Mama needs a money tree

My son Christian has reached that age where he asks for everything...and I mean everything he sees. I'm almost scared to turn the TV on these days. Catalogs that come in the paper are also dangerous. I guess it's my fault because the other day I gave him the Toysrus catalog and pen to circle a couple (key word: couple) of things that he liked. Bad idea. Now he wants to go around with a pen circling everything he sees everywhere. I've created a monster.

The sad thing is that I want to buy him all the things he likes, but I know I can't (and shouldn't).

And now, an example of how bad the "mommyIwant monster" has become....

Yesterday we were watching TV and they were playing a commercial for a Nerf Wii game which looked pretty cool:

Chris: Mommy, buy me that!
Me: What is that?
Chris: It's a nerf gun game
Me: Oh that looks cool, we'll see (bonus: no darts to poke Jordan's eyes out)

The next commercial comes on

Chris: Mommy, buy me that!
Me: I don't think you want that.
Chris: Yes I do. Why not?
Me: It's a carpet cleaning product.

Yeah. It's gotten way out of hand.

On that vein, time for a shameless plug. If you'd like to help me win $500 (so I can get Chris that oh-so-desired carpet foam), head on over to ivillage on Facebook and help Jordan win the Cutest Kids Costume Contest! The child with the most votes wins $500 (Hello!) so please vote and pass this on to your friends so they can vote too!

Jordan is dressed as a baby Michael Jackson (from Thriller of course), so check it out! Voting runs from: Monday, Nov 9 - Sunday Nov 15.

Please click on this link or this link.
You have to have a Facebook account to be able to vote.

I'm not sure if you can vote every day, but please give it a try!

Thanks

Hunka hunka burning love

I went to the movies with my mom tonight. On our way over there we listened to the new Pearl Jam CD. Once we were in the theater, they gave a preview of the 2012 movie (featuring Adam Lambert's Time for Miracles song), then they gave this preview for New Moon and finally, the movie started, This is It (great show, go see it, it's not sold out). I'd say my night was pretty much complete.

I got home and told the hubby about what a great night I had:

Me: "Pearl Jam in the car, then Adam Lambert's song, then New Moon preview and then Michael Jackson movie, what more could I ask for?"
Ren: (keeps watching the news)
Me: "can you turn the A/C down cause it's pretty hot in here".
Ren: "it must be you from getting all worked up about your evening line-up"
Me: "ha ha, that's true"
Ren: "how about you turn the flames down so I can hear the news"

What a comedian.

Walking!....almost

My little man is beginning to get brave. On 10/27 my mom and I were at her house talking about whether we thought JJ would be walking before Christmas (maybe) or Thanksgiving (prob not) since he seemed to not be interested in walking one bit.

Not 1 minute later, he was kneeling on the floor and he lifted himself up to a standing position (without holding on to anything!) and took three steps towards me. I was freaking it out because he'd never even let go while cruising before much less come to a full standing position and then walk away. My mom caught the tail end of it and saw him walking towards me.

The next day he took another 3 steps by himself.

Yesterday R said that he took 6 steps by himself.

I think I should make it a point to keep my camera handy because he keeps doing it and I haven't caught it on camera yet. Ah!

I am returning from the dead...

...just to show you the pictures of Christian and Jordan in their Halloween costumes!

Jordan was dressed as baby Michael Jackson (does that come as a surprise to anyone?). Christian was dressed up as Batman. He wore the mask intermittently throughout the night, but I managed to get JJ to wear his wig the whole time he was trick or treating. I guess he forgot he had it on at some point.

At around 6:45 we went trick or treating, but it felt strange because it was still light out. The first 10 or so doors that we knocked on, did not open the door. That kind of sucks. There also weren't that many kids out. Chris got tired pretty quickly, so we headed home after a short while.

It's kind of sad because Halloween these days isn't what it used to be. Nowadays, there's hardly any kids out because they all go to the mall. For some reason getting candy from Abercrombie and Fitch just kills the Halloween fun for me. Alot of people stop giving candy altogether because they get tired of buying it year after year only to have no kids show up, the kids don't show up because people don't give candy, so the cycle continues.

I loved trick or treating with my cousins when I was young. I remember a whole herd of us would go from house to house (with parental chaperones) and almost everyone would open the door...and no, there weren't any razor blades in my candy. Some houses had such cool decorations on the outside and some were even decorated inside. Ooooh spoooky! I remember we would pass many other herds of children too. After we got tired of walking around (or the parents were tired) we would head back home and check out our stash (which was always huge)! This is when the wheeling and dealing would commence. I cringed when I got pennies instead of candies and I was always trying to trade away the candy corn for gum. Ah, those were the good ole' days.

I know I can't turn back time and let my children experience Halloween in the 80's, but hopefully Chris and JJ can make their own wonderful Halloween memories so they can carry those with them for many years to come.

Jordan aka Mr. Punchykittyclaws

The other night I got punched in my sleep. There is none other to blame for that sudden onslaught of mid-slumber violence than my dear boy Jordan. He is in my bed more often than not and his sleep is a little restless. Although, he's not much better in the day time. He likes to bite my face, my finger and my shoulder.
He likes to touch/punch/swat at my face, but he does it really quickly like an angry cat, a spiteful, angry cat. I tell R that Jordan's affections are a mixture of a punch puppet and Mr. kittyclaws because his little nails are super sharp.

Ah my darling 13 month old, how I love you so despite your repeated attacks.

This morning he said his 5th word! I was telling Chris about how many days were left until we went to Disney and then JJ said "DINEY". I was cracking up and R was rolling his eyes and thinking the brainwashing begins so early (in the womb to be exact...I think JJ went to Disney twice before he was even born). Other than saying dada, gogo, mama, agua and Diney, he does a whole lotta babbling. Unfortunately only he knows what he's saying. It's pretty funny because he even adds the question intonation at the end. It sounds a little something like this: DabalamawafamatobolonocotuTUU??

His top right tooth is finally emerging, so that makes 6 teeth total. He's still cruising around by holding on to furniture and is just now transferring from one piece of furniture to another. I think he's saving his first time walking for "Diney" too (it's a family thing, that's where my brother took his first steps...Tomorrowland to be exact, by the race cars)! Probably not though because he's too much of a scaredy cat to let go.

What he lacks in upward mobility though, he makes up for in speed crawling. He goes up and down and all around the house chasing after Christian. Unfortunately this has led to several instances where he busted his lip because his body went faster than his hands. He also does this funny thing where he sits and maneuvers his legs to turn himself in a circle over and over again. It's pretty funny and I hope I can catch it on video soon because it's hard to explain and funny to witness.

Jordan loves his big brother Christian and thankfully the feeling is mutual...for now. Chris loves playing with his brother and actually shares his toys with him peacefully. He tells me that he loves his brother and he hugs him all the time. Sometimes a little too tight and a little too much neck hugging action, but other than that, it's super cute. I wonder how much longer this will last...

That is my update for now on Mr. punchykittyclaws. This Sunday is Christian's actual birthday and we're off to see the mouse! Wish me luck, good weather, no crowds and short lines...alright stop laughing, what can I say, it's wishful thinking.

Tidbits from Christian

Me: Christian, why are you bothering your brother?
C: Because...because...because.....because of the wonderful things he does...we're off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz!


The other day R was scolding Chris for something he had done and in the middle of the "don't you ever" and the "you are not to ever do that again" Chris very calmly said "there's a bug on your shirt dad". I can't tell you how hard Ren had to fight to not laugh.


Today in the car, we were talking about what rides he wanted to go on next weekend at Disney:
Chris: I want to go to Twilight!
Me: Sorry babe, there's no Twilight ride.
Chris: Yes there is! You go on a ship and the bad guys are there too and then when you look in the mirror, they're in the ship with you.
Me: That sounds like a good idea Chris, you're right, there should be a Twilight ride.
Sounds like an interesting concept (and it also sounds like a mixture of the pirates and the haunted mansion rides).


Random outburst from the backseat: "What do you mean I have a beard?".


This kid is hilarious.

Does whatever a spider can.

I threw a Spiderman party for both boys this past weekend. It just didn't make sense to have two separate parties when their birthdays are only about 6 weeks away. I was praying and hoping for good weather (and no hurricanes or tropical storms) and I got it for the most part.

The kids had a blast in the bounce house and at the playground and who knew the snow cone machine would be such a hit? I did not have Spiderman show up to the party because I learned my lesson from last year's pirate incident (Chris doesn't like characters or being the center of their attention) where the poor guy was trying to play games with the kids and none of them wanted to play. As they say in El Salvador, que cipotes mas bayuncos (silly kids).

We had a pin the tail on the donkey game and we were also going to play hot potato (Spuderman?), but I forgot the music, so the donkey game would have to suffice. The piñata was super nice, but it didn't work how it was supposed to, so we had to disembowel Spiderman in order for him to give up the goods.

After that, the weather got crazy and we got some wind gusts that knocked over the gift well, the treat bags and threatened to take a few of the children. We quickly sang Happy Birthday because we thought it was going to start raining. The candles of course didn't light so it was one of those let's pretend to blow it out moments, but fortunately Chris couldn't care less...and Jordan can't blow out candles, so we were good.

Our cake unfortunately was not good. Oh sure, it tasted good, but 2 hours before the party was due to start, it said "Happy Birthday Anthony" on it. Too bad it was supposed to say "Christian and Jordan" instead. Anyway, the bakery "fixed it" for us so that everyone at the party wouldn't think that I just went and bought a cake from the bargain bin. Oh good a Spiderman cake, I'll take this one hopefully no one will notice that the name is wrong. Regardless of the name being wrong, I think the design was kind of ugly (Look at it, what is it? a fishing net? a lopsided building? a trapeze net? fishnet stockings? a brick wall?), so this one is going straight to Cake Wrecks. The irony of course is that I had been perusing that site just the week before, little did I know that our cake would end up being a candidate.

In the end, despite the wind gusts, the malfunctioning piñata and the crazy cake, I think everyone had a good time. My parties? Never a dull moment that's for sure.

Jordan's actual birthday was on Aug 20th and Chris' birthday is on Sept 27. The celebrations aren't over as we plan on taking the kids to Disney that weekend...yeah, that's it....we're going for the kids. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

I'm too sexy for my clothes

Hey! Look who's on the new Jady Images flyer!


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We had a session with Jady Images this past weekend where we discovered these flyers. Ha!

Anyway, I can't wait to see how this last batch of pictures came out, but here's a preview from the Jady Images blog.




The ladies at Jady Images have also agreed to help me out with my "little" Thrill The World project! You guys are great! Thanks!