PT-LawMom

We have been going flat out ever since the weekend. Went caroling Friday night with a church group (so much fun!), then got up early Saturday to meet my mother for shopping. We left Pumpkinhead with his Granddad and had a lovely breakfast at La Madeleine. Then we headed off to Macy’s to search for formal wear for the cruise we’re taking in two weeks. My mother bought me a gorgeous royal blue silky wrap top and a long black/silver formal skirt. After that, I met my cousin for lunch (she cried when I gave her the portrait, then I cried and we were both wailing in the middle of Olive Garden!)

After lunch, I headed to the Apple Store to pick up my MacBook. The case had cracked again so they replaced it for free (third time). Apparently if you put your MacBook in a squished situation, the little feet above the screen will push into the case and eventually it cracks. I bought a little leather pad that sticks on the handrest areas and helps with that. It’s $34.99 on the retailer’s site, but I only paid $19.99 at the Apple Store.

After our Apple trip, we went to the movies hoping to watch Alvin and the Chipmunks, but ended up watching Fred Clause. Funny! Then Pumpkinhead said he wanted to play Checkers, which we don’t have, so we dashed off to WalMart to search for it. Unfortunately they were out so we settled for Chutes and Ladders and spent a good two hours playing it with Chapin.

On Sunday, Pumpkinhead went to church while Chapin and I went hunting for a bicycle and other Santa Claus gifts. We left the mall with lingerie and Nikes. Obviously Chapin wasn’t in Pumpkinhead-mode. Good thing I buy everything on Amazon. Then we went to Sam’s Club for eggs and yogurt and, finally, to WalMart to find a bike.

Unfortunately Chapin doesn’t believe in Santa Claus so he decided to give Pumpkinhead the bike that same day. On the plus side, we had a great time biking up and down the street. Pumpkinhead was so proud of himself!!

Then we realized that this was, for all intents and purposes, the last weekend before Christmas (unless you count next weekend which will be INSANE at the mall!!!) So we trotted back to the mall and spent 30 minutes searching for parking so that we could purchase suits for Pumpkinhead and Chapin (again for the cruise). Then we dragged Chapin to see Alvin and the Chipmunks. This time I thought ahead and bought the tickets on Fandango beforehand. Chapin and Pumpkinhead loved it… I fell asleep! I have NEVER fallen asleep in a movie! I was just beat.

Monday was Pumpkinhead’s school skip day. He had a blast at the backup daycare and I took him for a fun lunch at some nearby shops. We hit the bookstore on the way back so he was totally psyched. Then we were up until 10 making Christmas cookies last night (to send to school with him and to Chapin’s work).

All this is to say that I need a break from my break! I’m having tons of quality time with Pumpkinhead, but I still haven’t finished even one book and I MUST write our Christmas letter and get these cards mailed off today!!! Hopefully I can do that at lunch today. And I have not wrapped a single thing!! That’s tonight’s task, I think. Hopefully all of you are having similarly fun (but less crazy!) time off from school.

I told you I couldn’t resist my own blog. Just bought the Gold Box deal on the Gaiam balance ball chair for my home office ($59 as I type, but full-price is $99 and normal sale price is $79)!

Anyway, my point is that as I was returning to Amazon’s main page, I saw this neat tote bag. You purchase the sack and feed schoolchildren in developing nations for a whole year. Not only do you get a really sturdy bag to tote your heavy casebooks in, but you are also encouraging others to contribute every time you walk around with it.

“The FEED bag is a sturdy, reversible bag made out of natural burlap and cotton materials. The design of the bag was inspired by the big bags of food that I have seen being distributed to schools around the world. Besides being a cool bag, it is a tangible way to make a difference in the fight against child hunger. Every FEED bag sold will feed a child for a whole year in school!
Thank you for your support of the FEED project! With your help we will be making a big difference in children’s lives around the world, one child at a time. So wear your bag with pride!”

And, if you’re looking for something to put in those bags, check out the great used study aids available through Amazon Marketplace!

Stealing a post from Ana and reviewing 30 days of search history to see how people find my blog:

For the person searching my blog for a “Wife of a Law Student” shirt, try this

I want this one for me and this one for my little monkey, Pumpkinhead.

For the person searching my blog for what to get his legal secretary for Christmas, cash is always good. Or a gift card (Amazon? See sidebar) if you think cash is gauche. If you want to get her a “serious” gift, Kelly at Lawyer’s Right Hand recommends an investment in her professional development. I would suggest paying for a NALS certification. It will make her feel more confident and ultimately benefits you and your firm as well. Don’t buy her gels, lotions, perfumes or bath products. Don’t buy her clothes. If you don’t want to give money, how about a gift certificate for a nice restaurant near her house so that she and her significant other can go out to eat? You could also go with a spa certificate, although there are some (crazy!) women who aren’t into that. Hope this helps. In my personal experience over the past six years, I’ve always received cash or gift cards. If you need any more ideas, please click on my Amazon links at left.

For the person searching my blog for the cost of raising a child, BabyCenter actually has a calculator for this. That said, I’d say better not to look!

For the person who wants to know if it’s easier to get into law school part-time, the answer is NO! We’re smart enough, we’re good enough, and gosh darn it, our professors actually prefer us over the baby daytime students! That said, this article about the disadvantages is fairly accurate.

For the people searching for broke law student, you found me. Ditto for the people searching for law school diaries.

I really want to know what a “law school attack outline” is! Sounds vicious.

For the person searching for how to evaluate their legal secretary, do it nicely. Nothing in a review should be a surprise. Talk to your secretary before filling it out, if need be, and remember that your evaluation affects her compensation so please be as generous as you can be.

For the person searching my blog for the “negative impact of immigrants on America”, boy did you pick the wrong blog, buddy!

For the TWENTY people collectively searching for “Thanksgiving MILF”, “In-Law MILF” or “Lawyer MILF”, what the fuck?!?! Same for the FORTY-FIVE searches for “Aquadots Recipe.” On a similar note, I don’t know how you got to my blog searching for how to stuff THOSE up THERE! Ew!!!!

Finally, you can and SHOULD visit Ruben Navarette here.

I think Ana’s blog searches are much more interesting!

Lately I’m getting a lot of hits to my blog from people looking for gifts for law students. I have a few ideas. First of all, I’d suggest steering away from the traditional pens/leather goods route, at least until graduation. You’d be surprised how much stuff like this law students get for free from firms or at events.

Books
I have bought pretty much all of my books so far from Amazon (either new or, more frequently, through Amazon Marketplace). Most of us don’t have time to read for pleasure right now, but an Amazon gift certificate to help us purchase our books would be great!

Pampering
One thing I use a lot to ease the pain in my shoulders from hunching over my laptops and books is this microwaveable neck wrap from the Happy Company. They have a bunch of other cool pampering products as well, such as foot massagers, a tingly head massager (easier to use if someone else does it to you) and warm booties. Okay, now I want the whole page of products!! Ack!
Yoga DVD — I’m buying this one for myself in the hopes that if I get into it over the holiday season, I’ll actually keep it up during the year. This particular DVD has been highly rated by Yoga Journal for two years now.
Chocolate — how about some chocolate for the studying student? Or healther mixed nuts packets?

Useful Items
Book Holder — this book holder is not only sturdy enough to hold large textbooks, it also folds flat so we can carry one in our backpack for use in class or at the library!
Power inverter — for charging our laptop in the car
Rolling backpack — take the stress off our backs with a rolling backpack
Staple-free Stapler — environmentally friendly and definitely useful!
Delivery! — if you want to buy something truly helpful to a busy law student, how about subscribing them to regular delivery of paper towels, laundry detergent, etc., through Amazon’s Grocery service. I do this all the time because I save 15% if I order regularly and it all arrives with free shipping on my doorstep! Such a timesaver!
Great pens
iTunes Gift Card or, even better, an iPod. It’s so much easier to listen to review CDs on an iPod than stuck next to a CD player!

Finally, if you want a goofy gift, how about a marshmallow shooter? It’s the deal of the day at Drugstore.com. This boggles my mind but I can see how some people might think it’s cool. drugstore.com deal of the the day

Hopefully this list is helpful to those of you who have been searching my blog for ideas. There’s always the funny CafePress or Threadless t-shirt route as well. For law students with kids, definitely check out Redhead, Esq’s cute baby apparel.

There’s an article in today’s New York Times today about the increasing demand for technology for the pre-school set. This post might get me a lot of backlash, but I am so on board with the tech toys. In fact, this toy (shown on the front page of the article) is the one my son is getting for Christmas (thank you LeapFrog for the great sale and free shipping!) (P.S. Unlike many, MANY of my friends with kids Pumpkinhead’s age who have had them since two, this will be Pumpkinhead’s first video game-type machine.)

Okay, sure, the pediatricians know what they’re talking about and increased screen time is DEFINITELY a contributor to obesity and other issues. That said, we need some more pediatricians of my generation to get into practice. The reality is that we grew up on computers and other technology advances. The generation behind us is even more entrenched. Texting? Don’t even try to text me because I am SUCH a moron when it comes to that. IM’ing — time-sucker. But my peers would disagree and I think that is well-illustrated by some of the comments in this article, such as the mother who said she had to return the fake cell because her preschooler wasn’t easily fooled — she knew what a real cell looked like and wanted one (no, I wouldn’t get a cell for a child that young, but I thought it was an interesting observation). What do you all think about this tech trend? Is it damaging to kids or just realistic to purchase them technological toys?

It is 3:30 and I am just now grabbing a bite to eat. Thank God I had a protein shake on the way out the door this morning. All five of my assignments at work gave me serious, substantive stuff to do today (the gall!) so I’ve been flat-out all day. The only reason I’m taking a bloggy break now is that I will be without Internet connection for most of the weekend and I may go through withdrawal!

Fortunately, I have my casebooks and notes and I also have my copy of “Nice Girls Don’t Get the Corner Office” so that I can read it and be ready to discuss by Monday. Does that still sound good for everyone? Have you had a chance to read some? It looks like the layout is very conducive to reading in spurts.

FYI, I got an e-mail from Vivian at Blend Creations. They will be having a sale Friday and the 15% off coupon code (CBB15) I gave out during my holiday gift recommendation post will also still be good. This is not sponsored in any way whatsoever, I just like to share a good deal. I already have my Mom on alert to shop for me if I can’t get online that day.

Okay, nose back to grindstone. So much for getting out of here early for our 23-hour drive to DC. I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving and that you are all able to take time to be with the ones for which you are most thankful. I know I will be.

P.S. Misty — The title of this post reminds me to tell you that I promise to look at it and get back to you next week!

Last week, thanks to the amazing BlogHer Ads links (to recent posts by other BlogHer bloggers), I stumbled across the site of Carrie Evans, the Gremlin Wrangler. Carrie is a very talented artist with many of her works displayed here. I was impressed enough by that, but then I found her Etsy site and realized that she could do a pencil sketch of my son for a very reasonable price ($20 for the first single-person sketch and $15 for each additional). I thought, “What a great Christmas gift for my husband!”

I also decided to have her do a sketch of my grandmother and my cousin from last Thanksgiving (my Gramy passed away in January). Today Carrie sent me a draft of her final sketch. I requested a few modifications and the final product came out beautifully! I am sharing this with you today and would encourage you to consider patronizing Carrie in the future.* I know I cried when I saw how beautiful this came out so I can only imagine what my cousin’s reaction will be when she sees it framed. I am very thankful to have such a beautiful piece of art to share with my cousin this year as we deal with the harsh reality of having lost both of our grandparents in 2007.

Original Picture Final Portrait

Click the picture for a larger, more detailed view.

*I have not been compensated for this post. Once I saw my picture, I asked Carrie if she would mind if I shared her information with all of you because I know there are others out there who would love to have pencil sketches of their kids or other loved ones. I think heirloom-type gifts like this are just perfect to give and pass on through the years.

PunditMom is a mother, an attorney and a passionate advocate for the most important issues facing our nation today. Her posts are always inspiring, thoughtful and interesting. My favorite recent post was about voter apathy, but it was today’s Spin Cycle post on Republican candidates’ pitches (or lack thereof) to women that really got me thinking that I should share her with those of you who aren’t already familiar with her work. I’m not just saying this because she promised me a stack of free books, but you should really add her various blogs to your daily reading list.

1) PunditMom
2) PunditMom’s Spin Cycle
3) PunditMom Reviews
4) Momocrats
5) Soccer Mom Vote
6) DC Metro Moms
7) Huffington Post (co-authored by PunditGirl)

If you all are making holiday purchases there anyway, please consider using my Amazon search tool (at right in sidebar) to get there. The doctor bills from the bone scan, MRI and other tests are rolling in at an alarming rate (damn PPO!) so I’m trying to make a little extra cash. Sorry for the added advertising guys. I won’t go overboard, but I did sign up for BlogHer ads (at right) and the Amazon referral bonuses and would appreciate your click-throughs.

If you haven’t already checked out Amazon’s extensive grocery collection, I highly recommend it. You can typically get free shipping over $25. I get toddler wipes, paper towels, laundry and dishwashing detergent and dry goods that we go through rapidly (you have to buy everything in bulk, but that’s okay if you’re buying things you use regularly). I don’t know about you, but I find the convenience of having these things shipped to my door so helpful, especially with my busy schedule. I purchased an Amazon Prime membership last year (free two-day shipping!) so I order almost everything I need through Amazon.

For those of you on a limited budget (or the crafty/thrifty folks), check out Kisses with Sunshine’s 2007 Homemade with Love Carnival. Plenty of bloggers have signed up to share their homemade Christmas present ideas and there are some great ones! I wish I had the time or creativity to try some of these ideas. Maybe next summer Pumpkinhead and I will tackle some projects in anticipation of the holiday season.