Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Jeez...

They say you start to show earlier with your second child, but my goodness!! Yikes, I need to lay off the ice cream I think.


Yesterday was a very big day..."Before"


"After" - I know it's not much but I cut his 'bangs' or whatever you want to call them. Suddenly, after not bothering me for months, they were driving me crazy. The rest of his hair can wait though.


There was a little pre-halloween party at playgroup yesterday, too. Here are monkey Bailey and ballerina Lily showing some love.


And J needed a little love, too.


We don't really 'do' Halloween, so for J's costume I just found this little outfit in his closet. Put it on and suddenly he's Dada for the day. (Except Shawn does tend to wear shoes to work.)


"Hey - you!! Back to work!!"

Sunday, October 26, 2008

I love my husband!!

This morning, Shawn came downstairs and told me he was heading to the store. He wanted to make breakfast, and took J with him.

At 7am, I received this picture on my cell phone:

(FYI I've never let him ride in one of those...too worried about him escaping!)

When the guys returned home, they brought beautiful flowers and a PSL from Starbucks. Definitely the start to a sweet day!! Shawn declared that it was "Mother's Day" and made us all breakfast with pancakes, bacon, sausage and orange juice. It was so great!

After church and once J went down for his nap, I headed over to Fry's where I spent $17.50 on $61 worth of groceries. I was thrilled - I was expecting to save a lot but not quite that much!!

Oh...another reason I love my husband - he climbs onto our roof to take these pics:





Those are our new solar panels. It will be about a month before they are up and running, but Shawn said when they tested them out, our electric meter was spinning backwards - neat! If anyone decides they want to find out more information, check out Solar City and if you decide to go for it, don't forget who referred you. :-)

J will be 16 months tomorrow and I cannot believe it some days. I don't know when he got so tall or so much like a little boy and not like a baby anymore. Lately he likes to wear his hat while he's eating. Silly dude.


He also likes to be a big boy - check out the slide at Tumbleweed park. (we were out that way because he was getting a flu shot on Saturday)


He is also very funny, has two different laughs (one for when you tickle him and one when he finds something funny), likes almost all food (except for mashed potatoes and yellow squash), already is kissing my belly when I say "give the baby a kiss." I'm excited to see what a great big brother he will be to Baby B (aka Sweet Pea).

PS: She has a name. But we're not telling...you'll have to wait til she's born. That way we can wait til the very last second to change our minds if need be. :-)

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

And Baby B is.......

A BEAUTIFUL LITTLE GIRL!!!!

I cannot believe that we are going to have a daughter - that J is going to have a little sister!! I am so excited and I know Shawn is too. She looks healthy and is growing right on track for her March 27th due date. Here are a couple of pics.

Face & body - she's looking at the 'camera'


Her cute little feet.


She seemed sleepy or very relaxed during the ultrasound. Which is fine, J (from what I remember) moved almost constantly and still does. It might be nice to have a daughter that is...well...more laid back.

In other house news, we are having solar panels installed. Right now. During J's nap. They are drilling on top of the house and I'm praying that it doesn't wake him. (I already have his fan on high and I'm running the a/c fan to try to make more noise to cover it up.)

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Children's Museum

Saturday morning we decided to head over to the new Children's Museum in downtown Phoenix. There are a lot of completed exibits - well, exibits isn't really the right word - everything there, can be played with/in/on by the children. It's a lot of fun but I think will be even more fun once everything is completed. It costs $9 per person - even little ones over the age of 1 - so it's kind of pricey, but Jeremiah had enough fun for all of us.

Inside "the Supermarket" - they had little shopping carts and shelves of food that you can 'check out' through play cash registers and scanners. J preferred to help out on the janitorial side.


This is in the "3 & Under room" - everything is perfect size for toddlers. J loved it.


I climbed under this little deck and looked up while he was on top. He thought it was hilarious.


He was able to go up the stairs and come down the slide all by himself! He looks scared but he really was having fun.


Putting balls in the hole and watching them fall down. (almost like Plinko)


Hanging out in the little kitchen.


Going up the stairs all by himself - we need to get a short railing like that for our stairs!!


This is in the "Ballroom" - literally a room with a ton of things that balls can roll down. It's hard to explain. It was noisy and fun and J loved it.


They have an area for 'chilling' - lots of books and chairs and beanbags so you can wind down after all the craziness. J loved these tube things.


This is a temporary play area - a bunch of fabric tunnels that you see when you walk in. It's not the best first impression, trust me - Shawn and I looked at each other and were like...."we just paid $27 for this?!?!" But it gets better. And J loved the tunnels. (They're going to be building something called 'The Climber' where this is.)


At one point J tried to escape through a 'window' - didn't work so good.


Favorite picture of the day.


Overall, I'd say it's worth it. We only stayed around 2 hours, I think J would have stayed longer though. If you go on the weekend, go early! We got there @ 9am when it opened and by 11am it was starting to get pretty busy. I can't imagine how crazy that place is when it's packed with kids.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Our weekend

It was just beautiful here this past weekend!!

On Saturday morning we headed to the zoo. The tiger was being a little scary - lots of loud roaring, then he (she?) jumped probably 10 feet straight up into a tree, then sat there and stared at everyone staring at him. Tigers make me nervous...so we got out of there.




J was not afraid.


Hey, J, what is that? (he's doing the sign for 'elephant')



We left the zoo at the perfect time - 1130am - by then the parking lot was full and they were using overflow parking. It was crazy!!

Monday, Shawn had off for Columbus day, so we headed up to the Mogollon Rim to find some fall colors. We saw a little bit but not tons - and we didn't stay outside very long - it was frigid!!!! Brrrr.

We stopped at Woods Canyon Lake first to stretch our legs. It was very cold, so we didn't stay long.


"We're freezing!!"


J is happy if he can carry rocks around.


Brrr!!


Look, some leaves!!


Some shots from the edge of the rim...



And for a little treat, J enjoying a bagel with cream cheese.

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

I have one question for you...

So, you think you can dance?



Okay, so that's actually the beginning and not the ending. But it was so much fun last night to hang out with Jen, Kim, and Holly and see "So You Think You Can Dance" the tour. The dances were great! I have a few videos...they aren't great quality but you get the idea. You don't realize how shakey you are when you're taking the video - hope no one gets motion sickness!

Here is part of Twitchington's convict dance:


And the awesome Twitch/Joshua Russian dance (again, just a clip)


Here is the part of the big group Bollywood dance from the finale.


And another dance (which is strangely similar to what happens in the Roland house when Shawn leaves for work with his briefcase in his suit.)


And now for the pics:

Katee and (the winner) Joshua


Flying Joshua!


Hey...who is that?!?!


Oh my gosh, a legendary moment! Five blogs collide when Astraea meets up with our group.


And Twitchington performing a beautiful waltz that the choreographer created for his disabled daughter. It is a beautiful dance...although for some reason, in the middle of it, I thought of something funny that happened ages ago, and I started laughing. How inappropriate!! Holly was looking at me like I had grown a second head. But you know how the more you try not to laugh, the harder you end up laughing? Yeah, that was me.


I got home around 11pm - that is a really late night for me. I was yawning at 9pm. It was so much fun and although we'll change our seats, we are SO starting the countdown to next year!!

Monday, October 6, 2008

Saturday

We didn't have to leave town this weekend! Why? Well, because the weather is finally turning nice. On Saturday morning we went to the park and had a picnic. J had so much fun playing and running around.

J got some major air!



Look at that hair flying!!


Feeding the ducks.


Helping push the stroller.


Later in the afternoon we headed to my aunt and uncle's house for my aunt's (shhhh!) surprise birthday party! It was fun.

Playing outside (waiting for Cher)


Hanging with Grandpa G.


Shoved into a corner (50 people!) waiting for Cher to walk in.


Here's the SURPRISE!! Sorry it's shakey. I love surprise parties!