Thursday, June 28, 2007

Another Cake Episode, May 5th

Watch how she uses her powers for evil instead of good ;-)
(BTW--these took an incrediable amount of time to put up, because blogger hates me and I wanted to be all formatty and all. You know, I wanted the captions to GO with the pictures. I'm weird like that.)

And now presenting......

LET HER EAT CAKE!

Why Yes! I would like some cake, thank you.

I think a detect a hint of cinnamon in here?

don't be stingy now, pass it on over.
that's more like it. my cuteness has won them over! Soon I will conquer the world and all the cake will be mine! Bwa,ha,ha,ha

I think I see another piece over there that no one's eating...
Wha??? YOU put it down for a second, I can't help it if I thought you were finished with it.

May I have some more please *blink, blink, blink*

SHE WALKS! It's Love Thursday Walking Tour.

Edited: BAH! Unknown to me you can NOT run video on Blogger--WTF? Anywho, I have it posted online, but under our NAME so I will post a link to it when I get home this afternoon and list it on you tube under mamaspeak. In the mean time I will be adding a couple of funnies for your enjoyments.

Ok, she's been walking a bit here and there (half way across the room I'm told by my mom), but she finally did it in front of the camera. It's at the end so you have to sit through the painful singing (me) of ring-around-the-rosie (bet you didn't know there was a second verse, did ya? I'm a font of children's songs, soon I'll be dressing up in a purple dinasour suit and hiring out for parties.

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Wednesday, June 20, 2007

First Steps and Other Craziness at our House!

So DD#2 took her first steps (to me) on Father’s Day. She’s taken a few more since, but is in no hurry to learn to run right off, so that’s good news. She’s also gotten very, very clingy lately. Guess who she wants to cling to mostly? Needless, my back seems to be less then stellar; hopefully it’s temporary.

In other news, my body is freaking out! I dropped a nursing time from DD#2 (she gets regular milk in the middle of the day now & I’m not pumping at work) and apparently my hormones are reacting rather strongly to this change. I am FREAKING OUT. All the sudden, I’ve put on 5 lbs, Aunt Flo came to visit, my hyper pigmentation is way more visible, I’m breaking out, I have eczema on my lower arms, I’m not sleeping very well, etc, etc, etc….I called my OB but the nurse practitioner was all like, “Yup, that’s hormones. Nope, nothing you can do about it.” Bah! I’m going to call a dermatologist. It seems to me that if being pregnant can get my fibro in check (and these are all symptoms of fibro, well Aunt Flo isn’t, it’s just a symptom of being a woman) then there ought to be a way to emulate that so that my body continues being healthy. I swear I’m ready to become a wet nurse or surrogate; SERIOUSLY.

And lastly, I am super, super BROODY right now. I am seriously jonesing to have another baby. I know! DS would disown me if I even suggested it. And even if we were on track to have another, we wouldn’t be trying for another year yet. (So I’d be 40 when the baby would be born.) But I can’t even tell you how badly I’m feeling this. Then I go and read these blogs by women who don’t conceive easily and would take another one (ten) in a heartbeat and it makes me wonder why I don’t just go have another; I mean other then the fact that I’m still getting my butt kicked by these two on a daily basis. I keep trying to tell myself it’s hormones, but still. It does make me wonder what my life would’ve been if I’d been born in a time w/out birth control. Most likely I’d have something between 10-15 kids. That or I’d be dead. I would’ve died due to complications of child birth. I certainly would most likely have been pregnant for most of my adult life. Weird to think about huh?

I just reread this and realized that I need to find something to do at work, I may just be loosing my mind. I guess you already knew that.

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

Bathing Suit Season

It’s summer here.

We are finally having a rash of hot days all in a row.

Hot enough that the wading pool isn’t really cutting it anymore; how can it when TS knows that the “big pool” is open now? Hot enough that we’ve started swim lessons. Hot enough to require that I wear a bathing suit on a regular basis. (sound of record scratching)

I HATE that part.

I have absolutely no self confidence in my body. Pre or post babies. A lot of my lack of confidence (I’m realizing) has come from my mother’s pre-occupation with picking at me constantly. Besides constantly commenting on my hair, she typically critics my outfit (daily) and the way (how well she feels) I’m wearing it. My mom is a perfectionist, at least when it comes to other people. No, she is not all that thin. In fact she’s pretty overweight, but she has told me that she only picks on me because “she knows I could look so much better if I would just dress right/lose weight/workout.” Nice, huh?
Let’s just say her input has not been all that positive over the years, even when I actually was thin. I’m not sure how I didn’t become a bulimic or something.

Now before you get all, “I’ve seen your pictures on this blog and you look fine, stop complaining. Whiner!” Know that I am extremely selective about what I will post on here. Most of what you see will only be from the waist up, or at the very least, I’m sitting down and/or have a child in front of me. I’m savvy like that.

All things considered (I stress eat, and I've been stressed a lot this last year) I’m not really overweight, I’m flabby. Really flabby. So it’s not a big deal in the winter, I can more or less hide it. In the summer, in a bathing suit, not so much.

Ironically, I am most comfortable with my body when it’s pregnant. The bigger I am (except maybe at the very end when you’re super uncomfortable in the physical sense) the more comfortable I am. I’ll even wear a bikini when I’m pregnant. How’s that for ironic? I know it’s because I am not flabby when pregnant. I feel so confident in how I look. I am one of those women who has improvement in my skin and hair during that time. There I am in my full glory; shiny, thick hair, clear, glowing skin and my belly out for all to see. I feel like an earth mama or something. I feel like this is what my body was meant to do and how I am supposed to look.

I feel beautiful.

I found during my last pregnancy I was most comfortable in my tighter fitting clothing then in things that were big and flowy. My mom would and did encourage me to wear big and flowy; to effectively “hide” my bigness. Instead of looking pregnant I just looked fat. I mostly followed her advice during my first pregnancy and while I enjoyed my being pregnant, I was much happier in my choices the second time around. It drove her nuts that I was wearing all these tight fitting clothes, but I think what really bugged her was that I felt confident enough to wear these things when I was so big. (I wasn’t all that big, if you remember I only gained 10 lbs with my last pregnancy.) And she never would have worn something like that. I was doing something outside of her comfort zone, so she was uncomfortable. Living vicariously much?

So here I find myself at the start of summer, taking my kids to swim lessons (I have to get in with BS) and having to wear my bathing suit. All the while wishing I was pregnant so the way I look would be the way I’m supposed to instead of wishing for everything to be firmer.

I wear one of these suits to hide the flab, but also because I stoped shaving in certain areas a long time ago—too much trouble. So even if I got firm(er) I’d probably still wear the same suit, but I’d like to think I’d feel better about myself. Most of all, I don’t want my girls to know how self conscious I am about my body. I think a lot of my issue has to do with the fact that my mom felt that way about herself and has/is projecting it onto me. I so don’t want to do that to my kids. I love the way TS strips down to nothing and does the “booty dance”. She is so completely immodest, unabashed and comfortable with herself. I hope she always feels that way about her own body. I also hope she doesn’t ever strip down and do the booty dance in public, cause we’re only a pole away from a p0rn career if she does.

Hopefully, someday when my kids read this they’ll be shocked to learn how I feel about my looks. If they are, then I did my job well.

Thursday, June 07, 2007

Thursday Thirteen



So I thought I’d something different today. I mean besides posting for the third time this week. Don’t pee yourself I told you things had calmed down, I might actual get to post more then once a week. But then again every time I say something like that I get super busy, so let’s forget I mentioned it. My post yesterday was very much like a Love Thursday and since today is Thursday I figured I’d do a meme. Wait! Don’t leave, I’ve never done one before! Don’t you want to know these things? Come on, there is too things about myself you don’t know. Honest! I’ve got a good one at the bottom trust me. I promise you’ll still respect yourself and I’ll call you for a second date ;-) I’ve been tagged for stuff like this before, but it always seems to happen during times when I can’t respond, so I’m tagging myself, here it goes:

Thursday Thirteen

1) My hair is my most and least favorite aspect of my body. It’s curly. Really curly, but I blow it out every other week or so. It has loosened up over the years, so when I couldn’t straiten it out I hated it (puberty) . Now that I can, I kind of like it. I like that I have options. I also like that I don’t dye my hair. This is my natural color, I don’t (knock on wood) have any gray and I’m 38.


2) I have terrible skin. (Some of this I mentioned before, but not all of it.) I have hyper pigmentation, especially from scarring. I also keloid scar (the scar tissue shows up on the outside of the injury instead of the inside.)

3) I have very small feet; size 5 ½. Now you may be going, “hey that’s the size I wear, that’s not that small!” It is if you’re 5’ 7”. DS jokes that I balance on the stubs of my legs instead of actually standing on my feet.

4) In the same vein, I have an overall small frame. (This is where BS gets it from, I think.) I’m long, but small around (except when it comes to hips & arce, I follow my Hispanic side of the family on that front). What is means is that I have long skinny fingers, (ring finger size 4) long legs (they seem to go past where my waist is supposed to be, so it seems like most pants are too short on me) and if I were to diet and work out, I could be down to a size 4. I don’t really diet and work out, so don’t get overexcited. And I do have hip bones. So while I could be thin, my metabolism dictates that this tall, slender frame will carry lots of weight on it. So I wore that size 4, for like 5 minutes, ONCE! but not since. But it was an awesome 5 minutes!!!

5) I’m addicted to certain TV shows: Survivor, anything Law & Order and Heros. OMG I am so addicted to Heros! Also like to geek out on: Dirty Jobs, Mythbusters and Dr. G, Medical Examiner. I never really watched TV till I got my TiVO. I LOVE my TiVO!

6) I’m addicted to vinegar and not a huge fan of butter. Things you might usually put butter on; cooked veggies, potatoes, rice, etc…I will put vinegar on. I always have several kinds of vinegar in the house. I also have 2 kinds in my drawer at work, seriously.

7) I was really good at math & science in school. I was in advanced (upper grade) classes until high school (Jr. year) for math & college (freshman year). I think I’m still probably good at it; I just need the right teachers to work with me. As a result I learned to program in BASIC in 6th grade. If you know what that means you’re probably a geek too. I was in 6th grade in 1982-83.

8) I was a Girl Scout from 1st grade through 12th. I earned my Gold Award (their version of an Eagle Scout). (Let me specify that it was all the same girls during that time & no one knew we were in it. It was a good excuse to hang out on a school night. We also got to go to Hawaii in our Jr. year as part of it.) I told you I was a geek, but hey I wasn’t in band (nothing personal if you were in band, I’m just saying I wasn’t a band geek).

9) I have an ear for music. I learned to play the flute in 4th grade. I amazed my music teacher by picking it up and blowing into it correctly (it’s not typically an intuitive thing). I can tune instruments by ear, I can tell you what note you’re playing from sound and I taught myself to play piano and trumpet in 7th grade. I quit playing in high school because I didn’t have anyone to challenge me, my school band SUCKED and I had no goals related to it. I still have my flute and all my music in a box in my closet because I want to start playing again someday.

10) I danced ballet from 6th-12th grade. I was on Pointe in high school and lost a toe nail as a result of it. I also broke my little toes so many times I don’t even know, they’re totally deformed as a result (they’re all smushed, but they’re small so you can’t really see them anyway. ;-)\

11) I traveled through Europe BY. MY. SELF. when I was 24. I had never done anything like that (never even considered it) before that trip. It was a life changing trip, I became way more laid back and a lot more fun as a result. (Fodder for blog posts!)

12) I met my husband on a dating website. We were a super high match from the second I got on, but neither of us would contact each other because we didn’t like each other’s photos. (Long story) I ended up becoming friends with his friends (and room mate) through the site and then met him in person. Once we had our first conversation we have pretty much always been together. (Moral: pay attention to those questions and who they say you match with, maybe your problem has been that your “type” isn’t really your type. AND don’t judge a book by it’s cover.)

13) I was run over by a truck at age 3. Not hit, run over. If you want to get technical I was backed up over by a full size pick up. I had tire tracks on my chest (no shite!). My poor mom watched it all happen in front of her. I can’t imagine. Bet that got your attention. Now there’s the promise of a blog post to get you to come back later.

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Because Life is Very, Very Good.

So now that I’ve had an opportunity to breath and sleep a bit…don’t worry I didn’t get too much sleep, I wouldn’t want to get used to it or something.

We’ve actually been having cool, (the weather people like to call it mild,) weather lately. That just means that the sun doesn’t come out till like noon here. We have what we call microclimates where I live. That means it could be sunny, warm and beautiful at your house when you leave for work and when you get 3 miles down the road it’s damp and drizzly because it’s fogged in. Seriously. So like in SF they’ve been freezing their patooties off lately. Where we live, it’s more of just making sure we layer (aka—go nowhere without a jacket). While I’m ready to be done with this little weather pattern (I prefer it to be a bit warmer, thankyouverymuch) I have had an opportunity to enjoy the afternoon sun we’ve been getting. This is the first time since our move that I feel like I’ve been able to get a real breath of air and even almost relax on occasion. Yesterday, BS was napping and TS was having an impromptu play date at the neighbors (Have I mentioned that I love my neighborhood). I sat in the backyard writing thank you notes and generally surveying the climate. I realized something:

We’ve made it.
This is the American Dream, so to speak, and we’re living it.

Oh. My. God.

I suddenly feel all grown up. How did this happen?

Let it be known on this day, June 6, 2007 I noted that I AM HAPPY. I have my 2.5 kids (the dog counts as half right?), the loving, hot husband, the beautiful, healthy children, the 5 bedroom house, with a great room AND a living/play room. My rocking hubby has a kick ass job, which he likes (maybe even kind of loves, depends on when you ask him). We live in on of the most expensive areas in the US and we’re not in major debt (I don’t count our mortgage cause the numbers are unreal, but that’s our only real debt) we can afford to live, eat and play comfortably. We live in a GREAT neighborhood, with awesome neighbors/friends and desired public schools.

We are so very blessed.

So to whatever force you believe in (God, Allah, The Beetles…) , please let it be known that I said,

“Thank You”

Because Life is Very, Very Good.

Monday, June 04, 2007

Let Them Eat Cake




So the chaos of birthdays (my girls) is done. Tomorrow is my SIL’s and then there’s Father’s Day, but after that we’re off the hook till November. And even for these things this month we aren’t hosting them. So *breath*…and relax.


TS’s party was a success this weekend; we didn’t play any games, just let the kids play on the swing set and the play room. We did have a piƱata and let the kids all have a turn hitting it with a bat, then did the pull string thing. We practiced collecting candy with TS prior to the party to avoid some tears, like last time. It was hilarious, DS throwing candy into the middle of the room and then TS and he running to collect it.


Yes, I did get movies of it.


I got cupcakes from our favorite bakery; Icing on the Cake (so yummy, try the banana w/cream cheese frosting ones, they’re the BEST!) The kids all had them w/sundae cups, remember those from when we were kids? And everything was done by 4:30. I told TS she couldn’t open her gift till we finished cleaning the house, which wasn’t really a big deal, so she was opening gifts by 5:00 and back on schedule for dinner at 6:00. It was nice. TS had a lot of fun, no tears (at least from my kids) minimal mess, minimal clean up and everyone is happy, and best of all, in bed at a normal time!!!

I believe the high point of the day for BS was the chocolate cupcake I let her have; I strapped her into her highchair (on the deck outside), put a large bib on her and let her have at it. I LOVE this picture of her. I think my favorite part is the blue, blue of her eyes surrounded by the chaos of chocolate on her face. Two days later and she’s still blowing chocolate snot. Life is good.