Sunday Show and Tell #9

That’s right, it’s Sunday and time for Show and Tell again.

I don’t really have a show today, more of a tell.

Today, Bridget was in the bathroom with us as we were both preparing to go out for some errands. I was putting on makeup and Jake was in the shower. Bridget was being her usual raccoon self and pulling things out of drawers and cabinets.

Jake stepped out of the shower and Bridget looked up and Jake’s man bits, pointed and said, “Daddy junk!”

And if that wasn’t funny enough, she then pointed to her diaper area, as we call it around here, and said “Bridgie junk!”

She couldn’t figure out why we were both laughing so hard that we were crying.

But now I’m on the fence about whether to correct the use of this term. I mean, I can’t see how “junk” is any worse a term for it than “balls” or “nuts.” And honestly a toddler using the term “penis” is just creepy. However, I did also swear that we would not use silly words for genetalia, like “wee wee” or anything like that. So I don’t know what to do now except not let her see Jake naked so we can avoid the issue altogether. I can honestly say that I NEVER saw my dad naked as a child and I don’t think I was any worse for it.

Oh, and just so I don’t feel like I’m cheating you, here is a picture of Raccoon Girl

It’s a good thing she’s cute.

Sunday Show and Tell #8

Today’s installment of Show and Tell involves the recycling of birthday gifts.

Last year for his birthday a wee bit early, Jake got the original iPhone. Not out of the goodness of my heart really, but more because I could not take him bitching about the damn thing for one single second longer. He annoyed me into buying it for him.

Here he is with it, expressing his love for his new phone.

This year, the new edition of the iPhone comes out on my birthday. Which means that when Jake gets that one, I get his old one.

Not that I especially have a need for the iPhone. I hate cell phones in general and carry one because…. I don’t even know why I carry one. I guess for safety’s sake. I hate text messages, I don’t like getting voice mails, I don’t have any emails urgent enough that I need to see them whenever they arrive, wherever I am,  and I never feel the need to surf the web while I’m out and about. So honestly the phone is going to be very much wasted on me. I’ll be the only one with an iPhone who has no idea how to use it.

(And no, Jake does not suck for giving me a used iPhone for my birthday. I bought myself the lovely new bag recently and we are going on a vacation very soon. I don’t need anything else.)

Sunday Show and Tell #7

It’s time for Show and Tell again. And I’m heading back to my travel theme.

Back in February of 2005, I had the amazing opportunity to go with Jake to Paris. We used miles for my flight, work paid for Jake’s, and we had enough Hilton points to make the one night of hotel we had to pay (an extra night over what Jake had to stay for work) free. We stayed at the Hilton Paris.

We arrived on a Thursday morning, having flown all night. We ate at a lovely cafe near our hotel and were able to check in to our hotel. And then we made the horrible mistake of taking a nap. NEVER EVER do that. Stupid amateur mistake. So we fought jet lag the rest of the trip, which was awful. But Friday morning/afternoon, we were up and about and on our way to Notre Dame. This is me sitting in front of our hotel waiting for Jake to go back up to the room to get something.

We were really that close to the Eiffel Tower. But here’s a secret  - the Eiffel Tower is not really such a great place to be in Paris. It’s not really all that close to anything else. But it sure is pretty. Did you know the Eiffel Tower sparkles at night? Here’s a picture from our hotel window.

Paris is beautiful and I loved the Louvre and Notre Dame, but it didn’t capture my heart they way it does with some people. I much preferred our last day spent in Normandy, where we lucked into a fantastic tour of the beaches and WWII sites.

This is Omaha Beach from the American cemetery there.

I’d love to go back to France and spend more time in the rest of the country. One day perhaps.

Sunday Show and Tell #6

Time once again for Mel’s Sunday Show and Tell.

Today is my parents’ 40th wedding anniversary. Can you even imagine being married for FORTY YEARS??? I guess that’s hard for me to fathom, since it’s longer than I’ve been alive. But wow.

When they got married my dad had just turned 20 and my mom was about to turn 21. Their parents had to sign paperwork giving them permission to get married because in Missouri in 1968, you had to be 21 to get married. Can you imagine the 20 year old you getting married? I sure can’t. I think of who my choice of a spouse would have been at that point in my life and I shudder. Thankfully, they chose wisely.

Here they are, 40 years ago today. Mere babes, aren’t they?

Sunday Show and Tell #5

It’s time once again for Mel’s Sunday Show and Tell.

Since it’s Father’s Day, I want to give my awesome husband his Father’s Day props

Here he is putting Bridget’s crib together about a month before she was born.

Jake turned into a Dad within the 30 seconds after Bridget was born.

He looks a little overwhelmed here, but labor went quickly and easily and I think he thought he’d have more time to get his mind around what was about to happen before it actually happened.

This is the two of them in the hospital. Bridget never liked to be put back in her bassinet after a feeding attempt. He hated to hear her cry, so he just brought her to bed with him. I snapped this picture about 2 a.m. when the nurses came to get her to take her to the nursery for something.

This was how Jake spent the first two weeks after Bridget was born. My only jobs in the world were to eat, nap, and nurse. He had her pretty much the rest of the time. I rarely changed a diaper or swabbed the umbilical stump. He could swaddle her perfectly - I never figured out how to do it right. He is such a natural at all this.

They continued to be wild about each other.

A Daddy’s Girl is born. Someday some man will either thank Jake or want to punch him in the nuts for that.

Happy Father’s Day, baby. You are the best dad Bridget could ever have.

Sunday Show and Tell #4

I’m still on my travel tangent this week. But this time I’m all about preparation. Today we went to The Container Store to buy two things. One hour and $170 later, we emerged triumphant. We got the two things, of course, and so much more.

They are having a travel sale and did a groovy little demonstration of some of the products. Jake was really impressed with a few things and since I had missed most of the presentation walking around with Bridget, he asked one of the presenters to show me again. And this thing? This kicks ass!

Let me go on record here and admit that I am the world’s worst packer. Thankfully I married the world’s best. When we go on trips together, I always just pile all my stuff up and Jake packs it all for me. It’s very handy. The only problem is that when we arrive, I never know where anything in the suitcase is. But it’s a small price to pay. Anyway, if this product impressed Jake, a very seasoned traveler, it had to be cool.

This is the Pack-It Folder. The gist of it is this: It has a board to help you fold your shirts, pants, etc. perfectly and then you can put several items and it keeps them folded flat and unwrinkled. This particular one will hold I believe 12 items. I always have issue with packing because unlike most men, I don’t know what I’m going to want to wear each day and I like to have options should plans or weather or my mood change. But when space is at such a premium, I end up leaving things I want to bring in an effort to save space. But now with this lovely invention, I can bring more options in the same amount of space if not less.

Now, if I can just figure out how to trim down my bathroom products. I hate being such a stereotypical girl, but I use a lot of things. I don’t just use toothpaste and deodorant. But I got some goodies at TCS today that will hopefully help.

Now I’m all ready for Mexico. At least, I have all my travel products.

Sunday Show and Tell #3

Seems I’ve got a bit of the travel bug in me these days. And so my entry this week for Mel’s Show and Tell is another travel picture. This picture is from our trip to London over Thanksgiving 2002. Jake had been out of town and got home very very late the Friday night before Thanksgiving. He crawled into bed and said, “So how would you feel about Thanksgiving in London?” He had to be in Windsor the Monday after Thanksgiving. It was cheaper for him to go over the weekend, and since the weekend happened to be Thanksgiving, they offered to let me come with him and bought my ticket.

It was a whirlwind five days as we got ready to go. My passport was still in my maiden name and there was no time to get it changed, so we had to book my ticket in my maiden name. I felt like I was cheating the system but no way was I going to miss this chance. Believe it or not, that was the first time I’d ever been out of the US, and even now I’ve only been out of the country twice. I hate that and definitely plan to travel more when Bridget is old enough to go along and NOT be in a stroller. And to not be a terror on an 8+ hour flight. So in about 10 years? Ugh.

Our trip was short. We flew on the red-eye from New York on Wednesday night, arriving Thursday morning and I flew home alone on Sunday. We didn’t get to spend a lot of time but we packed in as much as we could.

This picture was from our Friday of sight-seeing. As much as we hated to do it because it was sooo touristy, we paid for the bus tour where you could jump on and jump off at any of the stops to see what you wanted and skip what you wanted. We just knew that we couldn’t get to it all in depth so we’d scratch the surface. The last part of the day was the Tower of London. Here I am looking quite contemplative about the fact that I was standing in a place of such historical significance.

The other interesting thing about this picture is that you can see my (gasp!) natural hair color here. This was years before I jumped on the color bandwagon. I’m looking at this and wondering why I ever started to color because my natural color was actually quite nice. Oh yes, the gray hairs. That’d be why.

Anyway, I fell in love with London and can’t wait to go back when I can spend a real amount of time and experience more of it. I also became fascinated with British history. Right now I’m about 70 pages into a very long biography of Mary Queen of Scots and plan to find one of Elizabeth I after I finish this one. If I ever finish it. This one is going to be a time commitment.

Sunday Show and Tell #2

Last week I did show and tell on Friday but since Mel is moving it to Sundays I will too.

Since it’s officially the kick off of summer, my thoughts naturally turn to the beach. I am a true sun worshiper. Who avoids tanning and burning at all costs because I don’t want to look like a saddlebag when I’m fifty. But still. I love the beach with every fiber of my being. I want to retire to a beach. Next month, if possible.

In June of 2006, when I was about four months pregnant with Bridget, we got the amazing opportunity to go to Hilton Head Island with Sarah and her HUSband and some friends to stay in a gorgeous house on the gorgeous beach for free. How do you say no to that?

Our first day on the island, after having gotten up at 3 a.m. for our 6:30 a.m. flight, the girls went to the grocery store to stock up on supplies for our stay. The men stayed to “unpack.” When we returned from the store, we found that their idea of unpacking including ditching us to go down to the beach.

This is what we found when we put on our suits and meandered down to find them.

I love this picture because when I see it, I just think about our whole trip and the lazy days spent playing in the waves, napping, reading, eating and being with good friends. I can’t see this picture without smiling.

We’ll be headed to Mexico in a little over two months and hopefully I’ll have some new photos to add to my collection of beach photos that make me smile.