Cicada Song

Junabun's Stats

2011-10-27T00:45:00.001-06:00

This week I took Junabun in for her 6 month checkup. She weighs 20 lbs and is 29 inches, which puts her in the 100th percentile for weight and 110th for height. Way to go, Juju! Her head is 55th percentile.

She continues to be a delight in our home. She is very good natured and easy going, and has a high tolerance for the abuse she suffers at the hands of her big brother, who just wants to love her to death.

(Recently I was talking to a friend whose daughter is Gulliver's age and is able to talk much more than Gulliver can. She doesn't have any younger siblings, but when she was shown a baby, and asked if she thought he was cute, she said, "I want to hit him." I laughed about what we would hear from Gulliver if he could articulate his own thoughts so well. "I want to hit her in the head repeatedly with this balloon." "I want to roll over her again and again and again." What we DO get from Gulliver on a regular basis is, "I la loo, June." So sweet.)

Junabun loves to eat, so when we eat we'd better be prepared to share something with her, or else she eyes us jealously and complains a little. Recently I shared my favorite pineapple Greek yogurt with her. We polished up the container of it, and when I walked away, she got very VERY angry. Far be it to deny her the delicious yogurt, I opened up another one and we ate up all of that, too. Again, when I got up, she got REALLY mad. But I didn't want to see what eating more than a full container of yogurt would do to her, so I called it quits there.

Juju learned to roll over probably a month ago now (close to the end of 5 months, beginning of 6 months). She does well sitting up by herself, and she's starting to think about crawling. She prefer's Gulliver's toys over her own age-appropriate toys, and loves to stick dinosaurs' tails in her mouth and make me go crazy.

One of Gulliver's favorite activities is sitting down with the iPhone and looking over past photos and watching videos. He recently found the following video (he was in bed when it happened) and was enjoying watching it, but a little over half of the way through, he discovered something amazing! Junabun says "Egg!" She does say it very clearly although it's never something I would have noticed if Gulliver hadn't. He is BEYOND excited about Juju's first word. Every time he watches the video, he waits for it, and then says, "Egg!" with Junabun. He also tries his best to get her to say it again, coaxing her, "Egg! Egg!"

We are loving being parents of these two kids! Right now I'm getting ready for Halloween, and I just am putting the finishing touches on the costumes. Gulliver, Junabun and I will be sheep from Shaun the Sheep (Gulliver will be Shaun). We are not sure yet whether Murray will join us as the farmer (if only we could figure out how to do it without buying a bald cap and some red hair...).

Living the Good Life

2011-10-22T00:14:00.000-06:00

[First, quick excuses: Work, work, work. But I want to blog consistently again, so here's a fresh start! To catch up on SOME things you've missed, check out my mom's blog! There are beach pictures!]

Recently Murray and I were talking about the fact that what we do doesn't require us to be anywhere specific geographically, as long as we can get a good internet connection. So that considered, why didn't we move somewhere more exotic for a couple years while we could! The trouble is: 1) I'm not adventurous like that, 2) I like to be near family, and 3) I'm not adventurous like that.

This Monday, Murray and I drove the Alpine Loop on a whim. Fall is by far my favorite season. I find it energizing! And I didn't want to miss the opportunity to get outside and see the beautiful fall leaves. So we packed up our little family, packed a picnic lunch, and headed out. The views and the colors were amazing, and it felt SO GOOD to be outside and doing something together as a family. We stopped at Cascade Springs to eat (no food down at the springs, so it was a parking lot picnic) and enjoyed the little hike to the springs. Again, it was beautiful, and everything felt incredibly fresh.

Gulliver loved being out on the trails and enjoyed looking for the grasshoppers. He brought two dinosaurs with him, so when we saw the grasshoppers, we had to stop and pretend that the dinosaurs were going to eat them, and that would make them jump. Great fun! All week, he's been talking about grasshoppers, dinosaurs, and the sleeping grasshopper (hint: it wasn't sleeping).

Junabun enjoyed the fresh air and the stroller ride, and I think she PARTICULARLY liked being taken OUT of the stroller to get some more personal attention.

After our jaunt at Cascade Springs, we started talking about all the wonderful things that surround us here in Utah, and decided that maybe it's wisest instead of moving away to seek a fun experience for a couple years, we should make a list of things to do here and actually do them! (This isn't the first time we had this idea... we thought about this a couple of years ago, but didn't do anything about it officially.)

So this week, I've had that in mind. Yesterday morning, Murray was working at home, and Junabun was napping. We haven't used our bikes all year. Or all last year. Or really more than once since we got married, if we're being totally honest. In fact, we had decided recently that we should probably just sell them. Well, instead I went out, pumped up the tires of Gulliver's Boot Scoot bike and pumped up the tires of my bike. We tried Gulliver's bike---which he loved---but his legs still are not quite long enough. So I put him on the high bar of my bike and we started riding around. What started out as a little ride around the parking lot turned into a ride of over an hour, and several miles! Gulliver enjoyed ringing the bike bell half the time, and we both enjoyed talking to one another. It was sweet to have him so close (he said, "I love you, Mumma" a dozen times) and to have a little date with him.

Today, we continued the trend of taking advantage of what we have here in Utah. We planned a fun trip to see Murray's sister's family in Moroni. It was so much fun! We prepared a ~~healthy~~ delicious lunch of Navajo tacos that was almost all carried away by flies (they were out in full force!). They allowed me to drive the Ranger (a cross between a four wheeler and a Jeep) up Maple Canyon with Murray and Gulliver. Gulliver loved it and kept pointing forward and yelling, "Gooooo!" He did NOT want to stop and look at the cows, he wanted to goooooo! (Murray, ever the protective father, urged me to not take the gradual turns at my reckless speed of 15 mph.)

After our little family spin, we went back to the cabin and loaded up everyone onto various vehicles and headed out again! This time even Junabun joined us (Murray, ever the protective father, made sure that both she and I were belted in). Murray, a little out of character for his artist personality, got his very own four-wheeler. After we were on the road, Gulliver looked back and gasped in admiration, "Daddy!" This time I was NOT driving, and we rode up very bumpy terrain. I think that both Gulliver and Junabun were thrilled!

During our ride, we went to an apple orchard where we were able to pick our own apples. Gulliver was at first interested in the ones on the ground (easy pickings!) until we told him those were yucky. After that, he'd just look at them and say, "Gross. Yucky." Sister M helped him to pick an apple from a tree and wipe it clean, and then he bit into his delicious treat! An apple just perfectly sized for him! I think that he ended up eating at least four! He decided he was a big big fan of the orchard.

But as good as the orchard was, nothing could prepare him for what was next. Murray's sister's family are turkey farmers, and they got a new batch of baby turkeys last week. So we took Gulliver to the turkey shed to see what he thought. I mostly expected him to be afraid, since he's going through a scaredy-cat phase lately where EVERYTHING is scary. Instead, he was SMITTEN with the baby turkeys and did not hesitate to want to touch one. At first he was very gentle and cautious, but he eventually became fairly confident... so we got him out of there before he could get TOO confident. He did NOT want to say goodbye to the baby turkeys (he saw a "sleeping" baby turkey, too... oh, when do we teach him about life and death??). But that's okay, because next on our whirlwind tour was seeing the BIG TURKEYS. We went to the big turkey shed, and unfortunately Gulliver seemed just as confident with these as he was with the babies... so needless to say, I didn't even let him NEAR them!

After saying goodbye to ALL the turkeys, it was time to head back to the cabin and order some pizza. What a good day! After pizza, we even enjoyed a bon fire and some star gazing (Gulliver, who LOVES to sing Happy Birthday, performed several rounds of the song and vigorously tried to blow out the fire).

What a perfect day! We are very grateful for our Moroni family for having us over and showing us a good time all day! I look forward to hearing what Gulliver has to say about everything tomorrow. Tonight, he was so tuckered out, that he only lasted about 3 minutes in the car. (After 2 minutes, he suddenly exclaimed, "Hat!!" and put his hands to his hatless head. I reassured him that we had his favorite hat, and pulled it out for him. He put it on and was asleep within about a minute.)

The Babysitter

2011-07-13T00:38:00.001-06:00

So tonight was a big night for Murray and me. Tonight for the first time, we got a real babysitter instead of just using Murray's parents. We have done this out in Maryland twice, but my parents arranged all of that. This time it was totally us.

We chose Miss Precocious, who is basically family. She is eleven and lives relatively close to us. She is also a very smart, very cool girl.

The whole experience was revelatory. Like, whoa, I'm totally on the other side of this now. I now know what it's like to be the parent instead of the babysitter. These were my insights as I prepared for our sitter today:

1) Parents are not super old. When you're the babysitter, they seem really really old. But now that I'm the grownup, I realize how young (and beautiful!) we really are! We are not old. And we are really cool. I promise.

2) Parents are going out and doing interesting, not boring things. A party with other grownups? Fun! A meeting with local artists and creatives? Fun! And the people we are hanging out with are not old! (Okay, I think my main revelation of the evening was that I'm not old.)

3) I really wanted to be the cool house. I wanted to have good entertainment and good food. As a babysitter, I NEVER opened the cupboards in the kitchen, even if I was told to help myself. Now I realize that the parents really meant it when they said, "Make yourself at home!" So I hope our babysitter made herself at home... Even if she didn't eat any of the delicious chocolate cookies I left out for her.

4) The parent is more worried about their own kids' behavior than the babysitter's behavior. At least that was the case with me. What if Gulliver poops?? Oh no! What if he poops?? (Gulliver kicks and squirms during poopy diaper changes, and it is a very difficult job to change that diaper!)

I left a long list of written instructions because I know I would have liked something to refer back to. And I left a Gulliver dictionary to help her decipher his language.

All in all I think it was a successful night (but I didn't get to talk to her, since Murray made it home before me and drive her home).

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Surprise

2011-07-05T08:48:00.001-06:00

What is more surprising than a blog post from me these days?

Finding THIS in your kitchen in the morning.

This means that either the Keebler elves got busy in my kitchen last night, or Murray, who was awake with the baby, got desperate enough for sugar cookies to make them himself.

If you know Murray, who never made Kraft Mac n Cheese on his mission because it was "too involved" and who has never understood why you would have to put ingredients in your recipe in a certain order ("they all get mixed in anyway"), then you would understand how incredibly monumental this is!

Not only did I find these cookies but I found the ROLLING PIN. Which means that these are not drop sugar cookies, they are rolled sugar cookies. (I bet he skipped the "refrigerate one hour" step.)

We don't have any cookie cutters though... So I'm wondering what he did about that part.

My favorite part of course is the gigantor cookie over in the corner, which I imagine was made from the dough scraps.

Well done, Murray! You've proven you can make sugar cookies! Next up: Dinner tonight!

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

The Birth Story

2011-05-03T16:59:00.000-06:00

So this is how birth with Baby June went down.

On Saturday, April 2, I went up to Salt Lake City to watch the morning session of General Conference with my siblings. It was a lot of fun, but on the way home, I was feeling WIPED OUT and really felt like I needed to nap. So I went down for a big, long, luxurious nap and when I woke up, I was feeling a little crampy, which I hoped meant something! (I didn't go into labor with Gulliver, so I didn't really know what to expect.)

I went downstairs, and we soon realized that I was getting contractions if I sat for a while and then stood up. So my mom and I kept experimenting with this to see how long I needed to sit before standing to bring on a contraction. (For example, at the beginning, if I was sitting for 20 minutes and stood up, I'd have a contraction. If I was sitting for 10 minutes and stood up, I wouldn't have a contraction.) This part was actually very fun, and the contractions weren't horrible. It was pretty fun to feel them climb and get more painful, and then fade away. As they got a little more intense, I'd just close my eyes and breathe, and then as they faded out, I'd announce, "I think that was a 6 on the pain scale!!" Since they weren't happening on their own, we sent Murray off to Priesthood session and dinner, and just told him to keep his phone on him.

While he was gone, my mom and I continued to bring on contractions by resting and moving. Gulliver was with Murray's mom, so I was free to just labor. And labor was FUN! In fact, we even went out to get some frozen yogurt, and during that trip, the contractions started to come on their own. Still, it was all very manageable, and definitely fun.

When Murray came home from Priesthood, we put on a movie. Since I was in labor, I got to choose what to watch, so I chose Morning Glory. When one is in labor, one wants to watch frivolous, meaningless, funny, girly movies. Or at least I do. Again, I kept standing up during the movie if contractions didn't come on their own. By the time the movie was done, it was about midnight, and contractions still weren't regular. But we all knew that I wouldn't be sleeping, either. Bummer.

We sent my mom to bed, and then Murray and I tried to get some sleep while still timing the contractions. We used the iPhone's stopwatch, which has a "lap" function. So I was able to press "lap" each time I had a contraction, and it automatically kept a list of the timing between contractions. Brilliant! While I was lying down in bed, they were still irregular, but I felt like they were getting a little more intense, and I felt like if I were up, they'd be more frequent. So I told Murray that we should just go to the hospital. We woke up my mom and took off. This was about 2:00 a.m.

There was a storm that night (that put a lot of women into labor... the hospital was pretty busy when we were there) and it started to get bad as we were driving to the hospital. The rain was turning into snow, and it was pretty messy. But I told everyone that there was no hurry, so we drove calmly to the hospital. (Murray drove calmly. My mom hit a pylon.) It was during the car ride, and during a contraction, that Murray asked me a question. After the contraction, I politely told him that probably he should not ask questions when he can see that I'm in the middle of a contraction.

At the hospital, as we were walking in, I started having a contraction, so I just stopped walking to wait through the contraction. My mom started saying something, and Murray told her, "Cicada needs ABSOLUTE SILENCE during contractions." And then I started laughing in the middle of my contraction. Good times at the hospital!

To be honest, labor up until now was all pretty fun, even though I did prefer not to be asked questions during contractions. AFTER contractions, conversation could totally resume as normal. We did a lot of joking and laughing. We got checked in no problem. I didn't request the jacuzzi room because I didn't really see myself using the jacuzzi anyway. I didn't have to have an IV since I wasn't getting an epidural, but they did do a hep-lock, which was totally fine.

I didn't really use any special laboring positions because I didn't really feel like I needed them. I spent a lot of time in the bed because I was tired and because I was comfortable there, but I did get up and walk around the room a little, and sit in the glider chair in the room. The contractions were still all bearable anyway, so I didn't really see any need to try out any special positions.

At about 5:30, the doctor came in and offered to break my water. She explained that if she did that, things would get really intense, pretty fast. She said that it would be as intense as it would get anyway, but that it would be more intense sooner. So that sounded like a good option. After Murray and I discussed it (because I was just a little bit chicken about the whole "getting intense" part), we decided to have her do it.

She broke my water, and guess what? Things started getting a lot more intense, pretty quickly. While I had been kindof humming through my contractions previously, now my humming got a little more intense. Maybe kindof groaning. A nurse showed Murray how to put counter pressure on my knees, though, and that was a HUGE HELP. As in, I couldn't have done it without him!! And he was working pretty hard, too. I was the one saying, "Push! Push!"

I know because my mom was there that this more intense part was an hour and a half, but it felt more like 30 minutes or 45 at the most. The contractions were right on top of one another, and poor Murray's arms were shaking as he was pushing on my knees.

At least I can say that there was no point that I even considered asking for the epidural. So that I think is a major win for me.

Towards the end, I started to lose it. The doctor was there. They were saying that I was mostly all the way dilated, but that there was a little lip still, that possibly the baby would be able to push past. They were telling me that I could push when I felt the urge, but I wasn't feeling the urge yet. But just for good measure, I started pushing anyway, because I was feeling DONE. I was really worried that for some reason, things would just STALL right there, and I'd be stuck feeling this way for HOURS. And I think maybe when that thought crossed my mind was the first time that I yelled. It was, I thought, uncontrollable, but when the doctor told me, "Stop yelling and focus on your breathing," then I WAS able to stop yelling and I felt like I could control it. Until, of course, the next contraction, and then I was yelling again. Ha. It really felt like I wasn't myself, and I was definitely a little embarrassed, because I was hoping that magically I'd be able to do the whole thing perfectly.

BUT. It was only about 5 minutes of hollering (again, I'm going on my mom's word on this, because if you asked me, I'd tell you that I only yelled twice, and the total duration of yelling was probably just 2 minutes), suddenly I HAD A BABY. It was crazy. I could feel her move down, and then all of a sudden she was out, head first and then shoulders! And then they put her on my chest, and there was my baby!!

I continued making a lot of noise, apparently (thanks, Mom, for letting me know these details) because all I could say was, "Wow! Wow! Wow! Wow!" Over and over again. This was at 7:45 in the morning.

Now, I've always heard about the amazing rush, like drugs, that you supposedly get after natural childbirth. Maybe that rush was the Wow Wow Wow part. Because IMMEDIATELY after, there was the CRASH. The I-Haven't-Slept-All-Night-and-I-Just-Had-a-Baby crash. It was during this crash (and while the doctor was sewing up my very little tear, I might add) that my mom took this choice photo.

Thank you, Mom.

When it was all over, I told Murray and my mom that I didn't know if I'd be able to do that again.

Two hours later, when my maternity nurse came to get me, she told me, "I heard you when you were delivering! I thought, oh! That must be the natural mom that I'm getting today!" I told her that even after just two hours, I was already starting to forget just how bad it was, and I was already starting to think, I might be able to do this.

Now, an entire month later, I can tell you, I LOVED it, and I would do it again. Even if it would cost the same (ultimately, between the anesthesiologist and the extra day at the hospital, the epidural would have cost me about $3000), I would choose to go natural. The reason is that I did bounce back very quickly (although I got the shakes, which everyone always said was an epidural side effect, but the doctor explained is just a normal reaction to child birth), and recovered very very well. It's hard to say exactly what was a benefit of going natural or not. I can't say that everything good about this experience was due to natural childbirth, and everything bad about the last experience was due to the epidural. (And for the record, my last experience was a very positive experience. I did have more recovery, but I don't know how much of that was because it was a first baby, and how much of that was because I had an epidural.) But overall, I figure that if what we're really talking about is an hour and a half of pain, I'm happy to forego the epidural. (I TOTALLY would get it if I knew that I'd be experiencing the more intense pain for an extended period of time!!)

So there you have it. My natural childbirth experience! I recommend it, if you're curious! As far as hypnobirthing goes, I think the two big things I got out of it were 1) I didn't go into labor afraid of the pain, so I know that I didn't bring any of that tension into the experience, and 2) the breathing techniques did give me something to focus on during the contractions and definitely helped me to be calm and have an enjoyable labor.

And now for a few photos of the baby at 2 weeks, taken by Nicole Hill Gerulat!

I'm Alive!

2011-05-03T16:07:00.000-06:00

It's been forever since I posted. So let me do the quick recap:

I had a baby.

I had a few more gallbladder attacks.

My mom left town.

I had gallbladder surgery.

It didn't go perfectly.

I was in the hospital for four days (it was supposed to be outpatient surgery).

Two of those days cost $32,000. I just got the bill.

Don't worry. While my insurance doesn't cover having babies, it DOES cover gallbladders, so I don't actually have to pay that. But still. $32,000 for two days in the hospital... and that DOESN'T count the actual surgery itself. Wow.

I stayed a few days with Murray's parents.

I came back home, but made Murray stay home with me.

I took lots of naps.

And NOW, a month after having my sweet adorable baby (exactly one month from today) I finally feel like I'm back to my normal self. I'm taking maternity leave, which is wonderful. Yesterday and today, I've felt like SUPER MOM. I've been taking care of two children, cooking proper balanced meals, cleaning the house, addressing and stamping birth announcements, going on family walks to promote a healthy lifestyle, and generally loving life (the sudden GOOD turn in weather may also be contributing to my overwhelming sense of joy right now).

And RIGHT NOW... right at this VERY MOMENT... BOTH my children are napping. So I actually have time to update the blog. Let's see if I can write about the birth story while they're still sleeping!

She's Here!

2011-04-12T21:21:00.000-06:00

Our little baby girl arrived Sunday, April 3rd at 7:41 a.m., weighing 9 lbs. 2 oz and measuring 20.5 inches.

I haven't posted about it because I have barely even touched a computer, which has been blissful!

Serve with Mashed Potatoes and Gravy

2011-03-25T00:52:00.000-06:00

Okay, if you didn't read that last post, PLEASE read this.

DISCLAIMER: I express strong opinions here which are entirely my own, and I make no effort to be diplomatic. If you have a different opinion from me, my intent is not to offend, but you can hardly blame me for how I feel about this subject!

Okay. Phew. Now that THAT's out of the way.

So I know that I've talked about health insurance before. It's tricky when you're self employed. And here in Utah, there's no maternity coverage. So if I wanted to have an epidural, I would have to plan on spending about $2000.

That seems like an awful lot of money to spend on something that only lasts a few hours. And sometimes they're not even administered properly and so I wouldn't get the relief anyway, and I would STILL have to pay for it. So I may as well spend the money on something I really WANT instead of on the anesthesiologist.

In this case, this is what I really want:

Isn't it beautiful? It's the only rocker/recliner I've ever seen that I wouldn't be embarrassed to have in my home (that's not the part that I thought might offend some of you... but it might, too, I guess).

So the point of this whole post is actually to tell you about what we're doing to PREPARE for natural child birth. My doctor and her PA both told me that if I don't prepare, it won't matter HOW much the epidural costs, I will get one. Okay. So I signed us up for a hypnobirthing class. By all accounts, this is an excellent method to help you through natural child birth.

I had already read the book before going to the first class, so I was pretty prepared. Not only was I prepared for the good stuff that I could buy into, but I was also prepared for the anti-medical stuff, that I don't have as much of a tolerance for. I know that the medical system isn't perfect, but I also know that swinging totally the other way and resisting any and all medical help isn't the answer, either. (It helps that we have a doctor whose opinions we really trust, and who we know has our best interests in mind.)

What we WEREN'T prepared for was the pot roast.

At our second class in the home of our hypnobirthing instructor, as soon as everyone was comfortably seated, our instructor apologized for any lingering smell of pot roast, explaining, "I've been processing placenta today, so you might still be able to smell it." She went on to describe what she does. She cooks the placenta, then dries the placenta, then pulverizes the placenta, and then encapsulates the placenta into gel gaps so that you can ingest it as pills.

(To do all of this, you need a license, and so to my minor relief, she also explained the process of how she then has to clean and sterilize the entire kitchen and any tools used... but you'd better believe I won't be drinking another glass of water in her house again!!)

This, my friends, is what we call CANNIBALISM! (This is the part where you may choose to be offended if you are a placenta-eater.) Oh my GOSH! There are NO WORDS! Except that there ARE words, and those words are HOLY CRAP, I HAVE SMELLED THE SMELL OF HUMAN FLESH THAT HAS BEEN ROASTED FOR THE PURPOSE OF EATING!!

I HAVE SMELLED CANNIBALISM!!

And the rest of that evening, any time we were doing a relaxation exercise, I couldn't actually relax because just as I was relaxing,

OHMYGOSH I JUST GOT ANOTHER WHIFF OF POT ROAST!

(If I could make that text flashing, I WOULD because THAT is how I felt.)

Okay, so the REASONING is that there are nutrients in the placenta. (Which, after we told my doctor about this today, and after she expressed the appropriate amount of horror, she pointed out that there probably aren't very many nutrients LEFT once you process it.) But you know what? There are also nutrients EVERYWHERE in the human body, and it's not as if I'm going to request my gallbladder once it's removed so that I can stew it up. I also didn't keep my bunions (but there was calcium in those boney outgrowths! And now I've lost that calcium FOREVER). And if Murray had to have a leg amputated (because we talk about weird stuff like this), it's not as if we'd roast up the thigh muscle for a family dinner!

Hey, we talk about burial vs. cremation vs. making dead bodies into diamonds in my family, too. Now this is a FOURTH alternative that we'd never considered. Maybe when my mom dies, we can just process her into pills and then we can all EAT OUR OWN MOTHER! Then we can all benefit from the source from whence we originally came.

I am scarred for life.

Have YOU ever smelled the smell of roasting human flesh?

Some Thoughts on This Pregnancy...

2011-03-25T00:02:00.000-06:00

Right now, I am 39 weeks pregnant. My due date is Monday, March 28. So I figured I should do a recap of this whole pregnancy, more for my sake than for yours, but feel free to read and maybe even enjoy it!

So this pregnancy started off a little differently than Gulliver's. I did throw up (once!) with Gulliver, and I haven't thrown up at all with this pregnancy. But I did feel like my stomach would get twisted in knots early on in this pregnancy. It was hard for me to eat much without feeling sick afterwards, and unfortunately it was all the healthiest foods (that I was craving because it was summer!) that were the worst offenders, like fruits and vegetables. I could manage grapes without getting sick. Otherwise, I'd have a lot of plain foods and carbs like breads.

That cleared up at about 12-14 weeks, which was nice. The middle of my pregnancy progressed without much interesting to report---quick doctor's visits, no problems eating, the assumption that I'd have gestational diabetes during the last third, and very little overall discomfort. I even began to wonder just when it was that I got so sore last time that I couldn't roll over in bed without Murray's help.

Oh, I did have sciatic nerve pain (not so much that it really interferes with anything I need to do, but it made things like sitting on the floor, bending over, and cleaning Gulliver's toys up a little more challenging). But it actually cleared up for the most part at a certain point. In future pregnancies, when I read back on this, I'll wish I made a note of when it started and when it ended, but I can't remember anymore!

A pretty common theme with both my pregnancies so far is that I don't tend to look as pregnant as I am. I'll be honest---a lot of that is probably weight. But I've also seen women who are about my same weight, and they CAN look a lot more pregnant than I look. I chalk it up to the fact that I have a long torso and short legs.

When I entered my third trimester, I was surprised by two things. First, I was surprised to find out that I did NOT have gestational diabetes, and I wasn't even borderline. That was a big shock. I'd been planning recipes and meals to eat during that time AND I was slightly looking forward to it because it would mean that I'd be really really good about my eating. (To prepare for this, however, I ate a cupcake from my favorite cupcake place, Cupcake Chic almost every day.)

Second, I was surprised that I still didn't need Murray to turn me over in bed, and wondered if I just made that up the first time.

But by about week 32, I think I suddenly had to always have a pillow between my knees when sleeping, and it's gotten worse and worse. I'm not complaining, but I am saying that definitely the last couple of months of pregnancy is when the discomfort starts kicking in for me.

Around that same time, all of a sudden EVERYTHING was harder. Bending down, picking up Gulliver, I felt like I could hardly do anything, and that I was going to be like that for the rest of my pregnancy. But then it kindof stopped, and things got easier for me again, so I assume that the baby was just in a weird position for a few days.

Still, right now, I'm at the point where it really really is a big help if Murray will put on my pants for me.

At week 35/36, I had my gallbladder attacks and spent a little time in the hospital. And so while I didn't have to follow a gestational diabetes diet, I was put on a low fat diet (25 gr a day) instead. Which, I must say, I am enjoying for the sense of control that it gives me and for the fact that it will help me avoid putting on unnecessary weight at the end of my pregnancy (although I don't regret enjoying every single one of those cupcakes now that I can't... I knew I was preparing for SOMETHING). Also? The low fat diet saves me from MINI EGG SEASON, which is the WORST. Since I have to continue eating low fat until my gallbladder can come out 6 weeks after I have the baby, I'm looking forward to the diet helping me to lose weight AFTER the baby and while I'm nursing. Fingers crossed on that one!

Right now, I feel like I'm eating the SAME THINGS EVERY DAY. I'm working like a maniac trying to get all my projects done before the baby comes, so that doesn't leave too much time to cook. So to be totally honest, we haven't been having proper meals around here very much. I'll just make myself soup or pasta, have some yogurt and fruit, and call it a meal. I can't WAIT till my mom gets here on Monday and can start doing meals for us!! I welcome her creativity!

So I guess that basically summarizes most of the physical aspects of this pregnancy. At my first cervical check (guys can stop reading here if they'd prefer), I was about 2.5 cm dilated and 70% effaced. I'm now about 3 cm and 80%. My doctor figures that the baby will come pretty quickly once my water breaks. But since she said that, I have all these dreams about my water breaking. I was talking about water breaking with my mother-in-law and how you don't actually hear about it happening in public THAT often. She said that she always heard that if you're in the grocery store when it happens, just grab a jar of pickles and drop it. Then everyone will just think that all the mess is from the pickles. I told her that I should BUY a jar of pickles and just bring it everywhere with me. So if my water breaks in the middle of church, I can just drop my pickles and say, "Oh no! I dropped my jar of pickles!! Well.... gotta go!!"

I'm VERY glad that this baby has stayed put so far. I'm getting to the point where I feel like I'm wrapping up most of my work projects, and that everything will be manageable (there's only one project that should go beyond the baby's birth, but it's my favorite project of the year, and Murray will actually be helping out with it quite a bit). And my mom comes out on the due date. So as long as I don't go into labor in the next few days, then my mom will be able to be here and to help. And we MIGHT even have a couple of days for activities like bowling, manicures, and a trip to the dinosaur museum, all of which we did in trying to get Gulliver to come (and none of which worked, by the way).

On the whole, I actually love being pregnant. Even with the discomforts I'm feeling now. I look forward to doing this a couple more times!!

Chicken Enchilada Dump Soup

2011-03-21T14:24:00.000-06:00

Today I am on Day 3 of eating my Chicken Enchilada Dump Soup. When I have a lot going on, I don't like to stop to cook. And I am perfectly fine eating the same food day after day. So I make a big batch of soup, and it covers my lunches (and dinners if needed!) for days!

A few years ago, we had nothing to eat in our house. It was one of those raid the pantry or go to the store kinds of nights. So I started looking through the pantry at what we had, and put together a dump soup, where I just started dumping cans of food into a pot. I was a little skeptical, but I LOVED what I ended up with! Now this is a no-time staple of our household!

1 large can green enchilada sauce
2 cans diced tomatoes
1 can black beans, rinsed
1 can corn, rinsed
1-2 cans chicken
1 carton of chicken stock (really, this just depends on how much you want, but I use 32 oz)
1 onion, chopped
rice (optional)

Saute the onion (I actually skipped this step this last time to save time and to save the fat from the oil that I normally saute the onion in, and it didn't make much of a difference) until transparent.

Dump everything else in, except rice if using.

Bring to a boil.

Add rice if using (when I had gestational diabetes, I added a TINY bit of rice, since I had to watch the carbs... now that I am pregnant and on a low fat diet, then I add LOTS of rice to really bulk up the soup and give me some extra calories).

Turn to low and simmer for a while (without rice, 20 minutes... with rice, 40 minutes so that the rice gets good and soggy).

You can garnish with sour cream and cheese (both of which I could do last pregnancy, neither of which I can do this pregnancy, unless I go out and buy low fat sour cream, but the point of this soup is that you are just using what's in your cupboard anyway).

If I'm feeling REALLY fancy and I'm NOT terribly low on time, then this is also a nice addition:

TORTILLA CRISPS:

Cut a few tortillas into eight wedges each. Lay out on a greased cookie sheet. Sprinkle with olive oil and balsamic vinegar. Bake at 375 until crispy (flip and rotate them while baking), about 15 minutes, maybe. (Also an addition that I can't enjoy right now because it adds fat.)

Gulliver Loves

2011-03-08T17:22:00.001-07:00

I thought I'd do a quick post about Gulliver. Murray and I probably talk about ten times a day about how much we are in love with him. He can pretty much do no wrong in our eyes. Except for all the mischief he can get into, but even in those moments, our annoyance doesn't last very long.

Lately Gulliver loves his hat. He wants to wear his hat all of the time---even to bed if possible. The other night, Murray put him to sleep and took off the hat. For a few minutes there wasn't a peep. And then Gulliver started crying, "Hat!... Hat..." as he fell back to sleep.

This morning he looked to me like he was standing in a bread line. I was making breakfast, and he came to me wearing his hat, begging for food. He got a measuring cup out of the drawer and brought it over so that I could put some cottage cheese in it. So I let him keep it for breakfast, and he ate out of his little measuring cup this morning.

Gulliver loves toothbrushes still. This would be great if it weren't for the irrational hatred of ME brushing MY teeth. For some reason, I brush, and he STILL gets very upset, sometimes to the point of throwing a full-on fit. If this continues a little longer, he might even be able to verbalize to me WHAT is going through his head that he is SO upset that I'm brushing my teeth. (He wants the toothbrush, and it doesn't matter how many other toothbrushes I give him, if I'm brushing my teeth, he wants MY toothbrush.)

Gulliver loves books. The ones we read the most to him lately are Duck on a Bike (he asks, "Guck! Guck!"), Green Eggs and Ham (he asks, "Ham?"), and Drumheller Dinosaurs.

Gulliver still doesn't love elephants. Please don't ask me why. Murray imitates an elephant for him all the time that makes him laugh. And Gulliver has no problem making elephant noises himself. But if he ever SEES an elephant in a book, on TV, or on the iPhone or iPad, he gets very very very concerned.

Gulliver loves Mickey Mouse cartoons. Even more than his dad. It's been Murray's DREAM to collect every single Disney cartoon, and we have the complete collection of shorts on our Apple TV (I should write an entire post dedicated to Murray's Apple TV...). He constantly asks for Mee Moush? Mee Moush?(Because we are good parents, we don't constantly LET him watch Mee Moush. But hey... when you need a little down time, a little Mickey doesn't hurt.)

Gulliver loves to talk. He says a lot of things lately. He is good at saying prayers. This is a sample prayer:

Ha Far,
Good day,
Mumma
Dadda
Food
(more gibberish.... sometimes a LOT more gibberish... and he's generally good at mentioning others around the table, too)
Amen!

Gulliver also repeats a lot of questions that we ask him. So when he does something funny and we are all laughing, he'll ask, "Is it funny?" When he's eating something he likes, he'll ask, "Is it good?" On a regular basis, he asks, "Is it cute?" He also will say "I sorry" randomly.

Gulliver loves kids. He gets excited when he thinks we're about to go play with kids, and he'll say, "Kids? Kids?" He loves going to nursery at church now and we tend not to have any problems while he's there. Two weeks ago, a nursery leader brought him to me because he kept telling her he was "dirty." She couldn't smell anything, but he was insisting that he was, so she thought she'd bring him to me just in case. I thought that was funny because Gulliver usually just says "Poop!" But then I realized that I'd sent him to nursery with his favorite toy, Ghostie, who he calls "Dotie." I realized he kept trying to tell her about "Dotie." And sure enough, he wasn't dirty when I changed his diaper.

Gulliver loves Grandma and Grandpa, who have been pitching in BIG TIME lately to take care of him. He was able to stay at their house the whole time I was in the hospital. Grandma helped us to figure out how to fix his eating problem---we've had a hard time getting him to eat. But Grandma cut way back on his milk, and suddenly the boy can eat! Not perfectly all of the time, but most of the time, he's able to get in a good meal now. Big improvement! The foods he loves the most are grapes, bananas, canned peaches, yogurt, cottage cheese, and peanut butter from the spoon. He is getting better at eating some messier foods on his own, like yogurt, but he seems genuinely bugged when he spills on himself. And he says "Ow!" when he does.

Gulliver does have weird food temperature issues, where anything warm is too hot to eat. Most foods get one chance, so I try to make sure it's cool enough before he tries it, because if it's hot once, it's hot forever.

Gulliver loves riding on his rocking moose. Whenever he does, we sing Bulls-Eye's theme song from Toy Story II (just saying "da da da da da da"the whole time). So now he'll get on and start rocking, and start singing "da da da da da" himself... although sometimes he even sings "ma ma ma ma ma ma."

Right now, as I'm typing this up, Gulliver is walking around with Murray's shirt over his head so that he can't see where he is going. This is a great game. I wonder how long it's going to take before he hits his head on a sharp corner...

Gulliver loves pulling all of the shoes out of the shoe shelves. I do not love this.

Gulliver is affectionate and still loves giving kisses. Whenever it's time to leave Grandma's and Grandpa's, we ask if he can say good bye, and he goes to everyone and gives a kiss. He also continues to give kisses (sometimes VERY INTENSE kisses) to mumma and dadda.

I think that's about good for now! Gulliver loves a lot of things and we love Gulliver!

My Sudden Vacation

2011-03-01T07:21:00.000-07:00

Hello all! I'm writing you from the priciest vacation resort I have ever stayed in, also known as the Hospital! And now is when you start scrolling down, looking for pictures of my second born. Don't bother---she's not born yet. She is still safely kicking me, even as I type.

No, I came to the hospital for another, less exciting reason. The short version is that I had a gallbladder attack that made my pancreas very angry, and so I've been here for the past three days and nights, enjoying the most expensive vacation of my life (which, thanks to Aflac, which we had in place for the baby, will be significantly less expensive than it could have been).

Here are some interesting tid bits and thoughts that I would like to share with you about my stay.

******

First of all, after my first gallbladder attack and ER visit on Wednesday, I was not prepared for the two subsequent gall bladder attacks I would have in the three days following. And had I been properly prepared for these attacks, I would have been told to tough it out, and it really sucks, but there's nothing they can do until the baby comes. This is what I was told when we came back to the ER on Saturday, when the pain was unbearable and I was convinced that something was definitely very wrong.

Until they got the test results about four hours later and said, "Oh wait! Nope! Just kidding. This IS serious and we're admitting you to the hospital."

My take-home lesson of course, is listen to my body, use good sense, and if I'm 36 weeks pregnant and in the worst pain of my life, there is no need to let pride keep me from calling Uncle and heading into the ER, even if I'll be told for the next several hours that I was just supposed to tough it out.

******

During this whole gallbladder ordeal, I have reflected many times on my aunt's gallbladder removal when I was 8 years old (I am the proud FOURTH generation of women on my dad's side of the family to need a gallbladder removal---thankfully it still won't need to happen before the baby comes). There is one main reason that I remember visiting her in the hospital post-surgery, and one main reason that my memory has been the topic of much conversation over the past week. You see, when I was a sweet young 8-yr-old girl, my not-so-sweet, young, 10-yr-old brother told me an inappropriate joke. That we both thought was extremely funny at the time. So funny in fact, that I felt I should share it with my aunt in the hospital in the presence of her guests (none of us can remember who the guests were though). And the joke caused her to laugh till she was crying, and she kept saying, "Cicada! Stop! Stop telling this joke!" which I thought meant that she was REALLY enjoying it, so I made sure to tell it through to completion. Well, I'm sorry to say that the joke is entirely too inappropriate to share on the blog, so you'll never know what it was. But I HAVE repeated it to most of my family members this week as I've shared this memory with them all, and it has brought most of us to tears. Less because of the joke itself, and more because of the image of an 8-yr-old sharing the joke with her poor aunt in mixed company.

******

So let's talk insurance! The GOOD news is that I got lazy this year and did not change our insurance coverage, even though it would have meant a reduction in monthly premiums. It would also have meant that we would spend less during the year in overall medical expenses (baby excluded) IF we had a year like we had last year (well baby visits, a trip to the ER for stitches, and a few miscellaneous doctor's visits for me). It would have meant spending MORE in case of serious medical issues or accidents. Well, call it laziness, call it intuition, call it inspiration, I didn't change my policy. So while we still have to meet a hefty hefty deductible (rhymes with sore mouth and collars), that deductible is 1) for me and both children AND 2) for the whole year AND 3) means that everything else (baby delivery excluded) is covered at 100 percent! So now's the time to start making a medical wish-list of things that can be done this year. And if Gulliver needs stitches again, bring 'em on!

The OTHER good insurance news, as I mentioned above, is that we have an Aflac policy for me that was meant to help offset costs for the baby! We certainly didn't anticipate using it for anything else (besides baby #1, I have never needed to stay in the hospital!) but half way through this process, we realized, oh my goodness, there is a pay-out for this, too! So we can basically cut that [sore mouth and collar] deductible in half! Major bonus.

******

About the food. You know that people complain about hospital food. But do you know what is way worse than hospital food? No food! Because the pancreas is responsible for the enzymes needed in digestion, and because my pancreas was terribly insulted, we needed to give my pancreas a rest. For over 12 hours, that meant absolutely nothing. Not even ice chips. And then, over 24 hours after I'd last eaten anything, I was finally granted ice chips and 1/2 a popsicle every 8 hours. Wahooo! The next day, I was upgraded to clear liquids and THEN to full liquids. Bring it ON. I have never enjoyed Jell-O or chicken broth or PUDDING so much in my LIFE.

You would think that with all these restrictions, and with a baby eating away my body's stores, that I would have lost a little weight. But the bed (which has been secretly weighing me without my knowledge or consent this whole time!) reveals that I have gained three pounds. Who knew! Win for the baby, I guess!

******

As you're in the hospital for a few days, you get pretty bored pretty quickly. That is why the realization Sunday afternoon that it was OSCARS NIGHT was a huge and fantastic realization! Murray and I had a two-person Oscars party together, complete with 1/2 a popsicle and ice chips! In fine Murray tradition, he tried to fudge his numbers a little, claiming that he got more predictions right than he actually did, but don't worry. I kept him honest and reminded him of the ones he definitely got wrong. We were both excited that our prediction (and the favored film) won best picture. We loved The King's Speech. We are less excited that the decision has been made to censor it for American audiences by muting 2 of the 5 f-words to make it PG-13. I mean, I'm all about making it PG-13, but I really felt that in context, the language should not have made it R in the first place.

******

Murray's family has been wonderful to take care of Gulliver during this time. They live pretty close to the hospital, which is also very convenient. Gulliver has come to visit a couple of times. He cut his ear on his first day with Grandpa, which made me feel more sorry for Grandpa than it did for Gulliver. When Gulliver came to see me, I asked about his owie. Completely oblivious to his ear, he immediately pointed to the IV tubes in my arm, VERY concerned. We think it's funny that he knows this is an owie, because how does he know they're going into my body instead of just taped on top? Anyway, as a very concerned 2-yr-old, he made sure to give them a couple good tugs to see if he could take care of it himself. Much appreciated, Gulliver. Now I've got some good bruising there to show off as a trophy when I get out of this joint.

******

Speaking of getting out of this joint! I should get out of here today!! My blood work came back this morning and everything is back to normal. Yippeeeeeeee! Now it's simply a matter of maintaining a low-fat diet (and hopefully avoiding any further attacks) until the baby comes, and until I have the gallbladder surgery 2 weeks later! (So long Mini Eggs! Hello Marshmallow Peeps!)

(That is SO NOT EVEN CLOSE to an acceptable substitution, for the record, but NOTHING is worth the pain, not even my beloved of all candies, Mini Eggs.)

So that I think about wraps up my thoughts and feelings so far on my stay here! The staff have been excellent and overall, I've been well taken care of here! Now I just have to get ready to COME BACK here possibly some time this month! And I'll even share some pictures of that hospital stay with you. I think it's okay not to share any pictures of THIS hospital stay.

Modesty, Thy Name Is Cicada

2011-02-01T17:11:00.000-07:00

Today I went to Deseret Book to buy some materials for my CTR-5 class at church (Murray and I started teaching the 5-yr-olds in January, and we absolutely love it). Of course, being the self-absorbed design snob that I am, I only purchased materials that I had designed myself (except for some rubber CTR rings).

It does, in fact, feel a little bit weird to buy something that you, yourself made. (Also? My total came to over $40!! Holy crap! I'm expensive!)

When I was at the cash register, I had to resist every urge to say, "I made that! I'm a designer and I made all of this stuff! It's mine! All mine! Look at meeeeeee!" Instead, I said, after the cashier commented on how cold it was, "Maybe it's the fact that I'm pregnant, but everyone seems to be complaining today about how cold it is, and I honestly haven't even noticed."*

And in that fashion, I avoided embarrassing myself like Kathy Proctor.

Phew.

Murray asked me if I was going to tell the kids that I made their bookmarks and their stickers, and I told him no, because it could seem like a lie to them. Or if they went home and told their parents that their teacher made their stickers and bookmarks, the parents would think that their kids were WAY off base, and they'd correct their children and say that their teachers just GAVE them the bookmarks and stickers, not that they MADE the bookmarks and stickers, and then the children would just be confused.

*This was, in fact, another modesty moment, because what I truly wanted to say was, "Maybe everyone in Utah is just a big fat baby because I grew up in much much worse weather conditions that this, and I'm not even wearing a COAT today (sorry Mom and Dad) and when I was a kid, we didn't HAVE snow days, and we walked to and from school in -40 degree weather, and our thighs FROZE and we would have to wait for them to THAW when we got inside (which causes deep tissue itching and much redness of skin)."

Car Seat

2011-01-18T16:50:00.000-07:00

Okay, Internets. I'm at work, working hard at a MASSIVE catch up game, after spontaneously leaving the office last Wednesday (or Tuesday?), going home, crashing, and ALMOST DYING OF HORRIBLE, TERRIBLE ILLNESS.

Not really almost dying, but I wanted to die. Among the downsides of being self employed is that it's actually really hard to just call in sick. Thankfully, my clients were all incredibly understanding, and let me have time off to be sick.

My brother, El Senor, was not so understanding, and went forward with his wedding yesterday, despite my illness (thankfully by then, it had cleared up enough that I was in fact able to leave the house).

Congrats to El Senor and La Senora!! I'll come out with a post all about them soon, I promise!

But this post is about ME.

ME ME ME.

Okay, but here's a picture of Gulliver from the wedding.

Okay, NOW onto me.

And when I say "me" I mean, the baby on her way, because she is stressing me out a little. Today I had my 30-week checkup, which means that I'm now on the 2-week schedule. And then, just after a few appointments on the 2-week schedule, I'll be on the 1-week schedule. And then, just after a few appointments on the 1-week schedule, I will have a whole new human being for whom I am responsible!!

And that's if she comes ON TIME!! What if she comes EARLY???? I don't even want to think about it.

So anywho, we really haven't done much to prepare for her arrival. But I had better make a list soon.

One thing on my list is to buy a car seat for her. And this is where you come in. I would like you to simplify my process by telling me which car seat I am supposed to buy. Please chime in now.

To consider: I would like the carrier type so that she can stay asleep when she falls asleep in it. We also own a Honda Civic, and it will be one of two car seats in the back, and will more than likely have to be put on the side, not in the middle seat. I'm okay with buying a smaller type, since I would likely prefer to purchase a Britax seat to match Gulliver's when she's big enough to fit into it and move her into that (Gulliver moved into his around 7 or 8 months).

Go.

Merry Christmas!!

2011-01-07T16:05:00.000-07:00

Okay. So I did Christmas cards this year. Now, ideally, I would have sent these all out on time, and you would have all gotten them, and then I would have posted our Christmas card just in time for Christmas! But as it is we hit a few speed bumps in this, my first year of being a responsible adult and sending a Christmas card (I AM, after all, THIRTY now!):

1) We kept waiting for snow, and finally by December 12, I realized I could not wait any longer. So my sister-in-law, Tin, took the pictures for us at This Is the Place, which was an EXCELLENT suggestion, as it lent itself to still looking Christmasy. (We have ABUNDANT snow now.)

2) The NIGHT we had the pictures taken, Murray and I did them up into the Christmas card and ordered them and paid extra to have them guaranteed to arrive December 17.

3) They didn't arrive on December 17.

4) They arrived on December 23, which is significantly different from December 17.

5) I addressed them all and got them in the mail December 24!

So now that I've heard that my cards have reached the Canadians, I figure it's not spoiling anyone's surprise to post the card to my blog! I did these up as actual post cards, and one friend who received it said that at first, she thought it was junk mail, and then she recognized my face. So... you know... if you didn't get your Christmas card this year, you may blame your significant other for throwing it in the trash...

(This is just an iPhone photo of our cards... if you want to see a better version of this photo, visit our about page!)

The back, of course, has our address and personal info, but I recapped the year in haiku. Here are the poems, adapted of course to our blog names (I used parentheses where our blog names don't fit with the syllables).

We are self employed!
We take lots of vacations!
The healthcare sucks though.

Cicad(a) is pregnant.
Gullie will have a sister
by the end of March!

Gullie got stitches--
seven on his lower lip.
Don't stand in the tub!

Murr(ay)'s eyes were hurting.
He thought he was going blind.
He just needs glasses.

And for those who were paying attention, our sentiment was ALSO a haiku:

Hope you have a great
[insert holiday of choice]
and happy new year!

Belly Picture

2011-01-07T14:35:00.001-07:00

I know you're all dying for a belly picture, to remind you all that I am actually pregnant. Well here's one! Giving baby all the love she can get at Five Guys!

Today at the Hospital...

2011-01-04T20:40:00.001-07:00

Today at the hospital as I registered and got all my info in the system, the following unbelievable conversation happened:

Employee, pointing to my doctor's name at the top of the order for my Rhogam shot: So... This "Shelly" chick...

Me: Yes, my DOCTOR.

Employee: Right. I shouldn't have assumed it was a woman. It could be a man's name.

Me: My doctor is a woman.

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

By the way...

2010-12-28T23:33:00.000-07:00

I redesigned my blog today, so if you're reading this in a reader, come over and take a peek! I never really liked the last design but never had time to change it. Now I've switched to a design that I can keep indefinitely and won't get outdated. I also wrote a fancy About page if you want to read that!

Gulliver Loves...

2010-12-28T23:30:00.000-07:00

Gulliver is growing up so fast that it's hard to keep up with the things he's interested in on this blog! But here are some things to keep you up to date:

Gulliver Loves...

Ghostie. It is a little nightlight from IKEA that charges during the day and that Gulliver can take in the crib with him at night. He pronounces it GOH-tie. When you tell him it's time for bed, he usually runs and hides, but when you catch him, he asks for Ghostie. Sometimes he talks about Ghostie during the day.

Peanut butter. When you open up the pantry, he comes running over, asking for "burr! burr!" (butter). This may or may not be because Murray feeds him peanut butter on a spoon. And I may or may not have also succumbed to this habit.

Songs. Gulliver loves it when we sing him songs, and he's starting to sing more and more with us. I've been singing the song, "It's in every one of us" almost every night for the past year at least, and he can now do almost all the words with me. Of course, "One of us" is "Wuh wuh wuss." He also loves Head Shoulders Knees and Toes, and if he's around toys or dolls that are close to his size, he's been known to sing the song to them and demonstrate on them.

When I put Gulliver to bed, I sing him a song. As soon as I'm done, he whispers "Song." And then I sing another. I absolutely cannot resist him asking for more songs.

Birds. He takes after his mother! And I'm going to be a really good mother and teach him what every bird is. So when he points and says "Bird!" I say, "Yes! That bird is a killdeer!"

Angry Birds. Gulliver finally has learned how to play Angry Birds. He's been intrigued by it for a while, but he could never quite figure out how to sent the birds the right way. Now he does, and he's better than his dad.

Goodnight, Moon. This is his favorite book. We read it to him every night. He is now to the point that he is starting to recite it along with us. (Half the words are good, and half the words are only intelligible because you know what he's trying to say.)

"Baby." When it's time to cuddle, I pick Gulliver up and I rock him back and forth and say, "Baaaaaaa-by. Baaaaaaaaa-by. Baaaaaaaaaa-by." He loves this, and even says "baby" along with me. Sometimes, he'll reach up for me and ask, "baaaaa-by, baaaaa-by," letting me know what he wants me to do.

Snow. He says, "Nowss" which is really funny.

Hiding. Gulliver loves to hide when you announce any of the following: diaper change, bed time, nap time, getting dressed, getting in the car (particularly when he wants to walk to the park instead).

Colors! Gulliver is great at his primary and secondary colors! Although sometimes he will get them a little mixed up.

Well, that's what I can think of right now! More to come, I'm sure. He's just growing up so fast!!

I Turned 30!

2010-12-28T16:47:00.001-07:00

Remember that time I made 30 goals to accomplish before turning 30? And I made all the goals the day before my birthday? And then I left you hanging? So I have accomplished most of those goals, but definitely not all before turning 30.

Still to do:
-Put all adorable baby clothes for baby girl in one place.
-Make 2 real goals for the new year (they're in my head, but I need to write them down... Which will happen when I do my yearly goal accounting)

That's it! So I accomplished 28 goals. Because I still FEEL 28, folks! I'm young at heart.

Since turning 30, I have been pretty busy! In a good way! I actually took an entire week off of work, which was blissful. Murray, Gulliver and I went to Disneyland! And I have to say that we continually worry about how well Gulliver will travel, because each time he is a little older than the last. Well, once again, he was a PERFECT traveller! We couldn't believe it! Between playing with toys, napping, and playing with his own feet for four hours at a time (not even an exaggeration) he made it through the whole trip with very very minimal complaining. Also, it helps that we his parents take after MacGyver just a little. We put a few movies on my iPad for Gulliver and using my iPad's own cover and two boy scout belts, we rigged the iPad to the back of my head rest and let Gulliver watch a few movies. He watched movies all the way from Primm to California on the way there, and then only watched one movie on our way back to Utah. He could have watched more, but during that four-hour block of time when he was playing with his feet (sucking on his own socks to be honest), we were waiting for him to fall asleep for his nap.

When we booked the spur of the moment trip to Disneyland, we saw there would be rain. I took that to be a good thing because it would mean fewer crowds and it probably just meant a very light drizzle. Boy, was I wrong! (And did I mention the Disneyland tickets and hotel were both non-refundable?)

The first day started with that light drizzle I was expecting, which quickly turned into actual rain. We pulled out the ponchos we bought at walmart (and laughed at the suckers who had to buy $40 ponchos in the park) and then fairly miserably waited in lines in the rain. Murray was the first to cry Uncle, if you can believe that, considering his love of Disneyland.

We went back to the hotel, soaked through, and Gulliver was so done in that he asked, "Nap?" and ran over to his crib. Poor, poor boy!

Normally I would have live-blogged from Disneyland, but you couldn't actually take your phone out if you didn't want it to get soaked.

The second day in the park was much better, possibly due to lower expectations, possibly due to better preparation, and possibly due to heavier rain in the morning, which cut down on lines. We actually walked onto most rides. Back at the hotel mid-day the boys napped while I took every stitch of clothing we had to the laundry facility and threw it all in the dryer. Having dry, warm clothes was an experience that couldn't be described as less than euphoric. And in fact, by the time nap time was over, it had mostly stopped raining. So we went back to the park one final time and enjoyed the evening at Disneyland with short lines and that light drizzle I'd been hoping for all along.

I'll do a separate post maybe tonight where I share some photos and talk about highlights. Like Gulliver meeting Mickey Mouse, which was pure awesomeness.

Since being back, we enjoyed a very merry Christmas. I even got my Christmas cards in the mail. On Christmas eve. Bah! It wasn't my fault, though, as they were due to arrive Dec 17, and instead arrived Dec 23.

Oh, and the other major news you may have missed (this whole time I haven't been blogging, I've been active on Facebook... Consider me converted) is that I passed my gestational diabetes test today, WELL within the normal range!! This comes as good news and bad news. The good news is, no finger pricking, no diet restriction, no pee sticks, and no added medical expenses that we would have to pay! The bad news? A week after having Gulliver, I weighed less than I did when I got pregnant. I now can no longer expect such a pregnancy miracle.

Well that brings you a little bit up to speed. I'll recap Disneyland soon! Although I'm toying with the idea of just hopping on my computer and redesigning my blog quickly because I'm sooooooo tired of it and never liked this design much in the first place but haven't had time to fix it. We will see!

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

30 Before 30

2010-12-14T00:58:00.003-07:00

Well everyone, today marks a very sad day in my life. I have finally caved and joined Facebook. I have extremely mixed feelings about this new stage in my life. I kind of liked being totally off the Facebook radar.

Anyway, one of my favorite bloggers, Nicole Balch of Making It Lovely turned 30 this year. She had a list of 30 goals she wanted to accomplish before she turned 30. I thought that was a really great idea. My thirtieth is on Wednesday. I have been really really busy, but it's never too late, right? Here is a list of 30 goals to reach before I turn 30:

~~1. Join Facebook--DONE!~~
2. Gain an ounce (for the baby!)
~~3. Put Gulliver's toys away.~~
~~4. Clean the kitchen.~~
5. Clear the junk on the dining room table.
6. Put all adorable baby clothes for our baby girl in one place.
~~7. Put away the Mr. Potato Head parts in the guest room.~~
8. Make the final changes to El Senor's wedding invitations.
~~9. Feed Gulliver some vegetables.~~
10. Get two nights of sleep (technically not possible since I was born just after midnight Eastern time, which is actually Dec 14 Mountain time...)
11. Throw away all junk in our Civic.
12. Get oil changed in the Civic.
~~13. Watch a Pixar short with Gulliver.~~
14. Actually figure out what I want to do for my birthday evening with Murray.
15. Vacuum main floor.
16. Pack and send gifts to clients.
17. Sleep in. Twice. (Morning of birthday counts.)
~~18. Eat a decent breakfast.~~
19. Give Gulliver a bath.
20. Send Gulliver's portrait to my parents.
21. Make 2 real goals for the new year.
~~22. Throw away spoiled food in fridge.~~
~~23. Make a proper dinner.~~
~~24. Share at least one photo or video to Facebook.~~
25. Call my grandpa.
~~26. Chat with my mom. (Tuesday is chat day!)~~
~~27. Shower and get properly ready.~~
~~28. Fold laundry.~~
~~29. Make the bed.~~
30. Have fun with Gulliver and Murray.

Okay, wow, 30 is a LOT. Wow. Maybe I won't be so successful in accomplishing all my wonderful goals. But if I do accomplish these goals, I know I will be a better human being. Also, note to self, I may spend the last day of my 20s frantically crossing a lot of really banal chores off of a list.

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

Where's Gulliver?

2010-12-13T13:58:00.000-07:00

Can you find the toddler in this picture?

This is where Gulliver decided to hide instead of getting in the car with Murray today. Ohhhhh, Gulliver. He loves to play games!

Bad Worm, Bad Dad!

2010-12-10T09:05:00.000-07:00

Last night, Murray and I took Gulliver over to the pool for some swimming. We haven't taken him swimming since this summer, and when we walked into the pool area, his face was just like [what I hope] Christmas morning [will be]. Of course as soon as we got there and he saw the other family playing, I realized our error in totally forgetting to bring any sort of toy over. Like a ball.

Previous to last night, Gulliver was fearless when it came to swimming. What he loves most is getting out of the pool and jumping back in, into your arms. And just to mix things up a little and make them more interesting, he was always really good at running around the edge of the pool, faster than you could swim, keeping you guessing about exactly where and when he was going to jump into the pool.

Well, last night, Gulliver for some reason was being a little more cautious. He would go to Murray and then very cautiously jump into the pool. Then when it was my turn, he'd come to me, grab my hands, sit down on the side of the pool, and very carefully slide in. What happened to my jumping baby (who this summer jumped right onto my head when I looked somewhere else for 1 second)?

Of course, this gave rise to no end of gloating on Murray's part. Almost each time we tested, Gulliver would jump into Murray's arms, but for me, almost every time, he'd sit down on the side of the pool and then slip cautiously in. Murray read into it in all sorts of ways. He's the protector. He's the physical one. He is the man. He also wanted to make sure I blogged about this (am I doing a good job, honey?).

At one point, it was time to bust out another trick from this summer. This summer, when Gulliver was outside the pool and I was inside, I liked to go over to the filter vents, stick my arm in, and stick my finger up and out of one of the holes in the cover at the side of the pool. This made a little worm that Gulliver LOVED. He would laugh and laugh and try to catch it, and try to stomp on it (once or twice successfully---ouch!). Great, wonderful fun!!

Last night, I stuck my finger through the vent, and the look on Gulliver's face immediately told me that he was maybe a little bit afraid of that worm. Because I'm the tender love-giver, the sweet and sensitive mother, the nurturer, then I didn't push this game on him and gave up on the worm idea.

A little later, Murray tried the worm game. Again, Gulliver's face showed he was a little afraid. Instead of running over and playing with the worm, Gulliver immediately tried to get back into the pool as quickly as possible. Murray told me to get Gulliver out of the water again and try to get him to play with the worm. So together, Gulliver and I got out of the water and went over to the worm. He was terrified. He stop, dropped, and almost rolled right into the water. Then, he clung to me tightly. Scary, scary worm!!

Well, what do you know, for the rest of the evening, he wouldn't let Murray hold him. He certainly wouldn't jump to Murray. In fact, Gulliver was no longer interested in getting out of the pool at all (the worms might pop up if he is out there!!).

And so he clung to me. ME. His mother. His nurturer. His best friend in the whole wide world.

Murray is married to a foreigner.

2010-12-08T09:50:00.000-07:00

Most of the time, I think that Murray forgets that he married someone from another country. And considering I've lived here for over a decade and all of my adult life, it usually really doesn't even feel like I'm from another country. But then, the other day, this conversation happened:

Me: I'm feeling tough.

Murray: How so?

Me: Well, I got about five hours of sleep, and then I think I allowed myself to get too hungry before I finally ate something, so my stomach has been in a knot ever since.

Murray: That's not feeling tough. You're not feeling well. Feeling tough means... feeling TOUGH. Rrrr! I'm tough!

Me: [Thinking...] Is this a Canadian thing? You really have never heard anyone say, "I'm feeling tough?" It means you're not feeling well.

Murray: What?? That doesn't make any sense! Tough means TOUGH! We do NOT say that in the States. How am I only finding out about this NOW?

Anyway, sure enough, it's a Canadian thing. The funny thing is, I'm sure that this is probably the first time in 3+ years of marriage that I have ever even said, "I'm feeling tough" to anyone. It's not something I say all of the time, but clearly it's in my brain and will surface occasionally!

A Giveaway!

2010-12-02T09:30:00.001-07:00

Oooooooooo! There is an awesome giveaway over at Petit Elefant!

That person giving away those portraits is so generous, talented, and handsome!!

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

Gulliver's First Professional Haircut

2010-11-30T15:35:00.000-07:00

We have been very busy lately! Thanksgiving was wonderful and the food we ate left absolutely nothing to be desired (except that I dropped the ball by forgetting to bring Disgusting Turkey, but I'll redeem myself for Christmas... and it looks like I may have to blog about Disgusting Turkey in the meantime, because I figured I'd link to the post where I've explained it before, and it looks like I never have on my blog!!).

Friday, The Boy, Murray, Gulliver and I drove down to St. George to attend my Grandpa's funeral (on my mom's side). When a loved one passes away at an expected time, then funerals can be quite enjoyable, and this was no exception! I had a wonderful time with my siblings, my parents, cousins, aunts, uncles, Gulliver, and Murray. I plan on writing a little more about that later!

BUT after spending the weekend with my family, there were enough comments about Gulliver's mullet or Gulliver's long hair that I figured something needed to be done. When we got in last night, we threw Gulliver in the bath and when he was out, sat him down for a hair cut, in which I cut off his mullet (which wasn't actually a mullet---it just hung over his jacket whenever he was wearing a jacket) and was afraid to do anything else. Murray criticized my work because it was so blunt, and the hair needed blending. So he got out his trimmers and we both tried to figure out how to cut the hair of a squirmy, wet, naked 2 year old. The result was not pretty. Eventually, I called it quits, once Murray had shaved an almost-bald spot on the left side of Gulliver's head. I told Murray that we'd be taking Gulliver to a professional in the morning. Murray insisted that he be given the chance to at least try to clean it up a little, but I figured that we may as well leave as much as possible there for the professional to work with. Murray and I were NOT professionals!!

So here is a video of Gulliver's first professional hair cut. I have an "after" picture (he went in looking like a baby and came out looking like a little boy!) but it was hard to get him to sit still, so it's not the greatest. But you'll see more of it in the next few weeks, I'm sure!!

Help! Weird Baby Names!!

2010-11-18T12:33:00.000-07:00

Hello Internets! I need your help again! I am throwing a baby shower tomorrow and I need as many weird baby names as I can get. You know. We all make fun of them. My aunt knows a little girl named Super Star Eight Jemima. No joke.

By tomorrow, I need at least 20 good weird names. By 4:00 MST. Please fill out my form and don't leave them in comments! I can share them after the shower, but before the game, let's keep them a secret!!

GO!!

Mole Tattoo

2010-11-18T01:01:00.001-07:00

A conversation between me and Murray, as I administered a shot in his arse:

Me: I wish we could just get a tattoo right in the best spot for me to stick this so that I always get it right.

Murray: It could be a mole tattoo. Seriously how much do you think that would cost? Ten bucks?

Me: I have no idea how much tattoos cost. I can't imagine a mole would cost that much.

Murray: It really wouldn't be that hard. Just a brown spot.

Me: It could be irregular and that would be fine.

Murray: Yeah that wouldn't cost much at all.

Me: But can you imagine your accounting to God in the hereafter at judgment day? I mean, it's just a mole!

Murray: "I said no tattoos."

Me: "But it's just a mole! I mean, look all the ones that You did! And I just added one more!"

Murray: "I said no tattoos."

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

A Triumph of Motherhood

2010-11-16T23:22:00.001-07:00

(Note: This is a long post all about looking for and finding toys, and may not actually be worth reading unless you are familiar with the Bible and understand that when a woman finds her missing piece of silver, she's gotta share the news with all the neighbors.)

Tonight I am celebrating a true triumph of motherhood. A week ago, I had a minor medical procedure done, which, sparing you all the important and very personal details, hindered my mobility somewhat. While I could get around, I was never truly comfortable, and the basic day to day efforts of simply existing were enough for me to handle without having to worry about performing my evening duty of picking up Gulliver's toys.

(A few weeks ago Murray and I had a major clean-up and promised each other that to maintain our clean house, we would each do two things: Murray would do the dishes and clean the kitchen every night and put away his clothes properly, and I would clean Gulliver's toys every night and put my clothes away properly.)

So it's been a full week since I have picked up Gulliver's toys myself and done a thorough sorting and putting away. And in fact, it's been more than a week that certain toy pieces have been missing, but I didn't have the energy to search for them.

Tonight I spent about an hour and a half fully dedicated to nothing other than sorting, putting away, and finding Gulliver's toys.

The first to be assembled properly was the stacking/nesting cups. No big deal since those are a favorite of Gulliver's and since i find a strange pleasure in collecting them and nesting them myself.

The next was 7 out of 8 stacking rings. This is one of my major major hunts just about every day. In fact, we bought a whole new set of stacking rings because one ring from the old set was lost, and I'm convinced thrown out accidentally in the garbage and therefore irretrievable, and the thought of having an incomplete set of rings forever completely justified the $6 purchase of a new set. (The old set is in a cupboard and is to be used as an "organ donor" for the current set when needed. What do you know, the missing ring is the exact ring that is missing from the original set.) I decided to continue gathering and hope that the 8th ring showed up.

And I also noticed the missing peg from the peg and hammer set. Are you kidding me? I've been working so hard at keeping that intact! Where are you, missing peg??

And then there is the stupid color spectrum puzzle that I never should have bought because the colors are wildly inaccurate, and as artists, our heads might explode if Gulliver ever calls "chartreuse" what THEY call chartreuse. Nevertheless, an incomplete puzzle is an incomplete puzzle. And it has been incomplete for a while now. Stupid missing inner tiny piece. Damn you, lilac!!

But then I actually FOUND lilac, which was amazing, and I went to assemble the puzzle and finally reunite all the pieces... only to discover that ochre was missing.

One of the most baffling missing toys was a larger dinosaur. I mean, missing puzzle pieces, rings, and pegs are one thing, but a whole 8-inch dinosaur? I'm not going to find that under a couch cushion!

And finally the monkey. Oh, the monkey! I love Gulliver's monkey finger puppets so much. They are at the top of the hierarchy of toys for me. So important, in fact, that I don't really let him play with them, unless he is closely supervised. I store them on display in the living room, on top of some framed pictures they are art to me. Recently, Gulliver was crying because I had to go to work, so I lingered a little while, holding him, and he saw this as an opportunity to point out the monkeys to me. I got him the monkeys, and was able to leave just fine after that, because the sorrow of my leaving was replaced with monkey finger puppet joy.

Tonight, upon my initial cleaning, I only found 3 out of four monkeys.

So. Without going into every detail, because this recounting of toy hunting and sorting is already too long and too mundane, here is a reminder of my missing items:

1 ring
1 puzzle piece
1 plastic peg
1 dinosaur
1 blasted monkey

And all of this was STILL missing about 45 minutes into the process, after I figured I'd already inspected every nook and cranny, and certainly all the usual hiding spots.

So the next 45 minutes consisted of some more intense exercise (in addition to my walk today! Today is also a triumph in pregnancy!!). I moved both couches, neither of which produced any results. I moved every single cushion/pillow in the living area (there are plenty) and I found the missing stacking ring! Yay!

I downloaded a flashlight app for my iPhone, looked in behind the electronics attached to the television and found the ochre puzzle piece! Yay!

I emptied out the blocks bag, the Duplo bag, and every single toy bin (and put it all back together again) and found the peg. Yay!

I puzzled long and hard about the dinosaur, which I expected to find under the couch, and wondered where such a large toy could be hiding. I realized the only place other than behind the couch was in the pile of stuff I've had to deal with for weeks (eek!) at the bottom of the stairs. I looked through it and found the dinosaur! Yay! (I promise I'll deal with it tomorrow.)

Then the monkey. Ohhhhhhhh the monkey. Where else could I look? I had already moved couches, gone through my pile of mess, gone through every toy bin and bag, checked under every single cushion, checked all of the usual spots to no avail! The only place left was the shoe bench, which needed attention anyway because there are still flip flops in it. I went through every. Single. Pair. Of shoes. And in the VERY last shoe..... I found the monkey!! And I literally called out, "Monkey!" and leapt right up from my sitting position (no small feat for being pregnant!) and reunited the monkey with his monkey friends on the picture frames.

Tonight, friends, is a true triumph of motherhood. (The house needs vacuuming, and I left all of the shoes in disarray so that i could immediately record this moment of joy.)

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

Spam Email?

2010-11-10T21:38:00.000-07:00

So in the last few days, I've gotten spam emails from friends' hacked email accounts several times a day. Today I think I got 5 or 6. Yesterday it was about 3. I wake up every morning to spam emails from my friends, and then later in the day, I receive the mass email that they send out to everyone apologizing that their account was hacked and to delete the email they sent earlier.

Is everyone else receiving these too? What is going on? I can't find anything about it online.

B-U-T-T-E-R-F-L-I-E-S

2010-11-06T11:27:00.000-06:00

Gulliver loves butterflies. He says "Fa-fly!"

Moths must be a November thing because they seem to be all over the place right now. And they wait by our door and fly into our house when we go home. And every time Gulliver sees them, he points and says, "Fa-fly!"

So last night we were sitting around and Murray spotted a moth on our ceiling. He grabbed the fly swatter, went over to the moth, and THWAP! killed it.

Gulliver saw the whole thing and upon the deathly blow he said, "Ohhhhh!"

To which I replied, "Ohhhhhh! THAT's what we do to B-U-T-T-E-R-F-L-I-E-S!"

We're at least TRYING to preserve his innocence.

Christmas Cards!

2010-11-05T10:31:00.003-06:00

I think that when you get married, you're supposed to send Christmas cards every year. Some very ambitious single people do this, too, but I certainly never did when I was single. I haven't, either, for the past two married Christmases. But I'm not going to repeat that mistake on this, my third married Christmas!

(It also doesn't hurt that a major major project this year was creating probably about 50 different Christmas card designs for a client.)

If you would like to receive a Christmas card from me this year, fill out this form! Even if you think that I know your address by heart (unless you're my parents or Auntie B, I do not know your address by heart), please add your address so that I have all addresses in one central location!! (And please don't hesitate to add your address, even if you don't feel worthy of a stamp. Trust me. You're worthy of a stamp. And because I'm a designer, I can do the whole thing on the cheap, so the envelopes and cards won't cost that much, either.)

Please note that if I don't recognize who you are, I may not send you a Christmas card :( OR, I may do an anonymous Christmas card. Hahahaha. It's a possibility.

Lip Trauma 2010

2010-11-04T23:03:00.000-06:00

Some of you may remember Lip Trauma 2009 when Gulliver was crawling under our kitchen table, slipped, and bit into his upper lip. It was traumatic, but we all survived.

Well, now I bring you the sequel, Lip Trauma 2010, which is MUCH more traumatic.

Two nights ago, Gulliver was in the bath. Murray and I were both home. I drained the bath all the way and then I went into Gulliver's room to fetch his towel while Murray stepped into our bedroom for a moment. What could possibly go wrong? I heard a thump and then a scream and knew that Gulliver had hurt himself more than normal.

I went into the bathroom and saw that there was some blood on his finger. "Oh no," I thought. He slipped and bit into his finger and now there's a long little cut on his finger!"

Then I realized it wasn't his finger at all. Gulliver had actually bitten THROUGH his bottom lip, in a horizontal line, about an inch long. He was bleeding on the outside and on the inside.

At the moment of this realization, I became a little bit upset. Some (Murray) might say hysterical. As Murray was holding our naked bleeding baby boy, I kept repeating, "He bit through his lip! He bit all the way through his lip! Oh no! Oh no!" We managed to get a diaper on him and two sleeves of his pajamas and then set out to find medical assistance. As any hysterical mother would do, instead of buckling my distressed baby boy into his car seat properly, I just held him in my lap to drive to the Instacare a few blocks away. (Although I was hysterical, it did cross my mind that things would be a lot WORSE if we got into an accident and he was killed just because I didn't want to put him in his car seat.)

The moment we started driving, Gulliver stopped crying. I couldn't believe it. My baby with a gaping hole through his lip stopped crying. The thrill of sitting on Mom's lap in the front seat of the car was much better than any physical pain he might be feeling. I didn't stop crying, however. I cried most of the way to the Instacare. Which was closed. So at THAT point, then yes, I strapped my baby boy into his car seat, and miraculously, he still wasn't crying. I stayed in the back seat with him, and let him play with Murray's iPhone and he played happily---really, actually happily---for the whole ride to the hospital, 15 minutes away. I, then, also managed to stop crying for most of the ride to the hospital.

At the hospital, we got all checked in. Calmly. Because still, Gulliver wasn't crying. When we were in triage, they asked if any of his teeth were broken, which kindof made me want to start crying again because it didn't even occur to me that in addition to biting through his lip, he may have broken his teeth. But his teeth all were okay, although the gums around the front teeth were also bleeding and bruised. Poor, poor Gulliver!

We were taken to a bed in the emergency area, and funny enough, Gulliver seemed to really be excited about his bed! He lay on his back with his head on the pillow, got comfy, and continued to happily play with Murray's iPhone. Any time he was poked or prodded, he took it all with a good attitude.

The doctor came and we discussed stitches vs. glue. He said he'd do glue if it were his child. And after we considered it all for a little bit, we decided that we would go with the doctor's recommendation. Only then he looked again and changed his mind. He said that on second thought, it was worse than what he had first noticed, and that he would recommend stitches.

So THAT was when Gulliver started crying. And I started crying again, too. A nurse put his arms in a pillow case and put the pillow case behind his back so that the case held his arms to the sides. Another nurse held Gulliver's head while Murray held his legs. I didn't have to do any restraining and just was able to touch him and be there for him. He was shot up with the numbing needle a few times, and screamed and cried then. And then of course he cried during the whole stitching process. During this time, he called out many many things, among which were, "Mamma! Dadda! Cracker [Milk]! No way! No! Hug [he says that whenever he wants to be picked up] Baby!" To which the doctor replied, "Baby?" Yeah, that one was a surprise, to me, too.

All in all, it was an emotionally harrowing experience. When he was all done, they gave him some apple juice, which stopped the crying.

Back in the car, Gulliver DID cry this time when I put him in the car seat, and although I was still back there with him, this time he cried all the way home, repeatedly asking, "Hug! Hug! Hug!" So sad.

Once we got home and I was able to take him out of the car, he stopped crying again and since it was much later than he is ever usually out, there were lots more stars in the sky than he has ever seen. Gulliver LOVES stars. So I took him out to where he could see the most stars and he said, "Wow!" I asked him he if could count them, and he started pointing and counting, "One, Two, Three," pointing to a new star each time. It was pretty adorable and a good way to end the traumatic evening.

The next day, you would hardly even know that anything had happened. Because the stitches are almost right in the crease of his chin, they're kindof hidden so you don't even see the stitches right away when you look at him. And the wound, to look at it now, is hardly anything you would think could cause so much drama. In fact, I asked him where his owie was and he thought about it a little bit and then pointed to his wrist. Nope. So if he doesn't even know where his own owie is, then I shouldn't have to worry too much.

(Although I still get sick to my stomach when I relive the moment of hearing him scream and seeing the wound for the first time.)

Our Family Update!

2010-11-03T10:30:00.000-06:00

Yay! We are very excited to know that we're expecting a little girl at the end of March! Murray can now sleep easy, knowing that we'll have one of each.

Batty Bat!

2010-10-22T00:21:00.000-06:00

If you're familiar with old time Sesame Street, there is a bit with the Count, doing the Batty Bat. Anyway, that's been going through my head a lot these days.

On Saturday, Gulliver will make a Halloween appearance in his awesome costume. Today I was a good mother not because I cleaned the house (I didn't), not because I fed my son three square meals with nutritious snacks in between (I didn't), and not because I put away the loads of clean laundry we have (I didn't). Today I was a good mom because I made my boy a Halloween costume. To me, Halloween costumes are supposed to be made. I don't think that I ever wore an out-of-the-box Halloween costume, and I'm fairly certain that I did wear a Halloween costume made out of a box. At least once. Anyway, before Gulliver can be old enough to beg for and request any of the prepackaged Halloween costumes out there, I needed to at least knock ONE out of the park. And I'm SOOOOO proud of what I did today. I don't have great photos, but there will be more to come after Saturday!

Gulliver is a bat this year (I still will keep a secret what our coordinating costume will be). I bought him girl leggings (an excellent suggestion from Jenny) and a black turtle neck (unfortunately, my idea that Gulliver could be Steve Jobs for Halloween only occurred to me today...).

Today I bought some black felt and some black glitter felt. I made up a bat-wing shape, and I cut it out of both felts. Then I put that iron-on glue interfacing between the two felts and iron-glued them together. That way, I made a pretty stiff wing! Then I sewed on snaps to the wings and to Gulliver's black turtleneck. I'm REALLY happy with how it turned out, and I promise some better pictures, but this is just a teaser.

Tomorrow I'll buy a black toque (stocking cap) and I will sew huge bat ears onto it. And Saturday, Gulliver will be the most awesome bat you've ever seen. All home made!

My Tough Boy

2010-10-19T16:40:00.000-06:00

Here's one more post about Gulliver, but I didn't want it to get lost in the last post. Today, he made me very very proud. We took him to the doctor for his flu shot today. Because I was there for another appointment, when they called Gulliver, Murray went with him alone. I reminded Murray to please ask if they had suckers because Gulliver is old enough to be mollified with sugar now.

Then I waited in the waiting room and listened. I didn't hear a peep and all of a sudden, Murray came back into the room carrying Gulliver, and Gulliver was completely dry-eyed. And carrying a candy.

Apparently, Gulliver got his flu shot and did not even cry. Let the record show that Gulliver is 21 months. (At this point, you don't need to chime in with comments about your children not crying when they received shots at 21 months because I am completely happy ignorantly believing that he is the strongest boy in the world!)

Murray, our eye witness, did say that he whimpered a little. But that was it.

Heck, even during MY appointment, I whimpered a little bit, and when they apologized for hurting me, I explained that I just had to be tough because my 21-month-old just got his flu shot without crying. And then they celebrated with me and told me that he must be REALLY tough.

I really am proud of how tough Gulliver is. I think I always heard that if you give kids too much attention when they hurt themselves then they'll learn that hurting yourself gets you love and attention and then they are wimps. So I have gone to the other extreme and I have actually cheered most times that Gulliver has fallen pretty much his entire life. And either as a result of my superior parenting, or a result of super-tough genetics, when Gulliver falls, 49 times out of 50, he picks himself up and dusts himself off and goes on playing as if nothing happened. (Because let's face it. Nothing happened. He just tripped and didn't actually hurt himself.) When Gulliver DOES hurt himself, he lets me know because he cries. And then I can pick him up and love him. Most of the time, if he hurts himself only a little, he'll come to me holding out the injured part to let me kiss it. But even then, he doesn't cry.

So there you go. I love my tough boy and I'm proud of him.

(And my mom and I have talked about instead of watching out for bullies, I'm going to have to watch out and make sure that Gulliver doesn't BECOME the bully!)

Gulliver Loves

2010-10-19T16:24:00.000-06:00

Here is a post all about Gulliver, who Murray and I continue to be in love with.

Gulliver loves the swings at the park more than any other piece of equipment. Today I even let him go on the big boy swing and he held on the whole time.

Gulliver loves the moon and the stars. Every time it's a little dark out (and sometimes when it's completely light out) as soon as we step outside, Gulliver starts saying, "Moon! Moon!" It's hard for me to get his exact pronunciation here. It's very exaggerated, with an extra little syllable at the end, like MOON-uh. When we're driving at night, it's pretty much a steady stream of babble about the moon. And then he also loves stars and will point them out, too. He calls them "Tar."

Gulliver loves some of his shirts! But usually if there's something on it that we can point out. Like his shirt in the above picture, which is one of his favorites because not only does it have a moon and stars, it also has LETTERS, which we're coming to. Whenever he wears a shirt with something on it, I ask, "Where's your monster?" Or "Where's your star?" Or "Where's your plane?" and then he stops, looks at his shirt, and points it out.

Gulliver loves planes. This started at my parents' house last month where on the deck, my parents started pointing out the planes overhead. Now whenever he hears a plane, he stops and looks for it in the sky. He LOVES planes. He pronounces it PEEN! or PEENuh!

Gulliver loves letters and numbers and he's SO GOOD! Wherever we are, whenever he sees a number or a letter, he reads it to us. I am considering decorating his room with some numbers and letters since he loves them so much. So far, he can do the whole alphabet other than L, Q, T (he pronounces this too, and I think it's a combination of both T and U, so we're not counting it), U, and W. Although lately, it seems like when we get to W, he just tries to put a few random syllables together, thinking that that must make a W. As far as numbers go, he still doesn't do 1 (although sometimes I feel like he's making a monosyllabic try at it) and he doesn't do 7. Other than that he can count to ten, and this weekend even counted 10 pumpkins in a pumpkin patch. I think this is the first time that he properly counted ten objects. Gulliver also loves 13. He waits for us to do 11 and 12, though. And then he just does variations on 13 (random syllable + teen) until we get to 20.

Gulliver loves his baby cousin Frosty, and other babies too. Recently Frosty, who is 4 months old, was put down on the ground in a Bumbo, and for the first time was accessible to Gulliver at his level. Gulliver immediately went over and gave her a hug. And then another hug. And then another and another and another hug. He basically kept hugging her until we dragged him out of the house. And Frosty loved all the adoration.

Gulliver loves baths. When I ask him about the bath, he says "Bathoom!" Recently, as soon as I mentioned it, he went to the bottom of the stairs, turned on the stair lights, and headed upstairs into the bathroom himself to get ready. He doesn't know how to take his own clothes off yet though.

Gulliver is starting to learn about bodily functions. We're prepping him for potty training and even bought a potty yesterday. My mom said that we were all trained before we were 2, and I didn't even realize that was an option!! I'd like to give a HECK YES to the idea of getting him out of diapers before we have the next one! So we are trying to at least make him more aware of his bodily functions because we need to have names for things if we're going to do this right. He doens't really respond to "Pee" but if you call it "Pee pee" he does. And then instead of saying "Poo" or "Poop," he says "Poot!" Which we think is really really funny.

So there is your update on Gulliver's development! Basically we believe that our child is the smartest, strongest, handsomest, most adorable boy on earth.

Holy Guano

2010-10-17T22:36:00.001-06:00

A conversation between me and Murray, concerning some details of our party costume for this Saturday that will be revealed at a later date:

Murray: We could have guano.

(I think Murray just likes to show off that he knows the word for bat poop.)

Me: We could do that.

Murray: I think it's white.

Me: It is not white.

Murray, in a borderline condescending tone: I'm pretty sure it is white.

Me: I know what guano looks like. It's not white. It looks like mouse poop.

Murray: No, I think it's white.

Me: I will bet you ten thousand dollars that it looks like mouse poop.

Murray looks it up online.

Let's take this small moment to just point out that Murray knows a lot of random things. But there are times that I know a random fact or two and when I happen to know it, it seems that Murray rarely believes me. Like the time that I was trying to tell him that superman was invented by a Canadian. That debate I would say got fairly heated.

So back to the guano:

Yeah.

What does that look like?

Murray, trying to save face: See all this white area around this image? That's the guano.

Me: And then a mouse came and pooped all over it. So. Murray. Do you realize that when I speak somewhat authoritatively on a matter it is because there is an actual real reason for me to know something? Like for example, we had a hunt camp when I was growing up and the attic was full of bats and the ceiling had holes in it and the bat poop would drop down on us every day and we had to sleep with our mouths closed and sweep it up in the morning. I know what guano looks like.

Murray: Well why is bird poop white?

Me: I think they pee and poo out the same hole.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Monkey Man

2010-10-16T14:54:00.001-06:00

Last week, we were driving down University Parkway and all of a sudden Gulliver started screeching and oo-ing like a monkey. We thought it was funny so we joined in.

Last night we were driving down University Parkway and in the exact same location, Gulliver started going monkey crazy again, and was clearly very excited.

Obviously he was seeing something but what? We thought it through and realized it must be the blow-up missionary on top of the missionary mall.

Today we tested out that theory and sure enough it proves correct. Gulliver thinks that Utah's own giant blow-up missionary is a monkey.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Gulliver's Hat

2010-10-16T11:56:00.000-06:00

This is the first hat that Gulliver has worn voluntarily for more than 10 seconds at a time. He's had it on his head most of the morning. I call it his bat hat. But he also likes to share. He will say, "Dada! At!" when he wants Murray to put on the hat and "Mama! At!" when he wants me to wear it.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Gulliver's First Movie Night

2010-10-14T23:41:00.001-06:00

Tonight I got the idea to take Gulliver to his first theater movie. Of course I'm not counting that time when he was a newborn and we took him to a late show and he didn't sleep a wink during the whole thing.

I called Murray at 6:15 and told him Toy Story 3 was at the dollar theater at 6:45, so rush home from work! About five minutes later Murray was home and we all packed into the car and rushed off to Movies 8 in Provo for Gulliver's first theater movie! We had discussed recently that he was probably ready, since he sits through all of the first two Toy Stories when we watch them at home.

It did occur to me on the way over that we may be in trouble because school kids are out for the week.

By the time we got there, the 6:45 showing was sold out. And the next 2D showing was at 9:30. They had 3D but Gulliver would never understand wearing the glasses.

So we left to go grab some dinner. But I did look up Toy Story 3 and saw it was playing at the Spanish Fork theater at 8:50. So we made our way over there. We did discuss the fact that they charge full price but we concluded that neither of us had been there in years and they couldn't possibly charge full price anymore.

We got there a little (very) early and bought our tickets at about $6.50 each. So not a dollar movie by any means. Then we hung out for a while trying to entertain Gulliver before it was time to head into the theater.

Here he is playing inside the car. That kept him entertained at least 15 minutes.

Finally it was time for us to go inside. The movie theater is dollar theater quality for sure. At least there was hardly anyone there and we almost had the theater to ourselves. Unfortunately the sound quality was unacceptable, but Murray complained and since they couldn't fix it they offered us free tickets. And a refund. But we just took the free tickets because we are nice people.

Gulliver enjoyed the movie for sure. The beginning elicited a couple of "Wow!"s and the climax elicited many "Oh no!"s. Especially any time Mr. Potato Head's parts were not on his own body. He also screamed along with the monkey.

He got a little bored in the middle and got up to walk back and forth in our aisle a little but for the most part he watched the movie like a big boy. We are very proud.

At the end he couldn't sing along with You've Got a Friend in Me though (he usually chimes in on all the "me"s) because it was in Spanish.

So that was Gulliver's first movie trip!

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Shoe to the head

2010-10-14T17:29:00.000-06:00

This photo was taken in the act of Gulliver bludgeoning my head with a shoe.

In all fairness it was after I dressed him in a pair of girl's black leggings to see if they'd work for a bat costume this Halloween.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Passenger Trains in Utah County?

2010-10-12T12:25:00.000-06:00

So our studio is in Springville, Utah, which is the southern part of Utah County and we are located beside train tracks. Trains go by a few times a day, which really doesn't bother us unless 1) we're on a business phone call or 2) we're recording video content and have to trash an entire video.

Of course my assumption would be that all the trains are freight trains. But the other day out of curiosity, I watched an entire train go by. Most cars were freight but then, there were a couple of double decker passenger cars!

It was evening and I could see that the cars were lit, but I don't quite recall if I was actually able to see people inside or if I didn't get a close enough look to see if there were people.

But my question is: Passenger trains in Utah county?

Yes, that's a question.

Are they for real? Or were they just moving some new passenger cars up to the Front Runner in Salt Lake?

I have also heard that you can take a train to San Francisco from Salt Lake City. Really?? Where is this train and how much does it cost?

Google is failing me. What do YOU know, Internets?

In Canada, you get free babies.

2010-10-03T22:32:00.000-06:00

So among the many things about the American healthcare system that bother me is that there is no way to actually properly financially prepare for anything. You can't know the price of having a baby, for example, because there are so many people involved with individual fees.

Here's what we knew we could expect:

Doctor's fee (prenatal care and delivery): $2100

Hospital stay, 48 hours: $4900 (less if we only stay 24 hours, but if we're preparing, we may as well prepare for the most possible)

Epidural: $2000 (estimate)

So that is what we were looking at. About $9000 IF I get an epidural. About $7000 without. (NOW can you see why it's actually an issue of money to get one or not? It's not like it's a $2000-decision. It's a $2000-MORE-than-what-we're-already-paying decision.)

Only one thing that neither of us had accounted for were other costs that are not included in this. And these are things that you don't expect, necessarily, because no one has told you about them, and no one informs you, "By the way, we're going to do this and it's going to cost you $XXX.XX." They just do it and send you the bill.

Murray called me VERY concerned this week to inform me that we got a bill from Lab Corp for lab work that matched up with the date of my first visit to the doctor. Yes, I remember that they took blood. And yes, I remember that at my most recent visit to the doctor, she told me that all my work came back looking good; everything was positive that was supposed to be positive, and everything was negative that was supposed to be negative.

What Murray was most concerned about was an item on the bill called "Chlamydia Amplification." This cost $131.50. Now for someone who is one hundred percent sure his wife doesn't have any STDs, I'm sure this item came as an absolute shocker for Murray, because why does Chlamydia need to be amplified if you don't have it?? Of course I don't have it, and I explained to Murray that I'm sure this is a test that legally HAS to be done so that STDs don't get transmitted to babies. But still. It does suck to have to pay $131.50 for someone to test you for Chlamydia, which you've done a really good job of avoiding your whole life.

Anyway, the total bill was $616.70.

At my next doctor's appointment, we will have our ultrasound. For that to be done at our doctor's office, we will receive a bill from the ultrasound technician (anywhere between $220 and $400). The ultrasound tech will then send the ultrasound to a center that will view it and study it and send the results to my doctor. And send me a bill for who knows how much. Who knows, because when does anyone ever inform you of how much you can expect to pay, or even ask your permission?

Then there will be other things to expect (but not actually know how much they will cost). Like getting tested for Gestational Diabetes. I am pretty sure it's a separate charge, and guess what. That orange soda is about $60 a bottle. Not kidding. If I come out positive after the first test, I'm not going to ask for a follow-up test where I can spend another $60 on soda. In fact, I'm really just tempted to ask if I can mix my OWN sugar drink with the needed amount of sugar and substitute it for the soda. Let's face it. I'm pretty sure I'm going to be GDS positive again.

(Oh, and by the way, to manage my GDS myself, I will test my blood 4-6 times a day for the last three months of my pregnancy. The test strips cost $1 each, and since this is related to my pregnancy, I don't know that my insurance will help with any of that cost. So I might expect my GDS self-management to cost an extra $300-$400. That's AFTER I got permission from my doctor to manage it myself and forego the biweekly visits to the Diabetes Management Clinic.)

Another thing. I will have to get a shot because my blood is rH negative. How much does that cost?

What about the hospital stay itself? Yes, I know how much the hospital charges for me to stay there. But what tests are done at the hospital that they charge me for separately? How much are they going to charge me for a Tylenol? What are the extra costs that one might incur while staying at the hospital (that again, you're not informed of as they happen; you're only sent the bill afterwards and you realize that that Q-tip cost you $8).

So it's really frustrating. I hope to get together with a friend soon who had a baby last year and also went to my doctor, and paid for everything in cash. I think she's pretty financially organized and I hope that she's got a folder of all her expenses so that I can add it up and get an idea of what we might have to pay for the baby.

Because we have NO CLUE and I think that a system where you can't actually properly financially prepare for service SUCKS.

(And just to let you know so that I don't start getting anonymous donations in the mail, we've saved lots of money and we do have Aflac that will kick in a little help, and we are 100% confident that we have the money to cover everything [and if there are expensive complications, then my insurance will kick in]. It's not that I'm worried that we don't know if we can afford it, it's just that it's frustrating not actually knowing how much something like this will cost us.)

(And just to be clear as well, as a reminder, if you are self employed in Utah there is NO MATERNITY COVERAGE AVAILABLE in any healthcare plan. It's not that we're in this mess because we chose a bad plan. We're in this mess because we chose to start our own business and make our own way in the world.)

(That's why I like to travel lots, so that I can take advantage of the perks of self employment as often as possible to remind myself that I really do actually prefer this.)

Feeling the Guilt

2010-10-01T09:00:00.000-06:00

Yesterday when I was working at our studio, I went to use the ladies' room.

Twenty minutes later, I went to use the ladies' room again. I'm pregnant. This is what happens.

Except this time, there was a mouse in the middle of the floor, blocking me from getting to the stalls, without having to actually step over it.

Which is weird, right? Because normally mice run away.

And I promise you, I let out a sound when I saw it. (I'd like to say a feminine scream but it was more of a manly grunt... possibly an indication that I'm having a boy?) It still didn't move.

So I took a picture of it to send to Murray.

And then I ventured even CLOSER to see if it was breathing. And it WAS!!

So why was it just sitting in the middle of the floor like that, all slumbery?

I went back to the studio and checked our mouse poison. When we first moved in here, there was some evidence of mice, so naturally I bought mouse poison. The bags of mouse poison have remained in tact ever since and we've seen no further evidence of mice.

This time, there was a hole in one of the packs of mouse poison. Which would explain why the mouse was just sitting there.

So then about 20 minutes later, curiosity (and thirst) got the better of me. I went to the drinking fountain outside the bathrooms and I went into the bathroom again to peek. The mouse was no longer in the middle of the floor. I looked around, and found it a few feet away, around the corner by a trash can. Still the same position. Still breathing.

Then about 2 hours later I went to check on the little victim again. It was about another foot away from where it previously was, and its legs were splayed out in behind it and it was most obviously not breathing.

And I cannot help but feel guilty that I left the tiny (and let's face it - cute!) little creature to internally hemorrhage to death! AND that I didn't have the guts to just put it out of its misery when I first found it. AND that I just left its little corpse lying there instead of disposing it. And probably a sweet little church lady is going to find it (because a church also shares our office building).

(At least I can use the pregnancy and protecting my unborn child from unknown diseases as an excuse for not getting near it.)

Happy Halloween!!

2010-09-30T16:05:00.000-06:00

It's my most hated time of the year. Please note that I'm writing this blog post in September.

I absolutely despise houses all decked out for Halloween more than a month in advance. And just in case you're wondering Kami, I'm not talking about the tastefully cute Halloween wreath you have on your door. (Heck, you had gingerbread houses all done up when I came into your house, so I know that you're all about the advance-prep for holidays!)

No, I'm talking about the house I saw in Orem this week that had a door completely covered in fake blood, with the words KEEP OUT. Also written in blood.

I'm talking about my neighbors a couple blocks away from me whose Halloween display assaults my eyes every year, especially since it goes up in SEPTEMBER. It consists of spider webs all over their bushes, skull lights along their walk way, a skeleton rising from the earth beside their shrubs, orange halloween lights EVERYWHERE, and (I think it's a new addition this year) a human-sized ghoul hovering beside their door.

I am not trying to be a joy killer. I know that lots of people out there love Halloween more than all other holidays! But are death and blood the kind of decorations that should be outside your house for an ENTIRE MONTH??

I would love to limit Halloween decorations to the night of Halloween, at which point they are completely appropriate and I give you full license to go as overboard as you like.

I will even be generous and allow people a week before Halloween, in case of any parties they need to host that don't fall on the NIGHT of Halloween.

Not in September.

And not for most of the month of October. Please, spare me.

Snowsuit

2010-09-28T16:15:00.000-06:00

Maybe it's the Canadian in me but September, in the middle of 90 degree weather, struck me as a really good time to buy Gulliver a full-on snow suit.

Now we just have to wait three more months to play, bud.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Call for Recommendations

2010-09-23T08:21:00.001-06:00

I think that it's time for me to start thinking about potty training. More than likely it is still a little ways off, but I'd like to start reading up on what to do. Any book recommendations?

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

Gulliver Is on Shrooms

2010-09-16T15:05:00.000-06:00

That was Murray's suggested title for this post. I would have chosen something more lovely like, "Gulliver in the Enchanted Forest." Either way, cute picture of a cute boy.

We're out in Maryland visiting my parents and today we took Gulliver to a petting zoo that we took him to last time we were here. There are cheesy, over-the-top, tacky elements to this place, called the Enchanted Forest, but that I think made things even more fun. Last time (in April) Gulliver wasn't old enough to "get" the Enchanted Forest part. He mostly liked the animals, to varying degrees. This time, he did like some of the Enchanted Forest stuff (like the mushrooms) and he also enjoyed the animals a little more.

Artie Fartie

2010-09-13T21:52:00.001-06:00

The dialog between me and Murray right now.

Murray: I have a name that I'm about as set on as I was on Gulliver if we have a boy.

Me: Is it Silas?

Murray: No. It's Draco.

Me: Is it Alan Rickman?

Murray: No. Do you want to know what it is?

Me: Yes.

Murray: It's Arthur. Because we can call him Art. And Artie. And I'd just sit him down before we send him to school and say, "Okay. The kids are going to call you Artie Fartie. And that's just because they're kids and they are stupid and have no imagination. Do you know what a fart is? Anyway. Don't let it bother you."

Me: Are you kidding? I'll sit him down and say okay Artie. The kids at school are going to call you Artie Farty. When they do that, you punch them in the face, push them down on the ground, sit on their head and fart in their face. And ask, Who's farty now?"

Murray: You son of a bitch?

And then we said, "Who's farty now you son of a bitch" in a kindergarten voice. And laughed at how funny we are.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Just a Thought

2010-09-07T22:52:00.001-06:00

So I'm not a total raging feminist who gets offended at every little thing, but I do have to say that it really bugs me when people talk about my doctor and say "he." It usually happens when I'm filling prescriptions, and actually the first few times it legitimately confused me because I assumed they must be talking about someone else, like maybe the pharmacist who filled my prescription. Not that I think all pharmacists are men, but I don't usually connect an out-of-context "he" with my female doctor.

I think that people just need to adjust to saying, "Your doctor stated that your son should take this twice a day," rather than "He said your son should take this twice a day."

(But just as a guilty admission, I always talk to people about their male printer. Like, "If your printer has any questions about this file or any problems at all, he can contact me directly by phone or email." I know I need to fix this.)

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

2 B Y

2010-09-07T15:45:00.000-06:00

So this post is all about how brilliant Gulliver is. If you don't want to read it because he is the most brilliant baby in the world, I'll understand. But as a mother, I choose to fully exercise my boasting rights.

EVIDENCE NUMBER ONE

So the first story is a little personal to my family. Gulliver loves numbers and letters and we're practicing them all the time. Lately, he's been saying "2.... B.... Y....." And I've thought, "Huh. It's funny that he's mixing them up like that, but who am I to judge?"

Wrong.

The other night, Gulliver was a little more alert than usual as I was getting him ready for bed. Our ritual these days consists of Gulliver almost passing out in my arms as I carry him upstairs to his dark room. Then he cuddles me like that for a while as I rock him and sing to him. So a few nights ago, like I said he wasn't all the way passed out, and I was singing to him our nightly song, which is a Muppets Christmas song that is a family classic, "It's in Every One of Us." The second line of "It's in Every One of Us" is "to be wise." So I sang "tooooooo beeeeeeeee wiiiiiiiiise" and Gulliver sang "tooooooooo beeeeeeeee whyyyyyyyyy." And THEN I realized why Gulliver was putting that number and those letters together! He was singing his bedtime song!

EVIDENCE NUMBER TWO

Speaking of numbers and letters, here's a tally of the numbers and letters that Gulliver says lately:
two (two)
three (tee)
six (seesh)
nine (nine)
thirteen (teetee)
A (aye)
B (bee)
C (occasionally - see)
H (occasionally - aich)
I (aye!)
O (oh)
R (aaaayh)
Y (why)

When we're in the car, I'll often recite the alphabet and wait for him to chime in the letters that he knows. Lately, when I get to X I pause and hear nothing. Then I turn around to make eye contact with him, and he gives me the darlingest smile and says all slyly, "Whyyyyyyyyy." He's a charmer.

EVIDENCE NUMBER 3

A couple weeks ago we were in Home Depot. I heard Gulliver saying, "Oh. Oh. Oh." I looked down, and he was pointing to the O in HOME DEPOT that was written across the handles of the shopping cart. GENIUS!

Later that night, we were shopping at Walmart and I handed him some dish rags that I was going to buy, and I heard him saying, "Nine. Nine. Nine." I looked down and he was pointing at an upside down 6 on the packaging. GENIUS! I flipped the packaging right-side up, and then he also identified the As on the packaging.

EVIDENCE NUMBER 4

Another thing that we say to Gulliver on a regular basis lately is "Where ARE we?" We usually say this when we're almost to Grandma and Grandpa's house, but we also say it when we pull into our house, or if we pull into another exciting destination. Gulliver excitedly repeats, "We wah weee!" Sometimes with extra syllables, like, "Weee wa wa wa wa WAH we?" Well, a few blocks away from G & G's the other day, I asked, "Where are we GOING?" Gulliver thought about it for a moment, and then replied, "Bu pa!!" That's right. We were going to Bu pa's house. (Grandpa is maybe Gulliver's favorite person in the world. Never try to rip him from the arms of Bupa.)

And how is Gulliver going to use his smarts? To become an astronaut.

(Yesterday, Labor Day, Gulliver was DELIGHTED to go outside and discover this flag planted in our front yard. Best. Surprise. Ever.)

Since I'm Horrible At Writing and Sending Letters

2010-09-03T17:14:00.000-06:00

To the owner/operator of our local Walgreens,

My husband Murray was in your store a few evenings ago. As he waited in line to purchase his items, two employees worked behind the counter. One employee said to the other (and it pains me to even write this), "I just had a brain fart." To this, the other employee responded by passing gas loudly.

I am bringing this to your attention so that you can have a much-needed discussion about propriety with your staff.

Sincerely,
Cicada

First Baby Appointment

2010-09-02T21:28:00.000-06:00

We had our first baby appointment today. Last time, we didn't hear the heartbeat the first time, so I didn't get my hopes up this time, but we did! We heard it! It was 160. I can't find what Gulliver's heartbeat was, but I was able to find an old blog post that indicated it was over 140. So I guess we can't count on it being a girl for sure. We'll have to wait about 9 more weeks or so to find out.

This pregnancy will be a little interesting because as I mentioned before, we'll be paying for everything at 100%. For the self-insured, there is NO maternity coverage from any health insurance provider. Help will kick in if something goes wrong, but we can expect to pay for everything if all goes right. At least we got in on Aflac before they closed their supplemental policies to Utahns.

We love our doctor and are thrilled that our insurance situation won't get in the way of her delivering baby number 2. She's also willing to work with us to find ways to bring down costs. For example, if I have gestational diabetes again (which I probably will), I won't have to go to the diabetes center every two weeks this time. I was able to manage the whole thing with diet last time, so I know what I'm doing. I'll just report my numbers directly to my doctor instead of going to biweekly counseling. By the way, she's a family doctor, and I also have to say that I LOVE that our doctor is a family doctor. I highly recommend it. It's just nice that she knows all of us, and there's no separate pediatrician or anything. She's it. And she's wonderful.

The epidural is still a big $2000 question. Our doctor said, of course, that unless I prepare for natural birth, then it doesn't matter HOW much the epidural costs, I will pay it. Not that I was planning on NOT preparing. But still. I already feel like we'll just end up paying for the epidural anyway because right now the only reason for me not getting it is financial. And I'd love to be all passionate about natural childbirth and hop on that trend, but I still do NOT see the appeal of doing it naturally. Please feel free to weigh in. Tonight I bought Ricki Lake's book that changed Dooce's perspective on everything. I haven't made it past the forward yet, but I'm very very not convinced yet.

I think that the best way to go about it is to just dedicate a job, or a couple of jobs, to the epidural. For example, tonight, I need to work on a client's rush job. I don't expect this job to take me more than a few hours. So then mentally (or "physically") I can put the money from this job aside into an "epidural" fund. Three more rush jobs like this and my comfort is all paid for.

I'm leaning towards that solution.

ON THE OTHER HAND, $2000 is still $2000 no matter how I make it. And it's still $2000 I could spend on something else. Here is a list of things that cost $2000:
- two tickets to Europe (I'm being optimistic)
- two tickets to Hawaii + part of the hotel (I've never been)
- a 27" iMac (I don't need one, but STILL)
- an incredibly comfortable, perfect rocking/gliding/nursing chair so that I can take care of the new baby as comfortably as possible
- 4 iPads (no, I wouldn't buy 4 iPads. But STILL)
- 2.5 family trips to Maryland (maybe even 3)
- 6 (?) hours of relative comfort that previous generations lived without during childbirth

What would YOU do?

Gulliver Loves... DINOSAURS!

2010-09-01T23:17:00.000-06:00

Lately Gulliver has been enjoying dinosaurs. This started, I think, when Murray got Gulliver a dinosaur toy with the tickets he won at the Nicklecade last month.

Although I don't think you should be able to "win" tickets if you're playing Skeeball like this:

Gulliver learns young that cheating gets you ahead.

Yesterday I headed off to the dinosaur museum at Thanksgiving Point on a whim to meet with girlfriends, but alas, we didn't know it was two-dollar-Tuesday, which meant that the entire place was SWAMPED with moms and strollers. Since school has started, you really only got the too-young-for-school crowd, which made for a real mad house. Which is why we ended up going to the petting zoo instead. And I was the only one who stuck around for the 50 minute wait for the pony ride.

Anyway, Murray was happy that the dinosaur thing didn't work out because he realized he'd really like to come along. So today after Gulliver's nap, we took a family trip to the natural history museum (perk #1 of being self employed---the ability to go off and have spontaneous fun).

It was a little pricier than I was expecting ($10 for adults... I thought maybe $5.50) but I still agree with our choice to avoid the crowds. We practically had the place to ourselves (but Boobs McGee also showed up, and she was showing enough cleavage to count for at least five other women).

Ironically, the best dinosaur reaction we got of the day was to the huge T-Rex on the outside of the building, that we didn't have to pay anything to see. Still, I feel like the $20 we spent was money put towards Gulliver's education. He is now much more informed about dinosaurs.

I don't really think that Gulliver got the whole skeleton thing, except at the end of the exhibit when he bumped into this mammoth:

Of course, maybe he was just impressed with the drama of the gruesome scene before him...

Here are some more highlights from the trip:

Riding on the back of the "parents please do not allow children to climb on dinosaur" dinosaur.

Budding paleontologist, stepping on skull of discovery.

These dinosaurs are within 3 seconds of kissing each other. Gulliver's theory on the extinction of the dinosaurs is that they all just loved each other so much and got along so well that there was nothing more for them to learn in this earthly life and they all went to heaven where they belong.

So that concludes the summary of Gulliver's excursion to the dinosaur museum. Oh, and by the way, if you ask him, a dinosaur says "Rooooooooooooar!"

Art Weekend in SLC!

2010-09-01T13:37:00.000-06:00

Nicole announced the Art Weekend in SLC today! Yay! This is an awesome opportunity to develop some skills you wish you had. The event sells out pretty quickly, though, so if there's a class you really HAVE to take, I would suggest signing up for it asap!!

Here's the full class offering this year. And you can go to the site for full info and sign-up!

Calligraphy
Customizing Blogger Blogs
Illustrator 101 Basics
Illustrator: Creating an Identity
Illustrator: Making a Pattern
Illustrator: Pretty Paper Products
Party Planning 101
Photo 101 Basics
Photo Workflow
Photoshop 101 Basics
Photoshop Actions
Photoshop Elements
Screenprinting
Sewing: Making Jeans Skinny
Sewing: Camera Straps
Studio Lighting
Tabletop Photography
Watercolors

Merry Christmas in September!

2010-08-31T23:15:00.000-06:00

Oh look! My "friend" has lots of Christmas cards available on Shutterfly!

Gullie gets a pony

2010-08-31T14:39:00.001-06:00

Worth the 50 minute wait? Yep.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

By the way...

2010-08-26T18:05:00.000-06:00

A "friend" who has a LOT in common with me has a framed print for auction (to benefit Gulf Coast restoration efforts) up on Ebay! Check it out!

The Baby Snatcher

2010-08-26T18:02:00.000-06:00

Today I was lying down for a leisurely nap while Gulliver was napping. I'd been talking on the phone with my mom, and was just about to settle down to sleep when I heard Gulliver cry and whimper a little. I kept listening, but he didn't make any more noise, which meant that he woke up briefly and then went back to sleep.

Then I heard the front door open and realized that Murray was home. So I got out of bed and crept downstairs to let Murray know not to make a peep, since Gulliver was just barely falling back to sleep.

Except Murray wasn't downstairs.

No one was downstairs.

And the front door was unlocked. I NEVER leave the front door unlocked. So naturally I assumed that I HAD left the front door unlocked. I peeked outside and didn't see anyone. I shut and locked the door, assuming that a small neighborhood child had mistakenly come to our door instead of his own house and was probably stopped immediately by his parent.

And then I had the sickening thought that maybe when I'd heard Gulliver whimpering and crying, there was, in fact, someone ALREADY in the house which I had foolishly left unlocked, and that Gulliver was no longer THERE because a BABY SNATCHER came and stole him.

So nap-be-damned, I rushed up the stairs and swung Gulliver's bedroom door open to find...

...a very sleepy Gulliver waking up and looking at me.

As any mother would in this case, I scooped up my precious baby boy into my arms and rocked him back to sleep in the rocking chair.

Only then it occurred to me.

What if someone was STILL IN THE HOUSE?

So as I rocked and thought about this, I heard the door unlock and open again.

To my GREAT RELIEF because I'm not so paranoid as to believe that someone other than us has the capability to unlock our door besides us.

When Murray came upstairs, I scolded him (softly because Gulliver was napping in my arms) for all the anguish he put me through. Apparently he had come home from work, opened the door, and realized that he hadn't gotten the mail. So he closed the door, got the mail, and then was pretty confused to find the door locked again when he came back.

The end. No baby snatcher after all, and also, I DON'T leave the door unlocked when I'm at home. Murray used his keys to open it both times.

(As an aside, it drives me nuts that whenever I leave the house, Murray bolts the door. I think that during the day, the lock on the door handle is enough. So I recently asked Murray why he always bolts the door and he said, "I always bolt the door when I am [indisposed] because I'm always afraid that if I don't, someone will break in and steal Gulliver while I'm [indisposed]!")

One More Thing...

2010-08-13T10:24:00.000-06:00

There are certain things about Gulliver that I know I will never understand. Like the scary elephant. I can just say to him "scary elephant" now and he whimpers and looks at me with sad eyes. (I'm not a mean mom. Usually the context is, "Don't choose that one! That's the one with the scary elephant you don't like!" Cue sad eyes.)

The other thing I don't think I'll ever really get an answer for is the whole toothbrush thing. Gulliver loves my toothbrush. He loves it so much that every time I brush my teeth, he throws an absolute fit because I have the toothbrush and he doesn't. What would you do if you were in my situation? Oh, right, you'd give him his own toothbrush, right? So one day I took another adult toothbrush out of its packaging and gave that to Gulliver. His very own toothbrush. And he loved it.

But.

He still wanted mine.

So one toothbrush was no longer enough. He needed two.

So I went out and I bought him a real kiddie toothbrush, with a lion and a suction cup on the bottom and everything.

And he loved it.

But.

He still wanted mine.

I do not understand this at all. He starts crying the moment I start brushing my teeth, and the crying doesn't stop unless I eventually give him the toothbrush. At times, I try to just distract him with something new, but this is something that he allows himself to get so worked up over that distraction doesn't work. He just cries and cries like I've betrayed him in the worst way.

So I've just given in. Letting Gulliver chew my toothbrush after I'm done with it is now just a part of my toothbrushing routine. And the routine begins with searching the whole house for where Gulliver last dropped my toothbrush.

By the way, check out Murray's blog for some awesome photos. And rest assured that we do actually clothe our baby. Sometimes.

Let Me Be Clear

2010-08-02T10:37:00.001-06:00

Apparently in my last post, the line about Gulliver not being the cutest baby in the world for much longer gave rise to some speculation that I might be pregnant.

Let me be absolutely clear.

That line meant that Gulliver is growing up so fast that he is not going to be a baby much longer. He walks. He runs. He climbs steps. He says words (a word I forgot was waffle---pronounced faffle). And he gets more and more personality by the day.

That line did NOT mean that he will no longer be the most adorable baby because a MORE adorable baby is on the way.

The farthest I would go would be to say that the baby on the way will be EQUALLY adorable to Gulliver. But, you know. At six weeks, it's very hard to tell.

The elephant in question...

2010-08-01T23:48:00.001-06:00

In case you were wondering this
Is the terrifying elephant that Gulliver is so afraid of that I mentioned in the previous post. I don't understand why it's the source of so much fear, but I do know that he hates the sound it makes. Which is funny because we make elephant noises to him all the time. I don't think we will ever understand why Gulliver hates this elephant so much. I mean he has literally shrieked in terror at the sight of it. Maybe it plagues his nightmares? Maybe it's the red eye?

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Let's Pretend I've Been a Good Blogger

2010-08-01T22:50:00.000-06:00

I know, I suck. And I can give you all the excuses. But mostly, the biggest excuse is that I'm busy at work and when I'm not working, I am not on the computer. But I will try to be better!

So here is the update on Gulliver who is getting bigger and bigger and is the most adorable baby (not for much longer) in the whole wide world.

Gulliver Loves...

... the backyard with its kiddie pool. He plays naked in it several times a week.

... the fountain at Lagoon. We went to Lagoon twice in the last week. Gulliver was very good on the rides, although he did have the classic kid-ride reaction that we failed to get on camera. Basically, we loaded him up into a helicopter with Vee and Bean and everything was normal until the ride started and it took off in the air, and THEN you should have seen Gulliver's face---his eyes and mouth got as wide as they can possibly go for the first two rounds. And then he just started clapping. Classic. At the end of our first trip to Lagoon, we let the kiddies play in the fountain, which is the type of fountain where the ground is dry and all the water shoots up around you, coordinated to music. I think that Gulliver just about died and went to heaven. I could tell by people in the audience laughing that I wasn't the only one getting a kick out of him. On our second trip to Lagoon, I budgeted more time for the fountain (since the first time I had to drag him away, soaking, and kicking, and screaming) and someone commented to Captain Fabuloso (who was watching him for a while) that his best entertainment of the day was watching Gulliver play in the fountain, since every time the water hit him, the shock and delight was exactly the same.

... Cookie Monster, Grover, Ernie, and Sesame Street in general. We have the 40th anniversary DVD and we are always watching the first one. I'm just struck at how clever and legitimately funny it is---the influence of Jim Henson is very obvious in the early days of Sesame Street. We love watching it with Gulliver and hearing him laugh at all the different things.

... counting. Gulliver loves numbers. He's been a pro at two and three for a little while now, but today he added a few more to his repertoire: five (aye), eight (aie), and nine (niiiiiiine). He is so smart. He likes to count his toys.

... the iPad. No screen time before 2? Well, we certainly suck at that. Gulliver loves the iPad and I've got it fully stocked with the best kids' apps. Gulliver is, however, terrified of a certain elephant in a certain app. I'm working at getting him used to it, but it is going to take a little more work. We have NO IDEA why he is so afraid of the elephant.

... bananas. Still.

... trucks and big vehicles. When he sees a big truck go by, he says, "Wow!" Not drawn out. It's quite staccato, actually. Wow. It's a pronouncement.

... kisses. And I love kisses, too. He took a little kissing hiatus, but now his kisses are back in full force. They're extra adorable since he usually says "Mwa!" when he kisses you. He has lots of different kisses, like the sloppy kiss (not my favorite), the head-butt kiss (also not my favorite), the succession kiss (mwa mwa mwa mwa mwa), and the Godfather kiss where the grabs both sides of your face and lays one on you ("You broke my heart!"). He also likes to sneak in a zerburt (sp?) kiss every now and then, which legitimately makes the both of us laugh. I find that Gulliver makes me laugh all the time.

... going into closets, closing the door, and coming out again (no jokes, please). This is a big delight to him. Except that he can't actually open the door to let himself out, so sometimes to make the game more interesting, I leave him in there for a while.

... going up and down stairs like a big boy. Sometimes Gulliver likes to be carried up and down the stairs. But sometimes he likes to hold my hand and walk up and down like a big boy. What he loves the MOST though is to find a step that's just his size and go up and down and up and down and up and down to his heart's content!

Gulliver says...

..."bye!" Finally! It's the cutest most sing-song "bye" you've ever heard. And he waves occasionally. Sometimes with one hand. Sometimes with both.

... car, which he pronounces, "cah?" or occasionally "cahy?" It's always a question. And we ask him, "Do you want to go in the car?" And he'll say "Go go! Cahy?"

... no for nose, tee for teeth, eye for eye(s)

... cackle! for tickle! He is a pro at giving tickles. We tell him whose feet to go and tickle and he goes and tickles that person's feet, saying, "Cackle! Cackle!"

... it's Ootsie! Since I want to foster as much of a relationship as possible with Gulliver and my parents who live in Maryland, every time my mom calls or I call her (almost every day) I announce excitedly, "It's Ootsie! It's Ootsie!" Gulliver has started saying this now, too. He says "itsitsy."

... cool! This is new as of a couple days ago. But Gulliver is clearly saying "Cool!" now when he sees something cool.

OTHER MILESTONES

In July Gulliver has his first night of throwing up. We were at a hotel and he was having trouble sleeping so I had him in bed with me and at a certain point, he threw up in the bed. So I cleaned him all up, took off all the linens from the bed, threw them in the hall and called the front desk, requested more linens and towels, and tried to rock him to sleep again. And then he threw up again all over me. So we washed up again, I changed my clothes, we put more soiled linens in the hall, and got him settled in on the other bed. And then he threw up again. So we stripped the bed, got him all cleaned up, got a bunch of towels from the front desk again (by this time, Murray was on a first name basis with the front desk lady) and the fourth (and final) time Gulliver threw up, at least it was completely contained by towels. Lesson learned: Just get a bunch of towels in the first place and if at all possible, try to have your child get sick at a hotel with an endless supply of clean linens, who also have to do your laundry for you.

Gulliver is now in nursery at church. So far it's going okay, but he's not the champ I thought he'd be. I thought that he'd be in there playing oblivious to our absence the whole time, but apparently sometimes he gets sad :(

Gulliver had his first "owie." And it was all my fault. He got a pretty bad sunburn on his arm and a small part of it had blisters. So for a while I had a band aid on it. When asked, "Where's your owie?" Gulliver would make a sad, sad face and point to his band aid. And then he'd want a kiss for it. Now if I ask him where his owie is, he searches desperately on both arms for it, but can't find it anymore! He still wants a kiss.

Which reminds me, maybe this isn't a milestone, but today, Gullie showed us fake crying. It all started with this foam fan that his grandpa got him---it's a toy where if you hold down the button, the foam blades of an airplane spin and the middle lights up. It's pretty fancy to be sure, but I was watching Gulliver playing with it, and any time he put his hands in the way of the blades, he'd make a sad face and say "ow." So I tried it out, and of course it doesn't hurt at all. I guess it just looks to Gulliver like it SHOULD hurt. So being the good mom that I am, helping my baby son to man-up, I chased him around with it, trying to touch the spinning blade to any part of him I could catch, like his hands, his arms, his legs, his belly, etc. Every time I'd catch him, he'd make the sad face and say "Ow." I'd keep reminding him that it didn't actually hurt, and he thought the game was fun anyway. Well, a little later I was reading a book to him that is all about building vocabulary so there are lots of pictures with one or two words underneath. All of a sudden, Gulliver was fake crying, and I looked and he was pointing to a picture of a baby crying. He is so smart. Now he knows how to fake it. (But because I'm mom, I know when he's faking.)

And speaking of "Mom," you'll notice that Mom, Mommy, and Mumma are all missing from the list of things that Gulliver says. Because he STILL doesn't call me anything.

But Gulliver is a pro at certain animal noises (lion, cow, monkey, snake, horse, elephant, and train...which I realize isn't an animal). The other day it was raining and I said to Gulliver, "It's RAINING!!" And he said, "Choo choooooo!" And yesterday Murray was in the car with Gulliver listening to Led Zeppelin's "Move On Down the Line", and Gulliver said, "ROOOOOAR!!"

Needless to say, we are both utterly in love with Gulliver, who entertains us endlessly.

Kids These Days

2010-08-01T22:05:00.000-06:00

Today I present you with a photo story about kids and technology. I'm a favorite auntie these days because whenever I visit, I have my iPad, which is fully loaded with kids' games. Usually Gulliver is happily playing with Vee and Bean's toys while they play with the iPad, but this time, all three kids were trying to share, and Vee and Bean quickly discovered that Gulliver is quite good at pressing the home button whenever a game he doesn't want is selected....

Before and After

2010-06-23T01:07:00.001-06:00

Look at these pictures of our bedroom. Can you tell which are the before and which are the after?

Today I slaved away the whole dang day cleaning our bedroom from top to bottom. We've been so busy lately that unfortunately our bedroom became the holding place of random Junk To Be Dealt With. Our bedroom was a total total mess. I'm going to bare all here and admit that it almost looked as bad as some of those Hoarders on that show, Hoarders. Most of the time we had to step carefully to make it to the bed. I just want you to understand the magnitude of my undertaking today. Because not only did I clean it all up, I CLEANED it all up. No temporary putting places. No piles to be dealt with later. No hidden closet disaster mess. No shove things in another room and clean that room another day. I cleaned the bedroom, I cleaned and organized the closet, and I put things away properly. Everything. It was a masterpiece. It was wonderful. It was perfect.

Have you guessed yet that those nice lovely pictures you see are the BEFORE pictures?

Murray came home late tonight, which gave me the time I needed to have everything in order for the Big Reveal. He was appropriately grateful and impressed. And then as I settled down into the bed, ready to relax for the evening, I told him the bad news.

In dusting our bed headboard (which is essentially a bookshelf), the remote for our ceiling fan/light fell behind the headboard and got stuck. We need this remote. We rely on this remote. And without the remote, the light/fan is stuck on its current settings. In this case, lights off.

I had tried myself to get it unstuck. A hanger wouldn't reach. Neither would the rod that opens and closes our blinds. A broom stick could reach it but didn't solve the problem and in fact may have gotten it more stuck. (Actually, in this process, the lights turned on.)

So Murray and I got to work together, trying to solve the problem of the stuck remote. I'll spare you ALL the details but suffice it to say that nothing could be done but to actually take our mattress off the bed, empty the under bed storage of all its books (our bed is essentially a library), pull the bed frame out from the headboard, and then rock the headboard until the remote finally got unstuck and fell out the bottom. (The fan had turned itself off during the unwedging attempts, so we were doing all of this in the dark and with no fan.)

Our neighbors, I'm sure, thought we were having an extremely fun evening.

On the bright side, I had been saving "clean under the bed" for a later chore, but we did that tonight too.

So, two hours after starting to retrieve the remote, our bedroom looks like the before pictures again. Phew. There was no way I was going to go to sleep without reachieving my peaceful wonderful bedroom sanctuary. And we are relaxing under a great fan with a nice working light. Yay for us! The whole house is thisclose to being perfect!!

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

More on Sleeping

2010-06-15T22:16:00.000-06:00

Murray and I have worked out a work schedule where I go to our studio MWF and he goes TTh. That way, we both get to have full days with Gulliver and we both get to work. It's really great, and I think it also helps you to make the most of your days as a full-time parent, too.

Today Gulliver and I had a great day. There really wasn't anything out of the ordinary or super special about today, but it was just a really great day. I love spending time with Gulliver. He is such a sweet boy. (He does have a temper, by the way, which my mother pointed out, not that I wasn't aware of it... but his tantrums are very short-lived.) He is very affectionate. He gives kisses and hugs and is basically the best boy in the whole world.

Tonight I let Gulliver stay up a little extra late. (Which might actually mean he gets up earlier in the morning... I hate that.) And then the craziest thing happened. Before I tell you, I'll at least let you know that the going to bed has been consistently good. Most nights he doesn't cry more than two syllables. We warm up a bottle for him, take him upstairs, change him, rock him, give him the bottle, tell him stories, let him hold Grover, and generally get him very very sleepy. And then we can put him in the crib sitting up, and he's usually okay.

Tonight was a new breakthrough. I warmed up his bottle and he clearly understood what was going on, and immediately turned away from the kitchen and headed towards the stairs. (This in stark contrast to a week or so ago when Murray was trying to grab him for bedtime, and he kept running away and hiding behind me, clutching my legs, with his wee nose between my bum cheeks---also clearly aware of exactly what was going on.) Gulliver went up the stairs and I followed. He went to his bedroom. I changed his diaper with no complaint from him, I got him into his pajamas, and then I rocked with him and talked with him. I told him all about our day today and all the fun things we did, and when I said that we went to the studio to see Dada, he repeated Dada several times, and he talked to me about as much as I was talking to him, all in the sweetest baby whisper voice you have ever heard. Ever.

And then I put him in his crib with Grover and his other friends, and there was absolutely NO complaint from Gulliver.

So. That's the breakthrough. Gulliver basically initiated his own bedtime routine instead of trying to run away from it. This is a big deal for me!

Gulliver Loves

2010-06-14T00:37:00.000-06:00

Well it's high time for a Gulliver Loves post. Don't think that we've been too busy to enjoy good quality time with Gulliver! We are loving every day with our little man and say to ourselves all the time how lucky we are to be his parents and how much we love parenthood. So here's the latest. Oh, and by the way, he is now 17 months.

Gulliver loves stacking and nesting toys. I just bought him some stacking/nesting cups from IKEA for $2.50 and it has been money well spent.

Gulliver loves outside. We need to make sure he gets lots of play time outside. He loves balls and says "ball!" every time he sees one, which includes driving past the UVU electronic sign on university parkway, which flashes the image of a basketball, and pulling into my brother's driveway, since there are balls and play things in the yard. In fact, Gulliver has started saying "ball" when we get off the freeway, on our way to my brother's house. Because Gulliver is a genius baby.

Gulliver loves strawberries and bananas.

Gulliver loves giving kisses and hugs, which he will do by request.

Gulliver doesn't love getting in trouble. He is a very sensitive soul and if he realizes that he's hurt you, he will cry. His little quivering chin, which is reserved only for guilt-induced crying, is pretty much the most adorable thing I have ever seen.

Gulliver still loves my unlockable baking cupboard.

Gulliver loves going up and down stairs like a big boy, which means that he'll go up or down normally, but holding my hand. Otherwise, he goes backwards and is very very good on the stairs. In fact, for the most part, we have stopped using the baby gate. I love it when he sees a step that he's going to want to get down, and starts moving backwards for several feet in anticipation of the step.

Gulliver loves his cousins. We are very happy to live near his cousins on both sides. They love to see him and he loves to see and play with them!

Gulliver loves some of the applications I put on my iPad for him. However, he pretty much hates my favorite one. It is a matching game with fun music, great graphics, and terrifying animal noises. He backs away from me any time I open up that app. As soon as I change it, he comes near again and plays.

Gulliver loves chocolate chips. He bounces and shuffles and makes excited noises any time I take them out. (see also, Gulliver loves baking cupboard)

Gulliver loves praying, which is also pretty much the most adorable thing ever. Usually he clasps his baby hands but tonight, he was folding his arms, bowing his head, closing his eyes, and peeking while speaking gibberish.

Gulliver loves talking. Most of it is gibberish, but there sure is a steady stream of it.

Gulliver loves his belly button. And I love him showing it to me, so I ask to see it several times a day. The other day, he stole my small stepping stool, put it in front of the full length mirror, climbed on top, and pulled up his shirt so that he could stare at his own belly button.

Gulliver says...

SHOE whenever we get his shoes on or off.

CHEESE whenever I offer him cheese.

CRACKER, which still means milk, or cracker.

COOKIE, but only in reference to Cookie Monster.

DADA, especially when we are walking into the master bedroom to wake dada up.

BUPA for his Grandpa. He even says this when we pull up in front of their house.

WHAT? I've decided that I'd like to claim this as my name, since he says it all the time, but never calls me mama. Gulliver says what whenever the phone rings, and randomly throughout the day. He doesn't say "Do what?" as often anymore, but it's almost as if the "what" has really become more of a question and more urgent.

OOOOO? Whenever he's pretending to be on the phone. The other day, he found a jump drive and pretended that was a phone.

TICKLE, which he pronounces CACOL and makes a tickling motion on his body. This comes from reading books with his grandma.

NOH, which actually means NOSE. He rounds his mouth very exaggeratedly when doing this.

BALL, although he can't say the LLs, so it is pronounced with a slight W sound at the end.

We adore every precious minute of having him in our lives!!

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

Inactive

2010-06-10T14:54:00.001-06:00

I know, I know. I've been an inactive blogger. Recently, Murray and I acquired a studio and that is now where we go to work. I work on MWF and Murray works on TTh. It's wonderful and very productive to get away from the house to work. But, I also feel that while I'm at the studio, I'm there to work, not blog. I'm so busy with work (which is a good thing! it's a good thing!) that I don't have time to write in my own blog or look at the blogs of others! (Sorry everyone!) And to help keep us from working at home, we've even pared down our home computers to just one laptop. (And two iPads and two iPhones... shhh!) It really helps with work! Because now, if it's 10:00pm and I have a project that I want to do work on, I really have to figure out whether it is something that I actually need to go into the studio to do, or if it's something that can wait till the next morning or the next work day. We've been working really really hard at creating boundaries between work and home.

And also? Our house is a wreck, but is slowly becoming unwrecked. Like today for example. I can spend a few hours catching you all up, OR I can keep washing and folding laundry. I won't even tell you how many huge IKEA bags we have full of clothes. I won't do it. Okay, I will. Seven. Seven IKEA bags full of laundry. (The good news is, about 4 of them are full of cleaned and folded clothes. Woot!) In other news, we will also be doing a major purging wherein we take a good look at all of those clothes and decide which ones we actually wear and want to keep.

Rooms in our home that are pretty clean on a regular basis:

Kitchen (although I'm getting the itch to do a pantry purge and I'm not going to lie---I'm really excited about it)

Gulliver's room

The Guest Room (which used to be the office)

The guest bathroom (which is my primary bathroom even though I'm not a guest... it gets cleaned because that gives me something to do while Gulliver takes his bath)

Rooms in our home that are moderately clean, but get cluttery sometimes:

Kitchen also fits into this category, actually.

Living room: Most everything in the living room has a home. But not everything. And the bookshelves could use a good purging where we clean them out of everything that should be at the studio. And our media could be better organized.

The laundry room. I should put this in the next category (rooms that I've given up for lost) except that I just barely cleaned it this morning and it looks a bazillion times better. It is amazing how happy a clean laundry room makes me.

Rooms that I've given up for lost:

Under the stairs closet. Yes, I'm counting it as a room. It seems like as much as I purge and organize this sucker, it never stays organized or functional.

The master bedroom. Ohhhh how I yearn for the day when it is clean. The problem is that the closet is currently unfunctional, which means that we actually don't have a good way to put away our clean clothes right now, which means that unless we tackle that closet tonight (hint hint, Murray) none of the laundry that I've been doing will make any impact on the cleanliness of our home. We need to PURGE PURGE PURGE of all the random stuff we've allowed ourselves to collect.

The master bathroom. Although the truth is that I believe given a large garbage sack and a good 45 minutes, I could have that puppy feng shui-ed out the wazoo. In fact, I'd love to do this tonight after Gulliver goes to bed and I'm home from a class I'm teaching. (Can you tell I'm in the mood to clean right now?)

The back yard. Also not technically a room (but about as large as one). The grass is dead. The paper wasps have invaded, infested, and asserted themselves as the main tenants. I just bought a yellow jacket trap that I was so sure was the answer to all our problems that I even dreamt about its effectiveness last night. But this morning, when I set it up, I read what the difference between a yellow jacket and a paper wasp is, and oh by the way although they look almost identical, this trap does NOT work on paper wasps, and we only tell you that on the inner packaging that you can only read once you have opened our product and disassembled the whole thing to be able to get the insert.

So. That is the status of our cleanliness life right now. Business is good. Our weight is bad. But now that we feel we've got a great system for work, we can start to focus on weight (I've lost three pounds this past week) and the house (I actually feel like we're getting there). I will have to update on adorable, hysterical, and brilliant Gulliver later. Perhaps Saturday?

I also wanted to mention, though, that I was trying to use my ward online directory the other day. This requires me to sign in to LDS.org, except that my username and password are saved on my at-work computer. So I tried and tried and for the life of me couldn't remember the right username and password combo. So I walked away from the computer, only to come back and find this:

Bwahahahahaha! Couldn't they have come up with different wording? Here is my alternate version:

Utah County Hates Babies

2010-05-14T14:39:00.000-06:00

Okay, just kidding. I don't want to start some social media war or anything. But why isn't the film "Babies" available in the most baby-hungry county in the world?

Has anyone seen it yet?

LINK HERE (because you can't embed... why??)

To Insure Proper Service

2010-05-11T21:33:00.000-06:00

Okay. I have an issue I would like to discuss and I'd love your thoughts and comments, even though I haven't posted in so long that probably no one is reading anymore.

Today at a girls' brunch, someone mentioned that she was talking to a photographer recently who, in a round about way, complained about not receiving tips. Now, at the risk of sounding like an ignoramus I will state clearly here that it never occurred to me to tip a photographer. A poll of the women in the room indicated that none of us would think to tip a photographer (right?). So I emailed two photographer friends to ask them what they think. Both indicated that it happens outside of Utah (but pretty much never in Utah) and that while it isn't expected, it is appreciated, and wouldn't be refused if offered.

Who do you tip? I tip waiters in restaurants and I tip my hair dresser (one of the brunch girls said that her hair dresser said if you're going to leave five dollars, you may as well not leave anything). And I'm not trying to be boastful here, just honest---I rarely tip under 20 percent. I think that's fair. Oh, and on the rare occasion that I get a manicure or pedicure, I tip then, too. I also tip house keeping in hotels because going back to a clean room really makes me happy, and I tip sky cap at the airport. I think that's about it. Oh, and I always feel guilty for not tipping when I pick up an order from a restaurant. You're not supposed to tip then, are you?

Anyway, going back to the photographers... I guess I just don't see why a tip should even be in question. Do you tip your auto mechanic? Your plumber? Do you tip your doctor? (That pap smear was excellently executed!)

I feel like my field of work is similar to photography. Should I expect tips? Most of my clients are outside of Utah. But I don't expect tips. I charge what the job is worth for me to do. And then I'm really happy when it's paid on time. That's about all I ask or expect.

I think that tipping is certainly appropriate when someone has gone above and beyond, but employed by someone else. Meaning, I know that the extra money I am giving is not going to the company, but is compensation above the worker's normal wages that they get to take home and enjoy. If I'm hiring an individual for creative services or the like, I would expect them to quote me their rate and then I would pay their rate. (But come to think of it, if I felt like the quality of their work was worth more than their quoted rate, and if I could afford to, I'd probably pay extra IF I feel like I'm getting a steal or bargain.)

Anyway, I'd love to hear your thoughts on tipping. Who do you tip? How do you decide?

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

I know, right?

2010-05-10T12:07:00.000-06:00

Okay. I've been busy. I know. And I'm STILL busy. But just so that you know I'm not dead, here's a video that my former mission companion Jill sent to me. There are no words.

Gulliver Gets It.

2010-04-25T22:57:00.000-06:00

Hooray, everyone! Hooray! Gulliver is finally going to sleep like a sane boy! It's been a long time coming. So we did the whole sleep schedule thing, which you'll remember. And then after a while, we got really tired of listening to our first born wail himself to sleep every night. So we got a little more involved and instead of plunking him down in his bed, we'd rock him to sleep in the rocker. Which, according to all the books, is something you shouldn't do. But whatever. It was a time that we really enjoyed spending with him, and was much nicer than hearing him cry. If he woke up while we were putting him in the crib, then he'd cry a little, but never very long.

Well, something happened while I was in Maryland with him. I don't know if it happened because of the adjustment to a new time zone or what, but all of a sudden, Gulliver became an easy baby to put to bed! Now bedtime goes like this:

1) Warm bottle.
2) Cuddly Grover.
3) Hold Gulliver while he holds Grover and drinks the bottle and tell him a bedtime story.

My stories are nothing to speak of. It involves Prince Gulliver going off into the forest on his faithful steed and meeting the forest animals and helping them and becoming friends because Prince Gulliver is beloved by all in his kingdom. So far, he's helped out some birds, a squirrel, a bear, a spider, and a beaver, who locked his dam keys inside his house. (Gulliver didn't laugh at that one.)

But by the end of the story, Gulliver is sufficiently fed, and somewhat relaxy. He's usually not completely asleep. But he's very cuddly and slow and he holds onto Grover in a very adorable way.

And then we put him into the crib. Even though he's a little bit awake.

And he is okay with it!!

I mean, sometimes he sortof cries. But I mean seriously like a 2-syllable cry and he is done. It lasts one second.

He really seems to get it now and is at peace with bedtime!

(Nap time is another story. We still let him cry for nap time, because it only lasts a couple of minutes and because if we didn't, he simply wouldn't take naps.)

(I'd post some pictures, but my phone is dead. But here's a picture from Murray's blog! We played with bubbles for Gulliver's first time last night, and he loved it!)

At the Garden

2010-04-15T13:12:00.001-06:00

We went to a garden today with Ootsie and Ms. Moo.

He enjoyed running around and playing in the fountains, and trying to walk up and down stairs like a big boy (with my help).

About the iPad

2010-04-15T00:28:00.000-06:00

All right. I feel as if i should tell you about the iPad. And i won't only say positive things. I'll say negative things too, like i type too fast on it for the autocorrect to capitalize my I's. And that kind of drives me nuts. But there are things that i must share.

Number one. Why we bought an iPad. I know you're all sitting out there in front of your computers, thinking that we are big big suckers. But we are not. I promise. Here's the thing. When the ipad was announced, we looked into it and couldn't find a practical purpose for the ipad in our lives. We did not need it. At all. It didn't fill any technological void in our lives. So we almost immediately dismissed it. And we laughed over and over at all the iPad hitler videos on YouTube.

But a few weeks ago, we all of a sudden realized what the iPad could do for us. We'd been talking recently about doing physical portfolios. And let me tell you, a physical portfolio is a lot of work. And a lot of money, actually, once you factor in 1) an attractive binder or folder, 2) the printing costs 3) the time involved in preparing print-ready files of all of our work, taking them to a printer, babysitting said printer while they screw up your stuff on the paper you've supplied and paid for, etc. Not to mention the maintenance. Any time you need to add a new piece requires more money and more trips to the printer

Enter the iPad.

1) It is attractive.

2) It is not much more, or possibly the same price as printing our portfolios, buying good paper, binder, etc.

3) It is super-easy to update. We can do it instantly, and without worrying about setting up a crop, and making sure that the colors match, etc.

Beyond this, it is more versatile than a paper portfolio. Even forgetting the fact that I'm not going to watch a movie, up surf the Internet, or type up a blog post on my portfolio, the fact is, i also wouldn't travel with my paper portfolio, or bring it to conferences with me.

The iPad on the other hand is perfect for conferences. I can have it to keep notes, use Twitter, or surf the Internet if I'm bored, AND i can bring it out if i happen to strike up a conversation anywhere with a potential client. And no, i wouldn't do this in an obnoxious way. I'd do it in a totally appropriate, only if the person is looking for services like mine, sort of way where it is completely natural. Like, "Actually making repeat patterns is one of my favorite things to do, and i even teach a class on how it's done! If that is the sort of thing you're looking for, i have some samples here with me both of the patterns themselves and of how some clients have produced them, in mediums ranging from print to textile to web! You can take a look if you're interested and see if i have anything that matches the aesthetic you'd like to achieve."

I meet a lot of potential clients at conferences. Most of them are brief encounters where they possibly tune out a lot of what i say until at the end of the conversation i give them my business card and THEN they say, "Hey, this is really cool! So often, i meet people who are graphic designers, and then they give me their card and it sucks, and I'm like, really? You do this for a living?" (I have been told that, and similar things a few times.) So if the business card (one sample of my work) can have that effect, then i believe that having my whole portfolio at the ready--again, only for those who are actually interested--will lead to even greater business/new client opportunities. (And it would not, actually be appropriate to use my laptop in a situation like this, since most of these encounters happen while standing in a hall or something. And it's awkward to haul out the laptop, balance it, wait for it to boot up, etc. I would never do that.)

So. Practical application. The iPad will likely pay for itself rather quickly.

Once we established the practical application, then we were free to enjoy every other joy that the ipad has to offer. And believe me. There are many many many.

A lot of what people say is that it's like a giant iPod. Well, yes, sort of, but maybe in the same way that my 24-inch iMac is like a giant 15-inch laptop. It's true that my iMac and my laptop are capable of the same things but it's a much different experience using my iMac. A much better experience.

Same with the iPad. Better, far far far better experience than using my iPhone. It's incredibly cool, very fast, very intuitive and very fun. It's very comfortable to surf the Internet in bed when I can't sleep, or just take a bit to catch up on blogs without staying in front of the computer. It's just nice. Really really nice.

But to be honest, like I said, until we realized its potential as a business tool, there was no practical need for it. And as cool and wonderful as it is, i wouldn't buy one if there were no need. But something i eradicate pointed out that the iPad is a new platform, which is really exciting, and which should encourage innovation. So what is already good will continue to get even better as people continue to develop for it and find new uses for it. And i think that that is pretty exciting.

So there you have it. My thoughts on the iPad.

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

Ootsie's Big Surprise

2010-04-13T23:23:00.001-06:00

So a little while ago, I was reflecting on the previous year and realized that I really haven't seen my parents as much this year as I did last year. Last year was awesome, where we saw them every two months or so. But i felt bad this year because Gulliver has been doing some really awesome things and I didn't want my parents to miss it all. So when I saw southwest's tickets go on sale, i found a reasonable fare to Baltimore and booked it, using southwest credit that i already had.

Then i called my dad to tell him that I'd booked a flight, and wouldn't it be fun to surprise mom! This was a few weeks ago. Since then, we'd been planning everything. My flight would arrive at midnight. We would sneak into the house and Gulliver and i would sleep in the basement. Then in the morning, I'd send gulliver walking into my mom's room to wake her up.

So yesterday i flew from salt lake to Denver to baltimore. I must say, the salt lake airport has a children's play area that thoroughly entertained Gulliver while i caught up on emails on my iPad (yes you read that right) using salt lake airport's free wireless.

In Denver, my late-night flight was delayed 2.5 hours, and the airport's free wireless wasn't working, and i got serious attitude at the information desk when i asked them if they had a children's play area. They don't, by the way. Which made me not feel bad when gulliver left many many hand prints on their windows, stinky diapers in their trashes, and crushed cheerios and Teddy grahams on their floors. Take THAT, Denver!

In the meantime, i had to keep my dad in the loop, and my poor dad thought i was joking when i said I'd be getting in at 2, not 12. I had to assure him several times that i was not, in fact, joking. So he told me that he'd take a nap.

A couple hours later, my brother fabuloso called to say that he'd been talking to my mom, who had said, "Your father is napping. It's 9:00 at night. I don't know why your father would be napping." hahaha

Our flight, beyond being delayed, was fairly uneventful. Gulliver was fairly good on both flights, but didn't sleep much on the second flight, which I'd been looking forward to so that i could watch a movie or read a book. On my iPad.

We got in at Baltimore, where my daddy met us, and let me know that we were kind of busted. So let me start telling the story from my mom's perspective.

My mom sometimes has trouble sleeping. So she woke up and my dad wasn't in the room. She thought maybe he was having trouble sleeping, so she went looking for him. He wasn't in the living room or the kitchen. And neither was the dog! She went down to the basement and he wasn't there. But in the bedroom, the bed was cleared off and made up nicely, and the pack and play was set up. Still, she thought maybe he was organizing. But he was definitely missing. (I may point out here that technically my dad was out in the middle of the night at a secret rendez-vous with another woman.)

She went back upstairs and called my dad. My dad, who already has some problems distinguishing my mom and me over the phone, and who has us both listed in his phone as ICE (in case of emergency) assumed that i was calling. So he picked up the phone and said, "Which flight were you on? I thought southwest from Denver."

"What?" my mom asked, thoroughly confused.

"Where are you?" asked my dad.

"I'm at home. Where are YOU?" asked my mom.

Realizing his error, my dad thought quickly and said, "I got hungry so i went out to get something to eat."

I may insert here that at some point during planning i had told my dad that he could always just say that someone from church had had a flood and he rushed over to help out. But in a pinch, my dad chose the "hungry" option. At 2:00 a.m.

When my dad and i got home, all the lights were out and the house was silent. We creeped in and looked up the stairs to see if we could see my mom but she wasn't there. So we went downstairs to get settled into our room. My dad wished us a good night and went upstairs. And then as i continued to get settled i could hear my dad. And my mom. Coming closer. When my dad had gone upstairs, he found my mom watching tv, waiting for him. She hadn't heard us come in. She asked my dad what was going on, and he tried to block her from coming downstairs, but the dog, Maeby, was clearly trying to tell my mom about the guests downstairs.

So i managed to ruin everyone's sleep that night. But she was genuinely surprised and delighted to see us, no matter what time of day. And her face was priceless as she was asking, "What are you DOING here?"

So that was my big surprise. And it's been fun so far! Yay! And I'm looking forward to all the fun we will have this week!

(And poor Murray is at home, being productive and enjoying another brief stint of bachelorhood.)

(And here's a glimpse of the havoc Gulliver is wreaking in my parents' home.)

-- Post From My iPad, with apologies for the typos and for the self righteousness of admitting I have an iPad.

Location:Vantage Point Rd,Columbia,United States

We are Famous!

2010-04-03T19:59:00.000-06:00

Murray and I are in a new short film, directed by Daltongirl!! A certain post really inspired her and she made it into something beautiful.

April Fools!

2010-04-01T10:12:00.001-06:00

I'm not actually much of a prankster, although I enjoy a good one, like the time we started calling the Independent Study call center with answers to the Rhonda's School of Dance radio quiz question. When told we got the wrong number, we would ask if we still won a prize. Ha ha. Good times.

Or there was the time on my mission when, during a p-day, one of the elders (for those who aren't lds, "elders" are 19-21 year old boys) left his digital slr on a bench in Rome, so we grabbed it and decided to keep it till he realized it was missing and when he did realize it was missing 45 minutes later, we told him that we didn't have time to go back and look for it because p-day was over and we needed to get back to work. Hahaha. These were the days before digital photography had even caught on, so you can imagine how expensive that camera was (and how few megapixels it probably had). When we finally told him we were joking and gave him back his camera, he still wasn't laughing. Hahaha. Good times.

Or there was that time that all my mom wanted for her bday was BBC's Pride and Prejudice, and instead we got her the latest John Grisham book (who happened to be one of my dad's favorite authors at the time, but not so much my mom's). And we waited till she was really starting to get upset before we have her P&P. Good times!

But what this post is REALLY about is the fact that I was always under the impression that April Fools day ended at noon. All jokes were to be played before noon. So when I realized that's not how it works here in the States, I wondered if that was a Canadian tradition. But NOW I wonder if it was actually just something the elementary school teachers made up.

So how about it canadians? Is it noon or all day?

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Sometimes...

2010-03-31T16:09:00.000-06:00

Sometimes this is what I look like when I'm at work.

And I wonder how people picture me when they're on conference call with me...

Gulliver Loves...

2010-03-30T22:34:00.000-06:00

It's time again for a little Gulliver Loves section. Here we go!

Gulliver loves football. Yesterday we got together with the family for an Easter egg hunt in the park. Gulliver was the most adorable baby ever, toddling over to the eggs in the grass, putting the egg in his basket, taking the egg out of the basket, putting the egg back in the basket... you get the idea. It was generally awesome and heart-warming. At the end of the day's festivities something caught little Gulliver's attention. His cousin Commander Cody was tossing a football with Uncle Elvis. He was absolutely riveted and wanted nothing more than to take his own turn and get his hands on that ball! So sure enough, because he is our only child and we are still relatively new parents, immediately after our day in the park, we went out and bought him his very own football. Not a baby football, either. A real football. Goodness knows that Murray and I know not a thing about football, but if Gulliver wants it, Gulliver gets it! (Apologies to our future fourth child as you are reading this. Sorry for the hand-me-downs. And sorry for not running out and buying any toy or item that grabs your attention.)

Gulliver loves milk. Of course he loves milk. But the funny thing about milk is that he calls it cracker. I don't even know how this happened. Sure, I used the word cracker fairly indiscriminately (pretzels, crackers, teddy grahams, cookies, bread, etc.) but whatever I called "cracker" tended to have flour as a main ingredient. So really, I don't know how "milk" became "cracker." But he says it a lot. He'll figure it out eventually.

Gulliver loves Grover. Remember Gulliver's Grover? Well, this little buddy has a special place in Gulliver's heart. He snuggles with Grover, which he's never done with any other stuffed toy. And he loves when we kiss Grover's nose, too. That cracks him up.

Speaking of kisses, Gulliver loves kisses. You can just say, "Kisses!" and he tilts his face up to yours and accepts a kiss. THIS IS LIKE CRACK COCAINE, by the way.

Gulliver also figured out what hugs are. Crazy how he picked up on that. You can say, "Go give your dad a hug!" and he'll go over and hug Murray's legs. So cute.

Gulliver loves bucking bronco. I get to play this with him. I don't do the traditional horse thing. I get it so that he flops onto my back, belly first, with his legs wrapping around my neck and head, and then I buck him off. It's great fun.

Gulliver loves brushing his teeth. What age are you supposed to be brushing their teeth, anyway? He has plenty. He has about four molars, four top and four bottom, and is cutting his incisors. A lot of the time, I get ready while he's in the bathtub, so he sees me go through my routine. And he wanted my toothbrush once after he got out of the bath, and stuck it right in his mouth. (And if you know Gulliver, you know that he generally doesn't stick TOO much in his mouth.) So since I have a whole stock of extra toothbrushes (in the hopes that people come to visit us, and in case those people forget their toothbrushes---it's a little bizarre, I know, but at least it's genuine!), I unwrapped a full adult-sized toothbrush and gave it to him. He now loves brushing his teeth.

Gulliver loves the ants. And it's a good thing, because no matter what we do, they seem to come back every year. We had our house sprayed this winter, so they are actually not as bad as they usually are, but they do run along where the carpet meets the kitchen tile. And sometimes, I catch Gulliver sitting at that exact spot, staring at the floor, mesmerized. He never actually does anything to the ants. He just watches.

Gulliver loves the stairs and he is an expert at going up and down (always with direct supervision) at this point. I think he loves them so much because they're usually gated off.

Gulliver loves outside! He's such a big boy now (and a pro walker!) that we can do fun things like take him to parks and stuff. And he loves it. He especially loves picking up dirt, sticks, and leaves, and offering it as gifts.

Gulliver still says "Do What?" He still says "Nanana! Nana! Nanananananana!" (Banana.) He still says Cracka (but as we've seen, this means milk, in addition to cracker).

Gulliver's new trick is "No, no, no." You'd think that we were bad parents, telling him no all the time. Instead, we are bad parents who suddenly started singing "Try to make me go to rehab, I said no no no." (MURRAY WOULD LIKE ME TO INTERJECT RIGHT HERE AND LET YOU KNOW THAT WE ARE NOT TOP-40S PARENTS.) Something triggered it, and for some reason I sang it, and wagged my finger, "No, no, no." Gulliver picked up on that fun immediately, and wagged his finger, too. No, no, no!

Gulliver is AWESOME.

Gulliver loves the ants.

Don't get bent, TAX MAN!

2010-03-25T21:25:00.000-06:00

So we have a tax man. The first time I met him, I was struck by how much he looked like Dustin Hoffman. I mean, he REALLY looked like Dustin Hoffman! So we started calling him Dustin Hoffman, and to this day (two years later, third round of taxes) we still call him Dustin Hoffman:

"Murray, can you call Dustin Hoffman and set up an appointment please?"

Like that.

The funny thing is that each time we actually see him in person, I am struck by how much he does NOT look like Dustin Hoffman. The fact of the matter is that over the year between our appointments with him, my mental image of him actually becomes Dustin Hoffman. So whenever we see him, I'm brought back to reality, and that reality is that our accountant is not, in fact, Dustin Hoffman.

BUT, our accountant is wonderful. Do you want to know why he is wonderful? Because my whole life, I have been fairly anxiety-free except for when it comes to money, and how much I suck at managing it. This anxiety is pretty much cured now that I'm married to Murray and can delegate most money management things to him. But I get slightly anxious during tax time still. But every time we meet with our accountant, a great weight is lifted off of my soul, as he speaks very calming words of how this is allllllll okay, and it's nooooooooot a big deal. In fact, the first time we met with him, I had a confession of a financial sin to share with him. This was a (I thought) weighty financial matter that caused me fear and panic any time it popped into my mind for YEARS. YEARS! And the first time we met with Dustin Hoffman and I shared my little secret with him, he actually told me that it wasn't a problem. At all. No big deal. At all. And in fact, everything was okay, and I didn't even have to do anything to fix my tax error from years and years ago. And it was like absolution and one of the biggest burdens I've ever carried was just LIFTED FROM MY SOUL.

I love Dustin Hoffman.

Each year, he takes our financial information and does our taxes for us. And we end up getting more back than we would if we did them ourselves. AND it saves us time. And saves me anxiety. This year because of the self-employment thing, I thought for sure it was going to be a big complicated mess. But it isn't. It is wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. And easy.

Let me know if you want his REAL name, not his Dustin Hoffman name, and I'll refer you to him. Because we love him.

Conversation with Murray

2010-03-25T12:33:00.000-06:00

I'm stuck in the middle of revisions with almost all of my clients right now. And I don't really love this process. Here's a conversation that I just had with Murray.

Me: I actually understand now why designers will tell you that they'll have your revisions to you in 2 weeks. I mean, most of the time, revisions only take one or two hours. So when I first started, I didn't really understand why designers couldn't just turn revisions around right away.

Murray: Uh huh.

Me: I mean, everything that I'm working on right now is revisions. And so now I see that I can't just turn everything around in the same day. I have to work on projects in order of priority. So that means, it takes a little longer for some people to get revisions.

Murray: Yeah.

Me: So I don't know. Maybe I should institute a 2-week revisions policy.

Murray: So what do you think the priority issue is?

Me: What?

Murray: The priority. What do you think the real issue is. With priority.

Me: Uh... I don't really understand what you're asking. What?

Murray, turning around to face me: I actually wasn't listening to you and I have no idea what you've just said, so I was hoping to bait you and try and get you to repeat it all without admitting that I wasn't listening.

Prepare yourself for the cuteness.

2010-03-24T00:42:00.000-06:00

Tonight, Murray was assembling some Ikea furniture, and Gulliver decided he wanted to help. Gulliver's help wasn't always the most helpful, but Murray didn't complain. How could you possibly complain when you have this adorable mini helper??

Later in the evening, I saw Gulliver go head first into one of the cubes. Because if there's a cubby open for the climbing into, it must be climbed into! I'm sorry I didn't get the camera fast enough to catch the legs sticking out the top. Or the contortions involved in getting himself facing up again. But at least I got a few shots of him in his cubby.

If you're considering parenthood, we strongly recommend it.

Why Men Can't Find Things

2010-03-24T00:37:00.000-06:00

Our pantry is a mess. I'll admit it. My mom helped me organize it over a year ago when she came to help out when Gulliver was born. And it was wonderful when it was clean and organized. And I've cleaned and organized it myself a few times. But right now it has deteriorated into a giant, unorganized mess, most likely filled with food we will never, ever actually eat.

So tonight, Murray decided he'd like to make us some tea. He admits to being an herbal tea man. He likes chamomile honey tea.

He was searching the pantry for tea. It's been a while since we've had tea. And he couldn't find the tea. So I got up to help.

As I stood in front of the pantry, I decided to explain to him the finding process, hoping that perhaps he could learn something. I said, "Want to know a trick? Sometimes I just look up through the bottoms of the shelves, because if what I'm looking for is on a shelf, I can see it from the bottom!" I said this, and lo and behold, I located the tea in less than 10 seconds. It was not, in fact, on the bottom of a shelf. But in putting myself at that odd angle, I was able to see it at the very back of a shelf, sitting atop a pile of other miscellaneous food boxes.

And then I asked Murray a very important question: Why is it that women are better at finding things than men are? At least this didn't come from an accusatory standpoint, since I was identifying this as a failing of an entire sex and not just him. Here is a not very faithful, but generally true transcript of our conversation:

Me: Why is this a problem for men? And I know it's all of you. Because we women talk about it. And because even when I was a kid, my mom would ask my brothers to find something in the pantry, and they couldn't find it, so she'd send ME, and I'd always find it, no problem. So why is this a problem for you? Because you want to know what we women think? We all think that the problem is laziness, and that we are enabling you because then we step in and find the thing.

Murray: No, that's not it, because I can honestly say that I really didn't want you to have to get up and find it yourself. I feel like I understand men enough to say that it's a situation where women are just naturally better in this area, maybe because of evolution. It's like, in the old hunter-gatherer days, men would go and hunt for the food and bring it back to the cave. And it was up to the women to put it somewhere. So the men's obligation at that point was no longer to think about the food or what they brought back, and they were reliant on the women to remember that stuff.

Okay, I can't remember any of the details of the middle part of the conversation, so I'll skip to the end...

Me: So let me tell you what is going through my mind when I'm looking for something. I have in my mind an image of what the tea box looks like. I think, "Tea box! Tea box!" and I look everywhere for that shape and that box. I know what the tea box looks like, so everything registers "not tea box not tea box not tea box" until I find the tea box!

Murray: Ah ha! That's interesting because that is NOT what goes through my mind. See, when I'm looking for it, I'm thinking, "the 'tea box'!" Not "the tea box!"

Me: [Blank stare.]

Murray: So what I see in my mind is that specific tea box, even down to the fact that it's honey chamomile. So when I'm searching for it, I'm looking for that particular tea box. What it sounds like what you're doing is searching for a broad idea of a tea box, and even getting down to the shape. So that kindof made me think, maybe there's something there!!

I'm still not so sure I get it. The tea box? The "tea box"? Are you kidding me?

What are your thoughts? (And please remember to be kind to the hunters.)

Gesso

2010-03-20T15:26:00.001-06:00

A few days ago I told murray that it is possible to just let gulliver play during the day while you get some work done. Many days, Gulliver is capable of happily playing on his own. Sweep the kitchen floor first and if you hear munching coming from the kitchen, go get him out of whatever he's gotten into.

So apparently Murray decided to test this out today, and didn't look up when he heard gulliver playing by himself for a while. When he finally looked up, Murray found this:

Gulliver had gotten into the artist's gesso. Which by the way is completely water soluble. Phew!

I walked in the door just in time to find Murray catering him upstairs to the bathroom.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Clutching onto My Youth

2010-03-12T01:23:00.001-07:00

A couple days ago Murray and I were talking about Macauley Culkin and how on the Oscars, he looked like a tiny boy, not much older than when he was in Home Alone. Really. I mean, he looks like a teenager at best. So then we were trying to figure out how old he was. I said I remembered him being almost my age but slightly older.

Murray said, "I think he may be 30."

My first thought was, "He is not THAT much older than me." And then I remembered. I turn 30 this year.

(I can remember my mom's 30th birthday.)

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Grover

2010-03-11T13:40:00.001-07:00

At Borders today, Gulliver got very very excited and started wiggling, hissing, and babbling quickly and loudly. We tried to see what he was looking at. It was a display of sesame street characters. Gulliver has seen sesame street only a couple of times, but does have a few characters already. Today we let him choose a new friend.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Little Nibbler

2010-03-07T16:56:00.000-07:00

This time, both Murray and I were in the living room, and could hear Gulliver playing in the kitchen. And everything was going well until we could hear the nibbling again. Murray went to inspect, and this time, it was baker's chocolate.

Gulliver is a little nibbler.

Little Man

2010-03-03T15:37:00.000-07:00

Gulliver's new shirt from Target makes him look like a little man. We are in love with this boy. Today, for the first time, I asked him where his nose was, and he got it right. AND he'll give kisses on demand now. Having your own baby tilt his head up to kiss you on the lips is pretty much the best high ever.

Scallop Pasta!

2010-03-02T20:54:00.000-07:00

Today I opened the freezer and saw the bag of scallops I bought from Target the other day, and decided that whatever I cooked tonight, it would feature scallops. Which I have NEVER cooked with before.

So when cooking time came, I looked up scallop recipes to see what matched the ingredients I had in stock, and found this, which I modified:

Ingredients:
6 ounces uncooked vermicelli, broken in thirds
(I used angel hair and didn't break it.)
3/4 teaspoon salt, divided
(I didn't measure the salt.)
1/2 teaspoon paprika
(I didn't measure the paprika.)
1/2 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper
(For some reason, I rarely add pepper to anything.)
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
(I didn't measure the garlic powder.)
1 pound sea scallops, rinsed and patted dry
(I don't know how much sea scallops I actually used.)
1 tablespoon butter, divided
(I used 4 tbsp butter. And some olive oil. Ha!)
Cooking spray
(See above. No cooking spray needed.)
1/4 cup water
(See above. No water needed.)
1 1/2 cup thinly sliced spinach leaves
(I didn't measure the spinach.)
1 teaspoon grated lemon rind
(I didn't measure the lemon rind.)
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
(I didn't measure the fresh lemon juice.)
4 lemon wedges
(I didn't include lemon wedges.)

I added some cut up prosciutto.

Directions:

Cook pasta according to package directions, omitting salt and fat.

Meanwhile, sprinkle 1/4 teaspoon salt, paprika, pepper, and garlic powder evenly over scallops.

Heat half the butter in a large nonstick skillet coated with cooking spray over medium-high heat. Add half the scallops to pan; cook 4 to 5 minutes or until done, turning once. Remove scallops; set aside and keep warm. Repeat with remaining butter and scallops.

Add water to pan; bring to a boil, scraping pan to loosen browned bits. Remove from heat; add pasta, spinach, lemon rind, lemon juice, and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Toss gently. Divide evenly among individual serving plates. Top with scallops; serve immediately with lemon wedges.

I followed the directions as general guidelines, and combined everything in the end and guess what. It was HEAVEN. It was soooooooo good. So good in fact that this will now become a family staple. In the future, I think I will also throw in a few capers, and some artichoke hearts, just for good measure.

No pictures, but I promise you. This is worth trying out! Dinner was ready in about as long as it took for the water to boil and the pasta to cook.

How the world views artists and designers...

2010-03-02T14:43:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I read an interesting article written by a lawyer about graphic artists providing free work for contests. Basically, the idea is that someone needs a logo, so instead of hiring a designer, they host a contest, awarding a monetary prize to the design they choose. The article author talks about how you would never do something similar to a lawyer.

Murray and I have encountered similar things, like acquaintances asking for free work from us. I liken this to doctors. You would never go up to a doctor that you kindof know and say, "Hey, I'm due for my annual woman's exam. I know this only takes about five minutes to do. Could I pop in and get this done [for free] sometime this week?" (Heck, I hope you wouldn't ask that of a doctor that you know well, either!) There are times that I have asked nurse friends advice (thanks, Sarah!) but again, they are friends, and I'm asking advice. People can similarly ask advice from me, which I'll happily give for free, according to the amount of time I have to dedicate to it.

Today, (funnily enough, the day after reading the linked article) a former client emailed me about an opportunity to create a logo. I could submit my design along with two other designers, and the winner would receive payment of $100.

Fortunately, I'm booked for the next couple months.

But still. I know that the client wasn't trying to insult me, and probably thought that he was presenting me with a pretty good opportunity. But this client happens to own a restaurant. How would he feel if I told him that I'd be visiting his restaurant tonight, another restaurant tomorrow, and a third restaurant the next day, and I would award payment to the best meal!

Why do you think that some people undervalue an artist's or designer's work? Is it because our jobs are seen as fun? (A lot of the time they are.) Ideas?

Gulliver Loves...

2010-03-02T13:04:00.000-07:00

(This is a photo that happened when Gulliver joined Nicole Gerulat's lighting demo a couple weeks ago... Too bad that it's on a flesh-toned background. Now if I can figure out a way to sneak Gulliver in front of Nicole's camera when he's in front of a complimentary background...)

Today Gulliver is having one of those extremely independent days where he just plays all around the living room and kitchen by himself. I've only had to interfere once this morning when I heard that he got some corningware (breakable) dishes out of the cupboard. And he didn't cry when I took them away. That must mean that Gulliver is in a VERY good mood. So let's check in on Gulliver, shall we?

Gulliver Loves...

...The corner kitchen cupboard, where he found chocolate chips the other day. I was working at my computer on the dining table, just barely unable to see him, and suddenly things got quiet and I could hear smacking.

He is his mother's son.

...The yellow couch. Still. Gulliver easily spends about 50% of his living room time playing on the yellow couch now.

...Eggs and cheese. And yogurt still. And cheese by itself. And bananas. (More on bananas later in this post...) But sometimes Gulliver won't eat these things, and I don't know why. Because as soon as he actually TASTES it, he'll gobble it up. Like this morning, when I tried to feed him cheesy scrambled eggs. He wouldn't open his mouth to taste it. I finally had to hold his head still and shove it in. Barbaric, I know, but for the record, he was actually laughing while I did it. And as soon as he got a taste, then he gobbled up all of his eggs. Until, that is, he was done, which he communicates by violently flinging his food onto the floor. Thanks, Gulliver.

...Walking. Gulliver can now walk around, albeit a little wobbly at times. He can walk from one end of the living room to the kitchen. He still crawls sometimes, but is walking more and more.

...His hammer toy from IKEA. He doesn't use the hammer yet, but he can push the posts through with his hands or other blocks.

(And no, we haven't given him a credit card to play with, that's a hotel key.)

...Phones. He will take my iPhone, put it to his ear, and say, "ohh?"

Gulliver says...

"No." He doesn't mean it, though. My favorite is when he says it when he does something that has traditionally caused us to tell him no. I also like it when he repeats it after he's heard me say it on the phone. No. No. No. It's unbelievably cute.

"Stop." He pronounces it "tap." This and No are words that I think he learned from Murray.

"Banana." This is my current favorite, because he doesn't just SAY banana. He sings it. It's always done in his sweetest most sing-song voice. "Nanana! Nana! Nanana!" So so adorable. When Murray took him to the grocery store recently, he saw the banana table and started saying it: "Nanana! Nanana!"

"Yogurt." He says "Gogur."

So, as you can see, we have an adorable son who keeps on growing up!

Proper Pride

2010-03-02T01:02:00.001-07:00

Remember my dead half front tooth? Well back in November I got the work done for it to get a crown so that the tooth was stronger and so that I no longer had a dead, two-toned front tooth. And after I got my temporary crown (while they made a proper one), Murray and I got insanely busy with work, which is why I'm finally getting the permanent crown put in now, only 4 months later.

Last time, they had to take off my cap and then chisel my remaining tooth down to a nubbin onto which they could cement a crown. None of this hurt of course because I have had a root canal on that tooth. When I was left alone in the room before they fetched my temporary crown, I was tempted to take an iPhone pic of my leftover smile. But I was too afraid of what I might see. So I didn't.

Today, the removed the temporary crown and fetched the new crown, again leaving me alone in the room, giving me the opportunity to snap a quick picture.

Again, I chickened out.

They tried out the new crown only to discover that it was the wrong shade. They gave me a hand mirror so that I could see that it was the wrong shade. They tool out the crown and left me alone in the room with the hand mirror.

I was all alone.

Did I dare steal a look?

I lifted the mirror and smiled at myself, and what I saw was basically the most horrific, hill Billy version of myself I have ever seen, so horrific in fact that I could only endure it about half a second before I quickly lowered the mirror and tried to purge that awful image of myself forever from my brain.

And still, the question remained. Do I snap a quick picture of this to share with the Internet? I generally don't hold back with the very unflattering images I snap of myself. (Go to murrayterrenodeamore.blogspot.com and find the one where he compares me to a gorilla.)

In the end, I didn't have the courage. Sorry, Internet. There are just some things that shouldn't be shared, and hill Billy nubbin teeth belong to that category.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Things I Hate

2010-03-02T00:46:00.001-07:00

I'm generally a very positive person, but for a while now I've been wanting to post a list of some things that I hate. Sorry in advance for any offense! Remember, I don't hate people. Just some things.

Halloween lights and other outdoor Halloween decorations, esp when set up in September. Halloween does not equal Christmas.

People who don't understand how to use roundabouts and who get mad at you when you're yielding to the car that has the right of way.

People who break traffic rules out of politeness to you, gesturing for you to go when it is not your turn and when it is not safe to go.

The font papyrus.

Blinking lights in a dark room.

Any bedroom electronics that have bright LED lights that are constantly on, or unnecessarily bright alarm clock displays.

Rancid dish rags. (This should probably be number one.)

The term "brain fart."

The awful feel of cotton rubbing against itself, or dry hands on glass.

Welp, that's all I can think of for now! To be continued, I'm sure!

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Home, Sweet... Ugh.

2010-02-24T09:56:00.000-07:00

So we came home. This is depressing because when I was in LA, I was convinced that it was SUMMER now! Even though I was still expecting sweater weather for Disneyland, I adapted pretty quickly to short sleeves and warm weather outfits. Divine. When we stayed with my aunt, we even walked to the grocery store (where we found and purchased full-fat honey greek yogurt, at 10 gr of fat per 4 oz, which was supposed to be for Gulliver but I easily ate over half of it). And here, now that we're home? It's snowing. A sad reminder that we still have at least three months before we catch up to the California weather.

Every time I visit southern California, I feel like I learn something new about my mom. Last time I was there, I think what I paid attention to the most was all the vegetation. All the different plants. Because I look at it all, and then I imagine my mom moving from Los Angeles up to Porcupine Ontario. Big, big change. And I'm not saying anything negative about where I grew up. What I am saying is that since I was born there and only ever knew my mom in that context, it's strange for me to visit the place where she actually grew up, and realize that her life was way way different than I could ever imagine it.

This time, I of course was struck by the weather. The fact that winter can entirely bypass a place that is in the continental United States still baffles me. When I've heard about people going to Florida in the winter, I guess I really have always imagined people going to a place where there is a milder winter. Now that I've visited LA in February... well, I realize that my mom made a big, BIG move, going to a place with -40 winters. I also understand a little better why my dad told her to get her head out of California when she walked to the end of the driveway in bare feet in the middle of the winter.

When I was talking to my mom about this big revelation, she said that when she first moved up to Canada, she asked my dad what kids did if they received a bike for Christmas. My dad told her that they would ride it around in the basement. He asked what kids in California would do. She said they'd ride it around outside in their pajamas.

Anyway. I'm ready to go back. Immediately. To California. I would quite happily leave THIS INSTANT if you told me that I could go and spend another week there. Or, you know. The rest of the winter there.

WWJD?

2010-02-22T19:20:00.001-07:00

You know you're on the right path when you're eating in the same burrito bar as divinity.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Obligatory Disneyland nap picture

2010-02-18T17:04:00.000-07:00

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Tower of Terror Hair

2010-02-18T15:53:00.000-07:00

As promised, a picture of my hair today after two washings this morning and adding no new product.

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Astro Blasters!!

2010-02-18T12:25:00.001-07:00

Gulliver beat me!

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.

Oh Shoot.

2010-02-17T18:08:00.000-07:00

We are headed out of town to teach classes. A few days ago Murray suggested I cut my hair short. This earned him bonus points. It may have been on valentine's day.

I'm never afraid of short hair and I'm never afraid of trying something new. I'll try any hair stylist other than fantastic sam's (where I send Murray). So in an effort to get my hair cut before leaving town, I decided to just pop into the mall while Murray and Gullie ran errands at Costco.

Murray expressed concern that it might not be a good idea to get a mall cut RIGHT before going out of town for business, where lots of people would be seeing and interacting with me. I dismissed this, telling him it has been a long time since I had a bad hair cut.

You might think you know where this is going. But you don't.

The hair cut was okay although the style left a little something to be desired. That doesn't worry me. A quick shower and styling it on my own fixes that.

But last night we made a bit of a mistake. I had lots of work to finish up, so I got right to it with American Idol on in the background. And then we saw Ellen. And we both loved what her hair was doing... Almost faux hawk, but not. So we wondered if my hair could do the same thing.

"We'll have to use my dippity doo!" declared Murray. You may remember that a while ago I found a retro looking black man's hair product called Murray's something or other. And it cost $2. (Compare to Bed Head's $17 wax stick.) And Murray has sworn by it ever since.

So back to last night. I put some of the product in my hair and we tried to do the Ellen style, only to find that my bangs were too long. So then we wondered if we could get it to stick straight up. Like a mowhawk. Which we decided needed a lot of product. So we loaded my hair up with LOTS of product.

You may have an idea of where this is going now.

Yes, last night's hair fun was very entertaining. But this morning after 3 hair washings, I've discovered that this stuff doesn't actually come out.

So much for the hair stylist ruining my hair for my business trip. I was able to do that all by myself.

(pic taken in the car, as presentable as I can get...)

-- Posted from my iPhone, with apologies for any typos.