Dust is a good thing, right?

It comes as no surprise to me that my last post was almost a month ago. The last month has been crazy, lovely, stressful, fun, emotionally trying, tiresome...you know, the usual.

Happenings in our household:

• Lots and lots of sickness for everyone
• Work. Work. And more work.
• Trying to handle the ever-changing mood of Peanut - teeth, major routine change, and missing daddy and mommy create chaos of the unfun variety.
• Doubting decisions one minute, then fulling embracing them the next.
  

I'm hoping to have some Halloween photos posted soon, but the child is having a dance party right now. I never pass up a dance party.

Fall

There is just something so distracting about fall. Once the air starts getting cooler, I think "oh crap winter is almost here!" and I try to spend as much time outside as I can. This chick was not meant for cold weather (but I suck it up because I don't like the creepy-crawlies you guys got in the south. Give me wind chills and snow any day over a bug bigger than a quarter).

And that is why I haven't been around much. Well, that and booking our lives full of weddings, birthdays, garage sales and other commitments. August and September were a blur.

* * * * *
I will be starting work soon.* I am equal parts excited and frantic right now. I feel like there's so much to do before then. Same crazy feeling I get with the onset of fall, except with more sleepless nights and tension headaches.

In an effort to remain in one piece, I'm exercising my organizational skills. I have collected a bunch of slow cooker recipes** so we won't become regular customers of our local restaurants.
Hmm...that comment may lead one to think that I do all the cooking around here. I really don't - ShankRabbit takes on 95% of the cooking duties (voluntarily, mind you. He loves to do it). So really this recipe preparation is to ensure I don't have to cook after getting home from work. And that I can soak up as much Peanut time as I can before she heads to bed less than 2 hours later. Really, it's something I should have been doing eons ago.

* * * * *
My child is fun. Have I mentioned that before? Yes, there are wonderful moments with a baby and yadda yadda yadda...but now she's such a blast! She may have her dramatic moments of life not being fair (hey, if I can't play hopscotch with the DVDs, neither can you!)...but she's so much fun to be around. We have dance parties and color and cuddle and chase each other around the house. And when all is said and done and she's been tucked in for the night, not more than a couple hours goes by where I find I miss her.

How can you not miss this face?


Note: Give the child food and she'll let you do whatever to her hair.


This was taken at our garage sale last weekend. It's the beginning of October and we've already had to break out the winter coats. ShankRabbit, however, was running around in a cordoroy blazer and/or just his t-shirt. And I'm the one that's been getting sick. Grr...



She understands the concept of smiling for pictures. Here she is saying "cheese!"...or in her words "Theeeeeese!" As you can see she's starting to develop her mom's signature "hooknose" smile - hopefully she doesn't actually have a hooknose later in life. It's not pretty.

_____________________

* I just got word that A (the lady whose maternity leave I'm covering) went into labor early yesterday morning (30+ days early. Yikes!). I really should be starting work NOW, but since I can't leave the child at home, I have to wait until her official first day of daycare. Could you imagine the absolute brain-chaos I'd be experiencing if I had to start right now?

** I sufficiently scoured the CrockPot Lady's archives for yumminess and I could use a few more ideas. Have any recipes to share?

Ridin' the waves...

I'm usually one who embraces change. However, this time around the change that is happening is huge and throws my head into an angry sea of mixed emotions. And when my brain is swimming, I need to talk...or blog.

After taking the first 3 months of Peanut's life just to be with her, I returned to the work force part-time. Once Christmas hit (and with that, our awesome childcare) we decided I should be the stay-at-home parent.

Now, after nearly a year of 24/7 mom time, I will be working outside of the home again - full time (ok, so it's not 100% definite yet, but it's pretty close). If it weren't for the specific opportunity I've been presented, I wouldn't have given it a thought...so don't think this is something we HAVE to do.

Peanut is a toddler now. She is growing increasingly independent, she loves being social and would benefit from a group setting. Also, ShankRabbit will be dropping her off and picking her up from daycare each day, so she will get a lot more one-on-one time with daddy, which is awesome.

There are just so many positives to this new situation that the "other stuff" seems so insignificant...but they are still there. I won't even list them because I don't want to dwell.

((sigh))

I just have to come to grips with letting my "baby" go...letting her grow and develop into the lovely child she is quickly becoming. Just yesterday she learned how to carefully dip her french fry in ketchup and take a bite (after a few rounds of just licking the ketchup off, she figured it out). We visited a potential daycare facility this afternoon and she was there only 5 minutes before she wanted nothing to do with us and ran off to play with the toys and other kids.

It's hard for me, but I think when all is said and done I'll be more happy than sad.

* * * * *

In other big news, our best friends (one of which was Peanut's nanny for a while) are moving 6 hours away in a couple weeks. My thoughts? LALALALALALALALA...I CAN'T HEAR YOU! Yeah, I'm taking the adult approach to this other big change...

Last day

It is officially my last day at work. I've passed on my responsibilities, packed up my personal belongings, and now I'm sorting through the many file folders sitting on my desk.

And in honor of my last day (at least I like to think so), one of my coworkers brought in a small CrockPot of Lil Smokies in barbecue sauce...a very yummy departure from the usual chocolate and cookies that occupy the "food corner" (a.k.a. the counter space across from my cube). the spicy aroma of a non-sweet got to me. I've admittedly had a couple servings already.
Mmm...food...nom nom nom nom...

Where was I?

Hmm. I can't remember where this post was going. Great.

Well, when I've collected my thoughts, I'll return with a more substantial post. Let's just leave this as an 'adieu' to the company I've been with for more than three years.

I'll miss it here.

Multiplication and me

The chocolate, nuts, and cookies from Wednesday (as mentioned in this post) multiplied. My guess is they got together on Thursday while I was gone and had food babies.

Now there are MORE cookies, MORE candies, MORE chocolate covered nuts...and the new addition: Almond Pecan Honey Corn (a really fancy name for something that resembles caramel corn).

It's a good thing I only work three days a week. With my lack of self-control, I'd be 500 pounds by Christmas.

* * *
I enjoyed my hour of "me time" last night. I took a really hot bath (something I haven't done since before I got pregnant), read a couple chapters of a David Sedaris book, and had an adult beverage.

I was determined to make this evening as indulgent as possible. Seeing as we had no chocolate products to snack on (dang it all!), I figured a drink was the next best thing. Usually I like to sip on wine, but none could be found. All I could dredge up was rum and vodka (potato vodka, for those keeping tabs on my gluten-freeness). So, I created the Isabella-version of a dirty martini:
--
shot of vodka
a little water
a couple lemon slices
slice of pickle
2 tablespoons of pickle juice (what can I say? I love pickles!)
serve over a few ice cubes
--
Needless to say, when ShankRabbit and Peanut returned home I was all sorts of relaxed.

This may become a weekly thing (I hope!)...if it does, I will need to make sure chocolate and wine are in our house. Maybe I'll even go crazy and paint my toenails. *gasp!*

'Tis the season to be jolly...

"...and so begins the onslaught of holiday goodie baskets - displayed for all to eat."

This is what I messaged to my husband this morning.

Our office executives get wonderful food baskets during the holidays - everything from cheese and sausage to fruit and chocolate. Being the generous types, they open it up and share with the whole office. I'm not one to complain - their generosity is much appreciated (my no-breakfast tummy will confirm that). But when you have a sea of chocolate covered everythings and a tin of pistachios staring at you from a mere 5 feet away, you have to indulge. And then you hate yourself at the end of the day because your meal schedule looked like this:

7:30 am - arrive at work. caramel turtle.
8:05 am - get cup of tea from the kitcken. handfull of chocolate covered nuts.
9:00 am - groan when you discover there is a huge tin of pistachios you missed - take one handful.
10:20 am - get print job from printer. take more chocolate covered nuts and pistachios. decide that nothing else gets printed today for fear of eating more.
11:00 am - drop mail off in someone's office...notice they have a basket on display with things like brie, creme brulee cookies, and other extravagant stuff. cut visit short and leave before temptation sets in.

On a typical day, I would have had a yogurt, banana, and maybe a bowl of cereal by now. I'm not even to 12pm and I've already had enough chocolate for the rest of the week...and still, no real substance.

Here's to hoping we get a lot of fruit baskets in the weeks to come. Harry & David, anyone?

Defying the Laws of Gravity and Grammar

I work on the 19th floor of a large downtown office building. Because of our close proximity to other tall buildings, sometimes I can watch it snow up. Yep, you heard that right...the swirling vortex of snow doesn't fall - it jumps. At times it even slows down so much that I can almost picture myself in a snow globe. Not that I'd want to be in one - that plastic terrain would be hell on my knees.

In other random news...

I can't decide if I want to capitalize the titles of each one of my entries or not. Mostly because:
a) I don't like how it looks to have almost all the words capitalized
b) I have issues figuring out what articles should remain lowercase
(Don't laugh. My command of the English language is gooder than you)

So, now that you are "in the know," I can continue with my blatant disregard for proper format. Thank you.