O Christmas Tree

This season really is steeped in tradition for me. Neurotic traditions at times, but tradition.

For example, that I HAVE TO go cut down a REAL WHITE PINE tree the DAY AFTER THANKSGIVING. I have to. I think my head might explode if we don't.

So after pretending to work for 4 hours in an office with all of 5 out of 60 employees in attendance we went to get our tree. I will let the pictures tell the story....

Matt being manly with his dull saw and tree transporter.


......................Doesn't everyone leave their baby by the good trees in order to mark which one you wanted?........................

........................Helping Daddy cut the tree down!........................

...........................................Timber!...........................................

...........................The final result..................................

What these photos don't show is that I think we may have selected a tree that was in the front yard of the tree farm's owner's house. But hey, there was no sign saying they were off limits.

It also does not illustrate was the amount of time it took me to decide on this tree and the amount of times I made Matt walk up and down a rather steep hill to look at ones that were 5 feet taller than our ceiling.

Oh well. Come my little Evergreen friend and scent my home with your branches!

Happy Thanksgiving

A slightly belated, but still very much heartfelt, Happy Thanksgiving to all our family and friends!

Yesterday was wonderful. So wonderful that it never even dawned on me to check my email, much less sit down and write this post!

I know I'm a little bit crazy, but I get buzzed off Thanksgiving. I love the cooking. I love the family togetherness, made even better by Matt's cousin Glen and his whole family sharing it with us. I love the decedent kick off to the holiday season.

I kept thinking about things that I'm grateful for yesterday, so here is my list:

~ I'm grateful that Gracie is a healthy, beautiful, good natured kid.
~ I'm grateful that Matt is great father, a wonderful husband and an absolute best friend.
~ I'm grateful that we have a warm home and food on the table.
~ I'm grateful that our home and our lives brim over with love for each other.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Please Approach the Elephant

Have you ever been to a Rainforest Café? (I know, stay with me here…)

It is overpriced, but extremely entertaining and monumentally kid friendly. As the name suggests, it is highly stylized in a rainforest theme. It is actually REALLY cool.

My favorite part of the experience though was always over before we were even seated. (OK, sure I loved the faux thunderstorms and random monkey noises too, but if I had to pick one it was this...)

The host stand was a giant elephant. Think Disney’s Dumbo ride (slighlty less cutsie) and that was the size of the thing. So when you were ready to be seated, the host would get on a microphone and call, “Will the X party please approach the elephant. Your adventure is ready to begin.” You would then follow the waitress along a path of painted footsteps, into the jungle that was the restaurant and order fancy sounding smoothies.

Having someone tell you to “Please approach the elephant,” was always so joyful. It was your turn. It was finally your turn!

Well, I do believe we are about to hear, “Please approach the elephant, your adventure is ready to begin,” from Gracie. She is standing, quite well, with no support these days.

At home she has been stretching the length of time she can stand without wobbling. It seems like just last week it was 5 seconds. Now is it up to 30 seconds. This morning I got a report at daycare that yesterday she stood on her own for about 3 minutes. Apparently, the only thing that caused the tumble was her excited clapping over the accomplishment.

Normally, the daycare people are really supportive about milestones. With this one though I have been warned there is trouble to come. One they can stand, walking will come very quickly, I am told.

“You’d better watch out. That Gracie, she will be into everything!” Thanks lady.

Another milestone is upon us.

I am excited about it. I love the excitement and twinkle in Grace’s eyes when she figures out new skills. And this is a big one. There should be fireworks!

Wogging Hurts, Part II

I wogged again this morning.

It sucked much more than last week. In fact, it was the direct opposite of last week. I felt good about myself last week. Until the pain set in the next day, I wanted to do it again. I was optimistic.

This week... is a different story.

I know we jogged a lot more than last week. And it was colder. Much, much colder. Still, I don't understand the direct contrast. I wanted to yack at the end of this weeks wog. I wanted to lay down on the frosty grass and take a nap. I wanted to die.

Matt keeps telling me that running is never fun. He says that he's gotten to the point where he at time enjoys the solitude of it, but that he NEVER enjoys the act of running itself.

Why am I doing this? WHY AM I DOING THIS!!??

I don't think I have ever run a day in my life. Not even high school. Come to think of it, I wogged back then too. In the mandatory gym class laps, I would run the straight and walk the curve of the track. I never ran the whole thing. Ever.

I keep telling myself that the more I do it, the easier it will get. Wasn't it supposed to be easier today?

As I said last week, I will do the 5K on Saturday. I will jog at least part of it. I will relish the silliness of the reindeer antlers Jen bought us to wear. And I hope, I hope, I hope I get caught up in the pack driven mania of the race. I am praying for race version of 'hive mind' to help propel me forward to complete this thing with dignity.

Some joy would be nice too. Just saying.

Parenting Snapshot

There is a mom in Gracie’s daycare that drives me nuts.

When I volunteered to be a parent liaison for the daycare, I had no idea what I was volunteering for. Most of the time it is fine. It is kind of cool. We are notified of stuff before everyone else.

Sometimes it is a royal pain. Like when dealing with the complainers. We have become the vehicle of said complaints, because they just don’t want to forward them themselves. Every so often they are legit. Most of the time they are not.

My latest gripe was an email to forward onto the Director the week. The concerns were:
A) The children are not getting enough fresh air and said parents thinks all the kids (even infants) should be going outside until the weather is BELOW 35 degrees.
B) She is concerned with the amount of ‘scary videos’ being shown and wants to have pre-approval authority before exposing the children to new movies and learning video games.

I was annoyed with the thought of having to forward such ridiculousness. My counter part drafted a very nice disclaimer to the Director before emailing it. I on the other hand, wrote a saga of why this person is a whack job. It included a mini-diatribe about how we CHOOSE to work and we CHOSE this daycare, so shouldn’t we trust them enough to know what is and is not appropriate. Thankfully, I deleted it before it left my desktop.

Today though, I had to take a step back and re-evaluate.

Today was picture day. I was told pictures would start at 9 am, so at 8:45 I changed Gracie into her cute little dress. 9 am came and went with no picture lady.

At 9:10, the head teacher announced that it would still be a little bit and that dresses were not compatible with playing so Grace should put her shirt back on. I said, "Eh, she’s fine. We will just work on walking until the picture people show up."

The teacher apparently disagreed because she unbuttoned the back of her dress and had it off before I could blink.

I was so mad. In my head I screamed, "I’m her mother, not you! If I want her to suffer and crawl around in dresses everyday that is my option, not yours!”

In real life I said nothing. I didn’t want to get into a fight with the lady who takes care of her for 8 hours a day over something so simple. I do wish I had said something though.

I need to keep reminding myself that yes, while I need them, they need me too. Even though I am giving up 8 hours a day of hands on parenting for my career, I am still the parent. I am still the decision maker for Gracie, not the teacher.

From this, I now have a slightly new outlook on the crazy, overbearing parent. I still think she is wrong, but SHE thinks she is right. And that is what matters.

Tis the Season

This will be Gracie's first real holiday season.

Sure, she was here last year, but she was still brand new and not very fun.

I recall screaming 10 minutes into the Thanksgiving meal I had spend hours preparing and days obsessing over. The complaint is only about the screaming though. I L-O-V-E the cooking and obsessing part of Thanksgiving.

I also recall the lump of 2 month old baby that didn't enjoy Christmas morning either. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say there was crying involved that morning too. Despite our efforts to crinkle paper, decorate her with bows and then drown out the cries with mimosas.

This year will be different though. In fact, it already is.

Much like retail stores, my satellite radio is moving up the start of Christmas too. Sure, they have a million stations so it makes absolute sense, but I will still surprised when an alert came up that my favorite Christmas song was playing somewhere in the box. The music, much like the decorations are supposed to start the day after Thanksgiving. Not weeks before.

Anyway ...

This has turned out to be a wonderful thing for me. Why? Grace seems to L-O-V-E Christmas music. You know, jingle bells and all make for great head bobbing. So far, Sleigh Ride is her favorite. Lots and lots of bells.

So this year's holiday season is filled with hope.

Thanksgiving will be served during the happiest part of the day, 3 pm-ish(right after her nap). I know she is a fan of yams, so they will only be better with butter and brown sugar. Cranberries will be a hit with their sweet squishability. Turkey will be tasted and shared with the dog.

It's a win-win for everyone. She will be happy, Lil' Rick will be happy, I will be happy and (most importantly) there WILL BE NO CRYING.

Here me kid?

Saturn #1

Upon our return from the Bahamas, we decided a little bit of financial re-assessment was in order. You know, a few hundred dollars in Pina Coladas will do that to you.

Over the last … oh, it’s only been a week and a half … it feels like a lot longer than that … we have been on a budget. No lunches out. No buying lunch at work because the kind of soup they have is tastier than the one I packed for myself. No trips to Target for stuff I really don’t need. No more fun at all.

I guess I shouldn’t complain too much. We are secure. Matt and I both have jobs that aren’t going anywhere in this scary economy. We aren’t saving because we HAVE to, we are saving because (on some level- more waited towards Matt’s side than mine) we WANT to. Well, we want to reduce the debt from all our spendy ways anyhow.

This morning was the 1st really cold wake-up of the season for us. Full frost everywhere. Heat on level 2 in the car.

Well, my car anyway. Matt’s umm … didn’t start.

He usually leaves a few minutes before me in the morning, so I was surprised to hear the front door unlock and open when we were putting on coats.

Me: Hey! What did you forget?
Matt: Nothing. Car won’t start.
Me: Uh Oh. Well, first cold snap and all. Want a jump?
Matt: Nope. Has full power, just won’t start.
Me: OK. What does that mean?
Matt: Means I’m not going to work and will start trying to figure out what’s wrong when the sun comes up.

So now the sun has come and the car still won’t start. While I know Matt doesn’t exactly enjoy driving the no-frills-oh-crap-both-our-cars-died-within-two-weeks-of-each-other Saturn, we both enjoy the fact that we own it without any payments.

Hope this doesn’t mean we have something new to be saving for.

Wogging Hurts

Sometime ago Matt tricked me into signing up for a 5K.

Yeah, you heard me. He tricked me and that is the story I’m sticking with.

It was surrounded by all this discussion about how I really want to / need to shed a few pounds and I can’t seem to drastically alter my eating / drinking habits, so exercise is in order.

Well, that was quite a few moons ago and I have been ignoring this looming 3.1 mile walk / wog / jog. Definitely not a run.

Anyhow, my only goal with this is to do it. To finish. Frankly, I really don’t care if I walk the entire thing. A little jogging would be nice though.

So yesterday, Jen and I went for a 2.8 mile wog around the lake. I think it went well. I did a lot better than I thought I would, and actually could have pushed harder if we hadn’t gotten so chatty on the back side of the lake.

What’s my complaint then?

I felt like SheRa yesterday and now I feel like hamburger today.

I had no idea how sore muscles I didn’t even know existed could get. We will do it again next weekend and hopefully I will get my butt on our elliptical machine this week to help combat my body’s rejection of exercise.

Wish me luck.

Can You Smell the Coconut?

Vacation.

It has come and gone and I haven't posted anything for a week and a half now. Recouping in hard work

Surprisingly, the 180 hours I was lamenting being away from the computer went very quickly. In fact, there was free internet access. I just choose not to use it. I was on vacation. I was with my family. I wondered what the Internets were doing, but had enough strength to abstain. I was quite proud of that fact.

We had a fantastic time in the Bahamas. Warm, humid, sunny, breezy 80 degree days. Sheer perfection. I made it a point to keep notes while I was away so I wouldn't forget the best moments of our first family vacation together.

In an effort to get the entries out, I am going to back date them to the actual days so I can post when I have time. So scroll back to November 2-8.....

VaCa - Day 8

SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 9

Home again, home again, jiggity, jig.

The trip is over. Despite having an hour delay at the airport and then a fully booked flight so we had to hold Gracie for the 2.5 hours home, everything went very well. Grace decided to break tradition and only slept for a half hour, but was still well behaved and happy.

Which made us very happy.

And in true Matt fashion, within one week of our return home, he is planning our next family adventure…..