A Very Happy Birthday Boy

Since I'm lacking on content of the verbal variety, I thought I would cheat & post the video of Liam NOT screaming for us to be quiet while we sang Happy Birthday to him. I don't think it shocked anyone any more than it did him, to tell the truth though. Imagine his surprise when he discovered he actually LIKED 20 people singing to him??




Please don't ask why on Earth I handed him a knife. But, in my defense, he WAS asking for the LIGHTER. So there.

Liam's NEW Fish Tank!

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Happy 2nd Birthday, Liam Robert!

Mama loves you, Little Boy.
Running around, just like your true nature!
Cannot wait to find out what's around the corner.

New Haircut (see #4) & Fun with Dada

Mr. Silly having fun with Dada & showing off his new haircut.
I'm still not 100% pleased with it but no one else seems to mind, so I think I need to give it up!
Altough Matias keeps finding weird things about it; like how she cut around his ears, left his swirl in one piece that now flaps in the wind when he runs, etc., etc.,etc.

Here's to hoping we survive his SECOND Birthday Party TOMORROW!!

The Good, The Bad & The Friday

Let's start with The Good, shall we?

Liam ended up at the doctor's last night (6:30pm) & we had a weigh in; I'm proud to report that he is 28.5 lbs. I'm every excited about this because he's gained 5 lbs. in the past 6 months & he's in the 50th percentile. I wanted him (in my head) to be about 30 lbs. OR 50% whatever was what, you know? He's not a chunky kid but I do like him to steadily gain weight as you already know about my food struggles with him & I'm pleased that he's in the 50% range & put on a nice bit of change there!

Let's follow up with The Bad, alrighty?

I mentioned Liam was at the doctor's last night; he was there because of a mystery rash that was all down his leg from above the knee down to the top of his foot. It could have looked like a bunch of bug bites, a rash or poison ivy (if I knew what that looked like...). He had a spot on his wrist also that was a bit more irritated but I never saw him scratch at it or bother about it. It wasn't getting better and it wasn't getting worse but it surely wasn't doing anything & it started to worry me. I waited to get my mom's second opinion & she was not excited about the patch on his wrist and was puzzled about the rest of it all herself.

I got on the phone and got him an appointment at 6:30, as I said, but at this point it was 6:10! We bolted out the door with instructions to call them when we were there & they would walk us through the back since we didn't know the origin of the rash & we might could contaminate the waiting room. Well then! Way to worry a parent more, right? But I'm glad they are cautious like that.

The rash is treatable with hydrocortizone lotion; which I had bought but was playing the Wait & See Game and should go away within a few days.

The Bad News is that she has seen numerous cases of this rash this week which makes me terribly uncomfortable. This means, to me, that something has been sprayed at the playgrounds that the kids are using. The rash only shows up on body parts that are not covered by clothing. It could also be something in the pool chemicals but that would not explain how many people have gone to the doctor about (and how many people haven't!!) unless somehow we ALL live in the same development. And we know that's not possible. It's not something I've changed cause I didn't go and change it in every other families household...

It's worrying me, to say the least. To the point of wanting to contact the local newspaper & report these mysterious rashes that have shown up in the last week at only one office. I have no idea how many offices are seeing cases, you know? Matias is saying it's pesticides & I agree that we will not be taking him back to the park that I took him to last until...until when? When do you consider something safe again? Until I get the news involved and find out if something has been sprayed on the equipment by accident or on purpose? I'm a worrier to begin with but this is totally throwing me off & into full on Worry Mode. I don't feel like I'm over reacting here either because this is my kid who has a mysterious rash for the love of god.

Now onto The Friday portion of our post today!

Five New Cute Things Liam is Doing This Week:

1. When he is in a shopping cart he now asks to "walk" instead.
2. Today when he was told he was going in Mama's car, he thought about it and said "no, Nana's car".
3. Instead of just tipping his dipping bowl of syrup up to drink it all, he actually dumped it onto his French toast and ate it properly!
4. He was putting Peanuts stickers on Nana & I last night and I got only Marcie stickers & I believe it was because they were both the same color, blue. Nana got a bunch of stickers today but Liam didn't have any! He'd much rather give them out than put them on himself.
5. He volunteered to be the Helper at Tumbles to demonstrate how to do a backwards tumble & he loved it! He really excels at this class & I'm still very thrilled that we have enrolled him in it. That and the 4 hour naps I get out of him ;) He also asked to do the Bill a Bah walk that he learned last week!

Tomorrow is his SECOND Birthday Party! I'm just about all set, only have things left to do tomorrow that can only be done tomorrow...

More family is arriving tonight & tomorrow so we are getting ready for a full house. I'll post pictures ASAP!

Have a great weekend everyone :) See ya on the flip side!

Thursday Things Only Mothers Know!

1. That if you pretend to pour Sunkist into his 100% Juicy Juice Tropical Fruit Juice he will drink it right up & ask for more.
2. Summers do kind of suck for getting kids to a birthday party with vacations and such happening in everyone else's lives.
3. That even if you put a chain lock thing (think hotel room) on your front door, that will only detour your child to the extent of now he just wants to learn how to use that & have you hold him so that he can "play" with it.
4. Somehow their barber/stylist needs to be better than yours cause a bad haircut on your precious one is a lot harder to get over than a bad hair cut on your own head.
5. When asked to narrow down Best Of pictures from the last year & 137 turns out to be the best that can be done, you simply shrug your shoulders & submit to it.

The chicken is in the pot...

We have Liam's birthday present! Well, about 95% of it, we have to go back on Saturday to get the remaining bits & pieces :) I'm not going to tell y'all what we got him until I can post pictures of the full set! I don't think I've mentioned what we are getting him & Nana you hush your mouth since I told you EVERYTHING we got him today, OK?! So excited! He's going to LOVE it!!

It's a little bit more than I was originally expecting/anticipating but it is really grand & I'm really not as worried about the long run as I thought I would be...am I being vague enough?

How about we do a Present Pool? Who can guess what we got Liam! If you guess it, I will send you an honest to goodness prize, cool? BUT I won't reveal a winner (if anyone even joins in!) until I post the "reveal pictures", OK? Also, just in conjunction with the phrase "reveal pictures" we are planning on doing a Reveal for Liam! We plan on having the 95% covered (yeah right, wish me luck with that one) until Saturday when we have his party and when he is napping we will get the remaining 5% and have it all ready for him upon his waking from his noni!

GIGGLE! SO EXCITED!!

As an aside; Christmas will be batshitcrazy in this house in the coming years. If this is how I feel about ONE present can you imagine the insanity that will occur with Christmas?!?!

Another aside; I've always been very thrilled that Liam's birthday falls smack dab in the middle of the year; just enough time between batshitcrazy seasons. I think that is just about all I can handle & "just right".

So yeah, Birthday Season is definitely upon me & I've caught the Fever. I've also got about 1/2 the work left to do on his Favor Tags but I do think that those are going to be extra-super-duper-adorable, yo. (that was for you Amanda)

Super Saturday at Super Target!

Since my little Liam Fellow was up at 6:07am this morning & had already been outside playing since 7am this morning, I decided to just go on to Target & get every thing done this morning. I was planning on going this morning but not quite at 8:45am, sadly, this is when Liam is having his breakfast, but we had already accomplished that goal by 7:30am so I got us 'dressed up' (as Matias says) and in 'Mama's car' (as Liam says) and we headed to Target with a fun list of Things I Need Before His 2nd Birthday Party Next Week.

I'm really excited about the favors I've rounded up for him & nothing cost over a DOLLAR. Nothing over ONE DOLLAR, people! I did forget to get some tissue but I can pick that up easily at the party store when I go to get our plates & stuff this week.

Here are the contents of Liam's "All Things Water" water themed 2nd Birthday Party...

Inside a blue or orange bucket will be in the following goodies:

1. Fish Tank Bubbles
2. Fish/Ocean Animal Squirty Bath Toy
3. One of those "gets real big when you add water" ocean critter
4. Fish/Ocean Animal Squirt Toy (notice I didn't use the word 'gun', my son might have tea parties but he will not have a toy gun)
5. I *might* add some good old goldfish, but I think I'm doing ok at the moment...

I'm so excited about it all & I was really stoked that everything was pretty well priced (can you tell?). I just have to make the tags for the buckets with my little Thank You note (for coming, not the thank you cards I still have to make!) & I think I might have talked myself into more work than I have originally planned for those little guppies (keeping with the fish/water theme here). I had a really cute idea but thinking it through more when planning how to do it all, I think I came up with an even cuter idea, if that is at all possible. It's not a lot more work & it's not like I'm making 54256 of them either, and with my nifty CM Tag Maker I'll get it all done right quick.

I realized last night that I neglected to post a (really crappy) picture of the actual invitation that I sent out! I didn't want to send until people who read this had received them & then I think I just forgot after that point BUT I do want to show y'all how they turned out because I was truly frightened about my ability to do good hair stamps! They came out quite close to how I envisioned them & I don't think they look bad at all - which is a mortal fear of anything I do to give to other people - doing crap for myself is OK but giving crap to other people is just embarrassing SO I was actually thrilled with the outcome!

For those who are curious, I scraplifted the idea from a forum that used the same stamp set & then altered it to fit my ability & design desires. I got the stamp set from Stampin' Up & it's called Eat Cake. I used Stampin' Up papers (Jersey Shore) because I LOVED the colors. I used my Circut for the scalloped circle on the front, the goldfish, & the tag on the inside. I used my CM wavy cutter for the piece of 'water' at the bottom & my scalloped corner rounder for the edges of the cake on the front. I used a box of cards from Michaels that came in a variety of colors, so I just choose 3 that went with the colors in the papers/themes/inks & went with it. I changed up some of the papers that I used to make the 'wave' depending on what card I was using as the background stock. I then got a bee in my bonnet and decided during the night that I wanted to use that cake stamp so I went on and stamped the envelopes too!

When I get the Thanks for Coming tags & Thank You cards done, I will post pictures of those if y'all are interested!












































P.S. I still cannot believe I am one week away from his 2nd Birthday Celebration!

This Time TWO Years Last

Was my Official Due Date.

And thinking about Christina & her rough past times being this late in the game, I remembered I totally went into Radio Silence Mode for a couple days at a time. Not answering the phone, the door (mostly deliveries of last minute bebe things), just battering down the hatches and waiting for another to open ;)

So we all know due dates come & go and it's tough to get through the waiting game but it's so quickly forgotten (not the labor portion, not yet forgotten) and you have such wonderful things ahead of you...

...with that said "Happy Due Date Day" to me (and Happy Anniversary to my parents - 45 YEARS!) and "Happy Upcoming Due Dates" to Christina!!

We're all pulling pushing for you!!

Friday Five!

This week, I'm going to wrap up our week with some things we did this week :)

Five Things Liam did this Week Friday Five Edition

1. Went to the pool twice & refused to go in the Toddler Pool & stayed in the Big Boy Pool for the whole time!
2. Woke up before 7am every single day
3. Decided to push his bedtime back to 8:30 (or 9pm depending on his mood)
4. Helped me do the laundry; he likes to help load the dryer article of clothing, by article of clothing
5. Helped me feed the cats their dry food and then proceeded to dump the whole bowl & sweep it up with his own broom (new word!)

Independent Thinker & Directed Play

Yesterday I noticed two really cool things starting to really flourish with Liam & it kind of blows my mind a little to see it all happening at such a rapid pace.

Thing the First: Directed Play

More often than not these days, Liam has a plan in mind when we play together & I use the term together loosely. I have to sit in particular seats/bed/area of floor & do nothing else but watch him play. Normally, I am not even allowed to join in but I can react & praise him when it is fitting; I tried reading my book while sitting on our bed but had none of that & came over to close it for me; I tried watching the news while still sitting on our bed & he went over to the TV and said "Mama, no!no!" so I had to turn it off lest my ears starting bleeding from the orders being barked from my miniature Director of Play. I have to sit in a certain deck chair outside while he plays with his bubbles or rummages through the recycling (something I am sure has a double intention since I am sitting I am also not able to get after him about the recycling!). At Tumbles yesterday, I had to sit on the floor in the specific area he marked when he ran through his Log Forest. I don't necessarily mind the direction it's just kind of annoying that I'm not allowed to do anything else during that time period. I suppose I have a lot of tea parties in my future, eh? (And yes, for the record, my son has tea parties and he LOVES them) I think it's amazing that he's assigning roles to me; that he's come to these conclusions on his own & knows how to make his mind known. He's known what he's wanted & is pretty good about letting us know which ever way he can but now it's moved onto something different, a little switch has been flipped in his head & instead of just knowing he wants to "play" he now knows that he wants to play in a specific way and how in the players in his world all need to be arranged and he's able to do that!

Thing the Second: Independent Thinker

Also since yesterday, I have noticed a huge leap in his independent thinking. We've been practicing jumping with him and he's just about got it. He's moved from the incorrect notion of going up first then down & is now on the right track with down first then up so he's real close to doing it correctly. Normally, we practice with him and have to ask him to "jump" and then he does but yesterday when we were upstairs engaged in Directed Play, I found him in the hallway practicing jumping on his own!. I had not said anything to him about it but he had obviously thought to himself "I think I want to practice my jumping now" and then completed that thought with action! It's one of the first times I've seen him do this that is not involved with some sort of play; sure he does it while playing in the his kitchen or with his stacking toys and Legos - he's got the whole Cause & Effect thing going on - but this was the first time that he had taken real action to do something completely on his own & I was left a little awestruck. Then he had to go do it again this morning...I've mentioned before that Matias usually has him pick me a flower when they go out on their adventures but it's always a prompted act of Matias telling him to pick a flower for Mama. This morning while he was free to play with the hose in the backyard, he came up the stairs (where I was watching from a safe distance) calling my name. He came over to me & handed me a clover he had picked for me, gave me a hug & said "flower, Mama"! It was so cool that he did that for me all on his own, with no direction or prompting, just a simple thought ran through his mind when he saw the flowers & it was like "I should pick a flower for Mama and go give it to her upstairs!" and he DID IT!

It so totally cool to see these things emerging in him & I know it's run of mill stuff for every single person out there but for me I am really blown away by it & I am really truly enjoying watching it happen in front of me! Like I said, he's had the whole A+B=C thing down for a while but it seems that it is reaching a whole new level of ability and skill and forethought and it's just so freaking cool.

It sounds silly to say (and to think it) but I never thought I could be continually amazed by the evolution of a little boy. We're hitting that 2 Year Explosion Point rapidly & I'm watching my Little Big Boy fade faster & faster daily into just, simply & wonderfully, my Big Boy.

Oh, J.W. Tumbles, how I love thee

A few weeks ago, I took Liam to an open house for our Mommies Group at a new gym thing for toddlers just to check it out & let him have a go at it. Well, he loved it & it was something we needed to do for him - he was starting to "out grow" Toddlin' Time or would be doing so very shortly - so I signed him up for a session. Compared to Toddlin' Time this place is like Harvard vs. Community College tuition wise BUT his ability to grow with the courses & learn new things far out weighed my initial gasp at the cost, plus Matias was fully on board ;)

Liam has always had issues with Circle Time (rolls eyes) because of a few things, 1) he doesn't like to sit still, 2) he would rather go explore all the cool things now that all those pesky other kids are out of his way & 3) sometimes I think expectations are too high on kids under a certain age to do things in Circle Time for extended periods of time - ok maybe that last one is my issue. At Toddlin' Time, no one was forced into participating in Circle Time so Liam rarely did but did join in on the activities he liked; bubbles, parachute, some songs & towards the end the maracas and since he was free to roam, he's never been scolded into fully participating. This is not the case at J.W. Tumbles & it is a struggle for us (also, I don't think they should do it at the beginning of class when the kids/Liam is still wired from a taste of Free Play) and he got a couple looks the first class & I was basically told that he needs to sit still, participate & get off those toys, which was SO MUCH FUN! We missed last weeks' class cause we were at Camp Carolina so I was a little nervous as to how he would readjust to Circle Time after only one class & then missing the next one and I was in for a surprise! Liam participated about 90% of the time on his own accord and he didn't even want to sit in my lap; he would push himself out and sit right down on the floor & clap his hands and do his little warm-up stretches and everything! One time I thought he was going to bolt but all he did was go over to another instructor and chill with her! Now he did get up a few times & bolt but I brought him back over & went over our Goals (HA!) and he would participate again. This is by far the best he has EVER done with Circle Time. When Matias came to Toddlin' Time he asked if Liam was always like that during Circle Time (man, I'm sick of typing that out...) & I nervously said yes (hoping he wouldn't "chastise" me for "allowing" him to run around) and he commented that that was exactly how HE used to be! I'm very excited about this improvement & hope that it continues in the right direction. It also doesn't help that the majority of the class (today it was just one other! We were missing 4 others!) are female thus making them better participants in Circle Time or anything stationary for that matter...

He did so very well in everything we did today and he tried everything, sometimes even more than once by his own choosing! We used a trapeze bar that they had to walk up stairs to & although he didn't love swinging he did try it a handful of times. We used uneven parallel bars to do a Bear Walk where you place your feet on the lower bar & then lower your body down to the upper bar & WALK sideways, shuffling along this little bar! He did that at least 3 times - even calling it the Bill a Bah! He went in the hammock chair with me & then by himself - he usually hates swings these days so him doing this at all is good for him.

But his favorite by far was the Log Forest! This thing looked like something out of that Wipeout show minus the water. It was awesome & I did get to try it as he wanted me to run through it holding his hand! They hang these punching bag type things (but way softer, duh) of various heights and tell the kids to run through them & it's so cool to see them duck & weave like little football players trying to stay away from the Logs. Liam loved to push them out of his way & hopefully get past it before it swung back around & slammed him. He did get bashed once but didn't fall over & laughed over it so I know he didn't mind it at all! He made me sit on the floor at the other end & would run through it, straight into my arms for a big ol' Back Pat Hug every single time. I want to set those things up in our basement.

The class is also 15 minutes longer than Toddlin' Time so he usually starts thinking about heading out around 45 minutes in but he had no problem heading back to play when they brought out the crab sandbox & filled it with balls :) Then I have to explain to everyone that we are big soccer fans in this house & so every ball is a GOL!

The thing I really love about J.W. Tumbles? That I know every single mother loves too? he is Exhausted when we get home. He drinks his milk in the car (today he finished it about 45 seconds after we left the lot - Kym it was before we hit the light at 28 & Linton Hall) & has his snackies, we come home, have lunch & go right to bed. He went down like a Log Forest today! Not ONE peep out of him & I only read to him for about 3 minutes before he told me "bed"! And come on, moms, you know you love it when you wipe your kid out without wiping yourself out in the process!

So, thanks J.W. - you've earned your overpriced cost of admission in my opinion!

What a Difference (less than) a Year Makes

The 1st shot is from Oct. 2007 & the next one is from July 4th 2008.

I cannot get over how different of a little boy he is in such a short amount of time. I know this basically stems from his birthday approaching & how much time I feel has passed so quickly and, my word, how much time is still left with him to learn & grow & explore and continue to play with water! It really blows my mind this "growing up" business these kids are into these days. I wish I could better express myself but it's a combination of the first year being so quick & full of wonder at every corner and then the second year settling into your life together, with solid routines & schedules and events and fun adventures and yet every day there is something to marvel at. And then, it hits you that this little boy standing in front of you, swiping a spider web away and saying "bye bye bug" is the same little boy who used to laugh himself silly over the puppets on Baby Einstein and that tomorrow and next year I will be remembering the little boy that is now and I have no idea what I will be doing with him then! Although, I'm pretty sure it will involve water, that much I can be sure of.

I've been doing a lot of thinking (read: stressing) about Birthdays, our children's birthdays more specifically & I'm amazed that some parents don't make big deals out of them (and I am not thinking of anyone I know, just in general) and it kind of sort breaks my heart for some strange reason. And this coming from the person who really didn't enjoy her birthday OR being sang to BUT I really enjoy the thought of Celebrating (with a capital C) the year that was and the year that is to be. There so much that they've accomplished & become that how can you not bake them a cake (or get your sister to!) & shower them with love and wishes and icing and toys they don't really need but good lord do you see how much fun he's having with them??? It makes me heart swell in places I didn't even know I existed.

And I just might be a hugely sentimental person who loves to look back over the years & see how far we've come & how far we've gone and who's been there with us year after year after year (...bobbing head..) and I just might be a person who loves to get together to celebrate all of that TOGETHER. Is this really surprising anyone? This feeling manifests itself in my work with Creative Memories (hello!), my Freak Gatherings, my need to Tour & continue to hit certain venues with certain people...it's all a part of Me...

...and the year between my son's 12th month & his 24th month is something to Celebrate people!

...and to think this started out innocently enough with just wanting to post those two pictures side-by-side to show how much he's changed and how much he's stayed the same.

All I know is I cannot wait to watch everyone (but Nana & Mama who are smarter than the average bears) get hosed down from the feet to the sky by a Fellow with a Hose next summer. I think we're going to be in trouble then. I think not only will he be beyond operating the hose properly but he will be able to unlock the door with a key he's stashed away somewhere outside & bring that hose inside with purpose & intention.

I'll be waiting with a towel & a camera. That much I do know.

Total Cop-Out

Things We Have Done in the Past Week

1. Hosted an asado at our house for 20 of our closest friends & went to an awesome (albeit probably the last show of the tour for Roi...) DMB show
2. Went to Camp Carolina with Nana & Grandpa, Mystic (yes, the cat) & Liam
3. Went to a really cool playground down the street, practically, from Camp Carolina
4. Went to a park with a train & a merry-go-round! Two FIRSTS for Liam!
5. Celebrated CANADA DAY!
   
6. Liam went to his SECOND DMB SHOW! He didn't fall asleep until about 10pm (Smooth Rider, I believe) & then woke up less than an hour later to finish off the show.
7. Had a sleepover at Auntie's!
8. Learned how to say "money"
9. Started an obsession with the GARAGE. What is it???
10. Celebrated the 4th of July! Our fireworks got rained out 15 minutes before they were supposed to start! And we kept the Fellow up for them! Liam has never seen fireworks...last year they got rained out in CT also!
11. Went for a ride in a 1921 Ford Model T - totally awesome & totally recommended!
12. Went back to the amazing park & ran across the Squeaky Bridge 427405 times.
13. Got some much needed (and CHEAP!) jammies at the Carter's Outlet (please note, the 3 piece sets ((shirt, shorts & pants)) are $5.99 right now!!)
14. Introduced Liam to the rocket ship shopping cart at grocery store
15. Learned how to say "green beans"
16. Started to learn how to ride a trike!
17. Helped bake a cheesecake
18. Was attacked by a shark AND a bear!
19. Liam had his outfit changed TWICE before Mama figured out finally to just put his swim trunks on him already for the love of god.
20. Charmed & bamboozled everyone with his loving Fellow ways

We had an awesome week at Camp Carolina & I wish I had the time (and energy) to write more details about it all & maybe I will throw a quick story up every now & then but I wanted to get it all down before too much time passed (Bonjour Montreal!) & then other adventures happened...

We've got his birthday coming up in just about a week and a 1/2 (WHAT?) and then Jen & Matias get to go to Deer Creek for some Adult Time! So we'll be busy & doing fun fantastic things, that's for sure!

Summer is definitely in full swing!!

REAL quick!

There are about eleventy billion new pictures from the last week up on Dropshots if anyone is interested!

Here's a random favorite to entice you with ;)

Liam & Mama at the Nino's 3rd Annual DMB Asado!