Picture challenge: day 2

Today is the 2nd day of the My Life In Photos challenge..."something on your table." I love my World Market vase. They don't sell it anymore but they have lots of cute other ones. It's filled with different fake (gasp) flowers year round.

After I shot this photo, I felt the need to be more honest and show you the full view (including Declan's carseat full of a stack of clothes that needed to go to the nursery).

Two very unrelated things:
1. I made Balsamic Apricot Chicken, roasted asparagus and cous cous tonight. I rarely cook this complicated (though it probably doesn't seem that complicated to most). It was delicious. The hubs even liked it.
2. My blog friend Rebekah was matched with an expectant mom recently! She'll be a mommy in less than 3 months to a baby boy! Another bloggy friend Bri got "the call" this weekend and is now home with her sweet baby girl. Woot woot!!!

Photo Challenge

I was invited to take part in a photo challenge this week. Here are the guidelines:

"Our first My Life. In Pictures. challenge will start on March 30th and run through April 3rd.
The assignment will be:

Monday- Something new
Tuesday- Something on your table
Wednesday- The view from your front door
Thursday- Something you do each day
Friday- Something old"

See/read more at this blog.

Today is "something new". This is our new bookshelf we got at Tar.get. I love it because it holds a ton and we've got 5 canvas drawers to hide what we don't want the world to see...it's definitely our new command central. Inside it we have mail, dog leashes, all my hubby's crap (wallet, ipod, hats, etc).

A few other things I like about this corner of my home:
-Bullfighting poster hanging on the wall. My husband got it many years ago in Spain and it has his name on it like he's the featured bullfighter. It's followed us house to house for the last 6 years.
-On top of the shelf sits a cool fan my husband got me when we were dating when his family was overseas.
-There are 2 little green vases that we got from a great friend at our wedding.
-Notice the little metal pig? My husband loves pigs and he personally picked this out at Pier 1 years ago.
-There's also one of our favorite pictures of Declan and one of my personal favorites from our wedding (our first dance to India Arie's "Ready for Love"...look it up...it's a beautiful song).

Girls just wannna have fu-un...

My "mommy's night out" last night included some of this...

And a bit of this...

The night was full of tons of laughter, lots of good conversation and closing out 2 restaurants. Today I'm exhausted but thankful that I re-charged with my ladies last night. Next month is my month to plan. Hmm...what to do, what to do? ;)

American Idol by Ash

This season there is so much talent...it's hard to choose a favorite!

Matt . Giraud- He is a 50/50 mix of my husband's high school friend, Austin, and Justin Timberlake (in the looks department). We've been saying that he's totally emerging from the shadows these last few weeks and the judges are starting to acknowledge it. Tonight he did Marvin Gaye proud!

Kris . Allen- Does anyone think he looks like a mini Nick Lachey? Hmm. Anywho, this cutie pie is rock solid and tonight's rendition of "How Sweet it is to be Loved by You" was really good. Oh, and I totally love his pretty blonde haired wife beaming in the audience week-to-week. 

Scott . MacIntire- First of all, the wardrobe department is seriously playing with the fact that he can't see. Pink jeans and a paisley shirt? C'mon...be nice. But really- he's a great guy but I've never been a big fan. He lost me at "Mandolin Rain" 4 weeks ago and every song has sounded the same since. Tonight was really annoying/cheesy/not good. I'm pretty sure he shouldn't be in the top 10. Whatev. 

Megan . Joy- So I was a bit surprised that www.votefortheworst.com picked Megan this year. They try to get people vote for the worst (like it says) to keep them around. I really don't dislike Megan, it's just that her jazzy voice gets a bit old. I'm still recovering from "Rockin' Robin" weeks ago and tonight didn't help. MoTown and Megan didn't meet in harmony tonight. Yikes. Hey, at least she's gorgeous!?

Anoop . Desai- This kid wins the award for his voice not matching his "look". But, he's smooth like buttah. Confession- we were hoping he was gone after he butchered Michael Jackson's "Beat It". Tonight he was a 7 out of 10. There are still several guys better. I will say that last week was Ahhh-mazing. This week, pretty good.

Michael . Sarver- He looks just like my worship pastor at my church, who's name is also Mike. For the record, my worship pastor is better vocally. I just can't figure out why he's made it this far. He's got a pretty good voice but not THAT good. This week we at least didn't start fast forwarding the DVR before the end of his performance. See, I can be positive about Michael. I bet he's going soon. Even Paula struggled to hand out a compliment tonight.

Lil . Rounds- Does anyone else think she's overrated? I feel like she's yelling through every song every week. Don't start flaming me now...she does have a great voice. Others are definitely more original and more entertaining.  I might be way off here but I think she should go home to her 3 kids. Ooops! Did I just type that?

Adam . Lambert- He's so good it's ridiculous. I'm a big Johnny Cash fan so last week was weird when he went nutso with "Ring of Fire" but it was still undeniable that his voice is amazing. Tonight was crazy crazy crazy GOOD. His falsetto is off the hook. I was lovin' the Elvis look tonight too. I think no matter what happens in this competition, he'll get a record contract and I'll buy his CD. 

Danny . Gokey- His soulful voice has been a favorite of ours since day 1. I love the unique raspy tone to it. He rocked it tonight as always. His dance moves are funny but he can pay a choreographer some day when he's rich. He'll remain a front runner. If America doesn't keep him there, the judges will. (Remember the "save" card this year?)

Allison . Iraheta - Can you believe she is only 16 years old? Every week I'm surprised by her mature voice and performance. She oozes confidence and was great at "Papa was a Rolling Stone" tonight. I predict that she'll go far, but I still think one of the boys will take the title this year.

In summary, tonight's #1 was hands down Adam.Lambert with Matt.Giraud, Kris.Allen and Danny.Gokey close behind. Allison.Iraheta took the cake for the ladies.

Let's hear it. Who's your fav?

7 months old!! Say whaaaaaat??

No, really, time freakin' flies!! My baby love is 7 months old today.

Today's date: 3.25.09

Weight: 16-17 lbs

Height: Yes please. Just kidding.

 I don't know how long he is, but he's long!

Things to remember:

-Declan is officially army crawling. 

Nothing is off limits any more. Yikes! We need to baby proof.

-Some of his favorite foods are peas, acorn squash, apple sauce, rice cereal and sweet potato puffs. He also recently likes a mashed up banana. We're going to start transitioning to adding some smashed table food.

-This last month has been a month of colds. Declan is either getting a cold or getting over a cold. We bought stock in Kleenex and I'm getting quite talented at the snot-suck-ball-thingy.

-Declan lets me get ready in the morning while he watches his new love...Noggin'. Oh, he just loves him some Noggin'.

-We've been putting D in nursery at church. Last week he was 1 of 17 kids (that are newborn to pre-crawl). The nursery workers took him over to the crawlers but he seemed so small/young that they brought him back to the regular nursery. Ha! 

Here's Declan's favorite play with toys/watch tv pose. He's watching Ni Hao, Kai-lan:

Ohhh, this look is SOoooo Declan-do-bear:

Picnik!

I just learned about this cool amateur photo editing website called picnik. I played around with this picture:

And came up with this little ditty:

Check out the website. You can do a lot of different editing and fun stuff like teeth whitening and eye color changes. (By the way- I can barely handle how cute Declan's 2 bottom teeth are in pictures...and person, of course).

Welcome, spring!

We've missed you dearly.

Wordless Wednesday

It's about that time!

It's about time, after what really feels like the longest winter ever, to get outside!! It was in the upper 50s today and we headed over to the park that's a block from our house. Here's our outing in pictures:






p.s...tomorrow's forecast says it will be 79 degrees!!! Ahh...SO EXCITED...

Deals deals deals

My mom told me about a fabulous diaper deal today that she found on this sweet (local) deal finding blog. Let me give you a little run down:

Hug.gies Jumbo Pack's were on sale at Wal.greens for $10.00
I printed off a manufacturer coupon for $3 off each pack

Hug.gies big pack of wipes were on sale for $6 apack
I printed off a manufacturer coupon for $5 off each pack

Tonight when you purchased $25 (pre-coupon) of these items, you got a $10 Wal.greens bucks coupon

So this is the math after coupons:
$7/pack diapers (x2)= $14
$1/pack of big wipes= $1
total= $16.81 with tax- $10 Walgs coupon= $6.81 final price

WOOT WOOT. So I seriously went to 7 Wal.greens tonight. Completely ridiculous, I know. I did see other mommies with coupons in hand and a glimmer in their eye.

(By the way, Mark made it to 4 Wal.greens with me but he burned out quick so I dropped him off at home after picking up Decs from my parents).

Ahh, I love me some deals! My loot:

Wordless Wednesday (no words needed...I'll just take this laugh any day)!!

The beginning of crawling taking over our house...

Sickness, sitting and other ramblings...

Not sure you can tell that Declan is super sick in this picture (I can--glossy/swollen eyes, red nose..freshly cleaned by mommy, etc):

Seriously, our sweet little boy has been smiling and laughing for the most part through the worst illness he's had to date. We've had TWO pricey trips to the pedi to be told that he has a bad cold and respiratory infection and to watch for RSV. Yikes. So, this morning when he woke up wheezy, I freaked. But he's fine. We're not out of the woods but were hopefully a weekend of downtime and extra TLC at home will help him heal. It's so heartbreaking when you can't do anything for your snotty, coughy, wheezy little man. (Side note- I know we are super lucky to have a mostly happy sick kiddo. The nurses and doctors at both visits commented on his smiling and good spirits).
Moving on, Declan is now sitting (boppy supported) for awhile before toppling over. Though he's not much for sitting, he did CRAWL yesterday. WHaaaa?? I couldn't believe it. I had my camera out taking pictures (shocking, I know) and I flipped it to video mode once I realized he was crawling to a toy. I'll upload that video soon when I remember how to do it. Here's the sweets sitting with his favorite crunchy book:

Yums to the Tums

One of my favorite monthly activities on my never ending "to do" list is making Declan's baby food. Though I'm not much to be admired in the kitchen, I get a strange amount of satisfaction by whipping up some healthy grub for my little guy. I've learned everything I know from this great website.

I can guarantee that it's uber easy! First, I take the veggie or fruit and bake or steam it if it needs cooked. Then, I take my "hand blender" like this one and puree well. I add a bit of water as needed. Earlier on, I added way more than now. Then, I use my Pamp.ered Chef scoop and fill ice cube trays. I freeze them overnight and pop them out (after a few minutes to de-thaw a bit on the counter) and put in a dated freezer bag. Looks a bit like this:

Before each feeding I put however much I need (each cube is approximately an ounce) in to these nifty glass containers also from Pamp.ered Chef and microwave.

Declan loves it!

Sometimes it doesn't all get in his mouth:

"Lemme try feeding myself, mama!":

A night with the cousins...

Declan's working on some top teeth and was extra crabby tonight at Nana & Papa's. He did get some good play time with cousins Ella and Shauny.
Grumpiness, exhibit A:

Grumpiness, exhibit B:

There were some fun times too! Shauny and Declan are destined to be 2 peas in a pod:

This one melts my heart:

I love that Declan can grow up with his cousins! It will be really fun when he's older and they can do more together. Hopefully these teeth pop through so my little man can be more comfortable soon! Teething bites. No pun intended. ;)