What the heck is Halloween?

Baybee Katie continued to garner media attention at her most recent photo shoot.

Even though she has stated multiple times that she is not interested in fame, she has still become the darling of the paparazzi. They just can't seem to get enough of her! Some say her disinterest in the media is just a hoax and that she is really just looking for all the attention she can get. This reporter would have to agree. Just take a gander at the comments below.

Please be aware that comments match the photos below them.

"OH BOY. Another photo shoot. I can't WAIT. Yip-freakin'-eeeee. Who signed me up for this crud? Um, these are going to be on the net, right? Just want to make sure I'm getting what they like to call in the business, 'exposure'."

"Alllllright. Who's bright idea was it to make me wear this hat? And where, praytell, are my pants for cripes sake? I've got an image to uphold people. I can't be parading around in my diapers! What kind of photo shoot is this? And my background, people. It's, like, falling down. What kind of low budget outfit is this?"

"Now, explain to me, why am I dressed like a pumpkin? Are you trying to tell me something? Are you telling me that I'm FAT? That's it, isn't it? I'm FAT. Ohhhhh. It's a costume? I'm just pretending to be a pumpkin? That's cool. Can't I be something cooler? Like, maybe, a kick-ass ninja or somethin'? Maybe a Jedi knight that's fallen to the Dark side. How wicked awesome would that be? I could, like, have a light saber and stuff. That would rock. Let's try that out in our next shot...."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Jedi's DO NOT wear pumpkin bibs. What are you people on?!?"

"Now, I'll just look off into the distance as if I am contemplating lifes mysteries. It'll make a great shot. Trust me. This one will make the cover of Time magazine."

"You mean, let me understand this 'cause, ya know maybe it's me. I'm a little messed up maybe, but I'm funny how? I mean, funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh, I'm here to friggin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny?!?!"

"HAAAAAAA!!! Just freakin' kiddin', man! Didn't ya ever see Goodfellas? Wasn't my Pesci right on, or what?"

Booga Booga

Since it is Halloween today, I decided to do something really scary.

I broke out my pre-pregnancy pant collection to see if anything would fit.

Wouldn't you know it, 80% of them did NOT fit. It's my damn belly. My legs have gotten a little flabbier, but not exceptionally so. It's all the belly.

I need to get rid of the belly.

It's the worst feeling when you're putting on a pair of jeans and you're pulling them up over your legs thinking to yourself, "Hey! These might fit. They're going on pretty easy....". Then BOOM! You get them up to your hips and try to pull the button over to fasten and there is a big lump in the way. Even if you suck it WAAAAAAYYYYY in, it still doesn't help. There is just no way in hell that you can get the damn things fastened. Sigh.

Well, good news is that there were three pairs of jeans and two pairs of khakis that fit me. There is light at the end of the tunnel.

It should be interesting tonight. We should get some Trick-or-Treaters this Halloween. First time in a looooooong time. Back east our house was too far away from other houses for the kiddies to walk, so we got nobody.

I've got it all set up. Got my black cat and pumpkin pics up in my windows, got the candy in the bowl, got the plug-in jack-o-lantern ready to go, cleaned off the steps so the kids won't kill themselves. Bring 'em on!

I find that I always buy candy that I wanted to get as a kid. The number one candy item when I was out trick-or-treating were peanut butter cups. So, now I buy them every Halloween because of that.

I wonder if I am off track; that I am just proving my old-schoolness. Are peanut butter cups STILL the number one Halloween treat? Like, are they still coveted enough that you would pull a chair all the way across the kitchen to the refridgerator, and using a broom stick pull your sisters candy bowl close enough to the edge so that you can steal HER peanut butter cups since she is annoying enough to always SAVE all her candy until yours is all gone and then eat it in front of you?

Not that I ever did that. Noooooo, not me.

Lookit all 'dem rich folk

Yesterday, I went to the movies. Let me rephrase that.

Yesterday, Katie AND I went to the movies.

Yep. You read it right. To a REAL movie theatre to see a REAL movie.

In a town about 20 minutes south of here, right outside the home town of "The Evil Empire", there is a movie theatre that shows 3 movies every Thursday just for parents. You can bring your kids and babies to the show. They turn the sound down a bit and turn the lights up just a bit. That way you can catch the latest movies with noisy baby in tow. They will even deliver concession goodies to your seat if you want. It only costs seven dollars.

How awesome is that?

We decided to check it out. Katie and I went to go see "The Queen." We were the ONLY ones in the movie theatre. The previews started out kinda loud and I was nervous about how the rest of the movie would go. Katie did get a little antsy during the previews, so I had to walk her around.

After the movie started, she calmed down a bit and actually watched the movie with me. She sat on my lap and watched the whole thing. No fussing, no crying, no fits, no....nothing. It was extraordinary. I fed her during the movie and even changed her twice. She was so well behaved, you would have thought that she was a couple of YEARS old. Hmph. It must have been the british accents. You know that's how SuperNanny gets those kids to listen, she has that musical british accent. Same goes for Mary Poppins.

Katie ended up falling asleep for the last 15 minutes of the show. Just sitting there on my lap. She fell asleep. That has never happened.

After the movie, I decided to check out the mall next door. Talk about ritzy. Since there are many, many million/billionaires in the area, this mall must cater to them. They had those stores that offer unique couture. The ones that don't have, like, small/medium/large. You just have to buy what they have on the rack at that time. There was a store that only sold black and white clothes. Super fancy. They had all the high end stores and even a shop that sold fancy-shmancy cupcakes. I did not buy one, but Auntie Onion Dip did when she was here visiting. According to her and Uncle Junior, it was just a plain old cupcake with a bunch of extra frosting.

I felt so out of place. There were all these 'MetroMoms' walking around with their kids. The kind of moms that wear business casual clothes ALL the time. For example, there was this one mom that was wearing a black button down fitted blouse with pin-stripe pants and high heels. She was pushing an Eddie Baur stroller with one hand while talking on her cell with the other. Her hair was flawless blonde, pulled back into a smart pony-tail. She was wearing a pair of those bug-eye, Elvis sunglasses with a soft brown tint. Her kid, no doubt, was styling in the most up-to-date baby wear; matching shirt, pants, socks, shoes and hat.

I saw another fashion-victim (wearing the same stupid looking sunglasses) carrying her little dog who was wearing a sweater to match her outfit. She was carrying her dog. In the MALL.

Me and Katie, on the other hand, looked like we just rolled out of bed (which we literally did). I was wearing maternity jeans (sigh), a blue shirt, sneaks and a purple rain coat. Katie was wearing some pink onesie with long sleeves and legs, no socks or shoes (she likes to wiggle her toes) and no hat. I'm surprised we weren't kicked out of the place.

We window shopped a bit and then headed for home.

This morning we got up bright and early for the echocardiogram. Katie, again, was on her best behavior. An echocardiogram is really just an ultrasound of the heart. She was able to stay in her baby car seat/carrier. I had to undress her, except for her diaper. They put four little circle thingies on her to record her heart beat and measure her heart rate. Then they gelled her up and took pics of her heart in motion. She didn't cry at all. She even smiled at the ladies while they were doing it and tried to grab their hands. At one point, she started getting a little fussy, I popped the binky in her mouth and she fell asleep! The whole process took about 45 minutes, with no tantrums. Again, I was amazed. We get the results on Monday, so I will let everyone know what happens with that.

"What a well-behaved baby!", one of the nurses said. "What a little angel," said the other. If people keep telling me these things, I might start to believe them.

Too late.

Well-Baby?

Yesterday was Katie's 2 month "Well-Baby Visit". That's what they call these appointments, "Well-Baby Visits". I'm not quite sure why. They just do. I call them check-ups. Whatever, right?

Anyways, it was pretty horrible.

Okay, the first half of the appointment wasn't so bad. The first half was the "exam" part of it.

A nurse came in and took her measurements = 10pds8oz, 22in long, 15in head circumference. She grilled me about her developmental progress, as well as our family "situation". Standard questions such as; Can she hold her head steady yet?, Is there smoking in the house?, Do you use a car seat?, Does she sleep through the night yet?, etc. Katie had a ball during this part. She was all smiles, babbled for the nurse and to top it off had a good pee on the exam table.

Then the doc came in and did her thing. Checked her ears, her eyes, her joints, pressed on her tummy, listened to her heart and breathing. Katie didn't like the doc very much. I think she gets scared by deep voices. Our doctor has a very deep voice for a woman and everytime she took Katie from me, Katie would look at me with her super-pathetic pout and then start to cry. As soon as I took her back, she would stop and smile at me. What a drama queen.

The doc thought that she heard a slight heart murmur. Huzbend had a heart murmur when he was little too. Might be genetic. Don't really know. The doc says that it's hard to be sure of murmurs in infants since they are constantly making noise and moving around. Just to be sure that everything is kosher, we got set up with an appointment to have an echocardiogram this Friday. Now, THAT should be interesting. How they are going to keep a 2 month old still for this test is beyond me. Hmmm.

So, after all this, it was time. It was time for the worst part of the appointment. The 5 vaccines. We had to move to another room. The nurse came in with her 5 needles. This was not going to be pretty. I had to hold Katie's arms down on the exam table, while another nurse held both her legs out straight.

BOOM. The first needle went in. Katie began to scream as loud as she could. Then she went BEYOND screaming. It was like she had reached a new sound level that, like, only dogs could hear. Her eyes filled with tears. The tears didn't go anywhere though, because she wouldn't blink. She just had her eyes in this painfull looking squint. The first injection site began to bleed. The nurse quickly put a Band-Aid on it. It bled THROUGH the Band-Aid. She had to take that one off and put another on.

BOOM. Second injection. The supersonic screaming continued. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. Three injections quickly in a row all followed by Band-Aid applications. She was bleeding slightly from all the injection sites. The nurse commented that most babies don't bleed like that. The bleeding stopped pretty quickly.

It was over. The nurses said that I could take my time with the room to get her calmed. I said, "Thanks". They left the room telling me that I could use Children's Tylenol if I found that she was overly fussy or got a fever when we were home.

So, I was left with a ballistic Katie and it seemed that there was nothing that I could do to calm her down. I tried talking and walking with her. No luck. I tried breastfeeding her. She was too whacked out to settle down enough to latch on. Finally, as a last resort, I pulled out the binky. I popped it into her mouth. With a few more hugs and kisses and a lot more soft talking ("It's okay, Katie. It'll be okay") she was finally settled.

I started to tear up a little after I got her settled. I felt so bad for her. I mean, why do I have to do this stuff? Why am I always the one that has to hold her as these people stick sharp pointy things into her legs and feet? Why do I have to look her in the eye and have her look back at me as if to say, "Why, Mommy, why do you let these strange people hurt me so?" Why am I the one that has to hold her as she screams and then afterwards try to comfort her with words that have no meaning to her?

Because, I'm a MOMMY now. And that, my friends, is what MOMMIES do.

And I'll tell you another thing, us MOMMIES kick ass! I am MOMMY, hear me ROAR!!!!!!

White & Nerdy

Okay.

So, how many of you knew who Lloyd Christmas was? I'm sure it was, like, maybe two of you. And that would be overestimating. Here he is....

If you still don't know who Lloyd is, shame on you. He's in one of the funniest movies of all time, 'Dumb & Dumber'.

The reason I bring this up is that, by using Lloyd as a reference point, I proved my own nerdity. Yes. I can admit it. I am a nerd. I've been a nerd all my life.

Here are some examples:

I, at one time, owned many 20 sided die. I had a whole bag of dice including, but not limited to; a 4 sided, an 8 sided, a bunch of 6 sided, maybe a 10 sided. You get the point. If you don't know, all these dice are required to play Dungeons and Dragons. I was a D&D hag. Yes, I was. I always played the same type of character too. Either a halfling or a kender (both are kinda like hobbits). We used to play EVERY Saturday night in high school. We would gather at someones house, chow on Doritos and Mtn. Dew, and slay displacer beasts with Plus Five magic weapons.

This love of D&D extended into dressing up for Renaissance Festivals, as well as producing a theatrical version of the King Arthur legend for a high school English assignment. I was Queen Guenevere. Huzbend, King Arthur, of course. We called it, "The Pendragon Legend". It was made with my parents huge ass video camera and edited using two VCR's. We made our own costumes for it as well. Our knights armor was made out of cardboard and Excaliber out of a two-by-four. It was a masterpiece of its time.

As a 'tween and teenager, I loved reading comics. In fact, my senior year of high school, I had a job in a comic book store. This allowed me to have first access to all the hot comics before they hit store shelves. I have to say that I got A LOT of attention at the store from the, uh, clientelle. How many girls do you know that can argue about superheroes and their powers? I mean, come on. I was a nerdy comic book guys dream!

I also am, and was, a big fan of anime and manga. I mentioned in my first post on this blog about Princess from Battle of the Planets. Well, that was just the beginning. From there I fell in love with Robotech, which led me to Lum, which led me to Bubblegum Crisis and so on. I would spend hours drawing all my favorite characters. This obsession eventually reached its peak when Huzbend and I visited Japan a couple of years back. We studied everything we could about the country and even took language lessons.

I love Disney. We've been to Disney World at least 6 or 7 times (I lost count), been to Disneyland & California Adventure once, been to Tokyo DisneySea and Tokyo Disneyland once as well. I can't wait to go again. We even ran our first marathon THROUGH the DisneyWorld parks. Sigh. I miss Mickey so. I'm jonesin' for some Mickey waffles (wipes drool off chin).

What else?

I still like to dress up for Halloween.

We still watch cartoons. We love 'The Avatar'. It's on our DVR list.

I'm a big fan of Star Wars. I can recite lines from the movie. We stood in line for the midnight showing of Episode III. I think I dressed up as C-3PO one year for Halloween. My first lunchbox had an X-Wing fighter on it. I like Star Trek too. Next Generation was the best (sorry old school Trekkies). I even have a book explaining how to use the Klingon language. We are currently watching the new Battlestar Galactica. I watched the old series. Huge fan of Harry Potter. Stood in a midnight line for the book AS WELL as the most recent movie.

I own a Nintendo DS and have been known to play Animal Crossing for hours at a time.

Last but not least, and essentially what seals the deal is this. I've been to four concerts in my life. One was Madonna. Two were Van Halen. One was Weird Al Yankovic. Yes, Weird Al. I am a huge fan of Weird Al. It was the 'ALapalooza' tour.

He's got a new song out that speaks to me. Check it out when you get the chance. Here's a link to a video over at YouTube; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xEzGIuY7kw

Enjoy!

Retaliation

Baybee Katie has been adamant that I not upstage her blog entry and has, for the past 3 days, thwarted every attempt I have made at getting one posted. She is pretty good at it too. She's ruthless. She'll do whatever it takes. Whether it be; demanding food, wailing for absolutely no reason, making me run across the house to wind up the mobile, disarming me with her devilishly cute smile, wanting me to read her the "Five Little Monkeys" with puppet accompaniment for the 11th time in a row, or just pooping her diapies nonstop. There is one thing I can say, the kids got stamina. Either that or she's stubborn. Sheesh. Just to get back at her, I posted these 'not-so-nice' (but kinda funny) pics of her. TAKE THAT, little kid!

Hmmmmm. What's happened since my last post?

Huzbend and I took an Infant & Child CPR class this past Saturday. Katie came along for the ride as well. Why is it, when we go out into public, she decides that she is going to be a complete angel? The class lasted from 9am until about 12pm. She slept through the ENTIRE thing. It was amazing. Everyone was complimenting us on what a "nice, quiet baby" we had. HA! If they only knew. It was all an act, I say.

Anyways, the class was pretty good if not a little scary. It was good because we learned what to do if a kid/baby is choking and how to perform life saving CPR on them. It was scary because I just don't want to think about having to be in a situation where my child is not breathing and I am the only thing that is standing between them and death. Ugh. I guess it's better to be prepared than to stand there helpless. At least you can do something.

It was really easy to learn. We all got to practice our techniques on Lil' Annies (child size) and Baby Annies. Huzbend got a little TOO into it at one point and while doing chest compressions on our Lil' Annie, pushed his hand almost through the dummies chest to the floor. The instructor had to slow him down with a very polite, "Um. There in the back? That MIGHT be a little TOO hard." Ha! It was pretty funny. GRRR, HE-MANNNNNNNNN!

On Monday, I was supposed to take Katie to her 2 month checkup at 9am. We got up that morning and rushed around to get ready. I actually made it to the docs office about 10 minutes early! I walked up to the check-in counter and said, "Hi. We're here for a 9am appt.". I gave the lady our last name and she began to look us up in the computer. She then muttered, "Ummmm" and looked up at me perplexed. I thought to myself, 'This can't be good.' She says, "I'm sorry Ma'am. We have you down for an appt. next Tuesday the 24th at 9:30."

What????? I KNOW that the lady that I had made the appt. with told me to be there at 8:45am on Monday the 16th because I was the first appt. of the day. I KNOW that I didn't write it down wrong. BUT, I was nice. The docs office is less than 5 minutes away from our house. I was too tired to argue and decided to cut them some slack. Sigh. I had mentally prepared myself for this appt. too. She was going to get 5 vaccines. Now I gotta psych myself up again next week.

I was able to get the grocery shopping done early though because of the whole appt. debacle. I was also able to get Katie home from the grocery shopping trip before she went rip roarin' crazy too. Man, has she got a cry on her. Wow. You gotta hear it to believe it. She really makes you 'pay' if your not on your game. See the picture below and imagine a thousand fingers scraping their nails on a chalkboard or a million Lloyd Christmas clones making 'The Most Annoying Sound in the World' all at the same time. Dude, no lie.

It's been 2 months, but who's counting?

Helllllllllllllooooooooooooooooooo to all you loyal subscribers! Baybee Katie here.

Huh? You don't have to subscribe to this gibberish? You mean, we don't get paid? What is the deal with that? Who would spend the time to type all this stuff out and NOT get paid for it? Oh. Really? Sorry, Mommy. Didn't mean to 'dis you like that. To each his own, as they say.

Ahem.

Anyways! Today is the 2 month anniversary of my entrance into this world. Ahhhhhh. What a strange trip it's been. I can honestly say that I've had a wonderful time so far. I've done a bunch of stuff in the last month and made some new friends along the way. So, sit back and enjoy the latest installment of "Livin' the Baybee Lifestyle: A Life in Constant Transition".

One day, about 2 weeks ago, I was minding my own business when this chick started making faces at me. "How rude," I thought. She was sticking her tongue out, grimacing and even worse, laughing at me! LAUGHING, at ME! I was about to ask her what the hell she was staring at and if she wanted to "take it outside", when I was told I was looking into a mirror. Whoa. Dude.

It was then that I took a good look at myself. What is up with my hair? I mean look at it. I am balding on one side and the hair that I DO have sticks up in the back and the front so I look like a mutant Alfalfa. Take a look at the picture below. How could this happen?

Not only that, what is with all the flakes? I look like I have parmesan cheese spread all over my scalp. This does not make The Katie happy. How do my parental units let me go out in public like this? Ugh. How embarrassing. Enough depressing talk. I met some more cool people this month. Auntie Onion Dip and Uncle Junior came to visit. A good time was had by all, especially Mommy who enjoyed having other people deal with my, uh, shtuff. Mommy and Daddy tried to go out to dinner with them. Didn't quite pan out. I decided to throw a fit. Oh, you should've seen it. It was a classic. You might think it mean of me, but really it just comes down to the fact that I was NOT in the mood for Italian that night.

I also met a guy named Mickey Mouse. I overheard that he owns a lot of property all over the world and that he is worth millions, maybe even billions. Mommy said that one day we'll get to go visit him at his "kingdom". Well, I guess he is royalty too. CHA-CHING! Sign me up. I heard that he has a girlfriend already. But, he hasn't met me yet. Get me some Head and Shoulders and I MIGHT have a chance.

Who else did I meet? Oh yeah! Lambie. Lambie is a pretty cool dude. He hangs out over top of my swing. Best thing is that his brother, Lambie, and his other brother, Lambie, are always there too. They crack me up. They do this little dance. Mannnnnn, you just gotta see it. Here's a pic of them in action. Bad photo of me. I must have had a little too much to drink, if you know what I mean. Got the sleepies.
In the past month, I've given up the whole "Boob? What is that?" facade. I decided that Mommy had enough stress on her plate. I'd throw her a bone. How nice am I? I can now do both - boob AND bottle. I am THAT good. I've also recently taken up binky sucking too. I have achieved The Sucking Trifecta.

Hmmmm. What else?

I'm finding my voice. I haven't quite mastered the whole english language thing, so I just decided to make up my own language. I like to call it, "AHHHH-GUUUUish". There really are only a few sounds so far, but it's a work in progress.

Last week, I was able to read "The Hungry Catepillar" with Mommy. She reads way too slow. I kept trying to tell her, but she always replies to me the same way no matter what I say. It's always, "You don't say?" or "Oh yeah?". Sigh. I don't think she gets what I am trying to tell her. Speed it up woman! I'm not an idiot, you know.

I'm a little worried about Daddy. He rides his racing bicycle to and from work everyday. He says that it's quicker than sitting in traffic and that he can save money on gas. The problem is that sometimes he is just so wiped at days end that I think that he must be zombified. I mean, take a look at the picture below and you tell me. Doesn't he look possessed? Cuh-reeeeee-peeeeeeee.

Well, that is my life. Recently, Mommy and Daddy have realized that I am the cutest baby to ever reside on the planet Earth (even with the poopie diapers and uncontrollable dandruff). So, they've taken to dressing me in some crazy outfits. This is all in an attempt to take me down a notch. But, they can do their worst. I am still super cool. And DON'T you forget it!

Check out the socks. They are coordinated to match the outfit. Thanks a lot Grandma. Mommy can't wait to show my future boyfriends this one.

Here comes Katie CottonTail, hoppin' down the friggin' bunny trail....

Now, this one doesn't look too bad. Froggies. Cute. Pink. Cute. Me. Cute.

The feeties on the outfit. Gag me with a spoon.

A Thursday Soliloquy

To binky, or not to binky: that is the question.

Whether 'tis smarter in the long run to suffer the cries and screams of an unsettled baby, or to take measures against a sea of tantrums, and by pacifying, end them?

To pacify, to sleep; no more; and sleep to say we end watching Nick @ Nite and the thousand sleepless hours that we have become heir to; 'tis an outcome devoutly to be wished.

To binky, to sleep; To sleep: perchance for more than four hours; ay, there's the rub!
For in that sleep of binky-dom, what bad habits may come?

So, we recently started using a binky. Sometimes, at night, I have to use it to get Katie settled. She's recently decided that she doesn't want to go to sleep at the designated bedtime of 10pm. She wants to stay up and catch the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. The problem with the binky is that while it does settle her down, it actually ends up waking her up too.

Here's how it goes down:

She will suck away contently until she closes her eyes. She'll get into this trance like state. She's asleep, but sucking at the same time. The problem comes when she begins to fall into a deep, deep sleep. Her mouth relaxes and the binky starts to fall out. Then her brain remembers, "Hey, I was sucking on something!" This thought provokes her to startle herself as she throws about both arms, kicks out both legs straight and sucks the binky back into her mouth. It's the same thing that happens to an adult when they are trying to stay awake and find themselves drifting off. You "jump" back to a wakeful state when your brain tells your body, "HEY! NO SLEEPING!" After this "jump", she promptly starts to cry loudly (and hysterically) until I can calm her once more. This pattern repeats itself about 4 or 5 times until she can actually let that binky go and stay asleep or I come up with some other trick to get her to fall asleep. It's quite a process.

So, it's a double edged sword. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Hmmmmmm. I have no idea how to combat this. I WANT the binky to fall out when she gets into that deep sleep, but I don't want her to scare herself.

I tried waiting for the exact deep sleep moment when the binky is about to fall out and then grabbing it myself. That just woke her up even faster.

Then there is the whole question of her getting addicted to it. What happens if we can't break her of the habit and she NEEDS the binky to sleep and calm herself. We become slaves to the binky. I guess it might be better than thumb sucking or finger sucking though. At least, when we think it appropriate, we can take the binky away and not have to worry about the potential for orthdontics down the line. I would wish that fate on no man, or baby.

Sigh. What a quandry.

Hit the road, Nicodemus!

About a month ago, I walked into our kitchen at about 2:30am after a middle of the night feeding. I turned on the light and saw something move out of the corner of my eye. I thought to myself, "Oh God. Please don't let that be a huge cockroach." The thing kept moving and I was finally able to focus on it. I didn't have my glasses on, so it took a few seconds.

It was much too large to be a cockroach or any other bug for that matter. It was furry and it was fast. It was a mouse. He was picking up some crumbs under our kitchen table. I stood there frozen as he began to run towards my bare feet. Thankfully, he made a quick right turn and dove under the dishwasher. The next day, we found mouse poopies scattered about the kitchen floor. We had a mouse problem.

Ew.

At about this same time, I spotted and killed three gigantic spiders. These suckers were bigger than any spiders we had ever had in a house before. I did some research on them and found out that they are quite common out here in the Northwest. They are called, "Giant House Spiders". That is no joke. They actually have the word "GIANT" in their names.

Double Ew.

I guess we should be used to "home invasions". In our house back east we routinely had new and exciting house guests. Most of them made their presence known in the middle of the night. The critters would get up into our attic and then fall down between our bedroom wall and an unfinished stairway. Then they would spend all night squeaking and scratching because they were stuck. Alas, many came to their rodenty ends behind that wall.

We were able to save a few.

There was the mouse that we rescued by attaching a single serve cereal box to a climbing rope. We left a cheerio in the box and lowered it down to the spot he was stuck. As soon as he went in to get the cheerio, we pulled up the box. Not only did he get a rescue, he got a free meal.

Then there was the baby squirrel. That required a uber-long stick. We stuck the stick down between the wall and the staircase. Being the squirrely type, he could not resist the urge to climb. So, when he did climb his way up the stick, I grabbed him and stuck him in a tupperware container full of bird seed and ushered him outside.

There was also a bat. He had made himself nice and cozy under the air conditioner that we had in our bedroom window. Autumn came and it was time to get the unit out of the window. Huzbend, being the He-Man of the family, lifted the unit out of the window and out rolled a little brown bat. He had been partially squished by the weight of the air conditioner and the tight squeeze out the window. Since he was squished, he didn't really move around a lot. So, I had to pick him up, throw him in a ziploc and show him the door.

We had mice, we had squirrels, we had ants (carpenter AND little brown ones), we had wasps and bees and spiders. You name it. I guess the difference this time is that these mice are not just behind the walls, they are in our living space and making a damn mess of it.

A week or two ago, there was a hole in a package of bread that we had left on the counter. There was a chunk of bread missing as well. I thought that it must have ripped in the store, so I took out two peices (not the one with the hole in it) and ate a nice ham and turkey sandwich. It was later that we found a mouse poop on the counter. The damn mouse had found his way onto the counter and ate our bread. BLECK! I ate that bread, man. I ate mouse contaminated bread. We went out and bought a bread box.

Triple Ew.

The other night, after another midnight feeding, I walked into the kitchen and caught Sir Mouse red-handed standing on our kitchen counter. As soon as I turned on the light, he made a mad dash across the counter, across the sink, through the dish rack and under the counter right near the dishwasher. Bastard had climbed up the back of the dishwasher to access the counter.

The next morning after a quick inspection, I found poop near our stove burners, near our toaster oven, on the dish dryer rack, on a wooden spoon IN the dish drying rack, and one lone poop near our drying baby bottles. He had eaten through a package of hot dog rolls and ate half of one bun. Oh-HO! Bold.

I called Terminix. Believe it or not, they DO take care of mice. The guy came this past Saturday. Upon inspecting our crawl space (we don't have a basement), he told us that we do have a mouse problem BUT we also have a RAT problem. RATS. What the hell? He had found their nests and their poop down there. So, he laid down all sorts of traps and sealed up as many possible entrances that he could find. He knocked down all the spider webs outside and sprayed for them as well. BTW, do you know that they don't have termite problems out here? Mostly carpenter ants. Hmph. Interesting.

Anyways, when Mr. Terminix was done with all this, he came up to have us sign the yearly contract and pay him our lives savings. He asked us, "Did the house inspector even go into the crawl space?" Yes, the inspector DID go into the crawl space and had told us that he saw no evidence of rodents or house pests. The Terminix guy thinks that the inspector guy must have been blind. Mr. Terminix had found several OLD carcasses in there of loooooooonnnnnnnnnng dead rats.

Quadruple Ew.

Sigh. I don't think we woulda bought this place if I knew the Rats of N.I.M.H. were in the crawl space. You see, the rats are probably in cahoots with the mice. They are using them to slip into the kitchen to bring them food. In exchange for this, they let the mice keep their measley little lives and have a share of the spoils. The rats have most likely also struck a deal with the spiders. They use these behemoths as enforcers to keep other bugs from touching what they consider "their" food supply. Either that or they use them as message carriers. They strap little notes to their eight legs to get messages from one rat colony to the next. Knowing these rats, as I do, they've probably already tapped into our water supply and our electricity......next thing you know they'll be setting up pulley systems in our back yard for mouse relocation projects.

No way, dude. They are SO outta here. I'm telling you right now, losers, pack up and head out to Thorn Valley. You guys ain't lasting more than a week with all the traps we got set around here.

Besides all the food contamination, electricity stealing and Extreme Home Make Over - Mouse Edition, could you imagine stumbling upon this in the middle of the night?!?!?

No spank you.

I'm Fed Up

I need to lose weight. I can't stand this anymore.

Before I became pregnant, I had gotten down to the weight I was in high school. It was awesome. I had worked really hard to get there too. I had eaten right. I was excercising twice a day. For once, it had paid off.

I remember going out Columbus day of last year and spending about 2 hours at the GAP buying new clothes to show off all my hard work. Then, I donated all my old "fat" clothes to the Goodwill.

DOH!

One month later, I was preggo.

So, it wasn't so smart that I went and bought new clothes and got rid of the old ones. I mean, by October we knew that we were going to try to get pregnant. I guess I just didn't think it would happen so, um, fast. I thought I would have a grace period of a couple of months at least.

By the end of December/beginning of January, I had to pack away all those nice new clothes and start to buy maternity wear. I figured, "Hey, now I will have an excuse to start working out ASAP after I give birth."

Hmmmm. How delusional I was. I'm still wearing my maternity clothes. I've got nothing else to wear. Even my old underwear doesn't fit. Okay. Sorry. T.M.I..

Since about the 4 week postpartum mark, I have been walking on the treadmill with Katie strapped to me in a baby carrier. This was all that I was allowed to do according to the OB/GYN because I was still healing internally from the surgery. At least it was something. Just enough to not make me feel like a total lard-butt.

Tuesday, I went in for my 6 week postpartum checkup at the OB/GYN.
Uterus - shrunk back to normal size
Cervix - all healed up nicely
External Suture Sight - all healed and looking good (I guess everyone is entitled to their opinion. I think it looks disgusting)
Internal Suture Sight - should be healed up

So, what the hell is that globulous pouch dominating my middle region???? I would assume it's a big lump of fat. I was kinda hoping that she would say that my uterus wasn't all the way back to normal. No luck. Ugh. I've got a pot belly. Don't get me wrong. If you remember I was up at least 50 some-odd pounds at the height of my pregnancy weight gain. I've lost 30 of it. That's all good. It's just this last 20 that just WON'T GO AWAY.

All the books say that breastfeeding will help you shed the pounds. Um, no. It hasn't helped me at all. The 30 that I lost was all water weight (remember the swollen tootsies). They expect you to eat an extra 400 to 500 calories a day when breastfeeding and you are still supposed to lose weight. Um, no again.

The Doc says that I can return to my normal activity level. I can run, walk, bike, hike, pole-vault, basically do whatever I want. That's all well and good. The problem is that I have a 1.5 month old that won't let me!!!

The little Dudette needs some kind of schedule. Please see example below:

Today, I put her in the swing and she fell asleep. I thought to myself, "This is it! My chance to work out!" She woke up.
I decided, "Well, she's up. No use trying to work out now." She fell back to sleep.
Then, I said to myself, "Well, she'll probably wake right back up if I walk out of the room. If she does wake up, I have a grace period of about 10 minutes. She'll lie there awake staring at the lambie mobile. I might as well take this opportunity to take a shower and bag the work out thing." I took my shower and walked out. She was sound asleep.

I started to get dressed. She woke up. I finished getting dressed. She's back asleep. I think, "She'll be up in about 15 minutes because she'll be hungry. I fed her about 3 hours ago. I can take this time to check my email and get a quick blog entry in and then I'll feed her. Then we can then go to Walmart without a baby freak-out." So, I left her in the swing.

As I have been writing this, she's been asleep. It's been almost 45 minutes. I've wasted another primo workout opportunity. I just don't want to get started and then have to stop. There's nothing worse than getting up a good sweat and being completely out of breath and then having to stop. You've got all this adrenaline and endorphines flowing and then BOOM. STOP. It's the worst. Really, I'm constantly worried that she'll wake up or be hungry or something. I hate to hear her scream.

So much for getting in the ultimate workout today. Wait. Maybe I should go right now.....

"WAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"

Sigh. Dammmmmmmmmmiiiiiiittttttttttttttttttttt.

"I'm ready for my closeup, Mr. Demille"

Overheard at a recent photo shoot of newcomer celebrity, "Baybee Katie".

Please Note: The captions relate to the pictures directly above.

"You want me to WHAT? Pose for pictures for your 'Thank You' cards? Are you KIDDING me? You're totally serious? Mannnnnnnnn. Like, I don't have anything better to do right now. I could be concentrating on finding my thumb....but NOOOOOOO, gotta take some pictures instead. I better be getting something for this. At the very least some breast milk, freshly squeezed."

"Soooooo, a horse walks into a bar.....Seriously, folks."

"No. Really? You're kidding, right? My agent told me that there would be milk here and plenty of it!"

"Get my agent on the frickin' phone! NOW!"

"BWA-HAHAHAHAHAHA. You guys shoulda seen yourselves just now. I was just kidding! You guys take things way too seriously. Haven't you people heard of 'sarcasm'? Jeez."

"Karaoke anyone? How 'bout a little Tom Jones?! 'It's not unusual to be loved by anyone. It's not unusual to have fun with anyoooonnnnnne. But, when I see you hanging about with anyoooonnnnnne. It's not unusual to see me cryyyyyyyyy, I wanna diiiiiiie!' Thank you, Thank you! Please, no autographs, no money. Just throw diapers!"

Recent reports have been verified. This up-and-coming star is definitely a D-I-V-A.