In the Studio

And now, for your listening pleasure - sit back, relax, and enjoy the sweet, sweet musical stylings of my nephew, Nolan.



A true artist would never let a little boogie get in the way of his mad jam session.

However, the cup of Goldfish crackers he forgot about yesterday but just saw out of the corner of his eye towards the end there completely merits distraction.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, those crazy sick beatz are none other than the timeless classic, "Party in the USA" by Miley Cyrus.

All together now:

"Nodding my head like yeah/ Moving my hips like yeah"

My Attempt at Not Being Blog Lazy

What The-?
Okay, I’ve mulled this over long enough that its time to throw it out there for public consumption:

I don't get Lady Gaga.

Is this just a sign of my age that I just don’t get her?

I don’t think so, because my 62-year old mother ADORES her. In fact, hang out on the south side of Chicago and chances are you’ll see Big Mar riding around in the Trailblazer, cigarette hanging out of her mouth while belting “Bad Romance” like it was an ode to single old broads everywhere.

(Sidenote: Please ignore the “Just Dance” track on my iPod – its not my fault it happens to be a good running song. Some things just defy explanation. Let’s be okay with that and get back to the bigger picture here.)

So what is it that I just don’t get?



Between the outrageous hair/outfits and the following of “Little Monsters,” I just don’t get it. And the more I think about it, the more I feel like my mother circa 25 years ago, when her little daughter M (age 8), was BEGGING for the new Madonna cassette tape while she wondered what the hell was so great about a trashy girl from New Jersey dressed in lace and whining about being a virgin and papas preaching.

Now THAT’S a flashback – how old am I anyways??! Better question – how the heck old is Madonna?!?!

So I guess I will just have to put Lady Gaga on my list of “Things I Don’t Get Because I Am Old or Just Uncool.”

And considering the size of that lsit, I’m gonna need some more paper.



Getcha Boots On, Sandy
Speaking of pop culture – what in holy hell is wrong with Jesse James?

Seriously.

You bag a chick like Sandra Bullock and even get her to marry you, and then you go whoring around with that Bombshell chick who’s covered form head to toe in ratty-ass tats, and reportedly a white supremacist?



I mean, did he have a lobotomy?

That’s the only thing that would explain why he did this, and expected it to be kept a secret.

*shakes head*

Ugh. I debated on whether or not to even put that picture up because personally I want to run naked through a scorching fire just to melt the dirty off everytime I look at it.

Which begs the question - how on Earth did Jesse James get naked and make the sexy times with her?!?!

Excuse me while I go bleach my eyes and brain N.O.W.




S.L.O.W.
Wanna know when three minutes is truly an eternity?

When those three minutes are the time it takes to brew that morning coffee.

GAWD.



Seeking Umbrella
So have I mentioned that it is literally raining babies around my head?

I’ve got three new nephews, one nephew/niece on the way, and all my friends have had or are currently pregnant with new babies.


Aiden and Nolan


Brody


Baby Sully On-The-Way

Me and Cheese are slowly becoming eeked out the social lives of once-babyless.

It is starting to make me wonder if they all know something I don’t, and if this is a train I need to reconsider boarding.

Of course, peer pressure is no reason to have a bambino. For a myriad of different reasons of which I will not disclose here, suffice it to say I am just not down with it yet.

Plus, I like my life right now. Yeah, I get it – its selfish. Nothing compares to the miracle of children, yada, yada.

But I’ll tell you something – being surrounded by baby-makers has taught me that not all is sunshine, rainbows and cute little baby clothes. It’s HARD – I don’t care who you are. And right now, I can’t comprehend uprooting life to take that on.

It's just such a tremendous responsibility of which I am just not capable now.

And besides, I don’t need yet another reason to sit around and binge eat cake frosting and corn chips.

Triathlon training is reason enough.


Not My Reality
And speaking of babies:

Does anyone believe that this lady had one just months ago?



My goodness.

I’ll tell ya what – you find a way for me to look like this post-pregnancy, and I’ll find a way to shoot out those little guys rapid-fire like a machine gun coochie.



T-Time
Oh, and speaking of - once again, triathlon season is upon us.

And now that the weather is mostly above Suck It degrees, I have taken my long runs back outside.

Nothing against the treadmill, which got me almost entirely through Ironman training, but I needed to get some fresh air in my lungs and I was just plain bored with the monotony of my iPod and the fact that I seem to uncannily time my runs during the Rick Sanchez timeslot on CNN –which my gym runs incessantly.

Seriously – would it kill ‘em to toss on Bravo for a few hours here and there?

In any case, I took my legs over to the lake these last few weeks.

My legs and my COMPRESSION TIGHTS.

That’s right – I bought into the fad.

And before I say anything else, we all know by now that I am truly not a new-gadget-type of girl. I am scrappy, plain and simple. I ride a four year old tri bike that is starting to rust and rattle all over, my riding shorts are also that old and all worn out at the crotch, and I can barely spell Garmin, much less plunk down the money to own or work one.

But I got compression tights, and boy oh boy do I love them.

Not only are they great for actually running and giving my ass the sports bra-like support it needs, recovering after a long run or a brick in them is genius.

After having them on a couple hours post long workout, I wake up in the morning feeling almost zero effects of the previous day’s smash fest.

I suspect I will wear the crap out of these until the are no longer compression but more like yoga pants, and the downside is that they cost a ton. And while I considered setting up a texting donation site a la Haiti to help fund my compression tights shortage, I figured I best hold off until I can pay my own way.

Either that, or just wait ‘til my birthday and drop LOTS of hints for my husband.

(Husband, if your reading this, that was hint #1).

Moral of the story?

Compression tights rule, and I hate being poor.

Disney Recap Will Have To Wait

Because I simply couldn't let this one pass without posting.



"Uh, mom? Yeeeeaaaaah...see, the thing is, I don't remember this being part of the 'Little Brother' contract I signed back in August. So howsabout you stop taking pictures, put down that cell phone, and get this half-nekkid child who's trying to style me as a contenstant in the 'Lil Leprechaun pageant off my back? Sigh. Makes me want for the good old days when he would just kick me in the head while I laid in the Boppy."

Morale of the story?

Time to start getting ready for St. Patrick's Day, or it may creep up and surprise you.

Cupcake

Last week at the grocery store, I bought a box of chocolate fudge cake mix and some butter cream frosting.

No reason in particular - I just seem to find myself wanting/needing to make the occasional cupcake without the proper ingredients, so I figured while I was there, I should buy in preparation for the next wave of domesticity.

'Cause like my menstruation, you never know when it's going to hit.

However, turns out you can't keep a jar of butter cream frosting in the house of a recovering/oft-slipping sugar addict.

Cupcake mix got put safely in the cabinet, while the jar of frosting was opened, tested, and placed in the fridge butter shelf for the occasional sugar hit.

I would only take about two finger fulls at at time - enough to quench that sugar shake at the end of each evening - the one that usually causes me to eat three ice bars in a row, hence prohibiting me from buying them anymore (ice cream bars and chocolate chips - bought again, with the intention of putting them in brownies, but in reality putting them only in my belly straight from the bag).

My goodness - what is it with me and baking ingredients?

But like any addict, the finger-fulls were no longer cutting it after a while, and I wanted more.

Like a spoonful.

Or two. Maybe three.

I eventually got about halfway through the jar, and finally decided - throw it out. Seriously, I can't be working out for two hours a day, and then blow it all of hydrogenated oil that taste deliciously and sinfully like butter cream.

So out it went. Right in the garbage with my dignity.

But for as much as I love butter cream frosting, I don't love it more than this little piece of deliciousness:



He told my sister he had a lunch date.

With his imaginary friends, Fou Fou and Kenea.

Forget the frosting - THAT'S real sweetness.

The Other Shoe

It was one of those weekends that is so blissful, you take pause in a random moment just to remind yourself that, yes, this is your life.

I went to Tennessee to visit my brother and his wife.

They are expecting their first child, and my whole family flew down for the Sunday baby shower.

But Saturday was all about family time in their new house.


It's Jenny, all pregnant and hanging in the backyard.

My brother, showing off his new bow-and-arrow hunting skills. The natural athlete he is, he just started hunting (an idea very foreign to us city-folk) and off course is amazing.

He tried teaching my brother-in-law.

The rest of us were kickin' on the deck, hangin' with the Mayor and his lil' brother.

Even the Mayor needs a little Momma love sometimes.

"Here Uncle No-No. It's Miller time."

Momma Q and Aiden.

The Mayor

The boys.

Cookin' with Coo-Coo Nana. I have to brag, because The Mayor has been cooking with my mom and his mom since birth, and he is really quite good, and not even 3-years-old yet. Look at him crack that egg!

Of course, if he's playing in chocolate, he must be cooking with Auntie Megan!

Me, Ellie and Aiden off for a walk, just outside of Nolan's backyard.

And on the way back.

Its hard to convey how glorious that day was in just these few pictures (and more to follow). The weather, the family, the laughs - it all culminated with an early Thanksgiving dinner and a Mayor-inspired dance party that evening.

Even now, I chuckle when I think of the little dude "Nodding my head like Yeah/Moving my hips like Yeah" just as instructed by Miley Cyrus.

Funny though, how quickly things change.

Like in an instant.

Fast forward to Sunday morning - my phone jolting me out of a sleep. It was Cheese's number. I didn't want to wake everyone up, so I silenced it, and tried to scurry out of the bed and into the hallway to talk. The phone continued to ring - two more times.

When I answered, it was Cheese.

Telling me he just fell off a roof.

In Virginia.

Because my husband travels out-of-state and climbs on roofs for a career, this was the call I always suspected I would get, but I always hoped would elude me.

I found out what it felt like to have your world stop in an instant.

Long story short, he took a dive off roof while getting off a ladder, falling onto his right shoulder as he hit a wooden deck below. Of course, not before he fell through a patio table.

Instead of flying home to Chicago that night, I flew right to Virginia. I found Cheese in his hotel bed, discharged from the hospital with a shoulder the size of a small child.

The diagnosis - his humerus (upper arm bone that is round at the top to fit in the shoulder socket), broke right off at the ball. Thus, the ball-part of the bone was still in the socket, while the rest of the humerus was just....hanging.

His arm was completely disconnected from the rest of his skeleton.

Long story short - we saw a surgeon the following day, who encouraged us to go back to Chicago for surgery. We flew back the following day, saw an ortho at Rush, and got ourselves a surgery day for Monday (why not Friday, I don't know. Neither of us thought to ask).

As for how he is - in excruciating pain. The bone keeps hitting the part it broke away from, the muscles are spasming, the swelling is cartoonish, and his body has finally brought the bruising to the surface, and has turned his arm black.

In my moments when I cry in frustration for not being able to minimize his pain, I reprimand myself - reminding myself that it could have been worse - a broken skull, a broken back - the mind can wander around all the ways it could have been much worse.

But it wasn't, and he's still here.

He's home, with me, in our house.

He's here.

A Little More Auntie Love

So like any other childless aunt that dotes on her nephews, I am going to fill this post with pics of my little smooshies. Maybe at some point I'lll get back to actually writing content, but alas, my life is so blah compared to the sweetness of these boys.





















Happy Sunday.

Foto Friday - Family Men

Hello Bloggies!

Have we met?

I don't believe so, so let me formally introduce myself - My name is Aiden.

And M is my auntie.

You know M, right?

From what I can tell, she likes to poke fun at everyone, she is always eating my mommy's food, always smells a little like she just rolled out of bed, and sometimes she gets really nervous when my mommy puts me in her arms.

And what's up with her hair?

Anyways, she seems nice and all, but...um...hey - can I tell you something? Between you and me?

So far, she hasn't been a super great auntie.

I mean, she comes in, she swings my big brother No No around, gives him lots of kisses and love, and he loves it and they play fire trucks together. She even brings him donuts that my mommy makes her take back home because she says it's not good from her "baby weight."

Whatever that means.

But then, with me, she mostly just comes over to me in the swing, leans in close, and says right in my face, "How come he always sleeps when I come over?"

It sort of bothers me, especially since I am just starting to get this whole vision thing down. I mean, she already looks sort of funny from a distance, so it's not hard to imagine that super-up-close version with a little vision-distortion can freak a little man out, right?

Sigh. I just don't think she likes me so much.

And people, how could you not like THIS face?



Maybe with time she will come to appreciate my finer qualities - my non-fussiness, my ability to sleep long stretches, the general containment of my poopies to my diaper (which, for a newborn, is not small feat, people). And besides she seems to talk a lot about running and some bike thing, so maybe once I can move on my own, master that whole "crawling" thing, wipe my own butt, and develop coordination, maybe then she might come play with me.

But I guess until then, I guess I still have my brother:


Yeah, this ol' boy isn't all that bad - I mean, once he got past the fact that I wasn't leaving, he seems to have stopped torturing me, poking my eyes, and slapping my head.

Although he has taken to peeing on the floor in his bedroom since my arrival. I wonder what that means...

Well, it's time for my mid-mid-morning milkies, and my mom gets cranky when I get off schedule. See ya later!

"I Never Saw Two People Enjoy Their Wedding As Much As You Two"

So says my mother.

And I tend to believe her, mostly because from the second I turned the corner out of the hallway to walk down the aisle, I was in wedding bliss.

I carefully reminded myself all the tips of the days that were imparted to me by all of you:

"Take it all in."

"Go slow."

"Remember EVERYTHING."

"It goes so fast so enjoy."

And I did. All of it.

I remember just about every last detail - and the tiny group was just right to make sure I got a chance to talk to everyone, and still spend most of the night (and quite literally every song) on the dance floor.

In fact, my dress is ruined at the bottom from all the dancing.

So here are a few of the moments:


The cake, complete with the silver ribbon to match my dress. However, I have no idea who put those rose pedals around it.

Not my call.

But quick story - Cheese and I actually were thoughtful about putting together this cake - I mean, we all know how important cake is in my life, so I wasn't just going to show up with some Betty Crocker nonsense (well, to be honest, given our budget, I might have, but the fancy cake actually came with our food/drink package, so we took full advantage!) So we chose moist white cake with three layers of thick fudge and Baileys Irish Cream filling, topped with buttercream frosting -yeah, 'cause that's how I roll - if your not in a sugar coma, it doesn't count. But I never got to eat it. Remember that story - I'll finish it in the next post.....

The table - I post this for a few reasons - this first is that my sister (again) did all the centerpieces, and I loved them. So simple, so perfect. The little bags with the "d" on them are actually homeade chocolate chip cookies made by my mom, while those red labels are embossed by my sister Devin. She did ALL of them. The lower case "d" represents my new last name, and was also the same lower case font we did our invites in. I liked the casualness of it. My mom then decorated the rest of the table with the grey runners and the floor-length linens.

Cheese's nephew - but the reason I put this in is this: Look at what he's holding. It's a chinese take-out box filled with Swedish Fish, Mike n Ikes, Tootsie Rolls, Peanut MnMs, Red Vines and Reeces Pieces. If he turned it, you would see a similar red round label also embossed with lower case letters that read "thank you." Heck yeah - No wedding of mine was going to be without a self-serve candy bar!! And thanks again to Devin for the labels she put on literally 100 boxes.

Ellie giving a speech. I believe it went something like this: "Now, I know many of you don't know Megan all that well, but in addition to being kind and beautiful and smart, you should also know that when she gets raging drunk, she pees in closets and on floors."

*Insert crowd roaring here*



And then up was Devin. My favorite quote from her speech? "Cheese, I intially wanted to use my speech to call you an asshole for stealing my best friend, but I see how happy you made her, more happy than we have seen her in so very long."



Is that a tear I see? Did Devin actually *gasp!* cry?!? Dang, makes my stone cold heart all warm and fuzzy.

Mom, in the two seconds of her speech she wasn't sobbing.

The best man and speech.

Just chatting.

I *heart* this picture.

And now, for the first dance...

"Today is the day I make you mine" - Today, by Josh Radin

"You looked right through me, there was...no one else

I sat besides you and...became myself."

Cheese and Momma Cheese

And lest we forget my dance with my mom - "You'll Never Find Another Love" by Lou Rawls,which she used to dance around to while holding me right after I was born. Momma Q spun me around for four minutes while my dress hung on for dear life. Yeah, these are the G-rated pictures.

Me and Nolan

Flower Girl Kennedy and her dad- sweetness!

Momma Q

"I got a feelin'....that tonight's gonna be a good night...."

"Here we go, here we, now we on top!"

Daddy Cheese

"Apple bottom jeans, boots with the fur, the whole club was lookin' at her

She hit the floor!

Next thing you know -

Shorty got low, low, low, low..."

"I like the way you move - da da duh."

Devin and Patrick!

"Let the music play

He won't get away..."
"Just hit the groove and he'll come back to you....Let it play!"

Nicole, fellow blogger and probably the best dancer of the night - showed my ass up, for sure!

Nolan and Jenny

"Footloose! Cut loose! Kick up the Sunday shoes!" And then Colin dropped to the floor and did the catapiller. Hell yeah, he did.

Footloose wore him out.

Oh, looks like someone's crashing from the sugar binge of the cake, pastry table, cookies, and finally four trips to the candy bar!

"Rock me momma like a wagon wheel, rock me momma any way you feel"

"Oh oh! We're livin' on a prayer!

Take my hand and we'll make it I swear!"

"Pour some sugar on me!"

Check Jenny out!

Me and Nicole at the Dollar Dance - oh yeah. Have I mentioned this?

Apparently, anyone NOT from Chicago likes to participate in this thing called the Dollar Dance, where the maid of honor and best man collect money from people who want to dance with the bride and groom - it can be any amount of money. The point is to make extra money for the honeymoon - and I guess its all the rage in Kansas. I dreaded this, but we actaully made out with mad loot.

Who knew I am sort of a hot commodity when it comes to dancing?

Now I can't say for sure how much Nicole paid for a little "Megan Action," but I am p.r.e.t.t.y sure I made it worth her while *wink*

Lady: "You come here often?"

Kade: "No, my mom wants me home and in bed by 8."

Lady:"Well, can I buy you a drink?"

Kade: "Sure, I'll take a milk, straight up. You know what? Make it a double - I brought my cookies over from the dinner table."

Lady: "Your mom every talk to you about cougars?"

Kade: "Like the ones in the zoo? Oh yeah. She said to stay away because they'll bite me really good."

Lady:"Your mom, huh?"

KAde: "Yeah - she looks sort of like you. Do you know her?"

Love.

Is the night already over?!?!?! They had to literally drag our asses to the car to go to the hotel. I could have stayed many more hours. But bigger and sunnier and sandier things awaited!

Hope you have enjoyed it so far - I know we have.

So if you're not sick of this yet, tune in tomorrow for some pictures (I'll find that one of Devin!) and a recap of the rehersal and honeymoon.