a chick with sticks (and a computer):

"You mean Bush is STILL in office? Let's get on with this thing, shall we?!"

Happy New Year, everyone! Tonight we go to a kid-friendly soiree from which we'll probably be home by 9. Tomorrow, we'll definitely be eating our black-eyed peas for luck and collard greens for money, because, like everyone else, we could use some of both!

Despite the economic catastrophe, I can't talk the same smack about 2008 that everyone else is because our dear Plum joined us in 2008. So for me, it was a very good year. But like most, I'm eagerly looking forward to a Barackariffic 2009, hopefully full of health, happiness, and lots of good YA novels. (I find lately I crave sleep a little less and the time to curl up with a great YA a little more. Which perhaps means I've officially left the newborn trenches?)

All the best. Hopefully you'll see more blogging from me in the new year. I'm gearing up for a return to work. Yahoo!

xoxo

Elizabeth

Plum is seven weeks old as of yesterday. Which means, erm, it's been about seven weeks since I last blogged. I'm loving this two-kid thing. I mean, I am blissed out by my baby and LaLa seems to have gotten past her most recent phase, which made her, frankly, a little obnoxious, knock-your-head-against-the-wall repetitive, and tantrummy. She's back to her sweet, sassy self. And she's in love with the baby, too.

The only rub is, there's hardly any time to do anything but parent. And do a shabby semblance of cleaning and organizing because I'll go out of my gourd if I don't. (But of course, I don't do a good enough job at the cleaning and organizing which is almost as frustrating as not cleaning and organizing at all. This is a girl thing, according to my husband, who doesn't mind chaos in the slightest.)

But I'm feeling the tiniest of itches--the urge to write and a new book idea percolating. But since I'm too overwhelmed to do much with that idea yet, I might as well natter a bit here with highlights of the blur since birth:

• Obama got elected. Whoooooo! And whew!

• My diaper bag was stolen. Which sucked more than one would expect. I felt creepy and violated knowing that someone was sifting through all my stuff -- wallet, house and car keys, phone, camera containing lots of undownloaded pics of my kids, LaLa's favorite sweater, and one of Plum's tiny little newborn outfits. But after dealing with all the cancelled credit cards and lock changes and such, I've forgotten about all of it. Except the camera, sniff.

• Plum got baby eczema, baby acne, and an unfortunate bald spot, all in the same week. But with a little hydrocortisone cream and some fast-growing fuzz, she's adorable again.

• We all got sick, even little Plum, unlike her sister who was born in the spring and sheltered from all germs by her over-anxious parents. Now, LaLa comes home from pre-school, her nose running, and dashes straight to the baby and practically licks her, so in love is she. And thus, Plum has been coughing and throwing up all week and we've been to the pediatrician -- seriously -- FOUR times in the past eight days. But she's finally getting better. And big picture, I think it's better to have a big sister who's so loving that she's infectious than one who can't stand her little sib, don't you?

• Media tie-in queen Judy Blundell won the National Book Award. Yay!!! And hmmmmmm! I've written my share of media tie-ins. Perhaps there's hope for me yet! (I was also super-proud to see that my Girlfriends Cyber-Circuit sister, E. Lockhart was a finalist. Wowee!!!!)

• My niece was bat mitzvahed and did fabulously. And there was Thanksgiving, at which I was thankful for too many things to count.

And on that note, the baby's clamoring to be fed so back to the (happy) chaos I go.