Does She Look Like Me Yet?

Since Bugs was born everyone comments "OH! She looks just like Hubs!" Which is great because I hear that helps fathers from wanting to flee from their offspring. But I had hoped she would at least look a little like me!

So the great Poppy (my dad) sent a picture after our visit over Thanksgiving to prove in fact she does look a tad like me...

Yes she looks a little like me in the eyes and nose (she has her dad's ears and mouth) but she looks a whole lot like her Aunt and Cousin - which is fine by me because they are both Gorgeous. And yes it needed a capital "G".  But I'll take what I can get! She's my Bugs afterall! Now if we could just figure out where those grey eyes came from we'd be set!

Monster Baby

This is not the first time Bugs has done this, however I feel it needs to be recorded for posterity.  Because you see, she is a "MONSTER BABY".

Hubs has growled at her as "MONSTER DAD" since she's been alive. And apparently "M"''s eldest son growls at her (in a non-threatening way of course) too. So now we have a "MONSTER BABY".  And I'm sure you will enjoy it!

(Sorry it's sideways I don't know how to fix that.)

And just to prove she is NOT demonic she can growl then talk then run away:



Also, when she first started "MONSTER BABY" it was in the middle of the night in our dark house and scared the bejesuz out of Hubs and I. Now that we know she is not demon spawn and can growl on command we find it entertaining to have her growl at passersby in the stores.  Entertaining indeed! Well until someone throws holy water at us.

Get a Move-on Tooth Fairy

From the time Bugs was about four months, our fabulous sitter "M" has said "OH - any day you'll see that tooth!". And it seemed true enough. You could feel the ever so tiny bumps under those baby gums. But alas, after months and months - still no tooth.

Well the tooth fairy must be in the Christmas Spirit because the first sighting of said tooth was December 9th (I know I'm behind here but I KNOW the date!).  It's her bottom left tooth (even though you could feel the top and bottom two teeth).

And she's grinning like a cat that ate the canary and all you see is one little fang. It's awesome! However, you think this kid will cheese it up for the camera? Yeah no, she'll smile but it's all closed mouth no toothy grins yet.

"What tooth?"

But in order to not forget the small stuff....we have a tooth! Just no evidence yet!


**UPDATE**
Over Christmas we procured evidence of said tooth as well as gained the second bottom tooth!

Well Hello there Santa Claus

Last night we took Bugs to meet Santa for the first time. Best idea comes from Hubs as he says "Let's go tonight while the Steelers are on Monday Night Football. I bet there won't be anyone there." And you know the man was RIGHT?! For reals there were approximately 5 people in line ahead of us! SWEET!

So Bugs is checking everything out. She loves to people watch and all the lights are just baby crack to her.  As we approach she's checking out the bearded man (note he did not have a hat but did have an authentic beard so he's a wash in the "good" Santa category) and not really displaying any sort of animosity.

Up we go towards Santa and I place her on his lap. All good. I turn around to walk out of the way of the camera and when I turn back around I see this:

"Santa! Please don't flash my girlie bits!"

Alright, that's one for the books! We purchased the ridiculously overpriced photos for us and the grandparents and walked about 1.5 feet away to get things situated/organized and I see this:

Who me?

Yes this is the angel we all know and love. Seriously though she has it right. I mean who would trust a stranger handing out candy asking you what your heart desires and begging you to sit on his lap? Kid's got good instincts and to that I quote The Black Eyed Peas...."I got it from her momma".

It's Beginning to Look Like Christmas

It’s Christmas at our house (at last!).  Due to an over scheduled December, the decorations were FINALLY pulled from the Attic of Disaster.  Having the nursery right outside the opening to the attic makes it nearly impossible to accomplish anything attic related. Because we all know you gotta get this shit done when the baby’s sleeping. But of course attic shenanigans wake the baby up. It’s a horrific cycle. Lesson learned is that Santa will not be storing ANYTHING in the attic in the future. The shed is looking mighty fine my friends.



Growing up we had some AWESOME traditions throughout the year. Halloween we went for pumpkins at the same patch, Christmas we went for a tree at the same farm, Easter the girls get Easter flowers on Good Friday. EVERY YEAR. I loved it. I love that most of the traditions have carried over to my husband and I.  We’ve cut down a tree every year since we’ve been together – even when we lived in Georgia and there was a freakin lizard in our tree (and it wasn’t even a “real” pine, it was some crazy shrub/tree concoction that was spray painted green).



Bugs First Tree



You gotta haul that tree yourself
or it doesn't count



That being said, there are some rules in my family about Christmas Trees. The first is that you MUST have a live tree. That smell is what it’s all about and no candle can trick me otherwise.  Second, you have to cut down your own tree and haul that sucker back through the muck, mud, snow, sleet and/or rain to your car. No lot trees for us (No offense if you’re lot tree people, or fake tree people for that matter). 



Now here comes the crazy good part.  When I was little, Santa decorated my tree. Yes, I went to bed with a nekkid tree and no presents to wake up and find the whole thing decorated with lights, candy, ornaments and presents everywhere. We didn’t even put gifts to one another under the tree until Christmas Eve. I would have to wait until my parents were in the living room before I could come out of my room to see everything. And let me tell you it was like walking into a Christmas heaven! We weren’t a wealthy family by any means, but waking up and seeing all that glamour and presents and stockings were weeks before that had been nothing – WOW! I will have those memories FOREVER!

The Hubs thinks this is a fantastic tradition. So even though Bugs is still too little to understand, Santa will be decorating our tree Christmas Eve so that she can wake up to all the Christmas glamour. Now I’ll just have to take a lesson from my parent’s book so that she doesn’t sneak out without us when she's older. In all my years, I never did. But then I never hunted presents either because I didn’t want to ruin the surprise.  So this may or may not last, but we’re going to try. And I’m forever grateful for the love and effort my parents put forth for me to have such magical memories.



Taking a Sick, but not really Day

As a new mom there are things that I’m constantly learning. Like snot suckers are the devil in a child’s brain. But I’m also learning “Mom Laws”.  So yesterday I learned “Mom Law 1” which would be that once your child gets sick and you stay home with her, she will be better by 9 am. 

Yes this is the first time I stayed home “sick” with Bugs. She wasn’t exactly sick-sick but she was up from midnight the previous night until when she crashed around 7 am.  She had a stuffy nose and is teething and her belly didn’t feel good – all three combined probably contributed to the late night rager that occurred at my house.  Well this momma was exhausted and the hour and half drive to work (then actually functioning at work) looked pretty bleak.  So we played hookie. And snuggled. And it was awesome!

Yes, watching Real World
Sprout all day IS exhausting.

As a working mom I don’t often get to just hang out. Usually the weekends are for catching up on everything that didn’t get done during the week. So yesterday was a nice excuse to just lie around and hang out and play and nap (and wow did she nap!) and just enjoy my baby. 

I have the utmost respect for you SAHM’s out there. As much as I enjoyed it, I know in my heart that I would be terrible at it. I love my job and I enjoy it and that is so rare. But I know that I wouldn’t be “me” if I didn’t have it. I would be a shell. A mommy shell. I would do a good job, but then what would I be teaching Bugs? I struggle a lot with leaving her at daycare, with missing out on the small stuff. It’s hard. It’s mommy guilt. I want the best of both worlds but can only choose one path. It stinks sometimes.

So I’ll take my sick days and enjoy them, even if it’s wiping snotty noses all day. It’s the small stuff that makes this mom gig worth it.

The Wrap Up - NYC edition

Bugs is ALIVE! (I knew you were all worried and hanging on the edge of your seats out there.) Probably because Hubs got called into work and MIL came to the rescue.  Hubs still has no clue as to what actually goes into caring for this youngster for an entire weekend (complete with chores).  I came home Sunday morning to find the little one with a cold and napping for 3 hours (which is usually unheard of!)  The look of joy on her face was priceless. Probably because I’d rescued her from the crib, but whatever I’m going to believe it was because of me!

The weekend was fantastic, minus the 6+ hour bus ride each way in the coach from hell. Pretty sure it was designed for midgets and the “escort” was terrible, but we made it with only taking out one sidewalk outside the Lincoln Tunnel. I won't even go into the terrible diner we stopped at along the way or the world's worst "escort" that forced us to stop at said nasty diner. Bus trip = suck-fest.

Once we arrived, got lost and then found, we decided to schlep from Times Square to Chinatown the 50 some blocks and back again. I’m sure honest to God citizens of the Big Apple think we’re crazy, but it was a nice day and we found a Crumbs Bakery on 6^th Ave that was not even nearly as crazy busy as the one in Times Square.  Along our journey to Downtown we saw hundreds (no I am NOT exaggerating) of Hootchie Santas. For Reals. They were everywhere. Apparently “SantaCrawl” was in full effect and these kids (OMG I just called 20 somethings kids, I’m officially old) were travelling everywhere dressed in various states of nakedness trying to pass themselves off as Santa, Mrs. Clause, Reindeer, and elves. I even heard one guy complain that the kids of NY were going to be traumatized by all the Santa wannabes. The best part was after they all stumbled out of the bar the kids yelling “Merry Christmas Santa!”  All the ones I saw played along and I hope none were traumatized too badly by Drunk Santas. We also witnessed a Mrs. Claus brawl with some intoxicated ladies – pure awesome.

I have to admit that all day I saw tons of kids being toted along by parents. Wow – you parents seriously rock. These children will learn to be so independent and city savvy! You work that city and holy cow how do you get groceries home? I’d be having that delivered in – and I only carried minimal purchases around all day!  Also you are geniuses because you blaze right through all the stupid tourists with your strollers and forge your own paths.  Note to self, bring a stroller next year – one to cart around packages in and two to forge paths.

Best parts were dinner in Little Italy, the window displays (NYC really does an amazing job of decorating) and Crumbs but the whole girls weekend was wonderful and getting away to come home to all the chores I left behind was priceless. Laundry waits for no woman, remember that. 

And sadly no Jen Aniston puppets were to be found. I even asked the scary back-shop knock-off sellers if they knew where I could find one. That's when they asked me to leave. Sorry Alyssa. I'll try and work that out on Etsy.

The Girls

First time away

This weekend is the first time I'll be leaving Bugs. I've spent every single night with her. Until tonight. I'm heading to the fabulous NYC to  stalk Mommy Shorts go shopping, eat a giant cupcake at Crumbs and sight see. I will also be on the lookout for a Jennifer Aniston puppet (ahem Alyssa), but I'm not holding my breath on that one.  But we are hitting up Chinatown, so you never know.

Anyway I'm leaving the care of my one and only with the Hubs.  Let me assure you he is entirely capable of doing this, yet here are few questions he's asked of me :

"Are you going to set out clothes for her all weekend" - because apparently he's never dressed her in the nine months she's been alive. I set clothes out this morning just to ease his fears.



Bugs first taste of pizza






"What do I feed her" - um food? It's gotten easier since she's now eating a little of what we eat but I'll give him this one. I've made a schedule to leave with him for the weekend.














"What if I don't hear her in the middle of the night?" - oh you will my friend. Trust me she only gets louder the longer you wait.

"I'm calling my mom to come over" - fine by me! My MIL (mother in law) is pretty awesome and she almost always brings food/dessert. Win - dinner when I get home. The only downside is that he may not FULLY GET just how hard it is to be with her all by yourself all weekend.  Is it wrong of me to wish this on him? naaahhhh. He NEEDS to know.

I'm guessing that these are all normal Dad type dilemmas. And I'm going to say as long as Bugs is alive when I get home Sunday afternoon, it will go down as a win in my book.  I'm sure that I will be sad and call and check in often, but honestly I am SO looking forward to sleeping soundly for two nights.

For Buggy

I’ve always dreamed of you.  One little girl to call my very own. I thought you’d be just like me, look like me, act like me. And every day I look at you, you’re just like your Dad. The laugh, the attitude (and yes at 9 months you have one!), the looks – they are all your daddy. You’re so lucky. I’m so lucky.

 I’m so glad you’re not like me. You’re you. And you’re perfect.

And it all started here

This is Bugs, Buggy, Bug, my baby.

It all starts because of her. Because I don't want to forget anything. And lately I forget everything. Pretty sure that's part of the "blur". At least I hope so because otherwise I need some ginko baloba in my life.

Most days its always the same thing, get up, take care of the baby, drive an ungodly long trip to work/daycare with the baby, work, pick up baby, drive the same awful drive home, take care of the baby, put baby to bed, relax for approx. 1.5 seconds and go to bed myself.

But then, then there are those shining moments, where she started to crawl, started to stand, giggled at a silly face, blew me a kiss, fake coughed at me, gave me a sloppy - Charlotte's bad kisser boyfriend on SATC kiss, that I just don't want to forget. I don't want them to be lost in the shuffle anymore.

When she asks, I want to be able to remember and tell her every detail. So this is for her, and me. And I probably won't get it right, but so far I've been inspired by best, funniest, bloggers and for all you girls, thanks.  And thank you to Sara, because in order to start this journey my sad self couldn't even get past the first question - the title.