There is another sweet older lady that lives downstairs. Not the crazy one with lipstick on her teeth, but a sweet one that brings toys for Otis (she used to watch kids) and gave us a loaf of bread at Christmas.

That loaf of bread happend to be Amish Friendship Bread. It was delicious. Well, last week she came upstairs to give us a bag of blocks and a blanket and she asked about the bread.

Me: It was wonderful!
Mark: I didn’t get any…
Me: Ya snooze, ya lose…
Neighbor Lady: Would you like your own starter? You can make some for yourself…
Inside my head: Oh dear. I don’t even know where our oven is…
Me: Um, duh! I love baking! You do bake it… right?
Neighbor Lady: Yes, you’ll have to bake it by Saturday. That’s Day 10. You just add some basic ingredients…
Inside my head and totally not listening to Neighbor Lady: Crapcrapcrap. Ingredients? I don’t have ingredients! I wonder if there are microwave directions…
Me: Yeah, I think we have all of that! Yeah, this will be great!
Neighbor Lady: Great! I’ll go get the starter for you.

Crap. “No, thanks! I don’t know where the oven is” would have been a much better answer, but no. I had to offer myself up to the Amish Friendship Bread altar.

Mark: You’re going to bake?
Me: Duh.
Mark: …

He don’t know me.

Neighbor Lady: Here’s the starter (hands me a ziplock bag of liquid) and the recipe. And don’t worry, if you lose the starter the recipe for it is on the second page.
Inside my head: Lose the starter? It can run away? Is it not dead yet? Crapcrapcrap.
Me: Thanks! I can’t wait until Saturday! Or should I say Baker Day! Ha!

Oh dear.

It was a Wednesday night. I had 2 days until B-day. Until Saturday the only thing I had to do was “Mush the bag”. Easy enough, right?

Mark: Did you mush your bag today?
Me: Crap.
Mark: Are you sure you want to do this? We can give it to my mom…
Me: I GOT THIS.

Baker Day finally got here and I realized it was do or die. I mushed my bag and started reading the directions. For the first time. I read the directions (past “Mush the bag”) FOR THE FIRST TIME.

Me: Do we have flour?
Mark: I think so.
Me: Salt?
Mark: Yes.
Me: Eggs?
Mark: Ummm… yeah. We have some…I think.
Me: Whatever it probably isn’t important.

So I got started. Here’s the thing, the only motivation that I had to make this bread was to get it off of my counter. I thought, “I’ll make it, be done and move on with life”.

But that’s not how Amish Friendship Bread works.

The very first thing you do with Amish Friendship Bread is make 4 more starters. FOUR MORE STARTERS, PEOPLE.  I went from having one bag of liquid bread to having four. If I read the directions all the way through I might have been able to stop it, but psh. Reading directions is for wusses.

After I scooped out the 4 starters, it was time to make the actual bread.

Me: Oh, crap. This thing needs instant vanilla pudding.
Mark: We have some!
Me: No, we have instant lemon pudding. And we have cook & serve chocolate pudding. Where did we get all of this pudding?

After a lengthy discussion about the difference between instant and cook & serve and whether we’d rather eat lemon Amish Bread or chocolate Amish Bread we decided to go with cook & seve chocolate pudding.

At this point Mark decided to tag team with me. I had most of the ingredients out and ready to go, but I guess I sounded like I was having so much fun that he just needed to get in on the action.

Mark: Cinnamon? Do you think we should put it in there?
Me: Why not?
Mark: Cinnamon and chocolate?
Me: You’re right. Take it out.

Mark: We only have 2 eggs. It wants 3.
Me: Uh oh.
Mark: Eh, they’re large eggs.
Me: Make it work.

By the end of it all we had taken out the cinnamon, replaced instant vanilla pudding with cook & serve chocolate pudding and used 2 (large) eggs instead of 3. Oh, and since we don’t have loaf pans we put them in a large rectangle pan and a circle pan. Needless to say, before we put the bread in the oven we said a prayer. Or two.

And that’s why, as we search for a house, I consider a kitchen completely optional.

Also, the Amish Friendship BrownieBread  was actually kind of awesome. In the name of Jesus.

Either way, he wreaked some havoc on the stomachs of the McKinney side of the family. He started on Sunday night throwing up every half hour or so. I know this has probably been said a billion times since Adam and Eve were new parents, but there may be nothing worse than seeing your baby sick. And this was just throwing up. I said so many prayers for the moms and dads of really sick babies.

And all he wanted was hugs from mommy. And every time my heart stopped because he was puking and OH NO MARK CALL 911 all I wanted was my mommy.

Then? I got sick. Because if stomach bugs were 12 year old girls, I’d totally be their Justin Beiber. I get one every single year. What can I say? They love me.

And being sick with a baby is so different than being sick without a baby. Without a baby I got to sleep between trips to the bathroom and watch entire episodes of Ellen and generally waste away in private. With a baby? Nope. You just trudge through that crap and catch the throw up (his, not mine) with your bare hand like a good mom does.

Unfortunately, the love didn’t end there. We gave the bug to my parents’ house, getting my sister, grandmother and dad sick.

However, in the positive news that always follows a case of the stomach bug, Otis’ pajamas zipped up like they did 5 pounds ago! Go on with your bad self, Little O!

I really suck at these. And I’m currently sucking at blogging. My last real post? December 9th. Disgusting.

Speaking of 9, you’re 9 months old. Can you believe it? You’ve been out as long as you were in! And I have to say I’m quite thankful that your gestation period ended 9 months ago. Because a 25 pound delivery would have been… hell.

You are thisclose to crawling. Which I’m not sure if you’ll ever really get to since rolling is your preferred method of transportation. This is fine except your favorite place to roll is towards things and places you shouldn’t be near. You’re getting fitted for your bubble next week…

You had your first Christmas and got what felt like a bajillion toys and do you know what you wanted to play with? Wrapping paper and the automobile vacuum cleaner your Lola got in Dirty Santa. Who knew?

I just want you to know I think you’re wonderful. And I really can’t imagine anything that could change that. I really can’t.

Love,
Ma Ma

January
I shared the REAL email I sent to Otis James to find out if naming our kid Otis was a good idea.

February
I drew cartoons to explain the reality of sex during pregnancy.

March
I threaten explain to Mark why our budget is a non-issue in the delivery room.

April
Your mom ever tell you she loved you from the first day she saw you? She’s not lying.

May
This is where I love on my own mom with a whole new perspective.

June
I try to turn my baby into an internet meme. It doesn’t work.

July
I struggle with the whole trust God thing.

August
Hallmark invites me to their Life is a Special Occasion Tour. It was cool.

September
I turn my labor experience into a motivational speech.

October
I joined Rodan + Fields. It’s still awesome.

November
Our kid poops. On the floor. Cheap parenting ftw.

December
I bring Domesticate Me back. You’re welcome.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season and is ready to kick 2012′s proverbial butt.*

*I’m 99% sure that I didn’t use “proverbial” correctly, but I don’t care. Kick it.

Vanderbilt’s maternity floor is really sweet and all of the nurses are fantastic, but let’s be real, the maternity floor is really the Baby Penitentiary. As soon as they’re born they get a little alarm system strapped to their ankle which will go off if it comes off or goes past certain doorways and the entire floor locks down. It’s essentially house arrest. If you aren’t familiar ask Lindsey Lohan.

Obviously, this is to protect babies from being stolen.  Or walking off. Or something.

Because of this we spent a nice chunk of time waiting for Otis to be discharged and have his ankle bracelet removed by the proper authorities nurse. When the nurse finally came in to discharge us it felt like pure chaos. Vanderbilt is a teaching hospital so there always seems to be tons of people around observing which is fine with me, but there just felt like lots of people around talking. In the midst of this we’re signing this paper and that paper and the nurse is talking really fast and the running commentary in the back of my head was, “Oh crap, oh crap, OH CRAP”.  Needless to say, I wasn’t thinking clearly.

And just as fast as the Discharge Team came in they left. And all  of a sudden it was just me, Mark and Otis. Never again would another nurse come to check on us to make sure we were alive.

Crap.

We got Otis ready which was an event in itself. Poor little guy did not want to wear the outfit I brought for him. Apparently, there are only so many times in a week one wants to squish one’s head through a relatively small hole.

After calming him down we gathered our things:

Bag of stuff we were told to steal take from the hospital – Check
Clothes I wanted to wear home but didn’t because OH MY GOODNESS, I’M A COW – Check
Car seat WITH baby securely strapped inside – Check
Baby Receipt – …

Me: Where’s that paper?

Mark: The paper you signed?

Me: Yeah, I think we need it to leave.

Mark: I don’t see it…

Me: Crap. I don’t know what it was but that nurse said we needed it. I think…

Mark: I don’t even remember. It was so fast.

We sat for a little bit just looking at each other. We didn’t want to leave and set off the high security alarms. How embarrassing. But, remember? No nurses were coming back to check on us. Ever.

Me: I don’t want to walk out of here without that paper. What if we get stopped?

Mark: Who would stop us?

Me: … I mean, don’t we need proof? Do they really just let people walk out of here with babies? That just seems… irresponsible.

We decided to go to the nursery. Our baby receipt was sure to be in there.

***People, I’m not joking about any of this.

We rang the doorbell to the nursery and they let us in.

Me: We didn’t get our paper.

Nurse: What paper?

Me: Um, the paper to leave? To say he’s ours? We were just discharged and I think we were supposed to get something…

Nurse’s face: New parents.

Nurse: No, you guys can just go. You’re ok.

And just like that we were released into the wild world. Without a receipt.

It’s been 8 months (plus some days because getting these letters to you on time is… difficult). I’m not sure that time has ever gone as fast as it’s gone this year. November feels like it lasted a week. Aye.

No crawling action, yet, but that’s probably not the worst thing in the world. Lord knows we haven’t child-proofed anything. Which makes us horrible parents. Or old school. I’m voting old school.

“Let him chew on the wires. It’ll put hair on his chest!”

We have decided that you are already starting to “talk”. Talk is in quotes because, let’s be real, you aren’t talking. But we’re your parents and it’s our job to feel better about ourselves through your real and imagined accomplishments.

Here’s what you’re “saying”:
Ma – Obviously, that’s ma for Mama. That’s me. We know it’s for me because you only say it whenever you’re upset and need immediate attention/shoulder to cry on. I’m screwed weak and you’ve already figured it out.

Da – Probably for dad. And you only say it when you’re happy. Sigh.

Woo – This one is hilarious. You ‘woo’ when you’re trying to crawl, about to get mad, or we’re trying to put a shirt on you. It’s like a warning sound that the crap is about to hit the fan if someone doesn’t fix something fast. I imagine that you’re trying to say, “Wooo, you’re about to piss Baby off!”.

You’re starting to develop favorite people, like your Aunt Melissa, and you literally light up when favorite people walk in the room. I can’t tell you how much I’m loving the little person you’re becoming and I can’t wait to get to know you better. You’re a little rock star in my world.

Love and Hugs and Kisses and A Couple of Spankings But Only Because I Love You Just Kidding Daddy is the One that Spanks,
Old School Mommy

I am old.

And if you have no clue who Cody Simpson is then you’re probably old, too.

At some point in the show they had some kid start singing. And they introduced him like people might care, or even get excited. And one of the little girls in the house gasped when she saw him and then whispered, “Cody Simpson“.

Cody Who?

I’m guessing he’s to Justin Beiber what Mandy Moore was to Britney Spears. It really doesn’t matter. What matters is that I didn’t know who he was and I’ve been waiting for this day since I was 17 when I realized there were actual human beings out there that didn’t understand the difference between N*SYNC, Backstreet Boys, 98 Degrees and O-town. As mind boggling as it seemed, I knew a day was coming when I would be… out of touch.

And December 2, 2011 is officially that day. Sigh.

Thankfully, I’m doing what I can to make sure I don’t look as old as my lack of pop star knowledge clearly indicates I am.

The Rodan+Fields Anti-Age Regimen is a great way to start taking care of your skin today so that you’re not Botoxing tomorrow.

If you want to keep your youthful glow email me (marie.mckinney@gmail.com) about becoming a Preferred Customer and get 10% off and free shipping on your orders.

Also, sign up for my weekly newsletter here! I’m sharing beauty tips (inside and out). Ha!

I know you’ve missed it.

But it’s back and, like everything else on this blog, babier than ever.

Here’s my question: Should you discipline babies? Specifically, 7 month old babies? That are really cute? And named Otis?

Yeah. I didn’t think so either.

The video is below. And I would just like to add that Otis has been like this from pre day one. The little guy likes things a certain way and he will throw a fit if he doesn’t get it. When I was in labor and our heart rates were being monitored Little Man would FREAK OUT when I moved or turned over. Nurses would come flying in thinking that something horrible was going on because his heart rate would drop out of no where. No, no. Just a very particular baby who likes things a certain way.

Adolescence is going to be awesome.

Anyways, here’s the video… enjoy AND let me know how soon your babies got whoopins so I can tell Mark when he’s allowed to start swatting. Because let’s be real. We ALL know I’m not going to do it.

Also, my fellow Tartar Saucer, Betty Becca, had a fun post pointing out the difference between domestic and domesticate… heh. She didn’t know about my Domesticate Me Show (if Snookie can have a show then so can I) which made me love it (and her) even more. Also, I think my skills at home are much closer to taming a wild beast than actually being artful in the home. So I vote that it’s still appropriate.

More Domesticate Me episodes can be seen here:
Saran Wrap
Ironing
Dishwashing 
Shopping
Wilderness Recipes

She is a part of the Tartar Sauce Club (even though she hasn’t made it to a meeting yet, dang prayer meetings!). Since she is a pre-licensed child therapist and this blog is quickly becoming All Baby All the Time, I thought it’d be fun to have her answer questions about kids, parenting and survival (for both us and them). Also, SHE HAS A PLAYROOM. So cool.
Anyways, Emily, I’m turning it over to you!

Me Random Parent: No parent in their heart of hearts wants to confuse or hurt their baby (or young children). Even if the parents aren’t yellers, heated discussions and/or arguments can be very dramatic, confusing and hurtful for babies and children.
How can a couple fight now that they have a baby/children in the house? 

Emily: Well, I think that it is very wise to be cautious and concerned about the way spouses disagree and/or work out their problems in front of their children. Even though some may disagree with me, I encourage all parents to go ahead and disagree with each other especially in front of their child(ren). I think that taking the squabble into another part of the house or waiting until the child is asleep or at the Grandparent’s house would be a huge disservice to the little one if the baby (or even older child) never witnessed Mommy and Daddy not seeing eye to eye.

I think that it is important to try and stay calm when having a dispute, often bringing in humor into the conversation can lighten the tone or even change the mood of the argument. But, it’s quite all right to let your fighting have an emotional tone to it. You let your child see you when you are laughing, when you are quiet, when you are excited- why wouldn’t you let your child see you when you are upset or angry? By letting your child see you (and your husband) display all emotions, you are setting prescience for your child’s emotional life. Emotions are all great; it’s the behaviors that come from the emotions that parent’s need to be careful with.

So, I encourage you to let your feelings be known and to state your point of view to your spouse BUT I caution you and your spouse not to scream, holler, throw things, name call, slam doors, jump in the car and spin the tires or heaven forbid threaten or physically harm one another. Why not try to calmly communicate with one another? Letting the fight get ugly doesn’t make your argument a better case, actually it makes you seem like an uneducated fool who is out of control. Trying to compromise, ahem, actually learning to compromise with one another, taking turns and backing down (even though you know you are right) are more than likely the skills that you want your children to have and to use when interacting with his peers. I challenge you to model these behaviors for your children, as we all know children learn by our examples and the examples of behavior shown to them not just by what we tell them to do.

Emily Patridge Counseling is a safe place for children to engage in therapeutic play, for parents to receive guidance, support and counsel, and for teens and adults of all ages and stages to repair themselves with the help of an honest, nonthreatening guide.

emily@emilypatridge.com 
2209 Crestmoor Road, Suite 320 
Nashville, TN 37215

Heh.

Anyways, I couldn’t help but doing a little bit of comparing a few weeks ago I went with a friend to take our babies to see Santa. We are both new moms and we spent most of the afternoon sharing notes and experiences which is essentially the definition of an awesome time for a new mom (“You mean we can talk about our babies all day long and no one is going to roll their eyes? Sign. me. up.”)

You might think that I compared our weight loss (she’s back to pre-baby, and I still have to lose the equivalent OF my baby) or mommy skillz (her baby takes all kinds of naps, and Otis basically has really long blinks), but no. I didn’t start “comparing” until it was time for Santa…

When it was our turn for Santa pics we had Otis go first because he was closer to fussy than Baby L. Unfortunately, a combination of hunger, tiredness and a strangely dressed old dude spelled disaster and unhappiness for my little man. He freaked out and the photographer suggested that we go ahead and do Baby L’s pictures and try Otis again afterwards.

You need to know that Baby L was equally tired, but this little man has show business in his DNA, and he turned his charm on. Also, Julie’s an awesome mom that immediately knew her rendition of “Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes” would get a smile out of him (sidenote: Baby L’s dad is a doctor and it makes all kinds of sense that he’d get a kick out a baby anatomy lesson).

Otis tried again, but he just wasn’t having it. Santa was not his friend, and I’m pretty sure he was considering finding a lawyer to file for emancipation because what kind of mother would subject him to such torture?

We went to pick up the pictures that were deemed “the best” by the photographer. Here’s what we got:

Yeah. My kid looks like he’s about to go ape on me Santa someone, and Baby L’s pic looks like the movie poster for a Miracle on 34th Street remake. Sigh.

* Before my mom goes off on me for comparing my baby to someone else, I’d just like to remind her of Rachel Darby and 1st grade (“Oh, you made all A’s… what about Rachel Darby?”). I survived, and so will he

** To clarify what I find amusing: That Otis would have a relatively standard/normal/horrified pic with Santa at the same time that Baby L achieved Santa pic perfection (I looked through the photographer’s pics from the day and Baby L really did knock it out of the park for the Under 1 set. He was even the package price sheet example!).

*** Santa was hilarious in a Are-you-serious? kind of way. I knew some of the people helping out and they mentioned that I was a marriage counselor, and Santa overheard. When I handed him Otis he was all, “You’re too young to be a marriage counselor”. Yeah… ok… well, take my baby. Then when Otis was freaking out and I took him back he was all, “You know, I give marriage advice, too. It’s one day for you, one day for him, and one day for you both of you each month. One guy said that advice saved his marriage.”  Great… I’ll put that in the book I’m writing, Making Mrs. Clause Happy for Eternity: Marriage Advice from Santa.

**** Seriously, I’m writing a marriage book. Sign up for my Nashville Marriage Studio Newsletter to get updates.