Another chapter from the Walston Parenting Manual: Rigid schedules are a must!

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After finally adjusting to the sweltering temperatures, be began our vacay in earnest. Nothing like staying up until 3am only to have your child wake up at 4:30. Through some amazing planetary alignment, she actually went back to sleep until 8:30!! I – with all true and sincere honesty – can say that I don’t remember her EVER sleeping past 7am. EVER. I will be sure to send her a nice fruit basket for this amazingly generous gesture.

I managed to find her some super groovin jammies that are silky and wonderful and, well, pink cammo. Sweeeeet. I also was able to take advantage of the retail mecca that is Walnut Creek and find us the new towels we so desparately needed. Shopping is good. Very good. Must control self.

We also got the very pleasing news that the appraisal came back on our house at a lovely $274K. The Goldilocks factor is in full effect. Too low: can’t shake that stupid PMI, Too high: property taxes would take us to the cleaners, Just right: $274K.

Gaining $100k in equity over a 2 1/2 year period: Priceless.

Tomorrow we leave for cabin-land. That place without high speed connections and shopping at fancy retail establishments. Instead we will be gorging on massive quantities of food and traversing the lake on speedy watercraft. Gee, I hope we can make the transition.

Well, it is now 10:40 and Stella is still awake and happy as a clam. I guess napping from 5-7pm isn’t probably the smartest idea if you are trying to stick to any kind of normal sleep schedule. But then again staying up until 3:00 am, thereby necessitating said nap, is probably not the smartest idea either.

Family therapists should probably start submitting resumes now.

Direct from a land where ‘hot’ is anything over 64 degrees.

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Walnut Creek is HOT! And I’m not talking Paris-Hilton’s-That’s Hawwwwt-hot, I’m talking sweaty-knee-pits-need-to-be-naked-DIRECTLY-in-front-of-the-air-conditioner hot.

We have been here all of about two and a half hours and we are already sweating in places we forgot we even had, and doing a pretty good job of shedding any non-essential pieces of clothing, whilst also loitering for extended periods in direct proximity of the air conditioner (which, much to Celene and Thad’s dismay, we have cranked to super-max.)

Hold on a sec, I need to take a drink of my alcoholic beverage and rub it’s sweet sweaty condensation all over my torso…..

There. That’s better.

So anyway, did I mention it was hot? We dug out the only nightgown Stella owns (had to literally pull the tags off it before I put it on her) and figure that we will need to wash it every day while on this odyssey, because you don’t find a lot of use for long-sleeved, footed fleece pajamas while traveling through geographic regions whose temps rival those of, oh say, Hades!

Our itinerary tells us we have one more day here wherein we plan to keep ourselves either submerged, neck-deep in the pool, or in some fancy-pants Walnut Creek establishment sucking every ounce of freon they have to spare. After that, we will be packing up our sorry, heat-loathing selves and relocating to some increased elevation, thereby removing us, ever so slightly, from the sweltering temperatures.

When did we become such wussies?

And, why, exactly, do you think she chose green?

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Firstly, I feel compelled to mention that our household has successfully logged another 70 or 80 hours of Hi-5 (not counting the time at day care). We missed the appearance on The Today Show wherein Matt Lauer said that he wasn’t sure about other families, but around his household they are pretty much commensurate to the Beatles. Right there with ya, Matt. Stella would step over my cold dead body to catch another round of Kimmie teaching her to make a windchime out of a bunch of kitchen spoons.

Stella’s ability to recite all the primary colors and otherwise order us around sometimes fools us into thinking she is NOT ACTUALLY ONLY 18 MONTHS OLD. After Tuesday’s usual ‘Fun with Knives & Fire Hour,’ we packed up the shiny box of razor blades and gave Miss Stella a cup of crayons and a pile of printer paper… At the dining room table… Unsupervised… Look, no one said we were the brightest parents on the block. They say a picture says a thousand words. I think this one gets the point across in about 4: What. Were. You. Thinking.

crayoned table

Nice.

Tuesday was a banner day on many levels. We were not only lucky enough to have a Stella original tatooed onto the dining room table (you know, the one we were getting ready to trade in at the local antique store any day now) but we also played a little game of “walk in on Stella climbing out of her crib.” Again. It is Dore’s prediction that we will startle awake one night to find a little face staring at us. That silly Dore! Everyone knows that Stella can’t accomplish much of anything without involving a crash, some sort of spilled liquid and a large quantity of mustard. We are in a world of hurt once she starts getting her stealth on.

So here we are at Wednesday. Aside from some of the usual minor backyard shennanigans (putting wood chips places they have no business being, bathing herself in the fountain, shoving dirt clods into her sandals, picking rotten berries, chasing White – the neighbor cat), it has been a fairly quiet day. We took a walk, played, watched some Hi-5 (natch) and witnessed the arrival of the newest members of our family…

all glad baby

…welcome home my beauties! Mommy loves you very, very much.

Sorry about that college fund Stella. But don’t worry, Mommy and Daddy will be sure to leave these beauties to you in the will.

And we shall name it Catsnackius

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So, it was right about the time that I was down on my hands and knees in Stella’s closet (you know, the one that – in all of her generostiy – she allows me to share with her) sniffing our clothes because I had caught a whiff of cat pee, that I realized my distain for our cats has reached a whole new level. This, along with the fact that while in the garage we also found two new places that our cats have taken the care to pee all over, has given me a renewed interest in revenge.

Some ideas I am playing around with:

  • I could run the vaccuum cleaner nonstop, but the spillover effect of that would be that Stella would also be hiding in a closet.
  • I could wrap their paws in tape, but that borders on sociopathic.
  • We have considered just locking them out forever, but there is a whole host of downsides to that approach — one of which is that our neighbors would grow to hate us so much that they would want to burn our house down.
  • Which leaves us with a conversation that Steve and I had the other day wherein he informed me that monitor lizards eat cats. (I know what you are all thinking – and NO, I didn’t prompt this line of questioning.) If I can find research substantiating the fact that they don’t also prey on curious and cute toddlers, we’re getting one.