a hodge podge of info

On Sunday we spent the day at my grandparents. Both my boys just adore them, and I'm fairly sure the feeling is mutual. We played for a while, Jason napped, we at lunch, played some more, and then went to the grove for ice cream. Oh, I forgot to mention this last time, the grove has a dairy-free treat. It wouldn't be my top pick, but at least I don't have to sit there and drool while everyone else eats ice cream!



Jason so desperately wants to roll from back to belly. Still not there. He's rolling fairly regularly from belly to back though and will now manage to scoot forward (purely accidental I'm sure). He lifts his little butt off the ground. It's too cute!

Jason seems to really be playing these days. He has a fascination with faces and loves to grab for them, touch them, laugh at them, or even occasionally eat them. As Tyler said "Mommy, Jason is trying to nurse on my nose". He loves his exersaucer, at least for maybe 10 minutes at a time.

Love is in the air

Well, it's now officially 5 days until Valentine's Day. A few days ago we took out our "decorations". When I say decorations, I mean a small assortment of cheesy stuff, but it makes Tyler very happy.

On Friday we baked up some yummy Valentine's cookies, courtesy of Pillsbury of course. My stay-at-home-mom skills are still in just survival mode, not bake-something-beautiful-from-scratch mode! LOL.

On Saturday Tyler actually agreed to let me take Valentine's Day photos. Then I realized that I didn't think we had Valentine's Day outfits, so a red (and white and blue) theme will have to do!




I had planned on ending this post with a request to keep your fingers crossed that Al would make it home before Valentine's Day. As you might know, he was scheduled to be back about a week ago, and then was saying that he should be home by Valentine's Day. In the midst of me posting this he called. Although I'm thrilled I got to hear from him (and he FINALLY got to have a conversation with Tyler), he is very frustrated with how things are going and will most likely not be home before the big day. I did tell him though that he likely won't be missing much...a family date to a restaurant, accompanied by a likely crying nursling and a 4-year-old whining for french fries. Not necessarily the most romantic scene you could imagine. At least I got a laugh out of him!

So, here's to love. Whether the romantic kind or the kind you experience when you look into the eyes of your sweet innocent baby, or get an unexpected hug from your growing-way-too-fast 4-year-old. Love is all around us.

it was fun while it lasted

Jason has been doing better. I can't say for sure that it was the medicine increase, or just pure coincidence, but there haven't been any more coughing fits and he's back to burping more often instead of the wet hiccups which ended up in spit-up. He has also been better about sitting in the stroller (yipee) and napping occasionally in his swing. Yesterday I was even able to nurse him to sleep and then put him down in his crib! Amazingly, he slept 45 minutes there. Even more amazingly, Tyler was quiet enough to not wake his brother for those whole 45 minutes, which is a rarity these days.

Of course today I couldn't get him to sleep in the crib at all, and the nap he did have in the swing was cut short by Tyler screaming at the top of his lungs. At least I enjoyed it while I could!

manatee viewing

On Friday Tyler had off from school. After all, it was a very religious holiday. Fair day. Yep, that's right. A day to take off to attend the fair. Fascinating, huh? Anyway, we needed to get out of the house, and despite the fact that we had very low temperature the night prior, the sun was shining brightly and it seemed like a great day to go to the Manatee Viewing Center.

Apparently everyone thought it was a good day to go the Manatee Viewing Center. It was packed, which worked out well since it was also packed with manatees! There were tons of them!


Tyler even had a decent enough attitude to ASK to pose for this picture.

After hanging out with the manatees for quite a while, we head inside to the manatee museum. Jason met his first manatee.

He then enjoyed chomping on his fingers.

While Tyler tried his luck at the new manatee puzzles.

Tyler had a ton of fun with this.

After the museum we took a walk down the dock to see if we could find any other exciting creatures. Tyler was disappointed we didn't find a shark, but we did find a few stingrays!

"Manatee" (Tyler's creative name for his stuffed manatee he got last year at the viewing center) was happy to see his friends.

As you can see, even with a "cold snap", it never really does get too cold in these parts, does it?

Jason obviously enjoyed himself too.

pet peeve alert

I'm sure we all have them...those things that drive us batty. I have quite a few, but this time of year reminds me of one of my major pet peeves. The word is ValentiNe, not ValentiME.

I was watching TV as I nursed Jay this afternoon and I had on Judge Alex. A TV commercial came on for the Gold & Diamond Source. It's a local commercial (the company is based in Clearwater), so can any of my Tampa Bay area friend confirm for me whether or not they actually used the word ValentiME in a paid TV ad? You would have thought SOMEONE would have let them know that this was a no-no. Perhaps my ears deceived me. I did rewind it, but I couldn't turn it up loud enough to hear without waking Jason.

My TV ad rant reminds me though, is anyone as thoroughly disturbed by the 1-800-ASK-GARY ads as I am? They usually feature an actor/actress promoting the company, instead of the lawyers themselves. That's fine, not everyone is ready for the TV, but who in the world is casting these commercials? Or are they particularly trying to gear themselves towards a certain clientele? Seriously, how can you promote a company by starting off the commercial "Hey y'all, it's Razz here. I'm no lawyer, I'm a spokeperson for 1-800-ASK GARY". No kidding, you aren't educated enough to be a lawyer? Shocking. It's bad enough that they used "y'all", but "I'm NO lawyer"? Geez. The same commercial also states "call 1-800-ASK-GARY. You MIGHT be glad you did". I'm sorry, I'd prefer to call a company where my chances of satisfaction are greater than "might". They have another equally annoying commercial, but the details escape me right now.

Okay, I'm glad I have that off my chest. I will now do my best to cease judging people.

torture

Is it wrong of me to put my child in clothes which clearly aren't comfortable? With Tyler I think I was more into the outfits. This time I'm more about the comfort. But sometimes I just can't resist putting him in a fun outfit. This one lasted maybe 10 minutes, but I enjoyed myself. Then it was back to regular clothes. Poor child though might develop a complex because even Tyler's preschool realizes that he's never really "dressed to impressed". The other day Jason was in little cotton pants a long-sleeve onesie and they said "awww, look, he's dressed today". I promise you he's "dressed" everyday, but many of those days his "outfit" could pass for a sleeper. LOL.

rolling, rolling, rolling

He desperately wants to roll back to belly, but has yet to accomplish this.

Belly to back, however, is going quite well!