Slave Woman. Bring me FOOD

Today, our child waved bye-bye. Now in the grand scheme of things, waving bye bye is no big deal really. But for our little 11 month old ... it's monumental. Well, actually for Mommy it was monumental, for him it was probably more of a, Dang, check out what I can do with my hand. Since he wasn't actually doing the traditonal wave, but more waving at himself and looking over my shoulder at Grammie waving at him. (He's waved at Jorma, but this is the first time that he did it and wasn't just mimicking Jorma and me.)
Certainly he'll have other accomplishments in his life and I'll be proud of them too, but this means he has a sudden understanding. He suddenly understands or is on the verge of understanding, that gestures mean something. And that is something cool. Now starts the sign language project. I've been showing him the food sign each time I feed him, but it's hard to break his eye contact away from the Cheerios box in my hand. But when I do, he just looks at me blankly, and then starts banging on his high chair with glee. Maybe I should teach him the sign for, "Slave Woman. Bring me FOOD!". He'd probably pick up that one pretty quick.

Reading my diary

Jorma says he's never read my blog because he felt like he was reading my diary. I think a lot of people feel like that for some reason and I'm not sure why. Maybe it's the daily entry.
But it's ok to read a blog. That's why people have them after all. You could have your own for a matter of fact. And... it's free. But please, please, read on. And for God's sakes leave comments if you feel like it.
The only comments I have so far are the 26 on the "Playgroup Day! Yay!" entry. And those are from a spammer. I didn't know that when I first saw it however, and I had written of my playdate group, "The playgroup girls are stark raving mad!". I saw the 26 comments and thought, great. The Mommies Club has found me, left enraged commentary for everyone to view and probably kicked me out. The I could coin a term like, "Dooce" (which means to be fired for writing on your weblog about your company), but instead would mean being kicked out of a club for writing in your blog. So anyways, it wasn't the Mommies, it was a spammer, but I put a verification code on the page, so it shan't happen again, my pretties.
What in the hell is a verfication code you might ask? Well then. I guess you'll just have to leave a comment and see, now won't you?

Bring DOWN big brother

When I was 11 I lived in an apartment complex. The complex had a swimming pool, beloved by all the kids who would beg a different mom each day to come to the pool and watch us while we swam. We really didn't want an adult to watch us, but there was an age limit for children without adult supervision. That limit was 12 years of age. After a full summer of adult supervison all of the kids discussed at the close of the summer how the next year, we would be able to swim whenever we wanted because we would be 12 years old. In early summer, the pool opened. It had new lounge chairs, new paint and a new sign. The sign posted the Pool Rules and on that list it said, No child under the age of 13 to be admitted unless accompianed by a parent or guardian. 13. We were stunned.
For some reason it never occured to us to just go to the pool anyway. In an apartment complex that large, there is no way that the office staff would be able to keep track of the ages of all of the kids. But we didn't know that then. We feared the office staff. Although in their early twenties, they had JOBS for God's sake.
While we it never occured to us to just break the rule, it did occur to us that maybe we could change it. Us being my friend Kyra and I. We were still young enough to be idealistic about the country, it's values and still believed that we were living in a democracy.
So, we consulted Ky's mom, who completely encouraged us to try to make a change. Bring DOWN big brother! We created a petition, handwritten on unlined paper that we had drawn the lines onto to make it seem a little more imporant that something torn out of a sprial ring notebook.
And we did it.
We went door to door with out petition, asking all of the residents to sign the document we had created that stated it was unfair to change the age for unsupervised children at the swimming pool. And you know what? They signed it. Most of them. We had a couple of people refuse but that measured out, by the couple of people that praised us for being so democratic, and then to further add to our karma we smiled and nodded as old women went on and on about their 15 year old poodles.
Once we had hit every house in the apartment complex we put our petition into a manilla envelope to make it seem more business-like and presented it to the office staff.
We stated our case and explained that we had gotten all of the signatures, presenting them with our envelope. They didn't say much and I remember leaving with a sense of dispair as they sort of just looked at us, looked at the list, looked at us. Now I know that they were just stunned. What do you say to a couple of rabid, libral 12 year olds? So, they just said nothing.
Until the next complex newsletter was sent... they had lowered the age that children could be in the pool area unsupervised to 12.
And it was a fantastic summer.

All hail the Chile Relleno

So in my last blog, I had "go me!" typed out, except the way that the font in my blog is used, it looks like gome. It wasn't Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment which is what GOME actually stands for. Just in case some of you were hoping to join up with the Dewchild.com Ozone Monitoring Experiment, which could consist of hhmmm. maybe sitting outside of different Starbucks around the city and seeing which one has the cleanest air. It couldn't be global though... you know. With the kid and all.

Today was a great day! Got out of the house, with my new friend from the Mommies Club, ate lunch, went to Target and had intelligent conversation. She is also a graphic designer, so now I have someone that I can send my mock ups to, and say, Can you BELIEVE my Client choose THAT one?! Ahhhh, a little design commiseration. Just what I need.

So at Target I bought a scale that measures body fat. I've never had my body fat measured before and well. It's shocking. I'll not mention my weight on the internet, (gasp) but I will mention that I am a whopping 38% body fat. That's almost half my body mass. Although according to the chart that comes with the scale, it's not really bad. Just bad. And then of course Jorma announces that he's only 21%, which for some reason doesn't really irritate me as I'm still in denial over my own reading. But I do think that's it's cool to be able to see when my body fat drops as I try to lose weight. I'm still trying to do the SouthBeach thing, although I had Mexican for lunch today which has a bluegillion carbs in it. All hail the Chile Relleno. Yum.

Dewchild.com on Google

Speaking of Google, I just Googled my site name, dewchild and my site came up first on the list. gome! gome!
ok, signing off now, for real.

Google Personalized Toolbar

I love new stuff on the web, but I've seen alot of it. But I must say, Googles new personalize it page is da bomb. Google was my homepage anyways, so now it's just less boring. It lets you pick what catagories you want, you can personalize your weather, choose cnn, or how to's and a quote everyday. And you can move around your lists. Each time you go to google, it shows up like that. You can add websites that have a streaming xml news page, like The Daily Show, or CNN. I love, love, love, love it. But if you use it for your homepage like me, after you create your sign on, (email address and password is all that's required) you just sign in, and then copy and paste the link into Internet Explorer > Tools > Options - Paste it into the Address section, choose apply and ok. You will SO love it.
I've been building sites all evening, practicing my new minimalist style. I really like it.
I got my new beginners Yoga DVD and tried it out today. It's only 20 minutes and I'm going to try to do it everyday and then take a class at the Y. I actually enjoyed it. I couldn't believe it. The video is pretty decent and I don't get lost because it's so slow moving. Granted, it might have been easier if Connor wasn't laying on my back when I went into "Upward Dog", then rolled off onto the floor. (He grunted, but climbed back on). But it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be.
When we were living in California, Jorma decided he wanted to do yoga one morning, (he used to do it religiously) so we started into his power yoga tape and after 15 minutes, I stopped leaned over to him and said, "What do you want from Starbucks?", took his order and then went to the Starbucks downstairs for breakfast and coffee.

Einstein Never Used Flash Cards.

I'm reading a book called, Einstein Never Used Flash Cards. It's about how children develop intelligence and how all of the flash card, classical music hype is really just that. It touches on children in our culture that are over scheduled so that their parents can feel like they will be ready for school-then college. It's pretty interesting and I agree with most of it. I mean, certainly there isn't any problem teaching your kid to read early, but they need to have the basic skills down too. How to get in line, how to sit, how to pay attention.

I bet we have an entire generation in 20 years that are talking to their cyber shrinks about how they were over scheduled children. I bet they say it causes some sort of psychological damage and they give it some sort of name. You know, like the now termed, ADHD, which we just called hyperactive when I was a kid. Which basically meant that your parents avoided giving you sugar and made you run laps around the house. I do think that ADHD is a legitimate disorder... I just feel as though it might be being misdiagnosed as it seems to be at epic proportions nowadays. Maybe they'll have all of the 20 somethings with their hang ups, relive their childhood and lay around playing video games and contributing absolutely nothing to society. Yeah. That'll be great for a whole generation.

I built a website this weekend, in the minimalist style that I've been wanting to experiment with. It's for my new clients who also have three other options to choose from. And I really dig it. I think I might shift my web style over to the minimalist style completely. I so love the less is more theory in web design.

I've joined a Mommies Club, which I think might be cool, but I'm really disappointed in the lack of community service that's being done. An organization that large, (not huge, but ya know, 50 members or so) has the potential to make a pretty good impact on the area, not to mention that it can help to teach some of the older kids that like it's just about them. Something that I think this generation may have a hard time grasping due to the whole overscheduling thing. Maybe I'll see if I can rally them into some community service action, or hell, maybe I'll to start my own. You know, community service club for kids. Then I can over schedule them with my activities, teaching them that it's not all about them, it's all about Mommy. Yeah, I know they'll never believe it... but it's nice to fantasize once in a while.

BOOK REVIEW: I Capture the Castle Rating: * * * *

Dodie Smith's, I Capture the Castle is about a young girl, who keeps a diary detailing her impoverished life with her father, stepmother and brother in an English castle. The characters are warm and endearing, the dialect is easy to understand and the plot moves about in a Jane Eyre sort of way. Published originally in 1948, this book portrays all of the innocence of an era long ago, but also serves to remind the reader that times may change, but adolesence does not. Girls still get crushes, and worry over what to wear and boys are still hard to understand. I enjoyed reading this book in the respect that I enjoyed reading Jane Eyre. The innocence of the period is so enchanting and as English novels often do, it makes one wish for a window seat on a rainy afternoon and a nice cup of tea. I had a frumpy sofa, a giggling 11 month old and a large cup of coffee but at least I got some reading in.

MOVIE REVIEW: Red Eye | Rating: * * *

Although McNutterson didn't pick the movie that I thought she would for girls night out, she still picked an alright one, being at the mercy of the movie releases as she was. Red Eye is a thriller directed by Nightmare on Elm Streets Wes Craven. A hotel manager is threatened with the death of her father if she does not agree to assist in a plot to assinate one of the weathly guests of the hotel.
This movie has all of the undertones of a classic thriller, relying on suspense rather than gore to keep the viewer captive. The plane scenes were far fetched at best, being post 9/11, it would be impossible for all of the commotion on the plane to happen without someone panicing and calling in the federal marshalls. The time spent off of the plane is much more intense and believable, and for once it appears that the damsel in distress actually has a brain. I did appreciate the lack of predicability in the film. It's a good one for video night, when you've watched all of the other new releases first. I give it ***.

Playgroup day, yay!

Playgroup day, yay! Other than getting lost on the way there and arriving about 15 minutes late, it was pretty cool. The playgroup girls are stark raving mad! They jog with the baby in the mornings and make their own organic baby food. I didn't volunteer the fact that the only running I do involves my child in the front seat of a shopping cart while I race down the grocery asiles throwing what I can remember (from the list I forgot on the kitchen counter) into the cart as I try to make it out of there before my child has a meltdown from having to sit still for that long, (A whole 15 minutes). I also didn't volunteer that I've been procrasting yoga class for the past three months. I did make my own baby food for a while though. Organic even. But after the butternut squash incident, I've been buying Gerber. Of course I also hold down a part time job and a social life (which is hanging by a thread) so maybe I'm just missing the extra time to do it. Nah. Those ladies are crazy. They were really nice though. And Connor seemed to be into it once he got his bearings... I liked him being able to play with other toys and other kids, although in the end he seemed more interested in exploring (aka, finding something to climb) towards the end.
Tonight was Mom's night out, which I will write about tomorrow, since I can hardly keep my eyes open and 7am comes quite early.
Night y'all.

Tomorrow is Mom's Night Out

Tomorrow is Connors first PlayGroup. It's happening right at his normal nap time, so it should be interesting. Tomorrow is Mom's Night Out. I'm so looking forward to it. I think we are going to a steak house, but I don't really care where we go as long as it's out. We usually catch dinner and movie. I'm not sure what movie we are going to see either. We all take a turn and when it's our month we get to pick. It's not my month. It is the month of McNutterson, (aka Beth, who will remain McNutterson for the rest of my blogging career to protect her innocent name, which I have already listed). Based on the movies that are out, I am guessing that she picks the Constant Gardener. Which looks ok. I will let you know tomorrow for sure. And Wednesday, you can look forward to my restaurant and movie review which I am going to start doing after Mom's night out. Of course for a night out, I might be willing to suffer through March of the Penguins which is also out... although I don't know how much suffering it would be. Those penguins sure look cute.

I won a Twinkie recipe contest

The million dollar winner of the Pilsbury Bake-Off, made a pecan pie, but instead of using pecans, used walnuts, a handful of chocolate chips and 4 crushed nuts and honey granola bars. That simple. A million Dollars. I guess it's the simplest things that are the best. Like the combination lock that lets you spin letters instead of numbers so you can put in a name that you can actually remember. You know those things that make you go, why didn't I think of that? As you may or may not know, I won a Twinkie recipe contest this year. My recipe for Twinkie Rum Raisin bread pudding is going to be featured in the Twinkies cookbook that comes out next year. And what did I win you might ask? Oh. Nothing actually. They just put your recipe into a cookbook and then put your name next to it. Hopefully they will at least send some coupons or something. Although I'm not nuts about a twinkie. Maybe they'll have a recipe contest for Hagan-Daz Chocolate Peanut Butter ice cream. I wouldn't mind some coupons for that.

A good project

Since Connor has broken our DVD player, we have purchased a new one. I never hooked up my CD player when we moved to CA, because the DVD player that Jorma had played CDs. Although you had to listen to 5 minutes of clicking and whirring each time you pressed play. So we didn't use it much. But now that we have a new DVD/CD player, I've vowed to listen to all of my old CDs. So that's what I'm doing. In order. Even the ones that I have only listened to once and hated. I've had my CD book for a while now and it holds some of the first CDs that I ever bought. Since I have added CDs as I bought them, if I go in order, it should be kinda like my life flashing in front of my eyes. Except with music. And except this doesn't take place in a few seconds but a few weeks, since I have to listen while my child is not practicing his NANANAN at the top of his lungs. I'm digging it. I listened to my old Bessie Smith and Carol King CDs even. I've worked my way through about 16 CDs so far with only 34 to go. It's kinda cool. I think you should try it too. It's a good project.

But then I had my tonsils out

Connor is getting over his cold now that he has given it to Jorma, (for those of you that don't know, the secret to getting rid of a cold is to give it to someone else) and I am not sick yet. I'm hoping that I will get to avoid it completely, but today Connor stuck a snot covered hand into my mouth while I was holding him and not paying attention. So, I might be next. I used to get sick all of the time. I mean ALL of the time. I could talk to someone on the phone that had the flu and get it the next day.
But then I had my tonsils out. What a painful experience that was. I was completely miserable for about 4 weeks. But in the end. I think it was worth it. Since I've had my tonsils out, I've been sick three times. Which isn't too bad considering that I had them out three years ago. I was excited about my tonsils being out because I thought that I might get to go on the ice cream diet for two weeks. The bad part is, that you feel so crappy you don't even want ice cream. I lived on Ensure and Jello. I lost 14 lbs in two weeks.
I went back to the dr because I wasn't feeling well after two weeks and he tried to give me five dollars to buy a cheeseburger on the way home, because he said that the reason I wasn't getting well was because I wasn't eating. He said he felt that if he gave me five bucks that I would feel obligated to do it and would eat a cheeseburger on the way home. Something about eating big food, helps the tonsils heal, knocks off the scabs, (sorry, but you're the one that kept reading) and forces the muscles to get back into shape. I didn't take his five bucks, but I did stop at Chic-Fil-A and then locked myself in a room at mom's house so I could eat and cry at the same time, without feeling weird about it. The Dr. had said, that I should lock myself in a room alone because it was going to hurt like hell when I ate. He wasn't kidding. It did. But when I could swallow ice cream without pain again. It was the best ice cream I had ever had.

My to do list

I am definately a list-maker. I feel better when I make lists. To do lists. They give you a sense of... direction and later when you check of your to dos as done, they give you a sense of accomplishment. Sometimes I put things that I know I'm going to do on my list, just to give myself an extra sense of accomplishment. Tomorrow to do list:

Pick up dry cleaning
Mail pictures
Expense report for work
Email HR director at work
Call new Design Client
Call Catfish stew guy
Call Gastro Dr. about RX coverage
Attend meeting on new project at work
Go by Car Insurance co
Scoop the cat box
Put air in van tires

I'll let you know how my sense of accomplishment is going tomorrow.

What I learned today.

What I learned today.
1. A sick baby is a pitiful baby (he has a cold)
2. Sweet potatoes are terrible when you cook them in the microwave (whole)
3. Don't just dump some sea salt out of the container into the pesto (way to salty)
4. If you email a specific spammer and ask nicely to be removed from the list, they will just send you twice as much spam (even if you were really really nice about it)
5. How to file a complaint with the Federal Trade Comission regarding a specific spammer (who thinks I need to buy Viagra)
6. How to find the IP address of a specific spammer when the email address is spoofed (Outlook > View > Options)
7. Sometimes when giving a child medicine it actually makes them more hyper instead of sleepy (Decongestant)
8. When you are 10 months old Oobi (see picture) jumping out from behind a sofa and yelling suprise is hysterical (thank god for the rewind button on the DVR)
9. When you are 10 months old and your runny nose rattles while you are drinking your bottle is also hysterical (and makes you choke because you are laughing and drinking... over and over and over)
10. Sometimes it's good just to sit around and talk to other adults (Mike and Robyn came by)

My Chiropractor cracks me up

So the coffee (see previous post) didn't really make too much of a difference this morning, except I was feeling like I had accomplished something first thing in the morning because I had actually programed the delay on the pot the night before. I was however awake enough to make it to the YMCA for a brief workout while Connor played with the kiddies in the Y daycare. I joined the Y because I thought that it would be nice to be able to drop him off and have a nice relaxing workout - child free. But because he's in the Y daycare, and I don't know what's happening with him, I'm instead in a constant state of anxiety while I work out, waiting for them to come in at any minute and throw us out because he hasn't stopped crying. Although today he did pretty ok. He cried a little bit in the beginning but calmed down (the staffer said) after about 15 minutes and started playing.
I also managed to work a chiropractor visit in, since my neck and shoulders are all wacked out again. This is a new chiro that Jorma has been going to and he really likes him. So of course today when I went in, expecting this great healing experience, instead I get to wait for an hour and 45 minutes before I was adjusted. The Dr. came in the first time after 45 minutes, (I had already been up to the reception desk once), talked to me, I did the heat therapy and then I got to wait another 45 minutes, when I went back up to the counter and told them that this was ridiculous and I was leaving, (not a nice discussion). They convinced me to stay, (they thought) when really it was the excruciating pain in my neck that convinced me, as an adjustment or two usually resolves the problem.
So of course not being able to leave well enough alone, I say something to the Dr. when I (FINALLY) get to see him. Granted I said, an hour and 45 minutes is a long time to wait for an adjustment, my friend, but I thought that was pretty nice considering I haven't signed up for any of the anger management classes I should be taking... And the Dr., like... totally came unglued.
I guess he was stressed or something, but he started lecturing me about how I needed to understand that he had been on vacation and he needed a vacation and deserved a vacation and he was behind with his patients because his patients wouldn't see anyone else and no shit... on and on with this. I was tempted to throw in, "Yeah and your spray on tan isn't winning me over either buddy" since he has this crazy obvious spray-on tan look going. I mean, how horrible must you look pale, to go and pay someone to dye your skin completely orange. Dunno. Maybe he's just been eating a lot of carrots or something.
So, he did pop my neck, but he didn't fix it instantly like my beloved Chiro in Kannapolis, Dr. Cook does. But he wants me to go back on Thursday. I haven't decided if I will or not. On one hand, he's like, right around the corner. But on the other hand, dude, he's wound pretty tight. I don't want to be there when he starts going postal with the... um.... x-ray machine, I guess. I suppose it comes down to whether or not my neck feels any better and really... it feels much worse. But sometimes, things have to get worse before they can get better so I'll have to give it a day and see. But the whole situation proves what I already knew, I do not wait well. And I also learned today that spray-tan does DOES NOT look natural. Don't do it people! And I also learned that I have more separation anxiety than my child. And finally I learned, sometimes just making a cup of coffee is an accomplishment.

Despair and dishes

Maybe it's something about not having a dishwasher that does it... but in the mornings if I wake up and the kitchen is trashed from dinner the night before, it just fills me with despair. Mornings are pretty hard for me. I know most of y'all don't want to hear my whining about how hard mornings are when you have to get up at 5am to fight traffic for an hour so you can go spend 8 hours with people that you really don't like anyway, but it's still hard. It seems harder than when I had to get up at 5am and deal with California traffic and people I didn't like anyway. (Actually I liked everyone that I worked with, but it still didn't make facing an 8-10 hour day any easier).
I first of all, like to lay in bed for a few minutes to wake up a little bit before I start my day. Then I like to walk straight into the bathroom and brush my teeth, put on something that resembles clothing, pull my hair back and stumble around until I find either coffee or something cold to drink.
That's without child.
With child - usually wake up immediately, grab the baby, change, put into highchair, throw a handful of cheerios down to avoid screaming fits, while I measure formula to make oatmeal with. At this point, for me I haven't brushed my teeth, pulled my hair back and may or may not be wearing pants. So you certainly understand while all of this happens in a kitchen with last nights plates, stacked (gasp!) next to the sink, which is filled with pots pans and random other crap to be washed can fill one with a sense of despair.
My husband who by this time has already been up for an hour, manages to look chipper toting his cup of microwaved yesterdays coffee around, as he avoids the bleary eyed grumpiness that is his wife in the mornings.
So I've got to find my groove with the morning thing. There are some Mommies, who get up and get ready first thing, shoes and (OMG!) make-up! These are the Mommies that spend their days at the YMCA working out so they can look good for their husbands. These are also the Mommies that have housekeepers, manicures and do not eat carbs. I am not that mommy.
But, Mommy that I am, I have to find some way to streamline this process. And I think it might involve coffee. So tonight I set the coffee pot. And before I go to bed I'm washing all the evidence that my husband made lasagna, (and it's alotta evidence), although I'll not complain too much since the lasagna was quite tasty. And I think before I make the oatmeal, I'll start drinking coffee. And then, after breakfast, I vow to get ready for the day, teeth brushed and all! So I can go into the living room and sit for the next two hours while a 10 month old dimpled lunatic crawls all over me, wondering... what in the hell do I need to get done today. Sometimes having a mission for the day is easier than not. That's the moral of my story. That and don't let your dishes pile up. Tomorrow maybe we can have a nice little talk about laundry.

BOOK REVIEW: Carpe Demon by Julie Kenner - Rating: * *

Julie Kenner's book, subtitled, Adventures of a Demon-Hunting Soccer Mom might be a good buy at a yard sale. It's definately not worth the full $12.95 price tag. Kate Connor a retired demon hunter is forced to go back to work when Demons invade her chaotic but peaceful life in Suburbia. All of her mystery solving and demon fighting takes place while she tries to get her kids to cheerleading tryouts and host dinner parties for her husbands colleagues.
This book is full of Three's Company situations. Everyone telling unbelievable lies, the co-characters being to shallow to see through them, causes the reader to lose respect for them all. Basically, the characters just aren't smart enough. Julie Kenner has attempted to charm the readers of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer genre and miserably falls short. You will figure out the plot well before Kate Connor does and read on wondering when she's gonna catch on losing respect for her all the while.

Rating: ** (out of 5)

Baby Neuvo

So we just got these really cute pictures of Connor taken. And we already have about 8 pictures of him framed around the house. So my husband says, we need to get some more frames. I gently tried to explain to him that we can't just keep adding 10 picture frames to our collection every time we get pictures made. He says, why not? I do the math for him... by the end of the year, we are looking at 30 framed pictures sitting around the house. And then what would we do when we have another one? Then we are looking at 50 framed pictures around the house on a yearly basis, which equals, 900 picture frames by the time they hit college. I didn't do the exact math for him but he does calculus for fun, so certainly he can come up with the same number. An interior decorator nightmare. Not that we have a lot of decoration going on in our house, but at some point we might... we can call our look, Baby Neuvo.

Posting pictures to the blog!

I learned how to post pictures into my blog tonight! I didn't realize that it was so easy or I would have done it sooner. I was scared that entering the code would screw up some of my posts and I'd end up getting it all jacked up and have to start from scratch. But actually, Blogger put in a gooey interface so you just click on the image icon and upload your file. It's nifty. So I posted a picture of a prairie chicken in case any one was wondering what in the hell a prairie chicken was in the first place.
I'm working on an About me page for my site. I came up with a list of 101 things about me. It wasn't that hard really. Jorma said he didn't know if he could think of 101 things about himself and I told him that I could think of 101 things about him. So I did. The best is. I have more socks than you. It doesn't matter who you are. I have more socks. This is because when Jorma lived the single bachleor life, he didn't have a washing machine and went to the WalMart on a regular basis to get socks and underwear so he didn't have to do laundry. As a result, when we moved in together, Jorma's "stuff" also included 7 hefty trashbags, (the lawn and leaf kind) of socks and underwear. But my stuff included two cats so I guess we were even.

Connor's busted lip

Today was pretty uneventful. I didn't leave the house, so I reorganized the livingroom. Connor, managed to bust his lip open on the stereo cabinet, (the mouth bleeds ALOT when it's hurt) but was easily consoled by his plastic teething fish that lives in the freezer. Sucking on the frozen teething toy did the trick though, in under an hour the swelling was gone completely. I handled it extremely well considering, I didn't realize he had even hit his mouth until he started waving his hand, (covered in blood) around.
The first time he ever got hurt, he rolled off of the sofa. This is when we were living in California and we only had the one car between us and Jorma was working. I panicked calling Jorma at work because I was ready to take the baby to the hospital for xrays and an MRI. After calling several of my Mommy friends I got calmed down with stories of, ahhh that's NOTHIN'... one time my kid (insert crazy kid story here). I guess before it's over I'll have my own share of crazy kid stories.
Poor kid, he's got a busted lip, what looks like a bit of a black eye, where he did who knows what, when... because he never cried about it and it wasn't there yesterday. And a bruise on his neck where right as I clicked his chest strap on his carseat harness, he decided to make a lunge for a plastized piglet who was laying in the seat next to him, (Tuesday). He was traumatized by that one and fought the carseat tooth and nail for the next 24 hours. His last batch of cat scratches have healed, but he has new mosquito bites from visiting PawPaw and Nana last week. He's a mess. I guess I just have to keep him hidden from social services until he heals up.

Connor and the Dr. Visit

So Connor is cutting teeth and has been since he was three months old. He has a molar up top that's coming in, except it hasn't broken the skin and the gum over it has turned purple. It's been like that for about a week, but it's just gotten darker so in a fit of paranoia, I call the Pediatrition to speak with the advice nurse.
I explain to her and she tells me that I need to leave immeadiately and bring him in, that they really need to look at it. So, I throw on some clothes, but no makeup and take off out the door with the baby. I get there in record time after teaching the other cars on the interstate that they, "Will respect the Mini-van!" (safely though) and wait for only about 3 minutes in the waiting room. Once in the dr's office however, the wait was slightly longer. 50 minutes longer.
I don't know how familar you are with our child, Connor but he's quite a handful. He wants to put everything in his mouth, squirms to get down constantly ( I mean non stop), crawls off in the middle of a diaper change if I'm not holding him down with my feet, and figured out how to climb before he figured out how to walk.
So 50 minutes of this. He is entertained by books for about 5 minutes before becoming fascinated by the biohazard container mounted to the wall. He of course never gets close to touching it, thanks to mom's new found paranoia, but makes a constant effort to climb me so he can get a better look at it. Moving the chair only brings something equally fascinating and after being held in place for just 15 minutes, he starts screaming unless I'm playing "bouncey, bouncey, bouncey kiss!" with him, which is played exactly how it sounds. I finally succumb to going back out to the car to get the stroller, which I should have done in the first place, but on the way back in, the nurse has found another doctor to see him, since the one we had scheduled with still had time with her current patient.
The Dr. says, the nurse said that you had to go and get the stroller because you were having a hard time containing the baby. I know by the look that he gives me that I look just totally run down. And Connor is perfectly still. He lays Connor down on the table to look in his mouth. I warn him that Connor is a wiggler and that I'll have to hold him still. But Connor is perfectly still. And the purple spot is gum bruising and perfectly normal. I get Connor into his stroller. The Dr. leaves and Connor starts trying to climb out of his stroller.

What is Labor Day, anyway?

Labour Day (or Labor Day) is an annual holiday that resulted from efforts of the labour union movement, to celebrate the economic and social achievements of workers.

The origins of the American Labor Day can be traced back to the Knights of Labor in the United States, and a parade organized by them at that time on September 5 1882 in New York City. In 1884 another parade was held, and the Knights passed resolutions to make this an annual event. Other labour organizations (and there were many), but notably the affiliates of the International Workingmen's Association who were seen as a hotbed of socialists and anarchists, favoured a May 1 holiday. With the event of Chicago's Haymarket riots in early May of 1886, president Grover Cleveland believed that a May 1 holiday could become an opportunity to commemorate the riots. But fearing it may strengthen the socialist movement, he quickly moved in 1887 to support the position of the Knights of Labor and their date for Labor Day. The date was adopted in Canada in 1894 by the government of Prime Minister John Thompson, although the concept of a Labour Day actually originated with marches in both Toronto and Ottawa in 1872. On the other hand, socialist delegates in Paris in 1889 appointed May 1 as the official International Labour Day.

See... everything's political.

like one of those prairie chickens.

I know, it's been a couple of days since I've blogged. I blame it on the Katrina footage I got sucked into. September 11th style. I'm not going to rant about how long it took the government to get in there and evacuate and supply (although I could) I'm not going to go on and on about how we seem to be able to organize and deploy for battle in 24 hours or less, but can't get off of our ass for a disaster that EVERYONE KNEW WAS COMING. If you want to read all of that stuff, check out CNN.com. There is rant a plenty there. I will say however... Republicans. You are toast next election. Yeah. I'm smiling just a little. (Sorry Mikey)
Poor Jorma can't watch the coverage. He can handle about 5 minutes of it and then he gets glazed over look and after it digests he gets so pissed off that he starts this free association type ranting which ends with the war in Iraq and in middle has a whole lot of profanity. I keep waiting for him to spin around and around like one of those prairie chickens.
Yesterday. I had a whole 7 hours of baby-free time. Did you read that? BABYFREE! (Insert thanks to husband here) I went up to Pattie's for her summer is gone blow out, where I got to sit and talk with everyone, (without a diaper change), swim in the pool, (without a time-check for the next feeding), drink a beer, (without dodging the reach of my 10 month old) and completely blow my diet, (without a child in my lap). I was Janice for a whole 7 hours. It was absolutely wonderful... even if I did start missing my little one about 3 hours into the gig. I told Darlene and she said, "Don't worry... that'll pass". She has three hellions (and I do mean hellions) of her own.
My little rugrat went with me to see PawPaw and Nana who were hosting Great Aunt Jo and Emmie for the weekend. He had a marvelous time throwing Cherrios and rice all over the floor of the mexican restaurant, where the doughhead waitress was explaining to me over and over that the plate she was holding was very hot while she held it in the reach of Connor who promptly burned himself and started crying. When you go to a restaurant you can pretty much tell if your wait person has children or not by the vicinity in which they place food, drinks and other necessities in relation to your child. Our waitress did not have children. Did not.
I'm currently reading a book about a demon hunter soccer mom. Now a book like that sounds like it would have potential. Doesn't it? So far it's crappy. I'll let you know how it turns out when I do my blog book review, which I will start doing each time I finish a book. Maybe someday I'll figure out how to work Movable Type and create a blog with a response area. Then we could start a book club. I guess first I'll just focus on blogging on a regular basis. It's a start.