Play Dough

I have made a new goal to be a fun mommy, well at least a little bit fun mommy, so little man and I have been doing some projects together. A few days ago we got out the play dough. Now I know that many of you mommies out there fun or not are cringing at the idea of play dough in all its crumbly easily squished into carpet messiness, but I decided to be brave and give it a try with my two year old. Well he loved it, and took to it immediately, carefully squishing and rolling and molding. The boy was in heaven I have never seen him work so intently on ANYTHING. Just look at the concentration on that face. He was like one of the great masters at work, carefully choosing his tools and making his shapes and marks in the dough.


Soon more colors were called for and there was more precise, careful work applied to the dough, I knew that my little Michaelangelo was making something wonderful, and not wanting to interrupt the creative process I stood back and waited patiently for the finished masterpiece. Finally my little man carefully lined up his three finished sculptures and announced with pride, "look mom! They're raccoons."


And yes there in front of me were the three most beautiful raccoons I had ever seen. They were totally worth the mess.

Alternate Christmas Cards

The other day I took pictures of the kids for a Christmas card. I found that it was difficult to get them both to smile at the same time... But we did get some funny shots Christmas card material?...maybe not, but funny? oh yes!

Brides and Grooms

Wordless Wednesday

"Ahh Juice!"

Why children's programing is for kids

So I must admit that with the addition of baby bug to our family little man has been watching a bit more television than usual. Maybe its just my nature to think about things too much, but I have spent way too much time thinking about my little ones favorite shows from my adult point of view. It all started when he was watching Johnny and the Sprites and I thought to myself hmmm, a man who lives all alone in the woods and sees "sprites" that only he can see...sure... that sounds healthy, someone needs to get that guy some medication. I've also been worried about Christopher Robin, you know Pooh and Tigger and the rest of the gang get their contract renewed, but after years of being the main boy Christopher gets replaced by a younger hipper girl named Darby? You can't tell that doesn't affect a kids self-esteem. And is anyone else waiting for Handy Manny to work up the courage to just ask Kelly out, I mean you can't tell me that he goes to the hardware store every. single. day. just for supplies, I mean no one is that bad at plannng ahead. And seriously why doesnt' Caillou have hair? And don't even get me started on Barney. Like I said we really have been watching a lot of t.v. lately. Hopefully soon we'll be back to our old active selves, but until then little man will be enjoying his shows, and I'll just have to pay attention to something else.

Update

I have to say that everybody warned me that the transition from one to two children would be difficult, in fact people talked about it like it was this harrowing experience that might just do me in, but I am so happy to report that I really feel like I am in baby heaven. Maybe its because due to his prematurity little man's birth and babyhood was somewhat stressful, and as much as I love him, it is more than fair to say that he was a difficult baby. Baby bug has been such a joy to have around, and even little man has said that he's good enough to keep.

last night Halloween was a ball little man loved trick or treating.

What I did this summer

Duhn, duh, duh, da...



Yep he's here, he's adorable, and he's actually a month old. I'm still reeling a bit from the shock of having two children instead of one, but I promise one of these days I'll blog his birth story. For now ya'll must be content to just revel in his cuteness.

Gonna be gone for awhile...

I know what you are all thinking "like that's new," but hey at least I'm telling you ahead of time. After feeling rather under the weather, and then spending three days in the hospital, my doctor has concluded that I am NOT preeclamptic (phew) but I do have rather high blood pressure so I have been sentenced to complete bed rest for as long as I can keep this baby in. We have thankfully just passed the 32 week mark which is when little man was born so Shane and I are feeling optimistic, and like every week we get after that is truly a gift.

I don't know when I will be on again, but I will try to post updates when I can. Thanks to all my friends and family for your support.

In honor of Ms. Rowling

My husband thinks that we have a house elf. To confirm this I asked him as pleasantly as I could yesterday what magic elf he thought was coming through and cleaning up his dishes each morning. Now this man isn't stupid and that's why I love him of course. He paused looked at me and said, "It isn't an elf its a princess." Thanks...I think, but put your dishes in the sink o.k.

Our vacation at home

Last week Shane took the whole week (and the Thursday and Friday before that) off of work. I was worried at first that we would not be able to find enough things to do and that we would regret not using the vacation time to go somewhere exotic and expensive, but I was so very wrong. Our vacation at home was bliss I absolutely loved it.

Thursday we dusted off the four wheeler and went for a ride, grandpa was gracious enough to let us borrow his too and we had a great time. Little man looked especially cute in his helmet that made his head appear to be roughly four times its actual size, and yes its the sunglasses again could the kid be any more stylin'?

Friday we embarked on a camping trip with friends, it was so fun. Little man literally just rolled in the dirt for two days...he was in heaven. I am happy to say that he also slept like a champ in his own little sleeping bag, which made the trip much more pleasant for mommy and daddy.

Wednesday was spent doing all of the usual Fourth of July activities. Parades were watched, barbecues were attended, and fireworks were seen. Little man was a little upset with all of the loud noises until Shane came up with this plan...

That man o' mine he is a genius. Little man loved his "headphones" and instead of spending the entire time during the fireworks huddled in terror on our laps, he actually got a little bored during the show...eh, what can ya do?

We spent alot of days just at home too, we took naps, we ate out, we went on bike rides, it was fabulous.

For a finale to our vacation at home we headed to cache valley on Saturday. Logan is where Shane and I met, and dated. We both went to and graduated from college there. It is also where we spent our first years of marriage. It is where our first house is, and it is where the mountains are. For these reasons we love Logan, and we love to visit it. We decided to go down there for the annual "cruise in" a fun classic car show, but while we were there we visited some of our other favorite spots, and even ate at our most favorite Chinese place YU-MEEE. We took the time to drive up Logan canyon and visit Tony's Grove. This was probably one of my favorite things on our visit, because I love the mountains. I grew up in Salt Lake City at the base of the mountains, and I LOVE the mountains. I honestly can say that being surrounded by mountains makes me feel so comforted, much like I imagine little man feels about his blankie. Yes I can live without them, but when I am near them I just want to wrap them around me and take a nap. Seriously I love the mountains (did I mention that I love the mountains). After I'd soaked up some nature time we made our way back down to the valley and watched the main street car parade. Now I already told you what I love, but Shane loves something else entirely (besides me of course) Shane love cars. He LOVES them, so he was in heaven watching all of the meticulously painted, souped up, washed daily by hand, costs more than we want to know cars go up and down the street for two hours. Little man liked it too although some of the cars were a bit loud for his taste.

We had so much fun altogether, and all of us were sad when Shane had to go back to work on Monday, ah such is life.

ABC's and accessorizing...

So guess who is taking a nap in his big boy bed right now? You got it, the little man is snoozing away, we haven't taken out the crib yet, just moved the bed in and he loves it so I guess we'll cross our fingers and hope this takes.

In other news I took this cute video of Bugaboo the other day. He loves to sing the ABC's sure he doesn't get ALL the letters, but for sure the cuteness of the glasses make up for it.

Creative Play Anyone?

So a few weeks ago I was so proud of myself, because I put together some really cute file folder games. You know some lovely laminated games on file folders with pieces that Velcro right to it. The kind that the same ladies who have color coordinated snack cups at church have. I was very proud of myself, and even more proud when Bugaboo found them and became enthralled playing with them. So enraptured was he by the new found games that I thought I could sneak away for a few minutes to clean the kitchen floor. Little did I know but in that time Bugaboo had found a new and even better feature of the little game pieces.

Yes they do stick quite nicely to a diaper, don't they?
In my defense I must say that Bugaboo does not spend all day in his diaper everyday, this was a special occasion inspired by this post over at Total Mom Haircut. We had a few minutes earlier been creating masterpieces with water paint.
I tell ya, he's not just a genius he is a creative genius.

Still getting older

So today I am getting ready to teach my class and I look in the mirror to make sure I look professional and grown up, so that people will take me seriously as I'm doling out parenting advice, and I saw it. There it was hanging out right out at the top my head like it had a right to be there or something. It was just looking at me, taunting me, waving lazily at my youth as it slid one more inch away down the slippery slope of life. And what you ask did I do about this intruder in my hair. This one single, wiry GRAY hair, I reached up and forcefully yanked it out. I will not be beaten that easily.

Huh?

So I just found out that it is time for my TEN year high school reunion, huh!?! When did that happen? I mean how can that be I'm only 22 right?...oh wait, and its not like I have a bunch of kids and live in the suburbs...oh wait.

O.K. fine I'm not as young as I used to be, at least I am proud of all I've accomplished in the last ten years, and I don't have to feel the pressures of all the high school social games anymore. Now, could somebody come over and watch my kid for the next few weeks, I have to write, and publish a best selling novel, or cure cancer before June 9th.

The Long Absence

So I know that I haven't been a good blogger for quite some time now. I have know one to blame, but myself, but well I just haven't felt quite up to it.

Fist there was this:

And that then there was two months of puking and feeling like a zombie, where I just didn't feel like doing anything.

And then The puking went away, but I still didn't feel like doing anything. And I mean NOTHING. The laundry was piling up, and I didn't care, I was even too apathetic to argue with SHane about what we should name the new bundle of joy. As far as I was concerned it didn't even feel like a bundle of joy. It was a strange feeling, and after a few weeks I started to worry that there was something wrong. I talked to my doctor, she thought the hormones were making me a little depressed, she prescribed drugs. I was scared of the drugs, not for me, but for the baby, what if they weren't good for this little one growing inside of me. I fretted about it all day. Then I prayed about it. That morning I woke up at four a.m. I couldn't sleep so I set up on the couch and flipped on the T.V. The discovery channel had some show about adoption on, this poor family had to wait four months to get there adopted baby from India. It was touching. Then I watched two episodes of A Baby Story. I felt happy for the happy families that were having babies, but I thought to myself 'they don't know what I know about childbirth. THey don't know that something can go wrong.' If you want the back story go here. That's when it hit me. That's why I was apathetic, that's why I didn't want to get to excited, this pregnancy was scaring me to death, and I didn't even know it. Deep down in the recesses of my brain, I was protecting myself by not getting to attached to this pregnancy. And then a new softly spoken little thought entered my head it said 'Nicole, what went so wrong?' And I thought of my little two year old bugaboo up in his little bed, sleeping. Yes he came two months early, and yes it was scary, but we did it, he's ok, he's a miracle.

It was like a magic pill...way better than the stuff my doctor prescribed. Realizing I had some major trauma and fear lingering in my past, helped me to face it, and when I faced it I saw that it really wasn't so scary. I can handle this, and I am so excited for this baby now.

I have felt tons better this last week or so, and I even have the laundry almost caught up. I can't promise I'll be a better blogger, I'm doing it on my own schedule, but I hope I'll be able to write more often...ok I'll at least post when the baby gets here.

And just for fun here is Bugaboo sleeping, isn't that the sweetest thing you've eva seen?

Babies Again

These were the most beautiful pictures of Shelah's new baby that I got the pleasure of making into announcements. Its actually been a few week since these were made, but I am just now getting a chance to post them here and in the gallery on the Song Bird website.









Isn't she the most divine little baby? I think that these have been some of my most favorite announcements to work on.

And remember if any of you folks out there need announcements, don't forget that I give lovely discounts to my bloggy friends...

Daddy's Boy

This was the scene this morning when Shane tried to use the bathroom by himself.
This...

and then this...

That little boy loves his dad, which is one of the many priceless and immeasurable benefits of parenting, unfortunately for Shane peaceful bathroom breaks are not also included in this benefits package.

No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

Ok this morning I am feeling seriously grumpy...why you ask? Oh you bet I am going to tell you. First of all Bugaboo thought that it would be totally awesome if he woke up at the crack of dawn, yeah kid that was AWESOME. Then I had to spend my morning cleaning up the mess from the dinner that I made last night just before I ran out the door to go to work. GRRRR!

Do any of you moms out there feel like Sisyphus the Greek who was condemned by the Gods to continually roll a great boulder to the top of a hill only to watch it roll back down again? Only instead of a boulder its a big ol' pile of laundry, and unlike Sisyphus you don't get to roll it up the hill in peace you have to do it with a toddler attached to one leg.

Love that boy

So last night we're driving in the car, Bugaboo is engaging in his usually torrent of nonsense jabber inter-mingled with some words I can recognize. Then he stops he is quiet for a minute and then says to me "lub you Mommy." He has never said this to me before so I fight back the tears and say "I love you too."

"Tankyou, mama." Is his reply.

I'm ba-ack...did you miss me?

Ok don't answer that.

Seriously I know its been forever, but really I've been swamped. First Shane was gone for two weeks, then there was Christmas, then we went on vacation, then Bugaboo got pneumonia, (which I totally know how to spell because I wrote about it two months ago when I had it), and actually that was while we were on vacation, so we got a bonus of seeing the San Diego urgent care, and all of its lovely locals. Things really have been busy.

First of all Christmas: I think its been a long time since I have been this excited for a Christmas. Last year Bugaboo's favorite Christmas activity was eating the wrapping paper, this year was so different, this year will forever be known as the "Year of the Trains." About six weeks ago. Bugaboo started showing an especial affection for trains, and especially yep you guessed it...Thomas. I don't know how this happened, but the boy is obsessed. When he wakes up in the morning the first thing he says to me it "trains!" The boys loves trains. So Christmas was so fun because well he LOVED the presents that we got him. I could barely sleep on Christmas eve I was excited myself to see him open the gifts it was a wonderful magical morning. Bugaboo spent the entire morning playing with his new trains, and was the most pleasant happy boy all day long, he even went down for a nap without complaining, although he did have to take one of his new trains with him.

So after Christmas we went on a trip. Shane has been traveling with work so much lately that we decided it would be a good idea to finally take advantage of all the vacation time that he has accrued and have some family time. We headed off to the much sunnier than Idaho shores of San Diego. Bugaboo was a star on the plane. We went to Sea World which was a hit. We hit the beach which was sandy and salty and lovely. The only bump in the road was the morning that we woke up to the sound of Bugaboo wheezing and struggling to breath. Let me tell you how quickly a fun trip can into something frightening, and also how much I hate my insurance. Seriously Aetna when someone calls you to say that they are in a strange city, and they do not know where even a hospital is, and her child is struggling to breathe, and could you please direct us to an emergency room on your ridiculous preferred provider list, even the ignorant fourteen-year-old that you have answering the phone should have at least offered me some sympathy after he proved to be thoroughly useless in finding me a doctor. An "I'm sorry I can't help you more," would have even been better than the, "Uh...like, I don't know," that I got. But I digress...We did find Bugaboo a doctor and after four hours in the urgent care department with a very sad little boy we were sent home with antibiotics. We stayed in the rest of the day, but by the next day Bugaboo was doing much better *phew* he seemed almost completely back to his normal self, so we ventured out and even spent about two hours at the zoo. We did the speed tour of the zoo, which meant we basically visited only the animals that we don't have at the local zoo. I really wanted a Koala bear for a pet, but alas its like illegal or something. Even with the illness it was a nice trip. We came home feeling refreshed, that is until I saw the pile of laundry we had made. Oh well, back to real life.

Since then I've just been playing catch up with my life, sorry my bloggy friends that I haven't been around I will try to do much better.

Bugaboo and the Tunnel

We love trains