Coughing Up Flame

L is getting her first ear infection. I should consider us lucky. It's her first one in all four years of her little life. I have a hard time seeing that silver lining when she's hogging the blankets in bed and spending the wee hours of the morning coughing on me or (bad breath) breathing on me until I finally give up and get out of bed at 5:30 am. That said, even tired and fearing what germs are making a home in me - she is hilarious.

In preparation for our doctor's office I started asking questions. What hurts? ETC.

Me: "When you cough does anything come up?" 

L: "Yup. The flame. I have it." 

Me: {thinking} "OH you mean phlegm."
L: "Yup. Flame. In my thought mouth."

Just when I thought it couldn't get weirder up in here, I have a fire eater. P.s. she meant phlegm. Naturally. And no, she isn't feeling a burning sensation, she just thinks phlegm is flame.

Merry MERRY

Yeah, don't even get me started how far behind I am. Good news? I'm here now, m'kay? Let's hug it out. 

This year we had our second annual, we ain't going NOWHERE Christmas. Of course, this one was different in that we didn't have visitors. This was one was special. Dreamy.* Wonderful* and just what you think when you think "Damn. That was a relaxing holiday." It's also where we learned we have holiday rush PTSD. 

Example:
Christmas Eve our plan was to go to the fish market.  I know, we are landlocked - what are we DOING going to a fish market. We asked the kid: What do you want to eat for Christmas Eve? She answered, "Lobster." Look, my kid has champagne taste, we indulge. It's the holidays. I digress; we had to go to the fish market and the Hill. The Hill is an Italian section of the STL and we heard full of delicious. We figured if we couldn't have Arthur Avenue food, we'd have the Hill for Christmas dinner. That morning as we were getting on our way the husband & I started to feverishly rushing around. We had to go. We had to go fast. We were running late. We wanted to get on our way earlier. Go GO GO!

Wait. WHY are we late? Where did we have to go? What is the rush? We had ZERO plans other than the two stops we had to make.

We seriously had to check ourselves.

You know what that is? PTSD. Loud & clear.  Look at those faces? HOW can we be stressed with those FACES?
So we chilled out and had a lovely day. Fast forward through (surprisingly) delicious lobsters and we let L stay up late and bake cookies for Santa. Her entire body was filled with Christmas magic.  It was palpable and completely indescribable until it happens to you.  Last year was great, she got it - it was fun.  But this year? This year you could see it in her eyes Christmas freaking spirit. And when I tucked her in to sleep, I cried. Big baby that I am - I just couldn't wait for my baby to experience what was to come. 

Christmas morning, went a little like this. All of it? Pure magic. 

• Present opening - between "Santa" (aka great deals), family, and friends it took close to 2 hours for my methodical kid to open her presents (and her baby sister's). While it may look like she got a lot of stuff - Santa wasn't only thrifty - he was practical.  
• L got to eat candy before breakfast and have Christmas cookies for breakfast (she is still talking about this amazing Christmas magic).  She asked nicely. I said sure. She looked at me in disbelief.
• We sat around a fire. We drank coffee, had breakfast (for those of us skipping on the cookies). We watched a movie - we stayed in our PJs. We had antipasti for lunch and then. We took a nap. All of us. CHRISTMAS.MAGIC. 

Finally we got up, got ready (jeans, baby) and sat down to a lovely Christmas dinner. 

LOVELY.

 * I would be remiss if I didn't mention while the holiday was dreamy it was also something of the best of the situation we were in. Of course, if given the opportunity to see family at our house and share the magic with family or friends we would have gladly shared the magic.

Sleep Tight

Truth: I hear "only you" often. This story should be filed under "only me."


Monday night I put my babies to bed and spend my evening waiting for JJ to wake up. She always wakes up at 11, so why go to sleep before that? 11 came, and went. Midnight. See ya. And just when I said to myself, "Self - forget it. You can't wait up for her to get up. Go.To.Bed." I got a text. 

A Tornado Watch has been issued for St. Louis
county until 1/17/2012 7:00:00 AM. KSDK.com

I signed up for alerts. Great idea. Oh yeah. Sleep tight, nighty night. 


Did I mention the husband was gone? The one who wakes up when a twig breaks three yards over? He wasn't home. Me? The tornado alarm could be going off and I would sleep through it. 


Oh wait. That's (not) funny because it's true. 

I proceeded to wake up every hour on the hour - just about. At one point L started crying, I ran to the room thinking it must be the storm that is scaring her. Nope. She was twisted in her blankets. (You can thank the bad puns on not getting any sleep.)

She fell asleep quickly, but soon after I was up again because of the sounds coming from outside. If I didn't get up to see it for myself, I wouldn't have believed what was happening outside.  It was hail, but it sounded like full fledged vehicles were slamming up against the windows.

Guess what?

No one woke. Not ONE peep.

The next morning, JJ awoke refreshed and ready to attack the day. 11 hours that little B slept. 11.HOURS. For the first time in her 5 months of existence PW (post womb). Me? I was a hot mess of exhaustion but the kids? They were well freaking rested. 


Only.Me.

Wordless Wednesday

Pin It Girrrl

I have a problem. 

Source: housetohome.co.uk via guarros on Pinterest

If I see it, I wanna pin it. My problem is I see something and I take it too far. I just can't help it. Take for example this cute little ditty.

I mean how perfect? 

• Jars which are recycled - good for the environment AND the wallet?!
• Organization is the key to happiness.
• Cute. How. CUTE.
• Different. Don't get me wrong. I'm not ashamed of the fact that 85% of our house could be a show room in Target or Ikea - but it's nice to have something different that you won't see at the store.

Here's the rub:

I don't know when to say "when." Our kitchen was being taken over by jars. Jars, jars, jars. 

• Jars that were ready to put stuff in, but no stuff to put IN them. 
• Jars that needed to be scrubbed - because labels are a biotch. 
• And somewhere in-between, but still IN our tiny kitchen.  Jars, jars everywhere. I completed the original project in October - and yet it is just recently I pulled the plug on the circuit of jar stations in the kitchen. My husband likes me more now, I'm convinced.

True story, the other day this conversation happened, while we were in the kitchen. L comes running in...

Me: "L, what's the rule?"

L: "No running in the kitchen!" 

Me: "So then, don't run."

Ball & chain: "L, you better watch out. Mom's going to put you in a jar if you aren't careful."I'm working on it. But this is just one example. I saw another pin once upon a time; how perfect!

Source: foundpaperco.blogspot.com  via guarros on Pinterest

Do you know how many boxes I have of memories I want to find a way to preserve in a better way? 

Source: allendesigns.typepad.com
via guarros on Pinter

  
Don't worry, I have my inner hoarder in check. I have ONE box like this of recent years... but still. Do you know how many holiday cards, birth announcements, wedding invitations, maps, tickets and postcards ONE box can hold?  I can tell you this: after seeing the same idea with holiday cards, it clicked. I got to work and now my couch has three piles of holiday cards: 2009 - 2011 neatly stacked and only one ready to flip through.  HOW PERFECT. Can't you just see it? Every year, unpacking our holiday garb to find little booklets of holiday cards from days of yore? Can't you just see it? SO EXCITING. Yeah, the husband wasn't as excited as me, either.  You know how IS as excited as me? The kid. She totally gets me. 

"Mama, this is SO cute of you." - best kid ever.

My husband on the other hand, doesn't think it's so cute. He mockingly mumbles "pin it girrrrl" more than he says "hello" nowadays while I continue to take things to far. Oh well, you win some, you lose some.