A rare serious moment

I haven't posted an update on Number One's tummy troubles in a while, and thought I would let everyone know how she's doing. She had been symptom-free for several months, and then in June she suddenly started having problems again. Last month they put her on a steroid, and yesterday they added a second steroid. She sees her doctor in two weeks, and hopefully by then she'll be all cleared up, but I've been hoping that for weeks now.

Please pray that we can find ALL her trigger foods. We know that dairy hurts her, and we avoid things like broccoli and cabbage and nuts, but obviously something started this in June and we just don't know what. And please pray that we can get her off the steroid soon--we just don't want her to get all puffed up like she did last summer, and long-term steroid use isn't good for anyone.

I started thinking yesterday, spurred by a post on another blog, about how it's easy to get angry with God when your child or another loved one is suffering. But God didn't do this to Number One; it's just part of life, and bad things happen in life to EVERYONE. It would be so easy to say, well, God isn't answering our prayers to heal her, He must not care. But that would be ignoring how He has given me a job with fantastic health insurance--something we didn't have until very recently. He has also provided the money to pay for her care beyond what the insurance covers. He has provided a school for Number One where they care about her, where the teachers and students look out for her. We live in a place with one of the best pediatric GI specialists in the country, and he knows Number One by name and responds to each and every one of my phone calls. We are blessed, is what I'm saying, even in this.

Shortly after Batman and I lost our jobs in Florida, I read a quote by Dana Reeve, wife of Christopher Reeve, who at that time had just been diagnosed with lung cancer. She said (and I've lost the quote, so I'm paraphrasing): "You can't stop bad things from happening. But what matters in life is how you respond to those things." I found that immensely encouraging; that is how Batman and I tried to live after being so shattered by our own situation, and that is how we try to live now. We want people to see how we respond to our circumstances--good and bad--and be encouraged. We're not perfect, and we never will be, but God's grace will fill in all our gaps, and hopefully others will see Him reflected, however imperfectly, in us.

And now we return to our regularly scheduled programming: Anyone watch Project Runway last night? Did you hate the winning dress as much as I did?

Hello, and welcome to Moviefone

Batman and I have been watching a lot of movies lately, both at the theater and through Netflix. Just in the last month we've seen:

Juno (quirky, we both liked it)
27 Dresses (a good rental)
August Rush (I liked the last five minutes)
Batman Begins (AWESOME.)
The Dark Knight (I LOVED it, Batman ironically enough was unimpressed)
The Holiday (a "romantic" "comedy;" I hated it, Batman loved it, and I'm not sure what that says about us as a couple)

But the best of them all was the one we watched last night, called "Lars and the Real Girl." It's about a lonely man who buys a (*ahem*) "love doll" over the internet, just for companionship. He treats her like a real girl, and the whole town does the same. It was such a sweet, touching, funny movie, and quite clean despite its PG-13 rating. I highly recommend it; Batman and I both loved it.

The next thing on our Netflix queue is a DVD of episodes of "The Muppet Show," which I think the girls will love. Batman is excited to see the new X Files movie, and so on our anniversary next weekend we'll go for a nice dinner, and then on to a theater so he can see Mulder and Scully and I can watch "The Dark Knight" again. Compromise: the foundation of a healthy relationship!

Spring, Baseball, Football, and Winter

This July 4th weekend was kid-filled, with cousins popping up all over the place. The 2 Busy B's came in from Austin on Friday and got to spend a little time with Special and Number One.

On Saturday, Batman and I drove the girls up to Texarkana where Pop and Baba met us to take them on to Tennessee for the week. They had the Arkansas cousins with them, and the kids were so anxious to get going they quickly abandoned the playground where we met, hopped in the van and put on their seatbeats!

I think Pop and Baba are going to have their hands full.

Sunday brought more time with Big B and little b; we went to lunch together and then I got to babysit while their dad and Batman played Ultimate Frisbee. Big B gave me a golf lesson (his advice: "Hit it hard!"). Here he is showing me how to putt into the "hole" we fashioned:

Then we set up blocks and knocked them down again:

And Big B was delighted to sit on Uncle Batman's motorcycle:

The rest of this weekend's photos (including some lovely portraits of the cat) are here.

B and I had a great conversation at lunch. After we ordered, we were discussing what vegetables he liked (that list was very small). I told him that I make spinach cakes that the girls really like, and he said, "My mommy makes brown cake." I do love those spinach cakes, but I think I'd like the brown cake more, too.

Later I asked him (referring to the sporting events on the restaurant's TV screens) if he liked tennis or baseball better. He answered, "I like all the seasons." I suspect the boy might have watched ESPN a time or two with his dad, what do you think?

I so enjoyed seeing all my nephews and my niece; they're such sweet little ones and I wish I could hug on them more often, but then it probably wouldn't be as special.

Speaking of Special, I miss her and Number One already. Is it Friday yet?

I'm busy, busy, frightfully busy

Batman and the girls have had quite a busy month enjoying their summer break. So far they've seen a play ("When You Give a Mouse a Cookie"), been swimming, gone to lunch with GrandBob several times, handed out breakfast to day workers waiting for jobs, gone to the Fine Arts museum, visited a vintage car show, rode the elevator to the top of the Chase Tower (the highest skyscraper in the city), played laser tag, came to eat lunch (Bosnian food!) with me, and taken a long (hot) hike. We saw "Kung Fu Panda" as a family on the IMAX screen, and I think Batman has one more surprise planned before he goes back to work next week.

What have I been doing? Working, that's what. The last class I took (which THANKFULLY ended last week) kicked my behind with papers and research and more papers. My job has had me working very long hours and weekends and I'm pooped. I've declared this week to be "no work at home" week, and so far it's been very relaxing. I forgot for a little while what it was like to have free time in the evenings!

Batman and I watched a show on the Food Network yesterday (am too lazy to look up her name, it's the skinny Italian chick with the big head), and saw a recipe that I tried tonight. It was a huge success, and I've been instructed to make it again every night forever. The recipe is here.

And now I must go. After all these weeks of Extreme Busyness, I've got a lot of TV-watching to catch up on!

Like the summer of George, but with fewer broken bones

Well, I didn't win the Wii, so it's back on my Christmas list. Also on my list? iTunes gift cards--I've gotten a bit obsessed with my new Mother's Day iPod. Kim had a cool idea on her blog, asking readers to list the first five songs on their iPods, so now I have a bunch of new songs to try. Too early to be thinking of Christmas lists, you say? Oh ho ho, I say, shop now and relax in December. I myself am 25% done, but will freely admit that Christmas shopping is the ONLY area in my life in which I am ahead.

And why am I so behind? Perhaps it's because I've spent the last two weeks here:

This picture was taken about 6:45 Thursday night while everyone else was getting dinner in the other room (fajitas, in case you're wondering, and they were pretty good). Nine of us worked elbow-to-elbow testing our new software in this little, hot room for two weeks, and even though we stayed until 9:30 last night (ON A FRIDAY) we're still not done. Blergh.

But enough about me! We've had a big week in our house: Special graduated from kindergarten (sniff) and Pop and Baba were here for the big occasion.

What a cutie-patootie!

Batman and the girls are all out of school now, and I think they have big plans for the summer, although the majority of those plans revolve around swimming and riding bikes. That still sounds better than my plan for the summer, which mostly involves developing carpel tunnel syndrome.

But! Today is Saturday! And I don't have to work until after lunch! So we're off to the pool. Happy weekend, everyone!

You gotta want it

Three Kid Circus is running a contest to give away a Wii console and Wii Fit balance board. I REALLY WANT A WII and Batman won't buy me one, so I'm taking up her challenge to write my most embarrassing fitness story.

I've known for years that I needed to get into shape, not so much lose weight as redistribute it, you know? Tone up a bit, be able to walk up more than two flights of stairs without getting winded, go running with Batman without him forcing me to schedule an appointment with a cardiologist afterward. Problem is, I've always HATED exercise. LOATHED it. DREADED it.

In an effort to find a fitness program I'd actually stick with, we have bought a ridiculous number of exercise-at-home gadgets and videos, although not quite as many as this. We've had a treadmill, an exercise bike, weights, Pilates DVDs, Tae Bo videos, a jogging stroller, and jump ropes, and that's just off the top of my head. I'm sure there are a lot more items that ended up in one garage sale or another that I have blocked out of my mind.

Shortly before we left Florida, I started running. Okay, I can't call it running--it was jogging, and not very fast at that. But I did it several times a week, and by the time we bought our house in Texas I was up to three miles, four times a week. Moving messed up my schedule though--I had a longer commute, and was just busier than before--and I fell out of the habit. Until earlier this year, I was barely running once a week.

But recently, I joined a gym. It's right across the street from my office; I go on my lunch hour almost every day, and if I can't go at lunch I go on my way home. There's another one in the same chain near our house, and I go at least once every weekend. Which brings me to the embarrassing part:

I like it.

That's right, after years of whining and procrastinating and complaining, I Like Exercising. I'm enjoying working out. I like the elliptical machine. I like the weight machines. My lovely family gave me an iPod for Mother's Day, and I love listening to it while I sweat for thirty minutes every day. I'm not so wild about the locker room--it always smells vaguely of Nair--but I feel great and strong and fit.

There is one other embarrassing bit. I always see one or more of my coworkers at the gym, usually one of the (male) project managers, and I can tell you there is nothing like having a sweaty, drippy coworker leaning on your machine talking about software requirements while you do leg lifts and hope they can’t see down your shorts . . .

Hoochie Mama

Last night as we watched "American Idol," contestant Syesha took the stage in a low-cut gown that showed off a great deal of her *ahem* assets. Special, who was sitting beside me in the recliner, said, "Mommy! I see something!"

She leaned in and whispered, "BOSOMS!"

While I laughed she heckled the TV: "She's dressed so unappropriate! Put some clothes on, lady!"

Do you think she'll worry about what's "unappropriate" to wear when she's 16? Yeah--I doubt it, too.



P.S. Was it just me, or was last night the most boring "American Idol" ever? The song choices were awful, David A. bores me to tears, Jason has just quit trying, and I just can't stand Syesha's dull impersonations of divas. Bleh.

P.P.S. I've signed up to do Book Binge in May but so far all I've read is the new issue of Lucky magazine. Does that count?