Clockwise from top left:
1. The Pasta Salad – From “A Taste of NPS”, a collaborative cookbook my mom bought 20 years ago
2. CPK’s BBQ Chicken Pizza – Tasty Kitchen/The Pioneer Woman
3. Chicken Fried Rice – Tasty Kitchen/The Pioneer Woman
4. Asian Noodle Salad – Tasty Kitchen/The Pioneer Woman

Clockwise from top left
1. & 2. Marcella Hazan 3 Ingredient Tomato Sauce – Steamy Kitchen
3. Espinacas con Garbanzos – Smitten Kitchen
4. Thai Chicken Pizza – Rachael Ray

We didn’t eat fast food ONCE this past week. For the record, they were ALL delicious. E ate everything, including the chickpeas.

And I’m not even the one leaving!

My good friend (both on the interwebs AND in real life, which in itself is pretty amazing) Amanda is moving to Virginia in two weeks and I am sad. Her stupid husband is making her go. Ok, the Navy is making them go but it’s hard to be mad at a giant government institution rather than one guy. Even if he is a giant dork super nice.

Amanda is the kind of friend who says stuff like “One of these days we should go check out that museum” or “This summer, let’s go to the lake” or “There’s an apple festival in Salem this weekend that looks fun” and then ACTUALLY DOES IT. I am baffled by that kind of motivation. 99% of all my “Oh, we should totally go…” end with me sitting on the couch stuffing my face with Goldfish and watching a Law & Order marathon (yet another reason canceling cable might be good for me). They have made us let us tag along on so many fun weekend outings that last week when we WEREN’T with them, Madison, Amanda’s daughter (age almost 4),  turned to her mom and asked “Where’s Miss Suz?” unable to understand how it was possible to do stuff without us.

Besides inviting us to parties and barbecues and parks and beaches, Amanda is my magical porch fairy/hand me down baby toy provider. For the whole past year at least once a week we find presents/baked goods on our porch, always from Amanda & family, always delicious & useful. ALL of Baby Evan’s favorite stuff came from them, including a super duper awesome playhouse we’ll be taking ownership of after their going away party next weekend, where I plan to throw a giant fit and beg them to stay. But not before stuff that awesome house into the back of our minivan. It keep the kid entertained for FOUR HOURS last nigt.

OH. AND. WHO IS SUPPOSED TO MAKE A CAKE FOR BABY EVAN’S SECOND BIRTHDAY? I couldn’t even attempt something like the one Amanda made for his first birthday unless I am 100% prepared to cut off a finger/get very drunk/end up lying on the floor in tears after three hours.

Amanda introduced me to Twitter, to blog giveaways, to Gardener’s Lake, to the church we (sporadically) attend, and to a zillion other things. They play marbles with us and don’t even mind that E yells and I call people names. Madison loves Baby Evan (she’s started requesting her own baby brother) and does an amazing job of playing and sharing with him when they’re together. Their friendship has meant so much to us during the past year, especially in the transition from DINKs (dual income no kids) to Dad works, Mom stays home with a baby all alone and desperate for someone to talk to who doesn’t want to chew on her nipples.

I jokingly threatened to slash some tires to prevent their leaving, but I think Amanda’s a little afraid I wasn’t joking. But of course I was. Slashed tires would barely slow them down at all! Pulling some random bits out of the engine, now THAT would take a few weeks to straighten out.

Still kidding. Mostly. We’ll miss you guys!

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p.s. Today is the LAST DAY to vote in the BlogLuxe awards (bebehblog is nominated in the funniest category!) so if you wouldn’t mind clicking right over there on that little black button I would love you forever and ever too —–>

Last night my parents took E and Baby Evan and I out to dinner at our favorite small local place Chili’s. Go ahead, laugh at me for thinking it’s one of the best restaurants ever but you KNOW IT’S TRUE. Who doesn’t want a giant pile of fried onion straws and a huge burger and a white chocolate blondie with a giant margarita blackberry iced tea to wash it down after a long day of screaming, screechy, smacking baby watching?

Anyways, after the third or fourth time Baby Evan threw something on the floor I decided I needed a moment to myself and ran to hide in the bathroom. As I slunk past all the people having their dinners ruined by That Family who insist on bringing their child to dinner even though he keeps screaming like his hair is on fire aka US I noticed a lady sitting in one of the back booths. She was probably upper middle aged and kind of frumpy and what I would definitely call the stereotype of the crazy cat lady eating dinner by herself in a busy restaurant. And I was INSANELY JEALOUS.

When I was in college, I used to spend a lot of time alone. Not is a “woe is me I am so sad and angsty” way. I just liked getting to make all my own decisions without worrying what someone else thought or wanted or felt like doing that day. Between classes and work and the 2+ hours I spent at the gym 6 days a week (I really liked my gym) by the time dinner came along I couldn’t bear calling around and doing the socially required “Do you want to get dinner? I know we had pasta last night but I’m really in the mood for Italian again but if you’re not we can go for BBQ but if that one place is too expensive there’s that other place and if we get a cab we don’t have to park because that part of town is busy on Fridays but I don’t mind driving either” dance just to eat something. (And don’t ask why I didn’t ever make my own food – I was 21 and employed and lived in a city with some of the very best restaurants in the world.)

So I started going to restaurants alone. And I LOVED it. I carried a book in my purse and would get the smallest table by a window and half-read half-people watch while I enjoyed my sandwich or Thai food or clam chowder or whatever. The book kept most of the overly-friendly-let-me-rescue-you-from-being-lonely-dudes away and I got to know the staff at a few of my favorite places and they learned letting me sit quietly meant a nice tip to make up for hogging their table. Not only did I get to enjoy my book and my food, I always felt incredibly grown up and worldly and brave for eating alone and not caring if anyone thought I was being stood up or didn’t have any friends or smelled really bad and couldn’t get anyone to sit with me.

I cannot remember the last time I got to eat alone. I don’t even get to eat alone in my own house anymore – there’s always a tiny person yanking on my pants or shoving his hands in my bowl or SCREAMING at me. (Seriously, the screaming is getting way out of hand around here.) As much as I honestly love bringing the baby with me most of the time – grocery shopping is a fun way to show him shapes and colors and new things and we both enjoy it – every once in a while it would be super awesome to…not.

I think the next time I need to go bask in the joy that is Target run very important errands down by the mall I’m going to take a book and enjoy some Panera. ALONE.

I am declaring WAR. An all-out battled to the death from which no one emerged unscathed and the casualties will be severe. The target of the impending attack: MY FLOORS.

With a dog and two cats, pet hair has always been a problem, but the kind I could generally solve with a broom and the occasional damp paper towel. But add a baby to the mix and suddenly the pet hair dust bunnies grow into tumbleweeds of Cheerios and Goldfish crackers and bits of sandwich and half chewed fruit and sticks and leaves and the kind of foot-blackening dirt that sticks to the floor unless you scrub it with straight bleach and a toothbrush. If I don’t sweep, dry Swiffer, wet Swiffer, mop and vacuum EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. the baby gets so covered in dirt he looks like that kid from Charlie Brown who vibrates with grime. I can’t take him out in public after 3 pm out of fear someone will call CPS. And if CPS comes to my house I’m SCREWED.

I took up the rug this weekend (sidenote: what the HELL was I thinking when I picked out a shag rug for the family room? It’s basically a giant upside down yarn mop that traps every crumb and hair and is IMPOSSIBLE to clean) thinking it would be easier to do a quick mid-day sweep of just the hardwood floor but all it did was create a barren desert for the dirt tumbleweeds to tumble across. Plus my problem with sweeping wasn’t so much rug-related as 300-wooden-blocks-two-dozen-chuck-the-trucks-four-sippy-cups-and-a-partridge-in-a-pear-tree-scattered-acr0ss-my-floor-related.

The most permanent solution to my problem is to get rid of the pets, although I don’t think I can bring myself to actually do that. (A quick Google search for “how long do cats live” reveals no hopeful results.) I suppose the other thing I could do is restrict snacks and meals to the high chair but the idea of making Baby Evan sit still for the 7 or 8 hours a day he’s eating something is laughable. I think he would rather give up food than be strapped in a chair that often – and since I JUST got him to eat I’m not doing anything that might hurt his love of stuffing his face.

So I’m left with war. The kind of furniture moving deep cleaning usually only reserved for the holidays or right before my mother comes. (CRAP. My mother is coming TOMORROW.) I’ll buy stock in Swiffer and reacquaint myself with my Dustbuster. I will pick up toys three times a day instead of once. I will not rest until the baby can strip naked, dump a cup of juice on his head and roll across the room without a single speck of dirt sticking to his body.

Ok, maybe that’s a little too ambitious. But I’ve got to do something.

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They reset the list on Top Baby Blogs so all that begging I did last week was useless. If you could take a second to click on the link below – and then click in the middle of the screen where it says “Vote here!” – I’d really appreciate it. The click is your vote, you don’t have to find me on the list but I encourage you to check out the other blogs over there – TONS of awesome moms (and dads).