I'll Never Join You!

Last night, I was giving Jack a bath, and he apparently decided it was time to ramp up the cuteness. Jack has a set of drums that he can play in the bathtub, and he grabbed one of the sticks.

Jack: That ite-sader. Ho, hee, ho, hee!
Me: Are you saying lightsaber?
Jack: Yes!
Me: Are you Darth Vader?
Jack: Yes, Luke. Here. Here Mommy’s ite-sader.
Me: I get to be Luke?
Jack: Yes, Luke. Ho, hee, ho hee!

Is that not the most awesome thing ever? I was psyched that I got to be Luke. Usually when we do pretend stuff like that, it’s to play Dora the Explorer, and I always get stuck being lame-ass Dora. Jack is Boots, Daddy is Swiper, and Mommy is stuck being Dora and saying "Vamanos!" all the time. But Luke Skywalker, that's genuinely cool.

Also funny, Jack would drop his lightsaber (which made me think, “Ooh, just like Return of the Jedi”), and I’d hand it to him. Jack would say, “Thanks, Luke!” and I’d say, “You’re welcome, Darth Vader.” Those are not words I ever thought I’d say.

Never Mind

Remember not so long ago when Jack initiated potty training and was doing an awesome job of it?

Well, for no apparent reason, he decided that he didn't like it any more after all. He quit asking to go, and if we suggested it? Well, there's something exceptionally pathetic about a kid crying, "Noo! No pee-pee potty!"

Steve got the brunt of it, since he's home with Jack all day. There is absolutely nothing pleasant about having Jack scream and cry every time you suggest he relieve himself in an appropriate way. No offers of stickers, special books, or even the knowledge that Buzz Lightyear underwear exists could sway him.

So you know what? We quit. Jack and I talked it over, and I told him that if he preferred to use diapers, that was okay. When he's ready to use the big boy potty, he should let us know. Until then, we'll just go with the diapers.

I have no idea what triggered this change, and frankly I don't think it matters much. Other than this, he's doing just fine. No new behavior problems or anything like that. And he's still really little. It's not like he won't figure out what to do eventually. I think he just wasn't quite ready to make the leap. But when he does, that Buzz Lightyear underwear is all his.

Mother's Day

Steve and Jack were extremely good to me on Mother's Day. Jack made me a butterfly and a tissue paper flower at the Family Museum, which thrilled me. The boys also gave me a Pooh mug, some candles (all selected by Jack), and a really pretty outfit (selected by Steve, luckily, or it would have just been an Elmo t-shirt). I got to spend a lot of time just hanging out with my little guy, reading books and playing, then we went out for dinner, where Jack was a semi-good boy.

It is wonderful to be pampered and doted on for Mother's Day, but it also made me think about how really lucky I am to be Jack's mom. I love the way he reaches his little hand up to hold mine, squeezing my fingers. His saying, "BIG HUG!" The way he absentmindely strokes my arms when he's sitting on my lap. His bringing me chubby fistfuls of flowers. And that occasionally, out of nowhere, he says, "Mommy pretty," and makes me feel like I really, really am.

Super Grover, Ready for Action

The boys and I enjoy the theater, as demonstrated last night by our trip to the Adler Theater to see the latest rendition of Sesame Street Live -- Super Grover, Ready for Action.

Jack, is, of course, a SSL veteran, having already attended "Everyone Makes Music" at the Patriot Center in Fairfax. We told him that we were going to go see Elmo sing and dance on the stage, and he was totally psyched. He patiently waited for us to dress him in an Elmo-Cookie Monster shirt, grabbed Roary, said goodbye to Buzz Lightyear and Woody, and was, like Super Grover, ready for action.

The whole way there, Jack talked to Roary and to the plastic snakes in the car about how he was going to go see Elmo. And Big Bird! And Cookie Monster! And Zoe!

He was not at all impatient waiting for the show to start, happily dancing to the background music, looking at the other kids, and playing with Roary.

When the show started, Jack happily clapped and yelled, "Yay!" as all of his favorite characters took the stage. They sang several classic Sesame Street songs (including "I Don't Want to Live on the Moon," which is one of my favorites), and Jack bopped along.

Also, this might sound nuts, but I thought that this show was superior to "Everyone Makes Music." Better story, better characterization, better use of Muppets.

All the way home, Jack talked excitedly about his favorite parts of the show. He liked it when Cookie Monster ate all of the colors (ie fruit and vegetables) and thought he was funny. He loved it when Oscar took over Elmo's World and Elmo had to save it (so did I). But for whatever reason, the scene when Grover threw his cape in the trash and Oscar threw it back out at him really stuck with Jack. I know this because Jack mentioned it about 47,000 times on the drive home.

Kind of Good

When I got home from work last night, Jack had a brand new bag to be obsessed with. And it was a really good one -- from the Disney Store, and featuring his new favorites Buzz and Woody from Toy Story. As usual, Jack was engaged in putting stuff in the bag and dumping it out again. And repeat. Over. And over. And over.

As you can imagine, it's mind-numbing.

So, I decided to mix it up. I told Jack that we were playing a game. I then challenged him to find certain things to go in the bag by my descriptions. Someone who's wearing a hat? Woody! Somebody who is friends with Bert? Ernie! Someone who is the same color as Jack's shirt? That one was harder, but he got it -- Elmo!

Jack thought our new game was the coolest thing ever. Several times when he figured out my "clues," he'd break out the full on "I Did It!" Dora The Explorer Dance Of Triumph. For my part, I was considerably less bored and was able to feel like he was learning from what he was doing.

When Steve got home and I told him this story, he said, "Huh. You were kind of a good mom today, weren't you?"

I opted not to kick his ass because I'm hoping for good Mother's Day presents.

Stuff I Love

It's Friday afternoon, and I'm in a good mood. But at the same time, not in the mood to write something really long and substantial. So, I think now is a good time to write a quick list of Stuff I Love right now.

1. The way Jack pronounces the word "orange." It comes out more like "orgish," and it's a word that comes up pretty often. Roary, after all, is orgish, so he loves all things that color.

2. Neutrogena hair products. I have no idea why, but I was recently afflicted with some crankling static hair. Isn't that supposed to happen in the winter? Well, I looked on my Internet Machine to see what I could do to fix it, and got the recommendation to switch to a clarifying shampoo and a mega-conditioning conditioner. Bought Neutrogena, and boom - problem solved. It smells good and clean, too.

3. The Nike + for in iPod. I am about to crank up the running in order to train for a marathon, so i finally got around to hooking up the Nike + that my brother gave me for Christmas. Yes, the Christmas that takes place in December. Anyway, it's the coolest toy ever, and allows me to track my pace, miles, time spent running, and uploads all of it to the nifty Nike website. I can also hold down the center button to listen to a "Power Song" when I need an extra boost. Mine right now is "All These Things That I've Done" by The Killers, and I don't anticipate getting sick of it any time soon.

4. The Target here has a Starbucks in it. How hot is that?

5. Jack's "mommy" song. Every once in a while, out of nowhere, Jack sings the word "Mommy" over and over again to the tune of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star." It is so adorable, almost as adorable as the word "orgish."

6. Any kids' books by Mo Willems. They have great typography, funny but simple illustrations, and best of all, are written in such a way that it's easy to read them out loud and have them be funny. I don't get tired of reading them over and over again, which is of course a very good thing.

7. The proliferation of small, independently owned coffee shops in the area. Sure, Target with Starbucks in it is pretty much heaven on earth, but I love being able to support local businesses. There is a place I like to go to on my way to work. Along with my coffee, they give me a napkin and a mint so I can enjoy my coffee like a gentleman. Isn't that lovely?

8. The unexpected response I got to my celebrity gossip post. Apparently several of you are just as intrigued by it as I am. I'll have to post more musings as I have them.

Celebrity Gossip

My friend K has helped me to accept the guilty pleasure that is celebrity gossip. Technically, I know that I have no business spending any of my time pondering the train wrecks that are Britney Spears and Lindsay Lohan. Or wondering if Sarah Michelle Gellar is pregnant. Or hoping that Katie Holmes manages to break free from her captors. They aren't people that I know, so it's none of my concern what they do with their lives, and maybe SMG just wore a slightly loose top one day, that doesn't exactly make her pregnant.

And yet, I find it good fun to read about the latest exploits of Brad, Angelina, and their gorgeous children, or to make jokes about Alec Baldwin's parenting skills, or to marvel at the freakishly skinny shoulder blades of Posh Spice Beckham.

Anyway, I've lately been thinking about celebrity relationships, and I'll tell you, some of them seem kind of fake to me. Like these people weren't all so much in love than they were looking for publicity. Their relationships seem almost political. Consider who some of them have dated.

Ben Affleck dated Gwyneth Paltrow back in the day. Does she have anything at all in common with Ben's later girlfriends (and wife) Jennifer Lopez or Jennifer Garner? Can you imagine those three women having anything in common?

Or take Jennifer Lopez herself. She dated PuffyDaddyDiddy, then Ben, then Skeletor/Marc Anthony. Really? Those three guys seem completely different. Would they all really be interested in the same woman, other than for her hotness?

It's funny how they loop together, too. Gwyneth Paltrow, who seems incompatible with Ben Affleck seems equally incompatible with Brad Pitt. And how did the guy who dated her also wind up with Jennifer Aniston and then Angelina Jolie?

They're like arranged marriages, I think?

Finally, I am upset to an unreasonable degree about the fact that John Mayer is dating Jessica Simpson. John Mayer is a talented singer-songwriter. He's also really funny and has written great stuff for Esquire. Why oh why is he with an empty-headed girl with big boobs?

Mama Bear

Last night, Steve and I took Jack to McManus Park. This park has been one of our best discoveries since we moved, because it is freaking awesome. It's absolutely huge, with all kinds of really fun playground equipment, all on top of a spongey surface (as opposed to the ever-popular mulch). The play structure is so big that we can play hide and seek on it.

Jack's favorite thing to do is to boldly climb all the way to the top of the very tallest twisty slide. Roary will wait for him about halfway down, and they'll slide down together. The slide is really high up, probably at least 15 feet, so it takes Jack a while to climb up there. Last night, he was working his way up the steps when two bigger kids (and by bigger I mean a maximum age of six) shoved past him to go down the slide. One of them practically stepped on him in his hurry to get to the slide.

Well let me tell you, my protective Mama Bear instincts came out in full force.

"HEY!" I yelled, "Watch it. He's littler than you."

To their credit, they were pretty nice kids. Both of them apologized and seemed truly sincere about it.

I was absolutely furious. Never have I wanted more to knock out a little kid than I did in that moment. I don't care if you're only six. You mess with my cub, you mess with me.

I Did It!

My mom has recently invented a new "chore" for Jack to do. There are eleventy zillion rocks in her garden area, and Jack's job is to wash them. We have stressed to him that it's very important to get them nice and clean, and it's a task that he takes very seriously.

Last night, I helped him fill his plastic wheelbarrow (an excellent score at a yard sale for a mere $1 on the part of Yard Sale Master Mom) with water and handed him a toothbrush so that he could really get the rocks nice and clean.

Jack was quickly engrossed in the job, so Mom and I were talking and only paying passing attention to him. Next thing you know, Jack gave a triumphant "I did it!"

What'd he do? He figured out how to operate the hose himself, a skill that he immediately demostrated by spraying his grandma, the side of the house, and Roary. We will definitely regret letting him get his little paws on the hose.

In other news, remember how Roary's Mommy-Daddy can be found at the zoo, in the pages of many books, and on TV? Well, Roary's mother also apparently lives in the soap dispenser on our bathroom sink. Every time Jack washes his hands, Roary has to spend some time talking to his mommy. Steve is about ready to kill me for buying that soap.

The Screwtape Letters

I read The Screwtape Letters recently for book club. Like many books I've read for various clubs, it's not one I would have chosen. However, in this case, I was not pleasantly surprised by enjoying it.

The concept is really cool. The book is made up of a series of letters that Screwtape, a senior demon, has written to his nephew Wormwood. Wormwood is trying to tempt his "patient," an Everyman, to their side in the battle of good and evil. Sounds fun, right?

Well, it isn't.

Even though the book was short (about 100 pages), I found myself skimming to get through it because it was so verbose. It was incredibly preachy, and it was very clear that CS Lewis was trying to push a Christian agenda in the book. At the same time, it was really boring. I won't be reading this one again.

The Namesake

I'm a bit behind on posting about books, so I might have missed a few that I read. Oh, well. My most recent book is The Namesake, which I picked up because my mom had a copy of it and I was looking for something to read.

For the most part, it was excellent.

The Namesake is Gogol Ganguli. His parents are Indian immigrants to the United States. Gogol was supposed to be a pet name, chosen because of a connection his father had to the Russian writer Gogol. But for various reasons, Gogol's name stuck. It's appropriate because the name mirrors the difficulty Gogol has in finding his place in the world. It's not Indian, but it's not American either, and neither is Gogol.

Gogol struggles for his entire life to find his place in the world. He finds his parents awkward and embarassing at times and is reluctant to leave his friends for extended trips to Calcutta. But in India, he is so moved by the Taj Mahal that he ends up being an architect. He falls in love with a very waspy girl and winds up living with her and her parents in what appears to be a true life Woody Allen movie. He's happy with her, but still feels this concept of "other"-ness. And when his father dies, he realizes that his ties to his own family were stronger than he'd realized.

For a while, it looks like Gogol has managed to find his place in the world, when he marries an Indian girl. But their relationship is doomed by the fact that neither of them have quite accepted who they are yet.

As I was coming to the end of the book, I kept hoping that Gogol would somehow find his place in the world. That somehow, things would be resolved. It never happened, and in retrospect, that seemed appropriate to me.

Meet the Parents

Jack and I have started a delightful new Sunday routine. He and I go out and do something fun in the morning while Steve writes. Even better, when I put Jack down for his nap, Steve and I then go out together, usually to hunt for a new Stately Wasser Manor.

This week, we went to Niabi Zoo. It's a small zoo, but hey -- Jack is a small kid. Besides, the zoo has pretty much any animal you'd want to see, a train, a carousel, and is a 10 minute drive from Temporary Wasser Manor, so what's not to love? Plus, we got a membership to the zoo, the Family Museum, and another museum, so it's free for us to go. Jack, in fact, had already been earlier in the week with Steve.

Jack and I spent some time looking at the elephants and monkeys, then he told me firmly, "Go see Roary Mommy Daddy now." Jack then proceeded to tell me exactly how to get to the tiger exhibit. I stopped along the way to look at a map, but I shouldn't have bothered, because the kid knew where he was going.

When we got there, both tigers were out. Jack and Roary were thrilled. We spent a long time with Jack holding Roary up to the cage as Roary delightedly said, "That Mommy Daddy! Hi, Mommy! Hi, Daddy!"

Before you start spinning some elaborate (and tragic) backstory about how Roary's parents came to live in the zoo, let me tell you: Roary's Mommy-Daddy are everywhere. Any time we see a tiger or even an orange cat on TV, in a book, wherever, Roary is very excited and declares that it's his "Mommy-Daddy!" In fact, the cat doesn't even have to be orange -- Roary spends a lot of time talking to the purple cat in Brown Bear.

After a long visit with the tigers, Jack, Roary, and I spent more time exploring. We saw kangeroos, including a baby in its mother's pouch. That was cool -- I don't think I'd ever seen that in person before. We watched a bear play in the water. Jack was brave and fed a goat at the petting zoo. And Jack loved the reptile house, where we spent a lot of time watching a turtle try to get off its back. All in all, it was a really great day. I am tempted to go again next Sunday.

Reserved For Family

One of the reasons that Steve and I decided to initiate Operation Relocation was to be closer to family. Since Jack was born, that's been more and more important to us. So far, this change has manifested itself in small ways. We tend to have a big Sunday dinner as a family, which has been nice. I loved having cause to buy a 10 pound ham for Easter. And Yoda knows it's been great having built-in babysitters so Steve and I can go on the occasional date.

Yesterday, though, was extra nice. It was my stepdad Doug's last official day at work before retiring, and his co-workers had a coffee to honor/roast him. Ordinarily, it'd be the kind of thing that I'd think, "Oh, that would have been nice to go to." But since we live here now, we were actually able to be there.

The staff at John Deere, where Doug worked, really went all out. Doug has, for reasons not worth explaining, dubbed himself Lord of the Crystal Swamp. The room where they had the part was decorated to look very swampy, down to the plastic frogs on the tables that Jack gleefully gathered up. Mom and Doug sat on matching thrones at the front of the room, and Steve, Jack, and I got to sit at a table with a sign on it proclaming, "Reserved for Family."

There were several very funny speeches from Doug's co-workers, and Steve and I both also spoke about Doug and his retirement. It was obvious that Doug was really well-regarded and respected. I was really happy to be able to see that for myself and to help Doug give the send-off that he deserves.

Welcome Home

One of the best parts of my day is Jack's reaction when I get home from work. Usually, he's in the middle of something fun, so he's a bit distracted. Watching Monsters with Daddy, riding his trike with Grandma, something like that. So, he'll say a casual, "Hi, Mommy."

Then, he realizes what he's just seen. He'll race away from what he was doing and will get to me as fast as his little legs will carry him.

"Mommy home!" he'll yell, often accompanied by a Flying Tackle Hug. Sometimes, he'll then give me a follow up question, such as, "No more work?"

"No more work," I'll assure him. "Mommy is home."

Then the Cub and I will go off to play together.

Pictures

Now that I've finally gotten around to learning how to get pictures off of my new digital camera, here's a photo essay of what's been going on.



Look at how empty Stately Wasser Manor was when we were ready to leave! Here is Jack, pretending to be a "bad guy," and chasing his daddy all around the empty house.



Behold, more empty space. Just wild.



Here's Jack hunting for Easter eggs. Actually being able to walk and pick up eggs, unlike his previous two attempts.


Easter morning, Jack scored eggs with stickers in them, a Dora DVD, Play-Doh eggs, and some matchbox cars. At the end of the day, he told me, "Jack like it Easter Bunny."




This is when Jack was pretending Roary was a baby. If you look closely, you can probably see a bit of orange fur under those tissues.


Jack proves once again that he's my son by immediately falling in love with Whitey's Ice Cream.



This picture I thought was supercool. Jack is sitting in the wheel well of a gigantic combine at John Deere Commons. The tires on the thing were taller than I am.

Big Boy

Jack continues to amaze me. Thanks to his sudden and passionate interest in using the potty, I bought him one over the weekend. He has totally taken to it. Yesterday, as a matter of fact, he stayed clean and dry all day long. This morning, there was a minor incident (due to the fact, I think, that I couldn't get him to the bathroom soon enough because someone was in there with the door locked), and he's otherwise stayed clean.

So far, this has taken almost no effort on our part. Sure, it's not over, and I'm not ready to buy him the big boy underpants yet (he has requested Elmo), but considering how little time he's been at it, Jack is doing a truly remarkable job. I am really proud of him.

At the rate he's going, in the next few days I expect him to announce that he's taught himself to read and to ask if he can use my credit card to pre-order the new Harry Potter.

Surprisingly Cool

Steve and I have made the discovery that our new home, the Quad Cities, is suprisingly cool. If you don't live in the midwest and have become (purely by accident on my part) a bit of a snob about it, you certainly wouldn't expect a section of Illinois that is nowhere near Chicago and a couple of cities in Iowa to have any kind of cool factor. And yet...

There are more independent coffee bars here than there are in all of Northern Virginia. Sure, there are fewer Starbuckses, but Starbucks isn't exactly cool, is it? Almost all of the public libraries here are new and gorgeous AND include yet more coffee shops. Why did no one think of that idea before?

There's a lot more for us, as a family, to do than there was in our old neck of the woods. On a cold day, we were pretty much limited to taking Jack to the play area at the mall (unless we wanted to take a pissed off toddler on a really long road trip). Now the options abound. We can keep things simple and take him to look at the fish, cats, and bunnies at Teske's, a garden store that sells pets. There is a play area at the mall here, too. The library has a gigantic children's section, including. Or, we can get more creative. Steve tells me that the Children's Museum in Bettendorf is amazing. I had a great time taking Jack to John Deere Pavillion to climb on all of the tractors they had displayed. There is a cute little zoo to go to when the weather gets nice, plus several other museums we haven't visited yet. All that, plus plenty of parks, walks along the river, and so on.

And life is indeed simpler and slower. This morning was really a great one for me. I woke up, got dressed, and had time to drink coffee, read the paper, and cook a pot of steel-cut oatmeal. Then, I woke up Jack and got him dressed. He wanted both waffles and eggs for breakfast, and I not only had enough time to make them for him, but also to watch a bit of Dora before work. That drive to work took about 13 minutes and included a nice drive along the Mississippi River, where I watched a barge drift along.

Plus, Jack just called to tell me that he went poopy in the potty. Life is good.

Surprise!

Last night, Jack was getting ready for his bath. He asked Steve if he could go pee-pee in the potty. Steve held him up under the arms, and lo and behold...

Jack went pee-pee in the potty!

This fabulous accomplishment was met with a great deal of cheering, as well as singing by Mommy and Daddy. And this morning, I made sure Jack told Grandma and Grandpa the big news so they could cheer for him, too. Jack, of course, was incredibly pleased with himself.

Jack going in the toilet was a completely unexpected development, considering that we have done absolutely nothing to encourage it. We don't have a potty chair, no potty-related books or movies in the house, and have really not talked to him about it much yet. Jack was completely self-motivated. I'm really proud of him.

At this point, we're not ready to go for broke and buy a whole lot of underwear and get ready to go laundry... unless that's what Jack seems to want. He's still young, especially for a boy, so we are really going to let him decide how much he wants to do right now. Steve and I are going to buy him a potty this weekend, so he'll have the option if he wants it.

Ro Baby

Jack is really ramping up his efforts to be the Cutest Thing Ever. He has started a new thing in which he pretends that Roary -- usually a tiger and his BFF -- is a baby.

He will cradle Roary in his arms very tenderly. You'll hear a quiet, high pitched little, "Wah, wah," because Roary is crying. And Jack will tell you very solemnly, "Roary baby."

Last night, Jack took Baby Roary and very gently put him in a little blue bin, just the right size for a baby tiger bassinet. He then covered Baby Roary with enough Kleenex to make a blanket, gave him a tiny kiss, and told him good night. Jack whispered to me, "Shh! Roary sleeping."

I just about died from the cuteness. But then, Baby Roary woke up and started crying. Jack had me hold him for a minute, making sure I cradled him the same way he does. Then, Jack carefully took Baby Roary in his arms and started singing "Rock A Bye Baby" to him.

Jack is a good little guy.

Jack vs. Vac

Jack and I had some mommy-son time, something that's incredibly rare at Temporary Wasser Manor these days. Steve was out at a coffee shop doing some writing, and my mom and Doug went out for a dinner date, so it was just me and my little man. I made macaroni and cheese for dinner because, as he put it enthusiastically, "Jack like it mac and cheese."

A couple of times, Jack asked for Daddy, Grandma, or Grandpa. I told him that they were bye-bye and that we were going to spend the evening together, just mommy and Jack. He seemed to like that idea, because it prompted him to compose a song about me, which consisted of him singing the word "Mommy" over and over again to the tun of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star." He is such the charmer sometimes.

After dinner, I decided to do a little cleaning, so I got out the vacuum cleaner. I told Jack that he could help me push it and warned him that it would make a loud noise. Jack was listening when I told him that, but when faced with the actual loud noise, he was kind of nervous. He was okay for a while, but eventually it was just too scary and he indicated that I should put it away.

I unplugged the vacuum and Jack immediately started to bitch it out. Jack told the vacuum that it was too loud and "not nice," and that it was a "bad guy" and repeatedly told it, "Go away!" Roary and I were like, "Yeah, you tell him, Jack!" I put the vacuum in the closet and Jack proudly slammed the door behind it.

He then basked in his triumph over the evil vacuum cleaner, declaring, "I did it!"

Genius!

Look what I found at the grocery store!

Coffee.
Flavored.
Milk.

Yoda bless Swiss Valley Farms and the team of geniuses working there who came up with the idea of adding coffee flavoring to milk, because that is pretty much the only way you can get Betsy to drink milk. You have saved me from becoming a hunchbacked old lady. My only regret is that this wonderful product was not available when I was pregnant.

Calgon, Take Me Away... No, Farther

It's such a cliche. Women are supposed to take time for themselves, perhaps relaxing with a lovely bubble bath. On Sunday night, I decided to do just that. As I sank into the lovely grapefruit-scented bubbles, my reverie was interrupted with, "Hi, Mommy!"

Jack had barged his little diapered ass right into the bathroom. He asked me what I was doing and if I was going to get "all clean." I assured him I would, but Jack decided to make sure by chucking all manner of bath products into the tub after me.

I'm pretty sure that's not how it was supposed to go.

But hey! It turns out that working a job with fewer hours and without a stupidly long commute does indeed relax me, put me in a better mood, and give me more time to spend with the boys. Looks like this plan is going to work!

Make That Three Unemployed Adults...

Temporary Wasser Manor no longer includes four unemployed adults and a toddler, because I got a new job! I start on Monday and am totally excited.

This is great news for all of us. Steve and I really didn't anticipate either of us getting a job this soon. Now we won't have to dip into our savings to pay monthly expenses, instead using that money to buy the eventual new Stately Wasser Manor, or to buy a new car, or something cool like that. It also takes the pressure off of Steve so he can spend more time writing and looking for the right job, not just something to pay the bills.

Steve, Jack, and I celebrated last night by going out for pizza and ice cream. Years ago, I would not have thought that was a worthy celebration, thinking I'd need some fancy restaurant, at least not one with paper napkins. But this was all about our family and it was just nice being with my guys.

Temporary Wasser Manor

We did it! Steve, Jack, and I have moved halfway across the country. Stately Wasser Manor is sold, and we are currently residing in Temporary Wasser Manor, also known as my mom and step-dad's house.

Things are going surprisingly well, especially considering that we have four unemployed adults (Doug and Nancy are now retired) and a toddler living under one roof. If that's not the makings of a sitcom, I don't know what is. Everyone is respecting each other's space, and we're all making an effort to be considerate and clean up after ourselves. Well, except for Jack, who is content to scatter crayons all over the place.

Steve and I were both really concerned about how Jack would adjust to the new environment. There are just so many changes, and the only things that are really familiar are Mommy, Daddy, and Roary. For the first few days, he was incredibly clingy. He tugged at me constantly, saying, "Mommy! Come on!" He got upset when either of us left the room. He also kept referring to stuff that was "at home." He and Steve were driving, and he wanted to stop watching Nemo and switch to Monsters, Inc. Steve couldn't switch it, so he said, "Sorry, buddy. No Monsters right now." Jack said, "Monsters at home," which just about broke Steve's heart.

But things are getting much better. The biggest improvment came on Sunday when the "big orgish truck" arrived with all of Jack's toys, his crib, and the furniture for his room. Jack felt a lot more secure and was happy to rediscover all of his stuff. We have also been working hard to emphasize that this is "Jack's new house." I was very happy yesterday when we were driving home, and Jack pointed at the house and said, "That Jack's house. Right there." He is still clingier than usual, and he's prone to a major tantrum at about 6:00 every night, but that's to be expected, and it's better than I feared it might be.

As for Steve and me, we quickly came to the conclusion that the midwest is a much better place for us to be. No more do we have to leave at least half an hour in advance of doing anything. Five minutes will get you just about anywhere. And it is remarkable how much friendlier everyone is. On my drive here, I stopped at a toll booth in Indiana. I asked the man working there for directions to a hotel. He looked me in the eye, made a joke, and smiled at me as he answered my question. It's rather sad how much that affected me. Everyone we've encountered has been the same way -- friendly, helpful, and not irritated with us. Despite the fact that I don't have a job and have an occasionally tantruming clinger monkey kid, my stress level is lower than it was on an ordinary day in Virginia. I am really happy that the three of us have made this change.

Still Here

This has been a busy -- but great -- week. Steve and I are officially done working as of last Friday. I've got a great lead on a job, so everybody cross your fingers. The morons at Verizon, after a stunning display of incompetence and poor customer service, finally got our internet up again (the best part was when they asked me if I'd be using service with Verizon at our new address; I almost laughed). And Operation Relocation is well underway.

Steve and I wake up, have breakfast, and make waffles for Jack. Whichever of us draws the short straw takes him to school, where he is horribly clingy. This morning, not even a table full of Play-Doh would loosen his grasp on my leg. Then we spend the morning packing like crazy. We've given ourselves enough time that if we follow our packing schedule, we have the afternoon off. So far, we've gone out for good lunches, wandered through a small town shopping, watched a movie, and generally just relaxed. Even though I'm packing and there are a lot of loose ends to tie up, I am more relaxed and free of stress than I've been in weeks. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come.

Pregnancy Brain

My friend Karen and I once had a discussion about "pregnancy brain" and if it really exists. She and I agreed that pregnant women sometimes find themselves being absent-minded and forgetting things because their brains are simply overwhelmed with everything they've got going on. When you're pregnant, the fact that you are growing another human being is always in the back of your head, so stuff like where you parked the car just gets pushed out.

Karen and I felt pretty triumphant about the fact that neither of us experienced this phenomenon. She and I, at the time, had the same job, one that required us to keep track of a tremendous amount of projects, all full of tiny details, and all in different stages of production. Being pregnant, for us, was just one more project, certainly not one to be preoccupied with. And by the way, the fact that Karen could be 40, pregnant, and about to be a single mom and not be preoccupied with all of that is a testament to her ass-kickery.

The trouble is that now, even though I am not pregnant, I seem to have a case of pregnancy brain. Between my last week of work, trying to find another job, taking care of the barnacle like clinger monkey that is Jack, packing, moving, trying to find mirror boxes that I don't have to pay $100 to have shipped, and a gazillion other things, my brain is full.

This morning, I got dressed, cajoled Jack to get dressed and get in the car with a combination of gummy vitamins and the Dora "We Did It!" song, only to discover that I could not find my keys. They weren't in my pocket. They weren't in my purse. Great. Now what? Well, I did have my spare key in my wallet, one that the fine folks at Saturn give you for emergencies just like this. I could use that key to drive Jack to school, go to my eye appointment, then to and from work. I wouldn't be the first to arrive in the office, so not having that key was fine, and Steve gets home before me, so no house key necessary. I would, as the sexsay gay visionary Tim Gunn would say, make it work.

Then I realized that I must have had my keys at some point, since I used them to unlock the car. I vowed to search for them, maybe in the front yard, after taking Jack to school. But there was no need. My keys? I was sitting on them.

Vacation from the Vacation

Steve, Jack, and I took a road trip last weekend to Allentown to visit Steve's parents, Bill and Diane. By the time it was over, I think we were all completely worn out. Time for the proverbial vacation from the vacation.

The drive there was a lot of work. Jack really never got the message that little kids love the car and usually fall asleep. Instead, I sat in the backseat with him and did my best to entertain him for the four hour drive. We sang songs, played with Roary, and looked for cows out the window. Then, Jack was no longer amused by that, and I was honestly too worn out to do anything more, so it was time to bust out the heavenly portable DVD player. Jack and I watched a Sesame Street alphabet DVD (featuring Stephen Colbert!), then The Lion King. We didn't get to town until Jack's bedtime, but despite that, Steve's parents thought we should all go out to dinner.

Let's think about that for a minute, shall we? Behold, the potential pitfalls:
• Jack is a two-year old.
• It was bedtime.
• Jack had just been cooped up in a car for four hours.
• Jack's behavior at restaurants is a roll of the dice.

Steve and I remembered our important resolution, which is I am in charge and I know what I'm doing. We told them that we most certainly would not be going out to eat, and asked them to pick up some sandwiches for us.

The next day was filled with similar challenges. The B&D had planned for us to go out for breakfast and for Diane's daughter and her family to come over for dinner, but didn't have anything else on the agenda. Jack tends to get bored and destructive when faced with an activity-free day at our house, despite the fact that it's filled with toys. The B&D's house is not only not filled with toys, but it is instead filled with breakable ceramic objects. And not just any breakable ceramic objects, but ones shaped appealingly like Mickey Mouse. And, bonus, Jack refused to take a nap. Steve and I worked our butts off trying to keep him entertained so he wouldn't have a gigantic tantrum and start chucking Mickeys at the wall.

The other kids arrived, thank Yoda. The littler ones had fun playing with Jack and immediately opened the drawer in the coffee table Jack had been playing around all day, revealing it to be full of crayons and coloring books. Don't you think that maybe that was some information that I could have used?

Once the visit was over, it was time for another long car ride (this one at least broken up by a visit to Boyd's Bear Country). At home, it became clear that Jack was pretty stressed out about the whole thing. He did not want Steve and me to be out of his sight, apparently worried we'd leave him. Jack and I were watching Dora (the TV was my friend), and Steve went outside to get a ladder. Jack completely flipped out, crying, "Daddy! Daddy!" and "Jack coming! He coming!" We had to reassure him several times that no one was leaving Jack anywhere and that we are a team -- Mommy, Daddy, Jack, and Roary, and that we stick together. Even still, he was incredibly touching and prone to tantrums at the drop of a hat.

I am completely worn out and somehow managed to gain three pounds over the weekend. I need a nap.

Operation Relocation

Big, big changes are coming at Stately Wasser Manor. It's kind of weird that I haven't written about it yet, but I think the change is so big that it's hard for me to get my head around it. Much easier to focus on the little things, like the fact that Jack had a record three tantrums in half an hour this morning. But here it is:

Stately Wasser Manor is moving.

Moving a lot, in fact. The boys and I are moving from Northern Virginia to the midwest, specifically to my homeland of the Quad Cities.

The change is going to be really good for us. Steve and I are increasingly frustrated with Northern Virginia. It's really crowded and congested here, making just about anything we might want to do a giant pain in the ass. We spend far too much time in the car driving too and from work, and there's just no telling if traffic will be bad or not. today, for example, it took me three times longer than usual to get to work for no apparent reason -- no bad weather, no accidents, just inexplicably clogged roads. Things that should be simple are daunting. Steve suggested a few weeks ago that Jack and I meet him at the mall for dinner and a little shopping on a Friday night. I realized that in order for me to leave work, pick up Jack, and drive to the mall -- which theoretically is not far away -- I'd have to take off work early.

This is also a very expensive place to live. Home values are such that, honestly, one of us would have to have an unexpected windfall for us to be able to afford a single-family home, compared to the townhouse that we have now. SWM is big enough for us now, but I would love for Jack to have a back yard and for Steve to have a room to use as an office. When we move, we'll be able to get a whole lot more house for our money.

In theory, we live in a big area, and there are lots of things for us to do. Great restaurants, museums, and so on. But the reality is, it's so much effort to get to any of those things that we just don't do it. I don't want to drive more than half an hour to go out to eat, no matter how good the food is. I'd love to take Jack to the zoo, but between the drive time and his nap, it's just not possible. Even getting together with our friends can be a herculean effort, such that most of the time, the boys and I just hang out at home.

The other thing is that we are living in this very busy and stressful environment with absolutely no family support. Steve and I are a great team, but right now, our great team only has its two star players, with no one on the bench. I'd love to be able to leave Jack with his grandparents so we could go out to a movie, or even just a leisurely trip to the grocery store. I have fond memories of Sunday dinner at my Mimi's house, and I would like for Jack to be able to do the same thing. I also think about Jack cutting himself on Sunday. If we lived near family, we could have called my mom and Doug and had them come by and shovel our walk and maybe make us dinner so Steve and I didn't have to stress about it.

After surprisingly little discussion (though it's something we'd both thought about in the past), Steve and I decided that it is time to pull up stakes. Northern Virginia, you won -- we're out of here. We sold Stately Wasser Manor and are looking for new jobs. Our last day of work will be March 9, and the truck comes for all of our stuff on March 21. We'll stay with my mom and step-dad until we find new jobs and a new house.

It is hard for me to look at the big picture because the changes are so big and there's so much to do. But when I imagine where the three of us will be a year from now, the choice is clear. It's time to make a change.

Update!

First of all, thanks everybody for your kind words about Jack. He seems to be doing okay, mainly just feeling a little stir-crazy after being in the house for too long. I'm taking him to see his pediatrician this afternoon, and after that will somehow entertain him so he doesn't get bored and trash the place.

Here's a picture of the little man with his comically oversized bandage. I think that'll go away after he sees Dr. Kelly.



And on a different note, here's a picture of Jack's new Stern Face. He'll adopt this look to tell Swiper, "Hey! No more swiping!" or to say, "Hey! Mommy! No touch it bag." Okay, Jack.

The First Cut is the Deepest

The boys and I woke up yesterday morning to an unexpected snowfall. We planned to have a relaxing, snowbound day at home, maybe go outside for a while to shovel snow and so Jack could burn off some energy. Things, to put it mildly, did not go according to plan.

I was in the bathroom, and I heard Jack start to cry as Steve called for me to come quick and bring a wet washcloth. Jack had been sitting on our bed watching TV with Steve, and he slid off like he usually does, but somehow, he managed to catch his ear on the corner of my nightstand, cutting it. I handed Steve the washcloth so he could apply pressure, and Steve told me to get dressed quickly in case we had to go to the hospital.

The hospital? I took a look at the cut on Jack's ear, about two inches long toward the top. It looked pretty deep, and it looked like he'd somehow managed to cut both the front and the back of the ear. When we got a better look at it later, it turned out that wasn't the case, but that it looked like it because the cut was so deep. In the worst places, he nearly sliced through it. Anyway, I took one look at it and agreed that we were going to the ER.

Steve went outside to clear off the car and get it warmed up. He had me get Jack ready and sent in a neighbor to help me. I was happy that the first person he found was Rich, who besides being a great guy, is a firefighter, so obviously very good in a crisis. Rich did everything I asked without any unneccesary questions, understanding that I just needed someone to help me out. He grabbed a shirt for Jack that buttoned up the front, for example, without asking a whole lot of fashion-related questions. And he did an outstanding job of grabbing snacks from the pantry. Rich isn't a dad yet, but rather a cool uncle. Cool uncles will include a box of raisins and a cereal bar in the bag of treats, but they tend to concentrate more on chocolate. This, of course, made Jack very happy.

Good thing, because it took quite a while to get to the hospital. The roads hadn't been cleared yet, so it was slow going.

Once we finally got to the ER and the doctor examined Jack's ear, I saw just how bad and how deep the cut was. I have no idea how he managed to cut his ear so badly in such a strange way. The examination hurt, and Jack cried, but all was well because the hospital had a DVD player in the room and we had Elmo's World.

The really hard part came, of course, when it was time to close up the wound. The nurses strapped Jack into a papoose board, which pissed him off. The shots to numb the area hurt too, and Jack was so freaked out by that and being strapped down that he screamed the entire time the doctor sewed up his ear. He screamed so hard that he actually burst blood vessels in his face. Steve and I took turns being right next to his face so he could see us and Roary. We talked about how we were going to watch Elmo later. How we'd have pizza for dinner that night. How we'd play Dora The Explorer and Jack would be Boots, Mommy would be Dora, and Daddy would be Swiper. That he was doing great and was very brave.

We both smiled and were cheerful the whole time, but good Yoda, was it a brave front. My poor baby was scared and in pain. I've read that after you have a child, your heart is forever outside your body, and it's really true. If I had the choice, I'd have had them stitch up both of my ears, with no numbing, and I wouldn't have cried a bit if I could have just spared my sweet little Cubaloo.

When it was all done, Jack had about a dozen stitches. They put a ridiculous amount of gauze on his ear (pictures to come). As soon as they unwrapped him from the board and gave him a sticker and a popsicle, he was completely fine. Smiling, even, and intending to hold us to our talk of pizza and playing Dora.

In fact, Jack would recount this entire experience in considerably less detail. Jack would tell you, "Ear boo boo. No touch it. Doctor fix boo boo. Jack get sticker and popsicle. Pink! Yummy!"

Flying Solo

Steve left at the crack of dawn yesterday for a graphic novel conference in New York, so the Cub and I are flying solo. He'll be back either late tonight or sometime tomorrow, depending on how things go.

When Jack was littler-- and when I was a newer mother-- the prospect of taking care of him by myself for a couple of days would be really daunting. How in the name of Yoda was I going to get ready for work in the morning? Could I possibly get him dressed and myself and get coffee and make it out the door in a reasonable period of time? How was I going to make dinner?

Things are so much easier now. For one thing, Jack is a lot more self-sufficient. He doesn't need to be held constantly. I can just hand him a milk instead of feeding him a bottle. But I also feel more confident than I used to. Steve had been worried that the antibiotics Jack is on would give him diaper rash and that I'd have to deal with it by myself. I shrugged that off -- nothing I can't handle.

In fact, Jack and I are enjoying our Mommy-Son time. Last night, I cooked dinner. It says a lot about Jack's sadly limited menu in the past that I am so pleased that he declared the macaroni and cheese I made to be, "Yummy. No is yucky. Is yummy." I gave him a bath (something I definitely would not have done by myself in the past), we played, and the little man gave me a total love wave when it was time for us to hang out and watch TV. I asked if he wanted Elmo or Dora, and he requested, "Kermit movie." That's my boy!

I told him last night that we are getting pizza for dinner. He must have thought about it all night. He woke up this morning, and said, "Hi, Mommy. Jack all clean! Mommy y Jack eat pizza!" I just want to give him a million kisses.

What's That?

Last night, Jack and I were looking through a catalog, playing one of his favorite games, "What's That?"

Well, there's really not much to the game. Jack points at something, says, "What's that?" and I tell him. Sometimes many, many times. "Still a doggie, buddy." I like to mix it up and ask him, "What's that?"

So, last night, he saw this picture:



and excitedly said, "Yoda!"



Yeah, I can see that!

Using His Words

Approximately eight zillion times a day, I tell Jack, "Use your words, buddy." This is so that he will communicate with us in ways other than caveman like grunts and the occasional whining. It seems to be working, because Jack is talking really well. And let me tell you, that comes in handy.

On Sunday, Jack repeatedly told Steve, "Ear hurts. Ear boo boo." The poor little man had a lot of ear infections when he was littler. This winter hasn't been nearly as bad, but it was especially hard when he couldn't communicate with us. All he could do was cry, leaving us to wonder if he was crying because he was sick or for some other mysterious reason. But this time, we knew what was up because Jack told us. We also knew he was in a lot of pain because even my offer of ice cream (Ben and Jerry's, no less) did not stop him from crying.

Even better, we can really see how he's understanding things. Steve made an appointment to take Jack to urgent care on Sunday night. I told Jack we were going to the doctor. Jack nodded and said, "Open mouth, say ahh. Get Elmo sticker." Wow, yeah. That is pretty much what was going to go down. It amazes me that he knew that, because it's not like a trip to the doctor is a regular event.

Jack continued to communicate well at the doctor's office, telling her "Ear hurts" and pointing to his right ear. Sure enough, that ear was infected. We scored some antibiotics, and she recommended Motrin, rather than Tylenol, for the pain. She didn't have any stickers, but luckily Jack has a smart mommy who brought an entire sheet of Elmo stickers for him. Jack didn't want any stickers for himself ("no sticker on jammies,") but Roary requested an Elmo sticker and "Elmo goldfish" on his paw.

Jack and Steve stayed home yesterday, and the little man is feeling much better. Last night, he and I were hanging out coloring, and Jack started sorting through his crayons, counting them as he went. "He's counting to ten," Steve said. "That's really advanced for his age." Of course, my boy is a genius... but even more of a genius than his daddy thought. Because the little man went on counting right past ten. He counted to 11.

"This one goes to eleven."

The Memory Keeper's Daughter

If you're planning on reading this book and don't want key plot points revealed, don't read this. I am going to start spoiling all over the place. You have been warned!

Okay, here's the story. It's 1964, and during a wintery night, accompanied only by a nurse named Caroline, David Henry delivers his twin children. The first is a boy named Paul, born strong and healthy. The second, an unexpected surprise, is a daughter named Phoebe. David needs look at Phoebe only once to see that she has Down Syndrome. Since it's 1964, David's wife, Norah, is not awake for either birth and doesn't know what's happening. David asks nurse Caroline to take Phoebe away to an institution. He tells Norah that their second child was stillborn. David's own sister was born with a heart defect, so he knows the heartbreak that can be caused by the slow death of a beloved child and believes that he is saving Norah from all of that.

This decision, of course, sets a huge chain of events in motion. Caroline takes Phoebe to the institution, but cannot leave her there. She has felt like she has been waiting for her life to start, and in that night, it does. She takes Phoebe away and raises her as her daughter. Norah is distraught at the loss of her daughter. The joy of having a new baby doesn't diminish that pain. She is confused by David's seeming unwillingness to mourn Phoebe. His secret drives a wall between them. Norah throws herself into her career (and a string of affairs), while David develops a passion for photography, photographing nature and parts of the body in harmony.

David believed he made his decision because it was best for everyone, but truly he did it because he thought it was best for him. He didn't want to repeat the tragedy of his sister's death. But the people around him were stronger than he realized. Caroline was a wonderful, patient, and loving mother to Phoebe. She fought for Phoebe to have the right to attend public school and to make her as independent as she could be. Phoebe wasn't the kind of person who could just be locked up in an institution; she was stronger than that, and so was Caroline. Norah's tenacity and success in her workplace was fueled, in part, by a feeling of emptyness. That void certainly could have been filled by the demands of caring for Phoebe. Paul felt a distance from his father, sensed the secrets between them, and was never as close to David as he should have been. David thought he was protecting those he loved, but he was really only protecting himself. In so doing, he utterly failed.

In the end, David dies unexpectedly, before he can share his secret with anybody. Caroline finds Norah and tells her what happened. As the book ends, Norah and Paul are navigating what it will mean to have Phoebe in their lives. Both of them learn a lot from Phoebe in just a short time. Norah learns that Phoebe doesn't need to be rescued and is happy with her life as it is. Paul is fascinated by Phoebe's approach to life. Phoebe lives in a world in which strange and unexpected things, like meeting your birth mother and twin, are the kinds of things that happen every day. She accepts them with a minimum of angst. Paul, following his sister's example, realizes that he loves her in an uncomplicated way.

The strengths of this book are its very concept and some outstanding characterization. It has two weaknesses. One is that it is a little too long and would benefit from a bit of editing. The other is that I was never clear as to why David told Norah they had a second child at all. She was unconscious during Phoebe's birth, so why tell her about it? Why not spare her all of the heartache? I was distracted by that question for quite a while until I had no choice but to willingly suspend disbelief. Nevertheless, this was a story that will stay with me.

Ultimate Spider-Man, Volume 7

My review of Ultimate Spider-Man, Volume 6 was kind of lukewarm. While there were fun elements of it, I really felt like Brian Michael Bendis shied away from the more emotional aspects of the story.

I'm happy to say that with Volume 7, Bendis shows what he can really do. Now this was a good story. Spidey meets Hobgoblin, and what a mess that is for the poor guy. The guy is scary psycho crazy and dangerous, but he is also Peter's friend Harry Osborn. Peter wants to help him, but can he? And in the next story, there are guest stars gallore in a big gang war with the Kingpin. We see Iron Fist, that boring kung-fu guy, Moon Knight (somewhat less lame than the regular Marvel universe version of him), Elektra, Black Cat, and Hammerhead. We see some cool fights, but we also see Peter grappling with whether or not he should follow Kingpin's wishes and take out Hammerhead. After all, Hammerhead is no doubt a bad guy, but is he really going to do what Kingpin wants?

What makes this book so much stronger than the previous volume is what happens in between all of the action scenes. Mary Jane, it turns out, used to date Harry and never told Peter about it. She manages, yet again, to find herself in peril, in part because she didn't heed Peter's advice to stay away from Harry. Peter decides that he loves her too much to put her at risk, so he breaks up with her. Both of them are utterly heartbroken. Peter starts to question whether it shouldn't be "Spider-Man no more," but rather "Peter Parker no more." If he can't handle having both identities, maybe the super heroic one is the one to keep. Can he truly be close to anybody? And where is he without people he loves like MJ and Aunt May? This story had a lot more heart to it, and that made all the difference.

Non-Evil Gift Bag

I have had issues in the past with Jack getting gift bags from school. But last week, Jack received a rare non-evil gift bag.

School was closed for Valentine's Day, so the kids had their celebration the next day. As soon as I picked Jack up at school, he said, "Hi, Mommy," but then more urgently said, "Bag!" Sure enough, Jack had a bag of Valentines that he knew he was going to get as soon as, but not before, his mommy arrived to pick him up. I got the bag off the shelf, and Jack and I were immediately swarmed by other little kids who were yearning for their own bags. I told the other kids that they'd get bags when their mommies or daddies came to get them, but you could tell they didn't quite believe it. Jack basked in the glow of finally having his beloved bag.

As we walked to the car, Jack, clutching the bag, started happily chattering about how he was going to go home and show his bag to Daddy and to Chew Chew Bacca. At home, he was so engrossed by his bag that I was actually able to cook dinner without him hanging, barnacle-like, from my leg.

I also discovered that Jack has now developed the skill to unwrap candy on his own. We adults have a very different approach to eating a sucker than Jack does. I pretty much figure once I put it in my mouth, I am committed to finishing it right away. Jack would beg to differ. He'll enjoy his sucker for a few minutes, but then there is absolutely no reason not to just go ahead and put it back in his bag for a while. The resulting sticky mess does not phase him in the least.

But even more than the candy, Jack was interested in the cards. We looked at each one, and I told him -- just once, mind you -- which of his friends they were from. Then, he'd go through the cards and hold each one up, telling me who gave it to him. Blew my little mind that he was actually able to tell me, for example, that the Cars card with Sally on it was from Brandon and the one with Doc Hudson on it was from Donovan. My boy is a genius. A genius covered in sticky sap, but a genius nevertheless.

Happy Valentine's Day

Yesterday was an incredibly unromantic Valentine's Day.

Our plans were definitely not the stuff you put in the movies. We didn't want to find or pay for a babysitter... and truth be told, we were pretty excited to watch American Idol and Lost... so Steve and I were planning to get a spinach salad, shrimp cocktail, and some kind of fabulous dessert from Costco and have a Living Room Picnic while we indulged in some fun TV. That's called making the best of it, people, and we were happy about it.

Then we got a bunch of nasty snow and ice. All three of us were home on Valentine's Day, and there was no way we were going to brave the trip to Costco (a whopping three miles away) for food. Instead, the three of us spent the day together and ordered a pizza for dinner. Jack has been talking for days about "Mommy Daddy Pizza," so this was very good news for him.

It ended up being one of the most wonderful and special Valentine's Days I've ever had.

Before we had Jack, and maybe even for a while after we did, my idea of a perfect Valentine's Day would definitely not have involved pizza or spending the day with a toddler who'd need to be entertained so he didn't tantrum all over the house he was stuck in. But for whatever reason, my thinking has changed.

The boys and I didn't do anything really big yesterday. We played with Play-Doh, out in the snow and ice, and Steve and I watched TV while Jack took his nap. When he woke up, we gave Jack his Chew Chew Bacca action figure (oh, sweet Yoda did he love that thing) and went to Starbucks for coffee and cupcakes. The cupcake, by the way, prompted Jack to sing "Happy Birthday" several times. He also amused himself by trying to balance Chew Chew Bacca on a caution cone, all while clutching Roary under his arm. Steve gave Jack a bath, and I went to the local Italian place, packed with couple having romantic dinners, for our pizza.

The three of us had pizza, I read Jack a couple of books, then Steve and I watched our TV shows and had some tiramisu.

Really, really unromantic, right? But it actually wasn't. I didn't feel like I was making the best of a situation in which I couldn't go with my husband to a romantic restaurant and gaze at each other over a bottle of wine, holding hands. Instead, I felt like my whole house was just full of love. I was able to spend the day with the two people who mean more to me than anything else in the universe, and I was just so happy. I also felt incredibly close to Steve, the man with whom I've created this happy family and wonderful life. In the end, I can't think of anything more romantic and special.

Happy Valentine's Day, boys.

The Force Is Strong in This One

Once again, Jack is proving that we brought the right kid home from the hospitial. Last week, he was having a tantrum, which seemed to me to be a fine time to watch some TV. Sure enough, the last 15 minutes of The Empire Strikes Back were on HBO. Score! I was home. Jack immediately stopped his tantrum, sat on my lap, and began an endless chorus of "What's that?" He tends to echo whatever I say, so it was awesome to hear his little boy voice saying Bobba Fett, lightsaber, Stormtrooper, Lando, and Artoo.

He was most facinated by Chewbacca, who he calls "Chew Chew Bacca." Every time Chewie was on the screen, Jack got excited and would cry, "Chew Chew Bacca!" We snuggled and watched the movie, and I'd explain things as they happen, like that Darth Vader cut off Luke's hand and that it was a bad boo boo. Jack suggested that Luke needed a band-aid. Lando told Chewbacca to go work on the hyperdrive (darned thing was always breaking on the Falcon). A few minutes later, Jack turned to me and said, "Chew Chew Bacca bye bye. He work." Cub was totally following the story and knew where Chewie was and what he was up to.

Since then, Jack has been checking out Star Wars action figures at Target and looking at the Star Wars picture books that I gave Steve as a present when I was pregnant. Chew Chew Bacca remains his favorite.

Last night, we "read" the picture book of Return of the Jedi. There are a lot of words in the book for a kid his age, so I just gave him the highlights, with lots of sound effects ("beep!" "Yub, yub!") and spent lots of time talking about Chewie and Yoda, who he also loved. Han Solo, by the way, is "Chew Chew Bacca friend" and the Falcon is "Chew Chew Baccca spaceship."

Jack was also fascinated by Jabba. He told Steve this morning all about the book. ("Yoda nigh-nigh," "Chew Chew Bacca help Han. Han Chew Chew Bacca friend") He also told Steve repeatedly that Jabba is "not nice" and claims that, in addition to keeping Han frozen in carbonite, humiliating Leia, and trying to throw everybody to the Sarlac, that Jabba bit his finger.

Tomorrow is Valentine's Day, and I do have some treats for my tiny little cupid. Steve and I have a card for him with a tiger on it, and I'm going to get him a balloon with either Dora or Elmo on it. And best of all, we have a Chew Chew Bacca action figure for him. It's a big one, so it's safe for him to play with. Jack's Uncle Dan gave it to him when he just two months old, and I've had it packed away for him. I told Dan about this, and of course, he was thrilled. Dan said that people might have laughed at him for buying an action figure for an infant, but he knew our boy would need him.

Creativity

One of the things that I am love, love, loving about Jack lately is that he is getting to be so creative. He and I decorated sugar cookies last week (I should post photos of the delightful sugary mess), and it was great to see the many color combinations of sprinkles that he put together. Naturally, he's a kid, and one of the Immutable Laws of Kid-dom is More Sprinkles Is Better, but to combine blue, purple, pink, and hearts on a pink cookie? Gorgeous.

A few nights ago, Jack got out his book-blocks and started carefully lining them up in a long line. He told us that it was a choo-choo train and "no touch." Never have we shown him how to make blocks into a train; he came up with this himself. Then, he dismantled his train and grabbed some utensils from his kitchen. The choo-choo was now pizza, which he served to us. Oh, but it was hot, so he had to blow on it before we could eat it. In Jack's vast collection of plastic food, he actually has pizza, but he didn't go get it, preferring to pretend with the blocks. Very cool.

Jack also loves pretending to be various animals. His favorites seem to be the frog -- lots of jumping -- and the horse, which involves vigorous gallopping.

I was then talking to Steve about how imaginative Jack has been lately. Steve added that Jack shows lots of creativity, imagination, and pretending with Roary. He talks to Roary, Roary answers him, he feeds Roary crackers, and so on. All of this, Steve said, is developmentally important, and something that the kids he works with often don't display. He's right of course... but because I'm a wee bit nuts, I consider talking to your stuffed animals to be completely normal.

The Big Love

No, not those fun-loving cult members on HBO, but rather a novel by Sarah Dunn. My mom got me this book for Christmas, part of a stack that she got for pennies at a yard sale, and I was casting around looking for something to read and picked this up.

The Big Love is chick lit, good for beach reading, and took me a whopping two days to get through. But there are definitely levels of chick lit. This one is about a million times better than, say, Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons or any of the Shopaholic books, but not quite to the levels of Jennifer Weiner or Marian Keyes.

The story is pretty typical. Alison gets dumped hard by her boyfriend Tom, who goes out to buy mustard for a dinner party, then calls her and says that he's in love with somebody else and never comes back. She even works as a columnist, as all heroines in these books have something to do with writing or publishing. But what makes Alison interesting is her background. She grew up an Evangelical Christian, which means that she certainly does not have a Sex and the City kind of liberation about sex or relationships. Even though she's more or less abandonded her faith, you can't completely shake all of the things she's grown up with, and she's in a state of panic about the prospect of never getting married that is a lot more complex and believably coming from her than from other heroines in books like this. She is also very flawed, one of the most neurotic people you'll see, and you can really understand why Tom went running away from her. She's not a total victim and he's not a complete ass. The result is engaging and at times quite funny. This was Sarah Dunn's first novel, and I look forward to reading more from her.

Ultimate X-Men Volume 6

When I posted my last write-up of a comic, I had responses from not one, but two fabulous readers. Super cool. So, here is another write up of my latest comic reading. I got Ultimate X-Men, Volume 6 in the same gorgeous hardcover format as the latest Spidey I read. It's by Brian K. Vaughn, and he completely rocks. BKV writes some of my favorite books -- Ex Machina and Y: The Last Man. The guy really knows how to tell a story. Per Marvel mandates, he writes in arcs, so as to be trade-friendly, but he also makes sure something happens in each and every issue. His stuff works both in trades and monthly, which is apparently no small feat.

There were some great stories in this arc. There was a story about Charles Xavier, rarely featued in anything other than an advisory role, foiling a bank robbery -- and showing signs of having a bigger agenda than many of his students are aware of. And a story between Rogue and Gambit, a couple that I'm not really in love with, that completely engaged me. But the big story -- one involving both the X-Men and a group of students from a rival school lead by Emma Frost -- totally rocked. I absolutely loved this book, no misgivings at all.

Saving Face

Since the Great Food Crackdown of 2007, Jack's snack of choice has been cereal bars. They're reasonably healthy, plus it's convenient to just hand him one to eat before school. For whatever reason, Jack prefers to have the cereal bar partially in the wrapper. The one time I unwrapped it completely and handed it to him, he completely wigged out. There's typically no logic to be found in the world of a two-year old.

Yesterday, he asked for his morning cereal bar, and let me tell you, I could not get that thing to him fast enough. As I reached into the pantry for it, Jack got impatient and had a semi-fake tantrum about it. His new technique is to get face down on the floor, but it's like he read in a book that that's how you have a tantrum, because he totally phones it in. He doesn't throw himself to the floor screaming. He more gently and carefully arranges himself on the floor. It's like when we play "Ring Around the Rosy." When I fall down, I don't really fall so much as carefully move to the floor.

He got up off of the floor when I handed him the cereal bar, but when I offered to open it for him, he said, "No, Mommy. Mommy no eat. Mommy no bite. Roary no eat." Then he took it and ran into a corner, shrieking, "Noooo!"

Fine. I could wait that out, because no way could he open the thing himself and would soon come crawling back to me.

In the corner, Jack struggled with the wrapper. I could hear him getting more and more frustrated, but every time I offered to help, I was met with a resounding, "Nooo!"

Eventually, I guess he gave up, because he came over to me, holding the still wrapped cereal bar. Jack surely didn't want to ask me for help, especially after he'd refused me, and perhaps because he was convinced that treacherous Mommy would steal his precious bar and eat it all for herself. He needed to save face, and he also needed someone loyal, someone he could trust.

Jack held out the cereal bar and said, "Ro open. Ro help."

"You want Roary to open the cereal bar?"

"Yep."

Roary eagerly ripped open the wrapper and handed it to Jack. "Thank you, Ro," Jack said, and happily ate the cereal bar.

In other news, remember the blue cupcakes from Wednesday? Well, yesterday, ever single kid in Jack's class had technicolor poop as a result of those things. Jack's hiney is now stained blue. Lovely.

Gift Bags

Steve and I went to pick Jack up from school this evening, and quickly got hints that it was going to be a wild ride. For starters, Renee, one of the directors told us, "Your son is a Smurf." Why? Because today was Nicholas's birthday, and he brought cupcakes with royal blue, Smurf-hued icing. And Jack proceeded to spread said icing all over his face and hands. That icing tinted his skin.


"He had fun," Renee continued, "And he has a gift bag that he can't wait to get his hands on."

Gift bag? Oh, no.


Every once in a while, a kid in Jack's class has a birthday. They bring cupcakes, which is cool, but they also bring these crappy little plastic gift bags. In the gift bags are crappy little items that Jack becomes hideously obsessed with. It's about 75 cents worth of junk that makes me want to drink about $20 worth of wine. As soon as he gets his hands on one, I am plotting when I can divert his attention and throw the damned thing away.

This particular gift bag contained a lollypop, a small notepad (which apparently Jack needs to jot down ideas for the story he's writing for the school paper?), a Thomas the Tank Engine noisemaker, and a superball.

Jack ate the lollypop on the way home, making his hands sticky, in addition to being blue. He then spent a tremendous amount of time taking the stuff in and out of his gift bag. If only his success matched his determination, because he repeatedly couldn't get it to work, prompting him to whine and cry. He then likes to rip the plastic bag into little shreds, getting pissed when static electricity makes them stick to his hands. Usually the noisemaker gets all slobbery, rendering it a useless pile of cardboard pulp.


Today's superball rendered the gift bag even more of a problem than usual. I hate to be the kind of person who complains about this stuff, but a superball is a freaking choking hazard. Jack popped it into his mouth, and I confiscated it, causing a huge screaming tantrum fit. I was about ready to join him, though as Jack wailed, "Baaaalll!" I was going to wail, "Damn you, Nicholas's mommy!"

The good news is that I got the bag away and threw it in the trash before Jack became best friends forever with it. Roary also enjoyed the icing.

And Jack's dinner of tomato soup combined with his blue flesh to make a very interesting hue.

Are You My Mother?

It seems that Jack's discovery of the Secret Hidden Backup Roaries had more of an impact than we initially thought. Luckily, he is not demanding more Roaries. But Roary has suddenly become very interested in mommies and daddies. Roary sees his mommy and daddy all over the place.

Every night when we read Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See, Roary gets very excited when we come to the page with the purple cat, declaring, "Mommy Daddy!" He did the same thing when he saw pictures of both tabby cats and tigers in Jack's animal picture book. And when Steve was home with Jack, Roary told him that Jack's Fisher Price lion was his daddy.

I don't think that Jack is traumatized by the appearance and disappearance of "Ro Daddy." I prefer to think that Jack really loves his mommy and daddy and wants his best buddy to have the same thing.

Ultimate Spider-Man Volume 6

That's right, babies: I read stuff other than novels. Most recently, I read the sixth hardcover volume of Ultimate Spider-Man by Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Bagely.

I absolutely love reading comics in this format. The book is larger than a comic, so the art really pops. The paper is nice, and the quality is great. And since Bendis writes in story arcs, rather than individual issues, this is an appealing way to read his stories.

This book was kind of a mixed bag. The first story was about Carnage, a Spidey villian made up of Peter Parker's spider-altered DNA. The most notable part of this story is that it features the death of Gwen Stacy. Gwen Stacy's death in the normal Marvel Universe was a watershed moment, a kind of end of innocence. The same was the case, I thought, for this story. I really wasn't expecting Gwen to die, at least not like this, and the result was horrifying.

Disappointingly, though, Bendis skipped out on the aftermath of Gwen's death and its affect on Peter Parker. The next issue skips several months in the future, so We never really see how Peter reacts to Gwen's death. What should be a pivotal moment in his life is seriously glossed over.

In fact, the remaining issues in the book are really a lot of fun, focusing on guest appearances from Wolverine, The Ultimates, Dr. Strange, and the Human Torch. They are enjoyable (with a sad misfire of an ending to the otherwise fun Wolverine story), but I really felt like Bendis should have shown us Peter's mourning to a greater extent. He had the meat-- Gwen's death -- and skipped right to the dessert.

Still, this was an enjoyable read. I have the next volume on my bookshelf and will undoubtedly dive into it soon.

The Great Food Crackdown of 2007

Jack is a typical toddler in his eating habits. That is to say, they are random and very limited. Jack might pound down chicken and rice as fast as he can one day, then refuse to eat it the next. And unless you count frozen waffles as a vegetable, Jack really doesn't eat vegetables.

We have had enough.

Steve and I recently initiated The Great Food Crackdown of 2007. We cleaned out the pantry of junk like crackers and yogos. Now if Jack wants a snack, he can pretty much either have fruit or a cereal bar -- that's about as junky as it gets. We are now making an effort for all of us to have the same thing for dinner. Because I don't want to eat nothing but yogurt and because Jack doesn't want to leap into the magical world of roasted red peppers and the like, I'm trying my best to find some middle ground.

Here are our new policies:
1. Goldfish and Yogos are "all gone." Until Jack learns to eat a little more normally, they are not an option.
2. All snacks are healthy.
3. The three of us will all eat the same thing at meals, or at least close to it. For example, if we were having pork chops and baked potatoes, Jack would get the potato and chicken nuggets.
4. Jack will have something new offered to him, but with old standbys as backup. The other night, I made a FABULOUS butternut squash risotto with a side of broccoli. Jack got that, along with a yogurt. I bet you can guess what he ate, but hey -- I'm going to keep trying.

The good news is, we've already found some new foods for him. Jack loves tomato soup, chicken soup (particularly if the noodles are shaped like letters or Dora), grapes, dried tropical fruit (pineapple, mango, and papaya), Craisins, rice, and quesadillas. Here's hoping we get something green on the list soon.

In other, more adorable news, Jack has learned how to say (drumroll) COFFEE! The other morning, Steve was getting him dressed. Jack started talking about his day, saying, "Jack eat waffles. Jack milk. Mommy coffee. Coffee hot."

Self Help

Self help books have never really been my thing, but here I am, having just finished two of them. The books are The Speed Trap and Slowing Down to the Speed of Life. I didn't go out and buy them myself -- they were a Christmas gift from my boss, which is actually a fine example of how supportive she can be. The books promise ways to help you simplify and slow down a fast-paced and stressful life. I actually found several things in them that I think will ultimately help me.

The books are based on a philosophy called Psychology of Mind, which sounds totally Tom Cruise crazy to me, so I'm going to gloss over that part and focus on their main messages, which are:

• To recognize negativity and stress as just thoughts
• To learn to think not just analytically, but also in "free flowing mode."
• To live in the moment

Let's look at these one by one. Everybody experiences stressful situations and feelings. But how stressful things are and how much they affect you can really depend on your point of view. I am making an effort now if, for example, I'm stuck in traffic, not to focus on how it sucks and I'm going to be late. I accept that there's nothing I can do about it, find some soothing music to listen to, and focus on enjoying that, rather than freaking out about the craziness around me. It really works, new age-y as it sounds. Similarly, I recently had a conflict with someone who was being really unreasonable. At one point in our argument, that person stormed off, refusing to talk to me, and saying, "Don't worry about it. Just whatever." I thought, "You know what? I won't worry about it." The thing that person was upset about had nothing to do with me. I don't want to let someone else's bad mood bring me down, so I decided really and truly to take her sarcastic comment to heart and not worry about it. It was a weight off my shoulders, to be honest. I'm now trying, when I start to experience stress (or what the books call "a low mood" to change the course of my thinking and help myself get out of it. I've been a lot less short-tempered since I started doing this.

"Free flowing mode" is something that I think will really help me at work. Ever notice how you can sit and stew over a problem, come up with nothing, only to have something pop into your head while you're in the shower? That's because when you put that problem on the back burner, your brain will work away at it, and you'll come up with a creative solution. Taking an analytical approach will be less successful. I've already started incorporating that philosophy into our brainstorming sessions at work, and it's really going well for us. On Friday, we spent a few minutes talking about a project we're going to do. We agreed on the analytical facts -- budget, timeline, audience, etc -- and then just let it go. Yesterday, we reconvened, and had not one, but two great and workable ideas to use. You have to trust in your own talents and creativity and be confident that you'll work things out. It seems that it actually works.

Finally, living in the moment really makes life more enjoyable. The night before last, Jack woke up at 10:00 absolutely freaking out. He was sobbing and would not go back to sleep, then conned us into letting him go downstairs, where he sat with me while I wrote my Apprentice recap, then scored a bonus episode of Elmo. We put him to bed again, and he kept crying and did not want to go to sleep.

I started to get really stressed out. Was Jack sick? Did he have an ear infection? Because if he did, he'd either not get antibiotics and have to tough it out, or he'd get them and have his horrible babboon butt diaper rash. And I'd have to stay home with him the next day, because Steve had a full schedule of meetings. That meant I'd be up with him all night, which meant I'd be home with a sick kid and cranky myself because of lack of sleep, and I was out a day and a half from work last week, and...

Then I realized those were all negative thoughts. Just thoughts, not reality. None of that stuff had happened, and if it did, I'd deal with it. Instead of focusing on all the crazy mind races, I decided to focus just on that moment. I pulled Jack onto my lap, helped him get comfortable, and rocked him. If I started to think about how long it would take him to fall asleep, and when I could quit rocking him, I made myself stoop and just enjoy cuddling with my sweet little guy. In that moment, if I didn't think about the next day or any possible consequences, snuggling with Jack and kissing his little head was wonderful. I didn't feel stressed out; I felt happy and peaceful. Jack relaxed too and fell fast asleep, and when I crawled into bed, I did the same thing. And you know what? He slept just fine the rest of the night and was in a great and healthy mood the next day. All of those things I'd been worried about were just thoughts.

This has turned into a long entry, but I have to say, I'm happy I read these two books. I intend to learn from them, and I think it'll be really good for me.