I like anything with chocolate chips...

I made a batch of banana muffins with walnut pieces & choco-chips Monday. Before I could even get them in the oven Alex was hovering... he scarfed down 2 as soon as they were cool enough to eat!

Now is this the look of contentment or what!?



(They're his Daddy's favorite too!)

Bigger Boy

So, we're back out on the patio... and wowee has Alex grown! Check out this compare & contrast moment:

August 07:

May 08:

out perk'd

No one would have guessed it possible, but I must admit I've been outdone.

My son is more perky than I am.

2 hours of shopping and a little bit of a car ride, holding my hand and "jumping" instead of walking, a hug that knocks me to the ground followed by a round of tickle-saurus, peek-a-boo at the bathroom door while I "potty"... and I was screaming uncle. (actually Stan was laughing at me while I handed the just-a-little-too-perky, only-1-hour-before-bed, child off to him with an impatient tone in my voice)

It would be just my luck to have a child who would out perk me. ME! aarrgghh. (and a giggle, as we play peek-a-boo from behind the kids menu at dinner... a little caffeine and I regained some of my old perky.) :)


BUT NONE OF THAT MATTERS BECAUSE


Tonight, as I was getting Alex ready for bed, Stan came in to say good night. His usual "Good night buddy", to which Alex replies "ni-nite". Tonight, however, Stan was gifted with this response:

"Ni-night budddy"

Alex got a bigger than usual hug, and a kiss, and Stan went boucing downstairs with one of the biggest grins I've ever seen on his face! He'll be bragging about this moment to himself for a while - I had to share it with everyone else.

They tease that being a parent is a job without perks - being someone's buddy for life - that's a pretty cool perk!

Granddad & Alex

We walked (I pushed the stroller) up to GG & Granddad's Sunday afternoon. We walked in the door, Alex snatched up his special dish of cereal GG always sets out for him, hauled it over to the couch where Granddad was sitting and climbed up. He had to sit next to his Granddad!
It's a good life!

Good Morning

Text message from Stan:

Alex woke up at 6:45 in a great mood. He is telling me a story about his cheerios that includes dinosaurs and roaring. I can't understand much else.

We're getting stories now! With sound effects, of course, he is a boy!

The "other" chicken.

Our little boy loves his chicken nuggets. However, he's been 2 since January and his Mommy is trying to expand his palate.

Enter steak fingers.


They look an awful lot like chicken fingers, now don't they?

So we introduce them as "chicken... um, the other chicken... Daddy's favorite chicken"

He gobbled them down!

Halfway thru I thought it was safe to offer that maybe they weren't quite chicken and said that they were "yummy beef", to which our brilliant son answers "Cow...moooo..."

Me: What?

Then he confims it. "Chicken (baak, baak), Pig (snort, snort), Cow... (Mooo)"

Alex: Points at fork mooo-ing.

That's our little carnivore!

We're okay

In case you heard the reports on the news and were trying not to freak out, I thought I would write a little note and tell you that we're all okay.

I know that the news (especially for the benefit of my out-of-state friends & family it seems) always get their geography WRONG and totally over dramatize the damage, so let me set the record straight:

We are OK. We knew the storm was coming and were watching the news. The forming clouds were AMAZING to see. Alex & I were at Glenn & Cindy's when the tornado sirens went off and we just went down to the basement and watched the news from there. Their basement's cushy and Cindy had stashed an entire library of Stan's old books for Alex on one of the shelves. Good Grammy. Alex thought it was all just an adventure.

We called Grandmother & Granddad and they headed to the basement. Stan was at church for rehersal but they quickly canceled that and he joined us again. Nate & Lindsay were accounted for via text messages and are fine.

We lost satelite signal for a while because the rain was so heavy. Dad pulled out the emergency am/fm/weather band radio/tv/flashlight (excuse me, torch), really-cool-emergency-thing that Val gave us for Christmas one year. We watched Fox4's Joe Lauria and at 8:15pm they cleared the tornado warnings and we went home. Alex was in his own bed a little before 9pm and Stan & I made sure we had the appropriate emergency things laid out and stowed away in the basement. Everything was calming down and we went to bed (with the TV on in the background).

We were woken by the wind at 1:45am. It was insane. I mean insane. Officially, hurricane force, straight line winds clocked at 60-112 MPH. Several small tornadoes touched down in areas outlying to the metro, MILES from us. Lots of people are without power and there's a lot of clean-up. There are a few road closures from debris and downed power lines, but we have not been directly impacted (our neighborhood looked as though nothing happened!)
And, I haven't heard of one serious injury, that's good news!

So, other than not having slept all that well (though Alex didn't stir once... that kid could sleep thru, well, a hurricane...) we are all just fine.

I have to say that it was just yesterday I had to explain to my warehouse manager that earthquakes don't come with warnings... that would be hilarious though... earthquake sirens, haha. No, earthquake warnings are wall hangings like Raindrops at my parent's house (I call dibs if you're listening, CAY, RAY & BAY) and pull cords on ceiling fans. You get 0.2 seconds to duck and cover. Here you've got at least a few minutes... Tradeoffs.