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We had an early Christmas with the Machamers at our house. I only did a meager attempt with the decorations, complete with a miniature table-top live tree with only lights and no ornaments. My lack of Christmas spirit was probably evident to everyone but no one commented. I only felt a little bit guilty after finding out that Jim’s girlfriend Saman was coming and it was her first Christmas. I think my only regret is that I don’t have a cute photo of Allison in front of a decked out Christmas tree. Or one with Santa. Yep, feel like a crummy mom for that.

Claire and I are excited we get to share in the boys Christmas present. The four of us are going to Nashville to take a cooking class at the Viking school one Saturday night in March. And I just realized that it’s actually in Franklin, Tn, one of my favorite places to shop! So that complicates the schedule some. I think we’ll do an early birthday celebration with family for Allison’s first birthday that morning and then I want to get out early to shop, check in the hotel and make it to the cooking class by 5pm. I was torn on how much of a party to throw for her first, but that may have just decided that.

On Christmas day we flew to Houston. Certain baby things are still stressing me out and I was already worked up about how this would go. I can definitely say I didn’t lose my sanity on this one and am super relieved! Security at Huntsville seemed more strict than in Houston, but it was empty and the people were friendly, and only mildly suspicious of the diaper cream that was bigger than the allowed 3.4oz. Allison even slept in Jeff’s lap for the second half of the flight which worked out great because I was the one crying and holding in the screams. Ears that don’t pop combined with a sinus infection that made me wonder if facial bones were cracking probably made for a scary face that would have frightened my child. The drive from IAH to my dad’s town was only a little over 2 hours. So we got there soon after my brothers gang. Saturday was the crazy day with a houseful of people. The kind of noisy, can’t hear yourself think, gathering that makes you love holidays. Somewhere in the mix of bloody marys and story-telling, Paul decided to reenact his karaoke production originally written and presented at a NASA/JSC party of his song about doing be happy, be mad, be mad. This required a few female backup singers and my dads sweat/head band and sunglasses. I have a video I’ll link up later. Most of my step siblings cleared out that night, so I had more time to catch up with my brother who half the time just seemed to stare at me like I was a stranger with a baby. He probably still sees me as the annoying 11 year old that would bug him and friends bad enough to make him poor a beer on my head.

So we’re back at home, glad to be back in our own bed even if that did include Allison for a few hours. I have no idea if her ear infection didn’t heal, if it’s teething or what, but she’s not happy laying down in her own bed. Now I have to find time for all that laundry, cleaning and trying to squeeze in a few visits with old friends that are in town for the holidays and then going out for New years. Glad the in-laws will be here to babysit for that.

I had just written how our dr said to make her work for her toys. Well what do you know, just 2 days later she's crawling. Jeff and I were baffled. I ran to get my Iphone so I got video of the second time she crawled (that we have seen).


More videos on my Youtube account here: http://www.youtube.com/lynnmach/

I actually took Allison to the dr the day before her checkup because I couldn't have her screaming anymore. And sure enough she had a double ear infection. That place stays so packed they didn't have time to do the rest of her well-baby stuff, so we had to come back the next day and pay another $20 co-pay.
Allison weighs 19 lbs and is 28.25 inches long with a head size of 45 cm. That translates to 50% in weight, 75% in length and 90% in head size. So we have a long skinny baby that's off balance because of her head size. haha. We were told by the doctor to start making her work for her toys. She needs to get around the room better whether its crawling, pulling, rolling or whatever.

I know we have a great baby that is fairly easy to deal with and I've been reminded of that this week, when it wasn't so easy. I dread all the future sicknesses that are inevitable. I need to figure out something to calm my nerves because when it hits on a certain time of the month I have trouble holding it together. I hate to be one of those people that blame things on hormones but I've always been a pretty laid back person that could count the amount of times I cried over a year on one hand and lately that attitude and tear production has really been tested. I think I came close to throwing the coffee table at the wall last night. It didn't happen but I sure did think of doing it to get Jeff's attention. Instead I just stomped on the hardwood floor sounding as loud as King Kong coming in. I'm hoping the hormones calm down by next week when we test out the flying with an infant ordeal.

So I'm not sure I want to admit this on my blog, but I have now read the first 3 books in the Twilight series in one week. Yes one week. I have said that I wanted to know what was sweeping the nation, making moms scream for the movie releases right along side their teenage daughters and now I know. I'm not ready to wear the Edward shirt Taryn said she bought me (she was kidding I hope) but I will say that these books have sucked me in. I'm going to do my best to hold off on the last book till next week after company leaves and yes I do feel there will be a gravitational pull that will be a real fight for me. I've never understood how Jeff could be so much of a book worm until now. Yes there have been books that were great page turners for me, but not where I couldn't put them down to sleep or hang out with friends. I can't believe myself Saturday. Jeff took Allison to Birmingham to hang with family and I had the day to myself. It was cold and rainy and I mostly read (Well, 3 loads of laundry, some cleaning and Christmas decorating too). That is so unlike me. Normally I would have been calling every friend I knew anxious to get out, but nope, I just read. It was good and bad. The bad part is I still haven't learned about vampire sex. Such torture to make me wait till the last book. I've already heard the rumors on how they'll make the second movie while trying to keep it PG-13 so the hysterical girls can come.
Now the busy week starts, and it better be busy so I can forget about that damn book for a few days :)

For the last 6 months at least I have ofcourse been wishing to get back to my pre-pregnancy weight. The last 5 pounds decided to take up permanent residence in my stomach and thighs. Skip ahead to this week when I started reading the Twilight book - yes I had to find out what this craze is that has taken over the nation. So I started that Sunday night and by Monday was about halfway done with a 400 or 500 page book. And I thought, damn, it's only Monday and I only get about 2-3 hours of reading time in after Allison goes to bed, so it'd be nice to skip a day of work to read. Can you see where this is going? I got my day off and I got that 5 lbs off. And it may have been the worst 12 hours of my life. The stomach bug started about 5pm when I was home with Allison alone (Jeff was in Atlanta). Luckily the restroom is right off her bedroom and I almost made it to the toilet every time. I'll skip those details. After she went to bed it just got worse. I think I got about 3 hours of sleep that night. I have a hard time asking for help, but my friend Heather offered to take Allison to daycare and I gladly took her up on that offer. It's good to have a friend with a flexible work schedule. Well it's good to have friends period! So I gradually got better yesterday, mostly chugged Gatorade and looked at the crackers in my hand. Jeff got home early this morning and he'll need some recovery time to get over the guilt trip I gave him. But now the house needs some Clorox sprayed into the ventilation system before company comes next weekend. Guess I may be doing a major scrub down instead of baking those cookies.

A little bit of snow came through this weekend. Ofcourse on a weekend when it didn't get me out of work :) Jeff went outside and got a snowball for Allison and ofcourse the first thing she did was put it up to her mouth. Maybe next year we'll get a photo of one smashed on her head - had to be nice this time :)

Thursday night my friend Taryn organized a girls night out for going on the art gallery tour that happens twice a year. I’ve been once or twice but not since the new Lowe Mill and Flying Monkey Arts center opened up. So we hit a few of the art galleries and the only highlights from those were Zara Edwards new pieces and a Gigi’s cupcake. Our last stop was the Flying Monkey Arts center. This is in a rough neighborhood that is slowly getting revitalized now that the homeless shelter has moved. Inside, the second floor has rough artist space where it’s divided with chain length fence or homemade constructed walls, and some of the art is what I’d consider ok, while other stuff would fit in better on the walls of my kid’s daycare. The third floor was all new to me. It was gorgeous and felt like a real gallery. Artists had their own room/mini gallery each with a large window to see inside.

When we got there I saw my favorite Art History professor and talked to him briefly. Then I probably ran into another 10 people I knew mostly from the art department. And I ran into a friend from highschool Kristy Jane that is an art instructor and has studio space there. I also found out that one of my art professors passed away this year, so in January when the UAH art department moves over to Wilson Hall, they will have an exhibit dedicated to Mark Marchlinski (sp?). I look forward to checking that out.

On the baby front, Allison had a stomach bug this week so both Jeff and I missed some work staying home with her. She threw up once on Jeff and once at daycare and had some bad diapers, but overall she was still her happy self. So no complaints from us. (That could change if I get it. Jeff was sick some last night but I think he’s coming around this morning.) I am running out of things to entertain a baby all day. I actually turned on cartoons this morning. Bob the builder was using solar panels! I’m excited how the next generation will be learning all this green stuff. Allison wasn’t that interested in the TV though. I’m glad, but also worried since I want her to like it enough to distract/entertain her while traveling.

She’s really good at peak-a-boo now. She’ll grab burp cloths or her shirt or whatever and put it over her face for a few seconds and drop it and expect you to give her a shrilly voice and smile :) She’s still not officially crawling but she’s pulled forward with her ams some. And she’ll go from her tummy to sitting up pretty good now. Except today where she must have had some momentum going and kept going backwards hitting her head on the toybox. Oops.

Here's a snippet of a g-talk conversation with my PREGNANT sister-in-law

Claire: VERY funny quote from an expecting friend
"if they made a wine smelling perfume, I would probably bathe in it."

Lynn: then you'd be tortured all day though

Claire: great point!
I think I am over wine
I just can't wait until I can have 2 or 3 glasses

Lynn: it still gives me a headache now

Claire: let me have my dream!

Lynn: :) sorry!

It's the first of the month, which means I got to pick out a new computer wallpaper. Every month Smashing Magazine has a long list of choices many with a calendar. I picked the neon Christmas tree towards the bottom. I needed something in my office to get me in the spirit considering I just put out Halloween decorations. Stupid I know. This year we're having a holiday party where every floor has a different holiday and ours is Halloween. Other floors got Christmas or New Years or Mardi Gras and will get to leave out their decorations for a month. I swore I would not help out again this year, but being one of only a few females on the floor, ofcourse I got suckered into it.

At home, we bought a table top live Christmas tree. It's a little dinky but I didn't feel like bringing out all of my Christmas decorations when Jeff could care less and Allison is too young. I'll try to get pics up soon.

We had a good visit in Meridian for Thanksgiving with the rest of the Machamer clan. Karen cooked up enough to feed us all weekend. The guys played a ton of card games while me or Karen got baby duty most of the time. Karen said something about Allison being out of the cuddling stage, but then she proceeded to sleep in her arms for 2 hours! Somehow I don't think Karen minded that at all. Uncle Jim was the only one that made Allison cry. Maybe she doesn't know what to think of men with hair :) We ofcourse watched the Iron Bowl which was a great game even if Auburn lost. Who would have thought they could keep the lead the entire game (well till the last 2 minutes) against the team ranked #2. I don't think there were many Tiger fans complaining even though we lost.

At home things seemed to have changed a bit. I think my cat and my baby have swapped personalities. I took Ginger (cat) to the vet last week and since the blood work came back normal, the vet gave her a cortisone shot hoping that would fix her bulimia problem. So far it has! It's been great, I've left food out and she no longer howls like a grumpy old cat. Instead, we're getting noise and screaming from Allison. I think some of it is her discovering her voice, but lately she's been more whiny and crying alot. I know we traveled for the holiday so that probably messed with her somewhat, but then Monday daycare said she had a good day, so I was hopeful it'd be an easy night getting back into a routine. Nope. She feel asleep in the car and upon waking up a half hour later at home she cried. And cried till she was occupied with eating. And then went back to crying. I finally got her happy before her bath and all was well for a little bit. Who knows if her cold is getting worse or teething or what.

Yesterday was a strange day. I didn't sleep well from what I thought was a regular stomach ache (they are common for me). After getting up and showering, I was shaking from being cold, then hot, then nauseous all with a bad headache. My reaction was just like when I take a pain pill - more misery than whatever pain came before. So I stayed in bed and slept and slept. After eating a bagel, soup and some aspirin I braved going into work. Things mellowed out so I'm going to blame it on the Indian food. Which is odd, because it was just a jar from Williams Sonoma and was on the bland side.

That night I went ahead and went to the art class I had signed up for even though my friend canceled on me. I didn't want to loose another $35 (Jeff was sick for the other one I signed up for). I'm glad I went, I sat with some other ladies I know from work and I do like the painting. My only complaint is that the room was so crowded, there was not space to get up and look at your painting from afar. So now I can see my hazy circle is a little crooked. I still like it though, just not sure where to hang it.

The next movie in the Twilight series comes out today. I have not read the books and I'm starting to feel left out of society. There are Twilight products everywhere. Bath and Body works even has a lotion. Seriously. Do you want to smell like vampires, or is that their way of saying it has a magical ingredient to enhance your olfactory senses to be closer to that of a vampires? Even my sister has read the books, just so she can know what her daughter is talking about :) I said I'd read them if a friend loaned them to me but I wasn't going to buy a teenager book. I can see the appeal though and a vampire love story seems to get reinvented every decade or so. Though I'm not sure why this one is making such big waves. Yeah, the characters are good looking but I think they could have found hotter ones. And honestly I don't think the main female character is a great actor. I'm hoping she improved for the second movie. I may go see it Monday night with some friends. Gotta keep a foot into popular social norms at least.

So I was googling how to child proof a Christmas tree and an article that was not helfpul at all did have a great idea in the comments section. Get big cardboard boxes, fill with heavy books and wrap them in Christmas paper and place around the tree. This just might work! (this year anyway :)

That stands for cry it out. I learned that on some baby blog. At the time when I read it, I had a perfect innocent baby. Now that baby is starting to get smarter and wants to manipulate her parents.
This past weekend I don’t think Allison was feeling quite herself, probably getting over a stomach bug, has 2 teeth coming, ran a fever one day, etc. So when she was overly tired and couldn’t fall asleep, I helped her with some cuddle time. Monday she had a great day at daycare, get home she’s fine, we go through the nightly routine (still trying to be consistent with this) of playtime, dinner, bath, book, bottle, bed. She fell asleep after the bottle in Jeff’s arms but as soon as she was put in her crib she forced herself to wake up. I think she has learned that playing is much more fun than sleeping. So she screamed. After a couple minutes we came in, gave her the pacifier, flipped her on her back and left. Scream again. Wait a few minutes we come in, and she stops immediately and smiles at us, like yep, you’re a sucker for this cute face. So we finally shut the door and waited and about 20 minutes of crying and screaming later she collapsed from exhaustion and feel asleep with only one slight blip about 1 am which was fixed with a pacifier. Up until this point we’ve never had to let her cry for anything (excluding that first month of pure shock which doesn’t count).
In conclusion – parenting just got harder :)

life is a bit hectic right now, so just a quick blog update that will most likely not be in complete sentences (just to drive my tech writer friends crazy)

Sister-in-law Claire "officially" announced she's pregnant. yeah! Can't wait for the newest baby Machamer in May. (http://clairemach.blogspot.com"). Claire keeps finding questions to ask me and somehow I've already forgotten some of them. I'm pretty sure though that my pregnancy was easier than what she's going through. Here's to an easier labor for Claire ;)

Allison is 8 months old today. She's still the cutest and happiest baby ever but I think I've written all that before. She's just working on that first tooth, but that darn tooth is causing some stinky explosions in another part of her body. OMG - why! She's still not crawling yet - just going backwards, but just yesterday she was up on all 4's rocking. She's not pulling up in her crib, but she'll get on her stomach and lift up to look over the edge and scream. She does alot of screaming. Usually not mad screaming, more like she's just checking out her voice. Jeff heard that babies cry to develop their lungs, so maybe since she doesn't cry, she's screaming to help in development. I'll take a loud happy baby any day over a loud angry one :)

I'm not sure I've written about it here but I've had foot pain for while. It was never enough to bother with a dr till Saturday. So what do I do, post a comment on facebook and what do you know, I have a diagnosis in a matter of minutes. hehe. I went to the dr on Wednesday and she confirmed Plantar Fascitis. So I have stretches to do and shoe inserts to wear. In the meantime, I came to work today in high fashion - slacks with tennis shoes. I match several engineers out here. Oh, and I ordered FitFlops. I know my mother-in-law just let out a happy scream. I'll keep you posted if they fit my skinny feet.

On the growing list of things to do....
Jeff and I are looking at windows for our house. Yes our 5 year old house has wood windows that suck. I also need to get new tires for my car, hopefully before the drive at Thanksgiving. I'm planning 2 baby showers (one at work and one for a friend). Work is super busy right now which is disappointing b/c I was hoping to do the above item at work. I still have some Christmas shopping to do. Jeff has a work trip in a few weeks which reminds me it will be his 3rd week without baby duties while I've only had one night off. I'm still looking for a girlfriend weekend to give him his payback.

ok, finished lunch, back to work.

For Allison's first Halloween she was a pink leopard. It looked like an easy onesie type of outfit and well anything with a hoodie with ears is going to be cute on a baby, so I got it. Maybe next year the ladybug costume will fit. We went to Keith and Angie's (the party house) and they had a houseful. Keith rigged up the John Deer lawn mower to pull a trailer with hay, so we had a hayride. I thought it was cute and got a big laugh when there were 2 much bigger trailers in the neighborhood decked out with lights and decorations holding about 15 people on them. What ever happened to kids having to walk to get candy?! Allison was a great baby and we hoped that keeping her up 2 hours past her bedtime would help her adjust to the time change but we're not sure it did. She didn't sleep good that night (could have been the over-stimulation :) and she still got up the regular time which today was 5am. Fingers crossed she makes it to 6 am tomorrow.

On her other updates, she's still just scooting backward, not forward. So far no big fussiness from the tooth that is breaking through. She's babbling alot but hasn't said momma or dada with intention. I think she's been trying to kiss us lately - she'll just come at you for a head bang with an open mouth, it's pretty funny. And sometimes if I'm holding her with a tanktop on, I swear she's trying to scratch off my freckles. I'm not sure how much she weighs, maybe 18lbs, but it's a great size for a hug and snuggle.

Today we tried out hiking with a very nice backpack my friend Stacy gave us. It was a little cold and windy (probably high 50s up on the mountain) but Allison did great. I say mountain, but Monte Sano is really just a big hill, but the only mountain we have around here. Hopefully she'll enjoy many more hikes and camping trips in the future.

When I picked up Allison from daycare today, Mrs Altman came running up to me so excited, Allison has her first tooth coming in. I was a little taken aback by how excited this lady was. Am I supposed to be this excited? It just makes me nervous that my happy baby is going to be cranky. We'll see.

Wow Friday night seems like so long ago... can't remember if we did anything. We were probably our usual selves meaning I was in bed at 9:30 and left Jeff on the computer. Lately that would be - on the computer playing bejeweled blitz on facebook. If he's playing that I must hold my verbal thoughts for 60 seconds till he's inbetween games. You just play each game for a minute and it's fast paced, so I'm not supposed to talk and mess him up. He was sort of polite about it, I believe his words were, "can you just NOT talk for ONE minute." I figure it was nicer than "shut up" :)

Saturday morning Allison had a nice long nap (she sleeps so much longer at home than at daycare) and we cleaned up the house some. When I checked facebook I saw that the new Kalou's Corner Market down the street in Providence was advertising smoked ribs. Jeff about came out of his chair, first because of the ribs and then because he didn't know they were announcing their daily specials. So he went down there and picked some up for lunch. I swear, that man can just be flying on cloud nine when he eats something with a delicious sauce on it. After the ribs were gone he just stood over the tinfoil drooling over the sauce that was left. I said well just get a piece of bread to sop up the sauce and he called me his hero.

A few hours later we got in the car with the intention of stopping by Champion windows and then the airport, but instead drove around some of the new construction development around Zierdt road until it was time to pick up his parents from the airport. We got to hear about their great trip to San Diego and all the wonderful food, and how they gave their leftover dinners to the homeless people. We probably got back to the house close to 4, turned on the Penn State game for Bruce and then Jeff and I put on nicer clothes to get our belated anniversary dinner at Bonefish. I thought my mahi mahi was good till I had his swordfish. I also had my new favorite martini there, a pine-apple one. So we'll definitely be going back. We had left fairly early, about 5:20 so Jeff would not have to miss much of the Auburn game. When we got back, turned on the Auburn game which was pitiful and making Jeff scream, so I headed over to the neighbors halloween party. Then I had to text Jeff when two of his friends were there, so he came over.

Sunday I stayed on the go, trip to Target, then we all went to lunch at IHOP, then us ladies went shopping at Burlington's Baby Depot ( great prices, but have to search through clothes like at TJMaxx which can be annoying). The guys worked on building arm muscle for 3 hours and installed a ceiling fan in Allison's room. Then one of Karen's friends stopped by and got to play with an adorable baby and tell Karen yes it's worth it for her to transfer her dental license to the state of Alabama when she moves. We had some of Jeff's chili for dinner which was especially yummy because I got to eat the bread for enjoyment and not just to put the fire out in my mouth. And luckily I remembered (though a little late, about 8:30pm) that Karen wanted to check out the Wii Fit. So we all got on there and did a body test. Karen was up first, but for her balance test had to use Jeff to hold on to. Her result - a Wii Fit age of 27 !! Then Bruce was up doing his balance test and nope, was stepping off the board in just seconds. His Wii fit age: 75!! Then Jeff and I got on there for the first time in months, that was months ago when I was gung-ho about loosing the pregnancy weight. And I did show up as loosing 5.5 pounds. Somehow the wii transferred those exact 5.5 lbs to Jeff's weight :) We played a few games and called it quits about 10pm. So that made 2 nights this weekend I was up past 10pm. Amazing. Now I'm back at work, relaxing.

In my free time at work I've been building up my google reader with too many websites to go through. I've now got a few folders for decorating, friends, web and freelance, tech, and misc. I'm really enjoying the decorating blogs I've come across. So many good ideas and not enough time to do them. I even have a few for baby room ideas and hostess ideas. Not that I can usually get people come to my house, but I try. That reminds me, I didnt post the photo of the painting I did for Allison's room. I've been feeling a little guilty for not customizing my own childs room. After all I do have a little bit of talent, I should create something for her. I found a cute photo on the internet, so I decided to get out my paints. It's not the wall mural I first had high hopes of creating, but hey, I think it's pretty darn cute. I've bookmarked several other things I'd love to paint... one day.

So this is a rant for all my female friends reading this blog. Yep - any guys, just go back to clicking on gizmodo or whatever gadget site that fascinates you.
I'm wearing my second pair of pre-pregnancy jeans this morning. It is such a relief when you get one foot in, then the second, and the jeans are still able to slide up, yes, over the butt, YES, and ugh take a deep breath, now button - yes they are on! Damn, as soon as that thought came with the next exhale this bulge of fat came with it. out of nowhere. Actually, not out of nowhere, I've been eying it for a 7 months, cursing at it to go away, but it's still there. I've never been built in a way to have a flat stomach. My longtime theory has been that if you have hips it will stretch your midsection flat. I've had not so skinny friends with six-pack abs that made me do a doubletake. I on the otherhand, am wearing mens jeans right now because I have no hips. I guess the pregnancy did not spread my hips out either, which is good, but the loose skin is just gross.
My hope in writing some of this is that these words can manipulate themselves into some sort of motivation to move my butt to the gym. I am no good at dieting and working out has never been fun, except for the time period I worked out with my crazy friend Taryn. Maybe I'll try to use my mother-in-law as an example who gets herself up at 5 am to do pilates. I'd rather not wait till after major back surgery to get that kind of motivation, so I need some of it to rain down on me now. So if you see me, go ahead and ask if I made it to the gym. We'll see if guilt will work too :)

Monday of this week started a KidsMarket consignment sale. It’s huge and they do it twice a year. I went in early March one day after work but as I walked alongside this long line with swollen belly and ankles and realized that was for checking out, I just turned around and walked out. So I figured this time I’d take off a couple hours early and check it out – a few days after it opened. Normally I’m all for a good bargain, but after 30 minutes of sifting through baby clothes and finding maybe 8 items that did NOT have stains on them, I moved on. I think that sale has turned out like so many other things that get popular – it’s overpriced. (Fans of Unclaimed Baggage know what I’m talking about) I was also looking for jeans for my nephews and I found Old Navy jeans with worn knees for $15. Come on people! What are those new, maybe $20 during a sale. And my friend found a package of new infant onesies marked $7.50 when there was a walmart sale price of $2.50 on it. After that I just quit looking and helped my friend sort through baby stuff. This was a friend that made the mistake of telling me the name they have picked out for their baby boy (due in a few months). You would think that after just having a baby myself I would have been more sensitive to feelings but nope, I reverted back to the way I’ve always been and blurted out the first thing that came to my mind. The name they picked out is Dax. I said it sounds too much like dicks and he’ll get beat up in school. I asked what other names they were considering and she just gave me a blank look and said that was it. I laughed and apologized how I just shot down the one and only name they had. ( I’m so sorry Sunny!) . She laughed and said now I know why you didn’t tell people the name you had picked out. Inside she probably wanted to punch me. When I got home and asked Jeff what he thought, he recognized the name right away from whatever Sci-Fi show its from (I won’t make a guess because it’ll just insult the diehard fans). I think in the future I’ll just keep my mouth shut on baby names. I lean towards more traditional names that won’t confuse their teachers for 18 years to come.

Yesterday I ordered an umbrella stroller. A year ago I got all excited when a tall friend of ours did research and found a stroller he liked and was tall enough. So when it was baby registry time, I was looking for it and found out it was discontinued. Well damn, this meant I had to do my own research. Wow, there are a ton of baby strollers out there and you know what – only one has extendable handles and it’s $359 !! I just couldn’t bring myself to buy something that top of the line, when other options start at $20. Actually that’s middle of the line since there are umbrella strollers over $600 – but I think you have to live in Hollywood to own them. So in my research I found a photo of Brooke Shields with an Uppababy stroller. Well that just solved it for me, if it’s tall enough for her, it will certainly work for me and it was only $150. And it came in red, so I’m sold. I’ll write more after we use it some.