Random things we've been up to lately...

Having a tea party with a cat.

Falling asleep while eating breakfast because you woke up at 5:30am...
Hanging out in laundry baskets...
...while eating crackers.
Showing off how long our hair is.
(Curls can be deceiving!)
Reading books...
Celebrating my nephew, Sean's, 2nd birthday
by masquerading as a butterfly...

...and eating pizza...

and ice cream...
or Lucky Charms if you're weird and don't like ice cream.

Pouting because you got in trouble...

No. Really. That is some serious pouting.

And just in case you can't see how far she is sticking out that lower lip.
(Yeah...I don't know where she learned that. :) )

She's at it again...

Helene managed to find an empty Diet Coke can
in the recycling pile.

To say that she was excited would be an understatement.
(and I love the missing shoe...)

It's the one thing she will actually take her bink
out of her mouth for...

Can you imagine how thrilled she would have been if there had actually been some left?
You can't blame this one on my example though.
I refuse to drink Diet Coke from a can.
She just knows the good stuff when she sees it.

Maybe it's just hereditary...

While I was upstairs organizing some stuff this afternoon, Sammy and Hannah yelled at me to come down and look at Helene.

And this is what I saw.

Yep.
She had climbed onto the computer chair and started guzzling.
Seriously. That cup is bigger than her head.

Of course, I grabbed the camera before
I took the Diet Coke away.
But I don't think this is a good sign...you can see in her eyes that she means some serious business.

random updates

No news on the baby front. Went to the doctor yesterday--still at 1 cm and the baby is totally floating (i.e. not engaged at all). No surprise there as both my kids weren't engaged even when I was in labor. We'll see what's going on next Wednesday. I may have him strip my membranes just to get things going, but I really don't like to do too much intervention.

Sammy had some weird fever for two days with no other symptoms. I thought maybe his legs were infected, but they seem to be okay. He did complain of a stomach ache on Tuesday morning, but didn't throw up or have diarrhea so I'm not sure what that was all about. I took him in for some blood work yesterday so we could check his Vitamin D levels. May I just say how rude/incompetent/lame the people who work at Quest Diagnostics are? It seriously took 45 minutes to process us. I won't even take the time to write out all the issues we had because it will just frustrate me all over again. Let's just say that they are completely inept. And that was not my first time experiencing their lameness.

Hannah is her usual sweet/loving/tantrum throwing self. No news there, although she said the funniest thing yesterday. She is one of those kids who is immediately wide awake when she wakes up, no grogginess or half-asleep for her. So she woke up and poked me and told me to wake up. (umm, yeah...I'm pretty much ALWAYS awake, Hannah)

"Mom, the kitties are taking our shoes!"
"They are?"
"And they're putting them on their feets!"
She then rambled on about something unintelligible--I think something about chasing the cats.

I was totally laughing. I wonder what she had dreamed about and was surprised that she still remembered it so vividly.

It's supposed to rain here the next two days (I guess our 74 degree weather had to end sometime), so no big outings planned for this week. Sammy has a follow-up with his surgeon next Thursday to see how his legs are healing and to talk about/set a date for the next surgery. I'm wondering if I should move that appointment up in case I am in labor...but I'm sure that's just wishful thinking, right?

On a lighter note...

Thanks to Lyndsey for this gem of a website.

This one is my favorite. No wait...this one. Or maybe this one.

Thanks for a much needed laugh!!

mini me?

When Hannah was first born, pretty much everyone thought she looked like Sam. Probably because of her natural tan.

I've noticed more and more how much she looks like me--ESPECIALLY her grouchy faces. Hmmm, what does that say about me?

Sam took this a few weeks ago and thought she looked just like me. I have to agree, she's a mini me. Right down to the frizzy curly hair.

wondertime

My mom bought over a few issues of the new parenting magazine Wondertime to see what I thought. I LOVE magazines, but rarely have time to read them any more so I only subscribe to four now: Mothering, Vanity Fair, Ensign, and Vogue.

Back in the day (read: before having children) that list would have included Marie Claire, InStyle, Entertainment Weekly, Real Simple, Martha Stewart's Living and probably one or two more.

Did I REALLY have THAT much free time on my hands? Apparently. Sigh. Although I did read Entertainment Weekly at work to keep up with industry stuff...or at least that was my excuse for reading it at work. Good times.

Anyway, I digress...I was reading Wondertime (which I am REALLY liking by the way) and noticed this article about food and it brought back a ton of childhood memories.

It was all about the different eras of food. Starting first with the kind our moms grew up eating (in the 50s) that you would NEVER hear about a family eating today. Think liver and beets.

Then the food of our childhood (the late 70s/early 80s). Think bologna and American cheese roll-ups and homemade chocolate pudding. (I also distinctly remember tapioca pudding).

Seriously, WHEN would you ever make pudding from scratch when good-old Jello pudding snacks are all ready to go? And let's not even talk about all the nitrates and processed crap in bologna (which, by the way, I ate quite a bit of. Yikes!) But seriously, for most of us, this food just isn't something we'd feed our kids nowadays.

A few menu items from the Telford house from when I was a kid that really sticks out in my mind are: Tuna Casserole (you know, the kind with the egg noodles, a can of cream of mushroom soup and crushed potato chips on top), fishsticks, meatloaf, and peanut butter and marshmallow cream (or is it creme?) sandwiches. Yes, you read that correctly. Peanut butter and MARSHMALLOW cream. I remember really liking them, but am way too scared to try it now.

I wonder what our kids will think is totally retro food when they are older. Tofu? Smoothies? I have no idea, but I better start coming up with a good defense when they start asking me why I made them eat it.

There must be some food vibes in the air--check out this blog and this one for some good laughs about childhood food. Luckily, we never had to endure any of these things...although I do remember my mom trying to be sneaky with the powdered milk because we were all out of "normal" milk and she was hoping we wouldn't notice. ummmm, no way would any of us 4 kids drink it. YUCK!

So, what foods do you distinctly remember from your childhood that is now totally retro?

Kitties like fresh breath too!

I was walking by our bathroom and noticed this.


I came back later to see if he was still there and he was chewing on my toothbrush instead. I wonder how long THAT has been going on... I'm headed out to get a new toothbrush as we speak.

and you thought YOU had talent!

OK--I have nothing new/exciting/note worthy to post, but I came across this and was laughing so hard. Poor, poor girl. I'm sure she never thought her small town beauty pageant "talent" from 1980 would be all over the internet in 2007. And what is with the outfit? Is she from the future? Niiiice. I wonder if she still "plays" the trumpet...

Be sure to watch all of it so you don't miss the "choreography". Enjoy!

CHECK IT OUT!!!