A Week of Thoughts (Yikes)

I think this is the longest I've gone without posting in almost a year...my apologies (did I totally ruin your week when you kept checking my blog for a new post and wound up disappointed? I thought so.). Usually long-ish blog absences mean I'm in the middle of starting or wrapping up a work project (my "real" work, aka HR consulting stuff). Such was the case this week, as there's an event I organized for this Saturday that needed some attention as well as a new project that I'm diving into that will soak up a good chunk of time over the next 6 weeks or so. As a result, this post is pretty random.

Here are some things that may or may not be noteworthy from this week:

• I keep adding the list of Things I Never Thought I'd Say. Some recent additions include: "Hold still, Mommy needs to wipe the peaches off your ear" and "No, we don't touch toilet seats or throw books in the bathtub." 
• If you are an animal owner you've probably experienced your fair share of grossness. Last week Howard was outside when it was raining and disappeared for a minute. When he ran back inside I noticed he was all wet on his left side, so I grabbed him to dry him off. The smell nearly knocked me out and my hand looked like I'd just committed a grisly crime--he had rolled in a dead rabbit. I briefly considered amputating my arm. After four rounds of shampoo and a trip to the pet store to purchase a new collar and tags he was finally allowed near me again. I may or may not have told him, during round two or three of shampoos, that if he ever pulled another stunt like that again he might find himself in a commercial featuring Sarah McLachlan music. I later apologized. 
• Speaking of Howard, he was rather upset that we got rid of our old couches (or, shall I say, his old couches). He isn't too sure about the new ones and has been sleeping on, gasp!--the floor. Don't worry, he's fine:

• I always thought that there was some sort of stigma with being either a working or a stay-at-home mom. I remember when I had just made the decision to stay home with Charlotte a friend of mine, who is also an at-home mom, told me that she always heard from people from both camps about how to deal with negativity from others who felt like you should be home with your kids or out working, depending on which side you were on. I can honestly say that after 16 months of being a stay-at-home mama, I have never gotten any sort of guff for what I do. If and when people ask what I do and I tell them, it's almost always met with a positive reaction or neutrality. In the beginning I would elaborate and tell them that I also worked as an independent HR consultant, just to immediately ward off any possible judgments, but after awhile I stopped (unless I'm talking to someone who might find what I do in my paying job to be interesting). So this makes me wonder if whether our preconceived notions about something make it more real to us than it actually is. In my case, yes. Thankfully.
•  Charlotte has always been talkative, even though it mostly means she babbles in cute baby speak most of the time. I feel like writing a letter of apology to her future teachers, as they will most likely need to remind her to be quiet. She is always chattering, and it's so fun to see her baby speak evolve more and more every day. She is a master mimic--her newest phrase is "Oh man!" and she puts her hand over her face as she says it. She picked this up from her Daddy one day (thankfully it was that and not what he said when he dropped his laptop...). She also started saying "Ta da!" (thanks Mom) and "Aw done!" when she's finished eating. In the past two weeks she's added several other words to her growing list: "Ba-Pa" (Grandpa, which my Dad is loving), "ball", "bed" (because she likes to jump on ours), "duck" (why duck?), and "bubbles." 
• A young girl, high school-ish age, who works at the grocery store called me ma'am and I died a little inside. Granted, I wear wedding rings and was carrying a toddler so clearly I'm not anywhere near her age. But when the cart boy gave me my pick-up ticket and said "here you go, Miss" I felt a major sense of redemption. Bless you, cart boy. It's the small victories.
• Sometimes when I see Chad and Charlotte playing together I want to bawl. It's so cute it's crazy. I both can't believe it yet I always knew that the boy I met at 14 would one day hold our babies. 
• Also, having a baby has made me a sap. Did anyone see Modern Family this week? The scene where Claire and Phil are driving home from dropping Hayley off at college left a lump in my throat the size of Texas. One day at a time, one day at a time...

Have a great weekend, everyone. 

~Stacy