March Madness

March is a busy month. A time of change, rebirth, first blooms of spring. The last few years it has been the moving on after a hard winter, ones that contained too many goodbyes to loved ones.


Three years ago at the end of February we said goodbye to my grandfather and my husbands father within days of each other. We knew March would bring about a big change because Bubbles II, as we called him back then was just waiting to make his entrance. Three weeks later he joined us on the 21st.


I admit to being surprised when I first saw him. The reddish blond hair threw me for a loop. He was healthy and beautiful and of course big brother loved him too.

While in the beginning I saw a carbon copy of Zach except with blond hair, his personality has developed to be quite different than Zach. Maybe it is being the little brother, but he knows how to assert himself a lot more. In good ways and bad. Fun loving and adorable he garners attention where ever we go. Daring he can be found repelling, jumping and climbing.

One sitter dubbed him "Frank" because of his brilliant blue eyes. He tends to be a bit more pensive at times and can be found staring out his window, when he will sit still that is. He is one busy guy. In fact it will take me all day to write this between his "help" and the things he gets into when I am otherwise engaged. In all ways a typical 3 year old boy.

I may have got more than I bargained for thinking Zach needed a baby brother. Together they are a force to be reckoned with. While Zach runs to me and cries, Max take care of the problem himself, and then runs to me and cry. We actually thought we would have to hold him back from beating the kid who pushed Zach down at a soccer game. That's not nice Jackie, raging from his mouth.

He looks more like daddy than his brother does. I think he acts most like my father, quiet but forceful. The pediatrician at his 3 year old well child check up thought perhaps he is behind on speech and ordered an evaluation. We will see, I just think he doesn't always feel the need to speak. My grandmother claims they thought my dad was deaf he could ignore so well, Max seems to have the same skill. However he will tell me what he thinks. The other day as I called him Max Attack, he informed his name was MAXWELL WHITE, OTAY?

Otay baby, oops I mean big boy, I know you aren't a baby anymore. However you will always be my baby. I am glad that I saw a catalog cover with a boy and his baby brother that made me think, I need another. You are my favorite first blossom of spring.

Can you please explain to me?

When did I get old?

I have been hurting badly this week. My hip went out. I know, it sounds like something that happens to an eighty year old. I was in enough pain to go the chiropractor and get a massage. Both of which I had never done before and quite frankly made me uncomfortable. Both of which were good experiences and not so bad. I may have to get a real job so I can afford the good life now.

Everyone who sees me painfully get up or sometimes walk asks what happens. Besides slacking on yoga and water aerobics, this is my answer...

Click on the pic to get the big version because while he looks cute and innocent I should tell you he refused to take a nap that day as is more and more the case. I swear he fell asleep in three seconds flat. Notice the one boot on, one boot off and the half eaten granola bar. Please don't notice the dirt on the floor. No really stop looking at it now and go on to the next section. I love him I really do, but I should hire him out to Hoover to test floor mates. I have been through two, maybe because I have to use it fourteen times a day for all the messes he makes.

What is the deal with the commercial for vitamin water?

I want to slap those jerks in the gym crying my water has too many calories. Because mine has none, zero, zip and I like it fine. Maybe I am overexcited because a lady the other day commented my kids were different because they liked water.

or

Now you know I am cheap and don't buy sodas or juice. You might also correctly assume I am jealous of people who actually work out, and whose hips work.

This isn't very timely but it has been bugging me for a while. I hate seeing people on my TV telling me to be green and save the planet when....

They completely change their sets to the color green to emphasize being green and then the next week are back to their old colors. Perhaps you have heard of Recycle, reuse and REDUCE!

or

Maybe I am just trying to justify the fact that I don't recycle glass properly. I have a Rubbermaid tub of it in the back and dream of buying a big machine to tumble into something pretty. Plus I would have to take it to Roswell or Ruidoso or something our city doesn't take it. Don't laugh that I just called Artesia a city, okay laugh it is funny.

Oh and to answer my new friend Weime's question. After all she was the inspiration since a list of these ponderings on her blog. Weeds actually do grow faster, because they outcompete the other plants, one of the characteristics that makes them weedy. They also usually outcompete the native plants for water, sunlight and nutrients. In some ways you could call them genetically superior, but really they are just invaders and usually non native. (I hope that question wasn't just rhetorical.) You thought when I told you I had a degree in Entomology, Plant Pathology and Weed Science it was funny. My mother still cannot say it without giggling.

Night all I am off to hobble to bed, actually I am getting better and better. I might walk like a 60 year old tomorrow. I plan on being thirty again next week or so.

What do you think?

I had another topic in mind but as I opened the MSN home page today this headline caught my eye and I feel the need to give my opinion, and find out yours.

This is the story of a mother going to trial for leaving her child alone asleep in the car.

These are the facts of the story...

She was taking her kids to drop of money to the salavation army bell ringer at a walmart.

Her 2 year old in backseat strapped in had fallen asleep.

She parked in the loading zone and was never out of eyesight of her asleep child, and the car was locked. She never entered the store, nor intended to.

I think it is ridiculous. I would have done the same. I have done the same, buying newspapers or dropping of mail at the post office. Had she left the child while she went inside that would have been different. I don't think she "endangered" her child nor deserves punishment. There are plenty of people who deserve that who aren't getting it.

Just so you know these are my rules for this.

It has to be fast, very fast. --Any obstacle, like I cannot see the car at all times or it might take more than 30 seconds, I don't do it.

My kids are both able to unbuckle themselves and unlock the doors so I don't dare leave them for any longer.

However as kids, we were left alone all the time for quick trips into the store. It was common then.

What do you do and think?

8 Things Meme

This is meme from Contents of My Life, stop by and visit her if you haven’t already. Some of you may remember her as Curly Sue from MSN. I had started a post my top ten ways to relieve stress. Oddly enough most of them are in the things I am passionate about....

8 Things I Am Passionate About:

Singing Crafting — polymer clay, watercolors, making cards…. have a thousand more things I want to learn.
trying to be a better…. wife, mom, person… Chile (red,or green)
Gardening
Chocolate
Amazing Grace — I wouldn’t be where I am without it. Yoga & Water Aerobics. (I extol their virtues to everyone, now I just need to do them more.)

8 Things I Want to Do Before I Die:

Visit Scotland
Visit NYC
Visit New Zealand Skydive
Stay in a luxury hotel.
Make out with my hubby on a deserted beach ala From Here to Eternity.
Be financially secure
Be on What not to Wear….I want that Nick guy to cut my hair.

8 Things I Say Often:

Stop that! 

 Do you need to go to the potty?
Put on some underwear!

      Please put your boots on.

Aw Pickles!
What’s the dill? Pickle? 
Pretty much this whole song…. 

 I love you…

Rock-n-roll!
What’s up Chicken Butt?

8 Books I’ve Recently Read:

Sense and Sensibility — Jane Austen

Pride and Predjduce — Jane Austen

Band of Sisters — Kirsten Holmstedt

Driving with Dead People, A Memoir– Monica Buckley Price

Infidel — Ayaan Hirsi Ali

The first four books of the Outlander Series by Diana Gabaldon

8 Songs I Could Listen To Over and Over:

American Woman by Lenny Kravits  

Black Horse and the Cherry Tree - KT Tunstall

 Oh Marie — Louis Prima

Brave– Nicole Nordeman

 One — Metallica 

I Bless your Name –Selah?

 Amazing Grace (My Chains are Free) — Chris Tomlin

Anything by my buddies Nosotros. 

8 Things That Attract Me To My Best Friends:

Do they make me think?

Do they make me laugh?
Do they get my jokes?
Understanding of each others problems.
Being able to help, even when the other person isn’t asking.
Their individuality Lack of Drama (meaning mean spiritedness, not problems, everyone has those.)

Acknowledging my personality quirks yet still love me