you'd think we needed to call poison control

on saturday, alexander turned five and a half months. now before you think i am one of those crazy moms who celebrates insignificant milestones, i just want to say two things: first we did not celebrate alexander turning five and a half months, we just used that date as the rough time around which we would introduce solids. and second, we celebrated alexander turning one month old by lighting a match that we stuck into a brownie square. and we took a picture, so just in case future babies feel like we love them less, we can show them just how much or little rather, fanfare alexander received. so anyways back to five and a half months. the time has flown. look at my baby at five and a half weeks and now at five and a half months.

on friday, i went to trader joe's and brought my scrunchy bunny an acorn squash. i spent part of nfl sunday roasting that thing and puree-ing it - i missed part of the redskins game, which it turned out, i didn't really need to stay and watch anyway. here is a chronicle of our first try at "solid" food.

*proud pureed squash maker and clearly a first time mom. check out that serving size!*

*a giddy alexander sitting at the grown up table, pre-squash*

*post squash GAG! he's thinking, "someone call poison control, my parents are trying to off me"*

*please mommy, no more squash. please."

finding the "ade" when given a lemon

as some of you know, husband and i have really been going through it with the house remodel and the crook of a contractor we hired. i have been going to bed angry, and waking up with clenched teeth, wondering to myself, "where is justice and righteousness in this world? and might it be ok if i carried out my own form of righteous punishment??"

but this week, as repairs and redos continued, we had fresh concrete poured in for new steps and a new driveway. progress! no more mud piles (for now)! husband had the brilliant idea to make our imprint and mark this momentous occasion/create a semi-permanent reminder of the h-e-l-l we have been going through.

so our little family marched out in the hot virginia sun, fyi, we have been going through a pretty killer heat wave. i feel that you must know this fact in order to appreciate how dedicated we were to turning a lemon of a situation into something more akin to lemonade.

**papa getting alexander's hands nice and moist to optimize hand imprint**

**papa unfurling little hands. surprisingly hard**

**and because it is so hard to unfurl those tiny hands and you can't exactly mash baby hands into mostly dry concrete, the finished product only displays alexander's knuckles. but isn't it the cutest knuckle print you ever did lay your eyes on? just say yes. **

and now, something totally not related. i had a special visitor at work yesterday. i think my boss thought i was kidding when i said i was going to go home with him. but i wasn't. but oddly enough, alexander went home and i had to stay at work.

**this little visitor definitely turned the lemon of working into more of a lemonade kind of day.**

a life lesson for this otherwise ordinary tuesday

dear readers, 

today i am going to give you a valuable life lesson. i will title it: sleep with your pants on or sleep with pants next to your bed. and a shirt for that matter.

at the risk of venturing into tmi territory, i will just say this, i tend to get warm when i sleep, so i like to sleep just in my undies, so that i can stick my leg out from under the covers. it's my own little self devised air-conditioning/venting system (patent pending). it's really great. supreme comfort.

but when the fire alarm starts shrieking "WARNING FIRE" at two forty five a.m., and you and your husband shoot out of bed...and when husband runs down the stairs in just his boxers, all heroically like the imaginary firefighter that he is, all the while screaming, "GRAB THE BABY!!!" and you run into the baby's room, scoop him up, and bound down the stairs, prepared to dash out of the house while husband tries to find the source of the fire or smoke, you really don't have time to consider the fact that you are still only in your underwears, and what a sight that will be. 

yes this is a true story. yes this happened last night. no there was not a fire. thankfully we did not have to go outside in our undies. but yes, i hovered around our front door, comforting a startled baby, and yes we were both without pants. and yes, we were terrified, especially since i had read the article about the 18 elite firemen who died fighting the wildfire in arizona right before going to sleep. it took a while to calm back down and fall asleep, as we lay in bed, conjuring up phantom smoke smells, and as my imagination ran wild, like anne of green gables wild, analyzing all the different possibilities and how we would get alexander out of the house if the fire had been such and such a way. i wish this on nobody.

but tonight, i will lay a pair of pajama pants next to each side of the bed so that we are prepared next time. tuck this away for your emergency preparedness box. this is something FEMA doesn't tell you about, but i have lived it. if and when you flee for your life, you will want to have pants on. 

and that is tuesday's life lesson.

remember....?

what's that thing called? the thing that comes between friday and monday? what is it again? oh yeah, a weekend? remember that? and remember what we use to do on weekends? sleep in until the sun was setting? it is all a vague blurry memory now.

remember staying up past midnight?

remember having time to do laundry?

remember watching tv?

remember having time to make the bed? 

ok that last one never really happened even before mr. alexander came into our lives, but you get the picture. i had the luxury of time and freedom to make the bed if i had been disciplined enough to do it. 

now "weekends" consist of pretty much the same thing as the week. wake up, feed a baby, wipe his poopy butt, play with him, make silly noises and silly faces. wipe his butt. cross our fingers that we do not get pooped on. we don't sweat being pee'd on anymore. diaper that cute little butt, and try to put him down for a nap. all this before 7:30 a.m. if we start this ritual at 7:30 a.m., we have "slept in." and it is glorious! not having to get up on a saturday until 7:30! and even feeling well rested. 

i can't remember the last time we stayed up past midnight. once the little dictator goes down for the night, i start counting how many hours i have to sleep before having to wake up between four and five a.m. those four and a half hours of sleep go by way too quickly to squander on something as frivolous as staying up past midnight.

laundry?? what does having clean clothing feel like? now, we throw clothes in the wash. it ruminates for a few days, and when someone finally remembers to put them in the dryer, they need to be washed again. if we're lucky enough to get our own clothes in the dryer, then, out they come into a basket they go, where they live unhappily ever after - not fulfilling their wrinkle free destiny. but the dictator's clothes? they get washed, almost daily, and folded. 

tv...ah yes tv. i suspect the next time we watch our tv, it will be a machine that the smithsonian will ask to be donated for an exhibit. 

but honestly, i don't really miss my old life. i mean, really, for this face, i will pretty much do anything. wouldn't you???