When Things Get Quiet

On the days we work from home I pretty much give the little man free reign of the main floor of the house. It's really one big area that consists of the kitchen, dining room, den and hallway. So, generally I'm not too concerned with where he's playing...that is until things get quiet...
























Apparently I got distracted while unloading the dishwasher! Later on in the day, I seemed to have forgotten to close the bedroom doors.












I guess he didn't want to wait for bedtime to get his story! At least he already loves to read. Oh, and my house is not really that messy. We were just waiting for the paint on Daddy's fabulous new bookcase to dry. All of the books are now stacked neatly with plenty of room for more. Pictures to come...

Rollercoaster Weekend

So I was all pumped for a beautiful weekend weather wise, but then my wonderful hubby squashed my dreams and told me that it was going to rain on Sunday!  No problem, we could still have a fabulous Saturday.  And that we did.  We started off with the little man waking up way early.... and where does the fabulous part start you ask?  Wait, here it is...he went back to sleep until 8:30!  Ok, so it happened to be in our bed which I vowed would never happen, but I'm beginning to be ok with an occasional Saturday morning if it grants me 2 extra hours of sleep. 
Do the math people...original wake up time was 6:30 am on a Saturday....I don't think so!  We then took a leisurely breakfast where the little man had soggy cheerios from a spoon and then we made our weekly grocery run.  I was a little bummed since we didn't save quite as much as we spent (I'm a huge couponer), but then remembered that I had an $18 rebate coming my way!  After a good nap, we made our weekly Home Depot run and for the 2nd time the little man freaked out when B unloaded a sheet of plywood from the shelves onto the cart???  Not sure why this happens, but we'll need to  remedy this as we buy a lot of plywood (see sidebar in reference to the state of our house.)  Since it was such a nice day I decided that TJ needed to have his first swing experience outside, but this was easier said than done as we currently don't own any type of swing.  This situation was easily remedied by a quick trip to Babies R Us and yes, I had a coupon for those of you wondering.  Well, I was right the little man enjoyed the heck out of it and this made my day.  Of course, we had to video it.

So, overall Saturday was pretty fantastic, but Sunday was another story. It started off pretty good as we weren't too late leaving for Church and I hadn't forgotten the diaper bag, breakfast for Sunday School or the food donation that had been sitting on the kitchen counter for a month. However, I knew something was wrong when I heard a low moan emerge from the group of men standing in the corner and saw B holding up a flashing vibrating nursery beeper...uh oh here we go. I ran upstairs only to find a lethargic little man who had somehow gotten a fever in the 10 minutes since we had dropped him off. Now this had me slightly worried as it had come on so fast and this child has never had a fever even when he is sick (2 ear infections so far.) But B took him home, administered Tylenol, let him nap and by the time they came to pick me up (I had to stay as this was our week to help in the nursery during church) he was perfectly fine or so we thought. We went home, had lunch and my child who doesn't eat had a whole piece of turkey and some veggie soup. He played all afternoon and ate rice from our casserole and some broccoli for dinner. He seemed fine, so we got him ready for bed and I decided to take the temp one more time. Whoa, back up to 101.7. So we gave Tylenol again and laid him down. Ten minutes later, unusual crying began so we rushed to the nursery. Unfortunately, my hubby (with the weaker stomach) happened to be first on the scene and picked up the crying lad right before he let loose projectile vomit everywhere....and yes, B's mouth was open! So of course an unscheduled cold bath ensued to clean up and bring down his temp and finally the little man went to sleep. That is until we made the bad decision to wake him at midnight to check the temp again. The fever was gone, but our unrestful night had just begun. So, our crazy weekend of ups and downs is par for the course around the Behrens house, but I would go through anything for my 2 favorite men.

Whatever It Takes

Really overall, we could not have asked for an easier child to raise.  Both Brian and I have a laid back just "go with the flow" temperment and so does the little man.  He's a great napper, plays well by himself when we're at the office (yes, I'm lucky enough to take my child to work with me) and we can pretty much take him anywhere and he is always complemented on his good behavior.  That being said, there is one area I become increasingly frustrated with on a daily basis....eating.  My child could care less about any food other than his milk.  We started rice cereal at 4 months old and a few weeks later began with homemade pureed veggies followed by fruit.  Not until we started yogurt did we get a willing open mouth from him.  Of course we have good days and bad days as with anything else and our pediatrician has told us not to worry since he is putting everything else in his mouth (toys, books, shoelaces, etc.), but I'm a Mom and I worry.  Each day we evaluate and try to figure out if we did something different on a good day or if he was sick or tired on a bad day, but the process is not very scientific.  I believe we have determined that he eats better if we are in a new environment (at a restaurant or friend's house) and if the food has more seasoning to it.  One night he ate an entire meal of guacamole with onions, cilantro, and jalepenos!  So we keep trying new foods and new processes of feeding....which brings me to yesterday.  A few girls at the office wanted to go out to a Japenese steakhouse for lunch and invited us to tag along.  I ordered the veggies and steamed rice in the hopes that maybe we could share something.  The waitress brought us some kiddie chopsticks and a bowl of goldfish and I thought "Thanks, but we'll be doing good if he eats one bite of rice off a spoon."  Of course, the goldfish went over like a lead balloon.  He wouldn't even pick them up from the table, so when my salad came I optimistically dipped the chopsticks in the ginger mustard dressing to see what reaction I'd get.  Well let's just say, I didn't get to eat much of my lunch for feeding my child salad dressing, rice, and hibachi veggies (zucchini, carrots, mushrooms, onions, & broccoli) from chopsticks no less.  Go figure???  But, I'm running with it.  Last night's dinner of leftover lunch and today's breakfast of cheese grits?  That's right...both served with chopsticks!  Hey...whatever it takes, right?

Better Than Facebook!

Okay, so I've finally taken the plunge and created a blog for the little Monkey Man!  I've been meaning to get a fabulous baby book/scrapbook together since he was born (almost 10 months ago), but unfortunately the best I've done is update my Facebook status when something monumental happens so I don't forget the date (and take tons and tons of pictures and video.)  I figure this is not quite as good as a scrapbook, but definitely a step above Facebook!  Maybe one day I'll actually blog what I remember of the first nine months and turn the whole blog into a book (yeah, right!)  Anyway...feel free sit back, grab a glass of wine and enjoy our adventures because we sure do!