Hi all. This has been a very busy week (in case you couldn't tell from the short entries laden with photos).

First off, Mr. Wonderful--who I will henceforth refer to as "BCH" (his initials)--and the Elder Son arrived last Thursday morning. The weekend was great, despite the intermittent rain and omnipresent humidity--things neither of them experience much in northeastern Colorado. We ate Mexican food, twice. Grilled out on the deck. Shot hoops in the driveway. Hosted a b-day party for The Geej. And generally did a lot of hanging out.

The Geej fell totally in love with Elder Son. Bless his nearly-13-yr.-old heart for putting up with her following him around and demanding his attention like a puppy dog.

As mentioned, the weekend culminated with a birthday party on Sunday for the Geej who I cannot believe is fucking 3 years old. Oh my GOD!! She is so not a baby anymore, y'all!

In a million ways, that's a total relief. But then I think: That's it. My only baby I'll ever have is no longer a baby.

It makes my insides ache.

Okay, enough about me...on to the fiesta!

We (meaning me, the Geej, BCH, Eldest Son, and Dah) descended upon the nearby Red Robin restaurant where we were soon joined by a bunch of her 2 - 4 yr. old friends and their TOTALLY awesome parents. There were balloons and the embarrassing waitstaff-singing-to-you moments, but overall it was great. In fact, no one from our table had a meltdown...not even the parents.



After lunch, everyone was nice enough to strap the kids back in the car seats and make the 3/4 mi. trek to Chez Geej where there were (as she requested) pink flowers, boons (balloons), cake and cookies. We chowed down and had a nice time. It was greased a bit by the mimosas and beer, but really, the kids all acted great and played well together (which helped).

Even though I didn't want to open presents until everyone had left, it was like trying to stop a tornado--that shit was just going to happen, no matter what I wanted. So Geej (and a couple of VERY enthusiastic older assistants) opened all of the presents--including the ones that the party guests had brought (even though I asked you freaks not to bring anything...I'm looking at YOU Millard)!!


A fishing pole!!

It was a lot of fun for all of us who were hosting. I'm hoping all the guests felt the same way.

Monday was The Geej's actual birthday, and that was the day of (cue "holy shit, something big's about to happen" music) The Great Dah-dah Give Away, 2007.

That's right: On her birthday, The Geej went cold turkey on her pacifiers (aka "dah-dahs").

We'd been talking about it for weeks:

"When you turn three, you're going to be a big girl, and we're going to give your dah-dahs to the babies at your old school."

But even with all the effort, she was all Nancy Spungen about it...junkying out on me...pulling each one out of the give-away sack for one...last blissful...suck.
So when the time came, one of sweet teachers (and occasional babysitter) Trina, from her old school where they actually had babies in attendance, came over and took the dah-dahs from Geej so that she could "give them to the babies."
There have been a couple of whiny moments, but for the most part, Geej has handled her withdrawal quite well.

There's much more, and I wish I could keep writing, but I'm too damn tired.

More tomorrow. I swear.