6 Month Update

My baby is 6 months old! It's going by so fast. I took him to the pediatrician for his check-up today. The nurse weighed him (21# 4oz.) and yells out, "Dr. G. come look at this! We have a 6 month old that is over 21 pounds!" (To put this in perspective, Lacey who was in the 50th%ile having an average weight for age, was 19# at her one year appt.) Next thing I knew, the staff was gathering around to see my chunk-a-lunka. It was so funny. He started giving them all big belly laughs and smiles, which he is very good at, and we all had fun with him. This is my favorite stage -- the 6-9 month stage. They smile, laugh, get on a schedule, start eating, rolling over, sitting up, etc. But yet they don't crawl or walk and get away from you -- the perfect combo! Anyway, he's in the 95th%ile for his weight and off the charts for his length (28 1/2 inches). Healthy boy!

Tanner with daddy in Newport.

I love my Tan-man!

I think he's going to be a gymnast! I put him in the Bumbo, then walked behind him and was talking. He heard my voice and flipped himself backwards to see me. How cute is that! I love you Tanner!

Surprise!

If you ever want to surprise someone for their birthday, I suggest doing it so far past their birthday, that it's actually half-way to their next birthday. I guarantee you, they will be surprised! My birthday is June 17th. This past June 17th, I happened to be in the hospital having a baby. Needless, to say, we didn't have the traditional celebration, but what more could you ask for than a healthy baby?? Regardless, Dave kept saying that he was going to get me something for my birthday. By December, my birthday was 6 months behind us and long forgotten.... or so I thought! Dave came home from work last week with a big, beautiful bouquet of flowers and a card. I asked what it was for and he just shrugged and told me to open it. It was a card saying that he was giving me my birthday present and to pack my bags because he was taking me on a surprise trip. We brought Tanner with us, but he had it all arranged to have his parents watch Lacey for the weekend. We boarded a plan for..... Newport, Rhode Island! I was so excited! There are 11 states left in the country I haven't been to and Rhode Island is one of them, so I got to check it off my list -- I now have 10 :) But the real excitement was in this town. I loved it, loved it, loved it. It was absolutely, breathtakingly beautiful, quaint, charming, friendly, surrounded by ocean and turn of the century mansions beautifully restored and decorated for the holidays. Here is Dave standing in the back yard of "The Breakers", a home built by the Vanderbilts in the late 1800's to be used as their "summer cottage."

Here I am at the door of the church where John F. Kennedy and Jackie were married.

This is the Cliff Walk. It is a 3 1/2 mile stretch where the ocean is on one side and the back of all the beautiful homes is on the other. It's gorgeous! (And it's in the 1,000 Places to see Before you Die book, so I got to check that off my list too!)

Dave is a tennis nut. The International Tennis Hall of Fame is located in Newport, so he was in 7th Heaven!

And just in case you were wondering if we really did have Tanner with us, here is the back of his cute head! He turned 6 months yesterday and I go to the doctor for his check-up tomorrow, so I will post more pictures and stats of him in a couple days. Anyway, it was a short, but wonderful and memorable trip. Thanks for the weekend, Dave! I was definitely surprised!

Lifestyles of the (not so) Rich and (not so) Famous

You always hear of people "going to the Hamptons." I've always been curious to see what all the hype was about. More importantly, I wanted to check off another item in my "1000 Places to See Before You Die" book. I looked into it thinking it might be out of our price range, considering the clientele that you usually hear about visiting the Hamptons, but turns out if you go in the dead of winter, it's really quite affordable! Aside from Lacey being a little, how should we say it nicely......"difficult" in the car, we had a great Thanksgiving weekend. Dave's parents joined us on this little adventure, so we were still able to spend the holiday with family.

We loved walking along the beach and seeing all the beautiful "summer homes." Although, I don't know why anyone would want to leave for the winter if their summer home looked like that!

You might think this is just a picture of Lacey, but look closely...it's actually Lacey making her movie debut with Steven Spielberg (walking behind her with a baseball cap on). It was so funny, we were walking in the downtown area of East Hampton, when Lacey took off running and ran into a nice man who was holding his mother's arm walking down the street. Dave grabs Lacey and apologizes while the man smiled, said it was okay and the man's mother started talking to Lacey. Dave looks up and realizes he's talking to Steven Spielberg! We didn't want to be obnoxious while they were enjoying family time over the holiday weekend, so instead of asking for a picture with him, we did it this way!

Here we are at the southern most tip of Long Island, Montauk Lighthouse. It's still a functioning lighthouse and we were able to go to the top, where there was a gorgeous view of the Atlantic Ocean.

A little bit Country and a little bit Rock'n'Roll

Dave and I are very similar in many ways.... but when it comes to music, we CLASH! I love country music (but mostly "pop" country, not the twangy hoe-down stuff) and he loves Top 40. I don't mind a lot of Top 40, but a lot of it, I don't like. Kelly Clarkson, however is one that I do like. So, when Reba and Kelly came into concert together, it was both our worlds rolled into one! Finally, we could got to a concert we both wanted to go to instead of taking turns and compromising (him coming with me to Martina McBride and me going with him to Shakira). It was AWESOME!!!!!! We had great seats which makes all the difference in the world. They both have such incredible voices and together, it's just amplified. I thought they might take turns, but they both stayed out on stage the entire time singing with each other or back-up for each other. And for any of you who watched the TV show Reba, Barbara Jean (Melissa Peterson) was their opening act doing comedy. It was hysterical! Hope you all have a very Happy Thanksgiving tomorrow!

Lotion Anyone?

So, for all of you wondering if Lacey made it out of the bathroom okay, yes she did. Although, I'm beginning to think I should have left her in there! Today, I brought her upstairs to change her diaper. I brought T with me as well and laid him down on the bathroom mat while I changed her diaper (he always likes to see and hear me or else he starts fussing). After I finished changing Lacey, I wanted to brush her teeth, but her toothbrush wasn't on the counter, so, obviously against my better judgment, I went down the hall into our bathroom looking for her toothbrush. Approximately 30 seconds later, I returned to find Lacey holding a tube of Desitin and my poor baby's face looking like this!

So, for all you experienced parents out there..... is it normal to have the "terrible twos" start at about 18 months or is my child just "advanced." Or, is this not really the terrible twos and it gets worse..... ahhhh!!!!!!

A Day in the Life of Lacey

Lacey started her day in the morning by eating an ENTIRE package of blueberries in about 5 minutes. I gave her a few with her yogurt, but she kept telling me she wanted more and before I knew it, she ate the whole darn thing! Then, in the afternoon she helped Mom and Dad rake up 21 bags of leaves from the yard. And then, that evening (I apologize for the sepia tone of the video!), she capped off the day by locking herself in the bathroom. You keep us on our toes, Lacey girl!

100,000

I wish the title was referring to how much is in my bank account! But, no, it is how many miles my beloved Honda Civic has driven as of yesterday! And no, I did not get into a car accident recently. I realized as I went to post this blog that this is the only digital picture I have of my car! Anyway, when I was living in Vegas, I purchased a Chrysler Sebring convertible -- I REALLY wanted a convertible! That car was CRAP!!!!! As my former roommates may recall, in the 2 years I owned that car, it literally spent more time at the shop than it did with me and I put $10,000 into that car during those two years. But I kept thinking "there's nothing left to fix on this car" and so I would fix it "just one more time" thinking that would be it. Well, when the regulator of my window broke at the 2 year/$10,000 mile mark, I decided to cut my losses, turn in the car and buy a brand new Honda Civic. My Uncle Dan, who passed away last year, was a car connosior and swore that Hondas were the best cars. I decided to trust him on this and in 2002, bought my Honda Civic. My little Honda moved me from Vegas to California, spent my entire 2 1/2 years of Huntington Beach life with me and then moved me from California to Maryland when I married Dave. She has been in two accidents with me (the first one is the one pictured) and although she got pretty hurt, she protected me very well and recovered quite nicely from both accidents. She only goes to the shop for routine wear and tear and gets 32 miles/gallon. So, happy 100,000 miles Honda!

Happy Halloween!

We had a great Halloween this year! Dave had the day off work which was so nice! We took Tinkerbell and our little Pumpkin to the neighborhood Halloween party which was great. They had a parade for all the kids followed by hitting pinatas for candy and then a pizza dinner. Lacey found a new neighborhood friend in the form of a ladybug :)

Tinkerbell loves her baby pumpkin.

Our little Pumpkins

Last weekend, we had beautiful Fall weather. We decided to take the kids to pick out a pumpkin. As you can see, Tanner dressed as a pumpkin for the occasion; I'm sure he'll hold that over our heads when he gets older!

I don't know why Dave and I actually thought Lacey would care about choosing out the perfect pumpkin. As soon as she saw the Moonbounce, it was all over. I could read her mind..."pumpkin, schmumpkin -- I'm headed this way -see ya later!"

Moonbounce

The View

Over a year ago, just for fun I put in for some tickets to be in the live studio audience of The View. I never heard back and I totally forgot about it.... until 2 tickets arrived in my mailbox a few weeks ago. Now that I had a toddler and a baby, it took some effort, but we worked it all out. I decided to invite my mother-in-law, Rita, to the show with me. Grandpa watched Lacey here in Maryland while Rita, Dave, Tanner and I went to NYC. Dave watched Tanner while Rita and I went to the show. Conveniently, the Regis and Kelly show tapes just up the street from the View, so Dave was able to introduce Tanner to Kelly. I think Dave was a little more excited about the introduction than Tanner! :)
Don't ask me how I ended up down on the floor dancing. Anyway, here I am "busting a groove!"
The guest for the day was Bill Clinton. I had mixed feelings about this. On one hand, I am far from being a Clinton fan. On the other hand, it was kind of a neat experience being in such close proximity for an extended period of time with a former President.
Here's Whoopi with her hideous red plastic shoes.
Bill with "The Ladies." No surprise that Whoopi and Joy are the ones with their arms wrapped around him!

I'm Tired

I've always wanted to be a mom. I loved baby-sitting families with babies when I was a teenager and I loved holding the babies of my friends once I got into my 20's. As I got into my late 20's, one of my pet peeves was when I would hear people complain about various things relating to their babies or small kids. I would think to myself, "I would love to be in your shoes and have a baby to complain about." And I vowed to myself that once I had children, whenever that might be, I wouldn't complain about it, even when times got tough.

Fast forward.... I had my first baby at age 30, my second baby 17 months later. Last night, I got home from work at 7pm. Dave had put Tanner down 30 minutes earlier, but Lacey was still up. I was holding Lacey enjoying my one on one time with her when I heard Tanner screaming. I gave Lacey to Dave and went upstairs, nursed Tanner and got him back to bed around 7:45 or so. Then I got Lacey ready for bed and put her down. It felt so good to just relax..... for about 20 minutes until Tanner woke up again. I fed him again (some of you have commented on his size; he's 20# at 3 months and this kid can eat!), held him and rocked him and got him down around 9:30 at which point I was so exhausted (because this has been happening every night), we just went to bed. The pillow felt really good... for 2 hours until Tanner woke up again, wanting to eat. I got up, nursed him, held him, rocked him and got him back down. I laid back down and was just starting to feel myself relax when I heard a scream from down the hall. As much as it hurt, I got up to check on Lacey. She was sick (diarrhea), so I got her out of bed, changed her, went into the guest bedroom and tried to lay down with her and get her back to sleep. I did this for over an hour (until 2:15) and realized this wasn't going to work, so I put her back into her bed. She screamed and I went back to my room. Just as her screams started dying down and I could tell she was falling asleep.... Tanner wakes up (2:30). I feel like crying. Dave must have read my mind because he got up and made him a bottle (I'd nursed him so much at this point, I had nothing left anyway!). He slept in ~45 minute increments until shortly after 5 when I realized that he was up for good. My day had started even though yesterday's never ended. But I am sticking to my vow - I am not complaining. I am just realizing what I didn't realize in my pre-kid days. Every stage of life has its challenges. I have to go now - Tanner is screaming his head off.

We Did It!

Kerry and I ran the Baltimore Half-Marathon today. This wasn't Kerry's first long distance race, but it was for me. I had only ran 5Ks prior to today. The weather was awesome, but maybe a bit too warm. It was almost 80 degrees and the course included a lot of hills that Kerry and I didn't really train for in advance. But the important thing is that we both finished and never had to stop to walk. I have to say that I actually enjoyed myself, but I'm still never going to run a marathon. I also have to give mad props to my wife for running this race just 3 months after having Tanner! If it wasn't for her ambition, we wouldn't have even thought about running it.

Before the race, in front of the Raven's Stadium.


After the race, proudly showing off our medals that included a crab, natch.


And here's our celebratory lunch! Pizza, chips, and soda. And not one ounce of guilt either.

There's Always Next Year....

This is a phrase all too familiar to any loyal Cub fan. We have been waiting and waiting and waiting....... for next year. Next year eventually comes; sometimes it offers hope (like this year) and other years it doesn't (like most other years). But even the years of hope, for 100 years in a row, have ended in disappointment. I expect to live another 50-60 years. I hope a Cubs World Series will happen in my lifetime, but I believe in statistics and they aren't on my side. Therefore I am producing future Cubs fans at a rather rapid rate as you can see, and can at least hope that maybe in their lifetime, it could possibly happen. Game 3 starts in 90 minutes and they must win this game (and the next two) to stay in the playoffs. I can only deal with so much, so I am trying to not get my hopes up too high, but like any true Cub fan, I am cautiously optimistic and know that if for some reason they lose again tonight..... there's always next year.

Fun at the Zoo

We had a wonderful day at the Baltimore Zoo on Wednesday! Lacey, Tanner and I joined our friends Britney (with Camden), Emily (with Bentley) and Laura. Above are the 3 one-year olds eyeing the elephants. Lacey's favorite part, however was the petting zoo.

Bad Hair Day

Our 3 month is already sporting a punk hair-do! Dave sent me flowers while he was on mancation to thank him for letting him go (and probably in hopes that the flowers may work to let him go again sometime! Nope!) :) Anyway, they were on their last breath yesterday, so while I had Tanner in the Baby Bjorn in front of me, I grabbed the flowers out of the vase and carried them outside to put in the lawn refuse bag. Somehow, during the transfer of my hands to the bag, all the pollen from the center of the flowers dumped on my baby's head! Have you ever tried to get pollen out of your baby's hair and skin? Probably not since most of you are smart enough to never get it there in the first place! Anyway, I had just finished giving him a bath and we needed to go to church, so, I tried a wet paper towel, instant hand sanitizer, baby wipes, etc. -- all to no avail.

Our solution -- he wore a hat to church! And, on a side note. I took the kids to the park this morning (with the permanent pollen still on Tanner's head). Bees started hovering around us. I had never noticed bees at this park before. Then I realized -- they were attracted to Tanner, my "flower child." Needless, to say, we didn't last too long at the park! And yes, my son's head is still orange, so if you have any ideas....

Libraries and kids - bad combo

I realize I just posted a blog like an hour ago, but I have one more thing I want to say.... I miss the Naperville Library! Why? Because it has a drive-thru! I had some books that were due today, so I packed both kids into the car and headed off to the library. After unloading them from the car, I put them in the double stroller and headed into the library. As long as I was there, I decided to get a couple new books. Lacey, however, was not about to just "sit there" while mom looked for books. Against my better judgement, I decided to let her out of the stroller, instructing her to stay right by me. I don't know why I bothered wasting my breath considering the fact the girl was in another aisle before I finished my sentence! She seemed to just be having fun going from aisle to aisle, so I focused on the shelves for a minute and picked out a couple of books (maybe 30 seconds of not watching Lacey). I turned around and there were books and CD's all over the floor - but no Lacey. I start picking everything up while Tanner starts screaming and trying to look and listen for Lacey. A nice man says "looking for her?" as he points to a little blond girl running the other way. Why yes I am.... I chase her, put back the books and go get Tanner (who is still crying). Then I look down and realize she had a CD in her hand -- I have no idea where it came from. I look up at one of the librarians and ask her if she has any idea where the CD goes. She just took it from me and said she would figure it out. I apologized and thanked her, then went to check out my book. The lady tells me that the due date is October 16th right as the lady who I gave the CD to, comes up and says to the lady checking me out, "Do you know where this CD goes? This young lady in the purple (pointing to Lacey) was "helping" us with it and I can't find where it goes." I sheepishly apologized again and responded,"I'll try not to come back before October 16th."

Lions and Tigers and Bears, oh my!

Well, at least bears anyway. This past weekend, we decided to do some post-mancation family bonding :) We drove to Shenandoah National Park, about 2 1/2 hours away. It was beautiful! Skyline Drive is a 105 mile stretch of road that runs through the National Park and the Blue Ridge Mountains. We stayed at the Skyline Lodge, located at mile 41 of Skyline Drive. We went on a hike by our lodge and ran into this bear. I was hoping he wouldn't mistake my kids for little snacks! But he didn't seem to really even notice us and we just watched him wander the woods for a while. Very cool!
The view from the beginning of Skyline Drive.

We saw lots of deer.
There was even a playground at our lodge, so Lacey was a happy girl!

Mancation

You know you've married a good woman when she has two kids under the age of two and she actually encourages you to go on a vacation without her. I went to Vegas this past weekend where I hung out with a mission friend for the first part of my trip and with two of Kerry's cousins for the last part. There was a lot of food, tennis, pool time, movies, more food, sleeping (which was a highlight for me since I didn't have a baby waking me up) and good times that were had. However, that's all I'm going to write, for as the saying goes, what happens in Vegas.....

Weekend at the Open

This past weekend, Kerry's cousin, Seth, flew into town to go to the US Open in NYC. We had tickets to both men's semifinals and the women's final. But, as luck would have it, Tropical Storm Hanna was bearing down to hit NYC on the very day we were going to be there. Regardless, we drove up Saturday morning with hope that we would get to see some tennis. We were kinda bummed because we were scheduled to see the top 4 players in the world duke it out, but since they were scheduled to play the semifinals back to back, we didn't think we'd get to see both matches. So, the first match was Federer vs. Djokovic. We watched about a set when we decided to head to the Armstrong Stadium.

Why, you ask? Well, we had heard that the US Open was contemplating starting the other semifinal match on another court so that they could get both matches in before the rain, even though everyone had paid to see both matches that day. This would be the first time they had ever played both matches simulataneously. So, we went to the other stadium and sure enough, they decided to begin quietly letting people enter the stadium. Since this was unplanned, it was first come first serve when it came to seats. So, Seth and I ran to get some awesome seats - 2nd row behind the baseline. They had yet to announce to everyone else that the Nadal/Murray match was going to start play soon. So, when the players came out to warm-up, the stadium was empty and we were sitting in $3k seats for free! Sure, it was a bummer that we had to make a choice to see one match or the other, but Seth I think we made the right choice. We saw 2.5 sets of tennis, and Charlize Theron, before the rain finally came and washed out play for the rest of the day. For reasons I won't go into on the blog, we decided not to stay until Sunday afternoon and night to watch the remainder of the match and the women's final. But we also think that sitting so close kinda ruined the rest of the Open for us. It just wouldn't be the same watching from the nosebleeds.

Here I am in the upper bowl of Arthur Ashe Stadium where our original seats were.

And here we are at our courtside seats at Armstrong Stadium. 2nd Row, baby!

Nadal to serve.

As Kerry would like to say, we were in the "sweat" zone.

This is a picture I found on the Internet. You'll notice Seth and myself in the background. Luckily I decided to wear some bright colors that day, unknowingly it would make it easier to spot us in the crowd on TV and the Internet!

All in all, it was an awesome Saturday in the NYC.