Baby kicks and toddler undies.

Guess what I am doing right now?  I'm watching my baby move around.  I can see the kicks and punches through my belly skin.  That's always pretty crazy to see.  I remember watching Amelie arms and legs drag across my belly skin when I was pregnant with her.  Not a surprise that she was very active in utero as well.  Even when she flipped from head down to breech, I felt it like a rubber band snapping.  

Anyways, I'm sick again.  She has a runny nose and was up for about 2 hours last night upset and crying.  I'm guessing her poor throat was as dry as mine and probably hurt.  

We took a trip to the co-op this morning to get some meds and a Neti Pot.  I irrigated my sinuses for the first time today and it was weird/great.  Amelie pushed around the mini kid card with the groceries and did pretty good.  She bashed it into the back of my legs a couple of times and almost knocked over a few displays, but she was helpful and had fun.  Sidenote: she was wearing undies at the store, went pee after we checked out, and got all the way home (even after a 2nd stop) before she peed her pants.  She got pretty upset about her accident, but made up for it by spreading out what should have been 1 poo into 3 different trips to the potty in about 10 minutes.  

Here she is finding a good spot to put the cheese.  

It was really hard to get a photo of her because she was moving so fast.

Here are a few mediocre picture of the painting that was done upstairs thus far.  Since I only take blog photos with my iPhone they don't always turn out fantastic.

I really really really really really hope we will be done with this project soon.  So bad.

Thrifty Thrifterson

I am sure that I could host a show on some network like TLC about thrifting.  If I had a little more time, an occasional babysitter during they day, and someone to pay me to shop, I could definitely make a living out of scouring the local thrift stores and finding awesome deals.  I mostly go to Goodwill, Savers and sometimes the Arc and usually find something pretty awesome.  I like to check the clearance items at TJMaxx, Homegoods, and Marshalls for stellar deals too.  I know there are other great thrift stores out there, but I don't have the time or a child with the patience to allow me to thrift as much as I'd like to.

Here is what I found today, and I'm way pumped about it!  It was only $49.99.  I saw it, decided to shop a little more and think about it, then when I went back, someone else was sitting on it and talking about buying it.  I was so sad.  I don't know if they decided not to buy it, or if they went home to get a bigger car, but the important part is that they disappeared.  So I ripped the tag of and ran up to the register and paid for it.  

It's in great shape, looks like it's hardly been used.  Look at how happy it is making Tyler and Amelie.  Tyler is sleeping on it this very second.

Check out the cool detail on the legs.

Then I found these giant pillows at TJ Maxx for $15.

 And this wavy blue patterned pillow was at Savers for $2.99, seemingly brand new.

This thing is going to go PERFECTLY in the nook with this chair that we got for free and this, or this for an ottoman.

I also found these 2 candle holders at Savers.  I love the little owl, and my mom has a green version of the red one I found.  I have been thinking of a way to sneak her green holder home with me from the cabin for at least a year now...good news mom, you can keep it!

I got a couple more things including some nice rubber gardening gloves for $2.99,  some Sesame Street undies for Sam (7 pairs for $5.50),  this planter for $7, 

and another cool own candle holder for $2.

I've been looking for a planter like that for herbs or strawberries for a little while now.  There were some at Menard's for $50, and others similar to it at TJ Maxx for $20 or more.  Yes!

Speaking of Menard's, we found our bathroom sink, fixture, mirror and vanity there this weekend.  $99!  It is small and modern and will fit in the master bathroom perfectly.  What a dorky photo though, you can see Tyler and my faces in the mirror.  

Amelie and I also did some fun non-shopping related activities this week too.  We played at Auntie Abby's house with Adaline and Sammy.

Look at these two finally learning how to share.

We also went to the zoo with some friends.  The kids outnumbered the adults but the 4 adult women were able to keep track of all 7 kids that we brought with.  Granted 3 of them were 1 year or under, these 4 sure kept us on our toes!

And tonight we all went down to the neighbors for dinner and had a lovely time.  Now Amelie is in bed, Tyler is snoring on the new couch, and I am nursing yet another cold, blowing my nose raw for the 2nd time in a month.  

Amelie would like to send a special shout out to her uncle Ben for the fantastic birthday balloons that he brought her last Tuesday night.  She puts them in the chair next to hers when she eats, carries them around the house with her, and routinely reminds me that "uncle Ben" brought her the balloons.  I think that he is her new favorite.

Soon, I'll have some more upstairs photo updates.  We have a little painting left to do, but are still deciding if we like the combo of colors we chose.  I took some pictures but the lighting is really bad.

Happy Birthday Amelie!

Oh my god, I worked on St. Patricks day and got my ass kicked.  In fact, it ended up being a whole weekend of ass kicking for me.  It was really busy and I was pregnant and tired, and sleep just wasn't in the cards for me all weekend.  Luckily my mom came over and picked up Ami on Friday morning and her and Abby took the kids to an indoor playground.  I slept until 12:15 when my mom called to see if I was awake yet.

I didn't have to work Friday night so after my mom dropped Ami off, we went to Eau Claire to visit the Skrtic's.  Ami can't sleep in a travel crib anymore, she climbs out, so I built her a bed on the floor next to me (she's also not very good at sleeping in bed with me.)  We had a lot of fun; we played outside, Ami and Carter messed up his playroom, they took a bath in the big whirlpool tub and had some popcorn before bed.  Ami really like Carter's swings and slide.

Then came bedtime.  She didn't fall asleep until around 10pm.   She came out of the room twice, and I went in 3 other times to try and get her to sleep.  She was so cute when I went in to bed around 11 that I took this photo.  She was sleeping in her Care Bears sleeping bag which she loves.  She woke up again around midnight, and was up every hour for the rest of the night.  I slept even less.  Once I woke up and her leg was wrapped over my neck.  She is tiny, but somehow managed to keep me confined to the edge of the bed.  When she was sleeping, it was great.  She was sharing my pillow and cuddling up to my face.  She got up around 5:30am for good.  I let her play games on my phone and watch Netflicks while I tried to get a few more minutes of sleep, but my service wasn't that great so the movie she was watching kept freezing and she would lean over with her face right over mine and yell. "Help!"

  

Here she is around 3am, not too happy.

Poor girl was either tired, scared, or really crabby when we finally got up and she sobbed for a good half and hour, but Krista made some great pancakes and she cheered up.  We left after breakfast and she slept the whole car ride home.

I had high hopes for a nap that afternoon before I had to work another early shift, but those dreams were crushed and I was running on fumes all night.  At least I made some money...

Amelie been pretty awesome this week.  She wanted to dress herself on Monday morning.  She put her pants on upside down and wore the sweatshirt on her head, but she had a great time doing it.  She did successfully get her undies on the right way though.

We had her birthday party yesterday.  Her birthday is actually today, but Tyler had to go out of town for work.  We had a few people over, I forgot how much work it is to host a party.  I managed to make BBQ pulled pork, colesaw, beans, and chocolate cupcakes though.  I got the house clean and had to make a last minute run to the store, but it all got done.  I had just stepped out of the shower, and out into the freshly mopped (ahem, swiffered) hallway, when this happened.

Aw shit.  We both cried a little over spilled milk.  Just kidding, only she did.

Looking back now, haha, it was funny.  But then, I was on my last legs and guests were set to arrive in less than an hour so.....

It ended up being a really fun party.  I was prepared enough that I didn't have to spend any time in the kitchen finishing up the cooking, the food was edible, and after the kids all got past the first few minutes of shyness, they had fun running around and screaming!  I wish I would've gotten a video of the kids helping Amelie open her gifts, it was like being in the eye of a tornado.  Paper flying everywhere, kids waving around art supplies and 2T clothes. 

The birthday girl stayed up over an hour past her bedtime, but that's what happens when you give a kid a cupcake.

We had our own little celebration this morning.  We made cinnamon buns and lit 2 candles.  She played with the balloons Uncle Ben got her, and just kept chanting his name all morning.  I save our gifts for her so she could open them up this morning.  It was a nice way to wake up...

I love how she is going right for the middle of the bun (the best part), just like I do.

AND, even thought they are now covered in 4 inches of snow, the tulips we planted in the fall are BLOOMING!

Happy second birthday Amelie!

Free Stuff!

Last night Tyler and I went to buy paint for the upstairs project.  We will be priming and painting this weekend...hooray!  (of course when I say we, I'm not referring to me.)  So on our way home we (and this time I mean me) spotted a chair with a FREE sign on it in someone's front yard along the parkway so we went around the block and came back for it.  We decided that we would take it home with us if it wasn't rickety and the seat was in good condition.  Well guess what,

I think it will be awesome upstairs in the nook with all that stuff I got from Homegoods last week.  It is in pretty good condition, we can tell it has been stored in someone's basement for a while because it looks brand new and there is dust that needs to be cleaned from the crevices.

Yesterday when I got out of the shower I found Amelie hiding under my comforter on my bed.  She was "secretly" putting on my chapstick, and what I mean by that is that she was smearing it all over her face and mouth and getting spit in the tube.  So I got it away from her and lifted her out of the bed, only to find a big pee puddle on the sheets.  Argh.  Then this morning she came and got me to show me that she had peed on the kitchen chair.  Bummer.  But, she does regularly leave me a nice morning poo in her potty to clean up, and has been pretty good about making it to the potty.  Last night Tyler told me that he took her up to the donut shop by our house in her undies and she used the bathroom when they got there, so that's another step forward.  She is even getting better about putting her undies on all by herself.

Although today she got them on backwards.

Her vocabulary is growing by leaps and bounds every day and she keeps saying new things to me every day.  A couple of days ago I suggested we go change her diaper when she woke up, and she told me, "No way!."  Her new favorite word is "tomorrow."  So when we tell her no to something, she will reply, "Ok, more (fill in the blank) tomorrow."  She also likes to fart, and then look at me with a surprised face and say...."oh, phart."  I laugh.

We gotta get ready to go to open gym.  Then hopefully she will be work out enough to take an epic nap, because I have to work tonight for St. Patrick's day.  Gulp, should be interesting.

Quick Ami update!

Amelie had her first hair cut last Friday morning.  She did really well.  My aunt cut it, didn't take too much off, just evened the mullet out.  

I worked all weekend.  It was finally busy and I made over double what I have been making lately.  I got home later though, and was exhausted all weekend.  On Saturday I got out of bed at 2pm (thank goodness Tyler took Amelie to play at the coffee shop)  Sunday I was up at 10:45 to get ready for Yoga, a necessary part of my weekend and mental health.  

Daylights savings time really fucked me this year.  When I was leaving work at 3 something am, it was actually 4 something am and I didn't fall asleep until after 5am.  Tyler was having a man sleepover with Ginger out in the living room, so I got the bed to myself, but I still tossed and turned forever.  My heels felt a little bit like exploding, which makes it hard to drift off to sleep.

Sunday night we celebrated Frank's first birthday, although you would think it was Amelie's birthday the way she was shoveling cake into her mouth.  I had to picked dried frosting out of her nostrils.  When we got home from the party I fell asleep on the couch for almost 2 hours and then couldn't fall asleep when I went to bed.  I was up until 2am.  Nap time today was glorious.

After nap time, when Tyler got home from work, we took a walk down Minnehaha Creek.

We ventured out on all the bridges and watched for ducks.  Amelie threw chunks of snow into the creek,  ran through puddles, and said "hello" and "goodbye" to every passerby.  She made a lot of our elderly neighbors smile and laugh tonight.  

Making my shitty kitchen a little less shitty.

I just wanted to do one last update of some space saving things we did to the kitchen.  I would have done this myself this morning, but I like it better when Tyler does the drilling and leveling of our projects.  I don't read directions nor do I have much patience for these types of projects.

Here is what our kitchen counter looked like before.  Please take note that I cleaned the countertops off before I took the photo.  Usually there is shit galore piled up on there.

I thought of this idea the other day at Ikea when we went to look at bathroom stuff for upstairs.  Well, I guess I didn't come up with the idea, some Ikea person did...but I thought of using it in our kitchen.  

We were able to get the stupid gigantic dish rack off the counter (which was not pictured) and make room for things like cutting, peeling and cooking.  I also used those hooks to hang up some frequently used items in our kitchen.  Since the drawers are original to the house they are really annoying to open and shut, and whomever did the spacial planning was an idiot.  We can't open more than 1 drawer at a at because they block one another.  Argh.  Now everything has it's own spot.

Here are a couple other things we have done to maximize the small amount of space in the kitchen.

We put a butcher's block over half the stove so we have some more counter space.  The fridge is right across from the stove so it's nice to be able to set a glass near it to pour juice or milk or whatever.  I have a basket with all the kitchen utensils and oven mitts.  There are some more oven mitts on magnets hanging on the side of the stove.  We got a magnetic bar and installed it above the stove for our sharp knives.

For a long time our garbage and recycling sat on the floor in a big ass mess.  We found these recycling containers and installed them on the wall next to the back door.  It really opened up a lot of space and looks much less cluttered.

This is the same type of bar we hung on the wall over the countertops.  It was left over from our last place and we screwed it into the ceiling to hang the pots and pans we use most.  That green basket will soon have a new home over the microwave.

We found this double shelf at a garage sale, we actually got 2 of them for a dollar.  I use one of them in my bedroom to hang my earrings on and this one stores our vitamins and fruit and such.  I love the color of our bread box, and there is space behind it for other things like onions and potatoes (although I tend to forget about the stuff I put back there until I see it sprouting from behind the box).  That green shelf I just mentioned will go here so there is a spot for that food I forget about.

Incidentally all the stuff we used in the kitchen is from Ikea except for the green basket (thrift store) and double shelf on the microwave.  I still don't love my kitchen, but I can handle it for a while now.

Damnit, I just forgot to watch Modern Family.