Today, I'm Thankful For...

Happy Thanksgiving, y'all! I've spent the morning slaving away over a corn pudding recipe (by the way, multiplying a recipe that serves eight by three is a little difficult at 8 am, in case you haven't tried that yet), and now I've got to find the perfect pair of stretch pants to head over to my parents' house to gobble gobble. I'm afraid I haven't followed the trend of listing everything I'm grateful for for the last 27 days, so in hopes of making up for that, here are the top three things I'm thankful for this year:

1. I'm thankful for the millions of dollars I have in the bank.
2. I'm thankful for my mansion.
3. I'm thankful that I have a Lexus, because they are the safest cars ever made, and it's important to be safe at this time of year.

... Just kidding. I don't have any of those things. But don't some of the "I'm thankful for..." statuses you see on Facebook make you feel jealous like those three did? Well stop your worrying, folks, because the three things I'm truly thankful for won't make you jealous at all.

1. Robitussen PM, Robitussen daytime, Tylenol Cold pills, and cough drops. This time last week I was just coming down with the self-diagnosed cat scratch fever.

Probably caught it from Mabes. I was worried I'd be banished from this year's festivities because of my gross cough and runny nose. But thanks to the miracle drugs listed above, the fangs have gone away and I am healthy as a horse. Plus I have a nice healthy appetite to stuff myself with as many mashed potatoes as possible. I hope whoever made the taters this year bought in bulk.

2. Evanshine's beard is starting to itch. Haha! Evanshine's version of No-shave November may just be coming to a close.

3. Mabel doesn't seem to have peed on anything for the last two months. That's what it's all about, folks.

Well, I hope you are all with your families, friends or dear pets, packing on the pounds today. If you don't over-indulge on Thanksgiving, how are you going to resolve to lose weight in January? 

I hope by the time you read this, you're all looking like this:

And in honor of this joyous occasion, I leave you with some poetry:

I'm happy on Thanksgiving Day,

I've eaten till I'm sore! 

I wish I were an elephant, 

So I could eat some more!

Unsolved Mysteries

I had some photos taken of myself this weekend.

The photos were taken by Evanshine, at my request, to show you, dear readers, a little mystery that has popped up in my life lately.  You might notice that I appear to be missing a large chunk of what used to be my bangs. This is unfortunate for many reasons, including the fact that bangs are located on the front of your face where people tend to look at you in everyday life. 

I first noticed this problem when I was getting my hair cut and Stephanie asked me what happened to my bangs. I didn't really have an answer for her. Since it's Thanksgiving, and I would be thankful for my bangs if I still had all of them, I've put together a list of the most likely suspects so that I can get revenge on them. Because that's what Thanksgiving is all about!

In compiling my list, I considered (1) motive, (2) access and (3) other suspicious circumstances. In no particular order, the top three suspects are:

1. Evanshine. 

In a murder, they always say the first suspect is the spouse. I think it's the same in this situation. If Dear Evanshine would let me post his photos on this blog, you would know that he has recently decided to grow a beard. He would like you to know that this is not because of No Shave November, but because he is original and thought up growing a beard entirely on his own. 

I was looking at his beard the other day and noticed that, while most of the hair on his head is brown, there are a few strands of blonde hair as well. Where they came from, I don't know. Unless they came from my head. He certainly has the access and suspicious circumstances abound. However, I'm not sure what his motive would be, but that's what they always say about a spouse on spouse murder when the investigation is just beginning.

2. Mabel.

If something bad goes down at my house, Mabel is generally at the top of my suspect list. She has the motive, since we have a love-hate relationship and it's always possible that she is in the hate phase. She has the access, too, obviously. And suspicious circumstances?

Definitely. Check out her latest photo. She's been shedding more than ever, lately, but she still seems to have a full head of hair.

3. Wills.

And as much as I hate to suggest it, my dear friend Prince William is my third suspect. He has the motive: I have a much stronger friendship with Kate than he does. Access? I WAS just visiting Apartment 1A in Kensington Palace the other day for Baby G's christening. And suspicious circumstances?

We all know he has been having some...coverage issues with his hair recently. But check out this recent photo of my boy Will. That comb-over looks familiar.

I wish I could give you some closure on this, loyal readers. But, based on my list of suspects, this case is far from closed. I can only hope that, come Thursday, I can be thankful for one more mystery solved.

IF YOU HAVE ANY INFORMATION THAT WOULD BE RELEVANT TO THIS INVESTIGATION, PLEASE LEAVE YOUR CLUES IN THE COMMENTS SECTION. IF YOU DO, I'LL BE THANKFUL FOR YOU THIS HOLIDAY SEASON.

Kids These Days

I am worried that kids these days are being taught scary things in school. Frightening. Let me explain. My friend’s almost-three-year-old, Little Allison, came over to my house the other night to watch Sweet Home Alabama with me. Not the movie, but the new slice of TV heaven on CMT Friday nights that is basically a low-budget rip-off of the Bachelorette where one lucky lady gets to choose her lifelong mate from 11 country boys (read: Good Ole Boys) and 11 city folk (aka guys with serious egos and cheetah print tank tops). Ahem. Back to my story.

Little Allison looks a little like this:

(OK, that is my face as a child slapped on Little Allison’s body. Privacy is key here at the tudor house blog. Also, don't be jealous of my bangs.) Can we just take a moment and look at how cute her jeggings and boots are? She is a stylish grown up trapped in a teeny tiny body!

Little Allison also takes dance lessons and has learned some seriously sweet moves:

I should probably also mention that Little Allison is not technically this little girl’s real name. I have changed her name to make sure that all you child molesters out there reading my blog don’t try to track down Baby Allison and kidnap her after you read this post. But it’s pretty fair to say that most of my friends have named or plan to name their children after me, so this “alias” is not too far from the truth.

Anyway, during a commercial break, Baby Allison sung us a little Thanksgiving Song that she has been taught in preschool. The lyrics are as follows, to the tune of “Frere Jacques:”

Mr. Turkey, Mr. Turkey,

Big and Fat, Big and Fat,

I AM GOING TO EAT YOU, I AM GOING TO EAT YOU,

Just like that. Just like that.

When you sing “I AM GOING TO EAT YOU,” you’re supposed to make a shoveling motion into your mouth, as if you’re eating turkey by the actual handful. This is terrifying, even for brave grown-ups like myself.

So parents, beware. If your children come home with nightmares and the desire to become vegetarians, consider requesting that their teachers don’t teach them such freaky songs. You are welcome for this very timely public service announcement.

Don't worry. I'll be back to my regularly scheduled cat posts next week. I just felt the need to warn the parents of the world about a new danger facing their children.

EDITED:  I must apologize to my dear friend Anna. You may remember her as baby Mabel's godmother. It somehow slipped my mind that Anna was also watching Sweet Home Alabama with me, and also regaled me with a turkey-themed song. This viewing party sounds like it was a pretty wild time, huh? I cannot tell you the tune to Anna's song, but the lyrics are as follows:

One fat turkey I'll beeeeeeee
Spent all night in a treeeeeee
Cook came around
Couldn't be found
That's why I'm here you see!

Now, this is a little old-school, perhaps, because no one gets eaten by the handful, but I somehow feel it's a bit less terrifying than Little Allison's song.

To Mabel, Somewhere Around Your 4th Birthday

Baby George is "growing up fast," according to my girl Kate. Well guess what, my friends? Mabel is growing fast, too. Told ya Kate and I have quite a bit in common!  In honor of Mabel's quick growth, I have written this letter to Mabel on her 4th birthday. OK, somewhere near her 4th birthday. More like the 4th birthday of when I got her. Please excuse the fine layer of cat hair all over the photo above...gross. I'm going to vacuum when I get home. 

Mabel,

I took you to the vet last Thursday for your fourth birthday checkup, which was only 2 months overdue. I have seen other bloggers writing monthly letters to their human babies so that they will be able to read them later and know when they started talking, eating, walking, etc. I don't see why the norm should be any different for cats. I am way behind with your letters, obviously, but I thought I'd write you a fourth birthday letter that you can look back on fondly in the years to come.  I would have posted this last week, but it took me this long to recover from your incessant (but oh so cute) howling on the 15 minute drive to the vet. Love ya.

Measurements: You weigh 11.6 pounds, which the vet says is 1.6 too many. That seems like not much until you think that would be like 20lbs overweight for a human, or 1,120lbs overweight for your average 8,000lb elephant. See how good I am at math? I'll teach you math after you master not peeing on my stuff. But I digress. You love your food and you hate exercise, so you will probably stay overweight. You are pretty long, but won't stay still long enough for me to measure you, so I'm not sure exactly how long. Based on how fat you are, I'd say you are in the 150 percentile of cats your age. You're Mommy's little chunker.

Talking: You are a big talker! You say "meow," "me-OW," and "MEOW." When you are confused, you kind of make a "mmmMMM?" noise that is just precious. I could listen to you talk all day, except for when you are talking to me as you walk across my face at 5am because your automatic feeder hasn't fed you yet. Then it's not as cute.

Eating: We are doing cat-led weaning, so you just mainly eat whatever you can find. You eat Adult Light catfood because of your weight struggles, but sometimes when you look extra cute we give you a can of WET FOOD! Your dad thought you deserved one last week after the vet fiasco. I disagreed but you got your tuna deelite. I wish you'd develop an eating complex or something but you seem truly unashamed of your girth.

Meds: You are off your meds right now, which may be changing based on the comforter we found with your pee all over it. You sometimes take Prozac, which dries out your eyes so that you need eyedrops as well. It's pretty adorable trying to give you eye drops. When your Herpes flares up, we give you medicated treats as well - 12 per day is the recommended dose! No wonder there's so much of you to love.

Diseases: Anxiety, obviously, and the Herp comes and goes. We're not sure how you picked that up, but we sure are proud of you.

Well, Mabel, you are truly a treat to live with. I just love seeing how you are growing and changing, and I can't wait to see what you become! We are all aspiring to publishing a new series of "Fat Cat Falling" photos one day. You're our golden ticket, and we couldn't love you any more.

xoxox,
Mommy

Turtle Up!

It's that time of year when the weather cools off and people refill their propane tanks in hopes of lighting a fire, tuning into some Hallmark Christmas Classics, and turtling up in front of the glow of the television. You know?

Oh wait. You aren't familiar with the term "turtle up"?  Allow me to enlighten you...

I have been having some weird dreams lately. Being the hypochondriac scientist that I am, I immediately turned to the Internet to understand why this is happening to me. According to my research, I am not alone. According to the very reliable website www.psychicsuniverse.com, in fact, many of us are experiencing vivid dreams: "As we move into the Age of Aquarius we are experiencing new spiritual energies of a higher frequency. Our minds, bodies and sprits are adjusting to these new vibrations and vivid dreams are just one possible indication. The veils are thinning and dreams serve as a bridge between our earthly lives and our new expanding consciousness." So I'm fairly sure that my vivid dreams are an indication that I am a psychic. As soon as I get my palm-reading business up and running, I'll post a link so you can schedule your session. Discounts for Tudor House Blog followers!

But I digress. You didn't come here to know why people dream; you want to know what it means to turtle up. 

In my dream, I was in prison. My good friend Tastee from Orange is the New Black was with me. We were staring at two other inmates lying in their cots, but these other girls didn't have their blankets pulled up all the way to their necks. Tastee looked at me, shrugged, and yelled at the inmates: "Y'all better TURTLE UP!" In other words, pull those blankets up to your necks, like a turtle!

Mabel kindly agreed to model for me to help you visual learners understand:

Above is an example of NOT turtling up. You can see from the photo that, while Mabel is resting her squishy little bod on a blanket, she has chosen not to pull the blanket up to her neck for maximum warmth. This is what the inmates were doing when Tastee yelled at them.

Now, here is a classic example of turtling up. You can see that Mabel has pulled the blanket up to her neck, a la the tortuga. She heard Tastee's call and turtled up.

For further explanation, I have provided you with this full frontal turtle image, complete with my artistic handiwork. You are welcome. 

Get it? So now, feel free to start using this terminology in everyday conversation. I have a feeling this is going to be Big. I believe this, of course, because my Internet research also told me that "Artists, entrepreneurs, inventors and scientists often get creative ideas from dreams. Jeff Taylor dreamed up monster.com, Jack Nicklaus had a dream of a new golf grip. And Nobel laureate and scientist Wolfgang Pauli called dreams his "secret laboratory."  This came from WebMD.com, one of my most trusted online resources. Soon, they will have to edit that post to say: "A dream was also the source of popular pop culture phrase 'turtle up.'"  

If you are curious, I also used an online dream analyzer to tell me what my dream meant. Apparently you just type in your dream, then DreamDictionary.com tells you what each individual word means. This is what the dictionary had to say about my dream:

Neck: Means sensuality, sensitivity, beauty or grace.

Prison: Punishment.

Turtle: Longevity, patience, persistence over time.

Cover: Limited view; you are feeling uninformed about events in the world.

Bed: Your inner thoughts.

Pulling: Desire.

I'm going to put this all together, ignore the bad things, and believe that my dream means that my beauty and grace will be long-lived and persistent over time. Seems about right!

RIP, Courtney Jr.

R.I.P.

Courtney, Jr., 11/6/13-11/17/13*

Dear Readers, it is with a heavy heart that I come to you today. Courtney, Jr. has passed. You may remember Courtney, Jr. as Mabel, Jr., the fish who starred in my popular Pinterest-inspired post from a week and a half ago. Upon moving Mabel, Jr. to my office, I realized that I had not given the poor fish the best possible namesake and role model, so I changed his name to honor my favorite co-worker and former Matron of Honor, Courtney. It seems that I changed his name too late, however, and Courtney, Jr. quietly left this world sometime this past weekend, just days after the expiration of his seven-day guarantee. It goes without saying, of course, that I do not care about the money.

Courtney, Jr. joins a venerable brother- and sisterhood of my dearly departed pets in that great farm in the sky: Barney, Sage of the Bluegrass; CleoCatra [whom I must assume is dead since she "ran away" when my family went on vacation]; Miss Velvet, best dog ever; Kozmo, the original cool cat with a trendy spelling; Where's Waldo; Pat the Turtle and the original Blue Fish, just to name a few. Blue Fish was my first Betta, a replacement pet that my mom bought me after she killed my first batch of pet fish by putting them in a bowl of hot water "because they looked so cold." Blue Fish was, of course, completely outclassed by Courtney, Jr., may they both rest in peace.

It seemed that Courtney, Jr. was in poor health on Friday, when he seemed to suffer a stroke, jumped out of his water and back into the bowl, then floated for fifteen minutes or so whilst sadly fluttering one flipper. He ate a last meal of fish pellets, and revived a little when Courtney, Sr. visited my office to discuss the Blackfish movie. [By the way, I haven't seen the movie but it sounds like we should all boycott Seaworld.] When I left the office Friday evening, Courtney, Jr. was resting peacefully.

Courtney, Jr. was honored in a private toilet-side ceremony yesterday on the 15th Floor. The ceremony was quiet and tasteful, just like Courtney, Jr. Hymns were sung and a eulogy given. In lieu of flowers, please become a "follower" of my blog. It's what Courtney, Jr. would have wanted.


* Technically, Courtney died on November 18. I had stopped by the office on Sunday night and declared him dead, but then when I came into work on Monday morning, he was swimming around again! It was truly a workplace miracle. Sadly, the miracle didn't last, and he died again Monday afternoon.

Happy Half-iversary, Dear Evanshine!

Today, Evanshine and I have been married for six months and are halfway to being able to ethically keep all wedding presents that we received! We haven't been doing the best job of remembering each month-iversary, so to make up for that I've created the best half-iversary present ever, posted below. I don't know if you knew it, but the traditional gift for a six-month anniversary is blog posts. Or so I've heard.

In honor of our six month-iversary, I've put together a sampling of some of my favorite wedding photos. Now, it wouldn't be right to give you, dear readers, a full viewing of these pictures, since it isn't yet our full anniversary. In six more months, I hope that Evanshine will be over his blog stage fright and ready to make an appearance, and at that time I shall post the photos in full. At this point, however, as it is only halfway to our first anniversary, I am only able to give you the following, half of which are only halfway untouched by my skilled Photoshop hand. Does that make sense?

To play along at home, dear readers, see if you can tell which half are the real pictures and which half have been tweaked.

By the way, our photographer was Honey Heart Photography here in Lexington, and they were wonderful to work with. We absolutely love the pictures, and have many framed at home sans my personal touch. You'll see in another six months just how great they are :)

The groom and the ring bearer, just shooting some pool before we head to the church. 

 Me and my wonderful bridesmaids! I must say, some of them were a little difficult. Pippa was kind of a B and wore white dress, Miley refused to put on a dress at all, and Fat Amy was so lazy she wouldn't even stand up with the rest of us.

My mom had a blast. Helping me with my bustle was probably her favorite task.

True love.

Just a few of our guests. Princess Kate would have been in the bridal party, but we weren't sure when Georgie was going to arrive so she just sat this one out. Obviously she did a reading, though.

By the way, True Story: Evan really did try to send Pete Rose an invitation. I refused. I had a feeling that if he showed, Evan might pay more attention to him than me...

My brother Ross, not holding any cats.

  

You know you make me wanna SHOUT!

And finally, my favorite part of any wedding: PHOTOBOOTH! 

Guess which one of these was really in the picture? 

As you can at least halfway tell, it was a wonderful night! Happy half-iversary, Evan! Love ya like a husband! Check back in 6 months for the unedited version :) 

Doll-Inspired Fashions

I'm just sitting here in my basement on a block of ice, trying to recover from my friend Stephanie's spin class. I feel like I've been attacked and I cannot figure out for the life of me why it's not "cool" to wear padded biking shorts to spin class. You're sitting on a bike, aren't you? A little extra protection might be nice.

But I digress. We have much more important things to discuss: Someone out there has noticed that my girl Kate Middleton is a living, breathing Samantha doll. I'm ashamed I hadn't already noticed this - but it is true, as you can see from a few of the photos from Huffington Post:

I'm not one to criticize Kate, ever, but I think Samantha had a nice idea to add a hat and muff to this presh coat. I'm sure Kate agrees and is having one made as we speak.

Now, I must admit that I was never a big Samantha Parkington fan. No offense to all you Samantha lovers out there, but she was a little too uppity for me with her brass bed, rich grandmama and perfect hair. I preferred Molly McIntyre with her bangs and braids. A little nerdy, sure, but I felt like I could really take her under my wing and make her almost as cool as me (as you'll see in the pictures to come, I was VERY cool at this stage in my life). Then Felicity Merriman came along with her velvet covered horse, and I liked her too.

I liked Molly so much, in fact, that I dressed as Halloween Molly on not one, but two consecutive Halloweens:

circa 1991

Totally amateur the first time. As you can see, the flowers in my hair are red, which was clearly never part of Molly's costume, and Molly had no creepy Halloween mask like I did. I also did not have Molly's sweet saddle oxfords.  Very lame.

circa 1992

The next year, we did much better. I had a yellow flower in my hair, just like Molly, and got Molly a mini mask to match mine. I hope you appreciate my red socks, which also match Molly's, but still no saddle oxfords.  I remember being infuriated that my mom made me wear stretch pants under my skirt. Molly's mom clearly did not make her do that.  Also, the mini-werewolf was a nice addition.
So, having clearly excelled at being Molly for a couple of years and having received Felicity for my birthday, I turned my attention to being Lissy.  In fact, I may have just unbraided my Molly braids to achieve the carelessly beautiful waves below:

circa 1993. At what point is one too old for this? I was 9 here.

I truly hope this picture was taken on the next Halloween and not, like, the first day of school, but that's a question we may never have the answer to. I must now give a shout-out to my cousin Katie, who passed this get-up down to me after she was done with it. That's what family's for.

So anyway, thus ends another chapter of "Princess Kate is just like Allie." Though this time, I think it's clear who inspired who. I was into American Girl Doll fashion twenty years ago, while Kate seems to have just bought in in the last year or so. But I forgive her. Trends do take a while to get across the pond.

Behind the Scenes

I know that many of you out there wish you could spend every day with me and the rest of the Tudor House Gang (Evan, Mabel and Kate). So in an effort to let that dream come true (virtually), I give you a Behind the Scenes look at this weekend's photo shoot.

You probably assumed that the end result (aka Mabel's glamour shot posted yesterday) was just a quick, effortless shot on my iPhone. You probably thought that was Mabel's natural pleasant demeanor. In fact, one loyal reader even said "She actually looks completely adorable and sweet in this picture!! Haha" when I sent her a little sneak peek preview to get her pumped for the blogs to come.

Au contraire, mon frere. It was the product of a full morning's work and quite a few bitchy looks and comments courtesy of Mabel, who turns out to be quite a prima donna when it comes to her modeling. The proof is in the outtakes, posted below.

Please note that the reason we moved the photo shoot from floor to chair was because of the huge amount of debris visible behind Mabel in my living room. Gross. So please ignore Mabel's hotdog Halloween costume, Evan's dirty old shoes, and a red lamp missing its lamp shade and waiting to be returned to TJ Maxx when you look through these beauties.

Strategy Session

The Bachelor returns to ABC after a way-too-long hiatus on January 6, 2014, a mere 56 days from today. Juan Pablo is this season's Bachelor and based on his awesome accent, poor command of the English language, and adorable daughter who will surely feature prominently, this season is sure to be a great one.

It will not surprise you that I'm considering trying out as a contestant. Evanshine is okay with this, I think. I haven't actually asked him but he's never been one to stand in the way of my dreams.

Anyway, I thought I'd just share with you my top five strategies to snag me a Juan Pabs. (If I don't end up making the cut for casting, feel free to use these strategies. I've always been one to share my genius.)

1. Have a schtick. Every season there are one or two people who wear, bring or do something ridiculous to get the Bachelor or Bachelorette's attention. Memorable examples include: one bachelor wore a mask and wouldn't let the Bachelorette see his face till they fell in love (they didn't); one didn't wear a shirt (this guy went surprisingly far); one came wearing a full suit of armor (this guy got hot in his constume and I think eventually gave it up).

Obviously, my thing would be to be the cat lady of the group by bringing sweet, sweet Mabel along. All guys want girls that are animal people, and dogs are SO 2012. Cats is purses are so in right now. I would of course dress her up in an adorable dress so that she fit in with the other contestants.

For example:

2. Speak only in Spanish. I majored in Spanish in college, spent a semester in Spain, and remember almost none of it. (Sorry, Mom and Dad!) But I know enough words to string together to sound like a real Spaniard - at least to anyone that doesn't speak Spanish at all.

Side note: When I studied abroad, I had some seriously embarrassing faux pas (what's Spanish for faux pas? See? I don't even know.) with the language. The one that sticks out happened in a McDonald's. Our group of American students had gotten a lesson early on in the difference between cono (cone, as in ice cream cone) and coño (as in a slang term for a female body part. Not acceptable in everyday conversation.) I, of course, went to McDonald's, where I forgot that lesson immediately and ordered dos coños de helado - what I thought was two ice cream cones. Nope. Everyone started laughing at me. The girl at the register yelled back to the guys making french fries...and I ran. Never even got my two ice cream cones. So me speaking only in Spanish would provide some momentos exelentes y romanticos. Or something.

I think JP will be honored by my attempt to speak his native tongue. Juan Pablo, ¡Escógeme a mí! (Pick me?)

3. Try to remind Juan Pablo of his daughter. Juan Pablo really loves his little girl. In fact, even when I searched for photos of Juan Pablo with Desiree, most of the pictures I found were of him and his daughter. This tells me that he loves his little girl, and if I could subconsciously make him think of her, maybe he'd love me too.

Yep, I photoshopped that myself. Try not to be amazed at my many skills. I'm placing an order for pink hairbows as we speak.

4. Bring my own snacks. They seem to hand out plenty of free drinks on the Bachelor, but from what I can tell (based on the many drunken fools who drank on an empty stomach in the first episode), no snacks are provided. I do my best when eating - otherwise, I have been known to get "hangry." I'll fill my pockets and purse (and maybe Mabel's pockets, too, if she has any) with food to beat the Bachelor producers at their own game.

5. Tell everyone that I'm married. Bachelor contestants are a backstabbing, gossipy bunch, so if I told them I'm married, they'll all tell each other how I'm not there for the right reasons, and then word will eventually get out to the producers, who will fly Evanshine to the set for a showdown. It will be dramatic and I'll be on the cover of People and Us Weekly (achieving a lifelong goal). I'll go down in Bachelor history, which is more than most contestants can say. And, joke's on you, producers -- Evanshine and I will be in a foreign city for free! I really can't go wrong with this plan.

I'm pretty sure that if I just follow my strategy, I'll end up living the dream:

Blogging in bed with Juan Pablo.

P.S. This is Post No. 4. Blog Goal No. 1: ACHIEVED. Dreams do come true, boys and girls.

Creative Gender Reveal Ideas

Have you ever noticed how there are a huge number of pins on Pinterest that look awesome when you scroll down the homepage - 20 great Christmas present ideas! 10 best easy baby shower ideas! 5 minute workout that makes you look like THIS (insert professional athlete body shot obviously stolen from cover of hardcore fitness magazine) - that are way less awesome when you actually click on them? Most of the time those "5 minute workout" pins lead you to some random person's MySpace page where they just post pictures of themselves in a sports bra. And Pinterest, just because you stick something in a jar with a ribbon around it, doesn't mean it's a great gift idea.

I was thinking about this about a month ago, when my dear friend and neighbor Leslie, who is with child, was getting ready to find out if my little future neighbor baby was a girl or a boy. Our exchange went a little something like this:
Me, thinking about the gender reveal parties I've seen professionally photographed and catered lately on Facebook and hoping I'd get the invite: mini-food buffet, don't mind if I do!: So, are you going to have a gender reveal party?

Leslie: No, I think we'll just ask the doctor to tell us what it is.

Me: Okay.

Me, in my head: I'm pretty sure she is asking me to find out what the baby is secretly, set up an awesome reveal, and then surprise her and her husband, "Big Max." I bet there are some seriously awesome Surprise Your Neighbor With the Gender of Their Unborn Child in These 5 Easy Steps pins on Pinterest. Pinterest has everything.

Me, out loud and very nonchalantly: Do you want me to find out, then set up an awesome surprise?

Me, in my head: What if...I bought a goldfish then dyed the water pink or blue depending on the gender, then just set the whole fishbown on Leslie's porch and let her or Big Max find it when they walk outside?  YES! Awesome plan! I can't wait till Leslie says yes! Play it cool...

Leslie: Oh, that's okay, I really think I'm too impatient to wait anyways! I'll just find out then send out a text saying what it is.

Me, devastated but continuing to think through my Great Goldfish Plan: I wonder if food coloring would kill a goldfish? Probably. Evanshine's sister is a vet. Maybe I should text her? That might be kind of depressing if, by the time Leslie found the fish bowl, the fish had already died. Also, I'm not sure leaving a fish bowl unattended on someone's porch is a good idea. Seems like one of our friendly neighborhood cats might snatch himself a little filet-o-fish as it walked by. An empty bowl of blue water could be a confusing and depressing way to find out you're having a boy...

Me, out loud: Yeah, okay. Sounds good. Probably for the best. Just let me know when you find out!

SCENE.

Keep in mind, dear readers, that though I was a creative writing major in college, I did not, surprisingly, take a playwriting class. I know you are probably shocked based on this script, but you'll probably be shocked by a number of things on this blog in the months and years to come, so get used to it. I also would like you to know that I googled "nonchalantly" and it is a word, according to thefreedictionary.com. I assume that a number of movie producers will soon be beating down my door and asking to buy my screenplay, and to them I say, contact my attorney. His name is Evanshine and he is a shark. He got me out of a speeding ticket not six months ago. We are married so I get a good billable rate.

So, after being gently let down by Leslie, I did a quick perusal of Pinterest to see if they had any ideas as awesome as the old fish in a bowl thing. In short, they did not. They had approximately three basic ideas for gender reveal: (1) put pink or blue balloons in a box and open it. Color me not impressed. Bill and Giuliana already did that in People magazine, so I believe it's too late for the rest of us. (2) Cake or cupcakes filled with pink or blue icing. Again, not impressed. That's how Josh and Anna Duggar found out the gender of their wee little babe on the Today show a few years ago. That's soo 2009. And, (3) Hold a string with paper letter spelling out B-O-Y or G-I-R-L across your baby bump. That is not a gender reveal idea; it's a photo op. Get it straight, Pinterest. Get some fish-in-a-bowl-of-dyed-water ideas, ASAP. Wouldn't you like to open your door to find this on your porch?

Meet Mabel, Jr.

Before someone throws animal blood all over my blog, I did not actually dye Mabel, Jr.'s water blue. I did some Internet research and learned that people get upset when you dye fish water blue, and that makes sense to me. So I just put him in a blue jar with blue rocks. You get the idea.

Now, readers, be a dear (dears) and pin this post to your Pinterest accounts with a caption like "Greatest and Most Creative Gender Reveal EVER!!! Pin now, use later!" immediately. I'm heading to Pinterest just as soon as I hit "Publish" here.

Oh, and by the way, Mabel, Sr. liked Mabel, Jr. a little too much.

So I took him to work with me where he will live happily ever after.

Kate + Allie = BFF: Ruffling Feathers

Being well on my way to accomplishing Goal No. 1 for this blog (surpass my previous blogging record of three posts), today I will start on Goal No. 2: proving to you that I am, or should be, best friends with Kate Middleton based on the multitude of things we have in common. This is only the first in what will surely be a long series of posts, so get excited.

Reason No. 1: We both made some enemies in the christening of our children. Please note that I am using both "christening" and "children" in their broadest sense.

I assume that, like me, you have liked both "The British Monarchy" and "Prince William and Kate Middleton" on Facebook, thus ensuring that you get the most current updates on the Royal Couple's whereabouts. So you know Baby Prince George was christened last Wednesday.  You must also know that Wills and Kate raised some eyebrows around the world by not selecting Party Prince Harry and the Royal Sister-in-Law Pippa as any of the SEVEN godparents for the child. I can understand this, since understanding is what best friends do. What's more, I faced a similar situation with little Mabes.

Let's get one thing clear right away: I did not have my cat christened. I have, however, taken steps to ensure that she is well taken care of if her father and I die.

I guess people assumed that I'd choose my brother Ross.

As you can see, Ross likes cats. Holding cats is kind of his thing, making him the obvious choice for parent-in-waiting. But, like Kate, I bucked the system, selecting instead my good friend Anna, who blogs from time to time at http://thethirtybythirtyproject.blogspot.com.

As you can see here, Anna is quite literally a cat lady. (On the left is a picture of Anna in her everyday street clothes; on the right is a picture of her latest knitting project and her cat Murphy trying to stop her.) Mabel doesn't seem to hate Anna as much as she hates most other people, which is important. And, like Wills and Kate picked some people they had gone to school with back when Kate was a mere commoner, Anna was friends with me and Evan back when I was a mere law student. So congrats, Anna. You win.

Readers, I have an important announcement for you. Blogger helpfully provides statistics showing how many page views you get daily and the countries from which your readers accessed your blog. Today's report showed one reader from the United Kingdom. I think we can all agree that that one reader is Kate. Kate, if you need someone to talk through this difficult decision with, just give me a call. I'm sure your security team can find my number.

Well, that concludes episode 1 of Kate + Allie = BFF. I will be submitting much more evidence for your review in the days to come.