Shameless begging disguised as a blog post.

Long ago, maybe two years ago, long in internet terms anyway, someone sent me an invitation to join Twitter.

I laughed out loud. I seriously thought that it was a joke. Someone had realized the ridiculousness of every suburban nobody publishing their excruciating lives in microscopic detail, and thought "ha! wouldn't it be funny if we took this one step further and had up-to-the-second blogging?" I figured that they sent it to me because as one of those self publishing "twits" I was in a unique position to realize how ridiculous it was. Ha ha, I get the joke. Now seriously, let me get back to my blog, I was about to update about the color and texture of my newborn's poo, and how at first I thought it meant he was dying but now, after extensive googling I've decided that it means he's gifted.

Then I saw a "twitter" side bar on someone's blog and realized that, no, it was a real thing. Then I banged my head against the table several times and loudly wailed "what is the world coming to!??"

So I felt superior for awhile, because I wasn't going to get involved with anything so blatantly absurd.

Then I accidentally joined facebook (seriously, it was a slip and fall sort of thing, I'll tell you about it sometime) and was seduced by the "status update" format of internet expression and the blog languished. I mean, of course, every so often there would be a poo so monumental that I just couldn't not blog about it, but for all those normal everyday poos it was just so much easier to type "Ragnar's baby's poo was within normal range for smell and texture, although color was a bit on the greenish side."

Shortly after that I started thinking of Twitter as a party that I'd dis-invited myself to.

And here I am. The goth kid in the prom dress. The nerd on the cheerleader squad.

Ragnar. A twit. You all knew it was inevitable didn't you? Just play along and act surprised okay?

@MamaRagnar

I'll feel less redunculous when I have some followers.

Ragnar...my pride, it's stuck in my throat, the Heimlich, quick somebody!

Three times a day...

At some point it will sink in, and I will no longer be tempted to say things that are basically a variation of "Wow! This baby is different than the last one."

Food is on our minds here at Chez Ragnar. I am exploring my yearly urge to plant and harvest, and Ragnarbaby is discovering the exciting world that is food from a spoon. When Ragnarson was a wee one, I gave him some experimental "solids" at 5 and a half months in a misguided attempt to encourage the "sleeping through the night" which it turns out he is simply not capable of. My first born is many things, but a sleeper is not one of them. Conversely, I decided to wait on solids for as long as possible with Ragnarbaby, since the last thing I feel like doing these days is preparing yet another meal (that would make three...one for Manimal, Rat Girl an I, one for the picky-pants Ragnarson and now...sigh...a freezer full of puree for the baby).

Someone had a different idea.

It started with squash, and then sweet potato. Then we moved on to peas, parsnips, beets, avacados, applesauce, cheerios, teething buscuits and soup. It's been a busy three weeks.

You know the great thing about feeding your baby beets? Zombie baby pictures.

Next time: my misguided attempts at the cultivating of food.

Ragnar...eat eat eat, three times a day, everyday.

PS. Thanks to those of you who have mentioned that you've missed seeing regular updates in this space. I love feed back and I'm really happy that you're enjoying these posts...but for Goddess sake! why don't you comment?

PPS. Apologies for the crap pictures, but my "real" camera is crapped out and I can't face the Nikon "warranty" department.

PROJECT..."scrap paper notebooks"

If you actually read that huge list of things that I proposed to do during the year of 2010, you might remember that submitting a project to instructables was one of my goals. For those of you not familiar with Instructables, it's an awesome site. Members post step-by-step instructions for just about any project you can possibly imagine. Way way way in the dark and dusty archives of the old D.P. there is a post where I linked some instructables projects, such as hooking LED's up to your bike wheel to make a lighted picture while you're riding...I of course would like to pimp out my spinning wheel, but haven't tackled electronics as a hobby just yet.

One of the things they do are contests, and they are running a contest right now for uses for paper coffee cups. I drink a lot of coffee, and I do occasionally come in contact with a paper cup, so I thought I might be able to think up some use for the garbagey things.

Voila! A scrap paper notebook. The only "new" thing in this project is the thread. The covers are of course, coffee cups, and the pages are messed up bids from our construction company, which we have a lot of, because apparently I haven't learned my lesson about proof reading BEFORE I print.

Super easy, super quick and super cool. All of my friends and neighbors will be getting "garbage" notebooks for solstice this year.

Ragnar...dumpster diving is the new black.