The. Longest. Post. EVER! (Now sub-headed for your reading pleasure)

With respect to anyone NEW reading this, you can get the gist of my commentary by the sub-headings below. For those of you who read it often enough to know what a babbler I am, the headers will simply allow you to remember what I was originally referring to once you get to the end of the paragraph and I’ve veered off onto such a random rabbit trail that you have NO memory of where I started. Perhaps I should put the headers as footers? That might actually be a little more helpful.

Family Pictures: This past Saturday, we went to do Christmas pictures with the Garmanes. We went once again to Portrait Innovations, where I have had incredible luck with Caleb pictures. However, it being the holiday season, they were backed up to where we didn’t get pictures taken until almost eighty minutes after our appointment time. Needless to say, Caleb Zakai was less than appreciative of the wait (*see “crappy Mommy” header below) and was squirmy to the extreme, and Gavi decided that he was done being cute and cuddly and broke out some massive screams. Still, the pics didn’t turn out too badly, altogether. The full family pics were great, the Fashbaugh family pics are beautiful, and there’s one of Megan and me that is one of my favorite pictures ever taken of me!

Crappy Mommy: One of the reasons Caleb may have been more upset than usual at the photographers is because Mommy finally lost all sense of reason and completely fell apart… where the diaper bag was concerned. Caleb Zakai made a poo, and there were NO wipes, NO clean diapers, NO diaper rash cream, etc. But by golly there were four bags of Goldfish crackers! Seriously, I have never felt like more of a failure. I had spare outfits for both boys, every medication known to man and handcream for ME, but Caleb was quite literally poop out of luck. It was miserable. We all made do, but it was a huge lesson to me that I need to have a diaper bag checklist.

Jingy Bells: Between being incredibly late for getting our pictures taken, then taking a long time to pick the best shots ~ when Caleb and Daddy and Grandpa were at Bounce ~ little man didn’t take a nap. Well, not exactly true: he took a ten minute snooze on Grandpa’s shoulder at lunch. His eyes were closing more deeply with every blink, and finally Grandpa just said, “Do you want to come sit on my lap?” Caleb hopped down from his chair, up into Grandpa’s lap, snuggled into his shoulder and crashed. But when he was transported into the car, he woke up, never to nap again. So when we were driving home at six o’clock, we thought he might crash for an early bedtime, and we were trying to avoid it. So Mommy started to teach him jingle bells! He LOVED it! Of course, it devolved into “Jingy bells, HEY! Jingy bells, HEY!” If I had a video camera in the car, I would have sent it to America’s Funniest Home Videos for the sheer fact that he sang that charming refrain for about ten minutes straight.

Dryer Genius: Caleb has been helping me with laundry since before he was a year old. His job is to take the clothes from Mommy from the washer and put them into the dryer, then when Mommy asks, he closes the door and pushes the start button. About a month ago, he discovered the button inside the dryer that makes the light go off when the door is open. But two weeks ago, he discovered that if he pushes that button in, the dryer door doesn’t have to be closed to start the dryer spinning. So now I have to watch him constantly, or he has the tendency to watch the dryer spin. I don’t know how harshly to discipline on this one, because I think he’s just plain brilliant. Jon says that it has a built-in discipline system because the heat from the dryer will hurt his hand before he can do it too long.

Two Blankets (aka: Sick as a Pup): On Saturday night I had thrown up a little, then after a lot of extra rest on Sunday – thanks, honey! – I felt considerably better. Then on Tuesday, I started feeling really nauseous again. Of course, my first reaction was to send Jonathan to the store to buy me a pregnancy test. Thirty minutes after it came up negative, I started hurling my guts out. (If I could have just held out an extra hour, I would have known it was really sick and not wasted money on a stupidly expensive pregnancy test!) So Tuesday night was the night from aich-ee-double hockey sticks, as I puked all the live-long night. Jonathan was in Las Vegas Wednesday, so I called my Mom. (In a Billy Madison sing-song, “Soooo sick, had to call my mommy.”) It took her over two and a half hours to drive here because of the crazy traffic accidents from the black ice on the roads, but she came and took care of my boys and me. Her first order of business was to put me in bed, and Caleb was her enforcer. She made me drink some broth, then was taking my cup to the kitchen when Caleb said, “Night night, Mommy. Two blankets?” See, when we put him to bed, that’s one of the choices he has – “One blanket or two blankets?” It was so precious to hear it echoed back. I almost started crying. Of course, having lost everything in my system for the previous fourteen hours might have had some bearing on that!

Grins Galore: Our little Gavi has taken up the mantle of smiliest baby in the universe from his brother Caleb. He is so precious! He’s not only smiley, but he’s really starting to communicate with sounds, too. My biggest thrill came last week when I was cuddling with him on the floor and saying “hi” in that stupid mom voice over and over. He repeated back the “i” sound with the same inflection. He’s also really big with the stereotypically baby “goo” sound. He’s so much fun! And he really loves Caleb. He’ll just follow him with his eyes and smile at him all the time.

Crayon Madness (aka: Thank the Good Lord for Magic Erasers): When I was fighting the sick and being so weak on Wednesday morning, my little munchie Caleb took it upon himself to use his crayons to color all over my coffee table. Seriously, how did Moms survive this phase before the Age of Magic Erasers? (Mr. Clean, I would like to volunteer to be in a commercial. I am THAT passionate about your product. I sound like a commercial every time I talk about them.)

Timing is Everything: Gavi slept through the night for the first time last night. From 10:30 to 5:00. Other than my milk-makers feeling like they were going to explode, I have never been more grateful for anything in my life. (The night before had been puke-a-palooza, so sleep was a real blessing.) When I told Jonathan, he responded thusly: “Why? Is he finally fat enough that he can secrete milk from his cheeks?” While I resent the fact that he called my baby fat, I’m thinking there might be something to that theory.

I’ve got to try to go clean up a little now. Grandma and Grandpa Fashbaugh are coming the day after tomorrow! I’m still too sick to do much – as a matter of fact, just standing up still sends shooting pains through my stomach. But I can sit down and fold laundry at least while Caleb takes a nap.

Oh yeah, Thanksgiving was great. My turkey was flat-out AWESOME. I’m not generally a bragger about my cooking – Jonathan and I had wraps four times a week the first few years of our marriage! – but for a first-time effort, I have to say that it was pretty incredible. And Jonathan and I are going to start eating a lot more sweet potatoes. Yummy!