For my mom!

My poor mom - gone all week at an art class, missing her grandkids, and I go dark on the blog. Here's what you missed, mom, aside from the river of puke! As you can tell, not a whole lot...

I was intrigued by this little gem when I saw it at Whole Foods, so I picked it up and knew right away it was going to be good by how soft it was in the package.

Turns out it is the BEST BREAD I HAVE EVER EATEN IN MY ENTIRE LIFE. Soft and sweet and eggy in the way good bread is. I am hooked. And since 1) I'm swearing off regular trips to WF for the time being (it kills my budget and I am working extra hard this week at being good), and 2) when you do the math on the fat grams it is downright shocking that someone figured out how to make a loaf of bread that is this bad for you... it was unfortunate that I ever found it in the first place. While the kids had the flu, this was pretty much all I ate along with a few ginger ales and saltines. I have a hard time eating when someone in the house has the stomach flu. It's a thing.

But I will see you in my dreams, Authentic French Brioche.

I took this picture of Ellie one morning after she had woken up, but it doesn't do her bed head justice. She looked like one of those pups whose hair makes them look like a lion and their heads are half of their body. The picture just ends up looking like another shot of her awesome head of hair. No, I don't do anything other than brush it right out of the bath tub at night and she sleeps on it wet. When she wakes up, voila...

While the kids mainly sat on the couch or slept in their beds for most of last week, Maddie and I had some great one on one time! I stood her up against the back sliding door and she loved looking out at the back yard. She is getting really good at cruising along furniture, and now she can cruise along the window which I find more impressive since nothing is really holding her UP anymore, just aiding her balance. She still seems wobbly though and I'm not holding my breath for steps before her first birthday (which is a mere 17 days away!).

I am telling you this babe is so narrow and slight, pants never fit! Even when I roll the waist band. Pretty funny because there's an inch or two of room in all the pants Ellie was wearing at this age, and I can't even use them with Maddie!

I let Maddie roam around the house a lot more than I ever let the other two kids at her age. For one, she is so entertained by Robbie and Ellie and anything they're doing/playing with that she rarely needs me for stimulation. She is cautious, and I don't have to worry about her trying to scale the stairs yet (although I keep a close eye when she nears them, because one of these days she'll try and realize that she's been able to do it all along!). Whenever I can't see or hear her, I look one of three places: wherever the older 2 are, the bathroom where she likes to peer down into the toilet and ponder life, and by the baskets under the table in the family room. She loves to pick up and take out whatever is in the baskets and then put it back. She seriously does this for up to a half hour. Who knew the third kid would be this easy?

A shot of my sick girl from earlier in the week... still beautiful!

And feeling better...

Sisters playing toys...

Naked baby on the loose (again)...

THIS is what I found after I spent 5 minutes feeding Maddie her lunch one day. These two cannot be left unattended for any amount of time. Stinkers.

In case you can't tell, they had swiped the large rolls of ribbon from downstairs and decorated Robbie's room with yards and yards of it. It was strung up everywhere. Robbie was pretty proud of himself even though I was less than thrilled. I had immediate flashes to the future when he will one day TP someone's yard. He'll be good at it. (That's my boy! ha.)

On Saturday night after the kids went to bed I ran to Buy Buy Baby for car seats. Long story, but after researching 5 point harness car seats vs. the booster seats I had the kids in, I was horrified. They are not nearly as safe for kids Robbie and Ellie's age as I thought they were. I wasn't going to mention it on here, because no judgement if you use those booster seats for your kids. We just decided that the kids would be much safer in an accident (God forbid) in different car seats and it seemed like the right choice for us. My dilemma was that they are both too large for the Britax car seats we had for them when they turned one, but I found a newer model by Britax that holds kids in a harness up to 85 lbs. This car seat can also be converted to a booster seat by removing the harness and using the car's seat belt like any other booster seat for up to 120 lbs. Anyways, I wish we had these 2 years ago, but I think they weren't even on the market then so now I have a bunch of Britax Boulevard/Marathon car seats and Graco booster seats that we need to sell! (*If you want to buy one/any of them from me, send me an offer. They're in great condition and gently used, and have never been recalled. I'll be putting them up on Craig's List soon!)

Soooo... that left us with 2 very large boxes on Sunday for the kids to play with. I taped up the open side to hold the flaps open and gave them crayons and they colored the outside and played on the inside for most of the afternoon. Boxes are a mom's best friend.

In between playing with / in their boxes, I let them play in the back yard while I worked in the kitchen. Cheryl stopped by to drop something off for me, and Robbie ran up to me while we were talking inside the house and said "Mommy, I peed in the back yard." and then ran back outside.

Good to know. I felt conflicted about that report, but whatareyougonnado? I let it be. I think this is just what having a little boy is like, right? They just pee in the back yard? I was about to ask you for your thoughts, but I decided against it. Feel free to keep your thoughts to yourself on this one! ha.

Sunday afternoon while the kids were occupied by their boxes (and various activities in the back yard), I painted a tree for my friend Cheryl. I had done one of these before for her, and she used it to make a family tree by putting the names of her family members on it. It was a cool idea. Well sadly, her father was just diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and is failing quickly. She wanted to have another family tree (I think the first was given away to a nephew?) put together, I think to display at his funeral whenever that will be. And she made a quick decision to leave for home in Minnesota sooner than she had planned, so I wanted to send it with her. The kids played quietly and then hovered over me towards the end as I finished painting, and I think it turned out alright. I am so rusty with my painting! And this is just a simple organic form and then I use acrylic paint and water to do a thin wash of color, almost pushing the paint with a scrubbing motion from the inside of the tree to the outer edges to get the color to concentrate along the outline. After I took this picture I decided to roughly edge the tree with a brown sharpie to make it pop and give it a little more definition.

I have a bunch of canvases and a collection of pretty acrylic paints for the kids and I to enjoy this week. One day I'd love to do a collection of their silhouettes.

We ended the weekend with early bedtimes for the kids Sunday night, thanks to daylight savings and the fact that R and E skipped their naps. They went down so easily! After dinner Rob and I settled in on the couch for a date with our DVR and our favorite treats - skinny cow ice cream sandwich for him, and my all time favorite ice cream in the world, which I just found yesterday for the first time in a year or so!!

I'm not even embarrassed to admit that I bought 4 of these while I could find them. It says limited edition on the lid and I'm not taking any chances. I haven't had a weakness for ice cream since I was pregnant, but this stuff is irresistible. It's not overly sweet, and tastes like a frozen chai. I could just eat it all day long.

Happy Monday!

{*Maddie update: I cut out yogurt and cheese from her table food diet and she has not thrown up since that last time on Wednesday evening. I think dairy (but not her formula) might be the reason she was randomly throwing up, and that her little system is still sensitive to it.}