I'm Busy.

Tate and I were reading one of hs 300 Sesame Street books tonight and he was having a good ol' time looking at a page of Bert and Ernie preparing an elaborate meal in their little apartment. He was doing a great job of pointing at random things and identifying them, such as hot dogs, pancakes, grapes, corn, and jam. (Ok. Now that I think about it, what the hell kind of meal were those two making?) He pointed at a can of whipped cream and this is what transpired:

Tate: "Asshat?" (No, he has still not mastered saying "what's that" correctly. I'm not pushing it. This way is much more humorous, especially in public.)

Me: "Oh, that's a can of whipped cream."

Tate: "No, Mommy. That's beer. Beer."

Me: "No, honey, not everything that comes in a can is beer. That's whipped cream."

Tate, looking extremely puzzled: "Where's the beer? They need beer!"

I was going to tell him that Bert and Ernie always seemed more like wine or martini guys to me, but I didn't think it was worth it. The problem was solved when he pointed at a bottle of ketchup and quite confidently proclaimed it to be red beer. There ya go.

His new thing when asked to do something is to turn down our offer quite regretfully, informing us that he is "busy." Yeah, busy crawling around on the floor looking for something to chuck at the dog's head. Or he could be going to the refrigerator, looking for a carton of milk to pull out and place in another room without our knowledge. That does take a lot of time and initiative. But no, most of the time he decrees his business while lounging on the couch, waiting for his next devilish plan to take form in his little head. Tonight, that plan showed itself in the form of putting penne noodles on Spencer's back and seeing how long they stuck there. Gotta say, those suckers just grab on and hold. There may still be one or two on there. I'm sure Nora will rectify that situation soon enough.

I Drown. I Drown in the Clutter.

I know I've mentioned this before, but my house will. Not. Stay. Clean. It was spic and span last night and by 10 am today...goodbye carpet! Nice seeing you while it lasted! So long, countertops! May we meet again someday! Both of my children have made it their mission to throw every conceivable thing they come across onto the floor. Hey, it's nice to have purpose in your life.

Here are some things I've picked up off my floor in the last couple days:

• A pot holder with a yellow plastic triangle stuck in it
• An empty prescription bottle from 2005
• A can of enchilada sauce
• One of Tate's shoes, from the pair of shoes I bought him recently that he refuses to wear. He seems to think they will cause his feet to catch fire or something. The other shoe was on the windowsill. I think it was trying to escape.
• One of Spencer's toenails. Yes, gross. At least Nora didn't eat it.
• 3000 magazines shredded into 39646903450000 pieces by Nora the Paper Eater. She seems to really enjoy purusing the lasting hoochie antics of Paris Hilton in my People magazines. Perusing, then eating.
• A miniature plastic A&W mugh with a french fry and AA battery in it
• A Christmas card
• A paper plate from Tate's 1st birthday party in 2007

I don't know where it comes from. Well, some of it probably comes from Nora's forays into random kitchen and laundry room drawers. She's very proud of her newfound talent of opening drawers and chucking everything in them to their death on the floor. She's merciless. Many a plastic cup has met it's doom being hurled from her little paw. Gravity rocks, if you ask her.

So I push forward, through the hodgepodge of random artifacts from our life strewn about my house. One of these days I'm certain I'll find a $100 bill on my floor. I have no idea where it would come from, but I've found stranger things floating around my house. It could happen.

I asked Tate to help me pick up today and he said "No, Mommy. I don't do that kind of thing. I don't think so." Ah. Well, good to know for next time. He's been a stinker of epic proportions lately, and it's actually been wearing on me quite a bit. I won't get into details because I just don't feel like it, but I will just say this. It's amazing how crappy I feel due to judgemental people. I don't appreciate it, and I hate that I let other people make me feel like I'm doing something wrong as a mother, but there you go. I let it affect me way too much. One of these days I'll just punch someone in the face the next time they give me or my two year old child a dirty look. They'd be in a crapload of pain, but probably not surprised. I seem like the type of person to do that, I'm sure.

So next time you see a screaming, tornadic blur of a little boy running around wreaking havoc and a stressed-out, frantic mother chasing him around trying to get him to stop hitting or pinching or pushing over racks in a department store or licking the conveyer belt at the grocery store or whatever, think before you give a nasty look. I've got a mean left hook.

Photo FAIL Part 2

Let's have another laugh or two at my kidlets' expense.

This is what Nora looks like after she pulls the ponytail out of her hair:

And, well....Tate.

This picture would actually be cute if he didn't have remnents of the 6 M&Ms he had eaten two hours before left on his face. Well, cute, and...kinda smarmy.



Ok, and here Nora's totally reminding me of some crabby old lady completely dissatisfied with her Blue Plate Special. She looks very disgruntled.

Ethel! This Early Bird Special sucks!!

Busy Little Bees

We've had a busy week. We took a little mini-break and loaded up the kids and went to Wisconsin Dells to stay at a resort with an indoor waterpark. We went with a family that we're friends with and had a great time.

Ok, well, the drive down wasn't so hot. (You know there had to be something, right?) Sue and her kids rode with us since her husband had to work late, so we were packed nice and tight into our van, with me and Eric in the front, my kidlets in the middle and Sue and her two offspring in the back. I could hear our van groaning as we all climbed in. Things were fine for a good, oh, 10 minutes, and then Nora started getting pissed off about something. I think was the fact that she had to stare at three people she barely knew in the backseat. It was fun at first and then she realized that they weren't going anywhere and it totally threw her little world out of balance.

So after 900 hours of her screaming and smearing nose goo all over her face and hair, we decided to do something about it and pulled over to make a bottle. For some reason, this bottle was not acceptable for Her Majesty and was promptly rejected. Figuring that well, we tried, we stuck her back in her car seat and continued driving, as she continued screaming. Finally, since I knew there were three other kids in the back trying to sleep, and poor Sue probably was feeling a little ill watching Nora use snot as hair gel, I lumbered over the center console into the back. This is where I stuffed my big butt in between the two captain's chairs and squatted on the floor, facing backwards, to try and convince her to eat.

Now, this was a lot of fun. I get motion sickness really easily, so facing backwards while squatting on the floor of a moving vehicle is not really on my top 10 list of of fun things to do. At least I wasn't subjecting Sue and her kids to the lovely sight of my butt crack sticking out of my jeans. I saved that for Eric in the front seat, everytime he turned around. Plus my legs were completely asleep and I was pretty sure that my toes were turning black due to lack of circulation. But hey, as long as Nora was silent.

So we get to the resort, check into our condo, and proceed to have a lot of fun for the next two days. Well, waking up at 5 am with the kids wasn't the best part, but when you have three kids sharing a bedroom, they spend a lot of time in there plotting how to make things just a little more difficult for their poor unsuspecting parents. I kept expecting to hear little evil cackles wafting out under the door, and at some point a declaration of "...And then the world will be MINE! MUA HA HA!!" That would have been Tate, obviously.

And please give me the crappy mother award because I took about 5 pictures the whole time, and they all ended up being of a big splash of water with Tate's foot or other random appendage sticking out. I never quite got the shot I was going for. But I was having too much fun playing with the kids to be bothered to actually preserve the moment for later.

And since it's been awhile since we've had a Grocery Store Trip From Hell blurb, let's go there for a moment. I had to take both kids to the store yesterday since we had no milk or eggs or, well...food, in our house and I heard that feeding your children is generally a good idea. We walk in and Tate starts yelling for his own cart. Last time Eric had taken him, he let him push one of those little carts with the flag that states "I'm Helping!" It did not, he informed me grimly upon returning home, go well. After the 4000th time of Tate picking some random can of tuna, baked beans, or sardines off the shelf and chucking into his cart and Eric discovering it 3 aisles later and having to go back and return it to the shelf, he decided that it was not working. The shopping trip commenced with Eric pushing the big cart, pulling the little cart, and ignoring a squalling Tate tucked under his arm.

So anyway, no little cart for Tate, which of course turned into a huge protest on his part. As some random dude observed as he walked by us, Tate was "not a happy camper". Thanks, buddy. I had no idea. Even better, there were no racing car carts left where the kids could both sit in the drivers seat, so I had to use a regular cart and put Nora in the seat and Tate in the actual cart, where he promptly got completely buried by groceries. It looked like he had no legs. Although, that was actually kind of a good thing. The kid can't stand up and try to jump out of the cart when he's got 30 pounds of potatoes and apples pinning his legs down.

And the best part. We leave the store, it's sleeting out, Nora's hollering for lunch, etc etc etc. I march up to our car, wonder why the hell th remote start didn't work, haul Tate out of the cart and frantically try to unlock the back doors with the remote. Not working. I try to unlock the front doors and the back gate. Nope. At this point both kids are screaming, I'm holding on to Tate by his hood so he doesn't run away, Nora's trying to climb out of the cart, the groceries are getting wet, and I'm freaking out, yelling "WHAT THE HELL??" because obviously someone out there hates me and has tampered with my remote control. Just as I'm wondering who I could possibly call to freak out at and insist they come and help me, I look more closely at the van and realize I can see my reflection in the side of it. Which means it's clean. Which means it's not our van.

I locate our van 3 aisles over and leave. Really, what else is there to say.

Except this. If any of you live in Green Bay, have a light blue Town and Country, and go to Festival Foods on the East Side very often, you're gonna have to sell your car. It's causing me way too much confusion and consternation. Thanks a bunch.

Yawn.

I'm so tired I could fall asleep like this:

Tate woke up this morning at 5 am. Sucky, yeah, but nothing I haven't done before, a bajillion times. Although it was extra special fun this morning, because he rolled over (he had crawled into our bed around 4, one of his really great, enjoyable new habits), looked at me, and burst into terrified, panicked tears. Because, you see, I am not Daddy. I'm just this horrible freak of nature known as Mommy. It took a good 45 minutes for him to stop wailing and asking if Daddy was downstairs. I kept trying to tell him Daddy was at work but apparently giving that answer earns one a kick in the shin. He finally calmed down, just in time for Nora to wake up. And the day's festivities have begun.

The crazy thing is, yesterday was worse. How could it be worse than waking up at 5 am next to a crying kid, you ask? Why, waking up at 3:50 am next to a crying kid, silly! And that's exactly what I did. Nora cut me a break and lounged in her crib til 5:30...what a pal. So Tate was awake from 3:50 til about 8:45, when he passed out on the couch as evidenced above. I was all ready to go back to sleep since Nora had gone down for an early nap but as we all know, my children do everything in their power to ensure I never get any sleep, ever. Nora woke up 15 minutes after Tate fell asleep. But get this. Tate slept until almost 2 pm. Pretty much the whole freaking day. 8:45 til 2. And Nora went down for her nap at 1:45! Another 15 minutes of silence! I know, right? My options of what to do for those glorious 900 seconds were simply endless.

So yesterday pretty much passed by in a fog for me. I vaguely remember talking to a couple friends on the phone but it's just a distant memory at this point. Pam and Nicole, if you're reading this, I have no idea what I said to you guys. Hopefully it wasn't anything more offensive and moronic than usual.

In other news, I got Tate some Elmo underpants just for the hell of it. The kid won't even look at his potty, much less sit on it, but I figured he could just kind of hang out with the underwear, they could get to know each other, forge a relationship, become confidantes, whatever. He does seem to like his little mini-briefs, and keeps trying to slip him over his head which makes for some amusing moments. He won't do it for the camera, though. Kid's too smart for his own good. He knows those pictures would be trotted out regularly at family gatherings for years to come.

He also has this toy phone that has Buzz Lightyear on it that he's obssessed with. So obssessed he can never remember Buzz's name, so we have this exchange about 35083 times a day.

Tate: "Who's that?"

Me or Eric: "Buzz Lightyear."

Tate: "Yeah! Buzz Whitehair!"

Me: "Sure."

30 seconds later

Tate: "Mommy, who is that right there? That guy, right there?"

Me: "That's still Buzz Lightyear"

Tate: "HAHAHA!! BUZZ WHITEHAIR!"

30 seconds later

Tate: "Who's-"

Me: "BUZZ. LIGHT. YEAR"

Tate: "Who is that, Mommy?"

Me: BANG BANG BANG. That's me pounding my head against the wall.

Seriously. 35083 times a day. At least Nora can't talk yet. At this point it's all squeals and growls. Which is fun too.

The four of us are going to Wisconsin Dells tomorrow to stay in a waterpark resort for a couple days. We're renting a condo with another family that we're friends with. It could be a blast, or a complete, unmitigated disaster. Sue, consider this my advance apology. Just in case it's needed. All I know is I'm wearing my kids out during the day. Like, to the point of dropping over. They'll sleep then, right? You'll see Tate climbing up the 40 steps to the top of the waterslide all by himself, over and over, pulling a 20 lb raft. Hell, Nora will do it too. Tate can run laps in the lazy river, against the currant. I'll float by with a drink in one hand and a stopwatch in the other.

We'll see how that works.

Apparently, I Suck.

Tate has recently decided that I'm a big loser. Eric, apparently, is the coolest guy on the planet. I'm going to need to have a serious talk with that kid...in what world is Eric cooler than me??

But all kidding aside, it kinda sucks. I have to bribe him, threaten him, lay on him, drug him up with Benedryl, whatever, just to get him to let me have the supreme honor of changing his diaper. Apparently it can only be Daddy who gets the joy of wiping poo off of a wiggly little butt. And no, I don't drug him with Benedryl. The other things I mentioned, yes. I'm actually more tempted to take a nice gulp or eight of the B-dryl myself. I imagine the screams would be a lot more muffled that way, and kicks to me shin would be nothing but a glancing blow. Barely noticable. Ah, to be floating around in a lovely fog of blissful ignorance.

Today after Eric went to work, we had a tantrum that will be spoken of for years to come. This was DefCon 5, people. I imagine people down the block were diving for cover upon hearing what they thought was an air raid siren come wailing through their windows. No, sorry guys...just my kid sreaming, because Daddy wasn't home to put his train track back together. Apparently if Mommy touches the train tracks they will burst into flames. So this was a typical exchange:

Tate, through a stream of tears and snot. Phlegm, too: "Fix it! Fix the tracks! AAAAAHHH"
Me: "Ok, Tate, give it to me and I'll put it back together"
Tate, trying to clock me on the head with a track portion: "NOOOOOOO! JUST DADDY! ONLY DADDY DO IT!"
Me: "Well, it's me or nothin' kid" as I get up to walk away
Tate: "Mommy, fix my track, please?" I start to walk back and reach for the track. "NOOOOOOOOOO!! WANT DADDY! WHERE'S DADDY??"

Wherever he is, it ain't here. Lucky bastard. This went on for way too long and just as my head was about to explode and grant me some sweet relief from the caterwauling of a deranged two year old, he climbed into my lap and passed out hardcore. It was pretty funny, but not as funny as yesterday when he fell asleep, tipped over and went right off the couch onto the floor. Didn't even flinch.

And on the subject of these damn trains, each time you buy a new little train dude they come with a little card that has their pictures and likes, dislikes, astrological signs, ideal first date, favorite alcoholic beverage, whatever. I don't actually read the things, I just spend all day looking for a 2''x3'' card in my pit of a house. Try that if you're bored sometime. It's extremely relaxing and non-frustrating, especially when you're being trailed by a little boy yowling for the Oliver Card. It's been in my laundry hamper, my dishwasher, a shoe in the front closet, the dog's food bowl, and my underwear drawer. These dudes like to get around. If they're smart they'll start hanging out in the liquor cabinet. I'm already dreading bedtime tonight though, because he's been wanting to sleep with the Salty card and I'll be buggered if I know where the heck that thing is. It's not going to be pretty.

Oh well. He's not all craziness. He's had his usual moments of humor peppered in with the insanity lately. Like yesterday when he was playing with Nora and looked at me very seriously saying "We have to respect our friends, Mommy. They need respect." Now, if he would just learn what the word respect actually means, we'd be golden. We also bought him a stuffed monkey at the mall last week and when I asked him what the monkey's name was, he said "Ummm...Snowy." There ya go. Snowy the Monkey. I find that just very random. But wouldn't expect anything less from the little guy.

Eric's working all weekend so by Sunday night I'm sure I'll be reduced to a babbling pile of goo. Although tomorrow night is dinner and pedicures with the girls. Ahh...a shining beacon of light in my world of poop, runny noses, and general clutter, disarray and pandemonium.

She's a Nut.

Nora, that is. A peanut. I just took her to her 9 month appointment and here are her stats:

Length: 27 1/2'' (45%tile)
Weight: 18# (41%tile)
Head: 46 cm (78%tile)

Ok, so she's not like freakishly small, just smaller than Tate ever was. I don't have his 9 month stats for some reason, but really all you have to do is like double whatever Nora's stats were and that was him. He was probably about 40 lbs at this point. Well, close, anyway.

But I'd like to proudly point out that although she's got a petite little frame, at least my girl is rockin' the Herculean head that we are just so proud of and famous for in my family. More room for brains, I say. Or just a really dense skull. Whichever.

Not much has been going on around here, hence the lack of blogging. Sorry. Well, there was yesterday, but that's one of those days I kind of tend to block out of my memory. Tate had been doing really well lately...being very polite, not hitting, kissing his sister, etc. I don't know how I keep falling for his evil plan, but I do. As soon as I start to believe we MIGHT be coming out of the "My Son is a Devil and Quite Mischevious, Which is a Word I'm Just Using Because I Love Him Too Much to Use a Different, More Accurate One" stage of our lives, BAM! He chucks me right back in.

We went to a playdate yesterday and while he wasn't horrible, he wasn't great either. Well, until he tried to push a kid down some steps. That went from not being quite horrible to crossing over into horrible-land. So we left. Then we had people over for dinner, and I just had a sinking feeling all day that it was not going to go well. I've learned that sinking feelings are usually there for a reason, and what do ya know, I was right. Having all these kids in his house just put Tate into overdrive. So many kids to hit! Where to start?? You could hear his little brain whirring and I kept expecting to see his eyeballs start spinning around in his sockets. He spent more time in his room than he did downstairs. Although I have to admit, sometimes I left him in there for a little longer than neccessary because it was just so...nice, having those 5 minutes to sit and not have to keep jumping up and pulling him off someone.

Oh well. My sanity is pretty much already gone. It was nice knowing it, but I'm not counting on being reacquianted with it anytime in the next decade or so. Although I've heard it's taken up residence in the Caribbean somewhere. Maybe I should go search for it there.

The Weirdness is Still Here

I've been conversing with Tate quite a bit lately, as a mother tends to do with her child, and some of the things that come out of his mouth just blow me away. Some are cute, some are funny, some are....weird.

Today he was running around doing Very Important Things while I was getting dinner started. I kept asking him to shut the laundry room door so the baby wouldn't get in there and he kept kinda vaguely blowing me off (at two? Seriously?? I thought I had a good 5 or 6 years before the selective deafness really set in). Finally it came to this:

Me: "TATE! Please shut the door, honey! Mommy's busy!"
Tate: "OH MY GOSH! OK, SWEETHEART!"

Well, at least the love is there.

Also, this is just so....odd. Tate is obsessed with our grocery store. Or, as he calls it, "goo-see cah". Like, he wakes up in the morning and asks to go to the goo-see cah. Or he's eating lunch and in between bites asks to go to the goo-see ca. Lately he's been getting really specific and asking to go the "Festi-ba", which is Festival, the store by our house. This morning Eric was looking to get the demon out of the house for a bit and give me a break and he asked Tate if he wanted to go swimming. Tate replied he would much rather go to the goo-see cah.

This went on for quite awhile. "Tate, honey, Daddy's going to take you swimming! You can play in the fountains!" "NO! Want to go to Festi-ba! Festi-ba, please!" Pretty soon it escalated into a screaming toddler banging his heels on the floor pleading for a grocery store fix. It's like his version of crack. He needs a hit of the fruit department and deli counter at least once a week to keep the shakes away.

So, they went to Festi-ba. I needed milk anyway.

And good Lord, when that kid gets a thought in his head he latches onto it and does. not. let. go. He has this little card that came with one of his Thomas tracks that has a picture of Peter Sam on it. Peter Sam is this weird, kinda hickish train. But this is a synopsis of about a 10 minute chunk of my afternoon today.

Tate: "Mommy, I got a card! Look, there's a card in my pocket!"
Me: "Yep, cool!"
Tate: "Mommy, look! Is that a card? Yeah! It's a card! Of Peter Sam! In my pocket!"
Me: "Yeah, Peter Sam! He's pretty hot!"
Tate: "Hmmm....where's my card? Where'd it go? Oh, there it is! In my pocket! Mommy, it was in my pocket!"
Me: "Wow, that is totally amazing!"
Tate: "I have a card! Peter Sam is on my card! Do you have a card? I have a card!"
Me: "No, I don't have a card. I'd like a nice big glass of wine, though. You got that in your pocket, by chance?"

And on and on and on. It's like a broken record. He finally wandered into the other room, still chattering about that stupid Peter Sam and I was able to get a moment of peace to wait for the ringing in my ears to subside. All was good until I was in the bathroom daring to escape to pee, when there was a knock on the door and a little voice calling:

"Mommy? Did you know I have a card?"

You don't say.

Are You Feeling Tired? A Bit Sluggish, Perhaps?

Then come and suck my family room carpet.

How's that for a random statement? Well, the reason I'm offering up my carpet for your sucking pleasure is that my dear daughter managed to upend an entire cup of coffee on it this morning. Now, I know that this is my fault. As those of you who personally know me are aware, I can usually be seen clutching a cup of coffee in my hand, desperately extracting every last ounce of caffeine out of it. Nora has obviously seen me with these cups of coffee many times and decided that it was time for her to be just like her mama. And who can blame the dear thing? Who wouldn't want to be like me? So, upon spying the full cup of cafe mocha I so brilliantly left on the floor next to the couch, she scuttled right over to it and attempted to pour it into her mouth. Unfortunately she really only managed to pour it all over her lap and the carpet. Don't worry, it wasn't hot. It was about an hour or so old.

Once I came back into the room from being gone for .05 seconds, I discovered the brown lake on my carpet and went into freak mode. We've only had the carpet for about 11 months and have narrowly escaped any huge, lifelong stains until this point. I grabbed the carpet spray stuff and dumped it all over the stain and started scrubbing madly. Ironically enough, the commercial playing on the TV as I was fervently and futilely scouring my carpet was the one for this thing:

Freakish, smug, uber-annoying gnat of a man: "Cola! Wine! COFFEE! Sham-wow works as a vacuum on your carpet!!!! Watch as it completely SUCKS the coffee out of this piece of carpet! It SUCKS right down to the bottom! You watching this, cameraman??"

Me: "SUCK THIS, BUDDY."

Tate came home with Eric in the middle of my scrubbing adventure, walked into the family room, assessed the situation, turned around and trotted back to me a minute later, cheerfully offering me a bottle of Windex. Because there there's nothing like a carpet with streak-free shine, is there? I thanked him for being so considerate, then jumped up to re-lock the cabinet under the sink where we keep the cleaning stuffm which I had very stupidly left wide open. Last thing I need is Tate trying to SoftScrub the inside of his nose or something.

Mom, I know you're reading this and hyperventilating but don't worry...I was very successful in my de-coffeeing adventure.

Also, I've decided that Nora no longer looks like David Cook with the hair and everything. No, now thanks to her latest hairstyle she bears an uncanny resemblence to this lovely fellow:

I gave birth to Gary Busey.

The Norey Dance

I like this video, so all you lucky suckers get to view it too. Nora takes her rocking back and forth very seriously. Make sure your volume is turned up so you can hear Tate's devilish laugh in the background.

Ok, I have no idea how to rotate it so it's right side up. Just lay on your left side and watch it that way or something. Plus, I swear my family room isn't that messy anymore. Really.

Happy New Year

Ok, I've never been one to make New Year's resolutions, mostly because I'm probably one of the laziest, easiest distracted people out there. Why set myself up for failure? But this year I don't have a choice. After trying on like 6 different shirts last night to go to a party and realizing that I looked like a whale in each and every one of them, I decided that I need to lose a little weight. Ok, more than a little. I've got the gut o' doom going on right now. Would you like proof? I'll give you proof. Why the hell not. Let's just throw it out there for the world to see.

The ciiiiiiiircle of liiiiiiiiife.

Cute picture, right? Me holding my brand new neice in the classic Lion King pose. I should be standing on a cliff in Africa, but my grandma's living room will have to suffice. So there's me who looks like I didn't bother to look in a mirror that day, and baby who of course is adorable. Then your eyes continue down and you gasp and think:

"Is Melissa 8 months pregnant?? How is that even possible when she has a 9 month baby? Look at that gut!"

Then I crawl into your thoughts and say:

"No, no, no. That's not a human baby in there. That's the recent medical phenomenon known as the Food Baby. It's made up of grease, salt, sugar and high fructose corn syrup. And there's no nine-month gestational period as with a regular baby. This one can bake in you for years. And it can spontaniously turn into twins, triplets, or octuplets. I think I shall name mine Jabba the Hut. Hopefully his twin sister Fatima will get nipped in the bud."

Well, it's either a food baby or this evil little dude making my stomach expand disgustingly. Hard to tell at this point.Feed me, bitch!

I just hate my stomach. Here is another perfectly good picture ruined by the Gut From Hell.
I just look like all kinds of out of whack there. The funny thing is, at this New Year's party I was at, just about all the women were standing around at one point comparing problem areas on their bodies and pretty much ripping their physical selves to shreds. I think it's a woman thing...we always end up either talking about our labor stories or bemoaning or lack of waistline. The guys, on the other hand, stood on the outskirts of our little Circle of Self-Hatred and guzzled beer while rolling their eyes and generally staying as quiet as possible. They know to not say anything. That's a husband thing.
But moving on. Am I the only person who thinks this is one of the funniest thing ever?

Rudolph the foot-headed reindeer.

There's nothing like artwork made from your kid's bare foot. I can't stop laughing at it. That thing is never getting thrown away because I love it.

Happy 2009, everyone. Feel free to harangue me at various points this year about keeping my resolution. If I scream at you to mind your own damn business I don't really mean it.