Braincation

So... three weeks?  That's not pathetic at all for a blog absence.

A lot has been going on, I just haven't taken the time to write about it.  For instance, JG turned one.  ONE! It was a big day for me, mainly because there were days when I told myself, "If I can just make it through this first year..."

Those were the days when JG wouldn't stop crying, I couldn't calm her and I couldn't find any comfort in being a mother.  It was sort of a nightmare and I had trouble imagining why I got pregnant in the first place.

It's not like it took practically two years for me to get pregnant with a viable fetus or anything.

But as the year progressed and we gradually figured out her protein intolerances, we got to know JG.  When she's not having a reaction she's quite a pleasant and funny person.  Lately she's been pointing at my belly button questioningly, and when I tell her what it is she repeats: "elly utton."  The b's are very quiet, she almost has it.

Adorable.

She smiles and laughs easily.  However, she doesn't hesitate to complain, and she's fond of tantrums... we are working on that.

And slowly her guts are allowing her to eat more diverse things, like scrambled eggs, and maybe even cooked dairy (because I accidentally fed her some and she didn't scream-poop and there was no bloody poop either *joy*).

(why yes that is a black eye)

Now that JG has been here for a year, I can honestly say I am the better for it.  I have learned so much.  SO. MUCH.  I am also really thankful that this first year is over, it was one of the hardest years of my life.  

I'm excited to watch her grow, and I hope I can continue to grow with her. 

Potential

I left school today feeling a combination of horrible and horrified.

I have a variety of students in class, from the exceptionally talented and smart, to the... how should I put it? Lazy and dumb?  But, they're not really dumb, just too lazy to do anything about it.

In that mix is a girl, let's call her "Girl Student," who is exceptionally bright, full of "potential."  And, by "potential," I mean that if she just put her back into it she would be a straight A student with colleges panting at her door offering up scholarships.  In my minds eye I see her as a math professor, because I think she could go as far as she wanted to.

However.

Before I say anything, let me emphasize that I like this girl.  Yes, she has mouthed off, and yes she is full of angry energy, and yes she thinks she is a bad-ass, but I like her.  Angry 14-year-olds can grow up to be well rounded and adjusted people, just ask yours truly.

Horrified.

Girl Student came into to class early today, looking all relaxed and happy, which made me happy for her.  Until she stood close to me to complain about being hungry and I inhaled.  What did I smell?  What does the rest of the class smell and keep mentioning/complaining about the rest of the period?

Skunk.

Now, Girl Student claims to not smell this, even though I know it is emanating from her.

Huh? those of you with soapy clean pasts may be asking, while those of us who have slid through the mud and gotten it caught in our teeth sigh "oh."

Let me catch you up.  Girl Student reeked of skunky pot (I don't know if that means it was really good weed, or cheap-ass weed).  I felt a combination of things like, "Yeah, relaxing is great," and "Holy mother my 9th grader is high" and "What do I do?  Who do I tell, if anybody?"

Horrible.

Around this time the original biology teacher comes in, let's call her Mrs. Biology.  She hears the complaints about the skunk and she smells it.  So, feeling a tad cornered with my knowledge I spill the beans to her in the hallway.

I tattletaled like a kindergartner who doesn't know the playground rules yet.  When we went back into the classroom I could see Girl Student looking at me like she knew what I had done... but, what else was there I could do?

I feel a little sick.  Mrs. Biology said she would tell/talk to the counselor, and now it's out of my hands.  I just keep thinking how Girl Student is on such the wrong track, and with each mistake she makes she is losing more and more of her foothold on the future.  Sometimes failures and mistakes are easy to move on from, sometimes they're a boon to learn from, but allowing yourself to treat yourself like shit is well... It's just stupid.

I just want to take Girl Student home and feed her ice cream.  So many angry/hurting/destructive students are lacking healthy home lives.  I feel horrible because Girl Student and I were building a good relationship, where maybe she was beginning to trust me, and I ratted her out for smoking pot.

Hopefully, it's for her own good.

But I don't wanna

Productivity is a thing that comes and goes for me lately.  I either want to or I don't.  The motivation is there or it isn't.

It makes me very moody, mainly because I like getting things done.  The last couple of weeks I've been working on my quilt, and amazingly enough I have the top and bottom done, all I have to do now is lay them out with the batting and baste it all together.

Easy, right?

Except that I am making a queen size quilt and there isn't a queen size space in my house to lay it out and baste it (I want to make sure I get everything even).  Why not do it outside on the  grass?

Because of the freakin' wind, rain, snow, and periodic hail.

Bah!

Unfortunately, I'm a little crazy.  Since I have set my sights on getting the quilt basted (loosely sewn together) it's very difficult for me to move on to something else (like making that doll for the upcoming family reunion my mom asked for).

(I should also mention that there is a folding table at Costco that I have decided I can't live without, and since I don't have it yet it is hard to start making something...  because, having it would make making something so much easier.)  

Usually when I come to this type of creative precipice I throw up my hands and watch yet another episode of Angel on Netflix.  But today, I had Glee recorded and laundry to fold, and in order to allow myself to watch Glee I had to fold the laundry.

Do I sound nuts to you yet?

So, while I was not creatively productive today, I was housewife productive.

And as soon as I buy myself that table, I will be otherwise productive as well.

poop

For those of you thinking about bringing home your very own bundle of joy, I have only one thing to say to you:

You better like poop.

Because as soon as you take that sweet squirming thing home you will have to become fast friends with its poop, there will be lots of it.

And when I say "lots of it" I mean there is going to be more poop than you are accustomed to coming in contact with.  Maybe you've had a dog or cat and they have had the periodic accident in the house, but that is still not comparable to baby.

(I understand that my bundle of joy, when she was tiny, may had produced more poop than normal because of her intolerance, but I stand solid in my opinion.)

Now, when baby poops it is unpredictable in timing and mass.  And aiming.  Say you've just taken baby's diaper off to change it, when BAM! and unexpected spray arches up and over and onto your pants.  Your.  Pants.  Or shorts, or skin, or whatever happens to be in the landing area of the poop.  Because that stuff can fly.

As baby grows up so does her poop.  It goes from a thin goo, to a thicker goo, and eventually to (depending on diet and gut issues) solid poop.  JG's poop differs on a daily basis depending on what decisions/mistakes I've made in what I feed her.  When she goes a day or two without soy in her diet (or mine) she gets some stinky, solid poops.  Okay, well, they are all smelly blobs of disgusting.

I think she prefers to be alone for her solid poops, because she'll wander off to another room and return all stinky.  Like, "Oh, my lord, are toting WMD's around in your pants?!"

Not only do I get to smell her daily gifts (suffocate, more like), but cleaning them up is always a... joy?  I get to find out if a gob of poo will find its way onto my hand, or if the diaper might fly open at the wrong moment and fling poop onto the floor.  Or, maybe the diaper has proven no match and the poo has spread up her back and out the sides onto onesie and pants.

That is always a joy.

What I'm trying to get across here is that in one way or another you will come into contact with your offspring's poop.  It's unavoidable.

Un-a-void-able.

Which is why I always try to make Alex do it.

That's what husbands are for, right?

Baby

At the grandparents:

Before a bath:

Feeding herself:

Giggling while Alex blows on her face:

 At some restaurant (I think that's her "what food are you going to give me?" look):

j

This is what you get for now.  Hope you're all having a good week.

Ah-HA!

For those of you holding on to your tippy-toes waiting for my mind to return to me, the word is Routine.  I am a very routine (not schedule) oriented person.

Here is how it usually goes:

I wake up
Change JG's diaper (if she's up)
Put JG in the midst of toys and feed the animals
Put tea kettle on to boil
Play with JG
Get the computer and waste time checking email, blogs, and playing with facebook fish...

And on and on.  I know, it is SO exciting, which may only punctuate how strange I am that when that routine changes (like not having to go to work) I break down a little.

What a weirdo.

I have to grade papers and stuff now, something I've been procrastinating all week!  Joy!

Craft Therapy

*Warning* Please be aware that some swearing follows... mainly because I feel like it, and also, swears are just words.  However, I do know that some of you feel offended or hurt by four-letter words, so please feel free to stop reading here and for this post find another blog to read to procrastinate whatever it is that you are procrastinating.  Oh, and thanks for reading.

Oh.  My.  God.

You GUYS!

I love fabric.

I love the feel of it, the colors, the possibilities!

And, a small apology for my poor me, bitchy post previously.  I needed to get some stuff off my chest, obviously.  And, anytime my schedule (the real word I'm looking for starts with a T, but for the life of me I cannot grasp it!) changes, I get anxious.  As if the whole world just crumbled and I'm standing in the middle, looking around as if it's my duty to put it all back together.

Dude, if Humpty couldn't put himself back together... wait, my analogy is getting lost even on me...so.  What I'm trying to say is that I am crazy at times, and I need to learn to weather them better.

Which is why craft therapy is such a freaking gift.  Also, that part of my brain that was with-holding my creative impulse finally turned on again - but for only one thing.

A quilt.

You should know that I've really only made one blanket, never a quilt.  The only reason I feel the compulsion to approach such a task is because of the queen size quilt batting I bought (hoarded) some... seven or eight years ago.

Yes.  YEARS.  I know how that sounds.

I haven't made a quilt in all that time because the math of it all escapes me.  I can think of designs (sort of) but the logic of putting it together confuses the hell out of me.  Then I get pissed off.  Then I quit.

Because, I am a quitter.  Usually an angry one (as you may have observed from my many complaints on this blog).

But I finally resolved to make something simple simple, something even a math simpleton like myself may be able to approach.

I will try to post photo's as I go, but you all know how good I am at that.  I'm just hoping I don't do something in the middle of it to irritate me and make me quit.

Because, like I stated before, I am a quitter.

And now I'm going to go enjoy some Angel.  Because I love David Boreanaz and Joss Whedon.

Tight

Have you ever had the sense that the fabric you are made of is being pulled taught, and the more you move the more shallow your breath becomes?

It's strange, I was really looking forward to having a week off, having time to accomplish some of the random things that have been swimming around in my head...  but, I can't seem to jump start my head into going forward.  Instead it rummages deeper into the past and finds things that I am irritated about, things I have buried and/or thought I was over.

I am still mad at Westminster for the ONE teacher who treated me like a child.  I am angry at her for staining my experience, which up until that point was splendid.

I keep thinking about my grandmother and how much I miss her.  I'm not sure if I'm angry that she's gone, but I keep replaying this memory of when I was about 14 and she gave me this pair of dangly gold earrings.  She asked if I wanted them and emphasized that if I didn't that would be okay.  I looked that the earrings, which to me at 14 seemed gaudy and over-the-top, and told her no, I didn't want them.  My friend Courtney was there at the time and said she was amazed, she could never have said anything like that to her grandmother.  I thought Grandma didn't mind, but I noticed later in the day that her feelings were a little hurt.

To this day I feel guilty for hurting her feelings about something so trivial.  She never said anything, but she was the kind of woman who's eyes spoke novels, if you looked the right way.

I'm also irritated that I can't seem to spend any money.  I know.  Lame.  Every time I go to buy something I think I want the moment I take the action to purchase it I'm not interested anymore.  I'm like a balloon, all filled up with excitement at the thought of having something new, only to deflate when I realize that owning it wouldn't do me that much good.

What happened to the consumer inside me?  I still have that little voice that urges me to buy, but apparently it's being tempered with my budding buddhism, which says that such things are unnecessary for true happiness.

It's true, but I'm 30!  I AM THIRTY, and I have this selfish need to gift myself something (sort of like a pat on the back) for the amazing year I've had: masters degree, baby, SAHM, job, other stuff.  I just can't think of what that gift should be, or when I do I don't want it anymore.  Take that capitalism!

And JG has been keeping me up all night.  She wiggles and whimpers and cries and refuses to let me sleep on my own.  I'm not sure how to rectify the situation, I know that she's miserable because of teething, but when we're both miserable the next day due to little sleep no one is the better for it.

Poor Alex, he the one having to deal with all of this.

Hey

Marriage Ref is hilarious.

and

I'm really digging Ugly Betty.  I'm going through the first season (checking it out from the library) and I find it adorable and interesting.  Some of the writing is a bit weak (repetitive), but the characters totally make up for it.  And anytime a television show is in its first season you've got to forgive some minor snafoo's.

I have only watched the first eight episodes, mainly because I was using it as an excuse to do nothing... which I really don't need any help with.  I have been doing nothing for two weeks now.

JG, on the other hand, is on the verge of walking.  It started with pulling herself up to a kneeling position.  Over the past three days the kneel has turned into standing, and she is using EVERYTHING to stand.  Along with the standing she is starting to take a couple of steps.

Oh.  Crap.

Oh, she has been refusing to sleep on her own.  I'm putting it down to teething, but man am I tired.  I'm also going to use that as my excuse for doing nothing.

(Now, when I say "nothing" I mean in terms of crafting or anything productive for me.  I have been lesson planning and whatnot for my one class.  But, I get home, I do nothing.  I watch Ugly Betty.)

This next week I have spring break.  Spring mother-loving-break!  Nine consecutive days of no schedule, no driving an hour all over the valley to get to where I need to be, and hopefully getting things done.

Eh.

It can be very grating to spend my mornings with a group of lazy, apathetic teenagers.  For the most part they are your average 14/15-year-olds, eyes glazed over, talking non-stop, and drinking overly caffeinated beverages.  However, the majority of them are also brilliant, which may only add to my aggravation.

Suffice it to say they may be rubbing off on me.  I have always been a procrastinator, but it may be getting worse.  For example, I haven't updated this blog for a week.

I just didn't feel like it.

It's not like nothing happened, I did turn 30 last week.  THIRTY.  

JG is cutting two teeth, which is really adding to her...um, pleasant demeanor?  Last night she would not sleep without me, so I just threw the towel in and went to bed early with her.  It's uncomfortable, my arms fall asleep, but by golly she didn't cry all night.  (We here at the PoetsHead household don't have the patience for the "cry it out" method.  I've adopted my sisters logic: there is such a short window of time where you can fulfill ALL of your child's needs, why deny them something that can be so easy to give?)

Mael is out of his cone.  For now.  Already I can see his foot getting bad again, but I figure that he should have some time out of the confinement of his cone.

Alex brought home a Doctor Who pinball machine.  He now has FOUR pinball machines.

I am such a good wife.

I got my hair cut.  It's really short and I really like it, but the back of my head and neck are cold all the time.  What is up with that?

And, finally, JG is 10-months-old.  Holy crap, she'll be a year-old in no time.  

(Here she is last month, taming a wild balloon Alex gave her)

Words

I was being a bad mother earlier and letting JG play with plastic bags she found on the shelves while crawling around.  She had pulled one of the plastic tab things off and I bent over and said "Let mommy have that."

And you want to know what she said?

"No."

(I took it from her anyway, the sooner she learns that what she says doesn't matter the better...  in regards to the long list of things I do not want to find in her diaper.)

She continued to play with the plastic bags and started choking/coughing (not on the plastic tab), I asked her if she was okay, and you want to know what she said?

"Yeah."

Alex can confirm that.

Holy crap.

Words.

She'll be ten months old on Sunday, and in addition to those two words we have heard her say, "Hi", "Dad" (though Alex claims she didn't - even though she looked right at him and said it), and maybe "Mama."  However, she hasn't really looked directly at me and said that, but when she's upset she will repeat it until I scoop her up.

She also tries words.  She'll look at the cats and a sound similar to but not quite like "kitty" comes out of her mouth.  Other maybes include "dog" and "Stella" and maybe "Delihla" (her grandparents dog).

On the unfortunate front she had a bloody diaper on Monday, most likely from something she ate, not something I ate.  In hopes of helping her colon heal I am going back on my strict no milk diet.  No more milky goodness for me.  But that's okay, and I'll explain more in my next post.

Fortunately (or not) the craving part of my brain demanded that I buy donuts on Sunday, so I bought a cake donut and a jelly donut and ate one in the parking lot and the other in my driveway.

In about five minutes.

Seriously.

So.  Good.

A Good Mistake

I just ate a cookie.  I might pay for it later, but not how you think.

Let me back track -- last Thursday we went to Cafe Rio for giant burritos.  I asked the cashier what the horchata was like and in a moment of... shall we say thoughtlessness (?) I drank the sample she handed me.

For those of you who don't know, horchata is a mexican rice drink made with milk.  Milk, or rather, it's fat and flamboyant brother, condensed milk.

It was delicious.

I wanted to smack myself on the back of the head afterwards.  First off, tasting the horchata broke one of my many "avoiding milk for JG rules" -- don't eat anything white.  Because most white foods contain milk.

I spent the next day waiting for JG's reaction.  With the chocolate the reaction was immediate, with two days of her screaming bloody murder before pooping, but that was two months ago.

She was fine all day Friday, and by Saturday morning I was fantasizing about a bacon cheeseburger from Crown Burger.

Holy.  Mother.



Wait.

Understand for a moment that over the past seven months I have built a thick cast iron wall around my desire for anything milk related.  Yes, I have pined for donuts and dreamed about bingeing on a buffet of butter drenched goodness.  In the past whenever I ate anything with milk in it JG would poop blood and scream like crazy, so it was easier to avoid the milk than deal with my angry baby.

Convinced my fantasy was just a fantasy, I asked Alex for his input.  Was I correct in my observation of JG's non/slow/reduced reaction?

He CONFIRMED it and agreed to a visit to the burger Val Halla of Salt Lake valley.

OH.  MY.  GOD.

The cheese was so sweet it overpowered the bacon.  OVERPOWERED it.  If you're a vegetarian or something crazy like that, you may not understand the magical properties bacon contains.  I am positive a bacon fairy exists to spread joy on earth... however...

The cheese fairy is bigger and systematically beat the bacon fairy's ass in the taste category.

For me, anyway.

We watched JG carefully for the rest of the day for signs, and there were none.  No screaming, no bloody diapers (NO BLOODY DIAPERS), nothing to say, "This hurts, I'm disappointed, and I hate you."

Only.  The only thing that hinted at a reaction was some wakefulness.  Thursday she woke up at 10:30 PM (she goes to bed around 7) and would not go back to sleep until midnight, and Saturday morning she woke at 4:00 AM and didn't fall back to sleep until 5:30 AM.

It could have been the cheese, or it could be teething.  (Teething exists simply to torture mothers with guessing games.)

Other than wakefulness JG was fine.



I was not.


I don't want to go into detail, but the toilet and I made friends.

Apparently going on a strict no milk diet has made my guts forget how to digest the stuff.

I spent Sunday feeling queasy.  I spent Sunday thinking of how to slowly work milk back into my diet.  Strangely enough, rather than being super excited, I'm frightened.

So, when JG screamed before pooping Monday night I was both relieved and saddened.

It may have been the milk, or it could have been something else.

For now I might sample small pieces of things with milk ingredients, but I won't go full tilt.  I am so thrilled that JG's system is healing and progress is being made in terms of maturation.

So, Milk, I'm eyeing you.  Soon, Milk, soon.

Through Their Eyes

Over the past nine months I have been a stay-at-home-mom, which means I spend most of my time inside with nobody but myself, JG, and Alex to see me.  Which means I spent little to no time thinking about my appearance or doing much to "keep myself up."  So, when I got a job where I would be standing in front of 14-year-olds I knew I would have to make some wardrobe changes.

Especially in the bra area.

Why?  Well, because I know how much you love to hear about my boobs, let me tell you.  The four nursing bras I bought last year are all in the DDD/F area.  As time goes by your breasts learn how much milk to carry, and gradually they shrink down a bit.  Meaning, my nursing bras (or "feeding harnesses") were doing little in the way of supporting the ladies.  They were almost greeting my belly button on a daily basis.

I became painfully aware of this when I realized that standing in front of a group of 14-year-old boys with my hoots danglin' in the wind and standing at attention (pointy-wise) would not be a good idea.

You may naively ask, Why?

Um, have you met teenage boys?  Do you know what they think about?  Or what new hormones they have coursing through their veins?

To be honest, I was sort of terrified.  If you're a woman you may have experienced the "blank stare" from the opposite sex while walking, or sitting, or standing, or anywhere.  Those glazed over eyes that translate to "What were you saying?  I was distracted by your boobies, I swear they want me to touch them."

Is that going too far?  I just want to communicate to you how I have felt about my boobs over the years.  Sometimes it can work to your advantage, but in no way does it work that way in the classroom.  I had one professor who REALLY needed a better bra.  Her party hats were so distracting that I would get lost thinking about how she needed to cover them up, and then I wouldn't know what she had just said.

All this to say that having good coverage and support is a priceless tool in a teachers arsenal.

So I went to the Lactation Station yet again where I was set up.  I love going there.  LOVE IT.  When I told the owner that I was going to teach teenagers she knew I would want padded bras.  I didn't have to say it.  She knew.

I found three great bras and I'm very pleased.

However.

My boobs are still huge, double D's.  While I try to do my best in making them an understated part in the classroom, there are times when I move or point, or something, and catch someone looking at them.

Oddly enough, it has been the girls I catch.  I can't blame them though, mainly because I just admitted to looking at my professors boobs.

I promise not to write about boobs again for a while.

Hello

I am still here, I'm just mentally exhausted.  I know it may sound strange to you, but my one hour of working every day is taking it out of me.  Today is first day I did not nap with JG, it's nine PM and I am going to bed, where I may just pass out as soon as my head hits my tower of pillows.

Stay tuned for a post on my boobs.  Hey, I can see you rolling your eyes in the back row there, but I can only give you what my head comes up with.

Busy Week

This week started out innocently enough.  JG and I laid back and had a relaxing Monday, where JG got bathed, she napped and I sewed monsters.  It was nice, and I wasn't expecting much of the rest of the week.

Until I received a phone call on Tuesday.

From a principal.

Asking if maybe I would be available to teach one biology class at his charter school for the rest of the year.  And could I meet with him to talk about it?

I think my heart stopped.

I've been obsessing lately over money and how in the world can I get out of the house to maintain my sanity? and this sounded a bit like an answer to my prayers.  If I could get through the meeting/interview without making an ass out of myself... which may be a rare thing for me, especially in my "mommy brained" state.

(Mommy brained: the inability to form sentences or remember big words from degrees you have earned, and a general loss of any social graces you may have had before having a child.)

Amazingly enough, I made it through the meeting without sticking my foot in my mouth, and left the interview very hopeful.  When I got the call from the principal an hour later offering me the job (one class of 18 ninth graders) I was thrilled.  Thrilled.  Still am, as a matter of fact, however it hasn't completely hit me yet.  I've had to pause every now and then to think, "Hey, I'm a Biology teacher now!"

Also, I have a lot of cramming to do.  I passed the test to teach the subject, but I like to be knowledgeable when I'm teaching.  I also have a lot of lesson plans to write.  Oh, man, so much time will be spent planning.  It is so awesome.  Seriously.

And the hours are perfect for me.  Five days a week I go in from 8:30-9:30 AM and teach, and I'm getting paid an additional two hours for prep time, which is very sweet of them to do.  So I'll get paid for seven hours every week.  While that may sound minimal to you, it will get me out of the house, give JG an opportunity to spend time with much loved relatives, and I'll get to be a teacher.  A Biology teacher.



A very big thanks to Joan for dropping my name to this principal, and letting him know I'm endorsed to teach English and Biology.  Apparently that's valued at my new school.





As a congratulations to myself I ordered my light-up LA Gear gold shoes.  They'll be here Tuesday!



I am such a freaking nerd!


A Biology teaching nerd!


Woot.

A dark yearning

Okay.

I have to admit something.

I was watching Ellen the other day.  And, whilst watching Ellen, where she had sent a viewer to the Grammy's gift tent, I saw a pair of shoes that I'm not sure I cannot live without.


Seriously.


Now, I have a couple things to say before I show you the shoes.  First off, I don't believe that buying things will fill some empty chasm in my soul.  I know better.  For that reason I have forsaken buying new clothes whilst being a stay-at-home-mom (I mean, really, my uniform is sleep pants and a sweat shirt, it's HOT and practical).  And, when I eventually get a job, I've made rules as to what professional clothes I can buy and how much.  I don't need a huge wardrobe, just enough so that my students don't make fun of me.  I want them to make fun of me for who I am, not for what I'm wearing.... (Mainly because I remember some of my high school teachers who wore the same thing week after week.)

Secondly, these shoes are on the edge of being horrendously ugly.  And that is exactly how I like my shoes.  I want to be able to pass people and have their faces contort as if asking, "Why God, why make such shoes that make me feel as if I'm going to be smothered by a group of tiny mouth-breathing toe-biters?"

Okay, I doubt that's what they'd really think, but it would put a smile on my face if it did.

And, thirdly, these shoes LIGHT UP.  YES!  You know, like the shoes you see little kids running around in?  YES!  I WANT THEM SO BADLY!

They also remind me of the LA Gear shoes I had when I was 11.  (But those were pretty, not ugly.)

Now, there are two colors I'm trying to decide between (for that other dimension where I can buy anything on impulse) - gold and red.  I'm leaning a bit more towards the gold, mainly because they say GAUDY so well, but the red ones are nice too.

I know, you're asking yourself why you ever bothered to read my blog in the first place.  But it's about to get better.

The gold ones have pink lights (in the heel!) and the red ones have red lights, of course.

Now can you see how crazy I am?  The kind of crazy that longs to spend $100 bucks on a pair of hideous gold shoes that have pink lights and light up with ever step I take?  I have to keep reminding myself I am going to be 30 next month, and are these really the type of shoes a 30 year-old would wear?









What?

I STILL want them...

I just want one night where I know I will sleep a straight 8 hours, where I won't wake up to pee, or JG won't wake up and need me for something, or the dog won't wake up and need to go outside to pee, or the cone-head cat won't need to sleep next to me under the covers and cleaning himself.

I just want one night of uninterrupted sleep.

Just.  One.

It won't happen.  But I thought I would put it out into the chaos of the universe and see if it could happen.

Soon, maybe?











Hey, in three months I can eat all the doughnuts and ice cream I want.  So, if you see me in June sometime with powdered sugar and chocolate around my mouth, calmly remove yourself from the situation.  I can't promise anything about my behavior.

Working

So JG's naps have been terrible this past week.  Not only is she fighting the afternoon nap as if it were a cloaked Romulan warbird  (yes, I am that kind of nerd), but when she does nap it's only for 30 minutes.

Suffice it to say, I have had very little time to work on anything.  Meaning my house is a mess and I have made one monster in the past two weeks.  One.  And I haven't even sewn him up completely.

In my head I'm working on some new patterns.  I'm planning on using some of my dad's old Levi's to make a soft denim monster, but what kind of monster I am unsure of.  I am in this creative space where I am lazy and know I should be making things, but instead am busy adding new photo's on facebook.

So.  Sad.

I should just give myself a date where I'm going to reopen the etsy store and go for it.  Give myself a friggin due date.  But my banner is old and I can't figure out how to make a new one.  (And it has the added bonus of giving me yet another excuse to not get things done.)

So.  Pathetic.

Plus, I have to deal with this:

Yeah, I think that's puss.

So.  Gross.

This was taken a couple of weeks ago, his foot is doing better now, but I'm a little sick of playing nurse to my gimpy cat.  The bigger/longer cone has made it so he can't reach his foot, so hopefully it will actually heal completely in the next two or so weeks.

Otherwise I'm going to amputate it.  Take that gimpy cat!

And, finally, the obligatory JG photo.  She really enjoys chewing on her sweaters.

It is Done

I did it.

I finally followed the crowd.

I joined facebook.


I know, you are all utterly amazed and can't believe it... or you don't really care.  Whatever.

I was thinking this last week about what an isolationist I am, how I spend so much time all by my lonesome (and JG), and how I am horrible at reaching out and being social.

Now, I realized that in today's day and age there is technology that can help to temper such an unhealthy way of living.  It's called social media, and I too can join the herd and connect with people I haven't talked to in years.

And I have!  Old best friends, ex-boyfriends (ok, just the one), people I went to school with.

But, I do have to say that I'm only acknowledging the people with names I recognize (and let me tell you, I am terrible with names).

It's so weird to talk the people I haven't known anything about for so long.  It's really nice to catchup and see how well they're doing.  No one that I know of has ended up in a crack house with some nasty monkey on their back.  And that is good.  All is good.

The sky hasn't fallen the way I thought it would if I signed up.  I'm actually pretty happy I did.

Bad Mommy

I had a bite of chocolate.

It was French.

It was smooth and creamy and crunchy and dammit it left my tongue wanting more.  Seriously, I have not had a piece of chocolate in six months.  Six months.  When I was pregnant I ate the stuff every day, so having to go without for so long has been... well, not that bad actually.  (I've learned to really love juice.)

Anyway.

Now, you may ask, why am I eating chocolate, when most chocolate has MILK in it?

What?

The doctor said JG has an INTOLERANCE, not an allergy, and I thought why not?  Alex was eating a French bar of the good stuff and for the first time I had the impulse to make myself happy, rather than making sure that JG doesn't bleed out of her butt... colon.

I had a bad mommy moment (and my dreams are filled with them, nightmares really, where I pig out on ice cream only to realize after my third milkshake that I can't eat the stuff - oh my poor baby girl!)

Was it a good choice?

No.

But at least it was only two days of screaming poop (because the intolerance causes a lot of pain, I imagine) with flecks of blood.  It used to be three days.  So her colon is slowly learning how to deal with the milk proteins, and hopefully in a couple of months there will be more improvements.

And then, and then, those milkshakes better be shaking in their boots because I'm gonna get so fat eating their offspring.

So. Fat.