Baby Tuesday

Right now I am sitting at my mom's house and Ransom is the only one here with me, because we had to leave early from dinner at Aurora's house, because he had a full out tantrum. Big time meltdown.

He is of course better here, toddling around and cooing at Wendy the 16 yr old deaf/blind dog, drinking his beloved juice, and asking me to show him photos of helicopters on Flickr.

I can hear him coming for me right now so I can't type very much.\


Feel free to make up your own captions until I can get online again. The computer is in the room where his crib is, and you can see how that might be a problem.


Galleria playground. Beats the Valley Fair playground easily.
Oh, and Baby B fell over. She's a trooper.


See, she's back, no sweat.

Baby Tuesday

Well it's been an intense week since last Tuesday.
Amazingly the kids are letting me have this time to blog.
Ever since we got here, Baby R has been acting odd.
Usually in a bad way, but right now, he asked that I put him in his porta crib
and leave the door open. He's looking at his new favorite book and talking to
himself. And Kid C was eating a plate full of grapes leftover from the memorial.


Here he is, excited to finally be on an airplane, studying the exit


Kid C, also fascinated.


Triple threat in the bathtub!! The ladies were not happy about a tiny naked man crashing their bath party, but I thought he behaved himself, all things considered.


Or not.


Here are the ladies dressed up in sparkley princess/fairy dresses watching Sleeping Beauty.


The sleeping situation is a constant puzzle with these 4 kids, so the night before last I moved Emmitt the pug away from Baby R's room to my bed. But listen to him! Honestly, that's insane! I figured it was better for him to keep me awake than the baby.

Okay, Baby R asked to get out of his crib, and he has done his 3rd poop before 10am this morning. He's got diaper rash and the squirts. Oye.
I'm gonna try to walk us up to the grocery store now for blueberries to counter the bad pH...


UPDATE: I walked up to the Tom Thumb and I was the only non-octogenarian at the place. And there were no soy dogs, the produce guy looked at me like I was speaking Chinese, and there was no fair trade tea. So I just bought mini corn dogs and some random tea that said "all natural" heh. And then we walked home, and again, any one we saw was straight from the cast of Cocoon.

we miss you

quick flight post

In response to Joanne's comment/question, the flight went pretty good. Sandi and bringing the carseat onboard for Baby R was critical. As were the movies on the laptop, but to a lesser degree.

What I didn't anticipate was "re-entry."

Since they didn't sleep on the plane, and it was really late when we got in, they fell asleep in the car, and then when we got home they were *refreshed* and ready to stay up for hours.

Baby R did have a crib in the other room which was pretty good except when Kid C started tripping out about not wanting to sleep, not being tired, and wanting to turn the lights on and play... at 1:30am
...3am
...5am

Yes, 5am, she finally fell asleep after I used up most of my laptop arsenal and one children's Benadryl. She woke up all psycho at like 4am and it took Aurora to come out and help me get her back to sleep.

Oye.

But they are up and cheerful now...

rough

Right now Kid C is screaming at the top of her lungs (really, it's horrible), and she's running around completely naked from getting out of the bath by herself. And that's just at the present, I don't even want to talk about what happened earlier today. It's been a rough afternoon. I have no brain capacity or energy or anything. I'm near-paralyzed now.

But I have my laptop loaded with rented itunes movies, I bought plenty of legos, and puzzles, and drawing boards. Sandi is the most important thing I'm bringing on the plane tomorrow.

And thank you to Joanne who is driving us to the airport tomorrow.

I hope something drops out of the overhead bins and knocks me out once we're in the air, and I don't come to until we touch down at DFW...

I'm sad

There's always something stiff about a lyrics without hearing the song.

But this song is in my head today. It's not making me any less sad, but...

"..I remember you like yesterday, yesterday
I still can't believe you're gone
I remember you like yesterday, yesterday
And until I'm with you, I'll carry on..."

Baby Tuesday

This weeks installment is brought to you by my reconnected-through-Facebook-friend Sky.
We realized our daughters are the same age so we set a playdate.
And whaddya know? He's also a photographer with a really nice camera.




He took a handful of dirt and popped it right in his mouth.
I couldn't believe it. I think I must be denying him some essential minerals or something.


Kid L was a "runner." She would take off and then Kid C was like "huh? where'd you go?!"


I forget what was so funny.
If you look in the background you can see Baby R trying to make peace with another little kid on the playground.


She's making a crazy face here, but I thought I'd include it anyway.


"Now that I've eaten dirt, now I'll have a stick to chase it down."
He's teething those 2 yr molars. :/


Kid L taught Kid C to log-roll. It's a valuable kid-skill.


Sky thought it was really funny that right after Baby R had eaten dirt and chewed on a stick, he demanded hand sanitizer. I don't use it alot, only when handwashing isn't an option. But he fished it out of my purse and insisted.


Drooly and muddy, that's my tiny guy.

I think I might ask Sky to take our family portraits one of these days. I like how some of these came out. And he wasn't even really trying.


In other news, it's time to register for fall preschool classes and this morning I realized that I can't have Kid C just go for 2 mornings a week when she's 4 (!!!)
I have to have her in at least 3 mornings a week at her current school which is another 140 bucks on top of the 240 they already squeeze out of us.
Ugh!!
380 a month for 3 mornings of preschool, omg, I don't want to pay that!
But I don't want to switch schools, I like her school.

I'm at a loss.

A friend of mine homeschools her son, but I really like the system we have now. She's always trying to sell me on it, but the thought of doing it makes me sweaty and tense. At this point, I think I'd rather work a night shift at a 24 hr restaurant once a week, to be able to afford real preschool instead of doing that.

I really don't know what we're going to do. It may come down to us taking her out and putting her in another class at the rec center while she's 4. She could be in dance class, and maybe an art class as well? Or swimming? That's something, right?

Because she's gonna have to be in preschool when she's 5 too, so maybe we'll revisit an actual preschool then. Oye.

peru young life shirt

One of the missionaries we support down in Peru, Christen, hosts teams to help with her ministry there.

She asked me to design the shirts for her teams to wear and here's what I came up with.

I took the ideas she had for what she wanted on there and tweaked it a little bit.

land of goats

This is how you know Christians are the minority in the Bay Area:

HILLSONG UNITED is coming to California for 4 nights of worship.

April 16 - SACRAMENTO
April 17 - BAKERSFIELD
April 20 - LOS ANGELES
April 21 - SAN DIEGO

I don't even like Hillsong, I just thought it was funny.

I mean, even Bakersfield gets a show. Wow.

Baby Tuesday

This morning, Baby R was that kid, which makes me that mom.

You know, the 2 year old boy who is a complete maniac in public, that the mom has to pull a wrestling move to hold on to him and dive out the door of the library/restuarant/bank/store for common courtesy's sake.

The kid that has the snotty boogery nose and a shirt with big drool/food stains.

Yes, it's happened. And I'm a little depressed about it. I hope it only lasts until he's 3. I can deal with it for a year.

Kid C didn't really have terrible-twos. She has always been on the difficult side since she was born, so I didn't notice a distinct change in behavior when she turned 2.
Baby R is no longer the teddy bear he once was. I love him just the same, but he can turn on "wacko" now like nobody's business.

My mom and I are considering going to Disneyland while she's here in about a month. And I'm up for it, as long as I just bring Kid C. Baby R is a Disneyland powder keg. It depends on whether Rich feels up to it, and if Kevin is willing to use his gardening-vacation-days to tend his son as well.

And as of 8am this morning, I scored Baby R's birthday gift on eBay. I like the tiny n' tuff megabloks sets. This can kinda connect to the one he already has.


Camera phone pics, because I'm too lazy to charge the batteries for the real camera.
This is my viewpoint in most of Baby R's waking hours.
Couple this shot with the sound of "uppa uppa uppa!"


This is also pretty common. It's fighting and whining.


he's saying "cheese!"


Here is Kid C as mayor of Crazy Town


Lotta love fo' the Olive



I know this is a random shot, but we went to the Great Mall a couple of weeks ago, with his little friend Baby CB to go to the H&M there. We have an H&M here in Sockswithsandalsland, but it's only women's clothes. The Great Mall one has kids clothes! Baby CB got some boy skinny jeans, tre chic, and Baby R got a sweet snap shirt and Kid C got some Hello Kitty skivies.

Okay, gotta go, Baby R has stripped himself naked and is hitting the projection screen with a magnadoodle board...

snoozer, fer' sure

I just got done painting and it's almost 2am.





It's a 5 x 8 banner to hang in the auditorium for our new series.
I have to hem it in the morning, when it's dry, so that white edge you see in the pic will be gone.

Majorly boring. But it's a banner, and it's for 4 weeks so *hey.*

Steve Martin Day

Sometimes I have Steve Martin moments. These are times during my child-watching day where everything goes wrong.

i.e., Someone has a diaper on his/her head while someone else is throwing up on the cat, and then the UPS man shows up while the dogs are trying to bite him.

Today is a Steve Martin day. As I said, Baby R won't nap, and Kid C usually has some R-free time with me during the afternoon, but now that that's not happening they are at each others throats all afternoon, and then of course, all over me.

Lots of screaming, lots of spills to be soaked up, lots of high-security timeouts, and above all: complete nonsense.

Today's pinnacle baby-felony (this is what I call serious crimes by children of the household) is:
the demand for a solid hour for "mac n' cheeese" and I told her we were out, and i would have to make it from scratch.

The whole time I'm making it, she's still asking for it. And Baby R is yelling in his room because he's not sleeping during "nap", which is so stressful.

I slave over her lunch, and make a total mess of the kitchen and when I finally set it in front of her she says "I DON'T WANT IT!"

!!!!!!!!!

I scream at her "THEN WHY DID YOU ASK ME FOR IT OVER AND OVER?"

"I DON'T WANT IT! I'M NOT HUNGRY!"


That....makes....me....so....angry.

Is she the only one who does this? Good thing I don't spank because I would have spanked her into next week!

I'm waiting for my iPod to sync so we can go in the car and they can listen to their music and be quiet.


(!!!!!!!!!)

the first of many sleepless days

Neither of them napped today.

And Baby R has molars coming in, an serious nasal drippage.

I repeat, no one napped.

Lots of yelling, lots of crying.

I want a cinnabon and a blanket and a few hours of Office reruns to heal me.


Oh, and did I mention I am the official Chairman of Marketing for the 2009 Silicon Valley AIDS Walk? Yeah, it happened. No matter how little time I have, I can't let the ugly graphics happen again. I'm the rookie on the team, and the only "faith-based" member.

But I can't think about that right now, I need Jim Halpert and Michael Scott.

Baby Tuesday

UPDATED:

Yes, Kid C is had her first ballet class this week. She is over the moon! Which is good, because it was the crux of the motivation for potty training, and I can continue to bluff leverage with the class.

Below are photos I took right before we left the house. The new tutu (she now has four) is from Auntie Sandi, the unitard and tights are from Dianne, and the real-deal ballet shoes I picked up from Salvation Army months and months ago, just because they were like 99 cents or something crazy and I thought maybe they'd fit her later. Score!






She's starting to really look like a kid nowadays. And when we went to the zoo today, it was nice to have someone to talk to. She can really hold a conversation and makes "jokes." Sometimes they're intentional and sometimes they're not, but she cracks me up.

Baby R on the other hand, not so conversational, but he has a few more words. I use the term "words" loosely.

He can say:
"momo" = Mojito
"ma" = more
"yesh" = yes
"unh" = uh-huh (this is the more popular affirmative, and interestingly enough is the Japanese word for "yeah." He's bilingual! ;) )
"no" = no **very popular** (and often it also actually means yes)
"Dada" = Daddy
"Momma" = yours truly
"off" = down, out, get me off, put me down, turn it off
"goad" = goat
"moo" = cow
"ott" = hot OR cold
"up-pah" = pick me up **very popular**
"gtah-gtaah" = guitar, and he always says it doublely that way
"go" = I want to go, make the dogs go away
"eh-kah" = helicopter
"apple" = airplane
"dowg" = dog
"ooosh" = juice
"nana" = food (but not banana)
"Ovive" = Olive (the cat)

Speaking of "Ovive," she's really turned into an asset in the house. Before, as you know, I wanted to back over her with the car and make it appear like an accident.
But now, Baby R *ADORES* her.
If he's really upset or crying, finding the cat instantly snaps him out of it. He pets her nicely and gives her hugs and follows her around cooing at her. It's very cute.
So now I can't hate her.
Because I think she likes him back and maybe in her own cat way, this is apologizing for peeing in his room (multiple times!)

But yeah, Baby R can't say Kid C's name, no matter how hard to try to get him to say it.
He says her name in a variation of Dada, it's like "DehDeh" and same with Grandma is "DahDaw."

He can't really say please or thank you, but he makes random syllables in the right tone and speed as if he were saying please and/or thank you. And he can sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, with random syllables, but he really knows the song, and sings it all the time to himself. Very cute.

Facinating

We might show this during services this week, or rather, I really hope we do.

slightly more fun?

They said they were changing the name. Kevin said the last design didn't look "fun."
So I changed the retreat graphics.

I'm not unhappy with them.
I call it scrapbook-meets-60's-girly-surf-movie.

I'm not putting it in the Church Marketing Pool because I'm afraid they'll rip it to shreds.

bear with me, I'm gettin fancy

Alright, since I have my new website and new business cards, and now I'm 28 and feeling like I need to...pull it together, if you will, I am redoing the look and function of my blog.

I was previously waiting until I could print out the old style one before I gave it a makeover, but that's apparently not going to happen for a long time.

So keep watch, it's changing...

it's been years

I put off drawing and painting unless it is absolutely necessary.
Tonight was the first time in many years that I actually just sat down with a pen and did drawings.
And only because I was asked to.
And because I got paid to do it.
I think that's why I can't respond without stuttering "I'm an artist" when people ask me what I do.
They're no masterpieces. They are supposed to look like the Twitter video illustrations, so I kinda went that direction, and they are also supposed to explain why churches should host Easter Egg hunts.
These are the scanned pages before I cut them out like little paper dolls to be filmed by somebody else.






Can you see the self portrait on there?
The others are (from left to right) live-at-home-with-parents-guy, disheveled engineer, husband of a friend of friend who's chihuahua's name was Seymour, 80's mall shopper, yours truly, and Lucille Ball.

today's makings

I made a blog for WestGate's Philippines trip.
(no, I'm not going, even though I totally would if I could!)

and

I made a web design for my friend.

Baby Tuesday

Happy Inauguration Tuesday, America!


Hey look at us at the beach in January.
Sorry eastern seaboard, these housing prices pay off right about now.


I think she's explaining something to Daddy while he's taking this pic.
She's always "explaining" something.


And here she's saying "cheese" to her bucket.


This cute little girl showed up right before we were leaving.
He was magnetized to her. Her mom took the group picture of us seen above.


Little beverage between sand castle rounds.


I'm not sure what's going on here.


Me in my new cut-offs and him in his french couture shirt.



Moms reading this will probably recognize this contraption.
It's a foot powered foam rocket launcher.
It belonged to this family near us that frankly made me a little tense.
But they let us, and 3 other kids play with it too.
That fun lasted a long long time. Long enough for me to chill on my blanket for a bit.


I usually go to Capitola Beach because it has decent bathrooms and they're nearby.
On Sunday, the bathrooms were closed and they had set out porta potties.
Yikes.
And there was a surfing competition going on, so the potties were well-used.
Yikes yikes.
Kid C wanted nothing to do with the porta potties.
So I convinced her to pee in the rocks to the side of the beach.
They're really big rocks, more like boulders.
She did fine peeing and then about 5 minutes afterwards she tripped over one that was peeking out of the sand and really scraped herself up.
Here in the photo she's showing me all 4 owies.
Thanks to the nice British owner of Cafe Violette who gave us bandaids, she got patched up right away and also got a little ice cream cone to calm her down.


I made this little video with iMovie of the beach trip too.