one more blue room

somehow, derek and i found the time to give our bedroom a much needed coat of paint this weekend. (it helped that derek's parents confiscated the monster for the afternoon, while we finished).

here's the outcome:


(this is the third blue room in the house. the kitchen is royal blue, isaac's room is little boy blue, and now this).

to contrast, here's what the room looked like before:

I feel safe.

The crazy guy in our neighborhood apparently wasn't satisfied with just sitting at the end of his driveway watching all the cars go by and taking down the names of speeders. We're now under the watchful eye of his security system. And we are all safer because of it. Needless to say, I'll be entering and leaving the neighborhood via a different route...
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

the week in pictures

we rode the ski lift up sugar mountain:

the beautiful (sarcasm) scenery from the top of sugar:

swimming in the resort pool:

playing with the light switch. a new favorite activity:

sliding down the roller slide at the banner elk park:


climbing the rubber/rope ladder:

playing in the stream:


golfing with josiah and josiah's dad:


feeding a duck:

feeding himself:

heading into linville caverns (this is the last good moment):

here's how he really felt about the caverns:

josiah wasn't too happy, either:

the boys, playing in the room:

josiah buckling isaac into his booster seat:


then it rained. and rained. and is probably still raining. and we came home. bleh.

ridin' the storm out

after two point five days of constant rain and a forecast that didn't look very promising, we cut our vacation a little short and headed back home. and now we're home. i'll try to post some vacation details (pictures) soon....

mountain vacation

on friday afternoon, derek, isaac and i headed out for a week long family mountain vacation in banner elk, nc. we got in around 7:00, after stopping for some groceries on the way.

yesterday, we rode a ski lift up to the top of sugar mountain, walked around, took in some scenery and then rode back down. isaac was pretty good on both 20 minute trip, except for a mini meltdown in the middle of each one. he wanted to throw things off the lift (sippy cup, my hat, his jacket) and became infuriated when he was not allowed to.

later, we went swimming in the pool at our vacation residence, out to dinner at some steakhouse whose name escapes me at the moment, and then to the park in banner elk. isaac loved loved loved the park. there were like 6 different slides, rope ladders, swings, a tire swing, plenty of stairs and ramps, and best of all - a stream with a semi-pond type area for splashing, getting muddy and exploring.

all of these activities are documented with numerous photographs, but unfortunately we have super slow internet connectivity, and so i will leave you with this one family shot, and hopefully find somewhere else that i can upload some shots at a faster rate.

CPR baby

I'm in CPR class right now, here's my baby.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

today....

...lucy came in and threw up on the living room floor, right next to isaac. this traumatized him, demonstrated by and ensuing total meltdown. good times...

peek a boo

 

bounce u

yesterday, isaac and i headed to bounce u for the preschool playdate session. isaac was probably still a little young and got bumped around by some of the older kids, but i think he still had a really good time. he liked the big slide the best, but it was hard to work in a turn on the mats from the yet-to-comprehend-proper-sharing-techniques preschoolers (and some moms!)

 

 

 

 

about the hives

chronic hives.
that's what they said.

the doc tested isaac for several different allergies and only showed a slight reaction to peanuts. not a full blown dangerous allergy. just a mild irritation.

the hives don't really seem to bother isaac, so that's good. the doctor said they come and go for a few months and then they'd stop. in the meantime, he gave us the ok to drug him up, but i figure, since they don't bother him, i'll just keep him drug free.

so, that's the hives update. no real answers. fun.

an end to the blotches???

I don't know if I've made any mention at all about Isaac's recent allergy escapades, so I'll try to sum it all up here.

About a month and a half ago, Isaac broke out in hives. We went to the doc. He prescribed Zyrtec. They went away. He went off the Zyrtec. All was good for a week or so. Then he broke out again. The Zyrtec didn't work. Back to the doc. He prescribed Allegra and an Epi Pen in case of emergency. He also set us up with an allergist. The Allegra kind of works. He still gets some occasional blotches. And we forgot to give him his dose on the trip home from NY and he completely broke out the next day. But, now, he's been off the Allegra for a week, b/c we have the allergist appointment today and he seems no worse than when he was on it (occasional spots).

Throughout this, I've tried cutting back on the foods that he eats, to point of only eating baby food that he was eating at 12 months. We changed sunblocks. I used Johnson and Johnson soap only.... All with no visible result. Except for: I stopped giving him his vitamin and I think that may have been a significant part of the culprit.

Anyhoo... we're off to the allergist at 10:15 and hopefully we'll get some answers. Until then, here's some pics of the boy, after two seperate breakouts:

 

 

 

 

ABC's

Apparently, I've been tagged, by Jessie, in this little game of ABC's. So, enjoy a post that's about me, mostly, instead of the boy.

A. Attached or Single? attached
B. Best Friend? i have a hs bff, a college bff, and a "grown-up" bff
C. Cake or pie? for sure, it's pie.
D. Day of choice? saturday.
E. Essential item? the internet.
F. Favorite color? wildcat blue!
G. Gummy bears or worms? sprees.
H. Home town? Batavia, NY 14020
I. Favorite indulgence? cookie dough.
J. January or July? This is tough. I like January weather but it's a boring time of year. July is too flippin' hot, but there's more to do. Tie.
K. Kids? One busy boy is plenty.
L. Life isn’t complete without? Candy.
M. Marriage date? May 17, 2003
N. Number of brothers and sisters? me, two sisters, brother, two step-bros.
O. Oranges or Apples? oranges.
P. Phobias? Bridges.
Q. Quotes? "I'm not superstitious; just a little stitious" -Michael Scott
R. Reasons to smile? Isaac being a goof.
S. Season of choice? I think I'm falling for fall. :)
T. Tag 5 people: Lorena, Joooodi, Mom, kc, umm...
U. Unknown fact about me? I wore dresses everyday until the third grade.
V. Vegetable? brussel sprouts and zucchini
W. Worst habit? procrastination. (ie: what i'm doing right now).
X. X-ray or Ultrasound? Um. I don't really have a preference.
Y. Your favorite food? Definitely pizza.
Z. Zodiac sign? Scorpio
(Another) Z. Which zoo animal is your favorite? Polar bears, I guess.

this day

so, i lied. i did get a chance to pull the pics off the two cameras. i put a lot of them in picasa and i'm too lazy to do all the commentary on blogger, so this slideshow will have to do:

fhs cake

i decorated this cake for some of my former students at forbush.
it was a costco cake. i just attempted the logos of all the colleges that they will be attending this fall.

 

Back to Regular Life

Almost all of our summer time adventures have come and gone. My mom came on Thursday and picked up Jake. She only stayed for a day and then headed back on Saturday. We used the rest of our weekend to regroup, somewhat, and today starts our return to normal, everyday life.

I have a lot of pictures, on two different cameras, of the time with Jake and my mom. One of these days, I'll get to them. Probably not this day.

Well, the coffee is ready for me to drink, so I'm going to get on that.

handsome

 

children's museum w/ jake

we took isaac to the children's museum the other day.
i didn't get many pictures, but here are a few:

proud krispy kreme employee:

 

waiting patiently for the big kids:

 

jake squirting isaac:

 

splashing!:

 

couch jumping 101

jake taught isaac to jump off the furniture.
thank you, jake.