Picture fatigue

I go through spells with my picture taking.  Sometime I worry I am focusing too much on taking pictures and preserving the moment for the future and for others.  I don’t want to lose enjoying the moment for us NOW.  Plus it seems a bit indulgent.  And what to do with all the pics?  Also, we have all been a bit sicky.  Halloween I certainly normally take pics—I mean all kids look adorable dressed up—but I was really out of it.  Not a single pic exists from this years Halloween.  Did it really happen? ;-)  It did, some parts were fun, and luckly we have plents off dress up pics and memories since it is a daily occurance around here anyways. 

Anyways, here are a couple photos that have been hanging out on my camera:

J sleeping with Shu-shi (shoe-shee), his best bud in the entire world.  We decided to keep the last uncleamed of Margot’s kittens.  He is almost all black and such a doll.  Really, he has been dressed up and carried around and tucked into bed and put in all sorts of containers and much, much more.  For some reason he puts up with it all and then comes back for more.  And then cuddles J when he is sleeping.  The majority of J’s waking time at home is spent playing with little Shu-shi.

 

 

We LOVE visit Grandma and grandpa and their beautiful horses!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Halloween weekend we spent all Saturday at the festivities in Middlebury to celebrate both Halloween and the opening of the new bridge.  This was lots of fun!

 

 

 

 

Pretty cattle in the sun (at West Street Dairy, where Bogie came from).

 

 

 

One of my very favorite memories this month: our first snow and snow day!  I was sent home from work, picked up J, and Brad even came home from work.  It looks kind of lame, but J convinced me to get out his sled, and he was right: we could actually get up some good speed going down the driveway.  It was great to celebrate the natural holiday with lots of play outside (in weather when almost everyone else did not venture out) and then with (homemade) hot cocoa after.  Our first snow tradition!

 

 

 

Second trip to the dentist.  He was great!

 

 

 

 

Walking across the new bridge and watching the river and train.

Only pictures from Thanksgiving.  They had fun making letters with their bodies as well as doing all sorts of other tricks.  We spent the morning at Grandma and Grandpa’s in Shoreham and then headed to Great-grams in Lincoln for the evening and a sleepover.  Lots of fun!! 

This morning at the library Joseph also got his very own library card.  We finished “Fantastic Mr. Fox” (his first chapter book) and felt this was a good way to celebrate.  So cute and exciting.  I am feeling extremely happy and thankful lately.  Life isn’t perfect, but it sure is good!

Joseph’s first blogging

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Playgroup leader to be, waterfalls of pee, and inviting the whole world to our house . . .

At three-and-a-half (WOW!) Joseph can really express himself and it is very entertaining!!!  Every evening I have a whole list of funny things J said to share with Brad.  Many are lost, but here are a few:  

• “I have a big brain!”
• “I am growing soooo much!”
• “When I grow up I am going to be a playgroup leader.”  (This is what he said when he figured out that I was going to be the playgroup leader and he therefore doesn’t get to go anymore.)
• “Look at this big waterfall!”  (While peeing.)
• Me: “What are you doing?”   J: “Building a house.”   Me: “Oh.  Who is the house for?”  J: “It’s for sale.  It costs 300 dollars!”  (This is very expensive; he is always selling things but they are usually, 1, 2, or $10.)  
• “I am the Dada shark and you are the mama, Salsa.  Our babies are Tucker and Conner.” (For about a week this was an almost constant game.)
• “How did he get that hook on his arm?” (About Captain Hook.)
• (First thing he came up with while we were talking about what we are thankful for): “I am thankful for the toys Santa is going to bring me!”
• “Is Daddy the biggest guy ever?”
• “Can I invite the whole world to my house for a sleep-over party?”
• “Where do rain clouds come from?”
• “You’re not going to be my momma anymore!” (When mad.)
• J: “Can you tell Santa I want _____________ ?”  (All of a sudden he is VERY into the idea of wanting toys.  Definitely something we need to work on countering.  Parenting gets complex in all new ways these days.)  Me: “Well, let’s write him a letter.”  J: “Does Santa live at that store in Burlington?”  (He was remembering a store on Shelburne road that is all Christmas stuff.)  
• “I want to be ______ for Halloween.”  “I want a _________  birthday party.”  (He talks about these things ALL THE TIME!!)
• “Momma”  All of a sudden I am momma now, as opposed to Mommy.  I don’t really know why, but I’ll take it!  Cute. 
• Freind H: “Sit next to me Joseph!”  “Do you want to go to the restaurant?” “You can come to Boston with us Joseph!”  Hadley is a little girl we see at story hour every week.  She is one of the first friends that Joseph made all on his own, without me being friends with a parent first and arranging things.  We have taken them out to eat after story hour a couple times and now they think this should happen every week.  They are always arranging new plans, though for now most of their quality time is sitting next to each other listening to story hour, doing a craft, looking at books—H pics out all the pink ones and J all the scary ones—, and sometimes a little running and arguing.
• “They will have ice cream buckets!”  (Tying to convince me that he should come to a Pampered Chef party with me yesterday.)

Introducing: Bogie!

This is our newest animal friend, Bogie.  He is about a month and a half old Angus/Holstein cross steer calf the we bought from my friends Alice and Ricky (look at that terminology I have figured out!  steer means castrated male).  We have actually had him since he was three weeks old, but I was a little hesitant to post because he ended up getting pretty sick right after arriving.  The weather was cold and rainy, we made a mistake putting to big a hole in the bottle, plus all the other changes combined to have him lying down and listless.  He still always ate at least, but I was out there at night covering him with blankets and praying he would pull through.  I ended up have to even take his temp and give him some shots!  He still is pretty skinny in my uninformed opinion, but I think he will be alright.  It has been quite an adventure.  Joseph has been pretty involved helping me give him a bottle and now a bucket of milk two or three times a day, cleaning out the barn, getting him hay, etc . . .  Of course Joseph has some funny ideas as well:  he does not believe that Bogie is going to be bigger then George (the goat) and he likes to make a big nest for them out of hay.  Joseph also came up with the name.  His full name is Bogis Bean after two of the characters in the book we are reading (Fantastic Mr. Fox).   

Oh yeah, let’s not forget why we have him: to eat!  I know that is disagreeable to some of you, but for our family we enjoy being close to our food sources. 

Yes George, we still love you.  You can always strike a pose!  And I think you too are going to be surprised when Bogie outgrows you!

The unexpected, yet most meaningful milestones

With a little one there are many expected “milestones” that we all look forward to: rolling over, crawling, walking, sleeping through the night, etc . . .  These are often exciting and moving and sentimental, though sometimes they don’t seem quite so noteworthy or happen so gradually you don’t know when the real “first” was (as happened with crawling for us—J moved so much just rolling and scooting and pulling himself EVERYWHERE that it was hard to tell when it really qualified as crawling and didn’t make any practical difference).  Or sometimes something doesn’t happen as the books and folklore say it should and it becomes a sort of dreaded milestone as your bitterness builds (sleeping through the night in this house; still not something J has attained).  But for me there have also been other major milestones—often even more meaningful.  These ones were not as expected, not in the baby books, and much more personal.

Here are some of my favorite firsts:

• following a direction/command (it was just shocking when we first communicated with words—when we could say wave and Joseph understood us!) 
• being able to walk holding my hand (this was huge for me—it felt so intimate and grownup)
• playing in the mud
• putting one of his projects on the fridge
• checking out library books
• story hour at the library
• saying “I uv you”
• noticing and asking about his peepee ;-)
• doing chores and allowance (He has been gathering the eggs sporadically for quite awhile, but now he is getting even more into it.  Yesterday he really enjoyed using the pitchfork to clean out the barn and give the animals new hay.  He also sometimes sets the table.  If he does his chores he gets a dime!)
• make a purchase by himself with his own money (Brad and Joseph has date at the new Mickey D’s in town and J wanted more chicken nuggets, so Brad sent him up all by himself!  He was sooo proud of himself and telling me all about it when he came home.)
• making his own plans with friends (he is always making plans for playmates and sleepovers with his friends.  We don’t have the time to keep up with all his plans!)

And right now we are reading our first chapter book!!!  Recently we have read, cover to cover, two huge story treasuries so I figured this was the next step.  I brought a couple home and soon enough J was following me around begging me to read Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr. Fox.  We are both enjoying it and I love that his reading choices are getting more and more interesting.  After all, story time is for mommy too!

Tag

Genevieve from Life on Terrace “tagged” me with these questions and I decided to play along.  Btw, Gen is a childhood friend with a wonderful blog and the most beautiful son; go visit!

Funny/Silly Questionnaire:

{1}: If you could be in any TV show when you were a kid what would it be?

Well, that is a funny question for me, given I didn’t watch TV at home while growing up.  I vaguely remember obsessing about some show call “Xera Princess of Power” I watched at my neighbors when I was little.  Then, in elementary I used try and force my best friend and her two brother’s to watch Maury instead of cartoons afterschool at THEIR house.  What does that say?  Yikes. 

I was more of a reader though and loved identifying with “old fashioned” characters such as Anne of Green Gables.  

{2}: What has been your favorite Christmas gift as a child?

I can’t think of any particular Christmas gift.  I do remember begging and begging for a “Baby Alive” which my parents were totally against.  Finally my grandparents got it for me and what a letdown.  I remember my mom and I giving my dad real coal in his stocking.  I also remember figuring out there was no Santa because I stayed up late and my Aunts started filling the stockings in front of me.  

{3}: What actress would you want to play you if your life was a movie?

No idea.  I can’t stay awake through a whole movie so I don’t watch them.

{4}: What decade fad do you wish would come back?

Ok, these are kind of strange questions.  I thought this read something about when would you like to go back to, and I of course was going to write about say “Little House on the Praire” times.  Oh I know--I would really like big curly hair 80’s hair to be in again.  That would be good for me. 

{5}:What song describes your life?

Again, can’t think of anything.  Sorry, lame I know.

{6}: What was your favorite subject in school?

For the most part I liked everything in elementary and hated everything in high school and then loved it all again in college.  Overall though English type classes are my favorite.  I have great memories of poetry (which was a whole subject to itself in 4-6 grade).  In college my favorite classes were those in the humanities.

{7}: If you could have a dream job for a day what would it be?

My dream would be to direct some sort of great, amazing, changing the world organization.  My more practical dreams right now are to be a social worker or a librarian. 

{8}: If you could be any animal, what would you be and why?

Ummmmmmmmmmm . . . snake, bird, cat, some sort of big, non-hunted water animal?  They all have it pretty hard actually . . . I like being a human, indoors in the winter and for the most part in control of my life!

Now, play along if you would like and answer these on your blog!