PUMPKINS! (And a mega weekend)

Last weekend was just dreamy!
After a hard week (see new post from October 9th) we thoroughly enjoyed Curt's 3 day weekend. We went to a pumpkin festival and Anna had a blast climbing on the giant pumpkins.
Check out the video (taken on Curt's cell phone, so the quality is poor):



Here are some pics:












Anyone fancy some good home cooking?



And then a nice, long nap?



(Notice Cricket underneath trying to figure out how to jump up and snuggle!)



Now, you may have noticed that Anna lost her clothes during the above photo montage. Imagine:
-a diaper change
-a naked hiney enjoying fresh air during the aforementioned diaper change
-a diaper bag without an extra set of clothes in it

Getting the picture?

After soaking herself and her clothes, and after moments of quiet desperation and quick thinking... Anna finished the festival in this:





Which is a mermaid tail skirt that I saw at Goodwill for $1 and has been stuck in the diaper bag for weeks, intended for a little girl in our playgroup.
We got some funny looks, but if you had seen the rest of the people wandering around in Hartsburg, MO - you wouldn't have given Anna a second look. (Great place for people watching! Hardly a full set of teeth in the bunch - but plenty of tats!)

What happens when....

A mom tries to check her email...


Anna finds the "cabinet of magic":


Luckily she has good taste. The DVDs she picked:
-St. Louis Cardinal's 2006 World Series DVD
-The Life of David Gale
-Dodgeball







Then, she learns how to turn on the TV:


Luckily, we have only three channels, so there wasn't much on!

G-U-I-L-T, dark nights, and work

A few updates.
So I started work... Before I started this week, I was the most whiney, ambivalent, morose momma you could interact with. "Woe is me" doesn't begin to describe it. But here's the deal (as Joe Biden likes to say): I only work 10-12 hours per week. Anna is truly, barely going to miss me. I will miss two bedtimes each week but she will get used to that very quickly. The thing is, it will be MONTHS before I'm used to it. It feels utterly wrong. But not paying Curt's student loans (which is the whole reason I'm working) feels wrong-er. Well, wrong-ish. I'd go on ignoring them forever and praying for a miracle for a lot longer if I could swing it.

So I became a "working mom" this week. If I were a painting, I'd definitely be a Dali all melty and creepy. THAT'S how frazzled and out of myself I felt.

IN FACT,

I had my first mom freak out in a long, long time. I finally gave in and took an OTC sleep pill because I couldn't settle down mid-week and I really, really, really needed sleep. Well Anna, who hadn't woken up before 3 or 5 am in months, woke up two hours after I took the thing because she was so uncomfortable (teething, stuffy nose - just plain grumpy - very Oscar the Grouchish). I didn't know if I could nurse her, which was what she wanted. So I called our doctor hotline thingy and waited ON HOLD for THIRTY minutes until someone finally answered a little after midnight. Meanwhile, Anna's screaming in her crib for the whole half hour because Curt tried to sooth her but was too sleep deprived himself to be really effective.

And I couldn't go in there to soothe her because she wouldn't understand why I wasn't nursing her. So I waited..... on hold...... piss#& as hell that they weren't answering to let me know if I could still nurse my kid..... listening to her wail.
What a night!

Mom guilt is a very, very powerful thing. I felt it.... last night.... for taking something that probably has fewer chemicals than a diet coke.



That's how much I love this girl:

And the winner is...

We hadn't gotten all the results in for Anna's Halloween costume. But I was still pulling hard for the little Dragonfly. Every time someone would vote for the cliche' girly ones, I would scoff! (C'mon people, we KNOW she's a girl. Do we have to brand it all over her body?) THEN, we made the mistake of going to Octoberfest in Jefferson City. You know, one of those things where the smell of bratwurst, popcorn, and suckers intoxicate you to the point where you think handmade hunting-themed quilts and weird realistic looking pets frozen in life-like poses are worth looking at.

Well, somewhere between taking Anna to hear and dance to good German polkas and watching the wiener dog races (quite popular, actually) we rounded the corner to see a booth spewing PINK. The entire booth was hand-made girl costumes and dress up clothes. There were wings, dresses, crowns, sceptures, more crowns, more wings.

With a lump in my throat and my heart beating madly, I stumbling forward, and against what I thought was my will, my shaky hand came up and began pointing...

We walked away with the ULTIMATE in girly costumes. It looks a little something like this:

but with more pink! We of course got her a matching heart-topped wand because.... well because.... the is no stopping new parents when bombarded with such a mirage as that darned pink booth.

And won't she look so cute???!!!!!!

First Steps!!!

Today Anna took her first step in this wide, wide world. She had all the grace and bravery that a ten month and two day old can have!

This evening, she decided she was going to stand unassisted a few times. I was sitting on the floor brushing my hair and Anna just HAD to come get the brush. I gave it to her and backed away from her while she was standing. I leaned forward and told her to brush Momma's hair. She couldn't reach me with the brush so she reached out with the brush, lifted her little foot, and planted it forward one step. Course, she then began to weeble and wobble so Momma had to come to the rescue. But she did it! My little one!

March on, Anna!

Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day!

Again stealing from a friend's blog....
Found out it is National Talk Like a Pirate Day. Here's a site to see what your pirate name would be.

Mine: Sassy Sally The Bloody
C: Cap'n Kidd Kilpatrick (Love it!)
A: Savvy Ann Blackwater

Did my niece and nephew too!
B: Black Bart Cutthroat
M: Fishbait Bonnie Cutthroat

Did mom and Dad's too for fun!
R: Queen Grace Dread (How fitting!)
D: Lt. John Anderson (Not Piratey AT ALL!)

Conversations...

On the phone with a guy we are meeting with for financial planning...
Me: "Hi Mr. _____. I was referred to you by Sean, who is good friends with my husband."

Him: "Yes, is your husband C____ _____?"

Me: "Yes - he knows your family."

Him: "Yep, I believe I sent you guys a wedding present..."

Me: "Yyyyyyyyeeeessssss....." (Thinking - "What do you say to that? Also - "Oh God, what was the present? Does he expect me to know after 5 1/2 years?")
Me: "Thanks a lot - that was thoughtful. Anyway........."


-------------------------------------------------------------
I was talking to Anna while she was eating a being super cute and told her if she got reincarnated, she'd come back as something wonderful.

Curt pipes up loudly from the other room:
"YES ANNA - You'd come back as a UNICORN!!!!!!!"
(In his manliest voice - of course :-)