I <3 Faces - Pouting

I love iHeartFaces! You really need to go over there if you haven't yet. This week has a kid theme of pouting and pets category. There isn't an adult pouting contest. They obviously missed the memo that we can pout, too. I guess we just aren't as cute doing it :-)

Random Picture Challenge

4 Little Men & Girly Twins normally does a random picture challenge on Saturdays. Since she's a mom and has a life, her schedule was a little delayed this week. The photo this week is supposed to be the 27th photo in your December 2007 folder. She has another method if you aren't obsessive like some of us and have different ways to sort your pictures.

The Bear was born that month so I have tons of pictures. Because of all my subfolders, this is my 27th photo. The Bear was a few weeks old (I started my really obsessive labeling in January 2008). He was all snuggled in and we were napping. Don't mind my "I just had a baby and am exhausted" look.

Sometimes I foget how small he really was.

Smudged

I am so ashamed of myself.

I lost it last night. For the first time, I screamed as loud as I could at The Bear. He was scared. I was heartbroken. I've gotten frustrated with him before, but I have never screamed like that.

Last night was Sub Ball for us. Hubby and I were actually going. I was a little anxious. The Bear was staying at a friend's house (a friend of ours that has followed us from IL to SC to CT and has a little girl a month older than The Bear). I knew he would be fine. It was only 2 hours of him being awake and then bed time. He had already been fed so it was pretty easy. Despite all this, I was still having the "I'm leaving my baby" jitters. I had only left him one other time and that was with my mom.

Anyways, I was attempting to get ready for the ball - that sounds so Cinderella-ish. I had for some reason decided to put curlers in my hair. I am not a fru fru girl, and I fail miserably at the girly things like that. Hubby brought The Bear into the bathroom while I'm attempting to do this. The Bear wanted attention and starts wiggling in between the counter and me.

In my clumsy attempt at using curlers, I'm dropping them all over the floor. Now, I have The Bear at my feet. I didn't hit him with any, but my feet were sacrificed for his well being.

I put The Bear in his crib. I was running out of patience and time. He was screaming, but I figured at least he was safe there. Not even 3 minutes later, Hubby brings a screaming Bear back into the bathroom and tells me he needs his diaper changed. I go and change him. And, ruin my nails.

I never have my nails painted. Because you know, I smudge them and they chip and it's just way too much maintenance for me right now. Hubby actually notices though. I could have not brushed my hair for 3 weeks or showered for a year and he would notice my nails being painted.

This entire time The Bear is crying and generally throwing a temper tantrum which is pretty par for his 15 month old self.

I screamed at him. I told him to shut up. I grew up thinking "shut up" was a bad word. We used "please be quiet", "hush" and "shush".

I put him back in his crib and went to our bathroom to cry. I don't talk to anyone like that especially my baby boy.

I snuggled with him later and said I was sorry. He cuddled right in to me, and I know he forgave me. It just breaks my heart to have done that.

I didn't fix my nail polish. The smudge went with me to the ball. Smudged nails are a small price to pay for a precious baby boy.

Wordless Wednesday

I <3 Faces - No Flash

This week's challenge is no flash. I can always get it down to two photos, and then I get stuck. Here's my entry for this week though. You should head over there to check out all the entries. Everyone else is much more talented :-)

Here is The Bear back in July 2008 on his 7 month birthday. Hubby was gone, so we spent the day taking silly pictures. Hubby picked the other picture I had pulled, but this one just brings back so many fun memories of that day for me.

The Great Car Seat Fight of 2009

It seems amazing that I can already name the greatest car seat fight for the whole year in 2009, but I have a feeling this one is going to be more of a war than a single battle.

The Bear has never been a fan of the car seat. All you moms out there who keep telling me how much your child LOVED the car and your baby always went right to sleep, please shut up. My son does not. He hates the car. I don't know why. But, he does.

The Great Car Seat Fight of 2008 began in February when The Bear was 2 months old. He would scream as loud as he could the entire time he was in the car. I adjusted clothes. I adjusted the straps. I adjusted the sunshade. I adjusted everything. He just didn't like it.

You might think I'm exaggerating. I'm not.
We drove from South Carolina to Illinois - 12 hours.
We drove from the in-laws to my parents' house - 6 hours.
We drove from Illinois to Connecticut - 16 hours.

I would be lying to say he screamed the entire time. I would say it was closer to 32 of the 34 hours. At that point though, it's safe to say he isn't a fan of the car.


The Great Car Seat Fight of 2009 is not as loud. Any time I go to put him in his car seat now (he's moved up to a convertible one), he arches his back and screeches. He's still not happy in it, but he doesn't scream the entire time anymore.

If only there was a way to make it not quite a struggle to get him in. If not, I'm sure all the people in the parking lots will find amusement in the two of us.

Random Picture Challenge

4 Little Men & Girly Twins always does a fun picture challenge on Saturdays. This week you have to post from the first picture from the 3rd folder that has brown in it.

Talk about a blast from the past. Don't judge. This is from 1992. The puffy sleeves and ginormous headbands were in then. Or you know, to an 8 year old they were in. It's Easter morning at my father's house with my step-sisters.



I think some things might just be better left in that third folder :-)

Small Talk 6

Hubby has duty today. Duty days on Saturday generally stink. It's hard to feel like weekend when he goes in to work early Saturday and we don't see him until Sunday after church. The timing doesn't work out for him to go with us when he gets home. He's generally stinky and sleepy (love you Hubby).

I found this which will hopefully lift my spirits and give me something to do while The Bear naps. Over at MomDot, I'm supposed to list 6 things I love or hate about spring.






1) Park days! Pre-Bear, I loved going to parks for picnics and swings. Now, I have a reason to go and not get creepy looks.
2) Dresses. It's so fun to be able to wear sundresses. Easy and girly - my perfect combination.
3) No more heat in the house. The static electricity in our house is driving me crazy. I'm done with it!
4) Family walks. I love taking family walks after dinner. I know Hubby won't be home long, but it's the highlight of my day.
5) Pastels. The colors I love seem to be everywhere. The flowers are blooming and the clothes are switching to the pretty colors. I'm not a black wearing person.
6) Attitude shifts. The cold, dreary winter wears on you after awhlie. It's nice to have a fresh, happy outlook when it's sunny and warm outside.

Mom Clothes

My closet is full. Like overflowing and busting at the seams. And, it's a walk in closet. Granted, Hubby and I share a dresser so there I don't have much that's folded. Regardless of this, I have a lot of clothes.

The problem is that there are limited clothes in there that fit my life style AND fit me.

I need comfy mommy clothes that aren't sweatpants but fit my mommy body. I'm back to my pre-Bear size, but I really don't have many options for that. I was working full time so I have lots of dressy clothes, but a limited supply of playground climbing, floor crawling options. Before that, I was in college. The clothes from my senior year fit, but I feel like I want to be slightly dressier than the yoga pants and hoodies. The only other clothes from that era were bar clothes which really would get me noticed at the park. The clothes from the start of college and high school are really getting too small. I can still fit into most of them, but I'm slightly more self conscious of that bit of tummy that shows now than I was 10 years ago.

I don't want to spend gobs of money for new things though.
A) Since I don't work, I find it hard to justify spending gobs of money on myself.
B) I've been holding out some hope that maybe I would slim down a bit. I've accepted my weight, I just wish I was in better shape.
C) We've been talking about having baby 2 sometime in the next year or so. Which would mean the clothes would quickly get replaced with my maternity ones.

I need mom clothes. Clothes that I can move in. Clothes that I can play in. Clothes that won't get me weird looks when I run errands. But, I want to be a cute mom.

A mom that doesn't wear "mom jeans". Just jeans that cover my tush when I bend over, please.

Attached

While Hubby was deployed, his truck officially died. It was old and peeling (not rusty, but the paint was peeling off). It was a manual transmission, and I am not talented enough to drive that business. And, it had no backseat so The Bear couldn't travel in it. I did my wifely duty and started it every week(ish). Sadly, since it didn't move and things were leaking, we had to have it towed away.

Hubby got a new car a few weeks ago. He wanted me to bring it into the dealer today so we swapped vehicles for the day.

I never realized how much I had things organized in my car. The Bear and I ran an errand this morning. I had no snacks. No sippy cup. No toys. No stroller. All the stuff that I keep in the car (so my purse isn't ginormous) wasn't there.

I felt completely lost. It was weird to realize how set in my ways I am.

I <3 Faces - Green

I LOVE iHeartFaces! You really need to go over there and check it out if you don't already. They have a weekly challenge. This week it's green. While we don't have tons of St Patrick's Day regalia, The Bear does have a green shirt he's rocking out today. (He also has a green diaper cover if that helps push over the celebrating ledge.)

I <3 Faces

I found this blog a few weeks ago, and I've finally gotten myself motivated to participate. Go over to iHeartFaces.blogspot.com to see the amazing pictures people take. There are professional photographers that make you so jealous and some great pictures captured by everyday moms. Every week they have a challenge; this week is creative cropping.

I took this the end of January so The Bear is almost 14 months old. He was so entranced.


Here is the original picture which I liked, but I feel the cropping makes his face and little chubby hands so much more prominent.

Monday Missions

We're trying this whole back to a schedule thing again.

Today, I had planned on being uber productive. I had wanted to dust everything and then at least vacuum the floors upstairs. And, do at least one load of laundry. Oh, and make banana bread.

But, it's raining. It's hard to motivate myself to be all spring cleaning-ish when it's cold and wet outside.

This is a very blah post. Just really struggling right now.

It's been rough making the adjustments to Hubby being home. I love him being here. I love being able to talk to him every day and such. It's just hard going from basically being a single parent running the house to going back to sharing. I need to figure out something to get myself out of this funk. Right now, writing boring posts is all I can come up with.

Random Picture Challenge!

First time I'm playing :-) The rules were the first picture from my February 2009 that wasn't a picture of my kiddo.



I'm doing Project 365 and February 1st featured The Puppy. Here he is pre-fur cut.

So much for that plan . . .

I had said that once March came around, I would get my world back on a schedule. Seriously, you think I would learn not to make any of these grand plans by now!

Hubby was supposed to be back to normal working hours this week so I thought it would be a good time to try to get The Bear and I back on track. Hubby is actually going to a school this week so he has rather cushy hours. He deserves it after working non-stop for 6 months, but it's making it difficult to get that schedule rolling. AND, we might have had a snow storm Sunday night/Monday morning which meant we all stayed home in PJs on Monday.

I'm beginning to question what normal is for us.
Hubby was gone for 6 months. Does doing something for half a year make it normal?
We only lived here for 3 months before he was deployed. Is that the normal I'm looking for?
What about our live in South Carolina before here? That was just a year though. I'm hoping that isn't our normal. SC and I really don't mesh well.
Am I grasping at straws and trying to revert to the normal from Illinois? I had just graduated and was working full time. Hubby was still in school. The Bear was just a thought for some day.

I feel like I'm going through all this stress and frustration to get to normal when there is no normal. We don't live a life in which we'll have a normal. Our world is constantly in flux. Hubby is home and will be working port hours . . . for a month and a half. Then he's leaving for dive school. Then home a few weeks and out for an underway. Then home. Then gone. Then home. Then gone.

I don't know what it is about me that feels the need to have order. To have plans. It just causes so much more anxiety for me (and Hubby who has to deal with me). I know I need to relax and let things just be. How do you do that though? Does anyone have a plan for that to happen? See - back to the needing a plan. What did my parents do to me? :-)

I'm working on it though. Maybe over the next 8 1/2 years I'll get a hang of this military life thing. Just in time for Hubby to retire :-)