Baby Butt!

If there is a master list of Cutest Things On Earth, baby butts are DEFINITELY on it.

You Call Your Baby WHAT?!: Nicknames

My family likes to give offhand, nonsensical and sometimes downright rude nicknames to everyone and everything in our orbit. Mr. Curry's beat, cantankerous old blue truck (which I miss but him, not so much) was Blue Thunder. My first picture with Ever was taken in front of Blue Thunder- she was only the size of a blueberry. Sniff. My car back in the day was white and the kids could not understand why we couldn't name it their brilliant idea: White Power. Again. Not so much. At the time we had a legion of cats and they were all named after Harry Potter characters (sniff) and had truncated names- Hermione 'mimi' Mr. Weasley 'weasel' etc. Our dogs, who are still around and SUPER ANNOYING* are Bodie: Bodes Muchaches, King of the Wild Frontier, and Wolfgang: Wolfie Toofie. 

Here's the rundown of the kids;

Dakota: Doda (what Lola always called him before she could pronounce his whole name) and a brief stint as 'Cody' in his younger years which didn't stick because he is SO NOT a Cody

Ian: Ian the Brain, Ian Genius (when he was little, nobody calls him that anymore. he has a sizeable head which is necessary for his genius level brain. Ever also inherited this oversized brain/head)

Lola: Yoya, Lola of the Moon Clan, Lolacoaster

Ever: Everkins, Kinny (we call her this all day, maybe more than her real name) Kinnykins, Ever Ysabeth (based on her name Ever Elizabeth, I tend to call her this when she is doing something sneaky and I'm warning her) You Old Fatty Baby, Fattykins

So what about you?

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I never promised you a rose garden!

xo

ms basilworth's files

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Toddler Propoganda

Have children today and you have immediate cultural relevance, because half of all advertising ( this is based on my obsessive consumption of all things pop-culture ) is geared toward parents. Specifically, making parents feel that they absolutely must buy THIS NOW if they are possibly going to have charming, successful*frolicking modern child that can function normally in society or I need this for adorable Facebook pictures. That's not what the ads actually say of course, but what K-FKD in our heads ( thank you Anne Lamott for naming that particular station ) is announcing. I'm the worst with this because I am a major sucker for packaging.Take a piece of shit and put a big pink bow on it and have it hum It's A Small World After All when you jiggle it, and I'm sold.

After Ever was born I tried desperately not to fall into rabid frothing consumption, and at first, I succeeded. I was on maternity leave and we were broke, and in the beginning Ever still had enough clothes and trinkets and doodads to satisfy a small orphanage thanks to my baby shower. Then I went back to work, and we weren't so broke, and Ever started growing out of her infant clothing and toys, and became a toddler, and I have a blog that could be leveraged for trades, and I know where Etsy lives, and Target was five minutes from my house- is that even fair play?- and so, I consumed. Mmmmm. Feels good, doesn't it? 

So let's look at what Ever has had from 12-17 months, and then at what she needed. 

What Ever Had From 12-17 Months

crib 

crib mobile

crib blankets

teethers

clothes

hair doodads

bloomers

baby shoes

snot sucker

stuffed toys

hard toys

jingly toys

car seat

car seat toys

music player

wooly lamb music player large

wooly lamb music player small

socks

mirror

pillow

baby wipe warmer

nursing cover

baby food blender

baby food glass jars

baby snack jars 
baby clippers
baby brush
baby shampoo
baby bath toys 
baby songs CD

What Ever Needed From 12-17 Months

boobs (mine) (not even included on first list)

clothes

diapers

snot sucker

Admittedly, a few of the above listed thises and thats made life a LOT easier these last months, mostly the car seat toys, baby CD and her teethers. And the rest of the things, well, they made ME very happy. Because I am totally a slave to the machine.

*What IS a 'success' at being a child? Lord.

infestation

This morning I woke to Ever and Lola laying low and folded in clean white sheets and blankets and beautiful light falling in glowing white envelopes from the shutters, and then, with my eyes closed, I heard Ever's tiny bebe voice squealing flea! flea! I rolled over and squeezed open my eyes to watch Lola pinch a tiny bebe flea off of Ever's fatty arm. We have fleas. We don't have money for Advantage. What we do have is a venti Starbucks cup with soapy water and about a million dead fleas lying at the bottom. At night I lay my Fifth Witness down and place my swollen feet on the carpet. I wiggle my toes. They are bait. The fleas jump and twitch and bip and make me sick. They congregate. Last night I was sitting in my thong in my close on the floor, eating chocolate pop tarts and reading Anne Lamott's  Traveling Mercies and and I looked down to see four fleas closing in on my vagina. I don't know if this has ever happened to you but I highly recommend against it. It's the closest thing to action my vagina has gotten in a while though. My life feels very random and scary right now so controlling the flea population of my bedroom does have some satisfaction. When I put on the lamp and lay a blanket over it to dim the light, the fleas wiggle butt upward out of the beige carpet fibers and begin doing their ticky dance around the heat of the bulb. It's like pulling crops from the fields. And then drowning them. I washed the dogs last week and the amount of fleas on them was staggering. I don't know how life as we know it will end but when all is desolate and still, I expect tiny black flecks of fleas to begin popping up from the scorched earth. I feel like Mrs. Hannigan- kill! kill! kill! That woman knew how to be depressed. I need a gin bath, red lipstick, a scratchy record player and a penchant for rich bald men with muscular necks. And in the end I'll be good enough anyway, and everyone will sing around a large fountain and give me free liquor and my lipstick will be red but not smeared and I won't ever put little girls in closets again, or drown fleas in suburban Starbucks cups.

i still take pictures

Put the Camera Down and Look At Me

Ever is seventeen months old and I am obsessed with her. I am not as much an infant mommy as  I am a toddler mommy- my love and adoration turns into full blown goo goo ga ga ridiculous, dopey, stars over my head love. Everything she does or is charms and delights me. Her belly button smells wonderful, like a cookie, her earwax ( waxsacks as Lola calls it, which makes me laugh every time. say it out loud. you'll see. ), the bottoms of her stinky feet. Her expressions strike me as particularly and UNUSUALLY charming, impish, intelligent, delightful. I'm in love, and it's just as disgusting and ridiculous and irrational as romantic love- maybe even more, because adult partners don't throw tantrums in the grocery store over being unable to once again, chew straight through the plastic bag AND the avocados. Or if they do, that's over pretty quick. I hope. 

Whatever it is she is doing, I want to document it. Ever look over here, I squeal at her while she's pulling off the petals of a flower. Ever look at mommmyyyy! I cajole while she kisses the dog on his big wet stinky nose. Ever see me? See me? See me? I repeat like a crazy ape, jumping up and down waggling my arms in an attempt to crack a smile out of my daughter, who is minding her own business concentrating on her puzzle. She looks up at me slightly irritated and wary. I think it's SO CUTE and have to immediately get a photo!!!

After the third time my entire group of children had left a room, disgusted with my photographic insistence and hauling the baby on their shoulders, I slowly began to accept that I had a serious problem. Like most writers I've always documented life in my mind as it went along, and having children has taken a natural inclination and turned it into something else- a fixation.

So much of my adult life has been about erecting barriers between myself and the people or experiences I love, and then working my ass off to dismantle those barriers once I realize what I'm doing. Photographing my children became one of those barriers. Instead of sitting on the hot concrete, feeling the sticky pull of dried soda on my arm, hearing the dog two doors over bark his deep, throaty complaint, and watching my baby girl explore each grass blade with the meticulous, absorbed intention of a neurosurgeon, I placed a camera in between myself and my consciousness, and let the camera be the focus. clickclickclick A photo can be a beautiful window into an experience you want to remember, and it can also be a momento of an experience you barely remember because you were so busy documenting. Instead of being a memory keeper at all times, I want to simply be Ever's mommy. 

  

(and get some good photos, sometimes.)

People In Your Neighborhood

take a seat and read

At Huffington Post > Kristen writes about the day she went against her rule and let her son play with guns. I totally relate to the underlying premise of this piece- that flexibility, the willingness to see what is most important to our kids- is just as important as following 'rules'

At Vodkamom> A hilarious tale of warning

At Boston Mommas> Great weekend moving tips from a pro

At Sassafrass> Jessica writes about her 'ninja squad' ie the people you need on your side during a divorce

At Sweetney> Tracey shares some Pema Chodron quotes- a Buddhist monk who eases the mind and spirit