Rapidly losing all sense of space and time.

It's official. I no longer know what day it is.

All month long I've been thinking that Memorial Day happens somewhere around May 31st. I could not get this date out of my head. Even though mentally I know Monday was not the 31st, I have begun living like it's automatically June already.

Yesterday I threw out a bag full of groceries all marked May 27th or May 31st.

I asked Leland to get a new gallon of milk and now realize the one I threw away would not have been bad for a few more days.

I keep thinking our anniversary (June 8th) is only days away and I haven't even thought about it.

I've begun stressing about MCM's birthday, thinking I only have 22 days to pull something together.

Even though I've now realized - via the blog world - that it is in fact only May 28th - a Wednesday - my body keeps trying to tell me that today is Thursday (not sure why) and it is June.

When we were still in Memphis there were certain things that kept me within the bounds of a normal week - a consistent church, certain days for lunching with the girls, certain days I would usually spend with my Mom and Dad, weekends for time with L (because we had those wonderful grandparents to occasionally watch the babe). Since moving, I can see that I've officially lost all of those things that gave my week a sense of structure...there's not a thing I've started to do every Monday or every Wednesday for example, and that stinks. I'm still filling up the days somehow, but the fact that it's inconsistent enough that I can officially not have a clue what the date is...well, that's just sad.

This is not so much a complaint as much as it's just a fact of life and possibly a fact of moving. The good thing is, I remembered that we do own a calendar, and I am officially going to mark up its pages. Can't wait to put a big X on today's square...another day down...another weekend on the way...

We can fly!

Or at least, we can attempt to fly. MCM and I are taking off early Saturday morning to see our dear friend Amber. It will be my first flying expedition with a baby in tow, and I'm understandably a bit nervous. Still, I feel like I can handle most anything she dishes out - even if it means the other travelers hate us. Moms? Any advice from your bag of tricks?

I've always had a distaste for flying. When I was a kid it seemed like there was always a new TV movie about airplane disasters - crashes, holes in the plane, the top ripping off. These images were burned into my brain (a lesson for parents - you never know how much your kids might be internalizing what they see on the tube!), and I think for a long time I actually said I would never fly. I didn't keep that vow, but I still get a little nervous anticipating takeoff and landing. Involuntarily I start running through a list of the people in my life...anyone I'm not on good terms with? Things I've left undone? Things I've left unsaid? Have I failed to say "I'm sorry" or "I love you"? And worse - what's going on with my life? Am I okay with dying right now? What about all those things I'd like to do but haven't yet?

Ugh, it's exhausting and anxiety-inducing. I mean, really, a 2-hour flight is as opportune a moment as any to take stock of your entire past and future life decisions, right?

So, to the blog readers (lurkers mostly and the few that are brave or interested enough to comment:) love to those I love, apologies to those I've hurt (intentionally or otherwise), and let's let bygones be bygones. After all, if things go badly, I don't want to leave feeling guilty and neither do you.

Wish us luck!

If only weekends didn't have to end.

I love a long weekend so much.

This one came right on the heels of one of those long, busy weeks where Leland had to work extra hours, and I was generally exhausted from being on baby duty. We mostly spent time together and tried to relax as much as MCM would let us. She is busier than ever! She came down with a nasty cold on Sunday, which has been making her feel pretty crummy every since. I absolutely cannot stand it when she doesn't feel good. She's been in good spirits, but it kills me to not be able to help her or fix it in some way. Even though she was under the weather we managed to spend some time at the pool, spend some good time outside, and grilled out at Kelly and Brad's house for Memorial Day. Thanks for the great food and company, guys! Sorry if everything MCM touched is now covered in snot.

MCM gets a kiss from Aunt Kelly.

The donkey that lives in K and BT's back yard. It galloped down the hill so we could all get a good look at him. I think it was our frighteningly accurate donkey sounds that got his attention. Eeeeaaawww!

Daddy and MCM take a look at Mr. Donkey.

Poor sick MCM. Still happy though!

Learning what grass feels like.

Sort of Wordless Wednesday

How funny is MCM's face? Do she and Leland have the same hair style or what? It even parts the same direction. Scary.

Not at all frightened that she's about to get her ear chewed off.

MCM's favorite thing - she points, and then you point back and touch her finger. Kinda like E.T. "Eeehhliot"

Sweet MCM and me in the yellow shirt...again. I need to go shopping.

MCM being sweet and silly with Mama. The usual.

Bathing Beauty

We slept in Sunday morning and had a wonderful day outside by the pool. After being awake all day Saturday, MCM definitely needed the extra sleep. The weather man said it would rain, but it ended up being an absolutely beautiful day! Believe me, it's much easier to be at a pool with a baby when there are 3 adults there to entertain her! She is a such a busy girl. I slathered sunblock on her but spent most of the time fretting over her poor, fair skin. Even though we re-applied 50+ sunblock - even in her hair - she still got a little bit of sun. I suppose it's inevitable. Here are some pics:

If anyone's still reading this blog...

I really don't deserve it! We've had a busy week or so and not a lot of computer time. Forgive me! I'm not even going to attempt to throw everything into one post, but I've got to start somewhere!

Leland's sister, Caitlin, has been visiting us since Friday, and we've had so much fun spending time with her! Today is her 21st birthday, so I want to say a big Happy Birthday to Aunt Caitlin!!

We took MCM to Do-Dah Day on Saturday. If you're not from Birmingham, Do-Dah Day is a festival that celebrates our fuzzy, four-legged friends. It's a day of fun, food and music, and everyone brings their dogs. It raises money for a number of local animal charities, so it's a great cause. Believe me when I say I have NEVER seen so many dogs (and some brave cats!) in one place. MCM chose to skip naps all day on Saturday, but you wouldn't have known she was lacking sleep. She had a great time being with Mommy and Daddy and she loved seeing all the animals.

Caitlin arrives.

Quick plug for the ring sling: I'm so happy MCM finally likes it and does so well when I wear her close. Sometimes strollers just don't do the job - in this case we would've had to roll a stroller up and down stairs, and of course there were big dogs everywhere (some looked like small horses, or at least pony size!). In the sling, MCM could be close and safe and didn't get scared by a crowd of people, barking dogs, loud music or any of those usual things that would frighten a sleepy baby. And let's face it, I love to have her close. It just feels good! This sling is a Maya Wrap that I got for next to nothing on Ebay.

Sleepy girl. She was completely worn out by the end of the day!

More stories to come...

A few late pictures...

MCM attended her first wedding a little over a week ago. I swear we tried our hardest to not be the obnoxious guests who brought their baby. We got her through the ceremony by bribing her with puffs. Food works every time.

Three generations of ladies.

Once the ceremony ended she was raring to go.

Love a little bit of drool.

Reception food on her face. Classic.

**Also, a quick shout out to my dear friend Joy who claims to never be mentioned on this blog (and still has NO pictures with MCM. Shame.) At said wedding, Joy reaffirmed her undying friendship by creating a make-shift nursing nook for me in the handicapped stall of a bathroom that was not only just a twosie, but it had no changing table. (The first time I've had to nurse in a bathroom in 11 months - pretty good, huh?) She pulled a small folding chair into what was not a very roomy space, held MCM so I could use the facilities, and then sat with me in the tiny stall while I nursed MCM and changed her diaper on the tiny chair. Too much information? Maybe. True friendship? Definitely. Love ya Joy!

We're Still Here.

I just haven't felt particularly bloggy for the past few days. Sleepy, yes, and ambivalent in the blog department. I think the newness of the move has worn off, for the most part. While I'm still happy to be here, I'm feeling a little less jazzed and a little more lonely. I'm sure I could create solutions to this problem, but for some reason when I get this way, being proactive feels like a little too much to ask.

We did have a fantastic family weekend. I chose to have Saturday be my Mother's Day, and we spent it mostly outside - going on a long walk, going swimming, eating wonderful Mexican food on a porch with Kel and Brad. Of course MCM was along for all of our festivities. It was honestly one of the first days in a long time that we had no particular plans, just did whatever we wanted, and it was great.

Also, Leland and I had been talking for a while about purchasing a jogging stroller. I was starting to get frustrated wearing down the plastic wheels on our Graco, but I couldn't seem to rationalize spending lots of bones on yet another stroller. Then, L happened to see that a fantastic BOB jogging stroller was being sold for over $100 dollars off at a local bike store. It was a floor model with a little fading from the sun, but it was much better than anything we would've allowed ourselves to purchase otherwise. So, happy Mother's Day to me! We got it, and I couldn't be happier! I feel like I could go for miles, and MCM seems to be very content when she's along for the ride.

We're also excited this week, because Leland's sister, Caitlin, is back on American soil! She spent the semester in London and will be in town this weekend to visit, see friends, and celebrate her birthday. Fun things to look forward to, and we can't wait to hear about her travels.

For now though, MCM and I continue to search for ways to fill up the days of stay-at-home motherhood. Two more days left until the weekend...

Samford Gunman Update

So, the campus safety officer made the whole story up. I know. How ridiculous is that? Leland thinks the SU powers that be convinced him to take the hit so they could keep that precious 0% crime rating. I doubt that. I think he was probably just bored.

Pool Days

(How cute is she? This picture was taken with my cell phone, that's why it's poor quality. I wish you could see how adorable she looks in this suit, but I was too busy making sure she didn't fall or drown to take any!)












Today marks a summer right of passage for me - the first day at the pool. It also marks an even greater right of passage - my first public outing in a bathing suit since 9 months of pregnancy and giving birth. You can imagine which one is outdoing the other in terms of milestones.

I know we're all interested in things like pre-pregnancy/post-pregnancy weight, so I'll just go ahead and say that I gained about 30 lbs with MCM. Miraculously it is all gone now. Still, things aren't quite the same as before. That doesn't necessarily mean they are bad. They are just...different. If I had to characterize the situation, I would describe it as small but still jiggly. (a good characterization of myself come to think about it)

Growing up, I would describe my self-image as teetering on the brink of self-confidence/total self-consciousness. The back and forth of it was often exhausting. On the one hand, I had the deeply held belief that it's what's inside that really counts - "Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain..." On the other hand, I had the deep understanding that no matter what I was told, how I looked really mattered. I looked around and felt a sort of ominous presence surrounding girlhood...a resounding "you're not good enough" might be a way to describe it. I remember having an awkward phase that hit its peak about 8th grade. (and I have the pictures to prove it) I think my friends can confirm this, because it's the year we had the fewest boyfriends or even friends that were boys - we were practically a girl gang back then - not always by choice!

In middle school, my friends and I looked at magazines and television and couldn't help but compare what we saw in the mirror to what was on the page. We spent slumber parties perusing YM and Seventeen, trying to figure out how to get our makeup to look like the model's, how we should wear our hair, what clothes will make us look best, etc. By high school there was often talk of eating disorders or rumors of who was doing what to lose weight. We saw girls who looked normal one year return the next year looking skeletal. At my high school, I would guess that a majority of girls had some sort of disordered eating habits, if not full blown eating disorders. (correct me if I'm wrong, but I'd doubt many would disagree) I remember being annoyed and stressed that the first youth group trip of the season was a beach retreat where, even though you had to wear one-pieces, you knew that everyone would be looking around and everyone else, and even the "good Christian boys" responded more to the very skinny girls, the ones who actually had boobs, the ones who looked more like the magazines.

How did I deal with this? Well, I remember getting very serious about attempting to work out right around the time school ended for summer. I'm not exactly a sporty girl, but I would take up some sort of fitness regimen that involved lots of crunches and a very long walk/run each day. I also remember lowering my food intake quite a lot. I usually blamed this on being too busy to eat. I probably weighed 105 on a normal day. (Are you seeing the ridiculousness of this?)

By college, I was thoroughly used to the girls/competition/weight/looks issues. (I developed plenty of my own neuroses along the way) I was utterly familiar with how this plays out in a Christian environment where the quest for perfectionism often goes well beyond perfecting our "inner" selves. Eating disorders were rampant. Sophomore year, I distinctly recall watching my next door neighbor waste away gradually until she finally had to leave school altogether. No one knew what to do. I heard that all she ate were hard candies like jolly ranchers. I'm sure there were a few girls who adopted that diet after hearing it worked well.

At college, I found a new justification for this focus on bodies/looks - it's what a good Christian woman does. There was a message preached, perhaps by accident, that a good Christian wife "takes care of her body" and makes herself look nice for her husband. Godly women "take care of themselves", and less godly women "let themselves go." Christian books and teachers admonished girls to make themselves appealing - wear their hair stylishly and put on makeup, lose weight if they need to. There is something practical in this message, but it was often taken to the extreme. I remember girls who lost massive amounts of weight after growing closer to God through certain ministries or reading certain Christian books. Of course, they had boyfriends and were respected for both their virtue and their beauty, but sometimes I wondered which was more important. (I do not blame these girls, because they were just trying to know the Lord and be "godly women" - ugh, how that phrase was over-used back then. I remember my brother telling me that when he was in college, a friend of his described a girl as "being a real P31" - if you don't know what that means, go get your Bible. I can bet she was your typically beautiful SU girl)

All this to say, being beautiful is nice, but what is most important? In a climate of eating disorders and an inordinate emphasis on outer beauty, what should we be teaching our girls?

I contemplate these things as I look at myself, now a mother. What will I teach MCM? What will she learn from me simply by watching me look in the mirror? What will my face, my body language teach her? Will I wreak of self-consciousness when I try on bathing suits at the department store? How will I combat the messages she's bound to hear on television, in magazines, at school, amongst friends, and God-forbid, at church?

I would say that for the most part, I am over any former obsession with how I look. I have wasted many, many brain cells stressing out about my flabby parts, and I have decided that life is too short to worry about such things. What worries me now is whether or not I will make MCM feel beautiful, whether I can find it in myself to do more than just talk the talk - kids see through that, y'know.

So today, I'm going to the pool with MCM. I'm wearing a bikini, because it's what I have - left over from the pre-pregnancy days. I guess my small but jiggly self will figure this out one trip to the pool at a time.

Just in case you don't live a few miles from campus...

Samford was on lock-down this morning after an armed man pulled a gun on a campus safety officer around 5:00 AM this morning. Apparently the man was skulking around one of the parking decks wearing all black and a black head covering. They enacted the RAVE emergency system, which all colleges are doing these days under threat of violence. The Homewood police (with the assistance of campus safety - thank goodness!) lifted the lock-down around 7:30 AM and declared the campus safe for students and visitors. It may not have been a terribly threatening situation, but I'm impressed that Samford has a plan in place and knows how to use it. Go Dawgs.

Read Samford's press release here.

Dear Magic 8 Ball...

Me: Is it possible for a 10-month-old to throw a tantrum?

Magic 8 Ball: It is decidedly so.

Wordless Wednesday

Samford: "The Harvard of the South"

I know you're all reading Stuff White People Like, but I couldn't help but let out a chuckle when I read today's entry on the Ivy League. Here's the last line:

White people also like to call their school “The Harvard of the ”. Do not challenge this, it will ruin their confidence.

What can I say? They've got our number. Please go read the rest of the post if you haven't had your laugh for the day.

In the news...

A new study provides some of the best evidence to date that breastfeeding does indeed make children smarter. The children in the study, who were all exclusively breast-fed for 3 months with many continuing for 12 months or beyond, scored over 5 percent higher on IQ tests and did better academically than their peers. The study did not conclude whether the increase in intelligence results from breast milk itself or from the bond that breastfeeding creates between mother and child. On that note, the researchers had interesting things to say about how breastfeeding mothers approach mothering in general:

“Mothers who breast-feed or those who breast-feed longer or most exclusively are different from the mothers who don’t,” Dr. Michael Kramer of McGill University in Montreal and the Montreal Children’s Hospital said in a telephone interview.

“They tend to be smarter. They tend to be more invested in their babies. They tend to interact with them more closely. They may be the kind of mothers who read to their kids more, who spend more time with their kids, who play with them more,” added Kramer, who led the study published in the journal Archives of General Psychiatry.

The thing is, those characteristics do not have to be limited to breastfeeding mothers! ANY mother can take the time to invest in her baby and interact with them closely. Breastfeeding certainly facilitates a certain amount of closeness - you keep the baby close, you spend less time apart, you touch and cuddle often. However, ANY mother can take the time to make a similar investment in her child. Pick up your baby, look into her eyes, talk to her, hold her close and play with her often. Who's to say that making the same investment in a relationship with your child wouldn't result in a similar increase in intelligence, emotional and otherwise? If nothing else, it's guaranteed to bring you great joy, and that's worth it to me!

Here are 2 links:
MSNBC - May boost children's IQ
BBC - Breastfeeding 'helps to boost IQ'

Un Sabor de Latino

MCM celebrated her first Cinco de Mayo tonight. I think she's a fan...

Something catches her attention...

It's music to her ears...

The Latin maestro! He was literally doing some sort of salsa dance while intensely staring at MCM through the glass door. She was mesmerized.

Still can't stop watching the maestro, even when Daddy holds her. The music was quite loud.

Derek takes over the mariachi DJ station. (an unfortunately blurry pic)

Three men and a baby. It's just like college...right?

We're back!

Promise I haven't had a case of writer's block.

We went home to Memphis last Wednesday, and I happened to leave my laptop in Birmingham. It was quite a long break from the computer and a long break in general. We had fun playing with Nana and Pop and seeing dear friends, but now we're ready to get back to some semblance of a routine. All of this traveling - Memphis to Bham, Bham to Nashville (and back), Bham to Memphis (and back) - has left MCM and I more sleepless than usual. She simply had too much fun to sleep! Hope everyone had a great weekend!