Both Julia Childs and Alton Brown prefer unglazed Quarry Tiles over pizza stones.

That's where I got the idea from.

We have achieved climbing. I looked away for five seconds while she was on the love seat and found her standing on the back of it, leaning against the window.

I come home tonight and there's my daughter standing on the loveseat. It took me a second before I realized that she shouldn't be there.

Then she fell and smacked her head tonight. Big ol' bruise on her head. And yet, back on the horse.

My new band is going to be called The Pizza Stones. They'll do all the early Stones hits in a cheezy Italian accent. They'll do the "Ptui!" thing a lot.

Reminds me of the Italian REM cover band whose name escapes me. They did a decent version of "Talk About The Passion" on an REM cover album called Surprise Your Pig.

Is it Violent Green, dw?

Upon googling, it appears the band in question is Samson and the Philistines. Now I want to hear it.

Granted, we're only a few hours in, but climbing seems almost as harrowing as having a newborn in the house. My only peace is going to be when she's asleep, huh?

t cries

My only peace is going to be when she's asleep, huh?

For now. Then the sleepovers will start, and there goes that one small consolation.

I don't know if I've mentioned it lately, but she's one smart and beautiful little girl.

Right now I wish I had a new job starting tomorrow and Annabel in some nice daycare, not just because I'm broke but because then I could surf the internets and work on my novel between the stuff I was paid to do without worrying that Annabel is breaking her neck if my eyes aren't constantly on her.

t cue usual angsting about bad financial choices of my adult life that keep us from having a big enough house to have a proper safe room all for Annabel's own

Susan, please stop flagellating yourself over this. Annabel is a healthy, happy toddler who will continue to be happy and healthy, no matter what size house you live in. All that's important to her is the fact that her mommy and daddy love and dote on her without reservation. And clean diapers. You'll never be able to completely child-proof a room, let alone a house. She's smart enough to peel the paint off the walls if that's the only thing left in the room.

Annabel is a healthy, happy toddler who will continue to be happy and healthy, no matter what size house you live in.

Barring catastrophic falls because I happen to turn my back for two seconds. Sigh.

I'm about to go read for an hour, now that she's in bed, because I want to actually do some relaxing, just-for-fun reading for a change, dammit. (My books of the week have been fiction research that's interesting but a bit of a slog, plus a memoir I felt like I should read because it's considered Important among the sort of lefty Christians I commune with, only I thought the author was self-indulgent and self-important, and couldn't present an idea in an orderly linear fashion if his life depended upon it, so last night I gave myself permission to put it in the back-to-library pile unfinished.) And then I'm going to take a fresh look at the living room and see if I can reconfigure things a little so that every second of my life won't be a game of keepaway.

Middle class famalies in NYC live in one bedroom apartments for YEARS after a baby is born. And they don't seem to have a rash of developmental delays. (We DO have baby bars on the windows though and those are darn handy)

I grew up in a big house and look how screwed up I am.