Matt and I are fairly convinced that we are raising our son slightly differently than a lot of parents. He doesn’t like Cheerios, but will demand Kashi.* If he sees someone drinking sparkling water he’ll get pissed if he only has regular water. One time at the grocery store he ran up to me with a strange spikey fruit yelling “kiwano!”. I think the other people around us thought he was making up words (he wasn’t). Just now Matt asked him what he wanted for a snack, his answer? “Strawberry kefir!”**
I frackin love this kid.
Other amusing things Wesley has said:
Wesley has blueberry mochi!
Orange mango sparkly water empty.
Buy Pocky!
*I’m not entirely sure where this came from since neither Matt nor I particularly like Kashi. I think we were just trying other low-sugar cereals when he refused cheerios.
**Ok people, how do you pronounce kefir. Is it keh-feer or kee-fer? I always said “keh-feer” until every youtube video (including one from the Mayo Clinic) called it “kee-fer.” But then Lexico says it’s “keh-feer.”
I was watching Wild Kratts with Wesley and they were doing an episode on Giant Pandas. For those who don’t watch PBS Kids, it’s an animated series by the Kratt brothers* and they have power suits so they can use the attributes of different animals (creature powers).
Kratt Brothers: What if we had panda powers?
Me: WTF are panda powers? Sitting around, eating, and refusing to have sex?
Spoiler alert: basically yes, although since it’s a kid’s show, it skips over pandas’ mating habits (or in this case, lack thereof)
*Who have been around frickin forever. I remember watching one of their shows on Saturday mornings when i was a kid.
We’re getting close to wrapping up the master bedroom so I’ve started brainstorming ideas for the living room/TV room. The other evening I called Matt over to check out the mood I came up with.
Matt: It’s fine…but I don’t like the rugs.*
Me: We never seem to agree on rugs! What do you look for in a rug?
Matt: You know what you look for? The exact opposite.
Me: *snort*
Matt: You look for color and whimsy…
Me: … and you have a beige soul. What’s wrong with whimsy?
Matt: I just think we should be more formal.
Me: But we’re not formal people!
Matt: Compared to a lot of people we are. I just think our entertaining spaces should be more formal.
Me: My dad and my step mom are formal. They have fancy table settings and glasses for different types of wine!**
Matt: So do we!
Me: Since when?
Matt: We have different glasses for wine and martinis and champagne and ouzo…
Me: From IKEA!
*And what was the focal point of the design? The rugs.
**This is basically my definition of being a successful adult–having different glasses for red and white wine.
Matt and I don’t always see eye to eye on decor. For one, he has this weird obsession with themes. Personally, I think the vast majority of themed rooms are poorly executed, but I do love touches of bizarre and whimsical.
So when I found this rug, I wasn’t terribly surprised that he had some objections. One of them being that he didn’t think it “went with the room” (“the room” being our study/guest room/everything room… that hasn’t gotten a formal design plan yet…).
Matt: We’d need to replace the album covers with a… thingy… a wheel.
Me: A wheel?
Matt: Yeah, a ship’s wheel. And an anchor. And you’d need to get. a peg leg.
Me: Me? Why me?
Matt: Because you’re the one who wants the rug!
I still really want to find a place in my house for this rug…
I’m going to steal some formatting from The Bloggess, because it’s just been one of those weeks where I’m just out of ways to describe things.
On Friday I went home sick from work and my stomach declared an emergency evacuation as soon as I made it home.
Matt handled daycare pick and baby-watching like a champ.
Then later that night HE got sick.
But we managed to survive the weekend.
I went back to work on Monday, feeling more or less human.
Then I get a call from Matt telling me he’s taking Wesley to the pediatrician. Turns out Wesley has croup (baby laryngitis) but thankfully doesn’t have any respiratory complications, and is just hilariously squeaky.
Tuesday I wake up feeling legitimately pretty good.
Then a few hours later I get hit with a wave of body aches and awful and have to go home early. Again
Matt comes home learns my temp is 102.1 and convinces me to go to urgent care. They test me for strep, influenza, and throw in a chest x-ray to rule out pneumonia. Everything comes back negative so they decide to just treat me for the flu anyway.
12 hours after taking my first dose of Tamiflu, I no longer feel like I’m dying.
As of early this afternoon I’ve been fever-free for 24 hours! I can snuggle my baby again!
And then I noticed these rashy spots on my hands.
So I texted a friend and yup, it sounds suspiciously similar to when she caught Hand Foot and Mouth from her son.
So now I really just need to disinfect everything….possibly without touching it.
I’m REALLY hoping I’m just paranoid at this point. Wish me luck?
Update: Woke up with more rashy spots on my hands and made a doctor’s appointment. The nurse took one look at me and asked “Do you have kids?” We have confirmed Hand Foot and Mouth.
Setting the scene: Matt’s upstairs working on putting the latch back on our bedroom door and I’m downstairs with a friend of mine playing along with Only Connect.*
Me: Did you just hear Matt?
E: I don’t think so? …Maybe he was calling for help because he broke his hand.
Me: But if he had a broken hand he could still come downstairs for help.
E: Maybe he broke his leg…. But then he could still at least crawl closer to the stairs and yell louder.
Both of us continue watching Only Connect.
…..
A while later Matt comes down and joins us.
Matt: It turns out this lock has a “feature.” If you push this bit in… Demonstrates and shows that part of bolt will pop out, even if the knob was in the “unlocked” position. Well, I didn’t know this and I closed the door.
Me: And you locked yourself in the bedroom?
Matt: And I locked myself in the bedroom.
Me: Ah… were you yelling for me earlier?
Matt: Yes, I was hoping you’d be able to help me get out.
Me: I thought I heard something. We figured if you really needed something you’d keep yelling.
To be fair, I was snuggling a sleeping baby and didn’t want to disturb him and I didn’t think Matt was up to anything inherently dangerous. I also didn’t realize that locking yourself into a room when the lock doesn’t even require a key was even an option. It was, however, our specific choice of lock that led to the problem in the first place.
The door originally had a deadbolt installed on it and it was just chunky and ugly. “Low-profile” deadbolts apparently don’t exist (except some super-mod and silver varieties), but I did find a pocket-door lock in oil rubbed bronze that would fit the existing hole and blend into the new finish. Instead of a key you can unlock it from the other side with a screwdriver (high security was not a concern of ours for an interior door lock). Because it’s designed for a pocket door however, part of it pops out so you can pull the door out of the pocket in the wall…. but if that bit’s extended it will act like a lock on a swinging door.
Ooops.
*Holy crap the puzzles are hard. It’s even harder because there are a number British and European references that I’m not really exposed to in the US.
Matt’s starting calling Wesley “Wessels” so I came to obvious (seeming) conclusion that he was having a nerd moment.
Me: Nuclear wessels!
Matt: Nuclear…?
Me: Wessels!
Matt: *blank look*
Me: Nuclear wessels! … you do know the reference, right?
Matt: No…
Me: The Voyage Home! Star Trek!! THE ONE WITH THE WHALES!!!
Why yes, I did get progressively more hysterical as I tried to explain. I’m pretty sure The One With the Whales is the official alternate title for The Voyage Home. I’m also sure I’m not the only one who would immediately think of this scene after hearing the word “wessels.”
And for the non-nerds out there, if you’re wondering why this is such a well known part of the movie, keep in mind that it came out in 1986.
During the cold war.
And there’s a Russian guy wandering around then-present-day San Francisco.*
Asking for nukes.
*Yes Star Trek is based in the future, they time-traveled because they needed whales, ok?
We had a bunch of family in town for my baby shower on Saturday and Matt’s mom was staying with us. Sunday morning they decided to head to church together before the rest of the family came over for brunch.
Matt: You’re a veteran, maybe they’ll do something special for you for Memorial Day.
MIL: Matt, I’m not dead yet.
Matt: Oh….
I may not agree with our government’s choices, but anyone who signs up to fight for their country and anyone who has lost their life in the process, they are truly strong and courageous, and worthy of our respect and admiration.
We didn’t do anything for Memorial Day, but did have a fabulous weekend and got to see a bunch of family we don’t get to see much of. All the parents trekked over from WI and both my sisters were able to make it (from KS and CA) which was absolutely amazing. I had a fabulous shower hosted by (one of) my BFFs and I’m just feeling so special and loved and thrilled that this baby is going to have a truly awesome community of family and friends around him. #PregnancySappiness
I’ve also hit Pregnancy Level: Hobbit Feet and had some seriously impressive swelling over the weekend. My mom freaked out a bit and demanded my sister give her professional opinion. Sister asked me if I was up to date on my rabies vaccine because she’s a veterinarian and not an MD. I picked up some sexy compression socks took it easy for the weekend and now my feet have shrunk to slightly puffy.
I still have this weird feeling of guilt when I take up the comfiest spot, don’t get up much when guests are over, and ask Matt to do simple things like get me some water because I just don’t feel like being on my feet anymore. Matt, on the other hand, has been scolding me to take it easy since forever. I’ve just been stubbornly resisting because I am not a fragile little flower… only now it kind of hurts to move and I’m tired so I’m giving in. Stubbornness and pregnancy do not mix terrible well.
I’ve got a prenatal appointment on Friday and an onsite Nurse at work if anything seems concerning before that, but I was under the impression that crazy feet swelling was a fairly typical pregnancy symptom. Plus I’m still a bit scarred from the Doctor who insisted my Asthma flair up might be a pulmonary embolism and told me to get to an ER like, NOW. Spoiler Alert: It wasn’t and the ER docs thought I was a little crazy.
Me: I don’t think [brother-in-law] is going to take my crappy parenting advice. He was wondering what to do about an 8 year old who won’t stop asking questions, so I suggested “why don’t you turn it into the game of questions?”