On The Curb

Hear ye! Hear ye!

The twins have been eating solid (the term solid being questionable) foods the past few weeks. Listen. Do you hear that? It’s the deafening roar of pennies steadily streaming from our bank accounts. Crikey, these gummy babies blaze through some baby food.

I decided to start the twins on solids at 5 months, striking a balance between Gab’s 6-month go at pears and Gav’s earlier 4-month foray into Pureeville (i was under more pressure with him, living in his grandparents’ house ::shivers:: ::froths at mouth just a wee bit::). Ethan had been waving the red flag “Feed me, Seymour” for quite some time. He would smack away at dinner, watching us eat, and was well on his way to hitting the street corners with his perfect mime routine of ‘baby eating a steak.’

So, I grabbed a few jars of pears and gave it a go. (after buying a couple of actual pears and dreaming i would make the baby’s food myself…i read a few sites; steam the fruit, puree with some amount of water, voila! a meal fit for a pint-sized, crapping his pants king…i ate one pear myself and tossed out the other moldy one yesterday…inspiration can be fleeting with me)

While I thought Ethan would go apesh!t crazy with the food, he actually had a bit of a time getting the hang of the whole ’spoon in mouth, intake food, swallow food’ bit. Being a champion breastfeeder, he kept thrusting the food back out with his tongue.

Alani, on the other hand. ZOWIE! Very first try…she knew exactly what to do with that spoon and food. You know how normally you’re spooning food from their chin, cheeks, and forehead back into their mouth? This gal did not lose one drop. Not a single drop. The princess bibs are all still pristine whereas the blue I Drive Trucks and Shovel Dirt bibs look like they’ve been used for that exact purpose - shoveling dirt.

(for fun and because i’m twisted, i sometimes put the Little Miss bib on Ethan…it’s just a catcher’s mitt for lost food and shouldn’t matter the color or design, but still so.darn.cute to see that big boy looking up at me with Little Miss embossed in pink across his chest)

Both kiddos are eating well now and still breastfeeding. (i’m always a little nervous they’ll decide to bid the b00bs adieu once they discover the world of pureed madness…bah, just a bit of worry wart on my part)

Although I’m buying canned/jarred/stomped into a fine gloopy consistency by enslaved baby food preparing fairies/pre-packaged baby food, I still fancy the idea of making some on my own. My dad is drowning in peaches from his peach trees (yes, peaches from peach trees, can you believe it? not peaches from pear trees nor apple trees…peaches from peach trees…i really should close my eyes and rest for minute, don’t you think?) and has a super deluxe garden ready to burst forth with all sorts of foods…squash, cucumbers, watermelons, potatoes, corn, tomatoes, cantaloupes, various types of peppers (none of which i’m keen on…i’m not a pepper person), green beans, and more stuff I can’t remember. Also, several other fruit trees aside from the peaches (which, yes, bear fruits other than peaches…zzzzzzz). So, yeh, I may make a drive up to Hometown, U.S.A. soon and load up on Dad’s homegrown goodness.

(i would really like to grow some foods myself, but seeing as how i just let two raspberry bushes almost die and, in turn, freecycled them to better raspberry bush parents, i’m not so sure i’d be the best gardener…watering regularly seems to escape me…now, if i had to go out there and breastfeed everybody, i might succeed in growing some grub)

I’ll leave you with the obligatory photos of babies eating food. You knew they were coming.

Oh, and after raving about what a clean eater Alani is, I go and make a lier of myself with this peach-smeared pic. She wasn’t too hip on the peaches at first. Also, she’s wearing a bib of Gav’s I managed to keep with me through all the years and moves.

Uttered from my lips far too often in this house:

• “Use Your Brain!” - Usually gutterly groaned following Gav’s panicked run through the house with some sugary concoction of soda or juice spilled in his lap, thus dripping the ant aphrodisiac (antphrodisiac) everywhere.
• “No teeth!” or “Don’t kiss like that!” - I know…sounds like raunchy bedroom banter, huh? Ah, tis not the case. Miss Gab has become quite the violent kisser with the twins. She likes to kiss, then see immediate lasting proof of that kiss.
• “Who’s got big balls?!?” - My highly inappropriate verbal exchange with the boy twin when I change his diaper. No worries. I’ll stop saying that when he’s able to answer, “I do!”
  • It’s even more inappropriate when the day’s gone on forever and I forget whose diaper I’m changing and ask Alani about her big balls.
• “Helloooo! I’m talking!” - The bipedal boys in this house (ethan is exempt as he currently travels via attachment to one of my b00bs or half-rolls across a small space of floor) have a nasty habit of walking away while I’m trying to tell them something. This is sure to turn me into my mother, sharing my life’s history with the grocery store clerk or the librarian who only wants to clear the fines on my overdue account, not hear all about how sometimes the left contact lens is blurry and the right is perfectly fine, but then, suddenly, the blurry swaps sides, it’s weird, maybe they’re dirty, i’m always picking eye boogers from the corner of my eye, i bet i’m introducing some sort of filth i picked up when i opened the door, i don’t know, right now the right is blurry but the left is fine. Ahem. I have important things to say. Listen to me, people of this house!

I’ve seen this mosaic idea floating around the web lately, but finally took the bull by the horns after admiring kilowatthour’s. A meme in photos.

The concept:

a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. Using only the first page, pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s Flickr Toys: mosaic maker.

**So as not to step on anyone’s celluloid toes, I only searched photos with Creative Commons licensure. Proper props are listed below along with most of my answers provided in each link title…no, I don’t eat beetles and my high school wasn’t Wildcat High; our mascot was the furry pu$$ycat…oh, and I don’t love metal horses most in life, but my precious non-screaming children.**

The Questions:

1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food? right now?
3. What high school did you attend?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What you want to be when you grow up?
10. What do you love most in life?
11. One Word to describe you.
12. Your flickr name.

Proper credits to the photo masters

1. Overflow at Dee Why, 2. spotted cucumber beetle, 3. Wildcat, 4. Purple Chihuly Chandelier, 5. NYC - SoHo: Prince Street Subway Station, 6. Pina Colada and Mojito, 7. My desert island in the sun., 8. Creme Brulée, 9. If Satisfied…, 10. Free Coffee? Take my child, please…, 11. Adaptive Path Sixth Anniversary Party, 12. Cow on the curb.

Look who’s destroying my n!pples! I mean, look who’s got her first tooth poking through!

I saw this wee gem of a tooth barely visible under the skin last week. I knew something was up as Alani has been gnawing the sh!t out of my milky mamas for a couple of weeks now. She would clamp down on one and smile at me with her eyes. My precious piranha.

Howdy hello. I have a backlog of events to report. The latest being my recent purchase (a mere 20 minutes ago) of an actual desk/computer chair. Catch your breath. I know it’s too much excitement for one blog entry. Once I pick up the handy dandy wheeled seating device, I’ll be all over the internet, writing like a comfortably seated über-inspired visionary. (i’m expecting this chair to change my life)

Now, on to other news that doesn’t involve my a$$ seating arrangement.

I attended my dad’s “family” reunion the other weekend…no, not that weekend…the other one…yeh, that weekend. I “air quote” because I had no clue who most of the people were. Most everyone had some affiliation with a Lurlene or Lorraine…”Hi, there. I’m Lurlene/Lorraine’s niece/daughter/2nd cousin in-law.” Okay.

Dad had to jet 20 minutes after I arrived (specifically, 20 minutes after I’d driven the 2+ hour journey…at least the twins slept and the two G’s zoned out with the dvd player the entire ride…gab even insisted on wearing the headphones out of the car and amidst the family reunioners…each person approached her slowly, commenting to me, “Oh, she’s….” -long pause- “cute”). One of my uncles had exhausted his last Percocet was not feeling well and was using my Dad’s car as the shiny red nose to guide his sleigh back to familiar territory.

So, once Dad had vacated the premises, I was left with the Lurlene/Lorraine contingency. I signed the guest book for me and my kid posse which is always an eyebrow-raiser. We have three different last names among us. Signing up for anything is a circus.

Gav Blahblahblah.

And, your daughter is Gab Blahblahblah.

No, she’s Gab Yaddayaddayadda.

So, you’re Mrs. Blahblahblah? Or, Mrs. Yaddayaddayadda?

Neither. I’m Janet. Miss Jackson if you’re nasty.

Paperwork squared away, I figured it was still too soon to hop back in the car. The kids needed to burn some energy. So, we took a leisurely stroll around the lake. Well, not all the way around the lake. Maybe a few hundred feet as I had Alani strapped to me (we’ve been using the baby björn lately as she sweats her bajeebers, whatever those are, off all mummified wrapped in the moby wrap…i, obviously, need to attend a baby wearing meeting for some wrap and sling lessons…i have a padded maya sling that’s never been taken out of the package and nylonthread relays that’s a sweaty deal, too…oh, and poor ethan…he’s so heavy, his hefty legs turn all purple and splotchy in either björn or moby…so, he usually calls shotgun for the stroller…oh, and while i’m rambling off topic here, i’ve only taken the baby limo out once…right now, it’s easier to wear alani, push ethan, and have gab run alongside…but, eventually, i’ll regularly don my limo driver hat…for now, i’m a pack mule).

Where the hell am I? Oh, the few hundred feet nature trek.

Yeh, so Alani assuming the bullet-proof vest position, Ethan in the stroller, and Gav wrangling Gab to stay on the path and away from the tempting turtles and ducks in the water.

And, here is where I illustrate my multiple personalities. Candy candy with the babies, average Joe with Gab, and an O.C.D. grouch with Gav. I should lighten up, eh? As long as you don’t press anything…because it’s recording.

I give you Pink Blanket Takes a Stroll…

Grabbing a quick sec at the computer to share the Lighting of the Great Lightbulb that just occurred in the car (on the way back from fetching a $40 box of diapers…$40?!?…for one child’s precious bum…crikey).

E waited in the car while I ran in just as the store was closing. I chuckled to myself at his offer that he stay in the car, knowing how the twins loathe stationary vehicles. Must.keep.vehicle.moving.at.all.times or bear the wrath of one or more screamers. While Alani has diligently earned her role as The Screamer, Ethan is equally guilty when it comes to losing his shit at redlights and extended waits in the drive-thru bank teller line.

Yeh, you wait in the car, buddy.

True to form, E rolled up to the front door with his forehead buried in the steering wheel and two B-movie screamers carrying on in the seats behind him. I plunked the elephant crate box of diapers in the trunk and worked out my giggles before entering the car.

Wheels rolling, the screaming was instantly replaced by slumped heads and silence. Then, E perfectly described his and my opposing personalities,

Ahhhhh, I cannot handle Alani’s crying. It’s not even crying. It’s screaming. And, she goes from, ‘Oh look at me and my cute dimples as I smile!’ to ‘Ohmygod, I’m screaming my head off like I’m strapped in a bed of fire ants!’ Instant change. Smiling to screaming!

Ethan, on the other hand, he builds. He’ll make some barely audible noises to let you know, ‘Umm, I’m not so happy,’ then progresses to a slightly higher level of fussiness again and again until he breaks out in a full cry if he ever even gets to full out crying. That, I can handle.

I sat there listening to him, trying to keep a straight face and wondering if he realized what he was saying. I couldn’t resist.

Soooo, who is who here, would you say?

Without missing a beat, E replied,

Alani is me and Ethan is you. She and I are so not going to get along.

The mirror can be quite powerful sometimes.

Okay, my kids aren’t making national headlines. Just your local bloglines here. Well, international bloglines now that I think about it. Hey, that’s mega headlines. (okay, i’ll stop thinking and just move along now)

Let’s start with the weest of wee ones…los twins. I never gave you the skinny on the fat of their 4-month check-up (now that they’re almost 5-months…timeliness is not my strong suit).

• Alani had reached 13 pounds, steadily creeping up her own growth curve. She looks so small just eyeballing her, but girth-wise she and Ethan are wearing the same size onesies (i love onesies btw…that’s basically the only attire each of my baby kids has worn, even gav back in his day…why aren’t we as adults snapping our clothes 3 times in the crotch?)
• Ethan, the whopper with cheese no onions (that’s how my whopper rolls), was over 17 pounds at 4 months. He’s resting at the top of his growth curve, but the doctor did make sure to inform us that he’s just big, nothing pathological. He’s so large, people have started asking how far apart in age he and Alani are. They think she’s a newborn and he’s already reached his first birthday.
• Lengths/heights: Both were hitting the 26 inch mark with Alani just a half inch longer/taller.
• Both are jabberwackies with their constant squealing, babbling, goo-gooing and baa-baaing. It really is adorable to watch. They don’t necessarily communicate with each other at this point (although alani gave ethan a major hicky on his heel yesterday…what she was trying to communicate other than, ‘hey bro, pass the hot sauce,’ i’m not sure…those chubby feet make ideal teething toys). Their babble is mostly self-centered, just testing and perfecting the all mighty voice box.
• Alani has calmed a bit on the caterwauling frontier. Her key to calm is to nap on a regular basis. I know, I know. That’s the key to everyone’s calm, especially babies. But, Little Miss Nap Nazi Gab makes it her business to keep all eyelids open at all times around here. “No nap for you!”
  • I at least get Alani snoozing in a swing in her room at regular intervals while entertaining Gab on the opposite end of the house. (yes, i’ve cloned myself…my clone is quite an efficient little b!tch) Ethan, he who can sleep through dynamite blasts, is easy…I can plop him down quite literally anywhere and he’ll sooth himself off to la-la land.

Let’s skip over Gab for now (as she’s occupying the bottom rung of my totem pole of happiness at the moment) and chat about Gav for a bit.

Gav came barreling in the house last Friday, sweating and gasping for breath. What follows is a string of words you never want to hear spewing from your child’s lips…

THE COPS ARE ON THEIR WAY! I’M GONNA BE ARRESTED! HIDE ME!

Keep in mind, Gav’s 12 years old, an all-A honor student (which, yeh, i know in this day and age doesn’t mean he’s incapable of creating some havoc…the last week of school he landed in school suspension for telling a girl, “If you don’t stop making that farting noise with your book, I’m going to bury you six feet under”…according to school rules, that was an indirect threat, although he kept harping, “But, Mom, it was sarcasm! I was being sarcastic!”…oh dear, my sarcasm needled its way in the poor guy’s genes). Gav thinks a glass of wine makes you an alcoholic, and also thinks people who curse are toothless, crapping in the woods rednecks (i am sometimes toothless and occasionally relieve myself behind some nearby shrubbery while consuming wine from a box ::yeehaw hiccup:: all to say, sometimes i speaketh with forked tongue).

Back to Gav.

So, wild-eyed Gav starts pacing the length of the house, I’m juggling two babies, he’s peering outside through closed curtains, and rambling at supersonic speeds. All I can catch are “Cat” “Old lady” “Ditch” “this kid” “that kid” “that girl” “that old lady” “BB gun”

::screech:: goes the needle across the record

Did he just say BB gun? And cat? And old lady? Aww, shit.

Turns out the cat phase of the story did not coincide with the BB gun. Thank my lucky charms.

Gav “found” a cat, picked it up, and carried it to this and that boys’ house. Their house is in direct line of sight with this snooty old unfriendly redneck bitch woman who lives across the street (e and i have tried on multiple occasions to speak to her…she will not even look in our direction). I guess she sent her daughter (or granddaughter? i really i have no idea their relation aside from the fact that they smoke together in their driveway…her smoking buddy) to fetch the cat who was already off licking its butt in someone else’s yard by that point.

Gav went on to add how this or that boy asked him to hold the BB gun (he says this and that boy were shooting cans and he did nothing but hold the ’shoot your eye out’ apparatus that one time…who knows) about the same time this bitch woman decided to yell across the yards, “I’m calling the cops on you, boy.” (i had not realized i was living in cootsville until this point)

I figured it was all just a bunch of silly drama and tried getting Gav to unwind. But, sure enough, up cruised a cop car in front of the house. I hadn’t showered, wasn’t wearing a bra, doubt I’d even brushed my teeth, Alani was now screaming, Ethan’s puked all over my shirt, Gab’s dressed only in a soggy diaper,…”Hi, Jerry Springer? Yes, I’m booked and ready to appear on your Thursday episode of Who Dat Baby’s Daddy. Do I have to wear shoes? What about pants? Are those optional as well?”

The black-and-white was talking to the old hag woman across the street.

I braced myself for our turn, but 10 minutes later he cruised up the street and hung a left towards this and that boys’ house. Whew.

This and that boys’ mom later came to our house explaining the “mishap” and how old hag woman across the street has it out for her kids because her 4-year old mooned the woman a year ago. Go figure.

Hey, are you still here? ::nudge nudge:: Wake up. That was my rambling way to say Gav is out of school for summer vacation. Yippee.

I’ll try not to be so blabber mouthy with Gab’s update. (who is presently being adorable roaming around the house in Gav’s scream mask…my definition of adorable might vary slightly from yours…deranged, adorable…they’re much the same around here)

Photo de photobunny

Did you know breastfeeding leads to x-ray vision? After several years of being milked, you and your two eyeballs are diagnosing hair-line fractures and learning that your neighbor wears his wife’s red satin thongs under his business attire on Fridays.

As part of my Mother’s Day swag, I visited my friendly Costco optometrist yesterday for my overdue yearly eye exam. I’m tired of looking like a physically abused librarian with my warped glasses. Since I haven’t caressed the surface of my eyes with my fingertips in over a year, I needed an updated prescription for contact lenses.

And, optometrists, unlike dentists, don’t boogity-boo scare me. So, I’m cool hanging out with the peeper doctor on a regular basis. (do.not.ask how often i visit the dentist…basically, my lower jaw will have to fall to the floor before i can be dragged into the dentist’s chair)

Your basic eye exam with a few changes. The initial ‘let’s get a look at those eyes’ apparatus - I’m gazing upon a precious little house on a hill, only it keeps alternating between, “Damn, I shouldn’t have had that last case of beer” blurry and “Damn, these are some vivid hallucinogens” sharply clear. Apparently, this was the computer giving me its personal eye exam to outdate the trained human in the room. After it prescribed my lenses, the computer and I played an engaging game of Global Thermonuclear War.

Another change - instead of adding numbing drops to my eyes followed by the pressure check, I experienced the “air puff” test. This was equivalent to opening a can of biscuits in front of each eye. POP! POP! Rather, PUFF! PUFF! but that doesn’t quite get across the startle nature of having air randomly “puffed!” at each eye. I hate being startled. Jack-in-the-box…I loathed that particular toy. The guy in the haunted house who jumps out at you with a buzzing chainsaw? Also, not my cup of chai.

The remainder of the exam was your usual Better? Worse? Better? Worse? which always makes me feel like I’m choosing the wrong ‘answers’ thus permanently effing up my eyesight. I never give confident replies. “Umm, that one? Maybe? I don’t know? My name is Tiffany? I’ll be your waitress?”

Ah, but the great news. My vision has improved since my last exam (January, 2007). Three powers better in one eye and two powers better in the other. (powers? i’m not sure of the correct lingo. 3-something and 2-something better) Kicka$$, eh?

As I’ve lost all semblance of social skills, I rambled incessantly throughout the exam about the twins, Gab, breastfeeding night and day, and may have even alerted her when my milk let down midway through the exam. My personal ’shut-up’ sensor is irreparably broken.

So, when it came time to tell me the results, proving she was actually paying attention to my babble, she inquired, “You said you were breastfeeding, correct?” Oh, like a thousand times in the tiny 15-minute window, yes. She had read a recent study on breastfeeding and its potentially positive effects on eyesight of both mom and baby(ies). Seeing the great improvement in my vision after 2 1/2 years of virtually constant breastfeeding really brought the study home. Isn’t that great? I joked, “Heck, I’ll just breastfeed everybody I know, even strangers on the street, and work my way back to perfect 20-20 vision. Thirsty? All in the interest of improved eyesight.”

She wasn’t interested in a mid-afternoon drink.

Hey, I still have an alphabet to complete. After b0mbing April’s NaBloPoMo, I left you hanging with ‘M.’ At this rate, I should pull ‘Z’ into the station (crash!) around mid-December.

What does ‘N’ do for me? Aside from driving me absofreakinlutely bonkers when coupled with ‘O’ coming out of Gab’s mouth a bazillion times an hour. (have i told you that she’s marched into tantrum town with her drama-queen spurs clicking the pavement and trigger-happy guns a’ blazing? someone…please…hold me)

Letter de Leo Reynolds

• Neuro - Be it neurobiology, neuropsychology, neuropimpology, I love all things neuro. My favorite organ is the brain. What? Don’t you have a favorite organ? (besides the obvious) They really should start asking first-graders to list their favorite organ alongside their favorite color and number. Brain, purple, and 7, Ms. J.
  • I’ll always give myself a sharp whack across the back of the head for not completing my Ph.D. in neurobiology. While I’d probably still be sitting here doing the same thing (currently in my underwear listening to ethan chirp through the baby monitor, glancing over at alani kickin’ it in the bouncy chair, and wondering when everyone else in the house is going to wake) and that degree would just be a fancy piece of paper taking up space in the closet alongside the other useless fancy pieces of paper, it still bugs me. Chips ahoy, let’s not get into how my mom felt about the whole graduate school departure! I took away her bragging rights, “My daughter is a BRAIN SCIENTIST!”
  • Like I was saying…the brain and its noodly nerves are where it’s at. Two turntables and gooey brain.

• Never Never Land - Ok. Now, I’m getting down right silly. Bear with me. ::roar:: I just had to throw this in to illustrate the mega-imagination I had as a kid (and add more length to my ‘n’ list). As I was usually by myself, I lived in my imaginary worlds (not to the point of being cooky-crazy unhealthy, at least not in my cooky-crazy head) and was especially fond of Peter Pan’s Never Never Land (um yeh, that’s christopher cross’s never never land linked, not peter pan’s…you have to endure lots of sailing to get there…let me suggest some dramamine®). A land where you never grow up and stay a kid forever? Who’s on board? I would, at the very least, like to vacation there once a year.

• Norwegian Wood - The song, not the presidential candidate. No matter your interpretation of the lyrics, something about the ditty soothes me. Maybe the pyro at the end? Lighting fire to some cheap a$$ flimsy wood seems quite therapeutic.

• Nutella® - I can’t go a letter without dropping some sugary sweet item in the list, can I?
  • I don’t chug chocolate syrup by the gallon, but I will don my cocoa-y glutton attire to scarf down a jar of this chocolate hazelnut spread. While it’s fine smeared on a slice of bread, I especially enjoy dipping graham crackers or Nilla® (another ‘n’) wafers in the jar. Yum, Nutella®. (they should hire me for commercials)

Breaking news: I just returned from the grocery store where the bagger, after commenting on how cute Gab is, said, “You don’t look like you have any kids.” Aha, but do I! I took this as a compliment but am puzzled as to what she must have been thinking.

Now, what could it be? I know she wasn’t fishing for a tip to carry my groceries to the car as Publix Hairs doesn’t allow tipping.

I’d like to think it was my hot, svelte rockin’ body. But, my scale and stretched out panties would beg to differ.

My warped glasses? The frizzy hair up in a messy bun with 3-inch long gray hairs sprouting out? (i’m delusional to think i can still pluck all of the ‘arctic blonde’ hairs taking over the real estate atop my cranium…yet, i yank a good 20 a day…it’s a habit at this point) My crow’s feet? The dry, callused heels? (i’m failing miserably at my new year’s resolution of baby bun soft feet) The deadpan expression on my face?

You wanna know my secret to eternal youth which elicits compliments from grocery store clerks?

My tie-dyed t-shirt.

Is there a word stronger than hate? Because that’s how E feels about this shirt. I’ve never seen anything (other than my affinity for Prince and his music) get under E’s skin more than my tie-dyed t-shirt. And, it dumbfounds me.

This shirt comes up daily in conversation. I use it as the fundamental difference between the two of us. I’ll wear tie-dyed shirts whereas he wouldn’t even scrub the toilets wearing such an atrocity (oh, but don’t get me started on the sleeveless dale earnhardt shirt he has in his dresser…i’m assuming that shirt came from the same alabama belle who turned him on to nestea in a can, yuck).

Deeper than tie-dye, E values appearance far more than I do. This is a topic worth an entire week’s worth of posts which maybe I’ll delve into later. FYI, if you want to befriend E, don’t wear tie-dyed clothing.

And, you can rest assured - I wear the ever loving shiznit out of my tie-dyed t-shirt! May you stay forever young in tie-dye.