Trot Trot

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A Whole Lot of Snow...

... Is what we have in Quincy today...

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A Reunion

Our friend Ann, who introduced the two of us and whom we hadn't seen in eight years, was in town from California with her boyfriend and braved the weather to come out for a visit this afternoon! Here is the three of us with Charlie and Amelia, who have her to thank for their existance. Thanks for the visit Ann!

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Male Bonding

Charlie and Mike playing Donkey Kong on Charlie's new wii

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Christmas Morning

We had a great Christmas morning! Charlie must have been a super duper good boy this year because he hauled in some good stuff -- a wii with lots of games, action figures, stuffed animals, movies, music, books and games as well as some new games for his DS and a whole lot of candy in his stocking! Amelia got a stylin' new coat courtesy of Grammy Bess and Grampy Paxton as well as some stuffed animals and books. She was supposed to get a baby doll too but Santa must have subcontrated that delivery out to an elf with a slow mule because last we checked it is still in California... Here are some pics of Amelia's first Christmas and Charlie showing off some of his loot! Merry Christmas!!

Christmas 2010

Santa's Elves Have Been Busy

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Cookies for Santa

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Tis The Season

For home made peppermint bark!

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First Snow!

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In A Dance Groove

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Holiday Cupcakes

Charlie's holiday party for school is tomorrow. Not only does he get to go to school in his pajamas and have a visit from Santa, but he gets to bring in these cool snowman cupcakes to share with his class. Lucky kid!

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Christmas Party

We had a great time at Mike's company Christmas party which was on an Odyssey cruise in Boston Harbor Saturday night. To top it off Sue stayed over with the kids so we were able to rent a hotel room Saturday night for our first child free night together since the kids were born. Thanks a million Sue!

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Holiday Pictures

We had my friend Heather's husband Matt photograph the kids for their holiday pictures in exchange for Mexican food. Kudos to Matt for doing such a good job with unruly subjects! Click here to view the proofs.

Christmas Tree 2010

Note the extreme similarities between this tree and Christmas tree 2009 and 2008...

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Jumping Bean

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Annual Cousins Picture

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Bathing Beauties

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Thanksgiving Dinner

We arrived safely in Charlotte this afternoon in time for the Patriots game and relatively unscathed from the plane ride and going through airport security. Here are some pictures of Amelia's first Thanksgiving!

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Pulling Up

Amelia has started pulling up on furniture. As you can tell from the look on her face in this picture, there's no stopping her now!

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Too Busy To Post Post

Sorry I have not updated in a while! Amelia is recovering from her third ear infection in 6 weeks and finally had a decent night of sleep last night (by which I mean she was only up twice.)

We are heading to Charlotte for Thanksgiving on Thursday and I can't wait!! Looking forward to watching the cousins play together, to a big turkey dinner, and to getting a chance to see the new Harry Potter movie with Mandy!

Charlie and Amelia are off for the whole week -- Charlie is enjoying his 11 "waffle days" before he has to go to school again and I am enjoying the fact that after 2 hellish days of work I have eight out of the next nine days off -- just have to work wednesday but otherwsie I am off till the following wednesday.

Tomorrow we have haircuts and packing to get ready for our trip.

If I don't post before we go, happy Thanksgiving everyone!! And I am packing the camera right now :)

The First Step..

... is admitting you have a problem. But I don't have a problem -- I have MORE HAIR BOWS!!
Leopard Print:

BIG!

Polka Dots:

Flower:

Not Much Going On

Just a quick update to report that there is not much to report this week.

Amelia has been up all night for the past two nights but according to her pediatrician she doesn't have an ear infection. Here is to hoping she gets a better night's sleep tonight because Mommy definitely needs a better night's sleep!

I got a new cell phone over the weekend -- the samsung fascinate
which allows me to surf the internet, check email, go on Facebook and of course check my blog, all within moments. Oh and let's not forget play tetris. It also has a 5.0 megapixel camera, a big step up from the 2.0 megapixels that my old phone had. All the more excuse to take pictures of the kiddos:

Pink Hat

Dentist

To make up for the lack of Halloween pictures I made sure Mike took several pictures at Charlie's first dentist appointment today. Still being sick, I stayed home with Amelia, but Mike gave the dentist's office two thumbs up. Charlie breezed through his first dentist appointment with no problem -- this from the kid who bawled his eyes out the last two times I took him for a haircut -- thanks to the kid friendly atmosphere, complete with arcade games in the waiting room.
Here he is in the waiting room playing Ms Pac Man:


And here he is relaxing in the dentist chair:


And since we rudely scheduled his dentist appointment for the day after Halloween we figured we'd keep up with the trend -- his next appointment is scheduled for the day after his 5th birthday party. Sorry kiddo!

Halloween

There are, unfortunately, no pictures of the kids on Halloween, for a combination of reasons. First, I forgot my camera. This was not actually going to stop me because I was atleast going to take a couple pictures with my cell phone of the kids dressed up. But unfortunately, shortly after we got to Phil and Sue's I was stricken with a stomach bug. The one picture I did attempt to get of Amelia in her octopus costme was erased when I dropped my phone immediately afterwards to go vomit in Phil and Sue's toilet. (Sorry Phil and Sue..) Charlie did get to go trick or treating thanks to Aunt Sue and cousin Kyle, who took him out. And I am slowly recovering from my stomach bug. Better luck next year!

Pink Octopus

After procrastinating about Amelia's Halloween costume for the past 3 weeks, this is pretty much the best we could do:

I know, she doesn't seem to be too thrilled about it either. Neither was Charlie -- I tried to pass her off as the Swamp Monster's pet, but he informed me that the Swamp Monster does not have any pets and if he did, it would not be a pink octopus.

Amelia's On The Move

Jack O'Lantern Extravaganza

We visisted the Jack O' Lantern display at the Roger Williams Park Zoo last night. The pumpkins were quite spectacular -- my attempts at night vision photography do not do them justice. If we go next year, though, we will definitely go at an 'off peak' time -- it was extremely crowded and we weren't able to take our time and look at everything we wanted to.

After A Week Of Obsessing

(just ask my co-workers who had to watch this video about a thousand times) I bit the bullet and bought the Baby Jogger City Select to schlep the kids around town in:
Just click here and then on 'watch it in action' under the City Select. Purchased in Ruby red of course.

Pumpkin Carving

We carved our pumpkin last night -- Charlie opted for the bat from our pumpkin carving kit, so here it is:

Because You Can Never Have Too Many...

... you guessed it....
HAIRBOWS!!
This time Charlie wanted to get in on the picture taking action.
The Dot Twist:

Red:

Pink Fuzzy:

The Sickies

My lack of blogging over the past week has been due to a bad case of sickies in the house -- Amelia was diagnosed with her first ear infection last wednesday and is steadily recovering on twice daily amoxicillin. Other than a slightly runny nose she is back to her chipper self. Charlie, on the other hand, was sent home from daycare on thursday with a fever and is still pretty much down for the count, with a continued fever and awful head cold to boot, he is a pretty miserable kiddo! He was supposed to have his first dentist appointment this afternoon but I canceled it and re-scheduled it for (oops!) the day after Halloween; good thinking on my part... We did manage to finally drop Amelia's passport application off at the post office this morning, with assurances from the clerk that we were doing so in plenty of time for our January trip.

Tomorrow we are back to the doctor if Charlie still has a fever, and if he is feeling better I am hoping to carve a pumpkin, inspired by Mandy's Jack O Lantern...

Swamp Monster

Charlie has been telling us for weeks that he wants to be a Ninja for Halloween, but once we got to the costume aisle at Target he decided that he much preferred the $30 swamp monster costume over the marked down to $7 Ninja costume...

The Birds & The Bees

(According to Mike and Charlie.)
I, thankfully, was not present for the following conversation:

CHARLIE: "Daddy, what are penises used for?"
MIKE: "They're used to pee and to make babies."
CHARLIE: "NO!! That's not right!! You can't make babies with them -- you'd pee all over them!"

A Much Needed Haircut

Before:

After:

9 Month Check Up

I took Amelia in for her 9 month check up today; she is 28 1/2 inches long and 19lbs 14 oz, which is 90th percentile for height and I couldn't tell you what percentile for weight because, to put it nicely, Charlie was rather demanding during the appointment. The pediatrician pronounced her right on target developmentally and was pleased with her eating -- she has now tried toast, waffles, macaroni and cheese, pasta, and bananas all fairly successfully, and loves her yogurt and a wide variety of baby food.

She had two shots, which she handled far better than Charlie, who was completely undone by having to get the flu vaccine in nasal mist form ("It's making my nose feel funny!")

We have to go back in a month to get Amelia's 2nd flu shot, and then not again until her 1 year check up!

Apple Picking

We had a great time apple picking this morning at Honey Pot Hill Orchards -- we enjoyed great fall weather amd delicious apple cider donuts as well as all the apples we could eat!
(And yes I know Charlie's hair is out of control, he has an appointment to get his haircut on tuesday!)

A Princess & A Pirate

(You can't tell, but Charlie's vest and shirt are both pirate themed.)

Print Worthy

(If I could just figure out how to print out pictures on my new printer.)

Bigger Fish

We spent the night up at Grammy & Grampy Robinson's and Mike and Charlie spent the day at the lake for one last time before the weather turns cold. Either the new fatter worms they have been using are catching bigger fish or the fish that have survived the summer in the lake have gotten bigger, because all the fish they caught today were a pretty decent size:

Update & More Hair Bows

My apologies for the lack of blogging this week; a busy work week last week (working my per diem job after getting off from my 'real' job) kept me busy every night last week and then I came down with a helluva stomach bug friday afternoon which kept me off my feet until yesterday.

Otherwise not too much to report -- Mike traded in Charlie's old DS for the new DS XL which has a bigger screen and is sturdier, and now Charlie is even more firmly "plugged in to the Matrix" as Mike calls it, than before.

I got my latest hairbows from bloomingbows.com
so here is Amelia modeling them:


I am completely in love with the lavender fuzzy one and have made it my ambition to purchase it in atleast several more colors... And as you can tell from the pictures Amelia loves them just as much as I do ;)

A Case Of The Breaks

Yesterday everything in the house decided to break at once; I opened the fridge to start getting breakfast ready and discovered that neither the refrigerator nor freezer were working. This led me to take everything out of the freezer and bring it to the downstairs freezer, drag out the mini fridge we have in one of the basement closets and haul it upsatirs (it is not so "mini" when you are trying to get it up a flight of stairs let me tell you) and pile the contents of the fridge into that, then call the repair man who couldn't come out till today. When Mike got home he unplugged the fridge and plugged it back in again and of course it has been working fine ever since. Oy.

Then the coffee maker started turning itself off and saying it was brewing when it wasn't, things it only seems to do when I am around. So I called Keurig hoping for another coffee maker but unfortunately the lady on the phone did not seem to be in a giving mood because she just had me jam paper clips into it per her instructions; it seemed reasonably okay today but we'll see...

The final straw was when I came downstairs to look up a zip code on my computer and discovered it was overrun with a virus and that I literally couldn't do anything on it. At that point I gave up and went to bed; I heard from Mike this morning that it took him 3 hours to fix.

I think I am going to try to stay away from the rest of our appliances for the week...

Fashion Show

Jessica crocheted Amelia a cute little beanie hat and matching booties after I lamented over the price of a similar crocheted baby hat I had seen online. We got them in the mail yesterday. (Thanks Jessica!) I decided that said items were best modeled with a pink tutu and naked from the waist up, and Amelia was a pretty good sport about the whole thing. When she's 20 and sees these pictures it might be another story...

First Day of School

Charlie looked up from his DS just long enough to say "cheese" this morning as he headed out for his first day in Ms Suzie's Pre-K class:

Lots of Fish, No Pictures

Yesterday was probably our last day of fishing on the lake for the season, and we went out in style! Charlie and Mike caught probably between 40 and 50 fish between them, with some of them actually a fairly decent size. Charlie caught a turtle, and Mike almost caught "Big Bob", the *big* fish we know is lurking in that lake somewhere... Unfortunately, Big Bob broke Charlie's fishing pole in his struggle to get away. Charlie is so far so jazzed about his day fishing that it does not appear to have sunk in that he doesn't actually have a fishing pole anymore. We'll see how *that* realization goes down...

I've Lost My Son To Marvel Super Hero Squad

Amelia Take Her Bouncing Very Seriously

Baby's Got Bows

Having decided that Amelia's lack of hair is not going to stop me from ornamenting her head, I ordered 3 custom hairbow headbands from bloomingbows.com. Here is Amelia modeling them:

Basic Black:


Monogrammed:


Over The Top:

Definitely Has Her Brother's Lungs

Pinkberry Comes to MA!

Pinkberry, the frozen yogurt chain that is apparently sweeping the nation, opened its first MA branch at the Derby Street Shoppes in Hingham last weekend. I went last Monday and have been waiting all week to go back. We finally got there this evening and it was delicious!! I had pomegranite frozen yogurt with raspberries, blueberries, fruity pebbles and pomegranite syrup. Mmmm.... As you can tell I had to sample a few bites before I took the picture:

Next time I am thinking cococut with kiwis, strawberries and mango...

Strange Request

With summer swim lessons over and the fall session not starting for 2 weeks, Mike told Charlie that they could do whatever he wanted, since they didn't have swimming lessons to go to. Charlie replied promptly that he wanted to go to the zoo in his pajamas, and well, that is just what they did while I was at work today:

Amelia Not Crawling

(But looking awfully cute nonetheless.)

Amelia's Passport Picture

Getting Amelia's passport photo proved to be slightly more complicated than we had anticipated. First we went to Ritz Camera, because they advertized 'passport pictures' in their window. However, we were told that they did not have the "necessary equipment" to do infant passport pictures, which needed to be done with the infant lying down. (Pointing out that Charlie's were done at the age of 6 months with him sitting on Mike's shoulders did not help.) Then we went to a portrait studio which informed us that yes they did passport pictures for infants but that they were booked solid for the next several hours. Finally we went to the CVS that had done Charlie's passport picture. The lady there plopped a piece of poster board on the floor by the candy rack, popped Amelia on to it and started snapping away. Here is the final product, cropped to hide the fact that Amelia was clutching her feet in both hands:

Tuesday Update

We spent Saturday night and Sunday at Grammy & Grampy Robinsons; Charlie got to roast his first marshmallow over his first campfire. Initially he was scared -- of the dark, of the people down the street lighting off fireworks, etc -- but eventually he started to enjoy it. Here is a pic of him and Mike toasting jumbo marshmallows on jumbo sticks:

Sunday we caught umpteen fish, none of them picture worthy, but I swear the big one is lurking in that lake somewhere. We even tried leaving the smaller fish we caugh on our hooks as bait, until that idea was abandoned for a) being fruitless and b)being cruel and unusual punishment.

In other news, this week I tried out Stop 'N Shop's grocery delivery service and I am HOOKED! Aside from having a code for free delivery for sixty days and having our Sundays -- the one day Mike and I are home together -- fully to ourselves with no grocery trip looming, *I* actually get to shop, perusing the aisles from the computer. And really, there is not much I like to do more than online shopping, even if it *is* for bread and milk. (But did I mention they have milk fortified with omega 3 fatty acids? These are the things you do not find out when you send your husband to the grocery store every week.)

Amelia is slightly grumpier than usual (a bit of an oxymoron I suppose since she is never grumpy) and I assume it is because she is teething; still waiting for that first tooth to poke through! In the meantime, she has inherited Charlie's old Fisher Price piano and has been banging away all day at it.

Charlie has another ingrown toenail but this time I took him to his pediatrician who prescribed keflex and said that it should clear up on its own between the antibiotic and the warm soaks and ointment we had already been doing. She says she never has to cut them, for which Charlie (who would only let her look at his toe from across the room) and I are extremely grateful.

That is about all the news from here! An extremely long post about nothing...

It's Official!

Thanks to Grammy Bess & Grampy Paxton we will be going on vacation in Costa Rica and staying here January 19th to the 25th! Amelia's passport is in the works and Charlie can't wait to 'go to the jungle and see some poison dart frogs'! And neither can I!

Fishing & Family

This morning we went... drumroll please... FISHING!! (Umm, did the sarcasm come through? We have been fishing I believe the last 5 out of 6 weekends now.)

The only photo worthy fish was this one, and Charlie as per usual, would not get in the picture:

Afterwards we went over to Phil & Sue's for a barbecue and for some birthday cake, as Sue discovered that Tom ironically shared a birthday this week with his nemesis, President Obama. She therefore fittingly had this cake made for the occasion:


All in all, a fun day!

Charlie & Amelia

Amelia's First Boat Ride

We got to Grammy & Grampy Robinson's bright and early yesterday morning and all went out on the boat -- Charlie caught lots of little 3 inch fish and Amelia thoroughly enjoyed her first boat ride. Here are some pics:

6 Month Check Up

Amelia had her 6 month check up this morning. She is 18lbs 2 oz (75th percentile) and 28 inches (over the 95th percentile) and got 2 shots, including her last hepatitis B vaccination. The pediatrician gave us the green light to feed her any of the stage 1 and stage 2 babyfoods, avoiding only strawberries and citrus, and to work her up to 3 meals a day by eight months. She also pronounced her perfectly on target developmentally.

Charlie, for his part, informed everyone in the office -- from the receptionist to the doctor -- that he was not the one getting the shots. ("It's my sister who's getting shots today, not me! Don't make a mistake, I'm not getting any shots today!" He also was very leary of the fact that Amelia's pediatrician is named Dr Wolf, and would have been hiding under a chair from the "Wolf doctor" when she came in, if I had not very firmly told him that he was being ridiculous and to keep his behind on the chair where it was.

Amelia did actually cry when she got her shots, probably to Charlie's delight -- he was a little too gleeful with his "Oh, poor Amelia!"s But she recovered quickly and I treated us all to lunch afterwards, our reward for surviving a long morning.

So all in all it was a successful trip to the doctor.

Another Successful Fishing Trip

Charlie and Mike had a successful fishing trip to Whitman's Pond in Weymouth this morning -- I tried to get Mike to take a picture of Charlie holding one of the 15 fish they caught, but this is as close as he would get:

While Mike and Charlie fished, Heather, Amelia & I enjoyed brunch at The Rustic Kitchen in Hingham and did some birthday shopping at The Shoe Market (thanks Mike!!)

Unfortunately, No Pictures

We had a fun weekend last weekend -- we went to the beach on sunday for the first time this season, with Kate & Brian and their boys. Charlie had a great time playing with Finn, and thoroughly wore himself out racing around the sand, diving in the waves and generally being a maniac. But alas no pictures because I was too lazy to walk up the beach to the house where I had left the camera. Bad mommy.

On Tuesday I got my hair dyed not blonde, but blonde- er. I was going to take a picture of that too, but Mike's not home and I can't figure out the automatic timer on the camera. Strike two for Mommy.

Amelia is enjoying carrots and has her 6 month check up on Monday. I do have a picture of that, but i figure there are only so many pictures you can post of your child covered in various shades of babyfood.

So really, not much goin on. Enjoying birthday fudge from Mom and will be enjoying lunch and a shopping trip with Heather on Sunday as my birthday present from Mike :)

Maybe I will find something to take pictures of soon...

Ode To Squash

More Fishing

Although I don't actually have pictures, sorry! Somehow I didn't quite manage to get the camera out, the fish kept us too busy! Charlie, as per usual, caught double digit numbers of fish, all pretty darn small, although we did see some actual big fish in the water but they avoided our fishing poles. We took Amelia for a stroll over to see Aunt Joyce, Uncle Gordon and Cousin Cheryl, and then had a yummy lunch on the grille, after which Charlie wanted to, you guessed it, go back down to the lake for more fishing. And you guessed it, today he is asking me why we can't "walk to the worm store and get a can of real worms and find a lake and go fishing." Sigh. If only it were that easy...

Weekend Updates

Just some random updates as the weekend starts!
1) Charlie started swimming lessons today; we signed him up for the eight week summer session at the Weymouth Club, and according to Mike he did great! Charlie himself was a little less than enthused when I asked him about it though -- he said, "It was okay but I still can't swim yet." All in good time...
2) We bought Amelia a jumperoo and she has been jumperoo-ing up a storm -- I will need to charge the video camera and video tape her soon...
3) Charlie has been obsessively eating peanutbutter since he was cleared by the allergist on Tuesday, and as he pointed out to me, "Mommy I ate peanutbutter and I didn't die!" I am still holding on to the epi pen in my purse though -- old habits die hard...
4) Amelia has been gobbling up her rice cereal and tons of boob juice besides -- I am starting her on squash tomorrow. She is definitely in a growth spurt, realizing that her 6 month check up is coming up I guess.
5) We are heading up to New Hampshire tomorrow for more fishing on the lake -- Charlie has been literally counting down the days till he gets to go fishing again. I am thinking of digging my fishing pole out of the attic and bringing it along too, so I don't have to keep bugging Charlie for a turn with his pole ;) I am sure we will have pictures, and maybe I will even remember to take some pictures of Amelia with Grammy & Grampy Robinson this time!

Cleared!

Finally! 3 years and 3 allergists later Charlie has been officially cleared of all food allergies including peanuts!! The doctor, who is the author of "The Peanut Allergy Handbook" and is president of the Massachusetts Food Allergy Association, said "Go home, throw out your epi pens, give him a peanutbutter and jelly sandwhich and then give him some reeses pieces for dessert." We took his advice and ran with it (although I am holding on to the epi pens for another week or so...):

Another Milestone

Amelia had her first solid food today! Charlie got the honor of feeding her her first few bites of rice cereal:

On The Boat

We spent our Fourth of July up at Grammy and Grampy Robinson's and had a great time fishing on the boat and later off the dock. Between Charlie, Mike and I, we caught a whopping 15 fish, most of them caught by Charlie of course :) And most of them tiny as you can tell from the pictures. There was, apparently, one large fish that Charlie caught while I was up at the house with Amelia but there are no pictures of it so exactly how big it was is up for debate. Mike says it was about the size of a shampoo bottle but Charlie claims it was "bigger than the house!"
Here are some pics of our time on the water:

Charlie Loves His Sister