New Words!

So, little man has learned a new word. Lawnmower. That;s right, he says lawnmower. He dosen't say mom, or mama, or call ME anything, but he can say lawnmower, and even knows the sound one makes. It is really kind of cute.

Scrapping

I enjoy scrapbooking, which a lot of people think is a strange hobby for me. I enjoy the feel of the paper, and all of the stuff that you amass when you really get into it as a hobby. I am a stuff collector, and I have a lot of it. I love stuff. Sometimes I got up to my scrap space just so I can move my stuff around. I do also use some of my stuff to do some scrapping. My newest venture is that I am a Creative Memories Consultant. I originally joined last year because I was going to spend a lot of money at a show I hosted, and a lot of the things were in the consultant kit. Then in December, I deactivated, because I couldn't afford to buy more stuff. In May they gave recently deactivated consultants the opportunity to come back for free, so I did. But this time I decided to make a go of it. Maybe earn a little extra money for maternity leave, should I ever need to take it again.

That's all I have today. I'm tired. One of the cats knocked over a glass of water very early this morning (onto my laptop), and I have pretty much been up ever since. Joy.

15 months, fathers day, flood, flu

What a weekend. Little Man turned 15 months old this weekend. Daddy was off all last week fighting the flood in Waterloo, IA, and came home just in time form me to have the Flu (or Food Poisoning) on Saturday, then left again on Father's day to go to Quincy, IL for a little more flood fighting. Whee! Who knows when he'll get to come home.
So forgive me for the short message, but I am still feeling a little under the weather today.

Foof

Hi there all. I am a member of the BzzAgent program, and one of the things in my Frogpond today was Foof. Now I don't normally think the Frogs are worth anything to me, but, I hate ads in my browsing, so this is right up my alley. It is a Firefox plug-in that blocks ads. You can also set it to show you relevant ads, but I have mine set to totally block. I like it so far.
Check it out:

Foof

I also put a link to it on the right hand side over there-----> It's under Places I go.


**Interested in joining Bzz agent? Let me know and I will send you an invite. :)

Tag.. I'm it!

Mary tagged me for this little do-hicky... so here goes.

What was I doing 10 years ago?
Let me think back to ten years ago... which would have been the summer after my sophomore year of college. I was getting ready break up with my boyfriend of almost a year and a half. Well, it was about to happen, HE did the breaking up, not me. He had just graduated, and was moving to Florida to go to flight school, and didn't want to have any attachments. I was heartbroken. Then I left to go home for a month for my brother's wedding. I was a mess.


5 things on my to do list today:
1 Work, and actually get some work done.
2 Clean my kitchen, after Little Man goes to bed.
3 Wii, maybe
4 Get a lot done on my project here at the office, that's right, work.
5 Work on organizing my scrap space, and maybe do a little scrapping.

Snacks I enjoy:
Mmmm. Snacks. I like chocolate, donuts, cookies, popcorn, cheese. Pretty much, I like snacks. :)

Things I would do if I were a billionaire:
Invest for a healthy annuity, then spread the wealth, some to children's hospitals, cancer research (I had a cousin die from cancer at 17 years old) make sure my family (parents, inlaws, siblings) are living comfortably. I would stay at home with my little man, and I would get some hobbies done.

Places I have lived:
Ready? Okay, I was born in Hastings, NE; Bladen, NE; Talahassee FL; Omaha, NE (Offut AFB); Rantoul, IL; Puyallup, WA; Mildenhall, England; Lakenheath, England; Lincoln, NE (college); and Davenport Iowa (current). Whew. Can you tell I was a military brat?

Okay... I'm tagging... umm, Anne from pumproom confessions, and well, I don't know. Back with more tags in a bit... maybe. :)

Joining the Wii-volution

We finally got a Wii yesterday. Yay! We bought it at Best Buy. The only reason we did is because Hubby won a GPS at the conference he went to a few weeks ago, and we already have a GPS, so we returned it for store credit at Best Buy. And they just happened to have Wii's in stock. Yay. So today, my arm hurts. A lot. But it is a good hurt. Now I just have to wait for somewhere to get Wii Fit in stock.

Totally not me...

So I don't normally blog about the political circus going on in America right now, but I have to get this off my chest. Really. IF you don't like it, tough. But check back later for a non-political post.
I have serious issues with the delegate system, and the electoral college in general, but they are in place, and it isn't going to change. But that is not what I want to write about. What really torks me off is the Florida and Michigan delegates for this year's primary. Rules are rules, people. (And really, this applies to things other than politics too.) Why is it that YOUR STATES broke the rules, but it is the DNC's fault your delegates weren't going to count? What is our country coming to that makes it okay to break the rules and then whine about not getting what you want (i.e. the delegates you 'deserve') Yes, voting is a right, and an important one to boot, but why didn't someone say, "If my vote won't count, why should I go out and vote." Tell your elected officials to put the primary back to it's proper time. Stage a protest against your state, who is so needy and power hungry that they wanted to shape this election, and therefore broke party rules so they could vote earlier than the rest of the country. Don't tell me they didn't try to schedule their primaries before the caucus and primaries of Iowa and New Hampshire. Moving their primary up so far caused a lot of problems for those states, and you don't hear them whining about how having a caucus on January 3rd ruined their holiday vacations. (For the record, it did, we had to cut ours 4 days short.)
So Florida, Michigan, step up, and be adults. Don't say you will never ever vote for Barack Obama because HE stripped you of YOUR delegates. HE had nothing to do with it. The DNC and the candidates did what they all thought was fair to give you the delegates you lost fair and square. Don't say "I'm switching to Republican," or "I'm voting independent" because you didn't get your way.
Okay. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest. Please check back soon for our regularly scheduled, non-political post. Oh, and don't hate me for my opinion. :)

As Promised...

Some pictures. Bad ones, but pictures all the same. I don't have any of me standing with any of the bridesmaids, but I will post a picture of each.

This is me. Don't I look happy? Two of the brother's in law had on matching pink ties.

These are two of the bridesmaids.

So the colors were REALLY close. It worked out really nicely! All of the wedding pics I took are poopy, so I'll have to get better ones from the rest of the family. :)

Ahem, An Update

Sorry it's been so long, I have been busy. And tired. And for some reason, I could not log into blogger yesterday. All poor excuses, I know. But too bad. :)
So I am WAY behind right now on NaComLeavMo. Because like I said, I couldn't get blogger to load yesterday. Annoying.

The wedding was fun. I didn't take many pictures, because the Little Man chose to cry starting 30 minutes before the wedding, and didn't stop until 10-15 minutes into it. So we missed the walking down the aisle, and the homily. We did get to see the vows. Which made me happier. I just couldn't believe that my happy boy, who rarely fusses, was all out screaming for 45 minutes, at that particular moment. Oh well. I think he was tired, and hot, and hungry. Not a good combo.
My dress matched the bridesmaids dresses wonderfully, so the pictures all look pretty neat. I have to find the camera, and I will see if there are any good ones on it.
Well, that is all for now, I need to do some actual work today. Yeah.

Today is the big day!

Hubby's sister is getting married today! The wedding is at 5:30, but this place has been chaotic since about 9 this morning. Two of the siblings are staying at another one's house this week, and between the three families, there are 8 kids, so it is a madhouse! Right now, I have bright pink fingernails and toenails, to go with the dresses the bridesmaids are wearing. I am not a bridesmaid, but the dress I bought is almost the same color as their's... not that I will ever wear a bright pink dress ever again. Really. Apparent;y the wedding colors are Raspberry and Champagne. Kind of makes me think of Steel Magnolias, with her Blush and Bashful shades of pink. In this case, I would say the raspberry is more of a fuchsia, no raspberry. Oh well. People probably thought my red was too much also... :) I'll have to post pics of the dresses later.

My Very First Meme

Hi there! I've been tagged for my first Meme! Anne from HERE tagged me! Yay! So here it is:

10 weird, random facts, habits or goals about me:

1. I have slight OCD when it comes to socks. I can't stand them, and when I do wear them, the elastic in my socks has to be exactly the same, and hit at the same height on my leg.
2. The light switch at the top of our stairs has to be in the down position or I cannot sleep.
3. I lived in England my sophomore-junior year in High School.
4. I have an insane fear of my teeth falling out, breaking or anything happening to them in any way.
5. I have a bachelors in Architecture, and have recently started back to school to work on a second bachelors and/or Master in civil engineering. My goal is to finish my degree before the kids start college. :)
6. My pinky toenails grow straight up, not out.
7. I like salt on my watermelon.
8. I can't stand the sound of static. At all.
9. I love to read, and I am not very picky about what I read. In my life there have only been two books I could not finish.
10. I hate to drive. The day I got my drivers license, I told my parents, "There, now I never have to drive again." And I didn't for almost two years.



Okay, there it is, my meme. I'm going to tag some of you NaComLeavMo folks! If you decide to do it, let me know!

**forgot to link to Anne's blog. That's what I get for blogging late late at night.

NaComLeavMo

Well, so far, not off to a great start with NaComLeavMo. I tried to make up for lost time yesterday, since we just got back from a weekend without internet access. So today I have to leave LOTS of comments, to correct the deficit. Plus, I am going to be gone, AGAIN, this weekend. So I have to build up a store of comments to make up for the time I'll be away. Hmm. Oh well.

This is a very short work week, I had yesterday off for the holiday, and we are leaving straight after work tomorrow to go to Omaha for my Sister-In-Law's wedding. So basically, I get to go home tonight, unpack my suitcase, and repack it with new things. Since we just got home from a six day trip last night, I don't really want to spend my evening packing. I would just like to relax a little.
---
In the biting world, Little Man has not bitten anyone in the past few weeks. So yay! Thanks for all the support ladies! His ear infection is also cleared up, and he has been sleeping through the night for almost two weeks, with just a few nights of waking. (Like last night, but I don't blame him, he spent the whole day in the car!) Yay to sleep!

Biter!

Little Man has been biting people. Kids, teachers, mama. You know, people.

The first person he bit was one of his daycare friends, and she is actually the daughter of a couple of our friends. Good choice kiddo. At least her parents were understanding! The daycare send home an "incident report" (gotta love the Army) when accidents, fights, whatever, occur, so there is a written record in case something develops from it. They don't tell you WHO your kid bites, or who bites your kid, just that the incident happened. We only figures it out because their's said "Was playing by the cribs and another child bit her on the hand," and ours said "Was playing by the crib and bit another child on the hand."

So if anyone has any ideas on getting him to stop biting, please, let me know!

Water Pictures

As promised, here are a few pictures of the flood.

This first one is looking east towards the government bridge, which is how hubby and I get to work in the morning. He works in the building with the tower in the upper right part, just on the other side of the bridge.These two pictures are looking West, there is a park between the left side of the picture and where the river is SUPPOSED to be. The small double fence area in the top picture is the same as the double fence area in the second picture.

This is another picture towards the east, the trees and fence to the right are at the edge of the river bank.

This is the bridge to nowhere. It really goes from second street, across river drive to the Casino. The parking lot is now filled with water, leaving just a little bit of the river end dry.

Poo and Peas

So the Little Man has been just a wee bit constipated lately, so we took him to the Dr to see what she suggested. I mean, we have changed his diet (less dairy, more water, fruits, bran flakes andother types of fiber). He really likes beans, baked beans, refried beans, whatever. He eats them up. The Dr. suggested trying MiraLax, so we are. Hopefully it helps and we can slowly wean him off of it. Poor baby. He also has an ear infection, so hopefully we can get that cleared up and we can get back to sleep at night. Mom is tired.

So one food that is supposed to help with constipation is peas. Well, Little Man has never been a big fan of peas. Until this week that is. We gave him a few, knowing he wouldn't eat them, but low and behold, he ate all of the peas we cooked (only like 10 of them, and they were covered in cheese, but still!) This is the kid who would separate the peas from other food in his mouth and spit just the peas out. So we though, that was a fluke, so the next night we made him more peas, plain this time. He ate almost all of them. Almost a half of a cup of peas. That is a lot of peas. So yay, he likes peas, now we just need to get him eating green beans and broccoli. Especially since we cook those more often than peas.

And the water keeps going up...

Well folks, it is very exciting here in Davenport, as we watch the Mississippi River rise up out of its banks and flood downtown. This is the first time since I've lived here that the river has been this high, and I'll admit, I really just want to stop the car and rubberneck. It's not really that exciting to watch, but I have this gross facination with it. I don't really understand. The husband says that currently they are predicting that the river will get to 19.5 feet. That will be in the top 10 floods on record for the area. And it is supposed to rain/snow tonight, which won't help either.

Here are some links to pictures/articles:

Downtown calm as Mississippi nears 19-foot mark

River levels

Breaking news - The Quad City times

If I can, I'll try to take some of my own at some point. They aren't really letting people downtown though.

OMG! No bumps, scrapes or bruises!

It's been a whole week, and little man has only had one accident report at daycare this week. (And it totally was not him, he got bit!) His nose isn't scratched, he forehead isn't bruised, and he looks pretty normal! I may actually get his 1 year pictures this weekend! Wow!

And it's official, Round Two of baby insanity has started, we have (at least) two pg friends, and I'm sure there will be more to follow! Will we join them? We will have to see what happens!

So apparently clumsiness is hereditary?

Last post I wrote about how little man fell and scratched the corner of his nose. Well, yesterday, he fell and did the SAME THING! How does he do this? He has a little bump on his forehead, the side of his nostril is all scraped up, and he has a scratch UNDER his chin. But nothing anywhere else. And this is after meeting the concrete face first. Hmm.

Okay, so he fell down at daycare. Then we get home and we are making dinner, and I step to the side, just as Little Man walks by, and he trips on my foot and slams his forehead into the cabinet. The little bump on his forehead is now a HUGE bruise with some little scrapes in the middle of it. What a great mom I am. He cried and cried and cried. We put some frozen peas on it. Still pretty blue, but at least the swelling is going down some.

So today he is back at daycare. Guess what? He fell down again! And whacked his forehead in the same freaking spot, AGAIN!! Argh! We are never going to get 12 month pictures done!

I have to tell myself he is a little boy, he is going to get bumped and scratched and probably haveb roken bones. Too bad that doesn't make me feel any better.

3 Years

Yesterday was our third anniversary. I got flowers. :) I figured I wouldn't, since hubby tends to forget to do that kind of stuff. He says he thinks about it, then forgets to call the flower people.

It was kind of funny, because my coworker called into my office that someone was bringing flowers in, and I came out to get them, and our secretary was holding the flowers and hugging the delivery guy. My first thought? Well, maybe I'm not getting any after all. But it turns out that the delivery guy was an old friend of hers, and the flowers really were for me. Yay!

We didn't do much last night, because I usually have class until 6:30 on Wednesdays, and don't get home till almost 7. So we are going to go out on Friday or Sunday I guess. We'll have to find a babysitter.

Speaking of the baby, he got his first real "owie" yesterday. I guess he fell over on the concrete and scraped up his face. He has a lump on his forehead and a scrape on his right nostril. Not sure HOW he did it, but he did. I mean, how do you get JUST that part of your nose on the pavement. Anyway, we shall be postponing 12 month pics again. We may get them before he's 2.

Year old, big head, no words.

So a few weeks ago we had little man's 12 month check up. He was at 22lb 9 oz, 29.5 inches tall and his head was a whopping 49.5 cm. That is 19.5 inches. The nurse took the measurements, and told us our percentiles, (about 50th for height and weight, above 97 for Head circumference) When the doctor came in, she seemed a little concerned about his head, so she measured it again. And got a BIGGER measurement. She said they will need to monitor that. I guess it can be a bad thing.
Everything else the the appointment went pretty well, his iron level was a little low, so he has to have vitamins. The Dr was also a little concerned that he doesn't really have any words. I mean, he talks all the time, I just don't know what he is saying. Daddy is convinced that he calls his binky mama. I keep telling him, I am mama, not the binky. Now, almost a month later, I think he is starting to get it. He also says something that sounds like, "I can get it" or "I can do it," which is most commonly used when we try to feed him.