Hey there

It’s been a while. I’ve been a little busy. I took two classes this past couple of months, a fiction workshop at the university where I work, and guitar lessons. Both are done for now, I might resume the guitar lessons in January. Re: the fiction class, I feel like I accomplished what I set out to. I had to write, so I did. AND I let other people read and critique what I wrote without curling into a ball whilst I screamed bloody murder. I wanted to, though. Every class session my stomach would get agitated and would grumblegrumblegrumble as loud as embarrassingly possible. Every. class. session. One time people actually commented on it.  I die. So now I am enjoying some down time, which isn’t much with work and parenthood. But still! There is a sliver.

The boys are both changing in leaps and bounds. Mad Miles is almost walking, he’s pulling himself up and crawling and sitting down on his own. He just cut his first tooth, 3 months before Z got his! He loves to yank my and Andy’s hair, he actually pushes my head to the side while he’s breastfeeding to get a better grip. He pulls DVDs out on the floor, and is really good at dumping my cereal all over my lap. He also is fascinated by any room that he’s not allowed to crawl in (kitchen, bathroom).

Z’s vocabulary has doubled. He’s talking in complete sentences. He blesses me when I sneeze and tells Mad that everything is okay when he screams and cries.  He mimics everything! He actually tried to say Pachycephalosaurus yesterday. Both are incredibly needy, and they only seem to need ME. This is very stressful, because I can’t even go to the bathroom without either of them freaking out. Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

I bought a new skirt at Anthropologie. It has pockets. POCKETS! I would never have noticed it on the website, but I saw it in the store and LOVED it. The material is thick and warm and lovely.

I also got a new pair of rain/snow boots since my awesome pair from JCrew are far too big. They’re Tretorns and green and basically the most comfy things evar.

I recently saw the thing that is New Moon with Meg and Sara. I had to cover my face several times during the movie. It was all kinds of ridiculous. The hungry kissing, the excessive pecs, and Kristen Stewart’s FACE were just too embarrassing. Oh and Edward’s slow motion walk from his Volvo at the beginning. O_O FOR REAL TWIHARDS? I’m also trying to understand why Graham Greene thought it necessary to take on “Drunken friend who dies so that Edward could mistake his death for Bella’s and do something completely cheesy and dramatic in Italy”. There’s GOT to be something better out there for Native actors, right? RIGHT? *looks around* Oh, right. And back to KS: I swear. to God. Probably the most irritating actress ever. Keeps the hair mussing, lip biting schtick on repeat and it has got to stop!

Andy and I are watching the rest of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince tonight. I’m not feeling it just yet, maybe the last half will win me over. The problem could be that I couldn’t understand a fucking word anyone said. British people! Open your mouths and enunciate!!

The End

For next time: the glory of The Room!

//<—I hate you WordPress.

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29

My birthday is tomorrow. We’re getting a sitter on Saturday so that we can eat a meal without pausing to take the salt and pepper shakers away from Z, or to shift Mad to the other knee. Maybe then we can enjoy the food we eat instead of shoving it mercilessly into our mouths and down our throats? Good times.  I will miss my little mad men though.

Speaking of which – Z is such a good little mimic, but now he’s also blurting out his own little sentences, mostly commands: Mama sit down on couch, Mama read to yoooooooouuuu, Mama come back. It’s so precious. He also sings! Actual lyrics! But just the catchy ones: he loves the lines “beating like a hammer” (Metric) and “tell me something, tell me something” (David Gray), and “Baby Baby don’t look back” (Fine Young Cannibals, but he says baby baby bo boo back). This is amazing. He must know it too, because whenever we try to capture it on film, he clams up. And Mad Miles – he is a twisting, sitting, scooting, grabbing fool! He is EVERYWHERE. He’ll be crawling any day now, I know it.

Bday presents – Andy got me guitar lessons. I had my first one on Tuesday! It’s slow going, but I am excited. 🙂

I got myself this dress:

LOVE

Augh, I can’t wait to wear it. I think my Frye boots and tights would look good with it in the winter, not sure which shoes I should wear with it now. Maybe my black mary janes?  My cream peep toes?

I watched the preview for The Lovely Bones and for the most part it looks really good. But I have two issues with casting: Mark Wahlberg and Reece Ritchie. I don’t think Mark Wahlberg is a bad actor or anything, but now every time I hear him speak I see him talking to animals. Plus, his intonation is off : when he says, “Susie would never go off with a stranger, it had to be someone she knew” – it sounds…sing-songy. Stop it, Mark. Stop talking and just look pretty.

Reece Ritchie as Ray Singh? NO. First of all, when I read the book I envisioned a dark skinned Indian boy. Why? Gee, I don’t know: “he had an accent and was dark…”, “They were fueled by the guilt they read into Ray’s dark skin.”, but apparently dark = gently tanned. Silly me. And the “You are beautiful Susie Salmon” line comes across as creepy based on the fact that he is WELL INTO HIS TWENTIES AND LOOKS IT, and she is a baby faced 15 year old. I get that Ray has to age while Susie stays the same, but couldn’t they have hired a younger actor like they did in The Reader and stuck a bushy beard on him later?

I want this on a shirt:

Make Whoopi

The End.

Trying not to freak out

I dropped the boys off at daycare this morning and I feel incredibly agitated. It’s weird to be in an empty house after 3 months of (mostly) alone time together. I want to relax but I can’t. Argh! This is hard. I have to get back to that place where I can trust someone else to keep my kid(s!) alive/fed/safe. I feel like my spidey senses are working overtime, I’m fighting the urge to drive back over there and check in on them.

Z didn’t even care that I left. He chirped “Buh-bye!” and went back to playing with his cars. I should be relieved that he didn’t kick and scream for me not to leave him, and I guess I am. A little. I want for him to enjoy his time there, I do. But I also want him to miss me. I’m mostly concerned about little Mad since he hasn’t been taking the bottle so well. The center is close enough to the university that I can drop by and breastfeed him if there is ever an emergency, so why can’t I stop worrying? *sigh*

LOVE

What’s in a name?

This book sucks

Z is obsessed with the alphabet. OBSESSED. He knows at least half of the letters so far (if not more), genius that he is. And you can’t read a book to him without him either cutting you off and insisting that you tell him exactly what EVERYTHING is (even things that I can’t really define….what is that? A thingamajig? Ummm…that’s a shadow.) or incessantly repeating a word until you echo it, even though you thought you’d already moved on. He will not move on unless he’s damn good and ready, and with each utterance of the word his pronunciation gets even more adorable.

“Apple! A-pple! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaapple! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAPLE!”

“Yes! Apple. That’s good sweetie. Okay, B is for bus…”

He’s having a hard time with Q since it looks like an O, but I could have sworn I heard something resembling a Q today. YES! I’m thinking of buying some alphabet cards to put on the wall in his room, he’ll love that.

He’s also getting better about calling animals by their names and not simply calling anything and everything a dog. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves: most things are still dogs. Everything in a Dr. Seuss book is probably a dog, since there literally is the lack of a better word. Or it might be a bird. He likes birds. One day when we were on a walk around the neighborhood (FINALLY got a double stroller – I love it!) We had to stop and stare for about five minutes at a crow collecting twigs and stuff for it’s nest while Z screeched “Birrrrd. BIIIIIRD.” The thing finally flew away and Z kept twisting around to look for it so I said, “Bye bye birdie.” to signal that it was time to move on. Now every time he sees a bird he says, “Buh-bye. Buh-bye birdie. Buh-bye.” Precious? Indubitably.

Watch me segue:

Speaking of proper names, I would never have thought Madrox would be so darn hard for everyone to pronounce. Really people? This was an honest to God exchange between me and my step-mil:

MIL: So it’s….Mad Rocks?

Me: Ma-drox.

MIL: Mad Rocks?

Me: Madrox.

MIL: Mad Rocks?

Me: *sigh* Just call him Mad.

FIL: *barks out a laugh* Mad?! Really! Mad? That’s CRAZY TALK.

Um. Yeeeeeeah. I hope he never has a friend named Richard.

Crazy beans with a side of awesomesauce

That’s basically my life right now. I’ve got a lot of emotions going on over here. There’s the overwhelming love I feel whenever I look at one (or both) of my boys, the overwhelming sense of pride when Z points at Mad’s nose and says, “No!” which of course means nose, unless he’s not pointing at a nose, and then it means no. He says no. A LOT. So then there’s that overwhelming sense of restraint when he screams it at me: I restrain myself from spanking my kid until he -what did my parents say?- can’t sit down for a week. Then he does something adorable again and I think I could never lift a finger to harm him.

Z is getting really attached to Bearison Ford, his Panda Bear. I think it might have something to do with trying to mimic holding a child himself. In any case, it’s very adorable. He woke up from a nap yesterday very fussy and only calmed down when Andy handed him his bear. (!) Also, he’s very obsessed with learning new words.

I’ve been trying to wear breastfeeding friendly tops to promote less nudity in public (the little we do go out) but to no avail: I exposed my large breasts (which were full of milk and practically bursting out of my bra) to a good many people at Fred Meyer’s a couple of days ago. I was wearing a henley top that decided to pop open at least three buttons – and I remained innocently unaware until I was loading the groceries into the car. *sigh*

I got two wisdom teeth extracted yesterday. Andy took the day off to help out with the kids and I’m glad he did. It was hard to focus on anything besides my aching mouth. I can’t believe you have to pay people to pull teeth out of your head WITH PLIERS. Isn’t that a form of torture? Mind you, the numbing helped with the pain but didn’t keep me from shaking like a leaf in fear. PLIERS.

Zain is throwing a fit. I suppose I should see to that.

Multiple baby

I decided to compare pictures of the boys when they were both a month old. Z is on the left, Mad on the right. Or is Mad on the left and Z on the right? Hmmmmmm? *shifty eyes*

Z and Mad

Here’s one of the two of them sleeping:

Sleeping babes

That? Is the sound of my heart melting.

Hamsters is nice

Oh Anthropologie. Why must you tempt me so? Too bad they’re three hundred bucks and some change.

And here are some shoes of the cheaper but still insanely cute variety: Frill and Mad by Jeffrey Campbell. Soon. SOON.

It’s colder than it looks outside. Although it snowed this weekend, the sun is shining and I keep thinking that it won’t be so bad when I open the door but then a cold breeze of death hits my face and I feel like shouting, “FRICK!” really loudly. So. Staying inside at all times sounds about right. Except for the whole work thing.

This weekend I was curled up on the couch a good 99.9% of the time. When I wasn’t watching Z (i.e. letting him crawl all over me) I was watching episodes of Firefly. The fact that there’s only 14 episodes still burns me up inside. Soooo good. Current favorites: Jaynestown, Out of Gas, Objects in Space, and Shindig. Although Wash is  “space Xander” he’s 10 times more hilarious. His reaction in Jaynestown when the mudders start singing “The Hero of Cantan”? “Wacky fun…”??? Kills. me. I still want to throttle Joss Whedon every time I watch the show or the movie, the jerk. God, it would be a dream of mine to be able to go to a Firefly/Serenity convention. *looks at Andy*

Here are some shots of me with child:

26 wks

28 wks

29 weeks tomorrow! Not even to the 30 week mark and I’m already insanely uncomfortable!

A week left of work and then a week and a half of glorious vacation! Unfortunately Andy will still be working so I won’t get to enjoy it that much. Next year I hope to spend that time in California with our families instead.

Andy is THIRTY.

So, last weekend Z and I headed off to Sacramento while Andy went to Las Vegas for a couple of days of heavy drinking and heavy petting. He and his friends haven’t seen each other in years so I’m sure they got a little sappy. Guys do that when nobody’s looking. Seriously though, I missed Andy like crazy and we were only apart for 3 days give or take. I’m such a pansy.

I got to see a play on Thursday night: The Color Purple, with my sister and my aunt at the Sacramento Community Theatre. It would’ve been a perfect night if not for this heifa sitting in front of us, cataloging every scene (incorrectly). Finally, a guy in her row had to lean over and ask her to keep it down, to which she stuck her hand up (who says “talk to the hand” these days? So dated.) and rolled her neck and then proceeded to get crazy worked up and threatened the poor man’s life. Bethany and I bit our fists and muttered, “WOW.” Can’t say it wasn’t wildly entertaining, but I really was much more interested in the play. I have to say, now I REALLY have to see a show on Broadway. That’s what I want for my thirtieth birthday.

I wish I could’ve spent more time in Sacramento. It was a small family gathering: just my dad, Bethany, Auntie Annie and my nephew Ezra, but it was lovely just to lounge around, chat and watch the boys play together.

Ezzie gives Z a push

Grandpops with the boys

Bethany in love.

Z was so happy to see his Daddy!

Z the Mighty

Z is slowly starting to get the hang of turning speech sounds into actual words. He’s a champ at saying No (what fun for me) and said Hi several times last night while taking a bath. He also says (i.e. gurgles) Zuri, kitty, doggy and Daddy. He finds no interest in the term Mama; it’s quite upsetting. According to my in-laws Andy started speaking at nine months and was using complete sentences by the time he was 13 or 14 months. I can’t even imagine being able to communicate with Z on that level, our conversations are all about miming something or trying to decipher which grunt means what. What? Are you pooping? Do you want a banana? Do you want me to stack blocks so that you can knock them down? I have no clue. Help Mama help YOU. I’m actually starting to sound like Gambit, I speak in the third person so often.

Oh! And have I mentioned the dancing? Z is a dancing FOOL. He hears a melody, and starts headbanging. It’s hilarious. It started with his toy train that plays a song every time you put the conductor in her seat. Now it’s EVERYTHING, me singing the ABC’s or even humming and he’s off! It’s yet another thing that makes me want to crush his face with love.

My kid is cuter than your kid

The evidence:

Andy caught him mid-stride. He likes to drag around his alligator xylophone. He looks so determined!

He poses for the camera now. His preciousness KILLS me.

*merf!*

And here is me, 18 weeks preggers.