No One Likes A Lonely Yank

Can you believe it's September?? Where did the summer go? I think I say that every year. I'm really looking forward to fall however. I absolutely love fall. It brings thunder, rain, cold snaps, hot water bottles, color, Halloween, the smell of burning leaves and wedding anniversaries. It's my favorite season. It will also bring us back to Portland! It's been a whole year since our last visit and I promised my Pops I'd come back home once a year. So it's a good thing Jenn's getting married in October, that's the main thing that brings us back.

I'm dead nervous to fly with the baby. Will his ears be hurting? Will he cry the whole way there? Will I get mad stink eye from the other passengers? Will he be getting over the jet lag just as we have to come back? Will all my hard work establishing a sleep schedule to ruined? But I know it will all be worth it to see him in his grandparents arms. No one tells you this but after you have a baby you get super sappy and cry at anything.

Things around here are okay. Charlie is doing great! He can rollover now and he can sit up for short periods of time. He's eating, smiling, pooping, playing and nursing everyday. But believe it or not this blog is not about Charlie.

I need some Sherrie time, some bitchin' and moanin' Sherrie time. I'm homesick...again. Probably just because I know I'm visiting soon so Portland is really on my mind. But it's more than just that. Being a mom and not having my friends or family here is turning out to be harder than I thought it would be.

I'm finally coming out of the baby fog. The first few months are so full on, the baby is all you can think about! All your energy is spent keeping the baby alive and happy. Faces come and go and somehow the groceries get bought and the garbage gets taken out, but really you are nothing more than a mothering machine. You run on empty with your foot on the gas pedal all day and all night.

But now things are calming down and Charlie and I are in a groove. We understand each other. I can distinguish between his cries and he gets my jokes. I'm no longer being milked every hour so I can think about life again. Or rather trying to have a life again.

Being here with a baby has been very isolating. So I thought I'd join as many mommy groups as I can. I started with the one at the Health Center up the street. It's a post natal support group where you learn about weaning, baby sign language and things like that. I met a gal and we exchanged numbers. Oh how excited I was! I came home and told Paul and Maria "I got a girls number!" But it was not to be. Unfortunately I didn't make the cut into the cool gang. "Thanks for applying Sherrie, but you're just not what we're looking for". Which is a middle class, white, English woman. I met the cool moms in the park last week and they walked two by two leaving me in the back...alone...twice. Whatever. I took note of the other mom's on the outside of the clique: the black mom, the Asian mom and me, the American mom. Whatever.

I went to the Tots club today for the first time. I didn't talk to a single person and not a single person talked to me. And all the kids were way older than Charlie. But it was pretty laid back and he got to play with new toys and watch other kids interact. They have a sing along at the end and he dug that. So it's good for him. And it seems like the kind of place I might meet someone at some point so I'm gonna keep going. We also start Music Shakers next week. It's a babies only group that does sing alongs. Fingers crossed for that one.

I've never been in a position where I had to make a certain type of friend. It's odd. I really need to communicate with someone who is going through the same thing I am. But also someone who gets me. I really, really miss my friends back in Portland right now. I really miss Americans in general. We may speak the same language here, but a lot gets lost in the translation.

I'm gonna keep trying. There are millions of mommy groups here, it's like nappy valley! My special someone is out there right now, perhaps looking for me :)

We took a drive through the country side to Henley in Arden last week. Just for ice cream. Which we ate in a graveyard.

My wedding bouquet got destroyed somewhere in the two transcontinental moves I've taken since being married. So Paul, the old romantic, had another one made for me. He was keeping it a secret but I saw him disappear with one of our wedding photos and he wouldn't tell me where he went. I was pretty sure he was putting a hit out on me.

Fun with plums! Which by the way, stain like a mofo.