john's mom works

john the sartorial genius so from where we sit, the impact of hurricane isaac was pretty minimal. i know there are other areas that were much more negatively impacted, and our thoughts and prayers are with them. but here at our house, we were without power for less than 24 hours and we're getting close to back to normal. it was definitely an adventure keeping a two-year-old occupied when elmo, yo gabba gabba, thomas, and bob the builder were not an option. john did seem to understand that the tv was "broken," but he didn't like it at all. we had a lot of fun playing yahtzee and coloring, and we read about a billion books by lantern light. overall, it was actually pretty fun. daddy had to go back to work today, so john and i ventured across town to visit our family and see how everyone else was holding up. a lot of baton rouge is still without power, but they have a generator over there so they're holding up just fine. and we were in for a lovely surpris...

suddenly i want to make spaghetti for dinner. if you haven't heard, there's a hurricane in the gulf that's going to eat the universe. ok, maybe that's a little bit of an exaggeration. (tho not much of one if you believe the alarmists!) the bad news: we're in for some rough weather overnight and tomorrow. tons of rain, some damaging winds for sure, likely power outages, etc.  the good news: isaac seems not as big and bad as they feared even yesterday, tho it is officially a hurricane now and will certainly bring yukkiness this way. as you can see from that map, louisiana is getting a direct hit. and pretty much every model has the storm coming straight through baton rouge. the mall is closing at 3pm today, at which point i'll be heading home to hang with the family and continuously drug the dog. (wouldn't you do the same?) i'll update as much as possible, and as your resident wind-fearer i'm a little bit terrified, but i have a ...

fun at mommy's work playground this past weekend, my husband was out of town for a men's retreat with our church, so it was just little bug and me hanging out. saturday morning we had to come to the mall because i had two events going on and needed to make sure everything was set up properly. john had a great time playing on the playland playground, and we only had to be here a couple hours, so then we headed out for the REAL adventure: going to see mike the tiger at lsu's campus! i'm not sure what's cuter - the sleeping tiger or the row of kids clinging to the fence to watch him. mike wasn't very active - in fact, he was just sleeping on his back in a shady spot. but it still made a heck of an impression on john (who had insisted on wearing his lsu shirt that morning in anticipation of visiting the tiger), who will tell you even now about "mike the tiger sleeping in the grass with his foot in the air!" lunch at the union and ho...

'bout sums it up. so, she said self-centeredly, you may have noticed that there was no john update yesterday. there are two good reasons for that: reason #1: under the weather (see blog title) there is no one in our family who is feeling 100% right now. ok, buddy might be fine - it's hard to get a self-diagnosis from a dog. but my husband's sinus/tonsil issues appear to be back, i've been exhausted and experiencing belly issues, and john is suffering from some generalized two-year-old malaise that manifests in a desire only to curl up on the couch with a blanket. reason #2: traffic that might not seem to make a lot of sense on the surface of things. but yesterday was the worst traffic day i've ever experienced in baton rouge. a tanker carrying isobutane (similar to propane if i understand correctly) was in an accident on i10, so the interstate was closed down in both directions from 3:45 yesterday morning through 6:00am today. this led to the most ridic...

actual quote: "i wear a book hat, mommy!" waking up came early for no apparent reason for me this morning. 5:29 a.m., fast asleep ... 5:30am, mentally making media plans for the holiday season. what?? the good news is, that means some quiet time before the rest of the house stirs. and even once my husband is up, we just listen with one ear for a little voice as we go about our morning routines. around 7:00am, i hear a telltale sound and pop into john's room to help him get up. "i'm sorry, mommy." is the first thing he has to say. his eyes are still clamped shut and he barely even knows i'm there. "sorry for what, little monkey?" "sorry for not listening, mommy." i'm not sure if that was a preemptive apology or if he dreamed he was being bad, but i guess i'll take it. the next thing he said was that he wanted to get dressed. i said ok, and pulled out a pair of shorts that he helped me wiggle him...

another john-selected outfit: sports sweatshirt, sweatpants, and chuck taylor all stars. in south louisiana in august. mom's impromptu draping job to keep the applesauce off the couch. apparently it exhausted the little guy. my husband recently heard somewhere that little boys are "dirt covered noise," and nary a more appropriate statement has ever been made. between the drumset, the loud voices, the mud puddles and the applesauce baths (see draping job above), john is a living breathing case in point. we had a very full weekend (cousin brooke was back in town, and we had a send-off family dinner for cousin ashley before she goes to study in shanghai for a year), but two stories stand out as dirt-covered-noise examples in primary. #1 this is kind of a gross story. if you don't like gross stories, skip to #2. it's not gross. on sunday afternoon, john was eating some applesauce and drinking juice at the kitchen table. i ran into the other room t...

you really can't see the full effect of the salsa in this pic. imagine this cute face ... with salsa ALL OVER IT. last night, my husband was stuck at a meeting late - he's an engineer whose company does municipal work, so when a project of theirs is up for discussion, he has to attend town meetings and the like. so john and i were on our own.  like a true champ, john came shopping with me when i picked him up from school - i had to find a new purse. he behaved himself so well while we shopped, and i decided to treat him to dinner out because he was so awesome. as we drove toward walmart, which would be our last stop of the night, i planned on stopping at subway for cheap/easy dinner. but john pointed at a mexican restaurant and said, "mommy, eat dinner THERE?" and mexican sounded good, so off we went. and you know what? it was spectacular. he sat in the booth next to me and enthusiastically ate his weight in chips and salsa and bean dip, and then still ...

first, a little bit of background. my mom (john's grammie) is famous for her awesomely ridiculous silly videos that she sends for john. grammie is a creative, funny, lady, and her videos reflect that personality. this was last night's video from grammie: (i can't seem to make it un-sideways without spending way more time editing than i have to do that right now. sorry!) needless to say ... john and i found this utterly hysterical. so after several minutes of pure laughter, we decided to make a video to send back to grammie: the crazy wiggles in the middle are when john started attacking the phone while i tried to record him. after we recorded the video, we watched it a couple of times, and i'm not going to lie - john and i cackled like hyenas for a good ten minutes. basically, a good time was had by all. look out for that chicken in the jungle. he'll get you every time.

i have two sippy cups ...one for each of you. this morning my husband was feeling under the weather. it's the same crud, i suppose, that i've been battling for over a week now. but since he wasn't feeling well, he decided to stay home and rest today rather than trying to get up and go to work. i tiptoed around a little bit and tried to stay out of his way so he could sleep. that whole process used to be much easier. now we have a semi-autonomous morning monkey who randomly decides that instead of eating cheese, he would like to jump on daddy's bed. (this is particularly poignant as another new favorite song is "no more monkeys jumping on the bed!") add in a dog who only wants to be glued to my right hip, and it's a little hectic on the best of days, let alone when we're a man down and i'm trying to be quiet. then, that's absolute chaos unfurling. so, my apologies, sick daddy. i did try to protect you. i hope you rested well today...

molting. today seems like a perfect day for a little game of awesome/not awesome. we'll start with when i picked john up at school yesterday. awesome:  we had to go to the produce market to get a bunch of fruit and veggies for the week, and john had a great time. he helped me pick out grapefruit, we discussed the fun-ness of going to the "fruit store," he walked around with me and behaved beautifully. he was a good sport when they didn't have any blueberries (he's been asking for them for days) and when we checked out he said, "mommy, i pay!" and handed the girl my check card. another stop at the grocery store on the blueberry hunt was equally enjoyable, with singing and willingness to buy strawberries instead and general cuteness abounding. not awesome:  the pure two-year-old fallout almost as soon as we got back to the house. he wanted dinner. he wanted peas and cheese and milk. i gave him peas and cheese and milk. he threw them, dumpe...

besties. we had a whirlwind weekend. i was under the weather, but we still managed to fit a lot of excitement in. in short: we put all of our cars in a row: and then we played baby godzilla: one of the most exciting parts was that my husband's brother and his wife and their sweetheart daughter came to stay with us. they live in charlotte so we don't see them too often, but brooke is only four months older than john, so they were perfect playmates: or maybe bandmates? and definitely ducky bathmates: and all that play made john a very very sleepy boy: unfortunately, the visit with the family was short. fortunately, they'll be back next weekend! but the fun wasn't over. first, we colored. then we dumped out all the colors because, dang, that tupperware would make a fine hat: then we tried on daddy's belt and shoes: then we decided a backwards baseball cap is a whole heck of a lot like a football helme...

sad and dejected monday was a little bit of a trying evening at our house. john was in a defiant mood, there was an impending thunderstorm so buddy was a mess, and we were trying to just sit down and just have a low-key dinner as a family. but between buddy jumping on the couch (and peeing on the couch) and john refusing to sit at the table, there wasn't much low-key about it at all. finally, my husband told john that if he didn't listen, he was going to get a spanking. to which john replied, "no, i go in time out. i bad. i go time out." and he went and sat in a corner. worth noting - we've never put john in time out before. my husband and i just looked at each other and whispered, "how long do we leave him there? what do we do?" and after about a minute or two, we told him he could come out and he cheerfully ran over and sat at the table and all was well. so the next morning, when i dropped john at school, i told john's teache...

has anybody seen my kid?

hell of a match. last night while running around the house in just a diaper (as usual), john suddenly got a wile hair. "shirt! i need shirt!" he said enthusiastically. "TIGER shirt!" he added. since he doesn't have a tiger shirt, quick-thinking daddy drummed up the next best thing - a lion pajama shirt, with matching pants for the bottom. shew, disaster averted. a few minutes later, another cry. "shoes! i need shoes!" so daddy took john back to the closet and let him pick out his own shoes. he chose the shiny faux-patent tuxedo shoes from the cruise. they set off the jungle pjs nicely, i think. back to the living room. just a few minutes later, one more cry, "i hug buddy! i hug buddy! SIT BUDDY! i hug buddy!" fortunately, buddy is every bit as obliging as daddy. even more fortunately, we caught it on camera: is it just me, or does buddy look just a tad bemused? i'll pretend it's at john's fashion faux...

john's been at his drums a lot more lately - doing different things with each hand, and this evening he started to use his foot on the bass drum pedal while drumming on the snare and tom - very cool. it's so neat to watch him discover the different sounds he can make ... really an amazing process. and if that's not cute enough, try this on for size: thursday night, my husband had a meeting that ran late and he didn't get home until after john had gone to bed. john woke up just in time to give him a hug before he left for work friday morning. as we were driving to school friday morning, john asked me, "daddy coming?" i said, "no, baby, daddy's at work, but you'll see daddy after school." john responded, "no, see daddy tommorrow." in a heart-wrenchingly sad voice. i said, "baby, did you miss daddy yesterday?" john said, "i miss daddy EVERYDAY, mommy." how's that for love??? (and as i told my ...

snuggle party! last night, i was in a little bit of a funk. no particular reason, just feeling emotionally iffy. it happens sometimes to all of us, i suppose. my husband wound up having to be out late for a meeting, so it probably didn't help that he wasn't home, but i was already feeling somewhat yuk. fortunately for me, it is nearly impossible to be unhappy around my child. we had a lovely snuggle party on the couch while we watched the olympics, and it was so good for my psyche. perhaps the highlight was a wonderful game we've invented together. here's how it works: i shout, "i love john!" as loud as i can. john giggles, and shouts back, "i love mommy!" i shout back again, "i love john!" he shouts back again, "i love mommy!" repeat ad nauseum - or at least until the next synchronized diving event comes on. (john calls it "jumping" and loves to watch it.) this morning, the snuggle-b...

my little bookworm assures me the airplane is ok - it's up in the sky! john has always given lots of positive feedback to us inept grownups in his life. when i changed his diaper on the glacier-sightseeing boat in alaska, for example, as soon as i was finished he shouted, "great job changing john's diaper, mommy! great job!" and if he comes into a public restroom with me, after he sings "mommy on the potty" while i pee, he will cheer after i flush, saying, "good job, mommy, you did it!" i've always found that characteristic of my little sunshiney fellow to be particularly endearing, and now i am noticing something else cool - when he feels a little uncomfortable, he calms himself down by offering positive words to the people around him . the past two nights in the bath, he's been ok lying down on his back for me to rinse his hair, even though he doesn't love it and you can tell he's fighting hard to keep his cool. tue...

john is beginning to learn the abc song. but in case you can't hear him in the video above, his version currently goes like this: a b c d mommy two five six r mommy. sometimes we throw a q in for good measure. i could listen to him sing it for days. and DAYS. i will probably ask him to sing it again on the way home tonight. how are children so unbearable, irrefutably, amazingly cute and unbelievable?