All the Stuff

Word Slip
While reading "What Floats" to Max I said,

There's a froggy on a lily pad,
A turtle on a log,
A long nosed alligator, green,
All floating in the blog.

James laughed when he heard me, and I realized I have been writing this post in my head for some time.

Max, King of the Wild Things

While wandering through the kids section of Barnes & Noble we came across Max and Bernard, the characters from "Where The Wild Things Are." We just couldn't resist (we didn't try very hard) buying them for Max. We thought it would be very cute to get him this costume for Halloween.

Here he is playing with Bernard.

Things Max is afraid of
Our not so tough King of the Wild things is afraid of chip bags, grocery bags, the printer, the blow dryer and James' sneezes.

Music Together Class
We went to our first music class last week. And although it was fun I had a small issue. My own silly issue. All five of the woman were from my stake. And they have all known each other for years. Not only did I feel like the odd man out, I felt self-conscious and had a hard time just relaxing and throwing myself into it. I did better as I focused more on Max and kind of ignored everyone else. It would just be easier if they were all strangers. It didn't help that it is in a ballet studio so there are wall to wall mirrors showing my unflattering reflection. I went home afterwards and send the pair of pants I had on to the Di and bought myself a full length mirror so that I can see myself before I leave the house. Stupid, silly issues I know. For the rest of the classes I intend to really focus on Max as the experience is just for him and I.

Curves for Woman
I have a membership to the Curves gym and I have recently started going again. Three times since Saturday. I am really loving it! It is only for woman and it seems to attract the "real" woman. Not all the cutesy girls in their cutesy work-out clothes who go to the gym to check out guys...or be checked out. OK, totally off topic. Anyway, I really like the setup. You don't have to think about what machine to do next or how to use the machine or how many reps, etc. The workout is set up to take 1/2 an hour; traveling in a circle using each of the machines for 30 seconds with a 30 second cardio in between each.

It is a nice social welcoming feeling as woman you don't even know greet and encourage you (what Relief Society should feel like.) They also have a system that is basically a personal trainer; telling you when you need to push harder, how many reps you need to do, etc. It just really takes the guess work out of working out. And its fun. And I pay much less attention to my body after working out. It is as if once the workout is over I can just accept my body as it is knowing that I have done what I could to improve it for that day. No guilt as I spend all day thinking..."I should work out." I And one final thought; a confession really; going there makes me feel better about myself because even as unhappy with my body as I might be...I look better than 95% of the woman I see there. I certainly don't mean that to be mean, just that I can't help but feel better realizing that my starting point is not that bad.

Emergency Preparedness
Lately I have felt very strongly that I should get us prepared. I saw the Emergency Food Kit in Costco several weeks ago and it has been in the back of my head since then. I finally purchased one. It includes 275 prepacked servings and has a 20 year shelf life. I also found on Costo online the Complete Emergency Preparedness Kit which includes things like a stove, fuel, water filtration system, crank flashlight & radio, along with 6 days of food for 2 people. Also, I purchased an extensive First Aid Kit. The other day James cut his finger and as I grabbed our little kit I realized how insufficient it was even for day to day use. The final thing I have done is put together a 72 hour kit for Max. Our kits still need work, but I do atleast have some basics put together. I am pretty excited to feel much better prepared. Similar to our fire extinguishers...these are things that I put the mind at ease, and that I hope I never have cause to really need.

Sunday Fast
I guess I need to thank Kata, or atleast tell her that something good came out of a bad experience. Sunday, I had one of the first honest fasts since I got pregnant. (CamiSue, I was in a very different place spiritually when you asked and so had a very different experience. I do think that you asking helped get me moving in the right direction.) I decided when I would begin and end my fast and then actually ended up fasting longer as I stayed for all of church and felt good about things rather than just desperate for food. I went to Relief Society and enjoyed the lesson and then for the first time in a very long while, I stayed for Sunday School. The SS lesson was about the pride cycle. I really liked the approach the teacher took as she asked us to make it very personal and rather than talk about the details that we all already know, to really think about where we are in the cycle and what we need to do to get to a better place. In Sacrament meeting we were once called to task and told to get going on Family History. It got me thinking about timing. My Patriarchal blessing says something about me doing family history work. But now is just not that time for me. The circumstances of my life have me going in a different direction. But there is no time frame or time limit in our blessings. Mom wasn't working on it last year but now she has immersed herself in it and loves it. (Kudos to Mom for all the work she is doing.) And someday that will be me. Just not today.

Today I...went to Curves for an early-morning workout, changed an all-over-everything poopy diaper, gave a bath to the poopy boy, scrubbed out poopy clothes, changed the poopy bedding, made many bottles, cleaned the toilet, cut toenails, took a 1/2 hour nap on my bed with my little boy, shopped for office supplies for work, bought a belt, bought a toy remote control for Max (whoever came up with that was brilliant) sent an email for work, (that was the extend of my work today), rearranged the living room, had a headache, went for a walk, didn't drink enough water, drank too much caffeine, had breakfast for dinner (Thank you James), calmed the hysterical teething baby, (thank heavens for teething tablets, Orajel and Gripe water), stayed up too late writing this post. Goodnight moon, goodnight nobody, goodnight blog.