Simple Sunday

Just a couple of pictures for your viewing pleasure.

The Couch

We have a couch and love seat in our formal room*. They are off white and we bought them with money that my grandparents gave us when we got married. We splurged and paid for some kind of stain proofing thing on account of the fact that we knew we wanted kids. We use them but we don't use them often. They look fairly new. Yes, I'm knocking on wood as I write and imagining a post in the not too distant future where I talk about how one of my two boys has just ruined my couch.

Anyway.

Despite the fact that I rarely use the furniture in the living room, it's a wonder that I had wonderful snuggle times with both my sons during the last 30 hours. I just put Matthew down in his crib. He fell asleep while he was drinking his bottle which never happens. I carried him over to the couch and laid down with him on my chest. His arms were pulled in tight underneath his body. His hair tickled my chin and the smell of Shea butter filled my nostrils. A trickle of formula ran from his mouth, which was slightly agape, and down his chubby cheek. He sighed. I sighed. The moment was good.

"MOMMY!" The Rock Star shrieked from the back door. And then there was some kind of catastrophe involving a three-year-old, a dish towel, and a piece of wood outside. Matthew's eyes flew open, his head popped up off my chest, and his signature grin spread across his face as if to say, My, what a good nap. I'm ready to play now. I carried him up to his crib.

Last night, Garrett announced that he'd made a bed for all of us. Troy was supposed to curl up on the love seat while Garrett and I shared the couch. I laid with my head at one end and Garrett had his head at the other end. I tickled his bare foot with the back of my index finger. He giggled. "Come here," I said to him and he curled into my body with his head balanced on my shoulder. As we talked he let out a series of rather loud toots**. I laughed. He laughed. He sat up and looked into my eyes as I chuckled.

"Garrett, do you know who else toots like that?" I asked him, prepared to throw my brother under the bus.

"Yes." He giggled.

"Who?" I asked, pleased that he knew of whom I was speaking.

Garrett paused and, through hysterical giggles replied, "The Prospector."



The part he is referencing happens at about the 4:24-4:44 mark. So you can fast forward to that point if you don't feel like watching all the Toy Story 2 bloopers. In any case, I completely cracked up. He collapsed back onto my shoulder and shook with deep belly laughter. The moment was good.

I'm glad I have that couch--and, of course, the boys who snuggle with me on it.

*When you have two boys under the age of three and a half, nothing is formal.
**Yes, we call them toots. I mean, we didn't until we had kids but now we do.

Little Bill

We've been trying to have more diversity in the things we let The Rock Star watch. Sure, Little Buddy is only eight months old now, but one day he'll identify with the things he sees (or doesn't see) around our house. Little Einsteins is good because there is an Asian and an African-American on it. Another great cartoon that Garrett has fallen in love with is Little Bill. And, really, how could you go wrong with Cosby?
Little Bill loves a particular superhero called Captain Brainstorm. In one episode, Little Bill wants to be Captain Brainstorm for Halloween and has to come up with things around his house that will help him put the costume together. When he gets stumped he says to himself, "There's got to be another way."

Let's just say that this is Garrett's new catch phrase. I hear him saying it really frequently. This morning, as he tried to shove his feet into shoes that are way too small I heard him exclaiming, "There's got to be another way!"

Do any of you have suggestions about other cartoons/movies/music/etc that would be good for us to have around to broaden the cultural identities of both our boys?

The Final Barf Installment

Wow. Thank you all for your advice. I even got some emails offering other helpful--and sometimes not helpful--solutions. Of course, the best piece of advice I received was from my brother who used to torture me when I was throwing up as a kid by saying things like, "Hey, do you want a big, giant, juicy hamburger with a slice of pepperoni pizza on top?" To this day, when I get the stomach flu, I have visions of the greasiest foods pounding through my head and I blame my dumb well educated brother.

So, anyway, here's what he had to say:

Hold your breath, starting with ten seconds, and increasing in ten second increments until you reach one minute. After that, gargle some saltwater mixed with minced garlic. Hop up and down on one foot for 8 seconds. And lastly, hop on a plane bound for San Diego. Drive east on Interstate 8 to El Cajon. See our apartment. And then, you're cured!

Good golly. After all these years of wondering how to make it stop the answer is saltwater. And garlic--which will taste delicious mixed with vomit. Then I get to hop up and down and fly on a plane. It just doesn't get better than that when my stomach is busy doing the tango with the rest of my internal organs. Oh boy.

And now, if you'd like, we can move on from talk of barf.

What should we talk about? Hmmm...yeah. I got nothin'.

The One In Which We Discuss All The Barf

Because I don't think anyone who works for Child Protective Services reads my blog and because the child in question is not mine, I wanted to bring your attention to this comment which was left on yesterday's post:

When Kyle was two, Jason and I both came down with a horrible stomach flu. We were so sick that we never even changed his diaper the entire day! I was eight months pregnant with Neil to top it off. What a fun day that was. We just locked the doors and hoped for the best. Obviously, Kyle lived through the day. He probably ate dog food or something, because I sure don't remember getting up to fix him anything to eat!

It made me chuckle. And then laugh. And then guffaw some more. The child being discussed--the one who ran around in a soggy diaper and possibly survived on dog food--is my cousin. Kyle is now 21. He is alive and well. This is how I know that The Rock Star will be okay even though he basically took care of himself yesterday. At noon, when he asked me for a hot dog, I had to talk myself into it for a half hour. I considered giving him step by step instructions so that he could do it himself but there was a knife involved so I decided against it. Finally, I closed my eyes and held my breath while I pulled it out of the package and stuck it in the microwave. If smells could kill...

But seriously, Aunt Vicki, why didn't you call my mom or your mom or the plethora of other relatives who lived near you so that you could hurl in peace, without the help of a two and a half year old? 19 years later I'm feeling very sorry for you.

I also want to know, how, in the world, I didn't throw up a single solitary time when I was pregnant with The Rock Star. Seriously. If I didn't remember almost every second of giving birth to that kid, I wouldn't believe I'd ever actually been pregnant. Maybe I had a case of pseudocyesis. Maybe he's not even real. He could just be a figment of my imagination. Because the fact that I never chucked--not once--during pregnancy is just, well, honestly, it's impossible. I did put my head in the toilet at a Coco's and then laid on said Coco's bathroom floor but I never produced a bit of regurgitated food. Therefore, I was never pregnant.

Also, the fact that I didn't throw up at all between the summer of 1999 and the spring of 2003 is unimaginable. I'm either blocking something out of my memory or Point Loma Nazarene University was like the probiotic for stomach ailments.

So, this last time, I almost passed out. I stood up from the porcelain throne and the world spun uncontrollably. I saw starish like twinkles. I collided into the bathroom sink. I considered the emergency room and the blessed relief of an IV drip. But seriously, I'm much too cheap for that. Troy would likely have had to pry my lifeless fingers from the toilet seat before I'd let him take me to the ER on account of vomit. Then we'd just bypass the emergency room altogether and head straight for the morgue. Here's the thing. I almost passed out. I pull muscles. My lower back always hurts something awful. I lose, on average, about six pounds. I gain it all back in a New York minute, in case you were concerned. (How many of you are singing Don Henley now?) Generally speaking, I throw up for about six to eight hours and, in that amount of time, I typically puke between 18-30 times. Obviously, the last 15-27 times are nothing more than bile, stomach lining, bones from my toes--I don't know what. But I feel like that is excessive. I feel like that is not normal. I used to get some kind of stomach bug once or twice a year. Since having kids, it seems like it happens more often. I think I've had it three times this year and we still have two months to go.

This time, I tried eating ice chips but I just threw them back up. At the seven hour mark I was so dehydrated that I didn't care anymore. I poured myself a cup of green Gatorade. (I hate green Gatorade for the sheer fact that I always drank it when I had the stomach flu as a kid. Green Gatorade tastes like the stomach flu to me. It does.) I drank it in small sips, knowing that those small sips would be staring at me in approximately 15 minutes. But they never came back up. Granted, it was the seven hour mark so maybe I just got lucky. Or, is it possible that my stomach malfunctions and it can't get out of some kind of cycle of yakking? Is there something in green Gatorade that calmed it? Do any of you have any kind of stomach flu cure that I could try next time? Because, you know what, this is ridiculous. Oh, and hey, I wasn't totally cured when I drank the Gatorade. I just wasn't throwing up anymore. There were still, uh, other things going on which suggested that something was still wrong with my innards. I wouldn't be sharing that with all the Internet world except for the fact that I am desperate for some kind of home remedy/medical study for which I would be paid heftily for my services/miracle and I thought you might need all the facts. I'll do anything next time. I'll eat dirt. I'll do thirty push ups followed by eleven hundred crunches--because my stomach would probably feel as sore as it does when I've finished throwing up 25 times. I'll turn around eight times, throw tarragon over my shoulder, spit three times into a sippy cup, and then swallow a dime if you promise me that it will help.

Seriously.

Uhhhhgggghhhh!

So. First we had swine. Then Garrett threw up a couple times. Obviously, you know what that means. I felt okay until about 6:00 last night. By 6:45 I was yakking. It was one of the most violent stomach bugs I've ever had--and that's saying something. This morning I felt like I got hit with a truck so I asked Troy to take the day off. He informed me that he would be taking the day off, not because I needed him, but because he, himself, is sick as well. We've never been sick like this at the same time. We had to take our baby to a friend's house because there was just no way that either of us could take care of him. (Thank you, Christy! You are a lifesaver.) The incredibly weird thing is that we are both running fevers. I do not run a fever with a stomach bug. I have no idea what is going on in our home but it's gross. I have that feeling that we will never, ever, eat again and never, ever, be able to leave our house again.

Okay. I've fulfilled my NaBloPoMo requirement for the day. Now I'm going to try to sleep some more.

Not Working

I blame the time change. It has Little Bud extremely discombobulated. I know it's only an hour. I know we didn't move him from Salt Lake City to Japan and expect him to just go with it. I know that 60 minutes shouldn't make such an enormous difference. But it does. 60 minutes means he's up an hour early, wants to take a nap an hour early, and then wants to go to bed at night an hour early. That is the only explanation for why he was ready to go to bed last night at 6:15. Nothing I tried would deter his tears.

As I bounced him on my lap, and his screams got louder, I asked Garrett to play Ahboo. It almost always works. So, Garrett got his face up by his brother's, smiled, and said, "Ahboo. Ahb--Ahboo's not working." And he said the last part as though he'd been trying it for three months without any success.

I turned the baby toward me and tried it. Nothing. That kid wanted a bottle and he wanted his bed. Like I said before, I blame the time change.

Halloween

So Garrett requested a monkey pumpkin and Daddy did his best. The boy was happy. It met his approval.

Matthew is just getting over a raging cold. He wasn't the happiest camper in the tent when we went to the pumpkin patch. He wasn't terribly interested in the pumpkin we brought home for him. He did pound on it like it was a drum for a minute or two before dissolving into tears and pleading with me to hold him.
Yesterday I took the boys to a local shopping center to trick-or-treat. I've decided that, next year, I am going to inform Garrett that he is to say, "Trick or Chocolate." Because, really, if you don't give chocolate, you might as well be tricking. At one establishment, Garrett had a choice between several pieces of candy. Miniature Hershey chocolate bars, Milky Way, and other various chocolate pieces lined the bowl. Thrown in, for good measure, I'm sure, were single Starburst squares. When the bowl was lowered and Garrett was faced with the big decision, he plucked out a single yellow Starburst. A. Single. Yellow. Starburst. Yellow! I've failed him. Not next year. Next year there will be a lesson in how to appropriately choose candy.

This year, the boy begged us to let him be a knight. Um. Okay. Sure, dude. So, without further ado, I give you The Rock Star as The Knight.

And it just so happened that when Garrett was 15 months old, he was a dragon. Well, naturally, I couldn't pass up reusing the dragon costume. So we had a knight and a dragon. I give you Little Buddy as The Dragon.

The dragon has two eyes, one just decided to be MIA from the picture. When I put Matthew into the costume, Garrett grabbed the tail and asked me if it was the dragon's...um...member. Except he didn't say member. He said the correct word. And I explained that it was actually the tail. Silly me, I kind of thought the spikes gave it away.

Pumpkin Patch

We were supposed to go to the Pumpkin Patch last Monday. Pig flu, however, had other ideas and we were quarantined. Last night, when Troy got home from work, we piled into the car and headed to the patch. It was frrrreezing! I'm not kidding. It may have been about 30 degrees outside but, what with the negative a billion wind chill and all, it was not warm. Not warm, I tell you.

I was disappointed because some of my favorite pictures of Garrett have been taken at pumpkin patches and this year I was trying to keep Matthew from turning into a popsicle and my fingers were too numb to take very many pictures. Still, we got just a few.

Garrett was proud to pull his cart down the path...

Matthew didn't really smile once the entire time we were there. At least I got this somewhat decent picture of the two of us nearly freezing to death...

I tried to get a cute one of the boys together but Matthew would have none of it. He just kept giving me this look as if to say, "I'm from SoCal. You know what we call this temperature in SoCal?"

And I'd look deep into his eyes and reply, "Yes, nonexistent. I feel ya, man."

"Mommy. No, seriously, lady. Stop taking my picture. Wrap me up tighter and put me back in the car. This place is all kinds of messed up cold."

"Little Bud, give it a rest. I was born in San Diego. My hands are turning red, too. I'm cold, too. But we only get to come to the pumpkin patch once a year. I agree that next year we should petition the parentals to bring us in August or September, before this place gets ridiculously frigid, but Halloween is tomorrow, dude, so give it a rest.
We came home and Garrett insisted that Troy carve him a "monkey pumpkin". And, really, your guess is as good as mine as to why he wanted a monkey pumpkin but no amount of coaxing would deter him. So, Troy made him a monkey pumpkin while Garrett stirred the guts around in a big bowl and declared that he was making us a pumpkin pie.

Pictures to come.

I'll be attempting to do this again this year, so I'll see you tomorrow. And the next day. And the next...

Hearing

Thank you for your prayers. Not a whole lot happened today but our lawyer is optimistic about the direction we are moving in. The next hearing is scheduled for December 4 and the judge will entertain the idea of moving the trial date up. Please continue to pray for the birth father. Pray that he would realize that we are the best place for his son and pray that he will, some day, come to know the Lord.

Ocho

Dear Matthew,

You are eight months old today. Eight. Ocho. I'd say it in French but I grew up in San Diego and there just didn't seem to be a need to learn how to talk in Paris. Huit. There. I looked it up. Don't ask me how to pronounce it. I haven't the foggiest idea. But goodness gracious how ever are you old enough to have seen 2/3 of a year? You're not. I just won't allow it. I forbid you to be eight months old. There. I said it. This is me stomping my feet in protest. Or, in true Matthew fashion, flailing my arms and sobbing gigantic crocodile tears of objection. You are hereby sentenced to a lifetime as a seven-month-old.

Yesterday it snowed and your brother danced around in it like a crazy lunatic. You crawled up to the door and stared at it with an incredible look of wonder. It's not that you hadn't seen it before, it's just that I don't think you remember being a month old. I bundled you up and took you out to see what all the fuss was about. It was coming down all around us and you just kept giggling and bouncing up and down in Daddy's arms.



I'm not a fan of snow in October. Snow in December and January is growing on me but snow any other time of the year is just a colossal nuisance. Plus, I like my weather in the 80's. But, I have to say, I like my kids in snow hats. What's that, Adorable Snow Bunny, you'd like me to buy you Vail, Colorado on account of how cute you are? I'll look into it.
You pull up on everything now. Everything. And then you cruise. Around the table, around the couch, around my bed, anywhere you can. Then you stop, let go with one hand, and stand there with this look that says, Oh yeah, I could let go and walk right to you, if I wanted to. After that you wobble on one foot, come down hard on your bum, look up and giggle as if to say, Psych. Um. Okay. Yeah, Matthew, you got me.

You are in to absolutely everything all of Garrett's stuff. Your brother, the one who welcomed you with open arms and never so much as looked crossly at you and always explains to us that you are behaving that way because you are a baby, has finally had it with you. Why, you ask? I'll explain it to you. There is rarely a moment when you are not climbing him, patting him, drooling on him, taking his toys, licking his toys, chewing his toys, pulling his hair, licking his hair, chewing his hair, pinching his nose, pulling his ears, are you getting the picture? But don't worry, Little Buddy. While your brother has had it with you at least five times a day, he is smitten with you at least twenty times a day so the scale is definitely tipped in your favor. And, as I tell you this next story, keep in mind that he still begs me to keep you here forever. I guess he doesn't mind his slobbery toys as much as he pretends to.



But anyway, the story. We still have to lay on the floor while your brother falls asleep at night. It's got something to do with being afraid of roosters. So, you've taken to spinning onto your belly and immediately crawling up the side of your crib into a standing position the second I put you down at night. The moment the light goes out you start hollering and babbling and banging toys and trying to entice your brother to come bust you out--or something. We've had to put Garrett in our room on several occasions just so that he can fall asleep. The other night, as I curled up on the floor, you stood up. For a minute or two you didn't make a peep, you just stared at your brother. Finally, after several long seconds had gone by, Garrett whispered, "He's staring at me." It was said less like, He's breathing my air and more like, He's creeping me out. And I have to admit, it was a little bit weird. You were just so silent and, well, brooding--almost. Do babies brood?

It's important for you to know how much you adore the dog. If I put you down in the family room, you will always be found riding him, squealing at him, pulling his ears, chewing his hair...you know, pretty much whatever you do to your brother. Beck adores you and reminds us every day that we are so glad we decided on a golden retriever six years ago.

Ah boo. Anytime anyone says this to you, you crack up. We don't actually get it. It's like your own private joke. We don't care though, because you break into the most infectious smile that we're happy to go around sounding like complete crazy people to elicit the response. Garrett started it, I think. I'm fairly sure that in all of his three-year-oldness he meant to say Peekaboo and left off the first part. This morning you were Grumpy--yes with the capital G--and I was trying to get a good shot of you at eight months eternally seven months. I called upon your brother. He ahbooed (oh yes, it's a verb) and you, well, you did this:You're looking at him, by the way. Because he's your best friend. Don't try to deny it.

Tomorrow is another hearing. Baby Boy, you just have to understand how much hearings freak me out. Seriously. Heaven help us all when the trial comes because I am going to be one giant ball of wrecked nervous system. Anyway, even when our lawyer is confident I'm all, "But, but, but, what if? What if they take my son away from me? How will I even remember to suck air into my lungs and then exhale it?" And, above all, I worry about you. If, one day, you are taken away from us, let me just say here and now that I am so sorry. I am so sorry for whatever you will go through. I am so sorry that I won't be there to explain it and hold you and kiss your forehead. I'm so sorry that you won't know where we went, only that we aren't there anymore. Please know, somehow, that we only meant all of this for your very own good.

I told you today that there is a hearing tomorrow and you did this:

And then I was all, Little Buddy, calm down. Pray to Jesus. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. And there are people praying for us all across this country--across this world, even. People like this amazing woman. People who know us and love us and people who don't know us and still love us. So, stop your crying, it'll be alright.

So you stopped wailing and then you were all, "Mommy, I wasn't crying about that, God knows what he's doing. I was crying because I have this nasty runny nose and you need to hold me right now." Except it sounded more like, "Aiiiieee babababbbaaba! Beababaaaiaiiaiaiieee!" But I knew what you meant. So took a picture of your foot for good measure.

And you thought that was funny.

Eight months. I don't even know where Matthew's mommy stops and Lori starts. I know we had a life before you were here but it's hard to think about who I was before I knew you. We were fine when we were just three but we were missing you. We all knew we needed to be four. And now that it has been eight months of being four, I cannot wrap my mind around the idea of being three. I love you. I love the sparkle of your eye, the spread of your smile, the curl of your hair. I love your edible cheeks, your tiny birthmark, the sound of your little voice. I love the little boy I've called son for eight whole months.

All my love. ALL of it,
Mommy

Open Letters

Dear Utah,

Sigh. We're breaking up. We're separated. And, okay, so I'm not actually leaving, but we're going to have to be one of those couples who sleep in different rooms and see other people but stay married for the children. Last year you decided it was important--necessary, even--to snow on November 5. I rebuked you. You listened and kept the snow out of the valley until an acceptable date. December, maybe. Therefore, the only logical explanation for why, on God's normally green earth, you would snow on October 27, is that you just don't care about our relationship. You care more about your lucrative ski season. You care more about, I don't know, the employment of snow plow operators. You don't care about me.

I will admit that the presence of snow--that is sticking, mind you. Sticking!--was made exponentially easier by the fact that a certain three-year-old I know was thrilled beyond belief and screamed, "It's h-no-ing!" (S is still replaced by H at the beginning of a sentence.) And did he ever have fun playing in it for the ten minutes that I let him before I brought him back in to nurse his swine flu. And did Matthew ever look adorable with his snow hat tied on. But, you and I both know it's not fair to use the children to pit us against one another. Foul play!

Anyway. I'm giving you back your ring, moving my stuff into the guest room, and getting separate bank accounts. It's over. I can't stay in such an unhealthy relationship. I just can't keep pretending you care about me. I can't ignore the fact that you just don't love me anymore.

Signed,
Your Ex.

*****************************************************
Dear The Rock Star,

So. Um. The other day, you crawled up on my lap and said, "Mommy, when I was born at the hospital, why did you take your underwear off?"

Is it too late to have a C-section? It is. Well, just thought I'd ask. Not wanting to lie to you and hoping you'd be happy with my answer and run off to play Geo Trax, I replied, "Well, so that I could have you, of course."

"No, no, no," you continued, "after I was born. After I was born why was your underwear off?" Son, I was confused. Trust me, after you were born, my underwear was not off. It was ugly and it was mesh and it had ice in it but, seeing as how I couldn't move faster than a three-toed sloth while I was in the hospital, I kept the actual taking off of the underwear to a minimum.

Still, I answered, "Um. I guess I took it off so that I could go potty." This satisfied your curiosity and you left me alone. But let me tell you, never did I wish I'd had a C-section until that moment. Because while, at three, it might be less traumatic for you to hear the truth about from whence you came than to hear a tale about your mommy getting sliced open, at ten or eleven you might wish you'd just been yanked out of my abdomen. Ah well, too late for a Cesarean now.

But stop asking questions that make my breath catch in my throat and I'll buy you a Shetland pony or a Corvette or something. Deal?

Love,
Mommy

***********************************************
Dear Tamiflu,

My fever is gone--for now. I think you're working. So, thanks for that. But why is it that if I try to stand for longer than twenty minutes at a time I feel like I was on the losing end of dog fight?

Affectionately,
Pig Flu Infested 28 year old

Little Pigs

Oink.

That's the sound someone makes when she's diagnosed with H1N1 influenza.

Thank God! Is what she declares when she realizes that she almost drug herself to Christmas Play rehearsal yesterday but finally decided that what with feeling nearly dead it probably wasn't a good idea. She's very glad because she would have somewhat accidentally infected the entire cast and there would have been a lot of ticked off parents.

But back to the oink. It's true. The Rock Star and I have swine flu. TRS* got sick on Friday night and is much better. The doctor thinks he'll make a full recovery without the aid of antibiotics. At this point his only symptoms are a nasty cough and an occasional low grade fever--always lower than 100. (Although it was over 102 on Friday and Saturday night.) I am annoyed though because he's been vaccinated. Of course, according to the doctor, the vaccine doesn't kick in for several weeks. I have not been vaccinated because I do not fall into the itty bitty group of people allowed to get the vaccine here in Utah. He gave me Tamiflu and told me to watch for a deadly rash. Awesome.

I am much better than I was yesterday. Yesterday I literally felt like ripping my head off of my neck just so that I could be rid of the headache. My lower back (maybe my kidneys?) was throbbing and screaming at me the entire day. From about 2:00-6:00 my temperature was just below 103 without ever lowering and I just cannot function with that kind of fever. In yesterday's post I said that I felt horrible at 101.5 and that was before it spiked for the entire afternoon. I slept for two and a half hours in the afternoon and then I slept from 9:00 pm until 8:00 am. Today the fever hasn't gone over 100. This has been incredibly wonderful. Except the cough. The cough is nasty. I feel like every muscle in my back is pulled. It's all very high times.

So. Oink. And now I'm off to take a nap. Thank goodness it's my husband's day off...


*The Rock Star.

Plague of Death & Appreciation

I seem to have caught some kind of plague of death. This is possibly also known as H1N1--although I can't be sure at this point. I have chills, a cough, a headache, fatigue, and a fever. The Rock Star came down with this on Friday, was fine all day yesterday until evening when he got another fever, and has been fine all day today except for the coughing and the fact that his nose is now running. Let's just say that the three of us, who are not employed by the church, played hookie today. This meant that I laid around attempting to care for my children while also attempting to not breathe on them and simultaneously trying to suppress my moaning. This also meant that I began to cry when Garrett rubbed his snotty Kleenex on my face just for kicks. I blame the 101.5 temperature. Sure, Garrett can function almost normally with such an elevation but I cannot. I normally hover around 97.3 so 101.5 just might as well be dead.

Today they honored the pastors for Clergy Appreciation Month. Here's what we got:

A beautiful plant.
A 25 dollar gift card to a local grocery store.
Another 25 dollar gift card to a local grocery store.
A 25 dollar gift card to a pizza place.
65 dollars.
100 dollars.
20 dollars.
A 40 dollar gift card to Sports Authority.
535 dollars for our adoption fund.

That's 835 dollars worth of stuff plus a plant, in case you didn't want to do the math yourself. So, a huge THANK YOU to all the people at our church! You guys are the best! It definitely made my plague of death seem slightly less insurmountable and distracted me from the fact that every single muscle feels like it is attempting to claw its way out of my body.

Stand Alone

Matthew will be eight months old next Wednesday. This means that he is currently seven months old. Say it with me. Altogether now. Seven months old. So, you can imagine my surprise when he let go of me this morning and stood by himself for a good three seconds. He's a professional crawler. He babbles all the live long day. Usually he just has conversations with himself that go like this, "Bababababababababababababababababa! EEEEEEEE! Bababa!" But, the other day, he looked right at me, smiled, and said, clear as a bell, "Mama."

It was a fluke. A lucky babble. I'm not kidding myself. But did it ever melt my heart in an instant. Seriously. And I know, I know, that what he meant was, "You are my mommy. Forever and ever and I love you more than anyone else in the whole wide world." Okay so he totally loves Garrett more than anyone else in the whole wide world and, in his mind, I'm just decent leftovers. But he might as well have thought all those things because in that one instant I would have personally moved the earth if he'd asked me to.

I'm just unclear as to why he thinks it's important to stand on his own. I mean, I'll give it to him, eventually it'll be pretty necessary but now? Now I am perfectly content to haul his chubby bum wherever he needs to go. But he's still insisting on growing up.

Sigh.