Motion Pictures

A certain grandma pointed out that we have only posted one lonely video since Reasor's birth. At first it might be seem that, since Reasor is our second child, we might have gotten a little less ambitious to take pictures and video. Luckily, that is not the case. We have simply just been keeping them for ourselves.

So here is a collection of a few that show some of Reasor's milestones up until this point:

5 months: Kicking like a penguin and staying in one spot.

6 months: Being ambitious as he makes his way towards Mommy...and the books...

7 months: Imitating Reuben in a epic crawl towards the camera.

7 months: Showing his tongue prowess.

7 months: A belly full of laughs.

Weather Weenies

On Saturday night, we went to Stone Mountain for the laser show. We were sitting out on the grass watching when it started to sprinkle. Several people got up to leave and I thought, "What weenies that they can't handle a little sprinkle." Within minutes their judgement was supported. It began to pour We're not talking just any rain. It was big-dropped, get-soaked-to-the-bone-within-5-minutes kind of rain. The kind in which you'd skip down the street for fun. Anyway, we had remembered an umbrella...in the car. I thought about going to the car, but it would have taken us 10 minutes to get there, and by then the rain would probably be over. So I held a frisbee over the baby's head and Kevin held the nursing cover over Alena. OK, I tried to hold a frisbee over the baby's head, but he kept grabbing it and putting it in his mouth. He was not bothered in the least by the rain. He didn't even seem to notice it. The people behind us (who had 3 umbrellas) were bothered that he was in the rain. Not enough to lend us an umbrella though. Just enough to mutter about us just loud enough for us to hear. Ah, people and their obsession with wanting to enforce their weather weenie-hood on babies all the time. It made me smile a little bit. But not as much as the rain itself. I love being outside in a downpour. So invigorating.

P.S. Dear Reasor's grandmothers, It was like 85 degrees still. No one was going to get hypothermia from this.

P.P.S. As you can see from the photo, by the time we got back to the car, the rain had pretty much stopped.

Chumpy

Currently Alena's favorite adjective is "chumpy." Rather than try to define it for you I will give you a few examples of how she uses it.

"Daddy, where did you put that chumpy thing to put on the chips?" (a chip clip)

"Mmmmm.... This is chumpy." (Cereal, crackers, chips, apples)

"Mommy, this guy is chumpy. Chump chump chump." (A dinosaur finger puppet)

New Year's Resolutions

I was just thinking the other day about how the last couple of years, New Year's resolutions have actually worked for me. I'm feeling pretty proud of myself. The only problem is that now, when I think of something I could improve I just plan on making it a resolution next year, as if it were impossible to start doing things better in the middle of the year. Still, I think a year is a good amount of time to make something a habit that will last when I start working on something else.

For instance, this year my new year's resolutions were:

Do as many dishes as possible while cooking dinner rather than taking advantage of the fact I have the amazing kind of husband that does the dishes when I cook. Last year I would get everything cooking and then sit down to veg until Kevin came home. This year I get everything cooking and then clean up before Kevin comes home. Sometimes I don't get any cleanup done because things come up (namely children), but this year I have not once sat down to watch TV or read for pleasure before cleaning up everything I could before the meal.

Teach Alena one primary song per month. This one is much easier than it sounds. All I do is choose a song I want to teach her, and then sing that whenever I feel like singing, and a few times a week as a lullaby. I lost focus in August and I'm not sure she learned a song, but I'm back on board for September with Love One Another.

Be able to to 20 pushups. At the beginning of the year I could do no pushups at all. Granted, at the beginning of the year I was 9 months pregnant. Then after the birth, I could still do zero pushups. Not even any girly ones. Then I started doing some circuit training to strengthen my arms and my arms hurt so much that I had to bite my lip to keep from crying while having to hold that little baby while nursing all day and night. So I gave it a rest. I started working on it again a few weeks ago and I did 12 girly pushups this morning and my form is getting a bit better. I think I might make it if I keep doing a core/push up workout 3 times a week like I have been.

Limit myself to 2 hours of internet per day. Regrettably this one never really took shape. I use the internet to entertain Alena and myself while nursing, since Reasor doesn't allow for the reading of books while he eats. So we'll give it another shot when I haven't got a little nurser.

Next year I've already got planned to start making my bed. That one will also work better when I haven't got a little nurser, which will most likely happen early next year. I'm also going to learn to play all of the songs in the Children's songbook. I've actually already started this one, but not with any sort of schedule, which means the goal will not be met until....ever. So I'll start a scheduled thing next year. I don't just want to play them with all the right notes, I want to learn to play the piano with my fingers curved and paying attention to the fingering suggested and such. I want to play the piano like I never thought was important.

Does anyone have any resolutions they want to share with me so I can perhaps copy ones that work well?