amazing day :D

I know my last post was all about how much I love fall but really I LOVE IT! Today started off kind of slow with me sleeping in and then us scrambling out the door for church. But for once Ryder made it through! Usually I have to take him out within 15 minutes of church starting, sometimes right after the prayer, but today he sat so nicely through the entire thing! And that hasn't happened since I don't even know. Next we ran and got pizza and ate it at our property in Cedar Bay. The weather was absolutely gorgeous, about 67 degrees and sunny with just a little breeze. BEAUTIFUL! We hung out there for a while picking apples and exploring. Then we found a chestnut tree! Well I didn't know it was a chestnut tree because first of all they look like green spiny balls and you have to crack them open to find the nut and second of all who knew chestnuts grew on trees? Not I, apparently. After that we headed up to Copper Harbor with Liz and Heather. I barely survived the long winding hilly road up there (I get soooo car sick when I'm pregnant) but once we got there I was fine. Of course we had to get some Jilbert's ice cream and then we headed to Hunter's Point. I'd never been there before but it was pretty cool. Ryder especially loved it because the beach is all small smooth rocks (not even a hint of sand so it was super clean!) and there is nothing in the world Ryder loves more than throwing rocks. So we hung out there for a while, throwing rocks in the lake and exploring the area. Next we headed to the playground at Fort Wilkins where Ryder had a blast chasing "chippies" and going down the slides. After John, Ryder and I headed up Brockway to take in the beautiful fall colors (after stopping at one of the stores in Copper Harbor to get 15 cent candy sticks of course). It's amazing how many of the trees have completely changed color!  I was a little worried with Ryder up there since there is basically no way to keep him from falling down the mountain except to keep a hand on him at all times so we didn't stay long :) I don't know how my parents always brought us kids up there without having multiple heart attacks! We ate some leftover pizza for supper and then stopped at Somleo's pumpkin farm with Paul and JoAnne. Ryder had a lot of fun picking out pumpkins and we couldn't leave without him having a "baby" pumpkin along with his regular one (sigh). It was cute though :] We also watched them launch a pumpkin from their catapult... pretty cool! That thing went sooo high pretty much exploded when it hit the ground. I was all pumped off it but Ryder didn't even watch the pumpkin fly through the air, he was too interested in the catapult thing. :] All in all, it was an amazing day. Now to put Ryder to bed and curl up with apple cider and a good book...ahhh :) :)

let me just say this again: I LOVE FALL!

Granted these last couple days have been cold and rainy, but that has given me plenty of time to do some serious net surfing. So far I've bookmarked a million or so pages all about fall :) Homemade costume ideas, recipes, activities, crafts, treats and more. Ryder already has a costume for this year thanks to hand-me-downs from my mom (THANKS MOM!) and it's an adorable lion costume! He looks absolutely adorable in it but we might have a problem. We went to Mallory's volleyball games and Ryder was completely terrified of the Lion mascot...hopefully he can get over his fear sometime before Halloween because when I brought out the costume he was not impressed. "No lion mommy! No rawr!" Huh. So I've been getting some nice "last minute" costume ideas in case we can't pull off the lion this year. Another thing this cool weather has brought on is a craving for soup. I LOVE soup! So far we've had Southwest Cheese, Italian tomato, Harvest Soup, Asian Pork and Noodle soup etc. The Southwest Cheese soup was awesome for chilly rainy days because it had a little bit of a kick to it (you use a can of diced tomatoes with green chilies) and the Harvest soup really satisfied my "fall food" urges because you use apples and butternut squash to make it. YUM! I threw in the Asian Pork and Noodle soup because I think John has been getting a little sick of all my "vegetarian" meals. I just have not been in the mood for meat lately, it hasn't really sat well with me my whole pregnancy and with only 5 weeks left til my due date I feel way too full of baby to want the more heartier meals. To be honest I picked the pork out of my soup and it was just delicious without it :) I've also been cooking a lot with apples lately. The Harvest soup has some in there and I've also made Turkey Apple meatballs, Apple Raisin pasta salad, and Apple Chicken quesidillas. Yum yum yum! Ryder and I love apples and eat at least one a day (usually 2 or 3 haha) anyway but hey they're good for you and taste the best in the fall anyway! Right now I'm planning out Halloween decorations and thinking up pumpkin carving ideas while drinking apple cider and eating candy corn. Can you tell I love fall? :] Ryder is (thankfully) napping right now but when he wakes up I think we are going to bundle up and go on a leaf collecting walk, our newest favorite game :) I know I have to enjoy these days while they last because winter will be here before I know it, especially in the U.P. and I'm just not quite ready for that yet :]

a little panic attack

So right now I am having a little panic attack over unprinted pictures. This happens about once a month. Today I realized that Ryder will be turning 2 in a month andIhaveyettoprintanypicturesofhimsincehewasborn. whew. Even just typing that makes me panic-y. Why do I not just print them??? I guess there are just so many that it always just seems too daunting (for all my not-printing I do take a ton of pictures). So this is me just putting it out there that sometime before Christmas...okay revise...sometime before new years...I am printing pictures. It doesn't even have to be all of them. Just some. I'm going to do it.


I can't believe I have not printed pictures in TWO YEARS! Anyone have any recommendations for online printing sites?

my little chocohaulic

So today after supper (I tried a new recipe for meatballs, it didn't really turn out. sigh.) I was cleaning up the kitchen when I realized Ryder was being quieter than usual. This is never a good sign. Usually he is either chattering away to me or trying to get me to play with him or enthusiastically throwing his cars around the house. Anyway I got a little suspicious so I walked into the living room and guess what I found? Ryder eating a piece of MY chocolate that I bought especially for ME to satisfy MY chocolate cravings. Then I noticed that he had five wrappers on the ground next to him. That means he ate SIX pieces of my chocolate. Needless to say I was not too happy. I mean if I eat chocolate when he's around, I share. But mostly I eat it when he's sleeping or I try and sneak it while he's playing because he loves chocolate way too much and would steadily eat through my whole supply (even my emergency stash) if he could. I couldn't even be mad at him though because right when I walked in he gave me a huge chocolatey grin and said "YUMM! Mommy I eat yummy kit!" Kit is what he says when he tries to say chocolate. So of course I just gave him a smile "Ohhh aren't you lucky you got to eat chocolate!" and I hid the rest. Until now that is because I just finished off the bag :)

For the first time in waaaay too long Ryder slept until 8:30! Whoo hoo! That in itself is an awesome start to the day but he also woke up giggling too! I don't know why, but when I went to get him he was just sitting in his crib holding a bunch of stuffed animals --he sleeps with about a million-- and just giggling away :) Not going to lie, I'm not the happiest person in the mornings but that sure put a smile on my face! Then we spent the next hour snuggling on the couch reading books. His new favorite is 100 First Animals that he got from Heather when he was in the hospital. It has a bunch of big, bright pictures in it and it's amazing how many animal names he knows! Like camel and kookaburra and otter. So cute! It's so nice to have a day finally start off on the right foot that, no matter what happens, I know today will be a good one :)

I guess I do really ask a lot of questions...

...because on our way home from Houghton today I was talking to John and he said "Wow, you ask a lot of questions. I mostly just make up answers because how am I supposed to know all of this random stuff that you ask me about?"
huh.
I think I was asking him what a Dryhouse was (we passed the Dryhouse Ruin sign going up Quincy) and he didn't know. I had kind of assumed he would because hello he's lived up here his whole life and passed that sign a million times and I figured he would have asked someone. Or else maybe he would have learned tons about mining (I'm assuming that a dry house has something to do with mining) since it was such a huge part of the yoop. I told him this but I guess he didn't take the Local History class in high school. This was his excuse anyway. About the time he told me I asked a lot of questions was a couple minutes of chatting later when we were driving through Calumet. I asked him why the houses had two house numbers, a 3 digit one and a 5 digit one. He knew the answer to this one, when they got the 911 line/dispatch thing up here the house numbers were too confusing (I agree on that one) so they reassigned each house a 5 digit number but I guess some people were too lazy to take down the other sign. As I was thinking he was all smart because he knew this he told me the "I mostly just make up answers because how am I supposed to know all of this random stuff that you ask me about?" part of the above statement. Huh. So now I don't know if that's the real answer or not but I guess it doesn't matter to me, I just wanted to know what he though the reason was.

a busy day= very sore feet

One of the side effects of pregnancy I could do without: sore feet! My feet get sore really fast even when I'm not pregnant but when I am I feel like I hobble everywhere! Just walking around the house is enough to have me limping. Everyone always tells me to just wear tennis shoes all the time, but guess what? I HATE tennies! I <3 footwear like converse and flip flops and this awesome thing called bare feet. Maybe its a claustrophobic thing? Because the only time I can wear tennis shoes is when I'm running, or else my feet dying for some wiggle room about 2 minutes in. Then I was introduced to this wonderful invention: those one Keen shoes that everyone has (whatever they are called, idk) They are like a shoes/sandal and totally trick my feet into thinking they are not in shoes! I've always said they were way to gorp-ish for me but during this pregnancy my feet were just begging for some relief and I had heard a lot of good things about those shoes so I bought some. Okay I sound like I just went out and bought Keens but really I went to Shopko --which is the only place near here that sells Tahnee appropriate shoes because they have a mini Payless inside-- and tried on a pair of off-brand shoes (I NEVER can bring myself to buy name brands, unless they are on like triple clearance) and walked around in them for like 2 hours. And I had to call my mom and John in order to have them convince me I should buy them. I don't know why I do this, I just do. Anyway, I finally just decided to get them because I think the sales lady and Heather were getting impatient with me, and I know Ryder was since he vocalized his boredom very loudly. And I figured I could just wear them around the house for a couple more hours to see if I really did like them. And yes, I do this hemming and hawing thing with almost everything I buy. John hates it. Well, I don't really remember where I was going with this but I bought the shoes and I love them and I wear them all the time. I seriously don't know what I'm going to do when it snows. Maybe I will have my baby before then (ha yeah right). Oh this is where I was going with this rambling story: Those shoes, awesome though they may be, did not save my feet today. They KILL.
First off Ryder woke up at 3:30am last night from bad dreams so I rocked and paced and rocked and paced and rocked...you get the idea. He is horrible with nightmares since he doesn't understand yet what a dream is. Last night it was something about cows, which he usually loves but not last night. Anyway, I was up for about an hour with him so I was absolutely exhausted when he woke up this morning at 7:30. You would think I would be used to this since I pretty much have an almost 2 year old who doesn't sleep through the night. He has nightmares or wakes up from dreams so often that it's actually rare for him to sleep through the night. But I'm not used to it.
Next we had to scoot out the door by 9:30 to make it to Mallory's volleyball game at 10. She plays for Finlandia and she is awesome. You would think that 2 hours would be plenty of time to get myself and one toddler out the door but I don't think I am awake enough to think straight until at least 9. So we slowly ate breakfast, slowly cleaned up, slowly got dressed and then hurried up quick and flew out the door at 9:45. So we were a little late to the game but we still made it :) After we played outside at Mal's apartment until she had to go back to get ready for her next game -- it was a tournament. And it was SO BEAUTIFUL outside! Cool enough that sitting in the shade was chilly, but the sun was so bright and warm that it was comfortable in the sun. I am loving these fall days right now. So we spent about an hour throwing rocks and sword-fighting with sticks and chasing leaves and rolling down hills. I did not roll down the hill but Mal and Ryder did and I really don't know who had more fun ;)
Next we picked up Marisa and headed to McDonald's for lunch. This was my bribe to get Ryder to cooperate with me at the volleyball game :) But first he kept saying "No doctors! No doctors!" until I figured out that somehow to him McDonald's sounds like Doctors. So now it's called the french fry place to avoid any undue confusion. If this keeps up I will no longer be able to say that I speak the English language and will have to confess to sliding entirely into Ryder-speak. After, we ran to WalMart to grab peanut butter. We ran out halfway through this morning's toast and it was almost a disaster. Because obviously the only thing an almost-two-year-old can eat for breakfast is toast with PB. What I ended up doing was just cutting off the part of the toast that had no pb on it and giving Ryder the other part. Somehow that made it all better.

Fall is here!

Fall is officially in the air! It's a chilly 45 degrees out today and absolutely beautiful! Even some of the leaves are starting to change! And though I looooove the fall season I know it means winter is coming (yikes!) and I'm not quite ready to face that fact yet. The nights have been pretty cold lately which I am actually enjoying...I'm usually always freezing (even in the summer) but being 7 and 1/2 months pregnant sure leaves we sweltering at night! I'm half way done knitting my baby blanket now, I just finished the middle stripe today. Now the hard part: staying motivated long enough to finish it! I am absolutely loving this pattern so hopefully that helps some ;) Heather stopped by today with two of her nanny kids, both boys. One is a year older and one less than a year younger than Ryder. It was fun to watch them play even though it took almost the whole visit for them to warm up to each other! It's funny how Ryder is so much more willing to play with adults than with kids his age. He asked Heather to play way before he would even look at the boys! It was nice to actually sit and visit with Heather instead of playing with an almost 2 year old all day, most of our conversations revolve around bodily functions (we are starting to potty train), cars crashes and races, fishing or baseball. Sigh. I must be the mother of a boy :) Speaking of potty training, our endeavor that started out so promising has now come to a complete halt. I originally broke out the potty chair because Ryder had started telling me when he needed his diaper changed. Right in the beginning he sat on it all the time but never went and now he won't even sit on it! The only time he ever sits on it is when he is trying to trick me into giving him a bath (he loves baths and our rule is that he has to sit on the potty before he gets in the tub). But boy do we talk about it! "Yes Grandma goes pee on the potty. Yep, Uncle Ty does too. Yes mom goes poop on the potty and so does Jacey and Auntie Lanette. Yes, Ryder, I imagine the neighbor wears undies like a big boy." This is why convos with adults are so needed! Talking about the potty all day tends to make one a little crazy. So all this talking but we are going nowhere.... oh well I guess we'll just keep plugging along. Sorry for the boring post today, I am way to tired to write about anything I need to think about. Ryder has been waking up at least 2-3 times a night lately with nightmares so I'm pretty beat. That's all for today! :]

gah

ooohhh these last couple days...First off Ryder gets a cold so we were up all night for 2 nights (he never does well with colds) then that turned into a full- fledged gasping-for-air type of situation where we end up in the ER for 4 hours and completely traumatized the poor kid with the worst blood-drawing experience ever and strapping him in that horrible looking contraption for a chest x-ray (which I totally get is necessary but that didn't make it any easier to watch) along with everything else that goes with an ER visit, and THEN we end up getting admitted to the hospital for the night where we got about 1/2hr of sleep (think breathing treatments every couple hours along with vital checks and meds in between and a kid who screams every time a nurse walks in) and ended up staying there til 6:30pm the next day (now think of a crabby toddler trapped in a hospital room all day with a very tired mom...complete chaos)...finally we get home and get him to sleep only to have to wake him up every couple hours for more breathing treatments...and did I mention I'm 7 months pregnant and exhausted? sigh