susuwatari

I had a rather good lesson today even if it was pouring rain and I raced there straight from work all stressed out. The horse I rode was a nice large chestnut with, you guessed it, a stripe right down his face. I came into the barn all flustered from running late and trying to drive quickly yet safely in the pouring rain. I immediately started cleaning him up without my usual greeting I give to new horses. I was lucky that he was so patient and didn’t seem sensitive at all to the brush seeing as he had coated himself in mud. Thank goodness it was all dried and came off fairly easily. I didn’t get him as clean as I would have liked but due to the time constraints I got him fairly presentable. My riding instructor Stephanie warned me that Stripe may try to misbehave by giving little cow-hops when I tried to get him to canter, which is why they don’t like to use him for the kids, though she hasn’t seem him do so in while. I wasn’t too concerned with little cow-hops as long as they didn’t turn into full blown bucks so I wasn’t too nervous riding him. Actually once I got on him I just seemed to relax, and considering how wound up I was from my stressful day this was pretty amazing. Every once in awhile I’ll get on a horse and get this feeling. It’s hard to describe. It is sort of a feeling of comfort and trust and something inside me just clicks. There has only been a couple horses that I’ve felt this with, in fact the only two I can remember recently is Stripe and my friend Sarah’s mom’s horse. I know it sounds a bit corny but it is like I’ve found a bit of a kindred spirit. I had a lot of fun riding Stripe and because I was more relaxed and confident, I actually got a lot of good work on getting my seat back. I managed to maintain the two-point at a trot without having to balance using my hands, at least until I started getting tired. I also had some wonderful canters. I love that Stripe will pick up a canter from a walk since I am better at keeping my seat with that transition than from a trot to canter transition. I am better at not leaning forward during the walk to canter transition (one of my many bad habits at the moment). He did misbehave near the end when he decided he was done with this whole lesson thing and shouldn’t I really be walking to cool him off about now? He started to pull down and lean heavily into the reins while I was cantering him and I was confused thinking maybe he just has a lot of problems cantering in this direction but something just seemed off to me until I realized that the reality was that he was being a bit of a snot. Once I figured that out I made him behave more though we had a bit of a power struggle going on for the last 5 to 10 minutes of the lesson. Even so I never felt nervous and found it rather funny. He so far has been my favorite horse to ride.

As an unrelated side note my dogs, and specifically I mean Hobbes, are complete snots. Wes was nice enough to let them out for me since I went to my riding lesson straight from work and wouldn’t be home until 9:30ish. I wish he would have thought for a second and realized that the basement door should be shut (hence the kitty door installed in the door) as Hobbes had a hay day with the kitty litter downstairs. He then somehow knocked over the dog gate keeping him in the kitchen and got into ALL the trash cans. Ugg I have been so spoiled with my dogs Freya and Rufus who never got into the trash unless I was foolish enough to put bacon or chicken right on top (honestly what dog could resist that temptation?) that it still remains a shock to me when I find the evidence of Hobbes dumpster diving activities. Ah well at least he’s cute the little brat. Wes if you read this and get all miffed don’t be, I am DEEPLY grateful that you stopped by and let my babies out. I was just so mad at Hobbes when I got home and found all of his messes. He drives me crazy sometimes!! Of course they are both looking at me sadly as no dinner tonight for either of them as their stomachs get some time to settle from all the crap (and in Hobbe’s case this is literal) they have eaten.

I took these pictures to show off one of the adorable outfits that Shiloh sent to us. Thanks Emma for your sweet hand-me-downs! You show incredible taste for a 6 month old!

Elliott likes to suck two fingers just like her cousin Braiden and her Aunt Marcie did. Actually she usually tries to stick her whole fist in her mouth and we can hear her going “slurp slurp” from across the house, but she settles down to two fingers eventually.

So last weekend we took Elliott to the pumpkin patch. Unfortunately, Elliott was super gassy and grumpy that day so we just tried to make the best of it. I put her in her Halloween costume and figured even a grumpy pumpkin is cute! Of course, it was cold and I forgot to bring her socks. We found a pair that would fit our niece, Miranda, and made do. At least Miranda got a souvenir!

Here we had the clever idea to lay her on the pumpkins…

Then she decided that was not such a good idea… (I guess I have an evil streak because this one is my favorite picture of the bunch. Her face looks like her shirt!)



A picture with Miranda and Grandma:

I have no heat. In fact I have had no heat since I moved into my house. The company that was supposed to install the heat exchanger the home warranty paid for has yet to install it. After being put off yet again and receiving no promised phone calls YET again, I have finally lodged my first complaint against a company on the Better Business Bureau website. I didn’t like doing it but it had to be done. We shall see if I actually have heat in time for my big Halloween Party this Saturday.

but thanks to Wes and Eric it is now back alive! Thank you guys so much!

Elliott is four months old now! Crazy! At her check up last week she weighed 15 pounds 6 ounces and was in the 90th percentile for height and weight. She is growing like a little chubby weed!

This month she started to enjoy being on her belly more. She is strong enough to push herself up and look at us and has turned over from her belly to her back a couple times, but only when she wants to. She is not interested in performing these tricks on a regular basis. She is more than happy to give us drooly smiles from her belly though.

For the past week I have been working on putting Elliott down for her morning nap in her crib. The goal here is for me to be able to take a shower and scarf some breakfast without having to sacrifice my morning sleep. Usually she only sleeps for 20 or 30 minutes and then sits there staring at her crib soother and fussing every 10 minutes or so for the rest of her nap time. Then when I go to get her she is exhausted and passes out on me. Today she stayed asleep for a whole hour! Woohoo! I just put her down for her afternoon nap so we’ll see if she actually sleeps for awhile. Freedom is near!!

Elliott has also started spitting up lately. I know most moms by now are totally used to this and don’t even blink when their children toss up their formula, but it’s still a surprise to me every time she gives me a big milky smile and dribbles out a mouthful of yuck. She’s gone from a rare once a week spit up to a couple times a day now. Usually this happens about 10 seconds after I dress her in a cute new outfit. If I actually try to sit her up and take a picture of her, it is a guaranteed event. I guess this means that I should actually start using that big pile of bibs we have. I always assumed I’d just use those when her drool status hit running faucet levels versus the slow drip that she’s currently at but maybe they are more useful than I thought.

Last week we tried to feed Elliott “solid food” for the first time. I put that in quotations because a teaspoon of rice cereal (which is like disgusting dissolved oatmeal) in a puddle of formula is hardly a solid. Elliott was not interested in the food and presented us with the extrusion reflex, meaning she shoved out the spoon and any liquidy food I gave her with her tongue and dribbled it down her front instead. We’ve decided to wait a week or a month or a year maybe to give her more time to become interested in food because it’s a huge pain in the butt.

Most people are desperate to try the rice cereal because their children are little stinkers who refuse to sleep at night. Our child is the valedictorian of sleep who sometimes likes to party a little and show us her rebellious side by being a little stinker who refuses to sleep at night for about a week. She did this the week after I had the swine flu and I was sure that I was going to die. However, as soon as I worked up the nerve to try the Cry It Out method (I KNOW, I’M EVIL, SHE’S ONLY 4 MONTHS OLD) she slept 8 hours straight and gave me that angelic smile in the morning that said, “I live to torture you.” She then proved this as a fact by back flipping off the changing table at 10am, landing with Olympic grace between her crib and the wall and screaming as if she had broken every bone in her body. After many tears, on both our parts, we realized that the only damage was a bump on her head. Of course, I later showed up at Wes’s work party with my adorable child and proceeded to gush my overwhelming guilt all over everyone by telling anyone who looked at her that she had fallen off the table and almost died, and oh yeah, it was ALL MY FAULT for looking away for a millisecond and I’m the worst mother ever. Amazingly I think some people might have agreed with me. (The pediatrician tried to reassure me the next day that this happens to all children between 4 and 6 months but she seemed very impressed by the back flip.)

Oh and just in case you don’t think I’m a terrible mother yet, Elliott’s other new development is an obsession with TV. She loves that big annoying chatter box more than any other entertainment. She’s not too picky, but seems to only fuss if Wes and I are actually trying to watch something we’d like to be able to see and hear at the same time. If it’s a commercial or some mindless horrible show that I flip on during the day just to placate her, she clams right up and sits in her swing with her fists in her mouth to adoringly watch the screen. This is sort of good for me because I can usually get her distracted enough to prepare and eat lunch without holding her. (Freedom!) Of course, I am overwhelmed by guilt that I am resorting to TV to entertain my 4 month old instead of doing some other Baby Einstein approved activity that all the good mothers are doing with their babies who don’t back flip off changing tables.

Okay, the crib soother is no longer keeping Elliott occupied so I must become a human mattress for her. I will leave you with a few photographs to reassure people that she is in good health and, of course, is super cute.

So I have been sick the last two weeks with the Swine Flu and then with Bronchitis that was caused by the flu, therefore I haven’t had much of interest happen to me. Instead of complaining about being sick I will instead post this video of extreme cuteness: