Smartee Pants Clothing has some really adorable things. It’s horrible when I have extra money sitting in my PayPal account, because then I start checking out sites like these and thinking about all of the cute things I could order for Alyssa or Ryan. Ryan in particular should definitely get a little something, since his birthday is just a week away.

So… money in my account, nothing to do but shop… what am I looking at? Well, I know that Alyssa would love their rhinestone tees, particularly the one featuring a crown and her name, or even Princess or the heart or cupcake. Their personalized children’s clothes are adorable, and I’m getting some ideas for Alyssa’s birthday… I’m thinking a birthday girl t-shirt? I bet she would love that!

Moving on from Alyssa, there are some really nice baby gifts then I can picture as being perfect for a friend of mine who is due to deliver any day now (speaking of her, I’m going to call in the morning to see how she is doing!). If she wasn’t so far along, I’d consider buying her some designer maternity tees to show off her baby bump with.

You know, I’m really glad I didn’t know about sites like these when I was pregnant with Alyssa and Ryan! Otherwise I don’t know how we’d have the money left over for baby gear and diapers and clothes.

So here is something interesting for you. I haven’t breastfed my son, Ryan, since late last October/early November, yet I still produce milk. I’m not producing anything substantial, but enough that I definitely know that it’s there. Is this normal? I know that once you have had a baby and lactated that it’s pretty easy to re-lactate, but what about continuing to lactate after you have finished breastfeeding?

On a related note, I had a breastfeeding dream the other night. I’m not sure if it was my baby or someone else’s baby that I was nursing, but I distinctly remember helping the baby latch on, cradling him in my arms, and feeling the familiar tingle and throb of my milk letting down. Yes, the dream was that vivid (as is this description!).

Sigh. I miss pregnancy. I miss breastfeeding. I miss Ryan being tiny. I wish I could go back two years and re-live his infant months all over again. I’d say I’d do Alyssa’s too, but she really wasn’t that pleasant of a baby. That sounds mean, but it’s true! She was always glaring, and never really interested in cuddling or snuggling. She was always very independent, and acted almost as if she was pissed off that she wasn’t big enough yet to go out and about on her own!

So, baby urges. I wonder if they’ll ever go away. I try to steer clear of baby photos, baby product sites, baby clothes, and items like moses baskets and crib bedding. If I don’t, the urges are just THAT much stronger. Grrr.

Home improvement stores bore me to tears. But in all fairness, I’m sure Fashion Bug, Lane Bryant and Target all bore Dan to tears, too. So once in a great while I subject him to FB or LB, and he retaliates by dragging me into Lowes or Home Depot. I have no interest in looking for grow lights or picking out the right nuts, bolts or filter for our furnace, so I usually go traipsing off to check out the gizmos and neat little gadgets along the front of the store.

We haven’t been to a home improvement store lately. In fact, the last time I was at one I’m pretty sure it was just ME there. Shocking, I know. But I had stuff to buy: light filtering mini-blinds, a new lock for the door, and some other odds and ends that I can’t find at Target or Wal-mart.

All right, a new TV show is on and I want to watch (Baby Borrowers!), so talk to you later.

Right now I’m watching Most Wanted on Court TV Tru TV. I like the show. It’s like COPs, only with more narrative, more still video rather than the sporadic video shot by a huffing camera man that can’t keep up, and more brutal crap. They just showed a mens jewelry store that got robbed by a guy who couldn’t just take the money and leave. Oh no, he had to hit the female clerk and shoot at her. So riddle me this. While I don’t understand people who rob other people and stores, I really don’t understand people who rob them, but insist on hurting, trying to kill or killing the innocent clerks and sales people. Can’t you just take the money and go? Isn’t that enough of a crime?

I ordered a t-shirt from ThinkGeek, and another from KlearGear. One is for Dan, and says “meh”, and the other is for me — it says “I’m blogging this”. I love geeky t-shirts. I can’t wait until they arrive!

Many advertising companies are taking advantages of the service someone like a Mom consultant can offer. A Mom consultant is a professional that can assist companies with reaching out to their favorite targets: moms. Mom consultants know how to approach us mothers, and they know what we do and don’t like, what we’ll make time for and what we just can’t be bothered with.

I have been approached by a few Mom consultants in the past. Some asked me to participate in product reviews, others were looking to sponsor my blog by placing sponsored content on it. Then some others just wanted me to answer a few surveys.

I like Mom consultants, because they really know how to approach us moms!

Have you been approached by a Mom consultant? How did it work out for you?

Oy, I am really tired… going on 4am. I swear, I’m going to bed in just a few minutes! I can’t wait to get my contacts out, because my eyes are very dry.

When it came to choosing names for my daughter, Alyssa, and my son, Ryan, I consulted a lot of baby name books and baby name websites. Once I knew Alyssa was going to be a girl, I set out to picking names. I’m pretty sure we had settled on a name before I reached the ninth month of my pregnancy. Her name would be Alyssa Marie [last name]. Marie was my grandmother’s middle name.

Now my son’s name took a lot longer to figure out. In fact, it wasn’t until a few days before I had him that we finally settled on a name for him: Ryan Edgar [last name]. Edgar is my grandfather’s first name.

I remembered consulting a few celebrity baby names list, but just out of genuine curiosity, and no real desire to follow the trends.

How did you name your kids?

Every now and again I’ll post spotlight reviews of other interesting and new blogs I find on the internet. One such blog is Daniel Neumeister’s blog, which can be found at danielneumeister.wordpress.com. I wish I could tell you more about Dan Neumeister, but so far his blog, which looks to be new on the internet, doesn’t have anything on it!

So hey Dan, if you’re reading this: go add some content to your blog! It’s hard to find out who you are and what you write about when your blog is empty!

Anyway, I’ve made a mental note and a tangible bookmark here on my laptop, to check back on Dan’s blog in a few days to see if he has added any content to it. If he has, I’ll be sure to update this post and let you all know.

That said, I really need to get into bed. It’s going on 4am, and I am very tired!

I had the unfortunate luck of finding the direct result of not spaying and neutering cats: sick, abandoned kittens. There were five in all, being eaten from the inside out by maggots. All had maggots in their eye sockets, maggots coated on their hind legs and tails, and maggots wriggling in and out of their protruding, bleeding rectums. All five cats were dying a slow, painful death in which they could do nothing but cry and wiggle about on the ground.

Even if your cat or dog is an inside pet, you should still have them altered, just in case they do ever get out. There are several other reasons to have them altered, including decreased risk of certain types of cancers and cysts, and better disposition. For dogs, male aggression is significantly reduced. For cats, the scent of the urine is also greatly reduced.

Just as importantly, do NOT feed strays. As tempting as it is to feed a stray, do not. Instead, take it in and care for it as a pet, if you’re able and the stray is friendly. If not, trap it, or call your local shelter/animal welfare agency, and report the stray.
As cruel as it sounds to not feed a stray cat, remember this: if that stray cat sticks around because it’s given food and possibly shelter, it’s going to mate, it’s going to reproduce. One female cat can produce 22 kittens in a three year lifespan. That’s a lot of kittens that are risking injury, torture, and slow deaths like the ones I found faced.

When you encourage a stray cat by feeding it, rather than trapping it or having an animal welfare agency trapping it, you are:
1) encouraging reproduction, which results in more unwanted cats
2) drawing other strays to your home and neighborhood
3) risking the spread of disease, as stray cats may often be carriers of rabies, FIV or other diseases that can be spread to humans and even other animals

When you don’t neuter your own pets, you are running the risk of it reproducing if it ever got out.

This post has been brought to you by the awful night I had last night, in which I found five maggot filled two week old kittens in a nine hour period, and made two late night trips to a 24/7 emergency vet clinic to have them euthanized. Oh, and a $188 vet bill. And a lot of tears and grief.

The tannish spots/gritty areas are maggots. They were also in their eye sockets.

Full story on jenn.nu: This is how a heart breaks

I have to pee. I’m thirsty. I’m desperately craving chocolate. But I don’t feel like getting up, my glass isn’t within reach, and there’s no chocolate in the house, and my mom has my car so I can’t even go out to buy chocolate. Le sigh.

Alyssa is up. She slept late today and didn’t come stumbling out until almost noon. I need to hurry up and get her into bed though, because tomorrow morning we all have to be up and ready to go out the door when Dan needs to leave for work, and that’s at 11am. We need to leave a few minutes earlier, so that Dan has the time to grab his check and take it to the bank. Since we’ve all been sleeping in, getting up at 9:30am (me) and 10:15am (kids) is going to suck. But, sigh, we’ll deal, somehow!

So, what does everyone have planned for the weekend? I plan on taking a part of my paycheck and shopping for mens rings, and paying bills. For the rings, I’m looking at titanium, but I also like tungsten rings. I know, I’m so exciting.

I just finished watching The Baby Borrowers. The show has a really neat concept: set up a teenage couple in a house and hand them a baby to watch for a period of three days. The house was completely furnished with regular furniture, baby furniture and food, and once the teens got their clothes and such unpacked, their child was brought in. Obviously there were safeguards in place: a nanny available 24/7 to shadow if need be, and the parents themselves could watch what was happening in the house at all times, from another house right across the street. But generally, the teen couples were on their own with their charges.

So this week’s episode featured toddlers. I can definitely sympathize with the frustration level some of the teens experienced. Toddlers ARE frustrating. And yeah, they sleep 10 - 14 hours straight, rather than the horrible little cat naps that tiny babies do, but they are SO much more active during the day.

Heh, I think this is my new favorite show. Have you seen it?