Yes, another food entry. We did grocery shopping today and I am really working on using more fresh foods/produce, so my fridge is overflowing with vegetables and freshness. Yay! Dinner was nothing special tonight, Tim grilled brats and we had strawberries and salad and mashed potatoes. But dessert was great, I made Marguerites that I saw on FoodGawker. They weren't as good as the ones on FoodGawker because 1) I only had 4 marshmellows and 2) They were stale and didn't really melt right. But they were still good! They will be better the next time I make them. They were super super easy. They took literally 1 minute to make from start to finish. Yay for a gas broiler! FoodGawker inspires me to try new things, I just love looking at all the food.

Savino had a HORRIFIC night last night. Oh man. I totally cursed myself. It was BAD. He woke up at 2am, and I had been up until 1am due to a combination of getting engrossed in my book and Tim. So I had an hour of sleep at that point, I got up and nursed him, gave him a bottle, and he was having a really hard time settling back down. I laid him down in his crib thinking he would just lay down and go back to sleep. Um, no. NO. I was up and down with him until 3am at which point I just laid down and Savino stood in his crib and talked and talked and then started yelling "DADADA" so Tim got up and tried to get him to go to sleep. He changed him, gave him another bottle, and after 20 minutes put him back in the crib. He was STILL awake and started crying, so I had to get back up again (and I couldn't sleep through Tim trying to settle him because Tim kept talking to Savino and Savino kept talking back). I nursed Savino AGAIN and gave him the rest of the bottle Tim made and finally at 4am he fell back asleep.

Except now at that point, I was completely awake. I laid there for a little bit and started thinking about what bills were due to be paid and got all paranoid that I forgot to pay the electric bill and so I got up at 4am and came downstairs and checked (it wasn't due until today) and paid it. Then I went back to bed and tossed and turned until 5am. Savino was up and wide awake at 7am. *sighs* I managed to keep him happy by letting him nurse off and on for an hour, between nursing he would crawl all over me while I held onto the back of his pj's so he wouldn't crawl off the bed. I let him play in his crib for about 20 minutes and he was happy as long as he had a bunch of stuff that I wouldn't ordinarily let him play with (the diaper rash cream, a book, my cell phone). I dozed off and on because I literally couldn't hold my eyes open. I was dying, I was so tired. Playing in the crib didn't last long though, and he was back in bed with me nursing AGAIN. Finally around 9 or so (I think) he fell back asleep because it was about time for a morning nap. He slept in bed with me on my arm and we slept until 10:30. Which is ridiculously late for us, really, but I couldn't function, literally, I had not gotten enough sleep being up all night. So it worked, and I was able to get up when he woke up, even though it threw our schedule off by about two hours for the rest of the day.

So yeah, sleep drama. I could do without it! Hopefully tonight will be a little easier. If he wakes up, hopefully he will go right back to sleep after eating. He was pretty tired when I put him to bed, so fingers crossed and knock on wood and all that.

I tried to do DITL today, I really did. I kept forgetting I was supposed to be taking pictures and then I realized that I suffer from anxiety about taking pictures in public. I felt REALLY self conscious about the few pictures I took, even though I just had my little point and shoot. *shrugs* I forgot about the time we were doing dinner and then I didn't do much of anything after dinner so there aren't many pictures there. I'll tackle editting pictures tomorrow or whenever.

I organized all my scrapbooking supplies tonight into that cart I was talking about that I bought at Lowe's. Um, yeah. I have too much stuff. I could have easily filled another cart. I didn't realize I had that much stuff! It made me really wish I could sit down and just go at it, I really wanted to. But I had too much other stuff to do. I am just trying to get all this stuff organized and put away. I have lots of pretty papers and stickers and things to play with when I do get time though! I also have lots of blank photo albums, I discovered. I have a lot of pictures, so I don't have any excuses other than no time.

Tomorrow, the pool. Again! We are all getting pretty tan with going out to the pool all the time. Savino is still pretty pale because I keep him slathered in sunscreen, but he has that gorgeous Italian skin that just tans right up no matter what you do so even he has a little colour, mostly on his legs where the sun hits them in the car. I wish I had that sort of skin, Haley has it and she tans instantly, I don't think I've ever seen her with a sunburn. Lucky them, at least they didn't inherit my pale burn-peel-burn-peel skin. I do tan, but very very slowly. Haley is itching to get back to the pool. It's been a few days.

Alright, I am going to force myself to bed and to sleep before 11:30 tonight. I need the sleep.

I am trying to squeeze in an entry before my son starts flipping out again. He has had exactly 0 naps today, just a brief nod off while he was nursing before dinner. We have been on the run all day, and he was up early and had an extremely extremely restless night. So he is running on Empty. He screamed through dinner over and over "Na na na na" and only paused in the screaming to eat most of a banana (maybe that is what he meant?) and half a peice of bread, and screamed through most of what he ate of his oatmeal, carrots and sweet potatoes and chicken. *sighs* He refused all bottles all day and just wanted to nurse and he nursed FOUR TIMES last night, starting at 12:40, then at 2, then at 3:40 and then at 5am. I was exhausted. I AM exhausted. I am just so used to being tired that I don't really feel it anymore.

Yesterday Savino started pulling himself up to a standing position all by himself! Eep! He is getting too big too fast! He also started repeating "Bye bye!" when you prompt him to say it, but only when he wants to. It is beyond cute! Haley insisted that Savino said "No" in the Gap today when we were at the mall, but I didn't hear it. He is just achieving milestones left and right. He is 9 months old! Where did the time go?


Haley's swimming lesson went well again. I didn't hang out and watch this time, she just took off and then I went to Eleni and Jay's to sit for half an hour.

Eleni finally ventured out with the baby for the first time. We went to the mall and walked around and shopped and it was really nice. I got Savino a new rash guard for the pool, a long sleeved one that is pretty much too big. It will probably fit better next year. I got Haley a really cute outfit from Old Navy, a skort and a t-shirt that matched with 3/4 length sleeves. She looked very cute in it. It's going to be one of her vacation outfits.

I had to break down and tell Haley all about our plans for vacation, we have been keeping it a surprise, so that she will really try to work harder at her swimming lessons. She needs to learn how to swim well to fully enjoy herself at the water park when we go. She was so incredibly excited to hear all the plans. She is beside herself with anticipation. Thank goodness there is only a month until we go, I only have to hear about it for four weeks.

We tried to go to the pool this afternoon but the rain and thunder started up as soon as we got there. Haley got in about ten or fifteen minutes of swimming before we called it quits and left. Hopefully tomorrow will be better. Despite slathering baby sunscreen on him, Savino is starting to tan up a little bit. He has skin like Tim and Haley, it must be the Italian/Greek in him, they all tan instantly and it takes a bit for them to burn. Haley always gets very tan during the summer, and their hair starts to lighten up and get blonde. Of course, Savino's hair is already pretty blonde, so it is getting almost silvery.

I think I have almost picked all the strawberries out of our patch for this first crop. There are a few more that haven't ripened yet, and the chipmunks or birds have discovered the strawberries and I lost probably fifteen or twenty to them before I went out and picked this evening, but overall I picked out quite a bit before they got to them! I am really pleased with the yeild this year. We even got some that could be considered "Goliath"-ish, they were pretty big. Everything I've read says the yeild goes down year after year, but I haven't experienced that yet. I just hope that the second crop is half as good as the first. We have enjoyed eating our fresh strawberries. They taste so good! There is a lot more flavor in them than the ones you buy in the store.

I bought Tim's father his Father's Day present today, an Ohio State hammer. Don't ask me. Tim wanted to get it for him for Christmas and they sold out of them before we could buy one. I saw one for sale in the mall today and bought it. At least I don't have to worry about that anymore. Father's Day shopping done. At least for Tim's father. I need to get Tim a card and figure out some sort of cute craft to give him from the kids. Haley made this totally adorable book that she printed out from some website and it has this really cute poem in it and places for her to color pictures and she did a really good job on it. She made it all by herself without any help from me! I almost started crying looking at it. She is so grown up! I am sure I can find some cute Father's Day craft for us to do for him.

I almost bought Tim a new wedding ring today, but managed to restrain myself. I HAVE to buy Haley's birthday presents before I buy anything for Tim. Our local Zales has a kick ass sale going on for pre-owned jewelry and Tim has tried this wedding band on before, and it even fits. I just hope no one buys it before I can. They also have a really nice men's titanium and diamond bracelet that I think he would like too. I managed to walk away without buying it, but it was a close thing.

OK, time to get the boy in the bath and then bed. Hopefully he sleeps well tonight!

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.

Corned Beef and Potatoes

Ok, this entry will probably be in peices because the boy is fussing around on the floor and must be attended to and rescued from the various places he keeps getting himself stuck (under the bouncer, under the jumper, half under the couch, are you sensing a trend?). The crawling in reverse thing has him all sorts of pissed off. The things he wants to play with are IN FRONT of him and he just keeps going further and further backwards. And I won't let him play with my slipper, and that is making him mad because apparently it looks like a fun toy. *shrugs*

I had an exhausting morning. Savino slept well throughout the night... until about 5am. And then it was nurse/fuss/nurse/scream and flail/bottle/nurse/flail. He FINALLY passed out at 7am when Tim got up and started getting ready for work. I was all, "Wake the baby and DIE". I had to stay up for a little bit to fix Haley's hair for school. I bought her some special St. Patrick's Day hair things and had to put them in her hair for her. She was SO EXCITED that it was St. Patrick's Day.

When we finally did get up, I put the boy in his Lucky Charm t-shirt. You will see, I took pictures, of course. He is too cute. Of course, I am pretty much running on fumes today, so it is a good thing he is being so cute.

Toys R Us was having a big Fisher Price sale this weekend, buy one get one free under 20$ so we went yesterday and picked out two new toys for Savino. I feel bad that he really doesn't have a lot to play with, I mean not that a 6 mo. needs a bunch of toys but pretty much everything we do have is girl-oriented. He needed some infant boy toys. Tim picked out this tool bench musical toy and I got him a little piano thing to bang on. He doesn't seem to care much about them, he just ends up flipping them over and then banging on the underside. Oh well!

Haley's Spring Break starts Friday and lasts until Tuesday. I am kinda eh over the fact that their spring break is THREE DAYS. That seems so short to me! But, they have to make up some time for snow days, so I suppose that's why.

Ok, boy must be rescued. I'm out.

I had to put the corned beef brisket in the oven, it has to cook for like 3.5 hours. I hope it turns out ok, I didn't have a rack that would fit in the bottom of the pan so hopefully that won't be a problem. We are having corned beef and potatoes and vegetables. Mmm. Irishness.

I can't believe next weekend is Easter. I need to get off my ass and buy Easter basket stuff I suppose. Haley requested a pre-made Easter basket this year, she didn't want her expensive Longaberger Easter basket filled. *sighs* I suppose she has a few more years of Easter basket before she will be too old, but I think she is a little cheeky for ASKING for which type of basket she gets. Oh well. It is probably cheaper to buy the pre-made baskets than to fill one myself anyway. Laila won't be here so I don't have to do one for her, she is going to be in Dayton. Jaden and Savino are kinda too young really, I might do something little for both of them.

I bought one of these Woodwick candles, in case you're not familiar with them they have this wooden wick that supposedly crackles like a fireplace as the candle burns. We burned it for a little while last night, but maybe I trimmed the wick too short because it didn't crackle. It smells nice though. I wanted the scent "Redwood" but they didn't have any at the Hallmark store, so I had to settle for "Fireside" which smells good.

I didn't end up getting Savino's convertible carseat because, of course, Sam's didn't have them anymore! This is the story of my life, I postpone buying something and then when I go back to buy it, it's not there anymore! Tim gets frustrated with me because of it, but that's just me. So, I don't know which car seat I am going to get now. I went to Toys R Us where they had the same car seat but not on sale... out of stock. Well, damn. We're going to have to get one soon, the boy + the infant seat = too heavy.

A little St. Patrick's Day cuteness for you...

What's St. Patrick's Day, Mom?




Ok, just put the camera down now, ok?




No really. Put. It. Down. (And yes, I did, look how angry!)

"I'm Through With Making Sense"

Well, we'll see how far I get on this entry. I have started and stopped entries (and ended up just deleting them) THREE times over the past three days. Life, it got busy! It didn't help that Tim took yesterday off (at my urging though, so I blame myself) and we spent an extra day running around doing things.

My camera is supposed to ship today! Woohoo! It is coming from NY so we will see how long it takes to get here, I am hoping it arrives no later than Friday. I am So. Excited. I have even been dreaming about taking pictures!

Speaking of dreams, I had another crazy Little House dream. Since we moved, when I dream of the Little House they are always really Crazy dreams. Last night I dreamt that one of Chantal's sisters gave birth on our bed at the Little House, that I was in the bathroom with the door between the two rooms open and I turned around and she was catching her baby. It was one of those really real dreams too, I woke up and was very disoriented.

Savino is teasing me, I know it, with this sleep thing. Saturday night he went down after a bath and nursing and a bottle and slept until almost midnight, he woke up around midnight, nursed again and took another bottle, and went back to sleep... and slept until 5AM!! Without waking up! He was in the exact same spot at 5am when he started squawking that he was when I laid him down at midnight! I sat up, nursed him and laid him back down and after a minute of fussing, he went back to sleep and slept until almost 7:30am when I w as actually awake enough to get up without trying to get him to play own his own for a few minutes so I could rise to consciousness. It was BLISS. I got almost 7 hours of sleep UNINTERRUPTED except to nurse him back to sleep at 5am. I felt so refreshed and rested, it was amazing. Sunday night wasn't quite as good, he woke up around 4am and I was still half asleep so I just put him next to me in the bed out of habit, but he went back to sleep after nursing and we slept pretty good until around 6am when I moved him to his crib and he slept for an hour alone. Last night was pretty good too, he slept until around 4:45am when I brought him into bed again. I think really the key is me being awake enough to sit up and nurse him and then lay him back down rather than just rolling him over into bed next to me and going back to sleep while he nurses. That is a difficult one, I get so sleep deprived that sometimes I just don't even wake up enough to think, "Oh, I ought to sit up and nurse him so I can put him back down in his bed". I think that he is reaching that age where he can sleep on his own, albeit still within arms reach, and I can finally sleep as well.

Anyway, it was a MAJOR success for him and me, I still feel like I am running on recharged batteries for all the sleep! I could get even more if I could manage to get myself into bed before 11pm. I am just embracing my freedom now that he will actually sleep for 4 hours from bedtime to that midnight feeding.

In other Savino news, he is working hard on learning to crawl or scoot. He can scoot himself about 25% of the time on his belly, and he has completely lost all interest in rolling onto his back from his stomach. He can roll onto his stomach from his back, no problem. Still nothing in the other direction though, unless it is completely unintentional, like reaching for a toy that is sort of behind him and rolling over on accident. Sometimes he rolls in his sleep too, but that is also entirely unintentional. But I think that crawling is in his near future, I think he is just going to figure it out soon.

Haley enjoyed her 4 day weekend after her one day at school last week. She was so reluctant to go back to school today, though she looked very cute dressed up in a new sweater and shirt. She needs a haircut, it's getting back below her shoulders again and she wants it trimmed. If I blink, she will be a teenager, it's scary.

We are doing our part to stimulate the local economy by getting a few new things for the house.
At Sears this weekend, I found a plain white china set for 6 on sale for 9.99. Um, Hell yeah! I was so excited, I have wanted a set of plain white dishes for so long and am always too tight fisted to part with the money when I see one that I like. This set is very nice and at that price even I couldn't complain! I also totally caved and let Tim buy a new acoustic guitar on Saturday. Yeah, I am a SUCKER. Oh well, it makes him happy. I find it hard to deny him happiness even when it is totally and completely ridiculous that he should want yet another guitar. We also got a new TV, our old one is some strange offbrand which about four years ago started to clip off the edges of the picture, including the menus on the digital channel guide, so you had to play "fill in the letter" when trying to figure out the names of shows or movies. Yeah. Suck. The new one is super nice, but I don't really watch much TV during the day unless Savino is having one of his nurse-a-thons and there is nothing else to do but sit and be.

Ok, Savino is falling asleep sitting up, I must tend to the baby.

Ok, got him situated in his swing upstairs (thank you new batteries), and hopefully he will take a long nap because his morning nap was like, maybe, 30 minutes? Not long enough.

I am drinking my Mother's Milk tea in an attempt to boost my supply, again. I blame a weekend of running errands and not being home enough, I don't think that Savino nursed quite enough and I was getting worried that my milk was going to start drying up. I don't know if the tea is helping yet or not, but it tastes gross, so I certainly hope it does SOMETHING.

I am trying to resist the lure of Ben and Jerry's in the freezer. I do. not. need. But I want!

We had lunch on Sunday with my sister-in-law and her fiancee. They have been together for a few years now, but she was sporting a huge rock for the first time on Sunday, apparently her fiancee proposed to her (again, I think) in front of their whole church in the middle of the service. I was totally amused by all of that, especially because my sister-in-law, Dawn, only joined the church because that is where her fiancee, Steve, goes to church. She's one of THOSE women, she changes to match her mate, like a chameleon. Anyway, I thought it was cute and sweet, and funny. They've been living together for awhile now, but her divorce from her psycho ex is just now finalized, so I guess he re-proposed to her and gave her a huge rock to cement it. They had plans to get married last year, but Dawn's psycho ex has been dragging their divorce out for like five years, and it STILL wasn't finalized at that point so they had to postpone it. They had purchased a cruise to Jamaica and Mexico and everything for their honeymoon. The trip was nonrefundable, so they went anyway, but the wedding had to wait. They still haven't set a date, but Dawn was flushed with pleasure to have her ring.

It started snowing AGAIN after it had warmed up enough to melt the almost four inches of snow that we had last week. I am so done with winter. I hate the snow. I hate the ice. I hate the cold. HATEHATEHATE. The warmer weather cannot come quickly enough for me. Poor Savino, I am waiting to switch him into the bigger carseat out of his infant seat until the weather warms up because I can bundle him up in his infant seat and zip up his bunting over him and carry the whole seat into the stores without getting him out so he stays warm. I think that he HATES that seat though, and is ready for a bigger carseat, so hopefully it will thaw out for good soon.

We've decided to try and go somewhere on vacation with the rebate checks that will be coming closer to summer. We have no idea where yet. I would like to go back to Florida, but the logistics kind of scare me. I am terrified of trying to fly with Savino and being THOSE parents who have the screaming kid on the plane, though a direct flight to Orlando is only two hours. And the prospect of driving down is even worse, so I don't know. I long for the beaches and the sun and there is so much there that the kids would enjoy, at least, that Haley would enjoy. We are definitely taking the kids to Disney, but probably when Savino is a few years older so that he can appreciate it as well. There are several amusement parks within a few hours driving distance of us though, so maybe we can do something like that. One place I was looking at as a possibility is this big lodge that is on the grounds of a water park and within shouting distance of another amusement park. I don't know if Haley is up for roller coasters yet, at least the big ones, but she gets all crazy and hyper at the suggestion of going on vacation. I'd like to DO something with the money anyway, rather than just spend it on stuff. I'm all into making some fun memories for us. We look back on our other vacations that we've taken with a lot of happiness, so I think we ought to keep the ball rolling.

Ok, I better take advantage of the sleeping baby and get some work done, or some cleaning, or SOMETHING productive!