Thursday, May 17, 2012
Birthday Magic
Monday, February 13, 2012
Jelly Parties All the Time
Well, the good news is, since I'm not on Topamax this go-round, despite the crazy hours at my crazy job, I am not horrifyingly depressed without even realizing it! Cool, huh? I am actually keeping my house (relatively) clean, happily cooking away, planning lots of ridiculously fun things, and generally you know, being fairly stable. Relatively speaking, again.
Since the housing market is still in the crapper I made the official decision to put off moving for another year, which means I have to figure out what to do with Jelly in the fall and for reals start to think about packing/moving. She is still very happy at the daycare, but it's a combined 3's/4's room and is definitely not a Pre-K program. We went and toured another location that runs a true Pre-K, and she LOVED it - has asked daily when she is going to start there. So I'll check out a couple other places, but it's a strong contender. In the meantime she's got a boyfriend, Evan, who is 5 and absolutely adorable.
He had a bowling birthday party recently - all family members, and Jenny.
Precious.
She is keeping me busy and is as hilarious as ever. When people ask what grade she's in (yes, she's THAT TALL), she likes to say she's 3 1/2, 'but almost 3 3/4'. The birthday extravaganza this year will be - wait for it - a surprise trip to Disney World. 4 fun-filled days (Fri evening-Tues morning) of the most expensive mind-blowing preschool activity a 4-year old could dream of. I decided to bite the bullet and do it because, well, it's not going to cost a whole lot more than what I usually spend (I have air vouchers and a Disney Visa Rewards that I've been collecting since she was born), and four is my favorite age. I freaking love four, that's what I taught when I did daycare. Plus I've never been, so I'm totally excited as well.
Otherwise it's pretty much business as usual - planning our first camping trip of the year for next month (if this weather ever warms back up), getting Fresh Beat Band concert tickets, booking another Easter in Cincinnati; basically packing every weekend full of zany antics.
Her latest thing is the living room sleepover party - I haul the spare room mattress downstairs, shove everything out of the way, and scatter various pillows, sleeping bags, and stuffed creatures everyone. She adores it - I usually last a few hours and sneak up to my bedroom.
It's interesting to see how she's changed as she's shot up and out of 4T, then 5T sizes; she can now follow directions with five moving parts ('go here, get this, complete this action, return item, come back') which I think is pretty impressive; she can undress/dress herself, turn on/off light switches, knows the Pledge, still sings damn Christmas carols, and is increasingly aware/interested in time concepts; how long, what day etc. I finally hung a damn calendar in her room.
Knock on wood we've been pretty healthy, except for Saturday when she barfed because she ate two pieces of pie at the diner at lunch. She had a cold that spread to pink eye and an ear infection, where I learned one of her tubes is finally on the way out. Annual dentist appointment is next week, we'll see what he says about the finger-sucking. She got her hair cut kinda short, and it's hella cute. I kinda wish she would ask for pierced ears.
Friday, December 16, 2011
No Place Like Home for the Holidays
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Sir Jelly
Thursday, September 22, 2011
The Bravest Mama
I have skied black diamond runs in the mountains of Colorado. I have dived the depths of St. Maarten, surrounded by sharks. I’ve flown in a private jet, and I’ve danced on the stage in a strip club. I’ve ridden a horse, a camel, an elephant, and an Ohio River steamboat. I’ve been stuck in a cave twice, once underwater off a small Columbian island, and once trapped by ice. I’ve sipped tequila in Mexico, eaten lobster in Nova Scotia, and bought strappy heels in New York city. I’ve been spit on by Shamu, lost money in Vegas, and ridden the trolley in San Francisco. I got kicked out of Graceland.
Last Saturday I ate a cricket.
Oh, the things you’ll do to show your child it’s good to be brave, and try new things.
The cricket was awful, all legs and antennae and the stuff nightmares are made of.
Jenny loved the worms. To be fair, they were crunchy and Thai-flavored, so it wasn’t exactly a hardship.
We both had a blast, and despite the pathetic drizzly weather enjoyed BugFest immensely.
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Plan C
Alrighty, so the whole post-migraine treatment plan wasn’t working for me, and the preventative Topamax was a little disappointing, so here we are at Plan C. I figured since most of the baddies are hormonal, I’d see what happens if I can level out that hormone shift that happens twice a month. I finally got in to see my gyno, which was just as pleasurable as I expected, and not only got a scrip for the have-a-period-once-every-three-months Seasonale, I got a bonus estrogen patch. Crazy! The biggest side effect of the patch is, well, cancer, but I’m only going to wear it a couple days/month, since it’s not like I’m going through the change and wearing seven at a time every day. Or licking them (seriously, one of the warnings is not to ingest them. WTF is WRONG with people?!).
So I’ve got the patch on, and I’ll let you know how that goes, and will be starting the pill in the next few weeks. Statistics give me a 33% chance of success – 1 in 3 people get worse, 1 in 3 people don’t experience a significant change, and 1 in 3 feel more like rock stars. And, you know, they note a decrease in migraine occurrence. We’ll see how this works out.
If you’d like a work update, well, it’s a shitload of work. The team is so shorthanded that I’m thrown a new project pretty much hourly, which doesn’t leave a lot of time for the whole ‘product training’ thing. You know that annoying phrase, ‘fake it til ya make it’? Yeah – that. But interestingly, there are some things about project management that I really did miss, so it might not be as terribly horribly nightmarish as I anticipated.
This weekend is the Labor Day holiday, so that’s pretty cool. And then the weather will start to be a little cooler, and Jelly and I have a few little camping trips already planned, and her Halloween costume is already in her closet (hello, I’m a planner, remember). We’ve had a few pleasant mornings that are 68 degrees, it’s quite the teaser. I’ve prepared by joining a Crock Pot group on Facebook, I think I’m ready.
Someone else is, too.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Summertime
My mum and my Jelly. My parents live in a little itsy bitsy town that is so damn cute, they have free weekly concerts in the park in the center of town. It's one block from my parents' place. We walked over one lovely evening and enjoyed some music. Things like this make me really miss living in town. And, you know, Canada, where you can sit outside in August and not pray for death because of suffocating heat.
Jellybean and her cousins. They are all nut bars, and this pic captures them quite nicely. My mum got them matching shirts and threw them on this bench, desperate for a cute picture of the three of them. I was upstairs working so missed the fun, but I know Jelly was having a great time. She misses them lots - she refers to them as 'my friends' when she talks about them.
Jenny has a special relationship with her uncle, my brother Jim. When she was a baby he would do crazy dance moves to make her laugh, so he was nicknamed Uncle Dancey, and that's what she calls him. He plays with her, and is patient with her, but also doesn't let her push him around. I love that she's got him for a male role model. His illness is a little confusing to her, since his schizophrenia meds mean he can't usually get out of bed til noon and I have to correct her that he is not 'having a lazy day'. He has good days and bad, but is always awesome with her.
My sisters. I am the eldest of four; my sister N, on the left, is three years younger, and my sister M, on the right, is 13 years younger. My brother is the youngest, a year younger than M. We are about as different as three sisters can be, and have gone through a lot in working through how we relate to each other. But I have never once doubted they'd have my back. Or, you know, 'support' me. Ha ha (this was funnier at the time).
Only in Cottage Country, the tourist region known as the Muskokas in Northern Ontario, would you find a kid in an elf hat and a life jacket. This look says, 'I love Christmas, and boating'. There's a little theme park a couple hours from my hometown called Santa's Village - there are only about a dozen mostly lame rides, a few food vendors, and some prize stands. But there's also Santa, and his 'summer sleigh', this crazy boat that does 360s in the water, and you know what, that amount of rides is perfect for this age group. And they have reindeer! She freaking loved it.
My girl, the cowboy. We put her up on a nice brown pony, and he took 15 years off my life by spooking and bolting, throwing my kid off. She handled it like a champ, no tears, and got right back up on this much calmer pony, Fancy. I play a LOT of games with Jelly now where one of her toys is Fancy, or she is, or god forbid, I am. The horseback riding fund may replace the beach trip fund next year.
I like this picture because it sums us up nicely - there's my sister's bra hanging right there, and my mum is outside in plain view of several neighbors in her bathrobe, and we're missing half the people because they're running around doing other stuff. But there's a great breakfast on the table, and eventually we'll all be seated eating together, and the kids are now at their own table on the deck below hollering at us. And it's a beautiful day! Look, my sister is even wearing a sweater! Seriously, sooooo ready for cooler weather...