Random Moments

Life at our house has been pretty ordinary lately so I haven't had much to post, so I thought that I would just post some random unrelated pictures that I thought were cute. Here you go!

Andrew has discovered climbing which brings with it a whole new level of independence and trouble-making. Apparently, this day he didn't get enough breakfast because he was helping himself to more as soon as I got him down from the table!

Sam likes to use his sidewalk chalk to create murals on the floor of the unfinished room in our basement. This particular day he had me lay down so that he could draw my outline. I was pretty impressed with his work! But is my head really that small?
This is Andrew's favorite cupboard to play in because there's bowls to stack and re-stack and there's enough room that he can climb all the way in and close the door. We (meaning Joe) just had to repair the cupboard door because he was hanging on it so much the he pulled the screws out of the hinges. Now, if I could only get Joe to put up the child locks...
And here is Sam just looking adorable. He used to hate the camera and would look away (or run away) whenever he saw me pull it out but now he's becoming quite the cheeser!

Ripe Peaches, Sick Babies and a Cool Scar!

That about sums up my last few days. Andrew was up Tuesday and Wednesday nights with a crazy high temperature. We first discovered that he was sick Tuesday night at about 11:00PM. Joe went in to close his window so that he wouldn't get too cold during the night (that's our nightly routine now because it is getting soooo stinking cold at night, not that I'm complaining, anyway, back to the story.) He was in there moaning and tossing around and looked up when he heard someone come in. He was burning up! At that point his temp was 105.4 and he was miserable. Of course, we got on the phone with the after-hours line for our pediatrician, which is actually just the pediatric triage (sp?) nurse at one of the hospitals. After a dose of Motrin and a 20-minute luke-warm bath (which, btw he hated because he just wanted to be sleeping!) the temp came down to about 103.5. The nurse said to keep him on the motrin, watch him closely and call the doc in the morning. So, that was a long night. He woke up apparently fine the next morning so we thought he was over it, whatever it was. We asked my mom to come over that night to babysit so that we could go on a much overdue date. Well, by bedtime he was burning up again and miserable, and that was with Motrin already in his system. Poor Kid! Another long night, even with the medicine, his temp was pushing 104 all night. I took him to the doc Thursday and, wouldn't cha' guess, his temp was 97.8. Typical! The doc was still concerned though to have such a high temp with no other symptoms and he started talking about things that present that way such as Meningitis, bacteria in the blood and urinary tract infections. Yah, that's a good way to freak a mom out! He gave me a list of symptoms and said that if he develops any one of those or a combination along with the temp to bring him to the office or the ER if it's after hours. Scary! Thankfully, his temp last night at bedtime was only 100, no problems during the night and he woke up this morning just fine. Prayers are answered! We'll still watch him closely but I think that it was just a bug that's now about out of his system.

Of course, the stress of having a sick and miserable kid who just wants to be held all of the time for three days straight wasn't enough. I also had 2 cases of tomatoes and 3 cases of peaches that were ripe and needed to be canned .... immediately! (Sigh...) Oh, and then on Tuesday morning our garage door jumped track after Joe pulled out to go to work, that was a little scary. So, my car was held hostage until the repair man came and fixed it, not that I was really planning on going many places, but it still added to the craziness of the day. Not an easy combination, but I survived (and so did my sick baby and most of the peaches and tomatoes). I did end up throwing the last 1/2 case of peaches in the freezer (nicely peeled and sliced, I wasn't that desperate!) because I couldn't bring myself to do another batch of jars that day. Joe thinks that I'm crazy for canning. I think that's it's very fulfilling and helps me feel a little more self-sufficient. It would have been cooler if it was stuff that had come out of my own garden, but not this year! I still have one case of pears to go and they are just starting to be ripe enough so I'll have to start those today or tomorrow. But then that's it, for this year!

As for the scar, that would be Sam's injury which he's pretty proud of! I dropped him off at Rob and Bre's to play while I took Andrew to the doctor. Apparently they were tickling and running around and just being silly, nothing unusual, but Sam ran into their bed frame. It hit him right between the eyes and he has check-mark shaped cut. It's not very deep, but I imagine it'll still leave a scar. Boys like that, right? Well, for right now he's just thrilled to have a bandaid in the middle of his face.

Man, am I glad it's almost the weekend...and this was even a 4-day week!

I'm Gonna Do It....deep breath...

I'm going to run a half marathon. Those are words that I never EVER thought that I would say. But, I'm doing it, so there you go! I started running with some friends from church in the spring and now I'm hooked. Granted, I'm pretty slow, I'm not looking to set any records or win the race, but I'm going to finish it, and that's what's important to me! Amy (my main running partner) and I decided earlier this week that we are going to run it together. We'd been talking about it for weeks (or months, I can't remember now) and couldn't make up our minds (maybe we'd just do a 10k and then do the half marathon in the spring, but honestly, if I have my way I'll pregnant in the spring so then running will be OUT of the question). We just couldn't let it go, so we're just gonna do it! It's October 4th so that gives us 4 more weeks to prepare, wow that's going to fly by. I'm really excited about it...and nervous/scared.

So, if there's anyone that's interested in doing it with us, let me know! Here's a link to the race's website:

http://www.active.com/page/Event_Details.htm?event_id=1587277&assetId=e124b3e7-c8e6-449d-8b92-dc993fe4e552

Wish me luck!

Don't Be Fooled...

Okay, so these pictures are really old, but I was just looking through pictures from this summer and I got a real kick out of these, so I thought that I'd share them. Yes, they are from the 4th of July which was in fact two months ago. Got it.

Look at that cute little angel face (Andrew, in case you're confused). He's such a sweet boy and loves everybody, but there's one way to get on his bad side...Notice Joe casually holding the food out of his reach. Okay, no big deal, there are ways around that. He just waits until Daddy puts him down to go and get something and then...
he moves in for the kill. This boy loves watermelon. Oh wait, this boy loves ALL food! So there he is peacefully enjoying his plunder when someone notices the watermelon juice dripping down the front of his new white T-shirt and then...
...WATCH OUT!! You want to unleash the wrath of Andrew, just take away his food!
Here's another example: Grandma is feeding him some yummy homemade ice cream and apparently he doesn't trust me, even though I'm behind the camera, because he won't take his eyes off me!And here's what happens when the bowl is empty. Talk about true injustice!
Well, now you know the truth...so you've all been warned!

It's Official!

I hope that I don't jinx myself by writing this down, but I feel pretty confident in saying that Sam is officially potty-trained! Hurray! That was a LONG time in coming...! Hmmm, we first started last October, that's right, 10+ months of the "the worst part about being a parent" (as my mom to delicately put it). In all fairness, we did take a break from November to March, but anyway, the point is, he's finally got it. I keep reassuring myself by saying that every child won't be this difficult...we'll hope it's true. But for now I'm just celebrating!

Here's a few of my favorite potty pictures...

Happy Birthday to Andrew!!

We celebrated Andrew's 1st birthday on Friday. I can't believe that my baby boy is a year old! We had a family birthday party during the day. We had lunch and then cake and ice cream, really basic, nothing fancy, but it was very fun. Andrew seemed to know that it was his special day and he enjoyed every minute of it.

Here's the cake that I made (it's a train, in case you can't tell). I was feeling ambitious and I thought it turned out pretty cute. The blue tower in the front is what we gave to Andrew to demolish and he did a great job! Joe couldn't believe that I wanted to give him that whole piece, but you only have a first birthday once!

Miri and Andrew waiting anxiously for the cake.The cake...just out of his reach......and here he goes!"Really, I'm allowed to do this?""Mmmmm, that's good!""Wow, this is great!""Really, this is okay?"Now it's getting serious... "Now that's what I call fun!"

After we got him cleaned up, then it was time to open presents. He got lots of fun toys and books (which Sam has been loving) Thanks everybody! Joe ended up doing most of the unwrapping since Andrew didn't quite understand the concept.

Andrew and Leila The crew (minus a few): Andrew, Leila, Sam and Dylan (L&D are my cousin's kids) Uncle's Danny and Jon living it up at this exciting party!

It was a fun and crazy little party, thanks to everyone for coming to celebrate with us. To make the day even more fun, we had some of our new friends from church over that night for a BBQ. Another fun event (no pictures taken at that party) and a great way to finish off the day.

A First for This Little Family

Round 1:
We got this great idea that we wanted to take the boys camping. We hadn't gone since the summer we got married and thought that it would be tons of fun to do with our little boys. So, since we are kind of wimps and didn't know exactly what we were getting ourselves into, we decided to try a campout in our backyard first. Baby steps... It turned out to be a lot of fun!

We borrowed my parents fire pit, set up our tent, ate dinner outside (although I cooked it in the kitchen, I'm not that crazy!) and spent the evening playing in the backyard together.

The boys loved the tent and Joe loved the fire, we even got to make s'mores! (Although Sam would only eat the graham crackers and chocolate.)

The next morning...

We decided to have Andrew sleep inside in his crib, so of course I had to sleep in my own bed so he wouldn't be alone inside...oh darn! Joe and Sam slept the whole night out in the tent. I snuck out there and took pictures of them sleeping when I got up to go running the next morning.

Round 2: The Real Deal

So with the trial run being such a hit and success, we decided that the next weekend we'd try the real thing. We enlisted my parents to go with us and set out. We went to my favorite spot from my childhood, Honeysuckle campground. It's way up in the mountains and it was beautiful, just like I remembered it. Talk about a walk down memory lane! The boys are natural outdoorsmen, they were just thrilled by all the sticks and rocks and dirt.

This is Joe and Sam going exploring, isn't is gorgeous?!

This is when we were gathered around the campfire that evening, probably right before Andrew went to bed. Putting Andrew to bed was the part that I was most worried about, but he didn't even make a sound. We set up the port-a-crib in the tent, laid him down with his favorit blankie, and that was it! Way too easy...meanwhile the rest of us enjoyed s'mores. This time, Sam actually tried the marshmallows.

The next morning...yes I survived the night with no air mattress and both of the boys slept through the night. Not bad, if you ask me! The boys were thrilled to wake up and find out that we were STILL camping and that we hadn't snuck them home to their beds while they were sleeping. Andrew discovered his new favorite place to play, under the picnic table (see below) and Sam showed me how he was as big as the trees (almost...).

Here's Andrew helping Joe roll up the tent...what a happy helper!

The River:

Did I mention that there is a little river/creek/stream (depending on the time of year that you are there) that runs right by the campground. The water was way to cold to get in (it was a pretty cool weekend) so we just made due with playing with the rocks. Joe and Sam built a dam, or tried to at least.

So after a great experience, I've decided that we can be regulars at this camping thing, assuming that we pick up a few essentials that we don't have yet, like an air mattress for me!