27

27 - that's how old I am now. Wow! Where does the time go? My birthday was yesterday and I can hardly believe that I'm only 3 years away from 30. I mean...people who are 30 are...well...old. Or at least they used to be. They don't seem that way much any more. My friend Heidi told me that she thinks odd numbered ages seem older than even ones. Think about it. I think she's right. Anywho, Preston took off work early yesterday so that he, Chase, and I could spend the afternoon together. We ran some errands, went shopping with my birthday money, ate sushi at the mall, and had a couple of friends over for dinner and a friendly game of Lord of the Rings Monopoly. That's right...you heard me...Lord of the Rings Monopoly. Pretty fun game...for Monopoly. Although I think they should have let me win since it was my birthday. Today Chase and I are just hanging out around the house. We may go for a walk at the park later. The weather is awesome here! I'm hoping to go out to eat at the Olive Garden tonight as a Birthday+1 treat. :)

Here's a recent pic of Chase. Look Aunt Amy...it's my pearl snap shirt!

A Baby Free Weekend

Preston and I had our church class retreat this weekend. It was really fun. For the third year running we were the retreat planners. I think we pulled off another good one. We stayed in a cabin on the Illinois River and some of us even went on a 3 hour float. We had a really good time. Mom and dad kept Chase for us over the weekend at our house. Chase did really well for them and I'm sure the grandparents had a blast too! I managed to eat my weight in junk food over the last few days! It's always dangerous for everyone to bring their own snacks to share. :) We also played lots of board games and volleyball too. I was sure ready to come home on Sunday and see my little boy though!

I love fair food!!!

So I went to the Oklahoma State Fair with some friends on Saturday. It was much fun. And I got to eat my favorite fair foods....roasted corn and strawberry crapes...mmmmm. I didn't actually eat as much as I thought I would though. I guess that's good. I came home with $12 that I had intended on buying more grease on a stick with. We just walked around and took it all in. Its weird how fairs bring in a different type of people...you know what I'm talking about.

Speaking of the State Fair, I got kicked out of the OK State Fair only 3 short years ago with my good friend Heidi. We were throwing popcorn from one of the rides...seriously we were seeing who could make it in the trash cans below. But this Carnie lady thought we were spitting on her and her customers at the "pull a ducky out of the kiddy pool booth." She went crazy and waited for us, yelling, at the bottom of the ride. She called the security cops over and they asked us to leave. haha. I would like to say that I was like 13 when this happened but no, I was 23.

Sometimes we're happy...sometimes we're not

These pictures are all from this morning...when he was happy.

He was not happy, however, after the doctor's appointment today. :( Chase got three shots today and was not very excited about it. And neither was I. He was so content before the shots...he didn't mind being weighed or measured or being checked out by the doctor. He even smiled at the nurse when she came in...but she quickly wiped that smile right off his faced. He cried like I have never heard him cry before...it was so sad...I even shed a few tears myself. :( I had always thought it was ridiculous in the past when I heard about moms crying when their babies got shots...I'm mean they're just babies and they'll forget about it in like 2 seconds...and it's for their own good. But it was different today when it was MY baby crying because he was hurt.

Anyway, he weighed 12.8 pounds, was 23 1/2 inches long, and had a head circumference of 15 1/2 inches. That's in the 75% for height and weight and 40% for the head. I don't guess he inherited his mom's huge head....but got his dad's smaller head instead!

He Laughs!

Chase laughed out loud yesterday! He did it once for me and once for Preston. It's so cute! He hasn't done it for me any today but hopefully he will do it again soon and I'll catch it on video!

In the mean time here is some video of him in his "kick and play" chair. Looks like he's got the kicking part down! Click here to see it...

He went to mom's day out today and he did really well! And so did I! I got soooo much work done today. It was great! :)

Fantasy Football

So I'm trying really hard to be interested in Fantasy Football this year. Since it's something that Preston is really into I'm thinking it will be fun for us to keep track of it together and it might just make me more interested in the games since they will be on in my house anyway. So Preston is in 3 leagues and I am in one. We are both in a league with some of our church friends. I'm not too sure that at this point my team is doing so well. We'll see. I'm still working on the "interested" part. I just slept through the first game we sat down to watch together. And I'm still working on learning player's names. The other day Melanie asked me some of my players that I had picked for this week and I couldn't even remember them. haha. Maybe next week Mel. Ask me again. :)

Things are going well around here. We've had a great weekend. It was nice to be in town. Preston mowed the lawn. I cleaned house. Chase ate, slept, and pooped. Lucy followed me around the house as usual and was generally "mad" at the vacuum cleaner. Preston and I sat in the hot tub and that was great. (It was only my 3rd or fourth time to sit in it...I had only been in it a few times before we found out I was pregnant. We tried to sit in it earlier this week but it was so hot we couldn't even put our legs in....I mean, we could have cooked dinner in there!)

This week will be the first week that Chase goes to "mom's day out"! I'm really excited. I'm glad to have some time to work on my home business uninterrupted.

Pictures: Chase on the Boppy; Me Chase and Lucy going for a walk; Preston the thug

Adventures in Traveling with Baby

We had a super Labor Day weekend. Not only did we have Monday off but we decided to take Tuesday too! Chase is a really good traveler. Much like his mom and dad he seems to really like to go places. There is nothing Preston and I would rather spend our money on than traveling. As you may know, last weekend we traveled to my home town (4.5 hours normally...5.5 with Chase) but this weekend was quite a bit further (9 hours). Of course we did take a major detour b/c someone missed the exit and didn't realize it for a really long time. I won't say who was driving but I can tell you it wasn't me. :) We had a fun time just hanging out and going out on the lake. The boys even got a game of golf in. Preston's parents even drove in from Houston just to babysit Chase while we were out on the lake on Saturday! Talk about above and beyond grandparenting! Then on Monday, the three of us headed out to Austin to visit Chase's Aunt Wendi and almost Uncle Wade (they're getting married in November...and Chase has a tux to wear!...but that's another story). That was really fun and I would like to add that Wade and I killed Preston and Wendi in Spades. :) It was a great weekend...and with every good weekend comes a few mishaps to remember. Here are a few:

1. Missing the exit...as mentioned above
2. Me falling down in the middle of the night while holding Chase. Thank goodness it was Preston's trundle bed that I fell on! It was a pretty smooth landing...considering.
3. The boat (it was a rented pontoon) not starting for like 20 minutes...we finally drifted into a random boat dock so we could get on dry land.
4. The boat almost sinking. Imagine driving along and the front of the boat starts nose-diving under the water! Good thing the driver threw it in reverse quick enough to not cause any damage.
5. The dog pooping on the boat. Poor Moly (our friend's Lab mix)...she just needed to go and didn't have any options...haha. Everyone started screaming "NOOOOOO" when we realized what was happening.
6. Did I mention Wade and I won spades?
7. Wendi making fun of the massive amounts of stuff (mostly baby stuff) we had with us since, in the past, we have generally been known as "light packers."
7. And here's the kicker....On our way home on Tuesday we had gotten up really early and headed back to OKC. Chase was sooo good and slept most of the time and was just really content on our trip. When we got about 45 minutes from home we stopped to grab some lunch. We sat down at our table and set Chase (in his infant carrier) on the table. We were eating our lunch when we could clearly hear that he was going "number 2". I thought, OK I'll change his diaper as soon as we get done. But then I looked into his seat and saw that he had had a major blow out. Great. So I picked up his carrier to take him out to the car (no, Taco Cabana does not have a changing table in the bathroom) and quickly found that not only had his diaper leaked into his seat...but it had actually leaked through the seat leaving a nice little puddle right there on our table in the restaurant! I made a bee-line to get outta there with Chase and left Preston there with the rest of his lunch and the "mess." haha. I don't think I can clearly describe it but it must have been a funny sight seeing these two new parents in the parking lot trying to "hose down" a poopy 2 month old. We ended up having to take the liner out of the car seat and just putting blankets in it for him to sit on the rest of the way home! What can you do but laugh.... :)