Mexico

Chris was traveling tonight so Cal and I had another girls night.

It was great, but my anxiety is starting to seriously pop up.  In 11 days I'll be heading here:

And while I'm SO excited to have 5 days to relax on the beach, I'm starting to feel heart-crushing, shortness-of-breath-inducing anxiety about leaving.

I mean, how can I leave this face?

I know that it will be five hundred times harder on me that on her.  She'll be hanging out with her usual peeps and having a blast.  She probably won't even notice that I'm gone. 

Well, I hope she notices a little, but the thought of her being sad that Mommy is gone is enough to bring tears to my eyes.

While in Mexico, I'm going to try not to obsessively go to the resort's business center to check my email, but I WILL be requiring all those hanging out with my girl to email me pictures. Constantly.

She's growing up before my eyes, I can't imagine how big she is going to look after 5 days.

But...I'm just trying to focus on the fact that after I get back we'll have all summer together.  I'm also trying to remember the fact that, after this crazy busy school year, I deserve this tropical paradise vacation.

So if you see me in the next 11 days and I seem like a basket case, please remind me that it will be okay that I go.  That she'll be okay.  That the summer is right around the corner.

Thanks. :)

Weekend Wrap-Up: The Memorial Day Mega-Post Edition

We had a fantastic weekend and I'm exhausted and overwhelmed by the thought of putting it all on a blog post.

So I'm going to let the pictures (and their captions) tell the story of our weekend.

Friday: Dinner at G-ma and G-pa's house

The fountain is back!

On a walk run

Riding George's bike

 Saturday: The Rainy-Crabby-Pants Day

Stuck inside

 Sunday: Stay-cation!

Depot Hotel!

Water Park!

Arcade!

Prizes from the arcade!

Lynx Game!

Go Lynx!

Cheering!

On the big screen!

Courtside with Boom and Bops for a bit

Monday: More Hotel Fun

Sweet face

Staying in the shallow water

BBQ at Auntie Cat's house/Nokomis Walk

Hat hair!

Big branch

There you have it!  More pictures from the weekend and the rest of May can be found here!  

Happy Memorial Day!

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT

This is a very important PSA.

If you are ever contemplating buying shorts that look like this,

I beg of you to reconsider.

They are CRABBY PANTS.  I repeat: CRABBY PANTS.

They may make you say things totally confusing to your parents.  Like:

"Yes get me out of my high chair! NO I STAY IN!  YES GET ME OUT! NO I STAY IN!!!!!"

Or you may find yourself telling your mom:

"I DON'T LISTEN!"

Or you may find yourself scream crying because, after taking the crabby pants off for nap time, your dimwitted parents wanted to actually put them back ON you in order to go to Petco.

So, I know you are all bummed that the hot pair of purple biking shorts you had your eye on may make you have some sort of toddler mood disorder, but please please please...go for the pink jammy-style ones instead. 

They apparently will make you smile while brushing your teeth AND you'll let your mommy hold you.

29-Months-Old and a Graduation!

First off, I'll let the 29-month-old show you how smart she is (I'm currently having issues with vimeo, so I hope the blogger video app works!).

Secondly, I'm very proud to share with you that after 17 weeks of training, Chris is officially a Bloomington Police Reserve Officer.  It is volunteer position that required extensive training and studying, and he'll begin his once-a-month shifts on Thursday night.

A good crowd came out to support him and I was excited to be able to be the one to pin on his badge, with the Police Chief looking on.

The night ended with a tour of the police station, which was AWESOME.  We got to see the dispatch room, the jail, the evidence rooms and the garage with all the cop cars.  I wanted to take a picture of me in a jail cell, but didn't want to embarrass my newly-graduated husband. :)

Weekend Wrap-Up: The Miserable Toddler Edition

As I have alluded to in previous blog post #1 and previous blog post #2, this weekend has been...interesting.

Friday
After the doctor visit, medicine, and a nap, it was time to get OUT OF THE HOUSE.  But not somewhere with a lot of other kids, so as to not spread a bunch of germs.  And  not somewhere outside because it was WICKED hot.  So, we decided to head to the Galleria with Dan and Anna.  Thankfully, she perked up and we all had a fun time.

Attacking Anna with a turtle

The return of Little Big Cheeks

Saturday
I'll start by saying that we have been SO INCREDIBLY lucky that Callie has been healthy for most of her 2+ years.  With that being said, her being sick this week made us realize how spoiled we have been to have her so healthy.  Sick kids are really not fun.

Saturday was rough.  Her second round of antibiotics and a trip to Dr. Stewart started moving things along and moving things out.  Out of her eyes.  Out of her nose. Out of her rear end. Her face was a constant faucet.  And a crabby one.  But she managed to have a little fun at G-ma and G-pa's house while Chris and I participated in my school's 2nd annual 5K (notice I didn't say that we both RAN in the 5K, because only one of us did that).

 

The ducky is back!

Go P.A.!

So the rest of Saturday was pretty miserable for the rest of us, but we made it to the condo for a bit.

And then, later, this happened.

Needless to say, we were all glad when bed time happened.

Sunday
Today we woke up to this adorable and MUCH happier face.

I feel better!

Yay!!!!!

Callie and I picked Laura up from the airport and went to brunch before nap time.

After nap time we dropped a still snotting Callie off at the condo so we could go meet Baby Mabel!  She is adorable and so tiny!  And Charlie is a proud big brother. :)

This evening ended with a jammy walk run...

...and a super sleepy toddler who went right to sleep.  Thank goodness.  Now I'm trying to relax and rest up for the last 5-day-week of the school year!  The end is in sight.  I can't believe it.

I'll leave you with a clip of Chris!  On the news!  Riding a bike!  It was a totally random thing and aired on the Saturday morning news.

Click here!

Parents of the Year

Tonight deserves its own blog post.

It was the kind of night, where the events all lead up to the culminating event of four of us changing a poopy, blown-out diaper on the ground next to a parking lot in the POURING rain.

But let me start at the beginning.  We've  been wanting to go to a park not too far from us (that Anna loves) for awhile now.  Since Callie has had a really crappy few days being sick, we decided to try and go this evening so that she could have a little fun.  It wasn't raining when we left the house, but of course, it started pouring as soon as we pulled up. 

We decided to run for it because the park was like a cool castle and had lots of places to get shelter.  There was blue sky in the distance, so we didn't think it would last long (clearly we did not consult meteorologists).  As we were huddled in the castle, a very strong smell started wafting and we realized that Callie had a major poop blow-out.  Like a through-the-shorts kind of blow-out.

So I got the diaper bag out, and somehow, we had no wipes.  And no 2nd set of clothes.

After a few minutes of trying to figure out what to do, we decided that Chris would run home to get the wipes and new clothes.

But the rain stopped, so while we were waiting, we decided to let her play to distract from the poopy butt.

The playground was SERIOUSLY cool!

But, eventually, the poop was just starting to become even more of a disaster than it already was, so we decided to abandon the playground and just run around the field until Chris got back.

Anna doing her best to avoid the poop

He got back just in time.  We threw the diaper pad on the ground, Anna grabbed her hands to keep them busy, Chris held her legs up and I wiped.  And wiped.  And wiped.  And then it started POURING.  Like EPICALLY POURING.  So Dan was a quick thinker and used a frisbee as a make-shift umbrella.

We finished up as best as we could and made a mad dash to the car.

"I drive!  I drive!"

 And, unfortunately, it appeared that the rain wasn't going to let up, and we had to say goodbye.

Super cool castle park, we will see you later

So there you have it.  Feel free to use this blog post to nominate us as Parents of the Year.  We definitely rocked it tonight.

Double Eyes to Double Ears

Well, it hasn't been the most fun week at our house that has ever been.

Last weekend there was the double pink eye.  Then this week brought a constantly runny nose and a non-stop cough.  Especially at night.  It was bad enough for us to google "toddler coughing" and find and try a home remedy of lathering Vicks Vapo-rub on her feet covered in socks for a few nights in a row.  The results were hit-or-miss.

She was super cranky and listless with my mom this morning, so I took her back to the doctor and TA-DA!  Double ear infection!  But she did have fun playing with my phone at the doctor's office.  She managed to figure out how to take some pictures.

After a melt down at Target while trying to pick up stronger antibiotics than she was already on, we made it home for lunch time.  Chris came and handled nap time so I could go back to work for awhile.

Thankfully, the super antibiotic started kicking in later in the afternoon/evening and she was back to her normal, silly girl self, with a lot of extra snot.

The return of "Little Big Cheeks"

Here's hoping the super antibiotic and a trip to Dr. Stewart in the morning kick this infection's booty and we get our (usually) healthy girl back.

Girls Night

Chris had a work event tonight, so it was just me and Cal. 

GIRLS NIGHT!

Hair cut and a sucker

Yummy sandwiches

Chasing duckies

Someone was more excited about the H2O than the ice cream

Play house

Nights with my little girl are so much fun.  Speaking of girls, I want to give a shout out to a couple friends who have just recently joined the Mom-of-Girls club.  My friend/coworker Amanda and her husband had little Elise last Friday. And our friends Andy, Jenna and Charlie welcomed little Mabel into their family this morning!  Congrats to them!  Can't wait to meet the little ones!