4 months

Tomorrow marks the 4 month "birth-aversary" for our little Lucy.  (Maybe you hadn't heard, but Jason and I made a baby - she's mildly sweet.)

Our lives have changed in many ways almost all positive. 

1) We have a Lucy.  Our lovely home was missing something, and it turns out that all we needed was a small, drooling, pooping, warm, smiling being to complete our circle.

2)  Laundry.  I did a lot of laundry before.  Usually my work day on Mondays were briefly interrupted with 4 loads of laundry.  This would keep us in business until the following Monday.  Well, not anymore.  It took me 3 days to get caught up from being out of town for 4 days and that didn't include the extra load for the bedding and towels from our much welcomed guests.  I have to simply admit that I will never be "done" with laundry.  I was caught up yesterday and the only dirty items were the clothes Jason, Lucy & I were wearing.  But, Lucy has other ideas.  She "blew through" three outfits at school yesterday.  Then there was a pee incident on the changing table and the towels from her super fun bath last night.  Not to mention the 4 burp cloths and multiple bibs that somehow became soiled overnight.

3) Sleep.  We focus on sleep a lot more than we ever did before.  There are discussions about who has the 2am feeding and when Lucy went to bed, when she got up, when she should be tired, when she napped, when she didn't nap.  We also find ourselves sleeping at odd times - I zonked out on the couch last night during an episode of True Blood (seriously!?  I was sleeping through murder, vampires and one pretty hot sex scene.)  Jason asked me, "why are you so sleepy?"  It is sweet that he asks, but he knows.  He also knows that once we moved upstairs to the bedroom (for me) that he fell asleep within 14 minutes.   

Speaking of sleep, Lucy is trending quite nicely this week.  She goes to bed between 6-7pm, wakes up around midnight for a bottle, then sleeps until 5 or 6.  It is GREAT.  I've even stopped waking up at 3am worried that she's starving to death. 

4) Furniture.  There is a ton of baby gear in our house.  It's not just the big 5 foot tall bear who lives in our livingroom, but the swingy chairs, the play structures, the high chair, the playpen... 

5) Safety.  Soon our peanut will be mobile. She's already moving around in her crib to the point where I'm looking into a mesh bumper solution to prevent her little legs from popping through the slats and seriously pissing her off (like last night) but mesh, so if she gets her face in the same location that she doesn't suffocate. 

We're also going to have to invest in baby gates soon.  We're kind of hoping we can wait until the holidays and make them a grandparent gift idea, but she's probably going to be mobile before that.  Plus, Jason and I have to work out where the gates will go.  He wants to block the bottom of the stairs and I want to cut off that half of the house, so Lucy has "free range" in the kitchen, family room area only.  We will block the top of the stairs for sure, but I don't want her roaming around the formal dining room (where all the crystal glassware lives) or the 8 foot tall bookshelves that seem like they might be fun to climb, but are filled with all the pretty things we've collected.  I think making that room off limits is a better plan.    We'll work it out.


6) Sex.  Here's what I'll say on that front.  It's still a very welcome activity and no one feels deprived.  However, the baby forces you to change things up regarding how spontaneous you can be and (I can't believe this is true) sometimes you have to "make time" to make time. 


7) Shopping.  Used to be, if we wanted something we would just zip to the mall, Target, Lowes or where ever.  Now, not so much.  After work, Lucy has a very limited window of time between arriving home and going to bed that unless the trip is quick shopping just doesn't happen.  We also are forced to split duties - someone will go to Lowes while the other hangs out with the napping/sleeping girl.  This isn't a complaint, it's just how things are.

8) Money.  We aren't going out to eat as much anymore, but for pete sake, the additional costs are soaking up that "slack" and then some.  We want to put the almost $400 a month in Lucy's college fund but for now, we'll have to settle for our (much) less than that contribution and beef it up with the funds from some stock I got as part of being a respectable employed person.   We can add more to the plan later when we aren't paying $#### a month for Lucy to play with Miss Alexis and Miss Valentia at "school".    We are lucky that we can afford this kid.  I can see where a single parent would be in a better financial situation to stay at home and take welfare money than work and try to cover the cost of (safe) day care.


9) Social Life.  Since most of my friends have kids that are older they appreciate our situation, but going out to dinner, parties or movies requires a LOT of planning.  Thankfully we are both very happy to view most movies on DVD, and so far the party season has been bbq's where we can lock Lucy in a closet somewhere to nap.  We certainly go home a lot earlier than we ever did before Lucy (see # 3)

10) Travel.  So far our travel has been weekends, but even then the amount of planning and packing that has to occur just for Lucy is incredible.  When we head to Denver in the fall for a week I'm thinking of either mailing a lot of what we'll need (clothes, diapers, food, toys) or sending a shopping list for my MIL to gather (at her leisure and on sale) things like diapers & formula. 

For our 4th of July celebration with the family we're looking to pack (for a day trip):

• the pack n' play
• 3-4 complete clothing changes
• 12 diapers (overkill - but she'll go through at least 8 during a full day, so 4 more is a safe bet)
• wipes
• sun screen
• formula and at least 4 spare bottles (so we don't have to wash after every feeding)
• hat (for Lucy)
• stroller
• the waterproof outdoor blanket
• bug repellant pods (we wear them around the baby - we don't spray the baby)
• toys (Pierre the peacock, and that weird plastic rattle thing that she likes so much.)

This list doesn't include the "for Jas & TP" pile:

• lawn chairs
• sun screen
• guacamole/chips
• clothing changes (I throw up on myself from time to time too, just so Lucy doesn't feel embarrassed.) 
• cooler 
• camera

There have been a lot more changes, like how in the morning we use to wake up to the tv and lay there and talk with our eyes closed until we were fully awake, now we get Lucy and bring her into our room and she forces us to wake up because she's so alert and happy to see everyone.  I loved mornings before Lucy, but mornings with Lucy make my day.

Enough, go back to work. (or for you Dave, go to bed!)

Bathing Beauty

Bathtime

Superwoman

It's been a busy couple of weeks in TP land.  Our baptism guests left Monday and I left Tuesday for a 3 night stint in San Jose.    This week has been go go go and I'm very much looking forward to tonight were we don't have ANY plans.

Being away from Jas & Lucy is rough. They are on a schedule in the morning that is very tight and our normal good morning phone calls when I'm on the road don't really fit in.  If Lucy would cooperate and wake up and eat when Daddy needs her to it would be easier, but we've learned you can wake her up on your schedule but she only eats when she's hungry.  Diva.

Sure, the idea of a solid nights sleep is great and this time I did sleep through two of the three nights, but I'd rather be home.

Lucy was fine while I was away.  Why wouldn't she be?  Jason is an excellent parent who is just as much involved as me - although, he is perplexed by the baby clothes storage system.  I have it worked out because I'm the laundry wench, but I can see where he doesn't have the time to study the drawers.   So, as I was saying, Lucy was fine while I was away.  Happy, sleeping, playing... all good.  I picked her up on Friday afternoon and she LOST it.  My narcissistic mommy thought was (is) that she didn't know she missed me until she saw me.  We played on the floor and I tried to calm her.   Jason got off work, came home, picked her up and much to my relief and sadness there was happy silence.    I'm sure it was a combination of the time of day and the magical reappearance of Mommy.

By the following morning we were back into a normal routine and Lucy seemed her cheerful self again.  I don't recall anything exciting about Saturday day, but that night the fantastic Jody came over to hang with Lucy (again) while we went to dinner and to our last 2011 Symphony event.  Dinner was nice and the Symphony was great.  I love the music to Carmina Burana it is thrilling.  Well, let me clarify that.  I love the opening and closing number to CB... there's about an hour and 15 minutes worth of music in the middle that is excellent, but not thrilling.


When the Pacific Northwest Ballet does their version of CB the middle songs have visual impact of the fantastic dancers in their "naked"outfits.    I may be someone who needs visual stimulation to keep me alert.

my favorite ballereno in action.

here he is again... raaar

 








Anyway... sorry for the man candy pictures.  I still have a major crush on Mr. Porretta and I wish he would come live in our house.  He's probably a diva who wouldn't want to do laundry or cook for us (in his little ballet outfits) and his significant other (I'm assuming fella) probably wouldn't want me following them around asking Jonathan to spin and pick things up or leap up to the top shelf to retrieve items for me. 

Back to our story.  Our weekend flew by.  Lucy took a monster nap after church on Sunday.  Naps are good and very important, but they also trap us in the house.  When she finally rejoined the waking world we took her for a walk and happened upon a new and exciting business opening in our neighborhood.  A liquor store!!!  (I know.. boozy momma, not good.)  We're excited on two levels, the first being it is a lot closer than the other location which is in a questionable location, and secondly they will have Sunday hours.  The idea that we're so pure that we don't need to stock our citrus vodka on Sundays is silly.

Jason made dinner for us Sunday night and we feasted on Chicken Fajitas, homemade guacamole and homemade pico.  He does have a prep cook that spent about an hour chopping onions, peppers and tomatoes, but in the end he's the master griller and put the ingredients together in a way to make them taste like food.   I made a pitcher of margaritas.

Monday night after work I was committed to an event at Luther's Table, so I left my girl and my fella at home and worked my butt off for about 4 hours.  It's amazing how quickly food service skills comes back to you and just how tiring it is.   For an event that had no planning and no prep work I think it went ok.  Two of us who were winging it in the back decided that when (if) we do this type of event in the future that she and I will plan it beforehand so it isn't so chaotic.

Last night, was my book group meeting.  The gals rescheduled so I could attend, but I have to say leaving the house at 6pm for the second night in a row without my people was tough.  Our gathering was (as always) wonderful and totally worth the effort.  I am glad though, that I'll be home tonight.

This morning, in spite of my very clear stance on the fact that I'm a mom until 8:30 am, I had a phone call with one of our business units in Germany at 7:30 am.  Lucy was still home and so I was the multitasking momma.  I  set us up on the couch with my phone and notebook , I placed Lucy on the pillow in my lap, popped in a 6 ounce bottle of creamy breakfast and dialed my phone number.  Lucky for me this is a meeting where I'm a contributor and not running the show, so I was able to be 'muted' for the majority of the call.  Lucy did a good job of not being loud or making any sounds at all during the times I had to talk.  She finished her bottle and then (with me still on the call) proceeded to have a very large bowel movement.  It was, in mommy terms, a blowout.  The blowout not only requires a new diaper, but an entire wardrobe change.  So, at 8:10 am, I took Lucy upstairs for a clean up and clothing change. At the same time, I was explaining the nuances of compliance testing.  Lucy, who usually giggles through clothing changes was perfectly quiet while I was on the phone.    I felt a little bit like supermom, but at the same time I know that her cooperation for this event is a one shot deal.  Next time I HAVE to dial into this meeting we'll get Lucy to school early.

That brings us current to today.

Chillin' in my bumbo

My toy!

Um...

There's a trend in Internet advertising where it seems the advertisers are pulling random photos of real people from somewhere (facebook perhaps?) for to help sell their goods. This particular ad grouping struck me as funny. The buff grandpa is well matched for the add, but the VERY large toothless lady to promote a wrinkle removal solution is odd. I've tried the gain as much weight as you can to fill out the skin to avoid wrinkles but it just simply doesn't work.

Lastly, I wonder what the secret to a good night sleep wtih the lady in the last picture could be? I didn't know that motorboating had a sleep inducing effect on people.

The other trend is to pull key words from your profile or email discussion and fine tune the advertisements to "you". This doesn't actually work when, for example, you have a former employer listed who went out of business in a firey flame ball - "Hey current Washington Mutual employees, get discounts on cars now!" Er... maybe the back end logic of that system is flawed.

Twins?

What do you think...twins? Nope, these two little pumpkins are my mom and me. I'm the happy one...oh wait that doesn't help. I'm the one on the right.

There was a LOT of talk this weekend about trying to get a picture of Lucy in a white dress with a similar happy expression. She makes those faces, but she doesn't sit up on her own just yet.

Getting the picture fell on the list of one thousand and one tasks to do over the busy weekend.

The baptism went off without a hitch and our outdoor bbq was held inside because as we all know, summer doesn't start in Seattle until the 5th of July.

It was pretty nice to have people over and not be pregnant, recovering from surgery or otherwise ill. I actually felt like a fully contributing person to our own event. There was a moment there where I had been interrupted while putting out lunch to get something for someone and then was stopped by a child needing a beverage and at the same time answer a couple questions about where things went or if the temperature of the beans were right that I wished for a nano-second to be 9 months pregnant again and lounging on the couch. It was fleeting. We were ALL super busy all day Sunday and it was a great time.

The kitchen was returned to it's previous glory, our fridge looks quite empty and sad now that the BBQ food has all been consumed but I'm thankful to have the house back and the only thing to trip over is baby toys.

Lucy did really well considering she was nap deprived, actually we were able to sneak her away from her fans for a couple quick cat naps, but they weren't the 2 hour monster naps that she actually needed. However, she was friendly to all the people and only had one major spit up and that was on Daddy before church.

Our houseguests have been safely dropped at the airport and I'm back home with laundry going and thankful for the quiet hum of my work computer. Immersing my brain into security policy work is a nice break from the whirl of (VERY WELCOMED) company.

Too bad I have to zip out to San Jose tomorrow - I think a few days at home with just Jas & Lucy would be nice. I guess there's next week for that.

Lucy's Baptism

This is the video of Lucy's baptism. 

Lucy Video

There's a baby in my room

Lucy is going to be baptized this weekend and (lucky us) we have grandparents visiting for the event. In addition to these most welcome guests we also have the pleasure of hosting Sally, grandma &grandpa L's very dear friend. Sally has been given the princess suite and is sleeping amongst the many lovely baby clothes and toys. (I knew there was a reason I didn't want to part with my single girl queen sized bed.). The Princess Suite is nothing short of precious, but it is comfortable.

Rather than subject our guest to co-sleeping with a three month old infant, Lucy has been moved to our room. It seems pretty clear on night one ar 9:39 at night that the noise we could get away with when she was 2 weeks old simply won't fly now.

It is sweet to hear her coo in her sleep, but since we NEED her to sleep well I'm going. To be sad if she doesn't fair well co-sleeping with momma and dadda. Although, when we were holed up in the "spacious" suite at the Fairfield Inn in Yakima she did just fine with our late night tv and talking.

We'll see how this goes. One thing is for sure...all monitors are OFF. No one need to hear momma toots projected through the house.

Not for small ears

Here is Samuel L. Jackson reading the newest in night time reading for toddlers, Go The F*ck to Sleep



Do NOT listen to this at work!


I've been told that one of Lucy's parents ordered this book for our collection.  I want to know where he's going to hide it...

Get a life!

 Dear moms of "toddlers and tiaras",

Get a life you are scarring your children and scaring the rest of us.

Your dolled up child needs to be a kid and sexing it up for the camera and the judges is creepy and wrong.

What kind of message are you teaching your little girls?  Beauty is not about hair and makeup it is about kindness and love.

I'm disgusted.

What is that about?

I hate that I can flip the switch into "bitch mode" when things go awry.    It is not a personality trait that I like.  Yesterday I was at the Costco Pharmacy to pick up the next 3 months of our "no baby" supplies.  The clerk, er technician told me that our insurance wouldn't pay for our next prescription until July 17.  I quickly did the math and recognized that if I couldn't pick up the birth control until the 17th then we would have a gap in coverage.  That didn't make any sense to me.  So, I called our insurance company when I got home.  The agent also told me there was nothing he could do that I would have to wait until July 17th.  I asked him, do you make heart patients wait until they have their last pill in their system before they pick up their prescription?  He made some reference about a controlled substance.  Then, I thought he put me on hold to get a supervisor, so I turned to express my frustration to Jason.

"It's stupid that they are willing to allow a gap in coverage which could easily result in a baby.  Seems to me that allowing us to pick up our next months supply before the absolute last day of the month is less risky than possibly creating a baby.  If I end up pregnant, I'll drop the baby on Aetna's doorstep and THEY can pay for it! "

At this point, the kid interrupted me and asked if he could put me on hold.   "Oh heavens, I thought I was on hold, sorry to be a royal pain while you're trying to help me."

Finally, the supervisor got on the line and said that she wasn't quite sure what the issue was, that I could pick up my refill after June17th. 

JUNE!? - holy hell, that is a totally different thing than July.   Never mind.

For the record, Jason heard the Costco tech say July as well - I'm not a complete idiot.

Lucy's first back to tummy!

Lucy made it all the way to her tummy for the first time. She doesn't know how to get back, but that makes it easy to get a picture.

Date Nights

Three very different date nights:

Thursday, while technically NOT a typical date night our original plans disappointingly fell through and we were on our own for entertainment.  Lucy was in a remarkably cheery mood until about 7pm when we put her to bed. Jason and I cobbled together a dinner of bbq'd red meat and left over chicken and pasta.  We sat down with a bottle of a new favorite "drinkin'" wine CMS ($9.99 @ costco) and talked for hours.  The topics varied from Lucy management, planning of the families arrival for next weekend's baptism extravaganza, follow up on a 'challenging' discussion from earlier in the week (sometimes you have to clarify the difference between what you hear and what was actually said) and 'did I ever tell you' stories.

Our time together is pretty much always good, but this night felt especially date-ish.  The business of the day was done and we just were together.  NICE.

the wine tower @ Purple

Friday, Auntie Jody and her new, wonderful man came over to hang out with Lucy while Jason and I zipped downtown for dinner and the Symphony.  While I did go through the list of emergency numbers and re-told her where everything was my confidence in leaving Lucy was high.  Jody is awesome with kids and she's in love with Lucy (maybe we all are) so you know that Lucy couldn't help but be a happy, sweet thing.  Well I know that those two things are unrelated, but it is a nice theory. 

Thanks to a still not recovered economy Jason and I were able to get into our favorite pre-symphony restaurant, Purple,  without a reservation. We strayed from our normal appetizer (three cheese platter) and went kooky with a selection of a baked brie.  True, we didn't stray very far... we're a couple of wild and free people.   While we dined we noticed that most of the wait staff shared a common trait.  No, not big boobs - that would usually be a safe bet but at Purple we noticed that most of the wait staff were, um...how to be delicate...'designed to never bump their heads on low clearance items.'  Yes, I'm saying that if you're over 5 feet 5 inches tall, Purple in downtown Seattle might not want you on their team.  At one point I saw a wait person scaling their wall of wine to get to a shelf that even I could reach.  Meanwhile, the song "We represent the Lollipop Guild..." was swimming around in my head.

The reason I won't see you in heaven.

After dinner we walked down to Benaroya Hall and took our most excellent seats and enjoyed a tribute to Barbara Streisand. Marvin Hamlish, the conductor of the Pops Symphony season has not only worked with Ms. Streisand but was an integral part of her first (of many) come back shows in Las Vegas. 


He composed the opening number to the show and said it was designed to enhance audience excitement as key selections of her most known songs meshed together until Babs came out onto the stage and gave the audience what they had paid (literally) thousands of dollars to see.  As the Seattle Symphony played the tune at the moment when in Las Vegas Barbara Streisand would have walked to onto the stage Marvin Hamlish pointed dramatically to the stage door and then pointed as the spotlight moved across to the microphone.  It was if an imaginary Barbara had entered and took her spot.  The audience cheered. Very funny.


There was a vocalist for many of the songs and she was quite good in spite of being very much affected by our lovely Seattle allergens.  After the intermission a different performer came out as Barbara herself.  She was quite lovely and sounded great, but her song was one of Bab's many duets and it was confusing how that would be handled until "she" started singing both parts and the male part was just a tad bit more natural sounding.    It was a riot.

The sweet (old) couple behind us were confused at the end of the show when all the performers took their bow and Stephen Somebody came out in a tuxedo.  "Who is that guy?"  But when the original vocalist and Stephen both sang Barbara parts sounding VERY Barbara you could feel the light of understanding go on behind us.  "Wait...that woman was a man."    Tee Hee


We were home by 11 and in bed and asleep by 11:15.  Happy night on the town.

Saturday, we again waited for Lucy to go to bed before we made dinner.  (A super yummy Shrimp Scampi)  Instead of lingering over our plates we decided to quickly clean up and start a movie.  The movie played, I watched the whole thing while Mr. "I don't ever need a nap" watched it with his eyes closed. As an aside, he has an amazing skill in bed that I'm going to share with you.   Don't worry it's not related to THAT, but he can be in bed with me we're watching a tv show and even though he's sleeping through the content of the show he is alert enough to hear the commercial breaks and he'll wake up just long enough to fast forward through them for me.  I can do this myself, but if he falls asleep with the remote in his hand he'll do it through at least one sixty minute program.  So cute.  Back to our date night, the movie thankfully ended (Just Go With It was mildly amusing and maybe worth the $1 rental fee) and we moved our operation upstairs.  I popped into Lucy's room to find her awake an needing a feeding, Jason offered to do it, but I could see he wasn't long for our world.  I told him I'd take care of it and by the time I got back to our room, a mere 20 minutes later the lights were off and my boy was snoring.    The time...10:15pm  I know, you're envious of our rock n' roll life.


So there you go, detailed insight into three different date nights at our house. 

Lucy Video

Fwd: Hello Bombshell part the story

> Here's the commentary on the photo below:
>
>
>> An advertisement in our Seattle Symphony program. I asked Jason "what kind of shirt would you wear with this bra?"
>>
>> His response: "who needs a shirt?"
>>
>> Touché my love...touché.

Hello Bombshell part deaux

Life these days

It might be fair to say that becoming a parent has shifted the focus in my world.  I'm still very sarcastic, very opinionated, and have lots of useless thoughts about silly things like Gwyneth Paltrow's hair.  My blogging time has been limited of late due to focus on work during work hours and the complete lack of time to do anything but family stuff during family time, and I know that the blog has morphed from funny posts about dating and travels to stories of poop, drool and sleep.  I do hope you're still with me from time to time.

Life with Lucy is good - she sucks up a lot of energy but I think that Jas & I are a good team.  We have to work together to get things done and the old way of doing things has had to shift.  We use to go to the grocery store after work and troll for what we wanted to make for dinner.  Now, grocery shopping is happening as we come home from work or if I take Lucy to 'school' early I can hit the store before I log on.   If we don't have a plan for dinner we eat crap and that's not ok.  Lucy's window of tolerance for activities after 5pm is pretty low, so we are eating out less than before, everyone said that would happen so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.  Most of the things people told us about parenting have turned out to be true.

Lucy resting her head on me is new, and I love it!

I use the word parenting with trepidation at this point.  I don't feel so much like a parent but the caregiver for a very important being. Although, Lucy is just starting to react to Jason and I differently than she does with other people.  At first it didn't matter who picked her up, she was fine.  Now I see that there are moments when she seems more relaxed with me or Jason vs. whatever lovely person is holding her.  I do feel like we have the secret decoder ring for making things right - but only after we've tried so solve the problem with the five other possible answers.  There is satisfaction in meeting the needs of our little girl.  I know others would eventually get to the same solution, but it is validating to be able to do it over and over again. None of these skills make me a super mom, but they make me Lucy's mom.

One funny thing about living with a baby is that it can be infinitely frustrating.  She refuses to speak her needs in clear, adult terms which leads to some delay in "crying abatement".   The sounds she makes can be unpleasant and not at all relaxing, but golly - once we figure out the puzzle and get a whole body smile and now giggles it is amazing how quickly the room lights up.

We're only three months into this journey and things will change every day. Heck we just graduated to bigger bottles and a year ago I had no idea that bottle nipples had different "flow" levels.  I look into Lucy's eyes and I see the same little being that we brought home from the hospital, but when I see the pictures from those days I'm blown away by how much she's already grown.

Ok, gotta run.  There's a window of time to get the laundry put away and the dishes out of the dishwasher before Jason & Lucy arrive so off I go to be domestic between my work life and my parenting life. But, first, here's another picture from the weekend.  Sunscreen needed to be applied to Lucy and we got her scalp too which enabled us to mess with her hair.  Tee Hee... this face says that I'll be paying for therapy later. 

Dammit Momma, not funny!

It's only Thursday.

Oh gosh, this baby thing has finally caught up with me.  I'm POOPED and I don't mean in the stinky diaper kind of way - but we could talk about that too if you like.  No?  Ok, onto my baby story.

Lucy is an awesome sleeper.  She gives us some kind of indication that she's tired - like eye rubbing or general crankiness and we throw her little body up over the stairs and she quiets right down.  KIDDING.  Dad or I pick her up for a snuggle as we gently carry her to her room.  The routine varies a bit, she might get a story (Good Night Gorilla !  LOVE IT)  or simply move into the wardrobe change.  A new diaper, pj's and miss thing is zipped up into a sleep sack.  We will be blanket free until after 6 months or when the weather finally gets cold. (Wait a ding dong minute, it is still cold!?)

After she's appropriately dressed and bundled we simply put her in the crib turn on the rain sounds.  As an aside I would like to give the maker of the iPhone application with the pounding amazon rain a big wet kiss.  It has been an amazing gift to our world.  Lucy might fuss for a few minutes, but then she relaxes into her pretty pink floral sheet and she's out.   Daddy (who returns to being Jason at that point) and I will sit down for dinner, pick up the house, watch tv or whatever until it is time to move our base of operations upstairs.

Usually, Lucy will sleep for about 5 or 6 hours and then need food.  If she goes to bed early - 6:30 being what I consider early then she will wake up in the 11pm to 2am range.  She's like my Grandpa Parkey,  asleep at 6:30 awake at 4am and as a bonus, spits food while she eats.  Anyway...the closer it is to 2am when she wakes up the better because it increases the likelihood that she won't be up until 6am (our own wake up time.)

Last night, she was up at 11:30 - down by 12:15, and then there was a wardrobe malfunction that resulted in the swaddle unit of her sleep uniform being bunched up at her face. The part of the sleepsack that binds her arms is not attached to the backing and she can wiggle her arms free from the bottom which bunches up the wrap around her face. This woke her up at 3:00 am.

It would have been VERY easy to give her a bottle of formula and put her back to sleep.  However, we are getting to the age (3 months!) where a middle of the night feeding isn't required.  At night time, 5 hours should be the interval.  So, through the glory of marital partnership and baby monitors we let her put herself back to sleep without a bottle - for the first time.  It took an hour, but it worked.   There was a lot of discussion while we were doing it if we were doing the right thing. It's hard to hear her cry and know we CAN fix it. However, as her cries became more and more spread apart and we could tell she never hit the "Dammit Momma, I'm *&%() HUNGRY" stage we knew we were on the right path.

All that work was great but at 5am when she awoke again she was genuinely hungry - so we were up. 

I need a mommy nap.


As I was searching for an image to borrow to show I was tired I ran across plenty of pictures of parents faking their sleep with their little baby.  But, these folks... WOW  look at the angle of their little one - they are genuinely knocked out.  So cute!

Grandpa on toast!

Weiners, Liars & Cheaters...oh my

Boys, boys, boys...

Get it together, and by that I mean keep it in your pants!  This simple advice was called out to my prom date as we left his house my senior year.  It didn't make me feel like a princess, but the advice was reasonable.  There are times when you have no business showing your business to others. 

I know, it can be confusing to know when and where certain behaviors are allowed so I've laid out what I think is common sense that might be helpful to you:

1) If you're married and the person you want to show your business to is not your wife or your doctor... the answer is NO.

2) Unless you're being paid to be in a quality magazine like "The Dicks of Capital Hill" don't photograph your penis.

3) Unless it is your only source of income never EVER post images of your penis on the Internet.

4) If you think what you're about to do could cost you your job, that is a strong CLUE that you shouldn't do it.

5) If you have to hide from the media, this is another CLUE you're on the wrong path.

6) If the Onion.com is writing articles about you, you have already screwed up.

7) If you're married and you meet someone who turns your soul on fire, deal with your wife FIRST.  If this new thing is true love, it will still be there after you respectfully deal with the woman who has stood next to you during events like the death of your child.  (You're a slimy douche bag John!)  Word to the wise Miss thing...if he's willing to knock you up while his wife is unaware, don't expect him home for dinner every night.  I think the "once a cheater, always a cheater" line might actually be sound information.

8) If you're a Republican and FOX news is calling you a douche bag you've gone to far.  The same is true for MSNBC and you Democrats. 

9) If you've commented on the morals of others as part of your campaign platform then you should refrain from having sex with the maid, sleeping with your photographer or twittering pictures of your pee pee.  

10)  There is no such thing as discretion when having sexual encounters with anyone but your committed partner. 

Bonus Point  11)  It doesn't matter how 'important' you are, if the woman says no or you have to force the issue it is RAPE.  They teach that rule pretty early here in the US and I thought it was a similar understanding in other civilized parts of the world.  By the way, attacking the character of the woman you've (allegedly) sexually assaulted is a dirty play.  She cleans toilets for a living, do you really expect us to believe that she's running an on the side call girl business? 


So, do you want to know who I think is classy?  Al and Tipper Gore.  They sadly ended their marraige without any (credible) evidence of wrong doing.  They announced together that they were done being married and then both quietly moved on to their own personal lives and we don't have to hear about it.  While I hope they both have new hot lovers making them eggs in the morning, I hope we NEVER have to hear about it.

The rest of you...well, like Danny's dad said:

KEEP IT IN YOUR PANTS!

Adoption Day

We adopted a new person into our family today. A 54 inch tall bear named Edgar Normous Bear, or E. Normous Bear. He came from the place where all big things come from - no not disneyland... Costco.

We hope that he doesn't scare the knickers off Lucy as she grows older. Supposedly, the bear is for Lucy, but Jason seems to love it quite a bit.

I'm ready to go!

Safety First!

Ridin' Shotgun

Pictures from the weekend at Grandparent's house

Grandma & her girls

Lucy snuggles with momma

Grandpa & LuLa

Hi there small thing!

Bear smiles for the camera

Jason BBQ's with help from Bear

Crazy Uncle Ed tries to give Lucy ideas