Conspiracy theories

I just finished reading Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol, so I have conspiracy theories on my mind, but I still wasn't prepared when I heard yet another one about President Obama at my work (already have heard about the Muslim ones and the ones about him not being a citizen). One of my co-workers came in and started talking to someone sitting next to me about how her cousin was reading Revelations and thinks that Pres. Obama is the Anti-Christ and will rule for 3 1/2 years. Thank goodness she wasn't talking to me... I have no idea how I would have responded. He has been president for over a year and this is still going on?! Come on, let's not be poor losers. And lastly, anyone who has this much hatred doesn't seem like they are in the right place spiritually if it did happen to be the "end of times."

Just sayin.

Here's a Snopes link about the Anti-Christ theory, with an abolsutely crazy video "proving" the theory. And here's a link to some other theories about him... people are nuts.

Milestones

(I'm sure it just got about 10x harder to take his picture!)

Brayden is reaching milestones left and right and it is just amazing to watch. It is so neat how babies just learn all of this stuff, a lot of it seemingly on their own. I mean, Brayden hasn't really been around crawling babies, but he figured it out. He isn't a pro at it yet, of course, but he has crawled at least a few feet a couple times a day since Friday. I cannot tell you how excited I was on Friday night as he hesitantly crawled those first few feet towards me. I was pounding on the floor, both out of my own glee and because I was trying to encourage him. I didn't know the people who own the condo downstairs were there (it's a vacation condo for them), and they pounded on their ceiling so I stopped. It was pretty funny.

In the last month he has also:

-learned how to pull himself up to stand


-cruised around his activity table (it's only about a foot each way, but he has gone all the way around it)
-waved (he did it twice in one day in January but then stopped)
-he has actually stood without losing his balance for 10+ seconds at least 5 times
-and just yesterday and today he is starting to master reaching down to pick something up off the ground while he's standing at the couch or his activity table (this one takes some concentration and is adorable to watch)

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: babies are amazing. They learn so much in such a short period of time.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Sensitivity

I had never though of myself as being particularly oversensitive (or insensitive for that matter), but parenthood has definitely made me more sensitive, especially when I hear about children suffering. Adam says it happened to him too, so I'm guess it's something most parents go through.

There have been multiple child abuse stores in the news. There have been a couple where the baby that was abused and/or killed was around Brayden's age- those really got to me. Anything having to do with shaken baby syndrome gets me teary-eyed immediately.

I cried when a contestant on The Biggest Loser told her story about her husband and children dying.

SIDS stories scare me to death. I am so paranoid about him while he's asleep. If I'm awake, I'm checking him every 15 minutes or so.

Seeing footage of children and babies in Haiti seriously made me want to adopt. I'm not a perfect parent, we are by no means rich, but seeing what they have been left with made me so sad.

And just last night, I was watching an episode from the first season of House, M.D. I heard it was a good show, so I got it from my library. Well, about 3 episodes in, 4 babies in the maternity ward all get sick at about the same time, and House sets about solving the mystery. I cried when a baby was strapped down for a MRI, and I cried when one of the babies died and the news was broken to the parents. And the show isn't even real!

Sometimes I wonder why I even watch the news anymore. If any story is told that involves a child's suffering or death, I wind up a blubbering mess.

Funny Face

Anne Frank

Anne Frank's diary is on my list of 50 books to read this year as one of the rereads. I read it back in junior high and didn't remember much of it. Really, I'm glad I don't have a good memory of the classics I read in school, because when I reread them now I get so much more out of them then I did back then. This was no exception.

When I started reading it, I could just not get into it. Anne was such a typical teenager, and the diary seemed like pure fluff. And truthfully, it kind of was at first. However, due I'm sure to her atypical experience in hiding, she underwent transformations making her as or more mature than most adults out there today. One thing that she learned (through experience) before I learned it (through schooling) is this:

"Oh, it's sad, very sad that the old adage has been confirmed for the umpteenth time: "What one Christian does is his own responsibility, what one Jew does reflects on all Jews.""

It took me taking a class entitles Gender and Other Contemporary Issues and reading about the unfairness of one minority person being seen as a representative for their race, religion or ethnicity. Another sign of her maturity is found in this quote:

"It's difficult in times like these: ideals, dreams and cherished hopes rise withinn us, only to be crushed by grim reality. It's a wonder I haven't abandoned all my ideals, they seem so absurd and impractical. Yet I cling to them because I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart."

It was so sad to learn what happened to the Frank family. Now that I have a child, I cannot imagine being torn apart to different concentration camps and actually surviving your wife and both of your children as her father did.

7

By the way, I cannot believe Brayden is 7 months old today. Time is going much too fast. Also, I must have been wrong about the teething last week- he must have just been sick. Either that or that tooth is trying to slowly torture both and me by coming up and then receding back down, over and over again!