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Friday was my birthday. I spent the morning and early afternoon kicking around the house with my little girl. Then I spent the late afternoon kicking around the house with my little boy while the little girl napped. Then I got in the car and went to a chiropractor for the first time ever. When I was in labor with Holly, an unsuccessful attempt was made to give me an epidural. The anesthesiologist gave me a spinal which lasted an hour and a half, and after that point I was rolling with the punches on my own. She later came in and told me my spine had a twist in it and that I might want to have a chiropractor check it out. To add to that, I've been dealing with constant lower back pain since I threw out my back lifting Henry out of his crib when he was six months old. A few weeks ago I got a recommendation from a friend for a chiropractor who takes a more holistic, overall approach and that's who I went and saw on Friday. It was great. After she shifted everything back into place, I felt instant relief. As it turns out, one of my lower vertebra was twisted and kinked and that was the source for a lot of my pain. She adjusted my neck, which was frightening (she later apologized and said she doesn't normally do that on the first visit but I really needed it), adjusted my middle back, fixed my lower back, then asked me to come back tonight to see what course of long-term therapy she would recommend.

The biggest surprise was the emotional effect it had on me. Friday night I was riding high, but by Saturday afternoon I was an emotional mess. I have a feeling the chiropractor's adjustments released a pent-up emotional maelstrom that was waiting to be dealt with. I was headachy, weepy, and completely fatigued. I spent most of the weekend wanting to crawl into bed to cry and sleep. Fortunately, yesterday afternoon was better, and today I feel myself again. I'm curious to see how things look when I go this evening.

Posted by Jenn at 10:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Holly's been working very hard lately at her verbal skillz. They evolve all of the time. I took this video last week with the idea of posting it right away, but on Thursday our internet access went haywire and while we could sometimes get on, it was never long enough to be able to upload anything. Finally on Tuesday someone came out to fix it and so here we are. In the meantime, this video is so last week's talents. This week her favorite things to say are "Doggie! 'oof 'oof!" and "Ah! Ah! Ah! BOOM!", the latter of which she says while standing, the "boom" coming when she plops back down onto her butt. This afternoon I asked her to say "mommy", then asked her to say "Holly" which she did while pointing to herself. All very thrilling stuff. To me. And probably to the grandparents. Aaaaaand probably not very many other people beyond that.

Anyway, here's the video from last week:

Posted by Jenn at 02:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The other night after lights out, Henry and I were laying in his bed when he asked why people, who generally spend a good portion of their day vertical, sleep horizontally. (Guess what concepts they've been studying in school?) I said something along the lines of it being more comfortable, then I asked him what he thought about sleeping vertically and would he like to try it sometime. He said no, but then informed me that cows sleep vertically, unless they're shaped like garages, then they sleep horizontally. He was very adamant about the garage-shaped cow sleeping horizontally. Over the course of the conversation it became clear that he's deriving some of his cow facts from the movie Cars, which has cow-like tractors, as well as WordWorld. I briefly panicked that this was the only exposure to cows that he has had, but then quickly came to my senses.

Back to the garage-shaped cow. What's he talking about? I'm stumped.

Posted by Jenn at 11:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Last week on Tuesday Henry's school had their Kindergarten Open House. I used to love open house night when I was a kid. There was something so cool about going to school after hours; you feel more like you own it, as opposed to it owning you.

Henry was very excited about showing us around the building. First we went to his gym, which doubles as the cafeteria. We briefly met his gym teacher, but were deftly rerouted by Henry to his classroom, where we received the grand tour of pretty much everything. We saw his cubby, his desk, the lego table, the playstove (Where Henry decided we would have an impromptu cooking session. Upon opening the oven and seeing two dolls in there, he said "Who's cooking babies? We don't want to do that!"), the monthly calendar, and, because he's his daddy's kid, we twice visited the classroom's electronic whiteboard. Then he led the way to his music room, after which we were instructed to close our eyes and hold his hands so that he could lead us down seemingly endless halls to his art room and finally the library, where, after almost fifty minutes of mounting excitement, he and some of his friends serendipitously converged. It was like watching the Big Bang (The theory, not the show): the excitement of the night won out and they all started acting nuts. It took some effort to extricate the young man before the library was reduced to rubble, but we managed. When we left one of his friends was stomping around on a small dais in the Kindergarten area and another was commando-crawling across the carpet to his less-than-thrilled mom.

I think my favorite part of the evening was when, in the music room, he ran into one of his pre-school buddies, who said "HENRY! HIGH FIVE!!!" after which he started walking around in circles singing "UH-UH, TCH! UH-UH TCH! We will, We will ROCK YOU!" Henry lit up and started playing the drums on his chest and beat-boxing along. It was hilarious. His teacher doesn't know it, but she's happy that they aren't in the same class together.

Posted by Jenn at 01:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I seem to have taken a bit of a hiatus from the blog. It's probably my subconscious prepping me for next month's NaBloPoMo craziness. Purge my brain, clear my thoughts, assuming there was anything there to begin with.

When last I wrote, my parents were arriving within a few hours, and my mom had plans to surprise the young man at the bus stop. She did, and although it took him from the time he jumped from the last step of the bus onto the sidewalk to the time he got to me to realize I was not there alone, he was indeed very surprised. After a range of reactions which ultimately culminated in a resonant "THHBBBTTT!" for lack of any better way to express himself, he played it off like he knew all along. When we got home, he saw his Grandpa and said, as non-chalantly as a five year old can play it off, "Oh, you're here, too," and with that, the weekend was off with a bang.

Saturday was by far our busiest day. We had a leisurely breakfast, after which we headed out to a local Octoberfest. Dave has been dreaming every night of the Disney Biergarten beer and buffet since we got back home, so he was anxious to heft another stein, as was my dad. The beer was good, although it stands to reason it would have been better had it been accompanied by the sight of my uncle sporting lederhosen while playing the alp horn. There was a bounce house, a horse and buggy ride, apple crisp, and battered mushrooms, so the rest of us were equally happy. We returned home for a brief respite before heading over to the University's football game. Holly and I hung back for part of it so she could sleep off the morning a bit. We arrived just after half-time and celebrated the last two quarters with Twizzlers, popcorn, goldfish, a smoothie, and raucous waving of plastic hand-clackers. By the time the game ended, four of us were wrecked and staggered home, while my Dad and Dave headed over to the soccer game. Their energy was bewildering. There must have been some magic in that Octoberfest beer.

The rest of the visit we spent laying low. The weather turned to a chilly, drizzly mess Sunday night and stayed that way for the rest of the week. It forced us inside where it was cozy, and we spent Monday and Tuesday relaxing. Henry was thrilled both days to see his Grammy waiting for him at the bus stop when he came home. It was very sweet. I'm not even going to mention the amazing dinners they cooked while they were here, because it just makes me glum, especially knowing what we're going to have for dinner tonight. Needless to say, it was hard to see them off on Wednesday morning.

Posted by Jenn at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Over the course of the week, Dave and I take turns working on the Sunday newspaper's crossword puzzle whenever we have a spare moment. For me, that's usually when I've turned in for the night and for Dave, it's also usually when he turns in for the night, many, many hours after I have. This morning I decided to take a quick break between baking Dave's birthday cake (Happy Birthday, Dave!) and cleaning the bathroom before my parents get here. As I was perusing the crossword clues, I came across "Sci-Fi craft" and the first thought that crossed my mind was "What? Like aliens made out of popsicle sticks?" Then I noticed Dave had already filled that one in and of course the answer was "UFO". That makes far more sense. What is wrong with me?

Meanwhile, while I was writing this post, my mom called and said they had just crossed over into Pennsylvania. Break's over.

Posted by Jenn at 09:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)