Before & After

So last night we picked up the couch and got it all situated. Now, we measured the couch and how it would fit and we knew it would be big, we just didn't anticipate it being THIS big, I was rather frustrated last night, but it is what it is- however I was hoping that the couch might have shrunk some last night, but when I woke up it was still the same size. Note to self- next time do not just merely measure the length, but also the height, and width. The room is not huge, so we will probably end up putting the couch downstairs once it is finished for the family room, and it will be perfect there. (I probably should have written this post after I had the couch for a few more days)

Before~

After~

What Happens...

When you give a kid a chocolate chip muffin?

Wouldn't you like to do this whenever you got the chance? (well, maybe not~) But Parker sure enjoyed those muffins!

CLOSE call...

So today is our garbage day~ Downstairs I had gathered some larger items to throw away, so I opened the garage door to take it all out. Parker was upstairs playing with his cars while I was throwing the garbage away. While I was doing that, Parker came downstairs and apparently while trying to open the door -he locked it. This has NEVER happened before, I came back into the garage, shut the door, went to the door to go inside and it won't open- I can hear Parker crying because the door isn't opening and I am instantly panicking. I am trying to talk to Parker through the door, trying to see if I can get him to understand to turn the latch, trying to see what I can do to get this to work. The front door is always locked, so that isn't an option. I am praying frantically to somehow open the door, help Parker understand how to unlock this door, Parker is getting more and more frantic and I decide to call Joe- now my cell phone is in the house, so I to run to the one of my neighbors house, she isn't home, so I run to another neighbors- Elizabeth, and she is home- she probably thought I was a little crazed as I was like, "can I borrow your phone, Parker locked himself in the house!" She was so nice to let me call Joe and Joe was trying to figure out what to do, because we haven't ever had a spare key, and if he comes home it will take at least 30 minutes. He remembers that one of the windows in the basement is open as we have a cable running through it for the internet (until the weather is better and we can run it through the roof), So I thank Elizabeth and book it back to the house, run to the backyard and open the window like a pro burglar- the basement door was shut so Parker couldn't see me coming in so I opened the door and just grabbed Parker- he was quite distraught, his face was red and splotchy, tears streaming down his face, his shirt was all wet from crying and I just held him. I was so grateful that everything worked out and that Parker was ok. I felt quite exhausted after the whole ordeal, Parker took a nap because I am sure that he was quite exhausted too. Note to self- get spare key and keep in garage.

So SmArT! 10 things...

So, I am sure all moms think this, but I really do have to say that Parker just amazes me at how bright and smart he is. Here are some things about him that just make me wonder where he learns all of this.

1. If you ask him to put something in the garbage, right then and there he will put whatever it is in the garbage.

2. You can ask him where any object is and he will either go and get it, or (another thing that amazes me) is he will come and get me by saying "mom" and point to where he would like me to go. I will ask what he needs me to get and he will take me where he needs me to go and will point to what I need to get for him.

3. He can climb on ANYTHING- he just recently learned how to climb on the dining "room" chairs, this is no small task- we have the bar stool height table and chairs.

4. I am so interested in his thought process- he will line up like 12 cars on the window sill in his room and rearrange the cars - you can see him study the cars and VERY specifically move the cars in different orders. That seriously amazes me, when you can watch him choosing the car...anyway...

5. He is very good with buckles, like on his car seat- he is quite fascinated by them and will make sure that you do not forget to latch it together, if you don't, he will (not that I have unintentionally- I just watch him to see what he does)

6. He is crazy good at coloring, he is definitely a righty, and will move his wrist to create different lines, etc. He will take one crayon or marker at a time, use it, and when he wants another color, he will put it back in the box and grab the next color. He also puts them back the right way, not upside down.

7. He is getting A LOT more vocal, he loves to point and jabber away- I wish I knew what he was trying to say.

8. He knows EVERY facial feature- such as eyes, nose, hair, ears, mouth, tongue, eyebrow, forehead, cheek... he will point to most of them on his self, except for nose and eyes, he will point to those on me : )

9. If his hands get dirty and I tell him that we need to wash his hands, he will run into that bathroom and I will lift him up to the sink, he will turn on the water, I will put soap on his hands, he will rub his hands together and when he is done, turn off the water. I will put him on the floor and tell him to dry off his hands and he will dry his hands off on the towel.

10. He is so cute to fold him arms. You can either say, "Can you fold your arms" Or "It is time for prayer" and he will fold his little arms. TOO CUTE!

WOW! This kid amazes me! These are just some things that he does that totally amazes me. I can't figure out what I am doing for him to figure all this out, I am glad that he is though! He is so wonderful and we are so grateful for him.

FaCeS

It is amazing how your kids develop their little personalities, and how they just know how to do things, or sounds to make. Parker makes little grunting noises when he tries to lift something heavy, or push something. He also makes HILARIOUS faces when he tries to squeeze something as you can see in this video below~

PaRkEr & JoE

Here is an adorable picture of Joe and Parker from his sister Janet's wedding. It is SO adorable!

FiRsT hAiRcUt!

So, the day finally came, time for Parker's first haircut- I had been debating on this for a while- but I didn't want his hair too short, however there was NO way I was going to attempt to cut his hair by hand. This posed a problem because it seems like most hair clippers only go to a #5 which was shorter than I wanted. So we went to my parent's house for dinner and they had a clipper set with a #8- it said it was about 1" so I thought that would work. He had to be held by my mom, and was fine as long as he was using the clipper brushes to use on her (thanks mom!)and it really didn't take too long. It was a little sad as I clipped the first lock of hair, but it turned out super cute!

Sorry the pictures are a little blurry- he wasn't being too cooperative : )

A tribute

To my grandpa! I figured I'd better write about it today, cause tomorrow might be kinda busy. He was born on Valentines day- FUN huh!? He isn't here for us to celebrate it, but I just wanted to write a little note about him. He passed away almost 3 years ago (March 4th) and Parker's middle name is his first name (James). He was an awesome grandpa! He was always joking, and had a few songs he made up for me and would sing them when I came to see him- of course the older I got- it embarrassed me and I would try to get him to stop, but deep down I was glad that he would still sing them.

There aren't enough words or things I can say about him- and honestly I try to not really think about him too much, cause it still hurts, but I am ever so grateful for the time that I did have him in my life, it does give some comfort to know that when someone you love passes away that it isn't the end, of course the sadness is still there, but it does give some hope still too. I love you grandpa, and am glad that you were in my life!

5 Years Ago...

I got in an accident- yes, it was February, Friday the 13th. Typically I am not a superstitious person, but I was this close to not driving anywhere today. (had I not needed milk, I wouldn't have) Anyway, I had a 96 Honda Accord (my fav. bodystyle) and needless to say it was totalled. It was kinda my fault- but I didn't get a ticket! Anyway, because the car was totalled we got the Montero Sport that still have and it worked out great. Anyway, just something that I was remembering that I thought I'd share.

Television~

So question of the day- What do you have to watch to get Parker interested in the TV?

CARS of COURSE!

The other night Joe was watching a show about offroading and jeeps, etc and Parker was quite mesmorized by the cars- He kept on pointing and saying "Car, Car" It was funny!

YuMmY!

So, I went to an Enrichment activity where Lindsay taught us how to make bread, now just to let you know, up until that point I was HORRIBLE at making bread, I would always kill the yeast, or I wouldn't knead it enough so it was really dense, etc. So I decided that I could use this class. So this was a fantastic class, they used this recipe that from start to finish you can make bread in 1 hour- that INCLUDES the raising time. So using this recipe you can make like 50 other dishes, so I decided to make homemade cinnamon rolls. They started out like this

Then after they raised they looked like this

Then after they baked they looked like this-

And once they were frosted they looked like this~

And boy were they YUMMY! Plus I made them, and they turned out! They were super easy, and they didn't take a lot of time. So anyway, sorry for those that are trying to eat healthier, this probably doesn't help...

Oh, and I showed the pictures I took to Joe and he was like GREAT the life of a cinnamon roll, glad we have it documented (But he really liked them, so it was all good : )

Yay I won!

So earlier I did a post about a giveaway on a friend's site- Busymommy.us and wouldn't you know- I WON!! Yay! I am excited~ Not that I need it right now, but eventually I will.

Oh, and isn't my new header SUPER cute too?!?!?! I didn't do it myself, but it looks FANTASTIC!

We are a 2 SUV family!

So Joe has a car! Well, we have actually had it for about a couple of weeks, but I am now getting around to posting it : ) It is a Jeep Cherokee- a silver gray color. I will take a picture of it when it is here and post it. I am so glad- We also just got a sectional couch- YAY! Well, it is not here yet, they have to make it, but hopefully it will be done this weekend. We have been without seating for a while, and the floor is not comfortable to watch TV on. So it will be like this couch-in red, but be the colors of the one below. We are super excited! It was a little more than we were hoping to spend, but we figured that we would rather get one that is the one that we really want as opposed to getting a good deal, but not really what we want. Now this couch was still a really good deal, just a little more. Although, with all the things we have been selling, in addition to the babysitting, I have almost covered the amount of the couch. Anyway, it will be our Valentine's present : ) And one of our few pieces of "GrownUp" furniture. Like I said in the 100 thing about me, I love other people's home decor, but have NO idea how to do mine. One day...

And his first word is...

Yes, his first word is "car" not really mama or dada, he kind of says those, but not like car. The other day I was going to cook a frozen pizza (yes, I was tired!) and he was pointing to the box and saying car, and I was like, No, this is pizza, then I looked at the box and there was a car on the box. Gosh he is good! Another thing, we have to make sure that when we put things on the counter that they are as far away from the edge as possible otherwise you get this...

(yes those are finger holes in the chocolate cake) or you might get this...

This is what happens when you get all of the ingredients out to make dinner and suddenly you can't find the butter. You might also find this...

Yes, he is sucking the spices off of the spatula. Earlier though he was using his finger to scrape off the spices and then licking his finger. He is such a fun little boy who also loves to help mommy do this...
You don't know how proud this makes me! He loves to help vacuum : ) He is such a helper!

He is so good at putting things away. If he is playing with something that he shouldn't, you only have to ask him to put it away and he does! CRAZY! He has also just today had another tooth come through. It is on the side, so I am not sure what type of tooth it is.

One of the reasons...

Parker is such a cutie! Look at his adorable daddy~ Now, I think it is quite OBVIOUS which one is Joe, but just in case~ In the both pictures he is in the cream color.

PiCtUrEs

These pictures were taken when Joe's sister got married. I think that they turned out SO cute!