tuesday list

happy humid tuesday to you all. summer has shown up in a big way here in nashville. our forcast for the next week includes nothing but 90's every single day - bleck. i am NOT a fan. but what can you do?

we took nuggie to the pool for the first time this weekend. she was a little apprehensive at first, but quickly perked up and enjoyed herself alot! she looked so cute in her little bathing suit. i'm so glad she enjoyed it, we'll have to go lots more this summer! i also felt alot more comfy being on the side with the other mommas. i can't believe i went out in a bathing suit, but just like bub said - no one is paying any attention.

bub and i had a fun little friday afternoon date. gramps was in town and he kindly watched the nugster so we could escape for a little bit. we saw Hangover 2 ... oh dear! and then bub treated me to a nice new pair of super comfy running shoes. it was a lovely afternoon :-)

i've completed two days of my couch to 5k. oh yea - i signed up for a 5k. say what??? i've never run a mile in my life - BUT, it's my latest attempt at figuring out how to work out with a babe in our life. we were given a jogging stroller before nuggie was born and she LOVES to stroll. so i can plop her in there and hit the pavement. i've always wanted to learn to run - so woot! we'll see how this plan goes. i've got a fun little app on my phone. i just strap it on and it tells me when to run/walk, keeps track of my pace and distance and lets me play music.

we have our first micro test today... i'm not at all sure what to expect. i haven't studied as much as a i should just because i have no idea what this prof wants. hoping that after this first exam i'll have a better idea of what he's looking for.

well nugg is napping, i best hop in the shower... let's get this hot summer day started.

flying dinosaur bugs

i'm back in class and so i get to overhear all sorts of random things. tuesday there was a girl sitting in front of me, talking to a friend about this epic cicada invasion we're having and she says - i'm from the north, we don't have flying dinosaur bugs where i live. and i thought - brilliant! that describes the little suckers to a T. they do look like something that should be flying around during cave man days. with their beady red eyes and weird transparent wings - ugh! i'm so ready for them to burrow back into the ground for another 13 years. they. are. gross. they're loud and i mean LOUD - like i've seriously considered using ear plugs to take nuggie for a walk, but then i think, she doesn't have ear plugs, i don't want her sweet little ears to be damaged. they also fly around like they're drunk, crashing into everything. so you're likely to be beaned in the head if you do venture outside. blah.

nuggie has decided she doesn't want to sleep at night anymore (who am i kidding, has the child EVER really slept at night???). she's drooling a ton, so maybe it's her little teeth bothering her? we've tried baby tylenol and baby motrin - but she's still up every 2-3 hours screaming. needless to say, momma is dragging today. coffee pot - work faster!

we survived another round of bad storms last night. this spring season is getting ridiculous. my heart is so sad for the sweet people of joplin. i can't even imagine what they must be going through. as this latest round was going through yesterday i thought - almost everyone i love is going to be affected in some way by this line of storms. it stretched all the way from indiana down to texas. thankfully it seems everyone is ok.

ahh, the coffee pot is done brewing - i've got to go find the biggest mug i can and fill it to the max. hasta la pasta.

baby food disastor

so while we were out in portland i watched my sis make her little man homemade baby food. she's a busy woman - working full time as a nurse practitioner, being a super mommy and wife, she also volunteers her time and has a stinky long commute. she manages to still make baby food for her little babe, so i thought, why don't i make my own baby food for nuggie? i don't work and only go to school part time - i have no excuse! nuggie's two favorite foods are peas and sweet potatoes. so i steamed up a bag of peas and a whole sweet potato (not together). i then pureed them and added just a little water to help make them a little more runny. i was SO excited - i made baby food! i sat little miss down in her high chair and eagerly gave her a spoonful of the veggies... and she cried. she made the worst little frown and gagged and cried! oh.my.word - how much of a little diva do we have??? do you see what i'm working with here??? ugh! i thought i was doing such a good thing! so it's back to gerber for us. i froze the little containers of food, we'll give it a try again in a week or so. why she prefers gerber to home cooked goodness i do not know... oh my sweet little diva doll :-)

portland - part 2

the rest of our portland trip included lots of fun things!

 cousin g has a fun little activity area that he shared with nuggie all week. every morning the babes played and had a wonderful time in their little space.

on wednesday we went to the japanese gardens in portland. they were amazing. it was so peaceful and so pretty. i can't wait to go back. i would love to just sit with a cup of coffee and my journal and spend the afternoon in this little sanctuary.

 nuggie enjoyed the gardens too! here she is peaking at something.

thursday we went to the coast. we visited a new to us beach called depoe bay. oh was it gorgeous! i can't get enough of the ocean. it was chilly, but wonderful. nuggie enjoyed her first trip to the beach as well!

for lunch we went to this super cute little place called tidal raves. the name sounds cheesy, but the food was amazing. and this was the view from the front of the restaurant!  i think i'd work there just so i could look at this scene every day!

our view from our table... i think i might have seen a whale tale?? 

on friday we went to visit grammy's work. nuggie had a splendid time cruising around in the shopping cart as usual. she seriously thinks it's the best thing in the world.

and there you have it. our return flight was rough. our flight from pheonix to nashville was 30 min late and then when we got to nashville they wouldn't let us land because of bad weather, so we had to circle around for another 30 minutes. nuggie was NOT a happy camper. i can't blame her - she had quite the busy week. and overall she handled it wonderfully. all the change and different experiences with only a few meltdowns. she's such a little joy :-)

portland - part 1

we're back! our trip out to oregon was wonderful. traveling is for sure very different with a little one in tow, but we survived and got to spend lots of time with my sis, brother-in-law, nephew and mom. 

nuggie had her friday photo taken on her first plane ride! she did so wonderfully on the way out. all that worrying for nothing, sorta. the return flight, well that's a whole other story. 

nuggie and g met for the second time. we all got together at christmas when the babes were still so small. they really seemed to enjoy being together this time around. 

on saturday we had a breakfast a fun little place called cup and saucer. then bub made his regular trip to the massive REI downtown. this trek found him purchasing shoes for his spartan races (i'll blog more about that little adventure later!). after breakfast we headed out to the lovely oregon wine country. the state is so totally chill that babies are more than welcome to join us on wine tastings. this little pic is my brother-in-law and sweet little gman. is he not the cutest little man in the world???

 this is my amazing, beautiful sister... nugg and she got along splendidly.

here are the boys with the babes. nuggie is grabbing at g's little nose. the two did this to each other alot this week :-) 

 nuggie also happened to turn 7 months old on this trip! how is my sweet little lady growing up so fast? i had to take her 7 month pic with the fam. 

 g needed to check out nuggie's bow.

 sunday night we had some really awesome amazing GOOD seafood. it's a little tricky to get fresh stuff in nashville - so we asked sisterkins to take us some place yummy in portland. she did NOT disappoint. i had the most amazing jumbo lump crab/mushroom/artichoke dish and bub got a massive bowl with seafood all in the shell. he had a small stack of tools he had to use to crack it all free. nuggie tried salmon for the first time and LOVED it! she also had her first piece of crusty bread to gnaw on, she thought that was pretty amazing too :-)

you can't go more than a mile or two without running into a park it seems, so we took advantage! you can also walk just about anywhere in the portland area, which i love. it's so different then down here in the south where you're lucky to even find a safe sidewalk to stroll down. sweet nuggie went on the swings with her papa and loved being pushed around in her stroller everywhere.

that's all i've got for now... i'll write more about our trip soon. now it's back to reality - hot, humid weather, and crazy cicadas welcomed us home - ick! school starts back up this week and bub heads back to work. it was so nice to have a little escape from it all. i miss my sweet family so much.

it's an invasion!

gross, gross, GROSS! these ugly looking boogers are here! we were warned of their coming invasion and they finally made their appearance this week. these my lovelies are what they're calling the 13 year cicada. i don't know what they do for 13 years - do they live underground that whole time? do they just lay dormant? i didn't even know a bug could live for 13 years - ick! but now they're outside buzzing that awful cicada buzz that shouldn't be heard till late summer and they're flying around everywhere and the dog eats them and their little molted casings are all.over.everything. it's just gross.

on a less buggy note - i've got all our essentials for our upcoming trip purchased and i've started packing nuggie's plane bag already. here's what i've got so far or plan to pack shortly (thank you to kaila for the tips!) all items are packed in their own little ziplocks or are grouped together in ziplocks as the internet moms suggested - one little bag with 1 diaper, a few wipes and a burp cloth for emergency d changes while on the plane, infant tylenol, infant motrin, nuggie's meds and teething tabs, a small canister of formula, 4 bottles, 10 d's, wipes, receiving blanket, squishy blankie so she can play on the floor while we have our layovers, burp cloths, 2 small packages of baby food, spoon, bib and washcloth, 2 changes of clothing, a clean shirt for me, snacks for bub and i, her ipod, new toys she hasn't seen, purell, wet ones, chapstick, advil and other necessities for momma, water bottle - empty - to fill up when we get into the airport and 2 copies of her birth certificate... whew - i'm worn out just thinking about all this - but it all fits nicely into one bag so it really isn't too much and you can NEVER be too prepared with our drama queen screamy banshee child.

i've been having nightmares about plane crashes and everyone on the plan hating us b/c nuggie is gonna scream - ugh, i'm a nervous wreck about this ordeal. but it will be worth it when we get to see my momma and sister and nephew and brother-in-law!

attention all mommas

help! i need some momma advice.

we're taking nuggie on her first plane ride coming up here pretty soon and i need some advice on flying with a little one. i've already googled all things baby/airplane and i've talked to our pediatrician - his grand advice, and i'm not even kidding - take some cash so you can buy the people around a drink. i wish we could afford this, but sadly it's not in the cards... so, what else should i know? there's debate about preboarding - should we do it? should we not and hold out to get on the plane till the very last minute? where should we sit on the plane? front, back? is it really, really awful to change a wet diaper at our seat? i would never change a dirty one there, but i really want to avoid that gross potty on the plane if we can. i'm not doing bendryl, so i need some other ideas girls. i've got a bag of little toys she's never seen waiting to dole out when we get airborn. any advice is welcome!

it's here, it's here!

we picked up our first CSA box on sunday! i'm like 90% super, really excited and 10% like, what on earth have we committed to???

first, we misunderstood some of the portioning, so rather than 4 portions of meat, we get 2. we do get the dozen eggs and then a 1/2 bushel of produce. but now the really great deal we thought we were getting, is still good, but not quite as great. second, i knew we'd have to deal with planning a menu around whatever it was we got for that week, i didn't realize that it really takes some creative thinking. for instance, this week we got: 2 heads of lettuce, spinach, 2 big bags of kale, broccoli, green onions, mint, these freaky looking things called kohlrabi, radishes and 2 big baskets of strawberries. all super great stuff - but how do i plan a menu around this? and then, after paying for this - can i get all the rest of our groceries for about $50? this week that was a no. i went WAY over budget. this is for sure a process.

all the challenges aside, i'm SO excited about joining our CSA. we get local, organic food that was grown/raised in earth friendly ways.

so here's a kohlrabi

it's essentially a german turnip (according to wikipedia) and can be eaten raw OR boiled and mashed... we'll see how it goes when i've got to cook these bad boys up.

tonight we're having hamburgers on the grill from our farm fresh beef and sauteed kale.

and on a quick side note - i've not forgotten my weighn' in monday's. it's just there really isn't much to report. losing this baby weight is tough. i'm still chugging away and i'll keep you all updated of any changes. i did make it to the Y today. nuggie had a huge meltdown in the nursery :-( my poor little babes. 

in the details

this week has been NUTS. finals, teething nuggie, sleepless nights, yelping pup, zooming all over the world trying to get errands and such done. it's just been crazy. today i'm breathing one huge, GIANT sigh of relief! finals are DONE - woot, woot! i have the next three weeks off till microbiology starts. i'm in the nursing program, just in case anyone didn't hear me shout that from the rooftops last week! and bub's guam trip has been canceled.woah, hold on - i'm not being super awful mean wifey for being happy about this... i'm only ok with this b/c he's been put on another project and it's going to be awesome for him, so he's ok with it and even really excited. so from my purely selfish perspective - i don't have to live without my hubby for 2 weeks and travel back from oregon with the nugg all by my lonesome. he is my very best friend and we make a wonder team... i can't imagine trying to do life for 2 weeks without him. he'll still have some travels coming up this summer most likely, but they should all be domestic trips and just for a few days at a time.

hope everyone has a fabulous friday! hug a momma you know this weekend :-)

our day in pictures

nuggie is a happy girl in her stroller

izzy says, "i'm not chewing on anything. nope, not me!"

my hostas are HUGE this spring!

herbs!

me and the nugster relaxing after our big afternoon outside

hope you all are doing wonderfully!! i've got SO much studying to do tonight. why i'm blogging i do not know!

i'm in!

well, they waited till the very last possible minute to mail it, but my letter finally came from the nursing department at school and i'm in! i'm officially a part of the nursing class of 2013 at aquinas! woot! i've got a list as long as my arm of things i have to do now, but it's all so exciting i don't even care! i've got to get two background checks, all sorts of shots/titers/tb test, get cpr certified, buy a stethoscope, a math book and some other goodies... oh, but i'm in, i'm in, i'm in! this is amazing! i know the next two years are gonna be nuts - hectic and hard. but this means so much to our little family - financially and emotionally and it means SO much to me personally. i'm doing this just as much for them as for myself. what a sense of accomplishment when it two years i'll be able to tack on an RN to my name... i'll have a title! say what?!?!