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Valentine’s Day isn’t just about smooching and eating loads of extra calories. Sometimes it’s just about generally sharing the love.

Heather, the Blogger formerly known as Pieces of Cheese, has launched a beautiful new site, One Woman’s World, and is having a sort of inaugural awards competition.

She is looking for nominations of female bloggers in the following categories:

1. Best Humor
2. Makes Me Want To Have Kids – This one is baffling people. I guess I mean the most Optimistic Mother. The kind that encourages other people to feel great about being moms!
3. Happiest Blog
4. Best Writing
5. Best Site Design
6. Most Inspiring
7. Most Meetable, In Real Life
8. Most Thought-Provoking
9. Best Discussion
10.Learn Something New Every Day
11. Best Commenter

They’re called “Share the Love” Awards and I think nominating a special blogger in your life is a great way to show you care and to let the rest of us know about cool new blogs. Take a minute and send some nomination love Heather’s way. The nominations are open until Valentine’s Day. Have fun!

In the Past Three Days, this is the person:

Who read herself to sleep.

Who breastfed her ducky…with a blanket…because they’re her “private breasts.”

Who got married, moved into a castle and went house hunting because she and her prince needed a “home” to live in.

Who reported that the washcloth was dead because it was dried out and crusty. She then told me that if she put it in the water, it would take all the dead off because Jesus gave us the water AND the bathtub.

Who jumped up into her car seat and proudly told me that she is the “fastest person in the world.”

Who just ate a tablespoon of butter before I had a chance to stop her, grinned and said, “Now it’s stuck in my body and you can’t get it.”

Who told me Jesus wants me to let her wear big-girl underwear all night long (she knew I’d never go along with it if SHE asked me).

Who asked if “Bob Marley is a little girl.”

Who says she’s “pretty nervous about the moon.”

Who struck up a conversation with our be-pierced Target cashier today and as we left told me, “I think she pretty loves me.”

In the Past Three Years, this is the person:

Who made me cry like a baby the first time I saw her.

Who makes me giggle with glee and delight every hour she’s awake.

Who makes fun of the way I dress.

Who, when asked what she’s doing, answers, “Just Chillin'”

Who started “giving rock” when other people’s kids were giving “five.”

Who knew over a hundred words at her 18-month check-up.

Who says “okayluvyoububye” and hangs up on you when she doesn’t feel like talking anymore.

Who is a princess.

Who went pee in the potty for the first time in July of 2004 and became potty trained…mostly…last week.

Who has her moments.

Who won the hearts of everyone in London to the extent that a proctor in Westminster Abbey (where no photography is allowed) took us behind a roped-in area and let us take a quick picture on Queen Elizabeth’s chair because Laylee was such a “gorgeous baby” (insert British accent here).

Who asks me if I’m “saturated” when I finish eating a big meal.

Who has the best imagination around.

Who spontaneously tells people she loves them.

Who scares me.

Who loves and cares for her brother.

Who makes me work harder, play harder and care more than I ever knew I could.

This is a terribly incomplete list of all the things that make Laylee who she is. Since we don’t use our kids’ real names or exact birth dates on this blog and she “turned 3” January 1st, this is her “birthday” post. We love her. She is darling, hilarious, sweet and wonderful. We couldn’t have picked a better one.

Yes, today was better.

I am a closet (well not anymore, I guess) Josh Groban fan. This evening while running errands, I was listening to that song “Remember When it Rained” on repeat. I LOVE that song. What I love most about it is how passionate it sounds. It always makes me think of smooching in the rain.

I know that’s not what that song’s about but that’s what I think of every time. While listening, I always write book chapters in my head where two people come to each other in the rain and admit their feelings for the first time without saying a word……ahhhh…

This is the little slice of dreamland that caused me to miss my exit as I was driving to the church bookstore tonight to have my new scriptures engraved with my name.

You probably think that since Dan and I live in Seattle, all we ever do is kiss and schmoozle out in the rain. Not so, my friends, not so. In fact, I have never been kissed in the rain. The idea of it seems strangely appealing but in practice, I’m not so sure.

I once saw an interview with Kirsten Dunst and Tobey Maguire where they said that the upside-down-kissing-in-the-rain scene from Spiderman was the least romantic, most awful kissing scene in the history of film. They say he nearly drowned, hanging upside down like that with rain running up his nose.

Aaanny-who. I like the thought.

The post I had been working on for today was a tender tribute to the first three years of Laylee’s life. It is cute and sweet but I feel uncomfortable posting it after she spent today as a screaming ball of chaos (to steal a phrase from Stephanie), was sent to bed an hour early for kicking me and then peed on the floor purposefully as I was helping put on her pajamas. She has been so unbelievably sweet the past few weeks.

A fickle hood is toddler-hood. Maybe tomorrow will be better.

So, even if you don’t stay home every day with your kids, every parent has times where they get to pull an all-dayer. Actually lots of non-parents get the chance to do this too.

Ever been a babysitter in junior high, desperate to earn those 2 dollars an hour so you could buy some fluorescent slouch socks or the latest Paula Abdul cassette, so you locked yourself in a filthy house with 5 kids you didn’t particularly like for 12 hours on a Saturday while the parents gleefully ran off to some exotic getaway, only to find out that they round down their payment, especially when they come home drunk?

Yeah, me neither. I was just asking.

So at some point you’re home all day with the kids. What do you do with them? Some of you are thinking, “Didn’t we already do a Tip Tuesday on this?”

Um, NO-O, Ms Smarty-pants. We did one about keeping kids occupied on a rainy day but this is totally different. “How?” you have the audacity to ask. Well, today’s tips could be for dry OR rainy days. Today’s tips are going to be better and even MORE copius and helpful than last time. And lastly, that was done back in 2005 and times have changed.

Others of you are thinking, “You’re supposed to DO something with them?”

Um…..yes. Yes you are.

Here is what I would suggest unto you:

Oh, the TV is broken, the legos have exploded, melting the crayons in the blast and the play-doh has dried up in the shape of Mr. T’s head? (Stop looking at me. Do you have a staring problem? What do YOU make with play-doh?) Well then, I’ll have to think about this for a second…..

1. Let them help you clean the house. This may not work for older kids but if I give Laylee a wet rag and let her wipe things – walls, cupboards, windows, my legs, Magoo’s head, etc. – it will keep her occupied for quite a long time and I’m able to get a ton of stuff done.

2. Library programs – Story time is just the tip of the iceberg at many public libraries.

3. Go out for a cheap ice cream cone. It can take forever to eat and it acts as a 99 cent babysitter. Sadly, most do not come with a free kid-wash.

4. Borders’ read with a dog day – Borders bookstore near my house has a day every couple of weeks where people bring their kid-friendly dogs in and you can go and read books with them. Then you say, “Bu-bye doggie” and go home where the only poop you need to clean up is yours and your kids’.

5. Go to the Movies – So you’ve got some money burning a hole in your pocket? Why not take your kids to a show. Last week Laylee, Magoo and I went to see Nanny McPhee at one of those special mommy’s-morning-out showings. It was great fun and cheaper than a visit to the shrink. (Do a web search for “reel moms” and your city. The site was down when I was posting this and I’m not sure when it will be back up so I didn’t want to post a dead link.)

6. The fabric store – Psych! Fabric store = they will hate you after 5 minutes. Just wanted to make sure you were still awake.

This Tip Tuesday topic is brought to you by Jessica who has a sweet new blog. Please leave suggestions here for indoor and outdoor fun with kids and then stop by and tell Jessica hello.

A little while ago, one of my new blogging friends left a comment where she said “woot!” to express her excitement about something. I thought it sounded really cute and I had never seen or heard it before.

When I asked Dan how I would use that in a sentence, like “Woot! That’s awesome news,” he laughed and said it was a commonly used hacker term…….but that he’d never actually heard someone say it out loud before.

Definition from UrbanDictionary.com:

Woot originated as a hacker term for root (or administrative) access to a computer. However, with the term as coincides with the gamer term, “w00t”.”w00t” was originally an trunicated expression common among players of Dungeons and Dragons tabletop role-playing game for “Wow, loot!” Thus the term passed into the net-culture where it thrived in video game communities and lost its original meaning and is used simply as a term of excitement.
“I defeated the dark sorcerer! Woot!”

This got me to thinking about all the acronyms I’ve learned since I first ventured into a chat room my freshman year of college. (My chat room days came to a quick end when a couple of my roommates started icky chat romances with supposedly married men and I realized I’d rather hang out with real friends than make fake friends on the internet. No offense. I really like you guys.)

I remember the first time someone typed “LOL” and I could just picture them with their tongue lolling out of there mouth. Lol? What’s lol and why are you telling me about it? Sicko! I was only trying to make a joke.

Somehow I figured that one out and started using it myself.

Now that I find myself wanting to say “WOOT!” when I’m excited, I wonder which will be the next internet acronym to make it into my already lazy spoken English.

BRB / Be Right Back – [berb]
“Hold on a sec Dan. Berb.”

BTW / By The Way – [bee-tee-dub-ya]
“Oh, bee-tee-dub-ya, I really like your smurf pajamas.”

CU / See You – [koo]
“Koo in two hours.”

MIL / Mother In Law – [mill]
“My mill makes the best prize salad. Yumm-ers!”

LOL / Laughing Out Loud – [el-o-el]
“Eloel. That is funny.” (said with a completely straight face)

Think of how much time and energy I could save if I didn’t have to actually laugh anymore.

Update – since posting this, Dan has asked me approx 100 times if I have brought the milk in from the milk box. I finally replied, “IITFF!”

Ha HA, computer hacker man. Bet you don’t know THAT one!

And he didn’t. It’s In The Flippin’ Fridge. (sidenote – he only actually asked me twice and the milk was delivered….um….Friday…..morning…..)

If you want to read about an amazing woman, go over to Mom on a Wire and check out my guest post.

Karli, who’s all about provoking thought and inspiring action is asking for submissions about amazing women.

I’ve been planning to launch a new web ring for a while now. A few people have already joined but I’ve been waiting to announce it publicly until the BoBs were decided.

I figured that if I were in the top three, I’d get a lot of traffic the day the awards were announced and if not, I could post about the ring and it would look like a whiny loser’s angst-ridden attempt at gaining popularity and friendship, which is also very cool.

There are a lot of great web rings out there. There are several great ones for mothers, but they are open only to women with children.

I’ve seen so much motherly, nurturing advice and love from my blogging friends, many of whom have not actually given birth to children. So, I decided to start a ring for all women who see themselves as nurturers or in a motherly role. I want the ring to be full of fun, clean, and uplifting blogs by great women.

Karli, from Mom on a Wire, came up with the ring name, Cirque des Mamans.

A note on how rings work:
Joining a web ring is adding yourself to a listing of blogs, centered around a specific theme or topic.

When you join the ring, you are asked to put code on your site. Our ring code looks like this:

«»
^{Powered by RingSurf}

The “des Mamans” button takes you to the ring’s main page, which is super-duper ugly and plain at the moment, but tells you what you need to know about joining and lists the current members with links to their sites.

The arrows on either side work like the “next blog” button in Blogger. They take you to the next ring member’s blog so you can surf through the ring by clicking on the arrows on each person’s blog.

There are several blogs I read that wouldn’t fit with this group and I don’t want anyone to feel pressure to join. It’s sure fun though, if you feel like joining us.

I also wanted to let you know that DYM is currently the second hit on an MSN SEARCH for:

dog bounty hunter mullet wig

Honestly, could you BE in better company?

And it looks like I will be going to prom with my cousin Floyd again this year. (It’s okay. He likes the mullet.) I know the point of these awards is to gain exposure and new reads and readers and that has been accomplished, in a big way.

After over a month of waiting to see what would happen, I had convinced myself that I didn’t care if I won or even placed in the top three. Well, I thought wrong. It’s sort of fun to win….and sort of not as much not to. I would be lying if I didn’t admit I feel a little humdrum not to be standing on the podium today. Ah, well. There’s still a big baby in me somewhere (no I’m not pregnant!) who needs a swift kick in the pants.

It’s been a great experience though and I’m so glad Caryn found my site and liked it enough to send in a nomination. She’s long been one of my favorite reads as well.

What I’ve learned through awards processes (pronounce – ‘pro-sess-eez’) during the past 6 months:

1. I can win Christian awards.
2. I cannot hold onto Christian awards.
3. Some people will always like me.
4. There are more good people in the world than the other kind.
5. You can make it pretty far in the BoBs with a few wisecracks and a floating head.
6. You can’t make it all the way to the top with a few wisecracks and a floating head.

I’m pretty sure this is the end of the awards line for my little blog. I’m not edgy, deep, or experienced enough to be a contender in the bigger contests and that’s okay.

Now that the pressure’s off and the twinge has subsided, maybe I can get down to some serious kick-butt blogging – mommy-style.

Thanks to everybody who voted and encouraged me. It’s been a ride.

That’s one of my favorite expressions a pirate would use if he lived in my house.

Another is, of course, the old standby “in the drink.”

Laylee drops her baby in the toilet. “Arg! She fell in the drink.”

Marilla asks Cordelia Anne what happened to her amethyst broach. “Oh, that? Yeah. I dropped it in the drink.”

Magoo is ripping the tubes out of the Medela while I’m trying to pump. “Throw ‘im in the brig!”

Seriously. I finally couldn’t take it anymore so I stuck him in the pak ‘n play where he could see me…..without leaving a path of destruction. I gave him a few toys. Laylee gave him a few hundred more, several directly on the noggin and he played happily in his padded cage until I was done.

But it started to give me ideas, ideas relating to the fact that I could get a lot of things done if I weren’t constantly worrying that the flailing, spastic, melon-headed human vacuum cleaner was self-inflicting blunt head trauma whilst choking on very tiny baby dolls and very large pieces of lint.

Back in the 80’s, weren’t they called PLAY pens? Didn’t parents use something very closely related to the pak ‘n play to cage up their children for “play time”? Then I think it became somewhat taboo and somewhat associated with “doing time” so people stopped using them altogether. Now they’re coming back as a “nap time” device but….iiiiiit might not have been good for me to witness the pak ‘n play’s diverse uses.

On the one hand – development of gross motor skills. On the other – a clean house AND a son who’s still alive at the end of the process?

Yeah…..

He looked happy. Didn’t he look happy to you? I mean, he was licking the thing. That has to be some sort of a sign of affection.

~30 hours after I lent my copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince to my friend….um…..Beulah, she sent me this email:

Kathryn,
I just thought I would give you an update on your Harry Potter book. It is doing fine. I have removed the dust cover so that nothing would happen to it. If I take the book outside (on my way to the car) and it is raining, I put the book under my sweatshirt so that it is kept completely dry from the rain (although after doing that, I can’t guarantee that your book will come back smelling the same way as it did when you loaned it to me). I am progressing through it nicely and I anticipate that when I am done I will go through some sort of Harry Potter/ wizard/ magic withdrawal since I read all Harry Potter 1-5 in the last 2 weeks. My dreams consist of magic and Harry Potter and I think that deep down inside I am just using this fantasy world of Harry Potter to escape from the horrors of my own life. I mean, let’s be honest, my life is crap. Everybody is always looking at me funny, they think I am some sort of show off and they don’t ever believe a word I say. My parents were killed when I was 1 and the only thing I have to show for it is this lousy scar….Oh, see. I’ve done it again. Off to Never-Never-Land, I was. The lines between fantasy and reality have blurred for me now, I don’t know if I will ever be able to get a grip.
Anyways…..just wanted to let you know that I am taking real good care o’ yer book.
-Beulah
PS. Thanks for the recipes!

I liked this. It was bloggable.

Today we went grocery shopping together. Before following me in her car, she mentioned my X-man super-parking-powers and said something like, “I guess I won’t be parking near you. That’s not one of my special talents.”

I told her that it might be possible for me to extend my powers to include her….as long as I was still using them for good, not to show off or put myself in a one-up position in the hierarchy or our relationship (Sorry. I’m speed reading my book-club book right now).

When I got to the store, it was lunch time and the lot was packed. However, I drove straight to THE spot and it was once again empty. I’m starting to wonder if that spot was formerly used as a toxic waste dump or contaminated with the plague and that’s why no one else will go near it.

I took my life in my hands and parked there anyway.

I got out of the car to take a picture of the spot, since car parking is the new theme of this blog. As I was lining up the shot, the guy in the spot next to me pulled out. I started losing it. I planted my body in the middle of the spot and as cars came up and turned on their blinkers to pull in, I waved them on to the back of the lot. I HAD to get this picture great parking spot for my friend.

People (and I mean people who obviously do not read this blog and did not recognize me from my floating head which resides immortalized on the internet) WERE MAD! I got me some major stink-eyed looks. Heads were shooken and choice words were muttered. I did not personally witness any “friendly” hand gestures.

But hey, I got the spot….and the shot.

Today, I would encourage you to head over to Stephanie’s and help complete her story. Fun and games people, fun and games. What will happen? Only YOU can decide.