Phrases heard 'round my home today....

"No Matthew, put that back please."     

 "Close that drawer buddy, that's mommys stuff."

"Freeze! Climb down from that speaker right now."    

"Chairs are for sitting Matthew."

"No Matthew, you cannot take the screw out of the table."     

"No touch."

"Sit on your bottom."        

"Get down from the speaker.  The speaker is not for standing on."

"Let's close the cabinet Matthew.  There's nothing for you in here." 

"Mommy needs 2 seconds to go potty babe."      

"NO STANDING ON THE SPEAKER."

Oh. No.

Snow Day

Video day

Let me preface this by telling you the quality of most of these videos are crap.  I have no idea what happened to the dial on my camera, but somehow I didn't have it set appropriately, and the lighting is just SO off.  My point being, while I will still enjoy watching these cute little clips of my son, you may be too distracted by the very bad lighting.  You've been warned.

So the first (and the only one with normal lighting) is a few weeks ago.  Matthew and I were just hanging out in the living room and he was being cute (oh wait, he's always cute!).  Anyway, I actually got him saying hi a few times, which is always fun when you have a child of few words.

Next up, and first of the awful quality, is Christmas morning.  This was Matthews first time on the rocking horse he got from his aunt, uncle and cousins in Arkansas.  He loves that horse!

Also Christmas morning, here he is playing with his singing puppies in a gift box (for lack of a more creative name).  His grandma and grandpa got him this and he likes to push the buttons and dance to the music.

Last one.  This is a video of Matthew looking through one of his animal books with daddy.  The quality of this one is HORRIBLE, but I just love it so much that I had to include.  I love how he is trying to say the names of the animals (in his own language of course) and how he keeps flipping the pages to find the koala.

Isn't it amusing that when you become a parent, the simplest things your kid does is amazing? Really.  He's reading a book!  He's saying hi! He's rocking on his horse!  It's all so very epic if you ask me.

Merry Christmas!

What a quiet little Christmas we are having!  I am very thankful for these two guys in my life. Words cannot describe how happy my Michael makes me and how in love with him I am!  And what an absolute joy it is having Matthew in our lives.  I love it.

So now that's it's the third year we are spending Christmas on our own, away from extended families, it's finally hit me.  This is my family and now is the time to make new traditions.  Sure, sure, this came after I shed some tears last night.  It started with "what a pathetic dinner I've made for Christmas Eve" and turned to "but I miss my family!"  After about 5 minutes, I collected myself and remember I must make the most of these holidays.  Matthew is only going to be this age once, and I for one, want to cherish and remember all the things that make this time special for him.  And us.

 I mean, really.  I'd have to be crazy to look at those two faces and not just be completely in love with what I have. 

We had fun playing around and getting a few pictures in front of the tree last night.  After our dinner, we set out to drive around the town and look at all the beautiful Christmas lights everyone had up.  We had the radio set to the holiday station and enjoyed the precious peacefulness that is a small town on Christmas Eve.  Matthew fell asleep in the car, and although it was early for bedtime, we allowed him that little catnap.  We stumbled upon a house with a whole lights display set to music if you turned your radio to a certain station.  It was very cool and I made a video of it, but you tube won't let me air it because the music is copyrighted.  Didn't even think of that one.

Perhaps the sweetest thing to have under my Christmas tree:

Truly the best gift ever!

After we came home, we got Matthew ready for bed and read to him The Night Before Christmas. 

Christmas morning we woke up and had a very busy morning opening gifts.  Mike and I made efforts not to go overboard on gifts for Matthew this year.  He's so young, and certainly has no need for tons and tons of pricey items.  Plus we knew his grandparents would have no problems supplying lots of exciting toys for him.

Sure enough, Aunt Jenny and her family got Matthew this awesome rocking horse:

It was love at first sight.  It took a while for him to open any presents as all he wanted to do was rock on his horse.  He has been playing with it all day. 

If Matthew's unwrapping looks "dainty", that's because it was.  He really was not all that interested in opening gifts. We would get him to open something and then he'd have to play with the toy, book, whatever,  for a while.

Daddy had lots of fun building with Matthews new blocks.

An example of the simple things.  Babci got him a very simple plastic cup with his name on it.  He carried it around the house all morning pretending to drink out of it.

We later put these fridge phonics on the fridge (novel idea, no?).  He loves them!

Here he is taking it all in.  He got lots of books, a new puzzle, an awesome new snowsuit, a keyboard, cars, and lots more.All sorts of stuff to keep him busy!

And here is some of my collection.  Obviously someone knows how much I miss Texas:

Yes, yes- you are seeing correctly.  A Texas shaped waffle maker! :-)

A few more things.  I've already tried out one of the new Wii workouts, and we are currently watching a movie.  Matthew is taking a much needed nap (hopefully long enough for us to finish the movie).

All in all, what a peaceful family day we've enjoyed.

Merry Christmas to all our loved ones!!

Ugg!

So my husband has informed me I don't blog enough anymore.  Ok, ok...that's not exactly what he said, but that was the message that got across.  I told him I don't have anything to say and he insists I do.  So, for now I'll try and fill some randoms in and maybe, just maybe, I'll let him have a guest spot and HE can blog for me, since he apparently has so much to say.

About Matthew--

-he's fully recovered from his surgery. He goes back to Portland for official follow-up in early January, but it's really like nothing happened.  Really.  A tiny little scar, but no biggie.  This boy got a very private area cut open and needed only one dose of pain medicine, and only 2 or so of motrin. 

-he's always been a bit slower at picking up words, but he's starting to talk a little more.  He follows me around the house and when I walk around a corner I am always greeted with a cheery "hi".  His new thing is, when we're playing in his room, he'll pretend to leave and pull the door closed behind him.  He tries to tell me "bye, see you later."  It comes out "bye, seeyasee."  He does it over and over and over.  It is *literally* the cutest thing ever.

-his mouth exploded with teeth recently.  He had 8 teeth for the longest time- 4 on top, 4 on bottom.  In the last 2 weeks he's added 5-6 more and there are 2 about to pop through the gums.  Not surprisingly, it made him a wee bit irritable for a few days last week (and by wee bit I mean I wanted to rip my hair out and sit in a corner with my fingers in my ears singing "la la la").  Anyway, it's weird to see so many teeth.

-he gives awesome kisses.  And if told "give kisses" he will do it over and over. I love making him perform like this.

-he's started learning body parts, and I have in turn, continued to make him perform.  He knows at least 10 of them, but my favorite are:  nose--"where's your nose?"...instead of pointing to it, he gives a few sniffles and scrunches up his nose.  eyes--"where's your eye?"....blink, blink, blink.  fingers--"where's your fingers?"--he gives the cutest little wiggle of his fingers.

-he is a dancing machine.  DANCING MACHINE I tell you.  He loves to dance. 

-He's become a picky eater.  It had to happen sometime.  He used to be so easy going about food, and has definitely decided he has preferences- a good thing, no?  It took some getting used to, but now that we fully realize this child is not going to stave himself, we just go with the flow.  Do I *wish* he'd eat vegetables? Sure.  Do I force them down his throat?  No way.  (I did, however, fool him once again--score two for the mommy. I made a delicious spinach quiche for a brunch we were attending. He gobbled the stuff up--as if it didn't have 3 or 4 cups of spinach--and onions!--in it. ha ha ha.)

-He's getting so big! Really he is! Most of the time he looks like a "kid", instead of a "baby".  He still wears a lot of his 12 month clothes, but just this week we broke out some 18 month clothes that actually fit him pretty well.  Well, I mean the waist is still a bit baggy and sometimes I have to roll up the pants leg...but you know, they fit.  :-)

About us--

-been busy getting ready for Christmas.  We'll be staying here at home and enjoying a quiet holiday together.  I love this little family of mine.  Have I mentioned how blessed I am? I am. For real.

-already planning some trips for the new year.  Matthew and I will be going to Florida to visit my parents in February.  In addition--I have two very awesome fantastic friends, Rose and Erika, who will be flying down from Philly for a few days.  Erika is bringing her boy Zane (he's about 8 months younger than Matthew, if I'm doing the math right in my head.  And since math was always my worst subject, remember I could be off by 2 or more months).  I am excited about every part of this trip.  Seeing my girlfriends, FINALLY meeting Zane, and seeing our boys play together.  I could go on and on about how surreal life is sometimes...one second I'm in Baltimore with these ladies by my side, living the social life (aka barhopping)...the next second I *blink* and here we all are in much different places in our lives.  Erika and I have kids! What?!?!?

-Mike continues to do amazingly well recovering from his heart surgery.  He has found getting back to real life makes it difficult to do his walking and exercise, but is working on making sure he gets it done every day.  I am in disbelief at how well he has recovered.

See--I had NOTHING to say.

Some pictures

Ok, I admit it.  I haven't felt like blogging lately.  Sometimes there's just not a lot to say.  While I could spend lots of time telling you about annoying things my child does.  Or the cute things my child does.  Or all the things my child does- I'm just not feeling it.  Instead, some pictures.

First, the cheesiest of the cheese faces. He cracks me up with this face.

A slightly better cheese face.

The epitome of the cheese face.  He was so completely pissed off about this hat that he was screaming and crying.  I wanted a picture though (is this too much to ask?).  So this is his "cheese" face, while screaming and crying.  I love it.

He likes to help out.  Without fail, as soon as I (or in this case, daddy) grab the vaccum and turn it on, he runs off to find his vaccum and then cleans alongside us.  So funny! (if he can't find his vaccum right away, he grabs the ball popper, which apparently can also double as  a vaccum).

Matthew adores his friends.  He sees them at the front door and starts squealing and running around in a little circle.  Here he is with his buddy Keegan.  They have had lots of special playtime lately.

The three boys.  They have been playing together since Matthew was about 7 months old.  He used to sit/crawl/watch them and now he's old enough to pretty much keep up with them.  Very cool to see the three of them growing up together.

The group came over to make some cinnamon applesauce Christmas ornaments yesterday.  I made them pose for a picture, which as you can tell they were thrilled about.  Little Lizzy has her work cut out for her trying to keep up with those boys!

Finally, Matthew and I had a very nice "chill" day at home today.  I decided to have a fun, do nothing but play and pretty much stay in our jammies.  It was awesome!  I also made him sit for a few Christmas pictures.  He wasn't too thrilled about it at first, but managed to sit still for more than usual.

Hopefully the pictures are enough to keep you mildly entertained! 

Our 2009 silly holiday dance!

Of course, I had to make another one this year.  I'm far too entertained by these things!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

One tough cookie

Taking guidance from his daddy, Matthew did fabulous today!  From start to finish, I am so impressed with how well everything went, and how good he seemed to handle things.  Surgery took about 1 1/2 hours.  The doctor was able to get his little testicle down to the correct place, and fix the hernia he found.  We did not necessarily know about the hernia ahead of time, but Matthews' doctor had told us 90% of the boys who have the undecended testicle, do in fact have hernias also.  I don't know if one thing causes the other or not, but they seem to be related in some way.

Here is Matthew enjoying his last cup of milk at the hotel the night before the surgery.  I did not spike this cup of milk, but for some reason we had HYPER baby on our hands.  I guess he was just too impressed by the digs for the night and he took a while to wind down for bed.  Once there though, he slept the whole night without a peep.

Matthew and daddy enjoy playing in the waiting area.  We didn't have to wait too long before they called him back to the presurgery area.

All dressed up in his cool hospital gown, hanging out with Mommy.  (I have no idea what Mommy is looking at, cerainly not the camera).

The coolest thing since Elmo.  Matthew was in love with the hospital bed.  He ran back and forth inside the crib playing until the pre-meds kicked in.

Speaking of pre-meds, here he is all hopped up on Versed.  They gave him some medication to help relax him.  It pretty much made him goofy.  As I carried him to the doors of the OR, he was like a little limp noodle in my arms.  I handed him off to the nurse and he gazed lovingly into her eyes smiling.  Sort of made the hand off a bit easier.

After surgery Matthew woke up in the recovery room.  We were not allowed to see him until he got back to his little space in the first area we were in. I walked in to find the following.  Matthew sitting up in the crib, eating a popsicle.  The recovery nurse told me how all the nurses in recovery wanted to keep him because he was just "too sweet and so cute."  Too bad I told them he wasn't up for grabs.

After the initial popsicle seen above, it got a little harder to see.  As he came more out of the anesthesia, he was quite inconsolable for a while.  Poor little man cried and cried and could not be calmed.  Finally we were able to get him more comfortable and he was quite distracted by an Elmo video.  Two popsicles later, he was discharged.  Here he is on the three hour drive home (with orange chin from his last frozen treat):

A bit blurry, but once home, he was quite happy.  Grabbed his stethescope (one of his favorite things to play with--and no, not from the surgery, we just had one here that he is quite fond of), and took off playing.  He is in pain off and on, but the pain medication helps wonders with that.

And with that, my boys are done.  They've been through more than I have, I suppose, but I certainly feel like somehow I'm the one done.  No more surgeries please!