This evening Jachin decided to create a time capsule to bury in our backyard. After inserting a few choice items that he felt best represented the year 2009, he wrote a short letter and stuck it all in a plastic container, marking the outside with the instructions: DO NOT OPEN UNTIL THE YEAR 2300 A.D.

“Let’s seal it with tape,” he said, getting the packing tape from the cupboard.

“Ok, do you have everything you want in there before we seal it all up?” I asked.

“Well, let’s see…”

And then he showed me what was actually in the time capsule.

A flower hair clip that Zoe and I made the other day, a rubber ball, a paper clip from the desk drawer, a fire cracker, and a Pokemon card.

“Man,” he said, admiring the Pokemon card, “whoever opens this time capsule is one lucky person! This card will be worth millions of dollars in 191 years!”

“No doubt,” I said… and it took me several hours to realize that it will actually be 291 years… so imagine how much the  card will be worth then!

“Hey, can we also put in one of our Wii games?”

“Umm, no. You can’t bury a $50 game in the backyard.”

And yes, I’m sort of a killjoy. And yes, I realize that a Wii game would actually be the item that would best represent the year 2009. But still…

We sealed it all up.

Then he and Zoe went to bury it in the corner of the yard.

Now before you go getting all judgmental about how crappy my yard looks, I should explain that this is the far corner of the yard, which I keep telling myself will one day be my luscious, green vegetable garden. Right now it is a lovely weed patch that houses a dying plum tree, several feral neighbor cats… and now a time capsule.

The entire process was supervised by the one cat on the planet Jon doesn’t want to strangle: Pouncer. Pouncer is the adorable, slightly feral neighbor kitten.

(again, try to picture some yummy veggies growing.)

After digging for a while, they plopped the time capsule in and examined the depth.

I didn’t have the heart to tell them that the time capsule may indeed be unearthed slightly sooner than 2300 A.D. , since their hole is precisely where I plan to put my cucumbers. Then again, at the rate Jon and I get home improvement projects completed, a garden by 2300 A.D. may actually be a modest goal.

I can’t believe how fast two months have gone by. It’s crazy. He is already like a totally different kid. A kid who can now sit with his little spine straight (for short periods, anyway), and chatter and smile. A kid who can now unclench his little balled fists, though he still can’t make his hands go where he wants them to (which has resulted in him punching himself in the eye a couple of times). What a sweetheart.

I’ve also figured out (after many evenings of crying and kicking) that he doesn’t handle dairy or most green veggies. So mama is now on soy milk. Blech. It’s not the yummiest stuff in the world, but ya do what ya gotta do.  

My sweet little guy.

(super-cute circus playmat from Junie None Designs… go check out the precious stuff she makes.)

I’m in a blogging funk. I presently have no desire to post. Even with some amazing blog fodder happening in the last week and a half.

Like us thinking that Jon was having a heart attack last weekend.

Yeah, you read that right. And no, I’m not just being dramatic. And no, I don’t super feel like writing about it (I’ve sat down on three separate occasions to tell you about it, and aborted all three times with a “save draft”).  But since it would actually be sort of rude and obnoxious to say that he almost died and then not tell you about… I guess I’ll tell you about it.

Number one, he didn’t almost die. We just thought that he was going to die. He was having chest pains that Friday night after basketball and then again Saturday morning. And then by late Saturday morning he had nausea and the shakes and his limbs were tingly. So what does a sane man do when he is sitting there on the couch with his wife on a Saturday morning with these seemingly life-threatening symptoms?

I don’t know what a sane man would do. But I’ll tell you what Jon did.

He jumped up off of the couch and declared: “Something is wrong. I have to go.” And then, despite my attempts to get him to stop and tell me what the hell was going on, he put on his shoes and got in his car and took off.

That’s correct. He decided to drive around the town while seemingly having a heart attack.

And so I packed up the baby and called my in-laws and yelled for the kids to put on their coats and get in the car. And then I tried Jon’s cell phone. He answered. And if I could have reached through the phone, I would have strangled him dead. I asked him where he was. Again he said to me: “Something is wrong.” But then he added, “I don’t know. I’ll be fine.” And then the phone went dead. (If you are thinking this is all very cryptic, it isn’t because my written account sucks. It’s because his ability to communicate in emergency situations sucks.) So I dropped the kids at my in-laws’, and then my father-in-law and I drove around looking for Jon, who by now was not answering his cell phone. (He would later tell me this was because his hands had gone completely numb… but luckily not numb enough to hinder his ability to steer.) We checked around at hospitals. We checked his work. I finally called the police.

That was one weird call. I had to explain that I would have gladly driven my husband to the hospital, had I been given the opportunity. I had to explain that I hadn’t made him drive himself while having a heart attack. The police found him some time later, checked in at a hospital. (But strangely not the hospital closest to our house… or even an “in-network” hospital, for that matter.)

Long story short, he had an EKG that revealed there was — thankfully — no heart attack. But his blood work came back a little wonky, so he was sent to have a coronary angiogram. For those of you not up on the latest, coolest, bossest, most cringe-inducing medical procedures, this is when they shove a wire with a camera on it up into your heart via your groin… and this is where I feel Jon got a little bit of punishment for scaring the ever-living crap out of me. (Poor dude has a bruise the size of North Dakota in a rather tender spot.) The angiogram showed no blockage, but there was some inflammation. He’s now on Celebrex, which I’d always assumed was a medication for old people. But no, now my spry, hot-buns husband is on it. (Of course it is entirely possible that we are old, and I’m just in denial.)

Other than fake heart attacks, we’ve also had the following things happen in the last week and a half: two of us have gotten colds; I started and then promptly dropped the South Beach diet; I finally shared the first chapter of my book with a couple people, and received some great constructive feedback; we attended the baptism of my nephew; Deacon got weighed and it was revealed that he is now over 11 pounds; we finally ventured back to church with Deacon; and I had a brainstorm about what to put on the huge, bare, green wall over our bed in our bedroom (it’s been bugging me for two years)… that’s a project I may actually blog about.

If I’m still in a funk, I’ll check in in another week and a half with any other crazy medical scares. If my funk lifts, it may be sooner… I mean the checking back. Hopefully sans the medical scares.

I have this friend, Heidi. She is a personal trainer. (But I’ve known her since before she became a personal trainer.) She prides herself on being somewhat of a hard-core, make-you-cry sort of a personal trainer. (But I’ve known her since she was just a hard-core, make-you-cry sort of a friend… not really. She is actually a very gentle, kind friend.) Heidi and I used to live next door to each other, several years ago. We would go to Gold’s Gym in the mornings together. I would jog in place for 45 seconds and do 3 sit-ups and attempt to call it a work-out. Heidi would then give me an intimidating look, and smack me with a licorice whip, and bark at me to stop being such a pansy and give her 20 more of whatever I was doing. Plus she liked to add more weight to whatever I was doing. But sometimes real sneaky-like — like when we were talking and I was looking at my chubby butt in the mirror — because she had it in her mind that I was much stronger than I actually am. And this is what we did. She played the role of drill sergeant and I played of the role of lazy sissy. It worked for us.

Then we both moved. After she moved: she became a real personal trainer, watched me roll from a golf cart, ran a marathon, had her third kid, and then promptly got skinny/buff again. After I moved: I continued to work on my still-not-finished book, rolled from a golf cart, ran a 5K, had my third kid, and then promptly picked up a licorice habit that has aided in my ever expanding butt. One of us is a little more focused than the other… but we are equally skilled at getting knocked up.

So the other night Heidi and I went to a movie. Then I mentioned how I was chubby and not happy about it. She told me that she had a 10Am slot open at her gym. I told her that my grandma comes over once a week to help me out by watching Deacon while I do stuff. It seemed perfect.  

Thursday morning I got a text (which cost me 40 cents because I no longer have a text plan on my phone) from her asking if I was coming over to her gym. She promised to be nice. And so I did. I went over and had her train me.

And it was one sad looking spectacle.

Some of my muscles were atrophied and some were tight. Some were out of shape and some were hibernating. None of my muscles were smooth or lithe or able to lift any more weight than that of a Diet Coke can or a bag of Pull-n-Peels. I am completely out of shape. She gestured toward the mirrors that covered the walls, trying to show me exactly how my body was working incorrectly. “Your knees are coming in on your squats,” she said. “But it’s hard to tell because your sweats are so baggy.” What I didn’t tell her was that my “sweats” were actually my pajama pants, and my real work-out yoga pants would not fit onto my body at the moment… other than if I were to use them as a headband. But to better help me see my stupid inward bending knees, she grabbed my sweatpants and pulled them in tight, allowing me to get a really good view of my chubby legs doing squats. I sort of felt like crying. Or punching her. Bless her sweet, buff heart. And then she barked (nicely) for me to give her 15 more.

I’ll be honest: it shouldn’t have been much of a work-out, but it was. After months of inactivity, just carrying the baby’s car seat from the car to the door has me a little winded. Heidi was perfect, though; making me work, but not making me die. I woke up this morning with sore legs and sore arms, and sore I’m-not-sure-what-they’re-for muscles in my back. And then I humped it over to my in-laws house where I did a couple miles on the treadmill. Nothing major, just enough to keep my Frankenstein legs from becoming completely stiff and snapping off of my body.

Next Thursday I’ll be back at Heidi’s gym, listening to her bark (nicely) at me. And I’m actively weaning myself from the licorice. And consciously eating more lean protein and veggies.

And with any luck at all, I’ll be wearing my yoga pants as actual pants again in no time flat.

Which means I should be looking for a new headband.

And your weekly baby video is here.