Fun with munchkins

Cooper helps with the laundry now. I take an armful of laundry from the washing machine and put it in the dryer and then he shuts the dryer drawer. And then he opens the door for the next armful and repeats the process. He's very helpful.

He also tried climbing in the bathtub with me last night. I was reading a book in the tub, and he walked into the bathroom, saw me in the tub and walked right over and hooked one leg over the edge of the tub and started to climb in. He was not happy when I stopped him.

He's also learning to run. My prayers now include a plea that he will be able to make those corners at high speeds. He freaks me out at least twice a day. We've already ended up with one welt on his head. Hopefully no more.

I can live with this

Your Word is "Love"

You see life as possibility to form deep connections with a few people. Relationships are the center of your world, and you always take time to bond with those you love. You are caring and giving. You enjoy helping those you love. And when it comes to romantic love, you feel passionately ... even in a very long term relationship.

What's Your Word?

RBOC: Thoughts on a Wednesday

Too many little tidbit type things floating around in my head, so a grand old RBoC post:

• My score at the penguin slide game on Wii Fit sucks because I am laughing so hard my penguin always falls off the iceberg.
• I don't like Katy Perry's music. Her songs annoy me for a variety of reasons, but it's hard to dislike her entirely for one reason. Whenever her new song Hot n Cold comes on the radio, Cooper starts rocking out in his car seat. It's so incredibly adorable.
• The video for that song makes the song even worse.
• While we're talking about music, does Jason Mraz's songs make anyone else want to go on a vacation? And is weird that I have a bit of a girlcrush on Pink?
• Cooper spent five minutes saying "die" over and over again in a sweet angelic happy voice this afternoon. It was both hysterical and disturbing.
• There is something incredibly wrong with getting to a doctor's office at 2:00pm, finally seeing the doctor at 3:01 and being done with the appointment by 3:03.
• Have I mentioned lately how well Cooper's physical therapy is doing? I have to remember now that he can walk, because I'm so used to carrying him or having him in a stroller when we go out. He walked from the car across a big parking lot into the medical building down the hall and into the doctor's office without stopping or falling all by himself. When we got home from going grocery shopping, instead of carrying him into the house, I put him on the sidewalk and told him to go in the house. So he walked up to the front door while I got the groceries from the trunk, and then knocked on the front door until I got it unlocked. He waited for me to open it, crawled inside (the threshold is raised and that still gives him problems) stood up, waited for me to come inside, and then pushed the door shut behind me. He's such a little kid now. It's great.
• I trust Whoorl's advice about most things beauty related, so when I needed new mascara, I picked up her recommended Lash Exact by CoverGirl, but have been saddened to find that there is something about the brush that makes me stick it in my eyeball one time out of three.
• More people, however, should do product recommendations by haiku.
• Why is it always the second your students walk out the door that you remember the important thing you forgot to tell them?

Enough for now. I have a substantive post brewing, but it's not ready yet.

You never can tell

My class last semester was my most difficult one ever. I had a hard time connecting with the students. Many of them never talked. Part of the problem was a new text book that I wasn't particularly comfortable with pedagogically, and my struggle to use that text upset the flow of the classroom throughout the semester.

I got my student evaluations today. I had been dreading these, because of how bad I had felt the semester had gone. I was floored when I read them, however. They were great. The students were remarkably perceptive about the problems with the text book, and were able to separate the problems with the text from the rest of the classroom experience. They had valid criticisms about that classroom experience that I can take an incorporate this semester. One student asked for more break out groups early on in the semester so she (why am I assuming this is a female?) could get to know other students and would feel more comfortable speaking out in the class as a whole during the semester. That's a great suggestion, and one I can incorporate now.

But they loved me. I couldn't have told that from the way they acted in class, but almost all of them thought I was great. The icing on the cake was this comment: "Without doubt one of the greatest teachers and influences of my life."

Wow. It doesn't get much better than that.

And yes, I know, teaching isn't supposed to be about ego, but anyone who has ever done it can tell you it's a performance, and who doesn't like a standing ovation at the end?

My birthday present

I got an early birthday present last night. GeekBoy got me the Wii Fit. I had told him that's what I wanted, so it's not like, "Hey, honey, you're fat, do something about that." He's supporting me in my goals. In general I don't recommend exercise equipment as a gift to your female significant others.

I played with it last night, and it's so much fun. It taps into my competitive streak perfectly. I must have the four star rating on advanced step. I will do this slalom course until I don't miss a gate!

One of the things that was cracking me up the most, though, is the other Miis running around in the games. My brother-in-law had way too much fun creating Miis at some point in the past and loading them into our console, so now I do my step with Jack Black, and Elvis kicks soccer balls at my head. It's the only way to exercise.

Is it just me...

...or has President Bush spent the last two months working on a Blue Steel impersonation?

Goals and rewards

I'm a big believer in goals. Goals need to be written down, and placed somewhere they can be seen regularly. That's why this blog is called Life by List, because I make lists of what I need to accomplish, and then go out and do it. With long-term goals, it's nice to break it down into shorter projects, and to reward yourself for each step along the way.

I have a big weight loss goal, but I try not to think about losing 100 pounds. Eeek. Just writing that down is overwhelming. I think about smaller increments usually. I can lose twenty pounds. And then I can do it again. And I'll reward myself at the end of each twenty pounds. But I knew I wanted a big reward for the end of all 100 pounds. I've been thinking about it for awhile now, and this morning I finally realized what I am going to do.

I'm getting skinny boots. Profgrrrrl got tenure boots, so why not skinny boots? I've always wanted boots like that, but they don't work when you're fat because they don't zip up your calves.

So, when I lose 100 pounds, I'm going to buy myself a fabulous pair of black leather kneehigh boots. And I'm gonna look smoking hot.

Oh, and when I weighed myself this morning, I'm down five pounds from my start weight. It's a start.

On becoming

My sister gave me a game of conversation question starters. My husband and I were on a long drive to visit my grandmother so I pulled the box of questions out and pulled one out at random:

If all your wishes were granted, what would your life look like?

That lead to an interesting discussion, and I realized that my wish-fulfillment fantasy is completely achievable without any genies or fairy dust or magic wands. The picture that came into my head was of my life twenty or thirty years from now, and there was a very specific picture of what my day looked like in that life, and the things I would be doing.

Some of that life looked like my life now. Some of it looked like things I knew I liked but didn't realize I wanted to be that significant part of my life. But all of it consisted of things I could achieve.

So that's my challenge to myself this new year. Make my life look more like that day in my head. That's why I'm losing weight. Because the woman in my head had a life that was healthy, and I'm not right now. It also means that I'm starting a few new projects that I may or may not discuss on here. And it means I'll be reorganizing the way I spend some of my time.

But here's to becoming an awesome sixty year old woman, one day at a time.

I'm a sheep

Like almost the rest of America, I made a weight loss goal for the new year. Week one, down two pounds. I'm learning to drink a glass of water when I feel hungry in the middle of the afternoon, rather than reach for a snack. This isn't going to be a weight loss blog, but I'm going to keep track of progress. We'll see where I am in a year.

What to do?

The airline broke the handle on my luggage. They won't do anything about it, because handles count as "protruding parts" and therefore they are not liable for damages to them.

It's a Lands End duffle bag that I've had for over a decade. I know that Lands End will give me a credit for it, because Lands End has one of the best refund policies of any company anywhere, but it seems sucky to make them pay for the airline being incompetent. And really, they were incompetent on this flight. Our flight home was delayed because they forgot to schedule us a flight crew.

But dangit, now my bag is broken. Jerks.