My Day in Pictures

Back by popular demand...my day in pictures.

Warning: photo overload is about to commence.


6:45. Unfortunately this is about what I look like that early in the morning!


7:15. After a shower and some mascara. A bit better.


7:15. Coffee, a vitamin, and checking email.


7:30. Bambino's up!


Taking her overnight 'sposie to the trash.


Breakfast.


Mama's multitasking: making the grocery list while Lane eats.


Reading post-breakfast.


Ugh...make the bed.


Made!


8:15. Breakfast and Bible time.


9:00. Chores.


Fold these.


So we can wash and hang these.


Daddy's work station.


9:45. Heading to the park.


Ahh. I love this view.


Run on the track at the park.


Play in the dirt.


Bum a balloon off another kid.


Noon. Home. Leftovers for lunch.


Dessert. Thanks, Sarah!


12:30. Stories and nap time.


1:00. More chores. Clothes are hung.


Thaw a chicken for dinner on Thursday.


Dinner prep.


Mmm.


Making buttermilk bread.


Snoozing hard!


Cookie dough.


Clean up the mess!


3:30. Lane's up! Play a bit.


She loves these guys.


Going to the bakkal for our groceries. They're bribing Lane with a mandarin.


It worked. But she's more interested in the strawberries.


4:45. Daddy's done with work! Heading to the park. Again.


Climbing.


Swinging.


See-sawing.


Sliding.


Daddy went too fast and landed on his bottom!


6:05. Home. Dinner.


6:45. Brushing teeth.


Bible story. Singing. Bedtime.

And here is where the photos end. Photos of me working on the computer are boring, as are photos of me unclogging our bathtub drain.

We're going to have family worship and head to bed ourselves!

Nap Time

I think someone was tired.

Daylight What?

Surely I am not the only parent who loathes Daylight Saving Time.

I can't even remember if we're "on" or "off" of Daylight Saving Time. Does it actually save daylight? Does it really matter if in the winter the sun comes up an hour earlier? It's still dark when you go to work whether the sun comes up at 7:30 or at 8:30! I just really don't get it. I like the longer days that come with summer, I really do. I like the sun not coming up at oh-dark-thirty. But the confusion that amasses...oh, the confusion.


Sunset as seen from our living room window.

First off, there's Fall Back (I don't know if Fall Back is going on to or off of Daylight Saving Time). To combat Fall Back we very gradually moved Lane's nap and bedtimes later by five minutes each day for about two weeks, so by the time Fall Back Day came, she went to bed at her normal time and woke up at her normal time, so she didn't wake up an hour early. It worked pretty well, I suppose.

But now it's Spring Forward. And I have a toddler who's eating real meals and snacks and is only taking one nap a day. She's been waking up in the 6 o'clock hour for the past couple of weeks and ready for her nap by 10:30 or 11:00. We've been eating meals ridiculously early for the past week, lunch at 10:45 some days and dinner before 5:00, because Lane's been waking up so early that it throws our whole day off. I decided to embrace it a couple of days ago so that when tomorrow comes, our schedule will be normal and we'll be getting hungry at "normal" times and Lane will be ready for her nap at noon or 12:30. I will be glad when the sun comes up later.

Europe/Asia does Daylight Saving Time at a different time than the U.S. does it, a week later for Fall Back and two weeks later for Spring Forward. So when normally my mom in Alaska is 11 hours back, for the past two weeks she's only been 10 hours back. And then there are the states that don't do Daylight Saving Time at all, and if you need to call someone in one of those, you're never sure what time it is. Then there are individual countries (ahem, like TURKEY) that decide they don't want to do Daylight Saving Time on the same day as all the other countries in the area, so they choose to do it a day late (and a dollar short?). Apparently university entrance exams were scheduled for today and they didn't want students to miss out on their extra hour of sleep last night (so instead they're going to make all "real" workers miss out on their extra hour of sleep tonight). So we do Daylight Saving Time tonight at 3:00 a.m. Can you imagine the mess at airports? Today, for one day only, Turkey was on the same time as the majority of Europe. Tomorrow we'll be back to being an hour ahead.

Seriously, why can't the clocks just stay as they are? Why can't we stay on Spring Forward Time? Nobody really cares if the sun comes up earlier in the winter: we all would rather have that hour of daylight in the afternoon, not in the morning. It's not helping anyone get out of bed any earlier! And it's screwing my kid's sleeping schedule up. It's one big mess, I tell you, one big mess. And I don't like it one bit.

***Did you know that it's Daylight Saving Time, not Daylight Savings Time? 'Fess up...who's been saying it wrong? ***

Ugh. Just Ugh.

We're sick. All three of us

It all started with Lane. Last Thursday she woke up with a fever and kept it for about 36 hours. It disappeared and was followed by a nasty cough, and shortly afterward, a runny nose. Shannon and I thought we were going to luck out and not catch it from her since it had been a week and we were still ok.

And then yesterday Shannon woke up with a sore throat and drainage. I woke up with a slightly sore throat but nothing too bad.

And then today happened.

My head feels like it's going to explode and my nose is running like a fountain. I keep coughing up stuff. And all I want to do is sleep. While Lane took her nap this afternoon, I also slept...for two hours. And I could have kept sleeping. Instead I got up and took her to the park, which only resulted in my head hurting even more from pounding the pavement for 40 minutes. It's 8:05 and I'm contemplating going to bed.

I have things to do, people! I can't afford to be getting sick. My in-laws arrive a month from yesterday and I have a serious vacation to plan! I have a language to learn! I have a family to feed and a house to keep clean! But instead of doing those things I'm staring absentmindedly at my computer screen with a tissue stuffed up my nose, trying to muster up the energy to at least read a book or watch an episode of Friends. Ugh. Just ugh.

In other news, Lane has a few new tricks up her sleeve. Yesterday Shannon discovered when asking her where all the different animals are in one of her books that when you ask her, "Where's the goose?" she points to HERSELF! How hilarious is that? We obviously call her "goose" a lot, since she doesn't even point to herself when you ask her, "Where's Lane?"! She's also learned how to "give us five" and it's really cute. Stick out your hand and say, "Give me five!" and she'll grin and slap your hand. Goodness, I love that girl. She's too cute. Now if only her cuteness could cure my headache...

14 Months Old

14 months. Where does the time go?



New things Lane's doing (go here for last month's list):

*says "nite nite" more frequently than last month, and "ne-ow, ne-ow" is often sounding more like "meow, meow." She says "meow, meow" every time she sees a cat in person or in a book or on tv. I think it's her first "word," other than mama and dada.
*is babbling more frequently...trying to "talk" more often.
*uses sign language for "eat," "milk," "water," and "shoes."
*has six teeth: four on top, two on bottom. No signs of any new ones coming anytime soon.
*waves bye-bye regularly and sometimes blows a kiss as well.
*is fascinated with putting things around her neck: anything with a strap, her blankie, our underwear, her shirts, etc.


Checking out the seagulls through the ferry window.

*is completely weaned. :-(
*hauls her overnight diaper down the hallway and throws it in the kitchen trash each morning.
*will give you things she's put in her mouth if you look at her and say "yucky, yucky," or "give me what's in your mouth, Lane."
*can correctly identify her nose and ears.
*does motions for the gorilla and elephant in Eric Carle's From Head to Toe.
*still wearing 9-month and 12-month clothes.
*just got a pair of size 5 shoes. They're a bit big, but much better than the almost-too-small-3's we just retired. Considering she only wore the 3's for about two months, we figure she'll be fitting into the 5's well by May or June.
*can climb onto our couches without help.


I love this photo because it shows her "fun" personality, which I'm forever trying to capture and forever failing at!

*likes to hide things: under the couch, under the rug, in the slit between the cabinets and refrigerator, etc.
*can open drawers and cabinets.
*loves to be outside and frequently goes to the door and waves "bye-bye," indicating that she wants to go outside.
*can get the circle shape in her shape-sorter all the time. Can sometimes get other shapes in as well, but usually gets frustrated and gives up before she meets success.
*can drink from a straw.

Ain't He Somethin'?

He brought me flowers.


A huge bouquet of red carnations, brightening up my kitchen on these grey days.

I told Shannon back when we were dating a secret: most (most, not all, I know) girls would rather receive flowers from the grocery store frequently than flowers from a florist twice a year. I'm one of those girls. I hate to spend too much money on flowers because let's face it: they die. They don't last, and if anyone is going to spend $100 on something material, well, in my opinion, it should last more than a week. So Shannon has obliged me with lots and lots of reasonably priced bouquets of flowers over the years.

He's always on the quest for the perfect bouquet, it seems. He'll buy me roses and be disappointed when they die within a week, and buy me daisies or mums another time and be thrilled when they last. Yesterday's bouquet satisfied him completely: he keeps remarking that he "did better" this time than last time. "Well," I told him. "Carnations are a heartier flower. They aren't as fragile as roses or lilies. They last longer than those."

And seeing the understanding dawn over his face I knew one thing:

I'm going to be getting a lot of carnations in the future.

But you know what? I won't mind in the slightest. Flowers are flowers, and when they come from my guy as a surprise delivered to me while I'm up to my elbows in dinner prep or surrounded by every toy we own with a 14-month old running circles around me, they brighten up my day and bring a smile to my face, whether they cost him $5 or $100.