St. John Pics

I have posted quite a few pics below. I couldn't help myself... Enjoy!

Roadside "wild" goats and donkey

The Westin Resort in St. John

View from our balcony

Pool

Island Boy

Family Fun

Beach Bums

Natural Beauty

Paradise Found...

We returned from our trip to St. John yesterday evening. It was more beautiful than I expected and very relaxing. St. John is only a 90 square mile island with 75% of it being a national park. So, it was very undeveloped and naturally beautiful. For the most part it was a very sleepy island.

Carsten was a great travel companion and fell IN LOVE with the beach. He was SO VERY active the whole time that we were there, hardly taking a moment to rest (This was a bit of a problem on the airplane, but we managed). I think he really enjoyed himself, as did we. We did not have much of an opportunity for active pursuits with Carsten along... we just played in the sun, sand, and crystal clear waters. I will write some more of our experiences and post some more pics in the next few days. We are glad to be back to the mainland!

The Devil in pink

Last week I took Carsten to the play area at Memorial City mall and we encountered the devil... in toddler form. The Bubby was playing in this area that is supposed to be like a little pond. He climbs into it and it has little hills to climb up and stand on, etc. While he was playing, this little girl (a.k.a "She-Devil") jumped in and started taunting all the kids. She-Devil was the scariest child I have ever encountered. She moved slanky-like... like a snake... and had this evil look in her eyes. She never smiled... she just had this wide eyed evil stare. I am an adult, and I was quite scared of her.

After she scared all the older toddlers and moms away from the pond area, Carsten was the only one left for her to pick on. She knew I was standing there watching him, so at first, she was very sneaky about picking on him. She would slank right by him and nudge him just enough to make him topple off whatever hill he was trying to climb. He would just laugh when he fell off thinking she was playing some kind of game with him.

I kept watching her like a hawk and was looking around to make sure her mother wasn't watching so I could rip the little She-Devil to shreds when she decided to make her move on my offspring. Eventually, she flat out just pushed Carsten down. He looked at me like, "Did you see that mom?!" and was a little confused as to what had just happened. I instantly pounced on her and very firmly told her, "No! He is just a baby and is much smaller than you. Do not push him." She looked at me coyly and continued slanking around the pond.

At one point, she came up to me and said something. I couldn't make out what she was saying. Whatever it was made no sense and sounded very cryptic. I was afraid she was trying to put me in some kind of devil worshiping trance. I didn't look into her eyes... just in case.

Not 2 minutes later, she made Carsten her victim again while staring right at me as she did it. Again, Carsten looked at me with hurt feelings and I pulled him out of the pond and said loud enough so that she could hear me, "Come on Carsten... let's go play somewhere else where you won't have to worry about being pushed around by the She-Devil." I looked deep into her evil eyes as I said it.

Anyways, she never bothered Carsten again after that. Apparently, Satan figured out I was on to him and was afraid I would blow his cover.

For the rest of the time we were there, I saw her torment kid after kid... mom after mom shooing her off their cub. I kept looking around to try and place her mom sitting on the sideline sooooo not paying attention. I never saw a mom approach her or visa versa. In fact, it seemed as if she did not belong to anyone.

I am convinced that she came straight out of the fiery pit's of hell.

Going to have to learn Spanish

When Carsten wakes in the morning, he is usually mad, crazy STARVING. Unfortunately, I am usually trying to take a quick shower and dress myself about the time he wakes up. So, we distract him from his hunger with one of his crack-like addict forming shows that put him in a trance for a good twenty minutes or so while I finish making myself not so scary looking.

This morning when he started to come out of his trance and started whining for breakfast, I reassured him that we would go downstairs and E-A-T in just a couple of more minutes. I spell words, like "eat", that send him into a whining frenzy if he hears them. He immediately started whining to go eat. He knew exactly what I was saying. He can't talk, but he can spell. Go figure.

"Tee-tee in the pot-tee"

Go Dynamo!

This is your kid. This is your kid on Nickelodeon.

Two peas in a pod

Unbearable Whining

"Is there anything that you can think of that you need for our trip to St. John? I am going this afternoon to pick up a few things. That is, after I go get a muzzle for Carsten."

"He could still make that noise with a muzzle on."

"What if we shoved a sock in his mouth before putting the muzzle on?"

"He would still be able to do it."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Damn."

Name that body part

Carsten is in this stage, and has been for a while now, where he wants you to name EVERYTHING... a million times. He points to something and looks at you as if to say, "What's this?" After you name it, he repeats the whole routine about 10 times... just to make sure he has a good handle on what it is. He is running out of obvious things to point at, so he points at the most random things... like a pot hole in the street that is filled with black tar... or the little strips of wood in the sidewalk or driveway... or the top of the lid to some water pipe in the sidewalk that is painted blue... What the hell??!! I don't even know what to call these things.

For a while now... like since he was in the womb (we have pictures to prove it) he has been very interested in his penis. Duh, he is a man after all. This kind of thing is in the genes. If he is naked his hand is almost constantly pulling, tugging, or squeezing it. Danyel and I are always worried that he is so rough with it that he is going to do permanent damage. Last week he started pointing at it. He finally realized that his favorite play thing probably has a name, too. We decided to call it a "Pee-pee"... cute, yet accurate enough. The pee-pee has become worthy of the double point... both hands angled down towards it pointing while he looks at us in anticipation waiting for us to say "Pee-pee".

This weekend he was into the body part naming game... the nose, eyes, ears, mouth, and of course, the pee-pee. He gets so excited waiting for me to ask "Where's your pee-pee?" that most of the time he just skips over all the other parts and goes straight for the good stuff. "Screw all the boring stuff guys! Look! Here's my johnson!"

Always too opinionated

There is a particular blog that I have been reading for a while now. It is not terribly interesting, but just something that I skim over for mild entertainment when bored. This morning after reading yet another post about her bad marriage that she is supposedly working on, I felt compelled to comment. I NEVER comment on strangers blogs, NEVER. 75% of her blog entries revolve around the topic that her marriage sucks and that her husband is a you-know-what. She takes husband bashing to a whole new level. Feel free to read for yourself... (rockstarmommy.com). Really, I didn't expect my comment to make waves... I just thought I would leave a little piece of advice that she would probably just read over and think "another crazy reader..." Shockingly, not 15 minutes after my comment was posted, she posted a reply comment in her defense. After reading her comment, I felt a little guilty. Obviously, it made a pretty big impression on her. I have never seen her reply to any of her comments. What if I made her feel bad? What if her day is ruined by my advice? But, then again, what if she took some of it to heart and it will help. Who knows. Really, who cares? I don't even know this person! Anyways, now all these people are leaving comments after her entry today damning me and my advice. I am hated and it feels good. :-)

I should really get a life.

Here's my comment and her reply.

I am not saying this to be mean, just a helpful piece of advice...

Maybe if you quit focusing on the negative and tried to be more positive about working on your relationship, it might actually work. I think it shows a lot of disrespect for your husband to continuously bash him on your website. I have a blog as well and no matter how angry my husband makes me, I NEVER advertise it to the world. My marriage is more sacred than that. How does it make him feel to continuously read all the banter about himself? I bet your therapist would agree that it is NOT helping the situation. I admit, it is entertaining, but at what expense?? I don't know the reasons behind your relationship troubles, but if you have committed to work on it together, I don't think that you are honoring that... even if the base of the problems are his fault. If you agree to work on things, you have to give it 100%. Otherwise, you are cheating yourself, Ty, and your relationship. Your anger deserves an outlet, but maybe a more private one... a friend or therapist, perhaps.

Sorry to impose... just thought I would offer my two cents of advice. Maybe it is not welcome, but I keep reading other people's comments who seem to praise you for Ty-bashing or make light of the situation and I think that that is irresponsible.

Cara,
I hear you. You're probably right. But, in my defense there, I have bashed myself continually about it also and fully admitted that I've got a ton of flaws, too. Not that it's productive in any way. It's really just more of an outlet than anything. I also posted on a pretty recent entry that posting all this negativity IS WRONG and that it's not helping things progress in any way and I do believe that.

I like being honest on here and I receive a lot of email from people thanking me who can relate, including men. I understand, though, when people don't really understand what I'm saying. I handle everything in my life with humor and sarcasm and that's not always embraced and it's definitely not the best way to handle everything either. But, that's just who I am.

I love my husband but we are going through a really rough time right now and when I decided to start talking about it on my site, I knew it wouldn't be the most popular of topics. But I think it's good, in a way, to show that we ARE working on things, but just because we decided "hey, let's work on this..." that it doesn't just magically get better.

Sometimes we move forward, but a lot of times we take 3 steps forward, 10 steps back. But I think that's normal and I'm not ashamed in any way to admit to that. I look forward to being able to write about taking 10 steps forward, no steps back.

But, I do get what you're saying about the negativity. But, like I said, it's just the way I handle shit. Which doesn't make it right.

Just crowned WMOY (Worst Mom of the Year)

My son is a perpetual victim of some sort of physical ailment. I try to take all precautions to keep him from hurting himself, but to no avail. Short of living in an empty house or gearing him in knee and elbow pads every day, I believe that I have done everything possible to lessen the likelihood of an accident. But, as you will see, my efforts are fruitless. After all, Danyel and I are VERY clumsy and accident prone, so this kid was born without a chance. Here are a list of his current boo-boos. As a whole, he looks like he has been in an awful car accident or is a resident of some third world country where he lives amongst wild animals and flesh eating bugs.

Boo-boo #1: Cut on bottom of foot. He stepped on a piece of broken glass in my mom's kitchen. He never cried. My brother just noticed a trail of blood across the floor. My mom doesn't remember breaking something and has no idea how the little shard of glass got on the floor. Leave it to Carsten to find it and step on it.

Boo-boo #2: Skinned knee from where he tripped in the driveway while running today. It is rare if Carsten is NOT sporting at least one skinned knee.

Boo-boo #3: Mystery cut above eye. I have no idea where this came from, just popped up a few days ago. He probably scratched himself with his fingernails that are overdue for a clipping.

Boo-boo #4: Ant bites all over his foot. Yesterday he was playing in the yard in his ball pen when he held up his foot, looked up at me, and started wailing. I rushed to wipe the swarm of ants off of his foot, but apparently I was too late. Bonus points for the mystery scab to the left of his ankle.

Boo-boo #5: Bruise on inside of left knee. There is also one on the outside of his knee. This looked much worse last week. It is left over from when he got his leg stuck in between the rails of his crib. Apparently, he thought that he could get out that way. It took a lot of twisting, pulling, and pushing to pry his fat knee loose. I don't know how he even got it in there. Climbing over the top never crossed his mind. Thank God. The thought of having to graduate him to a real bed at night and not being able to cage this wild child scares the hell out of me.

Boo-boo#6: Bruise on inside of right knee. This is from when he pulled the kitchen chair down on top of himself this weekend. They are made of iron and are very heavy. The top of it landed right on his leg.

Boo-boo #7: Scrape on his arm that we are guessing came from when we took him to Aunt Meme's neighborhood pool over the weekend. Again, this is just a guess.

Some other recent scars... Last week he was sporting a heat rash all over his back and arms. It just cleared up within the last few days. He also had a big scratch down one of his shoulders where I accidentally scratched him while trying to save him from yet another fall. It bled and everything. The fall would have been less damaging, for sure. At least 3 times a day he hits his head on something. I am amazed at the resilience of his skull and brain.

Got to go... CPS is knocking at my door.

The Accomplice

One of Danyel's clients gave this to Carsten as a gift. It is a monkey backpack/harness. Basically, it is a child harness in disguise. At first, I was sort of offended... "This woman wants us to harness our child? Who does she think she is?!" But, when I loosened up about it, I did think it was kind of cute. So, I showed it to Carsten and he was eager to take it out of the box. He smiled at the monkey and investigated the whole thing for a few minutes. I put it on his back expecting him to throw a fit, but he didn't mind it. He just played as usual and got a kick out of the monkey on his back. The tail functions as the "leash" so to speak. He thinks it is funny when I pull on the "leash" and stop him in his tracks. I have to admit, it was kind of fun for me too. Hehe.

After I thought about it, I decided that this would be great in airports. In July, we are going on an Edward Jones trip to St. John, U.S.V.I with the Bubby. We have some pretty long layovers in Miami and this harness will probably be perfect for the occasion. He is actually a very good follower, hand-holder, listener, etc, so we could probably manage without it. But, I think it would make me feel a little better to have the extra security to make sure we don't lose him in the crowds. The stroller will work only briefly to confine him as he is very active and loves to be on his feet!

I have always taken a stance against harnessing kids like dogs, but I think just this one time, I can compromise my ideals.

In search of some music therapy...

Today I bought the new Dixie Chicks album. It is probably the first CD I have bought in years. I am not much of a music buff. Danyel is like the "King" of music. He knows EVERYTHING about any genre or type of music. It's unbelievable. He is always shocked at how little I know about music. I can sing along with all the songs on the radio, but I have no clue who is singing about 80% of the songs... o.k. probably more like 90%.

Back to the Chicks... So, I bought the CD this morning at Wal-Mart. I actually made a special trip there when they were sold out of it at Target. This is how determined I was to buy it... or how bored I was this morning. Whatever. I have heard a couple of their new songs and have liked them, so I figured I would give it a shot. I have never been much of a Dixie Chicks fan in the past. Well, aside from the time they put the smack down on Bushy boy. They did their part to ruin W's reputation (not like he needs much help doing that), so the least I could do is buy one of their CD's.

So, I have not listened to the CD yet. The only time I have an opportunity to listen to music is when I am driving. But, most of the time, I give in to Carsten's constant "requests" to watch a movie on the DVD player. He doesn't take no for an answer lightly. So, it may be a few weeks before I actually make it through the entire CD.