What a Day. What. A. Day....

I put up this elusive tweet (since I'm a twitterer) this afternoon and am just now getting the chance to explain it...

First, can I just explain how I love snooze alarms? I LOVE them, I mean, how great is it to be woken up by a severe beep followed by ten minutes of silence and then another horrible beep? So fantastic. Especially at 5:00 in the morning. Especially two days in a row, especially when it goes off at least five times and especially when each beep is followed by a panicked," I'm sorry, sorry, sorry. I turned it off." Really?? Because you've said this Every. Time. It. Goes. Off. For the love, my dear husband, just don't use the freaking snooze!

Phew, glad I got that off my chest. Moving right along...

Boot Camp this morning with Sergeant Senora Strange Sounds gave me sore muscles in places I didn't even know existed and left me dripping sweet sweat from my eyeballs. It's highly necessary for me to sweat a lot, you know, since I never do that as soon as I walk out my door. What gives FL?? We went over to a park after working out since the weather lady had promised a cold front coming through today. I about melted. But not really because I haven't jumped on board the FL plastic surgery train. Onto the highlight of my day...

So, I brought a couple extra kids with me to the park today (yes, I knew them) and after leaving we headed over to McDonald's to grab some lunch (don't judge me). One minute the kids were happily chanting screaming chicken nuggets, and the next there was a hissing sound like someone had slashed my tires and suddenly smoke was pouring in the window.

Oh dear.

Not good, not good at all.

Thankfully I was at the window, so there was no one in front of me, so I told the lady I wasn't going to get my food right now, thank you, but I would pull over. So, the smoke cleared quickly and I jumped out of the car to check things out. You know, with all my knowledge of cars. The McDonald's manager also came out to take a looksy with all his knolwedge of cars too. In the process I broke the stick thing that holds the hood up. Whoopsy.

I still had three kids in the car and since the car would longer turn on, it was pretty hot. Did I mention that I have not changed from my super sweaty clothes from this morning? We piled out to eat our lunch inside, but the kids were too distracted by the playland to eat, which worked to my advantage with the phone calls I had to make. Aaahhh, I love enclosed areas. Except at one point when Em was stuck in one of the tunnels and crying because she couldn't get out, and I had to crawl in after her and drag her through while on the phone with the AAA lady but whatev.

The kids eventually at least nibbled at their food and the dad of one of the kids came to get them. Phew, down to me and Em.

Enter Ricco Suave.

Yes, tow-truck man is actually quite the Casanova who lets me know several times that he is very good at his job. Perfect. He sees this all the time. Makes sense seeing as though he drives a tow-truck. My mother-in-law was coming to pick me up, so he could go ahead and get the car to the shop. But he didn't feel comfortable leaving me there. Um, thanks but I'm pretty sure my mother-in-law isn't going to ditch me and her granddaughter. But I need to go to the repair shop to do any paperwork that he couldn't do. Alright, it's on the way home so I'll give you that one, Mr Suave. He also told me that Emma was just "the purdiest lil thang he's ever see." Yup, I couldn't have scripted it better.

So, Ricco and I are chatting it up, waiting for my mother-in-law, and just as she arrives a friend pulls up, asking if we're okay. Whoa. Stop right there. This is NOT the thing to do in the Mickey D's parking lot. As she was taking pics of the incident on her phone, the not-so-gentleman behind her was getting pretty livid. He was probably at least eighty and the reason you do not stop and ask others if they need help in McDonald's parking lots. He gave her the best worst look ever and death stared her down as he passed by. I love this. Last time I was at McDonald's there was another old man yelling obsenities at the lady in front of me. He also told her she better be glad he didn't have his gun with him. I'm sure he totally had just cause to shoot her too. But, I digress...

That's my fun day in a nutshell. Emma never did get a nap in, and I'm still in my stinky, sweaty clothes. But, Matt's next to me and he's not coiling away so whatev. Just gotta roll with the punches.

She's a good girl, crazy 'bout Elvis

After calling my girl a devil-child yesterday, I thought maybe it was necessary to post a little Emma cuteness because really, she's a sweet child, I swear. We've had great success with the transition from the crib to the toddler bed mattress on the floor. She generally stays in bed and yells, "Mooommmyyy," whenever she's ready to get up. She's at the point where she tries to distract us from bed time though. Right around when I tell her it's time to go night-night she gets very cuddly with her daddy, which probably buys her a good ten minutes. Then after our routine, as I'm kissing her goodnight, she takes my face in her little hands and strokes it saying, "Niiiice, niiiice." The girl knows how to lay it on thick. I tell her to close her eyes to which she squeezes them as tight as she can with this big goofy grin on her face. Ooooh Emma, she's a funny bird.

Around 3:00 this morning I heard her saying "uh-oh" over and over again. She wasn't crying, but she did it long enough for curiousity to get the best of me. I went into her room to find her sitting up on her bed with her eyes closed saying "uh-oh." Weeeiiiirrd. Matt and I have been known to do some strange things in our sleep, so I wonder if she will follow in our steps. One can only hope. Though it would be awful if she was one of those kids that walked out of her house in the middle of the night. Thank goodness for the alarm system. Oh geez, I'm already getting myself thinking of the worst possible scenarios. Deep breath. Phew, ok I'm over it. Anyway, I sat in front of her for a couple minutes without her even noticing, so I scooped her up and put her back down in a more comfortable position. I can't imagine her back would feel too good if she slept sitting up all night. Then the sweet angel slept through her daddy setting off the alarm at 5:00 by mistake (who btw just finished mowing the lawn without a shirt and is looking like one fine piece of hotness) and slept all the way to 8:15. Love that girl.

Seriously...what's a momma to do?

Emma's first few months of life were rather difficult, as I've said before. Nothing serious, but the child just had a bad case of acid reflux that she inherited from her daddy. It made for long nights and crying fits that would last for hours at a time. Enter Zantac. It changed our lives. I know a lot of people say in jest that certain products changed their lives, but this literally changed our lives. Emma turned into this sweet little girl that smiled and cooed. No longer were her little hands constantly clutched in two tight fists. To this day, I swear the girl has great abs because of all the time she spent tightening and loosening those muscles screaming her head off. Anywho, all of that to say she has been a very easy (ok, so maybe a little vivacious) toddler. However, these last couple weeks she has morphed into this little devil-child. Overall she's still my sweet little girl, but man does she have a temper.

She's been throwing the most ridiculous tantrums I've ever seen for no apparent reason. Now, maybe I'm just still in new-mom-to-toddler mode and can't read the signals, but sheesh, I'm not a mind reader. For instance, she fell asleep in the car around 11ish today, so I took her up to bed where she slept for another thirty minutes. She woke up happy as a lark, yelling, "Mooooommmyyy, MOoOOmMMy!!!" Always a good sign. As I was folding laundry, I had her come into my room and hang out. I asked if she wanted to eat. "Nooooo," was her reply. Ok. I continued to fold my laundry. A few minutes later I asked her if she wanted to read a book to which she nodded her little head fervently. I grabbed three books and had her pick one out for us to read together. Annnnd, for some reason, this made her terribly angry. I mean, she grabbed a book and started thrashing it around and threw herself to the floor kicking her legs and tossing her head from side to side, all the while screaming at the top of her lungs.

What the heck?? Where'd that come from?

Being the super even-tempered mom that I am (for the first three minutes of a temper tantrum), I sat on the floor and gently asked her again to bring the book to me. The tantrum continued...and continued. I tried to coax her out of it, but she would have none of my mommy-nurturing. So, I continued my laundry. After finishing it up, I brought the screaming child downstairs to attempt a nice lunch. She calmed down as I put on a DVD that my mom had made of her cousins set to music. As I made the sandwiches it looked like we were heading towards a better day.

Until she walked over to me in the kitchen.

I offered her a sandwich bite to which she threw herself down on the floor and started banging her head on the linoleum. Lucky for her we can't afford tile. Seriously, where did that come from?? What am I missing here? This continued on for way too long until I brought her up to flip out in the comfort of her own room.

During this time, I went to the source of all parenting knowledge, Google, and looked up toddler tempter tantrums. Um, the main points, stay calm (got it), know the triggers (uumm, reading books and eating lunch??), and bring to a safe location such as a bedroom (yes!) and stay there with her (really?). This is all you've got for me, Google?? I left the computer disappointed, and checked on her a couple times while she continued her fit. Finally, I got her to climb into my arms and take a bottle, which she never takes in the middle of the day. So, now she sleeps and I write, while I should clean.

Yesterday we had a similar tantrumific day, and Matt looked around the messy house and asked, "Huh...what'd you do all day?" Obviously I must have done something since the house was such a mess. But nope, I had nothing. Apart from a trip to the Y, I stayed in all day to clean. In fact, I actually did clean the house, but crazy girl had interrupted enough projects with her tantrums for me to only half-finish everything. Eeeeh.

So please, help a crazy motha out. Why has my child been such a psycho lately, and what can I do??

Eight Years

Someday I'm sure Emma will have to do a project for school where she asks her parents what they were doing on Sept. 11, 2001. It's a day I'll never forget as terrorism became more than just an obscurity that happened in distant lands.

I was home on summer break before my junior year of college. We were still on the quarter system and didn't go back until the following week. I was sleeping when my brother called and told me to go turn on the t.v., the WTC had just been hit by a plane. Of course at that point we had no idea of what was to come. I watched live as the second plane hit tower two. I remember a sinking feeling coming over me as it was quite apparent that this was no accident and thinking over and over, "What the heck is happening and why?" Pictures of the Pentagon flashed across the screen and newscasters speculated about other targets and how every flight in America had been grounded, but there were still planes unaccounted for. I spent the next several hours glued to the t.v. and watched the world change, live before my eyes. I remember my mom calling to tell me not to go anywhere, but where would I have gone? I don't think anyone felt like a trip to the mall at that point. I tried walking on the treadmill while watching t.v. but kept stopping as I watched in horror all the crazy images of things that were not supposed to happen in my country. I remember going to church that evening like so many others just to pray because really, what else could we do? I remember giggling once that night with my dad as Congress broke out in an ackward impromptu of "God Bless America" on the steps of the Capitol. The commentator saw it as a great show of unity, but for some reason we saw it as comic relief.

So many important and mundane things have happened in those eight years that have passed, but it's a day forever etched in my memory; no matter how many years pass I'll always remember it with clarity.

And We're Back...

I should be cleaning my house as Emma naps, but it's been way too long again since I've written. The last few weeks we've been going nonstop. My parents came to see us Emma for about a week, which was great! We actually got some painting done, and with the exception of the bathroom, everything downstairs is finally painted and decorated. Woo hoo! I don't anticipate ever finishing the upstairs. My parents also came to town to watch Emma for a weekend so Matt and I could head down to West Palm to celebrate a friend's 30th birthday. Seriously, when did we get so old?? Less than two years until I'm 30. Weird. Good thing I married such a young buck. :)

After West Palm, Matt was off to Chicago for a few days of work, and Em and I flew home to spend time with my whole family for a week. It's so fun watching Emma with all her cousins now that she can (sorta) communicate. She gets so excited to see them and jibber-jabs with them, holds their hands, and gives them lots of kisses. I treasure those moments that she has with my family; each time she sees them it's a little different. They change so much in such a short time. It's difficult not having day to day interaction, but I guess that makes it always exciting when they do see each other. I was hoping to spend some time by my parent's pool but only ended up being able to swim one day because of the weather. I really didn't mind trading in my swimsuit for my fleece jacket though. I'll take a break from FL summer heat any time, thank you.

We took the kids to Fantasy Island, which I haven't been to since Emma was a 1-2 week old fetus. Back then just my parents and I took Noah and Livvie because Isaiah wasn't big enough yet, and Abby (and obviously Josh) wasn't born yet. This time we had a whole slew of kids (and adults), and Emma got to ride rides outside the womb! We also went to the Fair a couple times. Not that it's so great (though it is the Great New York State Fair) but it's just a Syracuse staple. You know, like Wegman's and Hafner's and Dinosaur Barbeque and basically all those places that you'd never realize you'd miss until you're not around anymore.

So, anywho, I left home...to go back home. Strange how that works. Syracuse will always be home, but Lakeland is becoming more familiar. I mean, I'm not at the point where I would leave and say, oh man, I really miss Publix (it will never, ever compete with Wegman's duuuh), but it's definitely more home than when I wrote this post. I guess there's two ways of looking at it. Either I'm never truly home because I'm always missing the other place and people, (which is really inevitable but...) or I can take my aunt's advice and see myself as the luckiest girl because of the fact that I will always have two homes where I am welcomed and loved. I mean, there's people out there that don't have any place to call home...and I get two. I guess I'm a pretty blessed girl.