T minus three days to party!

My sister arrived Tuesday and we have been in party prep mode the last three days. I've made Theo's party hat, we assembled the goody bags, my sister is making a yellow submarine photo stand, and Saturday we do the big Costco run for drinks and snacks, then attempt to assemble the yellow submarine cake. All in all we're keeping it fairly simple - I'm re-using the decor from B's Cat in the Hat first birthday and instead of baking a giant three-tiered cake to be held up by dowels, I ordered a plain cake from Costco that we'll re-frost and shape into a submarine, surrounded by rainbow mini cupcakes. Getting everything to the party location should be interesting, but at least I have the Sorento's big trunk this time.

At Bobby's first birthday party I almost had a stroke from stress. Let's just say this time, as the mother of a three-year-old and one-year-old, I have a much higher tolerance for chaos, mishaps, and stress. You can only do what you can do; not everything has to be perfect. All the other parents, at least, will "get it" if not everything is on time, organized, and neat.

Theo survived his first year appointment and the mass of vaccines. Guess I don't have to worry (much) about the measles outbreak anymore, whew! They did say, since he hasn't gained any weight since his 9 month appointment, to fill him up with calorie-dense foods and we'll re-evaluate in three months. He is a tiny little guy - I compared Bobby's one year vintage outfit with Theo's little body and it was giant next to him. Of course at (almost) one, young Bobby was mangling my nipples and breast feeding all night long, whereas Theo had been down to just one morning feed for months and has been off the boob since Saturday and is mainly eating vegetables. So I need to up my game as far as his food intake, big time.

Speaking of boobs, I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop...it's now day six of no breast feeding, and my boobs still feel ok...I expressed a little into the sink the other night, but not much. I am waiting for them to fill up with rocks and then wither away to nothing. Part of me hopes this just won't happen this time...but I know it has to, I mean, milk has to be festering there with no outlet, surely this will all go horribly wrong at some point...?

On a whim, after talking to a married friend about how she and her husband got together, I did a little Google research regarding "alpha vs beta males" and found some really interesting information. That basically, this "let the man do the pursuing" thing really only pertains to traditional alpha male types - the aggressive, dominant, sexy guy who knows what he wants and pounces on it. For all the other guys, they do need a little push. What that looks like depends on a lot of factors of course - and I'm not even sure what all this means regarding the current state of affairs with my Love Interest - but I will say the article I found described him, and me, to a T. That you pretty much have to paint a billboard with I LIKE YOU to get them to not worry that they are going to be rejected or are going to creep you out. Then you ask - do you really want a guy like that? Um, yeah. That's totally my type. Betas need love, too, don't they?

I had to take an honest look at my three decades of dating experience and really examine what happened there - I can say with real clarity that the times I was pursued by the aggressive alpha types, I was never that into them, and we had kind of meh relationships because they weren't my type. The times I did the pursuing - twice by walking right up to a guy I knew kind of liked me and introducing myself and asking him out, once by becoming a full-on stalker and following this boy I liked all over lower Manhattan - we went on to have lovely, long-term relationships. Basically, I'm an alpha, and alphas and alphas are rarely a match. The alphas I dated just made me feel controlled, powerless, and shitty.

Again, none of this means anything if this guy just isn't into me, which may very well be the case. But I'm not just going to sit back and wait for him to call me for a date because that is never going to happen. For fear of rejection, for fear of jeopardizing the group we're in together and our two decades-plus friendship, he's just not going to do it. The fact that he threw out that one liner last time I saw him about getting together, though, does tell me he's at least somewhat interested. I just need to see him alone one more time. I'm curious where all of this is going to end up. 

But enough of my yakkin', let's boogie!