Savino has tooth #5 and #'s 6 and 7 are so.close. to popping through as well. Will someone please tell my son to STOP GROWING UP?!

He is 8 months old today. Insane. Just insane! Time is flying by. I am still paranoid over every little thing, every little cough, but he makes me so so so so happy, it is ridiculous. I saw a shirt today at Steve and Barry's that I must get him, it says "I was worth the wait". He was! I waited 8 years for him, and he was worth every minute.

Fingers crossed that he sleeps a little better tonight. I gave him half a dose of Tylenol because he was crying and chewing on his fingers at the same time, which is such a pathetic sight. Poor guy. He is in such a rush to get all these teeth!

Today I discovered how to get my kid to eat bananas. He doesn't care for them pureed or mashed up, but ate 4 slices of banana cut up into wee little peices. He loved it. So, I am going to start cutting up his usual purees into small peices and letting him eat that way in addition to the puree and cereal. It was like, duh, he's 8 months old, of course he might like trying some finger foods, but at the same time I was surprised. I only gave him a peice of banana because I was eating one while feeding him breakfast and he kept looking at my banana and smacking his lips which is his "Ok, I want some of THAT" cue.

It was in the 40's today. Winter has come back for one last AHAHAHAHAHA in my face. Of course, since I JUST put all Savino's winter clothes away, right? I had to dig out a sweat suit to bundle him up in.

I wanted to smack the cashier at Kroger's today. She was completely unfriendly, unhelpful, curt, and acted like she was put out ringing up my 5 items. I had both kids with me and Savino was losing it because he didn't want to be in the shopping cart anymore. I just wanted to snap at her, "Look, it's not MY fault you work at Kroger's. Go work somewhere they appreciate a surly attitude." I bag my own groceries, I am always polite and say thank you, I don't need nastiness from a 19 yr. old cashier. Oh well, I got to walk away from her and she had to stay at her obviously unpleasant job where she is probably getting paid minimum wage to be surly to customers. That's karma.

Ok, time for bed.

I Love Living In A Small Town

I don't know what is wrong with Savino tonight, but I think it is a combination of issues. His poor stuffy nose is still in full effect. I don't think there is such a thing as baby Benedryl, but the poor kid, I think this is allergies that are defeating him. I think he might have a sore throat or stuffed up ears as well because when I lay him down on his back he just gets so uncomfortable. I caved tonight and gave him some Tylenol after almost an hour of him screaming and crying and tugging at his ears and alternately clinging to me and then arching his back and thrusting away from me. I don't know, poor guy. This is the first time he's ever been in any discomfort for any extended period of time (beyond that wicked intestinal thing he had for like a week). That's why I don't think that it is just a spring cold, every time he's ever had a touch of the cold, it clears up almost instantly (thank you breastmilk! Woo!). I just hope that he starts to dry up soon. It doesn't help that there are like three trees surrounding our house that are just shedding pollen like nobody's business. Our cars have a lovely coat of yellow pollen dust on them. Much as I hate to say it, I hope it rains tomorrow to beat the pollen down off the trees and off of everything.

Needless to say, Savino hasn't been sleeping so well tonight. He screamed at bedtime and I ended up alternately cuddling him and then when he got frustrated with that, I laid him down in his crib and hung over the side and rubbed his belly and he quieted and stared at me until he dropped off to sleep. That was a first for him, usually I have to hold him until he falls asleep but he just drifted off laying there watching me. Tim came home (he got called into work at 8pm, niiiice) and Savino started crying again, he went upstairs to deal with him and Tim said that as soon as he picked him up, the boy laid his head down on his shoulder and went right back to sleep. Awww.

Some pictures... (Savino got a new hat, and it was too cute not to take a picture of!)




Also, I got new glasses awhile back, I am still trying to decide if I like them or feel weird in them. They are comfortable though.


It was a relatively productive weekend. Tim cut the grass on Saturday and tore apart part of our backyard fence that had fallen over. I am so defeated by our yard and the landscaping. All of the fencing has to come down. It is so so jacked up. Whatever. Anyway. He tore it up into peices and laid it next to the pool so that when the bottom is broken up, he can start throwing wood and whatnot into it to start filling it up. We have to completely rip up the decking that goes around the pool, it is all jacked up too. The yard around the pool has a bunch of dirt that came out of where they dug up the yard to put in the pool, and we have to dig it back down to remove part of the fencing, and all of that dirt will go into the pool as well. Back from whence you came!

Today we went to the garden center and bought 5 bags of cypress mulch and a bunch of perennials to try and replant up the front flowerbeds and make them look better. We need more mulch. The 5 bags were enough to cover the smaller circular flowerbed in the middle of the yard. The flowerbed against the house is still mulch-less. I moved and transplanted a bunch of strawberry plants all into one long row in front of part of the flowerbed. Last year they were spread all over, but this year I am trying to contain them to make it easier to pick and to look nicers. Hopefully my transplants will live, I was a little sloppy about getting them into the ground. Savino was playing outside with us in his exersaucer and so I had to get a move on before he got bored. We dug up three large peony bushes from the side flowerbed where all the vegetables were last year and planted them in the middle of the circular bed with the tulips all around the outer edges. In the front flowerbed I planted a pretty good sized foxglove plant, some salvia (a purplish butterfly bush looking plant), some geraniums (the only annuals I've planted so far), an asiatic lily, three white azaleas behind the strawberries that will hopefully get nice and tall, and I planted bleeding hearts in a pot for the porch. Tim's grandma loved bleeding hearts and he was getting all nostalgic looking at them so I said "Get it!". On the back deck I put in a jalepeno and banana pepper plant in the large tomato planters, hopefully they will live and not be eaten by groundhogs. I will KILL.

It sounds like a lot of plants, but somehow it still looks too sparse in the front. I guess I will suck it up and buy a flat of petunias or some other disposable annual to fill it in. I am at a loss. Gardening really is not my thing and though I've read and read, I still don't really understand what to plant with what. I pretty much just walk along and say "Oh, that looks pretty!" and the extent of my gardening planning is looking at the plant tag to see whether it's a sun or shade plant. Oh well. Tim is going to borrow his dad's woodchipper this weekend and chip all the wild grape vines he cut off the back fence and all the branches from the trees we cut down of the fence line last year and use the remaining chips for mulch. I still think we will end up buying a few bags of mulch, but that's fine.

So yeah. Yard and lawn talk. Good stuff. Aren't you envious? Hey, I am still drama free though, and that is a VERY good thing! I celebrate!

I have to get serious about cleaning my house tomorrow. For rlz. There are Gerber puffs EVERYWHERE. How are they migrating around the house from the dining room? I suspect the cats are playing with them and batting them around. That must be it. Either that or the Puff Fairy is coming and scattering them around. Savino probably throws four or five puffs overboard at every meal when I give him a few to distract him so I can make food or get his food ready, and by the end of the day if I haven't swept twice they are everywhere. Good thing I don't get paid to clean huh?

I did finally tackle the laundry situation, and of course that means that on my way to bed I need to transfer laundry from the washer to the dryer, but at least I am somewhat on top of it. I went through all of Savino's clothes and discarded things that were too small or seasonally inappropriate. What is sad is that I ended up taking things out of his drawers that HE NEVER WORE. How is that possible? Mostly pants that he never wore, that I bought because at some point I ridiculously thought, "Oh, he really needs more pants!" and bought him ten pairs. Oh well. I just took a HUGE bag of clothes over to Eleni's house on Tuesday and already I have a knee high stack of clothes all ready to take over again. This will be the third lot of clothes I have pushed on her. I told Tim today, if I wasn't passing them back to Eleni I could make a serious killing on eBay with all these clothes. In fact, I think I will let her know that when she is done with them, she can just pass them right on back around and I will dispose of them for her. Hehehe.

So anyway, I am going through Savino's summer clothes that have been sitting in the bottom drawers and the other dresser which is full of clothes for NEXT winter. I have been stressing that he didn't have enough summer clothes and in fact, just yesterday bought a lot of onesies and rompers on eBay (Well, it was .99c and even with 7$ shipping, you still can't beat that!). Um, yeah, he has plenty of summer clothes. In fact, I almost couldn't close one of his drawers which was stuffed with shirts and shorts and rompers and outfits. He has probably fifteen pairs of NICE pants, not just sweatpants or lightweight pants but nice cords and khackis and jeans. He will be fine on onesies once this lot I just bought arrived, and the only thing that he really needs is summer weight sleepers. I have to keep my eye out for some 24m sleepers for next winter, he only has a handful of sleepers that will fit next winter and now is the time when all of that will be on sale. I have to find him some summer sleepers though, the ones that he has now are TOO SHORT. His poor little legs are jammed in there and while he can still manage for another week or so, that's it. He has about 1/4 of an inch in there before they really will not fit, for real. And of course, those stupid things are so expensive! I hate hate hate paying like $9 for ONE sleeper when he will just outgrow it in a month or two anyway. Maybe I can find some super secret sale somewhere and score some. There is a big garage sale at the Knights of Columbus coming up next weekend, perhaps I can get lucky there. I would love to just let him sleep in a onesie or whatever, but the temp drops just enough at night to make that too uncomfortable for him because he doesn't sleep with any blankets yet and his blanket sleepers are too heavy and too hot.

Yes, these are the things that consume me. I love it. I am relishing the minutia. Boring is GOOD! I do not take this for granted!

Oh, haha, this is funny. Well, sort of I guess. *I* thought it was funny. So Chantal sends Tim a text last night that he didn't get until this morning that the cops were looking for someone who was on our street. Apparently they pulled someone over last night and the guy fled on foot and ran down OUR STREET and the cops never did find him. They were cruising the neighborhood still this morning. Tim was so paranoid that he took his big Maglite flashlight and went out to the garage to check and make sure there were no criminals hiding in the garage or the basement. I laughed the whole time. Though, thinking about it, it's probably not that funny having someone hiding out from the cops in your backyard, but still, I was amused. I was also amused that this was BIG DRAMA, having lived in big cities where cops chasing a criminal down the street is just another Friday night. It still never fails to make me smile just how little and sheltered and out of touch with urban life our little town is. That is also a good thing! I am glad to be raising my kids in a town where someone fleeing from the cops when being pulled over is the biggest deal on the news.

Criminals beware. Don't hide in my garage. My husband has a large flashlight and a wife who is not afraid of you! Hehe.

On that note, it's late, I must sleep.

Mom, doesn't it seem like just YESTERDAY??




He was so little...




Yeah, not so little anymore!

Savino SLEPT last night! Oh blessed blessed sleep. One day my life will not revolve around how much he sleeps, but for now it totally does. He woke up at 12 to nurse and I didn't give him a bottle afterwards like I normally do, I just laid him back down and he rolled over and went back to sleep... and slept until almost 7am! Woo! I actually woke up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and had to check on him because he was out so completely, he was still in the same spot he had rolled into when I laid him down.

I have figured out that he does this about once every two weeks or so. I can handle it! I don't expect him to do it again, but I think it would be awesome if he ramped up to one night a week of sleep.

This morning I had to get up anyway and help Haley get ready for her group pictures at school. I helped her pick out some clothes and then did her hair in two French braids. I am getting much better at braiding her hair! I think just doing it over and over has helped. I also figured out that I couldn't get all of her hair into the braids, the part right at the back at the base of her neck is just too short to be braided in, so I stop the braids just above that part and leave it loose. It looks so cute! And even better, it stays out of her face when I do it that way, so you can see her beautiful heart shaped face.

Savino is definitely about to push tooth #5 through his gums, there is a tiny ridge of tooth already out and I think in the next few days it will come all the way through. That explains the copious amounts of drool that come pouring out of his mouth.

I managed to get a bunch of leaves and dead grass out of the front flowerbed yesterday while waiting for it to be time to go get Haley. I put Savino on a blanket and let him pull up peices of grass and sneak them into his mouth when he thought I wasn't looking. He was too cute, he would pull a peice of grass and then look up and see if I was watching him, if he caught me looking at him he would give me this big innocent smile like, "Oh no Mom, I wasn't going to put it in my mouth!" and if he couldn't see my face (I was working behind the cherry bushes, so I could see him through the branches but he couldn't really see me), then his hand would slowly move towards his mouth and he would thoughtfully chew on the grass. I figured, what the hell, he was sitting in a patch of clover and grass and we don't put any chemicals on our lawn so a few peices weren't going to hurt him. I did run over and stop him from eating a leaf, that isn't quite the sort of thing that he can chew on. Anyway, I pulled out a ton of leaves and grass and now I need to rake it up and put it in a trash can for hauling away.

This afternoon after I pick Haley up we are going to Lowe's to look at plants because I am going to find something to plant in front of the cherries and around the strawberries and in the front circular bed where my sparse tulips are too spread out. I also need to get some pruning shears and some new cheap trowels that I can use to tear the crabgrass roots out of the flower bed. I always tear up my trowels so I just buy cheap ones so I don't mourn when I break them or bend them or otherwise mangle. I also need some new gardening gloves. Deals has all of that for $1 so I might make a trip over there too.

I tried to talk Tim into having lunch with me, but he has three admissions that all arrived at the same time, so he is swamped and I just said forget it. I am a little sad at that. The goal was to have lunch together once a week and that has not happened. He never even suggests it, I have to talk him into it. I guess I don't really care, I mean, we've gone all these years without ever having lunch together through the week, I just thought it would be a nice way to get a standing date in every week. Since he is on call for the rest of the weekend, I am not counting on him being around. I am just planning to do things that I don't need him for, like plastering the wall in the hallway where I have ripped out the wallpaper and somehow managed to tear off the top layer of drywall as well. I think that just a layer of patching plaster will be fine, the top half of the wall has textured paint on the drywall anyway.

I would like to figure out how I can turn our front room into some usable space. I need to get a TV stand for the TV in there, and figure out how to de-cat-hair the couch that is in there, it is COVERED in cat hair. It is so gross. I have no idea. I just don't know how to keep the cats off of it either, they just claimed that couch as their own. I feel bad that it is this whole room that we are not even using and I don't know why, it is a nice room and it stays very cool without any air conditioning in the summer. I think that it would be a great library/office area, but I am at a loss as to what to do with it. Right now we just use it mostly as a coat room. All our shoes are in there, well me and Haley's shoes mostly, and we have coats hanging on a junky coat rack that was there when we moved in. I guess I need to just get some hangers and put all our coats away since the weather is so much warmer that we don't need them. I don't know. It has a fantastic light fixture in there (remember the branch and leaf chandelier that I got for $14?) and I could put in some nice curtains, right now there are just some sheers hanging up. It needs another seating area, like two nice wingback chairs and a coffee table to go between the chairs and the couch. Some bookcases, some art or pictures on the walls, I think it would be really nice. Tim can set up his laptop in there, and with the TV hooked to the basic cable that is in there, it would be a nice place to just hang out or for Haley to do her homework at. I want to start maximizing our space, we have SO MUCH of it in this house and we just don't use it well.

So anyway, I have plans for the inside and outside of the house this weekend. I hope that I can get something good done. I also have two large picture frames that I need to decide what to do with! If I can find a nice 11 X 14 mat with an 8 X 10 cut out, I can put the new 8 X 10 of Haley and Savino that I have in it, or I could order an 8 X 10 of the picture of Tim and Savino in the park that I love so much. It is hard to decide! Then I have a big giant frame that I am going to collage some more pictures into, I have a thing for picture collages lately.

Chantal is supposed to come by at some point this weekend to pay her part of the cell phone bill. I will totally not be shocked if she doesn't show up, but whatever! I am good without the drama!

On that note, I am going to rescue a baby who doesn't want to practice crawling anymore and nurse him and try to get some laundry done and get him dressed for the day. We are bumming, him in his pjs and me in my workout clothes.

So today was a hard day for Tim. He sent me a text that he had gotten a call from a father who wanted to find out how he could get his daughter admitted to one of the inpatient programs at the hospital. This was.. Monday. Today he called the father back to find out if he had signed all the forms to release her medical records, and get approval from the insurance co. etc. and the father said it was no longer necessary. Tim asked why and the father said because the daughter had committed suicide yesterday. Tim was all torn up about it. He said he kept trying to think back whether he had asked the father if the girl needed immediate treatment or to go to the ER. It's so hard, what do you say to console someone in that situation? I just told Tim, you have to figure out how to let it go because otherwise it will eat you up. There's no way he could have known that the situation was that critical and the father said he didn't know it was that bad either. It's just very very sad. Tim takes it so personally when he can't help someone and to have something like this happen and him feel so responsible, that he wasn't able to help this girl... well, it was not a good day for him.

I have so much admiration and respect for Tim. It is so so hard to work in an adolescent psychiatric hospital. It really is. You see so many kids who have been hurt by life or more commonly, their own parents and families, who have seen violence up close and personal, or done violence to someone else. He sees kids that are so messed up... the only thing you can do is come home and hug the babies and do everything you can to make sure they never have anything bad happen to them while you still can.

So yeah, that is kind of a bummer. I just tried to have dinner ready when he got home and make it an easy evening on him.

Savino is Super Crank lately. I don't know what his deal is. I really think he is teething again! It seems impossible, this poor kid needs a break from teething! I probed inside his mouth and couldn't feel anything but noticed that there is a white ridge to the right of his bottom teeth, so maybe he is working on tooth #5. I just know the crankiness has to stop. It's ridic. I literally cannot leave the room and leave him behind. Every single time he wails like I am abandoning him. It makes it very hard to do ANYTHING. I have taken to carting him around with me and just setting him on the floor with a toy wherever I take him. It is only a temporary solution because soon enough he will be crawling, but for now it seems to work. There is the novelty of being on the floor too since I don't really set him down on the floor anywhere but the living room. I've had to sweep like twice a day to be able to do this, but if it's what it takes... Mealtimes are crazy too, he's taken to wanting a bite of this, a bite of that, a Gerber puff, a sip of milk, rinse repeat. Except if you don't figure out what he wants in time, he screams bloody murder with real tears squeezing out and falling down his cheeks. I swear I think he was pointing at his cereal bowl this morning, so I tried offering him that. I think he is too young to point, but maybe I am wrong! If he can just start communicating more, I think that will ease the frustration. He STILL isn't signing. I am trying to be consistent with offering the signs for everything but I'll admit, sometimes I just plain forget. I am trying to pay more attention to his hands too, and see if maybe I am just missing him attempting to sign something to me. We do "eat", "milk"(bottle and nursing), "all done", "kittie", and "more". He is reaching that age of being able to sign back, so hopefully soon.

Ok, well, I should be in bed. I have not been getting to bed at a good time and Savino has been up and done unpredictably again. I just wish the kid would SLEEP, give me another full nights sleep. I need it. I leave you with a park picture.

Been Awhile

I have been super busy taking care of things for Eleni's baby shower which was Saturday. It went well but man, I am GLAD to be done with that! It was a whole lot of work and running around like a chicken with my head cut off.

Today we had lunch with the whole family to celebrate Tim's brother's birthday. He picked Applebee's. I am not impressed with their food. It was OK because I spent most of the time feeding and entertaining Savino who towards the end of the meal started trying to rip my shirt off to nurse. He is getting a lot more demanding when it comes to that, which is not cool. I am hoping that he will start signing for it and stop just trying to pull my shirt down, I'm not too impressed with it.

Just a few pictures because I am trying to wrap things up here and head to bed. I have been out to the store every. single. day. last week. I am really hoping that this week I can just stay home and enjoy some down time.



Savino's 7 month pictures. He is getting too big!




One of the set of favors for Eleni's baby shower, they are monogrammed rice krispie treat lollipops.




One of the pair of hand carved doors in our house, this is the interior



And the exterior.


We are getting serious about selling one of these hand carved doors. I would like to make enough from the sale of one to get serious about some renovations on both of our houses. Our little house needs a lot of work before we rent it out this summer, we are upgrading the electrical and putting in new flooring or carpeting. We are going to be putting in new decks at the big house and replacing fencing, getting ready to renovate the kitchen and master bath as well. When we first bought the big house, the guy who appraised it for the mortgage company said he thought that the set of doors were worth half of what we paid for the house, and so if we can sell one and make a good profit on it, that would be awesome. I have e-mails out to architectural antique dealers and have yet to hear anything substantial back from anyone. The doors are original to the house, hand carved from the 1880's and made without any nails in peg and dovetail construction. They are definitely unique, I am having a hard time finding anything comparable to put a real value on them, but Tim doesn't want to part with them for a small amount so I am waiting to hear back on what a few dealers think they are worth before we start actively selling them. I am cautiously optimistic though, I think the right buyer would appreciate the craftsmanship and detail. They were one of the reasons we fell in love with this house, despite all the work it needs. It is bittersweet to think about parting with them.

I will try to catch up with what has been going on here, but I am beat for the night. It's been a long day. We have a long week ahead of us too, starting Thursday Tim is on 24 hour call at the hospital and will probably be called in several times in the middle of the night. It's good and bad, the money is ridiculously good when he is on call and it definitely adds up quickly, but getting up at 2am to go into the hospital sucks at the best of times. He's on call from Thursday to Sunday night. It has been nuts up at the hospital lately too, so we will see how it goes. Tim is not looking forward to it and frankly, neither am I, but we do what we have to.

Well, last night wasn't quite as good as the night before, with Savino sleeping through the night. Instead he woke up at 3am, but progress is slow right? I am a little tired this morning. Tim didn't even remember Savino waking up last night, which just goes to show, he has it easy!

Today I am picking Haley up from school rather than her riding the bus home because we are going to visit Eleni who lives literally around the corner from the school. I am taking over all the baby stuff that I have for her stacked up in Savino's room. Her baby shower is Saturday so I figured I would get it out of the way now.

Speaking of baby shower, I am about done buying things for this baby shower! Every time I think that I am really really done, I realize I have ten more things to buy, and I still haven't gotten all of her gifts! I need to go to the store and pick up more candy for the favors too. I need to print out the thank you cards that go with the favors. See how much I have to do? Ridiculous!

Poor Savino had it yesterday with me taking him shopping too. He was DONE after about an hour and so we went home and I fed him and nursed him and let him take a nap and then when he woke up, it was back to the stores to try and finish, but it was time to go pick Haley up from the bus and take her to the library so we still didn't finish. THEN after dinner we went out to the grocery store and I tried to finish getting the candy bars for this one game we're playing but managed to forget like three of them. So, I have to go back out AGAIN at some point. Ridiculous! I also still have to buy the fondant for the cake and the filling ingrediants. Well, it will get done eventually. Friday I intend to spend the day baking so I have to have it all done by then at least. I want to get the favors done this week so I have nothing to do at all on Saturday except show up and set everything up.

I am hungry and I swear there is nothing in this house that I want to eat. I don't want to go shopping, I don't even have room in my fridge or freezer, so how can there possibly be nothing that I want to eat? I have my coffee at least. There is no life without coffee!

Well, the baby is being ridiculously cranky so that's it for this entry. I'm out.

MEAT

Well, my freezer is officially FULL. I can't fit anything else into it. There was an unholy crowd of people at the store today too. Meat sales bring out the crazy in some folks it seems.

I got to have lunch with Tim today! Yay! I took the baby up to the hospital so he could show him around and then we went to Steak n Shake where I had a lovely salad. (Fun right?) Tim had to go to the guitar shop after lunch to look around, of course.

Tim finally got his bonus check, he was very happy about that. It was a little more than I thought it would be, so that made me happy too. I am thinking about getting a new vaccuum cleaner. Tim says I should get something fun but I think that we really need to be responsible with this money, we have a lot of work to do on the little house this summer.

I took the baby outside and sat him on the lawn yesterday, it's the first time he's been on the grass. He loved it, he kept patting the grass and leaves and babbled while I worked on cleaning some leaves out of the flower bed. I kept checking on him because I was waiting for him to stick something in his mouth. I looked up to see him cram a leaf into his mouth. !! I managed to get it out before he did more than get it gooey but after that we had to cut the outdoor experience short because he wouldn't stop trying to eat the grass and every time I said No and took some off him he laughed at me and grabbed another handful.

Pictures, of course.










I am frantically knitting and trying to finish this stupid baby hat before Eleni's baby shower. Well, the hat is not stupid, it is terribly cute in fact, but this pattern is SO BORING. I am not a fan of ribbed knits because they are tedious to knit, knit 2 purl 2 repeat until you want to jab your eyes out with a knitting needle. The only good thing about it is that you can put it down and walk away from it and not lose your place. That's a major bonus when you can only knit one or two rows at a time. I have 9 days to finish this hat. Um, pray for me.

9 days until Eleni's baby shower! Eep! I need to pick up cake supplies this weekend and do some favor and gift shopping. I have to get a tentative head count from Eleni's mom so that I know how many favors to make up. I have to get supplies for my games too, I am trying really hard not to have any lame party games. I am also having a hard time figuring out how many games we ought to have, I am in the "more is better" camp, but likely there will be a lot of older women there who might not be into playing a lot of games. Oh well, they'll just have to suck it up!

Well, the baby is starting to stir again, I ought to wrap this up so I can go tend to him. Fun fun fun.

Pictures

Just a picture dump. I'm too tired for much of anything else. It's finally warmed up enough for me and Savino to take walks in the afternoon and today we went on a long one and between that and the usual grind I am beat. These are from Sunday, we went to the park and it was Savino's first time in a swing. He really liked it, but it wore him out too, I think the fresh air helped. Then we headed home for a post post Easter egg hunt (Easter stuff was on clearance at Wal-Mart and it ended up being a cheap, easy, and fun diversion for the girls), and Laila modeled the witch costume she picked out from the Dollar store for being on her best behaviour. I think that's it.

Took Haley to the park this afternoon, it was the first time I have taken her out by myself without the baby since he was born, so it was nice to just have it be us again! Tim got stuck at home with the baby HA and he had to make us dinner, double HA! No, really, he didn't care, he seemed grumpy when we came home but I honestly think that he thinks I am going to just, like, LEAVE and be gone for days or something when I go somewhere without him in tow. Oh well. I took my camera to the park with us and got some nice pictures of Haley.

It was kinda chilly because it was later in the day, and we only stayed for about 20 minutes much to Haley's dismay. I told her we will come back, I am sure she will get sick of the playground before too long because we will be there all summer! They have baby swings for the boy and I am sure he will have fun playing in the wood chips and watching the big kids run around. He will probably be crawling by then and I'll be too busy chasing him to take pictures!









Every time I leave the boy with Tim, I miss him like crazy! This was maybe the 3rd time I've left him and gone off without him and it is still not easy. I even called home while we were out (we had to go to a few stores before we went home) to make sure everything was alright. I don't think he even notices that I am gone. He was happily playing with Tim on the floor when we got home.

Tim and his guitars. He is STILL obsessed. He has plans now to overhaul a guitar and put in all new components. I just shrug and nod and say OK. I don't care, he can be as obsessed as he wants.

Well, I should head to bed. I am still waking up with Savino at 4am and not being able to sleep. Last night wasn't so bad, but it is still not fun getting up at 7:30am after two hours of sleep.

Ok, I am out.

It was an interesting day. I wasted most of it though. Last night was awful. Just really bad. I got maybe two hours of sleep between midnight and 6am. Savino kept waking up and crying and he couldn't get comfortable. And then when I finally got him settled, I couldn't sleep. I got up and paid some bills, worked for a little bit, and then got sleepy at 4am and... Savino woke up again. I was in tears by 8am after Tim got back from taking Haley to school. Thank god he was off work today because I think it would have been bad otherwise. He took Savino off me, he had just finished nursing, and took him downstairs and I just passed clean out. I slept until almost noon. I woke up and shrieked when I looked at the clock, I had so much I wanted to get done today. I came downstairs and kissed Tim and thanked him for letting me sleep. It was awesome to sleep myself out. Fed the baby lunch and nursed him and then we had to go run some errands.

After Haley got home I managed to get some work done on the bibs I cut out the other night. I am a little pissed that the snap press I bought SUCKS. It works for making eyelets pretty good, but it jacked up like 5 snaps. I think the hand punch works better for setting the snaps with just a hammer. Oh well. I have a few more bibs to sew, the bobbin on my sewing machine ran out of thread for the second time and I didn't feel like unthreading everything to wind the bobbin back up so I will finish them tomorrow. I need to get another towel to cut up for backing because I have even more to cut out. I am going to have a RIDICULOUS amount of bibs! That is not a bad thing with the way we go through them though, I can easily use three in a day. I am trying to make some slow and steady progress on these projects.

Chantal called this evening during dinner and asked if Laila could spend the night. I said OK but that she would have to bring Laila out (because there is no way I am using my gas to go get her so that Chantal can go out and drink). She brought her sister Prissy and both of the kids over and Laila decided after about 20 minutes that she didn't want to spend the night. I think it was because it was close to bedtime and I told her and Haley to start getting ready for bed. I wasn't surprised. Laila hasn't spent the night the last three times she's come over to supposedly spend the night. I wasn't bothered but Chantal was pissed she "wasted the gas". I was like HA! now you know how it feels! Guess you're not going out after all!

Savino was totally enamoured with Jaden. He loves babies his size. He was cooing and kept reaching for Jaden and Jaden kept trying to give him kisses but Savino likes to play coy and turn his face at the last minute until he is ready to give a kiss. Then he opens his mouth wide and slobbers all over you. But he was actually cool with Chantal this time, he didn't scream in her face. He kept smiling and flirting. It was so sweet. He can be such a flirt! He loves having an audience, he was so entertained when normally he would be flipping because it was his bedtime. I had to drag him off and send Haley up to bed because it was bedtime and Chantal left while I was getting them to bed.

Tim was asking Chantal all these questions about what she was going to do about Shawn. *sighs* So the deal is that Shawn has nowhere to parole to. He can't live with his parents because his father is a convicted felon and you're not allowed to associate with criminals when you're on supervised release. He could live with his sister, but I don't know if she is going to step up or not. I guess he is not allowed to live by himself either. We'll see what happens. I sent Shawn some money today because Chantal is being a bitch and drinking her money up at the bar rather than send him any. She told Tim she isn't taking his calls either. Whatever. I'm so over it. I keep hearing from Shawn's mom about the guys Chantal is messing around with. What I really don't get is that Chantal doesn't understand WHY Shawn's family is so pissed off at her. Um, you are CHEATING on their son/brother? Why wouldn't they be mad at you? She honestly thinks they should just act like nothing's wrong. *shakes her head* Whatever. Tim wants us to stay out of it so I am trying to stay out of it.

My nose is so stuffed up. I had to take half of one of Tim's darvosets last night because my body was aching. I really want to take some Sudafed but I am scared it will dry up my milk so I have been relying on Tylneol and ibuprofen instead, and when I can't take it anymore, I take half a darvoset. Bless the painkillers. Those things make the world alright again. He gets all the good pain meds for his restless leg syndrome.

It has been warmer lately, I can't complain. Today it got up to like 61. That was great! Except, it is raining again, of course. April showers and all that. I am so mad, something has eaten all my tulips down to about an inch of stalk. WTF? I don't know if any of them will regrow or bloom, or if I am just screwed. That sucks. I had about 6 crocus blooms and they have all disappeared too.

I ordered a crapload of prints from Snapfish. I got 106, and I ordered an 8 x 10 and a bunch of 5 x 7 prints too. I am hoping they turn out well. I have never ordered prints that big before, I hope the quality is good. Everything was about $16. That is the most I've ever paid for Snapfish prints, so these suckers better be good!

Hm, I seem to have run out of interesting things to say.

Sickies

Oh last night sucked. Really really sucked. Savino has a little cold, and his nose is runny and stuffed up and he couldn't sleep very well, and to add to that, he didn't want to nurse, he wanted to scream and sit up and not lay down. I was up about three times before 6am and when he started screaming again at 6am, I thought I was going to cry. After a diaper change, nursing him sitting up, and part of a bottle (he was all about the bottle, it must be easier to drink with a stuffed up nose) after he had calmed down I realized I could put him in the swing that he has shunned for the last month or so. Either the novelty of being in the swing did the trick, or being upright so the drainage was going the right way, or having screamed himself out, something about being in the swing soothed him though he did keep reaching out and grabbing the leg of the swing and stopping it from swinging, I'm afraid he's going to burn up the motor doing that or something. Anyway, he passed back out after about fifteen minutes in the swing, I had it set up at the foot of the bed and wanted to be able to look over and see him so I put my pillows down at the foot of the bed and tried to go back to sleep. He slept for about an hour and then woke up in a good mood and nursed and played next to me for another half hour so I got a little more sleep. I got just enough sleep that I don't feel completely like a zombie, but I am still tired.

Savino is having nothing to do with the suction bulb either, I have been trying to suction out his nose before he eats so that he can nurse easier. He HATES it, in fact hate is an understatement. He was totally not pleased with that, but it does help a little bit. I might go out and get him some saline nose drops this evening. I am sure he will hate that too!

My throat is sore too, probably made worse by a night of sleeping with my mouth open and not getting enough sleep. I have a little bit of drainage but not as much as the baby. I am trying to encourage him to nurse so that he can get over it faster.

The other day the doorbell rang and it was the Schwan's delivery guy. In case you're not familiar with Schwan's it's like a home delivery food service, frozen foods I mean. I had never heard of it before, but I've seen the delivery trucks in the neighborhood before (I thought they were milk trucks actually). He left a catalog and when Tim came home he got all excited because apparently he used to order Schwans food and says it is really good. I was skeptical because the prices are kinda crazy. I mean, I guess if you figure in that you're not paying for the gas to go to the store and back, and all that, it isn't that bad, but some of the stuff is just overpriced no matter how you cut it. There were a few things I wanted to try, brown rice in a microwavable steam bag (that actually was a little cheaper than what you can get at the store and I love those things, they make getting dinner out quickly so much easier) as well as penne pasta in a steam bag, Tim wanted some potato things and ordered a pumpkin pie and some ice cream. It was about $16 for 5 items, so that isn't too bad. They come around to collect orders every 2 weeks, so maybe we will try something else next time. It's nice that there is no minimum order so if you just want to get one thing, you can. Anyway, we got our first order last night, they give it to you right when you order right off the truck. I might try one of the things of rice tonight, I'm not sure.

Tim still hasn't gotten his bonus check or payraise. Supposedly the payraise at least will be on the next paycheck. I am a little disgruntled, I think he is getting messed around with, but whatever. He's content to wait and see, so I guess I can just suck it up.

Where is spring? It's 51 degrees right now. Which is not freezing by any means, but COME ON ALREADY.

Tim has tomorrow off to take care of me and the sick baby, hopefully both of us will be on the mend by then though. Speaking of sick babies, I need to go tend to mine, he was woken up grouchy.

It looks like I will be able to squeeze in an entry while Savino is playing in the PacknPlay. He is obsessed with the strangest things! There was this plastic bubble mailer that Tim's glasses came in and he loves to squish it and crinkle it (he can't rip peices off, that stuff is like indestructible, I couldn't get the mailer open without scissors!), and I gave him three of his pairs of shoes and he loves to pull on the laces and stick his fingers in them and taste them of course. It's not like the shoes have ever touched the ground hehe. And he just sits there with his eyes really really wide just touching everything and looking at it and bouncing back against the mesh of the PacknPlay's sides. I have it arranged so I am in his direct line of sight so he can just look up and grin at me. He is playing happily at the moment.

I did a salsa dance workout before lunch while Savino bounced in his jumper. He was not too amused and kept "complaining" but he managed to last through the 15 minute workout. It felt like 45 minutes! At first it was all easy, and I was really getting into it, then there were these stretches and I'm thinking "Wow, that was a quick workout!" but um, no, that was the stretches BEFORE the workout. All of the sudden the instructor starts doing these steps that she certainly didn't teach in the warm up! I must have looked like a flapping chicken, but oh well, Savino was the only witness so who cares? It was a really fast paced routine and I really enjoyed it! I will probably record it on a DVD so I can do it again, I was doing it from the OnDemand menu and they cycle through different workouts, so if I want to do it again I have to record it. There was this 4 minute booty workout that I did too and you wouldn't think that you could really sweat from just four minutes, but you would be wrong! Then I put on the MTV Dance moves video and learned the Soulja Boy Crank It routine. Yeah, like I'll ever use it but it was fun anyway. I love dancing! Well, as long as there's no one to witness me being a fool. I used to love dancing in the club too, but lord it's been ten years since I have been in a dance club and I don't think I will be hitting one up any time soon.

It is colder today. Again. It was like 31 degrees this morning. Yesterday it was about 60, so that is a big change. Poor Savino is suffering from either allergies (which I wouldn't be surprised because Haley and I have them as well) or a spring cold because he woke up this morning with a seriously runny nose. Thankfully he's not too congested so he can still nurse without being uncomfortable and I don't have to suction his nose. He is not too pleased with me wiping his nose though. This poor kid can't catch a break. First he battles the stomach bug, then teething, and now a cold. All in like two weeks! Not fun!

I hope it is nice enough to take the kids to the park this weekend or something. We need to get out of the house, even I am starting to get sick of looking at these walls and I am the original hermit.

Eleni's baby shower is in less than three weeks! I have some cute ideas for favors and gifts to give out to partygoers but I need to get on them if I am going to have them done in time. I had the DIY Network channel on yesterday while I was nursing (the remote was on the other side of the room and I was stuck in the chair!) and they showed this really cute idea of sewing buttons on napkins to make flowers or fruit with a little added embroidery. They looked super easy to make and fast, and it would be an inexpensive gift or prize. I am really into handcrafting gifts this year (well, as long as they look nice that is!). I want to give things that will be useful and memorable.

I still have a ton of work to do to finish all the bibs that I started on. I got a large part done and then went and bought more fabric (it was on SALE!) and haven't worked on anything since. I didn't invest so much that I am feeling guilty about it sitting, but I really ought to just get it done with. If I could just take two hours to work on something, I could probably get it done but I never ever EVER have two hours to myself until after the baby is in bed and then I just want to decompress. I have all these projects staring me in the face and I just feel guilty when I want to just bury my head in a book and read instead or veg out in front of the internet with Anthony Bourdain keeping me company. Maybe if I just slowly chisel away at one project at a time... Well, it's a thought.

On that note, the baby seems to be getting bored pulling on his shoelaces and turning all his toys over, so I better wrap this up