See you next year

I'm worn flat out.

I composed the first paragraph of a terribly profound blog entry as I drifted off to sleep last night for the final time (at about 4am, I believe, after getting up with the baby several times). I can't for the life of me remember it, or even what it might be about.

It's been a hard week. The baby has had a fever every day since Monday, diarrhea for several days after that, and then yesterday, the piece de resistance: Vomit. For the first time in almost three years of parenthood, I had to deal with vomit. That's a pretty good track record, sure, but it doesn't feel so great when I'm scooping half-digested oatmeal and stomach bile off the carpet with a spoon.

The poor kid. I felt so sad for her yesterday! She'd been more or less her regular self all week long, despite her obvious illness, maybe running at 90% instead of 100%. But yesterday she just lay around. Literally. In my arms or, if I needed to put her down, she'd find a comfortable spot, lie down, and stare off into the distance. She wanted nothing to do with the Pedialyte DH brought home for her, but luckily I haven't tackled the project of weaning her yet so she stayed hydrated by comfort nursing all day and all night.

(Tangent: She's 17 months old. I'd planned to BF for a year, but here we still are. Sometimes I think it would make life easier to wean her completely -- DH says he'll write me a scrip for Paxil when I do, to help my anxiety and anger issues -- but I just don't have the mental energy to listen to her cry as she paws at my shirt. I don't think I'm comfortable BFing indefinitely, though I don't mind others who do.... 2 years old might be pushing it for me. 3 years old, absolutely. But if she doesn't self-wean before that, what? Just readjust my comfort level as I've already done, and keep on keeping on? Who knows. In any case, to bring it back to the topic at hand, I'm glad we're still BFing now because it really helped out yesterday when she felt so sick.)

She whined a lot, too, in between the nursing and the vomitting and the lying around in a daze. That wore thin. Am I a bad mother to admit that? I felt terrible for her; I know she was miserable. Her vocabulary is limited to things like "waffle" and "Daddy" and "Ganga Gauze" (Santa Claus), so she can't articulate how much her tummy hurts or if she has a headache or that she's so exhausted she doesn't know what to do with herself. But she's a championship whiner, and it really started to grate on my already thin nerves.

Bad, bad mommy.

She looked and acted much better today, thank goodness. I'd say she's running at about 75% -- not cured, but not listless and lifeless and miserable, either. I hope this trend will continue.

Meanwhile, I'm getting sick. I've got the toddler's cold already (did I mention she had one? Yeah, we're all on our deathbeds) but now I suddenly feel extremely weak on top of that. I hope I don't catch what the baby's got. No fever for me yet, knock on wood. No vomit. I'm probably just paranoid. Or tired.

Worn flat out, I tell you.

Obviously, we have no grand plans for New Year's Eve. The girls are both in bed, hopefully for the whole night (though I doubt it), and DH has parked on the couch to watch I Love the 80s on VH1. We may or may not stay up until midnight to watch the ball drop. (I'm usually up that late anyway -- and several hours after that -- but I just don't think I can tonight.)

Tomorrow will be better. Next year will be better. I resolve to get more rest; I think that will help a lot.


~RCH~

Two more shirts

Just a reminder, the holiday coupons are about to expire! If anyone planned to order, say, a bunch of Awesome Like a Possum shirts from http://leonine.spreadshirt.com for a hypothetical group of sisters, you need to do so on or before Saturday, December 31st to get the discount.

Or maybe that idea is a no-go now that some people won't be their regular size for a while?

In any case, just thought I'd mention it. :-)

While we're on the subject, I also have two new designs to showcase! The first, sadly, is not my own; a fellow shop owner was kind enough to make this design available to the rest of us. Because it uses three colors (and therefore extra fabric to produce) it's a little pricier than other short sleeve styles, but I think it's worth it. Eat More Meat is super cute.



The second new design is mine, made for my "lactivist" mommy friends. I don't know what the eventual feeding plans are of my newly pregnant sisters, but I recommend BFing if you can! (This from someone who initially found the whole idea quite creepy, lol.) It's easy and convenient, it's super duper cheap, it's the best nourishment for your baby, and -- best of all -- it comes in the cutest bottles.



All right, that's all for now. Thank you for shopping with Leonine Designs!


~RCH~

"The reason for the season" didn't sink in for the toddler, I guess

Item #1: As I put the toddler to bed last night, she snuggled into her covers, clutched her new Big Bird doll, and asked me sweetly, "Is Santa going to come again tonight and bring me more toys?"

Item #2: We went out to eat this evening, and as we drove home all full and happy, she broke into song:

You better watch out,
You better not cry!
You better not pouch
I'm telling you why:
Santa Claus is coming
To bring us more presents!

Oy vey, lol. What kind of monster have we created?


~RCH~

Not quite the home run I'd hoped for

DH asked for two movies for Christmas: Miracle, about the 1980 US Olympic hockey team that beat the Russians (which he insists was one of the greatest moments in American history -- sorry Gen. Washington, emancipated slaves, and sufferagettes!), and The Rookie, about a middle-aged high school baseball coach who tries out, and then plays for, the majors. Both have recently been added to the pantheon of sports movies that make him cry.

Neither of those titles was at Walmart, the easiest place to haul the girls, so I had to make a trip to an actual movie store. Oy. I put it off for a while, but finally trudged off to Hastings on the morning of Christmas Eve where I found Miracle right away, but not The Rookie. I had no shopping cart. The baby dangled precariously from one arm and my death grip on the toddler's hand was loosening, leaving her poised at any minute to careen wildly in a random path of destruction. I figured screw it, The Rookie is really freaking boring anyway.

I picked up Fever Pitch instead. Neither of us had seen it before, but I thought it looked cute -- who doesn't like Jimmy Fallon? -- and at least it was in the same sports genre! Baseball is baseball is baseball, right?

Except that I forgot the cardinal rule of gift giving: Apparently it's not nice to get your husband a movie that glorifies the team that beat his hometown ball club (to a pulp, I might add) in a recent World Series.

It took me a few hours to figure out his lack of enthusiasm. But then I did, and offered to take it back. "No, no," he said, a single tear staining his manly cheek (okay, I made that part up). "This is fine. I'm sure it's a good movie." (Heavy sigh from him.) He watched Miracle twice (big eye roll from me) before he screwed up the courage, but we did watch Fever Pitch this afternoon while the girls napped.

The verdict? I loved it -- it's a sweet and funny romantic comedy (with enough sports to make up for the romantic part, as far as boys are concerned). DH laughed out loud several times. And, luckily, the World Series win that eradicated the Curse of the Bambino at the expense of DH's beloved Cardinals was only mentioned / shown very briefly at the end of the show.... I think in the future we could watch the entire movie up until about the last 40 seconds, and it would be a perfectly satisfying entertainment experience for him.

So it wasn't quite the home run gift I'd hoped for, but it didn't turn out too badly despite my thoughtlessness, lol.


~RCH~

"This is why my pants don't fit,"

said the girl who decided to blog at 2:00 AM.

From the December 2005 issue of Psychology Today:

Unfortunately, mounting evidence suggests persistent sleep debt -- being just shy of optimal rest each morning -- can not only weaken immune response and cognitive abilities, but it is also linked to the onset of adult diabetes. Now comes word from scientists that skimping on sleep may make a person fat.

According to a study at Eastern Virginia Medical School, people who sleep just 16 fewer minutes per night than the average person are significantly at risk of being overweight. As inconsequential as those moments sound, it adds up to nearly two hours of lost sleep per week. After controlling for other lifestyle and health factors, researchers calculated that missing two hours of sleep each week is associated with a 10-point increase in body mass index -- or the difference between a healthy weight and obesity.

As you can see from the fact that I'm blogging in the middle of the night (and for no good reason; the babies aren't keeping me up tonight, at least), I get significantly less sleep than the average person. 16 minutes fewer? Puleeze. 16 minutes is for sissies. I'm hardcore, baby.

But I'm also having trouble squeezing into my pants lately. How depressing. I used to think I ought to start exercising, but now I wonder if I shouldn't just try to sleep more. Sleep sounds like the more appealling option -- you'd think I'd jump at the chance! -- but honestly, I think it would be equally difficult to overcome inertia in either case: Exercise is no fun at first; it takes a few weeks of consistent work for those endorphins to kick in enough that I look forward to it. Sleep is lots of fun, but so is a quiet house where I'm the only one stirring and my life and my thoughts are truly my own. If I give up my nocturnal "me time," I won't have any "me time" at all. (That's a slight exaggeration, since the kids usually do nap simultaneously and I'm alone then. But in the middle of the day I have the obligation to be productive around the house -- whether or not I actually am, lol -- so it's only in the wee hours that I feel truly free.)

*Sigh.*

So, my little minions.... The New Year is approaching, and with it all those silly resolutions. Which one should I make? Assuming I only have energy to commit to one (and even that may be stretching it, lol), what should I pick? Exercise or sleep?

I have to do something. I can't afford new pants.


~RCH~

I'll give you the finger ... update

Welp, two weeks later and my finger is almost completely healed! I have a lovely dark purple stripe along the side of my nail, but the pain is almost all gone and I'm slowly but surely regaining sensation in the part that went numb. (Apparently I messed up some nerves very nicely.)

Can you imagine if I'd done any real damage to my finger? If it's true that you're only given as much as you can handle, then the Lord must know how squeamish I am. This is probably the wimpiest finger-in-door story of all time -- hardly worth mentioning, really -- and yet I was thoroughly traumatized by the experience. And it's taken two weeks to get mostly back to normal. (Only mostly, because there is still that small numb spot. Not that it bothers me, but it's weird.) Doesn't that seem like a long time for a finger that didn't get broken, for a nail that didn't even need to be drilled or cauterized?

Obviously, I'm not cut out for serious injuries. (KNOCK ON WOOD.)


~RCH~

Better not pouch!

Following in the tradition of other mis-heard phrases, I give you the toddler's rendition of "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town." Apparently she doesn't know the word "pout" -- she does, however, know about pouches because kangaroos are cool. Substitute one for the other, and voila!

Sing it for me, baby!


~RCH~

Oh give me a home....

So we'll be moving next summer. I've skipped ahead in my daydreaming, past the part where we have to make this house presentable and sell it for a reasonable price, to the part where we find somewhere to live in our new town. Frankly, I don't know if we'll be able to afford to buy a place right when we get there. We have no savings whatsoever, and I understand there aren't as many creative financing opportunities for second-time homebuyers as for first. Sure, we'll qualify for bigger loans based on DH's new income, but we'll still have jack squat for a downpayment. I imagine we'll have to rent for the first couple years.

Still. A girl can dream.

I troll the local real estate web sites about once a week to see if there are any new listings. I don't really know what we'll need, in terms of space. The 3 bedrooms we currently have are sufficient for our needs, though an extra one for an office (or makeshift photo studio!) would be nice. Not necessary, but nice. I definitely want a family room in addition to the living room, so I don't have to entertain visitors in the same space wherein the toy boxes have recently vomitted up all their goods. I like having 2 bathrooms, though DH grew up in a house with just 1 and he turned out all right. (And hey, that would be one less bathroom to clean!) I have no sense of space, though, or any idea how to visualize square footage. We currently live in ~1200 sq ft, I think. Add that family room, maybe an extra bedroom, and where does that put us? 1500? 1800? 3000? (I'm fairly sure we don't need 3k square feet, whether I can picture that or not, lol.) I don't know when what I'm looking at is a reasonable upgrade and when it is an extravagance (online, that is; I'd know it in person, but right now all I have is information on a screen).

I don't want us to buy too much house (especially considering my rotten housekeeping skills, lol). I don't want us to have the biggest or the fanciest or the showiest house on the block. Still, I want quality. With any luck, whether we buy something when we get there or a few years down the road, this will be the house we stay in for the rest of our lives. I want to plant roots, dangit! I long for permanence!

I want brick. Brick is solid; it requires no upkeep; it's pretty (especially red brick). I want a fence, as I've got one child who loves to run away and another who would follow her sister anywhere. I want that family room, for sure, and a kitchen with enough counter and cupboard space.

I prefer older houses to new ones. Well, no, let me qualify that: I love brick houses from the 1950s. That post-WWII era optimism and newfound affluence led people to build homes that were simultaneously modest and generously proportioned (not a lot of wasted space) with quality materials. (I'm no expert, of course, and when we were house shopping the first time around and I mentioned that to my realtor BIL, he laughed. But in my experience that's more often true than not.) After the 1950s homes, my next favorite are the pioneer houses! I don't know whether they're hard to live in -- are they drafty, broken-down money pits filled with asbestos and lead? -- but they have so much character and charm and craftsmanship!

Here's a house I kind of like in our new town, though we definitely don't need "room for a horse," lol.

I like the kitchen cupboards on this one, but it's probably more space than we need. (Though DH keeps lobbying for more kids. I'm holding firm, but maybe I'd change my mind after living nearer to my family. Who knows. Maybe someday we will need more space.)

How fun would this be if I knew anything at all about renovation? LOL! Get Bob Villa over here, stat!

Being such a small town, of course, I don't have endless real estate options. So after trolling the listings for a while, I began to wonder about building a house from scratch. I found a house plans site and saved a few of my favorites; apparently I was on an old-timey kick that day, because they all have some of that pioneer flair:

• The long porch house


• The house with the turret


• The rounded porch house

Huh. I just noticed they've all got siding. What in the world happened to all the good brick houses? Sheesh. Still, these are fun. I wonder if they'd stick out like sore thumbs, though, lol. I don't want a house that seems out of place in its surroundings.

Anyway. It's late and I should go to bed, but for the record, those are my rambly thoughts on what I'd like in a new and hopefully permanent home.


~RCH~

Shine On

For those of you who haven't checked it out in a while, I've made some improvements to Leonine Designs, my shop at http://leonine.spreadshirt.com. I've added some pull-down menus on the left to help you narrow your search by the design name, the color of the shirt, or the type of shirt you're looking for. I've also re-ordered the selection to show a wider variety of designs on the front page.

As always, I'm open to suggestions! Thanks for looking!


~RCH~

Right on schedule

The toddler has learned to count! She's known how to recite the numbers from 1-20 for a long, long time, and she can recognize the written representations of at least 1 - 12. But when asked to count objects, say, a pair of shoes, she'd just point to them over and over and recite numbers until she felt like stopping. (How many shoes? Pointing back and forth from one to the other, "Wan, two, flea, four, five! Five shoes!")

I noticed on Sunday, though, that she's made the transition into real counting -- associating objects with their actual corresponding amounts. She counted the flowers on the baby's shiny black church shoes, pointing to each one only once, stopping at four because there were only four flowers there. She's done it with other things, since. I don't know if a light bulb switched on in her head, or if she's been secretly and gradually getting better at it for a while -- but the fact is, she can count. :-D

Unfortunately, she seems to have stumbled onto another developmental milestone, as well. I've read that children first begin experimenting with lies at around 3 -- their experience with pretend play makes them wonder if they can pretend their way out of trouble. Well, the toddler will be 3 in about a month; she's right on schedule.

She and the baby had a slight altercation yesterday that resulted in a bloody scratch on the baby's face. Although I had a pretty good idea of what transpired, I did what moms do and I asked anyway. "What happened here?" I said, pointing to the baby's scratch.

The toddler avoided my gaze, looking slightly down and to the side, and said, "A shark!"

Yeeeeeaaaaahhh. Sure.

So she's not a very good liar, lol, but I'm guessing she'll get some practice in these next few years....

Hooray for milestones.


~RCH~

I didn't need that finger anyway

The way I screamed and sobbed and moaned and carried on, you'd think I had amputated the finger entirely. DH couldn't understand me at all when I first called; he was in the noisy, crowded hospital cafeteria and I was in near hysterics (well, no, complete hysterics).

"Hello?" he said when he picked up.

"I (*sob, sob*) slammed my finger (*sob*) in the doooooor (*wail*) and it huuuuuuuurts! (*Sob, sob*). Not just a little nick, but my whole finger was just stuck in the door and the door was closed and I couldn't pull it out and I was holding the toddler in my other hand and I couldn't just drop her so I had to twist and reach around to open it with my other hand while still holding her and now my finger is purple and huge and it's bleeding at the nail and it's throbbing and it hurts sooooooo much! (*Scream of pain for emphasis*) I don't know what to doooooooo!!"

"Can you drive up to the hospital with the girls, or do you need me to come home and get you?" he asked.

"Why?" I asked, panicked. "Do I really need to come to the hospital? Do you think it's broken? Will my fingernail fall off?"

"I can't answer any of that until I see it," he said, "but I may need to drill into your nail to relieve the pressure."

"(*Long, protracted, freaked-out wail*)"

"Can you come, or do you need me to come get you?"

We decided I could probably make it. He told me to take 4 Advils, put some ice on it, and then head up to the hospital with the girls.

Yes, I'm a big fat baby, but I've never completely shut my finger (or anything else) in a car door before. And while it's certainly a painful thing to do, the idea of my finger trapped between a two heavy pieces of steel was as upsetting and scary as the actual pain I felt. It took a second, when it happened, for that fact to register: Your finger has just been smashed to bits and you can't pull it back out. Add to that the complication of holding an almost asleep toddler, and it took another few seconds for my brain to register a way to get the door back open and my finger free.

DH and all his little doctor friends gathered around for a gander when we arrived. I got a lot of sympathetic looks as well as a few door and hammer stories from other people. They noted the purply bruise, the swelling, and the lack of any noticeable hematoma under the nail bed. ("Do you think you'll want to cauterize it anyway?" one colleague asked DH. I paled. "Oh, don't worry; it's just a small, really hot needle that'll melt right through your fingernail to relieve the pressure. You won't even feel it." I winced in terror.)

DH sent me to get x-rays -- only my second ever in my life; the first was last winter when I got pneumonia (which, in completely unrelated news, was the first time in my life I'd ever had a fever, and I had one for 5 or 6 days straight! I'm suddenly so interesting, lol!). It turns out I didn't break or fracture any finger bones and that, along with the complete lack of blood building up underneath the fingernail, meant that I got off without so much as a bandage. (The toddler really, really hoped DH would give me one, but frankly I'm glad not to have anything touching my wound.)

I keep loading up on the Advil at appropriate intervals and I'm fine now. The funny thing is that the injured finger is the middle one on my right hand: I keep it up and apart from the rest of my fingers so it won't bump into anything, but that makes it look like I'm flipping people off. But hey, it's been a bad day ... so maybe I am. Tee-hee.


~RCH~

Oh Daddy, proud of your planets! Oh Mommy, proud of your sun!*

Ever in search of new experiences and diversions, I took the girls to the planetarium today and left my post-call DH to sleep the afternoon away in peace. Actually, our plan was to go to the university's free museum -- the toddler loves the dinosaurs, all of them T-Rexes (to her) with big growls -- but the planetarium is connected to it and shortly after we arrived, they announced over the loud speaker that a star show would start in just a few minutes. In addition to dinosaurs, I happen to know that girl loves her planets and sparkly stars. I figured this would be the best outing ever.

Holding on tight to the toddler's hand and awkwardly steering the baby's stroller with its bum wheel, we made our way to the planetarium and waited in line. I tried to prepare them for what they would see: It would get very dark, but there would be a movie on the ceiling that showed a twinkly sky and lots of beautiful outer space things. "Oh boy!" said the toddler. "Outer space! Shake your booty, Mommy!" (Lately she's been inserting that command at random times. Go figure. I did a little dance and moved on.)

We sat toward the back, so as not to bother people, and at the end of a row so we could park the stroller. I pulled the baby out and placed her on my lap, hoping she'd cuddle and fall asleep in the dark since she had stubbornly refused to nap earlier. But as the lights dimmed, the toddler scrambled off her chair and into my lap, as well.

I've only got so much lap.

The baby, already a bit cranky from the sleep deprivation, started to whine and climb Mount Mommy. In doing so, she stepped on the toddler's hand (I think -- it was pitch black at that moment) and the toddler began to cry. I tried to bounce and soothe and distract them both: "Look up there, guys! It's sooooo sparkly!" But nobody cared. And the toddler's cries seemed to be turning from pain into panic at the darkness of the room.

I decided we'd better go, but leaving a pitch black planetarium with two young children and a mildly defective stroller isn't exactly the easiest thing, either. Holding the baby in one arm, the toddler in the other, I felt my way to the stroller, plopped the baby in and fumbled for the straps. The three of us then bumped into the wall and followed it around to the exit. Of course, upon leaving I noticed the baby was missing one of her shoes -- her first pair ever, bought a mere three days ago -- and so I left the girls alone in the hallway (bad mommy) while I went feeling around in the dark under seats for the infant size 3 shoe that had been lost in the scuffle of the lap war.

*Sigh!*

Fortunately, I found the shoe and the girls didn't get abducted while I searched. So I guess something good came out of our trip to the planetarium.

Maybe we'll try again in a few years.


~RCH~

*A prize of five pretend dollars to the first person to name the song/artist referenced in the title of this post. ;-)

All the fishies live in there

"What's that, Mommy?" the toddler asked while on a walk one afternoon.

"A fire hydrant," I said. "It has lots of water inside. If something catches on fire, the fire fighters come in their red trucks, hook their hoses up right there, and then they can squirt water on the fire."

"Can we open it?" she asked.

"No, it's too tricky. Only the fire fighters can open it."

"But how are we gonna' get the fishies out?"

I explained that while fish do live in the water, they don't live in every bit of water.

Still, every time we pass one while walking or in the car, she'll point and shout, "A fire fighter hydrant! Over there! Let's get the fishies out!"


~RCH~

T is for Go Tech!

We went to another college basketball game on Wednesday. We bought $5 tickets -- cheapest we could get without sneaking in! -- expecting to sit in the nosebleeds. But apparently all the basketball fans left town for the holiday; the game was so sparsely attended that they told everyone up in the balconies to come down to the floor. We ended up watching the game from about 8-10 rows away from the court. :-)

The girls loved it. Like last time (which I meant to blog about, but never did), the toddler plugged her ears for the first 10 minutes or so. She doesn't like loud noises (the vacuum terrifies her); the buzzes, the whistles, the shouts from the crowd, the piped-in music all took some getting used to. The baby, however, got right into the spirit of things, shaking that little diaper-padded booty of hers and clapping her hands.

I never in my life expected to utter such a phrase, lol, but I was disappointed not to see the cheerleaders and drill team this time. There were four stragglers, left behind to do backflips after every successful foul shot, but I missed the showy routines from the full squad during long time-outs and half-time. When we went earlier in the month, the "fancy dancers" had been one of the girls' favorite parts of the game! All that running back and forth gets old when you don't understand the intricacies of the sport, but pretty ladies (and a guy or two) in sparkly clothes, dancing in perfect synchrony to obscenely upbeat music? Oh my goodness, bring it on. Little kids just eat that stuff up.

Geez, where are my principles? Lol! What can I say? I just love to see my children happy and entranced.

The toddler also missed the mascot, who must have had Thanksgiving plans elsewhere. Ever since that first game we went to, she's been talking about going back to see her friend Scarecrow (uh, he's actually not a scarecrow, but I don't argue). She thinks he's going to give her presents. She thinks everyone is going to give her presents, though I don't think it's out of greed. She just has this innocent optimism, a firm belief that good things will happen and in her vernacular, presents -- and birthday cake -- are the ultimate good things.

We had a great time, and our team won. I really wish we could afford to go more often.


~RCH~

Big savings on holiday orders!

The holidays are fast approaching! If any of you had planned to shop for gifts (or hey, for yourself) at Leonine Designs, now is a good time because I've got coupons for you! Woo-hoo!

Just navigate on over to http://leonine.spreadshirt.com, spend a ton of money, and then use the appropriate coupon code from the list below when you check out. If you don't know what your recipient would like, you could always print out one of my lovely coupon graphics and use it as a stocking stuffer! The possibilities are endless.

And, as always, if you see something that you'd prefer to have in a different color combination or style, or if you have a design idea you'd like me to help you bring to fruition, let me know and I'll do my best to accommodate you. :-)

~RCH~

I demand to see pictures

Attention fellow bloggers: Some of you are falling down on the job! I have requested pictures at least here and here, but nobody seems interested in following up on that for me, the lone far-away family member.

And the rest of you! For all I know, you've dyed your hair and had extensive reconstructive surgery to mask your identities; it wouldn't kill you to post a few pictures now and then, either, to make sure I'll still recognize you.

Here I am, all alone in the world, out of the loop with no way to weasel my way back in it at least until next Summer....

Seriously, people. Have a heart. Post some photos.

That is all.


~RCH~

The loveliness of low expectations

My toddler is so sweet.

She dragged a chair over to the stove tonight as I finished up with dinner. She watched me stir the ingredients in the pot, add a little butter and milk, and then as I poured the day-glow orange powder into the store brand Mac & Cheese she said -- with all the innocence and enthusiasm her little 2-1/2-year-old heart could muster:

"Wow, Mom! You're a great maker!"

I could have melted right there. "Thanks, kid!" I replied.

"You're welcome, Mommy."

Man, I love this job.


~RCH~

I know the answer is Jesus, but it sure sounds like a squirrel to me.

Out of the mouths of Mormon children, for your reading pleasure. Quote Book quotes for sure!


~RCH~

So apparently I shouldn't multi-task

Those of you who've known me longest: Have I always been such a flake? I feel like I used to be smart. I used to read big books with big words in them. I wrote poetry that managed to avoid the moon/June/swoon trap that so many adolescents fall into. I kept myself informed on current events, and had reasoned opinions on matters of politics and society.

Now, suddenly, I can't seem to make popcorn and pour soda at the same time.

I've burned two toasty cheese sandwiches in the last four days -- and this afternoon, immediately after burning my toddler's sandwich (and then scraping it within an inch of its life), I nearly burned the baby's. That would have made three in four days, but luckily I remembered I was cooking just in time.

We have a box of individual sized microwaveable popcorn bags whose expiration date is nearing. DH discovered it tucked away in some dark corner tonight, and made himself a bag. The lovely buttery smell permeated the house; I couldn't resist. I broke out a bag of my own, got it going in the microwave, then started filling up a cup with ice for the tasty beverage I'd have with it.

A minute or so later, I heard a pop and jumped, thinking (seriously), "What was that?" Your popcorn, moron.

The pops became more frequent and more regular, so I turned my attention back to pouring my soda, waiting for the fizz to settle down, then pouring some more.... My next distinct thought: "What do I smell burning?"

Oh yeah. I'm supposed to listen for the pops to stop. I forgot. I pulled the bag open and set it on the stove, under the fan, to smoke indefinitely.

It's not just cooking, though burnt up things do make good illustrative anecdotes.

Granted, I was a teenager (or barely past it) back in the day when I felt smart. It's easy to know everything at that age! At 17, I had a deep conviction of my intellect. Now, at 30....

It wasn't all adolescent hubris, though; I did know things! I had Tennyson's Ulysses memorized, beginning to end. I knew names and dates and contextual relationships in European history; I could hold my own in a conversation on the Treaty of Westphalia if an occasion ever called for it! I read Russian novels as if they were beach books, and gobbled up information on any subject that caught my eye for even a moment.

Now I struggle for words when I speak and write. I attempt to keep up with and form opinions about current events, but find my brain sputtering and stalling like an old car on a cold day. I try to read the occasional high-brow essay, out of concern that whatever intellect I had will rust from lack of use, but stumble over the most basic prose; I have to read and re-read and read again.

*Sigh!*

I meant to write a funny post about my recent inability to walk and chew gum at the same time, but it's turned out a little more depressing than that. For me, at least. It's incredibly frustrating -- and a little bit frightening -- to suddenly feel so dumb, so flaky. I feel a bit like Charlie in Flowers for Algernon.

Assuming, of course, that I remember the story correctly.


~RCH~

Phew! Toddler shirts through the holidays

I feel better now: The lovely Spreadshirt people emailed me again to clarify the situation with kids' tees. Although they are discontinuing that merchandise due to lack of interest, it's not gone yet except on the pink shirts -- they've run out XS pink kids' tees, but they should have all the other colors and sizes at least through the holidays. That makes me feel better, as I'd promised some toddler shirts to my mommy friends for Christmakkuh. I can still keep my committment.

Unfortunately, it's not just the toddler sizes they're getting rid of -- it's all the kids' tees. So if anybody out there in my (*cough, cough*) wide circle of readership wants something from Leonine Designs for their older child(ren), get it now while the getting's good! If you don't see anything there that you'd like, I'm certainly open to design suggestions and will do my best to bring your idea to fruition.

Well, that's all for now. I'm going to go buy my toddler a possum t-shirt now; she can't keep her hands off mine.


~RCH~

Pimp

More advertising, sorry. But also a vent! Just to spice things up. ;-)

I'm irritated at Spreadshirt.com right now. I spent time designing new children's tees for myself and for my online mom friends (many of whom are having their second child and wanted brother / sister shirts). I'd already been annoyed to find they didn't offer any infant products, but figured that I could still do well selling XS tees for the 2 to 4-year-old set. But suddenly they've dropped that size from their inventory! I emailed them about it and was told that -- ppbbfftt! -- just like that, no more toddler shirts, no intention of getting more.

I suppose they weren't doing very well, and the few orders I'd been counting on from friends isn't likely to make it worth their while to continue stocking an item that just doesn't move. I can understand the business side of it, but I'm still disappointed. And irritated.

Sigh.

In other news, though, I've also added some designs to the grown-up side of the store! Feel free to peruse (and then purchase) these lovelies from leonine.spreadshirt.com:



I'm happy to unveil the PrimaDonna line, inspired by the request of one of my favorite divas! Shown here is the pink tee (because hey, who can resist pink?), but click on the image to see the design on other products and in other colors.



Will Work for Shoes. A particular sister of mine came to mind on this one, though I suspect there are plenty more like her. (Actually, if it weren't a women's tee and a high heeled shoe, my DH would qualify to wear this shirt! He has many, many more pairs of shoes than I have. Silly boy.)



Unless anyone specifically requests one, this is probably the closest you'll see me get to a holiday-themed shirt. Could be a Christmas star, could simply be the gold star you got for being the coolest one in school. *Shrug.* Up to you. :-)



Apparently I missed Banned Books Week, but I'd say that's a cause to honor year-round! The tee is completely plain on the front, but the back (shown above) says, "Celebrate Freedom / Read a Banned Book" -- with a selection of frequently banned titles sandwiched in the middle -- and is available in both short and long-sleeved versions.

All right, that's probably enough pimping for now (seeing as it's 2:30 in the morning as I type this). Remember, the holidays are coming up! Irritated I may be with the kids' tees, but I've been nothing but pleased with the quality of Spreadshirt's products and I do hope you'll be happy, as well. Keep Leonine Designs in mind -- leonine.spreadshirt.com.

Thanks for putting up with this in lieu of a more personal blog! We took the girls to a college basketball game tonight; I meant to blog about that, as well, but as I said it's insanely late at night so I'll have to owe you one. Remind me if I don't get back to it. :-)


~RCH~

*Ahem!*

Um, anyone at Planet Cleverly plan to blog about his or her impending move...? *Wink, wink, nudge, nudge* You know who you are!

I need details, if not pictures and a link to its MLS info on a real estate web page! My, my, what a shock.

Also, somebody please force Mom to go to the doctor today.

That is all.


~RCH~

And the winner is....

For anyone still in suspense, a decision has been made: We'll be planting our roots firmly in potato state soil as of July 2006.

Everybody sing with me: And here we have Idahoooooo, wending her way to faaaaame...!

:-D


~RCH~

Oh, and one more

The toddler reminded me of another one when she bounded into our room this morning (she wakes up at full speed).

"The spagheetos are coming! The spagheetos are gonna' get me!" she exclaimed in pretend panic.

I assured her that the mosquitoes were safely outside, then rolled over and tried to get a few more minutes of sleep.


~RCH~

The crazy kid clearinghouse

For an overly articulate child, the toddler says a lot of goofy things. I keep thinking I'll remember them at least long enough to embarrass her in front of her pre-teen friends, but who am I kidding? My memory is already on the fritz. Better write them down.

Many of her toddlerisms involve misheard character names: She loves Pligget, Stickey Mouse, Buzz Likeyear ("I'm Buzz Likeyear!" "No, I'm Buzz Likeyear!"), and lately the Little Einstarts (or stars, depending).

She used to dance by bouncing up and down, but her new love is spinning endlessly in circles. "Oh no, Mommy!" she'll say, fighting vertigo to stay upright. "I'm getting so busy!"

Her favorite vegetables of all time are green beans or, in toddler parlance, "beam beams."

Not everything goofy that she says is a misheard word, of course. Some things she just misunderstands completely. We have a book about Santa Clause that she loves to read all year round. When she gets to the page with Santa flying over the housetops in his sleigh, she exclaims, "Look, Mommy! Santa and his kangaroos!" That one makes me giggle every time. I can't bring myself to correct her because I love to hear her say it.

There are more, I'm sure, but as I said my memory is on the friz. I'll add to this collection as I think of them.


~RCH~

Dream a little dream

All right, really. I need to finish packing. We leave on our trip in less than two hours, and here I am pimping out my t-shirt shop. Argh!

Back to work for me.


~RCH~

A permanent surprise

So I did something new yesterday: I plucked my eyebrows for the very first time ever. It was so much fun! Why didn't anybody tell me? I felt too inexperienced to shape them -- I didn't want an odd look of permanent surprise etched on my face, especially as I'm supposed to impress people (I guess) during our trip this weekend -- but my brows are certainly much thinner and much more sleek now. Every time I pass a mirror, I have to resist the urge to grab a tweezer and go at them some more, lol.

It's a silly little thing, but I feel like a whole new woman.


~RCH~

Pass the Paxil, please!

I have issues. According to DH, my whole family has issues (though I don't think any of us would disagree, lol).

First off, there's the phone problem. I hate it. If I know it's not for me -- if, say, it's the ILs or one of DH's friends, I'll either let it go to voicemail or do a mad dash across the house to get it to DH before it stops ringing. I will not pick it up even to say, "Hello? Yes, he's here -- just a minute, I'll go get him." If it's for me ... well, I might answer it. Depending on my mood. And on who's calling. And on my mood, which, chances are, is a non-phone-answering mood.

The problem extends also to calling out. Now that I am the grown-up, and the one in this family who spends the most time at home, I am responsible for making any business-related calls. Call the bank to verify a transaction? My job. Call a store to get their hours of operation? My job. Call a neighbor to borrow some sugar or ask a favor? Me, me. But I hate it. I dreeeeaaaad it. I put it off as long as possible (sometimes long enough for DH to get irritated, sigh heavily with resignation, and call from work on his lunch hour). When the task simply can't be avoided, I've devised a trick to gear myself up for the horror: I pretend to be my own secretary, thus detatching myself mentally from the situation. The person on the other end doesn't know I'm role playing, of course, but I put on my best professional voice and in my head (only in my head, lol!) begin the phone call with, "Hello, this is RCH calling from the office of RCH...."

Some people have described this as a phobia of the telephone. It's not, really; I don't fear the phone. I simply loathe it. I have a strong, pathological aversion to talking on the telephone, even to people I like. One of my sisters (who, like most of us, feels the same way) theorizes that the lack of contextual cues -- body language and whatnot -- leaves us feeling unsettled and lacking control. She's probably right. Though it's more fun for me to imagine my aversion as so big and broad and deep that it couldn't possibly have a rational explanation (or solution).

The phone, of course, is not my only issue. Oh, no. Apparently I have some general (yet, according to DH, pathological) social anxiety as well. I wouldn't really classify myself as shy; I stopped caring what other people thought of me long ago and have embraced my quirks. ;-) I don't worry that people will hate me, or think I'm weird or dumb or [insert bad thing here]. And yet....

Ugh.

For instance, I've got an online friend who lives in a town where DH has a job interview this week. The entire family is going, as we'd all like to get a feel for the place if it turns out we'll be planting permanent roots there. I love this friend; she's fabulous and funny and has an adorable daughter just slightly younger than my toddler. I'd love to get together with her while we're in town, let the girls have a playdate, maybe go to dinner (and demonstrate to my Luddite DH that not all internet friends are psychos or 12-year-old boys with elaborate false identities, lol). This woman and I have a lot in common and I know I'd have a wonderful time ... if she had any inkling I'd be there.

I've thought about telling her. I've opened up several messages and titled them: "So what's the weather like out there?" "Hey, are you busy on the 16th?" "Guess who's coming to town!" But I can't bring myself to write the rest, let alone send them. I feel anxious. I want to sneak into town and sneak back out, never letting on I was there. I love her; I want to meet her in real life, not just from behind a screen. But my stomach ties itself in knots at the thought.

My fear is unnameable and irrational and frustrating, but it's mine and I'll keep it, thank you very much.

*Sigh.*

For the record, if DH did take the job there, I'd be relieved to have at least one friend in our new town and I would eventually let her know (though not by phone). I wouldn't wait for an awkward run-in at the grocery store, lol. Or maybe I would. Aaauugghh!!

I've had a very similar scenario play out each time I've visited my hometown in the years since a good friend from high school and his little family moved back there from New Hampshire. I want to see them. They're great people, they have adorable children (whom I've only ever seen in Christmas cards and birth announcements), I think they'd get along well with my DH and I think our common life paths would give us a lot to talk about. And yet.... Sometimes I've gone home and pretended I wasn't there. Other times, I've contacted them via email and been relieved when we couldn't work out a time to get together.

As with my online friend, I both crave and dread social contact with these people whom I genuinely like. It is, dare I say it, a little crazy. Pathological. So do me a favor and pass the Paxil. :-)


~RCH~

Awesome like a possum

So I ditched the raster possum graphic which I was never really satisfied with (a raster is a graphics file that can't be resized easily and which Spreadshirt prints as a digital transfer only) in favor of a vector graphic (which offers much more versatility both in sizing and printing). The result is the tee you see above, and which you can see in better detail if you click on this link.

This particular shirt is offered in Azalea, a lovely bright pink, with black flock printing (that's the velvety stuff). Of course, you could let me know if there is any interest in a different shirt -- long sleeves? hoodie? sweatshirt? -- or different color combination and I'd be happy to accomodate you. :-)

Gift-giving season soon will be here!


~RCH~

Hey sister, I found it!

During one of the last days of her sabbatical, my sister and I heard a crazy voice on the college station and wondered who it was. The DJ never bothered to identify the song, and I forgot to Google the lyrics later.

Tonight, I heard the song again -- and this time the DJ identified both the artist, Joanna Newsom, and the song, The Book of Right-On (from the CD the Milk-Eyed Mender).

So there you go. She's probably an acquired taste, but her music grows on me each time I hear it.


~RCH~

Apropos of nothing

I don't usually check my email junk mail folder, much less open the messages and read them. But I did this weekend, for some reason, and came across this advertisement that made me laugh:

[begin spam]

"Ci-iallis Sof-tabs" is better than Pfizer V-iiaggrra
and normal Ci-ialis because:

- Guarantes 36 hours lasting
- Safe to take, no side effectts at all
- Boost and increase se-xual perfoormance
- Haarder e-rectiiions and quick recharge
- Proven and c-ertified by e-xperts and d-octors
- only $1.98 per tabs
- Special offeer! These prices
- are valid u-ntil 25th of September !

Clisk heree: http://infobayern.info








derive beryl marmalade rototill seafare duff couple fatuous recriminatory wrought clerk titrate capetown lear liquid charismatic volunteer husbandry dumb ayers baxter bang biopsy chordal peaceable lava possessor torrance holstein rubbish trickle commonwealth rawboned canna giddy doorstep bruno patsy chagrin sandstone mailbox aileron highest tyrannosaurus waring install silversmith cordon comparison swenson drawbridge annoyance debutante honorific

[end spam]


The random hyphens, the gross misspellings, the bizarre list of unrelated words at the end (words unrelated both to the product being sold and to each other!).... Someone is enjoying his or her drug habit, I'm guessing, and the drug must be something stronger than Ci-iallis.

LOL.


~RCH~

Bedtime for Bonzo

So I'm over the damage to my ego, lol. I've decided to try my hand again at professional stock photography; I can reapply in a month, and in the meantime I'll sort through my old photos and take new ones which will be better than those I submitted originally.

The tripod I received for Christmas arrived last Wednesday (long story; don't ask), so I can play around now with low light and long shutter speeds. Tonight I convinced the toddler to pretend she was asleep, and got this shot:



Opinions? Critiques? Anyone, anyone? Don't worry; I won't cry this time if you have something negative to say. My chin is up and I'm ready to learn and improve!

Is it too dark, or merely appropriately cozy? Does the lighting look natural? I messed with the manual white balance setting on my camera despite the fact that I know nothing about that and have lost the camera's manual, lol. Do you think this image would be useful, commercially? The site says they're up to their eyeballs in landscapes, sunsets, and flowers; they need more portraits and "contemporary life scenes."

Does it look as staged as it actually is?

Any input you can offer is appreciated.

Well, it's 1:45am so of course it's time to go get the baby.... Sleep eludes me again. ;-)


~RCH~

Everything disappoints

Life has a habit of turning out much nicer in my head.

We're only to Wednesday, mid-way through the week, and I've already suffered a slew of disappointments. I feel so pessimistic lately; I ought to look at the bright sides of things, but.... Nothing turns out the way it ought to and I feel sad about that.

I got an email on Monday telling me that my application to be a paid contributor on a stock photography site was rejected; my photos were not of sufficient quality.

*Punch in the gut*

I hadn't considered the possibility, frankly, that they wouldn't accept me. (Not me; my photos. I ought to stop internalizing that.) I don't know why. I have little actual art/photography training; I know I'm not some brilliant natural-born art world star. My life is rather prosaic; I guess it's no surprise that my photos, are, too.

Still, the disappointment caught me off guard and hurt my pride.

Later that day, though, I went to the mail to find a brown paper package with a Royal Mail stamp right above the destination address. Inside, the issue of the UK's Townswoman magazine that included a full page spread using the picture of my baby sleeping that I had uploaded to a free stock photography site. (It accompanied an article on teenage pregnancy, lol.) So my work may not be good enough to supplement my grocery budget, but apparently it's good enough to use in a magazine.

I left the magazine on the kitchen table, intending to find a safe place to store it until the baby was old enough to appreciate her stardom. But in the meantime, the toddler spilled her lunch of Cheerios and milk in the vicinity of Townswoman. It didn't get the baby's photo, but the first half of the magazine is now warped and the pages glued shut. Hardly the pristine condition I'd wanted to save it in.

Disappointed again.

This afternoon the FedEx man brought me the full color proofs of the cover I'd created for my brother's book. How exciting! But I opened the tube, unrolled the proof sheet ... and noticed something I hadn't noticed before, a last-minute mistake in all the tweaking that I won't mention here because it's pointless to do so. I wonder if my brother had noticed, too, but not mentioned it to spare my feelings.

*Sigh.*

There's always something to temper my excitement, isn't there? Nothing can go just exactly right. Nothing can go the way it does in my head, where my life is bright and shiny and all my endeavors succeed. I feel mired in mediocrity. I feel sad.

I'll get over it in a day or two, of course. I'll drive aimlessly around on country roads, listening to self-important folk singers on the college station while the girls sleep in their carseats in the back, until I feel better. Or maybe I'll just drink a few shots of Dr. Pepper (straight up, full strength, none of that watered-down diet stuff!) to drown my sorrows, lol. That would be the cheaper therapy, given the price of gas.


~RCH~

Sleep is precious, but here I am blogging

Last night was a doozy, the second in three days.

The baby fell asleep relatively early, and DH, fresh home from a business trip, went to bed early as well. I had the whole house quiet and to myself, a rare treat at 10:30pm (a good hour or two before the baby usually goes down). I should have followed their lead, but I'd had too much Dr. Pepper too late in the evening and felt comfortably alert.

I decided to work on a couple projects: Tweaking some photos to upload as stock photography and brainstorming designs for my t-shirt shop.

I created this design in both a brother and a sister version for one of my mommy friends who hopes to conceive a 2nd child soon:



I made this one because -- theoretically, anyway; it's still hot here in West Texas -- the days will start feeling crisp soon and everything will be full of color:



They don't look like much, perhaps, but they kept me awake and working until 2am. I am nothing if not slow and methodical. A tweaker.

I had more or less finished at 2 when I heard the baby stir and start to cry. She has an amazing knack of waking up right when I'm about to go to bed myself, lol -- it doesn't matter whether I try to go down early or so late that it's early the next morning; just when I feel wiped out and ready to crash, she's up and demanding my attention. I nursed her and snuggled with her for an hour. We watched an interesting episode of Digging for the Truth on the History Channel about the search for El Dorado, the Incan city of gold. The baby fell asleep in my arms, so I tried to put her back down -- which of course didn't work. She knows the difference, even in her sleep, between mom's protective grasp and the cold emptiness of her bed. But at after 3am, knowing her basic needs were met, I thought it best to let her cry it out. It doesn't usually take her very long to get back to sleep, especially at that hour and on a full stomach.

Usually. Not this time, of course.

She screamed and cried and screamed and cried, and even with her door shut and her sister's door shut down the hall, all the ruckus woke up the toddler. As the baby's cries finally faded into whimpers and then silence, the two-year-old slipped out of her covers and padded softly in footsie pajamas across the house until she reached our bedroom door. She gave it a good, squeaky shove open and startled me half to death.

I put her back to bed and returned to my own to fall asleep.

A few minutes later, she was back in our room. DH took her back this time, so I closed my eyes and let everything instantly melt away. He tried to get her to sleep, but apparently she stayed up and talked his ear off for a good two hours. I got up again at 5:30, when DH came back and the toddler trailed him in. I tucked her back in bed again, changed the music in her CD player to something more soothing, and lay down with her.

No sooner had I closed my eyes than the baby woke up at full wail.

I said goodnight to the toddler, closed her bedroom door behind me and locked it (mean mommy that I am) and went to nurse the baby again. We fell asleep together on the couch and, finally, everyone was out for the count. Thank goodness we have 11am church, because none of us woke up before 10.

So that's the story of our crazy night. I'd had a remarkably similar one two nights earlier, when DH was away on business and I had both girls to contend with all alone. I'm exhausted today. I ought to catch up while I can -- the girls are both napping as I type this -- but I'm blogging instead.

No, wait; they're not still napping. I hear at least one of the natives stirring, and the other can't be far behind. Ah, well.

Here we go again. :-)


~RCH~

On his farm he had some sheeps

I intended to spam all my loved ones with these clips of the toddler singing (she's always looking for new and inventive ways to avoid actually going to sleep at bedtime; last night's brilliant idea was to take pictures on the "cramma"). Sadly, when I looked at my email address book I realized that many, if not most, of the addresses there are out of date. But then I thought, hey! Why not just blog the clips?

Enjoy!

Old McDonald Had a Farm -- on his farm he had some sheeps
Baa Baa Black Sheep -- one for my master, one for my game
Row Row Row Your Boat -- Liza but a dream!


~RCH~

Speaking of design....

I added a new t-shirt to my SpreadShop, Leonine Designs. This is for my sisters, who are all awesome like possums. But anybody could wear it, really, because possums are cute.



Just so you know, I also have a gender neutral kids' version.


~RCH~

I don't know how the WAHMs do it

Last week I pretended to be a work-at-home-mom (WAHM). Masquerading as a graphic designer, I created and tweaked (and tweaked and tweaked) a cover for the book my brother is publishing.

I thoroughly enjoyed the experience; while my creative interests have ranged all over the map throughout my life (writing, photography, random crafts, and now design), I've always felt very fulfilled when creating. It makes me feel whole.

Problem is, while I'm off feeling whole, my children are running wild with the knowledge that mom's attention is diverted. We had all manner of ... incidents, including the time my toddler found and squirted white board cleaner in her eye while no one was looking. I took a break to flush her eye over the bathroom sink (she loved that!) while my sabbatical-taking sister held her down.

I don't know that I could have done it without the help of my sister, or at least not during waking hours. And with the baby's still somewhat erratic sleep schedule, I wouldn't have wanted to try in the dark of night -- I value the little sleep I get far too much. (On the other hand, I often work best in the wee hours, lol, so maybe I would have anyway and just skipped sleep altogether!)

Anyway. It was lots of fun, and I'd offer to do it again in a heartbeat. But it's given me a whole new appreciation for women who actually make a living at home while simultaneously making life worth living for their children. I have a looooong way to go before I learn to multi-task that effectively.


~RCH~

The difference between them

When my toddler was born, she seemed to me like an old soul. I believe that we exist before we are born physically, that the essence and intelligence of our spirits are eternal, so in some sense we're all old souls -- but it was more than that with my toddler. She seemed wise. Her lack of language simply kept her from expressing things we, her parents, were too primitive to understand.

This persistent belief colored the way I looked at her: I often wondered why she would behave a certain way -- cry in church for instance, lol -- when she, of all people, knew better. I'd watch in bewildered awe, and sometimes impatience, as she played with her toes -- doesn't she know about toes already? -- and have to remind myself that while her spirit may be old, this body stuff was still a whole new ballgame for her.

I felt differently about the baby from the start. She seemed completely new, blank and empty as the West Texas sky, just waiting for experience to find and fill her.

I don't know why I sense that difference between them, or if there's even anything to it. I certainly don't mean to imply that the baby is less intelligent, or the toddler less pure.... I guess these perceptions say more about me as a parent than it says about either of them.


~RCH~

Update again

DH just called again; he's on his way home after unloading and sorting just three plane loads of hurricane refugees. Looks like that's all we're getting for now.

I wonder if that means my sister's scheduled Red Cross shift, registering incoming refugees from 10:30pm to 7am, will be shortened. Or maybe they'll just have her help in some other way. Hmmmm.


~RCH~

Correction and update

Thank goodness, yesterday's bad news proved to be simply misinformation. DH went to the airport where he, his colleagues, and about 20 ambulances from this city and from small towns all around the region waited for three hours for the planes full of refugees to arrive. Rumors circulated about the delays and the condition of the passengers, but in the end ... nothing. Officials sent everybody home yesterday afternoon with no clear timeline on when the hurricane victims would actually arrive.

A frustrating waste of resources, sure (especially the ambulances -- these tiny West Texas towns can't afford to lend out indefinitely what, in many cases, is their only ambulance), but at least the two dead passengers rumor proved untrue.

Everyone went back today, and the planes finally came. DH called me after unloading the first two; as many as four or five more planes full are expected. He said they hadn't seen any serious illnesses or death so far, but that the experience still ranks as the most sobering and sad of his life: These people have nothing, he told me, but limp garbage bags filled with their few possessions; everything and anything else they may have once owned is lost. They are lost.

He said didn't know when he'd be home, but it might be after my sister (who is here on sabbatical) leaves at 10:30pm to volunteer overnight with the Red Cross. If I didn't have the two little girls to look after, I'd go too.


~RCH~

Here come the 'Fugees

DH left about 30 minutes ago for the airport; he and his fellow residents will meet two planes of hurricane refugees from the Gulf coast states and do triage, sending the worst off to area hospitals and the rest to the long-abandonned Reese Airforce Base just west of here. Well, the rest except for at least two -- they got word that two passengers have already died in transit.

Wow.

I returned from my trip with the girls on Monday, and have put off blogging because I wanted to upload some happy vacation pics and pretty day photos to share with you all. But that seems so pointless now.

I've been trying to wrap my brain around this natural disaster all week, trying to put myself in the proverbial shoes of the people floating around New Orleans on closet doors, waiting to be rescued, or holed up with thousands more, getting antsy and agressive, in a football stadium that's falling apart. I can't do it. I just can't fathom what it's like for them.

And now they're coming here, to what must seem like an alien climate of dust and horizon compared to the lush swamps they're used to. They seem like aliens to me, a little. I told DH to tell them they're in our prayers -- and they are, every day -- but somehow even praying for them hasn't quite humanized the refugees for me. I don't say that to be cruel.... I'm not sure I can articulate what I mean very well, or at all.

Their whole experience is just so inconceivable to me -- not the disaster, even in its tremendous scope, but the fact that they've been living on nothing for an entire week; that they've been scooped up and brought here, bewildered and bedraggled, with no idea what's in store for them next; that they have nothing to go home to, even if they could go home....

They; them; a separate entity. There but for the grace of God go you or I, but I guess it's somehow comforting to me that I can't imagine the refugee experience, that I get to stand a step away from the tragedy and shake my head with a gentle tsk-tsk at their loss and the region's unpreparedness for it. I need it to feel alien, if you know what I mean.

I try to avoid news of the disaster lately; it just gets more horrible all the time.


~RCH~

Scheming: New and improved!

So at the suggestion of a commentor on a previous post, I decided to try my hand at opening a SpreadShop at spreadshirt.com. You can see what I've got so far -- which admittedly isn't much yet -- by visiting Leonine Designs and purchasing one of every item listed. :-D

I've so far got three targets in mind: My sisters -- or women like them -- who could make any t-shirt look good (and by the way, girls, might there be any interest in a Likes Me Pink shirt?); a group of women on a private message board for moms whom I've become quite close to in the last year; and people who want to support organ and tissue donation (though there's no scheming there -- any profit I make from green ribbon apparel I'll donate to UNOS in honor of my best friend Kathryn).

The shop is open for business, but don't despair at the sparse offerings so far. I've only been at this since last night at around 1AM. I'll put more thought into it, work on some real designs, and make Leonine Designs the coolest custom apparel shop you've ever seen. Watch out, suckas! ;-)

In the meantime, though, please feel free to run up your credit cards at my shop.


~RCH~

[PS - Spreadshirt doesn't offer stationary products, so if you're looking for a handsome black and white journal, you can still help supplement my grocery budget and feed my children by purchasing this one at the Cafe Press site.]

Visitors and opposable thumbs

I'm falling down on the blogging job, and will probably continue to this month. Right now we're entertaining visitors -- I'm cooking more than usual (on a good day, you're lucky to weasel dinner out of me; now I'm making all 3 meals), schlepping kids to area attractions, and refereeing nearly constant fights between the toddler and her 7-year-old cousin.

Oh, and let me tell you: I am just sick to death of cartoons. If we never see another one, I will be thrilled. And the Doodlebops! 7yo changed the channel from my beloved and very educational Sesame Street this morning to force my toddler to watch the Doodlebops! Grrrrrrr. Doodlebops are the devil. Being the gracious host, I said nothing, but ... sheesh.

Anyway.

So we're entertaining right now, will have a week off, and then the girls and I are headed to see my family for the duration of the month. I'll blog if the mood strikes, but I anticipate having too much fun to bother. :-)

In medical news, I burned my thumb Saturday morning while scrambling eggs for our guests. My special talent -- my super power, as it were -- is making a huge mess in the kitchen. (DH insists I could make a mess simply boiling water, and I imagine he's right.) As I scrambled the eggs in the pan, some fell out over the side. I reached over to get it out of the way and touched the burner directly instead of the eggs.

OUCH!

I dunked my thumb in ice water the rest of the morning, and covered it with aloe vera gel thereafter. It blistered up on Saturday, the blister popped and peeled on Sunday, and as of last night it still hurt pretty much all the time. Not merely when the burned spot (which is actually fairly small) touched something, but constantly.

I kept showing it to DH. "Is this okay? Is it supposed to still hurt?"

Yes, he'd tell me. It's fine. You did the right thing with the ice water and aloe; there's nothing much to do for it now.

"But it's red and the skin is broken and it hurts. What if it's infected? Can you look at my thumb to make sure it's not infected?"

It's fine, he'd say.

"What if there's an infection and it gets necrotic, turns black, and falls off? What if they have to amputate and I'm left without an opposable thumb on my dominant hand? That happened to a girl from church, you know; not her thumb, but she had lupus and her toe got infected and before she knew it her whole foot turned black and now she wears a prosthetic leg from the knee down! (Not that you'd know it from looking at her; she's gorgeous and walks with nary a limp.) But back to me: What if it's infected? How will I function without an opposable thumb? How will I take care of the girls?"

He'd roll his eyes, look again, and tell me my thumb was fine -- healing according to schedule -- stop worrying.

It still hurts today, but less than it did yesterday. So I guess he's right, lol. I expect to resume full use of my thumb within the next few days. Yay.


~RCH~

Happy Birthday

Today is the baby's first birthday. Can I still call her a baby? She doesn't walk yet, so she's not a toddler, right? No toddling going on here (from her, anyway).

First birthdays are more for the mom than the baby, I'm convinced. For me, it's the biggest emotional milestone of her life so far; she, on the other hand, is a blank slate with no expectations of balloons or cake or more stuffed animals to add to the heap. I can't stop thinking about what I was doing at this precise moment a year ago; she just wonders when it's going to be lunch time.

A year ago today I was just getting to know her. She was so small, her face so pink and round, her fingers so long and languid.

I feel like there's plenty to say on this subject, but I don't want to say it. Maybe later. Right now I feel like Mary: I will take these things and ponder them in my heart.




~RCH~

Thanks for the medicine, medicine guy!

It's a good thing I married the DH I did, because I know so little about medical issues it's scary.

The toddler, ricocheting around the room like a pinball, knocked the baby really hard in the forehead last Saturday -- hard enough to give her a dent. A dent, not a bump. I freaked out and paged DH, who was on call and very busy.

Me: The baby has a dent. Is that bad?

DH: Um.... Is she acting normal?

Me: Well, yeah. She cried when it happened, but she's okay now.

DH: Put some ice on it if you're worried.

Me: But it's a dent. Not a bump. Doesn't that sound like a bad thing? Isn't a dent worse than a bump?

DH: Babies have soft heads. I'm sure she's fine and I'm sure the dent will, well, pop out. Just keep an eye on her.

After dinner that same night, I noticed she seemed warm. I took her temperature with the ear thermometer (which I don't entirely trust because her ears are too small for it to fit well) and got 100.2F. I took it with the forehead strip (which DH doesn't trust because it looks like a gumball machine prize) and got 101F. I took it under her arm and got 101.3F. I figured I could average the three results and avoid taking it rectally. (I have so far avoided taking anybody's temperature rectally, and I hope to maintain that streak.)

I paged him again.

Me: I know you're busy, so I'll make it quick. Can a concussion cause a fever?

DH: What? First put the crack pipe down, then tell me what's going on.

Me: The baby has a fever of 101. Could it be from the dent in her head?

DH: No. It's not from the dent in her head.

Me: Maybe her teeth? She has two on the bottom breaking through.

DH: That's a more likely possibility, though 101 sounds high for teething. [*Big audible sigh*] Give me a few minutes; I think I can break away. I'll come home and take a look at her.

He did and determined she had an ear infection, poor thing. He prescribed some Cephalexin, on the off chance it was bacterial. I piled the girls in the car to go pick it up from the drug store's drive-thru pharmacy. My toddler, being the very big helper that she is, repeated everything I said to the little squawk box and then after we got the stuff, as I was rolling up the window and about to drive off, she yelled, "Thanks for the medicine, medicine guy! We love you very much!"

LOL.

The baby took the Cephaluphogus reasonably well until yesterday, when a faint rash began to develop. At first I wasn't sure that's what it was -- it could have been the bad lighting in the room playing tricks on my bad eyes, or marks on her skin from being pressed against me while she nursed. But by 5pm, the rash had grown darker and spread all over her belly and back and, more faintly, onto her face.

I woke up my exhausted, post-call DH so he could look at it. He thought it looked like a drug reaction, but having been awake for nearly 36 hours and asleep for only 3, he decided we should go up to the after-hours clinic and have one of his more clear-headed colleagues check it out. Of course, that's what it turned out to be: My baby is allergic to an entire class of antibiotics. Great.

*Sigh!*

She's fine now. The dent popped back out and blossomed into a small but lovely purple bruise; she hasn't had a fever since Sunday; her bottom teeth have made it through the gum line; she's on a new antibiotic for her ear and the rash is almost completely gone. We're lucky her reaction wasn't worse.

What a crazy few days.

I have to laugh at my own ignorance -- can a concussion cause a fever? -- but really, it's such a relief to have DH around. Can you imagine me trying to take care of these girls without him? Lol. What a mess we'd be. ;-)


~RCH~

Another false start

We went through a pack of Easy Ups this week, but are no closer to potty training the toddler than we were in February when I bought her the Winnie the Pooh toilet ("Oh boy! Pooh and Pligget!").

I thought she was ready. I thought she's been ready for months, but I've been too preoccupied or lazy or daunted to follow through: She's extremely verbal; she has words to describe her various bodily functions and has (sporadically) anticipated them before they happened. She understands and can follow directions. We all know she knows how to take off her clothes.

We've had a few false starts since the introduction of her personal potty. She lost interest in the thing a few days after I brought it home, and I didn't want to push her. She'd only just barely turned 2.

Later in the spring I bought a few packs of real underwear -- pink and purple cotton panties with hearts and balloons -- sure that she'd be thrilled to leave her diapers for these. Turns out she didn't really care, and I had little interest in changing wet panties (or worse) several times a day.

Summer, people told me, is the perfect time to potty train because they can run around the house naked all day. Frankly, since I live in a house equipped with both heat and air conditioning, I'm not sure why the season matters -- but I felt grateful for an excuse to put it off again.

And now here it is, with summer half over and the toddler closer to 3 than to 2 (by like a week, lol, but still) and I feel like I'm completely derelict in my potty training duty. We need to figure this out.

I made a chart last Sunday -- crayon on cardstock; nothing fancy -- and told her she could put a Sesame Street sticker on it any time she went wet or poopy in her toilet. On Monday we broke out the Easy Ups, the training pants with the style of underwear and the ease of a diaper! I tried to force Koolaid on her all day long, an unheard of treat for a girl who's only allowed milk and water, but she didn't want any. We made frequent trips to the bathroom but nothing happened. Or rather, things happened, but they happened in her Easy Ups in between the trips to practice on the toilet. (And let me tell you, when it's poop, Easy Ups are absolutely not as easy as diapers. Blegh.) Whether deliberately or by accident, our timing was always off.

Wednesday afternoon, already frustrated with the direction of this little experiment and eager to inspire her, I let her put an Elmo sticker on the chart for passing gas in the vicinity of the Pooh potty. Hey, it was something.

It's now late Friday night and Elmo is all alone, smiling his happy vacant smile, waiting in vain for other stickers to join him.

The Easy Ups ran out today and we bought diapers to replace them.

*SIGH!*

I thought she was ready, but now I'm not sure: She doesn't seem to have any particular interest in staying fresh and clean; she doesn't mind walking around with her pants full of poop. I've read that being able to dress herself is a potty training prerequisite, and while she can tear those clothes off like a champ, she has a lot of trouble putting them on. I can work with her on that, but in the meantime.... Is it worth the stress this is causing between us? Can we take a break and try again later?

Oh! And speaking of stress! She has to be coerced into sitting on the toilet most of the day, but tell her it's time for a nap (or time to clean up, or time for *insert undesirable activity here*) and suddenly she has an urgent need. An urgent need that -- as evidenced by the emptiness of the chart -- never seems to pan out. Miiiiighty suspicious, I say. But what am I supposed to tell her? "No, you may not use the potty!" Argh.

What am I supposed to do? Soldier on despite her complete lack of interest? Put it off again until later? I worry that these starts and stops sap whatever potty credibility I had to start with (and I worry that I'm now the sort of person who writes long treatises discussing "potty credibility").

I want this to be a positive learning experience for her, but as the week wore on I found myself snapping at the slightest provocation: "Don't you touch that handle! You don't get to flush unless you actually get something in the toilet. Hands off. HANDS OFF." (Picture her with an evil grin, her hand hovering over the flusher, flinching occasionally to goad me.) If we try again later, when she's ready -- when she wants to learn -- won't it be more positive for all of us?

But she's 2-1/2 already; it's getting late. Please, someone, reassure me that she won't still be in diapers at age 15.


~RCH~

Scheming

I keep trying to find a good money-making scheme I can do from home to supplement the grocery budget. I've considered eBay, but I don't have much of my own crap to sell and I'm not convinced I could find decent enough thrift store items around here to net me a profit if resold.

They had a sidewalk clearance sale at the mall last weekend -- I saw dresses with original price tags of $125 going for $10. They were beautiful special occasion dresses; I'm sure I could have made my $10 back and then some, but I didn't have $10 at the time (or $20 or $30 or $40 to buy a few) so I missed that boat. Dangit.

Then on Sunday night, I stumbled across CafePress.com. What a perfect opportunity! They have a catalog of blank products to sell; you use your design and computer skills to whip something up and open a store on their site. They charge a base price for each item (say, $5 for product X) and you set your store's price somewhere above that ($7, maybe). When someone buys product X, CafePress prints, processes, and ships the order, keeps the $5, and sends you the $2. Opening a basic store is free; your only responsibility is to create the products and market them to paying customers.

"Hey!" I thought. "I can totally do that!" Sure, I don't have any actual design training or talent, but I do have Photoshop, lol. So I decided to try it out.

Problem is, with the basic (free) store, you're only allowed one design per product. You can't, for instance, make one onesie design in girly colors and have another of the same design for boys. You get one shot at the onesie, one for a t-shirt, one for a tote bag, one for a journal, bla bla bla.... Hmmph. So now I'm a little soured on the idea. I could pay them some money, of course, to get more variety in my store, Leonine Designs -- but I'm not willing to do that yet when money is so tight and I'm really only testing the waters.

Still. What can it hurt? All it costs me is time and I seem to have plenty of that in the middle of the night while my insomniac baby plays. So I made a journal pimping out the toddler's gorgeous lashes.

Consider this my effort at marketing.

You get a fairly decent idea of the product on the CafePress site, but their close-up pic is a low resolution version of the original that doesn't do it justice. So on the off-chance you'd like to buy this oh-so attractive journal for yourself or for a loved one (it makes a great gift!), here's a better view of what you'd be getting:




~RCH~

More music recommendations

Driving around with the girls and listening to the college station this afternoon, I heard "Welcome to Confusion" from the new album On Sleep Lab by The Stairs.

Anyone who loves me and knows my address can feel free to buy the CD for my birthday.

Another odd, but oddly lovable song off the college station: "Devil Town" by Daniel Johnston. How is it that I've never heard of this guy before?


~RCH~

The articulation of her loneliness

The articulation of her loneliness took me by surprise.

We brought a casserole and garlic bread to a woman from church yesterday; she'd had surgery earlier in the week and was just home from the hospital. I visited with her for a few minutes while the woman's 4-year-old daughter dragged my toddler from room to room, showing off her toys, the perfume in her mother's bathroom, their dog panting behind the sliding glass door to the back yard. My girl ate up the attention, and put up quite a fight when I announced we had to go.

I had finally gotten her squirmy, sulky little self strapped in the car seat when she looked down at her shoes and said, "Mommy, I want friends."

Oh!

I haven't stopped thinking about it since; it hurts me that she said that, and so sadly. I didn't know....

Though she's always been a social creature -- saying "Hi, guys! Hi, kids!" to everyone we pass at the grocery store, for instance -- she's only just now getting to the point where she will play with people rather than simply near them. But who does she have to play with? Me, day in and day out (and we don't always get along). That's it. Well, and the baby, but my toddler is so aggressive in her play and the baby is still so small (almost a year old, but barely 14 lbs) that I usually offer myself as a buffer between them.

We don't live near any family -- no adoring grandparents or cool older cousins to hang with. A bunch of moms from church meet at a park (or Chuck E. Cheese's when the weather is bad) on Tuesday mornings for play group; I take the girls as often as I can, but play group is at 10AM and I'm ashamed to say we're rarely presentable (and I'm rarely functional) at that hour. So it hasn't been real often.

We'll go religiously from now on.

I took her this evening to the indoor playground at the mall. Penance, I guess. I watched her scamper around, happily attaching herself to a group of older kids as they played tag. They didn't welcome her in; they weren't mean, but they ignored her. Maybe, in the crush of the crowd, nobody realized she was trying to play with them...? In any case, she was happy. She giggled and ran and hid behind the fiberglass elephant and popped out: "Here I am!"

I've never worried before about how she'll be received, socially. It has never occurred to me to wonder if she'll be well liked, or if she'll feel awkward and insecure the way I did all growing up. She's an amazing kid, so smart, so full of 2.5-year-old energy and hubris.... But now that I see her on the verge of that other world -- that place where she craves the friendship of peers more than her parents -- honestly, I'm gripped with a slight panic.

I want her to have friends. I want her to have good ones. I want her to never be hurt by anyone, which I know is too much to ask but I want it just the same.

I just don't want her to feel so lonely.