today...

When I was in second grade each student was assigned to bring 6 dyed Easter eggs to school for the class egg hunt. On the day of the hunt I brought in my six eggs. 3 of them were dyed the regular old PAAS colors (of course, I had used that nifty white crayon on them prior to dyeing so that after they soaked in the chosen color, I could pull them out to find my cute little stars, hearts, and smiley faces tattooed all over them.) The other three had the ever-so-beautiful plastic shrink wrap sleeves on them. Did you have those? They were like a little plastic cuff with cartoon-y figures on them and you slipped them onto the egg and then lowered it into boiling water so that it "shrunk" around the egg, tight as can be. So, I was very, very proud of my eggs when I turned them into the teacher to be hidden by the room moms. My pride was dashed when Jason Taylor got one of his eggs out. I swear to you, I can still remember it with vivid detail. Mutli-colored and vibrant, so shiny it looked like he had dipped in five or six shades of glorious fingernail polish. It was seriously beautiful. So beautiful that our teacher, Mrs. Wilson, declared it the prize egg the minute she laid eyes on it. I felt like crying because I wanted her to pick one of my eggs as the prize egg...and then I felt like my world would end if I wasn't the one who found that gorgeous egg. I didn't find the egg...pretty sure I was too busy keeping an eye on my classmates to make sure they didn't find it! All this to say that every Easter thereafter I've been trying to duplicate Jason Taylor's prize egg...to no avail. If only I had called his house after school that day to ask his mother just how they did it!! This year, the egg dyeing was very important because we will keep these eggs and always put them in Ella's Easter basket to remind her of her very first Easter. To be able to keep them, we did the whole "blowing out" of the egg through needle holes on both ends. She slept while Tommy and I sat at the kitchen table and blew our brains out! We blew out the yolk and whites of 9 eggs...which is no easy task...but after they've been rinsed and dyed, they will keep forever. (Providing she doesn't smash them when she's a toddler.) The entire process had us laughing and, of course, Tommy had to turn the blowing thing into a race to see who could blow their egg out the fastest. (He won.) And.....I'm fairly happy with how they turned out. I wish they were a little more muted...more pastel-ish and eastery....but I wanted them to be Jason Taylor-ish, too...and it's hard for an egg to be all those things. I like that they are shiny, like fingernail polish and maybe next year (we'll do the same hollow egg thing and keep them because Duh! next year will be her first, first Easter...like the first one she doesn't sleep through) I will add some white which would probably produce a lighter shade of colors.

As I said before, we blew out nine eggs and you might see that there are only 8 pictured. That would be because my husband ignored the warnings on the package and mixed all the colors together resulting in a near black and very scary looking egg that had to be thrown away.

Easter eggs, March 08

I couldn't really be too mad that he ruined a precious hollow egg (that one of us worked very hard to blow out) because he had come home from work with these....

red roses, 11 for me, 1 for baby girl, March 08




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daddy's little sports fan, March 08

The poor Cats. We were all sad today. So, so close they were! Maybe next year!

cheering with daddy, March 08

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sleeping beauty, March 08

Today I was getting ready to run some errands and I put Isabella in her pink Boppy chair that we keep in our bathroom specifically for when we are getting ready, showering, etc. She doesn't bounce around in it at all, in fact, she usually falls asleep. So after I was done in the bathroom I walked around the corner to our closet to get dressed. I was halfway into my jeans when I heard a boom (seriously, a loud boom) followed by hysterical crying. My heart fell to my feet as my mind tried to fathom how in the world she made it up and over the side of this bowl-like seat? She doesn't roll over yet, doesn't grab things yet, nothing. I took off running (only to slip on the carpet and fall because I had one leg in my jeans and the other out). When I got to the scene I realized that the entire seat cushion had slipped off the frame and had fallen through to the tile floor beneath it which seems nearly impossible given how tightly the cloth is stretched over the frame. I swooped her up and tried to soothe her while checking her head for a lump. (The fall was less than six inches, and the cushion/pillow was between her head and the tile...but given the boom I heard, I was upset to say the least.) So I am crying, and she is really crying. I'm telling her how sorry I am, I'm rubbing her head, I'm rocking her. She calmed down pretty quickly but then my mind started to race with snippets of things I have heard in my lifetime about head injuries...
"...may seem like nothing at the time, but turns out to be very serious..."
"....just laid down to try to get rid of the headache and then slipped into a coma....
".....seemed fine after it happened but later became very lethargic..."
So, I proceeded to call Tommy (whom I had just talked to prior to the accident and had told me he was just stepping into a meeting.) He knew something must be wrong when he saw that it was me. I sobbed through an explanation of what had just happened. He assured me that he thought she was fine given that the cushion had prevented her from making contact with the tile. After a few minutes of him soothing me, I got off the phone and gave her my own mini version of a physical. Everything seemed to check out OK.
She even smiled. Check.
She didn't wince when I rubbed the back of her head. Check.

(This all happened before noon.)

Fast forward to 7pm this evening. My mom came to have dinner with us and we were all sitting on the floor playing with Isabella. I was showing mom how she can pull up/ sit up by doing this elaborate routine that I do with her (that she loves!) wherein I go..."Oooooooooone, Twooooooooooooooooooooo, and then on Threeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...I pull on her arms and she sits up and cackles. We do this ten times a day (What To Expect... says that a 4month old baby should be able to pull up and keep their head level with their body...which she can do.) So......we're doing it for Gigi...we're really showing off....we're smiling and laughing.....

do you see where this is headed?

She jerks one hand out of my hand and goes backwards ....again, only 5 or so inches but...bumps her head on the same spot again...and this time it is all my fault.
And again, she is crying and I am holding back tears and trying to soothe her.
Guilt swallowed me up whole.
I felt more than terrible.
I felt awful.
It was one of those moments that I've written about before where I felt way too young and irresponsible to be someone's mother.
I felt so inadequate.
Again, she calmed right down with some rocking and consoling...
but my heart ached for the rest of the night.

It's hard to describe how it made me feel but the closest thing I can compare it to is this:
You know how when you hurt your toe and you spend the rest of the day trying to guard that toe from getting hurt any worse? It feels to you like everything and everyone is about to hit your sore toe? Well, that's how I feel now. I'm handling her with kid gloves, with that "I-just-came-an-inch-from-rear-ending-the-60,000$ bmw-in-front-of me" weak, jittery-ness.
I'm the one who is supposed to keep her safe.
And, twice in one day I've let her get hurt. I'm hoping she forgives me easier than I forgive myself.
And I'm so dreading the first time she wipes out on pavement. Tommy will have to scrape us both off the sidewalk.