Saturday, July 30, 2011

Our “Vacation”

I’ve decided to write this post, not because I want to remember any of it, but because I’m thinking one day I might find this post and think it’s funny. Right now it’s too soon for any of us to laugh about, but one day, maybe.

We booked a really short 3 night getaway to Ocean City shortly after returning from our South Carolina trip. We decided that the trip to SC was nice, but not really a “vacation”, so we thought we’d just take a trip to the beach for a couple days. We knew the kids would love it, and we couldn’t wait to see what Harper would make of the sand and waves.

We arrived at the Princess Royale Thursday afternoon, and although we were a bit early, they had our room ready for us. The room was decent, but I was concerned about the 6 of sharing such close quarters simply because Harper doesn’t have the best track record for sleeping outside of the comfort of his own bed. I just kept thinking that if he decided he wasn’t going to sleep in his port-a-crib we were going to be screwed because he’d keep everyone up with his crying and carrying on. But, I didn’t want to complain, so I just shrugged my shoulders and decided right then to make the most of it.

After unpacking a little, we all walked down to the water and give Harper a brief introduction. The water was quite cold, so Tony just held Harper out so his feet could touch the waves, and he just loved it! Every time the water would hit his feet he’d scream with delight! Since it was getting close to 5pm when we got back in our room we thought we should figure out what we were going to do for dinner. We found a flyer advertising a “Family Fun Night Buffet” right down in the restaurant of our hotel, so we decided that was a great idea since we wouldn’t have to leave the hotel and they would have kid friendly food.

The buffet had pizza, hot dogs, chicken tenders and a few other kids friendly foods, but it also had a pasta salad and garden salad for the adults. As we walked up to the buffet we couldn’t help but think that the food didn’t look all that good, but it was a buffet after all. So, everyone got a little to eat, and we went on our way.

The hotel was having a kids movie night, and while they normally do the movie out on the beach, that night was too windy so they were holding it in their indoor pool area. Landon was dying to see the movie (Megamind) and Zoe was sweet and said she’d take him to see it. Harper was already in bed for the night so Mema volunteered to watch Harper while Tony and I went for a walk along the beach. It was a gorgeous night, and we took a nice walk before finally heading back. When we got back to the room the kids were there so we asked what was going on and Landon informed us that he wasn’t feeling well.

I, of course, told him he should go sit on the toilet and see if that would help. He told me it wasn’t that kind of stomach ache, but he did anyways. When he came back he said nothing happened, but he still wasn’t feeling well, so I figured it was just a slight stomach ache, nothing to worry about…and then I realized that my stomach was feeling a little achy as well.

As we were all getting ready to brush our teeth and turn in for the night, Landon came rushing into the bathroom saying he thought he was going to get sick. And sick he was. For hours and hours. All night to be exact, and even into the next afternoon. I won’t give too much detail here, as I’m sure you can imagine it for yourself, but I will just say that it was like a domino effect from there. First Landon, then myself, then Tony’s mom, then Tony and finally Zoe. Zoe didn’t really start feeling badly until the following morning, so she didn’t have to fight for her spot in the single bathroom we were sharing that night, lucky girl.

While all of us were busy being miserable and sick, Harper decided that he was in fact, not going to be sleeping in some stupid port-a-crib. He woke up around 11pm and stayed awake, unhappy and crying until about 3:30am when he finally just collapsed. I’m sure he sensed that something was wrong, but I wish he would have sensed how much it would have helped if he would have just slept through it all!

The next morning was only marginally better as I was still unable to get out of bed and Zoe was only beginning to have her turn. Tony and Landon were feeling better and Mema was feeling better than before so they decided to take a walk down to the beach with the baby. Landon was so excited to get down there, so when he came back to the room only 20 minutes later I figured something was up. Apparently they all thought they were feeling better than they actually were and noone could stand getting in the freezing water! So, they all ended up coming back to the room and that’s when I decided we should go talk to the hotel management about getting our money back. (My mother-in-law spoke with the restaurant manager while I was asleep, and he told her that he hadn’t gotten any other complaints about the food. I think he might have been full of shit or people didn’t report it because they didn’t realize they had food poisoning. We have no doubt that it was food poisoning since we all ate the same foods and were all sick only hours afterwards.) After explaining to the hotel manager that we weren’t even able to leave our room because we were so ill he decided to let us out of our three night obligation. We only ended up paying for the night we were there and we paid a fee for using the room for the large part of the day (we checked out close to 6pm). We thought that they were very kind for giving us a break, but once we got back to the room and started packing I realized what a nightmare it was going to be to get out of there! Myself, Mema, Tony and Zoe were all still feeling awful and yet we had to pack our crap up and then drive 2 1/2 hours home. It was like punishment for stuff I haven’t even done yet! It was just so awful!

We did get everything out of that room in a hurry though, and we were home in almost 2 hours flat. Harper slept the whole way home and only woke up long enough to get his diaper and nighties on. He didn’t wake until about 3am for a little milk then he was back to sleep until 7am. I suppose he just likes to sleep in his own bed, and really, I can’t blame him for that. It doesn’t make traveling any fun, but I can certainly understand his need for the comforts of home.

Since we’ve been home everyone has started feeling much better. Of course. I know my kids are disappointed that they didn’t get to enjoy the beach at all, but it just didn’t seem like a good idea to stay and see what happened.

If you’re still here, thanks for reading all about our crazy, awful “vacation”. I sincerely hope you never have one like it.

Here are a couple of pictures I have from the 20 minutes Tony and his mom took the boys down to the water.

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Friday, July 22, 2011

3 Days Old {Layout}

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There’s just something special about newborn clothes.It’s just so darned tiny and some of the designs are just precious. I love shopping for infant clothes, and chances are if I’m invited to your baby shower, I’m bringing some kind of outfit.

Shopping for Harpers newborn wardrobe was probably one of my very favorite things to shop for. Buying furniture is nice too, but the clothes I could just go crazy on. When Harper was three days old, I decided it was time to get him into some of his sweet little outfits for a photo shoot, however, I didn’t realize how much work it was going to be to change him into outfit after outfit, so the “photo shoot” didn’t last long! I think I may have only changed him three times and by the third change of clothes, he was falling asleep!

The outfit he’s wearing above was one that I thought looked just adorable on him, and even though it was newborn size, it was quite large on him. It didn’t swallow him up, but it was very roomy, especially the pants.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Baby in a Bucket

I waited too long to buy a kiddie pool for Harper this summer.

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I’ve had to compromise.

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I emptied a big storage bin and put it on the deck, filled it with some chilly hose water, and plopped him right in. We tossed in a couple bath tub toys, some balls and a huge cup of ice. He was happy for at least half an hour!

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I used to do this same thing for Landon when he was a baby, I’ve got to find some pictures because he enjoyed it just as much!

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Just Like Christmas

It was like Christmas morning for me today.

Why?

Because we had our new furniture delivered…and that’s my kind of Christmas!

I ended up picking out this little recliner:

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This smallish couch:

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And this largish chair, which they call a “snuggler":

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The only problem I have with it is the minute Tony got home from work today, he fell asleep on the couch. And I fell asleep on the “snuggler”. I guess a really comfortable couch is a good thing and bad thing. Who knew?

Friday, July 15, 2011

First Bath

This layout is going to be filed under “took a month to finish and still am not happy with it”.

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Every once in awhile I’ll start a layout and then just totally blank on how to finish it. This is one of those pages. I started this forever ago and it just sat on my desk forever, waiting for me to finish it, but I just didn’t know what to do with it. I’ve finished it, as you can see, but it certainly isn’t one of my best pages, and not a favorite by any means. But it’s another page that’s finished and it means I can move on to the next thing!

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Framed

I saw a really cute idea on Pinterest a couple weeks before my sisters wedding. It was a photo of two kids (probably ring bearer and flower girl, or something) holding up a picture frame, and in the distance you could see the bride and groom kissing. It was such a great idea and one I wanted to replicate for my sister, but wouldn’t you know we just never found the time to do it!

That didn’t stop all of us from experimenting with using the frame to take other pictures though…and some of them turned out super cute.

Like this one.

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And this.

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And these.

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And, of course we brought it down to the lake too.

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But this is one of my favorites.

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Harper’s First 4th

While the big kids were out kayaking, Harper was busy playing.

He cooled off in the baby pool.

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He looked adorable in his 4th of July outfit.

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He played with sticks and watched bubbles float by.

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And he also played with Lorenzo a little bit.

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When he started getting restless, Aunt TT and Meme decided to take him out in the lake.

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He was thrilled!

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Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Kayaking

On July 4th my parents rented a couple of kayaks to take out on the lake. It was a total hit and everyone had a blast! I never did get to go out on the lake and give it a try, but it sure did look fun. I, of course, spent my time capturing all the action with my camera, and here are some of my favorites.

Tony was one of the first ones out there.

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Then Landon joined him.

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That’s Jaron and his friend Courtney taking a little break.

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Landon wanted to pull Zoe out into the water. It took a few tries, but he got it!

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The four kids enjoying themselves.

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Later in the afternoon my sister and her family came over and that’s when Murphy joined the kayaking.

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Tuesday, July 12, 2011

11 Months

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So, the little stinker is 11 months old today. Hard to believe that I’ll have a one year old next month. If you read my post about Landon turning 10 you already know where my heart is when it comes to these kiddo’s getting older and I won’t make you read that all over again. Instead, I’ll give you the little dudes monthly update.

  • He weighs somewhere right around 24 pounds. I don’t know his exact weight, but I do know he’s quite heavy.
  • He has 5 teeth. Three up top and 2 on the bottom, and he will bite you. And it will hurt.
  • He cries when I tell him no. Not every time, but he always looks up at me to see how serious I am, and when I’ve got my don’t you dare look on my face, he cries. Then I just want to let him do whatever it was I said no about because it breaks my heart knowing I’ve hurt his feelings.
  • He is s-m-a-r-t. He knows he isn’t supposed to mess with my plants and he crawls up to them and then turns and waits for me to notice before he bats at the leaves. He also knows he isn’t supposed to play in the dogs food and water, so he’ll just casually throw a toy in the general direction of her bowls and then ever so casually grab a piece of dog food or splash in the water before I get to him.
  • He’s tasted dog food and by the look on his face, it wasn’t too bad.
  • He crawls around like its his job.
  • He’s attempting to take steps, but usually he’ll just pretend like he’s going to take a step and then sit down…but we’re getting there. He does zoom around the house pushing his little mailbox toy and I’ve got video of that to post sometime in the (hopefully) near future.
  • He is chock full of personality and he cracks us up. He knows we think certain things he does are funny and he’ll do them over and over again. We also know how to get him to laugh and we all make sure to get a good belly laugh out of him daily.
  • Bath time is no longer his favorite time of day, and I think it is mostly attributed to the fact that he is just so darn tired by the time we get to it. All he wants to do in there is stand up and/or throw his toys out. He seems to be in his very best mood first thing in the morning, and sometimes that can be pretty darn early, but at least he’s happy when he gets us up at the crack of dawn!

All in all he seems to be hitting all of his milestones right on time and is generally an incredibly easy going and happy baby. He’s spoiled rotten and loved to pieces…just as a baby should be.

LaTisha and Lorenzo, July 2, 2011

The day of the wedding was hectic and crazy and altogether mind-bogglingly (is that even a word) busy, but I did manage to pull out my camera here and there. Can you believe I didn’t get any pictures of my sister in her dress, or her with her new husband or even my nephew all dressed up? I was in the wedding so I had to let go and hope that the photographer knew what he was doing; not that I had any idea, but I at least knew what I would have taken photos of.

Here’s some of the better ones from the night:

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Everyone had a great time and Harper was an angel considering it was way past his bedtime. Tony and I ended up leaving the party around 10pm and I ended up getting really sick that night, and no I hadn’t been drinking. I woke up sometime in the middle of the night running a fever and was down for the next couple of days. Thankfully my body held out until after the wedding and I got to witness my sweet sisters wedding. I am so happy for her and am hoping this is the beginning of all her dreams coming true…I Love You Tish!

Happy Surprise

The day before Tisha’s wedding was quite hectic. I didn’t have a chance to catch my breath much less take pictures, so I was quite surprised when I was going through all the pictures on my camera and found these:

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Apparently the little guy was having a great time playing around on our bed!

April Fools Pranks

The two little kids made me laugh yesterday morning.  I was upstairs getting things ready for school when I heard them talking about how ...