He loves me!

On this Memorial Day, several consecutive hours of sleep (woohoo) found me awake pretty early. And then the kids drowsily made it downstairs by 6:30. But big sister fell back to sleep on the couch and little bubba has pulled himself to standing in front of me and is babbling his heart out. It's all quite unintelligible, but from the expression on his face, I'm certain that he's telling me all the ways he loves me. Yep, certain.

I make myself laugh

I wore this to see Bridesmaids. Only I didn't get to see it. I did, however, get a big-A tub of popcorn. Because my heart was set on popcorn, even if the movie was sold out.

I didn't get to laugh at a hilarious movie, but I did make myself laugh mocking the wide-eyed, lips-parted expression that is ever so popular with the art directors over at J. Crew.

Tee-hee.

7/12/11 ETA: I'm cheating for July EBEW and linking to this outfit featuring yellow, since my camera is broken :(

My Neighborhood

We've lived in this neighborhood for 2 years now. I love it. The elevations are cute. I like the way townhomes are mixed in with smaller single family homes and larger single family homes. I love that we can walk to the pool and the park. I love that there's no street in front of my house and that there's plenty of space encouraging the neighbor kids to all play together.

Poolside

I don't know if the warmer weather is really here to stay, but I've gotten in a pool the last couple days! Today I took the kids and it was a lot of fun! Last year, Bauer was too little and when I let his tiny tootsies touch the pool water he immediately started to cry. Today, he splashed around giddily before crawling around on the conveniently large 6" deep step at our community pool.
Fantastic.


And, check out my 50's styled swim suit! I love it! It's still a bikini without the whole stretchmarks-hanging-out self-consciousness :D

I'm weird

So during the Family Guy last week, they made fun of this music video:

While I did find humor in the totally unintentional homoerotic vibe that was the 80s, I also couldn't stop thinking about how much I'd like a drapey green silk shirt with patch pockets. I mean really.

C'mon!

Why does every supposed 10min stop at Target turn into an 1hr+ ordeal where I spend 3-5x as much as I planned??? Is it effective store layout? Yeah, I'm going to go with that.

Unseasonable

We keep getting these weird stints of cool weather. I'm not complaining at all; we get plenty of heat here, and I'll take any excuse to throw on my favorite cardigans a few more days (not to mention getting a little more wear out of Bauer's 9mo size winter clothing)!

I should really

Take a sewing class or something. I'm realizing that imagining things in my head and having a stash of fabric does not a designer make. I've followed a couple easy patterns, but I wanna make the things in my head! There's gotta be a class (outside of getting a fashion design degree; I'm not that serious about it) that would make it easier for me to execute better.
But regardless, I finally pulled out my cutting board and sewing machine and iron and pins and blah-blah-blah and made Emberly the pinafore style top I'd been imagining for a while now.

{ideally, she'd have a plain dress or tank underneath, but it was close to bedtime and I didn't want to do all that LOL}

Haircut

At some point (probably during a piggy-back ride to get ready for bed), Emberly spotted her craft scissors hidden on a higher shelf of my desk. At some point, she managed to climb up there unnoticed and retrieve them. At some point, she got her brother to hold still long enough to cut a curl from his head.

Wonderful.
I actually didn't notice the missing curl (and I'm still not exactly sure where she did it). But I did notice the scissors and the curl lying on the very top of the garbage when I stepped on the pedal to toss a diaper. She's sneaky, but not that sneaky. She's only 4, after all.
At some point, I'll have to really stay on top of her, lest I find boys hiding in her room or illicit drugs in her vanity. At some point.

A couple things

Emberly is referring to everything that happened before her fourth birthday (not even 3wks ago) as the time "when I was a little girl." Because she is so not little anymore. Get with the program.
~AND~
The Cupcakery is selling "frosting shots." As in, little 2oz plastic side-of-dressing containers full of frosting. How *genius.* Cuz I really don't need the cake. So it is proven that I am not the only butter-lovin' sugar addict. At least not in Vegas!
Last, my outfit from my date last night. Okay, so "date" may be a bit of a misnomer. My girlfriend is moving out of town and I met her for drinks and yummies at Blue Martini to chat and people watch the prowlers. Seriously, I'm really glad I'm not older and single in this town.

What the twins?

Me and my little brother (circa 1987??)

My munchkins this morning

Florals

I *almost* forgot!

I wish I had put on some earrings {mostly to distract from that mess of hair LOL}... I had difficulty accessorizing with the bold red jacket (other accessory ideas? please, feel free to comment with links!).
I thought about going with the tropical floral top I got last year,

but the length is awkward for me *not* pregnant, and, tiny floral prints seem to be more the trend this spring anyhow.

Happy Mother's Day!

To all the mama's out there!
Here's a throw back of me and mine.

Love you mom!

And here's a portrait of motherhood as I know it, busy nursing and answering a gazillion questioins from an impatient preschooler!

Thank you, my babies, for making me a mom and teaching me some of the greatest lessons about myself!

Neutrals

This past week Toni over at A Bowl Full of Lemons hosted a Parade of Homes. A lot of the featured blogs used antiques and white. Not particularly my style, but still beautiful and inspirational! I found myself layering on neutrals this week, I think because those images stuck with me.


And this cutie is better than any accessory!

You'll also notice that I'm wearing my new shoes! Yay! My toe seems to be healed *fingers crossed.*

That's Yummy

I've been thinking about something and getting pissed off about it.
Whenever someone has dramatic weight loss, they talk about changing the way they think about food.
Food is for nutrition.
I agree. But it also tastes wonderful. It's pleasurable to eat and feel full. So it's very counter-intuitive to deny it as a celebratory outlet. Filling up on delicious food is an easy go-to reward, because it feels good. It's why I'll always choose cheesecake over, say, scrubbing up my baseboards. Neither baseboards, nor baseboard cleaner taste very good.
I don't think that's something I can turn off completely in my head, to seek out nutrition over yumminess. I can be really good about it, for a really long time, but there's always a binge period. And I'm not denying myself when I'm being good. I let myself have reasonable portions of tasty things. But something in me ultimately wants to overdo it.
Maybe I'm just a filthy hedonist.

Faceless Internet

I was thinking about how the places I come across mean-spirited people are mostly within online communities. And it just so happened that I watched an episode of Glee on my DVR today that talked about how the anonymity of today's technology gives people the freedom to be... mean. So I thought about it some more, about the significance of that. I think it's kind of sad. Because I don't think I actually come across any fewer mean people in real life, it just means that most mean-spirited people are also cowards, who only have virtual balls by which they try to tear people down. Nothing says confident and self-assured like being an a$$hole with only an avatar and screen-name for an identity. And that's not to say I'm saintly or really even nice. But I'm pretty much equally so in *real life.* I think it's scary that, in my case, these people are parents. And we wonder why bullying is such a problem today. Go figure.
Speaking of meanies and haters, let me tell you about my husband's latest joke LOL
Emberly got a collection of sock monkeys for her birthday.

Guess what he had to say when Emberly decided the largest was a mommy monkey?
"Well, it does look just like your mommy, with lipstick on." :| LMAO So rude, right?