Dirt Café

Chloe has recently acquired a taste for the finer things in life.  In addition to her love of dog bowl water, dog toys, baby wipes, Kleenex, and any type of food that has fallen on the floor, her most recent craving is for dirt. It does have many of the same qualities as sugar - smooth, crystaly... wonderful - except it is missing a few important qualities like being sweet and highly digestible. Nevertheless she loves to sneak a mouth full whenever we aren't looking. (Or, in the spirit of documenting this phase, whenever we are looking.)



 

 



The Birds. THE BIRDS!

I feel like a murderer. 

I'm seriously considering taking down the wreath.  I wasn't even really considering it until my Mom started with her scare tactics.  First of all, we spent a lot of money on that wreath.  And she made that bow by hand.  And the birds will poop all over the wreath.  And birds have lice.  And the lice will come in your windows AND BURROW INTO YOUR SKIN. 

Okay, so she didn't say that last part, but when she said birds have lice I have to admit that I pointed my finger at her and laughed.  Birds have lice.  That doesn't even make sense.  I was fully prepared to make fun of her here, but before I did I did a quick Google search "wild birds lice" only to find out that wild birds can have lice, and when the birds leave the lice will crawl through your windows AND BURROW INTO YOUR SKIN!  I only looked at one website, and it had less credibility than Wikipedia, but I'm going with it. 

So before the birds make up an official letterhead and claim primary residence exemption, I'm going to have Paul take down the wreath.  As of this weekend we will no longer be those people.  In the meantime I'm going to be feeling terrible for possibly and probably killing a few baby birds.  I don't even like birds.  I swear, becoming a mother makes you sentimental as hell.

Easter Wreath

This is what happens when you wait too long to take down your Christmas decorations...

 

I don't even need to decorate it with Easter eggs!  Now, if only I could make a real "Birds' Nest" sign for the house... then maybe we would stop getting so many dirty looks from our neighbors.

A Mousy Makeover

I guess Paul and I have never really "counted" the basement as a livable space.  We had only really used it for extra storage, or for an extra place to sleep when we had guests, or for a short retreat from a super hot summer day.  The real problem is that someone living there before us had cats, and apparently they let their cats pee on the carpet once or twice, because the whole basement had a faint undertone of cat pee.  But then again, maybe it was just mouse pee.

Sick. 

We brought Griffin to the house before we bought it to see if he got any paranormal hits, but all he did was run straight to the basement and pee on the carpet.  I guess it smelled so bad to him that he thought it was the outdoors.  So my point is that we have always wanted to put new carpet in the basement and repaint the walls.  That is all we wanted to do.  Here is a picture of what the basement looked like prior to The Mice.

But the Lord works in mysterious ways, because after The Mice came to live at our house Paul decided that no way, never, not ever was he going to leave the poopy ceiling tiles in the basement.  I just told him to do whatever he wanted since I was so stressed out about the whole thing.  Tearing down the ceiling tiles and replacing the carpet soon turned into calling a contractor, bumping out a wall, replacing the electrical, and so on.  And when I returned from D.C. I came down to the basement to find this:

 

After I pooped my pants, Paul explained that after pulling down the ceiling tiles he realized the idiot living here before us thought he was an electrician and wired the whole basement himself.  There were all kinds of fire hazards and issues that needed to be addressed.  We couldn't quite afford an electrician at $80 per hour for three days worth of work so we called our brother-in-law, Chad, an electrical engineer.  To the entire Moore Family and God, I thank you again here for blessing us with your help.  The electrical work in our basement was really a threat to our whole family, and it turns out that if those mice had wings they would have been angels (or bats).  Chad and family came to our house on three separate occasions to help Paul with the wiring.  When they were done the basement looked like this:

Then my dad helped Paul replace an old pipe.  Then Michael, our contractor and friend, framed in our new walls.  Then came drywall.  The basement looked like this:

Paul and our friend Matt borrowed a paint sprayer from an old football buddy.  They sprayed the ceiling and then painted the walls the following day.  We were then left with this:

Let me just stop right here to say how lucky you are to get such instant gratification.  Paul slaved over this basement for days on end, tearing away layer after layer of old drywall, dust, mouse poop, and carpet.  Michael spent a month waiting for us to move all of the garbage from the basement to the garage to the trash can (and the neighbor's trash can and the other neighbor's trash can) all in an effort to save on dumpster and demolition costs, which, by the way, was a horrible plan.  And after a whole month of waiting he came in and finished the job in less than two weeks.  Even though both Paul and Michael were so amazing, I spent the same amount of time rocking back and forth in a corner, afraid of what would come next.  Everything looks so much less stressful on HGTV.  And it all happens in thirty to sixty minute segment.  I'm just saying, as a blog reader myself, I can appreciate getting to see the entire project from start to finish in less than three minutes. 

Where was I?  So Michael finished up the trim work on Wednesday, and we finished painting and patching the floors on Thursday.  On Friday the carpet was installed.  Now we have a finished product that looks like this:

When you live in a really old house with beautiful wood floors everyone says it is a shame to cover them with carpet, and for the most part I agree.  But after a while you realize that it doesn't matter how pretty those floors are, because they are cold and uncomfortable and creaky and... well, it is just really nice to have a room with carpet.  The whole family agrees.  Chloe was so excited that she could hardly contain herself.  She was doing laps in the room just screaming and laughing.  She kept falling over and rolling around.  Paul and I were making carpet angels, and Griffin was being all narcoleptic just curling up and falling asleep every three steps.  We are super happy to have a new room in our very old house!

*By the way, if you are looking for a great contractor in the area try Michael Triant of Sarafis Designs.   

Mom Scouts

Last Friday I earned two new Mom Scout badges: Bare-Handed Puke Catcher and Bathtub Poop Scooper. I guess I was pretty lucky to go over a year without earning those particular badges. It all started on Friday morning around 5:30 a.m., Chloe's preferred wake up time. We went downstairs to get a cup of milk like usual when all of a sudden she started to puke. Instinctively, I stuck my hands out to catch it. It was mostly mucous so I didn't think much of it, but about an hour later I sat her in her highchair for breakfast, and she started to gag again. This time I caught twice the amount of puke.

Unfortunately, some if it ended up down her shirt, so we went straight to the tub. I washed her all up and she was just playing like a good girl when my Mom said she would watch her while I went downstairs. Well about 30 seconds later I hear "Aaah YOU ARE POOPING!" I ran upstairs and sure enough there was something floating in the tub that certainly didn't belong there. I scooped out the poop and flushed it down the toilet. Okay I know this is a little graphic, but my point is that prior to 7:00 a.m. I had already caught puke in my hands TWICE and scooped poo out of the tub.

Chloe still wasn't feeling well in the afternoon. My Mom called and said Chloe was very off balance and was crying a lot. Her fever was about 102 degrees even with Tylenol.  I made her an appointment to see the doctor. Mind you, I was complaining the whole time, because it seems like every single week that my Mom is here we are going to the doctor. I am the type to never go to the doctor. In fact, I didn't even open Chloe's thermometer until she was about four months old. It seems like every Monday Chloe goes to daycare feeling fine, but by Wednesday she has a runny nose, and by Friday she has a cold that has got my Mom thinking a visit to the doctor is in order. This winter the doctor has told us about five times and about $400 later that Chloe has a cold. (I'm sorry, Mom, I'm not blaming you per se, but you are batting, like, two-hundred.)

This time was different, though, because this time Chloe had a double ear infection. Poor baby had to get an antibiotic. She is now about half way through the medicine, and is starting to feel better. At least she doesn't have a fever anymore. But she is turning into a bubblegum flavored amoxicillin junky.  The doctor said that most kids have had four ear infections by the age of one.  Good job, Chloe!

Anyway, I figured I get to add my new badges to my recent collection, which include:

Board Book Memorizer - for the ability to read Chloe's favorite books without looking at the words while doing a variety of daily activities.

Poop Inspector - for the instinct to do a quick once over on a poopy diaper to ensure there are no rouge pennies.

Booger Picker/Snotty Nose Wiper - for the successful removal of the stickiest of boogers and runniest of noses using a tissue, shirt sleeve, finger, and/or shoulder.

Early Riser - for waking up every single morning at 5:30 a.m. for over a year.

Sure, they aren't exactly glamorous, but I am quite proud of them!  Oh, and Paul gets an honorary badge.  I'm going to call it something simple and self-explanatory like... I-didn't-quite-get-all-of-the-poop-out-of-the-drain, so-when-Paul-took-his-shower-after-work-and-tried-to-figure-out-why-the-tub-wasn't-draining, he-stuck-his-finger-in-the-drain, wriggled-it-around-a-bit, removed-his-finger, and-proceeded-to-sniff-said-finger, and-in-doing-so-he-confirmed-that-there-was-indeed-poop, human-poop-in-the-tub.  I think that has a nice ring to it, don't you?

A Few Pics

I realized that I haven't posted any recent pictures of Chloe in a while.  It is mostly because I have a hard time capturing her doing the things I want to capture her doing.  Because the minute she sees me get out the camera she goes stone cold.  Also, I want to take the picture with my Canon, my iPhone, and my video camera so as to not miss out on anything, but then as I set out to gather all of my devices, I get a little distracted.

Where did I leave my camera?  Oh, I think it is in my purse.  Oh my gosh, I almost forgot to mail this bill I found in my purse!  I need to get a stamp for it.  I think I have one upstairs.  I've been meaning to change my sheets.  I'll just grab those on my way back down.  Shoot I forgot to put the towels in the dryer.  Now they reek.  I need to wash them again this time with bleach.  I think I bought a new container of bleach.  It must be in the storage closet.  What is that smell?!  Where is that coming from?  It smells like a foot.  Oh my gosh these potatoes are rotten.  I need to throw them in the back room.  Griffin come inside.  WAIT!  Your paws are dirty.  I need to get a towel.  Oh, don't look at me like that.  Let me take your picture.  Where did I leave my camera?  Oh, I think it is in my purse. 

You get the point.  But here are a few pictures.  My favorite is this one.  It was captured at the Bradley Baby first birthday party, which is best documented on Sally's blog here.

Eating oranges with Grammy.

Reading with Daddy.

Eating cereal and playing with the milk.

Grammar Soldier

I have all of these hopes and dreams for Chloe.  I'm sure that most of them are shared by all parents.  One thing I especially hope for Chloe is that she doesn't turn into one of those broken English speaking and writing teenagers.  I think I die a little inside whenever I see some of my teenage cousins' Facebook posts.  This is a real life example of a recent Facebook update:

"I miss youuu! Sounds like you're havin lotsA fun with all the drunk txts i've getting :D Enjoy it sista it's snowin here! Bring back some sunshine pleaseeee LOV E YOUUU♥"

I just threw up a little in my mouth.  Are you serious?  I'm sorry, but I just don't get it.  The silver lining? She did use her apostrophes correctly.  I'm so sad for the English language.  I know that I may go a little overboard with grammar and such, considering that the first thing I would do if I were at all involved in politics is syphon a little something off the top of that chintzy Michigan guardrail fund, and replace all of the "drive safe" signs with "drive safely" signs.  Because, dear government, an adverb that is modifying an action verb should end in "ly."  And, for the record, in nearly all cases, the end mark goes on the inside of your quotation marks.  But I digress.  So maybe we don't all have to be grammar crazy, because it really does lower your quality of life whenever you hear someone say "I'm so nauseous," and all you want to do is grab them by the shoulders and shake them while screaming "NO! You are so nauseated." I really don't want us to all be that person, but, in all honestly, I kind of want Chloe to be that person - a grammar soldier.  Yes, that is what she'll be.