One Week

It took one week to regrow the skin on my pinkie finger. Today I have the tiniest little scab where there was an open 3/4 wound last Thursday morning. It was actually very interesting to watch the skin grow back from the outside in. I generally forget to keep cuts covered and neosporined like I should, so I usually end up with a big scar. This time I actually kept on top of it and got to watch the skin knit itself back together day by day. Skin is pretty cool stuff.

Ice Cubes

T enjoys removing and replacing things from boxes, drawers, and whatever else he can get his hands on. After dinner tonight, he wanted my soda cup. Since we were outside I just threw the ice cubes on the ground and gave him the cup to play with. He took the cup, went and rescued an ice cube and spent the next 10 minutes (until it melted) putting into and removing it from the cup.

10 (or more) things, the graduation edition

1. Aside from the hideously boring 'read every graduate's name' part, an Annapolis graduation is very cool.

2. Everything is more impressive in uniform.

3. My cousin is really, really tall. Even in a sea of tall, uniformed men, he's tall.

4. The Annapolis class of 2008 contained 20.1% women. This surprises me.

5. The most important thing I learned this weekend was to "not kiss unimportant ass." This is good advice I will have to remember.

6. T was outrageously good this weekend. His nap and sleep schedule was really screwed up and he was very rarely cranky. A long sleep last night (over 12 hours) seems to have returned the balance.

7. T is obsessed with doors. Opening and closing. Closing and opening. You'd think there was some kind of baby door crack.

8. My family rocks and I miss them all the time.

9. It's nice to get home from a trip on Saturday night of Memorial Day weekend. It's like we have a bonus weekend. The weather was gorgeous today and T discovered the joy of playing in water in the backyard. We have some great naked as a jaybird post-soaking pictures on the patio. He is so freaking cute.

10. Watching T put himself to sleep lately is like particularly good performance art. It generally involves lots of butt-in-the-air rocking and singing. It is especially fun to reenact these performances for your husband after the baby is asleep.

11. A safety razor can slice the crap out of your finger, even through a plastic bag.

12. When applying sunscreen for an outdoor graduation ceremony, it's important to remember where your hair is parted.

10 things

1. Sometimes I wish I had T's lack of fear. Today, I spilled scalding hot coffee all over my hand at Barnes and Noble. Once I made sure I didn't get T, I set about trying to clean up after myself and let the staff at the cafe know what I had done. T, on the other hand, splashed about in the coffee puddle and said "Uh oh, uh oh, uh oh."

2. In the past 2 weeks, I have had two separate people guess that I was 16 years old. Really? Looking young is a great thing, but 16 is no compliment.

3. My mothering instincts have taken me places I never expected. The other day I was changing T's diaper, when he grabbed the poopy one and flung it over to the changing table. The perfect little turd that was inside landed right next to his head. I grabbed the thing with my bare hands to keep him from rubbing it all over his head. It wasn't until I had restored calm to the situation that I realized I had just grabbed poo with my bare hands. Ew.

4. T discovered today that his wiener is much more interesting that a book about farm animals.

5. Someday, he'll discover this blog and be mortified.

6. I won't much care.

7. Packing to go anywhere these days is a mini series. The days of carrying on and worrying about meals when we get to the airport/car are over.

8. We go there so often that the people at Chik-Fil-A now know T on sight. Come back sun!

9. I really miss having close girlfriends. My mom's group is great, but I want someone I can call at noon and ask to meet me for lunch and a trip to Target boutique at 1 pm.

10. I'm signing us up for swimming lessons this summer. I realize it's probably a big early, but everyone out here has a pool (and there's the ocean). I want him to be comfortable in the water and learn to swim early.

Save us, purple Jeebus

I have been hearing about the purple Jesus prayer rug on the internet and from friends. Hallelujah, we finally received a Jesus prayer rug of our very own today from "Saint Matthews 57-Year-Old Church." You assure me that if I pray on my fancy paper prayer rug for 24 hours (or just put it under my bed) and then send it back to you with my seed gift, my prayers will be answered. I'm pleased to see that among the prayers that purple Jesus will answer are "Confusion in My Home, A New Car, and a Specific Amount of Money." My home is certainly not confusing enough. Not only that, you've thoughtfully provided me a postage paid envelope to send in my gift. Because the world's money is the devil's money, I am sending my envelope filled with earthly treasures, soil from the earth so you can plant my seed gift.

I tried and tried to see Jesus's eyes opening and looking into my own, as you promised on my prayer rug. Alas, purple Jesus won't look at me! Perhaps it's because I've angered him by opening my sealed prophecy before returning the holy rug. Be assured that I will follow your other directions and return the rug within 24 hours, since, "These next 24 hours are crucial to (me). Timing is important to God." I can only pray that purple Jesus will bless me with a "Big 6 Room House" like he did for Mrs. T.F. in Texas. Please send me my 2 1/2 inch by 1 1/2 inch "beautiful, blessed, Prosperity Cross." Please send my purple Jesus to "another family that's in need of a blessing." And finally ... Shame. On. You.


For more on the purple Jesus head scam, see here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

In case you can't tell

The shirt says "Mr. Happy"

I (sort of) miss grad school

Grad school holds the unique place in my life where I felt the smartest and the stupidest. After my first few days, I was convinced that the admissions committee must have switched my application for someone else's. I spent the next 2 years wondering how I had gotten lucky enough to study with and learn from these brilliant people. I also finished up feeling like I created the best scholarship I will likely ever produce.

My life today certainly doesn't provide the highs or lows of those sleep deprived years. I miss feeling like my brain was stretching every day. At the end of the day, I'm craving conversation that doesn't have to do with bodily functions, food or developmental milestones. I hope that taking classes again will fill the brain function void I'm currently experiencing.

A word problem

As I mentioned earlier, we planted our vegetable garden yesterday. Ry bought a soil test several weeks ago to see if our dirt was pH balanced. Yes, I know it seems geeky, but we've had a heck of time getting grass to grow here on the homestead, so we're trying knew things. Anyhow, we didn't get around to actually testing the soil in my garden until today. (Cue ominous music.) If you garden at all, you probably know that tomatoes like slightly acidic soil. The soil in my garden was about an 8.5 (7.0 is neutral for those of you who don't remember or slept through high school chemistry). The pH scale is logarithmic, which means that 8.5 is ten times more basic than 7.5. Anyhow, my garden is at the wrong, wrong, wrong end of the scale.

Generally, when your dirt is imbalanced, you would mix in some stuff with the "native" soil to achieve the correct balance. Yeah ... should've tested the soil earlier. So, do I ...

a.) Dig up my plants, mix in some garden sulfur and replant.
b.) Buy some fertilizer and soil additive and sprinkle it around the plants, water well, and hope for the best.
c.) Do nothing. I'm screwed. My tomatoes will once again suck this year.

And to your right ...

I have a few links on my blog for sites that I read most days. My most recent addition my former course director's blog, First Efforts. She's a professor chick who specializes in visual rhetoric. She has some really interesting insights about what pictures tell us. I've really enjoyed reading it, especially this political season. Also, she has a great sense of humor.

Garden and the gnome

The first year we planted a vegetable garden, it grew beautifully. We had tomatoes coming out our ears and zucchini the size of our arms. I couldn't eat any of it of course, since I was puking 3 times a day ... but no matter. Last year I was excited for a repeat performance since I could enjoy the fruits of our labor. Alas, aside from a few handfuls of grape tomatoes, our garden was largely a bust.

This summer, I bought our veggie sprouts from the nursery we used the first year and bought a garden gnome to bring us good garden luck. I have to assume that since they're called "garden" gnomes, our little guy will bring us a bountiful harvest. Plus, he's carrying a frog and I like frogs.

Teaching him the important things

As part of teaching T his body parts, I'll do something silly when he correctly identifies a given part. For example, he gets tickled when he locates his belly. He gets his head rubbed when he finds his head. When he shows me his feet, I'll sniff them and say "pee-ewe, stinky feet." He thinks this is hysterical. Today he kept trying to say "pee-ewe." At least he's learning the important things for life. Banana and pee-ewe ... what else does a kid need to know?

Nom nom nom

Darn, if only I had more than 4 teeth.

Sippy Cup (and Shoe) Retention

I have to wonder what my sippy cup turnover is going to be by the time T is finished with them. I'm forever finding his sippy cups in new locations (like the ottoman, tupperware drawer and under various pieces of furniture). During naptime, I go searching for lost sippy cups since finding one with milk in it after a few days is truly revolting.

We also almost lose a shoe every time we go grocery shopping. Today I was in line at customer service to see if his shoe had been turned in when I saw it peeking out from under one of the produce bins. Babies would be much cheaper if you could hang onto the stuff you buy.