Atticus - Mommy - why do you keep saying "school"?
Me - I'm sorry babe, I keep forgetting.
Atticus - It's not school, it's CAMP.
The kids started summer camp at the JCC yesterday. I thought Wren would be my easy breezy take it all in stride kiddo and that Atticus would freak out. Boy were we backwards! Wren was petrified and screaming and Atticus said "see you later alligator" and was on his way. I stayed for a bit to watch and see how they did -- and I'm happy to report that by the end of the day everyone was all smiles and flushed cheeks.
A few tears today at drop off for Wren and a few wimpers from Atticus, but I suspect both of them will be happy as clams again when I arrive to pick them up!
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Shoes!
I really feel like the kids feet are growing at an alarming rate. Seriously. We stopped by the mall on Saturday to have their feet measured and it was recommended that we already move up a half size for each kid. Yikes, they literally just started wearing their current shoes! I understand why folks get kid shoes at Payless, especially when we're running through them so quickly. But... that's also how I justify actually buying Stride Rite and other good quality shoes for them while they're young. Don't you want the best support for their growing feet? Oy. Dilemma.
The funny part -- if given the choice between their Stride Rites and their Target shoes -- both kids pick the SR's first. With the exception of Crocs. Everyone loves Crocs. Poor Wren found a pair at the mall that she loved, but we couldn't get the stretchy band over her fat little feet. Ha. How is it that both my kids have wide feet? Who knows?!?
Eh... there's really no point to this post. Just a ramble. In the meantime, I'll patiently wait for another 20% off coupon to arrive from Stride Rite so I can get another pair of sneakers for the two monsters. :) Thanks to Katie, Wren is stocked with size 7 shoes (her current size). I'm not sure why Amy only passed on size 7 shoes - Katie must have been really hard on all her other sizes, ha!!
The funny part -- if given the choice between their Stride Rites and their Target shoes -- both kids pick the SR's first. With the exception of Crocs. Everyone loves Crocs. Poor Wren found a pair at the mall that she loved, but we couldn't get the stretchy band over her fat little feet. Ha. How is it that both my kids have wide feet? Who knows?!?
Eh... there's really no point to this post. Just a ramble. In the meantime, I'll patiently wait for another 20% off coupon to arrive from Stride Rite so I can get another pair of sneakers for the two monsters. :) Thanks to Katie, Wren is stocked with size 7 shoes (her current size). I'm not sure why Amy only passed on size 7 shoes - Katie must have been really hard on all her other sizes, ha!!
Pennies From Heaven
If you've ever seen the movie, heard the song, or read Dear Abby -- you've heard that when someone in heaven is thinking of you, they send down a penny from heaven. I always tear up reading the stories - I know, I'm a sap - but now I may do so even more. Since my Grandpa Mike passed on May 23, 2012 my family has found countless pennies. Dozens. Seriously. I haven't ventured outside of my house yet today, but there are still several hours left for me to find one! And if it's not me, then Atticus I'm sure will have found one today at school. That's just been the way it's gone for the past couple of weeks. Bright pennies, old rusty ones, pennies in strange locations, pennies placed so obvious you have to wonder why no one noticed them before!!
Thanks Grandpa for all the pennies. We miss you too.
This is one of my favorite pictures of Grandma Jean and Grandpa Mike. It's from July 2005 at their house in Georgetown, TX.
Thanks Grandpa for all the pennies. We miss you too.
This is one of my favorite pictures of Grandma Jean and Grandpa Mike. It's from July 2005 at their house in Georgetown, TX.
Monday, May 21, 2012
Bumps and Bruises
I know why my Grandma Jeanne always lived within a mile of a hospital while my Dad and his brothers were small. There is a klutz gene and it runs in the family. Atticus was 0 for 4 on Saturday. He ran his hand along the fence in the back yard embedding several splinters in his fingers. We're still working on removing them. Then he tripped in the backyard onto the porch scratching his knees. Next, in the kitchen (and again later in his room) he managed to hit the same spot on his cheekbone on the counter (and then dresser) leaving a small bruise. Lastly, when we were getting our pajamas on for bed, he said the backs of his knees hurt? We don't know what happened (guessing rug burn from going down the stairs on his tush?) but there were two red marks on the backs of his knees!
Poor guy is falling apart and he's not even four!
Poor guy is falling apart and he's not even four!
Wren Turns 2
Wren's birthday was a rather quiet affair. I baked these awesome (if I do say so myself) Minnie Mouse cupcakes and took them up to her classroom for a small party. Wren of course was wearing her new "2" shirt and her Minnie Mouse ears. We sang Happy Birthday, ate some cupcakes and then headed home a bit early. Of course, since her birthday fell on a Friday - it was off to Trolley Stop for pancakes!
On Saturday, we took her to the park to play. All was going well with that plan until it was time to go. Wren was NOT ready to go and screamed at the top of her lungs for the 3 miles home. And I mean SCREAMED! Otherwise... a pleasant morning. Ha!
Monday, May 14, 2012
Mother and Son Outing
I had to ship my laptop off for work last Thursday afternoon. Since it's a wee bit tough to do work without one's work laptop, I decided to take a Mother and Son outing last Friday. Atticus and I decided to visit the Audubon Zoo. According to the weather, it was supposed to be cloudy in the morning with rain and thunderstorms in the afternoon.
We arrived at the zoo just after 10 am (with the tickets that I printed at home) and it started to drizzle. Atticus had chosen to wear his swimsuit to the zoo in case we made it to Cool Zoo. The rain wasn't enough to deter us -- so we started for the front gates. There were several school buses unloading kids and I asked an employee where to go if we had already printed our tickets. He pointed us in a direction and then we just waltzed right into the zoo. No one checked our tickets??? Atti and I wandered around - we saw elephants, we tossed pennies into the fountain, we started off towards other exhibits. The rain started to pick up a bit so we ducked into the Dinosaur gift shop to purchase a couple of rain ponchos. The really nice employee there gave me the 10% member discount too even though I told her we weren't members yet! Nice. I'll take the $1 savings, sure!! The purchase was more for me since I had the iPhone in my pocket and didn't want it getting wet!! Atticus only wore his poncho for a little bit... It was close to the dinosaurs that we caught our first glimpse of the "blue train". We tried chasing the train for a bit and someone riding told us where to catch it. By now, it was time to take a break from the bears, zebras, rhinos etc and grab some lunch. Inside the restaurant, I grabbed a few things and took my tray over to the employee to pay. The employee rung up our bottle of water, the bottle of apple juice and $1 for our small tray of french fries. She didn't charge me for our pizza or cheeseburger! Ummm, ok?!? By this point, I'm starting to think - either this is my lucky day, or something really weird is going on!! So, now we're fed and on our way to find the train depot we found the Cool Zoo and the Carousel. We watched the water park for a bit - but it was completely empty - go figure, it was still drizzling rain!!! Atticus wanted to ride the carousel and since it was his day, we went for it. We bought our ticket and climbed onto a big green alligator. He had a blast. Next up was getting tickets for the train (which we found out wasn't leaving for another 15 minutes or so...). While waiting for the train, we wandered over and watched some monkeys. Awesome! Then the train arrived. Atticus was thrilled. We actually rode the train all around the zoo just over two times. The driver, Devin, was so nice to Atticus and let him sit up front for a bit and toot the train whistle and ring the bell. The train and all of the golf carts may have actually trumped seeing all the animals.
By now it was raining pretty hard and we decided to call it a day. We had seen almost all of the zoo at this point. We missed the Louisiana Swamp -- so we'll have to do that next time, but I think we saw most everything else! It was a tiring day, but lots of fun. We'll definitely have to do it again.
We arrived at the zoo just after 10 am (with the tickets that I printed at home) and it started to drizzle. Atticus had chosen to wear his swimsuit to the zoo in case we made it to Cool Zoo. The rain wasn't enough to deter us -- so we started for the front gates. There were several school buses unloading kids and I asked an employee where to go if we had already printed our tickets. He pointed us in a direction and then we just waltzed right into the zoo. No one checked our tickets??? Atti and I wandered around - we saw elephants, we tossed pennies into the fountain, we started off towards other exhibits. The rain started to pick up a bit so we ducked into the Dinosaur gift shop to purchase a couple of rain ponchos. The really nice employee there gave me the 10% member discount too even though I told her we weren't members yet! Nice. I'll take the $1 savings, sure!! The purchase was more for me since I had the iPhone in my pocket and didn't want it getting wet!! Atticus only wore his poncho for a little bit... It was close to the dinosaurs that we caught our first glimpse of the "blue train". We tried chasing the train for a bit and someone riding told us where to catch it. By now, it was time to take a break from the bears, zebras, rhinos etc and grab some lunch. Inside the restaurant, I grabbed a few things and took my tray over to the employee to pay. The employee rung up our bottle of water, the bottle of apple juice and $1 for our small tray of french fries. She didn't charge me for our pizza or cheeseburger! Ummm, ok?!? By this point, I'm starting to think - either this is my lucky day, or something really weird is going on!! So, now we're fed and on our way to find the train depot we found the Cool Zoo and the Carousel. We watched the water park for a bit - but it was completely empty - go figure, it was still drizzling rain!!! Atticus wanted to ride the carousel and since it was his day, we went for it. We bought our ticket and climbed onto a big green alligator. He had a blast. Next up was getting tickets for the train (which we found out wasn't leaving for another 15 minutes or so...). While waiting for the train, we wandered over and watched some monkeys. Awesome! Then the train arrived. Atticus was thrilled. We actually rode the train all around the zoo just over two times. The driver, Devin, was so nice to Atticus and let him sit up front for a bit and toot the train whistle and ring the bell. The train and all of the golf carts may have actually trumped seeing all the animals.
By now it was raining pretty hard and we decided to call it a day. We had seen almost all of the zoo at this point. We missed the Louisiana Swamp -- so we'll have to do that next time, but I think we saw most everything else! It was a tiring day, but lots of fun. We'll definitely have to do it again.
Hmmm. This isn't working.
My big plans to post more often seem to be falling by the wayside. It could be that life has been a wee bit busy -- but I will try (once again) to update those around on the exciting life of the Baden family.
We recently acquired a Craigslist find -- a Little Tikes Sand and Water table. Two weekends ago we made a group outing to Home Depot to pick up a 50 lb bag of play sand. So far, the table has been an absolute hit. $25 spent on the table, sand and toys and the kids are thrilled to pieces! Woot.
Other than the bugs here in NOLA (and there seem to be a lot of them) playing outside still remains a favorite for my kids. I still think it's both a blessing and a curse that neither kid is interested in television. I sometimes think it would be fun to take the kids to one of the arena things with Wiggles, or Sesame or Thomas the Tank -- but they have no clue who the characters are! They've never heard of the Wiggles or the Fresh Beat Band or any other shows! That's a good thing, right?
Lots of other random things to update the world on... but I'm going to do a separate post for this past weekend!!
We recently acquired a Craigslist find -- a Little Tikes Sand and Water table. Two weekends ago we made a group outing to Home Depot to pick up a 50 lb bag of play sand. So far, the table has been an absolute hit. $25 spent on the table, sand and toys and the kids are thrilled to pieces! Woot.
Other than the bugs here in NOLA (and there seem to be a lot of them) playing outside still remains a favorite for my kids. I still think it's both a blessing and a curse that neither kid is interested in television. I sometimes think it would be fun to take the kids to one of the arena things with Wiggles, or Sesame or Thomas the Tank -- but they have no clue who the characters are! They've never heard of the Wiggles or the Fresh Beat Band or any other shows! That's a good thing, right?
Lots of other random things to update the world on... but I'm going to do a separate post for this past weekend!!
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