Yum, Yum

1. I could really go for some King Cake right now! I was always the lucky one to get the baby...love that stuff. And don't even get me started on Pan de Muerto. Every year living in Mexico when I saw it out in the stores, I would get giddy...and then eat it almost daily during the whole Pan de Muerto season as I like to call it. I really need to work on my baking skills...I have an irrational fear of baking. I did make a mean batch of banana bread a few weeks ago, should have boosted my confidence.

Maybe it is better for my figure that I don't bake...I know it is better for my husband's figure. Don't tell him I shared this, but for Valentine's I made some cupcakes (box mix, doesn't count as real baking) 12 cupcakes and 2 cute little heart shaped cakes. I had 2 cupcakes and about half a heart shaped cake and it was all gone in 2 days. Oh...and my kid doesn't eat, remember. Just sayin!

2. I seriously am loving Maine though (despite the lack of my favorite baked goods). This whole living on a beach looking out the window at a quaint little old New England town...I could get used to it. We have discovered some new areas up the beach from us that are picture perfect, PERFECT. I need to get some pictures to show off. I am looking forward to our adventures of getting to see so many areas of the US...moving not so much.

I mean...how perfect is this, right in front of our building. The tides here swing like crazy. You can tell that high tide covers this whole picture. So when it is low tide, we like to go wander under the pier. So cool...but the Maine beach wind can be a bit painful!

3. We have a full blown couch hog on our hands. Not just couch, but anything you sit on hog...well he really just does it to me, he sits sweetly next to his daddy. It drives me nuts! Anytime I sit down, Tate climbs up on the couch and MUST get behind me. He then uses his freakishly strong for his small frame legs to try to push me off. If I am sitting on the leather chair, he succeeds and I fall off. So the only time mommy can sit comfortably is when Tate is sleeping.

This is a picture depicting it cutely...generally it is not so cute. But the couch hog is wiggling his way in to ensure mommy is not the slightest bit comfortable!

3. In more Tate related news, the kid loves his daddy. He has starting to acknowledge his daddy by saying "dada". When my phone rings, he says "dada" (I guess he thinks only 1 person calls mommy), when he sees daddy's picture on my phone, when he hears the front door open, and also still just as random babble...his favorite syllable! The important part of this is that it is not just the cute "dada", but more of a deep, monster-like, growl. I have no idea what made him start growling it, seriously! It is cute but kind of creepy in public and in nursery I'm pretty sure he is the weird little boy who growls at the other kids!

He is just making sure I know who his daddy is. I am in the process of trying to capture the growl speak on video, but the kid is quite video camera shy.

4. So you would think, or at least I thought, that living in coastal cold weather would diminish the dry skin factor at least a bit. Not for me! My hands are getting pretty close to the need to be amputated state of dryness. Could be from all of the exposure to water...change diaper, wash hands, clean up mess, wash hands, cook, clean kitchen, wash dishes, give baby a bath, wash face. You get the idea. It is a problem.

5. Speaking of cooking, not to brag...okay, actually to brag...I have been kind of a cooking boss lately. Pinterest has become my best friend, a bit of a time waster, but also really helpful in the kitchen. I have been planning out meals 2 weeks at a time, shopping, and cooking like a dadgum chef! It is great and I am bragging. The husband loves it too...he is a well fed man.

6. I now have enough time between myself and my last haircut to talk about it. I must have a sign on my head that says, "Ignore everything I say and cut lots of choppy, short, mulletish layers into the back of my hair." Freakin hate it! So I have been wearing my hair up a lot more often these days until the layers grow back to a much less awful, fixable state.

One of the few pictures of me and my cute boy...I am always behind the camera. Oh, and me with my hair up.

Our Water Bead Experiment!

I had never heard of water beads but read about them on a great blog for play ideas, so I decided to find some and give them a try. I read that they can be found at the dollar store, but I didn't have any luck there. I know people who are really into them also order them off ebay in bulk for cheap, but since I was just getting started I got mine from good old Wal-mart! You can find them in the floral decorating section (should be by the craft stuff), apparently they are used to put in vases and look pretty...whoda thunk!?!

Anyways, I got 3 packages...yellow, blue and green (I read that the red ones can stain), for $2 each. They are tiny little things and I think come 100 to a pack. They are non-toxic but not recommended to eat, obviously, I doubt they would digest well! My little non eater didn't even try to put one in his mouth, he prefers crayons apparently.

We tried the yellow first, here they are ready to "grow"! You soak the package in 1.5 ish liters of water for 4ish hours. The "ish"es are because I don't really remember and don't want to go look at the package! But it really doesn't matter exactly how long or much.

This was after an hour and I though I did it wrong somehow...not much progress :(

But 4ish hours later they had soaked up pretty much all the water, I drained the rest off and we were ready to play!

You mean I get to touch these?!?

This picture is his first time squeezing one with all his little might, which is where the mess comes in...they can kind of bust with that much force from Super T leaving a gel-ish mess. I like my ish-es!

Lots of scooping and transferring. Those are his favorite things to do with lots of little things these days.

Then he went for the one-by-one by hand move, which worked nicely and neatly for a while.

More scooping...

We ended with full on both hand flinging...the camera went away because this clean mommy had a small panic attack! He started stepping on them busting them...a large mess ensued! I am glad he had so much fun, but I now have a shower curtain liner to put on the floor for our next adventure. And, I am planning to bust out the light box from the previous post too...how cool would water beads on lights be?!? Stay tuned for pictures from that. I will everyday be working on my mess anxiety to have pictures of the whole process...flying things and all :)

Inside, cold weather fun!

So, we live in Maine, and it's winter...cold. That means we can't go outside and play all too often. I am not a big fan of having Tate watch too much TV. He never cared about it at all until recently. Now he will pay attention, and actually enjoy a few shows...Disney Jr. stuff, and Backyardigans (he loves those little dancing, singing creatures)! Anyways, I try to limit the TV to a bit in the morning a occasionally in the afternoon if I need to get dinner together and he just doesn't want to let me!

We have been trying fun new things inside and Tate has been having fun exploring. Most activities geared towards "toddlers" are still too advanced for him, so I look for things that will be Tate approved!

This is actually a very recent picture of an outside activity with daddy that I just had to post. I was feeling under the weather, so Tate and daddy went for a walk on the beach on a sunny, warmer day. Obviously daddy doesn't care too much about matching...Tate's outfit was all over the place! But I heard the outing was a big success...running from waves and all!!

This is a common activity while mommy cooks. Tate loves to be in the kitchen with me, so these are his noodles and measuring cups. He scoops, moves, and sometimes tries to eat the raw noodles! It really works to keep his attention and I think he enjoys that fact that he and I are doing the same thing at the same time.

Shaving cream with food coloring for bath tub finger painting! This was the first time, which you can see, most of the painting was done by me...he hasn't quite mastered spelling his name yet. He mostly prefers to paint himself!

This is our homemade light box. I got this idea from a great blog called play at home mom...they have lots of great ideas (many more that I would love to do and have done, just need to get some pictures). The actual light boxes are pricey $50 and up. I made this for $5...proud of myself! All of Tate's toys are so much cooler to him on here. He loves when I pull it out. We usually do this in the evenings before bedtime. It helps to calm him down and he really studies each thing, especially the water bottles filled with items (buttons, glitter, coins, etc.).

I found these vinyl boxes at Dollar Tree and they are great for the light box and he loves them all day to put cars, balls, puzzle pieces, really anything in. The pom-poms are from a sensory bin that needs more work...but he loves pom-poms and loves them even more on the light box!

Reading! The kid loves books...especially ones with cars, trucks, tractors, trains, things that go in them. I have found good simple books at dollar stores for learning objects and words. He loves those types of books and they seem to really be helping him...he is starting to point at more and more things when I ask him!

Coloring! Tate is getting much better and much more interested in coloring. Lately, I know when he is done because he will set all the crayons down, survey his work, and clap! I guess that means the masterpiece is complete. I put the paper in a cookie sheet to keep the paper and crayons from falling on the floor a hundred times during the coloring process. He doesn't care that it is there and it makes his art time last a lot longer because he doesn't get frustrated or distracted due to loosing his crayons!

I made some playdoh from a simple recipe that is edible (but not tasty) and uses koolaid to color it and give it a nice smell. It has taken Tate a few times playing with it to actually use his hands to manipulate it. He seems to really enjoy it now though. We use some kitchen tools and cookie cutters and have some fun!

Water beads!! Another idea from play at home mom. If you don't know what these are, you should check into them...maybe I will do a little post on them cause they are super cool and so fun! See how excited Tate is about them?!?

This is after a lot of playing with them by Tate, daddy, and mommy...don't judge, they are really cool! If anybody wants to know more, leave a comment and I will do a post, I have more pictures including pictures of them "growing"! Seriously, they are cool...kids of any age 1 and up would love them! They are a bit messy, but fun!

Another, in the kitchen activity, putting pom-poms into different sized holes in a butter container! See what I said about him loving to put things in the vinyl containers. I have really started to try to become resourceful in re-purposing things to make activities for Tate. I have found that he enjoys exploring things like this butter container just as much, if not more than, his toys sometimes. So Tate and his mommy are on a new explore and learn adventure and we are having a lot of fun so far...with so much more to come!!!

Now see what Tate thinks about all the fun we have been having...

"Gee, thanks mom for cutting holes in a butter container for me!"

"Oh...and I might actually eat a snack for you if you bring it me on my couch, in an ice cube tray all cute, and turn on some Backyardigans!"

I am up for anything to get this kid to eat. Apparently changing it up a bit and giving him a snack with each bite in an ice cube slot worked...at least for today!