if i had any money at all......

the smartie tent that katie told me about and then blogged about would be on my back the first time i took this second baby to the beach.

these awesome, huge, lightweight nursing/swaddling blankets that everyone around here has would be stylishly wrapped around my baby as he drifted off to sleep in that cool smartie tent.

and jaime's dreams for ambrose would be a reality - you're right jaime. this has my name all over it. i cant resist a good octopus. i just cant.

like these fabrics for instance. look how awesome. dont think i've ever forgotten them for one minute. i haven't- every time i dream up crafts these prints take center stage in my mind.

these do too but for different reasons.

oh well. i can honestly say that i have what i want and i want what i have, but it's ok to like other things too.... or as my dad would say, "it doesnt hurt to want!" haha, really? it doesnt? :)

my friend lizzie started a blog for writers called oliofolio and asked me to be a regular contributor. this week makes it's second week going strong and i published my first piece on it a few seconds ago. each week we have a new theme and each day something fresh will be published from one of the contributing writers that has something to do with that week's theme. i will be contributing at least twice a month (hopefully more, i just have to get writing and be brave) and if you want to know the truth i am excited but a little nervous because so far the writing has all been so great that i feel like such an impostor. my insecurities aside, i am grateful for the chance to be a part anyway and honored that she even asked me. i think it will be good practice at the very least and it is so inspiring to read what everyone else writes and marvel at how good they are.

so this is my first piece on oliofolio: this is a test, or coming home to a place you've never been before. i was happy with it until i clicked "publish" and now i just see flaws, but here it is anyway. i hope to get better. head on over and let us know what you think of us all- we are eager to improve, create, share and grow.

love love love

matti's blog had a little treat waiting for me tonight. oh man is that ambrose an affectionate boy or what. we better watch out for him when he gets older. :)

making our last weeks last

we had quite the day starting with ambrose's two year old well-baby check-up and here are the stats (this is mostly for the grandmas but it's kind of you to humor me, thanks.):

32lbs. 37.5 inches tall 49.5 cm. head (way to go son) and healthy as a horse.
he has had another growth spurt height wise and has gone off the charts again leading the doctor to believe that he may be 6' 3" or 6' 4" or so when he is an adult. he was impressed that ambrose is so tall and grew so much since he mostly eats fruit, but the boy drinks a lot of milk too so i guess milk really does do a body good. :)

anyway, he had to have a blood test too and since he was such a good boy for the whole ordeal we headed out for a day of adventure. i think i ran out the energy-o-meter so much today, that by the end of the afternoon he was running on fumes and poor thomas got the worst of it when i headed out for a baby shower and he put the boy to bed.

we started out our afternoon at coldstone- cashing in his free birthday ice cream coupon (yeah, i removed his shirt in the store before he ate it... i really like that shirt and dont trust ambrose to eat anything neatly... least of all chocolate ice cream)

next we headed out to kaneohe district park- one of our favorites to play and get energy out:
he's been working on those dangerous stairs in that top photo for a while and can do them by himself with full confidence now (crap) and refuses to have me anywhere near him (bitting my nails nervously picturing him with missing teeth) to help him. ah, a toddler's independence.
after a while we were starting to head home when he started saying "play! PLAY!" and i said, "OK!" and we pulled over to explore heeia state park. it's cool. you can walk down this little path and look at all the boats in the harbor and then you quickly find yourself in front of a random house... i thought maybe jakob would summon me in and tell me all the secrets of the island but no such luck. no john or jack's dad or weird claire without her baby either (this is all LOST talk... sorry if you're, well, lost.. haha... i'm sooo funny.) so we continued on but the path looked a little too narrow and mysterious for a mother who is 30 weeks pregnant to be taking her two year old on alone... so i thought we could come back with daddy sometime.
really, ambrose's favorite part of the park was doing this over and over:
i got bored of that so we left. a few minutes down the road he was asking to play at the park again and i was like, "well, why not. we have nothing else to do and it's good for him." so we stopped at swanzy beach park in kaaawa.



and he did this again a couple of times as if to prove a point:
he really wanted me to play with him the whole day too. at one point i was just sitting down catching my breath and he impatiently came over to me and took off my slippers- just the way i take his off so he can climb up the slide more easily and placed them just so:
it was a pretty fun day. we just went wherever and had a good time being together. days like these make me so happy, but a little sad too. ambrose and i are such good friends and i know that in about two months everything will change for me, for him, and for "us." i am so excited to meet this second baby, but i feel a little like i am letting go of my first baby somewhat since it will never so easy to pack up on a whim and have an adventurous day like this until the boys are older. and i will never be able to give him this kind of undivided friendship once baby number two comes. i am going to cherish this time and keep it with me forever.

depleting the energy-o-meter

i cant even begin to say how nice it is to have a big old yard for my outdoors loving child to roam in. ambrose has never been a infant/baby/toddler/now almost child to sit around and stare. he has wanted to be, and do, and explore from the womb. in many ways this has been exhausting and sometimes downright frustrating since i have had to be a circus entertainer since he was born and find new things for us to do all the time, but in other ways this has been so fun!

i have an everyday goal to get all his energy out. i like to think that he has this big internal energy-o-meter and it is my job to deplete it every single day. sometimes i fail at this goal either because i have to get other things done or because i am too lazy and these are generally the hard days in the end. the days when he is the happiest and most well behaved are the days when we get out and move around so really i am not doing myself any favors by being lazy. go figure.

i cant give you any of the particulars, because you'll find out soon enough anyway, but yesterday there were eight children over, five moms, two sewing machines, and two irons going and an awesome project being completed assembly line style all day long at our house. the kids ran wild in the backyard and ambrose was in heaven. they came in and watched a movie for a while, ran out in the yard, ate various snacks, ambrose wore or didnt wear various amounts of clothing, played with his pals all day and by the end of the sweat shop we had going he was thoroughly exhausted and i realized he hadnt come to me bored and impatient once that day.

the thing is, everyday the energy-o-meter renews itself. today we get to start all over again. it's at 100% and he is washing his hands in the bathroom for the third time this morning singing, "hands! HANDS! hands!" i better go. :)

fun!

i'm getting so crafty lately. what's the deal.

i needed thank you cards for all the kind folks who showered amby with love on thursday so i made these cards out of my mother-in-law's stampin' up! scraps last night (thanks linda!)

and then today during ambrose's nap i made these oneies for my friend's baby shower this week- she's having twins! (thanks melissa peterson for telling me how!)

end of the session pa'ina: discovery center

he explored without stopping for air for two hours straight. we are definitely coming back!















of course his favorite part of the whole center was latching and unlatching the gate over and over and over and over...etc.

afterwards the kids got end of the session certificates and we were served a very local style lunch (he actually ate his rice for the first time and liked it - score!)

and the kids all got goodie bags with all kinds of awesomeness inside:

we love na kamalei. sometimes we have hard behavior days, but i am so glad that everyone is so loving and understanding and ambrose has learned so much socially, behaviorally and academically since we have been enrolled. what a blessing.

two showers in one day?!?

it's like i'm making up for lost time or something....

and in related news: it's pretty much beach weather again. thank goodness.

and to make the day extra cool we went to the discovery center in honolulu with the preschool this morning and that is officially the coolest place for kids to explore that i have ever been to. i took some bad quality photos on my iPhone that i will put up for the grandparents and aunties soon.

generous generous generous

i remember thinking last year at ambrose's first birthday party that we were so lucky to have such great, loving people in our lives and this year i feel that even more. thank you to my friends who came to help, who came to play, who came with gifts, who made gifts, who baked stuff, who came period and were just there. thank you thank you thank you. and i am serious people, amby really hit the jackpot this year with the awesome handmade gifts- like amazing crafty stuff that people sell for big bucks on etsy. i just stare at all of it and contemplate not letting him touch a thing until he is of a sensible age. ;)
anyway, everyone was so generous with us and it was the perfect day so thank you.