Equilibrium

We Can't Have Anything Nice in This House!

2010-02-13T22:17:00.006-05:00

I remember that phrase as a child. Has anyone gone through childhood without hearing it? However, it was only recently I fully began to appreciate just how true that phrase is. I've been working very hard on creating a new room for them that has been in planning for months. But I sit here now wondering why I didn't just strip the room bare and throw a couple of mattresses on the floor.

Allow me to take you on a journey of a week in my life.

Saturday, Jan 30th- The shampoo incident
We are expecting company. Since I still haven't hired a new housekeeper, my house is not exactly ready for primetime. We waited way to late to begin cleaning and then the frenzy began. While Bill and I were busy running from room to room picking up and vacuuming, I remember thinking how nice it was that the girls had finally stopped getting in the way and had gone off to play. My second thought was panic that they had stopped getting in the way and had gone off to play.

I stopped what I was doing and began to look around for the two cohorts. I saw the bathroom light was on and the door was closed. Uh oh. This can't be good.

I slowly opened the door and saw the shower curtain pulled shut. I pulled back the curtain and there I saw two fully dressed, fully soaked girls. But not soaked in water. They were soaked in shampoo. They had taken a value sized bottle of shampoo and covered every square inch of themselves, the tub, the floor, and the toilet.

Of course that was a room that had already been cleaned. Now we get to clean it again on a day where we just didn't have the time. Bill stripped the girls down, tossed them in the tub and cleaned the toilet and floor while the tub got cleaned from the girls splashing in the bath.

There was a plus side out of that mess. I don't think our floor nor our girls have ever been quite so squeaky clean.

Sunday, January 31- The bins
I had carefully sorted all of the old girls clothes to get them ready for sale and give away. I had sorted them by size and by season and had gotten the label maker out as a final mark of my brief window of organization. I had all of the bins stacked in the living room for Bill to take to the basement.

It took no time at all for the girls to discover the bins and decide they would work much better as play toys than as storage bins. When I came downstairs, this is what I found.

Every bin had been opened and the mixed and tossed about the living room and they were using the bins as forts. Nice.

Monday, February 1- Stickers
Let me say I hate stickers with a white hot burning passion. Once upon a time, I thought they were a clever distraction. I naively thought that if I gave the girls sticker books they would sit there quietly and place their stickers in corresponding pages and admire them within the confines of the princess book pages they were given. That happened once. Every other time stickers have been involved they have been placed anywhere but in the dedicated sticker book pages. They have been found on every piece of furniture, in their hair, in the car, in the dishwasher, and in Bailey's diaper. I have worked very hard to eradicate the house of every sticker and sticker book ever bought. Yet somehow, there is always more. I am convinced that somewhere in the house Reagan has a super secret stash of nothing but stickers and fruit snacks. She seems to have a never ending supply of both despite being cutoff for quite some time. Some day I'll find that chipmunk's stash, for now, I deal with them as they come.

On this day, stickers magically appeared on the living room windows. Some of the stickers were strategically placed up to six feet high. Despite having to get the goo gone yet again for another sticker incident, I am impressed at a 3ft munchinkin's ability to get the stickers possibly higher than I could have stuck them.

Tuesday, February 2- Sledding
Dear Diary, today I observed the girls using princess sleeping bags to pull each other throughout the house as sleds. I was too tired to care. I told them to carry on.

Wednesday, February 3- Washable Markers
Today Stanley Steemer came to remove the red, green, and blue washable marker from the carpet. Turns out "washable markers" are not actually "washable" on carpet. This was duly noted and all washable markers were promptly tossed in the trash (however I'm sure Reagan managed to get a sizable stash hidden with her stickers and fruit snacks before they were all tossed. I don't expect this to be the last of them.)

Thursday, Februay 4- The beds
The girls got to sleep in their new beds for the first time last night. Bill and I spent hours assembling them, making the beds, and getting everything just so for their first night.

Usually when they get up, first thing they do is head into our room and begin asking for milk, cereal, pancakes, pizza, fruit snacks, whatever strikes them. Today, they got up and started playing in their new room. When I heard them awake I went into their room. They had stripped every blanket, sheet, and pillow off of the beds and had shoved them in their princess castle tent. They then managed to toss one of the mattresses on the floor and were crash diving from the box springs to the mattress. They had also emptied every bin of toys I had carefully organized and emptied the contents of eight of them into their tent and once they finished that they tossed the bins in on top.

I walked back out and went back to bed. Maybe it was just a bad dream.

Friday, February 5 and Saturday, February 6- Say What?
No destruction! That was because we had company. The little monsters were on their best behavior so that my family would think I'm just making up all of the stories about them.

Sunday, February 7- Hershey's Kisses and chapstick
Family is gone so the girls had two days of pent up destruction to get out. The family was gone about 15 minutes before Reagan discovered some Hershey's kisses wrapped with a souvenir hockey puck from the hockey game the night before. Most went of the chocolate found its way into her mouth. However, some discovered its way into the couch and had melted into a series of Rorschach inkblot tests.

While Reagan was busy with Hershey's kisses, Bailey was upstairs. I heard a scratching noise on the walls and went to check it out. She had scribbled the entire length of the hallway with chapstick. I caught her in the act:

That was just one piece of the hallway. Multiply that by three for the full effect.
Note to self: Don't waste time trying to scrub off chapstick off the walls with wet wipes. It doesn't work.

Today, February 13- Sharpie
I was passing yet another kidney stone today. Bill had to leave for a while. I called a babysitter to come take care of the kids while he was gone so I could lay in my room and die.

I only had to make it 30 minutes after he left and before the babysitter got there. I laid in my room with the doors open and stupidly thought that the girls would quietly sit in the living room and play and watch tv for 30 minutes. What part of this post would make me think that, you say? None. But when you're in pain you'll rationalize anything.

About 20 minutes into Bill being gone, 10 minutes before the babysitter arrives, I hear a loud crash. I run downstairs to make sure the girls are ok. Thelma and Louise aren't in the living room at all. They are in the foyer. But not before they made a pitstop in the kitchen to dig through a few drawers to find their latest object of desire.

I run up to them and Reagan says, "Bailey dropped the sign on the floor." That's what made the loud crash, no harm done. I start to relax seeing they are both breathing and nothing is broken. But then I see Reagan and notice glints of silver around her mouth, on her hands, and running down her pants. While I am examining her I hear Bailey say, "Ray-run did it" and she's pointing to a corner of the hardwood floor.

That's when I see what was done. And that's where I actually start to cry. Reagan had found a metallic silver Sharpie pen (you know, the VERY permanent ones!) and had colored all over the floor and the wall. She had begun writing her name on a very precious table my father had handmade for me with countless hours of love. She had gotten through "R-E" and a scribble before Bailey crashed the picture. I circled the room and saw that she also scribbled on a 150 year old chair that had belonged to my great-great grandparents and had been passed down to me after my grandpa "Pop" had died.

Of all of the destructive things my girls have done, this was by far the worst. I yelled at Reagan and told her she ruined something very precious and valuable to me. I then got my composure and went and dug out the magic erasers I bought a while back and hadn't pulled out of the box. I tested it on the hardwood floor. I hate the finish on the floors anyway. To my surprise the Sharpie was coming off and wasn't removing the finish. I held my breath as I got the nerve to try it on the table. To my delight it worked! The Sharpie came off and the finish was still perfectly preserved. I decided to try my luck again and tried the chair. Again, it worked. It carefully removed the marks while leaving the beautiful patina that only 150 years of wear will provide. It also worked on the walls, but I noticed the wall was slightly darker where I removed the Sharpie.

About that time the babysitter arrived. I went back to my bedroom and decided the girls just might live to see another birthday after all.

So now it's the end of the day and I find myself once again saying, "How come we can't have anything nice in this house!?"
I'm also wondering what's in store for tomorrow. At the very least I'm looking up the stock in Magic Eraser and looking into buying that stuff by the case.

When I grow up

2010-02-13T16:01:00.002-05:00

Reagan: "When I grow up I want to be a bad, wicked witch."

When she was two she wanted to be a school bus driver. But now this? Where have I gone wrong? Someone is getting cut off from watching any more Wizzard of Oz.

Why?

2010-01-06T21:07:00.005-05:00

There is a Six Sigma management technique that is used to identify the root cause of problems called "The Five Whys." You start with an issue and continue asking why until you get to what the problem really is. Doctrine has it that it was developed by a guy in Japan at Toyota. I implore that it was more than likely developed by the mom of an inquisitive toddler who recently learned the word, "why."

Earlier this week we were in the car and Bailey asked a question. I gave a response, and she said, "Why?"

We were so excited! She hit a developmental milestone! This is big news! We need to log this stardate!

Three days later, and we are wishing she'd learn a new favorite word already. Every question and response is now reduced to a one word response.

Bailey: I have pockets in my dress?
Me: No, sweetie, there are no pockets in that dress.
Bailey: Why?
Me: Because the dress didn't come with pockets.
Bailey: Why?
Me: Because they didn't sew any on when they made it.
Bailey: Why?
Me: Because they wanted to save fabric to sew more dresses.
Bailey: Why?
Me: Because the person that designed the dress didn't think you needed them.
Bailey: Why?
Me: Because clearly the person that designed the dress didn't have a two year old of their own.

This sort of dialog continues for 30 minutes at a time. I've now clearly identified the root cause to the lack of pockets in girls' dresses amongst dozens of other earth moving revelations.

Need to learn the answer to word peace? Want to know why your DVD player isn't working? Just ask a two year old. Chances are, she's got all of the right questions.

New Beginnings

2010-01-04T14:03:00.002-05:00

"...For if they never should have bitter they could not know the sweet."

It's a new year. Funny, I don't feel all that different. It's like having a birthday, you are technically one year older but yet you look and feel the same as you did the day before. But because of some mark on some calendar adopted by some Pope back in 1582, we get a chance to designate a particular day more special than other days. It's a day where we get to mentally wipe the slate clean and start fresh. We get to say, "last year I had some bad habits" or "last year some bad things happened" but "this year will be different." We start off the new year thinking this is going to be the best one yet, the one where you get everything in your life just exactly the way you want it to be. We have grand ideas of these great goals, but within two weeks 30% of us have already given up and only 50% of us make it three months. Which is exactly why only 40% of us even bother to set new years resolutions at all.

Those aren't great odds. But I'm going to do it anyway. The year 2009 was pretty much one of the worst years of my adult life. It was tough mentally, physically, emotionally. I am determined to take 2009 and learn from it and make the subsequent years all that much better. I took the bitter so that I can appreciate the sweet all that much more.

So in order to make 2010 better and make 2010 where I want to be mentally, physically, and emotionally, here are my goals that I'd like to share:

I want to get organized. I want to have every closet, drawer, and nook and cranny organized. I want everything to have a home and a purpose or it is gone. I don't want to have to rely on a housekeeper to keep my life in order.
I want to be healthy. I want to eat healthy and exercise at least five times a week. If that leads me to my wish of losing a gazillion pounds, that would be even better. But ultimately I want to make sure I am healthy so I am around for my family for a long time and I want to be happy and secure with what I look like.
I want to become a better photographer. I want to learn to use my camera better and take better pictures. I want to one day take the darn thing off of auto.
I want to document the life of my children and myself for posterity. This is simple, I resolve to blog more. There are a lot of reasons I didn't blog much last year. I'm taking all of those away so that I have no reason not to blog at least five times a week.
I want to have a work life balance. This has always been a struggle. I still haven't figured out my action plan for this one. I just know that I need to make sure I put more time and attention to my children and husband and less on my work. If I don't, I'll fail at my other goals.

It's a tall list, but I think it's reasonable. I just need to set aside a little time each day. We'll see how far I get. Hopefully I'll be one of the minority success statistics rather than the majority that give up after three months.

So, how about you? What resolutions or goals have you set for yourself? How do you plan to make this year better than the ones before?

Pumpkin Patch Play

2009-10-21T22:08:00.011-04:00

Over the weekend we did the obligatory pumpkin patch fall farm day. This year we picked Souther Belle Farms. A great farm with a pumpkin patch, huge corn maze, cow train, peda carts, corn cannons, hay slides, pig races, and more. We went with my sister Tara and her kids Savahhah (10), Shelby (8), John (6), and Landon (3).

The kids were immediately impressed with the pumpkin patch and wanted to spend all of their time there. But we convinced
them there was more to see.

That would include the cow train...

(Shelby was particularly impressed)...

A litle time in the kiddie corral with horse swings made from recycled tires...

Several runs down the fastest slide on any farm for 100 miles..

And then on to the corn maze

But not just any little dinky corn maze. This one was massive and divided into three mazes of escalating length and difficulty.

Maze #1. We all went in together. We got a little separated. Bill and I got turned around and exited out the entrance, but within 10 minutes everyone was out and all was good.

Maze #2. Potty break for the little ones so John went into the maze followed by Savannah and Shelby hand in hand with Bailey.

Five minutes later John came running out and we figured the girls would be right behind...

But it wasn't so. The minutes pass and we start to worry. We start asking others coming out if they saw the girls and no one had. So Bill and I head into the maze to see if we can find them, no luck. At about the 20 minute mark, Savannah calls on her cell phone. Thank goodness for a 10 year old having a cell phone. They somehow got separated from Shelby. Shelby was somewhere lost and alone and Savannah was with Bailey lost, scared and crying. I had Savannah yell at the top of the lungs and we couldn't hear her. The maze was that big. I was running through the maze in my new practical high heeled crocs yelling for them. I finally came across a lookout bridge and climbed it and low and behold I found Savannah on a lookout bridge in maze three. Only problem was none of the workers knew how to get to that bridge. It was off of the trail. We finally found one guy who knew exactly how to get to her. He ran through to get Savannah and Bailey and in the meantime Shelby had been found by a passerby in Maze 2. She was crying, distraught, and just happy to be back with everyone. About 30 minutes after the girls had gone in the maze, Savannah and Bailey were escorted out. Here's our hero...

That was enough corn maze fun for one day so on to release some anxiety by shooting corn husks from a pressurized cannon....

And playing in the maize...

By this time it was near closing time. Just enough time to pick our pumpkins...

And call it a day in our adventures at the farm.

What no parent wants to hear

2009-10-07T15:00:00.002-04:00

Last night Reagan and I had a conversation:

Reagan: I don't have any friends
Me: What are you talking about? You have lots of friends. Everyone likes you.
Reagan: Then why won't they play with me?

Ugh! Just crush me. Spear my heart and take it out with a fork. This was something I hoped I'd never have to hear. No parent wants to hear that their child is being picked on, doesn't belong, or doesn't have any friends.

This bothered me all night. I couldn't wait to get to school in the morning to talk to her teacher and see what was going on. She's only been at her school a few weeks but as far as I could tell she was transitioning just fine.

When I got to school I told her teacher what Reagan said. Her teacher almost laughed and said, "Reagan? Reagan clicked with everyone immediately. She's always playing with someone. She's got lots of friends here."

It turns out Reagan was just getting a little homesick for her old friends and was missing them. I feel bad that she misses her old friends, but drew a heavy sigh of relief that all is well in her new school.

Let's hope it is a very long time before we have that conversation again. In fact, how about never?

Sick baby

2009-09-30T20:44:00.002-04:00

Bailey came down with the flu recently. Not one to cry, she just sat still in her most pitiful pout that she could muster. She missed her entire first week at her new school as her temperature reached as high as 103.7 at one point.

Poor baby!

Changing Times

2009-09-30T20:34:00.004-04:00

We recently made a decision to change schools with the girls. We've loved where they have been but we haven't loved the hefty monthly bill and the long commute. So the girls have started at a new school that is just minutes from the house. So far, they are quite happy and that makes us happy.

Reagan's favorite part about her new school? She doesn't have to wear uniforms anymore. She's been picking out her clothes every morning and loves the opportunity to do so.

Here are the girls in their last day of uniforms. Here's to new schools, new friends, and new memories.

It All Started With Two Pink Lines and a Computer

2009-09-22T20:17:00.008-04:00

Four years ago, I found out I was pregnant with Reagan. Daunted at the news and some ensuing complications, I did what many modern women do-- I took to the internet. I thought I was just looking for the answers to "morning sickness cures." While I never did find the answers to curing morning sickness, I found something much greater--friends.

It started when I stumbled across a "mommy board" where all of the women were expecting babies at the same time as me. Many were experiencing the same problems as me. Many had the same questions as me. I can't pinpoint the moment where this mommy board turned. Turned from being a resource of anonymous women providing answers, to being a conglomeration of wonderful friends providing support and comfort. But it did happen. And over the course of four years the desire to go from being friends through a network of fibre cables to being friends in the flesh became quite great. So much so, that some of us finally decided to meet.

Over the weekend, six of us from across the country converged in New York City to meet in person for the first time. I wasn't the least bit nervous. Through the boards and then through blogs, I felt as though I had gotten to know these women quite well. They were at a distinct disadvantage with me, however. I hadn't blogged all year so they didn't really know what had been going on with me and over time I'm sure the memory of me had faded a bit. After all, I was still only pixels and memories to them at this point. Nonetheless, they still wanted to meet me and I them.

In short, it was a fabulous weekend. The trip was everything I had hoped it would be and more. The women were everything I had come to know them to be and more.

I don't want to take away from the great posts that my new "real life" friends have already written, so let me point you their way so you can check out their take on the trips in first person view. It's interesting to me that all of them wrote very different posts about the same weekend. They all wrote their posts with focuses from their own strengths and their personality. Had I not have met them in person and been part of the weekend, why they each wrote with a different slant would have been totally lost on me. I love that I've now been able to delve into that aspect of them and see even more into their posts.

Joanna wrote a fabulous post about the trip and the good, human side of the internet and summed it up beautifully as "Jelly Bellies for the soul." It was a fitting post coming from a woman who is even smarter and wittier than her posts allow her to be, and that is saying much.
Lindsay wrote a great post about where we went, what we did, and how we ate, shopped, and twittered ourselves across the city. Lindsay is a planner and an organizer. She sent out spreadsheets and Word documents about our trip plans and emergency contacts. Can I just say just how much I love that?
Laura is the photographer I hope to be one day. She took some great pictures and applied some skillful editing to make us all look good. Her post is loaded with some of those great photos.
London wrote of our "shenanigans" and conversations. London has a flair for writing and words and it was only fitting that she would focus on that aspect.
Rita wrote--well I'm sure Rita has written her post in her head a dozen times (As she says she often does, and I admit to doing too. I intend to rectify this I swear!). Since Rita hasn't published her post, I'll speculate on what Rita has swimming in her head. I'm guessing Rita would write a post focusing more on people's character and personality. Rita herself is a person booming with character and personality, as are the other women. But in Rita's case, it seems to come easiest for her to know exactly who she is and to be precisely that.

I think the descriptions of each person in the above posts were quite accurate so I won't repeat those. Allow me to sum up how I feel about all of these women by saying that although we have different political, ideological, and whatever views, we still have much in common. They are all women I greatly respect and admire. They are all smart, friendly, compassionate, funny women. I laughed this weekend and let go like I hadn't in ages. It was like meeting old friends from school and just picking up where we left off years ago. They are all women I would choose to have in my circle of friends if they lived close to me. But since they don't, I'll have to continue to know them through Facebook, Twitter, and their blogs. Then, when we meet again next year, we'll just once again pick up where we left off.

It was such a wonderful experience that I hope to meet more of my online friends in the future. It's truly amazing to me that this whole weekend started its making four years ago as nothing more than a search for answers after seeing two little pink lines on a pregnancy test. And know I have the pleasure of calling five amazing women...friends.

My 9/11 Story

2009-09-10T23:20:00.002-04:00

I appreciate the many emails, comments, and concerns I've received over the last several months regarding my absence here. Please know that I appreciated every one of them. You all made me feel loved. I will be back to posting VERY, VERY soon, I promise. But first, let me retell my story I published last year of my 9/11 experience.

May we always remember.
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It was September 10, 2001. As the plane made its approach into the Newark airport, I did my usual routine. Looking out the window, I looked for the Twin towers of the World Trade Center. They were always so easy to spot on the edge of the skyline. From there, it was a straight shot down to find the little green spot that was the Statue of Liberty. I never got used to how tiny Lady Liberty was against the massive skyscrapers. The pictures and stories of her always seemed to make her seem much bigger in proportion than she really is.

I found my Twin Towers, found the Statue of Liberty. Check, and check, my ritual was done and I could go back to my latest James Patterson book. It was never really worth the time, but it was the only thing left in the newsstand selection of 20 books I hadn't read.

I picked up my rental car, drove to my hotel and checked in. I considered going into the city for dinner. I was just across the river from Manhattan and had nothing to do until I started teaching my class the following morning. But I decided I was tired of the city and same old same old and ordered room service and worked on reading my book.

Morning came and my day started just like the other 600 classes I had started before. I greeted students, made sure the computers were setup properly, familiarized myself with the facility, and made sure I knew who my contact was if an issue arose. At 8:30 the class promptly began and I started my introduction that at this point was a memorized speech.

Around 8:45, a student's phone rang. I made a mental note to make sure I moved up my "please silence your phones, put pagers on stun, etc." speech and glared at the student as she took the call in the middle of the class. I was hoping she saw my evil eye. Only as I was giving her the evil eye, I was noticing something in her eye--tears and panic. I was caught off guard and paused to look at this student and tried to imagine what sort of family emergency has just happened. She put down her phone and with a trembling voice and trying to hold back her tears said, "Something has happened. There was an explosion or something at the World Trade Center."

With the vast numbers of people that work at the WTC and being just across the river, I don't believe there was a single student that didn't also panic. No one in that classroom was without a loved one, a neighbor, or a friend that didn't work there and was immediately concerned for their safety. We stopped class while everyone started making phone calls, getting on the internet, going outside to see if we could see anything. Details were sketchy but it was clear that something big had happened. Then we find out it was a plane that crashed through. What a terrible accident, how could that have happened? Wait! There's a second plane! It just crashed into the other tower! This wasn't an accident! Our nation is being attacked and I'm sitting 10 miles from the epicenter.

We dismiss class and tell people to go home and try to find out what has happened to all of their loved ones. The phones were completely overloaded and everyone was having trouble getting through. My sister, Tara, was the first to get a message to me. Her message was, "Hey! I was just checking to make sure you are ok. I don't know where in the world your are today, but given your history of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, I'm guessing you are in NY. Call us and let us know." I was finally able to get through to her and to Mom to say yes, I was in NY, but I was fine. That didn't stop my Mom from being near hysterical but I assured her I was ok and not in danger. Was I in danger? I didn't really know. I still didn't know entirely what was going on. My statement meant I was alive and ok at the moment but I wasn't going to tell her that distinction.

In my stupor I go back to my hotel to watch the news and surf the net to figure out what is going on. On the way I could see the smoke pouring from the towers. I wasn't close enough to see the towers. I couldn't handle looking at them yet anyway. I learn the Pentagon was also attacked and there's word of potentially some heroes that ensured a fourth plane wouldn't take another target. Then, right there on my TV, it happened. I watched the first building buckle like a house of cards. I began sobbing thinking of all of my students and their loved ones. There were husbands, wives, sisters, even children in the daycare. How many were lost? Shortly after I see the second building collapse and I can no longer sit in my room.

I got into my car. I drove down towards the towers. When they were in clear view of the massive black pouring of smoke, I pulled over. Right there on the interstate I pulled over to the emergency lane and with everyone else and got out of my car and stood along the wall. There were no more towers to see, only smoke. I wish I had paid more attention to them yesterday. I wish I had known that would be the last time I would set site to the grand buildings. I would have looked longer, I would have gone into the city and taken another tour of them, I would have done a lot of things different.

I don't know how long I stood there crying just watching, sobbing, being numb. Emergency vehicles were constantly roaring down the interstate behind me, heading for the scene. Every time I heard their siren it jolted me out of my trance for just a second. Finally I put my thoughts together and decided I would do the only thing I could do, I would go donate blood. Surely there were many injured survivors that would need blood. I could do that. I found out a location of a Red Cross. Apparently half the city had the same idea. I was turned away as they couldn't handle any more donations. Defeated and unable to help in any way I could fathom, I went back to my hotel.

When I got to my hotel, the scene had changed. They were using the lobby as a makeshift treatment facility for emergency workers suffering from smoke inhalation and other minor injuries. Camera crews from neighboring cities had checked in and set up shop. I went to my room and cried again. I had never felt so alone. It was too far to drive home and the airports were shut down tight. I was stuck. I had no one I knew, no one who loved me to hug me and tell me everything would be ok. I cried myself to sleep.

A few hours later I woke with a start. Had I left the iron on this morning? What is that burning smell? I checked the iron. It was unplugged and put away thanks to the housekeeping service. Was it my curling iron? No, it was off too. I stepped out of my room and still smelled that wretched smell that burned my nose. My heart was heavy as I finally processed what that smell was. It wasn't the curling iron, or the iron, or the air system. It was the smell of the burning of two giant skyscrapers, two planes, and all of the people for whom it became a tomb. It was the smell of death. It is a smell that didn't escape me the rest of the time I was there and a smell that still plagues me to this day. This was the most vivid of my memories.

The next morning I showed up for class. I figured it had been canceled but no one was able to get through to tell me otherwise. I had nothing else to do anyway. To my surprise, six others showed up too. I learned that many in that class lost loved ones. It wasn't the news I wanted to hear. But there were six out of 24 that had shown up, that had all friends and family accounted for, and they wanted to learn. So I taught. I finally had a purpose in all this madness. I would teach my class and they would help me get through this.

Normally I teach a class by using humor. I skipped the jokes that week. I wasn't in a funny mood and it seemed inappropriate to laugh anyway. I bought them pizzas during lunch and held to every minute of class as precious time for me to have someone to talk to, people to listen to, people who would keep my mind off of what happened 10 miles away.

When the class ended that Friday, I was fortunate enough to be able to make the very first flight out of Newark when it reopened that day. It was times like these that I was glad I put in over 200,000 miles a year on Delta. They saw to it I was going home as soon as I could. My stepdad had been working in Princeton about 45 minutes away. My Mom begged and pleaded with me to drive home with him instead of getting on the plane. I calculated the amount of time I would have to spend with my stepdad in the car and decided I'd rather take my chances with the terrorists in the sky.

Although the airport was nearly empty, it took me four hours to get to my gate. They rifled through everything I owned while it was open on a table for any passerby to view my panties and my other contents. They took my tweezers, my favorite diamond chiseled tweezers that could search and pluck any stray eyebrow hair. They confiscated my water. They made me turn my computer off and on half a dozen times. But I wasn't complaining. I figured all of these precautions weren't going to stop another terrorist attack, but it still made me somehow feel safer nonetheless.

My plane left that Friday afternoon. Just four days after the world had changed. As the flight took off, it flew in the familiar pattern and over near the Twin Towers and Lady Liberty we go. Only this time there would be no towers to begin my ritual of finding The Statue. Instead, the smoke still billowed as black and strong as ever where the buildings once stood. No one spoke as the flight flew past. Tears glistened in everyone's eyes. I paid my respects, said a prayer, and wondered what life was going to be like after today.

Snow Day

2009-03-05T20:56:00.004-05:00

Sunday we had snow. Ok, it was only about 1/2" and it never even stuck on the roads. But it was the first time either of the girls ever saw snow. Fortunately, they didn't seem to be too terribly anxious to go get out in it. They were content watching it fall from the warmth of inside the house.

Master of Manipulation

2009-02-28T09:36:00.003-05:00

Reagan has long known how to work it to get out of trouble or to get what she wants. I have to admit to having been duped by a two year old many times. Here are some of her more recent attempts:

Last night in the car she got a package of fruit snacks. She was supposed to have shared with Bailey but scarfed them all down before she even handed the first one to her. When I heard Bailey mad, I told Reagan, "Reagan, give Bailey a fruit snack." Reagan said, "They are all gone." I shot her an evil eye. Then the dialog continues:

Reagan: I didn't give Bailey any fruit snack.
Me: I know
Reagan: Mom, I didn't give Bailey any fruit snack.
Me: Ok.
Reagan: Can you give me some fruit snack so I can give some to Bailey?
Me: Think I'm going to fall for that trick a fifth time?

Earlier in the week when Bill told Reagan to give Bailey a fruit snack, Reagan took the whole pack and shoved all of them in her mouth at once. She had fruit snacks falling out of her mouth while she said, "they are all gone" and holds up the empty package.

Then, this morning, Reagan acted out and I put her into timeout. She walked into the corner and stood there for about two seconds then turned around:

Reagan: I'm sorry momma (she starts to walk away to go play)
Me: Thank you for your apology, but you are still in timeout
Reagan: (fussing as she goes back into the corner, pause, pause, turns around)
Reagan: Momma, I need to come tell you something
Me: You can tell me when you are done with timeout. Turn around.
Reagan: Momma, may I come tell you something?
Me: What do you need to tell me?
Reagan: I need to tell you I'm sorry
Me: Ok, thank you
Reagan: May I go play now?
Me: No, you are still in timeout

I hope Bailey doesn't learn all of these tricks this early.

Out of the Mouths of Babes

2009-02-28T08:31:00.001-05:00

I got this meme from Facebook but wanted to include it here...

This is probably meant for children a little older, but I asked these questions of my daughter Reagan, who is 2. She gave some interesting responses...

1. What is something mom always says to you?
princess

2. What makes mom happy?
when i smile

3. What makes mom sad?
mommy is sick

4. How does your mom make you laugh?
funny

5. What was your mom like as a child?
mommy's not a baby! bailey is a baby and i'm a big girl!

6. How old is your mom?
ummmm....2. no. i'm 2 and you're 5 and bailey is 1. daddy is 10.

7. How tall is your mom?
6

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
mermaid! (yeah, I don't know what that is either)

9. What does your mom do when you're not around?
bailey

10. If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
huh?

11. What is your mom really good at?
i hear a birdie in a tree

12. What is your mom not very good at?
sick

13. What does your mom do for a job?
computer

14.What is your mom's favorite food?
celery (I hate celery, where did that come from?)

15.What makes you proud of your mom?
happy

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
tinkerbell

17. What do you and your mom do together?
happy yoga

18. How are you and your mom the same?
two eyes

19. How are you and your mom different?
ummmm.....

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
big hug and a little hug

21. What does your mom like most about your dad?
happy

22. Where is your mom's favorite place to go?
ummm...in a castle. and target. can we go to the grocery store and get a cookie?

Confession

2009-02-26T16:23:00.004-05:00

Saturday afternoon Bill came down with the chills and then went downhill from there. Sunday was his turn to sleep in, so about 12:30pm I went to check on him. He was laying in bed surfing on the laptop. He said he felt just terrible and just wanted to lay in bed all day. Instead of laying in bed I strongly coerced him into getting up and doing a couple of errands with me and the girls. This is despite him saying he thought he had the flu.

I should say, I didn't doubt that Bill was as sick as he said he was. But in all honesty, I thought he was being a a bit of a big baby. Despite being sick, I thought he should still be well enough to be able to go with me on a couple of really small trips. Suck it up buttercup! I go do things when I'm sick too!

Fast forward to Monday, and Karma comes back and hits me in the butt, HARD. Bill is not 100%, but feeling much, much better. After doing a great workout, jogging/walking 3 miles, I was feeling great. But then, just a few hours later and I got the chills. I finally jumped in the shower as an attempt to warm up.

I cannot tell you how quickly I went downhill from there. Yesterday, I was so sick that I needed to go to the doctor and had to have Bill drive me. Today, my bronchitis symptoms are much better but the flu is hitting me so hard I can hardly move.

And what have I learned from all of this?
1) Bill really is a tough guy. The next time he says he's sick, I'm just going to close off the door for quarantine purposes and let him emerge when he's well.

2) Payback is a beyatch. Not only am I sicker and for longer, I get to have the kids all by myself tonight as Bill needs to be gone.

Karma is laughing furiously at me right now. And somewhere under Bill's outward sympathy for me is the smuggest expression of "I told you so" one has ever sported.

Nightime Attire

2009-02-22T21:11:00.003-05:00

This is what you get when you let a two year old pick out her own pajamas and dress herself for bed. The photo is missing the red, blue and green knee socks she paired with the ensemble but I think it captured the mittens and panties on the outside of the pj's nicely. I think she's just missing a cape to complete the look. What do you think?

Posing on International Day

2009-02-20T12:28:00.007-05:00

This week has been International Week at school. They study different cultures, they get special snacks from countries all over the world, they do a potluck dinner of international foods, and on Friday, they have international dress day.

Reagan's classroom had Italy. That was a bit challenging to find something specific to Italy. But then I had an idea to dress her as a Gondolier. I think we got pretty close with what we could find to work with.

Bailey's Chinese dress is a special dress. I bought it in Hong Kong for my niece many years ago. She was just a year and a half old had been crowned Baby Miss Macon. I brought back that dress and she wore it in the Macon Cherry Blossom parade. That niece is now ten.

Bailey's shoes were a gift from my mom. When I was pregnant with Reagan, I was working in NYC. My little brother was singing right across the street from where I worked at none other than Carnegie Hall. So my mom and Bill joined me in NYC so that they could attend my brother's concert. My mom made a trip to Chinatown and came back with the shoes. I don't know that she remembered we still had the Chinese dress, but the shoes matched perfectly. Reagan wore that outfit at about a year and now Bailey gets to wear it too.

Reagan was pretty excited to wear her costume today. You'll see she was quite the poser. Especially when we got to the steps. She would lay on a step and say, "take a picture of me now" and then she'd hop up and say, "hmm, let me try this..." or "how about I go here" and try a totally different pose. She even intentionally winked in one pose. She'd always want to see what the picture looked like after I took it so she knew how to adjust the next pose.

Bailey proved to be difficult to photograph this time as she just discovered that she could see herself on the back of the camera too. So she just kept coming at me and wanting to see the pictures on the camera.

So here are the girls, striking a pose, working it for the camera.

Bailey getting mad because I wouldn't let her have the camera...

Bailey looking wide eyed and innocent after being busted for trying to strangle Reagan with her hat cord...

Reagan in her first of many poses...

Here's looking at you kid. Perfecting "the wink"...

Bailey's wondering what is with all the posing...

Reagan kept jumping in front of the camera when I tried to take a picture of just Bailey...

It was Roseola after all

2009-02-17T21:37:00.002-05:00

Yep. Both girls had rashes today and no fevers. Reagan's was much milder. Of course she also had Roseola when she was nine months old so I was surprised she got it at all.

Fevers

2009-02-16T20:22:00.002-05:00

Bailey came down with a fever on Saturday of 103.5. It wouldn't be the first time she's had a fever that high, but it's the first time she didn't want to play and cried even when held. She was absolutely miserable.

Bill took her to the Urgent Care (because I'm too much of a wimp). They checked her ears, they listed to her chest, everything was fine. They swabbed her nose for flu, negative. Drew blood for tests, negative. Drew a catatheter for tests, negative. The prognosis: a virus.

So we had one sick miserable little baby and then Reagan came down with a high fever too. We were giving them both Tylenol and Ibuprofen around the clock. I had to write it all down to remember who took what and when.

Reagan seemed to recover pretty quickly. She was a little grumpy, but otherwise fine. Bailey took a lot longer. We sent them both to school today since Reagan's was gone and Bailey's was under 100. They said Bailey was still a little clingy and fussy. I won't be half surprised if tomorrow her fever is gone and a rash is there instead. The classic Roseola case. We'll see though.

I had today off for President's Day and so Bill took it off too. Since we were able to send both the girls to school, we got a great day of doing some shopping, going out to eat, seeing a movie. It felt like one of those weekends before we had kids. I wish we had family around so we could get a few more days like that once in a while. It was quite fun and relaxing.

Miss Bailey

2009-02-10T22:13:00.004-05:00

Let me update you on Miss Bailey. She quietly turned one on Christmas Eve. There wasn't the pomp and circumstance or the party of 50 people like we had at Reagan's first birthday. We unceremoniously drove most of the day to Florida for Christmas. She never even got a first birthday cake. I feel a bit guilty about that and vow to make sure she always gets a proper birthday every other year.

When Bailey turned one, it seems like overnight the lights went on in her head. She took her first steps Christmas Day and immediately started babbling more, imitating more, and just wanting to be more involved in what we are doing.

Bailey's walking started out like a crab walk. She'd only walk sideways. After a week or so of that, she changed to the zombie walk. She'd slowly totter down the trek with her hands straight out. If she wasn't always giggling her butt off, I'd imagine her walking thinking, "brains, I want brains" in true zombie fashion.

Six weeks later, and Bailey is completely changed. She still has a bit of the zombie walk, but now she attempts to run, especially after successfully snatching a toy or food from Reagan or some poor unsuspecting baby at daycare. You'd never know Reagan has 1.5 years on her. Bailey doesn't let it deter her in the least. The other day she snatched Reagan's burrito right off her plate and was scarfing it down (with her only two teeth) as quickly as she could while trying to make a clean getaway. If Reagan is in "her" chair, Bailey pushes her right out of it. She has every bit of fiestiness as Reagan and has become quite ornery. She has discovered the classic games such as "let-me-climb-up-the-stairs-as-fast-as-I-can-and-see-how-far-I-make-it-before-Mom-catches-me" or "look!-I-can-stand-on-a-table!"

No matter what she gets into or cooks up, she continues to do it with a smile on her face and a laugh in her heart. She truly brings us great joy. Reagan truly loves her and gets just as excited as we do when Bailey does something new. Reagan has actually done a better job than us at trying to teach Bailey sign language. By one year, Reagan knew over 100 signs. By 14 months she was combining them to form "sentences." Reagan has retained most of that knowledge and it's really cool to see her "talking" to Bailey with sign language. Bailey only does a few signs, but we see her trying more and more every day. She understands a lot more than she communicates as she has become quite vigorous in her head shaking "yes" or "no" to respond to our questions.

Both girls are just amazing to us. They are so very different from each other yet we love them both with all our heart. I look back and can't believe I cried tears of sorrow and frustration when I found out I was pregnant with Bailey. She was truly meant to be in our lives when she was and I can't imagine our lives without her.

Out of the baby years...now on to more toddler years!

(I have a bunch of pictures to add to this post but I'm not on the right computer. Rather than wait, I'm posting now and will add the pictures later. Don't forget to come back and check them out. As many have pointed out, she's grown to be quite the big girl practically overnight. I have some cute pics to share.)

We Bought What?

2009-02-05T20:50:00.005-05:00

Let me share with you what can happen when you let a two-year old walk with you in a Target instead of putting her in the buggy. Here is a picture of some of the things we purchased earlier this week.

The punchline is neither Bill nor I actually knowingly bought any of these products. Bill usually handles the credit card transaction while I unload the buggy. This time it was the other way around. Bill tossed everything in the cart up on the belt, assuming I had a perfectly good reason why I wanted two types of acne medicine (neither of us have acne), a black eyeliner (I use brown), and my favorite--makeup for women of color. Let's face it, even on my tannest day, I can't use makeup intended for black women.

I caught Reagan putting in one of the Noxemas at one point and pulled it back out of the cart. She protested and said, "but Mom, you NEED it." Gee thanks for that. I pulled it back out, but the sneaky little bugger put it back in again when neither of us was looking.

Unfortunately, the receipt is tossed and since Target's return policy sucks, we now have a few items we can donate to the local women's shelter.

Oh, and this is also exactly how I ended up with six boxes of Weight Watchers Calzones on Saturday.

Some recent random pics, just because...

New Blog: Walk Away From the Twinkie

2009-01-30T12:58:00.003-05:00

Because I don't have enough trouble keeping this blog up (sarcasm on), I've decided to start yet another blog. Rather than turning this blog into my escapades on trying to lose a gazillion pounds and run a marathon like tomorrow, I've decided to keep that separate.

I figure it will be a good to keep a journal of my journey, and I'm inviting you to come along...

Walk Away From the Twinkie

My goal is to update both this blog and the other blog daily. I think now that I've finally finished my "second job" role, it will be much more realistic for me to find time. For the most part, I think I'm going to be working a normal 40-50 hour work week now. I'm pretty excited about that! That is also what led to me finally being able to take on the weight challenge as well. It's really nice when things finally come together.

I have a new cousin!

2009-01-30T08:55:00.003-05:00

My Aunt Kelly is a year younger than me (I'll pause for a moment while you wrap your noodle around that concept). After a difficult delivery, Kelly had her first baby. I now have a new first cousin!

Kelly lives in Seattle so we don't get a chance to see each other very often, but through the magic of Facebook and email I look forward to watching her little baby boy grow up.

Congratulations Kelly! We are so happy for you!

Brady Joseph Lynch

January 17, 9:35am

7lbs 3oz, 19 inches

Here's a picture of Kelly and Brady. How adorable is he?

Here's the proud dad, Tim, with little Brady. That's right, sleep while you can!

The Loftiest of Goals

2009-01-28T12:50:00.002-05:00

So what do you do when you find yourself 100 lbs overweight and you can't run to your mailbox? a) Get a rascal scooter
b) Diet and exercise sensibly to loose weight and get in shape
c) Bury your sorrows in a pint of Ben and Jerry's Chubby Hubby
d) sign up for a marathon

Ok, I realize most of you probably would have picked B (although C does sound like a tempting winner). Alas, if you haven't found out by now, I'm not like most people. I picked D. That's right, I signed up to run in a marathon.

I realize how crazy it all seems well, because it is. But I am very goal driven and up until now, I haven't had a strong enough goal and motivation to push me to my end result. So as I was perusing the company intranet yesterday I saw a notification for early sign ups for the Chicago Marathon on October 11. I started to think about it and thought this could be just the piece of motivation I'm looking for.

I did some research. A lot of people suggest you run regularly for about a year before you try to train for a marathon. There was a lot of good and of course, conflicting advice. In the end, I ignored a lot of the advice (not that I am recommending you do the same), and decided to go for it.

I'm not looking to beat a certain time or even enjoy the run. My goals are to simply survive it and finish it in 6hrs and 30mins before they take down the water and first aid stations. I may not get anywhere close to that goal, but I'm going to do everything I can do try. Bill said he'd call it success and would be proud if I just finished 10K. That may be all I can do, but I'm still shooting for the entire 26.2 miles.

I've got eight months to loose weight, get in shape, and prepare for the race. I'm starting with the "couch to 5K" program where at the end of nine weeks I'll be able to run three miles without stopping. We'll see.

Everyone has to have a dream, right? Here's mine:

Chicago Marathon

October 11, 2009

Bridget finishes the race

Lured from the tent

2009-01-27T21:36:00.002-05:00

I previously reported how Reagan would only sleep in her princess castle tent she got for Christmas. I am happy to report that a solid month later, she has finally been lured from her tent into a real bed.

Prior to her taking up residence in her tent, she was sleeping in her little toddler bed. But she's always had a twin bed in her room that has gone unused. The twin bed is a canopy bed that looks like Cinderella's carriage. She's shown great interest in it over the years-- for climbing, for jumping, for doing dive rolls off of it. For sleeping-- no interest whatsoever.

But about a week ago, I put in the Cinderella movie for the first time. She watched it with great interest, becoming very upset with the ugly stepsisters destroyed Cinderella's dress for the ball. Then, when she saw Cinderella's carriage, she immediately identified it as looking like her bed.

When the movie ended she asked to watch it again. She's now watched it about a dozen times. And she now wants to be "Cinderella Princess." The bed that was only good for jumping from has now become her bed of choice for slumber, over her toddler bed, over her tent. She looks so adorable being so tiny and sleeping in such a big bed.

I wish I had thought of putting on that movie a long time ago.

What's for Dinner, Super Bowl Corn Dip

2009-01-26T20:02:00.003-05:00

With the Super Bowl coming up, I've started thinking about what I'm going to take to our friends' Super Bowl party. Here's one super easy crowd pleaser for your consideration:

Corn Dip

Prep time: 5 minutes
Cook time: 30 minutes

Ingredients
2 cups mayo
2 cans Fiesta/Mexican corn- drained
2 cups grated Monterrey jack/Colby mix
2 cups grated Parmesan (or Parmesan Romano mix)
Add some cumin, jalapenos, diced chilies, or red cayenne pepper if you want (it's perfectly yummy without them)

Directions
Add all the ingredients and mix together
Cook in 350 oven for 30 minutes

Notes
Scoops Tortilla chips are awesome with this
I think next time I may try this same recipe but adding crab. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Ballet Dreams Dashed

2009-01-22T20:46:00.000-05:00

Reagan has a couple of things she takes at school in addition to her regular curriculum. One is tumbling, we are just now adding yoga, and her favorite: ballet.

Every Thursday Reagan has a ballet class that she SO looks forward to. Just the act of getting dressed up in her leotard, skirt, and ballet shoes makes it all worthwhile to her.

So today of all days, the girls sleep in a little. Bailey didn't wake up until 7:45. We haven't used a real alarm clock in 2.5 years because the girls take care of that for us. Not today. Ballet is at 9 and school is 30 minutes away. We had to hurry, hurry, hurry!

In our rush, I went ahead and put on Reagan's ballet clothes. The ballet instructor always begs us to do that anyway because it saves her tons of time on getting eight two-year olds out of uniforms and into leotards. But not once have I actually done it. I always send Reagan in her uniform and let them change her. Since I did go ahead and Reagan in her clothes, she was especially looking forward to ballet today. Every step had a little hop or twirl with it and she wore her tierra and waved her wand proclaiming she was a ballerina princess.

At 8:30 Bill scrambled out the door and took the girls to school. Shortly before 9 I started checking email. As I scanned the new mail, one subject in particular stood out: PLEASE READ NOW. NO BALLET TODAY.

Ugh, too little too late. I already had a two year old dressed and ready for ballet and walking through the doors of her classroom as I read. Apparently the teacher had a fever so she decided to stay home (good call). But I had Reagan already dreaming of prancing and twirling in ballet. While Reagan was in her uniform when Bill picked her up today, that didn't happen without a struggle. That was one disappointed little ballerina.

Of course she still thinks Santa Claus is going to come every morning and bring her more presents, so she's getting used to the concept of disappointment. And tomorrow is yoga, so life will be good again.

Here's Reagan at school during one of her ballet lessons:

What's for Dinner, Hearty Yummy Veggie Soup

2009-01-20T20:51:00.004-05:00

Confession time here. Last year I had a very busy, demanding job and towards the end of the year I multiplied that chaos by two. Working crazy hours, having a newborn that didn't sleep through the night, and combined with the fact I worked from home and virtually didn't move at all, I am starting this year weighing more than just before I delivered Bailey. That's just plain unhealthy, unflattering, and embarrassing.

So, starting the new year I made a resolution, along with 50 gazillion other people, to lose weight. My goal is a little more ambitious than many, but it needs to be. This time next year I plan to be 100 lbs lighter than I am now (geesh, I can't belive I'm saying that). My biggest part of the success will be to make sure I workout 30 minutes a day, twice a day, five times a week. But certainly eating healthy is part of it too.

So now I'm on this new eating healthy kick but I was hungry and it is really super cold outside. I wanted something comforting and warm, filling, but sticking to the low cal and low fat regimen. Then I remembered that Cabbage Soup diet of days gone by. Did you ever try that one? The one where on Day 1 the soup was bland but tolerable and you didn't mind eating just eight bananas in a day because you were going to be 10 pounds lighter by the end of the week. But by Day 7, just the sight of the soup in the fridge was enough to make you gag and you instead found yourself scarfing down a six month old bag of forgotten Halloween candy and an entire bag of chips. Yeah, that's healthy.

But it got me thinking. The veggies are low cal and healthy and the soup wasn't entirely bad. What if I made a soup that's tastier than the original and I didn't eat it 12 times in a day? Then it becomes a yummy, healthy meal rather than a diet. That was all I needed and I was off.

So, here is my version of the old Cabbage Soup recipe. It's got a nice little kick to it, but not so much that Reagan can't eat it. It really is quite tasty, healthy, and hit the spot on a cold Winter's night. You certainly don't need to be dieting to enjoy this soup!

Hearty Yummy Veggie Soup
Prep time: 20-30 minutes
Cook time: about an hour

Ingredients
1/2 head of cabbage, shredded
1 bag frozen crinkle cut or sliced carrots
1/2 bunch of celery, diced
1 large onion, diced
2 cans diced tomatoes (I used ones flavored with jalapenos and garlic and onion)
1 container V8 Hot-Spicy (you really want this over the regular stuff!)
1 can beef broth
1 packet onion soup mix
2 Tbls minced garlic
Other spices to taste- I used anywhere from 1-3 tsp of each: cumin, seasoning salt, Mrs. Dash garlic and herb blend, Worcestershire, pepper (Really season this stuff here!). If you want it even spicier, try adding Tabasco, diced jalapenos, or cayenne pepper.

Directions
Add all ingredients in a large stock pot. Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer until veggies are tender, around 45 minutes to one hour. Remember the veggies will cook down, so don't panic if there doesn't seem to be enough liquid. If you do need to add more liquid, add more broth and cut back on the salt you add.

Notes
This makes a lot of soup. Try freezing some of it for another day!

Girly Girl

2009-01-09T10:50:00.000-05:00

When I did Reagan's room, I have to admit to doing a very girly theme. There is pink everywhere and there is a bit of a Cinderella theme going through the room. However, I never bought a single Disney princess anything, never made mention of Barbie, and introduced her to Pirates and trucks as early as one could. Yet here we are, with one of the girliest girls I've ever seen. I'm not complaining mind you, I'm just dumbfounded as to where it came from. While I freely admit to supporting her habit, we did not start or encourage it. I can only surmise that some girls are just wired that way.

So, what makes me think I have one of the girliest girls around? Let me show you.

I give you Exhibit A: The Princess Castle Tent
Reagan got a lot of things for Christmas. You never really know which ones are going to be the big hit and which will bomb harder than a Jessica Simpson movie. The Princess Castle tent her nana bought her was clearly the front runner this year. Since this tent has been set up in her room, she has refused to sleep in her bed, opting instead for a little sleep mat and sleeping bag set up in her tent. She spends all of her free time in this tent. She would refuse pop tarts and fruit snacks over a few more minutes in her tent.

Exhibit B: Her weekend attire choices
Reagan wears uniforms to school Monday through Thursday. On Friday's we pick something together to wear. On weekends when we are running to Target and Publix, she gets to pick what she wears. You might see a common theme here...

Exhibit C: The Minnie Mouse high heels
I made the mistake of letting Reagan go into the Disney store one day. She saw a pair of bright yellow Minnie Mouse shoes and immediately pulled them off the rack and started trying them on. I let her put them on. Instead of wobbling, getting frustrated and yanking them off (what I hoped would happen); she jumped up, ran off, and starting saying, "Oh, mama. These are my favorite! I love these."

So $20 later we were walking out with a pair of toddler size 7 high heels that I was sure would be tossed the moment we got home. Uh, can I say how wrong I was? Every morning when it is time to get shoes, she pulls them out and says, "How about these?" Then I have to tell her it is a school day and she can't wear them to school on a school day. But when weekends roll around, all bets are off. I let her wear them to her heart's content. If you weren't looking at her feet, you'd have no idea she was in heels. She's just as adept at them as a pair of sneakers. I guess she gets that from her mama. Good thing since Mr. Height Predictor said she's going to be a towering 5'3" in adulthood.

The soles are worn, the toes are completely scuffed out, but she wears them everywhere, even to scooter in.

Notice the purse she is carrying in this picture? She picked out her first very own purse before she was even a year old and carried it everywhere.

So that's our girly girl, Reagan. Two years old and every day asks to watch Princess or Barbie movies. Wears her tutus with her pirate shirts and high heels and sleeps in a princess tent. When I grow up, I want to be just like her.

Been a long time gone

2009-01-09T08:53:00.002-05:00

What do you know? I do still remember my blog address. I stated before that until the end of the year I was absolutely buried in work. Well, now it's the new year. I'm down to one role and a more normal, manageable 50 hours of work a week. What shall I do with all of that newly found time? Blog, of course.

I have six weeks of pictures and stories to catch up on. I'll just be posting the highlights so that I'll have them for posterity. Everything else will be a new year, a new start, new stories, new recipes, and hopefully lots of fun.

So far, 2009 is looking pretty good. I can't wait to share it with you.

It must be Christmas, the Leg Lamp has returned

2008-11-22T00:00:00.005-05:00

One of my all time favorite movies is "The Christmas Story." One of the sub plots in the movie involves the Dad and the arrival of the "major award" he won. It arrives in a beastly sized wooden crate and he excitedly but carefully opens the crate and unpacks the items to see what he has won. The Dad discovers he has won a lamp. But not just any lamp. To him, this lamp is a thing of beauty, a masterful work of art that proudly needs to be displayed in the front window for every passerby to behold. To Mom, she sees nothing more than a ticky-tacky lighted leg with a fringe trimmed shade that would do better sitting on top of a trash pile at the city dump than on her living room table.

I tell you this story to bring you back in time with me to Christmas six years ago. My Mom, being ever the impulsive shopper , decided to pull over and purchase some Christmas gifts from a van turned into a makeshift roadside stand. Most of the year that "stand" sells turtles and hermit crabs with airbrushed decorated shells that are guaranteed to teach your child about The Circle of Life within two weeks. They might even throw in the Ziploc baggies and shoe box for your back yard burial for free if you ask them.

But a month out of every year they sell something else. They sell a Christmas decoration. My Mom saw these decorations and decided all the kids in the family needed one. That Christmas rolls around and my gift is unveiled as I pull it out from a kitchen trash bag. What Bill saw when I opened this gift was a thing of beauty. He saw superior skilled craftsmanship of a perfectly geometrical orb and entrancing multi-color lights dancing in symmetry and precision. He was in awe and immediately plugged it in to find just the right setting to showcase the work of art.

What I saw when I opened the gift was a couple of clear Dixie cups cobbled together with a dollar store string of Christmas lights. While I could appreciate the work that went into making the piece, I couldn't get past the fact that it was still just Dixie cups glued together. I smiled at my Mom and thanked her for the gift and made a mental note to drop it off at the first Goodwill drop off point I passed going home.

But it never made it to Goodwill. Bill overrode me. He made a spot for the piece in the front window the moment we walked through the door. He futzed with the angle, the height, and the light settings. He turned it on and walked out to the street to see how it looked from a passersby eye. I think he was prouder of that light than his first car.

This Dixie cup art has become known amongst all of our friends and family as simply, "The Leg Lamp." Six years later, Bill has once again pulled out The Leg Lamp and put it on display in the front window just as he has every other year. He futzed with the settings, adjusted the angle, and stood out in the street to see how it looked to passersby. But rather than wanting to destroy it in a furious dusting accident (yeah right, who would believe that one from me?), I just smile and go with it knowing the holiday season has officially begun and Christmas will be right around the corner.

The End of an Era

2008-11-20T23:08:00.006-05:00

Since Bailey will be one next month, we are getting to the point that we no longer need the exersaucer, walker, jumperoo, bouncer, and all of the other mass amounts of gear that seem to absurdly be necessary for something so small and helpless. The gear went through two girls within a fairly short period of time and was just getting to the point that it was all just taking up space.

So on Sunday, we pulled every piece of baby gear out and gave it all to some friends of ours expecting their first baby. Two Jeep Cherokee carloads later, our friends were well on their way to having everything they needed to prepare for their impending arrival. And we celebrated taking back our rooms and being clear of big bulky equipment that gets used for five minutes at a time.

Well, I celebrated for a minute anyway. Then I had a moment of sadness I wasn't expecting. We've pretty much been in baby mode for 2.5 years now. We are at the cusp of having no more babies, only toddlers that seem to growup by months at a time in just one night of sleep. No more new baby smell, no more swaddling, no more nighttime rockings, no more bottles. Just girls that want to take on the world and be older than their little bodies will allow.

While the door has not been 100% closed on more children in our future, it is unlikely I'll ever carry another. My uterus ruptured with Bailey and to have another carries great risk and danger. We may consider adoption in the future, but that would be much further down the road and is just a remote thought.

I've been very happy with our two girls and content that our family was complete. That was, until the baby gear drove away and it really sunk in there really may never be another. I hated the baby stage--the crying, the sleep deprivation, the colic, the acid reflux, the crying, the late night feedings, the sleep deprivation, the crying, the sleep deprivation, the crying. Did I mention sleep deprivation and crying? Yet as the bassinet and bumbo headed down the road, I suddenly felt sad. I wanted the stuff back. I didn't want to be done with it all.

But we are done with it all. The gear has all gone on to be used and loved by a new family. And our baby era has come to an end.

More Gratuitous Bailey Photos

2008-11-18T17:00:00.001-05:00

Bailey at 10.5 Months

Reagan's Magnadoodle Art

2008-11-17T21:52:00.004-05:00

Reagan was hard at work on the Magnadoodle tonight. Here are two of her pieces.

This one is Daddy. Can't you see the resemblance? What I'm most impressed with is that she has two eyes, a nose, a mouth, two legs, two arms, a body, a head. You have to kind of squint to imagine them, but the parts are generally in the right place. Overall, I'd say not bad for a two year old.

This is a heart. I think this is a better heart than I can usually draw.

Proud Moments

2008-11-17T11:13:00.003-05:00

It is the dichotomy of life. The busier you are and the more life events you want to share, the less time you have to share them. This is where I've found myself for the last while and will probably continue to be until the end of the year. I was already quite busy in my current role, but now that I'm officially an employee and not a consultant, I have the additional burden of taking on my new role as well. That is, until December 31 when my old role goes away and I am down to doing just the new employee gig.

I'm really optimistic that once the new year comes I'll have more time for family, friends, my blog, and myself. I just keep thinking, "just get through the end of the year and life will calm down." I'm finally at a point in life where I realize that won't just happen on it's own. I know I have to make time for the important things and not let other little things fill whatever new found time I may have after the first of the year. I'm saying that more for my benefit than yours. I constantly have to remind myself that I have to consciously make the time and set boundaries in this new role or I will end up just like I have every other year. This year I want to be different; unlike the last ten years where I said the same thing and I made no change.

So all of that to explain why wonderful things are happening with my family, random light or deep thoughts are occurring with me, yet nothing seems to materialize on the blog. Again, just let me get through this year and things will be different, I think. I hope. No, I commit! In the meantime, let me tell you about the girls and some of their latest milestones...

Bailey is now ten months old and continues to be the happiest, cutest joy to everyone she meets. She now waves, signs "milk", throws her hands up in the air when you cheer, and crawls and cruises almost fast enough to keep up with Reagan. She says bye-bye, uh-oh, da-da, and ma-ma. She's just starting to test her boundaries by knowing "no" but continuing to do something while watching you. All with a big a grin on her face and waiting to see how you'll respond.

Now on to Reagan. Can you continually talk about a two-year old without at some point mentioning bodily functions and the control or lack thereof? Well, I'm going there. Reagan is nearly potty trained and for better or worse, has done it pretty much on her own. We just started putting panties on her one day, put a baby potty in the play area, and said if you have to go, go. We don't put her on at any intervals and never ask her if she needs to go. Yet she has probably had three accidents ever. However, she would never poop on the potty. She would just hold it as long as she could or would even ask to have a diaper on so she could go.

So this past weekend Bill was on the computer across the room and got a whiff of something. I saw him scrunch up his nose and start looking around for the cause of the offending smell. About that time Reagan proudly said, "I pooped in the potty!" Bill realized then, "Oh, why yes, yes you did!" as he kind of half gagged.

Proud moments are not always rose scented.

Well That Didn't Go Like I Hoped

2008-11-04T23:21:00.003-05:00

Let me just be gracious enough to congratulate Obama and all of the Obama supporters on his victory tonight. I truly hope he lives up to your expectations.

My Vote

2008-11-02T22:35:00.006-05:00

I keep politics largely off of my blog and will likely continue to do so after this. But Tuesday, our country makes an important decision, one with serious implications and consequence. I am sharing my views with you not to sway you or tell you you're wrong if your decision has already been made and you don’t agree with me. In fact, I'm happy to hear comments and opinions of the matter, I just ask that we keep it a civil, healthy debate. But I decided I do want my children to know how I felt about these decisions and this election and in so doing, I am sharing them with you…

This Tuesday this country will make a decision and the world will hear our voice. Our voice will indicate whether we embrace the concepts of Socialism and take the largest step toward a Socialist society this country has ever seen. Or it will indicate that we choose our Capitalist society and try to reform what may be broken. As far as I'm concerned, this is the most important election of my time and my vote will be heard. As for me, I chose Capitalism, freedom, individualism.

I think Obama has some good points and says things quite eloquently. He is a wonderful public speaker and I've actually sought out and read or listened to word-for-word, many of his speeches. He has a way of moving people and speaking to people that is a rare gift. I think he may go down as one of the best public speakers in history. But once I begin to dissect his speeches, I find things that I don't agree with. There are some things that downright frighten me. Don't get me wrong, I think his heart is in the right place and he has good intentions and I agree with many of the issues he brings up. I just don't agree to his solutions.

At the heart of Obama's plan is a "spread the wealth" campaign which promises to offer affordable health care, education through college for everyone, require automatic workplace pensions, provide cheaper drugs, and lots of other social and welfare type programs that really do sound like a great idea. Here's the problem, how they are funded:

Obama wants to increase taxes for the "upper" class (this definition seems to be a moving target- was once $250K but the number is going down). The top 2% of the country's income earners already pay 90% of all of the taxes. Is it really fair to continue to impose more tax and on those that have worked hard and been successful and punish them for getting to that position?

He wants to reinstate the estate tax. This means that if your parents pass away, 55% of the money they would have passed on to you will instead go to other people you've never seen nor heard of. When I die, I promise you, I would much rather my money go to my children so I can ensure they are taken care of, rather than to have it go towards contraceptive education or some other program I don’t care about or support. If we take care of our families first, maybe they won't have to rely so heavily on government programs.

He is putting the burden on corporations to foot part of the bill. Many corporations are already feeling a hit during a time of recession (let's not argue whether or not there is one, the economy is definitely not great now). Many people are finding themselves victim of pink slips as companies just can't find profitability. Obama plans to pile on to that strain by requiring companies to fund even more money towards healthcare, more money for leave of absences, and offering pensions where they previously didn't have one. Here's the deal. If I don't like my benefits and what I'm being offered, I can go somewhere else. That is part of a free market. That is part of competition. If companies want to attract and retain the best and brightest, they will offer these benefits. If we force businesses to provide all of these great programs, here’s the ugly side effect, even more pink slips or lower salaries. I’d personally rather have more money and let the decision on where to spend it reside with me.

When it comes to welfare programs, there seems to be no end to the outreach of what the government should provide in Obama's mind. Don't get me wrong, I think there are people in this society that need to be taken care of and given a hand. But there are far too many that put themselves in that category because they have a sense of entitlement or just plain don't want to work. Surely we don't want to continue to perpetuate and even increase a society of people who are lazy and want to be taken care of?

In my opinion, we should continue to allow the private sector and places like churches to provide these welfare programs, not the government. And they should be a limited time during a rough period, not a lifetime sustainment. Programs that teach job skills, interview skills, provide clothing and residence to get established are all well and good. But of you've been given these things and two years later you've still gotten nowhere, one has to start to believe the problem is your lack of will and desire rather than opportunity. Then the programs need to start to be cut for that person. Obama has stated that he would want to model Marian Wright Edelman's prioritization in welfare programs. Funny thing is, even she believes that these programs should be privately funded and has largely dedicated her life to the collection and distribution of private funds for these types of programs.

The fact is, Obama's plan nurtures the lazy and punishes the hard working. That certainly isn't the intention, but a nasty side effect. Just look at our own Pilgrims. They started out in a Socialized society. Everyone pitched in and shared what they earned or grew. Their first Thanksgiving wasn't the pretty picture we paint it to be in the kids school plays each year on Turkey day. They nearly starved to death. In fact, many did. But when they decided to give everyone their own little plot of land to tend to and own and when they told them keep what you grow and trade your excess, they flourished.

If there is any question we would raise a generation of children feeling entitlement (some say we are already there-- just wait), just look at France's problems two years ago. Chirac signed a bill intended to help them be more capitalist and to compete in a global society. The bill gave a one year trial period to anyone under the age of 26 and allowed an employer to fire him/her within that year provided they provide reason. Sounds reasonable, right? That's no different than most right to work states. Well, France's youth didn't think it was so reasonable. That labor law resulted in strikes, riots, cars being upturned and set on fire, businesses being pillaged. All for the sake of stating that the country was removing protections entitled to them that had been in place for generations. Is this really where we want to be headed?

Obama also staunchly supports anti-discrimination laws. I understand the intent. I too want everyone to be treated fairly. However, does anyone not understand that by enforcing anti-discrimination laws you are ironically causing discrimination? An employer should be able to hire the best person for the job regardless of the color of their skin, what their sex is, or who they have sex with. Conversely, they should be able to fire anyone regardless of the color of their skin, what their sex is, or who they have sex with. Anti-discrimination laws lend themselves to preventing companies or schools from choosing the overall best and brightest and prevent them from losing those that are not up to standards. This creates a myriad of problems from decreased productivity and efficiency and increased costs.

I also oppose Obama’s plan for reducing costs for medicine. He wants to force pharmaceutical companies to cap their costs and provide more affordable medicine for everyone. Sure, they could do that easily. The actual cost of the pill is usually pennies, if that. But again, there’s nasty side effects. For starters, that means companies would have far fewer dollars for research. This means fewer new drugs being available and smaller hopes for finding cures to diseases that continue to elude us. We would also force their hand in removing many of the programs they already offer to the poor and third world countries. We would see a huge decline in worldwide vaccinations and increase in disease. This just adds more risk to us as we continue to be a global society and travel to these places.

I could go on and on and talk about gun control, Social Security, the war in Iraq, Foreign Policy, and Homeland Security, but I’ve already written a novel and I think you’ve gotten where I’m going with these things. In the end, my biggest concern is not for me, it is for my children and my children’s children. I don't want to leave my grandchildren holding the bill for my retirement and standard of living because I failed to plan for it. Obama is creating a plan that is not sustainable long term. If you look at many European countries, with each passing generation they amass more debt and tax to continue to sustain their lofty programs. Some countries are already turning more towards Capitalism and away from Socialism because it just doesn’t work in a pluralistic society long term.

Obama wants to eliminate the poor altogether. It’s a good goal to have, as is world peace, but does the end justify the means? Will these means even get us to that end? I don’t think so. I think Obama is too much an idealist and not enough realist. He’s got a good heart and good intentions, but ill directed solutions that will impact generations to come.

John McCain, President
Sarah Palin Vice, President
November 4, 2008

Week in Review

2008-10-31T22:07:00.004-04:00

So, here's an update on our past week:

Me
I have been working a whole lot of crazy hours and it's going to get worse before it gets better, but it really will get better. I've decided to hang up my consultant hat and take a permanent position as a Vice President at the client I have been assigned to this past year. This is going to give me a lot more stability personally and financially and help achieve some of the long term goals we have for the family and for myself. I expect to be working fewer hours in the end, but I have to get through this year first. I am not able to relinquish the reins of my current role so I need to fulfill my current role in addition to taking on this new role. This dual role will continue until the end of the year. After that, I hope I really will be getting back to achieving some work-life balance and work on some personal goals for myself (like getting healthy and losing weight).

To keep the family from going to utter chaos, we decided to hire a housekeeper to help us keep things organized and in balance. I hate to use the word housekeeper, I'd rather call her Wonder Woman Wendy, because that's what she is to us. She's basically doing everything from cleaning, laundry, cooking, helping get the girls ready in the morning, errands, you name it. She's only been with us a few short weeks and I can't remember how we ever got by without her. She's such a blessing to the family. Reagan gets so excited when she hears the door open in the morning and "Miss Wendy" comes through the door.

Reagan
Reagan's school has about 15 auxiliary options for two year olds. They offer soccer, tennis, tumbling, karate, ballet, and many other things. While it is convenient that they offer these things during school time and you don't have to shuttle your child all over the place in the evenings, these options can really add to an already pricey monthly bill. So we had decided to let Reagan do tumbling since she's shown a lot of interest in that and let the other things go for now. We learned that every week when it was time for ballet and the girls got dressed in their leotards and tutus to go dance, she pitched a fit because she wanted to go so badly. She's such a girly girl, it makes sense that she would want to dress up and dance.

So being the suckers that we are, we went and bought her a tutu, leotard and little pink leather ballet shoes and signed her up for ballet. She was beyond excited and kept saying, "now I'm going to go to ballet and go dance with...(names of girls in her class)." Reagan didn't disappoint. Her teacher tells us that even at her first lesson she was actually the best student in the class. She was very disciplined and coordinated and did everything very well.

I've also heard that she's really good at soccer when they've let them go to free demos. Sadly, I find myself being a bit sexist and not taking that as seriously as I did the ballet. I don't like soccer. I find it boring, and can't put out of my mind that more injuries occur in soccer than in any other sport. I'm happy to support the perpetuation of her girly side, but for some reason when it comes to soccer I just let it go. Maybe if she was older and said that was something she really wanted to do I could support it more, but as long as we are choosing what she is doing, it won't be soccer.

Bailey
Bailey had a short lived career as a baby model. She did the one modeling gig a few weeks back and then this week had a casting call. When I picked her up from daycare to take her, she had a terrible rash on her cheeks. I was wishing I had time to stop to get some makeup to try to cover it up, but I had to let it go. There must have been 20 other (mostly) adorable babies and they were running them in 10 minute appointments all day long.

The first time Bailey had her gig, they plunked her in an exersaucer to play and be adorable and she performed on cue. She did awesome. This time, I just had to set her on the floor and let her play with a few toys while they took pictures. She would have none of it. She screamed and reached for me and would not cooperate. I told them "Wow! This is so unlike her. She never does this. She was great last time." They basically went, "Yeah, yeah sure lady....NEXT."

So between the screaming and the rash, I'm pretty sure we won't be getting a call back.

Bailey was also supposed to transition to the next infant class this week. Only her previous teachers are having Bailey withdrawal. They are spreading out her transition longer than the usual one week as they keep snatching her up and taking her back to the old class. One of the old teachers even said she had a dream that she kept moving classes as Bailey did so that she remained her teacher all the way through. I think it's sweet that they are so attached to her and we don't mind them holding on to her a while longer. She's happy and well taken care of in either side so it's all good. Although I'm starting to wonder if Bailey might actually walk before Kindergarten because I'm suspicious as to whether that baby's feet ever touch the floor.

Bill
Bill rarely has a work emergency and makes sure he keeps his schedule so that he can take the girls to and from daycare everyday. But over the weekend there was work emergency. I found myself being quite hypocritical when he said he needed to go into the office. I didn't want him to go and said stuff like, "Don't you have people that you manage that can do that for you?" This is coming from the person that had to be forced off the computer and phone and out the door to take the kids trick-or-treating tonight because an issue crept up right at the end of the day. I'm really hoping my next role will be more like Bill's, but I won't hold my breath.

We are really hoping Bill's Dad moves out this summer. It's already been two years in the making and we really, really want the girls to grow up with some family around. But he and his fiance keep putting things off. Bill talked to his dad a few months ago and his dad said, "We're putting the house on the market next week." We were pretty excited about that as it seemed like the wheels had finally been set in motion. His Dad called last night. We were hoping with news that the house had sold. Turns out he still hasn't put it on the market. Figures.

So, that was our week in review. How was your week?

Trick or Treat, the warm up

2008-10-24T21:51:00.005-04:00

Tonight was the church "Trunk-or-Treat" only since it was raining, it was all held in the church instead. They had little crafts for the kids and then they all went Trick-or-Treating room to room. Reagan had quite a little haul. Good stuff too. I remember being a kid a trick-or-treating and 70% of it was Smarties, rock hard peanut butter taffy in orange and black wrappers, and chocolate coins. Who eats that stuff? It would sit in the orange plastic pumpkin on top of the fridge for six months before someone would be desperate for a sugar attack or someone would finally pitch it.

Reagan wasn't cranky tonight and she enjoyed wearing her costume, but she was uncharacteristically quiet and shy. Although she got into all of the activities and the trick-or-treating, she said very little. That is very unlike her.

Afterwards we went to IHOP and had dinner/breakfast with the girls still in their costumes. They were the belles of the ball as everyone had to come by and talk to the girls and comment on how cute they looked. Both the girls love that kind of attention and they enjoyed every minute of it.

I should mention, after we put Reagan to bed, she made up for being quiet at the party. Apparently she had a few too many Skittles. She went down at 8:15. At 9:30 she was still talking to her baby dolls and ordering them around from her bed. She also pushed the button for her build-a-bear bunny to laugh over a 100 times. I don't know if you've ever heard the build-a-bear laugh, but it's maniacal and strange, especially at night, in the dark. Tomorrow that bunny just may find itself down a rabbit hole too deep to ever escape from.

So here are the pictures. Reagan went as a witch, Bailey as a black cat. I decided to make their costumes this year. Don't ask me where that streak of brilliance and lack of time management came from. Ten minutes before we had to leave I was still threading tulle through Bailey's tutu. The living room is covered up in black Gothic princess tulle and my fingers have blisters from the glue gun. I won't make that mistake again. I think I may go ahead and put in my order for next year on costumes.com now, just to be safe.

I didn't get the costumes complete, especially Reagan's. But they passed muster. And the night wasn't without wardrobe malfunctions. Reagan's hat was too big and too heavy and kept falling down over her eyes. Maybe I'll actually get their costumes finished before their next costumed shindig on Tuesday.

Reagan's Halloween outfit

2008-10-24T12:12:00.006-04:00

Since Reagan wears uniforms to school Mon-Thurs, I can admittedly get a little over the top on the days Reagan has a free day to wear anything.

Here is Reagan this morning in her Halloween outfit, some with her pumpkin she painted herself. Unfortunately, Bailey's outfit has not yet come (that was six weeks ago, there is one Etsy lady that is about to be getting some bad press if I don't see it magically appear in my mailbox soon).

Tonight is "Trunk-or-Treat" at church. Hopefully, I'll get the girls' costumes done by then. I had the brilliant idea to make them this year. Next year I'll be back on costumes.com.

What's for dinner, Pumpkin Puree and Toasted Pumkpkin Seeds

2008-10-20T15:37:00.006-04:00

When we went to the pumpkin patch this year, we picked up several pumpkins specifically to cook with.

The smaller pumpkins are actually better to cook with. When they get big they get grainy and not as tasty. The pumpkins we used were specifically called "pie pumpkins"

Before you do anything, you need to get into the pumpkins:

* Take a sharp knife, cut off the top

* Cut the pumpkin in half

* Scoop out the seeds and pumpkin guts and throw those in a bowl to be sorted later. An ice cream scoop seemed to do the best job.

Here's my sister, Tara, and her daughter, Shelby, helping with the pumpkins. This was just before they were allured away by the enticement of painting pumpkins and abandoned me to do the cooking by myself.

Toasted Pumpkin Seeds

(Yes, this is a very small little dish of pumpkin seeds. It was all that was left by the time I got a chance to take a picture. Those ravenous little beasts (aka "children" on some days) consumed several pounds of pepitas before I could even take a lens cap off)

Directions

* Remove the pumpkin pulp from the seeds

* Rinse the seeds

* Preheat oven to 250

* Spray a cooking sheet with nonstick spray

* Spread out the seeds in a single layer

* Coat the seeds with seasonings of your choice

* Let bake in the oven about 20-30 minutes- until they start to turn light golden brown

* Remove from cooking sheet, taste, and toss with any additional seasonings

Seasonings

You can keep it really simple and just add salt (lots of salt!). I used a popcorn seasoning mix of white cheddar, garlic, and sea salt from Williams Sonoma. It's a bit pricey for the can, but yummy and convenient. You can also check the popcorn aisle for other popcorn seasoning blends. Or, spice it up and use cayenne pepper, cajun seasoning, or jalapeno seasoning. Use your imagination.

The results

These were a HUGE hit with the kids! They loved them!

Er, one just more thing...

Without ruining the moment of the yumminess that is pumpkin seeds, let me just give a word of advice. If you have a kid in diapers that attends daycare, give the child the pumpkin seeds on a day when the daycare will get to deal with the diaper the following day and not you. That's all I'm going to say about that.

Pumpkin puree

* Preheat oven to 350

* Cut the cleaned pumpkin halves into thirds or fourths, lay them on a baking sheet.

* Cook for about 45 minutes (until nice and tender)

* Remove the pumpkin from the skin (this is really easy to do- it just falls right off after cooking)

* Throw the roasted pumpkin in the food processor (you'll have to do this in batches) and pulse until pureed.

* It will last in the fridge for several days or you can freeze it for later. I would recommend that you freeze it in ziploc bags in 2 cup quantities since that is about the equivalent of one can of pumpkin puree that many recipes are based off of.

That's all there is too it. I don't recommend seasoning or oiling it because you want this in its pure form to be used in recipes later.

Tips

I let it sit in a bowl and use a paper towel to soak up any water that comes to the surface so that it is a bit of a thicker texture. If you want thinner, you can add a little water to the food processor when pureeing.

I attempted to buy a few more pumpkins labeled "pie pumpkins" from Walmart in addition to the ones we bought from the pumpkin patch. The Walmart ones were so tough, there wasn't a single knife in my collection of Henkles up to the task. I'm not even sure a hack saw would do it. Instead, some simply got painted for Halloween fun and a few got tossed into the back yard to see if we might see some pumpkin vines grow along the fence one day. But I think those suckers are petrified so they'll probably still be whole 20 years from now. They will be used in a game of lawn bowling when our kids have kids.

Uses

What can't you use pumpkin puree for? There is (in a Bubba Gump voice): pumpkin pie, pumpkin bread, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin pancakes, pumpkin waffles, pumpkin muffins, pumpkin soup, pumpkin butter, pumpkin dip. Recipes for pumpkin bread and pumpkin dip to follow soon.

For Bailey, I took the pure pumpkin puree, added a little pumpkin pie spice, and she loved it. She had it several times over the week. It's such a healthy and straight from the garden option. I even noshed on several pieces of roasted pumpkin myself. It was kind of a "one for me, one for the food processor" thing as I ate myself silly of just plain old pumpkin. Who knew it could be so tasty?

I'm going to write a book

2008-10-16T21:02:00.004-04:00

I've been reading London's successes and frustrations in writing her novel and have been living vicariously through her. But I could only watch for so long. London has inspired me to write a book. I'll stick to what I know, I'll write a collection of short stories about my life. I've got a few interesting stories to tell (or so I think).

In the spirit of openess and collaboration, I'll share with you what I have so far. Ok, here goes...

Inside every ordinary person is an extraordinary tale waiting to be told. Here is mine…

Yeah, that's seriously as far as I've gotten. Maybe writing a book is a little tougher than I thought. Perhaps I should just stick to the mommy blog and posting cute pictures of the kids for a little while longer.

Fun times at the pumpkin patch

2008-10-16T15:01:00.007-04:00

Last weekend my sister Tara and her crew were in town. We took everyone to the pumpkin patch for good times. We bought a bunch of pumpkins, and not just for decorating. I have several recipes to post for you as we made toasted pumpkin seeds, homemade pumpkin puree, and really yummy, very addictive chocolate chip pumpkin bread.

But until I get those recipes to you, enjoy the pictures. And yes, Bailey is still sporting the shiner. Boo hoo! And no, I'm not going to apologize for the picture overload. It's a pumpkin patch people! You're supposed to take loads of pictures (right?).

Bailey's Baby Modeling Gig

2008-10-14T16:06:00.000-04:00

We sent in a few photos to a modeling agency that was looking for new babies. Within days, they called us and said they had a job for Bailey. While we were pretty excited about Bailey having a modeling opportunity, I called the agent back and told him that although we were interested, Bailey had a black eye. He told us they could photoshop it out, no big deal, and we were booked.

Two days later, we were showing up for Bailey's first photo shoot. They showed us to the dressing room and had us dress her in a plain white onesie. They were taking shots for a new Bright Start/Baby Einstein pink exersaucer that isn't out yet. They wanted the clothes to be plain so that it wouldn't detract from the product.

They took Bailey from my arms and plunked her in the exersaucer. Then the team of four went to work. The hardest at work was the "baby wrangler" whose sole job was to make the babies happy and laugh. She had a whole myriad of toys and she got Bailey to smile and play while the photographer clicked away.

Not far away, was another person who sat at the monitor and viewed images as they came up and would tell the photographer technical changes for the best shot, "closer" or "more light from the left." Another person would direct what she wanted shots of, "See if you can get one of her holding the catepillar and the flower."

After the first 20 minutes, Bailey was getting bored and a little fussy (it was well past naptime). They gave her a break, taking her out of the exersaucer and handing her to me for a bottle and some downtime. They then brought in another baby waiting in the wings to get photos. My mommy competitive spirit kicked in when they put the "other" baby in the exersaucer and attempted to snap away. It was much to my satisfaction that the other baby didn't want to cooperate at all and seemed to be suffering from a serious case of bedhead that only a baseball cap cures. After about five minutes of trying the new baby, Bailey was back in the exersaucer for round two.

This pattern continued for about an hour. Three sessions later they were done with Bailey. She had made more per hour than Bill or me and she had her first professional photos taken. She was a champ. She smiled, she played, she touched the appropriate bobbles and toys at the right time and enjoyed the attention.

So when will we see Bailey in print? Maybe never. They photograph 10 other babies for the same toy and although the agent didn't seem to care that Bailey had a black eye, the client didn't seem all too pleased. I don't know if we'll be doing much past the exersaucer stint, but it was a fun experience and we got a few pictures to prove that Bailey was once a "professional baby model."

For those interested in baby modeling: One thing I would mention if you are considering "baby modeling" is avoid paying any money to get started. After I submitted the few snapshots of Bailey, the agent emailed me back and said they had a photo slot open for her that weekend to get some professional shots for her calling card and to be listed on their website. All of that for the low price of $395. I balked at paying for the photos and said although we were interested, we did not want to pay $395 for photos that would have to be updated in a few months anyway.

After a few interchanges of this, the agent told me to send me the pictures I had and he would see if he could make it work. If they are insistent that you must pay a fee to get started, go somewhere else. It's a great money maker for them so they all try it, but it's not necessary, especially for babies.

Bailey had never had a professional photo taken in her life. Admittedly though, I have the same camera many pros use so we do have an advantage there, but I don't know how to use the camera to the pros' level of talent. But it seems to me that clients looking for talent don't care how good the quality of the photos are, they can see through that and focus on the content, the baby.

The Shiner

2008-10-07T23:07:00.004-04:00

Shortly after I took pictures of Bailey on Saturday she tried to pull herself up on a bookshelf and fell. Hard. Her cheek/eye hit the edge of the bottom shelf.

I scooped her up while she cried and I tried to put a boo boo bear on her eye (they are ice packs that don't get hard that Reagan insists on having when she gets injured). There was a little bruise within seconds and it just got worse from there.

I've already been feeling like crappy mom of the year for it. Everyone keeps asking about Bailey's bruise. I didn't take any pictures or mention it before because I was just feeling so dang terrible about it. Everytime I see her eye I just want to cry. It was her first real injury.

As life and irony would have it, last week I sent in some photos of Bailey to a modeling agency that the girls school had put us in touch with. Today I got an email that they have a client that wants to do a photo shoot of Bailey THIS Thursday.

Now I really feel bad. Anyone know how to make a bruise go away faster? I suppose tomorrow I'll have to call and explain Bailey has a black eye. Maybe there will be other opportunities for her.

Poor Bailey.

Sisterly Bonds

2008-10-05T22:50:00.005-04:00

Yesterday I looked back in my rear view mirror and this is what I caught sight of in the back seat.

Reagan and Bailey weren't saying a word. They were just quietly reaching for the other sister past their own car seats and holding hands.

This photo symbolizes for me every reason why Bill and I knew we didn't want Reagan to be an only child.

After all I went through during pregnancies to get these girls here, quiet and small moments like this make it all so hugely worth it.

Candid Bailey

2008-10-04T22:49:00.000-04:00

What's for dinner, Cherry and Pineapple Buckle

2008-10-04T22:21:00.004-04:00

I don't make many desserts. Mostly because they usually involve baking and that means precise measuring and mixing and following directions. All things I admittedly don't do very well. But there is one dessert I make that is always a hit and doesn't require baking skills or the precision of a surgeon. The best part is it takes about as much time to make as it would to take a Publix store bought pie out of the container.

It's called a buckle because it uses a yellow cake mix as its base. It's part of the world of cobblers and crisps and other fruity, doughy goodness. But let's not get too technical here. Let's just call it deliciousness in a pan.

Times:

Prep time: 5 minutes

Cook time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

2 cans of cherries partially drained or 2 cans of cherry pie filling (I've used both and like both)

1 can crush pineapple, undrained

1 box yellow cake mix

1 stick plus 2 tablespoons butter (can use between 1 and 1.5 sticks)

1.5 packets of Quaker Apple Cinnamon instant oatmeal (shaken well before opening)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350

In a 9x13 pan, pour in the cans of cherries and the can of pineapple mix together

Dump the box of yellow cake mix on top of the fruit, even out

Shake the packets of oatmeal evenly over the cake mix

Slice the butter into thin pats. Apply the pats of butter over the top of the entire cake. Do not leave much space. Use as much butter as you need to thoroughly cover the cake- anywhere between 1-1.5 sticks.

Bake in a 350 oven for 30-40 minutes (follow directions on the back of the box)

Tips:

Serve warm with ice cream

Try other fruit combinations like peaches and blackberries

You can use fresh or frozen fruit but you need to replace the liquid that you lose from not using the canned fruits. You can replace that liquid by using a complimentary juice or even Sprite.

If Daddies Ruled the Fashion World

2008-10-02T20:41:00.003-04:00

Then all children would be going to school looking like this.

Yes, she went to school like this today. And she wore these shoes just like this. All day. Bill says she got a lot of compliments on her look. I'm guessing they were all from other Dads.

The Flower Girl

2008-09-28T21:01:00.009-04:00

Reagan was in a wedding last weekend for some good friends of ours. We were pretty nervous about her being a flower girl as at the age of two, she can be pretty unpredictable in how she'll choose to behave. But our friends wanted her to be part of their special day and were willing to take the risk.

The Dress
Reagan's involvement with the wedding started several months back when we had to get her flower girl dress. We went with the couple to go look at the dress that the bride had selected and try it on Reagan. Reagan is quite the girly girl and loves nothing more than dressing up in pretty things. I put the dress on her in the fitting room and brought her out for everyone to see. She twirled for everyone and looked at herself in the mirror. Then when it came time to take the dress off, we had trouble. She fought me every step of the way in getting the dress off. She kept sobbing, "my dress, my dress."

It was quite a deja vu experience to when I was trying on my own wedding dress. My mom, sisters, and nieces were with me. The youngest niece was just Reagan's age and is another girly girl. Since she saw me trying on all of the dresses she wanted to try one on too. She picked out a dress and her mom put it on her. When it came time to take it off, just like Reagan she just kept crying "my dress, my dress" and didn't want to take it off.

Since we had the two year old in the pretty dress, my sister wanted to put other girl in a dress too and take a few pictures. She was four at the time. She had quite a different reaction from her two year old sister that wanted to live in her new dress. When my sister tried to put a dress on the four year old she cried, "No! I don't want to wear the dress! I'm TOO YOUNG TO GET MARRIED!"

The Shoes
As any good girly girl would be, Reagan chose a pair of heels to wear with her dress. Of course, this would not be her first pair of heels. Before summer started she chose a pair of sandals with a little wedge heel that she wore all summer long and wore out and outgrew. So when it came time to wear these little shoes with the heel, no problemo. She ran, jumped, hopped, and danced the night away in those shoes. You'd never have known she was wearing a heel. She did better than some of the adults that were there that clearly put on heels twice a year and acted like deer on their new legs.

The Rehearsal
We practiced with Reagan for days before the rehearsal on walking down the aisle with a basket and tossing rose petals. It wasn't going so well. Sometimes she would toss the petals out and then immediately turn back around and pick them back up and sing the "Cleanup song" while shoving every last petal back into her basket. Other times she would take out one petal at a time and strategically place them all equidistant from each other in a perfect straight line. It took her five minutes to place about ten petals five feet and if you tried to hurry her along she'd pitch a fit.

So when it came time for the rehearsal, Reagan wasn't cooperating. She boycotted her nap at daycare that day and she was tired, cranky, in a new place, and lots of new people. She finally partially cooperated but it wasn't making me feel any better for the following big day. I told the couple it wasn't too late to replace Reagan with Bailey. They could just wheel Bailey down in a wagon and plunk her on the floor and she wouldn't make a peep. They tried to assured me whatever Reagan decided to do would be fine (I think they were trying to talk themselves into believing it too). I wasn't buying it, I didn't believe they were either.

The Wedding
When it finally came time for the wedding, Reagan pulled it all together and was a champ. She walked down the aisle with the other flower girl, she even tossed a few petals, she posed in pictures. She did unfortunately only stand in the line for a few minutes before she decided she'd rather sit with us. That was fine. But then she started talking and when I tried to quiet her she pitched a fit. So I had to take her in back and miss most of the wedding. But truthfully I saw more of the wedding than I ever expected in the first place. The last wedding we went to I missed the whole thing because Reagan had just learned to do somersaults the day before and insisted on practicing her newfound skill in the nice long, and open aisle. At least she didn't do any somersaults this time.

The Reception
Reagan is the original party animal. She shook her booty on the dance floor all night long. She danced with anyone that approached her and even showed off a few breakdancing moves she had learned from a previous wedding reception with her cousin Noah.

More Pictures
Here are some additional pictures from the wedding. I had hoped to get a lot more photos, but I had my hands full and took very few pictures this time. From what I could tell they actually had an awesome wedding photographer anyway so I know they aren't lacking in any awesome shots.

Congratulations to Dave and Lori!

In my dreams

2008-09-26T20:26:00.003-04:00

Oh hi, Honey! You're home! *kiss, kiss* I hope you had a good trip and enjoyed your week. Here's the kids, the keys, and there's a Stouffer's Lasagna in the freezer. I'll be at the Marriott if you need me. No, I'm not telling you which one.

*sound of screeching tires as I pull out of the driveway*

Dear Gwyneth Paltrow of GOOP

2008-09-25T21:18:00.007-04:00

Ok, I normally could care less about celebrities and I've never actually blogged about them before, but this particular thing hit some kind of hot button with me. Here's my letter to Gwyneth regarding the launch of her website GOOP.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Gwyneth Paltrow:

I love you, I really do. You're a vision of ethereal beauty with a fresh face that is never too overdone, you have a perfect body, and beautiful naturally blonde hair. Your kids are adorable and well behaved (even with their crazy monikers). You pull off a perfect British accent despite being born in LA. You married a guy in a band, how cool is that?

But I've got to tell you, this latest little adventure of yours, I don't think it was a very good idea. Maybe it is more of the execution than the concept, but I'll get to that later. I mean, you're launching a website. You're calling it GOOP. What the hay wagon is GOOP? Are you trying to coin a new phrase? Try something that isn't named after the junk you find stuck to the bottom of your shoe. GOOP doesn't sound ethereal or lovely, it sounds clunky, dirty, like stuff lubricating an engine of a 1973 Gremlin. I don't think it's a very good name, but you must have a perfectly good explanation for it. Actually, scratch that. You named your kids Apple and Moses. I think you should have lost your right to name your site, or a pet hermit crab for that matter. But that's not really my issue.

My issue is really the site itself. You've got these catchy little bits like "Make", "Go", "Eat", "Be", etc. and when you click on them at the moment you get the following blurb:

GOOP, a collection of experiences. GOOP, what makes life good.
My life is good because I am not passive about it. I want to nourish what is real, and I want to do it without wasting time. I love to travel, to cook, to eat, to take care of my body and mind, to work hard. I love being a mother who has to overcome my bad qualities to be a good mother. I love being in spaces that are clean and feel nice.
Over the years, I have tried lots of different things. I have made lots of mistakes. But I have figured some things out in the process and I would like to share them with you. Whether you want t good place to eat in London, some advice on where to say in Austin, the recipe I made up this week, or some thoughts from one of my sages, GOOP is a little bit of everything that makes up my life.
Make your life good. Invest in what’s real. Cook a meal for someone you love. Pause before reacting. Clean out your space. Read something beautiful. Treat yourself to something. Go to a city you’ve never been to. Learn something new. Don’t by lazy. Workout and stick with it. GOOP. Make it great.

I can't deny you your right to want to be the next Oprah or Martha Stewart. But really, you lost me on your first sentence: "My life is good because I'm not passive about it."

Oh, thanks for that. I was wondering why my life has sometimes been crap. It was because I didn't work hard enough, I didn't seize myself up by my bootstraps, see what I wanted, and gone for it? You mean if I had taken the same steps in your life and had followed a macrobiotic diet, learned a British accent, and practiced cupping, I could have had your life? I could have been the Oscar winner, married a rockstar, and launched my own perfume?

Come on. Let's face it. I could never be you. Your life is good because you were born into a good life, a life of privilege. You were born into fame, born into fortune, born with gifted genes. You attended exclusive boarding schools and were given things in life most only read about. I don't doubt you work hard in your life, but you have made a great life even better by that work. Most of us are starting with a lot less to work with.

I mean, have you ever been me? Were you ever in my shoes? I mean, if you started where many of us did, then you can color me impressed. Let's see, have you ever eaten Ramen noodles for four days straight, floated a check to the electric company, or been so low on "E" that you tried to turn off the air conditioner in 100 degree heat and even turned off the radio? Have you ever used a bottle of Nice 'N Easy or Sun In to color your hair? Have you ever bought your cosmetics next to the bandaids and toenail fungus cure? Did you ever think Applebees was "good eatin"? Did you ever take swimming lessons at the YMCA, hung up a pin up from Tiger Beat magazine, or take a summer job bagging groceries or flipping burgers? Have you ever served a Stouffers frozen Lasagna entree for dinner?

Your life if good now because you have assistants, nannies, stylists, makeup artists, managers, housekeepers, and PR people. I AM all of these people for me AND my family. Yes, I might have a little more time on my hands to do all of the things you do if I had a little help to get things done too.

And what is all of this about you sharing recipes you created with us? You follow a macrobiotic diet. When was the last time you scarfed down a twinkie or savored a bowl of chicken alfredo pasta? What are you planning to cook, exactly? If your planning on sharing with us your recipe for raw cauliflower with a side of pine nuts, mmmmmm there's good eatin. Look, just a heads up as your new BFF that's just keeping it real, if you serve that up as dinner around here us peasants are likely to revolt. However, if you plan to share your latest recipe for pot roast, do you really think we are going to believe that you chow on a hunk of chuck and dip your bread in the gravy and then wipe your mouth with a torn off paper towel? It's just yet another way you just aren't "just like us."

Launch your website, share your cool stuff. But do you really have to be so condenscending? We're on to you GOOP girl.

I call it "Fishy"

2008-09-25T19:55:00.003-04:00

This is Reagan's latest work of art. She said it is a "fishy". She told me the pointed side (left) is the head with the fish smiling and the other side (right), where her hand is, is the tail.

Mama Kat's Giving Away a Hoover

2008-09-24T17:25:00.000-04:00

Yes, that's right. She's giving away an awesome new Hoover vacuum. Go enter yourself here.

I already own a Hoover. It's awesome. But it is 17 years old. I paid $99 for it in 1991. Best $99 I ever spent. It still runs and looks brand new. Maybe that's because it spent most of its life in a safe protected closet not being forced to work. But that was before I had kids and before I've been without a housekeeper for six months. Now that baby gets some serious use. I can speak from experience that it can inhale an entire box of Honey Nut Cheerios in just one swipe.

About the same time I bought my vacuum, my Mom bought a Kirby from a door-to-door salesman. If you're a door-to-door salesman, just go to my Mom's house. She'll buy your stuff from you. Encyclopedias, magazines, wrapping paper, vacuums, beef steak of the month club, whatever, she just can't say no. Anyway, she paid about $900 for this glamorous top of the line Kirby. It was even supposed to fluff your couch cushions, sand your tables, and blow up your beach balls for the pool. Of course she never used it to sand or to blow up beach balls, just vacuum. And it didn't really do that very well. And where is that Kirby now? It's been dead for about a decade. Some investment that was.

Maybe it's high time for Mama to upgrade? My current vacuum actually even still uses vacuum bags. Do you know how hard it is to find vaccum bags these days? Even the cheapo vacuums are bagless now. I think my current Hoover should be bound for the Smithsonian while I upgrade with a new one I'll be winning from Mama Kat.

On the off chance I don't win that vacuum, let's hear your recommendations? Is everyone still drinking the kool-aid and loving their Dysons? Or does the Dyson go the way of the Kirby after a few years of use? Does your vacuum blow up beach balls? Sand tables? Clean a fish tank? Have any other "special" talents?

Update on Atlanta Gas Shortage

2008-09-24T11:36:00.007-04:00

Just a quick update on where things stand on the Atlanta gas shortage. Basically, it's gotten worse. Radio stations are now reporting "where to find gas at this moment" along with the regular traffic report. It's quicker to name the few gas stations in town with gas than to give the traffic report.

After taking the girls to the doctor and to school today, I needed to get gas. I found a gas station with gas. I got in line with the 50 other cars waiting and started playing with my new iPhone (which rocks!). Employees were doing their best to direct traffic but it didn't stop a few dummies from rolling in on two wheels and stealing a spot at the pump. When that happened, horns would honk furiously, the employees would yell at them, but they'd ignore everything and get their gas anyway. I'm not sure I'd brave that in Georgia. In this state you don't need a permit to carry a gun in your car. I'm afraid it's just a matter of time before one is used over this gas situation.

A mere 45 minutes later, I still wasn't even into the gas station lot when an employee walked to the street and started taking down the gas prices on the sign. Out of gas! Ugh. I drove off towards home looking for another gas station with gas. No luck.

Now I'm going to have to see if 1) the truck has enough gas and 2) I can get both the girls' car seats in there. Otherwise I'll need to take off two hours of work this afternoon before I got pick up the girls from daycare to go fill up the van.

Apparently a lot of the problem stems from the fact that in Atlanta we have special gas because we are big time polluters and we have a special forumula to help keep down pollution. The governor has asked for a temporary reprival from the EPA to allow us to use standard gas to try to get the supply back into town. Yesterday afternoon that request was granted. We'll see how long it takes before we see that impact us at the pumps. I'm guessing it won't be at least until the weekend.

And what started all of it? Panic from the hurricanes. You see in Atlanta we're special. We are panickers and hoarders. Don't believe me? Just go to the grocery store any time the word "ice" or "snow" is mentioned. You won't find a gallon of milk, a bottle of water, a loaf of bread, or a battery until you get to the state line. We go clean out the store like we are going to be shut in until spring thaw. So when the hurricanes were coming through, people panicked and filled up. I think you followed the dominoes falling from there.

No gas? What country am I in anyway?

Do you live in Atlanta or another area affected by a recent gas shortage? Share your story here!

Uh, oops

2008-09-22T23:31:00.005-04:00

So since my good sport of a husband took all of the flack for the snake story, I figured it was only fair I share with you the rest of the weekend (the part where I DON'T come off as the hero in wrestling a man-eating, oversized worm to its doom).

But before I do that, let me tell you about how Bill has taken his snake notoriety. One thing you should know about Bill, he dishes out as much as he takes. Which is probably why when some of his real life friends saw the snake story they didn't hesitate to call him and goad him about it. But Bill takes it all in stride. When he read the story he laughed and he admitted it was pretty darn funny. Bill has always been a terrific sport about being the subject of a blog story and is amazingly supportive of my blogging. That's evident enough by the fact that he wrote Reagan's birth story for me just last week. Is it a coincidence that I posted the snake story AFTER he gave me the birth story? Uh, let's move on...

So Bill was doing some yard work. I decided I would help him out. I got out my favorite tool--the electric hedge trimmers. I carefully plugged it in, made sure the cord was secure, and let 'er rip. I was going at the hedges like I was Edward Scissorhands working a masterpiece. Twigs and leaves were flying, sticks were dropping, bugs were running, and Bill casually worked his way into the other end of the yard.

About 15 minutes in, I took one particularly graceful slice at a bush that needed the attention that only an artist could give. Ok, that's what it seemed like happened in my mind. What really happened is I took a sideways whack at a bush and chopped the extension cord in half. I heard a loud pop and a flame shot out as the hedge trimmers promptly died.

As I stood there stunned and trying to decide whether I like the smell of burnt wiring, Bill calmly interjects:

Bill: You cut the cord, didn't you?
Bridget: Uh, yeah.
Bill: Well, to your credit, it took you longer than I thought it would.
Bridget: What are you talking about? I've only been at it 15 minutes.
Bill: Yeah.
Bridget: ...something unintelligible as she walks to unplug the cord...

Behold, my handiwork:

Bill says I'm now banned from doing yard work. Was that all it took? I should have done that years ago.

Backseat driver

2008-09-22T18:05:00.000-04:00

Bill is gone this week, so I get the duty of taking the girls to and from school each day. Since I work from home and the school is five minutes from Bill's work, normally the responsibility falls with him.

This morning we started the 30 minute drive to school. As typical for me, I immediately start swerving in and out of lanes. Reagan protested at once. She said, "No! This lane!" and points to the right hand lane. See, Bill is a much more conservative driver than me. He stays in the same lane and moves to another lane at precisely the same spot each day. Reagan knows this and had no problem telling me I was doing it wrong.

When I decided to take a different turn than Bill makes, Reagan once again expressed her anger. She pitched a fit and kept saying "No, go that way!" until I turned back onto the path that Bill normally takes.

While I'm glad to know my 2 year old can find her way home when she is 30 minutes away, I'm going to have to work on her and explain that "Daddy's way" isn't the only way to get there.

On a related note, when a school bus drove by she told me, "I want to drive a school bus." I don't know if she meant she just wanted to try it out one time or if she has career aspirations for being a school bus driver. If it's the latter, I'll remind myself that we will encourage our children to be whatever they want to be and then I'll think of what I'll do with all of that money I won't have to pay towards college.

Beep, beep! All aboard!

Trauma in the ER

2008-09-21T23:34:00.005-04:00

When the girls have to go in for wellness visits I make Bill come along too. He is there for one purpose--to hold the girls when they get their shots while I go running to the waiting room like the yellow belly coward that I am. I can't stand seeing the girls being put through pain. They are over it in a minute, I'm traumatized for days.

So today I took Bailey by myself for her first visit to the Urgent Care. She had been coughing and wheezing for a few days and having a hard time sleeping at night so I took her in to make sure she was ok.

The doctor prescribed a breathing treatment for her. They brought in a tiny little mask and hooked it up and said, "Just hold this mask over her face and let her breathe normally for about ten minutes while the medicine runs through it."

I dutifully held up the mask all of the sudden I was wishing she was getting shots instead. At least that would be one prick and it's over with. My laid back, always smiling, never cries baby hauled back and let forth some of the mightiest screaming and fisticuffs fighting I have ever seen from such a tiny tike. I went through ten minutes of sheer trauma while trying to console her and trying to keep her hands off the mask while I tried to hold the mask on. It was not a very well orchestrated effort as the nine month old was definitely getting the upper hand on me.

She's doing better now. Me, I'm not so sure.

Running on empty

2008-09-21T23:14:00.006-04:00

When Katrina hit New Orleans, in Atlanta we were hit with a rare problem--we ran out of gas. In one day all of the gas stations ran out of gas, some stations running up the price to $6.00 per gallon before they shut down the pumps. But within a few days, gas was running again and we were back to our normal ways.

When Ike hit Texas last weekend we found ourselves in a similar situation. Gas stations were running out of gas. Only this time, more than a week has passed and instead of getting better, it seems to be getting worse. Some gas stations near us waited nearly five days to get their first shipment of gas in only to sell out again in two hours. Today, we passed over a dozen gas stations in a ten mile stretch and only one had gas. The line was stretched all the way down well into the street as people waited and hoped to get the only gas for ten miles. Angry horns were honking and traffic was getting tied up as cars wouldn't allow traffic past them for fear of someone cutting into line.

I'm just glad I don't still drive my Infiniti SUV. That car protested profusely when I tried to cheap out and put anything other than premium in it. That wouldn't be happening these days. On the rare occasion I do see gas, I only see regular. It's been 1.5 weeks since I've seen a gas station with any higher grade.

Price has never really deterred us from changing our habits with gas consumption. When prices went up we complained a bit, but we didn't change our ways. This week, for the first time ever, we actually thought about our trips. Price may not deter us but availability certainly does. When you think you may not actually be able to replace the gas in your tank and may find yourself stranded with two young kids, you start to think twice about whether a trip is really necessary. We skipped our beloved weekly trivia game with friends as that would consume nearly 1/4 of a tank. It seemed frivolous under the circumstances.

Here's hoping our supply is back to normal again soon. I'm wondering what the supply is like in the rest of the country. Are the pumps keeping up with demand where you are?

Update 9/22: Here is a link to a CNN story talking about this issue. For a time, CNN actually had my blog linked to this story today. How cool is that? I had over 300 hits coming directly from CNN to my little old blog to see my story. http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/wayoflife/09/22/atlanta.gas.crunch/index.html

What's for Dinner, Jalapeno Cornbread Casserole

2008-09-19T20:47:00.000-04:00

Here is another unique recipe that you can do with a pound of ground beef. This one takes a bit more effort and time than the Sloppy Joe Pie, but it is well worth the rewards in my book. This is one of my favorite recipes that my Dad and step-Mom, Kerry, make. It may not look like much, but this stuff is gooood!

Here's Dad and Kerry when Reagan was just two months old, aren't they cute together?

Somewhere in between running marathons, triathalons, kayaking, and biking they cook. I'm not sure where. I'm tired just typing about their activities.

Now to do this recipe right, you're going to need a good old heavy cast 12" cast iron skillet. I suppose you could use something else, but it just won't be quite the same. You could always run to the store and get a cast iron skillet, it's something every kitchen should have and it's pretty inexpensive. But you'll need to clean it and season it before you use it. There is just nothing like an old, perfectly seasoned skillet for cooking fried potatoes and onions, fried green tomatoes, fried chicken, or Bill and my favorite-duck. If your unsure about how to season, clean, or store your cast iron, click here for tips.

Now, I also have to fess up to something. I changed the original recipe (who's surprised?). Dad approved of all of my changes until I mentioned the Jiffy cornbread mix. Yeah, he's a bit of a cornbread snob. He wasn't impressed with that change. So I'll tell you how I shortcut things (and perhaps shortcut flavor in the process but I won't admit it) but at the end I'll post his recipe in its original form so you can decide which one to use (Use mine or I'll never talk to you again. Ok, I'm just kidding. sort of).

This uses peppers but the overall taste is medium to mild in hotness to me. So feel free to add more or less peppers to your taste.

Time
Prep time: 30-40 minutes
Cook time: 40 minutes

Ingredients
2 boxes Jiffy Corn muffin mix
2/3 cup milk
2 eggs
1 (160z) can cream-style corn
1 pound ground beef
1 large onion, chopped
1 pound cheddar cheese, grated
5 canned jalapenos, seeded, cored, and diced
1 packet taco seasoning mix
4 canned chipotle peppers, diced
cornmeal for dusting greased pan

Directions
* Preheat oven to 350
* Grease 12" cast iron skillet, dust with cornmeal. Set aside.
* Combine cornbread mix, eggs, and milk according to package directions, fold in can of creamed corn, and jalapenos. Set aside.
* Brown meat drain, add taco seasoning according to directions.
* Saute onion. Combine onion, taco beef, and chipotle peppers and set aside.
* Pour half of the cornbread batter into your skillet.
* Spread half grated cheese evenly over batter.
* Spread meat mixture evenly over batter.
* Spread remaining cheese over meat mixture.
* Top with remaining batter.
* Bake at 350 for 40 minutes.

Dad's original recipe:
1 cup yellow cornmeal
1 cup milk
2 eggs
¾ teaspoon soda
½ cup corn oil (original recipe calls for bacon drippings)
1 (1-pound) can cream-style corn
1 pound ground beef
1 large onion, chopped
1 pound cheddar cheese, grated (original recipe call for round cheese?)
5 canned jalapenos chopped

Combine cornmeal, milk, beaten eggs, soda, oil and corn. Mix well and set aside
Brown meat until crumbly. Drain well on paper towels. Pour half of the cornbread
Batter into a well-greased cast iron skillet that has been dusted with cornmeal. Sprinkle grated cheese evenly over batter. Sprinkle meat evenly over the cheese, then sprinkle the chopped onions ( I sauté the onions in the same pan after browning the beef) and jalapenos over the meat. Top with remaining batter. Bake at 350 for 50 minutes.

Original recipe comes from the book "Texas on the Half Shell"

Snakecharmer

2008-09-18T15:59:00.005-04:00

Let me start by saying my husband, Bill, is a manly man. He's a guy's guy. He hunts in camouflage wearing something that is supposed to smell like deer pee (Or maybe it is deer pee? Never mind, don't clarify this for me. Some things are best not knowing). He plays Fantasy Football and Baseball and watches the games so he can get a first glance into how "his" players are doing that week. He can tinker with broken things and makes them whole again.

When it comes to creepy crawlies and critters, once again, Bill is my man, my hero, my macho man. He kills roaches in just one step. He balks at the black widows that occasionally invade the garage and basement. When the possum found its way into our trash, but didn't find its way out, Bill took care of it. When the shrew, mole, countless frogs, and other creatures found their way into our pool but didn't find their way out, Bill took care of it.

But I've learned there is one exception to Bill's creepy crawlie machismo. Like Indiana Jones, he has one known weakness...SNAKES.

Recently, a snake made its way into our pool and into the filter baskets. When Bill went to go clean out the basket, he stuck his hand down inside and promptly pulled it back out when he discovered the snake. (I envision it was followed with a scream only a tween at a Jonas Brothers concert could rival, but he won't fess up to that part). Here's our conversation when he came back inside:

Bill (eyes wide and excites): Whatever you do, don't go into the pool!
Bridget: Ok, how come?
Bill: Because there's a big old snake in it! It's like this long (stretching his arms about 18")!
Bill: I can't believe I stuck my hand down in there! I was trying to clean out the basket and picking up some of the leaves and there he was! I'm trying to drown it. I'll go check on it later.
Bridget: I'll go get it out.
Bill: You can't just go sticking your hand in there and yank out a snake like that! You don't know if it is poisonous. That thing could kill you!

Bill pauses for a minute, goes to the drawer...

Bill: Here, at least use some tongs

At this point I am amused that he was concerned enough for my safety to ask me to use tongs, but not concerned enough that he was willing to capture the poisonous, serpentine creature himself.

Together we go down to the pool. I asked him to bring the camera so we could capture my wrestle with the beast on film. Maybe I'd get a guest spot on some talk show somewhere or, krikey, maybe even become "The Snake Hunter." I cautiously open the lid and look inside for this snake that in my mind is as wide as my fist and as long as a car.

Once I found the snake, I pulled it out. I attempted to use the tongs to appease Bill but that just wasn't working. So instead, I grabbed the snake around it's gullet while at any moment it might strike. It's tail was moving and the head was opening in protest to me grabbing it. Then I briskly walked it toward the back of the yard and flung it as far as I could.

I asked Bill if he got some good closeups of the snake so that I could look it up. He said, "Oh, yeah, I good some good closeups of the whole thing!"

And here it is! Here is the vicious man eating reptile in the flesh:

Are you scared? You shouldn't be. I zoomed and cropped this baby by about 1000%

Here is the original "closeup" shot. Apparently, closeup to Bill means he was able to see any of the tiny, baby snake while filming from half way across the yard.

And to put it into further perspective, here is me picking up the snake off the ground after the tongs failed to do the job. Can you see the snake? Yeah, I hardly can either. Squint really hard.

From what I could tell, it was a gray rat snake. Perfectly harmless. But I am now armed knowing Bill has one weakness. Priceless.

All About Reagan, Part VI: The Birth (by Bill!)

2008-09-14T22:56:00.008-04:00

Part I: Introduction
Part II: Conception
Part III: The First Trimester
Part IV: The Second Trimester
Part V: The Third Trimester

It's been a while since my last "All About Reagan" post. I left you with going into the doctor's office and hearing that the baby was going to have to come today...as quickly as they could get it scheduled. Most of what happened after that point was a blur to me. So, I have something very special to offer today. My wonderful husband, Bill, graciously agreed to write the birth story from his perspective. He really put a lot of thought and effort into this. I really appreciate it and I know Reagan will too, oneday.

I love you, Bill! Thank you for writing your side of the story.
So without further ado, here are Bill's words...

It was May 4th and Bridget had another one of her twice-weekly checkups at her OB’s office. She had been going in for these checkups for several weeks now because of general health issues, e.g. high blood pressure, diabetes, stuff like that, all pregnancy related. These checkups usually went pretty smoothly as far as I could tell. On this particular day the doctor performed a non-stress test and she didn’t like the results. Apparently Reagan’s heart wasn’t accelerating (or was it decelerating? I forget.) like it was supposed to and she had decided that something needed to be done about it.

Bridget called me at my work sometime in the mid-afternoon. She was very upset and crying. My male intuition immediately told me something was wrong. Naturally I asked if she had wrecked the brand-new van or bounced a check but she just told me “no”, that it was a little more serious than that. Bridget told me to get to the hospital ASAP because we were having a baby that very day! Needless to say I wasn’t mentally prepared for that little piece of news and I immediately started to get both nervous and excited at the same time.

Well, being the super-organized family that we were at the time of course we had not packed either of our hospital bags. It was too late for that now. I told my boss what was going on and then I jumped in the truck and headed to the hospital. I think it was a Thursday.

I got to the hospital and found Bridget in a bed in one of the rooms in the Women’s Center. She looked terrible. I could tell she had been crying and she was extremely nervous about the upcoming emergency c-section. I calmed her down as best I could. I’m pretty sure I have her a hug and a kiss and said some comforting things like “it will be OK”, and “the baby’s only 3.5 weeks early, which is not too bad for a girl”, and “the doctor has done a bunch of these c-sections before so I’m sure it will work out all right.” Honestly, I was trying to calm and reassure both of us at this point because I was starting to get pretty nervous myself. I’m pretty sure I didn’t tell Bridget she looked terrible. If I did tell her that I don’t remember doing it, so she can’t really hold it against me.

Anyway, after sitting in the room with Bridget for a little while we both started to relax and it was then that we realized that we didn’t have a camera. We wanted to take pictures of Reagan’s birth and we were missing a somewhat critical component. I called my good friend Dave and asked if I could borrow his camera and if he would mind bringing it by the hospital. I explained what had happened and what was going to happen and he was more than happy to help us out. I promised Dave I would try to get as little of the birth-goo on his camera as I could. He laughed and looked at me funny, but he still let me borrow his camera. Did I mention what a good friend Dave is?

At some point in the process the anesthesiologist came in to the room to brief us on what was going to happen and to make sure Bridget was prepared. He gave Bridget some nasty looking goo and told her to drink it all down. It was supposed to stop Bridget from vomiting in the operating room while she was under anesthesia. From the face that Bridget made it tasted even worse than it looked. I was just glad that they didn’t ask me to drink any of that stuff.

I remember asking the doctor about how much longer it would be before it was show time and he said we were only about 30 minutes away. Everything was happening so quickly. I started to get nervous again but I tried to hide it. I didn’t want Bridget to get any more upset than she already was.

Soon after that a nurse brought in one of those blue disposable paper suits and handed it to me. I would need to wear that to go into the operating room. I didn’t have to take off my regular clothes, I just had to wear this paper suit over my regular clothes. Apparently it represses germs. I think they made me wear it just to make me look goofy. Regardless, I quickly dressed and Dave took a few pictures of me. I looked so silly. Like a 6’ tall smurf. I don’t know how many apples that is but it’s a lot. About that time Dave decided he’d had enough fun and wished us luck and left.

Soon after that the nurse came in to take Bridget to the operating room for her spinal block and to get her ready for the grand finale. She helped Bridget out of bed and noticed that Bridget wasn’t wearing any socks. I thought that was funny. I mean, how did the nurse not see Bridget’s butt all hanging out the back of that hospital gown? But no, all she cared about was that Bridget wasn’t wearing any socks. I guess you get desensitized to bare rump after working in a hospital after a while. The nurse went and got Bridget some socks, which I helped put on her feet since Bridget wasn’t really in much condition to do it herself. In fact, I’m pretty sure Bridget hadn’t even seen her feet in several weeks at that point. But I digress.

So the nurse walked Bridget and I down to the OR and then they made me wait outside while they put the spinal block in and then got Bridget all strapped down. It took about 2 hours, but the clock on the wall must have been running slow because it said only about 15 minutes went by. I was really starting to get nervous and excited at this point.

Finally the nurse came out and said it was OK for me to come in to the OR. I walked in and it was pretty much just like on TV, except the room was smaller and the nurses were bigger. Someone told me to stand up at the top of the table, up near Bridget’s head. They put up a screen that was about 6’ wide and maybe 2’ tall, and it kept Bridget from being able to look down and see anything. That was a portent of things to come, as I would find out soon enough. Someone slid on of those little round chairs you see in a doctors office my way, but I decided I was going to stand so that I could see the action. I’ve been deer hunting a few times and have seen more than a couple of deer get field dressed so I was pretty sure that I wasn’t going to pass out at the sight of blood.

The doctors came into the OR at that point, and started poking and prodding and smearing some antibiotic liquid all over Bridget’s stomach. Then they put some sort of sticky plastic coating on her stomach, I guess to help prevent the skin from tearing. It sounds gross, but it didn’t really look all that bad.

So the doctors get out a scalpel and they start cutting into Bridget’s lower stomach region, making fairly delicate incisions. They were using some sort of hot glue gun looking thing after each cut, and from the god-awful smell that thing was making I could tell they were using it to cauterize the surgical site to help reduce bleeding. Holy cow does burnt flesh smell terrible.
So the doctors are cutting away slowly but surely, stinking up the room as they go, and before too long they get to the point where it’s time to cut Reagan out of the uterus.

At this point I’m standing at the head of the table, looking down to where the doctors are doing their work, and everything seems like it’s been easy as pie. So the doctor makes the cute into the uterus, and OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!! there is a freaking HUGE rush of fluid and what appears to be watery blood that come absolutely pouring out from Bridget. It looks like there are gallons of this stuff. I have never in my entire life seen anything close to anything like this. I am holding on to the top of that little barrier that prevents Bridget from see anything, and I go absolutely white knuckled. My heart stops. My breathing stops. I am sure that something has gone horribly wrong and I am now watching my wife and baby die right in front of me.

I almost, almost shout out “Oh my God is that normal?!”, but then I remember Bridget lying there on the table and I don’t want her to panic. I manage to hold my tongue and I pray that either this is normal or, if it’s not, that the medical staff will know how to handle it and they’ll save my family.

Well, apparently what I saw –is- normal, because the staff just started cleaning up the fluid and then started working on getting Reagan out from inside Bridget. I started to relax. My heart started beating again. I’m not sure when I actually started breathing again.

One of the doctors worked on positioning Reagan’s head for exit while the other doctor started trying to push the baby out. Apparently you push the baby out by having a doctor push down as hard as they can on the chest/upper stomach region of the mother. I could tell it was really putting Bridget in a lot of pain because she started groaning and making a lot of noise. I just hoped that it wouldn’t take too much longer, because I was sure that Bridget was going to have either some cracked ribs or a crushed chest.

After only a few seconds I could see Reagan’s head, and after that it was only a few more seconds until they had Reagan completely delivered. She looked like a little gooey alien. But she was mine and she was beautiful.

Reagan Laura Fitzgerald

May 4, 2006 8:02 PM

6lbs 2oz, 18.5 inches

No, this isn't the end, this is merely the beginning. To be continued...

I wanna be a cowgirl

2008-09-14T21:17:00.004-04:00

My remberance of 9/11

2008-09-11T22:09:00.000-04:00

It was September 10, 2001. As the plane made its approach into the Newark airport, I did my usual routine. Looking out the window, I looked for the Twin towers of the World Trade Center. They were always so easy to spot on the edge of the skyline. From there, it was a straight shot down to find the little green spot that was the Statue of Liberty. I never got used to how tiny Lady Liberty was against the massive skyscrapers. The pictures and stories of her always seemed to make her seem much bigger in proportion than she really is.

I found my Twin Towers, found the Statue of Liberty. Check, and check, my ritual was done and I could go back to my latest James Patterson book that was never really worth the time, but it was the only thing left in the newsstand selection of 20 books I hadn't read.

I picked up my rental car, drove to my hotel and checked in. I considered going into the city for dinner. I was just across the river from Manhattan and had nothing to do until I started teaching my class the following morning. But I decided I was tired of the city and same old same old and ordered room service and worked on reading my book.

Morning came and my day started just like the other 300 classes I had started before. I greeted students, made sure the computers were setup properly, familiarized myself with the facility, and made sure I knew who my contact was if an issue arose. At 8:30 the class promptly began and I started my introduction that at this point was a memorized speech.

Around 8:45, a student's phone rang. I made a mental note to make sure I moved up my "please silence your phones, put pagers on stun, etc." speech and glared at the student as she took the call in the middle of the class. I was hoping she saw my evil eye. Only as I was giving her the evil eye, I was noticing something in her eye--tears and panic. I was caught off guard and paused to look at this student and tried to imagine what sort of family emergency has just happened. She put down her phone and with a trembling voice and trying to hold back her tears said, "Something has happened. There was an explosion or something at the World Trade Center."

With the vast numbers of people that work at the WTC and being just across the river, I don't believe there was a single student that didn't also panic. No one in that classroom was without a loved one, a neighbor, or a friend that didn't work there and was immediately concerned for their safety. We stopped class while everyone started making phone calls, getting on the internet, going outside to see if we could see anything. Details were sketchy but it was clear that something big had happened. Then we find out it was a plane that crashed through. What a terrible accident, how could that have happened? Wait! There's a second plane! It just crashed into the other tower! This wasn't an accident! Our nation is being attacked and I'm sitting 10 miles from the epicenter.

We dismiss class and tell people to go home and try to find out what has happened to all of their loved ones. The phones were completely overloaded and everyone was having trouble getting through. My sister, Tara, was the first to get a message to me. Her message was, "Hey! I was just checking to make sure you are ok. I don't know where in the world your are today, but given your history of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, I'm guessing you are in NY. Call us and let us know." I was finally able to get through to her and to Mom to say yes, I was in NY, but I was fine. That didn't stop my Mom from being near hysterical but I assured her I was ok and not in danger. Was I in danger? I didn't really know. I still didn't know entirely what was going on. My statement meant I was alive and ok at the moment but I wasn't going to tell her that distinction.

In my stupor I go back to my hotel to watch the news and surf the net to figure out what is going on. On the way I could see the smoke pouring from the towers. I wasn't close enough to see the towers. I couldn't handle looking at them yet anyway. I learn the Pentagon was also attacked and there's word of potentially some heroes that ensured a fourth plane wouldn't take another target. Then, right there on my TV, it happened. I watched the first building buckle like a house of cards. I began sobbing thinking of all of my students and their loved ones. There were husbands, wives, sisters, even children in the daycare. How many were lost? Shortly after I see the second building collapse and I can no longer sit in my room.

I got into my car. I drove down towards the towers. When they were in clear view of the massive black pouring of smoke, I pulled over. Right there on the interstate I pulled over to the emergency lane and with everyone else and got out of my car and stood along the wall. There were no more towers to see, only smoke. I wish I had paid more attention to them yesterday. I wish I had known that would be the last time I would set site to the grand buildings. I would have looked longer, I would have gone into the city and taken another tour of them, I would have done a lot of things different.

I don't know how long I stood there crying just watching, sobbing, being numb. Emergency vehicles were constantly roaring down the interstate behind me, heading for the scene. Every time I heard their siren it jolted me out of my trance for just a second. Finally I put my thoughts together and decided I would do the only thing I could do, I would go donate blood. Surely there were many injured survivors that would need blood. I could do that. I found out a location of a Red Cross. Apparently half the city had the same idea. I was turned away as they couldn't handle any more donations. Defeated and unable to help in any way I could fathom, I went back to my hotel.

When I got to my hotel, the scene had changed. They were using the lobby as a makeshift treatment facility for emergency workers suffering from smoke inhalation and other minor injuries. Camera crews from neighboring cities had checked in and set up shop. I went to my room and cried again. I had never felt so alone. It was too far to drive home and the airports were shut down tight. I was stuck. I had no one I knew, no one who loved me to hug me and tell me everything would be ok. I cried myself to sleep.

A few hours later I woke with a start. Had I left the iron on this morning? What is that burning smell? I checked the iron. It was unplugged and put away thanks to the housekeeping service. Was it my curling iron? No, it was off too. I stepped out of my room and still smelled that wretched smell that burned my nose. My heart was heavy as I finally processed what that smell was. It wasn't the curling iron, or the iron, or the air system. It was the smell of the burning of two giant skyscrapers, two planes, and all of the people for whom it became a tomb. It was the smell of death. It is a smell that didn't escape me the rest of the time I was there and a smell that still plagues me to this day. This was the most vivid of my memories.

The next morning I showed up for class. I figured it had been canceled but no one was able to get through to tell me otherwise. I had nothing else to do anyway. To my surprise, six others showed up too. I learned that many in that class lost loved ones. It wasn't the news I wanted to hear. But there were six out of 24 that had shown up, that had all friends and family accounted for, and they wanted to learn. So I taught. I finally had a purpose in all this madness. I would teach my class and they would help me get through this.

Normally I teach a class by using humor. I skipped the jokes that week. I wasn't in a funny mood and it seemed inappropriate to laugh anyway. I bought them pizzas during lunch and held to every minute of class as precious time for me to have someone to talk to, people to listen to, people who would keep my mind off of what happened 10 miles away.

When the class ended that Friday, I was fortunate enough to be able to make the very first flight out of Newark when it reopened that day. It was times like these that I was glad I put in over 200,000 miles a year on Delta. They saw to it I was going home as soon as I could. My stepdad had been working in Princeton about 45 minutes away. My Mom begged and pleaded with me to drive home with him instead of getting on the plane. I calculated the amount of time I would have to spend with my stepdad in the car and decided I'd rather take my chances with the terrorists in the sky.

Although the airport was nearly empty, it took me four hours to get to my gate. They rifled through everything I owned while it was open on a table for any passerby to view my panties and my other contents. They took my tweezers, my favorite diamond chiseled tweezers that could search and pluck any stray eyebrow hair. They confiscated my water. They made me turn my computer off and on half a dozen times. But I wasn't complaining. I figured all of these precautions weren't going to stop another terrorist attack, but it still made me somehow feel safer nonetheless.

My plane left that Friday afternoon. Just four days after the world had changed. As the flight took off, it flew in the familiar pattern and over near the Twin Towers and Lady Liberty we go. Only this time there would be no towers to begin my ritual of finding The Statue. Instead, the smoke still billowed as black and strong as ever where the buildings once stood. No one spoke as the flight flew past. Tears glistened in everyone's eyes. I paid my respects, said a prayer, and wondered what life was going to be like after today.

The "Ida Bear"

2008-09-08T22:30:00.006-04:00

The picture below is Reagan with her "Ida Bear." Ida, (pronounced ee-DUH) was an Au Pair in the US a few years ago. We got to know her really well as she was good friends with our Au Pair at the time. Ida gave Reagan the bear for Christams when Reagan was just seven months old. It came from Sweden where Ida is from and lives today. Reagan loves this bear. She sleeps with it, and carries it around everywhere. We've been fortunate enough to keep in touch with Ida and she reads this blog regularly. Maybe one day Reagan will get to meet Ida once again and thank her for the bear in person.

Here is Reagan with her Ida bear when she was nine months old

And here is Ida, the beautiful, sweet girl of the namesake bear

Ida and Reagan when Reagan was seven months old.

And here are just some other random pictures I've taken over the past week.

Being a rock star...

2008-09-07T21:13:00.002-04:00

is tiring work.

Reagan also tried to talk me into buying her a Dora doll at the store today. She held it lovingly and said, "But Mommy, it's so ADORABLE."

What's for Dinner, Baked Spicy Cheese Grits

2008-09-05T22:52:00.003-04:00

Last weekend we had friends for dinner and I served these grits as one of the sides. Our friend graciously and cautiously put just a little on his plate to be kind and said, "I'll just take a little, I'm not really a grits man." Well, three helpings later and a to go box for lunch the next day and I had a convert who discovered he did in fact like grits. He just never had them cooked like I made them. Over the years we've served dinner to many LDS/Mormon missionaries and they've been from all over the world. It isn't unusual for us to get a call saying, "Hey, can you make your grits? We've got a new guy who says he's tried grits and he doesn't like them."

So, this recipe is dedicated to all of you who just think you don't like grits. Really, just try them!

Time
Prep: 25 minutes
Cook: 30 minutes

Ingredients
1.5 cups Quick cook grits (this is key- not instant, not regular, they need to be quick cook)
1.5 sticks butter (Did I say this was a low cal dish? I think not)
1 lb Velveeta Mexican cheese (I prefer the hot when I can find it, but mild works too)
1 pkg Bacon bits (the ones in the plastic pouches, I prefer the Oscar Meyer bacon bits)
1 Tbls Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp Seasoning salt
2 tsp Kosher salt
2 tsp hot sauce (I often add a lot more because we like the heat. Add more to your taste)
3 eggs, beaten

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. In a medium saucepan, bring the water to a boil. Stir in grits, and reduce heat to low. Cover, and cook 5 to 6 minutes, stirring occasionally.
3. Mix in the butter, cheese, seasoning salt, kosher salt, Worcestershire sauce, and hot sauce.
4. Continue cooking for 5 minutes, or until the cheese is melted, add in bacon bits.
5. Remove from heat, and fold in the eggs, add to 9 x 13 baking dish
6. Bake 30 mins in the preheated oven, or until the top is lightly browned.

Tips
* When you add the grits to the boiling water, do so slowly and while whisking the grits in the pan. This will prevent the grits from clumping as you stir them in.
* To keep the eggs from scrambling when you add them to the grits, mix a little of the grits with the beaten eggs to slowly bring up their temperature (tempering). Once you have incorporated some of the grits, you can go ahead and add the rest of the grits. I go ahead and do all of this in my baking dish to prevent me from having to wash one more dish.

Weekend Recap

2008-09-02T11:07:00.003-04:00

We had a nice, quiet holiday. We spent it entertaining friends. We had friends over Friday and Sunday night for dinner. I've got some recipes from it to post for you, but like a dummy I forgot to get pictures. No matter, you'll just have to envision the awesomeness that was the baby back ribs (mmmm, can you smell them through your screen?), baked spicy cheese grits (hear me out before you go "eeewww!"), and Mad Hatter salad ("what's that?" you say?). There was lots of other food to be had too, but those are the recipes that I'll be sharing with you later. There was hot tubbing and Wii-ing.

Maybe Wendy will let me share with you the video of her husband doing the hula-hoop on the Wii Fit. It's not quite as entertaining as the video of me warbling out "Good-bye Earl" at karaoke night Saturday night at a bachelorette party (I really need to get out more). I'm not sure entertaining is really the word, actually. It is probably about as painful to watch that video as watching the first American Idol auditions every season. I can just see Simon watching me with his eyes tearing up and his body wretched over in pain. He at least would have put me out of my misery 20 seconds in instead of enduring the entire 4 mins and 17 seconds and would have interrupted with "That was some of the worst singing I've ever heard in my life. I think I can still hear dogs barking from four streets over. Do yourself a favor and NEVER, EVER sing again. Not even in the shower." I can promise you that video will NEVER end up on my blog. I'm cursing camera phones. If that video should ever find it's way to UTube, I'll be minus one friend and no, I won't tell you how to find it.

We also took Reagan to get some shoes for a wedding she'll be in weekend after next. I'm a little nervous about the wedding. The last wedding she attended I had to take her out because she kept trying to do somersaults down the aisle. We'll be practicing with her little flower basket and throwing petals, but frankly Reagan is pretty unpredictable. There is no telling what she might decide to do. The shoes we bought have a little heel on them. She seems to take after her mama and prefer shoes with a little lift. Considering the height predictor it calculating her to be a statuesque 5' 3" when grown, I guess she may as well get used to the heels now. She wanted to wear them as soon as we bought them. She ran all over the mall in them. I don't know how many two year olds can run and jump in a little heel, but she's got it down. She is a total shoe addict
(again, like her mama) and very particular about her shoes. I think a follow up post on shoes will be in order later.

I'm almost afraid to post this next statement for fear of jinxing the whole thing, but it appears we may be out of the terrible twos. Reagan started pretty early; she was full on in the throes of them before 18 months. But the last several weeks she's been very well behaved, has been listening to her teachers, and tantrums have become almost non existent. Do I dare dream?

And finally, speaking of dreaming, we have been able to get a little more of that lately. Bailey has at least dropped one nighttime feeding fairly regularly. She is down to just one a night, most nights. This brings me exceedingly great joy. I think she also might finally be getting in some teeth. She's only been teething for 4.5 months. It's about time those suckers start coming in, now that she's 8.5 months old.

All about Reagan, Part V: The Third Trimester

2008-08-26T17:23:00.007-04:00

Part I: Introduction
Part II: Conception
Part III: The First Trimester
Part IV: The Second Trimester

By the time I hit my third trimester, I think I finally started to relax a little. I could feel Reagan kicking like crazy and I had plenty of appointments to assure me everything was ok. I had a beautiful shower hosted by my friends Cristie and Shiela and everything was good.

Some pictures from the shower:

I should mention, the women on my mom's side have a history of medically necessary csections. We don't go into labor and even when forced by two days of pitocin, we don't dialate (my sister, Tara, can tell you all about that fun without an epidural). Even after evicition notices have been formally served to our babies, they still refuse to come out without the coaxing of surgically removing them.

So I wasn't worried about pre-term labor and knew I was probably going to have to have a csection too. I was prepared for that. My OB didn't want me to go later than 38 weeks, not because of fear of a huge baby, but because there is a much higher chance of having a stillborn baby for a diabetic when they get closer to full term. We scheduled the day; I actually put it into my Microsoft Project plan and worked everything backwards from there. I was leaving my job after the baby and wanted to leave everything wrapped up in a pretty bow and now I knew my date to work from. I was pretty excited that there was finally something in this pregnancy I seemed to have a little control over. I knew when she would arrive.

But then things like high blood pressure, carpal tunnel syndrome, round ligament pain, ongoing morning sickness, and finally preeclampsia set in and I was reminded I'm not in charge or control of anything, including the date. I was put on complete bed rest. I was allowed to get up every few hours to pee. Otherwise I had to be flat in bed. I continued to work with my headset on and my laptop balancing on my belly. Reagan protested my working by continuing to kick my laptop hard enough that she would often knock it off my belly altogether. I was glad I had taken care of the nursery and many of the details early enough so that I wasn't quite so worried about being on bedrest. I was just bored. Occasionally when I couldn't take the boredom anymore Bill would take me to the mall or to Babies-R-Us for a short trip in a wheel chair. It would be the highlight of my week.

Here are some pictures of Reagan's nursery. We actually moved again before it was all complete, but I had it mostly finished.

When I would go in for my appointments, I was monitored for my preeclampsia. It was remaining mild enough that as long as I laid completely flat, my blood pressure would stay ok and my protein levels weren't going too terribly high. I was swelling like crazy though. In one week I had gained over 10 lbs. I think it all went to my hands and feet. My OB warned me that there would probably be a time very soon when they would have to admit me for the preeclampsia and I would remain there until I had the baby.

I would also do a non-stress test (NST) several times a week. They would hook me up to a monitor to see if I was having any contractions and to see how Reagan responded. They would also do an ultrasound where they look for very specific things like fine and gross motor movement, fluid levels, etc. and come up with a total score. Reagan always did fine on the ultrasound, but the NSTs always took forever. She never really wanted to cooperate, bu eventually they would find the results they wanted and I was good for another few days.

This pattern continued for several weeks until I hit 36 weeks. I had gone into yet another appointment expecting to go home like I did every other time. At the worst, I figured I would finally be admitted to the hospital and have to ride it out there another few weeks. Never did I expect to go to a doctor's appointment feeling good, having no trouble, only to be told, "you're going to have a baby today, we'll be scheduling the surgery within the hour..."

To be continued...

The two year old wins in popularity votes

2008-08-24T20:07:00.004-04:00

I have lived in the metro Atlanta area for 14 years, Bill has lived here for 20. Yet, when we go out on weekends, we rarely see people we know. Reagan, on the other hand, seems to know half of metro Atlanta.

Starting when Reagan was about six months old, I used to get this awkward scenario where I would hear, "Reagan?" and some complete stranger headed my way. I would think, Reagan is six months old. Who could Reagan possibly know? Who is Reagan talking to behind my back already? It started out as Gymboree parents and when we moved Reagan into daycare at seven months then it was teachers from other classrooms and parents of kids from all over the school. All of these people knew my daughter, recognized her in public, but had no idea who Bill or I were.

Some people really were strangers, but remembered a chance meeting with Reagan. There were multiple times when, say I had Reagan at Target one weekend and some random lady came up to talk to her and then the following weekend Bill would have her at Home Depot and that same lady would recognize Reagan. Even while with different parents, she knew that was Reagan and start talking to her. Or I would get the, "Hey! I just saw your baby when I was over at the mall." Yes, and I was there pushing her in the stroller. But I guess you didn't see me. I had my darn invisibility cloak on again. Sorry about that, it seems to be stuck on a lot these days.

It turns out, Reagan was the official non-official school greeter at the daycare. Her classroom was the first one in the school and she would stand at the door at the window and pose in her outfit of the day and wave at everyone that came by and give them big smiles and sign to them in sign language. When we moved her to her current daycare at one year old, she was so popular she became an official tour stop for perspective parents. Reagan would always come up and greet people with a hi and talk to them in signs and always had a huge mischievous grin on her face. So people got to know her, whether they had any kids in her class or not.

Reagan is now 27 months old and we still never seem to go an entire weekend without someone recognizing her. Bill and I still stand there stupidly as they talk to our two year old and only five minutes into the conversation does it occur to them that Reagan probably didn't drive herself to Target and look up at us and introduce themselves. This has now recently started with Bailey too. Oh, brother.

In other popularity news, my next door neighbor informed us that Alton Brown shops at our neighborhood grocery store and says she's seen him in there a few times. We are huge Alton Brown fans, and would love a chance run in with him one day! Based on the above, no one would notice if I was actually living in the grocery store. But I'm pretty sure people would notice if I tried to do a stakeout toting my two kids. They would give me up within hours. They know people. So for now, I guess I'm just going to have to depend on chance luck for a run in with Alton Brown. Or maybe I should just ask Reagan to hook us up, she probably already knows him.

All about Reagan, Part IV: The Second Trimester

2008-08-22T16:10:00.005-04:00

Part I: Introduction
Part II: Conception
Part III: The First Trimester

The day after getting out of the hospital from my gallbladder surgery, we moved. I was mostly sitting in a chair directing the movers to various rooms of the house. Now that we were in a new house and I new I was having a girl, I was already thinking of what I was going to do for the nursery.

Just a week later, I finally bought my first baby items. I bought a little pair of Ugg like boots (yep, I'm all about the practical in infant looks) and a little outfit that Reagan ended up wearing for her six month pictures. It seemed surreal to me that after 2.5 years I was finally buying my first little pieces of baby clothes. I hung the items over the closet door in the room we chose to be her nursery. I found myself going in there a lot those first few weeks and just sitting in the empty room envisioning what the room would look like, what she would look like, what she was going to be when she grew up...

Baby names came next. Our first name we both really liked was Madeline. We decided to call her Madeline for a bit to see how it fit. It didn't. When I think of a "Madeline" I think of a sweet, demure girl who says, "yes poppa" and "no mother" and drinks from delicate porcelain play tea sets with her teddy bears and dolls. We knew this wouldn't be our baby. We knew that with all that I had gone through (and would yet to go through), our baby had gone through it too. She had already beaten terrible odds and overcome great diversity, and she hadn't even seen 20 weeks gestation yet. She was a fighter. Our baby was going to be tough, spunky, spirited. She would be the one to wear a girly dress paired with combat boots and jump through the mud puddles after a fresh rain (after being told not to). When I came across the name Reagan and threw it out, it stuck. That seemed like the name that fit our baby girl. So from 15 weeks on, Baby A had a name. She was Reagan.

Because of my PCOS, my doctor tested me for gestational diabetes early at 16 weeks. I chugged down the nasty orange litre of syrupy kool-aid, took the test, and failed hard. I didn't even have to take the three hour test or pass GO. I was sent straight on to the perintologist where I was told precisely what I would eat for the next 24 weeks and how to stick my finger four times a day to monitor sugars. I begrudgingly gave myself the first test prick. Dang! That hurt more than I thought it would. Well, by my calculations I had only 671 more fingers sticks left to go this pregnancy. I started wondering how accurate the results would be if I moved on to toes when my fingers refused to give any more blood.

A few weeks later I got a nasty bout of Bronchitis. I figure it was from all of the traveling I was still doing. Only it just wouldn't seem to go away. I couldn't breathe and just kept coughing. I was sent to a pulminologist where he informed me that I had pregnancy induced asthma. Huh? They have such a thing? Leave it to me to get that. He gives me a bunch of steroids and inhalers and I have to be on them the remainder of my pregnancy.

Amazingly, I am now breathing again and the cough goes away. Only all of the steroids and inhalers wreak havoc on my blood sugars and I'm now insulin dependent. Bill faithfully gives me my shots whenever I am home and I suck it up and stick myself in the gut when I'm traveling.

My doctor found out I was still traveling and put the kibosh on that at about 24 weeks. I can't say that I was disappointed. I worked from home the remainder of my pregnancy and began to pour myself into all things baby: the nursery, buying clothes, registering for items. I was getting so excited for Reagan to make her debut! I would play disco a lot around the house and in the car. Whenever YMCA or Celebration came on, Reagan would start kicking away and things were finally starting to feel real. I could feel her, she had a name, she had a nursery, we were really going to have a baby!

Me at 28 weeks and counting, in the start of Reagan's nursery

To be continued...

All About Reagan, Part III: The First Trimester

2008-08-19T14:35:00.003-04:00

Part I: Introduction
Part II: Conception

"The child must know that he is a miracle, that since the beginning of the world there hasn't been, and until the end of the world there will not be, another child like him."

~Pablo Casals

I was beyond excited about being pregnant with twins. Shortly after finding out, we we went on a 7-day cruise to the southern Caribbean that we had booked long before I got pregnant. The day I turned six weeks pregnant, I was in the shower at the hotel, getting ready to board the cruise ship. Out of nowhere I thought, "I think I'm going to be sick." I didn't even have time to get out of the tub. I hurriedly pulled back the curtain just in time to hurl into the unsuspected toilet while still standing in the shower. That marked the start of the all day sickness that plagued me through most of my pregnancy that no amount of prescription medications could alleviate. By the time my first trimester was over, I would have lost 17 pounds during a time when most women are gaining. But I didn't let a little morning sickness get me down on the cruise. We all had a great time on the cruise anyway.

When we got back from the cruise I settled back into life and started to get used to the idea of life with twins. I immediately started buying maternity clothes justifying in my mind that I was going to start popping out sooner than singleton moms. Never mind the truth was I was just excited over the plausibility over this actually being the real thing this time. This is the furthest I had gone in my pregnancies without any big red flags or scythes of doom reaching for my womb so I was almost starting to feel comfortable about things and starting to believe this was the real deal.

I continued my appointments with the infertility specialist and everything seemed to be going exceptionally well. I kept up with my 20 pills a day, 2 vaginal suppositories, and the blood work tests three times a week to make any modifications. The highlight was at least once a week my appointments would also include an ultrasound check. Baby A seemed to be measuring a bit ahead than Baby B most weeks. But it was never anything of large concern and there were a number of healthy plausible reasons why this could be the case. But by week 8, Baby B was a super star. Baby B's heart rate and growth had caught up and everything looked right on target with Baby A. It looked like Baby B was just a slow starter and Baby B was going to be just fine after all.

But then it happened. During the ultrasound on week eight, one casual little sentence of one seemingly insignificant measurement, and all the sudden Baby B looked like he may no longer have a future. Had that sentence been said to anyone but me, it probably would have gone without notice. But I heard it and with my obsession for research, I turned to the internet. The tech mentioned that the yolk sac was measuring a little big and gave the precise measurements. I took mental note of them. I also took mental note of the look of concern on the doctor's usually perfectly preserved poker face. I wasn't understanding why a yolk sac measuring 2mm bigger than they would like would mean that big of a deal, it wasn't even part of the baby. I could see my little bean floating perfectly inside, its heart beating strong. Before I left I got a talk from the doctor that felt like he was starting to prepare me for losing Baby B in his own way. I didn't hear most of it. I didn't understand the problem. I wasn't ready to hear Baby B wasn't going to make it.

I spent the next three days doing very little actual work related work. I mostly cried and poured over the Internet into every professional journal I could hack and understand and every PowerPoint presentation and any resource I could get my hands on that talked about the issue of having a yolk sac being 2mm too big. I found very little research on it. Most just don't measure it. Where I did find measurements I found nothing but despair. It all came down to those 2mm. Everything I read told me that because my baby's yolk sack was 2mm too big, he will die, and soon. There was nothing to do but wait. A familiar problem in an all too familiar scenario.

There had been no fanfare, no drama, no severe cramping, no massive loss of blood to mark the passing of this little life of Baby B. There would be no D&C or visit to the doctor to remove the baby. Baby B just quietly stopped his heart beating during the night at 8wks 3 days and became another angel baby. That following morning, I had woken to no morning sickness like I did every other day. Instead of the violence of sickness I felt only peace. I was still lying in bed when Bill told me "tell the babies bye-bye for me" as he was getting ready to leave for work. I calmly told him there was only one now. It was the first time I hadn't been crying since I left the doctor's office. Bill said "you can't know that." I told him that I do know that and it's going to be ok. And I am ready to move forward with the one little one that I know is still alive and well in there.

Bill went with me to my next ultrasound appointment just a few days later since we were expecting the bad news. It confirmed what we already knew. Baby B slipped away and stopped growing at 8wks 3 days. But Baby A was doing really well. I laid on the ultrasound table for a bit, gaining my composure, letting myself have another cry. Then we walked out together as our new, smaller family: Bridget, Bill, and Baby A. Baby B will never be forgotten. Baby A will grow up knowing that there was another. Another who waits in heaven to be reunited with its twin and the rest of its family one day.

We had mostly recovered from loss of Baby B and tried to get into a routine. We were looking for a new house, and I had taken on a new job, but it unfortunately required me to travel to New York City as much as I was able.

It was during one of those trips, at 11 weeks I woke up in severe stomach and side pain. It was so bad that I was crawling rather than walking to the bathroom for my morning barfing routine. It was about 4am and I had a flight at 10. I asked Bill to drive me to the ER so that I could get some decent pain drugs that would hold me over and still let me make my 10 am flight. I don't know what I was thinking. I didn't make that 10am flight. I didn't check out of there until a week later. It turns out I had a diseased gallbladder that no longer wanted to fight. They had me on a IV and drugs and allowed me to eat nothing but chicken broth and jello for a week in an attempt to make my angry diseased bladder happy again (clearly they have no experience in hostage negotiation- I've never seen chicken broth and jello on on a terrorist's list of demands). My gall bladder responded to my diet even angrier than ever. With no hope of it getting better, after a week they made the difficult decision to remove my gall bladder.

The only way to remove a gallbladder is under general anesthesia. When I go asleep, Baby A would go asleep. We still hadn't completely gotten over losing Baby B and I wasn't sure I could live with losing yet another baby. In the end, they assured me my condition was bigger danger on the baby as is than to undergo the surgery. I didn't like the odds, they told me there was a 20% chance Baby A would never wake back up. But I didn't see that I had a choice.

I was wheeled down into surgery and had one of the most panicked moments of my life. My fear wasn't for me, it was always for the baby. I only had a few moments to say goodbye to Bill and tell him I loved him and all I could think was how sorry I was that I kept failing him like this and losing his babies. I cried my way down to surgery with Bill standing in the hallway saying goodbye.

I pulled through the surgery. I woke up looking like a snowman with four little button like stitches and cover bandages going down my belly. They told me that I could go home now. I told them I'd be happy to go home. But I insisted I wasn't leaving until I saw an ultrasound of Baby A and saw a heartbeat.

I was 12 weeks 4 days pregnant. I held my breath while the tech put the ultrasound goo on my stomach and attempted to moved the wand around for signs of life. Almost immediately, Baby A returned with signs of alive and well. Heartbeat looked well, good movement, good fluid. I breathed. Letting my color return to normal, I pressed the tech a little harder and said, "I've heard you can sometimes tell gender on really good equipment at this age. I won't hold it to you, but what would be your guess?" The tech hesitates for a moment and says"it really is still awfully early. but if I had to make a guess today, I'd have to say you are going to have a......GIRL!"

To be continued...

Photos of the day

2008-08-16T20:24:00.007-04:00

I'm taking a break from my "All about Reagan" series to bring you some pictures of the girls I took today. Reagan is 27 months and Bailey is seven months. Bailey is sitting up very well and is trying really hard to figure out the mechanics of crawling. She's getting up on all fours and moving one leg at a time.

Bailey

Reagan

All about Reagan, Part II:Conception

2008-08-15T13:49:00.006-04:00

I read a study once that said that parents who suffered from infertility issues made better parents than those that didn't. Their conclusion was that parents that had to go through infertility issues wanted their children more and had more time to get used to the idea than those that didn't. I don't know if their study is correct, but I can tell you that Reagan was very much wanted and loved, before we even knew her.

I wasn't always sure I wanted children. I spent most of my 20's and into my 30's being a child myself. Bill will be the first to admit he spent his entire adult life ensuring that he would not have a "little Bill." But after we had been dating a while the subject of children came up and I knew I wanted children and Bill admitted he could see us heading that direction one day.

About six months after we were married I convinced Bill it was time to start trying to have children. I wasn't getting any younger. He wasn't so sure but he went with it for my sake. My first month off the pill I was so excited about the possibility I took a pregnancy test even before my period was due. It was positive! I couldn't believe it! Bill couldn't believe it! I was in a panic. Bill was in a bigger panic, almost to the point of hyperventilation. Bill said, "I know we agreed to start trying, but I wasn't ready for this. I wasn't expecting this so soon."

Just a few days later, our panic of an impending bundle of joy turned to panic of impending doom. I was having a miscarriage and we both spent several days in tears and agony. It was at that point that we knew we wanted a child and we had already loved the one we lost only a few weeks in my womb.

We decided to keep trying and it led to several more losses and a lot more heartache. We turned to an infertility specialist and he did every test under the sun on Bill and me. While all of Bill's soldiers proudly checked out fine, I was diagnosed with PCOS, blod clotting disorder, low progesterone, luteral phase defect, and endemetriosis (which I had a surgical scrape for). By this time we were two years into trying and during the process while my initial problem had been staying pregnant, all of the sudden I stopped ovulating and could no longer get pregnant either. So I had to take even more pills (20 a day), Bill gave me shots in the butt, and then we were going to start with Intrauterine Injection s(IUI), or as Bill fondly refers to it "The Turkey Baster."

We were on round one of IUI. It's not exactly the glamour you envision for the conception of your firstborn, or anyborn for that matter: Bill spanks into a cup, we have to rush down to the doctor before the soldiers refuse to fight the good fight (30 minute window), they spin it in some high tech thingy (medical term) and put it in a solution and put it into a syringe (aka "the turkey baster"), I lay on the table, and an 80-year old man squirts Bill's soldiers into place with the turkey baster while Bill holds my hand. Nothing to do after that but hope that two weeks later I'm pregnant.

I was pretty sure that wasn't going to work. We were two and a half years into the process and that just didn't seem like that was going to be the magic bullet (no pun intended there). But two weeks later I hop up on the ultrasound table, they examine me, and what do you know? I'm pregnant! With TWINS!

To be continued....

All about Reagan, Part I

2008-08-14T21:01:00.003-04:00

In my last post, Joanna astutely called out the fact that although I talk about what Reagan does all the time, I never really describe her and talk about her. My character development of Reagan has been flat and weak and I've let you infer things about her instead of really telling you about her. I did this for several reasons, but frankly I thought I was being more coy than apparently I was. What a dummy I am. But never mind all of that now. I'm going to tell you all about Reagan. I mean really tell you about Reagan--the good, the bad, the ugly, the silly, the indifferent, all of it.

My friend Cristie summed up Reagan quite well the other day. She said "Reagan is a six year old trapped in a two year old body." Although congitively Reagan could probably be ready for Kindergarten, her maturity is very much that of a two year old. And therein lies the fun. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Before I tell you about Reagan now, indulge me please by allowing me to tell you about Reagan from the very beginning and take you on a journey through her last two years. We are talking starting way, way, way, back where Mr. Spermie met Mrs. Egg and said "wanna get a party on tonight?" I didn't have a blog back then and I've never talked about my pregnancy on my blog so I want to take this opportunity to show you that Reagan had personality and spunk even from inception. I'm also taking this as an opportunity to play catch up on many of the stories and things I've missed of hers over the past two years. So I'll be doing a series of posts--All about Reagan. By the time I'm done, you'll know her so well you'll feel like she's been living next door to you for the past two years...like it or not.

Quality Time at the Doctor

2008-08-12T20:38:00.003-04:00

Reagan has had hives for two weeks. At first we thought it was the detergent which led to a massive rewash of about 20 loads of laundry. Because everyone loves to do laundry just for the heck of it. Then we thought it might be dietary and we switched around foods. But she kept getting new breakouts, so yesterday I called the doctor to bring Reagan in.

Yesterday, I ended up with a 2:45 appointment and Bill is out of town this week. Unfortunately, the girls' school is 30 minutes in one direction and the doctor is 30 minutes in another. So getting Reagan to a 2:45 appointment meant me walking out the door at 1:30 in the middle of an incredibly busy day. I picked up Reagan and off we go.

When we got to the doctor, the receptionist mentioned something about "hopefully the backlog is clearing up a little now." I didn't think much of it and sat down. If you haven't picked up on Reagan's personality by now, while I may sit down, Reagan doesn't. Reagan doesn't stop moving. Period. Her mind and body are constantly in motion. So within 10 minutes she had already gone through all the children's books twice and was on to perusing cars in the latest Car and Driver magazine (Oh, by the way Daddy, your daughter seems to be particularly fond of a little yellow Ferrari number. I think you're going to need a second job.).

Exasperated of reading material and no one else in the sick kid area to talk to, she targeted the receptionist next. Is it my fault they have chairs under the window? She climbed onto the chairs and knocked on the widow. The unsuspecting receptionist smiled and opened the window (lucky for Reagan she was on the sick side and got the nice one and not the cranky lady on the well side). Here's the conversation:
Reagan: Hey! Why do you have a giraffe right there?
Receptionist: It's just for decoration.
Reagan: Oh. Hey! What's that right there? (she points to the sign-in chart)
Receptionist: That's the sign-in chart. See, that's your name right there "Reagan..."
Reagan: That's my name right there? Reagan? What's that? (she looks on to something else)
This continues for five more minutes until the receptionist politely shuts the window indicating that the conversation is over. That's ok with Reagan because by then she had found a box of tissues and needed to blow her nose. 500 times. With a different tissue each time.

I'm doing everything I can to keep Reagan from ripping wallpaper off the walls. I'm singing with her, we dance in circles until I'm dizzy, we count in Spanish and English, say our ABCs, act out animal sounds and actions, but she eventually grows bored of me. She does well for the first hour in the waiting room. By 1.5 hours she starts saying, "I want to go home. Let's go mommy. Let's get out of here." To keep her eye on the prize and to keep her from a tantrum I tell her, "We can't go. The doctor needs to look at your rash and see if she can make you feel better. Once we let the doctor look at you we'll go get some ice cream, ok?" I get a resounding, "OK" to that one and we are good for another bit.

Finally we get called back. They say Reagan's name and as the lady is holding the door open to the waiting room with the chart Reagan walks right up to her and says, "I want some ice cream. Where's my ice cream?" The lady looks at her strange and takes her back. The nurse comes in and Reagan says, "Do you have ice cream for me?" I'm beginning to regret the ice cream thing. Focused like a laser beam, this kid is. Another 20 minutes in the room and we finally see the doctor:
Reagan: Do you have ice cream? I want some ice cream.
Doctor:No, I don't have any ice cream. But I'll give you a sucker when we are done.
Reagan: Ok, and then I can have some ice cream.
Doctor: Um, show me this rash of yours.
Reagan lifts up her shirt
Doctor: My that is quite a rash. I'm going to give your mommy this medicine. Will you take it every night like a good girl?
Reagan: No.
At least my kid is honest and self aware.

So 2.5 hours later, the diagnosis is hives. Duh! Take Zyrtec once a day and if she still has new hives in two more weeks they'll do allergy testing.

The upside, I had a great afternoon with Reagan. It is so easy to get frustrated with her when she wines or cries and becomes so demanding. I needed an afternoon like this to remind me of the other sweeter, fun side of Reagan. It was nice to have an afternoon where I had absolutely nothing for distractions such as the computer or tv. It was just Reagan and me and we had a great time.

And yes, she finally got her ice cream. Are you kidding? You think she let me forget that?

Not what you want to hear...

2008-08-12T19:43:00.002-04:00

So these are not the words you want to hear from your husband when you are a single mom for the week; holding down the fort while your husband is away on an important business trip:

"I gotta go sweetie. The limo is here. We are going out to wine country today."

Yea, life sucks for who?

Making Connections: Sun, Sunburn, Sunscreen

2008-08-09T21:35:00.004-04:00

Today we were hanging out at our pool. Here was a conversation between Reagan and Bill:

Reagan: Daddy, your shoulders are red!
Bill: Yes, they are sunburned.
Reagan: Ooooh! Your shoulders are sunburned?
Bill: Yes, that's where the sun comes down and burns my skin and makes it red.
At that point Reagan walks away. She comes back, a can of sunscreen in her hand. She fumbles with the cap.
Reagan: Here you go Daddy. Here is spray, no sunburn.
She then helps Bill apply sunscreen and rubs it in his shoulders.

My question is, if a two-year old figured out how not to get a sunburn, how come the 41-year old didn't?

Bailey's room

2008-08-08T20:35:00.007-04:00

To go back to all of the work I did a few weeks ago with my sister, Tara, I give you Bailey's room. We didn't change anything in the room, really. We just organized the closets. But let me show you the room first.

I particularly like this room because after doing Reagan's room all pink and girly, I was all pinked out. I was determined to do a feminine room without a stitch of pink in the room. And I succeeded, (well, all except for the giant pink elephant in the room of a glider that I still haven't recovered, ignore that part).

I also like this room because I did it all on the cheap. The crib I had. But see that cabinet between the closets? That is a $700 Ballard Designs cabinet I got for $90. The paintings above the crib I got for half off and the stone delilah hanging was my favorite find. It was at Kirkland's, originally $60. It was in some strange faux finish and they had them half off. I decided to take one. They didn't have anymore so they gave me the display, only it was chipped so they gave it to me for $15. Worked out perfectly because my plan was to spray it white all along. So for $15 and $2 in spray paint, I think it's my favorite thing in the room.

I decided to do a desk instead of a dresser because I don't like dressers. Stuff gets lost there. She can grow into the desk. It was a $900 desk I got for $125 at Ballard Designs. The cabinet on top is a dining room hutch cabinet I found at a Pottery Barn outlet. It was originally $600, I got it for $75.

See the paisley/flower mural painting in the Bailey stripe below? That took me three days to paint (yes, I'm really slow and my talent is questionable). So when it came to doing the same mural on the other side of the room between the closet doors I said forget it. It stayed a solid brown stripe forever. Then two weeks ago I was in the store buying hangers and I see these wall stickers. They had the perfect shapes and colors. I just had to buy them.

In 20 minutes , I had a decorated stripe (see below) that had taken me three days to do by hand. Where were these things last year?

But enough about the room. Let me tell you about what we really did with the room. The goal a few weeks ago was all about organization. Here is one of Bailey's closets after the organization. This is most of her clothes 3-12 months.

Because I like to hang most outfits, I had a hard time figuring out what to do with all of the hats, bloomers, pants, etc. that came with the outfits. Sometimes there would be three or four pieces to one outfit and no way to hang them but a bunch of safety pins.

Innovation won out. I discovered medium binder clips were a cheap and easy way to hang all of the coordinated pieces to go with any outfit.

Here is Bailey's other closet. It has all of her shoes, onesies, hairbows, hats, etc. Tara went with a clear shoe organizer for all of the headbands and hats that didn't go with any particular outfit so they didn't get lost in any one bin.

Tara's girls made tags for the bins for me with some scrapbooking supplies I had. They weren't exactly how I would have done them, but they are cute so I'll stick with them.

Ahhh, the sweet peace of organization...

What's for dinner, Chicken pot pie

2008-08-07T20:25:00.005-04:00

Last night we had a bucket of yummy fried chicken courtesy of my favorite Colonel. Today, we had the leftover chicken, in the form of chicken pot pie. This recipe is a great way to use up any leftover chicken or turkey (Thanksgiving anyone) and you can improvise the ingredients with what you have on hand.

For the chicken or turkey you can use leftovers, rotisserie, breasts, precooked strips, really anything will do. The key is whatever you use to make sure you season it when you cook it if it isn't already. I like my pie with lots of meat so if I use a rotisserie chicken I'll use practically the entire thing. But if I only had about half of a chicken, that's what I'd use and it would be just fine.

Time:

Prep time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 30-40 minutes

Ingredients:

2 9" frozen pie crusts (they come sold in packs of two and are great to have on hand at all times)

2-3 cups cooked chicken or turkey (diced or shredded)

2 cups frozen mixed vegetables

1 can cream of chicken soup (I use cream of chicken with herbs to add more flavor)

1/4 cup milk

1/2 cup frozen onion
1 TBLS minced garlic

salt and pepper to taste (I like LOTS of pepper in this dish)

optional: other spices I like in this dish are curry and cayenne pepper

Directions:

* Let pie crusts defrost

* Preheat oven to 375

* Saute onion and garlic

* Add chicken, vegetables, soup, milk, and any seasonings. Stir together. Remove from heat (veggies will still be frozen, that's ok).

* Add mixture to one of the pie crusts

* Take the other pie crust out of the tin and add to the top of the pie. Cut to fit and crimp the edges together.

* Put the pie on a cookie sheet and put in a 375 degree oven for 30-40 minutes.

* During the last 15-20 minutes of cooking, add strips of tin foil around the edges of the crust to keep them from getting burned or over cooked.

* Top should be nicely browned.

Notes:

The basics to this pie are the pie crusts, cream of chicken soup, chicken, and veggies. The portions of chicken/turkey and veggies aren't all that important. The types of veggies can vary depending on your mood or what you have on hand. If you didn't add any other ingredients or seasonings to this dish it would be a great meal. But you could also easily add five or six spices to it for fun and a kick and introduce a whole new flavor. Have fun experimenting with it. It really is very versatile.

Book review: Breaking Dawn Stephenie Meyer

2008-08-06T22:14:00.005-04:00

**Don't worry, no spoilers here!**
When I think back to my wedding day, I remember the anxiety and stress over the planning, the guests, the weather, and all of the details. And here I had one of the most laid back weddings I've ever attended. Add a bunch more guests and compound the fact that the groom is a vampire, some of the guests are werewolves, and you have people that want to kill you, and the anxiety and stress get kicked up to a whole new level. This is a wedding that makes even the biggest bridezillas go "you've got issues girlfriend."

This is how the fourth and final book in the Twilight Saga, "Breaking Dawn" begins. From there, Bella Swan attempts to live a life like any other girl who has just gotten married--she goes on her honeymoon and attempts to enjoy life with her new husband. Only life isn't quite so simple for Bella.

Meyer didn't disappoint in the same rich character development that sucked me into all of her other stories. At one point she was talking about over 30 vampires and actually created an index to help keep them all straight. Yet her description and personalities of each of them were so defined, I never once had to question which vampire was who. But one thing that I really enjoyed about Bella in the earlier books was that I felt like I could be her. In the third book she annoyed me because she was being too immature and making bad decisions, but I went with it. In this book, at some point she stopped being mostly identifiable to me. And that was disappointing. But there was one way in which she was entirely identifiable to me, and that's what kept me reading and kept me engrossed. I won't tell you why because I'd give you a spoiler, but there was one theme with Bella that I identified with body, mind, and soul.

As far as the story line, I appreciated that I felt like I didn't know the entire story 50 pages in, like I did with some of the other stories. I liked that this story had a bit more complexity to it than some of the earlier books. But I have to admit after reading over 500 pages to get to the climax, I was disappointed with how it went. I expected more than what I got for all of my time leading up to it. I appreciated that she filled in the blanks from some of the earlier stories, but some of them seem to have been filled in a little too conveniently.

All in all, I still really enjoyed this book. I am a true fan and didn't want to put it down once I picked it up. I even found myself moved to tears at one point, something I hadn't done in any of the other books. More than anything, I'm disappointed that this is the last book in the series. I thought there was plenty more she could have done with it, but I guess she has other things she wants to do.

One of her upcoming projects is "Midnight Sun" which is "Twilight" from Edward's perspective. At first I thought, "Ugh, how boring. I already know how that book goes. Give me something new." But when I thought about it some more, I am actually really excited about it. One of the primary reasons I like Meyer is her character development and "Midnight Sun" is a giant study in character development. I think she'll actually be able to do a lot in making the original story much more complex and compelling when written from silent Edward's perspective. The more I thought about it, I think it actually has the potential to be even better than "Twilight." We shall see.

Supervision required at all times

2008-08-06T21:42:00.005-04:00

Here is what happens when you leave Reagan unsupervised for more than two minutes.

Baby got a healthy dose of diaper creme application, especially to the eye. I'm not sure why the eye, exactly. Maybe Reagan saw a bit of pink eye coming on in baby?

Unrelated, if you've been wondering where I've been, we had family through Sunday afternoon, then I spent the remainder of the day reading "Breaking Dawn", and now I've been way busier than usual at work this week and haven't had any spare time. I think I've caught up on work now though and the worst of the craziness is behind me for a while. You'll see a lot more of me on my blog and everyone else's starting now.

Date Night

2008-07-31T23:16:00.006-04:00

My mom is in town for a few days. Granted, she brought my sister's four kids with her, but it's still nice to have her around. Not only has she been working on rewashing all of Reagan's laundry from the hives breakout, she's been kind enough to let Bill and me get time to ourselves.

Take tonight, for example. After all the kids went to bed we went out on a date. Ok, not a real date, but it pretty much felt like one. We went to the grocery store. Alone. It was so relaxing and refreshing to casually stroll through the aisles and put things in the cart and read labels at leisure. Usually we have the girls and by the time we get to the sodas we are saying, "Ok, forget the rest of the stuff! We don't really need it. I'll go get in the checkout line and you bring up the rear after you run get a case of Diet Coke. Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! We have to get out of here before they both spontaneously combust! Uh, oh. I already hear the little one starting. Eeewww! The other one has a dirty diaper strong enough to clear all of Shanghai! We've got to get out of here before someone calls in a hazmat team!" I don't believe it was coincidence that our grocery bill was much higher this week than it normally is.

Tomorrow night we get a real date night. One of those date nights we get about four or five times a year. We are going to a dinner and a movie and then we are standing in line with the rest of the Twilighters to get the fourth book when it comes out at midnight. I am SO looking forward to it!

Wordless Wednesday: Redneck tank top

2008-07-30T17:21:00.003-04:00

My friend Joy sent me this picture today. It was too good not to share.

What's for dinner, Sloppy Joe Pie

2008-07-29T17:57:00.004-04:00

I can remember being a kid and seeing my Mom standing at the stove, browning a pound of ground beef. I'd ask her, "What's for dinner?" Her response was usually, "I don't know yet." It boggled my mind how she'd already be cooking when she didn't know what dinner was to be. However, her method started like many of us, one pound of ground beef. From there, she may have decided to do one of several things, usually fairly predictable and somewhat boring (sorry Mom!). Today, I often find myself with the same base as my mom: one pound of ground beef or turkey or ground sausage. I'm always trying to find another use for the ground meat for days when things need to be quick and simple.

Let me be the first to admit, this recipe is still no gourmet affair. But it is a few big steps up from Hamburger Helper. This is simple, kid friendly comfort food at it's easiest. When your are standing at the fridge with the door open and needing something a little different to do with the pound of ground beef staring you down, this is it. This will prevent a revolt should you be tempted to reach for one more box of Hamburger Helper. This is so quick and easy and has so few ingredients, you may even add this to your regular rotation of meals.

Time

Prep time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:

* 1 lb ground beef or turkey

* 1 cup frozen onion, or one fresh onion diced

* 1.5 cups frozen corn, or one can of canned corn

* 1 can Mamwich or 1 bottle of BBQ sauce (whatever you have on hand will work

* 1 can refrigerated biscuits

* 1.5 cups grated Cheddar cheese

Directions:

* Preheat oven to 350 (if the directions on your can of biscuits tell you differently, go with the biscuit directions)

* Brown the ground beef, cook the onion with it, drain

* Add your corn (it's ok if it is still frozen, you don't want to cook the corn with the beef and onion because it will lose its crunch)

* Add your can of mamwich or BBQ sauce, stir everything together

* In a pie pan, use your biscuits to create a soft of crust by smooshing them out and pressing them together, something like this

* Add your hamburger mixture to the pie pan, smooth it down (go ahead and load it in there, make it all fit, even if it is bulging a little high at the middle)

* Top with your cheddar cheese

* Put the pie pan on a cookie sheet in case something bubbles over

* Cook in the oven for about 15 minutes (just follow the oven temp and cooking time for your biscuits)

* When the cheese is melted and the biscuits look done, pull out and let cool (the longer you let it cool the more it will "set up." If you try to serve it too early it will fall apart when you dish it out)

* Cut like a pie and serve

Book reviews: Stephanie Meyer Twilight series and The Host

2008-07-27T22:34:00.008-04:00

So last weekend I bought a few books. I began the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer. I devoured the books in a few short days and then read her latest book, intended for adults, "The Host." Now that I've finished four books and 2500 pages in the space of a week, let me tell you a little bit about what I thought about them.

Twilight series: Twilight, New Moon, Eclipse
This is a series about a teen named Bella who falls for a boy. But, not just any boy mind you. Bella falls for one that happens to be vampire and wants to kill her as much as he wants to love her. The series follows her story as she moves to a tiny town in the northwest and begins to interact with people that until she moved there, she would have believed were only mythical characters from story books.

These are just downright fun books. I haven't enjoyed books this much since the Harry Potter series. But unlike the Harry Potter series that throws in turns and often keeps you guessing to the end, with the Twilight books I felt like I already knew the entire story in the first 50 pages. It didn't really matter though, I devoured each book after the next. What kept me reading wasn't necessarily suspense, it was more wanting to hear the story told in the way only the author could. But don't get me wrong, there were certainly plenty of surprises along the way.

The character development is very rich and the main characters are so likable and easy to identify with. I cared about Bella and the others and wanted to hear the story. I identified with her as a strong, independent girl and remembered what it was like to be that age and too inexperienced to always make good decisions and too prideful to admit it. I understood her conflicts and wondered what I would do in her position. I also have to mention that I appreciated that the series was written for young adults and found the chastity in the relationship very refreshing.

All in all, I absolutely recommend the books to young and old. They are fun, refreshing books. And who doesn't love a good vampire story? I'll be in line with everyone else when the next book comes out this weekend. I'm hooked and happy to fulfill my fondness for the magic and mysticism genre with the Twilight series.

The Host
This was Meyer's first book targeted for adults. I have to say she certainly stepped things up a notch from her young adult series. I have to admit that somewhere around page 85 I considered putting the book down. I thought it was going to be a tearjerker and just mess with my emotions too much. Bill encouraged me to keep reading a little longer and I'm really glad I did.

While with the Twilight series I could see the road ahead, with "The Host", I was blind. I was reading in faith wondering what kind of journey I was going on. This is a sci-fi in your own backyard story that talks of species and life on other planets but the conflict and the aliens are right here on earth. It is a "The Puppetmaster" or "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" kind of story where the basic concept is earth has been silently invaded by aliens that have taken over humans as nothing more than hosts for the parasitic aliens and have pretended to still be human.

Unlike the above mentioned books, "The Host" is not a horror story. It instead delves deep into the study of the psyche of a symbiotic relationship and the chaos and questions surrounding it as it follows one who has become a host and a few remaining humans as they fight to keep from becoming extinct. Again, Meyer shines in character development and at some points I related to both human and alien so much I couldn't remember what side I was really on. Her whimsical tales of species' on other planets are so vivid I felt like I had been there.

I found myself contemplating a lot of questions with this book. It really made me take pause and think about a lot of themes: ethics, love, mortality, humanity, aliens, the greater good, sacrifice, prejudice. I love a book that makes me still think once I've put the book down. It's even better when the story to cause so much thought is an exciting, entertaining story. In that, this book did not disappoint. I'd recommend this book to anyone that enjoys the sci-fi genre or someone who is looking for a book to challenge their minds.

Hives!

2008-07-27T22:19:00.003-04:00

Poor Reagan! After all that laundry that my sister and I did recently, it turns out that Reagan was allergic to the detergent. Last night she slept in a tank top that had been washed in the detergent and this morning she was covered in hives anywhere the tank top had contact with her skin. Since I don't know what got washed in it and what didn't, I've now got to go rewash ALL of her laundry! Argh!

Some other random notes:
We went shopping today for a few things to finish my closet and Bailey's room. Wouldn't you know Ikea was out of what I wanted? As soon as that stuff comes in I'll post pictures of both the room and the closets. For the first time ever, I'll debut pictures of neat and organized closets.

I finally talked Bill into replacing our bed and dresser. I've always hated that furniture, mostly because I didn't pick it. It's left over from before we met. So today I drag him to every furniture store in town and I can't find a bed I like. Figures. But now I'm on a mission, preferably before he changes his mind. Anyone have a awesomely cool suggestion for a king size bed?

Bailey's sick with a cold. She's been having a terrible time at night and she's been getting lots of showers to let the steam work on her nose and chest. Between her cold and Reagan's hives it will be a miracle if the daycare lets both girls stay the day tomorrow.

Hotsseat Answers

2008-07-24T08:34:00.008-04:00

Thanks to everyone that submitted questions yesterday. Thanks Heidi, MrsMoma, Martina, Mountain Mom, Susan, Deanna, Lindsay, Jen, LauraC, Mama's Losin It, and Joanna!

How did you end up in Georgia?
I moved to Macon from Iowa with my family when I was 12. When I was 19 I'd had enough of the small, backwards town and went to live in Milwaukee, where my Dad lives. After one year in the frozen tundra I doubled back to Florida where my Mom and family lived. I spent less than a year there because I was too poor to live in the nice area where my family lived and sick of living in the neighborhood in Tampa that was shown every time "COPS" Tampa aired. So I found myself in Atlanta. This is where I really wanted to go all along. but I didn't originally because I felt it was too close to Macon. I've been in Atlanta since 94. I don't see myself moving anywhere else any time soon.

Where the heck have you been??? Okay that's not really my question..
Well, first my sister was here and we spent every available moment working on clothes and closets. Then when she left, I gave in to all of the mommy blogger peer pressure and picked up Twilight. I read the first and second book in three days and just started the third. I'm terrible about putting a book down once I start reading it.

How do you really feel about having 2 girls, esp when you think about the teen years to come? :)
I love having two girls. Sometimes I wish we also had a boy for Bill, but I wouldn't trade our two girls for anything. I am hoping we can go through the teen years with our relationships mostly in tact, our sanity in check, and midriffs covered. I may be a little optimistic on all three.

how do you come up with your topics? and writing style? and hilarity? ok, so take your pick on what you want to answer, lol.
My life gives me most of the topics. I have that kind of life that just seems to be a magnet for disaster, even of the most mundane and unsuspecting tasks. Believe it or not, some of the best stories have never made it into the blog. They probably never will either, because I don't want to share stories that would possibly hurt or embarrass someone in the end or get me in trouble at work. As far as my writing style, I just write as I would speak to someone. And I think you're being overly generous with the hilarity, but I'll take it.

If you were stranded on a desert island and you could have one person with you and only one item to eat every single day, who would you choose to be with you and what would you eat? And, how do you think you would have answered this question before you were married and had kids?
My person of choice would be Bill. If I were pregnant I'd say my food of choice would be a Burger King bacon double cheeseburger (was addicted to those with both pregnancies). Not pregnant, I'd have to go with triscuits and hummus. I never seem to get sick of that. Before I was married with kids I still would have gone for the Triscuits and Hummus.

Do you ever worry your kids will have some of your physical or personality traits that you don't care for in yourself?
Absolutely. I don't want my kids to be fat or have the Irish cankles (I think they are both doomed on the cankles anyway). When I get angry I cry. It's embarrassing and maddening. I hope to spare the girls of that trait. I also recognize that I carry the "addictive gene" and while I've managed to avoid life altering addictions, I can easily become addicted to smaller, unhealthy things. I hope they avoid that too.

Least favorite house chore?
Hmm...based on the bazillion posts about my closets piled to the ceiling with clothes, I'd have to go with laundry.

How did you and DH (dear husband) meet?
We have a mutual friend. Bill was having a big party that was going to be catered, DJ'd, and decorated. Our mutual friend volunteered me to do the decorations for his party.

Have you ever been back to that store where you had that horrible experience that you posted about? Also, any other horrid shopping experiences?
Yes, once and I think some recognized me. While taking both girls hasn't always been a cakewalk, nothing has ever compared to the one fateful grocery store experience. I pray I am always able to say that statement.

What are the most common misconceptions people have about you (and your family) as LDS?
People think we still practice polygamy or confuse us with Jehovah's Witnesses. I've had people say I didn't believe in Jesus or surprised that I dance. People assume I want six kids. Let me assure you, I do not. When my current client manager learned I was LDS he said, "Really? I wouldn't have pegged you as LDS. Most Mormons I can pick out within 10 minutes of meeting them because they are so over bubbly. You aren't...bubbly" I don't know what that all means, exactly. I still haven't decided if I'm insulted.

Have you stopped playing WoW?
I haven't cancelled my subscription, but I haven't played in quite a while. I just haven't had the time. After being glued to it for the first two weeks of starting to play again, it was a lot easier for me to walk way.

How much time a day do you spend blogging?
Lately, not enough. When I'm posting every day like I normally do, it is about an hour a day. Of course, I couldn't tell you how much time I spend reading other people's blogs. I spend way more time reading others' than working on mine.

Why do you blog?
Originally I started blogging because I was terrible at keeping up baby books and scrapbooks and I wanted my girls to have a record of their lives. That is still one of the primary functions of this blog. I don't put anything in here I wouldn't want them to be able to read 15 years from now. However, once I started blogging I found it was a great replacement for a therapist and it led me to tons of friends I didn't know I wanted or needed. My introverted self really gets a lot out of being able to communicate with people in this medium. I love to write and I love knowing people are reading what I write. That's what keeps me blogging.

What's your favorite thing about each of your kids?
I love Reagan's intelligence and her creativity to problem solving
I love Bailey's infectious smile and laugh

What's your least favorite think about each of your kids?
Reagan wakes up crying, every single day.
Bailey doesn't want to sleep through the night.

If your child was enrolled in swim lessons, but screamed each time you had to go...would you insist or would you pull her out??
Tough question. I think I wouldn't give up on the swimming lessons, I'd look for another approach to teaching them. We have a pool so it was really important that Reagan learned to swim sooner rather than later. I don't think I would have given up on that goal.

Would you like to adopt a Greyhound?
I don't even want to adopt a goldfish

What was your favorite subject in high school?
English

What "group" would you classify yourself in high school?
I was a nerd. I'm still a nerd.

What is a typical dinner like at your house?
Somewhere other than at our house.

How often do you and your husband go out for "date" nights just the two of you?
This is very rare. We have babysitter issues and no family in town so we only get to go a few times a year.

And am I your top number one favoritist bestest most loved blog to read EVER??? (their is a right and wrong answer to this question)
YES! (and so are all of the other blogs I read regularly)

What is your biggest fear for you girls as they grow up?
That they will be hurt and not feel like they fit in with any friends

What kind of books do you like to read?
I'm all over the board with books. I read all kinds of stuff. My favorites though are ones with a bit of a sci fi/fantasy/goth theme through them.

What is your guilty pleasure?
Going skinny dipping in the pool around midnight and floating around, looking up at the stars.