Changes

With Bean in the house nothing is the same (nor will it EVER be!). Here are a few of the things that I he has done lately to "change" our house!

-Cereal belongs in Mom's shoes. Whenever I put on my shoes I get a nice crunch
-Measuring cups go in the potty. We now look before we go.
-Diapers are EVERYWHERE. Bean loves to carry *clean* diapers around and we find them all over the place.
-Junk mail all is forwarded to Bean. He feels quite important when we give him his own piece of mail.
-If you hear him saying "ah ah ah ah", he is waiting for you to respond with "ACHOO!".
-Dad's belts are some of the best toys in the world. He will carry a belt around until we take it away.
-Another favorite toy...a soup ladle
-Kowe's toys and food are more fascinating than any toy or snack we could provide him with.
-Once he steps foot outside, he wants to remain there. And he will let you know that is where he wants to be.
-And finally, no one can cheer for a football game alone, he will chime in no matter who is playing or who is cheering! GO ILLINI!

Fab Four!

Woo Hoo! I'm such a dork and love doing stuff like this! Thanks for the tag Anna!

4 jobs I have held:
1.) Ice Cream Shop~ I started working at Gator's when I was 16 and worked there until the summer before I got married! It was the best summer job EVER!
2.) Resident Assistant- In college I was an RA for 2 years! So much fun!
3.) Best Buy- Yup, I worked in customer service for about 6 months. It was fun on the weekend when Hubs was working there too!
4.) Teacher- first grade!!

4 films I could watch again and again
1.) Steel Magnolias- My #1 favorite movie!
2.) Good Will Hunting
3.) Elf
4.) Father of the Bride 1 & 2

4 TV shows I watch
1.) ER
2.) The Office
3.) House
4.) Survivor

4 places I have lived:
1.) Belleville, IL
2.) Hudson, IA
3.) Champaign, IL
4.) Shorewood, IL

4 favorite foods:
1.) Fettuccine Alfredo
2.) Chinese Food
3.) Nacho cheese
4.) tater tots

4 websites I visit everyday:
1.) The Weather Chanel
2.) Craigslist-We are searching for a twin bed...got one you are trying to get rid of? Let me know!
3.) Gmail- I check my email compulsively!
4.) Our local newspaper

4 of my favorite colors:
1.) Cerulean (look in your kids crayon box...it's in there!)
2.) Purple
3.) Lime Green
4.) Yellow

4 places I’d like to be right now:
1.) Home alone cleaning like crazy
2.) In Aruba
3.) At the doc's office having our sono!
4.) In Texas with my sis-in-law hanging out

4 names I like but wouldn’t or couldn’t use myself:
1.) Corrine-I LOVE it but Hub's has vetoed it.
2.) Levi-Another veto...
3.) Mae- Doesn't work as a first or middle name for us
4.) Will-same as #3...just doesn't work!

Feel free to play along!! TAG! You're it! ;-)

I was gonna....

I was debating taking down that last post last night while I was laying in bed. This is when I become sane again and remember all of the awesome things about being a momma. I lay in bed and think about the day with Bean and somehow, by the grace of God, only remember the giggles and joys of the day. I think about our huge giggle-fest before bedtime, our lovely afternoon spent running around the yard, our time at the park when he was so proud of himself for telling me that the mulch is yucky, watching him collapse on his daddy and watch a Baby E. video after a looooong morning...those are the things I treasure. That is why I do it again.every.single.day.

Where morning dawns and evening fades You call forth songs of joy!!!!!
Psalm 65:8

Fried

I am fried. Literally, fried. I feel like every single day is Groundhog Day. Bean wakes up...play...breakfast...play...nap...play...lunch...play...nap...play...dinner...play...bath...bedtime. Every day is the same. Granted we do different things during "play" time; take walks, go to the park, go to the gym, watch a Baby Einstein, read books, play outside, play with friends....and yes, meal times are unique as well. But the pattern remains. I feel like I'm in a loop that never ends; however, I must say that I like the timing of this loop. Our days are very nicely scheduled and the timing of everything is perfect. I guess this is momma-hood. I'm not sure how to get out of my little funk, but I need to be yanked out of it. NOW!

Any ideas?

First-Last Date

I have been intending to blog about this for a few weeks...

Before Bean was born, Hubs & I decided that we were going to start going on a date every weekend up until his birth. We made this decision in August and decided to start in September. Bean was DUE to arrive on October 8th. We had our first date planned out. We were going to go to Olive Garden for the amazing "Never Ending Pasta Bowl". For a pregnant momma, this sounded like a dream come true! The first Friday in September was quickly approaching and we were SO excited to start our little pre-baby dates...when I WENT INTO LABOR! Bean was born on the first Thursday of the month, needless to say, we did not make our "first-last date".

Soooo the week of Bean's birthday this year, I went to pick up Hubs for a quick lunch date. We have discovered that lunch dates work FAR better for us than dinner dates. Bean is awake & hungry, lunch is cheaper, and lunch is usually served much faster than dinner. Hubs & I head out for lunch and he takes us to Olive Garden for the Never Ending Pasta Bowl! It was the first Friday in September. While we were eating, we came to the realization that we were actually on our "first-last date". Granted, Bean was with us on the outside and now there is somebody else on the inside...but at least we finally made it on our "first-last date"!

WFMW: Birthday Reminders!

I am a birthday fanatic! I love celebrating birthdays and I love sending cards to family and friends on their special day! It is hard for me to remember all of the date though. Even when I have them hand-written on my calendar, I occasionally overlook them or I don't notice until the day of! Here's my solution: photo calendars! My sister-in-law made me a calendar for Christmas last year that has a picture of the birthday boy/girl on their birthday! So now when I look at the calendar I see Grandma staring me in the face reminding me that her birthday is this month! It has worked GREAT! You can make your own calendar online using numerous different online photo places. (I like snapfish's calendars the best!)

For more great ideas go check out Rocks In My Dryer!

Apple*palooza!

We went to my Aunt & Uncle's house to pick apples this weekend. It was so much fun! Bean had a great time playing with their big dogs. This child has NO fear of dogs what so ever (which I am happy about!). We had an awesome time at their house. The apple trees were magnificent and we came home with 10 galons of apples PLUS a grocery sack full! We have already made and eaten an entire apple cobbler! *The cobbler was shared with friends!!*

We have the apples now in buckets in our kitchen and Bean LOVES trotting over, grabbing an apple and then carrying it around to munch on. Believe it or not, he can actually sink his little toofies into them and get a bite! I was shocked the first time he did it, but he can and he LOVES it. Hooray for apples!

He's Back!

YAY! Bean is back to his normal Beanie-self! WOO HOO! He (and all of the other kids in the neighborhood) have been passing around a fever. No other symptoms (other than excessive crabbiness!!). He ran a temp for a few days on and off and TODAY IS THE DAY! Thank the Lord that this fever is gone! He took 2 great naps and has been so much fun to hang out with. Just letting you all know the absolute joy we are experiencing over here...hooray for no more sickies!

Our First Date

Today Bean and I had our first date. We went to the mall and had lunch. Just the 2 of us! I had hoped to meet a teacher friend there, but she wasn't feeling well, so it was just us! Bean dined on a grilled cheese sandwich, corn Chex, zesty tomato puffs & a banana cookie (not very nutritious...). I ate a soft pretzel with cheese (my high school lunch of choice!). I think I ate that every day while I was in high school. Even though I spend 99.9% of every day with Bean, it was kind of special to go and "eat out" just the two of us.

After we were done eating, we shopped. OH did we shop!! *insert a very Cheshire cat grin*. I spent a good portion of my maternity clothes budget today on some awesome deals from the maternity store in our mall. All of my clothes from Bean are summery and since I'm going to be pregnant all winter, I didn't think my gym shorts and ribbed tank tops would cut it this time around. We also bought Bean an adorable Illini jogging suit. We had so much fun! Yes, even Bean. He enjoyed grabbing...errr..."showing" me which clothes he liked :-). He was even supportive through the trying-on process. Each time I put on something new, he would applaud and grin from ear-to-ear (He will make some lucky lady a GREAT husband!).

We wrapped up our adventure with a trip to see Daddy at the office (I NEVER have my camera on me when we stop by! GRRRR!!!). After I told him who we were going to go see he wouldn't stop saying "dah dah dee dah dee dee dah dah".

It was an awesome day for both of us. A little time out of the house, and we both came home with some new threads! WOO HOO!

WFMW: What's NOT for Dinner

Ugh...the daily decision of "What's for dinner?" is too much for us to handle. Yes, both of us get bogged down with this predicament. I don't want to make something Hubs doesn't like and Hubs usually "doesn't care" (except for when I do make the decision, the that's the one thing he doesn't want!). I know we aren't the only ones with this issue, so here is our solution; we make a list of ALL possible dinner options. Then we take turns crossing off 1 thing we DON'T want for dinner. Then whatever is left, is what I make. It works soooo well! We don't squabble over it, we simply come to a civil agreement. Give it a try! I promise it will work ;-)

L-A-U-N-D-R-Y!

There was a time that I really really looked forward to laundry day....
~~~~~~~~~~~
When Hubs and I were first married (and even while we were in college). We would save up our dirty laundry and quarters until we literally had nothing left to wear. Then, on the next Saturday, I would truck 2 laundry bags packed full of dirty clothes and at least 1 laundry basket full to a laundromat. There was one in particular that I LOVED. They had TV's, good music, snacks and Wild Cherry Pepsi out of a fountain! I would hog 5-6 washers, and sit down and enjoy my day of laundry. What would I do for all of this time you ask? Ahhhh....grade papers (while I was student teaching), read, do homework, zone out...it was absolute bliss! Then after the laundry was done, this laundromat had HUGE tables for folding and HUGE racks to hang an entire closet full of clothes on. And all I could think about was how much I "couldn't wait" to have my own laundry room in my house....WHAT WAS I THINKING!?!?!?!?
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Back to reality where I now have a laundry room in my house, and it now takes me 6 days to do 2 loads of laundry. And putting it all away? Half of the newly washed clothes have been worn and are back in the dirty pile before I get it all put away! I have contemplated taking a day and leaving Bean with Hubs and hauling our laundry to a laundromat, but I can't rationalize spending the $$. So for now I will day-dream about the fun days at the laundromat and grind away at the ever growing pile in the bottom of the closet.

Barefoot & Pregnant

Yup that's right...I'm pregnant and Bean is barefoot! At least that was the case today while Bean helped me scrub the kitchen floor. Bean usually takes a good 1.5-2 hour nap in the afternoon, but not today! Today he slept for a whopping 45 minutes! (I'm sure he knew it was Mommy & Daddy's big cleaning day and didn't want to miss the fun!). So right before Bean woke up, Hubs headed out to play a quick 9 holes of golf with our neighbor and I sat down to scrub the kitchen floor. And that's when Bean just knew he was missing out on all of the fun.

Scrubbing the floor with a toddling 12 month old looked something like this. I would spray the cleaner, he would grab the cleaner from me and examine it (and try to eat it, but after a few "yucky" reminders, that went by the wayside). Then I would grab the sponge and start scrubbing. Bean would then try to grab my sponge or try to stick his hands in my dirty rinse water. I ended up getting him a brand new sponge of his own, which he greatly enjoyed, and I also put Bean in charge of the paper towels. Which turned out like this:

New Baby Update

I realized today that I haven't posted much about the state of the new baby. Things are going very well in my tummy. I have started feeling movement and even a few kicks. It's VERY cool to feel that again and it makes me all warm and fuzzy. THIS is what I will miss the most after the baby is born. The night after I had Bean I woke up sobbing because I thought I could feel him in my belly, but then when I touched my belly he wasn't there, which BLEW MY MIND! It absolutely freaked me out that he was out in the world and not safe and warm inside of me. Not to mention the fact that I was a huge ball of raging hormones! I crawled out of my hospital bed (at 2am) and waddled down to the nursery where they had Bean for monitoring (still sobbing) and begged for my baby to come back to my room with me....oh geez...this post is supposed to be about New Baby, not Bean!

Back to New Baby, things are great. I can eat food anytime (and all of the time!). I haven't gained any weight since my 10 week appointment, in fact I have lost 2lbs thanks to working out and watching my blood sugar. I have a normal doc. appointment next Wednesday and then the boy or girl sono on Oct. 3rd. I am counting the days until then! Overall, things are great!

Rockin' !!!

Apparently I rock! Yup, that's what I've been told by Jen over at Learning Patience. This is my first blogger award and I'm completely excited! Thanks Jen!!

Now the heavy task of passing it along. I am a fairly new blogger and I don't follow very many blogs. The blogger that I feel is MOST deserving of this award is.......

Mary over at Owlhaven! She is an inspiration to me as a new momma. I love reading about her days filled with kids. She is a fantastic writer and an awesome momma. If you haven't checked out her blog, you are missing out! Sooo here you go Mary! Feel free to pass it along to another Rockin' Girl Blogger!

WFMW: Bum Print Pumpkins

Sounds a little crazy doesn't it? If you have a small kiddo (probably under 1), a cute idea for a fall craft is to paint their little bum cheeks orange (PLEASE use paint that is safe for skin and that is washable) and then use it like a stamp to make "Bum Print Pumpkins". After stamping the "pumpkin" you will need to add your own embellishments (stem, leaves, pumpkin lines, etc.). We have a paint-your-own pottery place in town and this is a super easy and cute thing to do on a piece of pottery for a loved one. I wish I had a picture, but I do not...use your imagination! They turn out super cute! I promise!!

For more great ideas visit Shannon at Rocks in My Dryer!

Church Struggles...

Soo here's the scoop. Our church has 2 services: 9am & 10:45. Here's the problem: Bean naps from 9-11:30 EVERY DAY! So we are faced with a dilemma weekly of how to make this work. Most weeks we skip out on church (yes, I know this is not good) and let Bean sleep. This makes our entire day much more pleasant and enjoyable for our family.

Today Bean sleeps in until 7:15 (typically he is up around 6am). With him sleeping in so late, he technically shouldn't go down for his nap until 10ish. This means we can make 9:00 church! YAY! Hubs and I take turns showering, feed Bean breakfast and are out the door by 8:40. We get him checked into the child care (Hubs has to drop him off to prevent the MEGA meltdown that comes with leaving mom). We made it through most of the church service and then our number came up. No big deal. I really don't mind being paged. We try to emphasize when we drop him off that WE DO NOT MIND. I would rather pick up a semi-fussy child 20 minutes into the service than get what I got today....which was a sobbing, hyperventilating, blotchy faced little boy who needed 10 minutes of Mommy time before he would even start to think about calming down...ugh. The lady says to me as I break myself in half to get through the window to grab my son, "We really didn't want to page you. I was hoping we could make it through the entire service". WHAT!!?!?!??! Oh I was not happy. But I got over it, calmed my baby down and we headed back for the last few minutes of the service.

One would hope this is the end of our church fiasco, but oh no, it is not...

We get home at 10:40 and assume that Bean drifting to sleep on the way home from church means that he is ready for a nap. We could not have been more wrong. I spent 30 minutes battling him. I would put him down, he would stand up, throw his pacies and SCREAM. We did this a few times, then I tried giving him a bottle (maybe he's hungry??). Well he guzzled the whole bottle and then continued to fight me. So I gave in and decided to forget about his morning nap. Grrrr.... After lunch and playing and playing and playing (and watching a Baby Einstein DVD) I decided to try the nap thing again...we only battled 2 rounds this time and eventually I won! He slept for an hour! ONLY 1 HOUR! After that I gave up. Hubs and I put on a dog and pony show for the rest of the evening and managed to maintain some level of sanity until 7pm when Bean was so sleepy he could no longer walk without tripping over his own feet. He did go down pretty quickly at 7, but has fussed a few times already.

I have decided that we may be taking a break from church for awhile. This was a long, hard, day. I would rather spend my Sunday praising the Lord in my own home with a happy baby and a happy husband (and a happy momma!).

Whew!

Yesterday was Bean's birthday. We went and had his 1 year pictures taken in honor of this great event. And today I am sooo thankful that we had the pictures taken yesterday. This morning Bean was walking around our first level (it is kind of shaped like a donut so he can walk in circles from room to room). In front of our door is a tiny little patch of hard wood floor, then carpet, then linoleum in the kitchen, then carpet in the family room and dining room. Bean is making the lap around and he comes to the hard wood floor and loses his footing and falls flat on his face (it didn't help that he was holding a plastic spatula in one hand and a small wooden firetruck in the other...). I heard him fall, no, I SAW him fall. I ran to the poor little guy and scooped up a boy with a wide open mouth and no sound coming out. Finally he gasps for air and lets loose the biggest yell EVER! After he calmed down I had a chance to access the damage...a scrape above his left eye and a very black & blue cheek....I'm so glad we did the pictures yesterday. He looks so beat up now!

To My Bean

My Bean turned 1 today! I am such a proud Momma and I can not believe that it has been a year! Part of my mind keeps flashing back to a year ago and remembering what we were doing that day and night. Then another part of my mind looks at this little boy walking around and wonders about birthdays to come. What will be doing 2 years from now? What about when he turns 16? or 26? (hmmm wonder how my mom feels....). It's so amazing. I am so blessed by him and I am so thankful for his sweet life. Happy Birthday Bean!

Wanna Get Pregnant?

Let me know and I'll send you some water! Apparently IT is in the water. I am expecting in February. My next door neighbor is due in December. The lady behind me is due in November and then HER neighbor (across from me in the back) is due in April!! Sooo crazy! We are very close with our neighbors so this is super exciting for all of us (and we all already have kids!). Between our 4 houses and with new babies we will have a total of 12 kids all under the age of 8. (11 of them under 4). My other neighbor, who is not trying to conceive, keeps telling us that she hopes she doesn't catch "the pregnant". It's pretty silly. With these awesome blessings, I want you to know that it doesn't come without heartache. We have had numerous miscarriages between the 4 of us, trouble conceiving, invitro...the list goes on and on...but here we are! God is awesome. I am so blessed to have such wonderful Christian women living so close to me that are sharing the same life experiences. Did I mention we are all stay at home moms? Yup, it's awesome.

WFMW: We're Loyal to You...

This week at Rocks in My Dryer, Shannon has come up with the great idea for all of us to share the name brands we are loyal to. Here are my top 10!

10.) Hanes Socks-LOVE THEM! and the color coded Hanes stitching on the bottom is sooo cute!

9.) Clorox- I love the bleach, but I also love their other cleaning products.

8.) Tostitos- I refuse to buy generic dipping chips. Tostitos are the best!

7.) Ragu- Another item I "splurge" for...GREAT sauce!

6.) Kraft Singles- Is there any other kind of processed cheese in a pre-wrapped square package?

5.) HUGGIES! - We started with Pampers, but I have since converted to Huggies- Bean gets a diaper rash with Pampers...all gone with Huggies!

4.) Pepsi-We LOVE Pepsi products around here: Mt.Dew for Hubs & Wild Cherry Pepsi for me!

3.) Country Crock- I grew up with it and it's what tastes like home.

2.) Cover Girl- Nobody can match my skin tone like Cover Girl!

......and the #1 brand is........

1.) BOUNTY! - I have tried numerous other brands of paper towels and there is none better than Bounty!!

We Survived

Yes, we all survived last weekend. The party was awesome! We had close to 30 people show up and it was sooo much fun! I think Christian even had a pretty good time. A few of the highlights for him were getting to eat his first hot dog (very yummy!), he LOVED the frosting off of his birthday cake (he "shared" the cake with Kowe), he had a great time playing with the ribbons off of his packages (not really into opening the presents), and he enjoyed all of the attention.

I think my house is almost put back in order. I am still doing laundry like crazy, but it is coming along. Poor Hubs came down with a yucky 24 hour flu on Monday morning. So that definitely motivated all of our over-night guests to hit the road early. Not fun... But, he is doing much better today and seems to be fully recovered.

Ugh...Bean is waking up from a much too short nap...grrr....what are we going to do for the next 3 1/2 hours!?!?!?!? Hmmmm....