Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
It's the time of year that I like to collect people's addresses to send out Christmas Holiday cards. So, if you did not send me your address last year, or have moved in the last 365 days, please send me your mailing address via email, and I will send you a lovely holiday card!
Please note that I do not sell addresses, nor give them out to anyone else. They are simply for sending holiday cheer.
Email: claudia.poirier@gmail.com
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
When I ever heard someone say "Human life is such a miracle!" I always thought it was such garbage. It, in my old opinion, was not a miracle; it was biology. It also happens to be biology that many people suffer from post partum depression, so biology failed me! Anyway.
Think about it for a second. You start out as two-one half cells. The egg is Part One and the sperm is Part Two. You can't have a baby without one or the other, and each is only half. And to think, from those two half-ready cells joining in holy matrimony comes a zygote. That's a real word. It's actually the word for the full cell made when the egg and sperm decide to join. After that, when it starts splitting, it's called cleavage and then there's all kinds of mitosis going on. It's actually very interesting.
Tonight I sat in the bath with my fat cheeked son and I watched him pick up a cup for water and a rubber duck. He came from two half cells. This little human with his sweet auburn hair, brown eyes, delicious squishy legs and a perfect gummy smile started out as an eensy weensie pair of cells from both of his parents.
I'm sure this all sounds very cliche, but I have a hard time wrapping my mind around it. Sure, technically I can absolutely see it. The cells join and then they split and keep splitting into a human. The emotional part of me, however, is really amazed by this happening. By the fact that somehow, despite everything that could have gone wrong, he came out perfect*.
*yes, he has his joined toe thing, but c'mon. So minor in the grand scheme of things.
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
This is probably going to seem like an odd choice of topic, but hear me out ;)In the past week, I've had four separate people call Cary a girl. Two were after they had heard his name, while we were waiting for our nurse to come and administer his six month (a month and a day late) shots. I think whey they heard his name they though "Carrie" and not "Cary" or even "Kerry".
He doesn't look like a girl, though.
Rebecca @ GGC wrote about this very topic, and I thought it was funny. I even wondered why mothers went so crazy when someone identified their children by the wrong gender.
Then it happened to me. Not so funny anymore. It truly is different when the stiletto is on the other foot.
I had first read of a couple keeping their child's gender a secret. they were from Sweden, so I thought it was maybe a cultural thing, but now I fully appreciate the validity of their experiment, except I pity the poor child if it is a boy, for they make "it" wear dresses. Anyway.
Maybe he does look like a girl and I'm just completely and utterly blind to it.
I just imagined, though, when he's dressed in "boy" clothes, like khaki overalls, blue jeans and sweaters sans flowers, bumblebees and Tinkerbell, that it would be a little more obvious.
How do you come back to people who say "she's so cute!" when it's a boy, or "Isn't that a darling little boy?" to your daughters? Have you ever been rude about it (I will admit, once I was extremely short with someone and said "HE" very emphatically...but that was like the third person that day to mistake my son as my daughter)? Do you have any good come backs for this? Is there any way, other than me crocheting him a hat that says "I HAVE A PENIS" that will let people know? Finally: how do you stop caring about it!?
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
I know that there are absolutely scads of people who are going to disagree with me about my choice of "ugly" actor, but just hear me out. Ed Westwick is a monkey.
I have a very strong affinity for men with well-cut lips. For example, Clive Owen has great lips. Paul Newman, in his younger days, has the epitome of perfectly chiseled lips. Ed Westwick has thin, weird, ape-like lips that do not look good for anything except smoking. Cigarettes, people. They also do not look all that much different from his face. I'm sure that with a little lip liner and some proper lipstick, his lips COULD look lush, full, and perfect. Though as of where I'm sitting, they so don't.
Another thing I find positively exquisite on men are cheekbones-matching-hanes. The hanes, on a man, are not his underwear, but that oh-so-delicious feature of their hip bones, the muscling and how it points to that perfect V shape. Click on the "hanes" link and the one I;m talking about is something else I dislike and find goofy looking (plus I have a strong suspicion this his muscles and hanes are PAINTED ON), Rob Pattinson. James Franco is probably my favourite guy with this because, ladies, he matches. his math is GOOD. anyway, that's not what we're here about. Ed Westwick has these utterly fabulous cheekbones that I would love to steal for myself. I have not seen him without a shirt, so I don't know if he has good math or not, but Lordy...I do love me some Ed Westwick cheekbones.
All in all, Ed Westwick is the kind of guy that I don't find attractive at all, even though he possesses many of the things that I like looking at in the opposite sex. the lips, the eyes, the manly looking brow...they're all present, and yet I find him mildly grotesque.
However, watching him as Chuck Bass on Gossip Girl is what makes me very happy to watch the show. Maybe it's his character, I don't know. I don't even know if he's a particularly good actor, but I am so wrapped up in that horrible little boy's life on that show I am embarrassed to let anyone know.
And that, my friends, is the Actor that I love even though I probably wouldn't give him a second glance on the street.
Just so you know, I looked up a lot of REALLY hot guys to write this article. Marky Mark, James Franco, Clive Owen. Mmm. I'm all OD'ed on hot boys. And then I have to wait for my husband to get home who is, to me, the most beautiful creature ALIVE. Know why? He's got the lips. For real. He's just so perfect, and kissable, and sweet.
I just want to say, you don't need to point out that I have got some REALLY weird taste in guys: I am very well aware of that. I mean, I went from David Beckham to Puff Daddy. the two could not be LESS alike one another, and yet, I find them both exquisite examples of the males of this species. While I know Richie is not David Beckham or Sean Combs, I think he's still so amazing and good looking and wonderful.
Doesn't matter if you don't agree ;) you don't have to be married to Rich. You can go marry Ed Westwick, the monkey that I find hot-but-not.
Yeah, I looked at too many hot guys already today.
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
ˈmɛlənˌkɒli/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [mel-uhn-kol-ee] Show IPA noun, plural -chol⋅ies, adjective–noun
1. a gloomy state of mind, esp. when habitual or prolonged; depression.
2. sober thoughtfulness; pensiveness.
3. Archaic.
a. the condition of having too much black bile, considered in ancient and medieval medicine to cause gloominess and depression.
b. black bile.
–adjective
4. affected with, characterized by, or showing melancholy; mournful; depressed: a melancholy mood.
5. causing melancholy or sadness; saddening: a melancholy occasion.
6. soberly thoughtful; pensive.
I'm sitting here, a book on one side, a pen on the other.
Another piece of paper folded into a pattern.
And I wonder.
Then I stop wondering. I make myself feel better.
The little monkey jumps in his jolly jumper, and I look forward to tomorrow. Because tomorrow is bright. It will be warm. And it will be a good day.
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
bleak.
dark.
quiet.
sad.
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
For the gift-giving season, I'm going to give you some ideas of what to buy some of the special people in your lives, revolving around if they are new moms, going to be new moms, or babies. Today I'm going to give you some ideas on what to buy new mothers.
New mothers know exactly how hectic a brand new baby can be. Help their lives become more zen-like with books about mommy & baby yoga, such as Yoga Mommy, Buddha Baby.
Flip Ultra Camcorder 2nd Generation, 120 Minutes Capture all the first moments of your new baby's life with the Flip camcorder. Simple, light weight, and with the ability to fit into your pocket, this is a great spur-of-the-moment camera! It's also at the lower end of the price scale for a quality recorder, so there's no need to break the bank.
Canon EOS Rebel T1i 15.1 MP CMOS Digital SLR Camera At the higher end of our price scale is the newest from Canon. This digital SLR camera now comes with high quality video as well, so you can capture all of your still and moving moments with your little one.
Moby Wrap Original 100% Cotton Solid Baby Carrier As much as some people love their strollers, there is a time and a place for baby slings and wraps. Ever gone to a craft fair and been completely unable to move? You think it's easy to maneuver a stroller in a place like that? Think again. Give your new mommies another option of baby carrying with something like a Moby wrap, a Mei Tai or a Baby Hawk so their little ones can still be secure and safe, and leave mom's hands free to browse, carry, and partake in the day's activities.
Milk Chocolate Coated Hazelnuts from Bernard Callebeaut Give the gift of chocolate: a perfect treat for the stressed out girl who just needs five minutes to herself. This particular variety of chocolate heralds from Belgium by way of Calgary, Alberta. I can personally attest, that even as a person who does not care for chocolate, this stuff is a bite of heaven.
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
- there is a popular series of movies starring Jason Voorhees, known as Friday the Thirteenth. Principal photography wrapped on Friday, June 13, 2008. Additionally, the American theatrical release date was Friday, February 13, 2009, for the 2009 version that is ;)
- The roman numeral for thirteen is XIII (ten-one-one-one)
- There were actually thirteen participants in the Last Supper. Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed Jesus, is the thirteenth attendant.
- In the Jewish faith, boys and girls get to have a bar or bat mitzvah when they turn thirteen, or become a man or woman.
- Triskaidekaphobia is the fear of the number thirteen.
- While thirteen is seen as bad, often it's not. For example, a baker's dozen contains thirteen items. In 13th century England, bakers could be severely punished if they were found short changing their customers. Thus, they included the thirteenth item to "prove" that their customers were receiving as much as the baker themselves.
- Apollo 13 was the only unsuccessful mission to get humans to the moon in the US.
- Many sky scrapers do not have a thirteenth floor; the number is either omitted (making the 14th floor the real thirteenth floor), or it is a service floor where the general public cannot access.
- Treize (trez) is how to say "thirteen" in French.
- Thirteen is a prime number, meaning it cannot be divided by anything other than itself and the number one.
- On a rugby team, there are thirteen players.
- In the 18th century, the British ship HMS Friday was launched on a Friday, the 13th. The the captain was a man named Jim Friday. The ship was never seen nor heard from again.
- Thirteen for dinner? Not in France. A party of thirteen can hire a professional quatorzieme, a fourteenth person, from an agency.
Originally published at diaper bag princess. You can comment here or there.
I've been twenty five for all of, what, two weeks? For some reason I totally feel like I've been just floating around for (twenty) two weeks. Not doing anything. Being a bum. I really do feel a compulsion to finally get my life in proper order; not Claudia order.
Last year I bought a Moleskine planner and a regular notebook. I love that thing. Like LOVE. But I don't use it to it's fullest potential. I keep about a million lists, but no real "good" ones. I don't keep track of stuff that I'd like to accomplish, or that I need to remember to do. Go check out some lists you should keep, even if you're Moleskine-free.
Last night, after making my weekly "crap to do" list, I realized that I need a much better system. I searched for I'd say about three hours for even just a chart that I liked, or one that I liked the idea of, but could copy over and make it a better style for our household. I turned up pretty empty after all of that. Then I remember something that Ms Jessica had at Balancing Everything. This amazing, truly great idea for chores, called a Chore Ticket Board. How much in love am I with these? I'm sure you can imagine. So I want to work on that.
I've been checking out the Unclutterer regularly, too, to see if there's anything I can do that might smarten me up and get things around me more organized. Like my shameful-looking office closet right now. I am too embarrassed to even post pictures of it; it's that bad. It's so unhelpful in there, that I haven't been sewing hardly anything as of late. I don't know why; I love doing the sewing. I just can't seem to get all my stuff together to fix it all up and get it in better working order.
I was never organized as a child or teen, so I feel like I'm branching out into new territory. It's kind of scary and strange to me. Do you have any tips for keeping your life in general organized? Anything you wish you could keep organized but just can't seem to do it? It's totally my desk ;)
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