Happy Holidays!

Are what terrorists say. Errrr..Merry Christmas....

Snow!

Yup...so we got a lot of snow...well for NC standards. This was Landon's first snow he could actually play in. He LOVED it. He loves knocking snow off the bushes, eating it, throwing it, you name it. I got some sweet shots of him and even a cute video with Grandma.


To note, Jack also had a fantastic time at Grandmama's house playing in the snow. He gets super frisky and runs around like a maniac. He loves to dig in the snow and root his nose around in it. Go figure. The boy has NO hair on his belly either!

Here are some shots(trying out Picasa collages....LOVING IT)

P.S. This snow residue is really fucking with my running schedule. It sucks.

Landon's Book of the Week - Monsterpops!

This week's book is actually 3 books. I have this set called Monsterpops that are a trio of pop-up books. The artwork is a little scary but once again, the silly voices do it for me.

First up there is Dinner Time. This is the cold hard truth about the food chain. Each of the animals pop-out of the page and eat the previous animal....THEN they get eaten too. I think my favorite page is the crocodile. His snout sticks right out of the page. I grab it every time :).

Next is Small Talk. This was my favorite first in the series. It teaches that gossip can really change things. On every page, there is an animal talking about this thing on the roof. Each animal makes something up and it gets crazy. The book ends a little weird but there are funny looking animals like a hippo with an under bite and a funny little martian! Mommy makes all the pop-up animals talk. She is so magical.

The last one in the set is Oh My A Fly. Now get this, it is about a woman who swallows all these bugs and animals. It is pretty messed up...but I still like it. It has a lot of rhymes and mommy can read it real fast. I have no idea why she does that. Funny part in this one is (SPOILER ALERT) she keeps eating all these animals and she never dies...then the last page, she eats a horse! And then it says "she died of course". So funny. Because she ate all those other things and the horse is what did her in. Silly woman.

Well that is my review of the Monsterpops series. I would have to say that currently I ask for Oh My A Fly the most over and over. I give the set 4 out of 5 cheerios. See ya next week!

O snizzy snap! I got tagged!

Welp I got tagged by cousin Sarah over at Zombie Running. She accompanied me for a post work run this evening...so woot!

1) What are you most fond of accomplishing in 2010?
- Not going insane with an infant
- Not going insane with a toddler
- Learning more about photography and working at it
- Keeping up with exercise even though it is really hard with a full time job, baby, husband, etc.

2) What are your running goals for 2011?
- Krispy Kreme in Feb (3 doughnuts this time?)
- Half Marathon in March
- 27 min or less 5K? Think I can?


3) What is your favorite race?
Meh I only did 2 technically because I chickened out at the KK Challenge. Gonna have to go with Old Reliable even though my pace was poopy. Got a nice shirt and it was a nice day with Jen :)

4) What is your favorite holiday guilty pleasure?
Hmmm...Joe Joes? Sausage balls? My entire floor has a week long potluck of junk. Yeah I ate crap daily. It rocked my face off. BUT I did run the most that week!

5) What was your most embarrassing running moment?
TRUTH TIME! This melts the mommy and running world. Since having Landon, I have had to ::cough:: train some "other muscles". Peeing while running has become my downfall. I have had to stop too many times and circle the block at home to go ...one more time. It sucks but I am dealing with it. You have been warned non-mommies.

So I have to tag someone.

I tag Jamie over at http://jamiemcq.wordpress.com/ - She did a half marathon within the baby's first year...CRAZY!

Landon's Book of the Week - Goodnight Gorilla

Goodnight Gorilla

Hello followers. This week's review is of the book of little words. The basic premise is a zookeeper is locking up for the night and the gorilla starts and unlocks all the cages. Then all the animals follow him home and try to fall asleep in his ROOM! I KNOW?!!! Anyway, since there aren't many words, mommy changes the story a little bit each time. We get to point out the moon and balloon in all the pages. I know which one is the gorilla and the giraffe every time! I am so smart. At the end we tell everyone night night and I go too! I have been a fan of this book for a few weeks, even though mommy brought me 2 huge bags of books. Silly lady. Well I give this book 2 out of 5 cheerios. Night Night!

STEVE!

This is Steve from Blue's Clues now...he has a band...creepy...

Our newest family member...BLUE!

Yup. Blue Clue's is integral in our lives everyday now apparently. We have known Landon loves it because it can put him in a trance and get him to stop crying.

When driving to the river for Thanksgiving, we decided to try to just pick him up early from school and head out...yeah...right after his nap. You see where this is going right? He wasn't tired and pissed off. He was screaming before we got out of Wake County. We tried his songs and that slowly wore out. We then decided to hook up the iPad and let it work it's magic. We plugged it into the stereo with the AUX port and propped it up on the console and let Blue work HER magic. O magic Blue...how we love you. The rest of Thanksgiving, when he was waking up at the ass crack of dawn due to teething, we brought the iPad to bed with us and let him watch. Glorious.

Well we have the first 3 seasons on Netflix and have them available via iPad, iPhone, computer, Apple TV, XBox, DVD player...muhahahahaha. Just this week, when we came home from school, Landon immediately went to the sofa and was trying to climb up(nothing new there) and then was walking around saying "boo?" and making fists and jazz hands. This usually is milk but it was obvious this wasn't what he wanted. After we asked for more context clues, we figured out he wanted to watch Blue Clue's with daddy. We later figured out that the hand movements? Totally the "Blue's Clues" motion that Steve/Joe does when singing the song. CRAZY. Now it is just too cute.

It is done

I officially signed up for my first half marathon yesterday(yup SAS pays $10 of the entry fee and then payroll deducts the rest...BOOM). I will be doing the American Tobacco Trail 1/2 marathon. I have been told it is a great 1st one because it is really flat. Hooray! I am kinda starting my training this week...yeah the coldest week on record. I am not too worried right now. Following any of the training guides this early is less than what I am used to running so I am not obsessing just yet. I am trying to align my running with other groups and people to help keep me honest. Some work friends go out for long runs on the weekends, so I am hoping to meet up with them. Call me a copy cat of Sarah :) I am ok with that.

Let's hear it for the num nums!

Well, the day has come, Landon is officially weaned from breastfeeding. We made it 15 months and 2 weeks...WAY past what I thought. I kinda decided after Thanksgiving and the WAY TOO early mornings, that we needed to cut the cord. He got into a little habit of coming into bed with mommy and daddy to keep quiet. While it worked, it left mommy with a baby clawing her and squirming at 5 am while Daddy snored. My extended sleeping reasoning for extended breastfeeding wasn't working as planned. So I figured, we make a change when we go back home and make the switch.

On Monday, he got up late, so we went straight to breakfast. Tuesday, when I went to get him from the crib, he pointed to the bed like he wanted me to lay with him but I asked him if he wanted his sippy, he said 'yeah' and we got it. No looking back.

I didn't cry like I thought and I think it was because I didn't let myself think about it too much. I didn't plan "we will stop at a year" and then dread the impending birthday. The time arose and we stopped. I miss it, yeah. It hasn't been about milk for awhile...just the snuggling. Sweet sweet snuggling. I did get a little teary when I dropped the night time feeding and my supply dipped way down and he would start signing 'more'. It was so pitiful :(. Honestly, it was never that hard. Yeah there was some getting used to and some sleepless nights...but it was fan-freakin-tastic. I would do it over and over.

*That's right GASP I put a photo of breastfeeding on here...but look! artistic!

Bag of Tricks

DUDE I AM FAMOUS!

Well kinda. I submitted LT's b-day decorations to an inspiring blog called Party like a Kid months ago and today they posted it! So exciting!!

Very Hungry Caterpillar Birthday

Sweet Caroline

So I decided to see if I could get Landon to sing a song with me....so here goes :)

Landon's Book of the Week - Curious George and the Bunny

Curious George and the bunny

Well followers, I missed my book review from last week due to vacation. Mom and Dad brought along the usuals, so I didn't discover a new favorite I thought I would take you back to a few weeks ago to a favorite. Now this one starts off with this monkey...and apparently he is pretty curious. He stumbles upon some baby bunnies. I like George because he seems to like to get into things...like me! He decides he wants to hold a baby bunny. Then he wants to play hide and go seek, so he puts the bunny down. What a doofus! The bunny runs away! He gets all sad and worried. Then he decides to get the mommy bunny to help him find the baby. And she does. Happily ever after...blah blah. Anyway, my favorite part is at the end when we get to tell the bunnies goodnight. That means I get to snuggle with mommy and go to sleep. Anyway, this book held my attention well and was a good story. I give it 2.5 out of 5 cheerios.

15 Months and counting

Quick update from LT's 15 month appointment on Friday.

Weight: 22lbs 3.5oz(20%)
Height: 31 inches(48%)
Head: 18.75 inches(63%)
*read: tall skinny bobblehead

• He has at least 3 molars coming in. Joy.
• He is right on schedule...even a little advanced considering he already likes to hit when frustrated...yippee right?!
• He is trying to say moon and daddy is teaching him the sign for please.
• We just learned that he enjoys stealing all the paper towels out of the holder at school when they aren't looking and run around the room giggling. The aggravation gene is strong with this one.
• He gets angry if he doesn't get his way and will protest by lying on the floor and kicking.
• He likes to go down the stairs like a big boy.
• He loves outside.
• He has learned the buffering symbol on Apple TV means Blue's Clues or the Backyardigans are coming and gets so excited. Cute cute
  

Landon's Book of the Week - The Monster at the End of This Book

The Monster at the End of this Book - starring lovable, furry, old Grover

Yup..awesome. If you haven't read this book, you were deprived as a child. It has neat pictures and Grover is so funny. Ya see, he is TERRIFIED of monsters. At the beginning, he reads the title and gets the heebie jeebies. Then for the rest of the book, he doesn't want you to turn the page. The best part is when my mommy makes the crazy voices for Grover! He tries to tie the pages together, build a brick wall, and even nail them to each other. He is just SOOOO crazy. Well come to find out SPOILER ALERT, HE is the monster at the end of the book. THEN, that silly monster tries to say that I was the one who was scared. THAT is ridiculous my good sir! Anyways, this book has been my favorite this past week but my new thing is to scream when mommy and daddy put me in my crib for night night...so I have bigger fish to fry.

I give this book 4 out of 5 cheerios.

Fall Photo time

The ending of daylight savings time is met with many curses. All childless people rejoice in the "extra hour" of sleep, while us parents(been dealing with this with Jack before Landon) curse the man. One lovely side effect is these first few weeks leave us with FANTASTIC photo shoot opportunities and gorgeous nature. Put them together and BOOM! MAGIC! I have been carrying my camera everywhere. Taking profile photos for work folks, dog pics, and nightly photo shoots of Lando. Here are some of my faves:

Charlene looking beautiful

Muggs! The friendliest pitbull of all time.

Little Miss Allison

Always my willing model

Why so serious Landon?

BAHHHHH!

Daddy did well with the camera

The most true to life photo lately

Lovey Dovey

Friday was Kevin and I's 5th wedding anniversary. I know!? Crazy isn't it? 5 years ago I married my most favorite person in the world. I can say we get along fantastic. We really don't fight. Yeah, I can be bitchy and naggy and he can play video games for too long...but we are very happy. We are a great team and parenting has only proved it further. When I want to scream and rip my hair out, he steps in and takes over. Heck, Sunday he wrangled him to nap in our bed for 2 hours. I would have just cried and freaked out when he wouldn't nap. I love him bunches and hope for many many more.



We went all crazy and got a screened in porch as our gift (year 5 is wood...BOOM). What can I say? We are practical. And I will post a full documentation of the project once the screens are in(custom made...took some time). But here is a photo:

Anyways, we went out to dinner at the Angus Barn and pigged out. We even had a magic show where he "fused" cards together with love. Awww But don't worry...we were in bed by 10:30...can't get TOO crazy....

Landon's Book of the Week - I Spy Little Animals

Recently, Landon is really into books. He is focusing on 1 book at a time...and there is no rhyme or reason. Anyway, I figured I would have a little fun and try to offer a weekly book review by Mr. LT. So here we go...week 1.

I Spy Little Animals

The book is a visual treasure trove. Even the cover is filled with all kinds of things. I could listen to my mom and dad read this over and over again...and usually they do! The page with the balls is my absolute favorite. There is even a page with a bunny with red eyes. It is pretty freaky...I make mom push that page faster. The page about the zebra truck cracks me up. The editors MUST know that it isn't a real "animal". I find the "starfish star" is in there for a cheap rhyme. Also 2 ducks? Cmon. You couldn't come up with another animal? Overall, I can say that I enjoy this book...every night...multiple times. I give it 3.5 out of 5 cheerios.

Whoring out my baby...

So yeah. I want to win a contest...REALLLLLY want to win. Wanna help? Here is how:

1. Go to Modern Bird Studios' Facebook Page and "Like" it. You will like it too. Check out the galleries for examples of their work. Here is a little more about the family company. You can also follow their antics on twitter @modern_bird and @the_lame_sauce. They are pretty funny and banter back and forth. They also have 2 ADORABLE children.
2. Like my photo in their Holiday Contest album.

Now wasn't that easy.

Bonus points if you forward this blog post/email to your Facebook friends. I will love you forever...promise.

Photoshop Time!

Sooo I loooooved this picture of Landon from Halloween. After weeks of photos of the side of his face, I was happy to get him looking at me AND smiling. Not to mention the whole outfit in the photo! My one yucko factor was those toys...blech.
I took this opportunity to figure out that clone stamp in Photoshop and get rid of them. I then figured I would help out the grass and brighten it up a bit. Without further ado....


Here is a side by side:
It ain't perfect but I was pleased.

Spooky Scary Halloween

Well not really but you ya know I needed a catchy title. Originally my plan was for Landon to be a dinosaur. I got a costume from someone on the bulletin board at work and I was all set. Then Saturday happened. Some back story, Landon got hand, foot and mouth and then proceeded to get us all sick in some form. Mine was just a yucky cold and Kevin's turned into a sinus and ear infection. So my Friday afternoon, we were exhausted. Pretty sure we went to bed at 9. Hooray! Anyway, for Kevin's birthday, his parents thought about us and our poor yard and said they would help us put out mulch. Saturday morning rolls around and mulch is coming....6 yards of it. So Kevin and his dad unloaded and did it all. It looks fantastic and no more muddy feet for Jack Jack. Anyway, that left me to play toddler wrangler all day. He was a PILL. We tried to go to Target to just have meltdown after meltdown in the store over everything. So back to Halloween, we had a party at 4 and I wasn't even going to attempt to put him in that dinosaur outfit with a hat and junk. Not worth the battle. Friday I had picked up a little greaser t-shirt at target as a back up outfit...and I was glad I did. We suited him up with that, some cuffed jeans, and spiky hair. Voila...our little punk rocker:
WE went out to Fuquay to Kevin's co-worker's party. We attempted to feed the toddler who never eats and played around. He loved watching the big kids play and Rodney's little girl Krista was a favorite. She played with him and he was just smitten. She even brought him a guitar:

Kevin and I went as Dexter and one of his victims. I thought abut this outfit for a few weeks and really wanted to do the fake NUDE thing but couldn't find a cheap solution. I decided to just wear tight black and the saran wrap. I am glad I did...I got enough weird looks with just the saran wrap! Some people knew who I was, others probably just thought I was whoring it up. Who knows...

Sunday, Landon and I headed over to my friend Jen's for a little pre trick or treating. We sported a mohawk this time. He once again had fun watching the big kids and chasing the dog dogs. He also played a little cornhole :).
And one more for the road:
Check out all the photos here.

Words Words Words

To honor the hilarious Bo Burnham and his new song Words Words Words, I want to report on about LT's vocabulary...er...things that sound like words :). In the past 2 weeks we have got

• Ball - all about throwing and keep away. Went to the park and had to keep steering him off the soccer field
  
• Night Night - we like to tell Jack Jack Night Night in the bathtub.
  
• Mama(though I think he means he wants food a lot)
• Nana(banana) - we have to hide them in the pantry now...he would see them on the counter and want it...the poor boy would never poop if we kept that up.
  
• Boo - cutest thing...very soft little "boo".

So now we have to watch what we say. Funny...I know.

Other high notes, he has learned:

• How to blow kisses
• Hugging(he seems to be picky on this one)
• How to throw a ball...sometimes he forgets to let go...hilarious
• How to break it down...his dancing seems to be going lower. I think it is that Bing Da Dip commercial...classic.
• How much he hates the word NO. Man that boy can throw a fit.
• How to scoop his dinner. We found that sometimes it is just worth him being disgusting to get him to eat. He is so proud when he can scoop his dinner

• He loves cars and pushing them around the kitchen floor. He just KNEW one day that he has to play with his cars on the hard floor. It was surreal to watch.
• That he needs shoes to go outside. He will find his shoes and carry them around and sit down and hold them to his feet

So exciting times mixed with some frustrating times. We just had a horrible teething day recently and that sucked. He got hand foot and mouth and that sucked but he wasn't too bad...just thirsty from the blisters in his throat. Anyways....that is my quick update. More to blog about including my hunt for an awesome park around town and OUR NEW PORCH. Supposed to be done on Friday...cross your fingers.

Lasagna Recipe Repeat

I had put this up on the old blog and had people ask for it, so I brought it back from the dead. So here ya go:

1 small onion chopped
2 cloves garlic minced
1 tube Jimmy Dean hot sausage
1 jar Bolgonese sauce from Trader Joe's(you can use any sauce you really like)
1 big tub of cottage cheese(I am not sure on the size but it is the bigger of the 2 in the store)
1/2 package of Italian mix shredded cheese
1 egg
1 package of frozen chopped spinach(let it thaw) - optional
Barilla no boil lasagna noodles
1 package shredded mozzarella cheese
salt and pepper to taste

Saute the onion and garlic in a sauce pan, then add the sausage. Brown the sausage and drain the fat. Return the mean to the pan and add the jar of sauce. Let simmer for as long as you like.

While the sauce is simmering, mix together the cottage cheese and Italian mix cheese in a mixing bowl. Mix in the egg and salt and pepper to the taste you like. If you would like, mix in the chopped spinach.

In a 9x12 casserole dish, layer sauce, then noodles, then cottage cheese mixture, then mozzarella cheese. Repeat and end with mozzarella on top.

Bake at 375 for about an hour. Then uncover and bake an additional 10 minutes to brown the top with cheese.

Tellin it like it is

I recently started following a fun young lady of Twitter by the tag @Babe_Chilla. She was dealing with a non-sleeping baby in tweet form. It was heart wrenching reading the tweets in the night about the baby not sleeping, her not being able to sleep and then she was home all day again. I felt the pain. She finally tried crying it out and it worked and it was awesome. I don't know this girl and I felt sooooo happy for her. She recently wrote a post all about the sleep journey and I cried reading it. I remember it...vividly...and I am glad she wrote it so people can understand....crying it out isn't mean or hurtful...it's survival at a point. Anyway, here it is. I hope you enjoy it.

Oh No, Say It Ain’t So! You Did Not CIO!?!

Our big toddler

Today was Landon's first full day in toddler class. He has been transitioning all week by staying there longer and longer. Today I dropped him off in his new class. He leapt from my arms and was off across the classroom(yeah I forgot to make him wash his hands). He was so excited to see his new toys and friends. We definitely will miss Miss Brackett. She was fantastic and couldn't have asked for better care. She is the sweetest thing ever and loves her babies. Of course we will see her around...no doubt.

So his new room is full of new exciting things. First off, no cribs. He has been working on sleeping on a mat for about 3 weeks now and loves it. Seems to sleep better and everything. Now he has a set naptime when everyone goes down and he seems to be sleeping 2 hours both times in the toddler room this week. It must be working for him. There are new centers including art, dramatic play, a sensory table, a reading corner, AND A SLIDE. This child is in heaven. They go outside at least 3 times a day and he LOVES that. THey have little toy lawnmowers and he just high tails it around the sidewalk apparently with his new friends. He even got a skinned nose today to prove it :). This would be the second incident report this week for falls :). Silly boy. He has his own cubby with his picture on the front and a hook for his coat. He also has to have rainboots to play in the puddles after a rain. HOW FREAKIN CUTE IS THAT!!!!???

Another thing they do in toddlers, is teach them more independence. Including washing their hands by themselves, putting their dishes away, putting their toys away and even help clean the room. After lunch, they get a wet paper towel to "wash" the table. We are happy they are training our little house elf!

Well I am sure there are man adventures to come...and I will pass them along!

Rock the boat

Our new enemy, the Asian pear

This weekend was a fun time. We were getting ready to head out to the park because it was so pretty and we decided Landon needed a snack before we went. I got out hummus, crackers & some pear slivers. I decided to pick up an asian pear to try when I was at the store and figured they were like any other pear. Nope. Of course by the end of snack, he was covered in hummus but he wasn't throwing things and was happily eating...so WIN. Anyway, I go to wipe off all the hummus and his face is super splotchy around the mouth and he had puffy lips! WTF? So we called the Dr. and they said to bring him in right away. Long story short, he is allergic to Asian pears. He never had breathing issues and was happy the whole time at the doctor. We now have Jr. epipens and have to keep an eye out.

Sorry for the rough picture, it was my phone.

Work work work

I have so much I want to blog about but I just don't have time. I am working a lot on our current redesign and it doesn't show any signs of letting up. With that said, I figure I will give you a quick run down of life

• We are looking to screen in our back deck...well most of it. We are waiting on the third estimate and then deciding. Not going to be cheap but I think we will really enjoy it and use it way more than we do. I will be sure to take before and afters. Also Kevin noted that the 5th year anniversary is wood...so it kinda fits.
  
• Landon has given up on crawling. All walking, all the time. He has great balance and often carries large objects with him. We are going out today to get him his first "real" shoes with a sole and everything. So cute.
• My only me time it seems anymore, is my fleshed out twitter account. I read while walking, riding the elevator, supervising Landon's dinner. I will write a post about all the fun mommies and daddies I follow now. Fun stuff. It always make me LOL...every time.
• We are breaking free of the man...kinda. We are planning to drop Directv and do everything the "free" way. Just pay a small fee for Hulu Plus and Netflix. Kevin has also bought Apple TV and it is to ship at the middle of the month. We have completely sold our souls to Steve Jobs. But no mock turtlenecks for me...
• We got new shelves from IKEA more than a month ago but I haven't gotten them decked out like I want yet for a picture. They are giant but they store A LOT. We got lucky that the dimensions were EXACTLY the right size and we now have "kinda" built ins.
• Gonna copy some of my new tweeps and do a "wordless wednesday" segement each week so it looks like I keep up with life. I still take LT's photo every day...just have to wait and upload in chunks.

Well I know there is more but we have to spend naptime catching up on DVR...sigh.

Mouth of the South

So just in the past week, Landon has started "talking" more. He just babbles to himself or a toy. Over the weekend, we could see him on the video monitor just talking to his toys and pushing them out of the crib. The cutest has to be when he "reads" books. He will hold the book and turn the pages and babble like he is reading. He does this a lot in the bathtub. Adorable. Anyway, it is hard to get a video of him half the time but I got him talking on the swing at the park. You can also witness the awesome crab glasses. He will wear these glasses for a long time without even attempting to remove them. It is hysterical.

My boy's love for a slide

So weekend before last, Landon and I went out to Shelley Lake to meet Jamie and Margo. For those of you that don't know, Margo is 8 months old going on 30. She is the cutest little bundle of rolls :).
Anyways, we had a nice stroller ride/walk around the lake and then headed to the play area. We have never been to a playground. This was an unknown...though I know he loves swinging. He was glued to watching the other kids. Luckily it wasn't super crowded and we soon got a swing.
He swung for a bit and then Margo had to go...so we ventured to the slide. Landon found love. He squealed as I let him slide down the bottom.

Then he just wanted to hold the side.

A little girl came to play and he got to watch her too!
That is the end of the photos. Mommy can only juggle the toddler and camera alone for so long. We tried the curly slide and the bumpy slide and loved them all. He cried hard when we had to leave.

Last week his teachers noted that he was 'slide king' when he would visit the other class and go outside. Anything he could slide on, he would. So this weekend, we took a trip out to Laurel Hills park because it will close at the end of the month to be remodeled. This was a park Kevin went to as a kid and it was kinda nostalgic. A lot of the equipment was too hot at lunch time but luckily we found a slide in the shade:

IT was so much fun. He just squealed the whole way down.







Fun was had by all and here are the pictures from the events:

Shelley Lake with Margo

Laurel Hills Park 9/19/2010

Baby steps

Yup....our days are done...

ATTACK BABY!

One of Landon's newest things is pouncing on you. His favorite is to sit in his Elmo chair and then propel himself out onto you. This wasn't Elmo but he was attacking Da Da.

Better Late Than Never

Here are the videos of the birthday cake:

It's Fashion Week Everyone....and I snagged a free purse

Over the weekend I made the mistake at looking at an InStyle magazine. Then I began to realize my frumpiness. I have gotten back to my pre-pregnancy weight(yay!)...and as I knew(refrain from saying I told you so), it is somewhere else. I can fit in my old jeans but the ass just hangs off me. Heck half my pants are too big. I know..."why are you complaining you dumb beaver?" but I don't want to have to shop and face the frumpiness full on! I don't know how to dress myself and I don't have the patience to find out. I also don't want to spend money! I am trying to get better about working out so I HOPE that means I will shed some fat from my awesome muffin top. So this week I planned to step it up and wear something different. I wore my platform mary janes! I felt awesome....so I need to find some cheap clothes. Mission....dress better without taking out a loan or giving Kevin a heart attack.

I turned to ole trusty Bulletin Board at work but didn't really see anything worth perusing. Then I decided I needed a new purse but KNEW Kevin would get all "you don't need a new purse...wah wah wah" so I started creatively thinking. I work with a girl a few years younger than I. She dresses AWESOME. She is super cute without looking ridiculous (like mini skirts and rain boots or some shit like that). ON TOP of that, she has an identical twin...so basically she has double everything she wants to wear. So I always ask her to help a sista out when she cleans her closet and she was like "ya know I need to do that". Then I asked her..."hey wanna get rid of some purses to a frumpy mommy in need?" Her answer? "What color?". CHA CHING! Today she brought me 2. I chose 1 of them in a lovely emerald green leather from Nine West. Apparently she is now spoiled by Kate Spade so lets hope she had those for me next season. THEN she told me to just take it...for free. Hells yeah.

This may seem silly for a post but you didn't have my week. This was a big win in my book. O and I will look totally hip when going to see Piranha 3D tomorrow night....

Goodbye Bottles and Pump Horns

I have waited for this day. First let me start by saying I love breastfeeding just as much as I thought I would. It was/is wonderful. Easy, special, and a magic bullet for a fussy baby. That being said, pumping sucks ass. I think I will delay future children just so I can have a bigger gap of time where something plastic isn't stuck to my boobs. UGH. I wrote about my trials with pumping early on. I never responded well. I tried it all. I finally just came to the realization that I needed to stop stressing so much about it and just do what I could. That meant for 6 months, I pumped 4 times a day at work. 4 TIMES! Do you realize what this does to your day? It was awful. I hated telling people "uh sorry you can't come down because I am pumping". Everyone got used to it but I still hated it. So at the beginning of July, I decided to start dropping pumps. This was really silly in retrospect. I read too much for my own good. I read of all these people talking about the engorgement they would get when they didn't pump those first few days of transitition so I started "dropping". I have never been overflowing...so looking back...I probably could have dropped all 4 and never felt at thing. In that last month or so...I was lucky to get 4 oz all day. It was pitiful but I was determined. The week of LT's birthday, I stopped...and oh how sweet it was. I wasn't carrying 15 thousand bags to work, cleaning pump parts, wipeing milk off my desk, etc. Life was back to normal!

After that things moved quickly. I was sending Landon to school with mixes of cow's milk and formula. I also sent just a big container of cow's milk to practice drinking in cups...and he rocks at it. He was drinking at lot at his meals and one day Brackett called from daycare and was like " um he drank 5 oz of milk at snack in his cups so do you want me to give him a bottle?" I said no and then he did the same the next day. So we just decided he didn't need either bottle so I just sent 1 in case he freaked out but I said not to "plan" to give it to him. He never batted an eye and even sat next to Josh when he had his and never made a peep. She said she had never seen a child wean themselves off bottles. Ta da. So you know what that means?! LESS DISHES!

Then I decided since we were on a roll, I needed to drop the bed time one too. He hasn't "needed" it in a long time and he was getting enough in the day...so I took it out. He had about 3 nights where I stopped nursing and picked him up to go to bed without the bottle and he cried and fussed but went right to sleep once he was in the crib. I just took the last of the bottles upstairs for storage tonight...awesome awesome awesome! This is one happy mama.

P.S. For what it's worth to anyone wanting to know, he drinks from a variety of sources including sippy cups, little shot glass type cups at school and some at home, smaller child size cups, my boobs(morning and nighttime), anything I am drinking from, and the rinse cup in the bathtub. I think he drinks more bath water than anything. :)

The Very Hungry Landon

Saturday, the 14th, was the big 1 year shindig. We drove down to the River to celebrate with the family and Grandma Judy came too!

I had decided to do the Very Hungry Caterpillar from seeing the post on Party Like A Kid. It seemed like a simple theme that you could build on. A cake theme, serve foods from the book. Red and green. Pretty easy and low key.

I was really excited about the cake. So I made the head cake and Grandmama made the cupcakes. This was also my first attempt at cake decorating/arranging...so be nice. I borrowed the 6" pans from a friend at work. The antennae were black licorice(which is hard as hell to find). I then cut slivers to make the hair...which turned out looking like the cactus that Yoshi eats. Note to self for a Mario party in later years :).



Next up was the decorations. I ordered a VHC banner, cupcake holders & cupcake toppers from the Eric Carle Museum. They were cheap enough that I didn't feel like a huge waste but still good quality. I then typed out what the caterpillar ate on each day and got some clipart from around the web. I put them on little cards around the table. This was probably a bit much but whatever...didn't really cost anything. I then made grape and strawberry kabobs to look like caterpillars :). Also we didn't have anything to put them in so I stabbed them into the other half of the watermelon! O creativity.






























Also to go a little "green" we reused the Woodstock biodegradable plates, cutlery & cups! I originally had bought all the stuff at the party store and started thinking about the investment we made down there for the stuff. K's Uncle bought about 150 place settings of Preserve tableware in lime green(so they matched!). I called him and he was like SURE and delivered them that day to us! I highly recommend them. Very sturdy and dishwasher safe. We did have one cup get all wacky in the dishwasher...but not too shabby. O and I saved about $20 bucks and I only used about 25 of place settings! Think of the other gatherings we have...whooo hooo. Here is a picture just for reference:

Well we had a lovely day down on the Pungo and so we used the community tables out on the lawn, pumped some music and chowed down. There was a nice breeze and not too humid...also we could hose down the high chair once we were done :) Even the doggies tried to hang around for some scraps.




I wanted Landon to have a shirt to remember the day so I did a simple iron on print. I used the border pattern from the book to make a big number 1 on the front. Simple and easy.











Then we let him at his cake...now time for a photo montage(cue 80's movie soundtrack):


























































He then got in the pool to rinse off and then PRESENTS! He racked up of course. He got a lot of books, a little musical truck, blocks, a drum, 2 tractors, a nerf gun(yeah thanks Sarah!), and, of course, bows and paper!





















The big presents came from the Grandparents...surprise surprise! Grandma Judy bought him a giant water table. We are keeping it here at home and he is loving it...when it isn't 500 degrees
outside:











And then Grandmama and Grandaddy worked to refurbish Grandaddy's old Radio Flyer wagon just for Landon. That means it will serve 3 generations! The minute he saw the red, he was pulling towards it:





















Then we finished up with some swinging and some snuggling with Aunt Sarah and Junior God Mother Aly:











Anyway, long story short...he had a FANTASTIC first birthday :)