Sunday, February 27, 2011

A whole new world!

So the time has come to spread my interweb wings. I have now left the confines of blogger and got my own domain. I felt like being a little more creative and moving to wordpress. I am going to try and do more posting...even if it is just a video or photo. Life is hectic but I only live it once.
So here we go:


I won't be posting here. For you people on the email list, I will show you have to subscribe via RSS on the new site soon.

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Wordless Wednesday(On a Thursday)


Took the photo yesterday...it counts dammit. It explains this delay.

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Selfish mommy

At the moment, Landon seems to be in a phase(please God let it be a phase) of waking up early as hell and screaming at the top of his lungs. I am pretty sure he is testing us because it isn't constant like he is hurting. He is trying different tones to see what gets a reaction. Too smart for his own damn good.

Our usual rule is, he doesn't come in our room before 6. We just let him deal with it. It used to be he would just give up and go back to sleep, but lately he doesn't. Just stands there at the crib rails yelling. It starts off a GREAT morning, let me tell ya. So this morning he did his first chirp at 4:57. Ugh. It was once and it seemed like he was asleep again but I knew it would be long. 5:27 and the screaming is full on like someone is beating him. Now for mommy to rack her brain on what to do. Let him scream and not give in or give up just so you don't have to hear screaming for another 45 minutes until your shower. So I was selfish and went and got him. And you know what? I might pay for it tomorrow morning, but it was worth it. He curled up on my shoulder and just laid there. We swayed and he just snuggled. No squirming to get away. No requests for Blue. No head butts. No hitting. No fussing. Just me, him and the white noise. He then let me rock him. This NEVER happens. He likes to torture backs(part of his MO). We rocked and he rubbed his feet on me and babbled a little bit, all the while glued to my shoulder. Now my neck is on fire and I have a serious headache but....it was worth it. Because he will never be 1 year, 5 months and 30 days old ever again. I will probably be cursing myself in the morning when he is up trying to get the same treatment but it's ok...I am a selfish mommy and proud of it...

Monday, February 7, 2011

The time I ran commando in the park...

This is a story I told to a few people and it was too comical to not blog. Warning: it isn't pretty.
So a couple of weeks ago I had some, uh, chafing issues. I had taken the week off to recover and decided to save up for my long run (7 miles at the time). I set out and I was feeling good. I now run from the house to Lake Lynn, around and then back. So I get about 3 miles in at the lake and things start going down hill. While running, I decide that my underwear is the problem and if I can just get them off, I will be fine. Now the conundrum begins. How does one get their underwear off while wearing running tights and there is no bathroom? I keep running thinking I can just ignore it. Wrong. I finally get to a spot in the park and I can't take it anymore. I look and no one is coming...and then things got serious. I found a stick in the brush and used it to rip off my own panties. Yup. You heard right. I totally went all cast-away on my delicates in a city park. Then? I kept on running. (I found a trashcan and threw them away in case you thought I was a litter bug). I ended up only making it to about 4.5 miles before calling Kevin to come and get me. My newly freed lady parts weren't the answer. It hurt bad. The funniness stopped there but I will always run by that place in the park and say "I remember this one time I ran commando in the park..."

Thursday, February 3, 2011

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Wordless Wednesday


Monday, January 31, 2011

Happy Birthday Jack Jack

When we adopted Jack, we had no idea what he was, how old he was, where he was from....nothing. We got a sweet deal on a great pup. He has been a great companion, a sweet cuddler, an excellent running partner, a sweet face when we are down, and is learning to be a great big brother. Landon looks for him first thing in the morning and was one of his first words. We gave Jack an unofficial birthday of Jan 30th so today we say Happy 6th Birthday to Capt. Jack Sparrow.








For the occasion...here are some videos of the boy:





Sunday, January 30, 2011

A Beautiful Day for the Park

Well Landon had a playdate this morning with 2 of his friends from school. Alia and Josh(or 'Yosh' as he likes to say). We met up at the Kids Together playground in Cary. It was fantastic. Huge, tons to do, tons of places to run around. We definitely will be going back even if it is a bit of a drive for us. However it is near Grandmommy...sooo yay! Anyways I tried to get a few shots of them playing. Talk about a workout!

It is a gorgeous day today, so we are taking full advantage!

We have a spunky one on our hands

Yes folks, he is 'spunky' to say the least. I figured I would do a big ole update since I had a minute. So here are some things the boys is doing all of a sudden:
  • Hitting - o yeah. Full on hitting when mad. Hitting us, hitting the dog, hitting himself. Temper is fiery in this one.
  • Head butting - I wish I was kidding. When bullet 1 doesn't work, we resort to head butting...be it mommy, daddy or the wall.
  • Dancing - Yeah he is a dancing fool. I can't EVER get it on camera though. We have daily dance parties where we put on some Black Eyed Peas Pandora and let him go to town. He seems to really like Rihanna. He bounces, spins, and shake his arms.
  • Trying to jump - There is a song they sing at school where they "jump up and down". He can't quite figure it out but he walks around on his tippy toes. It is hilarious
  • Talking - he is really starting to try to repeat more words. Also, the infamous NO has shown up and it isn't just one...we get "no no no no no" with lots of head shaking. Joy. Other terms spoken now: "oh no(or no NOOO)", "mama", "poo poo", "Josh", "coco(for coloring)", "tweet tweet", "quack", "woof", "Pablo(his stuffed penguin)", "uh oh"
  • Helping - he LOVES to help. His first ever chore has become feeding the dog. He gets Jack's bowl, carries it to the pantry, waits for me to scoop the food, and takes it back to Jack's spot. He also likes to help put his dishes away from the dishwasher, wipe his tray down, put his toys away(sometimes), and Swiffer the floor :)
  • Pretend - It is AWESOME to see his imagination starting to work. He loves to "cook". At school he stays at that center a lot apparently. His little friend Julien is always helping him in the mornings :). We set up his table in the kitchen yesterday and he has been making soup and pouring juice constantly. He can add salt and pepper and taste test.
  • Waking up at the ass crack of dawn - for whatever reason, 5:30 wake ups have become usual. Most mornings he goes back for a little bit but sometimes he just stands there and whines. Ultra annoying. Hope it is just a developmental phase.
  • Recognition - they have been working on recognized people and things at school. This week Landon pointed to all his friends and teacher by name and even points to himself when prompted. Yay Landon!
  • Sorting - he is into sorting shapes. He favors circles and stays away from triangles if he can help it. We got him a thing of pegs with wooden shapes to stack and count. He knows when to put the color on that colored peg. So smart :)
  • TV junky - this is a long subject I am going to reserve for another post. I have a love hate relationship with it.
  • Aggravating - yup! He got that damn Langdon gene. He will do something with this smirk on his face like "I know I shouldn't be doing this but gonna try until they physically make me stop and I lose my shit". He knows the dog hates the Swiffer and chases him with it. Poor Jack Jack. Grated he gets the daredevil nature from me, but the aggravating comes from the other 23 chromosomes.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Wordless Wednesday

Friday, January 21, 2011

What to do with a toddler - Idea 1

Winter sucks. Especially with a toddler with the attention span of a gnat. We rotate between activities in short increments until I need a break and he watches maybe 5 minutes of some Blue. [Bright side] I don't feel "lazy" since I spend a good chunk of my day carrying 25 lbs dancing, cleaning, running. Who needs weights? So I am going to try and write up a series of activity ideas for kids Waking Up Williams. She did a post about ideas a month or so ago, so check that out.

Idea 1 - Contact Paper Art

OK I stole this idea from daycare and it is super easy and relativily clean.
  1. Take a roll of plain contact paper and some masking tape.
  2. Find a vertical surface. Be it a wall, easel, or dishwasher(as you see here).
  3. Turn the contact paper slick side to the surface and tape off your desired shape.
  4. Peel off the paper on the adhesive side.
  5. Cut up pieces of paper, tissue paper, pictures from magazines, old coupons, whatever.
  6. Give to child and have some coffee/glass of wine.
They can stick (and unstick depending on the medium) until the cows come home...or he realizes the TV is on. We pick our battles.

Landon's Book of the Week - Party in My Tummy

You know what rocks? Yo Gabba Gabba. It may look like something gone horribly wrong to you adults but to me, Landon, it rocks my face off. The minute I hear DJ Lance's shoes, I stop in my tracks. I could stare at that screen for hours. Anyways, mommy and daddy went for a date night one night and the next morning, this book was waiting for me. Do you see that? That is awesomeness. For you non-gabba folks, Party in my Tummy is a song they sing on the show. It is super catchy and makes me dance. This is a flip book that talks about yummy food going into their tummies. Mommy and daddy sing this book to me a lot and it is one of my favorites. I have liked it since they brought it home. Now that we don't have Nick Jr., I can't see Yo Gabba Gabba all the time. This is the next best thing!

I give this book 4.5 out of 5 cheerios (I told you I liked it).

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Weekend Fun

This weekend has been pretty low key. Landon and I checked out the Greystone Recreation Center with his buddy Josh and his mommy on Saturday morning. It was GREAT! The equipment is for a little older kids but it was great for them to just run around. He was so happy his friend Josh was there. He would be playing for a bit and then look up and say "Josh?" So cute. They really like each other a lot. They even swapped snacks :) He played for a solid 2 hours and never a fuss. It was magical. We came home, had some lunch and he passed out for a nice nap.

This morning I upped my running tally to a 7 mile run. I have found a new route that is so nice. I run to the lake and around and back. It was GORGEOUS this morning. There wasn't many people out and it was just so beautiful that I had to stop to take some pictures(above). I love running in the cold weather...I feel like I could just keep going. It was a little dicey this morning with some icy spots on sidewalks so my time was a little lower but I was still under 10 min/mile the whole way! Woot! I am meeting a new possible running partner this week. I am super excited!

Then, since Kevin now has Landon's cold, I sent him to nap and Aunt Sarah came to help with Senior Fussy Pants. He loves hamming it up for new people...so I could make his lunch. He also learned a new trick and showed Aunt Sarah his love for the Sun-maid raisin lady.

It was nice visit and then the boy ASKED for a nap. He got up early really fussy so I knew it would be early. After lunch I asked him if he wanted to nap and he said "yeah". Then he didn't even really want me to read to him. He just grabbed his moose and wanted to snuggle(what he does on my shoulder before bed). It was madness I say!

THEN we went to Landon's first birthday party(late). He got up from nap and we scooted over to chow down on a cupcake(Thanks Margo). He had a blast seeing other kids and getting all jacked up on sugar. Happy 1st Birthday Margo!!!!

We got home and played outside and I got what I think is my favorite picture of him yet:


Yeah so maybe it wasn't that low key....

Friday, January 14, 2011

Landon's Book of the Week - Barnyard Dance

You know who rocks? Sandra Boynton. Mommy and Daddy love her books and I like them too. They are always pushing me to read them...well this one I do like! Barnyard Dance is super fun and Mommy bounces me on her knee to read it. It has a fun song and all the animals dance around. I like to point out the moon, as usual. It is also fun because I recently learned to stomp my feet JUST LIKE THEY DO IN THE BOOK!!!! I am so good at it...I even do it when I am mad!

Well I am just getting into this book, so I don't have a full review just yet. For now, I give it 3 out of 5 cherrios.

You know what makes me laugh?


This.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Breastfeeding Cafe

Yeah...tons of posts today...whatever. Making up for lost time. This is just a shout out for the breastfeeding cafe I went to when I was pregnant. I may have blogged about it at the time but I am too lazy to look. It was at a baby spa(read yuppy trend) in Cary. On Fridays at lunch, you can go talk with other breastfeeding mamas and a leader for free. It is super informal and GREAT. I had read to go when pregnant to ask questions and such. I found it great for that but mostly, I got to see people breastfeeding in person. Not in a sitting-at-a-table-with-a-cover breastfeeding. You got to see the mechanics and even once I saw an indian woman come in with her 5 day old and mother to get help with latch. Since it was so informal, a lot of moms seem to just come to talk to other moms and offer help. There weren't many people with problems the first time I was there so they were great at just giving me(and another girl) advice. I felt so comfortable and always knew that when LT got here, I had someone I could call. Luckily we didn't have that many issues that I couldn't just get help from healthcare at SAS. I never went back because it was so far away from the house on maternity leave but I wish I would have just done it to see the girls. It would have been a good outlet then. O well. Maybe next time. Anyway, Go Ask Mom on WRAL.com just wrote an article about the cafe and it just got me thinking about it again. Check it out:

What happens at a breastfeeding cafe?

Cord Cutting 101

We have officially damned the man. By this we mean, cut the cord on cable/satellite. All of it. Bye bye $75 a month tv bill. Bye bye $15 a month XM bill. We cut them both this past week and it feels so liberating. We decided to work towards it this fall with the a) new Apple TV and b) a slowly creeping up of the Directv bill. We started slowly...just trying to see what all we could get for free/over the air. We know we can get the local channels in HD over the air...so done. Then it was our beloved DVR for the shows we do watch. We have skowered the net and found where we can see almost all of them for free. There are a few that we can't...but we are ok with it. The big hit was ESPN really. That is something you can't get somewhere else. I left this up to Kevin really. I would be fine of course. I am just looking forward to not watching mindless tv for no real reason. We are already listening to more music and less screen time.

Now I can't say our start up has been cheap. So chronologically speaking, we first started with a Netflix account and a DVD player with a Netflix streaming app. Works like a charm and we can watch old tv shows we never got into (lost, 24, etc) plus all the movies and HBO series on disc.

Next up was cables to hook the laptop up to the TV...easy enough. Then we could stream Hulu and anything else across. This got annoying because of the need to get up to navigate the laptop.

We also got Hulu plus to get some shows that aren't on DVD yet(modern family). We can also watch most of the regular Hulu stuff through the app too. This is also available on our iPhones and iPad...just not on apple tv yet...odd I know. This is nice but I don't know if we will keep it forever...hard to say now. Just to note though, their customer service is great.

Enter Apple TV. $99 and we get a slick new Netflix interface, ability to rent movies, stream our iTunes library through the TV(so any movies we have on there and music), internet radio, photo slideshows, and, as of the 4.2 update, we can air play music and video from our iPhones and iPad...so when toddler is freaking in the kitchen, we can kick on the music without leaving the room. Boom.

Then on Cyber Monday, the deal of the day was a receiver and speaker combo set for $700. We had been wanting some for awhile but holy fuck they were expensive. This was his Christmas present, and it is really nice. Just the music through it makes it for me. I can walk in the door and flip my iPhone to play on the tv and we have dance parties during Landon's dinner. It makes me happy.

Right before Christmas, we got a flier in the mail from Amazon about a deal on a Roku. That, combined with Amazon gift cards from cashing in credit card points, we got a sweet deal on it and replaced the Directv box in our bedroom. This has mainly existed to allow us to sleep a few extra minutes on weekends by providing endless Blue's Clues via netflix. I will also have to say that it was nice to watch some of our shows on Hulu plus the other night in bed.

Lastly, Kevin found these bad boys. We have them in the cars and we can just hit play on Pandora and it streams right along...pauses for phone calls...everything. O and we already pay for the data on the phone...so it is "free". This was the dagger that killed off XM. We were listening to basically 1 station for another bill that was going up and up. So buh bye.

It feels great to get rid of these high priced bastards. Surprisingly, neither company tried to offer us some deal to stay. We were kinda shocked. We were expecting them to give us an introductory rate or something but nothing. They would downgrade our package! O well..c ya fools...we will be over here sucking up all the interwebs....

I saw the sign...


So I have been meaning to post this for some time but I wanted a video. I am calling the video a wash because I can never get it. Maybe one day. Anyways, I think this is my first stint in bragging about my kid. I know 'every kid is special' blah blah blah. My kid? He rocks at signing. His comprehension is even growing too. One day I was at Ollies over in Cary just looking around and there was a book for beginning signs. It was $2 and came with flash cards. I figured 'heck, it is worth a try'. Once I brought it home, he loved it.

Now he knew signs before I got this book. They teach them the basics at school and he also has a little friend since infant class that is hearing impaired, so the teachers have learned some more as well. I have also picked up some from shows on nick jr. Anyways, he loved the book from minute one. It is about 10 pages with a picture of a kid doing the sign and what it is. Then there is the word and an explanation on how to do it plus an adult. At first he liked looking at it and doing the few he knew(milk, more, eat, etc). Then he was doing them all...proudly. We got out the flash cards just as a distraction one day and it was like baby crack. He just kept doing them and trying so hard on the tough ones. This boy LOVES accolades. So as of now he can do all of the following:
  • Hug
  • Socks
  • Bath
  • Coat
  • Dog (and we taught him to pant with it. So cute)
  • Sleep
  • Cookie
  • Shoes (he looks at his feet...so kinda)
  • Duck (and he quacks)
  • Big
  • More
  • Book
  • Daddy (he tries...it is tough but then he sure as hell can say it)
  • Eat
  • Water
  • Toothbrush
  • Hat
  • Fish
  • Ball (tries and can say it anyway)
  • Cat
  • Milk
  • Car(showed signs of it today)
  • Diaper
  • Please
  • Thank you
  • Drink
So yeah...my kid rocks. Hopefully one of these days I can get a video!

The next cool thing is that we don't have to say them anymore...he just does them. I can hold up a card and he will do it! Amazing. I am so excited for him to communicate with us without all his words yet.

P.S. We also just found a show on PBS kids called 'Signing Time'. It was awesome and we learned more to try with him.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

Landon's Book of the Week - Baseball A B C

This week's installment is about my new favorite obsession...Baseball ABC. Each page is a letter of the alphabet and baseball terms to go along. I like to pick out all the balls on all the pages. Mommy and Daddy find this obsession strange, it seems. There are no real sentences or rhymes. But I just love it. I could read about "headfirst slides" and "pitching machines" all day. Sometimes, when mommy is running my bath, I go get this book and sit in between the chair and ottoman to just look at the pictures. Maybe this means I will play baseball when I get older. That would be fun....though I don't know if Grandmommy could contain herself.

Anyways, I really like this book but somehow it has disappeared lately. That's odd. Maybe I will find it soon....it still gets 4 out of 5 cheerios!

Saturday, January 1, 2011

Merry Christmas!





So...yeah...a little late. I was putting this off because I couldn't just slap up photos and a video and call it a day *sigh*. Well Christmas this year was a lot better than last...not gonna lie. The dog is in good health, the baby sleeps, I am no longer a food source, and he can actually play with stuff. O and it snowed. Yippee!


Christmas Eve, Kevin, Landon and I took the day off and putzed around. That night, we went over to Craig's (the guy who married us) house for his annual bash. We had to go early because SOMEONE'S bedtime....but he even held out and we didn't leave until 8! He was having so much fun chasing his new friend Caroline(see below). I was so proud of him because Craig has a lot of little nick nacks around and Landon never tried to touch ANY of them...even the lit candles!


Even though Landon likes toys, he still doesn't "get" Christmas yet. That being said, we weren't going to do much. We decided we would get him 1 "big" thing and then just some books and a few small toys. Our big gift was a sit and spin. He is still a little small for it...but he is getting the idea. We figure it will grow with him for a bit. We also got him a few little board books. These were more for us in the hopes that he will choose them over some he likes. We are only kidding ourselves. He also got some play doh. We know he likes it at school and heck...it's fun to play with. He plays somewhat with it but doesn't have that much of an attention span.

Now we also knew that we should go small on Christmas because we would be outdone by the grandparents. Boy were we right. As you can see from the photos above, he hit the jack pot at Grandmommy and Grandaddy's first thing. Holy hell. She scored big on a bunch of second hand toys on the Bulletin Board at work. It wasn't wrapped...just a sheet over them all...like we were unveiling a car or something. Geez! We had to leave some of the stuff at Grandmommy's because we don't have the room at the house. We did take the table set home along with a few of the smaller classic toys. We had been sitting him at the dining room table for crafts and coloring but it was messing with my feng shui moving stuff all the time to make room. The table has been fantastic and it only took him about a day and a half to figure out how to climb in the seat himself. He loves to color at it and is learning to put his crayons away when he gets up from the table. So cute.

After a change of plans from the weather, Grandma Judy came up Christmas day instead and brought MORE stuff. He got some new clothes, books, a dinosaur that wiggles and a stuffed Grinch dog(did he have a name?). He is in toy heaven. Grandma stayed with us until Tuesday and we did some shopping and bopping around Raleigh in the snow. Woot!

As for Kevin and I, we didn't do to bad on the Santa loot either. Kevin found a deal on Cyber Monday on a receiver and speakers for the TV and so he had ordered that. We really like it and it does a fine job. I also got him some movies on super sale, some toy story legos, and some stickers for the ipad, mac and iphone. They are retro apple logos. Neat!

I scored a new camera bag I wanted after reading Becoming Mom's post. It is from Jo Totes and it is fabulous. Super big and holds everything...including MY NEW LENS! I got a 50mm f/1.8 for taking portraits. It is taking some getting used to because with my camera body, it doesn't auto focus...so I have to go old school. First time I used it though, I got AMAZING results...see:
I also got an engraved necklace with Landon's name and birthstone from Etsy with matching earrings. I got some glittery Toms.

Kevin's parents made us a cornhole set for the backyard and got us a heater for the new porch(yeah gonna blog about it soon, I promise). My mom got us a sweet gift card to GAP, a new calendar, and a swanky iPad case! We got even more but I don't want to just go on and on :).

Man am I tired writing all this out...try living it. A week at home with a toddler is a 'special' kind of 'vacation'. Speaking of...gotta wrap this up...he will be awake soon!