Author Archives: metamegan

>Things That Backfire

>I do not recommend the following:

Discussing potential chocolate for potty training bribes in front of your 2 year old…

… Unless you want to see a 2 year old clutch his stomach, and yell, “I hungry! Chocolate!” while he rolls around on the floor.

Even considering potty training your 2 year old…

…. Unless you want to hear, “Mommy! I poo poo potty!” in the middle of the night.

Trying to distract your starving 2 year old while you cook dinner, by putting him in his high chair and telling him to play with play doh…

… Unless you want to hear, “Mmm. Gum.” and “I hungry! Play doh!” for days.

>The Week of the Cookie

>The school bake sale includes boxes of cookies… 4 types of boxes times 4 types of cookies per box times 6 of each cookie type times 85 boxes = 16 different types of cookies, 2040 cookies total. Behold what we hope is at least 240 of them:

Yesterday was baking day, today: decorating. Tomorrow everything gets boxed up, and Thursday is the sale. I am acting like I have a lot to do with this, but I am only doing a tiny part. My awesome neighbor is in charge and we decorated at her house this evening.

Saturday is my annual cooking baking extravaganza, I hope I am not burned out by then.

>We Might Have a Slight Problem With Squirrels

>We didn’t get a very good yield out of our garden this year, and I usually blame skunks and squirrels. I assume that it would be annoying if there was an animal eating our produce, but I wouldn’t know, because the animals in our yard eat all the leaves and flowers and we end up with nothing. Sometimes they even eat the plastic tag that says what variety of zucchini we planted.

So I have to admit, I wondered what was going to happen with our new bird feeder. I was pretty excited about our early Christmas present, because I thought it would be nice to watch the birds while I eat breakfast. But I just had this weird feeling that the squirrels would somehow get involved. The bird feeder actually looks pretty squirrel proof, but the suet is another matter. Well. I should say the suet was another matter. It lasted about an hour after a certain squirrel discovered it. This squirrel should have absolutely no problem making it through the winter.

Note that the squirrel looks like that before it even made a dent in the suet.

>We’ll Take Great Care of Your Kids, I Promise!

>But we might draw eyes on their necks and take silly pictures.

Yes, this could happen to your kids if you go out of town and your kids spend the night at Casa de MetaMegan.


But I promise to scrub your kid’s neck with a brillo pad, if that’s what it takes, so they don’t show up at school with lipstick and marker everywhere. Because I take my job as a surrogate parent very seriously.

>NaMoBloPo

>Well – I made it – I posted once a day for 30 days straight! I’m sure it’s not a coincidence, but I have tendinitis or something in my wrist now, so I may be taking some time off! Maybe not, we’ll see. But I’ll try to go for quality over quantity and just throw some pictures on if I ever remember to put my memory card back into my camera.

Coming soon:
Pumpkin cake near disaster details
Stuffing Redux

>Trimming the Tree

>Luke and I decorated the tree this afternoon. Last year we got a small live tree and put it in the bay window behind the couch because certain 1 year olds couldn’t be trusted with a tree and ornaments.

This year we got out the big, lovely, fake tree and we had room for all the ornaments. We decorated it while Jack was sleeping, and I pretty much let Luke have free reign. (Partially because I got paged in the middle of it and had to work. Booo!!!!) The only direction I gave was to say that anything breakable had to be out of Jack’s reach. Luke has an interesting tree decorating strategy. He likes to put things together in groups. So all the little glass balls are together, all the star wars ornaments are together, all the John Deere ornaments are together, and so on. (Yes, our ornaments are awesome.) It’s an interesting effect. I call it, “Vintage 6 Year Old.”

And yes, I did spend a few minutes thinking about cropping the Precious Moments ornament out of the photo, but it’s a very special God Parent ornament that Grandma says is from Uncle John, and Luke likes it.

>Speaking of Cold Turkey…

>With all the crying, and fever, and vomiting, and needing to be held by Mommy or Daddy Jack did not use or mention his pacifier for 30 hours straight over Thanksgiving. This morning, when he woke up as his happy, but still slightly congested self, he said, “Blanket! Stuffie! Boppy???” I pretending I didn’t hear that last part and whisked him out of his room.

So far so good.

Until nap time.

Interestingly, he didn’t ask for it, but I had the most difficult time getting him down for a nap. I tried to use the bulb sucker, which set of a crying jag, which required a book and singing to calm down, which made him ready for sleep, which made me lay him down, which made him suffer from his stuffy nose, which set of a crying jag, which required a book and singing to calm down, which made him actually fall asleep, which made me lay him down, which made him suffer from his stuffy nose,which set of a crying jag, which required a book and singing to calm down, which made him ready for sleep, which made me lay him down, which made him suffer from his stuffy nose, which made me almost consider digging out the hidden pacifier, which would have made all that for nothing.

So I did the next best thing. I gave up and decided to nap with him. We fell asleep in my bed, and all was well until his snoring woke me up. Yes, I did attempt to bulb suck his nose at that time, but after one nostril yielded such unsatisfactory results, I gave up.

Nap without the pacifier though… that is big!

And by bedtime, Dave will be home so I am not even going to worry about that.

>Happy Thanksgiving!

>Even when I am cleaning up throw up in the hours before Thanksgiving morning, I feel thankful for my wonderful life and happy family, and the health that we enjoy most of the time.

And when my baby only wants mommy, I am so thankful that Grandmom and Grandad are here to flip pancakes.

And when I can’t figure out what is wrong with the pumpkin cake, I am thankful that I discovered that I forgot the flour when the cake was only in the oven for a minute.

I am lucky, lucky, lucky! (I am not being sarcastic even a little!)