Friday, May 28, 2010

when stalking pays off

So, I love giveaways. I love entering them and I love winning them. I don't know where this lucky streak came from, but I haz one. It's like a strange alignment of the stars & planets & moons or something. It's really freaky actually, but I have been lucky enough to win some really great products (of course, why would I enter to win some crap?) but I won't go into detail, I don't want to sound all braggy and lame.

Now. Modern Bird Studios. I have been stalking their giveaways for months, to the point that I joined Twitter to get the extra entries. (And then, luckily for me, they tweet links to all their giveaways - making it extra easy to stalk them!) Anyhow, they have this seriously cool take on modern art by turning your photo into a unique awesomesauce two-tone painting. Hand painted. Seriously a lot of work.
So, I won a giveaway. OH SNAP! After much hemming and hawing over which picture to choose... we chose this one:


NOW, the next very ultimate other hard part. Also: Lame. I have been pestering them and going back and forth and trying to figure out what color combination to get! Here are my current options, please help me decide! Remember: the final result will be painted on wood, so some texture will come through.

Click on this collage to get a really good look at all of them.

What do you think? Please halp, internets!

Monday, May 24, 2010

Swagger.

OK. We don't have cable anymore, so I'm going to use that as my excuse for not having seen this commercial earlier. Thank goodness for other awesome bloggers like Emmie Bee and Kristi who post things like this where I will (eventually) discover them. If you've seen it already, please enjoy again. If not, you're welcome.

Friday, May 21, 2010

Worthy of repeating

Strange (yeah, not really THAT strange) how every Monday is the worst day EVER and by Wednesday or Thursday I'm ok and by Friday, well of course the world is awesome and the weekend looms large and endless. Then comes Sunday night, when I love Oliver more than I've ever loved him... but we're not gonna trek down that slippery slope.

So. To remind myself, and encourage myself to keep thinking positive, I'm going to quote myself. Myself.

"Right now ... I'm just going to focus on each day as it comes. And more importantly, I'm going to try my hardest not to fall into the pattern of spending every day thinking "I wish it was the weekend" even though I DO wish it was the weekend. I think that wishing away the weekdays does more of a disservice to me. Fun times DO happen during the week! Bathtimes and feedings and playtimes and rocking him to sleep are things that will happen any day of the week and those times are all special and perfect and important and I shouldn't just wish them away. Just because I didn't get to spend the whole day doing them like I would on a Saturday doesn't make them any less precious of a memory. And obviously, I don't want to lose a single one.

Imma start taking more pictures during the week."


YAHOO! Goal accomplished! Okay, so really Nick takes the pictures around here. But that's ok! Because they exist! I'm no longer wallowing in self-pity and feeling like I'm missing out on something because BAM. There I AM. In the pictures, playing and having a good time and making him giggle and rocking him to sleep. On a WEEKDAY. Whoa.

In an effort to keep up the pace and maybe get a little more perspective, please tell me: how do you keep yourself in the moment? I love my big boy and how he's sitting and playing and all that... but it's worth a shot: any tips on how I can make time slow down a little?

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Field Trip!

Oliver's first "school field trip":

faces blurred for privacy... and because I don't want to post pictures of somebody else's baby without their express written consent...
and because my kid is the only one we're looking at anyway, to be honest.



while we're at it... let's just take away all distraction.

there. that's how I see it, anyway.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Mother's Day

My first Mother's Day was AWESOME.

My boys gave me an amazingly beautiful perfect necklace, a (three hour!) nap, a long hot shower, and a delicious dinner. (The recipe is something we've made & blogged about before. Also known as that one time a famous person from TV commented on my blog!)

click to zoom

Sunday was a perfect, wonderful, slow-paced, relaxing day.


Now begin the mommyblogger sap-fest post that made me tear up while writing it.

I am a mom. I know, in no uncertain terms, that I was always meant to be this little boy's mom.


I am his protector, his defender, his caretaker... and hopefully someday his friend. He is without a doubt the best thing that has ever happened to me.

I am a good mom... no, a GREAT mom... because I learned from the best. I know it's common once you have a child of your own to realize just what you mean to your own mother, and gain a little more understanding and respect for who she is and what she's done for you. But you guys, I have ALWAYS (ok, with the excpetion of that year or two in high school when I was an asshat) known how great my mom is.

You know that old sitcom cliche where the woman has a shocking epiphany... "I've become my MOTHER!" Yeah, for me, that's a lofty goal. If anyone tells me "you're just like your mother" my response is, "Thank you!"

She's MY protector. My caretaker. My ally & my friend.

And now that she's my son's grandma, she's become my mama-mentor.

I can only imagine what great memories we'll all share.


I love you, mom. We're so lucky to have you.