Summer Running

Well I am 10 weeks out from my 1/2 marathon and this last week I came into a bit of a running slump. I was tired, overwhelmed with life and running took a bit of a back seat. To get out of this slump, I have set a new and crazy summer goal! By the end of summer......I hope to run to each of the 5 towns surrounding my town and back to my house :)

Now some of these towns are not too difficult to get to. In fact, I have already run to one of them and it was only 3.5 miles round trip :) The furthest town is about 10 miles round trip and that run will be very hilly....I am saving that one for last!

I know this seems like a very silly goal but I find that I like to run with purpose. I hope to knock off town number two this weekend. That's the one thing I really want for my birthday today...a nice long run followed by a nice long shower (maybe I'll get to shave :)).

Enjoy the weekend and Happy Birthday Mom (yes we share the same birthday, my maternal grandfather shared it too!).

They Are Growing Up So Fast!!!

My little baby bird friends are growing up so fast! Today was a big day for the clan....the babies left the nest for the first time and have been hanging out in the tree branches. They are so cute! One of them is right near the window and so we have been staring at each other all day.

Z can see them all now! He sees the dad (he's so bright) coming in and out of the tree with food and can see the babies moving around. I showed him this clip of a bird hatching and he was very intrigued. We have been talking about how baby birds come out of eggs but I think I am beating a dead horse :) I was not able to find little birds for his nest but I did order him this but I don't think that will help either. Oh well.

I am sad to think that in a few short days (maybe sooner) my bird friends will vacate their temporary home and go to live in the yard. It has been so much fun for S and I to watch them hatch from little eggs and grow to be the little birds they are today. I hope that next year we are lucky enough to have birds lay eggs in our tree again. This has been so much fun!

"Should We Let Him Cry it Out?"

This is a question many parents of a young child deal with. At six months we bit the bullet and did let Z cry it out. It was painful but the best thing for our family. No one was sleeping and Z had to be bounced on a bouncy ball for 30 minutes before he would drift off to sleep. Our backs were killing us and babysitters who liked to bounce were hard to come by :)

When Z turned 15 months, he was weaned and he finally started to sleep through the night. Usually (knock on wood) when he is crying it is for a reason (dirty diaper, hungry, thirsty etc.). But there are times when we just need to let him cry himself to sleep.

The other night we took Z to the doctors for a rash he had had for a week. It turns out it was an allergic reaction to either a bug bite or our new laundry detergent. The doc recommended Benadryl and said that it should put him right to sleep. She said there was only 1% of the population who did not fall asleep and got a bit hyperactive. I shared with her that I was in that 1% of the population and we all looked at Z. We hoped he did not inherit that bizarre trait from me :)

The first night he had the Benydryl he went right to sleep. S and I breathed a sigh of relief at this. The second night, our baby became a drunken fool on Benydryl with no alcohol! He was stumbling around and quite crazy. We put him to bed and he would not sleep. He was up for over an hour talking (not too unusual) and then he started to cry. S and I thought he was just over tired and I told S to let him cry it out. Well the crying became screaming and S looked at me and said, "Should we let him cry it out?". The screaming became louder and then he announced that he was going to get him.

Z sat with us in the dark watching TV, quite content to be with us and enjoying Last Comic Standing. At one point S looked at him and said that he didn't look right. We turned on the light and immediately saw that Z was covered in BLOOD! What the H-E double hockey sticks was going on?

S got a cloth to wipe away the blood from his face and arms. I noticed it had come from his nose (third bloody nose for the kid in 2 weeks!). It was all over his shirt and so S went upstairs to investigate. He came down from Z's room with the very bloody sheet in his hand and explained his theory of what had happened (CSI style). He thinks that the medication made Z a little loopy and that his sippy cup of water (which he always keeps on the crib rail) fell and hit him in the nose. My theory was that he just hit himself in the face on the rail of the crib in his drunken state and that caused the bloody mess.

Whatever the cause, the poor baby was cuddled with love and rocked to sleep. I was so full of guilt and shame for having suggested that we let him cry it out! I remembered my sister's story of when she was going to let her daughter cry it out one night and just happened to look at the video monitor only to find her daughter being strangled by her blanket! So I guess the moral of the story is, when they are good sleepers and they are screaming...go check on them!

The Babies Are Here!!!!

It is hard to tell from these pictures but the babies are indeed here! I couldn't see them for the first two days of their life but now they are poking their little fuzzy heads up and opening their beaks for food :) Momma and Papa Cardinal have been working around the clock to keep these little guys fed. I only see two but there may be another one out of sight.

Since the birth, the nasty black crows have been hanging around the front of our house. They wait for Mama to leave and they try to make their move. I spend much of the day opening the front door to scare them away. I haven't had to run out and chase them yet but I will if I have to. I want these babies to grow up to be big and strong cardinals :)

Z doesn't really know what is going on. I think he has seen Mama sitting on her nest but I am not sure. I took his mama bird and we built a nest with Easter eggs in it.

We talk about how Mama is keeping the eggs warm and soon baby birds will come out of them. He looks at us funny and takes his Mama bird and runs off with her. I am going to go out and get some little birds to put in the eggs so that his eggs hatch too. Then maybe...he will get it? I know he is only 21 months! But maybe he will absorb some of this great knowledge that our cardinal friends are providing ;) He did make this happy bird below.

Remember Grass Heads???

We decided to each create a grass head last weekend. Look how well they are doing. S's is the scary one, Z and I worked on the middle one and I have the one with the long eye lashes ;) It was a really fun activity for all three of us. I am not sure who had more fun!

Update on Life

Well it has been crazy busy over here in our world. We had a fantastic 4th of July weekend! The weather started off iffy but ended up great :) We attended a friend's BBQ, saw amateur fireworks (which Z loved), I ran a total of 9 miles, threw a family BBQ on the 5th and had the in-laws stay over night. We had so much fun :)

Monday my mom came with us to Tide Pool Class. It was sooooo much better this time. Now that Z has his ocean book, he actually had a clue (sort of) as to what was going on. He identified "sighweed" (seaweed), clams, kelp and of course rocks! He loved being able to be in the water this week and really enjoyed the long weapon, I mean NET they gave him :) The teacher found a lobster in the tide pools for us to see and it was that it was regrowing it's front claws! So cool!!! My mom really enjoyed the class and we were thrilled that she got to come with us.

I was looking at my calendar the other day with my mother in-law and she commented on how full it is. I have been thinking a lot about this and yes it is full but full of fun things to do! Summer is so short and there is so much that I want to do and experience with Z. There are water parks to go to, beaches to dig on, tide pools to explore, friends houses to visit and our very fun ocean Kindermusik class :) The way I see it, we have all of July to run around like crazy people and come August we will be playing at the lake all day for 3 out of 4 weeks! So if life wants to be fun and crazy right now, that is okay....in August we will be nice and lazy!

Finding a Reason to Celebrate....

I love holidays!!! When I was a teacher, we would celebrate every holiday there was (didn't want anyone to feel left out!). Every year we counted down the days to Elvis' birthday, celebrated Opening Day at Fenway Park, had a very large Charlie Brown Thanksgiving and even had a day long celebration of Summer where we turned the classroom into a Summer Camp :) My friend K nicknamed me the Christmas Elf....I think the Holiday Elf would be more appropriate ;)

A few months back I took a baseball away from Z because he was starting to damage our home. It was S's ball from when he was a kid and I started to read the kid like writing on the ball. It was the game ball he had been awarded on July 8, 1991 during his All Star game. He had made the last out with a tremendous double play (he caught the ball and then tagged first base) and had been awarded this ball. He had written the details of the game on the ball and I could just imagine him beaming at it, in his room after the game. It was then that I decided we would surprise S with a celebration of this event.

So I have made posters and hung balloons. A ball park menu has been designed for the party complete with hot dogs (really tofu pups), soft pretzels, french fries, beer and sports ice cream bars. Z and I bought him a Red Sox game ball and I wrote "After 17 years you are still a MVP and All Star!" I can't wait to surprise him tonight :) I love a good party and he is one man that deserves a party every day of the year!

Here's to celebrations and holidays! Cheers!!!

Happy 4th

Tide Pooling is Not For Everybody

Well this past winter I signed Z and I up for a Toddler Tide Pooling Class. All winter and spring I dreamed of the two of us in summer garb exploring our local seacoast. I love the ocean, have a zoology degree in fact, and couldn't wait to pass this love on to my son.

The morning of our first class I packed our backpack, lathered on the sunscreen and told Z all about the fish we were going to see. We drove the hour to the coast and we practically skipped into the center. There we met the most wonderful and enthusiastic teacher. She greeted us with a big smile and didn't even mind that we were 20 minutes early!! We started in right away on the warm up activities (coloring, making binoculars out of toilet paper rolls and exploring shells) and Z was really having fun. The other kids started to arrive and I couldn't wait to get out and explore. This was going to be everything I had been dreaming about (you probably know where I am going with this....).

About 5 minutes before class was to start, Z was getting restless. He was done with all of the warm up activities and wanted to run around and explore the center. I don't blame him, there are lots of fish tanks, a touch tank and lots of cool pictures to look at. So I took him off to see the sights before our class began. This may not have been a good idea.....

When class finally was about to begin, I had to drag Z back to the class kicking and screaming (which was so embarrassing). He finally calmed down with the "Hello" song (he loves music) and even sat quietly through the next song. After that he was done....he went to the window and called out "Water! Water! Water!". I tried to explain that we would be going out very soon.

The teacher brought out the next activity which were two really cool touch tanks. One was filled with crabs and the other periwinkles and sea urchins. Z wanted nothing to do with them. He was the only child who did not flock to the tanks and touch all that was inside. He wouldn't even touch the water (he LOVES water!!). He kept saying "NO" over and over. Oh well I guess he doesn't share my love for sea creatures.

When it was finally time to go outside, Z sprinted for the door. I chased him and tried to keep him with the group. He wanted that water!!! However, the water was on the other side of some rocky cliffs....not too safe for a 21 month old. The days walk would end at the top of the cliffs, looking in tide pools. This was not good enough for Z! I spent the next 35 minutes trying to keep him safe and distracted as he tried to find a way to get to that water. The teacher tried so hard to pull him in and he wanted nothing to do with her. She would put a cool shell in his bucket, he would dump it out. The only thing he liked were the rocks. I guess I could have save a whole lot of money by letting him play with the rocks in our yard!

I finally tried to reason with my not even two year old and told him that if he looked in the tide pools we would go to the beach and go in the water after class. This finally worked (although I had to keep reminding him of my promise).

I left the class not sure of what to think of my experience. It had been a gorgeous day and would have been so much fun if Z were a little older. I had to remind myself that he is only 21 months old and if he doesn't find periwinkles and crabs exciting that is okay. We have three more classes and I have decided to take a new approach. I will now follow his lead, if he doesn't want to look at sea life, we will go and look at what he wants to look at (even if it is rocks :)).

I made him an ocean bucket filled with all of his ocean books and toys so that he could explore before our next trip. I also made him a book about the animals he saw and the class. He loves the book and the bucket and can now identify kelp, seaweed, lobster, sea star, clam and sea horse....not too bad!

So we will see how next week goes, next week we will be at a different spot and he will be able to have his feet in the water the whole time if he wants. I think that will be a lot better :)

Happy 4th of July Everyone!!!

Mama Cardinal

We made an important discovery this weekend....a mama cardinal is nesting right outside of Z's playroom window. It has been so much fun to watch her. Papa is always close by and keeps good watch of his loving wife and their 3 eggs (at least that is all I have seen).

I took this picture and against S's warning...used the flash. This scared mama and she took off. I spent the next 2o minutes worried that she would not return to her eggs. I thought about how difficult it would be to care for the three little eggs and then three baby birds. I do not think I would make a very good mama bird. At last she returned and I (and S) breathed a sigh of relief. Z and I did a little dance to celebrate her return (Z had no clue what was happening but enjoyed the dance all the same).

Z does not really know what is going on, it is difficult to see Mama unless you know what you are looking for. I did put his bird stuffed animal by the window and when I say Mama Bird, he points to her.

I will let you know when the babies hatch....I can't wait to become an auntie!!!