More Pets for the Crazy House

Keep in mind we have 3 cats and 2 dogs. We also had a fish (r.i.p. Superman) that BoBo the cat ate last month.

Mary's birthday is next week and I had a thought of getting her a bunny. She's wanted a bunny for as long as I've known her and there's a rescue farm nearby that has quite a few. Anywho, the more I thought about it, the more I thought it was a bad idea. As much as Mary's wanted a bunny, we don't need another pet. Then Friday night she comes home with 2 hamsters. Oy. They are quite cute but I don't think the lil' guys will last long in our crazy animal house. Of course, she says it's my fault since I didn't want to go out to dinner so instead she brought Cam to the pet store. Ummm, you were bringing him to get food, litter, etc. for the 5 pets that we have. I didn't feel good so didn't feel like going out for Chinese food. Not a reason to get TWO HAMSTERS. I seriously thought she was joking when she came home with a box and said, "surprise!". Oh lordie, my wife is CRAZY!

Needless to say, the 2 new additions to our menagerie...

Lucy Spiderman and Ethel Batman



It was a pretty boring and seriously cold weekend. Saturday we stayed in most of the day except for going out for pizza. This ended up being expensive since we had to park in Harvard Square and then deal with gourmet pizza prices. We were also a bit disappointed as we used to always get this pizza when Mary lived in J.P. (lesboville of Boston). Anywho, it was so yummy but the new location seems to have changed the recipe and it's not so yummy anymore.

Sunday we went to church. It was well annoying. We felt bad that we hadn't been in a month (since XMas eve). However, Cam still wouldn't go to Sunday school so we spent most of the time telling him to be quiet and to sit still. I also was (somewhat) joking that I didn't want to go for the rest of the winter since it was annoying to find parking, jump over snowbanks and then deal with our mass of winter products (coats, gloves, hats, etc). O.G. also thought it would be funny to throw all 3 pacifiers I had brought on the floor. Needless to say, I didn't feel uplifted by the entire experience.

I did enjoy the rest of the day as I made some bread and Mary took Cam to see Bolt. And amazingly O.G. agreed to nap with me. Naps are good :-)

In other news, O.G. is officially in his new car seat. He definitely likes it better. The carrier/bucket seat was convenient. He had his first experience of riding in the grocery cart today too which was pretty amusing. Here it is when we were testing it out in the house. Cam has been obsessed with the box it came in and plays with it more than any of his actual toys. He cracked me up because when it arrived, he helped me open the box. I told him it was O.G.'s new bigger seat and he said, "and this trash can be my new seat". LOL.




Oh well, I'm off to attend to fussy fusserton who'd rather play with computer cords than his toys.

1/2 Party

So we had a cute lil' 1/2 Bday party with homemade calzones and store bought cupcakes :-)

After I picked Cam up from pre-school, I brought him to the mall to pick out a gift for O.G. I've learned that a way of deterring jealousy is to have him pick out things for the baby and then "teach" O.G. how to use it. Cam was so funny because he kept trying to along with the toy pick out clothes and blankets for O.G. I'd say, "we're just getting this one thing, we don't want him to be spoiled." And Cam would say, "but it's just so cute Mommy". LOL. He is my son.

Then I got each of them a balloon. I learned that O.G. shares Cam's love of balloons. And once we were home we decorated party hats. It was cute, cheap, & not stressful - much different than his 1st bday will be.

loving his balloon...

not so sure about this...

now what are they doing?...

loves a good cupcake...

Happy 1/2 Year Mr. Owen George!

Amazing things - An African American is President. And Mary woke up with O.G. for 2 nights in a row. I forgot how amazing an entire night's sleep is. She even slept on the blow up mattress in his room that we've set up for operation crib. And she did 1/2 of last night. Amazing stuff.

In other events, O.G. is 6 months today. I just can't believe how time is flying by. He tried some cheerios yesterday and seemed to like them. In general he's not super into food except some rice cereal and sweet potatoes. I think I may start the baby LED weaning as it seems easier and a better way to get him to eat food. I hear it's messy but like this pureed crap isn't.

In developmental stuff, he can mostly sit up but weebles wobble and they DO fall down. The poor guy is constantly hitting his head. He can get into the crawling position but doesn't crawl. He does do a mean inch worm and some how manages to get to dog toys. Not cool since he puts EVERYTHING in his mouth. So far, still only the 2bottom teeth but he's teething like crazy so I'm hoping some more break through soon. He also gets seriously pissed when you take something away from him - i.e. a dog toy. And he still hates his car seat but we recently got a new one which I think he'll like much better than the carrier one since he can sit up in it.

So what does O.G. think about being a 1/2 year? (I can't figure out how to rotate these camera videos)

Teething and Tubing

O.G. has been in full fledged teething so there has been no rest for the weary. He's been up screaming in the night. Apparently, True Hollywood Story and Conan O'Brien help. I bring him downstairs and t.v. seems to calm him until he falls asleep. The teething tablets help but don't cure all. So it's lots and lots of drooling, chewing on everything in site and sometimes screaming bloody murder.

In other news, yesterday we went snow tubing which was super fun. My friend M was nice enough to watch O.G. so we dropped him off on our way. I thought Cam would be psyched to do something that you have to be 4 to do but per usual he was whiney. We got there, did 2 runs, and he was complaining about eating. Cam does prefer eating to pretty much anything. So we went inside to get him a grilled cheese and he was happy normal Cam, at least for a little bit :-) He did enjoy the tubing and I was surprised that he wasn't scared. Even I was and I know Mary was because she screamed bloody murder the entire way down. It was definitely a lot of fun though.




Today we planned to go to church but woke up to snow pouring from the sky. Literally, it was just pouring snow and totally unexpected. The weather report said possible flurries, not 5-6 inches of snow. So we spent the day inside by the fire. I miss the gas fireplace we had in Maine. It was easy to light, you just pressed a button the remote and it didn't smell. The smell of the fire now is disturbing and makes me nauseous.

Anywho, tomorrow Mary isn't working. Her new years resolution is to work regular hours - 9 to 5 and take holidays and weekends off. I wonder how long this will last but I'll enjoy it while it's happening. We have plans to go to the city. Hopefully the weather will cooperate.

Bored and Dirty

I miss being on vacation. I am focusing on our next vacation since we're going to try to go to Family Week in PTown this summer. The process of finding a house/condo to rent is proving more difficult than expected. It will be nice to get Cam around some families like his. There's one lesbian couple at church that have a son around his age. However, he's convinced that one of the moms is actually a dad. Go figure. I haven't been able to convince him otherwise. She's not total butch but I can see him thinking she's a "daddy".

Anywho, I've been very busy today doing nothing and being dirty. LOL. The management company is supposed to send a plumber. All the water is working in the house except our bath/shower. So weird. O.G. and Cam were able to take their bath last night but ever since I turned it off, it won't turn back on. So weird. I didn't have time to shower yesterday so I'm feeling pretty grubby. Plus, as a Pisces I'm convinced I need water to get through the day so I'm feeling unmotivated.

I'm also probably tired since Mr. Owen George was not into sleeping last night. Since we got back from vacation, we're reviving operation crib. He's not coming into our bed. However, this means hours in his room with a little baby that doesn't want to sleep but instead wants to play. I also ended up putting the bumpers on his crib. He kept smashing his head into the sides, putting his pacifier through the slots, and getting limbs caught in them. So despite the potential SIDS risk, I think he's safer with them on.

He's also teething yet again. Once his bottom teeth came in, I thought I'd have a teething break. But no such luck. He seemed fussy from it this morning so I spent most of it walking him around. I started using the Hyland's natural teething tablets over the weekend. Has anyone else in blog land tried these? Mary's cousin's wife recommended them when we were in Florida. I had seen them a few times at Whole Foods but was hesitant until I talked to someone that actually used them. They seem to work but he usually falls alseep right after eating them. They do say that children may fall asleep since they're more comfortable. Still, it scares my neurotic mother self.

Oh well, it's time to motivate since I'll have to leave in a bit to pick up Cam.

I'm Baaaaaack

We arrived home last night just after 7:00 p.m. It was a long day of driving. We had over 10 hours from Richmond, VA. At least this time, we navigated around NYC and it wasn't a high travel time so we didn't hit much traffic.

Mary's off to get a massage (even though I told her I'd just give her one) and get her hair done and Cam is back at school. My sister is here since she had stayed at the house to watch the dogs but of course she's off to the casinos in Connecticut. So it's just me and O.G which is nice.

Anywho, the rest of our vacation was great. After our time in Orlando, we stayed one night with Mary's mom. Mary's family lives about a 1/2 hour from Orlando. That actually worked out good since it was only one night :-) We were also able to meet her dad and some other family member for brunch at "the club" (her dad's country club) during the day.





and later, O.G. was able to meet his great grandfather too

(he was fussy at the end of the visit when we finally thought we should get a pic of him with his grandpas hence the weird location of O.G.)

The next day we headed up the Florida coast to St. Augustine. It's a beautiful Spanish style historic beach town...if that makes any sense. We checked out the sights, had dinner and stayed the night.

we stopped at a beach that you could drive your car on...so not environmentally responsbile but awesome nonetheless



At a fort in St. Augustine...




O.G. loved his first beach experience...especially trying to eat the sand :-)





We then headed up to Savannah, Georgia in hopes there would be no power outages this time. Again, we didn't have much driving so we spent the morning in St. Augustine and took our time heading up to Savannah. We even stopped for boiled peanuts. Yes, boiled peanuts. Mary has been raving about boiled peanuts ever since I've met her but every time we're in the south, we never get any. So we did and well, I thought they were kind of gross. LOL. Mary was in her glory and that's all she ate as her lunch.

Savannah was short and sweet...we walked down beautiful River Street and then had dinner at the Pirate's house. Cam is super into pirates so he loved it. It's also the oldest wooden house in the U.S. so that was cool and the food was yummy.




The next morning I was up and out to wait in line at Paula Deen's restaurant The Lady & Sons. I was the FIRST one in line :-) Needless to say, I had no problem getting a lunch reservation.



fried green tomatoes - SO yummy



Then vacation was over, we got our full bellies into the car and drove the rest of the day to Richmond, stayed the night and headed out the next morning. We drove all day. The time in the car definitely wasn't fun but we did it and both Cam & O.G. did way better than expected.

Animal Kingdom

Today we ventured over to Animal Kingdom. It was fun but it was crazy. The place was just so packed. The big draw is the safari ride. We waited for 1.5 hours. Did I mention it took us an hour just to get into the park? I don't know how Cam made it through it but he did. It was mostly worth it as we saw some amazing animals. Cam was more into riding in the truck thing. You would've thought the kid was on a roller coaster.




Giraffes are my favorite :-)


There's a Bug's Life (I'd say Cam's fave movie) thing, it's a movie called It's Tough Being a Bug. Well, it's 3D and was kind of scary. Cam was petrofied but O.G. thought it was a riot. He kept laughing every time the bugs would yell and throw things at us.


Mary cracked me up in the 3D glasses. She totally reminded me of the bug husband on Miss Spider's Sunny Patch (a kid's cartoon). I'll have to find a pic for comparison.

It was a neat place but I'm so not into crowds or waiting hours in line. There was a line for EVERY THING even a big highlight, seeing Mickey.



Now we are back and O.G. is finally sleeping. The poor guy probably slept for about 5 minutes at Animal Kingdom. He just wanted to see everything. He is so funny.

Celebrating in Celebration.

Last night we went to dinner nearby in Celebration. I love Celebration. Disney created the town and it's similar to a New England style but WARM :-) Anywho, the houses are adorable and it has a great downtown. Mary's mom met us and we had a fancy New Year's Eve dinner. Of course, it was early since we have the kids. We walked around and took a little train ride thing. And Cam played in the fake snow - it snows every hour, the snow is soap or something like that.



(it cracked me up since someone made a snowman out of the fake snow)


We went back here to "party" though we didn't make it up until midnight. I heard fireworks going off at midnight but just couldn't get myself out of bed to go look at them.




Today didn't feel like New Year's day as we were running around most of it. First we saw Mary's aunt and uncle and cousins. Then we went over to see our new niece Gracie Rose and meet our 1-year old niece Lily. Then it was over to her mom's for dinner. Tomorrow is hopefully just our family as we're going to Animal Kingdom.