This time next week I’ll be doing a final check that I’ve packed everything and getting ready for my 1pm flight to San Jose. I don’t know what makes me more queasy – the thought of getting on a plane (terrified of flying) or the thought of being surrounded by the top women in blogging – my role models.

Last night I got to have a practice run of how it will go, only on a smaller scale. I found out that Kristi from Life with Aveline has a monthly meet-up with a group of women she went to college with. Turns out, many of them read my blog! I was invited to this month’s meet up, and even though I was a little scared of outing myself and looking like a big dork, I accepted.

It’s a little strange showing up to the restaurant and telling the hostess, “Yes, I’m here to meet up with a group of women I’ve never met in person. Can you tell me where they are?”

But I soon found the group: Kristi, Laura from Cheerios and Chickens, Laura’s friend Bonnie and her guest Tammie, and then my two blog stalkers Emily and Chris. (I say stalkers because they’re regular readers but don’t have their own blogs and never comment. Maybe this will make them come out of lurkdom.)

The result? I had a great time! It was a little unnerving at first to be the stranger among a group of women who have known each other for years, but soon we were chatting away about topics from our three blogs, discussing other blogs we read, and sharing fun stories of our lives and those we know.

Stranger than anything were the coincidences we discovered. Laura did her student teaching just up the road from where I live. Emily used to work right across the street from where I used to work, and Chris is also a university student advisor, just at a different university. It was eerie.

I hope I wasn’t too different from what they expected. I’ll admit I suffered from my common nervous habit of not being able to shut the hell up. Remember how I’m an introvert unless put in a situation that requires me to open up? I kept talking and talking and talking. I had ordered a drink, hoping the alcohol would mellow me out, but no, I just kept talking. Maybe that means I’m getting my alcohol tolerance back, which could be good for BlogHer. (Or maybe the Rusty Bucket just makes weak drinks?)

Despite my motormouth, I did manage to learn a lot about each of them as well, and I felt like they were old friends. We all have children close in ages. Chris has a brilliant little boy, who is already pooping in the potty at 15 months old! (Cordy prefers to put her toys in her potty.) Laura is the superwoman raising toddler twins with the awesome new teaching job, and Emily has one of the cutest little girls I’ve ever seen (the fuzzy head is to die for). Emily looked amazingly good for having had sinus surgery a week ago. I had sinus surgery once, and I certainly wasn’t out for dinner and drinks with friends a week later.

Kristi is currently 32 weeks pregnant with a little girl who was breech at her last doctor’s visit. As the mother of a breech girl, I gave her belly a strong talking to, ordering her to be good to her mother and turn head down. Hopefully she won’t be stubborn like Cordelia. If she is, well, I’m sorry Kristi – buy lots of earplugs for the rest of the family.

It was a fabulous get together, and I left feeling relaxed and renewed. Hopefully I’ll be invited back, because I really enjoyed meeting all of them. Besides, I’m the only one who knows where the all-male strip club is in town.

I’ve been interviewed! As part of the BlogMe mixer, Dana grilled me with some great questions.

Check it out here.

Recently, Aaron and I have been debating whether we should convert Cordy’s crib to a toddler bed or not.

Part of me wants to move to this next step of her development, letting her have the freedom to get out of her bed if she wants. After all, she’s growing up, and I’m sure she’d appreciate a little freedom. Besides, it’s only a matter of time before she starts to figure out how to climb the thing.

The other part of me wants her to stay in her crib forever. Or maybe at least until she’s 18.

Why?

Because my daughter currently has no sleeping problems.

Around 7:30pm, we change Cordy into her PJs, and then she sits in the recliner with Aaron and they read board books. (Our previous routine of giving her a bottle was retired this month when we boxed up the bottles.) She holds her froggie toy and her Blue’s Clues beanie, and helps daddy turn the pages and counts whatever is on the page.

Then, when books are done, he tells her, “Now it’s time for bed,” and as he carries her upstairs, he recounts her day for her. He puts her in her crib, tells her goodnight, and closes the door. At that point, she either lies down and goes right to sleep, or quietly talks to her stuffed animals and then falls asleep. She then wakes up generally between 6:30 and 7:00am.

As for naps, they’re just as easy. Around 2pm I tell her its nap time, carry her upstairs, put her in her crib, and close the door on my way out. Again, she sometimes talks for a little while (not complaining – just chattering to her toys), or she falls right to sleep and sleeps for 1-2 hours.

Yes, you all hate me now. I understand. Although I could point out that I paid my dues when she was younger. Four months of colicky behavior with another 12 months of resisting naps and night wakings has earned me my Sleepless Mommy merit badge (dude, we really need mommy merit badges). I should be allowed to enjoy my sleep now.

(Of course, we’re now considering #2, which would reset everything. Damn.)

So the thought of disturbing her sleep routines by switching to a toddler bed is a terrifying thought. Being able to leave her bed might be so new and exciting that she would decide to not sleep, ending up as a cranky, overtired toddler each day who would then fight sleeping each time so she could play in her room.

Of course, the side note to all of this is that we would also have to baby-proof her room before the toddler bed. Yes, of all of the rooms in the entire house, hers currently poses the greatest danger to her life. Aside from the crib, it’s a baby death trap. We’ve never used her room for anything more than her crib, so there is a myriad of junk laying around including tools used to put all her furniture together, the outlets are still uncovered (except behind the crib), and the cord to the window blinds hangs low to strange a curious toddler. The room needs work.

I’m curious to hear your thoughts on the matter. When did you make the switch, or when do you plan on making the switch? How easy was it? Any tips or tricks to share?

You know it’s a hot day when you can drink your Starbucks Chai Creme Frappuccino and you never reach the point where it’s just a lump of chipped ice. The thing melted faster than I could drink it. That never happens, unless it’s 98 degrees outside. Which it just happens to be. And in Ohio, it’s never a dry heat.

But onto cooler matters. It’s time for a winner to be chosen in my book giveaway! I decided the best way to choose a winner was to leave it up to Cordy. The kid doesn’t read my blog, so she’s about as unbiased as they come.

I put each person’s name on a slip of paper, and put all the slips into Cordy’s favorite pink hat. Then, I put all of the slips back inside the hat after Cordy snatched the hat away from me and plopped it on her head, sending a cascade of white paper down her shoulders as she ran.

Cordelia has never been asked to participate in a giveaway drawing before, so she was a little unsure of the rules. Holding tightly to the hat, I asked her to pick a piece of paper from the hat.

However, she grabbed a handful of papers, and then sat down on the floor with them to look at each one. (Also snagging the hat and putting it back on, of course.) I hoped that she would just hand me a name, but no luck. She started picking up individual slips, and hiding them in different places, while I followed along behind her to not lose any of them.

15 minutes later, still with no clear winner and starting to feel like Florida’s election board, I begged the child to give me a name. Any name. Finally, we had a success. She handed me a piece of paper. And then one more. And then tried to eat the next one. (I guess that was the stopping point.)

The first name given to me was Mrs. Chicky, who, I’m guessing, will be choosing the book about Norman, the yellow lab. But Cordy could not settle for one winner, and so our other lucky winner is: Dana! So, Dana, which of the other two books would you like?

I’m keeping whichever book is not picked, and as soon as money gets better I will probably be looking into purchasing a few more of the books from The Benefactory. Congrats to the two winners, and e-mail me your addresses and choices so I can send you your books!

I’m having one of those days. It’s Monday, it’s hot, my period started and is giving me hell, I’m bloated, and I’m generally in a grumpy, glum mood. On the plus side, at least I’ll have my period done with before Blogher. But for today, I have lots of little things to talk about, but nothing cohesive, so it’s a day for bullets.

• Apparently technology and I are not getting along today. When I arrived at work, I tried to log on to one of the programs I need, and it won’t work. Then I tried to print a student’s schedule, and the printer isn’t working. Both appear to be working just fine, but they won’t work for me. I thought it was a weird coincidence until I tried to get a soda from the vending machine, and the machine wouldn’t give me a soda, despite looking like nothing was wrong with it.

• Cordy has reached a new milestone: basic manipulation. Now, whenever she does something that hurts me – kicks me, bites me, hits me, etc. – before I can even fully utter the phrase “No, we don’t [hit, kick, etc.]!” she hugs me and says in her most loving, gentle voice, “Baeey-aah.” (Her word for hug. I have no idea where she got that word.) How is that for emotional manipulation? Child, you can’t hit me and then hug me right away and expect it to all be forgiven. Especially when you do it all again as soon as you finish the hug.

• We watched the space shuttle land this morning online, since none of the news channels were willing to break away from Israel to cover it. Being way too emotional thanks to my period, I had tears in my eyes when I saw it break through the clouds. When I was younger I wanted to be an astronaut – I even went to Space Camp in 7th grade. So I was overjoyed to see a successful landing. I pointed to the shuttle on the screen and said, “See, Cordy? That’s a space shuttle. It takes people into space, closer to the stars.” Cordy looked at it with a smile, and then pointed and said, “shut-tle!” I was so proud of her for saying that. I’m already wondering if they make flight-suits in her size.

• I’ve officially been off my antidepressants since mid-June, and I’m not sure how I feel about it yet. It’s nice to be off the drugs, but I’m constantly wondering if I really am OK. I recently developed a back problem that bothers me off and on. It’s not painful, but it feels like restless leg syndrome, but only on the left side of my upper back. When it’s affecting me, if I’m not moving my left shoulder, it tingles and there’s an overwhelming urge to move. I can’t even work myself into a panic thanks to WebMD, since this seems to be a rare symptom. I’m wondering if I have pinched a nerve, or if this could be some rare disorder as a result of going off my antidepressants? Never mind, it looks like I did manage to work myself into a worry, even without the help of WebMD.

Anyone else having a bad day today?

Tomorrow I will have the winner of my book giveaway!