Shutting This Beast Down

See, here's the thing:  I have too much media in my life.  Last night I was watching the TV, browsing on my lap top and talking on my phone.  Too much, too much, too much.  I am making cuts.  My family suffers from all of our media intake.  I don't know exactly what this is going to look like for our family, but one thing I am doing is hitting pause on the blog.  It's not like I am that dedicated to it anyway so it was an obvious cut for me.  I enjoy it, but there are other things I enjoy more...like browsing food blogs and reading book reviews.  Some things have to go and this blog is at the top of my list.  Along with my Twitter profile that I am also quite inactive on as it stands.  I am about to have 3 babies under the age of 3 and my family has to come first.  Doing crafts and reading books together have to take precedence over blogging.  

I can't bring myself to delete it because I have posts on here from 2006!  I enjoy a good trip down memory lane every now and then.  Plus, once my life begins to have some order and routine I may pick blogging back up.  Only time will tell!!

And, I have to mention that I know I bombed the Advent thing, but I have been computer-less for almost 2 weeks!! Long story, but truly, I did not have a computer to post daily updates.  All I had was my smart phone and all I do on that is look at Facebook.    

So, I bid you an adieu for now.  Thank you for those who have read my blog and hope to back one day...

So Much

So much to write about.  I am so far behind with blogging.  My excuse is that in the past 30 days me, my husband, and our two children have lived and/or visited 2 continents, 3 countries, and 3 states.  The other day someone wrote somewhere they were tired of living out of suitcase for a week and a half and I just had to laugh.  We have lived in 3 hotels and both of or parents places.  I am tired of it.  Of course I am!  Who wouldn't be?  We have 3 weeks to go before we are all back together in our new home.  (Yes, that means me and the hubs are temporarily separated again).  Those 3 weeks cannot come soon enough!  Le sigh.  

In my head, the posts I want to write are: 

Our Trip to England
Here's me and Caleb in a red phone booth! Any Harry Potter fans out there?

Halloween

Me and my munchkins.  Two years in a row now that Chris has missed :(

The Gender Reveal

No pics...that one deserves it's own post!!

I would also like to discuss my New Years Goals and my best and worst reads of 2012.  I also love talking about Christmas and what it means to me.  See, I have so much to write about!  

For now, let me just emphatically say I love Once Upon A Time and Grimm.  Seriously, those two shows are completely up my alley!  My dear mother has DVR'd all the episodes so I am being unproductive during naptime and bedtime and watching TV.  And I love it :)  I know this won't last forever.  One, me and Chris have never had a TV in our home (we have a TV for DVDs but no TV if that makes sense).  We have no moral objections to television, but we can't quite justify spending the money.  I think we will add it to our budget in the next year however.  Two, even if we did have TV, I would force myself to self regulate since it is such a time suck.  However, I just realized that I can watch episodes on the Internet (I know, I'm a bit behind the times)!  So, I'm excited about that prospect. 

I'm also kind of pregnant.  I mean, duh, of course I'm pregnant, I meant I'm kind of looking pregnant.  And, by kind of I mean a lot.  This pregnancy has been my biggest bellied one so far.  Weird.  There better only be one baby in there.  

This was 5 weeks ago so you can imagine how big my belly looks now!

That's basically it.  Well, not really, but that's all I got in me for now.  Time for bed.  Can't seem to get enough sleep these days!

Happy Dance

We fly to America today!  I am so so happy!  If I had more time I would compose a little jig so you could actually imagine me doing a happy dance, but it's 6am and we've got to wake the kids up and hit the road!  We've got a looooong day in front of us involving lots of flying and lots of driving (and lots of coffee) so wish us well!  Can't wait to be on the OTHER side of the Atlantic when my head hits the bed tonight.  I love my country.

Flashback Friday:Stranded at Zurich Airport

Yes, I know it says Flashback FRIDAY and today is Saturday.  That's the name of Emily's link-up, but it is really an all weekend type thing, ok?? :)



It's about a blast from the past that you either didn't blog about or didn't have a blog to blog about.  This was pre-blog days.  I'm taking it all the way back to 2004 when me and some of the coolest people ever got stranded in the Zurich airport.  We weren't just going to SLEEP like the boys...how boring!!  No, we went exploring and documented our fun :)

We got stranded in the first place because my bag didn't make it on our plane so of course we missed our train that was taking us to our ultimate destination.  It would have been too convenient if we had been on a early morning flight and just caught the next train.  No, we missed the last train of the day so had to spend the entire night in the airport!

Oh, and it was a couple days before Christmas.

Here goes:


This is almost the whole group: L-R Chris (my future husband), Helton, my bestie Karole, me, and Karole's husband Blair.  It looks like me and Blair are a couple, but we were actually digging through his bag looking for his hackey sack and we just stood up real quick for the picture ;)  Also, don't mind my very red hair.  I was in Europe and doing as the Europeans do :)


This is Stacy who is missing from the above picture.  I'm pretty sure delirium has set in at this point ;)

This might be my favorite picture of Karole.  Ever. 

Clearly, I don't fit in there.  I don't even remember why that was there.  Is it a toy for kids?  I'm pretty sure most airports don't have play areas. Maybe it was a display of some sort?

Definitely losing her cool at this point!! She is so funny.  I mean, was she cold?  What is she wearing?

What the boring old boys did...

Ha, I made this one bigger so you could see the look on my face.  I swear they said, "make a funny face", but they are both smiling so nicely!  It's really quite comical close up.  

Another one of our friends is really scared of mannequins so of course we had to take this to freak him out!  Oh, these memories make me smile :)

The next morning we had time to go to a coffee shop before we caught our train.  Everyone is good spirits at least, sleep or no sleep!

My hair is so red, it blends in with the upholstery.  Lovely.  

See, they really are a couple ;) 

You know Helton is super delirious when he cheeses for the camera.

Stacy and I were super impressed with her caramel flower on her coffee :)

Yes, this is my Chris.  Before I knew he was mine mind you.  He has learned that that pose is no longer acceptable for pictures ;)

At last, we reached our Winter Wonderland...Wengen, Switzerland

So beautiful it takes my breath away.  I'd say it was worth the wait ;)

Mr. Man 10 Months

2 Months away from being one?!  That is crazy insane.  It has truly gone by so fast!  The first 6 months were hard and slow, but since we got to Germany, I can't really keep up with him!  He is doing so much and changing so quickly these monthly posts barely do him justice.


The basics:

Sleeping
Same as last month.  Naps from 10-12 and 2-4 and sleeps 7p-7a.

Eating
He still loves to eat although lately he hasn't been finishing his bottles?!?  He was getting 4 8oz bottles a day and after 2 or 3 days of him not finishing them, we cut it back to 7 oz a feeding.  I have no idea if this is normal??  I don't like it, but there's no dang doctors to ask around here.  There is a nurse line you can call and I have called it before but they don't know my son and he doesn't have a regular doctor (has never seen the same one twice!) so I don't like calling them unless it's super urgent.  Can't wait until we are back with normal pediatricians in America!
As far as solids, he still seems to be eating the same amount, but not with the same urgency.  He used to get real mad if you didn't feed him continually but he's a lot more chill about it so I don't know if he's "maturing" or not as hungry.
He still cries when I wipe off his face.  Such a baby ;)

Playing
He has finally started to "play" with books.  He loves looking at them and chewing on them of course.  He likes doing it by himself.  If I put him in my lap all he does is try to grab the book and eat it or something.  Today I sat on the floor for "reading time" with both of the kids.  Autumn loved it, Caleb ignored me.  Hmmm...















Other Things of Note:
I don't know if I've mentioned these before, but he gives kisses on demand, claps his hand, says "mama" and "dada" but without purpose, pulls up to a standing position all the time, but doesn't stand on his own yet, and "yells" happily a lot.  He's quite loud!!

He hates changing clothes.  He acts like it is awful!  He also will not ride in the grocery cart or stroller without screaming.  I don't mean whining, I mean screaming like he's on fire.  We have tried to let him cry a bit but it is really hard when your child is screaming in the middle of a store and all you have to do is hold him to make him stop.  So we just hold him.  This, too, shall pass I tell myself.

Despite the hating of the stroller/grocery cart, he is getting much more independent.  He does great at home now.  He will happily crawl into another room away from me.  He will also let Chris hold him while we are walking through the store, etc.  These are big accomplishments :)  Even though he is more independent, he would still be happily be carried around by mama 24/7 :) AND, last night we went to a military ball and left him with a sitter for the first time and he did great.  When we got home, my jaw hit the floor.  He didn't cry (except when she changed his clothes!) and he went to sleep just fine! 

I know his shirt says 9 months, but I never take those pictures on time and I didn't get it last month's post!  Maybe I'll get the 10 month picture in the 11 months post ;)