Challenging Myself

I have decided to challenge myself. No, not to work out, climb a mountain, or learn something new.

I am challenging myself to ride the bus to work every day for a week.

This is something that I did for a long time when I first started working downtown. Unfortunately when I got pregnant, the motion and smells did not quite do it for me.

So I started driving to work, and got addicted to it.

Every time I drive to work this is how much it costs me:

Mileage: 50 miles round trip. My car gets about 16.5 miles to the gallon (economical I know). A gallon of gas right now is about $3.70. That comes to a daily expense of about $11.21.

Parking: I usually park underground in the winter and have begun parking in an above the ground structure now that it is warmer. The daily rate for parking is $7.25.

My total daily expense, not including wear and tear on the car, is $18.46. This would bring my weekly expense to $92.30 and my monthly expense to around $369.20.

Scary huh? When I look at it from that angle it makes me very happy that I rode the bus this morning. Just for kicks I will figure out how much the bus costs me to commute each day.

Monthly bus pass: $75.00 pre-tax, which I think makes it about $52.50 post-tax.

Mileage to park and ride: 22 miles round trip. Daily gas expense $4.93.

The total monthly expense for commuting via the bus is $151.11.

Really there is no question which of these I should be doing. So I challenge myself to start riding the bus again like I did before, EVERY DAY.

I will let you know how it goes. Reading while riding it to work today was actually pretty nice!

Happy bath baby!

Funny Beagles

Who knew that Nora and Puller were so funny?

Is it just me or is her laugh contagious?!?

Funny Beagles

More Funny Beagles

Calmness

Throughout my pregnancy, and even the three days at the hospital before Kate made her first appearance, while still in the womb Kate was a very calm baby.

Because of preeclampsia I was going into the doctor three times a week at the end, and having two ultrasounds a week. She was usually just hanging out in there, probably snoozing, with her hands up by her face (she still sleeps like this).

Come to think of it the only time she was really super active in there was at the 12 week ultrasound after I had eaten a Snickers bar for breakfast and at the Bruce Springsteen concert around 26 weeks.

I should have known that she would be a calm baby after pregnancy as well! How lucky did we get?!?

Lip Hickey

Kate, who I swear has been frantically working on growing in some teeth, has begun sucking her bottom lip into her mouth like mad.

This started yesterday while at daycare, and has now resulted in a hickey on her lower lip!

Ha ha ha ha ha.

When she gives us a chance to look at it I can't help but laugh, which of course makes her think she is funny, so then she laughs (it is a trait passed down through my family, we all laugh at our own jokes).

What a funny girl, now if I could only figure out how to get a good photo of it to use as blackmail someday...

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A Math Problem

What does irritability + diarreah + extreme diaper rash equal?

I think that Kate is finally working on some teeth! Hopefully for her sake it goes quickly. : )

No Way, Not Me!

I know that I have missed the last few weeks of "Not Me Monday" that was started by Mckmama, and I know it is a Wednesday, but this I just had to share.

(I can picture my husband shaking his head as he reads this.)

Last night Kate made a mess, and it did not stay in her diaper. Me unsuspecting of this large of a mess picked her up from her high chair and turned around to lay her down in her pack and play to change her.

The next thing I know I have poop all the way up my forearm and all over my hand. I turned around to look at the highchair and sure enough, it was there too.

At this point I wasn't sure where in her clothing it was coming out so I picked her up and carried her upstairs (by her armpits, not that she even noticed) to assess and clean up the damage.

I should tell you that she did not have a cover on her changing pad at this point since she had an explosion the prior night as well.

As I was cleaning everything up I quickly washed my arm/hands and took my rings off in preparation to give the stinky one a bath...much needed.

I didn't put my rings back on until I was about to leave this morning, and it was in the dark.

I made it all the way to work and sat down at my desk. All of a sudden I realized that I could smell something a little funky. At first I figured I must have stepped in one of the dogs' gifts that they leave outside for us.

Do you see where this is going...

There was Kate poop on my ring. And not just on my ring, but on the main diamond.

After laughing to myself, that this would only happen to me. I quickly took the ring off and cleaned it up in the bathroom.

Ahh, the joys of motherhood! : )

Nervous Driving

This morning I realized that my license tabs had expired on February 28. This means that I drove around for an entire week with out-of-date tabs and did not get caught. Whew!

I guess this might not be a big deal to most people, but when I lived in a house with four other girls during college, two of the girls got ticketed while their cars were parked out front for not updating their tabs. And if I remember correctly the fine was pretty high for the type of offense.

Our tabs cost so much more now with the new truck that I wouldn't want to pay any more than I have to!

A Case of the Black Tongue

Earlier this week I noticed something kind of freaky with Kate. Her tongue was black on the top back.

I noticed it when I was picking her up from daycare, and in the hustle and bustle of going home I forgot all about it.

I didn't see it again until yesterday, which of course made me wonder about it again. She doesn't seem to be acting differently, which helped to keep me from freaking out, but I was still curious about it.

So today when we were at Target, John and I bought a baby toothbrush (yes we are now these parents...crazy) to try and brush it off.

Well that didn't work, especially since Kate got pissed when we stuck something into her mouth that didn't have food on the end of it.

So I of course took to the Internet and found out that it was the medicine she was taking for her ear infection that caused it.

The only really bad part about it, is what it is called...

Black Tongue a.k.a. Hairy Tongue

Now that's just gross!