Sometimes, yes. It's a little weird to see. Last night I interpreted a jumble of words and signs for Jason. Light, off, eyes, surprised. Oh! His favorite page in Goodnight, Gorilla. I know that "eee eye eee eee eye eeee ooh" is the Farmer in the Dell. I know "nee nee" is singing and "bapap" is backpack. I didn't know he knew the sign for "help" until he did it just now, because he'd dropped a toy behind a cabinet. I know when he's sad or hurt or hungry, when he wants a banana or a cookie, and I know because he tells me. There's so much I don't know about this motherhood thing and every day I'm reminded that I've yet to really learn who Noah really is, as his own little person. So much to learn. Together. What an amazing gift and a privilege. Noah's second birthday from amalah on Vimeo. Music: Together by William Shatner (featuring Lemon Jelly) Happy Birthday to the coolest little boy I know. Read more →

(With more movie title format weirdness. I don't know why I'm having trouble letting it go. Possibly I think I am clever. Possibly tomorrow I will realize the truth.) Captain Corelli's Mandoline Jason's thumb tip appears to be growing back. Or so he says, because I refuse to look at it. He keeps trying to make me look at it. I keep threatening to no longer help him with his shirt buttons. By the way, this is what a mandoline looks like. This is also what a mandoline THAT IS BEING USED PROPERLY looks like. Take away the jolly little plastic vegetable hat and you'll see what went so very wrong for Jason. Laws of physics, people. Don't fuck with them. Cujo and the Chocolate Factory Our dinner party guests brought dessert on Saturday...a deliciously decadent chocolate cake. So decadent, in fact, that we accidentally left about half of it sitting on the kitchen counter overnight, after we all slumped off to bed in a food coma. The next morning, after determining that it was indeed too stale to eat, even as a toaster-breakfast-cake thing, we threw it in the trash. Which somehow ended up sitting by the back door... Read more →

Molarball: The Return; or Just When You Thought It Was Safe To Eat SpaghettiOs Again Also known as Friday, the day Noah had a coughing/choking/hacking-lung fit right after lunch and projectile vomited a plate of pasta, half a cheddar cheese stick and an entire sippy cup of juice. And if you think this stuff looks gross coming from the bottle, just wait until you see it come BACK UP. Exorcist remakes, take note. We've got incoming molars, people. And we are just fucking THRILLED about it. Birthday Party: Part Two: The Planninging; or Take Your Fucking Theme And Shove It Up Your Fucking Ass Also known as Saturday, the day it occurred to me that Noah's birthday party was exactly one week away and my extremely laid-back, jebus-lord-he's-only-two approach to planning the stupid thing meant that THERE HAS BEEN NO STUPID PLANNING. Half the guests are vegetarian, the other half are extremely picker eaters and/or children, yet another half (shut up, the math works in my head at least) are Jason's gourmet foodie friends and when I suggested burgers on the grill and a couple boxes of veggie burgers Jason's show-offy dinner-party-loving head exploded, sort of like when I told... Read more →

I've been dragging my feet all week over this post, but y'all are so lovely and sweet and caring that I just cannot lie to you anymore. I simply must confess. We cut Noah's hair this weekend. Wait! Don't cry! It's okay! We actually cut Noah's hair once already, way back in February, at one of those kiddie salons. I asked the...stylist? barber? person who cuts hair with the same finesse as a toddler cuts construction paper with some safety scissors?...to leave his hair longish. "Just trim the bangs," I said. "Maybe clean up the back a little bit." Of course, her internal cutting computer defaulted to BOY = SHORT = DWEEB and she practically shaved his head. WEEP. DO NOT WANT AGAIN, ALTHOUGH I DO MISS THOSE CHUBBY KNUCKLES. But there was no doubt that his hair has been getting a little ridiculous lately. I found myself contemplating a spray bottle at the drugstore so I could spritz and scrunch his curls back into shape during the day. (Okay, so maybe I was the one who was getting a little ridiculous. But clearly, I had to be stopped.) This time I took him to my stylist, and let me... Read more →

This one is going to be all boring gritty speech delay details, y'all, with assvice and requests for further assvice and probably a minimum of I-got-drunk-and-fell-down-ness, even though I DID fall down this weekend and still have gravel in my palm. I wasn't drunk, I was just running late for a showing of the latest Harry Potter movie (and of course by "latest" I mean "the one that came out months ago") and I tripped and fell off my so-last-season shoes. (Request for Non-Speech-Delay Assvice: How do you get teeny little specks of gravel out of your palm, especially after the skin seems to have healed right over them? And if there is no way to get it out short of re-slicing your hand open, is there any harm in leaving it there, i.e. setting off metal detectors at the airport?) ANYWAY. Most of you can probably skip this entry, and just let us speech-delay-type people talk amongst ourselves. (There is a really lame joke somewhere in that sentence, but I AM NOT HERE FOR JOKES TODAY PEOPLE. I AM NOT YOUR MONKEY.) (I AM SO YOUR MONKEY.) Part the First: Fish Oil? Le Fuck? This is something we researched... Read more →

I've decided to start taking Tuesdays off. Officially. No writing. No email. No nothing. (It's going super well today, obviously.) It's really more for Noah's benefit than mine -- so I can get him OUT OF THE HOUSE and expose him to VARIOUS ENRICHING ACTIVITIES, or like this morning's playdate at the National Building Museum (with Vickie and Teo), the chance to play with aballs that were slightly different than any of the 14,200,003 aballs we have at home. Oh, and then he started going up to random adults in the room and signing for milk, because his asshole mother left his cup on the kitchen counter at home, and was generally just not paying very much attention to him at all, because DUDE THEY HAD GIANT FOAMY LEGOS. I WAS VERY BUSY. Anyway. The point of all these words is to say that I am not writing any more words today, but am instead going to put Noah down for an nap and then eat some bon-bons on my diamond-studded sofa (so pleasingly bumpy!), sewn and stuffed with my millions of Internet dollars.** Some of those dollars will be coming from JCPenney this month, because I wrote some words... Read more →

Noah's vocabulary, two months ago: aball, adada, ababy, sort-of star, sort-of banana, sort-of car. Noah's vocabulary, today and right now: aball, adada, amama, ababy, star, banana, car, truck, choo choo, boo boo, bye bye, bubble, pop, singing, bib, eat, ruff ruff, TV, yum, cat, bike, box, bag, hot. He knows the signs for eat, more, shoes, cracker, cold, ball, star, banana, bread, play, hurt and cry. He hardly ever tantrums anymore and walks flat-footed most of the time. He invents games and makes jokes and follows directions. He uses his imagination and knows most of the alphabet. His favorite book is Olivia and he likes to pretend to eat her spaghetti and meatballs. He actually eats spaghetti and meatballs. He likes to holler BYE BYE PEE PEE at the toilet. He thinks farting is hilarious. He thinks Dada is a god but when he is hurt or sad he only wants Mama. He wants you to chase him, to catch him, to tickle him and make him dizzy and then when the game gets to be a little much he wants to cuddle and listen to your heartbeat for awhile. He would like some yums. He would like a banana,... Read more →

The distant future, the year 2000... No more agriculture. No more war. No more racism. No more fighting, squabbling, or rumbling. No more...yogurt. Robot 1: The humans are dead. (Robot 2: Yes they are dead.) Robot 1: The humans are dead. (Robot 2: I confirm they are dead.) Robot 1: It had to be done. (Robot 2: They look like they’re dead.) Robot 1: So that we could have fun. (Robot 2: I poked one, it was dead.) 0000001! 00000011! (Try this at home tonight! Supplies needed: wine box, scissors, toddler, and humansaredead.mp3) Read more →

I are not fat. I are victim of sensashunalistic tabloid society and unrealistic body image ideels. Also bad camera angles. Feel v. exployted. Gained two pounds mebbe. Small one says I can has waffles. Look at face and say I cannot has waffles. Go on. I dare. Snausage is teh new hourglass anyways. Read it n Vogue. Would open VMAs next year and look wicked hott but are boycottin with my boy Kanye. Love, but u cannot has be under my umbrella becuz u called me fat, Ceiba! Read more →

Since her last public appearance on this blog, Ceiba has porked up a little. A tad. A few pounds and ounces. A mere 25% of her body weight. Or so. Where mah spangly bra and hotpants be at, bitches? The scientific community is baffled, as her kibble -- her healthy, low-fat, high-protein, crazy-expensive for the preshus-shookie-ookie-kums kibble -- remains largely untouched. And yet there's something about the neck rolls and rotund torso that suggest WAFFLES. LOTS AND LOTS OF WAFFLES. I can has chili cheez fries? OMFG SMALL ONE HAS COOKIE COOKIE COOKIE Eh. Fuckkit. zzzzzzzzzzzzzz Max is also overweight, but that's nothing new. He's been overeating to fill a nutsack-shaped void for YEARS now. I eat kibble while Lard Dog sleep. Is win-win. Read more →