wishing a happy birthday.....

to Straton!

you're such a sweet husband and father.

always supportive, helpful and working hard for our family.

We love you!!

xx - Oakie & mama

under the weather

Oaklen has been pretty lucky. 

He's rarely ever sick and when he is it's nothing too serious.

Go figure, the year I forget to get our flu shots 

we all get sick. over and over again.

It's hard to get Oaklen to eat much of anything

but he is a trooper. 

Besides his 101+ fever, you'd never be able to tell he wasn't feeling well.

Sometimes though he'll do things like this that just breaks my heart.

We're ready for summer.

i can't think of a cool post title

Excuse the lack of posting. I feel like blogging has had it's fifteen minutes of fame, and I'm a little burned out with it. Not to mention it's become nothing but Oaklen updates. Which is a good thing, but hopefully I'll be turning my blog into a book one day and it would be nice if I could have a family book. Not another baby book for Oak (as much as we love him).

We do have some fun things coming up real soon. Like 2 birthdays, family pictures (hopefully in the snow), and trying to get Oaklen to eat yummy sweets like ice cream, whip cream and pudding. He's never been a fan and I find that so not normal.

P.S. you can find me over at a year of you and me which is a new site my sisters and I have recently started. And I actually keep up with that one.

i did it

I had an epiphany last night.

Laying in bed at 1:51 a.m. and unable to sleep (like usual), it hit me. hard.
I have to delete my facebook account! And my Twitter! And clear out half of my google reader (which keeps bringing back what I delete, every stinkin' time!) because, let's face it, I barely even READ what the post actually says anyway! And I'll unsubscribe from any emails I get, and immediately delete, or put off for weeks!

And so it is done. I got up from bed right then and there and did it. I actually deleted my facebook account! It's a big deal, folks.

I finally saw the whole picture. And I admitted to myself that I was failing myself as a mother, a friend and a wife. I spent far too much time looking at other people's children then my own son. I spent far too much time oogling the outfit she was wearing, or the craft someone did that made me jealous, or the house that was decorated so beautifully. It was eating me alive and yet I couldn't pull myself away.

Cold turkey is the way I had to go. And I have to admit, I already feel pretty good. It will be awesome having a full day of nothing but mommy business, dinner making, toddler chasing and becoming the best wife I can possibly be.

So here's to unplugging from my online life and plugging into my real one. And to making 2012 the best year yet.

cabin fever

I hate winter time. Not just because it lasts for what seems like forever, or that I'm always freezing cold, or that it's ugly outside if the snow has melted away.
I am so unbelievably bored.
What is there to even do around this town with a toddler? A toddler who reminds me why I can't take him out in public places, every single time we go out in a public place. (Somehow I keep forgetting that he is kind of a monster when he's out running errands with mom.)
I have got to figure something out before we both go crazy.

1. Oak playing in the heat from the vent

2. after church

3. refusing to take a picture with mom

4. sleepy baby and his cute, tiny toes

5. always reading

6. my awesome white elephant gift of the Biebs. Check out those muscles.

snow is falling on my grass...

This particular night was not a good one for Oaklen. He just did. not. want. to. sleep.
So what did I do? Made us hot chocolate while we watched the first (kind of) snow fall of the year. At midnight.

For one reason or another, Oaklen has been having a pretty tough time going to bed these days. Being in a toddler bed means he can get out whenever he wants, which we knew might happen, but each night seems to get a little worse. Of course it wasn't easy from the start. Get out of bed 10 times, be put back to bed 11. Now it's not just the getting out of bed twenty times, it's the hysterical I'm-about-to-pass-the-heck-out crying every night. I set a routine so he would hopefully get the hang of things; brush teeth, get a drink, read some books, bedtime. It hasn't clicked yet.

Now the poor guy cries and cries, crawls out of bed, opens the door to find mom and then loses his cool. Thankfully he understands when he comes out of his room, mom or dad puts him right back into bed. So it's not a huge struggle with that. The poor guy hates sleeping alone. He just wants to cuddle in his crib with mama. And when he finally settles down and pats my back like I do his....mama just might hop on in your crib and snuggle you to death cause you're stinkin' adorable.

book worm

This child of mine only wants to read, read and read some more. 

He cries at bedtime if he doesn't get a story from one of his books ("BOO-ks"). 

And even when I finally get him into bed after 10 stories, he'll wander out of his room in tears saying 

"book. booook. pease".

It's so sweet. And kind of exhausting. 

Which is why we'll be wrapping up toys he already owns for this years Christmas presents. 

He already owns more than any child should 

and they rarely ever get played with. 

Happy Halloween

We've got Justin Bieber at our house for Halloween. =)