Chris'isms

I don't want you to miss the joy that I experience on a daily basis at la Casa de Faiola Renoud. Enjoy.

Me: "Wow, Jamisen has not let me finish any of these books tonight. He just keeps stopping me and grabbing new ones."
Chris: "It's his version of channel flipping."

Chris: "So, I always cut the bottom of the fried eggs off because they're too difficult for Jamisen to chew.
Me: "Why are you telling me this?"
Chris: "You're in training."

Me: Chris, why aren't you wearing your wedding ring?
Chris: What really matters is what's inside; I don't need to wear it to know my deep commitment to you.
Me: Wrong. Would you like me to go get it for you?

 

Chris walks in on me doing 300 jumping jacks; conversation goes like this: "What are you doing?!" (genuinely horrified) Me: "I'm finishing my work out for the day?" Chris: "Don't! You'll give the baby a headache! All that jumping up and down!!"

Me: "I think I need to change this shirt. It's not fitting anymore."
Chris: (takes one look at my gym outfit, with the shirt that clearly shows a bulging belly and pants that cut off all circulation around the waist) "Well, I'll tell you one thing, I feel really secure in our relationship right now."

Me: "Global warming is really affecting food production in developing nations."
Chris: "It's not man-made global warming if it's just the earth's natural cycle."
Me: "You need to quit listening to Fox News."

Me: "I'm going to make a list of all the things we need to get done today."
Chris: "Can you put on there that Chris needs to relax?"

Me: "These new maternity jeans are too big. They're sagging in the butt."
Chris: "Keep them a week. You'll fill 'em in."

Chris: "We should think about teaching Jamisen a foreign language while he's young."
Me: "That is a great idea! What language should we choose? Chinese seems to be a safe bet. I'll find a tutor and arrange a language playgroup at our house where everyone can chip in some money and all the kids can learn Chinese!"
Chris: "Um, I was just saying we should think about it, not design and enroll kids in a language school."
   

 

Then, there's my Dad:

My dad, getting in the car after a grocery trip with a full grocery bag, asks my Mom a question.
Me: "Dad, Mom's not in the car."
Dad: "What?!"
Chris: "How did you lose her in a grocery store?"
Me: "Wait. Don't you have the wallet so she can't pay for anything?"
Dad gets out if car and wanders back inside store.

Bubbles and Santa

We were so pleased that Santa had a few extra minutes to stop by our house on Christmas Eve. Jamisen initially wasn't the biggest fan but with Daddy by his side, he walked over to the book bin, grabbed a book and brought it back to Santa to read to him. It was rather adorable. Jamisen's big present from Santa was a workbench. He promptly dismantled it, turned it upside down and tried to use it as a sitting stool. Funny little guy. He loves working with tools and is intensely curious. His intellect is always on display and we are so charmed by our little guy.

 

 We went hiking almost every day of the Christmas break. Our winter has been cold but no snow and the last few days have been drizzly but perfectly fine for venturing outside. Jamisen had to be drug away from his stone-throwing forays. He loved everything about the dirt, the rocks, and the splash in the water. There were major screaming and temper tantrums (shortly lived) when we tried to pull him from his rock throwing. The little man has quite the set of pipes on him.

  

Jamisen did have a traditional Christmas stocking with a couple small gifts. He was so happy with the bubble machine that he received. Of course, after a few days, he had turned it so topsy turvy that the bubbles ran out all over the living room furniture. He especially was delighted when we blew the bubbles through the Dyson bladeless fan and the bubbles went all over the living room, making everyone smile and laugh at Jamisen's wonder and awe. Our beloved Nanny, McKenna, said he played with his stocking stuffer, a snow plow, all day long. Mamma, who helped Santa on the stocking stuffer choices, was gratified to learn that the gifts went over so well. 

Christmas time is a wonderful time to spend with family. Grandma and Grandpa Renoud came (along with sister Anamarie) to deliver an amazing gift - the Learning Tower - which Jamisen immediately tried to "help" put together. It's a kitchen helper that puts Jamisen up at counter level so he can be a more active participant with cooking (lucky boy). He and the Learning Tower have been inseparable since he got it. Though, he has taken to trying to play with the kitchen sink - and since it makes him so happy, I've taken to indulging him. It's a recipe for water all over the floor and wet clothes. He went through two changes of clothes tonight and the kitchen got a very complete dousing during his play time. And when we take our soaking wet ginger-haired boy away from his water, he throws up quite the temper tantrum. The one tonight lasted at least 5 minutes. I feel terrible but it's extremely hard not to giggle at his antics.

  

Brother Ryan will be coming to stay with us for a few days this weekend. I can't wait to fully immerse him in our crazy, busy, fun and laughter-filled family life. The sheets have been changed and the house is prepped - we can't wait to see him.

Grinch Visit

The annual Grinch picture:

  

 Jamisen looks even more terrified than last year:

  

The reason the entire family is in the Grinch photo is because Jamisen was NOT having any of being left alone in the arms of some crazy big green guy.  

We also made all the soaps for the FSE Christmas party this year - a Christmas tradition. This year was Black Cherry, Red Apple, LoveSpell (type) and Dragonsblood (a musky men's fragrance). It takes me about 6 hours to make all the detailed soaps (there's a dropper involved) but Chris did his part by wrapping them all.

 

Little Elfen Helper

This week, we had a little pint-sized elf visit the Bramble Berry warehouse to help spread Christmas cheer. It turns out that he accepted a little Christmas cheer first. Thank you Norman (our operations ninja) for the fantastic fishing game. Jamisen caught onto it quickly and I can see that we'll have hours of fun ahead, 'fishing'.

   

 Jamisen's favorite part of visiting the office is always a toss-up between the giant 'Vanna White' wheel (seriously, we have a giant Wheel of Fortune wheel at work) and playing with my keyboard and my computer. He adores anything electronic or computer. Remotes, cell phones, computers ... he's all about it.  

 Jamisen the Elf was not just at Bramble Berry to practice his typing skills; he was also there to help deliver some presents I picked up for a few of the team. While everyone at Bramble Berry gets cards stuffed with a little sumpin sumpin (wink wink), sometimes I just run across a gift that screams out a name and then says 'Buy me, buy me!' When that happens, I channel the extra spirit of Christmas and buy 'n' wrap. All I needed was the perfect delivery method: enter Jamisen the Elf.  

 He got into the spirit pretty fast, and loved delivering the gifts. I think the big smiles and clapping helped. He is quite the little ham; he'll do most anything for praise. =) Here's to another super duper fun Holiday season at Bramble Berry. They're all better with a little Elf.  

Cookie Helper (Videos)

Remember, to watch these, you have to click through to the blog. They don't play in emails.
More cooking. Our little master chef in the making:

Becoming Martha

I've been learning to sew in my copious amounts of spare time. I even purchased a sewing machine. This is the first sewing project. Prepare to be underwhelmed but soon, my friends, you will ooh and aah over my sewing skills. And Jamisen + Baby Bell Pepper (who I can feel kicking now) will be the best costumed children at Halloween every year. No pressure. No pressure.

   

 Look at the evenness of my second project - those stitches! The tricky lines of the circle and heart:

   

 Proving I am trying to give Martha a true run for her money, I've been juicing for the family most mornings. Jamisen sometimes drinks as much as 3 ounces of it in a morning. And remember, greens are all about calcium. Goooooo strong bones!

   

 But, lest you think it's all healthy - these are the cookies I made for the Bramble Berry Cookie Exchange - Andes Mint cookies with a chocolate mint ganache .... but yeah, I didn't eat any and neither did Jamisen so maybe we are the all healthy family. Gold star. Gold star.

  

I was told they were delicious. 

PS - I was at a Winter Solstice ceremony/ritual the other night and we were told to imagine powerful women who have guided us in our lives. Of course, my Mom came to mind first. Followed by Amelia Earhart. And then, Martha Stewart. Martha Stewart. Top Three female influencers in my life. Other women at the Solstice ceremony were mentioning Joan of Arc and Athena and suitably impressive women of history. Me. Martha Stewart. I wasn't sure whether I should be proud or ashamed. But whatever, I'm following in her footsteps so I'm going for proud.

A Little Monster Booty for You?

Happy boy loves the Christmas lights. We now have two trees with lights and every morning, after he finds 'Bah!' the Elf, he asks to have the tree lights turned on.  

This morning the Elf was guarding a Christmas present - a very nice bottle of wine from Norman.

  

Chris is still in the running to join the CNN Ironman Triathlon Team (with all his spare time). We are so proud of him, of course.

  

Though Jamisen still isn't speaking (meh - he's fantastic at sign language), he clearly is learning a lot (as evidenced by this text from his Nanny, McKenna):

  

Cutest pants in the world - a little Monster Booty for you?

Happy Tree Hunting

For some reason, I have it in my head that a Christmas tree that we stalk ourselves and then cut down is somehow better than a tree purchased pre-cut. For that reason, I drag my husband (and now young son) out every holiday to freeze, while trying to hold a hacksaw. It's a delightful holiday tradition that I'm sure Jamisen + unborn sibling will thank me for one day. More realistically, they'll thank their father who does all the heavy lifting and cutting. Either way, it's all about holiday happiness.

We decided that we didn't need to walk all the way to the back to get the 'best' tree and that we'd be able to find a great tree in the front row. And, somehow, when we found the 'perfect' tree in the front row, we just had to keep walking. It was almost like it if wasn't hard to find, it wasn't somehow 'good.'

Well, after traversing the entire tree farm multiple times, we made it back to the front row where we figured out a dirty little tree farm secret: all the trees up in the front rows have been manicured within an inch of their little tree lives so they look more attractive than the average tree from the road. Thus, we happily found our perfect tree and claimed it as our own.

We love bowl cuts!

Jamisen got a little scratch on his face at Hillcrest (his 2X, half day pre-pre school). You can see it right by his eye. It's healing well with no signs of infection.  

He loves his new 'kid sized' stool, though one might argue he's not quite using it in the traditional way that chairs are typically meant to be used.

  

He is still having a major love affair with remote controls:  

Soon after that photo was taken, I took the remote away from him since eating the buttons off the remote control seemed to be possibly unhealthy and a bit excessive considering the remote was not ours. Man, oh man, temper tantrum meltdown! I did my patented 'Wander away and do something else and do not care and then, look like I'm having fun!' but it did take him a bit of time to regain his equilibrium. My belly is starting to show a lot at night, a little in the morning. I call it my 'food baby' at night. I'm refusing to wear my maternity pants yet so keep with the rubber bands in my normal jeans. I'm doing that for as long as I possibly can, which isn't much longer.  

 Daddy gave Jamisen a traditional bowl cut - do you love those bangs? How hilarious are they?!  

 Chris is on his way back from Detroit right now. I think he was in Ohio today though don't quote me. He was going to sign an agreement with a college to license their x-ray technology. It was a quick two day trip but involved 4 flights. He should land soon and be home to us by early tomorrow. Both Jamisen and I are excited. We both miss him dreadfully when he's gone though this time, he pre-recorded books on the iPad for Jamisen so he reads to Jamisen and I turn the pages. Jamisen really seemed to like that.

Two Bikers in the Family

When we visited Grandma and Grandpa Faiola, we all went to Sabbath School. Jamisen behaved so-so. It was his first time so he didn't quite understand the 'sitting' concept but he did okay. 

 

 He was way way excited about his new trike/bike/thing from our friends at Dandelion Organics who happily shared their hand-me-down.

  

 Chris has entered the CNN Triathlon team competition. You can watch his video entry here: 

 

Jamisen is hot to trot to help his Daddy win the bike portion. Look at his form! 

Go Chris, GO!

The biggest news of the weekend? Chris finished his Seattle Marathon in 3:25, almost a full hour faster than his time last year (blog post from last year here).  

 Can you see him waving at me through the crowd at the start? He's been training a lot more AND more importantly, dropped 25 pounds from last year's race weight. I know, I know, I have no idea where he was hiding that 25 pounds because he was in shape last year. I secretly think that he's losing all the weight, hoping to intersect my weight when I hit month 9 with our Bramble Baby 2. There are choice bad words for men that do tricks like that.

Jamisen and I kept busy while Daddy was running. We explored the Seattle Children's Museum thoroughly! There was a lot to see, including holes where animals burrow. Jamisen was fearless, going into the dark, dark hole until he popped out the other end. I was pretty delighted to see him (after all, what if the hole had a trap-door and really was an elaborate child smuggling ring that only picked little blue-eyed, strawberry-blonde boys?) 

 We played for 2 hours until it was time to go get Daddy and then, imagine our surprise when we walked to the appointed meeting place 15 minutes early to find Daddy waiting for us! He finished a full 35 minutes ahead of his goal time, and a full 55 minutes ahead of his time last year. We were so proud of him!

The salmon are making their annual migration in Washington state, going back to their birthplaces to spawn (and then die soon thereafter). Despite the incredible 'liquid sunshine' display the PNW gave us, the entire Faiola family clan ventured on a hike to see the salmon run. Jamisen was intrigued by the majestic creatures and thankfully didn't seem to notice many of them weren't really moving anymore.That's code for: there were dead fish everywhere, on the banks, smelling horrible as they decayed.

Does his outfit remind you of Paddington Bear? It kept him mostly dry but his pants still got soaked. He was such a little trooper, walking an entire half mile in pouring rain, without complaint. He mostly looked shell-shocked but game for the trip.

Clearly, we did not starve at Thanksgiving. We were also joined this year by Granddog Toby (Erik's contribution to the grandchild mix), who feasted on Pumpkin Apple pancakes for breakfast. The entire family, well, except Chris who is mostly forced into it, is vegetarian so our Thanksgiving celebrations involve lots of pasta and vegetables. They sound simple but they don't end up all that healthy, thanks to the happy helpings of cheese we always put on everything.

It was sure nice to go to Grandma and Grandpa Faiola's house for a few days because Grandma took care of Jamisen almost the entire time, leaving me to lounge luxuriously on the couch and read (with a slightly guilty conscience since so many of the Bramble Berry team worked all weekend to ship out orders). I finished two books (I'll admit, they were trash books - the new Clive Cussler and the new one in the YA Matched series. I went through a phase after 'Hunger Games' when I read a lot of YA.). We also saw 'Life of Pi' (I read the book and felt like the move was pretty true to the book plot line) and played some fierce 'Settlers of Catan' games after Jamisen went to bed at night. It was such a treat to have Grandma (and Grandpa) take on all the heavy duty parenting tasks (I didn't change a poopy diaper for three days!) that we might need to make Thanksgiving at their house a tradition.