May 10, 2009

Emmett says

I have a present in my diaper!
Who wants to change me?
Claaara want to change me? (No!)
Maama want to change me? (No.)
Daddy want to change me? (Clara & Mom say I sure hope so!)

March 18, 2009

Emmett the Clown

They've been doing a bunch of facepainting in Emmett's class at school. He'd come home like a tiger one day, and a lion the next. One day he came home as a clown. It was my favorite. I can't decide which of these pictures I like the best.




March 14, 2009

I'm sorry to tell you but your parents are dead.

Watching Clara play "house" with chess pieces. The king & queen are the mommy & daddy and all the rest are their babies. She was laying them all up together in a circle and talking to them so gently. And the babies would cry and she'd put them next to their parents to snuggle and they were loving each other. And then Clara said "I'm sorry to tell you but your parents have to go away now. I'm sorry to tell you but they're dead."

I had been sitting here marveling at how chess pieces can be "poor man's" toys. And then travesty struck and I cracked up.

Raisin in the nose

Today was my sleep-in day. When I got up, the kids were hangin' with Jeff and had been eating snacks. Emmett told me he had a raisin up his nose. Jeff and I didn't see it though. But apparently he'd been telling the same thing to Jeff for awhile. When we sat down to breakfast it looked like his nose was a little bloody. Jeff looked up there some more and decided there really was a raisin in it. I still couldn't see it. We debated trying to use some tiny tweezers to get it out...but decided against that. Going to the emergency room seemed a little extravagant too. I googled "raisin in nose" and found a post that says not to stick anything else in there cause you'll just push objects up further. They said if your child is calm (luckily Emmett was) that you just plug the other side of their nose and blow in their mouth. So I tried that with him and it popped out and landed on the floor in the first breath! Now I want to re-enact it...it was so cool!

March 12, 2009

make my day

Emmett was tryin' the potty this morning and while sittin' there sang happy birthday to his penis. As if that wasn't good enough, then he sang it to his leg. I am still laughing just thinking about it.

March 11, 2009

Favorite Things - March 09

This week, Jeff introduced the kids to a couple videos that they've been loving.
Emmett walks around asking about the camels in the car and says they need help.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7CsyNpgqFg

And both kids are yelling "FIX-IT!"
http://www.hulu.com/watch/38477/saturday-night-live-update-thursday-fix-it-109
Clara's even gotten to the point she's regularly saying Step 1, Fix. Step 2, It. Step 3, FIX-IT!
And then there's Clara's version of "Single Ladies" by Beyonce. "If you shoulda' like it, put a ring on it. Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh..."

I need to make some new videos of them.

Jill & Clara (Age 3) chat...

This was a Facebook note going around. I decided to do it with Clara. She loved it and would say her answer and immediately ask for the next question.

1. What is something mom always says to you?
go to bed

2. What makes mom happy?
stay in bed (when she does)

3. What makes mom sad?
getting out (of bed)

4. How does your mom make you laugh?
say silly stuff

5. What was your mom like as a child?
Lovies

6. How old is your mom?
I need a hint. (thinks about it. no hints given.) 31

7. How tall is your mom?
(looks me up & down) i don't know.

8. What is her favorite thing to do?
make dinner

9. What does your mom do when you are not home?
make dinner

10.If your mom becomes famous, what will it be for?
(points at herself)

11. What is your mom really good at?
making dinner

12. What is your mom not good at?
going to the lions (??)

13.What does your mom do for a job?
work.

14.What is your mom's favorite food?
macaroni

15.What makes you proud of your mom?
letting me have candy

16. If your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be?
aunt emily

17. What do you and your mom do together?
color

18. How are you and your mom the same?
we have both colored skin

19. How are you and your mom different?
we don't have the same hair

20. How do you know your mom loves you?
giving hugs

21. What does your mom like most about your dad?
you got married

22. Where is your mom's favorite place to go?
pizza

March 3, 2009

Clara-isms

Emmett is catching up with Clara in the talking department...but Clara's had some good ones lately.

Me: Where do you want to live when you grow up?
Clara: North California.
Me: Daddy & I used to live in California.
Clara: Well, I'm going to live in North California.


Teacher: If you could build your own dream house, what would it look like?
Clara: Jumping mats in it, and it would look like a jumping place.


The radio was playing in the car as usual the other day. I wasn't paying attention to what the announcer said.
Clara: Mom, why didn't he say KEXP?

January 17, 2009

November 16, 2008

Emmett's 2nd Birthday



We had fun celebrating Emmett's 2nd birthday with family yesterday. He had his favorite salmon teriyaki with fried rice, edamame, pineapple & egg rolls and cake! We made waaay too much food of course! Emmett wore himself out playing hard with his cousins, opening presents and playing with his new toys and clothes. Thanks everybody!

More pictures here: Emmett's 2nd Birthday on Smugmug

November 13, 2008

toofs

drove clara and emmett to school this morning. tried to explain to them i was getting some teeth pulled and would probably be sore and tired when they got home tonight. clara wanted to know if the toothfairy would come. when they got home they came in to see how i was. clara wanted to see the holes in my mouth. i think they're too gross to show her right now but i had brought my teeth home so the kids could look at them. they were quite interested.

when i went in for my appointment this morning they took me into a room, asked me two questions about allergies and to make sure i fasted. then put a laughing gas mask on me. i was surprised since i'd planned to be put under (i didn't really want to see anything happening and plus wanted to get some rest!). Apparently they do both things for patients at this office. So I settled in, closed my eyes and let the laughing gas do its thing. I got so high and relaxed and happy. the nurse person asked me a couple questions and i ignored her. i felt like i was sighing with pleasure at every breath and opening my mouth to talk was too much work. then a couple minutes later she asked if i was doing okay or if it was too much gas. i thought about not answering again but then started getting paranoid that maybe they wouldn't really put me under. and then i started getting paranoid about more stuff so i made the effort to tell her. she turned the gas off. i can't believe how fast you come down from that. i talked to her for a few minutes and she assured me they really were going to put me completely under and then turned the gas back on. Another nurse came in and they carried on a conversation and i tried to relax. got to the super happy high place again. and then...it became too much again and i started getting paranoid and thinking too much. i heard them talking about a blade of grass or something but in my twisted head i started envisioning them using a blade to slice my arm open. i told them i was getting crazy again. luckily a minute later the doc came in and gave me my injection. i could feel the pinch when he did that so i was thankful i was gonna be knocked out in a minute and wouldn't have to remember anything about my wisdom teeth coming out. they had me open my mouth to put a guard in to hold open my mouth and then...i was asleep.

November 11, 2008

How to make a flapper dress

I made Clara's Halloween costume this year. My coworker had suggested Clara dress up like Clara Bow for Halloween and we ended up deciding on a flapper to go with Emmett's '20s newsboy outfit.


I prepped Clara by showing her youtube videos of flappers. She was quite excited about the dancing.

There were a bunch of pre-made flapper dresses I found online but I was too cheap to buy one for $30. But in the end I spent about $50 on supplies for Clara's dress! Oops.

I did all of this at the last minute about 3 days before Halloween without a pattern so I just had to guess on what I would need. This is roughly what I bought:


7 yards of red fringe (this was probably about a yard more than I needed)
3 yards of sequins (I chose a thick, zigzag band of them; also much more than I needed)
a boa
2 yard string of pearls
feathers (I bought a couple packs of these in different sizes)

I deconstructed one of Clara's sundresses that had a little slip underneath so that it provided a tube shape in her size and then cut it to the length I wanted it. Then used Elmer's glue to attach the rows of fringe, starting from the bottom, spaced about an inch and a half apart. (I started out handsewing it but decided that was just craziness. And I was too lazy to set up the sewing machine!)


Tips:
1. place a cutting board inside the dress to keep the glue from sticking to the bottom of the dress.
2. use a hairdryer to dry as you go along.


Glued a row of sequins along the top and then tried it on Clara to figure out where to attach straps. I handstitched those on to make sure they'd be super secure.


She wore a long-sleeve white undershirt to keep her warm, white tights, black patent-leather mary janes, a white boa, and the string of pearls looped around her necks a few time. I tried to glue the sequin string to a headband she had but it made the headband too stiff to stretch on to her head so we just skipped that idea and put a headband on with a white feather stuck in it! We also penciled a mole on her chin for good measure.



More photos here: Halloween Photos on Smugmug

noises

today clara made a "noise" and i asked her if she tooted. she said nope, that was just a breath coming out of my bottom.

November 4, 2008

cute story in the P-I about my friend Cathy's Great Aunt.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/385789_oldervoter31.html

blue house

Today, at the booth, I was recorded for an informational video for "the Blue House" (Korea's version of the White House). :-) It was just footage of me pretending to show a visitor some products on display. The "visitor" was a translator I'd hired who does not want to be filmed for some reason. She made the video people promise to block out her face. Perhaps she's a wanted criminal.

My hotel has free fruit available in the business rooms. There's a big basket of apples by the elevator down the hall. And every day I have more fruit added to my fruit plate in my room.
Day 1: 2 oranges
Day 2: + 1 large Asian pear
Day 3: + 1 apple
Day 4: + 2 bananas



I haven't eaten any of it. I'm wondering if my table will be overflowing when I leave on Day 7. Maybe they're just trying to figure out what fruit I like? Tomorrow a pineapple maybe?

Here's a picture of my Chicago-style pizza and pickles. Mmm those pickles were good.


Do you know what this is? It was served along with some other kim-chi dishes with my mongolian fried rice. It really creeped me out. It looked like the little stick things had eyes and I felt like they kept moving. Still gives me the willies thinking about it. Couldn't eat that dinner.

home, sweet internet

i'm back! online anyway. phew. i hate being disconnected. i needed to vent so bad yesterday and it was so hard not having a computer to write all my frustration into. i finally broke down and wrote on a pen and paper but ended up feeling like i was writing a suicide note or something. pen and looseleaf paper journaling is weird.

yow yesterday was crazy. finally at about 4pm my booth construction was almost done. the booth was shaped kind of like an X with 4 big graphic panels on top of a metal structure; and then there was a 5th big panel stacked right in the center of the X. so that the overall height of the booth was about 16 feet or so. It was actually taller than 16 feet and they were removing some parts on the bottom that weren't supposed to be there to actually make it 16 feet to meet the show's regulations. Anyway, they used a forklift to tilt the booth up a bit so they could work on two of the sides at once. That worked fine. But when they went to set it back down the forklift driver raised it. Really fast. I think it must've gone another 8 feet or so off the ground at an angle and then it collapsed on itself and crumbled (crashing into neighboring booths in the process). It all happened really fast. I remember watching a couple crew members trying to grab the two sides that were going up in the air and use their body weight to pull it back down. But it kept going higher and they couldn't. I was standing on the opposite side mostly out of the way. But when it fell I couldn't get completely out of the way in time and part of it hit my arm. It's funny cause the booth looks nice and lightweight. But it's not! Anyway, I'm not hurt. I just got a big bruise on my arm. The guys got on their cellphones right away (noone said anything to me) and I went out to try to calm down. I knew the structure was ruined. And there wasn't anyone around that could speak English. I was supposed to have the booth completely done by 8pm last night. I knew I was screwed. After making a few phone calls to Jeff & my boss to whine about the situation I was in, I went back in and found the person from the construction company who spoke a little bit of English. While I was out (about 10 minutes) a crew of about 15 people had shown up and started trying to straighten the booth out. It was mangled and warped. There were holes in at least one of the fabric panels. There was no way it was going to go back together again. Luckily, I'd planned to reuse part of the structure in future shows in a totally different configuration. So instead of my big, tall structure. I ended up with three images along the back wall of a huge space. (lots of picture drawing, gesturing, charade-ing to explain that to them. i tried to show them pictures on my laptop and then found out the monitor had been smashed during the crash.) The show organizers came over to check on me and were really helpful. I had to order a bunch of new furniture to fill up the space...but they couldn't deliver it last night. I ended up getting it this morning at 9am (the show floor opened at 10am) so I had to unpack and organize stuff in a rush this morning. Definitely the worst show/work experience ev-er. And I was so tired it really amplified everything for me. I still only managed to sleep four hours last night. All of my coworkers had been at a work meeting and dinner so they didn't get back till late. Turned out they'd had a terrific day. Apparently they went to the head of a partner company's house for dinner. And had the most amazing Korean dinner they'd ever experienced. They can't stop talking about it. Grrr.

The company that broke everything said they're going to pay for stuff. And pay for a new laptop for me. They tried to give me a loaner one last night but they gave me a Korean version so I couldn't do anything on it. My dad had a brilliant idea to just get a monitor and try hooking that up to my laptop. I tried getting one from the hotel last night but they didn't have any and had already loaned out their laptop. But this afternoon, the company that broke everything brought me a monitor. And now I can get back online. Yay yay yay.

Kraziness in Korea

I will let Jill post more when she gets back, but I don't know that she will be putting up any more updates during her trip to Seoul.

Things at her conference took a big downward turn yesterday (it was already Tuesday there) when, as she was getting some help finalizing the big Impinj booth set-up, some crazyman hiked up her booth with a forklift until it imploded on itself...it fell on top of Jill, busted up her laptop and damaged some nearby booths, as well. At this point she's a bit bruised, jet lagged, and frustrated with the huge language barrier she's dealing with (and a particular forklifter!). They're starting this high-profile, international conference with salvaged parts of a very expensive booth that's now contorted & being held together with zip-ties.

Oof...feel free to send our girl some love by email.

November 3, 2008

time traveler

today's been a day of waiting. waiting waiting waiting. can't get stuff delivered that i need. ergh. the rest of my team is off at customer meetings today or not arrived yet. so it's been a lonely day. my lack of sleep is catching up to me and i've had a headache most of the day. and just feeling sad about a suicide in seattle and obama's grandmother.

decided to go for comfort food at lunch today since i was feeling grumpy. stumbled upon a chicago bar & grill aka UNO's Pizzeria. fun. the best was that my pizza came with kimchi! pickles to be exact. they were so delicious. the best part of the meal for sure. (picture to come later) and such a perfect combination with the cheesy, heavy pizza. now i'm wondering if pickles are actually considered kimchi. there's a kimchi museum right by my hotel. i've been meaning to go there and check it out. but running out of time already.

tested out my "i am vegetarian. i do not eat meat or fish." korean note yesterday when i ordered bibimbap for dinner. it worked. interesting note: the bibimbap here had lettuce in it! the place we go to in seattle does that too and we thought it was some weird american thing. but apparently not! jessie also ordered us a ferment(there was lots of gesturing at us) but we didn't want to. i didn't like it. little too much fermentation for me!

other notes:
lots of people walk around arm in arm here. boys & girls, girls & girls...it's very cute.
the men spit on the tradeshow floor. ick.
lots and lots of suits & ties.
lots of bendy straws!
there is no tipping in asia.
big love was on tv in my room.