Making Friends.

A blog about blogging!  And facebook!  What could be more intersting?  And when I tweet the link to this I will have created a turducken of social media!

So I"m doing this thing via the Secret to Success is Support Girls called 31 Days to Build a Better Blog.  I'm only on day 4 but so far it has inspired a few changes around here.  Meaning... drumroll...

I actually, finally have an About Me page!

Crazy that.  I also have added some fancy tabs at the top to try to organize my content like a grown up blogger would.  They need some work.  The blogroll especially needs some help.  But it will get there.

Also fun an exciting and all of that....

Life in Cleveland now has a facebook page!

Not sure what I'll do with that yet.  Probably just post updates there when I update here.  In case you like to get your blog feed on that way.  Please like me?

Speaking of begging people to like me... The day 3 challange was to find a blogging buddy.  I'm a little fuzzy on what that means but I'm guessing it's someone who you can hang out with and watch crappy reality tv.  Or you know... help promote each others blogs.  One of the two. And then I realized that the latest post up on my blog - the first thing all of these new people who were assessing if they wanted to be friends with me or not would see - was a post about me making a drunken fool out of myself and then getting food poisoning.

Right.  I win at social media.

Fortunately 3 bloggers wanted to play along with me.  So in the spirit of being a good blog buddy here's a little bit about them:

First is Amanda over at Raising Miss Mommy.  She blogs about raising a baby girl.  Her latest post about a parenting bucket list really got me thinking.

Next is Billie over at The Unexpected Mother.  She has two little boys and considering that she mentions Kaluha in her About Me paragraph I have a feeling we're going to be BFF's.

Finally is Kisha over at Untagged Seeds.  This blogger freaked me out because SHE IS ME.  No seriously.  There are two of us.  She was an architect, went on maternity leave, and then never went back, has a fiber-related Etsy site, was a charter member of APX at her school, and lives on a Great Lake in the rust belt.  I read her profile outloud to my husband and he thought I was talking about me.  Yeah. 

So Yay for making new friends!  And double Yay because tonight is Project Runway.  I can't wait to see what my kid thinks of it!

She wants me to make her Madeline doll a fancy skirt.  Seriously.

The last 48 hours.

So.  Wow.  Where to begin.  The last 48 hours have been insane.  How 'bout I start at the beginning.

Sat morning we decided to take advantage of the snow and take our kids on a sledding adventure.  I crowdsourced twitter for ideas on where to go and the overall recommendation was the Westlake Recreation Center.  Done and Done:

I also found this awesome website for all of your Ohio sledding needs.

Superfuntimes sledding.  But as things go we left the hill with both kids completely melting down and hungry.  So we made the grave error of stopping at KFC for some quick 'n easy lunch.

Bad Idea.  But I"ll get to that.

So we ate our lunch, laughed at how much our daughter went crazy over the popcorn chicken (clearly she is not very familiar with the ways of fast food.  I intend to keep it that way), and went on with our day.

Later we dropped the kids off at my parents house for a night of fun with the grandparents.  And I got to dust off (literally) my cocktail shaker and make myself one of these:

The Perfect Citron Cosmo.

Matt was feeling a little under the weather but I gave him the SERIOUSLYMANUPWENEVERGETOUTEVERAAAAH. Speech and away we went.  Bad Idea #2 but I'll get to that one as well.

So we met up with some of our friends at the Church Bar - which, totally recommend if you're looking for a "mix" bar in Cleveland.  Superfuntimes.  Couple of thoughts:  If you order a Citron Cosmo with the disclaimer "I know this is SO 2005 but..." you will make fast friend with the bartenders.  Also watching Tebow get his ass handed to him was extra super fun at a "mix" bar.

Somewhere during the night Matt decided that he REALLY wasn't feeling well (DANGER, WARNING, DANGER) and left me to fend for myself / make lots and lots of new friends.  And Oh did I have a ball.  I got to find out what a "mix" bar was from the manager  ("A bar where everyone feels welcome." "So, like, a bar."  "Well more welcoming than that."  "So one with alcohol?"  I am a bit slow sometimes), challange the bartenders to their cosmo making skills earning myself a free one in the process, and compare iphones with a group of gay men (Grinder.  DUDE.).  Which resulted in many of these:

I consider it a monument to my self restraint that I only posted one random filmstrip of my new BFF's  to facebook.

Eventually I made it home.  The second I walked in the door it hit me.  I remember at one point thinking 4 martinis in 5 hours does not equal worshiping the porcelain god drunk.  It equals thinking you're fantastic drunk.  And I am too fantastic to be this sick.  Plus why is Matt puking in the other room?  There's something wrong with this picutre.

I'll spare you all of the puking in stereo details of the next few hours but suffice it to say both of us ended up in the hospital with a serious case of food poisoning.  And my poor parents got to relive what it's like to have a sick and puking toddler. Luckily the little dude was spared the horrors of the situation.



Which means 2 things:

It was the popcorn chicken.

And I will never, ever, EVER eat KFC ever again.

So yeah.  That happened.  Thankfully we're all on the mend now.

What a crazy weekend.

My 2.5 year old's thoughts on Project Runway

So since our plans were cancelled I declared today a SNOW DAY.  Meaning same rule bending as a sick day - lots of movies!  picnics in the living room!  All of the craft supplies out at the same time!  Mommy in a tutu!  It's crazy around here.  Anways before I let my kid put in a movie I wanted to watch the last 15 min of Project Runway Allstars that I had fallen asleep for the night before.  I figured she'd at least be partially into it since the challange was couture (or as described by one of the contestants "prom dresses turned up a notch")  I explained the concept that they would pick their favorite dress and send the worst dress home.

She made me rewind and watch the runway 2 more times.

Don't let the monkey jammies fool you.  This kid knows her couture.

I typed up her reactions to the gowns for your amusement:

Looks like a Sleeping Beauty Dress!  Why she have a bib on?  Is she eating some lunch?  I don't like the polka dot bib.

Ooooh I like that one.  Looks like the hair movie (Rapunzle).  It's very sparkly.  But she doesn't have long hair.  No.  That's my favorite dress.

I don't like a dress.  What a pretty neck-a-lace!    It's very sparkly.  I have a sparkly neck-a-lace but not SO sparkly.

LOOK AT THOSE SHOES!  Mommy, LOOK AT THEM.  I need some shoes like that.  They are very tall.  I will be way up a sky!

(this designer kept referring to her dress as a Cinderella dress) That's not a Cinderella dress.  It has too many colors for Cinderella.  I like the purple and orange.  Cinderella does not like purple and orange.

She looks like a birdy.

 That dress has sparkly kitty fabric!  It's fantastic.

She should go home because that dress looks like my tent.

(unsure of this one) Do you like this dress, Mommy?  I like the arm tights.

I'm tired of this dress.  (when I asked her to elaborate she explained)  It looks like all of the dresses everywhere all the time.

 The stepmothers ripped that dress apart!  It's not very pretty because they ripped it all up.

It's a Malificent dress!!!  They wouldn't send Malificent home. No.  She has horns!

Her clear favorites were the Rapunzle dress and the Malificent dress.  I can't say I disagree with her.  And based on this commentary - and the fact that Miss Piggy is the guest judge next week -  I see lots of mother/daughter viewings of Project Runway in our future.  I love this kid.

Proof I love my Husband.

So big Christmas wrapup post coming... along with some fun knitting stuff.  But all of that got put on hold because today the Steelers are in the playoffs.  Which meant that today the kids are wearing the new gear they got for Christmas.  Which means that I had to try to take a picture of them in their adorable matching outfits.  As I've mentioned before, my daughter does not usually wear matching outfits.

It went exactly as well as you would think it would:




My kids are crazy.


I"m glad I didn't fight the battle of the hair tie with my daughter.  Crazy hair is the least of our problems here:


Although it's certainly not helping anything.

I did catch a couple of cute smiles.



And a few shots where neither of them looks deranged:


Nothing amazing but good enough to print for Matt's desk at work.


I am not in any of the photographs because I do not wear Steelers gear unless they are in the Super Bowl.

Go Browns! (and Steelers too, I guess)

Mall Santa. 2011.

I'm borrowing my grandma's pictures for this post since I didn't have any hands free to bring my own camera:

So!  Time for our annual trip to see the Mall Santa (here's 2009 and 2010).  This year my grandma made them adorable matching red corduroy outfits to wear.  So when I was telling my daughter what the plan was for the day I said something along the lines of  "you'll put on your red dress from Nonni and we'll go to the mall to see her" Specifically not mentioning S-A-N-T-A.  Considering her current line on him is "I DON'T WANT HIM IN MY HOUSE" it seemed prudent not to tell her she was going to have to ... gasp.. sit on his lap.  Also when you break it down the santa myth is pretty damn terrifying.  I haven't been pushing the issue.

(see also:  he sees you when you're sleeping = NIGHTMARES)

Anyways!

All morning she was a holy terror.  Fits and fights and all of the ugly that a 2.5 year old is capable of.  She doesn't usually act that way.  I guessed that she got wind of the whole Santa meet and greet and was having a complete freakout via acting out.  So I sat her down for a little chat:

Me:  What's up sweetie?  Why are you acting like this?

Her:  lip quivering

Me:  It's ok honey you can tell mommy anything and we'll try to fix it.
Her:  clearly trying not to cry but eyes filling up
Me:   Sweetie it's alright.  Whatever it is we can handle it. 

Her:  bursts into tears

I DON'T WANT TO MATCH MY BROTHER!!

Oh. Ok then.  Matching outfits are HIGHLY UPSETTING and filled with much sadness, woe, and bad behavior. Clearly she must be a special little sparkly and fashion forward snowflake at all times.  And here I was trying to force her to wear the same thing as someone else.  Poor kid.

I let her pick out a dress to wear after that.  No point torturing a kid with corduroy.

On to the mall!

She loved the train even if she was a bit unsure at first:

And loved riding the escalator over and over again with Pappa Nonni:

But when we got to Santa?  "I DON'T' WANT TO SIT NEXT TO HIM. I DON'T WANT TOO. NO. PLEASE NO."  My mom tried to talk her down and reason with her but I saw the look of terror in her eye, knew that there was no way it was going to happen without brute force, and just went for it:

That'll work.

I think she acutally had a really good time, though.  Despite the whole S-A-N-T-A part.  And the trip was beyond worth it for this:

Before his sister got involved he was actually pretty into it.

because of this:

My first Christmas, My son's first Christmas.  You're not seeing double.

Perhaps next year she won't be as terrified... although flipping back through previous years she's never been down with this Santa thing.  Or the matching outfits now that I think about it..

My Mom's Memory Card.

I'm sorry, mom.  I had to.

So.  My mom does not have what she calls the photo gene.  She takes terrible pictures and doesn't ever think to do it since my dad is a straight up photographs in jured shows photographer.  Anywyas she accidentally left her camera at my house after visiting santa yesterday and I thought it would be super funny to download her card.

It also could end in disaster.

I figured/hoped that most of them would be of my children.  But you really never know.

Here's what I found:

This pic is from November 2010.  So we're to assume that she a.) hasn't downloaded her pictures and b.) hasn't taken enough pictures to fill a card in OVER A YEAR.

Then we have exactly seven pictures from my brother's wedding (Dec 31, 2010).  All terrible and all for some reason cake related:

Then inexplicably several images of the gargoyles in her backyard.

Maybe she was trying to be arty?

Then some of my daughter doing a craft at her house.  Including this awesome:

I will paint ALL OF THE THINGS.

Then two pictures that I can't believe I"m even posting:

Taken on March 18.  Oh so pregnant and my daughter's leg was oh so broken.  But we're at the zoo!  Having fun!  On the phone with a doctor's office!  Sigh.

I don't... i can't... wow.

Then a few from her trip with my grandma.  I posted the group to flickr b/c I know my mom will never share them (or even download them, I guess):

And then, finally, a few really fantastic shots of their new dog:

After that it was me using the camera so I won't include them in this.  Nothing nearly as fun as the last time I downloaded a mystery memory card.  But still pretty amusing.

Tomorrow?  Actual Christmas related content!  Yay!