breasts (even with Alex being three months old they are still bigger than his head), I can only comfortably nurse in the football hold, and I have a fussy eater so a few pop-offs and screams are pretty much guaranteed per feeding - oh and my areola are a good 3" in diameter, no way they aren't showing. I can't even imagine being able to nurse him in any other position unless he's the one actually holding my breasts in place since their shape and direction seem destined for football hold unless steel struts or a third arm are somehow involved in the process. We did go out two more times since then and I did nurse him at John's library which almost doesn't count as NIP since he's got my back there. I also nursed him at a playground - oh and a great big "Thank You" to the other moms/nannies who just watched Michael run out the gate while I was calling for him to stop while I was nursing his brother who was doing his best "scream at the breast because this should be as uncomfortable for mom as possible" performance, your apathy was great appreciated and if your intent was to discourage us from visiting that playground you can sleep secure in the knowledge that we most likely will not be returning. Yeah, not bitter about that in the least.

Ranting aside, it's going to take me a bit before I get my sea-legs back, so to speak. Before I would try to time outings around nursing simply for logistical purposes - Michael has poor impulse control and his auditory processing isn't the greatest so he does not respond well to verbal commands (even less so than a typical 3/4 year-old) so nursing has to take place in an area where he's fairly contained. Now I have to contend with the spectre of the not-really-a-question question - nursing somewhere I think is safe only to have the rug pulled out from under me. There is more to say on this subject but I'm starting to become incoherent and it's getting late so I'll end it abruptly here.

In other, nonparenting news I am two pattern repeats away from finishing the first of my toe-up monkey socks, the ones that I cast-on for just after Alex was born. I also have blown through all 16 volumes of Fullmetal Alchemist a most excellent manga and I just finished the first novel I've read in ages - Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman. I bought myself a new summer wardrobe on Thursday - a size bigger than I want it to be, but now I have clothes that fit and look nice on me so I can hopefully start feeling betting in my skin. I also ordered a solarveil sling from Sleeping Baby Productions. After a lot of measuring, I figured out that my Zolowear really is a bit small for me so I'm hoping the extra length in my SBP sling will help me with learning how to nurse in it.

All right - it's 11pm, and I have a cake to make. 'night all.