Again? Really?

By the way, let's go ahead and add some sad with a dash of guilt to my anxiety.  When will I get better at leaving this kid and Trav for a couple days?

You said it

Last night's sleep wasn't horrible by any means, but it wasn't super duper either.  I stupidly stayed up later than I wanted to...Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert comedic abilities are just too much to ignore.  And then Alex woke up around midnight and he was not pleased.

First he wanted some milk.  I brought the milk.  DUH, that's not what he wanted.  He wanted juuuuuuuuice!  With an ice cube!  And he wanted to help me!  Juice? yes.  Ice cube?  Sure.  Getting out of bed to help me?  No way, no how kiddo.  But then he wanted his juice while we sat and rocked.  I saw an explosion following any sort of negative response to that, and I gave in.  After rocking with some juice, all was again right in the world and we all went back to sleep.

I don't know if I have mentioned it, but I signed up for a half marathon.  And it is happening in two days.  Anxiety is reaching maximum levels real quick like.  So between King Alex and his adventures with juice and my anxiety, I did not sleep well.

Alex was fairly quiet in the car this morning, which is rare.  Quiet aside from asking me "Why?" 10 bazillion times, but subdued nonetheless.  So I asked him if he was ok and he assured me that aside from being cold, he was good to go.  And then he let out a monstrous yawn followed with, "I tired Mama."  I told him I was tired too, and after a short pause, he declared we should go home to rest.  Amen brotha...right there with ya.

Ummm, ok?

I just printed my race registration sheet.  For the half marathon.  My registration sheet.  The one that has my name on it...with information about a half marathon.  Because I am running a half marathon.

Holy shitballs.

Tag

Alex loves loves loves the Backyardigans.  It's bordering on obsession.  And being the super responsible parents we are, we just keep on a-givin' him his fix.  Well, not every time, that would be ridiculous.  But it is a sweet 24 minutes when we do give in.  Whatever, it could be worse.  It could be WWE....amiright Kari?  Anywho, the characters play tag in one of the episodes and Alex has decided he really likes tag.

Two things...

First, when he is tagged, he not only tries to tag someone else, but he grabs the "tag" off of himself before tagging someone else.

Second, when he tags you, he yells, "You're ick!"

It is impossible to not play with him.

It's cooooooming

There are very few days between now and when I will be running a half freaking marathon.  Startin' to get more than a bit anxious.  It's a lot of miles man.  I only have 5 more miles of training, 2 of which are supposed to be walked.  I cannot believe it has been 10 weeks already.  Time flies when your constantly running apparently.

Last night I reached a personal best in regards to per mile time.  I ran 3 miles in 25mins, 52secs.  That's under 9 minute miles baby!  As proud of myself as I am for that little accomplishment, that is no way no how anywhere near the plan for Saturday.  For 3 miles?  Yes, that is a doable pace.  For 13.1 miles?  Not so much.  Slow and steady finishes the race.

I am the Tortoise.

YES!

Finally, the definition I have been looking for...

Labeled

I have run in the pouring rain twice in the past week.  I'm makin' the call...I am a runner.  Or I am really stupid...I like runner better.

I don't think I will ever get over how tiny he was when we brought him home.  Not sure what made me think of it today, but here he is in all his 5lb, 9oz glory.

9 Days

Only 23 miles left of training.  Throw the 13.1 miles of the race and I will have completed pretty darn close to the 195 I set out to do.  Admittedly, I did short a couple of the scheduled runs, but I ran all the days my little training chart told me to run.  I think it's kinda funny that at the start of this I told myself I would probably skip a few here and there.  Like my over-obsessive ass would have let me get away with that!

I am very nervous for the actual race, although I am 99.999% sure I can complete it.  Knowing my clumsy butt, I will break my ankle on the last training day or something awesome like that.  Since I am pretty positive I can complete the course, you would think I wouldn't be as anxious as I am.  But what fun would that be?  To be perfectly honest, I have a palpable fear of not following the course correctly and somehow ending up on the full marathon course.  Because that'll happen.  At least I am being realistic with my fears.

The other thing is no matter how far or how often I run, I always feel like a poser when I am around real runners.  The faster, skinnier, reflective clothing and water bottle belt wearing ones.  I wonder how miles I would have to log before I would consider myself a runner...

Today is the letter "F" day at day care for Alex.  Wanna guess what he brought to show?  His fingers.  Because his mom is an idiot.

Yes, all of those.

Fingers, fingers everywhere!

My niece was looking for something to do on Sunday, so I told her she could paint my toenails...her choice for me included  a base color of fuchsia topped with glitter.  Which was also then applied to my fingernails since she never gets to paint her mom's fingernails because her mom "has a professional job."

My nails are...attention grabbing.  I have to say she did a very good job.  All nails are covered and there isn't any polish or glitter outside of the nails.  But man, there is a lot of glitter on the nails.  Wowsers.  Alex keeps grabbing my hands and telling people to look at my nails.  And he tells them, "See?  They are purple, with sprinkles!"

And while we are on the topic of fingers, a super duper fun thing happened on Saturday morning.  Travis needed a ride downtown so Alex, Fuzzy and I obliged.  When we dropped him off, Alex wanted his window down so he could say/yell good-bye to Travis.  Cute stuff.

When we pulled away, I asked him if he wanted his window up or down.  He said up.  So I pushed the button on my little Ruler of All The Windows panel of buttons.  And then he started yelling OW!OW!OW!  I turned around to see his little fingers stuck in the now rolled up window.  I zipped the window down as fast as I could and reached back to hold his injured fingers while I waited for the light and he was screaming.  The light turned and I took off for the first parking lot I could get to.  After some snuggling with me and Fuzzy, the tears dried up and we headed home.

Later we got in the car to go to my parents' and he said he wanted his window up.  I asked if his fingers were out of the way, and turned around to double check, only to be met with a very disapproving look on my son's face while he said, "You hurt me, Mama."  So that was fun.

Curse you hills!!

I had to run during my lunch to make sure I got my 3 miles in today.  My office is in a very hilly location.  Today's run confirmed I hate hills.  Which may just be a slight issue since I am running this freaking half marathon in NASHVILLE.  You know what else is in Nashville?  Mountains.  The Great Smoky Mountains to be exact.  Awesomesauce.

I did manage to get all 3 done in juust under 30 mins so hopefully when there are MOUNTAINS on my route, I won't, you know, die.

Oh, and in case you are wondering, no, my office does not have showers.  Thank you baby wipes.  Don't mind me, I'm just busy keepin' it classy over here.

Buying his love

Today concludes Alex's term as Star of the Week.  The last thing he gets to do is tell everyone what the class "pet" did while Alex was taking care of it.  The class pet is a stuffed cat named "Fluffy" and you get to carry it around in a cute little backpack and put notes about what you and Fluffy did throughout the week in a little notebook.  Over the course of the week, Alex renamed the pet "Fuzzy" and decided the backpack was his.

As you can imagine, he was less than thrilled when I reminded him this morning that his turn with Fluffy/Fuzzy is done and now a different kid gets a turn.  That little reminder was met with, "But it's mine."  And I told him that no, it was in fact something everyone shares.  "But it's mine."  Yes, you had a turn this whole past week, but now someone else gets a turn.  "But it's mine."

So I did the only thing I could think of to make the madness stop...made a date to go backpack and Fuzzy shopping after school.

Really?

There are moments in my life when I seriously ponder how I have made it this far.  How did I graduate college?  How did I own a business?  How have I not perished in some stupidity induced accident?

Not too long ago, I finished paying the bills, doing payroll, and sending in multiple orders for work.  I rewarded myself with some web browsing.  And it was then, over 5 hours since I have been at work and 7 hours since I have been awake, that I realized it is Friday the 13th.  Did putting dates on each of the 14 checks I wrote or any of the 8 orders I sent in tip me off?  Nope.  It took an Amazon ad with a Pomeranian on it.

Good gravy, Jackie.  Pay attention.

Wanna play wif me?

Not having gobs of money sucks.  The end.

Sing it Meatloaf

Part of having a big kid that does things that big kids do, like show and tell and star of the week things is that you have remember to bring things to school.  I thought I was good to go today...I thought wrong.

I remembered to bring his favorite toy...again.  This should probably count for two because I had to bring it yesterday too.  Yesterday was the day the star of the week gets to show everyone his/her favorite toy.  I brought said toy with us.  Apparently showing everyone his kick-ass helicopter was not enough incentive for my child to not act like an ass, so he did not "earn the privilege of showing his toy."  Teacher asked if I could bring it back to day and he could try again.  And I remembered!

I also remembered that today is the day the star of the week gets to bring in his/her favorite snack with enough to share with the class.  Not only did I remember it was that day, but I also remembered the snack!  Firing on all cylinders this morning.

And then we got to daycare and as Alex was helping me unload his stuff like I am his personal llama, his teacher asked what he brought for the letter of the day.  Fail.

2 outta 3 ain't bad, right?

No kidding

You guys, I have a kid.  Like a real kid.  Not a baby, not a toddler.  A kid.  And this time the realization didn't come by the constant talking in full sentences.  Or the ever growing sense of humor.  Or seeing him on a two-wheeler bike with training wheels instead of his tricycle with parental steering handle.  Day care did it again.

Alex is the star of the week this week.  Just like when kids grow up and go to school and are all old and stuff.  We had to fill out this big ol' poster with things like his family, where he lives, his favorite color and food.  Travis was not ok with me just filling it out and slapping some pictures on it...he went all out with markers and stickers.  And each day, Alex gets to bring in something special and have all the attention on him during circle time.  Like a big kid's show and tell!!

Much Better

In an exciting turn of events, I can now chew on the side of my mouth that has the repaired filling.  Seeing as though Mr. Dentist Man drilled straight through to my brain, that particular tooth and surrounding area has been quite sore since Thursday.  But, as I type, I am chewing a piece of gum.  Right on that tooth and everything.  I may have to suspend my blueprints for infiltrating that office and setting stink bomb booby-traps for the employees.  Maybe.

If anyone has a hot minute and can take a break and come on over here and scratch my eyeballs I would really really appreciate it.  And while you are here, you can go ahead and scratch the back of my throat and the insides of my ears.

Spring is such a beautiful, lovely, colorful bitch, isn't she?

Clap! Clap!

I'm not sure what my deal is the past two days, but I am grumpy.  Just all around, in and out, upside down, grumpy.  My patience tank is running on fumes and I just don't wanna.

If you're grumpy and you know it, clap your hands!

*Poof!*

As soon as I acknowledge it, it's gone.  I profess my love for something cute my child does and WHAMO!;  he stops doing it.  We get home yesterday afternoon and he looks at me plain as day and says:

Mom, can you unbuckle me?

Nope.  No can do.  I can buckle you out though.

GAH!

Oh man.

I just looked at my calendar.

I have to go to the dentist tomorrow to have a filling redone.  It's a filling I got when I was like 8 or something...back when they still did silver fillings which I don't think they even do anymore.  Or at least it isn't the standard or whatever.  Oh sweet sassy molassey they are gonna drill the old one out and put a new one in.  THEY ARE GOING TO DRILL IN MY TOOTH.  Power tools and teeth do not go together.

And he is most likely going to try to talk me into getting wisdom teeth yanked out of my head.  Yeah...pretty sure unless you tell me I am going to die unless I get them pulled Mr. Dentist Man, those bad boys are stayin' right where they are.

Whatever.  It's all gross.

Future's so bright

We have two pairs of sunglasses for Alex.  Admittedly, one pair is a squink too big for his face, but it is totally usable.  But he will only wear them for .4 seconds.  Just enough time to smile at us and get us to gush about how cool he looks.  And then he yanks them off his face.

The problem with this is that he has very light blue eyes.  And the lighter the color your eyes, the more sensitive to sunlight they are.  So he is constantly squinting and saying it's too bright, while his eyes are watering and sending tears streaming down his little cheeks.  Yet he refuses to give in to the glorious retinal shade producing magic of sunglasses.

So every sunny morning, on the way to day care, this is his solution:

Favorite Alex-ism #478

When he wants to get out of his car seat, "Mama?  Can you buckle me out?"

This morning as he was climbing out of the car, "Thank you for buckling me out Mom."  You got it kiddo.

Chapter 2

As in number two.  A.K.A.:  poop.

We had a successful poop-free bath on Sunday, so I was really shooting for 2 for 2 last night.  No dice.  Everything was going smoothly until the farting started.  Which he giggles and asks "you hear that?" with every single one.  A couple sets of butt bubbles in and I asked him if he needed to poop.  Nope.  No way.  I explained that he could get out, sit on the toilet, and then get back in the tub...but if he pooped in the tub, he had to get out.  Still nothing.  And then the tell tale face appeared.  So I very quickly said he should sit on the toilet, plucked him out of the tub and plopped him down with a towel wrapped around his shoulders.  He sat there a hot minute and supposedly tried to go, but then told me he couldn't.  So I put him back in the tub and all was right with the world for a while.

I turned away for three seconds to grab the fingernail clipper from the cabinet.  I turn back around to see him half standing/half squatting and then I see it.  In the three seconds I was not watching, he let go of a Labrador sized turd and four little satellite turds.  Fantastic.

There are a couple things I don't get.  First, I do not understand how something that big can come out of something that small.  Second, I really do not understand how something that big comes out of something that small so freaking fast!

Also this whole pooping in the tub thing.  I don't get that either.

Insane

I caught it.  It took 6&1/2 weeks, but I caught the running bug.  I woke up this morning and was immediately looking forward to my run tonight.  My 6 mile run.  I think I have finally earned my padded room reservation.

Winning

We went to the zoo yesterday.  But due to not taking our plans in our own hands, we didn't go until about 4:15.  Yeah, the zoo closes at 5 on Sundays.  And they put all the animals inside for the night around 4.  So...we got to see camels.  And the sad ostrich that I am pretty sure has dementia from being captive.

On the bright side, Alex bounced back super fast from the disappointment of not getting to see the giraffes and he was willing to take a picture this time.

Squawk

If you ever need to figure out what your personal catch phrases are, have a toddler and let the parroting begin.  Friday night Alex didn't want to wear pajamas to bed.  What harm could that cause right?  Well, when your child kicks the four blankets required for bed time off of himself in his sleep and then doesn't quite wake up enough to make sense of why he's cold so he just lays there sleep/crying until you get up, it causes a lot of harm.  A lot of sleep deprived Mom harm.  Finally the sixth time this happened, I just took him to the couch with me to sleep.  At which point he instructed me not to breath on him...so he got to sleep with my feet next to his face.  Ha!

Anyway, one of the times he was awake enough to whine and wake me up, I went to his room to find him laying there uncovered and cold and he looks at me all sleepy eyed and says with just the right amount of attitude and impatience, "Dude...come ON."

I think I need to change up my vernacular around this kid.