15 minutes

For the past six months, I've been busier than ever. I started and finished student teaching second grade, finished my masters and started teaching 5th grade.

Teaching second grade was a dream. I loved my students, they loved me. They gave me beautifully decorated construction paper cards and they brought me flowers.

On the other hand, my fifth graders despise my existence and liken my role as their teacher as a dictator who hands out homework, keeps them busy with classwork and  oh, makes them mind their manners and abide by the rules.

Plain and simple, they hate me. That I'm sure of because they tell me so when they aren't calling me "Ms. Garbage".

But, while it might seem like I should have thrown myself a pity party over the Christmas break, I didn't. Even though I really desperately wanted to.

Instead, I reverted back to my stay at home mom days, boy do I miss those, and tried to soak in as much time as I could with this guy.

Today, for the first time in such as long time, Ham fell asleep in my arms during nap time. It was a miracle because neither one of us can find a comfortable position in the rocking chair anymore. We've finally outgrown it, which makes me really sad.


But that's the territory we're embarking on now, the toddler years.

These days, I don't have the lengthy rocking chair sessions I use to when Ham was a baby. Now bedtime is much different.

It always starts by reading Ham his usual favorites, Otis, Otis and the Tornado, Are You My Mother? and Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

He sips on his milk and makes the faces he's sees in the stories. If Goldilocks yawns, then he stretches his arms out and yawns with her, which in turn makes me really yawn.

And when we are done, Ham says "The N (End)", I turn the lights out and sit him in my lap and we spend the next 15 minutes in the dark talking.

If you jip Ham out of these 15 minutes of quality time, he is sure to cry. If you abide by it, he gets into bed fifteen minutes later with no fuss and asks for his plastic cars to sleep with.

I don't mind it though because these are the best 15 minutes of my life.

On days when the 5th graders have torn my ego to shreds. On days where I've yelled and screamed and called parents that don't care. On days where the grades do not reflect the time I spent teaching, I have these 15 minutes to look forward to.

A time when all is quiet and all is still in the house, except for the sound of the rocking chair creaking and Ham leaning in and whispering "What's Zat (That)?" to every creak he hears.

Sometimes he sit in my lap, facing me and he pretends to get dizzy from all the rocking. He says "Wa-Oh" and puts his arms out to balance himself. Sometimes he shakes his straight blond hair just to see it schwoosh from side to side. And other days, he examines my face for "boo boo's", which there aren't any, but he kisses them anyway and rubs my face softly with his hands. He reminds me that I have eyes and that he has eyes and we sing songs we made up about the moon. Then we check outside his window to see if the moon is out there, but we never see it.

Then it is time to lay him down. I lower him into the crib and he reminds me that his cars are not there, I tell him I'll be right back and I rummage through the house searching high and low for them. When I get back I hand him the cars I found, he tells me, "Dank Q" and he leans in to give me a goodnight kiss.

And as I creep out of his room and bring the door to a crack, I am thankful for our one-on-one time no matter how short it might seem in these toddler times.

Bob's Orchid Tree

The sun was setting down past the trees and there was still a little time to squeeze in a walk around the neighborhood.

Ham was growing frustrated with one of his toys and I suggested he take a drive in his car to cool off for a bit.

"Tay (Okay)" he replied and stood by the door.

Gripping his arm with one hand and lugging his plastic car down the steps, we squeezed through the potted plants and down the steps.

I fastened my makeshift seatbelt on him, a polka-dotted blue ribbon that I'm sure will embarrass the heck out of him one day.

The car rumbled down the sidewalk so loudly that I often wonder if people can hear us in their houses.

We headed straight past our usual spot.

I noticed one of our neighbors was out and we stopped for a moment to talk to her. As we waved goodbye, I motioned across the street and mentioned we were headed to our favorite tree. I always start our walk by giving Ham a leaf off the tree.

Once we had a good leaf or one that Ham thought was good enough, we headed around the corner past this super prickly plant that causes us to veer onto the road for a bit.

That's when we bumped into Bob.

Bob came running around the house waving his hands as if to tell us to stop.

I glanced down at Hammy holding his leaf, the leaf we technically stole off of Bob's tree.

I grimaced at little, thinking that maybe Bob wouldn't appreciate that at all.

"Watch out for that prickly bush on the corner!" he exclaimed. He motioned over to the bush that sits in the corner of his lot, the one that Ham and I artfully dodge every time we turn the corner. It's leaves could take your eyes out if you weren't paying any attention. 

"Oh thanks, we'll be careful."

And while I had Bob's attention I thought I might just bring up that beautiful tree in his yard.

It turns out Bob had a lot to say about it.

"It's an Orchid Tree. It's from the Carrribean." He said. "My mother was visiting one of the islands and fell in love with the trees there. She got her hands on some of the seeds and tried to bring them back into the country with her"

He shook his head remembering her story, "But they won't let her in with the seeds. They said she had to throw them away, that they wouldn't allow her to bring a plant or seeds into the U.S."

He smirked a little bit before saying, "So my mom went to the bathroom and put two seeds in her brassiere and walked right back through the line."

He motioned over to the tree. "This tree is a product of one of those seeds. The other seed didn't make it."

I was amazed. I told him I was growing a tree from a sapling I took from the tree over at my house in a pot, until I could figure out what to do with it.

He lit up as a thought crossed his mind and asked us to sit tight for a moment because he was going to run back into his house for a moment.

Ham and I waited outside. Ham was growing impatient. He pulled at the ribbon around his waste and arched his back, whining and squealing.  I tugged the ribbon loose and lifted him into my arms, bouncing him like he was an infant. He didn't appreciate it. I tried my best to keep him entertained while we waited.  Plus, if Bob turned out to be a crazy person and I had to retreat, I could abandon Ham's car and make a run for it.

Before long, Bob was back with old medicine bottles in his hand. I started to get nervous. He handed one over to me. I held it up in the light and recognized the butterbean shaped seeds of the Orchid tree. He handed over another medicine bottle of them. Inside each there appeared to be handwritten instructions.

"I made these for anyone who was interested in growing one. I wrote down instructions on how to care for it."

Amazing.

"Wow. Thanks....If the one that I'm growing doesn't work out, I have back ups" I shook the medicine bottle in the air as if it would tell me how many were in there. I imagined our future house surrounded by Orchid trees.

Bob went on to tell me more of the story, but Ham wouldn't stand for it. Ham crawled out of my arms and started pushing his car towards the direction of our house.

"Well I need to get him home," I said while trying to keep Ham from veering his car into the street.

I apologized to Bob, but he wasn't worried about it. I thanked him for the seeds and for the story.

I told him that Ham and I loved that tree, that it was the highlight of our walks.

We smiled and waved goodbyes.

And Ham and I headed back to our house with two medicine jars filled to the brim with Orchid tree seeds.

Butterfly Tree

"...Edging the golf course of the club was a glorious sweep of glowing purple. Even before I was near enough to identify the trees, the rich, heady perfume which filled the air told me they were Bauhinias. The sight left me breathless and it was then I realised how difficult was the attempt I was making to describe in mere words the trees I know better how to paint..." (D. Cowen, "Flowering trees and shrubs of India")

I said I would never write about this again but here I am writing about it.

So, remember when I talked about that tree in the neighborhood Ham and I love, the one I took the sapling from and tried to grow for myself in a pot?  (If you don't remember click here and here.)

Well....

It has been growing....

and slowly and surely I moved up its pot size twice.

And it even started growing bark.


The end.


That would be the end of it if I planted it in the ground but I haven't done that yet. For a while now I didn't even know what it was!

But have no fear. Mr. Yardbird and I researched and researched and finally we found out... it is an....

Orchid Tree!.....or sometimes called a Butterfly Tree. Or in scientific words Bauhinia blakeana.

Which explains a whole lot.

If I'm boring you.....stop here.

I need this for my records. When I'm old and senile. When I can't remember what that cool  tree is growing in my yard. When I want my grandkids to be impressed by my weirdness...

I can pull up this blog or hopefully I'll have it all nice in a book and say yes, grandkids of mine this tree has history.

And they can nod their weary heads and act enthused.

Anyway, the Orchid tree.

From what I know, it originated in Hong Kong, but also grows in India and some subtropical areas. Some guy named Sir Henry Blake found the tree and named it "Butterfly" tree after his wife, who was an avid painter of butterflies, trees and plants. Apparently, she really loved butterflies (about as much as I do) and found them buzzing around this tree's fragrant flowers.

The leaves which are huge and remind me of elephant ears were referred to as "clever" leaves because students in Hong Kong were asked to use them as bookmarks when studying. Ham uses them as a fan for now ------>

Henry....painter.... lover of butterflies....the pea pods I found at Aunt Carrie's house, being clever?

Can there be so many things to connect me with this tree? I'm kidding about the being clever part.

But knowing the name and the history of it are only part of it. Somehow this tree ended up in my neighborhood and today I found out how.

More on that in the next post.

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity Jig

This past weekend we took a roadtrip to visit Mr. Yardbird's family. It was a welcomed relief after all the hard work that went into getting back into our family routine with Mr. Yardbird coming home after ten long, really long, months.

We have a lot to get used to.

One being the house wasn't as tidy as Mr. Yardbird remembered it. Welcome to the life of a tornado toddler. Somehow when he visited the house was always spotless, well that's because a little help from my mom allowed me enough time to clean it and if I timed it just right, Mr. Yardbird would walk through the door in the most perfectly clean, not a toy to kick over or trip over moment.

The next thing being that I couldn't locate Ham's beloved hair brush. Apparently, brushing Ham's hair is important male bonding time and I somehow misplaced it for I don't know how long. The appalled look of Mr. Y's face when I said I never really brush Ham's hair (ever) tells me he should have been the one home and I should have been the one away.

And of course, there was the getting used to someone always being there when I normally sat in silence. Yes, I used to work on my lesson plans  on the sofa on Sunday in peace with the faint sound of the game on the lowest volume it could go and I could still hear it. Now, it's loud enough for Ham sleeping self to hear it down the hall and of course, I get the play by play from across the couch. But I don't mind it because I sort of missed the play by play even if it causes me to forget what "the students will do..." or what "the teacher will say...". Who doesn't want to know that Tony Romo sucks this year?

And for Mr. Yardbird, there were things to get used to as well. Like having someone to watch tv shows with at night. Even if that someone can't decide if she is still hungry or not and insists on eating ramen noodles at ten o'clock at night while we watch a tv show on our laptop. And it doesn't seem like such a bad thing to get used to except that I accidently lost grip of that boiling hot ramen noodle bowl and set us both screaming across the room with burned arms and legs and million mushy ramen noodles splattered on everything possible. I can't help it that I'm hungry a lot. But now that he's home, he'll get used to that again.

Just like he'll get used to doing the man things around the house, like trimming up the already trimmed bushes outside and then convincing me that he could do a much better job if  we bought him a hatchet. What in the world is a hatchet? And last I checked we have a guy that comes out to do that stuff. But I won't tell him.

And for me, I have reinvested in my good old ear plugs. My new ones I mean. The ones I had to go buy again now that my snoring man is back.

It feels like we're newlyweds again.

But I don't mind.

Letters from Michael - Part 2

So, Hammy I was receiving letters from Michael, well written, beautiful penmanship, correspondence at its best, letters.

Each letter was more beautiful than the last. He never made a mistake, the strokes of his pen were careful and deliberate.

And each letter I intended to answer, but when I thought about it, I figured I should sit down with some beautiful paper and write an elaborate note to him that matched his.

But, that's not me.

With me there are scratch-outs and my penmanship looks more like a 5th grader's. It is not graceful or cursive, its all over the place, as are most of my thoughts when I write a letter.

So time went on and each year I promised myself I would sit down and write that perfect letter and each year there was never enough time.

And finally this year in February, I decided enough was enough and I took out some stationary and a pen and made myself do it. But how do you sum up three years, and also how do you apologize for not writing, what excuse is good enough?

There isn't any.

So, I wrote Michael and said, I'm sorry I haven't written and I know that no excuse is a good enough one..." and I carried on about how life had been. I thanked him for the letters and I brought him to speed on the birth of you. I told him about your dad's adventures through work and my decision to pursue teaching.

I included pictures and I sent it off.

But months went by and I heard nothing from Michael.

And finally July rolled around and I was really worried. One day, while you were swimming in the pool I had the strange sense that I should try to call Michael.

So, after I put you down  to sleep (thank God for your three hour day naps), I asked your dad if he minded if I made a long distance phone call to Scotland. Michael always included his number in his letters, so I had another way to reach him. Your dad said it was a good idea, without hesitation.

So I sat down and I tried and I tried but I couldn't figure it out! Ham, I'm no technology guru. I was so mad. I tried Skype, I tried to call him through Google, but nothing worked.

I gave up, at least for now. I had a stack of papers to go through in our bedroom and since you were still asleep and I couldn't call Michael, I might as well sort through, organize, and shred mail.

I started making a pile of mail to shred and I was surprised to see a letter that Micheal had written to us from before. I didn't know how it ended up in this stack. It had been so long since I had opened it that is has already resealed itself. I gently pried open the envelope and peeked inside. There was Micheal's beautiful penmanship peering out at me. I tried to make out some of the words to see what this one had been about, his kids, his grandchild on the way? But my eye's caught something else....."Hammy". Yes Ham, my eyes caught your name.

My heart started beating fast and tore open the letter. I scanned the letter so fast, it was pages long. Your name was scattered throughout it.

Micheal didn't know about you Ham! So this means, he HAD written back, but when???

I don't know how it happened but somehow his letter was misplaced as junk mail and luckily on the day I was so determined to call him, I found it.

It turns out that he received my letter on his birthday, which coincidentally is only a few days away from your birthday. He was so excited he took off and celebrated your almost mutual birthday at a pub.

I'll tell you what that is one day.

He filled me in on his life and was overjoyed with the news of you.

And never once did he say, your handwriting is awful, your scratch-outs make me sad, please find some better stationary to write on.

Because the thing is, Michael's letter wasn't nearly as perfect as his others had been. Sure it was still beautiful, but for the first time I was seeing scratch outs and the paper was just photocopy paper. And I felt sad inside realizing that none of those things mattered to Micheal either.

So Ham, I keep on writing to him, sometimes on stationary. Sometimes I typed letters filled with pictures of you and he would write back telling me "I couldn't stop fussing over the pictures you sent".

Ham,  I doubt you'll let something like stationary and penmanship get in the way of something good, but it might be something else, just take a step back and think about what really matters.

Love,
Mom

Letters from Michael - Part 1

Dear Hammy,

Here's a life lesson for you --- If you wait until everything is perfect to do something you might miss the opportunity to do it all together.

Let me give you the perfect example:

When your dad and I were honeymooning in Italy almost 3 years ago, we spent the last few days of our trip in Rome.

By our third city in Italy, I was starting to come to the realization that I married a man who wasn't the best with directions since locating each new hotel took several hours and many puzzled looks at maps. There was also the occasional "It must be over there a few streets over." "Or just behind that corner." By the time we located the hotel, I thanked my stars your dad had only allowed me one suitcase, because carrying any more would have been out of the question.

Finding our hotel in Rome was no exception. Although we didn't have to hurdle our luggage up the stairs and over bridges as we did in Venice, Rome offered the unique challenge of dodging tiny cars that seemed to travel at the speed of light. Plus it was dark and we had taken the subway to the ghetto by accident. your dad was trying his best to seem like he knew exactly where we were and that he hadn't just placed his new wife in an uncomfortable situation of wheeling luggage down a dangerous street in the middle of the night.

Soon enough he decided to call our hotel quest quits and he flagged down a cab. What a relief it was for us, when we got in and saw a young hip girl driving it. Maybe she could help us. But we ate our words and the dust as she floored the gas petal and zipped between cars in what could only be described as Roman drag racing.  By the time that we got to our hotel which was nanoseconds, I nearly hurled myself to the ground to kiss the cement in appreciation that our lives had been spared.

Thankfully, Rome daytime was a nice departure from ghetto Rome nighttime.

During the day we explored the city, its museums, the colosseum, and threw down some bruschetta, expressos and a few gelatos here and there. At night we tried to find a hole in the wall local place to eat using our trusty Frommer's Guide. When we returned to the hotel, we would stop by the hotel bar to have a night cap and talk about the day's adventures.

One night we decided on the Ristorante del Pallaro. We hailed a cab and circled around forever before we finally eyed the name of the restaurant on the street we insisted it was on. Our driver had never heard of it, go figure. Once we were there we were served 8 courses of whatever they felt like feeding us that night. It was hands down the best food we had while in Italy. Your dad and I were in heaven.

Fun fact about Pallaro is that the owner claims that the restaurant rests on the site where Julius Ceaser was assassinated. It has been disputed, but it still adds to the restaurant's intrigue.

Before we left we hightailed it to the kitchen where we were able steal a picture with the owner and cook, Paola Fazi.

When we got back to the hotel, we decided to stop by the hotel bar for a minute to relax.

That's when we met Michael.

We were sitting at the bar, musing over the food and experience we had at that really neat local restaurant, when Michael caught my eye.

Michael was an older man, in his seventies. He was sitting alone a few chairs over, sipping on a glass of Brandy.

Since I'm not shy, I turned to him and asked him if he was American.

"No, I'm Scottish." he said, smiling.

We told him all about the restaurant we just went to and about our trip so far to Italy.

Michael explained the reason for his trip to Rome. It was a group trip with other folks about his age. He had lost his wife a few years before from cancer after a year long battle with it. He took care of her in their home in Dumfries. (When he talked about her, you could tell he missed her tremendously) In the past few months, he thought it might be the right time to start traveling so he booked a spot with a group trip to Rome. He wasn't particularly fond of the group he was traveling with - they were a bit boring for his taste.

He bought a glass a Brandy for your dad and the two of them sipped while I continued the conversation.

Before we knew we invited him to dinner with us the next night. We didn't know where we were going to go, but we would really love it if he would come with us.

At six thirty the next day, Michael greeted us in the lobby, hopped in a cab with us and joined us for dinner.

We continued our conversation over dinner and Malbec wine. I ordered something really awful to eat. I don't remember what it was but I mostly pushed my food around my plate while I told Micheal all about our lives back at home.

We talked about his kids, life in Scotland, how he lived in a town that was only twenty minutes from the town our town was named after. What are the odds?

Anyway, when we got home we parted ways agreeing to write to each other. I took down Michael's address and he took down mine.

Each year that followed Michael sent Christmas cards and one or two letters a year.

But Hammy here is the thing: I never wrote him.

Not for three years.

Let me tell you the ridiculous reason why.


To be continued...

Who do you think you are?

Today I got to go to church by myself.

It was amazing. I was able to sit back, enjoy the music, pray, and  catch everything that God was trying to tell me.

All without having to redirect a toddler, apologize to the surrounding parishioners, and without having to think of new ways to keep my son peaceful.

I love my Hammy but he is not ready for church yet.

I sort of accepted it, last week when he went and sat with another family for the entire mass. And though they were good sports about it, he did, in fact, eat every bit of their kids snacks and nearly break their toys. I thought it might be best to try this a little later on.

Nevertheless, this week I sat alone and though I thought of the little guy often, I enjoyed some me and God  time.

And as we went through the Gospel and the priest's homily. I sort of had the feeling this Gospel was really something that I needed to hear.

It was John 6:41-51.

You know the one - where Jesus has been preaching to the people from his village for a while and he finally tells them that He is the Son of God and his friends said something like "Whoa, wait a minute....Who do you think you are?...You are the son of Joseph!". Everything up until that moment is going great and then Jesus decides to challenge their thinking with this idea. And He basically  says "Accept this from now on". But it was really hard for them, because they were so used to how things were.

This is what our priest talked about - how hard it is for us to accept God's challenges.

And I sat there and I thought about how many times, while driving in my car and thinking about the challenges that God doles out to me, do I say "Whoa, wait a minute....Who do You think you are?....Don't You think we have enough going on, enough to think about?"

I'm not talking about spilt milk or dropping an egg carton on the floor. I'm talking about the bigger things, the things you don't have control over.

But the priest said something that really struck me. He said, "If you don't learn to accept the challenge and stop trying to hold on to the way things were, you will never receive all the graces God wants you to because of it."

It's pretty weighty.

But I look at all the good things that have come out of those challenges. New friendships and ones that maybe I needed to be let go of. More time with loved ones and learning how to swallow my pride and accept help when its needed. And maybe I understand a little bit better the why.

Maybe things that seemed obviously bad where actually the setup for something really good.

So I drove home and I told God, I do know who He is, maybe not exactly what He's doing. But I think I have a rough idea of where He is going with this. And well, maybe He should scratch some of the things that I said before.

I like to think He did, since He's so forgiving and all.

Murphy's Law

It's been the kind of week that:

• You drop a brand new egg carton on your concrete driveway as you attempt to carry in too many groceries at once. (All 18 eggs break)
• You drop a whole gallon of milk on the floor and the cap flies off and by the time it all registers and you grab it, half of it has poured out.
• In some strange way you manage to knock your coffee across the bathroom with your blowdryer wire (and you only had three sips of it)
• Your kid busts his head on your second to last toe in some freak of nature accident.
•  Surprise! Your kid has pnemonia. That cold that lasted all summer, the one the doctor said "hey it's no big deal, wheezing is okay". Well turns out its not okay.
• And your flowers you just planted from Home Depot kicked the bucket. And who said Vincas are hard to kill?

But that's okay because at least this week, our air conditioner is working and we have found other things to smile about like mismatched pajamas and a hand-me-down push car that is super fun to ride in.

The pain was incredible.

Last night I was a nervous nelly. Checking my alarm ten times and asking not one but three people to call and check with me in the morning to make sure I was up.

It was my first day of student teaching.

Waking up early is not my thing.

Especially 5 am.

But nevertheless my weary eyes popped upon when my phone alarm went off and I dragged my feet over to turn off the other alarm I set across the room.

It was a miracle.

I'm one of those light sleepers except when it comes to the sound of my alarm. The minute it goes off, my mind automatically tranforms it into the voice of someone in my dream. And for some strange reason I accept the fact that someone in my dream has resorted to speaking in beeps.

But today, I was able to combat my sleep disorder.

I made myself a fresh cup of coffee.

As I'm filling my Kuerig K-cup, I hear the faint sound of some super trendy pop song drifting from the living room where my sister sleeps which I'm guessing is her phone alarm and I shake my head because there's no way in heck that would ever wake me up. And who knows why her alarm was set this early anyway.

I sip my coffee, sit down for a minute and think what do people do in the morning, watch the today show, read the newspaper? take the trash out?

I have no clue.

Instead, I take a shower, start blow drying my hair and in one clean inexplicable sweep of the blowdryer wire send my more than half full coffee cup across the bathroom coating the entire bathroom in coffee. Fantastic.

The school day went fine. Except that I locked myself out of the school when I went to get my lunch out the car and I had to break into the cafeteria kitchen to get back in. It was sort of embarrassing for my first day.

And when I got home, I told Ham to help me find his shoes so that we could take my sister back home. I was relieved to be home, tired even. A visit to my mom and dad's would be nice. Plus we could stop for snowballs on the way.

Just when we got to the hallway, one of Ham's feet tripped over one of the three brooms he likes to pull out and leave as booby traps on the floor, forcing one of his feet up in the air, his other leg buckled beneath him and of course, his head came crashing down to the floor. It seemed like it happened in slow motion. In my head, I thought "nooooo.... Hammy's head!"

But not to worry. Since I was so close behind him, I attempted to save the day. I put one foot forward and tried to scoop down to save him and that's when his head came crashing down on my toe and I howled in pain. Ham was unscathed. Thank goodness.

My toe, sad and broken.

Every minute that passed the pain got worse. As my dad would say, "The pain was incredible."

I called Mr. Yardbird while I searched for Ham's shoes. "My toe, I think it's broken." I explain what happened. "It looks kind of weird."

"But that's how your toes look."

Thanks. Seriously? he had to go there? I'm no foot model, but sheesh. So what if my first two toes look like two fingers making the peace sign. So what if the rest of them are midget toes. It's quirky and fun, different, unique. Right?

I show my sister as I hobble out the door. "You see, doesn't it look bad?"

"Oh yea," she says, shaking her head. "It looks REAL bad."

I look up at her and I realize she's not looking at the right toe. "Wait a minute. Which toe do you think it is?"

She points to my second toe. I grimace a little. "No, Anna, it's not that one."

"Well which one is it?"

"The one that's screaming!" I say with desperation. "That one!"

"Oh, well um....it's hard to tell."

Thanks ya'll. I'll never show my feet again.

So I survived my first day of school, but my foot did not.

Isn't it romantic?

A few months ago, Mr. Yardbird and I had a rare opportunity to go out on a date. I could give you a million reasons why that is, but it's not important.

My cousin, Sally offered to watch Ham for us and when the night rolled around we put real people clothes on, got in the car and sailed down the street.

The problem is, is that we had no idea where we were going.

Mr. Yardbird turned the corner and asked me where we were headed.

I gave him my best "beats me" shrug of the shoulders.

You see, we were both pretty beat, Mr. Yardbird working harder than anyone I know and me chasing a toddler around the house while simultaneously writing well-thought papers. It was exhausting.

Somehow neither of us had thought about it.

So after driving around for forty five minutes we chose a real expensive restaurant for lack of direction and hunger and because we had no idea what to do with ourselves.

The problem with real expensive restaurants is that nine times out of ten, Mr. Yardbird is going to get sick three bites into the meal.

But we'll get to that in a minute.

So anyway, we get to the restaurant which is on a quaint but sort of busy street and decide why not sit outside. What a view the outside had, this is after all a really kind of trendy area.

What we failed to realize was that it was only 6:45 pm of one of the hottest days of the year and the cement sidewalks don't technically cool until well after the sun goes down. And so, even in the evening hours, when the sun is tucked behind buildings or trees, it's about as hot as the holy moly outside.

But nonetheless, we tell our hostess, we want to sit outside and we get a 'what a bunch of morons' look which neither of us really notice.

"Isn't this nice," I asked Mr. Yardbird.

He nods his head and smiles at me, taking a sip of his Malbec wine.

Malbec wine isn't the kind of wine you want to drink when it's excruciatingly hot outside. No, its robust, heavy taste makes it by far a cold weather wine. But we weren't thinking and so beads of sweat are forming at our temples and above our mouths.

But that's okay because this is romantic.

And besides that nothing quite cools you off like a nice breeze. No not the wind. But the gust of wind that each passing car brings as it plows down this little street. The cars that - did I mention - are only three feet away and when they pass they just about take you away with them.

That's okay because the breeze or gust of wind, well,  it's sort of romantic too.

The waiter comes out and asks us what we would like. I'd tell you what we ordered but I haven't a clue. All I remember is that Mr. Yardbird and I couldn't decide on some oysters for an appetizer and just when we decided not to get them...

"and we'll start off with oysters." Mr. Yardbird told the waiter. So I shrugged my shoulders, he must have really wanted them.

And while we wait, we try to come up with conversation that doesn't involve work, or school or Ham. But just as soon as that starts...

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Mr. Yardbird and I turn and realize our loud humming source is the street light across the road. We turn back to each other and we smirk a little bit, because I think we sort of know the situation that we got ourselves in. So, we try our best to talk above the loud constant hum of the light.

And while we talk we casually wipe the sweat from our brows, and pull at our clothes that are sticking to us, and I don't know about Mr. Yardbird, but it takes everything in me not to stand up and slap my legs and arms like a lunatic, because well, it is after all mosquito season and the last I checked there had been some mosquitoes buzzing around with encephalitis. But who cares about that.

And just when we thought we were at our wits end, the waiter appears with our oysters and boy do they look delicious. So we break off our share and we begin eating. I hardly notice Mr. Yardbird, because the fried oysters are entirely too delicious but then I decide to look up and tell him I'm so glad he decided to get them.

But, Mr. Yardbird...he didn't look so good.

I look over at a pale Mr. Yardbird, slowly chewing his oh so good oysters.

"You don't look so good."

"I don't feel so good."

It could have been the constant gushes of city air, or loud almost, deafening sound of the street light, it could have been the oysters, or the fact that it felt like 102 degrees outside, it might have even been the onset of encephalitis or any combination of the above. What I did know is that pale look of his face was nothing to take lightly.

"Maybe you should go splash some water on your face." I say this because I know exactly where this is headed and I need to by us some time to get the heck out of there.

"You're right." And while he heads off to the bathroom. I motion the waiter over, tell him to box everything up including our food that hasn't come out yet and cork the wine. We're leaving. And being the nice waiter he was everything was set to go as soon as Mr. Yardbird reappeared.

"Let's go."

Whatever it was that was ailing Mr. Yardbird didn't seem to be bothering him the closer we got to the car. "We should go for a walk. I feel better."

But I didn't think we should take any chances.

He set the wine in the backseat and we drove home in the nice cool air conditioned car.

But a quick slam of the breaks and I hear a loud thump in the back seat.

"Was that the....?" "Did you put the...."

A turn my head and sure enough the wine has exploded all over the back seat.

I shake me head. I'm trying to keep my cool but I want to tell him, "To the moon, Mr. Yardbird." and shake my fist in the air, like Ralph from the honeymooners.

But, I don't and I say "let's go get some carpet cleaner."

And so instead of getting our facebook, power couple photo in front of the restaurant, we snapped this at wal-mart.

Good Ole Wal-Mart

When we pulled up at home, we were shocked to see a night heron walking in the street. I had been telling Mr. Yardbird all about these birds that looked real strange in the tree across the street. And if things didn't happen the way that they did, we wouldn't have spent the rest of the night sipping gin and tonics, googling and chasing a night heron down the street with Sally which turns out was ten times more fun then oysters, encephalitis and 102 degree heat.

Night Heron

Googling Night Herons

We need a new.....We need to do...

Just last week, Mr. Yardbird came home and in his typical fashion, replaced our filters, said his favorite phrase "we need a new ________" about sixteen thousand times to which I wearily nodded my head and thought yep, add that to the list of we needs, and showed me how to properly operate my not so broken vacuum cleaner.

"It's not sucking anything up." I said. I hoped this would turn the "we need a new vacuum" light on in his head.

It didn't. Why doesn't that work when I need it to?

"Did you try turning this nob?" He asked. He points down to the nob that says something like floor followed by an arrow and then I don't know....carpet. Whatever.

I admit, I hadn't thought of that. "No." I say flatly.

"Well, it works just fine when you do that." He runs the vacuum over the carpet and okay, so yes, it looks like it might actually be working.

"Well wait a minute. That's nothing." I disappear into the kitchen and come back with a hand full of crackers. I smash them into my fist and toss them in front of the vacuum. "See if it can take THAT...I mean, that's what we're dealing with here." I motion over to Ham who looks like this smash cracker thing is something I made up or something that Murphy does, but certainly not him.

Sure enough it works. My temperamental, won't work for me, vacuum, works just fine for Mr. Yardbird.

I hate you, vacuum.

And I'm sort of mad, because just a few weeks ago, I was so proud of myself for taking it all apart to fix the internal problem I thought it was having. I called Mr. Yardbird and told him. "Yep, I think I fixed it. Took the whole thing apart. And I put it back together, no problem. Yep, nothing to it."

What I didn't realize is that I hadn't really done anything internally to it. I opened it all up, said yep that's the inside of a vacuum, and put it all back together. And as I hung up with Mr. Yardbird I glanced over and saw three screws I somehow missed. Three screws I sure hope the vacuum doesn't miss. Needless to say I didn't fix it like I thought. I was forced to use the handheld vacuum for weeks.

But oh Mr. Yardbird turns a nob and *poof* it's like a brand new vacuum.

He has a way of getting things back on course.

And besides the attention he gave our vacuum, and our air filters, he decided we should also think about dusting the house from top to bottom. "I bought this new duster and I think we need to dust the whole house," he said.

I look at that cute little duster in his hand.

"Uh huh." I forced a smile. And thought...If only I could wave that thing around and it would throw Ham's toys in his toy bin, the books on the shelves and magically organize my pots and pans, if ever I could locate them all.

Then I look over at Ham and I think...Who the heck has time for dusting?

But besides the filters, the vacuum and his sudden interest in dusting, he noticed my potted plants in the front of the house were looking a little shabby and he thought maybe it wouldn't hurt to go pick out some new flowers from Home Depot.

"We also need some new flowers," he said.

My ears perked up. "Did you say flowers? I asked.  Seriously....hadn't he just said "we need a new broom, we need a new rug, we need a new bed, we need a new portable gas grill, we need a house with no dust, we need a new filter, we need floors that are insulated or a house that's not a hundred years old"....I'm sorry but I can't keep up with our need news and need to do's.

But flowers. Well I can do flowers.

So off to Home Depot we went.

We put a dazed, I need a nap real bad, Ham, in the cart and as Ham and I whirled around the isles of plants, I rubbed his little back and hummed a song to him. I've master the push the cart with one hand and hug my Hammy with other.

And as we wheeled around, Mr. Yardbird searched for the purple/blue flowers I wanted so bad and Ham snapped out of his daze for a minute, glanced up at me - smiled real big - I'm not sure if it was from the back rub or the song I was humming- reached up and kissed my face. It was one of those sort of melt your heart moments, that makes you realize, my kid really loves me.

Ham has a way of doing that a lot.

While Mr. Yardbird located my purple/blue flowers, I managed to pick out a few other flowers I am pretty sure we needed.

And we went home and opted for working in my potted plant garden instead of dusting, thank goodness. We'll save that for a rainy day. And I've decided since Mr. Yardbird and the vacuum get along soooo great, they can just continue their lovely relationship.

Because, I think we need a new.... vacuum pusher.

 Thanks, Mr. Yardbird.

Pint Size Favorite Tree

Okay, Okay, I promise I'll only bring it up one more time.

Ham and I went for our walk today. It's been so hot outside so I have been getting him ready for bed with pjs on and then loading him up in the stroller to make the rounds while the sun goes done.

That's the only time when it's actually cool enough outside that you almost forget that it was 100 degrees just a little while ago.

So as we normally do, we cut around the corner to our favorite tree.

The last time we checked it out - all of the flowers and most of the leaves were gone leaving only the pea-pods dangling in the wind.

This time it was packed full of life with flappy green elephant ear leaves.

Ham and I strolled underneath it and I pulled some of the branches down to tickle him in the face.

Then I noticed that there were tiny versions of the big elephant ear leaves on the ground and I stooped down to grab one. But when I went to pull it up to me, I realized that it was attached to the gound and what I held was a tiny version of my favorite tree.

At the bottom of this tree maquette was one of the pea pod seeds from a few months ago that had snapped in half to start the growth process.

I was in awe.

And then I got the bright idea that maybe, just maybe, I could grow my own favorite tree. I say favorite tree, because I still have no clue what kind of tree it is.

So I held on to it and Ham and I continued on our walk. Past all the stray cats enjoying their meal time, around the old church as the church bells rang and under the oak trees.

And before long, I remembered how hot it was and it was time to head back.

So Ham and I headed home and I found a pot that would suit this tiny tree for now.

And I planted it.

And maybe one day this tree will be big enough to plant on the ground and will grow big enough to make the beautiful white flowers, pea pods and elephant ears leaves that I love so much. Maybe one day it will be the perfect tree for little ones to climb with its thick, low to ground branches.

Maybe.

Who knows.

What I do know is that my other favorite plant, my discount hydrangea that never bloomed for three years, well it surprised me this year.

Guess it's time to take on another plant.

The Bedtime Olympics

I think there should be an Olympic category for what parents have to do between 5 pm and 7:30 pm.

Somehow we are expected to feed, bathe, clothe, read a story, sing sweet lullabies to our kid or kids and then *poof* they are asleep and we place their sweet little sleeping selves into the crib and dust ourselves off and say that wasn't so bad.

If this is how it goes for you. Kudos to you.

For me - Yeah, right.

Instead I pray dinner is finished by five. Dang crockpot, hurry up and cook it.

I remind him to eat and quit for Pete's sake playing with his food. No don't put it in your hair. I was hoping I wouldn't have to bathe you, but thanks, now I do.

I have to unload and load the dishwasher while he whines incessanty that he wants to get out of the highchair.

And just when I think, good he ate all his food, no food on the highchair table. I pick him up and...voila there it is! Everything I thought he was eating was really stashed underneath him.

I strip him down to his diaper, put him on the floor and point to Murphy, our cat, he takes off running to terrorize her and I think hey this is an excellent opportunity to sweep up all the food and clean the highchair for the tenth time today. But, really I'm used to it. I might as well glue the broom and the broom tray to my hands and stick clorox wipes in my back pocket for easy access.

And when I finally locate my little one to bathe him he has somehow managed to rip through the house like a tornado leaving remnants of books, pots and brooms and remotes in his path.

That's okay, I like picking things up that I just picked up, ten minutes ago.

Then I get the bath water going and he waits impatiently next to the tub, trying to hurl his body over the bath wall.

And just before I lower him into the bath I step right into...what is that? oh, pee. Yep couldn't hold it, so he just peed right there next to the bath tub. Great. :)

And so I bathe him. Reminding him sixteen thousand times that this is not the swimming pool. Standing and kicking water into the air is not acceptable. But he won't listen and I'm soaked.

Then I dry him off and he takes off to his room and I struggle to put a diaper on him, maybe lotion, some pjs. All while he squeals and kicks and laughs. I think, ten more minutes of this madness, just ten more minutes.

I grab a book and sit back in the rocking chair with him. A short books with a few sentences. I point to things, he points to things and then he tries to rip a page out and I remind him I was reading that page, we need it or we won't know what happens. I'm kidding, how many times have we read this book, yep a billion jillion times, we all know that the letters get back up the coconut tree in chicka chicka boom boom.

Then he starts to say "yea!" and throws him arms up in the air. And then he thinks its so funny, and admitly I do too, so he does it over and over again. Then I realize to heck with the story, we'll try again tomorrow.

Then I rock him, but lets be honest, he's too old for all that, and he just stares at me in the dark blinking and giggling.

So I say off to bed with you, Ham, and my exhausted self lowers him into the bed still wide awake, still hanging on for a last hoorah.

I creep out of his room and close the door to a crack behind me.

And a few minutes later I peep back in and see this:

And I think not bad, I give myself an 8 in the bedtime Olympics.

First Day of DayCare

So what do I do when I'm traumatized by an event. I write about it.

Today was Ham's first day at daycare.

And it wouldn't have been so bad if I had done more to prepare for it.

I was just coming off of a week full of interviews, a week of realizing I'm going back to work...gasp...and a week where my husband spent his vacation caring for our little one so I could put a big girl suit on and some heels and sell my teaching abilities to 12 different schools.

It was exhausting.

And it was interesting because during that week I got to see a big role reversal. I found myself saying things to my husband like "Did you turn the air conditioner up, sheesh it's hot in here." "What did you cook for dinner?" and "What did you do all day?" and Mr. Yardbird said things like, "Ham had two poo poo diapers today, he ate x y and z for lunch and can you believe it he told me he wanted to wear his hat today!"

What the heck happened here?

Before things could get weirder, we headed off to Mr. Yardbird's hometown where we all relaxed and settled back into our normal selves again.

And then we came home to school and.....daycare.

When I imagined this first morning of day care,  I thought I would grab Ham's packed bag and as we skipped down the steps to the car, I would ask a kind neighbor to snap our picture. It's the first day of daycare after all.

But when I went to grab that packed bag, I realized I didn't pack it.

Then I realized that packed bag involved a lot things we did not have and that this might involve a super last minute trip to Target.

So Ham and I raced around the house.

I grabbed everything I thought we needed - an extra crib blanket, some wipes, a sippy cup and his swim gear. I scribbled some other things on a list for Target.

Ham did everything he could do to help. He pulled out my sewing supplies, tore down the Christmas tree box I had stashed behind a door, swiffered the floors, pulled out the brooms, and two pots with lids. Then he strategically placed all of the above in every walkway for good measure. Which is fine because who doesn't like to hurdle over things with a baby, a purse and a bag in their arms as they walk out the door?

Once we were at Target, I realized I forgot Ham's grocery cart cover and oh yes his sippy cup, which is great because its only 6,000 degrees hot outside and here I am mom of the year with no water for my son. Great.

Oh and that list that I made? Well I'm sure it's right where I left the sippy cup.

I grab the first grocery cart I can get. The first grocery cart I find near the car with dried up vomit on it. I started to lower Ham into it and that's when I realized it. Fantastic. So Ham and I rush into Target wipe down a completely vomit-free cart with 60 wipes and speed through to gather all of our last minute things. We speed past someone who says something about a roller coaster ride and that Ham should have his hands up in the air and that's when I realize I should probably slow it down a little bit.

Once we were at daycare I honestly expected the worse. I thought Ham would burst into tears. Arms stretched up to me begging me to stay. No, that wasn't it at all.

What I got was a few moments of Ham glued to my leg. Pictured here:

Followed by I forgot who you are mom.

He starts playing with other kids. And I stood there talking to his teacher, asking her questions I already knew the answers to. Like would he have lunch today. Seriously? Because I was waiting. Waiting for him to realize, hey she might be leaving me here, I better cry like I mean it.

It never happened.

I looked at the nursery woman, "Well, I'll just SLIP out. Yea, don't want him to see me." She nods.

I look over at Ham. He's turned away from me. Some kid pushes him and he starts to cry.

Oh well, here it is. Reach on over to momma. Nope, he goes right into the arms of daycare woman.

I stood there, Ham and I looked at each other. Sell out.

"Well I guess I should be going," I told her. "I'll just wait till he looks away.""I'll just..." I slowly walked out the door. Ham couldn't have cared less, there were no tears. No screams or kicks, no please don't leave me.

I felt ousted. Maybe he's growing up, he's too big to need his momma.

But, when I picked him up today, he reached up for me and clapped his hands. He tried to tell me about his day in his own mumbo jumbo way. So okay, he needs me after all.

So long Exersaucer....

Today I bit the bullet and finally put away Ham's exersaucer.

The truth is I really only stopped using it two months ago.

It sounds bad, but in case of emergencies, like if I needed a good place to stick Ham where I knew he would stay put for a few minutes, it did the job.

But we really are past all that.

We had been spring cleaning. I've been cleaning out the pantry, the fridge, the bookshelves.

And Ham has been finding new places to put my pots and the remotes to the t.v.

He likes to keep things interesting and I suppose it is his way of saying there are better places to put things.

I am not amused.

I had finally got around to our bedroom and finished putting clothes away and tripped over the exersaucer for the fifteen millionth time.

Most of the time I ignore that, because every time I think about putting it away, I get a lump in my throat.

In my heart, though, I knew it was time.

While Ham was taking his nap, I pushed the buttons on the sides and slowly took it apart.

I thought about the day we bought it.

We were lucky, because we hadn't had to buy anything for Ham. Clothes, shoes, toys, you name it. We were covered.

We were driving home from his four month shots we were a month late on and Mr. Yardbird had just gotten home from India. We wanted to get Ham something special from us and decided to swing past Babies R Us to grab an exersaucer.

Some how or another I ended up putting the exersaucer together by myself. I think because Mr. Yardbird had to go back to work.

I don't have the patience to read directions so naturally I jammed all the wrong pegs in the wrong places. Then I couldn't get them out and I forced to leave one of the toys off the top because it wouldn't fit with my arrangement.

I remember the look on Ham's face when he got into the exersaucer and how he cried inconsolably when he first saw the Penguin toy. And how for the first few weeks I had to face him away from that terrifyingly happy Penguin. But in so doing, Ham learned to love the seesaw panda bears.

And I remember how content and safe Murphy must have felt knowing Henry was confined to the exersaucer and how sad she must have been when he slowly transitioned out of it knowing her safety was compromised.

Poor Murphy.

I really did love that little exersaucer that seemed to bring Ham joy for months and months and me peace of mind to do things like wash the dishes and fold clothes. Now I as I fold cloths I have a little guy a few feet over unfolding them and folding them HIS way and I as I load my dishwasher, I have a little guy unloading it.

Oh, well.

Taking it easy

In this break between semesters, Ham and I have managed to keep ourselves pretty busy. We visited Mr. Yardbird, I picked up embroidary, I learned some new crock pot recipes, I went to a festival, we bought a pool, we cleaned the house and we hosted a bachlorette girls night.

And tomorrow we have orientation for.....day care! Ahhh!!

So many changes are headed our way, it will be nice to sit back and enjoy the summer.

Here's some of things we have been busy doing:

Hanging out with our favorite person

Owie and his band at the festival

Sally and me

Cousins!

Swimming!!

Moms are the best medicine.

A few Saturdays ago as I bathed Ham before bedtime, I had the distinct feeling that something wasn't right about him.

For a kid whose never really been sick before, it wasn't clear to me that this is what it was.

His eyes were greyish, reddish and they looked tired. But that made sense though, because it was bedtime.

But grey? I don't know.

Plus he was in great spirits. Well sort of. Aside from the occasional whine. But that made sense too, because his two bottom and two top teeth were finally making their debut.

Just to be sure I called Mr. Yardbird to say that I was thinking maybe Ham looked sick and I was going to snap a picture real fast and send it to him to see what he thought about it.

And this is what I snapped.

Needless to say it made me sound not very believable.

With a towel in hand, I scooped him into my arms and started drying him off. His little body started shivering.

And the thing is, he never shivers when he gets out the bath so I was certain there was something up.

I grabbed the ear thermometer, that I don't even know how to use and pressed the bottom near Henry's ear - 102.

So I was right, a fever.

But that wasn't all.

That night and the nights that followed Ham woke up every few hours screaming in gut wrenching pain.

After a trip to the E.R. and the doctor, we had it all figured out...Salmonella Poisoning.

This explained the pain in his stomach, the blood in the you know what and the fever.

It would have been manageable, maybe if I didn't have a 17 pages left to write of my assessment, a 30 minute speech to give and final paper all due that week, oh, and deadlines for applications.

All with a boy, who bless his heart, wanted nothing more than to cling to his mom when the pain hit him.

I was in sleep deprivation mode trying to finish up the semester and taking care of my sick Ham.

It would have been impossible, but...

our moms saved the day.

Ma Ma B and Maw Maw took shifts. They cooked, they cleaned and they offered support like only moms can.


Ma Ma B and I discovered what a great de-stresser the series Downton Abbey was....well when we could actually hear what was going on.

And somehow my mom made the best homemade chicken noodle soup out of the things I already had in my kitchen. Who knew?

And slowly but surely Ham went from looking like this.....

 

To this......

 

 

To this....

And finally to this....

Thanks God for moms!