Merry Christmas!

I'm sure you've seen this before, but it never stops being funny!

Spontaneous Reading

Exhibit A

At home. Chelsea is examining the ornaments and presents.

Chelsea: "Mommy! This one says Heidi and Jeremy!" (points to ornament that says Heidi and Jeremy)

Me: (skeptically) "Which word says Heidi?"

Chelsea: "This one." (Points to "Heidi.")

Me: (still not convinced) "Which word says Jeremy?"

Chelsea: "THIS one." (Points to "Jeremy.")

Me: (thinking that was too easy, she must've heard me say the names when we hung the ornament and she knows which name is which because of the order they are in) "Hmm. You're right."

---

Exhibit B

At Target, in the Customer Service line. Girls are in the cart. Store employee walks up and talks to Chelsea.

Store Employee: (to Chelsea) "Hi there!"

Chelsea: (hides face and grins) "Thomas!"

Me: (turns to explain to the man that she is obsessed with Thomas and says "Thomas" even when it is not an appropriate response, but then sees that the man's name tag reads "Tom") "Chelsea, did you see the man's name tag?"

Chelsea: (keeps head down, says nothing)

Me: (distracted by Customer Service lady)

Me: (to the man) "She loves Thomas trains, so she randomly says Thomas all the time."

Man: "No, while you were talking to Customer Service she said 'Tom' to me. Twice."

---

Exhibit C

Driving to playgroup. Chelsea is staring out the window. We pass the sign that says "Now entering Ipswich."

Chelsea: "Mommy? Are we in Ipwich now?"

Me: "Did you just read the sign?"

Chelsea: "Ep." (That is Chelsea-speak for "Yep.")

---

I knew that she would eventually do this. That she would be one of those kids who would just up and start reading one day, before any kind of instruction. She is sitting on her bed right now with a mountain of library books. Within minutes of any family member coming to visit she has them reading to her. Even when she was potty-training, the bribe we used to get her to sit on the potty was reading books.

Even though I knew it would happen, I didn't expect it to happen so soon. I thought maybe, maybe at some point when she's three. Oprah famously describes how she started reading at three, why not Chelsea? But I thought it would be more like days before her fourth birthday. Not days after her third.

I don't write this to boast. Although I'm insanely proud of her, I'm hoping this doesn't come across turning this mommyblog into a mommybrag. Mostly I just want a record of what's happening with her. So that if it turns out that she really is starting to read, I'll have proof. That way, when she has her own kids and I tell her that she started reading at three and she inevitably doesn't believe me, I can say, "It's on my blog."

---

Of course with every triumph comes a challenge.

At Chelsea's 3 year check-up with her pediatrician, the doctor could barely understand her speech. She still struggles with Ls, Ys, and certain letter combos. The doc recommended a speech evaluation and since she's three we can get one through the local public schools.

I called them and they want her to come in for a preschool screening. Which is wonderful because the schools have an awesome, inexpensive preschool program which services a mix of regular education and special education students.

Ironically, my precocious little reader might qualify for this preschool as a special ed student because of her speech.

I'm glad she'll be getting help (if they determine she needs it). But I'll be sad to hear those little Chelsea-isms go.

"Is this 'ticker 'till 'ticky?"
---

Ghetto Thomas Cake Tutorial

I may have mentioned once or twice before that Chelsea is obsessed with Thomas. She decided months ago that she would only receive Thomas presents for her birthday. Whenever the suggestion came up that she might get something else, she'd say, "Wellll, maybe for Kissmas, but for my birfday I'm only gettin' Thomas peasants."

Like any totally insane mother, I decided to make her a Thomas cake. Sure, I could have made one like this. Or even like this. But no.

Because I stumbled upon THIS.

What follows is my very lame, very low-budget, very UNskilled Ghetto Thomas Cake tutorial.

Step 1: Bake a cake in a 9x13 pan. Use a cake mix because a 3-year-old will not notice if the cake is made from scratch or not. (If you live in an apartment where the oven sits on a slant, be prepared for the back of the cake to be a full inch taller than the front of the cake. Trim as needed.) Wrap in Saran and freeze.

Step 2: Cut the cake into quarters. Stack three of the quarters to form your Thomas. Save the remaining quarter for snacking building. Be sure you have a little model on hand for reference.

Step 3: Frost the layers together. Use a sharp knife to shave and cut the cake until it vaguely resembles the model. Jab a stick through it when it already starts to tip over.

Step 4: Give it a crumb coat. Use store-bought frosting because, again, the kid won't care and you don't have the patience to make homemade crusting buttercream. (Please be smarter than me. This cake is going to be mostly blue, so don't give it a white crumb coat. Make your life easier. The crumb coat should be blue.) Stick it in the fridge and hope it stays together.

Step 5: Make the face out of store-bought fondant (40% off one item at Michael's!) and black icing. Poke a stick in that, too. Set aside.

Step 6: Mix up your colors. (Another tip: Buy some red. It is impossible to make red by adding color to white. It just gets hotter and hotter pink.) (Also, I don't know why the picture is sideways or how to undo that. Halp?)

Step 7: Cover Thomas in blue frosting and then decorate with the other colors. Poke the popsicle face on there afterwards. Take a thousand pictures. Feel smug. Refrigerate cake until needed.

Step 8: At the appointed hour, add track and candles. Take some more pictures before he's demolished!

Step 9: Present Thomas cake to your beloved child and hope that you get a smile like this:

Step 10: Prepare for cannibalism.

Step 11: Have baby wipes, paper towels, napkins, and a hot bath ready to battle the (blue! and black!!!) frosting-covered face and fingers.

---

Christmas at Fenway

Dear Heidi,

Congratulations! You are invited to attend the sixth annual Christmas at Fenway this Saturday, December 13! This invitation-only event will provide those in attendance with a guaranteed opportunity to be amongst the first suckers Red Sox fans to spend an obscene amount of money on purchase 2009 select Sox game tickets.

You will also have the chance to have your child confused by photographed with Wally the Green Monster!

Your child will also be terrified delighted by Santa and Mrs. Claus!

Arrive early for your chance to be photographed with the 2004 and 2007 World Series Trophies! (Note to parents: although we may advise you to seat your baby between the trophies, you should not construe this as permission for your baby to touch the pretty, gold, shiny flags.)

As a guest of the Red Sox, you are invited to arrive at Gate D on Yawkey Way at the ass-crack of dawn 8am on December 13. The ticket sales will begin at 10am and we will make every effort to ensure that you stand in as many different lines as possible for as long as possible are able to purchase your tickets promptly.

Once you receive your tickets, please hand them to your child to pose with while praying she doesn't mangle or drop them keep them in a safe location.

Congratulations again and GO SOX!
---

DJ Y-T

Jeremy just finished teaching Invertebrate Zoology for the fall semester. When his students told him that one of their other instructors had rapped briefly in class, Jeremy was inspired to create the following masterpiece.



Yet another piece of evidence that I chose wisely.
---

Diagnosis

About a year ago, I read this post by one of my favorite bloggers about her struggle with Hashimoto's thyroiditis. In the post, she included a link to a checklist of symptoms. I clicked through and found myself saying "Yes, yes, yes..." to many of the questions on the list.

I was convinced, for a few days at least, that I had some sort of thyroid issue.

But. I am easily persuaded. And, one of the symptoms? "Memory problems or having trouble thinking clearly." -from WebMD

Yesterday morning I had some blood drawn as part of my "annual" physical. Got a cryptic call from my doctor today, saying they had the results and that I should call the office.

Turns out...I have hypothyroidism. Duh!

The symptoms are pretty vague, so I can excuse myself for being unsure of my self-diagnosis. Here are a few of the joys of hypothyroidism:

1. Feeling tired, weak, or depressed.
2. Dry skin and brittle nails.
3. Not being able to stand the cold.
4. Memory problems or having trouble thinking clearly.
5. Heavy or irregular periods.

I suffer from most of these but I chalked each of them up to something else. Numbers 1 and 4? Well, that's just run-of-the-mill motherhood, isn't it?

Number 2? I thought I inherited those dry knuckles from my dad.

Number 3? It's freaking December. In New England. Isn't everyone cold?

Number 5? I'm still nursing which makes everything wacky.

You see?

But now I've got some prescription thyroid hormone waiting for me at CVS. Once it kicks in, I look forward to being alert, strong, happy, smart, warm, and THIN! (The doc also mentioned that my weight issues might also be attributed to low thyroid.)

So... yay?
---

9,237,388... and One?

I don't know how I've managed to miss this one before, since over 9 million people have seen it and it's been out there for a couple of years. But it's new to me and thoroughly entertaining so here, I present to you 12 Days of A Cappella.



Thanks to WERS and their All A Cappella radio show for introducing me to this.
---