How Kendra Got Her Groove Back

Can we talk about bikini waxes for a second? Because I just had my first post-partum wax and, all deforestation jokes aside, I think my Lady Land is standing up and singing her own national anthem right now, such is her pride. You could say she's waxing poetic BADAMP-CHING about the goodness and light that falls upon her now. The aesthetician was a mom herself who had also endured a c-section and one might think that was not a friendly topic to distract me with whilst stripping the southern hemisphere but we were just blab-blab-blabbing away about anesthesia and bad lighting and mom flaps (see also: Abs Missing, Reward = Big Bowl of Popcorn) and suddenly she asks me, "How does it look?" and I can barely believe it's all over. It didn't even hurt that bad. Of course the pain is all juxtaposed with the last waxing I had which was in my first trimester and everyone who's ever been pregnant must have Momnesia because they failed to mention that getting waxed whilst pregnant is about as much fun as a taking a nap on a fly trap with some hobbit feet in your face. Not NICE. I suppose the grooming is somewhat symbolic of how I'm starting to feel like a person again and not just a milk maid zombie. Just a week ago, we started putting the baby bundle down to sleep at a respectable hour and it has made such a difference. Lovey Loverpants and I have, like, dinner! And we have conversations! And we have other things....

Heyyyyy, how 'bout those Celtics!

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Baby Girl says, Let's get together and feel all right.

ESL Lessons Go Both Ways

One of the benefits of attending a church in which there is always a fresh crop of Koreans each year is that it nets me some ESL teaching gigs. I LOVE to teach English, especially to grateful learners. Just the way that different words sound on the ears, the different implications words carry -- it makes you realize what a creative God we have, inventing so many different languages and dialects within language. It is truly an awesome world chock full of false cognates :). One Korean friend often surveys me about new English words. She recently told me about her new photography website which she wanted to call HerApples.com. She said her male colleagues were extremely supportive of this domain name.

My latest student is very hungry to learn English. She came to this country from Korea just over a year ago and is very charming. She visits us a couple of days a week and I think it is as good for me as it is for her. I keep realizing all of the cultural assumptions I make in planning our lessons. Do you know the saying, "There are three kinds of people in this world, there are men, women, and American women"? Oh mercy, is that ever true. I am such an American woman when it comes to presuming where I can go, whom I can talk to, what I can buy and so forth.

Last week I gave my student prompts to encourage her to speak with confidence about certain topics. She was holding up a picture of a Cadillac and so I asked her to pretend that I was her husband and that I had just told her that she wasn't allowed to buy the Cadillac.

So of course I expect her to be all, "YOU CAN'T SAY THAT IT'S MY MONEY I'LL BUY WHAT I WANT I DESERVE THIS CAR."

Instead she says, "If my husband say that, I say, 'Okay.'"

Someone please buy this woman a Cadi. She'd like it in white.

Angel/Devil in the Dressing Room

My parents have a very nice swimming pool in their backyard. The closest I've gotten to it is fishing the dead beatles out of it last summer.

I'm looking forward to cannonballing off the side of it this summer, though. We'll be there all of a day, and you know it will be too stinkin' cold to swim.

Which is why I was inspired to buy a bathing suit at Target today. Because in the meantime, I can wear it around the house with leg-warmers like Jane Fonda.

It caught my eye because it was red and floral and the top of it would cover my still-healing Kanga pooch. Suffering a temporary lapse of stylishness, Kendra thought a picnic tablecloth would do the trick.

So I figured I'd try it on. Even though I should have known from the size of the cups in the suit I would have better luck fitting an acorn squash into a thimble.

For the first time ever, since I had Baby Girl in tow, we used the "family" dressing room. She was all, Mom, this is so the last time we do mother-daughter swimsuit shopping.

I looked in the mirror and realized I'd been unwittingly experiencing a wardrobe malfunction. Oh. No. I did not just walk around Target like this.

My boob pads had soaked through. I had two targets on my shirt, whilst at Target.

I tried on the suit and the top was indeed too small. Oscar Mayer called. It wants its hot dog casing back.

But otherwise, I didn't look bad. No, I really didn't -- seeing as I was pregnant with a wooly mammoth and now I am not.

I got a bigger size top and bought the swimsuit. I still had wicked buyer's remorse, maybe something about not having a paycheck to, like, pay for stuff?

I took it home and debated whether to show Lovey. He found the bag but didn't open it.

He just asked me if there was candy for him in the bag. Fantastic. I am going to look like a pack of Skittles. Taste the Rainbow.