Nothing out of the ordinary

We have had a very ordinary week here in Lane Land. I can't believe it's only Wednesday. I'm kind of tired and ready for the weekend already. I'm also amazed at how anti-climactic the week leading up to my birthday has been. I usually get much more excited. I guess 32 is kind of an anti-climactic age--no new privileges, no new decade, no double numbers, just a 3 and a 2. On Friday (the actual day of birth--love it when it's Friday the 13th!), my Auntie M and our friend Loretta (or Roletta) are taking me to lunch. Marcus, Dean and I are going out to dinner that night, then coming home to chill out and watch a movie, probably LOVE ACTUALLY so we can quote it as we watch. (after Dean goes to bed, of course) Marcus has scholarship auditions on Saturday, so Dean and I will surely find something to fill our time while he's gone.

Dean's 4th tooth popped through yesterday. It terrified our manny, BJ, who thought something was terribly wrong. Dean always runs a very low-grade fever when he's cutting a tooth and acts really lethargic and cranky. Poor BJ was sure he was sick and that he would shrivel up and blow away because he didn't want much lunch. Once we inspected his gums, we gave him a little Tylenol and a cold chew toy and he was good to go. He did wake up FREAKING OUT twice during the night, though. Poor little guy. I'm going to make him a grilled cheese for lunch. Toast feels good to baby gums, I hear.

There's a new art gallery in Montevallo! It's called the Blue Phrog. We met the owner last night at Eclipse, our coffee and book store. I'm hoping to get in touch with him this week to ask about bringing my class to the gallery for a field trip. It would be nice for them to talk to a manager of an arts organization that isn't performance-based.

In other news, I really need to get cracking on the workshops I'll be presenting next month at the Southeastern Theatre Conference. Last year, Marcus, our friend Scott and I did one on moving to NYC. It was so well received that this year we've broken it into two different workshops, one on moving to NYC, the other on networking in NYC, and added a fourth panelist. I think this will be the last year we present this one, since we've been gone from the city for close to a year and are already losing touch with the way things are there. I'm also presenting a workshop on stage managing outdoor drama. Should be fun. I'm looking forward to the conference. It's always fun to see old friends and make new connections. Since I'm not job-hunting or hiring this year, I'll be spending my days presenting or attending workshops, going to meetings for my new position with Alabama Conference of Theatres and finding other opportunities to get involved. There is an interest group for people who would like to write for Southern Theatre, our quarterly magazine. I'm going to attend that and pitch an idea: I think we should start a Southern Theatre blog. It's an idea I've been playing around with for a while and I think it would be a great informational and networking tool for our region. I would happily serve as "blogmaster" and be responsible for finding content to post 2-3 times a week. I'd like to do one interview with someone working in professional theatre each week, then a feature about new products, new plays, new programs, etc. I'm reading Blogging for Dummies right now to teach myself a little more about the wonderful, mysterious blogosphere.

How's YOUR week going?

PS:

I am TOTALLY a rockstar!

They said it was just a trim, but I thought she might cut my head off

Hey, peeps, Dean here. Would you look at what Mommy and Daddy did to me yesterday!?!?!?!?

They made me get my HAIR CUT! I got excited because I thought we were going to Target. But noooo, we went into this other place where this lady I do not even KNOW put a cape on me (a cape with NO ARM HOLES!) and cut off my hair!

I wanted to slap her hand away like I do when Mom tries to blow my nose, but there were NO ARM HOLES in my cape! Daddy's cape had arm holes. NO FAIR.

Mom was no help. Instead of saving me from this stranger with scissors, she stood there collecting my hair in a zippy bag (how ghetto is THAT?) so she could keep a curl and give one to each of my grandmas. If my grandmas had BEEN there, they certainly would have saved me.

But not Mom. Nope. She just stood there with her zippy bag snapping pictures and taking video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AowwEH0n5Ns

(I'm only 1. I don't know how to embed videos. GAH.)

Anyway, it was over pretty quickly. The lady with the scissors gave me a sucker, which Mom TOOK. (She's really no fun these days, I tell ya.) I guess I do look pretty good. But I am NEVER doing that again EVER. So there.

Pitchas

That is how old southern people say "pictures." (Pitch-uh-s)
Anyway, here are some illustrating how we spent our week.

Dean LOVES his new Radio Flyer car that he got for his birthday from G-Mama and Pop Pop. He wants to sit in it all the time and has become quite the expert at turning on the blinkers and the radio. Today he learned to beep the horn. Then he tried to eat it.

Just like he tried to eat this leaf.

We read "Moo, Baa, La La La" exactly 328 times.

No Mom, I won't get out of my car and eat my broccoli. So there! Blaaaaaaaaah! Can you see my tonsils?

We had a crazy hair day. Or 5.

And we went to Old Navy.

Speed it up, Dad, I gotta cruise this place for girl babies before my nap time!

Have a good weekend!

Well, well

Dean had his one-year well-baby appointment today. You want the stats? You got it!
Weight: 22 lbs. 1 oz. (50th percentile)
Height; 29 1/2 inches (50th percentile)
Head: 18 1/8 inches (75th percentile--way to go, Dean!)
Vaccinations: 3
Band-aids: 3
Books as birthday gifts from doctor: 1 (cool, huh?)
Prescriptions for nasty, horrible eczema: 2

He had his first taste of whole milk today. He spit the first sip out, but that's usually what happens with his first sip of anything. He should be walking any minute now and is finally able to eat table food for most of his meals.

The eczema is awful and I only write about it because a)I want to have a record of it and b)it might help another parent. He had a huge, nasty patch behind his knee, which is where I used to get it when I was a child. There are little patches scattered all over his body, but that one was the worst. It had gotten infected, so the dr. gave us a very mild steroid cream to help speed up his healing and an oral antibiotic. She told us to stop using the creams we'd been using and lube him up with Lubriderm. We also stopped using Johnson's baby wash in favor of (get ready) a plain white Dove beauty bar! The doctor said that is what dermatologists recommend for eczema. It was weird to have him emerge from the tub smelling like he'd just taken off his make-up instead of like a baby. Just another step in our growing process, I suppose.

The oral antibiotic has already been an adventure. When I brought it home from the pharmacy, I realized that the bottle was sealed and contained powder instead of liquid. There were instructions telling how to mix it, but I didn't really trust myself with that task. (Plus, for what it cost, the least they could do was mix it up!) I called the pharmacy and the lady said "Oooooooooooooooh, yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaah." People in Alabama sometimes talk slow, you see. "We shoulda mixed that up. Come on back." So, back to the pharmacy went Marcus. When I opened the now-correctly-mixed bottle, the aroma of orange Sweet Tarts (or in Marcus's opinion, a ground-up orange Safety Pop) hit me. We tried our usual "give it to him in the bathtub" trick, which didn't work. He spit it all over Marcus's sleeve. We tried again before bed. He gargled it. GARGLED. How does a one-year old even know how to gargle? Anyway, tomorrow morning it's going in the cereal. And I may wear a Haz-Mat suit.

Happy, happy birthday, Deano

I totally had a waffle with a candle in it this morning!

I have literally written this post a million times in my head and in "draft" form. I've read my favorite bloggers' archives to see how they put into mere words what they were feeling on their babies' first birthdays. I could say a million mushy things, but I won't. I will say that on this day last year, a little boy entered my life and my heart has been his ever since. With each passing day and each milestone, each smile and giggle, each new discovery, each goodnight hug, I love him more and more. When you're falling in love with someone, the rest of the world seems to fall away. I remember when Marcus and I were first together, we'd talk for hours about nothing in particular. Neither of us could tell you what any of those conversations were actually about, but they were some of the most important times in our relationship because they helped us learn about each other and about how we would function together. There have been times this year when the rest of the universe has seemed to fade away, leaving just our little family of three, or some days, just Dean and me. Watching the world through his eyes has been amazing.
Words are starting to fail me and Dean REALLY wants me to read his birthday book to him (again), so I leave you with my very first video montage. I was going to set it to a sappy song, but then decided to use one of Dean's favorite dancing songs, "I'm On My Way" by the Proclaimers from the Shrek 2 Soundtrack. (I think he likes it when they say "uh, huh.")


Happy first birthday, Deano. I love you to pieces.

Every day should be a birthday party!

Hey, peeps! Dean here! Mommy said I could blog today to tell you all about my birthday party, which was yesterday! The weekend was already super-exciting because my Uncle Lee came to visit all the way from Arkansas.














On Friday, my cousin Heather came over to play with me while mommy and daddy ran some errands. I took a nap on her.
On Saturday morning while mommy, daddy and Uncle Lee drank a BIG pot of coffee, someone pulled up in our driveway...it was Grammy and Papa! I was a little confused at first, but really happy to see them. AND they were carrying presents! (I know all about those from Christmas.)















Mommy made everybody put on those goofy looking hats to take pictures. She also just told me that Papa is probably going to kill her for letting me post that picture, but that's the risk we take, right fellow bloggers?
After lunch, my Aunt Meredith, Auntie M, Heather and Chase showed up and mommy said it was time for my party! I didn't really know what a party was at that point, but it sounded like fun, so I went with it. She and daddy put me in my booster chair by the Christmas tree (which I attempted to disassemble, thank you very much) and started handing me PRESENTS!!!!















I got a TON of new books (My favorite!!), some awesome blocks, a couple of DVDs, a piano and even a new car! Mommy only cried once, when she tried to read my card from her and daddy. She said we could read it later. I wondered why she's been so sappy lately and she said it's because she and daddy love me sooooo much.














Can you feel the love? (and can you dig my daddy's new short hair, no goatee look?)















I certainly can! (Jeez, guys, let a boy read his new Boynton books in peace!)
After presents and kissy-face, daddy took me to the kitchen to see my cake. He said mommy worked on it for HOURS while I was asleep Friday night, trying to make it look just like my favorite monkey friend, Stu. I think she did a good job.














Mommy said she's glad it turned out cute or else she would have had to throw the cake in the yard under a pile of leaves and submit herself to Cake Wrecks.
I had my very first taste of chocolate. At first I was skeptical.














Then I got the hang of it!














After I finished, I had a bath. Mommy says I had cake in places she didn't know cake could go!
I was on a sugar high for quite a while, so my Papa followed me while I climbed the stairs over and over and over for about an hour. I think everyone was REALLY impressed with my stair-climbing abilities! I crashed in the car on the way to dinner and had to sleep on mommy until her food came. Then I had a biscuit and some chicken and dumplins.
All in all, it was a great party and a great weekend!

Mommy will post tomorrow on my real birthday. She says this time last year she was in triage in labor and hadn't even had any drugs yet. Poor mommy.

In honor of my first birthday, I have decided to go on a baby food strike. I mean, I have two whole teeth and one more little nubber on top. Break out the table food, folks! My Grammy tried to give me baby cereal this morning, but I showed her I'm a big boy by spitting it at her. I think she got the picture, because she got mommy to give me a toasted English muffin and a pear. For lunch, I amazed mommy by eating a ton of pasta, more pear and some toast. And I only threw one piece on the floor! Now, if you'll excuse me, it's time for my daily post-nap Yo Baby. Later, peeps!

Things I have learned in the past 12 hours

On the eve of Dean's first birthday party, I've received an education from the great teacher Experience. Here are my findings:

1. There is absolutely no way to clean your house for a party the day before said party is to occur. That is, unless you send everyone currently living in your home to a hotel. Seeing as the money tree will not allow that at this time, all cleaning of the kitchen and living areas will be left until in the morning. Because Lord knows we'll be up early enough. (SLEEP, DEAN, SLEEP!)
Side note: Other moms, have you heard the tale that just before they really start walking, babies start waking up every few hours? Dean is "cruising" all over, but not walking independently yet, but he IS waking up about every four hours. Just curious if anyone else has experienced that.

2. If your husband comes to you late on the eve of the party when you've decided "What the heck? I'll start cleaning the kitchen tonight!" and tells you he's going to make beignets
for breakfast (for the first time ever, mind you), glare at him until he talks himself out of it and leaves the room.

3. The people at Wilton have obviously never actually baked a cake in one of their own pans. They give you very dramatic instructions like "ONLY coat the pan with shortening, then dust with flour! DO NOT use butter, margarine or oil!!! NEEVVVEEERRRRRRR!" Then in little, tiny 3 point font, they write "Non-stick cooking spray may be substituted for flour and shortening." Gr. Also, they think that a half-round cake pan that is approximately 6 inches deep will bake a cake in one hour. They are obviously ON CRACK. My cake? Took 1 hour 52 minutes. That time may have been shortened had I not had to pause for a few minutes to clean the burned cake globs out of the bottom of my oven when THE PAN OVERFLOWED! They tell you to put waaaaaaaaaay too much batter in there, y'all. I trimmed enough off of that cake to feed everyone coming to this party tomorrow.

4. No matter how many times they visit, I always feel the need to "show off" my house to my parents. Look! A sparkly clean bathroom! Look! Freshly vacuumed floors! Look! All the labels in the fridge are pointing out! (Ok, maybe not that last one) I think deep down I know that they are really just coming to play with Dean, but I still don't want them to think my house isn't up to par.

5. Dean does not nap well with other people in the house. Because he might miss something. He also likes salsa.

In the next few days, I hope to post party pictures, including the insane monkey cake I baked and decorated. Unless the finishing touches don't work out and it turns out to be butt-ugly, in which case I'm throwing it in the leaf pile, burning it and going to Publix for a sheet cake.

Just so ya know...

The Christmas decorations are staying up until January 6th. My friend Meredith helped me justify that decision by reminding me that January 6th is the last day of Epiphany, and therefore, the last official day of the holiday season. The real reason is that I want my mom and dad to see my tree and other decorations when they come for Dean's birthday party this weekend. And since we were gone for two weeks to celebrate with our families, I want to enjoy our decorations for a while longer. So there ya go. If you are among the guests for this weekend's festivities, prepare yourself for a little more Christmas.

In other news, Dean is slowly but surely getting used to sleeping in his own crib again. While we were gone, he decided that it would be fun to refuse to sleep except on male relatives or smack-dab in between Marcus and me. Aside from the 2am OH MY GOSH MY TEETH HURT screaming fit, we actually got some rest last night.

What's everyone doing for New Year's? We'll be preparing for the party this weekend. I'm baking the cake myself, a fact my father finds utterly hilarious. I may do a practice run, though I really don't need the extra sweets in the house. Our friend Lee is coming in on New Year's Day and I'm sure some of our students will be drifting back into town and coming over to beg for food...um, I mean tell us all about their holidays. :) On Jan. 2, we'll be cheering for Alabama as they play in the Sugar Bowl. (Roll Tide!) Then Saturday the 3rd is the big party for Mr. I'm One Year Old. (His actual birthday is the 5th, but who wants to celebrate on a Monday?) Every time I think about him turning one, I cry. Expect a lot of pictures because words will surely fail me in the coming days.



















Maybe if I just keep my back turned to her Mommy will stop crying and kissing my face and saying "Oooooooh, my baby boy is gonna be oooooooonnnnnnnneeeeeeeee!" Jeez, Mom. Can't a guy watch Johnny and the Sprites in peace?

Picture pages....Christmas edition!

Best Christmas present ever. :)















Dean had lots of quality time with his G-Mama!














He also took quite the liking to his Pop-Pop!!














Me, Dean and Mim (my dad's mom). I have had that sweatshirt since 6th grade. Are you horrified that I'm wearing it or impressed that I can still fit into it???




















Reindeer bum-bum! Hanging out with Grandma Willie (my mom's mom).















Dean checks out his new wagon.
















Family photo! Marcus, my mom (Grammy), Deano, my Dad (Papa) and yours truly. We clean up ok, huh? We added a little extra Merry to our Christmas by celebrating the first anniversary of my mom's kidney transplant on Dec. 19.















Double trouble...Dean and Adam.















Could you eat his face off in his monkey jammies?





















Dean got this cool zebra from G-Mama and Pop Pop. Marcus thinks it's awesome.





















Don't say I never post pictures of myself. My hair's even brushed in this one. You can't even see Dean's forehead bruise. ;)

Merry Christmas to all!

I hope everyone's holidays are happy and bright and full of wonderful things like family, friends and food. My grandma arrived today with an entire carload of fresh veggies, homemade cookies and candy and, most importantly, cheese straws.

I am horribly behind on my blog-reading. Last week was not a good week for me to be out of town with limited computer access. All the babies I've been following all year (AJU5, Kara, Megan, and others) turned 1! I promise to go back and read every entry on all of my favorite blogs that I may have missed.

Here are some pictures because BOY do y'all want some pictures! (Thanks for all the emails!)

Have a great Christmas, everyone!














Dean was REALLY happy to see his cousin, Adam. Adam eventually accepted the baby and they worked on sharing all week. By the end of the week, they were partners in crime...and dressed exactly alike...for three straight days.














See? The Handy Manny talking tool kit was quite popular.














Now he's in Oxford hanging with Grammy, Papa and 2 great-grandmas for Christmas!
I promise to upload more pictures tonight once the festivities have concluded and do an all picture post!
Have a wonderful holiday, everyone!!!

Still tickin', but we did take a lickin'

Well hi there! Remember me? We have been in DC this week (we're here til early Mon. morning) and computer access has been very limited. I haven't gotten brave enough (or dexterous enough!) to blog on my phone yet, but I'm sure that day will come soon. Anyway, we're having a lovely visit with the family. Dean loves hanging out with his big cousin, Adam. I would post pictures of them, but they seem to have hidden my camera somewhere. I plan to rummage through the couch cushions in a minute in an effort to find it.

Marcus and I went out the other day to do some shopping. It was fun to browse without a stroller, though I missed my little constant companion. The phone rang while we were in Borders. It was my mother in law calling to tell me that Dean had tried to impress her with his stunt-man abilities and had fallen off the bed and hit his head. The next 2 minutes are a blur of me dropping everything in my hands, searching for Marcus and trying to remember the name of our medical insurance. We got to the ER about an hour after they'd called and found Dean sitting happily in Grandmama's lap, HUGE goose-egg on his forehead, reading Pinnochio. He looks like he got into a fight and lost. Poor guy. We stayed for three hours of observation and were declared "Just fine" and sent home. In the meantime, Dean decided to impress the nurses with an amazingly stinky poop. And, naturally, we didn't have a single diaper. Fortunately, they had a loaner. It's always an adventure, isn't it?
Those of you who know me will notice that I am writing about this incident three days after it happened and am, therefore, able to have a good sense of humor about it. Because the day it happened? BASKETCASE!

We had a little birthday party for Adam and Dean the other night since they won't get to celebrate their actual birthdays together, and it was lots of fun. Dean tasted cake for the first time, and by tasted, I mean smeared icing in my hair and all over his dad's sweater. Adam eats like a champ and used a big boy fork for his cake. When I saw Adam for the first time this visit, (we haven't seen them since August) I teared up. I cannot believe Dean will be that big this time next year. Adam is a sweetheart and has taken quite a liking to his Auntie Jen. (Which doesn't thrill her AT ALL, let me tell you.;) )

We'll be doing family Christmas tomorrow, which should be a fun time full of babies in boxes wearing bows on their heads. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some couch cushions to rifle through so that I may take photos of said family Christmas!!

Our last "months-old" birthday

My little boy is 11 months old today. I say little boy because he is seeming less like a baby every day. I wish I could bottle moments with him to save forever. This age (all of babyhood, really) is so precious and is flying by so fast. I try to remember everything he does so I can tell him about it later, but I'm sure I'll forget so much. I want to remember how he smells, what it feels like when he gives me an open-mouthed kiss on the cheek, his two teeth scraping against my skin, the sound of his laugh when I blow on his belly. I know one day soon, he won't let me kiss his feet or nibble his earlobes. He won't want me around when he takes a bath (and GOD FORBID I sing "the song" when he's 5 years old!). Other things I want to remember:
*Dean LOVES tags. He would rather play with tags than whatever the tags are on. When we put his crib together, we cut all the tags off and gave them to him to play with. He was in Heaven. Christmas may be very easy this year...
*His favorite thing in the world to watch is "Don't Forget The Lyrics." He thinks they are singing to him. Dean doesn't watch a lot of TV, but he perks up whenever he hears a song, so this show is lots of fun for him.
*Whenever he's so cranky I can't console him with books, I log onto Youtube and play a classic Sesame Street video of Grover singing with Madeline Kahn. He LOVES this song.
*It is apparently hilarious whenever I put the binky in my mouth the wrong way so that he can come up and grab it from my mouth the right way. Unsanitary? Perhaps. Adorable? Definitely.
*He has this cute little shriek he does whenever he sees other kids. He gets so excited. I hope he's always a social being.
*If I can get a belly laugh out of him, I will keep doing whatever brought about said belly laugh until he's so bored with me that he just wanders away.
*I love that whenever he makes a new discovery or feels a new sensation, his eyebrows shoot up expressively.
*I love it when he wears footie jammies with animals on the feet.
*His hair is OUT OF CONTROL when he wakes up. Add his snaggle-toothed smile to that and how can you resist him?
*He sometimes sings in falsetto.
*He checks in with me. A lot.
I know soon he'll be into his own thing and I'll go back to work and our little Mommy-and-Dean Universe will not be the same, but these past few months have been amazing and I am so, so thankful to have my little boy.
I have to go stare at him while he sleeps now.

The funniest thing in the whole world

...is apparently me transferring clothes from the washer to the dryer. BELLY LAUGHS. Oh, to be ten months old. (11 this week. GAH.)

Home again, home again, but not for long

Holy clingy baby, Batman! Over the past 2 days, Dean has developed some serious separation anxiety issues. He wants all mommy all the time. Cute? Yes. Charming? Sure. Flattering, even? Absolutely. Also back-breaking, exhausting and sort of annoying when you would like to do something like go to the bathroom or eat. Poor guy.

This week the official holiday madness starts. We came home from my mom and dad's armed with Christmas decorations and serving platters. However, I think we forgot the big box of ornaments they gave us. (Poo! We somehow managed to accidentally steal 3 of my mom's outfits from the closet, though. Woops.) We did make off with the small Christmas tree that was in my room for years and years and years. It is now sitting happily in Dean's room. We decorated it as soon as we got home this afternoon. He likes to look at it while getting his diaper changed. This week, we'll go get our big tree for the family room. We're going with an artificial one this year. (Don't want to tempt bugs or vacuum needles...though a real tree would be nice...maybe in a few years when we host the holidays at our house.) We'll be spending the week before Christmas with Marcus's parents in VA, then flying back to spend Christmas with my family in MS. Then it'll be back home for a round of New Year's guests and Dean's first birthday party. And then I will need to go to the spa.

AND as if that all weren't enough, we're hosting a Christmas party for some of Marcus's students! This weekend! AAAAAAH! Who wants to babysit?

Today I was a good mom

I think I'm a pretty good mom most days, but today seemed like a REALLY good day. We got up this morning, had breakfast and got Dean settled into "baby jail" to do his morning routine, which involves talking to every stuffed monkey we own, making sure all his musical toys still work, then reading every book in the house. (I should mention that I am usually in baby jail WITH him while he's doing this. Got a mental picture now? Good.) Our friend Alli left after her weekend stay with us and I got to work. By 11:30am, Dean had taken his morning nap and I had done 3 loads of laundry, 2 loads of dishes (in my dishwasher, which miraculously started working again when the power flashed off this weekend! Hallelujah!), swept and mopped the kitchen, switched out the hand towels in the bathroom (I am a bit obsessive compulsive about hand towels in the bathrooms) eaten lunch and sent two work-related emails! I'm on fire, I tell you! After lunch, Dean and I played for a while, then he showed me how well he can climb the stairs. We stood at the front door and looked out at the rain, then he somehow got dirt on his hands. I took him up to the bathroom sink to wash his hands and you would have thought we went to Disney World. He BELLY LAUGHED at the water and started trying to splash. So I pulled the stopper and let some water puddle in the sink so he could splash. Soon we were both soaked. He grabbed a hair elastic and was trying to play with it, so I decided, what the heck? Let's go swimming. I stripped him down and tossed him into the tub with his toys. He had a BLAST. He splashed and crawled around and explored parts of the tub that were new to him. At night, our bathtime is fairly routine. Daddy runs the water and washes the hair. I wash the body, Daddy helps rinse and keep baby from drowning and gives comfort when Mommy splashes baby in the face. Then Daddy stands baby up so Mommy can wash his bottom parts (and there's a song we sing), then out we go into the hooded towel and off to bedtime. I think Dean enjoyed his little swim party. I was proud of myself for being impromptu and not getting frustrated when he got us both soaking wet. I want to be that mom on the commercial who sprays her kid with the kitchen sink sprayer. (By the way, if you ever want to mess with a member of your family or your roommate, put a rubber band around the "trigger" on the kitchen sink sprayer. They will get HOSED the next time they turn on the sink. HILARIOUS! Learned it from my mom!)
Deano's down for his second nap of the day and my kitchen has been scrubbed with Clorox. There is one glass in my sink and there are 2 garments in my laundry basket (they require gentle cycle with like colors, so they will likely be there a while) and there is not one board book on my floor. I'm going to stop writing now and breathe it all in while it lasts.

NOOOO! This is NOT happening now!

So, my wireless card is dead. At least I think (and hope)that is what's wrong. I cannot seem to connect to the internet on my computer. I tried for 3 hours last night and again this morning. I have finally given in and moved over to Marcus's computer, which is not making me happy. His computer is fine. I even kind of prefer typing on his keyboard. But I miss MY computer. It has my bookmarks and my pictures and a purple background and my shortcuts and it's MINE. Guess Deano and I will be going to Best Buy today to get some help from the Geek Squad. [Speaking of which, did you know that they really drive that silly little car when they come to your house? It's true.] I cannot believe this is happening, especially during NaBloPoMo (or as Marcus calls it, NaNaBloPop).

I had a fun post with a picture for today, but I need my computer to do it. Boo. SO, let's see. What can we do instead? I know, in honor of my mom's birthday (happy birthday, mom!!), let's have everyone tell me about a birthday memory. It could be a cool party you had, a nice gift you received, whatever you'd like to tell us.

One of my favorite birthday memories is from this past year. Dean was about 7 weeks old on my 31st birthday. We'd had a particularly rough night, preceded by an even rougher day. This was around the time we found out that he's a little lactose intolerant, so we were experimenting with different feeding techniques. The doctor had recommended that I only feed him "sensitive" formula (no lactose) for an entire 24 hours to see if that made a difference. I was still nursing at this point, so needless to say, we were both miserable with him on just bottles of new formula. He woke up at 5am, was not too happy when I popped a bottle in his mouth, and half-heartedly ate. After he was done, he burped, spit up, then nuzzled in for a cuddle. Then he looked up and smiled at me. His very first smile. Just for me. On my birthday. Kind of made the fact that I'd only slept 2 hours that week worth it.

Some fun things my little boy has done this week

Taken this picture of me, which, except for the fact that I have no mouth or chin, ain't too shabby.



















Ridden in a duffle bag. You know, because the 2 million and 20 toys scattered on our floor are just not enough to hold his attention sometimes.



















Ok, this picture does not do justice to what happened here. Somehow, Dean's right leg ended up in the left leg of his PJs and the right leg was just kind of hanging over to the side. I have no idea what's going on at the top, but it kinda looks like a toga.














Become obsessed with (and fearless about) the stairs. He crawls to them all the time and tries to climb. We finally had to build a barricade. And yes, we sang a song from Les Miz while we built it. Because we are JUST THAT GOOFY!














Done a little light reading. See the red thing? It's his new "book rack." (see the proper use of quotation marks there, by the way?) It's really a magazine rack, but I got it for 68 CENTS at the Target dollar spot to keep his books for him. And he dumps it out. And swims in the sea of books. And it is precious and makes me oh, so proud that he would rather look at books than do almost anything else these days.



















Fallen asleep on his daddy. In bizarre positions.















Cheered for the Crimson Tide against LSU. He said overtime makes him nervous.



















Played in the leaves. Which makes him super happy and giggly.















Worn cute old-man-style Spiderman flannel PJs. And apparently begun practicing yoga.

How's your week going?

10 whole months

My baby boy is ten months old today. Let's reminisce, shall we?



















Waiting...

















Here he is!














Six days old














1 month old














2 months old



















3 months old



















4 months old













5 months old















6 months old














7 months old














8 months old














9 months old














10 months old! Daddy and Mommy love you, Dean!