catchup

i haven't really had much time to post the past week. it seems really hard to 'catchup' outside of the heat of the moment, but over the next week i will be attempting to do so. here is the overview of what this past week has been about.
***midstream edit***
i guess i'm not in the mood for overview right now. i'll journal what i can now and finish the week as time goes on.

my mom was here for 24 hrs between 4pm monday and 4pm tuesday. i love my mom and i wish she could visit more and that is the only reason this visit was stressful. the whole time was somewhat bittersweet. i did manage to relax the second day which helped a lot. my mom is so happy visiting sylvia and frankly i'm more comfortable with her than with sylvia's other relatives. tuesday morning, jeff had to get to work at 7 am. he and my mom were able to eat breakfast together as my mom doesn't really sleep very late. i wanted to join the fun, but was very tired. my mom had mentioned that she would like to help me do things that were tough with sylvia while she was here. so around six in the morning, i thrust a baby at her and went back to bed. ah, bliss. well, not really. part of me is not able to relax when sylvia is far away, but i did get to sack out on the whole bed for an hr or so until i gave up and decided i was awake after all. i came down, had bagel and coffee, and then a shower big silly grin while mom again held sylvia. [real time update: sylvia is sleeping on the boppy on my lap and sweating like a fiend. i cannot believe how much this precious baby sweats while she sleeps] after the shower, we went to the park and then to panera with jeff. hmm, this is feeling like a rerun. ah screw it, it's my journal, eh?

then jeff and i had a few days in between to freshen up the house and attempt to catch up with laundry before our next run of visitors. this was a rather ironic interlude, because i was missing my mom and regretting living so far away from people i know. however, after the visit from jeff's dad and wilma i felt very penned in. jeff's dad is touchy-feely to an extent that creeps me out at times. jeff's dad and wilma are both camera fiends and are incessantly taking pictures and posing people. they look honestly surprised every time i say, 'ok, that's enough pictures'. it's like i've told them they're going to have to sleep outside with the wolves. no, really, you don't have a right to take all the pictures you want at any time. we went to babies r us with them and they brought their cameras. i thought this was a bit of silliness, but even a @#$# store is a photo-op. i was trying sunhats on sylvia which was not making her very happy. i finally, at the end of her patience, found a good hat. i removed the hat as our royal princess had about had enough, but a photo session was requested. i demurred saying that sylvia had had enough and i thought it was about time for a diaper change. after being begged for just one picture, wilma proceeds to set up shot, fiddle with camera etc. my idea of one picture is *click,snap,done*. sylvia is moving from fussing to crying and obviously needs a diaper change. i removed the hat from sylvia's head and told wilma that sylvia and i would be back and we were buying the hat so there would be plenty of opportunities [gotta love stream of consciousness ranting]. this was the first, but not the last time i have been grateful for the need for a diaper change. i almost went across the hall and hid in the mother's room to nurse her, but sylvia wasn't hungry and i was trying very hard to be good. i returned with sylvia and somehow some hat pictures got taken as i saw 5 of them. note to those with irritating inlaws, a diaper change requres removal of self and baby and can take quite a while sometimes.

ok, posting what i got, happy parts of same babies r us trip to follow. there is good news to come.

purple, my butt!

the 'purple' daylilies i got from sam's last year have finally bloomed. i was skeptical as i had never seen a purple daylily,but i figured what the hey. the box picture was a bit of a pale lavender. the first daylily is a dark red. perhaps there is some blue mixed in, but it's still more maroon than magenta. ah well, it's actually a rather pretty color and the three inner petals are slightly ruffled. there is also the possibility that the other plants, yet to bloom are purple. the plants were cheap. i was in the mood for an adventure and the resulting flowers are attractive.

the wonderful world of toys

on the brighter side of the inlaws visiting/trip to babies r us, we have finally gotten sylvia some real toys. she has had a few rattles and chewy toys, but she has been too small/young to really manipulate very much. so while h_postmortemus's dad and wife were on the other end of the store looking for shower gifts for another new baby, we snuck off to the toy section. at least, from the descriptions on the toys, sylvia is about a month and a half away from some big breakthroughs on the toy front. i had been hoping to get here one of the foamy blocks with little blocks inside it, but it all of those toys were on the 6mo+ range. not one to be restrained by labeling alone, h_postmortemusand i looked at them and they do seem to be beyond sylvia's manipulative skills. however, we did not go home empty handed. we did find THE CUBE and The Tunnel of Doom.. THE CUBE is ah, cubical in shape. every side has a different zany pattern. it rattles when you shake it. there are little crinkly handles, and rings hanging off of it. there's a flap with a swirly shape that can be opened to reveal a panda's face. one of the sides is fuzzy. it's just all in all a really cool cube. the best part is that because of all of the types of handles and the general size, sylvia can hold it very easily and it amuses her greatly :). The Tunnel of Doom. is a much larger device. i keep thinking of a baby MRI, but that is just wrong. there is a brightly colored mat with zany colors for the baby to lie on and in the middle of this mat is...you guessed it, The Tunnel of Doom.. the tunnel has more bright zany patterns and mesh windows. both sides of the tunnel have loops to hang rings, and rattles and nifty squeaky things. this is one of those multi-age toys which should amuse sylvia for a while. right now, she sits in the tunnel and kicks the walls which makes EVERYTHING move. this brings smiles quickly. there is a particular clear ring/rattle which is just the right size for her to grasp and she really enjoys grabbing it and well, rattling about. when she reaches crawling stage there will be fun to be had actually zipping through the tunnel and when she gets too big for that, the tunnel de-velcros and becomes a big colorful mat to play on. all and all, quite nifty. when you place sylvia in the The Tunnel of Doom. and hand her THE CUBE she just goes bonkers. i am not used to this level of self-amusement, but i think i can adapt. in defense of the evil inlaws, they did buy us the The Tunnel of Doom. and a booster chair. the booster chair will help a lot as sylvia's fussing during dinner time seems more and more a result of not being able to join in the conversation. this seems to be backed up by her general calmness when we go out and do the 'flip the highchair upside down' routine. so, this weekend was not all bad. final installation procedures on the booster chair will be completed as soon as princess princess wakes from her latest nap.