Four More Days (wish me luck!)

Camera Phone Favorites

At a Starbucks, waiting for his dad.

My brother James, likely being difficult. That's what he does.

I took this to demonstrate that bug bites aren't a good look on my kid's face.

I love how the hair that immediately frames his face is WHITE blonde, while the rest is more yellow blonde.  I love this kid.

My name is Jennifer Grace, and I am not obese.

Haters gonna hate.

Random Assortment from the Scanner

When you can wear jeans to little league, it's probably not that serious.

An exceptionally blurry picture of my grandmother, mom (holding me), Aunt Rebecca, sister in front.

Rebecca, Uncle Ben, Uncle Brian, sister, mom. YES.

My dad with his four (4!) older sisters. Clockwise from him: Randy, Sandra, Ellen, Cathy.

Have I ever told you that my dad's dad was a Freudian psychiatrist for the U.S. Military?

This is my dad, grandfather and great-grandfather.

Including a random baby picture of me, just because. DIRTYFACE.

Don't Be An Asshole

*People qualified to give me medical advice:  Medical professionals, provided that I'm currently under their care.
*People not qualified to give me medical advice:  Everyone else.
*Don't tell women that you barely know that they have a 'considerable amount' of weight to lose, especially via twitter.
*Especially not on the heels of one particular woman's discussion of eating disorders.
*You should probably make sure you're caught up on the conversation at hand before you decide to throw your 94 cents into the mix.
*No one asked you.
*Hey! I'm not obese!
*No one asked you.
*Predicting my death from diabetes (and how that death will orphan my son) is ALWAYS uncalled for.
*I worked really fucking hard to have any sort of positive body image at all, and I don't appreciate having that hard-earned sense of physical self worth attacked. Especially by a woman who claims to 'know me.'

I'm sorry sir, but you're invalid

The Types of Famous that Don't Count
(Not even a little)

*Famous on the internet
*Famous for the way you died
*Famous because of reality television
*Famous because People Magazine says so
*Famous for being a failure

You'll just have to come back when you get it right.

Hair Retrospective 3 of 3, post college to NOW

We talked about the early years, and the teen through college years.
Now let's talk about the ADULT YEARS.
So.
Once I graduated from college I had to like...work? To support myself? Which meant that I started spending an awful lot of time indoors, and my hair started to be Not Blonde.

But still curly.

So it was like that for awhile, and then I got pregnant and it did that freakishly long haired fast growing thing that apparently is normal for pregnant ladies.

(Not fat, just pregnant. Also yes, there is a LOT going on here that is worthy of discussion)

Then I had Gabriel and my hair started falling out and I made K cut it all of for me because I was OMG SO FRUSTRATED.

How squishy are those baby cheeks? SO SQUISHY.

After the initial chop-off, Stella started cutting my hair for me, but I also started growing it longer again, because, honestly, I prefer my hair longer (see also: curliness).
Throughout this time I had maintained a fierce opposition to bangs because HELLO HAVE YOU MET MY CURLY HAIR?
Then I was at a birthday party for my friend Holly's baby and all of my Chico Mommy Friends just sort of GANGED UP ON ME and Stella HAPPENED to have her sheers in her car and within MINUTES I was getting my hair chopped and I was prescribed SWEEPY BANGS.
This is a picture from when I got home that day, with less hair than I'd left the house with.

Went to a baby birthday party, came back with a haircut. Like you do.

I posted that picture...somewhere online (old blog probably?) and one of my friends said she liked the color that I'd dyed it, and I HADN'T dyed it (just the weird yellow bathroom lighting plus camera phone), but I was NEWLY INSPIRED TO DO SO.
And that basically brings us up to speed for my hair choices for the following SEVERAL years, with variations for the fact that red dye fades very quickly, and sometimes I need a haircut.

I was like, reinvented as a redhead, or something.
I started THINKING of myself as a redhead.
People started INFERRING personality traits based on my redheadedness.
The DMV guy even went so far as to make me change my hair color on my driver's license.
EVEN THOUGH I DYE IT Y'ALL.

And then!

AND THEN!

Then came The Great Hair Disaster of 2009.

Purple hair hurts my brain

After the...purpleness, I went through great trouble and expense to get it back to a color that didn't make me want to cry when I looked in the mirror.

Then I was like FUCK THIS BULLSHIT and I decided that I'm not dying my hair anymore.
I was traumatized, and done with hair crimes.
I haven't dyed it since.

And it faded to a point.

But then it was orange and full of roots and made me want to cry.

So then I stripped out the dye.

And that was better but still sort of two-toned.
So I cut it all off.

And that basically brings us up to speed.

I still have some roots, which makes it still hard to tell what my natural hair color is, but I'm working on it.
I prefer my hair longer, so once I actually get all the dyed parts cut off, I'll grow it out again.
I'm converted to the bangs though.
I loves me some bangs.

Post-Conference Fashion Rebellion

Now I'm not going to tell you that I wore this to work, because we have a dress code. But you can trust and believe that this is how I went to the grocery store, the gas station, and downtown to run errands. 
Because I have no shame.
I kind of don't want to tell you what I wore to preschool orientation.
My brain simply can't handle that many days of makeup and OUTFITS all piled up in a row.

BurnOut Sunscreen

Dearest Friends, Relations and Delicately Complected Googlers,

I would like to regale you with tales of wonder and beauty.
Gather round, for stories of the best sunscreen in all the land.

Y'all.
Just.
Y'all.
I have crazy sensitive skin and sunscreen makes me break out like nobody's business.
I'm also ghastly pale, porcelain, if you will, and thinking too hard about sunshine makes me burn.
And finally, after 27 years of suffering, I found a solution:

BurnOut Eco-Sensitive Zinc Oxide Sunscreen SPF 32

I bought this stuff from my local health food store in May and you guys?  I have not been burned A SINGLE TIME that I have used this stuff.
Seriously.
(I have gotten burns on days when I forgot to apply, but c'mon, no one's perfect).

Sunblock that works, that doesn't make me break out or itch or feel greasy.
UVA/UVB broad-spectrum protection.
Very water resistant (I've been swimming with it).
Goes on clear even though it's zinc oxide sunblock.
Paraben-free, petroleum-free, paba-free.
Biodegradeable, ocean-safe, eco-sensitive.

What I'm trying to tell you is that this stuff is awesome, and you should buy it.
--
Link is the affiliate kind, but I'd be just as pleased if you bought it locally.
This was an unsolicited post, just wanted y'all to know that I found a sunscreen that I love, having searched high and low.

Just like that, here we are.

I really don't feel like writing anything today, but I really do feel like posting these photographs. 
Taken separately, each makes me feel tender and squishy-brained. 
Together, they positively make my heart smile.

My great-grandmother and my mother.

Gabriel, and me.

If you go here (not p0rn, just my shared items in google reader) well!  

Then you can read some online writing you will surely love.  

Assuming, of course, that you and I have the same taste in Things Worthy of Love.  

If we do, you're awesome.

If not?

I suppose I'll allow you to live.

For now.

Story Time

Oh hi, I'm twelve?

Gabriel's school takes a three week summer break in August, so I've been bouncing him around with different family members and juggling schedules and bribing teenaged brothers and OH MY GOD I am so grateful that I have a full time preschool option for this kid.
The juggling, it drives me mad.
Anyhow! My 13-year-old brother Daniel is "in charge"of Gabriel today (under the umbrella of my mother's supervision).
Last night I stayed over at my parents' house, to avoid an hour and a half of roundtrip commuting this morning.
So.
Last night at my parents' house, I was taking pictures of Daniel, to demonstrate the fact that he's impossible to photograph.
(I'm not really sure how that came about, but it's a well understood phenomenon, and I was just driving it home. With pictures!)
Y'all.
He doesn't just look bad.  He looks like there's something wrong with him.
I didn't upload all of the pictures I took, because he literally begged me not to post the worst ones, and I'm obliging.
There are pictures worse than this and I'm not posting them
Just so you know.

Eyes OPEN, Daniel.

No, no. OPEN.

That's maybe too open.

You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?

Oh man you guys?
I thought I wanted to make fun of Daniel, but let's make fun of me instead, k?
Because WHAT THE FRACKETY FRICK?
At 27 years old (shut up, I can still say that for the next two weeks okay?), I think I should resemble a 13 year old boy slightly....less.
Than I do.
That shiny ruffled shirt is the only thing standing between me and my alter-ego as an early adolescent boy.
APPARENTLY.

On second thought, maybe it's the hat....

Oh. Oh I see.