stingy

The NYT says that the US is stingy.

Well no shit. Look how much we spend per day on Iraq-nam and we give a paltry amount to people who have lost everything. Not to mention that Bush couldn't be bothered to make a statement for an ungodly amount of time. How embarrassing.

Not my president.

So sad

I can't even believe the horror of what is going on overseas after the tsunami. I am so grateful to be safe with my family. It really puts everything in perspective. I don't have cable, but have seen some images online and have read emails of people looking for their families. It is so frightening and terrible.

I saw a picture of a woman with her 20 day old baby who survived by floating on a mattress. How will all these parents surive the loss of their children and vice versa?

God is pissed

I went to the St. Joseph's Motherhouse tonight. It was kind of depressing and there were less children there than I expected, although we had the delightful company of Emma and Soren's friends Emma and Philip and their parents, whom I really enjoy.

We tried to sneak out early, because they started the dances of universal peace, which I normally enjoy, but Soren was tired and hungry and Tom has to get up early (mostly likely) to shovel at work, and quite frankly, Soren was bored (and I have to admit that I was too, after the music was over). The music was great though! Although Emma and Soren's atonal rendition of do-re-mi was ... interesting ;)

Anyway, I got out to the car, only to find that my car key was missing. The remote lock was there and ALL my other keys, but not my car key. We spent about an hour or more looking for it, and Tom finally got a ride home with a kind samaritan to get HIS car key, because of course he didn't have his car keys with him. So we tried to leave at 8:15 and got home at about 10:30 p.m. The damn key had to be somewhere between the car and the front door, but we never found it. Too much snow and blacktop.

So, God is obviously pissed at me for trying to leave early. Either that or he meant for me to be a nun and this was a sign. If it was, it's not convincing me. Spending an hour and a half with 3 tired, cold and hungry kids is not good karma, God. Just so you know.

Waaah

My week off is already going too fast ;). I want it to slow down and I want Tom to have off too! We are going to some benefit thing tonight that the girls are doing a reading at. I tried to get them to sing Do-Re-Mi, a la Sound of Music, but they refuse on the grounds that Soren sings terribly off-key.

We went ice skating today at the pond at Highland Park and it was really fun! We were the *only* people there. I would have been suspicious that we were going to die in thin ice, but there really was a sign saying that the ice skating pond was open, so we chanced it. Jude enjoyed watching his sisters and didn't seem to get get cold, but I didn't let us stay too long, just in case. He yakked at them the whole time, obviously giving instructions and critiquing their form.

I met my neighbor's son today, who apparently just moved back in with his parents. He is divorced and his name is Morris. He seems harmless enough. He offered to shovel out my driveway if I ever need him to, which was nice.

We also ran across town and got a bag of clothes for Emma that I scored on Freecycle. And then we went to the Co-Op and I ended up with a ton more groceries than I went in for, which always happens. I also ran into a friend of mine and we ended up chatting for awhile.

Now, I must go and make dinner so we have time to go to this:
In Honor of the Holy Innocents

Prayers and Blessings for the children of the world.

A heart-centered evening in remembrance of all the
children of the world who are suffering.

Program for adults and children with music and dance.

12/28/04

7:00 to 9:00 pm.
Sisters if St. Joseph Motherhouse

I don't know what I was thinking when I mentioned it to the girls. I knew Emma would beg to go ::sigh:: I don't really mind going, it's just cold and we've been in and out a couple of times already, and I want to curl up on the couch with my husband and kids and do NOTHING. Sadly, that is not to be, so I better have fun!

progress

Well, obviously I spent a lot of time uploading pictures today. I also worked on my website a bit and updated some of the pages with new backgrounds and links to the homepage and such.

I also got a bunch of stuff done today. Went through the kids toys. Still don't really remember what they got. My ex-FIL got Soren a gorgeous tea set from Salzburg, Austria, where he just spent a week shopping and touring. He got Emma a *really* cool wooden marionette like the one in the Sound of Music.

Emma also got a battery operated dog and they both got a wooden train with chocolate from Austria (too bad Soren can't have milk chocolate :(!) Emma got a chemistry set and a feather quill. I can't remember what else...We had a fun time looking at everything though!

I did a buttload of laundry and cleaned up everything except the gifts, which means that it looks like Santa set off a bomb in our living room.

Jude has been massively fussy all day, which is very unlike him. He seems to have a tummy ache, but the homeopathic colic stuff didn't help. He is also still teething like mad and even has a rash/callous on his left hand and finger from chewing/sucking on the same spot so much.

Other stuff...we ran into a snowstorm on the way home last night. It was very cold - in the teens or single digits and we saw a few accidents. When we got home we discovered that the furnace wasn't firing. We were afraid to let it go, because it was already down to about 50F in the house and the pipes might have frozen by the time Tom could get home today and try to fix it since we didn't have parts, and I didn't want him out driving around in the storm.

It ended up costing $400 to have a guy come out and fix it. Eek. Danielle paid for it, but I'd like to pay her back if possible. What a nightmare!

Oh, and my ex-husband has started a blog. It seems mostly over my head, but he's really into what is going on in Iraq, so it might be a good source of news.

I think I'm caught up now.

Some more recent pictures from late November and early December. 

Soren's bday pictures are up! 

There are new pictures of Jude and the girls up. Enjoy!  

More holiday stuff

So far, what I've seen of their holiday presents from going to David's dads is pretty overwhelming. We are going to go downstairs in a bit and go through everything.

They did get gift certs to Toys R Us and Emma got an electronic game that is like skee ball, which I even like to play. She also got this huge ball that expands and contracts. It looks like it's made out of K'nex. She says she can't even remember all the loot she got! she got a quill, (my mom got her a calligraphy set too), a leatherman, 2 marionettes, etc.

Soren got a new baby doll, which I'm trying to get her to nurse instead of bottle feed, although she said she pumped the milk ;). David had bought her a baby doll a while ago that was supposed to feel like real baby skin, but when it came, the body was inflatable like a balloon. It has normal rubber arms and legs, but I don't know why it's made like that! David thought it was really weird, so got her a different one. She got a ton of stuff. I'll just have to wait till I see it all.

Let's see...I wanted to post about my dad. He continues to deteriorate. Apparently he still had a Kay's Jewelers credit account and one of the guys that was living there talked him into letting him buy $1200 worth of jewelry on it, and then split town. I will have to find some way to deal with this, as he is in no position to pay this off.

He also cashed in his life insurance policy and when I finally confronted him about why (the check came to me), he told me to pay back my brothers for taking care of him (!) (?) These are the kids who left him to live w/o electricity or heat in a drug-infested townhouse complex for four months and stole his settlement money so he couldn't live in his nursing home anymore. I am trying not to be insulted because I know he has dementia, but I get really tired of being accused of stealing his social security money and being mean to him when he would be living on the streets or worse if I hadn't found out what was going on and become his guardian. Argh. I paid off so many of his debts too! I can't believe he still thinks they should get all that money. Good grief.

Anyway, so I need to deal with that, and the assisted living facility is going to tighten down on checking his mail and I think I will have to disconnect his phone so he can't be so sneaky anymore. He also will have to check in every 2 hours if he goes out, because he gets lost, and they are going to put an alarm on the house with a bracelet on him that will trip it off, like they do with Alzheimer's patients. I kn ow I need to start looking into moving him into a more secure facility for his own safety. It makes me very sad though. I have tried to let him stay as independent as possible and those days are now over :(.

So, that was very stressful. Between my mom's intensity and my dad driving me over the edge, my jaw ached from clenching it when we went back to Erica's on Saturday night.

So. Still lots to say, but need to feed the girls and get Jude down for his nap.

Briefly, I had weird dreams last night. I dreamt that I was working for Gwin, Dobson & Foreman again. They are an engineering firm that I worked for when I was 18 or 19. Scott, one of the engineers, had asked me to make a list of all the books in the office, and it came in handy, because we found this hidden room which had cabinets and cabinets full of jewelry and crafts and they let us keep whatever we cleaned out to make room for the books. I got a bunch of diamond rings and a phoenix ornament. When I walked out the end of the room, Emma and I were suddenly listening to the Pope give a speech and a wild-haired man was standing in front of the crowd, reading from the Bible.

Then I had a dream that Tom's friend Gary was in the hospital with cancer and I was visiting him. My mind is very strange.

Well Merry Xmas and all that

Thanks for all the bday, Solstice and Anniversary wishes! It has been a whirlwind, but lovely week, all around.

Soren got sick on my birthday and threw up that evening. I felt awful for Tom, because he ended up watching her and the baby at his mom's while I taught my last class of the session, but he was a trooper. It was so lovely to not have to worry about taking care of a puking kid, a nursing baby and work all at the same time, which is what I spent years trying to juggle. Have I mentioned lately how wonderful my husband is?

Friday morning we left for PA and got to my mom's around 2:30. The girls and I opened xmas/bday gifts. My mom got me a really cool bracelet that is silver that looks like a belt. She always gets me lovely jewelry for my bday. The girls each got much-needed clothes - Emma got 2 pairs of pants, a denim jacket and a gorgeous red hooded sweater. Soren got jeans, 2 long-sleeved turtlenecks, a princess tea set and a boom box for her room. Do they still call them boom boxes? Gosh, I'm getting old ;).

Emma got a space set which didn't work and will have to be returned. My mom got Tom a gorgeous leather wallet, which was perfect, as his old one was falling apart and it was a standing joke that I wasn't allowed to get anything out of it because everything always fell out on the floor. She also got me a lovely black poncho with a hood which is perfect for breastfeeding in, as it zips from the top and the bottom. It's amazing to me how thoughtful she has become about me nursing babies!

We got her a pair of felt clogs by Acorn and Tom's mother sent an eyelash scarf that she made. My mom loved it! I forgot to mention that she got Jude a playmat with a mirror, but I think it overstimulates him to some extent. He's at the point where he is grabbing everything, but he gets frustrated that he can't manipulate things well yet, and the music and lights on the mirror that came with the mat seem to annoy him after awhile.

David and his sister came to get the girls around 5. Tom and I had shrimp and pasta salad w/ my mom and ended up hanging around till about 8:30 and then headed to Erica's.We spent the night there, which was lovely. We haven't had a night just to ourselves in over a month (not counting Jude). We got up Xmas morning and picked up my dad (I have a whole other post about him and his antics, geez) and took him to my mom's for breakfast. She made a standing rib, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes and gravy, stuffing, and cajun turkey breast for dinner, but my dad went back to his nursing home for dinner there. Egads, really, I must remember to post about all that. Unreal shit.

Anyway, we ate dinner and went to Erica's again. Had a lovely night, watched Ladykillers, with Tom Hanks, which had amazing dialogue. Love the Coen Brothers. I let Tom go to sleep since Jude woke up and wasn't inclined to go back to sleep, then Tom got up this morning and let me go back to sleep until 10:30! It was heavenly! We got a shower and then ate brunch at the Corner Room. Then we went back to my mom's to pack the car with all our crap. She was in a haughty mood, irritated that we had the nerve to enjoy each other and not include her ;).

We picked the girls up at David's at 3 p.m. and they got a ton of stuff. they didn't even open David's presents to them yet! He is going to hold on to them for their next visit. Xmas will go on forever!

I will udpate tomorrow - haven't seen all their presents yet. There is much more to say, but I think I am keeping Tom awake with my typing and he must get up at 4 a.m. to shovel at work at 5 a.m., poor chap :(.

Reminders to self:
Dad
furnace
girls' presents
mom - Nascar and neighbors
snowstorm
david's blog

anniversary

Turns out Tom *did* get a holiday bonus. Woot! Not a ton of money, but enough to be happy about.

He came home with a HUGE bouquet of red and white miniature carnations with baby's breath. I found a beautiful card this morning by the coffee pot - it said something like, "I have found the paradox that if you love until it hurts, it doesn't hurt anymore, it's just more love" and inside it said that a year ago I made him the luckiest man on earth. ::::swoon::: I got all teared up. I love having a romantic husband! and yes, I forgive him for waiting till the last minute to shop ;). He also got me a beautiful picture frma for a picture of us that I've had on my desk loose for the last year+.

I had to work until 8:30 p.m., but we went to Red Lobster with the kids late. One benefit of eating out late is that there are no lines! The meal was very good. We got the Ultimate Fondue, which I adore, and I got fried clams and lobster mac & cheese. It was yummy! Emma got snow crab legs and fries and Soren got popcorn shrimp. Tom got a plate of all sorts of seafood, but I know there was a lobster tail on there. I also had a very watery martini, which wasn't very good, but probably for the best that it was watery. Jude slept through the whole meal anyway, and was down for the night. He nursed at 11:30 and slept till 4:30!

Tom had to go in to work to salt at 5a.m. poor chap :(. The girls are going on a playdate this afternoon, so I am going to straighten up downstairs and do the dishes. I haven't made dinner in days, so haven't done the dishes and the dishwasher is still on the fritz.

We have a team gymnastics party at 4:15 and then I have to teach my last class of the year. Then I'm done until next Thursday. Woot! We go to PA tomorrow and are staying at Erica's. Sadly she won't be there :(. I want to get there early though so the girls can see my mom for some of the holiday. Then I will drop them off w/ David around 4 so they can go to his dad's for the annual xmas eve bash. Tom and I will have dinner with my mom on Saturday and just generally hang out. I plan to go to the mall on Sunday and use my Victoria's Secret gift card that I got in the mail for my birthday.

Did i mention before that my foster daughter called? She is working where my dad lives, so I hope to see her this weekend when I visit my dad.

Anyway, I should run. Soren had been reading me a Dr. Seuss book and I haven't heard any of it so far.

Dreams

First i had a lovely dream that I was at the beach with my co-worker Emily. We were stripping down to our bikinis and hanging our clothes up on the railing of the boardwalk because the tide was coming in - this huge, beautiful tide, and the sun was going down and it was getting dark. We wanted to have one last swim before it got totally dark, and there were *tons* of people there swimming. Just as I was about to run in, my cellphone rang and it was my friend Kim Rosenblum, whom I have not talked to in years. Weird!

Then the baby woke me up. Let me say that I was at this beach with NO kids. This probably stems from me being pissed off when I went to bed last night. The girls got invited to stay overnight at M&D's. Soren wouldn't stay. I was exhausted when we got home and passed the baby off to Tom (he had been nursed and changed). Hint, if I hand you the baby and climb into bed and pull the covers over my head, standing 3 feet away from me with a fussing baby is probably not a good choice.

Oh, and asking me to go shopping with you for my own damn gifts is not a good choice either. Find some time and get something that you thought of. Anything. I don't care if it's something from the dollar store, but I value at least some thoughtfulness and creativity.

So the dream I had right before Jude woke me up this morning was that the girls and I were in an elevator and the cable snapped. We were falling and I was screaming but realized that I needed to hold them, so I pulled myself together and grabbed them both. Somehow we weren't killed. I think we fell 4 floors or so, and I called the police on my cell phone, but I had no idea where we were. Then I woke up. Thank god.

Happy happy happy

Happy Solstice to those of you who celebrate! We celebrated with friends last night and had a lovely celebration at Lilac Children's Garden with the kids yesterday afternoon. I got bookshelves from Mike and Danielle! I'm so thrilled :). I love them!

Emma got a book on "Dragonology" and Soren got a book about monster stories. They both love them. Tom's niece got them both lovely warm robes. The gym pants I bought Emma were a big hit. She was so happy :) And Soren loved that damn Boobah ;).

Soren is right now laying in bed reading Snoozers to Jude. How cute!

Today is my anniversary. Tomorrow is my birthday! What a week. Tom's mom got us a gift certificate to a japanese restaurant for our anniversary and will keep the girls overnight one night next week so we can go out. I have to work today and tomorrow, unfortunately.

Tom is very bummed that he didn't get a xmas bonus at work. I'm not surprised. They suck.

Santa

Soren: "Mom, Santa brought this stuff from the Claire's Club!"

Me: "He must have sent his elves out shopping!"

Emma:

I love that the girls played Santa for Jude. I didn't buy anything at all for him, because he doesn't need anything but they couldn't deal with that at all ;)

heh

Emma and I were playing hangman the other night. Hmm...she never *did* figure out the word I gave her! She was guessing letters and couldn't find one, and said that she would have to start adding a face to her hangman. Then she said she had to add horns, like her sister has ;). I said, "Soren doesn't have horns!"

Emma said, "OK, I'll give it some piercings."

I said, "Or some tatoos!"

and again, she said, "Like Soren!"

I said, "Soren doesn't have a tatoo!"

She said, "yes she does, she went to a tatoo shop."

I said, "Yeah, like they'd give a 6 yo a tatoo."

Emma said, "She told them she was an Irish midget."

I about peed myself laughing. Where does this kid come up with these things?

Crime

Did I mention that a 19 yo man was shot twice on my street last Saturday night? When we came home from Tom's mother's house, the whole block was closed by the police. We had to ask the officer to move his car so we could get into our driveway. When Tom walked over and asked him what was going on, he said, "Nothing serious."

Hmph. Nothing serious? And they don't have a suspect? A woman I know who lives down where the police line was had the skinny. A white van followed this kid and someone shot him in front of their house. Her husband heard him calling for help and called the cops. Living a block from the ghetto may not be something I can do for long. I love this house, and I love my neighbors, but this is a bit close for comfort.

In other news, my mom called yesterday, a rare event these days. Her retina is partially detached again and this time they can't blame her blood pressure, which is normal. so they will have to make up some new reason for her going blind. She has a wide swatch of black across her right eye, her good eye, and is terrified that it will not come back this time. She has an appointment with the specialist in Hershey tomorrow. Think good thoughts.

She also took the opportunity to vent about how my sister never calls her, but admits that she never calls my sister. This however, is apparently forgivable, but my sister should call her anyway ;).

David sent a lovely sympathy card to Tom. It was very difficult when David's mother passed away. She died suddenly right before Soren was born, and we all grieved very hard. I so appreciated his thoughtfulness in sending a note.

The card said in the inside, "May peace replace your heartache" and David added, "with time anyway. Take care of yourself and each other." I thought that was very sweet. His dad even sent a xmas card to us AND a sympathy card. I am so glad that everyone tries so hard. I did so love David's family and it's too bad that relationsbecame strained when he was so ill. It wasn't so much the divoce so much as their denial of the state of his mental health that really caused problems for so long. Of course, I still think his sister is an idiot ;).

Anyway, work is going well. I am really enjoying the two classes I'm teaching. The girls are wonderful and I like teaching at a higher level. I'm still doing most of the administrative work that I love too.

Soren is going to be in the Kids Classic (get it? CLASSic?) fun meet for class kids on Saturday. I wasn't going to have her be in it at the last minute because I thought it would conflict with the memorial service on Saturday, but it's at 3 p.m. so I think we can swing it. I should really be there anyway. I'm supposed to be coordinating the damn thing, after all.

Jude has been kind of fussy tonight, but not totally. He can't decide whether he's going to yell and cry, or laugh and grin. I hope it's not an imminent sign of a personality disorder ;). Right now he's falling asleep in my arms while I type, which is lovely. He's such a dear baby.

I have had a stellar dinner of chips and dip, and now Edy's mandarin orange sorbet. How healthy! I suppose I should go to bed since Jude is asleep. I have to get up early to go to the doctor to have my foot looked at. Please please let them be able to fix it with something other than surgery. Crutches and 3 kids is an impossibility at this point.

Oh, I forgot. The girls and I went to the dentist today and got a clean bill of health, other than Emma's last molar that came in with a pit in it. Dammit. Not anyone's fault though. The hygeinist said that the girls have the cleanest teeth she's seen in a long time. Hmmm.. I always wonder if they say that to everyone, or if other people allow their kids to be slovenly ;).

Yummy

I love how Jude sticks the first two fingers of his hand in his mouth and just sucks and sucks! It's so cute :). And how he just pooped so much that it came out of his diaper all the way to his shoulderblades and it ended up all over his arm and back and leg and socks. God, he's lucky he's cute!

Thanks so much for all of the good thoughts and condolences. We had a very loving and calm weekend with my MIL and basically just spent time together, trying to take it all in. Tom and I took the girls to the science museum yesterday for a couple of hours and we went out to eat with a gift certificate, since we have no money again and didn't feel like cooking.

It turns out that his job doesn't offer any bereavement leave so he will lose at least 2 days worth of work since he took off Friday and today, and oh, he doesn't get Christmas off either, since it's a Saturday. Bah. Damn place. I really need to look into other insurance options through the state and see if he could go back to working for himself. This is ridiculous.

A friend of his is going to sublet the basement of the townhouse though, so we'll get a bit more income starting in January, which may offset the annoyance factor of his fecking job.

Today we're going to try to clean up the house a bit and I have to work tonight. He's on call, so he has to go there anyway, so I'll be juggling baby during teaching tonight, which worries me a bit. I'll be doing that NEXT week too. Gotta love it.

Anyway, thanks again - a friend of mine even dropped off a meal yesterday, so that will help tonight with not having to worry about cooking and all that crap. I swear, I hate having to plan meals at the best of times, let alone when things are not going well.

We spent the day with my MIL yesterday and went to the funeral home to help her make arrangements. I believe the memorial service will be a military funeral at 10:30 a.m. next Saturday at Thomas Funeral Chapels in Greece.

We were all horrified at what a sales pitch a funeral is. The urns themselves are ridiculously expensive. It turns out that Tom, packrat that he is, and jack of all trades, had worked for a monument shop years ago and had two urns. We decided to use one of those rather than buy one from the funeral home and the lady was clearly very disappointed in us that we weren't going to spend a thousand dollars on one. The whole experience was pretty depressing.

The girls spent the day with my friend Lauren (bless her forever and ever!) and Emma stayed overnight with her friend Andrea, whose parents are also taking her to her meet in Dunkirk today. I am feeling horribly guilty about not going, but I think she should go and try to live her normal life, but I feel that I should be here with Tom and his mother. Emma was very cool about it and I'm sure she had a blast staying there.

Ginny is going to tape the meet for me, so at least I'll get to see it after the fact.

At some point I need to go and get wrapping paper and start wrapping presents. The holidays are really a PITA ;). Bah humbug .

Anyway, we're all coping miraculously well. Perhaps it just hasn't hit us all yet.

Robert Hall 1926-2004

Tom's father passed away early this morning. I'm headed off to MIL's house to be with the family.

Critters and FIL

When I got to the townhouse last night (we were staying in the 'burbs, since Tom was on call), he quietly called me into the kitchen and told me he had had the strangest call ever. On top of the fridge was a clear box with a critter in it. I'm not a connoseiur of rodents, but it was definitely a rodent and appeared to be domesticated. It was fuzzy and cute anyway ;).

A woman had called because they had this critter in their townhouse (not really the complex's maintenance problem - they have an exterminator), so he went over to check it out because she thought it might be a rat (she hadn't had a close look at it). Her teenage son trapped it under a bowl.

Anyway, I took it to Petco today, where a tatooed and pierced young man cooed and loved over our new teddy bear hamster ;). I have never *wanted* to own a hamster, although I've considered a guinea pig, but I appear to have one now. It's very very cute. Long hair and with quite the personality. It doesn't seem to mind being handled, although I'm squeamish about it. I'm waiting till Tom gets home to let the kids play with it out of the cage. Mostly because I'm afraid it will get loose and the cat will eat it.

The girls named her "Tibby" which I think is a stupid name, but if they clean the cage they can name it whatever they want!

I'll try to take a picture of her at some point soon.

Tom's father has been placed in hospice, but at the hospital. He is really struggling for air and is failing. The hospice director says she expects that he may pass by the middle of next week. They are going to start giving him morphine to keep him comfortable.

Emma has another meet this weekend. we need to get a gift for a grab bag. Two of her friends on TOPS are her age and are moving from Level 5 to Level 6 in the middle of this season! They are two of the youngest but best gymnasts in the state in Level 5 - amazing kids. They're just not challenged in level 5 already. It's really neat to see how excited they are :)

Jude gets better at grabbing things every hour. I think he is staying awake at night to practice. I haven't gotten a lot of sleep the last couple of nights.

The girls went on a playdate (I went too!) today. We had a lovely time. Emma stayed longer than Soren and I and went to visit another neighbor down the street that homeschools. They apparently made some sort of script and play and videotaped it. I hope to see it! The girl goes to LCG too. Seem like nice folks!

Anyway, I need to motivate the girls to get into bed. Soren's on the phone with her dad right now, which could take awhile ;).

Jude

He is so cute! He's starting to get a grasp of the fact that his hands are his - they are connected to his body and he can use them for evil purposes! He grabbed the cat's whiskers yesterday, and loves to grab my hair (that's an easy target!). He also likes to grab my thumb, because he likes my thumb ring, and he talks to it for a long time.

He's cooing and babbling and likes to be held sitting up so he can see what's going on in the world. I sat his swing up on a more upright setting today and that made his day! I keep it in the kitchen so I can cook and talk to him at the same time, since I spend so much time there. He isn't like the girls - he likes to be held, but it's not a *necessity* all the time, and he enjoys swinging while we chat and smile and listen to music and do dishes.

He also has learned how to straighten his legs out to make diaper changes more difficult. And he hates the carseat. And he's drooling like crazy all the time. And loves to chew on his hands, my hands, the girls' hands, anything! He held a small chew toy for about 20 minutes the other day, mostly because I don't think he knew how to drop it. Boy, did that make him mad after a while!

Anyway, he's cute and wonderful and someday I'll brave WalMart again and get more pictures developed!

Ouch

Soren burned herself yesterday. She got a mug of hot water out of the microwave, that she was heating for tea, and it spilled down the front of her. Thankfully, I was right there, and literally tore her shirt off her and dumped her in the sink. She has a second degree burn the size of a 50 cent piece on her stomach and some small dot-like burns on her chest. We kept cold compresses on it for an hour and she cried herself to sleep. After some motrin and a good night's sleep, she's feeling much better. Poor kid :(. She was feeling well enough to do gymnastics last night, but was definitely hurting by the time we went home.

Next time, I'll just make the water hot in the teapot like I usually do :-/

Lions, Tigers and Doctors Oh My!

I had my doctor appointment this morning. It turns out I have an ongoing muscle spasm in my thigh - the oliotibial muscle or something. I have to see a physical therapist for some home exercises to d.

I also have an referral to an orthopedist for my toe spur. What fun!

She checked Emma's neck and it's definitely a swollen lymph node. She wants her back in a month if it's not smaller than my thumbnail.

The heating pad seems to be helping the muscular issues w/ Emma's neck, so we'll keep that up. I made her a rice sock, and she loves that!

Tom's father is going to be moved to hospice. Hopefully they can find something near the house. So sad :(. He was doing better for a couple of weeks, but hasn't been eating again and is having more trouble breathing.

We got the solstice tree up this weekend and finished decorating it this morning, along withe rest of our decorations. Now I just have to sweep up needles and get laundry put away.

I need to make a grocery run. We're kind of low on food around here. Finally running out of leftovers, although I've got lots of frozen soup I could thaw I guess.

I get so sick of cooking sometimes. I need to be inspired! I need some good quick crockpot recipes that have meat. Any ideas?

Pinky Stone

No, that's not a porn star. It's the name of the meet that Emma competed in today ;).

Although she sobbed for about a half hour because she didn't get a medal, she increased her overall score by almost 4 points, and that is pretty impressive, considering that this meet is probably scored a bit harder than the last one, given that it's a state qualifier. That means that if a girls scores a minimum of 28 points at any given state qualifying meet, they get to go to the state meet (or Team Cup for Level 4's) in June. She did! 32.45 points. She was actually one place away from getting a medal for uneven bars, poor kid, but there were 50 kids competing in her division, and they went out 12 places for prizes, so it's not so bad to be one of 38 kids who did *not* get a medal! Duh. She finally calmed down. I think she was really tired and starving and had to pee too, which all contributed.

The best news is that her team won *first place!* This is the first time in memory that Level 4 has one first place, not to mention so early in the season, and they beat Orchard Park, which is a first for us too!

Emma finally chilled out and admitted that the two most important things had happened: she had fun, and she did her best :). Next week will be another chance.

2 (1/2) mo. checkup

Jude grew a ton! 24" long (85th percentile) and 12 lb. 9 oz. (75th percentile) and 16 1/2" head circumfrence. He was a sweetie the whole appointment and everything checked out great. We delayed vaccines until 4 mo. Our doctor is really pushing for DTaP to start then. We'll see. She was cool about waiting for other stuff since we're hsing and bfing.

Tom also saw the doctor. He still hasn't had his cholesterol checked (tsk, tsk) and promised to go one morning before work since the lab opens at 7:30 a.m. and it's a fasting test. She also encouraged him to make his other specialist appointment for right after the holidays so it doesn't get pushed back and further, since he's put off making that appointment too.

She made sure his back and shoulder are hanging in there.

She was glad he has his testing scheduled already - Dec. 20. Hopefully we'll get *some* answers from that.

He got the flu shot, since he's pretty severely asthmatic and she gave him a long talk about not letting bronchitis go too long.

He was fretting and moaning about how long it all took, but I told him to hush up. The $15 he lost at work while at the doctor is not worth anything compared to his health.

Emma developed this HUGE (bigger than a quarter) lump on the side of her neck, so I asked her about that. she said it's probably a lymph node, but if it doesn't go down in a month, to bring her in. Then I remembered that she had had a spider bite or a mosquito bite 2 weeks ago, both of which she is extrememly allergic to, and she said that it was probably caused by that. She also wants Emma to have 2 neck massages a day and to put heat on her neck as often as possible becuase of her muscular pain from gymnastics. She said if that doesn't improve soon, or it becomes a burning pain, that she wants to see her in a couple of weeks.

I have an appointment Monday to address the pain in my leg and my toe. Geez!

LAM

Or lack thereof. Damn. I went 15 mos. postpartum w/ both girls before getting my menses back. 2.5 months, and I got my period today. Shit.

Guess it's because he sleeps so well at night and isn't a big nurser like the girls were. He rarely if ever comfort nurses.

I hate getting my period, but this explains my moodiness lately! It really *was* PMS!

u/s results

Were normal for Jude! Yay. So we're off the UTI train for now. He has his 2 mo checkup tomorrow. It was supposed to be today, but the dr. had a death in the family and needed to reschedule Tom and Jude's appointments.

He is getting too strong and squiggly for me to sit with at my desk right now while I type. He's trying to roll and turn and sit up and grab things and is generally not interested in quietly nursing while I surf ;). Imp!