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*That’s how Catie says Mary Poppins. I don’t know why the “H” sound in front of her name, but she does this a lot. Like her cousin Austin is “Haustin.” And this month? Is “Haugust.” Don’t know where it comes from, but it’s funny, so I let it slide.

This weekend, we made a quick trip to Charlotte to visit my sister, who got us tickets to go see the traveling Broadway musical of Mary Poppins. Catie would’ve been excited to just sit in Tracy’s apartment for 24 hours, but getting to see the “concert” (her words) of one of her favorite movies was definitely a bonus.

Wait, let me back up because I need an excuse to post this picture. On Friday evening, we went to our monthly Drum Night, and I got this picture, which cracks me up.

What a bunch of miscreants and ne’er-do-wells. I swear there needs to be a “No Loitering” sign over their heads.

ANYWAY. So on Saturday, we drove to Charlotte. Catie napped in the car.

Man, I wish I could nap in the car like that. (Also? Dave says that I do that exact open-mouth thing when I sleep. I say he’s a dirty liar.)

We hung out at my sister’s place for a while, then went out for dinner.

Catie was very excited by the crayons that came with her kids’ menu.

Then we walked around. Or, in my sister’s case, got dragged around.

(I’m pretty sure Tracy didn’t mind being dragged. She didn’t seem to mind giving Catie a piggy-back ride either.)

Soon, it was time to head off for the show. Dave wisely headed back to Tracy’s apartment to chill out and watch movies while the girls went to the show. (Dave is definitely not a Broadway kind of dude.)

I only managed to take this one really awful picture before the mean old usher came over and fussed at me for using my camera. (It was before the show even started!!)

I have to say, the flash on the iPhone 4? Kind of makes everyone look jaundiced. I’m not a fan.

As for the show, it was fantastic. I’m not generally a Broadway fan, but it was really great. My only complaint was that the matinee was sold out, so Tracy got us tickets for the 8 p.m. show. Which would’ve been fine if it’d just been us, but the show ended at 10:45, by which point Catie had dozed off on Tracy’s arm. (I woke her up so she could see Mary Poppins fly out over the audience, because MAN that was cool.)

Anyway, if the show comes to your town? I highly recommend it. It was so fun.

On Sunday, we got up, had brunch with Tracy, then drove home. Usually when we leave Tracy, Catie has a total meltdown. This time, I promised her that if she was good and didn’t cry when it was time to leave, I’d take her swimming when we got back to Raleigh.

She held up her end of the deal.

And yes, I absolutely did take her to the pool as soon as we got home.

All in all, super-fun weekend. And my parents are flying up on Wednesday to visit for a few days, so we’re going to get lots of good family time this week, which is great. I predict that Catie will be spoiled rotten by the time Labor Day arrives. Ah well. What can you do?

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So, besides my girl deciding that she’s half-fish this weekend, we also had not one but TWO birthday parties to attend. This makes three birthday parties in less than a month. It’s pretty sad when you realize that your 3 year-old has a more active social calendar than either of her parents.

On Friday evening, we went to a birthday party at the Jump Zone for Catie’s daycare friend Cole. I tried out the iPhone’s video camera and got this (warning: turn down your volume, the Jump Zone is LOUD).

That’s 34 seconds of a tiny blonde blur right there. And it’s pretty much all I saw for the entire two hours we were there.

Finally, we managed to round up the kids and go have pizza and cake. The private room for birthday parties had a big inflatable throne, which I assume is for the birthday boy/girl to sit on, but all the kids took turns climbing on it.

(If you look closely, you can see evidence of the Thomas the Tank Engine cake. That blue frosting stuff requires soap and water to wash off, it won’t be contained by mere napkins alone.)

On Sunday, we went to a birthday party for Catie’s friend Ava at a local playground.

Of course, it was all fun and games until it was time to get the kids together for a group picture, at which point Catie crossed her arms and pouted. (She wanted to keep playing.)

It’s a great park, and the party was a lot of fun, but I don’t know if there are adequate words to express how miserably hot it was. Ninety degrees, humid, and not a single breeze to be found. It was about as sweaty as you can get. Not that the kids seemed too terribly bothered by it.

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen this child more sweaty in her life. Before we left, I dragged her into the ladies’ room to splash some cold water on her face to try to help her cool off.

(If any of y’all remember the boy that Catie was caught kissing? That’s him. He’s a very sweet kid. And apparently he’s told his parents that when he grows up, he’s going to drive a mini-van just like his dad, and Catie will ride beside him. I think that’s the 3 year-old version of saying he’s going to marry her. I’m taking notes of all this for when they end up going to prom together in 15 years.)

The party was great, and I love that most of the other daycare parents seem friendly and nice. But it would’ve been a lot more fun in maybe a month or so when it’s 10-15 degrees cooler outside!

On the upside, though, spending all that time out in the heat made the pool feel extra-awesome on Sunday afternoon. So there’s that.

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This weekend, Dave taught Catie how to develop game apps for the iPhone.

She’s totally into it, and taking it very seriously.

She’ll probably design the greatest app since “Words With Friends.”

Oh, and I got an iPhone 4! Which shoots video! Related: we sang happy birthday to my sister, and filmed it since Tracy is currently celebrating her birthday with friends in Italy.

Of course, it didn’t really occur to me until later that my sister can only access her email on her Blackberry, which doesn’t have YouTube capabilities, so she won’t actually see it until she gets back to the US. Oh well. Happy birthday, Tracy!

We also watched a heck of a lot of Xanadu. (And I learned that if you turn the phone to a landscape setting, it automatically adjusts when you copy it over to your laptop. Nice job, Apple! I won’t make any more oddly narrow videos.)

(I’m still trying to get a video of her really singing it. So far, she kind of goes quiet as soon as she sees the camera. You can still see her lip-syncing it, but hopefully I’ll get a real video of it soon.)

(Also? This is how she always watches Xanadu – with lots and lots and lots of random questions about the plot.)

Sunday afternoon, we went to see the Wiggles in concert.

At first, Catie wasn’t too sure what she thought about the whole concert thing. But she took the popcorn very seriously.

Honestly? That might’ve been one of the most fun kids’ concerts we’ve been to (and I’ve been to a lot of them). You can tell that these guys have been doing this stuff for 20 years, and they just have fun with it and throw in all kinds of improv lines here and there, which makes it really funny for the adults in the audience.

That said, I’m glad I didn’t take advantage of the chance I had to get closer seats, because Catie got a little claustrophobic from the crowd, so we spent a lot of the show toward the back where it was emptier. She usually reacts that way in crowds, same as Dave, so I wasn’t too surprised by it.

I did manage to get one decent picture of all three of us, although the weird iPhone flash thing makes it look like we’ve been dousing ourselves in self-tanner.

Also? Sweaty. It was HOT in there. I don’t know how those guys on stage do it.

Overall, though? A pretty great time was had by all. But I can’t quite believe it’s Monday already.

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Tomorrow, I’m getting on a plane bound for New York City, so I can go to BlogHer ‘10. I bought my conference pass ages ago (February, I think?), so I’ve been looking forward to this for a long time.

But yesterday, there was a big chunk of the day where I thought I was going to have to scrap my NYC plans completely. See, yesterday we found out that my uncle Stanton (you know my cousin Cat who I talk about all the time, and our kids are BFFs with each other? This is her dad) had a massive heart attack. Like, he was dead for 10 minutes and the EMTs managed to shock him and get him back. It’s really really bad.

It makes no sense. He’s one of the most athletically fit people you’ll ever meet. He’s an avid cyclist and rides his bike every day. This whole thing actually happened while he was on a bike ride with his friends. It’s just a freak thing. It’s basically the equivalent of Superman having a heart attack. Completely illogical.

And all I could think about was how Cat must be feeling, about how I’d feel if it were my dad, and I just wanted to do something. Anything. So at one point I offered to sell my BlogHer pass and change my plane ticket to fly to Texas with her. She said no, and she flew out last night with Austin, her 18 month-old, since he can still fly for free, plus you know, the Magic Healing Powers of Grandbabies can’t possibly hurt. She told me not to change my plans, to go to BlogHer and have fun. (Sure. Easier said than done!)

Right now it looks like things are very much in a wait-and-see phase, and we likely won’t have any news until tomorrow afternoon at the earliest, by which point I’ll already be in New York.

So, you know, just FYI: I’m generally not the socially anxious type, and I don’t do Blogger Drama as a rule, so if you see me obsessively checking my phone with worry lines on my forehead? I’m not freaking out about the conference thing at all. I just don’t cope very well with family crises (but then: who does?). So if you happen to notice me looking all frazzled and distant, please come over and talk to me, give me a hug, slap me upside the head, shove a drink into my hand, whatever. I’d really appreciate the distraction.

Oh, also, for those of you who’ll be at BlogHer this weekend? See y’all tomorrow. (Yay!)

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Alright, this might get me some unwanted Google hits, but it’s also going to be particularly funny to those who know my family.

My maiden name is Butchee. Pronounced just like it’s spelled: BOO-chee. Like, rhymes with Gucci. It also rhymes with other words (hint: coochie) that made high school, shall we say, less than fun for me.

It’s a weird name, right? Turns out there was some dude about 200 years ago who came from Switzerland to the US. His name was Johannes Buetschi, but when he came here, his name was “Americanized” and he became John Butchee. If you meet any other Butchees, they’re probably related to me.

(Oh! Except! Y’all know I’m from Mississippi, right? When I was little, my grandmother had a housekeeper whose last name was also Butchee, which was weird since she was black. I didn’t quite understand how that was possible, until I was older and learned in history class how slaves sometimes took the last names of their owners and OMG, the Liberal Guilt. So yeah. Apparently my grandmother’s housekeeper’s ancestors and my family’s ancestors had, uh, some familiarity with each other. Yikes.)

(I also found out when I did some genealogy research that my great-great-grandfather – and all of his brothers – fought for the South in the Civil War. No, I’m not proud of that. AT ALL. But what can I do? It was 150 years ago. I’ll have a conversation about race relations with him when I see him in heaven.)

Growing up, I hated all of the jokes that were made about my last name. Even the good-natured jokes that my friends made still irritated me. In fact, when I reconnected with a high school friend on Facebook, she reminded me of this silly song she used to sing about my last name, and I finally got to tell her – 15 years later – “Yeah, I didn’t think it was funny then, and I don’t think it’s funny now. Sorry.”

Honestly, I jumped at the chance to change my name to Wilkinson when Dave and I got married. Can you blame me? It’s a name most people can spell and pronounce, and it doesn’t rhyme with any slang terms for female anatomy. I call that a WIN.

So, my sense of humor on the name-mocking? Eh, not so much.

But then, back in March, Catie and I went to New Orleans with my mom, to visit her family. Our hotel reservation was in my mom’s name, so my mom went to the front desk and told the lady her name: Carolyn Butchee.

Catie was standing next to my mom at the time. Her eyes widened and she repeated, “Caroline Boo-shee???” Then she collapsed into a heap of giggles like it was the funniest phrase she had ever heard in her life.

She kept repeating it over and over, “Caroline Boo-shee! Hee hee hee!!!” It became the big joke of the weekend, we could just say my mom’s name to her and she’d fall over laughing. (It’s also particularly funny to me because my mom has spent her entire life correcting people about her first name – it’s Carolyn, not Caroline – and the fact that her precious grandbaby pronounces it wrong slays me.)

And to this day, it remains one of her favorite jokes with my parents. Catie video chats with my parents on Skype pretty regularly, and my dad will ask her what his real name is. She says, “Pop-Pop Boo-shee!!” And then she cracks up. If we try to tell her that no, his real first name is actually Sam, that makes her laugh even more, because Sam is the name of her Grandma’s dog, so she thinks we’re totally yanking her chain and just making up nonsense names.

It also works well in knock-knock jokes.

My dad: Knock, knock.
Catie: Who’s there?
My dad: Pop-Pop!
Catie: Pop-Pop who?
My dad: Pop-Pop Butchee!

Then Catie practically pees herself laughing. She has no idea that Butchee is honestly their last name.

What’s weird is that this is the first time in my life that someone has laughed at my last name, and I’ve laughed along with them.

Especially since, sorry kiddo, I know your last name might be Wilkinson, but you’re 50% Butchee yourself. Better get used to it.

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I went to BlogHer last year for the first time. I felt a little awkward going into it since I didn’t really know anyone beforehand, and you can never be sure how you’re going to click with people when you meet them in real life.

One of the people who mentioned wanting to meet me was Greis. We had talked on Twitter some, and she seemed cool, but she’s also into sports and she likes country music, so I really wasn’t sure if we’d have anything in common at all.

Then I met her. And it was like meeting someone I’d known my whole life. I’m pretty sure I hung out with Greis far more than anybody else that whole weekend. She’s even in my favorite picture of myself from that weekend (if not one of my favorite pictures of myself, ever). She looks pretty hot in it, too.

Don’t we look purdy?

She’s just… normal. No drama. Totally easy to talk to and be around. And also very smart and incredibly funny.

Everyone should have at least one Greis in their life, is what I’m saying.

Tomorrow, Greis is doing something I did 8 years ago and having gastric bypass surgery. She and I have talked a lot about it over the past several months, and I could not be happier or more excited for her.

Rather than teach her parents how to use Twitter, she’s going to give them my number and have them text me after her surgery so I can update her friends for her. I’m honestly honored to have been chosen to do that for her. (I know, that sounds cheesy, shut up, I totally mean it.)

Of course, I’m totally bummed that because of the surgery timing and some other planned vacations, Greis won’t be able to come to BlogHer this year. I can’t really imagine what it’ll be like without her, since she’s so ingrained in my mental image of the conference. But there’s always next year.

Congrats, Greis, and good luck tomorrow. Can’t wait to see you on the other side. Love you tons, lady.

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When we were at the pool on Sunday, I noticed this stark contrast in child behaviors.

First, we met a little girl named Sophia. She’s 4 1/2, and apparently this is her first year taking swimming lessons. Her dad was in the water with her (along with her big brother, but he was 8 or 9 years old, and off in the deeper part of the pool with his friends), and she was practicing putting her face in the water and kicking. She came over to Catie and the two girls shyly introduced themselves. Sophia said to Catie, “I like your name,” which made me melt because I’m sure that an adult told her that’s a nice thing to say to make friends, but it was so sweet. I knew Catie wouldn’t know how to respond, so I said, “Well, I think Sophia is a beautiful name.”

She and Catie played together for a while, she showed Catie how she could put her face in the water, and Catie was duly impressed. Her dad was friendly and chatted with Dave and me while the girls played, and it was great. Soon they had to head home, and that was that.

Here comes the contrast.

Right as Sophia and her family were leaving, a new family showed up at the pool. Again, it was a dad (it seems the moms in our neighborhood get the day off on Sundays; I wish I’d gotten that memo), and there was an older brother and a little sister, but this time, the dad parked himself on a chaise lounge in the shade and started talking with another dad. The older boy jumped in and started playing with the older kids, and the little girl came over to me. Not Catie, just to me. She told me her name was Sarah, and that she was 4 years old. I did a kid introduction, “Hey Catie, this is Sarah. Sarah, this is Catie.” And I thought that maybe they’d play together nicely like Catie had just done with Sophia.

Um… not so much.

It became apparent pretty quickly that Sarah was in dire need of parental attention, and since her dad never once even glanced in the direction of the swimming pool to make sure that his kids weren’t drowning, she latched on to me. It started with her asking me a million questions and making me feel like I was in that Monty Python sketch about “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!” Then she wanted me to watch her while she did all kinds of pool stunts… which, oooookay, but shouldn’t your dad be watching you?

Also, I don’t know what the heck this kid does in her off-time, but she clearly is not supervised nearly enough, because she was covered in band-aids, which kept coming off in the water. Every time one did, I’d point it out to her and ask her to please go put it in the trash can (which she did). Then I’d look at Dave and make gagging faces. Band-aids floating in a pool is just about one of the grossest things ever. And this is why Dave and I started referring to her (after we left the pool) as Open Wound Sarah.

Then she started to get a little obnoxious. She and her brother had brought a ton of pool toys with them, but every. single. item. warranted this high-pitched, eardrum-piercing “THAT’S MINE!!!” shriek from her – and I’m not even talking about Catie, I’m talking about when her brother tried to use the toys. Even the things they’d brought two of (like, say, beach balls or pool noodles), she insisted that they were both hers, she didn’t want her brother to touch any of them. And I think it’s worth noting that none of her shrieking fits warranted even a glance from her dad, who was still engrossed in his conversation.

Next, she turned her attention back to us. Catie was playing with her inflatable pirate ship, putting her toys in it and pushing it out to Dave and me in the pool. Sarah asked if she could ride in the pirate ship. I said sure, if she wanted to share one of her toys with Catie. She gave Catie a beach ball (which Catie was happy to play with), and we let Sarah play with the pirate ship for a while. That’s fair, right?

About ten minutes later, Catie decided that she didn’t want the beach ball anymore, she wanted her pirate boat back. Sarah refused to give it back. I kind of stumbled with that one while Catie gave me this, “WTF, Mom?” look. I honestly wasn’t sure how to handle it at first. Then I decided that you know what? These are not communal toys, we are not on a playdate, and this kid has about a bajillion things of her own to play with. So I said, “Sarah, you know, Catie brought this pirate boat to the pool, so it’s hers. And if she wants to play with it, she should be able to play with it. You have a lot of your own toys here, so maybe you should go play with them instead.” Sarah gave back the pirate boat, then turned around and kicked the water to splash both me and Catie in the face. I said, sharply (and loudly), “Ok, that’s not nice, we don’t do that.” Her dad? Yeah, he still didn’t notice.

Sarah took off for the chaise lounge where her dad was sitting, rummaged around in their bag o’ pool junk, and came back with one of those Super Soaker water guns. I looked at Dave and muttered, “Great. Now she’s armed.”

And as I predicted, she spent the next few minutes filling up the water gun and spraying it into the air so it would come down on Catie’s head (which, hello, I barely got the kid to go down to the 2nd step, don’t get her head wet or she might freak and never come back). I told her to stop a couple of times, then finally said very loudly, “Ok, Sarah, that’s enough!” Apparently that was loud enough to get her dad’s attention, and he looked over just in time to see me making a face at Dave that probably indicated I was about to throttle his kid. He called for her to come put away the water gun. Finally. But that was basically his only parenting contribution for the hour that we were there.

But she still wouldn’t leave us alone, she kept trying to boss Catie around and take her pirate boat away from her, and it was just aggravating. Finally I said, “You know, I think it’s time to go home for lunch!” By that point, all three of us, even Catie, were happy to leave just to get the heck away from that kid.

I still can’t decide, though. Is Sarah just a bratty kid? Or is this her parents’ fault for not paying enough attention to her, and causing her to seek attention in negative ways? I was only around the kid for an hour, so I probably don’t know enough to judge, but I’m leaning toward the latter.

I just really hope we can avoid that family at the pool in the future. I have a feeling I’ll end up snapping and yelling at the dad to pay attention to his children if we have to go through that again.

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