Happy, Happy, Anni-ver-sary (sing with me!)

Happy 3rd anniversary to my hubby. We are celebrating tonight with a fun dinner out to a buffet at the new Indian casino up the road (funny, I know, but it was a random idea and we like casino buffets and heard this one was a good one!) and then this coming weekend we're heading out for an early breakfast at a yummy new spot and then a hike in the foothills. Can you tell food gets us excited? Food and exercise - they balance eachother out.

This is a special time of year for us with our wedding anniversary, my birthday, and then the holidays. It's funny to me that we're only celebrating 3 years when we have known eachother for almost a decade. We discovered this past weekend with a couple we met that they are also celebrating their anniversary today (in spirit since one is travelling) but for them, it's been 14 years. I can't imagine what my life will be like once Michael and I log 14 years married, but I hope when that day comes it will be just as sweet as today is.

I love you Mick!

Peace and quiet

I usually get up around 2:20 am in the morning to nurse (it's clockwork for both Maggie and I) and then go back to bed.

But not this morning.

Since I became pregnant, I would have these early mornings sometimes when I had a lot on my mind and couldn't sleep. So, I just get up and do stuff and it's great. This morning I've gotten lots done - laundry, messing around online, emailed, etc. Our house isn't that big, but it's big enough to where the bedroom side of the house stays dark and quiet and I can go the office and laundry room and make it full of life.

Wooly wonder

Spent half a day at the Dixon Lambtown Festival a couple weekends ago. Lots of knitting and spinning going on. A few of the gals from my knitting group entered handspun skeins and knitted projects into a competition and two of them placed! Below is the sheep to shawl competition going on where they take raw wool, spin it into yarn, and then make a shawl from it all within a matter of hours.
My special treat of the day was a 300+ yard handspun superwash wool yarn. Other than that, I picked up some sale sock yarn made with crab shells of all things to make myself some plain socks for the winter. I've only made myself one set of kneesocks and that was in the beginning of my knitting "career" so I'm due to knit some more as well as learn how to knit them at the same time using the magic loop method.

I had so much stuff attached to me that day, as I was trying to avoid using the stroller. Turns out it was a bad idea but it ended well. I had brought a small knitting project with me in hopes I'd have a few minutes to knit but it fell out of the diaper bag within minutes of getting there and I didn't realize I was missing it until that night. Luckily, it was kicked against a wall and found by one of the organizers. I tracked her down and she shipped it to me no charge. I love knitters. Now I'll be paying it forward.

As the weather turns, I'm getting more and more inspired to knit and craft (I just need more time!). I am currently working on a set of plain white onesies that I scored new at a garage sale and am dressing them up with fabric designs and glued-on gems and buttons. Good timing because I have a couple baby showers to go to this weekend. A few of them will be for Maggie but I need to get my butt in gear because they are 6-9 months and she'll be out of this size very soon.

The time of our lives

Can you say babies, babies, babies? As my friend Angela put it, something's in the water but truthfully, this is nothing new, it's just the time of our lives literally. My friends are now embarking on the path of having second and third children and it's all very exciting. So many playmates! This past year, I've heard of a pregnancy or birth every couple weeks it seems and I think I've had an acquaintance or friend give birth each month so far. It's often been more than one a month. Maybe I'm just uber aware since I was one of them. It's like when you get a new car and then notice those cars everywhere.

I just found out that three of my close friends all concieved within days of eachother and are therefore due within days of eachother. Not sure how much of a secret it is so no names here. How crazy is that?

Little Maggie is going to have SO many friends. Which is great, because she is quite the social butterfly. She turned seven months old yesterday. Ready to crawl (on all fours and rocking back and forth as well as doing the army crawl) and happy as a clam. Whenever we are out with her, everyone asks, "Is she always this happy? It's so great to see a happy baby." And then it makes me think about our day together and how she really is this happy all the time unless something is seriously bothering her, like hunger, sleep, or frustration and even then it's easy to fix.

Here's Maggie with little Ella (Erin and Eric's little one - 2 months old).

Workin' girl

I'm back to work for real now (P/T). Hit a few speedbumps in the beginning, but I'm figuring it all out as I go.

This morning, for example, I'm eating kix as I'm driving to work (yeah, not very safe at all but I like to live on the edge) and I was scrunching my hair with curl gel as I had the heater pointed at me full blast. It actually worked quite well!

I've been pumping a little here and there since she was born, but now it's a serious business and I experienced some frustration with a poorly-working pump so pump #2 is in action now. It's such a funny thing to go through (the act and art of pumping, that is) but at the end of the day I feel good that I can continue to feed Maggie momma's milk. It makes me feel more connected to her as I go about my day and it has such great nutritional value.

I have lots of support at work - three of us gave birth this spring and another co-worker is due in November. We also have a new dad in the office that can relate and many other parents of older children. So, it's all good and what makes me especially comfortable with it all is that our family is watching her. She's in really good hands. For the future, I'm on the search for the right daycare in case one day we need it. This week I toured a feel-good one that is definitely being tucked away in my tool box.

Although at this point I haven't felt like I need work to balance out my life, going back has its advantages (besides bringing in income of course). Not only do I get to see my co-workers and friends, it gives me a little time to myself and the opportunity to do errands and have lunch sans kiddo.

I can tell you though, there is nothing like racing home to your baby after the end of the day and seeing her smiling face when you walk in the door. Maggie loves giving hugs and it's the best thing ever. And oh, did I mention the house smelling of beef stew on a rainy day and seeing your own mom's smiling face as well? Makes life that much sweeter! Add Michael to the mix and his mom's homemade flour tortillas, and I'm a happy, happy girl.

Stormy weather

Lots of rain and wind yesterday. Made for a crazy day, but what a treat! I hear a ski resort or two have officially opened. Fall is here and winter is on it's way. As the storm was clearing yesterday evening...

Mammoth

Last camping trip of the season (thank goodness!). We joined my co-workers on a group trip to Convict Lake, just outside the town of Mammoth. It was nothing what I expected. I pictured a forested landscape but it was high desert with a nice shimmery lake and such a vast rocky backdrop that made for some incredible scenery. Highlights from the weekend included the pretty drive, the group dinners, visiting with co-workers and their families and seeing all the kids play together. Unlike some of my co-workers, we were campground-bound most of the time but it allowed us to get to know one of my co-workers and her mom better. I work with some really great people. Maggie got her sleepy time in and we were happy campers, literally!

It was a good night

Last weekend I went dancing with some girlfriends to celebrate my friend Jessie's birthday. It was a great time...tapas, sangria, one man band, and dancing. Watching the music videos and hearing new music was mesmerizing. Watching Jessie dance on the podium surrounded by dry ice and strobe lights getting her groove on...priceless.
Have you heard this one yet? It's a REALLY good one. Makes you want to hop up and go crazy!

I Gotta Feeling

Other good one...

Boom Boom Pow

What about Lonely Island (SNL parodies with Andy Samberg)? They crack me up. There's lots of good ones. I'll let you do the you tube searching on this one, they are a bit explicit.

(Couldn't figure out how to embed imeem songs...do we really have to pay?)

Green halloween

This is an interesting idea. I have a lot of the same questions they list here. My mom would love this idea-she is a dental hygenist and always encouraged us to eat healthy growing up and pointed out how much sugar was in the sweets we ate and how that led to cavities down the road. Which, I ended up with and I'm baffled how hubby has not, even though it seems he eats as much or more sweets. That and braces are a sore spot with me :-) I always remember my mom saying that there were X number of tablespoons of sugar in a can of soda. Is it three? Her nutritional parenting definitely shaped how I eat today, but on Halloween, isn't that a day to splurge a little?

I enjoy holidays and Halloween is no exception. It's always been parties in the past, but this year, we have more to celebrate. We have plans to visit a wool mill on Halloween day, followed by some possible trick-or-treating that evening. Regardless, Maggie is going to be a banana. Should Michael and I dress like monkeys? Maggie has specifically requested that Eden come over and trick-or-treat with her. Last year as Michael and I left the house heading out to a party on Halloween, we drove through the masses of children just up the street and couldn't believe our eyes. Must be a hot spot.