Thankful

Fortunately in my life, flowers seem to bloom after a rain. Maybe it is the fact that I typically try to find a positive in even a gloomy situation, but there really is a silver lining to most of life's trials. I write this now to serve as a reminder in the future when things might not go so smoothly. :)

Today's example: If you read this often, you know that we've all had colds and Connor had a little bug even before that. Let me just say that calming a sick baby is quite an exhausting challenge. His cold has barely kept him down and after the vomiting, it is a breeze. But there was/is silver lining to even his cold! Although not confirmed by a doctor, I think the sinus pressure or something has unclogged his left tear duct! I haven't had to wipe his eyes in about 3 days and his eyelashes are dry on that side (they haven't been in weeks and weeks...look closely at his pictures and you can see.) If it has indeed unclogged, this is fantastic news! If it hadn't fixed itself in a year he would have had to have a little procedure to surgically unclog it. Now that won't be necessary! YAY!

On another topic, Connor keeps the hours of a teenager. It really is pretty ridiculous and I blame myself for allowing it to happen. He consistently doesn't go to sleep until between 11:00 pm and midnight...sometimes later. Let me just tell you that by that point at night, I am beat. Brian is a big help putting him to sleep, but since he's been traveling so much I am absolutely exhausted by 9:00....and I've still got at least 2 hours of "entertaining" to do! I am so thankful that it is typically happy playing and not of the screaming variety, but regardless, I blame myself. I'm sure if I got up every morning at 7:00 with an agenda for the day then C would be used to it and follow suit. Oh well. The upside to teenage hours is that he sleeps in pretty well. :) Last night he set a new record for himself....(drumroll please)......9 hours and 10 minutes of consecutive sleeping! He went to sleep at 11:00 and woke up for the first time at 8:10! He ate and then slept for another hour and a half. So, once again, I am thankful. If it requires him being a night owl in order to get so much consecutive sleep, then it is worth all the walking, bouncing and playing in the late hours of the night.

This post is longer than I intended already. Ok, I'm done. Must sleep now.

Meeting Santa Claus!

We're going to meet Santa!!!

(Playing with the "baby in the mirror" before getting in the car.)

On Tuesday evening in Grand Rapids, we decided to find a Santa Claus. We were just going to go to the mall, but several people told Brian that the Frederik Meijer Gardens and Sculpture Park would be a fun place for us to go while we were in town. So, we checked it out. There were over 40 trees decorated in holiday tradition around the world.....and Santa was coming to visit! Santa stayed in his sleigh in a corridor of the facility near the entrance so although we originally planned on taking Connor's hat off for the big meeting, we left it on for warmth. Mrs. Claus was quite taken with our little man and didn't want to give him up. Connor liked her too and was fascinated with her red velvet outfit! I think he tried to eat it a few times. :) I guess next year will be the big test to see if he is still so willing to "sit" in Santa's lap.

We all enjoyed looking at all the trees and Connor really liked the lights and all the people. He was awake until the very end and snoozed in his carseat as we walked through the outdoor sculpture part in the snow! Overall, it was a very fun experience and once again I'm thankful that Connor does well around people!

After a day of playing in the hotel, and an evening with Santa and people watching, we were shocked that Connor still had so much energy! He yelled and kicked on the bed for well over 30 minutes "wrestling" with dad and just having a ball. This was his commando time...his favorite time of day. We shield ourselves with a towel to prevent golden showers, and he doesn't seem to mind a bit.

Then, the fun continued in the bathtub. Of course we didn't take our baby tub, but he really loved kicking in the "big boy" tub with his head on a towel. This lasted for over 30 minutes too. I was sure he was going to be pruny when he got out. He still has a cold, but the vapor bath in the tub seemed to help and it obviously hasn't slowed him down too much. Needless to say, he slept well that night.

I don't know why he looks so extremely yellow in this video. It isn't so bad until I upload it...oh well. He is NOT yellow. :)

By about noon on Friday when we were ready to leave, Connor was pretty much tuckered out. I love this little picture because he is holding the rattle in his hand, and yet he still has his thumb tucked under. He was sucking his lip too, but you can't tell that from a photo. Once again, he was a great little trooper on the 5 hours journey home. Mitsy and Toonces were happy to see us all when we got here!

Swimming in Michigan with Daddy!

Last week, Connor and I joined Brian in Grand Rapids, Michigan for the week. He's been having to spend a lot of time up there in the last month, so we just camped out in the hotel room during the day and then got to spend our evenings together.

We took advantage of the indoor pool and Connor got to SWIM! Of course it was about 15ºF outside with tons of snow, but the pool was actually warm and Connor seemed to enjoy it....at least there was no screaming. :) Thanks to the Mayfields for his stylish swim trunks....he still has LOTS of room to grow! The little swimmers diapers were huge too. I guess most 3.5 month old babies don't go swimming?

Weems/Toscani Wedding 11-15-08

At last, Connor is taking a nap and I am FINALLY uploading pictures and videos from this wonderful event. Let me start off by saying that Lara and her mother, the Weems family and anyone else involved thought of absolutely everything and the whole weekend was a lot of fun....every detail was perfect. :)

Mr. & Mrs. Nealon were coming to the wedding as well, so we all piled into Brian's company car (thank you J&J) and headed for Philadelphia on Friday morning, November 14th. If I am remembering correctly, it took us a little over 7 hours to get there and Connor was a champ. We were a little cramped in the back seat with 2 adults and a pretty big car seat, but Leslie and I were able to keep him happy and entertained the whole time (thanks to rattles, musical things, and a little Baby Einstein on my laptop!). He was a little trooper the whole weekend, but I am especially thankful he was good in the car....that could have been LONG ride!

After we arrived on Friday and got settled into our hotel, the Nealons babysat while Brian and I went to a cocktail hour hosted by Mr. & Mrs. Weems that followed the rehearsal. It was fun to get to see the crew again and although we missed our little man, it was nice to have a night out without him. :) I'm also not sure how it could have happened (I blame multiple moves and having a baby) but Brian and I met Bert Bondi for the first time! Bert is Megan's husband and I feel like we've been friends for years because I've heard so much about him, but it was great to finally get to meet in person. Megan, he's a keeper (despite the whole SEC thing :)). By the way, Bert, you owe me lots of pictures from the wedding and the cookoff....I know you say people always just say they'll send pictures, but I'm waiting!Overall, the whole evening was a lot of fun, and only a precursor to the next day. I have no pictures of Lara because she was only there for a very short time...I don't blame her....she needed her beauty sleep. :)The wedding was the following day in the afternoon. We sat in the back row with Connor in his car seat in case he decided to erupt for some reason. Thankfully he was an angel and we enjoyed the entire, beautiful wedding.Just Married! Mr. & Mrs. Aaron Weems
I love this one because you can see Lara's beautiful dress!

We killed time between the wedding and reception by driving around Philadelphia and Pat and Leslie got to see the Liberty Bell for the first time. I obviously have no photos since I was in the car with munchkin.

The reception (like the wedding) was absolutely stunning. It was held at the Rittenhouse Hotel in historic Philadelphia. There was a cocktail hour and then a beautiful dinner and dancing. The band was absolutely fantastic! (see video below) and I think it is an understatement to say that everyone had a good time. Once again, Connor came through in the clutch and was a great little baby. I think he was very entertained by all the people, lights and movement. He stayed with us through dinner and many of the reception milestones, then I took him and the Nealon's back to the hotel, then went back to the party myself. I missed some of the fun parts of the night including "It's Raining Men" that I looked forward to because of Bert's love of it, but I'm glad Brian got it on video. :)
Here are 2 videos of the fun reception. The bride and groom were so busy we weren't able to snap any of just the two of them....

So Far Behind!

AAAhhh. I refuse to let blogging become like scrapbooking in that it is so easy to fall behind and get really overwhelmed! So, I'm going to be upfront in what I need to write about....
• Weems/Toscani wedding in Philadelphia
• My mom's quick visit to Ohio
• Thanksgiving in Avon Lake
• 4th Annual Kaczka/Weems Chili-Cook-Off
(guess who took home first prize?!?!!!!)
• Radio City Rockettes and Christmas Crafting with Kellie Kraven

So, that is 4 posts, right...I'll try to knock them out soon. The wedding is really unacceptable because it was so long ago...are Aaron and Lara even newlyweds anymore?!

To jump ahead to the present, Connor and I are with Brian in Michigan for the week! He has had to travel to Grand Rapids to help with various projects in this area for the past couple of weeks and has to come back again next week, so we thought we'd tag along so Brian doesn't have to miss most of Connor's 3rd month. :)

Last week (after Thanksgiving) Connor was sick...poor guy. He caught some sort of virus/bug and had a rough few days. He had a fever on Sunday night and was vomiting up most of what he ate. Of course soothing a sick baby is a very tough task, especially when he just wanted to eat, but then whatever he ate would just come back up. I ended up taking him to the doctor just to make sure it wasn't an ear infection or something like that. He checked him for dehydration and looked him over pretty good. He said it was just a bug and would hopefully be gone soon. Sure enough, it took a few days, but he was back to being himself again. One of the nurses warned me that he might get a cold after the bug....well, it has arrived. It hit in the middle of the night on Saturday night and you could just hear the congestion when he breathed. :( I've gotten pretty good with the bulb syringe now and am able to suck some of the gunk out, but he still sucks a lot of it down on his own, so although he can't tell me, I bet his throat is scratchy. Although we have a really good humidifier at our house, that doesn't help us much in a hotel in MI! So, we'll likely try to pick up a cheap one this evening. Hopefully the humidifier combined with the "vapor bath" and soothing vapors night light that we already have plugged in, he'll be able to shake this cold soon.

While we are in town we hope to visit Santa and maybe take a dip in the hotel pool (only if it is warm...we aren't going to torture the baby who already had a cold!)

Connor "Talks"

Of course he isn't saying words, but this is more than just cooing. :)

Happy Thanksgiving to all....we have SO much to be thankful for!

He has also discovered his hands (as well as his voice as you can see in the video). To his dismay, both fists do not fit in his mouth at the same time. Since he doesn't take a pacifier it will be interesting to see if he ends up sucking on any fingers.

Milestone at 13 Weeks!

Rolling Practice last night with Dad!

After practice with mom...nice hair, buddy. :)

Practice paid off....HE DID IT!
I love love love this video...spit up and all. :)

What a big accomplishment! Yay, Connor!

This is how Connor has been making his fists for a while now. I just happened to get it on camera during his rolling session today. He does it with both hands and tries to put both fists in his mouth at the same time. Very cute...slobber everywhere.




We got more snow last night and today...sheesh....over a foot!

OH MY GOODNESS....ridiculous

Some of you might have read a post about the Grover Chair from a few months ago. Well, the saga continues. No, we STILL do not have our chair. I was promised the end of October and well, now it is almost the end of November and as of about 30 minutes ago I am completely back to square one. Our chair arrived at the warehouse on Tuesday.....DAMAGED. You have got to be kidding me.

So, Jim gave me a few options. Best Chairs was willing to sell me the grover chair at 1/2 price...which is still over $300. Um, no. Otherwise I would have to start the whole order all over again. At this point, I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place because if I refuse to do business with these people (Sweet Dreams Baby) then I will just have to pay full price somewhere else and still wait about 8 weeks. So, I started talking discounts. After all, I still want the chair....I wanted it 17 weeks ago when I ordered it the first time! So, it has been ordered again. They are rushing the order which means it should ship in 5 weeks....so I'm hoping it will be here for my birthday on February 2. In the meantime we will keep the grover chair until it gets in....and my debit card better see a credit of at least $175 sometime in the next few days!

For any pregnant people in the northeast Ohio area.....DO NOT do business with Sweet Dreams Baby! They just opened a 2nd store in the Canton area but it has the same owners so I'm boycotting there too. It would be one thing if the store was overly apologetic and offered to give me all sorts of stuff...but no. He didn't even bring up taking money off the next chair...I had to do that. What kind of business practice is that?! So, spread the word......boycott this store. If you don't you might not get the stuff for your kid until he/she is a toddler!

Ok, enough venting....I just still can't believe this crap!

By the way...it is snowing again.

Connor's First Big Snow...and getting even bigger!

It started snowing yesterday.....and hasn't really stopped. Although we do not live directly in the "snow belt" we sure have gotten a bunch of lake effect snow this time! I guess the snow forms as it goes across Lake Erie from west to east. Anyway, it is just a shame that Connor isn't old enough to build a snowman or have a snowball fight because the snow is the perfect packing consistency!
These pictures go from yesterday afternoon to a few minutes ago when Toonces snuck out while I was trying to get a picture of the huge mounds on our deck furniture. The image to the right yas yesterday afternoon. I was excited that there was some accumulation on the deck furniture! (little did I know what was coming!)

Today I hesitated to bundle Connor up and take him outside, but I couldn't resist. I waited for the snow to stop and I got him bundled. It really wasn't all that cold. I wasn't even wearing a jacket, just a vest...no gloves. I guarantee that the crying is NOT because he is cold, but just because I put him down. At this point, he'd calmed down, but I think he continued to squint because the snow was so bright.
Believe it or not, I actually found this snow suit for him in Georgia....it was on clearance at Babies 'R Us in Atlanta....I don't think any kid would ever need this extreme of a snow suit in GA!
I avoided putting him down again for a little while and took this walking shot. I actually like the way shadows of the trees look, but that was just a chance. I'm lucky I got his little face in the shot at all. :) For some reason his cheeks look a lot bigger when he is all bundled up!

I tried to get an accurate picture of how deep the snow had gotten by this afternoon around 4:00 or so. I think we probably had about 5-6 inches by that point.
This picture was taken on our front porch in an adirondak chair. Connor was a little trooper to go in the snow once again. I really wanted to put him in it to make the cutest snow angel you've ever seen, but I resisted.

This deck shot and this one of the front of the house were taken during the same time as all the Connor pictures this afternoon. Thank goodness our Home Owner's Association is responsible for plowing our street and even our driveway. I think they salted too because the snow didn't start accumulating on the driveway again until much later tonight.

The snow only stopped for a short time and then picked right back up again. I caught Mitsy and Toonces watching it come down. I think they liked being all warm inside, but then curiosity got Toonces....I don't think anyone is surprised about that!

This is a good picture of what our entire backyard looked like earlier tonight. I love the way the snow is piled up on the grasses, weighting them down. Connor was sitting in one of these chairs in the picture above...but these have about 2-3 inches of additional snow here.

Connor, nice and warm in Mom & Dad's bed. Since Brian is out of town, I'm letting the tiny guy be my bed buddy. It also allows me to just keep our room nice and toasty without having to heat the whole house. :) Of course a few minutes after this picture was taken, he woke up. Nowadays he doesn't like to go to bed until after midnight....then he sleeps until about 10:00 am (waking up once or twice). I'm not sure how I'm going to break him of that!

Here is Connor's tree. I don't think you can really tell how big it is in this picture, but the snow really makes it look like Christmas!

I don't know what this dog's name is, but it came to visit us once before. It lives nearby, but it doesn't usually roam the neighborhood. It greeted me on the back porch when I turned the light on to check out the snow and the thought that his owners are/were careless enough to leave him outside when it is 20-something degrees drives me insane. Once Connor fell asleep (for a little nap) about 30 minutes later when I was outside snapping these pictures he greeted me again. Brian promised me (over the phone) that the dog was fine and was probably just having fun playing in the snow, and that I didn't need to rescue him into the garage. He better not be out in the morning or I will save him from the cold and call his parents and tell them off!
Another shot of the front of our house.....a lot more snow tonight. I love the way the snow looks on all the berries. You can also get a good idea of volume based on the fire hydrant. The stick with the blue on the top is for the snow removal people so they can tell where our grass begins and hopefully won't drive into our yard. It is amazing that our flower beds are basically unrecognizable!

It just keeps snowing and snowing. By about 11:00 tonight we'd gotten even more snow and it continues to fall. I'm not sure how much....based on the chairs it looks like about 10 inches or so! RIDICULOUS. The truly amazing part is that I called Leslie (before 11:00) and she said that Avon Lake really hasn't gotten ANYTHING! Just a light dusting. That is so hard to believe that we are less than an hour apart, they are furter north and yet we are the ones totally covered up! I'm glad I went to the store today and got milk and a few other essentials....I don't think I'll be going anywhere tomorrow. (even though I think it is supposed to stop after tonight)

And last, but not least as I mentioned at the beginning, Toonces insisted on venturing out. She walked right along the back door and then jumped down onto our little patio path. I'm not sure where she went, but she was only out for about 5 minutes and then she was ready to come back in....crazy kitty. Here she is with snow in her fur. Of course she tracked it in too...I'll have to teach her to wipe her paws.

Now it is WAY too late and I should be sleeping. I hope you like the pictures. I'm warm in bed now with a tiny baby just an arms length away, and two kitties at my feet...life is good. I just wish Brian were in town to enjoy all of this winter (in the autumn) wonderland with us!

Sweet Baby Connor

He LOVES his new foot rattles!

Miscellaneous Pictures

Some of these are a little old....sorry about that.

This was one of the first cold days here. I had little C all bundled up and he looked so cute!

His favorite way to fall asleep during the day...lovely, I know. On a positive note, this morning I put him down when he was tired and he fell asleep on his own! YAY!

I put him in his Winnie the Poo robe and slippers last night. It was pretty funny, but he wasn't a big fan of the robe being tied on. Oh, and he still does his "jazz hands". :)

Confused kid, I know. The onesie paid off and the Falcons won, too bad the pants and burp cloth didn't pay off against Florida....

Connor's first fire in our backyard. I was so glad that Scott and Danielle came over so Brian had an excuse to get it going!

Family picture Halloween 2008.
I don't know why Connor's eyes are glowing like a cat???

First bath without the infant liner...he is such a big guy!

A nap on the couch...notice he is napping in the frontpack....am I a bad mom or what? Mitsy decided to join us too....love her!

Connor in his Bumbo watching me create his other Bumbo.


Dad took this picture while I adjusted the pumpkin a little so he would fit better. :)

Nature's Bumbo! Cute or cruel...you be the judge.
(I even put it in the oven for a little while before I put him it in to knock the chill off and he still didn't like it!)