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First and foremost, here is the missing super bowl picture I had promised you a couple of weeks ago.

All eyes are on the screen…watching the first major Wisconsin history making event of 2011.

All dressed up to go to a retirement party. One of these days I am going to do a post Cloud of Secrets style, except the subject will be a typical Morella outfit.

Morella opening up the pink tissue wrapped gifts that my Mom had sent us for my birthday (a little late). How on earth did she know that I would enjoy having the girls get presents as a present? The joy Morella got from unwrapping each handmade treasure was priceless.

A good portion of my dread regarding meals revolves around Neeners eating style. It’s the pits, man. I wish she would eat as much as she plays with.

Three times a day…every day folks.

Last weekend I was sick of the toys being spread all over the house, so I did a major clean up/organizing. It just picked up all the toys in the house and dumped them on Morella’s bed so I could put them away and group the things that should be grouped. I am happy to report that they have managed to keep the house clean longer than usual. They have been playing with the mini princesses, dress up and my little pony mostly.

Neeners and Daddy share a little playtime after dinner, before bed.

Playing some MLP after morning TV (These days it’s Oswald).

Neeners and the ponies, sitting in a box watching Oswald.

What’s disgusting? Union Busting! Kill the Bill! — Getting our protest on at the Capitol last Friday.

I took a break in parenting last Saturday to head over to Laima’s for fondue and fruit crisp. Here I got a great shot of her looking va va voom with the cat. I had mentioned that it was a classically evil pose because she was petting the cat, and she didn’t believe me…..at first.

It has taken three years and three months, but Morella has finally turned into a well cured …. ham.

Two things I want to remember.

1. On Saturday Tim, Morella, Athena and I all packed up and headed downtown to protest along with 70,000 other folks (minus a few paid pro-walker “protestors”) around the Capitol. I had a moment where I was baby wearing Neeners in the Rock Star sling, nursing her AND protesting at the same time. I think I might even get extra points there for having Neeners be a toddler and therefore considered “extended” by America’s low standards. Where is my medal?

2. Innsmouth, on of our litter mate cats that we got as a wedding gift to each other, was taken to the vet this morning to have four teeth extracted. They were in the last stages of decay. I wish I could have seen them, because I am morbid like that sometimes. Anyway, Innsmouth (aka Doctor as named by Morella ages ago) couldn’t eat anything before the surgery. So instead of feeding the others and not her, we didn’t feed any of them. Innsmouth and her cranky brother Arkham can both be huge bitches when they are hungry and take to walking around us, complaining and swiping at innocent legs, hands and faces if they get close. We warned Morella to stay away from them this morning because they were hungry.

“Why” she asked.
“Because Innsmouth is going to the doctor today. Her face really hurts her because of bad teeth. The doctor is going to take them out so that she won’t be in pain anymore. Then she will feel better and not hit us if we accidentally touch her face,” we explained.

Well, we picked up Innsmouth this evening and brought her home. Morella was thrilled. Before today Innsmouth has always been known as “Daddy’s Doctor” and Arkhham is “Morella’s Doctor”. When we got home, Innsmouth suddenly became Morella’s doctor. It soon became clear why.

She tiptoed around, swirled and nearly burst with happiness at our newly improved cat. You see we sent her to the doctor to take away her mean streak, and now she is a “nice Doctor.”

I think I nearly exploded with cute. Though I am not looking forward to the day when Innsmouth is a crab pot and takes a swipe for the hell of it. Usually though she directs her fury on just the other cats and only on the girls or us when we get near her face. Maybe we did get rid of her mean streak….time will tell.

Heading out for a playdate, but Neeners took her socks off and I can’t find them. So I’ll take a moment to unload before searching for them again.

–Kid socks for kids only 20 months apart is impossible! It’s a miracle when I can find two socks that match, hence the annoyance when a certain someone takes them off.

–I am starting a new habit. Breakfast every day. It’s not gonna be easy.

–There is nothing that makes your butt feel big like a teeny little girl holding up your giant granny, underpants and telling you that they are yours.

–There is ice on everything outside…uh…gotta go. Morella is asking to go.

Today Neeners was Neeners last well baby check up. After the 18 month is the two year and once a year after that. No more little baby check ups. Aww. Neeners kicked normal ass though! Perfectly normal on the developmental check lists and the autism check, on weight and height, and head and over all health. Way to go Neeners…but I hope you don’t mind if I take a little of that credit too. After all, at least 50% of your daily caloric intake comes from me. She weighs 22.8 pounds and is 31 3/4 inches tall, which is about 44% for a girl.

I did have one concern going in though and it was validated. Neeners has been struggling with a stuffy, green and yellow gooped nose for a couple of weeks now. Turns out she does have a sinus infection. She has it either for 4 or 6 weeks…so I am not sure. Apparently it is quite common not show any fever (90% of sinus infections do not have a fever) and take about 4 weeks to diagnose. As in “Johnny has had a cold for 4 weeks…maybe I should take him in.” It makes sense because there isn’t an easy way to diagnose it in a baby. Poor Neeners. I can’t wait to see what kind of a kid I will have in a couple days after the antibiotics kick in and clear up that congested head of her. My guess is that she will be skipping, laughing and singing every waking moment.

On our way home we stopped by the Chicago hot dog style food joint and I got us some gyros and chili cheese fries. Oh my gosh, what a wonderful lunch. It was just divine. I have never had chili cheese fries before this, but maybe that is a good thing because then I would be even more awesome than I am right now.

I put Neeners down for a nap after she fought tooth and nail taking her medicine (only 19 more joyful experiences to go…I hope chilling it really does help with the taste). Oh when we got back Morell had laid down for a nap — at 11:00 … and now at 2:00 she is still asleep. I expect she’ll be up any second, but wow. I even got a bit of a nap in there myself in the office to the sound of Tim tap tapping.

This afternoon is our weekly ho chunk lesson. I should try and prepare for it.

Hurray for Neeners being a year and half old. Her words now include:

what is that?
Daa – ee!
Momma or Nana (combination of Nani and Mama)
Ess? (this?)
Chocolate
woof woof (dog)
no
ah-oo! (hello)
Weh weh (morello)
Dop dat! (stop that)
Dop (stop)
Bup (up or help)
uh oh
Aw wee (sorry)

Oh nuts, speak of the devil. Morella is up and at a them. I guess it will have to be a partial word list.

–Neeners now plays My Little Ponies, Princesses, stuffies, etc with Morella.

–Likes to dress up

–Likes to sit on the green cube and watch Oswald (current favorite TV show here — ohmygosh!)

–Likes putting shoes on and walking around

–Wider food range than Morella, that said she still isn’t a very good eater and plays with more food than is eaten.

–Chocolate/candy/frosting/soda sweet fiend

–Only 8 teeth

–Bangs are long enough to be needed to clip

–Can jump, walk forward and backward, run, climb up stairs (needs heavy assistance going down).

–Doesn’t mind being outside so much anymore.

–Doesn’t like to be contained in a stroller, high chair, booster or cart seat. So shopping expeditions are now practically nonexistent without help because she runs away as fast as possible, with her giggly sister galumphing behind her, egging her on.

–Loves animals and has no fear in approaching cats…maybe dogs too but we don’t let.

I know. I used to post more photos, but that was before I got my Ipad and there is just no editing software on here…not to mention I am not even sure how I get pictures on here other than emailing them to myself and then downloading them. It is just easier to do all of that on the desktop, which I have limited access too. Hm. Okay I have full access to it, I just don’t always get to use it by myself….the kids usually want to “help”.

Its been a busy couple of days. Wednesday I had my night out. I met up with my friend Ann, whom I hadn’t seen in a month and went to Jade Monkey to cash in a groupon and play scrabble. Oy man, what a night. She kicked my ass! There was a couple next to us on a first date that ended with them going back to her place, old shuffleboard ladies bumping into our drinks and a group of rowdy convention men hitting on us. No wonder I lost … well that and Ann is a ruthless triple score stealer and doesn’t work to open the board. Why can’t I be satisfied with playing it safe and boring with three and four letter words?

Thursday …. hm. I forget. Did I hang out with Lowen this Thursday or was it last Thursday? I think it was this Thursday. We went to target for lunch and some light shopping. IT was great.

Friday I ….did something in the morning….something to get the girls tired… oh yes. I met up with friend Anna and her two sons and we went to the mall to do some kid laps. In other words we followed Neeners around since she just forges ahead. We stopped for a coffee and the kids spent most of the time playing on one of those light boards, a willy wonka candy game that was filled with black mold, and then the kids played in a hurricane machine. Let’s see if I can get a picture in here….

Nope…that was a huge exercise in frustration. Ugh! I almost wanted to stop and just go to bed. But words are better than nothing.

Then Friday evening I packed up the girls and we went downtown to Library Mall to attend the retirement party of someone I knew back in college. I ran into some old friends and potentially made a new Mom friend. We all had a great time and when we got back there was fresh bought booze from Tim, which I didn’t have. Instead, I got the girls ready for bed and put Neeners down before heading off to a Girls Night In I was invited too by a neighbor last month. Thank goodness for FB event reminders! I brought along my felt stocking kit and had a wonderful time hanging out Marcia and her school/knitting buddies. She has such good taste in people.

Saturday was a home, run some errands and eat some Fuzzy Tacos kind of day. Whenever we were home I just wanted to spend time in bed, cuddled under my down comforter. Luckily the girls like to hang out by my, so they brought their books and baby dolls to my bed and we all hung out. Sometimes I think about the day when we all will watch copious amounts of TV together, as a special something to do. We limit TV watching around here to only 1.5 hours a day tops. After the girls went to bed, Tim and I watched some True Blood, while crafting and sorting.

Sunday, today…we had brunch with another family at the Fitchburg Great Dane for their brunch buffet. It was amazing…one of the best spreads I have ever seen. We were seated upstairs where the kids had free reign to wander around the table. Perfect! Another great bonus, kids 4 and under eat free! It was reasonably priced at $15 per person too… take that Nau-t-gal! After stuffing ourselves silly, we came home to take a nap. Well, every one except Morella. She played quietly in her room the entire time with one ear peeled. I stayed up with her reading the internet under the cover of a blanket and pretended to be sleeping whenever she walked by. There is a 75% success rate at tricking her into taking a nap when I pretend I am asleep. Eventually I made a noise and the jig was up. So I went around and tried to find every toy, every container of toys and dumped them all on her bed to sort and put away. We also decided to retire some toys to the basement because of loss of interest or space. The basement does wonder for spiffing up toys.

I made a dinner no one ate – baked ravoli. Morella had a sandwich, Neeners nursed and I was planning on getting something at The Great Dane East for Book Club (we read The Alchemist) meeting tonight. We ran over to Michaels to try and find something organizational…and I got a few crafty things (felt bird mobile kit, heart wall hanging foam kit, some note cards, Athena got some large plastic heart beads and Morella got a MLP coloring book). Good times!

Book Club was good. Most of us agreed that the book was too vague and that we all probably achieved our personal legend but are baffled as to what to do once you achieve it. Are we just floating by on happiness clouds oblivious to the rest of the world? Do we have to find some other new legend to follow…even though the book seemed to indicate that was something you realize when you are a teenage/early adult.

Oy, I gotta go to bed.

I am having a pretty great February, so that’s probably why I haven’t posted as much. Sure the kids have been sick, but it’s only been a sort of an inconvenience, gotta stay home and muck it through sick versus going to the doctor sick. So yeah, so far what is good?

–Having Sigrid and Cecci come over and hang out this past Saturday night while Tim was out with a few friends doing Old Man Drinking night. They get dressed up as old men and go around to old man type bars ordering old man drinks. Meanwhile the significant others (the ladies) hang out here and talk. It was so nice. I was up until 12:30!

–Friday evening I went to an open House at the salon Lowen and Sigrid work for and won … an hour long massage! Free! To be used by the end of March. Oh my goodness…what a treat. Then Morella got her nails painted, and did a free yoga demonstration with a professional yoga instructor, I got a free chair massage and we all got free dinner in the form of party food and sandwiches. The drawback to the fingernail paint job was that the stuff they used to seal it on top caused the entire paint to peel off. So as of now, all of it has peeled off with no evidence that it ever existed.

One more….

–Went to visit a pal and her sons on the West Side and she made the kids and me lunch! Score. Whenever I don’t have to cook is a very good day indeed. It was another one of those lovely times where the kids behaved and everyone was an angel.

– I went to the Olbrich Conservatory last Thursday. The place was almost ours (except for few other family’s with small children). It is free for 5 and under and only $1 for me. I can’t tell you what a difference breathing that air did for me. It was absolutely incredible…I swear I was in danger of passing out because I was huffing so much vibrant air, filled with life. Oh man. I wish I could bottle that. Maybe I need to get more plants. Hm. Morella and Neeners had fun exploring the paths, looking at the little birds and koi and going up and down stairs. I liked that the whole thing was enclosed and all I had to do was hold Neeners hand every now and then and make sure no one damaged any plants.

–Last week before the big snow storm we upped the Jones factor in the neighborhood by building a snow man family. Tim later added a dog, but I forgot to take a picture of it. It was pretty darn adorable. Morella was so pleased to have finally built a snow man, eat a carrot outside and have a snowball fight.

–Sunday we watched Wisconsin Kick Ass at a Super Bowl party with our pals Sarah, Dave and the kids. Here is a shot of everyone watching the game — minus most of the adults. I am so happy that Sarah and Dave agreed to host a super bowl party, and let us come over even though Morella had the sniffles and Athena was still 0boogery. There was this melt in your mouth pork/bacon smoothered in sauce dish, chips with french onion dip, home made guacamole and chips, fresh fruit, veggies with dipping sauce, cheese, lunchmeat, beer, soda, fruit snacks, Oreo football shaped cookies, ice cream, fresh stove popped popcorn,

Morella’s typed her name = jasdfghjll;’zxzznm,./

Naptime — gots to go. It took me all morning to get this far on this post.