A Day in Pictures

So I did this last year about this same time.  Its just fun (for me) to look back months from now and see what a typical weekend is like for us with Wyatt!   I have been wanting to do this for a few weeks now, but then when a friend asked me what I was doing and I told her my weekend plans her response was "you have such a hard life".  The truth is that i don't, BUT it isn't as easy-peasy as one might thing given that there's a little toddler in tow with me ....

So here goes.

4:00 - Ben leaves to go to work :(  They have a concrete pour and a call time of 4:30 am.  

6:30 - Wyatt wakes up and we play in his room for a little while.  Even though he is awake, he doesn't necessarily want to get out of bed right away.  So I usually go in and play with him in his crib for a little bit.

7:15 - We head downstairs for breakfast. Our typical weekend fare is waffles, cereal bar, and milk.  W refuses fruit in the morning so I don't even bother anymore.  I usually have my coffee while he eats and after he's done I make my own breakfast. 

8:00 - Daddy comes home from work!  He's tired, but plays with W for a few minutes before changing and leaving for golf.

8:30 - We go upstairs to play for a little while and then get dressed to run some errands.

9:30 - We were almost ready to walk out the door, and I turned my back on Wyatt for just a second to find this.  Apparently he saw his snack trap on the counter and decided he needed it right then! (Oh and the spoons and potholders all over the floor?  That is our norm)

9:35 - We're off!  First stop is the embroidery place.  They're closed?  On a Saturday.  How am I to work with this?

9:45 - We get to Old Navy (told yall I would be going!).  They don't open until 10.  Ugh.  Retailers really need to get with the program -- for people with small kids, 10am is pretty much afternoon!  I decided I didn't want to wait in the car for 15 minutes so we headed to Target.

10:00 - I did successfully made my return at Target (that is never a given -- they have a pretty tough return/exchange policy).  Then I promised Wyatt a toy for letting me shop.  I told him I'd buy him a car, but he found this baby Elmo that he just HAD to have.  He's been toting him around ever since so I guess it was a good purchase.

10:35 - we're back at Old Navy.  Wyatt was SO GOOD!  He ate snacks while I shopped and even played in the dressing room mirror when I was trying on clothes. 

11:15 - We leave ON.  I thought about going to chick-fil-a for lunch, but I decided we were probably better off just to go home so we did.

11:30 - We're back home and I start unloading the car.  Wyatt's new favorite activity is to climb in and around my car after we're home.  He likes to 'drive' and play with the radio!

12:00 - Wyatt eats lunch.  Sorta

12:20 - I put W down for nap.  He's tired so I hope he sleeps well.  After I know he's asleep I shower, dry my  hair, vacuum the house, do a load of laundry, eat lunch, paint my nails and sit down to catch up on DVR.

2:00 - of course he wakes up right as I turn on the latest episode of DC Cupcakes.  That show is starting to annoy me anyway so its probably for the best that he woke up.  I went in there and watched him play in his crib for a while before finally agreeing to get out.

3:00 - afternoon snack. then he decides he wants to help me sweep the kitchen.  this kid LOVES the broom!

4:00 - We go upstairs and play in his room, the media room, my room.  All over the house basically.  Wyatt took a couple short trips to time out.

I stopped taking pictures at this point.  But, at 5:00 I fed him dinner then we went upstairs so that I could fix my hair and makeup before we went to our dinner club.  I got myself dressed, got W into his pj's, and ready for bed before the sitter came. 

I have no pictures of Ben and I from before the dinner, but have to share this you tube video taken at the very end of the evening.  Ben wasn't ready to go home yet .... (fast forward to about 48 seconds)

Wants and Wishes!

So, I shop at Old Navy.  A lot.  Is that uncool?  Probably so, but I don't really care.  I often don't have much time to shop and ON is very close to my house and as long as Wyatt has ample snacks he will normally let me shop for a few minutes.  Also, it is rare when I have to wear anything very fancy, so for the most part ON just suits my lifestyle.    

All that said, I normally just buy staples there -- you know .... t-shirts, cardigans, etc.  But I went in the other day and found the CUTEST printed blouses.  (Does that word irk anyone besides me? I feel like that is a very old-fashioned word to use) I only bought a couple of them, but I'm going back for more - they are just so cute and springy.  They must have hired new designers or something, because there are a million things that I want right now ...

I love this butterfly dress.   I'm not sure how it will look in person though.  That white may be too sheer for me.

Both of these tops are great for summer -- and I could even wear to work with a cardigan. 

I love this dress.  With a yellow or hot pink cardigan?  Soooo cute

Love this one too.  This one is good for early spring when you still might want something on your arms.

 And also this one!

Wouldn't this top be cute with white pants or capris? 

This one would as well.  I think I could maybe pair it with jeans too.

I got this one.  LOVE the birds!!  They have a white one like this as well, which is also adorable. 

They had some cute shirts this fall, too, which I bought only one of and I wear ALL THE TIME!   Love all this stuff.  I sure hope W is in a shopping mood this weekend, because I'm going to load up! 

New Year's Eve 2011

I suppose I'm a little late on this, buuuuut better late than never!!!

We went up to Charlotte for New Year's Eve this year.  There was a huge group of us all going up to see the Dunaways and the guys all wanted to go and see Widespread Panic while the girls opted to stay home and cook a nice dinner and drink champagne.  One of my criteria for NYE was that I wasn't leaving Wyatt, so we took him with us.

We really wanted to get a picture of the kids in their 'Happy New Year' hats, but someone wasn't very cooperative ....

See that sweet cooperative baby?  Yeah, she is so well behaved that her parents took her all the way to Australia with them a few days later!  (I think the badger would probably make it through that flight but he would likely give Ben and I heart attacks)

This ended up being the best photo of Wyatt and Anna that we could get.

We didn't get a group picture of the guys, but we did get this one of the girls prior to them leaving.  (minus Sheri ... she wasn't there yet)

And the closest we got to a family picture was one of me and Wyatt (kindof) and one of Ben and Wyatt.  Ha! 

Oh.  Can we please talk about Ben's mustache for a second .... this was just for fun for the concert!  He doesn't leave it like that in real life!  (I didn't really want him to do it this way even for the concert, but then I got accused of being the 'fun police')

Once the guys left and the babies went to bed, we got started cooking our fancy dinner!  Actually, if I'm telling the truth, Sarah and I relaxed and ate appetizers while Sheri, Ashley, and Becky did the cooking.  And if memory serves me correct, Sarah set the table so really I just sat and did nothing.  Thanks girls :)

After dinner, Becky busted out Big Carl.  (Isn't that the name of the huge wine glass on Cougar Town?)

From there, things just got plum silly.

Even Elmo stayed up to have fun with us!!

After the guys got home, they all took a turn with Big Carl too!

It was a fun NYE!  Thanks for having us up to Charlotte, Dunaways!

And, because I can't resist sharing ... I took this on the car ride home.  Wyatt LOVES his sunglasses (as well as his pacis)!

by the time Wyatt is 3, I will have a P.h.D. in feeding a toddler

Fact: If my mother made my meals each day, I would eat WHATEVER she put on my plate.

Fact: A one-year old doesn't see it the same way.  Instead a one year old will just simply refuse something on the basis of looks, texture, color, or their mood that day. 

I've mentioned this before - but I have a REALLY hard time with thinking of new, fun, creative, healthy ideas for Wyatt's meals each day.  I know all kids are picky, but Wyatt is extremely finicky.  He actually eats a pretty decent variety of foods, but its his entrees/proteins that I struggle with. 

I found this awesome website, which I thought was just going to change my life.  It is full of creative recipes aimed at a child's palate.  It would be so great to have a stockpile of (healthy) foods at the ready in my freezer and I was going to have his dinner ready in just minutes each evening!  (Sidenote: I thought I was going to have tons of room in my freezer after I quit storing breast milk, but I was oh so wrong) Well, that didn't exactly work out.  I just recently dumped out a batch of noodle pancakes and very berry muffins because he refused to eat them on about 10 different occasions.  I've tried a few other recipes from that site with varying degrees of success.  But usually?  I'm just back to the normal cheese/spinach quesadilla, chicken nugget, whole wheat pizza rotation.  On nights where I don't do one of those three meals, he usually ends up eating fruit, carrot sticks, yogurt, and a cheese stick and I send him to bed not all that confident that he has a full belly. 

While I refuse to be that mom that feeds my child fast food all the time simply because it is most convenient, I also refuse to be that mom who says "if you don't want what is on your plate, then you'll go to bed hungry".  At least not while he's still a baby ....

I'm sure in time our dinner struggles will become easier and maybe hopefully one day I'll be able to fix one meal that works for our whole family each night.  (As opposed to now, where many nights I end up fixing THREE separate meals)

BUT.  Soon, I will have to start packing lunches for Wyatt each day and I know this will bring a whole other set of problems my way.  I was googling 'toddler lunchbox ideas' the other day and found that the latest craze is Bento boxes?  OMG.  And I'm dying all over again .... I have visions of sending Wyatt with these adorable lunches each day and getting great reports like:

"wyatt ate all his broccoli today"   or

"wyatt is such a great eater!  we never have trouble convincing him to finish his lunch"   or

"once again, wyatt was a member of the clean plate club!"

A mom can dream, right?