not that you asked...

Year One: The Outtakes

Moments old*
 

One month
 

Two months
 

Three months
 

Four months
 

Five months
 

Six months
 

Seven months
 

Eight months
 

Nine months

Ten months 

Eleven months
 

One year old

*also known as The Most Heinous Postpartum Photo Ever Taken Of Anyone On The Face Of The Earth EVER. But it's Christmas, so have a hearty laugh slash gasp of horror on me.

Happy Birthday, Baby Girl

Moments old (birth story here.) 
One month
 
Two months
 
Three months
 
Four months
 
Five months
 
Six months
 
Seven months
 
Eight months
 
Nine months
 
Ten months
 
Eleven months
 
One year old
 
We love you, Bird.
Love,
Mama, Dada and Asher 

Family lore

As we were sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner, my dad announced that he had a story he wanted to tell. I don't remember exactly what he said, something along the lines of AND IT COULD CHANGE LIFE AS WE KNOW IT, but he said it in a way that was much less dramatic and also right after he said it he started eating, so I was pretty sure it wasn't going to be the eight million dollars I was thinking would be nice for someone to leave us.

SPOILER ALERT: Yeah. There's no money.

According to the story my dad was recently told, his grandfather (my great-grandfather) had been run out of the state of Virginia “at the end of a shotgun” after getting a girl pregnant and not marrying her. The irony of the story is that my great-grandfather himself had grown up without a father, after his biological dad had done the same thing to his mother – gotten her all good and knocked up and then run off. (Are you following this?) So it turns out that my great-grandfather had not taken his father's last name when he was growing up; he'd taken his MOTHER'S name instead. Which goes against All Basic Rules of Lineage, right? Especially in the early 1900s, when there was no such thing as Keeping Your Own Name or Hyphenating When You Feel Like It or any of that Modern Identity stuff. Back then, everyone took their father's names, right? Carrying on the family name with pride and all that jazz. I mean, granted, he had every right to take his mother's name, what with the completely absent father and everything, but that means that the WRONG LAST NAME has been handed down for the last few generations.

In other words, we're not who we thought we were. Or... well, something like that. I'm obviously not an expert. In fact, the truth is, I really had no idea what my dad was getting at after he told that story. This is the same reason I don't like listening to jokes, because I'm too worried that I'm not going to get the punch line at the end and I'm going to have to fake laugh and I have a really obvious fake laugh, and then I have to pretend that I get it until I can get home and ask Dave to explain it.

This time, though, I wasn't the only one staring blankly at him when he finished talking. Please explain to me how this could CHANGE LIFE AS WE KNOW IT?

“That means,” my dad helpfully continued, “that our last name shouldn't be Palmer after all.”

Here's where the blank looks changed to buggy eyes.

“Our last name,” he continued, “should be...”

“PLEASE DON'T SAY CASSEE, PLEASE DON'T SAY CASSEE,” my husband interjected.

“Our last name should be... THRASH,” my father announced.

OMG, people. Thrash! My maiden name should be Thrash. It's like, the coolest last name ever invented in the history of the whole wide world, right? I'm not sure that if I'd been named Emily Thrash, that I could have given that one up when I got married. I would have hyphenated AT THE LEAST. I might have even suggested that Dave take MY last name (I ask you, who messes with someone named Dave THRASH?), but unless Dave's brothers get on the ball and get themselves some offspring, Dave would have been the last procreating Cassee on his side of the family; the last one able to carry on the family name. So I doubt he would have been game. Not that it matters anyway, as my maiden name won't change, no matter how much I picture the Safeway checkout boy saying, “Do you need anyone to help you to your car, Mrs. Thrash?” Wait, no, the Safeway guy would never ask someone with the last name Thrash if they need help. Someone with the last name Thrash clearly DOES NOT need any help; someone with the last name Thrash is a certified bad-ass.

So short of a surprise eight million dollar inheritance, this was the next best thing to discuss while gathered around the Thanksgiving table, right? Totally juicy gossip about long-dead people who messed up the family tree.

Oh, wait. Except for the part where my brother and sister-in-law announced they were expecting in July. (I bet they wish they'd gone first with that one.) (No, seriously, I'm totally excited to be an aunt again.) (And I totally think Thrash would be an awesome name for a boy or a girl.)

I'm guessing my dad will LOVE this story

At first I thought the low point of my day was going to be the hour of screaming and the general helpless feeling known as watching your 11-month-old try and try and try – in SEVERAL DIFFERENT POSITIONS – to crank out a stodgy turd. Oh, it was awful, the way she clung helplessly to the edge of the couch, knees bent, tears rolling down her cheeks, and worse was how, after I put her in a warm bath, she crouched down on all fours and assumed a stance reserved solely for women delivering FULL-TERM BABIES and cried pitifully some more, and eventually I just couldn't take it any longer; couldn't take the tears and the moaning and the obvious discomfort and so, yeah. The low point wasn't the crying.

No, the low point involved (and I do apologize if you're eating dinner or have delicate sensibilities or are currently childless and ever entertained the thought that you might want to have a child at some point) my finger. I don't think I need to say any more, do I? Except to tell you that an unfortunate side effect of being your child's very hands-on Poop Advocate is that no matter how many times you wash those hands afterwards, you're never REALLY SURE you've got the all-clear to go forward with dinner prep. I mean, measuring out minced garlic and grating carrots and my hands were just WHERE, NOW?

I've said this before: Prior to having kids, I don't think I could have ever imagined the kinds of things parenthood would require of me, emotionally AND physically. But maybe even crazier than that, I never would have believed that I wouldn't hesitate – not even for a MOMENT - to do them. Today, for example, I was a crazy, non-hesitating human enema.

Let us all collectively shudder.

Poor Lucy. But after five minutes of snuffling onto my shoulder, she was fine, and back to toddling around the house gnawing on her burp cloth (a million handmade loveys and she adopts a raggedy burp cloth) and tearing apart the bookshelf and rolling around on the dog's bed. And I bleached the entire bathroom and washed my hands a thousand times and performed the exhaustive nightly ritual of trying to find one solitary thing in the entire house that she will eat more than two bites of before turning up her nose and slapping it away. Tonight's attempt included: peas, pears (both pureed and... well, non-pureed), apples, applesauce, yogurt, clementines, chicken nuggets, and graham crackers. (GRAHAM CRACKERS. WHO IS THIS CHILD.) But that's a post for another day, a day when I've gotten more than four hours of sleep the night before, and can put together a coherent thought or two instead of just leaving you with this:

OMG DO I LOVE MY FLIP CAMERA.

Also, my dad told the MOST INTERESTING STORY at the Thanksgiving dinner table and I am going to tell you it as soon as I get some sleep and wipe my memory clean of what happened today. Not my hands, though, MY HANDS ARE ALREADY CLEAN. (And so is my bathtub.)

Your tax dollars at work

I was going to write a post tonight but then I got all excited about Elizabeth's gift guide over at Style Lush, to the point where I was INVENTING people I needed to buy gifts for. And then I got all excited about writing my OWN Style Lush post, so I did that, and now it's 10:28 and it's not that I don't have the energy or lack of content to write a post, it's more that Hoarders is on and I need all that energy to clap my hand over my mouth every thirty seconds and say things like YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME. (Which I just said approximately six seconds ago when they unearthed a DEAD CAT FROM SOMEONE'S LIVING ROOM.)

So here. Have a video. Of my daughter holding an enormous hissing cockroach at the Smithsonian. Unfortunately we did not capture the special moment that occurred a few minutes before this one, when she grabbed a big green caterpillar and got it halfway to her mouth before someone whose job it is to manhandle enormous bugs wrenched it free of her grasp.

(OMG, in the span of time it took me to type that last paragraph, they have now found an additional dead cat. TWO DEAD CATS IN HER LIVING ROOM. Two!)

Right. The video. I know. Sorry. Here.

We don't use the word "pervy" enough, in my opinion

I spent this morning at the Newseum with Lori. And you know what? No one asked me any weird questions when I mentioned I needed to find a babysitter for the day so I could meet my friend from the Internet down in the big city. ALONE. Oh, didn't I tell you about that? A few months ago when I was headed out to the Blathering, Dave thought he was being funny when he mentioned to our couples' small group that I was going out of town to meet people from the Internet, people I'd NEVER MET BEFORE, who said they were young moms but who would likely turn out to be old pervy 60-year-old men. And I know Dave was joking, and I know he never thought I was in any danger of thinking I'd be meeting Manda and coming face to face with, I don't know, Rodney Dangerfield or something, but people who don't blog or read blogs or know anything about the Blogging Community (oh barfity barf barf) immediately assume a blog is the '90s equivalent of a random chat room and I'm pretty sure they all thought I would board that plane to Sacramento, never to return again, except possibly dismembered and in a styrofoam cooler.

But obviously, I survived Sacramento (no, wait, Sacramento survived ME), so I think everyone trusts my judgment now, for the most part. No one said anything about Lori or whether it might be weird to meet someone whose VOICE I've never even heard before, and just as I expected, it was perfectly normal and we talked the whole time about things we would never tell the Internet and we shared a huge chocolate chip cookie at lunch and we laughed and I was further convinced that I would very much like Lori to live right next door to me, and not just because she has a lot of books I want to borrow.

And everything went well on my commute home until I got off the bus and started the half-mile walk to my house, which is when I had to call Dave and make him stay on the phone with me while I attempted to pass a very drunk man staggering down the sidewalk in front of me. I just don't see a lot of drunk, staggering men out here in the suburbs, ESPECIALLY not at two in the afternoon. And this guy wasn't just weaving. I witnessed a total collapse on the sidewalk THREE SEPARATE TIMES, and twice I saw him TEETERING and on the very brink of falling into the path of oncoming traffic and I almost couldn't bring myself to walk past him because I was pretty sure he was going to topple over and land on me and I didn't want to get my new pink coat dirty when I fell off the curb. I guess I was also worried that he'd grope me or something. But okay, I was way more worried about my coat. Things I Don't Want On My New Pink Coat: chewing gum, dog hair, TIRE TRACKS.

Yeah, I bought a pink coat. I have always professed to hate pink, to LOATHE pink, and I even refused to give into the Girly Pinkness when I found out Lucy was to be a she, so her nursery was decorated in yellow and green, which I think just about killed my mother. But the coat! I found it at the J. Crew outlet a couple weeks ago and the fit is perfect and it has these adorable pleats in the back and I wanted a BRIGHTLY COLORED coat, so pink it is. I like it, okay? I LIKE IT. And this is as good a time as ever, I guess, to go ahead and tell you that I'm now contributing over at Style Lush along with a bunch of talented bloggers who I know and love, so I hope you'll stop by over there and check things out. I've written only two posts so far, but I hope to post a couple of times a week from here on out. I confess, I have never thought of myself as a stylish person (AND STILL DON'T, although you should see my coat!), but Jennie has a way with flattery, and I could not resist. Look up “peer pressure” in the dictionary, and BEHOLD! A photo of ME.

And now it's 10pm and I have to go to bed because Lucy, as delightful and wonderful and scrumptious as she is when the sun is up, is still absolutely craptastic at sleeping even though we are three weeks shy of her first birthday. Right now I am thinking about how much I would like to kick my pediatrician, the first person of many who told me that if I just managed to cut out that middle-of-the-night feeding, she'd start sleeping through. Oh HA HA HA, and also SUCK IT. Lucy hasn't had a bottle in the middle of the night for more than 10 days now, and yet she still wakes up two, three, four times a night most nights, and sometimes (and this is the HONEST TO GOD TRUTH) all she wants us to do is flip her over. Like, seriously, I'll go in there when I hear the screaming and she'll be lying on her back in the middle of the crib with her eyes closed, and all I have to do is flip her onto her belly and she goes back to sleep. Also HA HA HA to all of you “why don't you just let her cry?” people, because I DID LET HER CRY the other night, I let her cry and moan for TWO WHOLE HOURS and she never gave up until I went in and flipped her over, and then? SILENCE. People! This is an 11-month-old who has been walking for well over two MONTHS now, and she can't roll over in her own bed? I mean, HONESTLY. She's a stubborn little mule, that one, and at this point I am just plodding alongside her, waiting for her to make up her own mind about sleep and how it is actually glorious and wonderful and while I wait patiently for that moment, I am dreaming up all kinds of ways to get her back for this someday. I promise you it will not involve a dead squirrel. 

Have a really happy Thanksgiving everyone. Wishing you safe travels and good pie and the bigger half of the wishbone.

Tenterhooks! I know you were waiting on them!

First of all, might I suggest you make a Thankful Tree with your preschooler?

It took us about 15 minutes to make ours, mostly because I printed it out at Nickjr.com (because we are SLAVES TO CHILDREN'S PROGRAMMING MARKETING), and then had Dave help me cut out the leaves. Asher was excited that we were doing a project involving (a remarkably well-dressed for the season) Dora (seriously, a cardigan), and also that he was allowed to sit on the countertop to do it, so he was a willing participant for 95 percent of the time, until we got to the last one or two leaves. That's when he wandered into the living room to play with his flashlight. That stupid flashlight has provided HOURS of enjoyment, although I find it kind of odd that his idea of having fun with it is excavating dusty forgotten toys from underneath the sofa. Well, when he's not shining it directly into people's EYES. (Perhaps he has a future in archaeology.)

Anyway, we have had several talks over the last week or so about thankfulness and what it means to be thankful, and I tried to keep in mind during these talks that this is a three-year-old I'm explaining this concept to, a three-year-old who is petrified of blowing his nose and who only figured out the concept of sleeping under a blanket about two weeks ago, so I simply explained that things we're thankful for are usually the things that make us happy. So when we sat down to do the Thankful Tree, Asher had already been briefed and understood what I was asking and immediately started rattling off his list.

The first thing he announced he was thankful for? Asher. Yes, himself. NATURALLY. After that followed trains (DUH), and Dora, and Dada, and Mama, and Lucy, and then he pointed to the picture of Boots standing next to Dora at the bottom of the page and said, “That monkey.” OMG, people, this is a child who watches an episode of Dora EVERY SINGLE DAY and he can't for the life of him remember the name of that freaking monkey. But I wasn't about to change his wording, so That Monkey got his own leaf. Next up was “spinning.” Spinning! In circles! I mean, really! What's a life without spinning until you're so dizzy that you're threatening bodily harm by thwacking into something head first? I DON'T KNOW EITHER! He was also thankful for puzzles, and his grandparents, and the outside train we ride as much as we can every spring and summer.

Hilarious answers aside, it was really fun and rewarding to watch him think. Ok, and really REALLY fun and rewarding when he pulled some of that random stuff out his butt. (SPINNING! In CIRCLES!) Lucy has yet to try to rip it all down from the wall, which is a whole different kind of miracle, what with her general feelings on destruction, which are yes, please, and also that nothing is sacred.

But you're not here for heartwarming stories about my delicious children, are you? You want to know what the heck my father does with stink bugs that my mother saves for him in plastic bags.

HE FEEDS THEM TO A FROG.

Which wouldn't be so weird, if, as commenter beyond suggested, it was a pet frog. But it's not a pet frog, you guys, it's a frog that lives in a hole next to their driveway, and my dad waits for that frog to emerge at night and then he wanders outside with either the bag of collected bugs or some fresh ones he catches himself and he FEEDS THEM TO IT. My mom said one night they opened the front door and the frog was just sitting there, on the porch, WAITING. Waiting! For my dad to appear with a handful of insects! HOW WEIRD IS THAT?

Of course, it's not weird at all if you KNOW my dad, a man who used to routinely freak us out as children by letting various kinds of insects crawl around in his mouth and by picking up dog crap and throwing it at us in the backyard. With his bare hands, I might add. And some piles were... fresher than others, if you know what I mean. But perhaps he is most famous for the incident that occurred while driving me and a friend home from softball practice when I was in sixth grade. He slowed to a stop at a stop sign, opened the driver's side door, and picked up a dead squirrel from the road which he DANGLED IN FRONT OF MY FACE while he continued to drive and while I pressed myself against the passenger door and screamed in terror. When we got close to our house he tried to throw it clear of the car out of the sunroof but it just splatted onto the windshield and slid down, leaving a gruesome, bloody smear. When the car finally stopped inside the garage, I bolted and he picked it off the glass by the tail and chased me around the cul-de-sac with it. He tried to figure out a way to stick it to the garage door on the side of the garage my mom parked in, hoping for some magical moment wherein the door would lift up and the squirrel would hang from it and my mother would pass out from fright inside her Dodge Caravan but it never panned out and he ended up throwing it into the garbage can.

And then getting it out later that night and spreading it across my mom's car seat before she got in.

And then one more time to chase my brother down the basement stairs.

And THEN he threw it in the trash for good.

Huh. Yeah, so maybe the frog thing isn't such a big deal by comparison.