Ask not for whom the bell tolls...

because I know it tolls for me (and probably Tim, too).

On Wednesday night, Gus got sick. He most likely got his stomach bug from his friend Ryan, and if I had to guess I'd say it's one of these fun little viruses. I knew if we hung around Ryan so soon after he was sick we'd probably get sick, too, since noroviruses tend to be contagious for a good long while, but I didn't really care. Gus digs hanging out with Ryan, and chances are we'd get it somewhere else anyway, so might as well get it and get some fun out of it.

I know I'll most likely get the bug, and now I'm completely hyper aware of any little rumble or noise my stomach makes. Tim was out of town this past week and got home tonight, and I know the clock has probably started ticking for him, too. I feel like each meal I eat might be my last for awhile, heh.

This is Gus's first "real" illness. He's had some fevers and two episodes where he barfed once or twice, some runny noses, but that's about it. The freakiest thing he's ever had is the croupy cough that he used to get at the beginning of any runny nose thing- usually passed on from Kailey because she's the Queen of Runny Noses. Thanks to repeated viewings of Terms of Endearment (love, love, love that movie!), I knew to stick him in the bathroom with a hot shower running to steam it up really well, and in about ten minutes that would pretty much be the end of the croupy cough. He's so pitiful now, I feel really, really bad for him. I've never seen him so sedate. If I wasn't so consumed with how he's doing I could probably accomplish a ton around the house. As it is, I sit on the sofa next to him and surf on the net**, mostly looking up information on children and dehydration. Good stuff. In all honesty, I'm glad that I get to take care of him. I have some good memories of my mom taking care of me when I was sick as a kid (and I was sick a lot). I've always recalled my childhood through a sea of penicillin.

This bug requires more work than his prior ones, though Gus seems to be riding it out well enough. Some pedialyte, sodium ascorbate (aka vitamin c), sambucol, probiotics, and some sweet echinacea seem to be keeping him as well as I could expect (though it's not like I have a Control Gus to compare to). The pedialyte section of the grocery store was almost completely empty even though every other section in the vicinity was completely stocked, so I guess a bug is going around.

Ryan's dad was the Typhoid Mary that brought this home from a business trip, but Ryan's mom Georgina and his sister Meghan managed not to get sick even though Ryan barfed right in Georgina's face, so maybe I'll be as lucky as she was (lucky to not get sick, not lucky to get barf in the face).

Gus just ate two crackers and had some decaf iced tea while he watched Toot and Puddle and some Max and Ruby, so he's a bit better for now. I know that the worst is probably not over as I've heard and read that this particular virus seems to be gone and then it returns with a vengeance, but he's doing better for now so I'll take what I can get. He's not talking or moving around much, but I guess if he can sing along with the theme songs from those shows then he can't be doing too badly.

And as for me and Tim... now we wait.


**the proliferation of unnecessary links in this post highlight the kind of time I have on my hands.

We have a new pet(s)

Soon after we moved in, we discovered we had a mouse (or mice). Bre first saw it one night as she was watching tv in the living room. Tim and I saw it (them) soon after. It was a very brazen mouse, it would run under the floor from the basement, across the hallway and behind the tv stand, then it would come out the other side and disappear around the corner. A few minutes later we'd see it (them) hip hopping around on the kitchen rugs, eating cereal crumbs or whatever. No matter how I try I can't get those rugs crumb free. Anywho, I set out to get humane mouse traps- not an easy thing to do, so it took a couple of months. By that time, we'd seen two mice simultaneously, so we knew there was more than one. When mom was here for Christmas, we caught one. I won't get into the sad details of the end of the first mouse, but let me just say that when I went to let it go in the parking lot of the park up the road, he fell out and hit the pavement with a kerplunk. My suggestion that he "Run, run and be free little mouse" was met only with rigor mortis. Oh well, I tried, but I really did feel bad for the poor guy.

That little guy must have whispered to his buddy to avoid the traps, because we couldn't catch the other guy no matter what enticing food I used. So I bought some different traps- off the internet because that's the only place I could find them. Then I got busy with things and didn't set them out, and that mouse mocked me every night as he ate crumbs off the kitchen rugs and ran into the closet where we keep the dog food. Twice, I chased him around the house, trapping him in linen closets, in the dog food closet, underneath the bench in the front hallway, but I could never catch him. I had reports from both mom and Tim "Oh, the mouse is behind the fridge" or they'd tell me he'd just run between the dishwasher and the cabinet. Thanks for the info guys.

So last week, I finally set out the new traps, and a couple of days later, Tim and I heard a rattle rattle as we watched TV. Where am I going with this, I'm sure you're wondering. Well, we caught him and Gus and I let him go the next day (let him go alive!). Gus was very excited, said he was cute ("he's rewy toot!"), and said he had to go back with his family (after a long explanation from me about how he was probably so lonely in this house, being the only mouse and everything...*I hope the only mouse*). Gus picked just the right spot at a different park from where we "released" the first one and we let him go. Then, in the car on the way to run errands, Gus started going on about crickets. Cricket this and cricket that, so I had the bright (probably really stupid) idea to go buy some at Petco. Surely they sell them to feed to lizards and such, and what a cheap pet to have (and when it dies I won't feel horrible like I would if a fish croaked, and taking into account my history with fish, it surely would)! So we bought a container of crickets, a cage, and some cricket food- although we mostly feed them things like grapes and cereal, and once summer comes, I know we can catch some outside and not have to pay 13 cents apiece for them.

Gus's cricket cage. FYI, crickets love egg crates. Apparantly, if crickets don't have plenty of places to hide they'll fight and kill each other, and egg crates fit the bill. They'll also prey on each other if they don't get enough protein. Crickets are cutthroat little buggars.

Gus feeding the crickets some corn- and then he fed them milk by pouring his entire glass in the cage. He was positive that crickets love milk.

Crickets chirp, even in captivity. I don't see how people have 500 of these things in a cage in their homes, it must be maddening. Their chirping drives Sundance *crazy*. He can't stop himself from looking for them. After searching high and low for days, he finally identified that they're in the cage, and he whines and whines at them and then lies down beneath the cage as if to say "If you can't beat (or eat 'em), join 'em".

Gus was mad at me because I was taking pictures and "being too noisy". I can't help it, I'm a mom, we take pictures, that's just what we do! (get used to it, kid)

Cousin Patrice visits

Last weekend Patrice came for a visit (Patrice is Tim's cousin Forrest's wife). She was in DC for work and was able to stay with us Friday and Saturday night and most of Sunday. She was kind enough to spend much of the weekend with Gus so that we could accomplish a few things and also so we could go out on Saturday for Valentine's Day. When she first emailed me in January about visiting and with the suggestion that she could watch Gus so that Tim and I could have some alone time, it was still close to when mine and Tim's mom had visited, so I told her that it would be great if we could all just spend some time together because we don't get to see her enough. But by the time she actually got here, Mom and Janie's visit had worn off and I told her that I'd take her up on the offer since Tim and I hadn't had a conversation that lasted more than 1 minute without being interrupted. Initially we were going to go see a movie, but we got there and the line was long and so we (I) decided that we were going to do something where we could actually have a conversation, so we walked around the mall. The mall is not my favorite place in the world, but it's very close to us and we got to hang out so that was enough for me. Then we went out to eat at an Italian restaurant in downtown Rockville that wasn't very good but we still had fun. Then we got to hang out with Patrice after Gus went to bed, so I guess we got the best of everything. And Sunday night before we took her to the metro, we went out to eat at another restaurant so we felt cool. Woot! Thanks for the great weekend, Patrice!

Playing memory.

Eating the leftover pasta from dinner.

Opening the V-Day cards from Boppy and GG. (Tim's mom and Grandmother)

Patrice must have read 50 books to Gus (or maybe just the same 20 more than twice)

After I took the picture of Gus and Patrice, Gus had to take one, the above is the result. He pretty much always has to take a picture now if I take one. I guess I really have to get him a camera (an el cheapo one).

More days of clothes!

Gus's habit of wearing daytime clothes continues! A week or so ago it got very warm for a day or two, and so we met a friend at the park and then got the water table out of the attic, so most of the day was spent outside. It was really great and I can't wait for spring. And here in MD, we'll actually get one instead of it just being hot-ish and definitely humid all year 'round.

Gus likes to eat frozen food. Still frozen. We don't do too much processed food but when we do he always wants to eat at least a part of it cold. Whatever floats yer boat, kid. This is an Amy's frozen pizza being eaten frozen. He'll usually eat that Amy's frozen spinach pie still frozen, too. He did finally allow me to cook the pizza after he'd eaten some of it cold, but then he only ate one more piece.

Why is Gus smiling?

He's smiling because he's wearing clothes. Real clothes. Daytime clothes. Not pajamas. And we didn't have to wrestle him while he's fighting us and screaming his head off like we're torturing him to get them on him. Recently, he's been much better about getting dressed. Like he doesn't go all Gollum on us "It burnsss us, it burnssss ussss" whenever we try to put clothes on him. It only took 4 months. Ever since we moved here it's been traumatic for us all to get Gus out of the house, so many days we just stayed home. All the pictures I've posted of Gus out of the house were prefaced by the horrible process of getting him dressed and out of the house. Once he was out of the house he was fabulous, but getting there was not fun. One morning when we woke up, Gus asked me"Where are we going today?" and I said "Nowhere, we're staying home all day long and we're not leaving the house to go anywhere" because I had decided that we were just finished going anywhere until he was at least a little accepting of the process. After I told Gus we were staying home, he said "Yaaaaaaaaay!" and then said "I'm so happy" and was in the best mood all day. Oh boy. So we stayed home for awhile. But it got better...slowly. And in the last few weeks we've been to the park a little when it was warm and also to the library twice, to Lowe's and Home Depot and the grocery store, and all those times it was no biggie getting him dressed, and sometimes he even got himself dressed, holy cow. So expect to see Gus in more 'real' clothes...though PJs or just underwear will always be de rigueur for Gus.

Melissa and Rheanna

Last weekend they came to visit. Melissa had an interview at a pharmaceutical school here and Rheanna came along for moral support- and to party with us! Heh. We all got to hang out some, and they played with Gus while Tim and I worked on the doghouse a little. Rheanna made the mistake of tickling and wrestling with Gus and after that he wouldn't leave her alone.

This is after Gus's nap (hence the pull up, he's not remotely sleep potty trained, though he doesn't really go at naptime... but I'm not taking any chances since we still co-sleep). Gus made Rheanna play every single game he owns while Melissa "studied". I don't know how much she really accomplished, but she was nice to attempt it in the living room so we could still hang with her.

One day, the thing will be done. Gus helped paint some.

So it's now all painted, we just have to finish putting on trim and then stain it. Seriously, we are ridiculous about our dogs.

Sleep

Big kid can serve himself (our evil plan to have him completely self sufficient by 5 is coming along nicely!)

We received Gus's new pitchers and cups etc. He's wholly satisfied with them and takes great pleasure in fixing his own drinks. He's been preparing a lot of his own snacks by himself for awhile but he still relied heavily on us to make drinks for him. Now we keep the pitchers in the bottom of the fridge door, one with water, one with milk, and he fixes himself drinks when he's thirsty. I'm not sure that humans are really supposed to be drinking a lot of milk from other species, especially in great quantities (despite what the milk lobbyists tell us we should be doing), so the 'milk fairy' fills the milk pitcher every night and that's all he gets for the day. He only recently started drinking non-human milk, I think he decided it was The Thing To Do ever since my mom visited at Christmas and she drinks quite a bit of milk, so ever since then he's been on a milk jag. The facination seems to be dying out a little lately though, so maybe he's moving on.

We got Gus this table to prepare his drinks and snacks on. He has a step stool that he uses to get up to the counter, but that's a long way to carry a pitcher just to fix a drink. This is easier. He uses one of his work trays to carry it all to the table or sofa in the living room.

He's proud of the fact that the pitchers, bowls, and glasses are all made from glass and using them is a big responsibility. You know, because he's "very big" now.

Old pics

So, of course I wanted to add an old pic from the last time Gus saw Teri and Eddie, and of course, I liked more than just one. So here are a few pics from when they visited us in PC back in November 2006 (I think). Gus was 13 months old and Tim had been back from Iraq for about two weeks and still had an undiagnosed raging sinus infection. Eddie was competing in a triathalon in PC and had planned it long before Gus was even conceived because they knew we'd most likely be stationed there and they figured they could also squeeze in a visit with us. I remember that Gus wanted to see every.single.thing. in their suitcases and pulled almost every object out.

Eddie, Gus and Teri

Teri and Dane

Our friend Teri and her 2.5 month old son Dane visited us the weekend before last. We know Teri and her husband Eddie from our time in LA. Luckily for us they now live in Richmond and that's only about 1.45 mins from us. So Teri hopped on over here one Friday when Eddie was out of town for the Superbowl. Gus totally loved Dane and wanted to give Dane his bottle and play with him and swing him and take care of him and every thing else. We asked Gus if he wanted a brother or sister and he said he wanted a sister. We asked if Kailey wasn't his sister already and he said no, he's going to marry Kailey. Well, alrighty then!

This is Gus "reading" Teri a story. Until now he hadn't even wanted to "read" anyone a story even though I'd asked him many times if he wanted to read Tim or me a story, and he always said no. This time he said he wanted to read Teri a story. I mean, he volunteered, out of the blue! I was reeeeeeeeeally happy as Gus hasn't been that "into" reading until very recently. I mean, we read to him and he likes a couple of books before bed and he has a few favorites, but he hasn't really been book crazy until now. *Now* he wants to read an unlimited amount of books and read them all the time. I was wondering if he was going to be bitten by the book bug like I was and I'm now hoping that he has been. We've checked about 40 books out of the library in the past two weeks (and haven't returned any of them) and we read them all day long.

Gus read her Mouse Paint- a book that my mom bought for him when we went to the museum.

I wish I had a better picture of Dane because he is about the cutest thing ever. He's so snuggly, I could just hug him and squeeze him and pet him and love him. Gus could have, too. Gus was pretty much obsessed with caring for him the entire time they visited and he talked about him for days after they left.

Gus had to take a picture and this is it. He's becoming more obsessed with photography but luckily his aim is improving. I mean it's improving, but not in this pic.

Biscuit making

The day after it snowed we made biscuits...from scratch (sorta). Bisquick mix. If anyone has a good biscuit recipe I'd love to have it, so please email it to me.

He's probably saying "I like biscuits (bic-sutts). Biscuits are my faaaaavorite". In the background to the right, you can see the pot we used to make chili. Huge. Tim and I used to cook crawfish in it. I doubt we can get crawfish up here. Maybe lobsters?

We used cans from chili making the day before to cut out the biscuits. What are you supposed to use?


They turned out ok (surprisingly). Gus ate 8 1/2 biscuits (out of nine made). You heard me. Eight and a half. It took him from morning til night and not much else got squeezed in there, but he ate that many.

First snow

It finally snowed two weeks ago. A couple of inches (woot!). We'd had a flurry here and there but this was the first real snow. Gus wouldn't change out of PJs but at least I got him in snowshoes and a coat. The black gloves were my mom's idea (because he's highly resistant to wearing gloves). When she visited, she told him they were magic and made from spider's webs. Gus is extremely literal but somehow he believes this BS. He loves to talk about his "globes made fwom spiderwebs". They're really her silk glove liners.

He ate So. Much. Snow. that he must have used the bathroom about 10x between 3- 7 pm.

Gus's first snow angel. Yep....still in pajamas.

After he ate all the snow, he knocked the rest out of the bushes in the front of our house. It was very hard work, but Gus persisted. By this time, the spider web gloves had gotten wet and cold and so had his hands (not surpising since they are, in reality, glove liners) and so we switched to real kid mittens (finally, he listens to reason).

After we came inside, we made a humongous batch of chili while we chatted with Nana on the webcam and then had hot chocolate. Gus loooooooves hot chocolate, and the only days we get to have it are when it snows (rules determined by yours truly). We have it only when "snow falls from the sky", not when there's merely snow on the ground...or not a snowflake in sight. If we didn't have hot chocolate parameters I'd hear nothing but "I want hot chocolate. Hot chocolate is my faaavorite." morning, noon and night. Unfortunately, Tim was out of town on this snow day. He was out of town for a most of January, but hopefully he'll be home from now on.

Gus takes pics

Whenever Gus is clean and in clothes other than pajamas, I try to take a pic or two.

Gus has become obsessed with taking pics (wonder why?) and this is the first one he took (that made any sort of sense at all).

Makes less sense.

A yankee came to town

Now that we're in MD, NYC is only about a four hour car/bus ride away, so Cara can come visit us for just a weekend, no problem! And she did, a few weeks ago, and I won't get into the long story of how I came to be obsessed with the movie Grey Gardens and the Tony award winning musical that was spun from it (I'll just say the whole thing was kismet), but she came into town so that we could see a local production of it. It was excellent.

As soon as Cara walked in the door, Gus completely monopolized her. I barely got a word in edgewise. I thought it might bug Cara- seeing how she's single and without kids and all- but then I recalled that there's nothing Cara likes more in this world than an audience, and Gus is nothing if not a) easily entertained and b) an enthusiastic audience. So Cara got to do her schtick and Gus loved it all (except the wigs, we'll try that again next time). She also introduced him to Wall E- which he loved until the end when he cried and threw his spoon at the tv. Course, the next day he promptly asked to "watch the wobot moobie" so he couldn't have been that traumatized.

Playdoh

Cara's first Yoko Ono Island visit

As I was getting ready to post pics from Cara's most recent visit, I decided to include one from the last time she saw Gus (back in May of 2006) just for fun. After looking through them, I decided to include a few and make a seperate post of it because they made me laugh. I think Gus was about 8 or 9 months old. I can't remember exactly when she visited us at my Mom's at Ono Island, but it was the summer after Gus was born and while Tim was deployed. I introduced Cara to fishing and she became obsessed, and when we fished at night my mom had to keep calling me back up the house because Gus woke up a million times. Cara made me go parasailing and the boat driver almost dropped us onto a shark. Good times.

I think this was the first night after Gus and Cara met. Even back then he was shy and reserved.

Powder and Consuela.

"Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii Aunt Cara!!!!!"

"I think I'll have some nee nee milk!"

"DOH!"

Lots and lots of old news

So here are almost 3 months of old pictures, from early December and Katherine and Kailey's visit, and all the Christmas stuff and etc etc. So that only puts the Hardts a month behind in posts. Hope you enjoy.

Little Gus

I don't think this picture requires explanation. It is what it is. But look how long his hair is! It hasn't been cut since September, and this pic was taken in maybe the third week of December. We'd just let it grow if it was curly/wavy at all but it's pretty much straight so at some point it has to get cut (and did get cut, a week or so ago, though I don't like the way the hairdresser did it...but I digress).

Gus and Nana putting together dinosaur bones.

Unwrapping the creche that we had when I was little. Mom brought it with her when she drove up for Christmas. Luckily for us, she was able to come for a couple of weeks starting in mid- December. Gus had so much fun playing with it over Christmas and he learned the meaning of the word "fragile". Now he uses it all the time. I don't know how Mom can teach him these things that I can't. Usually when I told him something was "breakable" and to "be very careful" then his immediate action would be to toss whatever object he had in his hand as far as possible (j/k...sorta). But Mom tells him something is fragile and to "be very, very careful" and now he tells me constantly that stuff can be broken and I'd "bettuh be caweful". Wth???