This Month's Snapshot: February 2012

Hello there!

I've been trying very hard to keep up with my blog, and I think I have an idea.,

You see, my sister got married last week and moved halfway around the world.  Or, erm, to Denver.  Which is halfway around the world to me, so long as my sister is there.

At any rate, I've thought of a way to keep my sister updated on life here in The Fort, *and* keep up with this blog.  Whoo!!

My plan (oh please, ADD, try not to interfere), is to post these monthly snapshots, showing the highlights and everyday goodness of the month in words and...... wait for it...... snapshots!  Bah!  I crack myself up.

Anyway, I'm going to go ahead and get started with our February snapshot.

February 2012

The obvious highlight of this month was my sister's wedding!  On February 18th, Michelle got married to the perfect man for her.  She and Chris packed their bags and moved all her things to Denver this past week, where they're setting up their new household.  I'm so happy for my baby sis!

Oddly enough, I don't have any of my own photos of the wedding.  "Why?" you ask.  Because I was in the wedding, plus I had a toddler who was in the wedding to wrangle, plus I had a 3 month old nursling to tend to.  Those extra moments when I would have grabbed my camera and taken a few shots were taken up with fixing toddler hair, feeding the baby, and trying to wriggle myself into shapewear.  But I'm confident our photographers did an awesome job, and I can't wait to see the proofs!

In addition to the wedding, we had all the wedding festivities, which included me getting to hang out with some awesome bridesmaids, and some of Michelle's friends who I don't usualy get to see because they live in Texas.  You know what was really cool about this?  All of Michelle's bridesmaids knew and like each other.  How often does that happen?  I had a lovely time with all the girls.


Let's see, what else has happened lately?

We had an awesome piercing time just the other night!  Erica is now rocking a new nose-ring, and Sarah got pierced as well.  I'm not telling where.  AND I TOOK SNAPSHOTS!! (must contain my enthusiasm, must contain my enthusiasm.....)

Here's Erica getting her nose pierced.  It looks awesome!

 Sarah has the super secret piercing.  See the fancy curtains?  They demand my silence.

All in all it was a good trip.  I declined to do any body modifications on account of thinking it might not be wise to intentionally make my body heal from anything given that a) I had a baby not all that long ago, and b) said baby relies on my body for ALL of his nutrition at present.  Maybe this year my Christmas present to myself will be something fun!

I did make one major change to my appearance this month.... I got bangs!  I haven't had bangs since I was 12 years old, but man!  They look goooooood! (well, I think so)

And now for the small child update portion of our report.  Heeeeere's the kiddos!


Miles is super cute, as per usual.  Here's the little dude, taking a ride on my back, where he prefers to be carried.



Little guy is full of smiles and generally still a chill, happy baby.  He can roll over now from his tummy to his back, but otherwise most of what he can do consists of sitting there, eating, and creating diaper laundry for me.  Poor guy.  But he's doing really well.

I'm telling you, he's an old soul.  Loooooook into his eeeeeyyyyeees.

                                        

Norah is her typical 3 year old self.  Her new favorite thing to say to me is, "Why are you being so mean to me?!?!?" when I've done something awful such as instruct her to finish her yogurt before getting a different snack or demanding that she wear pants (or a skirt) in public.  Horrible, I tell you.  Horrible.  Here she is, wearing pants in public.  Aren't I awful?

She is also starting to learn her letters and numbers, which I think is pretty cool.  Her favorite books right now are the Olivia books, particularly "Olivia and the Missing Toy", which we got from the library.  She constantly wants to watch TV (I think she gets that from her dad), so we have been battling on that.  I will let her watch a show or two a day (depending on if it is a long show or a short one), and her favorite right now is Dinosaur Train.

Norah is on a mad banana pop kick right now.  You probably don't know what a banana pop is, but I'm going to tell you!  Banana pops are bananas, cut up and put on sticks, rolled in yogurt (greek vanilla honey this week!), and then rolled in other goodies - this would be whatever I have around the house - and then put in the freezer.  At present we have abandoned granola that D apparently forgot about, graham cracker crumbs, and tiny chocolate chips.  Mmmmm.  Norah wants to eat about 20 of them a day, so around noon I once again transform into the horrible mom who is being so mean to her.  And so it goes.








Yes, this is the life I chose.  Srsly.  I'm not kidding.  Aside from apparently being the meanest mom on the planet, it's actually pretty good.

Feel the power of the banana pop. You know you want one!

                                     

And, some other stuff happened.  Let's see, what else....

*Grandma turned 80 and had a party!  I don't have any pics, but it was a nice party.  Norah and I split a steak.  How cool is that?

*Curt and Mallory moved in together.  Mike kind of lives there, but also stays part of the time with his uncle, who he is a caregiver for. 

Hangin' with my bestie.....

*Mallory had a birthday party!  Nicole and I were accosted by strange men wanting to know what we looked for in a bar.  We didn't have the heart to tell them we generally look for gay bars.  When we reported to them that we preferred rock music, they proceeded to tell us about this awesome country bar we should go to with them.  Hrm?  Also, that awesome thing happened where the two drunkest people in the room always find each other.  Once they did, Mike and Meghan put on quite the dance show.  Rock on!  Oh, and I did take pictures of that party.

......and my other bestie.

Bex and Meghan, ravishing as usual.

Happy Birthday, Mals!

Well hello there, ladies!

All the shoes in this photo are mine, but not all of the legs.  Freaky!

Lastly, I'm trying to make some changes in our health here at home.  I threw out all the sugary candy and now all we have is dark chocolate.  I'm not entirely sure dark chocolate is better for me than a tootsie pop, although it probably is, but I can stop after one piece of dark chocolate, so that's what we're going with.  We're also trying to cut back on grains, and right now the goal is to replace one grain-y snack/side per day with a fruit, vegetable, or dairy product.  Currently popular are cottage cheese and apple slices, and this week we took a chance and tried a blood orange.  Pretty good!  .  I also took my very first Zumba class this week with Carissa.  It more or less kicked my ass, but I'm excited to go back. I am now the proud owner of yoga pants, so I think I'm ready for more.

That's all I can think of for now.  It seems like quite a bit, but it has been a busy month.  Michelle, if you're reading, I miss you already.  Sending you my love.  And in case you didn't see enough cuteness already up above, here are a few more pics of the kiddos.

Nom nom nom.... must eat muffin before the crazy woman takes away my grains!