stories from Seth

My brother-in-law periodically sends me conversations that he and Julianna have when I'm not around.  Some of them are downright hilarious.


Like this one:

Jules: "Girls say no, boys say yes."

Seth: "What?"

Jules: "Girls say no, boys say yes."

Seth: What does that mean?

Jules: "When I wanted to ride the motorcycle, mom said no.  You said yes.  Daddy said yes."

And this one:

Jules: My dad has a new job
Seth: I know, does he like it?
Jules: Yes.
Seth: When are you going to get a job?
Jules: When I grow up and be a daddy

There will be more to come later.  I am sure of it.

love

I just overheard Julianna say to Jonathan, "Let's talk about my brother now,"and he said, "What about him?"  She answered, "How do i stop being ugly to him?"  

That child melts my heart sometimes.

what Jules thinks of Mommy - Take 2

A while back, I asked Jules a series of questions about myself and it was fairly amusing to hear her responses.  I posted them here on the blog and reading over it recently I decided to ask her the same questions again to see how her answers would change.  Here's what she told me today.

1. What is something mommy always says to you?
Don't be mean to your brother.


2. What makes mommy happy?
flowers


3. What makes mommy sad?
being mean to my brother and hurting him


4. How does your mommy make you laugh?
telling jokes


5. What did your mommy like to do when she was a child?
She liked to play.


6. How old is your mommy?
this is gonna be a hard one - 25


7. How tall is your mommy?
(measuring with a little blanket) seven blankets long


8. What is her favorite thing to watch on TV?
the news


9. What does your mommy do when you're not around?
work on the computers


10.  If your mommy becomes famous, what will it be for?
to be fancy


11. What is your mommy really good at?
computers
Super Mario Brothers

12. What is your mommy not very good at?
playing Super Mario Brothers


13. What does your mommy do for her job?
she goes to school and teaches the kids computers


14. What is your mommy's favorite food?
fish


15. What makes you proud of your mommy?
doing splits


16. If your mommy were a cartoon character, who would she be?
dinosaur train mother (teranodon mothers)


17. What do you and your mommy do together?
make cupcakes

18. How are you and your mommy the same?
sometimes we match

19. How are you and your mommy different?
because I have blond hair and she has black hair

20. How do you know your mommy loves you?
because I love you right back

21.  What does your mommy like most about your daddy?
because you married him

22. Where is your mommy's favorite place to go?
to the den


-----

And just for fun I decided to ask her the same questions but about Daddy this time.  Once again, I did not make these up.  They're straight from the mouth of the little girl.  Enjoy!


1. What is something daddy always says to you?

Don't attack your brother

2. What makes daddy happy?

when I play Super Mario Bros with him

3. What makes daddy sad?

when I hit him

4. How does your daddy make you laugh?

by telling jokes

5. What did your daddy like to do when he was a child?

He liked to watch Dukes of Hazzard.

6. How old is your daddy?

25

7. How tall is your daddy?

(measuring with a little book) eight books long

8. What is his favorite thing to watch on TV?

Dukes of Hazzard

9. What does your daddy do when you're not around?

watch TV

10.  If your daddy becomes famous, what will it be for?

getting rich

11. What is your daddy really good at?

Super Mario Brothers

12. What is your daddy not very good at?

driving cars

13. What does your daddy do for her job?

he used to build cabinets

14. What is your daddy's favorite food?

candy

15. What makes you proud of your daddy?

getting richer and richer

16. If your daddy were a cartoon character, who would he be?

Mickey Mouse

17. What do you and your daddy do together?

play Wii

18. How are you and your daddy the same?

we both have brown eyes

19. How are you and your daddy different?

because I have blond hair and he has black hair

20. How do you know your daddy loves you?
because we do special things together

21. What does your daddy like most about your mommy?

because she's the same inches as Daddy

22. Where is your daddy's favorite place to go?

Let's see.... I think it's the candy store

the take home lessons of summer

I love summertime.  I must be an adult since now I absolutely salivate thinking about the Farmer's Market and the fresh produce stand up the street.  There's not much better than a sliced homegrown tomato with salt and pepper.  I used to think my parents were weird when they said stuff like that.

Anyway, Julianna loves fresh corn on the cob.  One of my favorite pictures of her is this one of her gnawing on an ear of corn, taken shortly after she turned two. 

I cannot believe how fast she's grown.  She's even upgraded to a full ear.

Today I am thankful for fresh produce, for a healthy kid who keeps on growing and for new summer memories.  What are you thankful for?

more bathtime fun

nine months

Dear Joshua,

So much has happened in the last two months that I’m not sure this letter will be able to do it justice. That’s probably because I’m a slacker and I failed to get your eight month letter written so now I’m having to cram everything into one. Regardless, you are changing at lightning speed and that makes it hard just as well. Your face is changing shape, you hair is getting a tad lighter, your torso is thinning just a bit, your babbles have gotten louder, and your mobility has improved tenfold. I just can’t keep up with it all!

You’ve developed a fondness for your mama lately and you cling to me quite a bit. When I’m making lunch or dinner you swiftly crawl to my legs and pull up on them so that you’re standing by my side. Then you beg and beg to be picked up. I remember this age with your sister and it was a lot easier to put her in the sling and carry her around the kitchen but for some reason I never remember to do that with you. I’ll try to do better with that and I hope that you’ll try to go to other people a little more willingly. Thanks, Tud.

I began weaning you two weeks ago. I just couldn’t take it anymore. You were biting me all the time and I was beginning to think that you weren’t getting enough milk to be satisfied but I was never really sure if it was that or just that you wanted to crawl all over me. More than both of those reasons though, I mostly wanted to quit nursing to see if it would help your sleep habits. Two weeks ago you would still wake up anywhere between 3 am and 4:45 am each morning and then sometimes one or two times after that. Since then you have certainly been better. For the last four nights in a row you have slept from 9 pm until 6 or 6:30 am and I am definitely pleased with that. I still nurse you whenever you wake up and I pump before going to bed so that you can at least get some breast milk, but that is dwindling fast so I think you’ll probably be on all formula here in the next two or three weeks. I’m trying not to have guilt about that despite the fact that you don’t seem to mind too much.

Last month you learned to crawl. You started crawling at about 7.5 months old. Before we went to the beach you would get up on all fours and go forward a “step” or two and then turn around and sit on your bottom and then do it all over again. You couldn’t quite figure it out. Sometimes you would push one leg out straight to the back and sometimes you would just rock or even push yourself backwards. But then by the time we got home from the beach you had gotten much more efficient and were finally getting around. As the month progressed you naturally got faster and now you are so fast that it’s hard to catch you. You will giggle and go when you see me coming after you. It’s actually a lot of fun!

You are also pulling up like a champ now, Josh. You immediately stand up at the end of your naps. You will have nothing of sitting on the floor next to someone and you must be climbing on them at all times. You can even climb our stairs quicker than I would ever think a baby should be able to. We only had one baby gate with Julianna and I’m hoping that will do with you as well, but I’m really not so sure about that. When I put you in your car seat now you protest with the greatest amount of strength and determination by twisting your body sideways and climbing out of it faster than I can blink an eye.

Now you are thisclose to walking. In fact, you’ve taken three steps at a time on your own on multiple occasions. I wouldn’t be surprised if I can officially say that you’re walking by the time I publish this letter tomorrow. You definitely have the desire and you are already brave enough to let go and try it on your own, it’s just that most of the time it’s easier to drop down on your bottom and take off. And we all like to take the easy way out sometimes so I don’t blame you.

We have an appointment tomorrow to see how the doctor thinks you’re doing. I’m certain that she’ll think you’re as perfect as I do, but I’m still eager to hear it. I’ll go ahead and apologize in advance for the shots that they’ll have to give you. You’ll be a trooper though. I know it.


Currently you are learning to wave “hey” and “bye-bye.” Nanna discovered that when she sings “Where Is Thumbkin?” you will flap your hand back and forth as if to look for your thumb to make it wiggle. You babble sometimes, though not as much as your sister did. How could anyone? Anyway, you will occasionally say “ma ma” or “da da.” You love to bend your knees and “dance” to music and we often find you staring up at the TV with your neck breaking off because you’re standing so close.

You have five teeth and will soon have the 6th. Of course, that helps with the eating thing and you can chew some pretty good stuff now even though most of the time you don’t want to. You’d never really guess this looking at your thighs.

You don’t really like vegetables unless its carrots or green beans but you do eat fruit.  I think your favorite food has got to be yogurt. You’ll eat any flavor and if the yogurt cup is on the table when you’re eating something else you will rock back and forth in your chair until I offer a bite of it. When you had your first taste of ice cream at Pap’s birthday party, you really weren’t impressed. I’m not worried; you’ll learn soon enough. I can’t believe we’ll be planning a birthday party for you soon!

Joshua, I know you won’t remember this when you’re older but I’ve been trying to exercise at least a little bit each day and you usually come with me. You’re my exercise boy. You ride in the bike trailer or between my legs on the bicycle seat and you are fascinated as you look at the world around you. When you ride in the jogging stroller you “talk” to the things we pass along the way. You get very enthusiastic when we see a dog. I hope that you’ll continue to be my exercise boy as you grow up because I’m learning to cherish the time with you. Especially since you still can’t ride your own bike. :)

Speaking of animals, I don’t know which you adore more, your sister or the cat. I imagine that once the cat gets a hold of you like he did your sister’s face one time that you’ll prefer Julianna, but we’ll see what happens. For now you love grabbing handfuls of cat fur as he walks by. And Simon loves that he’s finally getting a little attention.

So brother, happy nine month birthday. How quickly you’ve come to have lived outside of my womb for as long as you were inside it. I hope you like it here.

Love,

Mama

ironically the rain prevented us from using the gutter properly

My dad and aunt celebrated big birthdays this week.  The family got together and had a fun surprise party for them at my sister's house Sunday night.

We decided to surprise them with a gigantic banana split.  We bought a ten foot gutter and lined it with aluminum foil and then filled it with bananas, Neapolitan ice cream, chocolate sauce, caramel sauce, butterscotch sauce, walnuts, whipped cream, and cherries.  YUM!  It was delicious and so much fun to make. 

My aunt was truly surprised and that was loads of fun to watch.  Unfortunately, my dad couldn't be there for the beginning of the party since he took a shift at work, but nevertheless it was great to get together with family and do something so unique.  I think we'll do it again sometime.  After I run a few hundred miles. 

the house that daddy and jules built

As a tiny little girl Julianna loved to "work on" things.  She would examine the vacuum cleaner wheels and look under the doll stroller she has as if she were inspecting it's parts.  I always guessed that this was a result of being offspring of her engineer father.

Last weekend she and Jonathan got out their imaginations and built some sort of contraption.  Well, I'll just let the picture describe it.

links i love

Cool FREE font site.

Make your life an adventure: SparkPeople

Live in The Dash? Looking for somewhere to eat tonight? Local Dish

Need a vacation?  Fall is the perfect time of year to head to the beach.  Myrtle Beach Condominium (sorry I had to squeeze that one in there)

Really, really loving the sermon series on movies that they're doing at our church now.  Take a listen if you want to be inspired.

giant birthday banana split

Saturday we went to Lowe's and bought this:

Today we used it to make this:

 

More to come later.

how do you explain the concept of celebrity to a 4 year old?

Watching Nora Jones on Sesame Street one day last week Julianna said, "Mom, can we meet her?" I said, "Oh I would like that very much. I think she's an excellent musician." She replied, "Yeah, maybe we can meet her for lunch one day."

Sure kid. That sounds great.

our "craft" of the day

We're making tic-tac-toe pizzas for lunch today.  YUM!

And yes, she is still wearing her pajammas.

My little Edward

Just so I remember, Joshua got his teeth in this order:

#1 - 04.02.2010 (5 months 11 days)
#2 - 04.09.2010 (5 months 18 days)
#3 - 06.28.2010 (8 months 6 days)
#4 - 06.30.2010 (8 months 8 days)
#5 - 07.09.2010 (8 months 17 days)

Teething has affected him a little differently than it did Julianna.  Jules used to run a fever with every tooth that came through.  She would also get diarrhea, but other than that you couldn't even tell that she was cutting a new tooth.

Josh on the other hand, bites everything (including me!).  He will crawl right up to any one of us, bend over putting his mouth down on our leg or arm and clamp down hard.  He has left teeth marks on my body on numerous occasions.  He bites while nursing and I don't know how to make him stop.  Also, he has occasionally run a low temperature even though it's been nothing higher than about 99.2 and he's only had loose bowel movements once or twice so mostly it's just the biting and the sleeping.
 
Julianna was always a good sleeper.  Cutting a tooth never seemed to disrupt her sleep at all.  Josh on the other hand has never been a great sleeper.  He is almost nine months old and he still wakes up multiple times a night.  I don't know how much is attributed to his teeth, but I like to think that's a part of his horrible sleep habits since that's something I really can't control.

The funniest part about Joshua teething in my opinion, is the order in which he has gotten which teeth.  He started with the bottom two front teeth.  Then he moved on to the top two incisors, not the middle ones like most kids do.  Now he has his top two middle front teeth coming in but until they are through he will look like a little vampire since the incisors are really pointed like mine are.  I just call him my little Edward.

recipe Wednesday

We stopped by a roadside produce stand the other day and bought some "home grown maters" as the sign read.  We also got a bunch of other vegetables including some peppers that look like these:

Google says that this is a picture of a bunch of banana peppers but I don't know if that's what we got or not.  The weren't sweet like the banana peppers that I know of so maybe they were a chili pepper...?  They weren't too hot either until we got to the end of them where I had failed to get all of the ribs and seeds out.  There they were extremely hot.  Like I said, I don't know what they were.

Anyway, the cute little old man at the stand told us to slit the pepper open and remove the seeds (I did that but in my haste to get dinner made quickly I didn't did it out all the way to the bottom).  Then he told us to fill it with a little cream cheese and bacon pieces and cook it in the oven for a few minutes.

We tried it this week and the verdict is mmmmmmm... delicious.  We made one with light cream cheese and bacon pieces and we made the other one with a wedge of Laughing Cow cheese and bacon.  So good.  You should run out to your local farmer's market or produce stand as soon as you can and make this quick taste of summer. 

Just make sure you get all of the insides scooped out and you can't go wrong.  It's fantastic.

By the way, Google "peppers" sometime and just take a look at the most beautiful images.  Fun stuff!

motivation

I've been trying to lose weight ever since Josh got to be about 5 months old.  As always, it's been a rollercoaster ride full of ups and downs, but ever since the beginning of June I've done pretty well to stay on track.  I've lost 11 pounds since June 7th and I think that's pretty good.  Slow and steady wins the race.  I'd like to lose a lot more but I'm just trying to make small changes, changes that I can make a permanent part of my life.

One of my goals is to exercise some small bit every single day.  This really isn't as hard as I thought it would be.  I'm such a schedule/routine person that I used to try very hard to schedule in my exercise and do it on a regular basis at the same time each day.  I've finally figured out that this just isn't very feasible.  With two kids I have to be more flexible and just exercise whenever I get the spare fifteen minutes.

That means that if we have nothing going on one morning then I occupy the kids and try to go run before I take my shower.  If we have a busy morning of running around then I try to go right after dinner and ride my bike pulling the kids in the trailer or pushing the kids in the stroller as I walk the neighborhood.  Occasionally, we'll have a busy day full of running all morning and then all evening as well and then I'll have to try to squeeze in some exercise after both kids are in bed.  This is the hardest.  Mostly it's hard because I'm not a night person.  I am completely exhausted by the end of the day lately and I want nothing more than to sit on the couch after Jules and Josh are in bed.  Sometimes that's what happens.  Still.  I'm trying.

A few years ago when I turned 29, I set a goal of completing at least one organized race each year until I turn 40.  I don't think that's too hard to do and I don't think it is unrealistic.  As a matter of fact, I look forward to participating in various races with my kids as they get older. We're trying to convince Julianna to do her first race with us on July 31st as we run the Mission Mile.  It's only a one mile race and I know she could do it.  Right now all she says she'll do is cheer though.  I think she thinks she'll get a cheerleader uniform and pompoms if she insists on standing on the sidelines.  Wrong.

This year I finally feel ready to take on a big one.  I actually signed up for the Ramblin' Rose triathlon in August and while I may have simply lost my mind, at this point I am still excited about it.  I will have to swim 250 yards, bike 9 miles, and then run 2 miles.  I'm to the point now where I can run 2 miles pretty easily again.  I'm riding my bike regularly (but I don't know about 9 miles!) and honestly, the swimming part scares me to death.  I will probably just bob along in the pool, walking when I can and I don't care.  I will still be proud of myself, as long as I finish.  Please pray for me as I get ready for the race.

A couple of times lately someone very close to me has said some hurtful things about my appearance and oddly enough, once I got over the hurt of it all, the comments have only served to motivate me.  I think because it was someone who's opinion I value so much that has made it all that much more important to do what I can to get to my goal weight and at least do what I can to change how I look and how I feel about myself. Usually, things like that do NOT motivate me, they only depress me.  Usually, I am motivated by other things like fitting into a pair of favorite jeans, etc.

Also, I saw this picture the other day and I immediately remembered that I HATED my appearance in this photo.  I am actually surprised that I was even comfortable enough to wear a bikini.  I despised my fat thighs and I remember that when it was taken I was dieting then as well.  I wanted to lose about 15 pounds.  Sadly, I would LOVE to look that way now.  I can't remember the last time I wore a bikini.  Apparently, it was before either of my kids were born.  This picture was taken during the summer of 2004.  I hope to be comfortable in a bathing suit again by the summer of 2011.  With only about 28 pounds to go I think I can do that.

In contrast to the picture above, here is it's equivalent today.  This picture is horrendous.  It makes me cringe every time I look at it.  It was taken this past April and I cannot even believe I am posting it.  Anyway, the spare tire I have hanging over my maternity jean capris repulses me.  I hope that this picture will serve as inspiration for me to love my body again and be proud of what it can do and has done for me.

I shared this quote on Facebook not too long ago, but it still rings true with meaning to me these days so I thought I'd post it here to remember.


"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit." - Aristotle


What motivates you?  Can you offer any words of motivation to keep me going?  I could use it.

the amazing race

Here's a little about our contestants.

First up we have Jumpin' Jules.  She's got that ferocious competitive look going on.  Ohhhh intimidating!

Our next contestant is Ain't no Joke Joshua who's trying his hardest to walk but for now gets around pretty great by just crawling everywhere.

The race is about to being.  Get ready!  And they're off!


Untitled from c525600 on Vimeo.



So we were goofing off this morning and I was marveling at how fast Joshua could crawl now.  We decided to have a race between him and Jules.  Obviously, he's not quite as fast as a four year old, but still he can get around.  He will also willingly let go of the couch to get to the coffee table and vice versa.

I guess I've never really written about the fact that Joshua has fully learned to crawl.  I don't think I've written about it because, well, Joshua learned to crawl and now he's keeping me really busy.  But I don't think I've mentioned it also because I never got his 8 month letter finished.  I started it multiple times but then got some kind of not-quite-virus-more-like-a-glitch with Microsoft Word (which is where I write my letters to my kids before I post them) and lost what I had begun.  Then I got depressed about not getting it done on time and then never returned to it.  Anyway, enough about my issues.

Josh can crawl!  He finally figured it out about four weeks ago.  We were at the beach and he wanted to get in to everything he could.  He was about 7 months and 3 weeks old.  As usual, I'm going to compare him to Julianna.  She was 9 months and 1 week old when she finally crawled and she walked the very next week.  She was much more content to just stay still than he is.  I have a feeling that is a more common characteristic of girls.

But what all this means to me is that if Josh were to walk at the same time that Julianna did then we should expect him to be walking within the next three weeks.  Yikes!  I don't think I'm ready for that.  No, not ready at all.

no, it's NOT Carolina blue

We stripped wallpaper and painted our family room/den last weekend.  We had a group of friends willing to help on Friday night so it went pretty quickly.  We got all the wallpaper down before bed on Friday night and then we sanded and taped Saturday morning.  By Saturday evening, Jonathan had the whole room painted with two coats and we put the room back together after the kids were in bed.

And in case you were wondering before and after pictures are below.  I'm pleased with the results and while I won't be doing any other rooms in our house any time soon, I do look forward to seeing the finished product of them.  We have so many rooms that have late eighties/early nineties wallpaper on the walls.  Even though I know it's sort of coming back in style, I still think wallpaper is just nasty and I won't put any up ever in my life.

Also, please ignore my piles of clean laundry on the sofa and the fact that I forgot to take the before pictures until after we had removed the pictures from the wall and disassembled the couch.

Julianna didn't seem to mind the new location for the sofa.  The TV works just as good when you look at it from here.

We had to fence this one in to keep him from eating tiny strips of wallpaper.

They played surprisingly well together in their little fort.

Of course, the lighting is not great in these pictures so you really can't tell the actual color, but nevertheless here's what it looks like now.

The best part of all of it was when Jonathan told me that Julianna had asked him, "Daddy, why are there robot parts on our walls?" The he told me that she was talking about the switch plate covers being off.