My imac is dead. Again.

Enough said. This means that posting is more difficult because when John comes home, he's on his laptop. My warranty expired as well. This is only the, what, third time my imac has crashed? And it crashes each and every time I try and install new security updates. Quality with a capital "K." [sigh]

"Trumpets?! Standing on chairs?! Waffles?!"

Do you ever get tired of seeing commercials about women feeding their family? Then you need to see this video.

John tipped me off to these. Sarah Hawkins (the ... well ... "host" for lack of a better word) parodies the sexist commercials that target women. These shorts are great! :-)

If you want to see more, head here.

Troubles with Heat

I wanted to take a picture so people could see exactly what our heating unit looks like. Keep in mind we've had no snow or ice here. Our neighbors haven't had problems like this with their unit. Of course, if we had ours placed in an area where it could actually receive sunlight. [sigh]

Our landlord seemed a little pissed off at the company for not bringing someone out to the house today. John and I were told to run emergency heat non-stop or it could cause damage to the unit (if it's not damaged already). Hopefully someone should come out tomorrow morning to take a look at (and fix) our contemporary and classy ice sculpture. ;-)

Our mortgage paperwork is finally on its way to our lender! We finished signing everything on Saturday, but had to wait until today to drop it off at a UPS place. I was hoping to do this with Eric this morning. I needed to pick up a prescription, and I was hoping to drive to the nearest UPS store and find a drop box outside and be done with it. But nothing is ever that simple. I drove to the store and found no drop box. I parked my car right in front of the store because it had just warmed up. It's freezing here; we're under a wind advisory with gusts up to 40 mph. It's miserable. And with Eric being sick, I didn't want to park the car a mile away and have to walk with a baby all the way to the store.

When I didn't see a drop box outside, I quickly went in (bad mommy, I know, leaving my kid in the car but the alternative sucked as well) to see if there was a drop box inside. I didn't see one. I did see a long line of people waiting to mail their last minute Christmas gifts, however. So, I got back in the car, threw a minor fit, and decided to call UPS to come and pick up the stupid thing. Honestly, no drop box??!! It's like going to the post office and seeing no bloody mailbox! I actually saw a UPS truck on the Reston parkway while heading to the pharmacy. I should have driven it off the road and thrown the package in the back of the truck.

From the world of "Eric's Gone Mad-" Eric slept in until... 9:45am today! Holy crap. He has never slept so long before. When John and I got back from dinner last night, Mariko told us that Eric went down at 9:15pm which is late but not unreasonable considering his crazy nap schedule as of late. Imagine my surprise to actually wake up before the baby! It's now just after 5pm, and I think Eric may FINALLY be going down for a nap. He didn't nap much, if at all, this morning. Good grief, kid- NAP for heaven's sake!

I'm currently doing laundry. Tomorrow I hope to finish packing. We leave sometime tomorrow evening for my parents house in Charlottesville. I'm excited to be spending Christmas with my family, especially since they love to watch Eric. Maybe John and I can get some one-on-one time together, for which we will be in serious deficit once number 2 arrives.

Speaking of which... I tried to redo the poll with the baby names because I forgot to put in a dark horse option: Katherine. No middle name. We thought it was kind of long, and I like this name better than John. John hates Kate. I like Kate. But anyway... I didn't want to delete the poll yet again only to put that name on there, but let me know if you like it. Sadly, we had this much trouble coming up with Eric's name, too. It's a good thing we're not having a third. :-)

Bittersweet

Today my best friend Mariko came over with her boyfriend John Lewis to open gifts and celebrate the holidays. She just flew in from Bolivia last night. And today I am deeply in her debt.

This morning, right after we put a feverish Eric down for his morning nap, my cell rang. It was Laurie, a friend of ours who was going to babysit tonight for my FIL's birthday dinner. My in-laws had changed the reservation day once already in order to accommodate our getting a sitter. Laurie was in tears because she had sprained her ankle and couldn't come. Plus, she didn't know how she was going to drive home for the holidays. Poor thing...

So we started making calls and everyone was busy. God bless Mariko and Lewis! They volunteered to babysit for us. I'm grateful to them and grateful that Eric was no longer sick by the time we left. I wouldn't wish last night's Eric trauma on my worst enemy.

At dinner tonight, we talked about baby names with my in-laws. They liked Erin, but had the same reservations that most people have- namely (no pun intended) that "Eric" and "Erin" are just so close. We discussed names, and a few names came back up that John and I had previously rejected. So after a discussion with John, I redid the poll with our top picks, including middle names we're considering. If anyone has any other suggestions, feel free to leave a comment. We are truly stumped.

Mariko and I had a few hours to catch up. I loved being able to see her. I know I'll see her again soon, but it just sucks to have someone you love so far away... It seems like all my good friends leave far from me.

P.S.- I won't see Mariko again until August. M- stay safe and we miss you!!

O What a Night...

...Late December in 2008
This day started out so great,
then turned to CRAP, O what a night...

As per usual, our day started out fine. Better than fine. We finally got our updated mortgage papers (and they're mostly correct- hey they got John's name right this time) which we finished filling out today to mail in on Monday. Then John needed to do Christmas shopping, while I needed to clean bathrooms, so he volunteers to take Eric out with him. (!!) Oh, happiness and joy! I was even able to dust a little and go grocery shopping for some essentials. It's amazing the things you once hated or took for granted before you have kids that you now find priceless. [sigh] Note: Do not go grocery shopping on the weekend before Christmas if you can avoid it.

Eric took a late nap because of his shopping adventure with dad. Our good friends Todd and Leah came over this evening, and we all went out dinner and then got ice cream. We gave Eric a bath as usual, at which point he did something he has never done before- he pooped in the tub!

Gross. So after John cleans the tub, we put Eric down after his bath, but Eric just wouldn't sleep. Sometimes when we have guests over this happens- our little extrovert would rather be downstairs socializing. But after repeated attempts by John and I to get him to sleep, Eric would continue to wake up and cry. After Todd and Leah left, Eric did it again. John and I both went up to check his diaper, maybe give him a bottle (he didn't eat much at dinner), but... BAM. Projectile vomit. You gotta hand it to the kid- he can vomit further than I can throw.

My God.. it's now, what, almost midnight and Eric still hasn't gone to sleep! John and I just spent the last 30 minutes cleaning up Eric's puke (ok, John cleaned it up because pregnant chick here took one whiff almost puked herself). We thought it might be teething, but it's not teething. Just an upset stomach. I hate it when Eric screams as he's crying. It makes me think he's in terrible pain or something. But after puking for about five minutes, and then cuddling him, Eric seemed just fine. Tired, but fine. No fever, all smiles... I have to remind myself (and John) that nights like this are few and far between with our son. Eric has never actually been sick: never had a fever, never had a cold. I know it's strange. I attibute this to the fact that Eric inherited my crazy, overactive immune system.

So, anyway, that was an adventure. John cleaned the carpet while I cuddled Eric. And after putting him yet again, Eric started to cry yet again so John went up to try and put him down again. I put the vomity clothes, burping clothes, etc. in the wash and went outside to dump some dirty diapers in our garbage can. It's then that I notice our air conditioner (is that what those things are called? I think it's just an a.c. unit, not a heating unit as well) that sits outside is covered in ice and snow. This is not good. The entire outside and even the inside is covered in frost. We have no idea why. No one else's is. So now it's an early morning call to the landlord (and here we count our blessings that it's not technically our house and we can get free maintance) to hope he can fix whatever the problem is. We can't find anything on google about this. Anyone out there have any advice?

We Train Them Young

HA! Found it! (See my last post for an explaination). Bloody iphoto...

Even though Eric may have my light coloring and personality (sorry, John), he takes after his dad in all of his interests. When Eric was about six months old, he claimed John's cell and really got upset if Jogn tried to use it. We jokingly refer to Eric's baby philosophy as "What's mine is mine, and what's yours is mine."

About three weeks ago, John was lucky enough to get his hands on the new Blackberry Storm so Eric has "inherited" John's old phone. This is a picture of Eric trying to delete John's contact list. Notice the Java book in the foreground. The only toy of John's that Eric is not allowed to play with is John's pc. I personally believe Eric is plotting on how to get his little pudgies* on that whenever we turn our backs.

*I call his hands, his "pudgies." I don't know why. I probably didn't even spell it correctly. It's a good thing I have an English teacher as a best friend = free editor. :-)

Why Can't We Be More Like...

I wanted to blog about a cute picture I took of Eric using John's cell phone with a book in the foreground on writing Java. I thought I'd entitle it "We Train Them Young" for all our fellow geeks out there. But for some reason known only to my demon-possessed imac, iphoto is claiming that the photo isn't there when I can SEE the stupid thing. Grrr... (And WHY the heck does mac insist on putting an "i" in front of everything. It's not quaint, people. It's annoying. And redundant).

So for this brief yet bitchy post, I thought I would take a minute to justify (to myself) why I haven't done the whole family Christmas rituals that everyone else seems to do once they spawn. Now, this is not a criticism of people who do this. Frankly, I envy you because there's a part of me that really wants to, but a greater part of me that is, well, lazy.

I'm talking about the annual jaunt to JCPenney or Sears for the family Christmas photo, usually made into a lovely Christmas card that can then to sent to family and friends with the extras stored for scrapbooks (which I probably won't have time to start making until the kids are both in school; I find this profoundly depressing). The feminine part of me loves the thought of getting this photo for our family. I really wanted to do this when I was pregnant with Eric. I envisioned John and I taking an excited little Eric into the mall, waiting for only about five minutes, and sitting prettily with a warm, Christmas scene in the background as a professional photographer is able to cox us all to smile happily. We would collect our photo (which was instantly made into a gorgeous Christmas card) and go home to send them to everyone on our list.

The dominant masculine part of me knows how unrealistic that is. First of all, I used to work in the children's section of Sears. I used to watch the poor saps dragging their kids to the photo section kicking and screaming (you would think that might have been enough birth control for me- like going to Disneyworld during Christmas, but oh no). This is why I don't do the whole family Christmas photo thing. For one thing, just getting Eric dressed in something that looks nice is a hassle. Packing up the diaper bag complete with a bottle and now finger foods is a time-consuming task. Then there's John. God bless him, but I think he would hate this more than Eric. Put everything together and I think to myself 'Those Christmas cards from last year will go to waste if I don't use them.' So for those of you who got the same card last year and wonder why... now you know. And, no, I don't feel at all bad about it.

Then there's the whole Santa thing. I can't tell you how many people have asked me if I've taken Eric to see Santa. I nicely tell them 'no' but here's what I'm thinking: 'wtf?' First of all, Eric has trouble recognizing his own grandfather. "Santa" is something so foreign to my 12 month old that I don't think he'll have any later childhood trauma from missing the adventure of sitting on the mall drunk's lap while I pay at least $20 for the priviledge of watching him look bewildered. Yes, it's a nice photo, but seriously... I read post after post from my mom's group about how they can't get their kids to go happily (or barring that, quietly) to see Santa and sit still for a photo. What a hassle. I figure that if Eric and "Erin" want to go see Santa in the future while we're out and about around Christmas, I'll be more than happy to get the photo. Until then, why put them (and more importantly, myself) through that kind of grief? The holidays are stressful enough.

I say this now, of course. But one year when I have some free time [hysterical laughter inserted here] I may have a change of heart and drag the little rug rats to the mall, bribing them with McDonald's to sit on Santa's lap. Then again... ;-)