Since we were on vacation with access to all the grandparents (and Uncle Rob and Grauntie Marge) we decided to celebrate Katie’s first birthday a little early (just three weeks!). She has a few “first birthday” shirts to wear so we started with the same onesie Owen wore for his first birthday:
With Gramma Jean…
Then hanging out and watching TV with Owen:
Then outside in the backyard with the really nice grass—one of my favorite shots of the day! 🙂
Well, I had an awful night. The whole barking dog fiasco combined with a very sore back (a combination of having been to the chiropractor on Thursday and the passenger seat not being very comfortable since it’s tweaked to best fit Katie’s car seat) meant I tossed and turned all night…and was wide awake enough to see midnight, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5a on the clock. I gave up at 5 and caught up on email, Facebook, forums, Scrabble, the blog, etc. Tom woke up about 6, Owen was up about 6:15, then Katie woke up while Tom was showering. We were packed, breakfasted, and on the road by 7:30. Well, 7:40—as we were pulling out of the parking lot, Owen said “Where’s my B?!” EEK! He had had it in the room so I wasn’t paying attention…and he obviously set it down. Tom ran back in and got it. Phew!
The first sibling game of the day was sharing (that’s Owen’s B).
Then we stopped in Troy. I had to return some shoes to REI and we wanted to grab some sushi from our favorite place and take Owen to his old park stomping grounds.
First, Katie had some fries.
She usually offers to share.
Daddy and Katie sharing a fry, Lady & the Tramp style.
Owen was really excited about his fries on the way there, but once we got there he was way more excited about playing.
So off he went!
Katie after her first daddy-assisted trip down the slide.
And this is how she wanted to attempt it on her own.
Owen on his way up to the BIG curly slide!
He went down it about 10 times! He almost attempted a belly first (which we were going to allow) but then he changed his mind.
Katie’s first time on a real swing (and not just on one of our laps). SHE LOVED IT.
Owen would have stayed to play for another hour (and we hated to leave the memories as well), but we had to get on the road to Gramma Jean’s! Unfortunately, Katie had HAD it with the road trip and squawked for quite a bit. She did conk out for a few minutes, but about a half hour out she was JUST. DONE. Kicking and screeching and definitely not happy. I wanted to tell her I understood—I hate long road trips, too.
But then we were pulling in the driveway and Owen was so excited to be here and Katie was excited to be out of her car seat and the grandparents (including Grauntie Marge) were excited to see the kids…and then it was a flurry of activity as we unpacked, Tom’s mom and brother arrived, and we all ate dinner.
To officially start my vacation, I had a bottle of wine (yes, you read that right: bottle, not glass). And to make sure I slept that night (and didn’t get a headache from the wine!), I took two Excedrin PMs and a back pain pill.
WELCOME HOME!
Amazingly we started off on schedule—and if you want to be technical about it, we were actually seven minutes early. And we didn’t think of anything we forgot…
The barrette lasted a whole hour—which doesn’t seem like much but her previous record was about three seconds.
Things went pretty well until Katie got a little screechy. But Owen was SO awesome—he’d start talking to her, singing the ABCs, playing peek-a-boo (which usually resulted in giggles), and clapping (at which point she’d clap in return). But then it turned into hunger screeches meaning she wanted her bottle—which sounds easy…but isn’t. She can physically hold the bottle—but can’t understand she has to tip it (she wants it to work like a straw cup). We tried putting her formula in the straw cup…and then she doesn’t really want it. And even though it’s attached to a strap so it can’t end up on the floor…it ends up hanging or upside down…dripping milk. Sigh. At this age, Owen was definitely holding his own bottle—great for road trips.
So I tried giving her a no-spill snack cup…which lasted all of five minutes until she a) figured out how to hold one flap open and tip most of it out and then b) got the entire lid off! Joy.
No-spill snack cup: 0
Katie: 1
So we figured our good little eater would snarf down some mac and cheese for lunch. Nah. Not interested today. REALLY?! Also not really interested in any of our foods, including one of her favorite baby foods. GRRR.
The good thing about lunch is that the owner—after chatting with Tom—comped our meal as a thank you for his service. So a nice shout out to Prissy Polly’s BBQ in Kernersville, NC.
Neither kid napped well. Katie got maybe an hour each before and after lunch and Owen got maybe an hour total with his catnaps.
Then there was a sibling sharing game, played with the lid to the snack container. Owen would hand it to Katie, she’d hand it back, lather rinse repeat. Owen kept saying “We’re sharing! We’re talking turns!” 🙂 He’s such an awesome big brother.
When we finally got to the hotel, Owen helped daddy with the cart (it was too bright for a good picture!).
And Maggie’s bag…which was about half his size.
Katie was having a blast crawling/zooming across the bed. Of course as soon as I tried to record her, she stopped.
Then she learned how to get off the bed. Just like that. (Just like she learned how to slide off the couch.) She’s a smart cookie.
Then it was off to dinner. We ate at the hotel just to make life easy. Katie ate seasoned curly fries, regular fries, and beef brisket (in addition to her cheese slices, green beans, and yogurt). Yes, BBQ beef brisket. Owen? The triple-decker PB&J and yogurt we packed from home.
Then it was FINALLY time for the pool—Owen had been asking most of the day but had really started asking when we got to the hotel. He was VERY excited!
Catching a ride and kicking it with daddy…
Watching daddy and Owen in the pool:
Then I took Katie outside for a stroll since it was REALLY warm in the pool area.
It took a minute to get a smile.
Then it was back to the pool, where daddy nommed some Katie toes.
I love when I get an unexpected shot. 🙂
Back at the room, we turned our backs for a minute…and this happened.
Yes, she opened the drawer AND got in by herself. And she was SO proud! Of course, she got out by herself, too.
Unfortunately, there were a few tiny snafus.
I thought I did really well by packing overnight bags so we didn’t have to haul everyone’s suitcases in…but I apparently forgot obvious stuff like jammies and Katie didn’t have her burp cloth.
I rolled the stroller through something in the hotel (they had some construction areas) and tracked it all over our carpet. It looked like putty, and thankfully it was still wet enough to easily wipe up.
Owen picked a scab and bled all over the white sheets. I had no band-aids…either on me or in our med bag. Tom had to get one from the front desk.
I haven’t had reflux in a month…so of course tonight was the night. And I forgot to take my nightly meds before putting Katie to bed, and I really didn’t want to get up because it took her 25 minutes of SCREAMING to fall asleep and hell if I was going to be the one to wake her up.
Also, the room next door has a bird and a yapping dog. Luckily it didn’t wake Katie up…but it woke me up about 10:30, and them continued to bark randomly until the owners SLAMMED back into their room around midnight.
Oh, we also got the last non-smoking room and it’s…not great. The bathroom smells, the bathroom counter is chipping, the toilet runs, and the sliding bathroom door (handicap accessible) is off the track so it can’t close. But we got a military discount!
What a flashback I had today. I was 13 and in LUUUUUV with Don Johnson…so I obviously had this record! RECORD, people. As in not even on cassette…
As mentioned previously, Owen just LOVES Katie’s pool and wanted to play in it after dinner. I then had the bright idea to get out his old slide so he could slide into the pool. And he LOVED IT. 🙂
And then I told him to try sliding down on his belly…which, as you will see in the video, it took him a minute to figure out just how to do it. But after that, it was GAME ON!
And a few more butt slide shots!
And a comparison to just over three years ago…May 2010 and June 2013.
The pile of 6-9m outgrown clothes. 🙁
But, thanks to all the grandmas, her drawers are still overflowing! 🙂
Yep. I’m now that mom. Tonight’s bath was a dip in the pool. (Well, technically more than just a dip.) 🙂
Every time he says “Watch me mom! Watch me!” I think of all the hundreds of times I said the same thing about cartwheels (or thousands of times if you believe what my dad says).
Someone likes to chew on the B strings like Owen used to…
So back in February, a friend of ours posted about this really cool family portrait he had commissioned by KateWhitmoreArt on Etsy. Everyone RAVED over it and said they would love one…including me. And then a few months later, I finally said YES, I’M DOING IT! But it was going to be a pre-deployment surprise for Tom.
I worked with her for about six weeks before we had a final product—sending ideas, evaluating sketches, changing details, etc.—and I managed to keep it a secret up until the very end, when I needed his input on something (though, honestly, I could have decided on my own—but you know how I am about surprises and the final reveal would only be a day or so away anyway).
And I have to say that for someone who doesn’t get choked up too easily…I think Tom was actually a bit choked up. 🙂
In it, you will notice all the small details of our family that I gave her to make it perfect…
It turned out more perfect than I could have imagined. But, it did take a bit to get there. Here’s the first draft, when she was trying a Christmas theme (I told her we loved Christmas):
She sent it with this:
I thought it was a little too ‘out there’, possibly. I thought it would be cute to have you guys in the tree, surrounded by your ornaments and lights! I just felt it might be a little fun—the ornaments would have either icons/colors for your interests, the USMC, Cars, things like that, and something a little more unique than a standard portrait. Something you can’t get a photo of, you know? If you don’t feel this one, though, just let me know and I can take another crack at it!
So, while I did really like her unique take on us INSIDE a Christmas tree (I had told her we LOVED Christmas) I just wasn’t loving it enough…so I gave her the suggestion of a park or the ocean and sent a few more pics, after which she came up with this:
My thoughts were more YAY! but it wasn’t QUITE there yet. She said she didn’t do a slide (as I had suggested) because the spacing/sizing didn’t work out right. So to me it didn’t look like we were really at a park but more just having a picnic—which we haven’t really ever done. And I wasn’t sure about the kite as he’s never flown a kite so that’s just not him. I thought I might be over-thinking it but my online sounding board assured me I wasn’t…and that the artist DEFINITELY wanted clients to be happy. So I asked her to put Owen in his power wheels police car, have me taking a picture with my iPhone, have our actual sippy cup/Tervis tumblers on the table instead of a pitcher of lemonade, and change the picnic basket to the diaper bag (a long story, but it took trying/buying/returning about 15 bags before I settled on that one, so it’s kind of a running joke).
She was fine with all the changes and then sent this, which was IT.
Then came the color version and it was almost perfect. Bonus points if you can see what the last missing detail was.
Highlight this text to see what it was: The white S on Tom’s shirt.
So overall I’m absolutely and completely THRILLED. I’ve already ordered artwork for our walls (I had bought a Groupon ages ago unsure of what I would use it for…and I’m glad I saved it for this) and I’ll just say that I’m sure this will turn into Christmas presents… 🙂
We were ball out on the front porch watching the new delivery of decking when Owen decided he wanted to sit in the stroller.
So we’ve been wanting to get this chair redone every since Tom’s mom handed it down to us in 2003 (when we got our first house)…and we finally did it. The boyfriend of someone in my mom’s group does reupholstery and it wasn’t nearly as expensive as we’d always thought (though it was still a chunk of change). It’s not perfect—if you look close you can see he used white (?!?!?) thread—but it’s not super obvious from a normal viewing distance. We also lucked out on the fabric—upholstery fabric is notoriously pricey, but we got it from a $7.99 store. YAY!
BEFORE
AFTER
FABRIC CLOSEUP
We headed to DC this weekend for another Patio Party (the last one was in 2008) with the TiVo peeps. The two main events were—obviously—a viewing of the new Star Trek movie and a party on a patio. 🙂
Tom cleaning off the patio:
Me at my first Coke Freestyle machine:
The best seats EVER at a movie theater—electric reclining leather seats (no flash on my self-taken photo because a lady two rows behind us threw a hissy fit that people were using their flashes…before the lights even dimmed and WAY before the movie was even close to starting):
Our group that saw the non-3D version of the movie:
One of our good friends, Andrew:
My obligatory self-portrait pose (taken specifically for Andrew because he gives me grief about taking those pictures):
A recreation of a 2008 Patio Party photo:
And that’s about all the photos. We take a lot less pics now for whatever reason…
The only bad thing about the weekend was that my drink of choice for the evening—vodka and Monster [energy drink]—apparently reacts completely different with my body than it used to and I did not get one wink of sleep Saturday night. 😐 This was NOT the best time or place to have to realize this…away from home with a 6-hour drive ahead of us and nighttime plans once we do get home.
Once we got on the road and grabbed a quick hot breakfast at Panera, it was off to Ikea for a quick visit to pick up Owen’s present (he always gets a present when we come back).
So overall it was a good—though short—weekend!
I have always loved this picture of me with my mom…so now that I have a daughter of my own about the same age, I decided to recreate the photo today. I tried to match the outfits and sunglasses but this was the best I could do. It’s hard to believe its almost 40 years apart (1974 and 2013).
It’s hard to believe my trip to Texas was six years ago…it seems like yesterday!
So Owen was playing outside in his underwear and it reminded me of when he started potty training and was wearing underwear for the first time… So wow—look at the difference between then (September 1, 2012) and now (April 30, 2013):
I happened to check my YouTube Analytics this morning, and saw that this video has the most views—to the tune of 15,146. WHAT THE? REALLY? WHY? I’m intrigued.
Even the number of times other videos have been watched amazed me…the top ones have 400+ views. WHY!?! Who the hell is watching my videos? Not that I care, it just really interests me!
Yet another Jenny outfit from the days of yore… Could she BE any cuter?
C’mon Gramma Jean…I’m holding up my end of the bargain by dressing her in these and taking pictures…where are the pictures of ME to prove I actually wore this stuff? 🙂
Owen still fits in his chair but he looks like more of a giant than normal. Plus you can see all the bruises on his shins. I was worried but Tom said he had bruises all the time when he was little, too…
And just for comparison sake, here’s Owen in the same chair three years ago in April 2010.
I have been looking on and off for YEARS to find the Christmas outfit (see here)…and I finally found it today at our new Once Upon A Child!
Well, just the jacket, really. 🙂 This is the next item from the Jenny’s-old-clothes-for-Katie drawer. She wasn’t being especially cooperative this morning so no super cute photo.
Then Owen chimed in and said “I want to sit with her!”
And hugging her. I think. Well, at least he’s loving on her even if it really isn’t a hug per se.
…I got to see Top Gun on the big screen!!!
Why didn’t I see it in 1986? Because I was 12 (or 13) and my mom saw it first and said “It’s just a bunch of planes flying around and it made me sick.”
I KNOW, RIGHT?!
So I’ve watched it about 25 times on VHS…then DVD…just waiting for the day it MIGHT come back to the theater.
And that time was now…for a special limited release in IMAX 3D!
To help promote the films upcoming 3D Blu-ray release on February 19, Paramount decided to re-release the classic in a six day run that started on Friday, where the film averaged about $6,600 per screen.
And it was only an hour away in Wilmington so HELLS YEAH I was going! WOOHOO!!!
We considered it an anniversary [of when we met in February 1997] / Valentine’s Day outing so ate a sushi lunch first then walked down the street to the theater where I saw this:
And had to have some!
Yum!
Then it was off to the movie. Aren’t the 3D glasses stunning?
And the movie was AWESOME! Wow. The 3D aspects didn’t blow me away…but there were some cool aspects and the actors felt very close and sometimes it felt like you were IN the cockpit with them!
Also, interestingly, with the awesome THX surround sound, I heard A LOT more of the background noises that just melted away in TV showings even with a decent home surround sound system (like a running shower and background music that were never as pronounced).
It was my first actual 3D movie (other than Honey, I Shrunk the Kids at Disney about 20 years ago or 3D/IMAX attractions at Cedar Point) and I’d have to say 3D has come a long way. And it took a good 20 or so minutes until I finally stopped noticing that I was watching the movie through glasses and just enjoyed it without distraction. Well, except I had to pee about 30 minutes in but hell if I was going to miss one second of the movie after waiting 26 years!
We ended our day’s outing with a trip to Costco…so it was a great day! And I can cross See Top Gun on the big screen off my bucket list!
This is how she usually ends up:
And then she gets put back here:
In comparison, Owen was scootching pretty well at 6m10d (Katie is 6m3d)…so it will be close.
We went out for dinner tonight with the Trimbles and Mitchells and I decided to dress Katie in a very special outfit…something that was mine forever ago. Isn’t she adorable?
This morning we put up the tree! Owen was GIDDY with excitement as Tom got the pieces out, turned the lights on, and put everything together. The tree isn’t as wide as the last tree, so it looks A LOT smaller, but it works with the space we have so it will do for a few years.
We try to only get Christmas ornaments that are meaningful—like from vacations, colleges, traditions, or our annual family Christmas photo. Sometimes they include favorite TV shows—for example, Owen has both Little Einsteins and Cars ornaments—and this year I bought the Tardis from Doctor Who (Tom has watched it throughout the years, but I just decided to watch it and got caught up on the past six seasons on Netflix over the last month or so). Owen has watched it with me, so he knows what the Tardis is…and was SUPER excited when I opened the package. We didn’t have the tree up at that point, so he kept asking where the Tardis was. So this morning, the Tardis was the first ornament he hung and now he runs around saying “The Tardis! The Tardis!”
Owen was REALLY good at hanging ornaments on the tree, too—except he wanted to hang them all in a one-foot clump. Also, of course, they were all hung at his chest-level! I eventually started pointing out where to put ornaments and telling him to look for a bare spot—and he did pretty well.
Lastly, we had to take the traditional photo of Owen kissing the Bear (I used to kiss the Bear when it hung on Grauntie Marge’s tree).
And like brother…like sister. Owen was 3m3d and Katie was 4m5d.
Here is the next outfit from my past that Katie got to wear…though, unfortunately, I waited a bit too long and it was too small for her so she just wore it for a few pictures! (I apparently am a very bad judge of sizes—and it’s a homemade outfit so there is no sizing listed—and of course Gramma Jean has no memory of what age I wore it!)
You can see how Owen likes to interfere with the photo shoot. 🙂
When I was cleaning out the garage last weekend, I pulled out some old outfits of Owen’s that I wanted Katie to wear so I could try and get “matching” pictures. I couldn’t remember the exact age to get them SUPER matching, so today seemed like a good day. And then I went back and found the picture of Owen that I remembered in the outfit (it was one of our favorites!) and imagine my surprise when I counted the days of both and Owen was 3 months 27 days old and Katie was 3 months 28 days old! I couldn’t have planned it much better if I had tried!
All I know is that when Katie was done with her bath (which we do on the floor because there’s really no good/convenient spot to do it on a counter—and I can manage it by myself if I have to) Owen was standing there looking a bit longingly at the tub. I actually thought he might hop in fully clothed, so I asked if he wanted to get in. No, he didn’t. Then by the time I walked to the toy room to dress Katie, Tom yelled at me that my boy was in the tub!
Then…and now.
I saw this shirt at Down With Detroit and couldn’t resist.
This was one of MY shirts back in the day…homemade by my mom! She held onto it for almost 40 years on the off chance I’d have a girl so she could wear it! Also, be warned, this is the first of many hand-me-down outfits to come… And mom? Now you have to search all the old slides and photos to find a picture of ME in the shirt!
I love the belly button showing! Her first belly shirt! 🙂
