Desk

Goodness Gracious! This is what Stephen and I need for our computers!!

Photo from Storage and Glee

http://storageandglee.blogspot.com/2009/08/cubicle-alternative.html

Except we need a third spot. Lol. And we need a place to keep our computer bases (the part that's not the monitor). This thing is adorable though. It's neat and organized and small and everything that I love.

Ian's Firsts

Yesterday, Stephen and I were holding Ian's hands and letting him walk back and forth between us. Ian took a few steps on his own without our help once! It was wonderful! Therefore, I have decided to begin this segment of my blog. Of course, it will only be updated when something new happens. Here is a list that I wrote a while ago. I won't always update in this post, but I'll put a link in the top right corner that will take you to all the posts about Ian's Firsts.

2008

November

• 07: First Day! Obviously! After 34 hours of labor and a c-section, Ian was born!
• 13: Restaurant. Ian ate at Kirby Lane with his grandma, me, Gloria, and Tiffany. This was his very first restaurant. He was an angel.
• 27: Thanksgiving. Ian got to go to the farm and have an egg hunt.

December

• 20: Houston. This was Ian's very first time to go to Houston. We saw his Granny Janny and grandpa.
• 25: Christmas and night-away-from-home. This was Ian's first night away from home. I was told that T-bone and grandma did not sleep one bit. They laid Ian on their bed and watched him all night long. Any time he moved, my mom ran, warmed the bottle, and fed him. He never cried.

2009

January

• 18: Ian found his feet. He stared at them all day long. He would kick one, then the other. It was adorable.
• 31: Park. Ian visited Riverside park with his mommy and daddy.

February

• 03: Found tongue. This is the day where Ian began to grab his tongue and constantly play with it. He has an infamous picture of this!

March

• 18: Belly laugh. He was on the trampoline with D and M and he started to belly laugh. First ever. I have a video.
• 30: Swing. Ian went to Ramsey park with his cousins E and K. He loved the swing, then he promptly hated the swing.

April

• 06: Food. This is pretty self explanatory.
• 12: Sits up on his own with no help.
• 13: Hike. Ian went on a hike with his mommy and daddy.

May

• 07: IAN'S HALF BIRTHDAY!
• 29: Ian began is crawling adventures. IT was an army crawl, which he did for a long, long time.

June

• 09: Real crawling. Ian finally began to take real crawling steps... he still army crawled most of the time.
• 23: Teeth! Ian grew his first tooth!
• 29: Dada. Ian started to say dada... and he wouldn't stop.

July

• 25: Mama. Ian finally said mama.

August

• 10: Steps. Ian took some steps, but barely. He might have been falling with style.

ETA:

I just realized that I have a picture or video for almost all of these. I will be adding those shortly. But for now, it's breakfast time for Ian.

Excellent Finds

This weekend, I found some awesome sites that I cannot get over. I love them so much. I will be sharing those with you in a bit. But first... familial updates!! (I will also update later today because it's Ian's 9 month checkup).

• Noche had 23 fish. 2 died and I think they ate 1. Thus, we have about 20 babies. We went back to the pet store. After some long deliberation, we decided to release the babies in the tank, buy 2 more fish, and let them eat the babies. So far, this has not worked. The fish are not eating the babies!! What?! Who does this? Regardless, we got 2 new fish. One is orange/black and the other is yellow/black. Their names are Juice and Starburst respectively.
• Stephen's parents came to visit this weekend. We ate at a potential rehearsal dinner place. It was delicious. Stephen and I also hosted a game of Phase 10 with our parents over. It was lots of fun. Ian stayed up really late!
• Season 2 Episode 10 of 30 Rock is hilarious.

I will go by bullets and try not to miss out on any awesome that I found this weekend. Prepare yourself, I don't know if one person can handle this much awesome in one post.

• Design Mom - Her blog is incredible. I was going way back to see what other ideas she had. I am in love. She has super cute ideas. She is extremely creative. Her blog has been up since 2006. Dedication. I highly suggest that people follow her blog, even if you don't have kids. You will one day.
• Mabel's Labels - Yes, I have seen these before. Design Mom had a link on her page. I long for the day when I need to make labels for Ian. You can customize them too which I love. They have labels for everything! Clothes, stationary, household items, etc. You can even order combos.
• Toddler Bed - I LOVE this too! This is also from Design Mom. See? She's crafty. This is so adorable! It looks easy enough too. I'm thinking with my Uncle David's help, we could even add drawers to the bottom of the bed for some extra storage. I am thinking that this is a great idea for Ian. He never sleeps in his crib (yes, we have a family bed). This toddler bed would be perfect for naps and eventually sleep. It takes up no space. I adore this bed!
• Organize, organize, organize!! - My mother gave me her Real Simple Family magazine. This is one of my favorite things in the magazine. There is a wall organizer on this site. It looks extremely handy and fun. I'm a nut for organization. I would buy nearly everything on this site if I could. Go browse it, I know that you want to, I did.
• Schoolfolio - Yes, it is a bit expensive. But, you can store your kids artwork all through school. You are also buying it from a nonprofit. They promote art in schools. Art is important!! Once Ian starts going to school of some kind, I think that I will make this purchase. (This is also from Real Simple).
• Freckle Box - Another from Real Simple Family. This is neato. I love the storybooks. It inputs your kids name into the book and personalizes it for them. They also have personalized puzzles, lunchboxes, stickers, place mats, favors etc etc. These are great gifts for kids (seriously, the site even says so).
• Bakerella - Go check out this delicious blog! Look at this Father's Day idea... Um, one word: wonderful. Stephen would probably like this for any occasion, like his birthday. I thought it was adorable.

That is all the awesomeness I have for now. I actually have more, but the blog has got to end some time! Oh, Michael's was having a 50% off frames this weekend. I hope it's still going on so I can go back and buy more. I bought and uber awesome frame with a matte that fits my favorite 8x10 of Ian in his supermodel pose for $5. Steal!

I must finish my coffee, check on the fish, put together Ian's thing for the doctor, etc. I will update later on how Ian's check up goes. Have a great day! Enjoy exploring the wonderful sites.

Blog out.

ETA:

Ian and I just got back from his well baby check! He is ahead of the game developmentally. So that is awesome. He was 17 pounds 1 ounce (with his diaper) and 26 inches long (stretched to his fullest). His head circumference was over 18 inches... so he's still got a huge head. His height and weight are low apparently. The doctor didn't give me a percentile, she just said "the bottom of the charts." I know he's less than the 5th percentile. He has to go back in 6 weeks for a weight check. Shall be interesting.

He got his first polio vaccine today. He didn't even cry. He's such a big boy!

Continuation of Expansion

I am updating a little late in the day. You might be asking me why... well, Noche had babies. Who is Noche?! Oh, that is one of our beautiful molly fish we got to expand our family. As you all know, we got an aquarium. We decided that we would slowly fill the tank up and get all different kinds of fish so that we can name them all. This was the perfect plan.

We went to the pet store and we got 2 mollys. They are pretty easy to maintain. We got a black one named Dia:

We think that Dia might be sick. She's hiding a lot. We will see...

Here is the orange one, Noche:

This picture doesn't do her justice, she was fat. I knew she was fat. I even made the joke at the pet store that she was pregnant. I was right! If I were to take a picture of her now, she's skinny like Dia.

Anyways, this morning I woke up and I went to check on the fish, just as Ian and I have been doing every morning. He loves fish! I saw a little baby fish! I freaked, I called Stephen at work. I never call him at work. He just laughs. My older brother told me to just let them eat the little boogers. I can't do that. Stephen told me to go to the pet store and buy a little thing that goes inside the tank. Our favorite fish guy (who we are pretty sure has a crush on Stephen. My Gaydar sucks, but Stephen's pretty sure about this. We might send him in on his own and see if he can get his number) wasn't there. So, I had to settle for the random dude. He was nice enough. I bought this fish net thing. I caught most of the fish.

Before I went to the store, I counted 5 babies. When I came back and was catching them, there were 10. When I went to feed them, there were 11. There was one in the big part of the tank. I decided to leave it there. I'm not evil. But I read online that you can leave them if there are plants and rocks for them to hide. It was close to the rocks too, and it blended in. I think it'll survive. Or, I'll just have Stephen move it when he gets home.

This weekend, Stephen's parents are coming to visit. Our initial plan was to have them accompany us to the pet store so that they could help us pick out another fish for Ian's tank. They don't know it yet, though they might now after they read this. Now that we have nearly 15 fish, I don't know what we're going to do. Maybe we can give the babies to someone... I don't know. I hope we'll pick out another fish. We really want this Hatchet fish. It's adorable. I also want those neon glowing fish.

Ian needs play now. I will update more on our new fishies later!

Blog out.

Sweat Pants Day

I hereby declare today Sweat Pants Day! It is what I'll be wearing for the remainder of the day, and maybe week, or longer? But who's keeping track? For those of you who don't know this about me, I wear sweat pants when I don't feel well. I usually refer to them as "sick pants." Somehow, they just live my spirits.

(*Off story** As I'm writing this, Ian is crawling back and forth from his toy box in the living room to the front door, over and over again. I have no idea what he's doing, but now I can't stop laughing. He's hawling booty too and babbling... oh Ian).

Does anyone ever get their nails done? I do not. Yesterday at dinner, my Aunt Lisa was explaining how my cousin M's nails ALWAYS get messed up afterward... I guess I must be like a 4-year-old. There is a reason for it, and my experience yesterday just proves it. My nails never last for longer than 2 hours (even when a professional does them). I spent a while yesterday doing my nails. As a trick, before I had Ian, I would put on a movie or a long show, and I would start doing my nails. That way, by the time the movie was over, it would have been an hour and my nails should be dry... right? Wrong. Nothing ever works me.

I can literally not touch anything with my nails for an hour and then I somehow mess my nails up! It doesn't matter what I do. I've tried just one coat, base coat, top coat, base and top coat, instant nail dry spray, etc. I don't know what it is. Even when I pay to get them done, I instantly mess it up, so I don't waste my money. Is there some sort of trick that I'm missing out on? Share it with me! I'm willing to listen. On a positive note, my toe nails are almost never messed up. I must walk with grace and my toe nails never touch anything.

So yes, at least while I'm wearing my sick pants, my nails are done. There are only slight mishaps, but nothing huge.

Good morning readers! Have a wonderful day.

Blog out.

Mommy Goggles Monday

Good morning! Sort of, it is kind of late. Ian woke up super early this morning, cried and cried, then went back to sleep. Now he's awake for good. We've already done a few things this morning. I have a very important announcement to make, we bought Stephen's wedding band!! It is gorgeous. I love it. Stephen does too. This is VERY exciting. We'll be married before long.

How is Ian? He is great. He has 5 teeth now. We are breaking ground. Here is a picture from this morning. Please excuse the dirty kitchen dishes and the open drawer. I'm working on those after this post:

Adorable right? You can sort of see his teeth in this picture. I believe he now understands "Smile!" Because he smiles every time I say it... or maybe it's because I pull the camera out and he's a ham.

Another awesome development: Ian now walks when you hold one of his hands. He'd still rather crawl. He doesn't seem to have much interest in walking. He does stand alone for pretty long periods of time now though. Isn't weird how much he changes week by week? I think so. He's such a big boy now. On Friday, he will be 9 months old. That is ridiculous. So old!

Here is one of Ian looking at his aquarium with no fishies:

He's probably thinking "Can someone please help me get in here?!" He really wants to play in it. I'm glad he likes it before we even bought the fish. Easily entertained baby. Adorable.

I'll end this with a side note: On our wedding website, I'm adding some things to do around Austin. If you have any ideas, send them my way! We have lots of out-of-town guests. The only family of Stephen's that live in Texas are his parents, EVERYONE else is coming in from another state.

I hope that you had a wonderful weekend and that you enjoy your Monday.

Blog out.

Expanding the Family

It's not what you think. We aren't having another baby just yet. We are expanding through fish!! Yesterday, while Stephen was getting his hair cut, Ian and I went to Pet's Mart. We were looking at the fish and Ian was giggling like crazy. It was adorable. I don't know what it was about them, but he seemed to love them. It was uncanny.

Later on in the day, we took Ian to my parent's place so that we could go shopping for fish. We ended up getting a tank and what not. We decided to get a pretty large tank (29 gallons). It is in Ian's room. We got plant seeds so we are waiting for those to bloom a little bit. We got back for some fish at the end of the week. I'm pretty excited. Ian just looks at the tank for now. He got mad at me because I wouldn't let him get into it.

So yes, we are expanding the family. We are adding about 10 fish to our family. It's pretty exciting. We don't know exactly which ones yet, but it will be fascinating. I've already decided that all of the fish will look different (whether it be color, size, type, etc). I want to name all of them. Stephen thinks this is insane, but all family members must have names.

Here is a picture of the new aquarium:

Like it? There are no plants yet... they are still trying to grow.

**Side Notes**

Do you like the new layout? Up on the top right corner are links. One link is to the main page, the other to my 101 in 1001. I will be adding more links (i.e. my cooking section, my wedding webpage, etc). On the immediate right, there are links to other blogs that I follow. And finally, on the far right, is my archive.

Tell me what you think!! I like it because of the coffee-desk. It makes me think of how I am in the mornings when I sit in front of my computer to write glorious stories for you people.

Blog out.