Teague's 2nd Thanksgiving

Happy belated Thanksgiving to everyone. As I told my family last night, I have a lot to be thankful for. Sometimes I just need to stop to remember how much I have in my life...a wonderful husband, a beautiful child, an outstanding family, a job (which is big in today's economy), and so on.

We have really enjoyed these few days off from work and spending it with family. On Thursday afternoon we had lunch with the Dusha's and then Thursday evening we spent dinner with the Mohr's. Like my uncle Bola has said, every Mohr get together is like a hearing aid convention. Everyone is trying to "out-talk" the next person and yelling, so it gets a bit chaotic. Teague loved running around with the bigger kids. On Friday Ryan returned home for bball practice and to get ready for the scrimmage on Saturday and my mom and I did some pre-Christmas shopping. Another chaotic event. Yikes. Friday afternoon I had coffee with my high school friend Amber - always so good to catch up with her - and then we had a wedding reception for a family friend. Today before we came home we did some swimming at the fitness center in Morris and Teague was in heaven. He wanted to swim OUT of my arms. He has no fear of swimming and could care less how much water he ingests. He loves to jump from the ledge into your arms. I haven't seen him that squealey and excited before! Anyway, Teague had so much fun playing with his cousins and it was a nice reprieve from reading books every free minute with monkey boy! We came home tonight and I think Teague was happy to see his own bed! All in all, a great weekend. Here are some pictures and a video clip of our weekend.

Handsome little Monkey before the wedding reception (please note that his hair is actually getting long enough/thick enough for a little spikey do - though it's so blonde you can barely see it). How do you like the forehead bruise from his monkey antics of jumping from one chair to another -and lack of success at making it to the next chair - at daycare?!

This is either "so big" or "who's crazy" at the wedding reception dinner. The true reason for the picture is to show his new found love for ranch dressing!

Mommy and Monkey at the reception. Getting a "good" picture these days is really trying!

Oh man, look at that excited face! He was just dancing around the changing room so excited so go swimming!

Finally he just sat in the locker so patiently waiting for everyone!

I think he thinks the wait was well worth it, he loved swimming!

Melrose Holiday Tour of Homes

This year we agreed to have our home one of the five homes that is showcased on the Melrose Holiday Tour of Homes. The proceeds of this fundraiser go to the Ronald McDonald House and Hope Lodge. You can read more about the tour at http://melroseholidaytour.blogspot.com/. It's a lot of work, but well worth it. The local floral shop came into decorate our house (marketing and advertising tool for them) so I had to take some pictures of their work. Of course pictures can't do it all justice, but hopefully you can get a sense of the Christmas Cheer! I think we estimated that between the two days there were around 350-400 people to tour our home. Wow-zer. Hope you all had a nice weekend.

FRONT OF HOUSE AT NIGHT

DINING ROOM


LOOKING INTO THE KITCHEN FROM DINING AREA

LIVING ROOM

THE BASEMENT

I've Been Tagged.

I guess I have been tagged, at least that is what Kelly told me on her blog. So here it goes.

I am: glad tomorrow is Friday.
I know: what an amazing life I have.
I want: Teague to always have such a happy go lucky personality.
I have: great friends and an awesome family.
I dislike: dishonesty.
I miss: the long sunny days!
I feel: content.
I hear: Ryan watching the T-Wolves game.
I smell: Cinnamon Spice (wallflower).
I crave: sweets. ALL. THE. TIME.
I cry: when frustrated.
I search: for all the things I have misplaced - it's this mom forgetfulness thing.
I wonder: what Teague will be like as a teenager/adult!
I regret: not just laying around more before Teague. Man I run a lot now.
I love: my family.
I worry: about everything.
I remember: what a great childhood I had.
I dance: when I eat sweets. Just ask my sister, it really annoyed her growing up.
I don't: like the cold weather. (If I didn't love my parents/sister, etc. so much I would move ASAP to warm weather).
I argue: as little as possible, but I am not afraid to speak up!
I write: college letters of recommendation for my students ALL DAY.
I win: some of my own personal goals.
I lose: some of my own personal goals.
I wish: to keep my family safe.
I listen: to Teague babble and say new words daily.
I can usually be found: reading books to Teague.
I am scared: of things I cannot control.
I need: a vacation, with my boys.
I forget: what it feels like to have free time.

Tag to Amy VB, Anita H, Sapphire, and Jaime

Teague Stories

I remember when Teague was just a couple of months old I told my friend Kelly that I loved that particular age. She was talking about all the different stages of her son, Devin's, life at that point and how she loved 18 months the most because that's when they really seem like they start to converse with you. She's so right. 18 months is not quite here yet, but I see that same thing coming about. Teague's newest favorite word is "Happy!". So all the way to daycare this morning as he is looking at a book he is saying "Happy!, Happy!, HHHHHHAAAAAPPPPPYYYYY!". I think he is actually just learning self-descriptive adjectives!

Another cute story... Last night I was on my way home from a short post-work shopping excursion. I had just talked to Ryan so I knew they were home. I forgot to tell him something so I called back right away and nobody answered, except the answering machine. So I am blabbing on the machine and all of the sudden I hear this sweet little "ah, ba ba.........Hiiiiiiiiiiii!........." and I was so confused and so I said "Monkey, is that you?", and he says "Hiiiiiiiiiiiii. Hi." And just kept blabbing. Of course Ryan had left him alone to use the, ahem - facilities and Teague actually answered the phone! It's all caught on the answering machine, so whenever I need a good laugh/smile I can listen to that!

I was trying to update some privacy stuff on this blog earlier this week. I feel fairly comfortable using blogger, but apparently in my attempts to block users from being able to find this blog online by googling us, I blocked people from viewing the blog, so I think it's fixed now! Whew.

Christmas Shopping for a 16 month old

What do you get a 16 month old for Christmas? In all reality (like a majority of kids), Teague needs nothing. But it wouldn't be Christmas if you didn't buy them some type of gift. It's sort of like last year. I knew he could have cared less if we bought him something. Same thing this year. But I really want to get him something he will love - but what? More books?? Honestly this kid can sit for hours and hours looking at books and sometimes the same book. He loves books (hence, his 16 month picture to the right). As an educator of course I think it's great, but sometimes I wonder if he just thinks that all the toys we have for him are just boring? So I asked Tina, "What does Teague play with while he is here?" and she replied - "Well, mostly books." Well that didn't help. So I have just resorted to buying him and suggesting to others the obvious - books and necessities like shoes. B-O-R-I-N-G, but not to him so that's all that matters, right?

I did some shopping yesterday, but I wasn't impressed with selection. Maybe what it really was, I don't know what to buy a majority of people on our list. And then there's always the worry that I will forget someone, so what should I buy "just in case" for that "emergency" situation. Yuck. I really love shopping, but not when I have to buy ambiguous items for people!

Have a good week!

All Better

Monkey is soooo much better. It took him 8 DAYS to get over that stomach bug. A few people have asked if he had rotovirus, but he did not and he was also vaccinated for that. It was just a bad case of the stomach bug. Up until Sunday he was still vomiting. Poor thing. But he seemed really good on Monday and was THRILLED to be back at Tina's. When Maddie (same age as Teague) woke up that morning and came down to the daycare, Teague sprinted across the room, tripped and hit his head, and got right up without crying and ran over to hug Maddie. He missed his buddy. He was, however, very exhausted from playing all day. Tina said he would play and then go over in the corner and lay on the floor like he was so tired and then get up and keep playing. That night he was in bed sleeping by 6:45 and didn't get up until after 7 Tuesday morning. Same thing last night. He is just trying to get caught up on sleep.

Other than that, life is normal again at our house. Ryan starts bball in 1.5 weeks. Teague's bedtime will likely make it pretty difficult to get to many if any games, which is a bit sad - but if I really want to see a game I will just have to hire a babysitter. The weird thing is that we do not have a single home Friday night game - there are only 3 Friday games and they're all away! I have to say I am disappointed because that was the one thing I looked forward to doing in the cold winter months - watching basketball - but we may just have to push the pause button on that until Teague is older.

Have a good week and enjoy the cold, MN weather! (Wasn't it just 70 degrees last week?!)

24 Hours

Well we have went 24 hours without puke. It's been like walking on eggshells in some ways though! I have worried anytime he eats anything besides toast, rice, bananas or applesauce. He seems to like cheerios for the time being and today we have branched out to chicken noodle soup. He loves that. I think he really misses his bottle of milk before bedtime (yes, he still gets one and yes it's my fault - it's my only cuddle time, sue me!). Anyway, he seems to SLOOOOOOOWLY be rounding the corner. And I have gotten over myself, my rants are over - though last night he was having a fun time playing with me but had apparently ate too many cheerios and drank too much water (which he proved to me when we were rolling on the floor playing and he puked half in my mouth and on my face - I deserved it). That's life as a mom - the 3 "P's" don't really bother you anymore (pee and puke in the face or poop - but not in the face). Yum.

Teague snuggling in, listening to Daddy read....A-Dorable.

We did venture to St. Cloud today. Auntie Grums and Ken are here from Seattle and we definitely wanted to be able to spend some time with them. When we asked Teague if he wanted to go "bye bye" he basically sprinted to the door. He was rather tired of looking at the walls within our house for the past 7 days! He was good there, but you could tell he was still not feeling the best. He did, however in his sickness (un)equilibrium, trip and hit his head on a chair and boy did it leave an egg/bruise on his forehead. And boy did he scream and hold his breath (but that's nothing new for him). I just feel so bad for him.

So we are hopeful for a full week's worth of work. And I am sure he will be excited to be back with his friends at Tina's.

Enjoy the COLD weekend!

My Personal Pity Party

Since I am a mom, in reality nothing can be about me anymore. And I am okay with that - there is nothing I wouldn't do or sacrifice for the sake of my monkey baby. But since this blog is mine and I can write whatever I want, I am going to have a pity party here.

I am really sick of cleaning up puke. Like EXTREMELY sick of it. Yes, you are right - like my kid is not sick of puking - I totally get that and I feel horrible for him. But I am tired. I am so tired of getting up and washing sheets and throwing away pillows and giving my poor babe a bath in the middle of the night when he is barely awake and his face and head are covered in puke and he is really mad at me because he doesn't want all his clothes ripped off of him and water being poured on top of his head and his eyes are still shut because he knows if he opens them all that disgusting slime that is dripping on his face will get in his eyes. Yep, I am sick of it. Officially sick of 5 days of this junk. If you have been blessed with the 24 hour thing with your kid, consider yourself lucky. It's not a big deal unless you are going on day #6 with your kid puking - ALL NIGHT. And then your husband is sick too. And you kind of just have forgotten about yourself and the fact that you still feel crappy because there is no time for that. Good Lord, will we ever get through this? I suppose we will - just in time for basketball season and me being a single mom again????

Yuck.

Yuck. That's the way everyone in my house feels right now. And that's how we all basically look too. We all have the stomach flu. Poor Teague. He's who I feel for the worst. Ryan and I have managed to work today, but I think we will both be home tomorrow. Yesterday I worked, Ryan stayed home with Teague and today my dad is with monkey. I officially have a fever - oh, on top of the flu, I also have a cold. So at times my belly will feel better, only to feel worse in my nose. We all are in tough shape and it has little to do with Halloween candy, unless those two pieces between the 3 of us were infected with something???