Top 2 Tuesday- Splurges

 

This weeks topic for Top 2 Tuesday hosted by Taylor over at The Undomestic Momma is Splurges.

Here are mine:

1. ANYTHING for Ethan. My husband says I have a problem buying baby stuff. Its true I do. Clothes, toys, food (ha!) really pretty much anything for him. Currently it is stuff for his 1st birthday party. 

2. This is more of an "us" splurge. But our boat. We got it together right before Scott proposed (June 2008) and in general everything about having a boat is expensive-- maintenance, gas, wakeboard and tubing supplies, etc, etc. We love it though!

Here are some pictures of my 2 favorite splurges together this past weekend: 

If it looks like the pictures are on land not water it's because they are. Scott was washing the boat and E and I were playing in his baby pool when he decided he wanted to help.

Other splurges that almost made the list:
3. My SUV (Volvo XC90) -- love it!
4. Getting my hair done- my dad has always said I am paying my hair stylists' kids college education.
5. Target -- all of it in general
6. Comforters and sheets-- I just love the way it can change the look of a whole room!

What are your favorite splurges? Link up over at The Undomestic Momma!

Top 2 Tuesday- Favorite Things About Summer!

So I have been wanting to join this blog link up for a while now and even though I am a day late I am going to do it anyway because I am looking forward to summer big time! This Top 2 Tuesday is Favorite Things About Summer!

Mine are...

1. Being out on the boat!! Last summer I was pregnant/had a new born so I did no boat trips! I am going to order Ethan a little life vest and I bet he will love to be on the water! And oh yea, since I am no longer with child I will definitely be enjoying some tubing!

2. Time with Ethan and his FIRST BIRTHDAY (and party) because during the summer, school will be out I will get to cut back my hours and spend more time doing fun things with this little ball of energy. His birthday party is SURE to be quite the extravaganza. I mean you only turn 1 once!! I am thinking of a sailboat theme with red navy light blue and white. But not totally decided yet. More to come on that!

What are your favorite things about summer? Head on over to Taylor's blog to link up! =)

First Trip to the Zoo! or not

I must have lost my mind...but I decided that today was a GREAT day to take my little man to the zoo. Now let's just clarify that he is 9 months old (tomorrow) and I know that he will not know or understand the concept. But he LOVES staring/chasing the dog so I assumed that an elephant or a monkey would be triple as cool. So, I call up my friend Katie (who is still on maternity leave) and since I am on spring break (oh the joys of working for the school system) and see if her and baby Chase would like to join me on this adventure. She says of course because she would love to get out of the house, walk around and let the baby see the outside world. So off we go.. mind you it is about an hour and a half drive.. but the kids did awesome! They both napped and we chatted and we were like oh this is going to be so easy right!?

WRONG.

We get there 30 minutes after the zoo opens because of all the traffic from the Cherry Blossom festival.. and all parking lots are FULL and there are people with small children walking in front of cars without looking everywhere. At this point baby Chase is hungry and starts to cry and Ethan looks at him and tries to talk to him and even threw gave him a toy. So w are pretty desperate and we look for spots to parallel or a garage and there are nothing within a 10 block radius. Ethan is now upset because his friend is so upset. I make Chase a bottle and feed it to him from the front seat and I give Ethan a sippy cup. This keeps them content for about 15 minutes. In the mean time we decide we are just going to go get some lunch and walk around a bit so we can at least get something out of the trip. Which we finally do another 30 minutes later with highly pissed upset kids. That 45 minute drive through DC  (after the 1.5 hours it took to get there) where many people honked at us, we almost hit a few pedestrians, our children screamed, and we didn't even get to go to the zoo took a few years off my life

Alls well that ends well. Katie and I had yummy crab cakes for lunch and I got a new shirt from Ann Taylor Loft and Ethan enjoyed riding in his stroller outside and people watching.. which was close enough to a zoo within itself.

Me Time

I may or may not have taken an 1.5 hour bubble bath in my mom's jacuzzi tub complete with diet coke, iTunes, and watching the snow fall outside.

Hey.. us Mommy's need some ME time too!

Snow (again) and a list.

So we are currently in the midst of a blizzard.. or Snowpocalypse 2010 as they are calling it. Apparently, we could have over 2 feet by the time its over.. or more considering there was already snow on the ground that hadn't melted yet.

This is Maryland not Alaska.. and I need to move back to South Carolina STAT.

Since all this snow is damaging my brain.. this blog will have to be in list form.

1. E has an ear infection from teething.. poor baby.
2. I have a sinus infection from working with snotty kids all day.. poor momma.
3. Where is spring/summer? I want to break out my fav J.Crew shorts (yellow with navy anchors, duh) and the sundresses. Mostly because I was prego all last spring/most of summer so I miss those clothes  as maternity clothes are just not quite as cute!
4. My 2 boys are currently napping together and I love seeing them together sleeping or playing - I am truly blessed to have such an amazing husband and father to my baby boy.
5. Speaking of prego and baby boys. I have baby fever lately. and I am not too sure why. Scott and I always wanted to have our kids close together (by close i mean 2 or 3 years.. not 9 months) so it might just be something we are putting on our radar for this fall.
6. We will not be having more children until our house situation progresses some more. Hard to build a house with 3 feet of snow on the ground.. UGH.
7. I love spaghetti!
8. I miss Clemson and all my girlfriends in the south! Shout out to you bitches! Love you all!
9. My dog is hilarious in all of this snow. -- pictures to follow for sure.
10. This might have been the most random post ever.

I don't do... Children's Clothing with Characters Edition

You might remember my post about how I don't do cats and the many reasons why

In that post I promised to right about another thing that I don't do which is characters on childrens' clothing. Now let's just keep in mind that my baby is just about 7 months old.. so he still wears what mommy tells him. But I just do not do character clothing. I can't! and I won't! My inner fashionista will not allow it! In the next few years I am sure we will do battle over Handy Manny shoes or a Backyardigans shirt. But fear not Mommy's of the world. I have a compromise. He can wear any sort of character pajamas and have any sort of character toys!

Don't get me wrong my son wears tons of cutesy clothes and I want him to be comfortable. So, I don't get him dressed up in button up shirts and ties everyday. He does not however need to have any cartoon characters faces plastered across is shirt.There are a few exceptions.. in Disney World he can character it up.. if we were going to a Go Deigo Go! show -- of course he can get/wear a shirt.

Lets just be honest. Baby E looks much cuter in preppy clothes from places like the Children's Place or Old Navy or Carter's which are perfect for us because I refuse to spend gazillions of dollars on his clothes since he only wears them once or twice  but I would be lying if I said he didn't have some fabulous customized clothing like Christmas overalls with his name on them or some pricier brands like Ralph Lauren..

Because WHO can resist a 2 week old baby in a Ralph Lauren one piece outfit!

too much work too little play

 I worked 65.5 hours last week and my grad school classes started back.

I = brain dead.

More soon. Promise.

I have to tell you...

about this fabulous giveaway that my in real life friend (but annoymous-ish blogger) is hosting on her page!

Head over to Working Mommy's Lessons Learned to get the details. If you aren't following her blog already you probably should because she is HILARIOUS! I can actually picture the stories she tells happening to her. We were pregnant at the same time (our little ones are just a few days apart!) and she is just fabulous.

Anyway back to the giveaway she is giving away not one but two! of these super cute Pumpkin Sacks from Knotted Wear. They are not only cute but functional too!

I don't know why I am blogging about this because I want to win one! My big little man (who has 2 teeth, is crawling, and sitting up on his own BTW) will probably be too big but I just know that they will make a great gift! Especially for my bestest friend who is about to pop out a baby boy any day now. Or my precious 2 month old niece!

Anyway head over to Working Mommy's blog and check it out!!

scary times in the Tennyson household..

So baby E got strep throat right after Christmas. We  took him to the pedi and since he had it once before he gave him a stronger antibiotic.. Augmentin. This was on a Monday. By Thursday and Friday he was still acting as if he was in pain and he was not sleeping or eating. The previous time he had it they put him on Amoxicillian and he felt better the next day. On Saturday (New Years Day) we decided to take him to an urgent care (at St. Mary's Hospital) just to get his prescription switched because his pedi was out of town and the pedi on call wouldn't return my phone call (after I had been calling him since Thursday to change it). So the Dr. there put him back on Amoxicillian stating that the Augmentin (which is a combo of amoxiciallian and another drug) was probably messing up his stomach because that is common.

All hunky dory right?

WRONG. The next morning I go to change Ethan's diaper and he is broken out in hives in all of his creases (armpits, neck, etc.) At this point I am freaking out because I don't think it can possibly be an allergic reaction since he has been on the amoxicillian before and because the augmentin had amoxicillian in it. Off to the ER we go. I always think the worst but I mean this was bad the hives were spreading fast and I was afriad they would get in his mouth and throat.

So we go to the ER and a Physicians Assistant comes in (DOES NOT EVEN TAKE OFF HIS ONSIE to see the whole outbreak) and says he is allergic to the Amoxicillian.. switches his prescription.. tells us we can't give him anything for the hives because he is too little.. and sends us on our way. He was in the room for MAYBE 3 minutes. The nurse comes in to discharge us and warns us its going to get worse before it gets better and to take him to the pedi Monday morning. EXCUSE ME? its going to get worse but we can't give him anything. I think I was in so much shock I didn't know what to say. And my inner bitch that comes out quite often just could not make it out.

Ethan did not sleep all night (I don't know if they were painful or itchy) because he was so miserable. My poor baby was one big hive. I stared at him for most of the night because I was so scared his breathing was going to get shallow. We made it through the night somehow and took him to his pedi who proceeded to tell us it was one of the worst allergic reaction hive breakouts he has ever seen. He had to put my poor baby on steroids and on anti inflammatories. He said that his hives were so bad he was close to bruising.

MORAL OF THE STORY: St. Mary's Hospital and ER doctors SUCK! and I will be raising some serious hell with some big wigs at the hosptial.

I realize that it could have been worse and if it was any worse I would have killed everyone of them however they should have done something so it did not get to the point that it did! I wish I would have taken pictures of him to show how bad it got but I worried about the present and was not thinking that far in advance.

Ethan is fine now.. 5 days of heavy medication later. He is perfectly and healthy-- Thanks to his fabulous pedi.

2009 = blur

2009 was a huge blur for me!

In picture form it went like this:

Married and a beautiful baby boy all in one year -- and I could not be more happier!

I don't think 2010 can top this year!