I Can Read

1. Imperfect Birds - Anne Lamott
2. Operating Instructions - Anne Lamott (definitely recommend for any mother's out there)
3. The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins
4. Catching Fire - Suzanne Collins
5. The Audacity of Hope - Barack Obama
6. Mockingjay - Suzanne Collins
7. The Green Book - Elizabeth Rogers and Thomas Kostigen (definitely a book I would recommend for anyone interested in going green)
8. Firefly Lane - Kristin Hannah
9. Baby Proof - Emily Giffin
10. Healthy Child Healthy World - Christopher Gavigan (go out and buy it! wonderful resource for keeping your family healthy while living a green lifestyle!)
11. Heart of the Matter - Emily Giffin
12. Bossypants - Tina Fey (Hilarious!)
13. Prey - Michael Crichton
14. Julia's Chocolates - Cathy Lamb
15. In Defense of Food - Michael Pollan
16. One Day - David Nicholls
17. The Help - Kathryn Stockett (Loved it!!)
18. Dismantled - Jennifer McMahon
19. Always Looking Up - Michael J. Fox
20. How to Talk to a Widower - Jonathan Tropper (I will definitely be reading more of this author!)
21. Queen of Babble - Meg Cabot
22. One for the Money - Janet Evanovich
23. Lisey's Story - Stephen King
24. Two for the Dough - Janet Evanovich
25. Room - Emma Donoghue (Fantastic!)
26. Three to Get Deadly - Janet Evanovich
27. Matched - Ally Condi
28. The Giver - Lois Lowry (just as amazing as I remembered it)
29. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - J.K. Rowling
30. The Last Time I Saw You - Elizabeth Berg
31. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - J.K. Rowling
32. This is Where I Leave You - Jonathan Tropper
33. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - J.K. Rowling
34. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - J.K. Rowling
35. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - J.K. Rowling (currently listening to)
36. The Art of Racing in the Rain - Garth Stein (currently reading)

Well...I'm making my way thru the Harry Potter series.....but by listening to the audio book, instead of reading.  I listened to the first one and fell in love with the book and to the performance of Jim Dale, who reads each of the audio books.  He is pretty much amazing and even though they are quite long, I think I will continue to listen to them. 

My reading has definitely slowed down.  Football season just finished for my husband but I had been taking care of William in the evenings without the extra help - didn't leave much time for reading.  Fall is here and that means new TV show episodes....I can't resist.  William is also of the age now that anything you have, he MUST have.  This includes books which makes for a very difficult time reading, unless he's already gone to bed.  Even with only a couple months left in 2011, I am happy with the amount of books I've read this year.  I'm already up to about 36, which is (sadly) more books than I think I've read in the last ten years COMBINED!  It feels very good and I'm actually enjoying myself!

  

Disappointed in myself

So William is almost a year old and my weight loss has been absolutely pathetic.  Not that I was so successful prior to becoming pregnant, but I have been very disappointed in my progress or complete lack of....

In January, I wrote about how I was going to start my weight loss journey and here I am, nearly 40 weeks later with the same problem I had in the beginning.  Working out is hard to come by since I'm usually taking care of lil' man in the evenings.  Getting to the gym has been absolutely difficult - although I keep on handing them over the money every.single.month. 

In the spring, I did Race For the Cure and did my best to run most of the 3k and did some training leading up to it.  I was determined to keep on training to be able to run another race in the summer.  Not sure if you noticed but....it's fall now. 

If food wasn't just so dang good, I could at least make some progress on that front.  Alas, I'm still working on my self control, although I am getting better and go in phases of good behavior followed by phases of atrocious eating habits. 

I know WHAT to do.  It's just a matter of DOING IT - what a concept, right?!  I need to stop making excuses and get my rear to the gym (even if it means going before work - GASP - at 5am).  If you see me with heading to a vending machine with a dollar bill or going thru a fast food drive thru, I am giving you full permission to slap me - no...seriously....or yell. 

If I would have kept it up 40 weeks ago and lost just one pound a week....well, you can do the math - I'd be THERE already!  I need to make some permanent changes and make it stick this time!

Anyone else out there struggling too?  Anyone have any good tips or work out help with baby?

Cloth Diaper Love....still...

While tackling some in-the-diaper issues, we used disposables for a few weeks - so we could use Vaseline and some rash cream.  It's so easy to become used to the convenience of disposables after using them for an extended period of time.  You won't get much of an argument from me - they are super easy.  But then I remember why I'm doing cloth diapers.  None of the same chemicals, none of the same waste and they are so dang cute!

So while lil' man was in 'sposies, I took the opportunity to strip them - they had started repelling and we definitely had a case of the stinkies.  I've done an overnight soak before and it helped some, but I figured I would take the time for some serious stripping action.  I boiled all the inserts and then did a soak (inserts plus pockets) for about an hour in the tub in Rockin' Green, with some added boiling water since our water heater isn't set very high.  After the soak, I did a normal wash and line dried them.  Not only do they not smell AT ALL but they are SO white!!  It's like having brand new diapers.  My love has been renewed and we are back on the CD wagon.  :)

Wordless Wednesday - Boat Ride

William - 10.5 months

Discovery

Look what we found in the yard (just before Tressel would have destroyed it!).  We figured we would see what William thought about it....

Do you see the intensity in Tressel's eyes?  He's thinking dinner...

Hello, there!

Can we keep him?

OK, there's no toad in this picture....he's just cute :)

Dinner Time

Dinner time sure has changed in the last year. 

Pre-baby, dinners would be just Adam and me on our stools at the kitchen counter (or let's be serious, in front of the TV).  Nothing too fancy - sit and chat about our days, clean up, relax.  Pregnancy dinners were most likely spent in front of the TV while I balanced my plate on my belly - my patience and back hurt too much to try to sit at the counter.  William was born and eating was around his schedule.  I would try to feed him first, then inhale whatever was for dinner and then go tend to him.  Then we started putting him in the bouncer seat on the counter in between us to talk about our day and to just admire how cute he was.  Then William was big enough for the high chair!  We would pull him up in line with us at the counter (we seriously do have a kitchen table....) and I would take quick bites while feeding him whatever puree I picked out for the day for him.  Every once in awhile, we would give him some Cheerios or some teeny tiny pieces of fruit.  At this point, even those didn't slow him down. 

Now I'm trying to let him feed himself.  Dinners have now gone from about 20 minute sprints to about hour long food play marathons.  It's a good lesson in patience for me while I practice not just saying "Never mind, let me do it."  We sit and he slowly brings one teeny piece of green bean or turkey to his mouth at a time.  It's a miracle if at least half of the food makes it into his mouth.  Mommy is always there to help him, but it's pretty entertaining to just watch him try himself. 

Also - not sure if it's WAY too early to tell, but he is mostly preferring to use his left hand when he does everything.  Can you tell this early if they will be right or left-handed?

You would eat slow too if your fingers were this small and all the adults gave you was a spoon!

Wordless Wednesday - New Hiding Spot

Food from 'home'

Although I live in Illinois now, I was born and raised in Ohio.  Grew up near Cincinnati and went to The Ohio State University (yes, The).  Although I love where we are now, there is plenty I miss from home - family (most of my family is in Ohio), Ohio State, friends and then there's the food.  I guess when you grow up eating certain food regularly, when you can't have it anymore on a regular basis you CRAVE it! 

Even though I can get the sauce in jars to bring to Illinois, I miss LaRosa's pizza.  I miss Graeter's ice cream - seriously, can someone get me a turtle sundae, please.  And above all, I repeat, ABOVE ALL, I miss Skyline Chili.  It is my favorite food, hands down.  I worked at Skyline (can you say Skyline chili chick, Alisha?) for many years in high school and college and before I moved to Illinois had probably never gone more than a week without eating it.  I was one of the happiest ladies in the world when I discovered I could actually get it here at the grocery (although it's not the same).  Just the smell brings me back...yummy.

Well, I'm happy to now be able to share that with lil' man.  Over the weekend, he tried it and it's official, he's my son.  He LOVED it.  There's some hope that he may have a chance to be a Cincinnati boy after all. 

Baby's 1st Cincinnati chili 3-way:  spaghetti, chili, cheese

Baby's New Toys

So I recently talked here about how my kid is hard to entertain.  However, I think I figured out the trick....

1 - plastic serving spoon

1 - DVD case

1 - baby sock

1 - DVD player baby-proof cover

(In the background) 1 - toy box full of unused toys.....

That seems to be all that is needed to keep entertained over an extended period of time.  He has spent days carrying around this spoon, dragging it everywhere he goes.  The DVD cover thingy was ripped off the entertainment stand about five seconds after it was put up and he has spent weeks entertained by that.  The DVD case is a more recent find out of a large basket in our living room, but I can tell they will be long lasting friends.  The sock - he has spent all weekend dragging it around like it was his favorite stuffed animal or blankie. 

So what should I get William for his first birthday?  Maybe I can dig out some measuring cups or an old t-shirt to play with....hehe

Poop

I'm not going to sugar-coat it....this post is about poop. Not mine, I promise - does that make it any better? Just baby poop in general.

I think the first time I ever kinda figured something was definitely disturbed and wrong with parents of the world, I was in about 5th grade and I was taking a Red Cross babysitting class of some sort. One task we needed to do was take a list of 100 items/questions that a potential parent might want to know when they returned home and I had to pick just three that you would consider 'most important.' OK, I got this - how hard can this be. I selected my three and we went around the room and said what we picked. Pretty normal picks - when and how much did baby eat, what time did they go to sleep, etc etc etc. You get it. The instructor pointed out a question that no one had selected - How many (and types) of poopy diapers.

WTH? That's disgusting.

She's joking, I'm sure.

She's not laughing. Oh dear heavens, she's serious.

OMG, parents of babies must be seriously messed up that they care about poop. ("hehehe, she said poop" - probably what I would have said when I was like 11). Don't you just hold your breath, change the diaper, triple wrap it in a plastic bag, throw in outside garbage can and spray Lysol over the whole house? Who takes the time to look at it or even care that it occurred? Ewww.

Then as I grew up, I heard parents talking about poop but I just basically tried to block it out. Poop? ("hehehe, she said poop" - I was very mature for my age) That's just nasty.

Then I became pregnant and hubby and I diligently went to our childbirth classes. Hand out after hand out was provided about breastfeeding and labor signs and ....WTH! Poop. And this handout was the mother of all handouts - color pictures of all the imaginable types of poop you can imagine. It's just what a woman and man want to see when they are already scared shitless (pun intended) that they are getting ready to have a baby, but then they are handed pictures of poopy diapers to make it just a teensy bit more real. Yeah, you think you are ready with your cutesy little nursery all set up and your hospital bag packed....BAM! Poopy diapers in your face - not so ready, right? Now commence panic attack.

Then little baby comes and it's all cuddles and sunshine and rainbows. It doesn't take but a few days to realize that poop is slowly becoming a very important part of your life. Besides the fact that you are changing a poopy diaper eight times a day. You are now worried about minute detail. What color is it? How much? How often? What consistency? You feel pretty comfortable at first and then....BAM, out of no where the color changes and you call the pediatrician's office at 3am to ask why the poop is suddenly green and they reassure you that it's normal. Or you find yourself texting your friend once a week, worried that your daughter's poop has changed, yet again and you think something is seriously wrong when everything is just fine. (oh yes, Stefanie...you totally do this hehe).

Like it or not...poop is here to stay in the front of your mind for good. At least until potty training.....

NOTE: If you do not have kids and you are still reading this, you are probably staring at the screen in horror wondering WTH is wrong with parents of the world - I know, I've been there. When you have kids, you will understand and then you will think "Oooooh, THAT'S what that girl was talking about!" Just you wait.....