Birthday Boy Bash

Lincoln turned 1 and I absolutely love this age. I think this is where kids finally become fun. Not that I don't like the infant stage...well, OK, actually I really don't like it all that much. I admit it. But I do love it around the time they start to walk, which for Lincoln was about 2 weeks before his birthday. And now that he's been walking for about 1 month, he is running and spinning in circles! I'm not surprised in the least by these achievements. When he puts his mind to something, he accomplishes it. With gusto. 

At his check up he weighed 21 pounds and was 29 inches long. That puts him at about the 20th percentile for both. And he is, of course, perfect in every way. Hitting all his milestones on time and ahead on a few, mainly the gross motor stuff. He says Mama and Dadda and has said Hi a few times but not many other words yet. Well, unless you count animal sounds. He will moo like a cow and has quacked like a duck (or at least made some sort of sound when asked what a duck says) and will even try to snort like a pig, which is particularly funny.

Sto and I have decided that he is the clown of the family. He is always ready with his huge smile (that looks just like his daddy's, by the way) and will do anything for a laugh. He is a riot and keeps us chuckling all day long. Except when he's not, that is. He's also a man of extremes. Super happy! Supper upset! One thing is for sure, you are never in doubt about how he feels about things. 

He also seems to have a renewed fascination with his family jewels. I let him play around in his birthday suit the other day and ever since then he's been looking for that oh so special appendage. You can tell by the look on his face as he grabs at his diaper that he's thinking, 'Hey, what's going on? I know that thing was here earlier. Where is it?' Hilarious. 

His birthday party was a huge success. We went with an airplane theme. Now, I thought that would be an easy theme when I chose it. I figured I'd be able to find party favors and decorations no problem. Turns out it's not on the most popular list right now. But we made due with paper airplanes hanging from balloons and cute tags for In-flight Snacks and Beverages. We even had a Baggage Claim for the goodie bags which were full of airplane shaped crayons and an airplane themed coloring book (in a bag hand stamped with an airplane, of course). The only downer was that it was, literally, the hottest day of the year! 99 degrees or something crazy like that! But we had a tub full of water balloons, another full of squirt guns, and an octopus sprinkler so the kids didn't seem to notice the heat. The blow up bouncy castle was even a hit! And for the grown ups we placed industrial style fans on the patio with spray bottles to mist yourself. No one passed out from heat stroke and there wasn't much food or sangria left over so I consider that a success! 

Can't wait to see what the next year has in store for my little man. He is so treasured and we love our silly, smiley, smarty pants of a boy! 

The Great Pippasaurus

I need to record, for posterity's sake, Pippa's love of dinosaurs. It all started with a Cat In The Hat book that Sto picked up and I rolled my eyes thinking it was way too old for her. Boy was I wrong. Soon she could recite (and properly pronounce) the names of more dino's than I could. We now have 3 dinosaur books, one of which is an actual 'Dino-pedia' and her favorite. We have to bargain with her ahead of time to read about '___ number of dinosaurs and then it's time for bed!' She could go on forever. She knows which ones are herbivores and which are carnivores. And did you know that there really is no such thing as a brontosaurus? It's true. What we grew up knowing about these huge beasts was wrong, apparently. What we think of as a brontosaurus was actually a combination of an apatosaurus and a brachiosaurus. (And Pluto isn't actually a planet either, FYI).

So when Pippa got a dinosaur bath towel from Lola, it was awesome! Now, after baths, she puts on her towel and we all tremble in fear of the great Pippasaurus! A fearsome creature with big sharp teeth (that need to be brushed!) and long sharp claws that she likes to attack us with. Luckily I have thick armor on my skin and I can knock her with my big clubbed tail like an ankylosaurus! The smile on her face while we play this game is priceless. I never want to forget it.

Pinterest LOVE

I've posted about Pinterest before but I decided it past due to dedicate a post to all the ways it has inspired me. So, the following are straight from my boards. Perhaps you will get inspired too...

Source: frenchbydesign.blogspot.com via Heather on Pinterest

This is probably the thing I am most excited about. I LOVE these stairs. I've been working towards doing something similar to mine. I wish I could post the pic of my wonderfully artistic work, but I've only done 4 out of 14 of them. It's very slow going but someday it will be finished and beautiful! Stay tuned.

Source: naptimedecorator.blogspot.com via Heather on Pinterest

This is a totally cute reading nook and my playroom now looks very similar.  I never would have thought to do it myself but it was so simple. This is why I love Pinterest.

Source: blogs.babble.com via Heather on Pinterest

Why didn't I ever think of that?! We are never lacking for bag clips now!

Source: themotherhuddle.com via Heather on Pinterest

This turned out to be a great way to grill salmon. I used sockeye salmon which worked great because it's less fragile than regular salmon. But you don't have to flip it when you cook it this way, so regular salmon would work out just as well. I just seasoned with salt and pepper. Threw on a little fresh dill and laid it on slices of lemon. Easy-peasy.

Source: amy-newnostalgia.blogspot.com via Heather on Pinterest

Black bean and quinoa salad. Very yummy and super healthy. I've made this several times recently with slight variations each time. So much you can do with it!

Source: marthastewart.com via Heather on Pinterest

Steamed ginger cod. The original recipe says to microwave it but I'm not really into that so I just covered it and baked it until done. It was to die for. 

Source: bravetart.com via Heather on Pinterest

I made a batch of this roasted tomato sauce and was able to freeze half of it. It was super easy and really delicious. I roasted a red pepper along with the tomatoes which added some really nice flavor. Fresh and nutritious. You should try it.

Source: confident-beautiful-motivated.tumblr.com via Heather on Pinterest

Chocolate Banana 'Ice Cream'. Amazingly good! Just freeze a banana (cut it up into chunks first!) and throw it into the blender with some coco and a little bit of sweetener of your choice. Smooth and creaming and something crazy like 110 calories! But, you definitely need a good blender to make it work.

Source: onegoodthingbyjillee.com via Heather on Pinterest

Frozen yogurt dots. Just put some yogurt in a baggie, cut the corner off, place dots on a cookie sheet, and pop it in the freezer. So fun to eat. Pippa loved these!

Source: notimeforflashcards.com via Heather on Pinterest

Letter of the week! We love this! So far we're 3 weeks in to it: A (alligator), B (bumble bee), and C (cat). Pippa loves doing crafts about the letter of the week and it's really helping her to understand the sounds they make. I try to talk about it with whatever we do. I'm not generally clever enough to think of these things on my own so having someone else lay it all out for me works great. This site even give book ideas around the letters! I'm keeping a craft for each letter we do and when we are done with the whole alphabet, I'm going to make them into a book. (That cute idea is all mine!)

Source: treyandlucy.blogspot.com via Heather on Pinterest

What a fun party decorating idea. I did it for Pippa's B-day party and I'll do it again for Lincoln's.

Source: openingceremony.us via Heather on Pinterest

Top knots and sock buns. I'm in love. I wear my hair in some variation of a bun smack dab on the top of my head at least 3 times a week. It sounds silly but I feel more connected to current fashion and don't feel like such a dowdy suburbanite because of things like this.

Source: glamour.com via Heather on Pinterest

Sometimes I even wrap my bun in a scarf!

Source: davidharrickblog.com via Heather on Pinterest

Ok, so this is actually us. But I did 'pin it'. In preparation for our family photo shoot I scowered Pinterest, gathering great ideas for fun shots. They turned out great too. But that is a post for another day.

Up next, some of my Pinterest FAILS! ....

Vegas Baby!

One of my best friends, Laura, got married recently in Vegas. Believe it or not, I had never been to Vegas and wished I could have stayed for a few days, but alas, since Lincoln is still attached to the boob I only felt like I could manage a whirl wind 24 hour Vegas extravaganza. (More like, Sto could only manage without me for that long.) So I packed up and headed to the airport at the god-awful hour of 4am. I planned on carrying on my luggage, but apparently it's been a long time since I've traveled with only a carry on because I totally misunderstood the whole liquids rule. Did you know they only allow 3 oz total?! Who can possibly survive on 3 oz total? No woman I know! So I ended up needing to check my bag at the last minute. No big deal until I realize half way to there that I neglected to take my breast pump out first! Pain. Serious pain. And rock hard. That's all I can say. So I ended up going to the bathroom and attempting to manually express enough milk to make myself at least somewhat comfortable. It was very awkward, as you can probably imagine, and only fairly successful. As soon as I was off the plane and had my bag I high tailed it to the airport bathroom to do it properly. Now, let me pause here and say that my only anxiety about this trip is that I would forget my breast pump. I must have reminded myself a dozen times and I swear to god that I packed it. But as I rummaged through my bag I felt a growing sense of dread. I DID forget it! I cannot believe this. I am practically in tears by this time so I called Sto for a little support. Then I got in a cab as asked the driver to make a quick detour to the nearest Target before heading to the hotel. He must have thought I was nuts.

By the time I get there I'm frantic to pump and the line to check in is ridiculously long so I decide just to head up to Laura's room and check in later. We were having an 'administrative' meeting about the wedding anyway. All those pour women had to endure me pumping through out it (and of course the cheapy pump that I bought sucked and I was spilling all over myself and cursing the whole time). But all was well in the end, and once I got the girls back to their regular size I was able to focus on the festivities at hand. The rest of the afternoon was spent having a little lunch with Laura, trying to nap (which I thought was going to be easy since I had the luxury of a hotel room all to myself, but didn't end up catching many z's.) and then meeting everyone in the hair salon for some fabulous up-do's. It was about that time that my throat started getting raspy and I started to sound like I'd smoked a whole pack of cigarettes. Darn that dry desert air! I drank a ton of the salon's fancy cucumber water (hydrate or die!) hoping to get my voice back into shape but it did no good. It just kept getting worse and by the end of the night I was completely horse, and remained that way for the next 3 days! But I still had a great time celebrating Laura and Josh's marriage and even managed to not kill myself in my sky scraper-like heels. Laura looked amazing and I have never seen her happier. I even got a 'Thank You Very Much' from Elvis, because no Vegas wedding would be complete without Elvis! Love you Laura!

Crab Ride

I just had to add this photo from our Orlando trip. This was at Sea World riding some fun rides with Pippa. I could believe she was allowed on this one but she loved it! You might have to look close to find her. She's sitting between Sto and I....

Kids At Play

Ah, the sweet smell of vacation. I know with a set up like that you must be expecting me to jump into some crazy story involving chaos and bad smells. But, I'm here to proudly report that our recent vacation to Florida was incident free! It may be true that my definition of 'incident' has become more lax over the last couple of years. But in any case, we all had a great trip and no one got hurt, sick, or lost. Though, Pippa sure tried to get lost a few times. Sto had a minor heart attack one night when she could not be found in her bed. After an exhaustive 10 second-that-felt-like-eternity search she was discovered to be fast asleep on the shelf of the night stand! And during waking hours she seemed to be easily distracted and liked to wander off to explore. While I applaud your natural curiosity, Pippa, let's not do that in the middle of Disney World. Thanks. Of course, it would have been easier to keep track of her if she would have agreed to sit in our really cool new double stroller. Or stand. Or just ride in any one of the multiple positions made possible by it and thereby being the main reason we bought it. (Our 6th stroller, I might add. No lie. I could outfit the Duggers.)

This vacation we brought my mother in-law. We thought she would enjoy spending time with the grand kids and, of course, we could then take advantage of the babysitter and have a little fun of our own after the kids went to bed. It was a good move. She was a welcome addition to the trip and next time we would like to bring my mother to spread the wealth of fun around a bit. One such night, Sto and I got all gussied up and went out to a fancy shmancy dinner at a place call Norman's. It's a 4 star restaurant owned by a famous chef (Norman, I assume). We knew the night was going to be good when we started ordering our appetizers and our 'first plate' at the same time and the waiter said, why don't we just start with the first course and take it from there. No rush. Ahhh. What a pleasant change of pace. And the food was amazing, the grounds beautiful, and the company even better.

Our days were spent playing as a family. We ended up settling into a pattern: Hang around the resort and play until after Lincoln's morning nap and then head out to one of the parks, followed by 'naps' and then the pool. We did Sea World twice, Animal Kingdom on day, and Epcot one day. Sea World was great for Pippa. Totally on her level. She loved the dolphin show and still likes to talk about how they jumped out of the water. Lincoln, on the other hand, liked nothing about it. The very first animal to jump suddenly out of the water scared him half to death and I spent the rest of the show trying to calm him down in the back of the theater. Theme parks can be very scary for babies, apparently. He would also predictably ball every time the roller coaster went past. I just kept a steady supply of snacks on hand to keep him distracted. The poor boy ate so many peanut butter and jelly sandwiches that he is still refusing them 2 weeks later!




I think Animal Kingdom day was our favorite day, though. It's basically a glorified zoo but it was really awesome. We waited in line for the Safari 'ride' and it was so worth it. They load you onto a Jeep and you drive though the park with all sorts of animals just milling about. The giraffes were right next to us! Very fun. The last day we did Epcot with Fred, Myron, and Myron's sister and family. What fun that our trips overlapped!  But it turned out to be a scorchingly hot day and we took off a little early. No problem, though. It just left more time for the pool! Pippa could not get enough. There were 4 different pools to play in and most of them were zero entry so Pippa just loved it. Lincoln loved it too, as long as you didn't get too close to the big pirate ship shooting water at us. (Obviously, much weeping resulted if you did.) It took us a few trips to the pool to get the whole plan down, though. I don't know what it is about pools, but those kids where guaranteed to poop within 15 minutes of getting there. Every time! It's the worlds best laxative apparently! Thank god for swim diapers....which we doubled. But now we are well rehearsed for the community pool this summer. Can't wait!

9 Month Holla'

I can't believe Lincoln is 9 months old. Yes, 9. Nueve. Nine. He's come so far from his first few days. He is now 19.15 pounds. That puts him around the 25th percentile (though I find myself caring less and less about that stupid percentile chart. Funny how as a new mom I was obsessed with it, as were my friends. I've come to realize that comparing our children to other people's children is almost always a bad idea.) And he's 28 inches which also puts about the 40th percentile (there's that pesky percentile again!). So he's tall and skinny, though really, no one can really call those thighs skinny!

He is a very entertaining kid and very easily entertained, too. He just thinks everything is fun and love exploring and getting into things. He love to bang things together and laughs at the sound it makes. I showed him the light switch the other day and he out right laughed at it. How great is that?! In his eyes, everything is awesome! Fancy new toy? Awesome! Daddy's old sticky sock? Also awesome!

He's full on crawling now, too, which he's been doing for several weeks. Funny how I was worried for a while there that he might skip crawling and jump right to walking. (You know that whole connection between crawling and reading thing?) Silly me. I clearly had nothing to worry about. In about a week he went from his usual army crawl to a super fast hands and knees crawl. And he loves to be chased down the hallway. We play this game on a daily basis and it always has me and Pippa laughing just as hard as he is! He also pulls up to stand and is starting to cruise on the furniture. And he seems to be perfectly happy getting down again by just letting go and plopping down on his bottom. Thankfully the cloth diapers give him a little extra cushioning.

He loves games of all sorts. He like the usual one, of course. Peek-a-boo. Pat-a-cake. But he also thinks it's hysterical when you hold a toy in your mouth unexpectedly. He'll keep taking it out and putting it back in again. He also likes to put object in and out of a container. (That's advanced right? I know, he's a genius.) He like to mimic the sounds we make too. Screams in particular. And Sto and I agree that he definitely refers to him as Dada. He likes to dance to music and will beat the floor to like a drum.

Play play play. That pretty much sums him up. It's probably part of the reason he doesn't nap well....still. He's a lot like a puppy. He plays hard until he just falls to sleep. Then he wakes up after a short nap and want to play play some more. He's doesn't wake up well, though. Sort of takes after me in that way. He takes a while to wake up and spends the first few minutes confused and grumpy. It's actually pretty cute. But he sleeps through the night well, getting up around 5:30 and back to sleep again until 6:30 or 7. Or like today, 8. Not surprisingly I found a new tooth today. That makes 7!

Love my growing boy!