One Hundreth Post

In honor of my 100th post to this blog, I thought I'd post a festive picture. All I did was ask him to smile. All Rog had to say was, "Hey, you gave birth to him." Thanks Rog. What he doesn't see is that Eli totally has his smile. Don't you think?

I'm a cowboy, baby

Jude thinks it's time to fill his daddy's shoes. Complete with chubby belly sticking out from under his shirt too! He couldn't be more like Rog here. He also spoke what I think of as his first full sentence this morning. He walked into the bedroom when I was going in there to get dressed after my shower. He reached up and turned on the light switch (both boys are freakishly tall) and said, "Derego mommy!" (Translation: There you go, mommy!)

Artist-in-bloom?

Ok, so I'm just a proud mom, but who can blame me? Elijah painted this beautiful picture at school. We can actually get this piece printed onto several different items through a company that imprints graphics onto stuff. I think I'll get a book tote, some magnets, a key chain. Anyone want a t-shirt? I will proudly display Eli's art for whomever I can corner and show it too! And the $$$ benefits the PTA. I'd love to scan all his art and make a quilt. Too bad I don't have the patience or the proper equipment...

Goblins and Pumpkineers

At long last, Halloween came and went. The very first thing Eli said apon waking was, "It's Halloween!" By his excitement you would have thought he dreamt about nothing but candy and trick or treating the night before.

I've posted some shots from our pumpkin carving on Sunday. We carved our two new friends, Evil Ed and Grady O'Grin (whose design was carefully researched on the internet before hand-you can't just let daddy lose on a pumpkin with a knife.) I finally remembered to get some pics of them last night. Roger actually had to staple Grady's mouth back together yesterday. They already looked like wrinkly old toothless men by Tuesday.

As you can see Eli was quite "primed" in his Optimus Prime costume (the leader of the Transformers for those of you that don't know.) We borrowed a costume from Amy for our little "Punkin." Very cute, I think. He didn't care, he just wanted candy. The last pic is of the boys and Mikela Kralik (Casey and Matt's little girl--she's 4 months old now!) She was so cute in her little bunny outfit.

We also went to the Pumpkin Patch on Saturday (where we find our lovely pumpkins). I'll have to post those pics later. Rog had to take them on his phone as mom forgot the camera. You'd forget stuff to if you had to get yourself and 2 boys out the door in a timely manner. Not an easy task these days.

Punkin Head!

Poor Mikela-stuck in the middle!

Grady O'Grin (l.) and Evil Ed (r.)

Don't mess with the law

Yep. I fought the law. You know the rest.

My future's so bright I gotta wear shades

We had Eli's first parent/teacher conference on Tuesday. Everything seems to be going pretty good for Eli in Kindergarten. Everyone has worked with us on his food allergies. His teacher says he's a very honest little guy and very enthusiastic.

His only problem areas seem to be figuring out some of his letter sounds. He mixes up "b" and "p" and sometimes "q". Also, for a while we've been concerned about his inability to pronounce the "s" sound in most words. He says "wimming" for "swimming", "lide" for "slide" and so on. He just doesn't seem to realize he's not pronouncing the "s". His teacher is going to have a specialist work with him to see if we can get that problem corrected.

Other than that, Eli seems to be a normal kindergartner (except that he's freakishly tall, but there's not a specialist for that.)

Jude makes a shocking discovery

Yesterday, I was sitting on the toilet (yes, mommies go to the bathroom too.) Jude walked in as I was standing up. He points between my legs, furrows his brow and with worried look asks, "No P?" That's Jude's word for penis. Yes, Jude, mommy has no penis. He really seemed upset by this. Oh, the joy of new discoveries!

The great potty experiment

I'm just practicing, but I do it every day. With any luck, I'll be a pro long before I'm 4. (That's how long it took my big brother.)

Where do we draw the line?

He's only crying because we told him he couldn't eat any more ant hills.

Dog spa

Finally, actual proof as to how much Sadie enjoys her pedicure.

Better psychological screening

Where does the US Postal service find it's employees? Today, I just happened to be opening my front door as the mailman pulled up. He noticed me and motioned to me. He had a package that wouldn't fit into the mailbox.

I proceeded to open the door and he started up the driveway on foot. Everything was fine until Sadie noticed. Then came the barking. I called her out to me as I did not want Jude to wake up (he'd only been down for 20 minutes.) The mailman said, "Oh, don't bring her out ma'am." I said, "Sorry, my son is sleeping and I don't want him to wake up." He kept backing away this whole time. All the way back down the driveway. Keep in mind, she's not barking and I have a tight grip on her harness. We backed him all the way into his truck. He even shut the door before he would hand me my mail.

He said, "If I get bit, I get 3 days off work without pay." This man was truly frightened of my little dog that I had complete control of. If he would have made an effort to at least befriend her, maybe it would have gone better. Don't they train these people on how to regard animals when they meet them on their routes? If you show fear, yeah, you're going to get bit. Duh!

He may have been scared, but there was no way I was going to let him ring my bell and wake up my son. Why is every postal worker so afraid of dogs? If you're delivering the same route every day, is it so hard to make friends with some of those dogs on your route? I could go on and on. Where do these people come from? They must all own cats.

Ma, look what I made...

If I would just spend half as much time cleaning my house...

Chuck

Jude turns 18 months, officially, tomorrow. He had his checkup with the doctor today. Doctor say everything good! Jude big boy. Grow lot. Eat well. Ok, enough cave man talk. Here's the stats:

Weight 25 lb (sorry, mom, he's too big to lift now.) 45th percentile.

Height 35". The nurse said this is over 97%, so that means he's off the charts, I guess.

Words Judes says that we clearly understand: mama, dada, Sadie, baby, ball (ball ball), baba and pretty.

He also says: poo poo, Jesus (geezee) and today he said "fish" while we were at the doctor's office.

He's also developed an attitude that says "I'll do it the way I want to do it, and you won't help. If you do, I'll throw a big rock at you." As is clearly demonstrated by the above picture. This was taken right before he chucked the big rock at my camera. Luckily, the camera survived. He has an excellent throwing arm.

Scary thoughts

As I huddled under my desk at work last Monday night after they informed us we were under a tornado warning, I was reminded of the irony. Early that day I was working on the revision for a story involving a little girl and a tornado. (I'm submitting this story to a fiction contest in a couple months.) I was also researching on the web and came across this website titled "The (Real) Night of the Twisters". It is all about the 7 tornados that ripped through Grand Island, NE (my hometown) on June 3, 1980. I wrote my story a year ago. On the night I was finishing the first draft, we had tornado warnings. Are you seeing a pattern here?

Anyway, I was both fascinated and horrified by the stories I read and pictures I saw on this website. The most frightening part about it was that the strongest tornado (F4 strength, tornado number 5 in the graphs), out of the 7 that hit, went right through my back yard. This is the first time I had ever seen the charts that depict the paths the tornados took. I'm amazed at how 27 years later my stomach still gets tied in knots when I think about it.

I've included a picture with a star marking where my house was (it's marked with the bluish-green star. Sorry, it changes the colors every time I upload.). I'm also including the link to the website. It can be found on the left side of the page with my other links. You can view other pictures of the destruction there.

The kindergartner and his apprentice

At long last the day arrived and Eli is now a "school kid." Never was an event so looked-forward to! I took him to school. We left promptly at 7:20 for our I-80 commute. We found our way to his classroom and his teacher, Mrs Sumpter. I almost had to beg him for a kiss goodbye. He doesn't need his mommy that much. I almost cried, but remembered I had the commute back on I-80 and those morning drivers don't like cry babies. I sucked it up.

As his first day as the new "big boy" in the house, Jude tried on big boy shoes. He's excited about the opportunity to play in Eli's room without Eli's permission. He smiled a lot and giggled and was generally happy to have mommy's undivided attention all day.

When Sadie decided it was time, we all waited by the front door for daddy and Eli to arrive home. The good news is, they said Eli could return on Tuesday. We all breathed a sigh of relief.

License to write?

It's official. I now have a diploma. I've been taking this course for the last year and just completed it. Ironically, I received my diploma and my very first rejection slip (for a short story I submitted to a magazine) on the same day. Should I be happy or sad? I'm confused. My instructor has recommended me for their advanced course, which involves writing longer stories. Perhaps a short children's novel is on the horizon? I'll know in the next couple months if I got accepted to this course.

How boys give their mothers heart attacks and make their fathers proud

Thursday, Eli took his first official "major wipeout? on his bicycle. He decided to demonstrate how fast he could ride down the hill for his daddy. He went very fast, but could not keep control. He went face first over the handle bars. His mommy did not witness this demonstration. He was wearing his helmet. He got to experience first-hand why we always make him wear his helmet.

The top pic was taken on Thursday. The bottom one was take on Friday. The swelling on his top lip is going down, so he doesn't look so much like a Simpson's character. More scabs formed, though, so it actually looks worse.

Random pics I hadn't posted yet...

Hey, Mom, these sure smell better than my feet!

Dude! Sweet!

Eli's first rule in bicycling safety: Keep your eyes wide open!

I like to watch the little ducks at the Y, while they have their swimming lessons!

Semi-professional pics

Some of you have seen these, and some of you have not. I decided to skip the professional photographer for Jude's 15 month pictures. We just had a little fun in Jude's room with our own camera. A few days later, I got some pictures of Eli. One of them (the 1st one in the group of 4 below) I just fell in love with. It's so rare we catch him looking so angelic.

Late at night when you're sleeping poison ivy comes a creeping

Well, maybe not at night. More like in your neighbor's flower bed that you pulled 12-year old landscape fabric out of. Both Roger and Mary (our neighbor) got into something they had a reaction to. Roger went to the ER Saturday night (10 days after coming in contact with whatever it was.) He just could not stop itching. It was spreading. It was weeping. It was blistering. At first we all thought they had some bug bites. Roger got it much worse than Mary did, but he spent more time in the flower bed. The pictures of his face don't actually show how red and dry and puffy his face is.

She's pretty as a daisy

But look out man she's crazy

She'll really do you in

If you let her get under your skin

(Lyrics courtesy of The Coasters. 1959)