Thanks for letting us know how to find you, Elaine! The radio show sounds fun; I'll have to get on Greenwich Time...

Joshilyn, you have a BLOG?! I'll be right there!! I am also bookmarking tarts and backbloggers alike...so you've been warned. As I don't tweet or FB (is "facebook" a verb...? Probably not...), I sincerely hope blogs are not dead. As I am home with my toddlers all day, blogs are often the only bits of adult conversation I get! (Oooh, the grown-ups are talking!!)

Kathy, as many others have mentioned, you have managed to say what was in my head-only MUCH better!! You have also taught me so much about things I didn't even know I was ignorant about! (Not the least of which is the word "jagoff...") I can't thank you enough.

Thanks for coming, Barbara! I am so glad to have "met" you! Through TLC I found HOW TO BAKE A PERFECT LIFE (and loved it!). I look forward to April...

I am so SAD!! Like many of you, this is how I start my day. I feel like I have learned so much from everyone here. I haven't figured out FB yet (I know, I know...), but maybe this will be a kick in the pants to get with the 21st century... Thanks for all of the time you've all put in. I understand, really I do, I am just so...SAD!! p.s. In case anyone was fretting over my Santa-less children, we found a great version of "Twas the Night Before Christmas" illustrated by James Marshall. Of course! A book! (Duh, Paula!!)

I don't remember how I found out about Santa, so I guess it wasn't too traumatic. I do remember a friend of the family saying, "Paul has another year, so don't tell him!!" This year my husband and I are trying to figure out how (or if) to start the Santa thing. (Our kids are only 1 and 2...) We're finding it weird to lie outright, but we don't want them to miss out on the magic, either... I appreciate my parents' subterfuge much differently now!

After commenting that the cheerleaders at the high school football game looked like they were having fun - I was about eight at the time - my mom looked at me and said, "Oh, honey, they don't have any fat cheerleaders..." Ah. Well scratch that, then..

You have just given me a total "Duh, Paula!" moment. I hate to cook, but never connected it with the fear of failure until reading this. I am not brave or creative in the kitchen (I heat, I stir, I follow the directions on the box...), but it makes so much more sense now. I am forever trying to beat back the perfectionist part of my personality; maybe this new awareness ("Duh, Paula!") will allow me to try some new things. Thanks for the insight! I look forward to reading your book!

It's freak snowstorm day here in eastern Iowa. If it were warm and sunny, however, I would be celebrating the right to not wrangle two small kids into vast expanses of outerwear... Now that we've seen some warm days I really hate going back to coat weather!

Does having babies make new neural pathways? (If so, are there any remaining brain cells to traverse the pathways?!) After two babies in the last two years (and that will be all of that thankyouverymuch!), I know I've learned a LOT...I'm just not sure I can remember any of it...

My husband gave me a Garfield poster from his younger days that says, "Welcome to the insane asylum!" and has Garfield, Odie, and Jon in various states of crazy. As an early childhood educator it seemed wildly appropriate...

Hank- Believe it or not, I'm walking on air. I never thought I could feel so free-ee-ee! Flying away on a wing and a prayer; who could it be? Believe it or not, it's just me. (Ok, so I'm not 100% sure those are the correct lyrics...but it should be enough to get it stuck in your head...)

I went through The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (and the next two) this summer in doctors' offices waiting (and waiting and waiting) to have our son. The story definitely takes awhile to get going but once it does I couldn't put it down (even when surrounded by countless vintage People magazines...). I'm not reading any Redwoods this fall (I'm lucky to get time to read a blog!). I am re-reading the books on my shelves instead...a lot of Tarts, of course, and Jan Burke's Irene Kelley books.

Though I can't really narrow down a name of significance from my youth, in my life as an early childhood teacher the Austins and Jacksons really stand out... We had a heck of a time picking names for our kids because they all made me think of a three-year-old (or four...). I was a child of the Jason era, though. We had a bunch in our class (but only one that mattered...[dreamy sigh]).

All the heat in the Midwest this summer? Yeah, that was my fault - I was pregnant (and that's just how the universe is...). We welcomed a baby boy at the end of June. He joins his "big" sister who is a whopping 15 months older. ("Oh, sure, we'll have them close together" sounded better on paper... Lol.) Luckily, everyone is healthy and happy (although I'm pretty sure big sis is recording any and all injustices to use against me later...) and really, really tired! I've also been working on workshop presentations for early care and education providers (or "daycare folks") to be done in October. (I research and write the trainings and then attempt to present them without throwing up.) Since there hasn't been much downtime (did anyone else hear the hysterical laughter in my head? No? Odd...), I just have to take pride in raising readers. Sandra Boynton is more their style right now, but give them time.

Whoops. That should be "might go..." Grar.

My dad is a funeral director, and I was born into a family where everyone was already old when I got there, so I was the opposite of shielded from death...although I didn't have a lot of experience with roadkill. I was four when my grandfather died and my newly widowed grandmother, my mother and I were at my grandmother's house with the pastor of the church. He was talking about how my grandfather was going to go to Heaven and such. I looked up from sorting marbles (as my mother tells it) and said, "Pfft. No he's not." Silence as my mother frantically tried to think about what I might have learned in my one day of Vacation Bible School that would influence this train of thought. The pastor tried again, "Of course he is, sweetie, he was a good, kind man..." Apparently I put my hand on his arm and said, "His soul mught go to Heaven, but my dad's going to put him in the ground."

Oooh, yes, what Sue in PA said about lurking and reading and writing... Happy Birthday to all!

Nancy - No. Nope. Nuh-uh. We are not ready at all. We have all the "stuff," but it's not in the right spots yet. I keep thinking that 7 weeks to go means 6 weekends to "get things done," but I thought that way at 20 weeks to go, too, and not much has changed... When people ask me when the baby is due I say, "June 20th" because that somehow seems to be farther away... Poor kid! :0)

I'm a longtime lurker here, and we have a 14 month-old daughter and will have another baby in a mere 7 weeks (that sounded better on paper, by the way...yikes!). We were "older" first time parents, not so caught up in the facebook, YouTube, "must post my life in all its gaudy glory" thing, and there has been ridiculous pressure to post pictures of our daughter on various plaaces on Internet "because it would be so much eeeeeeeasier..." for other people. We don't have facebook accounts (or even a restricted photo site on Shutterfly...) because we really don't want her out in the Internet ether (I hadn't thought about it in a pornography way -though now I will; yeesh!- but just for privacy's sake). I mail (actual mail!) pictures (actual pictures!) to relatives and email a few now and again to selected friends. (Now, of course, I'm hoping no one is spanking their monkey -as Doc so eloquently put it- while checking out my infant daughter. Double yeesh!) As far as clothing and high heeled baby socks which, fyi, don't look any easier to walk or crawl around in than the real things, it has been a challenge to keep our daughter in clothes that I feel are appropriate as opposed to looking like a hoochie mama. She's a year old!! She doesn't need a halter top!! So she wears a lot of jeans and T-shirts and people think my "little boy" is adorable. (Really?! Even with the pink hat?!) Ah well, it's still better than the skinny jeans -what baby has skinny legs?!- and fringed midriff shirt. Ahem. Stepping off of my soapbox and slinking away now... :0)

One elephant walks into a bar. The other elephant says, "Duck next time..." (Buh-dum-ching!) Thoughts and good wishes for you all, Nancy!

I saw this one the other day amid lots of other...erhm...Christian messages: When the Rapture comes, you'll wish YOUR car had Jesus stickers on it. Yeah. Because THAT'S what Christianity is all about.

Robert Munsch writes a great picture book called "The Paper Bag Princess." The princess outsmarts the dragon, rescues the prince, and then when the prince is a snooty jerk she dumps him. (He writes it so much better than that, but it's great for young children; boys and girls.)