Voyages in Parenthood

What a whirlwind we have been on since last Thursday! Brock and I attended the Jimmy Buffett concert in NYC on Thursday night. We headed up early in the day to make sure we got there and missed all the traffic! Got into the city around 3pm, parked the car and went directly to Molly Wee's tavern (real convenient, a half block from where we parked the car!). We had a few beers and a little light lunch and headed out to walk around the city for a little bit before we met Bob and Linda at Todai for Dinner. We did end up at Brother Jimmy's BBQ for a Land Shark beer - we had been told that Brother Jimmy's would be the place for Parrotheads and believe me, from the sea of Hawaiian shirts we saw when we walked in, we were told right! We had a beer and chatted with one of the bouncers before we headed off to Todai for dinner. Now, I've heard of Todai at least once (or maybe every other) a month since I met Brock. Todai is a Japanese buffet style restaurant that Brock and Bobby (...

There is something all-inspiring about 17,000 people dancing with their arms above their heads, hands clasp, looking like sharks. The first time I saw it happen, I was so amazed, I forgot to join in! Now, I join in, but I am still amazed! We attended the Jimmy Buffett Concert at Madison Square Garden in New York City last night. My first concert ever at MSG (considering I live in Philly area, this is not as amazing as it might sound!). We had an awesome time! More on that later, the Marsons (Abby and Sami - Leda's cousins) are in town for the weekend so it's pretty crazy around here! Lots to update starting with all we did in NYC on Thursday afternoon and evening and ending sometime on Sunday or Monday, after the Marsons take leave. Check back soon!

Nine years ago today, Leda's Daddy married her Mommy in the backyard under the old sycamore tree with lots of family and friends who came to witness. It was a sunny and warm September day. Happy Anniversary, honey. I love you! UPDATED : Oh, and Avast! Happy Talk Like A Pirate Day! Arrr!!

This will be a pretty quick post, due to the fact I have a headache that has plans to hit the Big Time if I don't get myself to bed and relax. Saturday morning we all woke up and, after the obligatory last photo of Leda in her crib, we immediately began to disassemble the crib. Leda was a little concerned that we were taking her bed away, but as soon as Brock started to bring the pieces of her new bed into the room so we could put it together, she got over it. Three hours later, TA DA! Big Girl Bed! The dolphin quilt behind her is from her crib bedding set - we obviously never used it and I never had a place I could put it until now! Works perfectly and goes wonderfully with the bed and canopy! So far, so good. She napped in her bed just fine on Saturday and after we spent the evening with the Durhams, she was so tired by the time we got her home, she was asleep before I left the room! Today, she napped fine (after a few minutes of playing in her bed) and she seems to be asleep now...

Okay, I am officially sad. Leda is sleeping in her crib for the last time tonight. Big Girl Bed will be built tomorrow and crib will be dismantled. After tonight, she won't be a baby anymore (except for the binky). However, she will ALWAYS be my baby! Wonder how many sleepless nights are in our very near future! ;-)

I have recently come to the realization that I am stuck on reality. Yes, I admit it, I watch reality TV shows. Now, I can honestly say I haven't voted for anything on any reality show other than Dancing with the Stars (and only the last season with Apolo on it!) However, I do love to pick and choose my favorites, and when anyone I wanted to get voted off gets voted off, I sometimes cheer loudly! I discovered So You Think You Can Dance this summer and I really had fun watching that show! I never voted for anyone on the show, but I was sure rooting for Sabra and am so happy she won! This is probably the only show other than Dancing with the Stars with Apolo on it that I would almost seriously consider calling in a vote. But I didn't! I LOVE Survivor. I only watched the last show of the first season, but have watched pretty much every season since. It's not something I schedule my life around, but I love to watch it. There is something seriously deranged about shows where peop...

I can add two states to my list of states visited (or driven through) - Vermont and New Hampshire (if I'd ever been to either one, I don't remember it at all, so I count this weekend as the first times I've been in either state!) We left immediately after work on Friday and drove to Deerfield, Massachusetts to spend the night. We got there around 10:30pm and Leda had slept maybe an hour before we got there. So she was WIDE awake. We got into our hotel room and got ready for bed and decided to watch a little news (since Leda wasn't quite ready to go back to sleep). We probably turned off the TV at 11:30pm, but there was no sleeping until about 1am, when Leda finally stopped poking and prodding me and Brock to keep us awake! Of course, then, Duff decided he wasn't going to sleep pretty much the whole night, so he trotted around the room, with his collar tink-tink-tinking all through the night. Oh, and then the whining started around 4:30 or so! The dog, not the kid! W...

...(and a day or so)... until Leda is in a big girl bed. Ikea finally (FINALLY) had the bed we wanted for Leda in stock as of yesterday and so we trundled on down to the store to pick it up along with the canopy and mattress. Since we will be heading off to New Hampshire this weekend, it will be next weekend before I will be able to put it together, take down her crib and get her bedroom all reconfigured with the new bed. Leda's excited. She loves the bed (the set up they had in the store tonight had the bed as a bunk bed and Leda climbed right on up and loved it. Of course, she won't have it as a bunk bed yet, but it's nice to know she likes it that way as well!) I'm excited. Leda's been playing in her room a lot more now an likes to play in her crib (which she can climb in and out of when the side is down). This gives me heart attacks everytime I see her in and/or climbing in or out of the crib. I figure when we have the big girl bed in there, I won't have to ...

This is what I received in the mail today.... Yes, that would be TEN (10) catalogs! Yes, I said TEN! Okay, so I usually get a lot of catalogs - I have in the past purchased from many catalogs (mostly their online stores). But to receive 10 catalogs in one day, now that's gotta be a record!

Why is it that Labor Day is the end of Summer? Isn't the end of Summer on September 23rd? I always feel as though we are being rushed into Fall on the day after Labor Day. Not that I have a problem with Fall. I love Fall - one of my favorite seasons (I tend to like Fall and Spring more than I like Winter and Summer). I just don't want to be rushed into it. Anyway, school's back in session (not that it effects us all that much yet) and the traffic outside the house has picked up during the morning and afternoon hours and the weather has a nice coolness to it that is usually lacking during the Summer months. A leaf or two have begun to change on the trees outside my office window. I may have put away my "baving soup*" for the last time yesterday (*what Leda calls a bathing suit). We had a nice holiday weekend at home. On Friday night we had the Flogaus's join us for dinner. Dave and Annie and Brock and I had some nice adult conversation while Leda and Danny play...

Well, we had a nice weekend! Even though it was SO darn hot here! Actually, it was more the humidity than the heat, oh, forget it, it was freakin' hot! Anyway, we went to Connecticut to spend a Saturday evening with Brock's college buddies. One of his friends is turning 50 in a few weeks and his family threw him a party. It was an adult-only party - kids were going to be staying at the hotel with a few baby-sitters. This was unnerving to me on a few levels - first, an adult-only party? Hello, the last time I went to an adult-only party was like forever ago! How do you behave at an adult-only party? Does this mean I have to have intelligent conversations without yelling, "Leda, No!" or "Leda, don't touch that." every other sentence? I am not sure I know how to do that! Second, you want me to leave my child at a strange hotel with strange people?? Are you kidding me? I freaked out about this for about three or four days before hand. That was until I found ...

A few weeks ago, as my boss and I were driving out of town for work, we noticed that the main road into town was going to be shut down during business hours (9-5) late this week. My boss, who, for the two days I spent riding in his car with him, spent most of the time lamenting about all the bridges in the US that could fall at any moment (didn't make me very comfortable), said it must be to fix the bridge that we had just crossed. Turns out, it was better than that! M. Night Shyamalan, yes, The Sixth Sense , The Village , Unbreakable , Signs - that M. Night Shyamalan - was going to be filming scenes for his new movie at the 'G' Lodge, a local restaurant that is a fixture in this town (not yet as famous as the Val Rio - the diner from The Blob , but soon, might be!) Brock and I have never eaten at the Lodge, although I have passed by it hundreds of thousands of times over the 15+ years I have lived in this town and we threaten to go eat there every once in awhile. M. Night ...

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. Not as good as The Kite Runner by the same author, but very good! Different, as this is more about women living in Afganistan and their relationships with one another and having to live in a world that is just incomprehesible to me. It was moving. I highly recommend it, as I do The Kite Runner . I do think I liked The Kite Runner better, but this was a great book and I did like it a lot. Any book that can make me cry is always a really good book, in my opinion. I also read The Quickie this past week, the latest by James Patterson, one of my favorite authors. It was good, but I didn't like it as much as I usually like Mr. Patterson's books. I did happen to read it in one evening - it was a quick read (ha, no pun intended!) Definitely a good beach book (even though I wasn't on the beach when I read it!) I have finished all my summer books at this point. Except for Margaret George's Helen of Troy , a book I had begun to read a...

Last week sucked. I spent two days traveling back and forth to North NJ (about a 2-2 and half drive - both ways!), Brock was diagnosed with a fracture to the back of his 9th rib and last night we spent what I hope will be the only time in the ER with Leda. Let me start there - Leda's fine. She was being a typical 2 year old last night after dinner, not listening to a word I said and Brock went to go get her off the steps (that I had told her to get off of) and he put her in a time-out. Which she screamed and cried about - we assumed because she wasn't happy not being allowed to do what she wanted to do (which I think was to play on the steps, which she has been told over and over again not to do - and has had countless time-outs about!) Well, when the two minutes of time-out was over, she was told to come give me an apology and as she was walking over to me, I realized that she was holding her right arm. And, she was really not happy - in pain even. It turns out, how we aren...

It's been a busy and crazy week. We all planned to spend the day at the Pocono Raceway to watch the SCCA races and see some friends we hadn't seen in a really long time (like, B.L. - Before Leda) and introduce Leda to racing. Due to an incident which I will give details about later, Brock decided that a ride in the car for an hour and a half up a mountain and then back again wasn't in the cards for him, so I crazily decided to take the kid on my own. I am exhausted. Leda is exhausted. We had a great time seeing some friends and hanging out with GrandDad Teal and Fay. We watched one race (okay, so we spent most of it - or, let me re-phase, I spent most of it chasing Leda in the grandstands) and had some lunch and got a teddy bear (which, for some reason, had to be given a time-out in the middle of the paddock) and we headed home after about 4 or 5 hours. Mommy even had to grab a cup of coffee for the ride home - I NEVER drink coffee after Noon! We had a great time. Leda got ...

Yesterday was a busy day. Early in the day, we all headed over to my cousin Tommy's son's 4th birthday! Michael had a bouncy Castle with slide and a water slide for his birthday. Leda only went down the water slide once - she was a little shocked by the cold pool of water at the bottom! She liked the bouncy castle better! Oh, and the cake! A surprise for us, my Uncle Tommy and Aunt Tish were in town from Florida, so we got to spend a little time talking with them. Since they don't have anything better to do this evening, they are coming over for dinner! We came home and all took naps and then around 5 we left Leda with Caitlyn (the babysitter) and headed to Bethlehem, PA, to see Big&Rich at Musikfest . Three years ago, when we were down the beach that July, we had CMT on and I saw Big&Rich's Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy video. I liked the music a lot, so I bought the CD. That was it, I loved them! Leda listened to that CD a lot when I was pregnant! I've alway...

I know that there are people out there that think we are crazy thinking of moving Leda to a big girl bed when she seems perfectly happy to stay in a crib. Well, apparently Ikea also believes this! We got the new catalog last week and I quickly looked up the Kura bed that I linked to a few posts ago (I can only link to the post, not the picture of the bed because it is gone from the website now!). They have a new color - dark blue. I'm excited, so I figure I will call the store and find out if they have it in yet. The store doesn't have it in stock and has no idea when they will receive it. So, we figured, what the heck, let's order the bed via the phone sales number and go to the store to pick up the mattress and the canopy, since we know they have them. Nope, the phone sales lady tells me that the bed is an item that is not available via the web or phone sales, must go to the store to get it. I tell her my store doesn't have it and hasn't a clue when it's comin...

I looked so forward to that vacation in early July when we went to Portland. For months, I looked forward to it! Then, I got sick during that vacation. I enjoyed 1 and a half days of that vacation. So, I took an extra day for a long weekend in the Thousand Islands last week. We were originally going to go up Thursday night after work and come home Sunday. We went up Wednesday night after work instead. I could have used more - like a whole week! In any case, we did go to the Thousand Islands, and other than it being REALLY hot the first two days, we had a BEAUTIFUL weekend. Brock and Leda and I took off immediately after I finished work on Wed, but got stuck in traffic trying to get out of town! We ended up arriving at the house around 10:30 or so - not too bad with only two stops on the way up. Leda did not go to sleep at all the whole ride. We hooked up the portable DVD for her to watch and boy did she. We finally told her no more DVD about 9 or so, but she still didn't go to slee...

I have finished all of the Harry Potter series. Feel free to spoil the ending for me at any time! Actually, book 6 is probably my second favorite of the series (#1 favorite being book 3). Book 7 was good, but I really didn't want it to end. I read it fast and furious (as much as I could) until the last quarter of the book, then I slowed down a lot - I realized I just didn't want the book to end, because then it would be over. I'm not sure if I liked the ending. I think it's mostly because it is final - there will be no more Potter. I was a bit disappointed and, frankly, shocked, at one of the events in Book 7. I have to say, I think I had the exact same reaction to this event as I did when Sirius was killed. And, that is about all I will say about that. Not that I am going all Forest Gump on you all, just don't want to spoil the book for anyone who hasn't finished it yet. (and yes, I realize, I am probably the last person in the world who hadn't read the dar...

The Thousand Islands, that is! Spent an extended weekend in the islands visiting with Grandpa and Nana and the Lilly clan in from Denver. Much time spent reading, swimming, jetskiing, go-carting, celebrating birthdays (Brock's, Scott's and Bobby's) and enjoying family and friends (our Canadian friends, Dan and Deb, came over to visit us for an evening). Lots of pictures, very little time. I am off to Baltimore area for work for the next couple of days, so, depending on connectivity to internet, update may have to wait until later in the week!