Happy 2nd Father's Day, John!

I just wanted to give a shout out to my wonderful husband and the father of my adorable son :) He is *such* a devoted dad and husband, and I just hope that one day JW will realize just how amazing his dad is.  Trust me, great dads in the world are hard to find (I know from experience) and we ought to treasure those men who are manly enough to truly get into parenting and bring out the very best in their families. 

We went out to breakfast this morning to celebrate :)

14 months: Baby -- err, toddler -- signs!

After months of trying to get JW to learn baby sign language, he has finally picked several signs up and is using them constantly.  "Milk" is his favorite one, while "more" is a close second.  He will wave, clap his hands, and give kisses by request now, too.  It's super cute.

His favorite word by far, though, is "dada." He happily calls out for his Dada all day long... this is not to be confused with "da," though, since that's reserved for Kaiser and the rest of the animal kingdom. 

You know you have a toddler when...

You drop a small fortune on Amazon.com ordering a variety of gates, locking mechanisms, and the ultimate in childproofing -- the crib tent. 

Life is getting very interesting -- and active -- around here ;)

Not sure I like these toddler days...

The last few days have been a struggle.  My usually happy kid refuses to be put down, wakes up crabby from every nap, wants to comfort nurse every 2 minutes (which, even as a very big supporter of nursing, I'm *so* not okay with), and generally wears his grumpypants all day long.  I long for 6pm to roll around, because bedtime offers me the promise of some quiet time in the evening.  It also usually brings a husband home to help me, though there are times that JW refuses to stay with John if I'm not in the room, and comes looking for me, sobbing the entire time.

I really hope this passes soon.

John William's book obsession

My wee one loves books.  He loves to be read to, to flip the little cardboard pages, and point (with a thumb and two fingers) at the images in the book.  We have several books in his playroom and some upstairs, but we mainly play downstairs, so I've become quite familiar with the collection.

I have a freakishly good memory, but I don't think that's necessary to memorize these books once you've read them about 1000 times each.

So today we went out and bought a new one while we were out.  It's called "Ten Tiny Puppies."  He got SO excited when I handed it to him... I'm going to have to restrain myself from buying him hundreds of new books now ;)

If any of you have recommendations for toddler appropriate (read: virtually indestructible) books, please share!

Something I should have learned by now...

When you're pregnant, people give you so much parenting advice, and while some of it is useful, a lot of it is quickly forgotten (intentionally or not.)

One gem of advice that I still hear is that I should nap whenever my precious angel of a child naps.  I didn't follow that advice very well when he was a newborn because I was so overwhelmed and stressed out and desperate to find a "new normal".  I failed to follow that advice, even though it made sense and I was exhausted.

Well, here I am, a year later and I'm sooo sleepy right now because I couldn't fall asleep last night (ugh I hate insomnia) and instead of napping during those precious few minutes of the day when JW is asleep, I'm here on the computer, or I'm eating (okay that's necessary, I realize), or whatever.  And now I hear him getting up from his afternoon nap and I'm still exhausted.

I really wish I'd taken that advice.  Here's to the rest of the crazy day!

Adventures in...baking :)

The moms' group at church asked for volunteers to bring refreshments for two funerals being held at the church this week, so I signed up to bring cupcakes to one and muffins to the other.  However, this afternoon when I opened up the pantry to start baking, I realized that all I had was funfetti cake mix. 

I thought about going ahead and serving them, but seeing as the funfetti would be on the inside and kind of a surprise, I decided against it.  Totally not appropriate.  I can't succumb to my laziness.

Good thing the grocery store is like three blocks away ;)