Troy and I are home alone tonight. Aaron is at a meeting, and Jack is at my mom’s house for the week.

Troy is soooo funny. He remembers practically every detail about everything that we’ve done or seen. So, tonight, he is retelling stories of Jack….of why we LOVE Jack. Troy is always very funny in the retelling because he just tells all these random thoughts that pop into his head. My brother Jay used to do this when we were kids which I think is amusing.

Remember when….

Jack FREAKED out on the small roller coaster at Mt. Olympus in Wisconsin Dells?

You had to bribe him to ride a second roller coaster at Mt. Olympus with an airbrush tattoo AND cotton candy and he said that if he survived this roller coaster he would NEVER ride another roller coaster?

We were in the car waiting for Jack and my dad started backing up really slowly and Jack came out the door and froze and was all panicked like we were going to leave him?

Oh yeah, and the other day when Rachel (our summer nanny) was here, I fell and cut my elbow, and Rachel asked where the wet cloths went and Jack grabbed it and walked into the kitchen and threw it on the floor (a specific spot on the floor which is where we put the dirty dish towels/rags/etc. prior to transport downstairs to the laundry) and Rachel said, “Uhhhh, are you sure?” and Jack said, “yeah, that’s where they go.”  (He told the story in ONE sentence just like I wrote it.) I bust out laughing and told him that that story was really embarrassing because we do keep the dirty cloths and towels in a STUPID (though convenient) spot. Troy said, “I know.” Then he laughed.

Incredibly enough, Jack has NEVER thrown up since he was two years old. He is 8 and a half now. He truly has been one of the most healthiest kids ever, particularly for spending his life in daycare! I chock it up to breastmilk! He had croup once, a cold here and there, and he missed two days of school in three years for sickness.

But last night at 2:00 am, he threw up from the top bunk onto the floor, bottom bunk and toys that lay underneath. In the grand scheme of things, the volume was piddley. But I was reminded of how lucky I am to have such a healthy kid that I never had to deal with this ever before. When he was two, he threw up into me and then the toilet, each of which were easy to clean.

I just kept thinking how lucky I was when I couldn’t stand the smell while scrubbing the carpet. Speaking of which, it is amazing how LITTLE animal hair actually gets picked up by a regular vacuum though it looks like it is doing a good job. Check this out yourself with some hard circular scrubbing on your own carpet. My bff got herself the Dyson Animal and she says it was worth every penny! It picks up hair that she never knew was there.

Thanks to my bff, I knew that you could just take those gross sheets, chunks and all, and throw them in the washing machine. I think one of her kids has puked from the top bunk at her house too. I haven’t checked yet, but I am a little suspicious that I won’t need to wash twice. We’ll see…

I always use my favorite and cheapest deoderizer of all – pure baking soda on the carpet and bed to soak up the smells. It vacuums up beautifully with my Dyson handheld mini-vacuum.

Now, I’ve got a sore neck from sleeping on the couch as Jack got my bed.

Now that a baby is on the way, I guess it is time to get used to gross excretions and smells….although again, the breastmilk keeps the gross smells to a minimum as well until food is introduced.

Yeah, it’s been a lOOOOOOng time. Got it.

Check out one of my absolute favorite blogs called Cake Wrecks. It is laugh out loud funny when you see what some of these professional cakes look like.

Check out the Sunday Sweets: Reading Rocks post about children’s books that came to life vis-a-vis a cake. These are amazing!!!

We were very busy this weekend with dodging rain, or not dodging it as the case was mostly, during soccer and baseball games. Aaron left Saturday afternoon for a work conference, so I pretty much attended all rainy events alone or with Troy. We survived and are no worse for the wear.

The high school was performing Grease for the spring musical, so the boys and I went to check it out. Jack has seen Grease at least 100 times as it was his movie of choice last summer. The high school did a good job on it, but Jack was not impressed. “They skipped three parts. I can’t take it anymore! This is just not right!” Troy and I did a lot of laughing as a result.

A couple weeks ago, Jack had his allergy tests. Troy is allergic to pretty much every nondomesticated animal in Iowa along with every grass and tree. Jack is allergic to the animals we actually have (a cat and a dog) along with dust mites, mold and some grasses. Crazy enough, he has never had any problems with allergies inside the house with the animals. His are mostly as a result of being outside then coming back inside. His allergist was pretty shocked to learn he was fine all winter inside with a cat and a dog…I didn’t tell him that we like to maintain hellish levels of dust as well. Given his test results, there is no doubt he is allergic to the animals. The white blotches are the cat and dog.

We’ve been having crazy thunderstorms and downpours today. It will downpour, then stop and look as if there is an opportunity to walk the dog or something. Then, pouf, downpour. When we were driving in the car today, I saw lightening strike a business and sparks flew.

I was also able to get moving on my quilt this weekend. I was at a major standstill mainly because I didn’t like one of the fabrics I selected. I purchased another fabric and resewed those squares. I am much happier with the end result even if it required significant seam ripping on my part.

Aaron and I are still trying to pin down a vacation for the summer. We’ve been going back and forth between D.C. (though Jack is convinced there is a resident ghost in the White House and doesn’t want to go anywhere near it), Orlando (though the heat may be repressive, I’ve heard the lines are manageable at Disney), and the San Diego area. California is by far the most expensive option. I’ve thrown in a road trip to Yellowstone National Park via Mount Rushmore. This is shaping up to be not only comparatively inexpensive, but also interesting. The cost is going to depend heavily on weather or not the camp sites are reserved or not by the time we are able to make our reservations after May 1st. If the campsites are all reserved, there is very little cost savings PLUS there is all that time in the car with one another.  Soon we’ll know.

I fit in baking two batches of cookies this weekend as well. One was a chocolate chip recipe with instant vanilla pudding in the mix that I made with m&m’s. NUMMY!

Troy lost a tooth Saturday, so the tooth fairy brought him a dollar bill origami boot to add to his origami ring.

I took the kids to Monsters vs. Aliens this weekend in 3D. It was good, but I have two major gripes for SKG over at Dreamworks.

First off, the 3D was VERY cool. The kids loved it and so did I. It was worth the extra money, but I am wondering if we can just bring in our glasses for the slew of new 3D movies coming out this summer and fall. I certainly hope so. I listened to a very interesting discussion on the 3D technology on NPR’s Science Friday podcast a few weeks ago, and it sounds like this technology is coming on full force. I’ve got my glasses, so bring it on.

Gripe #1 with Monsters vs Aliens – When his communication techniques fail with the alien, the “President” eventually pulls out a handgun and tries to kill the alien. I was immediately disgusted with this display of handgun violence…it closely resembled the “thug” move in the movies in which the thug typically pulls his gun out of his jeans. It was not only completely inappropriate for a children’s movie, but it was also completely gratuitous and unnecessary.  I was nothing short of shocked to see this President figure in a child’s movie pulling out a handgun and shooting to kill. SHAME ON YOU DREAMWORKS! SHAME ON YOU! I find it so hard to believe that this made it past so many PARENTS involved in the decision making processes that went into this movie. It did not move the storyline; it was simply violence.

Gripe #2 with Monsters vs Aliens – Reese Witherspoon’s female character Ginormica has the shape of a giant Barbie doll – her waist is about 12 inches wide compared to her 40 inch hips. Her freakishly skinny waist brought to mind that picture of Michael Jackson from the 80s with the super thin waist – you know the one. Unfortunately, I cannot find it anywhere on the net.

The only nice thing I can say is that Ginormica actually has curvy hips which is a model women need more of.

Is there NO MOTHER OF A DAUGHTER at Dreamworks that can advocate for realistic images for our children? Not only do young girls, teenage girls and women need these images, but so do our SONS!  I think Ginormica is even more offensive to me because she is SOOOOO giant – the thinness of her waist is accentuated by her height.

How many more daughters have to suffer from anorexia and bulimia because they are constantly barraged with images that are completely unrealistic and unhealthy? How many? I don’t even have a daughter, and I am pissed off and fed up with this. When I complain about my hips/thighs/stomach, my husband reminds me of my (mis)perception of what is attractive in our society. Even I fall prey to these ridiculous ideals.

I cannot lie that I felt a HUGE amount of relief when I squeezed back into my pre-pregnancy size 5 jeans at the six week post-pregnancy mark. I couldn’t breathe in them, but I got them on which meant that my body would get back into them with me breathing. I would have been upset had it taken me 8 weeks or 10 or 16. Now, with some time away from my pregnancy and post-pardum body, I can truly appreciate what a woman’s body is capable of. Not only can we nourish our babies during and after pregnancy, skin and muscles stretch in remarkable ways. Hell, my abdominal muscles split apart (and completely freaked me out when I noticed) to accomodate the growing baby, but they grew back together just as my fabulous midwife told me they would. Nothing short of amazing.

I know very few women who find their own pregnancy body as amazing and beautiful as I did, which I think is a down right shame. I seriously question if one of the reasons I found it amazing and beautiful was because I was single and had no one to hide it from. This makes me sad if this is, in fact, true.

Even when a friend warned me about seeing my naked body for the first time post-pardum, I cried like a baby when I saw my own naked, flabby body full length in my bathroom mirror. No more tight stomach….just skin having to go somewhere. Even though my breasts were INCREDIBLE, I had to look at the flabby midsection. BUT, just as my friend warned me, the human body is nothing short of amazing and I did see my stomach muscles again.

What is my point? My point is that from the point young girls and boys age 2 and above are watching silly movies designed to entertain them, the imprinting has begun – good, pretty women are unrealistically and unachievably skinny. Oh, and they are mostly white, but that is a post for another day.

A little smattering of what I’ve been up to lately…

I’m anxious for Spring…winter, winter go away!

Although I can’t really complain since I do have a friends in Fargo and Bismark, ND in the midst of blizzard and flood warnings at the same time.

I’ve been putting my KitchenAid mixer to good use. What a GREAT xmas/birthday present from my hubby!

I prefer to use King Arthur Flour when baking. It is consistent and unbleached, and the company is 100% employee owned. I noticed the  The Best Brownies Ever Recipe on the back of the bag tonight when I was refilling my canister and since I’ve made brownies for everyone BUT my family, I thought I would give it a try. As the baker, I feel it is my duty to test the batter. This is a GREAT brownie batter – barely sweet, very chocolatey. The brownies are currently cooling, but look at this beautiful batch.

Last Sunday, Jack and I dyed some eggs, but because we are a little ahead of the Easter schedule, we used my Great Grandma Robinson’s egg blowing technique first. I forgot about this technique completely until I saw it on Martha Stewart. We used a sewing needle to poke the ends of the eggs and used our mouth and our air to blow it out. It was a lot of fun.

We then dyed them beautiful colors. The one thing that consistently was an issue was that the eggs don’t sink when the shells are empty which means that you need to be VERY careful to drain them properly before taking them out of the dye and transferring them to the container for drying.

I’ve joined the quilt-along over at Oh Fransson. I ordered my fabric online, all from the same designer’s line since I am awful and colors. I thought I was ordering all shades of red, but most was orange hues and some were red. I was disappointed, but after some reconfiguring and a hunt through Des Moines for two more suitable fat quarters, I’m back in. These reds are my favorite combinations.

I haven’t made a true quilt before, so I’ve learned a lot. Elizabeth is doing a great job in her instructions. Among the things I have learned is that I really dislike a 16 square quilt square. Those 1/4 seams are a serious pain to iron!

I’ve got one fabric square materials that I really don’t like at all, but I am trusting the process in how it will fit within the larger quilt. I’m hoping to finish the individual squares this weekend so I can begin working on the sashing. The square in the forefront is the combination I don’t like much at all.

I’m on the soccer board now, so I’ve been spending time learning about my new role as Vice President of the U8 division…wish me luck!! Field lines, nets, teams, bent out of shape parents, oh my!

Here’s a picture of a cute little crock my sister-in-law got me when she was working for Le Creuset. It is one of a pair. I broke my coarse salt canister and this little crock seemed just perfect!

I just got this email from Aaron…

Aaron pours himself a bowl of raisin bran.

Jack: “I’m going to warn you about that cereal. It will make you fart a lot in the morning.”

Aaron: “It does huh? Is that what happened to you?”

Jack: (pouring himself a bowl of raisin bran) “yeah”.

Two hours later and the angry sounds of methane trapped in my colon are literally interrupting other conversations at the staff meeting.

I made these fabulous homemade baked pretzels last weekend, and they will be making a repeat performance this weekend again. Yes, they were that easy and that good!

I found the recipe over at The Fresh Loaf blog. The recipe is from Alton Brown and thus in metric measurements, but The Fresh Loaf converted it to American conversions. The only change I would make is creating 10 good-sized pretzels from the dough instead of 8 gigantic pretzels. All of us loved these!

I also made my first true quilting project. I made it up so it is pretty simple. I wanted a table runner, but it turned out to be pretty gigantic for a table runner. I’m not sure what I’m going to do now. I purchased a back material for it and will finish it this weekend.

I just love the mushroom trees and the I promise to keep the trees fabric (both purchased at JoAnn’s).

Jack was also busy sewing a little purse for his crush. It turned out great! Again, we made it up as we went along.

Aaron: My co-worker came in late to work this morning because her mare died.

Jack: What?

Mom: Her horse died.

Jack: That is too bad that her horse died. How did it die?

Mom: I don’t know.

Jack: So, what about the governor dying?

Mom: What??? A horse died.

Jack looking very confused and then I realize the problem.

Mom: A female horse is called a mare, but it is NOT a mayOR.

Jack: Oh, I was wondering what you were talking about.

Jack really gets into singing the chorus to songs on the radio. One of his favorite things is to have me sing the first part of the chorus so he can wrap it up strong.

So, this is the context for this statement from Jack last night after we were singing along to Out of My Head by Fastball.

“I am such a good singer. I bet I could teach someone to sing really well in a week. I bet I could teach you to sing really well in two…no, three weeks.”

I just revel in the fact that he knows that well is an adverb and good is an adjective!