~You Are My Sunshine~

Tonight something different happened in our house (which I hope doesn't happen too often).  Rowen simply didn't want to go sleep...he cried in his crib, chatted in his crib, came out of his crib, back in, etc... and nothing seemed to work.  Finally I gave in and sat down and rocked him to sleep, something I haven't really done since those nights some many weeks ago when we were still having middle of the night feedings.  I shudder to think about those again, but I sure did love rocking him again.  

Since my singing voice tends to make dogs howl, I usually use a playlist to mask my singing when rocking Rowen, tonight was no different.  One of the songs on the playlist is You Are My Sunshine, one of the few songs I will sing to Rowen sometimes when we are playing.  I LOVE this song,  and I have two very distinct memories of it from my childhood, one a man singing it on a train to the Grand Canyon when I was around  3-4ish, and two singing it with my grandparents, it was one of our songs we sang in the car when I went to visit them.

The song came on tonight, and I simply lost it.  Bawled like a baby.  I love that there are so many little things like this song that are so simple that I am passing on to Rowen in bits and pieces.  Obviously there are years to come of passing on, but for right now I'm happy to just pass on a sweet song.  

I sure do love this sweet little boy....

~Saturday Morning Scene: Its Gonna Be a Hot One~

 

We are linking up again for Saturday Morning Scene, and I hope you all are having a wonderful morning!  Here in the burbs of Maryland the humidity hasn't quite died down so we thought we would go ahead and take an early morning swim....

Stay cool and enjoy the weekend!

When I grow up...

I want to be a what?  Well that is the question.  Now I realize I am long past the phase of dreaming of what I will be when I grow up, but I think my current situation has allowed me to sort of put off what I want to be, or rather do with the rest of my life.  There are a few facts that I know to be true.

  1.  I need to work, both for myself and for the lifestyle to which we are accustomed.  That may sound selfish but we live by the work hard play hard motto in this family and I would like to continue to do that.  And while there is nothing more I would like to do then spend all of my time with Rowen, right now and possibly never will that be the best option for us.  As long as he is happy and thriving I am comfortable with our current plan.

2.  I could continue to do what I do now for the next 17 years and have one retirement at 42 years old.  That sounds nice, but far away, and it always brings me back to the question of is this what I want to do.

3.  I have two years left of 'payment' and then I am free.  The next two years are all I owe, and after that I stay of my own free will.  This might be why I feel such a need to figure the next step out.

4.  I want to do what can keep us where we are the longest.  Right now we are in a good place, we have a nice house, Rudy has been blessed with a great job, and I have my work.  Although we aren't looking to stay in this house forever, we do talk about building a home and to do that we would need to stay somewhere.  It might not be a possibility in my career so that may put me at a crossroads down the line.  I don't want my children growing up in multiple different places, I want them to have a town, school, community, etc. where they feel as if they are part of something.

I know this post doesn't really make much sense, but these are some of the thoughts that go through my head everyday on my lone drives to and from work.  Maybe someday soon I will figure out what exactly it is I want to be when I grow up but for right now I am ok not having figured that out just yet.

~What a Year its Been~

You wouldn't know by looking into our house right now that last year at this time we had just finished our wedding ceremony and were starting to celebrate!  Today we are still in our pajamas, enjoying a cup of coffee, and hanging out with the most adorable baby in the world (yes I'm very biased).  Although we were married quietly before our wedding, we chose this day as the one we celebrate.  We have had an amazing, exhausting, exciting, consuming year (and lots of other things, the list could go on and on) and if its any indication of the years to come then I can't wait for the future! I had initially picked out a bunch of wedding pictures to post, and then thought of doing a picture of each month of this year but instead I decided just to do one picture from the wedding and maybe save the rest for another year!  Hope you all are having a wonderful weekend!

~Lions, Pandas, and Planes~

Right now we have family in from  out of town and this past weekend we took in some sights with them!  One of the places we went was the National Zoo.  I love this zoo, I love that its nestled in a neighborhood and if you weren't looking you would miss it.  Rowen slept through a big portion of it but we were able to get some pictures of him!

Rudy and our nephew Adrian...

Our niece Emily, she has the curliest hair I have ever seen!

The Lions just had cubs and they were the stars of the Zoo this weekend!

We were only allowed to see the male panda because DC is anxiously waiting to see if the female panda is pregnant!

On Sunday we ventured out to the Aerospace Museum at Dulles Airport.  Rudy had gone there right after Rowen was born with my siblings and he wanted to take the kids back as part of their visit!

It was great to be able to see all of the old planes and see so much history preserved in one place!  One of the things that I love about living in DC is that as Rowen grows and is learning more things its places like this that we will be able to take him and teach him about the history of the past.  I can't wait until the day when we see his face light up as he discovers the treasures these places hold! 

~Our Weekend~

Yesterday we returned home from our first road trip weekend and Rowen's first New England visit.  The ride up on Friday was painful, we left at two in the afternoon and didn't get there until almost two in the morning, which is four hours more than the trip should take!  Rain and traffic were the causative factors, but little man did great! He slept for almost the whole trip, and even went to bed when we got there.  This was definitely better than anything we could of hoped for since in more recent short trips Rowen has NOT wanted to be in the car, period.  

Excuse the phone quality picture...but this is what the little guy looked like the whole ride, Amazing!

On Saturday we ventured down to the Academy for the wedding of our friends Casey and Lauren.  The wedding was absolutely wonderful and it was so nice to see old friends again!  

I also got to see one of my dearest friends in the world, Shannon!  We hadn't seen each other since my wedding, and although it was a short trip, it was so nice to be able to catch up again! Shannon is busy planning her wedding for next summer, and I CAN NOT WAIT! Soo Excited!

And I have to put in a pic of me and the Mr., who wore a bow tie in Casey's honor!

We had left Rowen with my parents when we were at the wedding, so when we returned to their house on Sunday we had a great cookout with family and neighbors and everyone got to meet Rowen!

Sadly we had to come home yesterday, it was too short of a trip! I can't wait until we go home again now that there are so many little kids in the family I think holidays are going to be so magical!

~Three Months Old~

Dear Rowen,

Today you are three  months old.  I think tonight you knew I had something I needed to do so you decided to stay up late (past nine) which is the latest you have stayed up in a while.  We think its about time to transition you out of swaddling, but your dad and I have yet to tackle that one, maybe this month.

I think you have changed more this month than in the past two.  Everyday I look at you and can't believe how big you have gotten, how much you have grown.  I often refer to you as a little old sweaty sticky man who drools all day.  We think you might be in the early stages of teething, but either way, you pretty much live in bibs theses days because of the drool.  And when you decide to make bubbles it is ten times worse.  You also have started sitting with your hands folded all the time, as if you are contemplating hard decisions, it just adds to your old man persona!  

This month you had your two month appt.  You were in the 75% for both your height and weight at almost 13 lbs 6 oz and 24 inches.  We thought you were going to scream your head off when you got the shots but you got over it pretty quickly.  That seems to be how you react to most things, at first you can be highly dramatic but it is over in an instance.  You still sleep through the night, although you haven't figured out the sleeping in on weekends concept, which I don't mind.  As far as eating, you eat every four to five hours and usually finish off eight ounces.  The misses at daycare couldn't believe this was your schedule but I think they are getting used to in and enjoy not having to feed you every two hours.  You are still wearing a size one diaper (until this last box runs out) and are wearing mostly 3-6 months clothing.  Unfortunately I wasn't paying attention to how fast you were growing and there were some things you never even wore!

This month you started daycare, which I think was harder on me than you.  You seem to like it there and we are getting a hang of the routine.  Right now your dad wakes you up and takes you and I pick you up in the afternoon.  You are a very happy baby when you wake up, all giggles and smiles.  When we get home, its usually a two hour nap for you (and sometimes me too :) ).  

A few firsts this month:  swimming in a pool, 4th of July, bubbles, riding in your cowmooflauge, laughing out loud, and drooling excessively!

Sometimes I already feel like you aren't a baby anymore, you simply are growing up too fast!  Happy three months my dear chicken little, ham, meatloaf (courtesy of the misses), rowie bear!

~4th of July Weekend~

4th of July weekend this year just didn't feel like a holiday, in a lot of ways it felt like a normal weekend, in the slow lazy way summer weekends tend to go.  For most of the weekend we didn't do much of anything and again it was wonderful.

On Sunday we went over to B & Gs.  I honestly don't know what we would do without them, they are our family here.  It was hot enough that we wanted to float with them, so in the pool we went.  Rowen was able to go in for a little while, and he absolutely loves the water.  Swim lessons can't start soon enough, only three more months!

On Monday we went to the mall.  Yes on 4th of July we were in a mall, so American of us.  But when its so hot out that we really shouldn't have little man out thats a great place to be.  I picked him up a 4th onesie at old navy for half off and it was the inspiration for his 4th photo shoot.  I think he has discovered the purpose of the camera and has decided that every time he sees it he doesn't want to smile.  The only smiles I get these days are when he smiles at Rudy and I can snap it real fast.  Such is life.  

I think the only thing we missed about a 'normal' 4th this year was the fireworks.  Watching them on tv wasn't the same, but its something we can look forward to for next year when hopefully Rowen will get to enjoy them with us!