Under New Management

I guess I wasn't fired so much as I was put under new management. The company Frank works for no longer wants to pay for his English lessons, but he is perfectly willing to continue to pay for them himself. At least I know now that he is satisfied. Today he took our family to see the project he is working on. He works for a German company the makes round concrete forms. They're currently building a digestor at a big farm north of town. Even though I must confess I didn't really understand any of how it works, it was neat to see. It's huge and round and concrete. When it's done, the farmer can fill it up with corn waste and it will create methane which will then be his energy source to power his farm. At the construction site, Lizzy just wanted me to let her down so she could run around and fall off stuff, trip over things, and generally get herself hurt. Eventually we were able to let her play in some gravel. The rocks fascinated her, and she gave everyone there handfuls of them. She is so generous.

Tomorrow Better be Sunny

Today should have been a good day. But then I got fired. I (used to) tutor an Austrian man in English three days a week, but his company called me today and said they no longer wish to pay for this. Is it bad to hope this is a result of the weak economy? I'd rather assume that they're desperately trying to save pennies than think they were dissatisfied with my work. English is a hard language. It can't be learned in only a couple of months. Oh well. So now I find myself with free time in the evening and no spending money. I'm sure I can find enough projects to fill the time, and I'm trying not to feel sad about the money. It really doesn't affect our financial stability, but it was nice to be contributing something.
The other thing that was not fun about today was the WIC appointment Lizzy had. She was fine- happy, playing, smiling - until we walked into the room where they weigh and measure her. She threw one of her biggest tantrums yet. For some reason, nurses and doctors TERRIFY her. She clung to me, sobbing and screaming while I tried to get her clothes off and put her on the scale. It took a very long time, and we never did get an accurate reading, because she never stopped screaming and thrashing around. Once her clothes were back on, she was fine. Maybe she's just very shy.
And if her behavior wasn't bad enough, she fell off the chart as far as weight for length. She is basically tall, and very, very skinny. I'm not shocked by this (the child won't eat), but I can't help but feel a little bit like a failure. Why can't I get my child to eat? Anyway, tomorrow has to be better.

Jingle Bells

I am so exited for Christmas this year. I think Lizzy is just old enough to really appreciate the lights, the music, the decorations, the presents . . . all of it! And if there are even half the sweets at Christmas as there were on Thanksgiving, she is going to be one happy little girl. On Saturday we got our Christmas tree. We bought it from a little stand that was only about a block and a half away from our apartment, so we didn't have to strap it to the car or anything. My big strong man CARRIED it home. (It helps that the tree is only about 4 feet tall.) We decorated it right away, and I think Lizzy had a great time throwing the ornaments at the branches. It's been a bit difficult teaching her that all those interesting objects have to STAY on the tree, though.

Lizzy was very helpful:

The finished product:

You can sorta see the tree behind all these people:

My Big Strong, Tree-carrying Man! (I made that hat!)

Things of Which I am Mildly Ashamed

• Isaac bought a can of caramel popcorn from the boyscout who lives next door, and I stood in the kitchen and ate all the peanuts out of it. All of them.
• I don't like satires. I realize that makes me one of Them, but I can't seem to help it. Instead of thinking they're funny, I usually find them a little offensive. Either I must be narrow-minded and uneducated, or I have no sense of humor. It's really depressing.
• My daughter is afraid of vacuum cleaners. (She even cried out in her sleep just now, after I merely wrote the words.) Please don't misunderstand me; I am in no way ashamed of my daughter. It's just that I'm pretty sure the reason they scare her is that the sound is so unfamiliar to her. I think I can count on one hand the number of times I've vacuumed since she'd been born. Yes, it's a dusty, dirty world we live in.
• I never send birthday cards, not even if I really like you. You're lucky, and I mean really lucky, if I remember to call.
• When I was a freshman in college I used to regularly (as in once a week) eat a pint of Ben & Jerry's in one sitting. This also makes the list of Things of Which I am Immensely Proud.
• I am afraid of the dark. And I'm pretty sure that if the shower curtain is pulled when I go into the bathroom, there must be ninjas hiding behind it, waiting to attack me. This is the real reason we have two nightlights in our very small apartment. They're not for Lizzy at all.

I've been tagged

This post is in honor of the "I Love Your Blog Award." I now have to answer each of the questions with a one word answer.

1. Where is your phone? wall
2. Where is your significant other? Library
3.Your hair color? mud
4. Your Mother? lovely
5. Your Father? tall
6. Your favorite thing? icecream
7. Your dream last night? forgotten
8. Your dream/goal? family
9. The room you're in? main
10. Your hobby? reading
11. Your fear? dark
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? home
13. Where were you last night? party
14. What you're not? clever
15. One of your wish-list items? house
16. Where you grew up? beautiful
17. The last thing you ate? chocolate
18. What are you wearing? scarf
19. Your TV? new
20. Your pet? Lizzy
21. Your computer? Spike
22. Your mood? relaxed
23. Missing someone? yup
24. Your car? Isaac's
25. Something you're not wearing? shoes
26. Favorite store? grocery(?)
27. Your Summer? wonderful
28. Love someone? many
29. Your favorite color? nah
30. When was the last time you laughed? today
31. Last time you cried? yesterday

Okay, I tag Melody. You're it!

Sunday Naps

I used to think I like to nap, and then I met my husband. The man could sleep four hours straight in the middle of the afternoon and still want to go to bed early. After an hour, or maybe an hour and a half, I usually get bored. I find myself wanting to poke him repeatedly until he wakes up, and then pretend it wasn't me. "No, honey," I would say, "I was sleeping. You woke ME up." He would never fall for it, though. I'm just not sneaky enough.


On Sundays, we usually all take a nap at the same time. Lizzy often falls asleep on the walk home from church, so we dump (I mean gently place) her in her crib and then head off to join her in dreamland. She always wakes up first. After a quick round of rock-paper-scissors to see who has to get up with her, the lucky parent snuggles back in to sleep until the noise from the living room no longer makes snoozing possible. Today, Isaac lost the rock-paper-scissors. Initially, there were sounds of intense disgruntlement from the living room. Apparently, Lizzy was not too pleased with the world. After awhile it got quiet . . . too quiet. When I could no longer ignore the strange silence, I set off to find my usually boisterous family. This is what I found:

He CHEATED. He made her go back to sleep so the he could continue to nap. Isn't that rotten? Or - is it genius? We do like our Sunday naps. . . . (This picture doesn't actually show how cute they were. This is after she started squirming and waking up. But you get the idea.)

My funny Family

Look! Matching hats!

Blah Blog

Today was a pretty average day. I thought I would take Lizzy to the park. There is a big play structure right outside our front door, but I also wanted to take a walk, so in exchange for strapping the child into her stroller, I thought I'd let her check out someplace she'd never been before. I had visions of her running joyfully through the field and delightfully exploring new play equipment. Unfortunately, I did not accurately predict her reactions. Instead, the park turned out to be dirtier, colder, and far less interesting than I remembered from the last time I had seen it. (We used to live right next to it, before Lizzy was born.) They were doing construction across the street, and the noise really freaked Lizzy out. She has been really sensitive to loud noises lately, which is strange considering our upstairs neighbors. She's never actually lived in a house where there wasn't frequent banging, crashing, thumping, or thudding coming through the ceiling. Anyway, back to the park . . . She would not leave my side and wanted to hold my hand the whole time. The most animated she ever got was when she noticed some frat boys playing flag football over by the baseball diamond. She was pretty excited by that. I think she would have joined the game if I had let her. I'm pretty sure it was the football she was after, not the frat boys. At least, I hope so...

Okay, I think I might have decided that I love blogging. Isn't my blog the most aMAZing blog you've ever seen? On a more random note, one of the most recent books I read was Eats, Shoots and Leaves so I am now terrified of misusing punctuation. Never mind about spelling. Oh, I should probably go pay attention to the kids. The two-year-old I am "baby-sitting" is currently trying to sit in two chairs at the same time so that my one-year-old won't get either one. Pretty soon they're going to start throwing graham crackers at each other. Tschuess!

Yeah, I'm still not so convinced that I want to do this whole blog thing. I think I'll give it a try, though, and maybe even give it a while before I tell anyone that I've started. Ha!