Cynical Mom

Audrey in triplicate

I like every version of this photo so much, I couldn't decide which one to post. Taken while she was snoozing on my lap last week.

Increasing a toddler's vocabulary

Jared learned a new word this week: wayoh.

As in, "Boom boom boom... let me hear you say wayoooooh... (wayooooh)".

It's simple, it's repetitive... in summary, the perfect toddler song. Why hasn't Raffi done a cover?

He may also have inadvertently learned another word ("crap") at the same time when I heard the next part of the song come up ("Girl your booty is so round", plus a few other choice lines) and quickly changed the station.

He also enjoys piping in with a "funk soul brother" at the appropriate time, we picked that one up from Corporate Mommy and it is incredibly cute.

www.ipodmybrotherinlaw.com

My sister sent me a pointer to http://www.ipodmyphoto.com. We agreed that it was:

A) Cute
B) Ridiculously overpriced

Since as the new mother of two I have copious amounts of spare time on my hands, I took it as a challenge to ipod my brother-in-law.

Before:

After:

OK, so he's not exactly rockin' out like the sample on the front of www.ipodmyphoto.com, but I can't help but wonder... do you suppose anyone would pay me $18.95 to do this for a living? No? Shucks.

Funniest movie you've ever seen?

We watched Eurotrip again on Friday, and even though we've already seen it, we laughed out loud at the great gags in the movie ("Berlin? Ya, Berlin! I once stabbed a hooker in Berlin!"). It prompted me to try to come up with a list of the funniest movies I've ever seen. And I'd love to know what incredibly funny movies others have seen that I haven't.

If you had to create a list of your top 5, what would be on it? I can only come up with four so far: Real Genius, Top Secret, Eurotrip, Noises Off... possibly one of the Hot Shots. Clerks is up there, but probably not in my top 5.

I suppose I'm making it quite obvious that I don't need my comedy to be smart. :-)

Thank goodness for high-school health class

I took Audrey to her two month well baby checkup yesterday, and there was a toddler in the waiting room who was very interested in Audrey. The mom kept the toddler on her lap a foot or two away from Audrey and they looked at her. This happens pretty much everywhere we take her, so we're used to it now.

Then, the toddler coughed. The mom turned to me and said "Oh, don't worry, he's not sick... I mean, he has an ear infection, but he's not sick."

What exactly does she think ear infections are? Genetic diseases only passed down on the X chromosome?

A toddler's view of breastfeeding

Me: "What does Audrey eat, Jared?"
Jared: "He eats outta mommy's tummy!"

If this blogger's a-cookin, don't come a-lookin...

In our house, my husband is the cook for a variety of very very good reasons:

#1: I am a terrible cook.
#2: I am lazy.
#3: I don't like cooking that much.
#4: He's a good cook.
#5: He's not lazy.
#6: He likes cooking.

I occasionally will get inspired and look for and find a new recipe online which has netted me a few great finds (a quick and easy garlic chicken, and a time consuming but incredibly awesome spicy shrimp stir fry)... but the day-to-day- drudge of planning, shopping for and creating meals is far from fun.

Why do I mention this? Well, an old post of mine that discusses the breakdown of laundry responsibilities was in my mind this morning as I was doing laundry and thinking about how the kids' laundry is just mixed in with mine, and then I read Anne's post about cooking dinner and how it works for her and her family, and I thought this would be an interesting topic to discuss more broadly. Plus, I could use some tips.

Even if I liked cooking, was good at it and not lazy (a pretty unlikely triumverate, I admit), I would have a hard time keeping variety in our diet. As it is, we generally live off of a few staples (anything that we can grill such as burgers/steak/chicken, boxes of rice or potatoes or pasta, pizza, tacos, pasta of some sort, frozen stuff), steamed vegetables[2]) and a few recipes (the aforementioned garlic chicken, a pesto chicken... and crikey, I can't think of any others right now, that's pretty embarrassing).

So here is a set of questions for my readers [1]: How do you divide up cooking responsibilities in your families? And for those who do the cooking - how the heck do you come up with ideas and not end up eating the same thing week-in, week-out? And do you have any good recipes to share, particularly those on the quick-and-easy-with-common-ingredients side of things?

[1] Insert obligatory "both" joke :-)
[2] When we bought our house, it came with a built-in steam oven and espresso machine, but no microwave. As odd as we found that, we have since learned that steam ovens are god's gift to cooks. Perfect vegetables, every time, with so little work. You can also cook meat like the pesto chicken).

Holiday commercialism in my household

I'm not afraid to admit it: My kid got a lot of presents this year. A LOT.

But really, it's not about him. I needed something new to play with. I was going nuts playing with the same old toys and puzzles. Jared, of course, cares little for new things - his greatest joy this holiday season was in the unwrapping of the presents (regardless of the recipient - oooh, a bluetooth adapter for a GPS for dada!).

We also discovered that his tastes in toys are pretty simple: He'll play with whatever we enjoy playing with. So in another one of my attempts to foil (or at least stave off the onset of) gender stereotypes, I bought him a dollhouse, but was nervous that he wouldn't enjoy it. But then I discovered that what he really wants is to play with me, so we have had a great time acting out various scenarios with the dollhouse, like hiding something and then having the dolls look for it (and the collateral damage of the search - "oh no, the bathtub spilled water alllll over when we picked it up looking for the towel!"), or having the dolls sit on the couch and watch TV (sigh).

Jared's favorite dollhouse scenario, you ask? Having the dolls poop in the sink.

And then, because he is an observant little boy, he always has them wash their hands when they're done.

In the sink.

"Intellectual stimulation"

My sister posted some interesting thoughts recently about her transition from working mom to stay at home mom, and asked the question:

I miss a part of me that I haven't seen in a long while. Is work really the only solution to that?

Reading that started me thinking about how to answer that question for myself, as I've really enjoyed being home with Audrey the last couple of months (3.5 weeks left) but have also struggled to find out how to fulfill that part of me while on leave.

I realized that one of the main things that has kept me feeling like I'm exercising some brain cells is reading blogs. And so although I look forward to going back to work (but am still treasuring my 3.5 weeks alone with my girl), I feel balanced because I get to spend a lot of "me" time reading and thinking.

Also, while spending the holidays with my family, I read Atlas Shrugged (in bits and pieces between nursing sessions & playing with five children under the age of six - and let me just say, that's a hard book to read in bits and pieces), something I've been meaning to do for years. And while doing so, I discovered that my dad is a huge Ayn Rand fan and we had several discussions about her economic and social philosophy. I also learned that he credits his college scholarship to her as well: when he showed up for his interview with the recruiter at 4:30, the recruiter had a copy of Atlas Shrugged on his desk, and they bonded over it and ended up talking until later that night.

At any rate, thanks to all the bloggers I read who keep me thinkin'.