Because it really is all about the treats...

My last couple of evenings have been all about sewing. And that...is a sentence I never thought I would type. See, blog friend Joanna (Ms. Craft Queen herself - along with Kelly - both just put me to shame with all their craftyness) posted a tutorial on how to make halloween treat bags, and then challenged all her friends to make a treat bag this year. It's a tradition she has created to make her girls a treat bag that matches their costume and has their name on it. I love that idea...and I would love to be THAT kind of mom - but crafts are not my strong point. In fact sewing in general is probably my LEAST enjoyed task, and the one thing I really suck at. But, I didn't want to back down on the challenge without at least trying. Besides, it's for my boy right?

So I dragged my lazy butt to the store and bought some felt for the bag. I then went home and ransacked my craft box (I know, believe it or not, I have a large box of crafty crap stored under my bed) and found tacky glue, thread, an exacto knife and even a cutting pad with measurements on it. Who knew I had all that stuff lurking under my bed? I got out my sewing box, which is PINK of all things ( I don't do pink, but my mother in law bought it for me and since it was for breast cancer proceeds, I love it anyway) and sat down on my living room floor to plan it all out.

Adam is dressing up as Larry the Cucumber from Veggie Tales (to be explained in a later post) and so I decided to attempt a bag that looked like Bob the Tomato. So I cut everything out and decided to sew the face on by hand, which turned out to be a good thing because I got the idea to stuff a bit of cotton in the eyes, nose, and mouth to make them stand out a bit more. I surprised myself by how much it actually looked like Bob when I was all done with just the face part. For the green leafy part at the top, I was going to glue it on, but turns out - storing tacky glue under your bed for over 5 years without using it...chances are it will be dry as a bone - so I ended up finding some stitch witchery (that stuff that you just iron on and it sticks) and that worked pretty well. I did that for the letters in Adam's name too. For the record, stitch witchery is normally my sewing method of choice. All the curtains in our bedroom were "hemmed" using this fabulous stuff. No way I could mess that up - ha!

So then, I got out our sewing machine. Now when I say sewing machine I don't actually mean a regular sized sewing machine. I mean an itty bitty little sewing machine that we got for like twenty bucks and has been gathering dust in the way back of our closet. See? cute lil thing..

The fact that it says dressmaker on it cracks me up because you might be able to make a DOLL'S dress on this thing, but a dress for an actual human being? - fugettaboutit.

Itty Bitty. For comparison sake...here it is next to a can of soda...

Not your average machine. In fact, I've never even used it before (although I have used a sewing machine before and know how they work even if I suck at it). I sat down to try and hem the handles and...well...this happened. Yeah, it was a mess. I jammed that machine up 3 times before I cursed out loud and hubs heard me and goes "oh yeah, it did that to me all the time too!" Great.

So I sat there wondering what I was going to do because I still had to sew the actual bag together. I decided to just sit down and get cracking because my only other option was to sew it together by hand. And I did. And it took me two evenings of tv watching combined with hand sewing to finish it. I double stitched everything because I wanted it to be strong enough to hold actual candy...so it took longer than I expected. But it's done, and I'm so happy with it!

I can't wait for Adam to wake up and see it! I feel like I actually accomplished something I'm proud of - wooooooo! Thank you Joanna and Kelly and all you other crafty bag makers for inspiring me to follow through with this one :)

18 months

This month Adam officially turned 18 months old, and today we had his well baby check up. Here are his stats:

25.4 pounds (50th percentile)

32 inches (40th percentile...and up 2 inches in 3 months!)

Head is still off-the-charts big (they don't even put a number...just an UP arrow on his chart - ha!)

He's jabbering constantly and says words here and there - Daddy, Puppy, Baby, Cheese, HI, Ball...etc, etc. He DOES NOT SAY MOMMY..or momma, or mom, or anything of that nature, the little punk! When he's really pissed, once in a great while he'll wail out a maaaaaamaaaaaa but seriously, I got the shaft on this one. He runs around the house shouting daddy non-stop, but I can't even get one little mama out of him.
He loves EGGS (he would eat scrambled eggs for every meal), string cheese, pasta, chicken, fish, sweet potatoes (actually any potato in general), bananas, pears, peaches, mandarin oranges, blueberry waffles, goldfish crackers, fruit snacks.

He does NOT like red meat, pasta with red sauce, watermelon, cake or ice cream...freak.

He loves to sit and flip through all his books, and he's into "sorting" things now...he piles all his stuffed animals in one place and moves them to another place and then sorts them and moves them again...over and over - such a crack up. He loves digging in the dirt and he's throwing balls and toys overhand, so we're convinced he's gonna play "ball" someday :)

I tried to fingerpaint with him the other day, but it ended up being a big giant FAIL because he screamed bloody murder when he got paint on his hands and didn't calm down until he was in the tub and all the paint was off. Also, coloring doesn't exist in my world because he keeps EATING the damn crayons. So arts and crafts are just gonna have to wait.

Still loves his Veggie Tales over everything else, but also likes Sesame Street, Word World, Superwhy, Sid the science kid, Wonder Pets, and Handy Manny.

He's busy, busy, busy - and some days it seems like he's going to go through the terrible two's early because he throws major tantrums over lame stuff. He's been sort of a bad napper lately, but I'm counting my blessings because he goes to bed SO EASY, and sleeps from 8:30pm to 7:30 or 8am...WOOOOOOOOOOOOO - thankyajesus!

He's so full of smiles and laughter and shrieks of delight - it just melts my heart to see him be such a happy little guy. I'm still even amazed that he's MINE. Hubs and I quite often watch him running around and we'll nudge each other and go "we did that...".

It's just crazy to think about sometimes. And before I know it, he's gonna be two. NUTS

(this picture was taken in hub's work truck...a fun lunchtime spent with daddy!)

An explanation...

I should have known ALISON would find the one detail from the pictures in the last post that needs explaining...hehehehe

She wants to know what it says on the shirt that hubs is wearing in this picture:

So, hubs and my brother AJ get together about once a week and watch a show on the BBC called Top Gear. It's actually a really good show, very funny and entertaining...but also all about cars and anything else with a motor in it. They have a professional driver on the show called The Stig....who's a total badass, and each week drives a different car around a track and they rate it against all the others. Usually the cars are super expensive high end cars... Nobody knows what The Stig looks like because he's always wearing a white driving suit and a helmet. So last year for Christmas, we got my brother a shirt

and then for hub's birthday - they gave HIM a shirt (they were a wee bit worried he'd be offended....but when hubs cracked up and proceeded to put it on and wear it proudly, they stopped worrying)

I should do a post about hubs and all his nutty t-shirts one day...

You should all know that when I met him, he always wore PRESSED long pants...a button down shirt with a leather jacket...and perfectly gelled hair. He wouldn't be caught dead in shorts and a t-shirt...no way. And then we started dating - and it was a downhill slide after that. He doesn't wear anything BUT shorts and t-shirts. And ironing doesn't exist in our world - it's all about a wet washcloth and a toss in the dryer. Classy!

I think I ruined him...

Picture Post

I have been reminded (thank you Joanna!) that it's been way too freaking long since I posted pictures of Adam. The summer was a whirlwind and I can't believe it flew by so quickly (although I am SOOOOO enjoying this rain!!!).

So here are some pictures taken during a recent trip to Avila Valley Barn...

We started out in the little kids hay maze, and oddly - Adam refused to actually touch the hay.

Notice how his little hands are clenched together - ha!

So then hubs decided to try out the big maze...I was gonna go too, but once I saw how narrow the whole thing was, my claustrophobic side kicked in and I made it about 2 feet before I hightailed it outta there. I stood at the exit and waited for my boys
Check out Adam's face...methinks he's not-so-much into the maze thing The boy has reached this point where getting him to actually look at the camera and smile is a near impossible feat. I'm afraid I have no cheesy smiling pumpkin patch pictures...maybe he's going Emo on me, I have no idea...but I can say that the majority of the time, I look like a IDIOT trying to get him to look at the damn camera. Good thing he's cute anyway
I have a story about our visit with this cow: While we were standing here looking at the cow - which is QUITE OBVIOUSLY a cow. This girl walks up - probably in her late teens or early twenties - and she goes "ummmm, what is this? Is this a cow? It doesn't LOOK like a cow..."

I gave hubs the eyebrow raise like is this girl kidding me right now?

and then she starts talking to the cow and says "are you a cow? you don't LOOK like a cow!"

You guys, I seriously have ridges in my tongue from biting it because DUDE (and for the record, she was not a foreigner...just a red blooded american dingbat) I don't get it...how could a girl that age not know a cow when she sees one?

Here we are going on a hayride...again, boy NOT looking at the camera

Our attempt at a self portrait....only oops - cut out AJ our second attempt...capturing the perfect DIGGING FOR GOLD portrait. ACK...boys!

Lesson Learned...

Today - hubs and I attempted to go to Barnes and Noble in downtown SLO to use a gift card we've had hanging around. It was an impromtu trip thus we had no stroller or backpack for the boy. We had faith...we shrugged and told each other "He'll be fine".
We walked out of there empty handed and frazzled and vowing to never leave home without a stroller ever again.
Our shopping trip went like this:

Enter store carrying child
Cruise around for a few minutes looking at the tables full of books
Child starts to squirm and flail around like his butt's on fire
Child gets granted permission to "run around"...and apparantly takes it literally
Hubs runs around store chasing the little man getting many "awwwws" from customers
Child proceeds to wreak havoc and pulls many books from the shelves
Hubs pick up books and I look up to see the back end of the child disappearing around the corner of the shelf...
I hastily run around the corner only to find many many many many other aisles of shelves the child has quickly disappeared into
Hubs goes in one direction
I go in the other
Hear giggling and books dropping on the floor
Find child...pick up books...
and for some (WTF WERE WE THINKING) reason decide it would be "fun and distracting" to ride the escalator upstairs
Hubs heads to the history section leaving me to hope the kids section will be fun and interesting enough
I quickly learn that the kids section is worse because all the books are lower and smaller and there's more of them
Child is squealing and running faster then I think possible through the kids section
We round a corner and find two parents with children sitting quietly in their laps reading books together
Right then is when my child finds the stuffed animals and proceeds to pull them ALL off the shelf and toss them onto the floor...
Then squeal at the top of his lungs and tear down another aisle.
I quickly pick up the stuffed animals and cram them back on the shelf ignoring the laughter from the parentals
Only to run around the corner and find my kid in the coffee shop with a ceramic mug in his hand
(why oh why would they put the kids section right next to the breakables section???)
I run over and snatch it from him and tell him NO
Child laughs and runs over to a table of people shouting 'HI!!!!" at the top of his lungs
and then turns around and tears back into the kids section finding more stuffed animals neatly placed underneath a display table....and then not-so-neatly undisplays them while I sigh and hang my head in defeat
Some poor employee there is gonna have to redo all those lovely displays
At this point, hubs finds us...we give each other the "abandon ship" nod...scoop up the child...and bail outta there.

The boy is BUSY :)