5-Year Photos: Heartbreaker Alert

We took family photos in November but I'm just now getting around to posting them because they needed a little Photoshop magic first. Some mysterious spots showed up on Spencer's t-shirt that weren't visible to the naked eye during the shoot. This was our third shoot with 15 Minutes of Fame. We got some great ones of Spencer and a frame-worthy one of the two of us, but for some reason we just didn't get any awesome family shots. I just love the top two pics of the boy. Yummy!

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"Children are made readers on the laps of their parents." — Emilie Buchwal, children's author

Tree Talk Winter Walk

We spent Saturday afternoon at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, where they were having something called the Tree Talk Winter Walk in their arboretum. There were activities for the kids, like a scavenger hunt, sensory tables, name that seed, making bird nests and counting tree rings. But the best was fort building!

Spencer had an idea for a cross between a teepee and a lean-to. He collected most of the materials and Daddy executed the plan. After the structure was done, Spencer and I wove little bundles of reeds into the sides. The cutest thing was watching Spencer find hay bales and roll them back to our area.

 

It was a fun way to spend a gorgeous day in Austin!

Icepocalypse 2014

As much as we hoped and prayed to wake up to snow this morning, we had to settle for ice with a little dusting of snow on top. Spencer looked outside and was so disappointed. He really wanted to have enough snow to have a snowball fight and hit me in the face with some (direct quote). The city shut down because of the icy roads. None of us had to be anywhere today, so it's just felt like a regular Friday around here.

Spencer and I went outside around 8:00 to check out everything. We saw some icicles and lots of icy patches. Daddy's truck bed had a lot of ice in it, too. Not the snow we had hoped for, but still fun to experience wintery stuff in these parts.

Oh, I almost forgot that Spencer wanted to slide down the driveway. Not nearly as exciting as what we did back in 2011, but here's a little peek (kinda pathetic!):

We'll be back in the 70s this weekend, but more cold temps are ahead next week. Stay warm!

3/52

A sweet Sunday morning at Gus Fruh Park in the Barton Creek Greenbelt.

A Pain in the Neck!

Two Thursday mornings ago, I was washing my hair when I felt a little "tweak" in my neck. I got out of the shower and the pain started getting really intense, so much so that I wasn't able to go on Spencer's field trip that morning. I took some muscle relaxers that Dave had and stayed in bed all day. Dave had spoken to our doctor in the morning and he said if I wasn't getting better later in the day to call him. Well, at dinnertime I commented, "I survived childbirth, so I can make it through this." That's when Dave decided we better call the doctor!

So, Dr. Byrd sent me to the Westlake Hospital ER to get checked out just in case. What a family adventure! Spencer took his "body encyclopedia" book and impressed the nurses and doctor with his interest in everything. I could tell Spencer was a little nervous about the situation because he starts talking non-stop when he's feeling that way.

The X-rays didn't show anything out of the ordinary, so the ER doc said it was probably a sprained neck. And he tried to make me feel better by saying, "You'd be surprised how many people injure their necks while washing their hair in the shower!" I got an Rx for more muscle relaxers and pain meds and was on my way.

When I saw Dr. Byrd the next morning, he prescribed a steroid/anti-inflammatory and that really started making me feel better. He thought I might have a herniated disc. I can honestly say, other than labor, that was the worst pain I've ever felt, and it was very intense for a few days. Very difficult to move around and get comfortable to sleep. Luckily (or not...) I was up and around in time for my work trip to Minnesota the following week.

Something interesting has come out of this saga. As you may or may not know, Spencer always climbs into bed with us at some point during the night (usually not as late as we might hope). Well, when I was in so much pain, we couldn't allow him in the bed with us, so Dave talked to him about it and he agreed that he would sleep all night in his own bed. There were a few tears the first night, but overall the transition was pretty easy. He even said that he was feeling more rested each morning! Once I was feeling better, we explained that we'd continue with the new arrangement. I think we caught him off-guard with that, but he has been a little trooper and is doing such a good job! We still see him a couple of times a night, but he goes back to his bed - sometimes he needs Mommy to tuck him in of course. :)

2/52

"The world is but a canvas to the imagination." - Henry David Thoreau

 

Photo credit to Dave. Taken at The Thinkery today.

GattiTown

Spencer's pal Koen had a birthday last week and his parents invited us to join them at GattiTown to celebrate. For the GattiTown newbies out there like me, this is similar to Chuck E. Cheese's but without the animatronic shows and such. (We've never been to the Chuck E's either, but I'm sure that day will eventually come.)

Spencer had a blast playing games and riding the bumper cars. The lighting made it hard to get good pictures with my iPhone.

 

 

 

 I took a video of the bumper cars, but the quality is bad... here it is anyway.

I was proud of Spencer because he was a little unsure of the bumper cars but decided to give 'em a whirl. He had a big smile on his face once he got the hang of it. He had a blast and talked Daddy into taking him back last night!

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I'm going to attempt the Portrait-a-Week Project. This first one isn't exactly portrait-quality, but we can only go up from here! I'm going to look at it as a year in Spencer's life through my eyes. Might be portraits, might be something else. We'll see how it develops. Unlike a regular blog post, these will just be a picture and a brief description. Like I said, we'll see how it develops... 

This was a big day - first time Spencer ordered his own "7D" at our Vietnamese place.

Quick Trip to Friendswood

Spencer and I decided to take a quick trip to Friendswood last Saturday to visit Alison, Tom, Kenzie and Garrett. Dave was working on a freelance project and I had a bit of cabin fever, so getting out of town overnight sounded fun.

The boys had a great time together playing, riding bikes, setting spy traps for us, doing iPad and sword fighting, while I enjoyed drinking lots of coffee while having a good visit with Allie and Tom.

Spencer was excited to tell Daddy about everything when we got home. Sweet.

Christmas Cards (Nope)

We just didn't manage to get Christmas cards out this year. If we had, some combination of these pictures would've been included, so I thought I'd post them here. They make me smile.

Post-Christmas Fun and Happy 2014

Editorial note: I updated this post to include a few more things...

I took a lot of time off at Christmas this year - December 20 until January 2! It was so fun to have that much time with the boys. We went to see the movie Frozen...

 Took the new Tonka truck for a spin at Butler Park...

Saw a groovy light show at Mozart's (previous Christmas light viewings in the car had not been very enjoyable...not enough "movement" according to Spencer)...

 Went for a bike ride/walk around Town Lake...

Stayed up late to watch the first half of Alamo Bowl (while reading about birds of prey)...

Plus we did quite a bit of eating at restaurants and watching more TV than we usually do. Felt blessed to have so much time to play and wander with Spencer. Good times!

We also rang in the New Year at a neighborhood party. Yep, we let Spencer stay up until midnight (12:30 by the time we got to bed). World record for our boy. But he was having a blast with his pals at the party - it's so neat to have friends with kids Spencer's age in the 'hood. We were pretty unsure what the next day would be like, but we slept until 10:30AM which really helped!

Hope your had a wonderful holiday season and 2014 brings blessings galore!

Christmas Morning 2013 (REVISED!)

Editor's note: I realized that I didn't include any pictures from the "big" camera in the initial post, so there are many more pics now...

Spencer was excited to see what Santa brought on Christmas morning (the video eventually comes into focus...).

We checked out the stockings next and then not too long after, Paw-Paw arrived. Besides the awesome Mining Town LEGO set and Tonka truck that Santa brought, Spencer opened another big LEGO set from Paw-Paw, a cool remote control motorcycle from Daddy, books from Mommy (The Wizard of Oz and an awesome animal book), plus games, a wallet (major big hit!) and other assorted from stuff from Mommy and Daddy. He also had the Loves' gifts to open, which included a melody harp that we're all enjoying, plus some really fun games from Taylor, Audrey and Hyelom. Aunt Renee sent Pop the Pig and a big Transformer toy, and Aunt Dianne and Uncle Scott sent a cool construction-type-set. I'm sure there's other stuff I'm forgetting, but he made out pretty well! This little guy is blessed with such generous friends and family.

I loved watching Spencer give his gifts to Daddy - a box of firestarters, an Angry Birds notebook and a leather-bound notebook. It's such a joy when you take him shopping and he sees something like that Angry Birds notebook and just knows Daddy will love it, which of course he did! For the record, Spencer picked out some great pajamas for me!

Bonus pictures: Dave with his cool Bowdoin t-shirt from the Loves, Paw-Paw with the box of hot chili worms Spencer found for him, and the aftermath!

Sidebar: Can I just say how much I love Spencer's pajamas? I've been eyeing them for a couple of years but they were kind of pricey so I had never bought them. This year I decided to just go for it because I don't know how much longer he'll wear stuff like that - and they're roomy enough that he'll probably get another year of wear out of them. Cute little elf!

After our traditional pigs in the blanket breakfast, we spent the rest of the day being lazy, doing LEGOs and playing games. We had a nice, late lunch at home with Paw-Paw and I think we all went to bed early. It was a fun Christmas Day!