iPhone pictures from recently

I try hard to take a "daily pic" of Cal Boy to send to Eddie's parents. Here are some of the fun ones from lately:

Reading his book in the tub

Trying to get into Jackson's Jeep

Playing in the driveway

Worn out from playing so hard

Playing with his Fridge Farm (thank you, Miss Andrea!!!)

After a BIG dinner: check out that belly (and butt!)

Playing with Hank

Taking a rest after playing hard with Hank

And last night, he tried as hard as he could to get back into his baby bath tub.  He played in that thing for a long time! haha

Pumpkin Farm

On Monday, we passed up our usual play group to head to a pumpkin farm with some of Cal's "older" friends! I did a horrible job taking pictures. I didn't even get one picture with him and a pumpkin! Oh well....we still have time to hit up another one. This farm was Ganyard Hill Farm and we all had the best time running around, going through the corn maze, petting the animals and riding on a HAY RIDE! The day was gorgeous and the kids were all great. Here are some pictures from the day:

Side note: Under the sweatshirt, Cal had on a navy blue polo shirt with his khaki pants.  I kept joking all day that he looked like he was about to start a shift at Sidetracks.  No one thought that was funny-- Elon girls, do you see the humor???  please?? :)

Decluttering my....everything!

I love to read my friend Brooke's blog. Every month, she will do a post called "decluttering the Devers" and I have been inspired.  Well, between her posts and realllllly wanting to sell our house, I decided it was time to do some organizing around here.

Another friend of mine is going to be putting her house on the market come spring, and she has met with a Realtor who gave them tips on how to sell faster.  She shared some of these tips with me so I am trying to put them to use.  We have not hired a Realtor (yet!), but I am hoping to soon.  We have had quite a bit of traffic on our house, with it just listed in MLS, but we have yet to find the *right* buyer.  Maybe the next people that come through will be blown away by how organized everything is now and they will just have to have it.....maybe?

(be forewarned, I am EMBARRASSED at how awful the before pictures are.  I clean out the areas on a regular basis, but the last clean out was a while ago.  Now that I see in a picture how bad they look, it is no wonder we haven't sold our house! haha!)

Above the stove: spices and cooking "stuff"

BEFORE:

AFTER:

The Pantry

BEFORE:

AFTER:

The Laundry Room

BEFORE:

MORE BEFORE:

AFTER:

Bottom of Eddie's Closet: there is no before, I just took an after :)

A lot of these pictures were really hard to take with my camera since I have a really tight angled lens on there now so I could zoom out any further to capture more of the space.  I could have switched the lens, but that would be been a HUGE distraction and I would have stopped my progress. 

Side note: the shoe rack in Eddie's closet looks uneven, and there is a great chance it is since I put the thing together myself, but it's actually just the angle of how I am standing to take the picture....I promise!

Fall is here!

I am so far behind...... my house is not decorated "fall-like", my closets have not been switched over, and I have not bought a pumpkin yet. AND, I have not blogged in a while.

From this past Saturday until this Saturday, I was "kidsitting" two kids from DA.  She is a 7th grader and he is a 9th grader.  They live in the MOST amazing house ever and the kids are awesome.  Hank, unfortunately, did not go with us since they have 2 cats and 2 dogs (Boston Terriers), so that was a little stressful for me and Eddie-- one of us had to go over there at night to let him out before bed.  I would be up with the kids in the morning, so Eddie would run home to let him out.  About half way through the week, I just told Eddie to stay at home.  It was just too hard on him.
So, Cal and I got to hang out in this amazing house all week!

Sweetpea and Hobo loving on Cal.  And he loved that they were his size!

During the week, we went back to the museum again, and this time, we were able to spend some time outside since the weather had cooled off so much (finally!).  There are some great animals there and Cal LOVED them!  He would gasp over and over and over again every time he saw something new....actually, he would gasp when he saw something for the second or third time.  He was just flat out excited!

 Cal and his buddy Wyatt at the museum.  The boys loved the animals!

 I love Cal's hand in this one-- he was waving it at the animals over and over again. 

These pictures were taken today.  I just loved his little outfit (thank you, Target for the $6 sweatshirt!).  Cal was in kind of a funk and was having a total meltdown in between pictures.  As you can see in the second picture, he reached his limit.  I am not sure what his deal was today, but he was SUPER fussy.  He tried every last one of my nerves today!  Every time Eddie called me, Cal was screaming in the background.  He knew it had been a rough day! 

It actually got so humorous, I broke out the video camera to film his meltdowns!  (okay, before you give me the award for the worst mother of the year, just wait.....)  Cal was melting down over NOTHING.  He would press his favorite button on a toy that plays music and it cycles through 2 different songs.  He loves one and likes the other one (they really aren't that different).  He pressed the button today and the song he likes came on and he just fell to the ground screaming and crying.  Then, I would press the button and the song he loves would come on and he'd pop up and start dancing.  This little routine was on repeat for about 15 minutes until I just took the toy away....which caused him to have another fit!  Then, he was opening and slamming cabinets in the kitchen and if they didn't make a loud enough noise, he would drop to the ground screaming (at least, I am guessing that is what caused him to drop.  Really, there is no telling.  He wouldn't scream if it made a loud bang, but he would if it was quiet.....sigh).

He didn't take a morning nap today, but he did take an afternoon nap, so who knows what his problem was today.  I am sure he will be fine tomorrow and it's probably teeth or something upsetting him.

Ahhhh, the joys of parenting!
:)

Best Buddies

I write a lot of posts about how much Cal loves his dogdog, Hank. Well, Hank is pretty fond of Cal too. I shot this video of the two of them playing...Cal loves to go get Hank's toys and bring them to him. We have more of Hank's toys laying around the house than Cal's: go figure!
Here is the video:

The Birthday Party

The invite

Sunday was a beautiful day: hotter than get out, but still pretty and sunny! We had been planning for Cal's big party for a few weeks now and the Friday before the party, Eddie asked me to make him a list of everything I would need him to do before the party. I made the (pretty long) list and handed it to him and he decided he would get up on Sunday morning and complete the list. I swore I wouldn't be stressed out with his list because I had a list of my own to tend to.


We woke up Sunday morning with Eddie running to the bathroom to puke. Are you kidding me?? Bless his heart, he was SO ill the whole day. Thank goodness his sister was in town to take care of Cal while I ran like a wild woman to get everything set up and take care of his list as well as mine! My parents stepped it up too, thankfully and we pulled off a great party! I was sad Eddie wasn't able to come, but I know all of those parents were glad he wasn't there spreading the germs around.




Here are some pictures from the football themed party:

Grandma and Momma as the Refs

The jump house

So excited about the jump house

He sees the balloons and can't believe it!

The favors

With the birthday boy

The food spread on the "football field" table cloth

The birthday boy!

Checking it all out

The grandparents with their grandchildren

The tables and chairs

The cake-- a football field with a C in the middle

Cal with his "smash cake": in the shape of a football

taking a swing of his water while smashing the cake (missing a shoe)

half way through

m.e.s.s.

stylin' his hair with some cake

ahhhhh....water

after a bath in his new t-shirt!  (LOVE IT, Danita!!!)

waking up the next morning

After the party, I opened all of Cal's presents after putting him to bed and then took them all out of their boxes/wrappings so they were ready to play with.  I had them all lined up in the family room so when Cal came downstairs the next morning they would all be out on "display" and ready to play with!  He was in heaven!

Cal did some serious damage on his smash cake.  I took a video of the whole party so that Eddie could see it all.... here is a link to it: http://gallery.mac.com/cewilliamson#100655

I think Cal had a wonderful first birthday party and he loved just walking around the field visiting with everyone!