Just a few more pictures

Frieda had a bath tonight and woke up for quite a while afterward. Here are some open eyes shots.

Slowly but progressing

Who doesn't love a girl in blue? It compliments her lightening eyes beautifully. Thank you again, E! She already has that lighter burst in the middle of her iris that Tag and Pebbles also manifested so early.

Little Frieda continues to improve, and I'm daily grateful for modern technology. Her light machine that looks like a futuristic hernia belt continues to help her biliburbin count descend albeit slowly. She was awake for about an hour this morning, her longest awake period since she was born. She's finally waking up on her own to eat, showing how much better she's getting and also showing in the shadows under my eyes. She had put on three ounces as of yesterday, bringing her up to 8 pounds 6 ounces. She took quite a plunge that first week, clocking in at 8 pounds 3 ounces on her sixth day of life, down from 8'11. This poor child... every time we take her in for another blood draw the person doing the draw comments on how many lancings have yet to heal in her poor feet. It'll be nice to overcome this episode so we can ease up on insisting she eat every two hours and quit darkening the doors of the hospital out patient lab. Every time we take her light belt off she looks so tiny and once again feels so light.

Thank heaven my mother is visiting, something Man and I are infinitely grateful for. The kids renewed their adoration of Oma from the very moment they saw her again. I don't know what I would have done, with the every two hour feedings and still a household to run, every other day runs to F's pediatrician in the next city over (yes, this practice is worth driving for), daily hospital visits, and my own healing to tend to.

And yet in and among all of these busy doings we laugh, play, tickle, chat, take meals as a family, Man, kids and Oma have gone to the aquarium, and we just enjoy the heck out of each other. Man needed this break so very badly, and I have needed the help so very badly.

While typing, I got a phone call from the dr on call this weekend who just got her latest lab back. She's almost in the clear, with maybe one more blood draw and no more than two days of the light belt. Woohoo!

bonus pic: This is Pebbles at the same age Frieda is now. Are they sisters or what?

Now with karate chop action!

New this year, we present our 2008 version of Baby.

We know that before our models have surpassed even our expectations in cuteness, cleverness, and just general "thingness" (quote: Birdie Wooster), but this year we have a very exciting new technology to offer.

We've given you the Scream of Piercing (we just don't understand the level of negative feedback we've gotten for this amazing, superlative feature), Projectile Vomiting, Gaze of Paralyzing Cuteness, Bottomless Questioning, and Wardrobe Concocting Fantastique, but prepare to be amazed at our latest, most innovative offering.

Glow in the Dark Baby!!

For those midnight feedings when a harsh lamp is just too much and you know that with all you've had to deal with the day before the floor is certain to be cluttered with Dubiously Benign Objects, Glow in the Dark Baby provides a gentle, soothing glow sure to relax all your cares away, leaving you free to enjoy your tiny one for the fifth time that night.

The above is a bilirubin light. Her first pediatric appt revealed that she's lost a lot of weight and that she has some jaundice. A quick trip to the hospital for a blood draw revealed her need to be on a light machine for a little while, which necessitates daily blood draws and every other day weigh ins. Poor little dear is so sleepy she can barely eat every few hours, so we're pumping and feeding her as much as she can handle while she serenely glows her way through the day.

Other than that nothing cool is happening. Just the normal kid moments.

Oma is here to visit and is getting used to explaining things to Tag, who is recently very fascinated by aliens.

O: But aliens aren't big scary monsters. They're just people who don't live where you live. So, angels are aliens, Jesus is an alien, I'm and alien.

T: So Jesus turns into a big scary monster!?!

O: No, remember I'm an alien, too, since I'm just visiting and I don't live here. Did I turn into a big scary monster?

How am I going to explain this to his Sunday School teacher?

Freida

Email if you want her real name. :)

First, the only belly shot I've gotten from any one of my pregnancies:

I kept the image small since it's blurry. I was already hooked up to everything and had just gotten back from the bathroom. The angle of the shot is kind of strange, but my ankles were so swollen.

We started pitocin at 9 am after the usual battery of paper work. It wasn't doing much at all, getting me dilated to about a 4 after 6 hours (having come in at a 3). The dr came in to break my water. 30 mins later, I was at a 5-6, had barely gotten the epidural, and the dr decided to not go back to his office after all. 30 mins after that she was born. It was the lightest epidural I've had and therefore the most dramatic birth. The very worst of the pain was gone but I could still feel people touching my feet and temperature changes. I went from "holy cow, that pressure is intense...." to "I'm pushing and can't stop!" in about 10 hard contractions. It's the first time I havn't been able to control the pushing at all and hollered at the top of my lungs. She was crowning just as the dr ran in. They barely had time to take their places before her head was halfway out. The bed didn't even get taken apart before she was born. My nurse had just barely stepped out to use the bathroom and missed the whole thing.

Frieda was born at 4:06 weighing in at 8 pounds, 11 ounces and 21 inches long. She came out squalling and looking totally bewildered. She already has eyebrows and eyelashes and black fuzzy hair.

By the window. It wasn't direct light but those new eyes didn't like it.

One of my fav things about new borns: The faces they make.

Attempting to open the eyes and look outside.

Her hands are slightly foreground in these shots but they really are that large. She has fingers just like her dad and brother. I call them Gollum fingers, since they're so long and skinny.

Good news!

The nurse just called to say my blood work came back negative for pre-eclampsia. I had no idea that that's what they were looking for. Why? Because I've never had to deal with it before. She said that since it's negative that they're going to go ahead with the Friday induction. I said wow, what if it were positive? She said that they'd get me in much sooner than that. Sooner than 2 days? Yep.

So, in between keeping house for a few mins at a time, I watch movies and play on the computer. And wait. And pop an antacid. lol

On another happy note, I've been able to find all the child care I need for Friday and beyond. Woohoo!! It was a bit of a stretch, but thank heaven for kind people who've had babies.

Also, I've been looking into weight allowances for overseas travel. So far all I can find is that they transport the same amount overseas as on land, and for our family and pay grade we can take 8,000 pounds worth of stuff. Sound like a lot? I think when we moved out here we had under 5,000, but have since acquired some storage shelves, a large desk, upgraded our washer to a high efficiency unit, and Tag needs a larger bed here soon. My little guy is not so little any more. What do you cull first? Food storage or the shelves it goes on?

We have a lot we need to get rid of just because we don't use it any more because of redundancy. For example, Grandpa, a long time ago you recommended a submersible blender. Well, we took you up on the recommendation. We LOVE it and it replaces 3 other small appliances and does a better job than all three. No more lumpy gravy, it makes fantastic smoothies, makes egg wash in 2 seconds, and dozens of other things that come up in the kitchen.

::sigh:: I'm bored but anxious. Uncle J, any new games? My rice vocabulary waxes scintillating, by the way. :)

The movies you remember of yore

Yesterday I was so anxious and fretful that I went to Target to see what I could find in their under $10 movie section that would take my mind off of recent and forthcoming events. (why do I have hypertension? let me count the reasons...) To my surprise, there was a movie I loved as a young person, a movie oft-quoted and giggled over: Airplane! The "Don't call me Shirley" edition. I brought that and a couple others home (I'm calling this my "congrats for making it to the end of pregnancy #4" gift) but Man said that he'd heard some sketchy things about this movie. Bah! I said. It's just Airplane! A little light fun, stupid running gags, puns, etc. Something to make me laugh. Alright, he said. But, erm, let me know how it goes. He went off to do his homework, I settled down for a nice dose of nostalgia.

Well, let's just say that I'm now positive that I saw a TV edited version of this movie and I'm very glad the kids were in bed when I popped it in. It was rated PG on the back but there was very foul language, overtly sexual references, massive drug references, and even a couple of brief moments of anterior female nudity. It wasn't even that funny, really. No belly laughs at all.

Bah. Just as disappointing as watching Zorro: The Gay Blade all over again, remembering how dang funny it was only to get annoyed with it.

What movies have done this for you? Any really major let downs out there?

Fortunately I did pick up The Princess Bride which I HAVE seen and loved as an adult, as well as an Adam Sandler two pack -- 50 First Dates (which I LOVED) and Mr. Deeds (also hilarious).

We still quote Mr Deeds around here: Man can walk very quietly in his socked feet and has been known to make me jump by unintentionally sneaking up on me and then asking a question full voice. I yelp, and he says "ah, you underestimate the sneakiness." I swear, that Man needs a bell around his neck.

My Sweet Man

Poor Man. After night time false labor, he always wakes up a bit when I get up to make a bathroom run at night so he's getting about as much sleep as I am. He mentioned yesterday that today and tomorrow would be kind of bummer days to go into labor since they were basically going to play in class and enjoy the earnings of the store he started so many months ago. He's done taking care of the store for the rest of the time he's here but, even after buying gifts for their teachers, they still have a few hundred dollars leftover of pure profit with which they are going to throw themselves a nice class party.

I told him I'd keep that in mind. You know, so I could experience guilt if my water broke during his class party. ;) Just kidding.

So this morning he woke me up by kissing me all over my face (my all time fav way to greet the day, I must say) and then asked if I was in labor at all or if my water had broken, and was my cell phone charged. No, no, and yes, dear. Will I call if any of the above happens? Yes, dear, if any "hospitalness" happens I will call right away.

He was just so sweet and excited and in a good mood, looking forward to a new day and a new baby. It made it so much easier and enjoyable to crawl out of my warm covers and actually shower and dress before rousing kids for the school run.

Sooner than we thought

So I went to a dr appt today. Turns out even though I'm not dilating very much beyond what I've already done, I am experiencing gestational hypertension. So, we're inducing Friday. :)

Administrative garbage

There have been a lot of changes of command around post the past several months and as a result, things have stirred up a bit as all the different new commanders have each tried to make their numbers look good and to become popular. Some of their individual tactics have collided or otherwise backfired leaving the soldiers exhausted and angry. There's a massive tug of war between the actual Army aspect of things (PT scores, briefings, volunteer hours, ad infinitum) and the teachers who are also required to get results from these, our best and brightest minds.

Everyone is feeling stretched thin as punitive action after slap on the wrist get piled up on people just struggling to meet everyone's minimums, forget about exceeding any of them.

So Man's platoon sergeant ordered everyone to quit complaining. He said that sitting around talking badly about what's going on will only make everyone more angry and will spend what emotional energy they have left in pointless ways. Yes, things need to change and quickly before they have more than the average number of nervous breakdowns around post, but as Soldiers they have to be able to deal with a certain amount of pressure without it tearing them down.

So Man came home that day and said "you know, I'm so sorry I've been so negative about everything."

[double take] Eh? What brought that on?

He related the above order and said it got him thinking about the way he's expressed himself about every other job he's ever had, every college or U he's attended, every course of his life that hasn't gone as expected.

I've tried pointing it out before, you know, after I started to realize that my own frothing negativity was having less than happy effects on my poor family and friends. It took living this way, hearing that order, and whatever combination of events he couldn't possibly tell me about (you know the lovely subtleties of life we could never apprise our spouses of perfectly) to jog his understanding and realize what exactly attitude can do to a person.

Which is also a good refresher course for me, as well. I love talking to friend M and friend K who help me put things into positive, loving, practical perspective. Sister in law C also called the other day which was refreshing and delightful and positive.

I have actually typed up some very bitter posts lately but, thanks to their influence, had the perspective to say "is this really necessary?", give it up, and move on to funny kid stories instead.

Speaking of which, I was chatting with Tag yesterday. I don't even remember the topic but I asked him if he could pronounce a word correctly. He said "hmmmm, not necessarily."

lol Wow.

Then he asked "what does not necessarily mean?"

And having the kids question things like this tests my ability to define language, life, and perspective. "It means, it doesn't have to be that way."

"Oh, right, right, I got it." He's such a confident young man.

Button?

Miss Pebbles is experiencing a boom in her vocabulary. Just yesterday she started hollering about the "bacuum" that Princess was using in the living room (because, as every knows, "bacuuming" is a privilege, not a chore).

Before heading out to church I was doing the final kid roundup and found Pebbles laying down on her back on the rug in my room with an orange-sized ball stuffed under her shirt. She looked so peaceful and when she noticed me, her face took on an urgency that made me laugh and she softly but intently said "button!!", pointing to her stomach. Which is, of course, short for belly button. I just about fell over laughing at my little pretender.

Watching Pinky and the Brain the other day we caught Brain's Brain song (parts of the brain) and when he got to the dendrites Princess asked "are those synapses?" [double take] Erm, what? Grunt of protest from the girl, complete with eye roll. "Synapses, mom." What are they teaching you at kindergarten, child?

Tag moment... every moment is a Tag moment. He's so darn creative and perceptive and sweet. Nothing specific today, but we sure enjoy this child.

Makes me wonder how different, amazing, and enjoyable our littlest will be.

To do list:

1. Teach a class. (last class before maternity leave!)
2. Stop by post office.
3. Go do preregistration at the hospital.
4. Stop by Costco.
5. Take Tag to dentist.
6. Another 4 loads of laundry to fold.
7. Dinner?
8. Keep counting contractions (which have stopped being painful, but never actually stopped since yesterday afternoon)
9. Take a nap some time. Last night we were headed to bed at 9:30 (I know, super early but that's just what happens nowadays) when we heard a really loud beeping from our neighbor's house. They had just loaded the moving van yesterday and were staying in a hotel, so knocking on the door wasn't helping. Man called maint. who would "send someone out right away" but by 10:45 I was elbowing him to go crawl through that open window he found. 5 mins later, the batteries had been gutted from the offending smoke detector and we finally went to sleep. Today, am tired.

Dinner: chicken wings in crockpot, baked potatoes, breadmaker bread, salad.

More false labor

Another three hours of false labor and it's tapering off again. ::sigh:: Oh, well. 11 days until induction.

That means 9 days until Christmas!! Are you ready?

Today during the children's sharing time at church, the lady in charge was asking Christmas trivia questions and everyone was just giving her a huge hard time.

She asked us how many wise men there were. Someone said three, another kid said "actually, the Bible never said there were three... they just mentioned three kinds of gifts..."

Later she asked "what was Mary riding?" But the way she said it made it sound like "writing" and I, being a huge stinker and in the middle of my false labor, said "a novel?" (We just barely had NaNoWriMo, folks) Gosh, that's the most irreverent I've been in church since adolescence.

"Who turned them away at the inn?" Someone guessed "innkeeper?" and another kid said "but wait, don't you have to say his name?" I asked him if he knew the innkeeper's name. He said no but looked bothered that no one bothered to write down that innkeeper's name.

This same kid also struggled with the idea of immaculate conception and an older girl argued that Joseph shouldn't be called Jesus' father because he didn't contribute any genetic material -- he was just a father figure. Most of you know that my family has had some exposure to adoption, so I turned to her and kindly said "you know, an adoptive father is still a father, plain and simple." I'm no scholar, but Jesus may have been known for a time as Jesus bar Joseph, after his father. He took up his father's trade as carpenter until his ministry began. It's a very touching idea that he would have knowledge of his own destiny as Christ and yet he learned carpentry and respected his father and mother. Another interesting perspective is from the Forgotten Carols, a song wherein Joseph is said to have expressed his feelings thus: "I was not his father... he was mine."

So now it's safe to talk about....

All of the urban legends concerning labor induction at home!

Today we're term. So, yesterday, I did yard work and ran a bunch of errands. Then there was the Christmas party which woke Freida up and made her do the Foxtrot, upside down, on my tender stomach. We left early after I got sick of being in massive pain.

Today my friend reminded me that primrose oil has prostglandins in it and either ingested or applied directly to the area of concern can induce labor. Hmmmm.... one of Man's sergeants joked last night that if I happened to go into labor or deliver some time on Monday that Man could avoid a test and take a very extended Christmas break. No pressure.

Anyone hear of the Prego Pizza?

We tried a bunch of stuff when Princess had a hard time coming, including donuts in the stake center parking lot, swing dancing, long walks on uneven ground, Chinese food, Mexican food, driving over speed bumps, etc. Maybe we just had too much time on our hands.

The only sure way I've experienced induction was through pitocin which shall not be denied.

Man wants to rearrange the living room, too, so I'm thinking of helping him with that this weekend (being careful not to hurt myself, of course!!) and we're already thinking of ways to trim down our possessions for our puddle jump next year. So, I'm going to be doing some lifting to take care of a few things before postpartum recovery puts me in a chair for a month in earnest.

Now, before the comments section fills with helpful tips (which I'm looking forward to) remember that some of my lovely, more proper relatives read this blog, too, so keep it clean. ;)

Oh, by the way...

Last night, as Man and I snatched our 5 minutes of personal chat time before bed, he mentioned to me that induction is only 2 weeks away. As soon as he said that, it felt like my head imploded.

A: What???

M: Didn't you realize that?

A: Erm, no, um, yes but, wait, two weeks??? From tomorrow??

M: Yep. So, don't worry about her coming early or anything. Just take it easy the next couple of days and whatever happens, happens, and in two weeks she'll definitely be coming.

A: [head still imploding] But, I have stuff I need to get done, errands to run, shelves to clean off, what am I going to do??

M: [patting his crazy wife's shoulder] Put your feet up.

A: [going off on rant about no one else is going to do the dirty work for me, with school taking up so much of his time, etc, etc,]

M: You know, it's really ok. I'll help out where I can and we just won't worry about the rest.

A: [touched at his kind concern, but thinking he's out of his mind]

We finally said goodnight, falling asleep back to back since between his shoulder and my large stomach, cuddling has become increasingly difficult. He always falls asleep within one minute of his head hitting the pillow. I lay there, trying to mentally punch my head out back into place after that messy implosion.

Two weeks... why the heck is that so dang hard to process??

No baby yet

K has called to my attention the fact that, now that I've done the whole "I'm having false labor!" thing that it's a good idea to let y'all know whether or not baby has, in fact, been born.

Nope! Contractions every day, all of the associated crud of being in my final couple of weeks, but no baby. Tomorrow she'll be term. Tonight we have a Christmas party. Tomorrow we have another Christmas party. Today I have an appt, and I must make a dental appt for Tag whose trauma tooth is in fact changing color a few months after its one really rotten week. (anyone remember that? He creamed it twice within just a few days) Man told me to take it easy until baby comes and then I listed off all of the imperatives that absolutely must be accomplished over the next while until I do have the excuse of a newborn to keep me off my feet.

I'm thinking of treating myself to another season of Mythbusters that I can open when I come home from the hospital. Gotta do something with all of that getting-used-to-nursing-again time.

I'm getting into the really grumpy phase of things. I have boundless energy within this extremely tired, weighed-down, pain-ridden body of mine. I want to go crazy nesty all the while shouting "help! I'm bein' repressed!"

hm.... funny phrase to teach kids... sounds like a fun project. ;)

Animanaics

Having taken it easy today, we watched some Animaniacs (which my mom didn't let us watch as kids... oh, well. We can't all be as good as our parents) and I just adore this song.

Yakko's Universe.

Lyrics:

Yakko: Everybody lives on a street in a city

Or a village or a town for what it's worth.

And they're all inside a country which is part of a continent

That sits upon a planet known as Earth.

And the Earth is a ball full of oceans and some mountains

Which is out there spinning silently in space.

And living on that Earth are the plants and the animals

And also the entire human race.

It's a great big universe

And we're all really puny

We're just tiny little specks

About the size of Mickey Rooney.

It's big and black and inky

And we are small and dinky

It's a big universe and we're not.

And we're part of a vast interplanetary system

Stretching seven hundred billion miles long.

With nine planets and a sun; we think the Earth's the only one

That has life on it, although we could be wrong.

Across the interstellar voids are a billion asteroids

Including meteors and Halley's Comet too.

And there's over fifty moons floating out there like balloons

In a panoramic trillion-mile view.

And still it's all a speck amid a hundred billion stars

In a galaxy we call the Milky Way.

It's sixty thousand trillion miles from one end to the other

And still that's just a fraction of the way.

'Cause there's a hundred billion galaxies that stretch across the sky

Filled with constellations, planets, moons and stars.

And still the universe extends to a place that never ends

Which is maybe just inside a little jar!

Then there's The Parts of the Brain. Orson Welles singing a children's folk song? Hilarious.

And for persons like myself who are just absolutely terrible at geography, Wakko's State Song.

False labor

Ah, the joys of false labor. The dr says it thinned me out a bit but no more dilation. He doesn't want his patients walking around at more than a 4 though (I'm still @ 3). The good news is, we're one day closer to term.

And heck, something has to motivate me to shave my legs nowadays...

Insomnia

Have you ever gone to sleep, knowing something sigificant might happen tomorrow? You know, something inevidable but largely unscheduled?

Man and I crashed into bed around 10:15. It took me over an hour to go to sleep because of a feeling of anticipation, but by 1 I woke up with regular, painful contractions that hurt enough to keep this tired pregnant lady awake. So, I've had a bath, shaved my legs, pumiced my feet, made up the call list and child care instructions paper, all the while sipping water and am considering trying to sleep once more. Contractions are once again irregular but painful. Thank heaven for Tylenol and sheer exhaustion.

This baby is coming soon.

To do

My life has become one big to do list, "just in case". Yes, nesting again. I spent the morning picking up some misc errands only to come home to a neglected house. Of course that means it's nap time for everyone who takes naps. lol

Left to do: mail one small package, fold 4 large loads of laundry, clean up the kitchen, assemble and freeze garlic bread, run to the thrift store for a drop off, pack my own hospital bag (the baby's coming home bag is all ready to go), change everyone's sheets, sweep the whole house (which, of course, needs to happen every day anyway), and I'm sure a few other things I'm not recalling off the top of my head.

And, here I sit. Why? Because at Costco this morning I was almost certain I was going into labor. The contractions are getting pretty painful if no sitting happens for very long.

Anyone want to take bets on whether she'll be born this week or next? I'd prefer to wait until next week, since there are two Christmas parties I'd like to go to this Thursday and Friday. But then, I'm teaching a class on Monday the 17th, and I wouldn't mind having to call in a sub for that. It's a pretty fun class though -- acronyms and terms. Also, she'll be officially term this coming Friday which is sort of the goal. Thanks to K, though, for reassurances that nowadays 36 weeks isn't so unusual or anxious-making.

Dr's appt is tomorrow morning. I'm excited!

36 and counting

Yesterday marked 36 weeks gestation for little Freida. Just one more week until we have a full term little one. My Braxton Hicks contractions (fake, "practice" contractions) are getting more serious, I can feel her little head engaging, and now I'm washing little blankets and a small mountain of burp cloths in earnest. Thanks to friend E, I have a stash of newborn clothes for her to come home in. We're all getting the feeling that we need to wrap of various items of business pretty quickly, like getting registered at the hospital. In my defence, I just barely hit 36 weeks which is about the earliest they want you to get that stuff done.

I went to the dr this week to have my eye looked at again and part of the "since you were here and you happened to be pregnant" routine they wanted to do a Doppler of her heart. Two different nurses tried for 45 mins to find her heartbeat. They finally called someone up to get a better Doppler (no, this wasn't my OB's office) when the dr basically said "forget this", grabbed an ultrasound machine from the other room, found the heart in 1 second, and declared everyone safe and sound.

So my question is, why is it so dang easy for them to "just grab" an ultrasound machine from the next room rather than wait for a superior Doppler, but it takes weeks to schedule an ultrasound otherwise? I know, I know, the system has procedures it has to go through, protocols, formalities, proper channels. ::sigh:: Now I know why Tom Cruise bought his own darn ultrasound machine.

According to a previous ultrasound, if Freida kept up her track record of being about 3-4 weeks ahead of her due date, then I'm now waddling around with a 40 week-sized little person. A lady in the ward gave birth recently to a baby who was 10 pounds, 10 ounces and had a 16" circumference head. She blames junk food. Thank goodness for C-sections.

Anyway, I've gotten up to 45 on Free Rice. And yet I am well (quoth Benedic from Much Ado About Nothing).

Click to donate!

It's a phenomenon. I've seen these around for a few years, where you daily visit a website and click a button and some mysterious force will donate a penny or so to any given cause (pets, breast cancer, etc).

Wikipedia has an article on Click to Donate sites.

Google Click to Donate and you'll find many opportunities to do so.

The only problem is, it's boring to open a bookmark full of sites every day, click through them, making sure to get each and every one with the morning comics. And then, if you forget to do so, you feel bad, like you've cheated someone out of all of your little pennies that might have made a difference. What if you have slow internet? I don't want to load 100 sites a day just to donate pennies.

My Uncle J sent the perfect solution. FreeRice.com. It's a vocabulary game that increases vocabulary awareness and donates 20 grains of rice every time you get a word right. This gives you incentive to get a word right, since your score is basically how much rice you give away.

Now, how much is 20 grains? About 1/4 of a teaspoon. I havn't counted. But based on that assumption it'd take 192 right answers to make one cup of of rice, or approximately 3840 grains. In about 10 mins I've racked up 1060 grains of rice or just slightly more than 1/4 of a cup. I think I've gained more than 1/4 cup worth of vocab though. I'd say that this is worth a daily click just to get the brain juices going.

It also has a slight competitive aspect to it: different words are assigned to different levels, based on how many people get any given word right. On a scale of 1-50, people very rarely get higher than 48.

My highest level so far: 42. Which is, of course, the answer to life, the universe, and everything. I am content.

And no cheating. >:-( I've been tempted, but have yet to look anything up before making a semi-educated guess. Thanks, Mom, for all of that Latin and Greek! And Shakespeare!

Ack!

Just got back from the Dr appt. I'm 50% effaced and 3 cm dilated. He looked me in the eye and said he's pretty sure I won't be pregnant for 4 more weeks. I've been coughing like crazy, fighting this nasty cold, and I finally asked for an antibiotic today since it's so stubborn and I'm so sick of fighting it. And it's giving me a nice sinus infection to boot.

But ACK!!! Our due date was just some sort of nebulous "some day" event that I was carefully not thinking about so I wouldn't get all nesty and crazy. Forget about that sort of calm. I still need her to stay in there another week and a half so she's full term but after that... anything goes. My dr said if I get too dilated without any real action that it would be safer to induce so I don't give birth where I don't want to. Man has very strong feelings about making sure we're at the hospital with pain medicine, and a sterile environment and all that jazz.

Anyway, sorry if I alarmed anyone by posting the title and nothing else at first. I accidentally hit the "enter" button instead of tab.

Weekly update.

It seems like weekly updates lately! Oh, well, here's how the week went. (grumpy post)

Lil' Miss Pebbles got some shots a couple of weeks ago so last week her general irritation and fevers just seemed to be residual nastiness from those. The poor child hadn't had a well-child check up since she was 4 months old but I didn't remember the aftershock of immunizations being so difficult to deal with. Come to find out that, after teething so nicely for all of her other little pearly whites, her second year molars were playing merry heck with her ability to deal with life. She basically either cried or slept from last Wednesday until last night. I poured pain meds down her throat as I could since she refused to take them but we still managed to lose more sleep than we found. Last night she threw herself on the floor and just wailed for the 12 dozenth time so I left my almost-untouched dinner and went to the store to get some chewable pain meds. When I came home I told her I had some candy for her which she eagerly ate. 30 mins later she was tentatively smiling and showing interest in her own dinner. Relief! And now I will never go without a variety of pain-killing mediums ever again.

Looking forward to sleeping through the night, I lay my tired head down only to find myself groggily kissing Tag's ear because "a spider crawled into it and bit" him. Huh? Go back to bed kid. He's such a good boy and went back to bed but a few mins later I woke up to his pained wailing. He's usually pretty good about pain so I got up to see what was going on. His ear still hurt. Packed with wax. We went through about a quart of water trying to get anything out and did manage to get some results, but not before he was done with the whole operation. Great. More pain meds, sent him back to bed, but he was still up every 30-60 mins with pain or nightmares or being scared. This morning we get to wash it out until I'm satisfied that it's clean.

We had some friends over Saturday and they were kind enough to tolerate our crazy kids and we still managed to have some good fun and conversation. They're fellow Whose Line Is It Anyway fans, Man grilled, and I mostly stayed on the couch after enduring a lot of standing time at a community Christmas party earlier that same day, the redeeming coolness of said party being the three large bouncy structures they managed to fit into the community center ball room. It kept the kids busy while we caught up with friends and wore Tag down enough for a good nap.

Last night I tried ginger bread again with slightly better results. I used normal molasses this time but foolishly used a recipe that didn't call for salt and had too much baking soda in it. Oh, well. Third time's a charm and this last attempt was worlds better than the blackstrap nastiness from last time.

The only thing that has gotten me through this week has been a couple of phone conversations, especially my dear friend M who happened to phone right in the middle of a Pebbles melt down. Thank you, M! You were the high light of my week.

Now, off to clean out a Tag ear. Too bad I can't just take it off and send it in for a factory refurbishing. Or turn it inside out like a belly button.

Army Family Covenant

This week we had a very interesting and wonderful opportunity to participate in our local signing of the Army Family Covenant.

We got to be one of five witness families since they were pulling from a lot of demographics (one was a single parent household, one was a dual military household where both parents were Soldiers, I forget the other one, and we were one of two traditional families) and we also happened to be the lowest ranking family there. Everyone else was senior enlisted or higher.

I've never seen so many Colonels in one room before. Basically, the only person who wasn't there from our Regional Command was the General himself. We met every commanding Colonel from our post, garrison, and battalion. The Command Sergeant Major of the West Region was in attendance and incidentally is either a very nice man or a very competent schmoozer. We met the guy who is the regional head for MWR which means that while he's a civilian, he deals with commanding generals. And he really liked Tag's tie and shirt combo and chatted with him about reading. Poor Man was just overwhelmed by all of the birds and oak leaves and rockers in the room (rank insignia stuff) and it was interesting just to see these people are who command us. They were all, without fail, interested in our kids, talked to them directly, made a point of knowing which company we were in, and freely exchanged information on their own families, places they've served all over the nation and world, and were generally very kind. The Mayor was there as well.

Now, a brief background on how we ended up being there that night. You all know about the volunteer work I've been doing and loving. Well, I know the lady at ACS well enough that when they told her to find families of these demographics it was easy for her to just email people who fit the bill. I happened to be free the night she said the event would take place. She said it was no big deal, just a photo op with cake afterwards, she had no idea who was actually going to be there, etc. I said, ok, happy to help out in any way we can.

So we get there and of course the first person we encounter is the Battalion Commander and his wife. The men exchanged appropriate outdoor, in-uniform greetings and the wives got down to chatting like women do. After meeting everyone else, we sat, then were the first family to go up on the little stage to pose for the cameras while the Garrison Commander, the Garrison Command Sergeant Major, two people from Regional Command, and that civilian MWR bigwig all signed the covenant.

We (or, the people who knew it) sang the Army Song then we all started the process of stepping off the stage. Each soldier shook the MWR guy's hand and he palmed them a West Region Commander's Coin. The local MWR director also gave each family an AAFES gift cert as a thank you for participation. Then the Garrison Commander turned around and gave Princess the pen she signed the covenant with. It's a nice pen with a coat of arms on the end and everything. I'm going to swap her a fun pen for the nice one and keep it in the fire box until she's older.

We stayed around and ate cake and drank punch and chatted some more, and it was just like the end of church, when the kids and husband are hungry and ready to go but I'm not done talking yet.

I realized afterward that, in my little heels (yes, they were the only remotely cute shoes in my size and they have a 1" heel) I was as tall as or taller than everyone on that stage. I was standing next to the Command Sergeant Major and towered. But I bet he could still take me down before I could blink.

Then we went home, got everyone into pajamas while I whipped up some dinner, and Man and I discussed with cheesy grins how cool it was to meet this or that person, what we thought of the Covenant itself, and recalled in amazement how coincidental and insignificant it had felt to be asked to attend in the first place. And to think I was thinking of calling in sick! We've all been hacking up lungs and going through massive quantities of tissues for days now.

Update from dr's appt: all is well. I'm still measuring big (3-4 weeks big) but Freida is head down with as beautiful a heartbeat as we could wish for.

One of the reasons I love Christmas, and I'm soooo glad these people aren't my neighbors

My neighbors are all putting up their Christmas stuff outside. The people behind us have lined their fence with white icicle lights which are some of my favs. Others have 10 ft. tall inflatable nonsense in their yards. The guys who had a really nifty Halloween chest that would open up every time a car drove past now have some sort of snowman arrangement. Other people have absolutely nothing at all except for one lonely, sort of creepy, inflatable Christmas... thing, standing completely isolated in their yards.

On the other hand, what if this guy was your neighbor? I'd pop some popcorn, whip up some cocoa, and invite my friends over for the show, but then I'd throw my shoe at him if he woke up my kids.

Behold:
Frisco Christmas Lights

I can't imagine how loud and bright this is in real life but if he really is in "Frisco" I'd imagine there'd be noise ordinances.

Gosh, how old am I? Cool display and all I can think about is if it would keep me awake at night. Even with a nap yesterday I could hardly roll my sorry self out of bed this morning. Oh, well. Dr's appt today and now I go to see him every week until Baby Freida gets induced EXACTLY ONE MONTH FROM TODAY!!!! If I make it that long. She's already dropping and my body is doing other things to prepare for delivery but I'm positive that she'll make it at least the 2.5 weeks she needs to be considered term.

And my dear neighbor is moving in two weeks. :( ::sigh:: Another good friend to say goodbye to. Dare I grieve? Man and I spoke with the Primary Pres a couple of weeks ago, explaining that with a new baby and then Man preparing to move on to additional training soon after that it would be wise for us to be released at the new year. But by then I'll have only a couple of months before moving again. Being in the Primary has really given us a lot of compassion for people whose callings keep them largely isolated from the rest of the congregation as far as weekly social time is concerned. We've been in there since just a couple of weeks after moving here and I feel like I don't know very many people at all, with little time to make up for that before moving again. At least our next duty station will be more or less long term. Even if Man does end up getting deployed apparently they'll give us a free move to where ever my support network is, so next time we move I have high hopes of actually getting to know people.

Oh, well. There's my pity party for the day. I'll post again if the dr appt turns anything weird up.

My Sock Monkey

My little Sock Monkey! I have a sock bucket that I stash socks in until I get through a few loads of laundry. It's also where I keep lonely socks between laundry binges. Pebbles found my bucket and since it's kinda chilly and I hadn't put her in real clothes for the day yet, she got creative.

And here's a bonus shot of her trade mark intensity.

From a chain mail:

Last year at Thanksgiving, my mom went to my sister's house for the traditional feast. Knowing how gullible my sister is, my mom decided to play a trick. She told my sister that she needed something from the store.When my sister left, my mom took the turkey out of the oven, removed the stuffing, stuffed a Cornish hen, and inserted it into the turkey,and re-stuffed the turkey. She then placed the bird back in the oven.When it was time for dinner, my sister pulled the turkey out of the oven and proceeded to remove the stuffing. When her serving spoon hit something, she reached in and pulled out the little bird. With a look of total shock on her face, my mother exclaimed,"Patricia, you've cooked a pregnant bird!"At the reality of this horrifying news, my sister started to cry. It took the family two hours to convince her that turkeys lay eggs!

New Sport: Rolling Over In Bed

Sports casters:

Ted - nasal, high strung, had too much coffee. Is bitter that he doesn't get to work for the Olympics next year.
Phil - cheerful, informed, naive.

Team Event: Rolling over in bed.
Special considerations: handicaps - A is 8 months pregnant and Man has extended shoulder condition.

Ted: Well, folks, our event today is going to just knock your socks off. I know I wore two pairs just in case. There are two players on this team which can be both an advantage as well as a serious hindrance.

Phil: You're right, Ted, especially with the other listed handicaps coming into play. The times Man is gone A can just sort of spread all over the bed in very little time but she suffers serious point loss on form.

T: Well, it's not like we're dealing with professionals here. Haha!!

P: Well, Ted, after 6.5 years of marriage and their fourth pregnancy, I don't know what you'd consider a professional. The event is about to begin so let's take a look at the starting line up.

T: It looks like Man is already laying on his back for the night since he lost that right side, which has put a real damper on the available space for prego over there. A is laying on her right though and is just about to wake up.

P: Oh, there she goes, her eyes are open. Let's see if we can tell from her face what's going on... looks like her arm is numb! How'd that happen? Folks, this means that she absolutely must turn so here we go!

T: To start out it looks like she's just going to try the Relax and Flatten to get her half way there. It's always risky to go straight for Supine but this late in the pregnancy you have to watch out for some serious Charlie Horsing... Oh! Look at that grimace! She took the chance and it didn't pay off!

P: Oh, disappointing, folks she's turning back the other way! Oh, wait, she's trying the Barrel Roll where you bear hug the body pillow and try to roll over in place in one swift move to avoid any unnecessary stretching of the abdomen. Look at the shoulder action! The elbow is following...

T: Will her opposite knee hit the bed in time to redeem her earlier fumble? Oh! Oh! The body pillow got snagged at the bottom of the blankets! That foot action to try to get it under the blankets just isn't cutting it and it looks like she'll either have to try again or go without covers!

P: For the people are home who didn't hear about the Great Blanket Treaty, it's interesting to note that while this particular team has a queen sized bed they use king sized blankets to prevent mass confusion and midnight drafts. But even with king sized blankets that body pillow just isn't making it possible for A to keep warm and move to the non-sore side.

T: Well, folks, it looks like her knee is able to contact the mattress but without sitting up and totally rearranging the covers she just won't stay warm tonight. Will she go the extra mile, claim those extra comfort points and sit up?

P: Ted, it doesn't look like it. Her eyes are already closing again and yep, her mouth is even hanging open. Looks like it's all over, folks, without anyone crossing the finish line. She does earn extra points for not waking up Man but that last lazy choice just isn't going to get her ranked...

T: Wait, wait, the eyes are coming open again! Look, she's turning the other way and wow what a barrel roll! Both shoulders and legs over in record time with the pillow turning with such precision! What form! What style! Wait! She didn't stop!

P: Yes, Ted, it looks like this was an emergency Herculean Spin which is unique in that it doesn't stop until she actually hits her feet on the floor. Look at that dash out the door! Wow, you can tell she's practiced this one hundreds of times!

T: She may not have the grace she used to, but man can she book it when Freida gets to kicking. Here she comes back. Based on habit, I'm guessing she'll just got for the Snatch and Slither... Yes, there goes the grab for the pillow and this time her foot work is just perfect!

P: The pillow made it under the covers! Yes! Yes! I've never seen such a recovery! Oh, wait, wait, while she was gone Man rolled on top of the covers. Will she have enough to tuck in? Oh! Just barely!

T: But here's the real test Phil. Will Man wake up? He's been known to sham just like a pro but he's so considerate that we'll be able to tell if he got woken up by if he gets off the covers... no such luck. Oh, well. Points for not waking Man but some loss for lack of a desirable quantity of covers.

P: Ted, it looks like she's comfortable enough to get right back to sleep though, so the covers may not play into the final comfort score. The judges are discussing the final positioning and overall performance... some head wagging and laughing over there. I bet the Charlie Horsing, even though it came before that amazing recovery, will definitely count against her.

T: Well, if she had just gone for the barrel roll that cramping never would have happened. Here are the scores! 6.5 out of 10, but factor in the pregnancy handicap and we have a solid 8.

P: Tune in for the next roll over and see if we can observe yet another spectacular dash to the bathroom. We expect it to happen within the next 2 hours so stay with us.

School fundraisers

So far this year we've been asked to help our kindergarten children with no fewer than 4 fundraisers. Is this the state of educational affairs, that in addition to academic pressure our kids must also compete by selling? Princess came home today totally excited about the latest one which is 2 fundraisers in one, cookie dough and those discount cards you can use with local merchants. We've also had Scholastic hit us up a couple of times and a t-shirt sale. But this time they've brought in the sneaky people who offer the kids rewards all the way from some sort of sticky lizard thing up to a $75 Target gift card. As a high school student my experience only got worse: dreams of sound systems, sports equipment, science toys, etc all proudly displayed and crowed over by a salesperson who was allowed to come in and talk it all up with toothy grins, business suits, and pressure, pressure, pressure.

So Princess came home today and I remembered that feeling, remembered the pressure, the cajoling, the prizes for power selling and competing with peers. I remembered the worthy causes that these fund raisers all supported, the worthy causes that big, bad government wouldn't fund because of their backward priorities and therefore it was up to us to support these worthy causes by being missionaries, crusaders, champions of justice and right. You would be remembered as the power seller who lifted and redeemed these programs that had been left to atrophy by callous administrators who were also the saints with the genius and condescension to allow these sales to take place. The teacher would retreat into the background for the duration of the sales pitch, remain quiet for a short time afterward to let it all soak in as it would, nervously clear his or her throat and then resume business as usual. Unless it was a sports coach or music teacher, in which case you'd get more of a pitch from the truly needy instructor who, due to a very real lack of funding, would plead for help with the budget so equipment and sheet music wouldn't have to come out of teacher or parent pockets.

But who do you sell to? Princess' packet says in several places that you should never sell door to door for safety reasons. I'm not about to ask Man to take one to work to leave on the table where everyone can see it and have the opportunity to purchase. Why? Because he feels about it much as I do. I could try parents at the park like the other determined and earnest people who run home businesses (though they're always so very nice about it, really). The parents I know all have kids making the same sales pitches and spending from their own pockets as well so the little darlings won't go without a sticky lizard. I could run an ad in the paper, post fliers at super markets, risk posting privileges on Craig's list by advertising there. Who are these people kidding? Who could we possibly sell to?

This latest fund raiser is all the more infuriating because, as mentioned, there are two things for sale: cookie dough and discount cards. Three pounds of dough is a cool $14 and the cards are $10. Gone are the days when you could get away with spending a couple of bucks just to make the kids feel better. Now it's either hero or hoser. If you're a hoser, you are responsible for the bitter disappointment Jr. will feel when he faces his teacher empty handed and won't receive his sticky lizard or the adulation of his peers.

I wonder if I could waiver my kids out of these sales pitches like Sex Ed. I can keep them from being exposed to bipartisan propaganda in the form of sexual education so I should be able to keep my child from being exposed to cruel, pointless, unsolicited sales pitches.

Obviously these fund raisers bother me. Perhaps I'm recalling them as an angst-ridden teenager who didn't fit in but would if only I could sell. Perhaps we got these around mid-terms when other concerns were burdensome enough without yet another straw added to the pile. Maybe it was the look on my parents' faces, the one that said "we don't even have enough money for a decent Christmas... how can we afford this overpriced nonsense?"

I could go on as I'm sure you've guessed. But I'll tell you what I'll do. My daughter will receive the empowerment speech and then the matter will be laid to rest.

Ahem. Dear, there is something you must know about fundraising. It's an unfortunate necessity of an overburdened, understaffed, under appreciated institution that is desperate for support it can't otherwise claim from a largely armchair-outcry nation. Feel free to sell if you must and I shall help you in reasonable ways such as transportation, but understand that disappointment is a great possibility since the nature of this endeavor forces you to base your success on the choices of other people. I feel that academic advancement is for more valuable at this stage of your life and urge you to keep your priorities in perspective. I'm proud of who you are and how well you do with the challenges you face. I would not be disappointed if you didn't give this business another thought. Let me know what you decide.

Now let's go play at the park. You're 5 years old, for Pete's sake!

Before I scar you, let me explain.

That's how I felt talking to my Princess this past weekend.

We have a lot of expenses coming up with Freida needing a car seat and clothes. Thankfully, I didn't give away any of the blankets, receiving blankets, baby bjorn, and a few other new baby necessities, but I did give away several bags of clothes and bulkier items.

Then there's Christmas. We're still keeping it simple and less expensive this year (see above expenses) and we've also had to buy a clothes dryer recently.

This past Saturday I went to the PX glasses shop to see what my prescription would cost me. It's looking like a pair of glasses, for eyes as bad as mine, won't cost less than $400. I was expecting $50ish. I felt like I'd been hit in the stomach. So I told her I'd have to think about it but really... what's there to think about? Glasses or blind, baby.

I came home to talk to Man about it and started to cry. I have a complex where I have a hard time spending money on myself at all and the extreme guilt of having such an expensive need right when all these other expenses are coming up was too much for my pregnant emotions. Princess was in the room as I explained my feelings to Man, and that sweet girl offered me her allowance if it would help. I hugged her, sat her in my lap, and explained that it wasn't that we don't have money, or that things wouldn't be ok, it's just that I have a problem that I'm still working on that I don't want her to have. I told her how important it is to me to make sure that her needs are met and she shouldn't feel guilty about that, ever, because I love her and I want her to be happy and provided for.

I found a place online that can do my glasses, including prism, for about $100. After that, I found a newish car seat on Craig's list for $20 (used for one baby, no accidents). Then Man came home with an envelope from the Battalion Chaplain. Apparently soldiers with families all got these envelopes filled with gift certificates to the local commissary to ensure that our Thanksgivings would be bountiful.

It looks like God is telling me the same thing that I took great pains to explain to my own precious child. And I wept again.

It reminds me of a few Christmases ago when things were particularly tight. I had just come out of an Aldi (place to buy extremely inexpensive food, for the uninitiated) with our meager supplies and two small children. A man in a van awkwardly approached me and said that his church had purchased several WalMart gift certificates for families in need who they went out into the city to find and felt that God would direct them to the right people. He said that he felt strongly that my family should have one. I cried, thanking him, and felt rich.

Things this year are looking much brighter. A steady income, a larger home than we've ever enjoyed on our own, and so much to be thankful for that I feel like I'm going to bust at the seams. Who am I to weep over my own needs, thinking they are selfish and untimely?

This is another reminder that it all happens at exactly the right time.



Tag gas just come to inform me that I must have a car sticker on my cheek if I want to come into his bedroom. ::sigh:: Darn. Guess I can't put his laundry away or tuck him in at night any more. ;)

Copy cat

I'm going to copy Rachel's post today. Or at least the idea.

Things I'm grateful for:

My husband. We've grown together over the years. I'm proud of him and even far away from family and all of my close friends I feel totally friendful having him here with me.

My children. My little mirrors, my amazing, sweet little teachers. And no, I still can't wrap my head around having a fourth little H in just over a month.

My extended family. Y'all are a hoot and sometimes a holler. Yes, this includes my whole barrel of in-laws. I have more in laws than I have of my own blood kin which continues to amaze and amuse me. I miss all of you, especially around this time of year. I'm terrible at calling... so I'm also grateful for those who are better at it than I am and call anyway.

Our physical needs are met. We have a comfortable home, food, clothing, transportation, community safety, medical care.

Challenges. I'd like to quote my Uncle J: "every day, in every way, it just keeps getting better and better." I'm learning how to work through challenges and leave them behind me... for the most part. ;) And that makes my tomorrow something to look forward to.

The Army. Yes, that big, blasted, bureaucratic Army. The community around me is amazing, diverse, and capable. I have yet to meet a military person and family who doesn't have an interesting story to share. The community resources, the friends that are so easily made, and the common willingness to get the job done quickly and right so there may be much merriment afterward are all inspiring. I will always have a treasured place in my heart for these fine people.

This country. Yes, it has its flaws but it's home. I do have rights and opportunities if I but step up to accept and exercise them.

I'm grateful for peanut butter. Without it, we might starve.
Pink and purple flowers that my Princess adores.
Cars and airplanes that my Tag adores.
"Babies" (soft, stuffed animals) that my Pebbles adores.
Music, the making of, and engineering the listening to, which my Man adores.
I love these things that those dear to me love.

God. He who sustains and guides, redeems and extends mercy. He who loves perfectly.

Yes, I'm grateful for being reminded to be grateful.

What makes you unique

In our children's class every week, when we all get together at the end of our block of meetings, the primary presidency does something called Spotlight. They have all the kids stand up and then they start to read off the mystery child's list of "favorites" and little known facts until there is only one child standing and the mystery person is revealed. It sounds nice and organized on paper, but lot of the kids will stand back up if they like what's being said so there are always several kids left at the end until the name is read.

Anyway, yesterday, the Primary President tried to eliminate everyone else but the one person, declaring that no one else in the room could claim this particular little known fact. Drum roll... this person is the 7th child in her family. lol Three other people raised their hands, including two teachers (one of whom was our very own Man). She was shocked! Wow, that was a lot of people in such HUGE families!!

Gosh, this lady's a Mormon, for Pete's sake. A California Mormon, but a Mormon nonetheless. I personally know dozens of families that have 6 or more children but then again, I did most of my growing up in the Midwest.

Is there something that's shocked you that you find out is actually quite common among your own culture?

I was shocked by the number of Mormons who drink caffeine. Shocked. Oh, well.

Only in California

Princess has a little performance thing at school where the kindergartners get to sing a song on stage. It's a turkey song.

I'll spare you the three verses of nonsense, but basically it's about a turkey who is a child's pet and doesn't want to get eaten, so they have egg foo yung on Thanksgiving rather than eating the poor bird. Poor, poor bird.

I said in front of my kids that it's a good thing that turkeys are so dang ugly. I mean, DANG UGLY. I don't feel bad about eating them at all. That would be the barbarian in me coming out.

I adore that for a while my grandparents had seafood linguine for T-day dinner. It was different, delicious, and kept turkey dinners fresh and delightful. No one got sick of turkey leftovers for 2-3 months afterward. And little seafood creatures are also very ugly. I don't mind eating them either.

Cows are getting into the cute range, but they smell so terrible that once again, I don't mind eating them.

On the other hand, there are things that are too ugly to eat. Fried bugs of any kind (except for sea bugs like shrimp, of course) are totally off my list. So are snails. And what the heck do you do with a geoduck? Oh, and crawfish. Ew.

Are there vegetables that are too ugly to eat? Or fruits? There's actually a fruit called ugli fruit which I've found to be tasty. And the deceptively tomato-looking persimmon which I tasted for the first time at the farmer's market and loved. The Chinese plum doesn't look too bad. It's very small, a little smaller than a roma tomato. I didn't try those. :( I wonder if things start to look more attractive once you know how they taste, kind of like how some people become more attractive the more you get to know them.

Speaking of odd creatures, let's take a quick look at weird mascots. The above mentioned geoduck is actually the mascot for the Evergreen State College in Washington. Their motto is Omnia Extares (or, "let it all hang out"). Hah. UCSC sports the banana slug as its mascot. Then there's the Delta State Fighting Okra (how'd you like to be a cheerleader for them?), University of Arkansas at Monticello has the boll weevil, and North Carolina School of the Arts has the fighting pickles.

Yeah. Weird.

Don't suppress natural selection

I know I'd feel differently if my kid were to do something so dumb, but can you imagine someone actually mistaking the plastic capsule inside a kinder surprise egg for nourishment and consuming it?

...the 1938 Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act outlawed the combining of
“non-nutritive” objects with confections.

Eh? Look at the picture from the link, the second one down where the large, green, plastic pill thing is almost as large as the egg itself. Who can get their kids to take vitamins let alone gnaw on one of these bad boys? I think this is simply the result of a larger law excluding even those things which are blatantly non-hazardous.

It's a good thing we can still make our own confections with "non-nutritive" objects. There are a number of cakes, traditional or otherwise, available for those who still love finding the prize.

Vassilopita is the Greek version, then there's the Mardi Gras King Cake, with a doll or coin baked into it. What kind of doll I sure couldn't say and that does sound less than appetizing even if it is inserted after baking. Can you imagine getting the piece of cake with Disco Barbie "hidden" inside? Or cutting her up... "Hey, Mike, what'd you get?" "It looks like a foot and a sequin-guilded clutch. The horrifying part? This handbag is so last year..." There's even this pagan version that's all spiritual and one-with-the-earth and stuff.

Other prize-finding ideas include what my husband grew up with: the bay leaf was the prize, and an extra prize for a busy mother of 8 who didn't have time to fish around for the darn thing before supper time.

Back to Kinder Surprise Eggs, I'm a bit miffed that they aren't available here because they're really cool. I got one as a young woman over a decade ago (ack!!) and there was a little puzzle inside. I can't imagine a more perfect way to stuff a stocking.

Does anyone know why that law was passed, about non-nutritive stuff not mixing with food? What were people putting into food that a whole law had to protect us from the unscrupulous? You know, if you wanted to take this law to the nth degree we could outlaw all pills with cellulose powder or silicone-based caps, or about 80% of available junk food, and certainly most American chocolate since I'm sure that paraffin isn't nourishing.

::grumble::

Anyway, OB appt this morning was uneventful. The ultrasound did show Freida as being about 3 weeks larger than her due date would indicate (her head was 4 weeks larger!!), and my belly is measuring about 5 weeks big, but induction is still full ahead go for the 27th of Dec. At the rate she's growing, I'm sure I'll have a plenty full-sized baby for the event. I'm in enough maternal discomfort but there was a poor lady at the park today doing laps to try to get her labor to do something besides tease. She isn't due for another week but after 3 months of bed rest, as many months of terbutaline, and 3 days of active but unproductive labor, she is so ready to be done with the whole bloody ordeal. Thank goodness I carry better than that!

I'm almost legally blind.

So I went back to the eye dr today to finalize my presciption. He held a prism in front of my normal glasses to see if my eyes would accept it and they did.

I asked him to tell me again what my vision was relative to 20/20. He said it's 20/2800. What?? He said that he could stand 750 feet behind me and see what I could see at 20 feet. What?!?

Legally blind is 20/200, but only if it can't be fixed with corrective lenses. I'm still within the correctable range so I won't be getting any disability any time soon.

For the love of Pete!! Hopefully I won't go blind before I die.

If you had to choose between being deaf or blind, which would you take?

"Eye appt", or "Did you know?"

Man had this past Friday off so I ran on over to the eye dr to get a check up. Two items of interest:

1) Tag is not the only person in our little family who has an eye that likes to wander off and do its own thing. My left eye strays up a bit, which apparently is very unusual and should be fine with a prism lens. The only problem with that is that contacts don't come with prisms, so it's looking like glasses time again. During the exam things kept going completely double. In real life, that means that my brain is going through enough strain that it gets tired of trying to fuse the images from both eyes together that I'll either get tired eyes or get generally irritated with what I'm reading or otherwise studying (both are common occurrences for me).

2) Glasses won't be a bad thing because my eyes need a break from contacts anyway. In an effort to be frugal, I've been stretching my (fairly expensive) torics for longer than the recommended 30 days... by like 90 days. The dr was not pleased with that at all. What happens is, the longer you wear them the less oxygen exchange happens so your body ends up compensating by having engorged, visible capillaries grow all over the cornea. This will eventually turn the cornea opaque which is a Very Bad Thing. ::sigh:: Glasses again. And my vision is something like 20/260, so I'm totally dependant on corrective eyewear.

The initial part of the exam was sort of funny. He had me sit in the special seat.

Dr: Do you see the white box on the wall?
A: Yep.
Dr: Great. Read the letter off to me.
A: There's a letter?
Dr: Um, yes, the largest letter the chart has. Go ahead and start walking toward it.
A: [close enough to the white box on the wall that my head is mostly in the way of the projection] It's starting to look like a vague blurry square.
Dr: Ok, turn around and walk back toward to the white square. Let me know when you can see it.
A: [about 3-4 feet away from the letter thingy] If I squint, I think it's an E.
Dr: Oh, wow.
A: [thinking, "I don't like it when dr's say that where it concerns me."]
Dr: You have some special eyes there.
A: [thinking, "crap. don't like that one either."]

Interesting article

First off, freezer update. Apparently my freezer doesn't like the outlet we had to choose, even though a fan thinks it's just fine. The headache now is just finding where we can possibly plug this thing in. It isn't exactly portable. And never mind that it's been there for almost a year now before quitting. Maybe they're having relationship issues.

Anyway, this article caught my attention this morning, and led me to wondering why people I know chose their mate. A lot of people will say something like "God led us to each other" (which is certainly what I claim, even though he's handsome, funny, smart, a good kisser, and at least as tall as I am) or "love at first sight".

But let's keep it to the superficial. What would you be able to tell about your mate after just 4 minutes of focused chatting that would lead you to a second date and from thence to a lifetime commitment? I listed mine above (except I obviously didn't smooch him after just 4 minutes... that took at least 4 dates) so now it's your turn.

Days like this

Days like this.

Last night I heard little crying voices in my dreams, and this morning I found out why. I left Pebbles in her crib sleeping while Princess got ready for school and I scooped her out of bed right before the school drive to find that she had been sick in the night. Oh, well, no time to mop her up before putting her in the car. Bath as soon as we got home, but then she managed to soil the tub pretty badly. Drain, wash, repeat, this time ending up with a clean girl.

Then I find that my chest freezer isn't freezing for some reason. My poor little freezer is now completely stacked with all of the valuable bits I could salvage with several things I'm simply going to have to cook up right away.

::sigh::

May as well clean it out and try to find what's wrong. Yes, it's plugged in, the outlet works, it's turned on, but the power light is off. We've only had it for 2-3 years.

Same old theme, new experiences

I finally got some decent sleep last night so I decided to get all ambitious with this other menu planner thing I'm looking at. I know, I know, I'm always searching for the perfect way to get dinner on the table, but lately I've needed something new to shake things up a bit with little effort involved.

Enter Menus4Moms. Simple, no nonsense, easily adapted recipes for the busy mom.

Poor Man. Last night we watched Ratatouille for the first time and immediately thereafter I had to go get dinner on the table. It was a decent little dish -- onions, garlic, chopped zucchini, chopped carrot all sauteed golden, remove and add chicken that had been floured (with flour, salt, black pepper, and ground coriander) and brown on both sides, remove and deglaze with white cooking wine, add chicken and veggies back in along with chopped roasted almonds and chicken broth, simmer until chicken is cooked through and sauce is thickened. Not bad at all. Served with roasted sweet potatoes (dipping sauce was sour cream, lemon juice, and high quality curry powder)

Thereafter Man asked whatever happened to the dozens of other meal planning strategies I've used over the years. I told him that I got bored with them all and wanted something new. This usually results in inefficiency and uncreative last minute cop outs. There are times when I'm feeling absolutely inspired, when something jaw-droppingly wonderful manages to come out of my pots and pans and Man makes me sit down and write down the recipe. 95% of the time, however, I'm going through old recipes to find what's easiest but still interesting, and also matches up with stuff I have in the cupboards.

The result -- blah.

This website is different from some in that it's free. I also like the versatility of it, giving me something to spring board from without feeling bound by complexity or otherwise difficult to adapt flavor combinations (like chicken piccata -- lemon and capers together don't allow for a whole lot of inspiring acrobatics, unless you're a real foodie, which I am not).

It also encourages the use of a variety of protein sources both vegetable and animal. My standby is chicken. Or hamburgers. Man is getting tired of it and so am I.

This morning I took the lady's suggestion of cooking up a whole bunch of onions (see "prepared ingredients" toward the bottom) at once and freezing to allow for almost insta-meals in some cases and after peeling and dicing 8 onions I finally cried uncle and admitted that I really hate prepping onions. It's a painful thing to spend 45 mins only to end up with 3.5 cups of final product but I have to admit that it's going to make some things unbelievably fast and easy. I just dread the prospect of having to do this particular chore again in just a week and a half. Either that, or I could use copious amounts of onion powder. Blech!!

Or maybe I could just train my kids how to cook one thing each and then I could take their off nights. Yeah, that'd work.

T S Eliot

I grow old...I grow old...
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think they will sing to me.

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Til human voices wake us, and we drown.

The Love Song Of J. Alfred Prufrock

Gourmet flavor combinations that sound gross

Hearkening back to those salad dressings, I've found that there are a lot of flavor combinations in the foodie world that sound hideous but actually work extremely well together. The most memorable example from the dressings was watermelon/cayenne.

When we take a look at the world of haute chocolates (hahaha.... very punny) you find things like cayenne (theme?), fleur de sel, ginger, pumpkin, orange peel, liqueur, passion fruit, lime, anise, curry, coffee, black pepper, and the list goes one. We havn't even gotten into the combinations, like curry + orange in dark chocolate.

So, what sort of interesting things would a foodie come up with for something so achingly normal as a cupcake?

Behold, Cupcake Bakeshop by Chockylit.

Who would think of something like pumpkin + saffron, or parsnip + apple and then bestow that inspiration upon the humble cupcake? I think the oddest so far has been the sweet corn + maple + bacon cupcake. I enjoy all three of those flavors on my breakfast plate when in combination with the actual foods associated with each flavor, but in a cupcake??

The strange thing is that when I try these odd concoctions many of them work wonderfully well. I'm sure that some of you might be happy to just take my word for it and I don't blame you. I was tempted to give the watermelon-cayenne dressing a pass as well, but found a whole new way of considering each flavor as a result of that experience.

I'm learning more in my old age that food can be an experience. We live in enlightened times and in affluent society, so food is not nearly so much of an issue of survival as it has become a three times daily experience. If that means something like adding a bit of Thai peanut sauce to my cabbage salad, sure, why not. Or even sampling the mango + cardamom cupcake.

What are you favorite food experiences? The ones that you remember, savor, and look forward to? What food have surprised you?

My most recent interesting experience involves a strawberry ice cream formed into a lump and wrapped in a slightly chewy rice dough. Tasty, and interesting texture. Different. I found that one little lump gave me enough enjoyable experience that I didn't need to eat the whole container in order to feel satisfied.

Neighbor gifts

I've never been much for the cookie tray. It always seems like a ton of work to make 6+ different kinds of cookies, taking into consideration the dietary concerns of each friend I have. I'd rather just make a landslide of nut-free brownies and let them sort through their own dietary issues.

Anyway, if you're the sort who likes to get all creative and stuff for your holiday treat giving, here's a nice topic of the month put together by Recipezaar. It includes cookies, those weird cookie in a jar things (I don't know that I've ever ended up actually baking cookies from a jar), homemade ornaments, and even some treats you can make for your favorite canine. Heck, you can even bake something to put your cookies into. Edible cookie plate?? That's going the extra mile, especially calorically speaking.

I'm just going to stick with my old standby. Made on jelly roll pans, you can whip out many plates' worth in just a couple of hours, no frosting needed. Plastic wrap, stick on bow, smile when you knock on the door, get home in plenty of time to enjoy hot cocoa and candy canes with the husband and kids. The plates also stack in the stroller basket if you take them Christmas caroling. Just take a small bag of bows with you so they don't smash, then add at the last minute.

Or, even easier, snowman soup. I've seen this made with those tree and star colored marshmallows which makes for very cute presentation and, with no cooking time and just-add-water, it's more likely to get used.

Halloween, etc

First, dr's appt didn't reveal anything on Tuesday except the results from the hospital had not gotten back yet. They didn't expect that fast of a turnover anyway. Oh, well.

Anyway, Wednesday was interesting. Princess had her first "Harvest Festival" feast and costume parade at school. It was the expected milling about of 5 year old kids. I got there early enough to (barely) find a parking spot and help her change into her costume.

It's her new holiday dress with a pair of wings. Later that night we added purple sparkle makeup, lip gloss, and her loot bag was a watering can. They had a rousing game of musical chairs in which Princess proved herself to be entirely too genteel for such an aggressive game, offering her seat to the poor sad little kid next to her. Then we all trooped out to the large blacktop in the back of the school so the kids could travel around the perimeter to such tunes as The One-eyed, One-horned, Flying, Purple People Eater and an instrumental version of Ghost Rider in the Sky. They made about 5 circuits before everyone, including the kids, got tired of the whole thing. Princess frolicked around the whole time, enjoying her wings and twirly skirt. I got bored fairly quickly but shrugged and figured it looked like the kids were having a good time. On our way out to the van, Princess asked "so, what was the point of that?" I laughed and said I had no idea, but she sure looked beautiful in her costume. Oh, well.

I'm bad and didn't take a pic of Tag with his gumball machine outfit, which, unfortunately fell apart while trick or treating. We leaked balloons all over the neighborhood until the friend I was walking with offered to let him use an old costume of her son's. He finished the rest of the evening as a bespectacled pirate which I think he actually liked a bit better since he could run in that outfit.

I'll get a pic of Pebbles as a dinosaur later today. Her costume was purchased and actually could be used as pajamas now.

The trick or treating itself was an adventure. I took the stroller for Lil' Miss which turned out to be a heaven send. She went up to doors for the first 5 or so houses until she found out that riding in the stroller was more fun than trying to keep up with the other kids. We went walking with our neighbor and her two kids and they had such a hoot. The evening was absolutely perfect for haunting the streets, with a thick salty fog that left a lot of trees dripping just from ambient moisture, and all of the old, bent, twisty trees and shedding eucalyptus. We just stuck around our part of the base instead of going to the new housing, aka the "rich" housing (which is a misnomer since most of the people in the "rich" housing have the same pay grade as we do, they just got lucky). There were only about 4-5 houses on each street with their porch lights on, but we also managed to be either the first or second people to come by the entire evening, which at first didn't seem weird until the clock rolled around to 8:30 and we were STILL either the first or second people at each door. By then people were two fisting the giving of treats. I weighed Princess' bag of loot after we got the kids home and in bed. Just her bag came to 3.5 pounds! It seemed silly to me that all of those people went only to the new houses when I'm sure we came back with a better score in a shorter amount of time than they did. Oh, well, trick's on them. I heard of one house that just left their candy out in a box. The next morning they woke up to find that the raccoons had figured out how to unwrap candy and had made a terrible mess. The wife took the box inside and didn't touch the mess at all, which confused the man telling the story, until her husband came home and was made to pick it up all by himself. We can only guess whose idea the outside box was.

Anyway, Pebbles was able to fit her petite little self into a size 18m costume, which led to a mass measuring of the kids this morning. Pebbles is 2 feet, 8.5 inches, Tag is 3 foot 7.5 inches, and Princess has put on another inch in the last couple of months for a grand total of 4 feet 2 inches tall. She's already grown out of her whole last crop of clothes, you know, the ones I got right before school started. ::sigh:: I'm sure this is the generational lament of the ages. Or, one of them, at least. :)

Anyway, Man's on CQ recovery today. Someone needed to swap and Man figured it'd be better to do someone a favor now and then be able to call it in after little Freida puts in an appearance. We all know what a treasure sleep becomes in those first couple of months. So he called me up at 7:45 yesterday morning to ask if we had anything going on yesterday night, then that was the last I heard of it until he called back at 5:30pm or so to let me know that he started CQ that very morning and wouldn't be home until today. Just goes to show, you never know when your soldier will be coming home in the evening, or if.

So today we're measuring kids, watching Toy Story 2, and getting ready to finish some grocery shopping so he can sleep. Speaking of Toy Story, Ratatouille comes out on DVD on Tuesday!! We havn't seen it yet but we have a standing policy of buying Pixar movies.

Also, don't forget to set your clocks back an hour before bed tonight. Daylight Saving Time ends at 2am tomorrow morning and we all get to sleep an extra hour.

Unless you have kids.