So...

LMAO



Gearing up for trip to a big city to see friends. I'm planning on driving with both boys by myself. This should be, erm, fun.

Grrrrrr

I just found out that my trip to St. Louis is in nasty jeopardy. B could get time off of work to go, I know he could. But he won't. He works for a movie theater. He's the oldest on site employee. They seriously can live without him for a weekend. I'm even able to handle four 10-hour days in a row so that he can make up his precious hours. But I really really doubt I can get both kiddos and myself to St. Louis (please see post regarding cities in which I hate to drive) in one piece in anything under many more hours than MapQuest recommends. Argh!

Harry Potter 6---Total Spoiler

Here's what I'm thinking: RAB is Regulus Black. The Horcrux is actually at Grimmauld Place, because it's the locket that was casually mentioned in OotP that was large and heavy and that none of them could open.

Harry's inheriting of Grimmauld Place will be a good thing ultimately. We definitely haven't seen the last of Kreacher, and I think he's a nasty little being, but Dobby will counter him. I think Dobby will probably leave Hogwarts now that Dumbledore's gone and will come work for and live with Harry. I have no idea whether Harry will return to Hogwarts next year.

On to Dumbledore. It had to happen sometime. :::shrug::: The hero has to go on alone, and all of the adults surrounding Harry are now gone. The Weasleys are there, of course, and it will give me great satisfaction to see something rotten happen to that git Percy, but not on the same level as Dumbledore was. I think he was asking Snape to kill him rather than let Draco do it. He probably knew of the Unbreakable Vow, and wanted Draco's innocence protected. I think that in having Draco so devoted to his father, and his mother obviously loving him so much, that Rowling has shown us that Draco is capable of love, therefore I think there's hope for him yet.

I think one of the things we'll find out about Snape is that he was in love with Harry's mother, and that's why he hates Harry so much, but has been unable to harm him. Especially if Harry having his mother's eyes is actually significant.

Snape killing Dumbledore will get Snape in even better with Voldemort, and that will ultimately lead to great help for the Order of the Phoenix. However, Dumbledore said that many people thought they were very close to Voldy, when in fact, none of them were. Snape makes particular mention of Voldy's trust in him in the first chapter. This may indeed prove to be Snape's downfall, and I will also venture a guess that it will be Bellatrix Lestrange's as well. I like Ron and Hermione together ('bout dang time), and I do like the Harry/Ginny combination. :) I do think Ginny's previous interactions with Voldemort does come into play in Book 7 events. I also think Snape's half-blood status will be expounded upon more in the next book. I kind of felt it was glossed over in this one. I think that's about it...

Oh yeah, and I think Book 7 will be enormous.

People @@

My mom took me shopping the other day, and the boys did great. A lady in the dressing room commented several times on how nice the stroller was (hee!) and how cute they were, etc. They got fussy just as I was getting my own clothes back on and walking out. I turned to hang up my rejects and I heard the lady mutter something to her daughter about how pathetic it was that these poor babies had to sit there and cry while selfish mommy tried on clothes, ending with, "I just hate hearing babies cry." I put my clothing on the rack and replied, "I do, too," and walked back to my calming-down munchkins (my mom was pushing them). The look on her face was priceless. She said, "Oh! I had no idea you were still there!" and covered her mouth. I'm glad she at least had the decency to look ashamed of herself.

Harry Potter. :)

H and I went to Barnes and Noble last night to get my copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. It was fun. I met the same friends with which I'd gone to the last HP release party, and we made wands and ate cookies. I only had to stand in line for 9 minutes, and I was the 84th person in line. Of course, I'd told B I wanted to take cash. He didn't remember to get it on the way home, so he handed me the debit card. Our debit card hates me. Hates me with a pure fury that only an inanimate piece of plastic can have. It never, and I do mean never works for me. DH can run the card and it sails right on through with approvals left, right, and center. I try to run the card for $19.30 from a bank account that supposedly has $35 and it gets declined. Not once, but three times. @@ Fortunately, a friend stepped in and took care of it for me. I was so upset about it. :/

Anyway, I get home and B checks the bank account and the only thing we can figure out is that he got gas at the grocery store gas pump which routinely overauthorizes credit/debit card purchases. I have no idea why that's even legal, and I think it sucks.


On to other things.

My due date board has begun the inevitable discussion on when to start cereal, which leads me to an astounding leap of logic. A few people have mentioned that their pediatricians have told them to start cereal after the baby is taking more than a certain amount of formula per day (32, for the sake of argument), as they can get too much formula.

Here's where my logic starts to work. I thought the commonly held idea is that formula is adequate nutrition for the first 6 months, and held by some to be just as good as breastmilk. Please explain this to me.

If a child who is taking 34oz of formula per day 'needs' cereal, and the child who is taking 34oz of breastmilk per day does not, then it would seem to follow that formula is not adequate nutrition if the child needs more. Does my logic hold up? It's highly possible that staying up until 5 this morning reading Harry Potter has had a greater influence on my mental acuity than I had anticipated. If so, please ignore my ramblings. If not, then maybe there's something to it.

I got out

of the house. :) N wasn't a bad kid today, he was just very 2. He must not be feeling well. He was extremely clingy, and I feel like I was awful to him. :( I rarely just need to get out of the house, but today I did. So B took the boys and sent me out a movie with my friend R. We saw "The Fantastic Four" and it was great. :) I don't mind suspending a little disbelief for a reasonable flick.

I've bred the ultimate bottle snob. H refuses to drink from a bottle. Period. If I have to go to a chiropractic appointment, he'll resolutely refuse to even try the bottle and nurse voraciously when I return.

When I got back from the movie tonight, he was contentedly sitting in B's lap, sucking furiously on his fist. He had the best nursing session he's had all day. LOL

I swear he missed me. :) He nursed for a good 10 minutes straight, and then pulled all the way off and stared and me and smiled and giggled and cooed for another 15 minutes. :) He's asleep on the boppy on my lap at the moment. :)

N sobbed his little heart out when I left. I felt bad for leaving him, but he was with his dad-DEE!, and I needed a serious break from Mommydom. B said he didn't stop crying until they got in the car and went to the mall. I still feel guilty. His poor, sad little eyes watched me from the window as I left. I've been sleeping with H in a separate room the last few nights (less kicking from N), but tonight I'll go back in with him. He needs what he calls a Nuggle from his mom. :)

I had my break, and I missed my children terribly. Now I'm ready to jump back in to being a mom again. :)

An Anniversary

I just kissed my 23-month-old for the last time.

When we wake up tomorrow, he'll be 2. I can't believe it. It seems like it was such a long time ago, and yet so recent.

This time two years ago, I was getting ready to go to bed. We were just getting home from grabbing a bite to eat after walking the mall for hours. I'd visited my kinesiologist earlier in the day, and contractions were picking up, but then they slowed down again.

I was tired, and we went to sleep at 10. If I manage to stay up until 11:30 tonight, I'll catch the exact anniversary of my waking into the last 6 hours of my labor. The long, long journey that brought me my beautiful firstborn son.

The baby whose small self fit so snugly into my arms is now a little boy who runs cars over my legs and runs around the house giggling madly at the sight of the cat on the porch. He sings his ABCs, he yells, "One, Two, Jump!" and plants his bum on the couch with a gigantic bounce. He gives his brother hugs and kisses, loves to go look at cars with Daddy, and climbs up beside me and pats my face as we doze off for our afternoon nap.

His name means, "Gracious gift of God." He truly is. I am so thankful for my little boy.

Happy Birthday N Myko!

Driving

There've been some huge storms here this evening, and I was contemplating road trips while hanging out in the basement with The Husband and Kids.

St. Louis: The highway is the crazy let's send you around this loop so that you miss your exit, and then deposit you right back on the highway just on the other side of it. And while we're at it, let's keeps switching which side of the road the exits are on, so if you take a loop one time, you might miss it, but if you avoid it the next time, you'll miss it, too.
And heck, let's make every few exits send you into a really bad neighborhood. The kind where you immediately want to roll up your windows and lock your doors and you ardently wish you were driving an armored humvee-type neighborhood.
We don't have those where I live.


Little Rock: This city thinks it's fun to send a poor, unsuspecting motorist into oncoming traffic in order to enter or exit the highway. The speed limit on the frontage road is 50-55mph. The highway entrance and exit ramps cut across the frontage road in a sort of diagonal. There are yield signs for the driver entering or exiting the highway. In order to cross them, you must wait for the diabolical timing of the stoplights at the end of the frontage road to space out the traffic so that you have just enough time to get across the road and get your back end out of it before the next line of cars comes barrelling down. This is something I imagine I could get used to. The 10 whole feet of off-ramp, however, I cannot. I entered Little Rock just after dark. I found my exit, and expecting an off-ramp long enough to slow down without having to slam on my brakes, I started slowing down. Imagine my surprise when I had to brake harder than I ever had before in order to stay just behind the yield sign. Then I got freaked out again when I saw headlights that appeared to be coming at me. I nade it to my hotel in one piece, but never quite got the hang of that particular set up. The rest of the highway system, however, isn't too bad, and the city and surrounding areas are actually laid out rather nicely.

Vancouver: Eh. I like Victoria better.

The Special

I have had The Special. The Special is a sinus infection, a developing double ear infection, and pink-eye. @@ A sinus infection will usually knock me on my ass for a day or two, so this 4 and 5 day business was really getting to me. I'm glad to find out I actually am pretty darn sick with a major pain in the ass combination, and not just a weenie for a sinus infection.

I accepted antibiotics, and am now dealing with the unpleasant abdominal side effects of amoxicillin. Yay for nausea. On the other hand, I really do feel better already.