Filed under: tv & movies
sesame street turns 40 today. i have said numerous times that i will be heartbroken when it goes off the air. it is one of the very few tv shows/group of characters that several generations have strongly in common. it is a big part of my preschool memories and it warms my heart to see it becoming the same for my daughters. the writers/actors for this show somehow possess the rare ability to transcend time, musical styles, art, and culture, and they still are able to effectively TEACH simple reading, counting, and life concepts. they still show old skits and shorts within new episodes and i love that…they show things that i remember seeing when i was 4 years old. if i had to pick one show for my kids to watch every day, this would be it. happy birthday, sesame street!
who is your favorite sesame street character, and why? mine is a tie between grover and cookie monster. i love the way grover talks and that he loves to travel. i love that cookie monster loves to eat (mostly cookies), but that he is also very sweet whenever there are kids around.
i just watched an online clip of kanye west jerking the microphone out of taylor swift’s hands AS she was giving her acceptance speech for winning “best female video”. i don’t watch the VMA’s becuase anything worth seeing will end up on youtube anyway. if y’all haven’t heard about this, you need to google it. my face got hot at the end. i feel so bad for taylor swift! kanye really owes her an apology (and beyonce’ too…he made her look bad).
ANYWAY.
we had a great weekend with friends over in boca grande. much of that “great” was thanks to my MIL and SIL who kept the kids for us. it was a much-needed break. on saturday i stayed in bed until 9:00. yesterday i was in bed until 10:00! i think it’s been years since that’s happened. ryan spent most of his time away on the boat with all the guys. i spent my time laying by the pool, exploring the tiny downtown, watching several storms roll in and do their business, watching football on mute, talking with the ladies, and eating crap (no joke: all i had to eat yesterday was 3 sausage balls, cake & ice cream, and 10 chicken mcnuggets. i was STARVING when i woke up this morning).
not many plans for this week. right now i’m still in my pajamas…spent the morning doing breakfast, unloading/loading the dishwasher, doing laundry, and just being with my girls…we missed each other! when layne’s up from her nap we’ll do lunch then head out to get some errands done. tonight we’re doing a taco night in honor of ryan and jenny, whose baby is due THIS WEEK!! so exciting.
some small things that made me happy today:
- i entered 2 designs into this contest and they are on the site today. GO VOTE!!! i really want to win and i feel like i have a chance…the designs with the most votes right now are a huge deer and michael jackson. the prize is $150…help harper go to preschool!! please vote for either of the last two designs…they’re both mine: “branches” and “peony sketch”.
- chick-fil-a peach milkshake. so good it is just WRONG. why why why must their time be limited?!
- after i cleaned up the mess at our table, i walked into the playground at chick-fil-a and couldn’t see layne anywhere. i couldn’t see her because i was only looking on the ground. guess those nuggets were little bits of battered courage, because she decided today was the day she could climb up all the stairs to get to the little “rooms” at the top. she was SO proud (almost as proud of herself and i was of her).
- talked to a client in tallahassee today. we did a session like 2+ years ago and she decided out of the blue that they need another. i’ve also had another girlfriend from the TLH want to schedule something, so i guess i’ll be heading that way sometime in the next few months. thank goodness….hopefully this is the drought coming to a close.
- took the girls to dubois lagoon after naptime since ryan was working late. it was great….a little more crowded than i’d prefer, but not too bad. love the beach that time of day, and then we got home just in time for baths and bed. also, i got my favorite parking spot right in front of the shower.
- dating in the dark: have y’all seen this show? it is awesome. ryan came into the room while i was watching and laughed at me. he said i had a huge grin on my face. ha!
- sent in harper’s preschool registration!! yay! so excited (for her and for me).
Filed under: tv & movies
i just read this with my mouth hanging wide open. i cannot believe what a jerk he is. oh. my. goodness.
it’s been a great weekend so far. ryan and i just finished “slumdog millionaire”. both of us had been putting off watching it, probably because we were scared it was over-rated like so many other “highly acclaimed” films. it was fantastic….extremely artistic, excellent acting (even the small children were amazing), and not cheesy like we thought. i’d watch it again in a heartbeat.
friday night as soon as ryan came home from work, we headed over to one of our favorite beach spots (dubois). the girls and i had been on thursday and seen lots of little fish and i’d mentioned to harper that we should get her a net. ryan came through for her on his way home friday evening. she was ecstatic to try it out. however, when we got there, it was low tide, so all the fish were out to sea or hiding really well. she had a great time swimming and dragging the net around anyway. while were were there, we realized that it was layne’s 10-month birthday. wow! time FLIES and i feel like the closer you get to that first birthday, the quicker it goes. my heart is aching. i’d love to keep her the way she is now for at least a few more months. here are some pictures from friday and then some fun facts about layne at 10 months old…
Layne Katharine at 10 months old:
- she waves “bye-bye”.
- she says “hi” to strangers and stares at them wondering why they don’t say it back. she’s recently figured out that sometimes you wave hello to people as well as goodbye. (when i say that she says “hi”, i mean it literally…it was her first word after “mama” and “dada”)
- she growls on command. i’m trying to teach her to do it anytime she sees a picture of a lion or a tiger, but so far it’s not catching on…
- she eats literally anything you put in front of her and gets REALLY annoyed when it’s gone. she out-eats harper at least once a day.
- she follows harper around everywhere (and i swear layne can crawl almost as fast as harper walks…it’s hilarious).
- she’s developing a love for books (yay!)
- she blew bubbles in the pool today for the first time.
- if you say “no-no” to here, she shakes her head vigorously.
- her hair is finally really starting to fill in. has a hint of curl at the bottom (yes!).
- LOVES being in the water (really, she has no choice in this, so she’s just making it easier on herself by not making us force it on her).
- when we’re at the beach, she eats sand like nobody’s business. it is disgusting and i have tried everything. here’s a picture of the only thing that’s worked so far:
Filed under: tv & movies
this is my third post of the night, but i just had to log back on to say:
NO WAY!!!!!!! i absolutely cannot believe that kris made it to the AI final instead of danny!!!!!!!!! i am SO annoyed!! however, i will definitely be rooting for kris next week so adam doesn’t win. UGH!! i cannot believe it!
i really am going to get back to my normal bloggy self. 
however, the main reason for the title of this post is: my friend kathleen just posted a show about Fox’s new show, “GLEE”. i too am super duper excited about it. the previews give me chills… i’ll be sure to do a post after i watch the preview episode next week. i’d probably pay to watch it. i’m that excited.
anyway, one of the things i worked on last week was mother’s day gifts. i never really want to spend a great deal of money for mother’s day, but i want the gift to be sentimental. for me, this usually means making something. this year, i wanted to give the mothers some of the photos from our family photo session in january. i went to michael’s with really no plan (dangerous, especially when i have both kids with me). i found these cool blank journals and decided that was the route i was going. i got the supplies, went home and got to work. i tried so hard to remember to take a picture of every step, but like i’ve said before, i hardly EVER finish a task all in one sitting, so it was hard to remember to take a picture every time i sat down. below i will post pictures and tell you step by step how i made the journals, in case you’re interested.
the blank journal
twisted the plastic-coated wire out of the holes so that i had two seperate flat pieces of cardboard to work with (this also allowed me to determine the number of pages in the album without ripping them out).
coated the front of each piece evenly with mod podge, then laid a pre-measured piece of scrapbook paper on each (the paper overlapped the cardboard on every side by about 1/2 inch). rub the paper so that you get rid of any wrinkles or air pockets.
next, i sanded the edges until the overlapped portions fell off (i used sandpaper, but you can also use a nail file). you could easily cut the paper to match exactly and then you could skip this step, but i like the antiqued look that the sanding gives the edges.
next, i used my paper piercer to poke through the holes that had been covered with the mod-podged paper. i wiggled the piercer around in each hole to open it up as big as it would go. (pardon my horribly neglected nail polish. i promise that today it is long gone.)
next, i gathered what i’d planned to use for embellishment and figured out what my layouts would be. i got the scrapbook paper and little flowers on sale and michaels. had the dark brown paper, corner-rounder, and beads at home. the paper that says “family” on it is just some of the blank journal paper that i put through my printer.
after i embellished the front, i mod-podged two more pieces of paper to the insides of the front and back. we all signed the one in the back and i wrote a mother’s day message. forgot to take a picture. next, i twisted the wire back through all the paper and the holes. this the probably the hardest part of the whole project…very tricky.
here is the finished product, although i am so annoyed with myself because i forgot to take a picture after i put the pictures in it. i used photo corners (that i’ve had in my craft closet for like 5 years) as opposed to glue, so that if any of the moms wanted to take pictures out and frame them or stick them in their wallet or something that they didn’t have to rip out the page or something.
i made three different ones and my intention was to take a picture of them all together. ugh.
got up, got the kids dressed and fed, did the dishes, got myself dressed, got packed up (or so i thought), and headed out around 9:30. we were on our way to a petting zoo on palm beach (random, but yes) to meet up with some friends. walked to the garage and realized that my car wasn’t there (it usually is during spring training season). got to the car, got the kids strapped in. took off.
[i'm watching last night's idol. matt KILLED it. he is so so so good.]
the petting zoo was actually a special storytime at the society of the four arts on palm beach. i have several friends who go to it frequently and thought i’d give it a go since it’s been so nice out and i knew harper would love the animals. it was NUTS. there were seriously at least 100 kids there, not to mention the one or two caretakers with each of them. the animals were cool and it was fun to see some facebook friends in real life.
[seriously...scott is TERRIBLE. people, he doesn't want you to feel sorry for him because he's blind. DON'T VOTE FOR HIM! i love his shirt, though...i'd love to see ryan in that shirt.]
it took me a ridiculous 10 minutes to round up harper and get to the car so we could meet ryan for lunch. on the way to wendy’s, i stopped at cvs because i’d neglected to pack anything but puffs for layne to eat…i needed babyfood and REALLY need binkys. i was at target last night and they don’t carry mams, apparently. anyway, i unstrapped the kids, carried/pulled them inside just to find that i guess cvs didn’t have any either. put them back in their seats and drove 10 blocks to wendy’s. there was a winn-dixie adjacent to wendy’s, so we meandered over there while we waited for ryan to get there. [megan joy is BEAUTIFUL, but i just can't see her making a living off her voice.] got the babyfood and then went to grab the binkys. they were out. UGH.
went over and ate burgers/babyfood with ryan/daddy. after lunch we headed over to world thrift, my favorite thrift store. i was originally headed over there to look for a play kitchen for the newly cleaned porch, but when i called ryan to tell him they had two and the best one was on sale for $15, he said no. i don’t know why i was surprised. my husband is stubborn. i’ve been wanting to get harper a kitchen for a least a year and a half and he does NOT want one in our house for some reason. it’s so annoying, but i respect his opinion and would never go behind his back and buy it anyway (i love you, honey!). headed home and the girls both feel asleep in the car. layne “transferred” great, but harper was wide awake once i put her in the bed. i finally made her go to sleep around 3:15, and here i sit.
[adam seriously carries himself exactly like david cook. i went on and on last season about how cocky david was. i guess i wouldn't be surprised if adam won, but i so hope he doesn't.]
gonna finish up idol, then i need to run to publix to pick up a few things (binkys!) and then we may go fly harper’s kite. i have soccer tonight, which is always the highlight of my week. i’m pretty sure it’s our last game (we haven’t won enough to make the playoffs), so that’s too bad…but i’m 30 now, so i get to play in the summer league this year (whoo-hoo!)
PEACE!
so, the more i’ve thought about it today (yes i do think about my blog throughout the day…i have make an effort to force adult thoughts into my head), i’ve decided that the posts i like to read most are the ones where people write about their everyday life…true bLOGgers…those who use their blogs as a diary. therefore, i’ve decided that anytime i’m lacking “quality” material, i’ll just write a “log” of the day.
guess what movie we’re watching. did you see my title? it’s a morgan spurlock documentary – he’s the guy who did “supersize me” (the EXCELLENT film about his 30 days of eating nothing but mcdonald’s). so far it’s interesting. he’s gotten a little more hokey since he had a show on tv (28 days or something?), but it’s very informative so far. [there have been more terrorist attacks in the world in the past 6 years than in the 20 years before that combined.]
this morning after the movie, harper and i hung out while layne napped. i did some random design work and finally got dressed around 11:00. packed us a picnic lunch and met my friend kathleen at the playground. sometimes it’s so nice just to sit on a bench and talk. we got home right at the girls’ naptime (2:00). harper decided not to sleep, but thanks to a stack of new library books, i didn’t hear a peep out of her for 45 minutes.
i talked to my mother-in-law for awhile today. it is such a blessing to have a solid, life-enriching relationship with her. she is a special gal and i feel very fortunate to have conversations with her like the one we had today. i love you sherry (and not just when you read my blog, haha).
probably the highlight of my day today was a visit to xpress fitness. it’s a gym that is downstairs and across the street…approximately a minute and a half from my door (that includes the walk down the hall and the elevator ride). since layne still isn’t sleeping well at night and i’m up at least twice, it is near impossible for me to wake up at the necessary 5:30 in the morning to run. the only solution i’ve thought of is to join a gym. we don’t really have $50 a month sitting around, so i didn’t really think it would happen. until today. i can join this gym for $30 a month! this includes child care and classes! i’m going for a try-out work-out tomorrow, but i seriously don’t need any more convincing. i’m just doing it mostly to reinforce my husband’s doubts. stay tuned.
gotta go. i’m missing alot of information in this movie and it’s getting good!
layne did great last night!! hooray! she went down around 7:30 and we didn’t hear a peep from her until around 4:15 a.m. if i’d have known she was gonna sleep so good i would’ve gone to bed at like 9:00. anyway, when i went in to see about her at 4:15, i checked on harper like i usually do…just to make sure she hasn’t wet the bed and that she’s covered up. as i bent over to feel her, i felt her blanket on the floor at my feet. i bent down and grabbed it and it was soaked. “oh no,” i thought, “she wet the bed.” but then i felt her bottom and the bed and they were dry. she was covered up by a different blanket, one that i’d had on the end of layne’s crib to block out some light. “what in the world?!” i thought… i put the blanket in the laundry and then went back to bed. i knew i’d been sleeping SOLID from 11:00 until 4:15. i woke up ryan and asked him if he’d gotten up with harper and had she wet the bed. he said no. we’d had the monitor on in our room and neither one of us heard anything all night. i laid awake for at least 30 minutes, freaked out that i’d started sleepwalking. i couldn’t believe that i had NO recollection of hearing harper wake up, changing her sheets and pajamas…
this morning when she got up, i asked harper what happened. apparently, her water (sippy cup) had leaked all over her blanket, so she took the initiative to QUIETLY (shocking) get out of bed, put the wet blanket on the ground, and grab the new blanket off of laynie’s crib. all while in the dark. wonders never ever cease. ha!
and while i’m using this title….
am i the only one who thinks scott (the blind guy) on american idol is being humored? he seems nice enough, and i know that he can play the piano, but the bottom line: HE’S NOT A GOOD SINGER. i don’t feel like the judges should be easy on him because he’s blind and it really seems like that’s what’s happening. yes, he is passionate about music and that’s obvious, but if someone else can sing better, he shouldn’t still be around just because he can play the keyboard without seeing it. i don’t think even he would want to be kept around as a sympathy vote. i’m dying to know what other people think about this…. am i just being a jerk?
