Date Day

Since we didn't have any plans today, I decided to make it a "mommy & boys date" day :) in other words, I pretty much said yes to almost anything Logan asked to do (within reason, of course). So... we baked cookies at 9 am, read books for an hour, raced cars, watched two episodes of Busytown Mysteries, shopped for new pajamas for Logan at Marshall's, picked out a new board game on the clearance rack, and shared a ham & cheese sandwich and tomato soup (and a salad for me) at Panera Bread. We did have one small tantrum on the way out (he never actually wants to leave once we go somewhere, lol) but it was all rewarded with TWO napping boys in their beds this afternoon!!! Ahhh! I don't even know what I should do with my relaxation time...oh wait, how about a diet coke and some blog reading? Sounds perfect to me! :)

Changing it up

So the other week I was all prepared to write a post about how much I love our current schedule and that I hope it stays this way for awhile - workout/story time/play date in the am (some variation of those options most days), lunch, nap for the kiddos, and usually a quick walk to feed the ducks and play at the neighborhood playground before dinner. Love it.

But, sigh, like all schedules, it seems that that one has to come to an end as of two weeks ago. I'm crossing my fingers that it's just a phase, but Logan might have just given up his afternoon naps. We haven't been able to convince him to actually sleep during nap time for quite some time now, and he's finally at the point where he's really not overly grumpy anymore when he skips it. Yikes. I was kinda dreading that day, I really liked my midday break and later bedtimes for the kids. Now I'm exhausted by 5 pm and we're all rush rush to finish dinner and get baths before early bedtime. Blake of course is on his usual 45 minute to 1 hour nap schedule, so nothing new there. Oh well. Maybe the next schedule will be better?! I can only hope...

But for now I'm trying to enjoy the extra play time in the afternoon and hit up the parks again since the weather has been pretty nice. Hurray for winter in FL, the best time to live here! :) the temps have been mid to high 70s all week and mostly gorgeous, can't complain about that.

We've had a pretty fun past two weeks - impromptu sushi dinner with Kristyn, a really fun Moms Night Out, we toured City Place and Palm Beach again with my parents, a fun cookout with our awesome neighbors, and the South Florida Fair with the kids. Seriously, these South Floridians do not kid around with their fair! This was, no lie, the biggest fair I have ever seen in my life...it was amazing. Can't wait for next year when both kids will hopefully be tall enough to ride all of the kiddie rides :)

And like I haven't written enough, some picture to top it off ;)

Good and not so good, mostly not so good morning

This morning I experienced what was probably the most embarrassing tantrum that Logan has ever thrown. Not really a fan of the all out kicking, screaming, rolling on the floor tantrums to begin with (brings all kind of judge-y stares from others, yay), but this particular one happened to take place in the library, aka the QUIET zone. Hah hah hah. In my efforts to drag an uncooperative Logan out of story time, I tripped over another kid since I couldn't see the ground in front of me thanks to carrying Blake, Logan, and my bag. Cue more glares. Oh boy. Not sure if we'll be returning for awhile...yikes. This must be a result of the week long nap strike we've been under...

Anyways, earlier this morning we took a tour of the local preschool. Logan wanted to start school right then and there! It looked so fun, I am pretty excited for him. It was actually my second choice preschool (my first choice doesn't open registration until late February, boooo) but I wanted to ensure a spot for the fall so I went ahead and registered him there just in case. Of course everything fills up super quick if you don't get priority registration, but we have a definite spot for the 2 day a week class and we're first on the waiting list for the 3 day a week class. Hurray for August! I hope Logan loves it as much as I do! I think he wanted to impress the teacher because as she gave the tour and mentioned the things they would be learning, he busted out with his rendition of the ABCs :) hahaha.

Blake is ONE!

Oh my goodness, I can't forget to write a post about my littlest man turning the big o-n-e year old! I know I say this too much, but time really does fly. Some days it seems like he was just born! We are seriously so blessed to have Blake in our family. He adds so much! He is so sweet, loving, smart, and adorably cute (well, I might be a little biased, hehe.

He made the transition from bottles to milk in a sippy cup pretty easily, just like his brother. But he eats a TON, which is so different from Logan! I'm not used to having a baby that eats so much. He just shovels it in then signs for more! Speaking of signing, we started doing the signs for 'more' and 'all done' kind of sporadically, whenever we'd remember really, and the other day he just sort of picked it up...what a smartie! :)

He's also my walking man. He took his first steps quite awhile ago, then graduated to standing on his own, then took his first real steps (on his own, withot any prompting) at his orthopedic appointment (he showed those silly hips! No more hip dysplasia for him!), then just took off and never stopped while we were at Logan's 3 year check up. Must be something about doctors' offices that makes him wanna WALK! Now he is our little speedy terror that wreaks havoc in all corners of the house (just ordered another baby gate the other night, lol).

We celebrated with chocolate cake at Mimi & Grandad's house before we left from Christmas vacation, and we celebrated again on the night of his birthday with a piece of chocolate cake that Logan and I picked out at Publix. We love Blake, and he loves chocolate!

Part of me is sad that my baby is officially a toddler now, but most of me is excited because if you ask me, the best part of babyhood is after they start walking! Life gets really fun! :)

Loganisms

I know, I know, more Loganisms...but I can't even tell you how funny this kid is (or maybe he's just funny to us, in which case I apologize in advance for this post, lol). Although my brother-in-law did comment that "Logan is pretty funny!" after they babysat him on NYE...who knows what crazy thing he said to them to make him think that! Lol!

Logan holds up half of his strawberry and points out that it slopes down...
"Is that a slide?"

He propped up his half banana on his plate and asked Daniel, "is this an elephant?" (like an elephant trunk)
Daniel: sure, I guess it could be.
Logan: pshhhhhh!! (Pretends to spray water out of the elephant trunk all over his food)

We made a paper dinosaur today at the library story time (today's theme was dinosaurs) so I made a pb&j dinosaur sandwich for Logan at lunch. He then proceeded to take his halved strawberries and add eyes, a mouth, and a tail..."I made a new dinosaur, just like at story time!"

Meal time is hysterical these days. At first I would tell him to stop playing with his food, but I seriously can't help it now. I die laughing every time, I consider it a bad habit worth encouraging ;) he has a huge imagination!

At the zoo yesterday, we were at the butterfly exhibit with one of the butterfly keepers.
Butterfly Lady: Do you want to see a chrysalis?
L: Yeah yeah yeah!! ::jumps up and down::
Butterfly Lady: (looks at me) does he know what that is?
Me: hahah nope, he has no idea. But he's excited about it!

As we're leaving the butterfly garden...
L: Watch out for the monkeys! Hah hah hah!! They're in the trees!
I can't even write out how his monkey sounds, but it makes me laugh.

He has been obsessed lately with Dora the Explorer books (not the show, just the books, oddly enough) and he loves how map tells him where to go. So when Lily handed him her map at the zoo, he wouldn't let it go.
L: I'm wearing a safari hat, and here's my map!!
I still can't believe he wore that party favor safari hat throughout the entire zoo yesterday! What a goof.

We woke up the other morning to Logan screaming in his bed. We thought maybe he had a nightmare, so we rushed up there.
L: there's holes in my pajamas! Help! I need new pajamas!
Hahahah. He was wearing button down pajamas, and he was seriously upset that there were "holes" in between the button of his shirt ;) guess we won't be wearing those pjs any more! LOL!

Logan has been SO into shapes. I don't know what's up with this guy and colors (he just won't do it) but we are all about shapes over here. You wouldn't even believe how many times a day I hear "is this a circle?" "Is this a rectangle?" "Is this an octagon?" I guess it's true, when they want to learn something, it's all they talk about for awhile...

And last but not least...this post is brought to you by the number "eleventeen," which comes promptly after number fifteen. ;)

Christmas & New Years

I'm finally feeling a bit less exhausted after getting an extra hour of sleep this morning while Daniel watched the kids (best husband ever!). We got back from our whirlwind holiday on New Years Day, and Daniel subsequently came down with the flu that night. I've been on kid & house duty 24/7 since then!

Anyways, our Christmas turned out to be a lot of fun with family & friends! It was not at all relaxing, lol, but sometimes just a lot of fun is all you need :) We squeezed in four Christmas celebrations over Christmas Eve & Christmas Day (whew!!!) and way too much food. Daniel's dad gifted us (and Daniel's sister and bro-in-law) tickets to see the Orlando Magic play on the 26th and we all had a great time! They were club level seats so we had an amazing view (and the score was SO close, making it an exciting game to watch!).

We spent lots of time hanging out with Natalie, Monica, Adrian, Stephen, and Elizabeth while we were in Titusville! Melting Pot and World of Beer one night, bonfire and s'mores at Steve's house, margs at la Bamba, and a night at the Irish Pub. We had a blast catching up with everyone!

New Years Eve was craziness all in itself. Daniel left a day early to do Rehearsal events, so Daniel's dad flew me over to Tampa in his plane to meet him at the hotel before the wedding began. It was such a neat flight, only about an hour-ish actually in the air but seeing downtown Tampa and Lakeland from above was really cool. Once we landed, Daniel and the groom & groomsmen picked me up and we headed to the Clearwater Marriott so they could all get prepped and ready for photos.

The ceremony was gorgeous, Anna and Jason looked great! We caught up with some old friends, enjoyed the reception, ate yummy food, took pics in a photo booth, danced, and rang in the New Year with party hats and horns at midnight with Jason & Anna. The after party kept going until around 3:30 that morning. I was up and ready at 7:30 that morning to see the kids though! Haha!

Now the holidays are all over, and while we had a great time - I'm not gonna lie, I'm pretty happy to get back to normal life! :) I think 2013 is gonna be a lot of fun!

Hello 2013!

Can you believe it is already January of 2013?! 2012 just flew by. It was probably one of the crazier years we've had thus far - new baby, new job, new city. But one of the best years yet!

We got off to a bit of a rocky start. It was rough moving away from our home and friends in Jacksonville. And really tough for me when Daniel left for work in South Florida on Blake's one week birthday, leaving me alone with a 2 year old and a newborn in a Pavlik harness! I think my stress level hit new peaks that week, haha. But we survived that nutty period of our lives - switching homes, temporary living, finding a new town to live in, renting a house and moving our stuff, finding a new routine with two kiddos in the mix.

Now we have been settled in to Wellington for nearly a year (in February!) and I have to say that I really like it here now. I miss my best friend dearly but SO happy that we have been able to stay in touch and visit each other tons!! And who knows where we will end up later on... :)

Since every post deserves a photo, here's some Instagrams from our zoo trip today!

Story of Logan

Since I'm STILL working on Logan's baby book (ever so slowly), I might as well go ahead and type up his birth story so it'll be all ready to go when I get to that page in his book! Don't read this if you aren't good with birth stories ;)

It was around 3:30 pm on December 17th that I had my 39 week appointment. I had already lost some of the mucous plug and was having a few cramps that day so I was excited about that, even though that really doesn't mean a whole lot in terms of when labor will start. At my appointment Dr. Stoddard checked me and said I was only about 1-2 cm dilated, and told me that she didn't really foresee it happening anytime very soon. She offered to do a membrane sweep though, so I said what the heck, why not. I didn't even really know what a membrane sweep meant, but if she was endorsing it then I was all for it!

I headed home from the appointment around 4:30 pm and noted that I still had some cramps, but really nothing painful. As the afternoon wore on and Daniel called to say that he was on his way home, my cramps had gotten a little more painful. I was getting really excited at this point, but still didn't call anyone because I felt like it could still be false labor. By the time Daniel got home from work and we relaxed for a little bit, the cramps had started to form more into actual time-able contractions. Still very far apart, but at least it was more action than we'd had up until then!

We decided to go out to dinner, so I picked Moe's in hopes that a little spicy salsa would give it an extra push. I was definitely having contractions by the time we sat down to eat, but again still pretty far apart. After dinner we walked around the mall a couple of times. That's where things really started to heat up! As I waddled around, I would have to stop and pause every few minutes when a big one hit.

Just in case this was the real thing, we headed back to the apartment around 9 pm to get ready. I took a shower, straightened my hair and did my make up (as if any of that would last me! hah! such little did I know). We packed up the rest of our bags and hit the walking trail around the lake in the middle of our complex to get a few extra laps in and hopefully hurry up those contractions. By 10:30 pm, I was timing my contractions about 4-5 minutes apart and decided we could call the doctor. She pointed us to the hospital, so we hopped in the car and went to L&D around 11 pm.

L&D is definitely an experience! They put me in triage until they could definitely determine that I was in labor. I remember changing into that awful gown (ugh) and laying down in a curtained stall while a nurse monitored my contractions. They were still around 4-5 minutes apart on average, so the nurse was hesitant to admit us without knowing that things would continue to progress. While the nurse left us for a little bit to go find the on-call doctor, I felt a little gush of something. It's kind of embarrassing asking your husband to look "down there" to see what's going on, so I asked him to fetch the nurse! haha! If I only knew what he was going to see later on I don't know if I would have been so modest. When the nurse came back, I told her something had happened but I didn't know what it was! She checked and seemed a little concerned - which of course worried me (I'm such a worrier). She told me that I had lost a little blood, so they were going to go ahead and admit me to a room.

After we got all settled in to our room and everything checked out fine (turns out that some lose a little blood beforehand rather than after birth), I asked the doctor when he thought things might happen (enter impatient me). He checked my stats and came back with a time: noon. What?! It was only 2 am! Argh! At that point, he asked me if I was interested in an epidural. It had definitely crossed my mind that I might want one, but asked if I could wait it out a little bit longer. He said that was fine, but that the anesthesiologist was about an hour away. Okay well then, let's do it! So they called in the anesthesiologist and I got set up with an epidural (which was, by the way, way worse than actually giving birth in my opinion. Large needles and possible paralysis scares me to death). Soon I was pretty numb from the chest down.

Unfortunately the epidural slowed down labor, so we introduced pitocin into my system. All I can say is thank goodness I couldn't feel any the contractions at that point because the monitor was going crazy! The pitocin worked though, and pretty soon I checked out at 10 cm (baby pushing time!). Hurray! After 30 minutes of pushing and a little bit of suction (his shoulders were turned, getting stuck on my pelvis), baby Logan Roberto made his way into the world! And he cruised in right on time, 11:58 am on December 18. 7 lbs and 1 oz of cuteness (and a cone head to boot!). I asked the doctor how in the world he knew it would be noon when Logan arrived, and he said he'd been delivering babies for quite some time ;) To top it off, our doctor's son is named Logan also!

Congrats if you made it through this whole story :) I just now completed this little saga just in time for my little Logan's 3rd birthday! Woohoo! If I would have waited any longer I think I might have started mixing up Logan & Blake's birth stories since they were so similar! ;)

Merry Christmas!

We had a wonderful Christmas holiday with family & friends! I'll try to write more about it (and our New Years Eve) later but for now I'm too exhausted! Here's some quick iPhone pics of our week.