The Phillies have won the World Series

Our entire household couldn't be happier. We're going to the parade tomorrow and hopefully it won't be a total bust. Halloween and the Phillies championship parade! it's going to be a busy, no-nap, exciting day.

heat -- PLEASE!

With the thermostat at 56 degrees, rain, wind and the outside temperature in the thirties I flicked the switch and turned on the heat for the first time since the early spring. It might snow tonight! Now we just wait for the insanely high gas bills to roll in.

Go Phillies!

Made with Play-Doh

we're not lottery winners

I'm so glad that we never won the lottery. We usually don't buy lotto tickets but when the Powerball jackpot reaches over $100 million we buy a few tickets because it's too hard to resist. Had we won we would have had a lot of money invested in the market and would be out at least half our winnings. So, thank you lotto god.

up down in out

Baby Doodle knows his opposites. Last night when Mr. D and I were reading stories to BD I asked him if his feet were cold (they were bare in our freezing house). He said, "no, my feet are nice and warm." Then today when we were at Smith Playhouse I asked if the firetruck he was playing with was going to get to the fire fast. He said, "no, just slowly." I like that he uses adverbs correctly too.

it's cold

Our house is 58 degrees. We haven't turned on our heat yet. I'm typing with frigid fingers as the only space heater we have is currently running in baby Doodle's room while he naps (in his crib -- don't worry he can't hurt himself on the heated implement).

The lump part three

Baby Doodle's vascular lump (the one between his shoulder and neck on his right side) is going to be removed on November 11th (Veteran's Day and our friends' daughter's birthday). The doctor at CHOP who we have been seeing since BD was three months old will do the surgery. He recommended removing it now since it has grown a tiny bit and is likely not to recede into his body like he thought it might. There is a chance that it will get bigger as BD gets older and become a problem (block an airway or crucial veins). It sounds like a pretty benign procedure. He won't have to spend the night but will, obviously, be put under general anesthesia.

Just today I was filling out forms for one of my many doctor appointments and it asked what surgeries if any I have had. I wrote none. Poor baby Doodle would have to put one already in his short life.

The Phillies have done it!

Though Mr. Doodlebug has been a Phillies fan his whole life I only really became interested in their doing well when baby Doodle started showing intense interest in the team. So I was thrilled, not quite as thrilled as Mr. D, but thrilled nonetheless, that the Phillies won the league championship last night and are going to the World Series. I have to say, they are an impressive team. They don't rely on one or two key players to succeed, they really all contribute in one way or another. I've been impressed by Shane Victorino, who when we went to Flyin' Hawaiian day at the ball park over the summer seemed to be in a slump (I gathered this from Mr. D's yelling at him during the game, saying things like c'mon!). Jayson Werth is definitely the hottest and good at baseball too. Chase Utley's not bad either, on both counts.

Baby Doodle was very excited this morning to learn that the Phillies won. He threw his hands up and yelled, "the Phillies winned." He LOVED the pictures of them in the paper. Here are two shots of him admiring them.

I hope they can pull it off and win the whole damn thing. How excited baby Doodle will be to go to the parade.

That is the Phillie Phanatic on his shirt.

2 1/2

Baby Doodle is now 30 months old, that's two and a half. It's hard to believe how big and mature he's getting -- telling me what he wants to eat, eating it himself, playing with other kids, understanding lessons like taking turns etc. . . -- while at the same time remaining a baby in some ways -- wearing a diaper, sleeping in a crib with a pacifier, being strolled around town, and whining when he doesn't get something he wants.

He's articulate both in knowing the words he needs to express anything he wants and in annunciating those words so he can be understood, not just by me but by just about anyone, though sometimes he needs me to repeat what he said. He is obsessed with baseball, both playing it and watching it, specifically the Phillies, and with playing trains. The first thing he says when he wakes up after asking if "can we see if somping's on tv?" is "do you want to play trains with me?" He got a set for Christmas last year and has been playing with them ever since. He tries to make as long a train as he can and then proudly pull it around the tracks without losing a single car. He points out the whistle, smoke stack, freight cars, passenger engine and car etc. . .

He's becoming good at having full back-and-forth conversations on the phone. He is the most engaged with my brother who has no trouble understanding him over the phone, whereas my father can't hear well to begin with and is always guessing the wrong words he says. The other day he independently invited Grammy and Grandad (my in-laws) over to our house. They took the invitation to mean that we had put baby Doodle up to asking them, when really he acted completely on his own. We're going to see them another weekend.

He's still a very good eater. Today for lunch he ate half a bagel, yogurt and some of my salad. He will eat vegetables now and then, loves the usual favorites: mac and cheese, pizza, pb & j. He'll usually try and/or eat whatever we put in front of him.

He will sit on the potty if he's naked but nothing actually happens. Then when he has his diaper on he'll go. We're not pushing it. I've been working on converting the guest room into his new room. We have two scheduled guest visits and then the room will be his at the beginning of November.

Overall he's a very well-behaved, gentle, kind boy. I'm already starting to mourn our time together, just him and me. The new baby will forever change our family dynamic as it is now, for the better I'm sure, but still I'm a little sad that we've nearly reached the end of an era.