Check Gavin out here, at my husband’s site (www.justinrummel.com y’all!).  I’m going to charge admission soon because we will be expanding his repertoire.

oh, and I’m glad I didn’t have Gavin and Cooper as twins because otherwise I’d have trouble telling them apart.  I would be like, “um, the spotted one is Gavin, the fat one is Cooper”, which doesn’t sound very loving motherish.

 In other end of week news, Justin got his PMP and a few weeks ago he had nothing happen that is of any importance to even bother mentioning on this blog.  So I’m officially married to a PiMP with a shoe phone.  Plus, this means close friends and family members will no longer (or at least shouldn’t) receive random visits from G-men anymore.

1. ask, “who peed on the floor?” and actually get a confession
2. fight desperately with my three year old over MY boots  
   




3. be eating a sandwich, smell diaper ointment (i.e. Desitin or A&D), and realize that I completely forgot to wash my hands after changing a diaper…and waiting to finish my sandwich to actually wash my hands
4. be excited to just stay home on a Saturday night and watch movies
5. become the Laundry Goddess who can remove any stain, known and unknown (and some I wish I didn’t know)
6. NOT get sick when my children puke, or when it gets on me or my clothes, or I have to clean it off the floor or out of the carpet (although I still get sympathy sick whenever any other person gets a stomach bug and is puking)
7. be up to my elbows in my children’s diarrhea-filled diaper, scooping out poop with a plastic spoon into several small vials, and delivering the prepared poop to the pediatrician without batting an eye (although I did gag once or twice…gross!)
8. hear my three year old announce to everyone in our house after he had a potty accident that he’s going upstairs to get rid of “yucky Elmo”, and then showing off his “clean Diego pants”, while striking a pose that consists of him sticking his butt out at an exaggerated angle to showcase the Diego design on the butt of his undies.
9. the sloppiest kisses–and lovin’ every one of them
10. getting a fat lip from baby head-butts on a weekly basis (hey, I can only dodge so many of the head-butts I get!)
11. never thought I’d get so many bodily fluids on me that weren’t my own
12. having two healthy boys (not sure what I expected, but certainly didn’t ever dream of having two little boys)
13. being so uncontrollably in love with my kids

(think they look alike?…first one is Gavin, second one is Cooper)

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Get the Thursday Thirteen code here!

The purpose of the meme is to get to know everyone who participates a little bit better every Thursday. Visiting fellow Thirteeners is encouraged! If you participate, leave the link to your Thirteen in others comments. It’s easy, and fun! Be sure to update your Thirteen with links that are left for you, as well! I will link to everyone who participates and leaves a link to their 13 things. Trackbacks, pings, comment links accepted!

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

I truly believe that my kids are trying to kill me.  I am currently (successfully?) fighting a cold.  I don’t feel too bad, just a little congested and run-down.  But now both kids have re-implemented their Plan to Kill Mommy after a two-week hiatus where both were sleeping well through the night.

• 11:30pm–I go to bed
• 1:00am–wake up from some weird, cold-induced dream…take a deep breath, realize all that weirdness was a dream and go back to sleep
• 1:50am–Cooper is up crying.  Stumble around a suspicious-looking dark spot on hallway carpet, grumble about the cats, and go into Cooper’s room to give him his pacifier.  No dice.  So I nurse him and he eats like he’s been starving for days while I doze lightly.
• 2:15am–Put Cooper back into his crib where he seems a little more awake than ANYONE should be at this time of night.  Try giving him his pacifier and he gets annoyed at me and grunts.  Shrug, pat his belly and leave the room with him still slightly awake because I’m not awake enough to try rocking him.  Figure I’ll wake up more if he decides to shriek.
• 4:00am–Gavin comes into our room complaining about his arm (he frequently lays on it and it falls asleep).  But since he wasn’t crying, Justin figured it wasn’t his arm and decided to see if he needed to go potty.  Justin takes Gavin into our bathroom and helps him pee, then brings him back into bed with us.  I protest against it by moaning “no” in a very sleepy/annoyed/sick tone.  No luck.  Hear Justin babble something about coughing until he pukes…blah blah blah…and I think “not in my BED!” and fall asleep to the sound of Gavin coughing and decide if Gavin coughs still he pukes, I’m not cleaning it up.
• 6:10am–Cooper is up fussing.  I pray it’s one of those mid-sleep fusses.  He starts screaming.  Hmmmm…guess not.  I stumble out of bed to his room, being careful to step over the suspicious-looking dark spot on the carpet that is still there (was secretly hoping it was part of a dream sequence).  Cooper is now shrieking at full-volume and I see the neighbor’s lights turn on.  Shrug, pick up my little banshee and nurse him.  He finally quiets down.  I have a big cough and he pulls away shrieking and crying and generally complaining about the noise I’m generating while he’s trying to enjoy a peaceful early breakfast.
• 6:40am–Stumble back to bed.  See that Justin has taken over my spot and Gavin is all spread out in Justin’s usual spot.  Decide to just start getting ready for work…shouldn’t lay back down anyways or I’ll regret it.
• 6:45am–Finish peeing and go to stand up.  While doing so, I readjust my footing and realize that I’ve stepped in something wet and nearly slip all at the same time.  In the dawning light in the bathroom, can see there is definitely something liquid on the floor around the base of the toilet from about the 1 o’clock position to about the 7 o’clock position.  Sigh…wash feet with anti-bacterial soap.  Turn on the light and see that it is pee, presumably from Gavin’s 4am trip.  Wonder if any of it actually hit in the toilet bowl.  Turn and see another puddle about a foot in front of the toilet, too.  Sigh again and realize it’s not loud enough for Justin to wake up to hear me and assist…make a mental note to work on deeper breath to make bigger *sigh* noise. Start wiping up the mess and disinfecting the floor.
• 7:00am–Wash hands and start getting ready for work.
• 8:00am–Clean dark spot on carpet (cat puke).
• 8:20am–Leave for work late and realize 3 miles down the road that I forgot to grab some cold medicine so that I can cope.  Shrug and hope to grab a nap while pumping.

Ah, my little sweet pea is now 4 months old!  And how did he celebrate this big occasion?  By peeing on me twice, peeing on the pediatrician (yeah, didn’t feel bad about it at all–I laughed and so did he!), and by nearly having two up-the-back pooping incidents.  He also, thanks to the wonderful Rotavirus oral vaccine, projectile vomited a few times, too (lost count after three.  also, lost my mind and got shrill about the puke).  But a little puke and some extra CONTAINED pooping is way better than when Gavin had rotavirus…actually better than EITHER time Gavin had rotavirus.  Those were two of the worst weeks of my parenting life.   So if you’ve got little ones, talk to your doctor about getting them vaccinated.  It’s an oral vaccine and I think it’s grape-flavored.  Cooper liked it.

But then, Cooper is also 15 lbs 8 oz, and 25-1/2 inches long.  He’s in the 60th percentile for height and 75th percentile for weight.  He’s a bit of a bruiser.  Like you couldn’t figure that out with his incredibly deep thigh creases and his three chins.  Obviously Cooper is not terribly picky about his food…yet (I’m no fool…I know things will get crazy at age 2 and/or 3).

 I promise I will post a couple new pics as soon as I remember to either (1) bring my memory card to work with me, or (2) sit my butt in front of my computer for 10 minutes once I get home.  I don’t know about you, but my money is on Option 1.

Dear Little Grey Prius Hiding in my Blindspot,

Hi there…I know you are little and cute and ecologically-sound, but I bet you didn’t know that you fit PERFECTLY in my blindspot. I drive a cavalier, so it is a very small blindspot, but you manage to not only fit it, but stay in it for several miles in the grey rain without your headlights on. So sorry if I nearly checked you into the jersey wall-you were not in any of my mirrors and in the rain, I didn’t see you there in my blindspot. Learning to NOT drive in people’s blindspots would be a great plus. Turning on your headlights would be helpful, too. So would driving a car that doesn’t match the rain.

Sincerely,

A Concerned (about Illegal Checking) Driver

Dear Fellow Daycare Parents,

I know you love your big gigantic SUVs, but they just do not fit in the cramped parking spaces at our children’s daycare facility. Maybe if you considered driving your RAV-4 instead of the Land Cruiser to deliver your two children to the daycare, we’d all be able to exit our vehicles without getting dings in our doors. Or me getting my car nearly run over since your big SUVs take up nearly a space-and-a-half, but you as the driver do not seem aware of this fact and try to squeeze that Winnebago-sized truck into a space a Prius can barely fit in (see above…they can fit in some tiny spaces!…but you cannot).

Regards,

A Concerned (about my Paintjob) Driver

Dear Citizens of Centreville, VA,

I know we are located on the coast, in a major metropolitan area, where many people from many lands come to America and bring with them their own driving rules and skills, but you, fine city of Centreville, seem to have an extra-specially large helping of idiot drivers on your city’s fine roads. They refuse to use turn signals, stomp on the brakes any chance they get, ignore rules of the road and road signage, and generally drive like they own the road. What is it about Centreville that draws these people into your city limits? Is your city motto, “bring me your tired, your text-driving, your speeding through school zones?”

I know I drive through your town daily to-and-from work, but I also do extensive driving through your neighboring towns and witness far less driving infractions. I guess I can say that I’m glad these folks are in your town and not mine.

Kindest Regards,

A Concerned (about driving through the Wild Wild West) Driver