General

iLife ’05 is fantastic. Especially the new version of iPhoto – I’ve been obsessively compiling pictures of Carolyn into albums and books since I installed it last night. I think maybe for Christmas this year we might splurge and get keepsake albums for Carolyn’s grandparents that have pictures from her first year. That is, if I can somehow manage to keep it under the 100-page limit. Just for her first three months I have a 38 page album! (It’s really hard to leave things out!)

<photo-snob rant> I ordered a whole bunch of prints through iPhoto. I hope they turn out well – I’ve been having trouble getting good prints, which is ridiculous when you realize that they are 6 megapixel images. Ofoto seems to oversaturate the colors, although at least they don’t introduce image artifacts. I got a handful printed at Target the other day just to see what they’d be like, and they look as though I took them with the cheapest digital camera ever made. In several, Carrie’s cheeks and lips are an alarming (and pixelated) red. And they weren’t retouched in any way – just the jpeg files direct from the camera. I had to bite my tongue when the photo counter guy and a randomly passing employee were gushing over how good the prints looked. If I still worked at Kodak I’d be ashamed to see my company’s name on the back of those prints. </photo-snob rant>

Anyway, iPhoto ’05 is fantastic, and if you have a mac and a digital camera, it’s worth buying even if you don’t use any of the other programs. (Although I do intend to play around with iDVD one of these days…)

So the groundhog saw his shadow, meaning six more weeks of winter. But after the past few days of sunny, practically balmy (near freezing instead of below zero) weather, that doesn’t seem too bad. Besides, winter ending any time before mid-April around here is pretty unusual.

One of these days I really need to take those electric candles out of the front windows, too, since the days are getting longer and brighter.

If you like Hitchhiker’s Guide-type humor, try Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series. I’m now so completely hooked on these books that I’m sure I’ll be spending way more money than I ought so I can eventually own them all. (Yes, I know, I could get them out of the library, but Denis likes them too and I can definitely see reading them again someday.)

I started the first book 3 weeks ago, and now I’m almost done with the fifth. That’s not all that impressive, I suppose, as they’re not terribly difficult reading, but considering most of my “me” time lately has been rehearsing for the musical or practicing horn, it’s not too shabby.

I personally think it’s quite hysterical that Death rides a horse named “Binky”. I’ll never look at Carrie’s pacifier the same way again…

I’m feeling totally random tonight.

Tonight’s the third night in a row Carrie has gone to bed at 10! (And hopefully she’ll sleep until 6:30 or 7 again like she did for the last two nights.) I’m finally feeling like a good parent, now that she has a somewhat consistent bedtime. Plus she wakes up so much more smiley (I didn’t think that was possible), so she obviously needed more of a routine. She’s also starting the night out in her cradle, and only moving into our bed the first time she fusses. Not that I don’t love having her all snuggled in bed with us, but you wouldn’t believe how much room she takes up. If I could only draw cartoons…picture a baby spread-eagle in the middle of a queen-sized bed with the parents hanging on for dear life on either edge of the bed, and that’s what it’s like to share a bed with a baby.

Yesterday was my youngest brother’s 20th birthday. Not that I forgot, I just didn’t remember to actually blog about it. Happy Birthday, Michael! (Of course, the fact that he just turned 20 makes me feel really old.)

Somehow I managed to, while shopping for a pacifier medicine dispenser that cost less than three dollars, find enough stuff to qualify for the free shipping when you spend $75. Because, you know, that’s so much cheaper than actually paying for the shipping for the three dollar item. I should not be allowed to shop online. (But I can’t wait to get this box. So many fun baby things!)

There’s nothing more fun than kissing a baby’s tummy and having her giggle and grab chunks of your hair so you won’t pull away.

That’s probably enough randomness for the night. Maybe tomorrow, if the stars align properly and Carolyn’s naps are long enough to shower, dress and eat with time left over, I’ll take a picture of my scarf-in-progress. It’s kind of slow going, because I rarely have time to do more than a couple rows a day, but it’s so pretty.

I promised Lisa I’d post a link to Snood!, which is quite possibly one of the most addictive games ever. Plus, they have both mac and pc versions. (Actually, if I remember correctly, it started life out as a mac-only game.)

When you’ve been playing it non-stop instead of doing the things you should be doing, don’t say I didn’t warn you about its addictiveness…

(Perhaps I should really be wondering why we spend winters here…)

This was the view of our deck this morning. Note that the gate on the right hand side there is 3 feet tall. The lowest horizontal thing you can see? Yeah, that’s a bench running along the side of the deck, not the floor. I’ll grant that there was some drifting that went on overnight, but there’s an obscene amount of snow out there.

Molly was staring longingly out the window. She likes snow, but not the bitter cold – I think it makes her hips ache. Denis had to shovel out part of the yard for her earlier. Poor pup. But she does look awfully cuddly, doesn’t she? Makes you want to curl up with her with a good book and an afghan. And a cup of cocoa.

What does that expression really mean, anyway?

I think hell might have frozen over. There’s a vaguely car-shaped thing in the driveway, but it’s buried under several inches of snow. And it’s very, very cold – I think it might just have crept over the 0° mark – that’s 0° Fahrenheit, not Celsius – but that’s not counting wind chill.

Plus, I seem to have caught the same bug that Carrie has, so we’re currently a pair of snowed-in, snuffling, sneezing fools. Poor Denis – I hope he doesn’t catch it. And the DVD player which has been skipping and freezing a lot lately is now unusable, so we can’t even drown our sorrows in Baby Einstein or Lord of the Rings.

Send hot cocoa, please!

Today is Denis’ 30th birthday! (I can’t gloat too much, because I only have 11 more months before I turn 30…)

We’re going out for hibachi at the Japanese restaurant tonight. Hopefully Carolyn will enjoy it and not be scared by all the fire and stuff. And then we’ll go to my parents’ house and for the third time in four days we’ll have cake. I never thought I’d say this, but…I’m kind of getting tired of cake…

Oh, well.

Happy Birthday, Denis!

Where a 30-year-old can be a kid! Since Denis’ family is up for Carrie’s baptism tomorrow, we had a surprise birthday party for him at Chuck E. Cheese’s tonight. Where else could 10 adults go with 9 kids and not be thought of as disruptive? It was a blast, despite the fact that we scheduled it before we knew the Jets were going to play that evening. The manager was kind enough to keep our table updated about the game at regular intervals, though.

Our party hostess managed to find and light 30 candles for the cake, and Denis was a really good sport about having to give Chuck E. Cheese a big birthday hug – which I got on video! Carrie even managed well, despite it being very loud and crazy.

The only bad thing was that we ended up leaving with lots of tokens, because it was so crowded we didn’t get to play too many games. Oh, well, it just means we’ll have to go back on a weeknight or something and play Skee-ball until we can’t stand it anymore.

As sad as it is, we generally only watch the news via The Daily Show. Don’t get me wrong, we do actually read the actual news on the internet, too, we just don’t watch news programs on TV. Anyway, I’ve taken to calling Carolyn’s binky “and now, your moment of zen” when I give it to her.

Does that make me a total geek? Is Carolyn doomed because she has such a goofy mom? She’s probably going to pretend she doesn’t know who I am when I wave to her in front of all her cool friends…