McCain selected Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his Vice President running mate. First, if he gets elected I hope he lives a long life. I don't trust that Palin is prepared to take over as President should McCain decide it's time to kick the bucket during his presidency. He is 72 after all. While she may be a good person with similar views as McCain, she doesn't have enough political experience. She was governor for only two years and mayor of a small town prior.

I'm all for supporting women to run for office, but I think this choice clearly shows poor judgment on McCain's part. The term "loose canon" comes to mind. He didn't think through with a clear head. I fully believe he is playing to the public's eagerness for change and is off his game in this race. I don't trust that McCain's decisions will get much better if in office.

I'll be voting Obama, thank you. If I had bumper stickers, they'd say:
Obama '08
I am Pro-'Bama
No way. No how. No McCain!

Two new milestones with Elliot today: 1) he can now make the 'm' sound and even said 'mma-mma-mma' while looking at me, and 2) he pulled up to standing one time today at the foot of the stairs. After he stood holding on to the step I got excited and joined him on the floor. But then he wanted attention and didn't stand again.

I went shopping at the Divine Consign buying just over $100 of clothes for the boys. Elliot now has a winter coat but I'll have to find a new jacket for Josh somewhere else. I won't know until tomorrow or end of Saturday how much of my stuff sold. So far the baby swing is gone because I didn't see it on the floor. Next Spring I'll have more stuff to sell as Elliot outgrows the baby stuff and graduates to the toddler stuff.

I'm looking forward to our upcoming three-day-weekend even though we don't have any plans yet.

Here's me trying to put up a tent covering with Josh's "help". Actually he was an active observer.

Me: Dang it, the pole keeps- wait wait wait- ok, I think I got- oh no!- argh! it came out, ok I think I can- ARGH!- up up up- hold it- no no!- ARRGGHH! God- Mother- ok, ok let's see- stupid breeze- if I can just- no no wait, the pole again- not you too!- I just need to- wait wait wait- ARRGGHH! @$#!&%!!!
Josh: Mommy, you said @$#!&%.
*a quiet moment*
Me: Yes, I did. That was bad.

I battled it a few more minutes then gave up. Stupid tent covering. I don't need it anyway!

I joined Twitter this week. I still don't get it though. Like Friendster, this is a flash in the pan that will eventually have a number of abandoned memberships. I've tried to find "long losy high school friends" with no success. Like me, they probably don't want to be found!

Josh told me this morning that he would like to be a pirate for Halloween. And not just any pirate- he wants to be a big pirate! He means he wants the hat and long sword.

I'm not sure how I want to dress Elliot for Halloween. He's a crawler and explorer now so any outfit that looks good on the floor or plays the part of crawling will do fine. I'll see what's on sale at the consignment sale next week before I get creative or buy new.

I took the kids to the Natural Science Museum last Thursday. Josh really enjoyed! He liked the Children's area where he could play and explore science concepts. But he really enjoyed the big kid stuff like the tornado emulator, photovoltaic wall and the router display. (Is this a surprise?) He also enjoyed the hot air balloon that rises two stories. But he didn't care about the dinosaur bones. I guess that's a leap in knowledge he hasn't made yet.

Next year we'll go again but we'll take the Dart rail instead. I am sooo excited about this rail coming close to our area. Oh man- it'll be awethum! The new DART Green Line will go from Carrollton to Love Field to Downtown to Deep Ellum to Fair Park to Lake June. By September next year the Southeast portion should be open and our station will be probably early 2010.

All the weddings are done, all the parties attended, all our visitors have gone home. I don't know what to do with myself any more! My last big thing to look forward to is the consignment sale next weekend.

And taking our next push to potty train Josh. He knows how but doesn't want to do it at home. The down time should be ideal for us to focus on that.

Josh's willfulness is about to drive me insane! It's a struggle to do the simplest things: put on your shoes, get in the car seat, go to the potty, get in the bath tub, lay down in bed, eat your dinner, put on your shirt, close the door... When he gets it in his head that he's in charge he snaps "No!" or whines "I don't wanna...". Then it's a battle of the wills to get him to do (or not do) whatever.

This evening I asked him to turn around to face me while I was putting on a nighttime diaper. He kept turning away from me half as a game, half in defiance. After a full day of battles I snapped. I pushed him down, hastily strapped on his diaper then left him alone in his room to cry while I took a moment of time-out to calm down. We've apologized to each other and made our case ("Mommy, don't hurt me" "Joshua, please do as you're told") and now we're on good terms again.

On the up side, Rusty will be home tomorrow afternoon. There will be much rejoicing with him home!

It's only Friday but it feels like Saturday night already. Thursday Emily & Ian left town after brunch. After eating with friends (Tommy, Kathy, Lee & Barb) then sending Emily & Ian off, I spent an hour napping with Elliot and another hour cleaning house. Lee & Barb then came by to visit and help me with last minute bachelor/bachelorette party planning.

Yesterday night was the party. Rusty & I both participated but in shifts. He got the first half which was dinner at TomTom's. Apparently the food was fantastic because everyone raved about it. I attended the back half of the evening. I entertained and cared for the boys in the uptown area during dinner then we switched at the half-way point in front of The Ginger Man Pub. After a drink or two, we all moved on to Backdoor Comedy. The show was late starting but that's okay because we were late-ish to all get there. We opened with Mark Agee, had several other comedians then ended with Raj Sharma who did a roast of Tommy & Kathy. Oh man- we laughed so hard for so long! My stomach muscles were sore after the show! I tipped the roaster $50. This morning Tommy & Kathy sent this:

I woke up this morning in one of those "Oh Hey, I'm awake." moments.
I tried going back to sleep, but I was still glowing from how fun last
night was. All I could think about was how fun everything was and how
much it meant to me. My muscles were still a bit sore from laughing
and crying from laughing that much.

Thank you both, so very much for last night. It had us truly present
to how great our friends are and how much they love us.

Yarr!
-Kathy and Tommy.

I didn't get home until 1am then woke up at 6:45 when the boys got up.

The Falgout-Carter wedding is tomorrow. I'll take Elliot with me leaving Josh with a babysitter for a couple or few hours. I hope to make it through most of the reception but it depends largely on whether I can get Elliot to nap on my lap without too much noise. The good news is that the wedding and reception are at the same place and it happens to be close to my home in Carrollton. yay!!


Also on Thursday, Rusty's grandfather, Frank Macedon, passed away in the morning. It was abrupt but not entirely surprising. Rusty left at 4am this morning to fly out with his parents to Las Vegas as they settle affairs. Tomorrow they will dress the body then Sunday they will have a private viewing, a blessing by a nun then send the body to the mortuary. The plan is to cremate but I'm clear whether that's Sunday or some other time. Hopefully Rusty will be back home Monday.

With all that said, I need to shower and primp before bed since I won't get much of a chance tomorrow morning.

We played Scrabble this evening. Here are the words we played:
grip (I went first)
pistil
melt
awning
irk
melts
zed
dawning
veal
modal
jean
criers
coy
blog
shines
liar (+ at + le)
booty
spend
nap
duck
vex
cox
guild
dove
que
que (triple word)
if
done (Rusty's last played word)

Rusty won with 127 points, but barely! He used the remaining points from us to beat us. If he hadn't, I was in the lead followed closely by Ian and Emily.

Oh yeah, Emily & Ian are visiting for a few days. They drove from Norfolk, VA starting Friday, spent the night in Mississippi, detoured through Winona, TX arriving here Sunday evening. (They'll be here until Thursday mid-day then they're moving on towards Plainview, TX to see Emily's parents.)

Sunday was our sick day. It was bad! Oh God, we were sooo sick! We ached, we were feverish, had the runs, our stomachs felt swirly. Our bodies did a fantastic job of vacating every morsel of food from our systems. I think we ate some bad organic tomato soup (Amy's). First Josh threw up around midnight, then I threw up two hours later then Rusty at 3am. I was dumb and desperate for something soothing on my throat so I drank some SlimFast- which came up to say "screw off" an hour later. Let's just say we didn't keep anything but 7-Up/Sprite down for about 24 hours. Rusty & I laid around the house moaning and sleeping in shifts. We lucked out that it was a weekend so Russ & Anne took care of Josh (he had waaaay too much energy!) but Elliot stayed home with us. To make matters worse, I couldn't just lay around all day like I wanted to. Oh no. There was work around the house to do because we had company coming that evening. And a baby to care for. I had to clean the bathroom floor, the carpet in Josh's room, the carpet in Elliot's room, do some laundry and shower myself. I was so low on energy that I managed to do all this (that's right- Super Mom to the rescue) very slowly and with frequent breaks.

Today we slowly regained our confidence that not all food was bad and by this evening we're back to our normal dorky selves. ;-)

Elliot has an ear infection again thanks to his recent head cold. He's been dripping snot from his nose since last week Friday (one week!) and now has goop coming out his left ear. He doesn't like it when I clean out his ear and wipe his nose but otherwise he's content.

We got our A/C cleaned out this week- things are waaay cooler now! We haven't been good about cleaning out the intake on the A/C so it was working too hard. Rusty is also going to patch a few leaks this weekend. There are small holes leaking cool air into the attic.

Elliot's still getting around without crawling. He'll take a one-two then lunge the rest of the way. If an object is too far away he just doesn't bother.

Joshua is still in diapers. We talked at dinner time about how log is too long. Three years old is too long in my opinion but Joshua continues to show he's not ready or willing. This evening he pooped in his diaper in his bedtime instead of going to the potty. He knows full well where hes supposed to go and ho to do it himself but he chooses not to do it. We're at our wit's end with it. I want to be free of constantly taking him to the potty (b/c he won't take himself) and battle about that and Rusty wants to stop spending money on diapers for him. We may need a potty whisperer!

I'll miss Jim Tavaré. He was my favorite of the Last Comic Standing contestants. What's not to like about a strange bald man lugging around a bass? He was funny all the time, not just on stage. But Iliza did have a commanding stage precense which probably helped her win. Thank God God's Pottery did not win! I'm also watching Project Runway, Mindfreak and Who Wants to be a Millionaire, in case you were wondering.

Elliot tooks a few crawling steps last nights. It was clumsy and wobbly, but undeniably crawling. Today he hasn't repeated this new skill. Not yet.

Joshua had a small cold Friday that Elliot caught Sunday evening. Josh is over it by now but poor Elliot's nose is still runny and he still feels crappy. Hopefully he'll pull out of it soon. Maybe some good rest and easy play today will help since Josh is at school.

I created a Facebook account today. I really didn't see a need for one (still don't) but I decided on a whim to go with the flow. It seems like every other friend I know has one. Facebook sells itself as a hip means to keep up with friends (I already do), share photos ( I do), reconnect with old classmates and coworkers ( I don't care to). Whatever. I'm in the crowd now. So write on my wall or do whatever Facebookers do to "friends".

Yeah so, a friend of mine, well two actually, are getting married in like two weeks. It's crazy! I've been planning a scavenger hunt for their bachelor/bachelorette party. They want to do a combined thing avoiding the whole strip club scene, hookers in a hotel room, party bus thing. I can't give details about the hunt but I'm really excited about it! I got a chance to work on the list today. Tomorrow I'll scope out the Deep Ellum area for a reality check on what's in business and what's cool to do. Not only do I love planning stuff like this but I also love seeing it play out. Rsty & I are going to split the evening. The plan is that he'll do the dinner thing whilst I do the hunt thing and somewhere in between we'll hand off the kids.

Rusty is at a different wedding this evening. I put the boys to bed rather easily this evening. I'm surprised at how easy it was. I got both bathed, pajama-ed, then set Josh in front of his night-time show on Sprout. While he wound down, I nursed Elliot hoping he'd fall asleep. Nope, he didn't. But he was very sleepy and ready so I laid him in bed. Meanwhile, Josh's show ended while I was still feeding Elliot so he turned off the TV, picked out five books and brought the stool out for me to sit on next to his bed. Then he played with Legos in his room waiting for me to finish with Elliot. What a trooper!! I laid Elliot down and knew he'd either put himself to sleep or cry until I got him. Luckily he put himself to sleep. I played with Josh a few minutes, read him two books, rubbed his back then lights out. And it was silent upstairs! Not a peep from either room since then.

Except I think Elliot pooped while going to sleep because his room reaks and his back end feels solid. :-s

Oh dang it's hot out! They say- it's not the heat, it's the humidity. No. No the humidity is fine. Somewhere it's in the 70's and humid (Portland, ME?) and nobody complains that it's hot. No when it's 100+ degrees, it's hot with or without humidity. The humidity just keeps the heat around longer at night. It got up to 116 degrees around Phoenix, AZ today. Now that's hot! Despite our heat wave this summer, we have had some rain during what's typically the dry season. This morning we saw thunderstorms to the north and even heard a few loud claps of thunder- but we didn't get any of that rain. We got rain twice on Wednesday. Statistically speaking, we never get rain in late July or August. Crazy!

Elliot's got a new tooth coming in on the bottom. This bugger has been giving him problems though. He's been running low fevers almost everyday since Monday. I took him to the pediatrician on Wednesday to make sure it wasn't something to be concerned about. I looked in his mouth and didn't see anything. She checked his ears, nose, throat- he's all around healthy. While he was crying at her she did see the bump on the lower gum line. This will be tooth number seven.

August is shaping up to be a busy month for us already. Tomorrow Rusty is going to an old buddy's wedding (I'm not going), then we have Emily & Ian visiting, then Tommy's wedding & the surround parties for that, then my mom says she's coming to visit some time, then I'm selling baby stuff at a consignment sale at the end of the month.

That's right. We're so done with babies, I'm letting it go. Gear & clothes are up for sale then going to donation. The money I raise will go right back into buying new clothes for the boy's fall/winter clothes. I have nearly 50 things I'm selling at Divine Consign then whatever's left over from the sale will go into a garage sale the following weekend. Then anything left over will go to St. Vincent de Paul or some charity.

Speaking of Catholic charity, send your soothing vibes to Rusty. He's been having terrible shoulder pain for the last several days. He now thinks it's due to sitting in a non-ergonomical way at work. Even after a chiropractor and a massage therapist worked on him, he's still got a knot in the back of his shoulder. I rubbed his back yesterday night but it didn't do any good. So think meat tenderizing thoughts and send loosey-goosey vibes in his direction. Hopefully he'll get past this soon.

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