Mar 25, 2011

Sometimes We Go Outside

On Wednesday we spent some time outside, which was Colin's first real playing-in-the-dirt day of his life.


Like Colin's outfit?  Harrison picked it out.


Harrison's favorite thing to wear lately is anything that makes him look like a cowboy.  Put a button up shirt on him and he asks for blue jeans, his boot and his hat and he'll wear them everywhere.


Except in that picture, I guess.  But we had a great time.  The sun was warm, the breeze was cool.  Harrison spent his time making X's out of the weeds I was pulling out of my garden, and hanging them on the trees, and running laps around the house.

Colin crawled up the steps over and over, felt the "grass" between his toes, and had his first real taste of dirt.


And I'm pretty sure he was pooping when I took that picture.

Mar 24, 2011

Dreams are like popcicle sticks

Last night I dreamed that I was in this old School building that was being torn down, so a bunch of kids were camping out inside as protest. I was in a class room with a bunch of other kids and one girl said she had to pee, but didn't know what to do about it. The boys started passing around a soda bottle, which obviously didn't do the girls any good. It was getting to be a big deal, and I had to go myself, so eventually I just walked out of the room to see if I could find whatever passed for a bathroom in this old dump.

There were people everywhere.  It was like one of those events that are really well attended and are filled with people walking around and sitting everywhere.  I finally found the one-toilet bathroom, and had just sat down to use it when this completely crazy girl appeared, cheerfully demanding that SHE had to use the toilet right then. I tried telling her that I was already using the toilet, and that she could have it as soon as I was done, but she nearly sat down on my lap and tried to use the toilet with me still on it. I punched her in the head several times, but it didn't help. She was happily, enthusiastically, unmovingly determined to use the toilet whether I was on it or not. So I got up, yelled my head off at her but eventually just gave up and went to find another bathroom.

I found one, but it looked like there was some sort of slime-emitting sea monster living it in. So I searched and searched and found a teenie tiny little closet of a bathroom, all decorated in flowery wall paper and was about to sit down to relieve myself when some older man came and poked his head in the open, lacy curtained window to say hello. And he wouldn't leave. Finally two little girls came up to use the bathroom, the man left and I came out and knelt down to talk to the girls. I begged them to stand guard so that I could have 30 seconds of privacy for crying out loud, and in return I would do the same for them. They couldn't have been more than 4, but I guess they did the job, because I woke up after that. Phew!

Mar 23, 2011

March? Where did YOU come from?

Posting once a month is really pretty good, considering how hard it is for me to find time to do dishes lately.  Babies take up a lot of time and energy.  But babies and 4 year olds?  I barely have time to breathe, let alone blog.  Or shower.  My poor husband.  I really do stink.

But let's see.  A few weeks ago Harrison and Colin went Canoeing.


They had a few differences of opinion regarding technique and navigation


but I think they managed to put them aside and work together in the end.



-----------------------------------

Colin is now 9 months old.

March 7, 2011
I had to hurry and catch this picture of his two bottom teeth because his two top teeth were about to pop through.  He's sporting 4 tiny teeth right now, with two more top teeth on the way.

But I was saying.  He's nine months old.   That is very big.  He is very big.  He LOVES solid food and will eat anything I put within his reach.  His favorite way to eat is to suck on something for a while, spit it out into his hand, put it back into his mouth and repeat.  Ramen Noodles work the best because he doesn't even have to let go.

He keeps on standing up next to anything that will keep still long enough for him to hold on to it.  And he falls down a lot.  But that doesn't stop him.  He just keeps standing up.  AND he has figured out how to crawl up stairs.  Which is really fantastic.

He is 27.5 inches tall and weighs 18 lbs, 14 oz.  That puts him in the 25th percentile for height and weight.  His head, however, is in the 60th percentile.  Which explains why he spends so much time on his face.  That thing must weigh a ton.


He has also started clapping and now he throws a tiny tantrum when I take something away from him. Pretty soon he's going to be running everywhere and wrestling with Harrison.  Fun!

Speaking of Harrison, he got his school pictures back yesterday.


What a sweetie face.  He loved looking at this picture of himself.  Though he kept wanting me to scroll down so he could see the rest of his legs.
I wonder what crazy magic the school photographer used to get him to smile so sweetly like that?  Cuz those are some spells I could definitely use.

Mar 15, 2011

Productivity and the Challenges of being a Super Hero

I have to confess something to you, kind reader.  I don't know how to tell you this, so I am just going to come out and say it.  I like to read craft blogs.  And that is the truth.  I read several craft blogs.  And, no, not the lame ones, like Doiles for Dummies, or Ric Rac for the Rest of Us, or Glitter & Glue Dots for the Craftinomically Impaired or anything like that.  I read the good ones: Make it and Love it, Blue Cricket Design, Not so Idle Hands, and Welcome to the Good Life.  Ok, and, Doilies for Dummies actually is pretty awesome.

But, I don't really know why I read them.  I guess I like the idea that if the notion of craftiness should happen to take me, then I will have everything I need to find out how to make Bookends out of old Diapers, but the truth is that I will probably never get around to it.  Frankly, I am just far too lazy.  Not too lazy for my own good, just for crafting of that caliber.  And also for walking around.  

For instance, some girl on some blog said she was looking through the Pottery Barn catalog, saw this thing, and said to herself "I can make that" and then went and got the stuff, made the thing, and hung it on her wall.  All within a 5 minute period or something like that.  

Really?  You wanted to do it, so you just did it?  Just like that?   If that was me--and it wouldn't be, because turning the pages in a magazine is too much trouble--I would see the picture, think "I bet I could make one of those." and then fold over the corner of the page.  And then forget about it.  Or, if I was feeling super ambitious, I might even rip the page out of the magazine and stick it in a special file full of stuff I want to make someday.  I call it "The Good Idea Folder".  And that would be the end of it.  Then 10 years from now when we move I might find that file again, look through it, and shake my head that I could ever think any of that crap was cute.

The mentality of wanting to do something and then actually doing it is just completely beyond me.  Which probably explains why I haven't showered in over 3 years.  The only reason I am able to type this is that my fingers move so fast that if I am sitting in front of a keyboard and I start to think, it is like my thoughts literally just pour through my fingers onto the screen of their own volition, with absolutely no conxcoius effort on my part. (Yeah, I"m pretty sure that is how you spell that word.)  It is actually one of my super powers.  I call them Mind Fingers.  And I think I've gotten off topic.  But it is ok.  I've clearly made my point.  Thank you for your time.  

Mar 8, 2011

Style that is Out of This World

As you all know, I like to keep things fresh.  "Fresh as a baby's bottom", the saying goes.  And that level of freshness is getting harder and harder to maintain these days, what with the world and all of its things and changes and government policies.  I think you know what I am getting at.  "How can this be?" I ask myself a hundred times a day, which gets really annoying, but what what I REALLY want to know, is
Why don't Aliens wear pants?


Ok, yes, some of them do.  Lots of them do, I guess.  The ones who look Human are usually fully clothed and I guess most of the humanoid ones like to stay modest too, but certainly not all of them.  i.e. this guy:



Besides, most of the ones pretending to be human are only pretending to wear clothes, which really doesn't count.  I might pretend to wear pants with all my heart, but that won't change the fact that my bloomers are showing.



It's shocking, right?  Who do these aliens think they are?  Are their races so technologically advanced that they believe they have progressed beyond the need for clothes?



Cuz I would have to disagree.  No matter how "sophisticated" they think they are, they are still teleporting around the universe in the buff and I think they would get just a little more respect if they put on a nice suit, or maybe a dramatic hat and cape.  Even a bandoleer can work wonders.

Take this guy, from some early episode of Star Trek, who is wearing a futuristic little onesie.  He is the very height of fashion, and all set to go out and hunt a human for a while.



Makes all the difference in the world, doesn't it?  Maybe dressing for success isn't such a backward, human notion after all?  I just don't quite understand a civilization that doesn't include clothing yourself as an important part of your daily activities.  (though I think my husband definitely disagrees with me).

Still, of all this alien immodesty, I find nothing upsets me more than male aliens who run around naked from the waist down.
What in the world is that about?


Image result for planet 51
And obviously, it goes without saying that I don't have permission to use any of these pictures.