wip 10.8.11

friday:
worked. and girl's night out for nick's mom's birthday.

i cleaned out one of my drawers in the bathroom. got rid of a ton of old rubber bands. ben is a garbage picker. he totally dug them all out and proceeded to wear them! what can i say? the boy loves his bracelets! ;)

had dinner at hamada. and saw the ides of march.
gave gigi her new kitchen aid mixer. happy birthday. merry christmas. happy mother's day to her from all of her children and her sister.

saturday:
it was sooo nice outside.
we took a family bike ride. love all the trails by our house. stopped at a playground along the way so ben could stretch his legs.

they had the coolest swings. i just couldn't help myself.

then we headed to dairy queen. love that there is a food stop along the way.

yes, he is putting a goldfish cracker on my spoon. {we enjoyed creeping daddy out with our strange food combination.}

good to the last drop. i think his cereal eating skills came into play here...

then we turned and headed back.
was a long 8 miles back...
wee man fell asleep. in the beginning he kept letting his head fall backwards and kept hitting my chest. then he finally slouched over onto my arm. lemme tell ya, that was comfortable... not.

and a close up of sweet mr. ben.

headed to my parents to grab some peppers and pumpkins.

their house was currently under construction from the damage they had back from that storm when they were repairing their roof.

yay pumpkins from the meyer pumpkin patch!

ben loves helping grandpa pick the peppers and tomatoes.

silly boy wouldn't listen to us and ate a jalapeno.

he told us, 'it's not spicy' after he took a bite. nick begged to differ!

then we came home and passed out. was a long day in the sun. i was ready for my comfy bed.

sunday:

somebody has a sticker obsession.

then we headed outside. nick wanted to finish up some stuff with the shed.
ben loves it. his favorite part is jumping off of it!

but he thought his tri-cycle was more fun today. i have no idea where he learned to do a wheelie. 

i'm pretty sure he learned to work on 'cars' from uncle kevin. ;D

then it was back to the shed. and a super fun game of throwing a ball through the windows. seriously, was probably a good 30 minutes of entertainment. it's the little things!

then it was a nice relaxing evening inside with the boys.

made a nice dinner: brussel sprouts {can't find the recipe now} and super, yummy chicken. thumbs up from all three of us. love when that happens!

and getting used to a new kitty. meet chewbacca. {not the prettiest picture. but he is handsome.}

ten on thursday 11.3.11

because life just got a wee bit crazy around here.

- ben loved halloween. he loved trick or treating. and was mr. independent and wanted to 'do it by myself mama.' and he did. he also gave out handfuls of candy to our trick or treaters. was so sweet. one boy was like, 'can i really keep all of it!?'
- my kid is a rockstar. seriously, he did so awesome at nick's nana's memorial service yesterday. so proud.
- i love my husband. i love that he's my best friend. that we're partners. that we can anticipate what each other needs without words. we just know. like that dirty martini yesterday evening at the memorial dinner. perfect. ;)
- top chef texas. oh yeah!
- had high hopes for running {not run/walking} this hot chocolate. however, the fact that i haven't ran in two weeks has totally changed my goals. i just wanna finish! {maybe in 40 minutes. we'll see if i change that before saturday.}
- i found this. and am obsessed. some of them are beyond spot on. like the high expectations. so me. i go in spurts with astrology. not sure i believe in horoscopes and all that... but these were fun to read.
- i just finished watching kim's fairytale wedding. yup. finished the day after the big d announcement. i love khloe.
-my boyfriend was on jimmy fallon last night. you know what that means?! history of rap. part 3.
- ben has gone back to calling me 'mama'. it totally melts me. nick is still daddy. or nick!
- even though i love halloween, i couldn't stand the decorations any more. nick yelled at me when i tried to take everything down on monday. told me it was too soon! it's on the top of my to do list for this evening. ;P

wordless wednesday. leaves!

south bend, indiana. 10.23.11

ten on tuesday 10.25.11

- a coworker/girlfriend invited a new word for my shabster dictionary. hilestical. a combo of hysterical and hilarious. was so funny when it happened!
- i believe in manners. whistling is not a proper way to get a human being's attention. so when i hear whistling at work, i don't usually investigate. i guess last week i should have, because that is how one of my patients was trying to get me to come back to her recliner. i did inform her that there were many other more effective ways in calling me over to her. that any of the following would have sufficed: nurse, excuse miss, miss, mam, pardon me.
- i had my first starbucks spiced pumpkin latte ever. eh. i'm just not a fan of pumpkin.
- last night ben found something in his nightstand that resembled nick's contact case. {it might actually be a case for the case with a mirror.} he proceeded to open the case, pretend to take something out of it, and then poked his eye. he looked at me and said he was using 'eye tacts' like daddy.
- today when i woke ben up, he told me it wasn't time yet. that there was no sun. yes, beans winter stinks.
- i love thunder. really gonna miss it the next few months.
- was looking for something different for dinner. really there's only so many variations on mexican and italian. found this recipe. we don't have many 'southern' recipes. totally a keeper. was a bit spicy. ben ate it but drank a bunch of milk. so if you don't like spicy be warned.
- finally got nick to watch bridesmaids. so happy he enjoyed it. and melissa mccarthy makes that movie.
- tomorrow is not gonna be fun at work. i'm hoping i can be my pessimistic self and believe that it's going to be worse than it actually will be just so i can be pleasantly surprised when it doesn't completely kick my ass!
- thinks it's funny how things work out. like when you're not sure you want to do something and yet you do and then it kinda snow balls and in the end it turns out that that's what you were supposed to do in the first place because you're able to end up at the right place at the right time. feel like i had a bit of kismet happening this weekend...

wip 10.1.11

friday:
i cannot for the life of me remember what i did during the day. seriously, i need to get back on track with these! or put better notes in my phone!
in the evening, we walked to jay and christy's for wynn's birthday festivities. or wynnie as ben calls her. ;)
my pictures aren't the greatest. ben was obsessed with this gun that aunt gerri got her. too bad she bought in on some crazy road trip to somewhere in illinois. and by crazy i mean like, champaign!

and of course there are some pictures of jason and nick playing. i swear, sometimes they enjoy these get togethers a little too much! ;)

saturday:
decided to head to the apple orchard. love that it's one of our traditions. i believe nick and i have gone 7/8 years that we've been married. and we are 3/3 with ben!

it was a brisk day. but we toughed it out. so glad we did!

i tried to snuggle up with beaner on the tractor ride.

somebody was excited to be let loose!

with jer bear and gibi.

nick and ben.

yay the pressners!

mr. noah enjoying his apple.

the cousins.

baseball tradition. we are such rule breakers!

hanging out under some trees. 

walking with gibi.

noah and gibi. such a cute picture.

i love him.

i think someone was in awe of all the pumpkins.

not a fan of the sunflower!

and he wanted to ride the train all by himself. sigh. such a big boy now. 

once we got home, nick and his dad started working on the shed. so lucky to have someone who wants to help nick with projects. :)

sunday:
we had to be up and at em bright and early.
we ran the bucktown 5k. {maybe i should use the term loosely. i wogged. aka walk jogged.}

the girls. {pre}

the boys. {pre}

us {post}

and every one. {post}

was totally fun. and exhausting. enjoyed a late breakfast at i can't remember where... ah, thank you facebook. at the southern. was interesting. had a buffet. think they were prepared for all of us crazy runners.

then we came home and nick decided to work on the shed again. yup, his dad came to help.

bean and i did some yard work.
he enjoyed using the branches i trimmed, to hit other branches. we had leaves everywhere. but that's okay. he had a blast.

his new favorite past time has been jumping. from the bottom stair. from his step stool. from the curb. so he was thrilled when he figured out he could jump from the beginnings of the shed. 

helping clean.

and the boys deep in thought.

totally long weekend. totally exhausting. i think we were in bed before 9 which is completely unheard of for us!

woohoo wednesday: potty time!

so might be a complete fluke. not sure i'm counting on him to do it again... but somebody went poop on the potty tonight! ;)

took some convincing and some tears and some bribing of candy corn pumpkins during bath time but he did it!{and nick was so patient and good with him. he should get all of the credit.}

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

ten on tuesday 10.18.11

- i had to buy new running shoes. {it's only been 2 /2 years.} not that i've ran that entire time. but i'm told shoes are like a bag of marshmallows, they get harder with time! hoping they make my runs easier.
- nick and i were so exhausted after our uber crazy friday and saturday that we were both in bed by 830 saturday evening. party animals, right?
- just found out about these litter boxes. we are now the proud owner of two. hope the cats can figure it out. i'm gonna love not having litter every where!
- everyone thinks my 'work' pumpkin is a zebra. do zebras have circles? no, it's a tree! i guess that's what i get for doing it in black and white!
- am not ready for winter. i hate this darkness. i need sunlight!
- totally rooting for viktor on project runway. {i so don't want josh to win.}
- i enjoy long car rides with my hubs. so great to just sit and chat with no interruptions. {not counting gps!}
- today nick picked ben up from school, of course they stopped and saw ben's favorite tractors, but then ben started telling nick where to drive. and he took him on this route that we never go. nick asked him why they were going that way and he said, 'to look at the pretty trees.' i love that kid.
- ben has also been on a cereal kick. he had about four bowls for breakfast one morning. he then asked for cereal for lunch and ate an additional four bowls.
- am so ready for halloween. it's my favorite!