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Saturday, October 31, 2009

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween and it's been 3 years since I started my blog while in Hong Kong. Wish I'd taken more photos back then (yes yes hubs you can gloat that you got that one right). A friend took me out to Lan Kwai Fong to celebrate and not satisfied with my dress, bought a furry headband with bats on springs which she made me wear over dinner. Good times!

We just got back from our Texas vacation Thursday night and still in recovery mode. Why are vacations so hard to recover from? Is it the stress of traveling with a baby? She’s been such a pill the last two days! Today she’s been pinching me continuously, deliberately and maliciously. I suppose it’s time to work out a game plan for punishment – I really hate saying that word, it sounds so mean but we can’t have her going around smacking and pinching people!

On with our Halloween celebrations! We have Halloween movies, piles of candy for the condo kids (who know our address due to our cute little dog they love to pet), Nightmare Before Christmas, various costumes for Charlotte to try on and discard, cookies and hamburgers. In other words, we’re staying in tonight! Cheers and ghoulish wishes!!!

Saturday, October 17, 2009

It's Pink Ribbon Month

Otherwise known as Breast Cancer Awareness month. I read a really interesting article this past week about Pink Ribbon overkill and was astonished to read that no one owns the Pink Ribbon image! Having worked with licensed products for 9 years this blows my mind. I'm so used to images having ownership that require licensing dues; it's incredulous an image as popular as the Pink Ribbon could have no owner!!! So just keep this in mind as you encounter pink products everywhere, the purchase of such does not guarantee the manufacturer is giving anything to support breast cancer research and cure.

With this in mind, one of us wears pink - but more for reasons of the pants were only $5.00 at Target and we have pink cupcakes to eat - but more because they looked really good!

On with our Saturday adventures in pink:

Today we returned to the Island at Deerfield beach. I'm fascinated with Islands and this one is accessible with a FREE BOAT RIDE!!! My dad was a bargain hunter for free outdoor adventures so I always hear his voice cheer in my head when I do one of these.

First I need to show you this amazingly strong spider thread holding a stick!


Here's our Pink Explorer




And right before leaving we found a line of Iguana's just sittin' on the dock of the bay.


Sorry I just had to fit a song lyric in there. Here's the first 2 verses:
Sittin' in the mornin' sun
I'll be sittin' when the evenin' come
Watching the ships roll in
And then I watch 'em roll away again, yeah

I'm sittin' on the dock of the bay
Watching the tide roll away
Ooo, I'm just sittin' on the dock of the bay
Wastin' time

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Cha Cha Changes!

Ever since baby learned to walk 7 weeks ago the changes have been tremendous. She's been scaling every piece of furniture, pulling stuff off her high chair, throwing the remote control in the trash, horrible mood swings, finally two teeth, refusal to eat all things solid with the exception of organic puffs and yogurt puffs and today:

- SHE LEARNED TO OPEN THE FRONT DOOR!!!!

AND

- SHE LEARNED TO OPEN MY PRENATAL VITAMINS - the press down on lid and twist kind!!!

I'm freaking out right now. Who's idea was it to try again??? What kind of parents leave their front door unlocked and give their children bottles with vitamins in it to shake shake shake, shake shake shake, shake your booty. Sorry, for the burst into song, I've been singing all day in the office. We've become a strange and bizarre little group.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Did it work?

This week is tick toking by at a snails pace as I quietly take note of the little changes.

1. Sunday I had a massive craving for KFC.
2. Monday I looked at Chili husband prepared in utter horror and ran back out for KFC.
3. Monday night as I was rocking baby to sleep at 8:30 I almost fell asleep myself and quickly rushed her to the floor bed to nap next to her until she was fully asleep.
4. Today I looked at left over Chili in lunch and ran out for breaded chicken fingers.
5. For dinner I just had breaded pork cutlets.
6. Tonight my shorts feel tight.
7. I've stopped taking all medicines, including sleep meds and having terribly "light" nights until finally last night I slept like a rock.

I should have positive confirmation by weeks end. I suppose a normal person would keep things under wraps but what the hell, my 5-6 readers should know what I'm going through. Tick tock tick tock. 4-5 days to go.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Clean

Before children, a time period I like to refer to as BC, I led a very clean life. Weekends had an entertainment agenda with a visit to the beach/bookstore or movies but there was also an important element of cleaning the entire condo. Now that I have a daughter, I reflect back on the life I had before - clean, calm, orderly - but rather boring and I'm learning to giggle at the dirt that has entered my life and has yet to make any of us really ill.

Yesterday's sandy mess at the beach made me laugh as I recalled a time when my beach towel was spotless as I read a book and maybe got the very bottom sandy upon return from swimming. My beach towel now looks like a sandy beach. Almost pointless.

Prior to going to the beach Charlotte ran off with a lotion bottle that had a loose top. Seconds later there was a crash in the kitchen as lotion ooozed everywhere. She then proceeded to paint with the lotion as I cleaned it up.

Later that day I discovered she's tall enough to pull an entire egg tray off the high chair. Two eggs hit the floor and she happily painted the floor with them. It was fun.

Tonight, on our evening walk, she ran back to a pile of duck poo and picked it up. Horror!!! She definitely got a bath after that.

I'm getting used to the dirt and mess with very little time to clean it up. Husband's joining in the fun by letting a dirty little girl ride in the laundry basket of clean clothing on the way to the bedroom. Sigh! If I don't give in and join the fun I'll forever be in dirt horror.

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Back to the beach we go

It's mid-September and the weather is still HOT!!! The water temperature is 81f/27c and the air is 91f/32c.

Today at the beach we met 1 year old latina Sophia who was accompanied by her grandparents. Sophia was wearing a beautiful white dress with matching bonnet. She sat quietly in a chair while her GP's set up the beach gear (I don't dare put mine in a chair, she'd likely throw herself to the ground). Sophia then sat quietly on the beach blanket while her GP's fed her snacks. Charlotte looked on in horror, what kind of baby sits that quietly she bellowed to me (I'm translating her loud squawk). Charlotte then rolled around in the sand to show Sophia how it's supposed to be done at the beach.


Look she squealed, you are supposed to get really really sandy. Sand everywhere! In mom's purse, inexplicably in the bottles and wallets. Everywhere! And if you want a really really great sand mask, stick your face straight into the sand!




I used to get really freaked out when she was young and would tumble face first into the sand but now I realize it was intentional all along!

It should be noted that after two hours at the beach, baby Sophia was still clean - WE on the other hand were covered in sand regardless of multiple trips into the ocean but I wouldn't trade my shrieking, loud opinionated daughter for any other baby.

Sunday, October 04, 2009

Coupons

I grew up with a mom who bought generic and therefore didn't use many coupons, however she still had a great system for organizing coupons and every week before she went to the store she would review her coupon options. I need to get better at this. I have a coupon pile that I shove them into when they arrive in the mail and I look at it like every 3 months.

Today I looked through the pile and saved the following money:
Costco - $20 saved on back up system (original price $89.99), this has been on my to-buy list for several months so I was excited to use this.
Costco - $5.00 on diapers - my husband did our monthly Costco buy on the 1st of the month and I forgot to give him the coupons EGADS! So I actually bought an extra box of diapers, not sure this is the greatest plan since I'm spending on next month's budget but $5.00 seems worth it.
Target - $5.00 off baby items after spending $25, this justified new clothes, 4 pieces each $5.00 so it seemed like a good deal
Target - $3.75 on Gerber foods

Total savings = $33.75

My only regret in the day was finding a $50 voucher for American Airlines after I've already purchased the tickets to Texas. I got this last December and need to think of a way to remind myself to use it a year later. Maybe I just need to put all coupons in one envelope and if I shuffle through them on a weekly basis I'll be able to remember them when it counts!

Saturday, October 03, 2009

Parental Compromise

Do you make compromising split second decisions with your children? I'm sure you do, in fact we all make these decisions all day long and it affects our daily outcome. I'm constantly testing the boundaries with my daughter. Will she tolerate one more store? Will she behave during a 45 minute car ride? Will she play with the animals long enough to let me hastily write this post?

This morning I decided this little face had way too much energy to spend the morning at home


Dare I publicly admit I'm slightly tired of going to the beach every weekend? There I said it! Today we are going back to Deerfield Beach Island, she is now walking and it will be a new fun experience for her (last time I carried her for the entire 45 minute trail walk and it was a bit taxing). This decision was determined at 8:45am, knowing the boat leaves the top of the hour, we had until 9:30 to walk the dog, pack bags, fill water bottles, change out of pajamas and finish tea. It should have been easy to do all this in 45 minutes but I found us running late after I spent too much time moseying through blogs - I have no one to blame but myself.

I frantically rushed packing bread, milk bottle with ice pack in a nice little food pack for baby. Dropped it briefly to gather other bags + baby and rush to the car, we have 25 minutes to go and it's a 25 minute drive with cooperative traffic. I'm doing this, we have to at least TRY! About half way there I realize the food was left where I dropped it, or did I leave it on the car roof? Compromise moment - do I turnaround and miss the 10am boat ride? Do I have enough time to stop at Starbucks and get milk and coffee, that would be nice but no I have exactly enough time to get there and the lights are cooperating. Besides, once she sees the trails, dirt and pine cones she will refuse to eat regardless of what goodies I have in tow. We proceed, against my better judgment of her nutritional needs, and reach the boat just in time (even after I missed the turn and had to do a big U-turn - ACK!) And I'm so thankful that I never clean my car - there was a pair of shoes just waiting to go for a walk in the woods. What kind of mother leaves home without shoes? Thankfully I do not have to answer that one.

We didn't get very far on the trail, there were too many rocks, sticks, crunchy leaves, pine cones and pine needles to investigate.


It's really hard to get a smile or to get her to look at the camera once she's in full investigation mode, she's very serious about carbon cycle research.




The boat returns to mainland once an hour so 45 minutes into our fun I pick her up to walk back to the boat. She screamed bloody murder with kicking and flailing arms the entire 1 minute walk back to the boat. When I finally put her down she says to me "good girl". Yes, I'm a "good girl" for putting her down. So glad she's learning to put words into correct context.