Sunday, October 28, 2012

Circle Fest!

Yesterday, on our first fall day in a WHILE, we headed to Circle Fest at the neighborhood cooperative school. The highlight for Zayd was the gravel playground but he ALSO enjoyed ring toss and a fishing game where he came away with a fake witches finger. We've been trying to scare daddy with it ever since!




This is a smile.



He isn't falling. He was sitting like this to get a good view of the rocks falling.


Nesting much?

So, the amount of money that has been flowing through my fingers in recent weeks is...I can't come up with an adjective. We have lots and lots of packages arriving on our front porch or in the back of my SUV. And I am LOVING it.

What have we been buying you ask?
What havent we (let's be honest its 100% me) been buying?

With Zayd we followed the advice to try a bunch of different bottles in case they will only take to a particular nipple. I have a bagillion different bottles that all work differently *this* bottle needs a ring in it, *that* bottle  is too thick to heat up properly, *the other* bottle is so wide mouthed he can't breathe out of his nose. So, to the donation pile for most of them and we are going Avent all the way.
A bottle warmer. With Zayd we tried the "use warm water to warm frozen milk" and I am never doing that again.
What family of four doesn't require a king size euro-top mattress set?


This has arrived and is set up (and overtaking) our living room and I think I LOVE it. :)

I am not messing around with a wooden rocker ANYMORE. Give me the cushy overstuffed glider; it's worth every penny.


An awesome storage bed from World Market to go with our new mattresses. (Also, sheets and comforters and pillows, oh my!)


CHRISTMAS! My Christmas shopping is in full gear. Stocking stuffers are well underway for all three of my Mammen elves.
Socks with handles so Zayd can put them on himself!

A balance bike!
And lastly, some CLOTHES! (A ton more than these but here are a select few highlights.)


Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Election 2012!


To quell your fears of voter fraud, no Zayd did not actually vote. But he is REALLY glad that I did. Have you?

Sunday, October 21, 2012

Make way for baby

I have been doing a lot of laying down lately trying to rest my sore/misaligned/messed-up hip. Today, after 24 hours without my nerve firing "AH!", I got to spend some amazing quality time with my son. And, my goodness, he is such a little man. I have only been down and out for about two weeks but I am stunned by how much he has grown recently.

(I should say that I think some of it is attributed to the slow and easy lifestyle we have adopted here in the pre-babymoon phase. We never drive out of town, we are always home by bedtime, I snuggle him in my bed every morning, we're just consistent. And that means we have had naps of more than 2 hours, bedtimes that are easy where Zayd babbles himself to sleep, better eating, and not a wakeup before 5:30 in a long time. Sam and I have gotten a little restless and even contemplated the trek to Houston but with the results we are getting, its hard to even consider the hurried lifestyle we packed in this summer. That being said, he asks for his Nani and Nana ALL DAY EVERY DAY. But, he is happy, so I suppose we are all surviving.)

We started the day with a leisurely trip to the zoo (don't worry, we drove). The first zoo attraction we had to hit up was Zayd's and Sam's favorite - the snow cone stand. :)  Here are two shots of them practicing their smiles.



Everytime we head to the zoo, we discover something new. Today, we learned there is a fake house with a sandbox in front. I'm not 100% sure of its purpose or how it relates to zoology but Zayd loved it, ESPECIALLY because it came complete with small patio furniture and a broom!


I honestly can't decide which photo I like more. But the smile is pretty darn cute.



Recently, Zayd has taken to building things! It is fantastic. I wanted to buy him a super awesome block set for Christmas but I am not sure he can wait that long. Before bed, we found all of the sqaure-ish wooden objects in his room (fake sushi, train parts, and puzzle pieces) and he independently created some impressive towers.


His favorite part of building the tower is knocking it down. Sometimes, he can only get three blocks in before he just HAS to destroy it.



And to get the piece JUST RIGHT on top, sometimes, he plays twister with himself.


And here we are enjoying a tickle before bedtime. That is his monkey there in the photo that we have transformed into his baby. We are getting ready for a baby-ful house again because we definitely have a big boy on our hands these days.

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Sorting and Stacking and Destroying, Oh My!

One of Zayd's current favorite activities is sorting things, especially if it involves finding things to sort. This has created quite a few adventures for us lately, many revolving around fallen acorns or pecans. We spent a Tuesday morning at Landa Library recently collecting all of the acorns and sorting them into our stacking matroshkas that Auntie Erin bought for mommy's kitchen many moons ago and have been repurposed as one of Zayd's favorite containers. They come everywhere with us.

It's great to watch him consider each acorn and where it should be placed. I wish I knew the criteria for sorting but I do it wrong EVERY TIME. :)

Time to add one pile to the next. It's a science thing.

The hunt continues.

Somehow Zayd never uses his hands to stand up. No matter what position he is in.


I'm taller!

Mommy likes photos more than Z does. :(

Friday, October 12, 2012

Playing Ketchup

There is no way to catch up on all that I have missed while we've been

  • travelling
  • without a camera
  • at my brother and sister in law's wedding
  • dealing with sciatic pain that has pretty much knocked me down
But, here are a few quick updates
  • We bought a king size bed to fit our soon to be family of four.
  • Zahra now owns a few items of clothing and I have packed her take home outfit. (Still 61 days left but who is counting. It's funny because I am getting prepared in case things happen early but if things DID happen early, the newborn clothes I packed and the Birth Center bag I am preparing for myself would surely do us no good with a preemie in the hospital. But it feels nice to cross things off the list.)
  • Zayd is anemic and we have had to restrict his calcium intake to allow for better iron absorbtion
  • less milk = better eating but EVERYTHING has to have ketchup on it
    • This week I watched him eat 4 bites of butternut squash and a (single) leaf of baby spinach - amazing! He's also been devouring eggs and enjoyed some slightly spicy pad thai.
  • Zayd's sleeping has gotten better since we decided to stay put in our sweet home. I probably just jinxed it so let me caveat and say we still have 5:30 wakeups but he seems better rested and more content.
  • We are expecting architectural drawings of our soon-to-be-expanded bathroom any day now. Yeah!
  • I have started a craigslist binge and am selling anything I can convince Sam we don't need.
Here are just a few photos from our trip to MD.