No pics today

Just sore.
Two days ago I started working out during nap time. I did it again yesterday. Then in the evening we unexpectedly went to help a friend sand/paint baseboards. Tired. Sore.

I'm working out again today though! Go me!

Ok, just one picture.


This is from last weekend. Jared and I bought and are donating to the church 8 cameras, a computer to store the data on, and the instillation (with his dad's help for the labor). We had just received the cameras and were testing them out. Jared left the room to check on something and called me back to him. When I went to check on Miles I found him making faces into the camera and laughing at himself on screen. Too cute! Sorry for all the junk in this pic. We have got to do something about the game room!

I added a weight loss ticker at the bottom of the page. I'll try to update it at least once a week through the beginning of April at least. I'm currently in 2 weight loss contests and they both run through then. For posterity, here is what it looks like now...

Shoot Me! #2

Miles and I went to the science museum yesterday. We had a great time. In the kids area they have an infrared camera and a screen to display the video. I thought that might make a fun "shoot me" picture.



I couldn't get Miles to pose, but I think it's a fun alternative for the challenge. I promise not to use it every week!
For more go to:

Science Museum

For Christmas I asked my parents to give us a family membership to the local science museum. They were happy to do it! We've been once so far (forgot my camera) and Miles and I went again today. They are supposed to have story and craft time on Wednesdays. Either I wasn't in the right area, or they didn't have it today but we had a lot of fun anyway!

Miles playing with their huge water table.

There were not a lot of people there and seemingly all of them were there for the children's museum. It was not crowded at all, but there were enough other kids that everyone got to share and enough other moms to be able to make small talk.

Miles playing at the sand table

They have lots of little areas set up for kids to play, learn, touch, and participate. We started off in a little area where you can play house. That didn't last long, then we headed through an area with exhibits on electricity, heat, sound, and some gear toys to their water play area. They have a nice water table set up with lots of smocks. They have scoops, waterwheels, and ducks. We didn't play long there when Miles decided he was done. As we were looking for the next thing to play with he found a sand table. We played there for a long time.
He would scoop, pour, dump, pile, and rake the sand. He was really loving it. Other kids would come in and play for a bit then wander off. Not Miles! He knew right were he wanted to be! He did a great job sharing with the other kids, but I think he was never sad to see their parents take them off. Eventually he decided he needed to climb on the table. I told him that if he wanted to do that we would go upstairs where they have a paleontology exhibit. They have two huge sand boxes with shovels and brushes where you "discover" some cast dinosaur bones. We'd walked through this area coming in, so he'd seen it and was all for it! We made it upstairs (with detours to see the snakes) and he was in heaven! We spent the rest of the time there and he had the sand box to himself. At some point several other kids came in and used the other sandbox in the room, but he had the one to himself.

After playing for a little short of three hours we left the museum. On the way home we called grandma to say thanks for the gift and see if she wanted to go out to lunch. She was thrilled to get away for a while and we had a nice visit. Miles fell asleep on the way home, and I'm off to work out!

I want salad

1:30 A.M. ~ I hear screaming...what is he saying?
I went into his room and he is throwing a total temper tantrum demanding salad! He even knows it is in the refrigerator, and he wants it now! What on earth? He's been waking up once a night for a while now.

Here is hoping for better sleep tonight!

Weight Loss Goals

I posted a while back about a weight loss challenge (#5). There were a lot of things going on in everyone's lives at the time. We decided to hold off and start over on the first Monday of the new year. Guess what? That's today!

We are starting the three month weight loss challenge again today and we'll go though March 31, 2010. My goal is 15 pounds. I'll work on keeping track of it here!

Wish me luck!

Photo Book

I'd forgotten last year that I blogged about making a photo book. It was a bit of trouble because I ended up trying three different places before settling on one company. After deciding not to hand out the books to the grandparents at his birthday party and instead have the book include photos of this it got back burner-ed (I thought I just made that word up, but spell check put in the hyphen). We ended up not ordering them. Around Thanksgiving blurb.com sent out an email with a 20% off coupon code and free shipping! I'd been on their mailing list for a year and hadn't seen a coupon! I was so excited. We received it in time to give them out at our St. Nicholas Day get together!

At any rate, I said I'd upload pictures of the book when they came. Here they are! I can't recommend blurb.com highly enough. I'm not getting paid to say this, and I'm (sadly) not getting any discounts either.

What have we been up to?

Here is a December month in review...photo format.

My dad bought his own Christmas present early in the month. A Traxxas remote control car.

It is super fun to drive!

We always have a get together on St. Nicholas day. From his first December I told the grandparents that they didn't need to get Miles anything for St. Nicholas day, but if they did decide to we didn't want anything more than books. This year for St. Nicholas day we surprised both sets of grandparents a photo book of Miles' first two years. It was great fun to make, and even more fun to give!

Of course I didn't get any pictures of Miles opening his books. Jared and I gave him a compilation of Little Bear stories, and one called "Santa's Favorite Story." One set of grandparents gave him a book about St. Nicholas' life, and the other set gave him Growl Tiger!

We got our tree up, then wrapped presents.



We had some weather which didn't permit outside play, so we made do.




We also managed to make it outside some in little better weather.


I asked Jared and my dad about setting up a different
camera solution for Christmas morning, and they got right to work with a little help from Nicholas.

It didn't end up working out, but we are looking forward to using it on another get together.


Jared's mother's birthday is Christmas eve, so we always have a little family thing that day.




We have Christmas morning at our house.




Here is grandpa and Miles having quiet time before bed.



Fun the morning after Christmas.


Miles napping .


Nana and Grandpa took him to see a train exhibit on the thirty-first.



That and a couple of crafts pretty much sums up the whole month. We had fun, but it was busy. I also started working this month. What a blessing. Jared's mother had just offered to take Miles on Monday mornings when this opportunity opened up. For a couple of months I'll be able to keep it at one day a week. After that I'll have to work out care for him another day a week too, but that time will come.