hair

Piper has sprouted a ponytails worth of hair in the last 3 months. She pretty much went from no hair, to enough to do something with. Everyone comments on it too - "wow, when was the last time I saw her because her hair is looking so long all of the sudden!... and ...well, someone is finally getting some hair!"

All this hair she is growing is making me so happy and proud because I had no idea that I had a deep, longing, motherly need to play with my daughters hair. Most mornings I lift her up onto the bathroom counter, with her little sandled feet sitting in the sink, and she says "ponies mommy!" while I wrap the little strands of bright blond hair into teeny tiny hair clips and she watches in the mirror.
Then she hops down, runs to the full-length mirror in the closet and BEAMS when she looks at herself (no self esteem issues going on right now at all).

She loves wearing her hair in little pigtails, a single ponytail or funky, multiple ponytails ala Gwen Stefani-esque all over her head.

Don't get me wrong - most of the time she is sporting a tangled blond rats-nest on the back of her head, although this makes me proud too because it is further proof that she has some of my genetics. But for the most part, she is digging having her little hair done, and so am I.

birds nest

I had seen one of these necklaces on etsy the other day and this is my first attempt at copying it. It took me like 5 minutes to make, literally. I think it is really cute! toot toot!

so this is love

Piper just had explosive diarrhea...in my hand. Like, literally in my hand. She had just gone poopie and said her tummy hurt (what she says before she drops a deuce) and then she ripped a loud, wet hiney-talk. I lifted up her dress to continue wiping her from the previous poopie and right when my hand goes to wipe over her hind-end she lets out another hiney-talk and diarrhea SHOOTS out of her hiney and into my hand. I shrieked, but held it together and calmly leaned her back down onto her potty (that was thankfully right next to us) and calmly grabbed her panties and The Very Hungry Caterpillar book that were both now victims of said diarrhea attack and slowly stood up, said "Mommy will be right back sweetie" in a sing-song voice and then turned to the doorway and ran like hell down to the kitchen with my poop covered hands.
I basically cloroxed everything in sight including myself (think of that scene from The Crying Game). Poor little muffin. I can't remember when, or if, she's ever had diarrhea before. Oye. The things you do for your little ones.
She is now happily sitting on the couch (in a diaper, just in case!) watching The Jungle Book.

happy problem

Around this time last year I spotted a girl at Soggy Dollar Bar on Jost Van Dyke who had gorgeous, long, not-frizzy curly hair. As she walked by me I complimented her on her perfect curls and she said "I have two words for you, Moroccan Oil." She raved to me about the oil and said it is perfect for curly hair, but sorta expensive and hard to find in a store.

The other day, after a particularly bad hair day, I remembered her tip and went online and impulsively bought a 2 oz tester bottle of Moroccan Oil on amazon for $10.

I love it! I smooth on a small, dime size amount right after I get out of the shower when my hair is soaking wet. I air dry it and I swear my hair is less frizzy, and my curls are holding their ringlet shape better.

So the good news is that I found a good hair product! The bad news, it is expensive.

grocery trip

In case you were wondering, again, here's what I picked up at Publix today.
Cheez-its were bogo (buy one, get one free).
Corn is 4/$1, unfortunately this is bi-color corn and we all prefer yellow, but i'll take what i can get.
That loaf of bread you see in the corner is the first loaf of bread i have purchased in over a year! Can you believe that? Patrick (and I) have been craving super soft, store-bought bread.
Tonic water and diet cranberry ginger ale for our evening cocktails. Limes for that too.
Gala apples, my favorite.
Those bananas will be brown in like 48 hours. Which means they will quickly join the other sad, over-ripe bananas that take up prime real estate in the bottom of our freezer waiting for the day that I will make banana bread again.

moment

I had a little moment today by myself. I was sitting in my testing room at school, getting ready for an exam (IV calculations) and I was all prepared and ready for the information. I had my pencils, and my calculator and the other folks in my class and I were all shooting the shit waiting for our test proctor to come in. And it hit me, I'm doing this! I'm really doing this! This dream I've had for so long that I wasn't sure I would be able to accomplish. And I started chipping away at it and good lord, I'm here! In nursing school. Finally! And in the blink of an eye I'm going to be graduating and going on to a new, exciting direction.

I can't wait!

ANNOUNCEMENT!

Piper came home from school yesterday in the same clothes that we dropped her off in!!
This means...she had no accidents all day!!!

This is huge considering how we've been averaging about 3 accidents per day at school and she's even come home a few times in the "community pee clothes." Meaning, she peed in her panties 3+ times and ran out of outfits that I had packed her and had to wear the clothes that were probably once in the lost and found until being retired to live a long life of covering the butts of kids who aren't potty trained.

I'm so proud of our girl! We've still got a ways to go with the potty training, but she is doing really good.

"splashes" and "sprays"

I had my clinical hospital orientation this morning. It was really exciting and I got dressed up in my nursing school polo, khaki pants, obnoxious gleaming white tennis shoes and multiple name badges. We had a two hour orientation lecture with a nursing coordinator at Memorial Hospital in one of the hospital's big auditoriums. He was really nice and actually facilitated the student nursing orientation for our clinical instructor (FSCJ professor who will lead us through clinicals at the hospital) when she was a nursing student 20+ years ago.
We went over important stuff, like all the different codes to call for various emergencies, i.e. Code Pink, for an infant in cardiac arrest, Code Green if there is a bomb threat, Code Adam* for an abducted child, etc.
But what has stuck with me all day is how many power point slides he had to go over to explain to us all the various ways we have to cover ourselves up with hospital gowns/masks when dealing with "liquid fecal matter" that can "both splash or spray on your face and body."

*Code Adam? How did they come up with that? I'm assuming it was a child named Adam who was abducted.

I like these two shots of P and I. We took them while we were stuck in the pop-up camper during a torrential downpour thunderstorm the other weekend.

We really weren't posing as much as appear to be. I was glued to my new book, Broken Open (will do a review for it soon) and Patrick was rigging various lights around the camper.

btw, no tweaking or editing on these photos at all, just plain-old cool lighting.

You can't have him

He is all mine ladies.

M-I-N-E, mine!

Thank God I knocked over the porta-pottie in Auburn one warm and steamy evening sophomore year. Otherwise, he wouldn't have noticed me and I would be out one sleezy, mustached man.

Guess who...

Guess who wears panties only now? No seriously, guess.
Piper Anne Lynch, diaper free (except for night time and naps) since May 30, 2010.