Why your left ring finger always has pen or lead smudge marks on it. 

What it’s like to tuck your elbow in when eating next to a right-handed person.

How tough it is to find scissors you can use that don’t have rounded tips and rubber around the handles.

The oddity of being taught how to play softball, tennis or golf with your least dominant arm.

The feeling of a notebook binder pressing against you while trying to write.

The way you contort a wrist to ensure cursive slants to the right.

What it’s like to be in your right mind.

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

My 4th grade birthday party at Showbiz was an absolute nightmare for my 5-years-younger sister.  Fats, the mechanical gorilla on keyboard, scared her–so much she was inconsolable every time the curtain opened and his beady, glass eyes came alive.  He didn’t bother me.  But pretty much every other thing in a mask or costume does freak me out, even now.  I love Halloween,  but hate much of the attire.  Kindergartners in Scream masks don’t work for me.  Of course Charlotte is showing signs of a similar fear.  Do I bring this on or is it genetic?  She locks eyes on the Panther at UNI games, hundreds of feet away, and tracks his every movement.  In my 20s at a Seattle Supersonics game, I screamed like a woman auditioning for a horror film when I discovered Squatch (the team mascot modeled after Sasquatch) was by my seat.  But nothing compares with my meltdowns at haunted houses.  Freshman year of high school, I jumped on the back of a stranger in front of me to be carried through one bawling.  College took me through a fraternity haunted house, another failed attempt to face and try to overcome my fear, that ended with me being dragged by my friends with eyes closed.  The final breakdown came, also in college, when a haunted hayride at night with masked men jumping out of the woods and grabbing ankles led me to curl up in a fetal position at the center of the hayrack sobbing hysterically.  Clearly, it’s a problem.

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

Three pieces of advice to women from Barbara Rainey with Family Life are definitely worth sharing.  I signed up for daily emails, specifically for couples, from the Christian organization.  She says a wife should believe in her husband, be willing to confront him in love and pursue intimacy with him on every level.  This all makes sense to me.  Her husband, Dennis, says the the most valuable gift she’s given him is to believe in his God-given potential.  She adds that broaching a difficult subject with your husband can be accomplished with kindness and respect.  “Could I talk to you about something?”  This approach, she argues, will mean he’s far less threatened and insecure.  And, for the men reading this, she saves the best one for last.  The one about intimacy.  Barbara says most men consider it the most important part of marriage.  So she advises women to not resent being intimate with your husband, but learn to appreciate what is central to his manhood.

The wise woman builds her house, but the foolish tears it down with her own hands.  Proverbs 14:1

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

And play we did, all weekend.  Aside from some training for Weight Watchers, I pretty much devoted my kid-free time to overindulgence.  Dave and I went to 4 restaurants, 2 movies, 2 malls, 1 dance club and 1 buffet.  It was all awesome, actually.  But the whole experience reminded me why I gained 80 pounds the first year of our marriage, while pregnant with Charlotte.  As a childless couple, Dave and I are a bad influence on one another when it comes to eating out and shopping and spending money.  It’s easier to do it in excess when you can sit in a booth for an HOUR-long dinner, shop without a diaper bag or potty breaks and don’t get daycare bills in the mail.  The more-disciplined and controlled me is the mom with young kids.  So she is happy to be back!  But I am contemplating a trip to the vending machine, as I type, to be honest.

Will & Miles, 5-month-old twins from Cedar Falls

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

Being on TV the past 15 years has really exposed me to a lot of catty and critical people.  But fortunately the kindness and uplifting comments from so many others have cancelled out much, if not all, of the negativity.  Just today, in situations totally unrelated to my job, I had the pleasure of dealing with great people.  Dave’s nurse at Sartori Memorial Hospital in Cedar Falls was an all-around friendly person.  She prepped him for his colonoscopy with a smile.  If you can be easygoing and down-to-earth around someone awaiting the bizarre but necessary experience of getting their colon screened, you are doing a good job.  The day also took me to Coralville.  The kids and I drove there to meet my parents.  They’re taking them for the weekend!  As can easily happen when you’re hauling sippy cups, school artwork to show the grandparents, jackets and other paraphernalia into every restaurant and restroom imaginable with children in tow, my mom left the diaper bag on the seat at McDonald’s and didn’t realize it until they were long gone.  Papa called to request I call and have it held until we meet Monday, as we were both driving back to our opposite destinations.  Not only did the manager answer on the first ring, she located the bag within 30 seconds and confirmed the Hello Kitty and Spiderman stainless steel thermoses were still inside.  No problem, she’ll keep it in the office ’til we can get it.  This same manager’s response to a second call, per Dave’s important reminder, to empty out those cups so the juice doesn’t spoil and ruin them was, “No problem!”  Amazingly courteous, helpful and positive.  So just as I’ve heard what seems like an endless stream of bad customer service examples comes two eastern Iowans who do what their jobs require with a pleasant tone and a caring touch.  How nice.  By the way, Dave had one small polyp removed that the doctor thinks is benign.  Now especially happy he had the screening!

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

It’s probably a good thing I go back to work after Dave and I put our kids to bed.  That way he gets free reign over the TV remote every single weeknight.  It’s perhaps every married man’s dream, perhaps, to control the tube for a couple hours daily alone and uninterrupted.  Dave can freely flip back and forth between a thousand sporting events, news-style programs about said sporting events and replays of similar sporting events from years past.  Don’t get me wrong… I prefer to be with a man who’s a sports fan.  But a double standard exists.  Many a wife is supposed to be okay with a seasonal sporting event literally playing in the background of every holiday and family get-together imaginable.  We’re even expected to come up with drinks and appetizers and attend a party around it.  When will the Super Bowl for chicks go prime time?  A football field of shoes, for example, where crazed females try on as many pairs as possible before the clock runs out.  And it could all be live, with limited commercials for things like the latest bikini wax and lash-boosting mascara.  I would tune in.  Dave likely would not.  And that’s what I’m talking about.  I sit through football, baseball, basketball, even golf and Nascar on occasion.  So why won’t Dave snuggle up on the couch to watch the latest installment of Real Housewives?  Honey, are you reading this?

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

I am not afraid to drop names in the on-going effort to get my children under control.  Though today is only the first official day of fall and we are (hopefully) many weeks out from snow and Christmas lights, I have already mentioned Santa to Charlotte and the fact that he can take presents away from children who misbehave.  When I really need to bring out the big guns, I mention Jesus.  That he is always watching her, even when Mommy and Daddy aren’t around.  And that he can tell Santa about whatever offense she committed thereby eliminating another gift.  Of course not in those words do I express this to my 4-year-old daughter but she gets the point!  Dave really got creative Sunday after a caring Sunday School teacher wrote Charlotte a personal note praising her performance that morning.  He made a “fake” call to Mr. Mike and carried on a conversation about Charlotte not doing what her parents had asked adding that maybe he should talk to her about it.  At this point, she was nervously hiding between our couch and the wall.  She questioned the authenticity of the cell phone interaction, of course.  They all get suspect too soon these days, you know.  But in the end we managed to get our point across by bringing in a third party.  Whatever works!

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

I don’t know if it’s because I’m a caring wife or an overexposed-to-health-stories reporter, probably both, but I am like Dave’s personal assistant when it comes to figuring out which check-ups he needs when, scheduling them and making sure he shows!  Today I joined him for his annual, all-over skin check.  This is the second one he’s had.  Of course he gets WAY more sun than I do and wears MUCH  lower SPF.  Yet he has very few moles and, so far, nothing that needs to be removed.  Except a large, raised mole below his right temple that is colorless.  It was much larger years ago and he had it shaved off… but in recent years it’s returned.  I know it’s purely cosmetic, but why not get it surgically taken off now before it gets larger and an eventual procedure would leave a much bigger scar?  He agreed!  The minor surgical procedure is on the books.  He told the nurse I wanted to join him for his appointment because I wanted to see him in his underwear, then told the doctor this was my only chance to see him naked.  Ha, ha.  I do appreciate his willingness to meet my medical laundry list.  Next up, his first colonoscopy on Friday.  He was off to pick up the liquid he has to drink the night before the last time we talked.  Gotta keep our men healthy, Ladies!

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

Bright-eyed & bushy-tailed this morning!

I knew it.  I jinxed it.  After waxing poetic about the natural course of Charlotte staying put in her bed and Thomas sleeping soundly in his crib… it all came to, literally, a screeching halt last night.  Thomas was up (I don’t know at what late hour) hollering for Daddy and Mommy.  Dave was able to get him back down pretty quickly.  Still I’m amazed at his magic touch.  Then, again, at 4am Thomas was standing up and yelling out for us.  I was so out of it I thought it was Charlotte and shouted back, “Sissy, come in here with us!”  Dave informed me it was our son.  So I got up, walked down the hall to scoop him up and then Charlotte started whining.  Great, she was up!  I did what any nice wife who wants to let their husband sleep do, I took them both downstairs and insisted we all go back to sleep in the basement bedroom.  It’s a queen bed but it might as well be a toddler bed with those two in it.  I was on the edge the next three hours with my arms contorted around the 2-year-old on top of me and my legs intertwined with the 4-year-old who was sleeping on the left side of the bed with us.  Too bad we don’t have any pets–there was plenty of room for a giant dog and three cats on the untouched right side!  It was a nightmare I was awake for.  My attempt at a half-hour nap before work was thwarted by a doorbell ring from some campaign volunteer.  Just my luck.

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26

I don’t want to jinx it by writing about this, but recently two amazing things have happened.  Charlotte has stayed in her bed ALL night, no longer ending up in ours.  And she has stopped wetting the bed due to fewer drinks and more potty breaks beforehand.  It’s been great to have half the bed to myself until morning and to get a break from stripping and washing her waterproof mattress cover and bedding every other night.  I was a bed wetter and thought she might be as well, but I think she just overdid the juice and didn’t always try to go potty.  Now we’re insisting the sippy is less than half full and the toilet stop happens.  Her brother is back to sleeping well.  When he woke up a couple nights ago, he went back down never leaving his crib with Daddy’s touch.  Dave went in there and told him he had to go back to sleep.  Daddy rubbed his back.  And that was it.  He slept until 6:30am or so, late for him!

Posted under Baby Thomas: Month 26