say cheese

Today has been an exciting day in the P household. I use the term "exciting" fairly loosely. It may not seem exciting to everyone. Around here, though...the standard for excitement is pretty low.

Anyway, the day started with a first. The first time that I actually gave S her breakfast in a bowl with the spoon. On her own. I have one of those suction cup bowls, so I put her banana/yogurt/oatmeal combo in it, stuck it to the high chair tray, handed her the spoon, said a silent little prayer, and asked forgiveness from my carpet. It wasn't so bad really. She chucked the spoon immediately and dug in with her fingers. When she realized that her fingers weren't really the best vehicle for escorting the breakfast combo to her mouth, she decided she didn't care and went after the diced bananas that were scattered across the tray. I eventually removed the suction cup bowl, and I don't even think she cared...aside from the fact that she could see her diced bananas better without the bowl in her way. We'll wait awhile before trying it again. She just isn't interested in being fed right now as she wants to do everything herself, so I thought I'd give her the opportunity. Basically, I think we'll be skipping the puree step of making her food, and just giving her things that are steamed and diced.

The second first of the day was at lunch. S had her first grilled cheese. Since she's so interested in feeding herself, I thought I'd give her something new and sophisticated. Sophisticated for her, anyway. There was really so little cheese involved that I may as well have fed her grilled toast. She liked it, though, and she ate the entire grilled cheese, less the crusts, which I thought might be a "choking hazard." She also ate half a pear. She eats like a grown-up.

After all the lunchtime fun, we headed to the mall, which is totally mommy-central in the middle of the day. It's like playing a game: dodge the oncoming strollers. ("If you can dodge a stroller, you can dodge a ball.") I had to return a jacket that I'd ordered from Land's End. (Did you know you can take the stuff back to Sears and not pay shipping?? Score. I'll take that six bucks in Starbucks credit, please.) I also had to pick up a birthday gift for my littlest sister, who turns 11 next week. Since we were there, I let S play in the play area, and she was a little more adventurous this time. She crawled away from me several times, toward groups of other kids. I think she had fun, but after ten minutes, she was overwhelmed, so we came home for naptime.

The last first of the day was an Otis first. Background: we replaced all of our locks a few weeks ago, and the door to to garage doesn't shut entirely properly now. You've really got to put your weight into it to make it close, and then you have to double check to make sure it's closed. Then double check again for good measure. I ran out to the garage a little while ago to grab some packing tape, and as I was on the phone, I did not check the door the extra time. Apparently, it came open at some point while I was on the phone and taping packages, because I realized that Otis wasn't around anymore. Crap. Otis is not one of those dogs that you can just let out. Well, maybe he is, but we'll never know because we don't trust that he wouldn't chase a squirrel all the way to Maryland. I ran out to see if he was anywhere to be found, and I saw him in a yard a few houses down. I called to him, and he looked at me, confused. I ran back into the house to find something to entice him with, and when I went back to the garage, there he was. Good dog. Very, very good dog. I gave him a whole apple as a "thank you for not making me chase you throughout the entire city of Lexington" reward. Now he's napping, and I'm sitting here thinking I've got the greatest dog ever.

I have stuff to do. Like wash diapers. As always.

I'm out, peeps. Have a good one.

the comedy is divine

I decided weeks ago that the diaper pail needed a little decoration. Plain white can in the hallway outside S's room? Boring. Not any more. I have embellished its lid with such glorious literary eruditeness that I am quite pleased with myself. Quite. Dante would be proud to see that his work has survived the centuries and now adorns my daughter's diaper pail. I thought it terribly appropriate. If my high school English teacher could see me now...

Okay, nerdiness aside. I had quite the morning. Otis caught another unsuspecting creature. I was eating my breakfast, getting ready to mash up some banana for baby girl when I heard what sounded like an entire flock of birds erupt in protest. I looked out the back window to see about a half dozen birds hopping along the back of the fence, screeching at Otis, who was getting ready to pounce on a bird that was hopping around in the back corner of the yard. Clearly, the bird was already injured because it was hopping about six feet at a time but never taking off. As I stuck my head out the door to yell for Otis, the bird hopped into the air and that was pretty much all she wrote. Otis caught it right out of the air. Lovely. Luckily, my shoes from the great chipmunk chase of a few days ago were still by the back door. As I pulled my shoes on, I pleaded with Otis to drop the flailing bird. I ran and grabbed some plastic bags and dashed into the rain-soaked backyard. (Did I mention it was raining?) I turned the hose on full blast and chased Otis to the side of the yard, where he promptly dropped his catch and walked away. I don't know if all the bird's flailing had him freaked out or if he was actually retrieving the bird for me, and I don't care. At least he dropped it. That's the good news. The bad news is that the poor thing was still alive. Fairly mangled, but alive and likely in agony. So, I acted like the good farm girl that I am and broke its neck. Even typing that sentence makes me feel awful. I couldn't just let it suffer, though. Anyway, I scooped it into the plastic bag and took it to the garbage. That was that. Another day in the life...

I think there may be too much excitement around here. Way too much...and not excitement like, "Hey! I just won the lottery." I'd welcome that kind of excitement.

I'm off to do some laundry and then attack the squash bugs in the garden. Fantastic.

FIVE SENSES FRIDAY
Sight: S covered in avocado; so many tomatoes growing in the garden
Sound: Cory Branan's new (okay, it's been out for awhile) CD; S laughing
Smell: Basil in the garden; zucchini bread in the oven; Method lemon floor cleaner
Taste: peaches; cherries; zucchini bread; homemade croutons
Touch: clean sheets; clean Otis fur

Oh, yeah...at six months, the wee one is 20.5 pounds; 28.25 inches. That equals enormous. I should likely stop referring to her as "the wee one."

the good, the bad, and the ugly

By "ugly" I mean completely and utterly disgusting, so any nauseated pregos may chose to refrain from reading the part of this post chronicling Otis's activities yesterday morning. Just a heads up...

Moving right along.

The good. Baby, baby, baby. My sweet girl is so hysterical. Everytime I look at her, I think I love her a little bit more. Sometimes I think I may explode from it all. I am constantly amazed at how much I love my life right now. I have a wonderful husband, who always makes me laugh, even as he aggravates the snot out of me. I have a great dog, who is sweet and gentle with our daughter. Of course, antics like yesterday's can be exceedingly frustrating. He's still an awesome doodle, though. Then, there is the girl. My vocabulary is ill-equipped for describing how happy she makes me and how perfectly she completes our little family. I'm giving up on trying...you'll all just have to see for yourselves.

The bad. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I waited a couple of days before even broaching the subject. I was terribly disappointed in the movie. Terribly. I will say, however, that I agree with Feathernester and Die Frau. The casting choices for Luna Lovegood, Dolores Umbridge, and Bellatrix LeStrange were perfect. I am in love with Luna's character. As for the movie, I'm not even upset about stuff that was left out. I understand the concept of editing for time. I get it. I do not, however, understand why they chose to just flat out change things. Come on, people. I'm sure it's not that important that they had Cho rat out the DA instead of her friend. I'm sure it matters to no one that Umbridge busted up into the DA as she did instead of Dobby warning them to run. I'm sure all those crazy made-up Educational Decrees aren't important. In fact, I know those things aren't important. They're just annoying. I suppose I'm a Harry Potter purist. Then there is my other major issue, which applies to the entire HP movie franchise, not just this particular flick. Could they please stop changing the way things look? I'm only asking for a bit of consistency. A teensy bit. Did anyone else notice that when Sirius spoke through the fire that it was completely different than in Goblet of Fire? I didn't care for the way it was done, but why change it? Then...Why suddenly change the movie to reflect present day so much? Big, shiny Parliament...London all lit up at night...Dudley in his ghetto-thug finest...insanely shiny hallways in the Ministry of Magic? It's so silly. It's equally silly that I am this upset about it, I suppose. I know that the books are based in the present, but they've never made it all so slick and shiny. I thought they'd always done a good job of achieving a very neutral backdrop, timewise. Now I feel like it's all chockablock with harvest gold and avocado appliances, if you know what I mean. I will admit that the dueling scenes at the end were pretty cool, though I found it odd that they showed Dumbledore's ankles. I know that's a weird thing to notice, but it made him seem so ordinary to me at a moment when he seemed invincible in the book. Dumbledore in socks. How mundane. I'm done thinking about it. At least for five minutes or so...

Okay. The ugly. Otis caught a chipmunk yesterday. At least I think it was chipmunk. He's been chasing one that runs along the back fence for weeks now. Anyway, he caught something yesterday morning. Chipmunk, squirrel, badger, whatever. He then proceeded to eat it. It still had all (at least I think all) of its body parts when I first noticed the situation. I tried all the regular attempts at getting him to relinquish his prey. Tennis ball, food, cheese, grapes. Nothing worked. I got the hose out. He quickly figured out that I couldn't reach the back corner of the yard with the spray...and that he could outrun the spray anyway. I called M. He encouraged me to try one more time with the hose, making sure it was really on full blast. I got Otis to drop the remainder of the poor animal, which at this point was only a severed head with an intact eyeball. One of the more disgusting sights I've ever witnessed, let me tell you. Of course, as soon as I went into the house to get a bag, Otis devoured the head. He wasn't about to let me take away his snack. I wouldn't let him inside yesterday morning because I was afraid he'd lick S in the face and infect her with hanta virus or rabies or some equally unappealing disease carried by chipmunks. When I did let him in, he was remanded to his kennel until M got home and we were able to take him straight to the bath. Then he apparently stayed awake all night, vomiting all over the carpet downstairs. Quite pleasant, I assure you. We're now trying to decide between paying Stanley Steemer to come clean our carpets or buying our own steam cleaner. Awesome. The poor little guy clearly feels like crap today, but I know it won't deter him from eating the next animal he manages to catch.

I think this is a long enough post, I'm going to make a Boca Burger.

The amazing tale of poopers and the doodle

...the doodle being Otis. Obviously.

We've really started working on the evening routine thing with baby girl. She gets her bath usually between 8:15 and 8:30. Leading up to bath time is (drum roll, please) NAKED TIME. We undress the munchkin and plop her down in the living room floor on a blanket and let her play while her bottom airs out. There's an added bonus of getting to watch her little naked buns.

So far, naked time has been great. No accidents in the floor. Enter last evening.

I was frantically trying to get the kitchen and the kitchen sink ready for her bath while M was working on something in the office (what were you doing??). All of a sudden, there was a fairly panicked cry from the living room, "Sweetie." As I turned the corner in to the living room, M has baby girl pinned with one arm and the dog in a headlock with the other arm.

"We've got poop and a dog."

Awesome. S had a fairly major amount of poopage in a puddle that she was doing airplanes in. It was also running down her leg. I took over the girl while M tried to figure out if Otis was also covered in poop. It was quite the adventure, and all I could do was giggle at how happy S was. She was grinning and cooing and completely thrilled with herself and all of the attention. I'm telling you, having a baby is the world's greatest entertainment.

OH! She also sleeps in her crib now. That's pretty major around here. I'll give a thorough update later. For now, the girl calls.

Happy Monday.

Another day...

...another doctor. Today it was Otis's turn to go to the doctor. His appointment, however, was not routine maintenance. The little guy woke me up this morning yelping and shaking his head. We'd just had his ears flushed last week because I knew he had another ear infection. We, being the newly-horrific doggie parents we are, had been more than somewhat remiss in putting his meds in his ears. In our defense, it's a two-man job, and there aren't a lot of times when we have four adult hands available for dog upkeep. That will have to change, though, because I can't continue carting him and baby girl across town to the vet every week. Either way, his ears aren't bad. The vet thinks he probably has seasonal allergies. Unfortunately, no doggie-Claritin. He doesn't seem like he's too terribly bothered by his ears, but he's not acting like himself. Maybe he senses that S doesn't feel well.

Speaking of S, she has a fever (as predicted) as a result of her vaccinations yesterday. Nothing too bad...still in the "no need to call the pediatrician" range. Of course, last night was the first time we'd ever had to take her temperature. Another traumatic moment for me. She, however, grinned at her daddy the entire time. For now, the fever and Tylenol combo is knocking her out, which I'm grateful for. Only one bad cranky episode since the shots...I was worried she'd scream for a few days. Hopefully, she'll keep up the good behavior as we are hitting the road tomorrow. S's first trip to the motherland. We'll be in DC through Saturday and in Columbia through Monday. Lots of new family members for baby girl to meet. Lots of packing for me to do tonight. (Thank you LBS for the list.) I'm actually glad that I'm experiencing the stress of her first out-of-town adventure before our family outing to New York in a few weeks. You know, work out the kinks. Well, as much as one can.

We'll be back online next week. Until then, keep it real, peeps.

The labradoodle and the hare

Okay, so it wasn't a hare...just a plain old rabbit. Otis doesn't care. All he knows is that there is a foreign animal in the backyard. The rabbit showed up yesterday morning, so Otis spent yesterday obsessing over it. Apparently, it began when M let him out first thing in the morning, and unfortunately, I was not warned. I let him out when baby girl and I got up. Usually, Otis goes out, does his business, and comes back. Sometimes he dawdles. The dawdling normally involves the neighbor dogs being out. Yesterday, however, the fancy-mutt just wouldn't come in. The deck and backyard were still snow covered, and I couldn't see him, so I knew he was in the corner by the doghouse. After about an hour and a half, I was able to put the baby down long enough to put on shoes and go after Otis. He was completely covered in mud, so I cleaned him up a bit and put him in his kennel so he'd finish the clean-up job. He repeated the entire incident in the afternoon, and M wouldn't let him out last night without being on the retractable leash. Luckily, I think the rabbit went away because Otis has been pretty normal today. It helps that I've got grapes to bribe him with.

Not related to dogs or babies, I saw the cutest stuff on All Buttoned Up today. It's been awhile since I mindlessly perused other blogs. Baby girl afforded me about ten minutes of computer time this afternoon, though. So, check out the adorable stuff from The Small Object. I love the family tree and the "thumb war" print. I am thinking about trying to make a family tree for us, so it's good to see some ideas.

Lastly, I thought this was awesome. M and I have been slowly trading out all of our incandescent bulbs for CFLs. It's still hard to adjust to the brightness delay, but it's worth it.

Baptism by fire

Well, kind of. My family had been here since Monday afternoon. They left this morning around 11:30. Things were going pretty well. S had a bit of a tummy ache again, but nothing I couldn't handle...not to mention "nothing I won't have to handle." So, off the family went, merrily on the road back to Tennessee. I gave baby girl a bath, nursed her, and put her in her wrap. I went downstairs and threw in a load of laundry. I ate some lunch and made a couple of phone calls as S fell asleep. In the midst of one of the phone calls, baby girl decided she was no longer comfortable, and she started wailing. While taking her out of her wrap, I heard Otis puking in the dining room for the second time in about an hour. I put her in her car seat so I could clean up the dog vomit. She started squirming. I put down the Resolve, and went to check on her. I found her in a puddle of her freshest batch of butterscotch pudding. I am not exaggerating when I call it a puddle. We're talking accumulation, folks. Of course, her entire backside was soaked. Back upstairs we went to clean her up and change her. I managed to peel off her "All Things Grow with Love" onesie without spreading the poop and getting it on her head. The poop had managed to get all the way to her underarms of its own volition. Once she was changed, I managed to get her calm and back to sleep after about thirty minutes of rocking and shhhhh-ing.

Since then, I've managed to shower, clean up the dog vomit, put the poopy clothes in the washer, and dismantle the car seat, which will promptly be thrown into the washer once the clothes are done. I also need to re-assemble the guest bedroom and bathroom as M's family arrives later this afternoon. I suppose this is motherhood, huh? One thing after another after another...

I can do this. I think. Of course, I may do it as a bald woman, as I may pull my hair out.

Full house

The whole P family is now home and well. S has spent the entire day either sleeping or nursing...she even slept through the hack job we pulled on her little fingers. She's been clawing her face up pretty badly, so her nails had to be trimmed. Like all new parents (right??), we knicked her a couple of times. Luckily, she pretty much stayed in LaLa Land throughout the trauma, which was clearly more traumatic for us than for her. I've heard a lot of things will be that way.

Otis hasn't quite figured her out yet, but he can't stand to hear her whimper or cry, and he whimpers right back when he hears her. He's also already assumed his role of protector of S...he's like the Cerberus of baby girl. Wait, does that make my baby like the River Styx? She's not. I promise. She's perfect. There are plenty of new pictures on Flickr.

Hurry up and wait

Still no great progress to report on Baby S. The nurses have started joking that I've been pregnant forever. My doctor told me yesterday that he'll induce me any time that I want now...I just have to make the call. We decided to get through my actual due date. I'll go in for my regular appointment next Wednesday and if she hasn't decided to come out on her own by then, we'll schedule an induction. I'd rather not go that route, but I'd also rather not be prego anymore and I'd rather not have a 12 pound baby. I did pick up some raspberry leaf tea at Wild Oats yesterday. It's another of the crazy old wives' tales about naturally inducing labor. Walking just hurts too much now. So, I'm just hanging out...waiting for something to happen.

In Otis news, he's cracking me up right now. In between sentences, I've been throwing his ball around. He, like most dogs, loves to play fetch. He's unlike other dogs, though, in that he gets tired after awhile. Most other dogs I've played with are not physically capable of ignoring the ball back if you throw it. I've seen dogs that I thought were about to keel over from exhaustion continue to bound back with ball in mouth. Otis operates a bit differently. He'll always go after the ball, but he'll stall on bringing it back. If we're playing in the house, he'll decide he needs to look out the window for a few minutes or run upstairs to check on the status of things. Really he's just worn out. It makes me laugh that he won't just stop playing. I love that furball.

Scrubbing bubbles

I just spent three hours cleaning the kitchen. I think they call that the nesting instinct. I dare you to find a spot on the oven door. Dare you. I'm planning to dust, vacuum, and mop in a few minutes...I really only sat down to eat some lunch. (PB&J and a banana- yum) Otis has been laying in the dining room floor, staring at me like I've lost my mind. Of course, he was thrilled when I cleaned out the freezer because he got loads of ice cubes.

Speaking of Otis, he got a new 99 cent ball yesterday when I took him to get his nails trimmed. It's amazing how having something new makes him so completely happy. The new ball is a green version of his favorite orange ball. I think he likes them better than tennis balls because they are softer, so they don't hurt when he catches them. On the downside, because they aren't coated in slobber-absorbing tennis ball fuzz, they are spit-covered orbs of nastiness when you play catch. He loves it, though, and who am I to deny him?

Ooooh, and speaking of balls- bowling at 38 weeks pregnant was not the brightest of ideas. I had an awesome time, but I am miserable today. It was a little freaky how quickly I started to get sore last night after we left the bowling alley. So, note to all pregnant women and future pregnant women- steer clear of the great sport of bowling when you're all enormously prego- or at least stop after the second game when you think you should. I think the third game really did me in. Oh, and under no circumstances should you try to pick up husband's 15 pound bowling ball when you're helping tidy up at the end of the night. That sucker is heavier than you think.

Mudpie

Otis is a holy terror. His new thing is eating dirt. He's done it before on random occasions, but he's driving us bananas. It started the other day when he realized we'd brought the rubber plant back downstairs. He keeps sneaking into the dining room and stealing little clumps of dirt out of the pot. His grazing area has now extended to the outside. I did some research and can't find anything that indicates this is a "problem." Almost everything says it's a behavioral issue. Great, just in time for the baby- a behavioral issue. Awesome. Of course, his nails need to be clipped pretty badly, so I'm wondering if it's not really a digging problem that has carried over. I'm taking him to have the razors trimmed today. Hopefully that will help. I don't like for him to get into trouble. We'll see if the nail trim helps the situation. I'm also going to douse the plant's soil in bitter apple. Hopefully it won't kill the plant. It doesn't say that it's toxic in any way. I suppose I'll find out one way or the other...I don't imagine they sell bitter apple in quantities that would cover our backyard.

I'm off now to run errands. Have a great Tuesday.