I am ashamed

It's been over a month since I posted anything. That's ridiculous. I have nothing to occupy my time (besides a crazy 2 year old who won't leave me alone for 10 minutes) but that is no excuse. People who have far more going on that me find time to update their blogs, right?? So I will strive to do better. Although this will hardly count as an update since I'm not putting any pics up yet. Check back soon though! I'm motivated, I'm already thinking of things that I can blog about, I have ideas...

I guess I could tell you, quickly, what's been going on in our world for the last month. Umm let's see here - trips to the beach with Kerri and kids, birthday parties for Natalie and a visit from the Terrell clan, Jordan leaving to go back to school (boo) then coming back 2 weeks later for church (yay!) then leaving again (I miss my little bro), planning for our trip to MAINE which we leave to go on in LESS THAN A WEEK (can you tell I'm excited?!?!), enjoying the last few days of my 20s (sniffle, sniffle), planting a new fall garden (and I'm sure I'll be the one doing all the work.... again), cracking up on a regular basis at the funny and adorable things Blayne does and says, and just enjoying time with my boys. They are the best. So as you can see, I have a lot of material.

I promise, it won't take me a month to get my butt in gear and post some pics.

I'm getting caught up...

Slowly but surely!
Here are a few pics of Blayne from the past month or so....

Sleeping with his rabbit, it was an Easter gift from his Papa, Aunt Jess, Uncle Chris, Jackson and Chloe. How cute!!Playing guitar with Daddy on the back porch

Me and Sean celebrating our 4th anniversary at Downtown Disney. We had dinner at the Rainforest Cafe and then went to see Blue October (my favorite band!) at the House of Blues. We had such a GREAT time!!


These are the pics that he will kill me one day for letting people see, but I couldn't resist. Look at the cute little booty!! I don't know why he's grabbing it like that though... Anyhoo, his Gramma got this elephant thingy that attaches to the hose and water sprays out of it's trunk which Blayne loves to play with. And one day, I forgot his bathing suit so he got to play with it in the nude! And I just couldn't help but take these pictures. I'm definitely saving them - one day they might go in his "wedding video" showing him growing up... =)

More to come! I'm on a roll now!

Finally!

Gasp! Blink, blink, blink. No, your eyes are not deceiving you. Pick yourself up off the floor, I've updated my blog. I will not bore you with the trivial details about WHY I haven't blogged in forever (since Nov 13th to be exact) but rest assured I have better excuses than "I forgot" or "I didn't have time." Oh wait, no I don't..... =) Anyhoo, I was recently threatened (Hi Aunt Jac!) and plus I have to hear about Angie's awesome blog all the time (it is pretty awesome btw) so I decided it was about time. In my measly defense, I did try to get on here sometime during the month of December - I typed out a very witty post filled with love, laughter and lots of pics and then stupid Blogger messed up and deleted it before I could save it. So I was a little bitter about that. It was a great post too. Too bad I can't remember any of it.

A lot of things have happened since Nov 13th though - good and bad. But the best thing that has happened since then is that Sean got a job at Florida Hospital in SEBRING and we have moved and are living here now (as if all of you didn't know that)! He's working as a Radiographer on a PRN basis (the only downside - no benefits) but he's getting at least 40hrs/week. Which means that for right now (and hopefully for a while longer) I get to be a SAHM! That's a stay at home mom for those of you not up on the acronyms. I'm totally loving being able to stay home with Blayne and play all day every day. It still sorta feels like I'm on vacation though, I think because of the not working thing. Not that I'm not loving every minute, it's just weird. We did have to leave Michael, Amy and all the kids and that part stinks. We all miss them terribly! Even now, as I was looking at my old posts, there is a old video of Blayne and Hannah and Natalie playing the drums and the piano and Blayne is sitting in my lap and has watched those clips approximately 50 times in the last 10 minutes. And he just hopped up and said, "Mommy pants on, Car bye bye, MeeMee, HaRo, Dawee, Deethan, Ewy, Drums???" Which roughly translated means he wants to go see them right now. =) But aside from missing them and our good friends up in Atlanta, we are all loving life here in sunny Florida. We are living with my cousin Chet in his adorable house in Sun N' Lakes- and let me tell you how AWESOME it is to live in a house and not an apt! Here are a few pics I took of the outside and of Blayne's room so you can see what it looks like...

Front of house - love the palm trees!!
Our awesome backyard - complete with lounging chairs and a grill

The cool oak tree in the backyard

Blayne's awesome new Lightning McQueen bed (from the movie Cars)

And his new bookcase - his room looks out onto the backyard (obviously) and connects to our room which is on the right side of this pic

I have not taken any pics of our room or the rest of the house yet because I'm still trying to decorate that a little bit and get rid of all the boxes. So sometime in the next six months I'll be sure to update you again with those. =) So I think this is enough for now. Don't worry though, I promise I won't wait 4 months till the next post. But as a little teaser, I'll be putting up pics of some of the fun things that Blayne and I have done since we moved down here. So be on the lookout!

xoxo,
b

Fire Alarms and Autoclaves...

So as many of you know, I work in a lab. Maybe you didn't know that but now you do. This is my lab...

I'm a scientist, a microbiologist actually and I work with some pretty gross stuff. A little known or thought about fact is that our "trash" is disgusting. I have used petri plates with lots of little buggers in them and pipettes and gloves and all sorts of gross stuff that needs to be disposed of when I'm done with it. And I can't just throw this stuff out with the rest of the trash cause people would DIE. Not really, but they could get sick and it would be gross and most importantly it's illegal. So there are these things called autoclaves that sterilize stuff using a combination of pressure, steam and high temperature. People in the medical field use them all the time to sterilize their surgical tools before use and we use the autoclave here to sterilize any solutions that we make or glassware or what have you. When you sterilize clean stuff, it kills off any bacteria that may have been living on it and keeps it clean until you open or touch whatever it is. And when you sterilize dirty stuff (like trash) it also kills off the bacteria so that we can then throw our trash away in a regular garbage can. As a little side note, dead bacteria smell even worse than live bacteria so it's really my least favorite part of my job. And I'm sure the people who have to carry it out hate it even worse. There's a dr. here who has an office on the same floor as me and the first time he smelled the trash being autoclaved he came out looking like he was going to vomit. And he went home shortly after that. This is a dr who has seen (and probably smelled) all sorts of stuff!! So needless to say, it's really gross. Here's what our autoclave looks like - scary, huh?

Anyhoo - back to my story! So tonight, I'm at work, I started a bag of trash in the autoclave and then went to get in out an hour or so later. When you open the autoclave, sometimes the steam will sort of billow out of the top (which just makes the whole room, your clothes, hair, everything smell bad) and that's what happened tonight. Only this particular steam must have been pretty potent cause it set of the smoke detector. I almost peed my pants. I work late at night (obviously, I'm still here!) and am in this building by myself for the most part so any loud noise is a little frightening but this smoke alarm is like ear-splitting! There are no carpets, just tile and bare floors so the screech echoes and it feels like it rattles your brain. There I am with a bag of disgusting trash in one hand, gloves on, lab coat on really wanting to drop everything and plug my ears but I can't so I put the nasty trash in the garbage can, run back to my room, take off gloves and lab coat wash my hands THEN plug my ears, grab my purse and head downstairs. From previous fire drills, I knew that my building and the building right next to mine are on the same "system" so when an alarm goes off in either building, it goes off in both. I also know from previous experience that once the alarm goes off, the fire department will definitely come. Even if we call to tell them it's a false alarm. So I went downstairs to find our handy security guard thinking he would know just what to do. I was wrong. He had no idea what to do. Luckily the hospital security heard the alarm - from a parking deck across the street mind you, it's that freakin' loud - and came over to investigate. I told him what happened and he asked me to go back up to the earsplittingly loud hallway and show him where the alarm went off and what exactly an autoclave was. So we go traipsing back up there, he walks in the room and almost throws up in his mouth I think. As I may have mentioned, it stinks. It was actually pretty funny to see a security guard trying to act tough but almost gagging from the smell. =) So we confirmed that there really wasn't a fire anywhere and when back downstairs and outside to wait for the fire department. They pulled up right as we were walking out and he made ME go and tell them what happened. The fireman just sorta rolled his eyes, chuckled and drove off. He did not however, turn the fire alarm off in the buildings. So there we are, sitting outside... did I mention that all the people still working in the other building had to evacuate as well?? And that there was a class going on?? Well they did and there was. Luckily it was kinda late and there weren't very many of them but I didn't go anywhere near them. I stayed on my little bit of sidewalk on the other side of the street trying to pretend like I had nothing to do with it. I failed miserably though because different people kept coming up to me and asking me for my name and phone number and asking me what, exactly, happened again? Sheesh. So much for layin' low. After about oh 20 min or so the alarm got turned off. We had to wait for maintenance to come from main campus to deactivate it or whatever. I slunk back into my building and up the stairs thinking it was all over. Wrong again. Our security guard AND the maintenance guy were both waiting for me, wanted a full account, my name, phone #, etc, etc. I was beginning to feel like a criminal! And all I did was open a d@mn autoclave!! And it's not over yet... they get their info and head off on their merry way, I sit down to TRY and finish up and then I get a phone call... it's the hospital security guard and he needs a bit more information to put on his report. "OK" I say, "what do you need?" "Well for starters, can you give me your height, weight, hair color, home phone # and home address?" What the!?!?! Are you kidding me?!? Am I being PUNK'd?!??! Why in the world would you need all of that information?? And why do you think I would just tell you that?? I don't even tell the dr my REAL weight, I lie on government forms about that one, why would I just give that out to an almost stranger?? I mean, we did sorta bond over the nasty smell and shrieking alarm but we're definitely not that close. So I tell him that I really don't understand why he would need that information, I'm happy to give him all of my work contact information, but I don't think he needs my home address, etc, etc. He says OK and we finish up. Jeez. I definitely felt like a criminal after all that! These could be my last words as a free person! =) So the lesson that I have learned: Empty the autoclave last thing at night and if the alarm goes off, turn off all the lights, sneak out of the building and go home.

Awesome stranger at the airport

So me & Blayne flew down to Florida a couple of weeks ago for Jordan's graduation (yay!) and then we went to the beach for a week and then flew back to Atlanta. I was a little nervous about flying with Blayne because I didn't want him to be one of those terrible toddlers driving everyone else on the plane crazy and I didn't know how I was going to keep him entertained in a small space for an hour and a half. But (thanks to Sean's video ipod) he was wonderful and quiet and did awesome. Here's the thing though, when people see you coming towards a gate or terminal with a toddler most of them give you a look. I don't know how to describe it, it's sort of a mixture of fear and annoyance mixed with a little bit of "why are you out in public with that thing much less flying with it?!?" After that they attempt to avoid eye contact altogether. Anyone who's ever flown with a baby or small child has probably gotten "the look." For me though, that look doesn't really make me want to keep my kid extra good so he doesn't annoy you. Contrary to popular belief, I'm probably more worried about how my kid is gonna behave than the random stranger who may or may not be sitting by me for an hour and a half but when you give me that look it makes me want to kick you in the shins, flick you in the forehead and then sneak a stinky diaper into your carry on. And then it makes me secretly pray that we ARE sitting by you and that my kid will be obnoxious during the ENTIRE FLIGHT - just to drive you crazy!!!! One day some mom is gonna snap in the airport and smack a stranger and we'll all know why. And another thing that bothers me about that look - the person is directing that "eat poo and die" stare at MY BEAUTIFUL SON!! The cutest kid ever!! My smart, funny, adorable kid!! Don't you people know not to ever make a mom think you're insulting her kid?!?!? Geez. But I digress... in the midst of all these looks there was an amazingly nice stranger. A couple in fact but this lady sticks out. We were coming back from Sarasota to Atlanta and I got to the airport like two hours early (thanks mom) so we we're just stuck there and I was trying to keep Blayne happy. The airport was practically empty so I just let him run around and climb on the chairs and do whatever thinking that he'd get all his energy out and then he'd be ok during the flight. It worked btw, he slept for most of it! But as Blayne is running around I got a couple of "looks." Most people were pretty nice though -the Sarasota airport is MUCH nicer than the Atlanta one so I guess people weren't as pissy in general. Then Blayne hears a little crinkle-crinkle-crunch-crunch going on nearby. This kid (probably in high school) has just opened a bag of chex mix or something and Blayne locked in on him. He seems to think that no one should eat alone. So he heads off for this boy (before I can catch) him but then freezes when he realizes that he doesn't actually know this person. But the boy offers Blayne some of HIS OWN snack and then when Blayne gets all shy and won't take it, he actually takes some out and hands it to him!!! Blayne ate it of course. =) A few min later as I'm following him down another row of chairs this lady smiles at him and tries (unsuccessfully) to get him to give her five and then she tells me, "You know, you're a really great mom." Huh??? Me??? She said she was the mom of the nice boy who gave Blayne snacks and she thought it was awesome that I just let him run around and didn't try to keep him all stuck in a seat and that most people were too worried about stuff like that and that it was great that I was letting him have a little fun before the flight. Wow. That totally made my day!! My week even!! Actually, here it is two weeks later and I still think of it every now and then!! Not that I think I'm the greatest mom ever mind you but that this woman would say that to me - that she didn't ask me to keep my kid quiet or sit him down and she didn't give me or Blayne the looky-look either. So thanks, awesome stranger in the Sarasota airport. You'll probably never know how much that meant to me.