Child Dedication.

On Mother's Day, we dedicated Reilly at our church, The Crossing. It was something that we had been waiting a long time to do, especially considering it is only done there twice a year... Mother's Day and the Sunday after Thanksgiving. For Jeff and I, it was an important promise to make to our child, raising him in a Christian home and teaching him such values and instilling Christian morals into the way we parent and teach our children. So without getting too preachy.. it was something that we really wanted and felt we needed to do, and we did this Sunday!

Let me tell you.. this weekend was nuts! But I was expecting it to be, and just the same as it seems like every weekend lately, had everything ready to go by Friday! Saturday was Jeff's Birthday so Reilly treated him to Sesame Street Live, which they both LOVED and although we only made it through the first half, Reilly definitely lasted much longer than we had expected and got way more into it, dancing and clapping, and watching every minute, so cute! Saturday night we left the little dude behind and went out to celebrate Jeff's Birthday adult style, with a little sushi and Steel Panthers! Needless to say we didn't get home until after 1 in the morning, and had to be at the church by 9:30, so Mother's Day didn't come with sleeping in or breakfast in bed this year, in fact I woke up an hour earlier than both Jeff and Reilly to get ready and get the house/food ready for guests.. but hey, would it be Mother's Day if I weren't mothering?

The church had a sweet little breakfast before the service for the families and children being dedicated. Afterward we took our seats in the service, which- holy ready to leave Reilly in the nursery! His good friend Ava taught him the joy of jumping on the chairs yelling to the people in the rows behind us, but hey.. let them be little right? I thought it was adorable! During the dedication, all of the families stood on the stage for about 15 minutes, of course Reilly found his Uncle Tim, John, and Nick in the audience making faces to him, so he was making faces back, wanting to get off the stage to them, waving, pointing at them.. real nice guys! At least he kept people entertained I suppose.. little showman! We didn't make it through the rest of the service without Jeff and I dividing then meeting back up in the family room. After the service, we had some family and friends back to the house for a quick reception/lunch, and then took a much needed two hour nap!

I guess this year, Mother's Day for me wasn't about being pampered and adored (which Jeff.. you better believe you're making up for it next year!), but for me it was about something much better, and making a promise about what kind of mom I would be to my tiny guy, and I couldn't have asked for my first M-Day to have gone any differently!

First Dentist Appointment.

I know I'm like 8 years behind, once again, but.. figured the dentist wouldn't really take any time or effort to write, so.. voici!

Reilly had his first dentist appointment today! It was kind of fun.. he got the same treatment I get when I go, but on a tiny scale. We went to Adventure Dental on Flamingo and 215, just based on reviews we read online, and loved it! Dr. Richardson is the practicing dentist there, and is such a nice guy. He is really upbeat and fun, kind of what you would expect from a male pediatric dentist I suppose. The office is so nice also, I seriously want to decorate my bathroom like the one in the waiting room! Unfortunately the diaper bag was left at home so I didn't have my camera, or you know I'd have pictures of it.. ha. Lame. They also have a "Fast Check In", self check in on the computer, so I didn't have to fill out any paperwork, which was nice because I had just met Reilly there with his uncle after work and he was antttssssy to nurse, so was mauling me while I was trying to type in the information!

We got called back to the exam room immediately, which was very kid friendly. Colorful, yet modern also, with a TV screen playing movies over the exam chair for the kids to focus on. The hygienist asked me routine questions, then Dr. Richardson came in and examined Rei's four tiny teeth. Told me to get Reilly off of nursing pretty soon, which I'm totally motivated to do (believe me!), but easier said than done. (We are waiting until his 12 month appointment with the pediatrician to ask what he thinks would be the best source of nutrition once we wean him.. as far as milks go..). Rei wasn't a huge fan of the exam, but.. he had two strangers in his mouth and his mom holding his hands down, what person of any age would like that? However, it was less than 15 seconds. Then the hygienist brushed his teeth with a fun light flashing toothbrush, which Reilly loves having done, painted on some fluoride.. slapped a sticker on him (which I had to take off as soon as we were out of the office because he is allergic to the adhesive), made our next appointment, and we were on our way! So fast, so painless.. really great! Each appointment they take a picture, not sure why.. to see the kids' teeth? So a copy was printed out for us, and Reilly definitely liked picking a toy out of the treasure box at the end; by picking I mean me handing him to most unlikely choking hazard option.

So.. that was that, we enjoyed the experience. I definitely recommend Dr. Richardson and Adventure Dental!! And we'll be back there in 6 months!

Bye Bye Gymbo!

Reilly had his last class at Gymboree. I can't lie and say I'm sad to go, I have had enough Gymboree, despite whether or not Reilly likes it.. Mommy is ready to move on. We will however miss his favorite teaching Miss Amber. She was the sweetest teacher ever and Reilly loved her. And she was so awesome about knowing each child individually.. and genuinely showing interest in them. She started teaching Reilly's class when he was 3 months old, so it was sad to say goodbye to her. I had to lie and say we were moving because I didn't want her to know we were taking classes elsewhere.


But now.. Reilly is officially signed up at My Gym! You all knew it was coming, I worked there all through college! It will probably drive me crazy working there because my mind is CONSTANTLY (it's annoying actually) critiquing the staff, and watching the timing, and noticing if any programming is skipped.. hoping that wears off after a few months. :) Reilly loves it though, it's MUCH larger than Gymboree, so even in a big class he doesn't get intimidated by too many people and just roams free.. without even caring where I am, he was always so clingy in his other class. There are also a lot more activities to do, and the programming changes every week.. where as at Gymboree it is literally the same. exact. class. every. single. time. I could teach him the entire thing in his bedroom.. so really, he won't be missing anything. Of course he has already discovered the ball pit.. and since he is such an avid climber somehow always manages to find his way into it. So we are very happy with our decision, but miss the friends he has there. One great perk is that his great friend Paige is in his class so they have breakfast dates at Panera afterward.


One tiny tiny downfall, his class is at 8:15 on Saturday morning. Aye carumba! So.. I need to get ready for bed NOW! Goodnight!

Itsy Bitsy Spider.

Reilly's new song this week is Itsy Bitsy Spider. I'll post a picture later, if I can get one.. lately he attacks the camera whenever he sees it, so it's impossible to capture cute moments as of late. When he sings it he likes to do the sun motion, and it's the most adorable thing ever. And if you ask him where his itsy bitsy spider is, he'll immediately show you the sun, then of course he claps. Today he started doing more motions, he makes a little spider by tapping his hands together, and waves his arms all over the place when the water wipes the spider out. I should just get a video of it instead.. but it's seriously the most adorable thing I have ever seen!

Egg Drop.

So last week we went to the Egg Drop at Seastrand Park in Aliante. It looked to be a fun event, a helicopter was going to drop thousands of eggs for the children to pick up, looking back I'm not really sure why all of the things that could have gone wrong didn't go through my mind, considering that I'm constantly worried about everything, but this time around I must have been blinded by the adorable idea of sweet kids collecting Easter eggs. Honestly, the only thing that I thought could go wrong was an egg being dropped on my kid.. but alas..

My mom and I decided to go fairly early because I told her about the event after pre-registration had closed, so Keith wasn't registered. I was ready with coffee in hand (for her, not me.. still going strong Lent!) at 7:00am. Okay.. that's a lie, I was ready to go at 7:00am, however Reilly was still fast asleep, so I had to wake him up, nurse him, and get him dressed. Anyway.. we got there by 8, which is all that matters. The parking wasn't that bad by the time we got there, they had the lot closed so we had to park on the street, but we weren't far from the entrance, the line was nonexistent, but hey.. better safe than sorry right. Reilly and Keith got their color coordinated, age appropriate wrist bands, and we laid out a blanket and hung out until the event opened. Within the hour an INCREDIBLY HUGE line started.. no, not a line, a mob. The mob wrapped around the gate of the park to the complete opposite end, down the street.. and.. out of my sight. Once we were in Keith wanted to go straight for the bounce houses.. so Reilly and I found a spot away from the loud music and chaos and set up our blanket once again.

The eggs were set to drop at 10:45 for Reilly's age ground, under 3. There was a huge lot dedicated to each age group, and then this one was divided once more for toddlers who would be collecting eggs on their own and those who needed parents to help them. By the time 10:00 rolled around, holy cow, thousands of parents and children were crammed together around the field. I'm sorry.. but.. why, and how are you going to keep your under 3 year old still for 45 minutes? Fortunately, my blanket was huge, and no one was rude enough to step on it.. so our space was not compromised. We continued to hang out, playing with balloons, Easter grass, eating breakfast...we had fun. Once 10:40 arrived I was skeptical about even doing the egg hunt, would Reilly remember? No. Does he know what an egg hunt is? No.. Does he even care? No. So I figured we'd just see how it played out.. the helicopter came along and did drop thousands of eggs. They were all empty.. we'll get there, and the ropes were cut letting hundreds of parents loose to search for eggs. Wait, let me go back.. parents? Yeah.. parents.. I didn't see any toddlers picking up eggs, I saw parents going completely insane..pushing strollers onto an egg hunt field? Yeah.. that's safe.. knocking people over going... I'm getting mad all over again thinking about it. It was the most disgusting thing I have ever seen in my life. I saw an egg that the helicopter had blown far away from the madness, so Reilly and I hurried to it. I put Reilly on the ground with the egg between us so I could take a picture of him going for it, and a grown ADULT ran up and snatched his egg. I immediately yelled at that woman that that was his egg, and she dropped it, but.. I couldn't believe it. Is this really what parents are teaching their children? To be this selfish? To steal? To hurt others? Reilly was more interested in watching everyone from behind a gate than anything else, so that's what we did. After a few minutes I suggested to him that we go back to our blanket because this egg hunt was horrible, and a mother overheard me. She was holding her one year old, and agreed saying that they weren't even in for 30 seconds before her daughter was kicked and knocked over by other parents. I couldn't believe it. Since they were going by age I started worrying about Keith, whose age group hadn't gone yet. I thought the toddler group was brutal, what would his age group be like, so I called my mom and warned her about how crazy it got.

The best part about the whole thing was that once the egg hunt was over, you took your empty eggs to the candy exchange and traded them for a bag of candy. So whether you had 15 eggs, or just 1, or even none, everyone got the exact same bag of candy. We decided that if we took our eggs home empty, the Easter Bunny would fill them up on Easter, as opposed to waiting another minute with the crazy people. Prior to the hunt, I heard some parents telling their children to make sure each child got an egg, and only take one because there will be more eggs on Easter, and sweet lessons, but then I heard about other parents telling their children to make sure they got every single egg, it's just.. so sick, and so heartbreaking that this is the way some kids are learning. My mom saw a sweet little girl collecting eggs, when a boy came up and stole all of the eggs right out of her basket. I mean.. I guess we've all had something like that done to us, and it just builds character, and yadda yadda yadda.. but.. heartbreaking none the less. As we left, my stomach turned as we walked past parents counting out eggs from the baskets of their children that could barely walk, let alone fill an entire basket with eggs.

At the end of the day, Reilly had fun, he likes being outside, he got to play with two eggs, got a balloon, and a lollipop.. was completely oblivious to anything going on around him. So I guess that's all that matters, Keith had fun too. Will I do it again? Probably not.. my over thinking brain just can't handle it!

Water Baby.

Yesterday we had some time to kill while on my Dad and Rhonda's side of town to pay them a visit, so we checked out Nature Discovery Park in Aliante. Oh my gosh, we may have to move just to go play there everyday. Upon pulling up to the park you see a huge waterfall and a grass area filled with the future Beckham's of the world, but beyond that.. amazement! There is a walking trail that wraps around the park and multiple pond area with different types of birds: geese, ducks, pigeons.. and Reilly loved sitting on the edge of the pond watching the giant geese swim around him. There is a play area, which is gated! I haven't seen that at a park here in town before, so much safer, and it included multiple "you have to be this tall" to play alone signs, which was also nice because big kids and little kids playing together just seems like a recipe for disaster, in my opinion. The best part of the park was the splash area though! It had tunnels that shot water, animals that shot water.. just, so much water. I probably looked like a crazy mom when I took off Reilly's clothes and let him run (crawl) free in the water in his diaper, but hey.. he had fun! I wish I had my camera with me, I'll have to make an excuse to go again and remember to take pictures then. I definitely recommend this park, it's just south of the 215 on Aliante, and with the waterfall on the corner, you can't really miss it!

Don't Blink.. seriously.. don't!

I'll probably feel really stupid for saying this when he turns two and really isn't a "baby" anymore, but Reilly is feeling less and less like one everyday. Except for when he is being pissy, he doesn't really cry anymore, we don't have to figure out ways to calm him down, or take turns holding him whenever we go anywhere because he won't sit in his car seat, he is becoming just a well behaved little boy (again, when not pissy) who is interested in more than just me and it's SO much fun! And come to think of it.. I don't even know when the last time I had to nurse him in the car because he wouldn't calm down in his car seat was!

Reilly is officially done with baby food, he doesn't really eat that much on his own though, but I figure at this point it's really just for learning how to eat more than anything else, because he still gets most of what he needs through breast milk anyway. He definitely has his favorites though! It was funny.. the other night I gave him tofu, grapes, puffs, pears, and zucchini all mixed up on his tray and he picked out every single piece of everything except the zucchini.. how he could tell the difference between that, the pears, and the tofu which peeled were all white I do not know.. but he was not having any of that stuff! He also had spaghetti for the first time the other night. Such a mess, but he was shoving fistful after fistful into his mouth.. I've never seen him eat like that before. The toast he gives to the dogs, but most fruit he will eat up.. especially watermelon and mango, SO my kid. Wonder if the fact that I ate at least one container of mango a day towards the end of my pregnancy has anything to do with that.. he likes miso soup as well, so perhaps! :) I hadn't really made it to Whole Foods since we learned more about his allergies, but the other day I made a trip and found so many options for him, including teething biscuits.. and can now make him macaroni and cheese by cooking egg free noodles and melting soy cheese into them. I did make dairy/egg free pancakes for him one morning.. buuut they weren't so fabulous.. probably to the fault of using vegetable spray on the pan, some 'reviewers' recommended adding more sugar too, so we'll see.

He is also learning new skills all the time, as of now.. if I can think of all of them.. he can splash, clap, find his nose, make little crazy signs..ugh, make piggy noises, wave, still dances like nobodies business, never tires of hide and seek.. and you know, the rest of the things babies do. The best part is that he gets so proud of himself for his accomplishments, when asked where his nose is, he barely touches it before getting a huge smile and clapping for himself! It's the best. He's also really into his cd player on his crib and always points to it and looks at me, waiting for me to turn it on and sit through another hour of kid's songs.. so not fun.. seriously, I keep saying I'm going to make him a dance cd, but haven't.. so if anyone wants to.. you'd be our hero! This morning I was exhausted so after I put him down for his 10:00 nap, I too took a nap, and woke up in a panic when I realized it was 12:30 (2 hours is usually his max), I heard him talking and ran to his room.. he never cried, just pulled his cd player off the side of his crib and was sitting happily playing with it.. funny guy.

I can't believe this Saturday he will be ten months old.. what? Are you kidding me? I'm pretty sure he was just born last week.. I cannot even believe that he will be a year pretty soon, and that I have to plan a birthday party already! Insane.. seriously.. IN! SANE! As long as he stays a mommy's boy forever, and never tells me he hates me, or wishes he didn't have parents, or tells me he can't wait to move out.. then I'll be just fine, and he will live.