Actual Conversation

This is an actual conversation that took place last night during dinner while talking about the potential of playing badminton on the outdoor court of the Mountain View Grand.

Mom: I will beat your butt so bad at badminton that it will make your head spin.

Me: Are you kidding me? I could tie one hand behind my back, be 9 months pregnant and still kick your butt.

Dad: Oh yeah? Well I could stick the badminton racket up my butt and kick both of your asses.

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

May is the Season to Plant

Traditionally, every May, we plant our flower pots. Here are a series of pictures from the last three years. One thing that remains consistent is that you can be sure my hair is in a pony tail and I've got my bra hanging out.



2007: In this 1st picture, I am 3 1/2 months pregnant. Gibson and Tica were my helpers.



2008: We had just gotten out of the hospital and I was cherishing my first mother's day and looking forward to beginning traditions.



2009: I have a helping hand. Hadley loved playing with the dirt, putting flowers in pots, and transferring soil from one pot to another.


Her interest in helping me was so precious. She loved all the tools.

My Mom Logic

For the first six months of parenting, I couldn't believe I was allowed to have a baby without getting a degree in it first. I also couldn't believe that my mother had me when she was 20, and yet somehow I was still alive. I was so afraid of screwing up that I did a lot of things by the book. Literally. I would take a book, read aloud the chapter about how to give a bath, dictate to David what we needed to do, and then ready, set, GO. If a book didn't have the words baby or breast in the title, I didn't read it. At the time, I was hoping this phase would be temporary, so that by the time I would have to teach her about the birds and the bees, I would be able to wing it. ::fingers crossed::


Now that I have approximately 17 months of parenting under my belt, I am able to improvise now and then. So in addition to wiping her nose when it runs, making sure she is breathing in the middle of the night, and kissing her boo boos, I am now able to mock her for boogers, build her an afghan fort, teach her how to say poop and burp, and feed her peanut butter and nutella on a spoon, all without a book. ::pats on back:: I know, you wish I was your mom too.


When I became a mother, I expected to love my baby girl unconditionally. To this day, what defies my Mom Logic completely is my ability to love her so deeply that I am consumed with her. She is on a pedestal of perfection, my golden child. She is the measure of my worth. Without her, I am nothing. When she looks at me, I know that she embodies the epitome of everything I have worked for in this lifetime. I was meant to be a mother, to be HER mother. Together, we have made a cocoon for the two of us, a bubble of our life together. A bubble that no one can enter because it is her and me, me and her, against the world. Daily, she reminds me of who I am and what I want to be for her. My baby girl has taught me more about how to be a mother than any book I could have ever read.


Please don't pop my bubble yet to warn me of the teen years. It will fall on deaf ears. I prefer to live in blissful ignorance and make every day the best day ever.

NOTE: This was my post for the MomLogic Mother of All Bloggers Contest. Thank you so much to everyone that signed up to nominate me. I'll name my next child fish after you. April 30th they will announce the top 10 bloggers and then they will be put to a vote.

KFunk Guest Blogger

NOTE: Kristin of Love, Life, and Coffee is good friends with my SIL, Jinnie. We had our babies three months apart and have gotten to know each other through the power of blogs. Her post is a perfect example of something that I have never touched on. I struggle every day with the guilt of not having an office job, yet if I were in an office, I would struggle with the guilt of being away from H. for so long. Enjoy!

Being a working mom isn't easy. And I wouldn't know because I'm not one. But now that I'm back in the working world, I feel like I sort of dance the fine line between working-mom and stay-at-home-mom.


Back when Madison was first born, I made the wise decision of taking six months off from my job. Who knew the economy would tank and I'd end up getting laid off. Hindsight is 20/20! But in retrospect, I'm actually glad I took the time and spent it with my baby, no matter what the circumstances. I never felt like I was climbing the walls or itching to go back to work. I think that alone tells you I was never in the mode of "working mom." However, when it happened, I was still caught off guard.

Madison was almost a year old when I started contracting with my old company. I had just mastered the art of everything about being mom, when I was suddenly bringing her to day care and heading back to work. Being back in my same old office was like "Groundhog Day" - it was so "normal," it was surreal. On my first day back, someone actually came up to me and said, casually: Oh hey, what's up? Are you back from maternity leave? It was as if nothing had changed.


And yet, as all of us moms know, everything had changed.

So now, when we go to a playgroup, I don't feel quite like I fit in with the rest of the stay-at-home moms. And when I go to the office, I don't feel quite like a real coworker. My conversations range from edible playdough to software coding standards. I applaud the moms who go back to work after three months because ultimately, I don't think I could do it. Luckily Madison is at the age where she wants her independence and "freedom" (ha), and doesn't always need me right at her side. So that helps ease the guilt, just a little bit. Whatever the case may be, seeing their little faces at the end of the day is priceless. And I think in our collective mom hearts, we're all just trying to do what's best for our children anyway. And hey, does it really matter? They'll get even with us when they're sixteen anyway!

Gummi Crib Rail Cover Review

Last month, when I went to get Hadley from her nap, I noticed a few teeth marks on her crib rail. It looked like a beaver was using the rail to teethe on, and the paint was taken off down to the wood. Upon further inspection, I noticed that there were additional marks up and down the rail. We needed to do something fast before I started having panic attacks about lead poisoning, so DG got online and found this Gummi crib rail. We purchased one of them and I have to say that it completely fixed our problem. It went on very easily and is adhered so that it covers the rail that she chews on. It was also one of the cheaper products we found.

And to our comfort, her lead levels came back clean too!

Phase 1 of Potty Training

WARNING: This post contains comments that may be offensive to people who like to go into the bathroom, shut the door, turn on the water to drown out noise, come out, and never again talk about what happened in there. Don't worry, I'll be gentle with you.



This week we started Phase 1 of potty training which consists of Hadley coming into the bathroom everytime I go in, pulling down her pants and sitting on her potty next to me. But she's only 15 months, you say? I know, I know, but it is stress free with no expectations. It really has all started because our neighbor gave us a hand-me-down potty last week. I was going to store it in the garage, but then it ended up in the bathroom and I figured, I might as well start with the positive reinforcement now. It's all about repetition and comfort.

For example, I started teaching her to brush her teeth when she was 12 months. Once or twice a day we would go into the bathroom and go through the ritual of brushing our teeth. I would wet her toothbrush and hand it to her and then sing the Raffi song and she would watch me brush. About two weeks in, she finally put the tooth brush in her mouth. Now I have to limit tooth brushing to twice a day. She would live with that toothbrush in her mouth if I let her.

And no, I don't think she's going to be peeing in a toilet any time soon. Realistically, I don't expect this to happen until after she is two. Her head barely comes up to the toilet as it is. I'm just starting now with the fun part. Watching her sit on her potty with her pants around her ankles listening to hear me tinkle is just about the cutest thing I've ever seen. Well, next to her asking for her ducks, or doing Ring Around the Rosie, pretend peeing comes in a close third.

But what do I know about potty training? Nothing. I don't even have a book for that yet. When did you start potty training your kids?

Say Bye-Bye to Bottles

And just like that, the bottles are gone. January 27, I asked everyone in the internet world how to ween a child from a bottle. I got a lot of great advice from all of you. Here is what I did.

Step One
I went out and bought a bunch of different sippy cups; different brands, different colors, different spouts. My intent was to find one that she was comfortable holding and drinking water out of.

Step Two
I did nothing. While I promoted her continuing to drink water out of cups, I really stopped trying to get her to drink milk out of the cups. I didn't even think of it. I didn't even threaten it.

Step Three
I watched her garner interest in sippy cups when she was around other kids. She would see them drinking out of their cups and she would try and steal their cups for a drink of the precious liquid inside.

Step Four
Then today, I really felt like she was ready. So when I knew she was super hungry for milk, I made a big ado about how we had to put all of her bottles in a bag and give them to babies. "Babies NEED your bottles", I told her. "But you are a big girl who drinks out of a cup." This was more for me as I don't think it had any affect on her drinking out of a cup. I then gave her a cup of milk and she sucked it down. Success!!! ::cheers of glee::

Our next issue is attempting to switch from two naps to one a day. More on that later.

No Fear

If the sun is out, Hadley wants to be outside. She will sit and play in the mulch for an hour while her Dad is out raking, watering the compost, filling the bird bath or doing poop patrol. Then she needs to be dragged inside for stupid things like eating and nap time. She usually won't go without a fight though. This week-end, she found her outdoor house and LOVED it.

I am really going to try my best not to pass on any phobias to her. But seriously this thing is a breeding ground for wasps and spiders. Ew. But for her, it's a fairy tale cottage and like totally the funnest thing ever.

The Best $2.50 I Ever Spent

Hadley loves balloons. Pointing to them at the grocery store is one of her greatest joys in life. So at the St. Patty's Day parade in Denver, how could I deny her a balloon?

Hours of fun.

At last you are mine.

Guest Blogger Anyone?

I am looking to add a few guest bloggers to the mix in the next few weeks as it appears that starting a company, looking for a job, and running after a toddler equals less time for me. If you are interested in writing a guest post for the Beehive make a comment or shoot me an email.

There is only one rule. I'm a Project Manager, of course there is a rule. tsk tsk. I would prefer that the post be relevant to this blog. Luckily we talk about almost everything including parenting, pregnancy, raising kids, cooking, cleaning, art, music, restaurants, crafting, sewing, knitting, crocheting, pooping blah blah.

In the meantime, I'm working on the Dysfunctional Housewife, aka Cynthia to cook something up for us.

Angel Face vs. Grumpy Old Man

Hadley really loves bath time. When I yell out the words "Bath Time" Gibson stops in his tracks before running under the bed, and Hadley starts pounding her chest like Celion Dion and demanding her ducks. Her ducks live under the bathroom sink and only come out during bathtime. Well bathtime and extreme playing emergencies. I now have to be careful when I utter those words because she thinks she's going to be stripped naked in 2.2 seconds and the fun is going begin on the double. I love this picture of her post bath because it makes me think of lying on a cloud of soft toilet paper rolls in heaven.


This picture is my new favorite because it makes it look like we don't own a brush. But she had just woken up from a nap and was completely into cheesing it up for the camera.


And finally, this picture is a reminder of how I need to remember that when I dress her, at any minute a Paparazzi can sneak up out of nowhere. Get it? PAPA - razzi hehe. Wearing red and light blue is not perhaps the best choice I could have made for her that day. But when you look like a grumpy old man it kind of takes away the focus of what you are wearing.

Hadley Learns Her Letters

One day, while reading one of her numerous ABC books, letters just started clicking with Hadley. 'F' is by far her Favorite letter of all time. Each week, she picks up another one. She currently knows A, F, L, M, O, S, and T.

To celebrate her learning letters, I learned how to make a movie using our iFlip.

Mommy Blogging Contest

It appears that I've gone off the mommy blogging deep end the past few weeks posting nothing but pictures of Hadley. That's why I mixed it up this week-end with a fun recipe. However, you would be surprised by how many people write to tell me that they only come to this here online diary of mine to see pictures of Hadley. "What about ME", I ask? According to my Dad, it's no longer about me. That being said, I have so many fun videos this month, that the question is which one do I post? Playing with butterflies on her Dad's iphone, naked getting ready for a bath, or trying to say the word Octopus? So we're back to the business of cuteness this week, with me sprinkled in intermittently.

So what's this business about a contest? Well I'm glad you asked. I've mentioned before how many magazine subscriptions we have. DG has paired down a few over the years, only to start getting a several more once we had a baby. We currently get Parenting and Scholastic's Parent & Child. This week, Scholastic is having a contest to nominate Mommy Bloggers. So I was thinking, that if there are any that you really enjoy, ahem, that maybe you visit one day a week or so, and maybe there is always a Bee in the header, and you totally wouldn't mind nominating for a favorite, say like little old me, then you can click here to nominate them. And if you are so kind to do so, let me know so I can honor and love and treasure you with my sincerest gratitude forever and ever.

Weening a Child from a Bottle to a Sippy Cup

Ok, I'm giving a shout out for some help. Mamas out there, could you please let me know how you weened your kid from a bottle to a cup?

THE PROBLEM
Hadley will drink water or juice out of a glass and/or a sippy cup, but only during her meals. She usually drinks less than four ounces a day total. Since her 12 month check-up, she has 3 bottles (20 oz.) of milk per day (now supplemented with Pediasure). But she is so attached to her bottle, that she will only drink milk out of it.

For the past 3 months, every week, I have tried to get her to drink milk out of a cup. However, she refuses, fights it, and will not drink the milk at all. So I pour it in a bottle and she downs the whole thing. Can you say total manipulation?

THE ISSUE
Because she is underweight, she needs her whole milk and supplement. If she weighed enough, I would toss all the bottles and see who had the stronger will. (Me, me, pick me please.)

Other than all out warfare, does anyone have any ideas? I'm having visions of her going into first grade with her bottle attached to her backpack. Ok, not really, but sometimes worst-case-scenarios do sneak into my head.

Getting Into Everything, One Drawer at a Time

The cabinet magnet locks have finally been installed on the crucial ones that Hadley should not get into, but we have so many. The one downfall of a great big kitchen.


At first, when she couldn't open the dog food cabinet anymore, she freaked out. But then she realized she could still get to the towel, cookie cutter, pasta, and her spoon and cup drawer.


I had to move her snacks because she started feeding them to the dogs.


As with any kid, she always manages to get into the spots that you absolutely don't want her to go. So if you feel like you need help baby proofing your house, I'll rent her out to come over and show you what needs to be taken care of. She's like a drug sniffing dog in that way.

The Vocabulary of a One Year Old

Words she says:
Dog, Dada, Mama, Nana, Papa, Tica, Apple, Orange, Banana, Avocado, O, Up, All Done, Burp, Moo (cow), Ah ah ah (monkey noise). Her current word of the week is UP. As in, up the stairs, UP out of the crib, and my favorite, I need a hug, pick me UP.


Signs she knows:
More, Eat, Drink, Down, Book, All Done, Milk, Chicken Dance, Gimme, Hi and Bye, and Poop (ok, I'm still working on this one).

This week, her vocabulary is exploding. Yesterday when I was reading her Charlie Harper's ABCs, she started saying the words on almost every page! Ape, Owl, and Turtle were her favorites.

The Life of a Toddler

It has been an ideal situation for me to be able to stay at home with Hadley and not have to put her into daycare. (minus the sucky part of not working and making any money) Though now that she is almost 14 months old she really needs more interaction with kids so that she can learn socialization skills. So this year, I am making an extra effort to get us out of the house. I joined an online group of Denver Urban Moms that have different activities every day of the week. Just last week, I finally started to participate with Hadley and I think it's been good for us. Not just to get out of the house, but to open up her world to other kids, sharing, and communication. I also joined a Gymboree which is a gym for kids. We went to our first class last November and she LOVED it. It was like I had opened her world up, and she didn't realize there were little people out there just like her. She had 10 month old girls running circles around her, and for the first time, she pulled herself up on me, stood there on her own, and watched them all. Shortly after that, she took her first steps.

Last week, our schedule was booked:

Monday: Barnes and Noble Story time with Urban Moms
Tuesday: National Western Stock Show with Lora, Olivia, Sara, Reese and Phinn
Wednesday: Gymboree
Thursday: Music Harmony with Urban Moms
Friday: Open Gym at Gymboree

This week, we have a cold. I know this is what happens when little kids touch everything and put their hands in their mouth. I'm not interested in being a germ-o-phobe because I want her to begin building antibodies against all the crap she comes up against. Though the mutant snot coming out of her nose looks like something dead from Ghost Busters.

Hugs and Kisses

Hadley has always been a total love bug, but in the last couple of months she's really become a cuddle muffin too. She'll walk across the room just to hug and kiss my knee some days. When she throws her arms around me and puts her head on my chest, it makes me all warm and gushy inside.


Sometimes I just want to wrap her up in a big Mom blanket, like here.


Please understand that I am sacrificing my dignity here by posting the photos of me in an obvious lack of cleanliness. But I figure her cuteness overpowers my stench.

Here she is learning how to kiss on the lips. Though we hope she doesn't pass these out as readily as she does blowing kisses to EVERYONE, including the tellers at the bank, the ladies at Starbucks, anyone sitting in the near vicinity to her on the plane, the bag boys at the grocery store, and the mailmen at the post office. Since she acts in such a familiar fashion to her Dad, like a shut-in starved for attention, I am making an extra effort this year to get her out of the house every day to do fun things. More on that later.

Crawling to Walking

Right before Thanksgiving, Hadley started to crawl and take her first steps. She has been getting progressively more daring until finally at my parents house, she would walk across the room to me. Then when she didn't think we were watching, she would walk unprompted from one piece of furniture to another. She still prefers to crawl about, but each day I see her taking risks and trying to go further.
As any proud parent, the best part of this video for me is her excitement after she totally bites it. That's my girl.

Mommy and Me

A typical day in the life of a stay-at-home mom.

6:30am - Get up with H. so DG can go to work.
7:30am - Feed H. 1st bottle.
8:00am - Feed self 1st coffee, empty dishwasher, clean kitchen, make baby food.
8:30am - Feed H. 1st meal.
9:00am - Change diaper, go to office out of habit, check email, wonder what to do today.
9:10am - Plan to finish baby gift, organize office, do laundry, write past due thank you notes.
9:15am - H. is done playing by herself, wants in my lap.
9:30am - H. falls asleep in my lap. Tip toe upstairs to put her in crib.
9:35am - Madly rush back downstairs to do job search.
9:45am - Remember that I haven't eaten breakfast, run upstairs and grab food.
10:00am - Job search for two hours.
11:30am - H. wakes up, we play bouncy and peek-a-boo on bed.
11:45am - Go through all feeding again, bottle, me, solid food.
noon - Rinse, Repeat, and Go.

Notice there was no shower in that schedule, or blog post, or actual applying for a job, or getting anything done. Other than making H. happy which is really what I am all about these days.

Stay-at-Home-Mom

As you have all read from my twits, I was layed off on Monday morning. I feel like I've been dumped by my true love. I'm not sure what to do with myself and I want to call him to see how he's doing without me. Are you sure you're ok? Doesn't life without me suck? How will you get by? You NEED me. Don't you? *sniff*

Day three of unemployment and I realize that being a stay-at-home mom is not all bon bons and Oprah. I was always afraid of what 'staying at home' meant, fearful that I would resort to sitting on the couch, devouring lean cuisines and watching baby daddy's get dragged onto tv for paternity tests. *Gulp* As it turns out, the days fly by and the tv doesn't even get turned on. In between looking for a job, I want to take H. to the pool every day, hang out with my other friends with kids, and go to museums and the Botanic Gardens.

The question now is, what am I going to do? Ultimately, I will probably need to find a job that requires me to shower and brush my teeth every day. And wear clothes that aren't pajamas, and put H. in day care. I miss her already. Until then, I will enjoy every precious second with her.

Proud Papa

The first time I went up to DGs new cube, it was littered with pics of the dogs and his family, but none of me. Get married and your wife becomes day old mexican food. But here is DG outside of his cube at work, where he has surrounded himself with a wall of Hadley for people to see as they walk by. Olin Mills eat your heart out. I personally would want to stare at it all day. I would never be able to get work done.

I didn't do a Father's Day post because DG already took care of it, but I would like to take the time to wax on poetic about what a great Dad DG is, and not just because he prints out pictures and plasters them on his cube. 1) He loves her so much it hurts. 2) Listening to him play and read to her is enough to make me want to have 10 more of his children. 3) He has a special touch feeding her that no one else has. and 4) He is completely excited about parenting. I love me some DG.

Sitting Pretty

In the past couple of weeks, Hadley has learned to sit up on her own. She loves to sit and play with her toys or watch the dogs. When you tell her to press the flowers to play music, she understands and will reach out and grab them. This is good for at least 30 minutes of fun.

During our physical therapy assessment last week, I was hoping to WOW them with her feats of strength. And though they were impressed, we still have a few milestones to hit. So we are trying to train her to bear weight on her hands so that she can begin to catch herself when she tips over and we are also giving her more tummy time trying to get her to roll from her tummy to her back. (She can already roll from her back to her tummy.) It is so fun to play with her and watch her progress.

And in other news, her first tooth has broken through! I was on video Skype with my parents this week-end and when Hadley started chewing on my finger, I felt something sharp. I got so excited, I threw the camera down and started digging around in her mouth. I am now on tooth watch 2008 and monitoring the progress. My baby girl is growing up so fast. ::sniff::

Rice and Banana Casserole

It has officially been one week since I started Hadley on solid food. And by solid, I mean soupy. It's like feeding her cardboard flakes (organic of course) soaked in breastmilk. Even though it is not much, she is so eager to please that when I say the word "Open" she kicks her feet, grins and opens her mouth up wide. She's such a quick learner that after the first few feedings, she just sees the spoon coming and opens her mouth. It is so cute, in a cute and amusing way that only a mother could love.

I am going to attempt to make all of her food instead of buy jars at the grocery store. The book I am using that Jinnie passed on to me is Super Baby Foods. It is a wealth of knowledge. Yesterday she ate banana for the first time! Even though she furrows her brow at the taste and acts like I've just fed her something Gibson barfed up on the floor, I continue to smile, encourage her, and act like she's eating the most scrumptious lobster dinner. Next week we will try sweet potato and the week after that avocado.

Mommy Blogging

The new buzzword these days is "Mommy blogging". There has been a recent media blitz about mommy blogging, including on Nightline and NBC.

The queen of the mother bloggers is Dooce. And by queen, I mean that she and her husband quit their jobs and make a living off of her blog. The Wall Street Journal and other recent media have estimated the amount to be about $40,000 a month. What the?!?! I make .40 cents on Google Adsense and I giggle like a school girl. "Oh my mom must have clicked something." $40,000 a month! DG and I look at each other, sigh and start dreaming.

So the question that I ask myself is, "Gasp, Have I Become a Mommy Blogger?". And the answer is, well, um, ::foot shuffling::, sort of.

In the late 90's, every Monday morning, I would draft a "Monday morning email" to all my girlfriends detailing my lascivious rambunctiousness of the previous week-end. At the time, it was my own version of Sex in the City. It was the standard stuff, you know like drinking excessively, having guys pick up your tab and then take you to a strip club and give you a hundred dollars in $1 bills for the ladies, taking a cab home at 4am only to have the cab driver recognize you from the week before, going out at 10:30 am for a bloody mary and stumbling home 12 hours later wearing a 1/2 eaten candy necklace, or one of my personal favorites, going home with a guy I liked, only to have his girlfriend waiting for him outside of his apartment. Oh the good old days.

Anyway, I've always said this blog is ABOUT ME, so when I went and got engaged, my blog was about weddings. And through a natural progression of life, we now have a baby, so I blog about her because she's the cutest freaking thing I've ever seen. But now, instead of fun urban hip girl, I am suburban Mommy Blogger. I've gone from Girls Gone Wild to Girls Gone Child.

I'm not sure where this is leading other than to say that I post pictures of her so people out there, her grandparents mostly and my friends who are so far away can feel closer to us and watch her grow up. But have no fear, I'm sure I'll try to fit in some more sex, drugs and rock and roll. And by drugs I mean Vitamin C and Ibuprofen; and by sex, I mean watching Gibson hump Tica; and by Rock and Roll I mean GO buy the new Death Cab For Cutie album because it is awesome.

Parenting Dogs and Babies

I so badly wanted to name this post "Girls Who Pee their Pants", but felt it perhaps violated the integrity of these baby pics. I don't care if I go down in flames, but I didn't want to drag Hadley under the bus with me. She's got a reputation to uphold after all.

DG caught some pics of us playing this week-end. We sang the ABCs.


We practiced saying MA MA MAMAMAMAMAMA.


We had eskimo kisses.


Then I threatened to throw her down on a plate and eat her up because she's so gosh darn cute I can't take it.


As I was posting, I was reminded of a picture of Tica and me from 2006. Apparently I was practicing for parenthood.


Yes Gibson, I love you too.