message to society

I got some deep thoughts that need organizing so here goes. I just got back from a therapy appointment where my therapist inisists that I'm not the one with the problem-its society.

Ok, Society, listen up! I need a fucking break. I want to be a mother and a wife but apparently its a lot more difficult than I was led to believe. I dont regret having children and getting married so you single people, dont even go there. But I still need that place/space for myself.

Women all over the world are multitasking like crazy! Honestly, people, its not fair. We alone are responsible for raising children. An entire human being (more in most cases) is completely under our care 24/7. Everything we do/say is being scrutinized by tiny ears and eyes. While I'm sleeping I'm worrying. The next day, the next week, and years are all contantly being whirled around like crazy in my head. I have to think about me somehow at somepoint, so I have a cigarette or drink some coffee and write on here. But I need to let society know that this is simply not enough. There's books, magazine, coucelours, support groups all out there telling us what to do to make things better. How bout this? Get some fucking daycare for these poor women so we can take a bath and sleep in! Just once a week, or even a month! Anything is better than nothing.

Nothing is what we're doing. Maternity leave is for people to have a kid and then go back to work. You get 50% of your pay and 20% if your're a man. When you go back to work, if your kids' grandparents don't offer to babysit once in a while, your fit to be screwed. (i dont know what fit to be screwed means, i just wanted to say "worse than screwed" so that didnt quite do it, but i'm leaving this all here for comedic relief)

Now here in Canada we have "child tax benefit" and "baby bonus" which is far more than I can say for the states which is ...well...nothing. The Canadian government hands out anywhere from $50 to $300 per month to their citizens with children to help with things like childcare, medications, appointments, school clothing, etc. This is a really great thing that Canada does but its really not enough.

I was looking at getting subsidized childcare for the kids. I only needed a couple days a week so I could make my appointments (without frantically scraping somehwere for a bysitter at the last minute casue Mike's mom or cousin never showed up) but I would've loved having daycare all week and maybe trying to start my business idea or going back to school. Anyhoo the subsidy people told Mike and I that they needed $380 per month from us. After that, they said I could have daycare for one day a week or 5 days and it would all cost the same. They based it on how much Mike and I make. They never asked for our bills (the house that was forclosed on us, my $300/month medications, our ridiculous heat bill from shitty landlords, etc) so they think we're rich. I never would have gone for "subsidized" if I knew nothing about it actually was "subsidized"

So thank you, Canadian goverment (and more sarcastically to the states) for taking such good care of your mothers and wives. We're being neglected-plain and simple. The change that society is slowly heading towards is not going to happen soon enough to help me.

My mother in law won;t help because I told mike if he asked her for help that he has to tell her the truth. He told me that if told his mom the truth that she would never let it go. She would think and say terrible things. She might watch the kids like asked but he said to expect the worse response from her. She already thinks I'm the weakest person in the wolrd.

June, my therpaist, says that Lesa (Mike's mom) is one of two kinds of people. Her life revolves around power. I'm the other kind of person. My life is about love (empathy, kindness, respect). That part atleast made me feel better.

When I get angry at the kids for crying its because of my family who would get angry if I cried when I was little. I was told to stop and if i didn't, I was sent to my room cause "no one wanted to hear it".

Well of course no one wants to hear a poor little girl suffering from sadness and pain. (or in a lot of my cases it was from headaches and migraines that a 6 year old doesnt understand).

So immediately when Adam gets whiney sounding, I feel myself getting angry. I need to remind myself that thats not me. I dont like that anger and its not who I want to be. I want Adam to work through his feelings and learn the right way to release them.

Again, this is all justa tiny piece of the stresses. Some daycare would help me get this all sorted out. And if I could get it periodically then I'de be way more organized.

Society, please listen. In the old days new mothers had the help of the whole village, what the fuck happened to that? Did you all get selfish and ignorant? Raised by village idiots rather than good moral people?

Fix it. My children (and their future wives) deserve it.

Link Costume

Okay, so the movie is supposed to come out at some point here soon, so there might be some out there who may need a little help with their son's Link costume.

Adam is our model. He is 4 years old (in these photos) and completely ecstatic about being Link from Legends of Zelda for Halloween. He's been smacking at the keyboard since he was 3 months old, and gaming since 2 years of age. What can I say? He games, and don't judge me, cause the kid's a fucking genius. I didn't like all the computer games at first, but my husband took over, promising me that Adam would not let his chores, grades, or behaviour slip and he was right. Then to top it off, he requests new games daily because he gets bored of the ones we give him. So Mike decided to try Super Smash Brothers, Mario Party, Mario Paper, Bomberman, Final Fantasy One, and a few others. I've never seen anything like it, not in a child, anyway. He scores really high and since I dont know the game, I look it up. Google will tell you just about anything you want to know. [Mike believes that Google will become a seperate artificial intelligence and try someday to take over civilization] And anyway, aparently Adam's skill level is about that of a 30 year old man who has been playing for 20 years. He beats Mike at Mario Racing. I wouldmention that he beats me everytime but that doesnt really say much. Mike plays MMORPGS, first person shooters, racing, rts (real time strategy games) and has been since he was 15 and my 5 year old son kicks his ass.

Ok okay I'll stop my bragging and get back to the point. Adam requested to be Mario for Halloween and he suggested that his little brother be Luigi and I should be Princess Peach (aka Princess Toadstool) I was rather happy that he changed his mind....

But then Link AND Princess Zelda was my new assignment. I never really did convince him that I didn't need to dress up, I kept him excited about his.

First of all, I did a google search for Link costume and found a chick who had made one for a convention (i still believe that rather nerdish and dont get that). She took the costume down to basic Link in green tunic but she went all out on the shield-his final level shield. We decided to go with a level 1 Link with cloth tunic, no chainmail.

I made a little money pouch with leftover brown fabric from the boots and stuffed it with batting. His hat was just 2 triangles sewn together with the bottom part being the diameter of his head. It was a little snug but it needed to be to keep it on...

The tunic was made using a t-shirt (with the sleeves folded in) as the pattern and I made it about 6 inches longer. I wanted it to remain "rough looking" so hems were few, and I fringed it where it didnt already do it by itself. I sewed the sides and shoulders and cut a v shape in the neck. I was thinking about shoelacing the v-neck but decided against it (laziness on my part).

His boots were the hardest and longest part. I took a pair of his rubber boots and put them on their sides on a piece of brown fabric and traced a boot shape with a 1 and a half inch seam (and mobility)allowance. I also made extra room at the top because his boots get folded down to reveal a buckle in the middle. I sewed the top of the boot part together and the back of the boot and slipped them over the rubbers. I warmed up the hot glue gun and glued the bottom to the bottom sides of his rubber boots and the top after i folded it down an inch and half. It was missing a buckle so I went to the dollar store and bought 2 of those leather watch straps. They were perfect! I hot glue gunned them into place under the fold and his boots were done.

I used two old belts to make the "sash" and belt and assembled it like so. While I was at the dollar store I picked up some yellow hair spray paint too. His ears were triangular pieces of felt sewn into a tiny cone shape and slipped onto the top of his ears. They fell off a lot, so I hand sewed them onto the hat where they stayed quite sturdy-like.

I was pleasantly surprised at how many people knew who he was. Some said an elf because of his ears. Two teenage girls commented that he was "the coolest costume they ever saw" and that was enough for me :)

And Cody the sword wielding elephant....