That Does It

I know it's been a while since I've written about MIL. I seriously and very sincerely mean it when I say I have been trying so hard to be nice and just let things go. But if you've been a reader of this blog for any amount of time, you know that sometimes I need to vent before I explode.

On Fridays, MIL knows she isn't supposed to cook. It's my night to cook. But still, she asks me if I want her to cook. I gave her the are-you-completely-crazy-or-stupid face and she nodded in understanding. Yes, go away. Now. Please. Before I throat-chop you. I've had enough of you for this week. You have no idea how hard it is for me to be nice to you or to restrain myself from hitting you over the head with my frying pan that once was nice but is now scorched on the bottom and is dirty because you didn't wash it.

I take Seoul, who is so happy I'm home that she's clapping her hands, into our bedroom and nurse her privately while Raelynn plops down on the sofa in the living room to watch Nickelodeon. I hear MIL making some cleaning-type sounds in the kitchen and then I hear her leave. Good, I think to myself. I don't have to look at that woman for 2 whole days.

When I'm done attending to Seoul, I come out and discover there's not much she's really done in the kitchen to clean up. It's the typical messes. Vegetables on the floor. Crap all over the counter. You know. Except for this...

What IS this, you ask? Your guess is as good as mine. It could be tofu.  It could be meat. The liquid looks like milk but is very likely oily fatty yuckiness. She just left this nasty, unappetizing crap sitting out all day and couldn't be bothered to take it away with her. Like any of us will eat this.

And then, for good measure, she left this apple core. On a dirty oven mitt. WHY would you leave that out? WHY would you save that? And why would you put it on something that is in desperate need of a wash?

These 2 things completely set me off and I realized I could no longer keep quiet about all the stupid shit she's done lately.

Like when she inexplicably dug through my wardrobe. Why the hell was she in there? I have no idea. But she found part of my vortex. I know this because when I'd gone into Raelynn's closet, there staring back at me were 4 of the ugliest pants ever, all of them with polka dots and all of them I'd shoved into the vortex last year. I confronted her on it and she said Raelynn should be wearing these things under her clothes because it's so cold. Not like she doesn't have a shit-ton of other non-vomitous garments to serve that very same purpose. I used Google Translator to tell her that I'd tucked them away because Raelynn refused to wear them. Before MIL could say anything more, Raelynn chimed in with how much she hated them. So take that, Goatface. Oh and yes, I also used Google Translator to tell her to stay out of my closet. Don't touch my personal items. Cow.

And of course, there are days I come home from work and I notice she's given Seoul some of Raelynn's toys to play with. This wouldn't be a problem if the toys were safe for babies. But they aren't and this is why I have repeatedly told her not to do that and repeatedly shown her which toys are for Seoul (honestly, it's quite obvious but MIL doesn't seem to grasp this concept). Yesterday, I came home and found a small box with a shower cap I'd had stashed away on the upper shelf in our bathroom now out in the living room. When I asked her about it, she told me her idiot husband, my FIL, had given it to Seoul. I just can't even with these people.

The list goes on and as you know, one thing here or there doesn't get to me but after suppressing my annoyance constantly I feel a full-on rage boiling over. Bits of luo bo left out everywhere. Insisting Raelynn eat some snack after school when she's already had one. Telling me everything is "hao chi" which is Chinese for delicious and telling me "hao chi" about everything when it clearly is not "hao chi." Putting an extra shirt on the baby to keep her warm inside the house now that Spring is here and city heat has turned off the radiators but NOT putting socks on her feet. Her hagly voice. Washing the dishes with cold water (thankfully Jeremy saw her too and shouted at her). Drinking tea out of an old rinsed out jelly jar which I don't know why it bothers me so much but it just DOES. Using so much oil when she cooks that she ruins everything she cooks.

And so the story goes. There's more of course but I just don't want to waste another minute of my weekend complaining about her. I feel better after venting, for now at least. Until she leaves another bowl of grossness on my counter that is.

Get To Your Place

When I was a little girl, we had a dachshund named Snoopy. Actually, my dad will tell you his real name was Maximallian or some crap like that but my brother, Phillip, influenced the change to Snoopy. He was a great dog. He even saved me from the neighbor's evil doberman when it'd gotten loose. But even great dogs are sometimes naughty. And when Snoopy was a bad dog, we always told him to "get to your place!" Or "GET!" for short. I need to start saying this to MIL.

If you remember the giant blowout at the end of last week, then you'll know that to avoid any further altercations, I've been requested to pick out Raelynn's outfits the night before her outings with the invalids. Which I did. But of course, MIL went back on her word. Last night, it was muggy when I picked out the clothes. I picked a Hello Kitty t-shirt and pink shorts. Well, apparently this wasn't warm enough attire for this morning. She put her in a pink polo shirt and black polka dot pants. It actually looked okay enough, I suppose, though I have always kind of despised polka dots. But these pants I didn't mind because the dots are quite small and the style of the pants is actually more akin to leggings. In colder weather, I always pair them with a red, black and white ladybug dress that's become a bit too short but with these leggings-like pants, looks fabulous.

I'm not angry with MIL because the weather changed. I'm angry because that old bag, despite changing her into this other outfit, bought Raelynn even more pants. More polka dot pants! 2 of the same pair! And they're not any thicker or better than the 20 other pairs of fucking pants this child has.

Of course MIL thinks this shit will go with everyfuckingthing. She's ALWAYS wearing her vomitous polka dot pants. I have photos of her wearing them in this post, if you want to see.

Polka dots are not my style, but when done right, or paired with the right things, they can look really smart. MIL just throws polka dots with anything she sees. Or flowers.

I complained to Jeremy who was as aggravated as I was. He actually told someone at church yesterday that he couldn't wait to move away from his parents because they interfere in everything we ever do and contribute to Raelynn's bad behavior all the time. I hope we can escape before Seoul gets too big to be influenced by those neanderthals.

Speaking of Seoul, all her clothes are hand-me-downs (except for one thing my friend Natalie sent - thanks again, girl! xoxo) and all the pants she has available to her as the weather starts cooling down are bigger. Why didn't MIL buy her some pants? No, she HAS TO buy more pants for Raelynn because a closet full of them is just not enough. She has to constantly butt in and push our limits. You're not the boss of us, bitch. Watch your fat, old ass.

I'm angry that my husband specifically told his parents not to do something and they deliberately disregarded it. And that we came to an agreement about having me pick out Raelynn's outfits in advance and she just pushes and manipulates until she gets her way. I asked Jeremy if he could help me make a sign in Chinese that says "Get the fuck out of this closet and go fuck yourself," but he wouldn't let me. He didn't get mad like he usually does when I suggest these things though so I'm thinking he was quite tempted to put the sign up himself. He DID do that to a big refrigerator box someone left in our stairwell for a week though. Like the bike that took up space, it sat there on the landing between our floor (6th) and the 5th floor. A closer look at the box would reveal it had been for apartment 801. So those lazy assholes just dragged it down a few floors and left it. I can't be sure exactly what he wrote on there but I hope he dropped a few Chinese f-bombs in there. When the box still hadn't moved, he kicked the crap out of it and launched it down to the 5th floor landing, spilling out packing foam all over the stairs. That finally did the trick because when we came back, the box, the foam and the angry Chinese note from my husband were all gone.

I was really agitated by all this earlier this morning, but Jeremy reminded me that soon, Raelynn and I will go back to school and MIL won't be able to dress her like a street person anymore. We'll just have to worry about Seoul. And he's given his word that if his parents do not keep things sanitary and put her in any danger, that he will do something about it. I hope so because if not, I'll have to maim them with my bare hands. Or use these pants and the other fugly shit she's ever bought to tie them up and kick them down the stairs as I yell "GET!!!!"

Please Cease And Desist

I desperately need to send a cease and desist letter to my in-laws. Tomorrow is my last day of vacation and those 2 troglodytes keep popping up like a bad rash, interrupting my last moments of relaxation before I go back to work. I know they want to see Raelynn, but it's not like they won't get to spend all of Wednesday and Thursday with her while me and the other teachers suffer through our teacher workdays.

This morning, our land line rang. It was FIL. He said he wanted to come over to bring Raelynn some balloons to make her happy. Yesterday, during the great shopping adventure, my husband had bought Raelynn a big, shiny helium balloon. It was a pink unicorn, just like the balloon we bought her a couple weeks ago.

It had actually lasted a while before it deflated and now we fear throwing it away because of what happened yesterday.

I kept telling her to hold the balloon tightly. I tried to wrap it around her wrist but she wouldn't allow it. She is SO stubborn sometimes! Gah! We somehow managed to get her and the balloon into the car and off we went. When we went to get out of the car, Raelynn insisted on holding her balloon, and again, wouldn't listen to me. So it came as no surprise when she let go and it started to blow away in the wind. I tried to catch it but up, up, up it went. I wanted to cry too. Stupid pregnancy hormones. Raelynn was very upset about the balloon getting away, but she learned her lesson because she keeps telling me next time she'll listen to Mommy and hold on tight to her balloon.

Anyway, last night, my in-laws had stopped by to annoy us see what coat we got in exchange for the ugly yellow one and bring us some snacks from Taiwan that another family member had brought back for us. And that's when Raelynn told her grandparents about the balloon that got away.

So how could I refuse FIL coming over with some balloons for Raelynn? It was sweet. Granted, he didn't go get her a helium-filled balloon (he just brought some plain old party balloons and blew them up himself) but it was still nice nonetheless. He didn't stay long either and that was just fine by me.

Tonight, I made a fabulous eggplant parmigiana and a cucumber dill salad. We were happily digging into it, talking about how the day had been for each of us when the land line rang. It was MIL. She gave us THE lamest excuse ever for wanting to come over and invade our privacy. Are you ready?

And the award for the lamest excuse in the universe goes to MIL for this gem:
I made too many dumplings and now I need to bring the rest of them over to you.

PUH-LEASE! OMG! Just. Stop. STOP IT. We don't need your crappy-ass dumplings. We've got my classic eggplant parmigiana and it kicks your dumplings' asses. Jeremy kept telling her we were almost done eating but she invited herself over anyway. Cow.

So she gets here with her stupid dumplings, which were the oyster ones AFUCKINGGAIN incidentally. And she also trots out this terrible, insanely oversized thing for Raelynn...

She smiles triumphantly, like she's finally picked something we won't despise. Immediately, Raelynn screams she doesn't like it. At least she has some sense. This is definitely much better than many things MIL has chosen in the garment category but this cheap, frilly thing around the collar makes me stabby. It looks like cheap hospital gauze. I hate hate HATE when people, especially MIL, pick out old-lady-style clothes for little girls. HATE!

Here is a closer look at that gauche gauzey thing around the collar and that old-lady doily trim. As if this isn't enough to make you barf up your intestines, it's about 5 sizes too large, just like the ugly coat we had to exchange. *facepalm*

The good news is that Jeremy is in full agreement with me that this thing should be shoved into the vortex of ugly clothes with this, this and this. When she does things like this, it is exactly why I cannot stand her. She is so pushy and interfering. That being said, she should take this damn thing back and wear it herself. It's closer to her size and it looks like it would suit her perfectly.

Let's hope my last day of vacation is in-law-free!

Accessorize With MIL!

Would you take beauty advice from someone who purposely cuts their hair like this?

Of course you wouldn't! And neither would I. Perhaps MIL is a few dumplings short of a dim sum after all, much as I've suspected for a while. Today, when I came home, I made a discovery. A very odd finding indeed!

See, Raelynn has this one cabinet she loves to open. Even though it has a child-safety lock on it. She KNOWS how to bust that one open. We should have known when she was lurking around her daddy as he put it on there. Once we saw there was no stopping her with that cabinet, we took out anything that could be harmful. But there are still tons of things in there that are annoying to clean up if she gets into it. Try playing 52 pick up with the whole deck scattered about your house in the most random places. And of course, 2 people who lack a full deck are left in charge to watch Raelynn. Which means they just LET her open that cabinet up and take what she wants. Lovely, huh? Fucking morons.

Anyway, I hear the tell-tale sounds of Raelynn opening the creaking cabinet doors and I dash from the kitchen in a flash to stop her. She's pilfered some giant metal bolt-like thing that she can't swallow thankfully but I fear with her newly acquired throwing skills, she'll lob it at something, like one of the mirrors, that can break. I steal it back and go to lock up the cabinet, which also involves me TAPING it shut. But the in-laws just take the tape off. They have no fucking reason to enter those cabinets, mind you. There is no food in there. There is nothing they need to use in there. Yes, they suck. They suck big time.

But today, I saw something new in there. It was a plastic basket that was not in there before. Perplexed, I showed my husband and he too was dumbfounded. Would you like to see the magical mystery basket? Follow me, please...

For starters, let's check out the basket itself. It is absolutely filthy. Jeremy and I would never put something like this in the cabinet without cleaning it up. It looks like someone (MIL? FIL?) dug it from someone's garbage. Dig the stained and dirty pink paper lining the bottom too. It's quite disconcerting than an adult who is aware of how sneaky our child is would put something that has small, chokey items in it within reach of a toddler. You can see under the protractors (one of which has Hello Kitty on it) that there's a small, metal pin or button, a couple keys, bobby pins, gold twisty ties, a calling card (likely expired), and MIL's must-have fashion accessory pick for Raelynn...obviously used, ancient and rusty butterfly hair clips. Next up, a close-up of one of the hair clips...

I tried my damndest in the fading daylight to get a good shot of this. I'm not a professional photographer so shove it. At any rate, you can still see the screw in the clip (much like the screws in MIL's head) is rusted. Ugh.

Here is just another angle with different lighting. I moved it by the window to catch more of the fleeting last bits of the sunlight. The flash was just whiting out most of my other shots at this point.

Jeremy and I stared at the basket with alarm for a few more moments. Then, my husband makes me proud. "Hide it where she'll never find it," he commands me. And just like so many other items before it, the basket from hell tumbled into the vortex of ugly things from MIL never to be seen again.

Nice Try, MIL

Every day before I go to work, I painstakingly choose an outfit for Raelynn to wear. Usually, Jeremy will change her while I'm getting ready. But if he doesn't have time, I leave the outfit on top of Raelynn's toy chest for MIL to put her in. I do this so I don't come home to a baby that is overbundled in mismatched garments, and it seemed to be working.

Until last week that is. When I'd come home, I noticed Raelynn's closet door had been opened. That's no big deal except it looked like someone (guess fucking who) had rifled through there looking for something which pissed me off because I keep all her clothes folded neatly and they'd been tossed around with no regard whatsoever. But Raelynn was still in what we'd dressed her in earlier in the day, meaning there was no reason to look for a change of clothes. What did it mean? It meant that the troll-in-law was looking for something. But what?

And then, I had it. Way back in the corner of this poorly-designed closet in what was the stack of clothing I'd set aside because these items were still too large for Raelynn was an ugly white fleece vest with a rabbit on the back (dear God) and that horrid sweater she bought at the same time as those fugly-ass red shoes. It dawned on me that this bitch was dressing Raelynn in these disgusting clothes while we were away. Which is really annoying on so many levels. First, we've asked her to not change Raelynn's clothes unless she poops all over them. Second, we've asked her not to overbundle Raelynn. And here she is obviously doing both for no good reason. Sure, it's still a bit cold out but it's warming up now that spring is here. But it's not cold inside our house.

So what is a mom to do to protect her child from stupid relatives who should follow directions and stop pretending that they are the baby's mother instead of me? Why, shove all those ugly MIL temptations into the vortex of ugly clothes of course! Which is just what I did. And I couldn't help but snicker the next day when I came home to see that she'd quite obviously dug through the closet again looking for her hideous dress-up clothes. Nice try, MIL, but you lose again.

Pink Is The New Blue

When you see pink, what do you think of? What about blue? If you said "girls" for pink and "boys" for blue, you're thinking like the majority. Me too. But how did these colors come to be so gender specific anyway? Should it matter what colors our babies wear? Maybe it shouldn't, but it does. I know I will probably catch hell for what I'm about to say, but so be it. Baby boys should not wear pink. There, I said it.

Now I'm not saying a grown man can't choose to dress himself in a lovely light pink dress shirt under his suit. I'm not even saying a little boy can't go pick out a pink shirt to wear when his mom takes him shopping. Babies and beauty are in the eyes of the beholder and for me, Raelynn's got to dress like a little lady. If I chose to dress her in blue, that's my prerogative as well. But what if someone, like my MIL for example, bought blue things for her? Or clothes with cars and trucks on them? Clothes that just scream boy?

Fortunately for me, this is not a problem I ran into with my MIL. Sure, we had other fashion-related problems with her but not like this. One of my many pregnant friends is getting ready for the arrival of her son. And like me, she's married to a Chinese man. But unlike me, she mostly likes her MIL. Though that may change as her hormones begin to go crazy on her, coupled with her MIL buying questionable clothing items for this bouncing baby boy.

She was kind enough to share these with me, so let's have a look...

We've got a track suit. IN PINK. Did I mention she's having a boy? Did I mention her MIL KNOWS she is having a boy too? Ok, well regardless of the gender, this is one fugly pink track suit. Take a closer look at the artwork adorning this ensemble:

It says "small spr Rabbit" on it, which is delightfully stupid in an Engrish sort of way but no one I know wants that kind of shit on their child. Then there's a lame pink rabbit, and a pink car with what looks like a giraffe and another rabbit, this one blue. The car is emitting little hearts instead of noxious fumes. Or perhaps it's symbolic of love being a poisonous gas of sorts. Who knew that Chinese baby clothes were so deep and meaningful?

My MIL certainly chose some things that were about this ugly, but there was no mistaking that she clearly chose clothes for a girl. She picked out a few things that had similar ties on the front. Maybe it's a Chinese MIL thing. I don't know. What I DO know is that trying to tie a shirt, dress, pants or whathaveyou onto a squirming and possibly crying infant is maddening and is not something I recommend attempting unless you truly want to lose your sanity. 

But if you really want to lose your mind, come to a country where people think these split-crotch pants are acceptable attire. Here is a closer look of the pants for the pink track suit...

What cracks me up, pardon the pun, is that Chinese people (mostly the women) will nag and pester you about how your child isn't bundled up enough for the weather. Even if your child is dressed in a parka and it's hot outside. They will come from out of nowhere to butt in (again, pardon the pun) and tell you that you should be more careful to dress your kid more warmly. AND YET THEY PUT PANTS LIKE THIS ON THEIR KIDS WITH NO DIAPERS ON UNDERNEATH. So I'm having a hard time understanding this one, as are my other friends here, especially the one who now is scratching her head about this fucking track suit and wondering what the fuck she should do with it. I'm quite sure the thought of strangling her MIL came to mind as a use for this crap. But hopefully, she will be like me and create her very own vortex for ugly clothes and hide this barfy thing where her MIL will never find it or even better, will completely forget about it after a spell. Good luck, girl.

And here's another item given to my friend by her MIL:

It's a giant Hello Kitty "blanket." I use the term "blanket" loosely as it is made from terry cloth, just like a towel, though here, this kind of material is rather rough, like the sort you'd find at a cheap motel. So it's really a giant Hello Kitty towel. Made from inferior cottons and dyed with toxic chemicals. But I've noticed that in China, people will use towels as blankets which bothers the hell out of me. I caught MIL using our towels as blankets for Raelynn when I came home from work one day. She knows where the blankets are but yet would dig for this nasty-looking giant towel I'd use to throw down on the sand at the beach. So, into the vortex that thing went and it won't come out again until summer when we go to the beach again. But that's neither here nor there. Using a towel as a blanket totally makes me think back on the kind of days where you'd get too shitfaced with your friends, pass out cold on the bathroom floor and someone would toss a towel over you to help keep you warm while you'd drool onto the tiles. Yeah. Thank GOD those days are over.

But back to this Hello Kitty hell. This sort of crap is why Chinese MILs will quickly get on your nerves. I know this feeling all too well. It's the one where you feel like someone else is trying to forcibly exert their taste upon you. It would be like having my MIL come in and redecorate our home with things she thinks are tasteful. And thankfully, the opposite of that happened here in regards to home furnishings. I empathize completely because nothing is more annoying than having someone, especially someone who you experience a massive cultural and generational gap with, do this to you. It's hard enough having a baby. Add to it being a stranger in a strange land. And add to all that a bunch of ugly or stupid items that someone expects you to use on your child. You don't want to be rude, yet it's YOUR child and you want that child to be put in clothing that is easy to put on and take off, not to mention that suits your tastes. Raelynn could fully decide never to wear pink again and beg me to dress her like a boy, like Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's little Shiloh. I sure hope not, but as long as it is what she wants. But for now, she wears what Lane and I want to see her in and that is the way it goes. It all starts with simple shit like clothes and blankets and soon, snowballs into a full-on power struggle where the MIL attempts to invade every aspect and every decision about the baby's life. Perhaps we should have created a MIL vortex instead of one for appalling apparel, but I doubt there is a blackhole out there large enough for this sort of disposal. Until then we will smile, say thank you and abruptly shove things like this into an alternate universe.