While my internet is working well and my husband is at the office...

I thought I would take this opportunity to post an update on life in Tbilisi because who knows when I will have the opportunity again. You see, our internet connection? It sucks. Dial-up is blazingly fast compared to our home connection. I don't know what happened, the connection used to be fairly decent, but in the last few weeks our speed has been slow. How slow you ask? Well, just to open my homepage it can take anywhere from 2 to 5 min. I usually type in a web address (say, oh, Google) and then open up a game of Spider Solitaire, play the hand, then click back over to the internet window and maybe, maybe, the page will have loaded.

And if that were not bad enough, I have tried 2 times to post an update to my blog in the past week. The first time the power went out in the house while the update was uploading and in the 2 seconds before the generator kicked on and restored power to my house, and consequently to my internet server, my post was lost somewhere in space. The second time? Well, see the post directly below this one about the BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH.

So third time's the charm. Or so I hope.

Things have been going well in Tbilisi - Kyra is trying to crawl, trying to get more teeth, laughing all the time and generally keeping us all on our toes. She learned to clap last week and takes much delight in clapping all the time. For no reason other that it seems to amuse her. I fully expect her to have her two top teeth in the next month or so and to be walking, like her brother did, around 10 months. She wants to stand and only stand. Don't try to sit her down on the floor - oh the screaming horror. Help her stand? Laughter abounds. The only thing that worries me about her walking so soon is that we have stairs. When Blaine started walking we lived in a single-storey house in Florida - everything was flat and even. Here we have a long flight of stairs. Yes, we have gates, but we also have a 4 year old who is not so great about keeping gates locked. Constant vigilance is in my future. Ah, the joys of parenting.

Speaking of joys, Blaine is great - 10 more days until he goes back to school, but who is counting? Not me. Heh. He's my little magpie - he never.ever.ever stops talking. The only time he is silent is when he is sleeping. And he has learned the magic of "Why?". I thought hearing "mom" 2000 times a day was annoying but I would gladly take that over the why why why why why why. He is also the king of circular arguments. It's exasperating. Example:

Blaine: Mom, I peed a little in my pants
Me: Why didn't you pee in the toilet?
Blaine: Because I peed in my pants.
Me: Why did you pee in your pants Blaine?
Blaine: Because I didn't pee in the toilet.
Me: But you are a big boy who knows how to use the toilet, so why didn't you use the toilet?
Blaine: Because I just peed in my pants.
Me: Why did you pee in your pants? Did you not make it to the bathroom in time?
Blaine: No, just because I didn't pee in the toilet.

It's like a Laurel and Hardy routine. He could continue like that for hours. I would be insane, but it makes perfect sense to him.

So that's the excitement here. Blaine is back to school soon, David's parents are coming for a visit, Kyra is getting big (7 months old already - really, how did that happen so fast?) and Tbilisi is, well, Tbilisi. Hot, crazy, fun, exciting, exasperating. You should come visit. And babysit Blaine for me. Why? Why not?

The Blue Screen of Death

Or so Dave calls it. My laptop died last night. One minute was working, the next minute I had nothing but the blue screen. My harddrive seems to be fried (I'm posting this from Dave's laptop). So, in addition to our internet completely sucking wind now I have no computer to even TRY to access the internet on. I will, of course, be able to use David's computer but now I have to share. I'm not so good at sharing - that's why we each had our own laptop.

Bottom line? Expect even less frequent updates from me. Oh, and if those of you who are reading this will drop me an email, I would appreciate it. When the harddrive bit the big one, it took my address book with it so I don't have anyone's email address anymore. I have a few committed to memory - very few - so drop me a line and I will add you to my new address book. And I will write them down on a trusty old piece of paper and try not to lose it.

Well, now it gets interesting

Kyra has been able to roll over from her back to her belly for quite a while now. About 2 weeks ago, she finally was able to get from her belly over to her back.

2 days ago? She put 2 and 2 together and realized that if she keeps going from back to front to back...she can get across the room.

There's a toy over by the couch? Well, let's just roll on over there.

There's a brother playing with Hot Wheels cars? Why, I should join him.

My mother is trying to leave the room? I shall follow her, one little roll at a time.

Rollin' rollin' rollin'.

Let the child proofing begin.

Survey Says...

A few answers to a few questions posted by Zoot. Before I answer, let me state that I don't necessarily consider myself a "mommyblogger". I mean, I am a mom, and I do occasionally blog, but I don't just blog about my kids - though I have been posting more about them and less about Tbilisi in recent months. But that's just because my kids are so damn interesting and cute. So, anyway, on to the questions:

1. Do your kids know about your blog? If they're too young to know, do you plan to keep it open to them as they get older?
At ages 4 and 6 months, I don't think they have any clue about what a blog is. Yes, I plan on continuing to blog and yes, I will keep it open to the kiddos. I think it will be neat for them to be able to read about the different places we have lived and the cool things we did in those places.

2a. If so - do you worry they may get embarrassed later? What would you do if they asked you to stop writing about them? What would you do if they wanted you to take it down all together?
I don't think they would be embarrassed, but I will cross that bridge when I get to it.

2b. If not, what are you doing to make sure they never find it? What if they do find it?
I hope they do find it someday.

3. Do you think our kids will appreciate the archive of their childhood? Do you wish your parents had done the same?
I hope they do. I am better at keeping track of milestones, funny moments and other bits of childhood ups and down on my blog than I am at updating the baby books or scrapbooks. Heh. Scrapbooks. As for my parents, I can't really say that I wish they had done the same since the internet wasn't around. My grandma journals old-school with pen and paper and she starts a new one each year. I find them fascinating, even though there are some days where she just notes who came to visit and what the weather was like.

4. Do you go back and re-read your past parenting milestones? Do you realize you forgot a lot?
Sometimes I do go back and read and marvel that I am still sane - especially after the international pregnant travel with a child covered in hives. I haven't forgotten much. Yet. But I'm sure I will. I have only so much room in my exhausted brain.

5. What about your children's friends/teachers/moms-of-friends? What if they found your blog? Do you tell your child not to tell anyone about it or are they free to talk about it? Do you worry their teachers or other parents will think it's weird?
I'm pretty circumspect with regard to what I blog about. I initially started the blog so that friends and family could keep up with what was happening with us since we are so far from "home" (in quotes because the reality is my home is here with my husband and children. The US is now just a place I used to live). The blog was a way to update everyone without having to send out a bajillion emails every week, but is has slowly morphed into more than that. It's really more of an online journal - one that is sometimes not updated regularly enough - but if you would care to come hold my daughter (provided she doesn't scream at being taken from her mother's arms) while I type, I would get right on that.


And on a completely different note, I find it hysterical that blogger's spellcheck doesn't recognize the word "blog".