Fun Games

My dad taught the boy a new fun game. It is very simple to play. You run and yell, "Ahh!" then you either flop onto the floor or run into a wall. Lots of fun for children of all ages and Baba loves this fun game.

So tonight I was bringing laundry into my bedroom and Baba raced passed me yelling, "Ahhhh!" My husband followed close behind and said, "Excuse me, hon. Ahhh!"

Christmas Follow Up

When Baba was born, one of my father's friends sent us several dress outfits in various sizes. You see, he also has a son (a son who is my age and a good friend of mine) and they remembered how hard it is to find nice, dressy clothes for a little boys. Think about it. There are racks and racks of cute dresses and such for little girls, but the little boys clothes are usually limited to a rack, maybe two.

Anyway, long story short, he sent us an adorable suit outfit that is 24 month size (fitting into this at almost 22 months was borderline). Sadly, I don't think it will fit too much longer. There is nothing cuter than a little boy is a suit. He is going to be so adorable at little Ditty's wedding next summer!

And, we took a very nice, very us, family portrait. Christmas day was crazy! We got up - Santa had left a massive train set that takes up my entire living room - went to my parents house for brunch with my grandparents, went to Zippy's family's house, came back to my parents house. I went for a run while Zippy went to the hospital to visit his grandfather who claims he is three quarters of the way in the grave (this is an upgrade (or downgrade, depending on how you look at it) before he only had his foot or an arm in the grave, depending on the day), and had a nice, quiet evening watching Mythbusters. We have also decided that this summer at the cabin we are bringing plenty of diet Coke and Mentos.

Spam

So....even spammers take the holidays off, but rest assured they are back at work - I had 28 new emails in my inbox. I'm not counting the 10,000 in my bulk mail folder.

Wasting Time

I heart Lego Star Wars II. Totally addicted. Every spare second I am playing Xbox. Yeah, that's good for my carpal tunnels.

But, I did turn down an offer for three months of free cable so I've got that going for me. At least I won't be wasting my time watching TV.

Is it really wasting time, if I am enjoying myself enormously?

Puke-a-hontus

My child has puked once a day for the past four days. Is that normal? Should I be concerned? He feels fine until he blows chunks, cries because vomiting scares the crap out of him (I also hate vomiting), and then feels fine five to ten minutes after the episode, generally as soon as we calm him down. So my house smells like vomit, my car smells like vomit (we were on our way to visit my parents today when he thought it would be fun to puke in the car. It wasn't much fun), and I think my hands smell like vomit even though I know they don't because I've washed them a million times ("Out, damn spot, out!").

Merry Christmas. Maybe tomorrow he'll skip his routine stomach pyrotechnics.

PS. My Cleveland sista had her baby and he is adorable (and tiny!).

2 Christmases down, 2 to go!

I am on Christmas overload.

On Saturday we had pretend Christmas with my family (I blame my blogging absense since then on the fact I got Lego Star Wars II for my game boy) and another pretend Christmas on Sunday with my mom's family (my mom's brother and sister, their family, grandma and grandpa, and my favoritest great uncle in the world!). My grandpa is worse than a kid. He had all of his presents open before Baba did. My grandma yells at him every year because he can never wait his turn.

2 Christmases left to go. One Christmas Eve with just my neat little family - myself, Zippy, Baba, and Mister Wili. And Christmas day which I'm just counting as one Christmas because if I think of having to see if Santa came (which he will), going to my parents, going to Zippy's parents, and then going to Zippy's grandpa's house where 8 million of Zippy's relatives will be talking loudly as the three Christmases they actually are, I probably won't be able to get out of bed again until after the holidays.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Today I received from Miss ZennieZou the best birthday present ever!!! A few weeks ago we were talking about getting an imaginary cat for Zennie's daughter and I mentioned if I had an imaginary cat I would name it Sigmund. Zennie made my dream of owning an imaginary kitten named Sigmund come true!

ZennieZou made me an imaginary cat kit, complete with facilities, bed, and food. I even got an adoption certificate, with a chocolate gold seal and two gift cards, which Zennie wrote (in permanent marker) "My name is ZarahZou and I own an imaginary cat!" I love it! Thank you ZennieZou, you are the best friend a girl could have. And a big thanks to my husband who bought me purple flowers (I hope my imaginary cat doesn't eat my flowers).

A Very Merry Pretend Christmas to You!

Today is pretend Christmas! We are celebrating with my family today because Ditty and Poonch II will be in Indiana with Poonch II's family for the real Christmas.

Because it is pretend Christmas we can pretend to dress up. I'm wearing jeans and a sweatshirt but pretending I'm wearing an evening gown and looking smashing.

Highlights (and Lowlights) of my First Business Trip

Highlight: Asking if we were renting a sports car and then my boss saying we were renting four sports cars and we were racing.
Lowlight: Seeing our actual rental (a car that was a heck of a lot nicer than mine) and being told that even if we did rent sport cars I couldn't drive because I am not 25 (yet).
Highlight: Ordering appetizers, entree, dessert, and drinks because the company was picking up the tab.
Lowlight: Eating a ton of food and feeling sick every night.
Highlight: Realizing that my boss and her boss are really great people.
Lowlight: Realizing that my current position is going to be kind of boring and I am totally overqualified.
Highlight: Working out on my business trip (double, no triple extra credit for this. Every mile I ran in Jersey is like 3 Minnesota miles).
Lowlight: Sitting in the Philly airport for five hours because of fog delays.
Highlight: Taking off and getting above the fog. Philly looked magical - the skyscrapers rose above the fog. You could only see the tops of the buildings. The fog was glowing from the lights underneath.
Lowlight: Turbulance. Lots and lots of turbulance.
Highlight: Stopping at Wawa's and getting a Wawa water.
Double highlight: My boss telling me that I could write down that I worked 32 hours while we were in Jersey (in reality I probably actually worked 4 or 5 hours. Maybe).
Lowlight: The toilet in my hotel room ran constantly.
Highlight: Picking out what treasures to bring to ZennieZou, my treat.
Highlight: Waving to the Vorhees, New Jersey 6 times.
Highlight: Coming home to a clean house (not a test, but Zippy is definetly a keeper).
Highlight: Zippy keeping Baba up last night so I could see him before he went to bed.
Highlight: Getting a $10 food voucher for sitting in the last row of the airplane.
Highlight: Getting paid for working 41 hours this week when I didn't even work close to that.
Lowlight: There is a chance I may have to go to Jersey again in January.
Highlight: Working on my Jersey accent (ohmygawd!).
Highlight: Getting home!!!!!

Bye-bye Cars!

Tomorrow morning (and by morning I mean AM, very AM) I leave for Jersey. This is the second time I've been two Jersey this year. Imagine, I went for almost 25 years without going to Jersey and then twice in one year.

I have a feeling that my house is going to be a disaster when I return, but I know my boys will be busy. I busted a garage sale treasure out of the closet on Sunday morning and the boys haven't stopped playing with it since.

It is several plastic puzzle pieces with tracks cut into it. You put the puzzle together in different ways, thus making different tracks for the various cars to follow. There is a new track designed every time I come down the steps. Zippy is the engineer and Baba claps his hands with delight and tries to get 'ili to look at his cars. Now when we go upstairs or leave the house we have to say bye-bye to the cars, wili, the cows, the Christmas tree, the trains, and the TV. The leaving process is expanding.

I wonder if I'll be able to leave in the morning without saying bye-bye to all Baba's toys.

The Great Choo-Choo Boat Debate

Baba knows the difference between a choo-choo and a boat. On our way down the steps in the morning he points to the sail boat picture on the wall and says "boat!" and when we see his toy trains he joyously proclaims, "choo-choo!"

But every night in his bath he forgets. He points to the smoke stack on his boat and says, "choo-choo." We then explain to him that it has a smoke stack like a choo-choo, but it is a boat. He looks at us and says, "boat." We congratulate him on being the smartest baby in our house.

He says "boat" for a while, until he is certain we are complacant. He then gets a devilish look in his eyes and gleefully says, "choo-choo," while pointing to the smoke stack. You see, he'll pretend it is a boat for our benefit, but he really knows that what we call a boat is some sort of deformed choo-choo. Besides, if it really was a boat, it wouldn't make choo-choo noises as he pushed it around the bathtub, now would it?

2, 10, 11

Eyes, fingers, tombs.

Man, I love the Addams family.

I ordered the Addams family double feature from Wally World the Friday after Thanksgiving and it finally came yesterday (which probably has something to do with the dumb way they ship - first they UPS it from Arkansas to Carol Streams, IL then they throw it in the mail). We watched Addams Family tonight.

Dare I hope that Addams Family Values night will come soon?

Now That's Good Eating

I've often mentioned how much Baba eats. He has always been a big fan of eating anything and everything. When I was breast-feeding he usually ate every hour, every two hours if I was lucky. Yeah. That was a long seven months. When we started him on solid foods, he loved rice cereal so much, we were going through 2 to 3 boxes a week. And that stuff ain't cheap! So we switched him to toast. He would gum two pieces of toast for breakfast every morning. And then be ready for a snack a few hours later.

Now for breakfast he has 10 to 15 mini pancakes or a waffle, depending on what is in the freezer. Then he has a bowl of cereal and a glass of cranberry juice. He usually asks for "mere" on the way out the door, so I make a piece of toast or another waffle to go.

When he gets to daycare, he either has another breakfast or a snack. All of his reports for meal/snack time say "ate well." Once, he didn't eat well so our daycare lady took his temperature because he thought he was sick.

His palate has matured in his old age, the only things he doesn't like are raw onions (eww!) and grapefruit. That's it. Everything else you put in front of him he'll eat with gusto and then ask for more (mere).

The only problem we have now, besides the fact that he out eats me on a regular basis, is his constant desire to share whatever he is eating with Wili, his cows, his tractors, and anything else that happens to be around. Let me tell you there is nothing tastier than food that has been chewed on, put on the floor for the cat, rejected by the cat, picked up, and offered to you for a taste. Yummy.
But, I guess I can't really complain. He is sharing.

No! No! No!

No pictures until blogger resolves some issue that involves some letters and a server -- pretty much the explaination of how I could fix it on my own was gibberish, so no pictures it is. Hopefully this gets resolved sooner than later. No pictures and no beer make Homer go something something. Crazy? Don't mind if I do!

Anyway. Someone small, ornery, and cute has officially replaced "uh-oh" with "no" as his favorite word. I believe the twos are upon us. Right on time, too, only 4 months early. He has been pretending he is a tyranical toddler for a while, taking the attitude for a spin, giving us a sample of the year to come. But I believe the attitude is here to stay.

Among his new favorite hobbies: telling the cat what to do and what not to do. No more can Wili curl up on the lady bug pillow for a peaceful nap. Baba, sensing Wili has stepped a furry toe over the line, comes running and picks up the pillow, throwing the cat on the floor. Which earns him a minute in time out. He uses the minute to continue to say, "No, no, no" to Wili.

And the fits! He has been an expert fit thrower for sometime, but seeing as how he has now had almost two years of practice, the fits keep getting better and better. Not that I'm not having fun with that. I certainly get a kick out of sitting in front of the fridge, blocking his never ending quest for "mere chuice." More, pronounced "mere", is still one of his favorite words and he is addicted to cranberry juice or "chuice" as he likes to call it. Maybe his foray into the twos is due partly to his mass consumption of sour cranberry juice. Yeah, I'll deny that he is almost two and blame the behavior, not on his point in his development but on the cranberry juice. I always knew cranberries were evil.

Bah Humbug!

One of the reasons why I hate the holiday season is we are so busy! I hate being busy every weekend - I like a little time just to chill and relax and not do anything, including be sociable.

That being said, in December, we have two weekends we don't have plans - this weekend and next weekend. This weekend we are going bowling with Zippy's co-workers tomorrow morning, going to my parents to decorate their tree, going to a movie in the afternoon sans Baba, and meeting ZennieZou and ZickyZou for dinner (which I am super super excited about - I would gladly skip the rest of the crap). Somewhere in there I need to fit in a stop at Rainbow to buy more cereal (speaking of Rainbow, I bought 2 gallons of milk, 2 bags of scallops, and a can of turkey noodle soup that I thought was condensed chicken broth for 13 cents today. Yeah, I'm good), two stops at Walgreens (limit one coupon per customer? Ha! You just stop at two different Walgreenseseses), and a stop at Cub Foods.

Next weekend, I am going to Argosy to drop off my books to sell back (I will totally be rich!) and then heading up to Duluth to celebrate my birthday.

At least I don't have any plans for the next two weekends. :-)

Hockey, Hockey, Hockey

Zippy and I went to the Wild vs. San Jose Sharks game last night. Pretty much my boys STUNK!!!! There was no fights (um, what is the point of going to a hockey game if there are no fights?), but lots of penalties (all minors/no majors). But, it was fun.

First, I got to leave work early (which may have been the highlight of my day) to get ready for the game. My boss said to leave and I'm not strong enough to say no. So I went grocery shopping, spent just over $16 on $48 worth of groceries. Man, I'm good.

Then I went home and showered. Poonch II came and we left him and Baba to hunt the Wili. Zippy and I stopped at BK for supper (what can I say!? When we go out, we go all out) because if you bought a value meal (for Zippy) a happy meal (the perfect amount of food) was only 99 cents. And someone (Zippy) had to get one of the BK King Xbox games.

The Xcel was pretty amazing. Our seats were awesome - 15th row! The two minutes where San Jose had a 5 on 3 power play were awesome. The goal we scored 2 minutes into the game was awesome. The rest of the game. Eh. But, Manny wasn't looking good and Gabby is injuried so what can you do?

There was really annoying kid sitting next to us. He kept hitting me with his pom-poms and he kept swearing. He looked about 10. If, when Baba is 10, he swears, we are going to have problems. This kid thought that every time the Wild hit the puck it was necessary to yell, "Nice shot!" The Wild had 12 shots on goal all night, which means they had 12 "nice shots" not 9,257.

But still, I love hockey and can't wait until Baba is old enough to play. I'm thinking about joining a women's hockey league. I wonder if I can fight and what the league record for penalty minutes is.

Heaven on Earth

On Saturday, Baba, Zippy, and myself headed out to my grandparent's farm. Baba was in heaven. Almost all of his favorite things are on the farm: cows (moos!), tractors (putt-putts), and cats ('ilis). All that we were missing was his other obsession, trains.

Baba and I spent almost the entire day outside. He tried to befriend some cats, but they kept running away from him.

It always makes me laugh that he is so surprised that the small, defenseless farm cats run away from him (okay, okay, I know that farm cats aren't defenseless - I have a couple scars on my arms to prove it). I tried to explain the difference between domesticated and ferrel cats, but he didn't seem to get it.

He did get to drive, with his great-grandpa's help, a bobcat, a four-wheeler, and a putt-putt.
He has driven 3 different brands of tractors, John Deere (Zippy's dad is a John Deere man), Oliver (his great-grandpa loves Olivers), and White (interesting tractor history side-note: at some point in history Oliver became White, so I guess, technically, Oliver and White are sort of the same brand, but still, 3 different brands of tractors before the age of 2? How many people can claim that?).
This trip to the farm he was not scared of the cows at all. He befriend a calf, who tried to suck the mittens off of Baba's hands (calves, like baby's have a strong need to suck and will suck anything that comes close to them, hands, milk replacer, mittens, what have you). He also enjoyed "sneaking" up on the cows in their pens and saying "boo!" He thought scaring the cows was hilarious.

And, thankfully, before the end of the day, he befriended a cat. This cat, who for some reason followed Baba everywhere, was probably insane. Encouraged by his kitty shadow, Baba walked around the farm telling the 'ili about the farm. He'd say, " 'ili moo!" and point to the cows. Or " 'ili putt-putt" and point to the tractor.

I didn't have the heart to tell him that this 'ili had grown up on the farm and had probably seen all the moos and putt-putts before. When he got too far ahead of his new friend, he would stop, turn around, and say " 'ili go!"

A picture is worth 50,000 words

I've really got nothing more to say, the picture says it all. I finished my first draft on my still nameless novel with 7 days to spare. Hooray!

Gobble, gobble!

My family is all about tradition. There is the tradition of laying under the Christmas tree and singing (yelling) Christmas carols as loud as we can. There is the tradition of my mother never putting our names on our Christmas presents, only a code (one year Ditty was all prime numbers and I was numbers that weren't prime, etc).

We also like to play "fun" games. Ditty started a "fun" game where you put a deck of cards into four piles, cout to three, and then everyone grabs a pile. Lots of fun. There is also Bing-offs. Which is really an abbreviated version of BINGO. You play until one spot on your card is covered.

But now we have a new fun game and tradition. Its called bend over and play catch between your legs until the boy laughs. Then when he doesn't think that is funny any more, you fall over. It's really quite enjoyable. Happy Thanksgiving!

Why Doesn't Wili Like Me?

Wili is Baba' s best friend. I mean, BESTEST BEST BEST BEST friend. The first thing when he wakes up in the morning and is freed from his cell he starts his quest for 'ili'. Much to a certain cat's delight the quest is not ended until she gets her good morning kiss and Baba gets his good morning mouthful of fur.

So why doesn't Wili return Baba' s love with the same gusto?

I don't know.

They both love climbing the cat tree and looking out the window. They both love curling up on a warm lap.


They both love the cat tent, although Wili tends to sit in the cat tent and Baba tends to wear the cat tent as a hat.

They both like decorating cookies and eating frosting (yes, my cat eats frosting. Never open a box of Nerds around my cat, a friend of mine learned that the hard way when Wili nearly took her hand off to get some of the Nerds she was eating).

And, sadly, it isn't just Wili who runs away when Baba toddles in her direction. It's most 'ili's (Baba's word for cat). It's really quite sad when you think about it. All Baba wants to do is kiss them. What could a small, defenseless cat have to fear in Baba?

Oh, happy day!

Once upon a time I bought a used text book on half.com. Well, the stupid poo-poo head selling it took my money and never shipped it (I can think of several names to call her, but I won't write them, I'll just call her multiple names in my head. There, I feel better). Long story short, I found out this morning that the good people at half.com are refunding my money and $90.80 will be credited to my credit card within 72 hours.

I am so rich we went to Target and spent half of my refund. Only 12,000 words until my novel is el fine and I can get back to blogging. Hooray!

Bam!

30,000 words. Bam! Just 20,000 more measly little words and then I can return to the things that are truly important: blogging and playing Diablo.

And editing my novel and submitting it for publishing, etc. etc. etc.

Side note: How come when I spell check through my blog, 'blogging' isn't a word? Hmm.

Fil

So today we went up to Zecker Zinnesota to pick the boy up from my parent's house (my mom's birthday was on Saturday and she wanted the boy overnight as a birthday present. That was a present I could afford!). We went to lunch at Zippy's parents house.

To say that Zippy's father is special would be an understatment. Today Fil (father-in-law, get it? get it?) compared the condition of college football players to slaves. I'll let that sink in.

First of all, WTF? Second of all, are you kidding? Although my understanding of history may be sketchy at best, I don't remember reading about the slaves getting full rides to top notch universities. If Zippy wouldn't have grabbed me with Fil opened mouth and inserted foot I probably would have leapt across the room and kicked him.

After getting dogged at Zippy's sister's wedding (I, who have been married to Zippy for 3 years and have been with Zippy for 7 years, did not have a seat at a family table) I didn't think anything could surprise me. I was wrong.

I don't know what to say besides WTF?

Time and Words

How come at work (not necessarily my new job, just work in general) a minute takes an hour and an hour takes a lifetime, yet when I get home, time goes so fast I don't have enough hours in the day to finish everything I need or want to do?

I hit the 20,000 word mark last night on my novel. 20 days let to write an additional 30,000 words. Sometimes this work is writing itself and sometimes I can't imagine finding another 30,000 words of story. It's quite daunting and exciting.

Laundry Woes

It seems that ever since I became a mother, I've been doing a ridiculous amount of laundry, so it would be reasonable to conclude that I would be fairly good at sorting the copious amounts of clean laundry, right?

Wrong.

Oh sure. I'm good at sorting some of the clean laundry. Underwear are fairly straight forward. My undies are cute, Zippy's are more masculine (ie more fabric), and Baba's underwear are of the disposable diaper variety and don't end up in wash.

Pants are pretty easy, too. The shortest pants belong to Baba. If the number on the size of the larger pants is below 32 the pants are mine. If the number is 32 or larger then they are Zippy's. No problems there.

Shirts aren't too much trouble either. Neat cartoon characters? Baba's! Button up and formal? Zippy's. Large T-shirt? Zippy's. Cute shirt or medium T-shirt? Mine. (Just ask me how much I paid for this shirt: Okay, I'll tell you. Less than $3! I got 3 shirts and 2 pairs of pants at Vanity for $21.75).

So what's the problem? Socks! Baba and my socks are almost identical. There have been several times when one of my socks will end up in his drawer. As Baba would say, "Uh-oh!"

(from left to right: Baba's sock, my sock, Zippy's sock)

Bring it on!

Because writing 50,000 words in a month isn't enough of a challenge I decided to make it harder by writing in a genre (chick lit) that I've never written in before. Why oh why couldn't I just stick to sci fi and/or fantasy?

By the way, I'm at 9215, still ahead of schedule (yeah!). Next year I am doing the blog everyday instead of the novel in a month thing. Oh well. Live and learn. Back to the novel.

Day 3

I've written 6,179 words. My goal for to day was to be at 5,001 words. Hooray! So far, so good.

100th Post Extravaganza

This started off with a little, tiny, baby thought, "Hey, I could blog." If I survived my first year of being a mother I can do anything. So I thought about it for a while, did my research, and discovered a glorious, time consuming community full of women like myself.

I took a deep breath and created a new blog. I inspired ZennieZou to do the same. It is so much easier to type for a few minutes and hit 'publish post' than write in my journal everyday. My journal, by the way, feels neglected and dust covered. My computer does not.

There are a million things to write about and I always want to publish one more thing, tell one more story, or post one more picture of a certain Baba.











I am very thankful to my loyal fan (Thank you ZennieZou!), and my frequent readers (Zippy, Ditty, and whoever else is lurking out there), and I'm confident within the next 100 or so posts my blog will take off like Baba avoiding getting dressed after his bath!














I probably just wasted 100 or so words that could have been used towards my novel. That's it. I'm copying and pasting all my blogs into a word doc and my novel is done! Just kidding, I am at 2,830 words and avoiding increasing my total very nicely, thank you.

Happy Halloween!!!

Happy Halloween! Baba was a puppy. Zippy and I were homicidal maniacs. Simple and classic; they look just like everyone else.

I guess, since tomorrow is the first day of November (let the novel writing begin) I'll see you in a month. Big sigh.

Things to decide before 12:01 am November 1st:
What genre?
What is the story about?
Characters?
Plot (optional, of course)?
Conflict?
Resolution?
Why do I torture myself by making me write a novel in a month?

Candy bars

I really want a candy bar. I mean I really want a nice, juicy, chocolaty candy bar.

I used to work in shipping with a friend of mine, Mandell. One day we were talking about "hit the spot" moments. She said on her wedding night, after her and her husband consummated their vows, she's going to say, "Mmm. That hit the spot."

A candy bar would definetly hit the spot. I have a feeling that the Hep B booster I am getting in an hour isn't going to hit the spot the way a candy bar would.

Expensive Entertainment

Here is proof positive that children are the most expensive form of entertainment.


Yes, you are seeing the camera shake and hearing Zippy and I try to control our laughter in the background.

Quick note: This video takes a long time to load. I'm working on that. Patience young grasshopper, it will load eventually. In my unbiased opinion, it is worth the wait.

Christmas and Pizza

I love Christmas. My Christmas tree goes up the day after Thanksgiving like clockwork. I am almost done Christmas shopping, yet even I question why the Christmas decorations go out in stores with the Halloween decorations.

Put your Halloween decorations and candy on clearance (Okay. Fine. Just candy. I'm not really going to buy any Halloween decorations anyway) and then you can bring out the Christmas stuff. Don't waste valuable floor space with Thanksgiving stuff. I really don't need to decorate for Thanksgiving nor am I going to buy anyone a Thanksgiving card and/or present.

But I will take a cheap turkey. Yum.

We stopped at Nick-N-Willy's pizza today. We normally don't eat out that often; the biggest reason being we are poor. But we stopped today because we were hungry, and we get an extra $2 for Baba's Upromise account (PS, we are the greatest parent's ever. We have $1.32 in college savings thus far. That should maybe buy a pencil when Baba gets to college). Bad idea. The pizza was by far the best pizza I have ever tasted. It was perfect! Lots and lots of toppings and very little cheese. And it was pretty reasonable, price wise. There lunch special (which we ordered two of) was an 8 inch personal pizza and a fountain drink for $4.95. And it wasn't just a cheese pizza, it was any pizza. Yummy and dangerous. But, I guess, since we are saving for Baba's college tuition by eating out we can afford it.

(I'll just forget that we and Baba would be better off if we deposited $10.54 (our total) into his college savings account and ate at home. But still, $2.84 in his college fund and pizza is better than $10.54 in his college fund and no pizza. Right? Right?)

My Day By the Numbers

1: Number of stuffed bugs living in my living room (a ladybug).
0: Number of drinks I had today.
3: Number of drinks I wish I would have had today.
1: Number of showers I took today.
2: Number of miles I ran today.
2: Number of times I weighed myself today (one time I was holding Baba so I was technically weighing him).
3: Number of animals whose meat I tried today (chicken, duck, pheasant).
1: Number of rocking horses that Baba received as a Halloween present (um, where's my Halloween present?)
32: Number of times Baba mounted the horse.
32: Number of times Baba dismounted the horse.
57: Number of times Baba pressed the horse's ear to make his tail wag.
1: Number of eyeballs injuried by the snack cupboard.
9: Number of hours of sleep I got last night.
10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000: Number of times Baba said, "Uh-oh!" today.
28: Number of times Baba went to look for Pudge but found him sleeping.
1: Number of naps Baba took today.
17: Number of times Baba asked for "more" today.
2: Number of times I said, while watching my parent's cable TV, "boy, am I glad I don't pay for cable."
78: Number of times Baba said "moo" and/or located a cow.
8: Number of minutes until bed, hopeful.
68: Number of minutes until bed, actual.

Life's Great Mysteries

Why is it so much harder to run 1.2 miles when you have a fever and a stomach ache than 2+ miles when you are healthy?

Why does my dryer insist on eating a sock a week?

Why is Pop Secret popcorn a thousand times better than Act II?

Why is it when I'm not really hungry and decide to have, oh I don't know, apple sauce and ice cream for lunch am I ravenous after eating my psuedo lunch?

Why did my VCR eat my Sound of Music tape and not any of the silly songs or Thomas videos we own?

Why!?

A real conversation between my mother and I:

Mom: Another American Girl catalog came. You better have a little girl so you can start buying American Girl stuff again.

Me: (inside my head: Why do I need a little girl to buy that stuff? Can't I buy it for me?)

Mom: If you are going to adopt you need to get on an adoption list. It takes a long time to adopt.

Me: (noting I never responded aloud to her comment and never mentioned adoption in this conversation. Quick decision. Agree and end conversation or argue with her) If you want to adopt an older child it doesn't take that long. (Damn it! Wrong choice).

Mom: Well, my cousin Shelly was on a list for a long time and she just got her daughter from China. And she isn't an infant. She's one!

Me: (Ohmygod! One, she's practically an adult, why did she need to be adopted) Ben got his kids fairly quickly because he was willing to adopt older kids and siblings (ha! Take that!)

Lather, rinse, repeat. Why did I answer the phone when I saw "Mom's Cell Phone" in the caller ID?

Darth Baby

Lately, Baba has had the tendency to fall asleep for the night any where but his bed. Tonight he fell asleep right by his door. How do I know this? Well, when I walked past his door, I heard very heavy breathing a la Darth Vader. I guess he is not over his cold.

Nicknames

My little family (Zippy, myself, Wili, and Baba) and my bigger family (parental units, sister, and soon to be brother-in-law) have never been much on using your real name. Real names are reserved for times when you are in trouble (I actually tested all the possible names for Baba by yelling them in an angry tone. Names that felt "good" yelling stayed on the list of names).

That being said, we have gotten very good at the giving and receiving on nicknames over the years. I have a friend whom we call "Porkchop" - the story behind that name? Well, out of the blue she said, "Quit picking on Porkchop." As far as we could tell no one had ever called her Porkchop before that day. Alas, it stuck. My sister will answer to: Sistra, Ditty, Little Ditty, and KaylaMcaShoebomb-Kackalackaticktock-Tickalickaboombomb-No-Nicknames. She created that name for herself while we were out shopping for track suits (you remember? Those ones made out of the windbreaker material. The tops and bottoms matched). It was the late 80s early 90s and we were so cool! Oops. I mean rad. We were so rad!

I have never called Zippy honey or dear or sweetheart or any other name that makes me gag. He has been Poonch, Hungie, Oreida Potato, Husband, the Yady, and Poonchie, among others. The cat, much to the dismay of my sister, goes by Mister Wili (she thinks its dumb that we named a female cat Wili and thinks its ever dumber that we call her Mister Wili. She is now an it, so there) or Silly-Wili-Ding-Dong or just plain "Ili!" (always Ili! with an exclamation point. We are always happy to see Wili because then we can point to her nose, eyes, ears, and mouth and try to stick our sticky little fingers in each part).

And let us not forget Baba. He started out as Zebulon (Zebbie), which evolved into Mister Babis, and then the boy (that makes total sense. We've got "Husband" "Wife" or "Mife" and the "Boy") and now we go by Trouble. In case you are curious, my nicknames include: Toey, Sarie, Hungie, Mife, the Yady, ZarahZou, and Sistra, among others.

We also have a tendency to make up names for things or make up words. There are, what a billion quadrillion megabillion and five words and that isn't enough for us to express ourselves.

But we've got a new word/nickname (stick with me, although all this information is interesting, I do have a point). The other night we were doing our nightly march to bedtime and Zippy was reading a Star Wars book to Baba and me. I was paying closer attention than Baba. Baba uses story time to wring 5 more minutes of havoc wrecking out of the day - basically he likes to rearrange his room before bedtime, creating an obsticle of painful toys for us to avoid during our pitch black trips to his bedside to locate a plug for him in the middle of the night.

Anyway, Zippy got to the part about Anakin's mother, Shmi and he pronounced "Shmi" incorrectly. Being the Star Wars fan (nerd) that I am, I corrected him. He then changed Shmi's name to "Shimmy-shimmy-sham-shung." Every time he came across Shmi he would insert Shimmy-shimmy-sham-shung. I was rolling on the ground laughing. A certain Baba couldn't figure out what I thought was so funny, but laughed anyway.

The moral of the story: Never mispronounce a Star Wars' character's name in front of a Star Wars fanatic and everything is funny when you haven't slept in a couple days.

Savings, Decisions, and the People's Court

Someone went to Rainbow foods and spent $35.45 and saved $56.96 so I'm a happy girl. I went to Target to celebrate. I spent under $10 and did not buy the super cut jogging pants or the semi-cute but super cheap dress I wanted. Double celebrate.

So, I must admit that I don't have a lot of direction in my life - never have. I was never one of those kids who knew they always wanted to be a garbage man when they grew up. Frankly, I was jealous of those kids. So I went to college because that's what you are supposed to do. I got my degree in English in three years because I'm a dumb girl (dumb in that I thought if I didn't hurry my happy self up and graduate with Zippy he wouldn't wait around for me). "So what are you going to with an English degree?" everyone asked. I didn't know, but I had a degree so someone is going to give me a job and that's that.

Not so much. I can't say that I've ever had a job that I thought I could keep for an extended and the longest I've ever worked at one job is just over a year. I get bored so I quit. I regret quitting, although most of my jobs have really sucked. And, even if I wanted to go back, I couldn't admit that or have the balls to call up a former employer and ask for my job back. I think if Nevilled called me up and asked me to come back I would seriously consider it (sans bond training, or course). I liked ZennieZou and I can handle just about anything with a friend by my side. Sigh. One day, I'll figure it out.

But, on another note, I am addicted to People's Court again. Damn it! I thought I got over that. Why oh why must our rabbit ears work upstairs well enough to get trashy TV?

Why, oh why, oh why, did I decide to start running again in October. I have lived in Minnesota for must of my life and generally it gets cold here in the winter. So what is a girl to wear to keep warm when she's out running and it is 40 below?

Is this my email?

I changed my Avatar this morning. Now everytime I log in to check my yahoo mail I think that I logged into someone else's email because the Avatar smiling at me isn't the one I'm used to seeing.

Blogging or Jogging?

I have always had a real love/hate relationship with running. I both love and hate to run. I love how I feel when I'm running, but I hate being sweaty and out of breath. I love running farther then I've ever run before, even if it is only a couple feet, but I hate how tired I am when I get done running. I love how fast running whips my flabby ass into shape, but I hate actually having to pound the pavement (my knees hate running, too).

Before Baba was born, I used to run a lot. Okay, I'll be honest. Before I got pregnant, I used to run a lot (after I got pregnant my exercise consisted of walking from the couch to the fridge and back and racing to the bathroom to park the tiger, technicolor yawn, vomit, puke, upchuck, spew, etc). After Baba was born, not so much. It is so hard to find the energy to do anything, let alone run.

But, lately, I've been running again. Hooray! And let me tell you, running is all mental. Meaning you have to be mental to run. There is something seriously wrong with me. Yesterday, I wanted to go out in the freezing cold and run my happy self around the block (the block being about a mile or so). And if Baba and Zippy hadn't so generously shared their colds with me, I'd be out running this afternoon instead of blogging.

So why do I run? First and foremost, it kicks my ass. I can feel a difference in my thighs after only a couple trips around the block. Second, I like the peace. The monotony of running gives me time to think. Third, while I'm running I'm not stressing or eating; I'm doing something constructive. Fourth, all the cool kids are doing it. Fifth, if I start running 5k's and other fun runs I'll have a neat collection of free T-shirts.

I wonder which burns more calories, blogging or jogging?

A Lonely Book in a Sea of Toys

My brother-in-law's knocked-up girlfriend's daughter's birthday party was Saturday night. I ended up buying her a boxset of books - "A Little Princess," "The Secret Garden," and "Anne of Green Gables." All books I loved growing up (2 out of 3 are still on my book shelf today) and she loves to read, which is great.

Our gift was the only gift she got besides toys and clothes. I'm a firm believer in the gift of books. Books won't break. You never really outgrow a good book (you just get faster at reading the story). The birthday girl, Zannah, is in second grade, but is an awesome reader. Last year, she was reading chapter books.

And, if she doesn't like the books, I included a gift receipt so she can return for store credit and pick out different books.

The Baba and I

Baba and I spent an hour (yes, an hour) at Petsmart today. We saw "ogs," "ilis," "irds," "ish," and various reptiles and hampsters (he doesn't have a word for reptiles - just grunts growls). We then met Ditty and Zippy for lunch at Wendy's (nutrious and delicious).

I tried to put Baba down for a nap this afternoon (not that he needed one or anything). He joyously played in his room for 45 minutes and then I decided, spud to napping - he isn't sleeping anyway. After his release from prision, he ran for 3 hours. I have never seen him put on so many miles in our little house as he did today.

Where does all his energy come from?

How much?

How much do you spend on a birthday present for, deep breath, your brother-in-law's knocked-up girlfriend's 9 year old daughter?

TV, How Could You?

We didn't let Baba watch any TV until he turned one. It wasn't that we had "do not cross" police tape in front of the TV, he just wasn't interested so we didn't push it. But then we discovered that Baby Einstein truly is baby-crack. He would watch the "moos," "baas," and "udges" while myself or Zippy held him in our laps, joyously getting another 20 to 30 minutes of much needed sleep. It was a beautiful thing.

Zippy found an article yesterday that Cornell University has research that links the rise in autism to kids watching too much TV. Of course, swallowing small bits of water at regular intervals causes cancer, but still. It is hard to know what to believe and what not to believe since people are so disparate to find a "reason" for autism that they link it to everything, including TV and vaccinations.

I guess the big question is, which is a bigger risk with worse results: Me not having 30 minutes of whine-free peace a day or the boy getting autism?

Disclaimer: I am not in any way making light of the struggle that autistic children and their parents face every day. Nor do I dare minimize my need for whine-free space. It is a humdinger of a pickle.

Pleasant Pheasant and Gross Grouse

Pheasant season opened yesterday, I only know this because the opening dates of various hunting seasons (grouse, goose, early goose, deer, pheasant, duck, etc) were more important than Christmas day growing up (I believe Christmas is in December sometime?).

Because my parents firmly believe they will implode if they go more than a week without seeing Baba, we headed out to my grandparents farm so they could see Baba and Baba could wear himself out by running around all day.

Worked like a charm. Baba didn't seem to mind the freezing temperatures, he was too busy trying to chase down the "ili's," his word for cat. Why would a poor defenseless little kitty run away from someone like Baba toddling towards him?

Baba is now sleeping peacefully (hooray!) and I am trying to reach $20 worth of picture stuffs so I get free shipping from dotphoto.com. Who knew spending $20 could be so much work?

Speaking of work, we've been working very hard to get Baba to make our sign for Poonchies - you put your index fingers together and making kissing noises. Moving your fingers against each other obscenely is optional. He is finally getting it down! Our plan is to have him walk to the end of the aisle next summer at Poonch II and Ditty's wedding and make the sign.

Raindrops on Roses

The funny thing about depression is that just when you think that being depressed is so last week/last month/last year/etc, it comes knocking at your door and BOOM! its boxes of kleenexes and self-doubt waiting for you in bed. Depression is a bully - it increases it's self-esteem by making you feel bad. What a jerk! I am so not inviting depression to my birthday part.

The last couple weeks have been tough, not because anything specifically has happened, just because depression came around (that and Mr. Sun, Sun, Mr. Golden Sun has been hiding behind a tree). Despite the fact that I have broken several threatening email chain letters lately an amazing thing happened a couple days ago. I got an email from a really good friend who I hadn't talked to in a couple years. And she called tonight and we talked for over an hour. It was like we hadn't been out of touch for 2 days, much less 2 years.

Leaving Cleveland to move back here was one of the hardest things I've ever done and not a day goes by when Zippy or I don't mention wanting to move back home.

But, I'm in such a good mood that I'm starting a list of my favorite things - the things that make me happy:

1. Phone calls/emails from "long-last" friends.
2. Snow - the clean white kind, not the run over by 5 semi's kind.
3. Vacations!
4. Human Anatomy.
5. Sleeping in.
6. Mornings when Baba wakes up with a "Momma!" instead of tears.
7. Chocolate.
8. Reading blogs.
9. Good books, especially when I have the time to read said good book from cover to cover.
10. Making Baba giggle.
11. Lazy days.
12. PJs until noon.
13. Cuddling with my husband and watching dumb movies.
14. Bad Sci-fi movies.
15. My friends.
16. Writing.
17. My cat.
18. Going to my grandparents house (tomorrow!).
19. Christmas season.
20. Weekends were we have nothing to do.
21. Grocery shopping.
22. Coupons!
23. Chinese food.
24. Eating in general.
25. Stepping on the scale and realizing I've lost any amount of weight.
25b. Putting on a pair of pants that cut off the circulation to my legs a year ago because they had "shrunk" and the pants now fit (how did they un-shrink?).
26. The cabin.
27. Sleeping.

I'm too tired to think of anything else (it's 10:30! It is way past my bed time).

Coupon Queen

My name is Gaft Girl and I have a problem. Deep breath. I love coupons. I have been known, on occasion, to buy multiple Sunday papers when there is a good coupon (case in point, last weekend. There was a $3 off a box of Luvs diapers. The $1.75 was totally worth it to get a second coupon). I also have my mother and grandmother save their coupons for me.

My second, perhaps more disturbing problem is this: I love to grocery shop. I'm serious. I love trying to get as many groceries for as little as possible (I never spend more than a $1 a serving for a meal). I spend hours (yes, plural) working on my list, scouring the grocery ads, and comparing prices. It is probably a disease. But I can feed my family of 3 for less than $200 a month and I probably have enough groceries in storage that we could go at least a month without buying anything but milk (of course, if we bought a cow.....).

Next to Sundays (new grocery ads), Wednesdays are my favorite day. Why? It is double coupon day, silly. Double coupon day ranks right up there with Nudie Magazine Day (Billy Madison), Christmas, and my birthday. It may even outrank Christmas and Nudie Magazine Day.

On what other day is it possible to exercise my coupon prowess? I get to chose the 5 coupons I want doubled (my suggestion is to pick the dollar coupons, but that's my humble opinion) and as long as I spend $25 they are doubled.

The key is to spend exactly $25, before coupons, and then after doubling and other coupons the weeks worth of groceries are down to $15 or so. Hooray. And never, ever shop on an empty stomach (a Chinese food buffet with Zennie Zou certainly nixed any emptiness I had in my stomach today!)

I must admit that today I didn't quite ring up at my usual $25 mark. My total was $40, which is the most I've spent on groceries in a long time. But, considering I have $12 off my next grocery order and a $10 mail in rebate, I think going over cost me less in the long run. Plus, I got to meet the worlds tallest man.

If I wasn't happily married, I would probably marry Rainbow Foods. Or Giant Eagle.

Stay Away Winter!

What are we going to do when it is too cold to play outside? Somebody loves being outside. The first thing we do in the morning is look for the moon. Then Baba spends his time divided between eating breakfasts (yes, plural) and pulling us to the front door to try to get us to open it.

He was not a happy camper the few mornings that it has been too cold (and I have been too lazy) to go for our usual walk.

But at least yesterday was nice. We walked, or attempted to walk, to the grocery store. On the way to the grocery store are two parks. We made it past one park, but the other park proved too tempting for some toddlers and Baba took of (as in removed himself from the stroller and started running) toward the park. I followed Baba and Zippy continued to the grocery store.

BFF

My BFF from 3rd grade, Zhastity (on the left - can you tell that me and my monkey arms took the picture?), was up from Kansas this weekend for a mutual friend, Zyan's, wedding. Zhastity and I went to elementary, middle, and started high school together. The summer after 9th grade her family moved to Kansas, but we kept in touch. She was one of my maids of honor when I got married.

At Zyan's wedding, there were all sorts of Beckerites that I knew in high school, but never really hung out with. I spent more time talking to them last night than I did in 4 years of high school. Its really weird what changes can happen in 6 years and what never changes.

I also saw my friend Ebob at the wedding. I really miss Ebob. He could always make me laugh and helped me survive a horrible senior year of high school. The only time I have ever gotten in a food fight was with Ebob, his car "The Ho-da" (it was a Honda that he scratched the "n" off of) and my car, Eleanore. Pizza, if left too long on your car, will do damage. May Eleanore and The Ho-da rest in peace.

From left to right: Little Ditty, Zhas, and me.

Zhas and I are kind of strange because there are not too many pictures of the two of us together. There is, however, an amazing picture that was taken moments after Zippy and my wedding of the two of us hugging.

My favorite picture, next to the hug, is the three of us playing "doctor" after I got my tonsils out. There is also the picture of the two of us on my grandpa's 3 wheeler a million years ago. I always thought when we grew up we'd be next door neighbors.

Zhas is in and out of my life a lot - that happens when you live so far away. But she's always been there for the important stuff - my wedding, high school graduation, Baba's birth. I'm really glad she was able to come up for the short trip (she got up here Saturday around 1 and left this morning around 8). It was nice to see her. True friendships last forever and friends are only a phone call/email (this is the 2000s!) away.

Chapters 7 & 8

Chapters 7 & 8 are Male Reproductive system and Female Reproductive system, respectively. Since I have used my reproductive system once, I am fairly certain I know what my parts are and how they generally work. I am not a male nor have I ever been one, but after reading the introduction to Chapter 7, I now know that "the function of the male reproductive system is to reproduce."

Um, okay. Here I was thinking this anatomy stuff was hard. It's obvious that the function of the male reproduction system is reproduction needs to be explained, but something like "Phimosis" would never need an explanation. (If you really must know, phimosis is congenital condition of tightening of the prepuce around the glans penis so that the foreskin cannot be retracted. Which took me several hours of research to figure that out.)

It's a miracle!

A certain small child has been waking up pre-buttcrack-thirty (before 5:00 am) and waking up screaming for a couple hours during the night for the past couple weeks. That is until this morning when, miracle of miracles, he slept until 7 am. And, will wonders never cease, he slept 12 hours without waking up screaming.

Life is good when you've had 9 hours of sleep. Almost makes a person consider having another kid (or cat or puppy).

Wee Willie Winkie

I'm sure in 10 to 15 years, Baba will be mortified that his mother shared this fact, but we chose not to have Baba circumcised (he'll also probably be angry that I let him use tampon boxes at Target for rattles, but what can you do?). Why? Well, I think it is kind of cruel (would you want your business mutilated?) and I didn't want to subject Baba to a surgery that wasn't medically necessary.

So why am I sharing this? Well, fast-forward 18 months to his 18th month well-baby check.

Dr: Have you noticed anything unusual about Baba's penis?

Me: (thinking - Don't have one, wouldn't recognize unusual or usual anatomy) No, why.

Dr: Well, I can't retract his foreskin and I believe the hole may be too small to allow urine to escape. Tell me, when he urinates is it a steady stream or is it like when you put your thumb on a garden hose?

Me: (thinking - he is still in diapers, for Pete's sake. I don't usually let him run around without one.) I haven't really noticed.

Dr: We'll have to keep an eye on the hole in his foreskin. He made need to be circumcised.

Me: (thinking - Um, ow!)

All of the males I have told that Baba may now need a circumcision have grabbed their business and said "Ow." We have yet to determine if his pee-hole is the proper size or if he'll just grow out of it (into it? I suppose if his business were to shrink, he might be okay).

I had my first anatomy test today; my brain is fried. I did okay (92.5%) on the first part. Not so okay (66.66%) on the second part. Looks like studying the arm and heart again is in my future. But not tonight. Its off to TV and booze.

Ouch!

After 2.5 hours of LD testing (dyslexia, ADHD, ADD, and other fun labels), an anatomy test tomorrow, and more LD testing tomorrow after my anat test, I'm wrecked and my brain hurts.

Duluth

I went up to Duluth this weekend. I had desinged some wedding invitations for Zippy's cousin and I wanted to give them to his fiance, Zindsey. I also went to visit my good friend Roblyn the Goblyn. I love her! We went to Michaels, some scrapbook place, and Chinese food!!!

Very few people will check your teeth for lunch leftovers for you.



I'm invited to an adult cocktail party! Roblyn and I were very busy making the invites. What do I wear?