little miss can't be wrong (according to her)

god help me if sweet cheeks is going to behave this badly for all of her 4th year. the girl is more than just bad... she is time-out for 6-7 times a day, hit you and kick you, 'i'm my own boss' kind of bad. what happened! seriously stressful.

**

while trying to regain my sanity, i was looking on etsy and came across this fun site for tees, onesies, and hoodies. the seller is pudge. cute ones for both genders.

out then in

do you like jcrew? have you seen their newest catalog?

if yes, then you have seen a lot of something that was once in style, and i guess is again. and quite honestly, i am not sure how i feel about it.

do you know what i am talking about? katie holmes does, as i have seen her sport this look recently.

it is rolled pants!





how do you feel about it?

i so remember this look from years ago. i was probably in the 7th or 8th grade when it was at its height. i was so happy when boot cut and flared legs came out, i swore i would never go back to any thin legged pant again. the wider legs just looked better on me (and most women for that matter). last weekend i bought a pair of jcrew matchstick pants! surprisingly, i love them. probably because they are stretchy. i guess all the rolled pant is doing is bringing the skinny leg in for those who already have so much vested in their straight leg, flared, and wide leg jeans. makes them a bit more versatile i guess.

will you roll (again)?

i don't think sweet cheeks will. she is quite the fashionista though, so i could be wrong.

4 years old

yesterday sweet cheeks turned 4 years old. how on earth did we get here? where has the time gone? really, it was just yesterday that the husband and i were rocking sweet cheeks to the sound of our oven vent or running bath tub trying to calm her colicky nights. now i am the mother of a lip gloss collecting, purse carrying, smart with a little sassy attitude 4 year old.

she started the day with a candle and chocolate donut while the husband and i sang happy birthday. she blew out the candle, ignored the donut, and went right for the gifts. she got the barbie peek-a-books from us. her choice of course.




sweet cheeks and i then went to claire's to get her ears pierced. we got there, and she changed her mind. she has now decided to do it when she is 5. she got a purse and chap stick instead. i was fine with that decision.

later that day, my parents came down to celebrate with us. sweet cheeks tried on her new soccer uniform for them, and decided to go outside to play for a bit. she, the husband, and her grandpa played for a while. so much that sweet cheeks worked up a sweat. didn't know she could do that! it was so cute watching her play. she is really going to enjoy it on saturday with all of her friends.







we ended our night (in her 3rd outfit of the day) at our favorite tuesday night pizza place. it was a great time, and the restaurant even sang 'happy birthday' to her.



after pizza, sweet cheeks always hits the gumball machine. every week she hopes for pink but never gets it. until lasts night! she actually got a pink gumball! she was so freakin excited over it. it is the small things in life sometimes.



sweet cheeks with her grandma and grandpa (notice her mouth full of pink gum)



happy birthday to my one and only sweet cheeks, the girl who made her daddy and mommy the happiest and proudest people in the whole world. what a big accomplishment for someone so small!

florida or bust

so sweet cheeks and i took our first long road trip together. we left on thursday for a 6-hour drive to florida, a first for sweet cheeks. we went to visit my girlfriend, molly, of 20 years (holy cow do i date myself) and her family. she has 3 children, evan-4, elizabeth-6, and ethan-7 1/2.

i was pretty nervous heading out on to the road with a toddler. not just any toddler. my toddler, an only child who needs a constant playmate! how on earth was i going to entertain her and drive at the same time! in the end, i didn't have to. she really did an amazing job of writing, coloring, playing, and watching a few movies. when she did get antsy, we would just take a pit stop for some gum. it buys me some quiet time and puts a smile on her face. well worth it. i was quite impressed with how well she did traveling. she was just as brilliant on the return ride, which consisted of car trouble and 1 hour in traffic.


while in florida, we did lots of playing, playing and more playing. ok, well the kids did. molly and i did lots of sitting and chatting. i will treasure that time.

on friday, we took the girls out for a birthday treat. sweet cheeks turns 4 this tuesday and elizabeth turns 6 on thursday. we took the girls out for lunch, shopping, and a movie, which we didn't finish as it was a bit spookier for sweet cheeks than we expected. elizabeth kindly volunteered to leave the theatre with sweet cheeks and i, telling her mother that she could stay to finish the movie if she wanted to. (we were seeing 'race to witch mountain.' too funny!) the girls then exchanged birthday gifts. it was a great girl's day out.


here they are at the outside play area. elizabeth would gladly stop for my pictures, while sweet cheeks gladly ran away! (notice the new necklaces both girls picked out for themselves from gymboree, our first stop in our shopping trip)



elizabeth is a beautiful girl who did such a great job playing with sweet cheeks while we were visiting. she even gave up her bedroom for us for the 4 day visit.


we had lunch at johnny rockets. the girls enjoyed their shakes-




molly and elizabeth-



saturday morning, the kids all rode their bikes outside. i wish we lived on a quiet, flat street so sweet cheeks could ride her bike more often.




this was the best i could get of all 4 kiddos together on their bikes-



bubble time for sweet cheeks, evan, and elizabeth-



sweet cheeks and evan. he is only 6 weeks older than sweet cheeks, but a good 2-3 inches taller and about 10 lbs heavier! what a cutie he is with such beautiful eyes.


thank you so much molly and family for having us down for such a great visit. we will definitely come back (if you'll have us).

baby you can drive my car

i was recently doing a little on-line "looksie" for a friend of mine who is pregnant with a boy. i sent her several links of some really great finds for a nursery. so kind of her to let me do so, as i absolutely loved doing it!

this was one of my finds. how great is this car mobile! i absolutely love the shapes of the cars, as well as the prints & colors. it could easily work with any color or themed room.

you can find it at the hip infant.

the fresh maker

i am probably the last one to know about the mentos soda geyser. i was at a really cute new stationery shop in the highlands called paper source. (love this store!) they sell so many beautiful things, but they also sell lots of quirky kids items. the mentos soda geyser was one of them.



i knew sweet cheeks would have fun doing this experiment (as well as eating one of the mentos) with her daddy.

set up-



putting in the 7 mentos-



blurry pic but you can see that the diet soda actually goes pretty high up-



**

she will be 4 in one week and one day but she still has tantrums!

just a swingin'

the husband, sweet cheeks, and i, along with some family, went to the circus a few weekends ago. ever since, my child is continually trying to "perform." and by perform, i don't just mean entertain. the girl is trying crazy things. she asked me the other day to hold one end of our dog's tie-out cable, the other end being attached to the tree, while she walked on it. (the tie-out's are for when we are in the front yard playing so they do not run off, not something they are always on. my girls are strictly inside pets) i told her though the tight rope walker made it look easy, it really wasn't. the fact that it wouldn't really hold her up anyway was besides the point.

the husband put up a make-shift swing in the front yard for sweet cheeks after he grew tired of seeing her try to swing from the dog's cable. immediately, as soon as she got onto that swing, the tricks began. kneeling, standing, legs out high, legs out low, one handed, backwards, on her belly, she tried it all. thankfully so far, no injuries have resulted. the funny thing is that she is so serious about it. she really thinks she can do it. needless to say, she is quite entertaining to watch.






thought i would get some pics of my other girls, blue and bodi-



we all know i can not cook. anytime the husband is away for dinner, it is always a toss up as to what sweet cheeks and i will eat. our choices are usually limited to spaghetti, ravioli, soup, hot dogs, or sandwiches. not a vast selection. so last night i gave her the chore of selecting what our menu would consist of. she chose macaroni & cheese, edamame, and cream cheese & jelly on toast. nice variety right. so i let her make the edamame and sandwich. the edamame is just microwaved but she loves doing it all herself, even loves sprinkling on the salt. i toasted her bread, but she was in charge of putting the cream cheese and jelly on herself. she worked very hard for about 10 minutes to get that cream cheese to cover the toast. in the end, she made her own sandwich and ate half of it. that is good for her.

glory days

this weekend was absolutely beautiful outside. we had to take full advantage of it by doing a lot of outside activities. sweet cheeks did some scooter & bike riding, ball playing, as well as her barbie jeep riding. she is doing much better driving her jeep these days. she occasionally still forgets to look forward, comes close to crashing, and then scares herself out of riding anymore. she then offers me a good excuse as to why she can't keep riding, such as "my legs are tired." she makes me laugh so much.

here are just a few of my favorite pics from our outside fun on saturday-





sweet cheeks with bodi outside. she is sure giving our dogs a run for their money lately. we are continually telling her to ease up on her hugs and stop strangling them. they do great with her though and she sure loves playing with them.


saturday evening, the husband, sweet cheeks, and i met my sister, her husband, and 2 kids out for dinner to celebrate the two husbands birthdays. it was such a fun time. the food was pretty tasty but the company was the absolute best part. considering we were at the restaurant for 2 hours, the kids did a great job of behaving as well.

thought this picture of sweet cheeks with one of her cousins was a cute one. i wish i would have had the waiter take a big group shot! why didn't i think of that then.

tones of home

a post not about sweet cheeks. this is rare.




i was in the 11th grade when my sister went off to college. i, jealous, remained at home. thankfully she was good to me and let me come over often to visit and stay with her. she was kind to do so considering i still had braces and the only make up i wore at the time was eye liner. i will quote gary jonas for when i describe my eyebrows, "they looked like they were drawn in with a sharpie." why didn't i pluck my eyebrows till i was 18! i loved being with my sister, and felt beyond cool because i was hanging with her and her college friends.

it was during that time that my sister introduced me to the band dinosaur jr. we listened to the cd 'where you been" so much that year. i fell in love with the song "what else is new," and could listen to it over and over. even after graduation from high school, into my early twenties, we would listen to that band when we were hanging out or when we were partying like rock stars. ahhh.. the parties, the fun, the craziness. a short period of time in my life when i rocked at playing quarters and late nights were so easy to do.

on my way to work this morning, tired of the humdrum monotony of the radio, i decided to listen to a cd. what did i put in? dinosaur jr. i haven't listen to that cd in quite awhile, but of course hadn't forgotten any of the lyrics. while i sat in my car at what seemed to be a very LONG traffic light, i really listened to the cd. i was surprised when i found myself questioning if dinosaur jr was good music or not. his voice was a bit odd and cracky. why was i drawn to this music back then, and why do i want to listen to it now?

i think what it all boils down to is memories and what i am comfortable in. i loved that period in my life. i loved living with, and being with, my sister and best buddies nonstop. you know who you are. i loved my new found freedom, though i was still quite responsible. it was such an amazing time in my life. one that i do not want to forget. so i think it is totally the music of that time that i like to associate with because it is the music that turns on the memories for me. they play so clearly in my head when the music is on.

it isn't only dinosaur jr the evokes this feeling. oh no. there are so many bands like pearl jam, rage against the machine, nirvana, weezer, green day, mazzy star, rem, the cure, toad the wet sprocket, fiona apple, oasis, veruca salt, the cranberries, and blind melon.

that is all i can think of at the moment.

i guess the point that i am questioning is whether some of the music then was good or was it what was going on at that point in my life that made it good, and makes it enjoyable still?



(funny how the sound of music can evoke the good memories but the smell of liquor can evoke bad ones.)

enjoy the silence

in less than one month sweet cheeks will be 4 years old. it has been a slow transition from baby to toddler to the big girl she is now. you would think that because it has been a slow transition, it would be easier to handle. it really isn't though. and there have been things taking place all along preparing me for the little girl she now is from the helpless infant she once was. i am still unprepared.

the husband and i used to feed sweet cheeks with a bottle while walking around holding her as up right as we could. night time feedings were always the roughest. i or the husband would feed her while in bed, but weren't able to lay her down for a minimum of 20 minutes after feeding her due to her reflux. it was so hard to stay awake then. my head was heavy and would drop to my chin many times in harmony with my eyes closing. though it was most often my fear of her falling off of me while i slept that kept me awake. sweet cheeks doesn't eat much still to this day. though she does feed herself (with much coaxing) and sits in a big girl chair.

sweet cheeks didn't sleep in her crib for long. during the times she was sleeping in a crib, it was rarely a full night. her nighttime feedings lasted till she was 11 months old. we put her in a toddler bed at about 18 months, then to the twin bed by 2. all with the hopes that she would suddenly sleep well, and on her own. it only took the husband and i 4 years to get it right, but sweet cheeks actually goes to sleep on her own right now.

i have also done something i didn't think was possible, even with her getting so big. i finally turned off the baby monitor. i know it sounds simple, even a bit silly, but it was not an easy thing for me to do. we have a video monitor. from day one, i grew attached to that monitor which allowed me to constantly look in on my sweet cheeks when she wasn't in my arms. the sound soothed me. about a year or so ago, with a nudge from the husband, i started trying to sleep with the screen off. it wasn't easy but i did ok since the sound was still on. i was strangely comforted by the fact that, even though we share a wall between our bedrooms, i could still easily hear sweet cheek's nightly sounds and calls. it has been almost 2 weeks now since i turned the monitor off. i miss it. i definitely can't hear her as easily as i could when it was on, but i am adjusting. i do not want to admit it, but i have actually been sleeping pretty well without it but the fear of missing something doesn't go away.

the baby gate will be the last baby thing to go.

has anyone else had such a hard time giving certain baby related items up?

a sunday in the snow

i have seen so many posts and blogs over the last 24 hours of family and friends capturing the main event of our winter in ga. snow. holy cow. we never get snow here. we have heard the weather channel predict it for us many times and always end up with the same result, rain. yesterday they were actually right. we had quite a bit of the pretty white stuff fall and stick. sweet cheeks and her siblings, bodi and blue, frolicked in the snow for a good 20 minutes. seriously, i haven't seen my shepherd move that fast in a long time. the dogs were in heaven. the snow was so wet and slushy that we didn't stay outside for long. sweet cheeks and her dad did get to throw a few tiny snowballs at each other.






**

check out these crazy cool but not so classic sheets for a crib or toddler bed that i found at kool roomz from a company called pixel. i think they would be fun for a toddler but despite the fact that they are different, don't think i would put my baby boy in a crib with these sheets. might be a bit scary for someone so small to see these odd fish coming at them!