Furniture Frustration

Spending money stresses me out. That’s why I never buy anything. When I was a little girl my mom always filled our cart with brand name foods at the supermarket, which immediately prompted me to give her a lecture about how we could save 37 cents if we bought the generic ketchup. I also took things out of the cart and put them back when she wasn't looking. In college I ate lentils almost everyday and never updated my wardrobe so I could make it through without asking my parents for money or taking out student loans. I even cut my own hair and wore wet n wild makeup. Gross, I know.

Last week I took the plunge and bought a couch. I'm still recovering from the stress of the purchase. Buying a couch is a big deal. Right now I'm super stressed, not only because I dropped a bunch of cash, but because the couch doesn't match anything in our house. It looks hideous. We have to buy all new stuff. I would just take it back, but we already sold our other couches and there is nothing else in our price range that I will allow in my living room. Right now all of our furniture is for sale on craigslist and I am practicing deep breathing to help prepare myself for more major purchases.


Yesterday we decided to go to IKEA to see if there was anything that might possibly go with our new decor. It was only after we got there that I realized that only crazy people go to IKEA on Memorial Day. Max loved it. I've never seen him so happy. He was screaming, laughing, flapping, clapping, pointing, and waving at all the people. He was in IKEA heaven. He created such a diversion that we were distracted from our mission: finding something, anything that we could cut, refinish, paint, or tweak to make it work for our new living space. After a very discouraging trek through the maze of home furnishings we dined on Swedish meatballs and lingonberry juice and headed home with nothing more than a salad spinner and some kitchen scrub brushes. Can someone please tell me where I can find chic, yet affordable home furnishings? We are also in the market for a new t.v., where is the best place to get one? Also, is it ok to mix a dark, chocolate brown couch with black accessories? (curtain rods, frames, lamps, etc..) I am in major need of some design therapy.

Playing Tag

I've been tagged by Dandee Designs.

What was I doing ten years ago?

I was getting fired as the editor of my high school newspaper two weeks before graduation. It's a long story that involves a crazy teacher, me sitting in a "punishment" room everyday with other banished staff members, and my parents appealing the ordeal all the way to the superintendent so that I could get credit for the class and graduate from high school.

What was I doing one year ago?

I was teaching Spanish, giving finals, doing prenatal yoga, speed walking for hours on end at the mall to try to go into labor, eating at least one whole pineapple a day to try to go into labor, eating lots of really spicy food to try to go into labor, massaging all the acupressure points that are supposed to help start labor, etc... Nothing worked. I delivered 4 days late (after 3 days of labor).

Five snacks I enjoy:

-Red Hot Blues organic tortilla chips
-Luna Bars
-Hershey's Extra Dark Chocolate bar with cranberries, blueberries, and almonds
-Mangoes
-Afternoon tea with scones and any other appropriate pastry

Five songs I know all the words to:

-El Muelle de San Blas -by Mana
-Ballad For My One True Love - by Mason Jennings
-Aserejé- by Las Ketchup
-Bizarre Love Triangle - by New Order
-Pick Yourself Up -by Diana Krall

Five things I would do if I were a millionaire?

-I would buy a bigger house with a beautifully landscaped backyard and a mini-van. I would put what little was left in our savings account (we have a great interest rate). I would also consider hiring a housekeeper.

Five of my Many bad habits:

-Procrastinating everything
-Going to bed too late
-Watching too much T.V.
-Being judgemental and bossy
-Reading Ann Coulter's weekly column instead of things I should be reading

Five things I like doing:

-Floating (in my pool, the ocean, in a kayak, on a boat...it's so relaxing)
-Going to the Library or Barnes and Noble to read magazines I'm too cheap to buy
-Trying new restaurants and recipes
-Going to a spa or staying in a fancy hotel (doesn't happen that often)
-Travelling

Five things I will never wear again:

I can only think of one: a tucked-in shirt. My torso is just too short and I've been laughed at too many times. I'll never say never about anything else because you never know what will come back in style. I never thought the 80's would.

Five of my Favorite toys:

-my garlic press
-the internet
-our saws (although I won't touch them, I make J-P do the cuts)
-my dyson vacuum
-all electronics (Tivo, digital camera, cell phone, etc..)

I didn't follow all the tagging instructions correctly (adding the previous links) because Max just woke up and my free time is over.

I'm tagging (no pressure):

alex and anna
scoville clan
warren family
sarah

Fruitarians Unite

Max loves fruit. He has pretty much eradicated everything else from his diet. It all started when he saw me eating a grapefruit. I don't think you are supposed to give babies grapefruit, but he was screaming for a bite so I gave him one. Then it started, the grapefruit hysteria. He started hyperventilating and furiously flapping his arms (this is his sign language for feed me faster). I cut up the whole grapefruit and put it on his tray, hoping to buy myself a couple minutes of peace and quiet. Nope, he finished the whole thing in a matter of seconds and started screaming for more. He ate the grapefruit with such fury and intensity that he was literally punching himself in the mouth with each bite he shoveled in. He didn't seem to notice that I was laughing. Two grapefruits later I cut him off. These were my grapefruits, and he was not getting the last one. Now I hide the grapefruit, and he only gets one a day.

Max also has an obsession with blueberries, bananas, mandarin oranges, and several other fruits. Everyday when I am sitting at the table feeding him fruit, this scene from Notting Hill plays in my mind:

Keziah: "No thanks, I'm a fruitarian."
Max: "I didn't realize that."
William: "And, ahm: what exactly is a fruitarian?"
Keziah: "We believe that fruits and vegetables have feeling so we think cooking is cruel. We only eat things that have actually fallen off a tree or bush - that are, in fact, dead already."
William: "Right. Right. Interesting stuff. So, these carrots..."
Keziah: "Have been murdered, yes."
William: "Murdered? Poor carrots. How beastly!"

I laugh out loud when I get to the part about the murdered carrots. I almost wet my pants in the theater during that scene because I was laughing so hard. Max starts screaming for more fruit and I pull myself out of my Notting Hill daydream. Did I get a fruitarian baby because I have mocked their movement? Please don't tell me this is bad kharma.

p.s. Here is a link about how to become a fruitarian, just in case you are interested. Yes they do exist.

Sans Curls

Max has been long overdue for his first haircut. I have been putting it off for months because I've been too chicken--a wiggly, squirmy baby and scissors are not a good combo. Today we decided we couldn't wait any longer. At least not if we want to take him out in public. Here are the before and after shots.

Before:




After:

He has a love/hate relationship with this white dog...

He spends most of the day yelling at it.

When we were finished with the cut J-P said "ok, go get a plastic bag." When I asked why, he responded that you have to save the hair from their first haircut as a keepsake. I immediately started gagging (probably some lingering morning sickness) at the thought of saving hair in a plastic bag. Yuck! Does anyone else do this?

Date Night!

J-P and I had a blast of a courtship and this is, sadly, one of the only pictures we have to show for it. Most of it was spent at Disneyland, fancy restaurants, the beach, concerts, hiking, bike rides, swimming, playing tennis, parties, exploring Southern California, chatting in bookstores and coffee shops, and much more. We had so much fun. I think about our courtship a lot because now my life is really boring. I never go anywhere. J-P and I haven't been on a real, uninterrupted date since Max was born. Tonight will be our first one (thanks for babysitting Sarah). I can't stop thinking about it and have been planning it all day. Because I need to gain some weight (and because sushi is off limits), I think we will go to the Cheesecake Factory. The Cheesecake Factory refuses to publish nutritional information for their menu, and this tells me that there are lot's o' calories in their gigantesque portion meals. According to this site, there are 910 calories in a slice of chocolate raspberry truffle cheesecake and 64 grams of fat. I can't think of a better way to indulge myself.


p.s. If anyone has pictures of J-P and I while we were dating please email them to me. I don't know why we didn't take any pictures.

11 month update

Max is very mature for his age. He acts much more like a two-year-old than an 11-month-old. Want proof? Let’s pull out the list…Tantrums– check. Biting– check. Hair pulling– check. Breaking things– check. Only one nap a day– check. Pinching, scratching, hitting– check, check, check. I could go on.

Max is very quick and I can’t take my eyes off of him. Not even for a second. He is very accident prone (he gets this from his dad) and has an injury rate of about 2 per hour. He is covered in scratches, bruises, bumps, blisters, and other battle wounds. All of this occurs while I am watching him, so you can imagine what happens when I take my eyes off of him. A few days ago I turned around for two seconds to put a dish in the sink. In that time Max was able to open the only cabinet without a child lock, pull out a stack of glass bowls, shatter them, and put a piece of glass in his mouth before I could get to him. I was only two feet away. Just one day earlier we were shopping. I glanced away to survey the canned tomatoes, and when I turned around to check on him he had eaten the top two inches of the macaroni and cheese box I gave him to play with. Last night I put him in his playpen so I could attempt to cook dinner. When he didn’t throw his normal playpen tantrum, I was ecstatic. I started cooking as fast as I could. A few minutes passed, still no crying. I was suspicious so I went to check on him. He was happily devouring his brown nerf football. Half of it was gone. I started crying (hormones), my face turned red in fury, and I yelled at my baby for the first time. He started to laugh at me, revealing a mouth chuck full of brown Styrofoam.

On the positive side, Max is usually a very happy kid. He laughs and sings (see photo for visual) all day long. His favorite song goes like this: “laaaaaaaaaaa (pause for air) laaaaaaaaa (pause for air) laaaaaaaa….” Call me if you want to hear it, he does it on command and he loves to perform. More positive news: Max gave me the best Mother’s Day present ever. He finally preferred me over J-P! He literally pushed J-P away and wrapped his arms around me as we were putting him down for his nap. This was a huge deal because Max NEVER prefers me. Every morning I go into his room hoping to get some snuggle time and he immediately pushes me away, reaches for the door, and says “da, da, da.” I take him to our room and as soon as he sees J-P he starts flapping his arms, squealing, and dives out of my arms onto his dad.

J-P and I are doing well. I am a little worried because I still have not gained any weight (despite the daily box of Häagen-Dazs ice cream bars I am eating) and am thoroughly convinced that I have a parasite or intestinal worms. J-P’s workload has increased and he is now managing accounts in Phoenix, San Diego, L.A., Palm Springs, and San Francisco, which means we will never see him. We are excited to find out the gender of baby #2 in a few more weeks. Any predictions?

Morning Walk

Max is not an easy baby. He starts his day at 4:55 a.m. every morning. I usually let him cry for 5 minutes because it's against my personal code of ethics to wake up before 5:00 a.m. We've tried everything to get him to sleep longer. Nothing works. After my morning sickness started to dissipate and I re-entered the world of the living, we decided to take a daily family walk with our extra time in the morning. We walk along a canal behind our neighborhood so we don't have to deal with the noise of morning traffic. On the walk, J-P and I talk about our day. We argue about whether we should spray the weeds in our front yard or pull them, we speculate about the decline in the real estate market every time we walk past a for sale sign, and we discuss things that we want to buy. J-P tells me we "need" a fancy high-end bike trailer, I tell him that we "need" a chocolate brown distressed leather sectional from Restoration Hardware. In the end we both decide we "need" to save our money. Max babbles the whole time as if he were a real participant in the conversation.

Can you believe how bright the sun is at 6:00 in the morning?

My feet in better days...

My nickname in high school was "info". Not because I was smart, but because I new a lot of random, useless information. Still do. As a result, I am a very paranoid person. I couldn't enjoy girls camp because I knew that I could get a tick, that the tick might infect me with Lyme disease, and that it could paralyze me for life. Instead of frolicking through the woods like other 14-year-olds, I was walking around like a crazy person, spraying myself with repellent every 10 minutes. I'm surprised the fumes didn't kill me. When I lived in the Dominican Republic, I knew there were nasty parasites that would burrow through my feet if I went barefoot. I didn't let my bare feet touch the ground anywhere in that country for four months.

Pregnancy increases my paranoia. I'm a little more relaxed this time around, but I'm constantly bombarded by the subconscious retrieval of random pregnancy facts that are stored in a back corner of my brain. Right now phthalates prevent me from doing a lot of things. I'm waiting to paint my kitchen and my toenails until I'm more than half-way through my pregnancy because phthalates (chemical in plastics, cosmetics, paint, etc.) can cause birth defects, specifically in boys. The problem: I was the only person in church today with unpedicured feet. The only person. Everyone in Arizona has perfectly polished pedicure feet (with little painted flowers that I don't care for), and my white, unpolished feet were glowing. I'm ordering phthalate-free polish tomorrow! Nonetheless, it was a beautiful Mother's Day. I wanted to get a picture of Max and I on the first Mother's Day that I could officially celebrate. Here is a series of our failed attempts. I love how we both have half-way closed eyes on the last one.

Happy Mother's Day!!!!

Congratulations Tyler

...So when my parents told me that Dick Cheney would be speaking at Tyler's BYU graduation this April I was a little surprised. They got a letter telling them to be in their seats a few hours early and that protesting would not be allowed. Makes sense. I was very curious what Cheney would say to our young Mormon graduates and called my parents for a report later that day. He talked a little bit about second chances and life not turning out how you expect it to. He also mentioned that his wife's relatives came across the plains with the early pioneers of the church. Here is a shot of the secret service that my dad took outside the Mariott Center.


I haven't thought about it again until today. I was doing my daily perusal of blogs and I stumbled upon an article about an alternative BYU commencement ceremony featuring Ralph Nader and other questionable characters. It turned my stomach. I was in shock that BYU students would forgo the opportunity to be in the presence of President Hinkley and other church leaders that would deliver powerful, inspired messages just because Dick Cheney was going to be there too. Lame. I will never forgot the commencement ceremonies on the day of my graduation from BYU. The messages given by leaders of the church were amazingly powerful and inspiring and I still think about the things they said six years later. I'm sure they all missed out.

Can you see my house?

Living in one of the fastest growing cities in the country has it's perks. I live a reasonable driving distance away from every store I've ever wanted to go to (except H&M). They are building what is rumored to be the largest mall in the country just 2 miles from my house, and new and exciting restaurants keep popping up every week.

The downside of the growth--things are constantly changing. Sadly, we were kicked out of our ward last week. Ok, maybe boundary change would be a more appropriate term. Still, I feel like someone cut a piece of me off and I want it back! The worst part: we have to go back to 3 hour church. I guess we have been spoiled with our 2 1/2 hour time slot. I will not look forward to chasing Max around for an extra half hour every Sunday. Apparently the Gilbert/Queen Creek area is the fastest growing area in the history of the LDS church. They can't build churches fast enough. Seriously, where are all these people coming from?

Crabby Day

Max spent the morning crying and looking out the screen door at the pool, trying to figure a way to open it and get outside. I checked the temp and it was 80 degrees so I sent Max out to the pool with J-P for his first swim of the year. The pics didn't come out so well because it was so bright and he was shaded by his crab float.

Pregnancy Parasite?

I got in trouble at my doctor appointment. He said that I "really need to try and gain some weight." What? You mean you are not supposed to lose weight while you are pregnant? The morning sickness is now easing thanks to a wonderful thing called the second trimester. I went straight to Trader Joe's to pick up all my fatty favorites- quiche, trail mix, soy corn dogs, kefir, and dark chocolate (and a few healthier choices). I ate and ate all day long. The next morning I skipped to the scale to see how much I had gained and to my horror I had dropped another pound! Do I have a pregnancy parasite? Why is it that when I want to lose weight I gain, and when I want to gain I lose? I must have some super power that allows me to subconsciously manipulate my metabolism.