Fun Stuff

So Blayne and I have been having a blast since we moved down here! Here are a few of the things we've done...

We went to Henscratch Winery to feed the chickens and pick some strawberries. We ended up having to pick tomatoes and peppers instead cause the strawberries got messed up by the cold snap (and by cold snap I mean a few nights of 40ish degree weather) but that was fine cause I made some salsa with my fresh veggies which turned out to be really stinking good. =) But I digress... here are some pics!

Picking tomatoes... and then throwing them at the chickens. In his defense, I think he was trying to feed the chickens.Seriously, look at this guy!! His "hair" is ridiculous. All the other chickens probably make fun of him. Or her. That 'do is out of control.

We also went out to the Hammock one day with Kerri and Brody (Blayne calls him Bro-day with a HUGE southern accent!) and then went on the catwalk. It was the first time in a long time that I have actually seen any animals out there - have a look!

Blayne on the playgroundCrikey, he's a monster!! Easily 8 ft. Blayne likes this pic because the gator has a leaf on it's nose and that just cracks him up.
Kurckles too!! Well just the one turtle actually but there was another one swimming around in the water close by.
And this beast - we were leaving, driving down the main road and he just ran across the road right in front of the truck in front of me! And then stopped and just hung out in the bushes. Yeesh. I was glad to be surrounded by two tons of steel - imagine riding your bike past that thing! I thought about stopping to tell the rangers that there was a gator just off the road but then imagined the looks on their faces... "Oh reeeeeaaaaaaallly. An alligator huh? In the swamp?? Unheard of. We'll get right on that." so I just drove on home instead. =)

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

Halloween

Okay. OKAY!! I know, I haven't posted anything like weeks. Whatever. I've been working on something big. =) Tee hee. Anyhoo, here you go - updates! Yay! I'm going to do this one post at a time. So here are the Halloween pics - Blayne was Superman (aka MeeMan), Sean was Indiana Jones (obviously!) and I was a witch. No comments allowed about how I didn't have to try too hard for that one. We went over to Michael and Amy's house and walked around their neighborhood - they have a great place for trick or treating! Blayne was a little sketched out at first about walking up to other people's houses and he was not too sure about what he was supposed to say but he got the hang of it pretty quickly. His trick or treat was more like "iiiccck and eeeaatt!" but still very effective as we came home with enough candy to last all of us till 2009. Enjoy the pics!!

It's a well known fact that Superman is completely ineffective without his binky. =)

Superman, Wonder Woman and a Princess. Evil-doers beware!!

Princess Awwawwa (Aurora) aka Sleeping Beauty

MinerMan!!This was the best group shot I took. Geez, these kids would NOT stand still, all look at the camera and smile for the life of me!! =)
Blayne in the bounce house - he loves to jumpeee jumpeeee!!
Superman and a Super-Awesome-Fighting Ninja (aka Ethan)
Villains, Nazis and Aliens had better look out!!

My weird gene pool

A comment from my cousin Angie (hi Ang!) got me thinking last week about about our strange family. I mean strange in a good way though! Many of my childhood memories have to do with my cousins and the games we would play together. When I was a kid, most of my summers and after school days were spent with my cousins under the watchful eyes of my Aunt Jacque. I don't know what she did to her sisters as a child to earn the right to watch all of us on a regular basis but it must've been something horrible!! =) Anyhoo, there were 7 of us that pretty much grew up together: me and my older bro, Michael, and my cousins Ryan, Angie, Maria, Chet and Carrie. The boys were all roughly the same ages (except for poor youngest, picked on cousin Chet) and the girls were too. We were all at least within a couple years of each other. So mostly us girls stayed together playing in our "house" under the tree because everyone knows that boys are gross and loud and disgusting and the boys would all be building a tree fort or shooting bb guns at birds or some other nonsense. Anyhoo, what I started remembering were the games that we used to play as children. This is where the weird gene pool stuff came up - I mean how on earth did we think of these things?!?! One that springs to mind is something that Carrie and I used to do. Let me give you a few details about the nature of our relationship first though. Carrie and I were 5 months apart - I was (obviously) the oldest and most mature of the two. Nearly every day, from the ages of 4-10 (roughly) we would get in a fight. Not just a good old-fashioned name calling exchange (although those sorts of things were prevalent) but an actual fist fight. Or more accurately, a slapping fight. A good example is this: one day we were outside playing on the swing set in Aunt Jacque's backyard. I was maybe 5 or 6. Carrie was doing tricks on the monkey bars (we were perfecting a REALLY impressive routine that ended with a back flip off of a moving swing) and I was swinging. Apparently I was swinging too hard though because I was shaking the whole swing set. Carrie was quite unhappy about this and after screaming at me to stop for a few minutes (which of course only made me swing harder) she actually got off the monkey bars and came over and slapped me across the face. Naturally I smacked her back. I must've gotten her pretty good because she then went running inside to tell on me. So I smugly sat there, glorying in my supremacy and fully enjoying the swing set all to myself until it occurred to me that if Carrie was inside crying and I was still outside swinging with a grin on my face I was gonna be the ONLY one that got into trouble. So I began to cry as loudly as I possibly could and went running inside to tell on Carrie for hitting ME first. As soon as I got in the backdoor, Carrie immediately ceased her crying and began to yell, "She wasn't crying! I didn't hurt her! She's only faking so she won't get into trouble!" and on and on. I sobbingly explained that she did, in fact, hurt me, it just took me a minute or two to feel it. So we BOTH got punished. And then we were best friends again after about 5 minutes. This is pretty much how things went for about 5+ years of our lives. We were 10 before we spent a day together without hitting each other. Or threatening not to be each others cousins anymore. =) So anyways, we would play this game called "Leeches." Here's the gist... Aunt Jacque's house was on Little Lake Jackson so we would take out ONE inner tube and swim out as far as we possibly could (practically to the middle of the lake!) and then one of us would yell "Queen Leech!" or "Leeches!" or something like that and then we would both attempt to get all of our bodies out of the water and onto the ONE inner tube without falling off or impaling ourselves on the metal pump that stuck out so as not to be eaten by the leeches. I should probably mention that there were no leeches in the lake. At least no real ones anyways. This was all in our heads and we would stay out there for what seemed like hours trying to avoid the leeches. Weird, huh? Then there was another game that we all played together. It was kind of like Hide 'N Seek but not really. We called it Seek 'n Hide. A subtle, but distinct, difference. I think the main thing that set it apart was that the Hiders would go and try to find the most awesome hiding spot ever and then the Seeker would come and look for them BUT once you were in a hiding spot you didn't leave until you got found. So there was no racing for "base" unless the Seeker spotted you and you wanted to try and outrun them. The goal was to obviously to have the best hiding spot. Some notable spots were: the dryer (Angie hid in there. Once.) which turned out not to be too effective because Aunt Jacque walked by and shut her in it and then she started screaming at the top of her lungs and we all knew exactly where she was, the top of a cabinet in the main bathroom which required you to squinch yourself into about 6 inches of space, getting in the mirrored closet in Aunt Jacque's room, or climbing into a toy chest or under a bed. But by far the pinnacle of our weirdness came in the form of a game that we called "Follow the Yellow Brick Road." We would all shut ourselves in the middle room, and pile all the pillows in the house into a big pile in the middle of the floor and then turn out the lights, and stuff blankets and towels into the cracks of the door so that absolutely NO light got into the room. Then we would break into two groups on either side of the room and each group would hold hands as we would starting singing, "Oooohhhhhh, weeeee'rrreeeeee off to see the Wizard! The wonderful Wizard of Oz!!!!" at the top of our lungs while running as fast as we could toward the middle of the room. This always ended in a violent collision (well, duh) in which someone inevitably would get injured (cough, Carrie, cough). So we would tend our wounds, pile all the pillows back up and do it all over again!! And while, yes, it was a LOT of fun, it was also very, very strange. And don't even get me started on the madness that occurred down at the Lease. I'm surprised we all made it to adulthood with all of our limbs.

So now many of us kids that used to play together have kids and I'm just sitting here thinking that they certainly have some strange genes coming to them! They are probably gonna make up some crazy games or do weird things on a regular basis but at least we'll know where they get it!! From that crazy Heston side of the family. =)

Kids, kids and more kids!

So I watched Michael and Amy's kids this past weekend so they could go to a marriage conference... I know, I know - I'm an awesome sister. And sister-in-law. It wasn't technically a weekend, just one night but it worked out to be over 24 hours of me & Sean (but mostly me!) being responsible for the care, maintenance and feeding of 5 children. I may never fully recover. Here is a little taste of just SOME of what we got to experience over the weekend. Enjoy!! You may want to turn your speakers down before enjoying the following clips though. But don't turn them off or you won't be able to fully understand what I went through.

I'm sure you noticed how Hannah, once she noticed that I was filming her, began to pose for this!! =) And then there were the drums....

Just so you know, Blayne's NOT grabbing Hannah's booty but rather trying to get her to get up so he can have a turn sitting on the stool. He's saying "tee-turn" which means "it's Blayne's turn." So we spent a good hour or so jamming out in Ethan's room. At least that's all the time I spent in there - Blayne absolutely loves Ethan's drums so he sneaks up there whenever he can.

For reals, though, we had a good time! We played video games, watched movies, ate junk food, played outside... It wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be. I'm not saying I would be able to do it everyday but for one night, it was fun. I was glad to be able to spend some QT with my nieces and nephews and Blayne LOVES his cousins so he had a blast. The kids were pretty cute about it too. They were actually excited that we were having a sleepover! Ely ended up in bed with me, Sean and Blayne (ha!) and he snuggled me all night. Blayne was NOT happy about that. And then Hannah told me on Sunday, that she wished we could stay longer. Awww!

Bath Crayons & Superman

First up, let me say that the inventor of the bath crayon, while brilliant, was obviously a man. Or a woman who never cleans the bathtub. Blayne received some bath crayons as a gift awhile back but we kept them away from him for a long time because he preferred to eat them rather than color with them. That all changed about two weeks ago - he found the crayons and we let him go crazy. Then Sean had the great idea to draw some of Blayne's favorite things on the walls of our bathtub...

So this is what our shower looks like pretty much all the time now:

These are just some of his favorite things: SpongeBob, Winnie the Pooh, balloons, flags, the moon and sunshine (aka shunshine). I don't know if you can see it but he likes "sparkles" too (that would be stars - cause they go "sparkle, sparkle"!). Missing from these pictures is Wall-E and Eve who are normally up there next to SpongeBob. So now instead of cleaning the shower every week, I get to clean it every day. And it's still not really clean because the colors sorta stick to the grout and are impossible to remove with regular cleaning methods. On the plus side though, Blayne is entertained for hours and he LOVES taking baths with all of his fav characters and things to keep him company!

Another recent discovery is the Superman cape that Sean got for Blayne a few months ago. He wasn't really interested at first but he found that the other day and has been running around in a diaper and Superman cape ever since. And in case you were wondering Superman is pronounced "Mee Man." =) We tried to get a few pics of him "flying" but failed miserably...

These are just some funny pictures of him watching TV... I just had to include them 'cause he's so stinking cute!!

Oh and one last pic of Blayne with his PopPop and Gramma - taken at his baby dedication last weekend!!

Catching Up

Welp, it's been a busy couple of weeks! First of all, my amazing hubby graduated from Radiography school!! Yay!! And then, he passed the registry (which makes him totally official) with flying colors!! I'm so proud of him. Now all that's left is to find him a job! =) Here are a few pics from his graduation...

Then last weekend, we went out and got a bike seat for Blayne. We've been talking about it for months now and finally got one! We got him a helmet too - it has Elmo, Cookie Monster, Grover and other Sesame Street characters all over it and Blayne would sleep in it if we let him. He wouldn't take it off in the store and then once we got it home, he kept in on the whole afternoon. It was pretty cute! I love that he does that now, when we get him something that he really likes, and he keeps it on for days. The first thing he did that with was a pair of sandals that have Cars on them (from the movie) and they light up when you walk. He's still pretty infatuated with those but for the first few days, they were attached to him at all times! So anyhoo, we got him the bike seat, put it together while he napped and then went for a bike ride Saturday afternoon. We got a little carried away though and went like 8 miles. Which was about 2-3 miles too much for me and Blayne. Sean could probably ride to FL and not get tired (jerk) but me & Blayne got a little worn out. By the end, Blayne was kicking Sean in the back to get him off the bike so he could get out. =) There's a really awesome bike trail near our apt though, it's called the Silver Comet trail and it used to be a train track but they paved it over so now it's a bike/jogging/walking trail. It goes all the way from just outside Atlanta to Alabama or something. But anyways, there are no cars on it so it's much safer than riding or jogging on the street. And it's all shaded and goes through some pretty neighborhoods. And we did have fun, Blayne LOVED the seat (for most of the ride) and we've gone on at least a short bike ride every day this week. Here's a few pics of the boys on their bike and us on the ride...

Getting ready to go!

I tried to get a pic of me and Blayne but he was WAY to interested in the flowers and his snacks to look at the camera...

And then, as you can tell from the above pics, my kid was in desperate need of a haircut. So Sean and I gave him one!! I know, it was a bit ambitious but Sean has a good hair clipper thing with different combs for different lengths and we figured we could totally do it! Plus Blayne sat so still for his first haircut, we figured he's be fine for this one! Wrong. He was heartbroken that we were cutting his hair. He cried the whole time. With tears and everything. He was being very dramatic about the whole thing actually (which took all of 10 minutes btw). It didn't hurt him at ALL either. The worst thing that happened to him was that he got hair all over the candy we gave him because he kept thrashing all over the place. But we got it done! And it looks pretty good if I do say so myself! See??

Before...

After!!

Is he cute or what?!?!