Murder Trail and Parking Meters

Today was a beautiful sunny day so Boston and I wanted to get of the house and enjoy the weather. I had heard about a walking trail through my play group and decided to try it out. It's a couple miles around a pond and I was picturing a paved, wide open area with a pond in the center. So we drove there, parked, got in the stroller and walked to the trail head. We walked maybe 50 feet onto the trail before I decided it just wasn't going to happen. It was very backwoods in the middle of nowhere and I didn't see the pond. We may live in the safest state in America but I'm still not going to fly solo with the baby down murder trail. So we went downtown instead.

I parked at the meter and as I'm getting my change out to pay, a parking police dude came up and asked if I had ever done this before. Why yes, sir, I've used a parking meter before... I politely told him I had but he still took my money and inserted the quarters for me, checking to be sure every coin was accepted and then even topped me off with an extra quarter. So either I was looking good today or I look like a dope, because surely I can handle paying my own meter. We strolled around and checked out some shops then headed to the grocery store.

I hate our grocery store. It's the cheapest place in town which is why we go there and things are normally good quality, but it's also extremely busy and full of interesting characters. I'm used to having people stop and comment on the baby, which is cool. I mean babies are super cute, and he's cuter then most (yeah I said it) so I expect it. But today we couldn't get anywhere. Between the mass amounts of old people and my child hamming it up for anyone who cared, it took forever to get our shopping done. And people kept touching, which freaks me out. They want to touch his cheeks and his hands and his feet. Baby skin is awesomely soft, but we don't touch random babies. One lady even was stroking his little hand and telling him, "I love you, yes I do. I love you!" over and over and I had to politely stroll away as fast as possible. It took everything I had not to start yelling, "Stranger danger! Stranger danger!" But he loves it, so I'll allow it for a short time longer. I know I'll be sad the day I take him to the store when he's just a regular old kid and no one stops us to say how precious he is.

Rinse and Repeat

Last night was one of those nights. Boston thought for some reason it was time to play at 2AM and would not take the hint that we weren't getting out of bed. So it was a very long night. I woke up miserably tired after only a couple hours of sleep, while he was ready and rearing to go. When I finally had time for a shower that I desperately needed, I wanted to make it quick. Shampoo, rinse. Conditioner... that's weird, it was bubbling like crazy. I guess I didn't rinse well enough. Okay so rinse, really well then conditioner. Wait, it's still bubbling... wtf is happening?

Several minutes of serious contemplation later, I realized I'm a moron and just put a different kind of shampoo in my hair. 2 extra times.

At least I'm super clean. Sigh, I need my brain to work again.

If you’ve been paying attention to the news at all, you’re aware that the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee is this week. In England there are a ton of events going on in honor of this event and I’m pretty bummed to be missing it all. I’m one of those that finds the royal family to be very fascinating, though I didn’t always feel that way. When we were stationed in the UK in 2010 and the news of Prince William and Kate’s engagement came out, everyone was so excited in anticipation of the wedding. At first I didn’t get it, I thought it was kind of silly to treat a wedding like such a huge event even if it was for the royal family, however some friends invited me to tag along to London for the event and parade and I figured why not? As the date approached I became more excited and by the time April 29^th rolled around, I was beyond stoked. I had royal wedding fever.

The crowds were insane. Millions of people were there and it was nearly impossible to get through to certain parts of the parade route. At one point my good friend and I had to break away from our group to find a different spot to watch the parade because at the time I was 17 weeks pregnant and too nervous to shove my way through hundreds of people. I really thought we’d get trampled. So we wandered on and found an amazing spot on a balcony and we saw everything firsthand.

It was magical. I know that probably sounds really lame, but it had a way of sucking you in no matter how hard you fought it. By the end of the day I felt like I was part of a Disney movie. The atmosphere was eerily enchanting. You’d think having that amount of people in a relatively small area, some who were not fans of the royal family, that something awful was bound to happen. I know there were some protesters but I didn’t see a single one. All I saw was a group of people united by and entranced by the love Prince William and Kate share. Their vows were played over loudspeakers in real time and as they were spoken, millions of people were silenced. Once the ceremony finished, everyone cheered and rejoiced and joined together singing their anthem.

My friend Sarah and I in the middle of a shut down Westminster Bridge

I’ll never experience anything quite like it again, and I still feel really privileged to have been there. So I’m really bummed to not be taking any part in the celebrations for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. But I hold the memories of the Royal Wedding really close to my heart and I just really wanted to share that today.

Congrats Queenie, 60 years is pretty damn cool.

*All photos are my personal  photos 

First Word

Boston said "mama" today! I've been dying for him to say it already and he finally did and now I can't stop smiling. Proud mama right here :)

Monday Listicles

I frequent a few blogs that do daily blog hops and I really have enjoyed the Monday Listicles so I thought I'd try to make it a regular here. FYI, chances are I won't do this every Monday but I will make an honest attempt. Today's topic chosen by Stasha at Northwestmommy is 10 words to describe your home. If you know me well, you'll know I'm not a big fan of my current house but given certain circumstances we'll be here for a little while and I'm trying to make the best of it. Here's my home in 10:

1. Loud - My baby makes a lot of noise. I yell a lot. My husband farts loud and plays loud video games. So it's pretty noisy here, you don't come to this house for peace and quiet. 
2. Messy - I'm a terrible housekeeper and it's obvious when you come to my house. I make a semi honest effort but cleaning sucks and is a lame way to spend your time when you only get a small window of personal time each day. And that darn baby never picks up his junk so there's toys all over the house.
3. Squeaky - My dryer squeaks. And when my washer is running, my whole house rattles since it's pretty small. I have this baker's rack in my kitchen that shakes and squeaks against the wall. And occasionally as the house "settles" my doors rattle and squeak. It's really annoying when I'm trying to watch E! True Hollywood Story
4. Tiny - We live in a very small house with minimal storage space. We've had to get creative about storage and we've also been pretty lazy about it sometimes too which is another reason for word #2
5. Sticky - Baby hands on everything equals a lot of stick, combined with #2 and the fact I hate mopping, it's kinda sticky here. 
6. Furry - My dog sheds everywhere. She doesn't even have that much fur, she's just a Jack Russel but somehow her hair ends up on everything. Sometimes I find her fur on things she hasn't even seen or touched before, 100 miles away from our house. It's ridiculous.
7. Old - I don't know that for sure but I'm going to give it a wild guess and say our house is ancient. Our cabinets are very old school and our old stove was a safety hazard so I'd say it's a good guess.
8. Comfy - Our couch is properly broken in and we have an awesome recliner. Our bed is pretty amazing too
9. Silly - We like a lot of goofy things here. My husband acts like a mature 7 year old, my baby is a total goob, my dog is the dumbest Jack Russel I've ever encountered, and I can't say I've grown up much since high school. 
10. Love - There is a lot of love in this house. An amazing man I've had the privilege of being with for a decade, the most precious and wanted 8 month old you'll ever meet, and a dog so dumb you can't help but love her... Yep, there's a lot of love in this house. 

College Drop-Out

I spent last night and today scouring the UNH website trying to figure out what I needed to enroll in classes. I studied 2 years at the University of Alaska Anchorage right after high school. I ended up dropping out to move to Illinois to be with my then boyfriend who is now the husband, then when I planned to go back to school there, said boyfriend turned fiance decided to mix things up and join the air force. So I planned to go back once we moved to our base. The military decided to shake things up and we got stationed overseas. At the time I didn't know how to go about online school (still don't) and thought maybe I still wanted to be a teacher, in which case I would be entering my observation years and that simply wouldn't work. And then while overseas, I got knocked up (planned) and life shook things up and we ended up in New Hampshire.
So I became a college drop-out. Which has bugged me every day since. But now that Boston is a little older, I think I'm ready to go back to school. The problem for the past few months was deciding what to do. Now I have settled on a bachelors in social work, however the UNH website is not college drop-out/mommy brain/dummy friendly and I can't figure it out. So Tuesday I'll be going in to talk to them about enrolling and praying to God I can get in this fall and do some general ed classes online.
Anyway, during all of this I felt what I believe is my quarter life crisis. Feeling pretty shitty about being almost a quarter of a century old and still having no clue what I wanted to do with my life. Being nearly 25 with a family depending on me and not having a degree or any relative skills for life. Even worse, the majority of the things I'm interested in at this point are pre-med and take years and tons of commitment and time, plus many require school out of state and that's something that isn't an option for me at this point in my life. It's kind of a bummer. And trying to enroll in college again and use my head for the first time in 4 years felt like a great idea until I realized my poor brain has melted to practically nothing in the 4 years I've wasted drinking too much wine and watching reality TV all day. So many cells lost out on Teen Mom and Real World that I can't navigate my way around a university website.
Just a warning for anyone wanting to drop out and say, "Oh I'll go back later"; don't be a dummy. Just get your degree and be done with it because life will get in your way if you give it the chance. And your brain will go to waste. You may end up on Swamp People if you aren't careful.

It's been awhile

I don't know why I keep pretending I'm a great blogger. Or that I'll blog about the same general things or on a certain schedule. I know all too well that I have a horribly short attention span and will never be able to commit to a recipe only or whatever type of blog I originally had in my head. And I think I originally intended to write this really inciteful blog full of tips, awesome recipes and methods to deal with kids but realistically I don't know shit about anything yet so I'll stop pretending. Okay, maybe that's a little harsh but I can't pretend I'm an epic baker when I made some gawdawful biscuits that tasted like nothing, or like I'm some super awesome montessori mom when my son is 8 months old and I still don't know how to get him to sleep in his own bed. I've been away from the blog so long that blogger changed the whole set up and as I'm writing this thing, I'm not entirely sure I'm typing in the right spot. This might be a big waste of my time right now.
So I figure if I'm going to actually update this blog on a regular basis, I'll just write my random ramblings and garbage.
Today's garbage will be some minor catch-ups on our life. Boston will be 8 months old in 2 days. He's still doing a funny army crawl and probably never will do a normal crawl but that's okay because his is just as effective. He also learned just a week ago how to pull himself up to standing so now that's all he wants to do. All day long, pulling up on hampers and toys and my leg. Clawing his way up, stretching out my shirts and yanking my hair. He is such a little character and I'm loving this age he's at.
Stella thought it would be cool to climb the baby gates over and over again, and the dummy tore her nail almost all the way off the quick so she had to have it removed and is now sporting a goofy cone on her head. Dogs with cones are hilarious, and even though I feel really bad for her, I can't stop laughing about it.
I also have a sewing machine and I've been doing little projects all week. Today I upcycled a shirt, I'll blog about it later. It's pretty fabulous though.
That's all today, maybe I'll get back into the writing mood and post here more often.