Dentist!!!

Today was Charlotte's first dentist appointment! Now, before anyone "gets their panties in a bunch" about why Charlotte did not go to Dr. Cannata for her first dentist appointment, let me explain. Charlotte LOVES her grandfather...loves! I was concerned that she would go to the dentist and freak out, she has reacted poorly in the past to her dad and her grandpa wearing masks...so, it was a real concern. So, if that was to happen, I wanted it to be with a stranger and not at someone she loves and trusts. Can you imagine if she hated it and then we were at Thanksgiving dinner and she just kept glaring down the table at the "bad man who poked at her teeth??" So, I wanted to keep that separate...for now. When she is a few years older and more comfortable with the dentist, we will switch and transfer over to Dr. Cannata's practice :) Rest assured, Kevin and I are still loyal patients :) She checked out great! No cavities and no lasting damage from her 3 year long affair with the pacifier.

Getting cozy in the chair

Watching Sesame Street on the flat screen on the ceiling

All done! Showing her sparkling teeth and her set of pom poms as a prize!

Sanity

Sanity, I have found you and thy name is "gym daycare."

Ah, but I get ahead of myself. Lately, I have been dreading the mornings, dreading. Usually, mornings are a new beginning, a chance to get the day off on the right foot. For me, mornings are becoming torture...and it's all because of a certain soon-to-be 2 year old little boy. He has decided that his wake up time is promptly between 5-5:30am. Yes, you read that correctly. I am not even sure stock brokers are up that early. Sometimes I am able to bring him into bed with me and he will go back to sleep...but by 6-6:30 he is up for good. Fine, whatever..I can deal with being up early. I don't like it, but I can get over it. But, it's his ATTITUDE while he is up that early. He is SO crabby! Seriously, kid, no one is forcing you to be up this early, if you want to go back to bed, be my guest. Then by 6:30-7:00, he is SCREAMING for "eggs toast." I am so not in the mood to be cooking breakfast that early, but eventually he wears me down and I make it. This is where the real fun begins. As I am scrambling eggs as quickly as humanly possible, he is hanging off of my legs (no exaggeration) and screaming and whining the entire time. He CAN NOT get food fast enough. Plus, all of this screaming and whining is bound to wake up Charlotte and God knows, she isn't a morning person. It is SO aggravating. The constant screaming...sometimes I just want to look at him and scream, "Dude, I'm making it as fast as I possible can! I can't change the laws of physics and make eggs set faster." or "Do you see me screwing around over here or do you see me frantically trying to fix your breakfast??" Then, he will inevitably scream for juice, milk, whatever. By this point, the cup of coffee I have made for myself has been sitting under the brewer for 20 minutes because I can't take 60 seconds for myself to add splenda and creamer to enjoy it. I hate the mornings. Hate.

I am about at my wit's end with this. It makes the rest of my day horrible. So, today...I had had enough...I couldn't take the whining (because he is overtired). So, I packed the kids in the car and headed for the gym. A desperate move. I have belonged to said gym for months. I have gone twice. I knew they had a great daycare called the Kidzone that I had heard wonderful things about. However, some of you may remember my last experience with gym day care while in the city. Charlotte was 9 months old and screamed bloody murder the entire time I worked out. I tried a few more times, but I just couldn't take it...it was too hard to watch her on the monitors screaming and crying. So, I never tried again. But...today...I was about to lose my mind and I needed to release some stress (and get back to the gym...holy lord I need to get back in shape and drop a few).

I checked in at the front desk and paid my $6 dollars for one hour of freedom...a small price to pay. It would have cost me less to buy a punch card with 20 prepaid visits, but with my luck, they would hate it and it would go unused. So, I paid full price for my trial run. As we got to the day care, I saw one little blond boy who was screaming his little lungs out. He was a like a little toddler prisoner screaming for his mom and the tears were streaming down his swollen red cheeks. I felt horrible for him, I did. But at the same time, I was like..."Kid, you are gonna scare my kids...get it together!" But, I held my ground...I need a break and you kids are going to stay here. Both kids took off running and didn't look back....fabulous! So, I went and hopped on the elliptical and opened my iPad to read The Help. But, I couldn't concentrate...anytime someone walked by, I was sure that it was someone coming to get me because Nate was hysterical. I got a great workout in, just not much reading. So, about 45 minutes later, I decided to head back and assess the damage. What did I find?? Char was coloring with a little girl that she had gone to summer camp with and Nate was snuggled up with a 70-ish year old woman who was reading him books. When I tell you that I had to drag them to the car kicking and screaming, I am not exaggerating. They were furious that we were leaving! Charlotte cried the entire way home because I am a mean mommy who made her leave and that our house is boring!

This is an amazing discovery...It's a win-win-win.....I need a break, I need the exercise and the kids love it. The women there were so nice. They were like, "Come back anytime..call ahead and we will save two spots...is this the time you would normally come?? This is a good time, it's really busy around 9:00" So, if you need me some weekday and you can't find me...check the gym, because I am sure to be there enjoying my newfound freedom and some much needed ME TIME!

Picture Catch Up

Sorry, readers...I just haven't felt very "bloggy" lately. I have been consumed with other things and I just haven't felt like updating...and a few people have called me out on it. Ugh, I apologize :) Here are a few pics from what we have been up to:

We've been outside enjoying our new swingset!

This is Nate being pouty because he wants me to lift him down...he won't go down the slide, he's scare of it. He goes down slides at the park...just not this one. I think the "twistiness" of it scares him.

Climbing the rock wall

Finally a smile!

Nate always cheeses for the camera for mommy!

Look who's swimming in Uncle Jon's pool!!!

No more scaredy cat for Charlotte!

Having fun in the pool with Uncle Jon

Glad she beat her fears...so proud of her!

Charlotte and I went to the St. Agnes fest on Sunday for a while to help support Grandma's school. Here is Char getting a rainbow painted on her face.

Look at that GINORMOUS piece of cake!!

Even she is shocked!

This is what happens when you don't check the garden close enough. You find an 18 inch cucumber hiding in plain sight!

Huge!

It's half the size of Nate!

Today was Charlotte's last ballet class and the parents were invited to come in for the class and take pics. I didn't know about this because Aunt Emily took Char to class last week. Sooo...thankfully I had my camera in tow. But, I also had Nate in tow. For some reason, I grabbed my iPad on the way out and he was pretty good! He was a great audience member :)

Here is Char and her friend, Abby

Nate was mimicking the girls and doing his own moves

This was during the "Itsy Bitsy Spider" dance. Char was the sun..so when they said, "Out came the sun" she popped up and danced around.

Char was hiking up her skirt because she knew that it irritated me. I would motion for her to fix it and she would hike it up higher and laugh.

Trying to do an arabesque

They were doing a dance to "Rock a bye baby" and Nate laid down on the floor and pretended to sleep! Such a cute nugget!

Char smiling for the camera. She was pretty good with ballet, but has trouble listening and has her own agenda...it was a little embarrassing. I don't know where she gets it from..I was certainly never like that in class! :)

Charlotte's new favorite show is Peppa Pig. It's a British cartoon about pigs. She loves it and now walks around talking in a British accent. The other day she asked me to add biscuits to the shopping list. She also wanted to know where the rubbish was and when we were going on our next holiday. I didn't have the heart to tell her that mommy and daddy are going on holiday this weekend...just not with her :) We are headed to a wedding in Rhode Island with my whole family. So, Char and Nate are attending Camp Grandma this weekend and are very excited for her to come and spend time with them!!

Nate is talking up a storm and it's so exciting to finally have "conversations" with him and to understand what he wants or needs. Nate loves talking on the phone and screams whenever I am on the phone with anyone because he wants to say hello. Only, the first thing he says whenever he gets on the phone is, "Hi, I fell down the stairs" in a sad voice. Um, what??? No you didn't!!!! Stop telling every single person that every time you are on the phone!! People are going to think that I am beating this kid!! Today, Liz called and he said, "Hi Liz...I fell off the swingset." Huh???? Oh lord...

Char is really turning into a great big sister. She loves Nate so much and is always looking out for him. She often serves as his translator if someone can't understand him..she makes sure that he gets what he needs. It's so cute!

I have to get better about blogging or even mini blogging. The kids are saying and doing hilarious things now and I can't remember them when I finally sit down to blog...I'll make that my "fall resolution."

Swingset!!!!

We finally did it!!!!! It took 23 hours but Kevin and I assembled the kid's swingset. We were so proud of ourselves!!!!! The kids love it so far. Take a look! Thanks to John and Denise and all of the girls for their help on day one!

Beginning of Day 2

End of Day 2

Assembling the slide in the family room

The victory pose!

All done!!

The back view

Lots of blood, sweat (tons and tons of sweat...I mean, we made 6 pitchers of crystal light one day!) and tears....but God help those children the day they tell me that they are "too old for the swingset!"

When we got back from Michigan, our garden was BUZZING!!!! Look at some of the things we pulled out of it this weekend!

Cherry Tomatoes

Charlotte holding an heirloom tomato...HUGE

Cherry tomato plant

Eggplant!

Michigan 2011!

Wow...where to begin!!! First I have to tell you that I am in utter shock that it is August and my little baby girl starts school in a few weeks. I am having major emotions on that one...but that's for a later blog post. As you know, we spent that last week in New Buffalo, Michigan and had a fantastic time!! We rented a house right on the beach (private beach, no less!). For what the house lacked in moderness...it definitely made up for in location! It was so great to get away for a few days and just have fun. We spent a lot of time on the beach and in the lake. WE went blueberry picking and had the best time! The only drawback to the whole trip was that it was so difficult to get the kids to nap and sleep. First of all, Nate is still in a crib and there was no crib in the house. So, they were both sleeping in unfamiliar beds in an unfamiliar house...so, it was a struggle. Aunt Liz and Aunt Emily and Mike came up for a few days, so it was great to have a few more hands on deck...and we had some great board game battles after the kids were asleep. Emily and I are the reigning champs...no disputing that! Remember earlier in the summer, when I said that I hoped that, by the end of the summer, I would be laughing about the fact that Charlotte wouldn't get in the water....yeah, she's over that nonsense!!! She would have gone into Lake Michigan by herself if we had let her....so brave!! I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story of our trip!

Nate and Charlotte playing on the beach

The Nugget

Um...where do you think you are going, miss???

Char and Dad swimming in Lake Michigan

Nate could have played in the sand all day. He loved just dumping sand into the bucket and then dumping it out.

Charlotte got bitten by some kind of bug...that bump was HUGE! And, that sad little face..she kept asking Emily to scratch it for her...so sad!

We went blueberry picking and it went over better than when we did it the first time 2 years ago!! Charlotte loved it, she was all into picking "the biggest and best ones"

Nate was great at picking them too!!

Helping daddy pick blueberries!

Such a beauty!

Nate shoveling them in by the handful...he was an expert at eating the blueberries. He was loving them!! (mommy wasn't loving the diapers for the next few days!!)

We went down to the beach for the sunset one day..it was so much fun!

Dad playing catch on the beach

We can never get a good family shot! Char is always fooling around.

Out for ice cream before Liz, Emily and Mike left. Char cried for a half hour after they left :(

Dad and Nate with their ice cream comes

Char got strawberry...of course. She prefers to eat "pink" ice cream

Yum!

Having a great time!

My favorite picture from the vacation!