latina genius vs. scraggly old mom

This morning, as usual, I got Josephine dressed and then put her in her high chair for breakfast. Normally, that triggers a litany of desired breakfast foods: toast, fruits, juice, O's, cereal bars, anything she can think of that her body will process as straight sugar. Of course, I promptly start her with vegetables, but it's good for the girl to dream (of all the ways she can destroy her metabolic regulation of gylcolysis as an autonomous adult)...

Today, however, she got exactly what she wanted because I was so tickled.

The first and only thing Josephine requested, completely unprompted?

"Black beans."

I'm not kidding.

Must have been the shirt.

It turns out beans must be pretty serious brain food, because I was even more bemused by the conversation that followed.

After scarfing her oddly requested bowl of black beans, I scrambled her an egg with cheese and buttered a piece of toast. I put them all in her bowl, but placed the bowl out of reach saying, "The eggs and cheese are still too hot."

"Eat toast first?" came the quick reply.

Folks, I had not had my coffee yet. She had already stretched me out of my habitual motions with the request for black beans, and now she was forcing me to reconsider something ELSE.

It literally took my brain several seconds to process that we were having a conversation about the toast and eggs and then debate the worthiness of her request. It was a painful lag as my old brain attempted to catch up with the one belonging to my 1 year old problem solver.

Eventually I eeked some computation out of my frazzled synapses, and sure, sure-- eating the toast first was a perfectly fine solution. So I acquiesced again, and she proceeded to intermittently munch on toast and blow all over her eggs to cool them down.

Where did this person come from??

Does a strong enough coffee bean even exist?

josephine's watermelon seeds

Texas, our Texas! All hail the mighty state!

Texas, our Texas! So wonderful so great!

Boldest and grandest, withstanding ev'ry test

O Empire wide and glorious, you stand supremely blest!

(....so why not pass those blessings along to Texans with disabilities....)

Well, Josephine's been in heaven! Sean's parents' visit on Saturday was quickly followed by a stay by my mom, who came down Monday, since she was scheduled to meet with her district's Texas House of Representative's member, Todd Smith, on Tuesday morning. I, with the excuse of being her chauffeur, tagged along. She and her teammates did an excellent job, discussing the effects of the budget cuts to home and community based services for individuals with disabilities. A state cut as high as the proposed 29% would eliminate billions of federal dollars, too, and effectively shut down all programing outside of state schools for individuals like my sister, Janell. State schools are an inaccessible, dismal, and segregated option for the 27,000+ people who would be left up a creek... and all personal feelings aside, while those rage extremely strong.... by national standards, that would be a shameful and disgraceful landing point when our state has been struggling for decades to empower this population towards community integration and independence.

I know budget cuts are rough right now, and subsequent losses are rampant, but really--- my mom's group had excellent proposals for ways to make the programs more financially efficient (which unsurprisingly calls for REDUCING state-run options and moving towards waivers for privatized services). From what I can tell, though, it requires legislators to see beyond the shortfall this biennium and acknowledge the enormous financial benefit that would come from restructuring the system towards long term improvements. Being ridiculously cynical, I don't even expect politicians to consider human dignity, which is PRICELESS... but come on! Just the budget numbers alone are convincing!

Anyway, I was proud of my mom's political debut, so I made her take a picture in front of the capitol building:

In other news, Josephine has fully recovered from that awful cough!

And my CT scan came back totally fine-- yay! This reassured my doctor not to worry about a cysts or inflamed appendix, and led her to all sorts of abdominal shovings that made me want to either cry or hit her. The conclusion, however, is encouraging. It's nothing worrisome; apparently c-sections commonly develop adhesions... strands of scar tissue that bind one's uterus (in this case) to other organs or places in your abdomen. The binding is what causes pain when I move and my gut, in all it's bondage, doesn't. She showed me how to inflict further pain on my abdomen in hopes of weakening those strands of scar tissue and loosening their binds. Fun stuff. We'll see how it goes. I'm just relieved it's nothing serious.

Grandma reading Josephine a book, at which point Josephine proudly showed off her perfect ability to repeat back any word she chooses... "Peacock" came out plain as day.

I, watching, quickly was like, "How about 'MOM?????'" (Because, according to her, I am still "Ba." It's like she's decided I am not worthy of being upgraded to official "Mom" status.

But come on!!! What do I have to do??? I bathe her, clothe her, feed her, play with her... She can say words like peacock, goofball, and full sentences, plain as day... "Clean up this, too." But Mom? Nope.)

Almost all our amaryllis bulbs are in bloom!

Josephine, being proud of more dirt relocation:
Politics, medical issues, and verbal capabilities aside... some things like moving around dirt just stay consistently great.

a silent time

There's been a straight-to-the-lungs sickness for Josephine, a CT scan for me (trying to decipher some abdominal pain that I've had for over a year), four cubic yards of compost for Sean to spread through the yard (with much "help" from Josephine), a kitchen island to rework as I start on the next phase of the house projects, some church hunting, my darling sister's 26th birthday (not that we/she hardly got to celebrate it-- but it did happen!), a visit from Sean's folks (bearing some Christmas presents that our car couldn't handle in December), and A LOT of playing in the backyard, soaking up the precious few weeks we get of spring before the mosquitoes ruin it!

Josephine in her thrift store dress questioning Mama Jo about the blue people in the windows at the Domain (yes, I'm proud that isn't a customary sight for my kid!)... unpictured are all the questions I wanted to ask about what the blue people were wearing...

We've also had some buds...
...and a supermoon (something about it being the closest full moon since 1993). Sure has made for some nice nights outdoors lately.

Anyway, I do apologize for the blog silence, the lack of personal contact, and the fact that the camera has mostly been off the last couple weeks. The next couple weeks don't look much different, I'm afraid! Except for the fact that they're the LAST weeks of Josephine being ONE. (It already feels like she's 5, so who are we kidding.... but officially, on April 2, she'll be TWO. Gracious sakes.)

Hey, Josephine...

... what's that???(at the time of questioning, it was just the triangle on the left with the three bricks in a row) and she said, "tchtchtch ... CHOO CHOOOOOOOO!!!!" Which made me smile, and I said, "Train? Choo choo?" And she was clearly VERY pleased with herself. I asked if she wanted me to take a picture of it, which she did. Hence her addition above and her carrying it below. She just got very excited about the attention it was getting.
That was this morning.

Back in Atlanta we had the first of this kind of exchange. She was coloring on a blank piece of paper, and for kicks I acted curious and said, "What is that?" .. I wasn't expecting an answer. But she looked at it, thought about it, and said very definitively, "Girl." (I had to play it cool, even though I got a total charge out of her responding like that.) So I looked casually at the two brown lines, and I said, "Oh, I see. Does she need hair?" And Josephine seemed keen on that, so the drawing became THREE brown lines, followed by a VERY proud expression on her 22 month old face. I said, "Great hair! What about arms?" And she looked excited and colored vigorously side to side. Et cetera.

Looking at the picture above you can tell we went on for quite a while! It was just cute that she seemed so intentional about what she was coloring. I'm loving her imagination-- but in various ways it's been evident that she's always had one of those. So mostly, I guess I'm loving that we're having a conversation about it-- that I'm now being allowed into her imagination.

home again, home again, jiggity jig

Two Saturdays ago we sang the first half, "To Georgia, to Georgia, we fly with the kid..." but now we're home again (home again...) and recovering.

Wish it hadn't ended on the note of a mid-flight, demon-possessed temper tantrum. Pretty sure no one's nerves in the back half of the plane were up for that. And I don't know about the rest of y'all, but typically when Josephine has a temper tantrum, I set her gently in her crib and walk away. I don't sit there and watch-- it just makes her angrier. So this was Sean's and my first up-close-and-personal take on one, seeing as how she was ticketed as "infant in arms" and I had to basically keep her there. Conclusion: temper tantrums are kind of freaky. Later we agreed that we each had moments where, despite the bloodcurdling screaming, we started getting scared that this was some kind of seizure. I guess I don't really understand tantrums or if they're medically different events from just being really sad or mad. But it was intense. The flailing, the eyeballs rolling around, the lack of focus on anything. My child had been removed from her body and replaced with sheer anger. The body of anger did finally clonk out, as she'd been needing to do all along; too bad her 10 minute nap was interrupted with the jolt of touching down. Dang plane-- landing and all...

Anyway, can you tell I need counseling after the trauma of that flight? Moving on... the trip itself was awesome. My tent might be pitched in the introverted, homebody camp, but if I could, I'd go back this weekend and do it over again, multiple social interactions per day and all! Sure do love the folks we know in Atlanta; we miss them so much.

I was a nerd and took some pictures at the airport in Austin...

And a nice man even offered to take a family shot. Which you expect some place famous, like the Lincoln Memorial or in front of a natural wonder. But a vacated gate at the Austin airport seemed like a surprising (and therefore, very genuinely kind) place to offer!
Josephine coped with the flight delay fairly well with only 25,000 trips to the bathroom and one significant head bonk.
The flight itself went fine. There was a fair amount of upsetness as we started landing due to ears and some rather stomach-flipping dips. She was very clear about wanting to be down on the ground and kept growing furious that we weren't getting up to leave the plane immediately. That terror calmed when we finally exited but was reinvigorated by alien things like escalators and light-rail trains. She'd clearly had enough of alternative transportation and kept pleading, "Car? Car? Car?" Kind of sad. But also kind of cute how excited she got about her rental car seat. So we all thought the stress was over until we reached the hotel and had to deal with a glass walled elevator going up nine flights. Goooooooooodnight. She didn't like that. And it took all five days until she was truly a champ at standing there and actually enjoying looking out the glass wall.

Across the street from the hotel, running off a little steam...
I think it's funny how when we bend down to show Josephine something, she bends down to look at it.

Sunday we attended a baby shower for our lovely friends, Hannah and Jason! Hannah looked soooooo adorable (you too, Jason) and their friends seemed wonderful! Love those folks; they're going to make such awesome parents!!!!
We were supremely lucky to catch another family of friends two days before they drove off from Atlanta on a move to Boston! Only got a couple pictures of their youngest, Elora. I love the glance exchanges in the pictures. I think I'd rather have two pictures like this, than one of them both looking at the camera.

At Leon's in Decatur:
Note the "I'm busy, Dad" lean away from her doting father...
Dad/daughter coloring time. I'm looking forward to the day when Josephine's coloring will pay the tab the way her dad's does.
Monday morning was nothing short of incredible. 8 children, 7 mommies, a delicious brunch, and it actually WASN'T pandemonium-- it was really super nice! Loved seeing how all the little ones had grown, and meeting Harris, James, and Sofia. An enormous thank you to Christi for hosting us right after a road trip, in the middle of a two week stint at single-parenting with Jarrett out of town, and still bogged down by that first trimester of pregnancy! She is AWESOME.

Monday night we got to see 3/4 of the Whaley clan! Look at these two delights! Their mommy is one of those people you want to have on speed dial or in your pocket. The epitome of pleasant, peaceful, wise, and an awesome laugh.

Oh-- and again with the glance exchanges. I have no idea what got their attention in this first photo...
... or what caught Josephine's here-- but it's so cute!

I didn't get pictures of everyone we saw, sadly. But that's just how it goes. Did pull out the camera in the hotel room a couple times. Here's Josephine having a bit of time to wind down and color while Sean and I talked one night.

Her hotel crib. We tucked it under the outer curtain so she could go to sleep while we left on a lamp. Worked pretty well. I expected her to pull at the curtain, but she never did, thank goodness. The crib itself was hard as a rock, and she seemed to wake up crabby, so I'm guessing she didn't sleep too well those four nights. I had asked for extra flat sheets and used them folded up to add padding to her mattress, but I don't think it did much. I felt bad. Especially because I find firm hotel beds SUPER comfortable... so there I was sleeping better than ever while my kid was practically camping. We ended up in a room with two double beds so we thought briefly about giving her one-- but there's no way she'd have stayed on it-- so, oh well. At least the tired kid had fairly well rested parents!

A modified (and rather lame) blanket time with a bath towel, coloring book, and two GI Joes. Worked though, thankfully. With everything else being unfamiliar chaos, it was helpful for her to have some contained play time with familiar boundaries!
The biggest stressor, according to me, was the potty training business. There were a couple of trips in the car where she was claiming "yuck. hurt. yuck. potty." and so on to a degree of persistency and drama that I was SURE we were going to reach our destination with a rental car seat full of disaster. And there's a stretch in the Atlanta airport where you better be prepared to go 45 minutes between potties... from security to Terminal F is a long stretch! Thank the Lord we only had ONE accident, and it was in the hotel room and simple to clean up. (It was in the middle of fussing over eating her vegetables). And none since!

In regards to potty training, it's been so nice being back on home turf-- much less stressful! I don't feel the need to overly worry about it anymore, and it turns out that really, her control has improved dramatically over the last few weeks. She's really like any kid now. We've even taken her out to restaurants on a few occasions and not taken her once while we're out. Nights still require me to wake up at some point around 3ish and take her, otherwise she'll be wet in the morning. But that's a reasonable price to pay for a kid who otherwise has taken it fully upon herself to tell me when she needs to go and seems to take great pride in being a big girl. I know I got lucky with how quickly it clicked with her. I'm very relieved to have the hardest part of potty training behind us. I've grown accustomed to facilitating the trips and staying diligent-- making sure we don't leave the house without going, etc. I'm definitely happy with where things are. At least the part of me that is willing to admit how big she's getting is okay with where things are. There's still that part of me that wants my baby back!