Tag: Fam

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Week in My Life – Day 4: Thursday

Oh, Thursday, you day you. There you are, sandwiched between the hump day of Wednesday and the freedom of Friday, but you’re special in that you’re that brief moment before we hit full-on weekend mode. The anticipation, the relief, the ahh… Here’s what was the haps on this Thursday, the 4th day of my Week in My Life series with Adventuroo…


Today was crappy and rainy, so R forewent the bike taxi and I picked D up from daycare again. We had to run to the grocery store on the way home, something I always contemplate doing before I get D for ease of lugging groceries around minus the toddler, but she loves to ride in the cart and I hate leaving her at daycare longer than necessary so I got her first. On Thursdays our neighborhood grocery has milk on sale 2 gallons for $4. What the what?? This kid goes through so much milk I need that sale. Unfortunately the organic milk isn’t included in there, of course, but I have a hard time passing up getting double the milk for 2/3 the price of 1 gallon of organic whole milk. So hopefully she won’t start sprouting a third eye or suddenly double in size by next week.


However, I’m a complete space cadet and totally forgot to take any pictures of her cute little self riding in the cart. Seriously? Come on. Oh well, guess you’ll just have to settle for pics from home again. We got home around 5:30, and after making 2 trips in from the car (1 for D and 1 for the groceries), I got her up in her highchair and ready for dinner since she was getting pretty whiny. What’re we having tonight, Mom? So glad you asked! The green beans you didn’t get to eat last night, some Colby cheese, a couple banana-shaped and -flavored teething cookies, and of course Cheerios. Because what meal is complete without at least a handful of Cheerios shoved in your mouth?


I threw in that empty paper towel roll with the new roll sitting right next to it just cuz. Does anyone else do that? Like it’s too hard to unscrew the top of the roll handle and put the new one on? I just cannot be taxed like that.

Tonight would normally have been bath night for D since she didn’t have one last night, but she didn’t wear any leftovers home from daycare today so I figured I’d just wipe her off after dinner and save the bath for tomorrow night. You know, clean up for the weekend and all. Please ignore how dirty the bottoms of her pj feet are. I apparently need to mop our floors. Twice.


Once I got her changed and her teeth somewhat brushed, she was off to play for a bit while I went back out to tackle the kitchen clean-up. I was feeling antsy and frustrated since I got 0% of the cleaning accomplished that I had hoped to tonight, so the huge mess in D’s highchair and floor underneath it made me less than pleased. So I busted out the vacuum for a few minutes because I was sick of stepping on crumbs. D wasn’t too enthused about that.


After I got D’s dinner remnants off the dining room floor and all the dirt and mud from today’s rains off the kitchen and living room floors, I turned my attention to the kitchen sink. Where I was greeted with this lovely scene…


Awesome. Fortunately D was out in the living room sitting with Daddy to start her bottle bedtime routine again, so I had some time to myself to get that mess taken care of. By now it was 6:30. And by 7:00, I had this…


And this…


And this…


Don’t worry, I won’t show you what the contents of that bag of dirty diapers look like. I’ll be nice and spare your stomachs. Normally it doesn’t take me half an hour to clean off D’s highchair tray and cut a couple flower stems to put in vases, but I got distracted for a few minutes when R came into the kitchen to heat up some dinner and D soon followed. I absolutely love watching her play and “read” her books. She’s really quite good at entertaining herself.


Now it’s 8:30, and here I sit, typing up this post and getting ready to edit all the pictures. D played for longer than usual tonight, but finally reported for sack duty about half an hour ago. My goal is to be in bed around 9:00 tonight (ok fine, 9:30 at the lastest. the brewers are on!), because I have to get up early at 5:00 tomorrow morning to do my workout with Jillian before work. Man, do I hate her because she makes my body hurt, but that means it’s working, right? Right?! And man, could I go for another glass of Hallowine tonight, but that 5:00 alarm always comes so damn quickly. Tomorrow night, I promise. I have more flowers that need vases!


Dudes, I’m so excited tomorrow is Friday, you have no idea. Come back and see how we play on TGIF!


Yes, that’s the same green pj shirt. What?

 

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Week in My Life – Day 3: Wednesday

This Week in My Life with Adventuroo is rolling right along, so let’s see how Wednesday played out, shall we? In case you need a recap, you can check out Monday and Tuesday here and here.


Just as a reminder, I’m focusing on documenting the “after work” hours of my days here, since those are what’s most important to me. However, I thought I’d give you a sneak peek as to what my desk looks like during all those hours I’m hiding from you, so I compiled this little gem today. I sit in front of 4 monitors all day, so I tried to capture that. This pic doesn’t really do my setup justice, but here is what each of my monitors looks like, in their real-life order from left to right.


Ok, now that that’s out of the way…

As we creep closer and closer to the end of our prolonged nice weather here, we decided to take advantage today and go out into the woods on the Ice Age Trail after work. Each year we like to hike up to a big lookout tower near Sheboygan called Parnell Tower, which is roughly an hour from our house. So I left work earlier than usual today to go pick up D and head north before the rush hour traffic ensued.


We left home just before 4:30 and started our hour-long hike just before 5:30. I carried D in the backpack carrier on the way up, R carried her on the way down, and she squealed with delight as she touched many trees along the way. There was even a puppy at the tower with his owners when we got up there. She was thrilled!

You’ll have to forgive the blurriness of the actions shots, because they’re, well, action shots. And taken on a phone camera. Ahem.

By the time we got back to the car, dark was settling in and we were starving, so we decided to hit up KFC on the way home. I can’t remember the last time I ate this since I’m not really a fan of fried chicken, but R got it in his head on the way there and I was so hungry I would’ve agreed to eat just about anything by then. I gave D her dish of Cheerios and a bottle of milk when we got in the car, and she was lulled to sleep by the highway rhythm within half an hour. We tuned into the start of the Brewers game, and what a dismal one it was, with Gallardo giving up 4 runs in the first inning. Eesh. Too bad it never got much better for the Crew tonight.

This next picture is beyond terrible, as it was taken on my iPhone like all the others and zoomed in as far as possible to aim at something in our orbit, but I couldn’t not take a shot of the amazingly gorgeous harvest moon we saw on the drive home. It was huge, orange, and simply beautiful, shining brightly down on the hills and fields of the countryside. It was very Halloween-y as it peered out between leafless tree branches, and it was even surrounded by a light haze of clouds. I half expected to see the silhouette of a witch on her broomstick flying past it.

The coolest part of all, though, was the shooting star I saw on the way home. I couldn’t believe it! I haven’t seen one in ages, and it wasn’t even totally dark outside. In fact, no other stars were out yet, but this was definitely a shooting one. So I made a wish, wished again on the first real star I saw in the night sky, and hoped they both come true.

We pulled into the driveway at 7:40, and I was hoping I could just get D inside, changed, and quickly back to sleep with the aid of another bottle of milk. I was planning on giving her some green beans and mashed potatoes from KFC, but she’d been asleep so long at that point and it was past her bedtime anyway, I just preferred she go to bed as quickly as possible. Too bad my nice smooth bedtime transition didn’t turn out to be so nice and smooth. D became inconsolable as I was changing her and only took a few drinks of her bottle. She screamed harder when I tried to put her down, so I just cradled her in my arms in the glider next to her crib and patted her back while rocking. This seemed to work, and she snuggled in so hard while slowly calming down. After a few minutes she clamored up onto my shoulder in a big bear hug and fell asleep. Poor little girl. I was afraid she’d wake up at some point in the night since she had so little to eat for dinner, and I was right. Not 5 minutes after I left her room she awoke crying. R went in there and got her back to sleep with some more rocking and a little bit of milk, and fortunately we didn’t hear a squeak after that.

Now here it is, 9:20, and I need to get in the shower before uploading all the photos for this post. I’m a total greaseball after getting all sweaty carrying my 25 lb. baby rucksack on the first half of our hike. These Week in My Life posts are keeping me up past my bedtime, but I think it will certainly be worth it in the end. Stay tuned for Thursday’s antics. You know the best part about Thursday, don’t you? It’s 1 day closer to Friday, wahoo!

 

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Week in My Life – Day 2: Tuesday

We’re underway in Week in My Life, and this is pretty fun. In case you need a refresher of what this week’s all about, you can read yesterday’s recap here or check out the full guidelines over at Adventuroo. Now let’s continue…


R picked D up from daycare today on her bike taxi and took her to the park since it was another beautiful afternoon, but she was ready to be done over there before I was able to meet them after work, shortly after 4:30 again. So once I got home, D and I had some silly time together and I relaxed for a minute while Daddy watched his afternoon sports shows and she had some snacks. Then I had to make up for missing the park with some outside play time of our own. She even got to pet a puppy as it walked by – her favorite!

Dinner time for D came at 5:00 tonight and consisted of a delicious menu of mac and cheese, banana, and some fresh tomato from our garden that was leftover from Daddy’s dinner sandwich. Once sufficiently messy (and full), it was definitely time for a bath.

After her long night at the ball park last night, D started acting pretty sleepy shortly after 6:00, which didn’t surprise me at all. So I filled up a bottle, let her play a little while longer while I cleaned up the kitchen and bathroom and got changed out of my work clothes, then she got up on the couch with Daddy for the bedtime wind-down.

That didn’t last long, however, and she was soon back up and cruising around the living room – “helping” me write this post, checking out what shows we were catching up on from the DVR, and reading books.

Finally at 7:30 it was time to try for bed again, so back up on the couch with Daddy she went. She drank her milk for about 5 minutes before she started coughing again, so R just put her in bed awake (which, *fingers crossed*, has been working ok lately). We heard one small cry as he left her room, then all was silent in baby dream land. Ahh… Time for Mommy’s dinner (leftover R’s homemade sweet and sour pork – yum!) and a glass of her favorite, Hallowine.

R went to watch baseball in the bedroom at 8:00, which meant I then had the tv all to myself for the rest of the night! So I promptly turned on E! to watch Kim Kardashian’s wedding special. As you may remember, I NEVER get to control the tv in our house. So when I do, I go big. Now that’s the perfect way to end this Tuesday. Cheers!

(yes, that’s the same pj t-shirt from last night to go with the shine on my forehead. don’t hate.)
 
 

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Week in My Life – Day 1: Monday

I’m excited to be joining a pretty rad-sounding week-long series over at Adventuroo – Week in My Life. My mission? Document a week of my life pictorially, with as many or as few supporting words as I’d like. Sounds pretty cool, eh? And since this blog is all about “Life as I know it…”, well that seems just fitting, wouldn’t you say?

Now I’m definitely not a pro at this like Melissa is, so I’m going to try to capture just a portion of each day of the week this week, as opposed to all day every day. My time at home after work each day is what I really want to remember here, so that’s where I’ll focus my Week in My Life efforts this time around. Plus I’m not so sure my workplace would appreciate me running around snapping pictures of me and everyone else at their desks for all those hours anyway.

Here we go…

Tonight we were fortunate enough to have tickets to Game 2 of the NLCS at Miller Park, so I left work at 4:00 to go pick up D and head home to get her fed, changed, and have some supper before heading to the stadium. We were so excited to see if the Brewers could pull off another win against the Cardinals to take a 2-0 series lead!

I forgot to take a shot of the clock when I left my desk, so the car radio will have to suffice. And please excuse the less-than-professional quality of my pictures tonight – they were all taken on my iPhone.

D actually came willingly and excitedly to me today at daycare, which was great. Touchdown!

We got home just after 4:30, and I fed her right away while R ran to the store to get fixins for our subs for dinner. While D was eating I also unloaded the dishwasher from the previous night’s load. Multi-tasking. Key.

She loved drinking her water out of a different cup with dinner, then happily watched Daddy make sandwiches.

That happiness soon turned to squirminess, however, and it was time to get D out of the chair and cleaned up. We finally got everyone fed and ready to go, and headed to the ball park around 5:45.

The Good Year blimp hovered over the stadium all game tonight, which was pretty cool to see.

Once inside we took up post in our usual standing room only spot behind section 118 and cheered on the good guys. Go Brewers! Or touchdown! as D likes to call it.

This vantage point was great and all, provided a nice view of the field and had plenty of room for us and the stroller, but since this was our 2nd game in as many nights we were ready to actually sit in our seats and give the legs a rest. So up to the nosebleed section we climbed. Fortunately Guest Services was outstanding and let us “check” our stroller into their room so we didn’t have to mess with trying to cram it into the jam-packed row of seats in our section. Bonus points, Brewers.

While sitting up there, also, I was reminded of our wedding while watching the Jumbo-tron. R’s cousin plays for the Brewers and did that year, too, and the day after our wedding they surprised us with a huge congratulatory sign for us and our wedding party up on the big screen during the game. Too bad I was climbing the stairs when they showed it and missed it completely. Ah well, it’s the thought that counts, and that was an incredible gesture.

After an inning or 2 the close quarters and vertigo-inducing grade of the rows made us a little antsy, so we decided to give up resting our feet and headed back down a few levels. We had to make a pit-stop on the way to change D into her 2nd pair of jammies, since she peed through her original outfit while sitting on R’s lap up there. Oops. Our good friends A & S were also at the game, so we hung out behind their section for a bit to chat and commiserate over how poorly our team was doing. Ugh. Della loved S’s Brewers beads, though.

Finally after 7 and 1/2 innings we decided to head home. The Brewers were down 9-2 at that point, and went on to lose 12-3 unfortunately, so we didn’t miss anything by skipping out ahead of the crowd. We were all so tired and D really needed to get to bed. She fell asleep in the car on the way home so this was my last shot for the day.

She did do another gagging coughing spell on the way home in her sleep and got a little puke on herself, but it turned out to be mainly on the car seat straps and not her, so fortunately we didn’t have to change her into yet another set of pjs once inside a little before 10:30. Gheesh.

Now here I am, up waaay past my bedtime, putting together my 1st day of Week in My Life for you. I hope you enjoyed it. Stay tuned – 6 more to go!

 **sorry, i don’t know why my pics are all screwed up and jammed to the left. they look centered when i’m editing the post, promise. i’ll try to make sure they look better for tomorrow.

 

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Super Logo

So R created this mash-up of WI sports teams’ logos, and has called it the Wisconsin Super Logo. He made himself a shirt bearing it, and we can’t go anywhere without at least a handful of people commenting on how awesome it is.

And I must admit, it is pretty sweet. Although I would change the G in the middle to the C for the Chicago Bears, but I’ll let that slide.

He posted it on Facebook a few weeks ago, and now it seems to be spreading like wildfire. Yesterday one of the big sports analysts in the area even tweeted about it.

Poor R feels like everyone’s stealing it from him now, so I wanted to at least give him credit for it here. Like I said, he was the original creator, and you can even go to his site if you’d like to order one (or more): www.wisuperfan.com

Here it is in all its glory:

Super Logo!

 

 

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Worth at least a couple thousand words

Ever have one (or more) of those weeks where you just can’t seem to get caught up? That’s how I’ve felt since we got back from Colorado the other weekend. I’ve been doing a lot of exploring of and venturing farther out into the social media/networking world, and have set some pretty lofty goals for myself with this here little blog, which has ended up taking up much of the time I usually use to dedicate to my posts. Hence, the lack of pictures for you.

Until now! I finally picked out the ones I thought best summed up our awesome trip. The wedding was beautiful, the scenery was divine, and the company couldn’t have been better. Besides D’s illnesses, it was fantastic. Congratulations again to my sister M and now brother-in-law C – may you enjoy a long and happy lifetime together!

I made the photos small again since there are so many, so please click on any to make them bigger:

Get me!
R pretending he's freezing on an "ice cube" chair at Coors

Continue reading “Worth at least a couple thousand words”

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A tease

I finally got the rest of our Colorado pictures uploaded last night; now begins the process of going through all 500 or so and picking out the best. As you can imagine, that might take a minute. So in the meantime, I’ll whet your palate with a little teaser shot.

Remember the skyscraper shoes I said I was wearing? They lasted just about through the beginning of the reception before I opted to switch to my much more comfortable and dancing-friendly flats. But they did their job and dazzled. They really were quite ridiculous, but I got lots of comments on them! And isn’t that all that matters? Ah, the pain we endure all in the name of beauty. Check these babies out…

Ta-daa!

Stay tuned for the rest of our wedding weekend pics. They’ll be coming soon.