Cuteasaurux Rex

Jamisen's second Halloween celebration kept with the animal theme (last year, he was a cow). Only, this time, it wasn't an actual living animal. He went as a Cuteasarux Rex! And, while I would never be one to be competitive, I'm pretty sure he was the cutest Cuteasaurus Rex at the Harvest Festival celebration we went to (with, or without, the headgear).  

 It's raining cats, dogs, and an occasional frog around here so we opted for an indoor party. Plus, Jamisen has never eaten an actual bar of candy so we figured he didn't care much about the actual trick'or'treating part of the night.  

This was the perfect place for him, complete with kids, slides, cookie decorating (oh yes, there was sugar cookies and orange frosting) and a bean bag toss (which, he cleverly won by walking up to the bucket and dropping the bean bag in. Obviously, he's an out-of-the-box thinker).  

 There was a Fruit Loop necklace station. Jamisen was extremely delighted with the concept of Fruit Loops and spent most of the rest of the evening eating his necklace.  

 Unfortunately, he was not a fan of the awesome Cuteasaurus Rex headwear (clearly, this child would not last at a wedding in Britain) so we have this photo series to prove that the costume was a complete cute overload.  

 I hope you had a fantastic Halloween or Harvest Festival tonight. To all of our friends on the East Coast, you're in our thoughts and prayers.

We Have a Grape

Baby Renoud Two is a grape! S/he is a grape going on an elephant. I'm showing a tummy like I'm 4 months along right now. Ugh. I had to pull out my post-pregnancy pants last night for a dress-up event. It's only in my belly though. I've only gained 1.5 pounds and we're 10 weeks along so the weight gain is considerably less than with Jamisen at this point in the pregnancy.

 

 Mr. Jamisen is proving himself to be 18 months going on college, learning to cook in the buff. Our little in-house naked chef loves to eat breakfast at "his" kitchen counter.

   

 Jamisen's latest fun project involves building toy forts around himself, while sitting in the rocking chair. It's quite a feat and it involves him showing us which toys he would like his 'helpers' to pile around him.

   

 This is an action shot of him saying "More! More!", in answer to the question of whether he wanted a certain toy with him.

   

 At some point in this game, there are no more toys left in the living room at all but usually, Jamisen is so fully buried in toys that he doesn't notice (nor could we fit any more toys on there anyways!).
   

Jamisen does have a bit of a cold right now (he is sooooo stuffed up - poor little guy) but remains in good spirits. We're having a big discussion about whether to put him in Montessori school or just have him go to a part-time "art school" for two half-days per week to augment his nanny time. It's a big decision and changes a lot about our childcare routine.

Art Project by Jamisen

I found this fascinating little art project in the pantry room the other day.  

 Who could the culprit possibly be? Might the two incriminating foot prints in the baking powder be a clue? I wonder what size they are?

   

 Jamisen's latest favorite thing is pillows and chairs with pillows. He loves sitting in them and just relaxing back into the softness of the pillows. He is quite a comfort seeker. He still doesn't have pillows or blankets in his crib (when do we add those?? Must look that up.) so it's a novelty for him.

   

 He is doing a great job with his rocking cow. He can mount and dismount it all by himself now and even does some decent rocking action on it.

   

 There's a new play place in town called 'Perch 'n' Play.' It's like a giant outside playground ... inside! Perfect for our drear PNW weather. It's $40 for 5 passes so $8 for unlimited daily play. The have generous servings of goldfish crackers for $.85 and chocolate milk. Jamisen tried the chocolate milk and his mind was fully blown. He loved the sweetness!

   

 I worked all day Saturday, shooting SoapQueen.TV with Jeanee from Dirty Laundry. We taught people how to make bath fizzy cupcakes and Chris and Jamisen stayed very busy in between nap time, Perch 'n' Play and a Halloween Spooktacular at Gabriel's Art School, the preschool that Jamisen might start attending 2 part days per week.

   

 Another important milestone from this weekend was hitting 90 straight days of working out. It may only be important to me but I love keeping promises to myself. Plus, I need a lot of energy to keep up with Mr. Bundle of Boundless Energy, Jamisen, and working out is like a perpetual motion machine of energy creation.

   

 Chris and Jamisen also went to Costco this weekend. I personally think it's mildly suicidal to do Costco on the weekend but Chris is a brave warrior.
The big news of the weekend was that Jamisen got a new kitchen (!!) just for him. He loves it. And yes, that is seaweed he is eating. =)

You Know You're Pregnant When ...

This happened with Jamisen too - Ranch Salad dressing and rice. I know! Disgusting!? Doesn't the idea make you want to puke? Oh wait, it's just me that wants to puke? Strange.

 

Our little blueberry/raspberry has grown to be the size of a kidney bean! Hello little Legume.We can't wait to meet you in May. You're already causing quite a lot of change in Mommy and Daddy's lives as we search for a new house for our growing family. Ideally, we'd like to NOT be moving with a newborn and a toddler.

 

Overall, I'm feeling decent (except for the bruising from the shots which freaks Jamisen out). I'm working out around an hour a day (rockin' out to Zumba, Jazzercise and a couple strength training sessions per week) but definitely have the first trimester tireds. This weekend, I went to sleep at 7:15 on Saturday and on Sunday, took a 3 hour nap with Jamisen and then fell asleep at 9 p.m. (and would have slept all night had I not woken up with a massive bout of morning sickness around 2 a.m.). Ah yes, the morning sickness. I don't really have much in the morning (go figure) but I do have it at night. Last night, a nice chunk of cheddar cheese settled my stomach. Tonight, I'm carb loading with the delicious rice and salad dressing (WTH? Why in the world would my body be craving that?). I remember with Jamisen, I did start to feel a lot better and could eat normal food in Trimester 2.

Katie's Cupcakes

Bellingham is a unique place where small business is celebrated and the concept of buying local and buying from your neighbors is espoused. When Katie's Cupcakes went on the famed show, Cupcake Wars, all of Bellingham collectively held their breath. It was thrilling to have our little town on the map for our delicious eats. Katie's Cupcakes did a celebration party for their episode and served all four of the cupcakes from the show.  

 My awesome assistant, Kristen, and I went with friends. She and I are united in our love of all things cupcakes (despite being perpetually on a healthy food eating plan) and when we found out we could buy tickets to this special event, we were all in.

  

The evening did not disappoint. I never thought (in a million years) that I could be cupcake'd out but after 4 **full-sized** cupcakes (full-sized, people, full-sized!), I felt physically ill. It was not the fault of the cupcakes. They were AMAZING (psst: if you're in Bellingham, or want to make the drive, they're serving 4 packs of the winning cupcakes for 1 more week. You can pre-order them here but you have to order by Thursday).  

The best part about the night was the Q&A session. Of course, I wanted to know all about the behind-the-scenes. I've done enough TV to know that there are lots of interesting little background stories to get the show looking as good as possible and Katie and her assistant did not disappoint in sharing some of the fascinating and surprising behind-the-scenes. I raised my hands what felt like a gazillion times and asked lots of questions (everything from, 'who pays for the flights?' to 'do they provide all the ingredients?' to 'do they coach you to answer questions a certain way?'). We're sworn to secrecy for the answers but I'll just say that both Kristen and I were wowed by Katie's answers and her humble, hard-working nature. It came through clearly and we are so proud that she's a Bellinghamster!

Photos from Fall

There were so many great photos from last weekend that I wanted to share all 100+ of them! But here are some more to round out the last two blog posts. What can I say? The kid is photogenic!

Jamisen actually hated the leaves. We got one good photo and that was that! In about 8 seconds, this is actually what happened:  

Aw, poor little peanut! Not to worry, he was happy within just a few more seconds (easy come, easy go), playing with the rake:  

Grandma Faiola didn't ever want to take her hands off this little boy. She would have held his hands all day if he had let her (and stayed still long enough!).  

This is the digital version of 'Moo, Moo, Bah, La La!' (thank you Lisa McShane for introducing us to it) and Jamisen loves it!
There are sound effects, moving characters and of course, the fascinating and insightful tale of morality, lust and greed .... oh wait; no, it's a tale of barnyard animals and the different sounds they make. It really is that interesting.  

Any time there's a computer on, Jamisen comes swooping over. He loves electronics and he loves his Grandpa Faiola. I'm sure that doting Grandpa letting Jamisen play with every single button possible also makes Grandpa and his computer particularly appealing.  

Proud Mama loves her little boy. He is the sun, moon, stars and all of that. But wow oh wow, is he ever high energy! We can't wait to have Daddy back. Two weeks has been tough and Jamisen has missed him every day (as have I). It will be nice to have an extra set of adult hands keeping our little bundle of happiness and light busy.

More Photos from Fun Weekend

Helping Farmer Jamisen down the steep driveway:  

Playing Hide'n'Go Seek at the Playground  

Two old men, sittin' on the porch / grass, talking about the day:  

 Little boy in a big woods:  

 It takes a village to put together a Puzzle Ring:  

The final masterpiece. It took 1 hour and 5 people with countless attempts to put it back together.  

 Loves the train tracks:

  

 Quite happy to be carried by strong Grandpa:  

 Proud Grandparents and the cutest Mr. Jamisen in his itchy sweater:

Jamisen's Big Spill

We had a busy weekend. Grandpa and Grandpa came up for one day and in addition to hiking, visiting many parks and cooking Martha Stewart's Pinto and Rice burgers and doctored-up Cottage Cheese Protein Pancakes, there were trains: 

 

Smiles:

 

Corn:

  

Leaves: 

 

Wheelbarrows: 

 

Slides:

  

And this is where the mishap came in. Jamisen had been going down the slides all by himself, stopping at the bottom, laughing, posing and waving.

  

In hindsight, looking clearly at the picture above, you can see that Jamisen is leaning back just a bit; that would be leaning back perfectly into a luge position, in what is apparently the most awesome pair of sliding pants in the history of the universe (who knew that corduroy was the secret sliding awesesome-sauce?!). And whooosh! he was off.

  

He slid so fast that he practically got air and went into the next slide. Yikes. We were all shocked. But Grandpa apparently has the instinct of a wild game photographer on the Serengeti because he got a snap of Jamisen's topsy-turvy dismount. Jamisen was comforted quickly by Grandma and Grandpa. I was still at the top of the slide and in a complete moment of irony, tried to throw myself down the slide quickly only to practically have to push myself down the slide. If I had been wearing corduroys, I'm sure I would have gotten there faster.

  

 Not to worry, he was fine. There were a few tears of surprise but we were off and to the sliding races again. But this time, he had a chaperone on the slide. I learned my lesson. No sliding alone unless it's an obvious slow kiddie slide!  I felt pretty stupid for a few hours until it was apparent that Jamisen was no worse for the quick slide.

  

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