Last weekend, we had spring like weather and we took an impromptu family walk ( with the red wagon of course) to enjoy all the sunshine.

Bun: “I push Mama”

Linking the photo portion to the Simple Things Challenge over on Simple as that

Notes to Self:

Life in January seems to be starting out well. I have 2012 set aside to figure out what I want to do with the my life? Am I really a grown up yet? So many things to learn and figure out.

Some good friends are going to be returning to Durham for a visit this weekend. It is making me really happy to think we’ll get to hang out with them and even though they met Bun when he was baby, it will be like meeting him all over again, since he is completely different now. I’m also looking forward to some, fun, crazy grown up time with them as well.

Bun’s sentences and sayings are killing me these days. Faves of this week-

Me: Lets go upstairs and clean your poop and change your diaper

Bun: I’m sick of clean up

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Bun: (Sniffs Layla’s bum) Layla need diapoo change

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“I’m Okay” He says this whenever he needs some reassurance or has bumped his head, but not hurt himself enough to get any reaction from me.

“Daddy, you give me____” Usually followed by something I won’t give him aka blueberries, lollipop or candy

“What a Funny Fellow” My dad taught him this phrase and he says this with the biggest grin on his face whenever he or anyone else does something funny or silly.

Earlier this week J, Bun and I were getting ready to head out and run errands. And while I was getting ready, I asked J if he would help Bun get ready. Father and Son came up with this outfit. Although the boots, belt and hat are all Bun’s pick! I have to say, I kinda love his style! He is wearing Khaki courdrouys (my pick) Red Shirt ( My pick ) Grey Stripe Cardigan(J’s pick)  J’s belt looped around cardigan, Green Rain boats and sailor hat (Bun’s pick). We did convince him to take off the belt before we headed out of the house because I really didn’t want to deal with it falling down, once we were out and about.

The pics are super blurry because he would not be still and we were in a hurry to get out the door.

P.S Please not that the boots are on the wrong foot and he would not let us fix it. He put them on himself after all

In January, when the weather is 65 degrees and clear and the afternoon sun is shining on the playground down the street, it is absolutely necessary to spend the afternoon at the sandbox with dump truck. So it has always been and so it will always be.

Photos from my iphone

I’m not doing resolutions…don’t think I ever really have. Of course there are always goals that I’m working towards, but I don’t think they are related to the new year- Lose baby weight has been a goal since before I had a baby…its just that there is more of it now.

However, there are a few things I do want to do this year and just want a reminder for self.

***Send Holiday cards- Completely dropped the ball on this one, this year and it is making me sad. I love getting other people’s holiday cards and photos and I love sending them too.

***Ensure the existence of 4 family pictures taken in 2012. Meaning photos not taken with the iphone by me or J. It can be taken either by self timer or another person. Also, I’d like one for each season, please

***Do not wait till July to buy a swimsuit for Bun or self. All the cute ones are gone and they are still not on post season sale yet

***Cut bangs again or color hair again. Only not a boring brown.

***Cute flats. They are my best friend. I didnt’ really embrace being on the short side until this year. But there is now no going back. Comfort- Check. Style -Check

***More blog posts like this. A photo I’m loving of my kid, plus random thoughts. Some of the the big milestone blog posts stress me out because there are just too many photos to sort through. Like Bun’s party. Must post those soon.

***Find Answers. I need some about life, love, career, motherhood. I need to learn more and actively find answers

***Print. Frame. Display Photos. In my house. I have so many pretty frames with no photos

***Garden Again. This Summer.

***Disconnect Cable. Or think really long and hard about it. At least make the phone call.

Hmmm…I wonder if I’ll remember more once I hit publish.

Happy New Year!

I am starting out 2012 a little bit behind on blogging and life in general but it’s a new year and I am optimistic that not only will I catch up but life and blogging will have improved in 2012.

To embrace the spirit of new and different this post is being published from the wordpress app for iPhone. Woot woot!

Looking forward to all the potential that 2012 brings! Cheers

“Mo Trains” “Only Trains” – Avi

This play at the train table lasted hours….

And then, we wrapped up the day with an awesome dinner at my Mom’s house

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Still have to look through photos on my mom’s camera- so perhaps Christmas.3 will follow

J and I woke up really tired on Christmas morning, since we went to bed really really late because we stayed up practically all night on Christmas Eve. When Bun woke up that morning we just brought him into bed with us and let him watch a few Yo Gabba Gabba videos, I snuck down and got him a cup of milk too, just so we could sleep a little bit more. We ended up heading downstairs almost close to 8:30

And Then This happened:

Photos!!!!!

And of course more photos!!!

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Notes to Self about Bun and his Christmas as a 2 yr old

Me: {Points to presents under christmas tree} What’s under tree Avi?

Bun: A Twee Kirt (Tree Skirt)

Repeat a variation of this conversation almost every day we had the tree up. We have been watching the Christmas episode of Yo Gabba Gabba on heavy rotation and they mention putting a tree skirt once for like a second and it absolutely captured his imagination. I secretly think he would have been just happy if we told him the tree skirt was his present instead of the train table

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Bun pronouncing Christmas as “Grizmuz”

Bun saying “Thanks Santa” and then following it up with “Welcome Santa”

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Bun’s obsession with the “Dog” Stockings. We had stocking up by our fireplace and my mom also had them up at her house. My mother being the overachiever  had  stockings up for the two dogs as well. They had little paw prints on them and were really not spectacular in any other way especially compared to the other ones. But it caught his fancy, he was obsessed with talking about “Yaya Tocking” and “Maggie Tocking.” He didn’t really even mention or glance at the other ones, even his own.

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After the excitement of the presents had died down. J and I were cooking our big christmas brunch in the kitchen while Bun played with the Train Table and looking through our kitchen doorway and seeing the absorbed joy on my kiddo’s face was just an amazing feeling.

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Take more pictures of details and self. Stuff no one else in my family seems to care about. give directions if needed.

Baileys in our christmas morning coffee and I think we are definitely going to have to make this a tradition.

Put the tree up sooner next year

A few more weeks, and Bun will leave behind even more of babyhood far far behind.

I told J the other day that everyday that the better I am at my job, the more obsolete I become. As Bun grows and gets smarter and funnier and more capable, the more I fade from his life. I wouldn’t have it any other way though,  Its a bittersweet existence- being a mom.

These past few weeks, before he turns the Big 2 have been some of my favorite and most most frustrating times with Bun. He is willful and stubborn and pushes his boundaries all the time but he is also sweet and funny and he still loves me best in the world!

The most amazing thing has been seeing Bun transition from just repeating words, to forming phrases and this week putting together sentences. He wants to have conversations, recall the day’s events and even make toddler jokes! He also loves snuggles and hugs and kisses and will give them voluntarily.

Things I want to remember

I gotcha – I have no idea where he learned this but he says this when he finds one of his cars that have been “hiding”

Too Many- According to Bun , he has too many cars, too many toys and too many “Nacks” (Snacks). There are too many babies at the library and too many fire trucks in his book. Too many in his world is a good thing.

Where is ____? Avi, feet, toys. Anything that he hides and then recovers.

He has also discovered negatives, so he is proud to point out when something isn’t what it is. So he says things like “Not baby tummy, mumma tummy” and of course many other variations on this….”Not red couch, brown couch”…etc etc.

Hol ma hand peez- Hold my Hand please- said in a very stern voice

Boos Boos Watch now peez- Blues Clues watch now please

Momma Nuggles- Snuggles with Momma. He asks for these all the time lately. He was getting up in the middle of the night for a few days in a row while he was teething and I asked him why he kept waking up and he answered “Momma Nuggles”

Mamma Naina-  This is what he calls me now. I don’t know how many moms he thinks he has, that he needs to specify me by name.

He is still obsessed with cars, trucks, bull dozer and any and all kinds of farm machinery and construction vehicles. He lines up all his vehicles very very carefully and then randomly just messes them up.

He also has a strong love for all farm animals and we have many conversations about what the animals that live in the barn at our local musuem might be doing at a given time.

He is still not crazy about slides but he loves running around playing in the park and every once in a while he’ll even go down the slide a few times. His favorite thing in the park our outside is to throw the leaves in the air or collect pinecones and sticks.

I have seen him do some pretend play lately too. He pretends our couch is an ozeen (ocean) and his cars are boats. He pretends his frosted mini wheats are cars. I’m getting so excited for him to create more and more elaborate pretend play scenarios.

Jumping on furniture is another favorite activity and I have a really tough time keeping him from hurting himself as he “bounce” on our couch and bed.

He still hates 90% of all food – His only acceptable food choices are Chocolate Milk ( I mix carnation into his milk as per peds instructions) Wagula Milk (Regular White Milk) Pumpkin Bad (Bread), Idli (Indian rice cakes), Apple sauce and Hot Dogs. He will however eat any kind of fruit and yogurt. So thats what he eats on most days.

He is a really good sleeper and usually doesn’t wake up during the night but nap times have been really hard. I’m lucky if I get a 40 minute nap or one at all most days. Hence the lack of blogging. He is good about quiet time and will play in his crib for an hour or so but it still makes him really cranky in the afternoon and if we aren’t out at a play date it can quickly become meltdown central. Thankfully this week he has napped a little more consistently. I’m really hoping we can get back on track again.

I’m glad we made the most of it yesterday. Since it was Fire Safety Month, we toured our local fire station and then after nap time we explored a brand new park in our area.

Besides, I had to test out my iPhone 4S. It is so much cooler than my old clunky blackberry. I absolutely adore the flipview camera feature.

I was unsure if Bun would have fun, since we were in a group of slightly older kids, but he absolutely loved the fire station or as he calls it – Fire Truck House.

I also downloaded instagram on my iPhone. I am hooked!

mmm

Missing from pictures was the Fire Station’s Ambulance- Or Bun’s new love. He has been talking about the fire station non stop today, especially the Ambulance (Bun word- Adumance)

The Park

I read about Old Chapel Hill Park on this great website for Durham Moms and after nap time drove out to check it out with the Bun.  It had cool modern equipment that I haven’t seen in any other park in our area.

mm

I don’t know if it was the time of day, but we didn’t really see too many kids Bun’s age, they were all older, so we mostly played by ourselves. But we had a great time anyway.

When we drove home, Bun didn’t want to go inside so we headed out to the trail behind our house for some leaf stomping fun.

Because iphone uploads the photo on iPhoto on my mac, I played around in iPhoto for the first time today. I don’t care for it too much- I still prefer Picasa and Photoshop, but it was fun to play around.

Hence the overload of filters and effects.

The Brave one- This boy child of mine

This boy had blood work done today a few days ago, to test why he won’t put on any weight. He sat in my lap and I snuggled him, while he played with his car. I whispered in his ear that it would hurt, but he had to be brave

I asked the Phlebotomist if he would hurt? If he would cry? She said yes. I hate needles and blood. When she stuck it in his teeny tiny vein in his inner elbow, I couldn’t bear to look. I closed my eyes and waited for him to cry. I was on the verge of tears myself, dealing with the thought of my baby being in pain.  I was failing him, Thats why we were here, getting blood work done on a 22month old

Just like breastfeeding before, I was failing motherhood. I could not do the basics- feed my son

There was no sound. He did not cry. He did not whimper, just looked slightly annoyed, that it was taking so long.

She pulled the needle out and told me it was over. I took a quick peek at the syringe, it was big and dark red.

The phlebotomist said  ”He is a tough one”

This Brave boy of mine.