favorite things

I have been ignoring our blog lately because each time I look at it I am reminded of how behind we are. And also because I am enjoying a lazy summer with no school, just trying my best to enjoy being Will's mom, which isn't too hard. This is the first time since I got pregnant with Will that I haven't been working, in school, and worrying about our future. It's nice. Anthony would probably say I still worry about the future, but somebody in this house has to do it and I do the most thorough job. :) Our summer has been going really well so far.

A few weeks ago my friend Susan threw a "Favorite Things Party." I had a great time. Each guest was told to bring three of their favorite items and a favorite food to share. Then we went around and showed off our favorite things. I think what I liked about this party most (besides that fact that I got to talk about some of my favorite things and spend time with friends) is that I feel like I got to know the other girls better in a way that I normally wouldn't. Someday I think I will copy this idea and throw a "favorite things" party of my own, but it will have to be awhile since most of my local friends were at this one.

As soon as I got the invitation I started thinking about my favorite things. Here are a few of my current favorites (and this is by no means an all encompassing list):

Pentel EnerGel Needle Tip 0.5 Pen

I love these pens! They are the perfect thickness, easy to hold and write smoothly. I have made lists just to use these pens.

The Old Testament for LDS Families

I set a goal this year to read the Sunday School lesson each week. I haven't been perfect, but I've done pretty well. I've done a lot better since getting this book. I like the questions it asks, the helpful definitions and general authority quotes. Or maybe it's just the fact that it has pictures...

Smart Ones Orange Sesame Chicken

I have never been a huge fan of microwave dinners, but this meal has changed my life. I love it! I got hooked at the beginning of the year when every store was running sales on their weight loss products. Now I am constantly on the lookout for coupons and sales to justify buying them. I have been trying to come up with a recipe of orange chicken that tastes as good but is also as healthy. I haven't found it yet, so until I do, these guys will keep making their way into my cart.

Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child

Will's sleep schedule has been a roller-coaster (not a good one). For the most part, things have been pretty good for the past few months, but things really turned the corner after I read this book. Whenever we have a set back I pull it out again and it usually has some sort of answer. This book has also convinced me how important sleep is to a person's well-being. I have pridefully resisted naps in the past, but I have since embraced naps and it is wonderful.

Yoga Capris

I love these capris. They are so comfortable and versitle. I am probably too casual and occasionally wear them to the store, but I've seen worse worn publicy by others so I'm going to go ahead and excuse myself. I love that I can wear these to go on walks, clean the house, play with Will, read on the couch, the list is endless...When it comes down to it, I think maternity pants ruined me. I really do get bugged when I have to zip and button.

Anways, to me summer = comfortable and these babies are comfy.

Anthony & Will

I love this picture because they are having so much fun. I couldn't help but smile when I looked out the window and saw this scene. Anthony is a great dad and Will adores him.

And really, how could you not love this little guy?

Well, that's all for now. I'm sure as soon as publish this post I will think of some more favorite things, so I may have to do a follow up post some time in the future. I'm not really into tags and whatnot, but I would be interested to find out what some of you consider your favorite things...so let me know.

This post is dedicated to Will's Aunt Emily

I never knew food could taste so good.

Happy Father's Day

Will loves his dad.

Happy Half Birthday

Will is 6 months old. It feels like he has been around forever, but in reality, he has only been alive for 1/54 of my life.



Will was really excited to celebrate. I mean, just because he can't eat cake yet, doesn't mean his loved ones can't indulge themselves in his honor.


My culinary creations always taste better than they look. Half a cake for half a year.


We had some family over to join in on the fun. Will was kind of a diva, but hey, it was his party and he'll cry (more like fuss a ton) if he wants to.

Seriously though, he is turning into such a little boy. Sometimes I look at pictures, like this one, and I think, where did my baby go? Like I said, he is becoming a (very) little boy.


His personality is really starting to shine through. He is such a goofball. He makes us laugh all the time.
Some of his favorite things to do each day include:

• Eating--he's a natural. I can't put him in his chair before I have to food ready because he just sits there with his mouth open and grunts. In his limited experience, prunes are the best.
• Chewing--on everything. Fingers are not safe around him. I think he is getting close to cutting another tooth because he is chewing more than usual.
• Rhythms/music--the kid likes to rock. Turn on a song with heavy bass and any crying will instantly cease. But he isn't too picky. He's enthralled by clapping and snapping too. He loves to watch people dance. I'm dancing more than I ever have in my life.
• Outside adventures--we take at least one walk a day, usually two. He loves to look at the trees and touch grass and leaves. He reminds me to stop and admire things, everything is so fascinating to him. We also like to hit up the pool. He prefers to have his entire body from the neck down under the water to sitting in the baby pool.
• Sitting--getting better every day.
  
• Reading--Will's a total bookworm. He loves books. If I had the stamina, he would let me read the same book to him over and over and over and over. We only have variety for the sake of my sanity. Sometimes I sing the stories to him, which he loves. (In case you were wondering, his favorite book is Here Comes Peter Cottontail, a Easter gift from my mom. He loves that book the best.)

Pretty much we think he's the bomb.com. Thanks for letting me indulge my need to gush about my kid.

Well, this is not the rumored post about our trip to Boston and Alicia's wedding, BUT it is a funny clip of Will trembling due to the delicious culinary masterpiece that is Gerber's rice cereal. Enjoy!

Water baby

Note: A post detailing our recent trip to Boston by Anthony is forthcoming.

It's no secret that I love the pool. Last summer when I was getting big and pregnant I would visit our apartment's pool and daydream about taking our baby to the pool this summer and Anthony would warn me to not get my hopes up, not all babies love water. All winter I've been hopefully optimistic due to the fact that Will loves bathtime. "But bath water is warm," TJ would warn, so I'd pour a little cold water on Will to see how he'd handle it.

For the most part, he handled it just fine, but there was no way of knowing for sure whether he would like the pool or not.

Well, summer and the day of reckoning arrived. Will and I were so pleased to prove his doubting poppa wrong--he LOVES water!

There were NO tears. He was a little unsure at first. But once he got comfortable, life was good.

He loves being pulled through the water.

Check out that smile!

Now if only it will stop raining we can put our pool pass to use. Any of your Overland Park residents out there, we have a pool pass, so let us know if you want to hit up the pool!

Photogenicity

A photogenic subject (generally a person) is a subject that usually appears physically attractive or striking in photographs.


Sometimes I look terrible in pictures. I don't know why. I friend once said to me that a good thing about not being photogenic is that people will be pleasantly surprised when the meet me in real life (after just seeing pictures beforehand). I like to think I'm pretty normal looking, but then I take another bad picture and I start to wonder. Here is the latest. This photo was taken at a recent Royals game. Unfortunately for Melanie, I am not the only victim in this pic. It looks like she has a huge gap between buck teeth. (She normally has a beautiful smile.) Oh Sluggerrrrrr, you bring out the worst in us.


So yeah, I was looking at this picture this morning and I got to thinking, What is it about me and baseball games and terrible pictures. This picture was taken at a Cardinals game last August when I was 5 months pregnant. I freaked out when I saw it and spent the rest of the game, I am ashamed to admit, snapping random pictures of myself from different angles trying to see if my nose really had grown in the past hour.


Why am I not photogenic? What makes a person photogenic? Why does Lady Gaga look better in pictures than me?

So, naturally I turned to the source of all knowledge, Wikipedia. I am glad I did. Thank you Wikipedia for doing what Anthony has not been able to do for almost 5 years. You convinced me that just because I take an ugly picture or two, I'm not completely unfortunate looking.

Allow me to quote part of the entry:
*I have made bold the most important parts of the article.

The state of being photogenic may or may not necessarily be related to one's physical attractiveness in real life. Models are usually described as photogenic. The bone structure of their faces may represent something that is not generally pretty or may be even unattractive or frail looking, but when photographed, their features can turn into something that is physically attractive.

There are a few different possible causes for this. First, it is important to understand the difference between looking at someone with two eyes and through a single camera lens. With two eyes, the human brain is able to see the three dimensional aspects of someone's face, even when viewed directly from the front, and it gives much more information than most cameras. With a camera, the subject is viewed through a single lens, and thus much of the three dimensional qualities of the face are lost. . . .

Another explanation for the fact that attractive people are not always photogenic is that part of their attractiveness may be due to the charisma they bear in real life due to the way they move, express, and carry themselves. While this will positively influence the subjective appearance of that person in real life, a still photograph usually fails to reproduce these attributes, possibly rendering a picture of the person less attractive than the real-life perception and contributing to classify that person as less photogenic.

The lighting when the shot is taken can also have a large effect on a person's perceived attractiveness. Also a person's face may look different depending on the angle and intensity of the light being reflected off the face. This effect is magnified when a flash camera is used and may cause undesirable features, such as ridges or bumps to appear more pronounced then they otherwise would. Also lighter skin tones and features may appear washed out when taken from a flash camera.

So who knows. Maybe it's the bad lighting. Maybe I just have a lot of charisma. Maybe I have bad luck. But at least I don't have to let my lack of photogenicity get me down.


Here is a cute picture of Will, to comfort you, after viewing the pictures of me. He is adorable from every angle.

Clean Slate

I've been meaning to update this blog for so long, but I keep putting it off because there is so much I could blog about, or at least, there are so many cute pictures of Will I could post. I get overwhelmed by how behind I am and instead of just updating, I continue to put things off. This has been a problem for me throughout my life. It is something I would really like to overcome, so if any of you have any tips of how to overcome chronic avoidance and/or extreme procrastination, I'd love to hear them. Yes, I am soliciting advice.

On to bigger and better things....

Items of note since we last blogged:

• I finished a class (so much harder with a baby than I ever would have imagined). I am 6/7 finished with school! And now I am taking the summer off.
• For Mother's Day my whole family got together and my sisters and I worked to clean out the stuff we have stored at my parent's house. I found some great treasures--like my first Troll, my middle school yearbook (where I edited out all the swears) and my first (and only) softball uniform (can you consider a t-shirt a uniform?). It was great hanging out with my sisters. Will got non-stop attention. We ate lots of good food. I was sad to say goodbye.
• We spent a fun-filled weekend in Springfield visiting friends and introducing them to Will. When we moved we left in kind of a whirlwind fashion and didn't get to say goodbye to most of our friends. We had such a great time. It felt like we were back home. The only frustrating thing about the trip was Will. We wanted to show him off, but he was soooo fussy all weekend. Which leads us to the next item of note.
• Will has cut not 1, but 2 teeth. The day after we got back from Springfield I felt like I wouldn't be able to handle Will any more. He was fussy, irritable, and hard to soothe. I told Tony I was at my wits end. I prayed that tomorrow would be a better day. And it was. Will slept 6 hours straight (great for him) and was so much happier the next day. At one point I notice Will put something in his mouth and I swipe my finger to make sure he didn't have anything small in there and I feel something hard. A tooth? Isn't he too young to cut a tooth? A few weeks before at Will's 4 month appointment his pediatrician told us that he was pre-teething, and it would most likely be months before he cut his first tooth. I guess he's an early bloomer? Only time will tell. And just so you know, I sacrificed a finger for this shot.
• Baseball games. And lots of them. Since Will's first baseball game TJ has been to a game in Atlanta, we have gone to another game as a family, and Anthony and I went with his coworkers last Friday. That's a lot of baseball. Plus the countless hours of baseball at home via MLB.tv.

• Out and about! With the nicer weather we have been having lately Will and I have been pounding the pavement and I love it. There is a walking trail near our home and we are getting to know it well. Sometimes I sing to Will. But only if no one is there. My voice is the type of voice only a baby can appreciate. Sometimes we take a break and Will swings.

• Will is five months! He is turing into such a little kid. Sometimes I think I miss the crazy days when he would just fall asleep in my arms and snuggle into me (which is obviously my memory being selective, but at least I am selectively remembering the good times). He doesn't really like to snuggle these days. It's like he always thinks I am trying to get him to sleep. He's probably right. He has the cutest smile. It takes over his whole face. I can't imagine my life without my little buddy. He makes me happy.

There are probably more things I could say, but my memory struggles when I am tired. Here's to better blogging in the future.

Pictoral Travelogue

Last week Will and I spent some time in the Beehive State. We went to introduce Will to our Utah family and friends and to be a part of Jill's graduation festivities.

Congratulations Jill!!


So upset that the festivities were drawing to a close.

It is hard to sum up all we fit in to 4 1/2 days. I am still tired. So the pictures will have to do a lot of the talking for me.

Will's first flight! The trip out was great--we won't talk about the trip home.


He was so happy when we finally got to Hurricane and he could get out of his car seat.


Will loved my grandparents.


Especially Grandmamere. They connected instantly.

He felt content in her arms. We are already trying to figure out a time to visit again.


Will also got to meet his cousin Sadie and Aunt Carly and Uncle Daniel.


Unfortunately, Will was a bit grumpy when we hung out with them. Sadie was as even cuter than I pictured. It was fun to see the cousins together and their similarities. We observed that they have very similar head shapes and that Will's voice is deeper than Sadie's. It was also funny that if Will got fussy, Sadie would start to make some noise, and when Sadie was loud, Will had to get loud too. Already trying to one-up each other or trying to make sure the other didn't get all the attention.


I am mad I didn't get better pictures and that Will wasn't more cooperative, but I guess you can only ask so much of a 4 month old.

It was so fun to hang out with family. I wish we all lived closer and could hang out all the time.


I guess you could say we missed Anthony a bit. So while we were in Provo we took Will to a few places his dad might head if he were in town.

Will pounding it with his Dad's BFF, Darren.

Seeing how far his Dad has come since he met Mom. (I will admit that the Caddyshack looked better back in 2005).

Will loves family history already.

This is what we came home to:

Yikes! Christmas of '08 Anthony grew out his facial hair and then cut a goatee. Right after he shaved it off we watched Anger Management with his family and saw Luis Guzman's sweet facial hair. He's been dying to do it ever since. I'm pleased to say it didn't last long.

We couldn't have survived without the help of my parents--thank you!!

Bite Me.

Come over here and I will.


Or at least Will will.


Lately he has taken to biting. Everything. Part of me is glad he doesn't have teeth yet because the gums alone are pretty strong. But if he had teeth he might not be so fussy. all. day. long.