Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Reasons I Haven't Blogged in Two Weeks:

10.  I'm tired.
9.   On a recent night, Baby V was up at 11, 1, 3, & 5.
8.   A. had strep throat...
7.  ...Then a week later A. had an allergic reaction to amoxicillin and was covered in hives...
6.  ...and A. had to go to the ER and then puked up the prednisone she was given for the hives.
5.  V. started crawling, pulling up, and cruising all at once!
4.  I'm having major writer's block and am working on something that I cannot get going.
3.  Our Elf on the Shelf stares at me with his beady little eyes from over the fireplace and taunts me...
2.  Days of Our Lives has totally sucked me in what with their Gabi murders Nick storyline.
1.  I'm tired.

Top Ten Tuesday

Someone reminded me today is Tuesday... which means I said I was going to go with my Top Ten Thing or whatever.  I can't fall off the wagon after just one week, can I?!

Top Ten Things I Love About My Mom

This is inspired by our phone conversation this evening.  She called in a panic because she'd seen a Slate news article that had been accidentally posted to my Facebook page by my seven month old.  That's right, Folks, I gave Baby V my phone this afternoon to keep her occupied on the floor while I watched all important episode of Days of Our Lives prepared an organic and from scratch meal for dinner, and she managed to randomly post an article from my Slate News App to Facebook.

Here's the article

In case you don't want to read the article, it's about how children of divorce deal with splitting up Thanksgiving and how some divorced couples come together for the holiday so the kids don't have to divide time.

Our conversation went something like this:
Me: Hi Mom.
Mom: WHAT'S GOING ON WITH THE ARTICLE ON YOUR FACEBOOK PAGE????
Me: Huh?
Mom: It's about how divorced parents should have Thanksgiving together with their kids.
Me: Huh?
Mom: I've been worried about this ALL AFTERNOON!  What am I not doing as a mother? How am I failing you?
Me: Huh?
Mom: It's the article on your Facebook page!!!!
Me: Ohhhhhhhhhhh Baby V somehow posted that while she was chewing on my phone this afternoon and I deleted it.
Mom: Oh.
Me: Do you really think I'd use social media to work through my issues with your divorce?
Mom: Well it did seem out of character for you.  This makes more sense.

So, here we have it.  In the one minute that this article was up on my page, my mother (who works full time and is not normally online during the day) managed to see it, read it, and immediately fear the worst.  Bahahahahahahahahaha!

In celebration of her fantastic concern for my well-being, here we have it:

Top Ten Things I Love About My Mom.

10.  She can go from nap to high energy in under a minute.  One minute she's sleeping on the couch, the next she's up re-arranging furniture and adjusting picture frames.
9.  She taught me to love reading.
8.  She doesn't get mad when I "borrow" her clothes and act like I never knew they were hers (this never happens).
7.  She does NOT comment on how messy my car is when she has to drive in it.  She just pushes the junk important stuff to the floor and gets into the passenger seat.
6.  She works hard to maintain our summer house as a place where our entire family can come and grow together.
5.  She reads this blog and says it's great.
4.  She never stops learning new things and trying to get better at old things.
3.  She makes me lentil soup.
2.  She has overcome amazing and unexpected adversity in her life with an inspiring and amazingly positive attitude.
1.  My kids think she is way cooler than I am.

Top Ten Tuesday

I've been seeing lots of blog posts that have some kind of weekly "tradition" - like Throwback Thursday, Friday Finds, Wordless Wednesday, etc... and I like the idea.  But being me and being difficult I have decided to come up with my own thing - so, Top Ten Tuesdays it is. This might be the only Tuesday this happens... we'll see. I'm the decider, remember?

Top Ten Things I Love About My Middle Baby: Zany Z

First of all, now that I have 3 kids I totally understand how the middle child sometimes is left out or left behind or whatever... With the oldest every new milestone is AMAZING OUR CHILD IS A GENIUS!!!! and with the youngest every new milestone is MY LAST BABY TO EVER REACH THIS MILESTONE!!!!  So, with my middle one I worry she feels left out or left behind or not important, which is absolutely not true.  I hope my anxiety about that is just anxiety and not a reality...   

So here we have my Top 10 for this week

10.  She can sleep like a champ.  I knew from the very beginning that she was just like me - a couch potato who loves to lie on the couch and just chill out.  Our first morning home from the hospital she was in bed with me and she was just so content to sleep forever. I knew then we were sleeping soul mates.

9.   She is fearless yet tentative all at once. She does not take risks right away, but once she is comfortable she will be loud and busy and attracting attention in ways that no one else does. 

8.   She loves to pretend and use her imagination.  She will take something that she has heard or read (like the 3 Little Bears) and just run with it. She will dress up and make up stories or lead circle time or sing songs from school.  And she will be happy doing it with someone else or all by herself.

7.   Whenever Baby V starts crying she will immediately start singing our song to her "Baby V V we love you..." over and over again until she settles down.  Baby V has started to settle quickly when she sings to her - she seems to know it's coming.

6.  She has no problem standing up to her older sister, A.  She is one of the few people who does this with regularity.  She will immediately yell, "No, A!!! No!!!" if there is some kind of conflict.  She can get mad on a dime, but she can also immediately be sweet and loving as soon as the conflict is over.

5.   She can and will happily play by herself for long periods of time.

4.   She loves to sing.

3.   She will do almost anything you ask AS LONG as she's gotten a heads up.  No heads up?  Forget about it.

2.  When she cries (which is a lot because she is SO passionate about everything) she produces actual real tears. There's no messing around with her emotions.

1.  She has a spirit about her that is full of life and joy that is contagious to anyone who is around her. Today at Target every person who walked by us smiled at her because she was either singing or telling a story or shouting out a joyful exclamation at whatever crossed her path.  It is fun to watch her learn about the world and fun to watch others get to know her as she does that.

Yup, it's Wednesday already.  I'm behind before I even get started!