I wanna see some damn booties! (w/o crack, thank you very much). I suggest using the cable ties electricians use to keep his hands off his feet for the picture... good to see that even the world's most perfect baby gets crabby every so often. :) Sue, my own bout with Lyme involved the worst headache I've ever experienced. It was relentless and went on for a few days. I described it to my boss thusly, "my teeth hurt". It was then that I KNEW something was really, really wrong. You need to be on anti-biotics again! and you really need to keep on alert and follow the directions to the letter. LD is nothing to take lightly; it's absolutely insideous because it's so often misdiagnosed or not fully treated. I'm sad that your summer has been so curtailed by it. But, as all gardeners know, "there's always next year"! I know your open day will be a huge success. You worry too much, sistuh! Yes, Wendy! I would definitely be "up" for a Nutmeg State cruise. Lord knows I need to get the hell outta Dodge before the snow flies, lol. And I DEFINITELY could use the laughs. Yoo-hoo... Saucy? The preliminary layer of new driveway entrance gravel has been spread and it's QUIET here. I can even hear birds chirping. I have one final coat of paint to apply to one of the "man doors", but I'm tired, it's very warm, and I don't feel like it! I have to pay the remaining (mondo) bill for building supplies tomorrow. GULP. I'm growing increasingly irritated by the electrician who has been grossly unreliable about returning phone calls, but he gets one more shot before we find someone else... there're plenty of people looking for work right now... . You'll laugh at me, but we've taken our first tentative step into the world of "automation". Our mortgage is taken care of on the agreed upon date... not check writing, it just "happens". It worked fine the first time... we'll see how the next payment goes... . One down, 179 to go... but we are "rounding up" and paying one "payment" to principal every year. LOL An employee of the ambulance company that transferred Mum found the missing hearing aids in the car they used, after my paniced call to them. I have his name and the address of the company and will have his thank you in the mail tomorrow. It's my chore to write my letter of complaint this weekend, e-mail it to my brother, and have it looked over by the attorney before sending it formally. What is so exhausting is the blase attitude that "UTIs are routine", and that we "expect too much" from the facility; that the care given in a home environment is always better. HUH? jeez, we did it for "free"... they're charging 9K/mo.. Please, my friends, tell me I'm not being unrealistic when I expect that Mum will be free of UTIs, instead of having one every 2 1/2-3 weeks! Is the world really upsidedown and I'm the only one who missed the memo? If I performed as abysmally at work I'd have been fired 7 1/2 yrs. ago. When I screw something up I take responsibility and I FIX IT. I change the way I perform the operation. Is this mindset peculiar to tradesmen, people who work in fields where errors and mistakes are more easily "tracked down"? Right now, though, I want to go outdoors, enjoy the late summer warmth, and look at the devastation and dream about how I would like it to look... You're good, true, and loyal friends. You make me smile and even chuckle when all around me seems so glum. I thank you for that and hope to return the same in time.

I did find this at ToysRUs website and I agree about the bear being taken away from her, she doesn't react. From Toysrus.com & Amazon.com Editorial Review Bright-eyed Boo wants to have a conversation... but we're not exactly sure what the topic is. This replica of the young girl who is accidentally allowed into Monstropolis in Pixar's film Monsters, Inc. is made of hard plastic; wears a comfy-looking T-shirt, purple pants, and white socks; sports two ponytails held up with pompom bands; and holds on to Little Mikey, a one-eyed and four-footed Teddy bear. With articulation points at the hips, shoulders, and head, Boo is easy to pose and can either sit down or stand up. As for the "babblin'," that word sums it up perfectly. Push on her belly and she will giggle, sing, or say a phrase in an adorably young, although somewhat tinny voice. We didn't quite understand what she was saying, though, and one phrase actually sounded Hawaiian. The package claims that Boo will cry when Little Mikey is taken from her arm, but that didn't happen--not necessarily a bad thing from our point of view. --Pam Lauer

I think kids are attuned to different sounds than we are. The sound is there, but we don't pick up on it. We live a few blocks from a train crossing. DS (21 months) has just this last week started saying "choo choo" everytime he hears a train. Usually, I don't hear it until I stop what I'm what I'm doing. He's right, there is a train coming. I have blocked that sound out and didn't notice it. I consider it background noise. On the other hand hearing and seeing a train is a highlight for ds. I don't have any real advice since my child is still quite a bit younger than yours, but I would like to suggest trying the monster spray that I've heard about on the craft forum. You can use a spray bottle filled with water or a can of room freshener or something else sprayable, put a label on it, and call it monster spray (or whatever might fit your situation better.) Tell your dd that the spray should be sprayed under the bed and whenever she hears the noises. Maybe it will help calm her fears. Good Luck.

Thanks lynn2006 and aliris19--love the pun, aliris! We don't have flowers all the time lynn (wouldn't that be nice though?), but I should have taken a new kitchen pic with my beautiful Valentine's Day bouquet--DH drove to the store that Friday morning (after, during? the snowstorms we had) to pick them up for me! Flaten, I have a couple sets of Chilewich placemats (one set I got at Century 21 for something like $4 each--I couldn't believe it when I got home and googled them and saw that they retailed for $20/ea!), so I know how nice some of their materials can be! Here are some pics I have in my PB showing a few of our shades: Guest Bathroom: MB (reflected in the mirror--you can see how sheer that particular fabric is): Guest Bedroom (you can see part of the shade): The shades in the Guest Bedroom and in our "Spare Room" are the prettiest ones we have fabric-wise (IMO), and those have the most texture, too. The shades in the two bathrooms, and our bedroom are solid color, flat weave, and are fairly sheer during the day--we wanted to maximize our ability to look out the windows during the day, while leaving the shades down (on nice days, with the windows open, we raise the shades to the height of the open portion of the window). We have room darkening micro-pleat shades mounted behind the screen shades in both bedrooms. We lower those at night, and raise them fully in the morning when we get up. Privacy micro-pleat shades are available as well, BTW. I haven't seen them in person, but would think they allow more light into the room. Some light does seep in with the room darkening micro-pleats--there are pinholes up/down the length of the shades for the strings that help to raise and lower them. FYI, they do NOT make the Roman Shade style Designer Screen Shades anymore (like the two in our bathrooms, and the ones in our office and FR which are not shown here). They are only available now as a completely flat shade (like the one in our Guest Bedroom). They offer a range of fabrics; from very sheer to fairly opaque, completely smooth through textured, etc. HTH!