Ten on Wednesday

1.  The last day of Christmas with Baby sleeping in front of the tree.  Too sweet.

2.  One smiling baby:  For those of you that have missed out on us for the last week E's acid reflux has taken a dramatic turn for the worse.  We hadn't upped his dose since he was 3 months old and were in the process of trying life without the meds.  That did not work.  We're back deep into fussy projectile vomit land and back on a higher dose of meds.  We're on day three of the higher dose and I think he's feeling better and very cute in any case.

3.  Almost every single sentence of M's day begin with Mom, Mama, or Mommy followed by a pause for response.  IT is driving me INSANE.  I am sure she is just trying to make sure she has my attention, but imagine your "name" being said over and over and over.  We're working on it.

4.  M, and all of us, are absolutely delighted with the rain that is gently arriving today.  She has been so impatient to get to use her new umbrella and rain boots and today was the day... ok, so it wasn't raining so much as occasionally lightly sprinkling, but we'll take it!

5.  B and I are planning his birthday party.  We've invited a dozen of his friends.  Seven from school (including two girls!), three from his old school including his bff Preston, and two from our OU friends group.  I'm banking on not all of those coming or our house is going to overflow.  The theme is, of course, skylanders.  B is truly engaged in all aspects of planning this year from picking invitations to creating a menu.  His menu plan (which I'll augment, I suspect) is: Cheeseball with crackers, carrots and celery--he doesn't like celery, but says his friends might, tortilla chips, go go squeeze (apple sauce), and a cake that looks like the portal of power.  He selected a wide variety of printables for his decore via Etsy so we'll be doing a lot of cutting for the next few weeks.  

6.  B's birthday fun today also included his birthday money from Great-Granddaddy.  This is an annual tradition and until now we've always stashed it away in his 529 plan for some future college day.  This year, we told him he could pick one smallish thing to buy with the money himself.  He, obviously, chose a Skylander and needed to get it immediately.  So, I braved Toys R Us with all three kids and after some deliberation we have a Skylander Giant named Bouncer (a robot, tech Skylander).  It was great fun and we agreed that the remainder of the money will go to his college fund as usual.

7.  Brent is teaching a new class this semester.  It is fairly far outside his normal knowledge base and as a result he is studying, drafting PPTs, worrying, and learning at all hours of the day and night.  I know he will do great, but hope he can relax and sleep sometime this semester.

8.  I am back in training after 6 weeks of rotating sicknesses and random scattered exercise.  I'm doing a plan from the Train Like a Mother book and rather like the interspersing of cross-training days among the running.  The idea is to do strength and other kinds of exercises to get the body strong for running and hopefully help avoid injury.  Today's cross-training of choice was a Ballet Body DVD and I'm fairly sure I won't be able to walk tomorrow.

9.  This week we tried several new recipes, but two of note are the Popcorn Cookies from the new Smitten Kitchen Cookbook -- they are amazing, light, sweet, salty, yum -- and the Chicken Fajita and White Bean Chili from Savory Spice.  I was a bit worried that the Chili would be too hot and it probably would as written so I added in 1/2 cup of rice, 1/2 cup of the dehydrated corn (regular would work fine) and a small red bell pepper, because it was sitting nearby.  I also used fresh tomatoes from my garden basket and said a little prayer that my kids would actually eat it.  Amazingly, M loved it and everyone ate it very happily with their corn bread.  M declared it the bestest soup ever. (In addition to the Mommy thing, many things are the "bestest, bestest" which is nice).  

10. We may, at long last, actually buy a new TV.  It makes no economic sense, but it is time and how can one really have a Skylanders party with a nearly decade old tube TV, really? (Yes, that is ridiculous, but it has needed to go for a long time and I would like to be able to say read words on it and the whole social thing of boys and sigh).  Anyway, shopping is underway!