to do today:

see if Broadside can preorder the Halloween issue of Make.

40% sippy cups?

gummy worms

calms forte for kids

clean the damn house

send blue cross ymca reimbursment thing

sell stuff on ebay and craigslist

Stuff I need to knit:

mitten and hat set for Mum

sweater for Pete

holiday jumper – blue- for A.

coffee java jackets – at least 5

devil hat for A.

clapotis- with kool aide dyed yarn?

awesome fitted knits sweater I tried on last night- in shine?

fingerless gloves for Kenzie

This post is to document exactly when I was positive she would be at Harvard by 12 years old:

She was being particularly wacky, and I said to her, “Where did I get you? Did I get you at the baby store?”

She replied, “No, I got you at the Mama store!”

Do you see that HUGE cognitive leap there? She’s not even 3 yet.  Smartest. Baby. Ever.

This almost makes up for last night, when she wouldn’t sleep til 10pm, woke up at midnight, then didn’t sleep again til 4am. If you do your math correctly, you will see that adds up to way not enough sleeping.  This morning I have simply opened my skull and poured my Lady Grey directly onto my brain.

The no sleeping is partly my fault though, as she has not been sleeping well at all, so I just let her stay up until about 9pm last night hanging out with us and the neighbors around Katy’s yard sale chimenea.   There were s’mores (try them with dark chocolate and fancy ginger cookies-tres chic!) and Eighties candy for Katy’s totally 80′s birthday party coming up this weekend- Nerds, Laffy Taffy, Fun Dip. Oh yeah, baby.

Anyway, probably a bad call with all the sugar so late, and also she may have snuck some of Nate’s Coke. I was also distracted and slightly morbidly fascinated by my high school yearbook, which was dragged out because our new neighbor went to the same high school I did, so we were comparing notes. Oh man I hated Chuck Goodwin! I had forgotten how much I disliked that kid. In fact, I had forgotten most of those people.  And then, without warning, there they were, in all their unfortunately-banged glory. Turns out they are related by marriage to the kid in seventh grade who made fun of my less than full bosomedness in science class that one day.

Anyway, let’s not think of such things. Let’s focus on the best babyness. Let’s focus on the fact that she calls the neighbors by their cat’s name, because the cat is all she really cares about. Let’s also talk about the extreme flirtiness in which she engages the opposite sex.

Oh man, I was about to expound, but the Lady Grey is wearing off, and cognition is getting not so much with the clarity.  It’s just like Flowers for Algernon. Gahhhh….

If you decide to leave your potty training toddler in the bathroom by herself (because just sitting there on the dirty bathroom floor listening to her ramble for 20 minutes 14,000 times a day is just. so. boring., so by the 14,001st time, you just have to go check your email for a friggin’ minute so you don’t die), be prepared to then spend an additional 20 minutes picking up tiny wads of soaking wet toilet paper that have been flung all over the bathroom like the naughtiest kid in the back row has forgotten his ritalin and has been hawking manic spitballs (“Snakes, Mama!”).

the Baby is not sleeping. Again. I blame the potty training extravaganza, and the imprudent amount of gummi worm bribes encouragement she gets. But, no diapers is good, and almost worth the struggle. Last night at 10pm, she’s on the potty (again. this time she says she has “bees in her bum”. Either she’s strange or has some sort of disease, I don’t know.) and Pete, who has been asleep for 2 hours* and is in his underwear, stumbles into the bathroom.

“Are you okay, Pips?” he asks blearily.

“What are you wearing, Daddy?” she responds, then adds helpfully, “poop?”

*Pete’s not sleeping, either, but he already knows how to potty, so I don’t know what is up with him.

At the ice cream stand, a little girl asks me, pointing to Audrey:

“Does she have only one mommy and one daddy, and maybe another mommy?”

There is a song, on this site , in the interest of informing children about the lifecycle of a caterpillar, that rhymes pupa with supa-dupa. I am not kidding; it’s the third video. I’ll wait for you to watch it.

…..

I wasn’t kidding, was I? Now, picture that song in your head for 3 DAYS. Guantanamo would be a cakewalk. (hey, hyperbole! how ya doin’?)

I am reading an advance copy of “An Arsonist’s Guide to Writer’s Homes in New England”. It’s about a man who inadvertently burns down the Emily Dickinson Homestead. It is made extra fun for me because I know about all the places he is writing about. Still, it’s great so far.