14 Months, 12 Races

14 Months
Our LilRunr is nearly 14 months old. Every day, I must acknowledge that I am mothering a TODDLER rather than a BABY. This young man gains coordination and dexterity daily. He’s fixated on climbing right now, and will attempt to climb and stand on any object–living or not–in the house. The couch, his toys, the bath tub, Scott or I, the cat…he hasn’t yet applied this skill to his sleeping quarters, but it’s only a matter of time until I hear a “thump” in the night and discover the lad out of his crib and raising a ruckus.

He’s still my sweet-tempered boy, and nothing gives him more pleasure than being able to “help” around the house. He enjoys feeling useful and will proudly comply with nearly any request to “please help mommy and…” Yes, I have taken advantage of this useful component of the toddler psyche to convince him to eat a vegetable. “How about some green beans?” (vigorous head shake…NO!) “Can you help mommy and eat some green beans? (nom nom nom)

Sweet-tempered or not, he is easily frustrated when something he wants or wants to do is just out of his reach. Often, the desired item is the iPhone or iPad, which a foolish adult has attempted to “hide” from him but failed to completely remove from view. More frequently, however, there’s something that he wants to DO but isn’t developmentally ready for yet. All in good time, my boy.

This rarely happens in company, leading our families to believe that he is “perfectly behaved” and “always happy,” but he is capable of flinging himself to the ground, screaming, in an attempt to get his way.

Occasional screaming and continued night-waking aside, LilRunr is a delight to be around. His smile and laughter are contagious. Last night, he was taking a bath when Daddy showed him that the foam letters that stick to the bath tub will also stick to him. Oh, boy. It was like a naked baby super hero in the tub, with the letter B stuck to his little belly. He could not get enough.

12 Races
I’m planning my 2nd quarter of racing for the 12×12 plan. First up is the Mother’s Day 5k in Overland Park. This is another of those “girls only” races, so I’m preparing mentally for the sea of pink and tulle and running skirts. (Why run a “girls only” race, you ask? I’m a mom…Mother’s Day…awww…)

For June, I originally planned on running the Hospital Hill 10k. It’s one of those legendary events in Kansas City, and I’ve always wanted to run it. However…I have discovered that the entry fee is slightly steep. $50 for a 10k? Good grief. Is Hospital Hill “legendary” enough to warrant it? Or should I find a less expensive event somewhere else? I haven’t made up my mind yet.

July and August, on the other hand, are easy and inexpensive decisions. I’ll be hitting the “alumni run” circuit again, which means running in Baldwin in July and Pittsburg in August. I’m looking forward to the August race in particular — when I ran last year, I was a bit embarrassed by the result. I think I can really improve my time and maybe even finish a few places higher. I’m not delusional enough to think that I’ll be able to hang with the college girls, but perhaps I’ll be close enough to see them in the distance.

Social Media Failing

There is a certain social media site that is apparently the next great thing. The news repeatedly runs stories that open with, “so, are you on ____? If not, you may be the only one. It’s officially the fastest-growing website in history!” Etcetera, etcetera.

Personally, I don’t much understand the appeal. This website appears to be a way to bookmark with pictures instead of the names of links. It’s obviously incredibly addictive, and if you ask a fan of the site why they love it, they’ll say, “oh, I get so many great ideas.” Yes? AND? Seems to me that I could go to my good friend Google and say, type in, “awesome new chicken recipe” and get some results based on my exact query rather than happenstance.

Despite my confusion and ambivalence towards the site in question, there came a day when I decided the wise course of action was to sign up and claim my standard name, “megarunr.” I am a notoriously late adopter of Internet trends — I didn’t start a blog until 2008, after years of scornfully saying, “an online journal? Who on earth would care to read it? Get a life, people.” Now, of course, I’m hooked. Ditto for Twitter — I started an account a year or so after it was created, even though I thought that “a separate site for Facebook statuses was nuts.” I had the Lesson of the Blog to learn by, and I figured if there came a day when “megarunr” wanted to branch out from WordPress, it’d be best to have a consistent name.

I still don’t think I’m using Twitter correctly, but it gives me a place to post my mileage (when I run) (and it’s not raining) and a place to talk to myself when I’m up late at night and can’t sleep. Such a noble use of a technology.

So, when this new website came out and my reaction was, “are you kidding me? I don’t have hours a day to browse crafts and recipes and whatnot. If I need something, I’ll go to a search engine. Talk about worthless!” deep down I knew that there may come a day when I’d become more accepting. I’m just not hip, folks. Once the rest of the world starts to get over something, I discover it. (Need another example? Exhibit A: Scott and I didn’t start watching “Lost” until Season 6. We watched the Pilot after Scott had surgery, and then ended up watching all 5 seasons on Netflix and the first couple of episodes of Season 6 on Hulu in order to catch up with the rest of the country.) This is just the way I am, so a couple of weeks ago I decided to expand the “megarunr” identity to include one more social media website…just in case.

Almost instantly, I find myself irritated.

Irritation #1: Instead of being able to register, I’m told to “request an invite.” REQUEST AN INVITE? Who do you think you are? Do you think I’m dumb enough to feel like I’ve been asked to join some kind of exclusive club? This is the INTERNET, people!

Whatever. I request an invite, figuring I’ll get one of those robot emails telling me I’m in. Instead, I get:

Irritation #2: An email informing me that I’m on the “waiting list.” WAITING LIST? Yeah, I’m already losing interest.

So then, I let it sit for a day or two, and eventually the confirmation email arrives. I’M IN! I automatically feel better about myself…ok, not really. I feel irritated, because it tells me that I’m going to have to link this new account to either my Facebook or Twitter feed.

Irritation #3: No. Just no. I don’t want to do that. Why would I want to annoy everyone on Facebook with that mess? “Hey friends, Megan just found a cute craft idea! And another, and another, and this recipe, and that hair styling technique…” Also, I don’t really want to give permission to access either account to this third website. Stupid. If you’re that awesome, site in question, you should be able to stand on your own two feet.

I sit for a few more days, conducting an internal debate. To link or not to link…finally, curiosity gets the better of me and I say “FINE. Link to my Facebook.” I’m AT LAST taken to a registration screen, where I type in “megarunr.”

Irritation #4: For the first time EVER, on any website, “megarunr” is already taken by someone else. You’ve got to be kidding me. I have “megarunr” for blog, IM, email, Twitter, WellSphere, and I don’t even know what else. Who decided to suddenly take it over?

Boo. That irritation is the final straw. My slight interest has been crushed into oblivion. I really only wanted to make sure that I reserved the “megarunr” user name…since that’s impossible, I’ll go back to bookmarking things the old fashioned way. Without the pretty pictures.

This, That, and the Curse of March

I did not end up racing on Saturday. I made it to the event site, where I was in the minority as a normally dressed runner, without tutu or tiara or other “diva-ish” accouterments. “Holy moly,” I grumbled to Scott before I’d even left the car. “Yeah, I’m really surprised you signed up for this one. It’s not really you,” he replied, and then pointed out a passing diva in a black tutu who was holding a cigarette in one hand.

Arrrrrrrrrgggggggghhhhhh. But no, I did not skip out of the race because of a little tulle. Tulle I can handle. Bacteria, apparently, is another story.

I woke up on Saturday morning with all the signs of a UTI. I thought that I’d be able to run the race anyway and ignore it, but the closer it got to race time the more apparent it became that going ahead with the 5k would sentence me to 25 utterly miserable minutes. I wimped out and took myself to the doctor instead.

Ah, March. You win that round. I don’t know how I’m going to get a race in this month, and that’s frustrating. There are a couple of options this weekend, but I’d rather not talk about them or sign up for any of them in advance. If I’m going to get a race in this month, it needs to be a sneak attack. I can’t let March know what I’m planning, because clearly it is out to thwart my best efforts and well-laid plans.

In other news, LilRunr was bitten at daycare this week. This annoys the heck out of me. I knew this would happen eventually. It’s pretty much inevitable. Get a room full of pre-speech toddlers, and SOMEONE is going to express their frustrations physically. I think I’d be more upset if LilRunr was the biter, but that doesn’t mean I’m not irritated. The little guy is just such a sweetheart. His current phase is wanting to share with everyone. He’ll deliver toys to the smaller babies at daycare, bring me a stuffed animal to hold, offer the cat his pacifier…sharing is a behavior I can wholeheartedly get behind. Biting, not so much.

 

In Which My Child is Amazing and the Kitchen Floor Proves Hazardous

So, last night when Scott got home from work he was walking across the kitchen floor in socks, talking about goodness knows what, when I hear the faint sound of wood breaking and suddenly he is yelling, “WHAT IN THE HECK WAS THAT?” and “OW!” and “WHAT WAS ON THE FLOOR?” and I’m looking and looking and looking at the floor and saying comforting things like, “there’s nothing here, Scott” when he yells, “IT’S IN MY FOOT NOW, MEGAN!” and I look and yup, that is a piece of wood sticking out of the bottom of his foot.

Holy. Crap. I run for the tweezers and Scott tries to remain calm but that shard (can’t call it a splinter, splinters are tiny) is not budging and I’m starting to get a little woozy imagining what’s going to happen if I actually DO get it out of his foot. Scott’s sister is there, but you can tell that she’s just trying not to throw up because she’s imagining the immediate, shardless future as well. Poor Scott. He tells me to go ahead and pass out or whatever and then to GET IT OUT OF HIS FOOT, so I try to pull myself together and then work on the spike (it’s a spike now), jiggling it slightly in a way that has got to be killing Scott and now I’m saying less comforting things like, “if I pull this out of your foot it’s going to start bleeding like crazy” and Scott is telling me to just GET IT OUT OF HIS FOOT…NOW and then — bam — the 3/4″ spike is out of his foot and Scott is in way more pain than he was pre-spike.

The good news: the spike was in at such an angle that it was MOSTLY in the calloused part of Scott’s foot. There was hardly any bleeding.

The other good news: I found the spot where the spike came out of the floor, and it matches perfectly. There aren’t any spike remnants lurking in Scott’s foot to trouble him later.

The other other good news: Scott is OK now.

So let’s see…we were all perfectly healthy for a March-record-setting…3 days. And then THE KITCHEN FLOOR GOES ON THE ATTACK. Well played,  March. Well played. So much for my plan of not leaving the house for the rest of the month to insure our good health.

In unrelated news, our child is the most amazing, smartest, sweetest little boy in the entire world. I know that all moms think that, but it really is true for my kid. When I picked him up from daycare yesterday, they told me about how one of the younger babies was sitting at this activity table they have — we have one too, it’s terrific. It’s a table with all these fun toys on it and a chair on wheels attached. The baby can “walk” themselves around the table and play with the different toys. (Although, in my experience, once they learn how to move it themselves they spend all of their time running laps realrealreal fast. Still awesome!) Here’s a link if you can’t picture it.

Ok. So one of the younger babies was in it, and he tried to run in a circle but it bumped up against a different walker toy that one of the older babies had pushed into it. The daycare lady said that LilRunr noticed his friend was in trouble and popped right up and went over to the other toy. It took him some time to maneuver, but eventually he got the walker toy away from the activity table so his little friend could run. They said it was fun to watch my boy problem-solve.

LilRunr is just over one year old…and he’s doing whatever he can to help a friend. How sweet is that?

 

Happy Birthday, Little One

I have a post half-written that is filled with so many whines and rants that it seems excessive even by Internet standards. I may post it eventually, because misery can be funny…particularly when EVERYTHING goes haywire all at once in one weekend? week? oh please don’t let it be an entire month! of catastrophe.

There’s the stomach virus that struck me down mere hours after blogging about a “no-puke guarantee.” The forgotten iMac cable that had my sister-in-law and I sharing a power supply between two computers. The broken garage door that trapped us all in the house for a morning. The ear infection and fever that added stress to the already stressful plans for LilRunr’s first birthday party. The utterly, miserably failed cupcakes that I tried to make for the party two hours before the event was supposed to take place, wasting time and tears and flour and eggs before Scott finally took himself to Price Chopper for the easily-acquired, store-bought version. The fact that LilRunr has woken the house up nearly every hour overnight for the past 3 days, making all of us groggy and tired and perhaps just a tad irritable.

I could go on, but like I said — it’s all in that other post…only surrounded by WAAAAAAAY more  ”woe is me.”

The caffeine from my morning Mt. Dew is finally adding some clarity, however, because I’ve just realized that I’m not meant to be the focus today. At 7:44am on this day last year, our LilRunr entered this world.

We meet at last.

He kept us waiting 10 extra days past his scheduled arrival, but he was so worth it. He is currently waking me up every 60-90 minutes at night, but he’s so worth it. There’s not one thing this little boy could do to make me love him any less. From the moment he arrived, he’s studied the world with a serious, thoughtful intensity. It should come as no surprise that he walked at 10 1/2 months…he needed to see more for himself! In the past couple of months, we’ve seen his silly and outgoing side emerge. He doesn’t take long to warm up to a room full of people, and in no time all attention is on his precious self.

The next year is probably going to be a challenge, as we leave the “you can’t possibly spoil them” era and enter a world of rules and wills and patience and failed patience, as we try to guide this little man from toddlerhood to childhood.

Oh, I love that sweet boy.

Birthday cupcake. The verdict from LilRunr: Too messy!

The Crisis & The Window

You may have noticed that I’ve stopped blogging my training log. That’s because there hasn’t been much to log recently. I know, shocker. Yet another crisis of motivation for yours truly. I get tired of blogging about it, but when I’m not running it always seems like I should explain why…and the why is always the same:

I just don’t want to run. I don’t make time for it. I find excuses to avoid it. I whine and say, “ugh, not today.” It’s stupid and it makes me mad and you’d think that after all this time I could find a little consistency, but alas. This is the way things are.

I’m currently squandering my window.

You know, the window. The WINDOW! It’s what I’m calling my inexplicable and yet delightful ability to run faster than I have since college. It’s a mystery to me — I trained for two marathons, running on average 5 days a week, incorporated cross training and speed work, and yet my comfortable training pace remained at 9:10 per mile. That stupid nine always irritated me, but I figured that this was just my post-college pace and tried to be grateful for the fact I could run.

Then, I had a kid. Five weeks later, I started running…er…jogging…er…flailing around at an “oh-my-gosh-how-does-this-hurt-so-badly” 12:30 per mile pace. I figured that in addition to the 30 extra pounds, the child had added several minutes to my already depressing (considering what I used to do) pace.

I kept at it regardless, because running is “me” even if I’m all jiggly and slow and awkward. During the last crisis of motivation, I decided that I needed to train for a race. Enter the Topeka to Auburn Half Marathon, my made-up running club, and Saturday long runs at Corporate Woods. I had managed to get back to 9:15 per mile pace when, one gray, cold Saturday morning when no one showed up to run at Corporate Woods, I ran solo. The iPhone clocked me at an average of 8:32.

Where in the world did that come from? I don’t know. I really, really don’t. I run 3-4 days a week. I don’t do speed work. My cross training mainly involves lifting a twenty-five pound, squirmy toddler. But somehow, for whatever reason, I’ve cut 40 seconds off my training pace.

I don’t understand it. It’s…the window. My window of opportunity to run faster, get out of the “great middle,” and possibly win an age group award or two. Having watched my husband battle injury for the better part of three years, having seen my dad trade running for the stationary bike and elliptical, I know that the ability to run is never guaranteed. I should be enjoying this magical window of opportunity I’ve found, reveling in every single day that I can run comfortably and naturally, without pain or injury or fear.

And here I am, wasting it. Grr. It needs to stop. Today. 40mph winds be danged.

Facts & Questions

I forgot that DeAnna did one of those “chain” blog posts last week and tagged me. Normally, I tend to ignore these things like I ignore a whiny toddler who’s learning the “whine threshold” for parental manipulation…but this is DeAnna. We’ve been friends since WE were the whiny toddlers, and because of that (and also because this is a blog and writing about myself is kind of what I do), here is my response to the WRITE 11 FACTS ABOUT YOURSELF AND THEN ANSWER 11QUESTIONS blog post.

11 Facts

1. I have trouble saying the words “quinoa” and “osso buco.” I don’t know why. I mispronounced both once, and now for some reason I’m stuck with my original mispronunciation rather than the correct one.
2. Speaking of language, did you know that I minored in Spanish in college? I once wrote a 10-page analysis of Don Quixote IN SPANISH, which seems crazy to me now. My reading comprehension is still fairly decent, but conversationally I stink. This means that when I meet my sister-in-law’s Peruvian family members this fall, we should write each other notes to communicate.
3. I signed LilRunr and I up for one of those organic produce delivery services a couple of weeks ago. I keep meaning to blog about it as a “veggie adventure,” but then I forget. I feel a little silly about it, but it has been saving me time and diversifying our diet. Also, it’s incredibly fun to get an entire cooler full of delicious food on our doorstep.
4. I’ve always said that I could NEVER see myself making a child cry it out. Last night, I woke up for the 4th time listening to LilRunr rustle around in his bed. He let out a couple of “warning cries” that usually mean he’s working up to a full wail, and I got out of bed to get his bottle ready. I thought/hoped it was at least 6:00am, but it turns out that it was only 4:30. I’d been up with him at midnight, and dang it but I was tired. Mister was still in “warning cry” mode, so I put the bottle back in the fridge, climbed back in bed, and told a (maybe) sleeping Scott that I was just going to pretend that little man was going to go back to sleep on his own. You know what? He did. I’m not sure whether that makes me a terrible, selfish mom for leaving him in his crib or a smart, forward-thinking mom for giving him a chance to settle himself.
5. I’d like for LilRunr to have a lil’ brother or sister…someday.
6. I get to be a bridesmaid at my brother’s wedding this fall! Broskie and Mademoiselle got married in a civil ceremony last year, but they’d still like to have the big ol’ shindig in a church with a reception and lots of friends and family around. Mademoiselle asked me to be in the wedding party, and I’m tickled. It’ll be only the second wedding party I’ve been a part of.
7. A long, long time ago, I told my then-boyfriend Scott that I thought that bouquets were sad. I think I said something about how I’d never want to receive a bunch of dying flowers. I wish I wouldn’t have said that.
8. I NEED A RACE TO RUN IN MARCH! We were going to go somewhere far, far away and I was going to run there, but now we’re not going and I need a race. I’d prefer for it to be under a 10k, as I haven’t done many long runs lately. Ideas? Anyone, anyone?
9. I have a big birthday coming up this summer. I’ll be hitting a new decade, and I’m finally starting to feel like I’m not some college student anymore. I guess having a baby will do that to you.
10. I cross stitch in my (no longer existent) spare time. I’ve probably mentioned that before, but I just finished a bib for a cousin’s baby shower, and I’m really happy with how it turned out.
11. I’ve realized that some of these aren’t really “facts.” Ah, well. Let me conclude this section with the confession that I’d like to run a 1:45:00 half marathon this year. That’ll probably be this fall, as it will soon be too warm for me to want to run 13 miles.

And now, 11 Questions from DeAnna

1. What’s the one article of clothing you couldn’t do without?
   Running shorts. I know I’ve blogged about that before. I have this obsession with Nike Tempo running shorts.
2. If you were president of the US, what is the first thing you’d change?
   I’d make it so that all of the millions of dollars in campaign money went to pay down the national debt or fund actual helpful things like schools or community programs. I hate campaign season, and my current pet peeve is how these people raise millions of dollars in a day and turn around and spend it on negative ads, bumper stickers, and t-shirts.
3. If you could make money doing something besides your current job what would it be? (Don’t say blogging, we all want to be professional bloggers!)
   This is a tough one, because I LOVE my job and the people I work with. I work from home. I find my work incredibly rewarding. And you do remember this January, when I went to the company’s annual retreat in Charleston, right? If I had to do something else, though, I’d like to work with animals. In my unemployed stretch after graduating with my MA, I volunteered with a cat rescue group and had a blast. It was a way to help animals, and play with some adorable kittens without having to adopt enough to become a crazy cat lady.
4. If you could pick up any skill you don’t currently have what would it be?
   This is an awesome question! I’d like to be able to speak French flawlessly so that sister-in-law and I can communicate in either of our primary languages.
5. Jeans or yoga/workout pants?
   Heh. I work from home, and often Scott takes LilRunr to daycare. This means that on the average day, I have no reason whatsoever to get dressed. Sweatpants for the win!
6. A day you remember being truly happy.
   Well, obviously I’m going to have to go with the mom answer and say that the day our son was born was a truly happy day. It’s been almost a year now, and I’ve been recalling that day more and more as we near little man’s first birthday. It was such a relief to survive labor, such a joyful experience to stare into the eyes of our newborn son.
7.  Rain or snow?
   RAIN! Rain means that I don’t have to water my yard. After the drought last year, having an oddly-shaped yard with no in-ground sprinklers means being extremely grateful for rain.
8. Most random thing in your purse right now.
   LOL — I’m a mom. That makes the most random thing in my purse at the moment……..a pacifier that fell on the floor in Target.
9. Type of jewelry you wear most often. (i.e. rings, earrings, necklaces)
   My wedding ring. I don’t really wear any other jewelry. I’m not sure why. Laziness, mostly. Also, pretty necklaces don’t really go with my standard sweatpants and t-shirt attire.
10. A song that reminds you of high school.
    Easy — “She Likes Me for Me.” Scott and I used to hear that song all the time when we were driving to a movie or out to eat. It became (unofficially) (to me) OUR song.
11. How much water do you drink every day?
    I drink A LOT of water. It’s at least the recommended 64oz per day, but may be more. Hydration is important!

Now, I’m supposed to come up with my own questions and “tag” other people, but I don’t really have a lot of “blog friends” so I’m going to skip it.

Za Best

Scott is such a great daddy. I love watching my two boys interact, and one of my favorite things is listening to the silly songs Scott makes up for our son. They’re simple and usually repetitive, but they capture a moment in our boy’s rapid development. LilRunr LOVES them.

This isn’t going to translate to solely words well, but one of Scott’s songs goes, “he’s a baby he is the best…dad loves him.” It’s a common refrain around here, and often now one of us will just say “he’s the best” or, oddly, “za best.”

Sometimes, “za best” is said with a hint of sarcasm, such as when the young man is wailing in stubborn frustration after being pulled away from some surely dangerous item that he felt the desperate need to explore. Never mind that he has been given a supposedly fascinating, age-appropriate toy to play with. HIS VOICE MUST BE HEARD! (Sidenote: Why are babies bent on self-destruction? Place the boy in a room full of pillows, and he will gravitate towards the only hard surface capable of causing injury.)

In the midst of the noise and display of will, one of us will shrug and say, “za best.”

Because we have a mostly sweet-tempered, delightful son, more often “za best” is said with a tone of absolute adoration, such as when the boy gently, GENTLY pats the kitty and then turns to us for approval, a smile filled with satisfaction and pride lighting up his face.

So, if you haven’t figured it out, this is the post where I talk about the subject that fascinates me the most: my son. The very best boy there is.

• LilRunr is almost ONE YEAR OLD. I know. I’m not going to wish him to stay a baby forever because I am LOVING each new phase he gets to. Right now, we’re in a “fully mobile and exploratory” phase, which while tiring is fascinating to watch. He has 100% mastered walking and is now into E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G. He’s less interested in toys and instead is focused on shoes, doors, cabinets, curtains, trash cans, and anything else that can possibly move. He was *this close* to eating cat food the other day. He is determined to figure his world out, and the wonder and enthusiasm he throws into every little thing is as miraculous to me as the day he entered the world. Well, almost. It’s hard for a normal day to beat THAT day, but it’s impossible to be anything but joyful around a boy who sees a bag of lentils and a box of macaroni as a fascinating treasure.
• A lot of the time, I feel like I just talk AT the child. They say that talking to a baby is how they pick up language, but I’ve never been sure how much he understands. I mean, he’s still of an age where he mostly does what HE wants, so it’s not like I get confirmation that my, “little man, please come here. We don’t play with the blinds,” is getting through. Then, one day, I went into his room to get him ready for daycare. I saw that his “lovey” had gotten thrown out of his bed, and as I put him on the floor to run around while I got his clothes together, I said, “uh-oh, Mr. Kitty fell out of your bed! I think he wants to go back in your bed.” LilRunr walked right over to Mr. Kitty, picked him up, and tried to put the lovey back into his crib. WHOA. It looks like he understands quite a bit!
• Ok, so I’m not completely used to him walking. It’s a little strange to see the BABY roaming at will, moving things around and chasing the cats.
• He likes to read books to himself, and it is adorable. Sometimes he’ll take a stuffed animal with him, and read out loud to them both. “Boo ma voo da da bo.” “Adorable squeal.” Too cute.
• We took him for his first hair cut a couple of weeks ago. It was past due. I could tell that he didn’t like the way it tickled his ears, and beside one grandma who feared that he would be accidentally cut and traumatized, everyone agreed that it was “time.” He did remarkably well. He wasn’t scared by the scissors or the snipping, but of course he got bored halfway through and protested at having to sit still. The pictures say it all:
  

  "So, I get to sit in a car and play with this cape? Mmmm...kay."

  

  "Someone to pay attention to me? Yayyyyyy!"

  

  "All right...now I'm bored. Can we leave yet?"

  

  "DAAAAAAAAAAADDDDD!!!!!"

• There’s one thing that makes me nervous and that’s…CHANGE. Apparently I’m supposed to be weaning the kid from the bottle soon, and I’m not really sure how to go about that. Is there a way to go about it in which I don’t have to deal with screaming/crying/whining? No? We currently offer him a sippy cup (with water) at his solid food meals, and he does know how to drink out of it…he just doesn’t like it. At all. He’s also not very good at chewing “mushy” food. Purees are no problem and he loves just about any cracker or puff under the sun (forget about Cheerios, though…what kind of kid doesn’t like Cheerios? Oh. MINE!), but try to offer him cooked pieces of fruit or veggie and he will put it in his mouth and either immediately spit it back out or gag on it. I’ve chalked that one up as “not quite ready yet,” but part of me worries that I’ve somehow been remiss in my “introduction to solid food” process.

And now, a few more pictures of the very best boy:

"DA!" baby speak for "Look at the excellent display of light and shadow. This would be a perfect photo opportunity, Uncle Matt!"

He's ready for some football!

I have a feeling that those shoes are going to end up thrown to the bottom of the stairs or possibly hidden in a trash can.

I’m One of the “Good Guys”

I took the baby for a walk after school today. He was in this state where all of his toys were “boring” and the only thing that would keep him entertained was tearing down the blinds, and when three repeated attempts at distraction (look, LilRunr! The stuffed puppy says your name! Wouldn’t you rather play with the Kleenex box again? The actual kitty is right there! Go chase her!) and one attempt at relocation (dude is walking like a champion…he can place himself WHEREVER he wants. Terrifyingly awesome.) I gave up and bundled the kid into the jogging stroller.

Kiddo was instantly fascinated. We haven’t been spending enough time outside lately, and a second part of his growing up means that he loves to point to things and say, “da” or “ga.” I imagine that he wants me to label them for him, which may or may not be accurate. Baby translation is not an exact science.

So, we were walking along, LilRunr pointing and saying “da…da…da…ga” and me responding, “maple tree…stop sign…truck…dog…sky,” when I noticed a group of young boys across the street. They caught my attention when one of them yelled, “CAR!” and the entire group dropped to the ground and trained their nerf guns on a passing car.

Oh, boy…or rather, oh, boys. I can tell you from sad experience that a quick path to trouble is to throw/shoot projectiles at a passing car. There was this ONE TIME when I was about their age (6 years old or so) and a bunch of us kids were playing in our yard. It was the weekend of the Maple Leaf Festival, which brings bunches of traffic to my sleepy hometown, so there were lots of cars passing by on the gravel road in front of our rented house. One of my cousins decided it would be a good idea to lob pieces of gravel at the TIRES of the passing cars. Everyone took a turn, and the gravel either landed harmlessly off target or bounced off the tire and onto the ground. At long last, they realized that one person was being a chicken…me. After much cajoling and more than a little peer pressure, I finally picked up a rock…tossed it at a passing car…cheered when it struck the tire…and then watched in horror as it was whipped around the tire and then flung onto the body of the car at great speed.

That “snap” is still imprinted in my  memory. The driver of the car went BALLISTIC. He slammed on his brakes, backed his car into the driveway, and emerged screaming. SCREAMING. I thought he was going to kill me. The adults came out of the house and, after hearing the story, my dad offered to let him throw a rock at one of OUR cars. My dad is awesome. Love him. I’m not sure what finally appeased the angry man, but I spent a very large portion of that day sitting in a corner…and a long, sleepless night convinced that the “car man” was going to come back to kill me in my sleep.

I say again — throwing/shooting things at cars is a bad idea. Before I get a chance to be the mature adult, one of the little boys says, “nah, we can’t shoot cars. They’re not the bad guys.” All of the little boys stand up, and then I hear…”WALKER!”

Oh, heck nos, I think. You boys are cute, but if you shoot anything in my child’s direction it is ON. Mama Bear doesn’t get a chance to come out and play, though, because as all of the kids turn in our direction the littlest one says, “Mamas and babies don’t count. They’re on our team. They’re good guys.” There is unanimous agreement of this statement, and one of the other kids clarifies, “yeah, anyone under four is on our team. Their mommies too.” I start giggling to myself. You hear that, little man? We’re the good guys!

As I’m crossing the street, I hear them call one more time. At “BIKE!”, I turn back slightly so I can see if the boys go from being cute and funny to public nuisances. I hold my breath…and one of the boys says, “that’s a daddy and his son!” and not one nerf ball goes flying.

Apparently, daddies and sons are exempt, too. It was like the little kid equivalent to the shooting range that pops up either a bad guy or an innocent civilian. They’re probably wishing that our neighborhood had a few more bad guys, but I appreciate a group of little boys with a little bit of reason wrapped up in their mischievousness.

Dear Everyone…or, Fishing for Compliments

Dear Everyone:

I know that, like me, you probably read this blog from Reader or some other feed, which removes whatever cutesy little design I have chosen. Could you humor me for a minute and actually click through to the actual blog, though? I updated the template for the first time in 2 years, and I’m rather excited about it. I think it’s cute. Don’t you think it’s cute? (Hint: This is your opportunity to say, “golly gee, it sure is!” Also, if I ever ask you if these jeans make me look fat, the answer is NO. Tehe.)

Ok, I apologize for fishing for compliments. It was awkward for us all and I won’t let it happen again.

In other news, I ran 4 miles this morning. I forgot to change the litter box, though. Shoot. Lucky for me, the home office is as far away from StinkoLand as you can get. Well, not really. It’s right next door to LilRunr’s room, and the Diaper Genie that lurks within.

Try as you might, you will never escape StinkoLand.

That is all.

Sincerely,

Megan