Kids can be as funny as swear words and poop...

I read a lot about the lack of substance in 'Mommy Blogs' and have been witness to a few Twitter skirmishes on the topic as well. I suppose the premise (or at least one of them) of this argument is that strangers don't want to look at pictures of your kids or don't want to hear about them all the time. I think this is a little bit bunk in my case though.

1. I bet you that my kids are funnier, cleverer and cooler than most everyone. Did I mention 'ridiculous'?
2. I went to school to be a writer, that has to count for something, right? Give me a degree, I'll give you the world. Wait.
   

College didn't have a course on Correct Cliche, obviously.

That's all I could come up with.

Below is the obligatory story about Mein Kinder, separated by this glorious line. A Maginot Line, if you will, to protect you from my Mommy Bloggerness.
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Olivia has red hair and we've recently taken to calling her The Ginger, which annoys Maxine Jane to no end. As soon as the words leave my mouth a look of shock and dismay lights up her moppet-face, her hands shoot to her tiny hips, her feet immediately take the preferred stomping stance, her voice reaches almost maximum whining levels and it's becoming obvious that she's pissed as hell.

"Mom. Her name is not that! STOP SAYING THAT! CALL HER BY HER NAME!" She stomps away, looking to take her anger out on some unsuspecting sibling somewhere else in the house.

Against my better judgment I set off after her, hoping to get to the bottom of this. I find her face down in her bed, sobbing into a giant pink and yellow stuffed butterfly. Her life is so wretched and wrought with hardships.

"Maxine, what is the matter?" I try to bring a tenderness to my voice even though I'm half annoyed, half amused.

"You know that *sniffle, gag, cough, cough, sniffle* her name isn't 'The Ginger'." Despair emanates from her very core.

"It's just a nickname, Maxine. There's this old British man that lives down the street and he called her that the other day. I thought it was cute." I actually thought it was a little disturbing, being that the old British man stumbled onto his front porch as we were passing and called out, "Hey Ginger, Come on over here!!! Hey you! Tell your momma to drop you off for tea sometime!!!!" at us.

"It's a nice name, I guess. But I'm just so sad cause you and Jeremiah call me 'Mini-Jerk' and 'Washington' and 'Evil One' and they aren't nice like 'Ginger'." Her face is peppered with splashes of red, snot is running freely from her nose and she still looks lovely.

"Maxine Jane, aw baby. You know those aren't your usual nicknames! We just use those when we're kidding around, I usually call you my 'Angel Face' and my 'Little One' and 'Momma's Baby'..." I'm actually starting to feel sad as well and guilty to boot.

"Ya...I know. Ok, I'm not mad at you anymore, I guess. But, maybe if we walk past that old man's house he'll give me a new nickname too?"

"Maybe, Max..."

I shudder to think.

The Boutique

Standing in the corner by the front door of the ultra-hip boutique that sells some of my handmade wares, I’m suddenly very aware of myself and caught in a weird hyperspace of shyness and discomfort. There in the newly minted 'trendiest' neighborhood in the city, I've stopped for a brief drop-off, a quick in and out.

At the counter fairly far from the front door are three girls, I think of them as girls although I know that two of the three standing there are older than me. They are currently speaking in a strange flurry of words to each other about who’s coming to this show or that, who’s getting their hair cut and dyed, where they got this brooch (‘it’s so ridiculously modern, yet perfectly vintage’) or what their boyfriends/girlfriends are writing about this week on their style-blogs.

Children and caffeine may have aged me, made my breasts slightly flat and my teeth slightly tinted, but it seems they have also quashed any sense of situational levity I may have had, because when one of the girls, Valerie, finally notices me standing awkwardly in the corner, clutching my goods and starts yelling almost suspiciously over-loud in my direction, I almost turn and run instead of heading into the shop.

"Erin! Oh My God! You’re like a total lurker! Come over here and let me see your super cute face.” She’s wildly gesturing at me as though I’m 100 feet away and not 10. Her arms look shadily spindly exploding from the billowing fabric of the silk blue kimono that is engulfing her waif-thin frame and her bleach blonde hair is shaved up one side to revel a startlingly white skull.

Unfortunately she continues, “Trish! Have you ever met Erin before? She designs and makes that knit shit with her own two hands! Most popular accessories in our shop, you know, Erin. That’s why I’m always IMing you and bothering you to bring in more! I must be such a pain.” As she continues, she reminds me of a way too thin E! News correspondent fawning over Angelina Jolie or Natalie Portman.

Although I am flattered, I can tell her outbursts have brought a flaming spread of hotness across my face and I can’t think of anything to say in response. Trish looks me up and down, smiling all the time in what may be considered an absolutely polite way, if you don’t notice that she licks her lips lustily and kicks Valerie under the table. One of her hands does momentarily shoot to her head, self-consciously for one second, gripping the beanie obviously not made by me that’s loosely hanging off the back of her head.

“Oh yeah! We love all of your stuff here. You so have to work on changing your line’s name though. I’ve had about a half dozen people wrinkle their noses at your too-cute tags. Ultra-Cute Crochet is totally for baby hat designers.” Trish’s long fake eyelashes are entrancing me at this point in the conversation.

“Well, actually, Trish…most of my business in the past has been custom order kids hats, mittens, blankets and scarves. It hasn’t been till the last 4 years that…”

The rest of the conversation goes on something like that for another three minutes. They consider themselves business mavens and tell everything I’m doing wrong with mine, and then they move on to dissecting my personal style.

As I’m finally taking leave of these ladies, Valerie squeals with excitement and puts one hand on each of my shoulders. She looks right in my face and says with supreme seriousness,

“You know, Erin. I’ve looked at you many times on facebook and I’m always trying to figure out what your style is…because, you know things like that really interest me, you know. Until now I’ve never been able to figure it out. But it just hit me out of the blue and it’s made me incredibly happy that I have figured you out!” She gives me a very tiny shove backwards and takes a step back, long spider fingers grasping her pointy chin in what seems to be a very thoughtful repose.

“You are totally boy-cute, but it’s not quite that cause you have a very thin waist, but very un-boy like round hips and your boobs are hefty. Hmmm…” She tips her tiny form to the right underneath her billowing silk garment and looks at Trish, but doesn’t say anything else.

“So you really haven’t pinned down my style then?” I query as I’m stepping away from them and heading towards the door. Maybe this lapse in Valerie’s usually frenetic conversation will give me the out I’ve been looking for. Stepping once, twice, slightly turning towards the door, stepping again, “Bye girls! Hope you have a wonderful weekend!” It looks like I’m going to make my getaway, I reach out gingerly, put my hand on the...

And then as if she waited till I had my hand on the knob of the front door, she leaps towards me with an out of place abandon. I bite back the tiniest bit of fright, being that she is now skipping at me at a surprisingly full tilt speed.

“Oh ERIN! You are totally boy cute! You saunter into the shop like you could care less about what we think about you. Just like a cute boy. You’re wearing plaid pants, just like a cute boy. You’re wearing a pea coat, just like a cute boy. And here you are running out on us without a care of how we’re all fawning over you. Just. Like. A. Cute. Boy.”

Valerie is completely unaware of how strangely dramatic this speech was, and from the counter of the shop, Trish says, “Oh yeah, you’re so right Valerie!” She is obviously also completely unaware of the speeches extraneous gusto.

Now that my escape is permissible and I’ve been embarrassed to the very core of my being, I turn and flee. I get in the car and tell Jeremiah all about my whole experience and about Valerie’s ‘boy-cute’ epiphany. He’s thoughtful for a minute and as he pulls our car out of the parking spot and into the traffic heading home, he says only, “How is your style boy-cute if she kept repeating that you are just like a cute-boy. Shouldn’t it be ‘cute-boy’ style and not ‘boy cute’ style?” He chews on the inside of his lip thoughtfully.

I sit back in my seat and plan on never wearing plaid pants again.

The Thief

I made a shit load of bad choices in my life; one of them was befriending toxic people. I’m not sure if I wanted to rebel against my happy existence at home, or if I really wanted to help people in need. I thought of a toxic boy that had been in my life from around the ages of 13-16 after watching Rose give a dirty smelly little girl-like creature some change at the bus stop the other day. I wanted to tell her about the lessons I’d learned in my lifetime about people who use instead of give, take instead of help. I didn’t want to make her sad, or take away from the great feeling you get when you help someone out. So I didn’t say anything, I just came home and wrote this:

"I don't care if you're high when you come over, just don't smell like it." I dropped my head into my hands and slumped over between my jean-swathed legs. I was tired of him, tired of his excuses, mostly tired of trying to be this sick boy's friend. I had met him at my Daddy's pharmacy. He was picking up his medication for his ancient disease, hemophilia, and I was in awe of why a 13 year old boy would be at a pharmacy by himself, why he would be anywhere by himself.

He gave me a jovial pat on the back and laughed. "I didn't smoke any...I was just around people who were smoking. You can't get in trouble for just standing there." He flipped a greasy chunk of his black glossy hair off his face and tried to not laugh hysterically at my disapproval. I’m sure he was wondering to himself why I am so much of a square.

I sigh and consider asking him to leave. I had considered it so many times it was almost a novelty. My parents distrusted him, my boyfriend hated his guts and my friends thought he was strange. He made most people uncomfortable with his dingy appearance, his odd looks, his sad and tragic life story.

More than one time I saw him steal things from other people and although I told myself time and time again he would never steal from me or my family, I was still constantly on guard. I would find my eyes rolling to the left or right, watching his hands, other times my eyes would dart quickly around a crowded room to pinpoint his location in it. He was hard to miss, even in a crowd, tall and painfully thin with a mohawk of the aforementioned consistently greasy black hair, a stale black leather jacket complete with studs dulled by age. The jacket was a point of pride for him and he would wear it even on the hottest, sunniest day. He said that the jacket had belonged to his much older brother, but this was never really proven, being that his brother had O.D.ed sometime during the 80’s.

His mouth was too large for his face and he would sometimes drool while in repose, large snaggly teeth protruding, chin oddly melted in with his brontosaurus neck. His ancestors were Native American, his mother in their small dingy apartment drank liquor straight from the bottle like some cliche. His mother was as small as I was and so round it looked like she might topple over at any moment and roll, roll, roll.

“When can we eat, I haven’t eaten for days.” He’s starting to show signs of wear now, often he would be ill for days, not eating, not sleeping, just lying in his dirty bed amongst foul smelling sheets and discarded clothing. Today he was up and about, but I didn’t doubt that he was actually starving. So what made today different? What was it about this day that made me really want to break free from his toxic self? I imagined that it was his smell, my immature side made fun of the stench that wafted from his unclean body all the time. My mature side knew that I was tired of watching him use people and most of all tired of watching him die slowly.

“We’re not eating anything, I’ll give you some money to get something downtown, but I don’t think I want you to come to our house anymore.” I stood now and tried to face him with some seriousness. He made a move to lie down on my bed, he thought I was joking, or didn’t care if I was serious.

There just comes a time in your life when you have to shed weight from your brain. You have to let go of the toxicity and the attachments you make to the people that create said toxicity. I repeated this over and over again in my head and then said out loud,

“Just leave now. Please don’t call or come over anymore. I don’t want to have anything to do with you anymore. You just use me and make me sad.”

He isn’t a proud person. He shrugs and rises to leave.

“Can I have $30? I know you have cash in your change purse.” He doesn’t even look apologetic.

“Ok.” I cross the room, rifling through my book bag for my change purse. After 30 seconds, I hear the front door of my house opening and closing. I listen to the clomping of his giant leather boots and the jangling of the many belts he wore around his concave waist as he disappeared from my street and then out of my life.

I drop the book bag, I know the change purse isn't there anymore.

Ok, I'm a Breast-Feeding Nazi

I was reading some random bla bla bla political bla bla bla this morning, mainly glossing over it for pertinent bits of information when I came across this little gem:

"A 2010 cost analysis of low breast-feeding levels published in the American Academy of Pediatrics' medical journal Pediatrics found that if 90% of U.S. families followed medical recommendations to breast-feed for six months, "The United States would save $13 billion per year and prevent an excess (of) 911 deaths, nearly all of which would be in infants."

Bear with me here, I don't ever think that someone should be told what to do with their own bodies and I am certainly not a bastion of perfection as far as mothering goes.

But- if you decide to carry your child in your body and deliver them with your own strength and power, why the heck wouldn't you want to feed them from your body as well?

I understand that a lot of women decide not to breastfeed and that is their choice.

I just don't understand why not. I'll be the first to admit that breastfeeding is very hard, I gave Rosey a bottle for two weeks because some asshole Pediatrician (doctors aren't gods, you have to trust yourself as well) told me that I didn't have enough milk for her. Her recommendation? Give the baby a bottle of formula before I nurse her. I get seriously red in the face just thinking of this jerk telling other young, naive mothers just like I was the same thing and screwing up their chances of successfully breastfeeding.

Sooooo, if your body makes more milk depending on how often and how long you nurse your baby for, nursing the baby less will make you lose your milk completely. But even though I totally understood the concept, I felt like the Doc must know something that I didn't.

At 20 years old I was just a baby myself and despite my gut feeling, I gave Rose formula and it was horrible. The stuff actually stinks, bottle preparation, cleaning and sanitizing is such a pain in the ass. She was gassy, constantly vomiting and after trying three different types of formula and spending nearly $200 in two weeks, I was at my wits end.

I got a giant black garbage bag, packed up every bottle and every bit of formula and threw it all away. I went to Blockbuster and rented 10 movies. I came home, set up camp on my couch, complete with giant jugs of water and gatorade, snacks, movies and video games. I nursed then two month old Rosey straight for eight hours. She wasn't getting enough milk so I just kept on and kept on. She loved the attention and it was so surreal, just holding her for that long and staring at her.

Finally during the credits of The Ninth Gate with Johnny Depp, I felt this wave of heat flush my face and through my chest. Rose began gulping in surprise and then finished drinking in five minutes. I put her on the other side and the same thing happened.

I looked down at her and for the first time ever she had fallen asleep nursing, one thick drop of breastmilk dripping from the corner of her tiny little mouth. It was one of the most joyous moments of my life. I find myself thinking back on that time and actually yearning for it.

If you are considering breastfeeding and are leaning towards not doing it, or if you are currently breastfeeding and you think it's too hard, just trust me. It is well worth every bit of work and hardship you endure to accomplish your goal.

In two years you'll be crying because it's time to wean!

Dork Designs Launches

After much anticipation, weeks of planning and designing and tons of whining (on my part). Jeremiah and I are finally ready to launch Dork Designs ! I'm so excited it can hardly be contained.

I've also cast aside my previous business, Ultra-Cute Crochet in favor of this new website and the addition of screen printed t-shirts. One of the shirts for sale actually says 'dork' on it and yes, I'm wearing one right now.

If you are interested in putting a Dork Designs button on your site or if you're interested in saying a few words about the new site have at it! That would be so awesome indeed!
If you're considering doing a giveaway or something like that, please contact me at oliverosetree@yahoo.com or our new site email dorkdesigns@gmail.com. If you send a request to the gmail account...you may have to deal with Jeremiah...and I'm not sure you want to do that! :big giant wink:

My logo design was done by Jodi From Pink Designz and the website was designed by Andy Weigel. If you're in the market for either of these services, don't hesitate to get in touch with either of these designers. They were excellent and easy to work with.

I appreciate all the feedback about the site you can give me! Yay! Hip. Hop. Hooray.

My Stinky Valentine's Day Party

Rosey called me at 6:30 am yesterday from her Dad's house (this is his long weekend with the girls) to remind me that I am one of the three parents in charge of crafts/activities for the Valentine's Day party at school.

Whoops.

I remember reading the paper sent home about the V-Day Party, briefly speaking to another one of the parents and being perplexed and confused as to why there were three parents to do the activities and crafts for a 45 minute party and ONE parent in charge of the snacks and drinks. I know I tweeted about it once.

And then I promptly forgot, until Rose's phone call.

"Mom! What kind of thing are you doing for the party today? Mom!" She's way too chipper, demanding and awake for early morning.

Elijah, perched on the pillow beside me starts to yell, "Wo Wo on the phone! WOWOWOWOWOWOWO!".

"Hi Rosey. To be honest with you, I haven't really decided what I'm going to do. How about a word search?" I'm fighting a cold and my voice is very hoarse, which sets Rosey into a panic.

"OH no. Mom. Are you losing your voice?! You're not coming to the party, are you? I told everyone you were coming to the party!" Panicked AND whiny.

"Rose. I will be at the party with proverbial bells on. Don't worry."

"Bells? Proverbial? Mom. Why do you have to talk like that?"

I figured out some games, including the 'guess how many pieces of candy in the giant pretzel jar' (supplied by my Momma! Thanks Momma!) and some word puzzles.

I've been to the school many times before but this time, carrying a giant pretzel bin tied with ribbon and filled with candy, I was more excited.

Rose saw me walk into the class and gave me the cool kid 'half wave'. I love seeing her at school, she is a great student and a very social person, so I'm always proud of her awesomeness. Most of the other students, not so cool.

I was accosted immediately by three or four slightly foul smelling little boys. "Hi Rose's Mom!" I'm not sure why they were so interested in me, I supposed at first that maybe they had crushes on Rose or maybe they remembered me from another time I helped out in the class or during a previous year...

Oh. It's the giant, humongous jar of candy! Duh.

"Hey! Rose's Mom? Can I ask you something?'' This boy was particularly smelly. Why are boys so stinky?

"Yes, sure."

"How many pieces are in there?"

"What's your name?"

"Stinky." (I'm protecting the poor, disgusting child.)

"Ok, Stinky. Let me tell everyone this so I'm not assaulted with the same question over and over again."

I cleared my throat, which was still quite hoarse, motioned to the class for quiet. I was, of course, ignored.

"Hey! Hello! Can I have everyone's attention?!" I sounded like a weird, dying, zombie toad. At this point my futile attempts at quieting the classroom actually got a eye roll from a parent in the back of the room. Great.

"HELLO! Everyone listen to me! IT'S ABOUT THE CANDY!" Ouch. Yelling is hard work.

Finally everyone stopped what they were doing and listened to me for a minute. I explained them the rules of the guessing game and then added,

"I have no idea how many pieces of candy are in this jar. My mom helped me put this game together and was afraid that I would tell Rose the number, or give her some kind of hint, so she wrote the amount down on a piece of paper, put it in an envelope, sealed it and put it in my back pocket. So you don't have to ask me how many pieces are in the jar. I have no idea." I felt pretty happy with my speech and was satisfied that it would keep the kids off my back for the remainder.

Rosey's hand shot up in the air.

"Yes, Rosey?" Being a teacher isn't so hard, after all!

"So you're saying that you don't know how many pieces of candy are in the jar?"

Fail.

Writing Exercise

She sits upright, short legs stretched to the maximum length in order to reach the ratty ottoman, a tattered remnant of a dead grandfather. Next to her, perched precariously on the arm of the small beige couch, the skeleton of a pear lies in the center of a pearl colored tea plate, picked clean.

She opens her mouth to complain about the faint ache in her neck, closes her mouth with a decisive chomp and decides to keep her whining to herself. This ailment is simply remedied, no need to bother others with her petty infirmities.

She regrets sitting down to participate in this writing exercise, she regrets staying up till 2 a.m. the night before reading a totally random Val McDermid novel, she regrets drinking four cups of coffee this morning in order to remedy the late night random novel reading session.

One arm reaches up toward the ceiling, the second one follows it as she pulls herself out of her slumping position on the front room couch. She glances behind her with a slight sore turn of the neck and notices her work area is cluttered and messy.

"I wouldn't let it get like this if my neck didn't hurt so bad!" The recipient of this comment laughs and rolls his eyes.

L'enfer est plein de bonnes volontés et désirs!

The writing exercise was to write a short vignette (short, impressionistic scenes that focus on one moment or give a particular insight into a character, idea, or setting). Want to play along? If you write something comment me the link and I will add them to this post.

Mollie, who is lovely and also Ok in the UK has posted her vignette. Thanks for writing with me, Mollie!

Aimee at Pleasantly Demented, who found me through Mollie, also gave this a whirl and did a great job.

A Letter to God

2/10/2011 12:45 pm
location: my front room's couch

Dear God,

It's me, Erin. I'm not going to ask you for bigger boobs (trust me, I've got that part down), for a billion dollars, or for world peace. I'm not going to beg you to get into heaven (yet), blame you for cancer or AIDS, or bemoan my fate as the possessor of a wide, flat ass.

I am going to ask you for one simple, tiny little thing. I would like to have longer eyelashes.

That's all.

Thanks,
Erin

P.S. I've decided that longer eyelashes aren't really that important, but instead of deleting that and requesting something different, I'm going to leave that request there and just make sure you understand it's my #2 request.

P.S.S. My #1 request is that I'd magically not have to come up with the craft/activity for Rosey's Valentines Day party on Monday. And that whatever parents had to do it would have fun coming up with the craft and then implementing it with the children. I think that's it.

Thanks again, God.

Love Bunches,
Erin

P.S.S.S Ok. Just one more quick thing. You know how mother fucking cold it is today? You might not have noticed, because of how busy you are, etc...etc...

BUT IT'S 8 degrees right now. 8 DEGREES. Is there anyway you can do something about that? Before I have to go to the bus stop in 12 minutes?

Your Devoted Servant (I try, sort of),
Erin

I'm like an Award Winning Journalist!

The newly redesigned and immensely awesome (yes, I'm laying it on quite thick, but the admins are my buddies!) Studio Thirty Plus used to have a Blogger Q and A section. Each week a blogger would interview another blogger and then that interviewed blogger would pick a different blogger and interview them.

Well, Miss Yvonne interviewed me a while ago and then I interview Kim from Yellow Trash Diaries. It turns out Kim and I broke Studio Thirty Plus's Q and A...because it's not longer there.

Is it possible to break the interwebs? Leave it to us to make that happen!

Here is my interview with the lovely and witty Kim:


Hello Kim. Throughout this question asking extravaganza I expect you to be sarcastic and borderline rude the entire time. I hope you can live up to those expectations.

1) First off, just to make things a bit more comfortable around here (for me at least), let’s get something out of the way. Are you attracted to me? Are your intentions towards me wholesome or completely inappropriate?

Lately I have been asking my husband to wear hats with kitten ears to our bed, does that answer your question?

2) For those of us who don’t haven’t read through your whole entire blog…why the name Yellow Trash Diaries? I just want to let you know that I have read most of your blog.

Well, The Wind In My Vagina was already taken, so....

3) Being a fan of your facebook comic page, Kimmie Haha and your more serious looking facebook art page K.H. Waters Art, I’ve always wondered; did you have any artistic training? Can you make a little cartoon me? Can you do it right now? Like immediately.

Total artistic training: one class in middle school, one drawing class in college, and many, many lonely hours spent with my paper and pencil in my room during my childhood. Thank you for reminding me of that painful period in my life. Thank you very much, Erin.

4) You live in GEORGIA!? I feel damp just thinking about it. We used to drive through Georgia on the way to my grandparents old folks condo in Destin Fl. Is it hot right now? Do you ever think about moving?

Damp? Seriously?

My father was in the army. They sent us from Alaska to here-- 'cause the Army likes to fuck with people like that. Don't know why I've stayed since then, maybe the sweet tea has dulled my senses and will to leave.

5) Now that we’re knee deep in the mire of this horrible interview, are you regretting telling me that you would do this? Do you wish that someone else would have interviewed you instead? Like Vic…or Jules? They’re so much cooler than me.

Vic and Jules are much cooler than you. But really, Erin, that is a long list to get into, and do we really have time to go down that road? Also, I think Vic may be blocking my emails.

6) Ok, here’s the inevitable question, why did you start blogging?

My best friend begged me to. I think she was getting tired of the drunken heart to heart phone calls in the middle of the night.

7) What has surprised you about the blogging experience so far?

The great people I've bonded with.

What? Shut up.

8) You have two extremely adorable children (way to go with just the two…anymore kids than that and it’s out of control stupid), what is your favorite aspect of parenting? What’s your least favorite?

Okay, obviously you are out to completely humiliate me by making me show my soft underbelly. So, my favorite part of parenting, I suppose, is the freedom to completely love another person without holding back for fear of rejection or hurt. I love them without any walls and with such magnitude it humbles me.

Shit. There, happy now?

My least favorite part of parenting? Well, I didn't get high blood pressure for nuthin', honey.

9) I have a sort of weird obsession with bed time routines. Why? I don’t know. What is your bedtime/night-time routine? Do you think it’s strange that I want to know?

The only routine I have is an ongoing game with my husband. It's called Who's going to be last up the stairs and left turning everything off? It's a challenge to see who can surprise the other by retiring first-- we relish subtlety.

Yeah, we're boring. And lazy.

10) Your husband seems cool. Can we swap for a few days?

Depends. How is Jeremiah's credit score?

Our Photo Secrets...

I was editing some photos for the new website Jeremiah and I are launching soon (contact me soon if you want to do a giveaway on your blog!) and I noticed some discrepancies between the photos that are taken of me by my kids and the photos I take of myself.

This is a photo I took of myself:


And this is one taken by Maxine Jane:


Wow. That chipmunk is staring right at me.

I noticed another trend while flipping through folders. Jeremiah hates my guts with a passion unquantifiable.





That's one hot and very annoyed lifepartner! By the way, the t-shirt in the last photo is one of the new items we will be selling on the new website. I can't wait till it's finally done!

Batman Forever

I spend a lot time talking/thinking about my five year old daughter Maxine Jane and how to make her happy and comfortable. I spend a lot of time working with eight year old Olive on her school work and hygiene (oh boy...this is a long story and someday she's going to regret hassling me about it, cause I'm going to tell ALL OF HER FRIENDS about it). I spend a lot of time getting ready for my ten year old daughter Rosey to enter the Pre Teen Hell Zone and washing her soccer clothes.

And although I spend the most time with Elijah you would think I actually give him the most time all in all. But not really.

He's a very happy and self entertaining little boy, he likes to watch batman, play batman games, play with batman toys and play various batman video games. He's my only child that's ever been obsessed with something and also my only child that's ever insisted on dressing in character all day and all night long.

He's certainly handsomer than Kilmer and Keaton's Batmans, way cooler than Clooney's Batman and almost as awesome as Christian Bale's Batman (give me a break people, who's awesomer than Bale?).




I mean seriously! Look at that chin. That Jaw! Le sigh.

When I was a little kid I was obsessed with The Loch Ness Monster, World War 2 and Ernest Hemmingway...so I think that Elijah's Batman obsession seems healthy in comparison.