1,200 miles later and we are HOME!

This past week we took a vacation. We had to go to Missouri for Holden's appointment. We decided why not go an extra 7 hours and visit Chicago. Yeah, I know we are crazy!

We were only in Chicago for 3 nights, 2 days but we tried to pack as much sight seeing as possible during that time. Our vacation turned out to be a little National Lapoon-ish (like my made up adjective?). But we still had a great time!

On the way to Missouri, I met up with a friend. I've been part of a message board since I was pregnant with Holden. It is a parenting message board. It started off as a birth club for January 2005 but has branched out to include other Mamas. Four years later we are still an active group. I had never met anyone in person. So we stopped off in Oklahoma and met Megan and her 2 girls: Dacey and Aliza. It was a lot of fun and a nice break from our drive.



After Holdie's appointment we headed to Chicago. On the way I looked up restaurants and we decided to eat at a burrito joint to compare their Mexican food with ours. It was called Jaimico's Burritos. It was a pretty cool place. There was a bar that lined a big window where you could look out onto the city. It was pretty cool to sit and watch all the activity going on outside.

The burritos were pretty good. I don't know if they quite compare with Texas' but that's a hard thing to do! Unfortunately though the burritos were little time bombs waiting to explode in your stomach. Okay that sounds a little gross, but seriously Matt and me both had killer stomach aches that night from those little time bombs.

Oh no, Matt, don't eat it! Don't!


The next day we got up early and were rearing to go... Here is Holden decked out in his baseball attire for the Cub's game we were going to later that day.


We headed to the Lincoln Park Zoo and since we got there a little before they opened we stopped off at the Lincoln Park Conservatory.



I took lots of pictures at the Zoo but I will spare you those since I'm sure you've all seen lions, tigers, and bears... Oh my! <-- That never gets old. Here is Holden riding the Endangered Species Carousel at the Zoo.


Now to the Cub's game. This is where the trip was a little diasppointing. We were SO excited about the game. We got there about 10 minutes til the game started- we tried to get there earlier but when you have to walk it takes a little while. We didn't think it would be a problem since the seats are assigned, or so we thought. We get there and there are NO seats left. Apparently the outfield seating is first come, first serve. Booo!!! Also it was freezing that day. So after a while of sitting on the stairs, freezing out butts off, and having beer drip on us as drunk people walked by we left. It was the 6th inning and the Cubs were losing. That was $95 down the drain...

Holden was happy and excited when we first got there.


It was neat to see the historic Wrigley field..





We only stayed at the hotel in the city the first night. It was pretty pricey, so the remaining 2 nights we had reserved a hotel in a suburb. We drove to where the hotel was and when I went to check in, it turned out we didn't have a reservation there. Matt looked it up on his phone and apparently it was in a different suburb. It was weird though because we are SURE he made it for the first suburb. Never use hotels.com or any of those type sites (we also had issues with Expedia). The traffic was pretty bad so it ended up taking us an hour to get to the first place then another hour to go to the other suburb. Ugh!! We finally arrived to our hotel and found out the reservation was for only ONE double bed. Double Ugh!! Apparently that's what we had reserved but once again we are SURE that we reserved a room with 2 double beds. Anyway, after that dilemma we ordered a Chicago-style pizza. My sister-in-law's friend, who is from Chicago, recommended Giordano's. It was delicious! I think Matt thought so too.. LOL!



The next morning we all woke up so sore. I guess it was all the walking. We probably walked over 5 miles. We took the train back to Chicago for moe sight seeing.

We saw Sear's Tower.


Okay this has turned into a REALLY long post, so I'll end it here... later I'll talk about the rest of our vacation.:-)

The Randomness that is Lauren's Camera

My camera has such a wide array of pictures on it. Here is some of what I just uploaded..

#1) Me being being a dork in the car today. We drove to Hobbs, NM and back to take my mil to pick up a car. I decided to do an improptu photo shoot of yours truly. This picture is contradictory- I'm giving a peace sign, yet I look like I'm going to bite someone's head off... Okaaaay.


#2) I heart shoes very much and love love painted toe nails. Here are both of my loves together. On my feet I'm styling a pair of Simply Vera Wangs (that I scored at Kohls for 90% off, woot!) and freshly painted toes (it's the best I could do while in a moving vehicle!)


#3) The dogs playing in the snow.. (What, snow? Yeah, I told you it was random.) We got snow on Friday. Today it is a beautiful day. Go figure. I guess Mother nature wasn't finished with us yet.


#4) Holden woke up with a rash the other day. We're thinking it is a reaction to his antibiotics, so we have stopped them from now. He had a similar reaction a couple years ago to Augmentin. Poor Baby!




And lastly a cute one... Holden getting his cousin to laugh. *Swoon* Just so much cuteness!

A Quarter of a Century

My hubby turned the big 2-5 today (actually I guess yesterday, since it's already past midnight).

The day started with a breakfast of blueberry pancakes made by yours truly. Holden enjoyed them (and I think Matt did too).


I decided to make Matt a German Chocolate Chocolate cake this year. I had never made it before.. It isn't something I would want to make often- it's too much work! But I think it turned out well.




Penelope came by to wish Nuncle Matt a Happy Birthday. She brought along her Grandma and Grandpa too. Penelope is all smiles these days. I caught this picture of her. Isn't she precious?


Later Matt opened his gifts.




This evening we went out to eat at Matt's favorite place- Outback Steakhouse. I forgot to take a pic of him eating his birthday dinner but Matt took this picture of him and his Mama.


I tried to get a picture of me and Holden, but he wasn't having it.:-(

Three's Company Too

The 3rd demon-eyed dog in this picture is a newcomer to our family. His name is Tripp. We adopted him from the animal shelter last Thursday. We already have 2 big dogs (Max and Chandler- the 1st and 2nd dogs and the above pic). To most that would be more than enough animals, but not for us. I have always loved dogs, in particular big dogs, and had been wanting to adopt another for some time. I finally got Matt to agree so we went to the shelter and found Tripp. We were informed that he had faced euthanization twice. When he first came in they were going to put him down, but decided he was worthy of adoption. By the time we came along he had been in the adoption area for a little over a month and he didn't have much longer. We are so happy that we found him when we did! He has been deemed Holden's dog by Holden. Though I think he is more my dog- he follows me everywhere.

He loves to pull my clothes out into the living room. He doesn't chew them up, he just carries them out and leaves them on the floor. This morning he dragged out my *ahem* bra and I had to take a picture. I figured maybe his ears were cold with the freezing weather we've been having so I wrapped it around his head. LOL!



It wasn't easy finding a suitable name for Tripp. I never realized how hard it is to name a dog! We initially decided on Murphy while we were still at the shelter but when we got home we felt like the name just didn't fit him. Later while discussing names Matt mentioned Bristol, which made me think of Sarah Palin's daughter, which then made me think of Bristol's baby's name which is Tripp. Funny thing is right after we decided on the name I was walking up the stairs and was tripped by Tripp. Also the dog is a trip. A couple days after we got him, we were out running errands when we got a call. The dogs had gotten out- all 4 of them (our dogs and my mother-in-law's dog). We couldn't figure out how they did it. After getting the dogs from our neighbor, we pretended to leave again. Matt stood next to the gate. Not two seconds after we started pulling out of the driveway Tripp pulled the latch down with his mouth and pushed open the gate with his arms. I don't know what is with us adopting animals with amazing skills. We have Max, who can scale a 6ft. fence, and now Tripp who can open a gate. Luckily Tripp's ability is easily curbed with a lock.



Yesterday Tripp had to go to the vet to get neutered. Amazingly he acts as if nothing happened. We figured he would be a little sluggish, but he was just as spunky as always.

The other dogs are getting along pretty well with Tripp. I think he is a good fit for our family. Max and Chandler are like night and day. Max wants to be inside all of the time, only goes outside to potty. While Chandler loves to be outside. Tripp is somewhere in between the two. He likes to be inside more than Chandler, but enjoys being outside more than Max. Most of the time he will go outside and play with Chandler.



Tripp has already made himself at home. Yes *gasp* we let our dogs on the furniture. He is a typical Pointer and wants to do whatever people are doing. He takes the "part of the family" saying to heart.

Sweet Sleep

I mentioned last week about my sleepless nights. Thankfully all is back to normal! *knock on wood*

I've been trying to sort out my pictures (a very long process). They are organized by dates, but I wanted to have them sorted by other labels too (Holden with Daddy, Holden with Toby, Holden and Penelope, Holden Sleeping, ect.) Funny how all those titles have Holden in it. LOL!

While looking through my pictures I noticed A LOT of sleeping pictures. I never realized I took so many of him sleeping. Anyway, here are some of my favorites...


Sacked out on Daddy at not even a month old


This picture I love down to the dirty socks. Holden was 15 months and this picture captures that time in his life when he was toddling around getting into everything.


Ah, I remember the days when a car ride would put Holden to sleep. Here he is snoozing with his cousin, Jesse.


Sleeping at my Aunt's house back in October.


Sleeping in his crib, shortly before we switched him to a big boy bed.


And of course I can't forget when he would fall asleep in his high chair or booster seat.


When he was 9 months, I took pictures of him falling asleep. It was so cute seeing his eyes getting heavier and heavier until he just konked out.








Speaking of sleeping, that is where I am headed. Today was a long day and I am beat. Tomorrow we are going to garage sales so I have to get up early.

Good night,
Sleep tight

Wordless Wednesday~ For the love of a dog, a stuffed dog

Valentine's Day Ramblings

These are kind of jumbled up thoughts because I'm tired. Last night I had multiple middle-of-the-night wake up calls courtesy of Holden.

On Friday we ordered a heart shape pizza from Papa Murphy's. Isn't it cute? After being in the oven it kind of lost it's heart shape, but you can kind of see it.


Holden got a heart shaped cookie from his Grandma and one from his Aunt Tiffany. Funny story.. I was eating some of his cookie and got caught. He asked, "Why you eating my cookie". I said, "I'm just trying it to make sure it taste good for you." My mother-in-law was cracking up. Holden just said, "ok". He seemed satisfied by that answer. Whew!



On Valentine's day I asked Holden who was going to be my Valentine. He said him and Daddy. Then he told me that he wanted to take me out to Chick-fil-a. He wanted to drive me there in his car (his cozy coupe car). Isn't that sweet? Maybe he should give his Daddy some pointers! Matt dropped the ball this V-day. He didn't even give me a card! He has been under a lot of pressure with work and school, but I was still hurt by him. However we had a long talk and things are better now.

We did go out to eat on Valentine's. We didn't really plan ahead because Matt had a school presentation he had to do that night and we weren't sure when it would be over. We ended up waiting about 30 minutes for a table at a restaurant we never go to because it's pretty expensive. The wait wasn't that bad compared to some places we called- Outback's wait was 2 hours!! After dinner we attempted to go to a movie but once again ran into the huge crowds of Valentine's Day. All the movies that we wanted to see were sold out. Boo Hoo! (You would think we had never been out on Valentine's day. LOL.) We headed home where my Mama's boy was giving Nana a hard time because he wanted me to put him to bed.

My mil took some good pictures of me and Matt all dressed up. It's such a rarity, so I wanted to get it on camera.:-)









Well I hope everyone had a good Valentine's Day!

My new exercise regiment

I should cancel my gym membership, since I'm getting plenty of exercise here lately. I go up and down the stairs constantly throughout the day. And it doesn't stop at night either! Last night I went up and down probably 10 or more times. Why you ask? My lovely son kept yelling at the top of his lung "Mama!!!" I really thought I was going to lose my mind. Last night I was reminded of what it's like to have a newborn, except I think this was a little worse. LOL!

Let's hope tonight goes better. Ever since Holden was 2 months old he has slept through the night wonderfully, so this recent change has taken me by surprise. I don't know what it is... I think he likes that I come at his every call. I would ignore him, but his room is right next to Nana's (my mil) and I don't want him to wake her. I told him this evening to only call me if it's something really really really important. We'll see how it goes...

4 year check-up

We are over a month late, but we finally took Holden for his 4 year check-up.

He is 38 lbs. (65th percentile) and 41 1/4" (80th percentile). Up until this appointment he has always been in the 90th percentile for height and 75th in weight. I guess he's slowing down a little.

The nurse gave him a hearing and vision test. He passed both. Though I got a referral to an ENT because I'm a little worried about his hearing. He seems to say "what?" a lot. The hearing test they do isn't that accurate, so I would feel better to get it checked out by a specialist.

Holden had to get 4 shots. Poor baby! He was a brave boy though. He didn't cry at all. Actually he had the opposite reaction. Yes, my son laughed while getting shots. Weird kid! However I think by the 4th one he was close to crying. Lately he's been laughing when he gets hurt... I don't know that's all about! The nurses said that him laughing during the shots was a first for them... and I'm sure it will be the last. Only my child! LOL.

After the appointment we treated Holden to icecream. He picked out strawberry with m&m's. Then we went to Kirkland's to return something. Holden had to go potty so we had to run into to Target (next door to Kirkland's) to use the restroom. Note to self: Don't ever choose Target for a potty break. We ended up looking around and before we knew it our basket was full. Let's just say it was an expensive potty trip!

Tiger Woods in Training

Last weekend we went to play miniature golf. It was a lot of fun.

Of course I took a ton of pictures, so here are some of them...

Maneuvering a tricky ball..


Getting ready to put the ball in the hole or as Holden called it.. putting the ball in it's home. ;-)


I told Holden I need to start golfing his way... he just used his hand to put the ball in the hole. LOL!


Not only can he play a great game of golf, but the boy can teach it too! Here he is giving Nana some pointers.


Thanks for looking!

My Favorites from the Month

I meant to post this a few days ago, but I didn't get around to it. Apparently my New Year's resolution to not procrastinate isn't going so well. LOL! Here are some of my favorite pictures from the month of January.

Celebrating the New Year with some sparkling lemonade.


My birthday boy digging into his cake.


Silly boy with a happy meal box on his head...


Awwww... cousins


Penelope looks like she's deep in thought in the picture.


Today at Putt-Putt, Holden loved golfing! (More from that later.)


Chillaxin on Mama and Daddy's bed.


Loving on Daddy


Thursday night we went to a Rodeo. Here's me and Matt..


My mil's friend brought her grandkids. Holden really liked her granddaughter Kara. (They are the same age.) He kept wanting to sit by her.


At the Trader's Market a couple weekends ago.


Chowing on some corn on the cob at the Trader's Market.