Greyson's Music Video Favs

This little honey of mine LOVES music. I hope that sticks with him. I'd love for little hearts to swoon over him and his guitar (or drums or whatever).

We watch a lot of country music videos in our house for a couple reasons. Number 1: the "non-country" music channels (i.e. VH1, MTV) hardly ever have music videos and when they do they're in between 10 minutes of commercials. And #2: We like country. So if you don't, then you can deal with it or I guess we can't be friends...

Anyway, here's Greyson FAVORITE music videos. He'll literally stop whatever he's doing to watch these and be still and silent until they're over.

SugarLand, Tonight

 I had put this one from Sugarland on my facebook, so for those of you who are my facebook friend, this might be slightly repetitive.... But I think Greyson's got to like this one because she rolls around on a bed a lot and after all, he's a boy :)

Jason Aldean and Kelly Clarkson, Don't You Wanna Stay

So there you go! Greyson's Music Video Favs

xoxoxo

C

Good Thing #24: Work!

It's been almost a week since I've made a post but that's only because I've been crazy busy because.... I got a job! Tuesday night I got a phone call from a family friend who asked if I wanted a job and I said "Sure!" without hesitation and I started the next day. It might be temporary, it might be long term, but the point is I'm working. AND I get to bring Greyson to work which is both awesome and challenging. But left to my own devices yesterday I got a lot done considering I had Greyson all by myself (I'm the only one in the one room office).

It's pretty barren right now, as you can see. I guess the guy before me cleaned house before he left. Oh well. Nothing a little iHome and a plant can't fix. Anyway, what I'm doing is the administrative stuff for our local Home Builders Association, which is both great and a little nerve-wracking because I have to interact with the names in town that everyone knows, but I can handle it. I'll handle almost anything if it means I can bring my kid and have flexible hours.

I didn't realize how much I missed working, and how good I am at secretarial stuff. I love answering the phone. I love typing. I love making a spreadsheet look it's best. I still hate filing, but I can let that slide. I remember being a little girl and always saying I never wanted a desk job, but look at me now. It's what I prefer. I guess because I know I'm good at it without having to really try, you know?

And maybe when Greyson's a little bigger (not really nursing, and down to one nap a day) I can look into finding him a part time nanny for the 4 to 6 hours a day that I'm gone. I really only want to work part time as long as I have a little kid, but I do know that I need to work. Being home has been great but it's been tough at the bank. So I think this is the Universe's way of answering my silent prayers for financial help, I better do what I can with the opportunity while I have it. So I'm really going to try my best to be needed at the HBA and well-liked.

You might be wondering what the HBA does and hoping I'll tell you, but honestly I'm still learning myself. But what I do know is that it's a non-profit organization that benefits and supports local home builders across the country. The office of the HBA handles membership fees and renewals, and local HBA events (like in our town the big one is the Parade of Homes).

So it's awesome. There's a lot for me to do there once I get the hang of it, which is what I need because I hate to be twiddling my thumbs. Send me good thoughts so I can be really, really good at my new job :) 

xoxox

C

P.S.

I got bangs! I've never had them before and I HATED them at first and actually had to go back to the salon and have the girl fix them up, but I'm starting to like them....

Greyson's 1st Bee-day

I'm so excited for Greyson's 1st birthday. Who'd've thought that I'd be able to take care of a human being 24/7, for 365 days straight, and get their boogies, and dig kibble out of their mouth, and rinse poo off them, and still love more than anything in the world?? So yes, I'm planning a party. I was originally going to do The Very Hungry Caterpillar as a theme but I've decided on Bees and a Barbecue instead. Bees because I call him my little honey, and a barbecue because it'll be a barbecue potluck. And even though I won't send them out for another month or so, I've already made birthday invitations!

Almost done....

Finished!

It was really fun making them and didn't take me too long, surprisingly. The invites pretty much sum up the colors I'm using: black, white, yellow, and red and probably some orange. Everything I do is all hodge-podge but it usually ends up coming together in the end, so I'm not worried or stressed or Momzilla about it at all. I just want a party with people we love, who love Greyson too, and to take lots of great pictures, and have fun on a sunny day by the river.

Some people don't make very big deals out of 1st birthday parties. The argument that the baby won't remember much, the baby won't participate much, etc... But babies grow up. And I'll want to remember him as a little tiny thing when he towers over me at 6'. And I'm sure he'll want to see pictures of his 1st birthday when he's grown some. So for right now, his party is for me and in a few years we'll all be glad we did it.

I've looked up 1st birthday traditions from around the world, and almost everybody does a huge feast. One thing I like that the Chinese do is a little fortune telling game: They place the baby on the floor in the middle of a circle arranged with things like books, money, a truck, a tool, etc.... and whichever thing the baby goes for is what the baby might end up doing in life. Like if he reaches for the money maybe he'll be rich, or if he reaches for a tool maybe he'll be handy, etc... And they think that tigers bring protection to babies - maybe I'll have to get him a little tiger-something.

Indian (like from India, not Native Americans) get their head shaved. Yeah, we won't be doing that.

Australians eat something called Fairy Bread. Basically it's buttered bread covered in sprinkles....

Lol one site says that in Germany if a man is still unmarried at 30, they make him sweep the stairs of City Hall and his friends keep throwing dirt and rock on he stairs so he's always sweeping, that way the ladies know that he's still available....

And my friend Hazel ought to be able to tell me if this is true, but apparently in Ireland they pick the kid up by his feet and bump his head on the ground for every year plus another time for good luck. She's Irish so I'll have to ask if they really do that.

And in Argentina they pull your ear lobe for every year you've been alive, plus one for good luck. That one for good luck thing is pretty universal. I guess it's probably meant to fake out Fate.

Anyway, there's some things you might not have known when you woke this morning:)

xoxoxo
C

P.S. I made scones!

Bee Happy...

How would you like to be a bee and come to work to THIS tree every day? I think I'd like it....

There tons and tons of fat, happy bees, and they were so busy they didn't even buzz over to check us out.

I took Greyson to the park today and picked the prettiest tree there to set up camp. It's overflowing with blossoms and little petals would fall every now and then like snow onto me and my son, honestly making me feel like a poet in petticoats. It was only slightly ruined by the traffic rushing by 50 yards away. Oh well, I'll take peace and beauty where I can get it :)

xoxoxo

C

Good Thing #23: The little things...

You know how your heart can melt? Well, mine I'm pretty sure is in a puddle sloshing in my shoes. This little son of mine is too awesome and adorable. He's starting to figure things out and it's amazing to watch him do things for the first time. Like a week or two ago he had his brush in his hand and was trying to brush his own hair and I about peed my pants out of excitement, just because he now knows what things are for and what you do with them! Then the other night during his bath he picked up his face cloth and started rubbing his face with it - so cute! And last night he was trying to shove his shoe onto his foot. Oh yes, I'm jello for this kid....

In other news, my sometimes-sweet baby sister is graduation high school in a couple weeks which is totally weird. And only a couple weeks after that she's moving to Phoenix. Crazy! I've never lived more than 30 minutes away from her. And my dad and stepmom (aka Snoopy) are coming out for it so I'm super excited to see them and for them to see Greyson. They haven't seen him since he was about 2 weeks old (excluding Skype dates).

And speaking of visiting family, Zack's dad and stepmom are going to be able to make it for Greyson's 1st Birthday!

AND the 11th Sookie Stackhouse novel came out this month and I just got it in the mail! I have to finish what I'm currently reading (The Other Boleyn Girl by Phillipa Gregory - I've already read it a few times. It's delicious) before I can start Dead Reckoning.



I've also decided to put a cease and desist order on all paper towel usage in my house after what we have is used up. I've found these UNpaper towels online and am going to make my own out of this patterned flannel.

So I'm doing polka-dot on one side and the camo on the other. I've got 2 whole yards of each so I can probably make at least 32 UNpaper towels if they're all the same size, but I'll probably make a few that are a little smaller than paper towel size too, for you know, variety. Zack's not going to like not having paper towels, but he'll get used to it. I rarely use them any way, only to wipe Greyson's face after a meal and flannel cloth will be so much softer and I could probably use the same one for a whole day's worth of meals. I'm going to pack up the paper towel holder and just fold these up and store them on the window sill. :) Hopefully I'll get started on this tomorrow. I'll post pictures :)

And I've started watching a little girl on Tuesdays! She's super cute and makes me marvel at how big Greyson is getting. She's only 3.5 months so it's a big size difference. It really puts into perspective that Greyson really isn't that little of a baby anymore and compared to Lila, he's a great big kid-boy.

Also, I've got a couple new followers! Whoop! Thanks for sticking around! I was doing really good there for awhile posting something every day, but I sort of dropped off the planet there for a little while. I'm going to try to start posting damn near every day again, I promise.

Hm, well, that about catches you up with me! Hope everyone's doing well and good!

xoxoxo

C

Oh, by the way, these are awesome and comfy and they're my first Crocs ever (mostly because I never considered my self cool enough to wear the dorky old-school Crocs) I got them in navy but they have other colors...



65% saved - I'm getting better!

So I did a Walgreens run and saved 65% :)

(4) 1lb bags of Rold Gold Pretzels

(2) Arm & Hammer Laundry Soap

(10) Lysol Toilet Bowl Cleaner

(2) Pantene Shampoo

(2) Pantene Conditioner

(2) Nature Valley Granola Bars

(2) Fiber One Granola Bars

(3) Palmolive Dishsoap

(4) Mitchum Deoderant

(4) Colgate Toothpaste

(10) Hershey Dark Chocolate Bars

(1) Neutrogena Lip Balm

And I got $5 in Register Rewards for next time. So my total was $71.91 - $10.00 in RR from last time so I paid $61.91 out of pocket. But with the $5 in RR it's sort of like I paid $56.91 because you know I'll be going back. My total would have been $165.90. So yep, I'm getting better!

Oh, AND the girl gave me this free tote and a bunch of samples that she had left over from Mother's Day!

xoxoxo
C

Super great weekend....

It's the Monday after a great weekend, and I just wanted to share :)

Friday was super busy and tiring because on Saturday we were having our first ever yard sale. I was sort of nervous because what if no one showed up? I think it'd feel the same if no one showed up for your birthday. So I was timidly pricing all our "one man's trash in another man's treasure" stuff feeling a little iffy about the whole thing. I put an ad in the paper, put up signs and balloons, cleaned everything off, Zack was bringing home some rental tables. We were trying hard to make in good. And it totally paid off! We had SO many people show up. The signs and the ad CLEARLY stated that the sale would start at 9am but people starting showing up at 7:30am. Which was totally fine. If you want to buy my stuff you can show up at any time! I forgot to take a picture of our beginning spread but I do have a cute picture of Greyson helping me get the signs ready on Friday:

And here he is at the yard sale:

Oh! And here's the boys obviously very anxious and excited to help me the morning of the yard sale:

So we made a good amount of money - a lot more than expected -  and got rid of some junk, and got some sun which made it a really great day.

Then Sunday was Mother's day - my first one ever :)

I put a new-to-us shirt on Greyson and dragged Zack to church with me.

 Then we went and bought some newspapers so I can get the coupons, and then we went to Fuzziwigs (sp?) and Zack bought me some chocolate covered strawberries for Mother's day (and later I told him that he also bought me a wallet and a purse :) ). Then we came home, and Zack did the dishes and grilled some pork chops for dinner!

So yep, it was great.

Oh! Did I tell you Greyson is "cruising" now? Cruising is where the baby pulls himself up to stand up on/next to furniture/window sills/ etc....

Hope everyone else had a super great weekend, too!

xoxoxo

C

I think I'm actually OLD underneath my 23 year old skin. And by that I mean that I love that same things Grandmas do...

So, I've decided that I love to read mysteries - it's quickly become my favorite genre. And if you throw in a little romance WITH a mystery?? Well, there you go. Anyway, what goes better with a good mystery than a little tea? And what goes better with a little tea than some good friends? And what goes better with some good friends than costumes??

I've found this website called Mystery Tea Parties and I would LOVE to host one! The only glitch I see is that it's mostly all the rage with the 65+ crowd, but who cares. I like tea, mysteries, costumes, and friends just as much as the Elders do, you know? So what if I subscribe to Country Living and knit sometimes, all while my famous chocolate chip cookies are baking? I might have a small case Senior-itis it seems.

So Local Ladies, who wants to come to a tea party?! Whoomp! Whoomp!