Sammy's loving Baby Led Weaning

Sammy boy, you LOVE to eat!
 

Sometime in the last week, eating for a purpose just clicked for you.  I keep looking under your highchair, to the side of your highchair, inside the pocket of your baby bjorn bib (fyi, the best bib ever) to see where all the food went.  75% used to go over board, which made Bailey a happy camper and a tad bit chubby, but it looks like somehow 95% is now going into your little belly and Bailey is back to being the grumpy middle child.  Some days, I have no idea how you put that amount of food into your little belly, but I'm trusting you and wondering if there is some sort of growth spurt I'm missing.  I do still pray, please GOD don't become the 650 lb, 30 yo virgin.  I kid, I kid. 

A few weeks into starting solids, we went into full fledged baby led weaning mode because spoon feeding Mr. Independent wasn't fun and you basically thought purees were for the birds.  You eat pancakes and fruit with me in the mornings and for lunch and dinner I give you a rendition of whatever it is I am eating.  While I no longer need to worry about Autumn stealing my food, I am having to keep a look out for you as you've nearly nabbed my muffin and pancakes many a time. 

One concern I had of BLW and giving babies adult food was salt and fat content.  I really think you are helping me diet because if what I'm eating you can't eat then it's double the work for me.   I'm trying to be adventurous with my food choices now, since I don't want you pigeon holed into not exploring new tastes because I am a semi boring eater. 

Getting us both into the routine of eating 3 solid meals a day wasn't without effort.  For a while with so much food spilling all over the place, it was too much of an ordeal to feed you three times a day.  There just wasn't enough time and I didn't feel comfortable rushing you through your meal so that we could go do something or put you down for a nap.  So for quite the while, all you had was lunch.  Somewhere in the last few weeks, as you improved your accuracy of getting food to your mouth, you also increased your desire/need to eat.   I think your desire to eat may have also increased because you now see it as something social and fun.  Also, your hand eye coordination has improved drastically because of BLW, you can grab, hold, and pull toward you any toy you want now.

Here you are eating lunch with me at my favorite joint, Whole Foods in Fairlakes.  Yay for having their flagship store in our "backyard"!

 Some of the things you love the most are asparagus and carrots because you can get a good grip on them, watermelon on the rind because it's cold and helps with your teething, pears and honeydew because they are squishy.  Peas because you can chase them.  You absolutely loved Grandma's meatballs.  I mean you seriously were like nom nom nom nom nom.  Everyone couldn't get enough of you stuffing your face like cookie monster.  Grandma was especially proud.  You also downed her chicken soup, which gave her quite the thrill. 

 While, I've made 99% of your food, I do mix in some store bought items.  Puffs and yogurt melts are your absolute favorite.  They are gone even faster than grandma's meatballs.

Here you are enjoying your momsicle (frozen breast milk in a popsicle mold)!  This really helped you out when you were cutting your first two teeth.

 

 Happy Eating!

Dedicating Sammy!

Great is thy Faithfulness!  We are so blessed to be able to have Sammy to dedicate!  There isn't a day that passes that I don't thank God for the enourmous gift he has given me and Paul.  I never knew how wonderful it would be to become a mother and watch another person grow under my care.  I pray without ceasing that he becomes a man who loves the Lord with all his heart, mind and soul.

Our church, dedicates all the babies born in the past year together on father's day.  

It was quite the day for us.  We hadn't been to church since the weekend before Sam was born!  Partly because of the hurt of getting kicked out of our small group when I was 18 weeks along, and partly because we had a hard time figuirng out a time when Sam wasn't going to be needing a nap during worship service.  

Dedicating Sam and returning to church were awesome.  I'm glad that long break is over!  We were blessed to dedicate Sam with his cousin William.  Father's Day 2011, my sister in law Amy was in labor on father's day!  So it was also a big blessing for them to celebrate not only the dedication of their son, but father's day and Will's first birthday!  Ironically their first son Jack was born on mother's day!  Amy has this whole birthing on a holiday thing figured out!

Here are some pictures.  I wish I had some more/better ones to share.  When you give your camera to your parents, you never know what you're going to get!  

Five Minute Face, makeup the tomboy way

My Five minute face, isn't a new mom thing.  I think my ability to be quick getting ready stems from growing up as a tomboy who had better things to do than spend time worrying about how I looked.  That coupled with my propensity for always being late.  Either way, I've never been one to idle in front of the mirror.

My first trip to the make up counter wasn't until my freshman year of college during fall break.  My Mom and I went to the clinique counter and off I went with my safe brown eye shadow.  When I got married in 2004, I had my makeup professionally done and loved it.  She used all bobbi brown and from that point forward I was hooked.  Her cosmetics are awesome!  Frugalicious however they are not.  The last part to me is key, so unless I'm gifted some bobbi brown, I tend to do the frugal thing and shop either at the cosmetic store at the leesburg outlets for bobbi brown or I buy similar less expensive products at Ulta.

Coming from my tomboy background, while the bobbi brown concealers and foundation are nice, they are too high maintenance for me.  Now I stick with her eye shadows, eye liners, brushes and face lotions.

Here is my five minute routine and my favorite products:

Step 1: Clean my face! I love a good sudsy soft face wash.  In order for your makeup to look good, your skin has to be clean!  Paul surprised me when I was pregnant and bought the murad facial cleanser I was ogling after and unwilling to fork over the money to get.  Normally though, since I have problem free skin, I'm not picky. As long as the facial soap is sudsy and leaves my skin soft and feeling clean I like it.  My normal over the counter go to is Garnier Moisture Rescue (feels very similar to Murad) and is also pregnancy and breastfeeding friendly.

Step 2: Moisturize!  You also can't have good looking makeup with the second step to ensuring a good base, moisturizing.  My favorite affordable face lotion is Garnier Moisture Rescue with SPF 15
but if I had a disposable income, I'd use the bobbi brown vitamin enriched face base.  It is my absolute favorite beauty product.  It feels and smells so good!

Step 3:  Set the stage: Foundation!  I use bare minerals matte spf 15 foundation.  This is fairly inexpensive and lasts me close to a year per container.  What I like about it is, you really can't mess it up (I apply it sans mirror sometimes).  The color blends so well into your skin that even with my skin doing a racial 180 between the winter and summer seasons, I can get away with using the same shade.  The product really just smooths over any blotchiness you have in your skin.  I like the product even more now that you can seal the top shut after every use.  Before they did this, it was MESSY!

I skip ahead to Step 7 if I'm really in a rush.

Step 4: Eye Shadow:  I love bobbi brown and mac eye shadows but for the sake of time management, money and makeup bag cleanliness, I've been using pallete's of colors.  One is from elizabeth arden that I got in one of the bonus time sets from the cosmetics company outlet, the other is from Stilla.  I've also got my eye on the Urban Decay Naked 2 palette, but am waiting for a good coupon.  I love having all the colors you'd want in one handy place.  Helps to do the smokey eye look without having to fiddle around opening a bunch of different containers as well as saving a bundle.

Step 5: Eye Liner:  Bobbi Brown and Mac again are clear winners for me in this category.  I love their gel eye liners.  I wasn't too thrilled when I somehow misplaced my almost new pot however and couldn't bring myself to fork over the $20 again for another one.  I went to Ulta and tried out the tarte liner and have loved it.  I also tried the liner from bare minerals and absolutely hated it.  It looks nice while it is on, but it is way to MESSY.

Step 6: Eye Lash Curler: no explanation needed.  Though for an extra bang, warm up the curler under your hair dryer then curl your lashes.

Step 7: Mascara: My favorite is the bare minerals Flawless Definition Volumizing Mascara that I've luckily now gotten two free samples of.  I'm blessed with super long lashes so again I don't have to be really picky here.  I use whatever free waterproof black mascara sample I get.

Step 8: Lipstick: Not picky here at all. I use EOS chapstick as a base, then just apply a simple color that isn't sticky.  The new lip crayons that are out are really smooth and long lasting.  I've been using a LipSurgence lip tint by tarte that I got for free with my eye liner purchase from ulta.

Do you have a quick makeup routine?  What are your favorite beauty products?

Happy Anniversary!

It's hard to believe we just celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary.  Feels like just yesterday we were dancing the night away with our family and friends

 

It doesn't seem like it could be that long ago that we were newlyweds living in a small 1 bedroom condo, adorned with wedding and engagement picutres all over the place.  What an amazing journey God has taken us on.  He certainly knows my heart to have given me such a wonderful, patient and caring husband.

We celebrated with a great date night dinner at 2941.  We were fortunate to find a $50 3 course dinner for two coupon from google offers. 

Not the best pictures, but at almost 9:30 pm we'll take it!

I have a feeling, the best is yet to come:

Happy Father's Day!

What another exciting first!

Last year on father's day we were celebrating my best friend's wedding, our 7th anniversary and enjoying our babymoon in Miami.

Looking back, I knew even when I was 16, that Paul would be the perfect Dad.  I think because my family was so dysfuntional, even when I was so young, I hoped I would be able to have Paul be the father of my children.  I'm glad my intuition even at 16 didn't dissapoint.  His silliness gets giggles I didn't even know existed out of Sam.

Not to mention, all the love.

The trouble with technology

See that little cute clock? It is a smart clock, it knows the days it is supposed to spring forward and fall back. Unfortunately the clock is circa 2004, which is before some smarty pants decided to change the months we spring forward and fall back.

So, now my smart clock has become a smarty pants clock, which sporadically chooses random days throughout the year to f with me. You see, the time is wrong, day light saving time wrong. The funny thing is today is the first day of summer, no where near springing forward. I have no clue why, but now this damn clock has no clue when to readjust. Today is our third time springing forward. The last time was this past jan and unfortunately I had to drag my already sleep deprived self to work and was a complete yatch the whole day.

When Sam started crying to be tended to this morning, I looked at the time on my clock and saw it was 6, too close to his actual wake up time to feed him, so I had Paul soothe him back to sleep. Sam wouldn't settle, I should have known to listen to my baby and not the time, but at what I thought was 6 am common sense was overpowered by my need to keep sleeping. Finally after 4 back and forth attempts between the two of us to settle Sam, we gave up and woke up with him for the day early.

When Paul went downstairs to play with sam, we realized mr clock played his obnoxious trick on us again. It wasn't almost seven, it was almost 6.

The worst part about the whole ordeal was I had mr cranky jr and mr cranky pants sr on my hands for the rest of the longest day of the year. Ugh.

Anyone have any alarm clock recs? We'd just like it to be compact with a radio.

Eight Months with Sammy!

Sammy, you are so much FUN!  I am so thankful that you came into our lives and showed me how much love my heart has to give.  The way you trust me and love me is incredible.  I love watching your whole face light up when you see me and Daddy.   I've got a pretty big feeling that you are going to use that smile to charm your way through many a situation in life my friend.  You've taught me how much of a gift a new day through the eager look of anticipation on your face each and every morning.  You make getting up at the crack of dawn worth it baby son!

You've been a busy little man this month.  Ch, Ch, Ch Changes is the best way I can say it.  I feel like you just are rounding the corner from baby to toddler.  You are a one moving man!  I can never count on finding you in the same spot where I left you, whether it be to sleep in your crib or on your play mat.

For example:

You can pull yourself to standing and push yourself up off your belly into a sitting position, you get the biggest thrill when we hold your hands so you can walk.  You are crawling (yikes).  I'm sure crawling for you is so exciting, for me gives I'm having a slight panic attack.   You now have TWO teeth (please don't bite me)! 

We did a lot of fun stuff this month.  We celebrated my first mother's day with a trip to Clifton to enjoy some crepes at the clifton cafe.  It was a really fun easy going day.

We went swimming for the first time!  I was incredibly excited for this day and am so happy you love the pool.

We celebrated Daddy's birthday and Mommy and Daddy had ourselves a nice date night.  We also had another date night a few weeks later at the fair.  That was awesome too! 

Glad you go to bed early so we get some alone time.  Here you are in your bath, right before bed.

You through me for a loop a few weeks ago when you kept fighting your naps.  I quickly realized after a few days of this nonsense that now you don't need your third nap!  This frees up so much time for us to have fun!  Since you can stay up now around 3-4 hours at a time, we've gone on some playdates, out for lunch, shopping, walks.  It's fantastic!  I have lots of fun things planned for us to do this month.  It's time to get you socialized my friend!

Our first lunch date at Whole Foods:

At your friend AJ's baptism party:

 

Out with the Family at Dogfish in Gaithersburg (so much bigger than the one in Fairfax)

 You love to eat!  Here you are munching on some yogurt pops I made you. 

 You figured out your snack container.  You love puffs for breakfast.

 Shopping with Daddy at Nordstrom Rack

 Dinner at Ozzies!  We ordered food for you off the kids menu, that was a bit weird to say the least!