Away We Go

Snow Day

2012-01-23T16:08:00.009-05:00

We finally got our first real snow storm here in Rochester, for the second snowiest city in the U.S. this place is really not living up to our expectations! We were so glad to finally get to have some fun in the snow. As always, I have a hard time narrowing down pictures.

Literally trying to eat snow.

Throwing snow balls.

The beginning of a snowman.

Liam realizes it is more fun to jump in the pile than help build it.

Digging out.

Sweet rosy cheeks (don't mind the runny nose:).

Liam Liam and more Liam

2012-01-14T20:27:00.004-05:00

Liam is...

-Very active. All of his favorite activities revolve around movement. Walking, jumping, climbing, riding bikes and trikes and scooters. He surprised me a couple of times at the beginning of this past year by completely scaling a big rock climbing wall at the park before I even noticed he had started. A bit scary, but he was sure proud of himself.
-A simple boy. Any kind of car is still his favorite toy. Even 50 cent Hot Wheels.
-Cuddly and kissy. He loves to cuddle with me and watch Shea Street (still doesn't say Sesame, can't figure out why). Has to kiss both of your cheeks when he says goodnight or goodbye.
-Easily entertained, he laughs big with his mouth wide open. Can you guess where he got that?
-Sentimental. He was brought to tears a few times this last year when we sold items on craigslist as we were moving. "Where is she taking the chair!?". He was devastated.

His favorites are...

-Sesame Street, Word World, Super Why
-The Sandlot, Megamind, Cars, How to Train Your Dragon, Winnie the Pooh, Jungle Book
-Trick or Treat book, Go Dog Go, Lullaby Moon, Ten Apples Up On Top, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Bee Me
-Play Doh is his favorite creative play. He can sit and play for over and hour. I LOVE THAT!
-Frosty the Snowman, You are My Sunshine, Sweet Pea
-His grandparents. He loves to Ichat with them and make them feel loved by saying without fail every time "you need to get on a passenger plane and come to my new house"
-Making Gavin laugh.
-Urgurt (yogurt), I'm pretty sure he would survive on yogurt alone if we let him.

He dislikes...

-Wearing a coat! I finally had to force the issue as he would insist on going out without a coat on even when it was in the 20's. He's crazy.
-Being tired. That is when the uncontrollable whining sets in.
-Not much else. He's 3! He loves life!

He says...

-Miam (we have not tried to correct him, do you think it's time?)
-That's right.
-Where did that come from? (This is his version of "why?")
-Don't talk to me like that! (sassy)
-Gavin just does that cause he's a baby. Big boys don't do that.
-I can't, I'm very busy right now.

We love love love Liam!

Party!

2012-01-14T19:30:00.015-05:00

Our darling Liam is now three! It has been a fun/difficult/fulfilling/frustrating/love filled three years. These last two days have been only filled with love though, it is so fun to take time out to just celebrate your little ones and spoil them as much as you can! Liam had his first real birthday party, with friends and everything.

It was a lot of fun for all of us I think, Ryan and I loved decorating and planning for it and loved seeing his excitement in the morning when he came downstairs and saw the decorations, he paused at the bottom of the stairs and got a big smile on his face "where did that come from?", he then proceeded to play with the balloons with Gavin for about an hour. We just loved seeing his excitement. We were a little nervous as Ryan was on call that day and got an e-mail from a co-worker telling him to take a nap because he might be called in as his wife was about to have a baby. Luckily Ryan did not get called in either night, although he did disappear after the main festivities of the party to take a nap just in case.

Pinata! This was a home made pinata that was actually supposed to look nice but it did not dry in time for me to decorate it. But the most important part is that it works and delivers the candy, which it did.

We put these sticky hands all over the wall for the kids to play with. It might have been the most popular item there.

And then of course cake and presents.

It is so cute how excited other kids get about giving presents. I loved watching them crowd around and get so excited for Liam.

Liam's big present was his own sleeping bag and camping chair, so that night we camped out in his room, he slept in his little toy tent. He was pretty enthused and has now slept in there for his nap today and tonight again.

Look at me! Look at me!

2012-01-07T10:57:00.004-05:00

I love this face.

He spends a lot of time doing just this, he also likes to wallow all over us if we are ever down on the floor with him. He is standing up and cruising around on things these days.

Then Roxy came to request a game of fetch or tug of war.

Then Liam noticed pictures were being taken and had to get in on it.

And again Roxy, "play with me!"

I have a lot of people demanding my attention on a day to day basis. Luckily they are all adorable, yes even Roxy.

Sweet Pea Song

2012-01-06T20:41:00.003-05:00

A couple of weeks ago Liam randomly requested "the sweet pea song" as I was putting him to bed. Apparently Ryan had started singing this to him at bed time and he loves it. I do my best, but everytime I try I seem to get it wrong as Liam will say "Sweet Pea doesn't (insert something that I sang wrong). Daddy needs to teach you." I just love that Ryan is the kind of dad who sings his boys to sleep, even if he won't ever sing in front of me. At least they are lucky enough to hear it.

And a picture of all three of my boys together. Liam and Gavin could not ask for a better dad. He is a dad who wrestles, funny walks, reads books, sings sweet pea, cooks yummy things and loves these boys to death.

While I'm at it, here is another beautiful song by Amos Lee.

Good Mom Day

2012-01-03T22:39:00.007-05:00

I like to keep life pretty busy, full of outings to the gym in the morning, library, museum of play in the afternoon. And of course all of the errands involved in keeping a family of four alive, sometimes I think I get too distracted and don't take enough time to really see Gavin and Liam.

So on Saturday the plan was, as usual, to head to the gym first thing, but Liam had other plans in mind. He had hidden my keys, I was sure Ryan accidentally took them with him so I gave up looking pretty quickly. The result was perfect though, I think the boys really needed a day that was all about them, I used to call these kinds of days "Liam days", now I guess they shall be called "all about the boys days". We had a nice breakfast and played around, then headed out on one of their favorite things, a walk, to one of their favorite places, the Rite Aid on the corner.

Why Rite Aid? Well there is a tower of cars there that is particularly appealing. Liam goes straight there and spends most of his time examining all of them and picking out his favorite to play with while we are there.

Not to mention all of the discounted overstocked Christmas toys, we had a good time in that aisle. There was a dancing monkey that kept Gavin busy for a while, he mostly just tried to crawl after it and tackle it.

Does it seem weird that we take a Little Tikes car and a bike into the store? Don't worry, everyone who works there knows and loves the boys.

The rest of the day included lots of laughing, wrestling, reading, train track building, painting, singing and three well rounded meals. I found my keys sometime in the afternoon stuck behind the stool in the kitchen, it made me laugh, I think Liam might have hidden them on purpose, he was ready to slow down for a day. I was glad to have a day to just spend with them doing the things they love and looking into their eyes and seeing the people they are. They are pretty amazing little humans.

Let's get real

2012-01-01T20:15:00.003-05:00

A couple of years ago my Aunt Kristy sent out the best Christmas card ever, so in the spirit of that card...

-My house is more often a disaster than not.
-It's 10 months later and I don't think I can use the "I just had a baby" excuse for the fact that I: 1. still can not fit into my pre-pregnancy clothes, 2. always appear frazzled/stressed/tired.
-I am often too impatient with Liam.
-I find that being a mom is the hardest thing that I've ever done and end most days feeling like I was not good enough.
-I watched three episodes of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills over the last month...and two episodes of Keeping up with the Kardashians. Aaaah, that was painful to admit.

Happy New Year? I guess I could resolve to change some of those things above, but I think I'll just go see if I can find any episodes of Kourtney and Kim Take New York on demand instead.

Times they are a changin

2012-01-01T19:23:00.005-05:00

A lot is going on in the land of Liam these days. Back in October he was potty trained for the first time, it was a fairly easy process, not a lot of stress involved. Until three weeks later when we went on vacation to Utah, the first few days he did well, but then it got too crazy and he regressed completely by the time we left. The second time training him did not go as smoothly, he knew how to do it, he just didn't want to I guess. But I am glad to say we finally have a potty trained boy on our hands! Completely self sufficient, I do not have to be involved at all which is of course the reason for it all. Hurray!

Also, he joined a cool club today.

Sunbeam!

Here he is modeling a coat that my Grandma Lynn made for my dad when he was a little boy. I confused him by telling him it used to be Gramps coat, then he was convinced that it was too big because it was Gramps' coat! It took a lot of explaining but I think he finally got the idea.

"It's too big!"

Why are you making me do this?

And, strike a pose!

Our Liam is turning three in a couple of weeks, more details and mushiness to come.

Thankful

2011-12-27T19:43:00.003-05:00

I know, wrong holiday, but something about Christmas has gotten me feeling all mushy. I have just been thinking about all the people I love in my life, and the best part is that there are so many! So here they are in a nut shell, siblings, parents, cousins, grandparents, high school friends, college roomates/friends, D.C. friends, S.D. friends and ROC friends. I have amazing immediate family and amazing extended family, I love them all and all the fun memories we have and laughter they bring to my life and I miss them like crazy sometimes. I love the friends from my previous lives (high school, college etc.) who I have actually stayed in touch with and I love that even when we don't see each other for years we can get together and it is like no time has passed because we KNOW each other. And I love my D.C. friends because they have seen me through some hard times, pregnancy, new parenthood, stress of Ryan in med school. So thank you all for being a part of my life and for making it better!

And regardless of all the negative things that can be said about it (I'm looking at you mom) I am thankful for Facebook because it allows me to a part of all of your everyday lives despite the distance, and that is pretty amazing.

First Christmas

2011-12-25T20:05:00.011-05:00

This was Gavin's first Christmas and our first Christmas alone as a little family. Ryan and I have had a couple alone just the two of us (first being on our honeymoon) but since we had kids we've always traveled to family. Of course it would be fun to be with our families playing games and eating sweets, but it was actually really nice being in our home. For me it was fun to finally have the responsibility to create the magic and for us to start all of our own traditions. One tradition that might have to be altered in the coming years was going out for Chinese on Christmas Eve, my family does this and it's fun, but this year we got behind schedule and by the time we got to the restaurant the boys were past their prime, we spent a very comical 30 minutes wrangling and trying to stuff food in our faces until we gave up and went home. Next year I'm thinking take out:)

Liam trying to keep Gavin in the picture. We put the majority of the presents out a week ago and the boys set a high standard for all of our future children, they did not get into the presents once.

Liam wanted to take a picture, I think he did a pretty good job.

Can you say double chins? Ha ha, this picture says it all, don't they look a little shell shocked? That might be because Gavin decided to start Christmas day at 5 AM (teething). We were done with Christmas morning before the sun even came up, we spent much of the day just recovering. Here they are waiting to come downstairs to get started.

The stockings I made for the boys.

It was a lovely, relaxed holiday. Liam was super efficient at opening presents while Gavin just focused on one and let me open all the others. They were both happy with their loot and we are looking forward to purging old toys tonight.

We were lucky that Ryan had Christmas eve and Christmas day off so we just enjoyed being together. Now I'm just trying to decide how long is socially acceptable to leave all of our Christmas decor and lights up? They make me happy, so I wouldn't mind keeping them up through February:)

2011-12-09T08:54:00.001-05:00

My Aunt Vanessa left this comment on my blog last night "ok....Racheypoo. It's time. I can't handle the non conforming vertical family photo on your blog. Can I please crop it for you so it fits? My OCD doesn't manifest that often but I just can't take it any longer."

I would say that is a pretty strong manifestation of OCD Vanessa, but I will oblige you anyway:) We needed an updated picture anyway. Problem solved!

Memories

2011-12-08T20:22:00.005-05:00

We are putting together a picture wall in our dining room so we've been going through lots of our pictures from the last couple of years, of course that makes us mushy and sentimental, but it also reminds me of funny things that I never got around to posting. This is one of those things.

During our last couple of months in VA we tried to fit in a bunch of sight seeing that we had neglected during the previous four years. One of those outings was to the Masonic temple just a couple minutes down the road from our place. It was a really fun and interesting experience. Liam used to have a funny habit when we would go to museums of walking like an old serious professor pondering his surroundings, I think he had a lot of practice at museums at that point as we went to a lot of them.

A view of Alexandria. How could I not miss this place?

We took our first trip to a museum since moving here today to a gingerbread house exhibit at the George Eastman house. It was fun, although I wish Liam would have donned his old man pose, he could not keep his hands off the houses! Too many candies for a little man to resist I guess.

Oh Christmas Tree

2011-12-03T18:57:00.005-05:00

We had a fun time picking out our Christmas tree, the farm where we went also had a cute little market where we picked up some cider and homemade jams (Ryan is a total sucker for jams).

The whole time we were there Liam was on a "I want to do it!" kick, so he "helped" cut down the tree, and carry it and push Gavin in the stroller and so on.

We brought home a lovely Blue Spruce, honoring my Colorado roots. I love the smell of pine filling up our house.

Ryan did an awesome job with the Christmas lights, this was our first year with a place that we could put lights on, they make me so happy.

Thanksgiving

2011-12-03T18:48:00.005-05:00

We were so lucky this Thanksgiving to have some of our favorite friends Brooke and Marques and their sweet baby girl Olivia come visit from VA. They are the kind of friends who know all of your quirks and faults and somehow like you anyway, maybe that is what I'm thankful for this year, people who can look past my many faults! Unfortunately we didn't take any pictures of all of us, or of the feast, but we did get a couple of the kids...of course.

Halloween

2011-11-26T10:03:00.003-05:00

All the pictures of Halloween are on my mom and sister's camera, so this is the only one I have from my cell phone.

We spent the holiday in Utah without Ryan, Halloween is Ryan's fave holiday so it was sad to not have him around, but he was going to be working anyway so we opted to stay without him. Since he was not going to be there I decided to take it easy on the costumes, they still looked so cute though. Liam was an astronaut and Gavin was our little monkey. The other little boy in the picture also makes a cute monkey, but I'm not sure if I'm allowed to identify who he is on the internet:) Although of course most of you know anyway.

Trick or treating with Liam was so cute, I just loved watching him walk confidently up to every door, such a little man. A couple of houses we went to were having parties with a bunch of little kids, at the first house Liam informed the little girl that he was going to trick or treat some more but than he would be back to join the party. At the second one he just tried to walk in and join them. Pretty funny.

Happening Now

2011-11-21T20:01:00.002-05:00

I just finished saying night time prayers with Liam, in the prayer I said "please help me to be a better mom", he interrupted me and said "and please help me to be a better Miam. Jesus Christ, amen."

It's nice to know he is so introspective at such a young age. What do you think being a better Miam entails?

Some Things I Will Never Understand

2011-11-18T16:11:00.000-05:00

Like why SO MANY people watch CBS comedies! I consider most things on CBS unwatchable, but especially their pathetic laugh track comedies. I won't give specific names, but you know who you are (Two and a Half Men cough cough) and at the same time actual high quality, original and can you believe it, FUNNY comedies get shelved mid-season to make room for another terrible unoriginal laugh track sitcom, sorry Whitney, it's not me, it's you. Seriously one of the worst shows ever, painful to watch.

I've got your back Community, and hopefully NBC will too. They have a better track record for standing by their high quality content, even if it is not as largely watched as some lowest common denominator shows out there.

End rant.

I had to document this

2011-11-17T22:58:00.002-05:00

Tonight Liam was having some difficulty falling asleep, I had things to do so I headed downstairs anyway. He stayed up there for quite a while and I was actively engaged in painting when I turned around and he was suddenly standing right behind me completely naked! He has never taken his clothes off like this so it was quite a surprise, although it probably would have been surprising either way. After that I decided it was time to lock him in, I don't have to resort to that very often but tonight was one of those nights, I feel extra evil when I do it too because our doors all use skeleton keys, it reminds me of the evil step-mother from Cinderella. After that it only took a few minutes until he was quiet and asleep.

Just now I went up to go to bed and figured I should check on him. I walk in to see his clothes strewn around the room and to find a completely naked Liam sound asleep under the covers. I could not stop laughing. Hopefully stripping down like that doesn't become a trend, but it sure gave me a good laugh tonight.

9 months

2011-11-17T14:43:00.010-05:00

Gavin had his 9 month check up today, it was sad, he had to get a shot and then a finger prick for a lead test (something they have to do here back East since all the houses are so old). Also it was sad because I cannot stand the idea that he is that close to turning one! I feel like with the second the time goes by so much faster and I just want to slow it down. He is so incredibly delightful at this age that I just want to freeze him this way. It's funny how with Liam we were so eager for him to reach milestones and with Gavin I almost don't want him to because I want him to stay a baby longer. One of my favorite things about Gavin lately is that his love for me is becoming so evident (a bit self centered I know), like yesterday when I picked him up from the child care at the gym, he was perfectly happy hanging out with one of the babysitters until he saw me, then he burst out crying, sooo sweet! And today with all the trauma of two doctors appointments, he just wanted to nuzzle into his mama. It feels so good to be able to provide him with the love and security he needs.

Have you ever noticed how from a young age babies figure out to say "ma ma" when they need something? Sad, tired, hungry, Gavin has used that sound to express needs for a few months now and I just think it is so cool. The doctor today said that babies usually say "ma ma" for sad and "da da" for when they are happy, go figure:) I also love how he likes to share the joy he feels in learning new things, every time he develops a new skill he just has to find you and give you a big grin, he is saying "look at me, look at me" in his own way. He is so talkative too, if he hears another baby talking he gets a huge smile on his face and starts yelling out to them. Anyway, here are some pictures of our sweet Gav that I took about a month ago, the sad thing about the pictures is that many of them ended up being out of focus as I did not know that the auto focus was off, the good thing is that I still got quite a few good ones, and be warned, I am going to post ALL of the good ones! Ha ha, I have a hard time making decisions:)

The many faces of Gavin.

Go your own way

2011-11-12T10:26:00.003-05:00

Listening to this song in the car yesterday I was just really struck by how beautiful it is.

I really loved this that someone said in the comment section "This song actually makes me wanna break my heart so that I could relate to it. :)) Is that natural?"

Mysteries

2011-11-10T18:59:00.004-05:00

Ryan can sleep through earthquakes, babies crying and late night knockings on the front door and yet if he starts to snore all I have to do is say "Ryan, you're snoring" and he immediately stops and doesn't snore the rest of the night. I can't figure out why this is the case, but I sure am grateful.

Good for a laugh

2011-11-04T22:03:00.002-04:00

I took some super sweet pictures of Gavin recently, this is not one of them

unless you count the leg rolls, cause seriously, is there anything sweeter?

More to come.

I deserve the hours of lounging around cleaning out my DVR that I'm going to do tonight

2011-11-02T18:40:00.005-04:00

My day included this
1. Getting up at 5 AM to get me and the boys ready for the airport.
2. Carrying two tired crying boys through the airport while pushing a stroller with two car seats on it. Flying cross country, one layover.
3. Not eating anything but airplane peanuts and Diet Coke all day. Also not using the bathroom all day until we got home, too busy to even think about it.
4. Taking a taxi home and then immediately heading out to pick up the black lab we are dog sitting.
5. That dog marking his territory on the side of Liam's bed.
6. Gavin pooping in the bathtub (this is the first time this has ever happened with either of my kids!).
7. Tired Liam deciding it would be a fun experiment to spread his milk all around the rug in our living room.

And I did not lose my temper or get impatient once! That was my only goal for the day. Oh, and to make it home, which we did.

P.S. Utah friends, I love you all dearly, but this trip was for the sole purpose of seeing my little bro Marshal who was coming home from a two year mission in Mexico. I did not get a chance to see any of you as we were all booked up with family time. See you next time!

The load.

Sweet teething baby.

The experienced traveler. Can you see the tired in his eyes though?

Both boys did pretty well, especially considering the early wake up call. They both continue to be good travelers which I am very very grateful for.

When I have down time

2011-10-24T17:42:00.005-04:00

So, vacation is pretty great. Vacation near Park City is even better. Family, mountains, not much else around. I've trail run, mountain biked, hot tubbed, napped, slept in, stayed up late, and had a lot of time with my great wife and kids. However, there's also down time. I don't do well with down time. Boredom oft leads to ideas...I'll leave it for you to decide if those ideas are any good or not. This was my little project this morning...

My boy is a stud.

Happy Day

2011-10-20T07:43:00.007-04:00

As I think I've mentioned here before, Ryan works A LOT! This last month was particularly rough as he would only have a day off every two weeks, and he worked long days so we really hardly ever saw him. At the end of the month when he finally had a full day off, we soaked it in. Even though it was just a simple day, it was one of the best days that we've ever had as a family because we were so excited to all be together.

When they were done raking leaves Liam looked at Ryan and said "Let's make muffins!" So they did.

Gavin has monkey arms (long arms) and cat like reflexes, it was amazing how quickly he reached out and grabbed the whole muffin and in the same moment was shoving it into his mouth. He went on to eat two more muffins. He is growing!

There was also a brief hike in the rain. Ryan just couldn't stand that he had missed so much of Fall stuck in the hospital.

Of course I was there for all of this too, but I could not stop taking pictures of my three boys together. It makes me so intensely happy to see them having fun and loving each other.

More movie reviews

2011-10-18T19:34:00.002-04:00

Ryan is working all nights this week, so I have been catching up on stupid, cheesy, mind numbing chick flicks, cause that's what I like to do when he's not around. Tonight I watched an old "classic", Sixteen Candles. First of all, this movie is highly overrated, sure there were some funny parts, but otherwise it was just a pretty run of the mill teen flick. What stood out to me about it though is the message it was sending, which is a message that a lot of teen movies send, that if you are a quiet, awkward and average looking girl, that rich, popular, athletic guy will somehow see you across a crowded room and just immediately fall for you. I remember being a 14 year old girl and watching movies like this and thinking it could be true, it is like the ultimate sappy romantic fantasy for a tween. But here's the thing, this does not happen! I know, surprising right? Since when are movies not based in reality? Also, for all you 14 year old girls who read my blog (likely none), not only does this not happen but the rich, attractive, athletic guy is not likely to be a sweet insecure guy underneath who just wants someone to love him. Sorry. He is more likely to be a self centered, perverted jerk. Not ALL of them of course, but there is a good chance the one you are pining for fits the bill.

Oh and another thing, if you want to see some truly amazing, epic 80's hair, watch Working Girl. Otherwise, don't watch it. Melanie Griffith is a terrible actress. I recorded it on TV and got about 30 minutes in, once she got rid of her epic hair for a more subdued style, there was just nothing to pull me in anymore.

Old Disney cartoons are kind of morbid!

2011-10-18T19:25:00.002-04:00

Snow White: The queen asks the huntsman not only to kill Snow White, but to prove it by bringing her heart back in a box.
101 Dalmatians: Cruella de VIlle wants to kill sweet little puppies for their skins!

These are just two that we've watched recently and I was surprised. Now that I am watching them through my 2 year olds eyes I kept wondering how scary or disturbing it might be to him. I'm thinking at this point it mostly goes over his head. Either way, I much prefer the new school of Disney movie like Tangled, there is still a bad guy element, but not nearly as morbid. Plus, Tangled is just delightful!

My Boys

2011-10-18T10:10:00.003-04:00

Liam has said some funny things lately. He has been potty training, so the "potty" talk is pretty much constant at our house. This past weekend our street had another block party and we were standing there with a few adults talking about Halloween, one of the women was talking about how she was going to be an M&M, Liam picked up on that right away and said "When I make a poop in the toilet I get m's!" It was just funny to see him participating in this adult conversation thinking it was the most natural thing to talk about his poop. Yesterday at the park he was running around with another little boy, at some point the boy pushed Liam down and he started crying. I asked him if it hurt his feelings as I figured I could use it as a good teaching moment for him to learn not to hurt other people's feelings. He said through tears "yeah, he hurt my feelings." Later in the day he was getting off of the toilet and bumped his bum and said "ouch, I hurt my feelings". I told him those were not his feelings, he looked confused and put his hand up higher on his back and asked "are my feelings up here?" Try explaining what feelings are to a 2 1/2 year old, that was interesting.

He is growing up too, he can get his clothes off and on, even if they are backwards and can get off and on the toilet by himself. With that growing up obviously come more complications, he suddenly has very strong opinions about what he wears, in fact that was how I learned he could dress himself, he did not like what I put him in for church so he took it off and got back into his PJ's. He often says "Miam do it my by a self!" Can you translate that?

Gavin is still pretty much the sweetest thing ever! I have been feeling grateful lately that while Liam goes through the terrible twos I have my sweet baby Gavin with his constant smiles to take solace in. He is very playful and picks up on social cues quickly. He loves to wrestle already, he will tackle you and "kiss" your face. He does not like to be left alone, if you leave the room he is in he will quickly follow you wherever you go.

Messy Day

2011-10-12T12:55:00.003-04:00

Gavin had a messy day recently, we discovered that he knows how to remove lids from markers.

Then he helped us with some yard work.

And then the mix of marker and dirt residue from the leaves he was trying to eat.

How it really is

2011-10-06T14:37:00.002-04:00

Isn't this what being a parent of two young children really looks like? Crazy bad bed hair, all still in pajamas, tears, confusion. I can't explain it, but I really love this picture. I especially love how Gavin is looking at Liam like "What's his deal?"

On Bed Time Songs

2011-09-29T23:26:00.002-04:00

I didn't have a plan for what songs I would sing to my children to help them get to sleep at night. I remember at times throughout my life hearing certain songs and thinking they would make beautiful bed time songs, and then of course forgetting what they were. So it was interesting after we had Liam seeing what came to mind naturally, so here is my list.

1. You Are My Sunshine
2. Baby Mine (Dumbo)
3. Love (Robin Hood)
4. Moonshine Lullaby (Annie Get Your Gun)
5. You'll Be In My Heart (Tarzan)
6. Candle on the Water (Pete's Dragon)

Isn't it funny how many of my lullabies turned out to be Disney songs? And some from movies I didn't even like (Tarzan). Lately though, I have an even more surprising addition to my repertoire, Frosty the Snowman. I have my in-laws to thank for this. Last Christmas they sent Liam one of those Hallmark books where you can record yourself reading, or singing, the book. Kent, Karen, Justin and Tanner took turns singing each page of Frosty the Snowman to Liam and he loved it. He would spend so much time flipping through the book and knew who was singing when. It was a sweet gift certainly, but not without its drawbacks. Liam recently rediscovered it and has been "reading" it constantly. One night he requested as his bed time book and wanted to read it three times, and then proceeded to ask me to sing it to him "Sing Rosty the Snowman!", oftentimes more than once.

The book has now been hidden, I couldn't take the bedtime routine consisting of that much Frosty (don't worry, it will re-emerge from time to time). But he has left his mark, every night the song of request is Rosty.

Another funny thing about lullabies, Gavin and Liam interact so much these days and have a lot of fun playing together. However, them playing together has also led to Liam intentionally antagonizing Gavin (already! I don't get why boys do this). One thing he does often is roar at Gavin because he know it upsets him. Lately he has taken to faking remorse and will say "I should sing the Baby don't cry song to him. Baby mine don't your cry. Baby mine dry your eyes." Yeah, pretty much the cutest thing ever, even if he was the cause of the tears in the first place.

Imperial Trellis

2011-09-28T15:57:00.003-04:00

When we moved into our house I e-mailed my sister-in-law Emily who I think has really good and creative taste in design. I thought she might have some good ideas for some design blogs I could check out to give us good ideas for how to decorate our new house on a budget. She directed me to a couple of blogs, one in particular, budgetwisehome.com had some posts that interested me. This blog is all about how to get designer looks on a budget and has lots of DIY advice. So here is where the irony comes in, one of her posts was about her obsession with a particular pattern, Imperial Trellis, and how to find similar styles for cheaper. The result is that I am now obsessed with Imperial Trellis too, and none of the wannabe patterns have the color I want. SInce I am obsessed and want that pattern on drapes for my dining room, of course nothing else will satisfy.

Today I found what seems like a viable option, but it could also be disastrous. I found a blog about stenciling your own curtains and then I found this stencil which is the closest I've found to the Imperial Trellis look. I figure I could use it on other projects in the future as well if I like it enough.

So what do you think? Should I try it? Or am I just asking for frustration and wasted money? Have any of you ever tried it?

Thank you Budget Wise Home for encouraging me to want to spend more money than I ever would have otherwise!:)

SLEEP! What is it good for?

2011-09-26T18:00:00.004-04:00

We have had a complicated relationship with sleep at our house of late. It all started a couple of months ago when Liam decided he never wanted to go to bed (he actually said this "Miam never go to bed!") and continued on to Ryan's first full week of working nights, quickly followed by this past week with Ryan working nights every couple of days (no one sleeps well on these nights) and both boys getting colds which resulted in a couple of nights in a row where I got less than three hours of sleep...TOTAL! So yes, right now we live in a sleepy house. Thankfully we are finally getting back into a good groove with Liam's bed time and the boys aren't sick anymore so we are slowly recovering (except for poor Ryan who hasn't had a day off in two weeks and still has to work nights every couple of days). I think these pictures best demonstrate our level of sleepiness.

When I showed Ryan these pictures he said he had put his leg down like that to try to keep himself from falling asleep while laying down with Liam. He must have forgotten that he can fall asleep anywhere anyhow, especially with as little sleep as he has been getting.

Back when bed time for Liam was still dramatic he would oftentimes sneak into our bed. We would come up to find him like this. I thought it was sweet that he found comfort in being in our bed and was finally able to fall asleep that way. Plus, what is he doing with the covers? Who sleeps like that?

It's Kind of Big Deal

2011-09-25T21:43:00.012-04:00

A couple of weeks ago some big things happened at our house, Ryan turned 30, found out he has mildly high cholesterol and got a new bed. I thought it was fitting that for his 30th birthday he got to have that fun "you better start watching what you are eating" conversation with a nutritionist:) And as for his other present, as his mom put it, after 30 years of hard work, it seems fitting that he should finally be able to get a good nights sleep. After 7 years on the queen size mattress that we bought from a guy out of a storage shed at BYU, it was really time. So Ryan no longer has to take medicine in the mornings for his aching back, and we got a California King, so his feet no longer hang off the edge! He is pretty happy about it. So is Gavin.

I figured 30 is a big deal so I actually put out the effort to throw him a party, we've only been here 3 months and don't know a lot of people yet, but with a few of Ryan's co-workers and the few people from church that have actually even met Ryan (he works a lot!) we had a decent enough turn out.

These boys were so cute "playing" Mario Kart, the only one who could figure out how to move his was Peter on the far left, the other three just stared at the screen with their figures not even moving or just banging them over and over into the same wall. And yet they loved it!

It wasn't all toddlers at Ryan's party, there were big boys playing Nintendo too.

These are the shirts I got made for the party, not funny for people who don't really know Ryan, but it makes sense for those of us who know him and his passion for dressing up in outrageous costumes.

Don't you love the food smushed all over Gavin's shirt?

The spread.

The fabulous four.

Overall it was a good night. Thank you to all those who came and for tolerating the surprisingly cold temperatures for early September!

Ryan is one of the greatest guys I know. He is fun, thrill seeking, nurturing, hard working, tender, intelligent, open minded and an amazing dad and husband. The boys and I are lucky to have him!

I got a really good laugh out of this

2011-09-17T14:07:00.001-04:00

I love these two guys, or I guess I should say three guys. I want to be best friends for six months with all of them, I'm waiting for the offer from Anderson Cooper any day now.

A smattering of cell phone pics

2011-09-16T21:33:00.012-04:00

Don't you think that cell phone pictures are the ones that best capture your day to day life? My cell phone camera hasn't been working for a while and there are so many moments that I want to capture that I can't, but thankfully Ryan's still works so we get some great ones that way.

Ryan sent this one to me one night when I was out late at a book club I go to. The text said that he was fed and happy. He loves stuffed animals lately, oh man is he cute.

I just love this picture cause there is so much going on, Ryan playing with Gavin and Liam trying on shoes. He LOVES to try on shoes, anytime we enter a shoe store he grabs a shoe right away, plops himself down and removes his shoes and gets going. He is so fast about it there is no way to stop him.

After a particularly busy day we decided to order a pizza, we ordered a large, this is what we got! It really was that big.

On the weekend of Ryan's birthday we had a nice night out, got some Indian food and then went for a walk along the Erie Canal trail. The first pic is what happens anytime we try to take a picture together, and that was with me wearing two inch wedge heels.

At a barbecue at a friends house Liam got into the pool with his clothes on, his friend Fae was nice enough to lend him some of hers. We all agreed that he looked like a European boy.

A little while later I went to check on him upstairs and he was playing dress up, he no longer looked like a European boy, he now looked like a pretty little girl in heels.

Old Forge

2011-09-15T00:50:00.014-04:00

Ryan had a vacation week a while back and we had a lovely time camping in the Adirondacks. It has been fun to be able to explore different mountain ranges in all the places we've lived, the Shenandoah's were nice but it was nice to be back in some mountains with pine trees again, it turns out I really like pine trees. Once again, nowhere we've been yet seems to be able to match up to the majestic beauty of the Colorado Rockies, but different mountain ranges offer different perks. In the Adirondacks for example, you can camp on a beautiful lake and really feel like you are far out away from it all, but actually only be a few minutes from a cute little town with nice restaurants, candy stores and a water park. I am bound to post way too many pictures of our vacation, I hope you'll indulge me.

Our beautiful campsite.

We loved relaxing by the lake and fishing.

Making breakfast.

We borrowed this little kid tent from some friends, it was so great to have for Gavin so he wasn't always crawling around in the dirt, we also used it as a crib for him in the tent.

The hike we went on had a fire tower at the top that we got to climb up, pretty cool view.

Scootering around the loop. We were trying to get Liam to make a tough face and he just gave us this angelic smile, which is funny cause when we tell him to smile he does his face scrunch, so maybe from now on we should tell him to be tough.

And now his other attempt at a tough face.

Water park fun.

Maybe one of the most memorable things about this trip was that Ryan got to teach Liam how to fish, he got him his own little fishing pole and had a fun time. It made Ryan really happy to share this hobby with his little boy. One of my favorite memories of the trip was one night Ryan took his pole down to the lake just off our campsite, Liam had been down there throwing rocks with me, but when he saw Ryan's pole he took off up the hill to our campsite, I went up to see what he was doing and he was already on his way back down with his pole. Melted my heart for sure.

In this picture we were telling him to put his hand back up to make sure he was still holding his pole, he didn't quite get it, the result is a pretty funny and random picture.

It was so nice to get away with just our little family and to have no responsibilities other than to have fun with each other. I just wish we could have a weeks vacation every month.

Chocolate Chunk Pancakes

2011-09-05T23:18:00.003-04:00

If you go camping with Ryan McBeth, you are not allowed to take things easy and just eat pbj's. No, you will eat woofums (mini campfire pies), s'mores and pancakes with Hershey's in them for breakfast. Oh yes, and bacon. Ryan is simply too good for cereal on a camping trip. I know one little boy who is pretty happy about that.

Proof that he isn't always smiling

2011-09-05T23:14:00.002-04:00

He kept throwing himself back like this and yelling at me on the way down Bald Mountain, our hike in the Adirondacks, and I just had to snap a picture. Funny stuff.

2011-08-31T19:17:00.001-04:00

When I saw my grandma's comment on my last post I realized some might get the impression that Gavin fell down the stairs, he did not, he was downstairs to begin with, I just meant that he made his way over to the bottom of the stairs and was looking up for me.

Random thoughts and happenings

2011-08-28T20:43:00.009-04:00

I am feeling way too lazy to upload any pictures right now, so pics of our camping in the Adirondacks will have to wait, I know you are dying with anticipation!;) But here are some random thoughts and funny happenings.

Liam quotes:

"Go park your scooter by the rock and be a good listener to Miam" (he said this to me while we were scootering around the loop at our campsite.

"You are a nice mommy."

"I had a great fun day." He says this almost daily, it is so sweet.

"You can do it mommy!" Liam's encouragement to me when I'm running. Love it.

People who know my mom know she has a great infectious laugh, so infectious in fact that the other day on Ichat Liam started laughing like her, he would throw his head back and laugh boisterously. I think my mom got to experience for the first time what it is like to be on the other side of that laugh cause she could not stop laughing anytime he laughed, which he did at almost anything she said. It was really fun to watch. Also, during the ichat he got really upset when I tried to be a part of the conversation, apparently this was Liam and Gammy time, cause he looked at me and said very upset "Let Miam talk to Gammy!"

"Miam is so good at this!" Said while climbing a large rock, apparently all the encouragement we give him is going to his head.

Happenings/Thoughts:

-During one of our late nights trying to get him to stay in bed, which has improved dramatically so thanks for all of the advice. I was in our room on our bed and heard him come out but felt too tired to do anything about it so I chose to ignore him, he came crawling into our room, sliding across our floor like a snake and I just pretended I didn't see him. During his scooting he squeezed out a toot and quickly looked up at me concerned like THAT might be the giveaway! It cracked me up that he really thought I could not see him when he was right in front of me. It was pretty hard to keep a straight face and continue to ignore him.

-I passed someone tonight while running. It was a nice feeling, I am usually the one who gets passed up, so it was cool for that to be reversed. On a similar note, I finally made it all the way up the long hill at the end of my run, due probably in part to Liam's encouragement.

-I love listening to Gavin "talk". This morning he woke up with a new sound that he had figured out and he just sat on my lap looking at me making that sound for about ten minutes. I really enjoy this stage of babyhood where they are learning so many things. I love watching him use his hands and bounce in his jumper, he just learns so much everyday.

-I think someone snuck into our house about two weeks ago and replaced my sweet, obedient and mellow child with a constantly whiney, complicated and stubborn one. I guess the terrible two's have finally arrived. Underneath he is still the same sweet person, but it can be hard to remember that sometimes.

-There is nothing I hate more than whining!

-Liam shaved a chunk out of his hair the other night. With what you ask? A nose hair trimmer! It is RYAN's, not mine. Sorry for throwing you under the bus there Ry.

-Gavin recently started laughing at Liam's crazy antics. They are more likely to interact if I am out of the room. I love being upstairs and hearing Gavin just laughing hysterically at something crazy Liam is doing. And I love hearing Liam build off of that, he loves making his little brother laugh.

-A while back Ryan started doing funny walks while on family walks. What does this mean? It can mean anything from walking really slowly, stomping, skipping, chicken walk or jazz hands walk. Why does he do this? To keep Liam focused on walking, Ryan doesn't have a lot of patience for slow distracted toddler walks, so doing funny walks with daddy keeps Liam going. It is hilarious to watch.

-I love how when I'm feeding Gavin he reaches up his hand and just touches all over my face. Also, I felt a sense of pride the other day looking at him thinking, I grew him inside of me and now I'm giving him the food he needs to create those fat rolls on his legs and to grow so much. It's pretty cool! Now if only he could give me more assistance in getting rid of my newly acquired fat rolls. He gave them to me after all.

-The other day I strapped Gavin into his bouncer chair so I could take a shower. During my shower I thought I heard crying (I always hear phantom cries when I am showering though) and I thought it sounded like the cries were getting closer. When I got out, there he was at the bottom of the stairs crying up at me. Somehow he had gotten himself out of the bouncer and crawled over to the stairs. I guess he just really wanted to see me.

See, I told you it was random.

Final Thought:

For those of you out there who care about grammar, I apologize for my blog. I make absolutely no effort whatsoever to be grammatically correct, I just write in a way that works for me. Sorry if I'm making you crazy.

FInal Final Thought: If you made it through all of this, good on you!

I love camping

2011-08-24T23:31:00.002-04:00

But maybe my favorite part about it is when I get home all stinky and dirty and climb into a warm shower to wash the smell of campfire out of my hair. I think I actually like getting dirty camping just for the sheer pleasure of getting clean again. And as nice and cuddly and fun as it is to share a tent with my sweet little boys, I can't wait to climb into my own bed right now! So I guess I will. Goodnight.

Parenting Advice?

2011-08-19T17:00:00.000-04:00

We have been having major issues with Liam's sleeping for about two months now. He just will not go to bed at night. We start the process at 7 and have to lay with him for a very long time, sometimes up to an hour. And even then many nights he will still come out over and over and over, sometimes this goes on for a couple of hours! We are consistent in always taking him back to his room, never letting him stay downstairs with us, and yet he continues to come out. We have tried locking him in but he just completely freaks out and wakes up Gavin. We have tried getting rid of his nap completely which helped at first, but he is just so so tired during the day that it is clear he still needs it.

This has become a very frustrating experience for us and we are not happy about it becoming a nightly ritual. Any tips for us?

Yummy Gummy Grin

2011-08-19T12:53:00.002-04:00

This kid seriously smiles non stop! He is way too pleasant. He has actually been teething for the last week and a half or so, but the only clue was him having some difficulty sleeping and then the tooth actually popping out, no fussing or unpleasantness. Yes! Of course there has been a lot of this

but also thankfully still a lot of this

Never Blog While Drinking

2011-08-18T20:58:00.014-04:00

My mom told me that I should probably update my blog so everyone knows that I'm okay. So... I'm fine! I wrote my sad blog on a particularly lonely night, but all is well again. I think I was just really missing my good friends and family and wanting to fast forward a few months to where my friends here are at the same level as my friends in VA were after four years. The truth is I've actually felt more befriended (is that a word? It is now!) here than anywhere I've lived and have already met some really cool people.

Meanwhile we've been doing some cuddling

and some kayaking in marshes off the bay that is a couple minutes from our house (we saw lots of wildlife, this family of swans, beavers, blue herons and more. Do you want to come visit us yet?

and some camping

and some prepping for more camping in our new family size tent (one of my favorite things about camping is seeing how happy it makes Ryan to have Liam be excited about simple things like helping to put up the tent. Such a sweet fun dad.)

and some running (miss my D.C. running buddies but I'm managing to get into a groove on my own)

and some all day block partying (we might have the coolest neighbors ever!)

and some army crawling and scooting (he is working diligently at getting the real thing down, it is so fun to all of the sudden have him right by your feet grinning up at you, he can really move!).

Oh and don't worry, even with all these goings on, Liam is still making sure to take good care of his baby.

Oh and just to clarify, I was not ACTUALLY drinking when I wrote my sad post, but I do think I would be a sad sloppy sobbing in the corner kind of drunk:) Either that or laughing way too loudly and at inappropriate moments...wait, I do that anyway.

College

2011-08-13T11:46:00.002-04:00

So I've been working on our budget this morning and figured it was about time to add in some college savings goals for Liam and Gavin. The projected amount to save for Liam's college was 120,000 for public in state. Gavin's was 124,000. Wow! In order to save that amount by the time they are ready for college we are supposed to start putting away $600 a month for each of them. This is craziness!

On that note, does anyone have any recommendations for a good high yield long term savings account to use for college savings?

Entertainment

2011-08-09T09:25:00.002-04:00

Liam is at the age where he says and does hilarious things all day long. Yesterday he had a couple gems, he was watching Veggie Tales "Pirates Who Don't Do Anything" when he looked over at me and said very seriously "Miam is not a pirate mommy." Later that night when I was laying down with him to get him to bed (which is "nice and cwozy") he said "I'm really glad you're not a pirate Mommy."

A couple of days ago he found a baby doll that my mom had given him when Gavin was born, back then he was mostly interested in wrapping him up like Gavin and carrying him around in the gift bag that my mom had brought it in. But now he was full on pretending with it, first thing on his agenda was to feed him. So he got up on the couch, lifted up his shirt and, well, you get the idea. Next he wanted to take him for a walk in the stroller, and later feed him rice cereal, and put him down for a nap. He played with the baby all day long, it was so cute.

I don't have a picture of him with the baby, but here he is taking his George on a walk back in Alexandria.

Surprise! Moving is hard.

2011-08-04T21:55:00.004-04:00

So here is the truth, I'm having a hard time. I am really enjoying my boys and our new house and new area, but other than that? I'm pretty miserable. It turns out it kind of sucks to have no friends. Especially after having kids and becoming a stay at home mom, I really relied on my friends for my mental and emotional well being. Almost daily walks or trips to the park or runs with friends kept me sane. I don't have that anymore and I'm not doing so well. I miss the good friends in Virgina who became like family to me and I don't feel like I'm having much success in making friends here. I find myself constantly doubting myself and wondering why nobody likes me (I'm not asking for feedback by the way)? I know, pretty pathetic:)

So this was probably a bit too much truth for a blog, but its late and I'm tired and lonely, apparently those are the perfect combination for a Debbie Downer moment.

Any tips on how to make it through the post moving slump? And anyone want to come visit me? Seriously!

Thumbs Up

2011-07-30T18:31:00.004-04:00

We went to a Canal Days celebration in nearby Spencerport today, the main motivation for us was the car show which we knew Liam would love. It turned out we loved it too, I don't even like cars but found myself fascinated by the old cars, I loved checking out the interiors and found myself especially drawn to old school station wagons. Ryan wanted to take a picture of Liam in front of this car and I told him to give thumbs up, apparently we need to teach him how because this was the result (pointer fingers up).

There was a beautiful historical Rolls Royce that I was showing Ryan when Liam, who had been angelic the whole time and very obedient about not touching the cars, suddenly chucked a rock at it! Thankfully it did not cause any damage and we apologized to the owner who said "kids will be kids". What a nice guy! He might not have been so nice if it had caused damage though.

Sleeping Babies

2011-07-28T22:31:00.002-04:00

I love sneaking in at night to watch my babies sleep, in fact it is a nightly ritual for me, they always look so perfect and peaceful, it relaxes me and makes me feel so grateful to have them in my life. I feel the same way about Ryan, but I did not think he would appreciate me taking and posting a sleeping picture of him:) These three boys really make my life beautiful.

Pictures of Liam sleeping are particularly sweet these days as he has become increasingly difficult to get to bed at night. Every night is a battle and he can often be heard saying "Miam never go asleep Mommy." in the most reasonable voice.

This is just a cute pic of Burrito Gavin. He still loves to be swaddled when he sleeps and luckily he still fits in it.

Things to remember.

Liam's funny words and phrases: crackwers, Grandpwa, dullbozer, Sacka Claus, ogurt. I sink so. Okay Mommy, I will. Sorry bout that. When he comes home from an outing with Dad he walks into the house and yells "Are ho-ome". Even though he can pronounce L's perfectly in other words, he still refers to himself as Miam, if someone asks him what his name is the answer is always "Miam!"
Liam's personality: Adjusts well to change, from the moment we brought Gavin home from the hospital it was like he had never not been there. Liam is such a sweet big brother, he gets very protective of him, when Gavin was very little a friend was over and he thought she was getting too close so he ran over and sat in front of Gavin and told her she couldn't touch him. He has gotten so used to us asking him to go talk to Gavin when he is crying (usually so we can finish some task as Gavin loves Liam and will stop crying the moment he enters the room) that he takes initiative now and says "Miam a go talk to Gavin" if he hears him crying, then he will go in there and sit next to him and say "Mon o mon o mon o mon", he has already figured out he doesn't need to use actual words to make Gavin happy:) He is very active and coordinated, he recently figured out how to use our Razor scooter and cruises around on that. He has become very social, anytime he hears "tids" he wants to go find them and play with them, he seeks out kids on our street to play with often. But he does not limit himself just to kids, he will talk any adults ear off, yesterday at the doctors office he plopped himself down in a chair next to a cute 16 year old girl and chatted away. When we left he said "See you later!"
Favorite toys: Cars! New truck, Gramp car/Mini Cooper car, dull bozer, Later car (Mater). Markers and pens, loves coloring. Tricycle, scooter, small stroller, Little Tikes car.
Favorite Books: Ten Apples Up on Top (Apples on Top!), Go Dog Go (Go Dog book!), Five Tumbling Tigers, Dinosaur Shapes
Favorite Shows: Hesa Street, Letters Factory, Cars, Dragon Movie (How to Train Your Dragon), Baseball (The Sandlot), Winnie the Pooh, Jungle Book (Bowgli)

Gavin: At 5 1/2 months he just keeps getting cuter and cuter. He is just such a sweet baby! Rarely fusses, smiles and laughs all the time, especially whenever he sees a new face. He rolls around all over the room looking for toys, he constantly has his hands out to grab anything that comes into his reach (including a bowl of cereal onto Ryan's lap last week) and of course immediately shove it into his mouth (Liam used to find this distressing, but now that we've explained it to him he always says "Gavin is eating the toy, that's just what babies do"). He cuddles. He smiles up at you when you sing. He blows raspberries (which Liam loves to immitate, he lays on the ground next to him and kicks his legs like Gavin and blows raspberries, he thinks it's hilarious) and babbles. He spends a lot of time in his jumper happily bouncing away. He shows you he is happy to see you by kicking his chubby little legs rapidly. Sleeps 12 hours a night! All in all he is really just a joy to have around and we are loving this stage where his personality is starting to show through but he is not mobile and cannot cause trouble yet:)

Letchworth

2011-07-25T09:36:00.006-04:00

A couple of weeks ago we headed to Letchworth State Park to do some hiking. It was so beautiful! We are excited to check out more of the beautiful state parks in the area, we were planning on camping at one of the finger lakes this weekend but then there was the heat wave, so those plans were scrapped. Hopefully we can get out there soon though.

We found this secluded creek and had fun dipping in the cool, fresh water.

Handsome boy.

And the ever delightful Gavin at the park after the hiking.

A peak into our house

2011-07-25T00:18:00.013-04:00

We finally have a couple of rooms in our house 100% done. This house is definitely a project house which we knew when we bought it, lets just say there is lots of wall paper, and there was lots of shag green 60 year old carpet. But we have actually been having a lot of fun as we tackle each project and it is always exciting to see the end result. It never ceases to amaze me what a can of paint can do! I wish we had taken before and after pictures, but alas we did not. The living room used to be stark white all over and had peach colored drapes covering the windows. So we painted the walls and the fireplace, got rid of the drapes and here is the result.

We actually love the vintage wall paper in the foyer so we are keeping it.

We are trying to paint with light, happy colors to help get us through the lack of sun in the winter here. Baby Gavin's room.

The boys rooms both have doors that lead into the "sleeping porch" which we use as a reading room/train room. It is fun having the boys rooms connected like this and awesome to have a space that we can use exclusively for reading and puzzles.

Liam's transportation room. He has made the transition into a bed pretty easily, he has never fallen out and likes feeling like a big boy. Lately though he has been sneaking out more and more (it was cute at first, he often uses the excuse that he "needs to give more tisses") so that we usually lay in there with him for a bit until he falls asleep.

Our most recent project was painting the front of the stairs white as they were scratched and dented and a different color than the top of the stairs. So Ryan sanded them down a bit and last night we had a painting party. The weird thing is that the top couple of steps used to creak quite a bit, somehow painting the fronts has completely stopped the creaking! We are pretty happy about that, although confused as to how that worked.

We definitely have the free section on craigslist to thank for helping us furnish this house, every room in our house has at least one free item from craigslist and many used items. I miss the DC craigslist as Rochester is just not a very big or good market for used items.

First Food

2011-07-20T11:03:00.001-04:00

He is delicious! The rice cereal? Not so much.

Liam's Room

2011-07-20T01:01:00.004-04:00

So, Liam's bedroom has been the next redecorating project. The major improvement was repainting over the orange/salmon color to a happy, soothing light blue color called "water mark" (whatever that means). Something I really enjoyed in our old house was taking some pictures, specifically with Liam in mind, to use as wall art in his room. So the next project was to do a new picture for his new room. Normally, I'm not much of a "theme" type of person, but Liam loves cars and trucks (and really anything mechanical) so much, I knew his room had to have lots of cars. Once all our decorations are complete, I'm sure we'll post pictures, but for now my description of his room will have to do. His duvet cover is a cool transportation theme with cars, bikes, planes, etc. I've been searching ebay for classic automotive toys (cars, planes), though I've only purchased one so far. And for months I kept my eyes peeled for a cool, classic, vintage car to take pictures of to hang in his room.

I found a couple great ones on the side of the road in Heber and took about 50 pictures of them while Mitch waited in the car on the side of the highway. Finally, I've gotten through them, edited some, and narrowed it down to two. You all were very helpful in narrowing down pictures the last time I took them for his room, so I thought I'd do the same here. Which one do you like best?

Water

2011-07-18T23:11:00.003-04:00

Lately I have been in a state of near constant thirst. I just can't seem to drink enough water! As I was filling up my Brita pitcher tonight after pouring myself a big glass of cool, clean water, I had a feeling of extreme gratitude that I live in a place where clean water is so easily accessible to me. I know that is random, but I was just thinking what it would feel like to be thirsty all the time, and to not be able to easily remedy that. I do not know how I got so lucky, but I do my best to not take it for granted.

On that note, here are a couple of clean water initiatives you might want to check out to see if you can help:

http://www.cleanwaterfortheworld.org/

http://water.org/

Day to day

2011-07-13T22:20:00.009-04:00

This is what our days are like around here. They usually start with breakfast on the front porch which is followed by some lazying around. We blow bubbles, we color with chalk, we observe the neighborhood (Liam comments on all the goings on, (lawn mowers, sprinklers, trucks, dogs etc.) and Gavin rolls around and smiles at everything in sight.

When we are sufficiently awake we head out on a walk to one of the neighborhood parks. Liam is a pro on his tricycle now and cruises around like a speed demon.

This of course doesn't include any of the chaos and the tantrums and the negotiating and the crying. Because who wants to remember that? These are the idyllic moments of parenthood that I try to savor to help me make it through those other moments with my sanity intact.

The Good Life

2011-07-06T10:00:00.002-04:00

When we came to find a house in Rochester we were a bit frantic, Gavin was only a month old and the long road trip up was pretty rough, we originally intended to come and just look initially at neighborhoods and then come again to look at houses once we had decided on a location. But it was such a rough trip that we ended up finding a house as fast as we could so we could head home and not have to make the trip again. Because it was such a quick decision I had a lot of anxiety about the location and the house. I felt like there weren't any parks around and that the appliances in the house were old and lots of other negative things. It turns out it was all way better than I remembered. Not only are we surrounded by parks and playgrounds, there is even a splash park and a library right around the corner from us! And the house is better than I remembered, the appliances may be old but they are top notch, as Ryan put it "it's good to know we can afford to live the high life in the 60's". Our house is spacious and charming, we are definitely in house love, and the neighborhood is full of the most friendly people. We have already been brought two plates of brownies and met almost everyone on our street. After two weeks I feel like I know our neighbors here better than I ever did in D.C. The weather has been absolutely perfect ever since we got here, I guess it has to be to make up for the long winters:) Life is good!

Liam attaches himself to whoever is at the park that he can play with. On this particular day it was a couple of probably 13 year old boys. It was hilarious watching him follow them around like he was sure they were his best friends, luckily they were super nice and very obliging.

Sunbathing with them.

Gavin is such a flexible guy and is willing to take his naps on the go. Isn't he sweet?

And of course he spends so much of his time strapped to me in the "baby yorn" as Liam calls it. He is happiest here as he can chew away on the front of it (he is teething) and look around at all the sights.

Gardening

2011-07-05T22:31:00.008-04:00

Utah was next on our agenda. We had lots of fun and relaxing and hanging with family and friends. One of the best parts of the trip was doing the Dirty Dash with all my family (pictures to come soon), it was a total blast and we are hoping to make it a tradition. Another fun memory was Liam gardening with my Dad, he was out there with him for about 4 hours, and for the rest of the trip anytime my dad was puttering around in the yard, which is a lot, Liam just had to join him and he would talk his ear off as he followed him around helping him fix things.

I'm over this, I want to plant some more potatoes.

It was Liam's job to get the potatoes from the bucket and bring them over to place them.

More travel diaries

2011-07-02T00:00:00.008-04:00

So I know I have been blogging probably too much lately, but this is just what happens when you move to a new place, have no friends and a husband who is super busy with his new job. After the boys go to bed, the computer is my friend, I've been spending way more time on facebook and cnn and various blogs that I like to read than ever before, I know, it's sad. I feel kind of pathetic myself. Either way, here are some more pictures. We went to a Padres game in SD, always lots of fun. You know Gavin is really happy when his tongue sticks out like that, it's the best.

Liam is so used to flying now that he really wanted his own suitcase, so that's what he got for his 2nd birthday from Mimi and Pops back in January. He is a total pro with it and gets ridiculous amounts of attention walking around the airport with it. People are always trying to help him which he is adamant that they do not! After one flight he literally had six flight attendants just surrounding him and following him because they thought he was so cute. I agree with them, the suitcase is almost as big as him so it just adorable.

This was on our super short trip from SD to SLC. I took the boys by myself on this one while Ryan made the drive with his mom and bro Tyler. It was amazing how easy a 1 1/2 hour flight is compared to 6 or 7! I felt like we had barely taken off when we were already landing. If only all our flights could be this short.

Neon Trees

2011-07-01T23:00:00.002-04:00

So I know I am late on discovering this band, but my mom kept telling me about her friend's son who was the lead singer of this band Neon Trees and that they were really good, so I finally looked them up and LOVE this video! It turns out I had heard some of their songs before since they are playing on the radio, but I just didn't know who they were yet.

Beach Time

2011-06-30T08:59:00.000-04:00

Of course we had to go to the beach while we were in San Diego, even if it was a bit cold.

This is Liam saying "ooh, it's cold!"

Liam exhausted after the beach, we laid him down to change his clothes and he fell asleep in about a minute.

We went on a beautiful hike at Torrey Pines with my grandparents and my Aunt Vanessa and her cute girls.

We also went to Disneyland while we were there although I did not get any pictures. Otherwise we ate lots of Petersen's Donuts, had lots of fun in the pool (no pictures of that either) and best of all hung out with our family! Ryan's whole family was together for the first time since Tyler left on his mission two years ago so it was awesome having everyone together and for Liam to get to hang out with his cute cousin Ty.

Here they are sweeping the backyard together. It's fun that they are older and can interact more now.

We also got to see Christian and Emily and cute little Ethan who came down for the weekend and got to have some good times with my grandparents. We are lucky that my grandparents (except my Grandpa Haynie) live in San Diego so we get to hang out with them when we are there.

More hiking pics

2011-06-29T10:02:00.006-04:00

During our last couple of weeks in Virginia we did a lot of hiking. It is the best kind of free entertainment around and it was perfect spring weather!

Throwing rocks (one of Liam's favorite things) on another section of the Billy Goat Trail.

Me and my hiking buddy.

We also hit up a local park that has a cool mini train.

But surprisingly Liam liked the carousel more, he always likes carousels, even the small ones they have at malls. He likes riding the horsey but most of all I think he liked hanging out with his cute girlfriend Kylee:)

Gav Man

2011-06-26T08:00:00.003-04:00

Gavin was introduced to the bouncer while we were out west and really liked it.

He was really funny to watch in it because he did not quite understand the concept, he just moved his legs sporadically like he usually does and sometimes it would result in him being bounced back, and when that happened he would make this face...

Gavin is such a sweet little baby, almost anytime someone talks to him he gives them a big cheesy grin. One of my favorite things is when I have him in the Baby Bjorn facing out, if someone is talking to me he thinks they are talking to him and just grins at them, it always takes people aback and they just melt into baby talk with him and forget what they were saying to me anyway.

He continues to be an active little guy and prefers for us to be on the go, which isn't hard because he has a super active two year old brother who feels the same way. He likes to stand and look around and a couple of days ago took his first couple of lurches forward in worm style crawling. Another thing that stands out about him is he is super sensitive to noise, I am not allowed to talk while I'm feeding him and any remotely loud noise is extremely upsetting to him. It's kind of nice when he gets scared though because then I get to comfort him and nuzzling a scared little baby is just the best, does that sound weird?

Graduation

2011-06-25T08:00:00.000-04:00

Ryan's graduation ceremony was long, but also really great. The main speaker was the founder of Operation Smile and was funny and inspirational and interesting. It still doesn't seem quite real that Ryan is actually a doctor, and it is just crazy to think that the school part of his life is finally over. I am so happy and proud of him that he has been able to achieve his life long dream of being a doctor.

Gavin's blessing

2011-06-24T08:00:00.000-04:00

We had Gavin's blessing at home as Ryan's graduation ceremony coincided with our church time, we have now had both our boys blessed at home which has been a neat experience.

I wanted to post this picture just as a funny memory, the last couple of months with Liam have been interesting, he is generally a pretty sweet and easy kid, but obviously with all the changes happening and the lack of routine he has had a lot more attitude than usual (thankfully now that we have settled again he is starting to get back to normal). In this picture he was refusing to stand right next to us.

Later on he obliged.

Gavin's blessing was beautiful and we are so grateful to have him in our lives.

Gala

2011-06-23T08:00:00.000-04:00

Ryan's medical school had a dinner/dance/awards event at the W Hotel the weekend of graduation. We had so much fun! lt was awesome having family in town to watch the boys so we did not have to worry about how long we stayed out. We had a lot of fun dancing and hanging with Ryan's friends and then took a nice walk around the city and the White House to kind of say goodbye to D.C.

We felt a bit like we were headed to the prom as Ryan's family was at our house and Ryan's parent's wanted to take pictures of us before we left. I was glad they did, we never have pictures of the two of us anymore. Of course my eyes are closed but it is still a great pic (lest you think our life sounds too glamorous please enjoy the rusted chain link fence we are standing in front of:)

I am so glad I am married to a guy that I can have so much fun with.

Therapy

2011-06-22T14:23:00.005-04:00

I did not realize how therapeutic blogging is for me until I didn't do it for a couple of months. There is just something so nice about taking advantage of a rare quiet moment to sit down and write about our life (the quiet moment did not last long, I am now blogging with Gavin strapped to me in the Baby Bjorn and Liam being babysat by the TV watching An American Tale). It has honestly been a rough few months for me, my pregnancy with Gavin was a difficult one, not so much physically as emotionally, so going from there we had a baby, shortly thereafter moved and then travelled to visit family for about a month while we waited to have a house to move into. Well finally we are all settled here and it is has been so nice to go through pictures to help me focus more on the good times than all the stress I've been feeling.

We were very blessed in our move that we were able to time it for when Ryan's family and my parent's were coming out for his graduation. We jam packed that weekend full of graduation ceremonies, Gavin's baby blessing and then packing up. Our families were such life savers, our parent's are all masters of moving at this point so our Dad's took charge of the organization of the truck, our mom's speed packed and cleaned like nothing I've ever seen and Justin and Tyler were our pack mules. Ryan's sister Tonya took care of Gavin and Liam for much of the day so we could just focus on the move. I do not know how we could have done it without them! We feel so grateful for all of their help and I particularly feel grateful for them all dealing with me and my stressed out grouchiness (particularly my mom as I think she bore the brunt of it:) My parent's then drove with us up to Rochester where we moved all of our stuff into a storage shed. My dad found a cheap vacation rental on Sodus Bay where we were able to decompress for a couple of days before heading out west.

Here we are in our empty place.

And here Liam is enjoying the relaxing view of the lake.

Luckily we have been too busy to really feel sad about leaving Virginia. It was a great place to live and our lives changed immensely while we were there, we started just me, Ryan and Roxy and left with a full blown family. We already miss all of the great friends we made there but we hope that our paths will still cross from time to time.

So much to say

2011-05-20T15:25:00.002-04:00

There has been so much going on in our life the past month. Family visiting, Ryan graduating, the fun gala we attended before his graduation, Gavin's baby blessing and last of all moving. But unfortunately our computer is packed away with all our pictures on it. And there is only so much blogging you can do from a smart phone before you are really sick of typing with your thumbs.

So about a month from now there will probably be two months worth of blogs all in one day.

Some father-son time

2011-05-01T18:12:00.011-04:00

Rachel hosted a baby shower for one of her friends on Saturday, so after hanging streamers for her girl party, I decided to go reclaim my manhood by taking my boy to see some airplanes. First, we hopped in my new car (which Liam gets really excited to ride in, "Miam wide it, daddy's new car!") and went to get breakfast at La Madelaine, a french country bakery. While we waited for our food, we colored and chatted about whatever came to Liam's mind. Then with full bellies, Liam and I went to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. No, not the lame one on the national mall, but the cool one out by Dulles airport. That's the one where they put all the cool stuff they don't have room for on the mall. We saw the space shuttle Enterprise, the Concord, and hundreds of other planes, helicopters, and rockets from the beginning of flight, through world wars, and today. I wasn't sure how well Liam would enjoy it, but it seemed like the greatest place he'd ever been. All the way through the 2 hours of museum time, Liam would point to each new aircraft and say, "(gasp) look at that one!" At the end, we went up to the observation deck to watch planes land at Dulles Airport, made a quick stop at the gift shop to get Liam a plane, and headed home.

Excited to ride in Daddy's car

His delicious cinnamon french toast and fruit

So excited about the space shuttle

Proudly displaying his spoils

The boys in Easter duds

2011-04-27T22:50:00.006-04:00

I will be the first to admit that I am not on top of my game these days, in fact I don't think I have been on top of my game since before I was pregnant with Gavin. Yes, that is a long time. As a result our Easter was pretty low key, we planned a last minute egg hunt with friends and on Sunday Liam found a new truck in his basket then we played at parks all day and had chicken tortilla soup for dinner (with a bonus visit from some our favorite friends Rich and Maren who brought with them some delicious Danish pastry bread). So not much, but at least I did manage to get some cute pictures of the boys in their Easter hats, maybe hats will be an Easter tradition, there is not much else you can do with boys clothes after all.

Update: Notice how you can see Roxy peeking out the door in the corner of the last pic? Ha ha, I just love how she always finds her way into pictures.

Our Easter

2011-04-27T22:34:00.006-04:00

Heading out for the hunt, taking it very seriously it seems.

Surrounded by his incredibly cute female entourage.

He definitely knew how to get into those eggs quickly.

Sad to discover one of his eggs was empty (likely because he had already eaten it).

Working off some of his sugar high.

The holidays get more fun the older Liam gets so he can really enjoy them, I'm already looking forward to when Gavin can get involved too.

Free things

2011-04-23T20:25:00.003-04:00

As you know we have a move coming up, with every move it seems that there is a need for different things to fit in your new space and the need to get rid of things that won't fit anymore. Because of this I have become slightly addicted to freecycle.org, craigslist, yard sales and thrift stores the last little while. We've been able to sell some things we needed to get rid of and get some great deals on things we needed or wanted. This weekend alone we got a free computer armoire and a free train table for our big unfinished basement in Rochester. I am feeling intimidated by the long winters up there and the prospect of keeping two busy boys entertained and happy all day long inside so it has been nice to get some cheap and some free toys to fill up that space.

So if you haven't checked out the free section on craigslist or freecylce, you should!

Smile!

2011-04-22T14:02:00.007-04:00

I've been promising my mom some smiling Gavin pictures, so here they are. Sorry for the abundance, it is hard to narrow down pictures when you are choosing between dozens of your super smiley adorable two month old.

As you can see, we've got a very happy guy on our hands. He smiles a lot and has some adorable baby talk conversations with us. We have been trying to get a good video of that. He is very strong, loves to stand up and look around at everything. He does not like to be messy and is very vocal in letting you know when he needs a diaper change but relaxes as soon as he can tell you are taking care of it and also loves baths. He sleeps between 6-8 hour stretches every night and started that at 1 1/2 months (I know we are lucky!). He had his first big accomplishment yesterday when he rolled over from front to back for the first time.

He had his two month appointment last week and is average for weight, above average for height and VERY above average in head size (92%) just like his big brother who has always been around 95% for head size. I consider their huge noggins my badges of honor:)

Brothers

2011-04-16T09:14:00.003-04:00

A couple of weeks ago Liam started to take more interest in Gavin, it has been lots of fun. He loves to gush over him with us when he smiles or does something cute. He will stand there watching him and then look at me smiling and say "Miama love it Gavin." Miama is how Liam refers to himself, fyi. He also insists on always taking part in tummy time with him, he comes running from whatever he is doing to join Gavin.

He also likes to imitate Gavin's strange movements.

And Gavin loves to have company, he watches everything Liam does.

This one just made me laugh because that is Liam's bum in the picture as he was bending over the camera to look at the pictures while I was still trying to get a good one of Gavin.

Spring

2011-04-13T11:46:00.004-04:00

Ryan has a really easy schedule this last month of medical school and we have been taking full advantage of it. On top of all the moving preparations we have also tried to get out and do one fun activity almost every day. It has been great. Here we are enjoying the Cherry Blossoms.

In the interest of full disclosure, I liked the first picture better of Gavin, but I liked the second one better of me... so I put them both up:)

Great Falls

2011-04-10T21:29:00.007-04:00

As part of my "Wilderness Medicine" elective rotation over the past two weeks, we went on a hike and talked about some improvised medical techniques you can use in remote locations (cool, right?). Our instructor took us to the Billy Goat Trail, which is near Great Falls, just north of D.C. One of the things I love about this area is that you can be right in the city one minute, and the next you feel like you're in the middle of nowhere. I liked it so much, I took Rachel and the boys the next day, of course to a more family-friendly portion of the trail that didn't include scaling boulders. Turns out, Liam is a born outdoorsman. He spent some time in the backpack, but he walked a good portion himself. He climbed about every rock along the way, whether it was a small part of a rock sticking out of the ground, or a 4-foot formation. He even started to climb the face of a rock about 10 feet high at one point (I had to pull him down). For a short portion, Liam and I went and climbed some more serious rocks up to a lookout point. It was a good time, here's some pictures.

The main portion of Great Falls

Rachel and Gavin on the Billy Goat Trail

Things change

2011-04-08T07:38:00.002-04:00

The other day I was at the park with my boys and a woman there asked me what my husband does, the answer was as always "he's a med student". Later that day I was thinking about it and I realized that in one month when people ask me that question the answer will be "he's a doctor". I decided that will make me feel really old. Funny that having two kids doesn't make me feel old but being married to a doctor will.

Moving

2011-03-29T22:25:00.004-04:00

I may have had a breakdown to Ryan last night about leaving Alexandria and Washington D.C., the first of many I'm sure. I have completely fallen in love with this place, head over heels.

So just now I see a search typed into our google "how to stay happy in Rochester". Ha ha, I have such a sweet husband. I wonder if he found anything?

On that note, here is the house we will be living in for the next three years.

Isn't it charming? I have always wanted a front porch. I plan on eating dinner there every single night during the summer months.

Like Father like Son

2011-03-25T14:16:00.002-04:00

When Ryan was a wee lad he used to line up all of his toys around the house. Apparently Liam got that gene because from a young age that has been one of his favorite things to do. Here is some photographic evidence.

Don't you just want to kiss this face?

2011-03-24T14:12:00.002-04:00

Doing push ups on me.

Spring!

2011-03-23T13:45:00.003-04:00

We have been loving the spring weather and have spent every sunny day at the park or on walks. I just love these boys!

Exciting Day

2011-03-23T13:40:00.002-04:00

Here is a picture of us all together right before Ryan opened his letter telling us where we would be going for residency. We had lots of butterflies going on in our stomachs.

Poor Gavin, all you ever see of him in pictures is the top of his head poking out of the Baby Bjorn. At least we have proof that he was there, even if he was sleeping through all of it.

Outings

2011-03-23T13:29:00.005-04:00

A few days after my mom left, Ryan's mom and youngest brother Tanner came out to help. It was so much fun having them here! Tanner is kind of like a big brother to Liam since they are only a few years apart in age, he looks up to him a lot and likes to copy everything he does (including wearing argyle, anything argyle now is associated with Tanner in Liam's mind, he got upset last Sunday when Gavin was dressed like Tanner in argyle and he was not).

One of the best things about having them out was they were able to help me practice going on outings with two kids. Here are some pics from our outing to one of my favorite places, the Natural History Museum.

This butterfly hung out in her hair until one of the employees came and removed it. Doesn't it look like a hair accessorie?

Just chillin. Liam has always done this thing where he crosses his feet and I just wanted to capture it.

Liam has always loved all of the animals in this museum and Tanner did too.

Thanks again Karen for all of your help!

Addendum

2011-03-17T18:02:00.003-04:00

I want to take a minute to brag about Ryan, because everyone deserves to be bragged about from time to time (take note of that Ryan;)

Emergency Medicine saw a huge influx this year in popularity and had far more applicants for residencies than in recent years. Because of this people did not get as many interviews as in the past and 4 of the 12 who applied for it at Ryan's school did not match, including their class president. On top of that there were only 5 spots left open for scramble (a day where those who did not match call around to see if they can take those open spots) 3 of which were in Puerto Rico and 2 at Eastern Carolina University.

Needless to say we were very relieved when we found out that Ryan matched, although at the same time we were feeling so sad and stressed for Ryan's friends who did not.

All this is to say that Ryan is awesome, he was accepted to residency in a specialty that he loves at a program that he loves and all in a particularly hard year to do so!

P.S. Did my husband really admit that he became a doctor because he wants to be like George Clooney? If there is an Italian lakeside villa involved in that plan than I am totally in! Although I am assuming this is the marriage and kids friendly version.

Match Day!

2011-03-17T17:06:00.008-04:00

I'd like to tell you a story. Nearly 4 years ago, I started medical school with a dream of being a doctor...of some kind. I'll skip the boring parts and tell you that after months of deliberation, reading, shadowing, meetings with faculty, etc., I decided to go into Emergency Medicine (many of you know this already, but too bad, read on). I figured, George Cloony did it, and look at him now! Then came the application process. I wrote a personal statement, filled out my application, and under "other interests", I told them about my ice cream making talent (that was the icing on the cake).

Then, we waited...and waited, for interview offers. I flew and drove to Oregon, Missouri, Kentucky, Virginia, and upstate New York. 12 interviews over about 8 weeks. Then more deliberation, and finally I submitted my rank list. After that, it was out of my hands for about 6 weeks...more waiting. On Monday, I received an email telling me that I did, indeed, match (whew!) Fast forward to today, Match Day. For those who don't know, every graduating medical student in the country opened an envelope at 12pm eastern standard time today to find out where we would spend the next few years of our lives. 170ish students, with their family and friends, and some faculty, were crowded in an auditorium classroom so everyone could open their envelopes together (lots of energy, pretty intense).

Lets cut to the chase...I am pleased to announce that the match computers and residency gods are sending me to the University of Rochester! Of all the programs I applied to, Rochester felt the most like home, so we are very excited, and looking forward to this new adventure, in a new place, unlike anywhere we have lived before. Here are a couple pictures that I found online, and for my family (or whoever), here is a link to the program website.

University of Rochester Medical Center

Strong Memorial Hospital

Downtown Rochester

(Rated #3 best place to raise a family by Forbes magazine!)

View Larger Map

Because I feel the need to remember this

2011-03-16T15:25:00.004-04:00

I think I am suffering from an intense case of "baby brain" at the moment. As evidence, here is a description of my evening last night.

I head out to run three specific errands. The first errand is a failure as the store is out of the particular item I am looking for. I head for the second errand, grocery store for some specific baby items. I get to the cash register only to find that I do not have the credit card I need or enough cash. I rifle through my purse to no avail. I abandon the grocery store and head for my third errand, the mall. I take a ticket and head into the parking garage and park only to notice that I now cannot find my wallet. Again I rifle through my purse to no avail. I determine I must have left it at the grocery store. So I head out of the parking garage and for some reason go to the EZ-Out lane (auto pilot). Of course I get to the front and it wants to charge me for the few minutes I was in the garage, only I don't have my wallet, or cash, remember? So I have to call a cashier and explain that I really just cannot pay and can you please let me out of the garage anyway? He comes over and backs up the cars behind me so I can back up and drive over to the cashier lane, I am now the person that everyone hates in the parking garage. He kindly lets me out and I head back to the grocery store, only they do not have my wallet, no one has found it. As I walk out of the grocery store dejectedly I remember, I had placed my wallet in a different pocket of my purse than I normally do. Yeah, it is right there.

At this point I decided I was not meant to be productive and headed home with absolutely nothing to show for my hour away. Fabulous!

More Gavin

2011-03-14T20:40:00.008-04:00

I think these pictures Ryan took really capture perfectly what Gavin looks like. We are having fun trying to figure out what color his eyes are going to be. I am thinking either blue or green.

We were all gussied up for church so we decided to take our first picture as a family of four.

We are just enjoying this little guy, when we are not sleep deprived zombies of course.

He continues to be a pretty sweet baby and Liam has been an angel through this transition. I keep waiting for him to start to get jealous or act out in some way but it hasn't happened yet. Although he does take complete advantage of the fact that we are distracted at times by Gavin and wreaks extra havoc around the house, but always with a great attitude and a smile on his face:)

Fun times with Gammy

2011-03-05T10:16:00.000-05:00

We took a much needed outing, it was good to get out of the house a bit.

Wrestling turns into cuddles.

My mom taught Liam a classic song on one of their walks.

And just because I never posted a picture of me toward the end of my pregnancy, here I am the day before delivery. Liam really liked to pat the belly:)

Pictures and a video

2011-03-03T19:29:00.017-05:00

He likes baths.

We miss Grandma already! I am pretty sure she is Liam's favorite person, having her here really softened the blow of no longer having mommy all to himself.

The comparison pictures.

Here is Liam around the same age.

I think they have some similarities, like their chin and overall face shape. Sometimes when Gavin is sleeping I could swear I am looking at baby Liam. But overall I think Gavin is uniquely him.

And now the promised video of a Gavin smile. Please ignore the HGTV in the background:) Also, nothing interesting happens in the video after the 30 second mark, so don't waste your time watching after that.

Doesn't he have a great smile?

All About Gavin

2011-02-28T08:31:00.003-05:00

I love; his beautiful eyes staring up at me, the funny faces he makes while falling asleep, his sad cry when eating is done sooner than he wants it to be, how he places both hands above himself and then rests his head on them and looks up at me.

It has been such a different experience becoming a parent for the second time. Some of those differences have more to do with me than Gavin, I'm so much more relaxed this time and I actually feel like I know what I'm doing which has been really nice. Gavin is so different as a newborn than Liam was as well, one major difference is obviously his size, Liam never had a single roll on his body, Gavin was born with them on his arms, legs and chin:) Gavin also has a really mellow vibe to him, he seems like a little Ryan to me in his personality and in his looks. Gavin was born knowing how to nurse and does so with the skill and speed of a six month old, it has been so nice to not have to worry about his weight gain which was a constant concern for me with Liam.

So far he is a great sleeper, eater and all around a pretty easy baby, I love the simplicity of caring for a newborn, but my mom left today so I might be singing a different tune tomorrow. . Liam still mostly ignores him unless we draw his attention to him with a task like giving him his pacifier or taking care of him for a minute and then he is super sweet to him. I am hoping to get around to posting more pictures of him soon for his far away grandparents but right now he is sleeping so I am going to join him. Stay tuned though, there might be a ridiculously cute video of the elusive reflex smile coming up.

In case you haven't heard...he's here!

2011-02-21T19:32:00.007-05:00

Gavin Mitchell McBeth was born last Wednesday the 16th at 4:48 PM. He is healthy and strong and hefty weighing in at a surprising 9.6 pounds! Here are the details for those who are interested, for those who aren't, just browse the pictures.

When we got a few days past my due date we decided it was time to schedule an induction. I had really mixed feelings about this as I was hoping to go into labor on my own but now I am so so glad we did! I had a non stress test a week and a half before he was born, the doctor measured him and said he had a big head and was already 8.11, but I wasn't measuring big and had heard enough stories about doctors getting the measurements way wrong in these tests so I decided I didn't believe him. My doctor didn't either and thought he would probably be only about 8 pounds. My doctor felt pretty bad that we had it wrong as he probably would have induced me sooner had we known he was going to be so big.

Anyway, the labor itself was pretty non eventful. We went in for the induction, they placed some medicine on my cervix which kicked me into labor right away. I labored for about five hours and pushed for about five minutes. It all happened pretty fast! Too fast in fact, I think I was a little too eager. Without going into too much detail I will just say that Gavin's head is still perfectly round and I might be feeling the effects of that, to the 3rd degree.

We had the best nurse! How many nurses do you know that will bribe you with chocolate? She asked my what my favorite Girl Scout Cookie was and said if we had the baby before her shift was over she would bring me some. She was so attentive throughout and was a real advocate for me and made sure I had all of the information I needed. And she followed through on the Thin Mint promise:)
Gavin and I recovering from all our hard work.

One day old.

Ryan is such an amazing dad! He takes such good care of both of our boys and is so nurturing.

He may be big for a newborn but he is still so small!

Initially Liam was completely uninterested in Gavin. But on day two he started to take notice, he loves it when we give him tasks to help out.

Every once in a while I will leave the room and come back in to see Liam quietly sitting next to Gavin just staring at him.

I can't end the post without mentioning my amazing mom who is here making life easier for all of us. She is making the adjustment so painless for us and I'm so glad she is here while I am trying to recover! It was also so nice to have her here taking care of Liam so we didn't have to worry and could enjoy the honeymoon stage with Gavin in the hospital.

Gavin is a really sweet baby so far and we are just so grateful that he has finally joined us.

Beautiful Day

2011-02-13T21:54:00.010-05:00

So today started with Ryan leaving for the hospital early in the morning, which is always a bummer but especially on the weekend, and then Liam waking up with a cold. At that point I was thinking it was going to be a pretty boring day, since Liam was sick I knew we couldn't go to church and risk sharing his germs with the other kids, so we were facing a day of loneliness stuck at home without Ryan. But the weather was so nice I decided we had to take advantage of it and we headed down to Old Town to get a good long walk in. As we were walking along Liam spotted the free trolley that runs up and down King St and started freaking out with excitement and longing because he wanted to ride the bus so badly. He did the same thing to us yesterday in Georgetown anytime he saw a bus so I decided today I really should indulge him. We missed that one but a few minutes later I saw the trolley passing us back towards the waterfront, so I took off running. Picture this, me, very pregnant and now past my due date running as fast as I can pushing a stroller over bumpy brick sidewalks. I ran quite a distance, likely giving many people quite a laugh as I can only imagine what the combination of pregnancy waddle/full on running looks like, only to get to the trolley and find that we had to wait ten minutes for a new driver anyway. Oh the things I will do to make this little boy happy.

This is the face he makes now anytime I ask him to smile for a picture.

I kept trying to get a picture of him without that crazy face, this is the only one I got...

...because anytime he saw the camera he would do this again. Ha ha, I love it. Can you tell that he enjoyed the bus ride? He loved watching the doors open and shut and any time the bus came to a stop he would say "Go bus go!" and motion forward with his hands. Needless to say everyone on the bus was completely charmed by him as was I. All the people on the bus were so nice about helping me out too by offering to get my stroller off and on and asking if I needed help with anything else, it was a nice experience to be surrounded by such kind people.

Then on the way home we found a new exciting park which was the perfect way to end our outing.

It ended up being a really fun and happy day with sweet little Liam. The only downside is it reminded me how much I love and adore Alexandria and never want to leave it!

P.S. Grandma Sarah, your wish was granted, it wasn't a boring day for us after all!

Rank List

2011-02-11T15:16:00.001-05:00

Our rank list is complete! We've had quite a few people wondering how we will decide where we are going for Ryan's residency so I thought I would just do a brief post on how the match process works. Medical students decide which specialty they are going to pursue, in Ryan's case he has decided on emergency medicine, and then apply to many programs all over the U.S. We applied to many programs varying from locations as far south as Florida and Texas and as far north as upstate New York and everywhere in between here and our home state of California. We applied only to programs where the cost of living would be affordable for us, in other words, no we will not be coming to California for residency:)

Then the interview invitations start coming in and for a few months of life med students are flying and driving all over the U.S. for various interviews. Ryan was gone most of December and January although we were able to join him for some interviews that were within driving distance. When all of the interviews are over med students put together a list of the programs they interviewed at in order of their preference, the programs do the same thing regarding the students they interviewed. These lists go into a system that then matches programs with the students that they ranked highly who ranked them highly as well. Then in the middle of March on match day every medical student in the U.S. finds out if they got matched and then where they got matched.

So basically we have no idea where we will be going, although we do know where we hope we will be going. We are hoping our pending arrival will distract us enough over the next month that we won't go completely crazy waiting to find out where we will be spending the next few years of our lives! Keep your fingers crossed for us that we match and match well!

Still No Baby!

2011-02-09T15:57:00.003-05:00

We are all done, I am done being pregnant and Ryan is done living with me being pregnant. I suspect Liam and Roxy are too but they aren't really capable of vocalizing that yet. We got some happy news yesterday when I found out that my doctor has my due date down as two days earlier than I thought, so I am actually due this Saturday. I don't think I will have the baby by then, babies seem to be very happy hanging out in my belly as long as they can until we force them out (I inherited this from my mom who had to be induced with all of her babies). So I am due on the 12th and most likely the day that I would be induced is the 17th if he still hasn't come. There is a chance I would be induced sooner if my fluids are low which they were with Liam. So we should have a baby at least by the end of next week. Until then, you might want to avoid calling me because I just can't help it if I'm not all that pleasant.

Dockers Office!

2011-02-07T21:50:00.005-05:00

Liam has gotten quite comfortable with tagging along to my doctors appointments with me. He has a specific chair he sits in every time in the waiting room and knows the routine while we are there as far as which rooms we go to and what we do when we are in there. Recently he started reading magazines while we wait. He started off with ELLE

and then moved onto something more age appropriate.

While he reads them he talks about each page and what is on it. It cracks me up.

Egypt, or random thoughts at 5 AM

2011-02-05T05:03:00.003-05:00

It's 5 in the morning and I woke up to a growling, very hungry tummy. So while I am awake stuffing myself with TJ's raisin bran I have been browsing the news and here are my thoughts.

First, I was surprised at how long it took for violence to break out in Egypt. Does that make me cynical? I kept watching the story about all of these big protests and waiting for the looting and clashing to start, but it took a few days, which is far longer than it seems to take in most countries. Now here's hoping it ends quickly and that no more people or relics are hurt.

Second, Americans seem different from a lot of the world's population in that we protest without violence. I can't remember the last time a protest here turned into clashes between civilians and military or fighting between citizens with different ideals. Also, has there ever been a protest where college students started lighting random parked cars on fire (I'm talking to you France!)?

It just got me wondering what the difference is. Are Americans generally more satisfied with our government? Or perhaps more confident that our voices are being heard?

Whatever the cause is I just know that I'm glad, because I park on the street, so now I can go back to sleep feeling comfortable that no one will light my car on fire tonight.

Top 10 Things I'm looking forward to about not being pregnant anymore

2011-02-02T12:53:00.002-05:00

So out of curiosity I went back into our blog archives to see what I was writing about before Liam arrived and I noticed something, I had a WAY better attitude last time! Ha ha. I think I can chalk it up to the excitement of being pregnant for the first time and the fact that it was just a way easier pregnancy. But either way it did make me realize I should try to be more positive. However, I found my list of things I was excited to do when I was done being pregnant and felt like writing another one.

10. Read books to Liam without my belly almost forcing him off my lap.
9. Sleep on my stomach.
8. Walk at a normal and reasonable pace sans waddling.
7. Run! I can't wait to strap my shoes on and get back out there!
6. Have a flat stomach (I know this will probably take a while).
5. Eat food without feeling nauseous and sick the rest of the day.
4. Eat a Potbelly sandwich.
3. Go on a long bike ride, I have to enjoy the fabulous trails here as much as I can before we move!
2. Cuddle with Ryan.
1. And of course I am really looking forward to not being pregnant anymore because that will mean that we have welcomed a beautiful new life into our family. I can't wait to meet him.

If you want to see my list from last time, here it is.

1. Eating feta cheese. Specifically one of my favorite comfort meals, wild rice, chopped up cucumber and feta cheese crumbles. Delish.
2. Eating Mexican cheese (can you tell I like cheese?).
3. Being able to really work out! While I've still been working out through most of my pregnancy, the sluggish rate at which I move on the elliptical now isn't nearly as invigorating as a good run on the treadmill.
4. Skiing! Both water and snow. Earlier on in my pregnancy we visited my parents who were living on a huge lake (Pend Oreille, look it up) at the time, and all I could do was tubing, and not fun crazy tubing, more like tubing for babies. We are visiting my parents who now live by Park City, UT in March and I am looking forward to hitting the slopes!
5. Hot tubbing! Another thing I'm planning on doing at my parents in March, prefferably after a long day of skiing. There is really nothing better than that.
6. Fitting in small spaces. I still forget that I have this huge belly jutting out and that I can't fit in spaces I used to be able to. Sometimes when I'm unloading the dishwasher my stomach closes drawers accidentally, its quite funny.
8. Tying my own shoes. Ryan is practicing for fatherhood right now by tying and buckling my shoes for me, he is doing a very good job so far:)

Parenthood

2011-02-02T11:22:00.002-05:00

If you aren't watching "Parenthood" on NBC, you should be. It is totally the best dramedy on TV right now. Love it! It is tied as the number one show I really look forward to every week along with "Parks and Recreation".

Roller Coaster

2011-01-24T18:10:00.008-05:00

I have been INCREDIBLY eager for this pregnancy to be over, I know everyone is during the last couple of weeks, but I like to think I am suffering more than most;) I feel like every symptom that exists I am suffering from, including the return of nausea! A few nights ago I woke up to regular and somewhat painful contractions which lasted for a few hours, after a couple of hours of this I started to think maybe I would be having this baby sooner than I thought (I am full term though, so no worries there) and when it became real all of the sudden I started to feel some extreme emotions about welcoming this little boy into our home. Like, I woke Ryan up at 5AM with my crying. This is strange for me as I'm not generally some who cries, but these hormones will do things to you I guess. I was just lying in bed feeling sad that my time alone with Liam is coming to an end. I feel guilty saying this because I know we are going to love this little boy just as much, but at this point all I know is being a mother to Liam and it has been wonderful. He is my best little buddy, we go everywhere together and do everything together and so often it is just the two of us. I am just feeling sad that this chapter is ending and a new more complicated one is beginning. I also feel sad that I don't have as much energy as I would like to make as much fun for Liam as possible before everything changes. I am doing the best I can I think and thankfully he is really sweet and patient on the days when I am just not feeling up to much of anything.

So while I was really eager to be done, I have had a change of heart and have decided that before we welcome this sweet little man into the world

I am going to enjoy all of the cuddly simple easy mornings like this that I have left with this one.

On a side note, some funny things that Liam has said lately. This morning Ryan was doing yoga and Liam kept saying he was doing yogurt. On Sunday at church Liam accused Ryan of farting in Sacrament meeting by saying pretty loudly "Daddy fart!" and laughing. It was sooo awesome (for the record he didn't). Also, recently I was watching a clip of Christian Bale at the Golden Globes, he has long wavy hair right now and Liam kept excitedly pointing to him and saying "Jesus!" Maybe that should be hist next movie role?

P.S. Pre and post pregnancy bring out a very sentimental side of me that I generally try to repress because it is just too hard to live life that way. For example, we recently sold our stroller since we replaced it with a double one, this was hard for me as I just kept thinking of all the memories made with that stroller. Although to my credit I did not cry, which is something a younger Rachel would have done. When I was a little girl and my parents sold our van I remember crying and saying goodbye to it and thinking wistfully that at least my tears would always be with it. Ha ha, oh man, I was crazy.