Weekend Recap

Despite the forecast for rain, it managed to stay sunny and lovely all weekend. It's starting to drizzle now, but grilling is done, bathtime is started and we are officially inside for the night.

Here is a heart-meltingly wonderful scene from Saturday:

We went on a couple of long walks and played outside in the garden all weekend long.

I actually feel refreshed and ready to start a very busy week at work.

A sucker is born every minute

Hahaha!

Thousands of people have been 'fleeced' into buying neatly coiffured lambs they thought were poodles.

Entire flocks of lambs were shipped over from the UK and Australia to Japan by an internet company and marketed as the latest 'must have' accessory.

But the scam was only spotted after a leading Japanese actress said her 'poodle' didn't bark and refused to eat dog food.

Update: who's the sucker now? That would be me.

Heroes!

W00t! It's finally back!

Dead Peter? Oh, wait, just a huge piece of glass piercing his scull. I loved the scenes with the Petrellis. I wonder what the Grandmother's power is. I also wonder if the Grandfather had a power and maybe Linderman had him killed. I'm also going to admit right here that I'm starting to get a little crush on Peter. Question: did Peter absorb any of Sylar's powers? Like super hearing or metal melting? Because he should have, right?

Mohinder must have been scared shitless to be in the middle of the Sylar/Peter battle. Still don't like his character and from the spoilers I've read about next week's future episode? I'm going to continue not liking him.

What is the shapeshifter's name again? I did NOT think that Jessica was not herself when she led Micah to Linderman. Interesting that neither Niki nor Jessica wanted to let Micah help him. Jessica actually seemed to be protecting him. In other news, D.L. bores me.

Why were Matt Parkman's scenes flashing about when he was listening to Bennet? It was strange. Are they trying to make mind reading look more interesting? But cool that now they are a little band of amigos. Not that I like Parkman. But Ted is intriguing because I want to see Geico cavemen get their day in the sun, and I'm also warming towards Bennet.

I wonder if the sketchbook Isaac handed off contained information about Sylar? Or if his last comic book is about future Hiro, does IT contain information about Sylar? Is the editor one of Linderman's people?

Future Hiro! A future episode! Next week is going to be great.

I'm still getting emails from Wireless but I'm a little bored with them, too. Mostly about Linderman trying to fix the Petrelli election (probably why he needs Micah) and "we need your help!" to stop the fixing. If you're interested, you can check out her site.

What did I miss?

Eighteen Months!

(technically it was yesterday but the weather was so niiiiiice, I hope you'll forgive me)

Well, my little bundle of energy, my daredevil lovebug, you are amazing. I know I say that every month, but just when I think you can't get any more cool and fantastic - there you go evolving and growing and throwing us for a loop.

The talking, the running, the attempted jumping and hopping, the elaborate games, the opinions, the quirks - they all combine to force our hearts to expand in directions I didn't know possible.

You have such empathy and a lot of your made-up games now involve elaborate reenactments of bedtime and bathtime and what we did yesterday. You are the director and you give us specific instructions as to the role we are supposed to play. It's a lot of fun to watch and also very fascinating because of how much detail you remember.

This weekend, a lot of time was spent putting things on Girl's plates. You also washed her hair and plates and asked her if she was okay with the wet. There was kissing and petting and feeding.

Another game - directing us to get under the easel. With me, you pull me out when I say "Oh, no! Mommy's stuck!".

With Daddy, you just want to sit on him when he's under. He has to do an elaborate wiggle to get himself under there.

You've been talking in mini-sentences for a little while now but this weekend saw you putting together longer thoughts. "Daddy's coming? Where? There he is! Hi, Daddy!" You talk and talk and talk. Your memory amazes us as well. You hear a word you haven't heard before and you say it immediately. And it's more than just parroting it back to us - you remember it and use it in context days later.

I bought you some cute rain boots on the way home from daycare last week. We talked about them on the way home - about how you could now stomp and splash in the puddles and not get your feet wet. We briefly showed the new boots to Daddy when we got home, but you were on to bigger and better things. The next morning, you and I headed downstairs and I said: "Hey! Look at your new boots!" And you said: "Stompin' puddles! No wet! Spash!"

(There are a lot of exclamation points in our household).

Your favorite foods at the moment are shredded cheese (eaten with a "fok" out of a cup or bowl) (yes, it's just as messy as it sounds), crackers, pears, "faffles", cake (actually whole grain cereal bars) and the newly introduced peanut butter.

We love you, you little speed demon, you tempest of smooches. Please stay this age for a little while longer.

Shhhh, unnysay eatherway.

I've been terrified to say anything in case I jinx things...(it's been in the '70s around here and it might actually hit '80 on Monday)...you didn't hear it from me.

In other news, I'm going to get my hair cut today. My poor coworkers have been forced to endure mini pony tails and lots of frizz and uncontrollable hair and I think the hair on the back of my head actually tripped someone yesterday.

It was when Scissors started trying to convince me to "just cut a little off the back - you'll feel SO much better. No one will even notice.", that I knew it was time to call the salon. Luckily, my stylist works on weekends. And she's used to me coming in with a half-chopped mess in the back. I didn't say I resisted Scissors siren song; I'm not that strong.

I still have videos to upload of the "fish maracas tushie game" and "can Aaron squish himself under the Fisher Price easel?" but the unsay is iningshay and I've got to go find my ummersay ortshay.

I hope you have a ovelylay weekend. Smooches.

Stop being so hard on yourself

I love Ask Moxie. If I could, I'd internet marry her. I was lucky enough to start reading her fantastic site at the start of my pregnancy and her no-nonsense, common sense advice prepared me so much for each stage along the way.

Her latest brilliant post is about mothers and how we all expect (and others expect) everything to be perfect and rainbows and smooches, and in reality, things are tough. Having a baby is great and it also sucks at times. I wish I could do a lot of the things before we had Sophie but I would never NOT wish for Sophie. She is amazing and lovely and she can also be a royal pain in the butt. I wouldn't trade it for the world, but I can also admit that being a parent is hard and draining and like getting kicked in the head.

All those moms who look so zen (and people tell me I'm one of them--apparently I look calm all the time) are really just fantasizing about having a night alone in a hotel with nice sheets and no one else there wanting something from them. It's not like everyone else is totally in the moment and you're not. Everyone's dropping the ball in one way or another. It's just that some of us are forcing ourselves to be OK with dropping those balls.

Cow?

We got about an inch or so of snow yesterday and about 48 inches of rain. Cold, dreary, gray, yucky. I just looked out the window and the rain is blowing sideways. Flooding everywhere. I guess the silver lining is that the garden at our house is probably loving the rain. The other silver lining is that Sophie took a 2.5 hour nap on Sunday. She would have slept longer but we woke her up to eat dinner. Oh yeah, and coworkers slightly north of us got upwards of 8 inches of snow yesterday.

We took Sophie to UMass on Saturday for another child development study. This one observed her playing with different toys on different surfaces. At one point, she got a bit bored with the whole thing and said what sounded like "Bullshit" under her breath. We all started laughing. Also, at one point, she had a piece of paper in front of her and a scoop, a Velcro block and a crayon. She picked up the crayon and said: "Cow?" Because we weren't supposed to say anything to her during the filming of the tasks, off-camera we explained that she always requests we draw her cows. We were giggling about it on the ride home because the film is going to look like she thinks the crayon is a cow. Nice.

I have some cute videos to upload but Aaron had a big homework assignment due this week and the computer was occupied.

Blech

I drove home at high noon to check on the lentil soup simmering in the crockpot*.

Here's a mini sequence of events while I was fixing myself some lunch:

• Kitties loudly (and quite rudely, if you must know) meowing at me to go outside
  
• Me opening the door to let them outside in the sleet and snow
  
• Them panicking at the idea of being touched by anything wet, especially wet that falls from the sky
  
• Me considering shoving them outside to stop the incessant meowing
  
• Them frantically running into the house

Ten seconds later: loud meowing to go outside. I swear they'd ride the short bus if they went to school.

There wasn't any accumulation of snow when I went home. It did start to get messy on the way back to work. Sleet (hard pellets of ice for those of you in warm climates) and big, heavy flakes of snow. Which, when they splatted on my windshield, were exactly like there were millions of ice birds shitting joyously from the clouds. Intermingling with some joyously shitting ice mice.

*The lentil soup is not what I envisioned and I hope the extra simmering time changes things. I even made vegetable stock last night. Ugh. All that chopping and simmering and it's bland and the lentils are falling apart.

All Done.

It's f'ing snowing again. We're supposed to get about 6 inches by tomorrow when all is said and done. Down from the 8-12 inches they were predicting yesterday. And if that isn't enough - "I see your 6 inches and raise you another 6" - Mother Nature has decided that we need even more snow this weekend.

So much for the crocuses and daffodillies that were just starting to stretch up out of the ground. "See ya! Fowers, oh no!"

What became of my weekend?

Friday was my big day off! With a bonus in my pocket and great intentions of going to the BIG MALL to shop, ahhhh, shop, I headed out about an hour later than planned. Because if I was going to do the day off right, I should probably shave my winterized hairy legs and maybe do a face mask. There was also some lounging.

And then realized on the way to the mall (about 35 minute drive) that in order to hit all the shops on my list AND hit Trader Joe's and the supermarket (Aaron: "we have nothing to eat!") before rushing to pick up Sophie, I was going to have to kick things into hyperdrive. Which made the shopping trip a speed walking grab-a-thon tinged with stress sweat.

I wanted to at least hit H&M because I never get to go in there and Madonna had just done some designs for them. Never figured out which ones were hers, but they did have some interesting clothes. NONE of which fit me the way I had hoped and I ended up getting two cute dresses for Sophie. I also swooped through Forever 21 (nothing), Gap (nothing) and Target (a bunch of Easter things for Sophie and a sweater for me).

Rushed out of there, headed back up to Whole Foods and Trader Joe's and then rushed back home to get Sophie. Not the most relaxing day off and I ended up with a lot of yummy food and clothes for Sophie. Ah well.

Easter was spent up at my parents' house - Saturday afternoon and Sunday. My brother, SIL and their two kids came up on Sunday and there was a very cold Easter egg hunt during which Sophie was very concerned that all the big plastic eggs kept making their way out of my mom's basket and onto the driveway and her cousin was enjoying himself by taking all of the eggs out of the basket. Sophie kept saying: "Oh no! Egg! Back!" Hijinks.

And just because I'm all of a sudden into lists, Sophie's new words from the weekend:

• "Gammy" - Grandma. My mom blushes when she hears Sophie say her nickname. It's very, very sweet.

• "Aww Wight!": as in: "All right, let's get going."

• "Ooooh Yeah!" - just what it sounds like. Her skin is really dry and she hates anyone touching her feet. So I've been trying to make the whole lotion application time more enjoyable. Foot rubs with lotion accompanied by "Oh yeah!"

• "Wee wee wee, piggy!" - my mom managed to touch Sophie's toes long enough to do the "This little piggy" game. Sophie now requests we do it after the foot rub.

• "Tush!" - game in which we march around the house with fish maracas and put our tush on things. Like the wall and Sophie's chair and her car and Otto and Daddy. It's a lot of fun and I know you all wish you could join us.
  

5 Things. A.k.a., my week in a recap list

1. We woke up this morning to TWO INCHES OF SNOW!!! Mother Nature is officially dead to me.
2. I'm in the middle of reading "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy and it is freaking me right out. I tend to read before going to bed and, in this case, that is a very bad idea. This book won the Tournament of Books for good reason. I can't stop thinking about it. I'm almost done and I'm a little scared to continue but I need to know how it ends.
3. We watched "Pursuit of Happyness" - pretty good. Hard to watch without thinking about Sophie and how we would handle the same situation. Will Smith was very good and his son is adorable.
4. We also watched "Casino Royale" and holy crap - I have the hots for James Bond. I kept making involuntary "Uhhhn." noises every time he turned up in another hot outfit or basically just stood there. Yummy, yummy, yummy. Very good movie as well. I've never been a big fan of the Bond series but this one was really great.
5. I have tomorrow off! And I don't even go to church! The founders of our company are Catholic and Good Friday is an official day off. I've decided that I'm going to go shopping in the morning at the BIG MALL and then pick Sophie up early from daycare. AND I just got a lovely profit sharing bonus from work and it is going to be a very good Friday, indeed.

Mother Nature can still kiss my ass. Snow. In April. Hmmmph.

Backseat Vignette

Aaron was at school all day yesterday grading papers. So Sophie and I headed down from the hill to attempt some shopping: Target, Old Navy and Trader Joe's. She handled herself as well as any toddler who has just discovered the thrill of running. The new rule is: you can run, but you have to hold my hand. That mostly worked. Bringing her along, without the help of the very tall wrangler, helps my checking account balance stay plump.

Shopping semi-accomplished, I fly her back to the car and deposit her into the car seat. "Fie, Mommy!" "Moo!" (her car seat has a cow print). "Seat! Sit. Clip. Hi, Mommy. Uhh, hug. Gasses? (glasses) Keys?"

"Ah-boort?" (Her Albert Einstein doll, reintroduced at lunch in the car. His moustache is now white with yogurt highlights. She is into sharing her food.)

"Albert is right here, sweetheart."

"Aww, Ah-boort. Uhhh, hug. 'kay, bye bye Mommy."

I get myself situated in the front seat and we start backing out of the parking space.

"Beep! Beep! Beep! Car, back, Mommy. Broooom, car."

The talking and chatter from the backseat continues, non-stop. I attempt to answer some of her questions, but then realize she's talking to Albert. I turn up the radio a bit and settle in for the drive home.

"Pants? Where? Oh no! Ah-boort! I-steinnnn. Cacker? Yummy. Water? Ahhhhhh! Pants? Where?"

"High Five! High Five! High Five! High Five!"

"Lap? Seep? Piddow. Banket? Nap. Awww, Ah-boort."

"Dance! Dance! Hop! Hop! Hop! Walka-walka-walka."

"High Five! High Five! High Five! High Five!"

I'd like a web cam for my car, please.