Baby Legs for Boys

I made a bunch of baby legs for the Little Miss when she was younger, but unfortunately they're all pink, purple, flowers, or sparkles. Not the best choices for a little boy. 

In my search for more "masculine", or at least not-too-girly, knee high socks, I only found a few options. I found gray, brown, black and white stripes, gray with navy polka dots, and black at Target for $2-3 a pair. I couldn't find knee high socks for guys, so had to make due with the least-girly women's knee highs. Target has a lot of cute knee highs, but not very many that are suitable for little boys.

I used the same method I found here, that I used when I made LMS' baby legs. They come together pretty quickly, especially now that I have a Serger. When I made LMS', I had to zig-zag the seams, which took longer.

They're a bit long, but he'll grow into them in no time.

Since it's winter, they help keep his chubby legs warm in between the many diaper changes and the potty visits. Saves me a few dozen snapping-unsnapping of outfits :)

Easy Adjustable Baby Bow Tie

The Little Mister has a cute Sunday shirt that I found at Crazy8, and this is actually the second one I've bought him. The first was part of his blessing outfit, but he's outgrown it already. When I went looking for a replacement, I found a larger size on the clearance rack. Score!

 The only problem with these shirts was that the plaid bow tie was sewn on. Since I'm not buying multiple white shirts for a kiddo who will outgrow them in just a couple months, I removed the bow tie so it would match all the sweaters and pants we might pair it with.

But what to do with the little bow tie? It's too cute to just throw away, and it does match one of his sweaters.

I decided to make it into an adjustable bow tie, similar to this adjustable neck tie that we got from one of his cousins.

I carefully removed the bow tie from the shirt. It was just tacked down with two rows of stitches and came off easily.

Here it is with the bow tie removed.

The back of the bow tie. It was sewed together, so even when removed it held its shape.

I gathered my materials: the bow tie, some wide velcro, and some twill tape.

I used the blue neck tie to get an idea of how long to cut the twill tape (elastic would work also), and cut a thin piece of velcro.

I sewed the velcro pieces to the ends of the twill tape with my sewing machine, then hand-sewed the bow tie to the twill tape at the midpoint.

And now our little cutie can wear a bow tie:

the shirt's a little big for him, so it makes his chubby neck disappear even more than it already does :)

Or a {clip-on} tie:

Or a sweater vest and tie:

The twill tape is thin enough and narrow enough that it easily hides under his collar. The velcro makes it easy to adjust and easy to remove.

Such a handsome little boy!

Growing Like a Weed

crappy lighting, but I love the smiles

I forgot to mention this in TLM's 3 month post

Know how we always talk about how fast kids, especially babies, grow?

The Little Mister is no exception. I woke up Christmas Eve morning and I swear he was bigger than he'd been when we went to bed the night before.

Anyone else have that experience?

Sunday Funny

I mentioned on Thursday that TLM has discovered his tongue. Here's some funny pictures we've managed to take recently.

The first three were all taken within a few minutes of each other, the fourth was on a different day.

just the tip of his tongue showing = cute

looking slightly cross-eyed = he'll probably hate us for this one when he gets older :)

why are you guys laughing at me?  (love the eyebrows!)

me looking down at him in the Boba carrier, catching just the tip of his tongue out

New Goals for 2014

My word for this year is

Balance replaces discipline, which was the word for the last couple years, and which I didn't really achieve, though I did try. The two words are related, so I feel like it's a continuation of one to the other.

I haven't updated my goals and their progress since the end of June. I achieved some of them, but the rest got lost by the wayside when I got pregnant. The new year is a good time to re-evaluate and update my goals. Writing them down does help me to remember them and not just let them slide.

This year I'm focusing on four areas: running, food, finances, and time management.

Running
I talked about my postpartum exercise plans and the races I want to run here. Since then I've had to change things up a bit. Mr M now has a training thing that overlaps the spring half marathon I'd planned on running. Logistics are such that I'm not doing it without him around to help with the kiddos. I found a couple other half marathons in the area, but they're earlier in the year and I don't want to run a half without properly training for it.

In changing up my race schedule, I've also added some more races. If I'd been able to do the New Year's Day 5k, I'd have a race scheduled every month this year! Having monthly races scheduled will keep me motivated in my training and help me work towards my fall half marathon. I'd really like to be properly trained and prepared for it and I think the monthly races should help me stay on track. The races listed below without links are the ones I haven't done before, except the half marathon. Since we'll travel to get to that one, I don't mind linking to its site.

January-      New Year's Day 5k
February-    4 mile (give or take a bit) Mud Run
March-        a 5k
April-          an 8k
May-           a 5k
June-           a 5k
July-            a 10k
August-       4 miler
September-  Great Smokey Mountains Half Marathon
October-      Halloween 5k
November-  Turkey Trot 5k
December-   a 5k

And looking ahead to 2015:
January-      New Year's Day 5k
February-    4 mile Mud Run
March-        a 5k, 10 miler, or a local half marathon
April-          an 8k or a local half marathon
May-           a 5k
June-           a 5k
maybe a Ragnar Relay race in June or September and a semi-local half marathon in November

Food
Now that The Little Mister is here and the holidays are over, it's time to get the food situation back in order. I haven't been feeling too bad with how I've been eating, but it's only a matter of time before it does start causing problems. So it's time to clean up the bad habits I picked up since the morning sickness started almost a year ago. The two major issues: sugar and grains. The Little Miss and I need to make more progress healing our intestines, so we're going back on GAPS. Since I'm nursing and have to be careful about detoxing and going too low carb, we'll skip GAPS Intro and go straight to full GAPS.

I indulged a bit too much over the holidays and my weight has crept back up, so I'm hoping that eliminating grains and sugar will jump-start my weight loss. I really want to get my weight down where it should be. It will be a challenge to balance nursing, running, and GAPS, but the end result of better health will be worth it.

Mr M works with a bunch of guys who are paleo.  Since he wants to lose some weight and make things a bit easier on us (like not eating things we can't have in front of us), he's going to give it a try. Full Gaps is similar to paleo, so we'll be mixing the two up, seeing what works for us.

One key to making this work is planning out our meals. I've done this in the past with great success, but it got dropped when I stopped cooking last year. I've started planning menus again and am remembering how nice it is not to be staring in the frig at 5 pm, wondering what to make for dinner.

Finances
We've been piddling around for several years now, saying "we'll get out of debt this year", but not managing it. This is the year it actually happens. We've had a loose budget for years, but now we're tightening it up and tracking everything more closely so we can eliminate unnecessary spending. Our food budget (or lack of one) is a big offender.

We've been shopping at Whole Foods, Kroger, Sam's, Target, Amazon, our CSA, and a local online grocery service. It all adds up really quick.

I'm changing things up so that our bulk dry goods, including TP and diapers, come from Amazon. Their "Subscribe and Save" option allows you to auto-ship certain items every month, every other other month, etc. If you have 5 or more items in each month's order, you get a 20% discount on the overall cost. In addition, Amazon occasionally offers coupons for some of the items, and the coupon can be stacked with the discount.  We have a Prime account, so shipping is free, and the items end up being about the same as we would spend in a brick and mortar store. Some months it's a little more, some months it's a little less, so it all averages out. The added advantage of not being tempted to buy things not on my shopping list as I wander through the store means we save even more more.

About a year ago we started buying from a local CSA, but we were still purchasing items from Whole Foods and Kroger. We recently found a local online grocery service that sources items from Whole Foods and small local stores and producers. So now we purchase pastured eggs, grass-fed meats, and some fruit and veg from the CSA, and the rest of our fruit, veg, grass-fed dairy, grass-fed meats, and any other food items we need from the online grocery service.

The CSA delivers to our house once a week and we pick up our order from the grocery service at a location that's only 10 minutes from our house (about 20 minutes closer than Whole Foods). They deliver to that location twice a week, and deliver to other locations in the area on other days, so we have options if we need something but don't want to make the trek to Whole Foods. The interesting thing is that some of the items that come from Whole Foods are cheaper this way than in the store. The service itself is free (they make their money from the grocery stores and producers), and again, I'm not buying things not on my list, plus I'm spending less on gas, so we're saving money.

Organizing our shopping around Amazon, the CSA, and the grocery service requires actual menus and planning, which helps our budget and helps me be more organized. My goal is to avoid stores as much as possible, so planning ahead and being organized is a must.

We've enjoyed them, but we'll be selling the truck and trailer and buying Mr M a more economical vehicle. The truck gets atrocious mileage when used for commuting (which Mr M does), and we've decided we want to upgrade the trailer to a small RV. It'll take us a couple years to save up for the RV, but since we need to sell the truck, we need to sell the trailer too. All this will allow us to save money on gas and vehicle payments. The trailer is paid for but the truck isn't. When we buy a car for Mr M, we'll be paying for it outright. The money we save can then be put into savings for our future RV.

Time Management
Over the past couple years, my time has skewed a bit heavily towards projects around the house. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, and the vast majority of what I wanted to get done is now done. This is a good thing since newborns are a lot more high maintenance than 7 year olds, and take up a lot more time :) Our adoption file is on hold till fall, but once TLM is 1 year old, we can reactivate our file. Depending on the timing, we could potentially end up with two little ones very close in age, which will further decrease my project time. So it was good that I was able to get as much done as I have the last year or so.

With the big projects finished, I now need to improve the balance between my activities. Schoolwork with LMS, caring for TLM, housework (which I dislike, so it gets pushed to the back burner), meal prep, church responsibilities, time with Mr M, projects (I still need to work on some things), running….

So, lots to work on, but I've started making baby steps on each of them, so the goals are totally do-able.

3 Months Old

He's still a very solemn baby, but his smiles are becoming more frequent and he keeps trying to laugh. He hasn't quite managed it, but it's funny to hear him try. I still have a hard time catching the smiles on camera. He sees the camera come out and decides he's done smiling. I put it away, and he's all smiles again.

my current favorite pic of the little guy

The Little Mister still really wants his thumb, even if it's covered in fabric (a sock, a blanket, a sleeve). He'll pull out the pacifier and put in his thumb, though I've also caught him on several occasions with both thumb and pacifier in his mouth. I think he knows what he's doing- he'll smile at me as he puts his thumb in his mouth :) That spark of mischievousness has me a little concerned for when he gets older. I've heard the stories about the things Mr M and his brother did when they were younger :)

He seems to want his thumb the most when he's tired or hungry, so I'm working on following his cues, though it's not always convenient. He invariably gets the most insistent when I'm making dinner.

TLM has discovered his tongue and is always sticking it out now. Sometimes it's cute, but sometimes not so much. I've got another post planned with some pictures to illustrate the point.

TLM has very expressive eyebrows. He raises them, furrows them, etc. The furrowed brow that he frequently has makes him look like he's trying to figure out what's going on. My brother's oldest son could raise one eyebrow as an infant, but we haven't seen TLM do that yet.

Outside on a pretty nice day while I raked leaves. He was less than impressed and wanted to go back inside immediately.

"What's going on here?" Confusion Christmas morning.

He rarely sneezes just once: it's almost always 4-5 times in a row.

Remember how I mentioned his hair? Love it!

New Year's Day 5k

….didn't happen this year, for a couple reasons.

My orthotics died a month or so ago and I've been fighting the onset of a cold since just after Christmas.

my worn-out orthotics- cracking and falling apart, and no longer supportive

In November my orthotics decided to give up the ghost completely. I should have replaced them last winter but I kept putting it off and by the time I remembered again I was pregnant. I didn't want to replace them while I was pregnant since body mechanics are different then and it would affect how the orthotics were made. Once the baby was born my body mechanics would change again and my orthotics would no longer be quite right and I'd need to replace them again. They're pricey enough that I didn't want to do that, so I decided to wait till after TLM was born to replace them.

The problem with that plan was that my feet started hurting like they did before I got these orthotics a couple years ago and I realized that I'd waited too long to replace them. While I waited for an appointment and then the replacement orthotics, I had to stop running since continuing could really screw up my body mechanics and trigger another cycle of injuries. I don't have time for another round of physical therapy and I need to be able to exercise so I can get in shape, lose weight, and stay sane.

So even though I really wanted to be spending a lot more time on the treadmill so I can start losing weight again, I decided not to ruin my running plans for the upcoming year and to just be patient. Patience is not my fort`e, but I'm working on it.

my new orthotics- from the same company, but the different surface is supposed to hold up better than the smooth surface of the old style

I got my new orthotics just before Christmas and they feel so much better!

yep, the new ones are way better

Unfortunately, I've been feeling off since a couple days after Christmas- like a cold is coming on, only it hasn't progressed into anything horrible. It's just hanging around making me feel just icky enough to not want to do everything on my to-do list. I didn't think I'd do as well as I did last year, but it would have been a good start to the year.

While I'm disappointed I wasn't able to do the New Year's Day 5k, sometimes things just don't go as you planned, and you just have to go with the flow and not do things that could cause injuries and mess up long-term plans. At least now there's one less thing holding me back :)

Sunday Funny

LMS (far left) at the Irish Music School Winter Recital

driving home from Irish dance class a few weeks ago

Me:  "You need to make sure you're practicing at home."

LMS: "But I can't remember the steps when we get home."

Me: "That's why I recorded you this week and last- so we can watch it at home and you can practice.
That's why I was never very good when I took dance classes- I couldn't remember the steps when I got home to practice either."

LMS: "Was that because phones hadn't been invented yet?"

Me: "Umm, no. I had a cell phone {when I took a dance class in college, anyway}- it just didn't record."

LMS: "Aawww man, you mean you could only call people?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

How far we've come…..

Our New Trex Staircase and Porch

The deck that leads off the kitchen and down to where we park the cars has been having problems lately. The wood had started to crack and split and part of one of the stair treads had even come off. The wood was only nailed down (why didn't they use screws?), and some of the nails were loosening and popping up.

It was rapidly becoming a major safety hazard. We thought about replacing the old wood decking with new wood decking, but given how this wood has fallen apart (it's probably original to the house, so about 14 years old), how high-maintenance it is (constant power washing for mildew, plus regular re-staining), and the fact that we want it to look nice for when we sell the house (no idea when that will be, but we know this isn't our forever house), we decided against that. Even though it's more expensive, we decided to switch to Trex decking, as well as Trex posts and railings.

Mr M started the project a week or two before his mom arrived, hoping to be here when The Little Mister was born. We thought it'd be a quick and fairly easy job and he'd be done before she arrived.

Yeah, right.

We had to order all the Trex railing components, but only found out two weeks later that the order hadn't been placed because they needed more info but hadn't bothered to call us. We finally got that snafu straightened out after another week of phone tag, trying to get a hold of the right person.

In the meantime, Mr M tore out the old wood decking and railings and discovered that it hadn't been built to code and the stair stringers also needed to be replaced.

looking through the screen door as Mr M demos the stairs and deck

demo in progress

After tearing out everything that needed to be replaced (just the posts were left), Mr M started rebuilding it, placing the beams closer together so they'd be within code and adding a fourth stair stringer for better stability.

LMS and Mr M's mom helping him build the deck frame

He also ended up cutting the posts off flush with the deck. We thought the post sleeves would just slip over them, but the largest post sleeves fit 4" square posts and our posts were 4"x 5.5". Cutting them off enabled Mr M to use metal brackets to attach the posts to the deck.

frame built and stringers in place, getting ready to start attaching the Trex planks

I didn't take a picture of the decking installed without the posts up, but we ended up using it like that for awhile.

In between starting the project and finishing it, Daylight Savings ended, Mr M had drill out of state, Mr M had to work extra hours to make up for those missed while at drill, it rained on the few days Mr M actually had time to work on it, and we had to wait for another order to come in because when they ordered the railing pieces they neglected to get the bottom pieces.

Without the bottom railing pieces, you can't install the balusters or the top railings. It was pretty much a comedy of errors that you just have to go with the flow and do the best with what you've got.

posts installed, waiting for railing pieces

Mr M eventually bought a work light on a stand, which worked better than using the truck headlights, so he could work in the dark. Not the preferable way to go, but at least he was able to get the posts installed. And eventually the missing railings were delivered and he was able to install those as well.

installing the railings 

LMS was concerned about people falling off the other side and put up rubber band "railings" :)

Christmas Eve he was finally able to pronounce the project finished! 

Three months after starting what was supposed to be a quick and easy project. At least now we know what to look for in the future when ordering materials, and we know to plan on it taking longer than we think it will, especially with Mr M's work schedule.

isn't it pretty?

We love how it turned out! It's no longer a death trap, waiting to bring us a lawsuit, and it looks soooo much nicer.

There's definitely a learning curve to a project like this- especially the railings that go down the stairs. Practicing on this little deck and short staircase was good practice for the larger decks and long staircase of the front and back decks. We'll eventually re-do them also, but will have to save up since Trex is not cheap, unfortunately.

Have you replaced a deck? Was it easier or harder than you thought it'd be?

edited to add:
Mr M thinks I should have included a side-by-side comparison of the before and after, and he's right. So, Babe, this one's for you! :)

I can't believe it took us so long to update- it's so much nicer now!

Sunday Funny

aren't they so cute together?

We've noticed that LMS and TLM have/had different cries.

When upset, LMS would say "ninga-ninga-ninga!"
When TLM is upset, he says "ning!" very emphatically.

It's funny because it's the same sound, just a different variation.

Do other kids say "ning", or is that just our kids?