Twilight: the Movie

Last Friday, my sisters-in-law and I had a Twilight movie party. First, dinner, because all parties need food. Second, we all wrote questions based on either the book or movie and all answered the questions. Guess who had the most right answers? Dum dum dum...Times up! Me! Guess what my prize was (yes, there were prizes!)? That's right--Twilight the movie! Hooray! Needless to say, Zane will not watch it with me. But I think it's better. Right now he can only mock from ignorance. Waaaay better than mocking from knowledge.

Another First

Sabrina's firsts up to this time have been predictable, boring even, except to me of course. You know, crawling, climbing a step, tooth, solid food. But yesterday she had the type of first I wasn't looking forward to at all. She visited the hospital for the first time because she was sick, and had her first x-ray. Scary, right?

So, yesterday Sabrina was with Cheri while I was at school. When I arrived to pick her up, the first thing Cheri said to me was "your baby is so sick." Ahhh! NOT the sort of thing you want to hear! She'd thrown up four times, and proceded to do so twice more while I was there. Not just food, or water, but bright green bile. Then (yes, I'm stupid) I looked up these symptoms on the internet. Bowel obstruction. Then (yes, I'm stupid) I asked mom about that. It's fine, treatable. Surgery. Ahhh!

Anyway, I took her in to the doctor, who did indeed do an x-ray for bowel obstruction, but didn't see anything bad. Phew. I'm just supposed to watch for dehydration.

In other good news, Sabrina did not throw up from 4:30 yesterday afternoon until 6:30 this morning, and this morning was not her fault. I woke up because...well...Sabrina did not eat well yesterday, and she's still nursing, and...well...if you don't get it, you're probably a man. Anyway, I had A LOT of milk, and she drank it all, and then puked all over me. Oh well, I had it coming. Since then, though, she's eaten three times and not thrown up. Just a BIG poop. I wonder if it's diarrhea. I should check the internet.

Dear Mr. Trump,

When Zane was in 9th grade, so about 1988, he took a computer class for which he needed to write a letter to a famous person. I almost wet my pants when I read it, so I though I'd share it with you. Spelling and caps as in the original

Dear D. Trump
My name is Zane Froerer, and I live in Huntsville Utah. My mom was killed in a car accident, and my dad was shot by lebanese terrorists. I lost my arm in a fire on a school bus, and was crippled when I tried to save a baby from the wreckage. I work 12 hours a day to by me dinner every other day and new underwear once a month. But now my wheel chair needs repair and I need $500,000 by next to pay the repair bill, and $500,000 by tomorrow or they will throw my and rex, my pet rat out of our home. A box under the bridge on 25th. Can you help me. My Grandma Ned needs another $1,000,000 for plastic surgery or else she will die. I saved up my money for three years and but your game. I play it every day after work. And I cut your picture out of a magazine and hung it on my wall. If I had a phone I would call you. And another thing I need $10,000 to re roof my house. I need a new coat. MY old cardboard one ripped.
your biggest fan
ZANE FROERER

It might have been funnier the first time I read it.

Hair Geysers

I gave Sabrina a bath the other day, and was disappointed to realize that the next day, her hair did not shoot up in the very satisfying way of yestermonth. Because Tiny has three (!) cowlicks in the back of her head, baths used to give her a very odd hairdo. The front, which grows forward, would lay down tamely, adhering to her perfect head. The back would stick up in all directions, giving her sort of a peacock look. Or a mullet-for-babies. You know, business in the front, party in the back? Her hair is now long enough that it is tamer, so there is just a little cowlicky stuff going on in the back. Combine that with her two teeth, occasional solid-ish poop, and sleeping through the night, and I don't know what happened to my newborn!

Outside

Although a glance out the window would seem to disprove it, Spring is here! (Stupid snow. This is Salt Lake, not Saskatchewan!) Zane and I took Sabrina to the park on Thursday to experience The Outdoors. Sabrina did not like it. Well, she liked the stroller ride just fine, and the being picked up and held, as she is a clingy little monster lately, but grass? Nope. Put my hand on that grass and I will scream to the world your perfidy! Get me up! UP!

Saturday, hoping that Thursday's experience was an anomaly, I took her to Spencer's soccer practice. Not an anomaly. This time, though, I set her down on her blanket and sat just far enough away that she had to touch the grass to get to me. Although Mommy was not quite enough of an incentive, she did start touching and pulling at the grass. At least it's an improvement.

While at the park and NOT trying to overcome sensory dislikes, Sabrina and I went down the slide together. Then I thought she could go down part of it herself. I held on to her, of course. I'm not totally depraved. I did, though, forget that a slide is angled, thus to go down the slide better, and Sabrina fell back and bonked her head. As I'm sure you can guess, she now hates slides when she is by herself. How much work will I have to do to make up for one mistake? It's like she's a middle school student or something!

A letter to the Tooth Fairy

Dear Tooth Fairy,

I'm sure you keep track of these things, but Sabrina just got her first tooth yesterday. (I think that's why she was up twice in the night. Can I register my complaint now, or is there a separate form?) It's very exciting, of course, that she has her first tooth. It's the first step to chewing, after all, which is necessary to really eat cookies. Also, if Sabrina never got teeth, that would be weird, and disturbing.

So why did I feel like crying when I discovered this new milestone? Is it because her huge, gummy smiles when I come into her room in the morning are numbered? Is it because I love her babyhood so much that I mourn any part of it ending? Or is it just because I can look forward to more interrupted nights? Whatever the reason, despite the fact that I have been looking for her first tooth for two months, I did not have unsullied joy from my discovery of yesterday.

Thank you for all you do, and I'll see you in about six years.

Sincerely,
Molly (Sabrina's mommy)

I'll teach my babe 100 words...

Yesterday I was dressing Sabrina, and she started clapping, so I said (as per usual) "Yay!" Sabrina said "Yay!" It was not just aaayyy in the same tone as me, but a really good "Yuh" to start with. I'm not sure if she really meant it, though. And also...

...Kelli told me that last Thursday Sabrina said "ba-ba" three times when she wanted her bottle. Of course, I have no independent verification, and gosh darn it, I don't want SOMEONE ELSE to have heard her first words! Grrr!

Besides her first words (sort of, maybe), Sabrina is doing so well in other areas. She is SO GOOD at crawling, and pulling herself up, and drooling on things! I love coming into her room in the morning and seeing her sitting in her crib with a big smile for mommy!

The One Who Saves The Day

One of my former students did some sort of game thingy on Facebook, where she assigned different people to different cartoon characters who had some sort of label. So, she assigned someone to "cutest couple," someone to "big stud," or whatever. In years past, I would have coveted the "sexiest" label as personified by Jasmine from Aladdin, of course, but at the ripe old age of 31, I was highly flattered and actually quite touched to be awarded Buzz Lightyear and "The One Who Saves The Day." Aw.

To infinity and beyond!

Pain in the tooth

The babe, I believe, is teething. Evidence includes: fussiness, chewing on things (like her hands, the crib rail, fuzzy blankets, the garbage can (before I could stop her; I'm a bad mother!), and the dog's tail (okay, not that last one, but I bet she would WANT to)), and not falling asleep until I put Baby Oralgel on her gums and then sleeping like the dead for, like, 5 hours. I can't wait until these teeth are all through! Let's see, I have...hmmm...about 12 more years. Not counting any future children. I guess it could be worse. She could NOT get teeth.

This Golden Age of Babyhood is fun, though. Sabrina is so darling, crawling around and so pleased with herself because she can bang on an old Quaker Oats box, or pull herself up on the couch. I have always said that being a baby is hard because geez, she's only been pooping and breathing for a few months. But right now she's been doing all those bodily functions for long enough that she's mastered them, plus she's good at crawling, can use her hands, and is just perfecting a lot of these skills. Why wouldn't she be happy? I'm happy just looking at her!

Growing up Baby

Back in the 90s (or so, it's not like I really pay attention) there was a TV show called Malcolm in the Middle. I never actually saw more than a few minutes of the show, but, as I remember, the beginning of the first show went like this:

Mom: I miss kissing his bottom, and licking his belly...
Repulsed Psychiatrist: Have you told your husband how you feel?
Mom: Oh no, not my husband. My son, when he was little.

That's how I feel. I miss the newborn Sabrina, and she's only 7 months old!

Blessings

Last Sunday, Elizabeth's new baby, Emily Rebecca, was blessed. (By the way, I'm planning on calling her Rebecca, probably. Not sure yet what the rest of the family will call her.) Right before the blessing, Jacob, who is Rebecca's 2-year-old brother, was playing with Grandma. Grandma told him to be reverent for the prayer. He immediately put his head on her knee and said (slightly muffled) "Hebenly Fader, Tank you for....Granpa (pointing blindly in Grandpa's direction)...I just about lost it. I can't wait for Sabrina to have cute talking stories!

Rebecca's blessing was really nice, too. True, she was blessed to find her husband at college, presumably BYU, but who am I to deny the promptings of the Spirit? Afterwards we went to Liz and Daniel's house for the traditional post-blessing bake off. I took cookies, which got all eaten, probably because people thought they were Karen's (my SIL). I wanted to put Sabrina down to crawl around, but she would have gotten trampled by the wild hordes of children. Instead, she fell asleep on Daddy's chest, covered by his coat. Aw.

Something is different...

Yesterday, Sabrina woke up at 7:30. Zane got up with her to give me a few more minutes of sleep (I lurve my husband!). When I got up, I fed Sabrina and played with her a little bit. I kept feeling that something was different...

Sabrina was in her baby bag (you know, pajamas with no legs that zip up). As I sat her on my lap, I realized what was wrong. She was not wearing a diaper! Somehow she had wriggled out of her diaper, which was now residing at the bottom of her baby bag, and her bottom was residing, naked, up at the normal place bottoms go. Fortunately we had no...um...need for a diaper before I got a new one on her.

Last night Dad took us to dinner at ABC Mandarin (while we were there we found out he had Chinese food with Benn and Cheri the night before. He is so nice). Sabrina sat in a high chair and ate rice. To be more exact, she tried to pick up rice, with varying success, then tried to get it in her mouth, again with varying success, and then promptly spit out any rice she managed to get in her mouth. At least she was entertained. She did have more success with the lemon from Spencer's water, which she chewed on, made a hilarious "SOUR!" face, and then chewed on again. Babies are awesome.