My Car Was En Fuego.

This is where the baby was just minutes before.

My little sister (not so little, she's 21) was here visiting from Rochester NY (where she goes to college). We were supposed to go to my grandmother's house to visit and have dinner. We are walking out the door when my grandmother calls and says "Dinner is off, your sister is on the way to the ER". So it turns out my sis was having chest pains so she went to the ER. We turn around to go in the opposite direction, up to New Hampshire. Neither the hubby nor I had eaten all day so we stop at McDonald's. While we were on the highway I said to my husband, "The car seems to be smoking a little bit more than usual". He had a disgusting, belching fumes into the air, single-handedly destroying the ozone layer, 1995 Chevy Blazer (we didn't know it took its' name literally). He says "No, its fine".

Well I go into McDonald's to order when all of a sudden, my husband runs in with the baby, throws him at me, and says "TAKE THE BABY, THE CAR IS ON FIRE!" I, of course, think my husband is being a melodramatic little drama queen so I turn to look at the car. As I turn the car LITERALLY goes up in flames. The car is gone. Destroyed. Nothing left but the hulk. Had we not stopped, my husband, myself and my 11 month old son would all be gone. I can barely even think about it.

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Poor Little Jailbird

Sorry for the absence again! I just came on real quick because I had to post a pic of how the bambino fell asleep in his crib tonight. Here it is. Poor little jailbird.

And I'm posting this just because it cracks me up every time I see it: 

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How My Son Tried To Give Me a Heart Attack

I'm telling you right now, that my son's mission in life today was to give me a heart attack. Today at around 3 o'clock I was eating some tuna fish and I put American cheese on top of it. I gave CJ a sliver of cheese. I'm talking a tiny sliver. Not more than 3 minutes later, his face is bright red, he's got white welts all over his face and neck, he's scratching like a maniac and screaming. I gave him a bit of Benadryl and called the doctor, they said to come in so Craig came home from work and we went in. By the time we got there, the white welts were gone and CJ was happy as a clam.

So then just a bit ago, CJ is playing on the floor and starts gagging like he's choking on something. I picked him up and whacked him and out came the cheese and the puke he was choking on. Poor baby.

So just now CJ was in his exersaucer and I was sitting on the floor next to him and we were watching Jeopardy. He knows all the answers, obviously. But anyhow, he just leans his head over, closes his eyes, and goes to sleep. At 730pm. My son doesn't go to bed until midnight and that's after he nurses for half an hour, gets rocked to sleep by Mama, then wakes up when Dada comes home and then gets rocked back to sleep by Dada. So needless to say, I scooped him up and checked to make sure he was ok. He was fine, just apparently all tuckered out from trying to kill his mom today. So now he's in bed, sans pajamas because he fell asleep in just a diaper and a bib.

Update : Now over a year later, we know that CJ is severely allergic to milk. So that explains this shenanigans.

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CJ's 9 Month Check Up

In baby news, CJ had his 9 month check up today. For the first time since he was born, he is no longer in the 100th percentile. While he seems to me and everyone else to be a big old chunkamunk, he is now in the 50th percentile in both height and weight. He's 20lbs 5oz and 28.5inches tall. He's still wearing a newborn size 1 shoe though. Eeensy weensy feets.

CJ was perfect during my Gramma's funeral by the way. I got tons of compliments on his great behavior. At one point, after my cousin Kim gave a beautiful eulogy, I had tears streaming down my face. CJ's never seen me cry like that before and so was a bit confused. He decided to make me feel better by acting like a goof and attaching himself to my chin. He was making the ladies behind us laugh too by making funny faces. He was just really good. It was great to see that side of my family too. I hardly ever see my mother's paternal family. They live all over the world, from Cairo to Las Vegas to Maine. My Uncle Mike was my Gramma's beautiful blond baby boy and I haven't seen him since I was in Egypt in 2005, so it was really great to see him. Both my Gramma and I collect angels, so he and his wife Catherine gave me a few of the angels from her collection. I will cherish those forever. The service was absolutely beautiful. She was a huge part of the church there and good friends with the pastor so it was very personal. The pastor talked about how she loved the song "Lord of the Dance" and how they always joked that one day he would ask her to dance down the aisle with him. He said that he looks forward to the day that he goes to Heaven and taps her on the shoulder and asks "May I have this dance?". My cousin Kim talked about how sweet my Gramma was and yet how very outspoken she was. If she didn't like the way you dressed, she'd let you know. The last time I was there she wasn't happy with my hair, which was dyed black. She talked about how beautiful I was as a blonde, and said I looked like a gypsy.

Here's a picture of CJ on the grass in Gramma's backyard. I love this picture. Pin It

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother Review & Teaser

 Last week, we had to drive to Maine for my Gramma's funeral. On the way there, I read Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother . This book has been all over the news because of her controversial take on parenting. I actually really enjoyed the book. There were parts that made me cringe, but never did I think that she didn't genuinely love her children and want the best for them. Her idea of best might have been a little bit different than theirs, but she did have their best interests at heart. I also learned about the Suzuki method of learning piano, which is something I can't wait to sign CJ up for. Both my husband and I wish we were given piano lessons as children, so we are going to sign CJ up for lessons eventually.


Here's a few tidbits from the book.


Page 62, "There are all these new books out there portraying Asian mothers as scheming, callous, overdriven people indifferent to their kids' true interests. For their part, many Chinese secretly believe that they care more about their children and are willing to sacrifice much more for them than Westerners, who seem perfectly content to let their children turn out badly. I think it's a misunderstanding on both sides. All decent parents want to do what's best for the children. The Chinese just have a totally different idea of how to do that."


Here's a link to an extremely harsh review by the New York Times of the book. I didn't find the mother nearly as reprehensible as this reviewer did. Harsh huh? I love this though. Her oldest daughter, Sophia, actually wrote a letter about how great of a mom she actually was. I think that Amy can be proud of who her daughters have turned out to be. I hope my kids like me half as much as her daughters seem to love her.   Pin It

(Belated) Mailbox Monday

Something I've seen on other book blogs is "Mailbox Monday" which is when you list all the books that came into your home in the past week and where you got them. Just a cute idea so I thought I'd steal it. 


All of the books that came into the house this week came from paperbackswap.com. If you've never gone on there, its pretty awesome. Newer, more popular books are rather hard to get. For some, I'm number 23863423 out of 12323234545 so I'll probably never get the book. But for older books, its a great way to trade books you've already read for new ones. 


So one of the books I just got was Pirate Latitudes by Michael Crichton. I read a lot of books by Crichton back in the day when Jurassic Park was popular. This is one of the last, if not THE last, books that Crichton wrote before he died just 3 years ago. It's about pirates which I'm a big fan of so I'm sure I'll like it.


For my husband, I got the book Children of Dune (Dune Chronicles, #3)e by Frank Herbert. This is the sequel to Herbert's famous novel Dune. I know nothing about either but my husband says I should read them because I'll love them. I'll just take his word for it. I have way too many books on my to-read list to read other randoms. 


To add to the baby's big boy book collection, I got The Bungalow Mystery (Nancy Drew, #3). Eventually I want to have the whole collection for my kids. So far I've got 3 and 7-11. 


Finally, I got the book Cultural Literacy by E.D. Hirsch Jr. It's one of the books recommended for new teachers. The goodreads' description is "In this forceful manifesto, Hirsch argues that children in the U.S. are being deprived of the basic knowledge that would enable them to function in contemporary society. Includes 5,000 essential facts to know." 


So those are the books that came into my house this week. How about yours? Pin It