Happy Halloween!

When I was prepping Marshall for the night, he did not want to go out. "Mom, how about I just go to bed?" Then I promised we would walk with a flashlight and he got a little excited. However, when he started ringing doorbells and got candy, it was on. "Mom, you and Josie will go home. Dad and I will go do some more." A good time was had by all. :)

Marshall is an alligator. Josie is a chick hatching from an egg. (I am a lady with a bandana in her hair. All my creative energy was spent by the time it came for adult costumes.)

Marshall's Class Picture

It occurred to me last night that while I was scanning pictures, I should have probably put in Marshall class picture too, because it is quite possibly the funniest thing I have ever seen.

I wish it was bigger so, but yes, that is Marshall there being held by Teacher Connie. And the two mothers are in there under duress. Apparently, it was a screaming fest. Kind of like herding cats. I love the look on Ian's face (the blond boy who is looking at Marshall. He just turned 3, so he is one of the oldest ones in the class too.) Like,"Dude, calm down and look at the camera."

Like a new woman.....

That is I feel like a new woman. Do you need me to write a complicated business proposal, or a book? Or better yet, run a marathon? Because I feel like I probably could today because (drumroll please.......) JOSIE SLEPT THROUGH THE NIGHT....well kind of. She woke up at 11 (I think, I was kind of groggy) and I went in and patted her back and gave her a pacifier. She cried a little (so I am pretty sure the pacifier got lost) and then fell asleep. Next thing I know I am hearing her cry through the monitor. As I groaned, I rolled over to check the clock AND IT WAS 5 am!!!!! I nursed her and she went back to sleep. So things were really looking up until Marshall woke up at 5:30 and talked to himself in his room until 6:30. (Thus keeping me awake as I listened through the monitor). But still, a stretch of 6 hours of unbroken sleep? Are you kidding me? This is fabulous! I am not foolhardy enough to believe that it is going to happen again tonight, but who knows? Could this be the start of a trend?


In other news, I took Jo and Marsh to get pictures taken today. Mostly of Josie, since Marshall's school pictures came out so darn cute. And of course, my camera ham was suddenly very serious. But the photographer did get some great shots. I was hoping for one of Marsh and Jo together, but alas, it was not meant to be. Josie was too tired and Marshall was...well, Marshall was too toddler. But we are getting an official family portrait done this year by my friend and photographer Rebecca, so hopefully we can get some of the two of them at that time.


Marshall's School Picture (I am amazed that the photographer got this shot. He was way too interested in looking at the lights and the backdrop to sit still for a nice picture.)


Josie's 6 month pictures

Maybe Josie will have more fashion sense than her mother....

GROSGRAIN MINI STORE OPENING NOVEMBER 6!!!! AND BIG PREVIEW GIVEAWAY!!!!

There is this sweet stay at home mom who is starting her own business and I thought I would give her a little press. Her outfits are adorable. I can't wait for Jo-Jo to be able to fit into them. (Which, at the rate she is going, could very well be in a few months.....I swear, Will did not disclose that somewhere in his lineage he is part Amazon.)

I wish I were this crafty....or enterprising...or had my own good ideas. (I just copy other peoples. :))

A little me time

Ms. Josephine is a trained night eater. She wakes up every 3-4 hours and screams until I nurse her. I don't quite know how we got here since she was such a good sleeper (waking up only once each night), but here we are. At first it was a pacifier problem. She was waking up every couple of hours and crying for us to give her back the pacifier. So we worked really hard and got rid of the pacifiers at night. And probably somewhere during that time, I became the pacifier. We have tried crying it out, but this girl is relentless. Whereas Marshall would cry for 45 minutes at max, she can go for hours. Really. So I know I need to work on some behavior elimination strategies to get this to stop, but right now, I am so tired that it is just so much easier to nurse her for 5 minutes because I know that will put her back to sleep. (Clearly perpetuating the problem)

In anycase, I am a little sleep deprived. I don't necessarily feel like it all the time, but then I will be staring blankly into space when one of the preschool moms is trying to have a conversation with me. And things aren't getting done around here. Will and I are so tired that after the kids go to bed (which, thank God, is still regularly at 7), we end up falling asleep on the couch by 8:30. Last night I stayed "up late" (9:30) to cut out the pattern pieces for Marshall's alligator costume. And this morning I decided to do something for myself. I cut my toenails. That's right. I know it sounds extravagant, but sometimes, a girl just needs a little pampering. And now I am going to go take a shower while Josie naps and Marshall watches Mickey Mouse Clubhouse (where I think he learned to count backwards). It's a morning full of special treats. :)

Marshall-isms

• "Marshall, come help me make my bed." "Why? Did you go pee-pee in it?" (This is clearly a commentary on my housekeeping skills.)


• "Dad, come play with me." "Okay buddy. What are we going to play?" "I'm going to play race cars and you are going to play Little People." (Baby steps toward sharing...baby steps....)


• "Mom, can you clean off my feet? They are dirty." (Okay, experienced parents, what was on his feet at 7 am while he was playing in the living room? That's right...poop. It's still very sneaky, that poop.)


• "Okay, 9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1, Peek A Boo Josie!" "What Marshall? You know how to count backwards?!?" "Yes, mom! 6, 7, 8, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1!" (I did not teach him this. Must be from our daily TV-show-while-mom-showers routine.)


• "Hoooooo! Did you hear that Mom? What is it?" "I don't know Marshall, what is it?" "It's an owl Mom!" "An owl? Really? I thought they only came out at night time." "Mom, you don't need to be afraid of an owl." (He's big into owls lately. Must be Halloween. I got a door mat that shows an owl and says "Whoooooo's There?". Marshall studies it everytime we enter or leave our house. Also, he and Will went for a hike in Edmonds last weekend and when Marshall said "Hoooooo!" and an actual owl hooted back at him. Best Dad ever moment.)

Finally, here's 2 pictures of Marshall making a tower on T day (notice the train t-shirt) and apple cake on A day.

The First Supper

So the "official" recommendation by the American Academy of Pediatrics is that babies are solely breast fed up until 6 months. And I waited really really hard for Josie's sixth month birthday to feed her some rice cereal, but she was trying to eat our food so much (literally) that I thought she might be ready for solids. So this Monday (during Monday Night Football...GO PATS!), we started Josie on cereal. And BOY was she ready. Look at these pictures!

She was literally grabbing for the bowl trying to eat out of it. The actual food in mouth concept was a a little foreign though, so I'm not sure how much of the cereal actually went into her belly.

I love this picture. Like, "Excuse me, but I'm eating."

Girl's Weekend

Josie and I joined 6 of my friends from Brighton for a girl's weekend in Chelan last weekend. It was delightful. It was so nice to get away and just be with friends for a little bit. And the house we stayed at was SPECTACULAR. I knew we were staying at Sandy's brother's house on the lake, but I clearly had no idea what to expect. I even brought a little thing of cooking oil to make popcorn, thinking we were going to someone's cabin on the lake. Yeah, I didn't need to bring cooking oil. This house was amazing. Apparently Sandy's brother used to be a VP at Microsoft. So it turned into a very very nice vacation. :) (Not that it wouldn't have been even if we were in a lean-to in the woods. It was just great to spend time with friends.)

Anyway we visited a few wineries, walked around the town of Chelan, and just spent time together. It was wonderful. I came back refreshed and with a new appreciation for this time that I get to spend with my children.

Sue, Kari, Donna, and Sandy at a winery.

I LOVE this picture. It's immediately after Josie finished spitting up all over Andrea. Apparently, she threw up copious amounts about 4 times. (I was tasting wine. :)) I love the look on Josie's face. Like "What? What's all the fuss about?" (Psst...do you like those baby legwarmers? I made them from socks. So cute.)


Andrea and I in a grape stomping competition. (She won.)


All the ladies. Andrea, Linda, Me, Josie, Donna, Sandy, Sue, and Kari. (This is not a park. It's the backyard of the AMAZING house. I know I keep going on and on about this house, but I just felt so lucky and blessed.)

Letters...

So Marshall is obsessed with letters lately. For a while he has known what sounds each letter makes. But I am trying to make the move to understanding that the sounds of the letters work together to form words. So I started doing a letter a week. One day each week, I pick a letter and have activities planned that begin with that letter. I am trying to make it pretty basic. The first week we did M and we drew a monkey, a moon, Mommy, and Marshall with markers and then we watched a movie. Last week, to celebrate Dad being home, we did the letter D. On Friday, we went to Williamson and had donuts with Dad while sitting on the drill (that Dad is building). Then after naptime, we drew a duck and brought it to our neighbor and good friend DeWayne.

Here's a picture of Donuts with Dad on the Drill (or the frame for what will be the drill).

I also got Marshall a LeapFrog video where Tad the frog learns how to make basic words like cat, fun, big, etc. Marshall LOVES the video, sings the songs all the time and quotes it verbatim in his pretend play with his Little People. I know it's a bit cheesy and I definitely thought he was a bit young, but he really loves watching movies and I thought I could at least try to make it beneficial.

Well, this is what Will and I found on the garbage can yesterday.

I swear to God, neither of us had anything to do with this. (And please ignore the fact that my son is playing on the garbage can. It's magnetic. He likes it. At least he's not going into the garbage can?)

So I guess watching TV isn't all that bad? I mean it's definitely more from memory than from an understanding of phonics, but it's still pretty cool.

Catch-up Pictures

So here are some pictures to catch-up too! BTW- Josie is rolling over all the time now. Of course, she first did it when I left her and Marshall with our friend Nancy for 2 hours. Figures. :) She is definitely a mover and a shaker though. Marshall's going to be really upset when she starts crawling. She is already wiggling her way over to his Little People. :)

We went to a farm the other weekend. Look at how big Marshall is!

Mommy forgot the sunhat, so Josie was the hooded bandit!

Josie with Daddy's Red Sox hat. She's a fan already.

Jo Jo is finally old enough for her jumperoo. She LOVES it. (So does Marshall. It makes noises. :))

Catch-up

Gosh....it's been so long that with each day it's seems a more daunting task to try to blog....like I know that there's even more stuff I have to try to remember. (Which is really hard for me....especially with the lack of sleep issue....but we'll get to that...)

So I'll try the best I can to remember all the cute stuff that's going on...

• Marshall is really into reading this book my mom got him called "Underwear Do's and Don'ts". It's this funny book about underwear that we were hoping might inspire him to want to wear underwear (so far, not so much...but maybe the recent interest in the book is a promising sign?). Anyway, when Marshall picks up a book to read, he tells you the title first. So lately it's been, "Mom, I'm going to read this book. It's called Underwear Do's and Donuts."
• Josie is all about eating her feet. Changing a diaper has become somewhat of a contortionist act. (We are all cloth now btw. Loving it!) She also loves to give the raspberry. She has a happy raspberry and a mad raspberry. Last night she woke up while I was watching Project Runway and I really wanted to see the end so I made her wait. And through the monitor I hear loud "WHTHHHHHHHHH". Hilarious.
• So Marshall has also been really into labeling things. "Josie is a girl. I am a boy." "I am a brother. You are a mother." (We love to blow his mind by telling him things like Daddy is a brother too, or Grandma is Mommy's mother.....then he says things like "No Mom, Daddy is a father. And Grandma is a grandmother") We were reading How do Dinosaurs play with their Friends? and I say "Are you a good friend?" and Marshall says "No" which of course breaks my heart. I tell him "Oh honey! Of course you are a good friend! You share your toys and love to hug the other kids." And he says,"No, I'm not a friend. I'm a boy."

So it's like Marshall knew I was blogging and wanted to give me new material. He just came into the utility room and said," Mom, can you clean up my foot? It's a little dirty." Okay, experienced parents, what was on his foot? That's right, it was poop. I put a pull-up on him just to use them up. (I bought a whole bunch a while ago with high hopes, but they are size 2t-3t. So he is probably going to grow out of them before they get used.) Clearly, they don't hold in the poop. Anyway, there small piles of poop all over his bedroom floor and then little spots all down the hallway where he walked to show me his dirty foot. And as I am cleaning him up, he is giving me a dissertation on bowel movements. "Sometimes the poop is in our bummy. And it comes out. But it can be a little sneaky." Yes, it can little man. Yes it can.