"washable" crayons? blah!

ok, so our household is fairly new to the coloring scene again. we got max an easel for christmas with some large regular crayons. since then he has learned that eating crayons is great fun. so my inlaws bought him some clickable crayons that aren't as easily eaten, they work fairly well. but over the weekend, he received a few sets of "washable" crayons from the easter bunny.

one set i, er, the easter bunny got him were those Tadoodles from crayola. totally cute right? well, not so much. max got his easter basket and we took those out he went straight to his drawing paper and i turned around to get everything ready to leave the house for the day. NO MORE THAN 30 SECONDS LATER... he comes over to me whining about something and hands the tadoodle to me with the tip completely missing and his mouth completely stained blue along with blue stain on his shirt and sweater vest. damn it, we hadn't even left the house yet and my kid had blue crap all over his easter clothes.

then this morning i decide to give these crayons a more supervised trial. we sit on the floor with a new coloring book and these stupid tadoodles... i find they are so soft that they get on everything they come in contact with, even things that aren't being "colored" things like his shirt just because he's holding one close to himself. then i notice that while he's coloring, his hand will briefly leave the page and just graze the rug, yep the rug got it too! what a joke these things are! i think they are washable because when you use them you HAVE to be able to clean them up since they make a mess everywhere they go! we didn't have this problem with regular crayons. and frankly if they got somewhere that they shouldn't have, (read: the wall or floor or whatever) they come right off with a little magic eraser action.... plus if they go into his mouth, he just gets little bits of wax in there, and not a completely blue dyed mouth! i can't think that the dye could be better than just plain ole wax right?

anyways, if any of you with younger little ones haven't ventured into the world of coloring yet, i totally suggest passing up these tadoodles and getting regular old jumbo crayons. thus bypassing this headache and needless cleaning of your carpets...

all gums

so my little guy smiled at me today and i believe it was his first real smile not just gas :)
he took a huge poo while he was swinging then i went to check on him and he's goo'ing and talking up a storm then he just busts out this huge smile! so adorable, all gums, totally MY little guy.

good friends

so today i got out of the house with my little guy. he went with me to my monthly knitting get together. it was a very enjoyable time and i wanted to briefly blog about it before i forgot about some details that really just made me happy to be a part of this group of lovely ladies.

a few observations:
1 - these ladies are great! all of them! while sitting there, i realized how truly awesome they are. some of us have kids, some of us don't. those that don't are just as interested and excited about the little ones as the ones that are mamas. and totally ok with listening to the mamas and our constant banter about babies, and being a mom. the mamas, wow, i realized what a great group we've got going here. i think we all swapped something with one another today. i had a maternity coat to give back to amy, she had a few things to return to carrie and amanda (we missed you dear), annie had supposed germs for us to catch and take to our lovely homes (kidding) and a few others had loaned or promised other baby items to each other as well. it all was a reallly interesting how much we all had borrowed from each other. what an awesome system we've got going here.

2 - in addition to loaning and swapping of these items, i was the recipient of a few lovely gifts! thank you so much amy and melissa! everything is much appreciated! photos of amy's knitted gifts to follow in an upcoming post.

3 - also we all swapped lots of stories and understanding, and ideas for our kids and babies and family and recipes too. and we all loaned out our ears for lots of listening to each others stories.

4 -ooh and the food, lots of wonderful food! i need that marshmallow recipe michelle, what a fun and different desert option!

5 - and just because i think i mentioned everyone else above that has a blog, i didn't want to leave you out jen, i'll be emailing you this week to set up a playdate. thanks for holding andy for a bit. and thanks blogless erin for doing the same, ooh and thanks to melissa for making andy fall asleep too.

i had a very refreshing time and am glad that you all are part of my life :) i'm looking forward to the april get together!

a few things

i took the boys on our first outing alone yesterday. i don't know why i was worried about them acting up... because apparently it was ME that i needed to be more concerned with. we went to the mall, had a quick dinner, then went to the play area. max got his yaya's out by running around for about 30 minutes. then we went and did a little shopping. one stop a card shop... i'm trying to push this beast of a double stroller around and let me tell you, i now really feel for the handicapped people of our community. a single stroller is one thing... but a double, holy cripes... anyways, i'm standing there with cards in hand and i pick out another and take a reasonable step back away from the card stands and bam! i step right into the side of a shelf holding tons of those little figurines that are tan and have the blank faces, there are mothers and father holding babies, and expecting mother ones, i have a few, i think everyone does... but back to the story, so i bump into this shelf and about three or so of them go tumbling to the floor! i completely shatter one. i'm completely embarrassed.... i start to pick them up and pick up the broken pieces, the manager comes over to make sure that we're ok, we are. i offer to pay for it, she declines and then points out that she broke something earlier in the day. of course though, all the other shoppers who happened to be men, just looked at me like i was nuts... nice.... anyways, thank god the manager was so nice and understanding... after that, i paid for my cards and we went home... i do have to say though, that i feel much better now that i've gone out with them by myself. i know we can do it again and i plan to very very soon!

ok, so i mentioned a few posts back that i was going to start reading again :) i have. i lost interest in Freakonomics... it just wasn't what i was looking for at the moment... but, my copy of Happiest Baby on the Block came to the house on saturday and i've been complete engrossed. i have realized that reading a hardback book isn't very easy with a baby nursing.... so i have resorted to reading it a bit just before i go to bed. dr. karp is amazing! granted i don't think we have a very sensitive baby in his terms but let me tell you i think his methods are awesome! and so is his theory on "colic" and the "fourth trimester". regardless, his methods sure do help with prolonging sleep periods at night! whoa! two nights straight, andrew has slept for 6+ hour stretches! i'm in awe! and i'm only 1/2 through his book, the swaddling suggestions alone have helped this much. i was swaddling before but i don't think i was doing it tight enough. max always got out of them and andy was a bit too...

anyways, i really suggest reading this book. all new moms or mom's to be, pick this one up. there are cheap copies on amazon, i got my copy for $3.59 or something insane like that! it's worth it!

ok, so i know there was a third thing that i was planning to write about this morning but i can't remember what the heck it was... mommy brain strikes again...

annoucing a new space

since i know a lot of you are mom's from the pittsburgh area, i thought i would share this cool new site with you.

one of chris's co-workers contacted me a few weeks ago about a new site called Pittsburgh Mom that she was/is in the process of creating. she needed some help for some contacts on the west side of town, so she asked me to help her out and asked me to take part in their ongoing group blog too. basically it's a "one-stop shop for information and community for Pittsburgh parents". the site offers listings for all things kids, play places/area, parks, classes, storytimes, kid friendly restaurants, and so-on. plus there are community forums, a blog and lots of other fun information too. i hope to see you on pittsburghmom.com!

major connection made today

max made a major connection :) he peed in the potty for the first time today and he did it TWICE! we did a happy pee in the potty dance for him both times and made him feel really good about it :) he was happy and very proud. the plan at the moment is to just put him on the potty each time we get him up from napping or sleeping or if it's time to change his diaper or what not since he's not really communicating that he has to go just yet. i know that will happen soon though!

in other news, andrew is HUGE! i swear that he has doubled in size and is about to round out his first month! i can't believe that he'll be a month old in a few days! it's just amazing!

as for chris and i, we're surviving, adjusting to being parents of two.... it's rough. basically, we do for them, then we sleep. then we do for them... and sleep... same cycle... over and over... i know it will become less strict soon but in the meantime we just want some us time. so since we know that it will come soon enough we decided to book a little weekend getaway this fall to celebrate our 5 years of marriage! we've decided to go to deep creek md and stay here for three nights! the grandparents have already said go for it! so today we counted our change that we have been saving for a few years and low and behold we have enough money in change alone to pay for the three night stay! whoo hoo!

we can't wait and are looking forward to the time along :) yay!