Ian was offered some cake at his first and second birthday parties. Both times I had my camera ready for the classic messy cake pictures. Both times nothing entered his mouth and a dab of frosting being placed on his lips brought him to tears, which definitely wasn't the desired response. Since I assumed all cakes had eggs, I hadn't attempted to get him to eat any cake since then. Paul's mom recently told me about wacky cake. It's very easy to make. I doubled the recipe and made it right in the cake pan (fewer dishes to clean!). I can honestly say that Ian loves chocolate cake! I am quite certain he won't be refusing to eat his birthday cake this year! I made the cake from scratch today for the Halloween party we attended, but I bought the frosting at the grocery store yesterday. I read the labels and discovered that some cans had milk and some did not. October 20, 2012 feels a bit historic to me since it was the first time Ian ate some cake. I doubt I'll get a really messy cake photo since he can't stand to have food on his face or hands, but I'm certain there will be some chocolate on his face during his third birthday party! Another new food for Ian this week has been the cereal bar. He's been eating two of these for lunch without any fussing. It's
very nice to have a food he'll happily eat, especially one that's so transportable. He's also been enjoying fruit snacks, which aren't as healthy as a cereal bar, but they demonstrate how
very far he's come with his chewing skills over the past 6 months.
Today was a jam packed day. I tried to do as much as I could without assistance in the morning so Paul could get some work done. As soon as we got up in the morning, I was in "get ready for pictures" gear even though they weren't scheduled to start until 3pm. I figured it would take me all morning to get the kids bathed, pick out what outfits we were all going to wear, give Paul a haircut, and make two dishes (a corn casserole and chocolate cake) for the Halloween pot luck we were going to attend at 4pm. I had given Ian a haircut on Wednesday night while Nadia was at Cubbies. I had planned to cut Paul's hair at that time as well, but Oliver didn't sleep long enough for me to give two haircuts that night. I also managed to squeeze in doing one load of dishes (including put them away) and one load of laundry (which I did manage to fold but will have to finish putting them away tomorrow). My mission was accomplished, and we actually showed up at the Picture Me studio a little early. First we did the family photo, and we got two pretty good ones of all five of us. I wasn't totally "wowed" by them like I was by our family photo at that studio last October, but I was satisfied. The same went for the photo of the three kids. It was fine but not amazing.
Then we tried to get photos of just Oliver. That was pretty much a bust. I've struggled to get pictures of him the last few days as well. If he's been awake, he's wanted to be held All The Time, which means almost every time I've tried to put him down to take his picture, he's started crying. The same held true at the studio today. It didn't help that it was time for him to sleep, and he didn't fall asleep until I was in the final stages of picking which prints to purchase. If I am so inspired, I might take Oliver to Sears to try again just to get some photos of him, but probably I'll wait until December when we're in Maryland and ask my sister to do a newborn shoot for him, although he'll be 4 months old at that point.
Nadia and Ian's newborn shoots were done at Sears, and both of those went really well. I still adore the pictures of Nadia and Ian taken at Ian's first newborn shoot. I still say today was a success because #1 we got a good family picture (two of them actually) and #2 we ended up getting some cute pics of Nadia and Ian in their costumes. The party we were going to was a costume party, and so we had brought their costumes into the studio to change them into them after the photo shoot. Since Oliver wasn't cooperating, I went to "plan B" and had Jen take some pictures of Nadia and Ian in their costumes. She got some good ones! Would you believe it was our first time entering a photo studio in 2012? I've gone several times a year every year since 2008. If my sister can't do shoot in December, I will take the kids back to Sears or Picture Me so that I can hopefully get some of Oliver plus some for Ian's 3 year and Nadia's 4.5 year ones (in Christmas clothes).
I brought my camera to the party. If I had more hands I would have taken some cute pics of the kids in their costumes playing with other kids wearing cute costumes. Many adults were also in costume. My favorite adult costume was a woman who was dressed as a red Crayola crayon. I haven't been in a costume in over 20 years unless you count school "spirit" week. Spirit week usually was more along the lines of "crazy hair" day and such like that so it wasn't really a costume per se. I do remember for one spirit day we were to come as a story book character so I came as a princess and wore a gown I wore in high school. I had forgotten when I made that choice that I had recess duty that day. I must have looked ridiculous standing outside doing recess duty wearing a floor length gown made of blue lace. That's as close as I have come to wearing a costume over the past more than 20 years.
We had to leave the party early because I had purchased tickets to a concert before we got the party invitation. We dashed home, and Cheri was waiting in our driveway. She and I left (with Oliver) for the 7pm concert. The concert was fine. There were four different artists/groups on the stage over the course of the evening. The last one (Jason Castro) was by far my favorite (and not because he'd been on American Idol because I've never watched that show). Unfortunately he was the last one in the line-up, and around 8:30pm I realized how exhausted I was. We stayed until 9:15. I imagine the concert probably went until at least 10pm, but I valued my sleep more than attending the entire concert, just like I'll value my sleep more than the Steeler football game tomorrow evening. Friday night was a really rough one for me as Oliver was only sleeping one hour at a time. He'd be up for an hour and then sleep one hour. That is hard for me when I'm never sleeping more than one hour at a time. I long for the days when I'll get at least one four hour stretch every night. I know I'll have fewer headaches once that becomes the norm. I probably shouldn't have purchased tickets to a concert when Oliver was only 10 weeks old, but Cheri and I usually only go to 1-2 concerts a year, and this one was taking place 5 minutes from our house. We don't have anything on our agenda for next weekend, which is a good thing in light of Paul's need to kick it into high gear with his dissertation. I think I'll tackle carving two pumpkins with the kids for next Saturday. We got 5 pumpkins last weekend, but I'm only planning on carving 2 of them.
Ian was offered some cake at his first and second birthday parties. Both times I had my camera ready for the classic messy cake pictures. Both times nothing entered his mouth and a dab of frosting being placed on his lips brought him to tears, which definitely wasn't the desired response. Since I assumed all cakes had eggs, I hadn't attempted to get him to eat any cake since then. Paul's mom recently told me about wacky cake. It's very easy to make. I doubled the recipe and made it right in the cake pan (fewer dishes to clean!). I can honestly say that Ian loves chocolate cake! I am quite certain he won't be refusing to eat his birthday cake this year! I made the cake from scratch today for the Halloween party we attended, but I bought the frosting at the grocery store yesterday. I read the labels and discovered that some cans had milk and some did not. October 20, 2012 feels a bit historic to me since it was the first time Ian ate some cake. I doubt I'll get a really messy cake photo since he can't stand to have food on his face or hands, but I'm certain there will be some chocolate on his face during his third birthday party! Another new food for Ian this week has been the cereal bar. He's been eating two of these for lunch without any fussing. It's very nice to have a food he'll happily eat, especially one that's so transportable. He's also been enjoying fruit snacks, which aren't as healthy as a cereal bar, but they demonstrate how very far he's come with his chewing skills over the past 6 months.
Today was a jam packed day. I tried to do as much as I could without assistance in the morning so Paul could get some work done. As soon as we got up in the morning, I was in "get ready for pictures" gear even though they weren't scheduled to start until 3pm. I figured it would take me all morning to get the kids bathed, pick out what outfits we were all going to wear, give Paul a haircut, and make two dishes (a corn casserole and chocolate cake) for the Halloween pot luck we were going to attend at 4pm. I had given Ian a haircut on Wednesday night while Nadia was at Cubbies. I had planned to cut Paul's hair at that time as well, but Oliver didn't sleep long enough for me to give two haircuts that night. I also managed to squeeze in doing one load of dishes (including put them away) and one load of laundry (which I did manage to fold but will have to finish putting them away tomorrow). My mission was accomplished, and we actually showed up at the Picture Me studio a little early. First we did the family photo, and we got two pretty good ones of all five of us. I wasn't totally "wowed" by them like I was by our family photo at that studio last October, but I was satisfied. The same went for the photo of the three kids. It was fine but not amazing. 
Then we tried to get photos of just Oliver. That was pretty much a bust. I've struggled to get pictures of him the last few days as well. If he's been awake, he's wanted to be held All The Time, which means almost every time I've tried to put him down to take his picture, he's started crying. The same held true at the studio today. It didn't help that it was time for him to sleep, and he didn't fall asleep until I was in the final stages of picking which prints to purchase. If I am so inspired, I might take Oliver to Sears to try again just to get some photos of him, but probably I'll wait until December when we're in Maryland and ask my sister to do a newborn shoot for him, although he'll be 4 months old at that point. 
Nadia and Ian's newborn shoots were done at Sears, and both of those went really well. I still adore the pictures of Nadia and Ian taken at Ian's first newborn shoot. I still say today was a success because #1 we got a good family picture (two of them actually) and #2 we ended up getting some cute pics of Nadia and Ian in their costumes. The party we were going to was a costume party, and so we had brought their costumes into the studio to change them into them after the photo shoot. Since Oliver wasn't cooperating, I went to "plan B" and had Jen take some pictures of Nadia and Ian in their costumes. She got some good ones! Would you believe it was our first time entering a photo studio in 2012? I've gone several times a year every year since 2008. If my sister can't do shoot in December, I will take the kids back to Sears or Picture Me so that I can hopefully get some of Oliver plus some for Ian's 3 year and Nadia's 4.5 year ones (in Christmas clothes).
I brought my camera to the party. If I had more hands I would have taken some cute pics of the kids in their costumes playing with other kids wearing cute costumes. Many adults were also in costume. My favorite adult costume was a woman who was dressed as a red Crayola crayon. I haven't been in a costume in over 20 years unless you count school "spirit" week. Spirit week usually was more along the lines of "crazy hair" day and such like that so it wasn't really a costume per se. I do remember for one spirit day we were to come as a story book character so I came as a princess and wore a gown I wore in high school. I had forgotten when I made that choice that I had recess duty that day. I must have looked ridiculous standing outside doing recess duty wearing a floor length gown made of blue lace. That's as close as I have come to wearing a costume over the past more than 20 years. 
We had to leave the party early because I had purchased tickets to a concert before we got the party invitation. We dashed home, and Cheri was waiting in our driveway. She and I left (with Oliver) for the 7pm concert. The concert was fine. There were four different artists/groups on the stage over the course of the evening. The last one (Jason Castro) was by far my favorite (and not because he'd been on American Idol because I've never watched that show). Unfortunately he was the last one in the line-up, and around 8:30pm I realized how exhausted I was. We stayed until 9:15. I imagine the concert probably went until at least 10pm, but I valued my sleep more than attending the entire concert, just like I'll value my sleep more than the Steeler football game tomorrow evening. Friday night was a really rough one for me as Oliver was only sleeping one hour at a time. He'd be up for an hour and then sleep one hour. That is hard for me when I'm never sleeping more than one hour at a time. I long for the days when I'll get at least one four hour stretch every night. I know I'll have fewer headaches once that becomes the norm. I probably shouldn't have purchased tickets to a concert when Oliver was only 10 weeks old, but Cheri and I usually only go to 1-2 concerts a year, and this one was taking place 5 minutes from our house. We don't have anything on our agenda for next weekend, which is a good thing in light of Paul's need to kick it into high gear with his dissertation. I think I'll tackle carving two pumpkins with the kids for next Saturday. We got 5 pumpkins last weekend, but I'm only planning on carving 2 of them.
1 comment:
Love the photos! You all look so good in your browns--especially Oliver in his little vest. :)
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