Hanging with Daddy

Here are a couple pictures of my two favorite boys. Right now Clark is into just about anything we are doing, so here is Clark and his Daddy "playing" Mario Kart on the Wii... Clark looks very focused, cracks me up!

Time to baby-proof!

Clark is officially crawling!!! It's in short little crawling bursts, but he's on all 4's and starting to zoom around the house already. Of course he goes straight for the power cords and outlets, so we're spending some time this weekend making sure the house is Clark friendly. We've already removed our death-trap of a coffee table and moved the cat boxes to the basement. Now the vacuum will be busted out more frequently along with the mop. And, on the topic of mopping- if any of you guys have crawlers and want to limit the chemicals they get on their hands (hello, swiffer) water and vinegar makes a wonderful cleaning combo for the floors and is more toddler friendly! And if you don't want your entire home to smell like vinegar put a couple drops of essential oil in the mix (my fave right now is the grapefruit scent.) It kills all the germs, is better for our little planet- and much cheaper!

FatBaby update

Kim & Tom's maternity pictures are updated on http://www.fatbabyphotography.blogspot.com/ if you'd like to check them out-

Thank you everyone...

for making my birthday so wonderful. I had a great weekend filled with loving friends and family- sweet phone calls and beautiful cards. Two of my very best friends in the world drove down from Chicago and spent the weekend with me and we had a total blast! For the past couple years I really haven't been too into my birthday, it just didn't seem that fun anymore and the whole parties and gifts i always looked forward to just didn't seem necessary anymore. But waking up to my husband and son really made this year great- I am truly lucky and couldn't help but reflect on how much has changed in this past year- and I know that there are so many fun adventures in this year to come. Thank you again everyone for being in my life and making it so special! Love you!

Enjoy the sweet Olan Mills picture- too funny!

Green Baby

YAY!!!! Our recycle bin finally arrived :) I swear I've been like a kid on Christmas morning waiting for it to be dropped off. Despite our amazingly high property taxes sadly recycling is not included, but trash is for some reason dumpster style of course. There are various drop off points throughout the city but we never went as often as we would have liked to, and I was always unclear what I could and could not put in the bins so we were pretty conservative. There is a company in STL you can hire to pick up recycling once a week and we finally signed up. Now we have our first official blue bin and are so excited. We've been saving recycling for about a month, and I think we could fill 5 bins right now, but the more the merrier right??? I loved recycling as a child and am excited for Clark to grow up eco-minded as well, seems like he already pretty excited about it!

Spaghetti Monster

We figured it would be fun to introduce two future friends: Clark & Spaghetti. He had a blast touching the noodles and flapping them around like he was conducting a symphony- before we knew it there was spaghetti everywhere and one baby in need of a bath. I'm not sure who had more fun, Clark or Rich & I!

Memorial Day

Hope everybody out there had a great holiday weekend. We got back from Chicago on Sunday and headed down the street to Marc & Lisa's for a little Memorial Day BBQ on Monday afternoon- The grill was fired up, Corona Lights were flowing and kiddos were running around everywhere- Such a fun day! Here are pix of Clark with his cousins...

No Impact Man

Wow- is all I have to say about this blog. This guy is just a wealth of knowledge and a fun style of sharing it. He also has a ton of great links on his site to help you navigate your way through becoming more environmental friendly- baby steps! It's surprising how much $ you can save by doing things that are better for our environment. One thing Rich and I have done is try to make our home paper towel free. Now we do have a roll of recycled on hand in case of emergencies- but also keep tons of old wash clothes and kitchen towels on hand for every day spills. Also, hot water and vinegar (or tea tree oil) is fantastic on floors and an amazing disinfectant. Cloth napkins are also an easy way to cut down on your paper use. Small investment up front, but imagine never having to buy paper towels, napkins or floor cleaner ever again. In the long run you're doing what is best for our earth and your pocketbook too!

http://www.noimpactman.typepad.com/

Here's his blog's self description:

A guilty liberal finally snaps, swears off plastic, goes organic, becomes a bicycle nut, turns off his power, composts his poop, while living in new york city, generally turns into a tree hugging lunatic who tries to save the polar bears and the rest of the planet from environmental catastrophe while dragging his baby daughter and prada-wearing, four seasons loving wife along for the ride.

Chicago

This weekend we packed up the car and headed to Chicago. Clark got to meet his new best pug friends and even touch sand for the first time ever. It was a total blast! We were even lucky enough to have one of our good friends Jacqueline watch the little man for the night while we headed out for a concert. Fun times- We all can't wait to head back up there again! There were so many fun pictures I had a terrible time narrowing them down- so here ya go...

he was just LOVING the sand!

time out for some beach poopers-

i LOVE this family picture! I'm always behind the camera so this is a nice change!

double fisting 8mo old style-