NKOTB mania

It's back, my friends. In a big way.

Tonight, for example, the New Kids on the Block were at the Best Buy in Burbank signing autographs for the 650 fans who pre-ordered their new CD from that store, which went on sale this morning at 10 a.m. I did not order the CD, so I didn't have a special pass to get to wait in the ridiculously long line to get their autograph, but I was in the store when they got there.

My friend, Jenn, and I had planned to go down there to get a glimpse this evening. To do so, we were going to meet Chris for dinner after work (since he works in Burbank) at Olive Garden, which is in the same shopping plaza as the Best Buy. Jenn couldn't make it, as her hubby's out of town and her 9-month-old seems to be teething and was inconsolable this afternoon.

Emma and I met Chris for dinner, then we got finished and Emma wanted desperately to ride home with Daddy. So Chris said it was fine for me to go ahead to Best Buy to see if I could see my guys. So I went over and found that I wasn't the only one who had the idea. I made friends with a few other ladies who were doing the same thing as me. We chatted and stood by the laptops pretending to shop so we could try to get a good view of the guys as they came in.

There was a little confusion as to where they were coming in, but when they did come through, it was pandemonium. Holy crap. You've never seen 30- and 40-year-old ladies pushing and shoving each other around like that unless it was the day after Thanksgiving at the mall. Craziness.

Since I'm short, I couldn't get very good photos, but I talked a nice Best Buy employee into getting up close and getting me some good photos. It was awesome. Here are some of the pics he got for me.
Here are all the photos from my time at Best Buy this evening. It was tons of fun. I felt like a teeny-bopper again, all squealy and giddy.

I can't wait to go to the concert in October!

That's all for now. More later.

Bingo!

OK, so I can't say much about my experience, but I can tell you that I did tape an episode of Bingo America. I don't know when it will air, but if/when I find out, I'll let you all know.

Richard Karn was very nice. Amy, you should know that I wore the long necklace I just bought from you, and we he came over near us before we started shooting, he commented on it. So yay for that! :) And for all you other readers, if/when you watch the show and you see my necklace, you can order similar or other beautiful jewelry from Amy Cornwell Designs.

That's all for now. More later.

The Lock and the Frantic Mommy

Let me preface this story by saying that Emma knows Daddy doesn't take any guff and that Mommy will take said guff longer than him. Today I decided to that I shouldn't take it as long as I normally do. Which is where our story begins. (Keep in mind that some of this is purely speculation on my part, but I'm pretty sure I'm spot on.)

As I put Emma down for a nap, I told her that she needs to stay in bed and that if she opened the door one time I would come in there and smack her hand. I kissed her and told her to have a good nap and closed the door.

I heard her through the monitor moving around and playing in her room for probably an hour, and then I heard it. She opened the door. I put down the footrest on my chair, which makes noise. I heard her scramble around and close the door as I made my way to her room, and as I put my hand on the knob and tried to turn it, I discovered it was locked.

I knocked loudly on the door and told Emma to unlock the door. She immediately started crying (because she knew that she shouldn't have locked the door). I pounded on the door some more (because, honestly, that's a scary feeling not being able to get to my child) and yelled for Emma to unlock the door. She kept saying, "Not right now." We went on like this for what seemed like forever, which was probably only about 3-5 minutes.

Finally, at Chris' suggestion, I tried to calmly talk her through unlocking the door. The first few times I asked her to please unlock the door, she said, "Not right now." Finally she unlocked the door, and I went into her room. I picked her up and hugged her and told her to never, ever do that again because it scared Mommy.

I put her back in her bed and told her it was time to take a nap. She napped without incident.

That's all for now. More later.

Game show

I can't go into details about my day today (for legal reasons), but I spent the day waiting in a freezing cold room with no windows and with 5 other women to film for a game show. There were 6 of us total, and they were filming 5 shows today. After arriving at 7:15 a.m. and waiting all day in the room - with no cell phones, since they took them away from us when we got there - I found out around 6:00 p.m. or so that I was not going to film today and will need to come back at 7:15 a.m. Wednesday morning to film then. Then I had to wait for another hour or so until I could leave the premises. UGH. Talk about frustrating.

Exciting news about the show, though. Richard Karn (Al Borland from "Home Improvement") is the new host, so I'll get to meet him! :)

So anyway, that was my day. I got up and left before Emma woke up, and I almost didn't make it home before she went to bed. But she got to spend a fun day with Daddy, and I hear they had a great time. I'm glad for that.

That's all for now. More later.

Call me crazy, but: Being sequestered in a room with only a few other people is probably a little taste of what it's like in hell.

Total failure

My intent to blog more has really not worked out well, has it? I can tell you exactly what the problem is: Facebook. I'm on there ALL the time, chatting with friends or playing Bingo or playing Scrabble against my friend Jamie (she beats me a LOT, but I've taken a few games, thank you very much) or sending plants or Muppets or whatever. There's so much to do, and I often lose myself in the monstrosity that is Facebook. I think it's a disease, akin to Olympics fever, which I also have.

Got my hair cut last Friday. I liked the layers, but the length wasn't working for me. Now it's just above my shoulders, and I really like it.

Emma had swim class again today. She's doing very well, and I'm very proud of her for becoming so comfortable with being in the water. She had picked up two diving rings and another diving toy and was walking over to the wall to put them on the side of the pool. One of her teachers asked her if she wanted the ring he had. She said, "No thank you. I have enough." It cracked him up. I actually didn't hear her reply, but he told me. So funny. My little comedienne.

Emma's been doing extremely well sleeping in her crib-turned-daybed with the bed rail. Oh, and if I haven't told you yet, I stopped nursing. She's doing well with that, too. When I was changing her diaper before her nap today, she said, "I don't need milk." I said no she didn't because she's a big girl and gave her a high five.

That's all for now. More later.

Call me crazy, but: There is absolutely no way a lot of those female gymnasts from China are 16. No way.

Addiction

So I have an addiction. It's bad. I'm addicted to watching the Olympics. It's causing me to lose sleep since I stay up so late glued to the TV watching the excitement. Who saw the 400 freestyle relay the other night? CRAZY exciting! And how about that USA men's gymnastics team? They did so great!

Emma officially has an agent now. And she will be receiving a permit to work in the entertainment industry soon. So we will hopefully be going on lots of auditions soon, and then you'll hopefully see my little girl on commercials! It's all a bit overwhelming, but our agent is great and answers any and all of my questions. Right now we're just working on getting everything all set up and in place so we can really get started.

Emma starts another swim class Tuesday afternoon. Should be fun.

That's all for now. More later.

Call me crazy, but: I think swimming is one of the most exciting events to watch at the Olympics.

Hello!

I don't have anything to talk about today, but I wanted to check in and say hello. Emma got a haircut the other day. We (the stylist and I) decided the best course of action to attempt to counteract her two serious cowlicks is to try to grow it out. So she trimmed it all over to help it get healthy, and now hopefully it will get growing. It looks cute on her. Trying to pull it back more to train the top part to start laying down instead of coming forward like a bad comb-over. Pulling it back makes Emma look older, I think.

We start another swim class next week. Should be fun, and it's always a good reason to go to the pool, even for a little bit.

A friend of mine went to Comic-Con, which was recently held in San Diego. She was on the train with her husband and son (Emma's friend, Soren), and it turned out the entire cast of Heroes was on the train, too! She got to see them all! She was so excited. What a lucky day! I would have died.

That's all for now. More later.

Call me crazy, but: It's a sad day when paying $4.09 for gas sounds cheap.

Musical selection

I thought I'd let you all know what kind of music Emma and I listen to in the car these days. I have one of those visor CD holders, and Emma knows what order they're in. It's really funny. We've got a fairly eclectic mix of music up there.

1. Flo Rida, 'Mail on Sunday' (Emma likes song #5, "Low". She calls the CD "Low Low Low".)
2. Avril Lavigne, 'The Best Damn Thing' (Emma loves the upbeat songs, especially #1, "Girlfriend". She calls this CD the pink one.)
3. Maroon 5, 'Songs about Jane' (Emma refers to this CD as "Mommy music".)
4. The Beatles, 'Love' (Emma loves The Beatles. She knows what songs are coming up next when we listen to the CD, which is crazy. Her favorite two songs are "Hey Jude" and "Here Comes the Sun" - where she still says "it's so nice" instead of "it's all right". She says she wants to hear Beatles when requesting this CD.)
5. The Best of '80s Pop, 'Party Songs' (You've gotta love '80s music. Emma's favorite is #2, "Love Shack" ... she likes the part where they say, "jukebox money". She calls the CD "Love Chack".)
6. Veggie Tales, 'Worship Songs' (It's Bob and Larry leading a kids' choir, which includes Junior Asparagus, through some popular worship songs. Emma loves the "Secret Place song". She calls the CD "Veggie Tales.")
7. Putumayo Kids presents 'New Orleans Playground' (Emma loves these. Sounds like we're at Mardi Gras when we play this CD. She calls this one the red one.)
8. Putumayo Kids presents 'Animal Playground' (This is a bunch of songs from around the world about animals. I think Emma's favorite is "L'Otorhinoceros", which is a French song about a rhinoceros. She calls this the green one.)
9. Sesame Street, 'Kids' Favorite Songs' (Emma loves this one. One of the funniest parts is in the song "John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt" where Elmo says maybe he can say it without laughing and tries to say it, starts laughing and says, "Not!" LOL The CD was put out in 1997, apparently when that saying was still in fashion. When she wants to hear it, she asks for Big Bird, since he's the first voice you hear on the CD.)
10. Songs Kids Love to Sing, 'Toddler Songs' (This has a ton of fun kid songs. Emma's favorites are "The Wheels on the Bus" ["Wee Bus" as she calls it], "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" ["Itsy Spider"] and "Hokey Pokey" ["Pokey Pokey"]. This is the yellow one.)
11. Greg and Steve, 'Kids in Motion' (This includes one of the songs Emma loved at Gymboree, "The Freeze". When she freezes, she still puts her hands on her head, since that's what they taught the kids to do at Gymboree. We don't listen to this one as much anymore, now that we don't go to Gymboree.)
12. They Might be Giants, 'Here Come the ABCs' (My friend Jenn told me about this CD. I like it, but Emma doesn't watch the show on which they do these songs. I think it's on a Disney show. Needless to say, we don't listen to this CD much.)
13. Go Fish, 'Snazzy' (These are the guys we saw in concert at Grace. Emma loved them. She loves this CD. Plus she's so cute when she says "Snazzy" when she wants to hear it.)

That's all for now. More later.

Call me crazy, but: Could the contestants on American Gladiators BE any more annoying when they get all bragadocious before the events?

Emma unscripted

Emma is quite the chatterbox. You never know what she's going to say. Sometimes she's hilarious, and other times she's as sweet as can be. Here's a top five list of funny and/or adorable things she's said recently.

5. "I love you so much." Not as much funny as it is so incredibly sweet, but it's funny when she breaks it out. I was pushing her in a cart at Wal-Mart the other day, and she leaned forward and hugged me and said it. I almost cried right there, it was so sweet. I was all choked up as I said, "Emma, do you know it makes Mommy's day when you say that?" Precious moments.

4. "I don't want to." OK, so this isn't funny either, but she says it ALL THE TIME. After you've heard it enough, it starts to be funny that she can say it SO many times in SO many different ways.

3. "It's OK. Don't cry. I'm here." She said this to her yellow Care Bear, whom she had to leave in her car seat in the car while we went to Rubio's for lunch. I asked if he was crying because he missed her, and she said yes.

2. "I want some every day." She says this about any- and everything. Earlier this evening, for instance, it was bananas. She wants bananas every day. She says it all the time.

And the funniest thing Emma said recently is... drum roll, please...

1. "You're beautiful because you are wearing pants." She said this to Chris the other day. Who knows why, but we will never forget it. I'm going to use it in a card.

That's all for now. More later.

Call me crazy, but: Even a woman who likes girly chick flicks and other such movies can like a good Rocky story. I just watched Rocky Balboa (the newest one) tonight BY MYSELF, and it was excellent.