Things she's been up to

Are you missing Bug these days? She's been busy.

For her first item of business, she's been working hard at growing cheeks.

Bug's cheeks are 4 months old now, and, along with the rest of her body, they weigh in at 13 lbs 12 oz. Her cheeks, along with the rest of her body, are heavier than 55 percent of 4 month old girls. Her cheeks are stuck to a body that is 25 inches long, which is apparently taller than 85 percent of other 4 month old girls. Whoa, child.

It must be hard work growing cheeks like that. In fact, she's plum tuckered out.

She's not feeling 100%. And perhaps it's a bit of a good thing. Because she's also been tweaking the fine details of the speech she plans on giving immediately after taking over the world.

Outlook and outfit

While I was busy being hysterical, I got a text message from a dear friend.

"You can't control what happens to you throughout the day, but you can control two things: your outlook, and your outfit," Livia said, because she knows me. She knows that even though it's a little silly, in that moment I couldn't think about how it was all going to be ok. I needed to think about accessories instead.

So guess what. This week I wore my shiny red shoes. I wore my favorite green jacket. I put on make up and jewelry, and I made it through the week. And sometimes, that's what matters.

Outlook and outfit. Outlook and outfit. Outlook and outfit.

Sour worms and salty tears

Dear Bug,

I have a secret. Today, while you were taking a nap, your Daddy came home, and he brought me some sour worms. Not to rub it in or anything but you aren't allowed to eat sour worms yet anyway (no teeth, after all) so I didn't think you'd mind much. Turns out you must've felt a little left out, because you woke up just long enough to kick your arms and legs around and shoot one of your amazing grins at Daddy before I made you go back to sleep. You didn't even have a messy diaper. I know because I checked and there was no poop anywhere.

Anyway, Daddy brought me a treat because he knew I was crying. I was trying to be brave and all, but I just can't help it. Tomorrow I have to go back to work. It's taken a really long time to get to this point-- time that I've alternately cherished because the delays meant extra weeks with you, and fumed at because the stress meant I wasn't enjoying the time with you like I wanted to. But now here we are and it's here and that's why I needed the sour worms.

Our family is very blessed, Bug. Lots of little babies don't have both a mommy and a daddy, let alone a mommy and a daddy who are lucky enough to have good jobs. Plus, this new job will let me spend lots more time at home with you, and ensure that I can take you to the pool and the zoo, and that I never have to miss a doctor's appointment. I am so grateful. The first couple of days will be toughest while I learn what to do, but then I'll be able to plan my time the way I want to. Isn't that lucky?

But I'm still crying, Bug. Because sometimes there are other things that happen without a plan. You don't grow on a schedule, after all, and what if I miss it when you finally decide to roll over? Or what happens if you learn to crawl or take your first steps while I am away? I know Aunt Kimmi will take good care of you, but it's not the same and now here I am crying again without any more sour worms. (Daddy ate some of them.) It's not even the big things, Bug. You'll wake up from naps with your happy, cheek-splitting smile and you'll dazzle someone else with it. Someday you'll bonk your head or scrape your knee, and someone else will kiss it. Who will be there to kiss Mama's broken heart?

Don't worry though, Bug. We are going to make it. We are so very, very lucky, and it's all going to be ok. Mama's new job will be perfect for our family, and we will be gently guided to whatever comes next just like we have been before. I love you, you love me, we love Daddy, yes siree and everything is good. Tonight we'll snuggle and let you play in the tubby and buy Mama a bra that fits (curse these ever changing body parts) and then we'll kiss you goodnight. Tomorrow will come and it will be fine and everything is good.

Everything is good.

I love you to the moon and back, princess.
-Mama

PS- Sorry again about the sour worms. Someday you'll have teeth and then you'll really enjoy them, I promise.

With all due respect to Olympians

A note on Vancouver 2010:

The Luge and the skeleton freak me out. If whizzing down an ice pipe at 90 miles an hour with my face 4 inches from disaster is what it takes to be an Olympian, count me out. (She says confidently, as if her vanity regarding her facial structures is the only thing keeping her from Olympic glory...)

But here's what really gives me the heebie-jeebies:

The two man luge.

At what point did one man in a tight rubber suit look at another man in a tight rubber suit and say, "hey buddy, come sit on my lap. We'll do this one together. What? This 2 foot sled too tiny? Nah. We'll just squish."

BYU students can opt out of answering the above question, as I'm pretty sure it violates your honor code.

100% something

Possum image found here

Today, while I was taking out some garbage, I noted the following printed on the pizza box from Little Caesars:

100% real cheese.

This type of thing concerns me. When a company that makes, say, cheese pizza has to specify that they are using real cheese, I begin to question what other things might be less that 100% what they seem. It's like when McDonald's began proudly advertising that they now use only white meat in their McNuggets, as if that was the most novel idea on the planet. " NOW ONLY WHITE MEAT!" Like maybe it would've been ok before if you found a stray possum ear or something in your lunch, but NOT NOW. NOW ONLY WHITE MEAT.

Let's be honest. None of us would ever have bet our first born on what was actually in those Happy Meals. (In direct contrast to the way Schmoopsie did bet Bug on the 2008 BYU/Utah football game. I have to turn her over as soon as she's weaned.) The point is, we don't want our noses rubbed in those chicken parts years later. Let us revel in our ignorance, k?

Second point: Have you ever checked the packaging on baby carrots?

Ingredients:
Carrots

Seriously. As long as we're all on the honesty parade here, I think it should be amended.

Ingredients:
Carrots + a few stray fly legs.

The truth about baby growing

Preface

For me, blogging is an interesting beast. Most of the time, I love it. It's a creative outlet for me, and at the same time meets my imaginary requirement that every good mom needs to scrapbook. I don't scrapbook because I'm awful at it. I blog.

Anyway, I try to make this blog an honest, real, and revealing place, but I also have boundaries. Some boundaries are safety related (not posting my address, for example) and others are for personal or even stylistic reasons. It's a balance between being cheesy and boring (my life is so AWESOME that it is AWESOMER than anyone else's and here are 8 more posts about how AWESOME I am in case you somehow forgot my level of AWESOME) and sharing intimate feelings with the world. It's like a dance, sort of. And you'll remember that I'm not a good dancer. And that's why the world knows I have a Super Cervix.

So anyway, it's a challenge and the more serious posts are toughter to navigate that dance than the ones about poop in my laundry. But, whether anyone else wants it or not, sometimes I want it said so I can feel it later.

Chapter 1

Here's the truth: I loved being pregnant. Sure, there were a lot of unpleasant things: I waddled about, for instance. And I puked a lot. And I grew a single, recurring dark hair on my chin that Love Bear refers to as my beard. And I peed a lot. And sometimes I peed when I wasn't planning on peeing. Pregnancy is not necessarily lady-like.

But it is womanly. I felt wonderful about my body for the first time since I can remember. I loved watching my belly swell and stretch with my unborn child. I may someday forget my own name, but I will never forget what it felt like when my daughter moved and kicked inside of me. I was proud to stand and be seen without sucking in or tightening or pinching or hiding or twisting myself into any of the myriad of positions women find to hide themselves in plain view. For the first time, my body-- however unperfect-- had purpose. I joyfully anticipated the need for each part. My arms to hold and rock a child. My legs to kneel as I washed my baby. My breasts to feed and my lips to kiss and my fingers to stroke her cheeks. My body grew as she did, and it was good.

And now, at nearly 4 months post partum, I find myself wondering how regain that sense of purpose and confidence. I love my baby, and I revel in my ability to physically care for her. Together, she and I slowly learn the pattern of our days. I hold and carry and touch and tickle and caress and wash and snuggle and kiss. Mothering my child is a verb, and I am blessed with capability.

I yearn to be pregnant again. (Surprised, Sweetheart? Sorry to spring it on you...) But until then-- no, not even until then. Before then, I must find a way to appreciate and treasure my body and its purpose. I must find a way to banish my nay-saying and revel in who and what I am. It is not about the size or shape or even the function of my body. It is about the dialogue in my mind.

Because, you see, I am the mother of a daughter. And if I cannot restructure and recraft the words that run through my head, then someday my beautiful, perfect daughter will look at her beautiful, perfect body with the same terrible thoughts that I have about my own. And I cannot let that happen.

A funny thing happened on the way home from Vegas

We ran south to get warm this weekend. Turns out Bug is the most agreeable, wonderful road tripping baby ever born. Also, the cutest:

Seriously. Anyway, we headed to Las Vegas to watch Bug's Uncle Big play in a soccer tournament. Normally, Vegas is not my favorite place in the world, but right now any place that is warmer than the place that we live in is my favorite place in the world and I am willing to drive long distances to be in that place. The weather was wonderful, beautiful, phenomenal, remind-me-what-it's-like-to-feel-human-again good. I wore flip flops, and all was right in the world.

Last year, I cried in this hotel. See, exactly one day shy of one year before this picture was taken, Honey Bear and I were in this very hotel. We were headed to Zion's National Park because, like this year, I was furious with the cold and ready to move to Mercury because I hear it's warmer there. I was also desperate to have a baby, and practically ready to move to Mercury to get one. And on Valentine's Day 2009 at the Abbey Inn in Cedar City, Utah, we found out that a tiny Floyd was in my tummy.

This year, Floyd has long since come out of my tummy and grown into Bug. And boy, do we love her.

So, back to the trip.

Bug's Uncle Big is also my little brother, Caden. He is the reason we had an excuse to escape the frigid cold. We love Uncle Big, and here are a few of the reasons why:

Uncle Big bought Bug a rose on her her very first Valentine's Day. Let's all say it together: aaaawwwww!

Bug knows how to be shy and demure when accepting a present. What a lady.

Uncle Big washed the car. Without being asked. TENDER!

Uncle Big is calm and level-headed. He is easy-going with a quick sense of humor. Uncle Big is a team captain, and he is not easily riled or swayed by peer pressure. And, in direct contrast to his very nature, Uncle Big landed his first red card in this weekend's tournament. And boy golly, he did it in extraordinarily flashy, referee-touching, yellow card slapping fashion. What laughs.

Uncle Big is the reason we had an excuse to spend a weekend in the sun. The weekend in the sun also meant a trip to the local Children's Place Outlet, which in turn helped Grammy Lalli justify the purchase of Bug's first swimming suit. Bug looks so stinking cute in her first swimming suit that I can't even generate words for it:

And so all because of Uncle Big, we had a wonderful time in Sin City.

Oh, and now for the funny thing that happened on the way home from Vegas:

Lover Bear and I were playing a rousing game of Would You Rather on the way home when we noticed a vanity plate on a Utah car in front of us: IH8TEXS. Someone must have strong feelings about the Lone Star State to take the time and effort to order a special license plate for all the world to see.

Including, minutes later, the Camry with Texas plates cruising along one lane over.

Ha ha.

I'd spend less on shampoo, I guess.

I'm trying to envision myself bald.

In case anyone is wondering, I am shedding like a Yeti in the tropics. (Would they shed in the tropics?) There are strands, nay, clumps, of long-ish brown hair all over the bathroom and all over my clothing. It's disgusting. I haven't lost this much hair all at once since the 8th grade when Jeff G. stepped on a large chunk of my hair before yanking me up into a swing dancing lift.

I thought myself a reasonably informed pregnant person. I thought all I had to worry about in the post partum period was the possibility of pain, bleeding, depression, physical recovery from pushing out a human being, sore nipples, pregnancy clothes that no longer fit, pre-pregnancy clothes that no longer fit, night sweats, and oh yeah, raising a baby, what with the feeding schedules, sleeping schedules, baby fingernail clipping (the HORROR!), immunizations, bathing, car seats...

You get the idea.

No one ever mentioned balding.

P.S. Liv, don't panic. I'm taking some literary license here. It's not quite that scary in real life. (Almost, though.)
P.P.S. However, baby fingernail clipping really is terrifying. And it turns out I'm a bad mom.
P.P.P.S. I'm not kidding about the balding part.

Return of the Bug

If I were a reader of this blog instead of the author, I bet the only thing that would really irritate me about the recent computer malfunctions and subsequent lack of attention to the blog would be the shocking absence of pictures of the Bug. Behold:

I know, right? A-freakin'-DOR-ABLE.

Oh yeah. Before the Great (and figurative) Computer Explosion of '10, my sister-in-law Ashley's mom (did you catch the connection?) was kind enough to wander about in the cold with us to take a few pictures. For FREE. Isn't she sweet? We figured we ought to have some visual record of Bug with her parents besides the snapshots of Bug and her identical twin (Daddy) staring at the TV during Jazz games in their underwear.

Did that fill your Bug canteen? No? Yeah, me neither. Here you go:


Thanks again to Lori Todd for the photos! They look beautiful!

Literally

Do you know what makes me laugh? When people say 'literally' when they really mean 'figuratively'. Like, "if this headache doesn't go away, my head will literally explode!" Sounds messy to me.

In my own life, I try to use words correctly. I think it gives them more emphasis. For example, when I was about 12, the glass door on the oven at my dad's house literally exploded seconds after I removed the frozen pizza. Now, because you know that I know what 'literally' actually means, you can envision shards of glass exploding outward all over the kitchen floor. And guess what? You'd be right. (Ask Liv. She saw the horrible aftermath.)

This last week, our home computer also exploded, only in more figurative, literary sense. It did not actually explode. It simply stopped functioning completely all of the sudden, and with a bit of a dramatic flare. Thus the lack of posts of late.

Anyway, after a bunch of research and price comparisons, Honey Buns literally walked right into Best Buy and bought a new one. And I literally kissed him right on the mouth when he carried it through the front door.

It's a beauty, and it should be up and running with our new wireless internet (welcome to the 21st century, family) on Thursday. I'll be so happy I could scream. Literally.