Wednesday, July 27, 2011

The best tomato soup recipe you will ever taste

After looking online for a tomato soup recipe, I decided they were no good. Any soup recipe that uses canned tomatoes is not the recipe for me. So I winged it, as usual. Thought this time, I hit jack pot. Mental note, write this one in my cook book. I remember having no luck on the invent a tomato soup recipe mission last year, so I have no idea what happened to me tonight but ladies and gents, here is the tomato soup recipe to knock your socks off...

Bring to a boil and simmer the following ingredients for about an hour
One coarsely chopped onion
Four small zucchini/cougettes, half inch slices
8-10 lbs fresh tomatoes, skinned
Zest of one lime
Juice of half a lime
Some fresh basil leaves
Salt and pepper (a lot more salt than you would think)

Once all of the veggies are tender, blend with emersion blender.

Add about 4-8 Oz sour cream, depending on how creamy you want it
Another handful of fresh basil leaves
An inch or two block of grated fresh parmesan cheese

Blend with emersion blender again.

It's so good that I am eating a bowl at 1030 at night instead of going to bed and considering how many jars of this I can either can or fit in my freezer.

I know what I'm eating for dinner tomorrow night. Where is my grilled cheese?!


Easiest way to skin a tomato (in my opinion)
Cut tomato in half through the stem
Cut the stem out of both sides
Lay cut side down on a tin foil lined baking tray
Broil/grill
an inch or two from elements for 8 minutes
Leave to cool and peel away the skins

Technically the correct wy to skin a tomato is to etch a cross in the bottom of it and blanch it in boiling water for 30 seconds then plunge into ice water, then peel. I think this is messy and time consuming. Just my two cents.

Fun... For a whle!

Tonight I had the pleasure of cutting our grass with a push mower. It really was fun at first, then it got boring and seemed like it was never going to end. I do not wish for this chore to be added to my list of many! Besides, I still have to clean up after dinner, tidy the house from the day, and of course sweep and mop the floor. Oh and stuff diapers, fold laundry and try and get to bed sometime today! Oh and I have skinned some tomatoes ready to make myself some soup.

I am anxious to get going on my new yard but I fear there isn't much I can do without Danny's help, nor before slightly cooler, wetter weather. I did find a huge area of poison ivy so I can spray it tomorrow. And any suggestions on how best to kill ant mounds are welcome. My big conundrum, and suggestions are welcome (please) is how to get rid of ivy growing along the ground (regular ivy, not the poisonous kind) without killing the lirope grass growing within it. Alternatively, do I learn to live with it, I just really don't like it and feel like it's trying to take over my yard.

The landscape gardener comes to look at the property tomorrow and give me a price quote on a fence, which I'm pretty excited about. I also feel like I can't get going on my new flower beds until I have a fence to work around. It's going to be a shame, I'm going to be digging up lots of nice grass, but there are bare patches in other parts of the yard, so I can populate them with the the grass I dig up.

On to cleaning I guess... Is there a spot to fit chargeable batteries somewhere on my person? I might need an external boost!

Monday, July 25, 2011

Much better, thanks

I am much better today, thanks. I can actually smell the Vicks I am sticking up my nose!

Found the iron but can't find the dog razors as of yet. Why oh why won't my meany husband let me unpack any of these darned boxes! Mind you, he isn't here...

Went over to Quail Creek today to vacuum and clean out the fridge... Poor place is like a jungle. I guess that's what happens if no one weeds in MS for a few weeks. The deer have also gone through the back yard with a fine tooth comb. They were even back there when I went out side for a look this afternoon, and were none to pleased to be disturbed. Snorting and blowing through their noses at me, staring me down, eventually they jumped back over the fence. Poor hostas, hydrangeas, lillies, all gone...

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Floor work out of a different kind

Some people have yoga, some people watch tv, I have an evening routine of a different kind these days. I tried timing my new floor work out tonight, but it got a little messed up with a phone call to Danny and a quick nibble on some strawberries, but it goes as follows (roughly) taking an approximate total of 30 minutes (if you don't include the distracting husband):
5 minutes to sweep dining room and kitchen
3 minutes to mop dining room and kitchen with snazzy Rubbermaid Reveal (you need one)
2 minutes to text Danny and eat some strawberries
5 minutes to pick up toys. That child of mine needs to learn to put away his own toys.
10 minutes to talk to Danny and eat some more strawberries
10 minutes to sweep living room and play area
8 minutes to mop living room and play area


If you would like to donate to the "buy my wonderful Mummy a robotic vacuum cleaner" fund please send cheques to 126 Daffodil Hill, Apalachian Trail, Will-Never-Get-There-Land, MS, 00000, USA. Made payable to Why Don't Mummies Get Paid. I appreciate your generosity greatly, coz those little buggers seem to be expensive. Alternatively, Christmas is coming up and at my age, a vacuum cleaner isn't a bad present... Don't quote me on that, Im just tired of sweeping this darned beautiful floor already.

We miss you already

Today our Papa left us for three weeks and we miss him already. New Mexico and then South Dakota, probably not fun.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

So so sick

Why does this happen to me all of the time? Henry gets a cold from the flight, gives it to me, gets better quickly (thankfully) then I am seriously sick forever more. When I blow my nose I start to cough. When I start to cough it resonates through my whole body with a dry hacking but there is something in that tight chest to come up. Then my eyes get weepy and I confirm that yes, I feel like a big huge piece of crap. In short, I feel terrible right now and am going to bed as soon as I have eaten enough food to stop my stomach from growling; it's 8 pm on a Saturday night, geees I live the high life.

This morning Henry, Tux, Mojo (the last two are our furkids) and I walked to the farmers market for the first time in our lives. It was awesome (apart from my having to pause to blow my nose and hack my little heart out every few steps, oh and having to pick up dog poo). Unfortunately no eggs, I figured it would be getting too hot, but we managed to squeeze another box of peaches, two boxes of blueberries, some more tomatoes, figs and pears into our stroller (yes, Henry had to share leg room with the peaches, poor soul). Now all we need is some good goats cheese and some crusty bread for a mouth watering dinner.

Today we drove to Bolivar, TN to visit Dannys extended family at the lake, despite him having a wedding and staying in Oxford. Yes I am a fantastic wife (are you reading this Danny?). Yes, I realize that probably contributed to my shear exhaustion. Anyways, I'm off to bed, but if you are ever unfortunate enough to feel crappy in the summer please please halve some nectarines, sprinkle them with raw sugar and drizzle a good balsamic vinegar into the pit holes then broil/grill until the tops turn black (about 8 minutes). Absolutely delicious. Very very comforting. In fact, so comforting, I may have two more nectarines before bed! The good thing about this is that you can use slightly unripe nectarines, if you are impatient, like me. Only bad thing about eating this (I'm on my second bowl) is that you have to wait while the nectarines cool down. Ugh.

Friday, July 22, 2011

Fantastic last day

Today was the last day of my vacation and it was fantastic (apart from being super sick).

Henry and I cycled to the baby doctor for H's one year check up. No waiting, for a change. The nurse had to prick his finger for an iron test, which didn't bother him at all. Nor did it bother him when she spent the next minute squeezing blood out of his finger. But when she put that bandaid on his little finger he had a fit and started crying his eyes out. It's always hard when he gets vaccinations too, he cried so hard with the first injection and there was still two to come. I took a packet of fruit jellies though, and his wailing cleared up pretty quick when I offered him a berry bunny. His health is great. Weight 19 lbs 10 oz, 8 th percentile. Height 30 inches, 50 th percentile. Head circumference 79 th percentile.

We dropped the bike off at home and walked to the park, where we spent ages playing on the slide and swings and just generally crawling around. Danny even popped by and dropped off a donut! After lunch H took an insufficient nap and was a little grumpy. We cycled to pick up our csa veg then cycled to the pool where we had a blast. Back to town to meet Papa for dinner at Ajax. I thought Henry would have been tired when we got home at 7pm, his usual bed time, but I put him on thie driveway briefly while I unpacked the trailer and he became engrossed in some tennis balls, rackets, softballs, and badminton rackets that were lying around, so we sat on the driveway for half hour. When I did put him to bed at 730 he went straight to sleep.

I am now putting myself to bed and hoping I sleep better than last night with this horrendous cold.

What a beautiful day with my beautiful little boy!

Thursday, July 21, 2011

I love being Mummy...

This evening Henry and I ate peanut butter and banana sandwiches for dinner (I had Nutella in mine also, but don't tell H). It wa delicious and there was no one to tell us off! Then we had strawberries for dessert and I even sprinkled sugar on mine!

We cycled to HomeDepot this afternoon to get a couple of things and narrowly escaped a killer thunderstorm!

H and I seem to have horrid summer colds, not pleasant. I'm sure it will make the little mans shots worse tomorrow at his one year check up.

Tomorrow perhaps we will have salad for dinner to make up for tonight!

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Home sweet home!

We got home late last night after a rather awful ride home from the airport. It was super late for Henry, around 10 pm Puerto Rican time, and he doesn't do well in the car, so he screamed for about the first 20 minutes, despite the fact that I sat in the back with him. He eventually fell asleep, only to wake up when Danny over took someone because he crossed over the things in the middle of the road to stop you drifting. He then screamed until about 2 minutes from the off ramp to get to the house, when he fell asleep again. We eventually got him to bed.

Today was lovely. Since we had no food in the house, we went to Big Bad Breakfast and it turns out the farmers market is now open on wednesday mornings, so I bought two boxes of peaches and some other fresh veg. Definitely a good start to the day. H and I went to the store and then he played happily on his own (a very rare occourance) while I put the groceries away. After lunch and a nap we walked to the square with Alison and Sophia to get ice creams and play on the courthouse lawn. What a beautiful way to spend an afternoon.

I feel pretty useless since I can't make any progress on the house during the day and during the evening I spend my time cleaning up after the day. All the while Danny is running himself ragged working too hard at everything under the sun. It now looks like he won't be able to take off before the new job which worries me a lot... He is just spread too thinly and needs a rest. His sense of duty is something I admire about him, but there needs to be some self preservation.

Well, finger tapping on this silly iPad is somewhat annoying and we don't have internet yet at this new house, so good night to you and apologies for no holiday pics, they will probably have to wait til Danny gets back from his field trip mid-August to set up the Internet and desktop. Sorry.

Monday, July 18, 2011

The end of the trip

Im tired but its been a good holiday.

I managed to get burnt yesterday for the first time. Sucks that I go the whole trip and dont get burnt and get a little toasty yesterday. Not a lot, just a little. Little man has stayed unburnt, thankfully, though he is a little Coppertone Baby with his brown arms and legs and little white toosh.

We had a fun few days at the posh resort nearby. We checked in early saturday morning for one night to get the perks that go with the resort. We took a private ferry to the private island and played on the beach for the day. Jade even stayed in with Henry after he had gone to bed, so that Danny and I could go out together! We took a stroll through the gardens, got dessert and strolled around the marina. Poor little Jadie wasnt sure if babysitters were allowed to go to sleep so she was desperately trying to keep her self awake, to no avail! Then yesterday we went to the beach in the morning where Jade and Danny rented a jetski and Henry played in the sand happily. We dig him a big hole and he just spends hours climbing in and out of it! I managed to get him to take a nap in the Ergo (which of course made us sweat like no bodies business!) and then we all went to the little waterpark on the resort where I took Henry on the tubing slide and he played with Therese and Jade in the kiddie pool. Apparently he got so excited about going down the kiddie slide with his Auntie Jade that he screamed and pointed in the line with the other kids!

Today is a quiet recovery day by the pool, H is napping and Im on my way now.

Tomorrow we head home on a 1pm flight, perfect for nap time in the Ergo. So I guess that means we had better go pack! We have stuff EVERYWHERE!

Going to get one last Pina Colada with dinner tonight, Henry is addicted! I even put some in his sippy cup but he thought I was tricking him so he wouldnt drink it. When he suddenly realised I had given him some, he drank the entire cup!

Oh and butt rash is a little rough when he is sitting in a swim diaper all day and sand gets in the cracks, but hopefully it will clear up quickly when we get home. 1 year doctors apt Friday! Poor little man is going to need a vacation from the vacation to recover!

Monday, July 11, 2011

A day on the water

Henry slept like a baby, as it were, though this is a silly saying as babies don't really sleep well at all. So that meant both Mummy and Daddy slept well, which meant everyone was in a good mood this morning! Yeay!

I woke up early and just laid around waiting for H to get up, which occurred around 7am. We walked to the marina and looked at the boats and I was sweating before we got half way home - needless to say, its hot here! I left Danny in bed as long as I could and ended up waking him around 830am to check his email about the boating trip. Turns out you had to be there at 930am so we dashed around getting ready and Danny announces at 855am that he wants to go buy a floatie for Henry. So we head to the store, not stopping to look at a map. hmmmmm. So we get a little off route, but we did end up there, just 10 minutes later than we should have. So Danny flew into the Walmart and then drove to the boat dock like a bat out of hell, which is fine because he was just driving like a Puerto Rican. Speaking of which, there seems to be no rules of the road. People just pull out in front of people onto main roads, drive on the wrong side of the road when they feel like it (no cars along the side of the road to go round and there is a yellow line in the middle), park in the middle of the road... in short, they are crazy ass drivers and Im glad its not me driving us around as Id park up and start crying. And also its really weird seeing island/Mexican style houses and then a bunch of American stuff (Burger King, Pizza Hut, Church's Chicken, Walmart, Walgreens etc). And Danny is truly bothered by the fact that everyone has bars on the houses (windows, doors, patios, yards).

Anyways, we made it to the boat dock a little late, but in good time nonetheless. Since Im sure you love to hear about all of my many poo poo mishaps, Henry did a big stinker and I realised that the diaper thing I carry in my bag was still in the stroller from this morning. Oh dear. So we had no wipes. hmmmm. So I took him to the toilets and stuck his ass in the sink. I mean, its not like I havent done that before, regularly. It was a large catamaran and we got on quick enough to get a seat in the shade, thank goodness. I just think the sun here is so much stronger than at home. Henry was great, he just sat on my lap, dancing to the music. We sailed to a nice white sandy beach where Henry and I played in the sand. He stinking loved it! I kept burying him in the sand and he found it hilarious. He wasnt so keen on the salt water and cried when it went in his face a lot, but he liked sitting at the edge of the waves, as long as I lifted him up for the big ones.

He sat in the floatie (a bumble bee) on the boat with his bucket and spades and played happily for ages after lunch. As usual, everyone loved him and he was continually dancing to the loud music! At the next snorkeling location Danny and I took H with us in the floatie. He liked it alright for a while but I think he just wanted to see us because he would complain while our heads were in the water and laugh and be happy when we looked up at him. So I took him back to the boat and we floated around together next to the boat for a while. More playing in the floatie on the boat deck and lots of crackers and kiwi fruit kept the little man happy as Larry, despite no nap. So on the 3 minute car journey home, he went straight to sleep! He woke up briefly when we got him out of the car and then went straight back to sleep on my shoulder. Such a good little chappie.

After his nap we popped out for dinner and had a super hard time finding somewhere to eat and ended up at Pizza Hut because we were in a hurry. Strangely, everyone in there was Puerto Rican except for one other American looking family. I just think they arent really a culture that eats out all that much. There are tons of bars, just not very many local restaurants. We did drive around for a while looking for somewhere before we gave up and went to PH.

After a bath and a story, Henry went straight off to sleep and fingers crossed for another night like last night because I am whoopped!

San Juan tomorrow I think. Not a moments rest I guess.

Jadie comes in tomorrow night, so hopefully we can rest Wednesday as she will be tired from travelling and will want to play with H.

Oh and Wednesday is Henry's birthday, though with all the presents and parties a bit at a time, I feel like he has had a hundred birthdays already!


I just had a thought (yes, it hurt). I wonder what all of this travelling and activity is doing to Henry's development as a person. I mean, don't most kids just go to daycare and come home; with one family vacation a year, camping in North Carolina. He is a very very sociable person, but is that how he was born? Anna-Prescott and Collier, two of the kids he shares a babysitter with are 10 months apart in age and such different siblings. AP is very shy and quiet, while Collier is a little chatter box. Im sure their mum doesnt treat them terribly differently, so is it just how they were born? Was Henry just born a sociable young man? One of the things people always say about him is what a happy little baby he is, and yes he is a very happy little baby. Surely this is nothing Im doing - he must have just been born that way. Is it something I did pregnant? There is so much we just don't know. I like to think its just the way he is, that way I cant screw him up too much!

Sunday, July 10, 2011

Puerto Rico begins

Yesterday was long, seriously long. The travelling part wasnt so bad. Henry took a decent nap in his Ergo at the regular time. He ate airport and airplane food and all was looking good. He fell asleep on the drive from the airport to the condo and then we couldnt get him back to sleep when we got here. Hours of crying and us not giving in, then in the end he fell asleep, thankfully. But it didnt last long and I really didnt have the energy to do anything about it, so for the first time in his short life, he slept in the bed with us. oh dear. So of course I hardly slept because I was worried Danny would roll on him and to be honest, he looked so sweet asleep I watched him for a huge portion of the night. I was also hot because we raised the temperature in the room because he was sleeping without a blanket but I didnt bank on him spooning with me under the covers. And my foot was itchy. Put it all together, and the fact that he woke up at 630am, Mummy hardly slept last night. Though I wasnt so worse for wears today, thankfully.

The day started early but relaxed with a leisurely breakfast. Then someone suggested taking a ferry to the island which left at 9am so we rushed around getting ready and were actually out of the door by 830am ish. We drove around to a few of the wrong locations and eventually pulled up to the ferry spot to find out that people line up for tickets at 11pm the night before, to buy the ticket at 1am when the office opens. Needless to say, we ended up back at the condo pool, which was more than fine by me. It was then impossible to get Henry to nap for some bizarre reason. It took 1 hour and 40 minutes and even then he only slept 55 minutes. So he was very very tired this afternoon. We played at the pool again with our little fish. There is a baby pool thats just the right depth that he can wear his floatie and swim around without any help... unless of course he rolls on to his back. Then he is like a little turtle and he cant roll over, getting very annoyed at being stuck.

We had dinner at Ole Lelolai restaurant which was delicious but pricey. I get the impression its going to be an expensive holiday. I had Sea Bass with an olive tapenade and parmessan risotto, which Henry loved! He even ate the sea bass and Theresse's seafood paella.

Tomorrow I think the plan is a snorkel cruise on a catamaran, so we shall see how Henry likes that.

Im exhausted and was rather anxious for tonights bedtime situation, but to my surprise, he went straight to sleep. Thank goodness, I dont think I could have taken another night last night. Thank you H.

Friday, July 8, 2011

More

Every day we find a few more things wrong with this quirky old house, though as I learn to love it more, I fear Danny is distancing himself from it.

Today we learned that the ac pipes under the house are not insulated, so we are cooling our crawl space and there is only one working outdoor faucet, and it's by the front door. Neither thing should be a problem to fix, it just may be turning into a money pit!

Danny put up a temporary fence for the dogs, so it's nice to be able to put them out at night at not have to go with them

Off on our travels tomorrow. Got our baby floaties, our cloth nappies, more snacks than you would have thought one little man could eat in a year. Should be fun. Thought it's any wonder we have room for mummy and daddy's clothes with all the toys, snorkeling stuff and other crap we have packed.

We are mostly moved out of the other house now. Just some random stuff left in the garage, so that is good.

This evening Henry took his first joint bath with Sophia. It didn't go so well because he was super tired, but it sure did entertain the mummies!

Thursday, July 7, 2011

A day like anyother

Our first day in our new house was almost like any other day for Henry and I. All except we walked to the park around 9am to play on the swings, make some friends and slide the slide. That was a fun way to start the day and I'm sure how we will pretty much start all of our days off together from now on! We popped to the store where he proceeded to have a tantrum. These have been become more frequent lately and I dont really even notice, I just pick him up; well, that has got to stop. So yesterday I gently told him that nice little boys didn't behave that way and he was going to remain sitting in the trolley because he was fine. He screamed for the length of time it took me to chose a water filter and then got bored of it. I know he is fine, its just remembering to leave him when he screams bloody murder and not to do the automatic thing, pick him up. We are going to have to start 'time outs' for bad behaviour too as the more he learns, the more frustrated he gets when he cant place the puzzle piece in the right spot, for instance. He then proceeds to hit everything in sight and scream. Not going to fly little man. I just have to remember to deal with this behaviour.

It took me an entire nap time to sweep and mop the living space - did I mention I hate hard wood floors. I was just thinking about sitting down when a little voice started talking to me from his bedroom. oh well. I did buy this fantastic thing called a Rubbermaid Reveal though. Its basically a big broom type thing but with a microfiber cloth on the end and you spray water in front of it to mop the floor. Its quicker, uses less water and you get to wash the cloth when you are done for the next wash. I had it all clean and then when I walked the dogs at the park this morning before work, they trailed sand and morning dew back into the house, making it instantly filthy again. Looks like mopping is going to become a multi-week job for me. ugh.

Another major draw back of this new house is the somewhat lacking air conditioning. I had it set to 69F all day and it made it down to 73F. It blows a gale in the bathroom but the living room (where we currently sleep until the bedrooms are renovated - remember, waiting on the windows...) only had two vents and gets rather warm.

The biggest draw back of all (until the school semester starts up of course, and traffic is bumper to bumper at 8am and 3pm) is the ant situation. I watched the little army walk around the bait traps I set out last night. ugh.

But it really is a nice place to live. Our neighbour came by last night to bring us cookies and invite us to the neighbourhood party of the year at their house saturday night, which is terribly unfortunate because we wont be here. Shame, that really would have been a great way to get to know the neighbours. Though when our house finally becomes presentable, Ill have a party too!

Our new washing machine and drier are not only beautiful, but fantastic. Quiet, water efficient, quick.

The fridge is beautiful, though looks a little silly in the play room, where it will stay until we get a kitchen. Speaking of, it is the most poorly designed kitchen I have ever had the misfortune to use! I am so glad we are getting rid of everything in it!

Re-reading this, it really is silly the things that make a (or this) woman happy. Beautiful appliances, walking at the park...

oh and then in the afternoon we went to the pool where Henry was, as usual, the center of attention. So much so that all of the little children that wanted to play with him were using me as a jungle gym. Definitely made me realise I don't need 4 or 5 children, since I was keeping track of my son, generally had about two little kids climbing on my back for a piggy back and then two more wanting me to watch them swim. Tiring. Dinner time was hilarious yesterday too! I made pasta shells in homemade marinara with zucchini and squash. I tossed some cheese cubes in it too. So Henry starts out picking out the cheese cubes. I stabbed a shell with a fork and tried to feed it to him and he was typically very dubious of what that woman was trying to get him to eat so he picked it off the fork with his little fingers and carefully placed it to his lips. Then he ate once shell at a time carefully, then he lost all caution and was shovelling entire handfuls of pasta into his mouth! At the point at which he started to throw it on the floor, I decided we were done, though Mojo was enjoying the freebies. We had a bath and started to play. Papa came home and got a plate of pasta, sitting down with us in the living room/bedroom. Henry was like a whippit, over to Danny, standing up between his legs shovelling Dannys food into his mouth too! We had to take the plate away in the end! But you watch, when I try and feed him the same meal tonight, he will refuse to eat it! Babies!

Looking forward to actually spending some time with Danny on vacation next week, though even so, he will be at a photography class during the day. I just have missed him so much recently, he is always moving something.

Bramlett Boulevard, we are officially a part of your world now!

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

The BIG move

The big move got move up to today since I was put on mandatory leave by UT. No, I didnt do anything naughty, there is no juicy gossip, its just that I have 230 hours of leave and they dont have the money to pay me for it all so I am on leave to use it up. Timing actually worked out rather well because Danny wanted to move tomorrow but then tells me he has a photoshoot after work tomorrow. So I dont really know how they would have gone together.

No internet at the new house until August (what the heck is up with AT&T) so this is it folks. We will have a fantastic time in Puerto Rico, hopefully, and I will get some photos of H and I living in our hard hats for safety. Until then, Good Bye Quail Creek. I have to say, I am very very sad to be leaving you and I will most definitely shed several tears for you this evening.

Monday, July 4, 2011

I never thought Id say this

I never thought Id say this... But today, I hate my cloth nappies (diapers). Well, perhaps its not the nappies I hate, but the fact that Henry has worked out how to get them off. And yes, he had already done a huge poo poo in it. And yes, he did smear it over all of the teddy bears in his crib, all over his legs and arms and all over his crib. I went in there to get him up from his nap and I could smell it when I walked into the room. I thought that I had got lucky and it was an unusually small poo poo because there was just a little spot of it that I could see, until I picked him up and peeled back his binky (comfort blanket) and low and behold, there was the dookie of all dookies staring at me. Since blueberries come out the other end whole (probably just because he eats so many of them) I was rather concerned that he might have re-eaten the blueberries, but there was no poo poo on his face, so let's just hope that he didnt. And of course we were home alone, so I (gagging) had to peel off the sheets and deposit the mess in the toilet, occasionally stepping back for fresh air. Then I had to undo the bumper which took me so long, Henry came back into the room (from playing in the other room) to see what I was doing. Saw his binky (all covered in poo) lying on the floor, scooped it up into his arms and sat there watching me. He looked shocked when I yelled no and took his binky away from him. Poor little devil.

Mess dealt with, we ate some raisins on the kitchen floor and decided to go to the lake to meet Papa and the fam who were boating and grilling. It was over cast and rather cool out, which was a pleasant surprise, because I have to say, I had been dreading going out to the lake in the heat of the day. But 79F I can take rather nicely, and no sun screen was a treat too! Took Henry down to the lake with Papa and he just had a blast, total contrast to the last time we took him to the lake. He sat in a few inches of water, naked, playing with the sand, looking for stones and generally swimming around. He is a crazy baby though, he will totally swim out until his whole head is under water and just keep on trucking until you pick him up and take him to shallower water. Danny said he saw blueberries floating around, so they moved to a different part of the water! Fish food!

We left in time to avoid a total melt down and he went straight to sleep when I walked out of his bedroom by 730pm. Lovely surprise after yesterday. Trying to tidy up the mass of toys we are now faced with in this total construction zone of a house. Which reminds me, thank you so much for sending me a hot pink hard hat avid reader! I will send pictures when we move to the new house Wednesday; Henry even got a hard hat for his birthday, so we will both be safe, though his is yellow. By the way, of course the crazy old man is refusing to give us any money for the shed. Typical.

Oh and Happy 4th. Yeay for work tomorrow. NOT.

Sunday, July 3, 2011

Never a dull moment...

Today we had a first birthday party for our little man. A week or so early, I know, but we are on vacation for his birthday and this was the only weekend we had available.

I have never seen so many birthday presents, what a lucky young man. Thank you all so much. Its funny, I invited people whom I wanted to share Henry's first birthday with him. People I thought were important to him and people that were important to us. I didn't expect everyone to bring a present, or three. Which is silly because I wouldn't go to a birthday party without taking a present, so I should have realised everyone would bring one, but still, it was not necessary and you all are so very generous. It is going to take him a week to play with all of these presents! And I kept some of the ones we have bought him to give to him on his birthday.

I am exhausted. I stayed up until midnight last night decorating his cake, making salsa, chopping fruit, and so on. It might not sound late to you, but I usually go to bed around 1030pm and get up with Henry around 7am, no matter what time I go to bed! Needless to say, today was a little bit of a whirlwind for me! Henry woke up at 630am and I left him playing in his bed til 715am. We had breakfast and skyped Nanny and Grandpa to open our first present - a bumblebee bike, awesome! We played inside and out (before it got too hot) and generally had good times. When Henry went to nap I rushed over to Jill's house to get things rolling, and still I didnt really have enough time! We had lots of food, though most of it went so that was good. Lots of fruit, chips (crisps), crackers, meatballs... The kids all played in the pool for a good long time then Henry ate some cake, though he wasn't too into the whole smashing the cake into his face thing. He opened his thousands of presents and was not happy when each one got taken away so he could open the next! Whilst his papa was in charge of him he managed to throw himself backwards off the bench and landed on his back as I came walking out of the house and obviously went running over there. No blood - this time. Tidy up was quick and easy with lots of willing helpers. As he was playing on the deck right at the end, he managed to cut his foot, with lots of blood this time. Poor baby.

At first the bedtime ritual went more easily than usual, despite being 30 minutes later. Nappy on no problems, pjs on with no crying, to my surprise. But now, at 842pm we are still listening to his wails from his bedroom. He is just over tired we think, but he will not go to sleep. We have both tried to comfort him to no avail, so now we are leaving him, at a loss. 852pm and he is finally asleep.

What a day.