moosh in indy.

Not that I’m one to encourage unnecessary retail therapy.

But babies need clothes and retail therapy really does work in small doses.

It works even better when stuff is on sale and you just happen to have an extra 30% off coupon.

I took this baby shopping at the Old Navy baby sale and bought her several things with ears.

Forget Missoni for Target, let’s discuss Vivenne for Old Navy.

Want to see our whole bargain priced haul? (And I didn’t even know about the 30% off!)

Go forth and check out Vivi’s versatile and super cute fall wardrobe from Old Navy.

(Grab some for the babies in your life as well, while it’s on sale.)

This post is brought to you by Old Navy. Check out the Kids & Baby Sale in store with great deals starting at $5. I have been compensated for my participation but opinions, as usual, are my own.

I am so tired.

I have been walking the fine line between okay and not okay for the last several weeks.

Truth is I want to stop walking and simply crumple into a heap.

Winter is so close. The signs of darkness and cold are becoming harder and harder to ignore, and they are wrapping their fingers slowly around my throat.

I used to get excited for fall. Boots! Sweaters! Soup!

This year I simply do not want to do fall.

I don’t want the sun to go away for six months.

I know I shouldn’t be letting the fear of something that hasn’t happened yet ruin the time I have left. But it’s not as if winter is maybe going to happen, or maybe this year I won’t fall into a deep dark funk. It’s going to happen. And it’s going to happen soon.

This morning I woke up to an email thanking/applauding me for pushing on through my depression. She closed with this line,

 I’ve had moments where I feel like myself lately, but tonight. I don’t want to keep doing this for the rest of my life.

Me neither, Bethany.

I’m so very tired.

But I will keep going. For myself, for you, for the countless others out there who know this intangible pain, for my husband, my friends, my family and for these…

Giving up simply isn’t an option.

Last night I asked Facebook:

Have you ever been typing along, absolutely sure you spelled a word wrong, but the little red dotted line doesn’t show up so you type something crazy to make sure spell check is working?

There was a resounding yes.

One more thing we have in common kids.

*****

Here’s some decent stuff I babbled about over the last couple of weeks:

I sat Victoria Beckham down and discussed the validity of stretchy pants with her. It was a very one sided conversation.

Vivi’s preferred lullaby proves she is going to be cool forever and ever amen.

One kid to two kids, is it really that different? Now three…three and you’re outnumbered.

Yet another rule of parenting. When one gets sick they all get sick, just not at the same time.

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Vivi is going to be Perry the Platypus for Halloween. It’s taking all the willpower I have not to pin her platypus tail to every clothing item she wears from now until college.

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Heather started a new brain workout series on her site called Just Write. In case you have writer’s block and need a little nudge towards the creativity cliff.

My other friend Jessica has a whole site dedicated to getting over writers block, it’s called Kick in the Blog.

Or we could all just discuss the injustice of ingrown nipple hair.

Have a lovely day!

Addie is very right brained.

I am very left brained.

I doodle on everything.

She colors in the lines.

I draw zombie ponies holding blood stained knives.

She draws exact replicas of horses to scale with lifelike color and texture.

I picked my junk mail up today and noticed Meijer has very moody meat on sale.

They also seem to have equally emotional grooming products available.

She doodled! They were funny! I was getting through to her!

And then I started to notice maybe these aren’t just random doodles.

Nope, there’s Addie’s observant right brain. RIGHT THERE.

(babbled…Vivi is off the (height! and weight!) charts.

So…Vivi found her volume switch.

Multiple times today I made MAD DASHES across my house to make sure nothing was eating, pinching, sitting on, stealing, choking, scaring, hitting or biting the baby. Because surely babies don’t just randomly shriek out in the same high pitched shrill tones for every emotion they’re capable of conveying.

Turns out Vivi does.

And it’s the stuff scary movies that include children in the plot are made of.

Cody keeps the monitor turned up extra loud for whatever reason I’m not sure of yet because I can assure you that if she wakes with the monitor at a normal human level he’ll feel my kick long before he would ever hear her over the monitor at any level. I’m scared of what we’ll be awoken with tonight. It could be that she’s excited for another day of being a baby! Or she’s being eaten by a R.O.U.S. The monitor is capable of amplifying Vivi’s newly discovered volume switch exponentially.

I can hear her breathing through it right now.

The thought of her trying out her new mandrake shriek at two a.m. simply because she can with the monitor up this loud?

I may very well wet the bed.

Vivi screaming me awake or Addie standing thisclosetomyface when I open my eyes…

Suddenly it’s a toss up.

I was there when she held her third baby for the first time.

She was the first to find out about my second baby.

I was one of the firsts to know about her fourth baby.

I was the first (aside from the ultrasound tech) to know about the gender of her fourth.

Her family was the fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth to know the gender of their sixth family member.

And now you’re the…well. Let’s just say you’re in on the secret now too.

Love you Miss Emily, and your little family too.

I used to get offended a lot.

A lot.

Remind me to tell you about the time I walked out of church because I was so offended.

Nobody can know everything about everyone’s situation.

I’m not offended by all the dumb blonde jokes because I know I’m not dumb… and I also know that I’m not blonde. -Dolly Parton

There are too many people and too many situations to understand them all.

Someone is going to say something at some point that is going to ignite that little fire inside you. You are going to want to fire back. I’m going to ask you not to do that. I’m going to ask that when you find yourself offended? Take a deep breath and count to ten.

Cheesy I know, but it totally works.

Depending on the situation find out as much about the person as you can (without gossiping.)

I hate to break it to you but there are some people out there who have led charmed lives and are incapable of understanding the emotional complexities of difficult situations. However it’s not painful to admit that some people are just jerks looking for a fight.

Then there are the people in the middle. This is where I fall. I say stupid stuff sometimes. I try not to say as much stupid stuff as often. Sometimes I fail. But I apologize. And I genuinely mean my apologies. And I change.

Sometimes people don’t know they’re being offensive until someone gently corrects them.

Gently. Privately.

Assertively correct someone with a sprinkle of insult and fury yourself?

That person isn’t going to change. They’re just going to be convinced that you’re the offensive jerk.

…and they cycle continues.

It is very, very easy not to be offended by a book. You just have to shut it.
Salman Rushdie

It is very, very easy not to be offended by the Internet. You just have to click the little x.

It is very, very easy not to be offended by a TV show. You just have to turn it off.

Being offended is a choice.

Feeling offended is involuntary.

What you choose to do with that feeling is voluntary.

You’re not going to agree with everything everyone says every time. And not everyone is going to agree with you. That would be very boring.

But we can all make our disagreements much more civil.

Besides, when you’re the civil one it makes it a lot easier to weed out who the true turds are.

And true turds are rare.

Don’t be a turd.

You can be understanding and accepting without condoning.

Speak softly and carry a big stick. Preferably a pretty one you found on Pinterest or Etsy.

I wrote these words about hard won babies.

Hard won babies are the best.

******