The Cast of Characters

As promised. Because even I get confused with my code names.

Heather - me
Bucket - my husband
Llama - our daughter
Hawaiian Punch - Bucket's sister
iHusband - her husband
Tuna Roll - their daughter, Llama's cousin
The Army Guy - my brother
Frenchy - his wife
Z-man - their son, Llama's cousin
Wolfman - my brother

Those are the ones that exist presently. There are at least four people in the immediate family who don't have appropriate code names yet. I'll edit and add as needed.

A gratuitous Llama picture for the morning:

Late with the Christmas pictures...

Here they are, nonetheless.

Llama tried to escape from Santa Claus, but she didn't cry.


My big crawling girl, Christmas morning.

I managed to dress her, but not myself. You don't get to see my face, either, as I was not really prepared for the day. In classic Heather fashion, I woke up late and scrambled around. This is Llama and her cousin Z-man playing with her new ball popper, a gift from Uncle Wolfman (he has wolves... hence his code name).
Christmas Eve, Llama and Tuna Roll with their great-grandparents. Coordinating dresses, of course!
These pictures are all out of order because Blogger and I are having a disagreement. This was the Saturday before Christmas, when she saw Santa. He brought her the very first Christmas present. Look at that concentration!

More photos will come after New Year's Day, when we see the other side of the family. Llama and Tuna Roll have matching dresses again! Hawaiian Punch and I are going to keep this up (the matching) until they tell us to stop.

I think I need to create a "Cast of Characters" post so everyone's code names/relationship to Llama and me is available. That's tomorrow's gig.

Christmas comes but once a year...

Tonight, Llama, Bucket and I went to Bucket's grandparents' house for dinner. I drank a good bit of wine, and then we came home to let Santa Claus in. He visited with us and ate some cookies, helped me start tomorrow's breakfast, and then was on his way. We meant to go to Mass, but Llama was tired and we're pretty sure we can take a mulligan on this one. We hope, anyway.

Although Llama doesn't get it at all, she liked opening her presents from Bucket's grandparents and great-aunt. I can't wait for my brothers to get here in the morning so we can open all the stuff Santa left under the tree and gorge ourselves on fattening breakfast.

I'm going to sit here with Bucket and look at the lights on our tree... and think of this very night, five years ago, when Bucket asked me to marry him. It's a very good night.

Merry Christmas!

I cried while I wrote this.

Through an MSN board, I was introduced to the blogs of two people who are living through my worst nightmare. One is Matt Logelin, whose wife died of a pulmonary embolism without ever holding their child, and he blogs about his life with their daughter. The other is Emilie. She is dying of an uncurable cancer that was diagnosed while she was pregnant with her second child, who is only 2 weeks older than Llama.

If you're a parent, you can understand the icy trickle of fear that happens when the thought of life without your child crosses your mind. The thought of Llama growing up without me leaves me breathless.

Last night, as I sat in the rocking chair in Llama's room, holding her and rocking her back to sleep, I thanked God for the opportunity to be her mother. And I asked Him to allow me to continue to be her mother until she doesn't need me anymore. And I apologized to Llama for the times when I asked (even silently) for her to just please go to sleep, please, please, please, or the times when I resented Bucket for leaving us alone to muddle through. Thank God I have the chance to do it.

Ah, sorry to have laid that out there on Christmas Eve-Eve. And now I have to work on my own particular brand of crazy and get the house cleaned so I can host Christmas morning. I hope you're ready for whatever brand of crazy you're selling this week!

The Mumbling Wives Club

Established December 21, 2008. Consists of Hawaiian Punch (Tuna Roll's mama now has an appropriate code name), Llama-grandmama (who does not yet have an appropriate code name and is also Tuna Roll's grandma), and me. Apparently none of our husbands can understand us, ever, and this became the topic of conversation at last night's dinner.

We all understand each other just fine. I think it's the husbands who have a problem, not us.

As an aside, my Google Analytics is working. I used a free online tool called SiteScanGA, by EpikOne to figure it out. I'm pretty proud of myself.

Posting will be light this week, until Friday - when I hope to put up one meeelion pictures of Llama's first Christmas.

I'm adding something new.

I've added Google Analytics to my blog. Not because I'm a creepy stalker, but because I'm nebby like that. It'll tell me where people are reading from - just city/state or country (not that I'm conceited enough to believe I have foreign readers... my brother goes back to Iraq shortly and I'm curious to see if the military will let him see this).

You don't have to do anything. Nothing changes on your end. I'm not even sure what changes on mine, to be honest, because I am not the computer guru of this house. Bucket thinks my blog is silly and he is not interested in helping me figure anything out, so I guess we'll see if I can do it alone or not.

Breakfast with Llama

Llama eats three meals a day, and she does not like to be fed anymore. She is a big girl, and she wants to do it herself. To some extent, I agree with her. On the other hand, I like for some food to get inside her instead of on her or the floor, or in the dog.

A couple weeks ago, I made her some scrambled eggs and cheese. She likes it a lot, it's probably the most frequent breakfast choice around here. I was feeding her when the doorbell rang.

I didn't think about it, I just got up and went to answer the door. I left the bowl and spoon on her tray.

This is what I came back to:

See? She is a big girl. She has this all figured out. No assistance needed from me.