Awww

I bought this precious little green chair for $2.99 at Smith's so that Remy could sit with me and watch the sunset cast long shadows over the mountain. Actually though, Remy goes to bed before the sun sets, this chair is too big for him, and sitting still to watch sunsets is not something he is going to be interested in until he's like 40. So it is more like an adorable footstool for me to use as I sip iced tea and watch the sunset. And maybe Mom and Dad can use it as an adorable ash tray holder when they are over.

Sunny Corner + Good Book

Remy's favorite book at the moment is Pat the Bunny. If you have never read Pat the Bunny, it encourages the child to mimic Paul or Judy in different activities - like patting the fuzzy bunny, or smelling the flowers - and it has a sensory element, so that the flowers are actually scented, and bunny has faux fur to stroke. Pretty awesome for a toddler!

Patting the bunny.

"Paul can lick the wall. Now YOU lick the wall."
(Just kidding, Remy was just tired of bumping his head on the wall
and this was his natural response.)

Pinch Me

Excuse me, but have I morphed into Gwenyth Paltrow? Or maybe a reality tv personality of some kind? Because I don't understand how this could be where I will be vacationing in two short months.


Ross's grandmother is putting together a family vacation in Oahu, Hawaii in August and we have been invited. This is the grandmother who gave us a trip to Los Cabos for our honeymoon, so she may actually be part fairy-godmother. I suspect that if she puts on a bathing suit we will see diaphanous little wings growing out of her back.

I have never been to Hawaii, and as you can see below, six years ago it wasn't even on my radar...but then several things happened and I developed a deep longing for the place. It started with that honeymoon in Mexico and the realization that Western Michigan might not actually have the finest beaches in all the world (I feel guilty just typing it.) Also, through five-day-a-week viewing of Wheel of Fortune, I became a connoisseur of "Prize Puzzle" vacations and learned that Hawaii was sort of the sh*t. Finally, I am a Lost fan. Who could watch Lost for all those years and not want to go to Hawaii? Mountains and jungles and Sawyer rising out of the sea dripping wet...

So I am breathless with excitement and will probably spend a lot of time over the next two months zoning out as I daydream about fun in the sun with a beautiful family in the magical land called Hawaii!




...sigh.

What's Up

• I made Remy a 1 year book on Shutterfly (they sent me a rockin' coupon, so I kind of had to!) Can't wait for it to come in the mail!
  
• It is too freakin' hot here. It makes my skin crawl and it gives me a headache. I need to start running my errands in the morning or I may have a heart attack and die.
  
• I am still looking for Verbena. Home Depot was out so I bought more Rose Moss. It was only $1.99 for one of those little trays of six!
• Mom and Dad's new closing date is in August. Ridiculousness on the sellers part continues, but Mom and Dad are keeping their eyes on the prize.
• My desire to cook has been completely sapped by the summer heat, but Ross is my man and brings me food whenever I ask him too. I am a very lucky girl.
  

In the Apartment

With recent string of 100 plus degree days the apartment has become our oasis in the desert - but with a sea of dreary earth tones from wall to wall it was feeling more like a dried-up watering hole. My mission this summer is to freshen it up with blues, greens and anything that reminds me of water and sky. With some recent TJMaxx finds I think it is already starting to feel more refreshing in here! (It's still just a work in progress, so please forgive the orange pears.)

Prophetic...Sort Of

I recently came across this survey from 2005 in my blog archives. Here is a snippet:

5 places I would run away to:

• Arizona
• Texas
• New Mexico
• Ireland
• England

I would like to think that if it had asked for six places, Nevada would have made the list.

Que?

Remy has recently discovered Diego. The little guy has such a hard time with English, now we're throwing in Spanish as well! Oh well, I don't mind if the first thing he says is al rescate, I just want him to start talking.

Anyway, he finds the show thrilling and Diego's escapades show him what he has begun to suspect already, that Mommy isn't letting him do the fun things a little boy should be doing (like swinging from vines, riding on turtles, and shouting for no good reason.)

Cat Pics

Tory, the living, breathing dust bunny. She owes me her very life, but she thinks she is Ross's girlfriend. I try not to glare at her too much.

We had to remove the drawers from the bottom of the little wine bar because Remy had become obsessed with yanking them open and slamming them shut and I don't want him to break any of his fingers quite this early in his life. Piper thinks the bar is much better this way.

Jojo and her magical, mystical toad eyes.

Bonus picture. Highlights my amazing collection of $5 and $7 wines, and my state of the art security system. Behold my fanciness.

Fun with the Spray Bottle

A lot less work than going down to the pool!

Two Lists

I am a bit frazzled this Monday morning. Here is why:

• Remy bumped his head three times in two hours this morning. Ugly bumps which required ice (for sucking on of course, he looks at me like I am nuts when I try to put them on the booboo) and wet rags (also for sucking on, that's sort of his thing) and lots of hugs.
• Ross and I went out looking at houses yesterday. Lots of great houses for great prices and yet we still can't agree on what we want. (Safe, large, well situated vs Stick-it-to-the-Man cheap.) We are so tired of disagreeing that renewing our lease here yet again is beginning to look quite appealing.
  
• Mom and Dad are still waiting on important paperwork from the sellers on the condo they are trying to buy. It's been so ridiculously slow, I feel terrible for them. When Ross and I moved down here all we had to worry about was moving and that was nuts enough. But to be packing and transitioning everything while trying to buy a place in a distant city from a cold, uncaring bank at the same time? (((shudders)))

On the plus side:

• I figured out who is eating my flowers, and it's not beetles, it's flies! Now I need to figure out how to get rid of them...any tips?
  
• Ross and I had an actual date this weekend. We went to Red Rock Casino and dropped Remy off at Kid's Quest. We ate at Fat Burger, played slots, sipped drinks, and saw Super 8. Ahhhh, dates are nice.
• It's gorgeous here today - sunny, clear, high in the nineties. After Remy's nap we are going to get out and enjoy it! (read: grocery shop and maybe stop at McDonald's.)
  

A random picture of Remy, for your enjoyment.

Meanwhile, in the Potted Garden...

There has been some excitement out on the balcony. For starters, spikey-mystery-plant has flowered. Tiny white and orange flowers, totally cute. I seriously don't remember this happening last year, so it was a happy surprise.




There is a new addition to the garden. A....I don't know, I accidentally threw away the container before writing down its name. I'll have to google it or it will be the dark-leafed-mystery-plant. I didn't mean to buy it, I went to Walmart looking for Verbena (per Clint's fine praise) and the woman told me they didn't have Verbena but that this was one of her favorites and since she was standing there expectantly and I didn't want to be rude I bought it. But I failed to notice a huge section of it was broken off and at the moment it is not looking too hot. Poor whatchamacallit.


Brace yourselves for this next set of pictures. Periwinkle, before and after. Since there are no squirrels around here, nor balcony climbing ninja bunnies, I think this must be the work of the disgustingly huge beetle I saw on the balcony yesterday. But maybe it is some weird fungus or disease? Whatever it is it makes me steaming mad and I am definitely going to have to google this one.

Please excuse the poor quality of the picture. Clearly I was emotional when I took this.

The blahs that won't go away

So I am nearly two weeks into being ill, and I am realizing that this is probably not a bug. A proactive and responsible person would, at this point, call her doctor and inquire about changes to her medication. This capable person would then be forced to play phone tag with various nurses and receptionists with only a 50% chance of actually ever speaking to the doctor. The final outcome would most likely be a recommendation to stay on all medications until scheduled appointment in July, but, so as not to appear uncaring, nurse would add "but call us back if things get worse."

Maybe I am wrong. Maybe I should just call. Or maybe I will experiment with my medication, using myself as a guinea pig, and then shock and impress medical world with my findings.

Toddlerhood

Remy turned 13 months on Sunday and is less and less like a baby all the time. He is still lagging a bit in the speech department but it seems to Ross and me that he is making clear progress. He claps spontaneously, raises his arms when he wants to be picked up, mimics us more, and babbles more. Still no pointing and it is a crap shoot whether he will respond to hearing his name on any given occasion. I haven't made an appointment with Early Intervention but he is doing so much better, I will give it another month. Lately Remy's hobbies have been exploring the apartment and playing with things that aren't toys.

We Did It!

Remy and I finally made it down to the pool yesterday. It wasn't our first time this year, but it was the first time the water was warm enough for the buddy to do more than just sit on my lap in the shallow end. He had mixed feelings about the experience. Normally he loves water...but he's used to warm, shallow water festooned with tiny shining bubbles and a bucket full of toys. When we first entered the pool he seemed wary, but okay. Then I tried to put him in his baby inner-tube thing and he thought I was pretty much trying to drown him. After that he went from wary to perpetually-on-the-verge-of-tears. Unless I was spinning round and round or swishing him through the water at high speeds while making whooshing and vrooming noises. That he absolutely loved. So I managed to get a work out and he managed to have a little fun and then we collapsed by the side of the pool, me on a chaise lounge and he in his stroller, and just rested there soaking in the warmth and zoning out in the delicious way one does after swimming. It is gonna be a hot weekend so we will see if we can get Ross down there with us next time!

Drummer Boys

To see Ross playing drums at church the weekend of June 4,5 go to Canyon Ridge's media player and you can see him in "Surrender" and "All We Need" (both songs start slow but ramp up as they go.) The crazy thing is that his drums have been in storage for over a year. The first time he has had the opportunity to sit down at a set of drums since the move was when he auditioned for the band last month! I am amazed at how he can just pick it up again after all this time and sound so good. I saw him at the 11 o'clock service on Sunday and it was brilliant, looking forward to seeing him play again the first weekend in July.

And to see Remy drumming, just look at this!

As I may have mentioned - I don't know, I am not much of a complainer ;P - I have been sick all week. Add to that the fact that Ross needed to take my car while his was in the shop and I have spent A LOT of time in the apartment this week. Here are some of the things that have kept me entertained.

Sherlock from Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss. I am not a Sherlock Holmes snob. I have read The Hound of the Baskervilles and maybe a couple of short stories, but most of my experience of the famous sleuth is apocryphal (see Carol Nelson Douglas's Irene Adler series and Laurie R. King's Mary Russell series) so I have no problem with a smartphone wielding Sherlock. Especially if it is the brain child of two of Doctor Who's best writers. Cumberbatch gracefully walks a fine line between irresistible and alien as Holmes and Freeman plays a wry, humble, soft-spoken Watson. Series Two is currently in production.

The Invisible Bridge by Julie Orringer. I started this book because a) it has received rave reviews and b) it was a nearly 700 page novel for just $7.99 on my nook. That's a lot of book. I wouldn't normally read a book about a Jewish family during WWII because I don't like to be sad any more than I have to be but thankfully this has been a wonderful, old fashioned (reminds me a bit of Tale of Two Cities) novel and I love it. It is so vivid, and it is the first book I have read that looks at the war from the Hungarian perspective. However, now I am on page 408 and things have been going poorly for our protagonist for some time, and I need a breather soooo...

Sugar Daddy by Lisa Kleypas. Lisa Kleypas writes smart, steamy, heartfelt romance novels that never, ever mention the holocaust. This is the first contemporary romance I have read by her and so far I like it. It is set in the southwest, Texas to be exact, and tells the story of Liberty Jones growing up in a trailer park and overcoming adversity and finding love and all that good stuff!

Today

Sick baby.

Bossy cat.

Silent rose.

Good News

I am still sick and Ross missed his flight to E3 this morning, so we needed some good news and we got the best news - Mom and Dad's offer on a condo in Las Vegas has been accepted! The closing date is set for next month! Yay! So now lots of prayers that they get from this point to the closing without a hitch, and then for a safe move across country! It's going to be an exciting summer :)

Sick Days

Remy and I are on day two of our shared stomach bug, day two of not leaving the house. When he hasn't been weeping and railing against the cruel fates for imposing this diarrhea on him, he has been giggly and chatty and adorable. I think, as of this afternoon, he is on the mend...and if I can make up a little sleep tonight then tomorrow is going to be a good day. I will finally be able to do the grocery shopping I meant to do on Monday and maybe even do a little swimming. Ross is planning on having a good day as well, flying out to California in the morning with his friend Jeff to attend E3.

Piper

Remy and I are both sick with a stomach bug today. Not to be outdone, Piper threw up about half a dozen times. And instead of politely excusing herself to the balcony where she could be sick and I wouldn't have to jump up and take care of it right away, she stayed close to us so she could share the misery. She's 8 years old, but she doesn't want me to forget that she is still my baby too.

Circle of Life

Pictoral theme of the weekend: the circle of life. Hmmmm, profound.





The Doctor Who mid-season finale totally rocked. So good I was frozen with suspense the entire 45 minutes and ended up with a massive crick in my neck. I felt all warm and fuzzy about the ending...for about two minutes and then I was all like, crap, no more Doctor Who until autumn, and I still don't know what the heck is going on.