The Arrival

As soon as the e-mail hit my inbox my heart raced in anticipation of what the tracking number would reveal. The date on when to expect the new camera and all the glorious pictures it would allow us to take. Jason put a note on the door instructing the FedEx people to deliver next door instead of to our house because we didn't want that new precious package sitting on our unattended front steps. When I arrived home with the girls I thought how nice it would be to run over to the neighbors real quick and see if the package had arrived, but the reality was that the littles were ready for a snack and they could care less about the arrival of the package. Just as I was slicing into the strawberries I heard a truck pull up, I looked out the window, and to my disappointment it was a Budget Rental Car truck and not a FedEx truck, but then I saw a women in a FedEx shirt get out with said package, apparently FedEx now drives Budget trucks. The package had arrived!!! But motherly duties called first and I had 2 kiddos to get fed, diapers changed, a park bag to pack, and a park date to make. So I quickly dug through the package to find the battery and the charger knowing good and well that the battery probably needed to be fully charged prior to use. I would have to wait till the evening to give the camera it's first test run.

We had rain in the forecast for DAYS and yet it wasn't raining so I had given up on the weather man and decided we were going to go to the park and if the rain joined us, so be it. We got to enjoy about 50 minutes at the park before the rain set in, well actually it poured for all of 2 minutes, just long enough for me to scoop up Maddie and get Blythe to run to the car, all arriving soaked and then the sun shining right as I finish snapping everyone in....go figure. But it was close to 5pm and Bestbuy is right next to Jennifer's office so we called Jason and told him to meet us at Best Buy so we could purchase a camera bag and a few accessories after dropping Maddie off.

Our wetbags are slowly deteriorating and I have had 'make new large wet bags' on my to do list for quite some time now so I took the opportunity to have Jason go home with Blythe while I swung by the fabric store to pick out new wetbag fabric (I ordered the interior fabric, oh at least a month ago).

When I arrived home Jason had the camera battery loaded and was waiting for me to take the first picture. Of course I hadn't read even 2 words in the manual so I took a few (o.k. a LOT) of pictures on random settings just for the fun of it. WOW that camera can take a lot of pictures REALLY quick. I am pretty sure about 90% of the pictures we took that first evening need to visit the 'recycle bin' on the computer, but we did get a few cute ones despite the overcast weather.

She LOVES bubbles!

Spring Party!

On Friday Marcy braved hosting a spring party including painting pots and shirts!

look at my little artist starring so intently at her work!

After Painting and Lunch Blythe retreated inside to play dress up. Apparently this is what you get when you ask Blythe to smile. I Got the 'real' smile on the 3rd try:

Can you believe it, 3 super crisp and delicious pictures taken inside!

Friday Afternoon photo shoot:

As much fun as it was to paint a pot and a shirt, it was SO much more fun to do body paint, according to Blythe!

Saturday's Scores:

On Saturday morning Lauren and I headed out early to see if there were any good steals at a local kids consignment sale. Lauren scored some great outfits for Oslo and I fortunately didn't see anything for Blythe that I couldn't live without (she already has plenty of summer clothes). We were only gone for about an hour so there was still time to hit up garage sales with Jason. I scored some hangers for baby #2, a really cute church dress for $2.50, a pair of green heels for $2 (both of which I debut on Sunday), and a pair of flip flops for $1! Jason got a pair of camo pants for $1 a bow, like bow and arrow, for Blythe to grow into, and Blythe got a couple of free necklaces for being so cute. When I showed Blythe the bow that Dada got her she just looked at me like I was crazy because she knows that bows go in your hair and they look NOTHING like the object I was showing her.

"It's Always Something"

This is a phrase that I use a lot and I am pretty sure that every time I recite it Jason cringes a little because he just hates the phrase, but hey, it's true. About 8 months ago the little push buttons on our dishwasher slowly started to go out. We once had options such as "pots and pans, heavy, medium, light, rinse only, heated dry, etc." By the time I pulled out the owners manual to look up the warranty information we were down to "heavy and heated dry." The economical side of me, o.k. its more like 3/4 of me than one side, but you get the gist, was not o.k. with having to run the heavy cycle and use heated dry. Heck if we line dry our clothes we certainly aren't going to give our dishes the preferential treatment of a heated, steamy dry after a good wash. We lucked out and even though our dishwasher was slightly out of warranty we got the new parts for free and Jason installed within minutes. This is a good outcome to an "always something."

Just after Easter our toaster oven decided that toasting was over rated and that after 4.5 years it was done. GREAT...another something. Jason is going to take a look at it to see if he can fix it, but I see a new toaster oven in our future. Heating up the entire oven on broil for all of 3 minutes to have toasts seems a little overkill.

And our most recent "Always something?" LUKE. Yes, that 4 legged creature is being a nuisance. Shortly after Easter he was letting himself out of the yard and all the gates were closed, latched, and locked (he knows how to unlatch a gate so we have to lock it and since he doesn't have opposable thumbs he hasn't figured that one out). Jason set up the video camera in the backyard to catch him in action to see what he was up to. Before we reviewed the video I happened to walk outside and notice that he wasn't in the yard so I called for him and he quickly came back into the yard the same way he went out.... Apparently the gap between our chain link fence and the neighbors wooden fence had gaped just enough for his skinny little body to weasel through. We breathed a sigh of relief because we were afraid he was jumping over the fence (we know he is capable) and that would mean fence repair/addition/re-do something, all of which sound like this to me $$$$$$$. So Jason quickly put a board and blocked off that 'escape path.' 3-5 days go by with Luke still in the yard, were thinking the escape artists has been contained.

THEN our next door neighbors come and tell us last weekend that Luke keeps coming over to visit them. GREAT..now what? We set up the video camera again and we found that he was CLIMBING the fence where we have the compost pile, then jumping on the compost and then out. He isn't getting out and being malicious or even doing anything fun, he was just going over to the neighbors to say hi and see if they will throw him a stick, but we can't be those neighbors with the roaming dog. So solution #2 was to block off the compost bin so that he couldn't climb it..well that lasted all of maybe a day before Luke just climbed the regular fence.

UGH...this quickly reminded me of when Luke was a puppy and we put up a lattice in the kitchen to keep him contained and he figured out how to climb that thing within minutes. Luckily we only have chain link across the back half of the fence so we are going to install a hot wire on the top of the fence and Luke is going to get a NICE surprise the next time he decides to go socialize with the neighbors.

Moving away from the "Always Somethings" Blythe and I did something a little different yesterday afternoon. Our friend Lauren scored some house tour tickets from her neighbor so we took the kids on a walk to see a house that was built in the 1800's. Although I am sure the kiddos didn't think the tour was as much fun as a park, Lauren and I really enjoyed it and the kiddos were very cooperative. Blythe of course wanted to climb on all the furniture and the home owner was a collector of porcelain dolls (you know how much Blythe loves dolls), but a good game of keep your hands folded and clap deterred her from the above actions. The house was lovely and it was fun to think of what life was like back in the day. The house was mainly preserved from its original contents and not modernized. I thought to myself 'this was a house with servants and cooks who would take care of all the "somethings." My favorite part of the house was the "breakfast nook." It was surrounded by windows that looked out over a beautiful green lawn and connected to a porch with big old wooden rocking chairs. I told Lauren that would be my breakfast, lunch, and dinner 'nook!'

The Makings of a Sandbox

All good days start out with a sufficient tooth brushing and hair combing!

The horrible quality and graininess of these pictures is the #1 reason for the new camera!

First step in creating the Sandbox is a trip to the hardware store to purchase lumber and gravel. Or, in toddler world, a trip to the amusement park complete with make-shift playgrounds consisting of wheels, metal bars to climb and swing on, and long hallways to run down!

Second step is to rake the grass and make sure you have a level surface:


Thirdly you need to set out your boards and dig your corner holes:

At 19 months Blythe has already learned how the construction world works; one works while the rest watch!

Fourth step is to screw your corner post into your side boards. This creates a mud pit and if you are as lucky as we are, you have a cutie who looks like this!

Next it's time to dump in the gravel, transforming the mud pit into a gravel pit. Baby is please with this new pit as well!

Ooops, ledge isn't quiet wide enough for baby to sit on...

This next step was certainly Blythe's least favorite. We needed to put a tarp over the gravel and poke holes in it for the drainage. Blythe did NOT understand why on earth we would deprive her of her gravel pit. Luckily Jason had one bag of sand left over from another project so we quickly put the tarp down and gave her some sand.

And because Jason thinks of everything, it's time to put ledges on the 4 corners for the mommies to sit and watch/play with the kiddos in the box.


And the final step is to invite friends over for dinner and fill up the sandbox with sand!

Weekend Fun

We attempted to start our weekend on Thursday when we ventured over to Ritz Camera to compare the Nikon and the Canon SLR's. Jason and I have been saving up for an SLR for a while now and we had narrowed our selection down to two. We thought we might have better luck at Ritz camera as far as knowledgeable employees than Best Buy. As it turns out Ritz Camera no longer sells Canon so we played around on the Nikon and asked about a bazillion questions until we decided to jump over to Best Buy so we could really compare the cameras. We lucked out and found a really knowledgeable guy in the camera department. After an hour + of examining the camera's, chasing Blythe around the store, asking a few questions, enticing her that it is in fact fun to play in the shopping cart, try the camera out once again, repeat baby entertainment as needed, we had made our decision. We decided on the Canon 50D, even went so far as to pick out the camera bag. Then came the let down, the sales man crouched down (I am sure silently thinking to himself, thank goodness these people have finally made a decision), turned the key to unlock the magical camera, and ..... OUT OF STOCK. Seriously?? If you know me at all making a decision like this is no small thing, this amount of money takes a LOT of pondering. And if you know Jason at all he examines everything from every possible angle so when I say we quizzed the salesmen, that is an understatement. So we hung our heads and left looking like 2 little kids who just left Toys R Us sans toys :(.

But on the upside it worked out for the better because the memory card prices at that place were ridiculously high, but in the moment we couldn't justify having a camera for 7-10 days without being able to save a picture as we waited for the memory card to arrive in the mail. We had big plans for blue bonnet pictures, but those will have to wait. I ended up finding the camera for about $60 cheaper ordering it online from SAMS and Jason found the memory card for $100 cheaper (bascially 16 GB for the price of the 4GB one)! So in the end the sad little kids that left Best Buy are very happy to save money and we are anxiously awaiting our package.


Friday


Our neighbors acquired 4 tickets to the Aggie vs. Baylor baseball game on Friday night and they graciously invited us to tag along. We tailgated in the parking lot and took Blythe to her first baseball game. Apparently our sadness of the camera overwhelmed us as we completely forgot to take the camera with us to the game, so we will have to have a first baseball game do-over with the new camera :). Blythe was most excellent at the game, as she normally is. There was a little girl sitting in front of us that wasn't quite as happy to just be as our little B was and we were once again reminded that it's not always this easy. Hopefully #2 isn't going to come into this world and prove that to us in a big way.

Saturday


We celebrated Aunt Melinda's 50th birthday party and made a day trip to Waco. It was fun to see Loli and Papa and Grandma and Grandpa, in addition to the birthday girl and family or course :).

Blythe all jammied up and ready to get in the car to head back to Bryan. She was mighty comfy in Uncle Colin's arms.

Sunday's fun will have to wait until tomorrow because it's almost noon which means I need to shut down my computer and go get my little one!

Random thoughts and happenings

I have really slacked in the photo taking front over the last few days. Not because there is a shortage of cuties to capture, but just a shortage of brain connections to remember to throw in the camera.

We had a lovely play date at the park on Tuesday. Lauren graciously let me pay her back for the doctor's office help and let Oslo play at the park with Blythe while she had a zen grocery shopping trip. Yes, it is sad that grocery shopping can be considered a break, but lets face it, when you have a kiddo who isn't a fan of the grocery store, not having to fight the disgruntled toddler and the hatred for the grocery store can create a zen experience. Mike, Anna Clare, Robyn, Crissy and Ian joined us as well. So maybe my excuse for no pictures on Tuesday was because my 2 eyes, 2 arms, and 2 legs were keeping track of 3 kiddos :). I know I have mentioned this before, but seriously Blythe is a climbing fool. This particular apparatus that she successful scaled on Tuesday must been seen via video or at least a picture so I will try to capture it sometimes soon. I really was NOT ready for her to decide that she was big enough to climb that, heck her 2.5 year old friends don't even go there....

Tuesday morning Jason started his second 'take home exam' (remember we don't like those). He managed to squeeze in dinner with Blythe and I on Tuesday night and came home with some exciting news. His paper (thesis for his masters) received the best paper in Dynamics award and the award ceremony is in Scotland. Best part, his professor is seriously considering sending him. At first it sounds like, oh first possible vacation sans kiddo? but no, it is 2 weeks before baby #2 arrives so no traveling for this momma. BUT I really think he should go to accept his award and I am sure #2 will wait for daddy to return home. I suggested for him to see if one of his parents, or both, wanted to tag along to see him accept his award. Jason thought that was a great suggestion and I think his dad sounds pretty interested! Since Tuesday evening was pretty rushed with the 'take home exam' I didn't feel like Blythe and I properly congratulated him on his achievement so yesterday we hit up Specs and bought daddy a 4 pack of La Fin Du Monte (thanks to Darren who knew the name of it!). It would have been funny to have a hidden video of the looks I got with Maddie in the stroller, Blythe on one hip, and a baby in the oven as I hit up the local liquor store.

Blythe is saying so many words these days, there are just too many to keep up with, but there are a few words that she says that just make me smile. Not because the words themselves are anything of significance, but just the way she says them:

• "Peeut Butter" (peanut butter)
• "Skarcle Shoes" (sparkle shoes)
• "My Maddie" (it's never just Maddie, she always takes ownership.."where's my maddie," "what my maddie doing?"
• "Mooooon" (Moon, as if she needs to drag the oo's out to show the significance of how far the moon is)

And then there is our daily conversation (usually happens throughout the day)

B: "Where's dada?"

Me: "dada's at work"

B: "work"

B: "where's Papa?"

Me: "papa's at home"

B: "home"

B: "where's Mamo?"

Me: "Mamo's at her house"

B: "house"

B: "Oslo"

Me: "Oslos's at his house"

B: "his house"

And just in case you are curious, as I was, what would happen if I answer differently, here's your answer:

B: "Where's Papa?"

Me: [I looked at the clock and it was like 3pm so I thought, well technically he is at work] "Work"

B: "Where's Dada?"

Me: "home"

B: "No, papa at home, dad at work"

YEP, she KNOWS, watch out!

27 Weeks and Food

This afternoon I had my 27 week check-up. I had strategically made my appointment for 3:20 which is just enough time after nap to get a snack and pile the kiddos into the car. The kink I was not prepared for was Jason not wanting to go. I mean, I get it, its all of a 10 minute check-up where you get weighed, blood pressure, they measure your belly, listen to the heart beat and voila your done, but accomplishing those things being done on you with 2 babies to take care of??

I lucked out and Lauren let Blythe come over for a play date with Oslo round 2. I dropped Blythe off at Oslo's at 3 and then Maddie and I headed on to the appointment. I always have this fear that I have exceeded my weight quota and by 'my quote' I mean the weight gain that, in my head, is acceptable. The notion that I should only gain 4 pounds a month and that shouldn't start till week 16 or so, putting me at a total weight gain of around 25 pounds. I was right on target with my quota with Blythe and I am hoping for a repeat and not a surge of balloon pregnant lady. As I step on the scale, half holding my breath, and half thinking light thoughts, its on kilograms and lets face it I can't convert it that fast, then the nurse reaches for the scale and presses the lbs. button and voila...4 pound EXACT increase...wheew another month I am 'on target.'

I never fret much about my blood pressure as that has always been good and has never fluctuated so the rest of the appointment is pretty uneventful. My doctor tells me that he owes me a few extra visits because I am the text book patient. Weight gain, measuring, blood pressure, heart beat are all right on target, as always. I told him that I don't being the text book patient and I would like to keep it that way. Somehow we got to talking about 'pregnancy symptoms and how I don't have any of those (sans the growing belly) and he said "well you probably have some of them, but you have such a positive outlook that you don't notice them." I love that my OB knows me well enough to see that about me and I think he's right. I think, to some extent, you can determine how your pregnancy goes. We talked about those women who see the 9 months of pregnancy as a license to complain about everything and blame everything on the pregnancy. They are probably the same ones who think they can eat anything and everything they want during pregnancy and aren't impressed when the extra pounds are still hanging around a year later.

Food:

I am not big on traditional holiday food, you know the ham, turkey, dressing, etc. So I decided that we would have brunch for Easter so I wouldn't rock anyone world by having enchiladas or something totally nontraditional, but still wouldn't have to serve the mundane holiday food. I picked out a few quiche recipes online and I must say they turned out fantastic. The best part of it was that I had purchased the ingredients and left the recipes out and the food magically made itself! O.K. so the magic happened by Becky and Claudia and a few other helpers, but I must say that worked out GREAT. I think the only meal I ended up really being a part of was the home made pizza on Saturday and that was only feeding 8 people not the 17 we had on Easter Sunday.

In case you are in need of some good brunch recipes here are the links to the ones we made:

Zucchini, Bacon, and Gruyere Quiche - we used Asiago instead of Gruyere
Sausage and Red Bell Pepper Quiche - we roasted the peppers on the grill the night before instead of sauteed
Baked French Toast

Enjoy!

Easter Festivities

Check out her leg warmers:

Blythe wanted to play in the garage, but the dirty garage is not very conducive to a crawling baby. Luckily the weather was nice so I just opened the back door and let Blythe play in the garage while Maddie and I took care of things in the kitchen. Before long she had come up with a new fashion; wearing Dada's socks as leg warmers! How in the heck she got those socks on her feet and then squeezed the much too big and very bulky socks back into her shoes I have NO idea, but she was mighty proud and wasn't even ready to take them off for bath and bed time.

Our Easter Festivities started on Good Friday with an Easter potluck play date. I volunteered to provide the mom's meal so I made bow-tie pasta with alfredo sauce and everyone had a choice between chicken and salmon for those who observe no meat Friday's. The kiddo's had awesome bunny sandwiches, among other things.

And of course our play date wouldn't be complete without some swinging and jumping!

One of Blythe's favorite toys at her friends house is the doll stroller. I wanted to purchase an $8 baby doll stroller for Blythe for Valentines day. When I talked to Jason about the stroller purchase he of course did not want me to purchase one because he wanted to make one. He is perfectly capable of making one and I am sure, as he said, it would be more industrial and would look better than the 'plastic crap,' but I also know that he is very busy and I wanted my baby to have a doll stroller sooner than later. I gave in and told him he could make it with scrap wood. Well weeks came and went and still no stroller, so I told him that I was really hopeful the Easter bunny was going to bring Blythe a stroller. Jason had everything made, but he couldn't find wheels. The wheels he did find were $36...making that $8 stroller even more enticing. In the end we found an old umbrella stroller that we were able to take the wheels off for FREE! So now Blythe has an awesome stroller, made by dad, and all from salvaged, also known as dumpster diving, materials. Jason didn't want the Easter bunny to get credit for his stroller so Blythe go it after nap time on Good Friday...pardon the bed head :)

Our guests were arriving on Saturday afternoon and we thought what better way to greet our afternoon guests than with some home-made pizza and calzones!

Stylish apron made possible by Grandma Behrens!

Loli (or whatever your name is going to be, Becky) made us a tasty Bunny cake. Papa couldn't wait till Sunday to dive in and used Blythe as an excuse to get started early.

Our little cutie sitting on the front porch putting BAB's paci in and out of her mouth. [if you don't know who BAB is or what BAB stands for you haven't spend enough time around our little one, so come visit!]

Apparently I looked really funny perched up on the edge of the bar stool with my big 'ol belly and Do-Rag or Doo-Rag (google told me both spellings and since I am not quite that gangster I don't know which one I should use).

Easter Sunday!

After sitting still for an hour + at Mass Blythe wasn't too interested in sitting for pictures, but the men wanted to get our of their suits ASAP, which was understandable.

Blythe was however happy as pie to sift through her Easter basket. And the panties the Easter bunny brought her...wells he wanted to wear every single pair!




O.K. enough of this frilly stuff its time for the Egg hunt!

I must admit that the kiddos (Blythe, Ian, and Oslo) were a lot more into the egg hunt than I thought they would be. We had filled 50+ eggs and I was really thinking that they might each pick up about 3 and then be done with it. The first few seconds Blythe and Ian were overwhelmed by their competitive fathers yelling "where's the egg, good, now get another one, come on," but they quickly got excited and started really hunting for the eggs. Oslo at first wasn't so sure that he even needed to get an egg, but after he picked one up and opened it and saw that inside that somewhat unexciting plastic egg was gold fish, he quickly put on his running shoes and gave the other 2 a run for their money!


Our neighbors across the street have chicken's and they had just gotten some baby chick's so the kiddo's got to play/pet the chick's. The kids didn't seem to enjoy them as much as Lauren!