That Made Him Mad

I didn't blog last night because I was making some pillowcases for the daybed in Josh's room. I've finished them, but since Josh is asleep I can't take any pictures. So maybe tomorrow.

Today was a LAN Widow day. And LAN Widow days always seem longer than normal. Not terrible, but long. And Josh was the cause of the longness today.

He woke up again at 6am. (He usually sleeps until 7am.) I stayed in bed and listened to him until about 6:45am, which was about the point when I could tell he was going to freak out if he didn't get "rescued" soon. I got him out of his crib. That made him happy. But I didn't get there fast enough. That made him mad.

Mid-morning he had a diaper blow-out of epic proportions. Nasty, nasty stuff. Gross. Horrible. Erlack. I gagged the entire time I cleaned him up and got him into the tub. The diaper change made him mad. But the bath made him happy. But getting him out of the bath made him MAD.

By lunch he was in full tantrum mode. Putting him in his highchair made him mad. I finally relented and let him eat on the floor. That made him happy. But then I had to clean him and the floor up. That made him mad.

I had peace while he took his nap.

Then he woke up.

Full tantrum mode. But ta-da! Mommy and Spencer had made cookies for Daddy's LAN party. That made him happy.


But I would only give him two. And that made him MAD.

Then Daddy came home. Josh decided to sneak into one of Daddy's bags and go to the LAN party with him. That made him happy.


Daddy discovered Josh in the bag and said he had to stay home. This made him mad.


Then I took Josh and Spencer to McDonald's to eat dinner with some of the other LAN Widows. This made him happy. But I wouldn't let him drink and play in his ketchup. This made him mad.

We got home and I changed him into his jammies. This made him mad. But I didn't even bother trying to clean his face. This made him happy.

I read him some books and we said prayers. This made him happy. I put him into his crib. This made him mad.

Then he went to sleep. And that made me happy.

Sing... Sing A Song...

I am in lurve.

I know I say that a lot. Perhaps I fall in lurve a little too easily.

No matter. I am in luuuurrve. With Amazon.com's MP3 Downloads. Why?

Well, mainly because they're MP3's with no DRM. (Digital Rights Management) DRM is that evil little thing that make it so that you can't copy your cd's to another cd. Or download music, say from Wal-Mart.com or iTunes, and copy it to more than one hard drive or a cd. In other words, it forces you to just rent the music; you don't really own it because you can't really do what you want with it.

I also love it because songs are generally only $.89 or $.99 each. Awesome! I love that I can buy a song that I really like without having to buy an entire album. (We've all been there, am I right? You buy an album for one really great song and the rest of the other tracks are worthless.) Mix CD heaven!

And it's super easy. You download their MP3 Downloader and away you go. They have a ton of songs, and now that they've made a deal with Sony (I think that's who it is) they're getting more and more every day. I seriously think this is the future of music. I refuse to buy limited use music ever again!

I've probably bought $15 worth of songs in the last week, mainly for my Time Capsule, but also just because I've really wanted the songs. (BTW - Andrea, I decided to buy Vegas Movie Studio Platinum to solve my software problems. I liked it's free trial best. Plus I got a really good deal from Amazon on it!) Here are just a few:

1. The Way I Am by Ingrid Michaelson
2. Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol
3. Upside Down by Jack Johnson
4. Apologize by Timbaland
5. Hey There Delilah by Plain White T's
6. Take Five by Dave Brubeck

Now go. Try it. And don't blame me when you spend all your extra time and money on music!

TC Corkboard

Okay, I just realized the p.s. of my last post might not make any sense to anyone not in Indiana.

The Corkboard is actually the TC Corkboard. TC as in Tippecanoe County and Corkboard as in... corkboard. You know, those brown boards you post messages on that seem to be all over college campuses. Okay, let me start again...

The Corkboard is a Google Group for women in Lafayette/West Lafayette; the brilliant idea of Andrea. It's composed mainly of women in the stake, but is growing beyond that now because is it so infinitely useful! All sorts of information is posted daily: where the good sales are in town, upcoming family events, good sales or sites online, etc. But the best part (to me, at least!) is the 'brain trust' aspect. You can email a question out to the group and usually get lots of helpful answers. And the questions can be about anything: from how to deal with flying with kids to ideas on what to buy your husband for Christmas. Awesome.

For example, we all know Josh has a rocket arm. Unfortunately, he developed a very nasty habit, with said arm, of throwing his food all over the floor. I could not get him to stop, no matter what I did. So I asked the TC Corkboard for ideas and got all sorts of great answers. The thing is, they were all pretty common-sense answers; just not common sense to someone too close to the situation. (Does that make sense? As soon as I read some of the suggestions I was like "Duh! I knew that!" I just needed someone to point it out to me.)

(BTW, in case you're interested, I took a 4-pronged approach: 1. I gave him only small amounts of food at a time. 2. I told him before each meal that he was NOT to throw food. I made eye contact and told him in a very stern voice and in no uncertain terms "No throwing food, Joshie!" 3. I tried to stop giving him food before he got to the point of throwing. (I realized that he only throws food once he's full enough to play.) 4. If he did sneak a throw, I would totally ignore it. He's not completely cured, but it's only been a week. And my floor is dramatically cleaner!)

Anywho, my point in all of this is that I lurrrve the Corkboard and highly recommend starting one in your area if you can.

Oh Beautiful For Spacious Skies

So all of the media coverage of the recent primaries made me realize that I never changed my voter registration address when I moved. Eighteen months ago. Shame on me! So I did some research (read: typed "voter registration" into Google) and came up with the following information that I thought might interest you.

You don't have to leave home to register. Just go here, print the application, and mail it. Can't get much easier than that! (Okay, maybe if you could register online. But the government's not quite there yet.)

Not sure when your state's primary is? Go here to find out. (And if you don't vote in the primary, don't complain about your party's choice of candidate!)

Want to know where to go vote? Google "polling place" and your state. If you live in Indiana, go here.

Random voting questions? Check out this site.

Alright, I've done my civic duty. Now go out and do yours.

p.s. Sorry to all Corkboard members for the 'repeat'!

Organization: Questions and Answers

Maybe because it's January or maybe because it's literally 65 degrees outside (I know, it's January. What's up with that?!), but I felt like a little spring cleaning today.

Question: Wouldn't you think that kids would love to play outside in the nice weather today?
Answer: You could think that. But you would be wrong.
I tried to get the boys to play outside in the nice weather, but they would have nothing to do with it. Weirdos. I could force the issue and go to the park, but it's supposed to rain and I just know that if we went to the park it would rain as soon as we got there. Murphy's Law and I are not friends.

So I've been cleanin' and organizin' all morning. Here are some of the organizing projects I am most proud of. (I just wish I had thought of taking before shots. Then again, maybe not. They were pretty bad!)

Reorganizing the coat closet

The top was a jumble of board games, sports equipment, and extra winter gear, and the bottom was stuffed to the brim with winter coats. I moved three coats that are not currently being used (and won't be in the near future) so that we didn't have to literally stuff our coats when hanging them up anymore. Shocker: we even have room to hang up a few guest coats!

I also reorganized my winter gear, putting the hats, scarfs, gloves, and umbrellas that we use most in the hanging shoe rack I use for this. (See photo below.) All the extras are in a bag up on the shelf.


Question: Is there such a thing as too much winter gear? (i.e. hats, coats, scarfs)
Answer: No way, Jose! Even growing up in CA we had a basket of winter stuff that we seemed to use quite a bit. (Although we might have been wimps then - it rarely got lower than 40 degrees!)

I am no longer scared of an avalanche when I open the coat closet door. And as Martha would say, this is a Good Thing.

Reorganizing the linen closet

This closet had needed reorganizing since the day we moved in! Sheets and all sorts of random things were stuffed onto every shelf. I decided to make this narrow closet exclusively for linens. Except for a box of scented candles that I won at bunko once - I like the way they make the closet smell.

We inherited a ton of sheets from my Dad and Susie after they got married. Having a lot of extra sheets is actually pretty handy, as you can imagine. (Think midnight emergency bed-changes.) But upon closer inspection I discovered sheets that had "Honduras Tegucigalpa Mission" (where my brother served) written on them and pillow cases that were once white but were now yellow. Ewww. On the plus side, I also found three table cloths that I hadn't seen in ages and had figured the house elves had stolen. Hooray!

Question: Is there anything more futile than trying to fold fitted sheets?
Answer: Nope.

Hence the rolled sheets at the very bottom. I hate folding those things. And with ten to fold, that's a whole lot of hate.

Reorganizing the medicine cabinet

Okay, I actually did this a couple of months ago. But I kept meaning to blog about it and just always forgot. Anywho, we don't really have a medicine cabinet, so we were keeping all of our stuff in a Rubbermaid box in the bathroom closet. I bought this box at IKEA for $10 and printed the labels. Voila! I am happy every time I see it.

Actually, I am happy whenever I organize something.

Question: Does that make me a freak?
Answer: Perhaps. But a happy freak who knows exactly where everything is!

The South End

of a north-bound baby.

Primary Proverbs

Child #1: And then my horse, Cat, went in the stable and...
Child #2: The horse and the cat went in the stable at the same time?
Child #1: No, the horse is Cat.
Child #2: What? The horse is a cat?
Child #1: No, the horse's name is Cat.
Me (interrupting): And Who is on first!
*The conversation stops and the kids look at my like I'm nutso.

Child #1: Can I touch you?
Child #2: No.
Child #1: Why not?!
Child #2: Because you punch.

*I only have three kids who come regularly in my class this year. Fortunately, they were three of the most entertaining. So I suspect Primary Proverbs (when I remember them!) will continue in full force!