Dawn’s Blog | Dawn Cullo's Blog

As The World Turns

July 22, 2010 By Dawn Cullo 2 Comments

Yes it is true, even the cutest kids can be mean. Lily begins Kindergarten in a few weeks and the thoughts have crossed my mind about the type of kid I was in school. As I walk down the halls at St. Mary’s I think back to my time there and how I may have acted towards others. Let me just begin by saying that I have a horrible memory and really there is no way that I am going to remember everything I said or did when I was a kid but I am sure I wasn’t always an angel 100% of the time. I am sure that other kids were mean to me too, but that is just part of growing up.

I was in elementary and junior high during the 80′s and that was a time where I got a lot of my influence from T.V. and soap operas, I swear! I watched Days of Our Lives and General Hospital every day after school with my grandmother and often with my girlfriends and I watch Dynasty and Dallas and on the occasion Knots Landing with my mom. I did see Luke and Laura get married as well, yes I am that old. So of course me being the young impressionable kid thought that life was like soap operas, and I was a bit snooty at times and may have not been nice to some other girls in my class. I don’t remember exactly what I ever said or did but I just know that I wasn’t nice sometimes. Ok, Ok, there is one time that I remember and I get teased about it still. My friend (still to this day) Kathy was the ‘new girl’ in school. I went up to her and said “Do you want to be my friend? I only ask once”. Seriously, that is what I said, OMG I would be so sad if someone said that to Lily.

Our class was such a group of naughty kids though, they even sent in one of the priest to have a ‘talk’ with us about having ‘bad bones’ in our bodies which made us commit sins. He even referred to a soap opera character Savannah on Days of Our Lives.

You see, my parents split when I was in 2nd grade so my mom raised me and life was a little tough, I probably should have been in counseling or something like that but I never was. So not being able to resolve my feelings in a healthy manner resulted in not so nice behavior towards others.

Today I got some ‘payback’ from the universe. A little girl at Lily’s school was mean to her, and it hurt me to hear her tell me about it. Just seeing her little face upset was enough to make me tear up a little bit and think about the mean things I may have said to other kids when I was younger.

I am hoping, no I am praying that Lily has a good experience in school, and that the universe doesn’t punish me through her by having kids be mean to her. =( At her school I have to complete some parent participation hours and I keep thinking of all the people I am going to be working with now, was I mean to them? Do they hold a grudge? Am I going to be placed on the worst jobs ever for parent participation because of it?

I swear though life is tough enough for me already, really it is. My life certainly hasn’t turned out exactly the way that I wanted it to but I am trucking along trying to make the most of it. I did however marry the man of my dreams and he has given me two beautiful daughters. I am exhausted every day and I am a haggard stay at home mom who works at night to make ends meet. My clothes are not fancy, and I don’t drive a fancy car, I weigh more than I would like and I don’t always wear makeup….but I am a nice person and I try my best to take care of my girls first and then myself. I am not the girl I was so many years ago. Maybe my life not turning out the way I wanted is my ‘punishment’ for being mean, who knows but when life hands you lemons then make lemonade and I’ve got lots of lemonade, pink of course.

Filed Under Blog, Dawn's Blog Tagged With Dawn

Taxi Please

July 19, 2010 By Dawn Cullo Leave a Comment

Lily is starting Kindergarten at the end of August and we thought it would be a good idea for her to attend Summer School at her new school so that she could get used to the environment. We are almost done with the program and she is doing great, but I am the one who has been in an adjustment period.

I had no idea how hard this would be to drop her off and pick her up from school. At her new school they give every parent a security badge to wear once they have been ‘cleared’ by the office to be on campus. The badge is actually a yellow card that reads “Taxi Driver”. On the first day that I got my badge, I thought it was so cute, now I hate it because yes it reminds me that I am fricken Taxi Driver.

Every day I have had to drive her to school by a specific time, not like in Preschool where we could just come and go as we pleased. No, not when you are in real school, you’ve got to be on time people! Then I have to occupy myself for 2 hours with Abigail and then it is time to pick Lily up again from school. My entire morning and early afternoon is built around being her taxi, it is crazy.

There is an afternoon session that she doesn’t stay for and they ring a bell, holy cow if I am late picking her up I am pretty sure that she would go into category 5 hurricane mode. So every day I get there early and wait….tap tap tap my fingers, check my work email on my phone and get on facebook mobile while Abigail sleeps in the car and I wait for the perfect time to go into the school and pick Lily up…..wait did I mention that I have to actually get out of my car, sign her ‘out’ in the office walk to her classroom and get her? Oh My GOSH, this is madness and tons of fun when I have to wake up Abigail to do it.

I am almost sad in a way that this is what the next year is going to be like, my entire days filled with dropping her off and picking her up from school. Well, at least when she starts Kindergarten she will be in the afternoon class from noon – 3:00 and this means that we don’t need to rush out of the house or deal with morning traffic. I will also be able to do the ‘drive through’ lane to pick her up, I don’t need to get myself or Abigail out of the car to pick her up.

So, we are in her last week of Kindercamp and I am really looking forward to it being over, it was a great experience for both of us but dang it I am so exhausted.

Giraffes

May 21, 2010 By Dawn Cullo Leave a Comment

I did it, I finally broke down and bought one of those crazy Giraffe teethers for Abigail. I have seen them in just about every parenting magazine and heard from other moms about them, most recently my next door neighbor has one for her son who is just a few months older than Abigail.

When I pulled it out of the box I was shocked because I seriously thought that this was going to be a hard rubber type of toy but it is not. Sophie, yes she has a name, is made from a soft flexible rubber that smells so darn awesome, like vanilla. I took it out of the box and handed it to Abigail and it was like she already knew what to do with it, she shoved it right in her mouth. Sophie also has a cute squeaker in her tummy that sounds like a dog toy.

You can view a video about how she is made…mostly by hand. – the stress test is the best part of the video !!

But what is all the craze about? Why do babies love this toy?

•Sight:

At the age of 3 months, a baby’s eyesight is still limited and he can only make out high contrasts. The Dark and contrasting attention-catching spots all over Sophie the Giraffe’s body provide visual stimulation and she soon becomes a familiar and reassuring object for baby.

•Hearing:

Sophie’s the Giraffe squeaker keeps baby amused and stimulates his hearing. To begin with, the funny sound Sophie makes when she is squeezed helps to stimulate baby’s hearing, and then later, helps him to understand the link between cause and effect.

•Taste:

A Sophie the Giraffe is made of 100% natural rubber and food paint, and is completely safe to chew, just like a feeding bottle teat. Her soft texture and numerous chewable parts (ears, horns, legs), make her perfect for soothing baby’s sore gums during teething.

•Touch:

Touch is the first means a baby has of communicating with the outside world. Sophie the Giraffe’s soft feel, like baby’s mother’s skin, stimulates physiological and emotional response that soothe baby and promote healthy growth and well-being..

•Smell:

The singular scent of natural rubber from the Hevea tree makes Sophie the Giraffe very special and easy for your child to identify amid all his other toys.

•Easy to grip:

Sophie the Giraffe’s shape and 18 cm (7 inches) size are perfect for baby’s small hands. She is very light, and her long legs and neck are easy for baby to grip, even from his earliest days.

Still the same, even after more than 46 years…
She hasn’t dated in the slightest..

More than 30 million Sophies have been sold…

How to get one

Ok, so now you want one for your baby, well here is how you can get one. If you live in the Sacramento area you can head down to Goores, that is where I got mine or you can order one from Amazon

In closing, unfortunately when I think of Giraffes all I can think about is the most awesomest Saturday Night Live sketch about GIRAFFES.

Filed Under Blog, Dawn's Blog

Swim Lessons Done Wrong

May 20, 2010 By Dawn Cullo Leave a Comment

I have vivid memories of my first swim lesson experience when I was 4 years old. It haunts me to this day, I still get chills thinking about it. I recall crying and telling my mom how much I didn’t want to keep doing the lessons, but she felt it was important for me to learn water safety since we had a pool in our backyard. I can’t really argue with her on that point and she was just doing what she felt was right at the time. She put her trust in the swim instructor and hoped that she would teach me how to swim.

The swim lessons took place at the YMCA in Sacramento in 1977, my teachers name was Moe and she was really mean. I always was in fear of her and basically did what she said out of fear, not because I loved to swim. Many times I felt out of control, like I was going to drown because she wouldn’t let us hold onto the side of the pool deck for very long. She would only come and help us stay afloat when we made large splashes in the water and to top it off, at the end of each lesson she made us jump off the high dive. Honestly, I am not sure how high it really was but in my mind (at 4 years old) it was pretty darn high.

Growing up I had a pool in my backyard and I did enjoy swimming but always had a fear of being in the deep end, not being able to touch the bottom and keep my head above water, it is still a fear of mine today and my biggest fear is drowning.

Lily Swim Lessons April 2006

Now, it is my turn to teach Lily how to swim and she is already fearful of the pool, she seems to think that she will not be able to float in the water and sink to the bottom. When she was a baby we took her to swim lessons and she was ok with it until the teacher started to teach us how to ‘dunk’ her in the water. Really? That is just mean…and now I regret even doing that to her as a baby. They do teach you the proper way to prepare your child prior to dunking them, but I still think it is mean. We then moved on to swim lessons when she was 2 years old and those went well, I avoided the dunking lessons and we just agreed to let her get her blow bubbles in the water instead of going underwater.

Now we have a pool in the area that we have gone to and she has been small enough to hang out in the toddler pool, but this year she is too big. She will go with us in the big pool but she hangs on for dear life when we are in there playing. I feel bad for her, I know that feeling all too well about having fears in the swimming pool. We have signed her up for semi-private swim lessons this year, hoping that the teacher will somehow make a break through with her and help her to enjoy time in the pool, the big kid pool. If that doesn’t work then I think we are going to have to shell out some bucks for private swim lessons. I know that it is going to take patience on my part as well, but I think I’ve got this one covered because I can totally understand her fears and help her work through them….it’s going to be an interesting summer. I will keep you posted and let you know how she does.

Here are some resources that I found about teaching your child to swim. If you have any tips, please share them below in the comments section.

Parents Magazine – Teach Your Child To Swim

Sacramento Parent – How To Raise Water Confident Kids

Filed Under Blog, Dawn's Blog Tagged With Lily

I am so tired I might at well be drunk

April 23, 2010 By Dawn Cullo Leave a Comment

I am exhausted, having a new baby in the house has left me exhausted and acting like 1/2 of my brain cells are missing. At least twice I have put my shirt on backwards and worn it outside of the house that way, and today I put my yoga pants on the wrong way and started to walk out of the house but noticed my error. Often, I forget what I am going to say or can’t remember why I came into a room. I often leave the house with the girls and have to come back in to get something, not once but twice. Sometimes I feel like a drunk! Oh how I wish for a nice cold beer or a rum and diet coke, but that pesky breastfeeding stops me from consuming alcohol.

Now it seems like everyone needs something from me too, the cats want to be fed (how rude of them) or Lily needs help getting dressed and Abigail, oh boy she needs help with everything because she is a baby and my husband asks the most annoying questions like “what do you want for dinner”. =) I swear!

When Lily was a baby (4 1/2 years ago) I will admit that I was sleep deprived but at least I still had my wits about me. Now, that I am older my body is handling this lack of sleep a little bit differently. I wake up in the middle of the night at least twice to feed Abigail, and when I finally get back to sleep is it only a few short hours until it is time to get up and start my day, but I feel like my day never ends and thus it never really begins again. I have no idea how people with more than two kids get all their crap done. I am my own worst enemy really because I like to have a clean house and I like to have the laundry done so I am constantly cleaning and doing chores, I know I’m crazy.

One day I will get my sleep back, probably not until the girls are old enough to hang out with their friends more than with me. You know that age, when you are supposed to not like your parents. But when that time comes I will be sad because I will miss holding them and helping them get through the day and I will want these days to return, yes these days when I feel drunk and exhausted.

Filed Under Blog, Dawn's Blog Tagged With Beer, Dawn, Sleep

Spit Up Happens

April 15, 2010 By Dawn Cullo 1 Comment

In 2005 if I had a day like I had today I am pretty sure I would be crying in a corner somewhere in my house because I felt like I had failed at being a mommy. Back then, as a first time parent my world was spinning when it came to taking care of a newborn. I thought I knew what I was doing because I read all those parenting books. Lily was a difficult baby, not the kind you want to have as a first time parent. I should have never wasted my time reading any of those parenting books because Lily broke the mold, and still does.

Today, I am older and wiser or as my OBGYN calls it ‘pre-menopausal’. Well, leave it to my Gay OBGYN to call it like he sees it. Anyway, back to today. I just couldn’t get Abby to take a nap today and I pulled out all the mommy tricks but nothing was working. I was pretty frustrated today but I took it all in stride and just kept pressing on with my day. She did fall asleep in the car, but as soon as I got to where I was going she would wake up, lovely. The one thing that I did notice today is that she had a lot more spit up than normal and she wanted to chew on her thumbs more than normal.

This picture was taken by Lily just after breakfast and at the moment she took the picture I felt something warm on my leg….and it was Spit Up. I should have gotten the clue that this is how my day was going to be. Later in the day she even spit up down my back and it landed on the carpet at The Little Gym, awesome. I tried to get her down for a nap the entire afternoon and she would fall asleep but then wake up a few minutes later. That tells me that something is bothering her and I think that she is going through a growth spurt as she will be 3 months old in a few days.

When kids grow it actually hurts in their limbs and it can be quite bothersome, and I learned that from Lily. When she was little there were times when she was a monster, and I am not exaggerating about that at all. She was great birth control for us for several years. Basically, she would be very difficult and then a few days later she would have a new tooth or we would measure her and she would be 1/2 inch taller. When she got old enough to tell us what was bothering her, she told me that her arms and legs hurt and we would figure out that she was growing. So knowing this vital information helped me today and I never ended up crying in a corner somewhere in my house because I know that Abby is just growing and I have to help her through it and give her extra love and some Motrin.

Filed Under Blog, Dawn's Blog Tagged With Abigail, Dawn, Lily

Easter Madness

April 4, 2010 By Dawn Cullo Leave a Comment

Abbity Rabbity

Ok, well it wasn’t really madness but I thought that it was going to be. Now having two young kids makes everything take longer and just seem like more of a pain in the booty. Don’t get me wrong, I love my girls but holy cow now we have even more crap to lug around, especially on a Holiday visit to the in-laws.

However, this Easter I was pleasantly surprised, it went very smooth….omg did I say that? I could not believe how awesome my Easter was.

Lily was so well behaved and I was so proud of her as she didn’t gather ALL of the Easter eggs during the hunt at Grandma’s, she left some for her younger cousins. Abby was the best baby EVER! She cried when she wanted to be fed, took naps when she was tired and even did some socializing. I just couldn’t believe how un-stressed I was….it was a very nice feeling.

However, the days before Easter were a bit stressful for me. You see, I am a very organized gal…ok I used to be before I had the girls. Normally, I would have had all of my Easter stuff done at least the weekend if not a few days before. This time, I didn’t start until Friday and I was still putting things together on Saturday night, which drove me a bit batty. The whole time I was putting Lily’s Easter basket together I was so sure she was going to come bounding down the stair and ruin the surprise, but she didn’t and I stressed for no reason. She slept through the night, unlike me though. I was up every two hours with Abby and then up at 6:30 when Lily woke up to see what the Easter Bunny brought. *sigh* So we started our day pretty early and I had a headache the entire day, but it was still a good day.

Filed Under Blog, Dawn's Blog Tagged With Abigail, Celebration, Dawn, Easter, Family, Holiday, Lily, Louis

Wordless Wednesday – Happy Go Lucky

March 17, 2010 By Dawn Cullo 1 Comment

These shirts describe them to a "T"

Filed Under Blog, Dawn's Blog Tagged With Holiday, St. Patricks Day, Wordless Wednesday

Mabel’s Labels BlogHer Contest

March 14, 2010 By Dawn Cullo Leave a Comment

I was told by my friend Mabel that electrical storms are going to wipe out the Internet (perhaps forever). I only have one day left to write about my passion of photography. Time can’t be controlled, it continues to tick away every second and there is no way to stop time except when taking a photograph. I use my camera as tool to freeze time, capture memories, capture emotions and see the changes in those around us.

The photograph doesn’t need to be technologically perfect to convey the emotion of the moment. I don’t have a photography degree, I don’t’ have a fancy studio or use fancy equipment. I just use my trusty point & shoot digital camera. At family gatherings I will take some posed shots but my favorite kind of photographs to take are the candid types. Candid photographs really tell the best story and can convey great emotions.

I enjoy taking photographs of my family and friends but I also enjoy taking photographs of landscapes. The seasons change our landscapes throughout the year and I find this interesting how just one mountain range or field of grass can change so much through the seasons and I enjoy being able to capture those changes.

I would like to travel around the world to take landscape photographs. I have been to San Francisco and my heart was pumping faster when I was taking photographs of the Golden Gate Bridge. I really enjoyed taking those photographs and want to do more of it.

Being able to freeze time and capture the changes of landscapes and people is a powerful tool to have and I am grateful that I am able to use this power to make people smile, remember and appreciate the things around them.

Filed Under Blog, Dawn's Blog Tagged With Dawn, Mabel’s Labels BlogHer ‘10 Contest