W asked me to explain the song "Wish Upon A Star" from his lullaby CD. I told him you could look at a star and make a wish. He thought about that for a few seconds and said, "I wish for marshmallows in the sky."

I asked if he wanted the marshmallows to stay in the sky or fall down. He gave me a look like I was an idiot and said, "The marshmallows would fall down from the sky and go on the gravel then I could pick them up and eat them!"

I told him that sounded like a very good wish. Yum.

I was terribly puzzled, yet happy that our trips to NY and FL did not end in being sick. However, our health has proved short-lived. I think W, M, and I all caught something on our big day out last Friday. I narrowed down the likeliest place to have been infected was during lunch at Baja Bean, since both boys were out of the stroller, and touching things then putting their hands in their mouths.

It doesn't sem likely that we would have caught anything from any of the art galleries we visited, since both boys were in the stroller the whole time, and thus had limited opportunity to touch things.

Fortunately, it's just a mild cold. For W and me, at least. Poor baby M is our canary-- his symptoms always get worse first. He was pretty cranky and miserable all day today. So much so that I decided I couldn't take him to church in his condition. Not that I don't see sick kids out and about all the time (and I've been guilty of taking W to the park while sick because he needs to get out of the house regardless at his age), but M is still a little baby and I thought his rest trumped the need to give him any sort of environment variey today. I'm glad I stayed home, since M took extra naps today, and is at least less cranky than he was when he woke up.

T is skeptical that W and I are really sick. I told him that we are PRE-sick. It's the phase of the cold when you don't feel sick but there are telltale signs that you've been infected with something. This time, I noticed that we all started sneezing yesterday, and I have been particularly tired (I think I fell asleep at 9pm on Friday night). Today M and I have runny noses. Although W was sneezing, too, I haven't noticed that his nose has been running much, so maybe he did avoid the cold. But he was with T all day, so I'm not sure. I've already started in with extra doses of Emergen-C. Often I can nip the cold in the bud during the PRE-sick stage, which is what I hope to do this time. Poor Max is not so lucky, he seems to get sick more than anyone else here. At least there is no fever or anything, so that's a blessing.

While T failed to take a single photo while he and W were in FL, at least I got some useful information about the trip. W spent an entire day playing with matchbox cars. That answers the question what to get him for his birthday quite nicely, I think. I've started my eBay bidding already. I figure I'll get him a box of cars, he won't care if they're new. They're going to get trashed anyway since I let him take most of toys outside if he likes. Although I prefer if he takes plastic toys out, so maybe we'll save the cars for inside. I'm not sure. So far I've been outbid two or three times, but I've still got a number of lots where I'm the high bidder. This is why I'm starting the process so early-- if you stick to your price for a commodity item, eventually you'll probably get it, but it can take awhile. My price right now is $.30 per car, including shipping. It might be too low, but I'm not convinced of that yet. I may raise my spending level in a few weeks if I haven't won anything by that time.

I mean to post photos from our NY trip, but have been having upload problems since google messed up their web photo service by mixing it with google+. I'm probably going to have to find some other way to manage my blog photos now, which will take a little while to switch over since I have no idea what my alternatives are now, it has been years since I set up this blog so I don't even remember what I've got to do to change things anymore, I totally forgot everything I learned about website crm programming I learned at the time. . .

I finally finished packing for my trip, I leave early tomorrow morning! Well, I've finished packing clothes for Max and I. Which required finishing laundry. But I did reach laundry nirvana today-- there are NO dirty clothes in the house! ALL the laundry got done!

The weather in NY is predicted to not only be cold, but with freezing rain. If I were a tourist, I'd be hating it. I am somewhat resigned to LOOKING like a tourist since I can't manage distances in heels while carrying a 17.5 pound baby, (not to mention the state of my hair at this point-- it's not bad, per se, but ain't like I was getting it cut and colored while living in NYC). But I'm not touring, I'm visiting friends, and the weather isn't going to be too much of a factor. I kept my heavy winter coat for a reason-- although it doesn't get nearly as much use here in VA as it used to in NY (it's too warm to wear if the weather is over 40F), it still makes travel to cold places much more tolerable. I dug out my super-sized cashmere scarf, too. Over the years I've found that is generally too warm to wear in VA, I've switched over to smaller, lighter scarves. My NYC scarf is enormous, and super-warm. It was cold here on Sunday, so I had a trial run wearing M and my coat at the same time. Even though the coat is a tad big on me, and I could close it over M when he was a newborn (not that I had any need to back in June), I cannot fasten it while I wear him. I have to hold it closed over him in the front. But his head and shoulders stick out, and there's just no amount of adjusting I can do to get him covered by the coat. But this giant warm scarf will do the trick, and keep us both warm.

Time to get back to work, and pack the diaper bag with all the myriad baby stuff one needs while traveling with an infant. Although I lucked out since the friend I'm staying with ALSO has an infant, so there's a lot I don't have to pack. I'm pretty sure I'll fit everything in one carry-on and an under-seat duffel bag, which will be the "diaper" bag. I might possibly need another small tote, we'll see.

While I lost a pair of pants today, I gained a ukulele! My instruction book is titled, "Play Ukulele Today!" and it delivered as promised. I'm armed with a few chords, and dangerous. Been walking around strumming "Mary had a little lamb" all afternoon, to the delight of the boys. Time to apply the few chords I know to the whole genre of kids music so I can be a veritable housewife-minstrel. And get this-- the gig bag that came with the instrument has built in back straps! So I can wear the instrument like a backpack leaving my hands free to carry the baby outside. Oh yeah, the neighbors are going to have to get used to the sweet strains of the concert uke. Today I was just strumming G7 and C repeatedly, but watch out, I'll be shredding in no time!