So Many Stairs

Many years ago I lived in a ranch house.  When I moved into a two-story house I thought I wouldn't make it through the first two weeks climbing stairs.  I didn't think I was in terrible shape; in fact, I'd lost a decent bit of weight packing and moving us in.  But those blasted stairs would wind me--even when I wasn't tired.

Three weeks after moving in I realized I didn't notice the stairs anymore.  My body had gotten accustomed to the specific activity of climbing stairs versus doing other types of physical activity.  In this house I seem to be climbing stairs more than ever.  And while I'm used to stairs, after fifty flights in a day, I'm tired. I blame the basement.  Or maybe it's the children. 

I don't know how you count flights of stairs.  If you climb up a flight and then go back down them, is that two flights?  You traversed a flight of stairs twice.  You "climb three flights to your dentist's office" and you "have to go down four flights of stairs because the elevator was out of service."  So if I go up two and then back down two, do I get credit for four flights?

I eagerly look at the scale in the morning to see the results of all this stairing.  Okay, I anxiously look at the scale.  Still, it's not moving in a rapidly downward fashion.   So, I'm going to have to either do more stair climbing or add something else to my daily calorie-burning routine. 


The Big Boy Update:  He throws food.   He loves to eat.  Loves food.  But he drops a lot and some of it is intentional over the side of the chair.  At what age should I be correcting this?  I suppose I should start now, but I want to find out how to do it in a positive way.  I'm going to ask my mom expert friend for advice.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  So interactive.  When she's awake, she loves to interact with people.  She smiles, coos, wants to look at you and hold her head up on your shoulder.  She doesn't demand to be held like I've heard some babies do, but she does want to have a human to look at and do her baby-best to communicate with.

How To Slow Down Time

Have you ever looked at the clock and thirty minutes have gone by when it only feels like three?  Or you can't believe it's the afternoon because it seems like you just got out of the shower?  Or the deadline for that project is coming up and you have far more to do than time in which to do it?  Never fear, I've discovered how to slow down time -- put something in the microwave. 

Two minutes seems like such a short time.  I stick the bowl to warm in the microwave and start the two minutes.  Then I get some things done while I wait for the dish to heat up.  I'll put the dishes in the dishwasher, take some clean clothes into the bedroom for folding, get a drink from the refrigerator, ask my husband a question and then look over at the microwave, only to find there's still forty eight seconds left.  It happens all the time.  I know I'm not that efficient or fast because when the microwave isn't on, the day goes by so fast and I still have things to do.

So, I've got an idea for an invention.  All we need is some item we can put in the microwave that won't melt or explode.  Then, when you need a little extra time, you can put the microwave on for an hour or two thus allowing you to get seven or eight hours of work accomplished.  Now that would be a good invention.

The Big Boy Update:  Back in track pants.   He's looking so slim these days.  People are commenting on how he's not nearly as fat as he was a few months ago.  He's growing tall too.  His current track pants are getting too short so I got some new ones yesterday.  Today he looked both comfortable and stylish.  Not to mention fit and trim.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  Two nights now she's slept with her mittens on.  She's not been nearly as upset as I thought she would be considering she's being denied access to her hands for sucking.  She's still trying during the day.  Whenever she goes for her fingers it means it's time for more food.  She's also eating fairly well too.   She's a good girl. 

My Birthday Alone

I've never been big on celebrating my birthday.  Although, I'm all about throwing a big party for someone else, someone who wants to celebrate.  I'm not upset about my age, I'm not avoiding the day.  It seems like I tell people my age on a regular basis.  A while back my husband thought I was one year older because I'd mentioned that I was almost that age multiple times.  And no, he didn't get in trouble when he did it; heck, it was probably my fault.

I have one birthday that I remember fondly.  I was teaching a class in Munich with another instructor.  We were hours ahead of the US and by the time the work day was over people in the US hadn't contacted me by email to wish me a happy birthday.  This was before the days of Facebook or other social networking sites.

So by dinner time, I had had a happy day teaching (good course, great students) and we decided to go out to a nice restaurant as a class.  Seventeen people at one long table, fantastic food (I love German food) and some drinks with dessert and not one person there knew it was my birthday.  But I was happy and having a great time.

Sometimes it's not about having the attention on you on your birthday, it's just about having a good day.  That was a great birthday even though no one said "happy birthday" to me all day. 

This year we're watching the Super Bowl.  I've made a roast and my mother is bringing over a cake from the grocery store with that inch-thick fluffy white icing.  Even though my husband makes wonderful cakes and can decorate them beautifully, that's what I wanted.   But... he surprised me and brought me breakfast in bed.  Biscuitville!  I love Biscuitville.  We moved farther away from the restaurant so it's a longer drive and I rarely go anymore.  What a delight.   My in-laws are here.  Uncle Jon is here and one of our best friends is also coming over.  So it's one of those "good days."

It's definitely been a happy birthday.


The Big Boy Update:  Tomato sauce carnage.  He loves tomato sauce.  Loves it all over his body when he eats.  It's acidic and makes his face and arms all red and rashy.  It's hard to keep it off his skin when the alternative is to get his clothes stained.  So he eats and then we put anti-itch lotion on him.  He's a great eater, especially when it's pasta.


The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  She's kicking right now, cooing and smiling.  She is so social when she's been fed and is in someone's arms.  She makes the biggest smiles and has these great sounds to go with it.  I've been trying to videotape it, but she doesn't preform apparently.

The Cup and The Cake

For Movie Night this Friday we celebrated Shealyn's eighth birthday.  I asked her mother what she liked and we went for strawberry cake with strawberries between the layers.  Now you should know that when I say "we," what I mean is my husband did all the cake making and decorating and I just gave advice (weather he wanted it or not.)

We heard Shealyn was very into Harry Potter and princesses right now.  After looking online for Harry Potter cake themes, only to find amazing 200+ hour professional cakes or unexciting crest-themes, we went with the Princess theme.

My husband outdid himself.  Click on the photo to see the detail he put into the dress.  The 3D princess on top had a real doll torso decorated in rose petal pink and purple.  Shealyn even had a tiara to wear for the song and candle blowing out and then there was wand to remember the cake by.

Suffice it to say, the cake was a big hit.  We found out afterwards that she'd always wanted a doll cake.  Way to go daddy!

My birthday is this weekend too.  I didn't want to have the focus on me.  I'm getting a cake on Sunday any way.  So my husband made me a cupcake and put a candle in it.  Not just any cupcake, a mini-cupcake.  He iced it and put Happy Birthday in teenie tiny writing on it too.   My little cupcake was very good.  And also very thoughtful.

The Big Boy Update: There's a monster upstairs.  His room is over ours; in the morning when he wakes up he stands up and moves around his crib.  It sounds like a monster is upstairs stomping around.   But as long as there's no crying to go along with the stomping it's good news; that means he's entertaining himself until breakfast time.   This morning he had oatmeal for breakfast.  I was feeding him the oatmeal with a big spoon and he was sticking his baby spoon into the bowl.  He figured out that you put the spoon in the bowl and then feed the other person.  So he tried to feed me while I fed him.  Too cute.  Too fun.  Too messy.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles: Fighting the food.  She has been fighting the bottle lately.  I'm not sure if it's gas or some other cause, but she will violently shake her head and thrust her tongue out during meals.  Her brother was never that way, even if he was gassy.  So, we're keeping on top of the gas drops and giving her breaks after eating parts of her meal and burping her lots.  She eventually comes around and eats it all.  Perhaps I'm not being patient enough.  Lack of patience is one of my many faults.

Tidy As You Go

Tidy as you go is a cleaning tip my mother told me time and time again when I was young.  If you're cooking or working on a craft item or doing anything that involves making a mess, if you clean up as you go, the mess usually is almost gone by the time you're done.

No where else is this more helpful in the kitchen.  If you're short on counter space, or you have time between steps in what you're cooking, put the things you're done with away or clean them as you have the time.  To me, there's nothing more satisfying than having the kitchen completely cleaned up when the meal is ready.  You can sit down to eat knowing you don't have lots of work to do after you're done eating.

I've lived by "Tidy as you go" all my adult life.  I hated it as a child, but now I fully embrace it.  I plan on passing this phrase down to my children when they're older.


The Big Boy Update:  No concept of cold.  He likes the ice machine.  It's under the cabinet and he's figured out how to open the door, reach in and get a piece of ice.  Usually he drops it on the floor and it puddles up, he steps in it or sits in it.  So, normally he doesn't get to explore the ice machine for that long.  Last night I thought I'd see how long he'd keep at it.  Twenty minutes later he still hadn't taken one hand out  of the ice and had eaten several pieces.  He was completely entertained, and apparently not cold at all.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  Keeping her fingers out of her mouth in during the night is going to continue to be a challenge.  She can keep her fingers in just fine, but a pacifier (which she seems to like just fine) falls out just about the time you think she's keeping hold of it.  It's not much of a problem during the day, it only seems to appear at night.  If I can get her very full, she goes to sleep with nothing.  But in the middle of the night she wakes up and uses her fingers to self-soothe back to sleep.

Your Mental Size

I've heard many times that people who are trying to lose weight sometimes have a hard time because their mental size of themselves is larger than their target weight.  They see themselves as overweight, so even if they lose the weight, they return to a larger size due to mental image. 

I've always been relatively thin.  Not too thin, but never pudgy or overweight.  I could eat whatever I wanted.  I didn't appreciate that until I hit thirty.  Then things slowed down with my metabolism or maybe I just got more hungry.  I thought at first that my pants had shrunk, but no, I had gained weight.  I never even owned a scale until I was over thirty.  I had to figure out what my target weight was even suppose to be.

I went on a diet, did a good job and at a certain point realized I needed to stop because I was losing weight in places I didn't want to lose weight.  So, now I know what I should weigh to be a healthy right-sized person.  But I don't weigh that now by a good number of pounds.  I'm not fretting over it, it'll come off, it's doable.  It's just not what I currently weigh.

Back to my point of what your mental image is of your size.  I've started exercising using the Kinect on the XBox.  I do these dance things and at the end it takes a picture of you in the "finishing move" which is all kinds of silly, but hey, it's exercise.  Every time I think "who is that fat person in the picture?  That's not me!"   I'm thinking this means my mental image of myself is lower weight than I currently am.  If so, hopefully not only can I lose the weight, but I'll be able to keep it off. 

The Big Boy Update:  No napping for me. Yesterday he refused to nap.  This happens with one nap of the day sometimes, but never two.  He just didn't want to sleep.  This does not bode well for later in the day when he's out of energy, hungry and melts down.  But last night he pushed through it at the restaurant, spent a lot of time trying to interact with the baby at the next table and didn't fall asleep on the way home for his final bottle of milk and bed at his regular time.  He slept an extra half-hour this morning.  Ahhh, the quiet morning.  So rare.  So treasured. 

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  Not the thumb!  She's found her thumb several times.  At first, they indicate they're hungry by trying to get anything into their mouth.  Their hands find their way there commonly and lots of sucking sounds are heard while they try to find the milk.  Eventually, the baby finds a thumb.  The first time it's so cute.  The baby looks so blissfully happy that something just the right size for sucking is now in her mouth.  But I'd rather her prefer a pacifier.  That can be removed later.  She's getting more skilled now with her hands.  She seems to prefer the middle and fourth fingers.  She cried this morning before breakfast and then stopped.  I should have known.  When I went up at nine, she was happily sucking on those two fingers.  I woke her up (she smiled) and carried her downstairs.  Before we were even at the bottom of the stairs she had the two fingers back in her mouth.  So we're at high alert for pacifier insertion opportunities now.

When Does Something New Become Old?

You know that feeling you have when you get something new that you're very excited about?  Say it's a new phone.  You want to make sure nothing happens to it.  You want to preserve its newness, keep it in the perfect condition it was when you bought it.   The first time something happens to it like some dirt gets on it you overreact and get out the cotton swabs and alcohol to clean it.  You blow on it and then fret that dirt might have gotten into the port and it'll never be the same again.

But at some point, that item becomes "old."  It becomes old in our minds.  It's like your current phone that you've had for a long time that's all scratched up and dirty.  If more dirt gets on it, "meh, it's old, these things happen."  So when does that shiny, new item get old in our minds?

Today I was putting something back into the refrigerator and I realized the glass shelf was covered in drinking cup rings, debris and something sticky.  Didn't I just wipe off the shelves?  Since the refrigerator is still "new" in my mind, I cleaned off the shelves.  At what point will I not care about the shelves being clean?  When will the refrigerator become "old?"

The Big Boy Update:  This morning he learned he can drop things through the railings on the second floor and they drop to the first floor and make a loud sound on the floor.  I was hoping he wouldn't figure that out.  He likes to throw things down, especially if it's his food, and the dog is below his high chair.  We're going to have to watch him more carefully until this phase passes like the crazy stair-climbing phase did.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  This morning she woke up at 7:15.  She wasn't easily calming back down so I brought her into the bed with me and held her.  Since she usually sleeps until close to nine, or, she wakes up and entertains herself in the crib without help, I decided holding her for an hour or so couldn't hurt.  At this point my son has no interest in being held or cuddled.  I don't want to make a bad habit, but I hate to miss this sweet time with her.  After thirty minutes she fell asleep and I could get up and get mommy morning things done before feeding her.