Friday, May 27, 2016

7 Quick Takes about Questionable Google Searches, What to Call Your Tiger, and Why I'm Not on Instagram

It's 7 Quick Takes Friday! How was your week?


What's your favorite piece of baby gear? You know, the thing you discovered and were like, "How could anyone ever have a baby without this?"

For us, it just may be the baby straightjacket.

I learned from Google that it's actually called a swaddler (and in retrospect it may not have been a great idea to Google "baby straightjacket" because it makes my search history look so incriminating).

It's got these great Velcro tabs to keep the swaddle nice and tight. My baby's arms just freak him out too much.


A friend dropped off a gift for the baby, and how cute is this little guy?


The 2-year-old immediately started carrying him around and calling him "Belcome" (rhymes with "welcome") for some reason, and the name stuck.

In fact, I just overheard one of the older kids asking, "Hey, where's Belcome?"

I'm excited about this because my children have always been so matter-of-fact when naming their stuffed animals. Every single one of them is called "Color + Species." For example, say hello to one of our oldest and most well-loved stuffed animals, Pink Bear:

Pink Bear: first in a very long line of the most boringly-named stuffed animals ever.

"Belcome" could be the beginning of something.


Sometimes there are events in the life of a mom of 6 kids that are almost too weird to believe. For two hours on Wednesday evening, I was completely alone.

Usually in order to get some of this fabled "me time," I have to consult my almanac for the alignment of no less than 3 planets and schedule everything a month in advance.

But this time it happened completely spontaneously.

One of our kids is on a school trip, one was at art class, and Phillip drove one to soccer practice and took the other two to play at the playground next to the soccer field. I was left at home with just the baby, and he was asleep!

I literally did not know what to do with myself. I may have eaten a bunch of Reddi-wip straight out of the can. There was no right and wrong in that moment.


This past Sunday was my birthday, but honestly it's been so crazy around here with having a baby and visitors and Phillip getting a new job and the usual end-of-school madness that I don't think any of us remembered until the night before.

Actually, I know we didn't because Phillip looked absolutely horrified when I realized and announced at 9 PM on Saturday night that tomorrow was my birthday.

"I'm sorry I forgot," he said.

I shrugged. "That's okay, I forgot yours."

"Yeah, but I needed that!"

(For how that happened and Phillip's prophetic statement about it, see Take #3 here.)

So I think he's a little sad that he gave up his Get Out of Jail Free card so soon, but it wasn't like he totally blew it. We've been into desserts in a mug lately so he made me a personal-sized birthday cake and all was forgiven.


My birthday treat (see previous take) was delicious but when I went to take a picture it turned out looking awful.


When I expressed my frustration, Phillip pointed out that real food bloggers take an hour setting up the shoot, plus they wait for the perfect lighting and use a $1,500 camera.

As opposed to what we were doing, which was trying to snap a quick shot while nursing the baby on the couch after the kids' bedtime with a point-and-shoot camera that was a lightning deal on Amazon 5 years ago.

Makes sense, I guess.


In other bad food photography news this week, please meet acorn squash feta cheese casserole.

Try to contain your enthusiasm.

You're right, it does look like fake plastic vomit. It looked even more like it before I smoothed it out in the casserole dish.

Unfortunately, I couldn't blame these pictures on poor lighting. It really did look like puke, and only tasted slightly better than it looked.


Question of the week from my 10-year-old: Why do they have commercials for car dealerships on the radio? You're probably listening to it in the car, which means you already have one.

Never thought about that before, but the child has a point.

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Alicia said...

Thanks for the laughs. #7 is so true! Back in the day people listened to the radio in their homes, but does anyone do that now? He's a thinker. :)

Christina @ a gentle mother said...

As a former food blogger, I can tell you that your husband is right! Sometimes, by the time I got done taking photos of whatever I made, I was like, "I don't even want to eat this anymore!" LOL! Happy birthday!

Jenny said...

When I was first married I was looking for a way to hang out pictures in a collage on our wall, so I type "hanging pictures" into google. Guess what came up? Not how to hang pictures in a collage. I'll get teased about that one for life.

I only have 2 kids and when I'm some how alone I don't know what to do either. It's like your brain gets overly excited and you can't focus on your to do list or anything like that, so you end up picking the most unproductive choice.

AnneMarie said...

Haha, "baby straightjacket" is a far more exciting name than "swaddle blanket." :P A random lady at the bank told me about those ones with velcro the other day, and I'm seriously thinking about getting one for our little guy. I'm very much a minimalist when it comes to baby stuff, but it sounds really handy! Wow, 2 hours of spontaneous free time? That's crazy. I have no idea how I would handle that situation-probably eat all the treats in the house haha.
#7 is interesting, and your child has a really good point! I never thought of that, but it makes sense. Hmm.

Audrey Louise said...

I'm sitting here laughing SO hard at the stuffed animal names... (You're hilarious!!) When I was a kid I had a stuffed rabbit named Bunny. Bunny is still in my adult bedroom on the nightstand. My husband is less than impressed at my naming skills.
The 10-year-old child really does have a point about car dealership commercials...

Ann-Marie Ulczynski said...

It killed me when my oldest daughter named her bear, wait for it. . . Mr. Bear. My middle daughter named her lovie "mem-ahy" and her doll Stella, for reasons I don't understand :)

Michelle said...

Even as the mom of one kid, I never know what to do with myself when I'm alone. I fumble around trying to figure out what to do, and once I've made a decision, my alone time is over.

Jenny Evans said...

I guess it's just a personality thing. Some kids like to be strictly factual. No false advertising for them. Mr. Bear all the way! Others like to get a little more creative.

Jenny Evans said...

I am definitely with you on the baby minimalism (see my posts "10 Most Useless Pieces of Baby Gear" or "Babies Do Not Cost a Fortune") but I definitely think the swaddlers are worth every penny. Especially when they get old and strong enough to break out of a swaddle with a regular blanket and wake themselves up.

Jenny Evans said...

I can just imagine what you found!

Now that my kids are old enough to Google I've probably reminded them 1,000 times to be extremely careful about how they word their searches, and to never Google a woman's name without some qualifying information.

(My daughter wanted to draw a picture of Princess Anna once and just did a Google images search for "Anna" - let's just say that some photos came up of some young women named Anna who were extremely proud of what God (and possibly their plastic surgeons) gave them... hence our "no Googling without clearing it with mom or dad first" rule.

Amanda said...

My bunny from childhood is named Bunny. My sister's cow was Cow. I think that's just a thing! Glad you got some alone time. I bet that was super weird! It's weird for me and I just have one kid!

Jenny Evans said...

I think it's just a mom thing, regardless of how many you have.

Rachel said...

I laughed about the names of the stuffed animals. Pink don't think my siblings ever struggled much with lack of creativity in naming toys...except my brother, who named every stuffed animal he ever had "Cowboy". Also, every joke he ever told as a child was about a cowboy.

Susan C. said...

This isn't strictly baby gear but I bought a poncho and it makes a great nursing cover that doesn't scream "I'm nursing in public!" Not going to be so great in the summer, though...

PurpleSlob InRecovery said...

Lol, I can always count on you for a good belly laugh/liver massage! We tried the "baby burrito" as we called it for the grand baby. IDK, maybe we did it wrong, or maybe she was just Houdidni, needless to say, it never worked. Maybe because she was born 3 month old size???
My first stuffed bear, with a tear on her plastic face was called, wait for it, Cry Baby Bear. She is now 54 years old, and loved almost to death. I still sleep with her occasionally! But only when I'm alone. Which is all the time now, since I'm divorced. But hey, at least I don't suck my thumb!
You have brilliant children, with excellent deductive reasoning skills!

Rosie said...

We also have a Pink Bear! Actually, TWO. Because why make up another name for another pink bear when the original one worked so well? And the baby dolls are all named after their owners, except for the Bitty Baby whose name is... Bitty Baby.

So creative, my kids!

Catherine said...

Haha, totally with you on the animal name + qualaifier thing! That said, we do have a doll called Skittle, because Granny helped my daughter dress a set of six skittles as members of our family, so she genuinely thought that was the proper name for small-fake-people toys...

Jenny Evans said...

Hey, the man knows what he likes! So... is he a cowboy now?