Things I am not looking forward to

I like this picture of the Mason monkey because you can really see how blue his eyes are. It's crazy to have this little blue eyed boy, he looks just like his daddy.

Things are bumping along around here. We are currently down to just one kiddo as our big boy went out to the family cabin with his Nana, Pa and aunt and uncle. Without us. It's great for him, because he is having a blast with lots of Skyler only time. It's a bummer for us because nothing sounds better than being on the lake with sunshine and our boy. Sigh. It's all in part to preparing for this upcoming week when Andy will be gone the entire week for business in New York. Leaving me and the two kids to fly solo. To say that I am terrified is an understatement. So having Skye off my hands for a couple of those days will be helpful. Still, I miss my big boy and I wish I was there with him. I also wish that I didn't have a week of solo parenting ahead of me. Not all wishes come true apparently. So aside from the fact that I blog less in general now, I likely will be completely AWOL this next week as showering will be a monster accomplishment, let alone finding internet time.

Hodgepodge

I don't currently possess enough motivation, or brain cells, to create a coherent post. So here's random for ya:

- I am still in wonderment in how very different our boys are in looks. Skyler is brown like me, and Mason is (so far) white like his daddy. White skinned and blue eyed. Genetics are a funny thing.

- Pumping is going better, but I am still going to be so glad to be done with it. The question is when? Pumping will be easier, and make more sense, when I go back to work (at 12 weeks). Just wishing there was a more efficient way to do all this.

- Not sure if it is just me, hoping it's not, but I am still working to find room in my heart for two little people. Don't get me wrong, I love both boys dearly, but it's a different kind of love. I have known Skyler for two years now and love the person I have come to know him as. Mason is a love for the sake of loving, I don't really know him yet. This and the process of watching Skyler struggle daily with sharing "my mommy", it can be heartbreaking. This gets easier, yes?

Mmmm, Coldstone

My two year old...

...says and does the funniest things.

-This morning I heard pounding coming from the kitchen. What was he doing, I wondered. He was using my deodorant (that he had purloined from upstairs) to smash a stray piece of mandarin orange. Why? Because he thought it was a spider, or so he said.

-I was changing the diaper bag out of his pail as Skyler looked on. He announced, "Yucky, yucky poopy. Yuck, don't eat it". Correct my dear, and don't worry I won't.

-He was "helping" out in the yard today with his little green rake. He began to swing it a little wilder than appropriate and I suggested he not, since he didn't want to hurt himself. He raised the tool skyward and announced, "Skyler hurt the sky?", and looked concerned. He's empathetic and apparently much taller in his own head.

Just to mention a few :).

That's new

We are "potty training" the mister. I use that term oh so loosely, because really we aren't doing anything active in this endeavor beyond asking him if he wants to use the potty every hour or so, and assisting him if he assents. He uses it about five times a day, give or take, and hasn't really shown any dislike towards the process. This all leads to my story about how I was just summoned by our sleepy child so that he could use the potty. Now Skyler, and I am sure many other two year olds, uses any number of excuses to avoid bedtime. Saying he needs to potty could likely have been one of them, but since we are trying this "training" I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. Sure enough he had to go, and did, and then pulled up his own little pants, flushed the toilet and allowed himself to be put back to bed. That's new.

And so that you aren't left with all story and no pictures. Some other things that are new:

Skyler tries to take pictures of himself, with varying levels of success. Mostly he just holds the (wrong side) of the lens up to his eyeball and says "Skylah cheese!". I helped him with this one.


My child likes to pick things up and hold them with his toes. This lovely and strange trait is sadly inherited from me.

Skyler is getting better at handling, and not eating, play doh. He was rolling out 'snakes' here, which always live a short life before being mauled flat into a birthday cake.

One last "new" thing. Be sure to stop over and congratulate Carrie and family on their new arrival, baby Kyla. She is especially new as she entered this world a bit early. Be sure to leave a nice encouraging comment as they go through this new phase of life.

Disconnect

Sorry for the lack of posting lately, and likely to come. My internet decided to abandon me last week and the weekend visit from comcast failed to restore it. Apparently my router is the issue and dear comcast only troubleshoots their own equipment, of which my router is not. Thanks for the visit anyways. So until I figure out how to fix my router and/or purchase a new one... I am sans internets for the majority of the time. *Sigh*

Bring your child to work day

I brought (one) of mine, how 'bout you?

Deja Vu

I had completely forgotten something that started occurring towards the end of my pregnancy with Skyler. Every once and a while, when he would move, I could hear a distinct 'popping' sound. Like a little click of a joint, or something like that. I think I would have forgotten that piece of information forever if it hadn't happened again today when Mason was doing his morning calisthenics. The very same sound. So many things have been different between these two pregnancies, but this little piece of identical really ties them together. Any one else ever have one of these moments?

While you're waiting

Sorry, no big news from the ultrasound yet... that's not till later this afternoon. While you are waiting though here's some bits from dinnertime last night. I am very fortunate in that my husband cooks, and cooks well, so I have the luxury of spending that time with the kiddo while we wait for our yummy dinner. This was just MR bumming around and being his goofy self.

Comedy of errors

It all started yesterday. Well maybe it all really started this past Monday when BL left for his business trip. It's his first with the new job and he was scheduled to be away until returning late tonight. Of course the day he left was the day we found out MR had pneumonia, and so started our week of containment and crankiness. It was generally bearable, aside from the extra tantrums and poopy diapers, until yesterday morning. I decided that we needed out of the house, even if in some small way, so I prepared us for an outing to grab some starbucks and go for a drive. The getting ready process finished we got out the door, which I promptly locked, and I started the car to defrost. While waiting for this to happen the kiddo and I walked to the mailbox and spent some time wandering around in the front yard. The car started looking habitable so I went to open the door. It didn't open. The car was running, and the doors were locked. With my purse, cell phone, extra set of keys and everything else that might have possibly saved me from this awful situation. It was a frosty 8:30 am and I was locked out of house and running automobile with my sick kid. Great. The one small fortunate thing in this all is that we only live about a mile from where my mom works, so I headed out with MR and walked to her work. This in itself was no small task as the MR is currently in a no-hand-holding phase so I had to carry him the whole way. Hello braxton-hicks, which by the way have already started. Fun thing about second pregnancies. We made it to her work, called AAA and half an hour later I was once again reunited with all my worldly possessions. We still went for starbucks.

Have you ever

Found this on another blog and thought it worth the effort to see just where I stand. The things I have done/experienced are in bold. So, have I ever...

1. Started your own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Bathed in a river
7. Been to the Taj Mahal
8. Walked on a glacier in Alaska
9. Caught and held a snake (just the little ones:)
10. Spoke in front of a big crowd
11. Bungee jumped
12. Had a whirlwind love affair that broke your heart
13. Found an arrowhead or fossil
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Rescued an animal
16. Ate sweet breads, glands or tripe (blech, no and not likely)
17. Seen Mount Rushmore in person
18. Grown your own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hiked to base camp on Mt. Everest
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Watched an animal being born
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Learned a foreign language
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Stayed up for more than 24 hours
31. Trained a dog to do cool tricks
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community
36. Can drive a stick shift car
37. Won over $1000 in a raffle or lottery
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
43. Been serenaded (by a group of homeless drifters in college, strange story)
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Broken a bone
47. Started your own business
48. Quit a job because you were totally unhappy
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the Eiffel Tower
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain passionately
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in
55. Been in a movie (believe it or not)
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Joined a prayer group
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
62. Gone whale watching
63. Received flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten caviar
72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the changing of the guards in London
77. Broken something extremely expensive
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80.Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Got a tattoo (not yet, waiting till I am done stretching)
83. Been to a coffee shop in Amsterdam
84. Seen the aurora borealis in person
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Toured the UN
95. Hiked to Machu Picchu
96. Swam in the Indian Ocean
97. Conversed with someone when neither of you spoke each others language
98. Dirty danced
99. Been stung by a bee
100. Acted in a play

38 out of 100, I suppose I have some work to do. Though I don't ever intend to get the chicken pox nor do I think BL would approve of my having a whirlwind affair at this point in time, so maybe I can just consider those off the list as well.

Too lazy for a title

Some random things. I wanted to thank everyone for their responses to my Two and Through post, it was really insightful to hear your different opinions especially coming from so many varied backgrounds. BL and I have come to the conclusion that even we won't know for sure what we want until we get there. We will go through this (hopefully healthy) pregnancy and then wait, a year and a half maybe two years, and see how we feel then. I have always used pills for birth control, something I really dislike and honestly was never very good at maintaining. So following this pregnancy I will likely look into something a little lower maintenance such as an IUD. I think we are both leaning towards the comfort of having only two, but then who knows how we will feel several years down the line. I agree with what many of you voiced, that a tubal ligation or vasectomy seems scarily permanent so early in the game. So we will bide our time and wait to see if those measures are truly warranted for us.

One other random item that made my day, I filled my tank for only $40.00 today! It's usually $60.00. I kept watching the dollars move up while pumping thinking that this was the slowest tank of gas ever, since I had been sitting there a while and it had only reached $35.00. Then *click*, all done at 40! I knew prices had declined, but seeing $2.67 on the pump and feeling twenty bucks richer sure felt good. How much is gas in your neck of the woods?

In the meantime

We have been continuing to move at a pretty frenetic pace around here with the house stuff, having a housewarming in the wings just a few weeks from now we are back to working on projects in an attempt to pull even more together before everyone sees it. We have already accomplished a lot, so it doesn't seem as pressing to finish these few more tasks- it would really just be the icing on the cake.

This past weekend we had some really exciting tasks, organizing the garage and cleaning out the spare bedroom which had quickly become the junk room. Though it wasn't as fun as decorating or painting a room, the results were definitely rewarding. Having a functional and organized garage space really helps life feel more manageable. I am not reminded of the mess that waits everytime I take the trash out, and now all of MR's old baby stuff is tidily organized in tupperware containers just awaiting it's future use.

Unfortunately having chosen so many of our paint colors already, as well as having painted so many rooms, we are now really starting to get down to the nitty gritty with filling in the remaining spaces. BL has been kind enough to give a pretty liberal amount of leeway in directing this process, but now that the spaces are fewer it seems that the decision process is a little more heated. I am trying to come to terms with this, in my realization that he has a say too... I just haven't been very good at it just yet. Ultimately we will figure something out, at the moment we just need to take a step back and try to find some common ground.

In kiddo related news, following his little stomach bug he had a little relapse in his eating habits. He generally would try anything we would give him, at least once. After he was sick he staunchly refused anything that wasn't in puree form, and even that was a battle. We finally put our foot down and left it at, he will eat when he is hungry. So we went through a week long process of putting food in front of him and then waiting. And often being rejected. Finally, in the last few days, our happy eater seems to have returned. BL made a yummy lemmongrass chicken soup the other night and MR slurped that right up. He has continued to resume his willingness to consume since then (knock on wood). I am beginning to understand how some toddler's palates become so limited, they are picky little buggers sometimes.

Finally, and most exciting, there's some good news over in the Soupbowl household! Go over and congratulate Carrie and family on their exciting development(s).

I'm it!

It's been a while since I did one of these, AND I finally-finally figured out my wireless. So what better way to celebrate than to kill time with a time honored internet tradition!? Kristine asked, so here we go, 7 random facts about me:

1-When I was first pregnant with MR I knew. We had gone through a couple of negative pregnancy tests, shows what they know, and BL began to think that I really wasn't pregnant. But I let a few weeks pass, knowing all along, and sure enough- Pregnant! I am wondering if it will be the same next time around...

2-I hate the numbers 4 and 34, and will do what I can to avoid them. I can't tell you why I dislike them so much, but I most definitely do.

3-I am really apathetic towards food. I truly enjoy a good meal, when it is prepared for me. If BL wasn't such a wonderful cook and I was largely responsible for my own consumption I would likely be living off of quick fix meals and boxes.

4-When I was in high school my aerobics teacher was an overzealous advocate of women's safety and preparedness for every possible terrible situation we might ever find ourselves in. She was always telling us the latest awful story that had been passed around in an e-mail forward. One story she told us was about a man who would hide under parked cars and wait for women to pass close enough for him to slash their Achilles tendon- then to take advantage of them. I have since never walked up to my parked car without glancing underneath the adjacent cars, just to make sure.

5-My bad for me but oh so good treat of choice is a Hostess apple pie. I know that those things are entirely artificial, but they are so damn delicious.

6-The current tally of pictures I have taken of MR since his birth (according to Picasa) is a little over 2,000. I have a problem.

7-BL and I are high school sweethearts. We started dating half way through senior year of high school and we continued dating through our college years to get married a year after graduation.

Now for the tags, and you're it:
-Soon to be mother of three, Kristi
-Almost mother of two, Jessica
-Mama to mini-Hunk, The Burp Cloth Babe
-My go-to source for new goodie recipes, Jamie
-Newly mother to three, Mary
-My fellow Northwester, Ann(ie)
-Little Elvis' mama, Meredith

Blog stew

So lots-o-stuff on the agenda tonight, we have been up to quite a bit around here. First off, and most exciting, we have found a house! Hooray! Here's the kiddo in what (as of the 25th) should be our new kitchen.

We put in our offer about a week ago, and after some back and forth they accepted! We have already taken care of the inspection, and thanks to it being a pretty new home (2003) things are all a go. The biggest issue with the place is that it will need to be entirely re-carpeted. It was a foreclosure, thanks economy, and the previous tenants seem to have taken the news hard. At least I hope that is when they decided to let the animals start using the floor as their own personal toilet. If they lived like that before, then ewww. So we are getting all new carpets for the place. So assuming everything goes to plan and our tentative schedule sticks we will close on the 25th and finish moving in by early September. Yay!

In other news, the kiddo has a doctor's appointment tomorrow. Finally. He should have been in a month ago, but since moving back here to Vancouver and having to set up and appointment with a new physician- it just took a little bit longer than one would have hoped. Funny thing is this new doctor is in fact an old doctor, he was BL's pediatrician when he was a little boy. Pretty full circle. Hopefully everything goes well, and we will see just how big our boy is now.

On a random note, our child now says squirrel. It sounds more like qwirl, but this has to be the most random word he has learned so far. It's crazy how he picks up words and sounds now. Tonight in the bath tub I was singing him a silly song and he started trying to sing it back to me, in his own words of course, but the tune was there. He has also gotten a lot better, and consistent, and pointing out his body parts and following through with basic commands. He's becoming quite precocious.

To finish it all off, some more water play photos. Nana and Grandpa got him a water table toy for him to play with over at their house. Little do they know that he would rather play with the hose.

Life update

So I haven't really done much (or any) updating on my life in the greater scheme of things. Mostly because things have evened out and there isn't really much to update on, but also because I think it would end up sounding like a broken record. We are still here with my parents, though it hasn't even been quite two months it often feels like longer. It took a lot of readjusting for all of us to learn how to live "comfortably" under the same roof. I use parentheses because there are still glaring areas of discomfort, mostly focused around my lazy-ass brother and the obvious anxieties that come along with trying to live amongst other people's belongings with a toddler. We have come back around to a semblance of a schedule with the mister, which makes everything a little bit better. He has finally accommodated to his new surroundings and really seems to be thriving in his new proximity to all of the family members (both in and out of this house).

BL has been extremely diligent in his search for a job, a process that has had both highs and lows. The great thing is that in the small period of time that we have been here there has been an exponential increase in the number of interviews and opportunities that he has been fielding. We spent almost a year prior to moving with him trying to find a job remotely and he only went on one interview. Since the move he has been on atleast four or five, and he continues to find more options. Of course the downside is that none of these has come to fruition. One offering turned out to be a scam, the latest possibility just wouldn't produce sufficient income soon enough. I continue to be impressed by BL's ability to rebound and endure through all of this, he really has thrown himself wholeheartedly into this search. Good things are bound to happen.


As for me, I am continuing to adjust myself to being back in the office and away from my baby. I have gotten used to the new schedule, and I do enjoy the interaction and reason to shower daily, but it is still incredibly hard to walk out that door every morning knowing that I won't see my sweet boy's face for another eight hours. It's hard, especially at this age when so many changes are occurring and my little guy is growing bigger every day.


Speaking of the MR, he has been doing big things as of late. He has started walking small distances unassisted. He won't use walking as a consistent mode of transportation, but he has taken up to ten steps forward all on his own. We figure his continued hesitance is more of a mental block. He is more than physically capable, he will literally run in circles while holding one of our hands. It is just hard for him to compute that our hands are not what is keeping him upright, his little legs are. The kiddo has also started building up his vocabulary. He now says hi, bye, more, dog, dada, mama (sounds more like meh-meh), and best/worst of all - ow. He started saying ow because I said ow when he bit me one day. I stood him in front of me and told him no, ow, biting hurts mama. And what does the little booger do? Looks me straight in the eye, grins, and says loud and clear 'Ow!'. He continues to mock me with this particularly when he is feeling impish or extra tired.


To top this off and call it good here are some pictures from the past weekend. It has been hot and sunny round here and we have been taking full advantage of it all. We took a walk down to the local farmer's market with a couple of our childless friends on Saturday, and then on Sunday we met back up with our other pair of friends who have the sweetest little girl Mae. She is a little over ten months old and brimming with vitality. She and the MR have had playdates off and on over the past months but this was the first time where their age difference didn't seem to matter since she can now crawl around on her own. Overall a pretty good way to spend a weekend.

Bibliophile

I am so stealing this from Soupy. I've been thinking that I need to make a list of books I need/want to read, so this shall help get me started. The most popular gift to give me is a gift card to the nearest Barnes & Noble (I am currently in the possession of two from my latest birthday). I love to wander into the store knowing I will walk out new stories in hand. But I often find that all those books on my mental list escape me when I am going up and down the aisles, and it is only later that I remember the books I meant to get. Several are on this list. Thirty seven down, sixty three to go.

"The Big Read reckons that the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books they've printed. "

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Italicize those you intend to read.
3) Underline the books you LOVE.
4) Reprint this list in your blog so we can try and track down these people who've read 6 and force books upon them

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien; I am such a nerd, but I love these books. I get lost in them
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling ; I heart this series, it's not just for kids and it just wraps you up in another world. Love Harry Potter!
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible --some
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare -- perhaps not the complete, but quite a few
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden; I am mildly embarrassed to admit this, but I read through this under the pretense that I was really reading a true to life memoir. I was pissed when I got to the end and realized it was a work of fiction. Still love it though.
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown; I don't generally enjoy modern or mystery books, this is an exception to the rule
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery ; what little girl hasn't?
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens ; on more than one occasion, always for school
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez ; starting this one tonight!
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom ; heard many good things about this one but have never made time to read it myself
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo ; true, it can be longwinded here and there but this is still one of my all time favorites. If you can't handle the book see the play!

Bubble Bobble

Seriously, how cute is this goober? BL loves to fill MR's bath up as high as (safely) possible, and always makes sure there are lots of bubbles for his boy. Tonight was especially bubbly, as you can tell.

In non-cute picture related news, we have lots going on around here. We have started the liquidation process of our animal stock, which is both very sad and also very relieving. They were our first babies, so it is disappointing that we couldn't see the relationships through, but we also know that this is the beginning of a better path for all of us. One of our dogs has already been placed in a new home with someone who already had a dog of her breed, our other dog is on a waiting list for a shelter. Apparently this is a high volume time of year for shelters. Our kitties too have been taken in.

BL just had a second interview for a promising position with an insurance company. It's a management training position, which would give him exactly the experience he is looking for. Hopefully we will be hearing some good news early next week. Thing good hired thoughts for us.

And finally, me and the mister are going to be flying solo (well as solo as it gets around here) without BL as he is off for his best friend's bachelor party/weekend. So I am looking forward to lots of quality time with the kiddo, though I am sure I will be glad to have the husband back on Sunday.

Things are finally starting to resemble something like normalcy around here.