I’m a follower
Here’s my list of things I am thankful for:
- Turkey
- Gravy
- Cornbread dressing
- Let’s just skip the individuals and just say the entire meal
- The roof over my head
- The pile of Christmas gifts in the guest room that means I am thisclose to being done
- Online sales
- My parents
- My sisters & brother
- My nephews, including the one rolling around in my sister’s uterus
- My in-laws
- And all the rest
- My shiny new minivan
- Being able to take an after turkey nap while Tony did the dishes
- Tony for doing the dishes
- Tony for going to the store yesterday for last minute cooking things
- Tony for going to the store at 1 am for last minute baking things
- Tony in general
- TIVO
- My cats, for only being a little annoying today
- And Eliana, for everything she is
Hope you all have a Happy Thanksgiving with lots of food and family!
NaBloFail
So, obviously. I’d love to say I have a great excuse, but I don’t. I just..didn’t. And then it was 2am and no blog for whatever that day was and I didn’t really care. And then the next day I didn’t feel like it. And now it’s today.
So there it is.
I hope to go back to regularish posting tomorrow. How can I not have a Thanksgiving post? Especially when I have so so much to be thankful for. I’ve just been feeling the internet blahs lately. Today is better. So now we start again.
And a picture of Eliana to leave you with the warm smushy feelings.
Seriously, I wouldn’t try to steal her pie tomorrow if I were you.
Another gifting dilemma
I don’t know what to get my parents for Christmas. I know it seems a little early to be thinking about this, but I’m almost done. I’m one of those annoying, early shoppers. I just have a few small things to get for a few people and then something for my parents.
Let me tell you about my parents. They are the most sickenly sweet couple you will ever meet. They’ve been married for 22 years and together since I was 2. My dad still swats my mom on the butt when she walks by. It’s gross. Dad is 6′ and Mom is 4′11”. Too adorable for words.
They’re not so thrilling though, which I guess is normal. Not like I’m all that thrilling either. They both work hard and like to hang out at home most of the time. At night they sit in their comfy chairs and watch America’s Funniest Home Videos. Dad likes to play on the computer while mom watches. Sometimes they go for rides on the motorcycle and on long weekends, they go visit my grandparents.
Here’s what I’ve thought of and rejected so far:
- A massage- I thought of getting them a gift certificate for a couple’s massage. They both have bad backs and work all day on their feet. Sounds perfect, right? Wrong. My sister mentioned that there was no way my mom would be even partially naked and let someone touch her. I get that. So that’s out.
- A back massager seat thing- I figured if we couldn’t bring them to the massage, we could bring the massage to them. But the ones I tried in my price range kinda sucked. And I don’t even know that they’d really use it.
- Anything knick-knackish- They have enough crap in their house and if they want something, they’d just buy it themselves.
One year for their anniversary, my sisters and I chipped in and got them a ride on a dinner train thing. They’d wanted to go on a train ride and they loved it. My dad got a hotel and they made a weekend of it. i imagine it was pretty perfect. I would do something similar, but I can’t come up with anything. I don’t want to do the boring restaurant gift card route.
So, suggestions?
She’s pocket-sized
20 pounds, 10 ounces; 31 inches long. Eliana is teeny. She’ll be 16 months old on Monday.
We had her 15 months well baby check up today. I know it’s late, but we were in Oregon when she turned 15 months old and then we got home and forgot about it. Better late than never. Today was the first time she’s seen this doctor. She had a pediatrician before, then that doc left and she was reassigned my doctor. Then my doctor left and she was reassigned to someone else. This someone else was unacceptable.
(See, a while back, Tony called her old doc’s office number because he was concerned about something I don’t remember and I asked him to. He got a call back from this Other doctor and she yelled at him for calling the doctor instead of the nurses number. There wasn’t anything Tony could do about it because it’s the Navy and rank and all that. Another time he called in a refill for my stuff and she yelled at him AGAIN because I was taking the wrong dosage. For one thing, I was taking the dosage the nurse and I had talked about on the phone, not the dosage on the bottle AND I had taken this stuff for years at that dose AND do not tell me I don’t know what I’m doing when they hadn’t even done bloodwork on me and only prescribed it BECAUSE I TOLD THEM TOO PEOPLE ARE IDIOTS! Also, Tony is not my keeper. I am a grown-up and I make my own decisions. If you don’t like it, yell at me. You know, the one without the rank who will YELL RIGHT BACK AT YOU. I told Tony he wouldn’t have to worry about calling for anything ever again because I would take care of it. Yeah, they assigned Eliana to that doctor. Umm…Fuck that shit. I switched her. It’s a longer drive, but so worth it.)
(Except, I sorta wish I had the chance to yell at the Other doctor. Damn it.)
What was I talking about?
Right. New doctor. I liked her. She kept acting like Eliana was going to freak out at any moment. I tried to tell her that she digs new people and we don’t really have to worry as long as you don’t yell at her or piss her mother off. Eliana did great. Doc wasn’t too concerned about the refusing milk thing. She said as long as she’s getting cheese and yogurt and stuff, we should be good. But she prescribed some vitamin drops with iron just in case. It smells like ass. How am I going to get Eliana to swallow something that smells like ass when she won’t eat ice cream?
Anyway
She also didn’t seem concerned about the Not Talking. The paper she gave me said they should be saying 3-6 words other than “mama” and “dada” by this age. Eliana doesn’t. At least, I don’t think she does. I don’t really know what qualifies. But nonetheless, doc was ok since she babbles All The Time. She was doing everything else on the list and everything on the 18 month list too (except words). We’re all good.
Finally, we went to the immunization place and got her the MMR and a flu shot. We skipped the MMR last time because I didn’t want to give her so much at once. I wasn’t sure about the flu shot, but the thought of Eliana with the flu made my mind up for me. (No opinions on this, please. I have my own. Thanksomuch.)
The nurse who did the shots was AMAZING. Eliana, the child who screams/cries/fusses for AT LEAST 10 minutes after getting a shot, DID NOT CRY. Not even during the shot! She whined a little after and I could tell she sorta wanted to cry, but she didn’t. I love that nurse. I want her to do all the shots from now until college. She was so awesome!
Overall, good appointment. Yay!
I think she has a death wish
Lately, it seems, my biggest job is to keep the child alive. If there is anything remotely dangerous anywhere around, she goes for it.
Her new favorite place to play is on the fireplace. It’s all brick and abotu a foot off the floor. She climbs up and I know one of these days she is going to crack her head open.
There was a knife on the table and she grabbed for it. It somehow twisted around and almost sliced her face open. Luckily, Tony was there and snatched it before anything happened. I panicked.
She also managed to lock herself in the bathroom for the first time. I’ve known she could lock doors for a while. She does it when Tony goes out to the garage. I think it’s funny when she locks him out. When she got locked in the bathroom though, I panicked. Again. Tony was trying to turn the lock thing with his nail while I ran to the garage for EVERY SCREWDRIVER WE OWN (seriously, I grabbed 8). He had it opened before I got back and of course Eliana was fine, but I was freaked out.
What is with this kid trying to give me heart attacks?
Cute things my kid does
- When she’s hungry and sees food, she says “nom nom nom” and sometimes “nummy nummy nummy”. I’m not kidding.
- She blinks at me when she’s eating. On purpose. I’m going to have to get this on video for the full cuteness factor.
- The nose thing.
- She hands me things and when I say “Thank you.” she nods her head up and down and goes off to find more things. In fact, she does this with anyone she likes. Even strangers.
- When she wakes up from her nap and I walk into her room, she thrusts her binkies at me like she’s ready to give them away and get up.
- When I ask her where her bellybutton is, she lifts my shirt and points to mine before she points to her own.
- When I ask where her head is, she tilts it sideways before tapping it.
- She lays her head on my cheek to “give mommy love”.
Vacation in reverse, Part 2
My dad had this idea a few months ago to book a night at the Great Wolf Lodge. It’s a hotel/indoor water park and yes, it is as awesome as it sounds. I actually don’t have many pics since I didn’t want to ruin my camera and I was WAY TOO BUSY having fun. If there is one near you, go. Right now. Book it. I’m not even joking. We had an 8 person suite with a fireplace. It was really nice, though we didn’t spend much time there.
My dad hurt his knee a while before, so he wasn’t able to really do the fun stuff. (I begged him to cancel the whole thing since it wouldn’t be fair, but he insisted.) He and my mom watched Eliana a lot of the time so Tony and I could take a break. Parents are awesome.
There’s a ride called the Howling Tornado that was so much fun! I call it the toilet bowl ride because it’s similar to what I imagine being flushed down a toilet would be. During the day you can see everything coming. At night, it’s pitch dark. You start out in a 4 person inner tube going down what seems to be a normal slide. Then you just fall. It’s like a huge drop off, then you hit the bottom and go up the other “wall” until you’re really hight up. Then it’s just back and forth until you reach the last slide part and the end. After the first time I didn’t want to go again, but Tony and my sisters comvinced me to do it 7 times. I don’t regret anything. You do have to climb a bunch of stairs to get to the start, and yeah, that sucks. But it really si worth it.
There was also a big wave pool that would have been a lot more fun if it weren’t so crowded with kids on inner tubes. I didn’t have one and got hit a bunch. Still fun though. Lots a kid stuff and a hot tub. Some of them even have lazy rivers (ours didn’t).
If you’re not feeling the water, there’s an arcade, dances, storytime, and a hotel-wide interactive game for the kids. Since it was so close to Halloween when we were there, they had trick-or-treating. We took Eliana and she had fun. There was some kind of craft somethingorother for the kids, but we didn’t do that. Too much waterparking to do. No time to stop.
Eliana liked going down the slides and playing with the geysers. She was pretty content to hang out with whoever. I was always glad to see her when we wrestled her away though. She even slept great! (I was not worried after the amount of running around she did.)
Is this normal?*
How long does it take you to get back into the swing of things after getting back from vacation?
It took me 12 days.
Today I FINALLY started getting things accomplished around the house. Do you know how many loads of laundry we** did today? Six. Six loads of laundry. Granted, some of it was sheets and blankets and stuff, but still! Six! Also, windows were washed (inside AND out!) and dishes were done and the air hockey table was cleaned off.
I also crossed 10 people off my Christmas list. (Meaning I bought presents. Not that I hate 10 people today. Though you should still be careful.) That was a huge leap in the goal to be done by Thanksgiving. I am awesome. Online shopping makes me happy. No lines. No annoying sales people. No aching feet. I even got most of it with free shipping. Thank you, Internet.
I have a theory about Christmas music. I think the reason they start playing it in stores so early is the frantic shopping it brings on. It makes you think of Christmas. Which makes you think of all the crap you have to do/buy/decorate. Which sends you running around the store like a crazy person, elbowing old ladies out of the way.
I wonder if it works with cleaning? Maybe I need a little Rudolph to motivate me to mop my floors. I’ll let you know how that pans out.
*Of course it’s not.
**When I say “we”, I mostly*** mean “Tony”.
***When I say “mostly”, I really mean “all”.
Yes, I am a very lucky woman.
