I Am Died.

A conciliatory gift to compensate for my previous whininess on this fine fake-friday/pre-thanksgiving day.

Night Time Mothering....

... is starting to look like this:

I'm pretty sure I'm over it. It's been nine months, and I'm almost positive that the only thing my continued breastfeeding provides is pacification. They make pacifiers for this very reason. Not that Princess Gag-Barf would ever actually use one, but I still think I'm taking my girls and going home, because this party is o-ver.

Picture Pages!

Chillin.


Still Chillin.

Still Chillin.


You know....

ATTACK.

(kelly might be sporting a teensy little bald spot on the back of her head now. kid has a powerful grip)

Sunday Morning Coming Down (okay, not actually, but it is technically sunday morning and I kind of had to go there)

Ahem. It is somewhere around the one o'clock hour on this fine November 15th. Let's not get into the details of why I'm awake just at the moment, or why I'm keyed up enough to be writing here, rather than doing something crazy like sleeping or something.

Iris has been asleep for a couple of hours now. A few minutes ago, she started letting out some rather sad little bleating yelps through the monitor. I made my way upstairs to find her completely asleep, sprawled over her blanket in a rather uncomfortable looking pose. As I moved to right her limbs in to some sort of less pretzeled arrangement, she started crying and wiggling around again. I took the opportunity to rearrange her, cover her up a bit, and generally try to help her calm down.

She never woke up, really. She didn't open her eyes. I pressed my palm into the back of her head and tried to make contact with as much of her back as my weirdly angled forearm could muster. She flinched a few more times, but eventually stilled enough to seem genuinely asleep again. After I pulled my hand away I sat back and watched her for a few minutes. Part of me was waiting to make sure she wouldn't wake up again, but after a bit I realized that I was also trying to study her.

She is growing so fast. I looked at my baby tonight and saw her dream a big kid dream. In the low glow of the little glass turtle lamp who guards the changing table, I wanted to take a picture of her. She was so expressive. It felt like eavesdropping because she's such an active sleeper. She looked like she was upset or angry, or like she was giving someone a very serious dressing-down. Is it possible for a baby to look smugly confident while having a bad dream? If it is, that's exactly what she was doing.

I gave her a mental high-five when she very half-heartedly kicked at the air one last time before finally crashing in earnest. She's already so interesting, I honestly can't imagine what we're going to do when she starts talking. We'll have to find a way to record everything she says, because I can pretty much guarantee you that it will either be the funniest thing you've ever heard, or a really awesome name for a band, so either way, we'll not want to miss it.

(sorry guys. blogger wasn't working when I first attempted this post. thought you'd like it eventually, at the very least.)

Surly Monkey

Hi, my name's Iris, I like carrots and pickles and biting and freaking out and not sleeping. I'm proficient in the arts of fit-throwing and melt-downing (subtle differences, but I assure you, they're distinct). I can say "MAmamamamamamama," "DAdadadaDADAdaDAdadadad," and "Ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka!" That last one means "cat." I can hold my bottle, but I won't actually ever do it. I can crawl, but that would require you to stop holding me, so again, not gonna happen. I could probably walk, but see above re: put me down and you shall know pain.

Last week I totally punched Kelly in the face for not being Mama. Pretty much every night I try to install my foot into Mama's bellybutton for not being awake at omfg-shoot-me-now-o'clock. I have successfully removed about 25% of the cats' fur, yet for some reason they keep coming over to hang out with me.

Iris is really a joy to be around. She's a pretty happy baby in general, very smiley and ticklish. She's totally interested in everything around her, loves to sing songs and hear music everywhere we go. She wants to touch everything, but somehow skipped the part where she puts said everything in her mouth. Genius baby. Anyway, she's just sorta high maintenance, but I'm thinking "baby" is synonymous with "high maintenance," so I'm not exactly surprised/concerned. She's happy and incredibly demanding and maybe the demon in her soul is just a tiny little innocuous one, one who doesn't necessarily want to harm you, just really freak you out a lot. Hard to tell.

Ok, here's a good example. Everyone here seen The Incredibles? No? Great Pixar flick. You should totally go watch it right now. For those of you who haven't, allow me to explain the baby Jack Jack phenomenon. This movie features a family of super heroes who are doing their best to hide in plain sight, not reveal their superpowers & live as normal folks, etc, etc. Both parents and the two older kids have identifiable powers, but the baby (Jack Jack!) has always been known as the one "normal" person in the family. Cut to the end of the movie, most of the family is off saving the world, and some bad guy is trying to run off with the baby who has been left home with a sitter. This is also, quite helpfully, when Jack Jack comes into his super power.

Let us just say that Iris and Jack Jack have much in common.

Blue Steel

Behold, Her Pudgesty, Iris Luella:

Not much new happening over here, but Kelly took some more pictures, so I thought I'd share. I've now witnessed Kelly's photography stylee a couple of times, and I take back everything I ever said about the embarrassing noises/faces that I make while trying to take photos, because Kelly is way more adorkable than I'll ever be. Woman can do things with her eyebrows that would make even the most determinedly morose of the sulky emo kids crack up.

As you can see, Iris has become much more expressive of late.
I call this one her "I am learning that information for the first time ever!" face. Doesn't she just look so mock-surprised? Like, "oh, that is quite the dramatic turn of events! How shall I arrange my face to portray the most possible alarm?"

And this one, of course is all, "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, you are not SERIOUS?!!!1!??" Like you can see the "nuh-UH" about to roll off her tongue.

So, I don't even know how to talk about this (slaps face in shame) but Iris really likes My Little Ponies. PUHLEEZ for the love of all that is good and Holy, do not start adding "My Little Pony Paraphernalia & Small Parts On Which To Choke" to any sort of Christmas/B-Day present list that you may be keeping for Iris (lookin' at you, Grandmas). Iris has plenty of good quality time with the Ponies five days a week, and I do NOT need them taking over my house. ANYway, Iris really likes them. She whips them around by their manes and bangs them on the floor, and carries them around in her backwards-crawling escapades.

Look! With the standing! and the precious! and that awesomesauce outfit! I actually specifically requested that Kelly take pictures this day because I was so enamored with Iris' outfit. I actually want this in grown up size for myself.

And this one is just so gratuitously cute I threw up in my mouth a little. Just kidding. But it is ridiculously cute, no?

Hey, Iris just woke up! cc tb kkkkkkvg cv7gy fvgfrb. That was her stellar keyboarding skills right there, roughly translated, I think it means "Hi." Anyway, with the elfin one awake, now is the time when we snuggle on the couch and watch bad movies till she passes out. I'll try to get these pictures and the rest from the set up on Picasa soon.

Because

I'm fully aware that I sound like the bad guy when I describe Iris with words like "Angry Demon Elf," or "Satan's Razornails Freedom Hater," and that everyone wanted to believe that I was joking when I warned that she doesn't take smack from anyone, and that you should watch your soft parts because she's out to maul you. But just look at that face. That is the face of one twisted puppy. She's gonna mess. you. up.

Just joshin. I think she just really wanted some pancakes. She tends to make that face when she's feeling silly and/or really wants to lick your face. Which is always, so.... ya. She makes that face a lot.

P.S. Shamelessly ripped off this pic from Sarah's FB. Thanks dude.