Colin Attends His First Birthday Party!

We had a great time this afternoon! Colin got to attend his very first birthday party for his friend Carley Genzer. Our friends Sally and Ron were members of the "Babies Born in 07" group with us and Carley is the first of the group to hit one year old. I worked closely with Sally for years and there were six of us at my company who had babies within months of each other. I can't believe that Carley is already a year old...it seems like just yesterday that I was visiting Sally in the hospital while I myself was big and pregnant. Time flies! Anyway, Colin was adorable as always and he got to pose with his little girlfriend Aubrey (Ellen's daughter). How cute are they?!? :-)

My new neighbor is finally here!

We had a wonderful day today! My best pal Ellen moved just around the corner yesterday and Colin and I went over to see the place this afternoon. The house is beautiful and I am terribly jealous!! :-) Colin got a chance to sit down and play with Aubrey, who is 6 months old. They are going to be best friends, I can already tell! When Aubrey sat down in front of him, he just went crazy! He was screeching and laughing and grabbing her hands and face. I kept having to pull him back and tell him to be extra gentle! She is just a little girl, after all! :-) It was the sweetest thing...I have never seen Colin so excited before. It will be so nice to have them close by now.

We went for a Wal-Mart run and I am happy to report that Colin managed to stay awake for the whole thing. Thank goodness! He is the sweetest little thing in the world...the whole time he just talked away to me. "ma ma ma ma ma...da da da da da". I just don't know what I ever did without him.

In cooking news, I thought I would document that I made Balsamic Glazed Chicken Breasts tonight and it was fantastic! I am getting better and better at cooking and I think I am well on my way to cooking something Colin will love one day. :-)

My Message Board

I think I may just be done for good with the message board that I have been participating in. I joined the board back when it was an Expecting Club and have stuck around until now. Most of the women are nice and helpful, but there is so much crap on this board that I am always laughing to myself and staying away from it. But today tops it all and I seriously think this is the end for me. A woman posted, "Amy Poops in the Potty!" and then goes on to post about how her EIGHT MONTH OLD BABY is now potty trained. I am not kidding. She goes into detail about how she does it and everything. Not only do I feel sorry for her baby girl, I also feel like reading this constant crap is hurting more than helping. I mean, COME ON! That is just foolish on a lot of levels. I wish there was a message board for "Highly Educated Non-Idiot Mothers Who Don't Have Any Desire to Compete Regarding Milestones and Are In Touch With Reality". Can someone direct me to that? ;-) Poops in the potty...love it.

Mommy Lunch!

I made it to my first mom's club meeting today!! We had lunch at Central Market on the patio...it was a beautiful day for it and we had a great time. It was a small group, only 5 moms were there including me. There are about 70 members total in this group, but there are at least two activities every day around our area, so you can pick and choose the events you can make. The women I met today were all very nice and their kiddos were cute! I am so happy...I was really nervous beforehand, but it turned out to be a nice experience.

Colin is hitting the age where he hates to be confined. Gone are the days of him sleeping peacefully in his little carrier while the grown-ups eat. He is into everything and does not want to stay in his stroller. I spent the whole lunch with Colin in my lap while he grabbed at every bite I was taking and everything that was on or around the table. It definitely makes it hard to eat! :-)

Another thing that I also noticed today...Colin is a lot bigger than most of the babies his age! There were two boys there today who were within a month of Colin's age and they were a lot smaller. In fact, when I first met the group, I assumed the babies were in the 3-5 month age range. Nope...they were 7-8 months old! We have a history of big babies in my family, and it looks like I came through on that one. My sisters were seriously the biggest babies you have ever seen! They were so freaking cute...we called them "sumo babies". It looks like I am following in the family tradition with my little man!

Yummy Little Man!

As I am sitting here checking my email, this is the view from behind my chair. Due to the fact that I want to eat him up, I thought I should post to the world how precious my little baby is on this fine Wednesday. I love him SO! :-)

Today

Sometimes I hesitate to blog when there is literally nothing going on. I wonder if anyone wants to read the ramblings of my uneventful days, but then I figure that I am really writing this as a journal for me to look back on more than anything else. I am so bad about keeping a journal or scrapbook, so this is it for me. I know it will be fun to read about the mundane things that Colin and I did together when he was a baby, so I am going to keep it up. So I apologize in advance for how boring this must seem to readers. :-)

Colin went to the pedi today to check on his itchy red eye. They gave him a prescription for a topical cream which I am praying knocks this out. The doctor was pretty confounded by the whole thing. He said if the eye is not 100% by Monday, he wants to see him again for a referral to an eye doctor. I really hope this helps!! By the way, during said trip to the pedi, I came very close to doing bodily harm to one of the receptionists. Colin and I were running late...he had barely woken up from his nap in time to make the appointment and as usual I was running around like a lunatic to be on time. I am so worn out from Colin's sleeping issues this week, so imagine a woman who is at the end of a very thin rope, if you catch my drift! :-) We blow into the office with 5 minutes to spare (I was proud!) and I check in while blotting at the thin line of perspiration that was beading on my brow. WHEW! We made it! Or so I thought. This girl looks at me and says,

"Ma'am...we have a new policy that I see you need to know about. If you
arrive 5 minutes or more past your appointment time, you will be forced to
reschedule and come back at another time."

I kid you not. Word for word, that is what she said. I look at her with all the surprise that I feel and say, "Are you serious?" To which she says, "Yes, and you were cutting it pretty close today, so I needed to let you know." No words, people. No words.


A random rant to end my day...I am having the hardest time attending any of the events in my new mommy group. They have tons of activities that sound like such fun, but all of them happen when Colin is napping! Colin naps every morning starting at around 10 or 11 and then again in the afternoon at around 3:30 or 4. So if anything falls around lunch time or in the morning hours, we can't make it on time! And not a lot happens at around 1 or 2, which would work for us. It sucks because I really want to get out more, but I know better than to mess with naps. I think Colin may have to be a bit older before we get really involved. I know he will cut out that second nap eventually, so hopefully that will help.

Anyway, night night! :-)

Happy Easter with a TOOTH thrown in!

This turned out to be a beautiful Easter weekend. My family came up as planned and we had a great lunch here at the house on Saturday. Jer's parents also came over, so we had a big group all together at once for a change! Colin also got to hang out with his cousin Jackson, which was too cute for words. They are going to get into so much trouble together one of these days! :-) Today we said goodbye to my family and headed over to Jer's parents house for Easter dinner. We got back not too long ago and I just tucked Colin in to bed. All in all, a really good weekend.

The big news of the weekend is the official arrival of Colin's first tooth!!!! I noticed a tinge of white on his gums while giving him his breakfast on Friday morning and just about lost my mind! I called Jer immediately to tell him the good news. I still can't believe that my little baby has his first real tooth coming in! I can see more of it today...just a nice white tooth top swimming in all those pink gums. It is beautiful, if you ask me. :-) He is so funny about it! He keeps running his tongue over and over his gum line trying to figure out what is going on. He has been literally pouring drool and chewing on everything. He especially likes to chew on his rubber alligator bath toy. The only downside is that the poor little guy is in a lot of pain. I have not slept in days...he wakes up at all hours of the night and then has a really hard time getting back down. I don't know if all the teeth are going to hurt him as bad as this one is, but I sure hope not. He has been miserable...running light fevers and just not feeling good all the way around. Today he seemed in a better mood and had two really good naps, so hopefully we have weathered this particular storm. :-) Colin has also started consistently going to bed an hour later than he used to. He used to go down at 7:30 like clockwork and ever since daylight savings time, it can be anywhere from 8:30 - 9:30. I am going to have to pick a time and start putting him down on a schedule. I thought he would even out after the time change and go down on his own like he used to, but it is not happening. I know he does better on a set schedule with sleep, so I am going to probably pick 8:30 and stick to it.

You may also notice in the pictures that Colin's irritated eye is back in full force. It had cleared completely up, but started back again last week. We have been giving the Zyrtec again, but I really don't think this is allergies. He itches that one eye constantly and it is so raw and red. There is not drainage or anything to indicate infection, but with allergies I would assume that both eyes would itch and he would be sneezy, etc. But he shows no other signs. I am going to take Colin back to the pedi tomorrow to check it out again.

The pictures are all from Easter weekend. The last shot is all of the loot from Colin's first Easter. Not bad! :-)