Tuesday, April 15, 2008

The big 2-8...

Finally... a few minutes to post. I've made Alyson busy by sitting her down in front of her Learning House with some cheerios. :-)

Well, as of Sunday the 13th at 10:51am, I'm officially 28. 2 years away from 30....hard to believe. The weekend was pretty nice... I didn't have to cook ONCE! Saturday we took the baby over to our friends Dean and Joelle's for their daughter Jillian's 3rd birthday party. Talk about little kid city! There were so many kids running around the house... I was thinking, "This is a glimpse into my future..." lol. (I'm already planning Alyson's 1st birthday party!)

Anyway, after the party, we rushed home and changed, took the baby to Russ's mom's house and picked our friends Joe and Denise up. Joe's bday is the 12th and mine was the 13th, so the four of us went out to dinner up on Mount Washington in Pittsburgh, to a restaurant called the Georgetowne Inn. It was ok... the view of the city was AWESOME, but I don't think that restaurant would be at the top of my 'places to go back to' list! Overall it was a good time though. The four of us went out lastyear, to the same area but to a restaurant down the street, Monterey Bay. AWESOME seafood. So we're thinking this will probably be a yearly tradition with us, going out to dinner for our birthdays :-)

Sunday was my ACTUAL bday... Me, Russ and Alyson met my mom and dad and Russ's mom and husband Steve at Red Lobster. Halfway through the meal, I asked my dad, "They don't know it's my birthday, do they?" and he said no, that he hadn't told anyone. Once the end of the meal came, the waitress asked if we wanted dessert. We were all stuffed and said no. A few minutes later, she comes back and puts this HUGE piece of chocolate cake with ice cream down in front of me, and here come the waitresses to sing me happy bithday. I looked at my dad and said, "You're a good liar!" and he laughed and goes, "I swear, I didn't say anything!" Turns out Russ's mom told our waitress while I was busy and didn't notice. Sneaky sneaky. So at the end of the meal, we all got to enjoy my "this is so good I could now die happy" chocolate cake...even Alyson got a little bit of ice cream.

After Red Lobster, we went to the mall and walked off some chocolate cake calories...lol. That night, my husband ACTUALLY OFFERED to give me a back rub. Oh, and I got a dozen roses too :-)

So that's about it for the weekend. Not much else has gone on since. Just cleaning house and spending time with my beautiful little girl :-)

Well, the cheerios are gone and she's pulling on the cord to my laptop trying to chew on it, so it's time to end this here. More another time.... :-)

Have a great night! (Mine will be spent on the couch watching the finale to Biggest Loser) :-)

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

Attempt at some updates

I know it's been awhile, so I'm going to try my best to update...


Well,for starters.... Alyson had her 9-month visit to the pediatrician a few weeks ago... everything went well, and she's doing great! She now weighs 21 1/2 pounds (90th percentile) and is 29 1/4 inches tall (95th percentile.) The size of her noggin is still off the charts...lol.

She did great during the visit....until the doctor came in. I didn't know how bad her stranger anxiety was! I didn't think she had it that bad, but she wanted NOTHING to do with the doctor. She cried and reached up her arms for me to pick her up the whole time she was on the exam table. I had to hold her so he could listen to her heart and lungs and everything. On top of all this, she still needed two shots. (ugh)She ended up calming down toward the end, but even after the doctor and nurses left the room, she DID NOT want on that exam table anymore! I got her clothes and laid her back down on there so I could get her dressed, and she WAILED and wanted picked up again. Needless to say, it was an interesting visit.

Things with Aly have been good... seems like it's something new every week now! She's constantly getting into EVERYTHING, and has me running around chasing her around the house all day long. I'm trying to teach her to use a sippy cup, and so far it's going ok. She'll take a few sips, then she just waves the cup around, chews on the handle, and throws it on the floor. :-P She's enjoying her zwieback toast, biter biscuits, gerber puffs, and has a newfound love for Club Crackers. I've started doing more table food with her, and so far so good.

We've been enjoying the warm weather lately... she loves loves LOVES being outside. Prior to this nice weather, she hadn't been outside for a long period of time since October, when it was still somewhat warm out... and of course she was too young to know what the heck was going on. But now, she looks all around and just giggles at the dogs running in the yard, and just has a permagrin on her face... it's adorable! I had her outside yesterday while I cleaned things out on our deck...I took her Around-we-go walker (aka the "roundy round" as I call it) outside and she stayed in that and snacked on her Gerber puffs and cheerios and played with the dogs. I just can't wait to get her little baby pool out and let her splish splash around in it!! :-) This summer's gonna be so fun with her.

In other news, Russ and I looked at a few houses last week. I don't even know why we bother, because we always come home afterwards and decide we're not in the position to move, blah blah blah. But the real estate agent we deal with called one day and told us about a house he was listing that 'was perfect for us.' (He knows what we're looking for by now, after taking us to look at a gazillion houses.) So we went to see a few houses on Saturday... the first one, which I thought I would LOVE, was a total disappointment. Nothing like what it looked like in the pictures on realtor.com. The other one which the agent recommended, however, was awesome. It was on 1.5 acres and only 4 years old. The people who live there have to relocate for the wife's job, so that's why they are selling. The house is adorable...one of those houses that actually IS in move-in condition. I wouldn't have to touch a thing dealing with paint or carpet or anything. It's actually the first house Russ and I BOTH loved. We seriously thought about making an offer, but the more we thought about it, the more we decided to hold off. It's at the top of our budget and we think that we could get more for our money if we wait awhile. Plus, the house just came on the market so we didn't know whether the people would hold off on accepting an offer and all that.

So, as usual, we have decided to stay put. Big surprise. I told Russ, "Do you realize that the past 3 springs, we have gone house-hunting? Is it just a spring thing, or what?!" lol.

Unfortunately, I don't have many more updates. I've just been busy redecorating the house. I got bit by the redecorating bug, and have been busy painting and switching things all around in the house. Russ just shakes his head and lets me do my thing. I tell him, "Just leave the decorating to me. I may ask you about a paint color now and then, but that's about it." If decorating were left up to him, every wall would be white with practically nothing on it. My latest project has been repainting the hallway...the color I originally bought for our bedroom, but decided not to use in there. So now I have to figure out a color for the bedroom so I can get THAT done. We need to call and get our bedroom furniture delivered, but I want the room painted first. It's just tough trying to get this stuff all done while Aly's here. She doesn't keep herself entertained for very long, and Gerber puffs and Zwieback toast only do so much! :-) She went to Russ's mom's today for awhile so I could get some painting done, so that was nice!

Well, I'm getting tired, so I'm gonna try to head to bed soon. Hopefully I can keep this updated more often....it's hard to try and play catch-up where blogging is concerned. Oh, and almost forgot... I'm gonna put some Easter pics at the end of this. We went to church and then over my grandma's house for Easter, that's about it.

Nighty night :-)