Lone Star

I've been working with Travis to take over more things with Aiden and I can already tell it's making a big difference in Aiden's willingness to approach him.  Aiden used to come to me for everything and would throw a fit if Travis did it.  Travis' opinion was 'he doesn't want me, he wants you.'  Yessss.  But I need help!  So I forced him.  Travis was annoyed at first, but now that he's reaping the benefits, I know he appreciates it. 

As an extension of Travis taking on more with Aiden, I'm going to try to save grocery shopping for the weekends when Travis is around so I can go without a child.  It's so much easier on me and it gives Travis and Aiden some alone time.  We've done this in the past, but not frequently.  I went to get an oil change and bought groceries on Saturday without Aiden.  When I got home, Aiden was still awake.  Travis was having trouble getting him to fall asleep for nap time.  Finally, he just went in there and laid next to him on the floor.  Then he proceeded to take a nap of his own for an hour.

After nap time, Chris came over and we all headed to the Galveston Lone Star Rally.  Aiden loves motorcycles.  He points at every single one we see on the road.  His daycare is right near where the rally was, so there were lots of motorcycles driving and parked when I picked him up Friday evening.  We stood on the street corner and watched for a while.  He didn't seem to mind the noise, and really enjoyed just standing there watching, so we figured we'd take him to the rally during the day.  I've been at night in the past and it's definitely not for kids.  During the day it's a little less crowded, but it's still loud with all the bikes.

We brought Travis' ear muffs, just in case, but Aiden absolutely refused to wear them.  He was fine with the noise though, so I didn't worry about it too much.

Chris owns a bike so he wanted to peruse the bike parts tents.  I like going over there because they always have the really fancy bikes set up for viewing.  Aiden enjoyed it as well.  After that, we headed back over to the chaos and watched the continuous bike parade.  They set up a path down the Strand where anyone can ride their bike to show off.  There were some interesting people, let's just say that.  Here's a view down the Strand:

Both sides of the street are lined with parked bikes.  I read there were 400,000 bikes on the island this weekend.  I believe it.

Towards the end, we met up with Nadya, Alexey and Kate.  Kate was really nervous with all the loud bikes, but she said she wasn't scared and she didn't want to go home.  It was pretty cute.  She and Aiden caught up:

A common sight: Longhorn helmets.  Only makes sense as it was the Lone Star Rally.



Aeros on Ice

A group of friends from my work got together and bought tickets to a Houston Aeros amateur hockey game this weekend. Houston doesn't have a NHL team, which is interesting. We got excellent tickets through Groupon.com for $11 per person that covered a ticket into the game, a parking pass and an on-ice photo. We weren't sure what that meant, but in the end, we didn't get the photo. Groupon.com is pretty cool. You just enter your zip code and it will pull up great coupons available in your area.

There were three sets of parents in our group (we were one of them). We all arranged for a sitter and caravan'd up together in the Yeager's SUV. We met with the rest of the group to collect our tickets. Travis went to some college hockey games when we lived in Illinois, but I'm pretty sure it was a first for the rest of us.

Zach and Linsey

I tried to take a photo of the Aeros goalie and these got in the way...

Nadya and Alexey


Fight, fight, fight, fight!!!

There weren't as many fights as I thought there would be. That guy leaning over on the right got the brunt of the hits in this particular fight. He only spit a little blood, but that was all the blood I saw the entire game.

There is an intermission game they play with the crowd where everyone gets to attempt to throw pucks into a helmet in the center of the ice. Each puck has a number on it so they know who made the shot. I think they said you can win $500 if you make it. We didn't play, but it was pretty interesting to have hundreds of pucks flying over your head. Speaking of, only one puck ever left the ice during the game and it was on the opposite side of the stadium. Phew!

We were back in Galveston to pick Aiden up from Sue's by 8pm. We had to drop him off at 11 in the morning because we had to leave for Houston during his nap time. That way, he slept at Sue's and woke up to spend the afternoon and evening with her. They always have so much fun together. We are lucky to have Sue!

Dropping Aiden off in the morning meant we had a few hours to kill before the game. We went for lunch, just the two of us. Then we stopped by Target for milk and a shelf for the kitchen. When we got back, I walked in the door and felt confused. I am so used to having to utilize every minute with a toddler, that I didn't know what to do with myself! All this free time! What to do?! We found a couple things to do around the house before Nadya and Alexey showed up. I m insanely used to constantly caring for Aiden that it felt strange. There was no toddler to pull out of the car at each stop and then chase around the house. Huh.

This one got long...

Oi. It's been a long couple of days. But, I'll start with Saturday!

We made plans to go to the first annual Galveston Shrimp Fest with Zach, Linsey and Luke on Saturday. That morning, I brought the Murano in for an oil change and tire rotation. When we bought the car, we bought the car care package which covered oil changes and basic maintenance for so many miles. Looks like we're about to run out - we only have one "free" oil change left. Booooo!

The whole process took a ridiculous two hours, but Aiden did really well throughout. I was kicking myself for not packing a snack for him, and all my change was in the car, so I couldn't get anything from the vending machine. Unfortunately, we ran into Aiden's nap time, so he fell asleep on the ride home. I put him directly to bed when we got home, which meant he'd have to eat lunch afterwards instead of before, like we usually do.

Aiden woke up early from his nap and we headed to Galveston. We missed the beginning of Shrimp Fest because of Aiden's nap. The only bummer there is they were no longer allowing any new people to do the gumbo tastings. It was sooooo hot out, with no breeze, so we decided to take the babies into Yaga's for some appetizers. We hung out for an hour and then went out for snow cones. Aiden really seemed to like it. We all had cherry snow cones, so there were a lot of red tongues.

While we were sitting in the shade enjoying our frozen treat, Kate and her family showed up. We chatted with them for a bit before we all went our own ways.

Travis had worked all day, so we ran home to meet him for dinner. After dinner, Travis and I watched the Killers. It was eh. That's all I can say about that one. I should have gotten something else. Oh well.

Sunday, I cleaned all morning and then Robert came over to watch the Texans-Cowboys game. Ariel is in Illinois for a couple weeks visiting friends and family, otherwise she would have come also. I made a bunch of appetizers from stuff we already had around the house. It was nice to do something like that without having to spend a fortune at the grocery store beforehand.

Travis joined a softball league with Ariel and Robert and their games are on Sunday nights. (All friends are welcome to attend! Just text me for the game time whenever you're interested.) Unfortunately, they had to forfeit this weekend because only 4 team members showed up, including them. Annoying. I had already bought food for Aiden and I, so we ate then left. When we got home, I made the boys burgers and we watched the season premiere of Family Guy.

Over the weekend, Aiden's eyes had gotten a little gunky, so I called to make an appointment for him on Monday. I figured if it went away by then, I'd just cancel the appointment. Sadly, it didn't go away - it got worse. Monday morning when I went to wake Aiden up, his eyes and nose were crusted shut. Cleaning that mess up was quite the scene. YUCK.

We went to the 9:50 appointment Monday morning. When they called us back, the nurse had Aiden use the standing scale, instead of the one with a cradle to hold the little babies. My baby's growing up! He was 23.3 lbs. No idea what percentile he's in because we didn't discuss his growth. We had a male doctor this time. It was interesting because Aiden tends to gravitate towards men. He just stared at this doctor the entire time. So funny! The doctor pulled back Aiden's bottom eyelids and sure enough - pink eye.

Awesome.

Let me tell you right now, this is my least favorite ailment to medicate. Eye drops on a baby? Come on! Are you kidding me?! At least this time it's eye drop and not ointment. That was a nightmare on it's own. So, we have to do 2-3 drops in each eye FOUR TIMES DAILY for 3-7 days. Ugh.

The daycare won't let him back until he's been on medication for 24 hours. Since I gave him his first dose immediately after we filled it, he could technically go back today at noon. That falls right in the middle of nap time and it's too hard to go into work for just a few hours, so I took the entire day off. We should be back to our normal schedule tomorrow.

We spent the rest of Monday over at Robert's. Rachel watched Aiden over lunch so I could run into work. I got my regular stuff done and a few items that I normally would have done today. Hopefully it doesn't put everyone out too much.

We had already bought tickets to go to the Galveston Epicurean Event Monday night with Rachel and Robert. Travis called Sue to see if she still wanted Aiden with his conjunctivitis and she assured him we couldn't get out of this. She loves Aiden, sickness and all! Every time we drop him off there, she tells us we have to bring him more often. I keep forgetting about that. NEED TO REMEMBER THAT.

The Epicurean Event went from 6-8:30, so we weren't really gone that long. All the restaurants from around Galveston get together and serve samples of their cuisine, along with several wineries and various sellers of booze. I was stuffed after two booths. But, I made the rounds. It was hard not to with the boys trucking along, desperate to hit every booth before the end of the night. Oh and the CHOCOLATE. So much chocolate. And one booth was even handing out various vitamins and supplements, including digestive enzymes in pill form. I'm confident that those are the only reason I did not explode from all the food I ate.

I wish they had more activities like that down here. Up north, they have this for every town. The Taste of Chicago, for example. And the Taste of Champaign. Any activity that surrounds food is my kind of activity!

Our Little Toddler

We spent the weekend surrounded by all of Aiden's Walking Friends and look what happened!

A Toddler is Born from Nicolette Ward on Vimeo.

Friday night, we had the Ramby's over for dinner. Blair was running EVERYWHERE with Aiden sitting in the middle of the floor watching him go back and forth. Aiden has always shown interest in the walking babies. I think it finally occurred to him that perhaps he might join them.

Saturday was a crazy day filled with Travis going to work while I got the oil changed on my car and me going to work and running errands while Travis took Aiden home to nap and eat lunch. Then in the late afternoon we headed over to Kate's for her 1st birthday party. She was born 1 week before Aiden so it is amazing to see the differences between the two. Kate seems so much bigger than Aiden to me, but when they stand next to each other it's a pretty close race. Kate has been walking for weeks (months?) now, so she has advanced a bunch in the mobile area.

The party was really nice. It wasn't a huge party, but there was lots of food. They had a moonwalk, which Aiden enjoyed, and of course all of Kate's toys for the little ones to play with. Aiden kept up with the big kids the best he could. It made for a cranky baby who was late to bed. Travis hung back in Galveston to help Rachel put in a new A/C window unit, while we went home to shower off the sunscreen and then SLEEP.

Sunday we did lots of shopping (I'm still feeling sick from all this spending):

• Home Depot - flowers, gazebo and a couple deck chairs (although we do not have a deck)
  
• Hobby Lobby - last of the party craft materials and party favors
  
• Walmart - Slip'n'Slide
  
• Sweet Factory - $50 worth of candy equating to 3 lbs
  
• Kroger - a week's worth of groceries

When we got home, Aiden showed off his walking skills. He seemed to get more and more courageous as the day went on, stringing more and more steps together. This video was taken just before bedtime. I was hoping he'd be walking by his birthday so he'd get to more fully enjoy the party. Looks like he's walking, but not quite enough for what I had imagined. He's well on his way though. Look at him go!

Hangin' with Kate

Nadya, Alexey and Kate came over for dinner this weekend. It was nice for the kiddos to get some play time in together. It always cracks me up how babies interact. And HOLY COW look at how well Kate can walk! She's only one week older than Aiden and the kid's ready to run marathons!

Her babbling also seems more complex. Maybe it's because she makes different sounds than Aiden (her family speaks Russian with her) or maybe she actually says more syllables. Either way, it sounds like she's having a conversation with you. If you ask her where mommy or daddy are (in Russian) she can point to the correct person. I've been working on this with Aiden for weeks and he shows no interest in playing my game. =/ We'll figure it out soon enough!

Without further ado...

11 month old Kate from Nicolette Ward on Vimeo. (Click here to see more videos of Kate.)

A Date with Kate

Holding hands:

Kate even got all dressed up!

Tummy time - Kate's winning...

Aiden's Friend Kate

Nadya and Alexey's daughter Kate, who is just five days older than Aiden, came over to visit this past weekend. She is just too cute!! I am planning to visit them this week, since I can drive again now!! Kate was a little fussy for a little while, and Nadya's method of soothing was this hold and bounce move. Kate's face got a little squashed in the process, but she honestly didn't seem to mind.

It was so strange to see another little being that is just like Aiden, but not. I couldn't believe that I was able to tell the difference between the two, just by their weight. And they are probably only about a pound apart from each other.

Kate looks JUST LIKE her mom. It's amazing. Nadya and I agree that we deserve to have children who look just like us. I mean, we are the ones who had to grow the darn kids for nine months. Then we had to go through the process of delivering them into the world. We deserve it, right? =D

Congratulations Nadya & Alexey!

Introducing Kate:

Born June 24, 2009

7 lbs, 10 oz

19 inches

Daddy with his newest pride and joy (mommy isn't quite ready for a photo shoot)

[Sorry the photos are so dark. I didn't want to wake "anyone" up with the flash. I hope to get some better ones soon. If anything maybe I can steal a few shots from other photographers.]

Nadya & Alexey's Baby Shower

OI, it was another busy weekend! This one started off with Nadya and Alexey's baby shower (she's due just five days after me). Rachel has spent the past month or so, preparing for this party and I think it was a success!

Rachel and Max

Nadya and Alexey (the parents-to-be)

I think there were almost 20 people there and there was no shortage of food! Sandwiches, bread and spinach dip, hummus and pita, chips, veggie tray, brownies, candy, cupcakes galore. Carbs and sugar - my favorite. I was amazed at how big I look in these photos. (I have a doctor appointment this morning, so I'll have the official stats later.) My pregnancy brain completely forgot that I was supposed to make a pasta salad and dessert for this party. I recalled this information on the drive to Rachel's house - about 24 hours too late. Oh and I forgot to bring chairs. We're lucky I remembered sandwich tray and cooler.

When I told Travis I couldn't believe I forgot about the food, he said, "I can." No softening the blow there. The next words out of his mouth were, "What's my name?" I got that one right though.

After everyone had arrived and had a chance to chat and eat for a bit, Rachel broke out the games. The first game was the Baby Food Taste Test. She passed around six jars of food and everyone had to figure out what "flavor" they were. I am dead serious when I say she picked out the worst flavors possible. I think that pureed meat is the most disgusting mush out there. And what did she pick? Stuff like Ham, pineapple and rice. And Lasagna and meat sauce. Even the macaroni and cheese was a little iffy.

The Russians seemed a little concerned that we feed this stuff to our babies. Kostya's face says it all...

That game was ridiculous, but the Dirty Diaper game was even better. Nadya was so disturbed by the contents of the diapers that she had to pass on that one. Ha! She has some meconium surprises awaiting in her near future...

These dirty diapers consisted of nothing more than a melted candy bar. While I do have to agree that some of them looked eerily like some adult doodies, I mostly wanted to eat the contents. What smells more delicious than a melted Almond Joy? Hm? Tell me that?!

Considering that the only sweet desserts my husband likes are Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and ice cream, he won the diaper game. Starbuck's gift cards are AWESOME.

Rachel breaks in for a minute to take some photos.

During the gift opening, Rachel had one more fun "game" that involved setting a timer and having the guests-of-honor open their gifts. Who ever gave them the gift they were opening when the timer went off got another prize. Easy and FUN game. I won a Dove chocolate candy bar in that game. Just what I need.

Nadya and Alexey got a bunch of gifts, including a diaper cake from Rachel.

At the last minute, I remembered that I brought our video camera. Hopefully the video I took is done converting by the time you try to view it.

Long post... hope it's not too much for one sitting

Travis and I had a fairly random weekend. I used to always plan my days off down to the last second because I didn't want to lose one minute of entertainment. This weekend was different. At the last minute, we invited Chris, Alexa and Blair over for dinner on Friday. They haven't been to our house since Blair could walk, so that was interesting. Travis and I got a taste of what things might be too dangerous when we have our own little one roaming our house. I did attempt to pull things off the coffee table that were not baby-friendly, in hopes that Chris and Alexa wouldn't have to spend the entire evening chasing Blair around. Although I do have to give them props because when they said 'No', Blair was a very good listener.

There were a few time were you could tell that he was testing his boundries. For example, see the lantern lights behind Chris in this photo?

Blair loved them. And who wouldn't? Alexa told him no (not a good idea for a one year old to be playing with electricity) and he stopped! He made a pouty face and walked away. But just a few minutes later he walked back to them. Before he touched them, he looked at his mom to see what she was going to do, and then he touched them again! LOL! He is so funny. After a couple tries, each time being torn down by mom, he finally gave up on the lanterns.

We got in several hours of fun before it was time for Blair to head to bed. Alexa brought over a few items that she had been borrowing, along with a few more baby things that I passed on to Nadya (her and her husband Alexey are expecting a baby girl just five days after our little man). They also left behind a gigantic box. It was originally for Blair to play with, but when they left I sprayed it with catnip and it became the cats' box. They had a good time before it was time for their 37th nap of the day.

Saturday turned out to be a fairly gloomy day. Travis spent all day with the guys celebrating JR's Bachelor Party Day. The had a tee time of 11:30AM and spent the whole afternoon on the golf course. Then they headed to Hooters for dinner. They all planned to head to a bar after dinner, but Travis ended up leaving the party early. He had some weird, scary blackout moment. He said he only had a few drinks throughout the whole day, so it can't be explained away by too much alcohol. Travis said he started to get hot and his heart was racing. He excused himself from the table and then woke up almost half an hour later laying down in his truck.

This really freaks me out. I feel like we are so close to having the little family that we want that every little thing that goes wrong scares the living daylights out of me. He called to say he was coming home early and asked if I could have some chicken soup ready for him. As excited as I was to have him home with me, I didn't like the circumstances. JR said that he just disappeared and they didn't know where he went to after he excused himself from the table. That means he never passed out while standing upright.

We still have no idea what happened to him. He felt fine when he woke up Sunday morning and has not had an incident since. I hope it was a one time thing. It does seem like every time he plays golf, he comes home feeling like crap. I always thought it was a combination of too much sun and too much alcohol, resulting in dehydration. I guess that could still be the case, despite not drinking as much as he used to. Eek!

Sunday was another random day for us. We got up and Travis made me french toast and bacon for breakfast (that pre-cooked microwavable bacon is my new favorite). We decided to take Callaway for a walk, but were disappointed to find it was pretty chilly, with a significant breeze. We made it about half way down the block when some guy comes out of his garage asking what kid of a dog we have. Turns out, he has a Catahoula Leopard dog that looks a lot like Callaway. He and his wife were just about to head out on a walk themselves with their 9-month old son, so they joined us. They seemed like very nice people, so we exchanged phone numbers. They said they like to grill out a lot - maybe we'll get an invitation soon. =)

After the walk, we took it easy for an hour and ate lunch. Then we headed to Galveston to help Nadya and Alexey move. Now that they are expecting a little one of their own, they decided it was time to get a bigger apartment. It has worked out great being pregnant at the same time as Nadya. I know so many people who have had babies within the past couple of years and we have been offered so much stuff. We are ending up with two of some item, so I have been offering the "extras" to Nadya and Alexey. Yesterday, we were able to set them up with a free dresser and crib from a friend of Travis'. Having a baby makes it very easy to fill up any extra space you may have had in your home. I think they will easily fill out that new apartment.

Since they didn't have much to move, we spent only a few hours with Nadya and Alexey. Then we made a surprise visit to Ariel and Robert. We have been trying to meet up with them for weeks, but our plans kept falling through. This time we just dropped by and didn't give them a choice. We lazed around with them all afternoon watching movies and catching up on our lives. We had Pizza Hut take-out for dinner and watched The Legend of Bagger Vance. It was a little slow for me - not sure I would recommend it to anyone.

All in all, we had a good weekend. Although I'm not ready for the week to start yet. Oops. Too late...