Now, this is probably not the best way to sway people from one side to the other. But the guy on the left does have a point.


Opinions/thoughts/comments welcome.

Fun Quote

Found on my desk calendar for today:

"America's health system is second only to Japan...Canada, Sweden, Great Britain...well, all of Europe. But you can thank your lucky stars we don't live in Paraguay!"
-- Homer Simpson

Lots of news

1) My boy got a smiley-face on his behavior chart today at school! (Last week he was in time out several times for hitting.) His teacher said he did "excellent." I stopped by to peek in on him and they were in music class....all holding little jingle bell instruments & marching around the room to "Father Abraham." Adorable! We want another one so bad we could taste it but the time isn't quite right.

2) Conversation between me and a patient of mine Saturday night. This lady is a member of a country whose women are known for coming to the US just to have their babies here.
Patient: Are you going to give me a diaper bag before I leave?
Me: Yes.
Her: What else are you going to give me?
Me: That's about it.
Her: What about a car seat?
Me: You're responsible for that.
Her: But I do not have one. I need one. I want you to give me a carseat before I go home.

Ok people, the hospital social worker is not your mama. If you can make it to the US from another continent, you can afford a carseat. And how long have you known you were pregnant?? (Meanwhile just down the hall there's a little Hispanic family in which the father works 6 days a week to provide, and he wouldn't dream of asking for a handout.)

3) Last night I tried my hand at making one of our favorite Mexican dishes called sopes or picadas. We had previously bought them at a restaurant but it was far away & the customer service was crappy. So we tried it out. They came out pretty well, although I will do a few things differently next time.

4) Congratulations to Miles and Brooklynne Travis, who welcomed Halleigh Jane into the world this past Sunday at 2:51am. She is an awfully pretty little girl!

I am married to the greatest dad in the whole world. While taking Wee One to his room for night-night last night, I stepped on part of a set of letters that spell out his name but they've got wheels & are magnetically connected so it's really a train, I guess. (which he of course loves.) Anyway, the angle was just right to break the wooden axle to which the wheels were connected. Instead of just letting it go & relaxing for the rest of the evening, my husband went out to the utility room, got out his microtools, whittled the broken pieces down, glued the axle back together, & reassembled the train car for his little boy. Maybe all dads do that, but I haven't seen it.

They also play this game, similar to hide&seek but not really. Here is a transcript of same:
Wee One: High chair!
Hubs: High chair, have you seen Wee One?
WO: No?
H: No?
(Wee One runs off to find something else to ask)
WO: Movie! *(Lord of the Rings Trivial Pursuit game)
H: Movie, have you seen Daniel?
WO: No?
H: No?
(off to find something else)
WO: Jirafa! (Giraffe)
H: Jirafa, have you seen Daniel?
WO: No?
H: No?
And on, and on, and on...
It is really funny to watch. One of these days when we get a video camera, we will record & post it. One of these days when we join the 21st century...

My baby started preschool!!!!!!!!!!!! And apart from the initial separation anxiety, he loves it. They play, draw, paint, go outside, and learn letters/numbers/colors. (most of these he knew anyway, if I must comment.) Every Monday & Wednesday night before he goes to bed, I tell him he's going to get up the next day & go to school. So Tuesday & Thursday mornings he wakes up & says "School? Teacher?" And he enjoys the treat he gets at the end of the day if he hasn't been put in time-out. So far he's gotten all smiley-faces on his behavior chart. He looks so grown up marching into the building like he owns it. They grow up way too fast!!

Work has been absolutely insane the last few weeks. Labor & Delivery (hereinafter referred to as L&D) has been overflowing which means mother/baby and nursery have been overflowing too. I wondered aloud to myself last weekend, "What happened 9 months ago to make it so bad now?" Then I realized....so, on behalf of OB nurses everywhere, please, people, find a new way to celebrate the holiday season!!

Latest words

Shower, teacher, county (a word that he finds hysterically funny...I don't know why), school, fold (when he helps fold clothes), sockies, finished, hair, posa (mariposa = butterfly), Lupe (Hubs' sister Guadalupe), tia/tio (aunt/uncle).

So the other day I go in his room and find him standing in the doorway of his closet with a pair of pants that have fallen off the hanger onto the floor. He's trying frantically to put on the pants over his clothes that are already on. I say, "Son, what are you doing?" "Shorts, Mama, shorts!"

By default, the word "movie" in my boy's vocabulary means "Lord of the Rings." The other day we were at our neighbor Debbie's house (who, by the way, is his absolute favorite person outside the family) and she had a trinket box with an image of Gollum on it and ny boy's eyes get real big & he turns to me and says "Movie, Mama!"

Hubs had a rough day at work today...part of his job, as you might well know, is that before going to cut grass, he goes to the buffalo ranch that his boss owns to feed their buffalo. One of the females was trying to give birth but the calf was stuck so he & his supervisor were trying to help her out a little and give him a tug. They couldn't do it so they called the vet who came out and for a while they all tried but they couldn't get him out. When Jesus went out there yesterday she was there, so she had been there at least 24 hours trying. Anyway, they had to euthanize her because the calf died at some point during all this. So he didn't enjoy watching that. I wouldn't either.

Sad to hear about the Crocodile Hunter. After handling cobras and black mambas and 20-foot crocodiles, a stingray is what killed him.

Not this past weekend, but the weekend before I watched a 23-week (meaning born at 23 weeks....way too early) triplet die. I was just helping get his parents (who were on our floor) over to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. That was not an experience I'd like to repeat. Watching his mom tell his dad, "No, you hold him first. He's your only son," made me grateful beyond measure for the 23-month old hurricane that lives in my house, that he's healthy, that I still have him around. I am forever telling the nurses in that unit that I couldn't do their job in a million years and now I know for sure! And I could go home and go back to my normal life, but what about that family? They lost another one of the triplets a few minutes later. Not just one child that has died, but two. I cannot imagine. I can't wait for Heaven where things like this never happen.

On a brighter note...my boy starts preschool Thursday. We went to orientation today and he checked it all out. It seems to his liking. He will be one of the younger ones (if not the youngest) in the class..he beat the cutoff deadline by 5 days. But I think he will like it.