Tuesday, December 27, 2011

We Are Blessed

While we were out of town for 10 days, we had the post office hold our mail. Today it was delivered. All of it. And 2/3 of these cards were delivered today. This is how many people sent us merry wishes this year. And loads of pictures among them! Besides family and friends seen recently or 15 years ago, there are a few names to be dropped. Like Haslam, Ramsey, and Jeb Bush. I'm SURE they signed those suckers themselves, of course. I especially appreciate the folks who put their kid's FULL names, and the current year. For those of you who didn't, I filled out that info on the backs of the pictures.

Our Christmas was wonderful. We had tons of food, the boys cleaned up in the gift department, and we were given enough clothes and stuff to warrant an apple box shipped back separately. And most importantly, we got to spend tons of time with family. My boys are completely spoiled rotten and I'll have to un-rottify them in the days to come. Well worth it.

Thank you, Lord, for the wonderful blessing of my family. Thank you for healthy, brilliant, beautiful boys. And please, Lord, don't bless us with a third.

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Further updates

At Wally World today, we saw a large cardboard picture of the terrifying panda. Quint got tense and started edging over to my leg. I quickly said, "this is just a cardboard picture of the panda, Quint. See?" and thumped it in the head. He visibly relaxed, reached up to feel of it, and then hit it himself. Maybe we've turned a corner on the Panda's-gonna-get-me thing.

Quint learned that he can toot on command today. I tried not to laugh, really I did! But he would obviously try pretty hard, toot, and then absolutely die laughing at himself. And I would laugh at his reaction. Did I mention that he is boy to the core? So all day, there was tooting, laughing, then laughing. I put it on Facebook and my boyfriend from 7th grade said to make sure he doesn't try TOO hard or bad things will happen. He does still wear diapers. Which told the tale tonight at bathtime. Also, his contribution to the bubble bath was especially comical tonight. Never a dull moment around here.

I thought I'd try to put Hank down in the boy's room to sleep tonight. He was completely knocked out, still nursing a bit in his sleep, right until I stepped on the squeak outside their bedroom door. Then, he awoke, went rigid, and squeaked so loudly that the sleeping Quint flopped over in shock. He thumped right back down asleep, but I dashed down the hall with Hank just to make sure. Sheesh! I finally did get him down in there. I'll have to stealthily put the monitor in there here in a while.

Last night, when I went in to try to get Quint to stop crying and go to sleep, inspiration hit. I did the Elmo voice and had Elmo ask if he could spoon with Quint. He very sweetly put his arm around Elmo and we heard not another peep out of him.

I packed away 7 or 8 pounds of ham into the freezer tonight. All sliced up into sandwichable slices. We've nearly polished off the pound cake that was given to us, and the oaty-berry-yummy bars that were given to us. We will probably freeze some of the cheese danish that were too cheap to pass up. Because, as Pastor Chris said on Sunday, we all need extra carbohydrates around the house at this time of year. He was advertising for the bake sale going on in the foyer.

Every version of the Grinch is good. I want to ride the uphill trash dumper machine!!! It seems like a ride at Schlitterbaun!!! White Christmas gets dull after just 10 minutes.

Monday, December 12, 2011

Dropped the Ball

Ok, it has become shockingly clear that other people cannot audibly hear my every thought, so I'm going to have to impart some pertinent catchup info.

1. We are probably not going to put Hank in a head-reshaping-helmet. Insurance is not initially excited about paying for the first step CT scan. His head is starting to round out now that he's reliably sitting up for most of the day. And several relatives, who I trust, have looked at his head this weekend and they can't see the odd lumps that I think I can see. These lumps might not be there at all, and I might be just looking at his head too much. My big concern has not been childhood ridicule for an oddly shaped head, but later in life when his hair falls out and an odd shape would be more obvious. And as Cousin Four has pointed out, Hank is not going to be mad at me when at 40 or 50, he has lost his hair and realizes that lumpy head could have been avoided if I'd only put his head in a vise at six months of age. That will be in the 2050s or 2060s just for perspective. Good point. There is nothing wrong with his head (as far as we know) and the "treatment" would have been considered cosmetic. So, as I said, we are probably not going to be doing anything about this oddly flat head thingy.

2. I'm taking an Intermediate Accounting class this spring.

3. We are taking the umbrella stroller and baby sling with us when we travel.

4. Hank has gained a full pound since I started feeding him actual food several times a day. He is still considered underweight for his age, but is growing properly.

5. I fell down the stairs yesterday. My biannual missing of the last two stairs, just like I always do. I did NOT have a child in my hand at the moment. I did have an armload of (previously) folded laundry. I scraped and carpet burned one arm and severely jammed my second toe. Horrible injuries, that. Otherwise, I landed on my fluffily padded arse. Hubby had no hope of hearing the fall, being with both boys, a TV, with a running washer and drier between us. Cousin Four bolted over to me, kept examining the laundry and finally said, "there's no baby here!" "Nope, just me." Huge sigh of relief from him. Then, "Are YOU ok?" Completely understandable reaction, that still seemed funny at the moment. He then helped me up and asked if he could stop producing adrenaline now. Yes.

6. Quint has been having a lot of trouble sleeping through the night since he personally met Po from Kung Fo Panda. We saw him at the huge hotel with the great Christmas lights. He came out for his appearance probably 20 feet from us. (For a mere $50, you could have your picture taken WITH him!) Quint crawled out of the front of his double stroller, climbed my frame, clung like a burn and cried into my neck. We now have to have a nightly litany of "the Panda won't hurt you. The Panda won't come in here. The Panda doesn't know where you live. The dark can't get in." and other reassuring statements. So Hank and Quint are sleeping in separate places again so that Quint doens't wake Hank up.

I think my battery is just about to die!!! More later.

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Quint's first Christmas tree

Quint is just over two years old now and he can articulate things better and better. Saturday, we went to the Opryland Hotel to see the lights and decorations. He saw a sixty foot Christmas tree of blue lights, a thirty foot regular Christmas tree decorated with 15 inch teddy bears, lights and whole gift boxes. We saw the poinsettia tree too. At Lowes, we saw all the prelit Christmas trees for sale as well.

Sunday night, Hubby got home from a business trip after Quint was in bed. We got down the tree from the attic and put it up in the living room. We were tempted to wake Quint up to see it, but didn't want to disturb him. A few minutes later, he woke up from a bad dream. Our eyes locked, and Hubby darted up the stairs to go get him. Quint was sooooo excited!!

He ran around saying Grismas Tree, Chrisma Tree, Grandma Tree, and lots of other variations. He was jumping up and down and clenching his fists in glee. It was sooooo much fun!!

All day Monday, the lit but undecorated tree stood in the living room. I kept telling him that when Papa got home we would decorate the tree. I would explain that we would put pretty things all over the tree. At one point during the day, he dug out his train underpants and decided that they needed to go on the tree.



While we were decorating the tree once Papa got home, Quint kept talking about decking Asians. I could just imagine (cartoon style of course) Quint punching some Asian guy.

It was very fun to decorate the tree for the first time with Quint.

Sunday, December 4, 2011

Mispronunciations

Mispronunciations I can't bear to correct:

Alligator = escalator
Alligator = elevator
alligator = alligator

Grandma-tree = Christmas tree

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Making Baby Food

In my latest video of mommy advice, I explain how to make your own baby food and store it easily. There are two videos: a short one that gets the job done, and a long one that answers any questions you might have. The summary of the video is as follows:

Take two cans (matching) regular canned vegetables. Drain the water from one can. Combine both cans in your blender and blend until smooth. You may have to scrape down the sides occasionally. Pour finished baby food into a quart jar or tupperware bowl to keep in the fridge for daily use. Or put in smaller plastic containers to label and freeze.

Here is the longer video that gives lots more detail and answers a lot of questions:


Here is the shorter video, all of which is contained in the longer video: