My Little Indian

Can you hear her?

Woowoowoowoo

wawawawawa

wowowowowowo

When not exercising her vocal cords, she can be found practicing her version of "crawling."

Excuse me now while I go baby-proof my house.

About Pulling Weeds

I'd like to confess that I like pulling weeds. 

I know, crazy. 

But, there is something so satisfying about making this:

look like this:

Of course, with weeding come very sore muscles.  Muscles you never even knew you had.  Muscles that hurt only when you do weird things like bending down and ripping plants from the earth.  When the weeding is done, the muscles go back into hibernation until next year when they are awakened again.  I even find the sore muscle part of weeding to be satisfying in a way.  To know that I still have muscles is a good thing, even if they are sorely out of shape.

Now you are probably thinking one of two things, or maybe both.

One:  I am totally out of my mind to enjoy weeding. 

You are probably right.

Two:  You would like me to come weed your yard too.

Too bad, I only like to pull my own weeds.

I'm a snob like that.

These are my favorite weed pulling tools.

Yes, I even took pictures of my tools.

It really wouldn't be fair if I didn't give them the credit they deserve.

The pokey thing in the back (which has a name I'm sure, but I have no idea what it is) works great for stabbing weeds with stubborn roots.  Yes, stabbing.  Pulling weeds can get violent sometimes.  Try it next time you need to work out some aggression.  The forky thing in the front (which also has a name, a name that I know, but for some reason I can't think of it right now) has a weird looking knob on it.  The weird looking knob part is VERY important.  When I bought this thing at Home Depot a couple of years ago I had no idea what the knobby thing was for, but I quickly learned it provides leverage as you scratch away at the ground and makes the whole process much more efficient.  Of course, if we're really talking about efficiency, pulling weeds by hand is probably not the way to go.  I was kindly reminded of the effectiveness of Roundup, to which I scoffed, "Roundup is for wimps."

Pulling weeds by hand puts one in close contact with the likes of my friend here.

Pulling weeds by hand is not for the faint of heart.

This is where I've been pulling weeds.

Since I took this picture, I have now made it about halfway across, about to where the front steps are.

I'll let you know if I ever make it to the end.

Laci is in early weed pulling training.

At this point, though, she would rather taste the weeds than pull them.

Maybe she has the better idea.

the stats @ seven months

At her appointment on Monday, she...

...weighed 15 lbs 9 oz

...measured 26 1/4" long

...just in case you were curious.

By the way,

her condition of

wide-open-mouth syndrome

is neither contagious or terminal.

Sleep...or rather, the lack thereof & other randomness

Laci and I have spent the last week or so getting up every hour or two for quality mother/daughter time.  Her choice, not mine.  Tylenol has successfully reduced these quality moments to about every two hours for the past few nights, and for the first time in my life I am pleased to say I slept for TWO HOURS in a row.  The culmination of these sleepless nights:  two very sharp teeth peeking through Laci's lower gum.  I can feel them and just barely see them, and she finally has teeth for real.  Unfortunately, they are wreaking havoc on our sleeping patterns.  As if there was a sleeping pattern to begin with.  Since I am currently dealing with my own teeth issues I can totally relate to her pain and discomfort, but it really doesn't help my mood when she awakens me six or seven or eight times in one night.  To be honest, I've lost track of how many times we are up and have actually considered giving up on the concept of sleep altogether.  I think babies should come with a vat of patience in liquid form so that when I feel like running out of the house like a crazy person I can just take a swig and feel all better.  Fortunately, she is beautifully packaged in a cute little baby body.  This is definitely to her advantage as it keeps me smiling at her in between gritting my teeth while wondering, "Aren't you tired too?"  I mean seriously, she is up as often as I am.  Apparently when you are a baby, and have nothing to worry about, or think about, or dwell upon, your brain and body require much less sleep than an adult.  Oh yeah, and you get to nap whenever you want to.  Unless you are Laci and then you hate napping. 

But enough about sleeping.  No sense in rambling on about something I can only dream of. 

Here are some random pictures from last week.  At least I think they are from last week, they could be from the week before.  Lately my pictures have been living in my camera for a good few weeks before I make the effort to load them on the computer and browse through them.  Maybe that has something to do with the impaired brain I've been left to work with. 

Laci's first lawnmower ride.

She didn't really enjoy it, much to the disappointment of her father.

Isn't it awesome how everything is green again?

Yes, yes it is.

I know it will be dead and brown before I know it, so I'm enjoying it while I can.

Her favorite thing to do.

All the time.

And her bitter beer face.  Love this face.

Laying on our gross carpet.

When we first moved into our awesome double wide,

I swore I would never have children while living here.

I couldn't imaging our sweet little baby learning to crawl on this disgusting carpet.

Then my biological clock started ticking like a time bomb

and I conveniently forgot we had disgusting carpets.

When Laci was born, I obsessively put blankets down wherever she was playing.

Of course, blankets and crawling are not really good partners

and I've just had to learn to not think about the carpet.

It is vacuumed regularly and has been shampooed, and that's all I can do.

And apparently, Laci doesn't seem to mind its hideous gold/red/orange brilliance.

Our awesome double wide.

Pretty impressive, isn't it?

You know you want one too.

And finally, I'll leave you with this image.

This is what happens when daddy gets up with the baby in the morning,

so mommy can sleep in,

and the baby gets bored of every toy in the house,

and daddy runs out of ideas.

Reminds me a little of ET when the kids hide him the closet.

...seven months...

Seven things about Laci at seven months:

1.  She slobbers a lot. 

You would think I would wipe it away before taking a picture.

But, no.

2.  She likes to open her mouth really wide.

Looks like she's yelling.

She's not.

She's totally silent.

3.  She likes her fingers a lot.

Apparently they must taste good.

4.  She thinks this is a thumb protector, not a pacifier.

Hey, it works.

5.  She can blow raspberries, and she does so regularly.

More slobber.

6.  Sometimes she looks a little "special."

Notice the stream of drool from her mouth.

7.  I think she secretly believes she can walk.

But of course, she can't.

Sunday Drive

My goodness, where is this month going?  Time just passes too quickly these days. 

With the time change and nicer weather, we've been spending as much time outside as possible.  On Sunday, we went for a drive up to Ryan's parents' property above Berry Creek.  It was a really nice day, a little cool, but sunny and bright.  It was quite a drive for the peanut in the back seat - you have to drive up above Berry Creek, then turn off the paved road onto a gravel road, then turn off the gravel road onto a dirt road.  I couldn't even tell you where we were if I was looking at a map, but it didn't really matter.  It is usually a pretty drive but with the fire that blazed through there last Summer, the scenery was a little depressing.  Laci did great, though.  She slept most of the way and then was content to chew on her toys until we got there.  We tromped around for a while and Ryan reminisced about camping there as a kid.  I took a gazillion pictures and then had to do major tick patrol before we left.  I found two on me, crawling on my jeans.  Can I just say, "SO GROSS!!"  I think I am a country girl at heart, until there is a tick or two on me.  Then I just want to get the heck out of there.  Something about ticks just completely freaks me out.  The whole concept of a bug digging its little head into your skin is more than I can handle.  Plus, now I have mom guilt to deal with, "What if one gets on Laci?"  "What if one bites Laci?"  "What if she gets Lyme's Disease?"  I think you get the picture.  I am happy to report that we are officially tick free, bite free, and Lyme's Disease free.

Ryan is showing Laci the "shooting range" - really just a flat-ish spot on the side of the hill where we can throw clay pigeons.  Once, when we were first dating, he brought me up here with a few of his friends to shoot at night.  They popped open a glow stick and painted the clay with them.  They weren't very bright for shooting, but it was entertaining enough.  I believe one person who shall remain nameless (ok, it was Scott) painted his whole face with the glue stick goo, after which we told him it was toxic and would make him sick.  That was the first time I went to the property...brave girl I was.  I had absolutely no idea where we were, wasn't really into the whole shooting thing, and was freezing cold.  I ended up sitting in the truck watching the shenanigans if I remember correctly. 

I had never seen this before, so I took a picture.  Why not, right?  It isn't really special, it is just a tree marking the property line and the little plaque says something like they'll punish you if you remove the tree or damage it in any way.

I wonder what they'll do to Mother Nature

when they realize the other side of the tree has been destroyed by fire.

More destruction.

The only plus side to all the burned trees is that the view of Bald Rock is cleared.

Usually there are too many trees to get a clear shot of it.

Check out this tree.  It is totally hollow inside.

Makes you wonder how long it will really hold up.

These are the branches of the same hollow tree. 

I had to go on the other side of the tree to get the shot.

I wanted to get the whole tree in a picture, but couldn't do it because of how the road goes.

Most of the branches are hollow too

and reach out over the road.

Very strange looking.

Sadly, Laci finally figured out how to take her hat off.

Now I can't hardly keep one on her.

Good thing the weather is warmer now.

It was a good day.

What's Been Happening?

I just love this picture of my girl.  She looks so girly and so serious.

It has been a long time since I've shared on update on our shop progress.  That's because nothing was happening.  Nothing, for about a year!  That changed when PG&E finally came out and installed a new transformer and supplied power to the shop a couple of weeks ago.  Now, to most people, this might sound like mundane news.  But, for us, it was a monumental event!  Ryan started the installation process by calling PG&E in August of 2008.  Yeah, that's right, a year and a half ago!  After being passed around through half a dozen new service representatives, a phone call to the PUC, several contracts and contract modifications, thousands of dollars, and three cancellations due to weather, it took only a few hours to get the new transformer up and the wires strung.  I would have taken a picture, but really, who wants a picture of power lines?  If you need a visual, just go outside and look up.  Yeah, our lines look just like yours.  Of course, not even the installation process went smoothly for us.  You know Murphy's Law - if something can go wrong, it will.  Well, while the crew was here working, they got an emergency call.  Someone nearby had crashed their car into a power pole and the power line was sitting on top of the car.  No one could do anything at the scene of the accident until PG&E arrived to deal with the downed line.  Of course, the ONLY PG&E crew in the area was the crew at our house.  The other crew was in a training session in Sacramento, or something equally insignificant.  The crew had to immediately leave our place to go deal with this emergency.  In this case, "immediately" meant right after the crew got the lift truck stuck in the mud and had to wench it out with the other work truck.  Fortunately, they were only gone for a few hours and came back the same day to finish the installation.  It has been a huge relief to Ryan to finally have power.  Up until this point, he has had spotlights and extension cords running everywhere trying to supply light inside.  Now, he can finally just flip a switch, and he can move on to actually finishing the shop - final stucco coat, sheet rock, blah, blah, blah.  Can you feel my enthusiasm?  I have to find comfort in the thought that the sooner his man cave is completed, the sooner I'll get mine. 

In other news...

Ryan and I went out to dinner without Laci for the first time this weekend.  I know, it took us long enough.  Laci was more ready for it than I was.  How could I have gone my entire life without her and been fine...and now, if she isn't around, I feel like something is missing?  

Laci finally has some bumps on her lower gum to prove that she, in fact, teething.

She is practicing getting up on her hands and knees.  No crawling yet, but I'm sure it isn't far off.  Besides, she can now roll anywhere she wants to.  Immobility is definitely a thing of the past.

And, after six months of the same bedtime routine repeated almost daily, we have finally conquered going to bed at night.  Bath, nurse, go to bed, sleep.  She usually rolls around and grunts for about 10 minutes before going to sleep, but she can do it all on her own and I think she prefers it that way.  Now, if we could only apply that concept to naptime...

Laci's First Playdate

Laci had her first playdate this week.  Well, if you can call it that.  She wasn't too interested in playing with her new friend.  She was much more interested in stealing all of his toys, tasting them, thoroughly coating them with slobber, and then abandoning them for something far more interesting...like the next toy. 

No matter, the whole point was to catch up with an old friend - mission accomplished. 

This is Alex.  Doesn't he have the chubbiest cheeks ever?  Too cute!

Alex's mommy, Melissa, and I met in ballet when we were a wee three or four years old.  

Thanks to Melissa's mom, I can share with you the following picture circa 1983. 

Can you find me?

Melissa was also friends with Ryan when they were little

because Melissa's dad and Ryan's dad were, and still are, very good friends. 

Can you find him here?

(Hint:  he's the tiny one).

Of course, at the time, Ryan and I had no idea who the other one was.  Life is interesting, isn't it?

Alex's grammy thinks that Laci & Alex should fall in love and get married someday. 

This might be difficult since Alex currently lives in South Carolina. 

This might also be difficult because,

according to me,

Laci will never grow up and be old enough to get married. 

It is just ridiculous to think she will ever be that old,

especially when I consider how old that will make me. 

Moving on...

Don't you just love how babies are so fascinated with other babies? 

I do. 

Laci was much more outgoing than I thought she would be. 

I think she might have scared Alex more than a little

with all her grabbiness.

Since I couldn't decide which picture I liked best, I included ALL of them.