Gus "I never post on Facebook" Chung(lund) already posted this on his Facebook, thus making it redundant, but it warrants a blog post anyhow. This evening Little Miss J was being her wild little self jumping on the couch, which is typically frowned upon in the Chunglund household. When told not to jump, she replied that she was "hopping," and when asked not to hop she claimed she "ribbit." Finally, when I thought we had exhausted all versions of jumping, hopping and the like - the following occurred:
Me: Are we supposed to jump on the couch?
J: No.
Me: Are we supposed to hop on the couch?
J: No
Me: Are we supposed to ribbit on the couch?
J: No
(Little Miss J starts jumping on the couch again)
Me: What are you doing?
J: Up and down
(Gus laughing his head off from the kitchen)
I am clearly in over my head. The video below was taken subsequent to the previous verbal exchange.
The Chunglunds, including Carl, piled into the Xterra and headed to Lake Tahoe in search of some snow. We ended up at Echo Lake snow park, which had plenty of snowy woods for us all to play in. Carl even got to run off-leash. Little Miss J was nonplussed by the cold white stuff at first.
this picture was taken mere seconds before she face plants into the snow bank.
She warmed up to the idea of snow, but continued to hate on the hats and mittens. She never quite got the whole thumb in a separate spot thing.
She definitely started to like it when the sled came out
But no matter how much fun Little Miss J had, I think this Chunglund had the most fun.
We got a last minute invitation to Gus's cousin's house for Thanksgiving dinner, so we abandoned our turkey and trimmings in the refrigerator for another day. Saturday we busted it out and put together our own belated Thanksgiving dinner. I posted our menu on Facebook and some folks asked for recipes so here you go ...
Spicy Cranberry Chutney - I used Thai chilis rather than jalapenos and added some cardamom and cinnamon. This was also an opportunity to use the oranges and lemons from our citrus trees in the backyard.
Corn Pudding - Found this one on Pinterest. Someone in Gus's family always makes this awesome corn souffle and this is the best recreation I've found. I even made this for the daycare's Thanksgiving dinner and those little turkeys gobbled it up.
Last year I was turkey trotting with one of my besties, Suzanne. This year to preemptively work off some of those Thanksgiving calories, I signed up for Sacramento's Run to Feed the Hungry to benefit the Sacramento Food Bank & Family Services. The course goes right by our house and a couple other families in our neighborhood do the run/walk.
If you remember the last 5K we did with Little Miss J it involved emergency diapers being fashioned out of free race t-shirts. You can refresh your memory here. One would have thought we would have learned our lesson. I hang my head in shame as I write this. Little Miss J apparently gets nervous tummy before a race, which is understandable, because shortly before the gun went off she tells me "poopy diaper." Thankfully, our across the street neighbors were able to donate a diaper and some wipes.
With clean pants, Little Miss J was ready to run (or walk). She was not really about the stroller riding thing, and managed to make it one whole mile on those chubby little legs. It was a crisp autumn morning and the neighborhood looked beautiful with all the fall colors. We cut out of the race where it went by our street, as Little Miss J had clearly had enough. I had been bribing her with sticks, leaves, and water bottles for the last mile. It was the perfect way to spend Thanksgiving morning and we are thankful for all our new friends.
We haven't really been pushing the potty training, but thought we might make a concerted effort this weekend. Little Miss J requested Dora underwear so I obligingly picked up a pack at Target. I told her that when she uses the potty, then she can wear the underwear. She has understood this to mean that when one is actually physically sitting on the toilet, then one wears underwear. As such, she asks for Dora when she wants to go potty and then puts them around her ankles while she is sitting on the toilet.
In case you hadn't noticed by my regularly updates from one airport or another, we were in Florida last weekend for brother-in-law's wedding. As the bride, according to Facebook, has changed her last name to Chung, my hopes for a portmanteau have been officially dashed. Chungman would have been cute though, no?
The day after the wedding, we took advantage of the few precious hours between sending the bride and groom off on their honeymoon and heading back to the airport ourselves to take Little Miss J to the ocean. She was a little bit hesitant at first, but by the end she was laying down in the surf and letting the waves crash over her head.
While the numbering system here is not particularly accurate, there have been a number of parenting fails over the past few years. It happens. We, as moms, tend to be hard on ourselves and see things like the occasional McDonald's drive-thru run or lack of a Cricut for scrapbooking as our own parenting fails.
This evening it became clear that Little Miss J was on the verge of nuclear meltdown so Gus drove her and I back to the hotel for some chillaxing time. She was screaming her face off in the backseat first about "Juliet do it" referencing the fact that we didn't let her buckle herself into her seat by herself followed by a broken record recording of what sounded like "big cock." Having become somewhat immune to the toddler tantrum, I ignored her and inappropriately giggled to myself about "big cock."
As the screams continued, Gus managed to deciper that she was saying, "feet" rather than referring to her "big cock" or lack thereof. It turns out she was saying "feet stuck," which indeed they were - at least one of them. Her carseat was in the middle seat in the back and she had managed to get her left leg wedged behind the driver's seat and couldn't extricate it on her own. Once her leg was unstuck, tantrum over. Magic.
In one of the many parenting books I perused, I'm sure I read somewhere that I should check to see if there is actually something wrong before letting my kid cry it out. In my own defense, after my cross-country adventure I'm not thinking entirely clearly and am so exhausted that I can barely think straight. But nonetheless failure noted. Sorry, Little Miss J! You were right. Your foot was in fact stuck.
If you are still undecided, you could always vote for Super Bunny.
Super Bunny has a super crush on Elmo, so Big Bird and all his PBS friends can rest easy. She's on a mission to make this nation a better place one adorable act at a time. She tends to be a bit on the conservative side. She was recently heard singing "bye bye Bama" to the tune of La Bamba but she may have been unduly influenced (ahem GUS). Offers of Jelly Bellys, Max & Ruby, or iPad however, do wonders in appealing to her bipartisan nature. Latest polls, and by polls I mean Facebook "likes," indicate that her approval ratings are quite high.
this photo alone garnered 30+ likes
Plus, her presidential running mate is the one and only Carl Rove. Always there to lick your face, fetch a ball, or chase a squirrel. All useful qualities in a VP.
Super Bunny's positions on most issues can be summarized as "like" or "no like." We, as her campaign managers, like to keep her platform simple:
Don't hit/bite people
If you can't manage No. 1, at least say you're sorry if you hurt someone
Listen to your expert advisors (aka Mom and Dad)
Wear shoes and pants when going outside
Say "please" and "thank you"
Dance everyday
Take turns
No monkeys jumping on the bed!
So if you think that hitting/biting people is BAD and no monkeys jumping on your bed is GOOD, then Super Bunny might be the candidate for you!
VOTE SUPER BUNNY! This message is endorsed by the Chunglund Party.
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