Daily Life in February

We are stuck in winter.  I'm getting SO CRABBY in the afternoons, I feel bad.  I try to control it but even I can hear myself sounding like a complete bitch to Ingrid and can't stop myself.  I want to run outside without a coat on, or go for a long walk to the park or go to the lake.  But it's cold, it snows, it's windy, it's wet.  We try to go for a walk around the block, but after a few  houses I am already sick of hearing Ingrid complain about being cold.  Sigh.

 

So, we huddle inside.  We play with toys.  We paint.  We make play dough.  We play on the iPad far too often.  We get squirrely and I yell. 

 And then I get a drink.  At five o'clock.  OF COURSE. 

Somewhere in there if we're lucky, we take naps.  Otis has started to cuddle with a stuffed animal at his naps, which I love.  It's usually Mickey or a teddy bear.  It's adorable. 

 

 And sometimes I actually get around to doing something.  I painted Ingrid's room last weekend!  No more green stripes!  It's a nice muted gray color, and the stripes still show through but it's not nearly as horrible as the green was.  I will have better pictures when it's "done."

 

I also cleaned the basement and tried moving stuff around so it seemed like a place we'd want to use.  It's okay, but I just don't feel like hanging out in a basement.  An unfinished basement that is COLD right now, even sitting right in front a space heater.  I used Ingrid's broken dresser as a TV cabinet, it turned out okay, I think!

 The only thing getting me through this month is the fact that March means it's almost spring.  Like in a few weeks we can hopefully go outside with smaller jackets on.  But it's supposed to snow 6 inches tonight so I don't know...I'm hanging onto that hope.

 

2 Years 2 Months 2 Days

It's time for an Otis update.  He's *about* 2years, 2months and 2days old, although I may be a couple days late.  What is he up to now, you ask?  WELL!

 

He is now in a big boy bed!  We got a twin bed for Ingrid this past weekend and the toddler bed got moved into Otis' room.  He automatically curled up with a book and a bowling ball and got cozy.  We haven't had any issues with him at all, he just lays down with his teddy bear and goes to sleep.  In the morning he still sits in bed and calls "Oh MAMA, where are you?"  Same as Ingrid, he doesn't understand quite yet that he can get out of bed.  Which is good.

 He is now as much of a chatterbox as Ingrid ever was.  He loves to talk, and sing, and read books.  His favorite books right now are the Gabba on he has in the picture above, and The Doorbell Rang, which was a thrifted find that has become a daily read. 

 Favorite things these days--yogurt.  He wakes up and first thing he wants is a HUGE bowl of yogurt.  Any flavor, doesn't matter.  It amazes me how much he can shove in his mouth...Otis has caught the Gabba bug, much like his sister did at this age.  He loves to watch it and sing along, but his favorite part is the Knock Knock Joke of the Day.  He is a killer knock knock joke teller!  This kid is a comedic genius for being 2!

 He is always busy, but is never too busy for a cuddle.  This kid loves to cuddle, he is so huggy and kissy and adorable.  I will take it while it lasts! 

My Valentines.

This year was a fun Valentine's Day because Ingrid was in school, which meant making cards.  Luckily her teacher sent us an email asking parents not to go overboard, no candy or toys, just simple cards the kids made themselves.  I am totally fine with that!  We cut some printer paper in half, folded them into cards, and Ingrid sat and drew with markers and put heart stickers on them.  It took a few days of her doing this little by little, and in the end we had a nice stack for the class. 

 I also helped out at her school the other day.  We made these heart guy bags for them to put their cards in.  It was so funny to help out a bunch of 3 and 4 year olds!  And they all think you're a teacher because you happen to be an adult, so kids came up to me asking me permission to do things.

Of course some parents went crazy anyway and made some Pinterest inspired cards that obviously were not made by the kids themselves.  I do like the paint chip bookmarks, but I was not about to sit and make 32 of them for my kid.  I love that she wanted to sit and draw and create her own cards! 

 

We got her glasses a couple days ago, so now she is wearing them full time.  She is adorable, there is just no getting around it.  And she looks about ten years older when she wears them...

 If you've noticed my square pictures, you can see I have finally joined the Instagram party.  I'm not so much into the sharing part, but oh my god, I love the square pictures!  I love the borders and filters!  Even pictures that aren't completely in focus look better because they look like they were taken with some 70s camera and developed at one of those Fox places, right??

And now it's the weekend and we are going to shop for a stove and a refrigerator.  Possibly paint Ingrid's dresser.  Definitely bathe the dirty children.  And maybe go buy a cake for my birthday tomorrow?  I love cake.  It's a fun filled weekend, woohoo!

Bowling. And Underwear.

Sunday our friends invited us to go bowling, which we'd been wanting to do with Ingrid for some time.  We got a couple pitchers of beer, the kids ran around while we waited for our lane to open up, and we reminisced about the days of yore when bowling alleys were smoke filled.  (Ahh, the good ol' days.)

 They had shoes in Ingrid's size, it was pretty cute.

She had such a good time trying to roll the ball.  Otis had a harder time but he seemed to like it, too.  He just didn't want any help, and at one point his ball stopped mid-lane and we had to have the guy run down the alley and get it for us.  Ha!

zAnd in underwear news, we got some for Otis today.  He won't wear them, but we have them for when I decide to start.  I know you're supposed to wait for them to want to but I swear to god, Otis knows how to go on the potty, he just doesn't feel like it...So the underwear got played with today.  Many stuffed animals got to wear undies today.

I guess I should just think of in two years when he's totally potty trained and I can't even remember this time of having to work at it.  Right?

So much snow!!

We finally got dumped on!  I would've prefered to have this in December for Christmas, but what can you do?  It was so nice out the other day, just kept snowing but wasn't super cold.  The kids and I went outside to shovel and play, then our neighbors came over and played.  We made a snow fort, it turned out awesome!  Until Cody ran into it and knocked it down and Otis cried.

 When we're not outside, we are playing indoors, which means games (Sneaky Snacky Squirrel, the world's cutest game ever) and climbing, and going to the community center to play with toys we aren't sick of. 

 And in other news...Ingrid got glasses!  We went for her eye exam today and she was super psyched to get purple glasses.  I'm glad she's getting them now and not when she's 13 and all self concious.  And luckily one of her friends at school wears glasses so she won't be the only one.  She looks so cute in them!!

Moving Furniture Beats the Winter Blahs!

When I was a kid, it was completely normal to come home from school to find my mom had rearranged the furniture.  It never seemed like a strange thing to do.  I think I've talked about this before, how I know people that have had their furniture in the same place for like 30 years??  Insane.  Anyway, I had moved stuff around this summer and was pretty pleased with it.  But that was like months ago, so of course I got sick of it!  And the toys, ugh, the toys.  I thought with my Ikea shelves I had that problem covered, but then the toys exploded from their nice shelves into the dining room, where there just wasn't really room. 

 

So.  Today I took everything out of the living room, tried a few different places for the couch, hated all of them, talked to my mom on the phone for a bit, trying to brainstorm.  In the end, I came up with a wonky solution, but one that seems to work.  For now.  I angled the couch and made room for a play area behind the couch.  We now have a little play space in the living room, but it's kind of hidden so you don't really have to see all the junk.  Yay!

 Otis really loved it as soon as I was done.  He got out a book and sat himself right down.  Because he had room!  Success!

What I really want to do is move our cable to another space, which would really make things easier.  But until that happens, we'll live with this.  Which is fine.

 

**And can I just say how much I LOVE Ikea Expedit shelves??  Oh my god, just go to Pinterest and search for expedit and there are tons of great ideas!  I loved this one so much!  Such a good idea!**

Valentine's Crafts (and Other Random Pictures)

Ugh, we're in February...This is when I hate the midwest.  I'm sick of the snow, and the cold, and bundling up in a million layers.  This was Otis this morning:

All that just to get in the damn car.  His poor little redhead's skin gets all rosy and chapped in the cold weather so I have to try to cover as much as I can.  He got in the car and it must have been cozy, he passed right out.

So, we dream of Spring.  This is Ingrid's rendition of Spring, an apple tree, a bee, a girl with a spotted dog.  I love it.

 Random shot of Otis is another wonderful vintage find--we got this from Bug and Bear Vintage.  Love.

 Have you heard of mug cakes?  Shit.  There goes any chance of lessening my ass this winter. 

 And now, the Valentine's Craft.  I just love these super simple crafts.  It keeps the kids occupied and I have to admit, I had fun making one or two V-day hearts with them today.  We simply tore up pink and red paper, drew a heart on a piece of copy paper, and then used a glue stick to stick the colored pieces on.  Simple yet effective.