Kindergarten - Part II

Before you ask, no. I did not cry. I'm fine. Honestly? A little sick of being asked that. Shouldn't we only worry if our kids are upset? Because Claire shows so little separation anxiety it makes me think she might be ready for college.

For the record, I don't think I even got close to crying. I kept waiting for it to happen to me like all the other moms talk about. But nope. And I'm fairly certain it's not because I don't love her enough or won't miss her a little sometimes. She's just so ready. She's been so ready for so long. Can she be too ready at this point? Cuz if it's possible, then she is. And it will be so good for her, so how can I be sad? This is why I have babies. To see them become great kids.

So if there are any other moms out there who feel like they're supposed to cry but didn't, know that you have good company. I'm pretty sure it doesn't make you a bad mom. Just a non-embarrassing one.

Kindergarten

Now summer is over.

She's ready.

And off she goes.

A Mum for the New Mum

When I was in college, I took a class on floral arranging with my sister. It was my last semester and her first so we wanted to take a class together the one semester we would overlap in school. It was SO fun!

One day our teacher highlighted a floral phenomenon I had never heard of before. Homecoming mums. Have any of you heard of these before? Because I'm pretty sure they're non-existent in California where I grew up. In a nutshell these are like corsages on steroids. You know, kind of like how a person trying to get all ripped on steroids is doing something that ought to be attractive in theory, but in practice it's kind of disturbing and gross. Yah, kind like that, but with flowers and ribbons and other flotsam. If you've never seen these before, you really have to see pictures to understand. My descriptions could never convey the full wrath of these suckers.

As far as I understand, these are something that is most popular in areas like Oklahoma and Texas. Which somehow makes sense, what with "everything is bigger in Texas," right? I've still never seen the finished product in person, although I have seen all the supplies for sale in the local craft stores.

I gave birth to Scott about 9 months after we moved to Texas. Imagine my surprise (delight? horror? I don't even know) when I was brought to my hospital room after delivery and I saw this hanging from the door:

My own hospital mum!

And in case you thought it might be an isolated incident, here is the baby girl version I got for Kate:


They're very toned down compared to the homecoming versions, but relative to the size of your baby's body, they're huge! I hope none of the nurses were offended that I never actually pinned those babies to my babies. I tell myself that they MUST be only meant as wall hangings. Right? I don't know. Until I saw pictures with them in use, I would have thought homecoming mums were only meant for attaching wheels to and using as floats in a parade.

I think these photos to prove that I have two bona fide Texas babies. I love it!

I HATE When That Happens

I bought a mirror at IKEA the other day. The directions have only one step, followed by this warning:

Do you think that happens a lot???

So I guess if there's a window in your bathroom, you can't have both this mirror AND any curtains. Or, you know, towels. What about toilet paper? Fortunately our bathroom is totally windowless, so we're spared the dreaded inferno of the IKEA mirror.

Bathing Beauty?

NOTE: I don't have good ideas for current posts and I'm a little behind on posting some old things I wanted to post. You get out of date posts. So sue me. I have a new baby who doesn't like to let me get things done, okay? You'll pull through.

The pediatrician told us to sunbathe Kate. Here she is at 3 days old:

"Mom, it's too early. Turn that bright light off!"

That's One Way to Stop That Annoying Noise From Coming Back

Today is my 7th wedding anniversary. We'll totally get around to celebrating... eventually.

You see, Kate is not so good at going to sleep. She sleeps a long time once she goes to sleep for real. But she doesn't really like to fall asleep for more than 5 minutes at a time until around 1:00 am. But then she will often sleep for 7-8 hours without waking up. That IS wonderful that she can go that long of a stretch at such a young age (she's almost 7 weeks now), so I feel guilty complaining, but she is not my only child. Claire and Scott? They actually wake up in the morning before 9 am and, you know, need things. From me, no less!

And in just over a week Claire will start Kindergarten. AT 7:45 IN THE MORNING. Kate, are you listening? I cannot be held responsible for any of my actions if you keep this up after Claire starts Kindergarten. I'm pretty sure only sleeping from 2 am when Kate lets me get to bed until 6 am when I will be waking up to get Claire out the door is an automatic free pass to plead insanity.

Right now, I spend my evenings nursing Kate pretty much constantly. Because I prefer couch potatoing while nursing to miserably failing to console a crying baby. This is pretty much the makeup of my evenings: nurse Kate or deal with constant crying from about 8pm (when Claire and Scott head off to bed) until I pass out sitting up while nursing Kate in the wee hours. Then I wake up with a stiff neck and drool puddles on both my shirt and Kate, dump Kate in her bassinet, and crawl into my bed around 2 am. To M's credit, he does his best to keep her from crying for sometimes minutes at a time so I can get up and do exciting things like laundry. He has found she prefers classical music in Italian.

The point of all this whining? Just making excuses. The usual, "I haven't been posting a lot because... blah blah blah wah wah wah." But it's true. I don't get many chances to use the computer two handed, which makes typing a blog post a bit cumbersome.

[Hark! Kate is crying now! brb]

And now that I am finishing this post on a different non-Kate-crying occasion (thank you Bjorn!), I will tell you the OTHER thing making sleep scarce around here. M has a new calling at church. He's volunteering as the ward clerk. It's not normally going to be this bad, but with him still getting into the swing of things and having several more meetings this week than normal, there have been some late nights and early mornings. On Sunday afternoon M was taking a much needed nap. I snuck into the room to grab the baby swing and found him like this:

That's M asleep with his hand resting ON TOP of the snooze button for his alarm.

And that photo pretty much sums up how things have been around here lately. So we're officially rescheduling our anniversary. Aren't we romantic?

Sweat Shop... and Not JUST Because It's Summer in Texas

When my mom was here visiting, she helped make some curtains for Claire's bedroom. In case you need a refresher course, here is what Claire's bedroom looks like (but you might want to put on your sunglasses first). I absolutely LOVE the curtains she designed and made. Check it out:


Shortly after the new curtains were installed, Claire was asking me why they are two pieces with a split down the middle. I told her that's how curtains usually are so that if you want to you can pull them open and look out the window or let more light in. She liked this idea but was struggling to get the curtains to stay open. Later that day, I came up to her room and she proudly showed me how she had gotten them to stay open:


Let's zoom in on that technique:


Claire pointed out that she doesn't have any yellow clothes so we never use those hair clips. True, true... but still not my favorite long term solution.

I Have an Announcement

Here is what the announcements I mailed out for Kate looked like.
But you know, without the "editing." (Click to enlarge)