Here are some of the things I’m into right now:

Manic Mommies — This is practically the only podcast I listen to. It took me a little while to get into it but now I’m totally hooked. I haven’t spent much time on their website, but I’m going to be checking it out over the next few days.

Bejeweled for the iPhone — I don’t think I can link directly to the iPhone app, but I’ve been crazy addicted to this game over the last few weeks. A good time killer when I’ve been nursing for hours.

Cathy Zielske’s Design Your Life class at Big Picture Scrapbooking — I’m taking this online class right now and I’m loving it.

This cute bon-bon garland — I so want to make one of these for our Christmas tree or to hang as a garland on the mantle. Can you tell I’m into garlands these days?

Pumpkin Muffins — I made my own pumpkin puree a few weeks ago and I’ve been using this recipe to make pumpkin muffins. Yum!

Michelle Obama — Oh, how I love Michelle Obama! She is my new celebrity crush. This is a First Lady I not only like, but one I can really relate to. Just a few years older than me, she is promising to make helping working moms a top priority. She also is a snappy dresser.

Baby August  was born on August 31, 2008 at 2:21 a.m. He was 9 pounds, 12 ounces and 21 inches long.

Yes, we make giganto babies in my family!

Things are going pretty well so far. Augie is a great eater and he caught on much more quickly to nursing than Wyatt did. We’ve all been adjusting to being a family of four. Wyatt is having a little bit of a hard time, but over all he seems pretty happy to be a big brother. I think he would just prefer that Augie didn’t take so much of Mom and Dad’s attention.

I got my hair cut tonight! Wooo! No more split ends and now it will be harder for the baby to barf all over it. I’m sure he’ll find a way though….

One thing I never knew before I became a mom was that I would feel guilty all the time. I know this is unreasonable. My logical brain tells me that I am a good mom — that my son is awesome and my next son will be too. But man does that emotional part of my brain keep me in line when I get too cocky.

Here are a handful of things I feel guilty about as a parent — some rightfully so, some irrational:

• working
• working at home
• working at home in the evenings
• engaging in my hobbies
• letting my son watch DVD’s
• letting my son play video games
• letting my son see me play video games
• letting my son see me play video games where a house gets robbed and introducing a new fear of burgalars
• giving my son sugary foods to eat
• giving him pizza and french fries too often
• giving my son Cheerios and dried cranberries for dinner some times
• waiting too long to start my son in preschool
• taking my son out of day care
• leaving my son in day care too long
• forgetting to send cards to day care with Wyatt on Valentines Day
• not sending my son to a preschool that his friend attends
• not intuitively knowing everything that every other parent I meet already knows
• yelling
• losing patience with a three-year-old
• swearing in front of my son
• that one time I told Wyatt to “brush his f***ing teeth” and threw his toothbrush in the sink really hard (I still feel really guilty about this one almost a year later. I have a feeling I’ll take this one to my grave.)
• letting Wyatt skip baths
• not singing to the new baby in utero as often as I sang to Wyatt
• just beginning to document my current pregnancy
• eating fish while I’m pregnant
• eating goat and bleu cheese while I’m pregnant
• not sleeping as much during this pregnancy
• feeling stressed out during this pregnancy
• sometimes forgetting that I’m pregnant

What about you all? Anyone want to join in on the guilt-fest? Leave a comment if you feel up for it.

It seems that everyone who has a blog is required to write a post about the new year, their goals and/or their resolutions, so here is mine. I find it interesting that this time of year nearly everyone, including me, is compelled to purge the old and try to start things off with a fresh and clean slate. Without even thinking, I’ve been on a mini-cleaning and organization spree. I actually cleaned and organized the stuff on our refrigerator door the other day. I reorganized under the sink too!

I don’t usually make resolutions, but I do like to set goals for the year. As I’ve been thinking about what I’d like for the coming year, one theme has come up repeatedly and that theme is balance. Last year I felt like I was swinging around on a big, crazy, out of control pendulum. Or maybe one of those magnet things you see at kid’s science museums, because pendulums aren’t really out of control, are they? First work was crazy, then I got mono, then Wyatt was challenging, then I had a relaxing vacation. Even my hobbies felt manic. I’d read 6 books in a month and then I wouldn’t read anything the next month. I’d crank out 12 scrapbook pages in a week and then all my stuff would collect dust for the next five. I know that peaks and valleys are part of life, but I felt like I could barely think of more than one thing at a time last year. This year, I’m going to try to keep things on a more even keel. Work will still need a lot of my attention, of course, but I’m not going to give too much of myself at the expense of my health. Wyatt and Zach will be a focus, but I’m going to try to spend more time with friends too.
So here are some of the other things I’d like to do this year, both big and small:

1. Concentrate on good health
   Having mono has really kicked my butt. I’m still tired a great deal of the time and I’ve found that if I try to keep go, go, going too much I get sick again. I’m almost completely out of sick time at work which complicates things. The best case scenario when I’m feeling bad is to stay home and rest, but without sick time that’s a little tricky. I’m going to try to keep things a little bit balanced though and rest when I’m tired instead of killing myself with work, housework, errands, and fun.
2. Eat more whole foods
   This definitely feeds into goal number one up there, but I think it’s important enough to list out on it’s own. I like this goal because it encourages a couple of other, smaller food goals I have. Cook at home most nights. Take my lunch to work. Try to eat higher quality food. And there’s a little bit of an environmental benefit to boot.
3. Make a quilt for Wyatt’s bed
   Poor old Wyatt has been sleeping with a tiny little blanket on his bed for several months now. I’ve also never gotten over the guilt of not making him a quilt so this is the year I fix that.
4. Purge unnecessary objects from our house
   We have too much junk in our house and I can hardly stand it. I’m so much happier when there’s a little room to breathe.
5. Spend more time with friends
   It’s way to easy for me to focus only on family and work. I have such great friends and I miss them! I’ve already got something planned for this one too. Allison and I are going to fly up to visit Lisa in Seattle in a couple of weeks.

I had to give a big presentation in front of my entire company today, complete with a Power Point slide show. The topic I was discussing was how we are planning to meet our goal of doubling our site conversion rate.

Total yawn fest.

My strategy for keeping people interested was to put as many amusing photos into the Power Point as I could  fit. I actually managed to get something funny on almost every slide. Most of the photos were of the people in my department making funny faces and those were a big hit. I also had a slide about 1996 (not worth explaining why) so I put a bunch of photos from 1996 on it, including these two of Jennifer Aniston and myself.

Th following slide was this one here that I photoshopped.

I figure that since I went to the trouble of making it, I may as well put it up on my blog for the entire internet to see.